GAARD! Speaks!!--Kleezar

As you may recall, I--GAARD!--have been trying to prove snell wrong, by finding Marvel characters lamer than GAARD!

It's been a long trek, but at least, I--GAARD!--have found what may be the lamest villain ever. I speak, of course, of Kleezar, the Parasite of Eternity!!

Oh, GAARD can hear the quibbling already, that this was technically not a Marvel story, and hence not a Marvel character. Hogwash!! The story starred the original Human Torch, and guest-starred Captain America and enigmatic Sun Girl. That's as Marvel as it gets!! So travel back with GAARD! to the misty days of 1948....

How lame is Kleezar? The story refers to a "power so monstrous, so overwhelming." Well, let's take a look:



and


Oh no, he makes cats beat up milquetoasts, and turns horses into "fiery beasts of destruction." Now, 1948 was back in the past, but I'm confident that our automobile culture was far enough along that a few uppity horses hardly presented a serious threat to Earth.

But the crisis is severe enough to call in our three heroes. And Dr. Jefferson reveals that the animal madness is caused by "rays" emanating from Jupiter! And it's only a matter of time until it effects humans!!

Well, there's only one solution: the Human Torch must fly to Jupiter!! Yup, all the way to Jupiter. Afire the whole way. Hmmm, no wonder the Russians beat us to the punch with Sputnik...




But GAARD! digresses. It turns out the rays are caused by a "pool of peril," which is ruled over by Kleezar and his space parasites!! On the surface of Jupiter...


OK, so Kleezar, "nomad creature of madness," is a bat/werewolf/dragon/armadillo thing. And they dared call GAARD!! lame?? Meanwhile, let's see how the Human Torch is doing on his flight through the vacuum of space:


Ooooooooooh kayyyyyy. Anyway, so fatigued is the Torch from his journey, that Kleezar and his hordes whoop him pretty good. Kleezar monologues:


Fortunately for the Earth, a meteor storm arrives. Check out the description:


Yes, all of infinity is threatened by fire-rain!! And it wipes out all of the parasites except Kleezar!! Who shows off his villainous laugh:


HAA! HEEE! HA! HO! Oh, c'mon, man, GAARD! looks like Doctor Doom next to this guy...Anyhoo, the Torch gets his flame back, destroys the pool, and Kleezar meets his final doom:


So the Torch flies back to Earth from Jupiter...oh, dear, my brain hurts. But amidst the (apparently) many clouds of outer space:


But he won't die, because Captain America is on the job (and not giving up, like in Civil War...):


Yes, the Human Torch fell--FROM JUPITER--and CAPTAIN AMERICA CAUGHT HIM!!! And they were able to carry on completely "manly" repartee afterwards, too!!

So confronted by some scientifically illiterate, vaguely homo-erotic heroes, Kleezar's plan to accidentally flood the Earth with madness rays fails because, well, because he's lame. Parasite of eternity, my GAARD! ass...

But thank the heavens Sun Girl was there...

The magnificence of Kleezar, Scavenger of the Stratosphere, is from Human Torch #33 (1948), as reprinted in Giant-Size Avengers #1

Mike Carlin Is a Pussy

Well, at least all of DC editorial is, and of course, since Mike Carlin is now sole editor on the blight that is Countdown, by extension he is chief pussy.

Let's go to the exact words: from Newsarama's weekly interview with the Countdown staff (MC is Mike Carlin and AB is Andy Beechen):

NRAMA: Over to Mary...how much of the old "Mary" is left? She's killed in cold blood, she's terrorized a region, she's teamed with Eclipso (who she knows is a villain) - all without any second thoughts or reservations...she's notacting like herself at all - or all that brightly, either...
MC: Again we maintain that Mary hasn't killed.
NRAMA: Okay – she changed people from a “living” state into stone, which is “not living” in issue #31. Technically, it’s not killing, I guess, But she didn't raise a fuss when Eclipso knocked the head off of one of the stone guards, which, if he ever gets turned back into flesh and blood, isn't conducive to living…but I digress…
MC: I was waiting… Anyway - she is doing a good job of being mean... And the old Mary is in there... But so is a healthy does of Black Adam - hence the not having second thoughts, reservations or acting completely like herself.
NRAMA: Your thoughts on that Adam?
AB: There's a number of forces at work inside Mary -- she's a creature of conflict right now, so her behavior isn't likely to be predictable or rational...in fact, she's likely decidedly shaded to the unpredictable and irrational. Mere proximity to Eclipso at this point probably doesn't help, either.

