Meandering: The Walking Dead #105 Review

We’re a bunch of issues into the Negan Is A Douchebag arc in The Walking Dead, and I still don’t have that douchebag figured out yet.

I know a few people with some experience dealing with people on the autism spectrum (I know, I know: “Gee Rob, doesn’t everyone who knows you have experience dealing with at least one guy on the autism spectrum?” Yer a real fucking comedian, you are), and I’ve heard enough descriptions of missed social cues and inappropriate responses to interpersonal stimuli and the need for rigid routine to think that maybe writer Robert Kirkman intends for Negan to be rocking that kind of diagnosis… although everything I know about autism comes from secondhand anecdotes, Rainman and when people question my motivations.

But at the same time, I know a rotten, cowardly fucking bully when I see one, an I certainly see one in Negan. A big kid in arrested development who realized somewhere along the way that, since there’s no one to put the arm on him for telling racist jokes and flushing drunks heads down the toilet, why the hell not escalate to baseball bats and hot irons?  Maybe Negan’s just the kid who wedgied you in junior high who’s stuck in a state of arrested development, taking advantage of the fact that he maybe pinkbellied his first couple of “followers” into line, and the rest followed the pack.

Or maybe Kirkman has some combination of the two in mind; a character who never had the capacity to understand that just because a littler kid didn’t hit you back didn’t mean he was your friend, who thrives in a black-and-white set of simple rules that he suddenly found himself in a position to create on his own (no matter how much sense those rules might make), and whose pre-apocalypse personal obsession was zombie movies which made him better prepared to handle the rise of the walkers while we other social outcasts who were obsessed with, say, comic books, contributed to the rise of the new world order by becoming lunch.

Or maybe I’m completely full of shit, utterly off base, and have no idea what I’m talking about. And even if I am, who gives a damn? I don’t need the DSM-5 to know batshit crazy when I see it, and Negan is crazy. Regardless of his motivations (although clearly, this is the kind of thing that’s on my mind these days), this issue serves to show that, back at the ranch, Negan is at least as dangerous as the Governor, if not more so due to his obvious lack of real care for his people. He needs to die, already… and he has Carl.

This will not end well… and frankly, after six or seven months with this prick, I’m not sure it will end at all.

Clown Illustrations: Batman #15 Review

I’ve read through Batman #15 about four times so far, even though it is a middle part of a long crossover, meaning that even though there is some decent action and some forward plot motion here, there isn’t a hell of a lot in the way of real epiphany or resolution here. Sure, we learn the origin of that giant Joker card that Bruce keeps in the Batcave (and, based on that origin, that there is either a custom printer somewhere in Gotham who once hung up the phone and told his assistant, “Yup: Bruce Wayne is Batman. Or maybe The Joker. Either way, make sure the check clears before you start work,” or that Bruce is much arts-and-craftsier than I would have originally anticipated), and we discover how it’s at least possible that Joker knows the identities of the Batman Family, but it’s not like there are any big, sweeping moments that would normally keep someone reading and re-reading an individual issue of a comic book.

Instead, I found myself going over and over the book, wondering about what was actually going on in the heads of Batman and The Joker. We have Joker running around, attacking the people closest to Batman and his allies, claiming that he’s doing it to make Batman his best… but why? A razor-sharp Batman would make life infinitely more difficult for Joker, so what’s his motivation? And then there’s Batman, keeping at least one significant secret from Robin, Nightwing, et al, and trying to keep them away from the battle – despite the fact that at least Batgirl and Red Hood have, shall we say, intensely personal reasons for wanting to take Joker head-on – and apparently willfully ignoring some evidence that Joker might have the upper hand on him, all while implying that he thinks Joker is trying to prove a point… but why? And what point?

I kept rereading the issue trying to figure out what it is about each of these characters that is making the other act in ways that really don’t seem to be in their own best interests… and then I realized that, despite decades of reading stories about these two guys, that I’ve never really given that question a whole hell of a lot of thought beyond the obvious: “Joker is insane and kills a lot of people despite Batman constantly trying to stop him.” Which is fine as a plot engine, and one that has driven one hell of a lot of damn good comic books and movies over the years, but almost none of those stories ever made me think any more deeply about each character’s real motivations beyond that bullet point.

However, Batman #15, despite being a middle chapter, made me ask those questions. Which helped hammer home that Death of The Family is shaping up to be one pretty special Batman story.

Workaday Fantasy

All right, let’s be honest: last week was one hell of a new week for comics. Between the second-to-last issue of The Amazing Spider-Man, to the first issue of Jonathan Hickman’s run on Avengers, to the start of Daniel Way’s Thunderbolts, there was a shit-ton of new and exciting books to dive into, even if it turned out some of them were more new and less exciting than we were originally led to believe.

