Comic book quickies

SAGA #12

written by brian k. vaughan art by fiona staples

The single best episode of meet the author ever ! Well maybe except for that one issue of animal man with big grant Morrison. Saga there. Just cutting about. Being amazing again. No surprise really. It is saga we're dealing with after all. Its strange. Its only been in my life a short while. But its hard to Imagen comics without saga any more. That's something for me to think about. I here this issue generated some amount of controversy. Don't really see it my self. Last issue was amazingly more explicit. Oh wells. Maybe that's a part of the controversy. Apart from that it just a very bantery issue, like cover to cover banter. Little bit of fighting here and there. But mostly its banter. In lesser hands that could have led to disaster. But of course that's not the case here. There's like a squirely medic / mouse thing and a Cyclops man. Its pretty rad. Has to be said. Damn you saga ! Your just so damn good I don't really have much to talk about. I know I say that about a lot of stuff. But saga likes. It really is that way. Course you already know that. You read comics therefore you read saga. Or do I have that wrong. I have herd rumours of possible spots of resistance. Hmm. Ill have to send the storm troopers to investigate. Stay tuned.

THE STANDARD #2

written by john lees art by john rector

Now this was cracking. I liked this second issue a lot more than the first one. Maybe that's because we got to hang about with auld man standard. Now I liked kid standard. Booster gold that he was, its just that I was sold on auld man super hero cutting about and with this issue we finally got that. And I have to say. It was done pretty well. Like it could have been hateful. It could have been aww auld people are terrible and made fun of them. But no. auld man standard is quite the lad and he's handled with dignity. The wee authors note at the back of the first issue talked about not wanting to be grim dark and that shines threw more here. Auld man standard could have easily been a joke. About how ageing destroys you. About the loss of innocence and all that pish. Amazingly though. Genuinely not the case here. That really makes me happy loikes. Its nice to see ladness spreading from my home land. The art seemed to be upgraded just a little bit. Maybe its just me. But it seemed a little a sharper. Less amiutureishh. Maybe that's a little pretentious for me to say. But this time the art did seam to be improving. I like it ok ! If you fancy a wee bit of indi superhero action the standards your man !

AGE OF ULTRON BOOK #5

written by brian michael bendis art by bryan hitch

So guys. Like still. How can I say this again. Yeah. Still not buying this whole ultron thing. I here terrible terrible things said about it almost non stop. I can totes get that. Its been fairly horrible so far if we're being honest. I really should be one of the people complaining about it. Here's the thing though. It just dosent bother me all that much. Like if this was the actual marvel universe id be actually fuming. But for now its just a wee alternate time line. Now yes. What with the timey whimey developments of this issue and the spoilery covers for upcoming issues there is room for this wee abomination to become very very real. And when that day comes you can be damn sure ill be out there on the streets screaming and weeping. But right now. No matter how much it should offend me. It just dosent. So bendis right. The actual fuck were you on when you were wrighting this. Like I can get going for grim dark ware everyone dies like punks. But come on son. This isn't even good grim dark. I might go as far to call it sloppy. It feels like a bad tv show. Made for the syfy channel. Yes there's spectical but it also feels somewhat cheap. And FUCKING everyone's out of character to some degree. Something that once again would have me rageing. But dosent. So once again. Lets wait and see. Easy dose it. Easy dose it. The marvel lads MIGHT be going some ware with this event. But if they don't. Holy fuck why ?

UNCANNY AVENGERS #6

written by remender art by daniel acuna

BOOOOM oh mah god oh mah gawd ho my actual cracker eating god. This was BLOODY fantastic. Cover to cover a joy to read. A real sight to behold. So its a flash back issue to the days of kid thor. Well young man thor. Lad thor lets call him. I here the main thor book has this time of thors life pretty well down but it was nice to see it presented so AMZINGLY in a avengers book. So lad thors cutting about with the Vikings and that while kang stirs up shite with apocalypse. Its. Magical. Again I cried a little. Partly because I wasn't expecting it to be all that amazing and partly because it was just that god damn solid. Maybe its just a novelty to me. But apocalypse just cutting about in a tavern and beating the shite out of thor is perfect. It probably be my moment of the week. That is if fantastic four wasn't out. More on that bellow. Thor also pulls off one of my all time favourite tropes. The big damn heroes moment. FOR LONDON. The gods have not abandoned us indeed. It just has fucking everything ! I really can say more than that. Also. The art. gorgeous man. I feel like the artist did some issues for bendis late in his avengers run. I was having some flash backs to pink hulk super adaptoid norman ozborn. Not necessarily a bad thing Ill have you know.

