What I Bought 3/5/2025 - Part 1

The comics were supposed to arrive Monday, which would give me the chance to get this review written up for Wednesday before I had to leave town a couple of days for week. The comics did not arrive Monday, so here we are on Friday, kicking off a series of reviews of books from the last two months with the conclusion of a mini-series.

Calavera P.I. #4, by Marco Finnegan (writer/artist/colorist), Jeff Eckleberry (letterer) -  Nice of her to remove his hat. Wouldn't want to get a bullet hole in it.

Maria and Mike figure out that while the adult Mexicans may very well be getting shoved across the border, the cops are rounding up the kids to send them to the creepy scientist and loony bereaved mother. Which means hustling back to Calavera, who is growing some flesh back? Like one of those diagrams of a human meant to show the musculature without skin in the way. Not sure if that's because his time is almost up or because of something Fantasma did to him.

Fantasma and the creepy scientist's plan is to make Calavera keep taking the kids the cops rounded up through the portal until her son possesses one of the bodies. Which seems like an incredibly stupid plan, but Fantasma is too fixated on her grief, and the scientist doesn't care what happens to other people, so there you go.

Either way, they're gonna start with Maria's son. Calavera gets Fantasma to give him a little boost of energy (which makes him look like a skeleton again), which is a distraction for Maria and Mike to make their move. Which promptly fails, but Calavera tackles Fantasma through the doorway. Which is just a cave entrance, it's not glowing or otherworldly, but Finnegan has kept the whole thing looking pretty mundane throughout.

Miguel falls through with them, but Calavera's able to bring him back out before his time runs out. Maria and Mike reunited with their son, the creepy scientist on the loose, all those other kids presumably now without parents. Not exactly the feel-good win of the year.

There's also a flashback to Mike and Calavera serving together in WWI, and Mike later failing to honor his promise to get Calavera a job with the LAPD, because the commissioner won't hire a Mexican. Juan tells Mike to stop calling him Johnny, that his name is Juan. So Calavera stopped trying to play by the white folks rules and just lived as himself. Which explains his work as a private investigator, but I'm not sure how it fits into this specific case. The cops clearly weren't protecting those kids, but Calavera wasn't involved because of them. He was there because Maria asked for his help. Which he provided, so maybe that's the point. He couldn't save Fantasma's son, or her from her grief, but that didn't mean he'd turn his back on someone else who asked.

What I Bought 2/1/2025 - Part 1

I was at my dad's over the weekend, so as usual, we were going to watch some older movies. Pity the DVDs didn't want to cooperate. His copy of Black Moon Rising had a crack in it. The copy of Brass Target I bought him for Christmas - a new copy mind you, still in the plastic wrapping - locked up about halfway through.

Oh well, at least his truck is running again - finally, meaning he has two vehicles old enough to drink to rely on instead of one - and we got the fencing up  in the back yard like he wanted.

Metamorpho: The Element Man #2, by Al Ewing (writer), Steve Lieber (artist), Lee Loughridge (colorist), Ferran Delgado (letterer) - Metamorpho's turned his torso into a glow rod, if you were wondering. Seems like having it actually glow would have sold that a little better.

Sapphire's music career is dwindling because of new singer, Sugar Sweet. Who turns out to be a robot Mad Mod made for Simon Stagg by using AI to combine whatever is trending on social media. Yet Sugar doesn't seem to be spouting a lot of Nazi crap. Strange. It's a dual move by Stagg to both make money and tank his daughter's dreams so she has to run the company some day.

The plan falls apart when Sapphire, in a dual move to get her name of people's lips and make Urania look bad, leaks some security footage of she and Urania arguing earlier in the issue. Unfortunately, this means Mod's algorithm picks up the interest in superheroes and in destroying them, so Sugar becomes a warbot (with a dorky hat, but it's all nostalgia for something we never knew, baby) and tries to kill the Element Team. The attempt fails, thanks to the explosive power of glucose, but when Rex learns the warbot was the result of Stagg's greed and Sapphire's ambition, he decides he's leaving.

On the run, Mad Mod calls Vandal Savage for help hiding out. Which seems random, but I guess it's all to set up Savage and Java being old acquaintances and meeting up next issue. Which I guess makes sense. Why shouldn't the two cave-guys know each other? Though it seems irrelevant if Metamorpho's taken a powder.

