Nuff Said!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9cuGZJ9DP0

Stop it now!

The official commercial was bad enough, but fine it makes sense, not everyone is on the internet or going to comic book stores to know about this initiative.

But these trailers need to stop. They are genuinely bad and reek of 90s promotion with their beats and sound effects.

Head below the jump to see more of these…ugh…trailers.The commercial wasn’t my favorite but fine it worked.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMk65ULWnrc

But then these other things started popping up. These….sneak peeks.

Color me excited to see Grifter as a part of the DC Universe. But man, I hate this so much. (You can actually here it with very overused music here at Newsarama. )

www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1yOtIr3Oak

Stormwatch is another one I look forward too. But ugh…

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cny60m1DnB0

And Scott! Man, I’m looking forward to your Static Book too, but this trailer is just the bleh. Its like a barfed up version of the 90s.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=uaq9c4R4nEI

Look, I’m not a huge fan of motion comics, and hell I don’t even expect these to be. Also, I’m not a massive wizard at iMovie, Adobe Premiere or Final Cut, but for such a large campaign this looks and feels like someone at Warner Bros handed an intern a bunch of books and said, “Here. Make a movie out of this.”

Look you got a lot of good momentum behind this DC, just keep it going and stop making crummy promos. Get someone who knows how to make it a little more visually appealing on these or stop making them.

They are just not good.

But then again, it got me to devote a whole post to it. So mission accomplished too.

But what about the current and old DC Universe? How do we say good bye to that? Well, with some of these books…painfully.

Lets start with the worst cause some of these titles aren’t pretty.

Superman #714

The infamous “Grounded” storyline. I actually had some hopes for this. As a fan of Straczynski I thought he might be able to pull off a story of Superman traveling the country of a bit of a journey within himself at the same time. Fans and DC editors did not and he got yanked off a month or two into it. And it kept going anyway.

It wraps up painfully. Its been a total waste of pages and money the last few months and this is one book that will be better for the reboot/relaunch. Just forget this one existed.

Green Lantern: Emerald Warriors #13

Inherently there is nothing wrong with this book. We get a team up with Batman and Guy Gardner. Remember them? How Batman once punched out Guy with one punch and Guy kinda thinks Batman is a pain in the ass?

Yeah its a fine throw away issue, nothing great nothing horrible, but definitely a weird note to end a book which won’t exist after this issue. If you like Green Lantern and have been saying to yourself you should pick up this title while you can still find it, skip it. You didn’t miss anything unless you wanted the War of The Green Lantern tie in books. Its a forgettable foot note at this point.

The Flashpoint Tie Ins:

I’m not gonna bash these too hard. Tie ins are always throw away books. They have no real consequences. And in the case of alternate reality tie ins these usually especially don’t count or have consequences.

For the most part all the books work in that they give you more back story for the universe, let you understand the surrounding players actions and motivations outside of the main Flashpoint story, and fill in any significant blanks you may have on this current world. But unless DC plans to return to it, or bring some of these characters over, its all gonna change and be wiped from the records so to speak.

The Lois Lane Resistance series is good, even though it goes for the juglar by killing off the title character to show that even in an alternate reality the Lois and Clark relationship is still special.

The Hal Jordan series goes out of its way, once again like some many Green Lantern books, to paint Hal as this ultimate hero even though many times we still get a depiction of Hal as a total ass.

The Kid Flash series suffers the same problem as its main job is to paint Impulse’s sacrifice in this universe as the way to make Barry Allen the ultimate Flash and bring him the power he needs to fix everything, although now I wonder if the new Impulse/Kid Flash in the Teen Titans series coming couldn’t be a newly de-aged, unmarried Wally West and not Bart Allen but time will tell.

While I feel like I bashed some of these without going into a lot of specifics my main point is this. If your interested in the DCNU, read that, skip these books. You didn’t miss anything you need to know to enjoy it and you probably won’t have to refer back to it ever again. And if you were already collecting these books, what did you think? I’d love to hear it. I was fairly disappointed and hope that the new DCNU definitely ups the ante more than these finales did.

X-Men First Class also looked a little suspect when we first saw it.

The horrible posters that looked like a first year photoshop student created them, the odd idea that Havok might actually be Cyclops father recruited to the X-Men long before him. Xavier and Magneto at the strip club together.

Charles, are you sensing a threesome as well?

