What I Bought 7/31/2014 - Part 2

I'm typing this up Saturday, so greetings to all of you two days in my future. I'm only going to have Internet access sporadically, so I'm typing a bunch of posts up now. I'll have finished 12 posts in a span of about 4 days. So all the Invisible Man and Favorite Character posts for the next few weeks are good to go, plus most of this week is covered. But I'll be more behind schedule responding to comments than usual.

Harley Quinn #8, by Amanda Conner and Jimmy Palmiotti (writer), Chard Hardin (artist), Alex Sinclair (colorist), John J. Hill (letterer) - Hey look, a book from just last week! This is almost current!

Harley pawns the rings she stole from that Russian lady she helped Cyborg kill two issues ago. She also breaks up an attempted robbery, though she uses it as a negotiating ploy to get an extra 60 grand out of Sal. And a Hanzo sword. She gives some of the money to Tony, to complete a device for her, and heads off to her roller derby match. She's doing quite well, as you'd expect, until the opposition send in Bertha, who knocks one of Harley's teeth out. At which point Quinn grabs her mallet, charges back in, and beats Bertha to a pulp. Which gets her booted out of the league, but also get her an invitation to "Skate Club", which I'm not supposed to talk about, but oh well. Back at home, Harley has a picnic for her tenants to unveil what Tony built for her: a computer-guided catapult for getting rid of all the poop from the animals she liberated from the pet hospital. And the rest of the issue is hijinks with that, as Tony has some difficulty getting the targeting right, at one point splattering the hell out of DC's offices as Didio pitches his next big reinvention of the line. Oh, and Harley has another creepy guy watching her through binoculars. First it was Syborg, now this.

Reading this through initially, I was dumbfounded they devoted the last 8 pages of this issue to an extended poop-throwing gag. I don't know why, exactly, it maybe just seemed too absurd. But once I thought about it, I laughed. Why not? It seems a little too noisy for pre-reboot Harley, but for this Harley, sure. It's a quick fix, it required relatively little work on her part, and it gives her the opportunity to make a mess. And she seemed so excited about it, wearing her admiral hat and coat, it's hard not to be infected with her enthusiasm. At least, I hope it was enthusiasm. What are the symptoms of dysentery?

I'm going to guess the guy in the meeting at DC wearing the ball cap with "SD" and "LA" crossed out and sketching was Jim Lee? Maybe, possibly trying to get part of an issue of Superman Unchained finished before the heat death of the universe? Our universe, I mean, not the new 52. I go back and forth on Hardin's art. Sometimes I think he overdoes it one the line work, things get too stiff, and Harley starts to look sort of gaunt, which doesn't seem appropriate under the circumstances. This was one of the better issues, though. Things were a little looser, the expressions had more energy to them. Also - credit for this probably goes to Sinclair - I like that they remembered to keep Harley's eye makeup runny in the diner scene, after she'd been crying in the pawn shop (one of the robbers tried a doozy of a sob story on her). It's just visual continuity, basic stuff, but it would have been easy for them to forget it, and maybe wave it off by saying she cleaned up after.

I'll say this for Palmiotti and Conner: they're keeping Harley's attitude towards animals consistent. She really likes pets, even ones that aren't hers. Just the bit where she drops one of her meatballs in the diner, and is perfectly happy to see the dog belonging to the person in the next booth get it. Again, maybe not a big thing, but it's nice to have a consistent piece of characterization in a book that seems to careen from one plot thread to another with limited connection between them.

She-Hulk #6, by Charles Soule (writer), Ron Wimberley (artist), Clayton Cowles (letterer) - You remember the opening scenes of Pineapple Express? All the different tricks Seth Rogen would use so he could get people to admit who they were so he could serve them? I imagine Jen doesn't have to bother with any of that. If she asks if you are who you are, you admit to it, because you don't want her coming back if she finds out you lied.

Jen's call to Wyatt thankfully cuts out before she can mention the name to him and anything bad can happen. Which gives her the chance to check Patsy's voicemail and realize she got lucky. Meanwhile, back in the Dakotas, Angie was shot in the head, only to be saved by the transference of something from the monkey to her. The file is gone, the courthouse burned down, but Angie recalls what she saw. Back in the office, Jen gets a visit from Kevin Trench (aka Nightwatch), who is trying to find out why he was advised not to speak to Jen. The conversation is interrupted by a lot of demon things that attack the building, all of them calling her name. The demons are defeated, but Jen is gonna have to pay for the damages. However, Jen decides the blue file is too much trouble and brushes off Angie when she shows up to tell what she learned. Good news, Trench passed on her name to a lot of people in the superhero community that could use some legal help, so it looks like Jen will be able to pay for those repairs after all.

Do we get the feeling Trench is up to something? It would be one thing if Jen simply decided the blue file was too much trouble, but the way she brushed off Angie, then seemed surprised when Patsy asked if she hadn't been too harsh, that just screams to me something's up. I mean, it could have been a result of whatever that demon did that locked eyes with her, but there were also those two panels where she was inside Trench's cape. She saw something, or there's something happenin' in there, what it is ain't exactly clear. And now Trench helpfully redirects a lot of casework to her, so she'd be too busy to look into it if she wanted to. And Trench never said who advised him to stay away, Jen merely assumed it was Patsy, and Patsy didn't confirm.

Also, is it relevant the demons used the "BAMF" sound effect when they disappeared? They sure as hell didn't look like the Bamfs that follow Kurt around. We're not going to get some mess with Kurt's father are we? I know Soule's doing some good writing all over the place these days (unless you ask the Superman/Lois fans), but even he can't be so crazy as to think he'd get a good story out of that dumpster fire.

As for Wimberley's art, just no. Can't get into it. Well, that's not entirely true. The way he represented Trench's powers, even if it sort of mimicked Cloak's powers, that was good. Makes him less of the Spawn knockoff he was originally conceived/presented as (unless they've drastically altered Spawn in the 10+ years since I last glanced at one of his comics). But otherwise, the faces tend to look strange, and some of the perspectives he uses are really off-putting.

The Invisible Man 1.19 - Diseased

Plot: We open with Fawkes and Hobbes waiting for a friend of Hobbes'. This friend, Yuri, is going to help them capture a dangerous biological weapons dealer known as The Phone. Fawkes doesn't entirely trust Yuri, who is ex-KGB but now in the Russian Mafia, so he follows him invisibly when Yuri approaches the ice cream truck to make the buy. And there's Arnaud, with thermal vision sunglasses, and a revolver, so Fawkes is off to the races. So is Yuri, for that matter, following Hobbes' orders to run if bullets start flying, leaving Hobbes to deal with the armed henchman. Arnaud chases Fawkes into a dead end, but he used up all his bullets, so Fawkes has got him, right? Nope, Arnaud also brought along a gas grenade and a respirator, so he walks out of the smoke, hops on the truck and rides off, while Darien staggers out, retching and coughing.

There was more than just smoke in there, though, because now Fawkes has the flu. The Keeper comes by with soup, Hobbes drops in spraying disinfectant everywhere, then the Official and Eberts arrive. Amongst all the arguing and temperature taking, Fawkes sneezes Quicksilver. Quickly, to the Agency! Where we find out the gland itself is sick. When Darien tries to go invisible, the Quicksilver turns into some brown, incredibly smelly substance that sticks to his clothes. Well, it's not like going invisible was going to help against Arnaud and his stylish thermal imaging shades. Speaking of Arnaud, he's posing as a chauffeur at the airport to pick up a Dr. Halliday. Once the doc is in the car, Arnaud informs him they really only need his fingers and his eyes. Ominous.

Meanwhile, Hobbes has brought Darien to. . . I'm not sure what it is. There's a Ferris wheel, but also a bunch of small restaurants of various cultures. Hobbes explains all of these are storefronts for the criminal operations of their respective nationalities, and this is a sort of neutral ground. However, none of them have heard of The Phone, or have any interest in biological weapons, which do seem a bit much for mobsters types. More critically, they learn Yuri has been part of the Russian Mafia for over a month, because he owes them a lot of money. About that time, Darien starts Quicksilvering uncontrollably, which with a sick gland means he's nearly encased in an amber-like shell of Sicksilver. The Keep has to cut him out with a bone saw, leaving Darien huddling under a blanket, clearly shaken. She won't even give him a shot of counteragent, because she's not sure what it'll do to him in this state. The Keeper has determined whatever Fawkes has, it's isn't the Helena version of the flu, it's something she doesn't recognize. So she wants to take him to Fort Leavitt, which is a special military hospital for people who know classified stuff, so they don't accidentally leak secrets under sedation or whatever.

It's a good idea in theory, except for two things. One, the Official won't let them explain anything about Darien's condition with regards to the gland, which makes it kind of hard to explain the problem and how it's not a standard version of the fly. Two, one of the doctors on staff was Dr. Halliday, and thus Darien is delivered sedated, directly into Arnaud's hands. But the gland steps up to save Darien's life, as even unconscious, it Quicksilvers a portion of his hair, so Arnaud realizes something is wrong. So he and his assistant scientist abduct Fawkes, leaving the Keep unconscious on the floor. Hobbes had managed to track down Yuri again, after a lengthy chase, but Arnaud's boys showed up to close that leak. Not before Hobbes learned Arnaud sent Yuri to them, to lure Fawkes into his clutches. He gets to Fort Leavitt too late for that information to do any good.

Back at Arnaud's very large hideout, he and his associate are having an argument. The associate claims he can't be blamed because how could he design a virus to not affect something he had never seen? He calls Arnaud a half-scientist, and Arnaud shoots him. Darien wakes up about then, and the two of them have an extended conversation, where Darien questions Arnaud's love of extremely convoluted plans, and claims when he as the chance to kill Arnaud, it'll be real simple. Arnaud dares him to take a shot, so Fawkes punches him in the face, then gets beat up by the goons. So Arnaud has to make Fawkes not sick, so that the gland will be healthy, so he can cut it out of Darien's head, but he shot the guy who might be able to make that happen, so he'll need another assistant. Which requires him to abduct the Keeper out of her apartment, when she and Hobbes stop so she can grab some notes. At least Arnaud said "please".

