New Comix! - Week of 7/4/12

Good, solid comics across the board this week.  Hard to pick a favorite except for the fact that....HE-MAN'S BACK!

He-Man and the Masters of the Universe #1
He-Man returns to comic book form, this time courtesy of DC Entertainment!  I had no idea they had the He-Man license!  Not only is the MAN back, but they're giving this storyline a very fun twist!

The story starts off with He-Man and his friends, the Masters of the Universe, fighting against Skeletor and his minions.  Then the scene ends and you see that it was all just a dream in the head of simple woodsman, Adam.  He gets up, goes outside and gets right to work, chopping trees.  In the distance, over the treetops you can see the shadowed outline of Snake Mountain.  As he works, Adam ponders over his dream and wishes it or something like it would come true to make the awful world of Eternia a better place to live.  Apparently, Skeletor actually won and now rules Eternia with an iron grip.  None oppose him because he has made all the heroes forget who they are and what Eternia used to be like.  He keeps close tabs on Prince Adam, who now lives in a shack in the woods, cutting up trees and taking care of his ailing father.

Adam soon befriends a colorful falcon who comes to visit him while he works and his dreams continue until the point where he feels like he has to go find his destiny.  He leaves his father in the hands of a good neighbor (State Farm?) and starts his trek through the forest.  He soon gets stopped in his tracks by the hulking form of Beastman!  Adam doesn't remember Beastman, but the monster warns him to turn around and go home if he wants to live.  Adam doesn't turn right around so the orange beast jumps at him.  Adam runs, fighting back feebly with his woodsman's axe.  He is surprised by how well he's able to keep the monster at bay and wonders how it knew his name.  After a few close calls he tricks Beastman, stabs a freshly cut tree limb in his back, and knocks him out with a punch.  He is then more determined ever to find out what's going on in the wider world.  The issue ends with Skeletor sitting in Snake Mountain with the wounded Beastman saying that Adam had to be stopped, dead or alive.  Tell "everybody".

The good: I was SO excited to be reading a new He-man story, especially one with a totally new status quo.  Skeletor is in charge, Adam is a lowly woodsman who only dreams of being a powerful warrior.  This is fun.

The bad: I felt like they have a good story going here and they're rushing right through it!  Beastman should have been the crap out of Adam and sent him back home a mess!  Then, as Adam heals over the following weeks, his resolve to try again grows and he shows his inner character by braving his fears and trying to leave the woods again.  Adam should NOT be able to defeat and knock out Beastman with a punch!  I guess that was supposed to be awesome, but I thought it was out of character.  Adam isn't really the wuss he pretends to be, but he's not a warrior either.

Also, the cover art shows He-Man in his classic Filmation gear.  Inside the comic, all the costumes have been updated and not for the better.  Everyone shown in any kind of fighting costume has random bits of chain main hanging off of them at weird places!  Beastman has little bits 2-3 scales deep hanging off his arm bands and from his loincloth.  Not enough to help as armor, just enough to look like something bought at Claire's in the mall.  The dream shots of He-Man show him with a really long scale mail strip going down his crotch in front of his furry loincloth.  I'm not a fan of the costume upgrades, but it's certainly not worth dropping the book.

Overall: This was a fun new take on what is possibly my all-time favorite character.  For me, before there was Spidey, before there was Wolverine, before there was Batman...there was He-Man.  I'm all in!

- Obligatory Pick of the Week!

Ultimate Comics Spider-Man #12
Things are heating up between Miles and his villain uncle, Aaron!  They recently took down a mean thug called, the Scorpion together.  Aaron (a.k.a. The Prowler) wants to keep the teamup going.  Miles wants nothing more to do with his corrupt, manipulative uncle.

In this issue, Miles resolves to bite the bullet and tell his parents about being Spider-Man.  He knows his dad will flip out, but he has to come clean.  His uncle is using the threat of outing him to his father to blackmail him into helping him build a criminal empire.  On his way  home, Uncle Aaron intercepts him and gives him one more chance to change his mind.  He's very persistent, so Miles tells him "yes" to get him to go away and Aaron tells him to meet him that night.  When they meet later that evening, it's so Miles can tell him to go away and never come back.  Aaron has some respect issues and responds by trying to kill his "disrespectful" nephew.  The fight is a pretty good one.  Aaron has no powers, but he is loaded to the gills with villain gadgets, the main one being sonic-wave emitting gloves, much like classic Spidey villain, the Shocker, uses.  It comes down to a street brawl and Aaron is going in for the kill shot standing right above Miles when his damaged gauntles explodes, shooting Spidey across the street and burning his uncle to a crisp.  Before he passes out, Aaron whispers, "Just...like...me..."

