Batman and Robin #6

Writer: Grant Morrison. Pencils: Philip Tan.

What Happened: We begin with Batman and Robin tied to chairs in nothing but their underwear in front of a webcam... Uh-huh... Red Hood goes online and tells the citizens of Gotham to call his phone number, and that if they do the webcam in front of Batman and Robin will be activated, revealing their identities to all the world. From there we head to Red Hood and his partner, Scarlet, as they battle with Flamingo in Hood's secret layer. Flamingo beats the hell out of Hood and then proceeds to beat up Scarlet. While that was happening, Batman and Robin have untied themselves, gotten dressed and have headed towards the sound of the battle between Hood and Flamingo. Batman and Robin arrive on the scene and take the battle to Flamingo, who more then holds his own. Flamingo tosses Batman off a cliff and proceeds to shoot Robin in the back 5 times. Scarlet attacks Flamingo which gives Hood time to scoop Flamingo up in a backhoe and dump him, along with a mess of rocks, off the cliff Flamingo tossed Batman off of. Batman has managed to pull himself back up by now, and he checks on Robin before confronting Hood. The two have a heated exchange and Commissioner Gordon arrives on the scene with a mess of cops to arrest Hood. As the cops drag Hood away, he scolds Batman for not using Talia Al Ghul to find a Lazarus Pit to bring the former Batman, Bruce Wayne, back to life. By this point, Talia's minions have arrived on the scene to get Robin to heal him up, and Batman decides to chase after Scarlet, who escaped during all the commotion. It turns out that Scarlet has left Gotham City, and this issue ends with Batman returning to his base.

What I Thought: Meh. This issue wasn't nearly as confounding as most of Grant's Batman work has been, so I guess that's a good thing. Sure there were some things that perplexed me, such as who the hell Flamingo was, and why Jason Todd's hair was dyed red, but since I understood most of this issue, I'm not going to nitpick. I did like the fact that Jason mentioned to Dick that he should have hunted down a Lazarus Pit and tossed "Bruce's" skeleton in it, as well as insinuating that Dick is secretly happy that Bruce is dead, because it gives Dick the opportunity to finally be out of Bruce's shadow. That's actually an interesting accusation, one that I hope Grant expands on down the road. Besides that, there was a part of me that was hoping Damian would have died after being shot that many times, but unsurprisingly he survived. At least he didn't just get up after being shot and proceed to beat Flamingo, Jason, Scarlet, Dick, Joker, Two-Face, Doomsday and the ghost of Bruce Wayne...

Score: 7 out of 10.Go ahead and shoot him. Maybe when Jason does come back he'll be as awesome as he used to be...

Justice League: Cry for Justice #5(of 7)

Writer: James Robinson. Artist: Mauro Cascioli.

What Happened: This issue opens with Congorilla and the blue Starman asking Animal Man, Donna Troy and Starfire for aid against Prometheus. From there we head up to the JLA satellite where Hal, Ollie and their band of JLAers ask Dinah and her JLAers for help in dealing with Prometheus, which leads to Ollie and Dinah getting into a heated argument. Captain Marvel, Hal and Hawkman quell the argument, and the team begins to discuss what Prometheus was up to. While they're talking, Batwoman contacts the team and tells them about a confrontation she had with a villain named Endless Winter. After defeating EW, Batwoman pressed her for information as to what she was doing in Gotham. EW begins to rat out Prometheus, and winds up suddenly dying as a result. The team decides to send somebody to Gotham to retrieve the body so Atom can examine the body, and the scene shifts to Keystone City, where Jay Garrick is meeting with his one time rogue, the awesome Shade. Shade warns Jay that after talking to several villains, he has discovered that Prometheus is up to something extremely bad. Jay decides that the JLA should hear about this, and so he decides to take the Shade up to the JLA satellite. After examining EW, Atom discovers she had an implant in her head that would explode if she failed/disobeyed her mission, which explains why she suddenly died. Before the heroes can discuss that matter, Guardian arrives from Metropolis along with a strange device that he nabbed from the Plunderer. The JLAers study the device and send its specifications out to various geniuses around the DCU. The geniuses tell the JLAers that the device is a massive teleporter, and that it could be used to teleport an entire city anywhere in time or space. While the heroes are talking to the geniuses, Supergirl notices that Captain Marvel is missing, so she goes off to see where he got off to. Red Arrow also leaves the room, explaining that he has to call his daughter to wish her a good night. The JLAers decide they should split into groups and try to hunt down the villains Prometheus has employed. Before the JLA members leave, they are met by the recently arrived Animal Man, Donna Troy, Starfire, Starman and Congorilla, who explain that they are also after Prometheus. Congorilla immediately picks up a hostile scent, and rushes out of the room. He bumps into Supergirl in the hallway and the two spot a trail of blood. Upon following it, they come across Red Arrow, who is missing an arm and has half his face seemingly burnt off(Grrrr......). Congorilla tells Supergirl to cauterize Roy's arm with her heat vision before telling SG that they should go after whoever did that to Roy. Moments later Congorilla is hit by something, and his scream alerts the rest of the JLA, who rush over and discover Roy's bloody body laying in the hallway. Ollie freaks out, but he is eventually convinced that he should calm down so he can get whoever did that to Roy. This issue ends with Captain Marvel and Supergirl brawling in one of the rooms on the satellite while the bloody bodies of the Flash and Congorilla lay at their feet.

