The General Comic Discussion Thread - Part 2

[Mani-Man]

Second comic book week of December, a big one.

Batman #130

What a insane Issue.
Like that Opening is one of THE most insane things…even for Batman.
It adds a very deep Notch into “Badass things Batman does” and I love it.
Its so absolutely crazy comic book nonsense, how can you not love it.
And I have to Readjust my statement on Tim at least a bit.
Zdarsky does decent stuff for Tim, but I don’t know if I should be happy about that when its “just” decent work.
Tim deserves so much more, it’s a shame that the minimum is the best we can expect.
But still, Tim in a Main Batman book is good for as long as it lasts.
Liked the way how in the end Batman “defeats” Failsafe, I wasn’t sure at all how he would do it.
Funny thing is that somewhere else I had a discussion about characters being Power Fantasy and Deep characters in one…and this issue is a perfect example.
You get the Power Fantasy of Batman surviving falling from space…but later on also the Depth of the character when his last final action is to reassure Tim…loving it.
And of course the question is, what happens now?
Like what did Failsafe do exactly? I guess erasing Bruce’s Memory or so…we will see.
Im curious and so far the first Arc of Chip Zdarsy delivered on what I hoped it would deliver.
Fantastic Run so far.

I loved the “Iam a gun” sidestory finale too.
Don’t underestimate that Story because it shows again why batmans no kill rule is such a strong thing.
And that they use the Joker for it, is so much better.
It just hits different when the joker asks broken “Whos going to save me?” because in the end, Joker is just a broken man that went through something horrible and if Batman doesn’t care…who will?
So that is why he cant kill.
He cant kill the Joker because the joker can be saved, because Killing the Joker wouldn’t be the end, it would the beginning of something horrible.
Killing anybody is betraying his Promise, betraying who he is and for what the Batman stands for.


Batman & The Joker: The Deadly Duo #2

The Second issue definitely did enough to keep me hooked.
Liking this so far a lot.
A Joker/Batman team up is always interesting, but I find the plot so far intriguing too.
A lot of Potential where this could go…so im interested.

The Joker: The Man Who Stopped Laughing #3

What the hell? The issue is pure insanity, what is even going on?
Like you think the cover is already crazy? Wait till you read the issue.
It’s a crazy book that I enjoy very much.
And im super interested in how this story ends, so they have me hooked so hard.

Poison Ivy #7

Again a nice Issue of this, but im kind of happy when it ends.
I feel the rumblings of too long story beginning, and that is not good.
Two issues are left I think, so that should be fine in the end.
It’s a good book that visual has some super creepy stuff going on, this issue especially at the end.
Its nicely written and for the most part well paced.
I think its one of the underrated Gems…which we go a few this year if I remember correctly.
Definitly worth picking up if one sees it imo.

And with that we end a Week that I really consider crazy.
Like every comic I read this week had something in I consider really crazy…so yeah, it’s the best way to describe this week.

 

[flickchick85]

https://aiptcomics.com/2022/12/09/dc-10-issue-superman-lost-christopher-priest/

I’m embarrassed to admit I’ve never read anything by Christopher Priest, but I certainly know him by reputation, so I’m intrigued to read his take on Supes. I love how many stand-alone maxi series my guy’s been getting lately - Superman ‘78 (and it’s upcoming sequel), Space Age, the Mark Waid/Bryan Hitch Birthright sequel, now this. Not to mention World’s Finest. All that on top of PKJ giving us one of the character’s best mainline runs ever on Action. Eatin’ good!

 

[Primal Slayer]

Are the Wonder Woman Historia and the Green Lantern Jessica Cruz stories worth buying? I just learned about both in the last week. I know WWH only has two issues out and Jessica is my second favorite Lantern.

Historia is EPIC. It is so forking good and exactly what is needed in the WW-verse. Very fresh take on the Amazons that could make for a great show or set of movies.

It's the kind of high end writing and art that is largely missing from the main WW books.

Speaking of the current WW-verse...while I have loved how expanded it has finally become, Diana has kind of gotten swallowed up in all of it. She seems less important to her side of things sadly. I am glad that she is finally getting a Wonder Girl back in her comic, I just wish that Cassie/Donna werent so majorly sidelined.

I haven’t read either but I’ve heard good things about Historia. I’ll definitely be looking to pick that up when it’s all collected.

Don't be waiting to long now....Kelly hopes that this becomes 9 issues so the third book wont be wrapping it up in its entirety and 4-9 havent been greenlit officially yet so it could be years.

 

[Gee]

https://aiptcomics.com/2022/12/09/dc-10-issue-superman-lost-christopher-priest/

I’m embarrassed to admit I’ve never read anything by Christopher Priest, but I certainly know him by reputation, so I’m intrigued to read his take on Supes. I love how many stand-alone maxi series my guy’s been getting lately - Superman ‘78 (and it’s upcoming sequel), Space Age, the Mark Waid/Bryan Hitch Birthright sequel, now this. Not to mention World’s Finest. All that on top of PKJ giving us one of the character’s best mainline runs ever on Action. Eatin’ good!

I guess Priest's Black Panther run should be considered in your backlog then. I also enjoyed his Deathstroke series, however I've never finished it.

 

[lespaul59]

Historia is EPIC. It is so forking good and exactly what is needed in the WW-verse. Very fresh take on the Amazons that could make for a great show or set of movies.

It's the kind of high end writing and art that is largely missing from the main WW books.

Speaking of the current WW-verse...while I have loved how expanded it has finally become, Diana has kind of gotten swallowed up in all of it. She seems less important to her side of things sadly. I am glad that she is finally getting a Wonder Girl back in her comic, I just wish that Cassie/Donna werent so majorly sidelined.



Don't be waiting to long now....Kelly hopes that this becomes 9 issues so the third book wont be wrapping it up in its entirety and 4-9 havent been greenlit officially yet so it could be years.

I got the first two issues off of ebay but haven't even looked at them yet. I only found out about the series because I ran across a post on Instagram from Nicola Scott about issue 3. I was also gonna ask about the number of issues because I had seen the 9 issues but also seen it was three. I need to order (pre order?) issue 3.

 

[Babillygunn]

I guess Priest's Black Panther run should be considered in your backlog then. I also enjoyed his Deathstroke series, however I've never finished it.

I’m loving his Black Adam mini

 

[Mani-Man]

Pre Christmas Comics week, not a lot going on therefore…but still.


Batman Incorporated #3

Sadly that’s it for the series for me.
Issue 1 was fine, but im not feeling it since then.
It just doesn’t work at all for me.

Batgirls #13

As usual, a nice Issue.
Slightly chaotic but in a good way.
Its not mindblowing or anything, but enough to earn a buy.
Its solid fun, and that is enough to me.

Superman: Son of Kal-El #18

Decent enough to finish this run, but nothing really spectacular.
It leaves us where Issue 1 began in terms of Jons character.
And that is annoying.
There is barely any Character Development on a character that needed it.
The Aging up of Jon keeps being one of the dumbest Decisions DC has allowed in the last few years.
It leaves us with a rather empty character that only gets gimmicks.
There were attempts, here and there was something there, that is why I still have the hope that 2023 will be better for Jon and his character development.

Wonder Woman #794

A good issue, but when you look at the quality of Superman or Batman…this is not much.
I need Issues for WW that blow me away, that show why she is one of DCs Pillars.
Just being good, isn’t enough.
I like that this run channels stuff from different WW Eras…that is cool.
But we need more fire under a WW Series.

A decent Week.

 

[CrimsonMist]

Work has taken most of my attention the last few weeks, so I'm pretty late on reading just about all the books I bought.

The one book I DID read however was Danger Street #1, the new 12-issue maxi series by Tom King and Jorge Fornes. The book takes all of the characters from the 70's DC series "1st Issue Special", including but not limited to The Dingbats of Dr. Street, Green Team, Dr. Fate, Warlord, The Creeper, Metamorpho and the blue skinned Starman Mikaal Tomas, and tells one big story involving all of them.

In this issue, The Warlord, Starman, and Metamorpho acquire Dr. Fate's helmet in an attempt to summon and capture Darkseid so they can gain brownie points with the JLA and join as members. Needless to say, it all goes horribly wrong. Meanwhile, The Creeper in his human form of Jack Ryder gets involved with kid billionaires, The Green Team, Jack Kirby's Manhunter is on the hunt for a group of children, and Kirby's other character Atlas shows up.

