Perusing Previews - December 2013

Apart from the Star Trek Enterprise pizza cutter I've mentioned in a previous Previews post, I think this might be the epitome of merchandising.

Monday Memories #40 - JLA Incarnations #2

Each Monday this year I'll be taking a look back at a random comic, prestige format issue, graphic novel or collection of reprints from amongst my 3,000 or so comics that date from 1962 to 2003 - I figured anything in the last ten years would be too recent to hark back to.

The comics are chosen completely at random and apart from a four week lead-in period, even I don't know what I'll be looking at in the weeks to come!

Monday Memories #34 - Justice League of America #162

Each Monday this year I'll be taking a look back at a random comic, prestige format issue, graphic novel or collection of reprints from amongst my 3,000 or so comics that date from 1962 to 2003 - I figured anything in the last ten years would be too recent to hark back to.

The comics are chosen completely at random and apart from a four week lead-in period, even I don't know what I'll be looking at in the weeks to come!

Justice League 3000 Minus One

Well this bit of news was a bummer: Kevin Maguire is no longer drawing the new series Justice League 3000 by Keith Giffen and JM DeMatteis. Perusing my copy of Previews this weekend, I was all ready to add this to my pull list but I'm not sure I'll bother now.

Apparently the concept of the book is being reworked so what's in Previews may not resemble the book we'll get.

Oh DC, why do you keep doing these things?

Monday Memories #29 - Justice League Annual #1

Each Monday this year I'll be taking a look back at a random comic, prestige format issue, graphic novel or collection of reprints from amongst my 3,000 or so comics that date from 1962 to 2003 - I figured anything in the last ten years would be too recent to hark back to.

The comics are chosen completely at random and apart from a four week lead-in period, even I don't know what I'll be looking at in the weeks to come!

A Whole Bunch Of News

Having recovered from the weekend's exertions, I come back to find the internet has been pumping out all sorts of news:

Tom Taylor is the new Earth 2 writer while Nicola Scott remains on art. I know nothing about the Injustice: Gods Among Us series he's been writing so will have to take his stories at face value.

Monday Memories #19 - JLA: Our Worlds At War #1

Each Monday this year I'll be taking a look back at a random comic, prestige format issue, graphic novel or collection of reprints from amongst my 3,000 or so comics that date from 1962 to 2003 - I figured anything in the last ten years would be too recent to hark back to.

The comics are chosen completely at random and apart from a four week lead-in period, even I don't know what I'll be looking at in the weeks to come!

DC's July Solicitations

The big news from DC's July solicitations was the reveal of Trinity War not as a standalone mini-series as most events have been, but as a story running across the various Justice League titles. Justice League, JL Dark and JL of America will host the main story with, at the very least, Trinity of Sin: Pandora and Trinity of Sin: Phantom Stranger feeling the effects at the same time.

I wouldn't discount a number of one-shots tying in with it either.

All That Glitters

Last week in Justice League, we saw various heroes try out for positions on team, including the latest version of Platinum from the Metal Men. Trouble is - as these situations so, so often do - there was a bit of a brawl when Platinum lost her equilibrium.

At one point, she threw Firestorm, Blue Devil and Goldrush away from her:

but luckily, Flash caught Goldrush:

A call back to the fact that earlier she'd been flirting with him. Skipping over the fact that Vixen's left leg appears to have been amputated, cast your eye over Goldrush - for a woman who's covered in golden armour, she looks awfully . . . pink.

There you go, the latest in the range of colouring corrections from Crisis on Earth-Prime.

Feel free to ignore this post if it later turns out her gold armour vanishes if she's knocked unconscious or something.

I'm Extremely Photogenic. And About To Pop Out.

Last week's Justice League of America saw Steve Trevor putting his team together prior to a press conference to announce them to the world. The various heroes turned up and sat round a table but of all of them, one caught my eye - Catwoman.

She wandered around the entire issue wearing a costume that was open from her shoulders to her navel, leaving her heaving alabaster bosom open to the elements and, probably more to the point, the reader.

Now I've said before that I've no problem with skimpy superhero attire but this just struck me as both gratuitous and impractical. Imagine wearing this:

and going out to face Darkseid or Despero or someone. I think it's a safe bet that the "Rated Teen" on the cover would quickly head to "Suggested for Mature Readers" in seconds flat.