Back at the hideout, we end up in a test of wills between Arnaud and the Keeper. She wants to know if it's safe to give Darien counteragent, Arnaud wants to know what she's planning to do. As all this is going on, Darien finally goes Quicksilver mad and dispatches the two goons in short order. So much for Valt and Thuggo (only one of those is a name Darien made up). Back in the lab, the Keeper finally explains she's going to piggyback the antibiotic on the counteragent, so Arnaud doesn't need her any longer. Then Fawkes barges in, swats the gun away, and starts to choke him to death with one hand. Claire tries to reason with him, but Fawkes doesn't care if he dies, just so long as Arnaud goes first. Then she bargains with him, suggesting he could destroy Arnaud's stuff instead. At which point Darien turns on her for a moment, but it works. He starts smashing furniture, and Arnaud is sufficiently concerned to tell her where a sample of the original virus is, then escape. Claire cures Fawkes, but there's no useful information to lead them to Arnaud, so Darien is left unfulfilled.

Quote of the Episode: Fawkes - 'Die, cuckoo clock, die!' There are a lot of interesting lines in this episode, but I've known it was going to be that line since I started this series.

The "oh crap" count: 1 (32 overall).

Who's getting quoted this week? Susan Sontag, who said society needs an illness they can identify as evil. Stallone in Cobra, who said crime is a disease, and he was the cure. The Beastie Boys, who said let's get ill. Samuel Johnson, who felt disease began the equality death completes. And Mother Teresa, who said the biggest disease in the world was feeling unwanted.

Times Fawkes Goes Into Quicksilver Madness: 1 (7 overall).

Other: I liked the scene of Hobbes chasing Yuri. Not just because Hobbes stole that kid's scooter after the kid called him a stupid, bald idiot, though that was good. But before that, you can tell Hobbes is running in a calm, measured style, while Yuri's a panicky animal. Looking back over his shoulder, flailing his arms around, constantly trying to speed up. But Hobbes just keeps chugging along, waiting for Yuri to run out of gas.

When Fawkes and Hobbes are at the food court, the mob guy recognizes Darien as having been part of Johnny Castignacci's crew, which is pretty impressive considering that was only true for about 5 minutes (see 1.7, "Liberty and Larceny").

This is also the episode I always remember for the Hobbes/Claire relationship. I usually just remember Hobbes complimenting her on how good she looks in her pants at the end of the episode, and the fact that Claire responds with a slightly shocked "Bobby!". Not angry shocked, though, more surprised that he'd say that in public. There's quite a bit more than that, though. Right before he compliments her, he's trying to explain how worried he was when he came up to check on her and saw her apartment's alarm had been busted. When he gets to Fort Leavitt to report what he learned from Yuri, Claire's still shaking off the effects of the sedative. Hobbes notices immediately something's happened to her, and is worried. And when they get to her apartment, Hobbes expresses impatience and urges her to be quick, which causes Claire to tell him to go on ahead, and she'll catch a cab. It feels like one of those sitcom arguments couples have where the husband is annoyed with how long the wife takes getting ready, which is a little funny since Hobbes hadn't even been into her apartment yet. But hey, it's their first fight. Awwww.

I do wonder, though, where was she going to catch a cab to? They had no idea where Arnaud took Darien.

Really, the main show is Joel Bissonette is back as Arnaud. Whoo! I love Arnaud. He's brilliant, sadistic, charming, clever, a bit of a coward, but with a inner core of steel you do not want to underestimate. Remember, this is a guy who cut open his stomach to try and retrieve a data chip he needed. That the chip was too corroded by his stomach acid is beside the point, what matters is he was willing to do it.

And here he is, back with another ludicrously convoluted plan. Silver Age Superman would be impressed by the contortions he went through. He found a guy who needed money fast, who also knew Hobbes to lure Fawkes in. He found another scientist to design a serious virus that would initially appear to be just the flu. he tracked down a military physician and killed the guy for his fingerprints and retinal scans. Managed to hang around a military hospital until Fawkes is brought in, all so he can perform a surgery in 3 minutes before the next security sweep. That is insane, and I love it.

And I love that when Darien calls him on it, when he suggests Arnaud just sneak up and hit Darien with a bat, Arnaud tries to handwave it with talk of "variable", and "but you could turn invisible". You have sunglasses that enable you to see him! It's like Arnaud is the Riddler, he just can't help himself. You actually see it again with he and Claire in his lab. The virus his now dead associate made is designed to ultimately kill Fawkes, so Arnaud needs her to save Fawkes so Arnaud can harvest the healthy gland. More precisely, he needs her to tell him how she's going to do it so he can kill her, then do it himself. But Claire needs to know if Darien can have counteragent first. All Arnaud has to do is tell her that, but he won't. It's not even that he's trying to get her solution from her, he can't resist gloating about the fact he created counteragent, and Claire is stuck copying his recipe. He mocks her by asking if she was surprised he used an organic base, his sense of self-satisfaction coming through clear as a bell. This a lady he needs help from, and he can't stop pissing her off.

Arnaud is his own worst enemy, because he knows how gifted he is. He knows he's smart, but this makes him think he can always outsmart everyone, and that he can start with a plan that can easily go awry, and it'll be fine because he can easily devise a solution for any problem. He can be very charming, and he's a good liar, so he treats people like crap because he's sure he can get away with it. But this causes him to go through his help pretty fast, and also leads to people really wanting to get payback. Darien would hate Arnaud anyway, for killing Kevin and devising the flaw in the gland that gives the Agency the leash they have on him, but the fact Arnaud enjoys tormenting him so much, that's just the little extra middle finger. It's the guy who cuts in front of you without signaling, and also throws up a piece of gravel that cracks your windshield when he does it.

Ventresca and Bissonette do a good job playing up the animosity between Fawkes and Arnaud. I think half the reason Arnaud enjoys tormenting Darien so, is because he's pissed this ex-con keeps outsmarting him. Darien's the one who saw through his disguise at the I-Man project, who kept him from stealing all the files, who nearly blew Arnaud up, kept him from stealing Kevin's old notes, and Fawkes legitimately wants Arnaud dead, which I think scares The Phone a little. He doesn't want to show fear, so he twists it into hate and sadism. He can't just whack Fawkes with a bat and cut his skull open with a hacksaw, because he has to prove he's smarter first. He has to win his way. Darien just wants Arnaud dead, Arnaud wants Darien to suffer first. It's why Fawkes was willing to die if it meant he'd killed Arnaud first, but Arnaud always has to gloat and waste time having his goons beat Darien's ass after Darien popped him one.

I will agree with Arnaud that shooting people seems like an effective way to win an argument.

Favorite Marvel Characters #4 - Hawkeye

Character: Hawkeye (Clint Barton)

Creators: Don Heck and Stan Lee

First appearance: Tales of Suspense #57

First encounter: West Coast Avengers #6, possibly the same comic that introduced me to the Thing. Which is funny, because the running subplot of the issue is Hawkeye constantly badgering Ben to be the team's 6th member. It's Clint being annoying, and kind of an idiot, because he constantly ignores the fact Firebird really wants to join the "whackos".

Definitive writer: It's hard for me to say, because most writers write Hawkeye well. I have to go with either Kurt Busiek or Fabian Nicieza. I've read Busiek's Barton in Avengers and Thunderbolts (also an issue of Untold Tales of Spider-Man). Nicieza wrote Clint's first attempt at an ongoing, as well as a stint on Thunderbolts. I might lean to Nicieza, since he wrote him more in Thunderbolts.

Definitive artist: This is gonna sound weird, because it's not David Aja, not George Perez, and not even Mark Bagley. Those last two are close, but if we're being honest, that cover by Scott Kolins up there is the image I most often have of Hawkeye. It's perfect for him. He's wearing his costume, he's in mid-air upside-down, he's already put one arrow down the barrel of a stunned crook's gun, and he's got another arrow notched and he's ready to do the same to the guy's partner. Critically, he has a smirk on his face through all of it. He knows exactly how cool he is, and he enjoys the heck out of it. After Kolins, it would be Bagley, though.

Favorite moment or story: It's very tempting to pick him shooting Gyrich in the wrist in Thunderbolts #50, because I hate Gyrich. But come on, like I'm going to pick anything other than Clint saving the entire universe by outwitting the Grandmaster in Avengers Annual  #16 written by Tom Defalco, and this part at least drawn by Bob Hall and I think Tom Palmer. Facing a foe who stole the power of Death herself, and one who has rigged the game completely in his favor, Clint wins by challenging the Elder to a new game. And since fair is fair, Clint rigs his game as well. The sheer fact Clint is willing to bet it all on his ability to recognize a rube when he sees one, someone who won't notice Clint cheating, that's awesome.

What I like about him: He's a guy who, armed with nothing more than trick arrows, took on a millionaire genius in a flying tank, and he did it for love. And his own massive ego. But mostly love. What's not to like?

That does kind of sum up the things I like about him. He'll fight when by all right he's completely outmatched, and be absolutely certain he can win, even if part of what's driving him to fight is his own doubts about whether he can stack up. And most of his actions are driven by emotions. I don't think Clint's dumb (he was smart enough to build his own trick arrows back in the day), but he feels things strongly, and that's what tends to determine what he does, rather than any logical thought process.

This gets him into a fair amount of trouble, because when he gets steamed he'll shoot off his mouth at anyone in the vicinity, whether they're to blame or not. Which could get irritating real fast, but if someone points out to Clint he's wrong, he'll cop to it. It might take awhile, but he will admit it, and do so publicly. When Mockingbird busts his chops about completely ignoring Firebird as a potential addition to the WCA, Clint  admits she's right and suggests they immediately head to Espirita's home to ask her to join. He screws up, but he'll try to make amends. Even if it takes awhile, even if it takes going into Hell itself, which is what he tried to do to save Mockingbird years later. It turned out Hellstrom was tricking him into rescuing Hellcat, but still, Clint went right into Hell for his estranged wife (who Clint estranged by being a dumbass about her letting the Phantom Rider fall to his death, not one of his better moments), and then fought to save the T'Bolts after they had journeyed into Hell to help him. Former super-villains should probably stay out Hell as long as they can, generally, but they fact they did it speaks strongly to how much he'd proven himself genuine in his concern for them.

