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Ringquest Update and the Weekend Haul (Weekend of 11/9/2019)

Hard to believe it’s been 10 years now since Blackest Night was going strong, and DC gave away a bunch of plastic rings as promotional items with tie-i issues of the event. And then a few months later they did a couple additional rings. If you search "Ring Quest" in this blog, you’ll find some entries from back then; and here’s one that shows most of the rings 9 1/2 years ago.

Well, after all this time, we have ANOTHER ring!

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With the launch of the 2019 umpteenth-iteration of Legion of Super-Heroes, we get a new, updated ring; with a slightly more angular design on the logo, making it look a BIT more sleek and "newer" than the one we had before.

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Here’s the old one. It really DOES look a bit clunkier than the new one.

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And here they are side-by-side. I like the gold coloring of the older one a bit better…it has a bit more "sparkle" in my eyes; while the new one is a bit "shinier" but also very cool. These put me in mind of a lot of logo redesigns I’ve seen where the bulk of the logo is kept, but stuff is angled slightly to be more angular than blocky.

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And here are all the "recent" (2009 to present) plastic promo rings that I’m aware of existing; at the least, they’re the ones that I myself own, as laid out here for this very photo!

These are by far my favorite promotional items. As fun as some of the various pins and buttons can be as collectible objects…these things are just a whole other level of awesome!

Long after I’ve forgotten which specific comic most of them came with, I remember the general time and obviously still have the physical rings, even a decade later!

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A weekend visit with actually having TIME to BROWSE at Comic Heaven, I wound up buying a set of these Comico issues. It’s a set of 8, and only s3…somewhere between 25 cents and 50 cents an issue. And the first two volumes of Edge. These are from Crossgen when they had two "anthology titles" that collected 4 of their ongoing/monthly books into these monthly tpb collections. I really do wish other/current publishers would do something like this. I’d probably pretty happily pay $10 or so (mayyyyyyyybe even $15ish) for something like this with at least 4 issues’ contents.

And the Previews Gift Guide Holiday 2019.

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On Sunday I went to Carol and John’s where I snagged the Legion of Super-Heroes #1 (with the plastic ring!). I also got the Black Hammer 3 for $1 issue. 3 issues’ content for only $1…hard to beat that these days!

Then at Half-Price Books I snagged the Heavy Metal-published Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: A Quarter Century Celebration paperback from 2009. And using a 50%-off coupon, got Gambit: The Complete Collection vol. 1.

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They also had two of the Walking Dead hardcovers on sale for $3 apiece–these are the Jay Bonansinga novels from a few years back.

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Backtracking a bit–on Friday, lured in by a coupon for 40% off a single item, I visited a Half-Price Book in Mayfield Heights, Ohio…where I was pleasantly-ish surprised to find a significant collection of Mechwarrior: Dark Age novels.

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A couple months ago, I visited 7 Half-Price Books stores in 2 days, and one of my "goals in that was looking for Mechwarrior/Battletech books. Unfortunately, I’d only found a mere 2 that were worth getting.

But this shelf of books yielded 9 times that. 18 books in the series. Of course, my coupon–the reason I was there–was only good toward ONE item. So I saved a whopping $1.20.

BUT I added 18 books to my library, which takes me from missing more than two dozen to missing maybe a half-dozen in having the entire series. MUCH more manageable!

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Also finally snagged the X-Men promo trading cards from the "free stuff" counter at Carol and John’s. Missed these when I’d picked up X-Men #1 a few weeks back, and then where I’d seen them elsewhere, they’d still been "you have to buy X-Men #1 to get them." Having been a few weeks, now I have a set. Unfortunately, it’s after I’ve elected NOT to dive into the revamped X-line.

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Seven cards in the packet–one card each showing the cover of each first issue in the first "wave" of titles. On the back it lists the primary characters in the title; and the Krakoan language "key" is double-sided. This sure would have been VERY handy during HoX/PoX, but whatever.

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The Weekly Haul: Weeks of October 2 and October 9, 2019

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Well, let’s try to NOT get a full month or more behind as several times earlier this year already! Alllllllmost two weeks behind, but c’est la vie. That’s one of the things, I guess, about having one’s own blog and not making any money from it or such–far more freedom of schedule and such!

