Batman #677 Review

Writer: Grant Morrison
Art: Tony Daniels

Grant Morrison has taken over the month and rightly so. The man can flat out write and it shows in Batman. Here we have part of R.I.P. and he continues to move to the story. There is the welcome addition of the newest Thomas and Martha Wayne plotline that adds a bigger sense of mystery. They [allegedly] were involved in some questionable recreational activities and now it is possible that Thomas Wayne himself could be black glove, wow. It sure is intense. Also another idea he introduces is that Batman himself cud be his own villain, it is unlikely but with Grant you just don't know. The art is great as well and Tony Daniels has recovered since that mishap with issue 675. The conspiracy that Morrison has crafted is deep, he uses Alfred in a way that most writers would not imagine. Alfred has always been a father figure or as close as any to Bruce and him actually being his biological father, you need to step back and think about it. The ending was an awesome cliffhanger with Hurt using the trigger word and the villains laying the smackdown on Alfred's candy ass. This is an amazing title and Morrison just continues to keep the ball rolling. [sidenote an interesting article went up on another blog and I suggest you check it out http://www.doomkopf.com/2008/05/31/batman-is-going-to-be-the-spectre/]

Art: PHENOM
Overall: GET IT

All-Star Superman #11 Review

Writer: Grant Morrison
Art: Frank Quietly and Jamie Grant

All-Star Superman is the best comic book title out there. Period. It is what a superhero comic is supposed to be. It captures the aspects of being a superhero, but it still keeps mature convictions. It is by far the best take on the man of steel out there. This issue further showed how Clark is handling his impending death. He is still troubled by how Earth will protect itself without him, but he has faith in his friends to keep it safe. I am truly moved by how genuine this Superman is. He really does care for the Earth. This is mostly commenting on the last issue, but this one shows the evil in the world: Luthor. Morrison's Luthor is evil man. He gets to be a superhero for a day, but he is still smart enough not to go up against Superman just with that. So he gets Solaris. We see Superman take it down, but not after losing some of his loyal robots. All of the characters feel very real to me, and we see Clark passing out at the end. Now, after saying all this praise, it is still not something i look forward to like Cap or Batman, but I really appreciate the comic and am pleasantly surprised when it decides to come out. Frank Quietly provides beautiful art. He continues to draw Superman very small in the panels, and that fits the overall theme of this title.

Phenom
OWN IT

Final Crisis #1 Review

Writer: Grant Morrison
Art: J.G. Jones

Final Crisis is here and it kicks off with a silent but deadly BANG! This isn't a flashy Vince Carter kind of them but a more solid fundamental Tim Duncan approach. The first thing this issue strives to do is completely rebuild some of the assumptions we were supposed to take from Countdown. He completely revamped the whole Death of the New Gods series by making a war occur off-panel and having Darkseid win. That was a good move because if the New Gods would wage a war it would not be in your own realm it would be in heaven and I appreciate the phrasing that heaven is broken, that is just awesomely ominous. The Monitors themselves have also become more appealing as they now actually seem to serve a greater role in the universe. I enjoyed the little comment on how they had finally had to deal with time as well as their new plane of existence because the Monitors on Countdown were apparently very accessible to anybody in DCU. The artwork was awesome, I enjoy the photographic feel of it as well as a red sky, you know an event is epic when they sky is red. I want to know more about the relationship between Libra and Darkside, if Libra is going to be a big player then I want to know more about his role. As for Darkside, that is just awesome, using the anti-life equation with kids is pretty evil. Darkside is a great bad guy and I'm glad he is finally living up to his evilness if that makes sense. He lost a lot of epicness but he is coming back. I'm glad Morrison is revamping DC because it needs it, this issue sets up Final Crisis well.

Art: PHENOM
Overall: GET IT

Daredevil #107 Review

Writer: Ed Brubaker/Greg Rucka
Art: Michael Lark

Summary:
We finally get back to form. I am not going to count #106, which was pure filler in my opinion. We actually move on to a story arc now. We got Matt all crazy and upset and he foolishly attacks Luke Cage (bulletproof skin!). C'mon Matt! We find out that this dude is going to death's row for decapitating kids. Cage thinks he is innocent, and wants Matt to help. Dakota does some investigating, and ends up getting attacked. She goes to Matt, who finally breaks out of his funk to pursue the case.

Comments:
Ed Brubaker is very good. He is much better at stuff like Daredevil and Criminal than he is at Uncanny. The addition of Greg Rucka didn't hurt either. We get a good issue here. We see Matt is still struggling with losing Milla, and we see him fight through it and get back to the real world. The whole death row thing was intriguing without Matt, but now that he is there, it should be much better. It will be interesting to see how he does, and how he is going to help someone who confessed to the murders. They make Dakota look like a tough gal, who is clearly suspicious of this case. The art is nice looking as well.

GET IT

Take Tro (5/26/2008)

Very huge week coming up. I want to touch on this because it is clearly the biggest thing this year that I can recall. Lets see what we have:

• Final Crisis- This one is sure to be meaningful, if nothing else. If you are a DC fan, then I am sure you understand how important this event is going to be. This is the best book coming this week ----- Nuff said.
• Batman- Morrison said we won't see the Joker this issue, but who cares? Batman RIP is going to be fantastic, and Morrison is going to give us a hell of a good read. Tony Daniel has gone Super Sayan.
  
