Today, Patrick and Mikyzptlk are discussing Suicide Squad 15 originally released December 12th, 2012. This issue is part of the Death of the Family crossover event. Click here for complete DotF coverage.
Patrick: It’s always uncomfortable watching a couple fight. It’s even more uncomfortable when they’re both homicidal clowns. It’s even even more uncomfortable when it’s presented in this month’s issue of Suicide Squad.
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Today, Taylor and Patrick are discussing Team 7 2, originally released November 14th, 2012.
Taylor: Teams are in. Everywhere we look in today’s society, teamwork is emphasized as being one of the most important skills to develop. When you apply for a job, employers want to know how well you work with others and what your contribution to the team will be. Sports stars are lauded for the ability to swallow their ego and function as a member of a team that functions as one unit. And speaking of teams, we can’t ignore the recent Avengers movie which was one of biggest team love-fests to ever grace the silver screen. Hell, even Batman, the quintessential solitary dark night, learned to work on a team in Christopher Nolan’s latest film. Indeed, it seems that the way of the lone wolf — your Clint Eastwoods and wandering Ronin — is a thing of the past. Given this favorable disposition towards the idea of teamwork, it seems like DC’s Team 7 would be an instant hit. But as the second issue demonstrates both in its plot and it its execution, sometimes getting a team to work together effectively is harder than it would first appear.
Today, Drew and Patrick are discussing Justice League 12, originally released October 17th, 2012.
Drew: We’ve talked a lot about the five year rule here at Retcon Punch, and while we certainly have our gripes with how it affects continuity, I think we all understand why they did it. Giving every character some past allows them to maintain certain aspects of their pre-relaunch history, but does so without committing to anything specific. This gives writers a great deal of flexibility, without shutting the door for any future writes. Having a mysterious past also allows writers to pull out unknown details to add emotional weight to the proceedings. Doing this runs the risk of coming off as clumsy or cheap, but in Justice League 13, Geoff Johns provides an excellent case study in how to pull it off. Continue reading
Today, Mike Logsdon and Shelby are discussing Team 7 1, originally released October 10th, 2012.
Mik: Hey all, Mikyzptlk here, but you can call me Mik (with a long “I”) if, you know, you’re into the whole brevity thing. With that out of the way, let’s get cracking. Going into Team 7, I know next to nothing about this team. I know that it was originally a Wildstorm book but that’s about it. Except for The Authority, I tended to stay away from most of what Wildstorm had to offer. That being the case, I normally wouldn’t be interested in this book but DC has done a few clever things to get me interested. First off, they’ve added a few familiar faces from the DCU into the mix and, more importantly, they’ve set the book in the early (and mostly shrouded) years of the The New 52. ZERO Month did a good job of filling in some of the details of the first 5 years of the new DCU but there are still A LOT of gaps to close.
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Today, Shelby and (special guest writer) Lindsey Peterson are discussing Birds of Prey 0, originally released September 19, 2012. Birds of Prey 0 is part of the line-wide Zero Month.
Shelby: A difficult aspect of writing a comic book has got to be maintaining the balance between new and old readers: specifically, keeping both sides happy. You want to keep the long-timers happy; without their readership, you wouldn’t have been successful in the first place. But, you need to keep your books at least a little bit attainable to attract new readers; if your readership doesn’t grow, you won’t continue to be successful. With half of zero month behind us, we’ve seen examples of origins that bore us with nothing new and origins that confound us with no background knowledge given. Then we have my favorites, those titles which have struck that delicate balance between old-hat origin and current story arc connections. Birds of Prey is definitely in that last camp. Continue reading
Today, Drew and Patrick are discussing Suicide Squad 0, originally released September 12, 2012. Suicide Squad 0 is part of the line-wide Zero Month.
Drew: Patrick and I like to pitch terrible television shows to each other. Imagining episodes of “Jewish Sopranos” or “Time Cheers” is hilarious (though I maintain that “Time Cheers” would be a great sitcom), but the funniest thing to me about the game is that it’s actually how shows are often pitched to networks. Being able to convey the ideas as quickly and concisely as possible is necessary when you’re competing for attention, but it also addresses the realities of people watching random episodes — the easier the concept is to introduce, the easier you can get new viewers up to speed. Comics operate in largely the same way, relying on snappy synopses of the origin story to orient new readers. Returning to that origin can be tricky, running equal risks of overcomplicating the story with new twists or boringly rehashing the same information. Unfortunately, Suicide Squad 0 falls firmly in the latter category.
Today, Patrick and Drew are discussing Team 7 0, originally released September 12, 2012. Team 7 0 is part of the line-wide Zero Month.
Patrick: There comes a point in every heist movie where they assemble the team. Usually it’s done in a montage, featuring short (but implicitly characteristic) misadventures of various tech experts, combat experts, stealth experts — any kind of expert, really. And at the end of each little vigniette, George Clooney shows up and offers them a job. Oh, and the whole this is scored by a poppy drum and bass loop with occasional horn accents. These sequences are always about as much fun as the heist itself and doesn’t suffer from the complexity and double-back-false logic applied to the climax of most of these stories. Team 7‘s zero issue gets us off to a breezy start, with enough action, humor and built-in mystery to prepare its audience for what promises to be dazzling run.
Today, Patrick and Shelby are discussing Green Lantern 0, originally released September 5, 2012. Green Lantern 0 is part of the line-wide Zero Month.
Patrick: John Stewart was a member of the United States Marine Corps, but he’s never been trained in counter-insurgency. Kyle Rayner was an artist, but he’s never done freelance work designing a website. Hal Jordan was a test pilot and just like the early astronauts, he wowed the world with his bravery in the face of the unknown. Whatever the relaunch did accomplish, it utterly failed to update the Green Lanterns of 2814. None of them are creatures of the 21st century. And it is in that spirit that we meet the newest Green Lantern: a middle-eastern born American citizen, who grew up in a post-September 11th America and who was laid off when his Dearborn, Michigan automotive manufacturer shut down in the economic collapse. Simon Baz is interesting less because he’s new and more because he’s current.
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