The General Comic Discussion Thread - Part 2

[Babillygunn]

I just read The Vigil #1. I really enjoyed that. I’m not usually a Ram V fan even though I know everyone likes him. But this was a very interesting set up.

 

[Gee]

So... Kelly Thompson is writing the new Birds of Prey series this fall. One more member to be revealed.

 

[Mani-Man]

Packed Comics week this time.

Adventures of Superman: Jon Kent #4

A predictable story where we can see the final act coming from far away.
The biggest problem is that we literally had a video game with the idea and this is not covering new ground.
The biggest wasted opportunity is the Father/Son idea of this that is absolutely not important so far.
This Clark gone crazy because he lost Lois and his child, now you have his child in there but you don’t do anything with that.
Throwaway lines that don’t treat this as such a important thing.
This story exists because of the loss of Lois and Clarks child…why they do not focus on this is beyond me.
Instead we get Jon visiting Jay and have really awkward pages that they felt were more important than anything else.
Its kind of annoying because I do like the idea of the story.
But this is not doing anything with it.


As usual with the current Superfamily comics, the variant covers are all really cool.
Probably would say Tyler Kirkhams is the best, but I like the regular one too.

Batman #136

Zdarsky continues to focus on things I like.

Bruce emotion and his love for his family…that’s where he shines.
But the issue didn’t really do a lot to move us forward in terms of a new plot.
It keeps telling us about how Bruce fears being weak and losing his family etc.
But still, I appreciate every wholesome Batfamily thing.
Im so happy when Jimenez Returns full time with Zdarsky.
Nothing against any other artist, but the combo of these two is just something else.

My least favorite part should be clear to any longtime reader of my posts.
Selina.

Again another writer shows me why she is not working paired up with Bruce.
There is just nothing but empty stuff there.
I never saw any writer that made a good case on why these two should be permanently together.
Maybe that is the Purpose of this with Zdarsky, I hope so…we need to put this Batcat idea to rest…it is just not working.
Again, a writer like Tom King had to bend everything so that it “works” and still it didn’t.
There is not future for Batcat and I wished people would understand that.
Like we can keep doing this cat and mouse thing of course, that’s neat…but there is no permanent thing with them because the characters just don’t fit together without both of them having to be written completely out of character.

Anyway, Gabriele Dell'Otto cover for me.

The Flash #800

A bit disappointed this was a Anthology Issue instead of a Farwell focused issue.
Still, neat stuff in this and I do think a nice way to end Adams run.
We will see how the new team will handle the Flash.
Im not taking this Anthology issue as any indication so far.
Which is not saying this wasn’t a good issue or so, just that its to me not the real start of the new teams run.

On this you got since its issue 800 and all, quite a few special Covers.
I personally like David Nakayamas the most, but you cant go wrong either way.

The Joker: The Man Who Stopped Laughing #9

I can Copy/Paste my previous opinions on this in here and it would fit.
This is so much dumb fun, Im still enjoying the hell out of it.
Not much else to say to it.
Just a whole lot of fun and that is how things should be with such series.

Covers…when there is a Lee Bermejo cover, you go with the Lee Bermejo cover.
Doesn’t matter who else is there, Lee Bermejo all the way.
They all are good, but Lee Bermejo is Lee Bermejo.


Poison Ivy #13

Cover and Premise made this a whole different issue and I hate when they do that.
The actual issue is less “interesting” but still neat having Ivy trying to get a picture whats up with Gotham after being gone so long.
Loved how different Artists drew different parts, that was a neat idea.
Other than that, not much to say.
A rather lackluster issue, neat written but without really moving too much forward.

Lets see how this goes from now on however.
Potential is there, lets see if they can use it.

As usual, the covers here are all really good…but despite being misleading, I like the Regular one the most.

Shazam! #2

Ah this is sooooo good, im so happy with this issue.
Fantastic writing, great art and the plot is very intriguing.
It is again one of these things where I don’t want to go too much into the story because it is something people should read on their own.
I want to say things about it but also don’t because I want people to read these issue themself completely blind.
We are in for a great run with this.

