Mask of the Medusa
Batwoman #16
Yet another issue of the most beautiful comic book on the stands. The Medusa and her monstrous minions are laying waste to Gotham City in an attempt to raise Ceto, the mythical Mother of All Monsters. We get a check-in — and sometimes co-narration! — with almost every character we’ve met since this comic began, including Batwoman, Maggie Sawyer, Wonder Woman, Cameron Chase, Director Bones, the Hook, Bette Kane (with an all-new costume!), la Llorona, Maro, and even the Medusa herself. It’s a mad, chaotic war zone as all the chessmen take their positions on the board…
Verdict: Thumbs up. Once again, the most beautiful comic book on the stands. If that’s not enough, it’s a really fun piece of storytelling, too. I love seeing all these characters coming together, with all their agendas and fears and ambitions playing off each other, all working up to something truly epic and apocalyptic. I only wish we could’ve seen Joseph Kane in here, too — he’s just about the only major character we don’t see here.
FF #3
Apparently, the only survivor of the Fantastic Four’s journey into outer space is an elderly Johnny Storm, with the others all victimized by Doom the Annihilating Conqueror, an amalgamation of Dr. Doom, Kang the Conqueror, and Annihilus. Scott Lang tries to persuade Darla Deering to return to the group — an effort that quickly goes all embarrassing when the Yancy Street Gang targets her with a whipped cream bomb and then snaps some photos of Darla half-dressed. Can Ant-Man convince Darla to rejoin the FF? Can the team figure out a way to save the seemingly long-dead Fantastic Four?
Verdict: Thumbs up. There’s spectacular energy in this one. From the mystery of John Storm to the effort to recruit Darla to the Moloids’ trip underground, there’s crackling excitement here. While we’d expect that energy in a chase down a skyscraper’s stairs, we also get it from a mostly static scene with Johnny and Wyatt Wingfoot. Yeah, Matt Fraction is writing a very fun comic, but this feels like a Michael Allred comic from beginning to end.
Today’s Cool Links:
- Was the moon landing a hoax? Here are some photo-based reasons why it all really happened.
- Here’s an absolutely hilarious tutorial about how to make a railgun.
- What happens when you change a familiar song from a minor scale to a major one? You get a song that’s the same, but very, very different.
- Here’s some stuff to scare the gee-willikers out of you.