So my roommate goes batshit if anyone says “theory” because a theory has been repeatedly tested, while a hypothesis is the actual conjecture. So I’ve got some little questions and ideas brewing about Messiah Complex that may or may not play out in the last four issues. There are probably some spoilers in here, so I’ll put some space in here to prepare you …
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1) Why is Bishop after the little girl mutant? Could it be that there’s something ultimately menacing about her? We’ve seen Madrox in one future where Days of the Future Past has turned itself inside out on a self-policing mutant populace … but it looks a lot like Bishop’s future. So what timeline is this?

If we’re to believe that the girl lives in one timeline and dies in another, then it stands to reason that the one without mutants is the one without the girl … right? So why does it look like Bishop’s future? Could it be that the girl lives … and the mutants have to go underground because of it? Remember: Bishop’s future had Forge in it, somehow. Is Forge dead? Is this his way of preventing the timeline?

2) What is timeline two? If it doesn’t involve a dead mutant girl … what does it involve? IS the future with her somehow more unbearable? Is either course ultimately damning to the mutant populace?

3) Who is the little girl and where did she come from? Is she somehow related to the Scarlet Witch? The Scarlet Witch deemed there to be no more mutants … there shouldn’t be anymore mutants. And Wanda seems to be powerless, and physics tell us that things don’t simply go away … energy has to be redirected. And that was a hell of a power surge to blow out Cerebra. Also, where does Cable want to take her in time? It can’t be the Clan Askani, because supposedly that timeline is gone. So does he have a place in mind?

There’s a lot more that’s yet to be answered. And the writers aren’t just going to kill the little girl in the next issue. This is going to have to be a good finish … after all, we haven’t seen the Mauraders in a few issues … and if Forge figures into Bishop’s future, Gambit isn’t far behind.

Last week, the newest issue of “Death of the New Gods” came out, and the mystery is in full swing. New Gods are dying, and somebody familiar and unexpected is doing the killing.

So far, we’ve been given several clues within the pages of DOTNG, along with a few from “Countdown to Final Crisis,” though the clues given within Countdown could very well just be editorial missteps that will never be explained or just some writer trying to hot shot and be clever. Regardless, I think I have the mystery figured out.

Of course, I could be very wrong (I actually hope I am), so read the rest of this knowing that I don’t actually know any spoilers, and this is all just one drunk man’s theory.

For starters, we’ve been given a number of red herrings. Let’s go through those in order, shall we? (more…)

Well, it’s the holiday season, so cut me some slack with the joint and partially late reviews, here. I’ve been pretty busy with all that. That aside, though, let me just say, “HEAVENS TO BETSY, WE’RE IN THE TEENS AND NOTHING HAS HAPPENED YET.” To piss in everybody’s egg nog, I’m back once again for the (semi) weekly review of the shittiest (weekly) comic I’ve ever read. Actually, you can take out the second parentheses “weekly,” because this is really just the worst comic book I’ve ever read. And I read “One More Day.” Love it or hate it, at least something happened in that one (even if it is the stupidest ending to a story I’ve read in quite a long time). Nothing has really happened in this, other than the Monitors declaring war on the Multiverse anomalies (eight weeks ago) and then never doing anything about it. Oh, yeah, plus this series kind of ruined a lot of suspense from the Sinestro Corps War and tainted Bart Allen’s death by its stupidity. Plus, let’s not forget flushing Black Adam down the toilet and turning Superboy-Prime into a forty year-old man. Oh, and I guess it’s also killed the charm of the 52 Universes by plodding through a whole bunch of them and showing us how lame they are. I digress. What happened in issue Nineteen?

Fuck, let’s take it from the top. Piper drags Trickster’s dead body around. Then he decides to cut his arm off, but doesn’t do it.

The Challengers hang out in a bar on Earth 51, the happy ending earth. No, I don’t mean everybody gets a handy. The heroes won, is what I mean.

