I’m slowly but surely starting to feel better again. The weekend was plenty rough, but I seem to be on the road to recovery. So let’s get to a review.

Justice Society of America #12

Most of this issue is concerned with the latest JSA recruiting drive — in other words, new characters with some sort of legacy attachment to the Justice Society. We’ve already met the new Judomaster, a Japanese martial artist who has a power that makes her impossible to hit. Now we also meet the new Amazing-Man, the grandson of the original, a black community activist in New Orleans who can transform himself into any material that he touches; the new Mr. America, the former FBI partner of the Mr. America who was killed in the first issue of this series; Jennifer Pierce, one of Black Lightning’s daughters, who generates a spiky electrical field everytime she touches anything electronic; and Lance Corporal David Reid, a metahuman military man who generates plasma energy that he can fire with the aid of a metallic lance. On top of all that, Jakeem Thunder and the Thunderbolt rejoin the team, the Kingdom Come Superman continues to find his way with the team, and a new interdimensional threat is coming.

Problems? There are some. As Hannibal Tabu notes here, all of a sudden, Black Lightning has a second daughter? He has a strangely unnamed wife? Is Superboy Prime punching the universe again? Also, though I really do like most of these characters, the team is just way, way too large. They’ve currently got 23 members — you just can’t give that many characters the spotlights they all need in a monthly 22-page comic. Heck, when was the last time anyone even saw Sand? I think the creators have forgotten he’s supposed to be on the team…

Having said all that, I’m still giving this a thumbs up. I like all these new characters — they’ve all got good personalities, good storyline hooks, and I hope they keep ’em around for a long time, instead of sacrificing them all in “Final Crisis.” I particularly enjoyed the segments introducing Amazing-Man, which included a biography of the character from WWII that listed him as one of the DCU’s foremost civil rights leaders, and David Reid, whose family connection to the original JSA was completely unexpected. It’ll be interesting to see how this plays out.

What’s that you say? You say it’s Friday night, and you can’t get over your mad desire for mayhem, righteous battle, and wanton face-punching? Lucky for you there’s FRIDAY NIGHT FIGHTS!

Let’s tune in for all the action from July 2000’s JSA #12 by David Goyer, Geoff Johns, and Buzz, as Mr. Terrific takes on the evil Kobra. Our combatants warm up with a little friendly name-calling:

“Braggart?!” “Sociopath?!” Much too intellectual. Someone get busy with the nose-pulping and elbow jabs, please.

That’s more like it! Yay for nose-pulping and elbow jabs!

Busy, busy, busy. Do I have time for some comics reviews? Yes, I think I do.

Justice Society of America #11

The “Kingdom Come” Superman is still around. He says his version of Earth has been destroyed. (It has? Has anyone told DC? I think they think it’s still around.) Power Girl is breaking up about being the last survivor of Earth-2. The rest of the team helps save the new Judomaster (a martial arts expert whose special power is that she can’t be hit by anyone) from a bunch of Yakuza super-assassins.

Verdict: Thumbs up. But that might be because I’m a fan of the team. No, not really the highest recommendation, is it?

Lobster Johnson #4

More pulp goodness from Mike Mignola. The evil Memnan Saa has a vril-powered dragon, and he hopes that an army of them will help him conquer the world. Jim Sacks is dead, but he was dead before — his vril-powered armor has empowered his spirit, and he strikes a near-deadly blow against Saa’s forces. Can Lobster Johnson get the good guys — and himself — out safely?

Verdict: Thumbs up. An enthusiastic thumbs up this time. I love pulp and horror, and Mignola may be the best pulp/horror writer the comics industry has ever seen.

Blue Beetle #21

First, let’s all enjoy an inappropriate giggle at that cover, okay?

As for the story, the Spectre, God’s own vengeful and extremely violent Spirit of Judgment, has taken up residence at a local prison, where he’s gorily slaughtering prisoners who were involved in a deadly prison riot. One of the prisoners is Luis, the guy who injured Jaime’s father, and if the guard who Luis attacked dies, the Spectre will kill him, too. Beetle can’t figure out how he’s supposed to stop an omnipotent spirit — both his father and his (secret) girlfriend Traci Thirteen advise him to forgive Luis and let go of his anger. But will something so simple be of any use against a horrific monster like the Spectre?