Several quick, random shout-outs to start things off!

Sadly, far too many great bloggers out there to shout out without being an entire post. But all of the Super-Blog Team Up folks are fantastic and always worth following and reading!


Week of October 2, 2019

The first week of October brought what really is a small-er-ish week, though it felt a lot bigger!

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New Batman, new Young Justice, and the last House of X (really "just" chapter 11 of the 12-part HoX/PoX foundation-laying world-building whatever for the relaunching X-Men family of titles).

The 2nd issue of the 2-issue Legion of Super-Heroes: Millennium; the final issue of Batman/TMNT III round out the truly "new" stuff.

We then have the facsimile/replica edition of Batman #251, the Dollar Comics (DC‘s version of Marvel‘s True Believers reprint line) edition of the 1970s’ The Joker #1 (apt timing, obviously intentional, for the new film Joker).

And speaking of Marvel‘s True Believers stuff, two of those, reprinting the first appearances of Bishop as ell as Kitty Pryde and Emma Frost. The Bishop issue in particular is more of a 25-cent book to me…but I’m willing to pay the $1 for the True Believers in general, and definitely want to support the reprints, as I get more out of them than most new stuff the publisher puts out the last few years.

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…And the week’s Comic Shop News stands alone by virtue of the way I do photos for these posts. Since I’ve taken to including it each week, didn’t want to be overly lazy and leave it out.   


Week of October 9, 2019

And then for the most recent week…we lead with multiple $4.99 comics! Which is rather disgusting in its own way. Also a reminder of how absolutely shameful Marvel has gotten with its numbering!

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While a local comic shop (as of this past weekend) has a copy of the original Amazing Fantasy #15 (for only $8,000!)…I am quite happy enough with this $3.99 facsimile edition of the issue. Then we have the final issue of Powers of X, which is also the overall finale to Hickman‘s HoX/PoX saga. And then Spawn #301. #300 a few weeks ago was a big deal for the huge number, matching Cerebus as a creator-owned title reaching such a number, and so on…but now with #301, Spawn exceeds that record (it’s even earned McFarlane a Guiness World Record…a record which I was glad to see the creator acknowledge would never have been reached without all the other people who have also worked on/with the title over the 27 years!). That the series launched after the artists left Marvel which at the time had a 30+ year history of their then-titles, but is now 250 issues beyond any numbers Marvel is publishing 27 years later?

IDW gets the next couple of slots for the reprint series of the Image TMNT series as well as what may (now) be the 2nd-highest-numbered comic series of its obvious category in GI Joe: A Real American Hero. The fact that they’ve successfully published some 112+ issues picking up from #155 some 15+ years earlier totally blows the notion that only low numbers sell! We have another $1 True Believers issue from Marvel, this one reprinting the first appearance of Pyro, I guess? More importantly, it reprints the key Uncanny X-Men for only $1. Even with this edition, I would happily pay $3.99 or so for a replica/facsimile edition of the issue!

Then we have new issues of Superman, Supergirl, and Detective Comics, all of which I feel like I’m woefully behind on reading. And if rumours are to be believed for stuff DC may have coming up, it makes me feel all the more like these have a short lifespan ahead in my buying.

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Finally, we have the latest issue of Event Leviathan, which I’ve been getting–continuing to get–on the notion (now vain!) that I’d catch up on Action Comics and Superman and this title itself and not want to have to THEN chase down issues or such. At this point, 5 of 6 issues in and not having read any, I’d have been far better off just waiting FOR a collected volume! Ugh.

And this week’s Comic Shop News features Vampirella; with the very sorta cover that makes me feel dirty at seeking the title out at all, ever. That the title’s publisher insists on umpteen covers per issue makes it extremely inconsistent to even find issues and though I’d bought the first issue, I’ve missed subsequent issues for either not recognizing a cover, or seeing multiple covers and just not feeling arsed enough to decipher which would be the "A" cover vs. C or E or whatever umpteenth cover.

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The Weekly Haul: Week of September 18, 2019

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This week’s new comics wound up being relatively small, quantity-wise, but expensive (again) individually!

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The new Batman issue; seems these are on an irregular schedule. And the newest Superman and Supergirl, where it’s been barely a couple weeks since the previous issues, after the recall and reissue of both series’ previous issues.

