Axiom’s Edge Science Fiction and Fantasy

By Sam Christopher

This was a HUGE week for comics for me.

I’ll begin with the coolest cover of the bunch, as Moonstone’s revival of true pulp fiction continues with The Spider: Judgement Knight #1. “Blood of the Innocent”, a prose story by C.J. Henderson (Penthouse Comix, Moonstone Monsters Volume One) written around fantastic art by J. Anthony Kosar shows Richard Wentworth as The Spider, scourge of New York’s underworld as well as “Master of Men” (and an inspiration, if only for the name, for Stan Lee’s creation of Spiderman), in an adventure that threatens the woman he loves. A madman known only as “The Professor” (and, no, it’s not the friendly guy who made all manner of cool things out of coconuts for the castaways) has made a name for himself in the underworld of NY. The Spider has come to look upon this man as his equal and opposite; both men seem to be brilliant strategists who will do anything, dare anything to attain their ends. The Spider learns that The Professor’s main plan is going to come to fruition tomorrow and where the bad guy’s hideout is. Our hero realizes this is a trap, but given the master plan and what it could mean for not only New York but the entire world he feels he must attack immediately. Little does The Spider know the secret trap The Professor has in store for him. A great story about a great character, even if Wentworth and lady love Nita van Sloan are pretty much just Lamont Cranston and Margo Lane. There’s also a more typical comics story backing up the main feature here. “The Crossroads of Solomon Strang” stars a pulp character named Ghost Zero, who I admit I’ve never heard of. Written and drawn by Dave Flora, this is an okay story that’s really too short to get a handle on the main character. Excellent stuff all the way around.

Next, since I don’t give much love to Marvel we’ll go into two titles that made it out this week. Fantastic Four #570 brings us a new creative team and a new direction (unless you read Alan Moore’s Supreme, or his Captain Britain). Jonathan Hickman (Red Mass for Mars, Dark Reign: Fantastic Four) and Dale Eaglesham (Justice Society of America: Kingdom Come Special, Countdown: Arena) take over the title and begin by giving us more of what we’ve had: Johnny needling Ben, Reed and Sue being domestic and detached, Reed retreating to alternate realities in an attempt to solve all the problems of the world. In this story, this quest of Reed’s leads him to “The Council of Interdimensional Reeds”, which would have been more interesting for me if it had also contained Victor von Doom’s and Bentley Wittman’s—The Wizard, whose latest scheme has led to this ish’s action—as well as Reed doppelgangers from across the multiverse. Apparently, these guys save Earths everywhere from all manner of destruction (having them save Earth-2012 while “our” Reed is standing there was a nice touch—maybe that Galactus was going to eat the Mayan Calendar). Anyway, it’s not that it’s all that bad; I’m just never too sanguine about too much cosmic scope in these things. I would have thought the disaster that was “Doom’s Master” would serve as warning to all.

And, in Incredible Hercules #133, they keep us in suspense as to the travails of Herc and Zeus in order to apprise us as to the status of one Amadeus Cho. Seems AC had lost trust in Athena and the other Olympians but not in the Prince of Power himself. Finding out the circumstances of his parents’ deaths is just something Cho feels he must do alone. Along the way here we get a healthy dose of backstory—which helped me out since I didn’t read any of the “Planet Hulk” storyline (see my review of Skaar: Son of the Hulk for more on that)—for Cho as he takes the bus to his hometown of Excello, Utah, and walks right into—sorry, it’s not gonna be that easy… read it. Another issue, another winner from the talented writing team (and they must be talented as it surely never occurred to me that anyone could make Marvel’s version of Hercules interesting enough to carry an ongoing title) of Fred Van Lente (Action Philosophers, Amazing Fantasy) and Greg Pak (War Machine, Warlock), with some outstanding Rodney Buchemi (Marvel Adventures: Avengers, Incredible Hulk) art.

In our “World’s Finest” section:

In Batman and Robin #3, we find that Dick’s methods of interrogation appear to irritate Commissioner Gordon; of course, what Dick does here seems rather Batman-like to me. Maybe Gordon’s still a little on edge from Damian’s interrogation methods (baseball bats and metal buckets). And speaking of Robin, he awakes in Pyg’s HQ (the Pyg Sty?) only to find himself about to be added to the ranks of Pyg’s surgically-enhanced followers. The girl we met at the end of the first ish, Sasha, returns here and looks to be lining up for duty as someone else’s “Robin”. Looks good. “Very, very good,” as Wooderson would say (sorry, just watched Dazed and Confused again). Grant Morrison (The Invisibles, Vampirella) and Frank Quitely (Bite Club, We3) just keep this title rolling along as the best Batman-centric Batman: Reborn title, it’s strongest competition among all the B: R titles being Gotham City Sirens, which followed up a stellar first ish with a rather ordinary second.

