Previewing the Week’s Releases for 9/14/09 – 9/20/09

Comics
Amazing Spider-Man #605 – For the past few months Amazing Spider-Man has been turning in one solid arc after another. The Red Headed Stranger was an above average arc. Fred Van Lente did a solid job with his first arc on this title. Though this is supposed to be an epilogue issue to The Red Headed Stranger but we already got an epilogue at the end of the last issue. Should be interesting what happens in this issue especially with Black Cat around the corner.

Batgirl #2 – The first issue with Stephanie as the new Batgirl was an okay start. I'm still not sold that Stephanie can carry her own ongoing series and if this series belongs on my permanent pull list. But I am willing to see if Bryan Q. Miller can prove me wrong and turn in a good second issue.

Batman and Robin #4 – Morrison has been doing a fantastic job with Batman and Robin so far. This is the most fun I have had with reading a Morrison penned series. I'm interested to see what Morrison has in store for Batman and Robin with the Red Hood making an appearance.

Batman: Streets of Gotham #4 – This has been the best out of all the Batman titles. Dini has been doing a fantastic job with this series. Though I'm sad that he will hand over the writing duties to Chris Yost for the next arc I am glad that he is returning in the arc after that, as Matt Ampersand from Weekly Crisis reported. Looking forward to seeing how Dini ends this Zsaz and Hush arc and if Hush actually believes Dick will go through with his threat from last issue.

Blackest Night #3 – I have been one of the biggest critics of Geoff Johns work on Blackest Night, much to the hate of everyone who is loving this series. While I don't want to give too much away from my review for Green Lantern Corps #40, which should be up tomorrow, I do want to say that I am already sick off the Black Lantern Corps. At this point I have seen more than enough of the Black Lantern Corps but hopefully Johns can work his magic on this third issue and make me start to like this book.

Captain America: Reborn #3 – This has been one strange mini-series involving the return of Steve Rogers. Brubaker is using a lot of sci-fi elements to bring back the character which goes against the more grounded approach this series has been known for. I am hopeful that Brubaker can recover with issue and turn in a quality read.

Dark Reign: The List – Daredevil #1 – Originally I was only going to get the Spider-Man and Wolverine issue of Dark Reign: The List but after Daredevil #500 I decided to give this one-shot a try as it suppose to serve as a continuation of Matt being the leader of The Hand. I'm interest to learn what Andy Diggle has in store for Daredevil with the new status quo for the character Brubaker has left him.

Invincible Iron Man #18 – The last issue of Invincible Iron Man was very disappointing. As an Iron Man fan I am still optimistic that Fraction can turn in a good end to this arc. Hopefully we see these final two parts turns up the action as these past few issues have been lacking any sort of action.

Ultimate Comics Armor Wars #1 – Warren Ellis + Iron Man = More money for Marvel from me. Ellis is always money when it comes to writing Iron Man. And I have enjoyed most of Ellis work so I sure to love this mini-series involving Ultimate Iron Man.

DVD/Blu-rays
Dragon Ball: Season One – While this anime has sort of become a joke within anime fans, specifically DBZ and DBGT, I will admit that Dragon Ball is the series that introduced me to the world of anime and manga. While I did not like the later parts of DBZ I really enjoyed the original Dragon Ball were we followed a young Goku around in his search, along with Bulma and others, for the Dragon Balls. While I would like to get this box set right away I will probably wait a while till I get some more money to buy it. Still if you are a Dragon Ball fan this is a DVD you should pick up.

The Big Bang Theory: Season Two – The Big Bang Theory is one of my favorite shows on TV. This is just an awesome TV show. If you haven't given it a try then do yourselves a favor and pick this show up as it is hilarious nerd comedy.

