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Good day folks. This is the fourth edition of The Pull List for July 2009. I am usually very pumped to get my books but this week seems extra special. There are not one but TWO huge milestone Marvel books. Yes, both Hulk and Spider-Man have reached their 600th issue. Each special issue is jam-packed with stuff and should be a blast to read. Also, you may have noticed that the special surprise I had for you readers was the Wednesday Comics stand alone reviews. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. Enough chatting, let’s go to the comic rundown (1 Dynamite, 5 DC, and 17 Marvel for a total of 23) and then onto the show.
Spoiler Alert
Marvel
-All-New Savage She-Hulk #4- She-Hulk plans to mate with Norman but decides not to. Luckily, Boudicca tells her there is a solution that doesn’t make her a traitor to her kind but no one really cares because this tie-in really didn’t do anything but introduce Lyra to us as she hops to the Hulk comic. I just didn’t think this was all that relevant to anything and wasn’t a dark reign tie-in. Just because Norman is in it doesn’t make it a DR title, does it? 0/1.
-Amazing Spider-Man #600- This is just a packed issue. The primary story is drawn by John Romita Jr. and features Dr. Octopus trying to take over the city and ruin May’s wedding over silly jealousy. Octopus is really on his last legs, given that his legs and arms are useless now. Spider-Man gets the help of all his friends (the New Avengers and the Fantastic Four) and he stops Otto and the wedding is back on. This was a great way to celebrate the 600th issue with one of Spidey’s original foes. Oh yeah, a certain red-head shows up at the end, too. The back-up stories are equally interesting, including a Stan Lee story about the different Spidey’s throughout the years, a great Ben/Peter story, two kids discussing what it would be like to be Spidey, May asking Ben for his blessing in her marriage to Jonah, a look at the Spider-Mobile and a teaser of things to come. This is well worth the money, even if you don’t read Spidey regularly. 1/2.
-Avengers: The Initiative #26- Norman’s Initiative is open and in full effect. It is basically taking criminals and having them act as heroes while still being villains. The main group is alerted of the happenings at 42 (Blastaar took it over in War of Kings) and they want it back. I’m happy to see that War of Kings is making it into a mainstream Marvel title and that earns the point itself. 2/3.
-Black Panther #6- Shuri takes on Morlun all by herself and leads him to where Ororo is on her mission to give up her soul to free her husband. This was all part of the plan to switch Ororo and Morlun as the soul-givers and it ends up working out for the good guys. Shuri is now our new Black Panther while T’Challa recovers (I guess). So we have a new Black Panther but again I question the Dark Reign logo. What’d it have to do with Dark Reign? Luckily this one had a story that was good enough to make it decent. 3/4.
-Capt. Britain & MI13 #15- This is really sad because this has been a kick-ass book that is coming to an end way too soon. This was a case for the MI13 that they had Dracula fooled from the start. The magic skull that Dracula had destroyed to all the vampires into Britain was actually a replica and the real one still existed. With this the vampires were destroyed pretty easily. I wonder if this was the original ending to this story? I have a feeling it was but it would’ve been told over two issues to really bring Meggan and Britain together. It’s a sad to see this go but it went out as well as it came in with some great stories. 4/5.
-Dark Reign: Fantastic Four #5- The FF return and Franklin shoots Norman, but it was a toy gun. Are his powers coming back? Reed learns from the machine that he is the one who must solve the problems. Sue makes Reed take the device apart and Reed does, but he puts it back together to move it somewhere else. When Sue finds out she won’t be too happy. This was a five-issue arc to bring us to the new issues of FF. I wonder if this was meant as a mini-series or if it would’ve run in the main title if the current team wasn’t as delayed as they were? It would’ve fit in well as part of the main title. This makes Reed at the center of trying to find a solution and maybe bring the FF back up in Marvel’s popularity chain. 5/6.