Being able to admit a mistake helps differentiate Clint from jerks like Batman and Tony Stark, who are theoretically more logical in their thought processes, but in practice have their heads so far up their asses they can't even comprehend the possibility they might be wrong, let alone admit it. I can understand why the Avengers put up with him. He mouths off, but eventually he cools down and apologizes. In the meantime, the eruptions of Mount Barton can liven up those occasionally dull days around the Avengers Mansion.

Which wouldn't count for much if he couldn't carry his weight, but he does. Doesn't matter if they're facing Kang, Ultron, Nefaria, the Wrecking Crew, or an Elder of the Universe, Clint's gonna be up to something, whether he's going for a knockout, trying to keep the big bad distracted while the heavy hitters step up, or coming up with a plan of attack himself. He's not the most powerful Avengers, but neither is Captain America, and he does all right. Sometimes a problem requires skill and precision, not overwhelming force.

Clint's going to be one of the last Avengers to fall back, simply because everyone would expect him to be the first, and he's determined to prove them wrong. More than one foe has dismissed him as the weakest Avenger, and wound up regretting it. Crossfire specifically called him out as the weakest crimefighter in New York, only to have his attempt to kill Clint fall flat because he underestimated the guy. He tried to kill Hawkeye with his own bow, and couldn't even draw it back, the grenade arrow he'd notched fell at his feet and blew him senseless. The Collector called him the weakest Avenger, which was why he didn't mind saving him until the last. But Clint got him on the run so effectively the Collector couldn't rely on his arsenal and had to call on his considerable cosmic might. And if Steve Engelhart's Silver Surfer run is anything to go by, the Elder's have enough power to give Norrin Radd a run for his money, or even trounce him, so Clint pushing the Collector to that level is pretty impressive. Even then, he couldn't stop Hawkeye from freeing all the other Avengers.

The funny thing is, Hawkeye knows where he stands in terms of power. During the Avengers/Defenders War, when Clint threw in with the Defenders, he had to fight Iron Man again for a piece of the Evil Eye. Clint declared himself the weakest Defender (true enough when the other members were the Hulk, Dr. Strange, Valkyrie, Namor, and the Silver Surfer), and Iron Man the 2nd strongest Avenger. But in the same breath, he stated that wouldn't stop him from walking home with the prize. He was right too, because Iron Man forgot what it's like to fight against Hawkeye, rather than with him. He thought if he got in close Hawkeye wouldn't be able to use his bow. So Clint smacked Shellhead over the noggin with an acid arrow. Then Iron Man decided it might be better to keep Clint at a distance, and blast him with repulsor rays so Clint can't aim at him. No big, Clint simply fought through the repulsor ray sufficiently that he could fire a magnet arrow on a trajectory that would enable it to draw Iron Man's arm off-target, making him damage a building and have to deal with that.

Now knowing he isn't the strongest doesn't mean it can't get him into trouble. He thinks people doubt him, which is half the reason he shoots his mouth off. It causes him to do rash things sometimes, like decide he should try to capture the Hulk alone. Or approach the Thunderbolts and tell them he got them a chance at a full pardon if they follow his lead, even though the government turned him down flat. These are rash decisions, ill-advised, almost guaranteed to end horribly. Indeed, the Hulk nearly handed him his head, and the T'Bolts eventually found out he'd been lying, which fractured the team at a critical juncture. Somehow, Hawkeye makes it work out. He doesn't lose hope, he just keeps plugging ahead, and eventually an opportunity presents itself to turn things around. The Defenders show up, mostly to make Hawkeye stop harassing the Hulk, but it also keeps the Hulk from mashing Clint into paste. Clint is able to barter what the Thunderbolts learned about a new weapon the government had to kill superhuman threats into a pardon for his team if they keep quiet, even though it means he has to go to prison to keep Gyrich from spilling the beans.

Heh, the fact Gyrich hates him so much ought to be a reason to like Hawkeye in of itself. Gyrich hates superhumans (especially mutants, but pretty much all superhumans), perceiving them as putting themselves above the rest of humanity. But he hates the guy with no powers, the one who simply trained his butt of to be the best in the world at something, who finds a place alongside those superhumans, even more. Though it probably has more to do with their first meeting starting with Clint thinking Gyrich was an intruder and tying him up.

Also, I don't think Gyrich's a big fan of redemption, and Clint is all about it. Clint was the first of the three former criminals to join what became the Kooky Quartet. He'd made a series of rash decisions that ended badly, and breaking into the Avengers' Mansion and tying up Jarvis ought to have been another. But they heard him out, and he got a chance to prove he could be a hero. Since then, Clint's been big on giving people second chances. The Thunderbolts, obviously. The team of super-villains that posed as heroes, but once that became known, tried to save their necks by being legit heroes. Clint gets in there and helps them be a team and take some real pride in being heroes, even if the public doesn't always trust them. Before that, look at his early West Coast Avengers line-ups. Wonder Man had tried to get away from heroing because he was too afraid of dying. Tigra felt completely out of her league and left the Avengers after two missions. When Stark joined the team (in the original mini-series, Rhodey was in the armor), he had only recently pulled himself out of the bottle and gotten his company back together. Hank Pym eventually joined, and well, you already know what a trainwreck his life had been. Clint brings them in, convinces them they can be Avengers, and slowly but surely, they coalesce into a team, with Clint rallying their spirits even when they get lost in time (and he gets injured because Wonder Man is a dope who forgets not everyone is invulnerable like him).

So let's see, he's a loudmouthed smart aleck (good), who is almost always outmatched in raw power but wins anyway with skill, wits, and sheer guts (nice). He says what's on his mind whether it's a good idea or not (I'm envious), but admits to his mistakes (keeps him from being insufferable), and usually doesn't dwell on them overly long (I don't like mopey Hawkeye any more than I like mopey Nightcrawler). And his costume is purple, which is apparently a color I quite like.

What I Bought 7/31/2014 - Part 1

I had to travel to Cape on Thursday anyway, so why not pick up my comics. Unfortunately, Diamond has been shorting him on various books lately, including both issues of Daredevil that came out this month, so I don't have everything that came out in July. Hopefully by the time I get through the books I do have, I'll have acquired the ones I don't currently have.

Deadpool 31 & 32, by Gerry Duggan & Brian Posehn (writers), John Lucas (artist), Val Staples (colorist), Joe Sabino (letterer) - Deadpool's original sin is that he lied to Preston about passing those engineering courses at ITT Technical Institute.

Preston has found Deadpool's daughter, Eleanor, left in the care of Butler's brother some time ago. The brother is suspicious, and refuses to answer Preston's questions, so she leaves. Then Ultimatum shows up, and Preston reappears, smashing through walls in her robot body, tossing around old school bathtubs like nobody's business and generally turning the Ultimatum guys into red paste. Until a sniper damages her computer brain, but she's able to send a signal to Wade first. So Wade completely ditches Disco Dazzler to go find a ride to Chicago, ultimately getting there after Thor hurls his hammer with Wade attached. Thor's kind of a jerk about, but I guess he takes poor toilet etiqutte really seriously. Which is hard to believe considering he's friends with Volstagg. You can't tell me that guy hasn't wrecked a few loos in his day. Wade gets to Eleanor just in time to rescue her from Ultimatum (after having killed a bunch of their guys and disguising himself as one of them), and to watch Butler's brother die of a heart attack. Wade hustles her into an office building as a way to stall until the help he called earlier arrives. Meanwhile, SHIELD got Preston's LMD body running again and she and Adsit are on the way, and we learn what Adsit saw: Wade burning down a home with his own parents inside. Well then.

Oh, and Shiklah showed up to save Dazzler from the vampires and they're killing vampires together.

Figures that just as I decided to pass on upcoming Deadpool tie-ins to the next big event, on the basis that the current tie-ins to the big event of right now have been lackluster, the creative team ups its game. Or maybe it was just they stopped wasting time with vampires. It's not that I don't like Shiklah, or the idea of Wade hanging out with actual monsters, but this whole thing with Dracula doesn't interest me. Maybe if I read that Dracula's Gauntlet mini-series in the future, that'll help. Currently though, it's just something getting in the way of Deadpool spending time with his daughter. Which can only end badly, but I'm still hoping Wade will get some happy moments. Or I'm a sicko who wants to see Wade suffer loss so that he'll horrifically slaughter a bunch of idiots. I'd prefer to think that wasn't the case, but my enjoyment of the issue where he attacked that carrier and killed all the Ultimatum guys says differently.

I have had my complaints about Lucas' art, but he's quite good at drawing graphic violence. His people tend to react to being hit by bursting like water balloons. I mean, he doesn't skimp on it. Wade breaks some stupid cop's wrist, it isn't sufficient to merely show the hand dangling at a weird angle, the bone has to be protruding. Wade gets shot in the face? Have some teeth flying all over the place! There's also a nice page where Preston went out the window in the tub and it lands upside-down. Then she pops up and launches it into the air. Lucas shows the tub at various stages of its flight in that panel, up and to the right, and as it descends, it comes down on an Ultimatum guy standing in a different, smaller panel right next to where Preston is in the original panel.

After a disappointing couple of issues, Deadpool's back to doing what he does best: Killing idiots in matching outfits.

Too Many Hours On The Road Makes Calvin Something Something

When they get around to Expendables 4 - because I'll believe they'll stop at 3 precisely never - which action stars are left to add? The third one is going to have Harrison Ford, Wesley Snipes, Antonio Banderas, Mel Gibson, after all the ones they've used in the first two movies. I guess they could dig up Charles Bronson and Lee Marvin, just run a current through them periodically to make them move semi-convincingly. Or put some headphones on them, see if Weekend at Bernie's 2 was right about the animating abilities of music.

