Tag Archives: Comics

May 13, 2015

Mystery Comic 3: War Heroes 1

War Heroes is a six part mini-series written by Mark Millar (writer of Wanted and Kick-ass). It was released in 2008 by image comics. First of all let me say that image comics does a great job with this issue in presentation, not only does this book have a nice hard stock cover but it also doesn’t have any ads within the story. At first I thought it was a fluke but there really aren’t any ads in the book until the end, and even then there isn’t an ad on the back cover. I can’t remember the last book I have seen without an ad on the back cover! Hell DC is even putting ad banners on the front cover of a lot of their books recently so it’s nice to see a company give a shit out their product looks.

So the basic premise of this book is an alternative world take on the war on terror. Past the 9/11 attacks the USA has been attacked several more time in increasingly devastating attacks, starting with an attack on the capital. As the attacks escalate the response of the USA has increased as well. Martial law was declared after the being attacked in Washington DC and within six weeks the USA has invaded Iran. Later the USA has sent responses to Syria and other Middle Eastern countries. While increases in recruits occur after every attack the war is extremely unpopular and the government is having a hard time getting new recruits. In an effort to get new recruits the government has been giving new recruits super soldier drugs which give them comic book like super powers. Super strength, speed, and flight are included in some of the powers. The book ends with a small glimpse of several new recruits on their last evening at home before being sent to boot camp.

So it’s a little disconcerting that the first page has a Muslim with a bomb strapped to his chest blowing up Washington DC. That being said this book is definitely not pro-war propaganda such as Frank Miller’s Holy Terror. There is clearly some stuff going on under the surface and it is apparent that some of these attacks on US soil were clearly inside jobs.

“Even black Tuesday when two and a half thousand Americans died in three separate chemical attacks, failed to bring the country back together like the president expected”.

Clearly more is going on and I’m assuming it gets into all of this throughout the series. I have been a big fan of Millar’s work on other series and this seems on par with some of his other works. He often likes to mix genres and which comic books. This really fits along those lines of what if soldiers had super powers. He’s done stories like this before with Superman Red Son, Wanted, Kick-ass, and Jupiter’s Legacy. It’s repeating himself for sure but he also does a good job and each one of these stories feels pretty unique and deals with different issues.

It wasn’t enough really to peak my interest into reading more but it does seem like an interesting story.

I did some digging on wikipedia and this series is famous for never completing. It was suppose to be a 6 part series but ended abruptly after only 3 issues without a conclusion (it made it on Newsarama’s list of Comic Book Cold Cases). The first issue was released in June of 2008, the second in September of 2008, and the third in October of 2009. The series was optioned by Sony in 2008 for the film rights but being its been 6 years since any word we can safely call this series dead.

Leave a comment | tags: book club, Comics, Comics books, comixology, image, image comics, mark millar, mystery comics, war heroes, woot, woot.com | posted in Mystery Comics

May 11, 2015

Catwoman 75th Anniversary

By Jasomania

This year marks the 75th Anniversary of Catwoman. She made her first appearance in Batman issue 1 which came out in April 24th, 1940. In her 75 year history a lot has happened to Catwoman and there have been a lot of interpretations of the character. She’s had three on going comic book series, been in TV (animated and live action), and in two different movies! So in honor of her 75th birthday (I saw she doesn’t look a day past 60!) we are going to go over 9 facts about her you may not know.

1) Catwoman has been Portrayed in Film by TWO Academy Award Winning Actresses

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Not only have both Halle Berry (Catwoman 2004) and Anne Hathaway (The Dark Knight Rises 2012) have both portrayed Catwoman and won Academy Awards but Michelle Pfeiffer (Batman Returns 1992) has been nominated for Academy Award as well. Julie Newmar (Batman TV 1966) has won a Toni award for best actress in a musical and Eartha Kitt (Batman TV 1966) has won a Daytime Emmy for Best Actresses. Lee Meriwether (Batman TV 1966) has been nominated for two Golden Globes and one Emmy. So far the only Catwoman actress not to win or be nominated for a major award has been Gotham’s Camren Bicondova, but seeing as she is only 15 I don’t think it will be long before she joins this list as well.