-Dark Wolverine #76- This should be renamed to Daken’s chess game. He is playing Bullseye, Norman and the FF. He goes to the FF to tell them he wants out of the Avengers. Of course, Bullseye is following him and Bullseye is followed by Norman. So Daken stages a fight to make sure that Norman doesn’t know what he’s really up to but now Norman has footage of the FF he can use against them to tarnish their names. Whose side is he on? I love this little chess game so far. 6/7.
-Deadpool Suicide Kings #4- Deadpool convinces Punisher (who thought he killed DP last issue) that he’s innocent and that Tombstone is behind it. Tombstone gets some muscle from the Hood to prepare for his big showdown with DP and Spider-Man which happens at the end of the issue. I like the writing and most of the art, but this is the oddest looking Spidey I’ve seen in some time. 7/8.
-Guardians of the Galaxy #16- The Guardians are teleported to the year 3009 where the original Guardians (at least in terms of first appearance in “our” time) tell the current Guardians how to fix the world. They are about to be teleported back when the Badoon show up and destroy the only time travel device. So they head out to the Celestial Wall and transmit a message to Warlock through time. The old Guardians then destroy the world, and the current Guardians with it? The Guardians meeting the Guardians was really cool. 8/9.
-Incredible Hercules #131- Hercules beats himself (his mortal self) and Zeus sacrifices himself to give Pluto power. Unfortunately for Pluto, this also frees the denizens of hell who want some revenge. Cho finds out that his sister is still alive and is pissed at Athena for not telling him. Cho leaves Hercules at the end of the issue. I think Hercules needs Cho in order to keep the book entertaining but we will see. 9/10.
-Incredible Hulk #600- This is another big 104 page story but wasn’t quite as good as the Spidey special. Hulk is depowered in the main story by the Red Hulk and now Banner can never become Hulk again. We still don’t know who the Red Hulk is, but Urich knows and like the Busch’s beans dog, he’s not telling. Stan writes a sweet story about the Red and Green Hulk with a very clever ending. Finally, there’s a Lyra sighting (and no one cares), Hulk Gray #1 is reprinted we get a preview of what’s to come and a cover gallery. Now I question these 100 issues. We start with #’s 1-6 before we head to Tales to Astonish, which Hulk started appearing in with #59. That title went to #101 and now we are up to 49 issues. Hulk started with his own title at #102 and that book ran until #474 for another 373 issues (and a total of 422). Hulk’s second title started with #1 and ended at #112 (and became Incredible Hercules). So 422+122 = 544. Where’d the other 56 issues come from? I think they are counting the Tales to Astonish run from 1-101 and that’s just wrong. Oh well, that’s just my thinking. I think similar numbering issues plagued both Thor and Cap. This was pretty good, but not as great as Spidey’s and I wonder why they needed a reprint when someone like Peter David could’ve written something. 10/11.
-Ms. Marvel #41- Ms. Marvel shows up to fight Ms. Marvel and the battle is seen all over the airwaves. Then another Carol Danvers is seen at the end. This is the beginning of the War of the Marvels but you know what, I don’t really care and this is the last time Ms. Marvel will be appearing on here. 10/12.
-Nova #27- Nova fights his way to the Kree world ruled by Ravenous where his brother has Strontian as his captive. She’s too strong and frees herself and it looks like she’s killed Robbie before Richie could get there. Throwing Blastaar in here made it a nice War of Kings tie-in, too. Another great issue. 11/13.
-Runaways #12- The kids are coming apart at the seams, with Molly protesting Nico’s care of Klara. Chase’s uncle shows up and Chase is a bit surprised, since he reveals he killed him already. This kid has a dark past. This looks like the beginning of the end of the Runaways and the title never really had the same charm it had when Vaughn left the book. Immonen has handled this arc well so far and is probably the best since Vaughn, but I don’t know how much longer this will last. 12/14.
-Wolverine First Class #17- A young politician is a man Logan knows well. In fact, as Patch he killed his father. Wolvie uses Shadowcat to spook him a bit (even though Kitty likes the guy) but Wolvie may have been wrong about him and the dead father isn’t quite as dead as Patch thought. This is a fun story and sometimes in a world of heavy continuity fun stories like the First Class titles is a breath of fresh air. 13/15.
