#and cass' Batgirl series is also so important to me overall. i struggled to read it at first but payoff when i finally understood it

[tangerinesri]

The way batman and co comics from the 80s up until flashpoint had so much weight and depth to them. Like whether it was in a batman comic or a separate comic, there was so much depth and complexity and emotion in the comics.

Now I read the most recent ones and it really feels like reading a hollow shell.

[ladyloveandjustice]

Shadow of the Batgirl: A review type thing

I just read the graphic novel Shadow of the Batgirl by Sarah Kuhn and Nicole Goux, which reimagines the superhero origin of Cassandra Cain.

It was overall good and EXTREMELY cute! If you want an awesome story about a teenage assassin running away from her shitty dad and finding a neat library, a community of cool ladies and the hero within herself, AND WHY WOULDN’T YOU WANT THAT, definitely get this! 

It’s a standalone Batgirl story completely accessible to all and with none of the weird baggage and the complicated continuity of the regular Batman universe! it’s appropriate for younger teens but still a good read for adults, the art’s colorful and great, it’s packed to the brim with joy and hope.

And on top of all that, it gives a great character who’s been traditionally horribly neglected by mainstream comics for some reason (*cough its because she’s not white cough*) a spotlight and a chance to shine (and get written by an Asian American author for once!)! This also features one of my other faves, who had her disability and adult identity erased in the main universe, but not in this comic, hurray!

SO YEAH, if you like superheroes at all, highly recommend this!

NOW for a more detailed review, calling on all my expertise as a Cassandra Cain superfan and going into pros and cons. This’ll be long, but I’ll do it as a list to break it down.

Let’s start with the good stuff, there’s a lot of it:

- This story takes place in world where Barbara Gordon as Oracle (and former Batgirl) and Cassandra Cain as Batgirl exist, but Batman and The Killing Joke do not appear to. That is honestly transcendentally great to finally see this as an officially realized concept, Batgirl allowed to stand on its own as a legacy of powerful women, with all history of these characters being victimized for the sake of manpain erased. I am elated.

-The art was adorable, the designs were great, the clothes and Cass’s costumes were super cute, the setting was vibrant.

-Jackie was a really fun character and mentor figure for Cass. Loved her snark and how she and Babs basically become Cass’s two Moms and an awesome team in their own right. The relationships in this were just heartwarming. Loved the range of characters in general.

-Cass basically lived in a library aka my life dream. I mean, she did it because she was homeless and on the run from her assassin father, but like.

-Cassandra FINALLY knows her own race, (she’s half-Chinese) and gets to have a goddamn connection and basic feelings about it (Jackie bringing up what the bat means to Chinese culture), etc, god it should not have taken this long for this to happen.

(And it’s really important to have a version of Cass’s story where, y’know, the positive inspirational figures in her life include other Asian people, they aren’t just white people. it wasn’t until I read this it fully dawned on me how screwed up it is she never had that before.)

-For the first time in her entire existence, Cassandra Cain got to be in a canon romance that wasn’t fucking awful, can you believe it. Her love interest Erik was adorable, and him being a budding romance writer was an especially sweet touch- and I think there’s an implication/hint his dad’s the Bronze Tiger? Which is really cute Easter Egg for Cass fans, considering she had a strong friendship with the dude in her original series!

-The idea of Cass liking to draw and expressing herself through art is really fun and fitting. Her being visually focused, it makes a lot of sense.

-Cass extending her body language ability to sort of being able to guess at people’s underlying emotional problems from how they carry themselves is a really neat idea- it could have been implemented a little more smoothly but I like the concept.

-Cass going after the “evil-doers” in the library after becoming a hero was one of the best things I’ve ever seen. Deserves to be framed. I love what a huge nerd Cass got to be in this.

-The comic understood that core of Cass’s character is compassion and empathy, that how she reaches out for people, refuses to harm, and really believes in people and embodies change, rebirth, hope. THAT’S IT, THAT’S MY GIRL, THAT’S MY HERO..

-I’ve read a ton of comics with Barbara Gordon and this is the first one I’ve come across where she discussed her relationship with her mother having any sort of influence on her interests and personality, she isn’t even the main character of this and her mother matters more in it than every other comic I’ve read with her combined how sad is that

-I liked Babs just casually making gadgets and stuff all the time, and loved that she expressed she honestly preferred doing this and that was why she was giving Batgirl to Cass. MADE ME WANT TO SCREAM FUCK YOU DC ALL OVER AGAIN.

-Compared to the original Cass Batgirl comics, this story is obviously more accessible as a standalone, but it’s also just overall more appropriate for a wider range of ages since the darker elements of Cass’s story are way toned down. I was a young teenager when I read Cass’s series and was fine, but there are young teenagers that DON’T want like, graphic onscreen deaths in their comics, so it’s good there’s a lighter Cass story for them. It was just a really sweet, affirming story.

