Eric thought Catwoman #72 was the best book he read this week because of the emotional punch in the gut that it gave him. We also give you guys our thoughts of Mighty Avengers #5, Captain America #31 and more. We finish off the podcast by discussing the current season of Smallville, a review of this week's Heroes episode "Fight or Flight" and a little listener feedback.
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Written by Mike Carey
Art by Mike Choi
Coloring by Sonia Oback
Lettering by Cory Petit
I can't believe there was a time that i didn't like Mike Carey's X-men run. I really didn't like his first story arc with Rogue's new team, the weird children villians and the whole hecotomb stuff but with this issue it really seems like all of those things happened for a reason and it's now building to a head.
This issue is taking us straight into Messiah Complex and like I've said on the podcast, I'm really excited about this crossover. Carey does a great job of doing a little re-cap in this issue but also with finally providing us with answers as to what it going on with the X-men
I've said before that it seemed like what was going on in X-men was big, but was still being kept a mystery and in this issue, the cat is finally out of the bag. We found out that sinister is hunting down mutants with ties to the future because he doesn't want the X-men to know about something that about to happen, and it looks like that event is the first mutant birth since Decimation and that's taking us straight into Messiah Complex.
Mike Choi also did a wonderful job with the art in this issue, while I did think that Humberto Ramos' art was growing on me, I think Choi is a better fit with this title. His art is very sleek and straight forward and I think Ramos' cartoony style distracted you from the story.
So congratulations Mr. Mike Carey. I did not like you're first two arcs at all but this last one has made it all worth it, you don't see that a lot in comics, but I'm so glad I stuck with you and this book and I can't wait for Messiah Complex.......which starts next week!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Written by Will Pfeifer
Pencils by David Lopez
Inks by Alvardo Fletcher
Letters by Adam Hughes
This was a really tough one for me. While buying my books, I realized I finally had the good fortune of opportunity to review Powers and thought for sure it would be the pick. Catwoman came out of left field this week and blew me away, earning it the Book of the Week title.
This issue deals with Selina attempting to deal with her decision to give her daughter up to foster parents. Asking Zatanna to help her forget what had happened and also change her back to a villian were "lump in the throat" moments. I truly thought this might be the issue that the Countdown promo teases as Catwoman stands side by side with the Joker (which as a fan, I'm not especially looking forward to). What we get instead is Selina's reasoning for why she made that decision (I don't want to give it away here, read the book!) and a look at how Selina changed over the years.
Will Pfeifer knows these characters! Selina has just the right amount of attitude and tenderness that make her character so interesting and one of the most compelling female characters in comics. The interactions between Selina, Zatanna, and Bruce flow naturally and left me feeling like I got punched in the gut. Good work gentlemen!
Marvel announced today that Captain America will return in Captain America #34 and it won't be Steve Rogers in the costume. Speaking of the costume, Superstar Alex Ross designed the new suit which goes back to the old school feel of Captain America but also includes a gun. Obviously the first thought is the Winter Soldier will step into the uniform but who knows! I can't wait to find out. Here's some pics of the new suit.
And you can read the article with Ross and Brubaker here
Written by Geoff Johns
Pencils by Ivan Reis
Inks by Oclair Albert and Julio Ferreira
Colors by Moose Baumann
Letters by Rob Leigh
Are you kidding me?
Seriously, you have to be kidding me!
I honestly didn't think a single issue could be this good!!!
I know that we have picked Green Lantern titles a lot since the Sinestro Corps War started and with good reason, because the books are fantastic, but when I saw that Green Lantern #24 was coming out this week I decided then and there that it couldn't be the book of the week no matter how good it was.......
I guess I should just give up trying to fight Johns' work.
The main reason why I pick this book is because it was by leaps and bounds, the best issue of the Sinestro Corps storyline so far and all the prior issues have also been fantastic. I'm not sure how long Johns has been planning this but honestly a grand kudos goes out to him for one of the greatest storylines in comics, without a doubt.
We're really getting to the final hour of the war here and you actually feel that reading this book, I honestly got chills upon reading the last page. Reis really needs to be commended just as much as Johns with his book because the art is stellar. It's very crisp, extremely clean and I love his facial expressions, they really lend to the tone of the book. Something else that Eric and I am keep on mentioning is the coloring in this book and really coloring is key to a Green Lantern book, but with this war going on and the distinct parallel between will and green and fear and yellow, well Mr. Moose Baumann has also done a brilliant job.
Simply put, not only is this storyline exact what a big event should be, but Green Lantern #24 is the perfect example of what a single comic book should be. It was fun, engaging, moving, humorous, epic.......I could go on forever.
Bottom Line: Go read this book, and after that......go tell everyone else to read it also!
Great work DC!
Ganthet: "Will you forgo your elevated status and accept this ring again?"
Kyle Rayner: " Hell, yes"
Go to the marvel.com website and this is what you'll see, a big banner indicating that tomorrow 10/11 Marvel plans on unveiling the new project that's bringing Alex Ross back to Marvel. We've seen some teasers posters of a Cap suit with "The Return" in the background so it should be interesting to see what this new project is all about.......I'll remain hopefully optimistic until I hear what it is, but be sure that we'll post it here tomorrow for you guys.
This was a pretty light week for books so Eric took a chance on The Vinyl Underground #1 and dug its originality. We also discuss Cyborg:Superman #1, Green Lantern Corps #16, Buffy The Vampire Slayer #7 and more. All this and we give you reviews of the things for taking up a lot of out time lately....video games! I give you my spoiler free review of Halo 3 and let you know if it makes up for the lackluster ending of Halo 2. And Eric gives his reviews of The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass for the DS and Metroid Prime for the Wii.
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