And then there’s Gotham City Sirens #3, which brings the whimsy back—and that’s saying a lot for a story about a serial killer—while the Sirens themselves take the issue off. Harley, of course, was kidnapped by Hush at the end of #2, and Catwoman and Poison Ivy spent a couple panels this ish talking with Ed Nigma, former Riddler, to establish they were looking for Quinn before leaving the story to the reformed Nigma and Batman as the two men use similar methods to track the same murderer. Another excellent chapter in the Batman: Reborn saga, with writer Scott Lobdell (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Nick Fury: Agent of Shield) doing a marvelous job with the very eccentric Nigma and Guillem March (Oracle: The Cure, Power Girl) handling the artwork in fine fashion.

Thirdly in our Dark Knight portion of this “team-up” we have Detective Comics #856, where Kate’s story gets into high gear as the hybrid “true believers” help Batwoman’s father save her from Alice and reveal the new Queen of Crime’s ultimate plan to Kate. On a more elegant note, Kate’s father talks her into attending the GCPD Annual Charity Ball—he thought she could use a night off from crimefighting. Kate embarrasses her step-mother, ignores her cousin, dances with Maggie Sawyer (transferred from Supes to Bats, was head of SCU in Metropolis and now heads Major Crimes in Gotham City—she’s Chief Brenda Lee Johnson from The Closer on a different coast), and gets very scared by the end of the story—with good reason. Another gem from Greg Rucka (52, Elektra) and J. H. Williams III (Promethea, Inhumans). The Question Second Feature is not as good. Not awful, just don’t understand the rationale. A guy is ordered to kill her and he’s going to make no pretense that it’s an accident. He injects her with a knockout drug, ties her up, and puts her in the trunk of a car he then pushes into (probably) the bay. Why not just give her an immediately fatal dosage? Anyway, Rucka’s overall story is all right—just nothing great—and Cully Hamner’s (Blue Beetle, Red) art is good, too.

And our final Batman title is the out-of-continuity toon-inspired Batman: The Brave and the Bold #8, which continued the Global Guardian theme and took the Dark Knight to Tibet to track down the Yeti. Meh. Kind of a lame story with a few good moments and a fairly heavy-handed ending.

Okay, okay, Superman #691 is bringing us closer to my total loss of patience with this storyline. I can accept that a lot of people will buy into Supergirl attacking Mon-El in order to further the aims of New Krypton—of course, that’s without my questioning why over one hundred thousand “Supermen” need to resort to the subterfuge of destroying Metropolis’ water supply, or why they would do so pretty much completely in the open, or what’s the point in destroying that water supply in the first place. I can even—maybe—accept the world thinking a Kryptonian rogue like Ral-Dar attempting to assassinate the US President. What I find impossible to believe is the world’s populace believing that Superman, who has saved the planet on countless occasions, was aiding in any assassination attempt of anyone. And that’s without seeing anything. But there have to be cameras on-site not controlled by the military, cameras that would have shown Superman stopping Ral-Dar not helping him. And microphones, mics that could have picked up the conversation between Superman and Gen. Lane. But even without any of that, I just don’t believe anyone on this planet would take the word of a general involved in secret government black ops programs over the single greatest hero the Earth has ever known. The general and his cohorts, like Morgan Edge, just don’t have the credibility to stand against Supes. Especially after Mon-El, who despite all reports is not dead, comes to tell the truth about what happened in the sewer. Gen. Lane is beginning to look more and more like DC’s answer to Norman Osborne. And that is not a good thing.

And there was also the Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen Special #2, which followed our intrepid reporter as he tried to find out more about Project 7734 (get it? upside down and backwards?) and does learn a lot from a very unlikely source. Two unlikely sources, actually. Unfortunately, this didn’t help my impression of this storyline. A pretty good story until put into context with the rest of this increasingly unruly mess. And when you see the ending, the first thing you’ll think is, “okay, why didn’t this happen earlier in the story, at the guy’s house?” because that’s precisely where it should have happened.