Now for some cons, none of them damning:

The romance was cute, but wish it’d had room to breathe. Ideally, it didn’t need to be happening alongside Cass’s origin, I think it would have been better if it was just hinted at and then was allowed to fully play out as an after-she-became-Batgirl thing, but I can get that Kuhn didn’t know if this would get a sequel and there were probably a lot of good reasons she wanted to include it.

-I think this came from Kuhn being used to writing as a YA author rather than doing comics, but it was weird to read a Cass comic with so much narration and the way it was used really detracted from the potential power of the story. We’re told through Cass’s super chatty narration she’s not a normal teen, she TELLS US that she barely knows how to read and speak and TELLS US she’s better at reading body language-but we never get a sense of this, not even at the beginning, because the story doesn’t trust the reader to take in the visuals without narration, and then she’s able to talk like a normal teen pretty much right off the bat.

 I’m okay with Cass becoming a chatty girl, and her voice in this comic was fun- I know “silent Asian” has a lot baggage and Cass’s original character leaned into some stereotypes- but the first chapter/part would been far more powerful if it had her world be a little more silent and fully emphasized the visual, for her interactions with people and words be garbled and confusing, and if it gave us more of a sense of the world she comes from and how her perception of things differs from the average person. Cass’s original debut and the beginning of her original series did a really good job giving us a sense of this, and took great advantage of comics as a visual medium, and I missed that.

-Cass learns to read and talk SUPER EASILY and it just comes off as unbelievable. I do like the idea of her camping at a library, eavesdropping, and teaching herself, but I would have liked to see her actually struggle like a person would. Moreover, while I know the presentation of it was very flawed, Cass basically had a learning/language disability in the original series. I was kind of hoping this comic would lean into that, and actually give a more realistic and nuanced representation of that kind of disability (it could have been presented as something she always had that was exacerbated by how she was raised, not caused by it!).

 Honestly, I think her romance with Erik would have been far more interesting and meaningful and tied in better if she’d actually struggled to read, maybe even discovered she was dyslexic and couldn’t quite read the same way he could. That could have been a source of development between them.

-David Cain’s a super flat as a character in this comic, he doesn’t have much presence, menacing or otherwise, and Cass’s complicated feelings and relationship with him is not nearly as painful as they were in her original series.This is partly because there wasn’t a lot of a space for it though, and that’s fine.

-Overall, the main thing that hurts the story is that we don’t see all that much of what Cass’s life was like as an assassin, and her life with David Cain was like. It’s harder to invest in Cass’s transformation into a hero when we don’t really have a sense of who she was before,it’s hard to appreciate her breaking free when we can’t get a sense of what kind of cage she was even in. How much language DID she know? How much of the world was she exposed to? What was she really deprived of? I hope if there’s a sequel we can see more of this.

-Babs isn’t the main character of course, so this isn’t a real complaint, but I did miss her cynical and angry edge. She’s pretty much just a chipper nerd with no sign of her own baggage in this, and it makes her relationship with Cass less interesting. It’s implied that her “accident” did affect her and she just managed to work through a lot of it before she met Cass, but I missed the element of their relationship where they both were hurting from losing  “the world they knew” and working through it together, sometimes clashing, etc.

-I read one of Sarah Kuhn’s YA novels in anticipation of this, and while I’m relieved this is better about it than her first book was (I expected it to be, writers improve, I definitely know how messy a first book is) there’s still some cringe-y ideas of how “average” teens talk creeping in, occasional clunky pacing etc.

But all in all? It was a really nice little story that did a lot of cool things, and I really want a sequel and want more of this version of Cass and her universe. As someone who was driven away from DC comics in part because of how badly they treated Cass, Oracle and the Batgirl legacy. it’s really like a salve on old wounds.

[maychorian]

Batfamily Primer

Because I switched so quickly from writing tons of Voltron fics to now being obsessed with Batfam, I have a lot of followers who have no idea what Batfamily content is and how to get into it. Someone asked me for something like an essential reading list, so I’m going to do my best to provide that.

We’re staying away from the reboots, here. I don’t care for them. Also this list is geared toward helping people who like my writing to get enough Batfamily background to enjoy my current fic, Year of Fallen Angels.

Also, keep in mind that this is just my opinion, man. I like these comics, but they may not be for everyone. If you start reading Batman and associated comics and find they are too bloody or gory or dark or horrific for you, this fandom may not be for you. And that’s okay. 

I’ll put asterisks next to the ones I consider essential for understanding these characters and their relationships, but I’ll have other comics as well that I also think are good. These are all linked to a place where you can read them online. Use an adblocker. Explanations for my choices will be under the read more.

* Batman: Dark Victory (Starting in issue 8.) 

