This week's comics

Comic reviews. Spoilers here.

Star Wars #1

The Destiny Path part 1

Charles Soule writes a great Lando. With the Star Wars comics moving up into the gap between Empire and Return one of the things I'm looking forwrad to the most is watching Lando going from the guy who betrayed everyone at Bespin to the guy the Rebellion trusts to lead the second Death Star run. But on to the actual issue at hand...

So, as promised, its just after the climatic events of Empire and the Millennium Falcon is heading for the rebel fleet: no one trusts Lando, no one knows hat they're going to do about Han, and Luke is being mopey as hell about the whole father thing.

Actually, I'm being a little unfair on that last one, both to Luke as a character and Soule as a writer. Obviously, the next time we see Luke on screen he's going to have a new lightsaber and a wardrobe that heavily suggests he might be on the verge of breaking bad and following his father into the family business of betrayal and recreational genocide. Soule takes that doubt and really runs with it, putting Luke in a position of questioning absolutely everything: Ben, Yoda, the Jedi path and his own destiny. Its a great angle.

Also, it seems Poe Dameron's parents are going to be a big part of this run which was unexpected but quite nice to see.

Thor #1

The Devourer King part one:

The Black Winter

I've not read much by Donny Cates. A couple of crossover issues of Venom and... that's it, I think. I must admit I didn't really warm to his work there.

I liked this, though. Its not a huge departure from Jason Aaron's just finished epic arc but it certainly has its own flavour. I like the idea of Lady Sif being the all-seeing guardian of the bifrost, for one, and Cates' Volstagg is brilliant.

Beyond that the issue is all set-up: Thor is sad because he's bored on his throne but then a new threat literally falls on top of his royal duties and we're off to the races. That leaves me with not much else to say about this issue. I enjoyed it but it'll take another issue to see if the story actually grabs me.

Daredevil #16

Through Hell VI

You know what I love about Elektra in this series? She talks. She talks a lot. She's not chatty and she's not transparent but she does talk. I get the character is meant to be mysterious but I've never really felt like I knew her under most writers. Hell, even Brian Michael Bendis who could write dialogue-filled pages in his sleep mainly had her as a silent, looming figure when she turned up in his Daredevil run.

And, of course, for the first time in a long time, we have an old fashioned scene of Daredevil and the Kingpin talking in a room. Love those things, its been too long.

X-Men #4

Global Economics

So we get to the big obvious thing that needed to happen: the mutant nation of Krakoa in a diplomatic environment. In this case Magneto, Xavier and Apocalypse at an economics conference. I have to say, I love how this main X-Men series is doing one off short stories exploring different aspects of the Krakoa concept whilst the other series are doing more cohesive, arc-based things.

So its all fun, small things: the delegations bodyguards being the two mutants who have to wear sunglasses anyway; Magneto lecturing the humans on how human society collapses every few thousand years; Xavier impressing on everyone that he still believes in co-existence but isn't fucking around anymore. Its delightful and, it has to be said, a lot more digestible than Hickman's Avengers run.

Comic Reviews

This week Brian Michael Bendis gets a third chance to make a first impression; Judge Dredd penetrates Patrick Swayze; and, Jean Grey does some family visiting.

Spoilers below...

Man of Steel #1

Okay, cards on the table: I have a huge writer crush on Brian Michael Bendis. When I was getting back into comics after an absence of years it was his Daredevil that drew me in. Between that and Ultimate Spider-Man it was clear that this was a writer with a real love and appreciation for the characters he was handling, one who knew where to modernise and where to leave well alone for the benefit of continuity.

So now he's writing Superman. Now, there's no one more skeptical of nostalgia than me. I know its a drug, I know its a con half the time but damn me if this isn't Superman exactly as I remember the character. Bendis plays it smart, intercutting his bold new take on the “true reason” Krypton was destroyed with a very conscious greatest hits reel to assure people that this is their (and their father's and their grandfather's Superman). We see him swoop In to the rescue a couple of times, once with supervillains and once with an apartment building fire and all with that very earnest honesty about him even when he's being sarcastic.

I am also very, very glad to see that Jon continues to exist. Not that I thought he was going away, exactly, but more than I suspected Bendis might ignore the boy's existence between the very iconic and classic feel of things (down to the red shorts) and the plotline from the DC Nation one-shot about Lois not being at the Planet anymore.

If there's one thing Bendis seems absolutely determined on its that Superman is a reported above all else. Even when he's rescuing people from the burning building he's thinking about how this rash of electrical fires came about. Arson? Bad city planning? Ordinances that aren't up to scratch?

Its been a long time since a version of Superman grabbed me this quickly. I'm not saying its been all doom and gloom before now (Patrick Gleason's run on Superman stands out in my mind as a great recent series) but this just perfectly captures what I love about the character.

Judge Dredd: Under Siege #1

So, for a while people have been telling me that the American Judge Dredd comics from IDW aren't the disaster one would assume them to be. Not to insult anyone of a Yankish persuasion reading this but American fans (and most comic authors are fans these days) tend to not get that Dredd is meant to be funny. In fairness, a worrying number of British fans don't get this either nowadays but that's a rant for another day.

Reading this I'm trying to remind myself that this is by no means the first series IDW has put out and the conspicuous similarities to Dredd (2012) are probably a one off. Like the film (which I adore) we have a situation where two Judges are trapped in a giant apartment building with enemies on the top floors and a control room to be taking control of on the other side of the baddies.

In this case Dredd has been sent in to Patrick Swayze Block to locate Judge Beeny (presumably this story is set some time before she became a member of the Council Of Five) who went missing when the block went off the comms grid when she was meant to be doing a routine school visit.

Beeny is actually a character I have a lot of time for: a young, idealistic Judge who was the daughter of anti-Judge activists and one of the few reformers Dredd has ever been seen to so much as give the time of day. If nothing else I look forward to her and Dredd interacting across this series even if, sadly, the plot looks like one I've been through before just with slightly different villains. Who knows, though? Time will tell.

