Look, there are a lot of comics out there. Too many. We can never hope to have in-depth conversations about all of them. But, we sure can round up some of the more noteworthy titles we didn’t get around to from the week. Today, Drew and Patrick discuss Batman and Wonder Woman 30, Uncanny X-Men 20, and Ultimate FF 1.

Drew: What is it that attracts you to superhero comics? Is it the incredible feats? The straightforward emotions writ large? Is it the insane, mind-bending concepts? Is it the complex mythology built collaboratively over decades of a shared universe? Obviously, different fans are drawn to different elements of the genre, but anyone looking for an issue that delivers on all counts might be happy with Batman and Wonder Woman 30.

Writer Peter Tomasi has long been the master of squeezing emotionally resonant stories out of the mythologies introduced in other series, and this issue finds him digging into the rich world Brian Azzarello has been developing in his private corner of the DC Universe. Bruce’s pursuit of Ra’s al Ghul has brought him to Paradise Island, much to the chagrin of Diana’s sisters-in-arms. They begrudgingly allow Batman to continue his chase to a secluded cave which Ra’s believes contains one of the last Lazarus Pits. It turns out that pit is actually a misunderstood monster, who chases away Ra’s and his goons (with Damian and Talia’s bodies in tow), but is allowed a quiet goodbye with Diana and Bruce before Bruce takes up the chase again.

We hailed the previous issue as a quiet return to form for this series, which seems to have rediscovered its focus, both in Bruce’s relationship to Damian, and in Tomasi’s skills at incorporating mythologies he didn’t create. Indeed, this may be the strongest issue since the stellar, silent, issue 18. It pays homage to one of my favorite series, plumbs interesting emotional parallels, features a hulking shadow monster, and even finds time for a little history lesson. It’s a jam-packed issue, but artist Patrick Gleason manages to keep it from ever feeling overstuffed. Frankly, I’m not sure how he does it and still finds time for two (TWO!) iconic splash pages, but the effect is stunning.

Actually, that accelerated pacing may also contribute to the second wind of this title — with a series of one-and-done team-ups, the emphasis is really on episodic storytelling, which seems to be Tomasi’s strength. Whatever the cause, this series has clawed its way back onto my pull list, earning it in a way that few series out there have.

Patrick: We keep trying to nail down whether Tomasi is a more skillful storyteller when he’s saddled with other people’s shit or when he’s allowed to forge his own path, and I while I think this issue suggests the former, I know we’ve also claimed the opposite (such as the first arc of Batman and Robin, which spent 8 issues building up a villain Tomasi invented). So who knows? (Thus summarizes our comprehensive analysis of Peter Tomasi’s writing career on DC comics.)

I was a little less pleased with Gleason’s work on this issue. His drawings of Wonder Woman’s face are all over the board, sometimes rounder and more childlike, and sometimes ultra stern and caveman-esque. Plus, the title page features Diana in a pose that’s just straight-up sigh-worthy.

It’s a shame, because when Gleason’s on-point, motherfucker is on point. I especially like that he gives Diana more traditionally Greek features. It’s kind of a neat nod to the version of the character that Azzarello has been writing over in Wonder Woman, which has clearly embraced Greek Mythology wholeheartedly.

Tomasi’s doing a great job of exploring just what it’s like when Batman’s out of his league. He’s totally not out of his league chasing after Ra’s, but oracles and three-story mud-men-monsters? I’m reminded of the World’s Finest arc from Batwoman. The moment that seemed like the clearest indication of how Bruce has become is when he commands Wonder Woman to throw him at Damian’s sarcophagus. I assume Batman has at least as much self respect as Gimli, but, hey: desperate times, desperate measures, right?

[For a little extra fun, try saying “Nobody tosses a dwarf” in your best Batman voice. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised with the results.]

Uncanny X-Men 20 goes almost the exact opposite route, as Old Evil Scott appears to be completely in his element as the leader of the mutant revolution. In typical Bendis fashion, the issue is light on developments, but the spectacle of Scott Summers leading his X-Men in some shock and awe tactics is amazing. Chris Bachalo forgoes his usual slightly-at-an-angle paneling and delivers an entire issue of widescreen right angles, which makes the way Cyclops orchestrates his teams effort seem all the more methodical and badass. My absolute favorite scene in the issue shows how Scott and The Stepford Cuckoos (and presumably Magick and Tempus, because they teleport and stop time) intimidate the hell out of Maria Hill. It’s all pretty standard X-Men moves, but in such tight concert, Scott Summer’s X-Men come off as terrifying gods.

One minute she’s frozen in time with just Cyclops, the next she’s freaking out about a security breach to her crew, and then, seemingly in the blink of an eye, her soldiers lie unconscious at her feet. I love love love that the last panel reminds us of the great strength of S.H.I.E.L.D. — we saw that huge helicarrier spanning two pages a few flips back — reduced to a meaningless symbol when measured against Scott’s real power.

