Eleven-Month-Old Comics: The February 1 Edition (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

It's been a few months - OK, almost a year - but am I going to give it the old college try and attempt to get through my backlog?  Yes, I am!

Captain America:  Sentinel of Liberty #9:  Honestly, I'm not entirely sure what happens here.  I think Captain America and his new Invaders' attempt to free Manhattan from A.I.M.'s control is all part of a simulation that M.O.D.O.C. created to keep them busy for...reasons?  I think?  Complicating matters, someone attacked M.O.D.O.K. during an interlude, but I'm not sure what conclusion we're supposed to draw from the attack.  It maybe turned him into M.O.D.O.C.?  Maybe?  Oof, this issue.

Dark Web Finale #1:  I don't even know what to say here.  This entire event was so utterly ridiculous that it seems equally ridiculous to try to recap it.  It's my job, though, so I'll try.

Madelyne opens Limbo's embassy to the United States in New York to show the people in the dark that they're also in the light.  (We're really pushing the "bad guys are just misunderstood good guys" schtick beyond the point of reasonable disbelief here.)  She also decides to keep Ben in prison in Limbo (something all good guys would totally do).  Of all the possible outcomes for Ben, "locked in prison in Limbo" is the lowest on my preferred list.  I'd almost rather him dead.

Of my many complaints about this "event," the central one is the fact that Wells seems to have created a solution to Ben's problem that no one ever suggested.  I don't see why Jean could've shared Peter's memories with Ben the way she did with Madelyne. Before this event, Wells implied that Peter would lose his memories if he shared them with Ben (though Wells never really fleshed out that premise).  As such, Jean's abilities resolve that problem (if it was indeed a problem).  

But, again, no one even suggests that course of action.  It isn't like someone did suggest it and Peter refused because he wouldn't be special if he shared his memories with Ben.  That would've at least given us an interesting moral quandary, since Peter would definitely be the asshole in that situation.  But, again, we never even get there.

In other words, given that Ben's lack of Peter's (good) memories is allegedly what drives Chasm's darkness, he seems a pretty problem to solve with Jean's help.  (He isn't Maria.)  

To make matters worse, Peter constantly harangues Ben for his anger that he isn't really a person, as if he should just get over it.  Does Peter forget the "Shrieking" arc, where he decided that he'd never be Peter Parker again given the pain he felt losing his parents during "Lifetheft?"  Again, even if Peter isn't the asshole (in the sense that he's unaware he could use Jean's powers to solve the problem), he is here.

I could continue but I won't.  It's all a fucking mess.

Minor Threats #4:  Holy fucking shit, this issue is amazing and intense.

Patton and Blum do a phenomenal job of keeping the gang ridiculous but the story serious all at once.  I really had no idea where the story was going page to page.  

More than anything, though, it's Pigeon's narration that makes this issue, as it really amps up the emotional punch of his eventual heel turn.  

In a flashback, Pigeon breaks into a museum to steal Fabergé eggs only to find a scalped security guard with one of the eggs implanted in his exposed brain.  His horror at the scene reminds me of Riddler's iconic line from "Secret Origins Special" #1:  "Joker is killing people, for God's sake."

Returning to the present, Pigeon explicates Stickman's goals for us.  First, he decided that his relationship with Insomniac had gotten too complicated.  He wanted to go back to basics; by killing Kid Dusk, he discarded the "child-endangerment thing."  Next, Stickman set the trap at the Trophy Room to trim Insomniac's rogues' gallery.  Now, he implants bombs in the team's brainstems and sends them, via his sidekick Sideswipe, to the Dream Cave with enough C-4 to destroy it.  To Stickman's mind, he'll make Insomniac "fun again" by breaking all his toys.  Ho boy.  Not many people are playing with full decks in Twilight City.

But the team's paranoia about the traitor amongst them gets the better of them; as Stickman listens via the microphones he fitted on them, they kill each other.  After Stickman arrives, a toy distracts Sideswipe, and his portal closes while he's halfway through it, killing him.

