Happy Memorial Day Weekend to everybody in America! I’m traveling to visit family this weekend and it should be a good time. But before I left, I got in some good comic reading, like Wonder Woman, Spider-Man and even Wolverine!

Comic Book of the Week goes to Absolute Green Arrow #1 for another excellent launch of a new Absolute Comic!

Meanwhile, I’m still deep into Crimson Desert and how to extend that game through the whole summer! The dev team keeps coming out with weekly patches that add a whole bunch of free content, and now I’m a little afraid of beating the game and missing out on what they come up with next! So I’m in for the long haul. Beyond that, I highly recommend the TV shows Rooster and The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins; both really fun shows! Haven’t seen The Mandalorian and Grogu yet because I’m getting together with some old pals to check it out next weekend. Should be fun.

Comic Reviews: Absolute Green Arrow #1, Amazing Spider-Man #29, Wonder Woman #33, Batwoman #3 and Wolverine: Weapons of Armageddon #4.

Absolute Green Arrow #1
Writer: Pornsak Pichetshote
Artist: Rafael Albuquerque
Colorist: Marcelo Maiolo
Letterer: Jeff Powell

It’s the first new Absolute Comic of the third wave and it’s a nice addition to the lineup so far!

In the wake of Oliver Queen’s murder at the hands of the bad guys, his former business partner and Epstein-stand-in, Jubal Slade, is murdered by the Green Arrow. The two of them founded the GreenArrows stock trading app, which is how they made their billions. To try to solve the murder and to protect their own, the bad guys blackmail/hire Dinah Lance, an ex-cop turned MMA fighter turned bodyguard, who is down on her luck trying to make ends meet to pay her father’s medical bills. She was also Queen’s girlfriend and neighbor when he and Slade were launching GreenArrows. The issue is told almost entirely from Dinah’s perspective.

On her first day, she accompanies the bad guys, including Hector Hammond and Tyler Reese, to Queen’s Arrow-Cave. They are immediately set upon by the Green Arrow, who murders Reese and a ton of other bodyguards before Dinah scares him off and saves Hammond. Upon recovering, Dinah and Malcolm Merlyn head back to the cave and find a secret room…and what’s inside is very eye-opening!

Comic Rating: 8/10 – Very Good.

This is a very good first issue that establishes all the characters and the tone. Don’t go in expecting the balls-to-the-wall style of Absolute Batman. Like all good Absolute Comics so far, Green Arrow has its own unique tone. There’s a lot of talking, for one, interspersed with violent, sometimes gruesome action. And it definitely works in this first issue. But there is definitely a lot of talking. There is so much set-up to get through, as you can see from my recap. Dinah Lance alone has so much backstory. I didn’t particularly like the idea that she was already Oliver Queen’s girlfriend. I think that went a bit far. But I’m willing to see where it goes from here. Maybe it’ll become integral. But she’s otherwise a solid protagonist thrust into an interesting situation.

The Green Arrow is pretty darn cool so far. Albuquerque doesn’t skimp on the violence in this issue, and that’s going to help set Absolute Green Arrow apart from the other comics. I want more. Make this a violent comic! A few familiar names are thrown about as suspects for the Green Arrow, but we don’t get anything solid, which is fine. I’m more than happy with this being a comic starring Dinah Lance, with Green Arrow as this deadly figure. I also really enjoyed how this issue tackled modern day financial bro stuff. That’s also a great angle for this series to tackle.

Scott Snyder has said in his Comics Writing 101 class that a good way to update characters for modern reboots is to adapt them to the world as it is currently. That’s why Absolute Bruce Wayne is working class, because billionaires are the bad guys in the real world these days. So I’m fully on board with Absolute Green Arrow as a Luigi Mangione figure, killing the likes of Jeffrey Epstein and his ilk. That’s a very awesome premise for a mainstream comic.

TL;DR: Absolute Green Arrow is off to a great start and is a fine addition to the Absolute lineup, easily establishing its own violent tone — though there is a lot to set up and explain at times.

Amazing Spider-Man #29
Writer: Joe Kelly
Artist: Pete Woods
Letterer: VC’s Joe Caramagna

Now that the latest uninteresting crossover Big Event is over, I’m gonna keep giving Amazing Spider-Man a try.

Now that he’s back on Earth and now that Torment is gone, Peter Parker begins to rebuild his social life — though it’s not going so well. But his buddy/co-worker Brian is out of the hospital and Peter gets a text to go visit for a meeting with the company. Peter is suspected in causing the accident that injured Brian because Ben Reilly sabotaged some of the code on his way out. When Peter arrives, Brian reveals his new Spore fungi mind-control powers. He’s got all the main Rand company characters in his thrall and he soon has Peter under his spell as well, demanding to know the truth. Peter is able to break free enough to punch him, but Brian is more mushroom than man now and easily absorbs/recovers.

