What I Bought 12/1/2015 - Part 4

I tried to go to a comic book store I found out was not too far from here over the weekend. Just to look around. Its sign said it opened at 11:30. I hung around until 12:15, nobody showed up. There was a phone number, but what, I have to call the owner to get them to show up when their sign says they're supposed to be there? No.

Starfire #6, by Amanda Conner and Jimmy Palmiotti (writers), Emanuela Lupacchino (penciler), Ray McCarthy (inker), Hi-Fi (colorist), Tom Napolitano (letterer) - Bit of a change from the earlier covers.

We learn a little more about Sol's lost love, Maria, who worked in the Coast Guard like him. That happens in some dream flashback, while Kori's busy saving him from Dr. Soren, nearly killing the doc in the process. It seems important that, when Kori saw more of the doctor's memories, she still didn't see him killing the entire crew of the cruise liner. As still more bad news, that bounty hunter arrived on Earth, and starts hurting and killing people while demanding they bring him Kori. She shows up - advantage of living on a relatively small island - and beats the guy's butt. Then she throws him back in his cryopod, and sets his ship to drift in deep space, where I'm sure he'll remain for the rest of his days. And since the issue started with a lost love, here's Dick Grayson, who must have had a stopover on a flight.

I had kind of expected the bounty hunter to be more of a problem than that. Which is the sort of thing I remember being an issue when I was buying Harley Quinn. How Conner and Palmiotti seemed to flit from one story to the next, without anything seeming to stick or have real impact. I expect that plotline will come up again. The Citadel will find him and send him back, or her sister will send someone else to find her, but nothing sticks. They could be going for this sort of madcap, whirlwind feel, where stuff just keeps happening, but the characters don't seem to be reacting to it, outside of Stella's brief freakout last issue. Which ends up making it hard for me to care.

Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #2, by Ryan North (writer), Erica Henderson (artist), Matt Digges, David Robbins, and Chip Zdarsky (trading card artists), Rico Renzi (color artist), Clayton Cowles (letterer) - I think Dr. Doom always improves covers. Sometimes you need a guy with a metal mask to spice things up, and nobody likes Iron Man.

Doreen is mysteriously transported back to the 1960s, which has caused everyone except Nancy to forget about her. Which is making it hard for Nancy to get any help rescuing Doreen, once she finds the note Doreen cleverly left her. Fortunately, Dr. Doom arrives, wearing Kraven's pants as a fringe on his cloak? I don't know what it is, but he definitely has something made of fur with black spots on, so you tell me. Our hero, meanwhile, has already met one other person stranded, and has embarked on a plan to try to find any others, through the power of newspapers! But it appears someone else is trying to alter the future, which is not good, I guess? I mean, Hank McCoy's already fouled things up pretty well, not sure someone introducing the Ipod will make much of a difference.

I kind of hate the sliding timescale sometimes. My first thought when Doreen starts explaining to that robber that superhumans do exist and Captain America isn't dead was that of course they do. Then I remembered Peter Parker wouldn't have been Spider-Man since the '60s in the Marvel Universe anymore. Kind of knocked me out of the story. Otherwise, I enjoyed this. Mary and Doreen commiserating over the lack of microwave pizzas (a problem that would certainly terrify me), and being called "cupcake" all the time (a problem I don't think I'd encounter). I don't share Doreen's enthusiasm for the fashions of the era, but I could probably have shortened that to, "I don't share Doreen's enthusiasm," and left it at that. I'm rarely an enthusiastic guy. Except about this comic! And some of the others I buy.

I really liked the nine-panel grid of Doreen's quest for money to place an ad. Henderson altered her style in a way to make it feel appropriately old-timey somehow. Maybe it was just the stern, mustachioed face of the newspaper advertiser, but it felt a little, Tintin-ish, is the best comp I can come up with. I also enjoy that Tippy is extremely concerned about potentially altering the future, while Doreen pretty much blows it off.

And "Mr. Fantastic" is a much dumber name than "Deathlok", if for no other reason than I'm pretty sure none of the Deathloks named themselves that, while Reed absolutely felt like fluffing his ego a little more was the way to go.