And is it meant to be sexy? If so, I'm guessing David Finch has never heard the expression "Less is more"

Here you go, Selina - hopefully this covers both practical and attractive:

Monday Memories #11 - Extreme Justice #13

Each Monday this year I'll be taking a look back at a random comic, prestige format issue, graphic novel or collection of reprints from amongst my 3,000 or so comics that date from 1962 to 2003 - I figured anything in the last ten years would be too recent to hark back to.

The comics are chosen completely at random and apart from a four week lead-in period, even I don't know what I'll be looking at in the weeks to come!

Here Is The News

Or at least a bit of news with some rumours. I don't often do a round-up but as I found a bunch of things that caught my eye this morning, I figured it was as good a way as any to really start the New Year.

J.M. DeMatteis on the Phantom Stranger - thankfully this interview does confirm what I hoped for back before Christmas in that DeMatteis is doing the dialogue. He says "Dan does the plots, Brent draws from that and then I script from Brent's astonishing art." Honestly, Brent Anderson's art isn't doing much for me at the moment but with DeMatteis on the book I'll be sticking round for a bit longer.

Justice League film characters rumoured - the list is here but it doesn't really hold any surprises. There's mention that "Green Lantern: Will be Ryan Reynold's character from the Green Lantern movie, but will be freshly written with a more serious tone" but no word whether Reynolds will be returning to the role which I think is doubtful.

Poster for new Sin City: A Dame to Kill For film revealed - possible poster featuring one of the girls of Old Town is up here. With any luck, the new film will remind us enough of the original Sin City film that we can forget about The Spirit film.

Finally some news about Lady Mechanika - it's been absolutely ages since issues #3 was out and I'd just about given up on this series, even more so when I read the headline that creator Joe Benitez has parted from publisher Aspen Comics. However, the article says the split's amicable and Benitez himself says "My plans for Lady Mechanika include finishing "The Mystery of the Mechanical Corpse" this upcoming year and also launching a monthly Lady Mechanika ongoing series."

A monthly? I guess that means a new writer/artist on it then because as much as I love Benitez's work, there seems no way he can run to a monthly schedule.

Justice League Variant Covers

The news that the forthcoming Justice League of America #1 is to have 52 variant covers broke last week. Is that some sort of record for the number of variants of a single issue, by the way? I've never been a big fan of them - for the most part, I'm happy to get a single issue and read the story within rather than worry about what's on the cover.

Anyhow, the variants are going to be the state flags of America, all based on this image:

It's various members of the new League hoisting the flag a la Iwo Jima.

Thing is, comics are something of a geeky habit so why not throw in a few geeky flags as well?

New Justice League Title

So that's why the Martian Manhunter left Stormwatch - to go and front his own, new JLA team.

From the DC blog's announcement about the new book being written by Geoff Johns and drawn by David Finch:

"This is a very different kind of team book,” says Geoff Johns. “On first glance, people might think the heroes of the JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA stand in the shadows of Superman, Wonder Woman and the rest of the JUSTICE LEAGUE, but Green Arrow, Katana, Martian Manhunter, the new Green Lantern, Stargirl, Vibe, Hawkman and Catwoman thrive in the shadows. They're underdogs who have everything to prove and something to lose. They're a team of unlikely heroes who will help one another discover they're as A-List as anybody -- yes, even Vibe."

Thriving in the shadows? What the heck does that mean?

And the line-up: Vibe? Katana? Catwoman for goodness' sake?! For this we lose Justice League International?

Ah, don't get me wrong - I'll pick it up because I mostly like Johns's stuff; it's just a little disappointing that the JLI's gone and we get this in its place.

Who Else Would Wear It?

A good few years ago, before they had their latest falling out, DC and Marvel teamed up and produced a couple of cross-company series and one-shots. Perhaps the best and certainly the longest anticipated was Kurt Busiek and George Perez's JLA/Avengers mini-series.

