For Valentine’s Day last year, you may recall, we here at Retcon Punch showed you our love with corny, superhero valentines. Obviously, we had to do it again. So, Internet, this is our way of saying Be Mine; please enjoy these free, awesome valentines! Print them, share them, just keep our name on them; more after the break!
Today, Scott and Patrick are discussing Wonder Woman 27, originally released January 22nd, 2014.
Scott: What’s a reasonable attention span? Could anyone actually sit through all three hours of The Wolf of Wall Street without their mind wandering at least once? I doubt it. The average time between commercial breaks is seven minutes, and I have trouble staying engaged that long. I’ve been working a lot with preschoolers over the past few months and I can tell you that getting a three year old to stay focused on a task for even one minute is a challenge. It’s just so easy to get distracted by the thought of a snack or going to play outside. Well, much like a three year old’s brain, the hectic world of Wonder Woman is full of distractions, ready to yank you away from that thing that was so interesting just one minute ago. Brian Azzarello keeps things moving at such a pace that you might just forget about the thing you were just…Sorry. I lost my train of thought.
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Today, Drew and Patrick are discussing 100 Bullets: Brother Lono 7, originally released January 8th, 2014.
…I’m afraid the heart of religion is fear.
Father Manny
Drew: It’s hard to deny the importance of fear. It is the fundamental driver of our sense of self preservation, and may very well be the most basic, universal emotion there is. Of course, that also makes it the easiest to manipulate. Modern life is filled with organizations trying to scare us: corporations want to scare us into buying their products, political parties want to scare us into electing their candidates — but none of those organizations are about fear in quite the same way that religion is. I’m not just being cynical (and I don’t think Brian Azzarello or Father Manny is when he makes the above statement) — underneath all of that scary stuff about hell and sin is an elemental fear of the unknown: what if our ignorance of things we couldn’t possibly know (i.e. the meaning of life, the existence of a creator, etc.) was bad? Brother Lono 7 finds almost every character confronted by some unknown entity, and the results are decidedly bad for all of them. Continue reading
Today, Patrick and Drew are discussing Wonder Woman 26, originally released December 18th, 2013.
Patrick: On Brian Azzarello’s Mount Olympus, the gods and demigods all serve very specific purposes. When he shows up out of nowhere at the end of the issue, Dio identifies himself as the god of “the truffle harvest, tragedies, luxuries, parks and galleries.” That’s a weird concept, but one we always embrace when discussing mythological creatures: sure, I get why we need a god of the hunt (or wine or sword making or whatever). But, like, it’s a nonsense conceit, made all the more explicit by Zola asking “what’s a truffle?” Beyond being avatars of various nouns, the gods are also a family, and the roles they play within that family are just as indicative of the parts they play in this on-going drama. They are victims and bullies, martyrs and defenders, cousins, long-lost-sisters and little brothers. The mix of the divine and the human is sublime, making every turn of this series as surprising as it is inevitable. Continue reading
Today, Mikyzptlk and Drew are discussing Wonder Woman 25, originally released November 20th, 2013
Mikyzptlk: Strife. We’ve all felt it at one point or another. It has a way of seeping into us whether we want it to or not. No matter how patient or level-headed we try to be, we all succumb to the effects of strife every now and then. Dealing with Gods of “stuff,” Brian Azzarello has been able to use his divine characters to push his story forward in a number of ways. As you might have guessed, Azzarello uses issue 25 of Wonder Woman to place a particularly heavy focus on the character of Strife and her manipulative plans. Little does she know, Azzarello and Wonder Woman may just have plans of their own.
Today, Drew and Patrick are discussing 100 Bullets: Brother Lono 6, originally released November 20th, 2013.
If you say in the first chapter that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or third chapter it absolutely must go off.