Or they could go in another direction, and just branch out, get serious dramatic actors, comedians, dancers, whatever. Like the big pie fight scene in Blazing Saddles, but everyone involved is a big name actor or actress. And it lasts for two hours. And they use bullets and knives instead of pies. Or in addition to pies. Whichever.

But definitely have Meryl Streep and Morgan Freeman be the bad guys. You telling me Streep can't befuddle Stallone with some cutting remark, then stab him in the eye? She's Meryl Streep, of course she can! She probably even has a couple of shivs she made out of spare Oscars just for kicks, maybe while she was in a crafting phase. Morgan Freeman lulls a couple of the good guys in with his soothing narrator voice, then BAM! duel-wielding machine guns! He said he liked to play bad guys, because they're the most interesting and generally guaranteed to survive until the end of the film, so let's hook both these fine thespians up with the opportunity to go nuts.

I've Had Metroid Prime On The Brain

The thing I most want to know in the current volume of Captain Marvel is why the toxic planet of Torfa is toxic. It wasn't like that until a couple of centuries ago, but then it became a poisonous world, and that apparently hasn't faded in the time since then. It's also pretty clear that someone - Star-Lord's jerk father no doubt - is using those pirates to cut off the shipments of aid to the refugees there, so that they won't be as inclined (or able) to resist relocation.

My idea is something crash-landed on the planet back then. Not a meteorite that instantly exterminates everything in a flash of heat and concussive force, more gentle. Something that crashed somewhere secluded, then gradually leaked toxic substances into the planet. Something entirely undetectable, which makes it valuable. Think of it, a plague weapon that can't be found. All the aggressive space empires are gonna want that, and Marvel has a lot of aggressive space empires. Can't search for the source with all those pesky refugees around, so relocate them, under the auspice of compassion. Heck, you could even try and relocate them near a potential target, so the eventual sickness could be blamed on the poor refugees.

I'm curious as to what could cause the sickness, and how it can't be found or neutralized. Sounds like some sort of ancient, malevolent presence. Maybe some attempt by Ego the Living Planet to reproduce, or some weapon that's leftover from some long-past empire that had been floating for untold eons. Space is big, and the Kree, Skrulls, and Shi'ar weren't always the top of the heap. Hopefully whatever it is, it's something Carol could track down by a trip through perilous terrain and ultimately engage in a spectacular running battle, with lots of punching and energy blasts. Carol would make a pretty good Samus, even if she can't double-jump or curl into a ball and roll through small spaces.

A Man Called Sledge (1970)

I mentioned in yesterday's post that the characters in The Ratastrophe Catastrophe might actually be fairly smart, if they could get over the personal failings. A Man Called Sledge is all about people making the wrong decisions because of their personal weaknesses. In this case, it's always greed.

James Garner played Sledge, who led a gang of robbers. The film starts with he and just one member of his gang robbing a stage, then reaching a saloon to warm up. While Sledge spends some time with his lady friend, his partner decides to get in on a card game. Normally a bad player, he can't stop winning. . . until the losers shoot him in the back. Sledge staggers drunk down the stairs, and doesn't particularly want to kill anyone, but they press the issue by not allowing him a proper grieving period, and so he kills them both. He also attracts the attention of a weather-beaten old man, who follows him to a town. But the old man isn't interested in Sledge, he's interested in the heavily guarded shipment of $300,000 in gold being brought into the prison there. A prison where he spent 20 years in a cell next to the vault. It seems to have driven him a little mad, and Sledge gets the fever soon enough, growing determined to steal one of those shipments.

To the film's credit, Sledge doesn't pretend this is his retirement score. As Hans Gruber once said, if you steal $100, you can just disappear. If you steal $100 million, they will find you. So Hans said that in the 1980s, Sledge probably lived 100 years earlier, and 300 grand is roughly equivalent, once you adjust for inflation or whatever. Sledge understands that it's going to end ugly for him, he just wants to be able to enjoy the good life for awhile before then. I guess because the idea of faking his death didn't occur to him. Well, we can't all be as smart as Alan Rickman.

The movie really wants to hammer home the greed issue, because once they pull off the heist (with a few casualties), the survivors start playing poker for each others share. One person ends up with all of it, then kills the a guy who tries to shortchange him. Then Sledge, who had stayed out of it, plays cards with that guy and takes everything, then leaves with all of it. Then his former gang kidnaps his lady to draw him in to try and take back the gold, and you can guess how that goes. I guess that's meant to be a greed thing, but it really just comes off as Sledge being kind of a dick with no gift for employee relations. Seriously, you won all the gold, just give each guy back his share, then leave. If they want to start gambling again, or kill each other, fine. Your hands are (relatively) clean, and there's extra time to get away.

Also, the film isn't helped by the fact every time guys start playing cards or whatever, the movie starts in with an annoying song about remembering the danger of greed and coveting other men's gold or something. It's a too on the noise, they use it too often, and oh yeah, it's really irritating. A Man Called Sledge feels like one of those American-made Westerns that was trying to copy the success of the Leone films, but whiffed on it. Contrary to what the filmmakers (or my dad for that matter) think, it isn't about everyone being a bad guy. Clint Eastwood's character in the films always looks like a fairly remorseless killer interested only in money at the start, but the key is he demonstrates there are lines for him, and he can help people even when it isn't in his benefit. Sledge, on the other hand, starts out decrying the death of the stagecoach driver as senseless (he dropped his shotgun as ordered, and it discharged when it hit the ground and killed him), but generally demonstrates that he's mostly just a greedy, vicious ass as the film goes on. And the guys in his gang aren't any better, and there really isn't anyone else.

The Ratastrophe Catastrophe - David Lee Stone

There aren't a lot of options around here if one wants to go book shopping. The Ratastrophe Catastrophe was the best thing I could find in the local thrift store. Turns out it's written more for kids, but what the hey, it was 50 cents. It's set in your sort of typical fantasy land - goblins, dwarves, magic, things like that. Except most everyone is either corrupt, stupid, or both.

A farmboy named Diek is possessed by some remnant of ancient, dark forces, which prove to  make him fairly mesmerizing. Also unsettling, so it isn't long before his father sends him away to a nearby town. Where he learns that the Kingdom of Dullitch has a major rat problem, and is willing to pay handsomely to anyone who can rid them of the pests. Diek uses his flute to lead them out of town and into the river, where they will surely not pollute the water supply and cause dysentery or something. Not that Diek (or the force possessing him) would care if they did, because he gets stiffed. So he abducts the town's children, leaving the politicians to scramble to find some heroes to rescue them, which turn out to be a barbarian, a dwarf, and a former sorcerer having an end-life crisis who only remembers 3 spells.

It's the sort of story where the characters might actually be fairly intelligent, if they could stop falling prey to their worst habits, be they greed, arrogance, cowardice. They can't help themselves though, because that's always the easy way to them, ignoring the possible long-term consequences. So it's an accurate representation of humans, then, slightly exaggerated for comedic effect. Stone adopts a fairly dry tone for the humor, describing the events in a fairly straightforward manner, as if there's nothing unusual about most of it. It works well for me, but others' mileage may vary. It's also the first book in a series of six as far as I can determine, but I'm not sure I liked any of the characters enough to particularly want to follow their further adventures. I suppose if I stumbled across one of the later books for a reasonable price, I'd give it a whirl.

The Invisible Man 1.18 - Frozen In Time

Plot: We start at an open market, as Darien shops for clothes to match his questionable fashion sense, including a leather jacket with tassels. However, Fawkes soon realizes someone is following him and it turns out to be Kate Easton, the creator of the quantum computer in episode 1.8. She's returned from England because some of her associates have gone missing, and another, who she knows only through online conversations as Hit-O-Rama, has gone into hiding. The Agency can't afford a safe house, so she has to stay with Fawkes. There's a very male gaze sequence where Kate stretches the kinks out after her long flight, which causes uncontrollable invisibility in Darien again. Kate unwittingly takes care of that right quick by telling him she's engaged. Well then.

The next day, Darien tries to convince the Keeper to look into whether Kate's story checks out, without telling her what's going on. Eventually he has to tell her, though I'm not clear on why he was be secretive in the first place. Turns out 16 scientists have gone missing, experts in a variety of fields. Darien and Hobbes return to Fawkes' apartment to find La Llorna from 1.15 hauling Kate away. Turns out La Llorna is actually Allianora (we don't learn that until later in-story, but I had the captions on and they listed her name right off). With Kate abducted, the only hope is to find Hit-O-Rama, but the Internet service provider he's been using is not friendly towards the government snooping around. . . until they find these guys are from Fish & Game, pursuing a vile whale meat smuggler. I laughed out loud just typing that.

So they find him, but he wants no part of anybody, and opens up on them with a shotgun. They decide to wait for Allianora to arrive, capture him, then they'll find out where they're taking them. This leads them to a tractor-trailor with a cyrogenic unit inside, because nobody noticed the really obvious package van following them down an otherwise deserted road. Fawkes distracts the guards outside with a beehive he finds nearby. Aaah bees, they're stinging. And Africanized! He does rescue Hito, and captures Allianora with the same drugs she's been using on the scientists. It turns out that while whoever designed these freezing units has devised a way to safely thaw them out, that window only lasts 48 hours, and Kate's been missing 36 hours. And the Official and Hobbes' attempts to interrogate Allianora fail miserably. Darien cuts to the chase by offering to help her escape in exchange for rescuing Kate.