The latest House of X, #5…so I believe there are "only" 3 more weeks of this Hickman prologue of stuff.

I didn’t even realize the Daredevil facsimile/replica edition was going to be out, so that was a pleasant surprise!

And then Spider-Man (vol. what?) #1 ("of 5"?). The (infamous?) J.J. Abrams & Son project. Fair bit of speculator buzz about it and discussion because of a "twist" to stuff in the issue. $4.99 (AGAIN–like House of X and the Darededevil issue) so it was a "grudging" sort of purchase. If it’s gonna have a lotta hype, introduce another new character, and so on…since I’ve NOT been keen on the "regular" Spider-Man stuff since One More Day (and that was what? 13 years ago, now?) I’m a bit more interested in stuff like what I "hear" this is supposed to be.

Finally, the new IDW GI Joe series. Yet another reboot/relaunch/whatever. I’ve lost track, honestly–is this the third iteration? Or the fourth?–since the license went to IDW. Buuuut with it NOT being part of some "forced" "shared universe" thing, I figured I’d check it out. And conveniently, a copy was in with my pulls, perhaps because of GI Joe: A Real American Hero. We’ll see if I go for a #2, but another that at least gets a first issue to impress me!

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And then the weekly Comic Shop News here, along with a supplemental Fall Preview.

The Raven preview/ashcan/whatever it is caught my eye. It’s thicker and has a MUCH better "look" to it than a lotta such things. Again–it caught my eye. I wasn’t sure if I actually cared for a copy, but flipped into it and decided yeah, I’ll check it out. And maybe I’ll go back for the full volume or such.

Time will tell.

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The Weekly Haul – Week of June 28, 2017 (part one)

This is an interesting ‘week’ for me for comics. I mis-timed a couple things, and had weekend plans for multiple weekends crossed-up, so (to make a long story short) I have stuff to pick up this weekend, but still managed to find stuff for Wednesday!

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I don’t know what it is about this A.D. After Death book that so fascinates me! Maybe it’s the format, that it’s like a hybrid of comics, prose, and story-book all in one. The price doesn’t hurt much, either…when each issue would’ve been probably $9.99 if not $12.99 or $14.99 from Marvel, and a book this large and thick would easily be a $49.99 (at minimum) book from Marvel. But it’s half that price, from Image.

Again keying off pricing…the Nights of Dominion volume grabbed my attention visually, but as I picked it up and saw it was Oni and not Image, I started to put it right back–I was not gonna be paying $19.99 for an unknown book like this! But I confirmed the price…which to my surprise was half that, at only $9.99…a $10 vol. 1, a la Image. So I grabbed it.

Then there was the bargain-priced X-Men: Phoenix Rising volume. $4.50. Hardly more than a single-issue from contemporary Marvel…and cheaper than most Marvel #1s these days, or one-shots or annuals from either Marvel or DC. I’d’ve sworn I had the book, but a look at my inventory did not show it present, so even if it somehow is a duplicate…I can live with it for that price!

And finally, Violent Love vol. 1…saw a stack of these by the register, a flash/one-day sale…$5. Same logic as above…for "only" $5, yeah, I’ll try it! Don’t know when I’ll actually get around to it and reading it, but it’ll fit into the Image vol. 1s library and be something to read randomly at some point!

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I’d semi-forgotten about a couple of Amazon pre-orders, and about the time I was thinking I "should" go in and cancel them, I had an email saying stuff had shipped. So for roughly 50% off, I have possession of the oversized 30th Anniversary Predator volume. This is a massive hardcover, much like the two Aliens volumes and the Prometheus/Predator/Aliens/AvP collection from a couple years back.

Size-wise, the Predator volume puts Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes to absolute shame. Far larger, looks like a similar issue-count, but the two are the same price.

Not knowing when I’ll get around to actually reading it, I’m actually quite disappointed with the "package" of the Superboy volume. It’s just a standard-trim hardcover of about 9 issues…old ones, at that. NOT a good "value" in my eyes, for its $50 cover price!

I also do not like the generic text "logo"…maybe it fits the image used, better, but that skinny/non-blocky/non-bombastic text is far too "modern" as a "logo" for comics of this period.