X-Men: Volume 3 and 4 – While Spider-Man and Batman were the first comic book characters I was exposed to it is the X-Men that started my fanaticism with comics and made me go to the comic shop every week. And the reason for that is the 90s cartoon of the X-Men. For me this was my favorite cartoon as a kid because it had so many interesting characters that I could relate to. This series captured everything that was great about the X-Men and made me want to hunt down every issue of the X-Men, along with Spider-Man and Batman comics, that I could find as I wanted to learn more about these characters. These two DVDs are a must for any fan of this series and the X-Men in general. Personally, I'm looking forward to watching the "Dark Phoenix Saga" again as it was one of my favorite episodes of the series.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine – This first movie of Wolverine was a good action summer blockbuster. But nothing more. For the most part this movie while centered around Wolverine was mostly used as a catalyst to start a bunch of X-Men related movies. Will probably get it since I already have the first three X-Men movies. Damn me and my completist nature.

Movies
The Informant – I've always like Matt Damon's movie and this new movie looks like it could be a good one. It should be interesting to see Matt Damon in a comedy role as he has done a lot more series action roles than comedic ones.

Video Games
Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 2 – I enjoyed the first Ultimate Alliance game. I am unsure about this second one though. It looks like it could be a fun game with all the Fusion abilities to play around with but I will probably rent it before buying it just to see how it is.

Legen--wait for it---dary Comic Book Highlight for 6/17/09

Check out my reviews for last weeks comic book cartoons, Ultimatum: Spider-Man Requiem #1 and Invincible Iron Man #14 over at Rokk's Comic Book Revolution. Also I posted a new poll here on the Legacy to see if I should change the day of when I post the Highlights of the Week or keep them on the same day. So let me know what you think by voting on which day I should post them. Now on to the highlights of this week.

Cover of the Week: Captain America #600 (Alex Ross variant)

Even though I am not a big fan of Alex Ross's interior artwork I always love his cover's. He always knocks it out of the ballpark with his covers and this one for Cap #600 is no difference. Wouldn't mind having this as a poster in my room.

Captain America #600 Highlights

Nothing like seeing the original Avengers team to remind you how good the Avengers used to be as a team and not a group of individuals.

Got to wonder what this gun actually did to Steve: Did it transport him to an alternate world? Into the past? Future? Or something else?

Nothing like some good old training with some friends.

Well Red Skull we will find out starting next week during Captain America: Reborn.

Bump...Bump...Bump!

Nice to see how Steve touch people outside of the superhero community.

Rich people like to collect things to.

Invincible Iron Man #14 Highlights

Nothing like returning to the old reliable suit when on the run from the US government.

And the award for lamest superhero name goes to: Pepper Potts and her superhero name of 'Rescue.' Congrats Pepper! You just became 5x less interesting.

Maria Hill sure knows how to be subtle when trying to get someone's attention.

Madame Masque was a able to use her "Masque Senses" to locate Tony. At least that is the explanation that Fraction gave us.

Superman/Batman #61 Highlights

Nothing like some good old fashion superhero summer cleaning!

A nice moment for Bruce/Zatanna (Bratanna?) shippers before it is taken away.

Ultimatum: Spider-Man Requiem #1

To really see how bad the Ultimatum disaster was you Ultimate Spider-Man has been the place to see it not the actual Ultimatum event title.

'Counterintuitive'? I barely knew 4 syllable words in high school. Gotta be impressed with MJ's interview skills at the young age of 16.

Good to see that Bendis does actual know that Tony is a superhero. Now only if he realized this about the 616 version of the character.

I feel ya Pete, tuition is a bitch to get and pay.

After finally admitting that Spider-Man is a hero Jonah learns that CNN is reporting the Spider-Man is dead. Talk about irony!

Amazing Spider-Man #595 Review

Creative Team
Writer: Joe Kelly
Artist: Phil Jimenez
Inker: Andy Lanning
Colorist: Chris Chuckry

Story - American Son: Part 1

Review
After three months of ruling the Marvel Universe, Norman Osborn finally comes back to the pages of Amazing Spider-Man. Even though it has been cool seeing Norman rise to become an A-List villain, as he was only A-List in the Spider-Man books but in the rest of the Marvel Universe he was probably more like a B-Lister, it just hasn't felt right that his new role was not really addressed until now in Amazing Spider-Man. If there was one book, other than Invincible Iron Man, that should have started the new Dark Reign direction for Marvel it should have been Amazing Spider-Man as Spider-Man and Norman/Green Goblin have been battling out for years, Marvel time.