 

FANTASTIC FOUR #6

written by matt fraction art by mark bagley

Let us for a moment consider the extreme ladness of ben grimm. The thing. If I was pushed for my top 5 marvel characters. The thing would defiantly be up there. The sheer absolute ladness he generates is the stuff of legend. The saga of ben grimm should be taught to our young. From their earliest days they should be taught about his amazing adventures and his continuing ladness in the face of the universes dickery. Yes he's a monster. A hulking rock man. So fucking what. At no point dose he let that stop him from cutting about. Making scooby doo sandwiches. Watching tv. And pulling off kamina level fuck destiny shite like he dose this issue. Gotta give even more credit to fraction here. You got me you hipster bastard. You really did. All issue the thing is set up for a fall. The recap blurb reminds us he's been having anger problems. Hulking out into lava thing. We open on him fumbling with asprens. But he holds it together. By the end though. Dose he fall ? DOSE HE FUCK. The four are cutting about the big bang. See a guy strapped to a rock floating threw pre existence. The debate helping the guy. Sues aww like what do you think about this ben. But ben. Bens already outside. Gonna help the guy. WE'R THE FANTASTIC FOUR SUZIE PANTS. WE DONT JUST LET NOBODY DIE. THESE ARE THINGS BEN GRIMM SAYS. I really canny stress it enough. This may be my top moment of there year so far. And if you've been following me recently you'll know I think very highly about the quality of current comics. So that's gotta tell you something about this amazing scean. So ayes. You goota read this book !

BATMAN #19

written by scott snyder art by greg capullo

Well likes. This was batman. Being batman. I canny man. I just canny likes. Argue with that I mean. Those of you with long memorys will ken I really hate when batman isn't being batman. Now yes I do go on about the bat god a lot. Maybe too much. That's fine. I can deal with that. But stuff like the first volume of hush. Really gets my goat. When I read a batman comic I want to see batman being batman. Doing batmanny things. Like cutting about gotham. Paunching folk. Driving about in the batmobile. We don't get a hole lot of that here but It gets across that vibe quite nicely. Its bizarrely fresh. Sharp and crisp. That or iv gone quite mad. Its better than last issue. That's possibly what I'm trying to get at here. Ware last issue felt terribly fan ficy this one felt properly batman. There's a bizarre cold open. Yes. Probably clay face related. Or a subversion of clay face related shite. So really its all good in the hood. Or should I say cowl ! Ho ho ho ! I'll be quite now.

SUPERBOY #19

written by scott lobdell art by r.b silva

See this. This might be they single most un laddshishly hateful comic iv ever read. Now. That may be amazingly harsh. And I'm sorry for that. But deer e o me. What the hell guys. Just like. Its hard for me to describe to you. I wouldn't call it conventionally hateful. Its not like anything remarkably annoying happens. Its just all kinds of blughrg. Likes. Likes. likes. I'm trying to focus on the content of the actual issue right now. But I cant. MY MIND WONT LET ME. It dosent want me to remember any of it. Now don't get me wrong. It wasn't bad bad. Just dark agey in its plot. So much irrelevant shit happens. So many justification's and motivations that you meant to take on board but your like. Naw. Fuck that son. So at some point in the future the meta humans go to war with normal humans. Just naw. I'm not having that. That's cunty writing. That's something a writer from the mid 2000s would come up with. Superman wouldn't allow that. And if he's dead then his descendants wouldn't allow that. LADNESS itself wouldn't allow that to happen. So yeah. Don't go out of your way to read this comic because iv made it out to be terribly bad. Its not actually aw that. Its just weirdly offensive to my sensibility's. Sometimes I wonder if I should mellow out more when reading suprerboy. I'm not saying I should turn my brain off. Just look at it from a different angle. Up there I complained about it being dark agey. I like they 90s loikes. From time to time I like 90s comics. Maybe that's what there shooting for with superboy. I dunno man. Sometimes I just don't understand this crazy mixed up world any more.