-Wolverine Origins #38- Wolvie has an epic fight with Omega Red as Romulus continues pulling strings. This is just a big fight between Wolvie and Omega. Wolvie wins, but he’s knocked out by this fight and doesn’t see a new villain (Wild Child) sneak up behind him. 14/16.
-X-Force #17- X-Force gets back in time for X-23 to save Boom-Boom but fall captive to HAMMER. Crazy things are happening. The Sentinel program is being started up again and Surge’s powers start going haywire and it looks like she explodes at the end. This will just incite the anti-mutant sentiments even more. There were some interesting things going on here. X-23 was captured and Archangel was acting a lot like Apocalypse would, saying only the strong would survive. Interesting twists. 15/17.
DC
-Final Crisis Aftermath: Dance #3- The super-team has their own convention but they are caught unaware when danger strikes and they split up as a result. Their manager loves this because hey, any publicity is good publicity. The Twitterati posts really make this enjoyable for me and this is definitely my favorite of the four FC Aftermath titles because of how unique it is. 1/1.
-Final Crisis: Legion of Three Worlds #5- The saying better late than never definitely applies here. I had pretty much no idea what was going on but this had a lot of cool fights, Superboy returned (well, Connor Kent) and the Superman Prime is sent back to his Earth where everyone knows what he’s been up to thanks to some handy comic books. Yeah, that was a weird ending with the fourth wall being shattered but at the point it came out it was so after the Final Crisis story that the tie-in aspect was completely irrelevant. In the end it was a fun as hell battle story that brought back one hero while getting rid of a villain (for now). 2/2.
-Green Lantern #44- Flash and Hal wonder who plundered the grave Bruce when the black ring heads out and finds the fingers of Martian Manhunter. He shows up to attack Flash and Hal. They are shocked to say the least. Meanwhile, Scar (the evil Oan) attacks the rest of the Guardian sends some black rings to the world that was destroyed thanks to John Stewart. This is picking up really well and Martian Manhunter was just kick-ass here. 3/3.
-Tales of the Corp #2- This is another issue devoted to going a bit more indepth with the different types of power rings We look into the red lantern (rage) and the origin of Bleez; the purple lanterns (love) and see how Carol Ferris became Sapphire; and the orange lanterns (avarice) and how Larfleeze can steal beings bodies. There’s a really cool article by Ethan Van Sciver about how he came up with the different symbols for the different colors. This adds a lot to the different characters you’ll see in Blackest Night and it’s really like adding background to them that although you don’t need to enjoy Blackest Night, having it will make Blackest Night that much better. 4/4.
Dynamite
-Project Superpowers 2 #1- This takes place immediately after PS2 #0 so if you didn’t read that you’re totally missing out. So Black Terror and the rest of the superpowers battle President Power, Green Llama tells the Supremacy that they don’t run things anymore. Meanwhile, the Inheritor’s are searching for other super-powered people who haven’t been found from the urn yet and fund Captain Future, but he may not be what he seems. This is a fantastic start to the second series and with the Superpowers doing what they think is the right thing but coming across as terrorists (attacking the president) and they will eventually have to face the Inheritor’s. 1/1.
Awards
-Book of the Week- ASM #600 was just stellar. I would recommend it to any comic book fan just because of how much value you get for it and how great everything inside the cover is.
-Disappointment of the Week- Ms. Marvel #42 was the week’s worst. I just don’t care about this character (or either character) at all. It’s been a tough month for Brian Reed, as this is his second consecutive writing “honor” in this category.
-Cover of the Week- Incredible Hulk #600 by Alex Ross was just spectacular. I mean, what more can you say about this man’s art and his cover craft?
-The Bottom Line- Marvel had two clunkers in their midst but that doesn’t stop this week from coming very close to ruling all. Project Superpowers is a great epic, Blackest Night is living up to its hype, and the 600th issues of both Hulk and Spider-Man were both very good. This was a great week and since I only have like 30 minutes left to post this, that’s all for this week!
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