I'm blown away by the art that King inspires in his artists and I'm stunned by the way they work in lock-step. Danger Street #1 is pretty wonderful.

 

[Babillygunn]

Really looking forward to eventually reading Danger Street. It sounds right up Tom King’s alley.

I have started reading the Richard Dragon: Kung Fu Fighter omnibus on DC Infinite Ultra. Definitely a 1970’s era comic that blends the charm and fun of Bronze Age comics with the Bruce Lee fueled martial arts excitement that was present at that time. But it also has a lot of product-of-it’s-time cringey tone deafness, including the typical white savior martial artist and an African American sidekick who starts out looking every bit as bada$$ as our hero, but who is always sidelined for the finale. (He gets shot twice in the first three issues for goodness sake.)

If you can overlook the insensitivities and give Denny O’Neil the benefit of the doubt that he probably was taking a leap in even having a Kung Fu inspired book and a non-white prominent character, it can be a really fun read. The real gem is the third issue which pairs Denny O’Neil’s writing with Jack Kirby’s artwork. I wasn’t sure if I’d ever seen them together before, but it is a real treat.

Do I wish that Richard Dragon was Asian? Yes. Do I wish that his sidekick Ben wasn’t essentially typecast into a role similar to OJ Simpson’s from Naked Gun? Absolutely. But looking past that and enjoying it as a product of its time, do I find the product fun? Yeah, I do, even though I find it fairly offensive on many levels.

It is certainly conflicting.

 

[Babillygunn]

I am starting a re-read of Final Crisis. I’m hoping that the fourth time is the charm and that I actually like it this time. Morrison can be really hard for me.

 

[Milk Tray Guy]

I am starting a re-read of Final Crisis. I’m hoping that the fourth time is the charm and that I actually like it this time. Morrison can be really hard for me.

Good luck! I bailed on FC a long time ago and vowed never to return!

 

[Babillygunn]

Good luck! I bailed on FC a long time ago and vowed never to return!

It is odd. On paper I should like it. The story seems right up my alley. It is just too…Morrison. He takes a world that Kirby made equally profound and bonkers fun and just makes it grim and depressing. But I want to like it so I’m trying again.

At least it is very much superior to what Starlin did when he wrote Fourth World stories. Death of the New Gods was an abomination.

 

[flickchick85]

There are aspects I love about Final Crisis - the Superman Beyond portion, the main setup/concept…but I’d enjoy it a lot more if it was more streamlined and didn’t focus on so many characters I don’t care about. I think someone could make a great adaptation of it if they just took the basic concept/outline and ran with it, though. It’s my favorite premise of any of the Crises.

 

[Mani-Man]

Im with @flickchick85 on this.
It has such a cool premise but bloats itself and distracts with too much Characters and stuff.
It would be higher on peoples lists if it would be less fat.

 

[Babillygunn]

I agree with both of you. (Well, except for the fact that Infinite Crisis is my favorite crisis and favorite premise.). Morison tends to be extremely convoluted in his stories. I always feel like I had to have missed some pages. The story starts great but gets bloated and overly complicated. In the end it isn’t bad. But it isn’t as good as it could be.

 

[Comicbookguy339]

The problem with Morrison has always been that he gets lost in the meta aspect and doesn't care that much if the stories make sense in-universe.

 

[CrimsonMist]

On paper, Morrison's stuff always sounds like a good time. I've tried 3 times over the years to re-read his whole Batman run just to see if, eventually, I understood it. The third go-round, I gave up right around those Final Crisis explanation issues, I think post-#700. There's more than a few moments where I feel like I simply missed story elements that, on re-read, were never there. I have his whole run just sitting in a long box. I've been tempted to make a fourth attempt but I don't know.

I've been working my way around Alan Moore's bibliography, snatching up whatever I don't have. I recently scored a copy of his Captain Britain stories and found it very surprising and very much worth tracking down.

It's his first major superhero work, which shortly overlaps the start of his work on Miracleman and V For Vendetta. I was genuinely surprised by how self-assured, and (nearly) fully formed Moore's writing was. It had the thoughtful, literate (albeit sometimes purple) prose and whimsical sense of humor, both light hearted and dark. And the drama is top notch. It presages much of the themes to come in V For Vendetta and Watchmen, and the book starts in a similar fashion to the start of his Swamp Thing run.

