Quick Thoughts on: Deadpool #27

Deadpool #27: Writer: Daniel Way... Why is he, “Daniel” in this comic but, “Dan” in Daken? Pencils: Carlo Barberi.

Quick Review: This issue gets underway with Deadpool trying to buy a burrito but ending up in the middle of a robbery(what, it's a Deadpool comic!). It turns out that the store's owner has an arsenal of weapons under the store and is a terrorist, and the robbers all have healing factors. Deadpool battles the robbers but doesn't get anywhere since they all came equipped with healing factors. Eventually Steve Rogers, Black Widow and Moon Knight show up and beat up Deadpool AND the robbers. The owner tries to attack the three heroes but he is shot dead by Deadpool. We end things here with Steve offering a speechless Deadpool a job.

Quick Thoughts: See, when I'm reading a Deadpool comic I'm not necessarily reading it for it's story. I read Deadpool comics to laugh, and that's how I score them. If I laughed a lot over the course of the comic then it was a good read. If I didn't laugh then it sucked. This comic had me laughing. Repeatedly. It was all just good, stupid, Deadpool-arific fun. From Deadpool's interactions with the store owner, to his fight with the robbers, to the way he was fawning over Steve Rogers this comic was a laugh riot, and that's all I really want from a Deadpool comic.

Score: 9 out of 10.Agreed!

Quick Thoughts on: Green Lantern: Emerald Warriors #2

Green Lantern: Emerald Warriors #2: Writer: Peter Tomasi. Pencils: Fernando Pasarin.

Quick Review: While Guy Gardner is wondering how his actions will affect the way he is looked at by the universe at large, Arisia is having nightmares about Sodam Yat and Kilowog is acting moody. Why do I mention these three Lanterns? Because they have all been tasked with heading into the unknown sectors to bring some law and order to the worlds therein. While the trio of Lanterns are preparing for their trip, an enormously powerful telepath named Zardor is plotting against the Green Lantern Corps from within the unknown sector. Before they leave the known universe, Guy decides to go to the homeworld of the Blue Lanterns in order to be purged of the influence of the Red Power Ring he wore during Blackest Night. This issue ends with one of the Red Lanterns attacking Guy and warning him not to purge the Red Lantern influence.

Quick Thoughts: This was a big ol' set-up issue. Nothing more and nothing less. Peter is setting the stage for the next several issues, which is both good and bad. It's good because the upcoming storylines look pretty solid, but bad because this issue suffered due to the extensive scene setting. Hopefully next issue will give us a bit more action and a little less talking.

Score: 7 out of 10.The Green Lantern oath, always a good way to waste a page in a GL comic book!

Quick Thoughts on: Daken: Dark Wolverine #1

Daken: Dark Wolverine #1: Writers: Dan Way & Marjorie Liu. Pencils: Giuseppe Camuncoli.

Quick Review: This issue mainly shows Daken's part in the mysterious death of Wolverine that we have been granted snippets of in “Wolverine #1” and “Wolverine: Road to Hell #1” Daken has betrayed his father to the clandestine Red Hand all while betraying them to Mystique. Over the course of this issue Daken basically flirts, cajoles, befriends and manipulates everybody he comes in contact with, from the Human Torch to some random models, all while keeping his eyes on his ultimate goal, control over everything and everyone.

Quick Thoughts: I loved this comic. But that should come as no surprise since I absolutely love the Daken character. He's always been a manipulative bastard, and this issue spotlighted that aspect of Daken's personality flawlessly. This comic introduces Daken to any potential new readers(this IS a number one issue of a “new” series), while spelling out his agenda in this series. For Daken the end results is to create an empire similar to the one that Romulus had maintained for hundreds(thousands?)of years, and with both Wolverine and Romulus out of the way, now is his time to strike. Simple, logical for the character and intriguing. What's not to like?

Score: 10 out of 10. I tried, but I just couldn't find anything I didn't like here, thus the perfect score.My current Windows desktop background.

Quick Thoughts on: Zatanna #5

Zatanna #5: Writer: Paul Dini. Pencils: Chad Hardin.