This week, things have drifted a little back more toward a weekly status quo; not a bunch of flashy new reboots (but, but, Marvel doesn’t reboot! And Night Thrasher has always been the future of Marvel superheroes!), but instead just a steady, relaxing week of regularly-scheduled comics…

Comics like a new The Walking Dead, and one of the last Gail Simone’s Batgirl, and one of the first Justin Jordan Deathstroke issues. Well, shit.

For a hum-drum week, that’s a lot of awesome, which means that this…

…is the end of our broadcast day.

Seriously: if you gotta have a week of just normally-solicited non-first issues, there are worse ways you can go. There’s Scott Snyder’s and Greg Capullo’s Batman #15 and Pete Tomasi’s Batman & Robin #15 continuing the so-far compelling Death of The Family story arc, there’s the second issue of Matt Fraction’s Fantastic Four, a Kelly Sue DeConnick issue of Avengers Assemble, and even an issue of the best series of Before Watchmen: Brian Azzarello’s and Lee Bermejo’s Rorschach!

But you know how this works: before we can review any of them, we need time to read them. So while that happens…

…see you tomorrow, suckers!

Heroclix Team Awesome: Thunderbolts #1 Review

Editor’s Note: One last review of the comics of 12/5/2012 before the comic stores open…

Let’s get the preliminaries out of the way: the chick with the purple hair who doesn’t speak and is the only apparent member who isn’t asked to volunteer in Thunderbolts #1? That’s Mercy. She debuted back in Peter David’s and Todd McFarlane’s run on The Incredible Hulk – issue 338 to be exact, a couple of issues before the arc collected in the Ground Zero paperback. If I recall correctly, she shanks people who she thinks are down on their luck… and she thinks everyone is down on their luck. You’re welcome.

Thunderbolts #1 is yet another Marvel Now book that is, despite Marvel’s protestations, a complete reboot (but, but, Marvel doesn’t reboot! Which is why The Punisher is still a superpowered avenging angel! And he’s still a black guy!). We’ve gone from the team being the standardized government-sponsored team staffed by former supervillains hoping for redemption that it’s been for years (but don’t let it make you bitter; if you miss that idea, DC’s still publishing Suicide Squad), to apparently just General Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross, former Hulkbuster and current Red Hulk, out on his own, building a team out of the darker, more edge heroes of the Marvel Universe. You know, like DC’s Team 7.

So now our Thunderbolts are apparently Red Hulk, Punisher, Deadpool, Elektra, Venom and Mercy, which is a lineup, except for Mercy, that should be familiar to anyone who has seen twelve-year-olds playing Heroclix (although you probably heard them referred to as “The Asskickers,” or perhaps “Team Awesome”). However, this lineup is being written by recent Deadpool writer Daniel Way instead of a runny-nosed punk jacked up on Red Bull and his first boner over imagining Elektra naked, so we can expect a little more from this team, right?

Truth be told, I can’t quite tell yet.

…Moviegoer of Kleenex: New Man of Steel Teaser Trailer Released

As I’ve said before, since it’s the end of the year, the movie studios are starting to get we genre geeks hyped up about the 2013 summer blockbuster movie season. They’ve given us a wealth of teaser trailers and posters, which has led to the staff of Crisis On Infinite Midlives to argue, in the past week, as to which summer movie we’re looking more forward to: Iron Man 3, directed by the guy who wrote Lethal Weapon, Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang, and The Last Boy Scout, or Star Trek Into Darkness, directed by the guy who directed Star Trek and Super 8, and also produced Lost and Alias.

Oh yeah, and then there’s Man of Steel, directed by Zack Snyder. The guy who directed the completely unnecessary Dawn of The Dead remake, the can’t-even-sit-through-while-drunk-and-the-remote’s-broken Sucker Punch, and the resoundingly “no homo” 300. Sure, Man of Steel will be opening too, but I can’t imagine there’s gonna be anything that could vault it to the top of the “must see” list, even if we’re totally willing to forget Superman Returns, a movie that even a half-quart of Jack Daniels couldn’t make entertaining.

What’s that? There’s a new teaser trailer for Man of Steel that’s been released? *Sigh*

Fine. Let’s give it a look.

Bamf: I Love Trouble #1 Review

Editor’s Note: Now watch me kids, when I twist my ring: like magic, we’re at Spoiler King!

Let’s go ahead and state the obvious up front: I Love Trouble is a superhero comic.