Hmmm. Let's go to the tape, shall we?

Carlin: We maintain that Mary hasn't killed.

Or...


Carlin: We maintain that Mary hasn't killed.

One more time:


Carlin: We maintain that Mary hasn't killed.

Now, Lord knows I've kvetched enough about the lame, morally bankrupt process of DC having their heroes turn into murderers, and then handing them magical "get out of jail free" cards, as all is forgiven. It's a lame story, it's been overdone to death, it robs the stories and characters of any moral impact. Yadda, yadda.

But this pathetic attempt (with assistant rationalization by the Newsarama interviewer) is so gutless, so cowardly, so bereft of common sense that it boggles the mind.

Maybe Mike Carlin sincerely believes that being turned to stone and beheaded isn't killing. Look at the preview for Countdown #28 below the interview: maybe he sincerely believes that NONE of the people Mary "ironically" punishes die as a result of her actions. Hey, if Greg Pak wants us to pretend the no one has ever died in a Hulk rampage, who knows, right? Not bloody likely, but let's grant him the silly argument.

But if that's the way you're going to play it, what's the point of turning Mary Marvel "evil?" If she's not going to do anything actually evil, and you're going to hit the moral reset button by or during Final Crisis, what is the freakin' lesson you want us to learn? That it's alright to turn to the Dark Side, as long as you only play pranks? That it's OK to be a whiny self-centered brat who sees being powerless as a sufficient reason to accept evil powers and evil advisers and kill (or not?) innocent powerless civilians? That it's OK to give in to temptation as long as you were a hero (and will be again after DC asserts that all is forgiven)?

What about the rationalizations that it's "Eclipso's proximity", or "part of Black Adam inside her," so she's not morally culpable? Well, she made the decisions that let those things happen, so she certainly bears some culpability, right? And if it all turns out to not be her responsibility, WHAT'S THE POINT OF TEH FREAKING STORY????????

DC hasn't the balls to truly turn a "good" character "evil," and keep them that way. And yet they keep trotting the plot device out again and again and again. They want the excitement (and no doubt extra sales) from the public's fascination with characters turning "dark," but are too afraid of offending long term fans, or damaging merchandising/media rights, or angering their corporate master...or maybe they just think the Comics Code is still in effect. They want a Punisher, but haven't the creative fortitude to stand by that decision.

Ask yourselves: what's the long-term fallout from Emerald Twilight? None: Hal Jordan is back and good again, the Guardians are back, and it turns out that any of the interesting Corps members that Jordan might have killed, well, surprise, they didn't die. Wonder Woman killing Max Lord? None: he had been a non-player in the DC universe for nearly a decade, and Wonder Woman never really faced justice, even amongst her fellow heroes. Jason Todd being a vicious murderer? None: apparently all is forgiven, and now he's a potential boyfriend for Donna Troy and a potential savior of the universe.

So now ask yourselves: what's the potential long-term fallout of Mary Marvel being evil? Yeah, you guessed it. So the real question is: why is DC wasting our time with this nonsense?

Video Games Have Lied To Me--Phoenix Wright Edition

So, I read this disclaimer in the manual for Phoenix Wright--Ace Attorney, which had somehow escaped my notice until now:

Damn it!! So much for my bar exam today...

Friday Night Fights--Caped Crusader Style

All right, if we're gonna do sucker punches, let's do the King of sucker punches.

Let's go back to those crazy late '80s, when the new post-Crisis Justice League was still settling in, when Batman was actually chairman, and Guy Gardner was as annoying as hell:


Oh, there's gonna be a rumble:


Or not:


Yup, if you're gonna do a sucker punch, make it one that ends the fight before it starts.




Even Bahlactus couldn't have put him down quicker...


One-Punch Batman takes down pre-Warrior Gardner in the classic Justice League #6. Bwa Ha Ha Ha!!!