• All Star Superman- If there was truly a perfect comic book, this would be it. Words cannot describe how good this title is. It is just the perfect take on Superman.
  
• Astonishing X-Men- Do I really need to say anything? The biggest news here is that it is probably the 4th most anticipated book of the week. Holy cow.

Others include Green Lantern, Thor, Daredevil, Ultimate Spiderman, New Avengers, Action, and more. This week is just so loaded, and it is the perfect time of the year to be a comic book fan.

The Amazing Spider-Man #560 Review

Peter Parker: Paparazzi! Part 2 of 3
"Flat Out Crazy"
Writer: Dan Slott
Art: Marcos Martin

Summary:
Peter is still a paparazzi. He goes around trying to take pictures of Bobby Carr, but everyone hates him for it. He starts feeling guilty when one of his pictures led to the death of this one lady. He fights the paper-doll girl and beats her when he gets another paparazzi to tell her that he won't mess with Carr anymore. Some subplots that took place were that Harry is still pissed at Peter, JJ is running around, and that Carr's publicist was in cahoots with Bennett regarding Carr's schedule and stuff. And the mystery girl: MJ!

Comments:
I enjoyed this issue. I think Slott is just perfect for Spider-Man, and he shows it again here by really providing a well plotted issue. The quirks weren't over the top, and the story was told well. Him and Zeb Wells are the best Spidey writers out there, and I am looking forward to what they do with MJ. Slott is making Peter go through tough situations, and he is learning from these situations. I thought the paper-doll girl was a little weak, but who knows. I hope Slott is writing the Anti-Venom arc later on. That would kick ass.

GET IT

Jam Session

With the re-launch coming soon the best blog on the internet will only continue to get that much better. We plan a complete re-haul that is going to kick more ass than Bucky in Captain America which is a segway into reviews. Yeah it is some smooth transition.

Brubaker is definitely writing for trade form. The story is meant to enjoyed in one sitting and he isn't really writing for the month but rather to tell a story. I think he is doing a Grant Morrison approach where his whole series is a lead up to an arc that will most likely involve the Red Skull and an endgame so intense that it affects all of Marvel U. If you notice nothing is actually resolved and it seems to all be build up. I don't mind that at all but to review issues on an individual basis the scores won't be as high. It is the body of work that is the appeal here and judging by his body of work it is currently the best in the business. No one has been building as long as Brubaker but on the individual basis this issue is a mention. I'm sure at the end it'll be important but now it is worth a check.



Justice League was really enjoyable this week. I was glad that they finally allowed McDuffie to write a whole issue. He was always doing some 50-50 with the issue that was just lame. With the backup story gone it finally allowed McDuffie to tell a cohesive story and I think this issue was really good. They did a good job about pushing Libra which is probably the whole reason this issue was mad. If the man can somehow recruit Luthor that means he is big time. Fun fact Lex Luthor was actually a scientist before they reconned him into something more evil, an80's business man. I do hate how the Big Three are going down that same road of secrecy and decent that peoridically tears them apart. There has to be some lesson they learned from that. The villian work was solid and the art was pretty awesome. I am a big fan of comics looking like cartoons and not being Alex Ross (no disrespect) but I look the cartoony look. Hopefully they allow McDuffie to continue writing full issues because the man is talented, he did the cartoon and that means something.



We didn't get the Batman RIP review in so here I go. Batman RIP the debut issue was pretty awesome. The Joker character work was out of this world. Tony Daniels is pulling an Ivan Reis hitting his stride just as the writer is putting out a career defining story. That is a good combination. I believe Morrrison has yet to debut the new batmobile because Bruce isn't in his right mind and as such the car is probably incomplete. Morrison did good work hyping up the Dark Knight but going into the butcher Joker mode. That scene was absolutely scary. The man has a body count probably close to 1,000 and let us face it, he was getting stale. How does one rectify the situation, shoot him in the face, give him knives and watch him spread smiles the old fashion way, cutting the face. The Black Glove looks like it could be real heels but I just got a feeling they aren't the real villain. This is a great jumping on point but it really doesn't advance the story. The Joke work is the real highlight in this issue and I strongly recommend it as a biased Batman fan.



Mighty Avengers was not what we had come to expect from it. The Sentry is the most useless character ever. The writers made the mistake of making him too powerful so how do they cancel that out, they give him mental breakdowns that take him out to equation. I want to keep this brief, I can't seem to understand this character at all. The void is allegedly his evil ambitions or something along those lines yet it is playing hero. I think he would benefit from some assertiveness and the Void is frankly more interesting. MArvel is all about the anti heroes and the Void would be great for that. Hopefully Sentry manages to become not crazy and a legit hero again. Marvel needs to do something because this cycle of him being the first person taken out in every fight is just insane, he is way too strong for that.

That concludes the first jam session. Hopefully with the rehaul we can bring in more readers and make this blog live up to potential. I believe in Harvey Dent like i believe in this blog, ehhhhhh, bad call, but you get the idea. (Lamest commercial ever is the Taco Bell white rapper who raps his order, really who does that? It is not quality like that Free Credit Report commercial where they are in the car. That is a classy commercial.)