Yearly Archives: 2013

May 3 2013

Swamp Thing 20

swamp thing 20

Today, Patrick and Scott are discussing Swamp Thing 20 originally released May 1st, 2013.

Patrick: What’s your greatest fear? It’s something that could happen to you, right? Your worst fear isn’t that you’re living the life you’re living right now. But that’s the case for Alec Holland – everything he had to lose, he lost. Can you imagine what a bummer it’d be to realize your worst fear was that you’d live your life as you had? Christ, that’s depressing. It’s regret at its most primal level, and it’s exactly what we’re dealing with in Swamp Thing 20. Continue reading →

May 3 2013

The Movement 1

movement 1 Today, Shelby and Mikyzptlk are discussing The Movement 1, originally released May 1st, 2013.

Shelby: Not only do I work in downtown Chicago, my office happens to be located near the Board of Trade, the Federal Reserve Bank, and a number of other federal buildings. That means I see my fair share of protests; just today, a May Day protest made it’s way past my office to the federal plaza a block away. Being across from the Board of Trade, Reserve Bank, and having my office located in a building primarily filled with bankers means I saw my share of Occupy protesters when that movement was in its heyday. They were on my mind as I read the first issue of Gail Simone’s The Movement; if Occupy protesters were suddenly granted superpowers  and were truly able to turn vigilante, what sort of implications would that have? Continue reading →

May 2 2013

Dial H 12

dial h 12

Today, Taylor and Shelby are discussing Dial H 12, originally released May 1st, 2013.

Taylor: There comes a point in issue 12 of Dial H where after a series of very chaotic series the Fixer, who we were introduced to last month, is utterly confused. The cause of his (her, its?) confusion is the product of spell put on it by another character in the issue, as opposed to it actually just being confused by the events it’s undergoing. While this is a different type of confusion than readers of Dial H are used to experiencing, the reaction it elicits are basically the same.

An Excellent Question

What exactly does all this crazy shit mean? Dial H has always reveled in its own weirdness, an aspect of the series that has almost been aggressive in its persistence. At some point, however, all this weirdness has to go somewhere and actually mean something; weirdness for weirdness’ sake simply isn’t enough to carry an entire title. China Mieville seems to know this. Just as Dial H gets almost too weird for its own good, we are offered a glimpse behind the universe and what makes it tick, a process which maybe saves the title from going too far off the rails.

Continue reading →

May 2 2013

Age of Ultron 7

Alternating Currents: Age of Ultron 7, Drew and Patrick

Today, Drew and Patrick are discussing Age of Ultron 7, originally released May 1st 2013. This issue is part of the Age of Ultron crossover event. Click here for complete AU coverage.

ultron-div

Drew: I wanted to start this writeup with the clip from Back to the Future part II where Doc explains the notion of “alternate 1985” — the idea that changing something while time traveling to the past can create a timeline different from the one you know. It’s a common notion (and plot device) in most time-travel stories, but Doc explains it quite clearly in a simple chalkboard diagram. When I went hunting for that clip, however, I was bemused to discover that most of the discussion of that scene hinges on how the rest of the movie doesn’t really adhere to its rules (how does Biff of 2015 return to the “original” timeline — which needs to happen in order for Marty and Doc to use the delorean to return to 1985 — if he is coming back from creating the “alternate” timeline?) which illustrates the larger problem of time-travel stories: they can’t ever make any sense. Continue reading →

May 1 2013

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 21

tmnt 21

Today, Taylor and Drew are discussing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 21, originally released April 24th, 2013.

Taylor: Cities are dirty places. Go to any major city and it’s pretty much guaranteed that you will see litter piled in gutters, blowing across streets, and randomly dispersed in unsuspecting front yards. It’s not that people in big cities like litter (does anyone?) or care about the environment any less than people in smaller urban areas. Rather, it’s simply a matter of when you throw a huge number of people together they create a huge amount of waste. Keeping all of this waste together can be a hard thing to do, thus in cities like Chicago, my base of operations, litter and dirtiness are just something you get used to. This grime that accumulates in big cities gives them an unmistakable urban feel which most people can easily recognize, whether they have ever lived in such an environment or not. Kevin Eastman recognizes this aspect of cities and it is reflected in issue 21 of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which he both wrote and drew. The result is an issue that realigns the series with a new plot while at the same establishing a dark and ominous tone for the future.