2) Catwoman was Ranked on IGN’s top Heroes AND Villains List

Is Catwoman a hero or a villain? During IGN.com’s 2009 rundown of the greatest heroes and villains Catwoman ranked 20th on the list of greatest heroes and 11th on the list of greatest villains. So it seems our femme fatale is a little bit of both, as Selina Kyle says in The Dark Knight Rises, she’s adaptable.

3) Catwoman has been a Member of the Justice League

In 2011 the reboot of DC Comics entire line of comic books was centered around the Justice League comic book which started at the origin of the team. After some misadventures Amanda Waller of the shady government agency A.R.G.U.S. decided America needed their own Justice League in case something were to happen and the original Justice League went rogue. This lead to the creation of the Justice League of America whose members included: Steve Trevor, Martian Manhunter, Green Arrow, Hawkman, the new Green Lantern Simon Baz, Stargirl, Katana, Vibe, and Catwoman. Each member was meant to counter a specific member of the original Justice League with Catwoman on the team as direct counter to Batman.

4) She was Once a Flight Attendant

Comic books be crazy yall. I was unaware of this but going through the DC Wiki there was an origin story of Catwoman in which she used to be a flight attendant but during a crash got amnesia which lead her to her life as a criminal. You can’t make this shit up. I’ll let the DC Wiki tell the story since it is not available digitally and I wasn’t able to read the issue first hand.

“When Catwoman leaves her hideout, she finds Batman and Robin waiting for her. They try to give chase, but she throws a box at them with angry cat inside it. Batman runs towards falling debris, and Catwoman realizes he will be killed. Instead of escaping, she leaps to save Batman’s life and gets hit in the head by a brick.

They wake her up in the Batcave, where she feverishly screams about airline rules. It’s revealed that Selina Kyle was a stewardess, who fell out of a crashing plane and got amnesia. Kyle is horrified to hear that she’s become a criminal in her amnesiac state. Batman asks about her obsession with cats, and she explains that her father used to own a pet store. He taught her all about cats, and she subconsciously remembered that through her amnesia.”

5) On Earth-2 She is Married to Batman and They Have a Child

Yes its true! Gotham’s favorite on again off again couple had a love child! Well, technically this takes place in an alternative reality, I tried to avoid dipping into the Elseworlds stories of Catwoman but I can’t avoid this one. The character of the Huntress has grown in popularity and had her own mini-series and ongoing series in the new 52. She has appeared as the main star of the short lived Birds of Prey TV Series along with a few guest appearances in the CW’s hit Arrow.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

There are two versions of this character, the first is Helena Bertinelli, the daughter of a crime boss that shows up in the main continuity stories of DC Comics. Bertinelli is the version they used for the TV Series Arrow. The other version is Helena Wayne, the daughter of Catwoman and Batman. Helena is the version that is used for the TV Series Birds of Prey. Helena is also the version of Huntress that was used in the recent on going comic series Worlds’ Finest which was centered around her and Powergirl (Earth-2’s version of Supergirl).

6) Catwoman Has her Heart Removed by Hush

The popular villain Hush returned during “Heart of Hush” story arc that took place during the larger Batman RIP story. In this story Hush performs plastic surgery on himself in order to make him self look identical to Bruce Wayne. His plan is to kill the actual Bruce Wayne and live the rest of his days off of the Wayne fortune. During a scuffle with Catwoman she tears his bandages to reveal his new face and give away his plan. He manages to subdue Catwoman and removes her heart.

Batman tracks down Hush who uses a paralyzing gas and reveals his big plan. Batman is able to over come the gas and eventually over take Hush.

Batman gets Catwoman’s heart back to Doctor Mid-nite and he is able to return her heart back into her body. He warns her however that she may not ever return to her former level of physical prowess again. However in true Catwoman fashion Selina enlists an all-star team of friends (Oracle, Holly Robinson, Poison Ivy, Harley Quinn and Slam Bradley) to find and drain all of Hush’s bank accounts leaving him penniless.

7) Catwoman is Currently the Head of a Mafia Family

During the year long Batman Eternal comic event it was revealed that Catwoman is the daughter of mafia boss Rex Calabrese. Rex is a new character who was the cell mate of James Gordon who was in jail while being tried for murder. Rex had been in prison for a some period of time and used to be known as “The Lion” due to the scars on his face and his sharpened teeth. Catwoman breaks into Blackgate to speak with Rex where he tells her to seize power and unite the crime families of Gotham under her leadership.