But now Joe Kelly finally brings Dark Reign to the pages of Amazing Spider-Man. Out of all of the web-heads that Kelly has probably been my favorite writer out of the group. Kelly's style of writing makes him a perfect fit for a Spider-Man book. While I have enjoyed Dan Slott's and Mark Waid's stories on this title just something about how Kelly writes Peter and his supporting cast and villains just captures everything that makes Spider-Man such a great character. He does a great job with the comedy in the pages of Amazing Spider-Man that it does not feel cheesy (i.e. Peter and Jonah's brother bonding) and then a few scenes later he is able to take the issue into a very dark place with Spider-Man almost killing Norman Osborn.

Phil Jimenez did a great job capturing all the small and big scenes in this issue. He does a great job giving everyone natural facial reactions and never making scene's look odd compared to the dialogue. Also the beating that Spider-Man gave Norman towards the end of this issue was brutal and actually felt like Spider-Man was about to kill Norman if not interrupted by Harry's phone call it felt like Peter was ready to finish it. Even though we knew that Peter wouldn't actually kill Norman, Jimenez's artwork did make it feel like he was going to be close to crossing that line.

In this first part of American Son was probably my favorite book of the week, which is something I have not been able to say about this title in a long time. What made this issue great is that it does not feel like a Spider-Man book but instead a Peter Parker book. A Spider-Man title is always at its best when it focuses on Peter Parker and not Spider-Man and even when Peter is out being Spider-Man it still feels like it is Peter acting as Spider-Man and not the other way around.

I really liked the scene between Wolverine and Spider-Man on the roof with Spider-Man telling Wolverine if he will help him take down Norman once and for all. Wolverine's comments were perfect and dead on with him basically telling Spidey that if he really wants to finish it that he must be prepared to kill Norman as it is the only way to actually end things. It was a great conversation and kind of makes me want to see a Spider-Man/Wolverine mini-series that is written by Joe Kelly.

Maybe my favorite scene of the issue was the scene right before the dinner were Peter and J. Jonah Jameson Jr. get into an argument like actual brothers even though they, mostly JJJ Jr., does not like that JJJ Sr. and Aunt May are getting married. The scene was dead on with capturing the animosity between Peter and JJJ, and it was some of the best dialogue I have read.

Now I'll admit the final pages with Harry and Lily (Menace) wasn't the best hook ending but I am interested to see were this storyline goes from here now that Harry is going to be working for his father again. If anything this will make for some fun dialogue and action in the future with Peter, Harry, and Norman. Though I still don't know about the whole Lily situation.

Issue Rating
Story: 9.3/10 - Joe Kelly writing style is a perfect fit for Amazing Spider-Man as he knows how to give an issue both it's light and dark moments without going over the top.
Art: 9.5/10 - Jimenez artwork was great, though it is to bad that he is not drawing the whole arc and we will get a new artist in the next issue.
Overall: 9.4/10 - Amazing Spider-Man #595 was a great start to American Son and I look forward to the next part of this arc.

Legen--wait for it--dary Comic Book Highlights for 5/13/09

Cover of the Week: Green Lantern Corps #36

I like how there is no empty space on this cover for GLC #36. It gives a nice preview to the hectic war going on in Oa.

Dark Reign: Hawkeye #2 Highlights

So this is basically how we are suppose to see H.A.M.M.E.R as. If this keeps up it looks like Norman's reign over the Marvel Universe will meet a quick end.

I continue to love how Bullseye continues to get under Norman's skin. And it will be nice to see the usual homicidal maniac I expect Bullseye to be.

