Donomark

Again Mike, THANK YOU for putting the frustrations I felt with Mister Terrific to words. I wanted to like that book and the character a lot, but it was forced, half ass and unsatisfying. With Batman and Robin, was that really the Bat-Gyro the villains were trying to escape in? I never caught that...

Cliff Chang exudes the Greco-Roman feel to the Wonder Woman mythos. But Mahnke's a solid artist, no doubt.

Respectfully disagree that Batgirl #2 was an improvement. I continue to really dislike this title, partly because my face still stings from the slap of Babs being Batgirl again. Partly because the book itself is so moronically written with nonsense dialogue and awkward scene transitions.

He was on the money with that final panel from Batman #1. (1940) Of the #2s this week, Action and Static Shock top it out for me. Action was engaging as all hell, just as before. Static was surprisingly excellent. I enjoyed the last issue, but only on a badic level. We get more of Virgil's though process here, and a definite mystery at how hsi powers truly work. I was totally immersed in both titles, and can't wait for the next issue.

LOVED your Batgirl #1 review. On The Batman Universe Comic Cast where I reviewed it, I think I came off as more personally offended because I'm a Cassandra Cain and Stephanie Brown as Batgirl fan over Barbara. So because the first issue with Babs as Batgirl not only didn't answer shit, but was lackluster on its own merits, I feel as though my review didn't fully go over the massive amounts of fail that was that issue. But you nailed it with the scenes at the hospital with the dumbass cop and dialogue spoken. Bravo sir. One thing about your Static Shock review, Hardware is the guy from Milestone talking to Virgil, not Hardcore. It does make me ask, is there a character in comics named "Hardcore"? Looking forward to the rest Mike!

Downloading...here's hoping to tear into Batgirl like there's no tomorrow.

That Comics Alliance article was SPOT ON. Sexual liberation my ass, that's the equivalent to Girls Gone Wild. Yeah they choose to do it, but it's still for the sake of male titilation.

What's awful about the Catwoman issue is that the sexual tension between her and Batman has always been that: TENSION. Batman is too focused on his war on crime to give into it, despite the fact that he really wants Selina. And Selina is attracted to Bruce's hard-to-get nature of him. To have the characters not know each other's identities yet repeatedly have masked sex is so GADawful, I cannot believe DC rolled with this. Seriously. And Starfire went from a character who was comfortable with her sexuality and loved/never got over Dick Grayson (the man she was seconds away from marrying) to not even remembering who he is and wants wanton sex with people. Great. Wonderful. This isn't a patriacal rant of women wanting and enjoying sex, this is complaining about the mishandling of the characters for the sake of sex.

Just read Mr. Terrific. It's times like this where I'm seriously like why do I even fucking try... I've not read Eric Wallace's work before, but I wouldn't have pegged him as a black author unless someone told me. Actually that's exactly what happened. This is not good writing, and it's a shame because I was digging the main plot just fine. Overall it read like a solid comic book, but the racial tension throughout the issue felt extremely forced and unnatural. This was done so much better in Icon, Static, and even Hardeware-the latter which I couldn't stand. Dwayne McDuffie this guy ain't.

It's interesting that you guys felt that the first four episodes weren't so hot, because Bruce Timm has said in an interview that he felt like the first season wasn't very good, but the second season was. He described it as more Monty Python than Animaniacs-lite. Now it's not as though he's speaking from a creator role since he dropped out early on, but it made me think that that's probably the case. I watched the Fanboy episode the other week, and I can definitely see where you two are coming from. The non-sequiter bits didn't do it for me, but as a kid I remember this show being insanely funny back in the day. So I would reccommend and am going to seek out second season episodes just to see a fuller spectrum of the series.

Reading Batgirl, you'd come away thinking that she was never Oracle with the way she's been acting. Arsenal is sober from drugs, according to all accounts. And since everyone is young, hip and cool in the DCnU, Lian's yet to be born.

Supposed to be the woman from Flashpoint #5. She will be in every new #1 issue this month. Just saw her in Static Shock. Static Shock by the way was alright. There's a few questions I have which hopefully will be explained in the future, such as why the Hawkins moved and what's the business about Virgil being in Juvie, but the ending made me go "WOAH!"

LOVED Actions Comics. Now THIS was what should've come out last week. After reading JL#1 and Batgirl #1, things were looking grim. But this comic was so much fun and had great energy, it appeal to readers new and old alike. The whole reading experience was like one big "HELL YEAH!" Batgirl stank. This comic needed to justify why Babs was in the costume and it failed. The art was pretty to look at, but we have questionable dialogue with Babs trying to scare crooks, and Babs nearly wetting herself over fear of the Killing Joke incident which she has been well past in her life. She's faced the Joker twice since she was shot, but no. This issue has her basically saying "My life was worthless when I wasn't Batgirl!" What a fucking load. Detective was surprisingly decent. After reading the preview with Batman's "I own the night." line of dialogue, I figured it would be more Tony Daniel mediocrity. But it was solid. It was a straightup Batman tale with the Joker, not much else you can ask for. The ending sickened me however, I thought that was WAAAAYYYYY too violent, even in this modern era.

Has everyone seen this? http://www.theouthousers.com/forum/the-news-stand/dan-didio-responds-fans-questions-t70478.html I want to remain excited for this reboot, but this is seriously gutting me. It's so disingenuous, so stupid. It's like Didio sniper-shot every fun and positive thing from the 90s.