Comic book quickies 13.2.13

God damn. Time likes. It just wont stop. Well another week. Time for more comics. Aw right week. Not too packed but the books that were out were of nifty quality.

BATMAN #17

written by scott snyder art by greg capullo

Things are going to get fairly controversial here quite soon. I'm sorry for this in advance. Now I think this last issue of the death in the family arc was a massive let down. After reading it I lost a wee bit of my faith in humanity. As a species we may have lost a good ten or so years because of this issue. I really, really thought we were past this at this point. I thought we were better than this. Its a damn shame likes. This issue in my opinion is the first dud issue of synders run. Well aye the annual had a similar problem in shiteness to be fair. Now put your torches and pitch forks down. Most of the issue was out right cracking. Proper batman being batmanny stuff. Lot a great moments and some fabulous joker banter. The image of bats ayes being broken and STEAMING will probably stay with me for some time. Like pretty much everything the problem lies with the ending. Its amazingly unnecessary. Hatefully unnecessary. Just goona out right spoil it here. Run for the hills if you don't want to here. Basically the bat family no longer trust bruce. FUCK THAT. That's something that would have flew twenty to twenty five years ago. But holly fuck not today. The youth of today will read this comic and be inspired by it. They will think that's the way to write comics. You can see why I think this will set the world back. Batman is a god ok. He's not a cunt. Well he kind of is but not in a bad way The prep time batman may be nothing but an internet joke but that's what batman IS in our harts. He's an amalgamation of all the batmen we've ever watched or read. He's spent the last seventy years becoming a god and while this batman may young that's no excuse for failure like this. This whole arc was about the joker being the voice of people that think batmans better on his own being a grim and gritty bastard. Now I may be horribly wrong here but I'm pretty sure that's meant to be taken as an insult. Batman has a team that he kicks about with. Its a whole part of his history. Gona just deal with it. By making the bat family untrusting in bruce just makes them horribly unlikeible. Its a huge miss step if you ask me. Your basically saying the jokers right and those that believe his view that bats is better off alone is right. Dose snyder actually believe that ? I don't want to believe that. Now aye this is just comics. Nothing really matters on the actual story level. Things will eventually be fine. But like I say I worry for this issues effect on comics to follow and its influence on other writers. Synders batman run is beloved and a lot of people are sure to read it. I thought we were nearing a new era. A new age of comics. A neo modern age. Stuff like slotts run on spider-man and almost all of snyders batman pointed to more ladness in comics. Probably shouldn't jump to conclusions though. Ill see how this disappointing plot line turns out. Its very likely I could be calling it genius by next month.

FANTASTIC FOUR # 4

written by matt fraction art by marck bagley

Sue storm is a terrible human being. We all get that right ? She's just awful. I'm not even sure what it is I dislike about her. She's just so deeply not nice. Its maddening. It may be because her sole charter trait is being a mother. Now being a mother that's also a super hero. That's fairly nifty. Shame she dosent carry it off well. Now being a mother in fiction means that she's totes rocking the trope of a mother will commit genocide to save her children. Now aye. That might be a very true fact of life but come on people ! Lets get past that ok ? Now aye. I don't have any specific examples to throw at sue. But for fock sake guys. That's like basically her. Also I'm pretty sure she slept with namor. I bring this up because this whole issue was about how awesome she is. Now iv read this issue. That's why I'm reviewing it right here. Why is she so awesome ? Read the whole issue. No actual clue. Basically she hot. I think that's what the issue was getting at. Now that I actually think about it. Maybe that's the joke. Maybe everybody's aware of how amazingly un likeable she is and this issues shilling of her was all in jest. Lets hope likes. Reed richards ain't no lad either. He pissies all over the prime directive in quite a spectacular way to declare his un dieing love for sue. If it wasn't messing with the whole culture of a alien race I could totes get behind it. Basically thank fuck the things on the team. His massive ladness keeps them readable.

