column 2 "maybe they landed in the universe of cotton candy hookers and chocolate beer"

This week's score comic: comic shop 1, my ass (and my wallet) 0. Seriously the number of books I bought this week is fucking ridiculous. I spent a good sixty bucks on comics this week. Half of these books weren't even good. On the plus side, one event had a very good week. I doubt there would be any difficulty for you to guess which one. Please comment once you finish reading it, I like to be acknowledged, and no one commenting is depressing. On to the weeks reviews.

the gauntlet

The gauntlet rages on with this week's Amazing Spiderman 618. I sort of, was hoping for something really good after last week's issue was the best of the week. Best Spiderman comic since J.M.S. left. Completely changed my opinion of gauntlet. Then this came out. Not that it's bad, just not good. This issue sort of revived some plot lines from earlier in brand new day, specifically before I rejoined brand new day (I had to wikipedia half of this issue). Not that this is a bad thing, it's just that Mysterio only showed up for a few panels. It mostly followed the maggia's decent into fail. Not that I don't like the maggia, it's just this issue sort of bored me. The mister negative bits flew way over my head. In the end this issue fell pray to the problem that most of the gauntlet, save for last issue, has fallen in. Good writing, lackluster plots.

realm of kings

There where two realm of kings books this week, I didn't pick up realm of kings: inhumans because I'm bored with that book and the cosmic event cycle in general. In fact, the only reason I picked up nova 33 is because I treated it like a new warriors spin-off. I like new warriors a lot. To be fair, both darkhawk and namorita show up this issue so I'm hardly wrong in that assumption. In fact this issue had nothing to do with the rest of ROK, something I'm ok with. If you don't pick this up, you won't miss anything. Inside is a fairly decent comic with a plot idea that has been done to death.

the Mark Waid awesomeverse

This week's entry into the mark waid awesomeverse was incorruptible 2, naturally it was awesome. A contender for best of the week. If you aren't reading boom studios masterwork then you should. Go to the store, pick up both the trades for irredeemable, then get irredeemable 9 and incorruptible 1, then finish of with this. These books where amazing to begin with, and have been getting better with each issue. In this issue we get a plot, plenty of action, tons of hilarity, and best of all, a street view of the plutonian's rampage. Naturally, what we see is awesome. Buy this book.

our world at war

For some reason superman/batman 68 was part of our world at war. Why it was part of a nine year old crossover? I don't know, I didn't but it.

nation x

This week's only x title was uncanny x men 520 which was, thankfully, not part of necrosha. The resulting book was not bad just ,at time, a little boring. The parts with predator x, failed to interest me. However, the parts with magneto deciding to fix one of utopia's many problems without first informing cyclops was endlessly entertaining.

dark reign

Behold, this week possessed, what are sure to be, some of the last non-siege dark reign titles. Among them were both issues of thunderbolts and mighty avengers. I did not read thunderbolts because I dropped that book like it was hot a month ago. I did however read mighty avengers 33. Considering the solid last tissue, this issue was a bit of a let down. It was also at times kind of stupid. That said I still enjoyed it. Specifically the part where Pym convinces Osborne that he already used the cosmic cube. that was gold.

assault on new Olympus
Aono continued this week with incredible herc 140 . As someone who doesn't read this title on a weekly basis, much of this issue went over my head. What I did understand I did enjoy. Incredible herc remains one of the best books I'm to lazy to read. The agent of atlas part was also good. But then, that is hardly a surprise. I think I need to add this comic to my regulars.

non-crossover section
I read surprisingly little non crossover stuff this week. captain america 603 was some stupidity about right wing antigov rebels, some evil clone of cap, and bucky was still cap. Nothing a normal person should want to read. All this comic did, was anger me about the negative portrayal of republicans in marvel books. Actually the nomad part wasn't half bad.Deadpool merc with a mouth 7 was good. It pulled of dimension traveling deadpool in the funniest way it could (please see quote at the top). My only complaint is the artwork in the sergeant deadpool part, that was pretty horrible. Power girl 7 was the worst issue of this series. Where as vartox in last issue was brash, incompetent, and narcissistic, this issues vartox was competent and charming. THERE IS NO HUMOR WHEN BOTH CHARACTERS ARE THE STRAIGHT MAN. Glad I got that out of my system.