Verdict: Thumbs up. This issue wasn’t even written by regular writer John Rogers, but the characters of Jaime, his family, and friends are so well-established that the fill-in writer still does an excellent job. I’m not all that happy with the inclusion of the Spectre — any value he used to have as a character has pretty much disappeared. I could write a great deal more about the problems with the Spectre — and I will, later. Not today. Too busy.

Justice Society of America #10

The Justice Society is rocked by the appearance of a new, older version of Superman. He’s a dead-ringer for Power Girl’s dead cousin from Earth-2, but he is in fact from Mark Waid and Alex Ross’ very popular “Kingdom Come” comic from a decade or so ago, which Starman identifies as Earth-22. The JSA are well and truly freaked out about him and lock him in their board room, fearing he’s some sort of evil duplicate. Supes and Obsidian have a heart-to-heart, then Supes busts out to go rescue a girl trying to commit suicide.

Verdict: Thumbs up. I’m still not sure that I like the idea of dragging “Kingdom Come” even this close to DC’s continuity, I do like Supes’ characterization a lot. It’s also nice to see Obsidian again, since he hadn’t done more than make single-panel appearances since this series re-launched. Also very awesome: Superman’s flashbacks to his home universe are lushly painted by Alex Ross himself.

Blue Beetle #20

This is a crossover with the Sinestro Corps War storyline going on over in the Green Lantern comics. One of the Sinestro Corps rings decides that Christopher Smith — thuggish biker, mentor to Jaime Reyes, and the former hero named Peacekeeper — should be the next member of the Sinestros, because he’s unknowingly carrying one of the scarabs created by the evil alien empire called the Reach. So Jaime’s stuck trying to fight off someone with all his powers plus the powers of the yellow power rings. Brik, one of the Green Lanterns, shows up to help, but they’re still getting skunked. Is there any way to beat both the scarab and the ring to save the man trapped inside?

The fact is that sales for this comic are way low — like “imminent cancellation” low. But DC knows they’ve got a great character here, and they don’t want to give up on the book — hence, you’ve got Beetle joining the Teen Titans and a crossover with DC’s very popular Sinestro Corps crossover here. Not sure this one is going to do the job — heck, we only get a brief glimpse of Jaime’s family and friends, and his supporting cast are just about the best thing about the comic. Still, “Blue Beetle” is one of DC’s very best comics, and I do hope that you — yes, you — will go pick up a few issues.

Verdict: Thumbs up. Even when it’s not at its best, this comic is very, very good.

Countdown to Mystery #2

In the feature story, the new Dr. Fate battles a demon on the mortal plane and in hell, and in his civilian guise as the homeless Kent Nelson, he gets a job picking up trash at a cheap motel. In the backup story, Darkseid tells Eclipso that it was actually created by the Lord of Apokolips, not by God, and Plastic Man goes off the deep end, attacking his son and teaming up with Woozy Winks to commit crimes.

Verdict: Thumbs down. Thumbs way, way down. The Dr. Fate story is fine, but there are no depths to my loathing of the Plastic Man story. Turning Plas into a supervillain is bad enough — and more than enough to earn the creators my undying hatred from now ’til the heat death of the universe — but revamping Woozy Winks from addled but good-natured doofus to hardened criminal? That’s the thing that really makes me mad. It’s everything that disgusts me about DC’s recent trends of embracing darkness and violence, and just disrespecting their characters and the artists who originally created them. It’s a stupid and self-destructive business strategy, as far as I’m concerned.

Justice Society of America #9

Hey, wow, a comic with a competently-drawn Power Girl on the cover. That’s pretty dadgummed rare these days…

Anyway, this is a fairly cute transitional issue. Most of the story takes place at a benefit event the JSA is holding for a NYC firehouse. There’s a big pancake breakfast, with Citizen Steel and the kids of the Heywood family cooking up the flapjacks, and the two Wildcats (boxer Ted Grant and his were-panther son, Tommy) stage a charity prizefight. But midway through the first round, a fire call comes in, and everyone takes off for a burning factory. After evacuating everyone, the JSA discover the cause of the still-blazing fire — former Teen Titans villain/rock star/demon Goth got a hole blasted through his chest and what remains of his demonic powers are about to blow the factory sky-high. So to get rid of Goth’s body, Starman actually makes a black hole and throws him in it. And who steps out of the black hole afterwards? The Superman from the acclaimed Mark Waid/Alex Ross series “Kingdom Come.”