-Anton Chekhov
Drew: Chekhov’s gun is one of my favorite writing principles — it insists that writing be as efficient and purposeful as possible — but as a reader, I often find myself wishing I had never heard of it. When writing, Chekhov’s gun is helpfully prescriptive; when reading, it is frustratingly descriptive. Suddenly every gun introduced is a time bomb — there’s no question of if it will go off, but when. That dovetails beautifully with Hitchcock’s famous explanation of surprise vs. suspense (effectively, that surprise is when a bomb goes off at the end of a scene, while suspense is watching that same scene knowing the whole time that the bomb is there), suggesting that each new element must hold our suspense until it comes to bear on the narrative. Of course, we know that this is rarely the case in practice — few writers can sustain that level of dread for such a sustained period — which is why Brother Lono has been such a fascinating study in suspense. Writer Brian Azzarello took great care in introducing his gun, reminding us that it is cleaned and ready to fire, and waiting until issue 6 to finally use it. Continue reading
Today, Patrick and Drew are discussing 100 Bullets: Brother Lono 5, originally released October 16th, 2013.
Patrick: Here’s a truth about me: I was raised in the Catholic church. Baptism, Sunday School, First Communion, Reconciliation, Confirmation, service, retreats, classes — you name it. If I ever sound like I’m too-cool-for-school now, brother, you should have known me back then. Ironic detachment was my only form of self defense, and I applied it liberally. Here’s an example of how far I’d push it away: I used to say I was giving up Catholicism for Lent. You can smell my shit-eating grin as you read that last sentence can’t you? I kinda still do it — I frequently site that period in my life as useful because now I can recognize Christian imagery in literature. But irony can only take you so far, and there are some concepts so compelling and elusive that they haunt you, no matter how thick your armor. Brother Lono 5 strikes on that most troubling of truths: not only are we all sinners, we are all meant to be sinners. Continue reading
Today, Scott and Mikyzptlk are discussing Wonder Woman 24, originally released October 16th, 2013.
Scott: I love reading Wonder Woman. Brian Azzarello is now 24 issues into his run on this title, yet I feel like I’ve read 50. I mean that in a good way. The world he’s created is so vivid, the characters so constantly evolving that I feel like I’ve spent more time with them than I really have. Wonder Woman 24 is dependent on every member of the title’s diverse cast, and just about everyone has something new to offer. It isn’t the most thrilling comic book ever written, but it’s pleasing in a way that really no other title can replicate. Simply, Wonder Woman feels like a place where everybody knows my name, and they’re always glad I came. I never want to leave. Continue reading
Today, Drew and Scott are discussing Wonder Woman 23.2: First Born, originally released September 25th, 2013. This issue is part of the Villain’s Month event. Click here for our Villains Month coverage.
What comes before anything? What have we always said is the most important thing?
Michael Bluth, Arrested Development
Drew: Family. What would we be without them? No, seriously: they’re there from the start, and they have a profound effect on the people we eventually become. For better or for worse, who they are and how they interact with us largely shape who we are and how we act. The same can be said of who they aren’t — perhaps in spite of what we want them to be — which can have just as significant effect on the people we become. As a character, the First Born is far more defined by the absence of his family, but how that manifests is just as subtle and specific as any other family dynamic. Continue reading
Today, Patrick and Drew are discussing 100 Bullets: Brother Lono 4, originally released September 18st, 2013.
Why do you fight? Is it for the thrill — or the victory? There is a distinction. You know this, don’t you? Have you ever stopped fighting long enough to ponder the question? Is it to win… or to live to fight another day? Is okay, it’s for the thrill. The rush. The joy found not in winning… but in beating.
-Cortez, 100 Bullets: Brother Lono 4
Patrick: Brother Lono poses a host of interesting questions: ranging from “dear God, what the hell is wrong with him?” to “no, seriously — why are these people so mean?” The answers are seldom easy, and they’re never pleasant. While this issue mostly moves the plot toward the cartel taking over the Mission and Sister June’s DEA cover being blown, there’s a strong thematic undercurrent of why these people behave this way. The answer is just as ugly as the actions, but then, I’d expect nothing less of 100 Bullets. Continue reading
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