December 21, 2024

The X Spot: Superman Flies High, Scumbag Continues to Suck

Will Nevin035 mins

Loyal Content Consumer, how I have missed you.

Let’s get to it.

The Bottom (at the Top)

10. Deep Beyond #2. Writers: Mirka Andolfo and David Goy, Artist: Andrea Broccardo, Colorist: Barbara Nosenzo, Letterer: Fabio Amelia, Publisher: Image

Deep Beyond is the sort of book that casts a sheen over my eyes thick enough to cover a hot ’n’ fresh Krispy Kreme dozen: too much talking, not enough explaining, interpersonal relationships that are thick and contrived and meaningless but constantly referenced, concepts that are interesting but go nowhere and probably a few more inherent, unfixable problems. After two issues, I can barely tell you anything about it: It’s post-apocalyptic (popular genre of the moment!), there are viruses and sea monsters and submarines and twins and God, I’m tired just thinking about it, so yes, well, they’ll all be living underwater, so? Maybe this is for someone. Decidedly not for me. 

Could Have Definitely Been Better   

9. The Scumbag #6. Writer: Rick Remender, Artist: Bengal, Colorist: Moreno Dinisio, Letterer: Rus Wooton, Publisher: Image

I reviewed the first issue, and I hated it — the punching down, the casual treatment of drug abuse, the senselessness of it all. Friends, do you think it improved over the next five issues? Maybe found a point with the start of its second arc? “Of course not,” I type, answering my own rhetorical question while the insurmountable weight of existence presses down upon my weary soul as I continue to give this book a chance because it occasionally makes me laugh. But really, this is fucking trash, especially as it insists upon making the old South Park “both sides are bad!!11!!” point. (More on those fuckbois below, by the way.) Scumbag is a dour Austin Powers riff that insists upon coming at every possible idea from the worst perspective imaginable. So what’s the fucking point? 

8. Justice League #59. Writer: Brian Michael Bendis, Artist: David Marquez, Colorist: Tamra Bonvillain, Letterer: Josh Reed, Publisher: DC

Would Brian Michael Bendis be a bold new voice on Justice League as he begins his run with (checks notes) issue #59? (I hate Marvel’s practice of renumbering series every six months, but it sure is strange to bring on such a big name at such a random number.) Would he have any new ideas? Trusting corporate entities seems like a very easy road to disappointment. More of a shortcut, really. Justice League wasn’t bad, per se, but it was stereotypical Bendis: light and talky without a bunch of substance to go with it. The story’s big bad — who had all of the gravitas of the worst comedic excesses of the MCU — was especially grating and needed to be turned down about 30% or 40%.