As an aside, Jaime Delano picked up the Captain Britain reigns shortly after Moore, and that's also VERY good. I found that Delano also picked up the reigns of Night Raven, another Marvel UK character, after Moore stopped writing those stories too. The Night Raven stories were 4-page prose stories that celebrate the very pulp roots of the character. That Delano followed Moore on two projects, later to jump start the Hellblazer book for DC, makes it all the more unfortunate that Delano didn't take over Swamp Thing (with Gaiman) after Rick Veitch quit the book and DC. Delano seemed to really find a connection with Moore's work to carry on and maintain the quality.

 

[Mani-Man]

So we reached the Christmas Week 2022
Those of you who manage to go to a comic book shop before Christmas, I envy you…especially in a week where such comics come out.
Must be incredible.

Batman / Superman: World's Finest #10

What a Series, what an issue, what an ending
Waid and Mora are such an incredible team, nobody would have done with this series quite what they did.
They fit so well together, the writing and the art…match made in heaven.
Im always torn between mildly spoiling stuff or not, but in this case I absolute will not do that…go Read this issue.
Im blown away constantly by this Series and can only repeat what I said before, it exceeded the hype level that was built before this series started.

Batman Vs Robin #4

It wasn’t as strong as it could have been.
Not bad but the potential it had, wasn’t used imo.
It didn’t really dare more and at some point in the issue you just could tell what would happen next, it got too predictable.
We will see what Issue 5 does before Lazarus Planet.

Batman: Urban Legends #22

As usual it’s a good issue with neat stories…nothing to complain.
Of course for the last issues the Murder club was my favorite story, and this continues.
Will be sad to see the next issue having the final part of that story.

Dark Crisis on Infinite Earths #7

I caught up to it and regret it.
This is such a weak event, you get the feeling they just made it to have an event, not to tell something.
Or better said, they just called this thing Dark Crisis to make it sound more important than it is.
Maybe in a few months I change my opinion, but I think this is the weakest crisis event we had.
The Unintentionally funniest moment is when they have Black Adam for a few panels look actually like The Rock when before he looked so clearly different.
I had to laugh so loud at that because it feels like they did it because they expected the black adam movie to really hit a homerun.


The Flash #789

Again such a great and fun Issue of The Flash.
You can tell the love of the team and that makes the series so much better.
Its just a ton of fun and care put into this Series, and that makes all the difference.


Nightwing #99

That issue flowed nice and was well written and drawn.
When its good, Nightwing is absolutely good.
There is this vibrant life in the writing and Art that just fits so incredible well.
The interesting thing is that even in more filler like issues, they do noticeable world building.
Not always, but often enough to be noticeable.
Cant believe next issue is already Issue 100…that will be fun for sure.


And with that, we end the Week and go straight into the Christmas Weekend.
Another fantastic week that was fun.
Nothing Christmas themed sadly, but it is what it is…gift something one of these comics and call it a day.
Im not sure how much I will be around, so I want to wish everyone Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays…we will for sure see us next week when we all recover from eating, eating, more eating and celebrating.

 

[Primal Slayer]

Dark Crisis was a waste of an event. Nothing new happened. Nothing important happened. DC really needs to stop trying to mess with the Multiverse when every effort just makes them look worse and worse at it. For a company to go from COIE to....this is just sad.

 

[Primal Slayer]

Historia #3 came out...and was AMAZING.

One of my favorite pages

Spoiler

 

[flickchick85]

Yassss my precious has finally arrived!

 

[Babillygunn]

I was able to find some amazing stocking stuffers at my local comic shop. I actually got an original copy of Superman #75, the Death of Superman issue, in decent shape for 40 cents. I got Superman: For All Seasons issue 2 for free. Then I got various other older comics like Teen Titans (Trial of the Terminator) and some issues post Death of Superman for 50 cents. It was also a very Kirby Christmas as I bought my son collected editions of Kirby’s Superpowers and Kamandi.

 

[CrimsonMist]

It was also a very Kirby Christmas as I bought my son collected editions of Kirby’s Superpowers and Kamandi.

Parenting done right! I hope your son enjoys the Kamandi book. It's so much fun!

We're about to exit 2022's comic book output. I must say, this week was one helluva week to end the year on. A small haul for me, there were still some gargantuan titles in there.