Batgirl/Robin: Year One

Batman: The Killing Joke

* Batman: A Death in the Family

* Batman: A Lonely Place of Dying - Batman #440, New Titans #60, Batman #441, New Titans #61, Batman #442 

Robin: Reborn 

Robin: The Joker's Wild 

Batman: Legacy

* Batman: The Mark of Cain - Batman #567, Detective Comics #734

Batman: Hush

* Batman: Under the Red Hood 

* Batman: Batman and Son

Batman: The Resurrection of Ra's al Ghul 

Red Robin

So, Batman’s origin story has been told tons of times in tons of ways. You probably know the story of the kid, little Bruce Wayne, who was leaving a theater and walking through an alley, only to watch his parents gunned down in front of his eyes. He never got over that. Like, ever. And he decided to dress up like a bat to scare the criminal element in his city and try to save as many innocents as possible. So far so good.

There are LOTS of comics you can read to get that origin, but I’m gonna go ahead and put Batman: Dark Victory on this particular list. You can skip to Issue #8 to see where Dick Grayson comes in, the original angry bird.

If you like bitty Dickie, there are plenty more adventures you can follow with him. Year One is a great exploration of him, and you can also see Barbara Gordon’s origin as Batgirl in that volume.

The Killing Joke is not essential for understanding the content I reblog and create, but it’s an essential piece of Batman lore that really should be on any list like this. It explains why Barbara is in a wheelchair and also gives us even more reason to hate the Joker, as if we need it.

Next, Jason Todd. Jason was a street kid who Bruce caught trying to steal the wheels off the Batmobile in Crime Alley, the same place Bruce’s parents were murdered. Bruce took a shine to the kid and took him in, but Jason had issues. Sadly, he never got a chance to deal with them, not in this life, anyway. His death is difficult to read, but essential for understanding future character dynamics and problems. Suffice to say that Bruce never got over this, not really.

Next, the origin of Tim Drake in A Lonely Place of Dying. Definitely essential to understand Tim’s motivations for becoming Robin, as well as the mindset of Bruce and Dick and how affected they still are by Jason’s loss. I’m including Tim’s first two mini-series as optional reading because I just love him so much, and also Batman: Legacy because it’s an excellent example of the dynamic between Bruce, Dick, and Tim as they worked together to fight crime and save the world.

Cassandra’s origin is very short, just two issues. It falls in the middle of a much longer arc called No Man’s Land, in which Gotham is cut off from the rest of the country after an earthquake, and Batman and his associates struggle to protect the innocent and suppress the evil. It’s kind of a post-apocalyptic story, and I remember loving it when I read it twenty years ago, but I haven’t had a chance to re-read it recently. Cass’s origin story is still good, though.

Hush is not essential, but it’s just a good overall introduction to the world of Batman, all of his allies and associates, and it has a good story, to boot. Also includes the first reappearance of Jason Todd. You could just read that, without reading anything else on this list, and still have a pretty good understanding of most these characters.

Under the Red Hood is long, but it’s really, really important. It’s not really among my favorites because there’s no Tim, but it’s still essential.

Batman and Son is the introduction of Damian. Which is really, really rough. For something a little more fun with him, but maybe not as essential, I recommend the Resurrection of Ra’s al Ghul. That arc also deals, a little bit, with some of the losses Tim Drake has suffered, and has one of the best hugs between Dick and Tim in all of comics.

Finally, if you’re reading this list to have the background to enjoy Year of Fallen Angels, I also recommend you read at the least the first twelve issues or so of Red Robin. It’s tough going, especially at first, but it’s important.

And that’s it! Again, this is a very basic primer and doesn’t even touch on a lot of things that happen in the Batfam history. I didn’t even try to explain Stephanie Brown. But if you at least read the asterisked items, you’ll have a pretty good understanding of what you’re getting into with this fandom and if you’re interested in reading more. I hope this helps.

[renaroo]

Wednesday Roundup 15/6/2017

So this is a day late but in my defense I had a ridiculous amount of comics to get through with no one to blame but myself here. And you know what? I genuinely enjoyed almost everything. But does that mean every comic was good this week? And even so what did I think was the best? 

Honestly I don’t know how to write these intros for people who wouldn’t be here to read my opinion anyway so let’s just jump into it. 

Marvel’s All-New Wolverine, Marvel’s Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows, DC’s Detective Comics, DC’s Gotham Academy: Second Semester, DC’s Justice League of America, Image’s Motor Crush, DC’s Superwoman, IDW’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, DC’s Titans, IDW’s Transformers: Salvation, DC’s Wonder Woman

Marvel’s All-New Wolverine (2015-present) #21 Tom Taylor, Leonard Kirk, Cory Hamscher, Terry Pallot, Michael Garland

Okay I need this issue to reread a million times over because there are just so many things I love all at once. Like, oh my gosh. I was almost in tears multiple times because relationships! Healing! Supporting each other!

