So, What comics did you buy this week?

[Tom Foolery]

Fearless 1-4. As part of Marvel’s 80th anniversary, they did this anthology series that celebrated the powerful female Marvel characters, written and drawn by female creators. The main story ran thru all four issues and had Storm, Capt Marvel, and Sue Richards invited to a secret girls camp to be guest lecturers. Kamala Khan is there as a camper and she thinks the place is shady because no one has ever heard of it. Then some aliens attack as an excuse for guest stars like the Guardians to show up. Eventually the heroes give their keynote speeches. Huzzah for female empowerment and stuff. It was dull, but their heart was in the right place. There were two backup stories in each issue with the likes of Hellcat, X-23, Jubilee etc, but with the main story taking up half the book, each backup story only had like 5 pages and that’s hardly enough to develop a cohesive plot, let alone character development. The entire endeavor was pretty forgettable.

Firefly. Ugh. I spent the last week muscling thru this ongoing series from Boom studios. Writer Greg Pak had a few very brief and spartan lines of dialogue that felt like they could’ve been spoken by the characters on the show, but mostly he misses the mark. Jayne is reduced to dumb thug, Simon is pining for KayLee who is mooning over a new recurring character Leonard Chang-Benitez, etc. Mostly everyone comes across as generic characters in a generic space western. And the art for the first twelve issues didn’t help. KayLee, Inara, and River all looked pretty much the same. Wash, Mal, and Jayne were superficially different thanks to the color of their hair.

1-12. Mal and Zoe get pegged for war crimes during the Unification was and are getting chased by an Alliance Unificator, Boss Moon, a half cyborg lady who ends up becoming “frenemies” with Mal, or they had some Moonlighting bullshit going on. Things escalate when Mal’s mother gets involved and there’s an impending second uprising that gets quelled at the last minute and Mal gets the rest of the crew a pardon in exchange for him agreeing to hunt down his own mother.
There was also a oneshot in there where Mal goes after his mom, and we also get an “origin” of sorts of him growing up.
13- 19. Mal becomes a regional Sheriff and teams up with Boss Moon to go after criminals, while KayLee, Jayne, and Leonard continue on as the crew of the Serenity doing heists, often coming into conflict with Mal and Moon. Zoe, Wash, River, and Simon fuck off in a sideplot that barely gets any coverage where they go establish the Haven colony that eventually gets destroyed in the movie.
20-24, plus Blue Son Rising 0, 1. An ‘event’ that required two extra issues, but since it was only crossing over with the only series in this universe, it could’ve just been issues 20 and 26 instead but whatever. The mega-corporation Blue Sun which is basically Amazon+WalMart+Haliburton+everything else builds some AI droid cops to help Mal, then build 2.0 versions that look and sound like Mal, but surprise the giant corporation is the bag guys, so they have to break into a facility to shut them all down via some wifi malware or some shit.
25-26. There was a time jump to a few years after the movie, where Zoe, and Simon are off on their own with some other new random characters and also Zoe and Wash’s four year old daughter, Emma. KayLee is Captain of the Serenity and she, River, Jayne, and Leonard are getting chased by bounty hunters. Then Zoe finds out someone is posing as Wash and she goes to confront him, and it’s one of those AI droids, but programmed to be Wash.
The rest of the series went up to issue 36, but they’re in the new box.

Firefly:Brand New ‘Verse 1. First part of a six issue mini that’s an even bigger time jump. Zoe is captain of the Serenity, Emma is now 16 or 18 and there’s a couple new crew members. Zoe goes to visit Inara who is now a companion priestess and gets a job to heist a freighter.

I recommend you skip all of this atrociousness and just go back and rewatch the show for the 28th time.

Next up, Flash!!