What I Thought: I've got to admit that this issue left me with one overriding feeling, that of pure, unadulterated rage! Suffice to say, if I were living in the DCU right now I'd most definitely be a Red Lantern after finishing this issue. To say that I'm pissed off about what happened to Roy, one of my favorite DC characters, is the understatement of the decade! I was actually enjoying this comic up until the scene with Roy, but after that, there was nothing good I could take out of this comic... Nothing. Damn, I'm still so pissed off that it's hard for me to even decide what I want to type here. I like James Robinson's writing alot, but this issue really angered me. I'll stick with this mini through its conclusion, mainly because of how much I like the rest of James' work, but I'm telling you, this comic left a very, VERY bad taste in my mouth...

Score: 4 out of 10.Why did this happen to Roy?!? Why couldn't it have happened to... Well, anybody else in this damn scene!

Justice Society of America #33

Writers: Bill Willingham and Matthew Sturges. Artist: Jesus Merino.

What Happened: This issue begins with the JSA attempting to defend the JSA Brownstone from a small army of super-villains. Mr. America rushes into the room where All American Kid was being held and asks for his aid in taking down the baddies. AAK can't wait to help, and once America turns his back he gets KO'ed by AAK! Called that one! Anyway, the heroes begin to rally and AAK arrives on the scene and takes out Wildcat(from behind naturally). King Chimera sees what AAK did and confronts him, holding him at gunpoint. Unfortunately for Chimera, a large girder falls between him and AAK, revealing the gun to be nothing but an illusion. Upon learning that, AAK runs off. Dr. Fate arrives on the scene, which pretty much spells the end of the villains. The heroes wrap the bad guys up and begin digging through the wrecked Brownstone looking for any injured teammates. AAK digs out Obsidian, who is still trapped in a shadow egg, and presents him to a strangely clad woman. After AAK hands Obsidian over to the strange woman, she teleports away. Before AAK can go after the heroes again, he is confronted by Mr. Terrific, who obviously survived his mystical surgery from last issue. Terrific reveals that he has figured out AAK's true identity, Kid Karnevil from Salvation Run(!!!). Karnevil admits that his team knew Terrific would have eventually figured his identity out, which is why Karnevil tried to kill Terrific as soon as possible. Karnevil goes to kill Terrific(again)but is knocked out by one of Terrific's T-Sphere's. Afterwards, the team begins to bicker over tactics and what could have been done to have prevented Karnevil's betrayal, as well as the attack from the villains. In the end, the team decides that they have no choice but to split up, which ends this issue.

What I Thought: Well bravo, very nicely done Matthew and Bill. When Geoff Johns stopped writing this series, I was expecting the absolute worst... To be honest, I figured things would get so bad I'd probably wind up dropping this title altogether. Instead of dropping this book, not only will I be buying the regular JSA series, I'll be buying the spin-off comic, JSA All-Stars! I was quite happy with this comic, it wrapped up nicely, while leaving a few storylines dangling for the future. Although Karnevil's ploy was uncovered and he was defeated, we still don't know what his true mission was, nor why he was ordered to capture Obsidian. The same holds true for the band of villains who attacked the JSA. We don't know who was behind them, or why they were ordered not to attack Star Girl. Yep, much to my surprise, not only is this series still going after Geoff's departure, it's still going strong!

