Avengers #12

Written by Brian Michael Bendis

Art by John Romita Jr, Klaus Janson & Dean White

Published by Marvel Comics

Why push like this? Make Cappy Cap a fucking sell out liar, like Iron Man the sell out liar? Maybe this is the audience or something, but who wants to read about a super-hero like fucking Iron Man? Sure, he's got a cool suit, even if it's sort of fire-hydrant-y sometimes, but for christsakes the guy is a jagoff. He lies to people, wanders away after fights like a big dumb baby--rooting for him is like rooting for the CEO of Chase Bank in a footrace against a team of crippled Cub Scouts and volunteer firemen. Maybe it's just that John Romita Jr and Klaus Janson have been stuck drawing this coma-inducing exercise in how-boring-can-Bendis-get comics, but enough is enough: somebody needs to give this baby a hot bullet.

Invincible Iron Man #503

Written by Matt Fraction

Art by Salvador Larroca & Frank D'Armata

Published by Marvel Comics

Nah, we're done talking about the character, fuck that bozo. But take a look at this shit, it's hysterical.



See that shit? That grid shit?



Who you think you're fooling, lightbox? God, that shit is unreal, isn't it? It doesn't show up again, unfortunately. Hell, it only shows up in a couple parts of the panel, if we're being frank and castle. It's nowhere near the wrecking crew that is this little cameo:



So what's the problem here? It's that no fucking American in his right mind would disrespect Bill Paxton's fucking perfect face by layering on some frosted hair and that kind of cornball 'stache. Bill Paxton fought a Predator, an Alien, and the original Terminator: that makes him a bigger deal than every Marvel super-hero combined. Disrespecting Bill Paxton is like shitting on the flag while at a soldier's funeral and the flag happens to already be folded up and resting in the grieving mother's lap, so yeah, I mean shitting in the lap of a woman who just lost her son in the service of this great country, that's what it means to frost Bill Paxton's fucking hair. And sure, it's lame enough that Paxton is hanging out with some Asian Fusion version of Justin Timberlake and a guess-you-couldn't-find-a-copy-of-Sliding-Doors-or-Shakespeare-In-Love-so-sure, Nicole-Kidman-just-had-to-do, but ultimately, Bill does all kinds of bullshit to pay the bills, not the least of which is not cackling hysterically when Chloe Sevigny walks into the room dressed like a Prohibition era bootlegger, which seems to be her "style" these days. But some low-rent Iron Man comic? They're called standards, you fucking jackanapes.

Invincible # 79

Written by Robert Kirkman

Art by Ryan Ottley, Cliff Rathburn & Niko Koutsis

Published by Image Comics

I've watched enough of the post-Roswell Katherine Heigl ouevre to know that crying at the sight of a baby is often an indication of a problematic relationship with those mothering feelings referred to as "common" by white male virgins who write shitty television when they aren't writing shittier screenplays, and I've watched enough of Kirstie Alley reality shows to know that binge eating is a common response to stress, but binge eating and compulsive crying? Say no more, it's gotta be an abortion. Game, set, match: that meat-hitting-the-floor sound you just heard was Kirkman putting a big fat W in the He's So Serious column. It's pure class! Do we have a challenger for Stephanie-Brown-gets-teenage-preganant in the most ill thought out pregnancy related storyline in a super-hero comic book? Only time will tell! (Probably not though. That thing was an agitprop masterwork.)

Uncanny X-Force #8

Written by Rick Remender

Art by Billy Tan & Dean White

Published by Marvel Comics

While a lot of this comic looks like baby's first steps towards reinvention, that's only a bad thing if you didn't see what this Tan guy's art used to look like, which was what the Lord lovingly called Canceraids on the Eighth day, which is also when Elijah brought low expectations down from the mountaintop. I'm not even sure what that last part means. But if you think that's my way of working myself into faint praise for a comic I will continue liking merely because I want something to look forward to that isn't the moment when I tighten this noose and not necessarily because this issue was particularly good, then wow you must be a goddamned mind reader. So tell me this, Encyclopedia Brown: is Psylocke supposed to be attractive? I'm really asking, I can't tell from this art.