Harley and Holly meet Hippolyta, who tells them that they’re being duped by Athena. They take her word for it, even though they’ve been lied to since the first issue of this stupid series. I mean, I guess it’s convenient for the reader, since we all KNOW they’re being duped by Athena, but these bitches are willing to swallow anything. Wow, these innuendos are just falling into my lap over here!

Over on Apokolips, Jimmy Olsen smooths things over with Forager, kind of, and she realizes he has a Mother Box inside of him. I wouldn’t mind being inside his mother’s box. God, I’m on a roll! Anyway, they escape through a Boom Tube that Jimmy somehow creates, and then make out. For real.

That was a waste of paper. (more…)

The final chapter of One More Day, J. Michael Stracynski’s Spider-Man swan song, was finally released today, and only three months later than it was originally scheduled. While that may be a new personal best for artist Joe Quesada, this may have been a new personal worst for JMS.
Although to be fair to Stracynski, this was probably more of an editorial mandate than anyone at the House of Ideas would ever admit.

****SPOILERS AHOY!!****

In the issue, Peter and MJ decide to take up Mephisto on his offer to restore Aunt May’s life in exchange for their marriage. As an added bonus, Mephisto decides to make everyone on Earth forget that Peter is Spider-Man, and even agrees to a super-secret caveat that MJ whispers into her ear. After they agree to the bargain, Mephisto reveals that the little red-headed girl he showed Peter last issue that was obviously the potential offspring of the Parkers was actually the potential offspring of the Parkers. Shocking! Then Peter wakes up, kisses a non-shot May on the cheek, stuffs a wheatcake in his mouth and heads off to the surprise party for…wait for it…Harry Osborn!

Wow, that was stupid.

This now means that everything that happened since Peter and MJ got married way back in 1987 didn’t actually happened (which equates to every Spider-Man comic that’s been published since yours truly began reading Spider-Man comics). While Mephisto claimed “all else will remain the same” once he removed their marriage from existence, obviously that’s not what happened. Unsurprisingly, the Prince of Lies lied, and the marriage no longer having existed has had a massive effect on Peter’s life. (more…)

I buy too many comics. Way too many comics. And a lot of them really aren’t very good. But as it was pointed out to me this weekend, I have a very strong inner completist, and I find it incredibly hard to stop buying a monthly series. I’ve struggled through Peter Milligan on X-Men and Brad Meltzer on Justice League of America because I figured it was only a matter of time until they left the book and it got good. I even kept buying Marvel Knights Spider-Man during the Reggie Hudlin’s run, and that guy’s about the worst comic writer ever (keep clicking…that’s not just one link).

Now that I have more important things to spend my money on (like rent, food and heat), I’ve decided it’s time I actually hunkered down and dropped a few books from my regular haul. And that sounds like a good excuse to review some comics and post on the blog, if you ask me.

Justice League of America

Picked up with JLA #115 (2005)
Dropped with Justice League of America #16 (2007)

The Justice League was bad under Brad Meltzer. While it’s better under Dwayne McDuffie, I wouldn’t say it’s significantly better. My first reaction of McDuffie’s JLA was that it was breath of fresh air after Meltzer’s run. Of course, even carbon monoxide seems like fresh air compared to sarin nerve gas. I like most of the stuff Dwayne McDuffie’s done in comics so far, but he’s not in the same tier of guys like Peter David, Ed Brubaker and Robert Kirkman, who you can usually trust to turn a book around if it’s hit a bit of a rough patch.

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Hello, everybody. This week is the first week where we’ve decided to change the format of the weekly Book of Doom. It used to be that, each week, one of us members of the Legion would choose a book, we’d all read it, and, each Saturday, the original chooser would post a collection of each of our reviews of said book. It rarely turned out that we all enjoyed a book on any given week, so our reviews were mostly negative. But not anymore! Under our new format, each Saturday, one of us will post a compilation of each of our favorite issues from the week’s haul. Not only will there be multiple reviews of multiple books each week, but, hopefully, each review will be mostly positive. And isn’t that just a lot more fun to read? Well, let’s hope so. And, hey, if you disagree with us and think that something we don’t mention is the best book of the week, well, by all means, feel free to leave a comment or two.

