Category Patrick Ehlers

Patrick Ehlers, Co-Editor-In-Chief
patrick@retcon-punch.com

Location: Los Angeles

History With Comics: Patrick came late to the comics game. After enjoying adaptations of Batman, Superman and the Justice League, he was finally tricked into picking up a set of graphic novels after seeing Robert Rodriguez’ Sin City. Naturally, this lead to further exploration of Frank Miller’s work, specifically with Batman. But it was not until an unexplainable desire to read Blackest Night that Patrick began purchasing the trades of Geoff Johns’ run Green Lantern. With a convenient new entry point and a handful of friends to follow him into the madness, Patrick began reading monthlies with the New 52’s Justice League #1.

New 52 Favorites: The Flash, Swamp Thing, Batwoman

Other Favorite Comics: Usagi Yojimbo, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Saga

Jul 22 2013

100 Bullets: Brother Lono 2

100 bullets 2

Today, Drew and Patrick are discussing 100 Bullets: Brother Lono 2, originally released July 17th, 2013.

Drew: What is it that defines us? Is it our thoughts or our actions? Can moral men have immoral thoughts? This is the stuff of middle-school philosophy debates, but it becomes a bit more practical when we talk about self-improvement. What does it mean to change? Is it our thoughts or our actions that change? Is the past we’re coming from a set of actions, or something more fundamental to our being? When I interviewed Brian Azzarello last month, he said that Brother Lono is “the story of a man trying to not be himself,” and issue 2 begins exploring exactly what that might mean. Continue reading →

Jul 22 2013

Deadpool 13

deadpool 13

Today, Ethan and Patrick are discussing Deadpool 13, originally released July 17th, 2013.

Ethan: Back in issue #7 of Deadpool, the writers and artists took us on a timewarp with a faux, never-before-printed “inventory special”. The issue was allegedly produced in the late 70s/early 80s giving the team an excuse to indulge in 10 times the saturation of pop culture references in the already saturated title. It was an entertaining  issue in its own right and a nice break after the Zombie Presidents arc. Now that Vetis is taken care of, writers Gerry Duggan and Brian Posehn and artists Scott Koblish and Val Staples are back to their tricks with another trip back to the era of disco. And if you think the bell bottoms and dated catch-phrases were flying thick and fast last time, you might want to sit down and hold onto something before you open #13. The hair is longer, the polyester is louder, and the racism is, if far from accurately depicted, at least touched on.

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Jul 19 2013

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Microseries Villains 4: Alopex

alopex 1

Today, Patrick and Taylor are discussing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Microseries Villains 4: Alopex originally released July 17th, 2013. 

Patrick: You know what’s a weird feeling? Being really stressed out by work or relationships or whatever and then seeing an animal in the wild. The animal may need to fight for its very survival, but the expectations placed on the animal are clear: survive, hunt, gather, frolic, be free. Your life, on the other hand, is full of weird tests of abstract concepts: intelligence, loyalty, honor, decency. In one of the more twisted tests of loyalty, Shredder offers Alopex a choice — which ends up not really being a choice at all — between her old life as a wild animal, and her new life as a member of the Foot Clan family. Alopex makes it look like an easy choice, but only outwardly; readers get a more complete, and much sadder, tale. Continue reading →

Jul 19 2013

Justice League of America 6

JLA 6 trinity

Today, Patrick and Spencer are discussing Justice League of America 6 originally released July 17th, 2013. This issue is part of the Trinity War crossover event. Click here for our complete Trinity War coverage.

trinity war divPatrick: Did any of you guys ever play Warhammer? If you’re not familiar with it, it’s a table top war game where you assemble an army from your race of choice and battle against your friends’ armies. It’s the least pick-up-and-play game you could ever imagine – understanding the basic rules means reading a 100+ page manual, and keeping a cheat sheet with charts and tables with you at all times. And then there’s understanding your own army, for which you need yet other book completely dedicated to that race. Then you need the little metal figures to represent the members of your army (sold separately), and if you’re really hardcore you can paint them. Then you need a surface large enough to play on – one time my friends and I took a door off its hinges and used that when we were denied the dining room table. Ideally, this surface will be populated with trees and terrain and stuff like that. Setting up the Trinity War has felt an awful lot like setting up a Warhammer game. Everyone’s been reading extra books they don’t really want to read just so they can play in the big game. Now the event is actually here and I can’t believe I’m surprised that all the characters feel like pieces in a game. Continue reading →

Jul 18 2013

Avengers 16

Alternating Currents: Avengers 16, Drew and Patrick

Today, Drew and Patrick are discussing Avengers 16, originally released July 17th, 2013. 

…times infinity!

–Schoolyard Traditional

Drew: Infinity is an incredibly abstract concept. By its very definition, it is beyond comprehension. It is often treated — especially by children — as just a really big number, something you could multiply yesses by or supersede by adding one to. Infinity might simply be the next step in a logical progression, from hundreds to thousands to millions and so on, usually following shortly after “bazillion.” Adults are a little less prone to these misconceptions, but I can’t claim to have any true understanding of what it would mean for something to be infinite. That is, until I started reading the interminable prelude to Marvel’s Infinity event, which doesn’t feel “big” as much as it does “endless.” Continue reading →

Jul 17 2013

Indestructible Hulk 10

hulk 10

Today, Shelby and Patrick are discussing Indestructible Hulk 10, originally released July 10th, 2013.