Regular cover for me, the rest are good too…but the regular one is so good.

Steelworks #1

Okay, you have my interest with this issue.
The Backup issue leading up to this was rather questionable in quality and all, but this one was solid.
Im interested in where this goes.
Not bad Michael Dorn, you get me curious about what you can do.

All the Cover can score points with me…one of the few times I really cant decided which I like the most.


A full Comics week that was very good.
Only the Jon Kent one struggles a bit, which sucks especially since every other Superfamily book is working well.
This arc however, is just not working for me sadly.
The Rest however is good and nice.

 

[Slick]

So... Kelly Thompson is writing the new Birds of Prey series this fall. One more member to be revealed.

Looks like it might be fun.

 

[CrimsonMist]

A small, modest week:

Flash #800. A bit of a mixed bag, for sure. Loved Adams' short story. Just a fun, Flash story typical of the character. Would make a great animated short. Waid's Impulse story was also great fun. The Editor's note on the first page killed me. I absolutely hated Williamson's story. This facile, sentimental, nostalgia-tinged exposition that Williamson has these characters espouse about everything is just putrid writing. I have no context for Geoff Johns' story as his initial run with Wally is not a run I've gotten around to reading just yet and it seems to lead to some sort of future story that, if we ever see it, will come drop by drop like much of Johns' recent output. I'm 100% on board with Spurrier and Deodato's run starting in September. The writing feels like a more digestible Morrison story, and it seems to definitely borrow vibes from Morrison & Millar's brief run in the late 90's. We'll see how it goes several issues in, but for right now, I've seen nothing that tells me this is a bad thing.

Shazam #2. As much as I'm digging World's Finest, we're only two issues deep on Shazam and I'm already unsure of it. There's so much one can do with this character, and this current storyline is not it: dealing with the gods who make up the SHAZAM acronym and their meddling in the live of the hero. Honestly, it's boring, obvious, and after seeing this story beaten to death over in Wonder Woman for god knows how long, it simply isn't a story I need to read about here. Give me giant robots and talking caterpillars, and the old school Dr. Sivana and his ugly kids any day. Jeff Smith's Monster Society of Evil and Jerry Ordway's Power of Shazam provide the perfect groundwork for the Marvel family to walk on. And after the New Champion of Shazam book with Mary, I thought we'd get there. We'll see.

Hey Kids, Comics Vol. 3 #3. I don't know if anyone else here has been reading Howard Chaykin's interesting, irreverent history of the comic book industry over it's previous two volumes, but this is such a solid read. In typical Chaykin fashion, he romanticizes absolutely NOTHING. The comic book industry is cut-throat, racist, infantile, sexist, ugly, cheap, hysterical...you name it. But more importantly, how this all comes together, and the culture the industry inadvertently created and subsequently came to foster, is so incredibly fascinating. I know Chaykin interned with Gil Kane (on whom one of the main characters is based) so I'm guessing a lot of the history in the book comes from that relationship, but I really wish that there was some ancillary reading material that sheds like on the real history behind some of the incidents we see in the book.

Love Everlasting #8. The first issue of this series I bothered reading in a while. The first arc felt like the same issue repeated again and again and again, and while that's actually the plot of the comic (A woman wakes up in a new romance comic type scenario after admitting she loves her husband/boyfriend), it grew very stale very fast. This new arc sees Tom King (yes, that Tom King) finally latch onto one of the scenarios, where our lead, Joan, doesn't admit these feelings to her boyfriend, eventually marrying and having kids. Chaos ensues. I stopped reading the book a few issues back, buying it out of sympathy and perhaps to be completist, but this issue grabbed me. So now I'm hooked for the next issue.

Was gonna pick-up Loki #1 because I didn't realize Dan Watters was writing for Marvel now, but opted for Watchmen back-issues (trying to complete my Alan Moore floppies collection).