I can never tell just how much we’re supposed to sympathize with Maria Hill, which makes her an infinitely more effective character than DC’s Amanda Waller, who fills almost the exact same role. Waller is just such an insufferably evil person that it’s impossible to feel for her, but Maria Hill is a genuinely good person who wants to do the right thing. She may not be the moral guidepost that Cap is, but she is a loyal soldier, and more or less has humanity’s well being in mind when she acts. I can’t tell if it’s the fact that she’s so buttoned-down, or the slightly fascist air that S.H.I.E.L.D. gives off, but it’s so rewarding to see her bested like this, even has I’m horrified of what Scott’s capable of.

That’s the note that Bendis goes out on too: Scott’s sort of a dick about accusing Beast of sending sentinels after him, but at least he’s trying to solve his problems through words instead of fists. Of course, something happens and beams of energy start to explode from Cyclops’ face. He might be amazingly powerful, both as a living weapon and as a leader of X-Men, but he still doesn’t know how to control that power. That’s the kind of Cyclops psychology I can get behind. Drew, I know you have a hard time latching on to Scott, did any of this do it for you?

Drew: You know, I’m still not sure if the emotional messiness of this series is an asset or a liability, but it certainly complicates Scott’s motivations here. Beast almost seems like a logical suspect — he did break the rules of time travel just to torture Scott — but this is decidedly not his style. It’s fun to think about that list of Marvel super-geniuses as a checklist of upcoming cameos, as Scott rules them out one by one, but honestly, the only one that sounds even close is Magneto, who Scott seems to dismiss out of hand. Should I be upset that Scott isn’t following up the best lead even if I know that that lead actually goes nowhere? That’s the one downside of a list of known names — we kind of know what all of these guys are currently up to.

The other problem with the list is that I’m not convinced we’ll ever actually get to all of the names. Bendis has a way of letting each new boondoggle become the guiding motivator for the series, and while he planted the seeds of Scott’s malfunctioning power from the beginning, I fear that it is going to take over the series entirely — at least for the next several issues. I wonder if Mystiques Mutant Growth Hormone will be required to stabilize poor Scott.

Patrick, I’m with you on Bachalo’s art this issue — it’s stellar as ever, and lacking many of those distracting affects that usually make us qualify our praise. He still seems to favor wide bands of empty space at the top and bottom of pages, seemingly at random, but otherwise, the art here is crystal clear and full of fantastic acting. That scene with Maria Hill is gripping, thanks in no small part to the emotional transparency on Maria Hill’s face. The Cuckoos have access to every piece of classified information in her head, but she’s most uncomfortable when they start getting personal.

“Personal” is a decidedly different gear for Maria, and I’d be happy to see Bendis explore it further. You know, after he gets around to checking in with all of those super-geniuses.

Speaking of, super-geniuses seems to some how be both the cast and theme of Joshua Hale Fialkov’s Ultimate FF 1. Basically, the only character on the team who isn’t of genius-level intelligence is the robot. That’s a funny enough idea, but Fialkov doesn’t quite trust his own writing to make that clear, so resorts to including each character’s IQ when he introduces them. It’s exactly as clunky as it sounds, accomplishing little other than distracting us all from the story itself.

The issue itself is a decent enough introduction to these characters and the Ultimates Universe. The biggest differences between that of 616 are laid-out clearly enough, and this universe certainly promises surprises for those that are new to it. The biggest surprise obviously comes at the end, as Sue fears Reed has been released from prison, only to discover that it’s actually Doom. Doom with goat legs or something? Either way, it’s probably not good.

Fialkov manages to find each character’s voice here, and excels at bouncing them off one another. The banter between Tony and Sue is worth the cover price alone, with Falcon, Coulson, and Machine Man acting as icing on the cake.

Pencillers Mario Guevara and Tom Grummett deliver a distinctly stylized issue, which captures the emotional range of this issue quite nicely — it’s not all goofy or all scary, but a healthy (if a tad unfamiliar) mix.

Patrick: Oh, goodness, that parenthetical comment about the art actually helps me out quite a bit. There are quite a few panels that looked unfinished and over-inked to me. It’s definitely not by favorite effect, but it does convey this concept of familiar but off-kilter in some way. As someone who is not very well-versed the Ultimate Universe, that’s what all of this is to me — characters I know that are just a little different — but that’s also the theme of this specific issue. The construction workers at the beginning of the issue believe they’ve struck a sewage pipe, until they discover it’s neither a pipe nor sewage. Then there’s the final revelation that Coulson has deployed Doom instead of Reed. Clear expectations are established and then subverted.

It sure is clunky to post every character’s IQ along with their name and stats, but I was actually reminded of Manhattan Projects, which made the point of delineating who was and was not a genius on the character pages that closed every issue. It might be important for both Fialkov and the reader to know that these are genius characters, but it might be even more important to the characters themselves to know that. Sue and Tony do an awful lot of good-natured bickering about which one of them is more important to the team, and just how much influence Tony’s money should buy. We’re able to take that banter — and Sue’s threat to replace Tony with Brodie — with a grain of salt because we know that this groups needs to be the smartest group it can possibly be. That requirement allows us to even consider for a second that introducing Doctor Doom to the line-up is a good idea.

I don’t totally love the FF’s uniforms, but Sue does look a little bit like Zero Suit Samus, so I’ll hold my complaints on that front until the next issue.

The conversation doesn’t stop there, because you certainly read something that we didn’t. What do you wanna talk about from this week?