Yeah it was looking bad. But it seems like it might all come together.

Check it out.

Case in point, the two I read today in one sitting at the Elizabeth Public Library in Elizabeth, NJ, Monkey vs. Robot and Monkey vs. Robot – The Crystal of Power.

Monkey vs. Robot is the creation of James Kochalka, possibly most recently known for the release of his Super F*ckers title released earlier this year.

In the two books, Monkey vs. Robot and the Crystal of Power, we follow the struggle of a group of jungle dwelling monkeys who have to deal with a factory of robots polluting, changing, and experimenting in their jungle who answer to Mother.

In Monkey vs Robot, the robots have begun to building their factory, collecting the material they need to build more of themselves and grow in number. But while doing that, they begin to release this tarry, oil like substance into the jungle which soon kills on of the monkeys. The monkeys discover this and are angered. Later, in what seems like a bit of retaliation, the monkeys cause one of the robots, carrying a massive boulder to slip on their excrement crushing it. The robot is discovered by its brothers, along with the cause of its demise, and all out war against the monkeys is declared. What follows is a knock down drag out brawl of monkeys being killed, robots being demolished and burnt and much of the forst and factory being destroyed.

The book ends on a hopeful note in its epilogue for the monkeys but as is seen in the second book, the Crystal of Power. The robots remain and are still up to no good.

In the second title, after being experimented on and escaping from the robots, we are introduced to a monkey who has gained a bit more intelligence than the average monkey and seeks to help the others rebel as the robots seek to find a crystal to restore mothers power. In this story, we follow a robot who has lost his ability to communicate with the others and seeks to complete his mission to please mother.  Later, we are introduced to new robots from Warrior Squadron Red, a vicious set of robots who merely roar and kill all that stands in their way.

The ending of this story has no epilogue, so we can’t be sure who wins this time, monkey or robot, even though we do learn the fate of the crystal of power.

Monkey vs Robot has been named one of the Top 10 Hottest Comics previously by Face Magazine and I think I can see why. Theirs a simplicity in the story, especially since much of it is told without words. The books almost feel too short because of that, because by the end, after watching monkeys and robot fall by each others hands in sometimes horrifying but not grotesque ways, I feel invested in them. I wonder what happens to them after the last page, if one side wins and accomplishes their goals or if the struggle continues, each trying to find another way to proceed with this cute yet still very real genocide they both pursue of the other side to survive.

Maybe Mr. Kochalka will bless us with another Monkey vs Robot in the future, but for now, check your local library and see if you can find it or grab it here at Amazon.

For those unfamiliar with The Winter Guard think of them as Russia’s very own version of the Avengers complete with their very own oppressive government operatives to keep them on a very short leash. Over the years The Winter Guard has popped up in various titles sometimes as villains but more often as heroes not quite gaining the spotlight they deserved. Never before has the team had its own title until now and although this limited series comes to an end in issue #3, it appears that perhaps this is only really the beginning.

Last year Gallaher and Ellis whose previous collaboration happens to be the multiple award winning werewolf cowboy web-comic High Moon, debuted on the printed page with a one shot comic called HULK: Winter Guard that introduced an all new line up of Russian superheroes wearing the familiar costumes of some of the Winter Guards long lost members. With fans eager for more Gallaher and Ellis delivered with this limited series that has now come full circle and hopefully set the stage for something bigger.

Without spoiling anything, Issue #3 delivers a final showdown between The Winter Guard and a certain baddie aided by a familiar alien race that doesn’t quite have shape shifting down as good as the Skrulls. Yet rather than opt for page after page of massive destruction and powerful explosions this issue continues what has been an exciting story from the start accompanied by some of the best artwork these characters have ever been captured in.

Steve Ellis’s pencils get something of a makeover when accompanied by Val Staples’ coloring job and long time fans of Ellis’s work on High Moon may not recognize it. Look a little closer however and it’s easy to see the artist’s signature style shine through albeit a little more matured than his rustic renderings on High Moon.

Gallaher’s story is one of redemption and intrigue that ends violently for some and hopeful for others. This series has successfully re-introduced several long lost characters back into the mainstream continuity of the Marvel Universe and in this final act readers get a chance to discover just who the bad guys and have been all along. Issue #3 keeps readers guessing to the bitter end and just when it seems safe to stop guessing more questions are asked that will hopefully be answered in further work from Gallaher and Ellis.