I usually find myself disagreeing with Mike whenever he's bad on whatever he's reviewing (save for Batman and Robin) but with JL#1 I agree wholeheartedly. It wasn't awful, but to bring in new readers and re-start the DC line, it NEEDED to be better than it was, and I just wasn't.

Good stuff.

Okay I just read JL twice. One from the perspective I have as a comic fan for for a decade and a half, and another from the supposed mindset of a newcomer. On first reading, it wasn't anything special. Art is gorgeous, but the writing doesn't go beyond exagerrated character tropes which Geoff Johns is mostly about whwn he writes the characters. I've never liked his Batman because he always portrays him as a tool and while this isn't as bad as it has been in past Johns stories, it wasn't welcome to me. Batman can be standoffish, but when he's actively insulting other people for the reasons of bigging himself up, then it's out of character. Batman doesn't need to tear people down with insults, he knows he's a badass and he won't spend any time and energy on it. Why would he need to? Hal was also flanderized to being a cocky, arrogant beat cop. It was exactly grating, but it stuck out for me. I'm wondering how the Teen Titans history is now if Cyborg is going to be in the Justice League, especially since Dick's history is supposedly unchanged. That's the inherent problem with this relaunch however, you cannot just simply say Batman's history is unchanged. By the very nature of changing other people's histories, you change his. It's a ripple effect. Not looking forward to the Supes/Bats brawl that's coming in the next issue because Jesus Christ is it old by now. We get it, you like Dark Knight Returns. We get it, Superman and Batman are opposite. I understand that this is the two of them first meeting each other, but it's a cliche by this point in fiction to have any hero fight one another before teaming up. Marvel Comics whored that trope out years ago; it was old by the mid 70s. Now looking at this from the assumed "new reader's" perspective, I suppose it would have been alright. Starting with just Batman, Green Lantern and Superman is a good idea since those three are in the public mindset right now the most. This did do a decent job of expositing the status quo without going overboard, which is a credit to Geoff Johns to be sure. The ending with Superman was a nice hook, and I would really be interested to know what new readers think about this. If I were to rank this as I am now, a hardcore fan, I'd give it a straight 2.5/5-3/5. Nothing special at all. As a "new reader", possibly a 4/5 but again I'd be guessing.

I wasn't reading Secret Six, but I heard so many rviews about the last issue that I got it and read past issues to make sense of the Scandal Savage/Knockout/Steipper marriage proposal. While I don't necessarily think it's as exploitative as you think it was, I agree that it was without much foresight. Everyone in the BG of the hospital cheering just rang as unrealistic to me, because in the real world polygymous marriages aren't a usual thing. Homosexual marriages are way more commonplace than that. I agree with Stavros that with a final issue, spending time on exposition shouldn't really be a main concern. I agree that ever issue is someone's first, but that's the case with a lot of people who read comics. I got into Spider-Man in the Clone Saga where I didn't know what was going on. I didn't blmae the issues, I did research. Same with a friend of mine who got into DC Comics with Infinite Crisis. In any other case I might agree, but in this instance, especially with how rushed everything had to be with the relaunch, it just couldn't have been bothered with IMO. Glad you dug Snyder's 'Tec run, it's indeed been awesome! Are you planning on revealing which titles from the new 52 you want to pick up if any once the lookback reviews are over?

I know Ian said he's been drunk during podcast recordings before, but this is the first time it was *very* apparent. Wow! Where the movie's concerned, I've always had an affection for Spawn because I too am a child of the 90's, and Spawn was the shit all throughout. It went across the lines of Batman and Robin in that as a kid I didn't realize right away that people hated the film. I saw it recently again and it's decent, but Klown is very annoying. Michael Jai White was great casting, and it sort of has a soft spot in my heart. Have either of you seen the director's cut? If so, what are the differences?

Hal was in one scene in Die Hard 2: DIE HARDER.

I really liked it. I'm a casual fan of the series, having read each of the books only once and I enjoy the movies, so this is a fun show to listen to. My only real suggestion would be to fix the audio, and keep doing what you've been doing!

Looks good, will have to see it in action, but it looks impressive. The Lazerus Pit pic is fake as hell though.

The stuff with the personified TARDIS was fun and cool, but the stuff with Amy and Rory was effing chilling. Very nice.

That Son of the Mask review trumped FYEO's Die Another Day review for making Ian incredibly pissed off. The original Mask is a classic. Glad to see that it got the score it deserved.

Yeah, I was never bothered by Dent dying by Batman as I was with Ra's "dying" in Begins. That was my ONLY problem with the movie, because it is legitimately out of character for him to do that. But with Two-Face, his only concern was saving James Jr. That doesn't correlate to him having to conceed with intentionally killing Two-Face, he just went at him when the timing was the best. As it happened, Two-Face died, but IMO I don't think it's Batman's fault as such to say that "HE KILLED TWO FACE". Two-Face died as a result of Batman's actions, but wtf else was he to do really? It's not as though Two Face was gauranteed to die, he just kind of did. I don't know if that makes any sense but essentially, while Two Face did die due to Batman's actions and wouldn't if Batman didn't tackle him, Batman still didn't kill him persay. Anyone ever notice that the reveal that they're over a huge ledge isn't even hinted at until Batman tackles Two Face? It may just be me, but that always comes out of nowhere.