Yanking Out the Rug from Beneath Us--Update

OK, so last week I was bitching about DC punting on storylines that were running late. Just not waiting for your team to finish, and instead starting the next storyline, and printing the end at some later time in an annual or such. It had happened in Wonder Woman, Action Comics, and Superman Confidential.

Well, here they go again. In this week's Superman #668, they do it again. For whatever reason the conclusion of the "Camelot Falls" storyline wasn't done, so some editor just said "Let's punt it":


I suppose we can now add Carlos Pacheo and Kurt Busiek to the list of those who aren't important enough (apparently) to have magazines delayed for them, while Frank Miller and Jim Lee and Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely have carte blanche to take entire calender seasons, if not years, between issues of All-Star Superman and All-Star Goddamn Batman.

I do give them a little credit: at least there was an actual apology this time, and a definite issue given where the story will be eventually printed. Still, though, there's no definite time frame given--"later this year" isn't terribly helpful.

Frankly, this is nuts. Something like this happens once, well, stuff happens. But 4 times?!?! Three of them on major, in-continuity titles? That is inexcusable. Period. This is a complete editorial meltdown, is what it is.

DC needs to either a) stop relying on artisits who can't do monthly work for their monthly titles; or b) grant them the time they need to finish by delaying publication. Maybe this is news to DC, but constantly screwing over your readers really isn't good policy.

And if this kinda thing is going to keep happening, why the hell can't it ever happen to Countdown?????

The Reluctant Meme

Sally P has declared it Beefcake Week.

Now, I'm too busy to go along with more than one meme at a time, and obviously ROM isn't free yet, so that's where I should be focused.

Still, it's hard to reject someone's request for help, so....this one's for the ladies:

That's Superman, disguised as an extra-dimensional alien, from Superman #45 (1947)! I hope you ladies brought plenty of dollar bills...

Superman's Forgotten Powers

I have always been the first on to kvetch when writers decide to give Superman new powers. What, the Last Son of Krypton* isn't powerful enough for you? His near godlike abilities aren't enough, so you have to give him new skills to pull out of his hat? (I'm looking at you, second season of the Legion of Superheroes cartoon, and at you, too, Superman II).

But...you read enough Superman stories, and you'll find that this is hardly a new phenomenon. Sure, Golden/Silver Age Superman had flight, invulnerability, super-strength, heat vision, x-ray vision, super-breath, super intelligence, super-hypnosis, super ventriloquism, super-hearing, telescopic vision, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. But even to the early creators, that just wasn't enough.

Take, for example, Superman #251. This was one of the first comics I ever had...no cover, terrible condition because I've read it 5 thousand times. And, while continuing the Sisyphean task of organizing my collection, I came across it and started reading it again.

And the middle story was a reprint of Superman #45, from 1947. Oh, man, the memories came flooding back as I read this. And as an adult, I kept finding myself exclaiming, "Hey, Superman can't do that!!" Of course the 1972 editor is kind enough to tell us in a caption on the first page, "Sharp-eyed readers will note the Man of Tomorrow takes on a couple of super-powers in the tale that are no longer considered part of Superman's super-abilities!" Like this:

This ugly yellow dude from another dimension, using a "dimensional travel device," (in 1947!!)comes to earth and captures prominent and special earthlings--he's a collector, you see. He'll tell you himself:


So the dude comes for Superman, and Kal-El "plays possum," pretending to let the alien win, so he can go to the alien's dimension and free the captives. But Superman waits to long, and is trapped in a glass case with "suspended animation gas," so he can't move. Fortunately, it's easy to escape when writers can make up new powers as they go along:



Ah, yes, Superman's famous "telepathic will-control." Too bad he apparently forgot how to use it; it might have come in handy against, say, the Dominator invasion, or Imperiex, or...

But wait! That's not all! After Superman manages to escape from his display case by rocking until it topples (hey, wait, I thought you were paralyzed!!), he is still weak. So he decides to use "strategy," and yet another new superpower:




Yep, suddenly Kryptonians are shape-shifters...wow, again we have a power that would have come amazingly in handy any number of times...but as far as I know, never used again.

