Weekly Comic Review for 11/20/13
I’ve got a bigger week of books this week with a few oddballs I decided to check out so here we go.
Afterlife with Archie #2 – Jughead has attacked that party. Now where do we go from there? Well, it’s a Halloween party so people just think he’s in costume. When Midge runs up to give him a hug, she becomes lunch. Moose and Archie drag him off, not knowing he’s a zombie. When Midge comes back though, Dilton figures it out. Ms. Grundy (Like Solomon Grundy? I can see the family resemblance now.) and Mr. Weatherbee both come in too. Kids are getting bit (which will make matters worse) and everything is just going to Hell. Cherry Blossom shows up to cause trouble but gets freaked out after hearing about the bites, even though she hasn’t seen the actual zombies yet. At Pop’s, two girls discuss their hidden lesbian relationship while a random zombie comes into the diner. (They’re still pushing the gay acceptance in the line even with zombie focus of the title. I find that really cool, especially for an Archie comic.) The main group escapes and goes to the safest place they know, Lodge Manor. The problem is that, according to the concluding banner, one of the group is infected. My prediction is that Moose got bitten by Jughead. It’ll be a few weeks before we find out if I’m right tho.
Ben 10 #1 – IDW seems to have gotten the rights for the Ben 10 stuff. Sadly the art and such is matched to the new Ben 10 Omniverse show. I tried to watch an episode of that and couldn’t stand it. Ben looks fairly normal, Kevin looks all goth, and Gwenn has short hair and dorky glasses which maker her look like a dweeb. (She looked cool in the Ben 10 Ultimate Aliens series. Not sure why the TV show, and how comic book, did such a serious backslide on the character. (I saw an episode of that recently and her alien form wears a super-hero costume. Realy????) The bad guy is Ssserpent who I’ve only seen once and who got taken down as quick as Ben could have taken a normal person down yet now he’s a more serious threat. Oh, and there’s a mermaid. First and last issue I’m getting.
Bloodshot and H.A.R.D. Corps #16 – The team gets ready to head back to Harada’s office but not before they get saddled with 3 more members. One is an addict who it seems will be constantly drunk or high. The next has cycstic fibrosis and the procedure is about the only way for her to life more than a few months. The last has mental deficiencies (or as the major puts it, “retarded”) wth rage and depression issues. Can we say cannon fodder? Not only is Harada ready though, but the A.I. in Bloodshot’s nantes have taken on a robot form and have turned against him. This will be a tough battle. Overall, the new direction of the book has definitely been better than what I was expecting it to be.
Eternal Warrior #3 – This Valiant title is a different story though. Even though past issues said this was “now”, they continue to stray further and further away from the continuity set-up in Archer & Armstrong. The Geomancer is the one he knew from way back in the colonial days when he had to kill the Indians. This is all despite the fact that we’ve seen 2 others at least since then. (The one that got killed and the one who took is place in Archer & Armstrong. Plus, they are sticking with the long hair on Gilad despite how he looks in other books. (It was short in A&A and a little on the longer side in Unity.) On top of it all, after the boring “here’s how my life has been” story for Xaran, we find out that her brother is alive. Not sure if he was resurrected or if they are going to say he was immortal even though he was dead for a while. My dedication to Valiant wants me to give it more time but my wallet and sense of continuity and storytelling are telling me to run as fast as I can from the title.
Forever Evil: Rogues Rebellion #2 of 6 – The first half of the book is nothing more than an extended rehash of what happened to the Rogues in the main series. The fact that, in this issue, Deathstorm uses his powers to rip a giant DNA strand out through Captain Cold’s mouth is really stupid It was much better shown in the other story. The second half of the issue had the team in Metropolis (where they ended up after the escape) where they get attacked by Parasite. The Syndicate has put a target on them for all the other bad guys to go after. They escape but then end up in the clutches of Poison Ivy. I don’t know which side she’s on yet. Overall, the issue was pretty boring.
Green Lantern: New Guardians #25 – We start off with Carol talking to the Star Sapphires about what happened. He seem to know but don’t care much. In the middle of the debate, Carol gets called off and gets told that Kyle is alive, something she is both happy and pissed off about. (Pissed because he never told her. The new Guardians did after saying no one should know.) They go off to a planet where everything seems to be perfect. Nothing can be this perfect so something must be up. Kyle finds out that the way everything turned out right is that they somehow do things so that all the right choices and happenings happen to them at the cost of another reality getting the bad one. This leaves other realities in ruin so that they can be happy. This doesn’t sit well for obvious reasons. This isn’t just in terms of Kyle, but in terms of another reality’s population who make it through their portal. This is really going to blow up in their faces quickly.
Harley Quinn #0 – The wacky side kick that started as part of the Batman cartoon, moved into his comics and then to the Suicide Squad has now got her own monthly title. It turns out she goes all Deadpool in this issue. Fourth walls aren’t just broken. They’re shattered. She talks about having her own comic book and trying to figure out who should do it. Most of the pages are done by different artists who do one page each. She critiques the style and situations on each, talking to voices along the way. In the end, as she’s leaving the building she’s in, she is given a building she was willed by someone who was formerly her client. I have no clue where this is going to go. At least they’ve promised the fourth wall will stay intact from this point on.
Longshot Saves the Marvel Universe #2 – It turns out that Longshot actually caused the In-Betweener to split into white and black sides for order and chaos. The order side is working for S.H.I.E.L.D. and somehow captured the chaos side. Dr. Stranger figured out what happened and even explains the new look for the In-Betweener. On top of it all, there’s some demonically posessed teddy bear too. Even worse, Deadpool has a magic wand. This be getting a little too wacky for me.
Scooby-Doo Team-Up #1 – OK. Normally I wouldn’t be picking up a Scooby-Doo comic but I just had to in this case. Any of you remember the old Schooby-Doo cartoons where he used to team up with random stars and characters? Well, that’s what this is all about. The first issue is a classic team-up with Batman and Robin. We’re talking Robin in elf shoes and little green short shorts. They are chasing after Man-Bat and the gang joins in to help. The character writing, phrases, and slapstick are all exactly as they would be in the old cartoons. It’s great. It even ends with Scooby scaring Shaggy by wearing a mask like he always did. It was a great touch of childhood back again. I’m not saying I’m adding it to my pull list but this issue was great.
Trinity of Sin: Pandora #5 – Forever Evil tie-in – Pandora confronts the Outsider on how to open the portal again so she can send the Crime Syndicate back to Earth 3. While she doesn’t get an answer to that, she does get more information on the skull. The first being that she didn’t open the portal and the being she let into the world were not the evils but being who just drew in the power of the sins. She was punished but never did anything wrong. The Outsider escapes though and Pandora gets pulled in with the other Trinity of Sin by Constantine. Not very exciting but there’s some interesting revelations.
Young Avengers #12 – After a year, we’re finally reaching the end of this arc. The first 2/3 of the issue is set-up with people, connecting and character development which leads into the fight at the end. Things don’t go well for the team but they’ve got to pull together next issue as it’s “to be concluded”.
There’s some good stuff this week and a few real flops. There were a few that really stood out those. For me, those were Afterlife with Archie, Harley Quinn, and Scooby-Doo Team-Up. Check them out and enjoy them.