X-Men Red Annual #1

Even four issues into the main series, I'm still cautious about X-Men Red. Its not that its bad, its certainly entertaining, but the sticking point for me is that its essentially a Jean Grey series. I don't like Jean Grey much. Over the last few years the teenage version that's been running around has softened my view of her and I think its just the Ms. Perfect version that everyone idolises that gets my back up and Taylor seems smart enough not to push that angle too much. Jean in this series is definitely the same woman with the same formidable reputation but more conscious of her flaws.

Anyway, the annual is basically the story of what Jean did just after her resurrection, in spite of the whole of the rest of the team being on the cover, and is a pretty personal story only connected to the Red team by featuring Jean's first meeting with Laura and Gabby.

The long and the short of it: not much happens here but fluff and then of Jean's emotional journey is basically just to put her where we say her in #1. That said having been said: ain't nothing wrong with fluff, especially fluff that has Jean and Rachel interact like family for practically the first time ever. Plus, any issue with Gabby in it is definitely worth at least a look.

The Exiles return

Exiles is something of a special series to me. The original run started in 2001 and was part of Marvel's great turn of the millennium creative renaissance. It was my first experience of Judd Winick's writing and introduced me to two of my favourite comics artists: Mike McKone and J. Calafiore. I adored the series for its endless invention of not only interesting alternate versions of familiar and obscure characters but also the interesting situations they were injected into: alternate universes that needed something nudging back into order.

Hell, this was the series that even brought the best out of Chuck Austen whose other work for Marvel I was... significantly less fond of.

Oh, and it also did the Spider-Gwen thing years before Spider-Gwen was a thing. Exiles had a version of Mariko Yashida, in the “normal” Marvel Universe Wolverine's rather boring martyred true love, and reinvented by giving her her cousin Sunfire's powers and making her gay. The issue where she comes out to her teammate Morph remains, to this day, one of my favourite done-in-one character study issues up there Brian Michael Bendis' best one-shot Ultimate Spider-Man issues.

Her love interest, by the way, was a Mary Jane Watson who was Spider-Woman so more proto-Spider-Gwen there.

The series has been revived a couple of times. There was a not terribly exciting run by Jeff Parker that lasted all of six issues in 2009 and a pretty damn good revival of the concept as X-Treme X-Men in 2012 under Greg Pak. The later I highly recommend checking out, especially if you ever wondered why people are so fond of the Dazzler character.

The fun of the series has always been reinvention, which is probably why the Chris Claremont run and its odd decision only to feature versions of characters originally created by Claremont didn't sit well with me (though I did like that run's take on Mystique). Seeing the new line-up, especially an older Kamala Khan, really interests me. Plus Saladin Ahmed is attached as writer and this guy made me care about Black Bolt! I didn't think anyone could make me care about Black Bolt and he managed it.

Seeing what he has in store for Blink, Iron Lad and Kamala Khan is going to be a sight to see. 

Comic Reviews

Batman and the Signal #1

It has taken a damn long time to get this far: Duke Thomas in his own series (albeit with Batman co-billing for some reason even though he's at best a cameo in this issue). He's been around since pretty early in the New 52 (yes, some good ideas happened even then), was a major figure in the big Zero Year storyline and the lead character in We Are Robin plus all sorts of cameos and back-up features over the years.

Now he finally has a limited series and a name: the Signal.

And, even better, all that waiting meant something, writer Tony Patrick isn't treating him as a blank slate but as a character who comes into this series with some real history. We even get to see a couple of the other former street Robins, Iz and Riko, hanging out with him and helping him with cases.

The whole unique selling point of Duke, it seems, is that his stories take place during the day, this is a big thing repeated until its hammered into the reader's skull. We even have a day shift GCPD detective, Aisi, who is so obviously destined to be Duke's Jim Gordon. She also has a prosthetic arm which even looks like they might be portraying an actual physical disability rather than just slapping a science-fiction perfect cyber-arm on someone. I could be wrong, it does look a little science-fiction cyber-y but then look at some of the prosthetic limbs around these days and a few of them actually do look like that.

Duke also has metahuman powers to do with light: being able to see it in different ways, get glimpses of the past like a mental replay button and the like. Its rather vague in places what he can do but its also clear that he's still exploring his powers and that they'll be a major part of the series going forward. Looks like its going to be fun.

Rogue & Gambit #1

I admit I ship these two characters almost out of habit. By the standards of '90s cartoons they were the big (albeit sexless and sometimes dubiously consensual) romance of the old X-Men show. One of my ongoing frustrations with Marvel is that they just will not bloody let these two have a happy ending. Rogue lost her powers in X-Treme X-Men and they retired to a nice town in California and then she goes and gets her powers back (on purpose, no less). In X-Men: Legacy she finally gained control of her powers, which lasted until whoever wrote Uncanny Avengers decided that was boring, and in the intervening years she barely said two words to Gambit.

Now they have a mini-series to themselves and... well, it could be worse.

The set-up is that there's a tropical island therapy retreat for mutants and Cerebra is losing track of the mutants who go there. Kitty, a sucker for true love if ever there was one, decides to save lives and matchmake at the same time by sending in Gambit and Rogue to work on their relationship problems. Gambit is pleased as punch, Rogue is annoyed as hell and the guests at the retreat are creepily happy even for people staying on a tropical island.

Now, the island retreat thing is a nice twist but also a pretty standard X-Men plot (there is a nice place for mutants to go, mutants go there and it turns out not to be nice after all) but what fascinates me is the relationship counselling issue. It can;t be denied that these two have issues and not just Rogue's obvious problems with physical intimacy. Gambit has issues to in that he often comes off as a bit of a creeper with boundary issues. He just won't stop trying to touch Rogue! She keeps explicitly telling him not to, as well. Bad Gambit!

Its also clear that this series is really invested in the pair's past with a big splash page dedicated to edited highlights of their relationship that stretched from moments as iconic as Gambit's trial (and that lovely pink and yellow Shi'Ar costume Rogue was rocking at the time) to ones as lost to time as Rogue being stabbed back in the X-Treme days. Hopefully, that's more than just fan service and there's a real plan here to take that history and move the characters forward some.

