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Hench-Sized Comic Book Reviews – 10/14/17
Have you heard the horrible news?! After many long years, Amanda Conner and Jimmy Palmiotti are leaving Harley Quinn! Say it ain’t so, you guys! I’m going to miss you! Don’t worry, I’ll stick with you all the way to the end!
Unfortunately, we don’t have a new issue of Harley Quinn this week! Instead we’ve got some truly awesome issues of Amazing Spider-Man, Detective Comics, Mister Miracle, Runaways and more! And I’m very pleased to award Comic Book of the Week to the latest issue of Ms. Marvel, which settles back into basics and delvers a super fun issue!
Whatevs
DC released a new issue of their Metal Event this week and it’s OK, but I’m not particularly liking it. There’s an artifice to the whole thing that’s turning me off. Like, Scott Snyder and DC are trying too hard to fit this into old bits of DC continuity, and that falls flat when the story is so basic. It’s just a bunch of evil alternate reality Batmans, and we’re told that the world has been completely conquered. I think the scope is just too big for what they’re giving this story and too much is being hammered into place just to be clever. No thank you.
Comic Reviews: Amazing Spider-Man #789, Detective Comics #966, Mister Miracle #3, Ms. Marvel #23, Runaways #2 and Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #25.
Hench-Sized Comic Book Reviews – 9/30/17
Comic Convention Season is almost over! Tomorrow I will be selling Gamer Girl & Vixen at Uticon in lovely Utica, NY, so if you live in the area, stop on by! For now, though, I’m reading regular comics!
Plenty of fun entries this week, from the proper return of Tim Drake in Detective Comics to the return of Volstagg in The Mighty Thor. But Comic Book of the Week goes to the new issue of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers for some great character moments, great monsters and a great twist ending!
Beware the Goth Sloth!
I also read the first issue of Marvel Legacy, and it was fine. It’s mostly just a big tease for all of Marvel’s upcoming storylines, and some of them look fine. None of them tickle my fancy, so I just hope we get some good stories out of them. I don’t particularly like this 1,000,000 BC Avengers, even if it’s slightly clever. And the less said about the real Wolverine’s “return” the better.
I can’t have missed you if you never went away, Old Man!
Comic Reviews: Batgirl #15, Detective Comics #965, Infamous Iron Man #12, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers #17 and Mighty Thor #23.
Good News, Everybody! Tim Drake Was Robin Again!
Robin is one of my all-time favorite comic book characters, and Tim Drake is my favorite Robin. And as a comic book geek who likes what he likes, you can imagine how bummed I was at how drastically the New 52 altered Tim Drake’s origin story. The biggest change the New 52 reboot made was that Tim Drake was never Robin in name, only Red Robin, as if the adjective changed anything. There were also changes to how he became Robin — like the name “Tim Drake” being a witness protection name, and taking away the fact that Tim figured out Bruce and Dick were Batman and Robin.
Well guess what? There’s good news, everybody! Because self-proclaimed Tim Drake fan James Tynion IV has decided to change everything back in the pages of Detective Comics! Now and hopefully for all time, Tim Drake was Robin!
This takes me way back
Look at the ‘R’ insignia on his chest! There’s only one R! That means he was Robin for reals, people! Tim Drake was legitimate! Rebirth has finally lived up to its purpose! At least in my eyes!
And that’s not all! In this week’s issue of Detective Comics, Tynion re-establishes Tim Drake’s original origin story! Once again, Tim was a smart kid who deduced on his own that Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson were Batman and Robin, and he tried to convince Dick to be Robin again — only to take up the role himself!
Way back!
It also sounds like “Tim Drake” is going to be his real name again. No more of this witness protection retcon! That was always poorly thought out anyway!
As a Robin and Tim Drake fan, I couldn’t be more pleased. It’s been a long several years since New 52 drastically altered my favorite DC Comics character, but I’m glad to see that the wheel of comics has once again turned things back in my favor!
Of course, this raises newer, weirder questions about Robin continuity.
In the original stories, when Damian Wayne showed up to be the new Robin, and Tim Drake graduated to being Red Robin, he took on a whole new costume and purpose. It was a natural transition, even if the name “Red Robin” was a weird step forward. It’s no Nightwing, but DC made it work.
But now? That picture above is Tim Drake’s first costume as Robin.
And this is Tim’s Red Robin costume for Rebirth.
Still an OK costume
So…what happened in the new continuity when Damian showed up? How was it decided that he would become Robin and Tim would become Red Robin? Because based on these costumes, it looks like the change in the new continuity means that Tim just added a second “R” to his insignia. His costume looks almost identical, so he didn’t even transition out of that.
It’s like Damian probably whined about being Robin, but Tim clearly wasn’t done with the job, so to make everybody happy, he just added the word “Red” and a second “R” to his costume. The letter is probably just taped on.
“Look, look, see? Now I’m Reeeed Robin. Totally different identity.”
Works for me!
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Big Tim Drake News This Week!
Finally, at long last, Tim Drake is going to return to comics after his fake-out…was it earlier this year? Last year? I don’t remember. Either way, there’s going to be some big Tim Drake news and re-retcons in this week’s issue of Detective Comics! Check out this preview and interview with writer James Tynion IV!
I’ll be back after the issue drops to share all the great news! I just wanted to prepare everybody in the world of comics for this great week.
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Hench-Sized Comic Book Reviews – 8/12/17
Next week is Flame Con! I’ll tell you all about it when I get home. It’s going to be the big convention debut of Gamer Girl & Vixen, and we are very excited! But we’ve got to wait, and until then, we can read the likes of Detective Comics, Harley Quinn, Squirrel Girl and even Ms. Marvel!
Comic Book of the Week goes to the first issue of writer Tom King’s new Mister Miracle series. This is the issue that everybody is talking about this week, and for damn good reason!
Can’t argue with that
I’m ready for Secret Empire to be over. These events are way too long. The latest issue is fine. It’s all still fine. But there’s no energy anymore. It doesn’t feel like the story is just going through the motions, per se. It’s more like…clearly this whole thing was orchestrated from on high, like all stories. But rather than really tell the story and the nitty gritty, we’re kind of just strolling through the big moments. We’re not reading this comic so much as it’s being told to us. I hope that explains it.
Comic Reviews: Detective Comics #962, Harley Quinn #25, Hulk #9, Mister Miracle #1, Ms. Marvel #21, Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #23.