Moving on to the brave and the bold 31. You know who I love, J. Michael Straczynski. Apparently, so does someone at dc. They gave him a title and a license to do whatever the fuck he wants. The end result is an awesome comic. This weeks dose of J. Michael Straczynski, consists of a team up between the atom and the joker. Where in gods name does he come up with this stuff? This comic is brilliant. Contender for best of the week. Maybe better then last issue. And last issue was a super awesome team up between green lantern and dr. fate tying into JLI. And if there are two things I love, it's J. Michael Straczynski and JLI. Back to this issue, we see the atom reluctantly go into the joker's brain to cure him of a brain disease. We then see a new take on the joker's origin (read: NOT BASED ON THE WORKS OF ALAN MOORE). All in all a great issue.

siege

I read two siege books this week. dark wolverine 82 sort of fell flat. it wasn't bad, just not an interesting comic. Dark avengers 13 entirely consisted of Bendis trying to throw reveal after reveal about the sentry at you. It lead to horrible comic. Suddenly the sentry is a drug addict, and the void is the angel of death. Horrible stuff. It actually made the already pretty shitty character of the sentry cross the line into terrible character territory.

fall of the hulks

It's odd to find two good hulk comics in one week. Especially a good leob hulk comic. But here I am reading hulk 19 and incredible hulk 606 and I notice, fall of the hulks is four for four. Speaking of fours we saw the f.f. in both these issues. Apparently the Inteligencia (I call them the brain trust) puts there plan for world domination in order. The first step is to take the smartest people on earth out of the issue to make there job easier. So this week they target reed richards and dr. doom. both are defeated bringing the brain trust one step closer to victory. And I think she hulk dies, don't quote me on that It's not clear what happened to her. I don't know. The only problems I had are that both doom and the f.f. lost a little easy, and that romita jr. isn't doing these books. I loved him in fall of the hulks gamma.

AND NOW FOR THE BEST EVENT OF THE WEEK

image united

image united is a great book. It's really cleaning house. In fact I would go so far as to say it's one of the best comics ever. I especially love how all the artists draw there own........... hahahhahahhahahhahahahhahahhahahahahahhahaha I'm sorry I couldn't keep a straight face. Image united is actually one of the worst pieces of shit I have ever read. The real best event of the week is below.

blackest night

Blackest night kicked ass and took names this week. first there was starman 81. I never read the original so this issue went way over my head. However, unlike dan didio's weird western tales issue, this book was forgiving to new readers. It ended up so good, I wanted to read the original starman run.

Green lantern corps 44 was something to behold. Tomasi, a writer who up until now has worked miracles, has completely lost his shit. The past two issues have been full of instant fixes, shit dialog, deus ex machinas, and plot holes. despite that this issue was awesome. Was it the art? Was it the great character's that he's using? Was the concept behind these issues so good that instant plot fixes and bad writing doesn't matter? I don't know. I personally think it was all of the above. For some reason tomasi dropping the ball hasn't killed this books overwhelming quality.

Phantom stranger 44 was something different. All of the revived titles have been one of th following, a nostalgia comic (starman, weired western), or another book in disguise (catwoman=gothem city sirens, suicide squad=secret six, power of shazam=52). But this book was different. It actually tied into not one, but two actual subplots in blackest night. It advanced the spectre subplot from earlier in blackest night, that will show up in green lantern 50. It also concludes the deadman subplot seen in BN:batman and the main series. The book itself is really good and I recommend reading it.

the best issue of the week

This week's best issue falls under the blackest night banner in the form of blackest night:flash 2
PLEASE NOTE, THIS REVIEW IS FULL OF SPOILERS. This issue was awesome. It was sort of two awesome stories in one. Half this issue followed the rouges in their attempt to hunt the black lantern rouges. If you have read final crisis rouges revenge then you would know geoff johns is a great writer for the rouges. If you haven't then JOHNS WRITES THE ROUGES LIKE NINJA CANDY. We see one on one battles between the appropriate living and dead rouges. We also see black lantern rainbow rider, I enjoyed that. But the part that propelled the issue to greatness was the blue lantern flash part. It showed
barry and saint walker unite to take down black lantern after black lantern, all with the battle cry "all will be well". Please note;that would have been this column's title if I didn't like the quote from merc with a mouth a little better. All in all it ended up a great issue, and a must read.



And that my second column see you around next week.