Sure, it’s a superhero comic where the protagonist is a bit darker and edgier than your standard Marvel or DC fare, and it’s one without capes, spandex or superpowered bad guys (yet… unless you count a protagonist who uses her powers to steal classic art a “supervillain” right out of the gate, but the story doesn’t steer in that direction), but there is no way to spin a book about a woman who suddenly develops powers, that forecasts that there are other people out there with similar powers, and that shows government interest in the woman with powers, and see anything but a superhero comic with a darker bend than many.

Biting The Root: Scott Snyder and Yanick Paquette Leaving Swamp Thing

Remember yesterday, when Gail Simone got icked off of Batgirl? And I listed all the books from the initial DC New 52 that I could remember (of course, forgetting Joshua Hale Fialkov and Andrea Sorrentino on I, Vampire at the very least) and bemoaned the fact that so many creators and books from that first round of rebooted comics had gone down with all hands? And that I listed Scott Snyder as working on Batman and Swamp Thing?

Yeah, funny story about that…

Hey guys – was going to wait until we got a little closer to announce this, but yes, Swamp Thing #18 will be my (cont) tl.gd/ka763m

— Scott Snyder (@Ssnyder1835) December 10, 2012

Swamp Thing #18 will be your what, Scott? Your manifesto? Your articles of sessecion from the United States of America? Your Goddamned prom date? There’s a term for Tweets that are longer than 140 characters, Scott: it’s called a fucking blog post!

Hey, what’s that link at the end of the Tweet do?

When The Legend Becomes Fact: Avengers #1 Review

Editor’s Note: It was the spark that started the fire — a legend that grew in the telling. Some believe it began the moment Spoilers were rescued from a dying universe…

Before you ask, no, I don’t know who all those people are. The floating chick on the left is an incarnation of Captain Universe (who I remember from Micronauts comics when I was a kid), and if I had to hazard a guess based on the nuclear symbol on the team diagram, the dude on the right apparently flying in an effort to escape the fire pouring out of his ass is Nuke from Squadron Supreme. But there are at least four people on that last page I couldn’t pull out of a lineup if my life depended on it.

So now that we have the fanboy gymnastics out of the way, we can actually talk about Avengers #1.

First of all, there is no doubt that this is no longer Brian Michael Bendis’s Avengers. From the opening pages implying that “Previously in Avengers” was a cataclysm of cosmic creation, followed immediately by the representation of the Avengers lineup by an abstract diagram, this issue is a shot across the bow that this is indeed Jonathan Hickman’s Avengers. And that means that, after years of stories that seemingly always hinged around a bunch of guys shooting the shit around the kitchen table, we are in for something very different.

And that is not a bad thing. At least not yet. But we might get there.

And Then There Were (About) Seventeen: Gail Simone No Longer Writing Batgirl

There have been rumors going around for a couple of weeks that Gail Simone, in the face of her exclusive deal with DC Comics coming to an end recently, would be leaving Batgirl, which she has written since the DC New 52 relaunch. Simone has been denying those rumors pretty consistently, to the point where just one week ago, she publicly and flatly stated that “I have not left Batgirl” on her Tumblr blog.

That, however, was a week ago. About 90 minutes ago, on her Twitter page, Simone announced that she would no longer be writing the book… and that her earlier statement was technically true: she did not leave Batgirl. She was replaced.

On Wednesday of last week, new Batgirl editor Brian Cunningham informed me by email that I was no longer the writer of Batgirl.

— GailSimone (@GailSimone) December 9, 2012

Outsourcing: Iron Man 3 Japanese Trailer Features Some New Footage

I realize that we live in a streaming video world, and that because of the ready availability of streamed movies, many of you no longer buy DVDs. And if that’s the case, you are the worst fucking people on Earth.

Because since DVD and Blu-Ray sales have flatlined in the past few years, the international market has become more important for movie studios than ever. And because of that, the cool genre movies that geeks want to see are opening overseas before we get to see them here (Most recent example? About 25 countries are getting The Hobbit before it opens in the United States). So thanks to you swine who have stopped accumulating movies on physical media for the rotten and unjustifiable reason that streaming is inexpensive and convenient, other countries are getting all the cool shit before us! I hope you’re Goddamned proud of yourselves.

But there is a positive about the whole situation: because those markets are so lucrative, they tend to get trailers with a little more detail and a little more footage than the American versions. We saw it earlier this week with the Star Trek Into Darkness trailer, where the Japanese version had a bit more going on than the American version… and now we’re seeing it with the Japanese version of the Iron Man 3 trailer, which has some previously-unseen footage in it. You can check it out after the jump.