Green Lantern Corps #36 Highlights

Emerald Eclipse in essence is the sequel to Sinestro Corps War. It is great that at least GLC knows how to integrate the other Lantern Corps while continuing the war between the Green and Sinestro Corps.

With Sodam turning the Daxam sun yellow I wonder if we will see a war between Daxam and New Krypton in 2010.

Oracle: The Cure #3 Highlights

This was a nice little cyber battle between Oracle and the Calculator, though it was a bit of a one-sided battle.

Ultimate Spider-Man #132 Highlights

Who doesn't love a good chick fight! The best part was when Kitty says she loves Peter as much as MJ while her current boyfriend, Kong's looks on. When USM is relaunched as Ultimate Comics Spider-Man I would like to see more stuff with MJ and Kitty.

With Venom involved later on this was a nice battle between Spider-Man and the Sinister Six and I hope that we get a Sinister Six II storyline when this title is relaunched.

I was impressed with how Immonen was able to capture the Ditko Peter Parker. And I like the creepy look to the zombie Uncle Ben at the end of this page.

Man I will be super pissed if Loeb kills Ultimate Peter Parker. It would only give me another reason to hate Loeb's work in an ever growing list of things I hate about his work.

War of Kings: Ascension #2 Highlights

The Annihilus baby back and it should be an interesting plot point after War of Kings is over for Nova or Guardians of the Galaxy to pick up on.

It should be interesting to see how DnA will mix Blastaar into the main War of Kings book and if his escape from prison 42 will mean that some of the other Marvel heroes on Earth will get involved in War of Kings.

Legacy Shorts: Comic Book Reviews for 5/13/09

Dark Reign: Hawkeye #2

Creative Team
Writer: Andy Diggle
Artist: Tom Raney
Inker: Scott Hanna
Colorist: Guru eFX

Story - Hawkeye Part 2 of 5

Review
Diggle continues to impress with how well he understands the homicidal maniac that Bullseye really is. I love seeing how Bullseye, as Hawkeye, took out the camera crew at the beginning of the issue and then pinned down to helicopter pilot with one of his arrows and then placing an explosive arrow right out the pilot to give him a chance to live. It was a very sick act I expect from Bullseye. And I also continue to enjoy how Bullseye continues to find ways to get under Norman's skin by the actions he does as Hawkeye.

Now as I said before I have mostly stayed away from most of the Dark Reign books but just from the few Dark Reign books I have read I have not seen H.A.M.M.E.R portrayed the way they were in this issue. Norman and his H.A.M.M.E.R organization were portrayed as plain terrorist in this issue with what they did to the workers at the TV station. This portrayal doesn't really fall in line with how H.A.M.M.E.R has been portrayed in the past and with more actions like this it may be just time before Norman is new power.

Also I continue to dislike that it is only Ben Ulrich that is calling Norman's rise to power in question. It has been one of the more unrealistic things that almost no one has questioned the amount of power Norman currently has and it is another that hurts this issue as we are reminded of this in the middle of the issue.

Issue Rating
Story: 7/10 - Though Diggle writes a great Bullseye I found his portrayal of H.A.M.M.E.R and the reminder of the non-questioning of Norman's actions to hurt this issue.
Art: 7.7/10 - Raney's art continues to look great but I still would have preferred someone like Aja or Lark to draw this book that should have a darker feel to it.
Overall: 7.35/10 - Dark Reign: Hawkeye #2 had an entertaining beginning and ending but a lot of what happened in the middle of the issue hurt how good this issue should have been.

Oracle: The Cure #3

Creative Team
Writer: Kevin Vanhook
Artists: Julian Lopez & Fernando Pasrin
Inkers: Bit, Norm Rapmund, & Fernando Pasarin
Colorist: HI-FI

Story - A Matter of Anti-Life or Death

Review
All I can say about this series is that I guess I should have learned already what I get when I get my hopes up. Oracle: The Cure had some potential to show why Barbara could carry a book on her own but in the end this series proved to be little better than what you would read in a fanfiction. Other than Morrison it just seems that any writer trying to pick up some of the plot points from Final Crisis are just doomed to failure. And Vanhook made the search for the left over Anti-Life Equation on the Internet very uninteresting. It doesn't help that I could have cared less about a battle between Barbara and the Calculator as we have seen it in the past before and in a much more interesting story. I kind of wish Vanhook would have used another villain for his story than the Calculator as the story did not feel very fresh.

