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, Patrick, and Spencer discuss Saga 26, Universe 2, The Woods 11, Batman Eternal 48, Operation S.I.N. 3, Spider-Woman 5, Guardians Team-Up 1, Rocket Raccoon 9, and X-Men 25.

Well, I’ve been afraid of changin’
‘Cause I built my life around you
But time makes you bolder
Children get older
I’m getting older, too

Stevie Nicks, “Landslide”

Drew: In 1972, Niles Eldredge and Stephen Jay Gould coined the phrase “punctuated equilibria” to describe systems where short burst of change punctuate otherwise stable conditions. They were working in evolutionary biology, but they might as well have been referring to highly episodic narratives like sitcoms and comics. Or, at least as long as there aren’t kids involved. I’m not sure exactly what was the first series to acknowledge that its child stars were aging in real-time (though that would be a fun research project), but everything from For Better or For Worse to Full House benefitted from that precedent. In those situations, the series must evolve along with those characters as they mature, gain independence, and grow into (and out of) age-appropriate storylines. Saga has long been driven by “big” ideas — family, love, war — but as issue 26 reveals, the specific relationship to those ideas will change along with its child characters. Continue reading →

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, Patrick, Spencer and Drew discuss Darth Vader 2, Spider-Man 2099 9, The Amazing Spider-Man 15, Deadpool 42, Secret Avengers 13, S.H.I.E.L.D. 3, All New X-Men 38, Effigy 2, The Wicked and the Divine 8, Orphan Black 1, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutanimals 1, Batman Eternal 47, Secret Origins 10, and The Flash 39.

“I’d rather be a hammer than a nail.”

-“El Condor Pasa,” Simon & Garfunkel

Patrick: Part of being a good soldier is accepting the responsibilities that are thrust upon you without questioning. I was hanging out with our own Shelby Peterson this weekend, and she was talking about the ship that her father served on in the Navy. Evidently, they did all kinds of drills as through they had nuclear weapons on board their aircraft carrier, but none of the sailors ever actually knew whether or not they were armed with nukes or not. That information simply belonged to men at higher pay grades, and it was basically their jobs not to ask questions. In Darth Vader 2, general Tagge makes the assertion over and over again that Vader is nothing more than a tool or a weapon, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. Continue reading →

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, Patrick and Spencer discuss Astro City 20, Guardians of the Galaxy 24, X-Men 24, All-New Ghost Rider 11, Spider-Woman 4, Justice League United 9, and Batman Eternal 45.

…it ain’t about how hard you hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. How much you can take and keep moving forward.

Rocky Balboa, Rocky Balboa

Drew: A hero’s journey necessarily requires adversity, which in turn requires perseverance of the hero. Indeed, perseverance is the key quality of virtually every hero — especially superheroes. They may get knocked down in the first round, but there wouldn’t be a series to read if they didn’t keep getting back up. But what about when they’re no longer certain they’d survive getting knocked down? How does a hero reconcile their ingrown drive to keep fighting with the hard truths about getting older? That’s exactly the idea at the heart of Kurt Busiek’s Astro City 20, as Quarrel and Crackerjack confront how their age is affecting their performance. Continue reading →

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, Patrick, Spencer and Drew discuss Secret Avengers 12, New Avengers 29, Spider-Man 2099 8, Nova 26, Harley Quinn 14, The Flash 38, Batman Eternal 43, Catwoman 38, Bitch Planet 2, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles/Ghostbusters 4, and Casanova: Acedia 1. Patrick: M.O.D.O.K has always been the wild card of Ales Kot and Michael Walsh’s Secret Avengers, but issue 12 blow that unpredictability out to absurd levels as every single action he’s undertaken in the last year or so is explained to be that of some kind of rouge agent (or possibly even rouge double-agent). Y’see: M.O.D.O.K. had planned to betray the Secret Avengers and kill them, but he also legit fell in love with Maria Hill, so even while he was sending monsters to kill Coulson and Fury, he also didn’t want to hurt them. It’s an intensely dense bramblepatch of motivations, and it mostly works because the confusion is so damn entertaining. Continue reading →

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, Spencer and Patrick discuss Astro City 19, Batman Eternal 41, Justice League United 8, Superman Wonder Woman 15, Spider-Verse 2, Avengers 34.2, S.H.I.E.L.D. 2, Silver Surfer 8, and All New Captain America 3.

Drew: The deeper psychology of superheroes has been de rigueur in comics for the past three decades, but few writers do it as well as Kurt Busiek. Astro City 19 follows the life and times of Quarrel, tracking her sense of duty and loyalty back to her absent father. The daddy issues get freudian as Busiek also track’s Quarrel’s volatile romance with Crackerjack, revealing both the positive and negative sides of their relationship. As the second chapter of a four-part story, we don’t get a conclusion here, but Busiek plants enough seeds to get the psychology good and messy before pulling back out to allow time to heal at least some of the wounds. I’m looking forward to seeing where this goes. Continue reading →