Monday Memes #5

Last week we had a look at New Guys joining teams; of course the opposite happens:

And Green Lanterns don't just leave the League - they leave the Corps as well:

Rings being thrown on the floor or over the shoulder all add up to the same thing: I Quit!

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #115

Zatanna makes a whole lot of sense

Flashpoint Tie-In Titles

DC have released the titles of the mini-series that will run alongside the main Flashpoint series later this year and, I have to admit, they sound pretty good for a collection of titles:

• Batman Knight Of Vengeance
• Deadman And The Flying Graysons
• Citizen Cold
• Deathstroke & The Curse Of The Ravager
• The Outsider
• Abin Sur The Green Lantern
• Project: Superman
• Frankenstein & The Creatures Of The Unknown
• Secret Seven
• Emperor Aquaman
• Wonder Woman And The Furies
• Lois Lane And The Resistance
• Kid Flash Lost
• The World Of Flashpoint

Three issues a piece, plus a couple of one-shots to come as well. This should be a good summer.

Of course, some people over at the Source blog have had a more . . . extreme reaction than me:

Oh, Hal . . .

Friday Night Fights - You Can Choose Your Friends...

It's Friday once more and you know what that means, don't you?

Busy Working

Not that anyone's really noticed, but I've been a bit lackadaisical around here for the last week or so, just relying on some standard posts to keep the blog count up. For once, though, there's a real reason: I've been working through the proofs of my next book, Kingston to Cable, which should be out at the end of March.

I don't really like to blog about my own stuff here - this blog's for comics, after all - but thought I'd mention it as (with a bit of luck) I may be getting an endorsement from someone who's written both novels and comics. Fingers crossed, eh?

Normal service will now resume.

Power Girl #23

Shocking isn't it - me pushing a Judd Winick book!

Monday Memes #4

Every now and then, usually on team books, a New Guy turns up which is always an excuse to plaster them all over the cover:

And sometimes it's not a guy but a gal like the time Dr Fate was a woman and joined the Justice League again. For the first time.

But it's not only team books - solo titles get the New Guy treatment as well:

You gotta love John Stewart pushing Hal Jordan out of the way as he proclaims that he's Green Lantern!

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #113

The Weaponer's impressed!

Friday Night Fights - Fight Like A Girl

I missed last week's fight due to life getting in the way but Spacebooger demands I put one up this week!

Have A Little Faith

I've posted before about not being that excited about the forthcoming Judge Dredd movie but after reading a report over at Bleeding Cool by Dredd co-creator John Wagner, maybe I should just cut them some slack:

No, the uniform doesn’t look like a muscle suit. It is very believable. To others – as they say at PMQs – I refer you to my earlier answers. I’m very satisfied with the way it’s going but it’s not going to fulfill everyone’s hopes and …dreams – that would be impossible with so many diverse demands upon it. Let’s say that it’s a damned good start and my guess is that most fans are going to like it a lot. Remember, if this one does well there will be more films to follow and these will cover other aspects of Mega-City life. By the end of it we should have a very good picture of Dredd’s world in the round.

If Wagner's happy with it, I guess we should be too.

The Line Between Madness And Genius

Each week I visit ComicList to jot down which titles are out so I know what to expect when I get in to see my local comic dealer shop. Browsing through the list a moment ago, I came across this little gem:

Monday Memes #3

Having a superhero team lay defeated before their enemies is a staple of comic covers so I've called this week's meme Team Defeated. Putting the covers together, though, made me realise that if your team is the Justice League, you're going to feature quite heavily, regardless of what iteration of the League you're in.

So here's Team Defeated Justice League #1

People give the Detroit League a hard time but they've been taken down by Despero. The uber-League were defeated by a freaking spider spirit.

The poor old Red Tornado should almost have a meme of his own - how many times has he defeated the League?

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #113

Oh, Guy Gardner . . . you charmer.

Flashpoint Teaser Pics

Over at the DCU Source blog they're running pictures as teases for the upcoming Flashpoint storyline . . . which I still haven't decided whether or not to annotate!

This was the first one:

and the others seem to be following the same theme: logo with a sentence above it, hinting at changes to the DCU's established (I use that term loosely) history / timeline.

Thing is, I read "The spaceship never crashed." and instantly thought of one image.

Guess Who's Back

As you may be aware by now, the Tasmanian Devil has reappeared in the DCU in the pages of last week's Starman/Congorilla one-shot and I for one am glad. As I mentioned in Sunday's Cocktail post, however, it does sort of make a mockery of Blackest Night's raison d'etre.

Monday Memes #2

I thought about sticking with one theme (I should say meme as that's what I'm calling these things - damn my alliteration addiction!) per month but then thought what the heck, I'm just going to throw whatever out there.

Last week was Homage, this week something I'm calling You Need Hands:

Big hands, to be honest.

Sometimes, as above, with various heroes trapped in their grip, but mostly it's all about the hands.

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #112

Ah, Hourman - how often have I felt like that?

DC start their run of gorgeous, minimalist covers and what do I do? Go and splash a whole bunch of text over them.

Friday Night Fights - The Dynamic Duel

It's a New Year, a time for resolutions and things to change but not over at Spacebooger! Oh no, the New Year simply means new fights to that guy.

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #111

Is it wrong to find a centuries old immortal blue man throwing up funny?

Christmas and New Year delayed me getting hold of my comics hence the bumper delivery today!

More Rings Than You Could Possibly Imagine

And more news from the DC Source blog: a new Red Lantern ongoing book will debut in 2011.

That, in itself, came as a bit of a surprise - I have to wonder how long an ongoing series based around characters who are little more than big balls of mindless agression can be sustained. When there's only one character in the Red Lantern Corps who can actually put a sentence together (the others make do with GRRR! ARRRGH!) you have to question how this is going to work.

For me, though, the big disappointment was the announcement that the writer is going to be Peter Milligan. The last thing I read by him was Infinity, Inc. back in 2007. I lasted the first three issues before I ditched it as it simply didn't work for me.

This puts me in a quandry: I'm a Green Lantern fan but I don't have an inexhaustable supply of money and I don't like the writer.

Think I might try out a few issues and see how it goes.

Letter Columns To Return

Read some great news on various sites yesterday, not least the DC Source blog: letter columns are returning to DC books!

They were always a good read back in the old days, even when you had to take into account the fact that they were referring to things that happened two or three months before the issue they appeared in and I applaud their return.

Monday Memes #1

During last summer I had a bit of fun looking through my cover scans and posting my favourites every Monday.

This year I'm going to throw out covers which share a theme or an idea, hence Monday Memes. First up: Homages:

Nothing is sacred to Ambush Bug and I thank heaven for that - not even the cover of Superman #1 excapes him.

Nor the cover of Flash #123 which introduced the world to the DCU Multiverse, spawning either a hugely rich vein of imaginative storytelling possibilities or hideous over-complication depending on your point of view.

You know what? Despite a bunch of mini-series, a handful of specials and currently appearing in Doom Patrol, I still think there's not enough Ambush Bug in the world. Just saying.