Escape they do, despite Hobbes putting bullet holes in the drywall. Allianora keeps her world and brings Darien to all the cryo-tubes, as her employers are creating what they call a library. And seeing as they've scrambled his GPS tracker, well, things ain't looking good for Fawkes. Oh no, another faceless goon and he's using the drugging thing on Darien! Oh never mind, Fawkes replaced the sedative with water before he left, and he easily escapes the cyro-tube and rescues Kate. Darien takes her to the hospital and calls Hobbes, but by the time he finds the "library", all the other tubes are gone. In the aftermath, Kate and Darien discuss how she and her fiance will go ahead and get new i.d.s, while Hobbes and the Keeper compare notes in the hallway.

Quote of the episode: Allianora - 'Saving books is useless without the minds that create them.'

The "oh crap" count: 5 (31 overall).

Who's getting quoted this week? Henry Kissinger, who noted even paranoid people have enemies. Probably because they, like Kissinger, are assholes. And someone said opinions are made to be changed, because that's how you get at the truth.

Times Fawkes Goes Into Quicksilver Madness: 0 (6 overall).

Other: Not sure I agree with that quote I used. Presumably other smart people would come along who could build on the things they found in the books.

I notice Darien doesn't have the uncontrollable invisibility issue when he makes out with Allianora.

There's a weird conversation between Darien and Hobbes about who Britney Spears was married to at that time, while they were following Hito's abductors. That was odd. Something else that's strange is that Hobbes is perfectly willing to make dirty innuendo about Fawkes and Kate, but is also unable to actually directly mention sex, as he's demonstrated in the past , such as when dealing with his ex-wife. I guess that's something to do with his difficulties with intimacy.

Speaking of intimacy, he and the Keep are moving closer. He was sleeping in the chair in her office when she and Darien came in. Sure, he says it's because there's no couch in the building where he can nap, but we know better. Keep came with him when they rushed the "library", and sure I think she really wants to get into a gunfight, and yeah, they needed someone to safely thaw people out, but you know she can't get enough of Bobby Hobbes.

Oh yeah, one thing about the freezing. How is it going to help preserve knowledge for a post-apocalyptic world, if you can't thaw the geniuses out after 48 hours? Were they going to hope some other geniuses survived who would figure out a proper thawing for people in longterm deep freeze? I have to assume they already have some method for that, but if so, why have the Keeper describe it in those terms to Darien?

In next week's episode, my single favorite line from this entire series.

Favorite DC Characters #4 - Sgt. Rock

Character: Frank Rock aka Sgt. Rock, the Rock of Easy Company

Creators: Robert Kanigher, Joe Kubert

First appearance: Our Army at War #83

First encounter: It could be any one of my dad's old Our Army at War comics. Offhand, I'm going to guess it's either issue 213, 214, or 234. Those are the ones I have the oldest memories of reading through.

Definitive writer: Kanigher and Kubert. Most of my dad's comics are from the period when Kubert took over writing, and Russ Heath drew them, but not all, so I'm going to credit them both.

Definitive artist: JOE KUBERT! Even though Heath drew most of the ones I have, Kubert still did his share, plus the covers, and it's his Rock, a little more worn, a face that's more creased, the whipcord arms, that I think of.

Favorite moment or story: Look, there are a lot of moments of Rock being awesome, beating Nazi's butts and saving the day, but I'm picking Kanigher and Kubert's "Easy's Had It", which was in Our Army at War #203 (I'm not sure if it was a reprint or that was its first appearance). The story is about how all of Easy Company is convinced Rock is this invincible super-soldier and that he's all that keeps Easy going. Rock continually tries to beat it into their heads that no one is indispensable, and everyone is expected to carry on if any of the others fall. Unfortunately, he keeps undercutting his point by saving the entire company with single-handed exploits of awesomeness, as he takes out two Tiger tanks, and later shoots down an Me109. Then Easy Co is sent to take out an entrenched group of Nazis on a hill overlooking a critical road, and Rock gets hit. As Easy Co seemingly has no medic, the guys are convinced Rock is dead (though he's merely stunned). For a moment, all seems lost as his guys carry him down the hill. Then they stop, and set him to, as Bulldozer puts it, 'watch them finish. . . what he started.' Then they start back up that hill as Bulldozer exhorts the guys to show how combat happy they can get. . . for ROCK! It gets a little dusty every time I read that story. 

What I like about him: Well Rock won Toughest Guy in Comics in a 2006 poll conducted on Chris Sims' original Invincible Super-Blog, how can I go wrong with that?

I was not initially a big fan of Sgt. Rock, or any of DC's war comic characters. I wanted superheroes, and my dad had relatively few of those in his collection. And most of what he had was DC, and I wasn't up for Silver Age Superman and the constant stream of tricks he played on his friends. That changed as I got a little older. Part of it was, since the war comics featured characters who were human, they were more in the underdog vein I found I preferred. The Haunted Tank was this little M-3 Stuart that constantly found itself up against German tanks many times larger than it was. The Losers were 4 guys always up against superior numbers (and their own neuroses about being losers). The Unknown Soldier, even with all his skills and tricks, was usually alone in hostile ground, with no hope of back-up if things went wrong.

Then there's Rock. He's tough, but not bullet-proof. He gets wounded, he gets beat up sometimes. He's experienced, but not infallible. The Nazis can still get the drop on him sometimes. He's a good solider, but he's not some specially trained secret agent master of disguise, nor does he know how to fly planes or pilot boats, and he doesn't have the ghost of a Confederate general giving him hints and warnings. The closest thing he has is his "Sergeant's Radar", and that's something he developed by virtue of having fought in the war for awhile. He became a sergeant by, as he puts it in "Battle of the Sergeants", 'just by bein' lucky and lastin' longer than anyone else atop a certain hill I'd rather forget.' Rock might have been a little tougher than your average American citizen who was drafted to fight (by virtue of being a steel mill worker and semi-pro boxer before the war), but at the end of the day, he was mostly a regular guy who had to stay alive long enough to learn how to fight in a war, just like most people.

While Rock is generally a tough, no-nonsense guy, he does have a sense of humor. he's not likely to unleash a gut-bustin' laugh, but he's getting a decent bit of amusement out of Easy's attempt to surprise him with some new duds in the picture up above. Beyond that, he has a solid core of compassion the war hasn't dimmed. Rock looks after the guys in his company, even the ones who cause trouble. When PFC Hogan shows up in issue #214's "Easy Co. . . Where Are You?" and immediately starts in with the sass mouth and questioning Rock's competence, Rock refuse to give in to the urge to whip Hogan's butt. When Hogan gets himself captured (because he thought he could handle everything himself), Rock's determined to save him, and leads the charge on the enemy position to rescue him. When Smitty finds himself too scared to fight, Rock talks to him about how everyone has hang-ups, and the key is to turn them to your advantage. In Rock's case, he cares about his men to the point he nearly gets killed trying to gather the dog tags of the fallen under fire (and we see it in other stories of that time, so this wasn't a one-off thing). But it also manifests itself in the way he doesn't ostracize Smitty for being scared, but instead calmly works with him to conquer his fear, to realize he's part of the group, and while they rely on him, he can also rely on them. That lesson of "Easy Had It" again, that no one person has to win the war themselves, it's everyone's job.

The compassion carries beyond Easy Company, though. Rock's inclination when meeting people not in uniform is to consider them friendly or non-hostile until they give him a reason to think otherwise. In issue #234, when Easy takes part in the invasion of Italy, they make their way into an old pisan's house. He's not out to make any trouble, so when three Tiger tanks rumble up, Rock tells his guys to get ready to hightail, so this family and their home aren't destroyed. As it turns out, the home has a basement, and the pisan encourages Easy to duck down in there with his family, but Rock's first instinct was to draw the war way from these innocent people. A few issues prior to that, Rock was attacked by an enemy soldier in the snow, who turned out the be a 17-year old boy. Rock's exhausted, maybe at the end of his tether, so it haunts him, and ultimately he finds the boy's home to deliver his effects personally to the family. It's not the smartest move, but Rock doesn't want to kill anyone, certainly not a kid, and he felt like he owed it to him. It's one of the key things in DC (and probably also Marvel's) war comics, there's no glorification of the person who loses himself in the opportunity the battlefield presents to kill.

In fact, in issue #233, Rock may have killed one of his own men, Pvt. Johnnie Doe, who was committed to killing anyone he could justify as an enemy. Could be Nazis with their weapons in the air, could be people dressed as farmers carrying guns, Johnnie didn't care, he just shot them. They hadn't said they were resistance fighters, or that they were surrendering, after all. He was just being careful to protect his guys, he might claim, but it's all an excuse. Eventually, he was ready to drop a grenade down the chimney of a house that had enemy soldiers in it, but also a family they were using as shields. Johnnie proclaimed the whole thing a set-up, even as Rock shouts at him not do it, it'll be murder. And then Rock fires in the same panel the grenade explodes, and Rock's left with questions as to whether Johnnie held the grenade too long, or Rock killed him.

Certainly, Frank Rock is a bit of an idealized vision of an American soldier, but I don't think that's a bad thing. He's a citizen solider doing his best to carry out orders, while not spilling any more blood than he can avoid, on either side. He was asked by his country to try and help stem the tide of totalitarianism and help people in other countries be free alongside millions of other people, and that's what he's trying to do. He doesn't take any joy in killing or death, it's just an ugly reality he has to deal with. The goal is to help something better come about, and there have to be people alive afterwards to enjoy that something better for it to mean anything.

October's Shaking Things Up A Little

First things first, Avengers Undercover does end in September. Marvel might want to consider using the same sort of tag DC does in their announcements. "FINAL ISSUE" OR "LAST ISSUE", whichever. Case in point, Hawkeye is projected to ship in October, and it's described as the Final Round between Clint and the tracksuits. It's also listed as the final issue in the fourth trade paperback collection that's popped up in my Amazon recommendations. So maybe it's the last issue. 22 issues in 27 months. 23 if you count the annual. Seems like it's missed more months than that, though it remains to be seen if the book ships when it say it will.

Moving on, there's a few things of relevance. Superior Foes wants us to know it still hasn't been canceled, and neither has anything else I'm buying. Yet. However, as I mentioned earlier this week, I'm skipping the Axis tie-ins for Deadpool.