[Diabolical]

I think I've been reading Firefly because I'm desperate for some gorram Firefly.
Nothing has felt quite right about the whole thing, especially with the way each character is written. I don't think Chinese is ever spoken. Yeah, the art was pretty bad in those early issues. There were a few things I liked, like the idea of Washbot - that was a decent way to get some version of Wash back - but the execution, not so much. And there is an interesting idea in the latter issues, but again, so-so execution.
I strongly suspect that Whedon has zero input on these Boom comics, unlike the Dark Horse stuff. And is there a single continuity anymore; are the DH comics and the Boom comics supposed to form one timeline?

All-New Firely is better, but still not good. I wonder why I still buy it every time I finish an issue.

[Tom Foolery]

I can’t recall hardly anything about the Dark Horse stuff. Didn’t they bring back Jubal Early in one of the minis? Like, I’m 90% sure I read them, but they left zero impression on me.

Boom also put out some hardcover OGNs. One was a heist starring all the girls, including Saffron, and another was an anthology of Wash stories. There may have been more. I’d be inclined to look for them if they did softcover TPBs of those books, but I’m not a hardcover guy.

[anarky]

I'm so fucking confused by Firefly EU. I don't know what counts and what doesn't. I have the hardcover novels, but haven't read them, and am worried about whether they'll be a waste of time and money.

I mainly remember The Shepherd's Tale, which my copy must've been different from everyone else's, because most people seem to like it and I found it to be, well, "anticlimactic" isn't strong enough a word.

[Tom Foolery]

Flash. Didn’t start Flash until issue 60-something because it had a cool variant cover. Then I backtracked looking for variant covers back to issue 50, so that’s where we start.

50. The end of an arc called Flash War. Hunter Zolomon is back calling himself the ‘One True Flash’ and he’s tricked Barry and the recently returned Wally into releasing other Forces besides the Speed Force called the Strength, Sage, and Still Forces. They chase Hunter running thru time, but they run so fast, they end up breaking the Speed Force or something, so that Time Travel with the Speed Force is no longer possible. Hunter escapes.

51. Wally has to deal with the fact he was ‘erased’ from continuity and came back and his family os still missing. So he ends up going to Sanctuary, preceding the eventual mass murder in the Heroes in Crisis mini. The other Nu52 Wally, now being called Walter gets pissed at Barry for something that happened during the Flash War, not exactly sure, he got abandoned in the future while they were fighting Hunter? Anyway, he ditches Barry and goes to join Damian Wayne’s Teen Titans. So Barry and Iris are back to basics going forward. No sidekicks.

52- 54. Barry starts a quest to learn more about the other Forces after going to talk to the multiversal assembly of Flashes from the other 52 universes. Apparently the 51 other Flashes just fuck off in a big meeting room until Flash needs to talk to them about shit. Anyway, the younger, newer Trickster gets a portion of the Strength Force and turns into a giant hulk-looking monster and Flash has to stop him with the help of Commander Cold, who is like a heroic Captain Cold from the 25th Century trapped in the present because Barry and Wally ruined time travel. They stop Axel and Barry gets a little insight into how the Strength Force works.
55-57. Heatwave gets the Sage Force and Barry and a Central City detective get trapped in a mind maze inside Rory’s head to try and find his inner innocent child to diffuse the Sage Force before he ignites the entire city. Commander Cold and Iris help out.
58-63. The Forces have spread beyond Central City, so Barry and Iris go on a world tour to places like Gorilla City, and the villain country of Badhnisia looking for Force users. They fight Fuerza before teaming up with her, then they fight a guy named Psyche before reluctantly teaming up with him to defeat a duo of globetrotting immortals calling themselves Gemini who want the Force powers for themselves. At the end Barry gets word of the massacre at Sanctuary.
64-65. This was a crossover with Batman dealing with the fallout of Heroes in Crisis and Gotham Girl breaking bad. Iris gets pissed at Batman and Barry for continually “recruiting” kids to be heroes and them becoming collateral in their war. She ends up leaving Barry.
66. Was a one off that focused on the original Trickster’s origin.
67-69. Jesse James returns in a big way and uses Sage Force technology to brainwash all of Central City into being “happy” before Flash stops him.