I'm not sure how Miles will respond to this, but i'm about ready for the storyline to move along.  Don't get me wrong, I have enjoyed every issue of Ultimate Spiderman, before and since Miles has taken the lead role, but the Prowler thing has been dragging a bit.  I'm ready for Miles to move past the shadow of his uncle and keep growing into the hero he was meant to be.

Solid story.  Great art.  Keep the Spider-train rolling!

AvX (Avengers versus X-Men) #7
At the end of issue 6, Cyclops had had enough of the government's superteam and decides it's time for "No more Avengers".  The X-men go hunting and hound the Avengers from hiding place to hiding place.  Some great battles take place, with Scarlet Witch being the Avengers' only Ace in the Hole, aside from Hope, who they can barely keep from the X-men. For some reason the Phoenix is susceptible to harm from Scarlet Witch, but she is easily sidetracked in battle, which they use to keep her off balance.  While Tony Stark and Black Panther work to find a way to counter the Phoenix Force, the Avengers scatter across the globe, dividing the X-Men and using Dr. Strange's magic to make it appear that Scarlet Witch is everywhere at once.  At one point they are retreating from Namor's group and Hawkeye ends up consumed in fire by Emma Frost, burned almost to death and captured by the mutants.

Back at Utopia, the previously solid Phoenix Five are starting to show cracks.  Magik and Colossus are starting to talk a little crazy, the former saying that the Witch is "evil" and must be purged from the Earth.  Namor and Scott yell at each other, Namor saying that they should just kill the Avengers, Scott saying he doesn't want to kill anybody.  Emma then goes behind Scott's back and tells Namor where the Avengers are hiding, which she has NOT told Scott.

In a new plot twist, Iron Fist brings a kung-fu buddy from his secret city (read my review for issues 5 and 6 for more details) where they claim to know how to counter the Phoenix and prepare Hope to control it.  The Avengers are making plans to evacuate Wakanda to Iron Fist's homeland when Namor attacks their base full-force.

This story has been getting better and better since Iron Man split the Phoenix into 5 pieces and it inhabited 5 X-Men.  I'm a little leery of the answer to the Avenger's problem being magic kung-fu, but we'll just have to wait and see where this goes.  I'm anxious to keep reading and the art has really taken a step up the last few issues thanks to Olivier Coipel.

New Comix! - Week of 6/27/12

Fun week of comix!  2 Great ones and 1 decent.  Pretty good haul!

Wolverine and the X-Men #12
This issue picks up right after the events in AvX #6 last week.  Marvel timed this VERY well, which doesn't always happen.  In AvX #6, The Avengers raided the X-Men island, Utopia, and made off with the "Mutant Messiah", Hope, with the help of the Scarlet Witch.  In this issue, the X-Men then set off scouring the globe for her, enlisting many of Wolverine's X-Men team to do it.

Rachel Summers, Cyclop's daughter from the future and one-time Phoenix host, leads the hunt and tracks down Wolverine.  Their talk goes poorly and soon it's an all out brawl between a squad of X-Men and a squad of Avengers and man is it a good one!  Between Phoenix Namor and the Shi'ar Prince Kid Gladiator, Thor spends most of the time getting beat down.  Iceman tries to talk things out with Beast only to get shot in the face with some kind of heat gun!  Kid Gladiator tries to push around his school principal only to have Wolverine attack a certain "weak point" that is left to the imagination, and the Kid drops.  The X-Men definitely have the edge in the fight and in the end, Rachel finds Hope, knocks out Black Widow, and...let's her go!  She didn't say why, but something she saw when she looked in Hope's mind convinced her to let her go.  On the last page she's trying to explain to Cyclops how Hope and most of the Avengers were able to escape when the King of the Shi'ar race, Gladiator arrives and announces that "THE PHOENIX DIES TODAY!"  For those who don't know this guy...he's like Superman with a mohawk!