Deadpool: WHAT?! You're abandoning me?

Only until the Axis tie-ins are over. I'll be back afterwards, assuming the creative team doesn't change.

Deadpool: But Axis is going to change everything, and none of it will ever be the same again!

Yeah, that's why the Red Skull is running around in Onslaught's old clothes. And why the world is being covered in hate. I seem to recall it was being covered in fear just three years ago. Fear Itself ring a bell?

Deadpool: That was totally different. Now the Avengers and the X-Men are going to work together!

Hey, it's great the heroes will actually fight villains instead of each other, but your Original Sin tie-ins haven't convinced me there's going to be anything worth seeing.

Deadpool: Hater.

Scram would you? I think the birders are rifling through your pouches! The only other possible change of note is Ann Nocenti's going to be writing a Klarion series. I have no idea what to expect whatsoever, other than it probably won't resemble Klarion's Valentine's Day team-up with Stephanie Brown. Oh, and it'll probably be canceled in 8 issues. So I'll probably try it. Why not? I know, everybody's all giggly in anticipation over the new direction for Batgirl, and I hope it does well, if only because it might encourage DC to diversify the tone of their line a little more. But, Barbara's still not a Batgirl I'm particularly interested in, so it'll fall to the rest of you to make it a success.

Wolverine's Causing Some Problems For Me

One problem I have with Avengers Undercover is this idea that the kids won't receive any benefit of the doubt for their actions, because they're considered damaged goods. That they were considered unstable after Murderworld, and now they straight up murdered Arcade, and that's it, they don't get to be good guys or make any excuses for their actions.

The problem with this, as he so often is in such matters, is Wolverine. The kids were put through Hell, and when given the opportunity to face their tormentor (who had in no way repented or attempted to make amends for his past actions) they killed him. How is this different from the relationship between Weapon X and Wolverine? They experimented and tortured him, and now he kills people connected to the project whenever he gets the chance, and has done so for quite some time.This isn't taking into account his typical slaughterings of the Hand, the Yakuza, random biker gangs or hate groups, etc., etc.

That Wolverine's done these things isn't the problem. It's that he's done them, and continues to do them, and it doesn't seem to hurt his standing with the rest of the costumed hero set at all that's the issue. If Wolverine can kill people for no greater offense than they stand between him and the guy he really wants to kill, and he can still be headmaster of a school, serve on 3 different X-teams, and be an Avengers, why can't Hazmat, Cammi, and the rest be cut a little slack for cutting Arcade? I'm not saying sign them up for the Avengers - frankly, you could hardly blame any of them if they never wanted to do the hero bit ever again - but they shouldn't be in a situation where they're being thrown into SHIELD lock-up and treated like super-villains.

I think sometimes the worst thing that happened in the Marvel Universe was Wolverine became popular. Say what you will about whether the Punisher fits in the Marvel Universe, at least he's still generally regarded with wariness or outright distrust by the heroes (his odd team-up with Dr. Strange in Original Sin aside). I don't know if Wolverine's reputation was ever that bad, but in the day, Spider-Man and Daredevil fought him as often as they worked with him, and Captain America told Logan the Avengers would never have him. Even the X-Men weren't quite sure of him. Most of the time he was a trusted friend and ally, but every so often, he'd lose his temper, lash out at them with his claws, storm off on his own, disregard somebody's orders. Even they couldn't entirely drop their guards around him. He was a bit of a wild card, because he wasn't as merciful as the other costumed do-gooders. If it had been him on top of the bridge watching Gwen Stacy be knocked off, the Spider-writers in the '90s would have had a heck of a time explaining how Norman Osborn engineered the Clone Saga when he'd been hacked into little bits.

Which might have been a blessing for all of us, as it would have spared us the next 15 years of attempts to make Norman more like the Kingpin or Lex Luthor, but I digress.

The key was despite Logan's penchant for bloody revenge, he still had enough kinder, more noble moments you could understand how the X-Men stuck by him, even if the rest of the heroes kept their distance. He was capable of warmth, bravery, sacrifice, compassion, all those good qualities. He didn't always default to them, but they were there.

The problem is, while those qualities haven't vanished over time, neither has all the killing. If anything, it's getting worse, as he grew overexposed and writers couldn't think of any better stories than to have Wolverine slice up 50 bad guys. No, 100 bad guys. No, 200 bad guys. And the bad guys all have laser chainsaws! Ahem. Until you get to Millar who has Logan setting out to kill everyone in HYDRA, which is apparently over 40,000 people. I don't know if he managed it or not (given HYDRA's continued existence, I'm guessing not), but that's ridiculous. Yet Logan only seems to grow more accepted. He and Spidey have breakfast at Strange's Sanctum Sanctorum. He and Ben Grimm share brews and play cards. Everyone seems to have simply decided that's who Logan is and they'll just ignore that massive pile of bodies behind him. Which makes it kind of strange when they get bent out of shape about some teen heroes killing one guy, or they treat Deadpool like garbage because he kills people for money (but also saves the world sometimes), even though Wade has a legitimate mental illness.

I don't know what the solution is. Wolverine could stop killing people, or at least kill people much less frequently. Him being dead ought to help in that regard, at least until he comes back. Though I wouldn't put it past Logan to continue to kill people after he's dead. Or, go the other way, let him keep killing people, but make this an actual sticking point, where the Avengers aren't so happy to have him around, and making him headmaster of a school is not a good idea. All that ninja-killing has to be cutting into his time and availability to handle the administrative duties of the position in a timely fashion. Let him be a part-time history teacher, or something. Professor Howlett's Tour of Deaths of the 20th Century. The problem there is trying to explain the sudden about-face everyone would have to experience to put Logan back on the "not approved" list.

What I Bought 7/3/2014 - Part 5

All right, last pair of comics for a couple of weeks. One book has a guest penciler, the other one is getting back its usual artist.

She-Hulk #5, by Charles Soule (writer), Ron Wimberly (artist), Rico Renzi (color artist), Clayton Cowles (letterer) - I have never tried that "tape all the pieces of evidence on the wall" thing you see people do. It always looks too messy and disorganized for me. I'd just get distracted by it.

We're into the "let's split up, gang, and look for clues" portion of the investigation. So Jen visits the Shocker, who is both more and less pitiful than he is in the book we'll be discussing further down. But Jen manages to avoid a fight, and the Shocker manages to remember a few things after he zaps himself with his gauntlets. Patsy goes to visit Tigra and they have a pleasant chat until Patsy mentions the name of the guy who brought the case against them. Then Tigra tries to kill her, and herself, though Patsy narrowly averts both those things. Angie's up in North Dakota trying to find the original documents, which she does, but the person at the courthouse is about to shoot her. Which means it's probably a bad thing Jen wraps up the issue calling Wyatt Wingfoot to discuss the case with him.

So we have post-hypnotic implanted suggestions, a mysterious person was up to something and needed two villains with similar shticks to help, and the resultant effort by the heroes to stop it destroyed a town. I have no idea how all that pieces together. I also don't know if it's significant that Wimberly used the same spiral in the eyes thing for the country clerk when he's getting ready to shoot, and for Angie and the monkey when they saw whatever it was they saw in the ruins of that town. Is she (or the monkey) connected to all this?  Is there some sort of illusion cast over the town, and it requires a similar effect to the hypnotic suggestion to see through it?

Can't say I care for Wimberly's art. Everything's too wrinkled, and he draws things so I feel like I'm looking through a fish-eye lens, kind of like Tan Eng Huat does, which is not an effect I'm terribly fond of. He does good work with the sound effects, though. I especially like the SCREEEE when Angie hits the brakes, the way it follows her across the panel. Don't understand why he uses quote marks around them sometimes (like the THMMM when Jen lands on the fire escape. I like Renzi's colors. They're very, "Day-Glo" is the word that comes to mind, and maybe a little unusual, but they evoke the mood well and make sure things stand out. Angie's car against the frozen expanses of North Dakota, or that pink-purple sky over Tigra and Hellcat's heads. It's a good backdrop for their color scheme, and it looks odd enough to put the reader slightly on edge.

Superior Foes of Spider-Man #12, by Nick Spencer (writer), Steve Lieber (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Clayton Cowles (letterer) - Hmm, I get that Wimberly is trying to make their costumes look like they fit as real clothes would, but no. He made the Shocker look even dumber than usual, like it's some common hood trying to pretend to be the Shocker with a custom made ski-mask.

After two issues of stupid time wasting crap, back to the actual storyline. I mean, jeez, did Lieber and Spencer think they were Fraction and Aja, going to stall for time with a bunch of stupid ancillary nonsense? Whatever. Boomerang manages to convince his team that it was really the Chameleon who screwed them over, which wouldn't have worked if the Owl wasn't there backing him up (because Spencer's Owl is about 1/100th as smart as Mark Waid's Owl). And the Owl wants them to help get back his painting from the Chameleon. He even went out and hired a bunch more super-villains for Boomerang to dupe, er I mean lead in an assault. Isn't this a little small-time for Bi-Beast, though? The others, sure, I could see them getting on board (maybe not Shriek), but I kind of thought Bi-Beast was into destroying humanity or taking over the world, stuff like that. Just being cannon fodder here, so I guess it doesn't matter. Boomerang suckers Overdrive into taking a fake of the painting (because Fred's such an expert on art he can detect forgeries now?), and that leaves Boomerang free to loot the safe. The other thread is that Hydro-Man told Hammerhead how Shocker has Silvermane's head, and now Hammerhead's guys are going to storm Hermann's apartment. Hmm, now would be a good time for She-Hulk to show up and ask more questions.

I'm still having a hard time buying Boomerang being smart enough to even come up with a scam like this, let alone keep it together this long. He's a putz. He's always been a putz. He couldn't out-maneuver the Beetle for leadership in the Sinister Syndicate, because he's a dope. Fortunately, everyone else in the book is an even bigger dope. It's like the Futurama episode where the giant brains make everyone except Fry complete idiots. But there are no giant brains to be seen. The book is still funny, but remember how I said a couple of weeks ago that I've grown really impatient waiting for fictional characters to get their comeuppance? I'm kind of itching to see his team kick his butt.