Can’t say I really know what to think of this one. On one hand, I really like these “Day in the Life” stories where we get to see super-people doing stuff like making pancakes and entertaining awe-struck kids. But I’m really not too keen on bringing the “Kingdom Come” Superman over here — DC’s continuity is already stretched just about to the breaking point, and adding another few Supermen isn’t going to do any of it much good. And dangit, it’s been ages since we saw characters like Sandman, Jakeem Thunder, Mr. Terrific, Dr. Mid-Nite, Obsidian, or Ma Hunkel. It’s way past time that this comic got back to giving all of its characters some time in the spotlight.

Verdict: I think I’ll give it a thumbs up. The pancake breakfast and boxing match really are fun.

I feel like getting the last of my weekly reviews over and done with right now, so let’s get to it.

Justice Society of America #8

Our focus in this issue is on our purty, purty covergirl, Jesse Chambers, formerly known as Jesse Quick, currently known as the new Liberty Belle. This issue has some backstory to deal with first — the main villain in this piece is Zoom, who is the anti-Flash. He’s partially responsible for the loss of Jesse’s superspeed powers, and he’s the guy who demolished Damage’s face. The JSA is after him, but he’s hiding out in Atlanta, and due to an incident years ago where Damage accidentally blew up a chunk of that city, he’s not allowed to set foot anywhere in Georgia. But Damage wants to tear a chunk out of Zoom’s hide, so he goes in anyway. Now he’s got hold of Zoom and has built up a charge of energy that would kill thousands of people if he lets it off. Jesse volunteers to go in and talk him down.

Verdict: Thumbs up. It’s nice to see something here about Liberty Belle, who has been a complete cypher until now. That’s really the biggest irritant about this comic, though, because there are far too many characters who we’ve barely seen at all in the past eight issues. Where’s Jakeem Thunder? Is he a current member of the team? Where’s Sand? What’s up with his funky new costume and powers? Used to be, there were almost as many people in the JSA, and they were still able to keep us up-to-date with all of them — that doesn’t seem to be the case now…

She-Hulk #20

There isn’t much of a way to talk about this one, because it’s jam-packed with spoilers. Basically, Artie Zix, the guy who currently runs the law firm, reveals his secrets and gets our main characters to reveal some of theirs, wrapping up a number of old loose plot threads before the next storyarc.

Verdict: Thumbs up. Seems fine, but not particularly outstanding.

Metal Men #1

A very nice relaunch of one of DC’s most enjoyable teams. This one has lots of great stuff, from a return of some of the concepts cooked up during the JLA’s “Obsidian Age” storyline, to a giant robot made up of nanobots and evil toasters. We also see Doc Magnus before he had completely developed the Metal Men into the shapeshifting herobots we know and love, and we get to briefly meet a new Metal Man named Copper. And of course, the Metal Men end the issue completely destroyed, because that’s what the Metal Men do — they get wrecked whenever they save the day…

Verdict: Thumbs up, again. Duncan Rouleau is the writer and illustrator, and his art and storytelling completely overclock the specs on good, action-packed, charismatic fun.

Not many comics left to review this week, and I think I can get most of them reviewed pretty quickly. To the ReviewCopter!

Hellboy: Darkness Calls #4

Baba Yaga’s crusade against Hellboy continues, as Koschei the Deathless attacks. Hellboy’s a pretty tough customer, but he does his best work against opponents who eventually stop living, which Koschei doesn’t do. Luckily, Hellboy gets a little assistance from a little girl from Russian folklore, but it may not be enough.

Verdict: Thumbs up. Mike Mignola’s take on Russian mythology is big fun. Not much horror action in this issue, but a full issue of near-nonstop action is nothing to sneeze at.

JSA Classified #28

This issue focuses on Jakeem Thunder and his wish-granting Thunderbolt as they try to use their nigh-omnipotent powers to give everyone everything they want. While Jakeem expected to spend his time reconstructing demolished homes and feeding the hungry, he ends up fielding demands for new plasma TVs and repaired PlayStations.

Verdict: Thumbs up. One of the superhero criticisms you see from time to time is that you see them pull people out of fires and accidents, but you never see them stick around to clean up damage or rebuild homes. This issue has one of the better explanations for this that I’ve seen — it’s better thought-out and doesn’t completely insult your intelligence the way some of these do. We also see some much-needed character development for Jakeem, who tends to get forgotten over in the main “Justice Society” comic book.