Score: 9 out of 10.See, now this is how Dr. Polaris should be! The guy has the powers of Magneto, he should be nearly unstoppable!

Freedom!

Yee-hah, I'm out of school for about 5 weeks! Not only that, but I'm in a GREAT mood to boot! My Accounting professor informed me that I'll be getting a B+ in that class, and with how difficult that course was, I'm beyond pleased about that! As for my other classes, I'd be willing to bet any amount of money that I'll be raking in all A's, which will raise my GPA even higher. While that's all fine and good, I have to admit, I'm DEAD tired! I picked up about three hours sleep last night, thanks to my own stupidity. Note to self: NEVER put off finishing three papers until the night before they're due!

As I type these lines out, my eyes are literally burning, so I can see I'll be ending this post pretty soon. Before the end though, I should probably put something comic book related in this post, since this is a comic blog... Umm, let's see, I plan on posting reviews for Justice Society of America #33, JL: Cry for Justice #5 and Batman and Robin #6 sometime tomorrow night. I've already read JSA and JL, and before I pass out later on tonight, I plan on breezing through B&R #6. After that, I'm going to start blowing through the ever growing pile of comic books I've been ignoring thanks to my school related duties, so expect tons of half-hearted, shoddy reviews on a nightly basis!

Besides that, I'm currently reading through the Flash: Wonderland TPB, which is significant because it collects the first storyline of Geoff Johns Flash run. It's funny looking back at these comics now, because Geoff really spells out alot of his future plans in this trade. First of all, in the first Flash issue Geoff does, Barry Allen(a mirror version)makes an appearance, which caused me to chuckle... Man does Geoff like the character of Barry Allen or what! The first chance he got, he brought Barry into the Flash comic! Geoff also has the Rogues treat Wally as if he were still Kid Flash, and not fit to fill Barry's boots(big surprise there...), and in my favorite part thus far, Wally comes across a portrait of Hal Jordan in the Green Lantern Museum(don't ask)and talks about how Hal was a hero and how he couldn't understand how it had all gone so wrong with Hal. Even though those words were coming out of Wally's mouth, you know they were actually emanating from Geoff's heart. Although the returns of Hal and Barry diminished the roles of Wally and Kyle(two characters I really like), you've got to respect Geoff for making sure to resurrect two characters he was/is obviously a huge fan of. Hell, I know if I was a comic book writer, I'd do the exact same thing. Huh, this post sure went in a weird direction, didn't it? Well, before I continue to blather on, I think now is as good an opportunity as any to end this post the only way I know how... Long Live The Legion!!!

A LAZY look at Dark Reign The List: The Amazing Spider-Man #1

Writer: Dan Slott. Pencils: Adam Kubert.

Score: 6 out of 10.

What I Thought(In 150 words or less!): Meh. This was an OK story, but it went a long way in exposing one of the main problems with the entire Dark Reign storyline, Norman Osborn... Osborn was the absolute worse choice for the big villain behind the entire DR storyline, and Spidy pretty much makes my point for me during this comic. Osborn is a criminal. A big one. Always has been and always will be. The idea that everybody in the Marvel Universe loves him because he's wrapped in the American flag is just plain ludicrous. Anyway, the art was good, but Spidey was Spidey, and since I'm currently on my "I hate Spidey" kick, he annoyed me more then anything. When you start rooting for Norman Osborn to wipe the smug look off Spidey's face, you know it's time to put the comic down.Come on, blast him! You know you want to!!!

The Best of the Rest.(Dec. 4-Dec. 11)

I was seriously thinking about skipping this column this week. When I get to the back issues I've read this week, you'll understand why. However, since I'm rarely at a loss for words(as this blog is a testament to!)I figured I'd throw out a BotR post anyway. First things first, I only have ONE more day of school before I get to kick back for about 4 weeks. I seriously plan on spending a good 15 hours asleep after Monday, because I've really been burning the midnight oil between papers, homework and studying leading up to this Monday. I still have two papers to finish before Monday, but I managed to write out one paper freehand at school today during my 2 hour break between classes, and the other paper is only 2 to 3 pages long, so I'm not really stressing about it too much. I'll probably start and finish it on Sunday(before the Giants game of course!). Besides that, I have a pretty brutal Spanish test on Monday, but I've always been a very good test taker, so I'm pretty confident I'll ace that test provided I put some study time in. What all this gibberish means is that I'll probably only post one quick post tomorrow(probably on Spider-Man: The List #1), and not post anything at all Sunday night. Between the two papers I still have to finish, studying for that Spanish test, and watching the very important Giants-Eagles football game, I doubt I'll have the time to post any new reviews. After that though, get ready for the floodgates to open up, I plan on going through 50 some-odd comics in about a week or two, so this blog should be chock full of new content on a nightly basis... Provided I don't get lazy.