It’s a shame it’s only a three issue series as after reading the final issue it’s all too apparent a lot more can be done with these characters. However being that it is only three issues it’s a pretty safe bet the first two back issues can still be picked along with issue #3 when you’re at the comic shop next time, or you can wait for the trade, either way this is one limited series you don’t want to miss.

What does it mean?

Good question right? Well for starters what Joe Q unveiled and then quickly transformed was something long time comic book fans will surely recognize as the now long defunct Cross-Gen Sigil. (The logo of a small time Florida based comic book Company that made it into the big time for bit before going bankrupt back in 2004.) CrossGen prided itself on quite literally the lack of superheroes in its books where instead readers were treated to tales of high adventure in fantasy realms or mystery and suspense in noir like settings and even the occasional intergalactic space battle or two.

CrossGen made comics that didn’t need cape clad crime fighters to tell stories of the struggle between good and evil, with each individual series tying into the grand scheme of the “Sigilverse,” despite however different each may have appeared, and though the company officially went belly under some time ago, it gave many of the most popular creators working in comics today their start.

o what does it mean? Is Marvel going to re-print old CrossGen collections under a new banner? Or perhaps this long lost universe will find a home in the house of ideas where the stories and characters that made up the world of CrossGen can once again flourish and maybe just maybe these great titles will get the endings they deserve and what the fans have been waiting for.

At any rate, what Joe Quesada’s presentation at Comic con really means is anyone’s guess; but for those unfamiliar with CrossGen or those that just need a little refresher course of what the books were all about Alltern8.com is here. Check out the list below for all the highlights of CrossGen plus where these series could go in the future:

Sigil: Space Opera at its finest Sigil tells the tale of The Planetary Union and its war against the reptilian Saurians through the adventures of the gun-for-hire and former union solider Sam Rey, his partner in crime Roiya, the self-assured Zanniati and with her bodyguard JeMerik. Epic in scope this series was at one written by current editor-n-chief of Boom! Studios Mark Waid and penciled by a very young Steven McNiven. With Marvel’s own intergalactic space opera in full swing after Annihilation helped re-launch popular characters like Nova and The Guardians of the Galaxy, Sigil seems a likely choice and more than ready for a Make-Over at the very least maybe fans will finally get a chance to get their hands the two unreleased volumes that have yet to see the light of day.

Meridian: Floating islands in the sky, airship duals, and a young girl coming to terms with unnatural abilities while questing to avenge her father and stop her evil uncle from ruling the world. Meridian was all that and more, plus it was one of the first CrossGen titles that worked toward the ultimate goal of the companies’ stories, a crossover. Meridian is really the title where a lot of mystery of the sigilbearers is explored as many of CrossGen’s other heroes and villains made cameo appearances and ultimately it ended with the start of a new series called Negation War. Whatever Marvel decides to do with Cross-Gen one can only hope for more stories about Airships!

Sojourn: This fan favorite was technically the highest grossing series to come out of the Cross Gen Universe and has been the one world fans have truly been waiting to see continued. The series itself ended after only 34 issues with one heck of a cliffhanger courtesy of comic legend Chuck Dixon. Sojourn twisted up the idea of the Sigilbearer the CrossGen universe by making the Sigilbearer in Sojourn the primary antagonist for Arwyn, a young woman on a quest to recover the pieces of a mystical arrow that can in fact destroy the evil Sigilbearer known as Mordath. Again this is another series set in a fantasy world of dragons and magic, something Marvel could really use in its line-up, with a loyal fan base still alive online Sojourn seems prime for a comeback.

Ruse: This Eisner award winning series could really be looked at as one of the first examples of the Steampunk genre in comics. A detective thriller set in the Victorian age Ruse combined the literary style of a Sherlock Holmes Novel with everything that is great about comic books and although the characters themselves could hardly be considered original the world created by Mark Waid and Butch Guice was one of the most complex of the CrossGen Universe. Marvel would be hard pressed not do something with this title, it’s Steampunk for crying out loud, and while many of their competitors have already jumped on the steam powered band-wagon Marvel has only ever dabbled in passing. With Ruse they have a chance to not only do something Steampunk, they have a chance to do it right.

Scion: A tale of star-crossed lovers set in a world of high fantasy where magic and science co-exist and greedy rulers thirst for power. Following Prince Ethan of the Heron dynasty and Princess Ashleigh of the Raven House Scion was a unique series and though it officially ended happily ever after for most of its heroes there were still many unanswered questions leaving plenty of room for Marvel to come in really make the series something special.