With DC cancelling a bunch of stuff either before release or after a first volume is out for what should be a series, I’ve half a mind to return this volume. I’m collecting Superman stuff, but not so much on Superboy or the Legion…and this is not a deluxe, oversized hardcover nor anything special/deserving of a hardcover offhand like this…better to be out in paperback and slash the price!

We’ll see, I guess…

Next week I’ll likely show off stuff I pick up this weekend if I get down to Kenmore as planned…and I missed this week’s X-Men Series I cards post. C’est la vie!

The Weekly Haul – Week of June 14, 2017

Another Wednesday’s come around…and a couple new books I’ve been looking forward to…as well as yet another week (over a YEAR now!) in which there’s a Superman comic I’m interested in "by default"…!

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I get tired of the far over-used kneel before Zod! schtick…but it works for this cover…or at least, it did when I first saw the image when the issue was solicited a couple months back. Seeing it now, I’d forgotten about it…but it works, AND it fits the story (Revenge).

I’m actually curious about this Dark Days thing, and since it’s DC and they’ve earned back plenty of my ‘loyalty’ I’m willing to let them have the occasional $4.99 special issues that truly DO seem…y’know…SPECIAL. Since I have a copy on hold, my "convenience/immediacy tax" edition is one of the variants just so I don’t have multiple copies of the same cover (SINCE variants are all-pervasive and I can’t simply will them outta existence). I would have liked the Superman & Batman cover…but I still can’t stand Kubert‘s art when it comes to Superman in particular.

The homage nature of the Legion of Super-Heroes/Bugs Bunny issue really "sold" it for me…and I love the look of these various DC/Looney Tunes crossovers, so why not? They actually ARE special things, so I’ll bite the higher cost, at least as long as the cover’s attractive and properly "sells" the issue (and I don’t get stuck with zero choice as to cover, etc).

And finally, because it was cheaper than two Marvel single issues, and only slightly more expensive than two DC Rebirth issues, I snagged the X-Men vs. Avengers/Fantastic Four paperback. It’ll fit into my collection, or at least disappear into it, quite well I think!

While a bit expensive for only 4 things…I got everything for less than cover price of the paperback, so that’s pretty good, I’d say!

Zero Hour Revisited – Legion of Super-Heroes #61

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legionof_superheroes_0061End of an Era Finale: Borrowed Time!

By: Waid, McCraw, Immonen, Boyd, Pinaha, McAvennie, Carlson
Special Thanks to: Kurt Busiek
Dedicated with Respect and Admiration to: Binder, Siegel, Shooter, Levitz, Giffen and The Bierbaums
Published by: DC Comics
Cover Date: September 1994
Cover Price: $1.95

OK…now THAT is the sort of thing I was expecting!

This issue sees the remaining LoSH members and Legionnaires united, and learn the truth of the Time-Trapper. It’s not just their "now" and such being threatened by the time issues…it’s all of Time itself! And it’s revealed that there’s nothing that can be done here/now to STOP entropy from engulfing everything…but for there to be ANY chance of Time being put right, a duality, the existence of both the older and younger Legion folks–must be resolved. This is by having the young doppelgangers "merged" with their older, original selves…even as the older selves are also about to fade out. And so it ends…lives given, a heroic sacrifice, for even the CHANCE of an eventual positive outcome.

The story is rightly called End of an Era, and this felt enormous.

Unlike the other Legion tie-ins to Zero Hour that were also chapters of End of an Era–this one I felt the enormity, the significance, that sense of this being a pivotal moment–not just for what it has to do with Zero Hour (not much, directly) but also for what it is to the history of the Legion of Super-Heroes. The Legion is a definite blind-spot for me…but I’ve often been "aware of" their presence with occasional interactions with other stuff I’m reading. And I know there have been a number of "reboots" and such, just as I recall the "5 Years Later" and the younger Legionnaires…because even though I didn’t follow the series, I DO recall getting that first issue–Legionnaires #1–because hey, it was the ’90s, it was polybagged with a card, and most importantly–it was a #1 (then still a rare thing compared to modern comics).