Hawkeye #14

Sadly, this title just got cancelled so I have to enjoy it while I can. The big thing in this issue is that Kate has been kidnapped by time travelling villain Eden Vale and Clint has a plan.

This is as bad as it sounds.

Thankfully, the highlights of this terrible plan are a) Clint working with Kate's supporting cast and the gang getting a full bore education in the human disaster that is Clint Barton and b) Clint abducting Madame Masque (who is now walking around inside a clone of Kate's body) so he can switch her out for Kate as part of a big rescue.

If you can see exactly how this was going to go wrong from the get go, congratulations, you are exactly as smart as the writer. Its actually interesting to have Kate and Clint in the same title again if only for the fact it brings into sharp relief that as bad as Kate screws up sometimes she is nothing compared to the absolute disaster that is Clint Barton. It was also a cute move to have Masque try to freak out Barton by coming on to him whilst looking like Kate. The teasing and continual rejection of Hawkeye/Hawkeye romance is the gag that keeps on giving and I'm glad Thompson decided to continue it from the Fraction days.

I really am going to miss this title. 

Comic Reviews

This week Wilson Fisk goes the full Trump; Weapon X clings on to my pull list by the skin of its satire; everyone in the Runaways needs a hug; Mister Miracle gets considerably more than a hug (the lucky goit); and, Booster Gold gets some measure of satisfaction from saying “I told you do” to the man who told him he wasn't responsible enough to wear a cape.

Daredevil #596

Charles Soule continues to be as wonderfully unsubtle with the whole Mayor Fisk angle as I'd hoped. After last issue's confrontation between Daredevil and Fisk the entire NYPD is let loose on the city in an attempt to bring the superhero who “attacked” the mayor to justice. I'm sure this has nothing to do with, oh for instance, the current US president's relationship with ICE, not at all, guv. On a less snarky note this whole arc rather vindicates Soule's decision to put the genie back in the bottle as concerns Matt's secret identity since this storyline just couldn't work with people knowing who he was.

And the issue cliffhanger is a fantastic twist that makes me hope the Mayor Fisk angle continues beyond this arc.

Weapon X #12

It has to be said: I was rapidly going off this series. The initial arc didn't thrill me but I kept at it because I liked the choice of characters for the team and then Amadeus Cho rocked up to lend a hand. Now we're out of the Reverend Stryker-shaped woods and I'm hoping this next arc follows through on the promise I saw in the concept when it was announced.

And don't get me wrong, this is better. Weapon X get a call from some South American guy who apparently appeared in the first arc and I forgot that a militia with US flags tattooed on their faces is rounding up and killing mutants on the orders of the local dictator. Turns out they have those flags tattooed there because they're a rip off of Nuke, a mad as bag of frogs Captain America knock-off a couple Weapon Plus generations behind Logan and Sabretooth. I sort of remember the character from a Wolverine: Origins arc and I suppose I shall go back and read that to get myself up to speed.

My continued interest in this series basically hinges on how well Greg Pak addresses the politics of this arc. He has a South American dictator using “American technology” (read: knock-off super soldiers as substitute for ex-US army hardware proliferation) to kill his own people. This is not an unknown situation in developing nations across the world. I trust Pak on this, he's a clever writer and I'm hoping the subtle as a brick attitude to satire Marvel has going right now continues.

Runaways #4

There's this odd trend in superhero comics that comes from their long, often decade-spanning histories, where a new writer will come in and make a thing about an old inconsistency. Sometimes its dumb but sometimes its the key to a fantastic new angle on the whole thing. I hope Rainbow Rowell has hit on the latter because, good grief, did I not notice a staggeringly strange plot point of the original Brian K. Vaughn run.

Molly's parents have the same mutant power. The exact same mutant power. That only happens with siblings and it is, frankly, a bizarre coincidence even for a comicbook universe otherwise (or very, very icky but let's not go there). Now we discover that Molly's grandmother is a geneticist who took Molly's father in when he was a kid. I hope this is going somewhere awesome.

Meanwhile, on the level that makes me feel less like a relentless geek, Gert continues to work through her issues with how everyone has grown and moved on since her death. She distrusts Molly's grandmother on sight, refusing food and drink from her on principle. Its consistent with where the character was when she died and actually throws into sharp relief how bitter Gert and most of the rest of the team was in the old days.

And, damn it, can someone just give Nico a hug.

Mister Miracle #5

Okay, so this was actually a pretty straight forward issue of a series that has previously gloried in not making a lick of sense. Plus, Big Barda spends quite a few pages with not many clothes on and therefore enough guns out to stock a frigate. Which was nice...

In less lascivious terms Mister Miracle is spending a day with Barda before he gets executed for... I'm still not quite clear on what but this whole series has a “just go with it” vibe going. Anyway, they spent time around LA, they sit on the beach and Scott monologues about Descartes and Kant and the origins of “I think therefore I am”. There is light bondage and Barda... wow. There is also a PR man who keeps harping on about how executing Scott is going to make the New Gods unpopular so he wants Scott to really, really consider making it look like suicide to soften the blow which is pretty much the only part of the issue that feels as trippy as the rest of the series has been. I wonder of the lack of mad is a blip for this issue (Scott's impending doom sharpening his perceptions) or the beginning of a shift that'll lead us to the conclusion.

Also, the moment when Scott and Barda listen to “their song” is all kinds of wrong and wonderful.

Action Comics #993

I have missed Booster Gold. I'm not 100% clear on whether this is meant to be the Booster from Jurgens' pre-Flashpoint series or the Booster who appeared in the New 52 Justice League International but its nice to see Jurgens back on the character regardless. On the one hand he seems to be a time cop as he was pre-Flashpoint but he also cares about his fame, which pre-Flashpoint Booster had basically given up on as vapid and immature.

