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Hello All! No excuses this time, just laziness. I had all the books read by Tuesday if it is any consolation! I’ve decided to put this in my reading order just to make my thoughts a little more linear. Other than that, this is your usual edition of the TPL. We have a total of 24 books, 1 each from Image and DelRey, 6 from DC and the rest (16) from Marvel.
Spoiler Alert
Image
-Mice Templar II #4- Mice Templar continues it’s expansive mythology. This issue sees Karic and Cassius’ training continuing with Karic getting better by the day, the captured mice have their rebellion stamped down, and Cassius reveals why the Templar fell. I never expected this book to be this good. It’s just fantastic and a great way to start the week. 1/1.
Del Rey
-The Talisman #0- My LCS put this in my pull box because I’ve been buying all the Stephen King books from Marvel. I’ve never heard of this book before. From what I’ve read in this first ever DelRey book, the Talisman is some device that enables people to travel between time and places, juggling between the modern world and a feudal knight’s type world. Yeah, it was alright. I wonder what else Del Rey will release to stay on the shelves. 1/1.
DC
-Batman: The Unseen #2- Oh, this is a twice-weekly book. The Invisible Man continues causing havoc and even meets face to face with Black Mask. Batman is investigating and is getting closer to his man, but isn’t quite there yet. I love the art of Kelley Jones and his team-ups with Moench always seem to work, and this is no exception. 1/1.
-Blackest Night: Superman #3- Superman is able to break Psycho Pirate’s control over Superboy and Psycho Pirate is subdued. For our other characters, Supergirl takes out her the zombie of her father and Krypto helps Ma Kent take out Lois Lane. Smallville gets back to normal (amid a ton of casualties) and Superman says he’s gonna figure out what’s going on with the world. This was a better conclusion than I had expected. I mean, the end of the last issue was just silly but this really redeemed the book. 2/2.
-DCU Halloween Special #1- This is an annual tradition now, seeing how the first one came out last year. This is a collection of 13 tales, some of varying quality. The highlights would be a Bagley drawn Hal Jordan story, a cool Batman story where Robin saves the day (dressed a Superman), a Mirror Master/Bloody Mary tale, and a Wonder Woman/Blair Witch type tale. The two Superman stories to end the book were quite cool, too. This is a tradition I can get used to. 3/3.
-Final Crisis Aftermath: Dance #6- Most Cool Superbat takes the team on his shoulders and creates a media juggernaut. This was cool, but I think it was rather pointless in the long run. I think that of all the four Aftermath tales come to think of it. It was useful in tying up loose ends with characters which makes it not worthless, then. Hm, I just waffled here in my own column. So yeah, this ties up loose ends from some of the minor characters seen in FC. I really like the tone that this book had. 4/4.
-Justice League of America #38- The JLA is in the dumps now and everyone’s hurting. It gets worse when Despero shows up. Only the timely appearance of Zatana helps get rid of Despero but there’s an even bigger threat on the horizon: Blackest Night. Bagley drew this so I’m instantly a fan, but please let’s change the line-up, the Vixen led JLA isn’t working. 5/5.
-Superman/Batman #65- This is a Halloween inspired issue where the Scarecrow kidnaps Superman, Batman, Joker, and Luthor and puts them through their worst nightmares. Batman’s already living his and so he’s able to break free and turn the tables on Scarecrow. When you already have a huge Halloween special an issue like this doesn’t seem necessary. Plus the art on most of the pages wasn’t so great, either. 5/6.
Marvel
-Amazing Spider-Man #609- We continue seeing how Raptor and Ben Reilly had their falling out, Kaine gets involved on this mess and Raptor takes Parker’s family ransom in Forest Hills. Yes, life sucks for Parker. This mistaken identity story is working, even though this issue was more slowly paced than previous issues. 1/1.
-Dark Avengers #10- We start a new story here, and it was pretty decent. There’s something going on in Dinosaur, Colorado and the Dark Avengers end up heading out there to find why people are going missing. They think it’s going to be an easy job but when Sentry is taken out they get a bit worried. Norman is taken to a dimension with Dormammu, Nightmare and Mephisto, and what could those three be up to? I’m pumped for this new storyline. 2/2.
-Dark Reign The List – Hulk #1- Norman wants Bruce Banner off his list. He has a great plan, sending Hand and Ms. Marvel after Bruce and Skaar. Ms. Marvel gets an ingenious idea, she drenches Bruce in gamma radiation in hopes that he will turn back into the Hulk, where Skaar will be waiting to kill him. That is actually a really cool twist at the end. Amazing Spider-Man #14 is reprinted, which was the first appearance of Green Goblin and featured the Hulk. 3/3.
-Dark Reign: Skrull Kill Krew #5- The Skrulls swerve everyone by turning on Norman and trying to help Skrulls. Ultimately, this was useless and I didn’t enjoy the story at all. 3/4.
-Dark Wolverine #79- Daken tries to clear his name at the urging of Norman but he gets his ass handed to him by Moses Magnum and other D-listers. Was this on purpose? Because that would be weak. Daken says he’ll settle the score. Like I said, if that was legit and Daken got beaten by those three I’ll say this was terrible, but I think they’re going with the Daken vs. Norman angle and if that’s the case, this is worthy of the point. 4/5.