The X Non-Comics Thoughts of the Week

  1. Sincerest apologies for no X Spot last week — the first half of last week was lost to anxiety over an approaching tornadic storm system; the back half was lost to the tornadoes themselves. Then the cycle repeated itself with another storm system this week. I mean, goddamn. It was a shit fuck two weeks, and I’m glad to have it behind me with only a power outage to show for my stress. Tornadoes are just the worst, I tell ya — mercurial, arbitrary, deadly, mean things. One day, I’d like to live in a place without them. That would be nice. I told my wife before the first round of storms that I was anxious in the clinical sense, and I don’t think I’ve ever described myself that way before — but that was definitely how I felt. I couldn’t sleep. Eat. Read comics. Even think long enough to compose a thought about how to maybe write about them. My wife lovingly pointed out I also have anxieties about food and exercise, and she’s probably right there, but those are inputs I can control. The weather? A hopeless sense of futility there, friends.
  2. It feels dangerous to say this, but it really feels like the beginning of the end of the pandemic is here. My friends in meat space and I have all gotten our second doses (a privileged position, to be sure), and now, we’re trying to figure out how to slowly and responsibly ease into something approximating a social life. It feels weird and scary and new after a year, but I’m ready for it — to see people in person, to laugh together, to get away from a goddamned screen for a precious few fucking minutes. I’ve never been so excited for a Wrestlemania house party. Even though I’m positive the show itself will suck out loud. 
  3. Vaccines have made this possible, of course, and they had to considering that we literally tried nothing else aside from “die for the economy.” Soon, we will exhaust the people willingly, desperately waiting for a vaccine to be left with the “vaccine hesitant,” the people among us too stubborn, too nervous or too “smart” to roll up their sleeves for a shot or two. What do we do with those types? (Since we can’t stuff them all into lockers or shoot them into space.) We could try to persuade them, show them the vaccine is safe and important. Convince them that it’s their duty as Americans, which seems to be the reasoning behind four out of our five living ex-presidents signing up for PSA duty. Trump is naturally the conspicuous absence, but I’m not sure what good he would be, given that he can’t stay on script to save his miserable life and his supporters (the white yokels most likely to refuse the vaccine) won’t listen to even him on the topic. I know every body counts in the herd immunity numbers game, yet I simply can’t be bothered to waste time and attention on the stupidest and most bigoted among us. I was sitting in a restaurant the other night, waiting for some takeout and listening to the conversation in the table behind me because that’s a thing I do and you can’t stop me and no, I don’t care if it’s rude. I must have heard a fella say to his friend two or three times to “do the research.” But that doesn’t work because your first few Google results are liable to be WhatYouDontKnowAboutVaccines.ru and CoronaviruzCures.Biz. Listen to actual doctors who aren’t grifting: They’ll tell you to get the goddamn shot(s) ASAP.  
  4. South Park made a “vaccine special,” huh? I can’t imagine watching that show in the year of our dark lord twenty and twenty-one. I won’t lie: I watched it as recently as three or four seasons ago, but my tolerance for their rich ass libertarian sensibilities wore thin years and years before that. Their satire well has run dry. For all the celebration of their ability to produce an animated series only days before it’s set to air, has anyone stopped to think whether that system produces anything good? That silly question doesn’t matter, naturally, because the show’s ability to consistently draw ratings means Matt Stone and Trey Parker will continue to grind it into a fine, unwatchable powder, ceaselessly suffering in the deepest bowels of a corporate content mine. As a punishment for their contributions to the philosophy of the “fuck your feelings” crowd, I can think of no better retribution. (They’ll be paid for the work. That’s a bit of a bummer.)
  5. I think my first trip back to a movie theater will be for Bob Odenkirk’s actioner Nobody. That seems less than ideal, but I’m not expecting the world; give me Death Wish without the racism, and I’ll be happy.
  6. Daylight saving time is the best. If you spend any time outdoors in the late afternoon/early evening, that extra hour changes so many calculations. I don’t have to rush to get to the park to get my run in. I don’t have to be in a hurry on the actual run. My whole day seems more open. Again, DST is the best.
  7. Andrew Cuomo is still the fucking governor of New York? Why? As soon as the accusations of abuse and sexual harassment dropped, he should have been gone. As soon as he deployed his lazy “cancel culture” defense, he should have been roasted over an open pit. Fuck him and the “gubernatorial staff” that apparently determines the level of respect he affords other human beings. And if that wasn’t enough, he also diverted coronavirus tests to family members? There is no bottom to the shit hole that is that guy. 
  8. When I saw it on Twitter, I was pretty sure the allegation that Jay Johnston (of Mr. Show and Sarah Silverman Program fame, as well as the voice of Jimmy Pesto on Bob’s Burgers) participated in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot had to be some kind of bit, and yet three weeks later, it remains an open question that hasn’t been denied by either Johnston or a representative. Mammas, don’t let your comedy character actors grow up to be insurrectionists. 
  9. I think a lot about the fundamentals of professional wrestling, what makes it sing as an artform. At its core (and this comes straight from the Wade Keller/Todd Martin school of analysis — I’m not the genius responsible for this), it’s simulated combat between one side fans should want to see win and one side fans should want to see lose, a sports-like contest with the benefit (from the promoter’s perspective) of being able to control the outcomes. When pro graps deviates from the formula — either with muddled characters who don’t drive a rooting interest or it gets away from the idea that wrestling matches settle who’s physically better — I worry, and both WWE and AEW have given me some headaches lately. The Miz, for example, is as physically credible as a kindergartener with a calcium deficiency, and he shouldn’t be in the same camera shot as the company’s main title, much less actually hold it. For the interminable week or so that he was champion, what was his claim to being the best wrestler on Raw? He was the smartest? The most ruthless? I understand he was a means of getting the belt off Drew and on Lashley, but those details matter. Same with AEW — the week after Revolution, Moxley goes on television to declare Kenny Omega was “the better man” in their not-so-exploding barbed wire deathmatch. No! Bad Mox! Nothing was settled in that match; Omega won only because the Good Brothers turned it into a 3-on-1 farce, and that has to be a point he hits. In AEW’s other big misfire of late, turning (or apparently turning) the Inner Circle because another heel (MJF) turned on them is a bad way to book a show. If you know you’re about to pull the trigger on a big turn, set it up a little more gradually in the weeks (preferably months) leading up to it — and there’s no way I would have booked Jericho and MJF to bloody Papa Buck. Jericho will be able to play it, sure, but the point-by-point details in that story are bad.
  10. Uncle Will is going to do you a favor: You have my permission to skip the Synder cut. Really. You’re not going to add anything to the #discourse, and there have to be better things to do with those four hours. You won’t regret skipping it.                    