Next up, the rest of this Flash run. The series went to issue 88 before reverting to the “original” numbering with issue 750. Then I got probably another 12 issues or so before my guy stopped ordering variant covers and I wasn’t interested enough in the Flash to get the regular covers. If the story is getting good when I get to that stopping point, I might start looking for those issues and catch up.

[jjreason]

Saga 58 - digital copy. Saga is still good.

[Tom Foolery]

Flash continued.

Flash 70-75. Flash:Year One. While interacting with a new character called Steadfast, who wields the Still Force, Barry remembers an entire year he had somehow forgotten where he accidentally runs into the future and meets a future Flash trapped in a Central City run by the Turtle. Barry heads back to the present and fights the Turtle and also the future version of the Turtle and he gets his classic iconic red uniform and a bunch of other stuff, but manages to stop Turtle and prevent a repetitive time paradox. This whole year he managed to forget about immediately after he got superpowers. Lol.

Flash 76-81. The Black Flash(aka Death) sees the other Forces and their avatars as a threat to the Speed Force and starts hunting them. He manages to kill Psyche, the Sage user while Barry and the others are trying to figure out how to stop Black Flash. Then Hunter shows up and tries to acquire all four Forces to enact the Forever Force, so he can attract the Black Flash and “kill” it and take it’s power. Barry shows Hunter that the Clown that killed his family was given the gun by Eobard Thawne to manipulate Hunter into becoming Zoom. Realizing his entire life is bullshit, Hunter sacrifices himself to repair the Speed Barrier he had destroyed way back in issue 50 and re-jumpstart the Speed Force. Just in time for Captain Cold and the Rogues to return having been given upgrades from Lex Luthor during the whole Year of the Villain event.

Flash 82-87. Cold has taken over Central City. He kills Commander Cold and throws his head into the cell where he’s got Barry locked up in Iron Heights, with the rest of the City thinking he’s dead. Golden Glider helps Barry escape, but his powers are wonky and overpowered because the Speed Force got messed up. Glider and Flash recruit Heatwave and Weather Wizard to stop Cold because they want the old Captain Cold back and not the boosted powered one working with Lex. This leads to a showdown between the Rogues and Mirror Master and Cold. Flash defeats Cold, but he almost beats him to death with his amped up powers, so he turns himself in and they take both Barry and Cold to jail.

Flash 88. Flash and Cold in the back of the paddy wagon have a conversation. Pied Piper helps Barry with his overpowered speed and Glider breaks Cold out of prison.

Flash 89. The origin of a new villain called Paradox.

Flash 750. Giant anniversary issue reverts to the original numbering. Paradox recruits Godspeed to destroy Flash. A bunch of other back up stories and pinups and whatnot.

Next, the rest of the Flash run, then some of those bigass 100 Page Flash issues, and a Wally West mini called Flash Forward that spun out of Heroes in Crisis.

[Tom Foolery]

The comic sorting in the basement has taken precedent over the backlog of reading, but here’s the rest of the Flash series

751-755. To battle the new villain called Paradox, Barry has to team up with the only person known to have defeated Paradox in the future: Eobard Thawne. And the only place in the timeline Barry knows Thawne will definitively be…is the moment in the past after he killed Barry’s mom. With the help of fellow speedster Godspeed, they stop Paradox by manipulating the past so that he never becomes Paradox in the first place. And then Zoom turns around and breaks Godspeed’s neck!

756-758. Thawne recruits various Flash villains from different eras to form a Legion of Zoom to fuck with Barry amd ends with his ultimate goal. He vibrates at a specific frequency and merges with Barry’s body to become the Flash!

759-761. Josh Williamson ended his extensive Flash run( he had written every issue of the Rebirth series, so like 100 issues?) as with the help of Max Mercury and Jesse Quick, who were ‘erased’ by Flashpoint/Nu52, Barry breaks free of the speed force prison he’s in while Zoom has control of his body and recruits pretty much every speed hero to take down Thawne’s Legion of Zoom, which is pretty much every Flash villain. Epic battle ensues, until Barry and Thawne race thru time, and the Flash ‘reboots’ Thawne so he won’t remember being Zoom and sticks him back in the future as the curator of the Flash museum. Williamson went out strong.

