comics roundup 13 November 2008

Amazing Spider-man #577
So this is another one-issue special featuring an appearance from everyone's favourite violent dullard, Punisher. It also involves a villain direct from 70s Blaxploitation called Moses Magnum, who feels the need to say his own name a lot. Spidey is trying to drive taxis and stumbles on Punisher who is investigating Moses Magnum and his trafficking of mutant growth hormone. Spidey and Punisher do the unlikely teamup thing and defeat Moses Magnum in style with enough quips and weary sarcastic ribbing and inter-rivalry that you almost feel they're Riggs and Murtagh or Starsky and Hutch or something. Good issue and better-drawn than last week's Hammerhead manga cartoon mess. This was gritter drawn, almost like the Daredevil team.

Wolverine: Old Man Logan #69 (dude)
It's a shame that long arcs have a filler before the key episode when you learn the 'secret'. We know it's set in the future; Wolverine has given up the claw and we don't know why it happened and what his problem is. So in this episode, he and Hawkeye escape from Spiderman's psychotic granddaughter, fall down a hole, avoid being eaten by mole-men and then have a bar brawl, before Wolvy decides to tell us exactly what happened on that fateful day. Woeful filler from super-hot Millar.

Batman: Cacophony 1 of 3
This is written by Kevin Smith so I thought I'd pick it up. Why do I keep going back to Smith who is hellbent on destroying any faith I had in him (it's personal- I'm sure...) His mundane podcasts with Mosier are painfully bereft of anything interesting, as they take an hour to tell boring anecdotes and create long numbing scenes out of pointless situations, plus Clerks 2 was a bad revisit to the legacy, unevenly paced and full of silly writing. It was as if the budget ruined it. I quite liked his Spidety and Daredevil arcs but this is just silly. Walt Flanagan's weird Jay Leno version of the Joker is basically Jay of Silent Bob fame, and the plot seems all too familiar to the Spidey plot he did. I just don't know. Must try harder next time, because in 22 pages, I was more intrigued by the adverts than the overwritten panels full of sass and self-reference. Sorry Smith, you had me at necrophilia... but have since lost me.

Detective Comics #850
This was the conclusion to the Hush storyline as we find out what happened to the parents that wanted him to be just like Bruce, so much so that he has had plastic surgery to that effect. As he tries to manipulate the Batcave to his own gain, Batman fends him off as best he can, leading to a tense cat and mouse game before an inevitable bittersweetly triumphant conclusion. Great arc with a chillingly funny coda.

Batman Confidential
I read this. It's not worth reviewing. Joker oversaturation has gone wild in the run-up to the Dark Knight DVD release and the only arc worth reading is Joker's part to play in next week's conclusion to Batman RIP. In the meantime this is tie-in filler of the worst proportions. I only with Batman 'dying' next week, they'll start to scale back the ridiculous over-kill of titles featuring him. Probably not... it's an excuse to create new stories for a Bruce Wayne Batman despite whatever happens to him in the main title. Expect lots of 'Untold Stories of the Bat' type stuff next year. Blah.