Now that that’s out of the way, let’s get things rolling! (more…)

Tomorrow, or, more likely, if you’re reading this on Wednesday, today, the third issue of Countdown: Arena will hit newsstands, and, if you’re anything like the fanboys it caters to, you’ll probably buy it. “Who cares if it doesn’t make sense,” they ask, between handfuls of Cheetos. “It’s got a vampire Batman. So it’s automatically awesome.”

I hope you haven’t fallen for it. For those who haven’t, here’s the premise: The Monarch is building an army of the strongest and deadliest heroes and villains from across the Multiverse in order to do battle with the Monitors. He’s recruited three prime candidates of each of the main heroes from alternate universes, brought them to his super special top secret Arena (in yet another geographically uncharted area of the Multiverse, called the Quantum Universe), and now they’re set to do battle, with the victor joining his army. The title of this series does have the word “Countdown” in it, so it’s not surprising, then (we should actually expect it) that this series hasn’t got a lick of logic to it, which, inevitably, makes it so that this story is completely unnecessary and is only being published to give fanboy dumbasses a couple pages of wet-dream fantasy fights. (more…)

Well, start by going here. Then change your pants, or whatever it is you do. This is one part in a big movement. 2008 will not suck superhero-movie wise.

“Iron Man,” from all looks, promises to be a good ride, with an amazing Robert Downey Jr. performance. But what “Iron Man” will lack is one crucial component: The Joker.

What’s needed in the sequel to “Batman Begins” is the right interplay between Batman and the villain. While the first movie was fun, it seemed that the bad guys were more incidental. Perhaps this is because the Scarecrow and Mr. Ghul aren’t enraptured in the mythos as much as some characters, or maybe because the point was the beginning of the god damn Batman. But here, we have the true antithesis to Batman in the Joker. A look at “The Killing Joke,” “The Dark Knight Returns” and “Arkham Asylum” will show just why it’s so important - and why Chris Nolan can’t fail us.

Seeing the Joker, I’m excited. This isn’t a weak Cesar Romero TV villian, or Jack Nicholson playing hammed-up and polished. This is the Joker we all know and love. The batshit insane clown. He doesn’t even bother to hide that he’s raving. It adds a more “real” feeling to him, I suppose.

But now, the heat is on. They’ve got to establish the Joker/Batman mythos … and spare the Joker in the end, too. One point of contention I had with the Batman films of my youth (I feel old) is that the villains always died at the end. Even if it was a “climax,” it always seemed anti-climatic - and made no room for Arkham Asylum, either.

This also made the first series seem more like movies than mythos. Batman was really given a context to be put in. Instead, he was just assaulted by bad guys, new girls and lame gadgets. Every new part to the series was a one-up on the last. And in all of them, Batman wasn’t a detective - he was a nearly-god like human.

Much in the same respects, “Batman Begins” never established the detective aspects. Batman demanded answers. He didn’t investigate them. His power of vengeance was there, but without the deduction. In order to establish a truer arch to the stories, we need to see this develop. And, in the same way, we need to see the interplay with the other characters develop. While all of this is happening, we need to see the evolution of the Batman. By making the second movie about the Joker, we’ve got the crucial first step. That is, if the step is taken.

So, to sum it up - the trailer looks cool, Chris Nolan. Just don’t fuck the movie up.