The story pitted cosmic entities from both universes pitting the heroes against one another before they overcame their differences, teamed up, turned the tables and defeated the bad guys. In the midst of the story, though, they entered a shared reality where both teams had co-existed in their own universes, sharing annual crossovers and adventures which led to this splash page aboard the JLA's satellite:

It's a typical Perez scene, crammed full of lots of characters interacting with each other. Hawkeye and Green Arrow use trick shots to try and best each other; Red Tornado shows Vision and Scarlet Witch pictures of his adopted daughter, Traya; Guy Gardner tries chatting up Moondragon.

Over the years, I've read this series several times but it's only now I've noticed Sue Dibny's T-shirt:

The Least Popular Author In The New DCU?

Looks like it's David Graves, one-time champion of the Justice League, author of dozens of books about mysterious worlds, magical artefacts and the League itself.

How do I know he's not exactly topping the New York Times bestseller list?

A couple of weeks ago, DC didn't even bother to show one of his books with anything other than gibberish text and this week, in the pages of Stormwatch, he just gets a generic description amongst the detritus of a professor's study:

Click to enlarge

See that? Just in front of Jenny Quantum - "Justice League Book"

Would it have been so difficult to do this:

Click to make bigger

And for those of you who think I have too much time on my hands, I'd like to point out that this whole thing took me less than ten minutes.

But yes, I do still have too much time on my hands.

Justice League Movie?

Poster by Alex4everdn.

SuperheroHype claim that Warner Bros are making plans for a Justice League movie, tying together the various DC heroes in one film.

It's a sad fact (only from the point of view of being a DC fan - I actually enjoyed most of the films) that Marvel has, over the last few years, cornered the market in superhero films with the success of Iron Man, Thor, Captain America and the like all leading up to this year's uber-successful Avengers film while DC have had next to no luck.

Who Was Who Is Who #23

So for want of anything better to write about on a Monday, I'm going to go through all my copies of Who's Who and see if I can predict who will make it over to the new DCU by the end of 2012, who might make it and who hasn't got a J. Wilbur Wolfingham's chance.

JONNY DOUBLE - private eyes have never really regained the popularity they had in the 50's and 60's have they? For that very reason, I can't see Jonny showing up any time soon.

Shows Promise, But Isn't Really Trying

I read that phrase so many times on my old school reports and it would always elicit a disapproving head shake from my parents.

Sad to say, it looks like Justice League is going the same way.

Oh sure, back when it started, when the whole New 52 was . . . er . . . new . . . Geoff Johns would write back-up pieces for the book. I'm sure we all remember fondly the faux pages of David Graves's book or the classified questioning of Steve Trevor but now time's gone on . . .

Well, they're just not putting the effort in any more.

From this week's Justice League:

Look at that page. Just gibberish letters. They didn't even bother to put in the lorem ipsum text which would have been something. See? They're just not trying any more.

Would it have killed them to use something from one of the earlier back-ups? I mean if I can do this:

in ten minutes, surely someone in the DC art department can do something way better thaN "AK;JW FK'YIDLLE; DASIJ' ASNHEK"?

Come along, DC. You must try harder.

No More Justice League International?

While browsing through my news feeds, I came across DC's August solicitations and fully intended to throw together a quick Don't Ask -- Just Buy It post but then another item from CBR caught my eye: Justice League International #12 is to be the final issue of the series.

From the article:

"The issue is also the only entry noted for August as the final issue. Considering the most recent Diamond sales estimates have the book far from the least-selling DC title, the ending is most likely story driven"

There's some small comfort there that it's not a decision made based on sales, but that still leaves me wondering what's happening with the book. Over the last few issues, several of the starting members have been hospitalised (none of whom appear on the cover above) and Rocket Red's been killed so it seems likely that this incarnation is done with (not a decision I'd be happy about if I'm right, by the way.)

And yet, there's the solicitation of Justice League International Annual #1 also out in August written by Geoff Johns and Dan Didio, two of the head honchos at DC. They're hardly likely to waste time writing a finale for a book that's being cancelled that month, surely, particularly as the OMAC character - whose series was written by Didio - has just joined the team.

Much as I loathe Bleeding Cool, I've heard rumours from that site that DC will be publishing #0 issues in September. If that's true, I foresee either a Justice League International vol 2 launching after the #0 issue or a newly named series featuring some or all of the same characters in a slightly different team.