Teen Titans #49

It’s a crossover with the “Amazons Attack” miniseries. There’s a three-way battle between the Titans, the military, and the Amazons with a bunch of innocent internees in the crossfire. Most of this takes place on a runaway passenger train, and it’s still not a bit exciting.

Verdict: Thumbs down. Boring, irritating, confusing, poorly written, badly plotted. I have a hard time believing that the Titans would help escort military internees to a concentration camp just to keep themselves from being arrested. And Supergirl and Wonder Girl somehow manage to go off, get persuaded to fight with the Amazons, crash Air Force One, and then change their minds and come back to the Titans, all in the space of a few hours. This comic was freakin’ awful. I’m not dropping it yet, mainly ’cause Blue Beetle is going to be in the next few issues, but things better improve soon or I’m giving it up.

Bahlactus demands whuppins — SO LET THERE BE WHUPPINS!

From the most recent issue of “Justice Society of America”: Citizen Steel unleashes on some bad guys.

First, he grabs a guy out of the air…

And then he — owww, my gosh, I think he killed him! I’m pretty sure that guy’s skull’s crushed, man…

And I’m pretty sure both those guys are dead, too.

Is this the type of thing we want kids reading? Shouldn’t this stuff be regulated? Can’t we — Oh, wait, they were neo-Nazis? Never mind, killin’ Nazis is legal. I think it’s in the Constitution and everything…

I’ve snagged a pretty good crop of new comics this week — just in time to get hit by a sudden busy spree, both at the office and at home. So let’s see if we can get some reviews done very quickly for some of the new books.

Shadowpact #15

The plot is fairly straightforward. Dr. Gotham is an insanely powerful sorceror who wants to kill the magic-based superheroes in the Shadowpact on behalf of his evil, interdimensional god. He eats a sandwich and holds a busload of kids hostage in Chicago ’til the team shows up, then he kills Chicago.

Verdict: Thumbs up. The entire story is all about establishing Dr. Gotham as an unusual and very dangerous villain, and it does an incredible job. You really wouldn’t expect the two highlights of a story to be (1) Dr. Gotham eating a sandwich and (2) killing every living thing in Chicago, but it works amazingly well. Of course, I’m sure they’ll undo the “killing Chicago” thing next month, but still, this issue is a great ride.

Runaways #27

There are really two reasons I picked this one up. First, the cover here is just awesome. Second, I was told that the Yellow Kid (the star of the very first comic strip, “Hogan’s Alley,” back in the late 1890s) had an appearance, and I’ve long been a fan of old comic strips.

Well, the problem is that the Yellow Kid appears in just one panel. And beyond that, I know almost nothing about the main characters in the comic, so most of the stuff that went on here was completely lost on me. I will say, however, that I guffawed at the bit where the little pre-teen character (Molly Hayes, Wikipedia tells me) warns everyone that girls are on this side of the room, boys on that side, and no kissing or yucky stuff is allowed. I also like the fact that they hang out with a dinosaur. Don’t remember whether anyone ate sandwiches, although one character threatens to eat someone else.

Verdict: Can’t really give one. I’m just not familiar enough with what’s going on.

Justice Society of America #7

First of all, let me direct your attention to this cover by Alex Ross of the JSA’s newest member, Citizen Steel. This was not the same cover that was previewed — the preview got a lot of attention when it was released because Citizen Steel was, um, well, shall we say, in a state of, umm… Well, hang on just a second. (gets out thesaurus, looks up various interesting words, giggles in an immature manner) Tumescence. Turgidity. Perpendicularity. Upstandingness. (giggles some more)

Anyway, this caused a lot of hollering and weeping amongst the fanboys — you see, while they consider it a constitutional right to leer and drool over upskirt pictures of Mary Marvel and “Turkey’s Done” pictures of Psylocke, fanboys apparently run the risk of actually dying if they see a picture of a dude sportin’ lumber.

Anyway, it seems that DC decided that, if they were willing to reduce the size of Power Girl’s breasts on the last “Justice League” cover, maybe they should reduce the number of socks stuffed down Citizen Steel’s shiny shorts.

Oh, the story? The story’s fine. Citizen Steel makes his grand debut by helping beat the heck out of a bunch of neo-Nazi thugs. All that, plus Starman and Superman eating sloppy joes.

Verdict: Thumbs up. Who doesn’t love sloppy joes?