Wade and Gabby alone could just about make this issue perfect, but then you have Laura and Daken hugging and worried about each other, and Old Man Logan being likable for the first time in any of my readings of him. There’s so much I enjoy, though I find the cover rather deceiving. This is much more of a Howlett family reunion than anything else, though I did enjoy Riri’s parts in it.

I just eriously adore these characters and it meant a lot to see them all come together like they have here and that cliffhanger HURT so much more for it. 

I will nitpick the art a bit because we’ve been doing so good about keeping Laura in the Wolverine costume which is much preferred to her X-23 wardrobes, for sure, but this issue it pretty much looked exactly like one of her old costumes without the midriffs and it was kinda weird. I know she took off a lot of her armor for skin contact but it’s... idk. It was weird. 

The main thing I’m happy about though is that as we go on, I realize that literally all of the Marvel books I’ve kept are going out of their way to not involve themselves in Secret Wars and it’s kind of beautiful. Laura and Gabby are stuck on an island that’s quarantined (and I can pretend Wade’s there with them instead of whatever’s going on since I dropped Deadpool for the summer crossovers, thanks Tom Taylor!), Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur are literally off world, and the rest are non-616. So yay me!

Marvel’s Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows (2016-present) #8 Gerry Conway, Ryan Stegman, Jesus Aburtov

For those who don’t know, Mary Jane Watson is genuinely one of my favorite Marvel characters and is easily one of the reasons I ever stuck with the Spider-Man comics for as long as I did was because of my interest in her and wanting to see her and Peter.

I can also thank her for my genuine attraction to redheads probably.

But one of the main reasons that I’ve loved this book so much is because, as written by Gerry Conway, this is the Peter and MJ of my dreams. I love them so much, and the complications that comes from their relationship and from growing older, raising a daughter, and MJ’s desire to continuously be the glue to keep both Peter and Annie together logically causes her to seek out a way to continue being Spinerette without syphoning off Peter’s powers. 

It’s almost like growing old, having a stable relationship, trying to keep things fresh while raising a kid, are all dramatic and worthy of good storytelling in their own right or something HMM.

Anyway, yes it’s completely on the nose where this is going and it’s a little curious how MJ’s not immediately aware of the connection between what’s going on with her right now and the horrible, arguably traumatizing experience she and Peter had, but who knows what’s canon anymore lol

Basically, I sideye a bit from a story point of view, but this series continues to make up for it with the real thing that matters to me: these characters and their development.

DC’s Detective Comics (2016-present) #958 James Tynion IV, Aluaro Martinez, Raul Fernandez, Brad Anderson 

Honestly I really love the slower issues where Tynion takes more time to make moments for the relationships between the characters and give us interractions we didn’t know we wanted -- Kate going with Luke and Jean Paul to a basketball game, Cass and Clayface being adorable by reciting a play, Bruce at a poker game with a bunch of assholes in homage to Almost Got ‘im!? It was a lot of fun honestly. 

...

Okay I take issue with Cass’ dialogue. I know she was repeating lines from a tape and such but it’s weird to see her make so much progress when just two issues ago she was almost monosyllabic. Like... I want to see Cass gradually learning, I want to feel her frustration with hitting walls, I want to see her struggle and achieve despite the struggle because that gradual progression was honestly something we weren’t delivered in the former canon. We have a great opportunity for it here. 

But y’know. I’m particular with Cass and it’s hard to say where her baseline for reading and speech even is in this canon because her dyslexia may be in tact but her circumstances growing up are completely different. So I don’t know. 

Now. I’m a sucker for Bruce and Zatanna team-ups because I’m a schmuck but I’m really excited for next issue. Had a lot of fun with this one. This feels like a decent pace for Tynion -- at least in my opinion. 

DC’s Gotham Academy: Second Semester (2016-2017) #10 Brenden Fletcher, Becky Cloonan, Karl Kerschl, Adam Archer, Massyk, Sandra Hope

This comic is speeding toward an end and I’m not sure if I’m ready! 

From the beginning, for me at least, the selling point for Gotham Academy has been just how much these kids felt like real teenagers and real friends with all their various relationships and connections, platonic or romantic or something in between. And it’s powerful to see that coming to play as an advantage to completing Olive’s arc, but also as a disadvantage since the consequences of many of her actions hurt that much more.

I’ll save a lot of my thoughts for a complete wrap up of the series but overall, very happy and very grateful for the continuously good read that is GA

DC’s Justice League of America (2016-present) Volume 1: Road to Rebirth Steve Orlando, Jody Houser, Ivan Reis, Andy MacDonald, Stephen Byrne, Jamal Campbell, Mirk Andolfo

WE GOTTA GET THE BAND BACK TOGETHER. WE’RE ON A MISSION FROM GAD. 