Biggest Status Quo Change- The Walking Dead #45

This week in TWD: Dale, Andrea, Glenn, Maggie, Sofia and the twins all packed into the RV and left the prison, while in an attempt to take the fight to the Governor’s men, Tyrese is taken prisoner and Michonne gets her f$&#ing brains blown out. Yeah, not a good week for Rick and the half dozen or so people who decided to fight it out for the prison. Granted, I highly doubt this is the last we’ve seen of the RV gang, and Michonne “died” off-panel, so it’s more than likely she’s not dead. But just about every instinct I’ve ever had about this book was completely off, so virtually anything could happen next issue. And that’s the way I like it.

Best Countdown Tie-In- Green Arrow and Black Canary #3

I know what you’re thinking: “What are the words ‘best’ and ‘Countdown tie-in’ doing so close together?” While Countdown to Final Crisis has had more tie-ins than you can shake a stick at, quality tie-ins have been few and far between. And the best ones have been the ones you didn’t realize were tie-ins until the end. When Athena was revealed as Green Arrow’s abductor in GABC #2, I didn’t think much of it. When that issue came out, Athena was just some crappy character from Countdown. Since then, it’s been revealed that Athena is actually Granny Goodness, a slightly less crappy character from Countdown. Of course, she’s still not un-crappy enough for me to remember that little tidbit, so when it was revealed all over again in GABC #3 I was surprised yet again. What made this a good tie-in, though, was the revelation of Darkseid’s secret plans involving tricking Black Canary into training a new batch of Furies and destroying the metahuman community from within. Hmm…that seems like the sort of thing they might have wanted to spend more than two word balloons on.

Best Bludgeoning- The Joker

I’m not convinced I should pick up the third issue of Salvation Run, but I may have to buy it just for the antics of The Joker. Like this issue, when The Joker bashed Psimon’s brains in with a rock. Silly Joker! But that’s not the only brain damage The Joker inflicted this week. He knocked Booster loopy four times in Booster Gold #5, including clubbing him upside the head with Skeets (and that couldn’t have felt good for Skeets either). Man, it’s too bad they didn’t give The Joker a Sinestro ring or he could have done a lot more damage this week.

Since we’re nearing our year-end awards here at Doomkopf, I thought I’d share another collection of year-end recognition.

Year’s Best Graphic Novels, Comics & Manga is what it sounds like - a collection of excerpts from the year’s best graphic novels, comics and manga.

It’s from 2005, and I found a copy at a Borders outlet store for $4.99, marked down enough from the regular cover price of $19.95 that I thought it was cheap enough to justify a try.

While designed to honor the best of the year — and it was a nice read — it’s also purchased marketing. While entertaining, it does certainly play the role of introducing the reader to things he or she might’ve missed (and in my case, things I missed more than two years ago).

So since I finally had time tonight to read through the “Graphic Novel” portion of the collection, I thought I’d share whether or not the anthology sold me on pursuing any of the winners further.

Superman: Secret Identity
by Kurt Busiek and Stuart Immonen; DC Comics

This just confused me. From the nine pages included here, I’m left to gather that there is a character named Clark Kent who is also Superman — but it’s set in some kind of postmodern world in which everyone knows that Superman is a character called Clark Kent, so this Clark Kent gets set up on a date with a “Lois” as a joke.

I’m a huge Kurt Busiek fan, but I don’t really know what’s going on here, and I don’t particularly care to go further.

The art looks great, though.

Verdict: It may have five stars on Amazon, but I’m content letting this stay a secret.

Blankets
by Craig Thompson; Top Shelf Productions

Part of why I picked up this collection was because I’d heard so many great things about Blankets. I figured this would be a convenient way to give it a tiny test.

It’s 11 pages of a guy and a girl sharing stories of using blankets as children. Now I’ve seen this book in person before, and I have seen that it is much longer than 11 pages, so that leaves me to wonder if the whole book is about blankets or what. That gimmick seems like it could get old.

But dang, this was a great 11 pages to pick. The stories they share are sweet and fun and they build to a great short-story finale. This felt like a self-contained story, and as such, worked as a great commercial for the book. I also loved Thompson’s artwork.

The verdict: I may be the last person to realize it, but I want to read this book.
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