Wolverine #8

Written by Jason Aaron

Art by Daniel Acuna

Published by Marvel Comics

Did you know that there were still chapters of this Wolverine-goes-to-hell storyline coming out? Of course you didn't, because holy shit, eight fucking chapters!!! All of something that also crossed over into multiple Wolverine related titles without ever actually being interesting in the slightest except for the part where they revealed that Marvel's version of Hell is about the size of Whole Foods, to the point where even recapping what happened in the issues makes one tired because, seriously, this is the plot being used just so we can have comics where Wolverine fights his friends with his claws? It wasn't any better when Mark Millar had some magic manga characters with broomstick hair cut off Wolverine's head with a magic manga sword, but at least Enemy of the State didn't pretend that the reader actually gave a fucking shit why Wolverine was killing his friends, it totally got that you just wanted to see what happened when dude fought other dude. But hey, whatever. This has more bad jokes in it about the inside of Wolverine's head, where his sexual fantasies are....oh shit, like bondage! Bondage with his friends!?! That's what Logan jerks off to? That's insane! Now I see why Jason Aaron's feelings were hurt by Alan Moore saying super-hero comics were kind of boring and not that good! Bondage fantasies. Man alive. Alan Moore doesn't know what he's missing. He should stop praying to snake jesus and read Wolverine comics, he's totally missing out on some CLASSICS.

Dark Horse Presents #1

Written by Various, Frank Miller

Art by Various, Frank Miller

Published by Random House

Jesus, did this fall out of a time warp or what? Real quick, because whaaaat: Concrete comics always feel like they're getting ready to say something really preachy and new-agey, and sometimes they do. This one may have been a unmentioned cross-over with an old EC Comic, but it still felt like the characters were getting ready to bark about why you shouldn't watch Deadliest Catch at every turn. The Neal Adams thing proved that his Batshit Hideous Weirdo Bad Comics are infinitely less charming when they aren't narrated by naked Batman, the Finder thing was as adorably forgettable as all Finder comics ultimately are, unless you're one of those people who are just desperately committed to being a Unique Snowflake and it was thence important in some way that makes me uncomfortable, the Star Wars thing was drawn by Paul Gulacy and Therefore Hilarious While Still Unbearable, and the Frank Miller thing had one really balls out interesting page tagged in between some ramblings, a bad drawing of that African dude who used to help the X-Men teleport by swinging a bolo tie, and that was it. Except for the last two pages, which were pretty much perfect, but are probably available on the web somewhere for free. It would be interesting for future issues to include a list of how much each person got paid for their contribution, if only because then the people involved in this thing's creation would be as uncomfortable as the people who fucked up and read the entirety of that Neal Adams thing. BLOOD

Thunderbolts #156

Written by Jeff Parker

Art by Kev Walker, Jason Gorder & Frank Martin

Published by Marvel Comics

Jeff Parker seems to have the same problem I do, which is a weakness for team-building stories, because while this comic consisted in halfsies of a decent-to-solid BPRD rip-off (which is fine, the BPRD is ultimately a rip-off of things I haven't read, albeit the ultimate rip-off model of all time), the rest of the comic was loser villains being barked at by C-lister heroes in hopes of joining up with a second Thunderbolts team, who--if things play to form--will probably see action when the Thunderbolts A-team gets themselves sidelined by World War I era German soldiers (nice way to avoid relying on Nazis, that) or whatever other thing they end up not being able to take on their own. Why this comic comes out as often as it does makes no sense, but for now, it's still hitting above the red line. HOIST IT

