Misfit City #1

I strayed from Marvel again! Opting for Boom! Box. Which I’ve never heard of before.

I’m basic. We know this.

There must be something in my water because I am really straying this week. But don’t worry, I’ll be back with Marvel vengeance next week… That would be a good series title.

I decided on this comic book at the spur of the moment. I love the word “misfit” for some reason, and the cover was an all-female cast in a map. So, I was pretty sure it was going to be at least cute.

And I’m not wrong.

On the cover the girls and their dog are on an old school map where X marks the spot. The characters are all very different looking, and as I read the story they have completely different personalities as well as looks/styles.

Two of the girls work at the coffee hut together and their other friend works at the museum.

They’re from a small town called Cannon Cove. Not much happens in Cannon Cove, in fact the greatest thing to ever happen to their town was a cult-classic movie called “The Gloomies.” Sound familiar? I should mention that the girls hate Cannon Cove and they especially hate “The Gloomies” movie because of all the tourists it has brought.

This book is great because it’s basically an adaption of what the writers think would go on in a town the “Goonies” was filmed in, years later. I like that they’re using an all-girl cast because I am a hardcore feminist I decided.

These girls are all very sassy. Wilder is the brains, Dot is the muscle ( I say this because earlier she was fishing but not on a boat, INSIDE of the lake in one of those rain boot jumpsuits), Macy is the trouble-maker cause she wears Ramones tees and Karma is the bubbly, annoying one.

Example: Karma being annoying.

After we are introduced to the girls, we are introduced to the villains. The book doesn’t come right out and say, “and here are the villains” but the woman looks like Cruella De Ville and the guy looks like a thousand year old vampire, and not the sparkly kind. The villains’ rich uncle has died and they are hearing about what they have received from the will. They received a house and a boat, but the one thing they actually wanted was a chest. The chest was donated to the museum Macy works at and where the girls hold their weekly poker game. Luckily these girls are very bad at poker, or at least very unlucky because they lost several times in a row to their dog, Pippin. Losing to a dog at poker forces them to find out what is in that chest, because that is of course more interesting than a poker-playing dog. As we know, all dogs are amazing at poker.

It’s literally all they ever do.

The chest is sort of interesting, but when they close it after they all get bored that’s when the real fun happens. A map pops out of a secret compartment and this map leads to a damn treasure.

Wilder wants to follow the map, but Macy is a wet-blanket despite her “cool-girl” style of dreads and a nose ring. Like, I assumed this girl would be the first to follow a map to some money. But alas, all of Wilder’s friends say no and leave the poker party.

The End!

Just kidding.

What a horrible comic book that would be! Although I’d say there is some lesson of life in there somewhere.

Luckily the story continues. Macy arrives at home and hands some lyrics to a song she’s working on to her bandmate. A short time later her mother gets a phone call that the museum’s alarm is going off. So in this town for this particular museum they clearly don’t believe in hiring a security guard for the museum at night so they have the next best thing and send in a teen-age girl to handle the possible burglary. Might I also add that the mother doesn’t find this strange at all and forces her daughter to go saying “Roger is paying you to do this.”

Okay who is this Roger and why is he being so shady right now?

Anyways, Macy arrives back at the museum to turn off the alarm. After she turns the alarm off she is immediately whacked over the head.

Later, she is being hauled off into an ambulance on a stretcher, but seems fine otherwise. Her, what I can only assume is her brother/bandmate possible love interest? I don’t know they haven’t made it clear yet and Wilder meet her at the ambulance, wondering if she’s okay. It turns out she is okay and also saved the day by writing her song lyrics on the map! Apparently getting hit over the head with a blunt object makes you believe following an old treasure map is a great idea because from there they decide to do it!

YAY!

Wow this story was really cute. I can’t wait to see what is at the end of this treasure map. AND IT BETTER NOT BE A FREAKING LET DOWN. I WANT TO SEE CASH. DIAMONDS. PEARLS. WHATEVER ELSE RICH PEOPLE BE HIDIN IN TREASURE CHESTS. I would also feel the story would have a great ending if it led to the burial site of hundreds of murdered bodies from the same serial killer. BECAUSE THEN they have the perfect sequel.

Tata for now.

Batwoman #1

I finally strayed from Marvel! Someone get me some sort of award straight away.

While I was perusing my local comic book shop, Forbidden Planet NYC FYI, I saw this bad betch in all of her fake red hair glory and I knew she had to be mine!

