Secret Six #6: WTF?!?!? The MAD HATTER?!??!?!?!??!?! He’s the one behind all this? I’m pretty disappointed by this, mostly because I only remember the Mad Hatter at the guy from the Batman TV series who had a hypnotic eye pop jack-in-the-box-like from his top hat. He seemed more goofy than mad. Maybe it was my attitude this week, but this was my first of the two “meh” titles I picked up. Normally, I like everything Gail Simone does, but too much time was spent on Deathlock, the least interesting of all the characters, Yeah, he gets to betray his friends and all, but the “I’m just being the scorpion” line rang so false, the way Catman told Batman that they were going to kill each other one day, weren’t they? For being such C-list characters, the Secret Six don’t lack in ego. C

Legion of Three Worlds #3: This issue has a HUGE cast that is almost impossible to follow unless one has been a fan of The Legion for the last two decades. But who cares?? Geoff Johns and George Perez have all the nuances down for long time Legion lovers to debate and spar over, while for the rest of us, they deliver an issue with no less than three goosebump-raising moments (especially the last on on the last page). Superboy-Prime, get ready to be spanked! A

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season Eight #22: The “meh” continues strongly in this issue, ironically called “Swell”. Don’t get me wrong – the banter between Kennedy and Satsu is right on the mark (especially, “Your eval’s SO getting a smiley face!”) but the main point of season eight is getting lost in all these side stories. The stories are great in and of themselves (the cartoon episode TOTALLY not included), but they don’t contribute to the tension I should be feeling by now. C+

Manhunter #38: The end. *single tear* A+

Secret Six #5: Bane is by and far becoming one of my favorite characters in this series. I know everyone thinks Deadpool is sexy and Catman has a great butt (he’s my number two, but not for his butt (Ragdoll is number three)), but Bane’s complexity makes everyone else look like the chorus line. He claims a moral superiority to his fellows and has a compassionate heart, but when he ripped Aaron’s neck apart, I was in love. A

Action Comics #873: Aaaah! “New Krypton”. Now I get it. I was disappointed that the main conflict of this arc – bringing the Kryptonians who murdered some Science Police officers to justice – wasn’t resolved, but now there’s a new Baddie on the solar block that will need to be dealt with eventually, which I find to be the greatest change to happen in the DCU in years. It’s easily worth years of stories and plots in the hands of a capable writer. Sadly, Kara got shafted again in terms of characterization. That poor girl hasn’t known a moment’s rest even since she died during Crisis on Infinite Earths. A-

Final Crisis #6: I’m hard-pressed to know if this was camp or kitsch or what. There
were the oddly out-of-place silver age super-science moments with the Inerton and Radion; and even more silver age “shouting my thoughts out so everyone knows what I’m doing in the panel” lines like “It might take the last of my magical energy but I think I can stop her!”. Then I counted FIVE plots to save the world going on all of which involve cosmic-level technology and evolution? And finally Brainiac 5′s warning about his sentence becoming meaningless ON PAGE ONE was at once incredibly precocious and ironically too late. As far as the image on the last page goes, how can ANYone take a death in the DCU to heart anymore? Said death will be undone as soon
as The Question sucks the Earth through the cosmic soup strainer and brings us to the Fifth World. Guaranteed. Last issue was so good, but this issue was an unreadable mess. Again. D+

X-Infernus #2: I have a horrible premonition that Marvel is setting up Pixie to be “Magik Lite”, and as much as I like her character, I don’t love her as much as I love Illyana. Putting Pixie in a position to be the next X-enchantress will make her “Magik Zero”, a disservice to both women. That aside, the action and stakes (saving Illyana and Pixie’s souls) are ratcheted up a notch. A

Getting ready for the holiday took me away from reviewing comics for a few weeks, so to catch up, here are my encapsulated opinions. Feel free to email me for deatils.

X-Infernus #1: Strong start with diabolical subplots. I’m hoping this leads to a reincarnation of The New Mutants. A

Dark Reign #1: Oh noes! Another event!! In its favor, however, is its short run (three months according to the checklist). Working against it is that it’s another event.

Secret Six #4: Simone’s idiom of gelling disparate elements borders on vaudeville at times, but it continues to intrigue. A-

Action Comics #872: “New Krypton” continues by adding more useless characters to the board (“Creature Commandos”? Really?) while finally touching the main conflict. B-

Final Crisis Revelation #4: DC’s treatise on the Nature of God is one of the most disconcerting comic read of the year. Loves it. A+

Final Crisis #5: DC’s Millennium + 20 years = Final Crisis #5.