All that (extensive) complaining aside, credit to Spencer and Lieber for making me care about the Shocker. He's a chump, the guy who figures if you say you're a team or a gang, it means something, in spite of all evidence in his life to the contrary. I've always kind of liked the Shocker, because at his core, he's just a thief. He doesn't care about world conquest or bloody revenge. If he never saw Spider-Man again, I'm sure he'd be just fine with that. But he can't help himself being a thief. He either can't, or won't change, and so he's stuck. There's always going to be a hero there to ruin his day. Now he's got to deal with the fact the people in the same boat as him don't even treat him well. I'd really like to see him get a good moment here, just trounce Hammerhead and his guys, but it's probably not going to happen.

OK, that's weird. I was looking back over it, and the Owl says he hired more guys, and that Fred requested 11 more villains, Fred's response being that now they're the Sinister 16. Except with only 4 members (Boomerang, Overdrive, the Beetle, Speed Demon) to start with, that would only be the Sinister 15. But Lieber drew 12 villains, which would make 16. I'm confused. I also notice Speed Demons is nowhere to be seen during the attack on the Chamleon, so either he's got something planned with Fred, or he's hanging back, waiting to pounce when Fred tries his double-cross.

It's interesting how much more subdued Rosenberg's colors are here than on Nightcrawler. It fits; there's not weird magic, super-powered robots, or schools with training rooms that cost billions of dollars. It's a bunch of cheap crooks running around making fools of themselves. It's basic greed and stupidity, just dressed up a little.

Apparently I Don't Trust Anyone In The Marvel U Anymore

A few months back, I was complaining about how, in the pages of Avengers Undercover, Constrictor part of Zemo's little cabal, seemingly get to stand on the same level with what I see as much higher-quality villains. And then I noted that all four of the main villains - Constrictor, Zemo, Madame Masque, Hellstrom - have been heroes or helped heroes in the past. And since then, I haven't been able to shake the feeling that something about the whole situation feels off.

Both sides are trying to run scams, of course. The kids have their plan to go along with the baddies until they can find a way to bring Zemo down and rehabilitate their images. The villains are trying to snooker the kids by presenting being part of the gang as really cool and awesome. And Hellstrom's lying through his teeth when he tells Nico he hasn't done anything to Cullen. We know that's nonsense, because we saw Zemo asking if Hellstrom had Cullen under control at the end of the first issue.

Also, the whole situation with Arcade screamed "Set-Up!" The bad guy's plan to get Cullen his shot at Arcade just so happened to be ready to go right when the others came looking for Cullen. But at the same time, there was no opportunity to check if all the kids were on board with it. Nope, just chuck them into the middle of it. Then, there's how convenient it is that SHIELD just so happens to find Arcade's secret lair - which has presumably been up and running for awhile - right as the kids are trying to bail. This one could be explained as Deathlocket disabled whatever jamming or scrambling devices Murderworld had when she shut down Arcade's powers, but it seems questionable those systems were shut down (even though they're hardly related to Arcade's powers), but not the recording or transmitting equipment that would broadcast Hazmat killing him across the globe. And wasn't it convenient that SHIELD brought along some mages who could block Nico and Cullen's abilities, even though Arcade's never demonstrated mystical abilities? And rescuing them from lock-up makes it look like the kids pulled a jailbreak.

It's pretty obvious the whole thing with Arcade was Zemo's way of boxing them in, so his offer looks that much better, so maybe it's the only option, really. But I can't shake the feeling there's more to it than that. That conversation Zemo had with someone over the phone. The smart money is it's Techno/the Fixer, but what if it's Tony Stark or Hank Pym? I have this feeling the kids are being tested by the Avengers (or SHIELD) as part of some psychological evaluation. What's their decision-making process like, what direction does their moral compass point, how deeply affected are they by their time in Murderworld, how much of a potential threat are they, stuff like that.  It would be really messed up, but a lot of alleged good guys seem to be operating under a vague umbrella of the ends justifying some really awful means, so I could see it.

Now you say, why would these bad guys help with that? Who says they are? Constrictor and Hellstrom have both done the good guy thing before, they could easily be in one of their good phases, or else they're being paid well (or Constrictor could just be a dupe). Zemo and Madame Masque not as much, but by the nature of their outfits, there's no guarantee those are the real Zemo and Masque. We haven't seen their faces, it could be Winter Soldier and the Black Widow for all we know. If Kate Bishop can pretend to be Madame Masque through an auction, I'm pretty sure Natasha could pull it off in her sleep.

Maybe, instead of letting the bad guys infiltrate their peacekeeping organizations, the heroes decided to infiltrate the bad guys, take control, and try to limit the damage. What have we seen the bad guys do so far, besides beat each other up? The kids killed Arcade with an assist from Hellstrom, and a bunch of them attacked an A.I.M. installation. And only Captain America shows up to get involved? With roughly 5 million heroes as part of the Avengers these days? Uh-huh. Sure, the villains could theoretically use AIM stuff to cause all sorts of trouble, but given the structure of the organization they're in, it'll only happen if the top dogs tell them to. And in this scenario I've constructed, that won't happen because the head honchos are really good guys. There was the attack on a SHIELD base at the end of the first issue, but that could be a put-on, just to maintain appearances

I'd say the chance I'm right is 10% or less, that I'm jumping at shadows because the writers these days seem so inclined to have heroes do shitty things and try to justify it somehow. I'm not even sure I'd want to be right, because it would such a lousy trick for the good guys to pull on the kids, but it's an idea I've been mulling over for some time, so there you have it.

What I Bought 7/3/2014 - Part 4

And now the weather is behaving as it normally does in July. Blerg.

Ms. Marvel #5, by G. Willow Wilson (writer), Adrian Alphona (art), Ian Herring (color art), Joe Caramagna (lettering) - I noticed that on the credits page they screwed up and listed this as "Part Four Of Five". Getting so people can't even count to 5 anymore. Ah well, that's a nice cover, though. Quiet, reflective, pretty.

Kamala's initial rescue attempt fails miserably. She gets injured right off the bat, and only narrowly escapes. Then she falls asleep at her kitchen table surrounded by food (she's got to feed that metabolism if she's gonna heal), and gets caught by her mother, who is freaking out. Her dad steps in and calms things down, then turns the emotional thumbscrews. I'm sure it's not (totally) his intent, but I can't help reading those sort of touching parental confession moments as a bit of guilt tripping. I'm sure he's sincere, but it did make Kamala feel bad, so there you go. Anyway, she resolves that she has to be more prepared, so she and Bruno start testing her powers, and he's uses his experimental polymer to make her a stretchy costume. Hey, when you can't afford (or steal) unstable molecules, get super snot. Thus, her next attempt goes very well. She's shrinks down, rides in on one of the little robot things, gets it to zap Doyle, she grabs Vick, and they're out and gone. But Doyle's boss isn't happy, and Doyle's boss is. . . a Terrigen-evolved pigeon? Great, a giant rat with wings. I imagine that's going to produce a dumbfounded reaction when she meets him.

Nice touch by Caramagna altering the font size based on Kamala's size. I especially like the panel where the words get smaller as you go through the sentence because she's shrinking as she's talking. Alphona's still doing an lovely job on the artwork. I don't know if it's intentional, but when the Inventor leaves his message for her at the end of the issue, the way Kamala's holding her mouth mimics the way the mouth was drawn on the large stuffed version of her the Inventor left.  The range of expressions he gives Kamala and Bruno when she's convincing him to help on page 10. She's goes from this frustrated and determined look to being cheerful, to then sort of smugly pleased when Bruno agrees, and the whole time Bruno has this clearly pensive and uncertain look and posture. He really doesn't want to encourage her, but he cares about her, and his brother needs saving, so what can he do?

Three things about the writing. One, how long was the Inventor going to have Doyle watching Vick in that basement? Kamala and Bruno must have needed at least a couple of days to run all those tests on her powers and to make the costume. I guess the Inventor could just be very deliberate in his decision-making, though deliberation isn't a quality I tend to associate with pigeons. Two, I'm hoping Kamala and her mother get to have a reasonable discussion soon. So far, Kamala's only had those with her dad, while mom tends to freak out and start wailing about how her child is going astray. Maybe she's just like that, all histrionics and overreacting, but I hope to see another side soon. The other characters are getting more facets to them. Third, I like that when she manages the rescue, we see very little fighting. because Kamala isn't the sort to enjoy beating people up because she can, and she's there to rescue someone. Once she's got that someone, she's getting the heck out. She wants to help people, not necessarily beat up bad guys if she doesn't have to.

Nightcrawler #3, by Chris Claremont (writer), Todd Nauck (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Cory Petit (letterer) - I wonder sometimes if I'd want a tail like Kurt's. Given all the things he can do with it, it seems handy. But then I'd have to cut holes in the back of all my pants. Plus, it would throw off my posture, probably mess up my back.

So the robot attacks again, and we find out it's called Trimega because it can split into three, each which seems to control a different element. Kurt and his friends from the circus aren't doing so well until Margali steps in and banishes the baddies. Kurt convinces her and Amanda to return to the school with him, where Margali receives a very cold welcome from Storm, and I am missing some backstory here. I have no idea what atrocities Margali's committed, though I can't help wondering if she's killed more people than Wolverine (a thought I have often these days). Kurt's a little peeved and goes to the Danger Room to contemplate the fact that he turned his back on Heaven (and I got to say Kurt, my experience reading GrimJack suggests this was a bad idea). It falls to Logan to bring beer and talk with him about accepting that he made the decision, and needs to make the best of it. Which is good. It's always a little odd those two are such close friends, but they are and Logan would definitely not want to see his buddy so down.

