What I Bought 12/10/08

One thing I should have mentioned about Black Hats yesterday: The ending is a little iffy, in that it required Capone to respond in a particular way, and I'm not sure the situation he was presented with would have actually generated that response. Something to consider. As to the comics for the week, I considered the Punisher mini, but 4 bucks, man. I know it's coming lineiwde soon enough, but didn't quite feel I could spare the cash now. Maybe I can get the trade. Onward!

Amazing Spider-Girl #27 - Chemical Vat Mayday has suited up to help the other do-gooders try and rescue Peter, who is, yep going to suffer the fate I expected (and which cover solicitations for future months had confirmed). So I guess that's one predicition I got right, which makes me something like 3 for 474 or so. Our Mayday is running around in Arana's body trying to figure out what to do, while Arana is in May's body trying to do. . . something to Black Tarantula. I thought she wanted to kill him, and she certainly seemed to enjoy mocking him, but then she became apologetic fairly quickly, so I'm not sure what she was planning. Did not realize Black Tarantula's eye beams could do the Omega Effect thing and chase their target. He's a better shot than Darkseid is, though.

It's your standard issue of Spider-Girl, though the personal life plotlines have taken a bit of a back seat, what with so much costumed tomfoolery going on. I'm surprised Black Tarantula made a joke about 401Ks, since he'd always struck me as a stoic sort, using more calm, patronizing "compliments" to deride his foes. I did enjoy his response to the guys who brought him Spider-Girl, considering they beat her up. I think we're going to see several fights brought on by confusion in the issues to come, given all the people who are (or were) in bodies they weren't supposed to be in. Which, given the threat that's looming, is only going to make things worse for the good guys. These last few issues are fixing up to be crazy.

Amazing Spider-Man #580 - The Blank robs Aunt May's bank while she's there. Peter is determined to catch him. He's rather clever about it, which is always good. Granted, the Blank isn't a challenging foe, as he's no real threat to Spider-Man, more in the sense he's hard to stop, like a (very)low-grade Juggernaut.

It's a simple, self-contained story. No reference to any of the ongoing stories, like Menace, or the Spider-Tracer Killer, or any of that. Just a guy robbing a bank, and Spidey's gonna stop him. Works for me. I'm not certain we needed an explanation of why the Blank is robbing banks and armored cars, especially since it was mentioned once and not brought up again. It works as a motivation certainly, but so does "He likes money". I quite liked Lee Weeks' art. It feels like a combination of Marcos Martin, Romita Jr., and a little Sal Buscema in places, none of which are a bad thing to remind me of, though JRJR might have been a consequence of the coloring as much as anything.

Booster Gold #15 - Something has gone drastically wrong with the time stream, and it involves a knife that was supposed to stay in its case during the Killer Moth heist mess of a few months ago. Booster, Michelle and Skeets go to fix it and run afoul of Elongated Man, who is skeptical of Booster until he provides proof that they'll both be in the Justice League in the future. Of course, Booster neglects to tell Ralph about what's going to happen to Jean Loring, which, hmm. Also, a rainbow-colored person attempts to make off with the knife, and Booster gets dumped in some No Man's Land. No, not the Bat-event thing from, whenever the hell that was. Trench warfare No Man's Land.

Ha! You all laughed when I said the story Dixon wrote wasn't over, but who is laughing now?! Me, that's who! Hear me laugh! Ha, ha, ha, ha, aw enough of that. Jurgens' first issue as writer/artist was pretty solid. Booster abuses his time-travel privileges, and he and Michelle bicker like I have seen siblings do on TV and in real life, which was amusing. I wonder about Chronal Energy Man. Is he related to the mysterious laughing figure that was in Kord Industries at the end of Johns' run, or is this some dire new threat? The good news is, Booster seems to be growing into the role. He was fairly comfortable with the "I'll go back in time a few minutes to catch the knife theif, you'll see me then when we catch up to you" plan.

Secret Six #4 - The team starts to bicker amongst themselves about the card. Scandal sees Knockout. Deadshot is terribly disinterested in all of it. We meet their sixth member, Junior tracks them down, and a large contingent of villains show up as well. Things look bad for our band of anti-heroes, that sort of thing.

OK, this Bane playing dad to Scandal thing is really starting to disturb me. More than Junior and his actions, which is probably a poor reflection on me. Maybe I'm just trying to figure out what Bane's getting out of the deal. That was a pretty low blow by Catman toward Scandal, though. It was a moot question he psoed anyway. Knockout was a New God so she'll just pop up in a new body somewhere, no worries. I like that Deadshot doesn't give a damn about what the card could mean for him. he's so fatalistic, it would be odd to see him worried about avoiding what might be waiting for him on the other side. I'll be curious to see what Bane's decision is.

Nothing really superb this week, just four solidly entertaining books.