Hey, wait a minute!! All of Superman's powers, plus telepathy and shape shifting?!? Is Superman really a Martian? Has J'onn J'onzz come to earth a decade early to assist Superman? Or is Superman really a White Martian who has been hypnotized to think he's Kryptonian because...

Uh oh, we'd better not let Dan DiDio know about this, or we'll have a new 20-issue maxi-series with 24 spin-off books to explain it...

SPOILER ALERT: Superman rescues Lois (of course, she was one of the hostages. Duh!) and the other hostages, and destroys the dimensional travel device so it can never be used again. The collector and his species are never even named, and are never heard of again...)

*Does not apply in current continuity. Probably. If they ever finish that damned story.

All panels from Superman #251, reprinting Superman #45 (1947).

What The F#$%^--Count Vertigo

I've been working my way through the original run of Suicide Squad the past couple of weeks, and that's brought to mind a serious question I've always meant to ask:


Count Vertigo??

Let me get this straight: You've got a dude named Count Werner Vertigo. And he just happens to have a hereditary inner ear defect that effects his balance. And his name is Vertigo. And he develops the power to cause vertigo in others.

And his name is Vertigo.

Guess he never saw that one coming, huh? Him and Lou Gehrig.

So, what creative genius foisted this upon us? I oughtta---

Oh, wait, it was Bob Haney. That explains everything, doesn't it?

Sigh....

Baseball breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart.

--A. Bartlett Giamatti

What, No Catwoman 2?!?

You know, maybe it isn't script or casting problems delaying the Wonder Woman movie....

This piece, if true, is absolutely and unbelievable stunning. Seriously, is this the 21st century? Or have we slipped back to the 19th?!? No female leads in WB movies??

You know what I hope? I hope Jodie Foster wins the Oscar for her performance in The Brave One (she certainly desrves at least a nomination). And I hope she goes up on stage and refuses to accept the Academy Award because Warner doesn't believe their movies should have female leads.

That would be cool.

Update: Occasional Superheroine has also posted on this, and as usual, more coherently than I.

Friday Night Fights--Dark Knight Style!!

Uh-oh:


Batman, it looks like Deadshot has the drop on you. What do you do? WHAT DO YOU DO??


That's right--


SUCKA PUNCH!!

Bahlactus!! Ah-ah! Savior of the Universe!!

Batman's humiliation of Deadshot courtesy of Suicide Squad #10.

Snarky Questions About This Week's Books

Instead of reviews, which ain't my schtick, I've got some smart-ass questions which need answers.

A) What, the Batmobile drives from the right side? Is Bruce Wayne importing his vehicles from England??



B) I know DC heroes are frustratingly casual with their secret identities, but is this at all wise?


Seriously...taking the Titans out to a Kansas farm to meet Supergirl...isn't that just a bit risky, especially given that the Terminator's daughter and a kid who has sold his soul to the devil are members?? (Yes, I know the Supers flew a ways from the Kent spread before hooking up with the Titans, but c'mon now...)

Aside: When Identity Crisis started, I had hoped that the story was going to involve somehow having knowledge of everyone's secret ID's wiped out. I mean, how many hundreds of people know that Bruce is Batman and Clark Superman? It's not remotely credible that somewhere, somehow that information isn't going to leak out. Some sort of spell to wipe out knowledge of everyone's identities would fix that, and lead to some interesting stories about whom you'd trust with that info. But nope, instead they did a story where the Atom's ex-wife becomes a serial killer. Much better choice. Really.

C) Why is it that Search for Ray Palmer: Crime Society is infinitely better than anything they've given us in Countdown?

Perhaps because it involves absolutely zero about the search for Palmer, and virtually zero about our "Challengers of the Unknown." And it actually focused on the world where they were visiting, instead of just a bunch of cameos from natives, and no sniping between Kyle and Jason Todd. Seriously--whose idea was it to team these three together? Could there be a more annoying team (at least, more annoyingly written) in all of comics?

D) Why is it that in one page Paul Dini does more to explain and advance the "Athena's Shelters" storyline in one issue of Detective than they do in 20+ issues of Countdown, even though Paul Dini is allegedly in charge of that project? I mean seriously, is it that everyone else writing Countdown is so inferior?


