New Comix! - Week of 10/3/12

Well, this year's big Marvel crossover event, Avengers Vs X-men, came to a yawning conclusion this week.  Might as well review it now.

AvX (Avengers vs X-men) #12

This 12-issue mega-crossover of the Summer is finally over!  Thank goodness!

In issue #11, Cyclops took sole possession of the Phoenix Force, promptly killed his father-figure, Professor X, and became the evil Dark Phoenix.  In this issue we see the Avengers deciding that the only way to beat the Phoenix was by the combined powers of Scarlet Witch and Hope (the "Mutant Messiah") and the kung-fu training of the Iron Fist.  Fast-forward to the big fight and Cyclops is wading through Avengers and X-men alike, booting Hulk to Nicaragua (or someplace else far away...who cares, right?), punching Thor to Russia, sneezing Beast to Wyoming....you get the point.  Then Scarlet Witch and Hope are there and lay into him.  The Witch is using her mutant "hex" powers and Hope is using her mutant power to mimic the hex powers while focusing them with her week-long study of kung-fu to devastating effect.  It turns out that the Phoenix's biggest weakness is a combination of the lamest powers on Earth.  They beat him and the Phoenix Force enters Hope.  Instead of going crazy, she uses the power to circle the globe and put out all those darn fires that Cyclops made as he attempted the world's largest barbecue.  Coming back to the scene of the battle, she joins hands with the Scarlet Witch and together they fullfill their weird destiny and together say, "No More Phoenix", thus destroying the Phoenix Force and dissipating it's energies.  The issue ends with Cyclops in a ruby jail sale where Captain America is trying in vain to give him the biggest guilt trip in history.  In the end he tells Cyclops that one thing he DID learn was that he and the Avengers should have done more to stem the prejudices  against mutants, and that he is reforming the Avengers lineup to include more of them.  With that news and the news of new mutants appearing across the globe after the Phoenix's demise, Cyclops is actually pretty happy with the outcome.  He saved mutantkind and the Avengers are working for Mutant rights.

Y'know, I'm being very snarky, but this wasn't a bad comic book or a bad story.  It just didn't wow me, like crossovers in the past have.  It was okay.  Was it worth the approximate $74 I spent on it over the past 12 weeks, not really.  Maybe next year I'll skip the big crossover for the first time since the first one (House of M?).  There were fun moments, but I have to be choosy with my purchases as comic prices increase.  Should've passed on this one.

- A finale worthy of a big, collective, "Meh".

Versus #6

Finally this series comes to an end also!

This tie-in series was no-story, all-action and that's all it was intended for.  In the final issue we see Hope and Scarlet Witch duking it out in the first-half, and a series of one-shot battles for the 2nd half.  Quick scorecard: Hope beats Scarlet Witch, Cap beats Cyclops in a verbal abuse contest, all the Marvel scientists beat on each other with physical violence and sciency phrases and no one wins because no one can understand what's going on, Havok beats Cap, Domino beats Red Hulk, Jarvis beats Toad, Hawkeye thinks dirty thought about Spider-Woman fighting different hot superhero ladies and we all win, Iceman beats Iron Fist, and I don't get the last one.  

This is a brainless comic book, but the second-half was super-fun!  I needed that after such a serious, joyless series finale.

- Funny stuff!  Pick of the Week!

Axe Cop: President of the World #3

Let the weirdness continue!

An evil space scientist has kidnapped a random human and injects him with the DNA of everything to create the evil "Everyman"!  Back on Earth, a giant gorilla made of green goo is ravaging the city.  Axe Cop uses his pencil gun to draw his friend, Goo Cop, back to life.  Goo Cop combines with their gorilla friend, Junior Cobbb to combat the giant monster.  Since Axe Cop redrew Goo Cop as gold goo instead of his previous green, Goo Cop wins the fight.    Suddenly, Everyman shows up and explodes into everything at once.  Literally. He becomes a giant monster created out of millions of things like wrestlers, dinosaurs, pigs, octopuses, nunchucks, ect.  Axe Cop's response is, "I think he's is AWESOME.  I want him on MY team."    Goo Cop quickly turns into a rocketship and they fly off to the lair of the evil space scientist.  As soon as they get there, he cuts off Axe Cop's head, much to the dismay of his friends.  Luckily, Axe Cop has a robotic spider in his neck that picks up his head and puts it back on his body.  Then, the robot in his moustache gives him a golden axe and he cuts the scientist in half.  Then, he has his scientist friend with a unicorn horn, Uni-Man, create a super good-guy potion that turns Everyman into a good guy as well as the giant supremely evil robots, Tu and Bu, from the last issue.  No Axe Cop's team consists of himself, Ralph Wrinkles the dog, Goo Cop, Junior Cobbb the gorilla with gun fists, Everyman, Tu, and Bu.  Next he turns his attention to the two evil aliens who started this whole mess and turned Goo Cop and his family into goo.  The aliens have built a robot Axe Cop look-a-like and are addressing the people of the Earth, commanding them to all stab themselves to death, since he is President of the World.  Just before everyone on Earth commits suicide, the robot Axe Cop is handed a note from the REAL Axe Cop.  The note explains that they are stupid and that he used his pencil gun to draw a duplicate Earth and had all the real people moved to that planet and then he replaced them all with robot duplicates full of explosives.  The aliens were now on a planet full of explosive robots who were about to stab themselves and blow up all at once.  The world stabbed itself and the Earth blew up, along with the stupid aliens.  One month later, Axe Cop has become bored with the new peaceful planet and being only President of the Earth.  He decides to also become the President of Karate and earns his black belt in three hours.  Then he went to a secret cave and learned the rest of Karate that no one else knows and becomes the first man on Earth to earn the coveted Tiger Belt.  "He was now the President of the World...and Karate."