 

[signalman]

BOP Comic.
Harley Quinn ***YAWN***
Never found Big Barda interesting.
Never heard of Zealot but I have never read a WILDSTORM comic.
I will pass on this new series.

 

[CrimsonMist]

BOP Comic.
Harley Quinn ***YAWN***
Never found Big Barda interesting.
Never heard of Zealot but I have never read a WILDSTORM comic.
I will pass on this new series.

While I admit that the Harley saturation (and to be honest, the Batman saturation in general) is growing a little obnoxious, Thompson is a good enough writer, and Leonardo Romero a fun enough artist, that I'll check this out for an issue or two.

Totally bizarre line-up though. Would have been cool to see Lady Blackhawk come back, if only to give the Blackhawk IP a boost. I have no idea where that property falls in continuity now though. And I'm kind of a sucker for Black Canary divorced from Green Arrow. It really helps the character stand out on her own. And seeing how they all interact with Barda should be good fun. As i said, 2 issues and we'll see.

 

[Babillygunn]

Never found Big Barda interesting.

May the ghost of Jack Kirby haunt you the rest of your days. Lol.

 

[Milk Tray Guy]

John Romita Sr., An Icon of Superhero Comics, Has Died

He was 93.

RIP

 

[Mani-Man]

John Romita Sr., An Icon of Superhero Comics, Has Died

He was 93.

RIP

Really sad to hear about that.
But his legacy will remain, Spider-Man to a great deal is what he is Today, thanks to him.
And people will not forget his talent and will be influenced in the future still by his work.

Maybe i pick up some Spider-Man Comics this week since surprisingly i got only GREEN LANTERN #2 in my comics week.

And i dont have much to say about that.
Nice art but so far the story hasnt captured me too much.
I like the idea of Hal trying to find new purpose and all, but the storytelling here is still rather slow.

 

[CrimsonMist]

The loss of John Romita, Sr is massive. While I never quite took to his Spider-Man, his cover work, specifically Giant Size Chillers #1, is extraordinary. The Giant Size Chillers cover is one of my all time favorites. It's damn iconic! I remember being so excited when I found that book at a flea market when I was a kid. His work on Captain America in the 1950's was nothing to scoff at either!

Maybe i pick up some Spider-Man Comics this week since surprisingly i got only GREEN LANTERN #2 in my comics week.

And i dont have much to say about that.
Nice art but so far the story hasnt captured me too much.
I like the idea of Hal trying to find new purpose and all, but the storytelling here is still rather slow.

I dug the first issue of Green Lantern enough to consider picking up this second issue. Held it in my hands at the shop yesterday and was gonna pull the trigger until I saw that the series gets derailed for two months by Knightmares. So i put it back on the shelf. As much as I enjoyed his Flash run, I'm not for crossover event books interrupting books immediately after launch. Not to mention, Knightmares sounds about as appealing as eating dirt.

Wound up with just Doctor Strange #4 and the new Brubaker/Philips graphic novel, "Night Fever". But I have no time at all to read them this week.

 

[signalman]

Stanley Lau aka Artgerm variant cover for BATMAN & ROBIN #1.

 

[Mani-Man]

I dug the first issue of Green Lantern enough to consider picking up this second issue. Held it in my hands at the shop yesterday and was gonna pull the trigger until I saw that the series gets derailed for two months by Knightmares. So i put it back on the shelf. As much as I enjoyed his Flash run, I'm not for crossover event books interrupting books immediately after launch. Not to mention, Knightmares sounds about as appealing as eating dirt.

That really upset me when i came to the end of the issue, i hadnt noticed that we are already about to get that Horror arc.
We are getting too many crossovers that derail runs and it sucks.
And in this case it especially sucks because the run only began and has to build itself a narrative first.
But nope, we throw Hal right into a big crossover arc.
I could have understood it 8-10 issues in, but after 2 issues?
That is way too soon when we dont have yet a real direction for this.