Quick Review: Zatanna manages to take care of the Fire Demons that had been pestering her last issue and promises her cousin Zatara that she would go to one of his magic shows after he explained to her how much it would mean to him. Unfortunately things don't go as planned as Zatanna is attacked by Benjamin Raymond, who had acquired a love potion from Mammon, a powerful Hell-based demon. In order to keep his soul from Mammon, Benjamin has to cause Zatanna to marry him, and thanks to his love potion(and zombie slaves)by the end of this issue that scenario seems ready to come to fruition.

Quick Thoughts: First off, I'm a huge fan of Zatara, so it was nice to see him get some page time and a bit of character development. Here's hoping he remains a regular in this series. But enough about Zatara, let's get to Zatanna. I'm actually enjoying this story, Mammon was humorous while still being reprehensible, Benjamin played a very good villain, and Zatanna was Zatanna. No complaints here.

Score: 8 1/2 out of 10.That is one UGLY demon!

Quick Thoughts on: X-23 #1

X-23 #1: Writer: Marjorie Liu. Artist: Will Conrad.

Quick Review: This issue begins with X-23 having nightmares about Wolverine offering her a spot by his side in Hell. As this comic goes along we see that X-23 is unable to really communicate with any of her fellow mutants on Utopia. Emma Frost blames Cyclops for X-23's lack of social skills, since it was Cyclops who allowed Wolverine to place her on X-Force. To make up for this, Cyclops sends X-23 to a former mutant half-way house where she can try to learn from the people there. This issue ends with X-23 waking up at the half-way house with flames and bodies laying all around her.

Quick Thoughts: Meh. First off, a confession... I hate the X-23 character. I can't think of a more uninteresting character than a teenage, female clone of Wolverine. With that said this issue wasn't that bad. It wasn't great, but it wasn't horrid, which is a testament to Marjorie Liu's writing skills. I'll probably pick up the second issue of this series, but I'm not sure how long I'll be sticking with this series.

Score: 7 out of 10.I have no idea why I scanned this page...

Quick Thoughts on: X-Men #3

X-Men #3: Writer: Victor Gischler. Pencils: Paco Medina

Quick Thoughts: After completing their various missions, the X-Men resurrect an antagonistic Dracula, who they ask to assist them in reeling in his rogue son. Meanwhile, Cyclops sends Wolverine out to track down and bring Jubilee back to Utopia. Unfortunately for Wolvie, Jubilee is now fully embracing her vampire side and ends up biting and turning Wolverine into a vampire as this issue ends.

So Wolveroonie is a vampire now... I'm not sold, but I guess we'll see. I like the fact that Dracula didn't just throw his hat in with the X-Men, since they obviously need him a lot more than he needs them. I'm still enjoying this storyline and for me, that's all that matters.

Score: 8 out of 10.My, what big teeth you have Wolverine...

Quick Thoughts on: Titans #26

Titans #26: Writer: Eric Wallace. Pencils: Fabrizio Fiorentino.

Quick Thoughts: Sick and tired of Deathstroke's actions towards her, Cheshire guilts Arsenal into helping her take down Deathstroke... Permanently. Slade accepts Arsenal onto his team, figuring the death of his daughter Lian had pushed him over the edge. Osiris fights with his teammates and gets contacted by the White Lantern entity, which tells him to, “Help Isis break free”. Finally, Cheshire and Tattooed Man screw up a mission which leads to the entire Titans being called in to help, where they all get taken down except for Deathstroke.

I think I like the direction this series is moving. At least I think so... I like that Roy seems to have SOME sort of direction, and seeing him and Cheshire secretly work to take Slade apart from the inside could be fun. Osiris has his own story, Cinder seems to have some issues, and Tattooed Man seems like he(of all people)might become the voice of reason here. All in all, pretty decent stuff.

Score: 7 1/2 out of 10.Poor junkie Roy...

Quick Thoughts on: Superman #702

Superman #702: Writer: J. Michael Straczynski. Pencils: Eddy Barrows.