Anyway, after the whole Mister Oz business, Superman has travelled back to Krypton just before it was destroyed but things go strange and he ends up on what seems like either a Krypton that was never destroyed or a Krypton from another timeline. There's one of those trippy hypertime segments featuring what look like glimpses of the New Krypton storyline and Cir-El, the future Supergirl from more than a decade ago. Booster is travelling to find Superman before history gets completely screwed, which may or may not already have happened since... well, check out the earlier parts of this paragraph.

There's also some business in the present setting up the Rebirth status of General Sam Lane, a character I have never cared for and, judging by the way he's spoken of here, never will. Still, it promises interesting developments for Jon and Lois which is something. In all honesty not much happens in this issue and the main pleasure is seeing Dan Jurgens writing Booster again and that's more than enough. 

Comic Reviews

This week the Kingpin of Crime gets his Trump on; Tim Drake has a word with himself; mutants and aliens get therapy; and after months of uncertainty we get branding confirmation that Jennifer Walters is still female.

Daredevil #595

Mayor Fisk part 1

Marvel just does not do subtle satire, does it? I mean, they even have Foggy Nelson explain to the reader that no one who voted for Fisk was under any delusion that he wasn't the Kingpin of Crime but they liked that he was a political outsider. Just about the only thing they don't do is make him a Republican, instead making sure to mention he ran as an independent.

Meanwhile, Mayor Fisk has ordered he DA's office and Matt Murdoch in particular to start preparing briefs on how to hold vigilante superheroes accountable. Its not a comfortable situation as any reasonable person probably would prefer people who cause massive property damage on a regular basis to have some accountability and it ties in with the recent Supreme Court arc about bringing the heroes into the legal framework. We get Matt in full hothead and pissed off mode which means he falls for approximately one hundred percent of Fisk's plans through the whole issue because Matt Murdoch can always been relied on to make things worse for himself. Its an interesting angle that continues to use Matt's new position as a prosecutor to good effect and I look forward to seeing where it goes, though I hope that Fisk stays mayor for a while to come because that's the sort of angle that has a lot of juice in it.

Detective Comics #968

A Lonely Place of Living conclusion

Given her presence on the cover I was hoping to see a Steph/Tim reunion but sadly not. Instead we get a big long fight between various elements of the Bat-family and evil future Tim. Its not badly written or drawn but there is a lot leftover for future stories and in the typical infuriating time traveler way evil future Tim keeps banging on about how Kate will do “something” without going in to the sort of specifics that might help prevent the something even though his murder plan fell through.

Still, he does say the something will happen in a few weeks so we might get to that sometime within the next year.

Runaways #3

Find Your Way Home part 3

Okay, this is a SPOILERS one so skip down a bit if you don't want to know why I liked it...

…

I like that Karolina said now when Nico, Gert and Chase came into her life and asked her to abandon it. I like that she felt guilty about it and had to chant affirmations at herself whilst crying after they left. I like that she's shown as conflicted and unhappy with her decision but that the narrative is firmly on her side about it. I like that she is putting her own needs first here. Chase never recovered from Gert's death and Nico has her abandonment issues from the break-up of A-Force (such a good title...) but Karolina is in college, she has a girlfriend and is making headway with therapy. Much as I like the character (and please let that girlfriend be Julie, please please please) I think showing all this is a very positive thing.

I also liked that there was acknowledgement that getting Chase and Gert back together would probably be a mistake. He was always a little older than her and now there's an age gap of years that makes things horribly creepy if they tried to reignite their actual relationship.

Generation X #8

Speaking of superheroes moving on, after far too many years an X-book gets back to seeing what Husk is up to. Last time we saw her was back in the dying days of the Wolverine and the X-Men title when she'd started being the school's guidance counselor. Now she's completely outside the X-Men, taking her PhD to become an actual psychiatrist. What's more, she's started talking with her proper accent (and less annoyingly written, I hated the old phonetic way the “hayseed” characters were written, its more contractions and the odd apostrophe now).

Also, nice to see the likes of Mercury, Dust and Hijack are now low level leadership figures amongst the student body.

She-Hulk #159

Jen Walters Must Die part 1

I am so very dubious about that title change. Nostalgia is one thing but... ugh, nevermind, still the same writer so there's hope. That having been said...

Now, its not like Tamaki's run on this title was without humour before, in fact it was pretty damn funny, but there's a different flavour to the funny in this issue. There's a restaurant that sells “burger cake” and a professor who is a stereotypical airhead blonde. Maybe that's the “Legacy” angle for this title: to go a little more towards the oddball humour of the original She-Hulk run (okay, okay, pedantically it was the second run but no one actually cares about the first one).

I'm honestly not sure how I feel about the change. On the one hand it is a pretty minor change but I hope that it doesn't come to dominate the tone of the series which up to now I've really, really liked. Time will tell. 

If Disney buys Fox...

… and to be clear, as I write this its only being reported by one source so pinch of salt but if they do buy Fox (or “the bulk of Fox's media assets” as the Newsarama article put it) then I look forward to what Marvel Studios does with the Fantastic Four.

The X-Men, not so much.

Put the pitchforks down and let me explain. Now, I'm not quite on board with the idea a lot of people seem to have that the X-franchise should have ended with Logan. It was a great movie (only the second or third the series has produced, shockingly) and I loved it but I also really want to see what the franchise can do now that Hugh Jackman's Wolverine is off the table. There are so many characters, teams, storylines and ideas floating around in that property that have gone unexploited for so long. Hell, I'm even looking forward to that odd superhero/horror hybrid they're putting out under the New Mutants name.

I just don't think there's much mileage to putting the X-Men in the MCU. They've got the Inhumans for better or worse to be their standard issue excuse for why this person who doesn't rate an involved origin has powers. They've got the Avengers to act as their big tentpole team. I'm not sure what the X-Men or the mutant concept offers at this point.

So maybe it might benefit Disney to keep the X-Men as a seperate franchise. There's an audience pop to be had in adding Wolverine to the Avengers but I think that's about it.