Selina’s crime boss story picks up in the on going Catwoman series starting with issue 35.

8) Catwoman has a Side-kick Catgirl

In Batman issue 695 Catwoman steals the contents of a safe belonging to the Falcone crime family. When she returns home she finds Kitrina, a teenaged escape artist and Carmine Falcone’s long lost daughter, breaking into her apartment.

Selina leaves Kitrina bound in a locked room and calls Batman to her house in order to turn her over to the police, but discovers that Kitrina had managed to free herself. This impresses Selina, who had tied up Kitrina using an “inescapable” knot that Bruce had shown her years earlier.Following a massive battle with Black Mask and his henchmen, Selina agrees to take on Kitrina as her new sidekick, Catgirl.

During the legendary story by Frank Miller, the Dark Knight Returns, Carrie Kelly took up the mantle of Robin. Well in its sequel the Dark Knight Strikes Again Carrie Kelly has ditched her role as Robin and continued her work under the title of Catgirl. In the Miller-verse Selina Kyle exists and is the Madam at a brothel, having long retired as her role as Catwoman.

9) Catwoman has a Sister Named Maggie

Selina Kyle’s parents both died pretty grisly deaths (her mother committed suicide and father died of alcohol poisoning) while Selina and her sister Maggie were young. Maggie went to an orphanage and was quickly adopted while Selina grew up on the streets. The two lead pretty different lives and while Selina entered the criminal world her sister Maggie became a nun. Selina’s criminal activities have had a big impact on Maggie in that she was at one point kidnapped and beaten by Black Mask. Things get worse for Maggie Black Mask then forces Maggie to eat her own husbands eyes.

Selina does get revenge however and kills Black Mask, shooting him in the head. Maggie however goes insane and is committed to a mental institution. She later escapes and takes on the villainous persona of Sister Zero after killing a nun and using her nun-tools as weapons. Sister Zero then hunts down Selina and attempts to kill her believing that her soul has been taken over by a Cat Demon.

That’s it folks! I hope you enjoyed and maybe learned something new about every ones favorite feline femme fatale!

Leave a comment | tags: anne hathaway, batman, batman returns, Cats, catwoman, catwoman 75, catwoman 75th, Comic Books, Comics, DC, dc comics, gotham, maggie kyle, selina kyle, the dark knight rises, the more you know | posted in Cats, Comic Books

May 8, 2015

DC July Variant Covers: Teen Titans Go!

By Jasomania

DC continues their theme variant covers in July (2015) with Teen Titans Go! There will be 23 total spanning across various books. This is going to take place once the Convergence Event is over so there are a lot of new titles joining the fold this time.

Leave a comment | tags: Comic Book Covers, Comic Books, comic covers, Comics, cover art, dc comics, DC Variants, July, July 2015, July Covers, Teen Titans, Teen Titans Go!, variant covers, variants | posted in Comic Books, Variant Covers

May 5, 2015

Mystery Comic 2: Fantastic Four 383

By Jasomania

This week’s comic is a classic example of the early 90’s. There is a ton of shit going on and every one is saying out thinking out loud everything that is happening around them. So this comic starts off with a sub note that Reed Richards is dead. Now in the comic world a death is held with a grain of salt. Jean Grey has been known to die at least 20 different times, so we won’t take his death too seriously. Even this comic doesn’t seem to bother with taking his death seriously, this is the first page.

“The apparent death of their leader, Reed Richards”. I mean come on at least pretend to commit to this!

Any ways this is my first Fantastic Four comic that I have ever read. I am some what familiar with the characters in that I have watched both of the shitty movies they released in the 2000’s. I don’t know why the thing is wearing a helmet the entire time though and I can’t explain Sue Storms weird boob window in her costume.

“The apparent death of their leader, Reed Richards”. I mean come on at least pretend to commit to this!

At first I was going to let this slide, since I don’t know what is going on and what the Skrull are and what they have done. But then I thought about it and this guy’s name is Devastator and he flies around in the Death Cruiser, not exactly a name you use if your mission is peace. He says in another panel that his “scared duty is to eliminate any life form capable of waging war”. Wait what? CAPABLE of waging war? So basically any civilization capable of hurting one another. Any ways this side story goes on the entire comic. This all occurs on the same planet that the Fantastic Four are on so you are probably assuming that they will get involved in this in some way but they don’t. This story ends with Paibok, who is the king of the skrulls beating out Devastator and saving the planet (yay!). While this sounds well and good who really gives a shit, this has nothing to do with the Fantastic Four who are spending the entire book trying to leave the planet.

