Friday, March 14, 2008

Things That Made Me Happy...

in my comics this week.

  • If you don't pay attention, you'll miss the cinematic visual scene transitions in Legion in the 31st Century; and that would be a shame.
  • I don't remember Paragon; did he actually appear before, or did he escape from Blockade Boy's blog...?
  • Woo @&#%ing woo. I love you, Etta.
  • I almost fainted for joy when I saw Catherine Colbert. Pity about what happens... .
  • Love the Kent's new apartment and its secret passage to the Conservatory.
  • That's not my whore, that's my accountant!
  • Dr. Fate cleans the courtyard.
  • Hey, who designed that Wonder Woman statue? Jack Kirby?
  • Kyle Rayner, Donna Troy, subtract Jason Todd, the Monitor, but add Harley Quin, Rookie Catwoman, Mary Marvel, Karate Kid, Triplicate Girl, Firestorm, and Veteran Atom... I'm not sure what Countdown's building toward, but it's great at building Heroclix teams!
  • Blue & Gold working with Hawkman & Green Arrow? This oughtta be good.
  • Thank you, Kurt, for showing Superman actually working on the serum; I've missed that.
  • OMAC-Alfred. Heh; sir, would you like some tea with your termination?
  • Wonder Woman starts dating; yay!
  • Nobody delivers good news like Dubbilex!
  • The Time-Stealers. Ah ha! Now we know...
  • Thank you, Kurt, for taking the time to show someone clobbering Hal Jordan.
  • Wait... is that the beginnings of the "Spectre Revenge Squad"?
  • The Daxamite Priest Elders of the Protonic Flame. I just love saying it.
  • How Ted Kord escapes a thousand OMACs.
  • Hey, look, we've reached that point again in a Judd Winick story where demons/aliens/monster show up completely out of the blue because he never knows what else to do with a plot!
  • "Yes. There are thorns." I love you, Wonder Woman.
  • The Phantom Stranger Showcase 2. Steep yourself in the madness.
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17 comments:

  1. SallyP3/14/2008 8:56 AM

    All excellent reasons for being happy with comics. You know what made ME happy? Power Girl's Cat!

    Oh, and Omac-Alfred. Heh heh. And the fact that Booster ALSO told Ted that he's smarter than Batman.

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  2. Anonymous3/14/2008 9:12 AM

    Paragon is back?? Libra, the Human Flame, and Paragon??? It's like a VH1 "celebreality" show for old villains; guys whose careers were over twenty years ago and more, suddenly showing up again. Give me a call when the Rainbow Archer, Anti-Matter Man, and the Lightning Master get here.

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  3. Anonymous3/14/2008 10:39 AM

    Paragon has actually popped up once before, shortly before the JLA became JLDetroit (maybe JLA 224?) I don't really remember the story, but I remember as a kid waiting for Paragon to pop up again. I just took 25 years for that to happen.

    Similarly, I was hoping that the Challengers of the Beyond storyline in Countdown, when they first entered the Microverse to search for Ray Palmer, would encounter the civilization the JLA discovered in JLA 213-216.

    I don't know why I like that era of the Justice League so much as the stories (upon rereading these days) aren't THAT good. Of course, I also think that the Giffen-Bierbaum era of Legion is the best Legion ever, so I may have no taste as other Legion fans have pointed out for years.

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  4. Anonymous3/14/2008 10:52 AM

    I don't know why I like that era of the Justice League so much as the stories (upon rereading these days) aren't THAT good.

    There was a JLA story arc from that period where the League fights a group of "Beast-Men", human beings turned into human-animal hybrids with accompanying powers but retaining their human intelligence. There was a great scene in this shortly-before-Crisis issue that illustrates how dark and disturbing comics were becoming: when confronted with a Whale-Man, Aquaman uses his aquatic telepathy to shut down his mind and leave him a vegetable. Brr.

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  5. Anonymous3/14/2008 3:09 PM

    Wonder Woman dating, fine. Wonder Woman dating NEMESIS, who has been consistenly portrayed in issues of Wonder Woman as an immature jackass and a sexist pig? Not so much.

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  6. Anonymous3/14/2008 3:46 PM

    Gail agrees with you. From a post she made at Scans Daily (sorry, I don't have a direct link to it):

    -----------
    Okay.

    First, I adore Bluefall and mean no disrespect to her. I actually agree with her that Diana, the Diana I believe in, would not fall in love with the Nemesis that has been portrayed recently. And you guys have been amazingly supportive of me and also didn't kill me even after my two issues of Teen Titans came out, when you had every legal and moral right to do so.