Calavera P.I. #3, by Marco Finnegan (writer/artist/colorist), Jeff Eckleberry (letterer) - Shooting religious icons has to be some sort of sin. Or is it exempt under the no graven images rule? Or maybe it's exempt under the, "I'm trying to shoot the skeleton detective, but my aim sucks," rule.

My concerns that everyone was being cavalier about the ticking clock are apparently unnecessary. The clown in the van (as in, a guy dressed as a clown is in the van) is driving away slowly enough for Calavera, Maria and her cop husband Mike to argue in the middle of the street until Maria makes a random car stop and commandeers it for her and the skeleton.

They're smart enough to not just drive right into the trap, but their attempt to sneak in the back through the woods fails. Maria escapes, but apparently shooting a skeleton with a machine gun is more effective than stabbing him. I guess if you shatter enough bones he can't move. Maria returns to her office, but Mike failed to round-up any officers for back-up. Because they're all busy hounding and arresting Mexicans right now. Well, you know, priorities and all. Brutalize and intimidate, that's the motto.

OK, so here's the odd part of the issue. The person behind all this is the woman who killed Calavera. She wears a red dress that seems brighter when she gets less human, and a veil across her face that sometimes makes it look like her face has cracks and fractures running across it. She's not engineered this to bring Calavera back out of guilt. No, she wanted to die and be reunited with her son and he stopped her. But she met a scientist who thought he could give her what she wanted, and he'd accomplish his dream of. . .bridging the divide between the worlds of living and dead. It hasn't worked so far, but having a walking dead man is somehow the missing piece.

So, the whole plan hinged on the notion Calavera could, in fact, rise from the dead for one night? In that case, why have they just been watching and trying to lure him into this trap instead of jumping him the moment he stepped out of his grave? And how is the rich bastard Calavera busted for human trafficking in issue 1 - who turns out to be the clown - involved in this? He wanted revenge badly enough to buy into a cockamamie plan like this? It's all so odd, I'm not sure the final issue can pull this thing together.

What I Bought 12/7/2024 - Part 1

I tried to do the novel writing thing last month. Not officially; I didn't use the NaNoWriMo website even before they said it was fine if people let AI write their novels - what's even the point if you just let a machine do it - but I went into November with the general notion of writing 50K words of fiction, and maybe actually finishing the thing I'd been working on since June of last year.

I barely got to 21,000. Just couldn't get motivated, which has felt like a problem most of the year, really. Oh well.

Calavera P.I. #2, by Marco Finnegan (writer/artist), Jeff Eckleberry (letterer) - If people's torsos are turning into buildings, this might be beyond the skills of even a skeleton detective.

So, Calavera's back, as a skeleton in a fedora and trench coat. And she actually smacks him, yelling at how she mourned him anyway. Like, lady, do you think he's just wearing really nifty make-up right now? A priest shows up to offer some exposition, that the dead can return on this night, but only for one night, whether they finish their business or not.

Calavera gets a quick rundown on what the Great Depression's doing to the city, and especially the Mexican-American population. Scapegoating and forced deportation, mostly. Calavera also finds out she's been producing comics, pulps, and even films about him. Starring a white guy, of course. That's got to be a weird feeling.

Having burned 40% of the issue, and with over 30% of the mini-series already done, Finnegan decides it might be time for Calavera to get to work actually detecting. I'm just not getting the pacing. Why have the priest make explicit Calavera's got one night, then doodle around like this? Where is the urgency, if not from Calavera, who has no connection to the kid other than having been friends with his mom, then from her at least. Push him a little, demand they start asking questions, something.

Calavera does question the first homeless guy he sees on the street where she saw, who the clown gave a matchbook with a meeting place scribbled on it. He goes there, barely gets started doing anything, and two guys attack him, including one who stabs him with a shaving razor. Which has a blunt end, because it's meant for cutting, not stabbing. Am I supposed to assume this goon is a moron, or what? Just draw him with a switchblade or, you know, anything meant for stabbing. It doesn't do any good, and he at least gets the name of whoever wants to meet him, but then the cops show up to deport Mexicans and Calavera runs into Mike the Cop.

And then the clown just, drives by in a van, with the kid locked in the back. That's obviously bait, or maybe this "La Fantasma" figured out this wasn't going to get where she wanted if things kept proceeding at the same pace. I like the concept, but either the execution, or the things Finnegan's focused on, aren't clicking for me.

Batgirl #2, by Tate Brombal (writer), Takeshi Miyazawa (artist), Mike Spicer (colorist), Tom Napolitano (letterer) - It helps break up the black on the mask, I know, but giving her mask big white eyes like that makes it look strange. Like Batgirl's version of the really huge, Erik Larsen-style Spidey-Man eyes.