THE STANDARD # 1

written by john lees art by jonathan rector

Purtty nifty wee indi super hero book. First issue was a little rough but I'm willing to see ware it go's. There's a fair bit o gorn and cynicism in here but its tempered by old fashioned hope. Id say its too early to tell which way it will go but the mission statement by the author at the back gives me hope. I quite like it when the writer of a book gives a wee word about what's going to be happening at the back of the first issue. I spose it just there because that cant have a letters page. Still nifty as fuck to me though. The plots really just ok. There's two heroes called the standard. One who kicked about the golden/ sliver age and the second standard is the firsts side kick whos taken up the mantle. The second standards basically booster gold. A celebrity super. Nothing rang wea that. Nothing too ground braking either. Now I really cant judge ware the book will go. Its looking like it will take shots at grim and gritty tropes but it dose have them same tropes as part of the plot. So like I said. Its hard to tell ware this series will go just on the strength of this first issue.

 

AMERICAS GOT POWERS # 5

written by jonathan ross art by bryan hitch

So still amazingly were now five whole issues in and the hero of the book is STILL a lad. Yes the world and almost every other character in it is AMAZINGLY EVIL. But the hero is STIL a hero. Maybe its just me that's hung up on this. But in this day and age the very fact that the hero isn't even a little bit of a cunt is something to marvel at. In my book at least. a character that previously seemed like a bit of a lad dose seem to go a wee bit power crazy but that is done by having david tenant turn into giant man. Don't know how to feel about that. This books main problem is its loss of momentum. Its a real shame likes. It started so god damn well with that double first issue. Kinda goat board of the whole hunger games / running man plot. Its aww right likes. Its just no tournament arc though. To be fair this issue is more world plot stuff happening. The evil American military decides to just bomb all the super powered teens. Because evil.

KATANA # 1

written by ann nocenti art by alex sanchez

So I gave kantana go this week. Cant say I regret it. In the last year or so I decided to give more comics a try. Number ones that is. Within reason though. I'm no goona actively depress my self by seaking out comics by the dark creators to read. So I picked up this issue and gave it a quick flick threw. Art wasny bad so I gave it a chance. It was a fairly good read. Some parts were slightly hard to follow but that may just be my ignorance of the charter coming into play. What's here though is good action and by the end of it I didn't dislike katana. Id call that a win like. So this book is part of a new line spotlighting the new justices laeuge. It will be interesting to see what that books all about because right now I'm not entirely sure why its happening. Its a weird back and forth comics have. They have a big super hero team gain new obscure members that go on to have interesting story's but eventually they have to put the iconic team together. Its a whole ting.

SUPERBOY #17

written by tom deefalco art by r.b silva

So hell on earth is still going on. Not really complaining just it feels like there's been a hundred issues of it all ready. Cant really complain about that either as iv been missing the superman issues as I only get super girl and super boy. Its not all that bad. Probably unnecessary. Its totes one of them cross overs ware you need to buy comics you don't usely buy. He'll is a bit of a weak villain. He's curb stomping everyone. Not sure how or why. And bloody super girls like actually in love with him. Maybe. Sucks if she actually is. Could turn out well if she's not. A few nifty things have come out of the cross over though. Like batmans hella pimpy fur snow gear and super boy having to ware superman's suite for plot reasons leading supes to cutting about in his action comics causal jeans and S logo t shirt. Iv most likely said before but even though supermans the last hero you should give a causal costume too this one bizarrely works on him. Not actually sure what happened this issue. Aye the plot advanced but there was this silver surfer bug dude and galactus looking guy. I'm pretty sure drugs were involved with the writing of this issue. That or it was intentionally written to appear like it was written on drugs. I liked it !