Not Many Complaints, I Tell Ya

7. Post Americana #4. Writer and artist: Steve Skroce, Colorist: Dave Stewart, Letterer: Fonografiks, Publisher: Image

It took until the third issue, but Post Americana finally clicked for me during a scene in which an escapee from a secret bunker designed to ensure continuity of government explained — presumably after telling us about the wonders of bidets — that it wasn’t officials who made it to the shelter; rather, it was the rich and monied who bought their way in and then spent the next 80 years guessing at what government was before emerging from their hidey hole to retake the American wasteland by force. So it’s WALL-E but mean and stupid with drones and bombs. Heckuva idea.

6. The Joker #1. Writer: James Tynion IV, Artist: Guillem March, Colorist: Arif Prianto, Letterer: Tom Napolitano, Publisher: DC

The inner, never-to-be-published workings of DC Comics must be fascinating, rife with a lot of political and personal drama just like all the best doomsday cults. The Joker is a book born of that toxic stew of stupidity, but somehow overcomes it; calling it one thing to prey on the stupids who will unendingly consume that character but actually building it around Jim Gordon is one of the few times I’ll happily sign up for a bait and switch. Gordon is so haunted, so scarred by the years fighting him, and while James Tynion IV’s Batman makes me roll my eyes more often than not, this seems like the start of a fascinating and honest look at not only Gotham’s top cop but the city’s soul. 

X Spotlight: Things on ComicsXF You Should Read

Almost the Best

5. Maniac of New York #2. Writer: Elliott Kalan, Artist: Andrea Mutti, Letterer: Taylor Esposito, Publisher: AfterShock  

The brutal sting of the book’s premise (What if we all ignored a deadly thing killing our friends and neighbors and pretended everything was normal? Coronavirus times, AMIRITE?!) wears off a little in this issue and settles more into the typical slasher/very tall people bad, but I’m not going to hold a book’s brilliance against it. Brother Justin and I go into it more deeply, of course, but I’ll say I enjoyed the bits that featured a slimy nonfiction writer making his bones on the maniac’s murders without living with any of the consequences. Fuck you, Bob Woodward.  

4. Batman/Superman #16. Writer: Gene Luen Yang, Penciller: Ivan Reis, Inker: Danny Miki, Colorist: Sabine Rich, Letterer: Saida Temofonte, Publisher: DC

Future State’s Batman/Superman was in the “Fine” to “Perfectly OK” realm of Things That Neither Impressed Me Nor Gave Me Things To Complain About. But this, the first issue on the other side of the two-month event that felt twice as long? This was nice and felt like it took more chances than most books put out in the main DC and Marvel lines — 10 double page spreads telling two separate stories with a buttload of Elseworld-esque characters like a prissy Bruce Wayne and an Alfred hopped up on venom who’s also schtupping Martha Wayne? That’s stupid cool. It’s comics. There’s a way.

