Weekly Crisis Comic Book Reviews for 05/14/08 - Updated

I was really pleased with this week's haul. Not only was it bountiful, but they were almost all, universally, amazing issues. I was really happy that I decided to pick up Amazing Spider-Man again, as this was quite literally one of the best issues of that series I've read in a long, long time. Batman RIP read like a prologue or teaser more than the first part of a major story. Guardians of the Galaxy brought the goods and has the scope and scale that Annihilation: Conquest should have had and Thunderbolts was more insane telepath goodness with the Green Goblin getting in on the action.

I'll try to update later with some more reviews of stuff like Sky Dolls, The Walking Dead and Wonder Woman, the latter two being titles I missed on my previews that were brought to my attention by commenters.

Oh, one more thing. I didn't forget about the archives of my old reviews. I've been chugging along diligently (okay, lazily) and am nearly finished with all the Wednesday reviews. Still have the Thursday ones to do, but there's far less of those than the Wednesday versions. One of the reasons I've slowed down is that every time I get a chance to do it, I usually plow through a bunch, but Blogger comes up with a spam protection captcha (insert random generated letters to continue) after 30 or so posts. Considering I do 10+ reviews a week, it makes it annoying to keep going once it comes up, but I'm really going to go at it this weekend to finish up. I'll probably launch the new archives within the next week or two.

Enough of my excuses, hit the jump and enjoy all the reviews!

UPDATE - Added Secret Invasion: Fantastic Four #1 and Wonder Woman #20 reviews.

AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #559
Written by Dan Slott
Art by Marcos Martin

For some reason, I hate to admit this about a Brand New Day story, but I really, really enjoyed this issue. Maybe the first storyarc just had to deal with having the taste of One More Day still in my mouth or the expectations of having to prove all the retcons and magic nonsense were worth the effort, but I found myself loving just about every minute of this issue. To be honest, I think it actually felt like I was reading the old Spidey again. It was fun, easy to get into and there were lots of things happening throughout the issue to keep me interested and entertained.

First up, we open with the new villain, Screwball, in the act of fleeing from Spider-Man after a daring daytime robbery of some random gambling den. She and Spidey engage in some great back and forth banter, which lasts just long enough not to feel forced or get stale, as they make their way across town, both highly agile characters doing various acrobatic feats along the way.

Screwball, if you haven't heard, is an internet attention whore that has people set up to film her robberies and escapes in action and broadcast them live on the internet on her very own webpage.

She actually manages to elude Spider-Man, prompting him to ask how she's managing this with his spider-like speed and agility. She only quips she's into parkour and he's too slow to keep up. This leads to my only complaint with the issue, being that they use the word parkour about a million times, as if they are beating us over the head with it, but it's only a small gripe. As she makes her last escape, she quips that it's all about the "Parkour luck", which actually made me laugh a bit as even Peter groaned out a, "she did not just say that", in reference to his Parker luck.

This was only the opening act of the book and the rest focuses on the paparazzi aspect of this storyline, in that Peter gets reassigned to the paparazzi section of the paper to put his "ninja photography" to work on catching celebs in action, which he takes a liking to and is actually quite good at doing with his spider powers.

I found it interesting that we've never seen Peter try this before or, at least to my knowledge, it has never happened in the books. It just seems like a natural fit and it was a nice twist to the character. I don't forsee him staying with it, everyone from Robbie to Aunt May and even Harry were a little annoyed and concerned over his bottom feeding new job.

Finally, the other new villain, who I had the least amount of interest in, Paperdoll (think that's her name, it wasn't actually stated), was actually incredibly interesting, and creepy to boot! I'm not sure what her powers are, but she seems to be able to blend into walls and has a fixation with paper that seems to have some connection to her powers. She's obsessed with a celebrity that Peter was covering earlier in the issue and is stalking him. She bought an entire newsstand's stock of DB paper's simply because his picture was splashed on the front page and went back to her apartment, which is covered with photos of him, and pinned a new one up. She "shed" her skin, for lack of a better term, and appeared ghost-like or paper thing, possibly blending into the wall, and was kissing the photo.