 

[Babillygunn]

That really upset me when i came to the end of the issue, i hadnt noticed that we are already about to get that Horror arc.
We are getting too many crossovers that derail runs and it sucks.
And in this case it especially sucks because the run only began and has to build itself a narrative first.
But nope, we throw Hal right into a big crossover arc.
I could have understood it 8-10 issues in, but after 2 issues?
That is way too soon when we dont have yet a real direction for this.

I really enjoyed the first issue. I haven’t read the second, but hearing this, I’m enormously disappointed. I have no interest in the Knightmares storyline after reading the preview issue.

Plus between Tom King’s Knightmares arc in his Batman run and Zack Snyder’s Knightmare sequence in BvS and ZSJL (both of which were low points) the title “Knightmare” has absolutely no goodwill with me!

 

[Mani-Man]

Big comics week with WW 800 and more Batman/Superman good stuff…but also the final issue of Batgirls

Batgirls #19

So that’s it, a fantastic run focusing on the Women of the Batfamily, coming to an end.
I will absolutely miss this series and will get it physical as soon as its possible in its entirety.
It deserves to go into any collection.
Final Issue was good and wrapped up everything nicely, the art was great and yeah…it was absolutely good.
Will miss the hell out of it.

Cover…go with the Regular one, that is the best imo.

Batman / Superman: World's Finest #16

Do I need to say anything to this?
Like 15 issue proof of how incredible this team is, this series.
And they keep throwing out banger after banger, incredible issue after another.
Really incredible stuff here.

Regular cover here for me, Lee Bermejo always goes…but I prefer on this one, the regular one.

Black Adam #12

Final issue on this one too I noticed after reading.
Yeah I think there wasn’t a lot more in the tank since the last few issues lost me.
It finds a decent way to end it, but compared to how strong it started, a bit disappointing.
Not sure if I will get it physical, probably not but I need to let it sit for a while and digest it.
From what I gather, many aren’t happy with the Series…so who knows where this leaves us.
Could be that they go forward and ignore what happened here etc.

As for covers, Regular one…the rest is neat but I sadly don’t care enough.

Nightwing #105

That was fun, alone for the change of Perspective.
The idea of doing a comic issue full from the actual POV of the main character is neat.
Things work but its something you can only do in a one off story, because you are restricted in the way you can tell a story.
For this issue it was working and it was a lot of fun.

The Regular cover works for this perfectly, but you don’t go wrong choosing one of the other variant covers.

Superman #5

First of all, I ship Jimmy and Silver Banshee now and don’t you dare to take this away from me DC.
That was so lovely and hit me in the feels quite a lot this issue.
And boy that ending…incredible.
Williamson and Campbell continue to be a dream team for Superman…absolute great work from both.
Fantastic art and incredible good writing.
I hate that this takes a backsteat for the horror arc, that is super annoying and ruins the momentum.
They really have to slow down on crossovers.

As for Covers, the regular one is a bit too much for my taste.
It makes it hard to focus on anything with the way its done.
Mikel Janin is my pick here for Shipping reason.XD

Wonder Woman #800

What a wild ride.
Like you got incredible art, you got bad art, you got great writing you got awful writing.
I got hit with Wonderbat stuff I didn’t expect.
Good Wonder Woman stuff etc…but then we come to the backup story and puh, that was rough.

My first reaction was utterly disbelief on what I read.
King overshoots what he was trying to do here by a lot and I cant wrap my head around he why.
The way he writes Trinity was in no way or form enjoyable.
He can write females, so why did he write her so obnoxious?
There was not one panel where she spoke that I liked, because she doesn’t sound sassy or so, she sound arrogant and insufferable.


Maybe its because there are enough characters there that could take over for Diana in a future scenario and would rather see them than a new character…maybe im biased on this.
I don’t know, but i didn’t like her when she was revealed and in this issue I even liked her less than that.
I can see this be because im so done with these future storylines etc…I do not know, I cant say for sure.
But I was fine with Jon and Damian in this, so I don’t know.

We will see what he does going forward, but this doesn’t make me want to see Trinity ever again to be honest.