Or is it that the weekly format is DESTROYING the series, because there ain't 52 weeks worth of story, so we've got to pace things very slowly to kill time until Final Crisis?

E) How come Bizarro Doomsday looks and acts exactly like regular Doomsday?


I mean, I was thrilled with the concept--Bizarro Doomsday...rad!! But shouldn't he be nice, or meek, or articulate, or in some way the opposite of regular Doomsday?!? Seriously, if they didn't tell you he was "Bizarro" Doomsday, you'd think he was just regular ol' Doomsday. This is why we have GOT to stop letting amateurs tell Bizarro stories.

F) Speaking of Richard Donner, when, exactly, was it decided that the Richard Donner Superman movies were part of the official Superman continuity?


I mean, does anybody like the Phantom Zone as the floating mirror thingy? Do we *really* have to declare that "the son of Jor-El will kneel before Zod?" What's next? Otis?

G) Why the hell isn't Blogger working properly today? Grrr.....damn you, Google!!

Pictures from, in order, JLA/Hitman #2, Supergirl #22, Countdown Presents: The Search for Ray Palmer: Crime Society #1, Detective Comics #837, Action Comics #856, and Countdown #30. Phew...

Yanking Out the Rug from beneath Us

When All Star Superman one the Eisner Award for Best Continuing Series, were they being ironic? Were there quotation marks around "Continuing?"

Granted, it's doing better than the Goddamn All Star Batman, which saw a 1-year hiatus between issues. But in nearly 2 years, A-S-S has seen a grand total of 8 issues, making it considerably less than bi-monthly. So this is "continuing??"

I kid because I love. But also, I want to compare this to the opposite of the "occasionally published" comic, the "our creators are so slow we punt" phenomenon, we has been going on a lot at DC.

Last week, much to my surprise, Superman Confidential did NOT feature the continuation of the "Origin of Kryptonite" story by Cooke and Sale. Instead, we got a tremendously abysmal mermaid story, with only the following editors' note as explanation:


No apology or explanation, just "here it is--tough." ON PAGE 4.

Now, part of it is my own damn fault, for not reading the solicits or paying attention to the cover when I picked up my pulls. And it's not like the Cooke/Sale story was the greatest thing ever, either. But still, this kind of thing is pretty damn annoying. No wonder more and more readers just wait for the trades...

And as we know, it's hardly an isolated incident:

• The One Year Later relaunch Wonder Woman was unable to complete even it's first storyline...eventually they just started the next storyline with a new team and said, "we'll show the end to you guys later." They did, finally, in the Wonder Woman Annual a couple of weeks ago. SPOILER ALERT: apparently, Diana didn't die in the "Who is Wonder Woman" story.
  
• The highly publicized Geoff Johns/Richard Donner/Adam Kubert collaboration in Action Comics was never able to finish, with the editors bailing after 4 issues with several months of fill-ins and Countdown tie-ins before starting the NEXT Johns/Donner storyline, and promising us that sometime in the future we would see the finish of the "Last Son" story. Really.

Now, I shouldn't be too harsh, because obviously DC's editors are in something of a dilemma here. Having inconceivably long gaps between issues of a continuing comic must be bad for sales, right? Not to mention for the fans, who (if they're like me) have a hell of a time remembering what happened last issue when last issue was 4 months ago. And for some of your supposedly flagship titles, like Action or Wonder Woman, you definitely want to keep publishing as continuously as possible, even if it means foisting fill-in crap on the fans.

But obviously there are different rules for different creators. If you're a "Name," say Frank Miller or Jim Lee or Grant Morrison, well, take as long as you need (Eisner Awards must help in that decision, too). If not, well, we're yanking you, and we'll just publish somewhere, sometime, when you finish.

Now I would argue that this latter approach is a real disservice to the fans. Especially those who don't bury their nose in the industry news.

• No one should be surprised, as I was, by getting product they wouldn't have wanted. Again, mea culpa, but there should have been a more prominent warning; if not on the cover, than certainly before page 4.



• Certainly something more than a mere "it will appear elsewhere" seems required. After plunking down $15 bucks to follow the "Kryptonite" story, I'm damn well owed an apology, aren't I?



