Reed Gunther #4

President Grover Cleveland has received alarming reports of monster attacks all over the nation, so he calls out the fearsome Special Agent Mundy to take care of the situation. Meanwhile, adventuresome but somewhat dim cowboy Reed Gunther and his pet bear Sterling have just arrived in New York City, where Sterling is immediately mistaken for a monster, and that leads to a frantic chase, as Reed and Sterling try to both take in the big city sights and avoid getting shot by monster-hunters. And it all ends with Sterling in Mundy’s custody, and Reed with no guns, no where to stay, and no pants. Can Reed track down where Sterling and the monsters are being held? Can he get free from Agent Mundy? And does he still have a chance of finding Starla and the evil Mr. Picks?

Verdict: Thumbs up. Ye gods, this one was a lot of fun. Lots of very funny lines from Reed, lots of great shenanigans around the city, great depictions of 1880s NYC, excellent action, the grand comic reappearance of Grover Cleveland, and a bonus pinup by Stan Sakai!

Billy Batson and the Magic of Shazam! #17

This one’s a break from all the heavy, serious stories of the past several issues. Aliens are abducting cows all over the nearby countryside, and Billy is assigned to help investigate the story for WHIZ news. Mary tags along, and they soon discover that, despite the local farmers’ lame attempts to disguise their cows as human beings, the abductions continue. After changing into Captain Marvel and Mary Marvel, the heroes confront the alien responsible and learn his surprising reason for his cow-napping spree.

Verdict: Thumbs up. Very cute, very humorous, and very fun. This is what this comic should be about all the time.

The Avengers #2

The Avengers meet up with their newest member, Marvel Boy, an interdimensional Kree warrior named Noh-Varr, and ask them to build them a time machine so they can try to keep their future children from destroying the universe. What Noh-Varr builds is a time viewer that lets them see a number of different alternate futures, including the world of Spider-Girl, the Days of Future Past, and the Age of Apocalypse. They get to see their kids execute Kang the Conqueror, and then time apparently breaks. And before Marvel Boy can get to work on a new time machine, Wonder Man busts in, bellows some threats, knocks everyone around, and then vanishes. After that — hey, look! It’s Apocalypse and a brand new bunch of Horsemen!

Verdict: Thumbs up. I’ve got some concerns about Wonder Man’s out-of-nowhere attack, but I’m also thinking this is either a mind-control situation, or a Wonder Man from the future. Other than that, the dialogue is okay — maybe a bit strained in places, especially when Spider-Man tries to wisecrack, the action is pretty good, and we’ve got some interesting conflicts being set up.

Today’s Cool Links:

• I’m a total sucker for Abbott and Costello’s “Who’s on First” routine.
• A new batch of comics from Kate Beaton, including an Aquaman sketch she’ll be auctioning to raise funds for Gulf Coast cleanup.

The Avengers #1

I’ve never been that big on the Avengers, but seeing as how DC’s “Brightest Day” is collapsing in its own filth, I thought I’d check and see if Marvel’s “Heroic Age” is going to work out any better. And since Marvel is focusing most of its “Heroic Age” on a multitude of new “Avengers” titles, that means reading some “Avengers” titles.

This one is going to be their centerpiece — Steve Rogers, the original Captain America, recruits Thor, Iron Man, Spider-Man, Wolverine, Captain America (the Bucky Barnes version), Hawkeye, and Spider-Woman into the core Avengers team, with Maria Hill in charge of the day-to-day operations of the team. The only person who turns him down? Wonder Man, who has decided that the Avengers were ultimately at fault in all the world’s recent troubles. So the team gets together, exchanges some small talk, Iron Man worries that he’s gonna kill Captain America again… and then Kang the Conqueror shows up.

Kang is on his way to getting spanked hard by everyone until he pulls out his doomsday weapon — in fact, it’s a literal doomsday weapon that Tony Stark thought of several years back and decided never to build. Now that he’s got everyone’s attention, Kang tells them why he’s really there — in the future, Ultron finally took over the world and wrecked everything. But the Avengers’ children managed to defeat Ultron when no one else could, and they’re now running the world with as much ruthlessness as any supervillain. And if the Avengers don’t figure out some way to get into the future and defeat their own children, he’s going to come back and activate Tony’s doomsday device.

Verdict: In general, thumbs up. The story’s fine, the get-together backchat is fine, the art by John Romita Jr. is freakin’ awesome. But this is a Brian Michael Bendis comic, and the guy’s got some serious weaknesses (Snell does more than his fair share of documenting the atrocities). Will they come into play here? Well, we’ve got one person acting badly out-of-character (as in Wonder Man, who’s apparently about to decide to start attacking the Avengers), and we’ve got a few pages of iffy dialogue (a lot of the stuff that works fine in a comic like “Powers” doesn’t work very well in superhero comics where everyone does killer banter). Because it’s Bendis, I’m sure we’ll eventually get a lot more random character retcons and I’m-too-lazy-to-try-harder screwups. But for now, it seems to be working out fine.

Avengers Academy #1

Christos Gage and Mike McKone start up a new Avengers book (there are probably going to be at least a half-dozen by the time they’re all done) focusing on new teenaged heroes. Hank Pym, Tigra, Justice, Quicksilver, and Speedball are the primary instructors of the new Avengers Academy, designed to help train the next generation of superheroes.

We meet Veil, who can turn into poison gas and who is slowly dying as her body loses cohesion; Hazmat, a girl whose powers and personality are poisonous; Mettle, a skull-faced kid with a metal body; Finesse, a girl with zero social skills who can learn new fighting techniques, skills, languages, and everything else in the blink of an eye; Reptil, a kid who can shapeshift into different dinosaurs; and Striker, a guy who can generate electricity and who’s desperate for fame and fortune. And it turns out that all of the kids have an unusual secret in common…

Verdict: Thumbs up. A slow-moving issue, mostly because nearly the entire thing is devoted to introducing us to all these new characters, as well as getting us on board with the new status quo of the Academy’s teachers, especially Speedball, who is a lot less happy-go-lucky than he used to be. Still, despite the slow pace, I enjoyed it. I’m a sucker for decent character work, and we’re getting some good personalities drafted together, as well as some interesting conflicts set up for the future. Let’s hope they can keep the good stuff coming.

Today’s Cool Links:

• Chris Sims picks out his 18 favorite Batman panels.
• Dr. Watson is scary.
• The random Warren Ellis Twitter generator makes me giggle.