Of course, it turns out the gang isn't dead.  That said, man, the guys had me going there for a while.  I noticed the various tanks full of fish when the gang arrived in the Dream Cave, and apparently Scalpel did as well.  Once Playtime used her powers to send in nano-sized Army soldiers to remove the bombs from their brains, Scalpel used the puffer fish's tetrodotoxin to simulate their deaths.  

Confronting Stickman, Brain Tease claims that he saw through Stickman's "ruse" about a traitor amongst them, but he's proven wrong yet again when Pigeon holds a gun behind Playtime's head.

Via another flashback, Pigeon explains that he feared not just a future that involved this new level of brutality but also that he had no role in it.  Throwing in his lot with Stickman, Pigeon decided he might escape irrelevance.  (The scene where someone sends him a drink in a lonely diner on Christmas Eve is devastating.)  

As Stickman starts attacking the gang, Pigeon begins to realize his mistake and recalls how he had no one and nothing, but putting on the mask made him somebody.  He aches for the days when "the Code" meant something and the supervillains were all thick as thieves.  To save Frankie, he drives the Dreammobile (or whatever it's called) into Stickman.  Stickman tries to kill Pigeon as he reaches through the broken windshield, but Frankie uses his hammer to kill him.

With Stickman dead, a terrified Frankie tries to find a way to escape the Dream Cave.  But Insomniac arrives, and he's fucking nuts.  He's furious they took away killing Stickman from him and attacks Frankie.  Snake Stomper saves her, telling Insomniac that his punch is for Diego Salas before Insomniac kills him, another devastating moment in this issue.  Insomniac moves to take out Frankie, but she sees Toy Queen's jack-in-the-box gun in one of Insomniac's shattered trophy cases and uses it to decapitate him.  Never has a murder felt more just, I have to say.

In a news report, we watch as the cops lead Brian Tease to prison for the murders, and he seems thrilled.  Toy Queen wakes from a nap to find the blood-splattered gun where it belonged in her trophy case, realizing (also with joy) that Frankie killed Insomniac.

Frankie goes to Pigeon's hospital room and tells him that the Continuum agreed to leave Redport if she agreed to keep Insomniac's murder quiet.  To his horror, she then exiles him from Twilight City.  We later see Frankie with her daughter, so it's clear that the Continuum also cleared Frankie's name.  (Frankie's daughter apparently made a terrifying toy pony at daycare, so that's fun.)

Later that night, Frankie enters the bar where it all began.  Based on the respectful (and fearful) looks she gets, everyone knows that she killed Insomniac and Stickman.  Someone hands her usual ("Chilled it eight minutes like you said."), and she passes a shrine to Snake Stomper to the backroom.  There, Scalpel has a superhero tied to a chair, and he starts to rant about the Continuum.  Frankie holds a gun to his head and tells him to send a message that superheros aren't welcome in Redport.  He asks what the message is, and she says, "You are."

In other words, it's all just fucking amazing.  Unlike the tonal mess that is Wells' "Amazing Spider-Man," Oswalt and Blum really manage to combine drama and humor in a wonderful blend, so you never really know what to expect panel to panel.  I cannot recommend this series enough.

Moon Knight #20:  This issue is solid.  

Someone - "the Ghost in the Telephone" - brainwashed a pair of two-bit goons who 8 Ball identifies as the Harlequin Hit Men and had them kill Marc's five of the 12 members of Marc's former "Shadow Cabinet."  Hilariously, Marc dismisses the Hit Men as D-List villains given that 8 Ball called them "a couple of jokes" and they once fought Speedball.  But Marc isn't likely to take their murder spree lightly.

The back-up story is possibly the best part.  We learn that Marc's predecessor once helped Blade, so he's willing to do Marc a favor and teach Reece how to be a vampire.  I wouldn't have put two and two together there, but I'm thrilled McKay did because it's a great pairing.  Reece showed her worth in the main story as Marc's "woman in the chair," keeping him focused and using Jake to identify the route the Hit Men were taking so he could stop them.  Under Blade's guidance, she'll be a kick-ass vampire.

Star Wars:  Sana Starros #1:  Sana has two dads!  As a gay man raising a kick-ass daughter, I have to say that I love the idea that my little girl could one day maim and murder her way across the galaxy with the flare and grumpiness of Sana Starros.  (We also learn that Sana has an estranged twin brother, Phel.)

