Jumping in Headfirst

Archie "Lyrics are stupid. Music needs to SOUND good." They're two points that are totally separate and yet are often conflated with one another, and have been ruining modern music for at least ten years now. A piece of my soul may well have died reading it, yet I have to applaud Mark Waid because it kind of captures the youth of today spot-on. The comic as a whole is excellent though, finally explaining to readers the dreaded "lipstick incident" that caused Archie and Betty, Riverdale High's most unbreakupable couple to, well...break up. It's a familiar story: they start listening to people outside the relationship. The most terrifying real life villain--two high-school kids--kick things off by essentially telling Betty she doesn't know how to gender right. This leads to a Hollywood-esque "makeover" where Betty goes from tomboy to super girly girl, then goes on a "date date" with her boyfriend Archie, which is incredib...

Batgirl In case you needed to know, Dick's response to Barbara's monologue is, "Yeah...you're right."   This is just...legitimately bad, and pretty much indefensible.   This issue could have played out in any number of ways.  It's about the marriage of longtime Batgirl supporting character Alysia Yeoh--it could've just been about Batgirl trying to keep the wedding day from exploding while dealing with some criminal threatening Burnside.   (Or to be honest, the opening is adorable as all hell so it could've just been about the wedding and I'm pretty sure Batgirl's current target audience would've been all about it.)  It features Lucius Fox, so it COULD have been about briefly bringing him out of retirement as Batwing for a team-up between the two.  Or if it just HAD to feature Dick Grayson, you could've done one of those neat comic books where a villain they're dealing with today is one they dealt with when they first met,...

1872 If you can't guess what happens, Fisk is killed on the next page.  This is actually pretty frustrating, as a storyteller.  This whole story was meant to be about how righteous people have to live within the law--even when it'd be more convenient for them not to.  Steve Rogers, "A Good Man", literally dies for this ideal.  Red Wolf actually has the chance to kill him but changes his mind because he learned the value of working for an ideal, and what's good and just rather than placing himself above the law...only for Natasha to just pop up and go "lol fuck that".  And Red Wolf's cool with it, which is the really maddening part.  If the point is to set up that these two are on the same side but won't always get along due to a difference in ideology, I get it.  But if its just "I could have done that", then it raises the question of why didn't Red Wolf just put a bullet in him to begin with.  Either way, 1872's ending s...

Sorry about this being late.

It worked for Flash (sorta), now let's see Arrow.

I'm about to try something.  Let's see if it sticks. On Jay Garrick:   The shadowy character from the end of season one stands revealed.  Of course, longtime comic fans already know who this is, but the writers found a concise enough method of introducing him, Earth 2, and the multiverse in forty minutes.  It's also good that the show didn't immediately segue Jay into the "mentor" role.  Certainly, it's the ultimate place for him, but it's flat out illogical for Barry to accept a new "mentor" after recently learning the last guy who tried to help him be a better Flash was not only a traitor, but the person who murdered his mother and irrevocably altered the course of his life forever.  Having said that, Jay's "But I'm not him" line when Barry confessed all of that to him was great--it's the kind of directness that fits someone of his years/experience perfectly, and gave viewers a perfect summation of the direction...

Even though Secret Wars is still ongoing, Marvel October can't be stopped!   Let's see what things look like (another) eight months into the future over at the House of Ideas, along with what's going on in the world of Batman, DC's newest character with an ongoing Telos, and more!

The second season of the Flash hit the ground running (pun not intended), as it tied up the monster cliffhanger of the first season, introduced a brand-new villain in the form of Atom Smasher (played by WWE veteran Adam "Edge" Copeland), and started us off with what will become the major conflict for this season.  It's not a bad start--it actually accomplished far more than what one normally expects of a season opener. The episode begins with Flash absolutely trouncing Captain Cold and Heat Wave, two of his fiercest rivals from the last season, only to reveal itself as an elaborate dream sequence.  In the interrim of Flash saving the city from the singularity that threatened the entire planet at the end of season one, "Team Flash" seems to have disbanded.  I think if I had one main problem with an episode that I mostly loved, it'd be that there was too neat of a bow placed on the end of season one.  To help close the singularity, Firestorm split apart...