Contrary to popular belief I think what the X-Men movies need isn't to be part of the all-powerful and critic-proof MCU but to just be under Disney management. Fox might be getting better at commissioning and making non-Wolverine films like Deadpool and The New Mutants but let me put it like this:

The X-Men movie franchise deserves special recognition for being a series whose timeline made no sense before time travel was introduced to the mix. Take Mystique, for example, who we now know to be Xavier's adopted sister and as much as she denies the role she obviously feels a great deal of affection for him and the school.

Then you go back and watch the first movie where she coldly and calculatingly tries to murder Xavier in his home. Character consistency would be nice. Being able to hold on to the core of a team for more than a film would be nice.

A version of Jubilee who bloody does something for a change (and there have been two film versions of the character now) would be nice. Okay, this grudge is purely generational because Jubilee was “my” generation's teenage POV character what with the cartoon and everything but, in all seriousness, could Fox just stop being Fox for a second and allow the POC character they spent as much time introducing as Nightcrawler and Cyclops in on the action?

Actually, now I mention that I notice the utter absence of Karma in the New Mutants trailer.

Fox are dicks, please buy them out, Marvel. 

Comic Reviews

This week Batman learns the consequences of interrupting his ex-fiancee's bisexual orgy; Astonishing X-Men continues to underwhelm; and, the Joker continues to break good.

Batman #34

The Rules of Engagement 2

Most of this issue is Batman and Catwoman fighting Talia's ninja soldiers and bickering like an old married couple. It is delightful. I'm not going to lie, I adore Bruce and Selina's relationship, have done since Hush had Bruce reveal his identity to Selina. I loathed the New 52 version where Selina didn't know who Bruce was and it was all based on meaningless sex. Now I'm back to adoring the relationship as Tom King exploits their long history in the way these things should be exploited: as a reason for them to know each other really, really well not as a list of continuity points to be rattled off.

Okay, King did exactly that a while back when the pair argued about how they first met which was pure fanwank about the different versions of DC continuity but you get what I mean.

Its also nice that it turns out they're hunting down Talia for more reason than Bruce having an uncomfortable conversation with his ex. Now, I'd have certainly enjoyed that story but the revealed reason (no spoilers) makes a lot more sense in the context of the rest of King's run. Also, its less self-indulgent which is probably a good thing.

Astonishing X-Men #5

Life of X 5

The rotating artist thing continues to underwhelm me but the plot is picking up. For a start its nice to see some sort of behavioural reference to the complicated relationship Xavier and Mystique had in the early-2000s. I loved the Mystique series, it was the second best thing the brief “Marvel Tsunami” line (yes, really) did which is high praise considering the best thing to come out of was Runaways.

Oh, and I'm never going to get used to the fact that the Shadow King's real name is Farouk.

I mean, damn.

Batman: White Knight #2

So how much is Joker lying? I think that's what this whole story is going to come down to. Here we get him speaking in his own defense, claiming that the crimes of the Joker have been exaggerated by a GCPD who need him to justify their budget and the prison-industrial complex they've set up with Arkham. He has his own plans for Gotham which are not strictly on the up-and-up.

Also, Sean Murphy does not like modern Harley and demonstrates this fact in absolutely scathing fashion. I was worried that having a “good” Joker in a relationship with Harley was going to be all sorts of problematic but Murphy seems to have given it a good, long think and come up with a way for it to work without being grossly offensive.

This was does, admittedly, mean jettisoning a lot of the history of the character and presuming that Joker was less awful to her in this continuity than all the others ones but there it is. Even then your mileage may vary but I rather like it. 

Comic Reviews

This week Batman's first day as an engaged man ends in massive bisexual orgy (for someone else); Gwen Stacy finally gets to experience the sort of grimdark reinvention she missed out on in the Eighties by being dead; Thor provides some fanservice for French readers; Cable indulges in some unexpectedly appreciated artistic nostalgia; and, Iron Man undergoes a merger.

Batman #33

Rules of Engagement part 1

For serious, though, the colourist could remember to give Talia dark skin but not Damian? For real this is a thing that happened. On another note, the art does a terrible job of distinguishing the Robins, relying on you remembering who is wearing what colour shirt rather than making any real distinction of hair, height or facial structure.

Like, for instance, that one of the Robins is of Arab descent.

Anyway, this is another of those issues that shows how well Tom King writes for the serial format. The issue has two threads: Batman and Catwoman travelling across the desert in search of something with the Tiger King of Kandahar and Alfred gathering the Robins and Duke to tell them of this utterly insane thing Bruce has done (and also that he's in the desert). Aside from the aforementioned problems of keeping track of which Robin is which the b-plot is a good showcase for the family dynamic including a rare chance to see Duke in the group without Bruce. The desert plot is a whole lot of walking and talking and people being mysterious at each other which is great and atmospheric (including the decision to just skip an entire fight scene) but really needed the Wayne Manor stuff to keep the attention.

And it all ends with the revelation that what Talia has been doing since we last saw her is enjoying a comfortable retirement with her harem of twenty or thirty men and women and a very large bed. Nice work if you can get it.

Spider-Gwen #25

Gwenom part 1

I admit to finding it slightly odd that this got a Legacy storyline. I know Gwen herself has existed for half a century but Spider-Gwen is such a different (read: superior) character to the original I tend to forget that. Anyway, so now she has the Venom symbiote and never has Robbi Rodriguez's art been a better fit for an idea. His jagged lines and flowing shapes are perfect for this, its amazing.

Otherwise its exactly the story you'd expect it to be with Gwen hunting down the man who put her father in a coma and laying out a more savage than usual beating to the man. This might sound like a bad thing, predictability usually is, but it works and taking only a single issue to get Gwen to the place she is at the end of this one likely means the plot will go to more innovative places very soon.

The Mighty Thor #700

The Death of the Mighty Thor part 1

I'm not usually one to equate horrific permadeath with a good story, in fact I find the idea that the only good closure for a character is ruthlessly slaughtering them for shock value to be incredibly immature, but if they brought back Throg only to satisfy the “[a] Thor will die” promise of this arc I will be pissed.

