h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Eh. I'm bored. And I spent a lot more on comics this week than I normally do. What do these two events mean? Affy reviews his comics! Let's begin, shall we?

52, WEEK 18:

Okay, we're 18 weeks down and 34 to go in DC's most ambitious weekly comic series ever. Continuing to chronicle the "Lost Year" between the events of "Infinite Crisis" and "One Year Later", Week 18 brings The Shadowpact (a misfit team of magic superheroes) together with Ralph Dibney (also known as "The Elongated Man.") Dr. Fate's helmet has been rediscovered, and Dibney requests the Shadowpact's help in figuring out who it's supposed to belong to. Meanwhile, (former) Detective Montoya and The Question are still in Khandaq, receiving a medal of honor from Black Adam for preventing an Intergang suicide bomber from killing hundreds. Also meanwhile, Booster Gold's funeral commences, and Skeets is in what passes for mourning.

If you understood all of that, then congratulations! You know the DC comics Universe more than your average person. For the first time since 52 started, I feel like the comic hasn't surpassed my expectations. I received about exactly what I expected. While this isn't a bad thing, it causes a normally wonderful comic to feel more like a checklist. I give it an "A", but that's only when comparing it the standards of other comics. It could've done better. It didn't get a B because I'm always a sucker for seeing The Shadowpact in action.

BIRDS OF PREY #97:

I've been following Black Alice ever since she first showed up in Birds Of Prey (not hard. She's only made about five appearances since then, all of them heavily advertised), and she's more impressive everytime she shows up. As potentially the most powerful magic user in the DC Comics Universe (though probably the most unskilled), it isn't a surprise that they eventually went with a story where she's pressured to join up with a team of heroes and a team of villains, both trying to convince her that the other side doesn't want to help her.

Normally this type of story is pretty predictable. You can catch the warning signs early on to figure out whether or not the young prodigy will turn to good or evil. I had to keep guessing on this one, though, and wasn't expecting the end at all. I rank it as an "A." Easily.

ROBIN #153:

Meh. I don't normally purchase Robin comics, and this is a good example of why. Nearly every major Robin story that I read starts off really good, but then trails off in the second half. I picked up #152 last month because the cover promised some real tension: a showdown between Robin (Tim Drake) and the son of the person who killed his father (Captain Boomerang.) That's the type of tension that can work really, really well. And #152 was a very good set up for the tension. This month, however, I think the writers focussed too much on the action. It was amusing to watch Robin and the Captain Boomerang Jr. (or whatever he's calling himself now) to run through a series of boobytrapped villain hideouts, but beyond a few of the expected "you can trust me not to kill you while we're in a deathtrap" scenes, this was mostly action and very little character development (and dagnabbit, don't promise me a showdown between a character and the son of the person who killed that character's father without giving me some character!) I give it a "C". It's a good, light read if you want to read a comic book for the sake of reading a comic book, but there were better options out there this week if you like that kind of thing.

SONIC THE HEDGEHOG #166:

Marking the 160th issue since I first started buying these comics more than a decade ago (that's right, I started the sonic comic at issue 6. I've been reading 'em a LONG time!), and it marks the occasion by bringing back the "Mobius: 25 Years Later" story. We were left with a cliffhanger over a year ago when we last saw the M25YL story, so I was pretty psyched.

While I liked what I saw, it felt a bit too different for my tastes (the timeline shifted due to the cliffhanger, so the entire world was very different.) One major problem I had with this was the sheer length of time between storylines. I had to do some serious scrambling to remember who should remember what from the previous timeline, and the fact that this was clearly an expository issue to a larger story hurt a few things as well.

But on the plus side: Shadow? Married to SALLY?! AAAAAHHHH! Wow, that just came out of the blue.

I'm giving this a B+. It's much better than Sonic comics have been lately, but I'm still a bit too bitter over the "Robin" issue to trust starting issues to storyarcs.

MYSTERY IN SPACE #1:

....wha?!

I'm a bit weirded out here. I don't know if I can really tell you what happened, beyond the fact that Captain Comet is dead but he's not (that's what I *know*. Who's to say what I don't know?) I'm going to grant this one a "B-" and walk away very slowly. I'll keep reading this. But still: ....wha?!

DETECTIVE COMICS #822:

Woo!

Paul Dini proved himself as a person who "understands" Batman when he was writing for the Animated Series back in the nineties. He certainly hasn't lost his touch now that he's graduated to comic script writing, and he had an earth shattering idea to prove it: "Why don't we make Detective Comics stories about a detective who solves mysteries?" Brilliant, Mr. Dini! I've been suggesting this for years.

It also looks like he may be attempting to get back to the "roots" of Detective Comics by having detectives other than Batman working. Don't get me wrong, it's still very much Batman's comic, but in this issue he was competing with another detective to solve the case.

The name of that detective?

Edward Nigma. The Riddler.

'Nuff said. "A+"

And finally....the special feature:

THE WATCHMEN:

I've finally caught up with the rest of the world and read The Watchmen, often called the greatest graphic novel of all time. Having read it, I'll make the claim that Maus is a superior graphic novel, but The Watchmen is definitely a good read.

What I really liked about this story was that it managed to infuse political themes without being too political about it. I mean, Nixon was in it and he didn't get slammed. You can loose your job for mentioning Nixon and not slamming him these days. He wasn't shown as a good guy, bad guy, genius, idiot, hero, coward, anything. He was just someone who had to make some tough calls.

Beyond that: the characters managed to be suggestive of traditional superhero archetypes without outright being comparable to them. Only "Owlman" has an obvious tie to an A-string character (hint: he dresses like a Bat), but to say he was Batman wouldn't do Owlman or Batman justice.

In the end, I liked it, but I think it's been overhyped. "A-."

And that's the Born-Of-Boredom-Comic-Book-Review. If I'm bored again next week, I may do it again (I doubt it though: next week doesn't look boring.)