Speaking of getting lazy, I was planning on posting reviews for Justice League: Cry for Justice #5 and Justice Society of America #33 tonight, but by the time I finally settled down for the night, it was too late, and these two comics deserve better then one of my patented LAZY reviews. Without getting too much into either comic, I liked the JSA book, and I'm really looking forward to both of the regular JSA books that come out this month. The JL book left me feeling VERY conflicted... I liked the story and I loved the art, but what happened to Red Arrow in that comic nearly had me foaming at the mouth like a rabid raccoon! Don't worry, for those of you who have NO clue what I'm talking about, I should have reviews for both books up by Tuesday night at the latest.

Oh, one more thing before I get to the back issues I read this past week. This one is for you guys who comment here on a regular basis. On both my blogs I have it so that you can leave a comment without having to go through any validation measures(those letters, comment moderation, etc.). I always figured not having any comment validation measures would encourage people to post comments. Lately though, I've been getting alot of annoying spammers posting their crap on various posts. On one hand it's pretty irritating that everyday I have to delete this spam garbage from my site, but on the other hand it makes me laugh... I guess these nimrods posting their spam on this blog really think I have some kind of massive following! Hey spammers, I have 4 people who I would consider regulars here at my little piece of the internet, not 400! So to you guys who do check my blog out on a semi-regular basis, don't click on any spammy(hmm, is that even a word?)looking comments left on this blog. Don't click the profile name for anyone who seems to be leaving spam, and don't click on any suspicious looking links left by my spam-posting enemies. There, take that you lousy spammers!

OK, with all the housekeeping taken care of, here's my(pathetically short)list of back issues I've read this past week.

Batman Knightfall: Part One: Broken Bat TPB- This trade collected Detective Comics #659-663 and Batman #491-497... Yes, Batman #497 is the final issue collected in this trade, and as a huge Bat-fan, I'd seriously recommend anybody with even a passing interest in Batman to get a hold of this comic, because it is definitely a modern classic. So this trade collected 12(!)comics, and it only brought us halfway through the massive "Knightfall" storyline! For those of you who are new to comic books, or have been living in a cave, and have no clue as to what Knightfall is all about, allow me to give you a quick synopsis. Bane, a new villain to the Batman rogues gallery breaks out dozens of Batman's greatest foes during a calculated military-like strike on Arkham Asylum. The lunatics from Arkham run wild and begin murdering hundreds of Gothamites. In order to halt the insanity, Batman basically runs himself ragged trying to recapture all of his worst/deadliest enemies. All the while Bane is watching from the shadows, waiting for just the right time to strike down the Dark Knight and claim Gotham as his own city. I really don't know how any self-respecting Batman fan can't like Knightfall. It's got everything a good Batman story should have, and it allowed many of his rogues, from ones I hate such as the Mad Hatter to ones I love like Scarecrow a chance to shine, and like I said earlier, the climatic battle in Batman #497 between a tired and rundown Batman and Bane is definitely a classic. For a score, I'll give Knightfall: Book 1 a 9 1/2 out of 10.

Batman Knightfall: Part 2: Who Rules The Night TPB- This trade collects the final parts of the Knightfall saga; Batman: Shadow of the Bat #16-18, Showcase '93 #7-8, Detective Comics #664-666, and Batman #498-500, for a grand total of 11 comics. With Batman out of the way due to the events in Book 1, Bane has become the supreme crime boss of Gotham City, with his fingers in practically everything. Bruce Wayne may be a broken man after his confrontation with Bane, but he realizes that Gotham still needs a Batman, so he hands the Mantle of the Bat over to Jean-Paul Valley, AKA Azrael. Unfortunately for Bruce, the power of being the Batman goes to Jean-Paul's head and he decides that he's going to rid Gotham City of crime his own way, and that includes confronting the man who broke Bruce Wayne himself, Bane. This was a very good, interesting trade. The fact that Bruce chose Jean-Paul as his successor still boggles my mind to this day... I mean really, shouldn't Dick Grayson(Nightwing)have been the guy Bruce pegged as the next Batman? That fact is touched upon in this trade, and Bruce reasons that Dick has become his own man, and as such wouldn't want to step into Bruce's cowl/shadow. OK, that's all fine and dandy, but why Azrael? That guy is DEFINITELY a few cards short of a full deck! I really don't know why everyone in the Bat-family is so surprised when Azrael starts acting crazy after he's given the responsibility of being the Batman... Anyway, these comics were very good, although not quite as good as the ones in Book 1. For a score I'll give this trade a 9 out of 10.