The cover art looks like a movie poster. Batwoman is falling gracefully from some high up space with blazing hot red hair, red cape and red boots. Below her are the torsos of 4 ambiguous people who are all giving me “the eye.” Batman is also there. They’re like best friends so that makes sense.

This series is lovingly titled “The Many Arms of Death.” I suppose I will find out why. Not sure if Doc Ock is in this. I highly doubt it, therefore I’m completely out of ideas.

Batwoman reveals that she has been doing Batman’s dirty work for him, tracking down the last seller of monster venom on the international black market.

She’s all super spied out with a mic in her ear that connects her to Pennyworth Jr., a younger, hotter female and tech savvy Alfred. Batwoman has found her target, and she’s sure of it now because after sticking a needle in his arm he turned into a monster. Now she’s gotta kick him in the dick to get information out of him.

Pennyworth senses the danger Batwoman is in and deploys Batwoman’s handy dandy motor bike, which helps Batwoman dodge this monster’s fists. She leads him down some streets in a Jurassic-Park style chase scene, but she eventually defeats him and he reverts back to a regular dude.

Now she can finally get some information out of him, except that he gets stabbed in the eye by one of the floating torsos from the cover. The floating torso has a full body and she’s really bad ass looking. She wears her makeup in a super avant-garde way. Tres chic. Anyways they were apparently underground in some cave, I have no idea when this happened. The eye stabbing lady leaps up and out of the cave through a crack in the wall, as you do. Batwoman decides not to follow her out for some reason. Probably because the cape would have gotten caught in the crack?

No worries though because the eye stabber girl left behind one of her daggers so Batwoman’s got a lead. The dagger was made in a tiny beach town called “coryana”where Batwoman almost drowned back in the day but was saved. She was nursed back to health by a strange and likable enough guy named Rafael. When they make it to Coryana he is the first person to greet Batwoman, but unfortunately he’s been stabbed in the back and is just stumbling around the pier. So the dagger girl must be close by. When weird shit starts happening that’s when you know you’re getting close to the truth.

That was an awesome comic. Good job DC. I know DC and Marvel are like the Mary-Kate and Ashley of the comic book world, very similar, but we all favor one over the other. In this case I felt like that although I’m a Mary-Kate stan, I can find room in my heart for an Ashley. ❤

Inhumans #1

When I came across this Inhumans #1 in the comic book shop I couldn’t decide If I wanted to buy it and cover it or not. Then I got to thinking that after reading all of those X-Men comics, I was pretty interested in what the Inhumans were all about, so I bypassed the batwoman I was going to pick up (I went back) and instead (as well) got this comic. The cover is bad-ass and slightly overwhelming. I’ve said before that I like a solo comic book, these superhero group comics and the comics that have too many cross-over arcs stress me out. So picking up this comic book I knew I was getting myself into something deep that I may not be able to pick myself out of. Since…ummm it’s both. And I knew I was getting myself into both cause there’s like 500 inhumans on the cover of this thing. How much time was spent on JUST THIS COVER?! And also, who the heck are these people?!

One thing you should know if you are going to pick up a comic book with characters that have been around for years and you know nothing about them, then it is a good rule of thumb to have your computer out and google up to find out what got these characters in this situation and why they are the way that they are. Having said that, I did not google a gosh darn thing.  SO THIS IS GONNA BE GOOD.

So, based on my own readings and general knowledge…WHAT HAD HAPPEN WUZZ The X-Men went to war with the Inhumans over “Terrigen.” Terrigen gives the Inhumans their powers, but it is toxic to Mutants. So the mutants decided to beat up the Inhumans and after all these battles, The Queen Medusa of the Inhumans destroyed the “Terrigen Cloud” because they lost. The mutants and the Inhumans are going to rebuild this Terrigen together as long as it is controlled and does not affect the mutants. Because Marvel doesn’t want us to forget that the X-Men are the good guys, but they also needed a way to introduce Inhumans back into the mainstream comic book world for a dollar. Wow, what did I consume today? Petty with a side of shade it seems…

So anyways, we begin our story with this hot guy in a towel listening to the news about the Inhumans and mutant war. Apparently he’s an inhuman from another reality, obv, and he knows what Terrigen is and apparently the Inhumans do not. Therefore…I have no idea. But this comic named Inhumans Prime. PRIME! SO IT’S GOTTA BE GOOD.

Some of these inhumans are very alien looking and then some are human-looking. Since all humans look basically alike wouldn’t you think that Aliens would too? I always wondered that. Like when there are “aliens” none of them look at all alike. Some of them have tails, some have tentacles, some have horns. Wouldn’t you all have tails and just be different skin tones and eye colors and varying weights and heights? I DON’T GET IT.