Supergirl #36: The penultimate chapter of “New Krypton” finds Alura being a horrible mother and a krytpo-centered, myopic slattern. I wish this had actually happened back in chapter 3. A

Manhunter #37: While I normally don’t like “X years later” jumps in plots (the atrocious A.I. still haunts me), Andreyko’s jump gives me a sense of continuity that will extend beyond the last (next) issue. A+

Hellblazer #250: Old-fashioned holiday fun the way they used to do it in Hell. A

Wonder Woman #27: Gail Simone loves these characters as demonstrated by the rich textures and motivations and interactions she gives them. Her Genocide scares me way more than her Junior. A

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season Eight #20: Cool idea, but after the pointless “Return of Fray” storyline, do we really need another break from the Big Bad’s arc? My magic eight ball says, “Definitely not.” C+

Runaways #5: I’m starting to find the “the best way to end a conflict is to just end it” idiom to be a fun one. It let’s the story move on to more interesting problems. Other than that, not much happens. B

Thor #12: Loki continues to rise as my favorite transsexual villain as he and Hela make plans to rule everything. A+

X-Men NOIR #1: Ugh. They did it better on Smallville‘s “Noir” episode (and that sucked eggs).

Ultimatum #2: It seems the Wasp can’t get a dignified death in any universe A-

Wonder Woman #25: It seems that even in Gail Simone’s world a Wonder Woman movie is not meant to be. However, unlike the comic movie which “lacks a proper second act” (my favorite line of the whole book), the conclusion to this arc is proper and exciting every step of the way. No one can balance all out action with beautiful little human moments like Gail Simone can. A+

Superman #680: “Happy.” A+

Secret Six #2: I’m just flat-out embarrassed for Catman. God love Gail Simone for trying to give him a sense of dignity, but he’s Catman, a rip-off of Batman so painfully obvious that he resists pride. I’ll give her this: she didn’t retcon him into a cool costume or a better origin, as is the DC way of late. However, she left him with the impression that he’s Batman’s arch-nemesis. Those other guys, “petty little psychos who [Batman has] made into celebrities”. Catman goes so far as to say “One day, we’re going to kill each other, aren’t we?” But I think it’s this level of self-delusion that I like about Catman; the same way I like the damage of the rest of the Secret Six. They’re badasses, but they’re also completely fucked up. A+

Legion of Three Worlds #2: OOOOoooh that Superboy-Prime is in dire need of that spanking I spoke about last issue. Lightning Lad agrees with me, as do most of the 31st centurians; Superman is the only hold out for a happy morally high-grounded ending. I honestly have no idea which way Geoff Johns will go by the end. I’d hate to see another “death in the DC”, but an “I love you, Willow” probably won’t eke out the requisite cleansing rehabilitative tears. Funniest moment: the bickering Brainiac 5 triplets. A+

Final Crisis: Revelations #3: Revelations ties with Legion of Three Worlds for the strongest titles of the whole Final Crisis extravaganza. I wasn’t impressed at first, but now I can’t believe the ideas that are coming up, particularly the idea that God has abandoned His creation and left it in the hands of Evil at the end of the world. I imagine for people who see 2008 as the threshold for the Last Days, that God has indeed abandoned them. Every day, I read about how Christians feel under attack from the liberal media, Islamic extremists and teh homosexual agenda. Poor things. I prefer to think that maybe we’ve outgrown that God and are moving to a place where Justice and Mercy don’t have to flow directly from Him, but stem from each of us individually. At least I hope so. Anyway, that was what I got out of this issue. A+

Runaways #2: There is a lot going on in this book for it being two issues old – an alien attack, a job for Chase, an alleged suicide attempt, new digs. It seems Terry Moore is setting up stories for the next three years, which I wouldn’t mind if it means he’s sticking around for that long. I love his Nico. I’m not sure how it does it, but her face is more cartoony that everyone else’s yet, she doesn’t stick out like Roger Rabbit. Xavin is like the clown fish of Runaways . S/he isn’t funny-ha-ha, but she can switch genders as the situation needs. This issue sees her (typically) masculine side coming out to threaten Karolina’s Majesdane attackers. But something was not sitting right with Karolina in terms of Xavin. I didn’t finish Whedon’s Runaways, though I’m not sure Whedon finished Whedon’s Runaways, so it’s possible something damaged their relationship or maybe Karolina mistrusts Xavin’s clown fishiness. Whatever the reason, it was a moment of sadness in the book. A-