For a book that was basically one big fight, it was an awful lot of fun.  This series is known for it's humor and they somehow managed to keep that present even in an intense storyline like this.  Chris Bachalo's art is heavy and blocky and SO cool!  His rotating artist on this title is Nick Bradshaw, who did a great job with the cover (see above).  Nick's artwork is VERY similar to one of my all-time favs, Art Adams.

Fun Fact: Of the 7 Avengers featured fighting on the cover, only 3 of them actually appear in this issue!

This wasn't a jaw-droppingly awesome issue, but it was pretty darn entertaining!

The Mighty Thor #16
If you've been following my blog, you know that I'm not crazy about the current storyline in Thor.  The Thunder God accidentally freed a race of ugly alien dog things that were sealed away by Odin eons ago and they are now running amok, putting everyone in Asgard AND nearby Broxton, Ok asleep and trapping them in a big, group, nightmare world.  In the nightmare world a goth kid from Broxton used his imagination to turn Thor into the goofball character that his metal band put on their cd cover, The Deconsicrator (the dumbest thing I've seen in comics in a while).  The big "D" smashes up the landscape in dream world for a while before calming down and realizing that he not only feels his hammer in his hands in the dream, but he can feel it in his hands in the real world as well.  Consentrating, he calls forth a bolt of lightning in the real world and fries the alien dog right off his sleeping chest, waking himself from the dream.

I have forgotten to mention this in the past few issue's reviews, but while the sleepy dog alien story has been happening, Dr. Don Blake, Thor's ex-host from his earth banishment days has realized that he is not real.  He was created by Odin specifically to house Thor's spirit while he was on earth learning humility.  He's not happy about this and asks Thor's longtime villain, The Enchantress, to make him a god again.  She agrees and puts Blake through some weird ritual and at the end she CUTS HIS HEAD OFF!  His head doesn't die though!  While his decapitated head looks on black goo poors through his neck and takes the form of a big, black muscular creature that Enchantress names "The Keep".  Blake has just been used.  In this issue, Enchantress, The Keep, and Don's head take a trip to Hell to use it as a shortcut to Asgardia.  They find the ruler of the dead, Hela, incapacitated by an alien dog (they're called Mares BTW).  The Keep kills the thing and Hela wakes up.  She sees what Enchantress has done to Blake and warns her that Thor will either kill her for this or at least want to, but gives her leave to travel through her realm and onto Asgardia.  Upon arrival, the 2.5 travelers find all of Asgardia's inhabitants asleep all over the place with a goofball dog thing sitting on top of each of them.  They bypass the litter of bodies and head to the throne room.  When they open the doors they find Thor waiting for them, fully awake and already pissed (and for some reason, not waking up his friends and family?).

Okay, i think the Mares are stupid.  I mean, just look at them!  And the Deconsicrator?!?  Ugh...that's almost bad enough to take this series off my pull list!  But the Enchantress bit?  That's got me interested.  I'm very curious to see how Thor handles the treatment of his alter ego.  And The Keep is actually kinda cool looking!

Not great, but getting better.

Spider-Men #2
Every now and then a comic book comes along that makes me sit back in my chair, smile while I read it, and occasionally laugh out loud to myself.  This is one of those books.

In the last issue, Peter Parker into a scuffle with Mysterio and accidentally got caught up in a weird portal that transported him to the Ultimate Marvel Universe.   In that universe, the original Spider-Man is dead, and the world now knows that he was Peter Parker from Queens.  As the grown-up regular Marvel U Spidey swings around town he is shocked and completely freaked out by how people keep mentioning Peter Parker to him.  Then he goes to the rooftops and runs right into the new Ultimate Spidey, Miles Morales, in costume.

This issue: Peter Parker was Miles' hero so when he sees the old suit he immediately asks if he's Peter Parker, hoping that his idol was either not killed or has come back to life.  Peter doesn't know what's going on, but he's tired of people knowing his secret identity all of a sudden and after a few funny back and forths, the freaked-out Peter starts getting physical.  While Pete has the experience, Miles has a shocking "venom-sting" and following a very cool fight scene, uses it to knock him out.  Peter wakes up  in SHIELD custody talking to the African American version of Nick Fury, which he thinks is quite funny.  Nick quickly realizes that this isn't HIS world's Peter Parker and lets him go, asking Miles to fill him in on the details until Fury can fix the situation.  As they are flying away in a SHIELD helicopter it is hit with a rocket blast and goes down.  Luckily there are two Spideys on board, so they save the pilot and escape.  Then they see their attacker, it's Mysterio.