Batgirl and Shiva escape, but Cass still isn't willing to leave the city. She brings Shiva to a restaurant she apparently frequents and the elderly Vietnamese lady that runs it, stitches up Shiva and convinces her to stop trying to order Cass around if she wants results. It's probably useful for Shiva to observe Cass outside of combat, which is pretty much the only thing they ever do around each other. Get a better understanding of what actually matters to her daughter.

Although we don't get any internal narration from Shiva, she explains the Unburied found that flowers that sprouted from the graves of 100 murdered fellow monks. The flowers grant powers, so other people wanted them, there was a lot of fighting, the monks and the flowers appeared to die, but apparently not.

Before Shiva gets around to explaining a) why the Unburied are back now, and more critically from my perspective, b) why they're after her, the monks catch up. There's another fight, and Miyazawa seems to have Cassandra use Batarangs almost like spiked brass knuckles. There's a couple of times where she's punching guys while she has the 'rangs projecting from between her fingers.

Which isn't a concern for Kalden the Unseen, blind and super-fast and proceeds to kick Cassandra's ass. She can't read his moves, but I can't tell from the faltering internal narration Brombal gives her in the the aftermath if he did something to wreck that ability, or just shook her confidence really badly. Probably the latter, but either way, she and Shiva are riding on the top of a train out of Gotham, and the blind swordsman probably just killed that nice family that gave her soup on a regular basis. But he's sad about it, you guys! He cried when he killed two firefighters earlier!

More seriously, I assume Brombal's planning to contrast Kalden with Cass. Kalden kills, then uses some power to experience the pain and terror he inflicted, but he keeps killing. Cass killed once and was horrified by what she saw in her victim's eyes, to the point she swore against doing it again. How that's going to play out, especially with Shiva, a generally unrepentant killer, in the mix, I don't know.

What I Bought 11/16/2024 - Part 1

The local comic store's orders haven't been showing up, which is why no reviews of new comics recently. However, I went with Alex to a gig in Wisconsin last weekend. Maybe not the smartest idea to do a 1,000 miles of driving in 40 hours, ahead of a week of inspections, but oh well. Among other things, we checked out a comic store, and it had all the books from the last two weeks I wanted.

Which is only three comics, but is still a welcome result.

Batgirl #1, by Tate Brombal (writer), Takeshi Miyazawa (artist), Mike Spicer (colorist), Tom Napolitano (letterer) - It feels like her foot is turned kind of oddly, but Cass is the fighting expert, so I guess there's a reason.

Shiva contacted Batgirl because they're both in danger from a group called The Unburied, but who basically look like The Hand's Blue Division. What the ninjas want, besides (apparently) Cass and Shiva's deaths, is not explained, but they're (apparently) dangerous enough Shiva decides it's better for her and Cass to run than fight.

I keep saying "apparently" because I can't shake the feeling Shiva's not to be trusted. Brombal and Miyazawa use this bit of smaller panels focused on Shiva's face or hand, with one-word captions describing what Cassandra is reading. Except Cass also mentions that her mother knows that skill, and knows how to deceive. And on the last page, when Cass leaps to Shiva's assistance, Miyazawa draws Shiva standing behind Cass wearing what I'd call a smirk. She was in a martial arts stance two panels earlier, but seems to have dropped it once her daughter gets involved. Is that because having someone to fight alongside her changes her approach, or because this is all part of her plan?

It looks as though Brombal's going to focus on Cass and Shiva's relationship. It's comparatively untouched compared to Cass' relationship with David Cain, and most of what we've seen is just them beating the crap out of each other, and temporarily killing each other. Shiva clearly enjoys pushing Cass' buttons, while Cass spends as much of the initial fight attacking Shiva in a way that lets them attack their opponents unexpectedly.

Calavera P.I. #1, by Marco Finnegan (writer/artist), Jeff Eckleberry (letterer) - Can he blow smoke rings with no lips?

In 1925, Juan Calavera is a private investigator who rescues a bunch of girls smuggling into L.A. for some rich white guy, with a little assistance from local reporter Maria Valdez and her trusty flashbulb. Despite the successful conclusion of the case, Calavera doesn't seem happy with the life he leads. So maybe it's fortunate that, later that night, his attempt to keep a grieving mother from killing herself or any innocent bystanders, ends in his death.

