Archive for Wolverine

Substitutes and Inferiors

The Brave and the Bold #35

I’d pretty much given up on this title — J. Michael Straczynski’s storytelling skills lately have ranged from incompetent to downright insulting. But I’ve got a weakness for both the Inferior Five and the Legion of Substitute Heroes, so I shelled out the dough to check it out.

This story is closely related to a previous “Brave and the Bold” story where the Legion of Super-Heroes and the Doom Patrol teamed up to save the future Earth from a black hole. Now in the aftermath, the Legion of Substitute Heroes have decided they’d like to get some of that Saving-the-World glory for themselves, so they steal a Time Bubble to try to team up with the Doom Patrol before the Legion can. But they arrive too late, the Legion and the Doom Patrol have already left, and they have to go look for a new team to join with — in this case, the Inferior Five. So in between various time travel mishaps, trying to explain advanced quantum theory to everyone, and losing Dumb Bunny’s tail in the Time Bubble’s machinery… the Legion of Super-Heroes and Doom Patrol still save the world by themselves. Oh, well, at least the Substitutes and the Inferior Five are still friends, right?

Verdict: I think I’ll actually give this a thumbs up. The main thing a story starring the Substitute Heroes and the Inferior Five needs to have is a nice big dollop of silly, and this was a pretty darn silly story. Sure, some of the jokes get hammered just a bit too hard, but it could’ve been a heck of a lot worse.

Astonishing Spider-Man and Wolverine #2

Well, Spider-Man and Wolverine have gone time-traveling, getting stuck in a future where the human race has been wiped out by Doctor Doom, after uploading his intellect into a planet, but the cavemen who Wolverine trained in the distant past have managed to survive and (barely) thrive. While Spidey does what he can to teach them science and try to find a way to defeat Doom the Living Planet if it ever comes back, Wolverine has locked himself away from the world to avoid the former cavemen who now worship him. Finally, Spidey finds the one weapon that could save everyone — the Phoenix Force — and manages to forge it into a single bullet. But when it’s fired, it’s guaranteed to kill whoever pulls the trigger. When Doom makes his return, is Spidey going to be able to fire that fateful bullet?

Verdict: Thumbs up. Lots of great stuff here, including Doom, the Phoenix Bullet, and Spidey’s replacement costume. The dialogue is nice, the artwork is great, and I’m loving the crazy ideas that are getting tossed around here.

Booster Gold #34

Rip Hunter tells Booster that since he rescued Rani from the future, he now has to take responsibility for her as her surrogate father. Booster isn’t ready for that responsibility, but his sister Michelle takes up the challenge. Still trying to figure out a way to stop Maxwell Lord in the past when he was a good guy, Booster takes another trip to the Justice League International days and runs into Ted Kord, who drags him along on one of his get-rich-quick schemes. Soon, Booster and Blue Beetle are on the trail of some strange thieves who stole a mystic book from the Vatican. Needing to track the thieves off-planet, they turn to Mister Miracle and Big Barda, who aren’t very enthusiastic about helping. After riding a Boom Tube to a quasi-fantasy world, they fight a dragon and come to the attention of a fairly unambitious-but-still-villainous wizard called Hieronymous the Under-Achiever. Can the heroes survive against his magical minions and enslaved subjects?

Verdict: A narrow thumbs up. I like the Bwa-Ha-Ha days of the Justice League just fine, but this doesn’t feel like one of the adventures of the new, more competent Booster Gold — it just feels like an old ’80s JLI tale. On the other hand, it is pretty funny, particularly the geeky Hieronymous.

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Lost in Time

Astonishing Spider-Man and Wolverine #1

Spidey and Wolverine have found themselves transported back to prehistoric times. While Spidey has turned into a hermit, caging up giant spiders, letting his beard grow, and doing hardcore research into the time period, Wolverine has taken up a role as the leader of a stone-age tribe, teaching them how to fend off larger and more barbaric cavemen. But Spidey’s discovered that an extinction-event meteor is on its way, and they’re all going to die tomorrow. Is there any hope for anyone to survive?

Verdict: Thumbs up. This had a very nice set-up and fun dialogue. Petey and Logan have been stuck out here for quite a while, and their limited interaction was pretty cool. Not sure we’re going to have any deeply meaningful story here — this is mainly an excuse to get Wolverine and Spider-Man involved in some fun time-travel stuff. There are some things that bug me — humans and dinosaurs never existed at the same time, and how did Peter Parker manage to refine glass lenses to make a telescope? — but those are minor quibbles in a very enjoyable story.

JSA All-Stars #6

A botched spell by Anna Fortune has somehow brought the terrible Subtle Realms to our own dimension — and released the monstrous King of Tears from captivity. Meanwhile, Stargirl has just discovered that the Atom-Smasher who she’s been traveling with for the past month is actually Johnny Sorrow in disguise — he’s been trying to get her to fall in love with him so he can sacrifice her to bring himself back to life. Is there any way for the team to destroy the King of Tears, stop Johnny Sorrow, and rescue Stargirl and the real Atom-Smasher?

Verdict: Amazingly, thumbs up. The art is still awful, but the story and pacing finally make up for it. We get multiple storylines with focuses on numerous JSA members, and they all make sense, and they all get decent coverage. That’s something that this book hasn’t managed yet, and I’m hoping it means good things for this title’s future.

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Friday Night Fights: Twerp Stompage!

It’s Friday night already? And we all feel the need to fightin’? Well, that must mean it’s time for Friday Night Fights!

This week, we turn to Marvel Adventures: The Avengers #24, by Jeff Parker, Ig Guara, and Jay Leisten, where the dastardly Hate-Monger shows Wolverine that insulting words really can hurt.

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Let that be a lesson for all of you: avoid people who can grow to a hundred feet tall and stomp you into the dirt.

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Wolverine Frog?

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This is one of those bizarre stories that just pops up out of nowhere and immediately gets snapped up by who-knows how many folks, so what the heck, I’ll jump on the bandwagon. Frogs that can pop claws like Wolverine? Surely a sane universe could never contain such things, right?

X-Men fans rejoice: Wolverine has come to life, as a frog. When the comic book warrior faces a fight, metallic blades spring forth from his hand. A new study concludes that certain African frogs are similarly equipped, having sharp, claw-shaped bones that pierce through their own fingertips when the animal is threatened.

More than 100 years ago, scientists observed the mysterious bony appendages in museum specimens of the Arthroleptidae frog family, but they had no idea what to make of them. Some speculated that the protrusions were an artifact of the preservation process. Harvard University biologists David Blackburn decided to solve the mystery once and for all after having the frequent misfortune of being injured by the amphibians while doing field research in Cameroon. “The frogs will start kicking and drag these claws against your skin,” he says. “I’ve gotten bloody scratches from them many a time.”

I… have no idea what to think of this. Frogs with retractible bone claws is something I’m sure I’ve had nightmares about. Time to go hide myself in the closet, I think…

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