    Also, there was no editorial mandate. Not only has DC let me do everything I wanted to do (except use Rucka's great versions of the gods), they are actually modeling her appearances everywhere else to match more closely with my version of Diana. They couldn't be more supportive or less invasive.

    I think you guys are going to be surprised where this story goes, and I think it's going to make a lot of people go, "AHA!"

    I totally agree that the Suicide Squad Nemesis is the shiznit, and for me, that's who the character is. So there must be a reason for his recent behavior, and what that reason is goes to the very goshdarn core of both Tom and Diana in a way that I think could not BE more truthful and elegant.

    Believe me, I pondered about this a lot, too. I love Nemesis, I love Diana, but on the surface, I couldn't see where that was going for a while. Now, I think I know, and we're going to be seeing the truth of it very soon. It's pretty intense, I think.

    I also have to say, this scene is one of my favorites in the book so far, and this one page out of context I feel doesn't really capture the fun and discomfort of the scene. I hope people check out the whole thing in context for a bit better picture of what's truly starting, here.

    And finally, I have to say, Bernard Chang did an AMAZING job on the Khunds. I think he's just terrific.

    I love this book. Smile

    Best wishes always

    Gail

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  7. Marcos3/14/2008 5:42 PM

    Whole thread with above Awesimoness is here: http://community.livejournal.com/scans_daily/5147748.html?thread=188965220#t188965220

    Also, my favorite line was Superman to Paragon "I must not be as smart as I thought."

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  8. Rob Pugh3/14/2008 5:44 PM

    Line of the week, for me - "She watches the MTV."

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  9. Jeremy Rizza3/14/2008 8:52 PM

    "The Spectre Revenge Squad"?

    I'm picturing a line of scowling, burly men wearing green thongs with skulls-and-crossbones embroidered on the crotches. (But then, I'm always picturing that...)

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  10. Shamus3/15/2008 12:16 AM

    That new apartment doesn't feel like Superman. it feels like someone's fantasy if they had a chance to be Superman. Sorry to say but Superman was not just strong in the physical sense, but also in his very limited material needs, not to forget his spirit.

    Ok he is a fictional character. They reinvented him. Me no like.

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  11. Jacob T. Levy3/15/2008 12:23 AM

    Thank you, Kurt, for showing Superman actually working on the serum; I've missed that.

    Me, too! It was one of my favorite simmering subplots in the pre-Crisis background, and the one that made sure that even planet-juggling Superman wasn't actually omnipotent.

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  12. Anonymous3/15/2008 2:47 AM

    I loved the Paragon story when it first came out in the 1980's. I'm also a big fan of the Composite Superman, Super Skrull and Super Adaptoid. I'd be a fan of Amazo if I ever saw him used properly as a villain. He was good in JLA's Rock of Ages storyline and in Another Nail.

    It was one of Kurt Busiek's first stories.

    Here's a review of it, it is under the Justice League Task Force review, from Fanzing.

    http://www.fanzing.com/mag/fanzing24/jla.shtml

    A fanzing reporter later asked Kurt about the problems in the story and his response was how should I know, I wrote the thing in 1983 and haven't looked at it since.

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  13. Scipio3/15/2008 6:29 AM

    Shamus,

    I hear what you're saying.

    My view is Superman wouldn't do that for himself;

    he would do that for his family.

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  14. Anonymous3/16/2008 8:16 AM

    I was about to say the same thing. I suspect Clark Kent, bachalor, would have a very unassuming, spartan apartment.

    Though the Metropolis-to-Fortress teleporter does seem pretty pragmantic.

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  15. MaGnUs3/16/2008 10:31 PM

    I am the only one who is bothered by the fact that Daxam's portrayal has nothing to do with the Daxam shown in Sodam Yat's origin story published only a couple of months ago?

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  16. Tom Mulherin3/17/2008 2:15 PM

    Scipio,

    I assume you've heard by now, but something that should make you happy is that Congo Bill (as Congorilla) will be in James Robinson's new Justice League book!

    http://forum.newsarama.com/showthread.php?t=150409

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  17. Anonymous3/22/2008 9:58 AM

    The forgotten Paragon:
    "First Appearance: Justice League of America #224 (March 1984)"

    Ha! The issue-date would indicate a Conway-era one-shot character, thus, by definition, ACTUALLY A MARVEL CHARACTER, so he would have been a "character donation" that either you or Devon made a couple of years ago. So naturally nobody would remember him as a DC character.
    But I looked him up, and he's a very-early Kurt Busiek character, which spoiled my little joke right there. So, um, never mind.

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