3. Shadow Doctor #2. Writer: Peter Calloway, Artist: Georges Jeanty, Colorist: Juancho!, Letterer: Charles Pritchett, Publisher: AfterShock

History is often an incomplete story, written by the bigots and winners and other assorted assholes who manage to lie and cheat their way into something that didn’t belong to them. (For evidence of this, check out this Twitter thread about thriving and empowered Black communities sacrificed in the 20th century in the name of “progress” and white pride.) Subsequent generations simply don’t update that shit — unless they’re forced to. Shadow Doctor is both personal and historical; the writer’s attempt to reckon with his family’s place in Al Capone’s empire feels real and meaningful while also giving everything the proper context. One thing I especially enjoyed in this issue was Calloway’s confidence in the reader knowing who the mobster was — there was no scene that beat me about the head and face with the idea Capone was awful. Thanks for respecting my intelligence. (But feel free to show him being a vicious heel later.) 

2. Stray Dogs #2. Writer: Tony Fleecs, Artist: Trish Forstner, Colorist: Brad Simpson, Publisher: Image.

My initial reaction to Stray Dogs was likely colored by something of a misunderstanding between the marketing and what the first issue presented; it didn’t read like Silence of the Lambs + Disney because that’s not exactly what it is. You tell me that, and I’m expecting to see a dog in danger of getting skinned and/or asked to undergo an emergency skin care regimen. (Wait, that’s pretty much 101 Dalmatians, isn’t it?) But Sophie — the scared, sweet dog who is me if I was a teenage girl — isn’t in any danger of being tortured. Rather, the terror in this series is the predicament that the whole ragtag family of dogs finds itself in: The man of the house is a serial killer who arranges to meet women at a dog park only to kill them and steal their dogs to keep as his own. (Dogs, as a conceit of the series, have a poor short-term memory and do not recall these events all at once. Instead, they recover it piece by horrifying piece.) The emotion of the final page of the second issue is earned — and crushing.

The Top X List: X of X — The Hossiest Hoss of the First 10 Weeks 

Programming note: This week’s Discord quotes were lost on account of a malfunctioning fax machine. We have ordered a replacement.

A ranking of the best of the best.

10. Man-Bat #1, X^6. There are no losers here, but I remember nothing about this book.

9. The Batman Adventures Holiday Special, X^2. A classic I’m glad I finally got around to reading.  

8. Batman: Turning Points #1, X^4. The perfect coda to Year One.  

7. Casual Fling #2, X^10. Good, but not as good as #1.

6. Shadow Doctor #1, X^8. Hell of a series.

5. James Bond: Agent of Spectre #1, X^9. Checks off everything I want in a Bond romp.

4. Knock ‘Em Dead #1, X^1. The most personal work yet from Eliot Rahal. 

3. The Replacer / Kill a Man, X^5. Two great OGNs, one publisher, one dead ass tie at the top. 

2. Hollow Heart #1, X^3. A real punch in the feels, and it’s only getting started. 

1. Casual Fling #1, X^7. What a tight, tight thriller.

Interested in signing up for the ComicsXF Patreon? You know what to do. 

Finally, the Big Hoss of the Week

1. Superman: Red and Blue #1

If I dissected the tiniest flaws of Superman: Red and Blue (like suggesting that Dan Watters’ story that both lays out the whole concept of the series and has a brilliant meta reference comparing it to Batman: Black and White should come first and not fourth), it would serve only to flag the fact that I’m just here to annoy you. The heart of this issue — the pieces by John Ridley and Brandon Easton — shows how much Supes, even though he is not of this world, represents the best in us and how the worst problems in this world can’t simply be smashed and pummeled away. Try to read “The Measure of Hope” and not feel absolutely wrecked. I dare you. 

NeXt Time on the X Spot

Legends of the Dark Knight Ch. 1, The Department of Truth #7, James Bond: Agent of Spectre #2 and seven more … because it’s pronounced “ten.”

Will Nevin

Will Nevin loves bourbon and AP style and gets paid to teach one of those things. He is on Twitter far too often.

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