I actually enjoyed this issue. I don’t know all the names–but most were "familiar," both in general and from earlier chapters read recently. And I recognize Thom as a character who was involved in JSA stuff during Geoff Johns‘ run–at least around the time of Thy Kingdom Come, a few years back. Though this was read in a vacuum (if somewhat LESS of a vacuum for reading the Legionnaires and Valor chapters already, plus stuff in Zero Hour itself), it was enjoyable and worth reading. I’m genuinely interested in at least "looking into" more Legion stuff (if only via Wikipedia), and curious about how long both this version of the Legion title and Legionnaires actually ran…but not quite enough to look it up while typing.

I’m a bit mixed in feelings on the visuals…I’m not entirely thrilled with them, but the art worked well here. Particularly seeing Immonen‘s name, I feel like I should enjoy the art, and there’s that part of me that wants to say something proactively positive about it, but flipping back through the issue, I’m not really struck by anything overly stand-out about it. It is not bad, but it’s–as with most comics–not one that blows me away with some sense of singular awesomeness. The story is definitely gotten across, and here perhaps more than on other related issues, the fade-to-white is extremely effective both visually and in serving the LoSH story while also tying it concretely to Zero Hour.

Though this does not directly move the plot of Zero Hour forward, it is certainly a worthy tie-in, and one of (continually, surprisingly) few to carry the crossover banner that seems to have been justified in doing so.

Zero Hour Revisited – Valor #23

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valor_0023End of an Era part 5: Infinite Valor

Writer: Kurt Busiek
Penciller: Colleen Doran
Inker: Dave Cooper
Letterer: Bob Pinaha
Colorist: Dave Grafe
Assistant Editor: Mike McAvennie
Editor: KC Carlson
Partners in Time Travel: Mark Waid and Tom McCraw
Published by: DC Comics
Cover Date: September 1994
Cover Price: $1.50

Of the books I’ve been least-familiar with and had never read before, Valor #23 does quite well as something I didn’t feel terribly lost in the reading…at the least, it was easier to follow along than the Legionnaires issue, given this has a smaller cast (by far!) to juggle, and I already had a bit of expectation from having read the Superboy issue that referenced this one in a footnote!

We find Valor and his wife traveling to meet up with the Legion, though as they travel they’re dealing with the changing, shifting winds of time, with neither past nor future holding steady one moment to the next. As a sort of "side story" within the issue, we also follow an encounter/conversation between the Time Trapper and Rokk–who was trapped in a cosmic archive, reading for years and gaining in knowledge of all Time. While Valor and Tasmia link up with the Legion and join the ongoing fight with Mordru and Glorith, Rokk learns a great deal from the Time Trapper about the nature of this Legion and the Legionnaires as well as the Trapper himself….and Trapper references his experience from Zero Hour #4, which proved an instigating moment for his actions now in End of an Era. Amidst the Legion’s battle, another figure pops into existence–Superboy–playing into/around/with the Zero Hour stuff as well as general Time-stuff because this is a Legion story. And with the conclusion of this issue, we have the conclusion of the series.

I was surprised to see Busiek’s name on this…I either had never realized or never made the conscious connection of his ever having touched this title. Reading stuff in the Letters pages I saw reference to Mark Waid…and I start to suspect that if it was Waid and Busiek on this book, that could be why I’ve only come across the occasional issue in bargain bins! I recall both this title as well as the Eclipso title "spinning out of" the Eclipso: The Darkness Within Annuals event to a bit of fanfare, but never really seeing much come of them, as neither series quite lasted even two years (yet by modern standards they were actual, FULL runs, on par with anything Avengers or Spider-Man or X-Men related!).

Since the focus in this issue was on Valor, and the Rokk/Trapper stuff, even though I’m not overly familiar with the characters, it was easier to follow along than trying to make sense of numerous characters/relationships and interactions. As such, I definitely enjoyed this a lot more, and there’s something about reading a "Final issue" of something that doesn’t exactly have a hard end so much as it ends individually while leaving stuff open for the character(s)/story to continue elsewhere.

The art is a bit wonky to me in places, particularly the opening page, with perspectives and faces and such seeming a bit inconsistent and proportions a bit "off" somehow. There’s also a sketchiness to the linework that isn’ entirely appealing to me, and gives a much different appearance than other artists. That said, for what we get here, everything’s quite follow-able, and I imagine the visuals are consistent with prior issues and would not be quite as noticeable as they are in this if I was reading the Valor series itself and not an isolated issue at the end of its run.