So I guess the main story is that of the Fantastic Four trying to escape imprisonment. It’s not really clear why they are imprison but for whatever reason it seems that it occurred around the same time Reed Richards “apparent” death. So it’s the Thing, Sue Storm, and The Human Torch along with female Skrull who probably fucked the Torch (I’m not making that up they infer that they boned). So that’s straightforward enough right? Wrong. The skrull woman is also preggers and apparently skrulls are only able to have a baby with the assistance of some device. So after they break out of prison they have to break into a hospital to get said device.

So after helping the skrull woman get the birthing device they grab a space ship and GTFO. That’s pretty much the end of the Fantastic Four side of the story. I did very much enjoy the hilarious references to pop culture that the Thing makes. I made up a montage of them.

That brings us to the last part of our story which is probably the strangest. Which is the fight between Franklin Richards and Huntra. They don’t tell you who either of them are or where/when any of this is taking place. So checking on comicvine Franklin is Richard and Sue Storm’s child and is a omega level mutant. I think it’s still taking place in the future since he appears to be grown and the Fantastic Four don’t seem to be that old, I have no idea though, this is just a guess. Any ways they are fighting off and on throughout the entire book for no explained reason. It ends with a cliffhanger that apparently Franklin Richards has to kill his own mother for some unexplained reason.

And that’s pretty much the comic!

There was one strange thing I noticed in the letters section in the back and that is that on the letters they had the full address of every one who sent in a letter. Which is a pretty terrible decision on Marvel’s part seeing as they are pretty much all from kids.

And to end our report we have my favorite ads from the 90’s which include LCD video games, Huffy bike, and some Sega video games.

Comic 2 - 3

1 Comment | tags: 90's Comics, book club, Comic Books, Comics, fantastic four, fantastic four 383, Marvel, Marvel Comics, mystery comics, old comics, woot, woot.com | posted in Mystery Comics

May 3, 2015

Top 6 Killer Catwoman Moments

By Jasomania

In honor of Catwoman’s 75th Anniversary (who’s first appearance was on April 24th, 1940) DC All Access has released the following video with some her best moments.

Leave a comment | tags: Cats, catwoman, catwoman 75, catwoman 75th, Comic Books, Comics, DC, dc all access, dc comics, st. jason, youtube | posted in Cats, Comic Books

April 27, 2015

Mystery Comic 1: Detective Comics: Batman – 734

By Jasomania

This is a great comic to start with because it’s a batshit (pun intended) crazy. First of all its part 20 of the of 88 “No Man’s Land” crossover event that took place during the entire year of 1999. Let’s take a minute to let that marinate. There was a crossover Batman event in 1999 that took place across 13 titles and various one shot comics. So if you were trying to follow along in this series back in 1999 you would have had to buy 88 issues costing roughly $175 dollars. Even though that’s over an entire year that’s a hell of a lot of comics if you want to get the entire series. It also means is confusing as shit if you were to be a new reader trying to get into a certain comic.

It’s intimidating enough when you see a number like 734 next to a book. If you are new to comics you are going to ask yourself, “Do I need to read 733 issues to know what’s going on?” Not only that but this is part two of a two part story, “No problem!” you exclaim, “I’ll just buy Detective Comics 733 and all will be well.” So you go to Detective comics 733 but when you do its list as “Crisis of Faith” not “Mark of Cain”. No “Mark of Cain” part 1 is in Batman Comics issue 567. And not only is Detective Comics 733 not the first part of the story you were looking for but it also is part 16 of No Man’s Land not part 19. So within one month you have lost three parts of the No Man’s Land arc.

