Tag Archives: Bane

Oct 15 2013

Forever Evil: Arkham War 1

arkham war 1

Today, Mikyzptlk and Drew are discussing Forever Evil: Arkham War 1 , originally released October 9th, 2013.

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Mikyzptlk: Giant line-wide crossover events like Forever Evil can be exhausting. Suddenly, a story crops up that seemingly takes over the narrative of the entire “universe,” while sidelining the stories you might rather be following instead. Not only that, these events usually bring with them a slew of additional material in the form of tie-in miniseries. These minis can be very hit or miss, but the best ones tend to expand upon the main event by showing us the effects it’s having on the rest of the word, and characters, around it. This is where Arkham War comes in. The only problem is, I’m not sure who to root for.  Continue reading →

Oct 1 2013

Batman 23.4: Bane

bane 23.4

Today, Patrick and guest writer Andrew are discussing Batman 23.4: Bane, originally released September 25th, 2013. This issue is part of the Villain’s Month event. Click here for our Villains Month coverage.

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Patrick: I’m gonna pull back the curtain at Retcon Punch here just a little. We like to invite our friends and family members to write about issues that don’t require a lot of context to understand – anything that seems like it’s going to be elemental and insulated. This way, we can get the perspective of non-comics-readers on a comic book. It’s a valuable perspective to have, and one that’s impossible to recreate within our regular writing and editorial staff. This policy bites us in the ass from time to time. It turns out that the more elemental characters are wrapped up in DC mythology because of their singularly compelling nature. We were bummed when Scarecrow was 20 pages of weird connective tissue and set-up for Arkham War – we thought for sure that our buddy Greg could just write some funny stuff about the scary drawings. That’s selfish though: why should the most interesting characters be relegated to the least interested writers? Without further ado: Bane. Continue reading →

Sep 11 2013

Talon 11

talon 11Today, Patrick and Drew are discussing Talon 11, originally released August 28th, 2013. 

Patrick: When I was a kid, I used to think that Jedis were the coolest thing in the whole world. Why wouldn’t I? The only examples I had of Jedi were either too old or too young or too evil, but I loved Obi-Wan Kenobi and Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader. They’re so rare that we never saw a Jedi in their prime — and that scarcity made them precious. Of course, that all changed in 1999, with the release of Phantom Menace. As the prequels rolled out more and more Jedis, I became less and less enamored with them. This is obviously a function of a lot of things — I was getting older, the movies were getting shittier — but chief among them was that the Jedis just weren’t a valuable commodity anymore. I feared the same thing would happen with Owls and Talons in this series, but instead I find myself overexposed to a different type all together: the hulking man-monster.

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Jul 30 2013

Talon 10

talon 10

Today, Patrick and Mikyzptlk are discussing Talon 10, originally released July 27th, 2013. 

Patrick: There’s a moment during this issue where one of Bane’s mega henchmen, code-named The Wolf-Spider (because he’s terrifying), tells Calvin that there’s nothing he can do to stop Bane’s army from destroying the Court of Owls. Calvin gives his blessing – there’s nothing in the world that would make his life easier than the utter annihilation of the Court. It’s a funny moment, and one that seems like it is frustratingly close to a workable armistice between the Talon and Bane’s henchmen. Alas, we’re talking about characters named Talon and Wolf-Spider, so the fists keep flying. Back in Gotham, Casey escapes from Harmon’s torture dungeon and gets herself arrested by honest cops in order to protect herself from the Court. It’s an issue of unlikely alliances teased, embraced and broken.

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Jul 3 2013

Talon 9

talon 9

Today, Shelby and Spencer are discussing Talon 9 originally released June 26th, 2013. 

Shelby: I’m a total sucker for magic tricks. As a kid, I obsessed over David Copperfield specials; as an adult, I understand it’s all a matter of misdirection and slight of hand, but I still fall for it every time. The magic of expecting one thing, but finding something else never grows stale for me. “Misdirection” is a label that can be applied to both this issue of Talon, and the title as a whole. James Tynion IV has continued to subvert our expectations with this title, making us think we’re reading one kind of story when it turns out to be another entirely. And, just like any slight of hand, the smallest little hiccup can knock the whole illusion askew.
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Jun 3 2013

Talon 7-8

talon 7-8

Today, Shelby and Patrick are discussing Talon 7-8, originally released April 24th and May 22nd, 2013. 

Shelby: We need to remember that the Talons are bad guys. I know, we’ve got Calvin here fighting the good fight against the Court, and we’ve got Mary working with the rest of the Birds; that makes it easy to forget that we first met the Talons as a sweeping wave of indestructible killing machines, hellbent on assassinating whomever they were pointed at. This title started out with Calvin’s unique position of being a Talon on the lam, a man with all the training needed, but unable to go through with the final process that would truly transform him into the Talon he was meant to be. In issues 7 and 8, all that is going to change; hold on to your butts, because things are getting complicated. 
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Jul 25 2012

Cram Session: Night of the Owls

It can be hard to keep up with all the comics you love. But it’s damn near impossible to keep up with all the comics you’re interested in.

Retcon Punch got you covered.

This is one we’ve wanted to put together for a long time. If you only read one or two of these series and you want to get the skinny on what else happened – we’ve got the video for you. Here’s the whole Night of the Owls presented chronologically.

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Jul 25 2012

Chat Cave: The Dark Knight Rises

The Dark Knight Rises. Welcome to the Chat Cave.

Hey, here’s the unfortunate reality: The Dark Knight Rises is going to be forever linked to the shootings in Aurora, Colorado. Unless you saw a midnight show, your theatre-experience was affected by the actions of one 24-year old with some guns and a gas mask. You had police officers wandering in before all the major action sequences, you looked twice at everyone that walked in. What happened was terrible and we’re going to be hearing and reading and writing and talking about it for a long time. And while we’re not in the habit of covering current events, we absolutely have to talk about the new Batman movie. No one’s trying to be crass, no one’s trying to be dismissive; our discussion is going to be about the movie we all saw this weekend. Let’s try to keep it that way in the comments.

Oh, and f’real: SPOILERS TO FOLLOW

Continue reading →

May 30 2012

Cram Session: Batman: Dark Knight 1-8

It can be hard to keep up with all the comics you love. But it’s damn near impossible to keep up with all the comics you’re interested in.

Retcon Punch got you covered.

We read a lot of good Batman books. We also read a lot of bad Batman books. This series falls firmly in the latter camp. It’s aggressively goofy and has more cameo appearances than a Robert Rodriguez movie. The Night of Owls issue was unremarkable, but not a total disaster. Catching up on the eight issues that came before it is totally unnecessary as there’s almost no over-lap in the characters, and a huge writer shake-up between issues 8 and 9. Still, there’s something charmingly dumb about this series, so it’s hard not to pay attention to it.