Astonishing X-Men #27: Given what Warren Ellis was doing last month with The Boys, I feel this month’s X-Men to be a bit of a trap. Maybe Ellis is starting to fall into the groove of the Whedon legacy, but this is the guy who brought us Planetary and Transmetropolitan and Desolation Jones and I doubt he’s suddenly learned how to be cute. Not that he isn’t talented enough to find the cute voices in him, but he’s getting into Buffy levels of banter here. Frightening. I also think he and Brubaker are in a competition to up the ante for how sexually charged each issue can be. This month’s round goes to Ellis because bestiality (or “xenophiliac experimentation” as Agent brand puts it) always wins. My theory on this is that he has a deal with Grant Morrison to write comics that are too accessible and too inaccessible respectively and see how far their fans go to defend their writing as “cutting edge” and “metatextual” and “brilliant”. Honestly, I can explain this issue any other way. B+

Uncanny X-Men #503: The X-Men are led a merry chase through downtown San Francisco by Empath, the most evil (if not the most flimsy) of all the late Hellions. If i didn’t hate this guy before, I do now, especially since he struck a low blow to Sam Guthrie (“Dead baby brother!”), who holds a special place in my heart as showing the first naked (male) New Mutant butt during my mid-adolescence. Action aside, Scott Summers honestly needs therapy. I mean, deep-down monstrously invasive therapy. Brubaker’s entry in his competition with Ellis has Emma in Scott’s brain playing Dungeon Mistress when they’re supposed to be doing reconnaissance and he doesn’t realize it’s not really Emma!. What the…? Did Luke and Laura ever go through shit like this? No. And they live in a soap opera. And, finally, I get what Brubaker is doing with his heroic bio-captioning, something I wasn’t all that enamored of because it was too clever by half UNTIL Pixie stabs Empath right through the thought-maker and her caption says “Megan Gwynn. Pixie. X-Man.” Then I got it, and now I love Pixie. She’s not Kitty Pryde, but she’s an armed and dangerous woman. A

Manhunter #34: There is a LOT going on in this issue, not only in terms of action, but also the extensive cast list. If this were a lesser writer, I’d be concerned that the whole story would fall deep.. ok, deeper into soap opera territory – just look at the complicated (yet “brief”) family history as told by Grandpa Iron and Gramma Phantom Lady – but Marc Andreyko avoids the hysterics while keeping everyone’s lives messy. Spoiler alert, but the cover is completely misleading, and I should be more disappointed than I was, especially after last month’s cliffhanger had me drooling to see Kate and the Birds of Prey kick some Suicide ass. Each side got their licks in, but it wasn’t the slugfest I was hoping for. Still, I came away satisfied with the outcome. With all the brouhaha over Northstar being a celibate eunuch (not redundant; see “Farinelli”) over at Marvel, it’s nice to see Todd (Obsidian finally out on parole from whatever it was he was doing in JSA) and Damon share a little sugar. Of course, we’ve seen them kiss before and have a post-coital moment in bed, so… yeah, this round to DC in the “Gayer than Thou” wars. A+

X-Men: Return of Magik #1: Strange déjà vu because I know I’ve seen these stories before. Any original material of my favorite mutant demon sorceress on the way? No grade.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season Eight #18: I’m going to retract 60% of the contempt I had for Joss Whedon’s re-using Dark Willow (as telegraphed from orbit revealed last issue) and say that it lends sufficient pathos to the plot built up around her and the future of the Slayer race (i.e., there is none) to keep me onboard. Still, there’s a lack of focus on the sub-plots – what happened to the Slayers after the castle went BOOM, what is Twilight and how bad are they are chiefly blurry – and adding treants to the mix didn’t clear up the haze. Other than that, the issue really belongs to Xander and Dawn (PLEASE don’t let them get together!!!) and Kennedy for schtupping Willow while voluntarily possessed. B-

The Boys #22: The dénouement of “I Tell You No Lie, GI” doesn’t tell us anything new about the supes or their role in the world, but with the revelation that Wee Hughie is dating an auxiliary Seven member trouble can been seen rising like the sun in the East. And poor Annie. When she blinded A-Train, half on top of her, pants all the way down, I should have cheered the way I cheer for Scully when she draws her gun on the Freak-of-the-Week, but I felt more like she is getting what she deserves for not walking away from the whole mess. I’ll have to read the back issues to find out what’s keeping her there (unless someone can email the info and save me a lot of money). For as strident as people are about Kick Ass’s childish homophobia and cartoonish violence (which, God help me, I enjoy reading), I find The Boys far more troublesome. A-

Secret Six #1: I want to have Gail Simone’s ability to jump into a story head-first, free-style through her characters and kick like mad through sub-plots. (Yes, this is a Michael Phelps-inspired hook. Why?) I don’t even like these people, but her villain-in-a-box and compassionless anti-heroes aren’t really too far off from the actual heroes of the DCU in terms of their heroiclessness. Plus, Catman is hot and needs to be naked more. A+