The first, Miracleman: The Silver Age #3, aka Miracleman #25. Originally solicted to come out through Eclipse Comics back in 1993, it's been a very complicated and headache inducing road to finally get here. I personally have been waiting for this since Marvel picked up the character in 2009. As a (now) 34 year old, Miracleman was one of the first series I collected when I became serious about collecting comics. Having a full run of the Eclipse series is one of the joys of my collection. So it was with a heavy bit of weathered expectations that I went into this issue. There's the excitement that we're finally getting new material to conclude the story Gaiman started decades ago cut by the fact that this is technically issue 3 of a 6 part story arc. It was definitely a joy to see some old school Gaiman comic book writing. Mark Buckingham's art is spectacular. He's redrawn the first three issues of The Silver Age and has outdone himself completely. That said, not a helluva lot happens just yet but the excitement to see what comes next is pretty overwhelming.

Wonder Woman: Historia #3. This book is a **** masterpiece. Just perfection in every way. The callback to the first issue that concludes this issue is perhaps the single most beautiful moment I've read in comics since maybe King's Mister Miracle. It's the best part of the book. DeConnick changes the established lore just enough, and in a way that probably (in my mind) supersedes most of what has come before. As I've said elsewhere, this book approaches Watchmen levels to me. It's just so above and beyond most of anything else DC has been putting out lately. It a throrough, mythic and realistic, examination of the origin of the Amazons through Hyppolyta's point of view, and provides her with so much more agency as a character beyond just "Wonder Woman's Mom" and the murderded-while-pregnant reincarnation version seen in Perez's version. I've read that it may be that issues 4-6 were given the go-ahead and I truly hope that this is true. This book is special. If you haven't picked it up, do it NOW.

The Riddler: Year One #2. I picked up the first issue when that came out, but never got around to reading it until I realized the second issue came out this week. I was pleasantly surprised by how good it was. I usually stay away from movie tie-in books, but this was surprisingly well executed. If you didn't tell me Paul Dano wrote this, I'd have never believed you. Unlike most non-comic book writers writing comics for the first time, Dano excels at it. No doubt written from character notes Dano made about the character, the story takes the "God's Lonely Man" theme of Taxi Driver and recontextualizes it. It's unfortunate that this is a bi-monthly book. I cant wait for issue 3.

Action Comics #1050. The MOST frustrating book of the week. No spoiler here, as it was announced a few weeks ago now, but the secret identities of the Super family have been restored, and personally? I don't like it.

Spoiler

Everyone you'd expect to still remember that Clark is Superman still knows that Clark is Superman. So where exactly is the drama? They put the secret identity back in the box so neatly that it feels lazy and pointless. I feel like for a medium that insists on how creative and clever it is, any one of these writers could have more thoroughly explored a world that knows Clark is Superman. The lack of a secret identity opens Clark and Co. up to more storytelling possibilities, and I liked how it made him more relatable and opened him up more to the greater DCU Cosmos. And while Luthor makes a pretty good counter argument to that, Luthor becomes a mustache twirling one-note supervillain under what I'm assuming is Williamson's pen as opposed to the grounded, angry and malevolent xenophobe that Philip Kennedy Johnson portrayed him as. I found the execution pretty hackneyed, and just as petty and reactionary as many of the fanboys who bemoaned Bendis originally getting rid of the secret identity in the first place. And the suggestion that the lack of a secret identity somehow reduces Lois Lane to Superman's wife? What? When was that EVER said? When was that idea ever explored or even suggested? The whole issue felt like a bunch of talking points for an argument that never happened. Instead of exploring ideas, they got rid of them and made up silly reasons for doing so.

This has easily been the worst issue of Action Comics since Infinite Frontier, and for what? To restore a status quo that no one bothered doing anything with that didn't need restoring in the first place? So Williamson, who's quickly become a writer with nothing interesting to offer, can write generic Superman stories again on the main, more important title? I'll stick to Action Comics, now basically an anthology title, for now.