Shelby: It’s really easy to look back at a situation after the fact, and see the obvious solution to the problem, what with hindsight being 20/20 and all that. I know it sounds like I’m making some sort of mean joke, talking about vision in an issue of Indestructible Hulk that features Matt Murdoch, aka Daredevil, the blindest lawyer/masked vigilante around, but stick with me. For Bruce Banner, great big chunks of his life are lived with only hindsight to guide him. When he turns into the Hulk, he loses his control; all he can do is look back when it’s all over and try to assess what happened, maybe even learn something useful about the Hulk for next time. Banner moves forward as himself by constantly looking back to when he was the Hulk. It’s not ideal, but I guess hindsight is better than no sight, am I right Matt? Ok, one mean joke…
Continue reading →

Jul 17 2013

Green Lantern Corps 22

green lantern corps 22

Today, Patrick and Shelby are discussing Green Lantern Corps 22, originally released July 10th, 2013.

Patrick: My little sister studied in Ecuador for a semester in college. She spent a couple weeks tromping around the rain forest and camping on a beach on the Galapogos and dropping her new camera into a river – y’know: normal stuff when you’re studying the biodiversity of one of the coolest places on the planet. Naturally, she came back with new perspectives on birds and insects and had a few anecdotes about hilariously adorable seal pups on the beach. But the part of the experience that she ends up talking about — and I trust the part of the experience that stayed with her the most — is just about the friends that she made while hiking the Forest in the Clouds. When I asked her about that, she shrugged and said “It turns out human beings are the most fascinating mega-fauna on Earth.” She was being flippant (as flippant as one can be while still using words like “mega-fauna”), but it’s an oddly profound statement: for all the wonders of the world, people are going to be the most interesting thing you encounter. DC’s galaxies are vast, and jam-packed with strange and wonderful things. Issue 22 of Green Lantern Corps features a lot of these wonders, but all without losing sight of the of the most interesting mega-fauna at the heart of it: John Stewart and Fatality.
Continue reading →

Jul 17 2013

Uncanny X-Men 8

uncanny x-men 8

Today, Patrick and Ethan are discussing Uncanny X-Men 8, originally released June 10th, 2013.

Are there demons? Please no Dormammu please no Dormammu please no Dormammu… Oh, thank God.

-Fabio “Gold Balls” Medina

Patrick: Scott Summers and the New Uncanny X-Men have spent the last three issues stuck in purgatory. I’m being literal, but what the hell – it’s a metaphor too. The fall-out from the Avengers’ battle with the X-Men has left the mutant leadership in ruins, their superpowers in shambles, and even fractured our heroes’ goals. Illyana Rasputina Conquers Purgatory featured some fantastic art; Frazier Irving rendered Dante-level hellscapes marvelously, but the story had started to spiral around obscure minutae of the Marvel world, all personified by Dormammu. Fabio starts the issue basically praying to be done with Dormammu – when he opens his eyes to see a familiar sight, home, his relief is our relief. The X-Men are back where they belong. Continue reading →

Jul 15 2013

Fearless Defenders 6

fearless defenders 6

Today, Patrick and Taylor are discussing Fearless Defenders 6, originally released July 10th, 2013.

Patrick: Hey guys: GENDER IN COMICS! If there’s one thing we get whipped into a frenzy about on a fairly regular basis over here at Retcon Punch, it’s the portrayal of women in superhero comics. And with good cause: not only is there a decades-long tradition of turning female characters into disposable subjects of the leers and catcalls of male readers, but the inequity between male and female characters continues to this day. When DC relaunched it’s line two years ago, the editors found a home for 4 different past male-Robins, but couldn’t be bothered to include Stephanie Brown in their ranks. Why? The same can be said about Earth’s Green Lanterns: Guy, John, Kyle and Hal were all zipping around the universe, but whither Jade? And even a series like Fearless Defenders, which in 6 issues has only featured one named male character, seems to be plagued with gender problems: occasionally-cheesecakey art; a hysterical, flakey lead; and now the ubiquitous woman in a refrigerator. But it is possible that we put too much responsibility on these all-women series to be paragons of gender equality?
Continue reading →

Jul 15 2013

Young Avengers 7

young avengers 7

Today, Spencer and Patrick are discussing Young Avengers 7, originally released July 10th, 2013. 

slim-banner

Spencer: Teenagers are a tricky bunch to write. They speak, think, and communicate in their own unique ways, and it’s glaringly obvious when adults try to imitate these patterns without knowing what they’re doing. Fortunately, Kieron Gillen isn’t a writer who falls into these traps. Gillen has a remarkable knack for writing teenagers, and this is more apparent than ever in Young Avengers 7, where he uses these kids’ relationships (and social networking accounts) to show us how the team has progressed since we last saw them.

Continue reading →