Moving on to other members of the Justice League, first we finally have Flash: Rebirth #4, and in this ish Eobard explains it all. Seems there’s a negative side to the Speed Force, and Eobard Thawne, the Reverse Flash, actually creates it and causes it to spread by running. Also, according to Thawne as well as all the evidence the talented team of Geoff Johns (Green Lantern, Adventure Comics) and Ethan van Sciver (Impulse, Claw the Unconquered) show us here, unlike all the other speedsters in the DCU Barry Allen doesn’t tap into the “positive” Speed Force, he creates it. I don’t think I buy any of that. It’s a good story but makes no sense given all we’ve seen in the past. I do like this tale, and this issue does give us the return of a certain mentor of Bart Allen’s (and not with a Black Ring on), but I just don’t think this whole system of Barry making Speed Force while Eobard Thawne makes “Reverse Speed Force”, and whoever runs the longest wins, can hold out against other writers’ takes on this thing. But, then, I didn’t think all that Parallax nonsense in GL would last and look where we are.

And speaking of the Green Lantern, GL #45 answers the question of where that humongous, planet-sized Black Ring was headed—and the answer’s not to John Stewart’s liking. Meanwhile, on Zamaron, the Star Sapphires are battling with Sinestro’s half of the Sinestro Corps—Mongul controls the other half—hoping to remove the GLC’s greatest enemy by introducing Love to the Soldiers of Fear. Here we find that Carol Ferris is seen as a great leader for the Sapphires by the Zamarons because she won’t allow the ring to guide her. Meanwhile, on Odym, the Blue Lanterns battle to defend themselves and their Power Battery from the orange gang of thieves sent by Larfleeze while Black Rings hover around the planet waiting for someone to die. Meanwhile, on Okaara—and I know there are a lot of “meanwhiles” here but this ish was entirely vignettes and I’ve actually spared you a couple—the Black Rings infiltrate. And you do know the entire “Orange Lantern Corps” is made of constructs of beings Larfleeze has murdered and collected in his lair. Redrum.

Finally, and since we’ve brooched the comics event of the steaming Summer about to fade into the glorious Autumn, we have Blackest Night: Titans #1. No team in the DCU has been hit as hard by death as the Teen Titans, even with the returns of Superboy and Impulse (both of which puzzle me; with all this going on I’m wondering if the “returned” heroes might not end up as some sort of bridge between the living and the dead). This issue shows the return of Tara (which you’ll get from the cover) and of Hank Hall, the original Hawk who died rather than become Monarch (for those who didn’t read the “Armageddon: 2001” annual series), as automatons of the Black Rings. The Rings also try and raise Don Hall, the original Dove, but he is said to be “at peace” and either wouldn’t or couldn’t be raised (which gives me another thought: I wonder if those who are “at peace” may not eventually rise anyway to help their friends against the Black Lanterns). And the ending of this ish is… WOW! And it could stand. A good opener by J. T. Krul (Soulfire, Titans) and Ed Benes (Gen13, Birds of Prey).

Other comics:

Buck Rogers #3- Buck and Wilma get closer in the future, even as his funeral takes place in the present.

Final Crisis Aftermath: Ink #4- mark makes a pact with Samurai as Liberty Hill burns. And we find out the cause of all this. Maybe. There are still two issues left.

Justice Society of America #30- The team recovers enough to capture a few of the villains—with the help of the big stuffed “watchbear” Jay Garrick borrows from Fred Sanford’s window—and return to the Brownstone to find Mr. Terrific near death. The seeds of Magog leaving to go into his own solo series are further sown here as well.

The Last Days of Animal Man #4- Prizmatik and Bloodrage attack the league of Titans tower and do something at the end I find unfathomable. Buddy, meanwhile, takes a beating but keeps retreating, saving Starfire in the process from not only the aforementioned villains but also that old man who was making a pass at her—oh, wait, that was him. And then he takes her to the last place you’d expect but also the most logical place he could.

Red Sonja #47- As we continue the slow march to #50, Sonja decides to aid some slaves she finds on the trek north to the Blood Dynasty. She finds her sister, who betrayed the family to Lucan Martur and then was sold into slavery (along with her and Martur’s baby daughter), and, well… let’s just say that understanding isn’t one of Sonja’s strong suits.