In all seriousness, I’m a huge fan of Vixen and Ryan Choi as well as a big fan of Justice League International, as it was in its 80s glory. So my interests with this particular lineup were piqued from the beginning and I made myself wait for the first volume to dive in. 

For the most part, this is a team gathering exercise. Characters that have lacked the spotlight in the last few years -- Vixen, Ray, Killer Frost, and the Atom -- were given whole issues to reintroduce them to this continuity. And honestly those issues were great. I really, really love the updated origins for them and feel that they’re a good blend of honoring the past of the characters as well as adapting them for a new world. 

Lobo, Batman, and Black Canary took back seat, but considering that there were already tensions showing within the group, I think it’s safe to assume that giving the spotlight to the rest of the team won’t always last this long. Things are nothing if not explosive among these members.

I really did mean it when I said this is a team gathering exercise, because there’s no first case to unite everyone. There’s not any real antagonists or team-ups we see to speakof. It was just getting hte jLA together. 

And for me it’s enough to get me intrigued, though I’d completely understand if people told me it was far from enough for them. 

Now they just need to add Big Barda, Booster Gold, and Ted Kord and I’ll be satisfied. 

Image’s Motor Crush (2016-present) Vol. 1 Brenden Fletcher, Cameron Stewart, Babs Tarr

I was not the biggest fan of this team’s Batgirl team though I appreciated the aesthetics and what not. There just never seemed to be a storyline that really interested me and I couldn’t be sold on the characterization for Barbara. So I kept hearing about Motor Crush for the last year and was really itnerested in it so I wanted until this volume came out and. 

Well, quite simply, I’m in love.

Tell you what, those biker gangs that kept coming up really confusingly out of place in Batgirl make a hell of a lot more sense now that I can see this team’s actual passion project. 

So I love Motor Crush a lot, I’m really invested in Domino, the mystery that is her origins and the powers of Crush itself. I love her relationship with her ex, Lola, I love her father -- I love just about everything and the cliffhanger really surprised me. 

I will say that while I love having a world that speaks for itself rather than constant narration, it’s a little hard to follow this world entirely, I’d like a bit more explained than what has been, but at the end of the day I’m very excited to see more. 

DC’s Superwoman (2016-present) #11 K. Perkins, José Luís, Ray McCarthy, HI-FI

You know, I have made it clear that I’ve been worried about this title for a while now, really just hoping it was going to find its direction and wow us with the great potential that is the Super Family outside of the main Kent triad. And I feel like that’s for good reason -- the end of Jimenez’s run let a lot of people feeling justifiably scorned, there was a mishandling of a lot of heavy and important subjects that were raised, and at least the initial stuff with Perkins taking over kind of left one wondering if they had a fully formed direction to go toward next. 

But I am really glad that I stuck it out for this long because the family of John, Lana, Nat, and everyone else is so important and so fundamentally different from the dynamics found elsewhere in the new familial renaissance of the DCU that I needed it. And I hope it continues to emphasize these relationships and how important they are to each other.

I’m still unhappy with how anxiety and mental illness is being handled in the title and find it lacking since it was brought up to begin with and now being ignored. That subject alone is making me rethink my disinterest in Green Lantern books as a whole because I have loved and felt inspired so far by what I’ve seen of Jessica Cruz and their handling of anxiety, and it’s why I picked up Silk at the high recommendations of a close friend. 

So I’d like for mental illness to be treated better in this title -- the least it can do after bringing it up and treating it the way it did at the end of Jimenez’s run, but there’s so much value in the non-nuclear family dynamic of the Irons household and of the uniqueness of Lana’s powers and her approach to fighting crime that it’s worth it. For me anyway.

IDW’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2011-present) #70 Kevin Eastman, Tom Waltz, Mateus Santolouco, Ronda Pattison

I knew the end of this storyline was going to be, at the very least, explosive but wow, WOW I had no idea how many twists and turns it was going to take in that time. That was a phenomenal ending to the Mutanimals storyline for the time being, and I just feel so bad for Slash, down to my core. I’m so worried about him, and whenever he will be allowed to recover.

At least I hope he’ll recover.

This series is seventy issues strong and i’m just so blown away by the way they still manage to keep me on the edge of my feet while so many different storylines and character developments are happening at the same time.

I mean, I even feel for Old Hobb here!

I do suppose a complaint I could hold here is that the titular turtles themselves have ultimately not been very front and center throughout this storyline, and that really showed in the conclusion, where for the most part they were lost to the colorfulness of the huge, colorful supporting cast that has been developed over the years. 

For me, personally, I think that’s honestly okay. We can’t have the same story over and over again with only the main four characters driving the narrative, and it’s been a long standing tradition in TMNT for a good 30 years now to sort of embody the concept that our main guys don’t really look for situations to get involved with but sort of fall into them naturally. 