The art was really good for this issue, as well. Marcos Martin is a great artist, but I don't hold him up in the top echelon, like a McNivan or Hitch or what have, but his style really fit this book and I loved one page where he had Peter mulling over what to do with a photo as he walked up, down and around a building before coming to a stop upright as he made his decision. Great stuff.

Verdict - Must Read. Definitely worth picking this issue up, even if you dislike much of the BND stuff. At the very least, you can drop it after the three issue story is over. However, I think you'll all be very impressed with this issue and, hopefully, the entire storyarc.


BATMAN #676
Written by Grant Morrison
Art by Tony Daniel and Sandu Florea

Batman RIP officially starts with this issue and it felt very much like a prologue or teaser than an actual story. We begin with a brief introduction to the Black Glove, showing off some very Morrison-esque characters. You'll know what I mean when you see them, as they are about as conventional looking as the Authority is diplomatic.

Afterwards, we get a random chase scene that seems designed only to show off the "new" Batmobile. I say "new" only because it looks identical to just about every other standard Batmobile design we've seen except this one has, oooohhhh, red lights.

The chase ends predictably and leads to a scene back at the mansion where Bruce begins undressing upstairs as he enters his room, where his current girlfriend, Jezebel Jet, who recently learned he's Batman, is waiting for him.

As they embraced, we listen in on Alfred and Robin going over all the changes and craziness Batman's been through over the past year with his trials in 52 and the recent near death experience. It felt very much like a "hey, you guys that picked this up for the big event, but don't know anything about the current run, this is a recap" and had me wanting to just flip through the pages to until something new came up.

We then have Bruce talking with Jezebel about his parents at their grave as she shows him a letter from the Black Glove, requesting their attendance at a party, to Bruce's shock and surprise, as they are the ones he's looking for.

The issue ends with a really creepy Joker segment that has me wondering what was real and what wasn't. This is definitely the prose version earlier in Morrison's run and doesn't even try to explain how he was in Salvation Run, even though they basically say all the crazies are missing earlier in the issue, which seemed to reference said Salvation Run.

The Joker scene opened with Arkham's doors open, blood running down the steps and then switches to a more monotone colouring scheme of the interior. Joker is seen amongst blood stained hallways and dead bodies strewn about as a television talks about an airborn Joker virus killing millions. We then get a shot of his therapist talking to him before the power goes out and the Black Glove request his attendance at a party to kill Batman. As the power comes back on, we see a normal coloured version of this Joker with blood stained clothing and cell.

So, as you can tell, I have no idea if Joker was imagining all this death during his session or if the dead bodies are from the Black Glove infiltrating and if that Joker virus is even real or not. I'm pretty sure it isn't, but the scene was one of the more disturbing takes on the Joker I've read and a bit insane and confusing at the same time, which I imagine was the intent.

Verdict - Check It. The Joker scene was great, but the rest of the issue felt like filler and recaps for new readers jumping on for this event. The art was excellent by Daniels, but I hope the story picks up next issue.


GREEN LANTERN CORPS #24
Written by Peter J. Tomasi
Art by Patrick Gleason and Prentis Rollins

Well, Mongul is one messed up individual. Apparently, the planet he's seeded with the Black Mercies has a ring around it. Nothing special, right? We've seen lots of planets with ring formations. Hell, our solar system has a bunch of them in the outer parts. Well, not like this one. It's made of dead bodies and it's thick enough to impede the Lanterns' descent to the planet. Awesome.

Oh, speaking of the Black Mercies, I was afraid this issue would turn into a rehash of the last Green Lantern appearance by Mongul where Ollie and Hal had perfect dream worlds for two issues before taking down Mongul in the span of a few pages. Well, not this time. It appears Mongul has reverse engineered the Black Mercies to be more in line with the Sinestro Corps' fear motif and they now generate absolute fears for those they enslave.

Ion and Arisia received a two page splash page depicting their inner fears and Ion's appears to be related to the Blackest Night prophecy from back in the old Alan Moore Green Lantern Annual. It seems to have him getting attacked by shadowy figures with giant metal poles, similar to the White Lobe's stabbing him with the lead pipes in the Annual, a scene where a rainbow of rings pierce his chest, showing the various corps' rings flying through his chest, and other shots of him failing as Ion and being the "last one", in reference to last Green Lantern. Not a spot on reenactment, but pretty interesting nonetheless. Arisia's fear sequence showed her buried alive, from back when she "died", and even a shot of what looked like Parallax escaping from a Manhunter's body and jumping at her. Something to look for in the future or just random fear related dreams?

