What I Bought 2/18/2026 - Part 2

The anime re-watch wrapped up Gundam Wing over the weekend. That was fun, since I hadn't watched it in at least 15 years. I forgot how quickly things would change. Maybe one episode spent letting us think Heero died after self-destructing his Gundam, a half-dozen episodes on Relena trying to run a pacifist nation she only learned she was the inheritor of like 15 episodes earlier. She surrenders to avoid more deaths, an episode later she's a figurehead queen. An episode or two after that, she's running things for real, only to lose that one episode after. Gundam creators got no time for decompression, clearly (consecutive recap episodes in the middle of the series aside.)

It's Jeff! Meets Daredevil, by Kelly Thompson and Gurihiru - Those might be the most pronounced horns I've ever seen on Daredevil.

It's another collection of brief Jeff stories by Thompson and Gurihiru. Contrary to my expectations, they aren't focused on Jeff working with Daredevil. Their interactions are limited to the first comic, appropriately titled "Daredevil did it," where DD knocks over a statue while pursuing some thief (complete with a big sack with a $ symbol on it, so you know they respect tradition.) Jeff was sitting on a bench eating lunch in front of it, so the cop that comes along arrests Jeff.

Fortunately, Gwenpool and Kate Bishop hire Matt Murdock, and Jeff is acquitted, while Daredevil is sentenced to the community service of picking up all those pieces of statue that have just been lying scattered around the park ever since? So if you always wanted to see Daredevil doing in that a reflective vest. . .you'll have to by the comic because I scanned a different image. Hah!

The remainder of the comic is Jeff in his usual hijinks, most of which involve food. Although he does get mad when he keeps losing a fighting game and hurls the TV through the Hulk's kitchen window, which I can both relate to and think is an unwise choice. There are consecutive strips where Gwen is trying to make Jeff take medicine for some skin rash he's got, but Jeff proves extremely capable at not swallowing the pills. Although all that could have been avoided if Gurihiru simply drew a picture of Jeff's stomach, allowing Gwen to slip through the gutters to drop the pills in there.

It's cute fluff, but that's fine with me.

Generation X-23 #1, by Jody Houser (writer), Jacopo Camagni (artist), Erick Arciniega (color artist), Ariana Maher (letterer) - Maybe it's the angle, but Gabby;s lower body looks majorly elongated relative to her upper body.

Laura and Gabby are protecting a random mutant girl from a bigoted mob. Bigoted, idiot mob, given at least one of them shouts, "Just little girls!" at two girls with very long, very sharp claws extending from the backs of their hands. I'm once again amazed every citizen of the Marvel Universe hasn't managed to accidentally kill themselves trying to gargle bleach instead of mouthwash.

In the middle of the fight, something weird starts happening. Something like stained glass pieces appear from thin air, and as they pass through people, they get switched to, I'm not sure. Gabby thinks she smelled a friend of hers from her days as a sex worker, Kiden, who had time manipulation powers. Except seeing Laura at one point as young girl in a frilly dress, while Gabby looked like some Rob Liefeld creation for a second (sleek, elongated helmet with glowing visor) seems like more of an "unlocking alternate realities," power.

But I never read NYX, so maybe this is how the power worked. Laura follows the scent, finds more of the stained glass, plus a machine with the same claw set-up and hair as her. Beyond that, someone who isn't Kiden, who was looking for Laura, because people are dying from experiments involving mutant DNA. The girl speaks in fragmented and cryptic sentences before aging like she drank from the wrong Grail. Laura tracks her scent to a too-normal looking building, she and Gabby break in, there are more of the robots, and then a bunch of teenagers who are very happy to see Laura.

It feels like Laura is going to assume the teens are victims, while I suspect they're the ones conducting the experiments in order to make themselves more powerful. Maybe Gabby will be more suspicious, maybe not. Houser keeps Gabby as very eager and chatty, while Laura looks after her but plays along in trading jabs occasionally. The way the relationship was written felt right, which is a good sign.

Camagni plays into the characters' personalities by having Gabby be very expressive with her body language and facial expressions, where Laura is more reserved. So Laura will study a "too-normal" building, and all we get are narrowed eyes, while Gabby will stand there with one finger tapping at her lip in a "thoughtful" posture. When Laura tracks the girl's scent back to said "too-normal" building, in a page of her riding a motorcycle through the city, Camagni layers on panels showing the girl's progress as Laura's following the trail to its source.