As for the Covers, its issue 800 so you can expect a few options.
I like the Regular one the most, but there are options for everyone I think.


So yeah, a interesting week that ended two of my regular comic series.
Stuff was going on this week.

 

[CrimsonMist]

Superman #5

First of all, I ship Jimmy and Silver Banshee now and don’t you dare to take this away from me DC.
That was so lovely and hit me in the feels quite a lot this issue.
And boy that ending…incredible.
Williamson and Campbell continue to be a dream team for Superman…absolute great work from both.
Fantastic art and incredible good writing.
I hate that this takes a backsteat for the horror arc, that is super annoying and ruins the momentum.
They really have to slow down on crossovers.

Gotta ask on this because I'm genuinely curious: Is Williamson's Superman that good? I've been seeing other pretty high praise for it and my curiosity is trying to get the best of me. I think his writing on The Flash (see my review of Flash #800 and other posts throughout the forums) is pretty insufferable and his Robin fell off pretty steeply. But I enjoyed about 3/4s of it, and thought the Infinite Frontier stuff was solid until he plunked down Death of the Justice League, which was probably the single worst comic I read last year. So Williamson's writing leaves me a little cold.

Wonder Woman #800
My first reaction was utterly disbelief on what I read.
King overshoots what he was trying to do here by a lot and I cant wrap my head around he why.
The way he writes Trinity was in no way or form enjoyable.
He can write females, so why did he write her so obnoxious?
There was not one panel where she spoke that I liked, because she doesn’t sound sassy or so, she sound arrogant and insufferable.

Maybe its because there are enough characters there that could take over for Diana in a future scenario and would rather see them than a new character…maybe im biased on this.
I don’t know, but i didn’t like her when she was revealed and in this issue I even liked her less than that.
I can see this be because im so done with these future storylines etc…I do not know, I cant say for sure.
But I was fine with Jon and Damian in this, so I don’t know.

We will see what he does going forward, but this doesn’t make me want to see Trinity ever again to be honest.

You know, I saw some previews of King's story and thought the same thing: "Boy, Trinity sure is sure of herself!". And then I read the issue, and felt the same way still. And then I read some Flash comics and changed my mind.

You see, Trinity is pretty cocky. But characters like these tend to get humbled fairly quickly. I bring up the Flash, Wally specifically, because I think people forget that Wally started off pretty cocky under Mike Baron's run on the character for the first 14 issues of the series. He's pretty insufferable as a human being. William Messner Loebs humbled him pretty quickly after that. That's the best kind of character development.

What also changed my mind was this: Jon and Damien. You remove them from their parents and what do you have? Jon is basically written as Clark. And while Damien has certain language tics, he's basically Bruce. Trinity's attitude is radically different from Diana, and not too unlike girls I grew up with. It sounds like her attitude is antagonistic because she enjoys busting Jon and Damien's chops. But you can't say that she's a Diana clone. And that's what makes her interesting.

We know King can write some pretty great women. So I trust him to develop Trinity pretty thoroughly and humble her soon enough.

Anyways:

Doctor Strange #4 - This book is GREAT! It's gotten consistently better with every consecutive issue. It's snappy, witty, and has great artwork. Color me surprised that I'm reading Marvel proper again!

Night Fever - Brubaker and Philips return with yet another new OGN, Night Fever. Our protaganist , a meek and mild publishing salesmen wanders around France, seeking refuge from the mild-mannered, white picket fence life he lives back in America. He finds it in an illicit underground masquerade party when he decides to impersonate a random person on the guest list. Finding a renewed sense of self and fearlessness, Webb then meets the mysterious Rainer who takes him through a twisted, drug-and-sex induced path of violence, forcing Webb to confront the violence he thought he wasn't capable of. This one has some definite Nicolas Winding Refn vibes: some sort of very bizarre cross between Only God Forgives and Straw Dogs. What still manages to blow my mind is how Brubaker's writing comes across so effortless, especially for a guy who's bashed out something like 5 OGN's in the last 14 months (and has another one coming at the end of the year). But what Night Fever is DARK. It's disturbing and gets pretty heavy. Very Jim Thompson in it's way. This book is devoid of all the pulp fun of the Reckless books and even the Criminal book. Even Fatale and The Fade Out, both bleak in a very 1940's pulp way never got this dark and bleak. Brubaker and Philips do it again. If you're not following their work, especially of late, you really need to hop on that wagon and do a deep dive. They've not missed the mark once.