Otherwise, this issue was a big tour of various Thors who have existed over the years including the young and old versions Jason Aaron introduced earlier in his run. The Throg bit is really fun, actually, and I hope we get to see more of the little fellow somewhere. The only downside really is that since Jane is only one Thor among many she gets rather the short end of the stick storywise. The Odinson gets to fight Malekith's army for the fate of the Norns; his past and future selves have nice little mini-adventures; Loki has a short side story with his biological (?) father Laufey; whilst Jane is left fighting Jennifer Walters in full-on PTSD episode Hulk mode. As even the narration notes, that's a story that''s been told again and again just with a different Thor and Hulk this time and not much more to say about it than that.

I'm not stupid, Jane's on her way out as Thor whether she survives her cancer or not, that's just what this whole Legacy business is about, I just don't like seeing her sidelined like this even for an anniversary that's about the larger concept of Thor than just her incarnation.

Cable #150

The Newer Mutants chapter 1

It worries me how much nostalgia Jon Malin's art inspires in me. I grew up during the bad times of comics, aka the last time they were a profitable industry, and so the Rob Leifeld house style was basically the look of comics to me for oh too many years. I've not read anything of Malin's before so I don't know if he's consciously aping the style for this one gig or if this is how he normally works but it definitely scratches an itch of nostalgia I'm almost guilty to admit exists.

(I'm not sure why Blink and X-23 look as stoned as they do on the cover, though.)

Anyway, the issue goes all-out on the Leifeld nostalgia with Cable reuniting with Shatterstar to investigate the mysterious death of Candra, one of the immortal Externals, in the distant past of 2004. Longshot and Doop are also there with others promised by the cover down the line. Like a lot of the nostalgia the Legacy imprint is trading on how well it connects with the reader is 100% tied to whether it was a thing for you first time round. I was never big on X-Force in the Leifeld era (the local newsagent didn't carry it) and I only know Candra from one random Gambit-centric X-Men arc. I seem to recall Cannonball was an External or might have been one or was one and then it got retconned or something... oh, the continuity! Anyway, the long and the short of it is that James Robinson is off the title now, there's a new writer and a plot I don't care for particularly so this series has one more issue to prove itself interesting enough to keep or its culled off the list.

Invincible Iron Man #593

The Search for Tony Stark part 1

First of all, I had forgotten how cool the classic Iron Man logo is. I adore the rivets. Painting Warhammer 40,000 miniatures you tend to hate rivets but when they're a design element you don't have to pick out in Boltgun Metal they actually look really, really cool.

Moving on...

From here on out it seems that Invincible and Infamous Iron Man are merging into one series complete with the Doom and The Thing part of this issue keeping the art style from Infamous. Its jarring, to say the least. Still, there is one upside to Infamous Iron Man ending (if it is ending) because that means there might be an opportunity for an Ironheart ongoing once Tony Stark is again fully installed as the straight white cisgender male Iron Man that fanboy retailers have been humping their pillows at night hoping to see return (along with every other straight white cisgender male protagonist who took some time off recently).

Because I'm resigned to losing Jane as Thor, let's not lose Riri as well, Marvel. 

That time Jean Grey was a tentacle monster

No, seriously, this was a thing at one point and I want it to make a comeback. Just imagine it: Marvel's making all these moves right now in preparation for the “original” Jean to make a comeback and instead of the 90s blue and yellow suit or the green bodysuit and gold sash of the classic Phoenix costume we get this...

Wouldn't that be glorious?

Okay, this is mostly just me trolling but I think there is something to be said for bringing back Little Miss Perfect in a slightly different form, especially as the younger Jean Grey is largely just the same character but a bit more assertive. The other original X-Men have pretty big differences between their time lost selves and their modern day selves (being less dead; being less evil; being more confident in their gayness; being Doctor Strange with big feet) but the difference between the two Jeans seems to be little more than the younger Jean is reaching some deep, personal realisation a bit sooner than the original did.

So what would be a better way to distinguish the two than to give one of them massive hentai tentacles?

Let's face it, boys, Logan would still be into it. 

Ta-Nehisi Coates' Storm: a wishlist

I am so stoked for this series. Storm is one of my favourite characters, she has such a deep and rich history to draw on and so, with all respects to Ta-Nehisi Coates

#1: a twelfth issue

Ah, yes, Ta-Nehisi Coates spinning off a title from his Black Panther run, we all know how well that usually goes, don't we? I admit, I didn't bother with World of Wakanda but I did my part for Black Panther & The Crew. I just hope that this issue can somehow find the audience it needs to keep going because just based on Storm's appearances in Coates' other work he has so many ideas for her that it would be a crime for this series to get the “one arc and then chopped” treatment.

Also on this subject...

#2: bitch ass manbabies to shut the hell up

Attention, cretins! This is Storm we're talking about here: she's not a new character and she's not taking a precious bloody name away from any fictional white men you might be emotionally invested in. Could you please, just this one, shut the bloody hell up about “forced diversity” with this one. Go back to crying into your cornflakes about how the Hulk is now an Asian kid and/or a woman.

We cool? Moving on.

#3: Cairo

One of the really interesting parts of Black Panther & The Crew was exploring Storm's relationship with Harlem, her parents' home that she only experienced as an adult. The previous Storm ongoing had a lot to say about her relationship to Kenya (if I'm wrong about it being Kenya, I apologise, I remember it being Kenya that she lived in between Cairo and meeting the X-Men). One part of her life that hasn't been touched on in some time is her childhood on the streets of Cairo where she was a pickpocket.

#4: The Further Adventures Of The Crew

A man can dream. But if not the whole tea, then maybe just...

#5: Misty Knight

I was wrong, it turns out. When I was reviewing Black Panther & The Crew I completely forgot that Misty and Storm know each other really, really well. Back in the olden days of Chris Claremont's original run, Misty was Jean Grey's roommate in New York city and so she and Storm interacted quite a lot. This throws that relationship I enjoyed so much in The Crew in a whole new light.