Not to mention it’s probably a strength that 70 issues in, we haven’t once repeated plots or stories or put any of the characters on a loop of development to end up right back where they started. I don’t think the achievement of that can be understated, especially as we near that landmark #75!

DC’s Titans (2016-present) #12 Dan Abnett, Kenneth Rocafort, Dan Brown

Bleh. BLEH. I was holding out judgment on the twist of Wally and Donna and Roy ending up in some kind of love triangle because I wanted the context but honestly the context is kinda... bleh. It would be awesome if we lived in some world and time where Donna’s origins were not constantly retconned and thus the source of her characterization in every run of every thing she showed up in. Which is by no means a new problem but still.

And my opinion is... Wally and Donna are both going through a hard time and Wally is having to accept that his life is fundamentally different from the previous world he knew, that he can’t just badger people into returning things to the way they were -- especially Linda, who he loves but it’s a very one-sided relationship as a result of the parallel universe paradox and stuff. It makes sense to me that in a ploy to gain some sense of control over that, he and Donna both would try to take fate in an unexpected direction, into their own hands. 

But making it a love triangle with Roy just kinda keeps my eyes firmly rolled into the back of my skull. 

I overall like Lilith, Dick, Garth, and Karen’s development and characterization in this issue. I think they’re taking Lilith in interesting directions and I’m really curious about what her omen means for the future, since apparently there’s a traitor among them. And they set up plenty of reasons for various members to be that traitor in this issue but I can’t help but assume already that it’s going to end up being a twist. Good twist or not remains to be seen. 

IDW’s Transformers: Salvation (2017) John Barber, Livid Ramondelli

I’m going to be completely “original” here and say that I’m not a fan of Ramondelli’s at for the various Transformers comics. i know! I know. Shocking, never said before, completely going against the general fandom consensus. I’m such a brave soul. I know. 

Okay, joking aside though... I didn’t think the art was bad in this one-shot. Actually! I’d argue a lot of it was even good. He may not be my favorite artist and I’ll think that his colo gradients are butt ugly most of the time, but there was better handled action sequences than usual, the characters looked like they had weight, and we even got a range of expressiveness in the characters that is... well, frankly, not usual for Ramondelli. 

So other than that shocking revelation, I thought Barber performed good once more on tying the TF universe together again, answering some prior plot points and nicely knotting off loose ends. Trypticon being a Titan is not the biggest revelation in the world, but the development of Sandstorm and the Dinobots was great, and I loved just how devious Starscream truly is under Barber’s pen even though I’ve fully been enjoying the characterization for him in Till All Are One. 

But the most important thing of all: SPARKLINGS. SPARKLINGS. All I’ve wanted for years is baby transformers so I am HAPPY BEYOND BELIEF. THEY’RE NO LONGER A DYING SPECIES AND THESE PRECIOUS BABIES COULD BE BORN WITHOUT EVER KNOWING THE CIVIL WAR AHHHHHHHH

DC’s Wonder Woman (2016-present) #24 Greg Rucka, Bilquis Evely, Romulo Fajardo Jr. 

WOW! I mean, just wow! What a resolution to everything. I have so many emotions for Diana, for Barbara Ann, for even Veronica Cale of all people. Etta and Steve were great, the art was amazing.

It’s just such a relief and such... honestly just an amazing feat that Greg Rucka is beginning to wrap up this just phenomenal run of Wonder Woman 

I really enjoyed how everything turned out and it was so remarkable to see Diana’s resolution to save Veronica but also to not turn her back on her friends and loved ones as well as the torment it is for Barbara to not be able to get into Themyscira after all her life’s work.

And I liked Diana’s assessment of Veronica at the end, it was true and also blunt to the point of cruelty. But fitting also. 

It’s amazing what a turn around I’ve personally felt when it comes to Veronica’s character because in all honesty I was not a fan of her most of the time in the preboot, but Rucka really has fleshed her out and done something unique with her perspective now. There is tragedy but there’s also less deniability for her fault in all of it. 

I’m sad to be coming toward Rucka’s end on the run, but I’m also so happy to see the love and passion he’s put into everything culminating to what it is now.

This is a genuinely hard choice but I think if I go by what tugged on my heartstrings the most, what gave me the most joy overall and just feelings unrelenting from start to finish, I would have to say that my pick of the week is All-New Wolverine. I adore this series and I couldn’t be happier with this issue and how they’re keeping my precious Marvel girls faaaaaar away from Secret Empire. A close second would be Wonder Woman but really I would happily recommend my entire pull this week. It was a geat week for comics.

But that’s just my opinion! I’d love to know your thoughts. Agree? Disagree? Think I missed something I should’ve picked up this week? I’d love to hear from you!