The issue begins with Sana realizing that she needs a break after apparently ending her relationship with Aphra.  As such, she comes to her grandmother's house, where her grandmother, Grammy Thea, informs us that she always comes home after a break-up.

Of course, it turns out Sana isn't the only one who makes questionable romantic decisions in the Starros family.  Her cousin, Aryssha, is pregnant with twins whose father is an Imperial officer, Captain Cerasus Ehllo, who storms Sana's grandmother house to find Aryssha.  It turns out Aryssha wanted to give birth at her ancestral home, but Ehllo wants her to give birth on his ship.  He takes her with him and then orders his troopers to kill Aryssha's mother, Mevera, and Grammy Thea.

Of course, Sana saves them...except they pretty much save themselves.  They take her to the armory, underscoring that Sana isn't the only, um, "capable" woman in the family.  It also turns out Ehllo taking Aryssha is part of the family's plan to steal back a family heirloom.  As Sana says, you can see why she doesn't visit often.  So much for her vacation.

Six-Month-Old Comics: The October 5 Non-Event, Non-Marvel Edition (HERE BE SPOILERS!) (Updated with "Blade Runner: Black Lotus" #3)

Batman #128:  This issue is spectacular.  If you didn't believe Zdarksy and Jiménez were going to deliver an epic story after the first three issues, this issue will make a believer of you.

Zdarksy leans fully into the Tower of Babel as Bruce helplessly watches Failsafe use Superman's moves against him (as he would do).  Failsafe lures Superman into a position where he can stab him with a kryptonite shard.  Bruce and Clark are only saved because Black Canary, Green Arrow, Hawkwoman, and Martian Manhunter arrive.  

Realizing he's outnumbered, Failsafe leads them to a Gotham block that Bruce owns.  Showing how deeply the Failsafe program ran, Failsafe deploys a series of countermeasures designed specifically to take out Black Canary, Hawkwoman, and Martian Manhunter.  When Nightwing wonders how Failsafe plans to take out him and Green Arrow, Failsafe responds simply that he'll do it personally, since he can clearly just beat them to death.  Fun!

I can't explain how brilliant this entire sequence is.  Zdarksy shows how Zur-en-Arrh has anticipated the Justice League's every move since Bruce would've anticipated every move.  In so doing, Zdarsky also displays an extensive and intuitive grasp of Bruce's character.  Plus, Jiménez is on fucking fire throughout these scenes.  He not only delivers amazing action sequences but also somehow captures the terror on the heroes' faces as Failsafe surprises them at each turn.

To that point, Zdarksy also uses small moments to convey the situation's seriousness.  For example, Green Arrow dryly remarks, "That's...bad," when he and Tim discover Bruce slumped over Clark.  (Bruce lost consciousness after bandaging Clark's wound.)  I mean, I think we'd all respond with a certain level of terror at seeing Batman and Superman seemingly dead.

At this point, Green Arrow metaphorically throws the keys of the League's ship to Tim and tells him to escape with Bruce and Clark.  A barely conscious Bruce sends Tim to the Fortress of Solitude to heal Superman, since he's the world's hero.  Before he dives off the plane (so that Failsafe doesn't follow him to the Fortress), Bruce tells Tim how proud he is of him.  Again, it's a small moment, but it's also a sure sign that Bruce thinks that he's going to die.

But Bruce (and Zdarsky) isn't done.  Aquaman saves him, and Bruce awakens two weeks later mostly healed.  Aquaman then informs him that Failsafe has taken over Gotham to goad him into returning.  It's a full Brother Eye situation as some Bat-Family members (like Oracle) are captured and other ones (like Cassandra Cain and The Signal) are on the run from the robot minions that Failsafe has patrolling Gotham.  Zdarsky ends the issue with Bruce contemplating his cowl and asking himself what the plan is, in a way doesn't inspire much confidence.

