Work Can So Get In the Way

Sigh. Workshop all week at work. Over 12 hours a day. That really drives me to want to do nothing but sleep. So, I"ll put up some reviews today, just because I finally have some time to breathe.

And I must not neglect to mention that I am watching Hooper while writing these up.

Action Comics #831
Black & Blue

I like Black Adam. I don't know why. I just find him fascinating. Wish that they would stop wavering him back and forth between good guy/bad guy though. But, I guess if they did that DC would have Marvel's Dr. Doom, so oh well. Waver him. Just keep him away from the JSA.
Anywho, is this issue a Villians United tie-in? Who cares. There is no tie-in. Supe's makes mention of a group gathering. That's it. Otherwise, we get to see some battling of the big guys. I did like the comment that "He hits harder than Marvel." Unfortunately, it was someone else pulling Adam's strings, otherwise there may not have been a fight at all.
Oh, maybe the tie-in was the completely and utterly useless race between Bizarro and Zoom. Wow, did that part of the book just suck. I don't read Villians United. I don't care about the race. That could have been a simple sidebar mentioned in the limited. Filler material.
Now that I think about it, this whole book seemed to be filler material. At least the showdown between Adam and Superman was fun to see.
Overall: 2/5. And did I mention I like Black Adam?




Firestorm #17
An Unrighteous World

I like Black Adam. Hahaha. I went into my spiel above, I'm not doing it again. At least here he is brief in appearance. Why Firestorm? I enjoyed Firestorm a few years ago (ok, so it was many years ago.) And someone, who will go nameless, for all of a two second read, Chris, mentioned that it wasn't getting raped by readers, so I thought I would give this a try. And it wasn't too bad. One thing I will say is that the art was very...concise I guess is the best word. Very sharp lines. Was a pleasure to actually enjoy just about all of the frames.
This is probably truly a tie-in to Villians United, but since I don't read that limited, I can only assume. Don't believe the covers when they say Tie-In (see the Action review above to learn more.) This one stands alone pretty well even without reading the limited. The bad guys kidnap him, want him to power some stuff, he breaks out, fight ensues...yada yada yada. We meet some weird character. I don't know what part she plays, but I would rather have seen someone else here. Having the new Scorpion pop up in the current Hulk series is a great use of a "new" character, but this gal was just too odd even for my tastes.
The Villians: Queen Bee- not impressed at all. Waste of space. Royal Flush Gang- hell, they are always at least entertaining. Parasite- was ok. Black Adam- heh.
The interlude kind of confused me. Some reference to Thanagar warriors, out in space I'm guessing, followed by a surge of power to Firestorm. That gets a WTF?
Overall: 3/5. Clean art. Good story too.

Pause: I just found out that Doctor Detroit has finally been released on DVD. I'm excited.

Let's continue the DC travels. Apparently of the books I received this week, only one was Marvel. So that will be last.



JLA #118
Crisis of Conscience Part 4

This was a great book, until the end. I have to tell you that Aquaman popping up was quite the shock. That is not the Aquaman that I recognize from the past few years. Perhaps there has been a change over there. I'll live without checking. Aquaman is drawn quite well here. And on a side note, I am not the biggest fan of Aquaman. A guy that talks to fish doesn't do much for me. Moving on, Johns moved this story along pretty well. Pretty decent Despero fight. I was pleased to see the trio of lasses on Themyscira. Because I am a fan of Wonder Woman. She is drawn pretty well too. Sure sure, we have the tea party amongst the members about brainwashing. Whatever. I'd like some Earl Grey please, splash of milk.

It ends in the Batcave, Batman and Catwoman style. I like how Catwoman keeps making appearances in JLA. Not that she'll be a member, but the guest appearances and how she makes use of them are fun.

Then the end of the book. Wow. Its bad. League vs. League? This didn't leave me wanting more, but we all know I'll buy the next book anyways.

Overall: 3/5, would have been higher but the end just sucked ass.

Batman & Robin The Boy Wonder #2
Episode 2

This book sucks. Batman as a neophyte? Frank, go back to Daredevil. Jim, go find a new project. Both of you should just stop this travesty. Even Burt & Loni knew when to call it quits. I would rather read Moon Knight, Fist of Khonsu than this heap of crap, and that was a real bad, short-lived series. Is Richie Rich still out there for reading? The art is very good. I will give it that. But this is the absolute worst story. I'm not even comparing it to the "classic" setup. This is just Bruce Wayne, pedophile extraordinaire. This book is coming off the buy list. I have a shredder at my feet. I'm thinking about it.

Overall: 0/5. Don't buy this book. Save your time. Pick up Looney Tunes. You'll get a far far better read.

Wildcats: Nemesis #1
The Art of Living Dangerously

I know very little of the the Wildcats background. I picked this up on a whim. Probably because I felt bad about putting less than $20 on a credit card. I"ll give it a couple more issues because this one wasn't all that bad. Lots of great action. Great drawn action too. The end went into a little history on this whole scenario, and that was actually a nice tie up. I really liked it at the end rather than at the beginning. "Can't believe I'm breaking up a three-way cat fight" inspired me to try another book. What a great line.
I got guns, I got swords, and I have some good old fashioned violence. Hoping the next one continues this same trend.

Overall: 3/5. Looking forward to see how issue 2 goes.



X-men #175
Wild Kingdom 1

I do so like it when old members come back to play, and don't play too nice. This is something I don't even recall seeing in the Avengers. With X-men, Storm returns and really doesn't want to play co-leader with Emma. Wolverine still kinda does his own thing. It all makes for some great bantering. Please, please please end this whole way dragged out Gambit-Rogue thing. The last three issues were a nice twist due to the whole Mystique, but this thing has gone on longer than the Ross-Rachel Friends affair. Hell, end Gambit. He sucks anyways. He's a weaker Beast with dumbass playing cards. Storm is too strong of a character to play nice with this bunch. Its' a decent story, I"m interested in seeing where they take it. Black Panther. Eh, nothing too special. I was never a big fan of his. I would like to see some of this team revamped, but I'm not going into that cuz its always lame to lay out who you want as a group in a supposedly short review.

Overall: 3/5. Good character conversations. Decent storyline. It kept my interest.

That is all I have for this week. Two quick tidbits from last week purchases:

Ghost Rider- Wow! I really liked the setup and can't wait for the next ish. 5/5

Superman/Shazam- What a dog. I was really looking forward to this, but I don't care for how Middleton draws. That really is not my style. I prefer the sharper lines rather than pretty roundedness. Just reminds me of the 80's pastels. 2/5

Have a lovely day all. Talk to ya hopefully sooner than later.

Randy