1872 I'm pretty sure I was waiting this entire mini-series to see if they'd pull the trigger on a steampunk Iron Man.   So, y'know...much obliged. 

And here we are again.

And we return again. Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows And so we learn the true purpose of the Regent doing all this power stealing: he's trying to gain enough power to defeat "god Doom".  A few thoughts about all these spin-offs: most of the parts of "Battleworld" have major..."issues" in one way or another.  They're war-torn, or conquered and being ruled by some overbearing despot, or just contain such hostile environments that anything other than "survival" is a luxury goal. A couple months ago I theorized that Doom picked specific worlds, and the more I read from these mini-series the more sure I become about that.   Most of these worlds are far too disorganized to even notice Doom, let alone attempt to fight the guy. Even in the case of guys like these or Future Imperfect's Maestro?  They're vastly overestimating their own abilities and vastly underestimating Doom's, and so any attempts to try and overthrow hi...

JiH's longest-running column returns.  A-Force For Doom to have "crowned" barons of each realm, it sure seems as if each one's hold on their power is just as, if not more precarious, as it would be on the real world.   Also, it seems like the ladies of A-Force just can't stay out of trouble.  After losing junior member Miss America during what should've been a standard "stop the giant monster wrecking the city" mission, they're right back to crossing the barriers between realms. Still and all, the novelty of seeing all the major lady heroes of the Marvel Universe hasn't worn off and likely won't, which means I can keep my hype for the inevitable re-launch of this book during Marvel October. Amazing Spider-Man: Spiral Mr. Negative displaying some actual common sense--something that would probably crack most of the secret identities left if used in more stories.   "How do you know who I am?!"  "Motherfucker,...

"If I told you I killed a nigga at 16, would you believe me? Or see me to be, the innocent Kendrick you seen in the street With a basketball and some Now-and-Laters to eat, If I mentioned all of my skeletons, would you jump in the seat? Would you say my intelligence now is great relief? And its safe to say our next generation maybe could sleep With dreams of being a lawyer or doctor,  Instead of a boy with a chopper, that hold the cul-de-sac hostage?" That verse from Kendrick Lamar's "mAAd city" shows off the inescapable duality of the black youth--the one that allows us to be viewed through one set of eyes as the "good" or "safe" kind of black through our personalities or manner of speech, while an entirely different pair could see us as merely gangsters or thugs just for our clothing choices, even though more often than not we all have similar backgrounds, and any of us could be forced at any time to do less than savory things ...

If Sony hadn't taken it, these guys would've gotten the best in show.  Easy. Rating: A- Sometime last year, I did this enormous post on NeoGAF talking about all the games we could see during that E3.   I did a ton of research for that, and during that time I realized how easy it would be for Square to do their own conference if they wanted to. Well, lo and behold here we are a year later and Square has popped up with the strongest conference from a non-console developer.   (They topped Nintendo too, but I’ll get to that in a second.)    Square’s probably the most well-rounded developer making video games right now.   No other developer could’ve offered you as many big budget titles from so many different genres and settings.    Barely two weeks ago, I was calling Square the equivalent of a significant other that’s a jerk—they ignore you for weeks, refuse to do anything around the house, but then just when you’re...

I definitely wanted this one to be better.

Uh-oh.  The "big dog" has arrived... Rating : HOLY F- (A++) If you paid attention to the internet scuttlebutt the night before, you knew there was a possibility of what happened.    I said: “Sony can only disappoint, or break the internet” roughly two hours before their conference started.   Fortunately, Sony decided to go for the latter. We should’ve known they weren’t fucking around when they started on time for once.   They wasted absolutely ZERO time and kicked things off by re-introducing The Last Guardian.    Though I didn’t care about it when they revealed it in 2009 (and care even less now), it was a beautiful reveal and a great way to start things off. But they weren’t done.   Horizon, the game I’ve been talking about for ages , was next and it looked jaw-droppingly beautiful.   Boasting a unique setting, hauntingly beautiful music, and a bad-ass female protagonist hunting down ROBOT DINOSAURS, Guerilla Games m...