The Archie Titans?

Tiny Titans/Little Archie #1

I have been looking forward to this a heck of a lot more than is probably healthy — partly because anything that Art Baltazar and Franco do on “Tiny Titans” is awesome, and partly because Archie crossovers with superhero universes tend to be ridiculously fun.

We start this thing off by discovering that Riverdale and Sidekick City are actually pretty close together geographically — close enough that Archie Andrews’ mom and Alfred the butler both go to the same dry cleaners — and when their outfits get mixed up, Archie ends up wearing Robin’s costume, and Robin ends up with trademark sweater. Once that mix-up gets cleared up, the Titans spend most of the issue visiting the school in Riverdale. Jughead provides hamburgers to Cyborg, Kid Devil tries to play tic-tac-toe on Archie’s head, and Mr. Weatherbee catches up with Principal Slade. And there’s an absolutely brilliant sequence with Miss Grundy that actually made me laugh out loud.

Verdict: Thumbs up. I had high hopes for this one — they were met and exceeded. Go get it, people.

Marvel Adventures: Super Heroes #7

Iron Man and the Black Widow investigate a report of a crashed UFO off the coast of Portugal when they get captured by an undersea base run by a woman calling herself the White Spider. She ws supposed to be the Black Widow’s replacement, but instead, she’s trying to take over the world. She keeps Iron Man unconscious while she tries to figure out how to access his armor, and she takes away Black Widow’s costume, which is full of a lot of useful gadgets. Can Natasha figure out how to stop the White Spider’s plans? Meanwhile, back at Avengers Mansion, the rest of the team accidentally uncovers some of the Black Widow’s secrets…

Verdict: Thumbs up. Good fun, great dialogue, fun artwork. Nice to see a focus on the Black Widow in this one.

Green Lantern #58

Atrocitus and Sinestro try to find the rage entity as it looks for a new host, Carol Ferris accepts her new role as the queen of the Star Sapphires, and Adara, the hope entity, selects a kidnapped girl named Nicole Morrison as its new host.

Verdict: Thumbs up, but just barely. It’s a bit of a place-holder story, and the only really interesting thing happening here is the character of Nicole Morrison.

DC Comics Presents Jack Cross 100-Page Spectacular

Okay, a while back, Warren Ellis and Gary Erskine started this comic, about a hard-boiled, ruthless anti-terrorism specialist who liked to spend his off-hours organizing anti-war protests. They planned to make it an ongoing series, but it ran out of steam after the first four issues. So a couple of weeks ago, DC put out all four of those issues into this small collection, in which Jack tries to track down a conspiracy within the government that’s trying to obtain a new superweapon and use it on the American public.

Verdict: Thumbs up. The price tag on this one is eight bucks, but this may be the only way you’ll ever get to read this story — and it’s definitely more than worth the price. Jack makes a great hero, the action is pretty fantastic, and it’s great fun to read. If you can still find this one, try to get yourself a copy.

Today’s Cool Links:

• Chris Sims got to visit the offices of MAD magazine, and he brought back awesome pictures to prove it.
• New posts from Allie Brosh are always a wonderful thing, but her latest features some of her best stuff.
• Giga Pudding!