Funky Phantoms

Ghosted #4

Jackson Winters and his crew of heist-artists need to steal a ghost out of the notoriously haunted Trask Mansion, and they’ve hit on the idea of getting one of their number possessed by a ghost so they can walk the poor schmuck out of the house and then get him exorcised to hand the spirit over to creepy rich bastard Markus Schrecken. Unfortunately, the guy who gets possessed is Robby Trick, the only member of the crew who can perform an exorcism. Even more unfortunately, one of the reality show videographers, Joe Burns, has already been killed by the ghosts. And even more unfortunately, Anderson Lake, the security consultant, is working against everyone. And worst of all? The sun has set, and all hell is going to break loose.

Verdict: Thumbs up. Excellent, spooky, hard-boiled stuff. Great characterization and dialogue, fun art, and an increasing sense of doom. Just what I need in my horror.

Batgirl #24

Barbara Gordon is in disguise trying to save her boyfriend, but he’s just been shot by Commissioner Gordon. She manages to escape, after beating the snot out of a couple dozen cops and soon learns that Knightfall is behind the increase of super-weapons in the hands of gangs — she lets the gangsters kill each other, then mops up the few who are left. And now Knightfall and much of Batgirl’s rogues gallery are after the Commissioner. How can Barbara stop them all by herself?

Verdict: Thumbs up. The story is really keen, the art is gorgeous, and I’d love to see how it all turns out. Of all the mainstream DC books I’m going to miss when I drop them from my pull list in the next week or two, this is probably the one I’m going to miss the most.

The Manhattan Projects #15

We have only one character in this issue: Oppenheimer. Or rather Evil Oppenheimer, Good Oppenheimer, and their armies of alternate Oppenheimer clones, all waging schizophrenic war within the mind of Oppenheimer. The Good Oppenheimers are trying to control Oppenheimer’s mind through innovation, while the Evil Oppenheimers work to defeat them through assimilation. Which side will win?

Verdict: Thumbs up. A weird issue, even by this comic’s standards. But it’s excellent, it’s violent, it’s funny, and it’s going to make the future issues even weirder.

Today’s Cool Links:

• If you love Superman, you’ll love this video, created by Bruce Timm himself.
• We don’t have anything to fear from zombies, because the animals are on our side. By the way, the animals are also terrifyingly likely to kill us anyway.
• Ahh, so that’s how the grandmasters play chess!
• These “Breaking Bad” Halloween costumes made me laugh and laugh and laugh.