• More definite plans than "printed at a later date" should be given. Obviously, given the slow work of the creators, you may not have a definite date, but tell me it's going to be in an annual, or a future issue of the regular mag, or a giant one-shot like the 1970's Cancelled Comics Cavalcade--maybe Late Book Bonanza!!

Of course, that's all fan service for after the gears have been gummed up. Perhaps a bigger question is, which is better? Interminable waits between issues, or cancelling the story and just starting the next? I know I prefer the former, even though I'm not thrilled about it. How about you?

And the other question is, how can DC avoid this (other than stop employing slow-ass folks--I kid because I love)? Perhaps schedule more bi-monthlies? Or not start publishing the story until most (all??) is already in the can? I yield to anyone who has more inside knowledge of the workings of the industry than I...

Final Crisis-Preview--PREZ!!

Well, once again it's time to consider who should become part of mainstream DC continuity once they blow it up (again) and rebuild it (again). This time, I'm going with someone who never really was part of it, who was explicitly an imaginary story:



Yup, it's time for PREZ. Created in 1973 by Joe Simon and Jerry Grandenetti, it's...wait. Let me repeat that. We have a concept that was created by the creator of Captain Freakin' America just laying around, and DC is doing nothing at all with it. Nothing. That's wasteful folks. And the Final Crisis is just to place to rectify this gross negligence.



Yes, you read it right. Published in the heady days after the XXVI Amendment, which guaranteed the vote to 18-year-olds, Simon imagined that such a change would lead to future amendments lowering the age requirements for Congress and the President. The end result:


It's a fascinating reflection of the times. I've only read the first issue (only 4 were published before cancellation), but Joe Simon, who was approaching 60 when this was published, tackles corruption, Big Business, pollution, police brutality, commercialization, campaign finance reform, the oppression of Native Americans, pork barrel projects, biased history books...all in the first issue!!! Sure, it comes across as a little too forced hip and naive, but at age 60, Simon was pushing a pretty radical agenda.

PREZ wasn't 100% forgotten. Neil Gaiman did a Sandman story featuring him, and Ed Brubaker did a Vertigo one-shot about PREZ (man, I have GOT to find that).

But PREZ, it seems to me, would particularly resonate in 2007/2008, as a lot of Americans seem thirsty for alternatives to the same old politics. So why not make him mainstream continuity? Or perhaps DC is too afraid of rocking corporate boats these days to print anything so overtly political...

Hell, if they expect us to believe that Lex Luthor could be president, or Pete Ross (Question: what are the odds of 2, count them 2 people from Smallville, Kansas, becoming President??), then we can suspend disbelief enough to believe Prez Rickard. Make Mine the Flower Party, brother!!

Hopping on the Bandwagon

Dudes, I know how to join a meme:


I have no knowledge of the status of the ROM rights, or who has 'em, or what the flipping problem is. But this must end now.

It's not like there's any huge amount of value in Rom's rights, right? So somebody cut somebody a check and let's get this party started.

I'm reminded of a similar situation faced by the best TV show of all time, Mystery Science Theater 3000. They tried to get the rights to riff a terrible 1950 Z-movie, Radar Secret Service. Apparently whoever held the rights thought they had a hot commerical property on their hands, and were waiting for Spielberg or NBC or someone to step up with a big check. It didn't happen, and 3 years later they called up MST and said their movie was available.

So seriously...whoever holds the rights to ROM, really...what are you waiting for? A Michael Bay made summer blockbuster? George Lucas to step forward with a kajillion dollar check? It ain't gonna happen, Rom-rights holder.

Let's take the first step. I personally pledge $1 to the Free Rom fund, one whole dollar towards buying his rights or settling the lawsuit or whatever. C'mon, people, together we can do this...

Now about Miracleman...

Words To Live By 2

Damn you, Fraction and Brubaker, are you reading my mind again??!!??!!

Panel from my fondest dreams--err, from Immortal Iron Fist 9# . Consumer tip: Victory wenches are much better than defeat wenches.

Mehr Spaß mit Deutschem!

No, no, it was Der Affleck, not Der Damon....

Drum snare.....