Submitted by Mike 'Ace' Maillaro on Tue, 04/25/2017 - 07:30
Welcome back to Critical Blast’s weekly look at what new comics you should check out each week. Just a warning, I make these picks pretty much a week BEFORE I actually get to read any of these comics, so if something is a stinker, I take no blame on that. Let's get to it!
So here's where the situation stands in the Marvel Comics Universe, vis a vis their crossover event, Secret Empire:
Captain America is the bad guy and, for all intents and purposes, has always been the bad guy since his origin. He's an agent of Hydra, the outfit that has ever been looking to dominate the world because dominating the world is a cool job to have.
Of course, Captain America has not always been the bad guy. You weren't reading about the adventures of a secret double agent doing deep cover for a villainous entity while he stood up for the Red, White, and Blue. The Marvel Universe reality was rewritten (I won't delve into the *cough* technical details; it's a cosmic entity that can rewrite history/reality on a whim. Let's just call it "magic" and move on) such that Steve Rogers' past was changed, aligning events to have him brought up the Hydra Way. Nurture beats Nature in this scenario. So, presto: Captain Hydra.
Remember how upset the world got when it was revealed that Captain America had always been a Manchurian Avenger in the employ of Hydra? That quickly subsided when it was revealed that Kobik, a being created from pieces of the Cosmic Cube, had rewritten reality to make America's beloved Steve Rogers into a traitor from childhood. She'd basically done a "Red Son" on old winghead even as she helped Maria Hill create the idyllic village / supervillain prison known as Pleasant Hill, where villains had their realities changed to become law-abiding Mayberry citizens.
Having bided his time until this moment, Captain America puts all his tactical skills to bear in SECRET EMPIRE, organizing a three-pronged attack that is designed to allow him to take over.
DC Comics and IDW Publishing have had their share of property marriages in the past. I was particularly fond of the Star Trek / Legion of Super-Heroes crossover, as it seemed a natural given that both teams were future-oriented, making it easier to breach dimensions and meet.
It's a little trickier with the pairing of Star Trek and the Green Lantern Corps, but writer Mike Johnson is making it work.
STRANGER WORLDS continues the story begun with THE SPECTRUM WAR, which found Hal Jordan and a handful of other ring-bearers (not all of them green) lose the fight against Nekron and get ejected from their reality just before it collapsed entirely to destruction. They emerged in the STAR TREK universe, which means they didn't just swap realities, but they time-traveled into the future. However, without a power battery, all the ring bearers soon find their energy waning, and there's no way to recharge their rings.
Climb in and buckle up, boys and girls. This is the event we've been waiting to kick off ever since DC kicked off their Rebirth line with REBIRTH #1. That ended with Batman finding a yellow smiley-face button with a blood streak that was immediately familiar to comics fans as the iconic badge (and plot driver device) of WATCHMEN.
For months now (years, it seems) that plot has been left out there, supplemented in drips and drabs in various titles. But now, the team of Tom King and Jason Fabok have honed in on the main mystery, and it's a fun ride!
Yeah, I'm going to be walking smack through spoiler territory here, so you've been warned.
Submitted by Mike 'Ace' Maillaro on Tue, 04/18/2017 - 10:42
Welcome back to Critical Blast’s weekly look at what new comics you should check out each week. Just a warning, I make these picks pretty much a week BEFORE I actually get to read any of these comics, so if something is a stinker, I take no blame on that. Let's get to it!
So if you've been paying attention to S.J. Mitchell's coverage of the SUPERMAN:REBIRTH storyline, you should have had all your questions answered as to how Clark Kent and Suerpman can both be running around together -- particularly after the Superman we've been reading about lo these past several years just died!
And since that Superman died, you'd think Supergirl would be more than a little suspicious about this Superman, whom she welcomes with open arms, begs to speak in Kryptonian with (because Kryptonian doesn't have contractions, except it totally does every time they speak it), and spends family time with like a good cousin-once-removed with Superman's son, Jon. You'd think she would, but yet she's not.
Conveniently, today happens to be a Kryptonian holiday (Kal must have had a copy of Poor Rich-Ard's Almanac tucked into that rocket of his), the "Day of Truth," and so he's vowed to tell Supergirl the truth about what happened to him.
Thomas Pavitte's MARVEL: SPIDER-MAN 1000 DOT-TO-DOT BOOK makes anyone able to render drawings of their favorite Spider-man characters. Featuring twenty scenes -- including a double-sized spread pull-out -- and printed on heavy stock, single-sided pages, each of these pages will keep you busily entertained for hours.
Yes, hours. Did I fail to mention there are 1000 connections in each drawing?
Now, any kid who's done dot-to-dots before can tell you -- the more dots you have, the more detailed your finished drawing will be. So you can imagine the kind of results you'll get with 1000 dots! The good news is that the pages are huge -- 9 1/2" by 14" -- so there's a large canvass to work on. The bad news is that, well, there are 1000 dots! And since some of the lines trace back over themselves, there's a handy color-coding in place so that you don't get lost.
Submitted by Mike 'Ace' Maillaro on Tue, 04/11/2017 - 14:24
Welcome back to Critical Blast’s weekly look at what new comics you should check out each week. Just a warning, I make these picks pretty much a week BEFORE I actually get to read any of these comics, so if something is a stinker, I take no blame on that. Let's get to it!