-Deadpool: Merc with a Mouth #4- Deadpool continues with the off-beat antics, as he and Dr. Betty escape the Zombie T-Rex and make off with the Deadpool Zombie head. This retains the wit of the other ongoing written by Way and is definitely different from other books on the stands. 5/6.
-Incredible Hulk #603- This is where continuity confuses me. Weren’t these two meeting in another book already? Anyway, Skaar and Wolvie fight which leads to a Skaar/Daken fight which pleases both parents. The Leader looks to get involved on the last page. Well, might as well bring back the Hulk’s greatest enemy. The back-up with Lyra and she continues taking out the foes modeled after some of Hulk’s rogues gallery. The Lyra stories have been surprisingly enjoyable. 6/7.
-Invincible Iron Man #19- Iron Patriot (Norman) finds Tony and starts beating the crap out of him, but Pepper has alerted the media and Norman can’t finish Tony without looking like a murderer. Tony’s brought to the Helicarrier and is close to death. His living will states that should that happen, Donald Blake should be called. Well, let’s bring Thor into the book! I enjoyed World’s Most Wanted and seeing Tony as an idiot was a new angle for him. However, this is it for the title for me, since I just can’t afford all these books anymore. 7/8.
-Punisher: Noir #3- The Punisher is dead and his son is there to pick up the mantle. It is years later and he takes out two of the three who participated in killing his father, including Jigsaw and Barracuda. The third participant appears to be some sort of cross-dressing man. This is the only Noir story that has kept the Mythos of the character while adding a pretty radical change with the whole father-son thing. 8/9.
-Mighty Avengers #30- Hank Pym talks to Eternity and decides he needs to fix this situation with the Unspoken. The Unspoken has pretty much had his way with the rest of the Avengers to this point. I really like the Unspoken one, though I find the storylines of Hank and Reed Richards to be virtually identical right now. This may be one that doesn’t survive my big cutbacks in the following months. 9/10.
-The Stand: Soul Survivors #1- The Stand continues, with Nick Andros finding Tom Cullen, a mentally retarded man, along his trip. He also finds a woman named Julie but when Julie rubs Nick the wrong way he slaps her and tells her they don’t need her. Like any woman, she reacts by shooting at them and destroying their stuff. So Nick and Tom are on the road again and meet a guy in a truck named Ralph. I love the pacing of this issue and the tornado scene was really well done. 10/11.
-Thor: Tales of Asgard #6- We close our little Tales of Asgard segments with a cool story about Hogun and the gang battling Mogul and defeating Hogun’s hated enemy once and for all. This is vintage Kirby and Lee and definitely worth a look, especially since it collects these back-ups in one easy to read collection. 11/12.
-Thunderbolts #137- Somehow Iron Fist is captured by the Thunderbolts and put under mind control. He battles Luke Cage, who must’ve survived his heart attack in New Avengers. They fight, but Luke reaches to Iron Fist’s soul and with the help of Ant-Man they escape from Norman. I wasn’t too crazy about this, especially since Luke was never healed in the pages of New Avengers, nor did he even really turn himself over yet. Little things like that are annoying. Plus, Iron Fist was captured so easily it made him look like a joke. This will be the last issue of Thunderbolts I get, and it goes out on bad note. 11/13.
-Wolverine Origins #41- This is more Wolverine vs. Skarr action (with Skaar punching Wolvie across the country and impaling him on a tree). Banner shows up and tells Wolvie they may be able to help each other. This was a better telling of the Skaar/Banner/Wolvie stuff than Incredible Hulk did. Although I wonder why this and Incredible Hulk seem to be almost the same. 12/14.
-X-Men Legacy #41- Rogue borrows Trance’s powers to get to Emplate’s dimensional home where he is keeping Bling as a prisoner. Bling’s name is spelled with an exclamation point but I won’t be including that. So Rogue is at Emplate’s place and finds that not only is Emplate spying on the X-Men, but DOA has summoned monsters that can hurt her in trance form. I always liked Emplate as a villain, probably because of my love of Generation X and he fits really well in this story. 13/15.
Awards
-Book of the Week- When I look at the list of books I’ve read this week there is only one clear winner and that’s the first book I read: Mice Templar #4. This is a comic that is just destroying everything else on the stands right now. It has an in-depth, well thought-out mythology and a main character in Karic that is really endearing. I just love this comic.
-Disappointment of the Week- For being consistently bad, Dark Reign: Skrull Kill Krew highlights the worst of the worst this week. From the beginning I knew I wouldn’t like it, but at least I have all five issues so I can bundle them up and sell on eBay.
-Cover of the Week- Deadpool: Merc with a Mouth features an AWESOME Suydam cover of a black and white Deadpool with contrasting black and white lines behind him. This just looks so cool I would put it as my background.
-The Bottom Line- What is it with me and these latenesses? I had these all read by Tuesday but I don’t know why it took this long to actually review them. I am even almost done reading next week’s comics, too. I also have come to the realization that I buy too many books a week so I hope in the coming months to whittle the list down to something more manageable.
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Questions? Comments? Shoot me an email.
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