After Peter goes through the portal, we get a scene of Mysterio waking up and realizing where Spidey has gone.  He's not happy.  He gets up, puts on a virtual reality-type headpiece and activates a life model decoy-type body that he calls his avatar and sends it through the portal.  It turns out that the Ultimate Mysterio that Peter Parker fought before his death, was actually the avatar controlled through the portal by the regular Marvel Universe Mysterio!  Very cool twist!  He sees the Ultimate U as HIS playground and he's ready to take out the remaining Spider-men in his way!

Oh my dang, this was SO fun!  Sarah Pichelli once again rocked out some beautiful artwork, but it's Bendis' writing that make this so special.  Character crossovers are usually SO lame, but Peter and Miles are both so likable and funny and Bendis's dialog is so witty that this is just a blast.  This will be a really great collected graphic novel when it's all said and done, but I'm not going to miss a single issue of this one.

- PICK OF THE WEEK!

Weekly Comix! - Week of 6/20/12

Lots of fun comic reading this week with just one stinker.

AvX (Avengers Versus X-Men) #6
NOW this story is getting interesting!  At the end of issue 5, Iron Man attacked the Phoenix Force with a new weapon that was supposed to disperse it's energies.  Instead it only fractured the Phoenix into 5 pieces that then inhabited 5 nearby X-Men; Cyclops, Emma Frost, Colossus, Namor, and Magik.  The "Phoenix 5" then pick up the unconscious Hope Summers and head back to Earth (they were on the moon).

Issue 6 starts out with the world being transformed by the now almost-omnipotent X-Men.  They are making Africa fertile, creating massive fields of produce in Siberia, creating a huge source of clean drinking water, and establishing virtually unlimited, free energy for the people of Earth to use.  They present themselves to the UN and say that all they want in return is an end to war and violence against man or mutant.  Everything seems pretty peachy, but the US President meets with the Avengers and voices concern that the X-Men have no accountability.  The Avengers meet in secret to try to plan a counter attack should things go bad, but have come up with nothing.  There's a weird section in the secret city of K'un Lun, where Iron Fist is from.  Some weird monks look at ancient drawings showing an Iron Fist facing off against the Phoenix...apparently the kung fu guy is somehow going to be the answer.  And then we see the Scarlet Witch having sweaty nightmares about the return of the Dark Phoenix.

The President orders the Avengers on a strike mission to retrieve Hope Summers from Utopia in the hopes of finding a way to control the situation.  You can imagine how badly that ends.  Scott and Emma alone disperse the Avengers and even Thor can't match their power. Then Scarlet Witch shows up and leaves with Hope and the battered Avengers.  Cyclops tries to grab her arm but pulls back, his hand burning where he touched her.

Afterwards Scott and Emma contemplate what to do next and he is furious that even at their strongest, even after they have given the world everything it needs, that the "humans" still sent the Avengers to attack them.  Scott's solution?  See below.

This issue was SO good and really got me excited about the series again.  It helps that John Romita Jr. has been replaced by Thor artist, Olivier Coipel, who is one of my favorite Marvel artists.  Things are escalating and I think it's going to be one heckuva wild ride!

- PICK OF THE WEEK!

Avenging Spider-Man #8
This series is basically a "Spidey Team-Up" book.  Every issue features Spidey interacting with a different Marvel hero created by a different creative team.  So far there's only been one "meh" issue so far and the rest have been really fun and have featured fantastic art.  So far.

"This issue finds our titular hero teaming up with major Marvel heroes, Dr. Strange and Silver Sable and was totally exciting!", he said with his voice dripping with sarcasm.  Not only were the team-up characters boring but the story was uninspired and the art was mediocre.  Spidey gets pulled into some plan by two bozos on the cover above into helping some European princess escape from Dr. Doom.  Doom shows up, they fight, the good guys find her boyfriend and get her married before Doom can stop them, and then he leaves.

