Awesomed By Comics Podcast Episode #150!!!

This THREE EXCLAMATION POINT episode of the Awesomed By Comics Podcast is brought to you by 150 episodes of the Awesomed By Comics Podcast! So, including this one, I guess. (META!) We pause to look back on the last 3+ years of this little show, remembering some of the things we really liked ("Trinity?" Remember that?) and some of the things we really didn't like, which you can probably guess.

Meanwhile, we also do a regular show, for what was a monster week in comics in terms of sheer volume. Jeff Lemire and Travel Foreman's debut issue of Animal Man was easily the best of the relaunch issues, Evie has finally caught up on Garth Ennis and Russ Braun's The Boys so we can both talk about that now, some fun cosmic goings-on for Marjorie Liu and Phil Noto's X-23 and her gang, a fantastic #2 issue for G. Willow Wilson and David Lopez's Mystic, and a surprisingly solid start to Rags Morales and Grant Morrison's Superman. And then also we whine about books that were DUH NUH NUH NUH NAAAAAAH NUH NUH NAAAAAH etc.

We also annoint the official ABCP TEEN PATROL:

R.J. Washington (Commenter name: XandGunn)
Ryan Emmet (DocWhiskey)
Alberto De Jesus (Power Listener!)
Jennifer Rubinowitz (ABCP Yugioh Champion)
Laura Abe (Guyalice)
Dann Fuller (Another Power Listener, whose wife's debut novel you should all pick up! "The Princess Curse," in bookstores now!)
David Watts (everyone needs something in parenthesis!)
Greg Deaner (Lebeau2501)
and our very own Rick Jones / Snapper Carr, Ziah Grace.

Download/subscribe to the show here or in the right sidebar, and leave an iTunes review! Tell us what you think in the comments, and please always remember that you are more than welcome to list your own winners for our categories in the comments. Hell, you can list your own categories for our winners, for all we care. Or list your own winners for your own categories, from your own books. Whatever you want to do. And if you feel like donating, there's a button over there with which you can do just that! (Or save your money to buy my record when it comes out, which I also fully support.)

COVERS:

Moon Knight 5 by Alex Maleevand X-23 14 by Phil Noto

ABC Podcast Episode #122, plus visual aids

This episode of Evie & Aaron and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Weekend is brought to you by compromised immune systems and the inability to STOP THE RUN. We give much respect to two future-tech-idea-driven comics at different ends of their runs (The Infinite Vacation and Vision Machine) pay tribute to the always exceptional Secret Six, and Aaron has a bit of trouble with the proximity of the "O" and "P" keys on the keyboard. Speaking of which, Heroes for Hire keeps rolling, Daredevil and Superman start to get back on track (despite a shit beginning and some ridiculous proportions for Lois) and we bid a fond farewell to Thor: The Mighty Avenger without having ever learned the identity of the mysterious "Mister K."

Download/subscribe to the show here or in the right sidebar, and leave an iTunes review! Tell us what you think in the comments, and feel free to suggest your own winners for our categories. Also consider supporting the show with a donation of your choosing.

Cover(s) of the Week

Evie's Pick, from Infinite Vacation #1, cover by Christian Ward



Aaron's Pick, from Daredevil Reborn #1, Cover by Jock



Panel(s) of the Week:

Evie's pick, from Secret Six #29 by Gail Simone and Marcos Marz



Aaron's pick can't be shown because SPOILERS!!!! so instead here's a bonus anatomy lesson for Allan Goldman, penciller on Superman #707

ABC Podcast, Episode #102 plus visual aids

This week's episode of the Awesomed By Comics Podcast is brought to you by crazy two-sport athlete conspiracy theories, sandwiched by appearances of one of music's most recognizable tritones. We literally CANNOT say enough good things about the finale of the Boom! series "Codebreakers" -- because saying any more than we did would give the surprises away, and we are demanding that you read it. Superman hits the road to go be a dick somewhere other than Metropolis, The Stuff of Legend and The Unwritten both deliver great work as usual, we lol at Booster Gold, and the X-Men wrap up what turned out to be a fairly solid event by pointlessly murdering innocent and equally endangered creatures.

Download/subscribe to the show here or in the right sidebar, and leave an iTunes review! Tell us what you think in the comments, and suggest your own winners for our categories!

Cover(z) of the Week

Evie's pick, from The Unwritten #15, cover by Yuko Shimizu

Aaron's pick, from Gorilla Man #1, cover by Dave Johnson

Panel(s) of the Week:

Evie's pick, from Echo #23 by Terry Moore

Aaron's pick, from Thanos Imperative #2 by Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning, art by Miguel Sepulveda.

(for the real one, look down below - be warned, there's spoilers.

Taking her ball and going home

I'm not usually one to spend too much time prognosticating on plot resolutions, because I like to be surprised. But because I'm a bit sick and am feeling a little snotty both literally and figuratively, I would like to note that in a post on November 13 I wrote this, about how the whole "100,000 Kryptonians on Earth" thing in Superman/Action/Supergirl could possibly solve itself:

Either the world ends, or they all die in a General Lane Kryptonite attack, or Superman improbably convinces them all to behave forever, or somebody finds them an empty but perfectly inhabitable planet orbiting a yellow sun that they can all go be powerful and autonomous on. Ok, that one is probably the most plausible. But that seems a little anti-climactic.