After that, Finnegan jumps ahead five years, where Valdez is running some kind of production company, when she gets a call that tells her to 'find the detective.' Oh, and she better hurry, because her son's been abducted by a clown. So she tries a ritual, and Calavera's back among the living. As a trenchcoat-wearing skeleton, which is kind of odd since we don't see him wearing a trenchcoat prior to this. But I guess even nights in L.A. can get cold with no blood or tissue wrapped around your bones.

Finnegan sticks with solid blocks of color on this book, but in duller tones than were used in Morning Star. I like the look of it, and his design on his characters seems more consistent. Doesn't feel like the colors swamp his lines, faces don't end up looking strange sometimes. The brief fight scene is laid out in a simple progression, but Finnegan uses yellow rectangles against a darker background for highlighting a point of emphasis. It's a nice touch, or maybe I'm just more interested in this story than I was Morning Star.

What I Bought 6/28/2024 - Part 1

I had to drive through Illinois over the weekend, always an incredibly boring experience. I forgot that they really want you to know how close you are to road work, but never tell you how far the road work extends. The left lane closes in 3 miles, then 2 miles, then 1, then a half-mile, but nothing about how many miles the left lane is closed, which is what I actually want to know. How long am I stuck at the mercy of the slowest driver?

Blow Away #3, by Zac Thompson (writer), Niccola Izzo (artist), Francesco Segala and Gloria Martinelli (color artists), DC Hopkins (letterer) - Leaving nothing but tracks, shadows, and possibly a dead body or two.

Brynne's fixated on what happened to the mountain climbers. Asking questions, annoying the sheriff, who it feels like Izzo is drawing in the most suspicious ways possible. Face half in shadow, odd smirks or glares. Standing in front of one of Brynne's tables, eyeing a knife while Brynne's back is turned. It's like a blaring siren, to the extent it feels too obvious, though I can't figure the angle, unless it's meant to highlight Brynne's state of mind.

Because Brynne may have handed over copies of all her footage, but she didn't hand over the recorder the climbers had that she found. She's still poring over that, parsing silent looks or the fact Beardo is reading American Psycho, going frame-by-frame through the fight until she determines that when they both went over the side during their fight, one of them either got snagged on something, or was clipped to a safety anchor.

So, even with the sheriff having wanred her of a blizzard, Brynne follows their climb up the mountain (which Izzo does as a 9-panel grid starting in the lower left corner.) She finds some blood frozen on the snow, and a deep crevasse. before she can properly climb in, a rope gets tangled around her foot and she goes in the quick way.

With the one-panel flashbacks we keep getting of some previous project of hers that seems to have blown up, I feel like we're going to learn there was nothing suspicious. But part of that is because we've got basically nothing to go off. Brynne's got some blurry footage from her cameras and a few snippets (at least that's all we've seen) from their camera. None of which points to anything concrete. There's not even a body yet. It's similar to how the sheriff's being illustrated to seem suspicious, while we've got no idea why. The main thing it illustrates now is Brynne has a tendency to draw serious conclusions off little evidence.

All that said, I do at least want to find out what's happening, which is more than I can say for this next book.

Morning Star #3, by David Andry and Tim Daniel (writers), Marco Finnegan (artist), Jason Wordie (colorist), Justin Birch (letterer) - We've gone from gun to ax. Next issue they'll be down to a pointy stick.

Charlie's still missing, but now Marabeth's being chased by a weird version of the park ranger and a bunch of animals that talk in wavy voices balloons with elongated words. Marabeth flees across a river, but finds that weird pile or orange guys her dad and his partner found during the fire in issue 1. 

Meanwhile, Jolene gets briefly menaced by some flaming specter, then a whole bunch of funhouse mirror Charlies appear, also talking in the wavy voice bubbles with elongated words, asking her to help. Help Charlie, help them, help someone else?

This isn't working for me. Maybe the creatures, illusions, constructs, whatever they're meant to be, aren't supposed to be frightening, but it feels like, for how Marabeth flees, and how freaked out it's making Jolene, they should look more terrifying. But Finnegan's art doesn't sell it. The "park ranger", with his face entirely shadowed, and the spots where his glasses would be as white voids almost works. It's at least unsettling, but nothing further.

