Wonder Woman #21

With the monstrously powerful First Born and his henchwoman, the cyborg demigod Cassandra, prepared to kill Zola and use her baby Zeke to destroy the world, Wonder Woman and Lennox are having trouble slowing the villains down. Orion shows up to help, but he’s not managing to tip the scales too much over on the good guys’ side either. Orion drags all of them along into a boom tube to escape, but the First Born actually holds the tube open so he can get to them. Is there any escape?

Verdict: Thumbs up. Great art from Cliff Chiang, fun writing from Azzarello. Excellent action, a nice cliffhanger ending for one character, and a modernized take on Jack Kirby’s Fourth World.

Uncanny Avengers #9

The Avengers are in disarray — while Wonder Man helped Captain America escape from Hydra, Cap also had a secret meeting with Kang the Conqueror, who revealed that the future of seven different timelines are threatened by current events. And the Apocalypse Twins revealed to Thor that Wolverine has killed dangerous mutants as a member of X-Force. As a result, Cap wants Logan — and any of his supporters — off the team. And it doesn’t help that everyone is still arguing about Havok’s controversial rejection of his mutant identity. And worse is on the horizon — the Apocalypse Twins have assembled a new quartet of the Horsemen — the ominously-named Four Horsemen of Death…

Verdict: Thumbs down. Ye gods, is this ever a talky comic book. There are so many word balloons in here, you could use ’em to float a house. The Apocalypse Twins talk to each other so they can provide exposition for readers. Kang does the same. Wolverine does the same. And Rick Remender lets Scarlet Witch function as his mary-sue mouthpiece so he can try to defuse the controversy he caused by turning Alex Summers into a self-loathing mutant. (It doesn’t work, by the way — Remender’s rationalizations are still insulting.)

We had a short break from the battles last week, but we’re back on schedule for this weekend. Break out the Funyuns and Yoo-Hoo, kids — it’s time for… FRIDAY NIGHT FIGHTS!

Tonight’s battle comes to us from May 2009’s Secret Six #7 by Gail Simone, Nicola Scott, Doug Hazlewood, and Rodney Ramos. Bane has dosed himself with a little Venom, and he’s ready to party!

That’ll do it for me this week — see y’all on Monday morning.

Batwoman #21

This might be the first issue of this series that includes less-than-beautiful artwork — but it’s still absolutely perfect for the story being told.

Our focal character is Killer Croc, most recently seen transmogrified into the Hydra by Medusa’s magic. After the defeat of the Medusa, he was taken in by the were-creatures of the Church of Crime, slowly recovered, and took a lover, a snake woman named Claire. After the death of Abbot, the Church wants a new leader, and they’ve decided the Croc can be their king if he kills Batwoman. Is the most brutish of Batman’s foes smart enough to kill Kate Kane?

Verdict: Thumbs up. I really loved the focus on Croc, and the characterization that has him mostly as a bruiser, but with unexpected depths of emotion and intelligence. The art by Francesco Francavilla is rougher than we’ve come to expect from this series — but Killer Croc is also a great deal rougher than our usual protagonists. It works out very well.

Captain Marvel #13

Well, this is going to end up getting awkward. This series is crossing over with “Avengers Assemble” as Carol Danvers tries to figure out who’s behind the attacks on her and what’s causing her strange brain disease. So we’re only getting half the story, unfortunately.

One of Carol’s old enemies, a Kree villain called Yon-Rogg is back, but Carol doesn’t know it. In an attempt to kill her, he’s activated a bunch of robotic Kree Sentries all over the planet. While she, her friends, and some of the Avengers, including Spider-Woman and Bruce Banner, try to brainstorm solutions to the various problems, the Sentries start roaming around and tearing stuff up, while the rest of the Avengers try to keep everything under control.

Verdict: Thumbs down. I just hate these crossovers. They never seem to make a lick of sense. And artwise, this series is still in trouble. The artwork has definitely improved with Scott Hepburn and Gerardo Sandoval working the pencils — but it’s still way, way below the quality that this series deserves. Once again, is Marvel trying to kill off this series with sub-par artwork?

The Manhattan Projects #12

Harry Daghlian knows that Enrico Fermi is an alien. Fermi doesn’t like hearing about that at all. So he transforms into his “drone” form — a large insectile monstrosity — tears Daghlian to pieces, and pitches him into space. Then he heads back to the moonbase to tear stuff up and ruin everything for the Projects. Can Feynman, Oppenheimer, Groves, Einstein, von Braun, Gagarin, and Laika save the day? Or is bad science done for good?

Verdict: Thumbs up. Fermi has been my favorite character in this series for a while, and it’s great to see him cut loose. It’s also interesting to see some of the plots that have gone on behind the scenes and right under our noses. Grand stuff — hope you’re reading it.