Quick Thoughts: Superman continues his seemingly aimless trek across America by wandering through Detroit. Supes wanders along, meets people(and some aliens)and helps the economy by making the aliens open up closed factories. Yeah...

Wow, so is it too early to come right out and say that JMS has lost his ever loving mind yet? Yeah, I think it is still a bit too early for that. I mean, this is all leading towards something, right? Right?!? Sheesh, I sure hope so...

Score: 3 1/2 out of 10.And Superman walked and walked and walked...

Quick Thoughts on: Brightest Day #10

Brightest Day #10(of 1,986,875,126): Writers: GEOFF(1959 4 Life!)Johns & Peter Tomasi. Artists: Lots of people.

Quick Thoughts: Here we discover that the Firestorms have to work together and not argue with one another or else the universe will end!!!!!! It's like the Odd Couple, but with powers! Oh yeah, plus Blackest Night Firestorm is also still a part of the Firestorms for some reason. From there Black Manta hunts down Aqualad and reveals that he is the boy's true father(WOW, who didn't see THAT one coming???). Before Manta can kill Aqualad's adopted dad, Aquaman steps in to face Manta.

*Yawn* Boring. Don't care about any of this stuff anymore. If you want to read some cheer leading, “rah-rah-rah, Brightest Day is Grrreat!!” stuff, look elsewhere. In my honest opinion, this mini is the perfect cure for insomnia, although I suspect it may also cause madness, so it's a mixed bag.

Score: 5 out of 10.So Aqualad is Manta's son... Yeah, NOBODY could see that coming...

Quick Thoughts on: Brightest Day #9

Brighest Day #9(of 700,934,276): Writers: GEOFF(1959!!!)Johns & Peter Tomasi. Artists: Lots of people.

Quick Thoughts: The Martian Manhunter arrives in Starwood Forest(get it??)and goes insane, trying to burn it down. Green Arrow says nuts to that and halts the mad Martians attack. Eventually MM realizes that Starwood Forest wasn't the forest he was supposed to burn down, so he leaves for Mars. Meanwhile, Black Manta and the evil Atlantians decide that they should try to find the new Aqualad before Aquaman does.

Ugh... This is STILL going on?!? By this point every story in this “event”(and I use that term VERY loosely)annoys me, and if not for my compulsive need to collect this full series, I'd have dropped this issues ago.

Score: 4 out of 10.The Martian Manhunter: a menace to trees everywhere.

Quick Thoughts on: Wonder Woman #602

Wonder Woman #602: Writer: J. Michael Straczynski. Pencils: Don Kramer & Eduardo Pansica.

Quick Thoughts: Wonder Woman beats up the army goons who were trying to kill the hidden Amazons, but is unable to force them to leave. Instead, WW decides to take on the army goons herself, while allowing the Amazons to sneak out the back door of their temple. This action nearly leads to WW getting herself killed, but one of the Amazons sacrifices themselves to save WW. WW gets angry and decimates the army goons before heading back to the Amazons and helping them get to safety.

If you want to know what I thought about this issue, check what I had to say during the Superman #702 review, because the same applies here.

Score: 6 out of 10.Wonder Woman SMASH!!!

Quick Thoughts on: Batman #702

Batman #702: Writer: Mad Grant Morrison. Pencils: Tony Daniels.

Quick Thoughts: This issue rehashes a lot of the Batman stuff from Final Crisis. Batman investigates Orion's murder, gets captured by the rogue Alpha Lantern, tortured by Darkseid's scientists, frees himself and shoots Darkseid, but not before he is hit by the Omega Sanction. We do learn that Darkseid altered reality after sending Bats into the past, thus giving us all the recent Barbatos junk. Thanks Darkseid...

This comic wasn't half bad. I was glad that Grant pretty much said that Darkseid screwed with reality, which makes a lot of the recent events in Batman make more sense. The secret caverns under Wayne Manor, Barbatos, etc, can all be explained away by Darkseid's reality tampering. So I might not like it, but at least that fixes the MANY continuity breaks. I will say that the more I think of it, the more I HATE the fact that Bats shot Darkseid with a gun... Yeah, I know it took place a while ago, but it's just SO wrong on SO many levels.

