by Michael DeLaney
This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!
When Pete Tomasi began pairing Jon Kent with Damian Wayne back in the pages of Superman, their dynamic was immediately successful. The pair emulated their fathers in a way that previous Superboy/Robin duos never could, with Damian having Batman’s brooding and Jon having Superman’s pluck. But what happens with you throw another Jon Kent into the mix? Continue reading
by Spencer Irwin
This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!
Despite the double emphasis in its title, Tony Stark: Iron Man isn’t really a solo spotlight for its titular hero. Instead it’s an ensemble piece, a team book, devoting just as much (if not more) space to the stories of Jocasta Pym, Andy Bhang, Bethany Cabe, Amanda Armstrong, or Rhodey as it does Stark. In fact, issue 4 outright turns this choice into an ethos, predicating Stark Unlimited’s entire victory on the fact that they are a team who can work together and pool their ideas, and their opponents from Baintronics’ loss on the fact that they’re not a team, they’re a hive mind. Their lack of multiple perspectives and approaches seals their fate. Continue reading
by Patrick Ehlers
This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!
The entirety of Donny Cates and Dylan Burnett’s Cosmic Ghost Rider has been about enthusiastically mashing up disparate elements of the Marvel Universe to create singularly compelling ideas. Our hero, if we wanna call him that, is a mix between Punisher, Ghost Rider and Silver Surfer. He spent the whole last issue battling teams of What-If cross-over mash-up characters until grown-up Punisher-Thanos came back in time from the future to rescue him. But the fourth issue finds the creative team juxtaposing disparate qualities that are far more elemental and aesthetic. Instead of a Juggernaut that is also a Duck, Cosmic Ghost Rider 4 give us a pastoral fantasy that is also a post apocalyptic nightmare. Continue reading
by Michael DeLaney
This article contains SPOILERS! If you haven’t read the issue, proceed at your own risk.
Typically, a write-up from Retcon Punch would consist of one or two writers sharing their observations and interpretations of a given comic book issue. This write-up, however, will be something else entirely. As the title suggests, I find myself asking the question “What the hell happened to Nightwing?” Continue reading
by Patrick Ehlers
This article contains SPOILERS! If you haven’t read the issue, proceed at your own risk.
Why does Batman win every fight? Because he’s prepared for every conceivable eventuality. Superman goes nuts? Batman’s got magic. Or Kryptonite. Or both. This same sort of logic has been applied all to all the genius superheroes. Sure – why wouldn’t Tony Stark have armor designed specifically to fight the Hulk? Even Infinity War (the movie) depicts Doctor Strange literally experiencing all possible outcomes until he stumbles upon the one way to defeat Thanos. But those stories never really take the time to explore what that process of hyper-perparation looks like, or the toll in takes on the heroes’ relationships. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Macro-Series: Donatello shows just how damaging it is to always only prepare for disaster. Continue reading
by Michael DeLaney
This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!
Chip Zdarsky brings his time with Spider-Man to a close as he sends off the ‘ol webhead in a personal manner in Peter Parker: The Spectacular Spider-Man 310. Spider-Man has amazing powers and arguably some of the best villains in the Marvel Universe, but Zdarsky zeroes in on what keeps this character consistently relevant: his humanity. Continue reading
by Spencer Irwin and Drew Baumgartner
This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!
Spencer: There’s quite a bit to unpack in the high concept behind Man-Eaters, and I don’t just mean its metaphors and allegories. Despite the fact that it takes place in a world similar to ours in most ways, the one new element Chelsea Cain and Kate Niemczyk introduce — menstruation-triggered transformations into murderous big cats — opens up a bevy of new questions that beg to be answered. Thankfully, Cain and Niemczyk answer them with grace, simultaneously building both world and character effortlessly and never falling into the dangers of rote exposition. Continue reading
by Michael DeLaney and Patrick Ehlers
This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!
Michael: Comic book readers are probably familiar with the idea that “Batman always wins” – he’s an inevitable force of nature. I think that The Punisher is similar in this respect. Frank Castle is primarily a hunter, but when the roles are reversed he’s as wild as a cornered animal, finding any and every way to disarm opponents and escape. Such is the case in Matthew Rosenberg and Szymon Kudranski’s The Punisher 2.
Frank Castle isn’t a complicated man – at least he probably doesn’t consider himself to be. He’s got two rules: kill criminals, don’t kill cops. That second part tends to make Frank’s life a little more difficult, as he has to get creative when he is evading New York’s finest – as well as its superheroes. Continue reading
by Spencer Irwin
This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!
For the most part, emotions aren’t inherently good or bad — their effect ultimately depends on how you process them. Too much of a “good” emotion can be overwhelming, while traditionally negative emotions like fear, pain, sadness, and even guilt have their lessons to teach us. Growing up religious, I’ve seen guilt successfully steer people towards better choices (or away from poor ones), but I’ve also seen guilt consume people down to their very soul. In the wrong hands guilt can be a powerful and dangerous weapon, a tool to wield against others, to manipulate them and tear them down. Ananke, of course, has never met a weapon she hasn’t wanted to give a try, and in The Wicked + The Divine 1373AD guilt proves to be a potent addition to her arsenal. Continue reading
by Spencer Irwin
This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!
What is Heroes in Crisis actually about? The answer drastically changes my reading of this issue. See, as a murder mystery it works quite well — it doesn’t alleviate all my criticisms (which we’ll get into in a bit, believe me), but there’s interesting hooks in the form of which of the two prime suspects is the murderer, why they did it, and how the Trinity of Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman will react. As a murder mystery, Heroes in Crisis 1 is an enjoyable, if flawed, comic. But Heroes in Crisis has primarily been advertised and solicited as a more low-key, nuanced look at how superheroes handle trauma, and when judged by that metric, it’s far less successful. Continue reading
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