drive-by readings: Blackest Night: Superman #1

Blackest Night: Superman #1 (DC) "A Sleepy Little Town, Part 1" James Robinson Eddy Barrows Ruy Jose Julio Ferreira Rod Reis Barrows/Nei Ruffino (cover) Shane Davis/Sandra Hope/Alex Sinclair (variant cover)

first of all, Eddy Barrows draws a mean Krypto (didn't he draw that Cujo in Teen Titans, the one that ate Marvin? WIN!!!). and the rest of the book is no chopped liver either. as for the story ... well, am a little befuddled by the dialogue, at least on the resurrected Kal-L's (yeah you know why) part. his motivation is just to kill everyone? ("yes, grifter, haven't you been reading Blackest Night?" - Geoff Johns) seems so simplistic to me, at least for this Superman tangent of the theme. and somehow, seeing Connor Kent (the artist formerly known as the first arrogant Superboy) flying around again, after Infinite Crisis, makes me shake my head (i know, i know - Action Comics #1). let's just everyone stop making events out of deaths, ok? as Blackest Night shows in a nutshell, absolutely no one stays dead forever.

Green Arrow is still a horndog ...

... that's why he's joining Hal Jordan's new Justice League ...


... so they can ogle more chicks!

(because his wife is chairwoman of the current League, and damn if he'll be able to get away with it!)

hey, i didn't make that up; Newsarama did!!


(btw, the censored parts of that DC Memo were "retcon", "Final Crisis" and "Batman R.I.P.")

covers of the week

Mysterius the Unfathomable #1 by Tom Fowler
Green Lantern #37 by Shane Davis, Sandra Hope, & Nei Ruffino

JLUnleashed

ever read your comics using a widescreen big-ass monitor? would you ever go back to your puny 14" screen? hell, no!!!

especially if the reading material is about big-ass fights. slap around the Justice league, will ya? be prepared to be whupped.


if we don't reconfigure the size, Batman will be even larger than life.

okay, it ain't HD and it ain't video. but it'll save your eyes and make you drool (i'm not worried about power consumption as this monitor is located in the - cough, cough - office).

was there any doubt that the League would stay down for long? actually, they really need a bunch of nastier villains to clean their clocks. Luthor has been doing this shtick for awhile now and he hasn't won anything.

there goes another empty promise. i dare ya, Diana.

since all of these happens just before the Black Canary/Green Arrow wedding (yes, we know - continuity sucks), team leader Dinah knows she has to finish this quickly so they can continue the bridal shower (hey. those studs cost a lot of money ok?).

Dwayne McDuffie is building something here, with Vixen's fluctuating powers and a manipulative third party. kissing Superman? is Lois watching this?

speaking of the Big Blue Boy Scout - what does he do when he gets his powers back? why, punch the bald asshole, of course. but you know he held back - he still doesn't want to kill Lex after all the crap Lex puts him through year after year. wuss.

oh-ho! and who comes to pick up the anti-League? Amanda Waller? really? i smell something fishy ... like a bigger Injustice League (and she's saving Luthor's ass for her own ends).

fresh off his run on the Fantastic Four, where he made T'Challa the baddest brother in the universe, the same undercurrent flows through here, with a much-fleshed out Vixen, Black Lightning, and now Firestorm.

o, Bat-God, please give me a widescreen monitor like this for Christmas.
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Justice League of America #15
Dwayne McDuffie/Ed Benes/Sandra Hope

like lightning

first of all, here's a solemn sendoff to Bart Allen, the newest Flash, who wears the mantle and holds the title of the fastest man alive for 13 issues. and since there can be only one official Flash in any given era, i'm sorry to spoil your day because Bart just bit the dust (heh) ...

Impulse/Kid Flash/Flash, 1994-2007

Bart, as Flash, loses the Speed Force (the thing that powers all Flashes, except Jay Garrick), and proceeded to get a royal beating courtesy of his Rogues' Gallery. but he went out like a hero, buying enough time (with some help from his grandma Iris, wife of the greatest Flash, Barry Allen) for his love Valerie Perez to prevent a Speed Force backlash that would destroy the West Coast (there goes the Oden/Durant sweepstakes - wait, so that's why Kobe was trying to get traded!).

child abuse! child abuse!

geez, being beaten to death by your best villains ... that's kinda humiliating. but i am looking forward to this guy exacting payback within the next six months ...

you know what this means ... yes, another Flash relaunch!

as it turns out, with the conclusion of "The Lightning Saga" in Justice League of America #10, the entity the Legionnaires wanted to bring back with their lightning wands was none other than ... Wally West! (missing since Infinite Crisis and the second-greatest Flash ever)

wooohooooooooooooooo! now the world is right again! Black Canary wastes no time in making Wally a JLA member ASAP.

is it just me, or does Ed Benes draw everyone too muscled? in the scene below, its like hugging industrial-sized throw pillows. or huge cement blocks.

of course, a sad/happy ending in a comic universe would not be complete without dangling plot lines. why is Legionnaire Karate Kid (not that wimp Ralph Macchio - wait, not that Marvel guy either) still stuck in the present? what does Starman mean that worlds will die again now that Wally is back? hint, hint, two words ... Countdown and Monitors. and since the Legion can do this stunt, can they bring back anybody else who "died" or is missing? (yeah, if Geoff Johns decrees it).

and who did the Legionnaires get in exchange for Wally? is that Bart?

i think i read JLA first before the Flash issue, but then it doesn't really spoil the whole thing. although one can't do without the other.

i'm out like Bartholemew!
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Flash #13
Justice League of America #10

league of their own

Justice League of America #7
Brad Meltzer/Ed Benes/Sandra Hope
DC


took them 7 issues (wait, make that 8 ... with that #0 prequel) to finally get a team ready ... that's already more than half a year! anyway, i eagerly awaited what Brad Meltzer could bring to a regular series after the much-praised Identity Crisis. as much as it was exciting to bring the League back together (The Tornado's Path), i'm still ambivalent about the overall product because of Ed Benes' art. i don't know ... i mean, yeah i know, Howard Porter had his moments but towards the end his work sucked too (okay i'm a fan of that mid-90s Grant Morrison/Mark Waid JLA run). maybe i just can't get the Glory association out of my head. anyway, i should be warming up soon enough ...

especially with moments like these ...

can't you tell that Arsenal loves Super-Supreme Pizza?

Meltzer mines our childhood, bringing in Black Lightning (Black Vulcan?), and the League now has its Hall again, circa Superfriends ...


... but with an added twist, because the Satellite HQ is retained (i can't wait to see who gets trapped first in the teleporter/doorway in a future supervillain attack!).

Diana pitches a movie script about wine connoisseurs teleporting from one vineyard to another

as always, we have the irreverent Hawkgirl ... who may or may not be doing the horizontal mambo soon with Roy.


this new League finally cements the Hal Jordan comeback; is Barry far behind? just kidding. but seriously, no Flash? is the Red Tornado an adequate speedster? and despite Vixen's morphing abilities, she's limited to animals ... a far cry from the Martian Manhunter's shapeshifting skills and telepathy. speaking of which, this seems to be the only JLA incarnation without J'onn.

that's my nitpicks. on the plus side, i like Black Canary as chairwoman (future tactical arguments with Batman?), the return of the Big Three, and the infusion of new blood. and oh yeah, the headquarters (i bet it'll be wrecked by issue #25).

bring on the Legion of Doom!!!