#6: Special Agent Ororo Munroe, FBI

I am sure this was brought up recently in some X-title or other but once upon a time, in a much later Claremont run, Storm and several other X-Men were deputised to the FBI as the XSE (yes, it was really called that, Xavier's Security Enforcement). She is, or was, a legitimate agent of the government. Food for thought.

#7: Doom

So there was this very odd arc in the Claremont days where Doom captured the X-Men and subjected them to all sorts of trials and tortures but in the end he lets them go in exchange for a dinner date with Storm. It sounds like I'm making this up but I swear its true. There was a similar situation with Dracula.

#8: Bruno from Ms. Marvel

He's in Wakanda, Storm spends a lot of time in Wakanda and what's more Storm is a teacher so she could easily be brought in to lecture at his polytechnic on mutant rights or agriculture or something. This is the most fannish idea on the list and that's why its last, a little whimsy to go out on, but just think about how cool it would be. 

Comic Reviews

This week the Joker gets his head straight, his ex and her ladyfriend take a holiday to Riverdale, reality TV brings nostalgia to the mutant masses and Kate Bishop has some surprisingly non-sapphic catharsis coming her way.

Batman: White Knight #1

This looks like its going to be an interesting take. I mean, I'm a little iffy about the (apparent) intention to have Joker and Harley as a happy domestic couple down the line (and on the cover) but given some of the plot points introduced here there's a tiny chance it could work. More likely it won't and that'll be problematic but since Harley hasn't appeared yet aside from a flashback cameo, I'll give Sean Murphy time to get there.

So, we have the big idea pitch: Batman is steadily going off the rails with his brutality and the hero/villain dynamic between him and the Joker gets flipped. Its interesting that what Murphy has Batman do in this issue to show how crazy brutal Batman has become is actually not anywhere near as extreme as what some recent movie versions have him do as an ostensible good guy. I'm one of those people who bangs on about how Batman of the comics is a very different, very much more human character than the mainstream version (and, no, the comics are no longer the version mainstream, blame the direct market) and this just throws that into sharp relief. In fact, the story doesn't even portray Bruce in an entirely negative light for the things he does giving his breakdown some sympathetic motivation.

So we have the beginnings of a heroic version of the Joker which even riffs on The LEGO Batman Movie of all things as its starting point. Murphy draws the hell out of every panel, not least of which the big confrontation between Batman and the Joker. What little we see of “Mister Napier” in the first few pages of the issue before we flash back to his origins suggests more of a gentleman consultant to the GCPD which, if true, would be a nice rebuke to Bruce's approach in putting forward the idea that he might have been able to do more as Bruce Wayne (again, more of a criticism of the way the character is in film than how he's been portrayed in comics for decades now).

Anyway, a really promising start but I do worry that the Joker being “cured” is just going to be used as an excuse not to address his past treatment of Harley before they settle into unquestioned domestic bliss.

Harley and Ivy meet Betty and Veronica #1

You know what really cheesed my onions last week? The Suicide Squad issue of Gotham Resistance. They had Stjepan Sejic, a man known for his acclaimed wlw romance series Sunstone, drawing an issue with Harley and Ivy in it somehow written by the only writer on the payroll who still thinks those two girls are straight. That is a wasted opportunity right there.

So now we have a crossover where Harley and Ivy meet another two female characters whose straightness has famously been up for debate. If nothing else, it can't be worse than the time the Punisher turned up in Riverdale.

So the set-up is simple: Mister Lodge has purchased an area of local wetland to develop into “Lodge University” (at least the guys at Archie are getting some useful mileage out of the Trump administration) and Ivy is not happy so she and Harley come out of hiding to try and “persuade” Hiram Lodge not to go through with it. Meanwhile, the Riverdale kids are preparing for a Heroes & Villains costume party Lodge is hosting and that they've been conscripted to help out at.

Betty and Veronica are in full on enemies mode at this stage, by the way, whilst Harley and Ivy are in one of those domestic “we're hiding from the law, that's why there's only one bed” arrangements they fall into from time to time. Its actually nice to see both sides of the crossover being as slice of life as each other, albeit with one side more comfortable with murder. Oh, and Kevin Keller and Sabrina Spellman are besties which is either new or something I didn't know before but I hope they continue to appear in the series.

X-Men Gold #13

I bloody love Mojo as a villain. I love the idea of an interdimensional dictator who is also a reality TV producer who provokes fights with the X-Men for ratings. I love how bizarre it is. I love how it allows the X-books to go in a different political direction from the usual race and sexuality based commentary (which are both good angles but variety is the spice of life and all that). It's always nice to see the awful, capitalistic little scrote and now he's the focus of this era of X-books' first crossover.

This is the X-books' Legacy storyline and, as such, there are references to a bunch of old storylines, “the greatest hits” as Mojo describes them. Funnily enough, on the same page, Logan describes it as trying to kill the X-Men with nostalgia, which... oh dear.

Now, on the one hand there's nothing here that actually annoys me other than the fact we get the briefest Xaviers' baseball game ever. Seriously, guys, those are remembered as the series iconic character piece scenes because they tend to actually feature character work. Here we have the Gold team not even reacting to the fact the Blues turn up with a vampire version of Storm. Aside from that its all good: villain I like, nice set up, even a good bit of progress for Rachel's character arc.

And at no point did it need big visual callbacks to Inferno, Days of Futures Past and The Asgardian Wars. That's just fan service for the sake of fan service or so it seems right now. Hopefully as we get further into this story the choices for callbacks will have some relevance to the characters but for the moment its just a bunch of alternate costumes for longtime fans to get a brief feeling of satisfaction for recognising and nothing else.

Hawkeye #11

Kelly Thompson's version of Kate and Madame Masque is a lot less... sapphic than Fraction and Aja's was. I mean, its still there if you want to look at it and there's even a rare occasion here of a “we're not so dissimilar, you and I” conversation that isn't complete bollocks in this issue that sort of feeds into that but its a lot more of a straight forward hero/villain relationship now.