Marv Wolfman and George Perez's NEW TEEN TITANS: THE JUDAS CONTRACT is one of the seminal stories in comics history. Not just a four-part tale, the story served as an endcap to a long-running plot, revealing that one of the Teen Titans had actually been operating undercover as a spy for Deathstroke, the Terminator.
While this story couldn't be captured accurately in the DC Animated Universe, writer Ernie Altbacker and director Sam Liu came as darn close as they could to the feel of that story and its touchstones, while also staying true to the established DCAU continuity.
The film opens with a vignette of the original Teen Titans: Robin (the Dick Grayson incarnation), Speedy and Kid Flash, with Beast Boy and Bumblebee taking the places of Aqualad and Wonder Girl. The scene details their first encounter with Starfire as they find her in battle with aliens. It's also the first kiss between Robin and Starfire, since Tamaranians absorb language through kissing.
Submitted by S.J. Mitchell on Fri, 04/07/2017 - 13:43
Now that the Superman: Reborn story is behind us, things begin to settle down at the Kent farm in Hamilton County. Until Batman and Robin show up.
***WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD***
Clark Kent is enjoying his family life as he pauses from his chores to watch Jonathan and Lois go about their day. When a storm begins to brew, Mr. Cobb (a local dairy farmer), asks Lois if she'd send his grandaughter home. He kindly suggests that she get Jonathan inside to take shelter as well. Lois clearly wants to talk about what just occurred but Clark cuts her off and says even though things have changed, they'll figure things out as a family.
Here's the problem I have with comic books that are based on an ongoing television show: you can pretty much rest assured that nothing dramatic is going to happen, because that would shake up the television series -- and no television series is going to let their fans get confused because of an event that happened extra-canonically in a funny book. Which tends to suck all the suspense out of things.
RIVERDALE takes a slightly different approach, telling not just stories that happen in the same universe as the television show, but which happen in-between episodes, acknowledging directly things scenes that we've watched and then expanding on them. Think of it as "the stuff that happened during the commercial breaks."
Submitted by Mike 'Ace' Maillaro on Tue, 03/28/2017 - 07:58
Welcome back to Critical Blast’s weekly look at what new comics you should check out each week. Just a warning, I make these picks pretty much a week BEFORE I actually get to read any of these comics, so if something is a stinker, I take no blame on that. Let's get to it!
Submitted by Mike 'Ace' Maillaro on Sat, 03/25/2017 - 06:00
From ABC News:
Last month, Marvel set the internet ablaze after sharing a tweet with just four simple words.
"GENERATIONS – coming Summer 2017," was posted on Feb. 16, along with a picture that led to far more questions than answers.
An Alex Ross art piece had the likes of Steve Rogers and Sam Wilson both sporting Captain America garb, Peter Parker and Miles Morales wearing Spider-Man gear, and Logan and X-23 in the classic Wolverine yellow and blue -- wait, what?! Wolverine died in 2014!
Submitted by S.J. Mitchell on Wed, 03/22/2017 - 08:22
As we continue coverage of the SUPERMAN: REBORN storyline that has been occuring in the pages of SUPERMAN and ACTION COMICS, the story heats up in the third act by resurrecting a lost hero.
SUPERMAN #19 takes us back to the first few moments when Jonathan was taken by Mxyzptlk. It's sort of what you'd see on a CW show where they give an intro such as 'previously on (insert show title here)'. While this is sort of irritating for those of us who HAVE been following along, this helps readers who are jumping in understand what's happening. However, when panel real estate is so limited in comic books these days...there's nothing more frustrating that having that space wasted on story you've already read.
Submitted by Mike 'Ace' Maillaro on Tue, 03/21/2017 - 07:45
Welcome back to Critical Blast’s weekly look at what new comics you should check out each week. Just a warning, I make these picks pretty much a week BEFORE I actually get to read any of these comics, so if something is a stinker, I take no blame on that. Let's get to it!
Submitted by Mike 'Ace' Maillaro on Tue, 03/14/2017 - 10:43
Welcome back to Critical Blast’s weekly look at what new comics you should check out each week. Just a warning, I make these picks pretty much a week BEFORE I actually get to read any of these comics, so if something is a stinker, I take no blame on that. Let's get to it!
Submitted by S.J. Mitchell on Mon, 03/13/2017 - 15:18
The first week of March kicked off the Superman Reborn storyline that crosses over between SUPERMAN and ACTION COMICS. If you're looking to get up to speed, make sure you take a look at our Superman #18 coverage before reading on.
Caution: MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD
ACTION COMICS #975 starts off with Superman and Lois Lane frantically looking for their son, Jonathan, who has recently disappeared. Flying off to Metropolis to investigate the apartment of Clark Kent for clues they discover the place is empty, with the exception of the refrigerator and cupboards. Strangely they're stocked full of junk food.
Submitted by Mike 'Ace' Maillaro on Tue, 03/07/2017 - 08:40
Welcome back to Critical Blast’s weekly look at what new comics you should check out each week. Just a warning, I make these picks pretty much a week BEFORE I actually get to read any of these comics, so if something is a stinker, I take no blame on that. Let's get to it!