Anyways, Maximus is leading a group of rag-tag rebels around the Grand Canyon. AND THERE ARE NO TOURISTS. UNREALISTIC!

Karnak has shown up to take Maximus and Triton, a merman(???), home. A fight ensues, and Karnak beats Triton to get them home, but Maximus has some Terrigen up his sleeve, which he feeds to the “Terrigen eater” he lovingly, calls “Farty.” This Terrigen eater can become anything he wants after consuming Terrigen so he decides to become this giant alien ox thing with extra arms and a trendy septum piercing.

The fight however, never even has a chance to turn into Farty Ox’s favor because right behind him are a group of inhumans coming to kick his ass.

He takes down, like maybe, two inhumans? And then he just turns back into the old farty man he was before. This dude was a part of Maximus’ squad, so after he gets taken down, Maximus is about ready to fight, but a tiny, angsty teen-psychic teleports over with Lockjaw and cancels his powers out. To which he basically shrugs and then gets sent to jail. So cheeky this guy. I like it.

Later….DRAMAAAA.

Black Bolt, Maximus’ brother, decides to visit Maximus in jail and stare at him menacingly while Maximus brings up everything Black Bolt has ever done wrong. And the most upsetting thing about that is, Black Bolt has this weird tick where if he speaks up for himself he destroys entire populations. WHAT ARE YOU GONNA DO?! Poor Black Bolt just has to take the jabs from his brother and be the “bigger person.” It’s no fun being the bigger person. Comic books make that fact very obvious. Anywhoozle, Maximus decides to whisper a confession into Black Bolt’s ear, and as the reader, we don’t know what it is. But whatever it is seems only to be a minor inconvenience to Black Bolt, as he just sort of walks away from Maximus only mildly angry. It makes me think he burped in his face instead of saying anything of substance when Black Bolt got close to him. You know, brother shit.

Obviously whatever Maximus did or said to Black Bolt was pretty petty because Black Bolt decides to up the pettiness by 10,000 fold and has his wife sentence Maximus to a life sentence in the abyss of space. (Which we know he will break out of, spoiler.)

Queen Medusa also mentions in her speech that after she sends this guy to deep space, she’s going to appoint some girl with Rihanna’s old haircut to lead everyone and no longer be Queen. She’s certainly pulling no power punches while she still has that royal power. Like, “first of all my annoying bro-in-law is getting exiled because I’m over him, and secondly I’m putting this chick in charge while we come up with a proper government, which will take my lifetime, and this girl is mad-loyal to me, so I’m set for life and I’m tired. Bye.”

But she said it more eloquently than that.

So, the inhumans are recovering from the war and it really hit them and they’re changing everything about themselves. FULL RE-BRANDING. Like, Marvel didn’t even try to hide the fact they were re-branding them. But I’m buying, so it’s working. And I might buy their spin-offs too. Probably not the Black Bolt spin-off because I like my heroes to be more talkative and less moody, but I might buy the Royals spin-off that was mentioned in an epilogue of this comic book!

All in all, it was a pretty good read, and if you want to get into something new the Inhumans may just be the next Guardians of the Galaxy. Damn. Disney. I wanna call them sell-outs and be all hipster and moody about liking comics before they were cool, but these stories are good. And good for comic book writers and artists and whatever because they’ve been making me happy for years and THEY DESERVE ALL THE GOOD SHINY RAINBOW THINGS IN LIFE!

