Who'd Like A Cocktail? #253

Judging by the construction of his sentence, I'd say it's fairly obvious he's not using it

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #214

Admitting it is the first step.

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #190

Flash and Hawkgirl get off to a flying start.

Who Was Who Is Who #1

So for want of anything better to write about on a Monday, and with DC's New 52 well under way (how long are they keeping that title do you think?) I'm going to go through all my copies of Who's Who and see who's made it over to the new DCU, who might make it and who hasn't got an Aegeus's chance.

ABEL - portly keeper of the House of Secrets and late of the Dreaming, I've no idea whether Abel made it through. The number of Vertigo titles I pick up has dropped over the years to approximately none. Not a single one. Anyone seen him around lately?

ABNEGAZAR, RATH & GHAST - really, these should have been listed under Demons Three, don't you think? Can't see these guys coming back any time soon.

ABRA KADABRA - long time (pun intended!) Flash villain it wouldn't surprise me if he came back in some new, updated fashion.

ADAM STRANGE - now here's one I'm pretty certain is going to find his way back to us, either in the pages of DC Universe Presents or Justice League and my bet would be on the latter title. Geoff Johns is an unashamed fan of the silver age and Adam Strange was always popping in to the satellite headquarters before dragging the League off for some adventure or another so it wouldn't surprise me at all to have the bloke turn up before the end of 2012. There you go: my first solid prediction.

AEGEUS - seriously? A Greek terrorist riding Pegasus, flinging thunderbolts at Wonder Woman? Hands up who thinks this guy will ever be seen again.

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.

Who'd Like A Cocktail #56

A bumper haul this week so let's get on with it:

• Amazons Attack! trade paperback - yeah, I heard it was a bit pants but what the heck, it's a corner of the DCU I wouldn't normally visit. It was okay, I guess - I like Pete Woods' work if nothing else.
• Blackest Night: Titans #2 - dead ex-husband and child or not, I can't help thinking Donna was a little too accepting of the Black Lanterns; the Hawks vs Dove battle heats up; and Titans Tower takes a tumble. This is good!
• The Boys: Herogasm #5 - oh The Homelander's plans get derailed and he's not happy about it; and the Boys themselves look to be in trouble.
• The Dark Tower: Fall of Gilead #5 - things are pretty dire right now as the tale approaches its end.
• Final Crisis Aftermath: Ink #5 - we get Tattooed Man's origin and this series begins to pick up again after a lull in the last couple of issues.
• Green Lantern #46 - Hal finally finds Carol's joined the Star Sapphires; old enemies team up; and Sinestro beats the snot out of Mongul. Cracking issue!
• Justice League of America 80 Page Giant #1 - I love the 80 Page Giants and really wish there were more of them. Sure the framing story here isn't exactly original - members of the JLA get thrown across time leading to crossovers with various DC heroes from yesteryear - but the majority of the stories are good fun (particularly the Green Arrow/Firestorm story)and it was nice to see Snapper Carr and Cheetah's fling from Final Crisis: Resist picked up on.
• Justice Society of America #31 - the lines are drawn more clearly for the forthcoming split and the villains attempt to reorganise. And that last page - anyone think that's for real? Cause I sure as hell hope not.
• The Last Days of Animal Man #5 - seeing Ellen supporting Buddy and helping him get back in the game makes me want to see a real Animal Man series up and running again.
• Teen Titans #75 - wait, what? Changeling's back?
• Ravager co feature - nice, taut story, nice art work, an interesting (and pissed off) lead character. And they say she can't carry a regular series?

And what made me smile this week:

Green Arrow cheerfully facing down Ra's Al Ghul from Justice League of America 80 Page Giant #1

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #52

Here we are again for another round of cocktails:

• Blackest Night: Titans #1 - Black Lanterns! Ed Benes! Butt shots! Joking aside, not a bad start - the ghostly pram/stroller in Donna's room was a nice, creepy touch.
• The Boys: Herogasm #4 - 9/11's always going to be an emotive subject even when dealing with an alternate history of it. Ennis handles it very well.
• The Dark Tower: Fall of Gilead #4 - the centre cannot hold / Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.
• Final Crisis Aftermath: Ink #4 - oh wow, it's the return of the long dead brother complete with super-villain name. And this series started off so well.
• Green Lantern #45 - oh boy is Agent Orange in trouble now!
• Justice Society of America #30 - Dr. Fate's back! Oh yeah! Could do without the bickering but I guess that's building to the JSA All-Stars series coming soon.
• The Last Days of Animal Man #4 - Jeez, poor old Buddy's getting put through the wringer here.
• Project Superpowers: Chapter Two #2 - you know, with such a huge cast in the Superpowers universe, it'd be nice if someone annotated it . . . Seriously, though, this is good stuff.
• Teen Titans #74 - poor Kid Devil, not to mention Kid Eternity.
• Wednesday Comics #8 - hmmm, toss up between Metamorpho and the Flash this week I think.

And what made me smile this week:

Heh - pink bunnies have never done it for me.

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #48

Been busy as heck all week, mostly with the Annotated Blackest Night, but here's my weekly round-up:

• Battlefields: The Tankies #3 - "Ye put one doon the barrel, son!"  Marvellous!
• Blackest Night: Tales of The Corps #3 - nice director's commentary on Blackest Night #0;
• The Dark Tower: Fall of Gilead #3 - poor old Cort buys the farm;
• Final Crisis Aftermath: Ink #3 - who'd have thought you could get closer with your tattoos?
• Justice League of America #35 - oh come on, another Justice League reboot and we get the Royal Flush Gang again?
• Justice Society of America #29 - Stargirl has a Highlander moment!
• The Last Days of Animal Man #3 - for a guy who spends all his time thinking about his family, Animal Man's family give him a rough time this issue;
• Teen Titans #73 - wait, Bombshell knows the chemical composition of mustard gas?!
• Wednesday Comics #4 - still delivering more pluses than minuses.

