Another Friday means another week of stupid comics! But how stupid are they? Well that’s a stupid question because the answer is obviously stupid. Hoorah and cookies for everyone.
But before I begin, I just got back from a boat concert, which is real neat. I was on a boat (motherfucker), listening to Royal Bliss play music while on a boat (motherfucker). We drank and joked, and all in all, had a real good time. Boat concerts are fun, because the vibe is totally different than non boat concerts. There’s more silliness, less stress. Bands joke in ways they don’t on stage, and they’ll vary their sets up a lot too. Did I get the Royal Bliss hits? Yeah, but only like three of them. The rest were offball songs they rarely play live and covers, some taken by request. It was a blast. We got to sail into a sunset and yell at the other boats near us for not having concerts on them.
Also Jack-on-the-rocks was only $5.00! That’s a life hack everyone. Go to a bar and order booze on the rocks. You get more bang for your buck, at least in the Midwest.
And now, comics.
Deadly Class #34
Deadly Class is the best book out this week and sometimes the best book out this month. I’m not sure it hits that standard here, but holy shit is it a good issue. There’s a lot of violence–I think this is like the third issue of non-stop violence without action fatigue–that’s the accumulation of 30 issues of baggage. Now I don’t know all the history since I only jumped on around issue 22, but I got an understanding of the rest: these kids hate each other for good reason. And because Deadly Class is a book with stakes and characters who aren’t invincible, you don’t know who is gonna make it to the end and in what state they’ll be. It’s heavy stuff, even if it’s surrounded by some fairly cartoony violence. If you want action done right, grab this book.
The Flash #47
I haven’t read The Flash since issue 4, but I was told we were on a new arc and maybe, just maybe, it might not suck for the same reason the first four issues did. Nope. Still sucks. The writing is awful, the characters are awful, and the Flash mythology is awful. Sometimes the artwork is cool, but oftentimes it’s just overly busy and annoying.
Black Panther #1
Goddamnit Marvel, how are your movies so good and your comics so crap? This issue opens with a page of really fucking stupid exposition and then smashes into a bunch of meaningless violence from a character with zero characterization to him. He’s boring. What he’s doing is boring. It’s fancy looking, but it’s boring. It’s everything Deadly Class is not. It’s vapid horseshit, and I’m sick of superhero books thinking they can cover up their bad words with bad action. Fucking stoppit.
Aliens: Defiance vol 1
Yeah it didn’t come out this week or even this year, but I’m rereading it and Aliens Defiance is still rad as fuck. Brian Wood really has written one of the best Aliens comics out there, with a bitchen set of protagonists and a plot that circumvents a lot of the Alien tropes. It’s smart and it’s tense. It’s awesome.