 

[Babillygunn]

Gotta ask on this because I'm genuinely curious: Is Williamson's Superman that good? I've been seeing other pretty high praise for it and my curiosity is trying to get the best of me. I think his writing on The Flash (see my review of Flash #800 and other posts throughout the forums) is pretty insufferable and his Robin fell off pretty steeply. But I enjoyed about 3/4s of it, and thought the Infinite Frontier stuff was solid until he plunked down Death of the Justice League, which was probably the single worst comic I read last year. So Williamson's writing leaves me a little cold.

Personally, I’m loving Williamson’s Superman. I didn’t think that it was possible, but it’s rivaling PKJ’ s Action Comics right now in terms of quality.
But I generally like Williamson. I thought that Robin was a brilliant comic.

 

[Mani-Man]

Gotta ask on this because I'm genuinely curious: Is Williamson's Superman that good? I've been seeing other pretty high praise for it and my curiosity is trying to get the best of me. I think his writing on The Flash (see my review of Flash #800 and other posts throughout the forums) is pretty insufferable and his Robin fell off pretty steeply. But I enjoyed about 3/4s of it, and thought the Infinite Frontier stuff was solid until he plunked down Death of the Justice League, which was probably the single worst comic I read last year. So Williamson's writing leaves me a little cold.

I definitely love his Run so far, feels very crisp writing wise.
I could see the Art doing a lot of heavy lifting with just this warm and approachable style.
Maybe its a bit of both.

You know, I saw some previews of King's story and thought the same thing: "Boy, Trinity sure is sure of herself!". And then I read the issue, and felt the same way still. And then I read some Flash comics and changed my mind.

You see, Trinity is pretty cocky. But characters like these tend to get humbled fairly quickly. I bring up the Flash, Wally specifically, because I think people forget that Wally started off pretty cocky under Mike Baron's run on the character for the first 14 issues of the series. He's pretty insufferable as a human being. William Messner Loebs humbled him pretty quickly after that. That's the best kind of character development.

What also changed my mind was this: Jon and Damien. You remove them from their parents and what do you have? Jon is basically written as Clark. And while Damien has certain language tics, he's basically Bruce. Trinity's attitude is radically different from Diana, and not too unlike girls I grew up with. It sounds like her attitude is antagonistic because she enjoys busting Jon and Damien's chops. But you can't say that she's a Diana clone. And that's what makes her interesting.

We know King can write some pretty great women. So I trust him to develop Trinity pretty thoroughly and humble her soon enough.

I do assume King will put the breaks on her for sure, that man wrote a Incredible Supergirl story and in general is good a writing Female Characters.
I guess that is why this threw me off so much because it felt like someone who never wrote a Female character in their life at first.
We will see, something will go down either way.
He either saves the character or destroys ever chance for her to be involved in some way or form ever again.

 

[Mani-Man]

Big Shot comic week right here

Action Comics #1056

A busy and swift conclusion to the first arc that doesn’t waste too much time…which maybe would have elevated it a bit more.
Because it doesn’t give the story room to breath.
But it doesn’t hurt the story too much either.
Backup stories are fine too…nothing to complain this week.

And Covers, I really like the Regular one a lot…looks cool.

Batman: The Brave and the Bold #2

Not as strong as the First issue and the art this time threw me a bit of, wasn’t as creative I feel as the first issue…but still a well written story so far.
Nothing too groundbreaking or so, I don’t know if that is even possible with Joker, but still good.
I really liked the Scars backup story, that one was visual neat and every father/son scene between Alfred and Bruce is my kind of beer.