And that's it... Yeah, I know that's only two trades, but together they contained some 23 comics! I'm currently in the middle of the third and final Knightfall trade, and so far it's been nowhere near as good as the first two trades were, but hopefully things will pick up as the trade reaches its climax. After I finish that trade off, I'm not sure which of my MANY trades I plan on starting, I guess I'll just close my eyes and pick one at random. Well I think I've rambled on for long enough for one post, so I'll leave you all with those immortal words, Long Live The Legion!

Dark Reign The List: Wolverine #1

Writer: Jason Aaron. Pencils: Esad Ribic.

What Happened: We begin the festivities with Norman Osborn deciding that he wants to take over "The World", which was the place mad scientists created the various Weapons, including Weapon X(Wolverine). Noh-Varr(formerly of the Dark Avengers)finds Wolverine and alerts him to the fact that Osborn has set his sights on conquering The World. After alerting Wolvie, Noh-Varr plans on leaving, but Wolvie convinces Noh-Varr to team-up with him(which ups the awesomeness quotient of this comic a thousandfold). Wolvie and Noh-Varr reach The World, and immediately upon entering, Wolvie is brainwashed, and a horde of genetic freaks(and Wolvie)try to attack Noh-Varr. Noh-Varr manages to escape into the ventilation system where he meets with Fantomex(!!!!!!)! I'll tell you right now, there's NO way this comic can possibly score lower then a 8 out of 10! After an initial misunderstanding, Fantomex explains to Noh-Varr that with all of the scientists who formerly ran The World dead, The World has gained sentience and is defending itself from what it perceives as intruders. By this point, Osborn has unleashed an army of zombie-soldiers into The World, so besides the genetic freaks and Wolvie, Noh-Varr and Fantomex have to deal with them as well. After fighting through the hordes of freaks, Fantomex and Noh-Varr reach the brain of The World, where Fantomex instructs Noh-Varr to kiss it(!!!)in order to prove that he is no threat to it. Noh-Varr does, and in response, The World halts the attack from the freaks and frees Wolvie from its mind control. From there, Wolvie, Noh-Varr and Fantomex clean up the rest of Osborn's zombie-soldiers. This issue concludes with Fantomex using a shrink-ray from Dr. Doom to shrink The World down to pocket size to better keep an eye on it. After pocketing The World, Fantomex, Wolvie and Noh-Varr say their good-byes and head their own separate ways.

What I Thought: Hot damn, that was frigging AWESOME!!! Just Noh-Varr being in this comic would have been enough to leave me very happy, but the addition of Fantomex was like a pleasure overload! Although I have to admit that I haven't really enjoyed any of Grant Morrison's DC work, his Marvel work is mind-blowingly good, so for this comic to feature two of Grant's Marvel creations(Fantomex and Noh-Varr), and for Jason Aaron to have done a splendid job with said characters, I couldn't be happier. This is one of those cases where I was expecting nothing before I read this one, and I turned out being VERY pleasantly surprised.

Score: 9 out of 10.Noh-Varr and Fantomex in the same comic acting completely in character?!? Has someone over at Marvel been reading my mind?

A LAZY look at Dark Reign The List: Punisher #1

Writer: Rick Remender. Pencils: John Romita Jr.

Score: 7 out of 10.

What I Thought(In 150 words or less!): Woooo, what a mess this was! Long story short, the Punisher pisses Norman "Marvel" Osborn off one time too many and Normie sends Daken to take care of Punisher... Permanently. Daken does just that, cutting Punisher into a dozen or so pieces. The fight scene between Daken and Punisher was intense, but the ending and upcoming Punisher as a zombie/monster storyline just seems ridiculous! "Franken-castle"? Really?!? Then again, it sounds SO bad that I might actually pick it up out of morbid curiosity, so what does that say about my taste?Ouch, that's going to take a MIGHTY big band-aid to fix...