[renaroo]

Wednesday Roundup

*long deep sigh*

Okay, I said last week I was going to cancel all Marvel subscriptions in response to the bullcrap that was revealed in Secret Empire. And I continue to firmly stand on not supporting Marvel on any decisions involving that catastrophe. But I must go back on my word. After discussing with friends and others about the best course of action, I am afraid that Marvel set things up -- what with the anti-diversity talks just a few weeks ago -- to make it seem as though any boycotts that would come about due to the Hydra revelations last week would be scapegoated to the titles that are doing the opposite. So I want to support titles that do just that -- titles like Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur -- so long as their book isn’t involved with the crossover and if their authors don’t seem to have much involvement either. 

... also I pre-ordered Deadpool Vol. 6 for a specific reason that I’ll get into in the review.

All that out of the way, let’s get into the comics this week~

DC’s Batman Beyond, Marvel’s Deadpool, DC’s Detective Comics, Marvel’s Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur, DC’s Wonder Woman

DC’s Batman Beyond (2016- ) #7 Dan Jurgens, Bernard Chang, Marcello Maiolo

*long heralding sigh* We can’t leave well enough alone, can we, DC?

The continuity of Batman Beyond has somewhat been in the toilet from the start. Anything which got its start thanks to the awfulness that was Futures End was sort of doomed to that, especially since they were trying to make that the canon ending of the DCU proper, while at the same time drawing in elements from the animated series. 

This book, though, honestly gave me a lot of hope for what it was doing, which was to focus on the characters pretty specifically from the DCAU Batman Beyond cartoon and growing their stories and relationships rather than focusing on trying to put itself too immediately in the Earth Prime timeline. 

And those moments from this issue are great. We get more Max and Bruce interactions, which I love. We get some actual growth of Dana and Terry’s relationship. Curare is still one of my favorite villains. Matt’s increased role excites me.

And then we get this fucking page. 

I have a bad history with DC splash pages of “our family history” already (see any of my Batgirl (2009-2011) rants), but this one just goes straight for the throat. Sorry literally every woman in the Batfamily ever. I mean, usually at least Barbara gets a shoutout but not even that this time around. And then the worst offense is that Damian and Duke are both whitewashed. What the actual fuck.

This entire page is a disaster, especially since we are very obviously just using it to foreshadow that the leader of the League of Assassins has to do with Damian, because godforbid anyone but the biological child be treated special. 

Oh, sorry. Biological male child. Or else we’d see some plots with Helena Wayne, couldn’t have that. 

Oh, Batman Beyond. Why must you hurt me the way you do. I was enjoying you so much too. 

Marvel’s Deadpool (2015- ) Volume 6: Patience: Zero Gerry Duggan, Matted Lolli, Scott Koblish, Guru-eFX

So I’ve obviously made some exceptions to my Marvel rule and that is simply a case-by-case basis. There are stronger reasons for the other exception this week, Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur, which I would honestly be devastated if it was taken down because of this monumental grossness that is Marvel right now because it’s the epitome of everything that’s not the Secret Empire catastrophe.

The other is Deadpool because I pre-ordered this volume months ago and because Deadpool is just a weird exception of a comic to begin with. At least as Deadpool is written under Gerry Duggan and how these particular issues especially are written.

So yes, while I would recommend all the issues in this trade to comic fans, the issue I really bought this volume for is for a very personal reason: #20 is the issue dealing with suicide and mental illness and... as someone who struggles on this road in my own life, in both point of views we have here, I am... very particular about how these issues are approached. I hate the way it was handled in Robin (1993-2009), despise the way it was portrayed in All-Star Superman, I just honestly don’t feel like I’ve ever read a story -- especially in comics -- that spoke to me and made me feel like I benefited from it the way the comics were obviously trying to make me feel. 

Deadpool goes the most realistic route I’ve ever seen this handled. It’s about “death is permanent, so let’s make sure there’s nothing else you want to do first” It’s about helping someone out, giving them other things to focus on in the moment, giving them more to experience, and then knowing when professional help is needed, when you’re beyond your means. 

And it’s hard. Deadpool says it best -- unkilling someone is way harder. And I’ve never felt an issue strike such a cord with me before. 

Of course, that’s only one of several issues collected, and we finally get the climax and our answers with Madcap. The entire storyline was rediculous, dramatic, frightening, and any range of emotions between. A great story overall even if anything involving Hydra -- especially Bob -- inherently sickens me at this point. 

If you’re on that level with me on the Hydra stuff, I would recommend buying #20 on its own and then #25 to finish up the Deadpool 2099 story which, for me, had a good conclusion to it. 

But yeah. This was a splurge purchase at least partially because... I have a feeling I won’t be picking up the next few trades of Deadpool flat out, honestly. Lots of Secret Empire this way comes. And I’m not happy about it. Hopefully I can pick up Vol. 8 or 9 and we can get back to Deadpool and Ellie and Preston and everything that makes me love this comic to begin with. 

DC’s Detective Comics (2016- ) #955 James Tynion IV, Marcio Takara, Marcello Maiolo

CASS HAS A GIRLFRIEND BALLERINA AND SHE APOLOGIZED AND ALL IS GOOD AND NOT AN ORPHAN ANYMORE BE STILL MY HEART

OKAY. So that’s out of my system. Last time (two weeks ago) I went into a full on rant about how there are things I Love about Tynion’s writing -- relationships, character building, the sense of family, understanding how to write Cass the way few writers other than her creators have truly gotten -- and things I Hate about Tynion’s writing -- an overall lack of build up for payoff, weak plots, a bit of a ‘break the status quo’ mentality despite a lack of building said status quo -- there are Things. And I can make entire essays about how I feel he needs to grow as a writer especially when it comes to writing mysteries which is what Detective Comics should be at its core. 

I’m putting that aside for now -- still there, I still have my issues with this arc -- but this issue is... It’s going to be a milestone. 

It’s going to be a milestone in bringing Cass’ character back into full form. And I loved every moment of it. The pacing was still.... ehhh. Could’ve probably benefited more from immediately starting with the flashback explaining Cass’ recovery and reintroducing our ballerina girlfriend, then launching into the present time uninterrupted. Maybe show Cass rescuing the others from their naked Hell, because as far as I can tell that just means we’re going to have another disorganized flashback in the next issue which isn’t making me excited because that should be the finale to all of this. 

Yatta yatta. Critical lenses are on, everyone, don’t worry. I’m still the Rena you know.

I just don’t care as much because those things I Love that I mentioned? They where here and they were with my favorite characters. And ALSO???? Tynion planted the seed of the ballerina and Cass living above the studio many issues ago??? And then actually gave us payoff for it??? What is this, a personal letter to me?

Nah, can’t be. No windows were broken in this issue.

I enjoyed myself is what I’m getting at. It’s amazing how I can be really irritated with Detective Comics and then all the sudden it drags me right back in with an issue that gets me just right. 

Marvel’s Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur (2015- ) #18 Amy Reeder, Brandon Montclare, Natacha Bustos, Tamra Bonvillain

So i’ve dropped some books in my personal Marvel ban, and I will be avoiding anything remotely related to Secret Empire like the plague, and I still encourage other people to do the same. But there are some books, some ideas, some diversity in the Marvel lineup that for me are simply just too important to throw out with the bathwater. 

Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur is 1000% a book I want to survive Marvel’s current tirefire. 

And since Marvel curiously made it clear that they were going to throw their diversity titles under the bus and blame them for any loss of sales this summer just before knowingly putting out a terribly controversial book, I can’t help but allow my suspicions to rise. 

Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur continues to be the best of the genre and the first book I recommend to kids -- which is something I do quite a lot. If you’ve been following my blog for a while you’ll know that I am very active in trying to get new, young readers into comics and have personally given out comics to kids in and out of the country. It’s something that is very important to me, having been raised with comics myself. 

So I am very happy to go back on my word for titles like Moon Girl and I’m so glad that a book so inviting and loving is around in the disaster that is the larger comic landscape for the Marvel Universe. 

DC’s Wonder Woman (2016- ) #21 Greg Rucka, Liam Sharp, Laura Martin

Considering how vocally I have been annoyed with the “B story” of this Wonder Woman run thus far, it’s a real relief to finally be able to say, as the storylines converge and we come sadly closer to the end of Rucka’s return to Wonder Woman, finally this slow burn has been worth it. And this moment I chose in particular -- Veronica Cale at long last taking Diana’s hand -- is so built up, is so necessary that it makes everything truly feel like it’s deservedly come full circle.

And Cale’s motivations in Rebirth fit so much better than they did in the Post-Crisis comics, it makes everything about this confrontation and this conclusion worthwhile.

Though there’s still a lot to be fixed in terms of Rucka’s more... tone deaf treatment of earlier racist tropes and so on that have proven to be basically completely unnecessary to this plot. That’s a pretty gross road to end up going down for no reason.

And finally we get to Ares. And maybe it’s the animal lover in me but I’m like “those poor Dobermen, hope they still have a home with Cale after the twin gods’ souls are released. 

... Look we all know I’m going to pick Detective Comics for my pick of the week this week because I’m a sheep and it hit everything I wanted from an issue of Detective Comics including giving us more Cass-Ballerina action and having a fanciful callout to Phantom of the Opera that made my heart soar. 

But I would, for this week, also like to provide a secondary pick for Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur for being not just a fantastic book (which it is) but continuing to provide a bright light at the end of a very, very long and dark tunnel that is the Marvel Universe. It is the Marvel of tomorrow if they could just stop with their bullshit. Which, because it’s Marvel, they probably won’t. 

But these are just my thoughts and opinions, I’d love to hear from all of you. What did you think of this week? Any good titles I’m not picking up? I’d love to hear from you