Redness and screams and Christmas and hearts and cracktastic fun

Spoilers ahead for Green Lantern Corps # 43, Supergirl # 48, DCU Holiday Special 2009, Superman/Batman:  Blackest Night # 67, Power Girl #7.
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Green Lantern Corps # 43
In the aftermath of Kyle's death Guy really doesn't cope very well.  Natu pleads with Guy not to succumb to the rage, because Kyle wouldn't want it.  Guy replies 'But I do'.  Which is a somewhat unusual way to deal with death isn't it?  At least, it is unusual in cultural depictions.  In real life, the (thankfully) few funerals I've been to there is always the emphasis on what the deceased wants for the living, both immediately and for the future months.  Whether you believe in an afterlife or not, the fact is the living are left behind and they are the  ones hurting.  I'm not one to live your life according to the how the dead would prefer.  Honour them, yes, but I can see why Guy reacted he way he did and I think it's perfectly legitimate.

Aside from that, there are plenty of other good moments in this book.  If you are in any way interested in Guy Gardener I recommend you pick this issue up.

Supergirl # 48
At last, a Kara centric issue.  Some have described this story as rushed and a bit forced.  I disagree.
We open with Kara bawling Lana out for not telling her about illness - she goes through self righteous anger, disbelief and fear.  Kara is then called away to meet with Inspector Henderson.  We get exposition regarding the Silver Banshee and her curse and then we get the cofnrontation.  Silver Banshee arrives to reclaim one of the lost treasures that will restore her humanity, and through a series of twists and turns Kara is transformed into a second Silver Banshee.  My guess is she has manifested as a sister of the original Banshee.    She has a subtly different costume to the original Silver Banshee and it looks great.

I should mention I am a big fan of the Banshee and her outfit.  When she's cropped up in previous Supergirl issues I've loved it.  Sty35st5ca33, (or stylistically, if you don't have your num lock on), I think the contrasting colours between the Banshee and Supergirl's outfit work really well in any panel or piece of art.

As for the issue, I adored it.  As mentioned above it has been a long time since we had an actual Kara story and not a crossover.  Add to that the good art and some interesting layout, and this is a winner.


DCU Holiday Special 2009
Overall, this was pretty weak.
Batman has very good boots.
The Wally west story was fun.
The Doom Patrol art was good (pity about the story)
The Deadman story was moving - but only because I'm a schmuck.
I should have liked the Huntress story more, but it was a bit dull.

Everything else was utterly forgettable.

Superman/Batman: Blackest Night # 67
Crap.  Solomon Grundy, Man-Bat and Bizzaro are possible my least favourite characters.
I did discover that Man-Bat became so due to an experiment - he was trying to develop a cure for deafness but it somehow backfired.  I suppose this could be read as a just punishment but on the whole this angered me.  It ties into cultural assumptions that to be deaf is to be incomplete, not whole and that deafness is similiar to a disease that needs curing.  Man-Bat was created in 1970 (according to Wikipedia, so it could be wrong), but this view is still prevalent today.  It's part of the medical model, wherein able bodies are to be aspired to and all other types of bodies are wrong and something to be fixed.

Ddeaf people don't need your pity.  To be Ddeaf is not to be automatically deserving of pity.  I know there are Ddeaf folks who would prefer to be hearing, there are also Deaf folks who are proud to be Deaf and wouldn't want to be hearing.  To eradicate deafness would be to eradicate all the sign languages of the world and to eradicate Deaf culture, which, incidentally is very different to hearing culture.

Recently the disability activist movement has sprung up, should you be interested in learning more about this topic may I recommend FWDforward - standing for feminists with disabilites forward.  It is a new site, launched in October 2009 and is updated several times daily.  It has become an excellent resource for disability information and views.

Power Girl #7
Well, wasn't this just cracktastic?
A villain who speaks in the third person, who has travelled from another galaxy to woo Peej and convince her to bear his children.  All because a contraceptive bomb was dropped on his city rendering all other inhabitants infertile.  He wears thigh high boots, little pants and sort of fluted shoulder pads on his waistcoat.  He is convinced of his desirability and sexiness.  Need I say more?

I associate Amanda Connor so strongly with this title I forget she doesn't write it.  Justin Gray and Jimmy Palmiotti do writing duties, Paul Mount does the colouring, John J Hill letters.  Credit must go to all of them.  This is a great title.  Download a preview here.