Tag Archives: Poison Ivy

Feb 13 2015

Harley Quinn Valentine’s Day Special 1

harley quinn valentine

Today, Spencer and Patrick are discussing Harley Quinn Valentine’s Special 1, originally released February 11th, 2015.

Spencer: Amanda Conner and Jimmy Palmiotti had a rough road ahead of them when tasked with refashioning Harley Quinn into the star of her own comic book. A villain protagonist must walk a fine line, being sympathetic enough to earn the audience’s affection while still villainous enough to avoid losing the spark that drew readers to them in the first place. Conner and Palmiotti’s approach to Harley Quinn has often involved pitting their villain protagonist against people even worse than she is, having her stand up for animal rights, and giving her a sort-of family in the form of her tenants; judging from sales numbers, it’s been a successful tactic, but has Harley become a better person in the process? Despite being a holiday special, that’s the question at the heart of Harley Quinn Valentine’s Special 1, and it’s a surprisingly rich question to ask, even if the answer is a bit unclear, and the question often muddied and buried within the oversized issue’s many tangents and asides. Continue reading →

Feb 12 2015

Retcon Punch is for Lovers; Happy Valentine’s Day!

February 14th is about three things: socks with hearts on them, discount chocolates on the 15th, and corny Valentines cards for your friends. We can’t really share the first two with you, our loyal readers, but boy can we share the third! A couple years ago we made a bunch of corny Valentine’s Day cards, and we had so much fun we did it again last year. Because we’re once, twice, three times a lady, we’ve done it again and made a new batch of Valentines for you all. Feel free to print and pass them out to the nerds you love the most, just keep our name on them, huh? More after the break.

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May 5 2014

Batgirl Annual 2

 

batgirl annual 2Today, Shelby and Drew are discussing Batgirl Annual 2, originally released April 30th, 2014. 

slim-bannerShelby: A couple years ago I saw Melancholia in the theater, I believe with the esteemed Retcon Puncher Taylor. Spoiler alert: it’s probably the most depressing move I’ve ever seen. Beautiful, but calling it a downer would be an understatement. In it, Kirsten Dunst plays an extremely depressed woman; at one point, she is physically incapable of getting out of bed, relying completely on her sister’s aid. For me, it raised the question of how much leeway should we give people suffering from mental illnesses such as depression. While I was watching the movie, I was distracted by how seemingly mean the rest of the characters were to this severely ill woman, but you have to step back and think about the impact her illness has had on their lives. At what point do those closest to someone with this sort of disease finally snap from dealing with it, and can we really blame them for doing so? And finally, what happens when that mental illness manifests itself as super-powered criminal activity? (Okay, that last question is more about the Batgirl annual than Melancholia, but you get the idea.)

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Feb 20 2014

Harley Quinn 3

Alternating Currents: Harley Quinn 3, Drew and SpencerToday, Drew and Spencer are discussing Harley Quinn 3, originally released February 19th, 2014.

Drew: When someone accuses a joke of “going too far,” they tend to mean that it is offensive — that it has left the concept of good taste behind in the pursuit of a bigger laugh. But offensiveness isn’t the only metric of taste. Indeed, I would argue that even the most family-friendly humor can take its core concepts “too far,” neglecting to cultivate the expectations that jokes are designed to subvert. Taken too far, scenarios become unrecognizable, characters become unrelatable, and irony curdles into nihilism. It’s the reason I can’t really get into Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job! — I’m unable to form a frame of reference for why it’s even supposed to be funny, making the experience little more than a parade of one-note awkwardness. I found myself feeling the same things as I read Harley Quinn 3, as the series continues to stretch its own rules to the breaking point. When absolutely anything is possible, it’s hard to be surprised by a punchline. Continue reading →

Feb 18 2014

Forever Evil: Rogues Rebellion 5

rogues rebellion 5Today, Patrick and Spencer are discussing Forever Evil: Rogues Rebellion 5, originally released February 12th, 2014.

