FOMO Sucks in Runaways 2

By Taylor Anderson

This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!

There are a lot of reasons to dislike social media, but perhaps one of the best is that it propagates FOMO, or “fear of missing out.” In in a nutshell, FOMO is when people generate anxiety over the fact that something cool is happening right now and they’re not a part of it. What with friends and such sharing all their awesome experiences virtually all the time, it’s not hard to see why this is now a problem. This fear though, must be nothing compared to Gert’s, given that she was dead for two years and resurrected only to find the world completely different from what she once knew. Continue reading

Batwoman 24

Alternating Currents: Batwoman 24, Drew and Shelby

Today, Drew and Shelby are discussing Batwoman 24, originally released October 16th, 2013.

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Drew: When evaluating a work of art, I tend to ignore the artist — I’m far too focused on what the art means to me to care about what it means to anyone else, even if that anyone happens to be the one who made it. I think it helps me stay focused on the work in question — it’s all to easy to excuse bad art from an artist you like, or dismiss good art from an artist you hate — and focus on the meaning of a work of art. Occasionally, though, the artist (or the context into which the art was released) dominate the work’s meaning. Van Gogh paintings are presented as springboards for discussions of madness, and Beethoven symphonies simply cannot be performed without someone mentioning deafness. The real-world drama surrounding the release of Batwoman 24 are not nearly so biological, but in many ways, that only makes the issue a more frustrating read.

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Batwoman 23

Alternating Currents: Batwoman 23, Drew and Shelby

Today, Drew and Shelby are discussing Batwoman 23, originally released August 21st, 2013.

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Drew: At the end of Batwoman 22, Kate asks Bones for thirty hours to prepare for her planned takedown of Batman. We all suspected that that request might not be entirely on-the-level, assuming that Kate would use that time to set-up her own counter-plan. Issue 23 reveals that we were only half-right — Kate does use that time more for her own personal ends than for preparing for her mission, but how she uses it is entirely unexpected. Continue reading

Batwoman 22

batwoman 22

Today, Patrick and Drew are discussing Batwoman 22, originally released July 17th, 2013.

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Patrick: We spent last month with The Killer Croc — an oddly blunt instrument for symphony as subtle and sophisticated as Batwoman. A few pages in to this issue, and we become aware that our heroes are searching for Bane to ask him for advice on how to capture Batman. I know Bane’s actually done this before, but it is interesting to see the brutish villains popping up in a more cerebral title. And the party doesn’t end there — the ranks of the good guys and the bad are fleshed out with soldiers and psychopaths. How exactly these opposing forced are going to accomplish their goals is another topic of conversation altogether. Continue reading

Batwoman 20

batwoman 20

Today, Shelby and Drew are discussing Batwoman 20, originally released May 15th, 2013.

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Shelby: Trust is always an interesting concept to explore when masked superheroes are involved. The protagonist’s entire experience is based on a lack of trust: they don’t trust their loved ones to with their secret identity, they don’t trust the existing authority to take care of crime. That the distrust is well-founded doesn’t lessen the fact it’s the foundation of a successful masked superhero. But even the most independent superhero has got to have someone in the corner, some support system of people they trust and can rely on. Unfortunately, Kate seems to continuously find herself faced with people telling her, “you will trust me, whether you like it or not!”, essentially rendering the entire concept meaningless.

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Batwoman 19

batwoman 19

Today, Patrick and Drew are discussing Batwoman 19, originally released April 17th, 2013.

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Patrick: Early in this issue, DEO Agent Cameron Chase says to her sister: “I think I’m about to do something horrible.” This isn’t an admission of guilt, she isn’t asking for absolution, and she certainly doesn’t want to be talked out of doing this horrible something. But Chase isn’t the only person in this series that’s about to do something horrible. The whole cast of Batwoman imposes personal sacrifices on each other to the benefit of… well, of what exactly? Love? Honor? Duty? The very thing they’re sacrificing?

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Batwoman 18

batwoman 18

Today, Jack and (guest writer) Nate are discussing Batwoman 18, originally released March 20th, 2013.

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Jack: It’s hard work to start a sequel off with a credible voice. The expression that most often comes to mind is “Space Mutants IV:  the Trilogy Continues.” This is essentially the beginning of Batwoman’s second major story arc, and I am proud to report that J.H. Williams has risen admirably to the occasion. The grim mystery of Gotham’s missing children solved, this series hits the ground running with a new set of problems for our heroes, or at least a set of unsettling complications of all of their old problems. Continue reading