Of course during the six year run of CrossGen comics there were many great stories to read and comics to collect, the above is just a sampling and some of my favorites. Remember a title that didn’t make the list? Then contact us and tell us about it. It’s anyone’s guess as to what Marvel plans to do with CrossGen in the future but you can count on The Review Zoo to bring you all the details as they roll in.

So Harper Collins kindly sent me a review copy of Larry Doyle’s latest book, Go, Mutants! Doyle previously wrote I Love You, Beth Cooper. He’s also a television writer with The Simpsons and Beavis and Butthead to his credit, which might have given me insight into what I was about to get into, had I thought about it.

Mutants! quirky premise, a world where monsters from 50’s B-movies were real and their offspring now populate high-school, promised to be a hilarious read.  And it was, sort of.  The novel mirrored its B-movie inspiration, putting forth a mix of truly great moments and equally horrid moments.  The protagonist, J!m (the blue son of an invading big-brained alien) provided dry amusement throughout, but the narrative was a hodgepodge of painful puns à la Piers Anthony’s Xanth series, some truly witty laugh-out-loud moments, and excruciatingly low juvenile humor.  The writing style is a hodgepodge as well, veering back and forth between normal prose and movie-script, reminding the reader, as if the reader might forget, that the strange tale being read owes its existence to early horror movies.

Besides a blue, teenaged alien wannabe rebel, Mutants! also features a sentient slime blob, a radioactive man-ape, and an assortment of aliens, mutants and mad scientists.  Poking fun at the absurdity of high school and B-movies both, the novel is full of oddity and weirdness, and the end is no less twisted.  Proving just how crazy this tale is, the main character dies well before the end of the book (No, that’s not a spoiler; the narrative constantly hits the reader over the head with blunt two-by-four foretelling of J!m’s imminent demise).

It’s not a book I would reread; there are face-constricting moments I do not want to relive.  Yet if you’re a fan of alternative history, strange worlds, B-movies – or even just the tv shows for which Doyle has written – it’s worth a glance to see if you can take the groans along with the laughs.

A website was also set up for the title Go, Mutants! and can be found here.

The heroic age is in full swing in the Marvel Universe as June continues to deliver more issues under the publisher’s new banner. The Avengers Academy is now in session, while Steve Rogers sticks to the shadows as the leader of the all-new Secret Avengers. Of course at the center of it all is the super hero team everyone is counting on and they definitely have their hands full.

Avengers #2 hit shelves this week and if you haven’t got on board yet, what are you waiting for? It’s no secret that Marvel has its top talent on this title. With writer Brian Michael Bendis teamed-up with master comic book artiest John Romita Jr. the first issue was a hit and sold out shortly after its debut, yet the question still remained is this a series with shelling out four bucks for each month?

That answer, at least to this avid Avengers aficionado, is a resounding yes. Having high hopes for the series to begin with I felt issue #1 did a good setting things back up after the past seven years of crossovers and mega-events did a really good job of knocking them down. It was still a little too soon to tell however, and maybe it still is, yet after reading issue #2 all I can say is Wow!

With such high standards come extremely high hopes from fans. In a series that in many ways is the flagship of Marvel’s new Heroic Age, The Avengers definitely runs the risk of crashing under its own weigh. With fan-favorites coming and going and often more characters than there simply is room for, titles like these can often be some of the most confusing to follow (i.e., DC’s JLA/ JSA/ whatever the heck they’re called). Yet as more of the story is revealed in this brand new title it becomes all too clear that Bendis is delivering a solid story, and one that is downright entertaining to read. It is refreshing to get to back to the team’s roots. No “Who can you trust?” mentality or “Whose side are you on?” bickering allowing the team to exactly what it was meant for, fight bad guys and save the world, and that is exactly what they need to do.
Issue #2 introduces the final member of this newly reinstated team, Marvel Boy. Yep, that’s right, the former dark Avenger from outer space. Only he’s good now and is using his super smarts to help jettison the team though the very fabric of time to thought the menace of Kang. Man is it good to have the old villains back, of course there is a new villain to, but you’ll just have to read the issue to find out who it is.