Ugh.  This was the most generic, lame, watered-down story I have read since that awful Mighty Thor Annual two weeks ago!  C'mon Marvel, how about some quality control?!?  And this has been such a good series too!  That's the bad thing with having a comics pull list at your comic store.  You're expected to buy every issue, even when there's a crappy one.  Next month features a more interesting pairing of Spidey and the revamped Ms. Marvel and features fantastic Marvel artists, Terry Dodson!  Now THAT'S what I'm talking about!

Do NOT buy this issue.  It was awful.

Wonder Woman #10
Here we have my only DC purchase of the week.  I have really been digging the new mythology-heavy Wonder Woman story, but the past few issues have really gone off-track.

This issue continues the story of Diana in Hell facing an imminent marriage to her uncle, Hades (eww).  I read this just a few days ago and can barely remember what happened...not a good sign.  Long story short she tries to run away, some of her godly allies show up to try to help her, Hades gets mad.  He says she lied when she said she loved him.  She replies that she didn't lie because she loves EVERYONE and that HE will never love until he first learns to love himself.  Then they trick him into looking into a mirror and then WW shoots him in the heart with one of Eros's guns (think Cupid's arrows).

This is a big departure from the main story and it feels like the writer is making it up as he goes along.  What is the big picture?  What's the point again?  Just 2-3 issue ago this was a compelling story.  I'm hoping it picks back up soon because i lose patience with bad stories quick.

I'm going to be generous and give his 3 stars because the overhaul on WW has been so dramatic and welcome.  Also, the art has been consistently entertaining.  I like the costumes and the reimagined look of the gods.  And Hermes has bird legs, which is fun.

Saga #4
The story of star-crossed lovers and new parents, Marko and Alana continue!

This issue actually begins with a bounty hunter called "The Will" taking time away from hunting the main characters to relax at the Las Vegas of space stations, The Sextillion.  Keep in mind this is a "mature" title.  The Will walks around seeing all manner of sex acts being performed by bizarre aliens without seeing anything he wants to participate in.  The proprietor of Sextillion notices his apathy and takes him to a special wing staffed with slave girls.  His slave girl is a six-year-old girl.  Thankfully The Will is a heartless killer, not a sick pervert and he kills the pimp right there as the little girl hugs him in thanks.  This story is interjected throughout the issue, but that's The Will's part all told together.

Wow...weird opening huh?  Not sure how The Will is going to fit into the grander scheme of this story, but he's a pretty cool, Han Solo-type guy. I'm hoping he'll end up helping the main characters.  Speaking of...

Alana, baby Hazel, and Izabel the teenage ghost are dragging the unconscious Marko across the planet trying to save his life after he was wounded by a bounty hunter.  Alana is still furious because in his fever dream mutterings Marko mentioned a wife named Gwendolyn.  He wakes up and has a lot to answer for.  He explains that Gwen was his fiance back on their home world but when he left to join the war he changed a LOT and she stayed the same and they grew apart.  Then he met Alana and the rest is history.  The next morning they are preparing to leave the planet (i'm not sure how since they have no ship) when an attack ship from Alana's army appears right in front of them.  Alana says there are 6 soldiers inside and that maybe they can talk their way out of this when Marko says "No."  Though he took an oath of pacifism and swore to never draw his sword again he draws it now and says, "We fight".

It has been implied through this new series that Marko is one bad mutha with a sword, but we have yet to see it do to his oath of non-violence.  That being said, the moment where he breaks his oath would have had a lot more weight if it happend 50 issues into the series instead of 4.  I love this story and can't wait to see what he can do, but I have to question the timing of this.

Other than that it's a great issue.  Wonderful artwork.  Compelling characters.  REMEMBER THIS IS NOT FOR KIDS!  You don't want your thirteen year old getting his hands on this.  If you're old enough to handle it though, it's a great read.  It would have gotten pick of the week if AvX hadn't been just as good and more all-ages friendly.

New Comix! - Week of 6/13/12

This week was a good mix of the good, the bad, and the ugly.  

AvX Versus #3

Okay, c'mon Marvel...I KNOW this title isn't about story or plot, but this series focuses on only 4 characters each issue and only two of them X-Men.  WHY has Colossus been in EVERY Versus issue so far?!?  There are a TON of great X-Men characters.  Don't get me wrong, I'm a huge Colossus fan, but let's spread the love a bit!

