Friday, July 29, 2011

Action Comics #903 & Detective Comics #880

We're deep in DC territory now, as the next couple of review I do will be coming from the DC family of comics. We kick things off with two of DC's longest running series, Action Comics and Detective Comics. I've said it before, and I'll say it again, the fact that DC is renumbering these two series come September is a travesty... Renumber every other series, but come on, these two series have been running since the 1930's! So there are my thoughts on that, here are my thoughts on this month's installment of those two books.

Action Comics #903:

Summary: This issue begins with the various members of the Superman family(Supergirl, Superboy & Steel) picking a Doomsday and trying to prevent it from carrying out the Doomslayer's mission, the destruction of the earth. As for Superman himself, he decides to take the fight right to the Doomslayer himself by firing himself at the Doomslayer's ship in a big cannon... Yes, that was a bit weird. Luckily for the Supes family, the Eradicator has managed to take possession of Doomsday(the original) and has been traveling the globe with a band of heroes beating up the Doomslayer's rogue Doomsdays. On the Doomslayer's ship, the Doomslayer is busy giving a soliloquy about why he's destroying the earth when he's interrupted with news of a hull breach. The Doomslayer quickly realizes that it was Supes who breached his ship, and nervously watches as Supes makes his way through the ship and heads right for the ship's engines. While in the ship's engine room, Supes possibly figures out the Doomslayer's identity(a Doomsday clone that got lost in the ship for millions of years), which leads to the Doomslayer hastily powering up the engines with the hope being that the heat from the engines would destroy Supes.

Thoughts: I really don't have much to say about this one... It was perfectly acceptable. The story moved along well, Supes entered the Doomslayer's ship, setting up what I'm sure will be the final confrontation between Supes and the Doomslayer, and Supes appeared to deduce the Doomslayer's identity. Now if I read into this issue correctly, the Doomslayer would be a Doomsday clone who got lost on that massive alien ship for a few million years, meaning the lost Doomsday would have had a few million years to evolve, which would explain the Doomslayer's intelligence compared to the other Doomsdays. If that's the identity of the Doomslayer I have no qualms with it, as it makes sense. I'm a bit confused by the ending with the Doomslayer firing up the engines, since I thought he wanted to do that after his ship burrowed into the earth's core, but whatever. All in all, this was a good, fast, action-packed read.

Score: 7 out of 10.The Doomslayer really needs to work on his insults...


Detective Comics #880:

Summary: We get started with Commissioner Gordon calling his ex-wife Barbara to warn her that the Joker had escaped from Arkham and that she needed to go with hotel security just in case he was going to go after her. Barbara agrees to go, and upon hearing a knock at Barbara's hotel room door, Gordon can hear screams and a struggle from the other end of the phone. By the time he reaches her room, Barbara is sitting nude in the tub with that ghastly Joker-venom produced smile on her face. Gordon takes Barbara to the laboratory that was given to the Gotham PD by Wayne Enterprises, and learns from Barbara Gordon(that would be Oracle... Why are there two characters named Barbara Gordon anyway?) and Dick Grayson that Barbara #1 would likely survive with no real damage since she was hit with an early, less-lethal dose of Joker-venom. From there, Dick switches to his Batman duds and heads to Arkham where he begins to track down the Joker by following the trail of Joker-venom the mad clown was secreting. Dick finds Joker, crazy as ever, living in some ancient catacomb under Gotham, complaining about the fact that Dick wasn't Joker's Bat. Joker actually realizes who Dick is, as he repeatedly calls him “little bird” before attacking Dick, since Joker had been waiting for “his” Batman to return. Dick proceeds to beat Joker down and demands that he leaves the Gordons alone. Joker scoffs at Dick, telling him that he didn't do anything to the Gordons this time, and that “his” Batman would have figured that out right away. It's then and there that Dick realizes the mistake that he made, and understands that whoever had helped the Joker escape Arkham had actually attacked Barbara #1. Barbara #1 wakes up from her Joker-venom drugging and begins to scream to Gordon the identity of her real attacker... This issue ends with Gordon's son, James Jr., arriving at Oracle's apartment and proceeding to attack her.