Score: 7 out of 10.I still say Batman NEVER should have shot Darkseid...

Quick Thoughts on: Invincible Iron Man #30

Invincible Iron Man #30: Writer: Matt Fraction. Pencils: Salvador Larroca.

Quick Thoughts: Tony Stark drives Sasha Hammer away from the big Stark shindig and tells her that he knows that Sasha and her mother were working with Ezekiel Stane in an attempt to destroy his private and public life. Now exposed, Sasha reveals that she had been altered by Stane and forces Tony to crash his car. Tony armors up and battles Sasha, gaining the upper-hand until she begins attacking innocent civilians. Tony diverts his attention and winds up at Sasha's mercy, until the timely arrival of Rescue(Pepper Potts). Tony allows Sasha to escape(mainly so she could tell her mother that he was on to them)and helps the injured civilians. The following day, Tony prepares to test drive his new fossil fuel free car in front of the media. Before he can begin the test though, the Hammer girls have Detroit Steel(via his drones)destroy the car with Tony in it.

This was the first issue of this series that I actually enjoyed the whole way through. Granted I've only been reading this comic for 4 issues, but prior to this issue I was pretty lost. This one was the first one I understood from beginning to end. So for the first time in who knows how long I can honestly say that I am looking forward to next issue of Iron Man!

Score: 8 out of 10.So do I!

Some Quick Thoughts on: Green Arrow #3

Green Arrow #3: Writer: JT Krul. Pencils: Diogenes Neves.

Quick Thoughts: So last issue Ollie was shot in the head with a black arrow. Instead of dying he gets saved by the spitting image of Thor. Faux Thor tosses Ollie in the waters in the enchanted forest(I can't believe I just typed that!)and Ollie's wounds are miraculously healed. Ollie asks Faux Thor who the hell he was, and Faux Thor explains that he believes himself to be the Sir Galahad of legend. The forest then does some crazy stuff and a giant shadow gets ready to attack Ollie.

Weird... I mean this comic isn't terrible, but this is SO far away from the Oliver Queen I want to read about. Ollie living in Star City/Seattle fighting street scum while romancing tons of women I like. Ollie running around in the enchanted forest? Not so much...

Score: 7 out of 10.Good old Thor.

Some Quick Thoughts on: Action Comics #892

Action Comics #892: Writer: Paul Cornell. Pencils: Pete Woods.

Quick Thoughts: Lex Luthor, some of his scientists and Deathstroke the Terminator head to Antarctica to search for some residual Black Lantern energy. Lex and company discover a large black dome, and upon investigating, Deathstroke goes crazy and tries to kill Lex. Lex battles Deathstroke, and eventually Lex begins to succumb to the power of the strange black dome. Eventually one of the scientists manages to complete his analysis on the black dome which causes it to dissipate, freeing everyone from its influence. Lex decides to continue searching for more of these black domes.

Besides the Deathstroke/Lex Luthor fight(which was like something out of the DC vs MK video game)this comic didn't do much for me. I hope this series goes further than Lex randomly wandering the Earth searching for these energy domes... Lex is way too deep a character to be wasted like that.

Score: 6 1/2 out of 10.FINISH HIM!!!

Some Quick Thoughts on: Batgirl #14

Batgirl #14: Writer: Bryan Q Miller. Pencils: Lee Garbett.

Quick Thoughts: Batgirl and Supergirl decide to get together in their alter-egos and have a nice, quiet night. Needless to say, that doesn't happen, as due to a science experiment gone awry, 24 Draculas spawn from an old movie and run around tormenting the students at Batgirl's college. After some difficulty, the girls manage to defeat and destroy each one of the Draculas. Their Dracula experience also leads to them becoming closer friends.

This was an okay one-off sort of story, but with how awesome this series always seems to be, “okay” is actually a letdown. This series seems to be in some sort of a strange holding pattern lately. Maybe it's the Bruce Wayne Return thing, or maybe that's just the way Bryan is planning it out, but the last two issues have been quite forgettable.

Score: 7 1/2 out of 10."BLAH-HAHAHAHA"... Classic...