Issue Rating
Story: 4.5/10 - Vanhook was very unimpressive with his writing as it felt I was reading dialogue from a fanfiction.
Art: 6/10 - Lopez art was good though this issue have a lot more inconsistencies that hurt the look of this issue.
Overall: 5.75/10 - Overall Oracle: The Cure was a very disappointing mini-series and I have no idea how this ties in with what DC has in story for Barbara and the new Batgirl book in the future though I could care less.

Ultimate Spider-Man #132

Creative Team
Writer: Brian Michael Bendis
Artist: Stuart Immonen
Inker: Wade von Grawbadger
Colorist: Justin Ponsor

Story - Ultimatum Tie-in

Review
If there wasn't more of a reason to hate Loeb and his Ultimatum event but for the first time that I can remember in its almost 10 year run Ultimate Spider-Man actually wasn't released last month. And if that wasn't bad enough it seems that Ultimatum has finally affect the quality that we get in Ultimate Spider-Man. Even Bendis and Immonen best can't help make Ultimatum a better event. Still the team of Bendis and Immonen due their best with what little they have to work with and still continue to make the Ultimate Spider-Man tie-ins to Ultimatum much more compelling that the event itself.

Again as always the strength Ultimate Spider-Man #132 is the stuff that goes on in Peter and supporting cast lives. The short fight MJ and Kitty get into, MJ actually punches Kitty, was great. The best part was right when Kitty says she loves Peter as much as MJ and just stopping before saying Peter's name was made even more awkward as Kong, Kitty's current boyfriend, was there as well with a shocked face. Bendis does a great job with this scene as his dialogue is perfect and it will be interesting to see if Kitty and/or Spider-Woman will be able to reach Peter before what looks to be his final moments if we are suppose to believe what Loeb has been saying.

Also while Bendis went a bit to long with the stuff going it was still much more enjoyable than the senseless fighting over in Ultimatum. And I got to give it up Immonen as his artwork continues to grow on me and he kicks some butt with his artwork in this issue. Also I liked the little call back to the Nightmare plotline from issue #70 and #71. It was cool to see how he brought Spider-Man's worst enemies to life and used all the people Hulk killed against him in order to mess with both heroes mentally.

Issue Rating
Story: 7.8/10 - Bendis does the best to give this Ultimatum tie-in much more depth than the event itself though their is little he can do to stretch out the very thin story of Ultimatum.
Art: 8/10 - Immonen does a great job in this issue and his splash pages were awesome.
Overall: 7.9/10 - Overall this was a good issue of Ultimate Spider-Man but still not close to some of the better issue of this series. Still an average issue of Ultimate Spider-Man is better than most of the other titles on the market.

War of Kings: Ascension #2

Creative Team
Writers: Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning
Artist: Wellinton Alves
Inkers: Scott Hanna & Nelson Pereira
Colorist: Guru eFX

Story - Null and Void

Review
Though the last issue showed some promise with the Fraternity of Raptors showing themselves to be villains this issue suffered from focusing on giving the reader insight into Christopher Powell, better known as Darkhawk. I found the stuff dealing with Chris to be a very boring character study and would have preferred to see more of a focus on Talon and the Fraternity of Raptors.Still I am enjoying how DnA are building the Fraternity of Raptors into the antithesis of the Nova Corps and hope that after War of Kings is over that DnA build up a war between the Nova Corps, what's left of the Nova Corps after War of Kings, and the Fraternity of Raptors as it would be awesome to see and give Nova a Sinestro Corps War type event. Also I will be interested to see how DnA tie-in the ending of this issue into War of Kings.