Maybe these scenes should be taking place at night, maybe it'd be scarier if the colors were darker, I don't know. But the story isn't really helping, either. We know Jolene feels stressed and probably guilty she didn't fight harder to get her husband to stay instead of going to fight this fire, but we still haven't seen much of Marabeth's thoughts, let alone Charlie's (outside the handful of panels in issue 1 that show all these odd things he sees in the world around him.) Does Marabeth resent having to find Charlie, does she envy him, does she worry about losing another member of her family? I feel like any connection or interest I have in the characters is the result of me working really hard to do so, not the result of Andry and Daniel's writing. I don't care much if any of them survive the story, let alone if they figure out what's going on.

What I Bought 5/31/2024 - Part 2

For part 2, we've got the second issues of two series, and I'm writing this on the 2nd. I hope Batman will at least knock on the door rather than crashing through the window.

Blow Away #2, by Zac Thompson (writer), Nicola Izzo (artist), Francesco Segala and Gloria Martinelli (color artists), DC Hopkins (letterer) - It's a quick trip to the bottom of the hill. Quicker if you don't care what condition you make it in.

Brynne finds a camera at the base of the mountain, but it's frozen solid, so she takes copies of her own footage to the nearest village where the sheriff is not on the same page about there being foul play. Brynne finds the locals uninterested in talking with her, minus a pilot who flew the two climbers in a few times, and that they worked with a local hunter. Likely the guy whose traps Brynne messes with.

The camera thaws and the footage reveals one of the climbers was nervous about something, and was recording the trip without his buddy's knowledge. The rest is unknown, but someone went through Brynne's cabin while she was away, the sheriff's looking funny at her (or Brynne's paranoid, I didn't really get the sense the sheriff was thinking of her as a suspect from their conversation), and her boss is on her butt to get those bird photos, which Brynne has decided don't matter.

We get a few more panels about some incident from Brynne's past. It looks like she recorded a man committing suicide, possibly in her office while they were talking. But there's never any dialogue, and it's always just one panel at a time, so it could turn out to be something entirely different. Much like Brynne's attempts to piece things together from the various footage she's found. Some of which has convinced her the climbers switched jackets at some point before reaching the summit.

I can't really tell that from the art, so maybe we're meant to take that as commentary on Brynne's character, that she jumps to conclusions based on insufficient evidence. The way Izzo draws the scene, as small panels of still images from the footage, where the climbers are little more than brightly colored stick figures, it doesn't really look like "Red" barely moved from being shoved, as Brynne sees it, given how far apart the two appear in the panel.

Morning Star #2, by David Andry and Tim Daniel (writers), Marco Finnegan (artist), Jason Wordie (colorist), Justin Birch (letterer) - It's Night of the Giant Children.

The family prepares to scatter the ashes, but the daughter, Marabeth, has some things to work through. Feeling abandoned by a father who willingly jumped out of planes into forest fires, mostly. Her mother tries to explain it, but it's unclear if that helps. And Charlie always seems at a remove. Jo reaches out to draw him into the hug and it looks like he steps back. At least, he's still at arms' length after the hug.

But the ashes get scattered and next morning, Charlie's gone. The ranger isn't answering the phone, so Marabeth goes looking while Jo waits to see if Charlie returns. No sign of Charlie either way, but Marabeth encounters a deer acting a little strangely. Not nearly so strangely as it does once it's out of sight, however.

The conversation that felt most relevant was thee part where Jo and Marabeth discuss which parent each kid is more like. Marabeth think Charlie is the one who takes after their father, while Jo is sure it's Marabeth. I think it says the most about how Marabeth saw her father, and how Jo sees herself. Jo describes Charlie, and herself, as feet in the air, head in the clouds. Charlie hasn't seemed at all connected to reality or the rest of his family up to this point, so I wonder if that's how Marabeth sees her father. Always off chasing some fantasy or dream.

Meanwhile, Jo saw her husband as a solid sort, protective, an anchor, based on how she compliments Marabeth and trusts her to take a rifle and go look for Charlie. But Nathan's the one who accepted a candle from a Romani woman and gave it to Jo, promising that as long as she burned it, he'd always come home to her, which seems pretty "head in the clouds" to me.

As for the weird animal behavior, I don't know. Something's infected them or duplicated them, I assume. What and why, no idea.

What I Bought 3/30/2024 - Part 1

Sometimes when I drive at night, I think about the person who came up with these blindingly bright headlights. Seems like three-quarters of all cars have them now. I think about having that person flogged. Headlights that blind all the other drivers, what a brilliant idea.

Morning Star #1, by David Andry and Tim Daniel (writers), Marco Finnegan (artist), Jason Wordie (colorist), Justin Birch (letterer) - Nothing like a family vacation in nature. The ticks, the humidity, sleeping on rocks, the ticks. . .