Patrick: Let’s talk a little bit about the need for, and the necessity of, spectacle in superhero comics. At first blush, it seems absolutely crucial, right? If our characters aren’t using their powers and punching each other in the face and teleporting and zapping each other with lightning, then like, what’s the point of making them superheroes in the first place? There’s something about the non-stop, out-of-the-frying-pan-into-the-fire pacing of Rogues’ Rebellion that feels like superhero comics stripped down past the concepts of good and evil and great responsibility all that stuff. It’s pure adrenaline-powered action, with only a modicum of scheming to slow things down. Perhaps it’s fitting, then, that these are Flash’s baddies — and that we even get some time with Johnny Quick — as the plot ramps up to a fever pitch heading to the conclusion. Continue reading →

Feb 12 2014

Detective Comics 28

detective comics 28 gothToday, Spencer and Mikyzptlk are discussing Detective Comics 28, originally released February 5th, 2014. This issue is part of the Gothtopia event. We talked with John Layman about Gothtopia, you can find that interview here.

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Spencer: Back in the summer of 2010 I was obsessed with Bryan Lee O’Malley’s Scott Pilgrim comics, and eagerly awaited the release of their movie adaptation. I spent the weeks leading up to it reading and rereading the comics and preparing myself for the awesomeness I knew the movie would surely be. After I actually saw the movie, though, I was oddly disappointed by the many changes made between it and the comics. It took me quite a while to reconcile the two versions, but once I did, I ended up seeing it twice more in theaters and it quickly became my favorite movie. I had a similar experience reading Detective Comics 28 this week. After last month’s introduction to the “Gothtopia” storyline I was expecting a lot out of this issue—specifically, more exploration of this new Gotham utopia—but the story ended up veering in another direction entirely. I was disappointed at first, but fortunately, the story I got instead ended up being pretty enjoyable in its own right. Continue reading →

Jan 27 2014

Harley Quinn 2

harley quinn 2Today, Spencer and Shelby are discussing Harley Quinn 2, originally released January 22nd, 2014.

“I think I may have found a project I’d actually enjoy doing: helping these cats and dogs. They should be rewarded for not being people. I hate people.”

April Ludgate, Parks and Recreation

Spencer: So far, both issues of Harley Quinn have featured its heroine rescuing animals from oppressive environments. Harley being an animal lover isn’t really a surprise—she’s basically a big kid, plus she’s canonically owned and raised laughing hyenas in the past—but it still seemed a bit odd to me at first that this book was hitting this point so hard. I suppose it ultimately makes sense, though; when writing a book featuring a villain protagonist you’ve got to make sure the antagonists are even more loathsome, and everybody hates animal abuse—even supervillains—right? Continue reading →

Oct 18 2013

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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Sep 24 2013

Detective Comics 23.3: Scarecrow

Alternating Currents: Detective Comics 23.3: Scarecrow, Drew and Greg

Today, Drew and guest writer Greg Smith are discussing Detective Comics 23.3: Scarecrow, originally released September 18th, 2013. This issue is part of the Villain’s Month event. Click here for our Villains Month coverage.

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Drew: Peter Tomasi is an ideal utility player — he’s able to synthesize and adapt the ideas other writers introduce in flagship titles into something that can stand up on its own. He regularly turns what could be an unwieldy Frankenstein monster into something beautiful, so long as he’s given the space to do so. It turns out that last caveat is rather important — without appropriate time to develop the ideas, he’s forced to strip them down to the connective tissue they are, yielding stories that feel rushed and obligatory. Unfortunately, Detective Comics 23.3: Scarecrow falls firmly into this latter category, squandering some etherial, appropriately Scarecrow-y Szymon Kudranski art on a strange housekeeping issue. Continue reading →

Dec 11 2012

Detective Comics 15

detective comics 15

Today, Scott and Patrick are discussing Detective Comics 15, originally released December 5th, 2012. This issue is part of the Death of the Family crossover event. Click here for complete DotF coverage.death-divScott: It can be surprisingly easy to convince yourself of something that is obviously not true. I had a crush on a girl in elementary school and then some years later, I retroactively convinced myself that she had been my girlfriend. I don’t know how exactly it happened, but over time I came to believe this to be true, and only when I really stopped to think about it did I have the sad realization that I never had a girlfriend in elementary school at all. I also more recently convinced myself that this story sounded cute, and not at all desperate and creepy, which again may not be totally true. Regardless, I can sympathize with the Clayface arc that dominates Detective Comics 15: discovering that a love you believed in never existed sucks.

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