762-766. Fill in writer has Flash going up against Dr Alchemy. Solid arc from an interim writer.

767 was part of the Endless Winter JLA crossover event.

Annual 3. Flash helps Captain Boomerang help a bunch of the Suicide Squad escape from Task Force X and fight Deathstroke out in the desert. This was more of an issue of Suicide Squad, with a bunch of new characters I don’t recognize.

The new writer took over the next issue and made Wally the main character. Don’t have any of those issues, but I like Wally better than Barry, so maybe a hunt is in my future.

Next up, for real, the rest of the Flash Giant Sized books, and the Flash Forward mini starring Wally.

[Tom Foolery]

Flash 100 Page Giant 1-4. The second volume. Each issue was released at WM and a Direct Market version with a different cover was put out in comic shops. Two original stories per issue, and three reprint stories. The reprints were a 4 issue arc from the Nu52 Flash run, and the first 4 issues of both Green Arrow’s and Blue Beetle’s Rebirth series. I didn’t read any of the reprinted stuff, because I have the originals and they will get read eventually. The new stories seemed to be set in a separate continuity from the comics, maybe based on the CW show or the movie universe, but not part of those continuities either. More like inspired by them. Barry has only begun to date Iris, she doesn’t know his secret ID, and her appearance is inspired by the show/movie’s Iris(eg not white). Flash fights King Shark on a cruise ship, then has to deal with a “new” threat of Eobard Thawne from the future. The story was concluded in a fifth issue that wasn’t released in DM, only at WM. Thanks Obama.

Flash Forward 1-6. After the events of Heroes in Crisis, Wally is in Blackgate awaiting trial for the deaths at Sanctuary. Tempus Fuginaut, a cosmic being tasked with protecting the multiverse, breaks Wally out and sends him on a unique mission to save the multiverse from the expanding Dark Universe. After saving a couple alt worlds, Wally finds out his children are still alive on a pocket dark universe world, but to save them, he has to sit in the abdicated Mobius Chair, which will consume his memories with the entire history of knowledge of everything. He agrees if Tempus promises to return his kids back home. So Wally becomes like the new Metron and it sets up his role in the Dark Knights:Death Metal mega event. The kids get back home, and Linda remembers they existed and her life with Wally before Flashpoint/Nu52 erased everything. Very emotional.

Yay! Flash run finished. Next in the box was a bunch of the DC Future State minis. Like, A BUNCH. I’m gonna skip all those for now and jump ahead to the ‘G’s. Not exactly sure what’s in there; Ghost Rider, GIJoe, Guardians, Gwenpool, and maybe some other stuff as well. Onward!

[Tom Foolery]

Some Ghost Rider books. 72% of which star the Punisher. Go figure.

Cosmic Ghost Rider 1-5. Fresh from his introduction in the Thanos ongoing from 2017, a million year old Frank Castle, has the powers of the Ghost Rider and the power cosmic as a former herald of Galactus. He decides to go back in time and kill Thanos as a baby. But when he gets there, he decides toddler Thanos isn’t guilty…yet. So he decides to raise baby Thanos himself, which leads to one of the funniest panels in comics history when Uatu arrives to witness “The worst choice that any living being has ever made in the history of thought.” Guardians of the Galaxy from the future, led by Cable, arrive in literal waves to stop Frank, but he obliterates them and Thanos grows up to become the Punisher. Eventually crazy Frank realizes his mistake and destroys Punisher Thanos and resets the timeline by returning toddler Thanos to his crib. But now he’s stuck in the past with some time to kill so…

Cosmic Ghost Rider Destroys Marvel History 1-6. Frank decides to stop the killing of his family in Central Park, but he’s got a few years before it happens, so he inserts himself into the origin stories of every major Marvel hero. He regales these adventures to his family after he shows up at their door posing as his own ‘Uncle Fredo’. But on the day of the massacre, Uatu again steps in and prevents Frank from changing history, so he’s forced to watch it unfold as it originally happened, because it is a pivotal anchor point in the timeline.