Covers, I like the regular one enough.
But the Brett Booth one with Superman is really really cool.

Detective Comics #1073


Ram V nailed another issue.
This run is not everyones cup of tea, but I really really like it.
There is so much depth and nuance in this that I think we can only really 100% appreciate all the things reading it in one go later.

Absolutely incredible work here as you come to expect by now from Ram V.

The Regular cover is absolutely fire, really cool and my pick for sure.

Green Arrow #3

Another top notch issue on this that pulls the curtain back a bit to give us some information we need.
Great character interaction and a surprising cliffhanger…what more can you want?
Great great Book so far, 3 fantastic issues.

I don’t know who Ejikure is, but their Cover is my favorite.
Ollie and Dinah…perfect for a Green arrow cover.


Harley Quinn #31


Yeah no, I cant deal with this anymore.
The writing and the art is just too confusing, not working together and struggling to maintain a good flow.
I have such a hard time focusing on anything here because its all so over the top to the point where I lose concentration and cant recall what in the last page happened.
It is so jarring and I don’t know if I ever experience something like this before.
But its really annoying.
I don’t know if I should drop it or if it gets better once this arc is over.
Like I honestly enjoy the run in general so I want to keep going, but if this keeps going on like this in visuals and writing, I have to stop because there is no fun in reading like this.

As for covers, go with whatever you like…that is where the book continues to score imo.
Great covers.

Yeah outside of Harley Quinn, a great comics week.

 

[CrimsonMist]

I definitely love his Run so far, feels very crisp writing wise.
I could see the Art doing a lot of heavy lifting with just this warm and approachable style.
Maybe its a bit of both.

Personally, I’m loving Williamson’s Superman. I didn’t think that it was possible, but it’s rivaling PKJ’ s Action Comics right now in terms of quality.
But I generally like Williamson. I thought that Robin was a brilliant comic.

Hmm. I'll see what back issues my shop has available this week and maybe pick up the first two issues if available. Thanks for the insight!

June ended with an interesting week.

Action Comics #1056: I am completely dumbfounded by this story arc. I didn't like it AT ALL. It started off strong enough but pretty quickly went off the rails. So much story happens between the panels. You can feel it in the way that Sandoval lays out his pages. Lots of panels showing multiple parts of the story at once, just to keep everything contained in as little space as possible. Between the Warworld refugee camp, Metallo's sister, and Cyborg Superman's pretty paper thin motivation that made him feel almost like a throw-away plot point, this story definitely felt like it needed a few extra issues. The whole story felt half-assed, almost like the brakes were slammed. Maybe that's the case what with Knightmares next month. But consider me astounded at how truly disappointing this issue was. And I say this because...

Incredible Hulk #1: ...was pretty damn awesome. PKJ takes the reigns of the Jolly Green Goliath, does away (a bit) with whatever that nonsense Donny Cates brought to the table was, and piggyback's off of Al Ewing's brilliant Immortal Hulk run. Nic Klein's art is fantastic, deviating from the traditional superhero house-style typical of Marvel books. His work echos Tyler Crook's brilliant work on Harrow County and Lonesome Hunters. PJK's writing does it's best to avoid where possible the silly tropes of modern horror comics. There's some great cosmic horror afoot in this book. And I'm excited, until otherwise stated, to see where it goes. How PJK managed to pull this off while totally missing the mark over on Action Comics is bewildering.

Detective Comics #1073. Another wonderful, purply-prose turn from Ram V, with Dan Watters as well continuing his back-up story. I've since lost sight of what the hell is happening in this book, protracted as the plot has become. But the reading experience, especially with Ivan Reis' evocative Gene Colan/Tom Mandrake hybrid style of art, is always an exciting one. I will admit that I tire of these "Batman vs abstract concepts" type of stories; Batman "saving the soul of a city at the cost of his own!" and all that. Sometimes, it makes me miss King's run on Batman...just a story about a dude coming to terms with the woman he loves and how that affects his day to day life. Ah well.