Batgirl #21

Barbara Gordon is going through angst city over the supposed death of her brother, but she heads off to capture the Ventriloquist and rescue her hostage as a little shock therapy. As seems to be the theme for all of Batgirl’s adventures, she spends most of the issue getting knocked around — by the new Ventriloquist’s telekinetically-controlled puppet and her dead parents — before she finally grabs her victory.

Verdict: Thumbs down. Mostly because I’m tired of seeing Batgirl get stomped on every issue. Barbara just isn’t that good at crimefighting. It’s a minor miracle that Batman hasn’t either ordered her to hang up the cape or started her on some sort of serious training regimen to keep her from getting killed by the next random jaywalker to cross her path…

Today’s Cool Links:

• No one likes the Superman-Wonder Woman romance. And the Superman-Lois Lane romance is spotlighted and popular in “Man of Steel.” So of course, DC Comics — ever stupid — wants to do a new comic entirely devoted to the stupid Superman-Wonder Woman romance. I’ll retire to Bedlam.
• And now Spider-Man has a brand-new long-lost sister. Mark Waid and James Robinson, this is stupid stuff.
• You owe it to yourself to learn from the sad tales in the Sad Cat Diary and the Sad Dog Diary.

The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys #1

See, there’s this guy named Gerard Way, and if y’all read comics, you know he wrote the “Umbrella Academy” series, which is completely awesome. And you probably also know that he was the lead singer of a band called My Chemical Romance, and their last album “Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys,” featured a couple of videos in which the band portrayed the Killjoys, rebels in a day-glo post-apocalyptic future, opposed by mask-wearing soldiers called Draculoids and a corporate assassin called Korse who looked just like Grant Morrison.

So what we’ve got here is Way’s continuation of the storyline from those videos. Years have passed since the Killjoys were murdered by Korse and his Draculoids, and the Girl they tried to protect is on her own, wandering in the desert with her black cat. She runs into some punks in the desert who alternately hinder her and help her. Meanwhile, in the slums of Battery City, a pleasure droid works to buy a new battery for her — sister? Coworker? Lover? Beats me. And Korse has been reactivated so he can capture the Girl and destroy anyone associated with her.

Verdict: Thumbs up. I can’t be said to be all that familiar with the Killjoys’ backstory, but what this comic has generally makes good sense and is fun to read — I was fairly concerned that the opposite would be the case. The script by Way and Shaun Simon is well-done and fun, especially the monologues on the radio from Dr. Death-Defying. And the art by Becky Cloonan is really nice, too.

Batman: Li’l Gotham #3

It’s Valentine’s Day, and the Joker just hates Valentine’s Day. He’s not a fan of love in general, and he really hates it when Harley Quinn gets all lovey-dovey. And then he gets some of Poison Ivy’s secret formulas on him, and suddenly every woman in Gotham City falls in love with him. Is there any hope for the pheromone-plagued madman? In our second story, Damian Wayne teams up with Katana and Alfred to track the snakey thief who’s stolen a valuable jade sword.

Verdict: Thumbs up. Adorable, funny, action-packed, and beautifully painted. Why can’t DC make some more all-ages comics that are this much fun?

Today’s Cool Links:

• Bully has an interesting post on why he wasn’t able to finish the new Superman movie, and on why some depictions of comic and film destruction affects us more strongly than others.
• If anyone needed to be thrown out of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, it’s definitely this freakshow.
• I wish someone in our army was hardcore enough to say this.
• This is a very, very good dog.

American Vampire: The Long Road to Hell

A new American Vampire comic! After much too many months since the hiatus began, too. I consider this a good thing, even if it’s just a one-shot.

It’s 1959. The guy on the cover is Travis Kidd, a vampire hunter who likes to wear a set of wooden fangs so he can “bite them back” before he kills vamps. But our main characters are Billy Bob Lee and Jolene Gibbons, a couple of hip kids who make their money going to dances in Nebraska and heisting wallets when no one’s looking. But they run into serious trouble one night when they both get attacked by the undead and turned into vampires. The local vamps want Billy Bob and Jolene to work for them as thieves, but they manage to escape, eventually picking up a little kid, an orphaned hitchhiker named Jasper who claims to be able to sense evil people. They bring him along so they can use him to find people they won’t mind killing, while racing to Las Vegas to find a rumor they’ve heard about a cure for vampirism. Can they manage to survive Travis Kidd? Will they make it to Vegas?

Verdict: Thumbs up. So very nice. Yeah, it’s extra large and it costs seven dollars, but I think this one is worth it. It’s a great story by Scott Snyder with great art by Rafael Albuquerque. It’s got great characters and action and dialogue and mood and suspense and romance and horror. You want to go pick this up, kids. Don’t miss out on the fun.

