Oh, there was flooding down in Tennessee, and all the books were late. But it all turned out all right, in the end. We're just running a bit behind here.
BATMAN &/VS! ROBIN #12 – Contortionist weirdness we’ve got on the cover with the force of Dick’s kick apparently breaking his own leg, definitely the most bizarre offering from my man Quitely to date at the end of his first year of providing covers for this engrossing publication, but certainly an entertaining bookend when contrasted with the cover for #1.
This was a banner issue for this title, and a significant marker upon the hypermap of Morrison’s epic Bat-run.
Too many cool things about this issue. The Bat-signal architecture of Wayne Manor. Damian, in general. That entire page with Dick and Slade, when he creams him with the IV-stand. And, of course, the end. Can’t imagine what’s coming next. Ecstatic.
Best bit, though: Page Nine, Damian says, "There's something funny about him." Hahah.
UNCANNY X-MEN #524 – Ah, God, this is, I swear to you, just a slice of the real stuff right here. Fraction and the Dodsons are killing it to death. After coming away from the previous chapter feeling nothing about the Shocking Death (that, incidentally, came across as completely arbitrary and closer to random and meaningless than I prefer and, most of all, out of nowhere in light of the fact that 1) the character really hadn’t been developed by anyone recently, meaning this wasn’t a death at the climax of the kind of long-simmering subplot that Claremont made this book’s stock-in-trade and arguably top selling point, and 2) this lack of culmination is most graphically illustrated by the fact that the issue in which the death in question occurred happens to be an issue of X-FORCE, in which, before now, the deceased had appeared maybe a grand total of twice) that blast of perfect little koan epitaphs just laid me out. Storm, most of all, man. You’ve just got to stop in the middle of that and nod to yourself and say, Yeah, Uncanny X-Men.
The real deal, right here, my friends. And the best words you’re going to hear coming out of Logan’s mouth for just the next little while, I promise.
THE BOYS #42 – Glad something’s hitting this number this month. This book’s been giving me a really bad feeling about this for months now, and it keeps getting worse, just the sight of a cover fills me with dread at what it might or I already know that it contains. I want to go on record hoping and hoping that it somehow improbably works out for Wee Hughie and Annie. And that I am really, now, dreading the more probable and horribly opposite result.
BRIGHTEST DAY #1 – A ring! I got to buy a ring for only $3 and it came with this comic book! So cool!
On board with this. The artjam blend could have been much more jarring. The feeling I have this early on is a little bit past my idealized recollection of hitting 52 every week, which is a fantastic indicator, at this point. This book is doing everything it’s supposed to, coming across as essential and absolutely indispensable for any serious fan of the DC Universe. I mean, open with five pages straight out of Johns’s regular GL gig, then pick up the WEDNESDAY COMICS baton for another blast of serious Aquaman validation, and, you know, Mars, and the Atom has a cameo. Aren't those four things, or the promise of an alternate combination of scenes of a comparable quality, worth 3 dollars, people?
iZombie #1 – Vertigo is on a such a streak right now, couldn't resist diving in on another $1 #1, especially with Allred and (Austin's Own?) Chris Roberson. Interesting and engrossing, but I got pissed when I got to the end of the issue and realized I'd already read the last five pages in preview. That's not the way you do it.
DEMO 2 #4 – Yet another detonation of fantastic from these two. I really feel too much affection for these folks at this point to do just more than report that this is why you buy and read and make comic books, sublime from every angle, makes me feel at peace. Just with the rightness of the thing, how it all comes together.
HOUSE OF MYSTERY #25 – Hilarious and engrossing bout of Exquisite Corpse. Definitely my favorite personal trek through that trick, have never seen a sicker run of one-upsmanship kicked of by that ultimate You Bastard! gesture of Willingham’s, I mean what a last panel he did there, what a damn page.
Fine fine work, all around. And Go, Austin’s own Dave Justus!
WAR OF THE SUPERMEN #1 – Couldn’t resist showing up to see how the premise played, was delighted. Definitely some shocking business erupting, can’t really imagine it going anywhere from here other than global massacre, so looking forward to seeing how that doesn’t happen. I mean, 100,000 Kryptonians VS Earth? Think about 100 Kryptonians VS Earth. It’s going to get ugly.
hail Zod.
BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER #35 – Meltzer crushes it all the way home. Challenges Goddard and Vaughan and Jane as Best Scripted Arcs, though, of course we’re holding that fifth place for Joss’s next little bit here.
As for that last page, all I can say is Finally. I want to drive drunk through winding mountain highways with the windows marked over and the lights burned out, screaming the Sex Pistols at the top of my lungs.
****
BEST OF WEEK: SPIDER-MAN/DR. STRANGE: FEVER #2 – As much as I loved me that Morrison Batman, as always, even the Madman himself would concur that the most satisfying release of the week arrives to us in the form of a $3.99 periodical, titled above, that features, among other various notables, a unique and intoxicating singularity of artistic vision, one of the best Spider-Man pages of all time just suckerpunching you right there in the middle at Page Eleven (“THEY WERE SO OLD…”), and such an overall insane tripped out palette. McCarthy is so perfect and out of his mind, and then, just when you can’t take it anymore, the sorror-fly makes his return with a gorgeous origin retcon that has me pumping my fist. This comic is insane. You need it in your life. HARRAH!
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