Lots of Reviews

Egad, but that was a long drought between comic book purchases! But here I have two weeks worth of reviews, although I would imagine that you've all read LAST weeks already. Still...I am compulsive about these things.

I picked up Batman;The Brave & the Bold #5 mainly because it had Guy Gardner on the cover, and also because I just miss it SO much. It has Guy and Bats fighting Manhunters, which was a whole lot of fun. Lobo shows up. It's delightful.

Batman $ Robin #21. Well I liked this. I liked it a lot. It turns out that someone is going after the relatives of the various inhabitants of Arkham, fitting them out with beautiful angel wings, and sending them to their eternal reward. Whether they want to go or not, courtesy of the White Knight. There is some detective work, some snarkiness by Damian, some dry wit by Alfred, Gordon, some spookiness and what has to be one of the BEST pictures of Batman and Robin...ever. Pat Gleason shows them swooping across the skies of Gotham, with the Bat-signal illuminating the sky behind them. Gave me shivers, it did. I am liking this a whole lot too.

Birds of Prey #10. Rest easy, Oracle isn't dead. But we all pretty much knew that. However, that doesn't mean that the rest of the Birds are particularly happy, and they do their very very best to piss off the Calculator and his cronies. And of course, they do a particularly good job of it. Hawk shows up, and there is even a non-appearance by Batman that made me smile. The end result is that with Oracle "dead" she can go back to working in the shadows. The only people who know that she's still alive are the Birda,and a bunch of Bat-people. But not Cass, because she has enough on her plate. Or something. Still, pretty darned good.

Booster Gold#42. Well! Booster is in prison, and gets a cell-mate known as the Perforated Man. The Perforated Man seems a bit...odd, and they keep making time jumps all over the place. It turns out to no one's particular surprise, that the Perforated Man is actually Booster! Who'da thunk? He's been infected by whatever it was that Doctor Nishtikeit injected him with. Oh those Nazis! So Booster has Chronal Lebrosy, which sounds and looks most unpleasant.

This...was ok. Not great, not terrible, but man, I'll be glad to have Jurgens back again.

Brightest Day #21

Well THAT was exciting! This issue mostly covers J'onn and his continuing battle with D'Kay on Mars. While back on earth, a whole lot of other heroes are dealing with the aftermath of the Aquawar, and are beginning to realize that something is wrong. Seriously wrong.

J'onn continues to hold off D'Kay, who just won't give up. I have to say that once again Pat Gleason does a phenomenal job with the art. D'Kay is just so...terribly alien that it's fabulous. She's pulling out every trick in the book including trying to convince J'onn that he's gotten her pregnant. He's not falling for it however, and finally pulls the ultimate whammy himself. She's a telepath who hates to listen, but he gives her the thoughts of everyone on Earth. It's a lot, but not quite enough, so he grabs her and flies...into the sun.

And THAT was the Fire that he was supposed to set! The Life Entity is pleased and brings him back and gives him a choice between Mars or Earth. J'onn finally choses Earth, and flies to Star City, where he immediately tries to save people from the conflagration going on around the mystic foresst. Naturally, that's when poor Deadman shows up. He tries to warn J'onn, but J'onn knows what is going to happen, and goes gracefully.

Things are really moving along now, and I can hardly wait to see what is going to happen! Very very good.

Cinderella: Fables Are Forever #2.

Cinderella is up against Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz! There are Russian Fables, and smaller splinter groups and treachery and all kinds of good things. Delightful.

Green Lantern #63 Man, the Guardians are Douchebags.

Jonah Hex #65

I liked this a whole lot more than last month's issue. Jonah gets caught in a blizzard, and is rescued by a nice guy, who is stuck up on the mountains, trying to get his cattle to market. They end up fighting some wolves, and some extremely nasty bad guys, and each time, he nurses Jonah back to health. He also tells him a little about his old life, and how he made some mistakes but just wants to atone for it.

Naturally Jonah takes out all the bad guys and rides out, and we discover that he had originally come out to get the bounty on the man who saved him...but he lets him go. Nice. Very nice.

Justice League: Generation Lost #21

Now this was a perfectly nice issue. No idiotic unneccesary retcons or origins. I'll just fill you in right now, that Blue Beetle ISN'T dead. But they did their best to fake us out right up to the last page.

But anyway, poor Booster is having a bit of a crisis of conscious. He was the one who kept pushing them all to go after Max, and now all these people are dead, he thinks because of him. He wants to quit, but of course the rest of them won't let him. Captain Shinypants is also having a bit of a fit of the guilts, and Ice manages to calm him down...and she doesn't utter a single swear word. Really, it was quite refreshing.

Gavril is sad because Jaime was so young to die, and he's doing his best to make sure that his armor is up and functioning correctly, while Bea wanders in and talks to him. Then she goes and lays a big smooch on him, which both surprises and delights him. Finally! These two have been making googoo eyes at each other for a while now. And quite frankly, Bea deserves to have a boyfriend. And Gavril is a nice guy.

So anyway, Booster is having a tantrum about how he should quit, and how once, just once he'd actually like to get the better of Max, when Jaime stands up behind him and points out that he knows what Max's plans are, and a cheer goes up from the crowd! Jaime's not dead! The characters that I love are actually written...in character! See, it CAN be done!

Secret Six #31

Oh my goodness1 Remember that little old plot device left over from the mess with Ragdoll's crazy sister, and the "Get-Out-Of-Hell-Free" card? Well, Scandal decides that the time has come to use it, to get Knockout out of Hell, and goes to retrieve it, only to find out that it's missing. She immediately pegs Ragdoll as the thief, and goes and tries to beat him up. And, in a really spectacular fight scene, we discover that as funny and adorable as Ragdoll is usually portrayed...he's certainly NO pushover, and he's a whole lot more dangerous than he's usually portrayed as being. Scandal loses it and guts him, and then things really go to hell.

Literally. Black Alice finds them the entrance to Hell, which is actually a shopping mall that is hilarious and terrifying all at the same time. Alice is genuinely terrified, and she stays behind, so the rest of them, including Killer Shark go to Hell, and manage to meet up with Etrigan...not to mention Ragdoll. And Ragdoll has brought friends. Oh, it's going to be good bloody fun.

Not a clunker in the bunch. I love it when I only get GOOD comics!