Comics reviews!

Ooh this week I came away with rather a lot of goods :o
There's the Stephanie Brown Batgirl figure (reviewed here at Action Figure Blues) - they had it on the shop wall so I buckled.  She's pretty nice.  Good articulation, nice accessories and good hair.  I'll get a proper review and pictures up at another time.

Then there's the grab bag of about 10 Justice League comics - including JLI, JLE and Justice League quarterly!  When I got home and investigated the contents I discovered that amongst those included were the Batman one punch issue. and the introduction of Power Girl's cat!  So score 10 points for me.

As for the comics.. well spoilers ahead for Gotham City Sirens 16, Green Arrow #4 and Wonder Woman #603.
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Gotham City Sirens 16
This was a lot of fun - the art was very strange in places but the story was fun.  It was a little all over the place but in a good way.  Harley provided the comic relief again, but in a really fun way.  I give this issue top marks.

Green Arrow #4
God this was dull.  It rehashed the Brightest Day J'onn in the forest plot and made it a lot less interesting.
I shouldn't be having this reaction - I adore Ollie.  He's one of my favourite characters, yet this book is boring the pants off me.  I suspect this is because it's all mired in the crossover and is framed as being really dark.  I want fun Ollie.  I want Dinah back.  Or at least Mia.  I want happy, smiling, grumpy, sexed up, chilli making, horny, fighting against the fascists Ollie.  I want Dinah back with him and the both of them flirting together.  I want Connor back, non powered, as an awesome martial artist and archer. I do not want angst.  This is boring.

Wonder Woman #603
I got the alternate cover - it is lovely.  I continue to like Diana in this - she is time displaced, but she's still very much the leader.  I wasn't so enamoured with the trip to Hades angle, but I appreciate the incorporation of Greek mythology.  I really want to see who this mystery man is and I *really* want to see Diana kick his ass and get her lasso back next issue.

I wonder if she's going to have to search for all the treasures, a la Ben Caldwell's Wonder Woman in Wednesday Comics?

Finally, go read about the 10 greatest nude comic book fights of all time.  There's plenty of naked man action, and the Bat and the Cat is in there!

JLA fun

You gotta love J'onn.  You just have to.

2 weeks worth of comics

Ooh look I got behind again.  Oh well, I have something to say now.  Onwards!  Spoilers ahead for Birds of Prey #5, Brightest Day #10, Superman/Batman # 76, Supergirl #56 and some old 90s Superboy issues.
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Birds of Prey #5
Reading this I was struck again by the lack of solid female friendships in DC's comics.  In this issue Dinah decides (fairly inexplicably to a new reader) to quit the Birds and bugger off to Bangkok with the White Canary.  Zinda and Helena are having none of this and follow her to Bangkok to tell her so.  Friends that won't let other friends do stupid things are good friends.  I can't think of any other book where this sort of thing would happen, and it's what made this issue special.


Brightest Day #10
The firestorm matrix bonding Ronnie and Jason together is revealed to be the spark the ignited the big bang.  This would have captured my interest far more if we hadn't had the Aqua story running alongside it.  Gods alive that was good!  There's all sorts of dramatic heroism all over the shop.  I had tears in my eyes reading this (I think I may be a bit emotional at the moment...).  Without a second thought, Jackson's Dad was going to sacrifice himself so his son could live, Jackson wasn't having this so he's saves his Dad and fights back against Black Manta.  Back on land Manta slings a fish hook at Jackson's father, which is caught at the last moment by Aquaman, leading to an awesomely dramatic full page splash.

I LOVE this sort of stuff.  My heart was all a flutter reading this.


Superman/Batman # 76
This made my heart go all a flutter and made me a bit weepy, until I thought about it more.  You see, this issue deals with Bruce's death & funeral, and Superman's emotional state after the death of his friend.  This is all good and it is great to see, except for Bruce's funeral.  Lois wasn't allowed as it was allegedly core Justice League members only, in civilian clothing,  and there was a secret identity issue.

Fine.  Lois must know near enough all the JLA members identities by now, but fine.  Then you see the funeral scene.  Attending is Clark, Dick, Alfred, Tim, Diana, Dinah and Ollie.

Ollie?  There's no Hal or Kyle, no Wally or Barry, Carter or Zatanna and you're trying to tell me Ollie gets to be the core of the League?  And no Selina or Barbara?  Nothing would stop those two attending Bruce's funeral.  Hell, Talia should also be there.

Ridiculous.

Supergirl #56
As with last issue, this was great.  Best issue of these 2 weeks without a doubt.  Jamal Igle's art is great, I think he's getting better every issue - it now seems he's not going to Birds of Prey and was never going to go to BoP, so let this be a lesson to us all.  I hope he stays on Supergirl, I really do.  He even drew Sterling Gates in this issue, proclaiming Kara 'sooo ugly!' (some Bizarros speak in opposites) complete with little hearts(!).

Sterling Gates has given Bizarrogirl a distinct personality.  I didn't think that was possible (with the Bizarros).  There's some nice homages to the pre-crisis Kara with Bizarrogirl crushing on BizarroLex.  Mostly, I am struck by the similarities between Bizarrogirl and that imposter Supergirl from issue 18.  There's some things in there about what a Supergirl 'should' be and Kara is considering if she is measuring up to the standard set by the S shield.  I know these last couple of issues have been a general reflection on Kara and recent events but the introduction of Bizarrogirl reads, to me, like a redone version of issue 18.  A far far improved version which is much less patronising to the readers.

Superboy Plus the Power of Shazam #1
Superboy meets Captain Marvel Junior and they are tested for strength and determination.  Cap'n Junior fails, Superboy passes.  It's an incredibly contrived issue set up to bring readers into a new Superboy plotline and vaguely advance the plot of Cap'n Junior.  Not really worth getting unless you're a completest.  The best bit about it is Knockout, who will never cease to rock.  the worst bit is Tana Moon suddenly becoming Caucasian.

Superboy Plus Slither 2
Another meh issue.  Better than the Shazam one but not great.  I'm also trying to track down the other Plus issues as I believe that Robin, Impulse and Catwoman also got involved.

Superboy annual 1997 - Pulp Heroes
Now this was fun.  Superboy and co take a journey to Dinosaur Island.  Superboy gets drunk, loses his memory, they meet cavemen and fight off dinosaurs.  Lots of pulpy B movie type fun.  All the cavewomen are hot, slim yet busty and in fur bikinis.  The cavemen are fat, ugly and in fur loincloths.  I love the pulp style, I appreciate the aesthetic and I'm a sucker for old monster B movies.  However reading this, I was considering what it means culturally and politically when the women are objects of desire and the men aren't.  I think it's particularly important to be aware of this in a comic aimed at teenage boys.  Guess my conclusions.


Superboy & Risk Double Shot (1998)
Another fun one.  Superboy goes undercover at a school to discover which student broke into Project Cadmus.  He adopts an incredibly nerdish persona - which is quite obviously poking fun at Clark's mild mannered identity - and proceeds to be bullied and discover nothing.

There were 3 other books released under the Double Shot title, one was Supergirl & Prysm, the other two are Robin & someone and Impulse & someone.  I am tracking them down on ebay.

I want to write about smear tests

This is probably an unexpected topic.  I don't really talk much about health and this sort of stuff on here, but occasionally I get to thinking and I feel like I need to get some ideas down clearly,

Smear tests.  Generally, (in the UK), every woman over 25 gets one, every 3 years.  They take a scraping from your cervix and send it off to testing to check for pre-cancerous cells.  Well, the official literature says a brush like device is wiped over the cervix to pick up some cells, but in my head it's more like a scraping.  It feels more like a scraping that's for sure.

Do you know how they do this?  Well, you go to the doctors or your local family planning clinic and have an appointment with the nurse.  They usually lock the door to prevent anyone walking in, you sit on the bed, a screen is drawn round and you remove your skirt/trousers and your pants (knickers for Americans).

You lie back with your knees up, the nurse asks you to relax your legs and they insert a speculum into your vagina.  It's cold.  It's has some gel on it to assist with lubrication, although not too much because otherwise that can interfere with the reading of the sample and then you'll have to come back in again.  Then there is a feeling that I can only describe as being winched open.  I haven't got a fucking clue what they actually do because I can't see anything, given that I'm lying on my back.  Then they scrape your cervix.

It can be a quick procedure, if you're relaxed, it's definitely uncomfortable and can be painful.  What it is always is invasive.  I was lucky that the first time I had a smear was when I also had a contraceptive coil put in.  After this week's appointment the speculum was placed on the table next to  the bed, giving me a chance to look at it.  This was the first time I'd seen one and it looked like a yellow ray gun.  My first thought was 'I'm letting them stick that up my muff??!!'

The smear test is nothing compared to the coil.  Inserting a coil is painful, takes longer and results in womb cramps for the next few hours or days.  But on the plus side, it's the only hormone free effective contraception that isn't condoms, so I don't feel like I've got much of a choice.

The way women are designed, with our reproductive organs inside is, means that any gynaecological check up will be invasive.  It's different for men, men can usually be examined without having anything inserted.  I'm not saying that when men do need full STD checks it's a happy experience - of course it's not.  But I am under the impression that insertion of things into men's penises happens far less often than insertion of things into women's vaginas, be that thing fingers, coils or speculums.

Some nurses and doctors will be sympathetic to the female patient's fear, awkwardness, tense state and levels of anxiety.  Some are not.  I think one of the issues with it is that you can't see anything and you have no control over what the nurse/doctor is doing.  You are helpless with someone poking around in your most private areas.

And you know what, most of the time women don't really talk about this stuff.  If we consider that something might be wrong with out genitals or cervix, we don't ask a friend or older colleague for support.  We worry and we panic and we get ourselves worked up and afeard and then we go to the doctor's surgery or family planning clinic convinced something is deathly wrong.  Yet we really do have so many shared experiences.  There's a shame and stigma attached to talking in realistic terms about our reproductive parts and it's bloody nonsense.

What are the signs of cervical cancer?  Do you know? I don't.  How many of you are aware of what a mystery lump on your labia might mean?  What would you do if you were having a number of mildly unpleasant downstairs issues?  What about recurring bouts of cystitis?  What about painful penetrative sex?

Why don't we talk about these things?  We talk about other diseases and painful hips, elbows or migraines.  Maybe if we did share more information and views on female sexual health less women would be scared of getting a smear test done.

Superman/Batman: Apocolypse or, let's not publicise what the story is actually about

Ooh this made me angry. Over on Anj's Supergirl blog he posted about the Superman/Batman DVD that's coming out.  You know, the one that features Supergirl's arrival on earth and in the comics was collected as Superman/Batman: Supergirl.  The arc that's all about Supergirl.  Sure, in the comics we got to reflect on and consider Bats and Supes different upbringings and trust levels, but this came about because Kara landed on earth.  So you know, it's all about Supergirl.

Anj included a quote from an interview with the director Lauren Montgomery, which states:

"Montgomery discusses how Supergirl's name was taken out of the title of the story, which was called "The Supergirl From Krypton" in the comics. Montgomery said it happened after the Wonder Woman DVD-release animated film didn't meet sales expectations. "We had to fight to even put her on the cover, and then they put her skanky version on the cover. So 'those' boys would buy it." "

Motherfuckers.
THE STORY ARC IS ABOUT SUPERGIRL.


If they don't think she can sell a movie why do a movie about her?  For fucks sake.  I despair I really do.  As Anj put in the title of his post - Happy Birthday Supergirl, now let's get snubbed!


When will people learn that films don't fail because the lead is a woman.  They fail because of bad marketing, bad producing, bad casting, bad directing, bad dialogue, bad ideas.  Having a woman feature prominently in it will not make your film fail.


Men will buy films with women in them.  Men will even buy films (and books and comics) with women where the women aren't sexed up.  Look at the Aliens franchise.  Look at Whiteout.  Both feature tough women who aren't conventionally sexy.  Both did really fucking well and are extremely well respected.


Arggghh.  I think I'll be channeling John Stewart here.

I'm fucking fed up with this shit.

Thinking of Steph

Lets look back at when she was awesome, before War Games was ever thought of.  Spoiler and Robin have just broken into an aprtment and are surprised to find out the blonde woman in the apartment has dealt with the intruder.

Trawling through old images

In search of something to post, I am coming cross several fun scans I had forgotten about.  Like this one:

There's something very amusing about the notion of killer penguins.   I seem to recall something similar from a Robin issue as well...

Happy Harvest!

Or Mabon, or Herfest or whatever you want to call it.  I go with Harvest, Mabon is too unfamiliar and i'm not keen on words like Herfest or Herstory - they aren't not gonna stop the oppression ok?  It's the autumn equinox anyway.

Harvest is the death of the year where we celebrate the abundance of food that's around and go oh fuck winter's coming soon.  I dislike the cold.  As well as being the death of the year, harvest time is when the god symbolically dies with the harvest (another reason I dislike Herfest - Ostara is in Spring, that's the goddess festival, not everything needs to be centred around femaleness, or even gendered but that's a differnet argument).  In Greek tradition Demeter (goddess of the harvest amongst other things), lost her daughter Persephone to the underworld for 6 months, and she's so depressed about it she stops tending the earth, leading to the 6 months of winter that we experience.  Persephone comes back in Spring, Demeter is happy again and the plants start growing again.  I think pomegranates are important somewhere.  I should get one.

Anyway, I've been decorating a scarf with some (material) foliage and (iron on) apples and I intend to be eating all sorts of good stuff and making merry today.  Goats cheese, fruit, stew, local veg, decent meat, crackers, nuts..nom.

Hope you all have a good day!

Where are all the Deaf superheroes?

Both the DCU and the Marvel Universes have quite a lot of superheroes/villains/supporting cast members who are disabled, but fuck all that are Deaf.  Or deaf.  Or hard of hearing.  I'm not picky. 

Peter David put a couple of lipreaders in his Supergirl and Young Justice comics and Green Arrow/Black Canary had that villain last year that was deafened by Dinah, but that's it.  Where are the rest?  We've got Babs in her wheelchair, Chunk, Professor Xavier, Daredevil, Dr Midnight, Speedy/Red Arrow, Tony Stark, Dr Niles Caulder, Captain Marvel Junior, Osiris, Crazy Jane.  I'm sure there's more, that's just what a quick google search turned up.

Where the Deaf heroes?  I'll tell you where there's one - Echo, from the Daredevil comics.  That's it.  I should be able to name more.

Echo first turned up in Parts of a Hole (soon to be reviewed over at New readers...) and I was stunned when the story actually constant reference to her lack of hearing.  Her abilities aren't linked to her Deafness, unlike Daredevil's abilities and so I felt like I did when I read Venus Envy - it's a regular superhero book about a woman who happens to be Deaf.

The book isn't about her Deafhood, but because she is Deaf she experiences life different to a hearing person, and so the story show that.  On the whole it does this well, and it also explores Daredevil's blindness well.  There's a great scene where they are in the cinema and Echo is describing the action on screen and Daredevil is describing the dialogue when the actors are off screen.

But.  (You knew there was a but coming didn't you?)  It isn't quite good enough.  The problem with having just one Deaf hero is that she becomes representative of all Deaf people and the mistakes that are made are amplified and picked upon over and over.

For example, Echo can mimic any physical action she sees.  This makes her an ace fighter.  Luckily for her she's also quite bright and so can work out how to put the moves together in order to win a fight or choreograph a dance show.  I imagine that being able to mimic physical actions must have made it easier for her to learn the handshapes and movements needed for American Sign Language (ASL).

But, this ability is used in book to explain why her speech is not slurred.  Because she can copy mouth patterns I suppose... Wait.  Just back up there one moment, what?  Most speech isn't formed on the lips.  Lip reading is hard, very hard.  If it was easy to lip read everybody we wouldn't need trained lipspeakers.  How on earth is Echo meant to see and mimic the movements of the tongue and the throat in order to produce clear speech?

Ignoring all that, the in text reasoning seems to assume that no Deaf people have clear speech.   Well, quite frankly that's bollocks.  The level of speech will depend on things like when the person lost their hearing and what speech therapy they've had.  Ooh it makes me angry when people get basic stuff wrong.

What else, oh yes, how she learnt ASL.  Apparently her father taught it to her using Native American folk stories, and possibly shadow puppets.  Well I'd be really interested to know where he learnt it and how she developed her knowledge of the language.  Because we see nothing of this in the book, she doesn't sign once.  I don't think I've met a signer who never signs when they speak.  When a sign language is your first language you tend to use it alongside your spoken language.  You just do.

Echo somehow manages to lipread people in the dark and never makes a mistake when she is lipreading.  The former is impossible and the latter is highly unlikely.  But, I guess if you had a book full of communication errors it would get a bit dull and prevent the flow of the story.  For the same reason we don't tend to see protagonists going to the toilet.  So I'll forgive them the perfect lipreading.  The rest isn't really forgivable, it's just ignorant.

This is such a shame because it's clear that the writer has done his research - there is so much stuff in the book that is Deaf aware.  It becomes an odd half and half mix.  I'm very keen to read more about her and I just hope that other issue build upon the solid base that this book gave, but improved the rookie errors.

And I want more Deaf, deaf and hard of hearing heroes.  Please.

Incidentally, Echo's sign name would either be the sign for Echo, a handprint across the face (she wears this when she performs), or possibly dancer.  Daredevil's sign name would be the devil horns on his costume.  Matt Murdock (Daredevil's civilian identity) would be lawyer I reckon.  His partner Foggy Nelson's sign name would be Fog.

Killer Croc's origins

As told by War Games.

Is this still canon?  I'd assumed he'd been involved in some freak accident.

Batman gets told off

There were a few good moments in War Games.  Only one or two mind.  This is one of them.

There.  That's the best bit of War Games.  Now no one else will have to read it, hah!

This reminds me of a scene with Babs, Cass and Bruce, that I will never ever get tired of:

War Games

I just read it.

Ho. Hum.


Now I see why everyone hates it.

Then I read War Crimes.  Way to go, assasinating Leslie's character.

The only good thing about it is Steph was heroic to the end, and Selina was supportive.

But Batman is still a massive dick.

Wonderful comics came out this week!

Red Robin 16 was not so wonderful, but have been better if it wasn't read next to Batgirl 14 and a Dr Horrible 1 shot which was..odd.  I also got Teen Titans 52 + 53 and Gotham City Sirens #9.  Which was amazingly good fun.  But onto the scans!  I cannot gush enough about Batgirl 14 so will display my love via scans:

So much win about this issue.  So much.
For a more indepth discussions see Nevermore999s LJ and Anj's blog.

Then there is also this lovely page of Kara from Teen Titans 53.

Maybe Eddy Barrows should take over Jamal Igle's pencilling duties on Supergirl?

The ayes have it

Well, technically Amanda Connor has it, but 'The AC's have it' sounds terribly wrong.

I'm talking about my Supergirl artist poll, of course.  18 of you voted (Thanks all!) and the overriding winner was Amanda Connor with 12 votes, woo hoo!

Amy Reeder got 3
Ed McGuinness,Ale Garza, Nicoal Scott and Francis Manapul got 2
There was one vote for Other

It appears none of my readers were interested in Eric Jones (for shame!), Ben Caldwell (probably not right for Sterling Gates stories), Patrick Gleason (I'm only interested in him with a new colourist) or Guillem March (Probably not right unless you want a cheesecake Kara).

Other suggestions put forward were:
Renato Guedes

Can't quite believe I forgot him.  I love Guedes for giving Kara knees, but I think sometimes his work suffers for being coloured to lightly - he (and Kara) needs strong bold, colours.  the above picture is bold, but a lot of his work wasn't.

Other suggestions put forward were for:

Cliff Chiang (yeah he could work)
Ian Churchill (Dear gods please no anything but him again)
David Finch (I'm not too familiar with him)
Ivan Reis (A GL artist. I'm unconvinced)
Ethan Van Sciver (I didn't like the colours on his Flash Rebirth book, so change the colourist and I could be more convinced)
Marcus To (He certainly does a lovely Robin)
Tony Daniel (He's ok)
Shane Davis (I don't know his stuff)
Gary Frank (His Christopher Reeve Superman scares me)
Ed benes  (Nooooooooooooooooo!)
Philip Tan (Another GL artist, maybe he could work)
Brian Bollard (As for Shane Davis)
Alex Gardner (Who?)
Matt Camp  (He's responsible for those awesome Supergirl covers a while back)

Out of all suggestions, I want Amy Reeder or Matt Camp on board.

Thanks to all who voted and commented, on here or on twitter, and thanks to those who promoted the poll!

Today

I don't have a real blog post.  I had last week off work on leave and was just getting into the swing of it when I had to come back to work today.  Booooo.  As I don;t start my new job for 3 more weeks I'm not really in the mood for my current job.  Ah well.

Here, I wrote a review of Wolverine:Origin over on New readers.. You can read that if you wish.  You can tell I like it cos it's a Marvel book I still own.

Link time!

Because I haven't thought of a real post, have some links:

Snell over at Slay, Monstrobot of the Deep! talking about how the comic industry should respect itself.

A take down of rape jokes and rape culture over at Shakesville.

A comic editor's response to an 8 yr old fan's upset at Jason Todd death, from Ragnell's tumblr.

A mash up of Van Halen's Jump and The Beatle's Imagine.

Zoe Williams talking about the stupidity of ruling that sex whilst HIV positive is a crime.

Kat Banyard on feminism.

OUT140 - telling your coming out stories in 14o characters or less.

A bloody fantastic American Sign Language interpretation of Marilyn Manson's The New Shit.   He's done it like a music video and it's amazing.

It's Beefcake week!

Or so Sally has declared.

Works for me, here's my contributions.

First up, is Thugboy from Empowered:

Last up, is Arthur, demonstrating why he's awesome:

Big Barda vs Superman

I was rereading Superman/Batman for New readers... and came across this little gem, showing Barda and Superman having a disagreement about who's going to rescue Kara from Apokolips.

What I really like about it is that Turner has drawn Barda as taller than everyone else in the room, and so, when Superman wants to exert his authority he flies vertically so he can be looking down at Barda.  Barda of course, is having none of it.

No Mans Land - other art part 2

The last of my No Mans Land series, and the rest of the notable art.

From legends of the Dark Knight 125.

Detective Comics 727.  Tim looks more like Connor Hawke here.

More from the Fruits of the Earth storyline.  I'm not sure which issue this is from, apologies.

From Legends of the Dark Knight 125.

From Legends of the Dark Knight 126. Batman is looking for the Joker.

From the issue where Barbara discovers the other Batgirl.

Shadow of the Bat 85.  A more cartoonish penguin.

Shadow of the Bat 77.  A more odl fashioend rendering of Batman.

There you have it.  The end of my No Mans Land series.  Tons of different things were covered in these 80+ issues and there were tons of different art styles.  God knows what it would be like to come into these blank, reading the trades.



It's polling time!

No Mans Land - other art part 1

Ah, here's where I just post a load of scans and revel in the loveliness of them all.  Issue numbers are underneath each picture

From Azrael 54.  A plot line that reminds me of the Buffy musical episode given that there's a demonic dancer involved.

From Batman 23.  Finale of the Underground Railroad story.  I like that it's a normal, non caped guy here, in a pose that is referencing Batman's usual iconic lookout.  It infers that we can all be Batmen, even if we're normal and have no special training.

Batman 568, from the Fruits of the Earth arc (also written about here).

From Detective Comics 738, A Bat/villain pile up. Haw!

Also Detective 738.  Cass actually looks small here.  For a lot of NML she looked more atheltic than waifish.

Detective Comics 741. How to tell a story without words.

Also Detective 741.  The end of NML and Batman gets to be tender again.

Do you remember about my poll?

No Mans Land - Huntress

So, I keep seeing talk about how Huntress got shot in the stomach.  This usually is in reference to the stupidity of her bare torso'd costume (btw if you do go look at the post that picture came from you'll find it's a list of the 8 sluttiest superheroes.  Yeah, nice.  For some reason Black Canary is included.  Yes, I think we can ignore that site.).  Anyway people argue that Huntress shouldn't wear that daft costume cos she got shot in the belly once - she'd want kevlar to protect herself, surely.  (My argument against it is that it looks ridiculous, she'll be cold, and why would she want to flash some skin when she's not superpowered and is fighting crime mostly at night).

Anyway, guess where she got shot in the stomach?  It's No Mans Land!  Here's some scans from when it happened.  It's starts here:

She is protecting children in a building.  She is the only one there to protect them.

She's now been shot.  It looks like this might be the end.  I like the above panel a lot.  She's not weepy or scared, she's defiantly looking up at her attacker, almost daring him to go through with it.

Skip to the next issue:

Then, if I recall correctly, the cavalry arrives.  Or at least Nightwing does, and he takes her to the only hospital in NML.

 I never knew Dick cared so much.  This is cemented by this next page:

And that's why Huntress needs a full kevlar suit.  Dick and Helena should get together again.


Psssst. There's a poll on this here site.

Comics!

This batch of comics have been more inspiring, in terms of reviewing them, than others have been for a while.  Covering Superman/Batman 75, Green Arrow 3, Gotham City Sirens 15, Wonder Woman 602 and Daredevil 55.  Here goes nothing..
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Superman/Batman 75
Eh look, the Legion didn't piss me off.  And then there's a scene where Batman is mopping Superman's brow.  Because Superman has kryptonite poisoning.  Bruce is getting more tender, dammit!  That is actually a very adorable scene.
The rest of the book is 2 page stories where the creators seem to be letting rip and having lots of fun - this is what Superman/Batman should be.  The rest of the DCU can go to a dark and dank hell but this book should be fun.  There's a parody of the floppy format by Steven T Seagle and Teddy Kristiansen (them who did It's a bird...) which I really wasn't expecting as this was touted as a sequal to It's a Bird.
The Con story was great - there are 2 kids, each dressed as Superman and Batman, and they start hassling a guy dressed as the Joker, concluding with plans to launch a groin attackk!!! then they spy  Catwoman and her reactions is just priceless.

Adam Hughes does a wodnerful spread of Batgirl and Supergirl - he gives Kara a lovely face,  which looks similar to Helen Slater.
Friendly Advice is Tim and Dick and Con and Kal talking about the Cass/Con/Tim love triangle.  Dick is teasing Tim something chronic.
And the most unexpected story - a continuation of the chibli story arc from Superman/Batman 51 and 52, where we find out that tiny Superman isn't really dead, he's just sleeping!  awwyeah!
Krypto vs Ace.  Nuff said.

Then some odd stories - Joker vs Lex done Calvin and Hobbes style, Batman/Superman as a grown up Connor/Damian, and a weird story about a kid and his dad.

But the rest were ace.

Green Arrow 3
This is bewildering.  Ollie was brought back to life by the mystic wood (i'm trying to work in a bush joke here) and a knight named Galahad.  Yes that Galahad.  I think I liked it.

Gotham City Sirens 15
Aww this was all about Harley and Ivy. One of ma favourite female friendships in comics.  Aww.  Selina's in it too, but this is really def all about Harley and Ivy.

Wonder Woman 602
Diana startsher trials to earn the mantle of Wonder Woman.  She take soff her jacket and reveals some strappy gold bits to the bustier which some people reckon is gonna be her lasso.  I like the strappy bits.  I also liked the sacrifices angle, them pesky Gods, wanting you to prove your faith in blood.  I'm a little unclear where Diana got that sword from, but I think this goes to prove you shouldn't piss off an Amazon.

Daredevil 55
You are correct, this isnt usually on my pull list and is in fact quite an old title.  I got it cos I'm trying to locate soem Echo stories - she's a Deaf girl in the Marvel universe.  This is the start of a story arc named Vision Quest and is by David Mack, so the art is all painted and the way it;s put together it kind of looks more like a  collage than a regular comic book.  I suspect I'd get more out of it with the whole arc but it was an OK read.  Her Deafness is integral to her experience and came up regularly throughout the issue so that was good.


Hey, it's poll time!

No Mans Land - Babs sees the other Batgirl

This takes place before Cassandra puts the cowl on.  Babs discovers another woman in Gotham wearing the Batgirl suit.  She's understandably upset.  From Detective Comics 732.

Remember that Barbara stopped being Batgirl when the Joker shot her in the spine and no one has taken up the mantle since.  She's hurt.  I think the art is fantastic in this story.


Ps: don't forget to vote in my poll!

New poll - Artists for Supergirl

So y'all may have heard the rumours that Jamal Igle might possibly be leaving the Supergirl book and going to Birds of Prey.  I have no idea if it's true, I sincerely hope it's not, and the only good thing about it will be that it means I'll pick up BoP. 
Apparently it is true.  (19.09.2010 - change of news again.  Igle was never offically attached to BoP.)
I am very sad.  I shall be adding BoP to my pull list tho.
Anyway, whether it's true or not it got me to thinking about who else could do Supergirl well, as written by Sterling Gates. I think it's important to specify who the writer will be because the art must match the dialogue and feel of the story.

So, there's a poll over there on the right, with several artists that I particularly like.  Go ahead and vote.  But before you do, let's recap on each one's work...

EDITED TO ADD Eric Jones and Amy Reeder.  Doh, how could I forget them?  I've now changed the poll.

Landry Q Walker reminded me of Eric Jones, who did Cosmic Adventures in the 8th Grade and did a bloody marvellous Kara.  I think she may be a little young for regular continuity but I'd be interested to see how he draws a more adult Kara:

Amy Reeder.  Simply delightful.  I have a lot of time for her Supergirl, so thank god we have her on covers now:

Ed McGuinness

As you can see he's already drawn a ton of Supergirls in Superman/Batman.  He's got good expressions whilst maintaining a cartoony appearance.

Amanda Connor, you all know her from Wednesday comics:

Ale Garza - I think his Kara is adorable, here's the cover he's done for Superman/Batman 77.

Nicola Scott
Probably one of my favourite artists at the moment.  Her female characters have a lot of strength and poise, something which I think would go well with Gates' writing of Kara.

Ben Caldwell
Another Wednesday comics nominee.  I think a Supergirl story drawn by him would be very mysterious and wouldn't work if it was rooted in everyday life, like Gates has been writing Kara.  If however she decided to rejoin the Amazons, Caldwell would do lovely.

Patrick Gleason
Gleason is probably best known for his work on Green Lantern.  I like his pencils but not the way they tend to get coloured.

Guillem March

He's recently did Gotham City Sirens.  Now I like his art in that book, but I think it may be too sexy for Supergirl.  I think she needs to be portrayed as a teenager and March would make her look like jailbait, or make her look adult.

Francis Manapul
He's doing the Flash comics right now and he has done Superboy in Adventure Comics before.  He has a very dreamlike style.

Other - leave a comment somewhere and tell me who you want to draw Kara.


I haven't included Jamal Igle because I think it's fair to say that given the choice we'd never let him leave the book.  I've also only included artists who currently work.

Go vote!