Ok so nobody "found" them anything, but in this week's Action Comics #873 (supposedly a Lex Luthor Faces of Evil thing that had very little Luthor in it but whatever), that bitchy Alura-El (or Alura Zor-El? How does that work?) picked up the giant chunk of the Arctic Circle that New Kandor was sitting on and built a planet out of that Kryptonian crystal crap and put it in orbit around our sun, opposite Earth so that we'd never see each other, because neener neener meanie cooties. Also I don't think that's how orbits work and the gravitational pull of New Krypton would probably end all life as we know it, but hey, better than a bunch of beligerant Kryptonians flying all up in people's grills I guess.

On a related note, do you ever write down the plot summary of a comic book and think, "what?"

Ho Ho Holy shit I have a lot of wrapping to do tonight

We'll be gallivanting around the Eastern seaboard for the next several days, but please be sure to download the two-part year-end podcast if you haven't already. Have an awesomed one everybody!!


(I almost went with this image, but then feared that anyone who hasn't been around here all that much might take it the wrong way.)

More like New Krapton... oh whatever I can't keep up

UPDATE: Nevermind.

Ok, so, maybe Superman is caught in a rougher scenario* than I thought? This may very well be Geoff Johns' biggest triangulatory retcon challenge yet. But I think he's up for it.**

*Scroll down to "Stardust"
**I really do, no joshin. He's a master at turning nonsensical nonsense on its head until it looks like it was right side up the whole time. God speed.

Ok but seriously

I'm not really a giant fan of Superman, for all the reasons that anyone who isn't a giant fan of Superman isn't a giant fan of Superman. He's a little too too, you know? I like me some baggage, and failure, and character flaws other than being too nice. But I still appreciate the scope of his importance, and read his various titles, because no self-respecting girl who follows the DCU and was a toddler in the late 1970s* would do otherwise. In general I don't get overly invested in the Superman stories beyond their importance to the big picture. Which is why this New Krypton thing is, how shall I say it, a triple helping of whack.

100,000 Kryptonians. With the power of Superman. And naturally without his values and loyalty to humans. Let's put it this way: if Geoff Johns and James Robinson manage to think up an escape from this situation that is not totally devastating or totally preposterous, I will be stunned. Either the world ends, or they all die in a General Lane Kryptonite attack, or Superman improbably convinces them all to behave forever, or somebody finds them an empty but perfectly inhabitable planet orbiting a yellow sun that they can all go be powerful and autonomous on. Ok, that one is probably the most plausible. But that seems a little anti-climactic.

I think, though, that what's really sitting weird about this storyline isn't the crap sandwichness of the situation vis a vis homeland security. It's that it just so wholeheartedly unravels the mythology of Superman. He's the last son of Krypton, forced to cope with this responsibility on Earth. That's, like, his thing. Sure there's been the joy and drama of introducing isolated characters like Supergirl and Phantom Zone folk and alternate-universe Kryptonians, but not a whole damn city's-worth of them--I know the bottle Kandor thing has been around for a while, and I'll admit to never quite getting my head around it--but this is just nuts.

Now I realize that people who have been reading comics for decades might look at this and go "girl, this is nuthin, we've seen crazy irretrievable shit and this ain't it." Ok fine. But you understand my concern. I guess maybe this is where reboots come in handy. Perhaps Johns phoned up DiDio sometime last year and said "Dan, I'd like to use my Crisis Line please," and Grant Morrison will render this all moot. Cuz otherwise, I don't see this ending without a whole lot of martial law and broke shit and PTSD.**

*Like Aaron with Julie Newmar, I attribute my first recognition of the opposite sex and vague understanding of its significance to Christopher Reeve. I assume this also works for gay males of my approximate age.

**I know it's comics, everything will be fine.

Sarah Palin Prepares for Tonight's Debate at the Fortress of Solitude, Jor-El Hologram Not Much Help

(photo via)

ABC Podcast, Episode #15

This week's episode of Awesomed By Comics is sponsored by "Two and a Half Men," and Harriet's Halfway House, and three-quarters of a banana. Aaron and Evie revisit the awesomeness of Arcana's Penance: Trial of the Century with the second issue, say a sad goodbye to X-Men First Class as an ongoing, and finally give something to always-a-bridesmaid Tangent: Superman's Reign. Editing may not be super tight, Aaron has a lot of actual work to do.

I actually couldn't get this up when I was at home with my scanner and whatnot, so no visual aids for Cover and Panel of the Week just yet--maybe tonight, if I get a burst of energy.

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ABC Podcast, Episode #11 and visual aid

This episode of Awesomed By Comics is sponsored by knock-knock jokes, because we are in the pocket of Big Fun. Aaron and Evie actually agree on most of this week's winners, and Aaron accidentally gets some of Greg Land's e-mail, which explains a *lot*. Li'l Leaguers and Layla Miller win big.

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Cover and Panel (actually Page) of the Week, both from Superman Batman #51:

Gore-Al

Though it is a frequent temptation for the lazy, sometimes it is ok just to link to an Onion article.

Now go read Aaron's extremely excellent essay below.