A Few Quick Thoughts on: Green Lantern #48

Writer: The comic book GOD, Geoff Johns. Pencils: Doug Mahnke.

What I Thought: What I think is that it would have been nice if DC had informed me that I was supposed to read this comic prior to reading BN#5! But what's done is done. I did enjoy this comic although I already knew how it was going to end since I'd already read BN#5, which kind of sucked. For me, Sinestro and Atrocitus really stole the show here. Sinestro was his regular awesome self, and I really began to get into Atrocitus' character here as well. The only thing that bothered me here was the fact that nothing really happened. All of the heads of the Corps met, they argued, they fought, and then they all decided to team-up to go after Nekron. Meh. This was a good comic, but I kind of feel like there could have/should have been a little bit more going on.

Score: 7 1/2 out of 10.Note to self: Never piss off Atrocitus.

A Few Quick Thoughts on: Dark Wolverine #80

Writers: Daniel Way and Marjorie Liu. Pencils: Stephen Segovia and Paco Diaz Luque.

What I Thought: This was another good issue of this series, although I wasn't as high on this one as I've been on the previous few issues. I'm still enjoying Daken's mind games with Osborn, and pretty much everybody else he came across in this comic. Daken played around with Osborn, Moses Magnum and his gang, and the world at large when he saved a baby right in front of some television cameras. Leave it to Daken to do what Osborn wanted done(fixing his tarnished image), but in his own way, not Osborn's. I was a bit let down by the way this comic ended, I've never really liked comics that had ambiguous endings, like this one did. So did Daken kill Emmy or not? I guess he did, but I'd have actually liked to have seen exactly what Daken decided to do in the final moments of this one. Other then that, no real complaints on my part, this was another solid Dark Wolverine.

Score: 7 1/2 out of 10.Yet another example of why Daken > Wolverine. Where as Wolvie at times is little more then a mindless berserker, Daken is cold and calculating, which makes for a much more interesting/satisfying read.

A Few Quick Thoughts on: Supergirl #47

Writer: Sterling Gates. Artist: Matt Camp.

What I Thought: I definitely enjoyed this one. The story was sound, the art was good, and the swerve at the end made perfect sense, even if it was pretty obvious. I liked the way Sterling worked in the flashbacks Alura was having about her departed husband, Zor-El, without having the flashbacks take away from the story. I'm guessing that Alura and her lackey, Commander Gor, will force out everything Reactron knows about Project 7734 and it's leader, Gen. Sam Lane. Once she discovers that Lane orchestrated the assassination of her husband, things in the Superman-universe should get VERY interesting. I for one am getting extremely curious to see how DC is going to wrap up the New Krypton/Gen. Lane storyline. Will the Kryptonians attack Earth? Will Lane start a war with New Krypton first? And of course, where will Supes fit into this whole equation? Yeah, things are really starting to heat up in the Superman family of books.

Score: 7 1/2 out of 10.I shudder to think of what Commander Gor is going to do with that rod he's brandishing at Reactron... My brain works in weird ways.

A Few Quick Thoughts on: Superman/Batman #66

Writer and Artist: Scott Kolins.

What I Thought: Well, a few quick things here. First off, this was a Blackest Night x-over issue. Besides that, although this comic is called "Superman/Batman", neither character showed up. Instead we had Bizarro(filling in for Supes)and Man-Bat(filling in for the Dark Knight). I kind of liked the premise here with Bizarro looking for a friend. Hey, when you're a backwards talking dude from a square shaped planet, I'd imagine it must be hard to make new friends. Man-Bat wasn't interested, he wanted to be cured of his bat condition and instead of befriending Bizarro, Black Lantern Solomon Grundy wanted to tear his heart out. Poor Bizarro. Seeing as that I like Bizarro, and the throwdown between BL Solomon and Bizarro was pretty cool, I have to admit that I enjoyed this one. In the long run, I'm sure this comic isn't going to matter, but this was a fun little meaningless tale.

Score: 7 1/2 out of 10.If I was just a little bit crazier, I'd only talk in Bizarro-speak.