Revenge of the Cosmic Ghost Rider 1-5. After hanging with the Guardians for like ten seconds, cosmic GR comes up against a Cosmic King of crime that filled the void when Thanos died. The King is possessed by an ancient cosmic entity that wants Frank’s power, but can’t possess him unless he gets his soul back(which he sold to Mephisto years in the future for the Ghost Rider powers) so a convoluted plot to give Frank back his soul is implemented. Unfortunately, the plan doesn’t work and Cosmic Frank’s new sidekick, the perpetually scrappy Cammi, gets infected at the end. Cammi is like the new Rick Jones of the Marvel Universe. Look up her wiki. She’s hung around with Drax, she survived the Young Avengers deathmatch Arena, she’s been a Darkhawk, flew with the Ravagers for awhile, etc. If she can settle on an identity, I’d read an ongoing book starring her.

Ghost Rider 1-7, plus a Mother of Demons oneshot. Short lived ongoing that got cancelled during the pandemic. Blaze is King of Hell, and returns to Earth chasing escaped demons. He gets in a fight with Dan and takes his powers away, so Caretaker convinces Dan to go to Limbo and get the Spirit of Corruption powers from Belasco. Then he re-teams with Wolverine and Punisher(Hearts of Darkness reunion!)to stop Blaze who’s slowly being infected by the evil of the demons he’s sending back to hell. The series ended without a resolution, but it was wrapped up the King in Black:Ghost Rider oneshot the following year, where they give Hell back to Mephisto so Lilith doesn’t get it.

Next up, GIJoe!

[Tom Foolery]

GiJoe:Silent Option 1-4. A mini that spun out of the main ARAH book by Hama. Helix goes after the human traffickers that abducted her when she was a kid, and the Joes send in a team including Bombstrike, Sean-Eyes, Dawn-Eyes, Torpedo, and Alpine, to rescue/back her up. Culminates in an attack on the home of Helix’s adopted parents. Also has a backup story in each issue with Helix’s “origin” after Snake-Eyes rescued her years ago. Pretty badass story arc.

GIJoe:Sierra Muerte 1-3. I honestly tried reading it. But I couldn’t get past the art.

Next up is a dozen or so issues of the ARAH series.

[Diabolical]

I had no idea Cosmic Ghost Rider was so batshit weird.
I might have to pick up the trade(s).

[Tom Foolery]

I had no idea Cosmic Ghost Rider was so batshit weird.
I might have to pick up the trade(s).

It was definitely written as borderline satire. At least the first two series were.

[Tom Foolery]

GIJoe:ARAH 267-275. A massize 10-part story arc called ‘Snake Hunt’ where Cobra brazenly kidnaps Sean-Eyes, thinkng he’s the OG Nate so they can put him in Dr Venom’s Brainwave machine and turn him into a Cobra Assassin. Hama delivered on a promise to feature EVERY Joe character in the run as the entire Joe team mobilizes to invade Springfield. Even after the DOD cancels the mission and tells them to stand down, they all use their vacation time to continue the mission. With unlikely allies, such as Zartan and the Dreanoks, Destro and Baroness’ Iron Grenadiers, and the Oktober Guard, the Joes and their allies converge on Springfield to rescue Sean, culminating in issue 275, where each panel is a full splash page, and the entire book exists without word balloons. Yes, a glorious SILENT ISSUE of ARAH.

276-278 were stand alone issues, part of an ‘Untold Tales’ arc. Featuring Law & Order in a one off issue defending the Pit, most of the cold weather team on a mission in Frusenland, and a black bag op into Benzheen.

Yearbook 1. A reprint of the original ‘82 Yearbook with a new cover and better coloring.

The book is currently on issue 293, and from what I’ve read, IDW is losing the license and the book is wrapping up(again) in issue 300.