 

[Mani-Man]

It is time, the final Comics week of 2022…and boy was it an incredible year.
Maybe 1-2 weeks over the whole year where I wasn’t pleased with the comics I bought.
The rest of the time every week was so very good.
As usual, I cant really pinpoint one specific issue or so that I would say was the best, there was so much and I have a bad memory on such things.
We had incredible stuff on Batman, Detective Comics, Superman, Nightwing, Flash, Robin, Harley Quinn etc.
There were many short series with 3-4 issues that were incredible, One Dark Knight, The Knight and so on.
I don’t know if I ever read this many comics over the year…I don’t even want to know how much money I spent this year on them, probably a good thing. XD
I definitely don’t regret it because god damn was this a incredible year.

Anway, lets go into the final Comics Week of 2022


Action Comics #1050

Sadly, the year ends with a necessary thing but not really a good thing.
The way they restored Clarks secret identity…is not good.
It works and all…but its wonky at best.
I mean sure, there is no good way to restore something like that without it feeling weird as hell…so maybe I shouldn’t go too hard at it.
But they could have simply ignored the whole thing and acted like he never revealed his identity to the world, considering nobody…absolutely nobody did anything with this information.
Was it even a Month where this was a thing? I don’t remember.
In theory such a huge step but nobody cared enough to do something with it.
Another one of those bad decisions Superman had to deal with that a certain someone thought would be such a cool idea.
Instead of trying to make something with it, they in a lazy way go back to the status quo.
Sure there wasnt a lot to do with it considering suddenly making it important when nobody gave a damn about this reveal, would be dumb...but the way they gone back on it is dumb too.
However, i do think you can do more with the Secret Identity thing...in theory.
You can ground things a bit more with Clark as Reporter and all that, but still...dont decided on such things when you have no long term plans for it.
Other than that, not much to say about the issue.
Lex feels at this point super Pathetic and one dimensional, I hope they work on that in the future too.
I need Lex being a real threat again.
It is more one of these issues that steers the ship into a direction instead of going full speed.
For that it was okay, not the strongest way to end 2022, but if 2023 can make up for that…im more than happy.
As usual with such Issues, the Covers are just incredible.
I love the Normal one, but Alex Ross etc are definitely a good choice to pick up.

-.-.-.-.-.-
As For Batman Beyond the White Knight…since I never see any spoilers for it, I decided to wait till this one is finished before picking up any new issue.
I know its only one issue left after this weeks issue 7, but the wait between is too big for me, it takes me out of the story.
I rather buy the 7th and 8th issue together to read it in one flow.
-.-.-.--.-.-.-.--.-..-

Detective Comics #1067

Bring me Mr Freeze and im Happy.
Im not 100% sure but seems they kept the Rebirth Detective Comics part of Mr Freeze where he brought Nora back and she turned into a villain that left Victor.
Really cool because I like the idea of it.
Also Freeze who hides away in his Lair and all, has something.
Its just such a visual cool idea and all that.
Other than that, the Story is still very good and im really looking forward to where this goes.
Ram V does a good job and im pleased with this being the final issue for Detective Comics in 2023.
Also, get the normal cover…the others are good but a cover with Mr Freeze…you need that in your collection.

Harley Quinn #25

I like the Story very much, nothing more to add to that really.
Im not really into Old Harley, where did that even come from?
There was this weird Mad Max kind of story going on in Rebirth or so right?
That’s where she came from…I don’t really remember because Im not super into the concept.
But still, I like the writing and general story of this Arc.
Good way to end the year for a surprisingly good series.
I again miss the old art style, that worked better with the over the top writing.
But this art style is good too…so im happy.
While it absolutely doesn’t fit the vibe and all, get Francesco Mattinas variant cover…that thing is a banger.

Wonder Woman Historia: The Amazons #3

What else can you say to this…its absolute magic.
Alone for the Art this is a must.
Like seriously, google this and see for yourself…and then buy all 3 issues.
In general do me a favor and buy it, because Nicola Scott said that this is planned as a 9 issue story.
Tell DC you want more, because I want more of this.
This Book needs to be completed, History needs to be made with it.
No words do this justice, it needs to be experienced…so do it.


And with that, we end the year 2022 in comics.
Again, what a year it was…just incredible.
I can not praise this year enough…it was something else.
I was brought back to my childhood so often, where I felt this childlike joy from reading issues and all, it was such a great feeling.
If 2023 is anything close to this, boy will we have a year.
It all looks like we will get a even better year and I cant wait for it.

 

[Babillygunn]

Looks like I will be giving Historia a read.

I love this board and it’s great recommendations!