Again the star of this mini-series continues to be Wellinton Alves great artwork. I love how Alves capture all of the cosmic stuff. I hope that Alves gets a more splash pages of action to draw in the last two issues as he wasn't really given any in this issue.

Issue Rating
Story: 5.3/10 - DnA do an good job when the issue did not focus on Chris. To bad most of the issue did focus on him instead of Talon and the Fraternity of Raptors.
Art: 8.4/10 - Alves does a great job with all the cosmic stuff and I would love to seem him back on Nova or tackle an Iron Man book.
Overall: 6.85/10 - This was an average issue and this mini-series still has potential to be a good one. Though I wonder how the ending of this issue will tie-in to the main series.

Legen--wait for it---dary Comic Book Highlight for 4/8/09

Cover of the Week: Daredevil Noir #1

Even though we've seen this cover many times over, especially in Daredevil comics, I like the whole black with a little bit of red to the Daredevil Noir version. And the rain affect on the cover is pretty cool.

Battle for the Cowl #2 Highlights

I present to you Jason "The Mass Murder and Child Shooter" Todd. At this point all that potential growth Jason had coming off his return in Under the Hood has been completely wasted as DC has decided that he should be their version of Punisher.

Talk about identity theft. Jane Doe is certainly one chick you do not want to mess with.

Though Gotham City burning is nothing new still Daniel kicks ass in this scene though I would have preferred if it was Two-Face or Penguin behind Gotham burning not Black Mask.

The beast, or in this case the bat, has been awaken as Dick is finally ready to take his rightful place in the Batfamily as the heir to Bruce's mantle and kick Jason Todd's ass.

I still don't understand why Jason just had a crowbar just laying around in his "batcave." Oh wait, that is suppose to be symbolic of his death at the hands of the Joker. That's clever. NOT!

Maybe Tim will eat a senzu bean to heal that huge wound from having a batrang the size of a football in his sternum. Now that would be a twist.

Dark Reign: Hawkeye #1 Highlight

Norman Osborn has to be the number 1 most incompetent leader there has been. Wait, Luke Cage was the leader of the New Avengers not to long ago. My bad I meant to say Norman is the second most incompetent leader with Luke Cage being the first. My bad!

Shouldn't this be the question that is asked by all reporters in the Marvel Universe in every title Norman appeared in for the first few months.

I know some fans want Iron Man or Captain America to be the ones to take Norman down but how sweet would it be if Hawkeye shot him right in his black heart and walked away saying he is done being the "hero?"

See now there is a signiture that she will never forget. Norman isn't going to be to happy about this.

Green Lantern #39 Highlights

And so the Orange Lanterns are born. To bad for the supposed Guardians of the Orange Corps learned first hand that greed is not something to be controlled. (I know, bad pun. Sorry!)

I like this twist of Hal not leading the Blue Lanterns as a Blue Lantern but a Green Lantern as Hal has the power to power-up the whole Blue Lantern Corps. It should be interesting, especially with how the Guardians treated Hal in this issue, if Hal does join the Blue Lantern's and how he will be able to find the hope to power all their rings.

Philip Tan really turned up the creepiness level as he shows that the Orange Lanterns may be the most out of control of all the Lantern Corps.

Ultimate Wolverine vs. Hulk #4 Highlight

See know this is a Rulk that I like. I wish Ultimate Rulk would go to the 616 Marvel Universe and go Ultimate Hank Pym on 616 Rulk's ass.

War of Kings: Ascension #1 Highlights

I love Talon's powered-up armor. Alves did an awesome job with his look of Talon in this issue.

Though I prefer Talon's power-up armor more I like that Marvel has decided to finally upgrade Darkhawks costume as this new power-up form gives Darkhawk a definite power upgrade to go up against someone like Nova.

Wolverine: Weapon X #1 Highlight

See that is what happens kids when you wake a sleeping bear from his nap.