Monthly archives: February, 2013

Robin, Robout

SPOILER ALERT!!!!! This hasn’t happened in comics yet, but it’s all over newsarama.com: Damian Wayne is dead. Gotta say, I did NOT see that one coming.

This will probably come as happy news to some. At least a couple of my fellow bloggers were not fans of Damian Wayne as Robin. He never really bothered me, but I can see why he would. First, his conception doesn’t really make sense in the New 52 timeline. If Bruce Wayne has only been Batman for 5 years and Damian is 12, that means Ra’s al Ghul decided Bruce Wayne was worthy to mate with his daughter a good 8 years before he ever put on the cowl, when Bruce was barely into his 20s. Second, Damian’s a whiny little kid. Nobody likes a whiny kid.

nullBut my immediate thought when I heard the news was “so who’s the new Robin?” There’s got to be a new Robin, doesn’t there? There’s always been a Robin, hasn’t there? Turns out, there has.

Jason Todd was actually introduced in the Batman comics while Dick Grayson was still wearing the green short shorts. As soon as Dick became Nightwing, Jason was there to step into his booties. Tim Drake debuted a year after comic readers voted to kill Jason Todd and became Robin after 5 months. Except for Stephanie Brown’s short stint (which may or may not have still happened), Tim was Robin until he became Red Robin, specifically so Damian could become the new Robin.

But in New 52, Tim Drake was never Robin. So Batman had Dick (who turned out all right), then Jason (who was beaten to death with a crowbar by popular vote), possibly Stephanie (who was tortured to death), and Damian (who is murdered by his clone…no, seriously). So maybe there won’t be a new Robin? That’s really not a very good track record. If I was Batman, I’d be having second (fourth?) thoughts about bringing another tweener into the game.

But get real, there’s got to be a new Robin. And it’s got to be someone the fans already know. So let’s speculate!

Tim Drake
Why not just go back to what worked? (more…)



Worst to First: February 20, 2013

It’s the return of Worst to First! I think I did, like, two of these once. But they’re back!

To the uninitiated and painfully stupid: I’m going to review the comics I bought last week, starting with the worst one and working my way up to my favorite one. It’s pretty simple, really.

Let’s start ‘er up!

WORST

Action Comics #17

action comics 17I guess this is the worst issue I read last week. I still kind of liked it, though, so prepare yourself for some mostly positive reviews.

This is the last issue of Action Comics that Grant Morrison is writing, according to DC’s website (that is what “penultimate” means, right?), and it’s sufficiently chalk-full of confusing, freaked-out gobbledegook, but there’s also something very endearing about a story that combines a trio of time travelers trying to warn Superman of his fate with a giant fight between Superman and an enormous Superman-killing robot. Whatever flaws there may be, I’ll forgive, because that premise just screams “Classic Superman Fun.”

Y’know, this brings up an interesting point. I’ve been arm-chair quarterbacking about Superman movies for years, and I always argue that, in order to make a great Superman movie, they need to have Superman fight something enormous, whether it’s a robot or a monster or a robotic monster.

Too often, his big struggles in the movie are just him trying to fly really fast or lift something really heavy. Kind of lame, ya ask me. Take note, Hollywood! I’m tossing out pearls here. (more…)



Podcast of Doom (transcript): Dropping Green Lantern


[SFX: Intro music]

DOOM DELUISE: Hello and welcome to the latest Podcast of Doom. I’m your host, Doom Deluise, and with me is – –

JIM DOOM: Hey, I’m supposed to be the host. What are you doing? Hello, folks, I’m your host, Jim Doom and – –

DOOM DELUISE: I forgot to ask you, but why did you quit reading Green Lantern?

[SFX: Intro music fade out]

JIM DOOM: I just haven’t enjoyed it at all.

I am glad that DC is doing something to make their roster less of a white-boys club, but the attempt to normalize those of middle-eastern descent by having him be a falsely-accused terrorist just felt really heavy handed and I can’t get into this Third Guardian War at all. And I’m spending too much on comics, so that finally got the axe.

Green Lantern was one of the longest-running comics I’d been buying.

I think I’ve been reading that since I first made the effort to read more DC books around the time that the Countdown to Infinite Crisis began. (more…)