Unfortunately, that's the last good thing that happens because, in order: Amanda drops Rachel like a sack of potatoes, Margali does something awful to Storm and Beast (turns them into photos, extracts one from each, and lets the rest collapse into a pile), and then a whole lot of those Trimegas attack the school. I'm not sure how Margali figures Kurt will continue his new in life in peace after what she just did to his friends. Geez, between her, Mystique, and Maddy Pryor, do any of the X-Men have moms that aren't completely demented? All of them seem to be "I'll slaughter village full of babies for my child", which is just messed up.

Well, I don't have any idea what the robots are up to, but I'm pretty sure this arc is going to end with Claremont putting a his own final end on anything between Amanda and Kurt. It's becoming more and more apparent Amanda's claims that she doesn't know what's happening are a load of garbage, meaning she's lied to Kurt and put his friends in danger. That revelation will go over well, I'm sure.

Rachelle Rosenberg's doing a good job on the colors. Every setting had its own sort of palette, and they remembered that if it was near dusk in Germany, it would be much earlier in the day back in New York. So the skies are going orange at the circus, but it's all bright blue skies back at the school. It's a little thing, but I appreciate that they paid attention to that detail. The rosy pinks of Kurt's recreation of Heaven, versus that metallic blue of the regular Danger Room and the interrogation rooms. The deep purple in the school hallways when the attack begins. It's a nicely ominous color, though I wonder if it's a coincidence that the light coming in through the windows is similar to the color they use for Kurt's teleportation cloud effect.

The Invisible Man 1.17 - Perchance to Dream

Plot: Darien shows up needing a shot of counteragent and notices the Keep looks tired and stressed. He asks her if she'd like to hang out with him and Hobbes sometime, she declines. As she gets ready to give him the shot, her watch goes of and she abruptly leaves. Darien purses her across town and finds her chasing after some guy out for a jog. Then has to tackle her so she doesn't kill the guy, even as Claire insists she has to kill him before he kills her. This despite the fact she has no idea who the guy is.

Back at the office, the Official orders Claire to stay in the building under watch/guard, while Fawkes and Hobbes investigate this Mr. Burton. Except Burton has no idea who Claire is, or why she'd be scared of him, and he's a busy man, with an insistent business partner who just lets himself into Burton's backyard to ask for some papers. That having proved to be a dead end, our boys turn to the FBI and oh god, it's Jones again (see episode 1.3, "Ralph"). Jones will not share info with these "bozos", which gives us Darien and Bobby irritating Jonesy by bantering about whether they've been insulted until he leaves.

So Darien breaks into the FBI's office, and we get a funny exchange where he admits he doesn't know how to use a copy machine. Hobbes manages to talk Darien through the mysteries of the copy machine, and they pull it off with only minor chaos. Going through the files reveals there have been 4 recent murders where the killer and victim were seemingly unconnected, and in case the killer offed themselves after. It's also noted all four killers were going to sleep clinics for sleeping disorders. The guys had better hurry up, because Claire is getting impatient and hurtful, telling Darien outright that her life is in his hands, and she doesn't trust him. Really? Where's all the trust and warm feelings of the last few weeks? Darien and Hobbes have a conversation, where Hobbes suggests they go bowling or play mini-golf since there's no point of breaking into a sleep clinic during the day. Fawkes doesn't seem inclined to go along with this. At any rate, the sneaking about the clinic reveals a guy sending impulses to one of the female patients to stimulate her pleasure centers, which he is waaaaay too into. Not sure about Darien basically threatening the guy with jail and prison rape if he doesn't quit and leave right now, but it's hard for me to feel bad for the technician, little creep that he is.

This does give Darien the idea that someone sent a message to Claire through similar impulses while she was at the clinic, which is not a theory that impresses Claire. She outright says there's another answer, and that Darien and Hobbes aren't smart enough to find it. And then, she mentions the nightmares she's been having, the ones that remind of the time a stranger nearly pulled her into his car as she was walking home from school. So, great, they added a run-in with a child predator to Claire's backstory. Booooooooo. Basically her nightmares were that predator coming after her again, and somehow, she's convinced Burton is that guy, even though she has no idea who Burton is. And then Wil Wheaton enters the picture. He's runs a computer software company, and works on the systems at the clinics. And yep, you guessed, he (and his partner) are using that access to send images to patients to make them serve as assassins. A drone strike, if you will. And having overheard the boys questioning people at one of the clinics, now he's ready to send someone after them.

At the Agency, Claire is in a near panic trying to get out, and has already knocked out her two guards somehow. Darien and Hobbes manage to restrain her, and set Eberts with the task of keeping an eye on her while they chase leads. Except now they're being followed by Wheaton's assassin, a guy on a bicycle. Then Hobbes just has to stop for a coffee, and Bike Guy gets his chance. Darien thwarts it, but can't stop the guy from killing himself. Jones arrives, extremely pissed because he's certain they broke into the FBI's office and stole files, they even saw the van outside. His mood isn't helped with Darien and Hobbes  taking bets on how long it would takes Jones to arrive, or Hobbes claiming he was there because he gets nostalgic for his time with the feds, and that it's like checking in on an ex-girlfriend. At this point, we learn that Burton's partner hired Wheaton to eliminate Burton, because the partner's been embezzling funds. We also learn Wheaton's partner is getting cold feet, but not soon enough, since Darien finally had the brainstorm to check into the people who maintain the clinic's systems. Catching the two nerds is easy enough, but bad news, you can't erase the impulse they've placed in Claire. And then Claire escapes again. Man, those guards are having a bad time of it. Well, you get what you barely pay for, I guess. She purses Burton on another jog, and this time succeeds in killing him and herself, in front of Darien and Bobby no less. But wait, it was all fake, which explains the guards getting dropped twice in one day. Since they couldn't remove the program, they had to let it run its course, so they somehow sent that into her head to accomplish this. Also, Claire doesn't remember any of it, though they are nice enough to explain it during a pleasant walk in the park. Oh, and Claire kisses Bobby on the cheek. That's very sweet.

Quote of the Episode: Hobbes - 'Fawkes, you don't know how to work a copy machine? It's a copy machine. Every American knows how to work a copy machine. You stick the paper in. what are you talking about?' Fawkes - 'Hey, you know, if I needed a copy of something, I just stole it.'

The "oh crap" Count: 2 (26 overall).

Who's getting quoted this week? Homer, who said sleep is the twin of death. Hobbes quotes Metallica as having said ask not for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for you. And then the Beatles, in that we all get by with a little help from our friends.

Times Fawkes Goes Into Quicksilver Madness: 0 (6 overall).

Other: I really enjoy watching Fawkes and Hobbes banter when there's a third party there. Especially Jones, because it bugs him, and he's a jerk, so it's good to annoy him. Also, they're starting to do synchronized handshakes, which is kind of cute. And I like how effectively Hobbes winds up Jones. Jones knows Hobbes' weak points, but the reverse is true, and I like to think Jones' insults are growing less effective because Hobbes is growing happier where he is. Well, happy by Hobbes' standards.

If Wheaton and his partner are just sending images of the target into their victim's brain, how do they find them so unerringly? I could maybe understand if Burton's partner told them he always goes for a jog along a certain route at a certain time, though I don't know how you convey that information in a way that sticks. But how the hell did Bike Guy find Fawkes and Hobbes? All Wheaton knows is a couple of government guys are after him. Don't tell me he managed to successfully tail Hobbes long enough to learn things about him. And how is it Darien turned invisible and knocked their would-be assassin off his bike, but was completely unable to get the gun away from the guy or at least stop him from killing himself? That makes no sense.

I forgot to mention this last week, but Claire telling Darien he's not smart enough to see the real answer jogged my memory. Kind of surprised Darien didn't ask super-intelligent Hobbes for a way to get the gland out of his head safely. Oh well, opportunity lost.

Have to say I'm disappointed in Claire not having more faith in the guys. I get she's scared, convinced this guy is after her, convinced she has to kill him, but I thought there was more trust there. This was like a flashback to episode 1.11, when she and everyone else seemed convinced Darien had beaten the hell out of the Official. Which OK, his body did it, but not Darien himself. Which is another thing. How can Claire be so sure Darien's theory about someone sending impulses into her brain is bunk? Set aside the fact he turned out to be right, and just look at recent history? Last week, Hobbes was infected with a retrovirus that made him the smartest guy on the planet. Before that, they ran into a woman who seems able to become water. Go back before that and you get a situation where Darien's being taken over by the memories of a dead man that are stored inside the invisibility gland. Why is "they sent an urge to kill someone to you through electrical signal while you slept" where the line has to be drawn? Is it just because it's happening to her that makes it difficult to accept?

This is a strange episode in general. The plot feels a little weak, Burton's got someone trying to kill him, but that's barely touched on. The killers only appear halfway through, there's not much to them. The story just seems to meander. There's a lot of joking, a lot of banter, from the stuff with Hobbes and Jones, to Hobbes wanting to go bowling, to the copy machine, to the Official and Eberts musing whether Hobbes might actually be more of an expert on mental issues than the doctors. But then you have the creepy tech who's basically sexually assaulting that lady by sending her impulses without consent, and then the writers dumped Claire's childhood encounter with a predator right in the middle of the episode like a giant turd. It bugs me, because it comes out of nowhere, we've never seen any indication of how it has affected Claire prior to this, and it doesn't come up again. It's just the particular trigger the writers decided Claire needed so she'd be scared enough she could be driven to kill Burton. It's just kind of a plot device here, so Fawkes can feel bad, and I don't know, make Claire seem vulnerable, which didn't seem necessary to me. The Keep's been pretty rock solid up to this point, her sorrow when she thought Hobbes died a notable exception. We've seen her happy, amused, angry quite a bit, worried, but she's still professional, while also having been allowed to show more compassion as the season progresses. But I don't know that we've seen fear so far.

 The episode just has a very uneven tone, where everyone's joking, then BAM! here's a lady being violated in some way. Pause for moment of somber reflection (or dude getting angry), then more joking.