Sherlock Holmes #4- Continuing this great mystery with a mysterious stranger, a found letter, and the recapture of the world’s greatest detective.

Son of Hulk #14- Dunno. I liked this new direction at first, and it is still interesting, but I’m not as sure of it anymore.

The Unknown #4- This mini winds up with an interesting non-answer to the current mystery and an interesting prologue to the next.

Wonder Woman #35- WW and Black Canary finish up in Tokyo but not before Diana is forced to make amends to one she (sort of) wronged. And the ending was a real, real shock.

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Aug 23 – Viking, Batgirl, Batman: Streets of Gotham, and More

The Jack Kirby Store: Offering a comprehensive selection of compilations of The King’s work available on Amazon.com including the Fourth World, Fantastic Four, Kamandi, Thor, Captain America, The Eternals, and many more.

By Sam Christopher

Before we get into the comics this week, I recently joined a website called adoptaussoldier.org which puts people in the US in touch with some of the people fighting for us in foreign lands. Doesn’t matter what we think of the actions they’re involved in, doesn’t matter what we think of the President or the Congress which sent them wherever they are, or are keeping them wherever they are, we should each and every one of us thank the people who risk their lives for our freedoms. The way this works is you sign up on this site and they assign you a soldier to write to via EM or snail mail. I just joined last week and I can tell you that reading the excitement in Samantha’s (my soldier) EM gave me a feeling that… well, it’s about the same feeling as giving a present to someone you don’t know on Christmas. Anyway, I highly recommend the site and the activity and thank the lovely Sharon for finding it.

To comics…

It’s finally here! Blackest Night #1, the comics event of the year from Geoff Johns (JSA, Avengers) and Ivan Reis (Ghost, Action Comics) centering on Death, kicks off with a celebration of life in Coast City, rebuilt and repopulated after the Cyborg Superman destroyed it during the final days of Reign of the Supermen. The day of Superman’s death has, since his resurrection, become a holiday honoring all the superheroes in the DCU, and while the regular folk celebrate their saviors, the “capes” memorialize their dead. Meanwhile, in Space Sector 666, the dead are “honored” in a whole different way. And here we also find that our friend, the “Dark Guardian”, has emerged from the bowels of Oa with a decidedly unhealthy appetite—unhealthy for the other Guardians, that is. Hal explains the way of the current world to Barry Allen, while Hawkman and Hawkgirl have a serious fight before she finally tells him what he most wants to hear—and gets out of it what she expected. This is an excellent beginning chap to a story which seems like it’s been prologued for a decade or so now.

And then we have Blackest Night: Tales of the Corps #1 which gives us three ancillary stories to the mythos thus far. First up, we have “Tales of the Blue Lantern Corps: Saint Walker” by the aforementioned Johns with Jerry Ordway (Superman, Infinity, Inc.) artwork, in which we learn of the bottomless well of hope within Walker that led the blue ring to him in the first place. An incredible story of faith that leads me to think Larfleeze doesn’t stand a chance on Odym. The second tale of the ish is “Tales of the Sinestro Corps: Mongul- For Your Love” by Peter Tomasi (The Mighty, Aquaman) and Chris Samnee (The Mighty, Pulp Tales). This is all about Mongul’s son trying to be Mongul. Meh. Not bad but the worst story of this issue. Finally, Johns and artist Rags Morales (Hawkman, JLA) bring us “Tales of the Indigo Tribe” in which Will and Fear do battle on the field of Compassion. The Indigo Tribe is an unknown commodity still. All we have been told about them is that they are the color of Compassion, and we see here their language is indecipherable even to a GL’s ring. Could be they’re the key to ending the Blackest Night.

And this discussion of Blackest Night would be incomplete without a mention of one last prelude. Titans #15 has Tempest (formerly Aqualad) taking stock after the deaths of his wife and child, and Arthur Curry—Aquaman. Queen Mera has also gone missing and the Atlanteans, who always hated Garth (Tempest) due to his violet eyes (they hated Curry because of his blonde hair at first too—the Atlanteans are apparently a superstitious and cowardly lot), are suddenly looking to him for leadership. He goes to Gotham City to talk it over with his best friend, the new Batman, and returns to take the throne. Oh, and his Uncle Slizzath, a necromancer, commits “suicide by Tempest” along the way, too. And, despite the cover, not only does Tempest not battle the Titans in this issue, no current Titan is ever even shown except in flashback.