This issue actually felt like a rather low key conclusion to the storyline that been running, in the background at least, since the first issue if it actually is the end. The business with Kate's father rather suggests we're moving into a new phase of the story as Kate's family issue and family history come to the fore. That said, as quick as Madame Masque#s part in the plot is dispatched it does leave room for some good character progression with Kate and her friends. There's a lot of catharsis for Kate, not just in things she says to her friends and her father but in a couple of good, dynamic fistfights she gets into and there are few characters in comics who need catharsis more than Kate right now.

Plus, next issue there's an All-New Wolverine appearance before we move on to the triumphant return of Hawkguy! So there's that to look forward to. 

Comic Reviews

This week, Brienne of Tarth gives evidence; two jerks head into space; the Ninth Doctor and Rose end up all at sea; the X-Men aren't as astonishing as they think they are; and, Riri Williams experiences future shock.

Journey to Star Wars: The Last Jedi: Captain Phasma #1

The last time Marvel did one of these Journey To... series it wasn't what you'd call the most relevant comic they ever did. It was basically the story of how Poe Dameron's parents met. Okay, the details of The Force Awakens were super, super secret so what Marvel could do was rather limited and I didn't go into this thinking much had changed.

Effectively, this issue (and probably the whole arc) forms an extended epilogue to The Force Awakens as Captain Phasma narrates a not entirely frank account of how Starkiller Base came to meet its end. The dialogue is minimal, as suits the character, Marco Checchetto's art carries the bulk of the storytelling duties. If there's one thing that's clear from how the creators are treating the character its that they, and perhaps Disney's licensing department, view Phasma as being more the “new Darth Vader” than Kylo Ren is.

Frankly, I'm with them on that one.

This first issue doesn't shed any more light on Phasma's character than her appearances in the Poe Dameron ongoing have. She's still pretty much just a very efficient, very cold storm trooper in particularly cool armour. The writing captures her voice well and the art makes her look all kinds of badass in a way the film singularly failed to so I'm more than willing to pick up the next issue to see if things get more interesting.

Green Arrow #30

Hard-Travelling Hero part 5: Constellation of Fear

Its a reunion of the original Hard-Travelling Heroes! I was pleased as punch when some throwaway dialogue early in this arc referred back to the original Green Lantern/Green Arrow series because that's one of my favourite classic comics and here we get to see how the two Rebirth versions of the characters work together!

As it turns out they've mellowed towards one another and that's good because this issue the exact opposite of what the original Hard-Travelling Heroes was about: this is Ollie needing to get out into space, high above the people he's trying to save instead of convincing Hal to keep his feet on the ground and notice the little people. There's a lot of nice scenes where we get to see the two Greens be jers to one another in that way that people can be when they're totally comfortable with each other.

We drop in, briefly, on Star City and Dinah and Emi's ongoing investigation into whatever happened to the secretary Ollie is meant to have murdered. Honestly, I wish there was more to that plot because I like Dinah and Emi together and this brief scene is one of only a few rare snapshots we get of the two women being superheroes together.

Doctor Who: The Ninth Doctor Special one-shot

The Lost Dimension part 2

So, is it all starting to tie together yet? Well, no. This issue does exactly what it says on the cover. After the Alpha one-shot set up events all across the modern series continuity (and the Fifth Doctor era) this one hones in on the Ninth Doctor and Rose. It follows up briefly on the Jack and Tara subplot from Alpha but in the main this is a standalone that has Nine and Rose running into Madame Vastra and Jenny Flint on the high sees. Its exactly as fun as it sounds as a one-off, though at times it does feel more like a second prologue to the story.

Anyway, interestingly Vastra and Jenny already know the Doctor which opens up the comics to do so much more with the Paternoster Gang in the future. There's more distrust between Vastra and Nine than she had with Eleven and Twelve, though Nine just isn't as trustworthy as his successors (unless you're Rose). Now that the series has long abandoned Vastra and Jenny (and Strax) I'd love to see Titan revisit the characters in depth.

Especially as the comics seem a lot less shy about Jenny and Vastra making heart eyes at each other than the TV show was.

Astonishing X-Men #3

Life of X part 3

I'm starting to wonder about this different artist on every issue angle. Its a nice idea in theory but it doesn't seem to be contributing much to the overall experience. I can see how it could but even with most of the series so far taking place on the astral plane there hasn't been the sort of stretching of artistic muscles you'd assume would be going on.

This issue art comes courtesy of Ed McGuinness, an artist I really like. For the most part he's called on to draw Old Man Logan wandering through various scenarios built by the Shadow King to sucker him into believing its all real and putting him under the King's control. So far to good.

Its not that its badly drawn, its just there's nothing about the scenario that merges with McGuinness' art style to create the sort of amazing showcase that a series with a different artist on every issue should be offering. Nothing here is bad, its just that this was sold, as most series of Astonishing are, as a series os especial specialness.

And I'm not feeling it.

Generations: Iron Man and Ironheart one-shot

This one, I'm feeling. This issue has a whole list of pencillers, inkers and colourists that should make it unwieldy and confused but just adds to the experience as different artists hand in art that matches the different moods and sense of confusion Riri goes through in this issue, art gaining definition as she comes to understand what's going on around her. This issue also marks the first time one of the younger characters going through the Generations thing has been sent to the future, which I guess makes sense since the story being teased at the end of the issue is the return of Tony Stark.

Anyway, Riri is in the far-flung future we've been teased with a few times, the one where Tony Stark is the Sorcerer Supreme and those kid Avengers from that one cartoon turn up because that can't just be left to lie dead in the dust where it belongs. The two bond about futurism and its interesting to see because for the first time this is a pairing where both characters know each other. True, there's a gap of experience between the two because this Tony knows Riri far better than she knows him but no one is ignorant of the situation.

If nothing else this really makes me want to see more interaction between Riri and the real Tony Stark rather than the increasingly dodgy AI version.