Brightest Day #18 AND Brightest Day #19(of 1,029,534,876,564,928)

I think I've put it off for long enough... I mean, this is akin to getting a root canal while having your appendix removed... WITHOUT anesthesia! Yes X-Maniacs, I'm ready to... God, it's hard to even type the words out... *sigh* I'm ready to review not one, but TWO issues of Brightest Day... May god have mercy on my soul, because I know Chairman Johns and DC sure as hell won't! As usual, I'll be reviewing these two comics using “Brightest Day Rules.” What exactly does that mean you ask? Before I even open up any issue of Brightest Day I expect it to be the WORST thing I've ever had the misfortune of reading, and as such the comic starts out with a score of 0. Depending on each scene, I'll add or deduct points, meaning it's conceivable for one of these comics to have a final score in the negative numbers! It hasn't happened yet, but hey, each issue of this “masterpiece” is another opportunity for that vaunted negative score. Okay, I've locked the doors and windows, put on some soothing music and cried for an hour. I think I'm ready to begin this review...

Brightest Day #18

Review: We start off with two of Chairman Johns' FAVORITE villains, Not Old, Not Bald, and Not Fat Captain Boomerang and Captain Cold having a lover's quarrel over Capt. Boomerang rescuing Reverse-Flash(Chairman Johns' FAVORITE villain)from prison. What and ever. From there, Deadman calls Dove and whines that his White Lantern ring was powering up, because apparently Deadman never expected a POWER ring to POWER-up. From there we head to Zamaron where Hawkman and Hawkgirl kill Hawkgirl's Predator possessed mother, thus FINALLY freeing them from the curse and simplifying their history for the first time EVER! By this point Deadman's ring has fully charged and he flies away. Hawkman and Hawkgirl teleport to the “one place on Earth” they'd most want to be together and wind up in a museum... Wow, how romantic... Finally free of their convoluted history, they decide to lose their clothes and play naked twister. What? Maybe that's how they get their freak on. Before Hawkman can pull out the spinner(ugh!), Deadman, or I guess his White Lantern counterpart, Aliveman, arrives on the scene to... well, apparently to point his ring at them and stare. Hawkman is naturally alarmed by Aliveman's appearance(plus he probably doesn't want to play naked twister with another dude around), and Aliveman explains that he's not in control of himself, but that the ring is controlling him... Suuuuuure it is Aliveman... That annoying White Lantern Ring tells the Hawks that they are supposed to service the big, super, spectacular, amazing, fantastic, astonishing, STILL unnamed White Lantern champion, which runs counter to Hawkman's naked twister plans, leading to Hawkman telling the Ring to get lost. The ring responds by disintegrating the Hawks, ending this issue.

Thoughts: Okay, now for the fun part! That first scene with Cold and Boomerang earns -5 points because it made me think of Saint Barry... I had no qualms about Deadman's initial scene, so I'll give it a pity +1. The stuff on Zamaron was actually pretty good AND served a purpose, getting rid of Hawkgirl's evil mother and FINALLY getting rid of that curse on the Hawks, so I'll give the whole mess a +5. However, -1 point for the Hawk's deciding the most romantic place they could go was a museum... Another -1 for Deadman freaking out about his ring reaching 100% charge... I mean come on, he HAD to have seen that coming! +2 for Deadman acting like a creepy voyeur, and -3 for DC killing off the Hawks AFTER fixing their damned confusing history! Seriously, what the hell is THAT all about! Finally, +3 points for me repeatedly abusing the phrase, “Naked Twister.” So after some addition and subtraction, this issue of Brightest Day ends up with a......

Score: 1 out of 10. Well, at least that's better than a 0...It's only going to get worse from here, Aliveman...

Brightest Day #19

Review: We get started with Deadman... Oops, I mean Aliveman complaining to the White Lantern Ring about it killing Hawkman and Hawkgirl. The Ring pretty much tells Deadman to shut up so it can tell him a story... Oh god no... The Ring's story made my head hurt, so I'm not even going to TRY to fully explain it. Basically, the Earth has a soul and humanity is... um, corrupting it somehow or something. Anyway, by having the twelve returned characters do twelve random things, this somehow leads to their life force becoming purified. Oh, and Starwood Forest can't be destroyed by the “Dark Avatar” before the “Champion” has risen or some real bad stuff will happen. The skies will turn neon green, children will eat live puppies, chickens will take revenge on farmers and the Earth will explode. Like I said, bad stuff would happen. After that lovely news, we head ♫Under Da Sea♫ where Aquaman and The Boy Who Will Inevitably Become Aqualad are talking about stuff. You know, girls and the ocean and stuff. Hey, what else would YOU talk to the bastard son of your archenemy about? Anyway, those EVIL water-magic Atlantians suddenly attack Aquaman and The Boy Who Will Inevitably Become Aqualad and knock them ♫Out of Da Sea♫ thanks to Aliveman and his EVIL Ring freeing the EVIL Atlantians from the Bermuda Triangle. Aquaman and The Boy Who Will Inevitably Become Aqualad move to rescue as many people from the beach as they can, while trying not to get killed. That sounds like a good strategy to me. The leader of the EVIL Atlantians, Siren, taunts Aquaman by telling him that she had captured and killed Mera off-panel(well she doesn't actually say “off-panel”). Aquaman responds to this news like any rational fishman would, by slowly reaching a hand at Siren and threatening to kill her... That-a-boy, Aquaman, slowly grab at her! Unfortunately, Aquaman's grabbing hand gets chopped off by Black Manta, which makes Aquaman cry... That's right, he CRIED! Aquaman's crying mercifully ends this disaster.

Thoughts: My GOD was this terrible! And NOT in a good way! Okay, let's get to the scoring. Right off the bat we'll go with a -7 for that HORRIBLE story the White Ring told Aliveman... Purifying random b and c-list hero's(and villain's)life forces to save the Earth's soul and/or Starwood Forest from the DREADED(but never mentioned before this issue)Dark Avatar... What? Really?! From there -1 for The Boy Who Will Inevitably Become Aqualad coming across as a TOTAL loser by telling Aquaman a story about his girlfriend screwing other guys, while he did her homework and got no action... How the HELL is THAT supposed to make him look good!? I'll give the beginning of the fight between Aquaman and The Boy Who Will Inevitably Become Aqualad against the EVIL Atlantians a +2 because the EVIL Atlantians used the phrase, “Death to the Air-Breathers,” thus proving that they were indeed EVIL. However, -100 points for Black Manta chopping off Aquaman's hand, and -250 points for Aquaman responding by CRYING over it... What the HELL kind of a hero CRIES when he gets injured?!? Cripes, that Risk guy got his arm pulled off by Superboy Prime and he didn't cry, and he's a TOTAL loser! On top of all that, why in the world would you chop off Aquaman's hand? I mean I just can't rationalize that in any way... If you wanted to keep the superior Aquaman from the 1990's around, then why the HELL did they bring back the Silver Age version?? That would be like if Marvel broke up the marriage of Peter Parker and Mary Jane, and then had them get married again, IMMEDIATELY AFTER they broke them up! Why retcon Aquaman's hand getting chopped off only to CHOP IT OFF AGAIN?! To make Aquaman hate Black Manta even more? Manta MURDERED Aquaman's infant son, I doubt having Manta take Aquaman's hand as well is going to make Manta somehow MORE hated by Aquaman! Okay, let's get that final score tallied up so I can put this post to bed...

Score: -356 out of 10... Hmm... That sure is a unique score... Well, it's my blog, and I make the rules, so if I feel like giving a comic book a -356 out of 10, so be it!Jeez, be a man and walk it off you big baby...