That's out of my system now.  Let's review the book now...

Again, this title focuses only on the 1 on 1 battles that the main title of this story AvX didn't have the time and space to focus on.  This is a book split into two, each half focusing on a fight between two characters.  At first the Avengers were cleaning house, but in the issue the tide turned.  Black Widow faced off against Magik and Colossus fought the Thing.  Widow really takes it to Magik even when the mutant takes them into her demonic limbo realms.  In fact, in the end, Widow thinks she's won and turns away only to get run through with Magik's Soul Sword, which rendered her unconscious.  The other fight was just what you would expect, a slobberknocker!  Punches all around!  It was fun, but there's not much to describe.  Colossus just out-punched Thing.  

This book is great for what it is.  Mindless violence between superheroes by some of the biggest names in comic art.  Don't overthink this one, just enjoy.

Avengers Assemble #4

What's a nice way to say, "piece of crap in comic book form"?  After issue 3 I swore to cancel my subscription to this one, but my curiosity about Thanos talked me into buying one more issue.  I have since beat my curiosity with a hammer and locked it in the pantry.  This was a waste of my money and I wish Marvel had a buy-back option for disappointed fans.

First, let me explain that this book is intended to be "light reading" for newcomers brought to the comic stores by the best movie in the history of cinema, The Avengers.  Great idea, bad followthrough.  This isn't light reading, it's shallow, boring reading.  I think Bendis let his 6-year-old kid write this or something.  Bendis is capable of great work, but this is the opposite.  It's like a week shadow of what an Avengers comic book should be.  The characters are cliches of their usual selves and Thanos doesn't even fight!  He gets the Avengers to fight the Hulk and his loser underlings go chasing off after the fleeing Black Widow. I'm not going to expand on this story.  I want to forget I read it.  

Hold on, maybe I'm being too harsh.  Yes, this book sucks haggis, but it's probably perfect reading for middle schoolers, so that being said, buy it for your nephew, but dont' read it yourself.  Let it be a spring board for future comic buyers.  Yeah, that's where it belongs.  Seasoned readers should steer clear.

Mark Bagley's art is the only saving grace in this steaming pile.  He does a good job, but I think he's better suited to Spidey than the Avengers...just my opinion.  For him I will give this one more star than it deserves.

The Mighty Thor #15

The lame story of the Mares continues!  Thor has unwittingly unleashed a race of alien dogs into the world who put you to sleep and trap you in a big group nightmare with other victims.  The Mares look cool and are unsettling to look at.  It's just funny because their so tiny!  They are beagle sized!

In this issue the victims of the Mares have to face Thor's greatest nightmare, his daddy issues!  A giant undead Odin attacks and Thor has to face him alone because everyone else who has fallen to the Mares are weaklings for some reason.  Where are the other awesome Asgardian warriors?  Who knows!?!  In the meantime some random goth kid in nearby Broxton, Oklahoma has run away from home...and run INTO the Mares!  He runs away but gets trapped in his truck and falls asleep, thus trapping him in their nightmare world.  When he arrives, some weird man-sized otter monks tell him that he has some cool mind abilites and task him with dreaming up a savior to save them from the nightmare.  About that time Thor and Zombie Odin's fight collapses the huge dream room they were fighting in and they are both crushed in the rubble.  Suddently Thor bursts free from the rocks but he has been changed by the goth kid's imagination and NOW looks like the lame dude on the cover of the kid's garage band's cd!  

Wow...I really like Thor, but this story kinda sucks.  I'm not digging the goth kid or his lame goth Thor creation.  I hope this ends soon so we can forget IT like a bad dream.  Only Thor's personal awesomeness saves this issue from a lower score.

Spider-Men #1

Now we get to the good stuff!

In this new, unprecedented story regular Marvel U Spider-Man, Peter Parker gets to meet the brand-new Ultimate Marvel U's Spider-Man, Miles Morales!  This whole issue was a set up to the meeting, but it was a fun read in and of itself.  Brian Bendis is at his BEST writing Spider-man.  It's funny, it's fresh, it's action-packed!  Here's how it happens...