And, speaking of Batman, in Batman: Streets of Gotham #2 Alfred learns never to trust Thomas Elliott (Hush), even if Elliott’s on fire, and Firefly learns the price of overstepping his bounds with Black Mask. Unfortunately for Black Mask, Firefly had anticipated his master’s response and taken steps to shield himself from the consequences of his own actions. Unfortunately for Firefly, though, our new Caped Crusaders are as efficient as the originals, and Gotham isn’t burned to the ground by the “human torches”. Afterward, the Bat-crew (Dick, Damian, Alfred) gather to lick their wounds after the (mostly) aborted conflagration, they also start to send out the “have you seen…?” notices to all the heroes in the DCU for the escaped Hush, who has the face of Bruce Wayne. They then look on the television and find that he’s also impersonating Santa Claus. In the Manhunter second feature, Kate hunts with Rorschach-like panache for the missing Jane Doe—an Arkham escapee who can take on the appearance and characteristics of anyone by simply skinning them and wearing their skin. Not bad for a second story. Definitely worth the extra buck.

And, finally, we have a couple of characters who are older than comics. First, in Domino Lady #1, Moonstone does what they do best: bring back an old character and update him/her without updating him/her. Doc Savage, The Phantom, Kolchak: The Night Stalker—Domino Lady fits right in with two stories written by Nancy Holder with different artists, Danny Sampere and Leeahd Goldberg, respectively. Now if only they’d bring us The Shadow, or an anthology series adapting the old Astounding Science Fiction Stories to comics, or maybe some horror from Lights Out. I think Moonstone would do an outstanding job with these. And then there’s Sherlock Holmes #3, in which we see an old man return to the room he rents only to find it has been sublet by the landlady, forcing him to go to extremes to protect his claim. And, as the escape of Sherlock is being kept under wraps, Watson goes to the marvelously obtuse Mycroft Holmes for aid.

Other comics:

Action Comics #879- Lois has Mon-El check her father’s grave and finds what she expected while Codename: Assassin meets the Flamebird. I just don’t understand it not flash-frying him along with all the Orcs he had helping him. Captain Atom was all right for a backup feature.

All-Select Comics 70th Anniversary Special #1- This stars the Blonde Phantom and Marvex the Super-Robot. The BP new story was very predictable, and I got it even though I’m not a woman. The Marvex story—meh. The two-story reprint of Marvex from Daring Mystery Comics #3 and 4 in 1940 are the best things in this ish and they’re not great.

The Brave and the Bold #25- Hardware and Blue Beetle team up in a blatant ripoff of Armor Wars. Don’t they realize Tony Stark has deep enough pockets to sue them?

Buck Rogers #2- More of the story unfolds as Buck learns why the military wants to commandeer his gravity drive in the now, and tries to escape the “ani-men” in the future. The title for the third ish is “Ghosts of Mars”, which is cool because you’ll be thinking it all the way through the second.

Lockjaw and the Pet Avengers #3- From the ocean floor to be swallowed by a whale to the White House to be confronted with the power-mad would-be ruler of… no, not the President this time, it’s the guy who’s always after the Infinity Gems. Makes sense; where else would someone willing to stop at nothing to gain power over others be but in Washington, DC?

The Mighty Avengers #27- “The Unspoken” Chapter One. The former king of the Inhumans returns from wherever he’s been, and Hank Pym unveils “The Infinite Avengers Mansion”, which much to Jarvis’ relief is self-cleaning.

The Unknown #3- Word of advice: If you go through The Door to the Afterlife always, always, always prop the door open behind you.

The Walking Dead #63- Rick, Andrea and crew hunt for the missing Dale until it’s decided to take up the march to Gabriel’s church, where we finally learn what I think is Gabe’s real story. And we get to see the Hunters, who have taken the saying, “If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em”, to a whole ‘nother level.

Werewolves on the Moon: Vs. Vampires #2- Captain Maggie Pilgrim, the beloved of Lord Till of the vampires—although she doesn’t know it yet—decides the wolves can be of use against the vampires that no one believed existed until yesterday. And we get to meet Pilgrim’s non-aging, garlic and sunlight-avoiding, blood-drinking father—who hasn’t been a vampire for the 20 years he’s been kept in that mental institution by Earth Central. Just another funny, funny chapter from Dave Land and the Fillbach Bros.

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