The rest of the issue deals with some boring, for me, at least, recaps of Mongul's origin and history for those that don't know who he is or only came on during the Sinestro Corps War and the search for Ion and Arisia. The GL's retrieve both, who appear to be alive, but in critical condition, but are interrupted by an angry "queen" Black Mercy that seems upset they killed so many of her children. Not sure how it will put up a fight, though.

Where was Mongul during all this? Well, he was making some kind of planet seeding gun construct as he fired the modified fear Black Mercy seeds into space to, I supose, land on random or targetted planets and begin spreading fear and taking over those planets, too. I suspect he'll show up next issue for the showdown with the Green Lanterns.

Finally, we had a seen with the sciencells on Oa, where Sinestro, and every other Sinestro Corps member held captive, begain cutting themselves and drawing symbols on their cell windows. I'm not positive, as I don't have my Corps symbols memorized, but I think they looked like the Red Lantern logo, but it could have simply been the Sinestro Corps one.

Verdict - Must Read. It was a great issue that had some very interesting developments for everyone. I enjoyed the fear dreams Ion and Arisia had, although I still dislike Ion being out of action so easily, and was impressed with Mongul's continued plans and just about everything was done right this issue with the sole exception being that boring recap section.


GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY #1
Written by Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning
Art by Paul Pelletier

Guardians of the Galaxy was a great first issue, but, much like The Order, decided to use the reality television style action scenes broken up by the random character in studio talking sections. Maybe it's just me, but I don't particularly care for this type of narrative, but, at the same time, it wasn't enough to stop me from enjoying this issue. I hope they don't choose to go with this style of narration for the entire series, though.

The events of this issue are relatively mundane and easy to describe. The GotG, who are nameless at this point, have discovered that space is broken, due to the Annihilation Wave's forced entry and destruction of the Kline, and Warlock wants to fix it. This leads to their first battle with, to my surprise and delight, the Church of Truth.

For those unawares, Adam Warlock has a lot of past with the Church of Truth and they touch on it briefly here, but, like me, choose not to go into it too much, as it deals with time travel, alternate realities and other complex stuff. Just know that they are a bunch of zealots that convert or destroy anyone that is not a part of the church and they once worshipped Warlock, or his evil counterpart, Magus. This opens up a lot of great story paths that could eventually lead to an appearance by Magus or Warlock returning to that persona on his own or what have you.

Back to the summary, the issue deals with the team kicking ass and taking names as they attempt to stop the ship from colliding with one of the fissures in space, which are the "broken" parts that Warlock mentioned. Intersperced, we get each members reality TV log of the mission and the reasons and recruitment scenes for each of them.

They aren't as bad as I make them out, and the Rocket Raccoon drinking binge with Starlord and Gamora's getting upset with Nova for calling her for a recruitment instead of a booty call followed by make up sex were some of the highlights of the issue, but I just didn't like how they broke up the action all the time. This is probably a personal preference, though, so some will like, others will have the same issues I do.

Another one of my favourite scenes was the return to Knowhere, the current base of operations for the team, where we get to see "Mister Cosmo", the talking Cosmonaut dog from recent Nova issues. He's still just as funny and it looks like he and "Comrade Raccoon" have some issues with each other that I can't wait to see explored.

We end with the reintroduction of Mantis, who's the team's shrink, for lack of a better term, and no longer a field operative, and Groot, who's still a twig, but growing nicely. Mantis didn't seem like the Mantis from Starlord or Conquest. She's still mysterious and has the odd speech patterns, but, and it's hard to explain, her actions and speech just seem off. She's far more of the Matrix-style Oracle now, giving random omens and what not.

She has her little reality TV moment where she reveals she knows the team will be named the Guardians of the Galaxy in 24 hours time and that in nine months, one of the team members will betray and kill them, but can't reveal it to anyone due to consequences of revealing the future and other mumbo jumbo. Again, it came off much less like the Mantis I enjoyed in previous appearances. Bug was no where to be seen, despite being at Mantis' bedside at the end of Conquest.