Spidey (Peter Parker) sees a weird flash of light on the outskirts of Manhatten and proceeds to investigate.  He finds Mysterio's lab, but doesn't realize it's not HIS Mysterio, it's the Ultimate Marvel version.  During the ensuing fight, Spidey gets sucked through a portal in Mysterio's lab and he finds himself in the Ultimate Marvel Universe!  As he goes about trying to find out what has happened to him, he talks to several people who tell him that his costume is in poor taste and that it didn't respect the memory of Peter Parker.  Spidey freaks out at the mention of his name and tries to play it cool.  See, in the Ultimate Universe, Peter Parker died defending his family against the Sinister Six after having already sustained an accidental gunshot wound to his abdomen thanks to the Punisher.  After his death, his secret identity became public knowledge.  As Peter takes to the rooftops, he runs smack into Ultimate Spidey...Continued Next Issue!

Like I mentioned, this story is uncharacteristically fun for a crossover story and Bendis is in fine form on the dialog.  Ultimate Spider-man artist Sarah Pichelli is handling the art beautifully.  This is a great start to the story and I can't wait for the next issue.  This will be a nice graphic novel once it's collected.  Pick of the Week!!!

Weekly Comix! - Week of 6-6-12

They say 2 out of 3 ain't bad...that's the case with this week's comix.  Check 'em out!

AvX (Avengers versus X-Men) #5

In the last issue the X-Men and Avengers were facing off yet again, this time on the moon.  Just as they started bumping chests again the dreaded Phoenix Force showed up.

In issue 5 the Avengers brains go to work as Tony Stark (Iron Man) and Hank Pym (Ant/Giant Man) have created an enormous Iron Man suit equipped with weapons designed to disperse the energy of the Phoenix Force.  As the colossal fiery bird swoops down towards Hope, the building-sized Iron Man flies right into it and unleashes it's payload.  The result is a huge explosion of energy that leaves all the heroes temporarily blinded.  As their vision returns Tony Stark asks, "Did we do it?  Did we kill the Phoenix?!?"  The answer is NO.  What DID happen was that the Phoenix was split into 5 parts, each of which inhabited one of the X-Men at the scene.  The "Phoenix 5" (consisting of Cyclops, Emma Frost, Colossus, Namor, and Magik) simply pick up the unconscious Hope Summers and head towards the Earth leaving the Avengers wondering what to do next.

This story is finally getting more interesting than just a bunch of fights.  This Phoenix 5 twist is a surprise and I'm curious to see where the story goes from here.  The art is sufficient, but as I've stated earlier, JRJR's art doesn't seem to fit this story perfectly.  Still, it works.

The Mighty Thor Annual #1

Once a year Marvel likes to put out a barely in-continuity, extra-thick issue of it's main titles and call it an annual.  I was forced to buy it because my comic store automatically pulls "The Mighty Thor" for me and it would be rude to not pay for it after they have based their orders on their customer's pull lists.  Here's what happens...

There are a couple of really vague, insanely powerful cosmic-level players at work here, using such characters as Galactus, Silver Surfer, and Thor for their own ethereal chess games.  Darth Vader wannabe, Scrier, borrows Silver Surfer from Galactus and tricks Thor into helping him fight off an invasion by some vague evil entity called "The Other".  I can't describe what happens because it's so vague and because it's not worth recalling.

This comic was a waste of time, money, and paper.  Just because Thor is in a story doesn't make it good.  I couldn't care less about Scrier or The Other or their power struggle for the universe.  This is generic cosmic garbage with a healthy dose of bland.  It was so boring it took me 3 readings to get through it.  I wouldn't recommend you picking this up from a garage sale, much less a comic book store.  Sorry, Marvel, you've gotta put SOME effort into the story.

Ultimate Comics Spider-Man #11
Why aren't you reading this title for yourself?  Really?  You don't have $4/month?  As much as I loved Ultimate Peter Parker, Marvel is doing a great job filling the spider-tights with Miles Morales.  It's not the same old Spider-Man.  He got his powers the same way, but his powers are different, his supporting cast is different, his setting is different...so far even his villains are different!  Miles is a good kid, but he's very young so it's interesting to see how he deals with the situations he's put into.

