Category Archives: Batman
And So There is a Duke Thomas Action Figure I Gotta Have
Toy Fair was this past weekend, and while once again I did not attend, I could very much salivate over all the pictures and good action figure news I found online! Among the good news was this stellar Duke Thomas as Robin action figure that I now gotta have.
As a major Robin fan, I’m so far OK with Duke Thomas as Batman’s new partner. I’m not thrilled that he’s Yellow Batman Junior instead of Robin, but I’m hoping DC and their creative people go somewhere good with this. He’s Robin in everything but name.
Fortunately, DC decided to make an action figure of Duke in his badass, helmeted Robin costume instead of his Yellow Batman Junior jumpsuit.
You may recall that I ranked this costume as my third favorite Robin costume of all time! There’s just something about that awesome helmet/jacket combination that tickles my pinks. It’s a perfect modern Robin costume, though I’ll admit it probably doesn’t go as well with the classic Batman costume as the regular modern Robin costume does. But it was great for Duke Thomas and We Are Robin, so I’mma gonna get it.
I’ll try to find this sweet Batgirl action figure too.

I’m a little disappointed in myself that I don’t yet have a sweet Batgirl of Burnside action figure. I love that comic.
Courtesy Comics Alliance for the Toy Fair pics.
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6 Thoughts On The LEGO Batman Movie
I’m not going to call it the best Batman movie ever made, but Yeehaw, The LEGO Batman Movie is a hoot! Fun, funny and full of Batman-themed hijinks and Easter Eggs, the new sequel is mostly everything you could want from a follow-up to The LEGO Movie — and we’ve still got a proper sequel to that coming down the line!
The LEGO Batman Movie is quality Batman entertainment on a level we just don’t get to see very often. That makes it something special indeed.

Movie Rating: 8/10 – Very Good.
The bar has now been set pretty high for the rest of the year full of superhero movies. It’s not insurmountable, but The LEGO Batman Movie was still a blast! It was so good, and I do so enjoy this style of humor, that I’m even considering watching their upcoming Ninjago movie. Hopefully the party doesn’t stop anytime soon.
Join me after the jump for my review of The LEGO Batman Movie!
Why Does Batman Name His New Team the ‘Justice League of America’?
DC has relaunched a new iteration of the Justice League of America this past week and I’m a little confused. According to Justice League of America Rebirth #1, Batman forms the team to be a grounded, more human-focused group of superheroes as opposed to the god-like regular Justice League.

Batman is a big fan of The Flash TV show
We all know the branding reason why the new comic is called ‘Justice League of America’, but after reading this prologue issue, I’m wondering what the in-story reason is for Batman being so patriotic in naming his new team. When has Batman ever been a flag-waving character?
The Rebirth issue is a prologue about Batman going out and recruiting Black Canary, Lobo, the Ray, the Atom, Vixen and Killer Frost to form his new team. This isn’t the first time Batman has formed his own, more grounded Justice League. Any comic book scholar worth her salt would see this as an obvious Batman and the Outsiders-style group.

JLA is definitely the name he picks
But no, it’s not called ‘Batman and the Outsiders’. For reasons that go unexplained, Batman just copies of the name of the regular Justice League and tags ‘of America’ at the end, as if his team is only going to fight bad guys in the continental United States. It makes zero sense.
Especially when you remember that there already was a ‘Justice League of America’ in the New 52 continuity, which I’m pretty sure still applies in the Rebirth era. That team had a reason for using ‘of America’ in their name. They were legitimately government-based.

Remember them?
Has Batman forgotten about them? Is her purposefully co-opting the name for his new squad? What reason could that possibly serve?
Batman is a superhero who knows how branding works. And he’s clearly put a lot of thought into this team — hence why he’s recruited complete newbies Ray and Atom, and why he recruited Lobo for a grounded, more human-focused group of superheroes. So it just doesn’t make any sense why Batman, of all superheroes, would call this team the ‘Justice League of America’ instead of literally anything else.
But I suppose even Batman recognizes that ‘The Outsiders’ just isn’t marketable.
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I Was Not Prepared For This Monday
I don’t know what crazy partying I did this weekend, but apparently it caused me to push off all blog prep for today. So in lieu of an actually interesting thing to read, here’s a fun featurette on The LEGO Batman Movie!
Comes out in, like, two weeks! So excited!
Also, keep staying tuned, because I might have some really cool blog news to share this week!
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Hench-Sized Comic Book Reviews – 1/28/17
Comics! I love’em. You love’em! We can’t live without’em! And here’s another big stack of reviews for comics I read this week. Kind of fun how I keep doing this.
Lots of good reading options this week, from Infamous Iron Man to the new Hulk series to my return to the Pink Ranger mini-series. There are so many good comics to choose from these days. Including and especially the new issue of Spider-Woman, which easily wins Comic Book of the Week due to another impressive, emotional issue.
Though I’m not going to lie to you: Spider-Woman #15 is crazier than I could have ever guessed.
I’ve also figured out the worst part about Inhumans vs. X-Men: the unintentional villainy of Ms. Marvel. I’m clearly with the X-Men on this one. The Inhumans are monsters who are comfortable with either killing or deporting every mutant on Earth. Since she’s an Inhuman, Kamala Khan gets drafted into the Inhumans’ side with the new issue, and it’s repugnant. That Kamala would so cheerfully and excitedly join the side in favor of genocide is just wrong. But here we are.
Comic Reviews: Detective Comics #949, Hulk #2, Infamous Iron Man #4, Power Rangers — Pink #6, Prowler #4, Spider-Woman #15, The Dregs #1 and Teen Titans #4.