Everyone had their time to shine this issue and all had some memorable scenes. Raccoon and Cosmo had lots of fun coming up with random names for the team, Drax had a funny "should I stab it, would stabbing it help?" type of line, Gamora and Nova had their recruitment scene and so on. There was definitely something for everyone and I'm looking forward to more of the same next month.

Speaking of next month, the issue ended with a fissure in space and the team suiting up to go stop it. Coming from the rift this time was a frozen temple-like object and clearly seen in the ice is Captain America and his shield, frozen. They spoke of alternate dimensions outside of ours beyond these rifts, so it could be related to that, but it looked a lot like Thanos' temple from Infinity Gauntlet, but the ice made it too difficult to tell, so it could be anything at this point. I thought the Cap shield meant a trip to Earth, but looks like they're going in a different direction.

Oh, one last thing, it seems the Church of Faith has a woman in charge and is quite interested in who the mysterious invaders of their ship were and it looks like they will be the villains of the piece.

Verdict - Must Read. If you like Green Lantern / GLC, Nova, Annihilation or fun team books, this is a must purchase for you. I'd recommend everyone give the first issue a shot at the very least. Easy jump on point, lots of great characters and solid art make this a hard to pass up book for anyone.


SECRET INVASION: FANTASTIC FOUR #1
Written by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa
Art by Barry Kitson

As Secret Invasion is a comic book event and comic books don't typically kill off major characters, I didn't exactly expect the Fantastic Four, or two, since it's just Johnny and Thing, to die with that Skrull Negative Zone bomb set off in Secret Invasion #1, but I still get annoyed when it ends up being just a cheap gimmick used to build up suspense when we all know it means nothing.

Case in point, no one dies from this giant, swirling Negative Zone vortex and it was literally designed just to pull the Baxter Building and Reed Richards' inventions into the Negative Zone. What looked like some big, "OH SHIT", type explosion is simply another random day at the Baxter Building, as evidenced by one of the onlookers making the same joke in one of the panels about how stuff like that happens everyday with the FF.

So, while I did enjoy this issue, I have trouble accepting the very concept that it's built around, namely being sucked into the Negative Zone when they should be killed.

As for the issue, it does explain what happened to Sue Richards, sort of. For those interested, she was off on a conference in Vancouver during SI #1 and a Skrull Reed Richards was waiting for her in her hotel. She knew right away it wasn't him and the Skrull used his own invisible powers to disable Sue. Not sure why she isn't dead or why she was taken captive.

Meanwhile, we see the events, step by step, as the Skrull, who was revealed as Lyja, to no one's surprise, since it's been on covers for this series' solicits. In the Negative Zone, the Thing looks after the kids while fighting off some of Annihilus' bugs, which I assume didn't bother to join the invasion into our universe. Johnny, on the other hand, goes to check on Sue, who they saw enter the lab before the N-Zone portal blew open.

He starts questioning "Sue" and, through stupidity or just plain bad Skrull intel, Lyja can't remember Sue's favourite movie and is found out fairly easily. Good thing they are "undetectable". I guess Reed's big discovery before Pym shot him was the ability to ask the Skrull imposters questions.

Verdict - Check It. The creative team works well with what they were given by Bendis, so I can't fault them for an otherwise decent issue, but the majority of my complaints are more Secret Invasion related and the setup of this issue than the actual issue itself. I'll probably stick around for the whole thing, so it's not a terrible book by any means.


THUNDERBOLTS #120
Written by Warren Ellis
Art by Mike Deodato

Man, they shouldn't release the Thunderbolts one-shots so close to the infrequent appearances of the actual book. It just makes the one-shots seem so much worse than they are and goes to show that very few are as twisted or insane as Ellis is.

As predited, Venom didn't suffer any fatal wounds in his epic battle with Swordsman last issue and the symbiote is actually repairing him as we speak. Swordsman seems to have regressed to a more childlike state as he stumbles aimlessly through the compound and the telepaths are ramping up their plans and now forcing the Tbolts to target civilian workers.