World's Finest #16. This was great, if only (but not especially) for the Firestorm moment. Waid has really been hitting all the beats, this arc. And Dan Mora hasn't slipped at all. It's incredible how consistent he's been. Wish I could say more about this book, but so much as been said already.

July and August sees DC ushering in a whole slew of Knightmares Tie-ins, which means my DC pull is next to nothing: about 4 books each month. The majority will be Image, Titan, and surprisingly Marvel at 4 titles.

 

[Babillygunn]

The Flash #800

A bit disappointed this was a Anthology Issue instead of a Farwell focused issue.
Still, neat stuff in this and I do think a nice way to end Adams run.
We will see how the new team will handle the Flash.
Im not taking this Anthology issue as any indication so far.
Which is not saying this wasn’t a good issue or so, just that its to me not the real start of the new teams run.

I loved this so much. And what a murderer’s row of Flash writers! Waid, Adams, and Johns! It was fun.

But…unfortunately, putting stories by those three next to Si Spurrier’s story only showcased how weak it was. We all knew that following up Jeremy Adams was going to be an uphill battle, but I still was optimistic. Now, though, I am not holding out a lot of hope for Spurrier’s run based upon this short story.

 

[Primal Slayer]

Im already over NightTerrors and it just begun. Just bring on the new WW refresh.

 

[Babillygunn]

I have no plans to read any of Night Terrors at this point.

 

[Mani-Man]

A very short week because its Dominated by Knight Terrors and I can put my thoughts of several of those in one, and outside of that its only one comic on my normal list.

Adventures of Superman: Jon Kent #5

Here I can repeat what I said the previous issues easily.
Predictable as it gets.
This is simply Injustice 2 just with Jon…and as someone who already doesn’t like Injustice on its own, this does nothing to make this universe or story seem better.

Like I don’t see any need for this story to exist.
It doesn’t do anything really different or even focuses a lot on the idea of Jon seeing “his father” at his worst.
That could have been interesting, but it doesn’t do anything with it.
Just like it doesn’t do anything with the idea of Injustice Clark dealing with “his son” and all.
Potential is there but nothing is done with it.
Instead the most bland story is told here.
There are points where this story could shine, but it doesn’t go out of its way to do that.
Maybe the one positive about this is how Jon called out Harley for playing her role in all that happened.
But even that isn’t really used to its potential.

A rather disappointing Arc that had the potential, but then I shouldn’t have expected more from an Injustice story.
Art is fine, but that’s about it.

And then like I said what can be put into one big opinion piece.
Knight Terrors…yeah no.

I read Batman, First Blood and Joker and not one story here is really good.
Like nothing really blew me away here or made me interested in the next issue.

I could make this longer by ranting about how writers thanks to tom king do still this Selina=Happiness for Bruce…but im not here to rant about batcat.

Knight Terrors just like the Shadow War and I think another crossover arc I cant remember, are just these big hyped but empty arcs you confuse people with.
Like its so complicated to collect.
Im glad I read first blood first because if I would have read batman first, I would have been thrown off how it started.
You gotta read a bunch of issues you probably don’t care to get the full picture…that is just bad imo.

Maybe im so annoyed by the crossover event stories because a lot of the solo stuff works so well.

Like I rather would see Green Lantern continue his arc instead of being thrown into the Knight Terrors arc.
I wanna see Zdarskys Batman go on instead of this, Superman fantastic runs derailed for Knight Terrors.
Maybe that’s my problem with these Events at the moment.

Anyway, yeah im not too happy with the next few weeks.
The Covers are cool but so far Knight Terrors doesn’t deliver.

But it seems DC has more faith in this event considering how much Knight Terrors stories we will get.
We will see.
I can only hope it gets better.

 

[Babillygunn]

Night Terrors, Drowned Earth, Future State.

When was the last time that we got a huge crossover that anyone actually liked? I dread them.