The "Zur-en-Arrh:  Year One" back-up story is just as compelling as we watch Bruce undergoing his "treatments" to create Zur-en-Arrh.  Bruce wants privacy, but Commissioner Gordon gets him on the red phone when Joker starts poisoning people again.  Bruce meets Gordon who comments that Joker is behaving like he used to be.  Bruce observes that he's behaving like he was before Dick became Robin and lightened up everyone.  (I love this comment, a sly almost ret-con of Joker's more cartoonish iterations.)  But Bruce realizes the victims of Joker's poison aren't smiling and wonders if Joker isn't broken like he is, a truly terrifying prospect.

In case I didn't make it clear, this issue is a candidate for Issue of the Year.  I love everything Zdarksy and his creative team are doing here.

Blade Runner:  Black Lotus #3:  This issue  is rough.  The script is basically a never-ending sequence of the characters uttering clichés.  For example, Dixon, Junkett, and Miguel all utter some version of, "I knew there was something different about [Elle] when I first laid eyes on her."  The plot is better, but at times the visuals don't match what the characters are describing.  For example, when Junkett reveals her stash of explosives for Elle to bring to Barnes' facility, Miguel calls her a genius, even though he's just looking at a large metal box.  I'm hoping next issue is stronger than this one.

Minor Threats #2:  Although this issue isn't as great as the first one, it's still a good time.  

Brain Tease puts together the pieces to the puzzle of Stickman's motives and deduces that he's heading to the Trophy Room Nightclub to brag about killing Kid Dusk.  (Brain Tease realized that Stickman would've been able to see the Trophy Room's spotlights from his prison cell.)  Brain Tease is right, though not in the way he thinks.  

In a truly grotesque and shocking scene, Stickman's henchmen roll out Kid Dusk's corpse on a motorized wheelchair.  The Insomniac appears and cries over Kid Dusk's body, leading Playtime to realize that Stickman was chumming the waters to get revenge on the elite criminals who never approved of him.  Playtime follows Stickman's henchmen onto the roof, but she's wounded when one of their bullets ricochets off a pursuing Insomniac's armor.

Again, although it lacks of some of the first issue's charms, it compensates by showing the very real stakes at play here.  The Insomniac's rampage through the Trophy Room makes you realize the Continuum may be too late to stop him from going too far.  It also makes you wonder if Playtime is going to realize how far over her head she is here.

Undiscovered Country #21:  Now we're getting somewhere.

The Resistance duo bring Ace, Chang, and Janet to a bunker under the completely obliterated Forbidden City, where they're surprised to learn that Pavel is leading the Resistance.  Pavel explains that he survived and took over Destiny and then walks the trio through this sub-zone's status quo.  

We learn that America opened its doors 13 days after the team entered it and the team emerged with a cure for Sky.  Despite the world seemingly on its way to reconciliation, Chang and Janet saw something in America that convinces the AEA and PAPZ to destroy America.  Instead, America makes short work of the Alliance in a three-week war, establishing Pax Americana.

Beyond the obvious question of what Chang and Janet saw, I'm also curious how exactly Chang and Janet didn't know that America would win.  After all, Pavel describes America unleashing all the horrors that we've already seen on the world.  How did Chang and Janet not think it was going to do that?

Snyder and Soule don't dwell on that question, as it's clear we're not supposed to be thinking too hard about these hypothetical outcomes.  When President Graves somehow invades the bunker under the Forbidden City, his men mow down everyone.  Just like Charlotte and Valentina, Chang and Janet awaken to a new reality, one where they and Pavel rule the world.

Meanwhile, Charlotte and Valentina aren't doing so well.  They make their way to Sam in Pearl Harbor while discussing how they still feel their wounds from their previous deaths and feel weaker.  Sam confirms that they only have so many lives left, and an irate Valentina pins him to the ship where he's a captain so that he can die with them.  Instead of moving to the future, they discover themselves in the middle of the Civil War.

This arc has definitely lit a fire under this series in a positive way, but I'll also admit that some of these mysteries are getting old.  In a way, nothing here really helps us understand more about Aurora and the series' core mysteries, as we're spending our time just sussing out Zone History's mysteries.  I'm sure they'll be connected, but it's probably about time to get there.