So far I get the feeling that the Legion side of the DCU is dealing with a double-pronged Time crisis…the Zero Hour related one as well as wonky time anyway due to time travel and such. I’m sort of curious about the actual Legion issue, where-ever it falls now in the Zero Hour month’s worth of books, given TWO of the three chapters of End of an Era fell on the same week. As the final issue of that initial week of releases (based on some checklist I’d used to organize by stack of the complete Zero Hour Event), this provides a lower than ideal point, but definitely not at the bottom of the list. It’s easy to write off events as not having much of an effect on books, but I do recall the JSA and the Legion being quite heavily impacted by Zero Hour, whatever other characters were hit.

Zero Hour Revisited – Legionnaires #18

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legionnaires_0018End of an Era part 4: Changing Times

Story: Mark Waid
Pencils: Chris Gardner
Inks: Dennis Cramer
Letterer: Pat Brosser
Co-Plotter/Colorist: Tom McCraw
Assistant Editor: Mike McAvennie
Editor: KC Carlson
Published by: DC Comics
Cover Date: September 1994
Cover Price: $1.50

I continue to find myself a bit disappointed at these early tie-ins to Zero Hour…as they don’t really seem very much like tie-ins, or only just briefly, tangentially tie in to the Event story.

This issue is both a Zero Hour issue as well as chapter 4 of a 6-part 3-title crossover. Coming in on the start of the back half of the story is not the best place…especially with no "previously" page or such to highlight key developments so far. In that regard–the lack of conscious context makes this seem a lot more like it’d fit contemporary comics, where "jumping in" at the fourth chapter of six is not very prudent.

The main thrust of this issue is that the current Legionnaires fail to stop a couple of baddies from gaining Ultimate Power…and said baddies remake the universe–or at least parts of it…including their own "dark" Legionnaires. Combine that with time-issues associated with Zero Hour anyway, and it’s a bit confusing for a reader not overly familiar with the characters involved. Adding to the confusion is the knowledge (or so I think) that the Legionnaires are "younger versions" of the older Legion of Super-Heroes characters so there’s already at least two versions of several characters without even getting to Time anomalies. We do see several Legionnaires trapped in the 20th century who receive the Superman/Green Lantern/Metron call-to-arms, but outside of that, this issue has nothing useful to add or expand upon regarding Zero Hour itself so far.

The art’s not bad, though I’m not now (nor have ever been) all that familiar with the characters, so there’s no significantly defining version of the characters nor a favorite artist for me to compare this to. Even elements I’m lost on are more my own lack of immersion than necessarily any fault of the art…the characters just ARE what they are…and they’re familiar enough that I’d just have to say that I have no problem with the art itself.

I’m also in a weird place in trying to critically consider the writing…because as said, this is the FOURTH chapter of six…so while I did not enjoy the story, it’s not to say that it’s bad writing or anything. It’s my slogging forward into  this chapter due to it having the Zero Hour banner on the cover, instead of going back to seek out the first three chapters of this story, at least, to gain context on what’s up.

I’m pretty sure I remember Zero Hour being a fairly major "break point" for the Legion books, or so I’d heard, and that would make sense–this seems like an ok chapter within the context of the Legion/Valor stuff…but this really adds nothing of particular value to my reading of the Event itself, and is an issue that should be easy enough to skip without missing out if you were to try to read the event in general.

JLA Adventures: Trapped in Time [Review]

jlaadventurestrappedintimedvd_0129While I’m not thrilled at the idea of the “classic” (for me, this means 1986-2011) DC stories being scrapped in favor of New-52-centric stories being adapted for DC‘s line of direct-to-home-media release, I’ve been looking forward to Justice League: War for awhile, if only just to see how they adapt the story to the screen, given it seemed like basically a lengthy fight scene to me when I read it.

There was no Fall 2013 new release (instead, we got a “special edition” that combined Dark Knight Returns parts 1 & 2 into a single feature)…so I’ve been looking forward to the next NEW film for quite awhile.