GIJoe 1-10, plus Castle Fall oneshot. IDW’s last attempt to reboot the series. An evil tech-giant called Cobra takes over the world, and the Joe team in this one are civilians recruited as a resistance. On the one hand, the concept is far removed and can barely be called GIJoe, but the writing and the characters themselves weren’t bad. The issue that focused on Scarlet was particularly well done, focusing on her PTSD after returning from a previous war in the Middle East and trying to adjust to life afterwards. I decided it liked it, it just wasn’t y’know…Joe, except superficially. The book only made it 10 issues and then they did a hasty oneshot to conclude the story and defeat Cobra.

Snake-Eyes:Deadgame 1-4. An ancient supernatural warrior is reawakened after centuries, and the world’s best current warrior is invited to battle with him, for the fate of the world or something. The story is pretty weak. Liefeld draws SE in some nice action poses, but he’s only got so many of those in his bag, before they start looking repetitive. There’s a 5th issue in the new box, but I’m not that excited to see how it plays out, despite the ‘twist’ in the fourth issue where Destro and Baroness show up and blow the bad guy away. I did, however, see a bomb diggity variant cover that I spent way too much money on and I’m gonna frame it and hang on my wall because it’s badass.

That’s it for Joe! Next up, a couple of random Green Lantern and Green Arrow books I bought and then I think a Guardians ongoing or two.

[Tom Foolery]

Green Arrow 50. The final issue of the Rebirth ongoing. Not sure why I bought this new after skipping the entire rest of the run. Not even that big of a GA fan. I eventually tracked down almost the entire run in cheap bins, but the rest of it but its in the DC/Nu52 boxes. Anyway, the issue…At some point, J’onn J’onzz gave Ollie a secret box that had a weapon that could take out the Justice League if they ever needed taking out. The US Govt decides Ollie shouldn’t have the box and they should, so they send Black Canary to convince Ollie to give up the box. He says no and proceeds to beat up like 100 Spec Ops guys and gets his house, his secret Arrow Cave, and his escape plane blown up in the process. After he escapes, he opens the box and there was nothing in it to begin with. Lol, J’onn! Ollie discards his GA outfit and the empty box, but makes a vow to continue fighting evil as he walks away. The box starts glowing.

Green Lanterns 56. I got this because it had a cool foil cover. DC was doing a gimmick month with fancy foil covers, so I have a bunch of them. Dan Jurgens writing and Mike Perkins on art was a nice surprise. I like Perkins’ stuff. In this isssue, Hank Henshaw aka Cyborg Superman has a new power ring called the Phantom Ring that controls all the GL rings. He has the entire Corps trapped and only John Stewart and Simon Baz are untrapped. So they spring into action without using their rings and turn the tide. Henshaw escapes and heads to Earth to re-destroy Coast City.

Green Lantern 1, 2, and 8. Grant Morrison took over on a new ongoing with art by Liam Sharp. Morrison has a goofy ass imagination. Some pretty far out concepts. He’s entertaining, but he’s an acquired taste.

Green Lantern Annual 1. More Grant Morrison. The Jordan family reunion gets interrupted by aliens using the wi-fi to attack another alien hiding in the bedroom. I don’t know enough about Hal’s extended family to appreciate all the characters here. Did you know Hal had a nephew/cousin with the same name (Hal Jr) who is also a d-list hero named Airwave?

Green Lantern 80th Anniversary oneshot. One of several 100 page specials they’ve been doing, with the decade variant covers. Aquaman, GA, Robin, Joker, Catwoman, and WW have also had oneshots. Pretty cool, they got pretty much everyone who’s done a sizable GL writing and art stint come back to do stories for this. Denny O’Neil, Johns, Marz, etc. doing stories featuring all the main GLs from Alan Scott up to the new GLs Cruz and Simon Baz.

And lastly a few Grimm Fairy Tales pin up oneshots. Zenoscope never misses an opportunity to draw scantily clad women.