Freelancers #6

The final issue of the series sees Val, Cass and Katherine Rushmore fighting against almost all the gangs in Los Angeles to try to bring Drachmann, one of their former teachers at the orphanage, to justice. Can they handle overwhelming odds, betrayals, torn clothing, and inadequate weaponry to come out on top?

Verdict: Thumbs up. Mostly action, action, action, but it seems like the right ending for the series, which has worked really hard from the beginning to replicate your average high-octane action movie.

Worlds’ Finest #13

Huntress and Power Girl are on the run from Desaad’s minions, particularly his giant quasi-dog monster. Aaaaand that’s pretty much it.

Verdict: Thumbs down. So very not interesting.

I keep getting reminded of more great comics that have gone out-of-print lately. And it’s pretty depressing that this is one of them, because it’s one of my very favorite comics of the past decade.

JLA: Welcome to the Working Week

This little prestige-format book came out in 2003, written by comedian and actor Patton Oswalt and illustrated by Patrick Gleason and Christian Alamy. It came at the end of the Morrison glory days of “JLA,” while the writers who came after him were still working hard to keep the brilliance of the series running at a high pace.

Our story is deceptively simple. The Justice League responds to an alien invasion of Portland by teleporting the entire population of the St. John’s neighborhood into the Watchtower. Once the invasion gets handled, the population gets transported back home — except for Marlus Randone, superhero fanzine writer, who sneaks off and enjoys a week of roaming the halls of the Watchtower and watching how the Justice League handles its off-the-clock time. Oh, there are a number of crises going on — Flash stops a hacker from launching a nuclear weapon, Green Lantern brokers peace between alien races, Batman solves plenty of crimes, and we get a number of ominous hints that something terrible is looming behind the scenes — and the whole thing ends with an attack by a team of powerful alien supervillains.

But by and large, most of the focus is on how the JLA spends their time when they’re not fighting evil, as well as Marlus’ observations, speculations, and memories of the DC Universe’s superheroes. Batman’s obsessions, Kyle Rayner’s and Wally West’s everyman qualities, Plastic Man’s fun-loving nature — it all gets examined in varying detail. Most of the story is pretty light-hearted, but everything wraps up with a series of lightning-fast super-battles, excellent insights, and inspirational moments.

Verdict: Thumbs up. The whole story is just great fun all the way through.

It doesn’t mean there aren’t moments that’ll make you scoff at everything going on. I can’t possibly imagine the Justice League letting Plastic Man throw a giant rave just to capture one supervillainess. I can’t possibly imagine Wally West being unhappy that Batman has gotten one of the Rogues to reform. I can’t imagine Wonder Woman inviting Lady Shiva, Killer Croc, and Cheetah up to the Watchtower to spar. I can’t possibly imagine security on the Watchtower being so lax that a guy can hide out among the world’s greatest superheroes for a week without getting caught. But frankly, that stuff didn’t bug me too much. Plas’ party is hilarious, Wally’s unhappiness with Batman is not particularly significant, and Wondy’s battle is one of the best moments of the book. And it’s so much fun watching Marlus spy on superheroes, it makes me think they should let people hide out here more often.

And everything else in the book is just so very good. If you just can’t stand light-hearted superhero comics, you probably won’t like this. But if you don’t like light-hearted superhero comics, you’re probably Dan DiDio and shouldn’t be reading comics anyway.

Marlus Randone is such an amazing character — hipster cynic crossed with gleeful fanboy, always with a great quip and observation, with his own interesting backstory and motivations. It’s really too bad we haven’t seen more of him in the DCU.

And Patton Oswalt’s writing is just so very, very good. Some of the stuff he writes here — about the Martian Manhunter, about Aquaman, about Marlus’ father — stands out for me as some of the best expository writing in comics. There’s one page toward the end with Marlus wandering around the Watchtower’s trophy room, musing on the nature of being a superhero, that still strikes me as one of the best descriptions of the superhero phenomenon, both in-universe and out.

Why is this out of print? I really don’t know. Patton Oswalt is still a pretty popular guy, both in and out of the geek community. DC should be waving this book from the top of the comic shops. DC and Marvel should be desperate to have him write more comics. I really don’t know why they’ve let this comic languish.

You can still find it, thank goodness, and you won’t pay a fortune for it. If you haven’t gotten to read it yet, shell out a little cash and enjoy it for yourself.

Empowered: Animal Style

Empowered has taken a part-time job working overnight security for the 20th Annual International/Interchronal Alternate Timeline Superhero Auto Show. And as is typical for her rotten luck, it gets invaded for the first time ever by car thieves. In fact, it’s a team of villains wearing animal-themed powered armor who call themselves Animal Style. Emp is entirely outnumbered, so she’ll have to use her best superpower — brains. Will that be enough to let her save the day and avoid getting tied up again? Knowing Emp’s luck… probably not.

