Bloody Good

 

The Goon #22

There’s a new Zombie Priest in town, and he’s got the zombies givin’ the old Zombie Priest the bizness. He’s also got some bad news in store for the rest of town, too. More of the more docile zombies around town are starting to go bad — and I don’t mean smelly — and Momma Norton, the crazy gypsy mother of the local pub owner, is gunned down, possibly by Labrazio, a guy who the Goon killed years ago. But if it’s not Labrazio, who’s behind the killing? What will Norton do to get revenge? Will the Goon get to beat anyone to pieces with a shovel before the end of this?

Verdict: Thumbs up. Not quite as much riotously funny stuff as in previous issues. This is really a dead serious story, with lots of emotion, from Momma Norton’s bloody prediction of death to Norton’s complete sorrow over his momma’s passing. Even the Goon is deeply affected by all this — he cries twice, whether from sadness for Momma Norton or his own tortured past with Labrazio. It’s easy to forget that this is a horror comic, what with all the crazy, funny stuff that happens here, but it’s clear that some truly horrific stuff is on the way.

 

Justice League of America #19

The Justice League heads out to the prison planet where the government has been stashing supervillains (in the “Salvation Run” series). They take along Rick Flag, a government agent who helped put the villains away. Unfortunately, when they finally arrive at the planet the government has been sending everyone to, they find it deserted, except for a few illusions of supervillains. They are taken prisoner by strange glowing tentacles of energy that only Hawkgirl is able to escape from. It turns out that their captor is the mostly useless space-tyrant Kanjar Ro, and he reveals that the villains’ teleport beams were intercepted by teleport beams from… somewhere else… before they arrived here. After that, the heroes escape and, um, I guess they go back home.

Verdict: Thumbs down. So much awfulness. Kanjar Ro? What, was Crazy Quilt not available? And he uses energy “drawn from the fabric of space-time” that just happens to be weakened by Hawkgirl’s all-purpose “Nth Element?” Isn’t that fairly stupidly convenient? And finally, I’m just completely sick to death of Ed Benes’ plastic, Michael-Turneresque penciling.

 

The Flash #238

Flash and his family are having money troubles — Wally can’t get a job, and being a superhero doesn’t really pay very well. There’s a new supervillain in town called Spin who can turn people’s fears real — he actually causes an earthquake by latching onto people’s fears of an earlier quake. And when Flash gets caught on camera complaining about his money woes, the media launches the soundbite into a major scandal. And when Wally goes after Spin, the villain manages to use his power to turn people’s fears about Flash selling out into reality.

Verdict: Thumbs up, more or less. Spin is, honestly, a fairly lame villain, but I liked the way they introduced Wally’s money troubles. One of the things that’s always bugged me about superheroes is that most of them, as written, should be unable to keep a job and just a shade above abject poverty anyway. So it’s not at all bad, but Spin is just a lousy villain.