Batman #709

Written by David Hine

Art by Guillem March

Published by DC Comics

If animosity were directed with more accuracy, more of it might be landing on David Hine, as his name seems to come up every time there's interesting art tied into a so-so story. At the same time, so much of Hine's work--especially on Batman--reads like classic DC editorial interference, and if these letters columns are any indication (or the constant spelling errors, or the inability to keep a creative team, or the multiple inkers, or the way nobody has any respect for them, at all, like...dude, you literally have to make it your life's mission at a NYC convention to not hear about how little people respect DC's editorial staff, because staff employees will just walk up to complete strangers and say "Mike Marts eats soup with his hands" and "Eddie Berganza thinks black people can't drink water"), most of Batman's comic-related problems don't start with the creative team. That being said: whoever thought it was a good idea to bring Azrael back is almost as dumb as whoever thought it was a good idea to color this comic only in the limited shades that can be found in an electric eel's aquarium. However! Guillem March does have some really nice panels in this, like the one where widdle Dickie Grayson watches a competitor get stomped by local yokels, and it's unfortunate that the guy's name is forever going to be attached to comics that are obviously headed for the biggest reboot since they killed headband Supergirl. I grade this one C, for curiously bad.

Green Lantern # 65

Written by Geoff Johns

Art by Doug Mahnke, Keith Champagne and no, seriously, look at this art credit box:



You know it's a DC book, nobody else has the balls to just lay it out there like that. "Hell yes it takes five people to ink a monthly Green Lantern comic. Count the names, bitches!"

This is part of a Green Lantern mini-event blah blah blah, the only thing that's of any interest to anybody is whether or not the Peter Milligan Red Lantern book is going to have Mike Mayhew covers AND whether or not there's anything homoerotic going on in Green Lantern this week:



And yes to the second one, we don't know yet to the first. This installment in "why all the gay jokes, is it because of that fucking jacket? Because historically, gay male stereotypes actually HAVE fashion sense" is not as awesome as the part where Guy Gardner blew a frost dick, but it's still kind of awesome when you realize that particular issue was the issue right before this one, so obviously there's going to be more to come, and eventually somebody is going to try to top that frost dick, because holy fucking shit that frost dick is just laying out there like a sexed up challenge, all legs spread and balls-lolling. There isn't an artist at DC that isn't itching to rustle up a shot at the title; like Gladiator, this shit is going to echo in eternity. Right now, the frost dick is the king of all these sorts of panels. It doesn't have any context with which to ruin itself, because it's quite simply exactly what it appears to be, a drawing of a guy sucking white, ropey fluid off a thick penis-shaped shaft. There's even what appears to be musculature. I've been stapling it onto telephone poles outside schools, myself.

You know why this thing is such a godsend? Because there's absolutely no possible way for anyone to pretend that this is something other than what it looks like, and therefore, if anybody ever tries to tell you differently, you now have carbon paper level proof that You Are Dealing With A Crazy Person. That's it! This is the Green Lantern Acid Test that can out the sick amongst ye, the metal detector for the hidden tin foil hat wearers. You want to know if you can trust a dude not to corner you into some fucking-kill-yourself conversation about whether or not super-hero comics are literature, or why they shouldn't have cast Christian Bale as Batman because in real life he's not tall enough to convincingly portray Bruce Wayne, or how their private campaign to reclaim the word "geek" is going, or to interrogate you about possible costume redesign contests for Batgirl, or some motherfucking laundry lists of tips on how to customize motherfucking sisterraping action figures so they can build their own hypothetically "perfect" Avengers team, or what you thought of their latest six hour podcast of the 100 greatest Thor stories NOT by Samnee n' Simonson, or any of the other horrible, horrible things that make those of us with working genitalia want to forcibly sever our genitalia and hold it up to the sky like the monkey with the bone at the beginning of 2001, right before we bring that sloppy mess of wetness down on top of our own fucking childhoods, because I swear to God, I swear to God right fucking here and now, if somebody ever asks me what I thought of the trailer for the digital release of a motion comic prequel to the Thundercats cartoon relaunch, I'm going to break into a nuclear facility covered in Smuckers strawberry preserves, and I'm not going to be sorry even if everybody I've ever loved ends up looking like Michael Ironsides at the end of Scanners. That's how strongly I think that these comics above merely make literal what every sane person--man, woman or child--has known all along.

And that's that Hal Jordan is totally gay.

-Tucker Stone, 2011