Verdict: Thumbs up. Extremely funny stuff all the way through — I can’t get enough of Terrorpin’s battle cry, and the glimpses we get of the alternate reality cars are just brilliant, especially Juicetice and Kato’s infamous White Superbronco and the Egyptian-styled car designed by Ed “Big Daddy” Thoth. And it’s also really cool to see Emp kick so much ass — it’s usually pretty rare, even in the full-length collections.

The Movement #2

The members of the Movement have taken some of the more corrupt officers of the Coral City Police Department into custody, which is leading to some concerns that they’re treading down the same path as the authoritarian police. And there are plenty of other conflicts tearing at the group. Mouse and Burden are thoroughly insane — Mouse swings from abject sorrow every time one of his rats dies to almost immediately wanting to eat the bodies raw, while Burden keeps flipping from emotionally abused religious fanatic to demonic hellmonster, almost at random. And all Katharsis ever wants to do is fight and kill the group’s enemies. So while Katharsis goes off on her own to fight the cops and their wealthy paymaster, the rest of the team sets out on the trail of the so-called Cornea Killer, which sets them up against the ominously-named Weather Witch.

Verdict: Thumbs up. Much better than the first issue, as we’re finally getting some clue about the Movement’s personalities. The action is quite good, too, and the interpersonal conflicts are excellently drawn. Having said that, I am a little curious how it’s going to work with two team members so thoroughly broken mentally. And I’m afraid I did let out an exasperated groan when we learned the true identity of the Weather Witch…

Gaah, just ain’t had a lot of time to find some more battles (I’ve been trying to spend more time doing fun writing, as opposed to blog writing, which is frequently not fun), but Friday Night Fights waits for no one, so here we are.

So tonight, here’s Atomic Robo Free Comic Book Day 2009 (which you can and should read right here) by Brian Clevinger and Scott Wegener, as we get to witness the first meeting between Atomic Robo and his arch-nemesis, Dr. Dinosaur!

All hail Dr. Dinosaur! ALL HAIL DR. DINOSAUR!

Astro City #1

Great news! Astro City is back on the map! No longer at Wildstorm (since Wildstorm no longer exists), it’s now being published as a Vertigo comic.

Our re-introduction to the city comes through the narration of a purple-skinned guy called the Broken Man. He addresses the readers directly, trying to involve us in some ill-defined scheme to prevent a future disaster. We also get introduced to a new character — American Chibi, a new superhero who looks kinda like chibi anime characters. She encounters a mysterious door floating in midair over the Gaines River, but she — and none of the other superheroes in town — are able to get the doors to open. Meanwhile, we run into Ben Pullam, a character we met waaaaay back in the first issue of the second “Astro City” series. (You can find it in the “Family Album” trade paperback.) Back then, Ben was a widower with two young daughters — today, he’s a good deal older, and his daughters are grown up. They’ve gotten together for an overdue visit — but what is Ben’s connection to the mysterious being who finally emerges from the door over the river?

Verdict: Thumbs up. The Broken Man is a tad irritating, but I assume that’s a lot of his purpose. Aside from that, this is all the stuff you love about Astro City — fun superheroics, some innovative twists on the superhero formula, normal people getting the spotlight, and an excellent story and art. If you ain’t reading this, you’re stone crazy.

(I do wonder if this is really a Vertigo comic. Granted, there’s no way it should go under the DC banner, which is apparently solely devoted to the New 52 — and makes almost everything associated with it suck — but it seems odd to see it here as part of DC’s mature readers line.)

The Hypernaturals #12

The last issue?! Bah! But how do things turn out? Sublime is preparing to kill the Quantinuum AI — which will end up wreaking havoc across the galaxy. Shoal reveals that the Quantinuum is a refugee from another universe — but it’s insane, desperate to help others at the same time as it wants to kill itself, so it creates superheroes and supervillains. Elsewhere, the rest of the Hypernaturals team has to fight off an army of supervillains — actually normal people in the teleportation network who’ve been transformed into monsters. Can the team stop all the bad guys? Can Shoal and Thinkwell save the Quantinuum?

Verdict: Thumbs up. A very nice end for the series. Lots of action, great dialogue and characterization, and all around fun stuff. I’d really love it if this series was continued, but I guess that depends on whether Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning want to keep it going.

Ame-Comi Girls #4

Power Girl and the new Green Lantern fight Star Sapphire for the heart of Jimmy Olsen. Avril Palmer — the Atom — fights off the Brainiac infection in Supergirl’s brain while Supergirl and Power Girl punch each other. And Sinestra gets hold of both a yellow power ring and a black one.

Verdict: Thumbs down. I’m just not even a little bit interested in this series anymore.

Today’s Cool Links:

• Huzzah! Comics Alliance is back in business!
• This story about Dwayne McDuffie, Halle Berry, and Michael Dorn is completely hilarious.
• Snell brings us the bizarre tale of Mickey and Goofy as quasi-realistic secret agents.