While the bizarre storyline starts to lose some of it's sparkle by the 3rd issue, this is still a brilliant book and makes me smile everytime a new one comes out.  

- Good juvenile humor!

New Comix! - Week of 9/26/12

Mike Allred is back drawing Doop!  What more do you need to know?!?

Wolverine & the X-Men #17

How do you make the best X-Men book even better?  You get Mike and Laura Allred to do the art on issue 17 is what you do!  The artist who co-created Doop is back to draw him once again for this one issue.  Doop has been a background character in this series since it began, usually seen manning the reception desk or occasionally filling in as substitute teacher.  His presence is what convinced me to start buying this book, as he has only appeared sporadically since his previous team, the X-Statix were killed.  As good as this book is every single month, I've wanted more Doop.  In this issue I get everything I could have hoped for from him.

This issue focuses on Doop and what in the world his roll is at the Jean Grey School.  The students think he's a joke.  The faculty think he's a shiftless bum.  What does Wolverine see in him?  We're treated to a series of flashbacks, showing Wolverine practically begging Doop to come fill some mystery position.  Doop make Wolverine agree to a series of bizarre and dangerous stunts before he accepts.  Wolverine then explains that his school has many enemies who wish to destroy it and his duties on various super-teams keep him away from the school too often for him to properly protect it, which is where he wants Doop to step in.  It's Doop's job to seek out and destroy any potential threats to the school!  Sweet!  Afterwards we see Doop stopping threat after threat, sometimes with violence, sometimes by seduction (seriously..ha!).  He stops a nazi bowling league, an aggressive county school board, an intergalactic robot army, Sabertooth, Fin Fang Foom the dragon, outplays the devil in a guitar competition, and shuts down a scathing review from a blogging nun.  Thoughout the book he becomes more and more run-down and everyone at the school thinks it's because he's a loser, while he's actually exhausted from saving them from various threats every night.  The issue ends with Doop passed out in the hallway wearing one of Wolverine's suits.  Wolverine brings him a blanket and says, "Keep up the good work." before walking away.  

I liked this issue so much that I kept wanting to stop reading it because i knew it would end.  Doop is such a crazy character that you never know what's going to happen and I LOVE random-style humor.  It's as zany as a Marvel comic can get and still stay in-continuity.  I haven't read a bad issue of Wolverine & the X-Men yet, and this issue sets the bar even higher than normal.  So fun.  So cool.  Great art.  Holy crap.

- No Brainer Pick of the Week

Ultimate Comics: The Ultimates #16

I think this MAY be the first Ultimates comic I've bought in the current series.  I used to love the Ultimates back when the Ultimate Universe was new, but after the first 2 story archs, the quality level went down to the point where I just didn't feel I had to buy it anymore.  I picked this issue up mainly because I read about it in the news, and I like being in the "know" on important events in the comic book world.  I have a reputation to uphold, after all.

Quick Setup (I know most of this because I read Ultimate Spidey): In a storyline titled "Divided We Fall", Washington DC was attacked and destroyed, the country is in chaos, states are seceding, sentinels are taking over the midwest, the Carolinas are at war with each other...it's a mess.  

In issue #15 the American people voted Captain America President of the United States via write-in ballot (i think that's how it happened).  In this issue Cap addresses the nomination in a press conference outside of the Triskellion (SHIELD's base of operations).  After listing the challenges ahead, Cap accepts the position and immediately leaves in his jet stating "America is my White House."  He then gets right to work, commanding the Thor and IronMan with precision.  He flies to Carolina and physically collects the leaders of both sides and forces them to make a truce.  He then heads to Detroit where a dictator and his militia have taken control of the city and takes down that guy.  In between missions he's warned to follow the proper channels of authority by a smarmy senator.  Cap continues doing what needs doing anyway.  After the Detroit mission, the new director of SHIELD (I don't even remember his name) gets the order from the senator to destroy Cap's plane because he doesn't play by the rules.  The director fires the missile and is quickly knocked down by the Black Widow.  As they fight Cap's jet crashes into the control room and he tackles the director, beating him easily and officially firing him for trying to assassinate the President.  Meanwhile, Thor is checking out a disturbance in Wyoming which turns out to be an army readying to invade America led (to Thor's astonishment) by his own son.

This was a good issue.  It was fun watching a scenario where Cap is elected President and to see what he would do with the title.  That being said, I'm still not compelled to keep buying the series to see what happens next.  Decent issue though.