Category Archives: Superman
DC to Rely on Sameness to Sell Comics
Because unique characters and comics didn’t work, DC has decided to put all of their eggs in the Justice League basket. I can’t blame them. If your Hawkman, Static Shock and Legion of Superheroes comics aren’t selling, why keep putting them out? Comic books are a fickle market. We fans say we love certain characters, but we don’t say it with our wallets.
DC announced two new comics yesterday, both of which fall back to tried and true money earners:
Superman/Wonder Woman and Justice League 3000.
Her lasso is out of control!
DC already announced months ago that they’ll be making a Superman/Batman comic, reviving a title from before the reboot. So I guess it just makes sense to add Superman/Wonder Woman, especially considering their new romantic relationship. Not much is known about Superman/Wonder Woman so far (other than it focusing on their relationship), but it will be written by Charles Soule and drawn by Tony Daniel, and it will debut in October.
All they need now is Batman/Wonder Woman to make the trinity complete. Expect that announcement any month now.
Justice League 3000 is replacing the soon-to-be cancelled Legion of Superheroes comic. DC started the New 52 with two Legion comics, both of which have now been given the heave ho. I’ve never been a Legion fan myself, so I never bought the comics, but I always figured the Legion was important enough to always be around. But nope! DC has decided to simply create a Justice League in the future. Click the jump to see all the future versions of the characters. This idea is…interesting, to say the last. I don’t know what to think of the idea. It’s too bad Legion had to go, and it’s too bad DC is just falling back to the safety of the ‘Justice League’ brand name. But maybe Keith Giffen, JM DeMatteis and Kevin Maguire can work their magic. They’re the brilliant creative team behind those hilarious Justice League comics of the 80s and 90s.
I’m not saying it’s a bad thing that DC is relying on the Superman and Justice League brand names more than they should. Both DC and Marvel are doing it. I just find it…generally disappointing. Not that I was buying Hawkman or Legion of Superheroes, but I liked to believe some people were.
Anyway, click the jump to see the new futuristic JL members and let me know what you think about these two new comics in the comments.
Superman Cereal by Phil Postma!
To prove that I’m not just a Superman Hater, and can be quite sweet to the Man of Steel, I’d like to share these adorable Superman cereal boxes from artist Phil Postma. I’m glad to know that there are people in this world who use their great talent for silliness.
Check out the rest after the jump! The best one, of course, being Bizarre-O’s!
Hench-Sized Comic Book Reviews – 6/15/13
This is a big week for Superman. Not only did his super big, important movie come out, but it’s also the launch of the heavily hyped and potentially good Superman Unchained. As you may have seen already, I didn’t care for Man of Steel, but I’m a little warmer towards Superman Unchained, even though it didn’t contain any chains whatsoever. I also enjoyed the first issue of the new Batman: Zero Year storyline. If only DC had put out a new issue of Wonder Woman this week, they would have had strong comics for all three of their major characters.
Though when it comes down to brass tacks, only one of them can come away with the coveted Comic Book of the Week. And even though Superman Unchained had some pretty fancy art, only one comic book this week provided the origin story for Batman’s giant penny. Batman #21 wins!
I apologize for the low number of reviews this week. Between Man of Steel and just a hectic work week at my day job (a double homicide, a single homicide and a missing baby) I ran out of time. Still, all good comics all around.
Comic Reviews: Batman #21, Nightwing #21, Superman Unchained #1 and Wolverine and the X-Men #31.
Review: Man of Steel
I’m going to spare everybody any obvious Superman references in my opening. No ‘it’s a bird…it’s a plane’ stuff. Nothing about Kryptonite or telling you to ‘look, up in the sky’. This isn’t a time for geeky references. This is a time to hang my head in disappointment that Man of Steel was not the movie I hoped it would be. I had such high expectations for this film, almost all of which were supported and lovingly caressed by a series of awesome trailers. And I’m a huge fan of director Zack Snyder’s previous films. I thought Man of Steel was going to be great. Instead, it’s a mess, from beginning to end.
Your enjoyment of Man of Steel will rest almost entirely, I think, on your tolerance for excessive CGI and fake explosions. Personally, those sorts of movies mean nothing to me anymore. Never once during Man of Steel was my pulse racing, and even Superman Returns managed that much.
Movie Rating: 2.5/5 – Pretty Bad
The worst thing about Man of Steel is the pacing. The film is in love with snap cuts that have no transitional elements whatsoever. One minute Superman is having an important conversation with Lois Lane and some military generals, the next he and Lois are suddenly standing in a desert just staring at one another. Man of Steel never takes any time to cherish a moment or a scene, even when it’s called for. First and foremost, this a Superman movie, but Snyder also tries to make it a movie about first contact with aliens, and that’s fine. It’s a perfectly reasonable plot to give a Superman movie. But the films never fully connects with that theme. You can feel the movie trying to grasp the concept, even flirting with it, but before anything meaningful can happen, it’s straight on to the next CGI explosion or spaceship.
The only thing Man of Steel really has going for it is the acting, which is generally well done all around. Henry Cavill is a generally OK Superman, at least when he’s called upon to act. Kevin Costner and Diane Lane are great as Pa and Ma Kent, though Russell Crowe is pretty much just playing Russell Crowe when it comes to Jor-El, Superman’s alien dad. I think after Les Miserables, I’m only ever going to just see Russell Crowe on screen from now on. I can’t imagine him ever inhabiting a character again. And Crowe shows up far too often in this film.
The standouts of the film are Amy Adams as Lois Lane and Michael Shannon as General Zod, the villain. Adam’s Lois is far more than any sort of damsel in distress, though it’s shocking how much leeway the U.S. Military is willing to give a lowly newspaper reporter. And Shannon is just really villainous, though the attempts to make him more than just an evil, snarling bad guy don’t really work. But that’s fine. He’s good as an evil, snarling bad guy.
Join me after the jump for my full review. There will be some SPOILERS, but probably not many.
More Superman Celebrations on the Way!
I’ve got my ticket for Man of Steel for the 7 p.m. showing Thursday night, so hopefully you guys and gals will see my review Friday morning. Man of Steel was my most anticipated superhero movie of the Summer, and I’m very excited to see it. I hope it’s damn good. Fortunately, it couldn’t do any worse than the now classic Superman IV: The Quest for Peace.
Good old Screen Junkies. I can always count on them to be a hoot! Now we just have to wait for them to do an Honest Trailer for Man of Steel! You just know it’s going to be good.
Henchman-4-Hire 