And what made me smile this week:

Heh!

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #24

Hey, look at this, a Cocktail post on time for once . . . okay, it's about half a week after most people get their comics but I'm in the UK and I pick mine up on a Saturday so cut me some slack, huh?

Ah, The Boys #23 - if there's one title I look forward to each and every month, knowing I'm going to get one hell of a good read it's this one and, with no surprise, this month's delivers. Vought American, the company behind most of the successful American superheroes, is obviously gearing up for some huge confrontation; Wee Hughie and Annie continue their romance unaware of who each works for; Butcher still gets his kicks . . . manipulating . . . the Director; and a plan is put in place to find out information about the most profitable superteam out there, the G-Men.  Said plan involves someone from The Boys going undercover and while I mentioned Ambush Bug last week as giving me a laugh out loud moment, that didn't compare to the last page of The Boys #23. If you haven't read it, you need to, trust me!

I honestly thought I had missed an issue when I read Justice League Of America #25, I really did. I even went so far as to double check the stash of comics I still haven't bagged up and put away and sure enough, there was #24 - I had simply forgotten what had happened. That's not a good sign for what is DC's flagship team title. Still, it was a better read - the Anansi storyline speeds up and there are some nice touches and references to Animal Man's previous problems with reality aka Grant Morrison. Red Tornado quits the team after asking his long suffering girlfriend to marry him and at the end, the reality warping powers of Anansi appear to have created an alternate time-line complete with its own version of the League.

One issue I had missed last week was Tangent: Superman's Reign #7 so I picked that up this week. The change of regular artist was a little unsettling as Wes Craig's style seems a little more cartoonish at first - which isn't saying it's bad, just a little different. On Earth-9, Batman and the native heroes manage to break into Superman's fortress to find their friends captive while the magicians attempt to find Superman himself; both groups coming to the knowledge at the same time that both the Earth-9 Superman and his wife Power Girl are now back on our Earth. They wander around, shocked at the idea of homeless people and attempt to help but merely gather a crowd of hangers on, people who want something for nothing. Of course it's not long before our own Superman and Power Girl turn up to find out what's going on. The back up story, History Lesson, continues to be a potted history of the Tangent characters, this time focusing on the Flash while at the same time having the Earth-9 Jennie Hayden showing a lot of gratuitous cleavage.

Picked up Terror Titans #1, the first of three new mini-series this week, and which follows on from recent events over in Teen Titans. Within the first couple of pages, a third string character bites the dust, cut in half by an axe, before his compatriots are made to fight in an arena for the Clock King. Ravager, late of the Teen Titans herself, has joined Clock King to train the Terror Titans and isn't impressed by the team that she almost singlehandedly dealt with recently. Dreadbolt, field leader of the Terrors, is given a mission by Clock King - to kill Dreadbolt's own father, the villain Bolt while Ravager takes to the arena and battles another third stringer, Fever. It's all good, dirty fun hanging round with the bad guys and girls who aren't afraid to kill people and there's a couple of surprises in there.

Being a big fan of Alan Moore, I had to pick up Top Ten: Season Two #1 even if the man himself isn't connected to it. Written by Zander Cannon, though, who has worked with Moore on these characters before, as well as being illustrated by Gene Ha who co-created the original series with Moore, it's no surprise that it's in good hands. Like the original, it begins slowly, offering up several different threads and stories for the characters to deal with, both criminal (like having twelve dead girls appear in the fountain outside the police station), personal (Lieutenant Peregrine's husband going through an identity crisis) and procedural (the new Commissioner being something of a stickler and insisting on the entire Top 10 members wearing standard police uniforms. That the series is only running for four issues surprises me - there's a lot here that would seem to imply a longer run, but hey, I'll take what I can get.

With Trinity #18, the maxi-series appears to have shifted up a gear, changing from one big fight to something more of a mystery. Krona's out from his prison and free to roam the stars while the release of whatever energy by the bad guys in last week's issue has shifted this world into something else. Heroes are all members of the Justice Society International and Lois Lane's a bitch on TV who is determined to bring the Atom in for questioning over the death of Sue Dibny. I'm something of a sucker for alternate worlds - hell, that's one of the reasons I read DC and not Marvel! - and while this issue is a little bit of a scene setter, it still works.

The last title I picked up was the last of the new mini-series that started this week: Vixen: Return Of The Lion #1 and I have to say I'm glad it's only running to five issues. I picked it up as Vixen's long been a character I've liked - hell, I was one of the three people who enjoyed the Justice League Detroit - but I have to say this held no surprises whatsoever. With the discovery that the death of Vixen's mother wasn't solved years ago, she packs up her bag and heads back to her home village . . . which is being threatened by me who work for the man behind her mother's death . . . whom she humiliates and defeats in battle . . . prompting an appearance by the bad guy . . . whom she attacks but is surprised to discover is stronger than her. Early in the issue, Superman tells her "You can never go home again. It's a cliche because it's true." and that seems to sum up this issue - it's strictly by the numbers. If this was an ongoing, I'd be looking to drop it; as it is, I'll stick it out for the run.