Shipping This Week! -- 05.05.11

ASTONISHING X-MEN #10 [YEAH RIGHT!]
CAPTAIN AMERICA & THE FALCON #14
DISTRICT X #13
FANTASTIC FOUR #526 [old-fashioned Diablo shenanigans; part 2 of a story buying time before the JMS / McKone team hops on board]
MARVEL TEAM-UP #8 [Blade v. Punisher v. the Ringmaster w/ one of the Mandarin's rings!] [RINGmaster!!!]
MARY JANE HOMECOMING #3 (OF 4)
ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #77 [angsty pants a go go]

Last week was a great comic book for me though! The free comics (well, Flight was the only one I really enjoyed, but they had a FCD sale at the store), the final issue of Human Target, Shining Knight #2, and I bought/read the Kyle Baker Plastic Man trade (awesome!) and the first Alias trade (also very good and utterly Bendisy).

Although I'm still playing catchup on holiday weeks, and I haven't got last week's haul yet - Bank Holidays delay comics day to Fridays in the UK, and my shop's just moved and hadn't been delivered to by the time I was there on Friday.

So, am I the only one who's noticed that GothAM Central and Green Arrow are just about the only DC titles that haven't been late at all over the last year or so?
I noticed because they ALWAYS ship the same week. So maybe they're just late together. Still, most of the other books I read can hardly be called monthly.

All this fanboy horsesense about "OMG I remember when folks like Kirby and Byrne would work on 10 books, and they came out every month on the month and WTF all these late folks nowadays are just slowass hacks" can go lick one third rail. If anyone's to blame, it's the "traffic cops" scheduling these books w/out recognizing the creative team's tardy tendencies. Of course, I read enough books each month that I (& my wallet) can survive a few titles going AWOL every so often.

(OK not really.)

If anything, fill-in issues should be SPECIAL EVENTS - instead of employing the Jim Shooter approach ("hey! Fingeroth! write me 22 pages of Hawkeye & Antman fighting the Taskmaster at a carnival! Milgrom needs them in 48 hours!"), editors should plan for the regular artist / creative team to take a siesta (to catch up on work or whatever), and get some hottt artist / creative team combo to work some mojo for a 2-4 issue storyline that actually sorta ties in to what the regular team is doing. Of course, such an approach would defeat the purpose of the LIMITED SERIES, but that's fine w/ me.

[xpost?]

xpost HAHAHA I am glad it wasnt only me who noticed the Fingeroth truth.

HUK ARE YOU EXCITED ABOUT THIS

OK, in an ideal world this should have shipped in a different week to Rann/Thanagar War #1, but it's a great end to a great mini. Adam shows WHY THE HUMAN BRANE IS BETTER THAN PUNY ALIEN BRANES. But...! A final twist...! Leading into...

RANN THANAGAR WAR #1

Which isn't nearly as good. It ties up the missing time period between it and Adam Strange well, but... is it just me, or has the Zeta Beam technology comepletely changed (based on how Adam uses it here)? Also, NO NEED FOR GL PLZ KTHXBI

AQUAMAN #30

This is beginning to pick my interest up again. It's turning very rapidly into Catwoman Under Water, which is no bad thing. More of a moody crime strip than a hero-sock-BANG-fest, and none the worse for it. Keep watching this title, it could get very good indeed, very quickly.

DESOLATION JONES #1

As anyone who read Frank Ironwine knows, the only thing Warren does better than hard SF (Ocean concludes next week, doesn't it?) is hard-boiled detective material, with a hint of powers. This is such a strip, though he tries possibly too hard to dip his toe into Grant-esque weirdness, and is as good as you'd expect it to be. In fact, this could shape up into what The Filth should have been.

FABLES #37

I can't remember anything about this. Which is a shame, because I do enjoy it.

GREEN ARROW #50

Arc concludes, yadda yadda yadda. GA fights with all three Speedys. EVERYTHING TURNS OUT ALL RIGHT with little or no tension - especially since the previous issue concluded with Roy following the villain through the woods, holding together his slashed throat, on the promise he would get treatment at the other end. Then JUMP CUT MADNESS to "3 months later" when BAMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM! out of nowhere Brick returns. I can't explain why I love this so much, particularly when I know it kinda sucks, but I do.

PVP #17

Reprints, amongst others, the Comic Shop With The Biggest Trade Paperback Selection plot and the Bootleg Software plot. Still pound-for-pound one fo the funniest web strips out there.

FANTASTIC FOUR #526

The Diablo plot sort of concludes. This feels like a Lee/Kirby tribute strip, especially in the dialogue.

MARY JANE HOMECOMING #3

Oh no! Mary Jane is homecoming queen! Oh no! Note to Marvel and DC editors - MORE TEEN ROMANCE BOOKS PLZ.

PUNISHER #21

The Nicky Cavella plot rumbles on, but with a higher bodycount than probably ever before in the Punisher. Seriously, huge amounts of people end up dead in this. It's a decent enough mid-storyline isuue, I suppose.

PUNISHER CELL ONE SHOT

This feels like the Punisher book Garth has always wanted to write. Without spoiling it too much, Frank infiltrates a prison and kills the people involved in the death of his family. I can't believe he hasn't done it before, but he's obviously thought about it for some time as this feels 'crafted' in a way a lot of his other Punisher material doesn't. Worth picking up.

ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #77

Utterly pointless. Adds nothing to the ongoing arc, other than to let us know Nick Fury is beginning to think Spiderman is a liability and Peter is thinking of giving it up (again). Bleh.

SPOILERZZZZ

Ha - I actually read Rann / Thangarian War BEFORE the last issue of Adam Strange - "OMG THEY DID WHAT?", and I expected some big to-do about the rescue efforts & such in AS, & then when I read AS, it was all (seemingly) off-camera. I was really looking forward to more planetary armageddon. (As for the best of the INFINITE CRISIS OF UNIDENTIFIABLE SECRET ORIGIN minis - I'm partial to the writing on Villains United, but the art is very meh. The other 3 are OK - I want to like Days of Vengeance more than I do; some of the dialogue was very stilted, but then Det. Chimp came in, and YAY. Also, purty art. ECLIPSO IS FOR CHILDREN.

USM did end kinda perfunctory, in that timeless sad way. But, wow, the last 4 pages w/ A) Nick Fury's casual "oh, yeah, we need to take away Spider-Man's powers" pronouncement (!!!!) and B) THE BREAK-UP! more than made up for the "KIIIILLLHRRRRRRRRHH MEEEEEEEEEEEEEAHHHHHH" stuff.

Spot-on re: the FF Lee / Kirby tribute stuff. It was a nice change of pace, even if the whole "bad dream" subplot went right over my head. Also, a nice send-off for WE in UFF w/ Anhillius In Las Vegas! Also also, kudos for WE for writing a story that involves the search for Ad01f H!t13r's homemade pornos. (JH Williams 4evah!)

Spot-on also re: MJ: Homecoming. Sean McKeever's got another mini coming up in a couple of months about a teen hero called Gravity - I'm really looking forward to it. And, based on the few scenes w/ Spidey in these books, I'd LOVE to see McK & Slott Machine tag-team and do a little Spiderizing (if the growed-up married Avenging Spidey can withstand getting a shot of FUN in the buttocks).

Also: Monkey Joe is the new Awesome Andy.

ALSO: the first issue of the Simone / Byrne Action Comics is probably the best Supes story I've read in a long while (and I say this as a semi-fan of Rucka's run, and a semi-fan of what Brian Azzarello did for the first 6-8 months of his thing) (boy, did it end on a weird tip, tho). The one odd thing - Nelson (he who is inking Mr. Byrne) REALLY lays it on thick. Also, someone please get JB away from the Image-shaped xtreme panels, kthx. They really don't do anything for the story.

SPOILZERISZEZD

The pirate vampire gets rescued by a greedy film producer! The vamp bites his hottt PA and turns HER! The producer wants to make a story out of the pirate vampire's life! The vamp & the girl gang up to take the producer down! BUT HE STOPS THEM BY EATING A CLOVE OF GARLIC AND SPITTING ON THEM! This is fun stuff! Possibly acquired-taste fun stuff, but fun stuff nonetheless.

NB: Brick never went away. Back at the end of the "New Blood" arc, GA laid a beating on him and then let him go, since law enforcement of Star City is too chickenshit to go after Brick after Brick killed the previous mayor and D.A. So he's just sorta been lurking unseen, making friends with everyone else GA has tangled with in the past year. AND NOW THEY ALL WORK TOGETHER!
BUT THE JLA IS FALLING APART! WILL EVIL VANQUISH GOOD? WILL TOM FOWLER STAY ON AS PENCILLER? DIDN'T NIGHTWING QUIT SUPERHEROING TO BE A MOB MUSCLE? IS MIA GOING TO HAVE A HARD TIME REPLACING HER PHARMACEUTICALS WHAT GOT BLOWED UP? WHO THE HELL LETS A DUDE WHO HAS RETURNED FROM THE DEAD BUY MEDICAL INSURANCE ANYWAY?
TUNE IN NEXT MONTH!

GLA #2 was good! After #1 I wondered if the subsequent issues would have that element of pathos along with the slapstick and the metahumor, and this one certainly does.

I'm enjoying Mnemovore as well, even though nothing really happened in issue #2 and the 'viral marketing awards ceremony' thing was lame.

Um, hello, IMPALEMENT ON A GIANT PIPE?! Not that I really think anyone's going to die, but come on.

xpost

BTW - GIANT SIZED X-MEN #3 is COMING SOON! Featuring a very short story by JOSS WHEDON and NEAL ADAMS! And LOTS OF REPRINTS! For only FOUR DOLLARS! I'm NOT BUYING IT! (Tho I might.)

?

IT IS MENNNTOK!

Although, in that X-Axis review he seems to think that the robot flies off to Genosha at the end of the issue to kill Xavier. WTF, surely Xavier is the one who flew back to the mansion?

BRAIINS!

When do we want them?

BRAIIINS!

No, the robot's the one flying to Genosha. Although I was confused as to which one was flying when I first read it, if you look again you can see the plane flying towards Xavier in the next-to-last panel. That's also why the robot's colored red at the start - the red tint of the plane's cockpit window.

Also: I too was amazed by the impalement.

Also also, this month's classic Whedon line: "Normally I wouldn't have done that"

kitty and colossus, on the same big stick. romantic!

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