Continue reading →

May 1 2013

Young Avengers 4

young avengers 4

Today, Spencer and Patrick are discussing Young Avengers 4, originally released April 24th, 2013. 

slim-banner

Spencer: Tricksters are a common archetype in most works. They spread chaos, disregard authority, and cheat, con, and lie in whatever ways they can to get what they want. We all feel like we know better than to trust them, and so do our protagonists, but the best tricksters find a way to get past our defenses and bend us to their whims anyway. Kieron Gillen knows exactly how to write an effective trickster, and his Loki — one of the oldest and greatest — somehow manages to keep surprising both the Young Avengers and the readers; he might just be proving himself a greater threat than even that pesky interdimensional parasite.

Continue reading →

May 1 2013

Invincible 102

Alternating Currents: Invincible 102, Drew and PatrickToday, Drew and Patrick are discussing Invincible 101, originally released April 24th, 2013.

Drew: Big reveals can be a lot of fun, but they often have the effect of retroactively making everything leading up to them seem patently absurd. The very notion of “spoilers” bears this out — sure, knowing Bruce Willis was dead all along removes the impact of the reveal, but the more lasting effect of knowing is that it draws your attention to how hard the movie works to never explicitly show that he’s alive, ruining what would have otherwise seemed totally innocuous. Once you know he’s dead, he can’t credibly be seen as not dead, which makes the whole movie kind of dumb. As a newcomer to Invincible, the big reveal in issue 102 feels a lot like that spoiler, shifting our perspective on a character so drastically that I find it hard to believe we could have ever thought anything else. Continue reading →

Apr 30 2013

All-Star Western 19

Alternating Currents: All-Star Western 19, Drew and Taylor

Today, Drew and Taylor are discussing All-Star Western 19, originally released April 24th, 2013.

Drew: Time travel does weird things to stories. Leaving aside whatever chronology wankery that usually goes along with it, time travel stories actually require pretty specific things of their characters. If they are going to the past, for example, they must not know history that well (or events have to play out in a way different from what they learned). Sure, having a character aware of the hands of fate sounds good, but knowing everything before it happens sure sounds boring. Making the time traveler relatively unaware allows for all kinds of neat dramatic irony — we know how things play out even if the characters don’t. This is especially true of historical events we might recognize, but it’s also true of smaller period details. We laugh when Bill and Ted high-five Napoleon, or when Marty McFly plays Johnny B. Goode because we understand that that’s not how someone from that time period would behave. It’s this smaller-scale dramatic irony that permeates All-Star Western 19, as Jonah Hex runs into a time-displaced Booster Gold. Continue reading →

Apr 30 2013

Uncanny X-Men 5

uncanny x-men 5

Today, Ethan and Patrick are discussing Uncanny X-Men 5, originally released April 24th 2013.

Ethan: Each of us has at least two definitions of self – the one we show to the world, and the one we identify as our true self. The external definition — the mask — is usually a tool we use to fit in. Perhaps your mask is funnier than you believe the “real” you truly is, or more confident, or more flippant, or more compassionate. Some of us may present a version of ourselves that is not too different than the one we believe to be true; others of us may show a face that’s more dramatically different than our internal, hidden one. Whatever the distance between the public and private self, whatever qualities you infuse into this living theater of personality, you — and only you — can fully plumb the difference. That is of course, assuming that you know who the “true” you is. In Uncanny X-Men #5, Brian Michael Bendis begins to peel back the figurative and literal masks worn by Magik, reminding us of her past and exploring the present condition of the rebel mutants.

Continue reading →

Apr 30 2013

Fantastic Four 7

fantastic four 7

Today, Shelby and Patrick are discussing Fantastic Four 7, originally released April 24th, 2013.

Shelby: When I read comics (or watch movies), I throw myself into it completely; I get so wrapped up in the world these types of media create, strongly written characters can affect me very deeply. This happens with characters I love (you all know of my gigantic crush on Clint Barton), and it happens with characters I hate. Sometimes, I just can’t extricate myself from a fictional universe to remember that it is, in fact, fictional, and I probably don’t need to get angry at a character for being a total ass. Continue reading →