Imagine, then, my surprise when I came across JLA Adventures: Trapped in Time while browsing a Target Sunday evening. At first I mistook it for another Superfriends release, yet it had the “classic” JLA logo I’m familiar with from the ’90s/early-2000s, so it got my curiosity up. Target‘s had that “exclusive” line of DC figures under the Justice League branding; so I may have partially wondered if this was a new line of “re-presenting” Superfriends episodes through Target.

But according to the box, it was an original animated movie, albeit Target-exclusive. I wrestled with leaving it–after all, I’d NOT been looking forward to THIS one, and I’ve never been a fan of the Superfriends stuff, so I put it back. Then I picked it up again. And ultimately bought it along with my groceries and such.

In broad strokes, this reminded me of those mini comics that came in boxes of cereal several years back…fun enough, familiar-looking characters, passable stuff that’s fun as something different, but by no means anything special.

I liked the animation well enough…it wasn’t anything phenomenal, but it wasn’t terrible. My primary “issue” with the animation has to do with the character designs themselves–what fault I may have found with the animation probably comes more from this aspect.

The costumes are a blend of preNew 52 and current…Superman’s lacks the ugly collar-and-armor look BUT has the red belt in place of the trunks. Truthfully–I have no issue here as I don’t know if I would have noticed if I’d not been looking for it.

Bizarro and Cheetah looked “off” a bit, while Black Manta, Grodd, and others looked ok enough. Luthor looks like a sleeker, higher quality rendition of something pre-1986 to me, or at least what I unconsciously associate with that earlier period.

Story-wise, this is fairly typical fare for superhero shenanigans. Heroes beat the villains, villains use time-travel to change a key moment in history and thus undo the heroes; “b-list” heroes not affected by the time change (um…wibbly-wobbly, time-wimey stuff) must emerge and put things right.

The use of the Time Trapper here is probably the most accessible version I’ve encountered of the character. Rather than being a known villain of the Legion of Super-Heroes or such, he’s just an entity released from an artifact in the LoS’ museum a la a genie from a bottle. Granted, this makes him/it more of a plot point than any sort of character with any depth, it works for the story. I’m sure my own lack of experience with the Legion–they’re a definite blind spot in my experiential DC knowledge–lends itself to my ready acceptance of this interpretation of the character, where those far more familiar with Legion stuff may well take issue with it.

I didn’t recognize any of the voice actors offhand…but this honestly doesn’t bother me at all. Perhaps largely for not even expecting this movie and having no vested interest in its particular version of the characters (it’s not based on/adapting anything I’m familiar with specifically nor is it a continuation of the ’90s Batman, Superman, or Justice League/Justice League Unlimited animated series or previous direct-to-home-media film).

Since I’m not expecting the “traditional” voice actors for Superman, Batman, or Luthor and had no expectations for any of the other characters, I took stuff at “face value,” wherein all voices fit if only for the fact that none of them particularly DIDN’T fit; no one “sounded weird” to me or had odd voices coming from an otherwise familiar appearance.

In the end, this is–to me–a rather mediocre thing, though. It’s not bad, but it’s not wonderful. Ultimately it’s rather forgettable. JLA Adventures: Trapped in Time is enjoyable in the moment, having watched it…but on the whole it doesn’t strike me as anything worth rushing out to buy. A rental would be an adequate way of scratching any “curiosity itch” one has regarding this for now.

The NEW DC Universe

With the relaunch of DC’s superhero line in September, things start off with 52 #1 issues. Justice League August 31st, and the other 51 in September. The titles for this initial launch have been reported as follows:

  • ACTION COMICS
  • ALL-STAR WESTERN
  • ANIMAL MAN
  • AQUAMAN
  • BATGIRL
  • BATMAN
  • BATMAN & ROBIN
  • BATMAN: THE DARK KNIGHT
  • BATWING
  • BATWOMAN
  • BIRDS OF PREY
  • BLACKHAWKS
  • BLUE BEETLE
  • CAPTAIN ATOM
  • CATWOMAN
  • DC UNIVERSE PRESENTS
  • DEATHSTROKE
  • DEMON KNIGHTS
  • DETECTIVE COMICS
  • FRANKENSTEIN, AGENT OF SHADE
  • GREEN ARROW
  • GREEN LANTERN
  • GREEN LANTERN CORPS
  • GREEN LANTERN: THE NEW GUARDIANS
  • GRIFTER
  • HAWK & DOVE

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