In this issue Miles is blackmailed by his criminal uncle, The Prowler, into helping him take out a rival villain, The Scorpion.  This is NOT your dad's Scorpion folks.  This guys is more like a Mexican Luke Cage with an affinity for using a chain with a spike on the end as his weapon.  He really strong and really hard to hurt.  Together Spidey and Prowler ARE able to hurt him though.  Miles finally knocks him out in the street just as the NYPD show up.  They try to arrest Miles as well, but of course, that doesn't work.  The issue ends with Prowler texting his nephew who is back at his dorm room (he's in a charter middle school with dorms) that this is just the beginning.  Miles texts back, "No, I'm done."  Prowler replies, "Oh, really?  Do you want me to tell your dad about this Spidey thing?"  Miles is in a bad spot!

Great artwork.  Great story.  Not QUITE good enough to get 5 stars from me, but very close.  PICK OF THE WEEK!

New Comix! - Week of 5-30-12

Aaaaand I'm addicted to a new series.  Here's what happened...

I was at the comic store and didn't have ANY comics that I'm following.  I heard in passing though that one of my all-time favorite characters, Doop, was making reoccurring appearances at Wolverine's new mutant school as an adjunct teacher!  I had to know more.  The series is "Wolverine and the X-Men" and follows the little, canadian mutant as he has broken away from Cyclops's group on the island of Utopia out of philisophical differences.  This series is only 11 issues long, so I decided to try to catch up!  Unfortunately, this is a VERY popular series and back issues are scarce.  Between 2 comic shops and 2 online stores, I have been able to get them all except for issues 3 and 10.  The search continues.

Why do I love this title?  It's fun.  Wolverine wears dress clothes and teaches class to a hilarious group of mutant students.  Beast has accidentally opened a portal to a dimension full of miniature Nightcrawler-type gremlins who are running amuck on campus and causing all kinds of havoc.  The classic X-Men villain Krakoa, the living island, is now a mainstay on the campus and helps protect the grounds!  Toad, the former evil mutant, is now serving as the disgruntled janitor!  Kitty, Wolverine's original teen sidekick, is serving as his vice-principal!  And DOOP is back!!!  This title is fun, funny, clever, and the 2 rotating artists have been great.  I love it when comics are actually fun to read and not all soap opera drama!

I don't have the energy to review all of the previous issues, so I'll just start with #11 and we'll go from there as new ones come out.

Wolverine and the X-Men #11

This issue gets tied up in the AvX blah blah blah that's going on across all the Avengers and X-books.  The important thing is that this issue falls between AvX issues 4 and 5 when Wolverine is with Hope and they are trying to reach the moon so Hope can try to intercept and control the Phoenix and Wolverine can kill her if she can't.  In the meantime, the Shi'ar Empire has sent out it's assassin group "Death Commandos" to kill the Phoenix host and any who try to protect her.  Wolverine and Hope get attacked by the Commandos and barely come out alive, but during the fight Wolverine experiences flashbacks of when Jean asked him to kill her to save her from the Phoenix and he realizes that he can't kill Hope.  He doesn't have it in him.  When she's not looking, he contacts the Avengers to tell him where they are headed.

This was a filler issue that moved the AvX plot along, but the art was solid and there were some great character moments.  Not bad all-in-all, but not amazing.  This series as a whole is still awesome, so I'm not worried about it.

New Comix! - Week of 5/23/12

Just one comic came home with me this week.

The Mighty Thor #14
I'm catching up on 6 weeks of comic reviews and I actually don't remember much about this issue.  That's not a good thing.  Here's what I DO remember.

Thor has accidentally let a group of monsters loose on Asgardia called the "Mares".  These little alien dog monster guys put you to sleep upon contact and keep you locked in a dream world.  Thor was the first to be trapped in the dream world, but other citizens of Asgardia and nearby Broxton, Oklahoma soon join him.

In the meantime, Dr. Don Blake has gone to the Enchantress to seek her help.  He has realized that he's not real.  He was create by Odin to be a vessel for his son when Thor was sent to earth to learn humility.  Now they are separate (when did this happen?  I have no idea!)  and he has no identity or memories before his college years.  He feels empty and used and wants desperately to be a "god" again.  Enchantress agrees to help him, but knowing her, it won't go as Blake hopes.

Decent artwork, but i'm getting bored with this "mares" story really quick.  Curious to see what happens to Blake.  I would only recommend this issue if you were already buying Thor. It's a filler.  Not bad, but not great.