Comic Rating: 8/10 – Very Good.

I really liked this issue. Creating new Spider-Man villains is always a mixed bag, but Kelly has put in the groundwork with this Brian character and his love of fungus, and I’ve seen in articles/interviews that he wants to build him in the classic mold of a science project gone wrong. I can get behind that very easily. Not every new villain needs to be some secret evil who is behind every bad thing that happens to Peter Parker, or needs to be some crossover with Deadpool. Gimme a classic science accident turned supervillain for sure! Though in his debut as Spore, Brian should have been given a proper costume. The set up is all that, he’s definitely a menace and I look forward to this story…but ya gotta give him a classic supervillain costume too! Hopefully that develops as the story moves along.

The story works nicely. I enjoyed seeing Peter try to pick up the pieces of his shattered social life. That was fun. I enjoyed the check ins with the other characters. I really, really like the idea that Peter has a crazy space girlfriend at the moment. That’s fun! But Marvel has already announced their attempts turn Symbie into the next Jeff the Land Shark. Whoo boy, that’s gonna whiff hard. Does Marvel really not understand that this sort of thing has to happen naturally? You can’t just create the next Minions based on the original Minions. Ah well. Great artwork, great feel to the comic and I definitely look forward to the fight with Spore.

TL;DR: All the groundwork has already been laid for the introduction of this new, classically-inspired super-villain, and the first solid issue of his menace is quite entertaining.

Wonder Woman #33
Writer: Tom King
Artist: Daniel Sampere
Colorist: Alejandro Sanchez
Letterer: Clayton Cowles

The storyline moves along at a nice pace with another fine issue.

Now reunited with Steve Trevor, Wonder Woman, Trinity and Steve travel to the Underworld to visit the Fates and get all of this undone. But Matriach shows up too.

Comic Rating: 8/10 – Very Good.

I’m still not entirely sure why or how Steve Trevor is back, but I’m sure it’ll come up. For now, we get some nice little scenes of the family together as they set about their journey into the Underworld. Not a lot more happens beyond that — but I was a sucker for Greek Mythology in Middle School, and the Underworld stuff was my favorite. And my favorite mythological monster of all time is Cerberus, the three-headed guard dog of the Underworld. So any comic with a Cerberus cameo is alright by me! And we finally learn who the narrators have been for this storyline, should have guessed. Not really a whole lot to say about this issue, other than it flowed nicely, had great art, some stellar mythological cameos and progressed the story just a bit further. Fine stuff all around, I’d say.

TL;DR: While not much particularly happens to the plot in this issue, it’s still an entertaining trip through Greek Underworld Mythology, my favorite childhood subject!

Shorter Reviews

Batwoman #3
By Greg Rucka, Dani, Matt Hollingsworth and Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou

Comic Rating: 6/10 – Pretty Good.

As much as I love Batwoman, Renee Montoya and Greg Rucka, this comic isn’t doing much for me. I would just say that not a lot is happening to really pull me into the comic, since it’s going for this narrative trickery of not really focusing on Kate Kane as our protagonist. So I’m not sure who the protagonist is. The twist is obvious, but the comic continues to tease it, and that’s gotten us nowhere in three issues. And the artwork remains divisive to me personally. So I’m still reading, because I have the utmost faith, but it’s just not clicking.

Wolverine: Weapons of Armageddon #4
By Chip Zdarsky, Luca Maresca, Bryan Valenza and VC’s Joe Sabino

Comic Rating: 8/10 – Very Good.

I didn’t know this was only four issues long and it ends well enough. I enjoyed this more than Zdarsky’s main Captain America comic, at least the Latveria arc. Plenty of good action. The artwork is solid. I don’t really care for this Interdimensional Boxes as a MacGuffin, but it’s whatever. What I’m really interested in is David Colton still, and Zdarsky made great use of him in this mini-series, especially the team-up with Wolverine. He even gets a great scene in this issue where he settles things with Steve Rogers after his opening storyline. So yeah, consider me on board for anything Zdarsky does with David Colton going forward. This mini-series was a great use of the character.

The comics I review in my Hench-Sized reviews are just the usual comics I grab from Comixology any given week, along with a few impulse buys I might try on a whim. So if there are any comics or series you’d like me to review each week, let me know in the comments.

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –