Category Archives: Comics

Hench-Sized Comic Book Reviews – 4/29/17

Good news, everyone! The Gamer Girl & Vixen graphic novel is here! Almost! my partner, the great and glorious Kristi McDowell, picked up the comics at the shipping depot on Friday, and she said they look amazing! I’ll be heading down to her place soon to start packaging them and shipping them out to our Kickstarter backers. If you’d like to order your own copy, stay tuned to this blog for details!

Meanwhile, regular comic book companies keep putting out books. Unfortunately, I’m kinda busy at my day job his week, so I had to trim some of my usual reviews, like Hulk. Fortunately, there were still some goodies! The final issue of Patsy Walker a.k.a. Hellcat is Comic Book of the Week because it went out like we all hoped it would: adorably.

Patsy Chibi 03

If only that were true for the rest of us

Double meanwhile, after only two issues, I’ve already decided to drop both Weapon X and X-Men Gold. The former is fine, I just don’t care about it. But I am finding X-Men Gold to be actively bad. There’s no cohesion in the comic. Events and scenes aren’t held together by any real foundation, and seem to exist solely to make for ‘kewl’ moments. Plot points are nonsensical and lacking in logic. And the art, of course, is terrible.

These are probably similar reasons to why I’ve stopped watching all of Marc Guggenheim’s DC Comics TV shows on The CW. Yes, even Flash

Comic Reviews: Detective Comics #955, The Flash #21, Infamous Iron Man #7, Patsy Walker a.k.a. Hellcat #17 and X-Men Blue #2.

Read the rest of this entry

The 6 Best German Superheroes

Guten Morgen! Most comic book companies feature heroes and villains based in America. Heck, Marvel Comics has pretty much every single superhero in their stable hanging out in New York City specifically. I bet it gets pretty crowded! But on those rare occasions when a hero goes on a world tour, they get to meet superheroes from other countries!

Like Germany.

Germany List 01

This one

I’ll be kicking off a new world tour List of Six series with Germany. I did a list on French superheroes a few years ago, and it remains pretty popular today (thanks Google search!). There are a lot of fascinating world superheroes out there, and a lot of neat ones from Germany specifically! So join me after the jump for the best German heroes and villains in mainstream comics!

Read the rest of this entry

Introducing: Marvel Rebirth!

I refuse to be a dancing puppet on a string. Marvel Legacy can go suck a lemon.

Look, I am nobody. I’m a middlingly cool, extremely handsome blogger who writes about comic book and pop culture stuff. There are a million blogs out there like mine, and I honestly cannot tell you what makes mine better than theirs. I don’t make any money off this blog anymore and it hasn’t gotten me any sort of exposure or better job. It’s just something I like to write for the fun of it.

Which means I have total editorial control. Which means I’m going to pass on reporting on things like Marvel Legacy or Marvel Generations.

Marvel Legacy 01

Generations was announced a couple weeks ago. It’s going to be a mini-series teaming up classic Marvel characters like the original Wolverine with their modern replacements like the newer Wolverine. And then Legacy, which was announced this past weekend at C2E2 Comic-Con in Chicago, is going to involve bringing back and solidifying the classic characters, while relaunching all the titles and giving a bunch of them their original numberings.

So yeah, it’s another Marvel relaunch. They do this every two years or so, like clockwork. I am not going to get excited about it or report on it.

But more than anything else, this is just Marvel Rebirth. That’s all it is, and I’m not going to call it anything else.

Marvel sales have been slumping in comparison to DC Comics recently, because DC has had success with Rebirth, where they doubled-down on telling classic comic book stories with classic characters, as opposed to trying anything new or modern.

And since it worked, that’s what Marvel is going to do. They’re not going to say that Marvel Legacy is just Marvel Rebirth. They’re going to flower it up with all manner of marketing and PR talk. And they’re going to expect all the comic book news sites to march to the beat of their drummer.

But it’s just Marvel Rebirth.

And even though I write a blog about comic book news, I’m not going to dance like a puppet on their string and talk about how amazing this is going to be. I haven’t particularly cared about DC Rebirth. And whether I not I care about Marvel Legacy will depend entirely on whether or not the relaunch produces good, enjoyable comic books. That’s all that matters.

There are no string on me.

Get it? like Age of Ultron.

———————

Hench-Sized Comic Book Reviews – 4/22/17

Lots of fun comics this week! Marvel kicks off Secret Empire, which I won’t be reviewing. And DC kicks off their next big Watchmen event in Batman, which I’ve decided to get back into reviewing. In fact, we’ve mostly got DC comics this week! A reversal of the norm!

Unfortunately for DC, the one Marvel comic I reviewed — Ms. Marvel #17 — wins Comic Book of the Week for some really fun bits! Like a day-saving video game session in the middle of a convenience store!

LAN Party 01

This is how Kamala Khan saves the world

Meanwhile, the opening salvo of Secret Empire came out this week, and while I don’t really review Big Events anymore, I’m digging it so far! I absolutely love the set-up and premise behind this event. Captain America has been brainwashed into being a secret bad guy, and he’s using his clout and heroism to build up a secret army to take over the world! And the rest of the heroes are going to need to band together against impossible odds to defeat and save their greatest champion.

That’s just good crossover storytelling! I liked all the issues that kicked off the event, I love the evil knife twists that Captain America pulls off, and I hope for an exciting ride.

Comic Reviews: Batman #21, Batwoman #2, Harley Quinn #18, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers #14, Ms. Marvel #17 and The Wild Storm #3.

Read the rest of this entry

Which of My Favorite Characters Has Marvel Killed In This Big Event, So Far?

It’s happened again, folks! As we all know, whenever Marvel launches a new Big Event Crossover, somebody’s got to die. They’ve got plenty of characters that can be used as cannon fodder, and many of them are some of my favorite comic book characters. That’s what happens when you have a special place in your heart for C, D and Z-list superheroes.

In the last big event, Inhumans vs. X-Men, it was my all-time favorite comic book character who bit the dust: Madrox the Multiple Man.

Mach Madrox 01

Never forget

Madrox died in the prologue to the main event, making it sting just that little bit more.

And sure enough, with Secret Empire kicking off this week, another one of my favorite C-list comic book characters has been killed off during the prologue. Gosh darnit!

Who bit the big one? Who has Marvel carelessly cast aside in the name of having casualties? Join me after the jump to find out! SPOILERS, obviously.

Read the rest of this entry