This is a perfect example of why it’s so hard to break into comics if you are an outside reader. Of course with the internet its easier now to find out what is happening with comics month to month but it’s still pretty damn difficult. If comic book companies are scratching their head to why people don’t buy comics this serves as a huge example. First it’s a huge crossover that involves close to 100 books, second they are spread out randomly across 13 titles, and third within a year afterward none of the events of No Man’s Land even mattered. I get the need to keep the status quo when it comes to a character like Batman. You can’t really kill or injure characters and so that happens the impact that stories are going to have. But to have an event like this that last an entire year and involve so man titles have all most no lasting impact in the Batman or DC universe, its little wonder how this kind of thing can lose more readers than it gains. It’s another example of the comic industry desperate for sales squeezing as much money from their base as possible rather than do something that might gain new readers.

Ok enough rant back to the comic itself.

So needless to say it’s a little confusing coming straight into this book. You get a one sentence blurb kind of describing what No Man’s Land is and then it jumps right in. Cain is trying to kill Commissioner Gordon and his daughter tackles him out a window to stop him. Batman saves the both of them holding on to Cain with a rope and Cain holding on to his daughter by the hands. He drops her and it picks up with Cassandra (his daughter) in a graveyard (hanging out not cause she’s dead) not exactly explaining how she survived the fall.

Batman then talks to Cassandra for a while (no explanation why or how he got there) and finds out that Cassandra can’t speak any language, she only knows the language of violence.

Are you shitting me? The language of violence… I know enough about Batman to know that Cassandra Cain later will become Batgirl. I have also read enough Batgirl that they use this whole she can’t speak thing for a while in the comics. It leads to interesting stories but she understands language she just can’t speak it. I don’t know how this kind of thing works but it seems to me if you can understand English perfectly you should be able to speak it to some extent. It lead to some interesting stories but they winded up dropping the whole thing by a very random contrived method. They had some random meta-human who we have never met and never see again. He has the ability to fix peoples brains and he happens to run into Cassandra, fix her brain, and leave. So from then on Cassandra can speak and write. It was a total cop out and you can tell it was only done because the writers were tired of skipping around how she couldn’t speak and picked an easy out. So knowing what I know about the character this whole section about Batman’s shock at her only knowing the language of violence is pretty lame.

Back to the story, Batman finds Cain and fights him while Cassandra dons a black mask and attacks/steals money from Two Face. It cuts back to the Batman/Cain fight and right before they land a devastating blow on each other Cassandra breaks up the fight distracting them by throwing the money she stole from Two Face at them. Then it cuts to Batman introducing Cassandra Cain to Barbra Gordon (Original Batgirl) who thanks her for saving her father and tells her she was once Batgirl. It ends with Batman saying to Oracle “Oracle. Call them”, with no explanation of what that means.

Over all it’s not a bad comic just really hard to follow completely out of context. I luckily had some history about No Man’s Land and Cassandra Cain but which helped a lot. Had you just picked this up without any context it would probably be a lot of non-sense. Overall I give it a 6 out of 10.

Here are a couple of my favorite vintage ads from it.

Leave a comment | tags: batgirl, batman, Comic Books, comic books and cats, Comics, dc comics, detective comics, mark of cain, mystery comics, no man's land, woot | posted in Mystery Comics

February 28, 2015

DC March Variant Covers: Movie Posters

By Jasomania

Usually these variant covers sell out pretty quickly but I got a feeling these Movie Poster variants won’t last the day they go on sale. I’m hoping to pick some up but more likely will be forced to get them off ebay.

Leave a comment | tags: 300, bill and ted, Comic Books, Comics, dc comics, free willy, harry potter, justice league, Magic Mike, Mashup, Movie Comics, Movie Posters, purple rain, the matrix, the wizard of oz, variant covers, Variant Month | posted in Variant Covers

February 22, 2015

DC February Variant Covers: Harley Quinn

By Jasomania

Who better to represent the month of love than every ones favorite Harley Quinn. In February DC Comics will be releasing a series of 22 covers. Also don’t forget to pick up the Harley Quinn Valentine’s Day Special as seen above.

Leave a comment | tags: Comic Books, Comics, dc comics, February Comics, Harley, Harley Quinn, Valentine's Day, Valentine's Special, variant covers | posted in Variant Covers

February 20, 2015

DC January Variant Covers: Flash 75th Anniversary

By Jasomania

January will have a new set of Variant Covers from DC. This months theme will be the 75th Anniversary The Flash and the scarlet speedstar will be photo-bombing some of the most iconic comic book covers of all time. Here are all 22 covers that will be out throughout January.