The book opens on two wildfire-fighters, trying to escape a blaze that's gone beyond their control. Instead, they find the rest of the guys in their squad, curiously frozen in a pile. Wordie colors them in an orange-hued negative look, and no explanation is given as it happens to at least one of the other two.

A year later, the widow of the guy we didn't see get frozen is preparing to take her two kids and the urn containing her husband's "ashes" to the forest. But first she's getting a lot of static from her mother, via her sister, as they want her to move back to Connecticut. The sister is, however, incredibly bad a diplomacy - calling your niece and nephew "screwed up" to their mom's face is not a winning argument -  so that goes nowhere.

The remainder of the issue is the trio traveling to the forest. Mostly this establishes that Charlie, the younger sibling, spends a lot of time lost in his imagination, or "exploring other dimensions" as he apparently describes it. Wordie uses a lot of off-color or neon blues and greens for when Finnegan draws what Charlie's seeing. And he sees something that looks like his father floating in the air outside the fire tower that first night.

So it feels like the book will focus on Charlie. We see that Jolene (the widow) takes no crap from anyone, and maybe drinks a bit. There's a comment near the end of the issue that makes me wonder, anyway. But she seems to keep a cool head with her kids. Takes Charlie's reluctance to speak in stride, at least.

Marabeth we're not given much on. She isn't complaining about spending time in the woods, seems comfortable in the ballcap/t-shirt/jeans look she's rocking (this is set in the 1950s), and is very concerned at the possibility of being moved cross-country and away from her friends. She only seems mildly annoyed by her brother, if I'm reading the eye roll Finnegan gives her correctly when she comments, 'He's exploring other dimensions. Again.' But there's no name calling or second-hand embarrassment at the behavior.

Jackpot and Black Cat #1, by Celeste Bronfman (writer), Emilio Laiso (artist), Brian Reber (color artist), Ariana Maher (letterer) - What's sparked this sudden burst of generosity by the Black Cat?

Felicia's robbing Chance's flying, invisible casino, and very quickly we're off to a questionable start. Why? Because Bronfman writes Chance as saying the casino's great because, with the patrons being criminals burning their ill-gotten loot, it's all reward, no risk. This is the exact opposite of how Chance operates! This is the character who said "Life is dull at best, made tolerable only by risk." He's a bigger thrill-seeker than the Black Cat! 

OK, fine, whatever. Chance is just a guy getting robbed by Felicia, whose heist is noticed by Jackpot. Felicia explains some app on her phone is threatening her if she doesn't commit crimes. MJ, recognizing Felicia doesn't typically kowtow to threats, follows her (as a little pink energy butterfly similar to how Psylocke's power used to be drawn), and finds out Felicia's got a new girlfriend.

Jackpot has this Paul guy all the Spider-fans seem to hate do some snooping, interrogates the original creator of the app, then has to keep him and her self from being killed by a bunch of weirdos following orders from an app. Which she does by getting essentially Medusa-hair for a superpower. Oh, and now the app is on her phone, threatening to kill Paul if she doesn't commit crimes.

So, this is a sentient program trying to gather resources for some big plan, right? Basically what Ryan North did in Fantastic Four a few months ago, just more ethically compromised? I mean, that was my first thought, when the app is just appearing on people's phones, and it already knows Jackpot's connection to Paul and who Felicia is, and the guy who originally created the app is clueless. The program's running itself.

But, OK, positives. Mary Jane wanting to stick by her friend, even when her friend tries to keep her out. Felicia being suspicious of someone following her, and not pleased when they don't take the hint. Those character bits felt well done. Don't know what happened to Odessa, but Felicia's got a girlfriend besides in flashbacks, that's nice. I feel like Bronfman and Laiso are being more creative with the powers Jackpot gets. Not wildly so, I mean Darkforce portals and prehensile hair aren't reinventing the wheel, but the energy butterfly thing was kind of nifty. If you're going to give Mary Jane an H-Dial, then get friggin' weird with the thing.

(Along that line, I don't like that she can just immediately spin the thing again if she gets a power she doesn't like. Make her find a way to use what she's got, or wait a while. It's too overpowered to just let her spam the thing until she hits the lotto.)

I don't know if either book convinced me to buy issue 2. I can see talking myself into them, but that's not exactly a high bar. They're both definitely me gambling on the things I like being more prevalent in upcoming issues than the things I didn't care about.