Ben Reilly: Scarlet Spider

This is the third comic I’ve picked up in the last few weeks that starts in Las Vegas. I wonder how these heroes aren’t all running into each other. Is Ben Reilly a hero though? Is Nick Fury? Is Elektra? Meh. All of them are pretty seedy, so I guess this is the place where the morphed hero/villain people head to.
Ben Reilly is a clone of a hero, but he’s so tortured that he’s turned into a character all his own. I love Spider-Man. I think that’s why I picked up this Scarlet Spider spin-off. Also, I really, really enjoy Reilly’s outfit choices. A cosplayer’s wet dream. I hope this series lives up to his runway skills.
I’m not really hip to the clones storyline, I did play the running Spider-Man clone game on my phone and it wasted a lot of my life, but I’m still pretty unsure of who Ben Reilly is outside of his origin story.
The picture that they’re painting of him is basically the character of Deadpool having an illusion that he is Spider-Man. The only reason I know he’s not Deadpool is because there are no yellow bubbles. All of the other major identifying points of Deadpool are there. For example; scarred up face, (that’s all I see right now, could be body as well) Imaginary friends who talk to him, and he saved a woman and then forced her to give him $50. Since I’m reading as I write, I’m currently reading in the story that he’s also picked up an old lady to befriend whose name is “June” which is, in Reilly’s words, “close enough.” There’s a merc with a mouth I know who also likes to hang out with old ladies.
If there isn’t a Deadpool spin-off where Wade Wilson attempts to steal the life of Peter Parker, which sounds great, then what we’ve clearly been missing is here in this book.
Immediately after Ben Reilly adopts a new “Aunt June,” a squad of armored and armed goons waltz into the casino and begin to threaten the patrons and demand their money.
That just seems unlikely to me because Casinos have so much surveillance! These robbers clearly didn’t think this one through. And I’m right, they did not because they are quickly foiled by a bald man who, when shot by a crap-load of bullets, is unaffected. Always a good thing to be.
Now, Reilly is intrigued by this guy because of the invincibility-thing he’s got going on, and just before the bald man came to the rescue, Reilly had broken in half the machine gun of one of the goons who threatened his Aunt June. Therefore, the bald man kinda likes Reilly too. This is my sort of meet-cute.
The unnamed Bald man brings Reilly to his boss, whom also owns the casino. She’s also really hot and scary. Her name is Cassandra Mercury and she’s the reason Reilly came to Las Vegas.
It turns out that back when Ben Reilly was going by the name of his former captor, “The Jackal” he got into the pharmaceutical industry and instead of curing his patients he was simply replacing them with healthy clones. Not cool. Very freaky actually. And Mercury was a victim of his crimes. The Jackal took away her daughter and replaced her with a clone.
Naturally, Reilly asks Mercury for help, but ummm the problem with that is, Mercury is still pretty miffed about what he did to her daughter.
And that’s that! You’ll have to check out the next issue if you want to find out if Mercury helps The Scarlet Spider or if she simply blows his brains out!

This was a pretty cool story. It did really feel to me like Deadpool and Spider-Man had a baby. Which is a dream come true, but I’m feeling back and forth about continuing with this series. He is a pretty fun character so far and I do want to see what Peter David is going to bring to the table with him. I feel like this one is going to be quite character-driven and if it’s not that’s a mistake. I really want to get to know Ben Reilly right now after all he’s been through. He seems to still have his humour despite losing his mind. Good combination. Hmm I might have just convinced myself to continue this series…0.o

Nick Fury #1

Mmmkay let’s start with the cover. It’s so pink and pretty! I was immediately attracted to and excited by this trim and simple cover.
Nick Fury is on a solo adventure in the French Riviera for his first mission. He’s headed into a casino to “acquire data” from a chief money-man for Hydra.
He’s given a set of tasks to complete and he uses his handy dandy S.H.I.E.L.D pin to complete these tasks.
So let’s talk about this pin for a sec. It looks like a clock and every time he moves the hands something in this casino fritzes out…Somehow he got his pocket watch to link up to the casino’s gaming machine, the random dog inside the casino, the sprinkler system and the music. It’s a little incredulous but this is a comic book and he is the world’s best spy, so I’m sure he did research beforehand. He’s not going into this mission all willy nilly!
Fury has created an amazing distraction…or distractions all over the casino, but while laying his traps he caught the eye of one bitch you don’t want to mess with.
Fury gets the data he needs and now all he must do is get past Frankie Noble, Agent of Hydra, and her cronies.
The fight heads to the skies. Which is odd because Fury chose a car as his transportation of choice and Noble chose a boat. Spies are so weird. Always spending so much money on these gadgets and gizmos. Makes Batman look like a punk.
Wrong Universe.
Moving on…
Fury has defeated the flying boat by forcing the boat to relive a treacherous Titanic moment. Pause for tears and throwback to Titanic.
There wasn’t room on the door.
He tries to get on but it sinks.
People forget that.
Back to the comic book…
Some hydra agents have survived the crash, including, SURPRISE! Noble. Now this crazy bitch is standing on this rock with Gwenyth Paltrow’s head* in one hand and a gun in the other, waiting for Fury’s car to crash into her face.
But in true hero form, Fury maneuvers his car away from what could have been a fatal death blow.
Until next time…

All in all, it was a fun read. I do want to continue reading even though there isn’t any crazy plot established yet. I believe this series will definitely be entertaining, and honestly my favorite comic book series are the solo adventures. Things like Civil War where everything is linked together just stresses me out. I’ll definitely be picking up #2 when it comes out May 17th.

*It was actually her wig*