Oh, and Norman Osborn was awesome and has my vote for president. As witnessed throughout this storyarc, he's gradually been losing it, probably due to the telepaths, messed up meds by Moonstone and general Goblin insanity. This issue sees it come to a head as he goes to collect his Green Goblin costume and equipment from storage in one of the more entertaining naked dictations I've read as Norman makes mad plans for presidency, bemoans having to do everything himself, from knocking up (god, why are they referencing this?) and killing the blonde girlfriend (Gwen Stacy for those not in the know) to running the Thunderbolts. It's a great scene and you can look for it, and many other Goblin related scenes, in the Moments of the Week.

Once fully garbed in one of the cooler renditions of the Green Goblin costume to date, Norman begins searching for Swordsman and Venom to put a stop to their tantrums. He stops casually to ask two guards where they are and they can barely spit out an answer before he takes off, cackling all the way, to kill Venom and Swordsman. We later see him catching up to Swordsman, who is practically whimpering like a child, and verbally berates him, saying things like he was born when a pig coughed and so on before absolutely tearing into him with bombs and those razor sharp batarangs. We find Swordsman, later, crucified, with the batarangs pinning him to the wall, near death and bleeding profusely as we cut to Norman, who's about to slaughter the entire complex population thanks to the telepaths' prodding.

The other Thunderbolts weren't forgotten either. Radioactive Man wants to give everyone cancer and, before he can do anything, one of the guards starts bashing him in the back of the head, knocking him out. Songbird questioned him and he said he didn't want cancer and Songbird agreed and complimented him on a good job before leaving. Moonstone was pushed towards going after Doc Samson and Penance, who are still having a casual chat about him becoming Speedball again. I'm not sure how they will stop these telepaths, as everyone seems to be insane, incapacitated or under their control at this point, so I hope Ellis has thought that far ahead and we don't get some rushed conclusion.

Verdict - Must Read. It was another deliciously insane issue of Thunderbolts and makes me sad that Ellis has made enough money off of us and is going to go do other stuff now. Might want to trade wait on this one if you haven't been picking the series up, but it is definitely another amazing issue of Thunderbolts.


WONDER WOMAN #20
Written by Gail Simone
Art by Aaron Lopresti

This issue marks the beginning of the four part, Ends of the Earth, storyline. To be frank, I'm not sure what's going on in this issue, but I like it.

We begin with Wonder Woman in her winter garb, making her way through the harsh winter climate searching for the Mead Hall. She is beign followed by wolves, which she is forced to put down before finally entering the hall. In this winter waste land, she does not have her powers, but is still quite formidable.

There, she encounters Beowulf, the man she is looking for. It just so happens he is looking for Grendel in this place and it leads them to butting heads before agreeing to put their differences aside and teaming up against the other hall inhabitants, who all happen to be Grendel supporters.

Meanwhile, it cuts to Diana Prince at her job, six hours prior to the Beowulf encounter. She's been promoted by her boss, Director Steel, but he seems to have suspicions about her ability to survive encounters that would normally kill a person. I'm not sure if he knows she's Wonder Woman, but it's surprising how a pair of glasses can mask your identity in the DCU.

After the promotion, Diana and her friend, Etta Candy, celebrate over lunch before returning to her office, where the red eyed man from earlier issues is waiting. He has a sword, which Diana easily takes from him and knows she is Wonder Woman. He's not there to fight her and offers to let her use her lasso on him to see the truth.

What happens next is a bit odd, even for someone like me who knows very little about Wonder Woman. She goes almost catatonic and, in some panels that cut to her inner pysche, we learn that the man, known as Stalker, has no soul and Diana is trapped in an empty void of darkness. Etta grabs the lasso and enters this void and helps bring Diana back from the abyss, but she still remains in shock afterwards. Stalker then reveals that Diana isn't strong enough to do what he wants and has helped remove her compassion so that she can help him kill D'Grth, otherwise known as the Devil. Not sure if this is Neron in the DCU or not.

Verdict - Check It. The art was excellent and I especially enjoyed Wonder Woman's arctic attire and the entire Beowulf section. The entire issue, while a bit confusing as to how or why she was searching for Beowulf didn't bother me so much as it made me want to find out more, which is a good thing. I'm not sure if this whole kill the devil routine will end up being a great story or not, so I left this as a tentative Check It, despite enjoying the issue a great deal.

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