In a bizarre turn of events Wonder Man also makes an appearance in this issue, only he hasn’t come to help. His presence gives the story a unique depth tying this new series to everything that was great about the old one. It is as though with the new hike in price for the book has challenged the creators to give readers their money’s worth and so far they have.

John Romita Jr.’s art is really something to behold and needless to say he is in top form on this title, developing some stellar pages that may make fans want to poster their bedrooms with. The entire artistic team is really pulling out all the stops on this book right down the individual lettering of each characters dialogue.

Overall issue #2 delivers a great story with some awesome artwork, while at the same time continuing to develop what could be one of the greatest Avenger’s story arcs ever. If you haven’t gotten your hands on a copy yet do so, then come back and tell us here or over in the forums what you thought of it!

Reading through each of the books, Avengers Academy #01 and Young Allies #01, I began to get an idea of what their plans truly were. Starting with Young Allies #01, the book kicks off with kidnapping in a small Colombian town that serves as an origin to the newly created, or newly recreated if your well versed in your Heroes Reborn Universe alumni, Toro. From there it jumps to snippets of conversation between a group of new young super villains, preparing for their New York City debut as the Bastards of Evil. From the conversation and their appearances later in the title we’re given clues about who their possible parentage may stem from. What about the other Young Allies, you ask?

We’re introduced to them right after that. If you haven’t seen the cover or some of the promo pages floating around on the internet, the Young Allies group is composed of Firestar, formerly of the New Warriors, Arana the Spider-Girl, Nomad the former Bucky from the Heroes Reborn Universe,and still relatively new hero Gravity. The group is joined by Toro once the battle begins with the Bastards of Evil, as all happen to be within close proximity to their debut attack.

The colors of Chris Sotomayor, artwork of  David Baldeon, and writing of Sean McKeever really knock this one out of the park. If you’ve been familiar with the Marvel Universe in the last few years then you’ll know most of the characters and its good to see these characters that may not be able to carry a stand alone book just yet, teamed together to hopefully form something very interesting and just as entertaining in future issues. Young Allies’s is a definite recommendation.

Avengers Academy introduces us to the first set of recruits, each who seem to have been handpicked as recruits by Norman Osbourne during his reign as director of the Initiative. The first team is comprised of six members, Veil, a young girl with the ability to break herself down into various gaseous states, Hazmat, another female able to project radiation and toxic waste from her body, Mettle, a man possessing the ability to turn himself into a metallic form, Reptil, whose body can morph into various dinosaur parts, Striker, whose body is able to generate vast amounts of electricity and Finesse, who is a polymath, a person who seems to be able to pick up and learn nearly anything at a highly accelerated rate.

The group teaching this next generation of heroes is Hank Pym, former Ant-Man turned Wasp, Tigra, Quicksilver, Justice and Penance now back to the code name of Speedball. As Pym explains to Tigra and Quicksilver, he feels they may be the best suited to train these new cadets as each of them has strayed from the path of heroism at times do to pressure or just bad decisions or in Quicksilver’s case, having a bad parent in a person like Magneto. During an argument towards the end of the issue, Finesse, displaying her ability for lip reading is informed that their group hasn’t been picked just because someone thought they were the best suited to be the next Avengers or because some of their powers might kill them. By the last page, these new heroes know exactly why they were chosen and what their mentors really think of them.

Again, this is another solid first issue. Christos Gage has crafted another fine title with new heroes being introduced into the Marvel Universe and I think it will definitely help in introducing this generation of comic book readers and fans to newer generation of heroes they can call their own. Mike McKone and Jeromy Cox are always excellent and the designs and colors for each of the new characters are fantastic.

Like I said earlier, I wasn’t sure what Marvel was doing with two new books so similar in style coming out the same day at the same time, but I think I get it now. Young Allies is the book for you if you want characters that have been around for awhile who are getting their moment to shine together. If you liked any of these characters this is the book for you, as I feel it will probably have enough of a connection with the old school Marvel Universe and the new stuff that keeps coming to find a healthy balance. But, if you like many out there, want new superheroes, superheroes that haven’t been around since your dad was a kid or for the last twenty or so years, then Avengers Academy is the book for you. These are fresh faced heroes with no connection that we know of so far to your dad’s or even grandpa’s generation. They’re here to make a splash in the Marvel Universe and hopefully, from what I am seeing so far, they stick around for a while to come.

Both books are on sale now at your friendly neighborhood comic shop.

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