Professor Charles Xavier Explains It All For You

Just found this over at Comics Alliance. College Humor has published The X-Men Guide To Puberty by Caldwell Tanner, who you may also know from Five Easy Ways To Show You Don’t Give A Fuck. Read along as Professor X tell you everything you did, and maybe didn’t, want to know about your unholy mutant aberration rapidly developing body!

I remember when my mom said the same thing to me. I think it was shortly after she admitted she didn't really like kids.

Read the rest of the “What’s Happening To My Body Book For Mutants” here.

I’m Batman: Frank Miller’s Holy Terror Review

Wow. My two-day hangover tells me that Red Sox season finish was certainly worth staying up for. Let’s pretend that atrocity didn’t happen, and that even if it did that there was something we could do about it, and move back to comics, where the good guys always win, shall we? After all, if that kind of fantasy’s good enough for Frank Miller, it should be good enough for the rest of us.

I’m gonna withhold judgment for just this second as to whether Holy Terror is a good book or not and start with what will be obvious for anyone who reads it: this is a Batman story. It started it’s life as Holy Terror, Batman! when Miller announced it in 2006, and he maintained that it was Batman story until 2008, when he started telling people that it was about a “new hero [he] made up that fights Al Qaeda.”

Sure, Frank. A new hero. You made up. In a cape and a cowl. With a utility belt. And gadgets. And an archenemy who’s a cat burgler. With claws. Who has “nine lives.” And I’m sure it’s purely by coincidence that you technically pulled Batman out of your story about a vigilante who tortures and kills terrorists in 2008, when Warner Brothers was releasing The Dark Knight and making about a bajillion dollars. Sure you made it up, Frank… if by “you” you mean “Legendary Comics’ team of entertainment lawyers.”

So yeah, this is a Batman story. It started its life that way, and Miller clearly left the obvious parallels in there so we’d KNOW it was a Batman story. So let’s just treat it that way – none of the “The Fixer” or “Natalie Stack” or “Detective Dan Donegal” crap Frank ginned up to duck the lawsuit. It’ll just be Batman and Catwoman and Commissioner Gordon for the purposes of this review, partially because I think Miller wants it that way, and partially because I’m too damn lazy to keep flipping back through the book to remember pastiche names.

So anyway – here be spoilery chunks:

I’m Assuming There’s A Point

EDITOR’S NOTE: This story was updated 10/1/2011 with details about the fifth teaser. You can read more after the jump.

Earlier this year, Marvel rolled out the concept of a “Point One” issue of their books – an issue outside a book’s normal 12-issue run that would be written as a one-and-done book that wasn’t heavily tied into ongoing continuity to act as a jumping on point for new readers. Meaning that they’re old-school annuals, for all intents and purposes, but I’m guessing somewhere along the line Marvel realized “.1” is more attractive than “Annual”… or at least it is when you’re paying the printer by the letter.

Apparently the Point One initiative’s been pretty successful, and I tend to agree – we’ll probably be reviewing Black Panther 523.1 later week, and while we didn’t get a chance to review X-Factor #224.1, it was a tight story that was one hell of a way to get into the best X-Book you’re not reading. And it seems it’s been successful enough that earlier this week, Marvel announced a 64-page Point One issue for the entire Marvel Universe, where they’ll be teasing their events for 2012 and “the return of fan-demanded characters.” (But Marvel doesn’t reboot! Because Marvel makes no mistakes! And pay no attention to the fact that Bucky Barnes has been dead twice since 2005 while still co-headlining his own book!)

All week long, Marvel’s been rolling out teaser images for the one-shot, including stuff you’d expect for an event teaser, like Brian Michael Bendis’s and Bryan Hitch’s upcoming Ultron arc in Avengers and Matt Fraction’s already-announced Defenders book with penciller Terry Dodson… but they’ve also teased a return of Nova by Jeph Loeb and Ed McGuinness… and yesterday they teased, well… THIS: