Comic Book Moments of the Week for 12/12/12

 

Hello hello, and welcome to another installment of Moments of the Week! This week sees the continuing perils of the Joker in Batman and Batman & Robin, the highly controversial Avengers Arena debuts, the Fantastic Four heads off on a journey, and Cable & X-Force begins. Oh, and a certain big time Decepticon returns in Transformers. Much more as always after the jump, so click and enjoy!

Avengers Arena #1

 

Arcade has captured all the teen heroes by unknown means, and now we have a Battle Royale situation going on. The heroes even try to fight him but he has some pretty godlike powers, kicking Hazmat clear across the field. and tells the kids there's no way out except to fight one another.

The kids never choose anyone (and that is Cammi from Annihilation), but if you can follow the health bars, the only one who is the weak link at the moment is Hazmat, the only person who continues to try and fight Arcade. So the decision is pretty much made....

And there's the first to fall, but at the same time the incredibly out of place powers Arcade has makes it feel like everything is just a dream or simulation. It is comics, after all.

Bandette #3

And to balance out Avengers Arena, here's a nice fun take on the thief world, where Bandette, the fearless French thief, is remembering how her heists were foiled by yet another thief, Monsieur. Sacre Bleu! Of course they must meet to square off!

It's a fun series by Paul Tobin and Colleen Coover, and if you liked those Coover backups to a few Marvel books in recent years like X-Men First Class, this is worth a look. And it's only a buck for a full issue, deal of the year.

Batman #15

One of the secrets Bruce kept from the family, where the Joker seemingly made it into the batcave years prior, making it seem like he has known everyone's identities for years. Bruce goes on to make many logical points of how it would be impossible for the Joker to make it into the batcave, but again, comics. Plus the guy is walking around with his face cut off. Bruce distances himself fromt eh family and goes after finding those who helped the Joker.

It's not said how long the Joker's been in Arkham and scaring the guards to do his bidding, but that kind of construction can't be that quick, so maybe he has been there for nearly the whole year.

Batman & Robin #15

If you're squeamish, you might want to just skip this whole section, as Patrick Gleason provides the first truly disgusting and creepy version of Joker's face to date. You have been warned!

Truly disturbing, and he's even playing with his face! Damian was trying to find clues to Alfred, but the Joker captured him in the aviary of Gotham Zoo. Joker mentioned this in Batman #14 but he spells it out again why he's doing what he's doing...

The face is always smiling, even when he's yelling and putting his hand through it. Major kudos to Gleason for how warped the face would look with all the abuse it's going through.

Bloodshot #6

Bloodshot is being hunted in the facility where other experiments have been going on, by a pack of genetically enhanced soldiers......Universal Soldiers perhaps?

Ouch. Not only does that look incredibly painful, but to get taken out by a protruding bone in someone's arm? Pride will be damaged too.

Cable & X-Force #1

Cable's arm that was formerly full of the TO virus has basically been atrophied to the point where he can't use it without support (same with his right eye), so you get an arm that's like a Mega Man upgrade. And during all this time, Cable hasn't said anything to Hope, which makes his adopted daughter pretty upset.

Weird as it looks with floating planes everywhere, that seems pretty normal for a Summers family interaction.

Fantastic Four #2

The fun and games with the new F4 members is short lived as the regulars get ready to go on their time travel jump that Reed hopes will find a cure for unstable molecules deteriorating.

Wave goodbye, everyone!

Very optimistic of you, Scott. If they do come back in the projected 4 minutes, that would be a first, right?

Marvel Universe vs. Avengers #3

Thor, bro, that's terrible to just fly away because you don't like Doom's plan. Even Clint is at a breaking point, but Doom always has tricks up his sleeve.

Cured, but scared of everything? Going from one extreme to the other is the only choice at the moment, but maybe Doom actually said he would deliver on everything. You know, he's not such a crazy guy after all......

 .....oh. Well, there goes that theory.



Scarlet Spider #12

Kaine is so messed up about what happened in Minimum Carnage that he takes to drinking, and like Peter, alcohol doesn't mix well with Spider-powers. Plus, being kicked out of his hotel room? The only thing to make it worse is that a bunch of costumed Santas rob the hotel looking for jewels worth millions of dollars. Annabelle shrewdly tells them there's more loot up on the top floor....

What seems as casual superhero bigotry is actually a way to stay in the hotel, everyone wins! Except poor Belgians.

Transformers: Robots in Disguise #12

I'm pretty sure Bumblebee is right on this. I mean, it's Megatron! While all this is going ont he Decepticons are planning to revolt now that Megatron has returned, and Starscream can feel his grasp on power is slipping away. One motivational speech for the masses coming right up!

No go, and the whole city battens down the hatches for the upcoming return of Autobots vs. Decepticons, even though half the sides don't want to fight that fight anymore.

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