Six-Month-Old Comics: The August 24 Non-Marvel Edition (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

Minor Threats #1:  Oswald and Blum don't really hide their influences here, which makes this issue all the more enjoyable.

The series' premise is that the Justice League (the Continuum) is panicked that the Insomniac (Batman) is going to interrogate a super-villain to death in his quest for the Stickman, who murdered his sidekick, Kid Dust (Robin).  Terrified that the Continuum's crackdown is going to risk her ability to reconcile with her daughter, Playtime (Silk Spectre II) assembles the crowd at the Lower Lair (The Bar with No Name) to hunt down the Stickman on its own.

But Oswald and Blum don't rest in just giving us the type of premise that really only "Invincible" has given us.  Frankie (a.k.a. Playtime) is a fully developed character in just one issue.  Her mother (Toy Queen) is as awful as Silk Spectre I was to Silk Spectre II, seeing Frankie as a sidekick and not a daughter.  An elderly Toy Queen is jealous that Frankie had a power, the ability to create complex machines with whatever she can find.  But Frankie's childhood was so terrible that all the machines still look like toys, a subconscious acknowledgement of her mother's emotions and physical abandonment.  Toy Queen at least wants her to reconcile with her daughter, Maggie, so she helps get Frankie a job bartending at the Lower Lair.

Oswald and Blum makes the stakes clear though when one of the Continuum snatches Frankie in front of her daughter as she's begging her estranged partner to let her see Maggie.  Maggie is terrified, setting back Frankie's efforts to reconcile with her.  Frankie sees little choice than take out the Stickman on her own to end the Continuum's harassment, though she admits that she engaged in her costumed career because she was good at it.

You could see an ending her were the Continuum brings on Frankie as a good guy, solving all her problems.  Oswald and Blum make it clear that Frankie is probably the biggest impediment to that happening.

Sins of the Black Flamingo #3:  Given the fact that Sebastian actually has emotions in this issue, it's surprisingly dull.  Even the sex montage between Ezekiel and Sebastian feels rote.

The issues begins with Sebastian's resurrection.  Uninterested in the details, he heads straight for Ezekiel and they have sex.  Ofelia is worried about said details, as they involve a love-lorn Abel connecting his heartbeat with Sebastian's.  Sebastian confesses to Ezekiel that his presence on Earth makes him questions everything he thought he knew after touching the Devil's Tooth, namely that Earth is Hell, we're the Devil, and the creator - if one ever existed - was a blip, nothing more.  Ezekiel informs Sebastian that only a damned object can break his collar and, once it happens, he will exit this body and return to Heaven.

Sebastian has to break into his own house to retrieve the Tooth to break the collar and finds Scar's men ransacked it.  (Before he leaves for his house, he blows off Abel as he attempts to confess his love to him.)  As Sebastian looks over his tossed belongings, we get an awkward flashback.  Sebastian got started on the road to the occult when he had a long-term affair with his archeology professor, Hugo Tarn. He and Tarn spent months, if not years, robbing graves, museums, and sites, until they found the Tooth.  Tarn tells Sebastian to touch it to see if it really did "reveal the true beauty of the world."  Sebastian instantly becomes Raistlin and spends three years in a psych ward.  By the time he's released, Tarn is dead.

In the present, Sebastian opens his disguised safe to get the Tooth, but a bleached blonde guy surprises him.  Holding a gun at Sebastian, we learn that the guy has been stalking Sebastian on Grindr, but Sebastian doesn't fuck racists.  The guy tells Sebastian that he told "his boss" that Sebastian was the "little bitch who robbed your museum" after he saw him and Ezekiel arrive at the South Beach party.  Sebastian tosses the Tooth at the guy, destroying his mind, but the aforementioned boss - a crazed Ann Coulter-like figure - tazes him.  Wearing gloves, she grabs the Tooth and informs Sebastian that "the American Reich is about to get its own pet angel."

Again, meh.  I can't put my finger exactly on why this issue was so boring but it was.  I feel like Wheeler doesn't go as far as I want him to go.  For example, we never really learn what Sebastian saw in Tarn, who exhibits seriously creepy vibes.  Hopefully we'll get a better sense of what motivates Sebastian in future issues.