Thoughts: This comic started off kind of slowly, but the reveal at the end made it all worthwhile for me. So it was James Jr. who smuggled the Joker-venom into Arkham to free Joker, since he knew that once Joker was free everybody's attention would be on the Clown Prince of Crime, allowing him to enact his own insane plans unmolested... Very nicely done, Scott Snyder... Right off the bat I thought it was Joker who attacked Barbara #1, and I didn't realize who the real attacker was until roughly when Dick and Gordon figured it out. It's nice to be tricked by a comic story every now and then, especially when the swerve makes perfect sense and isn't simply added for shock value with little thought put into it. As usual, this was another good issue of this series.

Score: 8 out of 10.That is one creepy ass looking Joker!

5 comments:

  1. I really need to see if I can get my hands on Detective Comics #879-880 lol. This story is too good and the scores you gave it means it's worth the cash. I love comics that pull you in emotionally, at least that's how I feel I'd react to reading it, lol. You did a fine job of reviewing this sir.

    Oh and side note, I'm going to be reading Venom this weekend so I'll be making my way over to that post with my two cents. :-P

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  2. finally finished my x-men roster ( I know you'll hate Kitty, & honestly, I did not kill her , mostly because it would have been pettier than usual from me, but here you go

    http://devilkais.deviantart.com/#/d41zqu4

    BTW, you said that Apocalypse was altered many times, isn't it more because the writers are lazy ? Honestly it seems they don't really seem to bother knowing the characters & keep saddling them with ass-pulls...if you could give me the 90's x-men runs you've enjoyed!thanks

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  3. Here's hoping you enjoy Venom, Lisha. The first issue didn't grab me right away, but after that it was gold!

    Let's see, I LOVE the inclusion of Boomer/Meltdown, she was always amongst my favorites in X-Force, awesome choice on Jesse Bedlam, he's a character who really should have become more than he was. Naturally as a huge Gen X fan I liked seeing the team so Gen X heavy. My only gripes would be Shadowcat, who I just plain hate, and Rogue, who never really managed to grab my attention. Even at her apex she was just so bland with the whole, "Ah can't control my powers, sugah... But I REALLY want to kiss Gambit..." That just got so old for me after like the 400th time...

    I agree completely, Saidi. It WAS the various writers fault! I'd place the blame either on the Twelve storyline, which had Apocalypse basically running around as a body snatcher, possessing people left and right(first Nate then Scott), or even the Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix, which I did enjoy, but kind of started the whole, "Apocalypse needs to hop from body to body to survive..." shit. The Apocalypse from the earlier 90's(around the X-Cutioner Song, one of my favorite EVER comic storylines btw) used the Celestrial tech he acquired to build tanks to replenish himself. THAT'S the Apocalypse I want! Nowadays, it's almost anything goes with the Big A. He can possess others, he can be reborn from a child, it's almost impossible to keep it all straight.

    As for favorite X-runs, let's see, X-Men #1-about Operation Zero Tolerance(I loved the X-Men Blue Team), the AOA is of course my all time favorite story, followed closely by Fatal Attractions and X-Cutioner Song, I enjoyed X-Force until Cannonball left, because he was like the heart of that team, and without him the dynamic was WAY off, the build up to Onslaught was great, I enjoyed the Astonishing X-Men mini-series if only because it featured the best X-team ever assembled, basically anything from the beginning of the Blue/Gold teams until about Zero Tolerance. The stuff after that was VERY hit or miss with me.

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  4. I came down here to rest..
    to sleep, and dream and then to be born again wet and new, when my bat returns


    Men, that guy, Snyder really has a twisted mind...

    I´m loving all his run
    He always surprise me
    when i started this comic was like
    Meh.. Joker Killing some other Gordon family AGAIN

    an then comes the reveal with Jr..
    that was amazing.

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  5. I thought the exact same thing, Alien! It wasn't until the very end of this issue that I figured out the twist with James Jr. That was a great piece of writing by Snyder, without a doubt!

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