Sunday, January 22, 2012

Flash Review - 1/11/12



Avengers 1959 #5 – Its over!!  Woohoo!!  Probably one of the more pointless series that Marvel has put out in a good long while and I couldn’t possibly be happier that it’s done.  I put up with this series because I thought at the end there would be a cliffhanger or tie-in or SOMETHING that made it relavent to current stuff going on, but no!  This series ended exactly the way it began: With no point at all.  Was it fun seeing Namora?  Always.  Did I like seeing Kraven the Hunter as a good guy for once?  Definitely.  But 5 issues and $15 later, I sort of expected that we would get a little something more out of all this.  Maybe, in the near future, we will find out that Louise Mason took Infinity Formula or some crap and she’s still young, vibrant and adventuring (since she hasn’t been seen really since her stint over in Sensational She-Hulk years ago.  That would be worth it, but I sort of doubt it.

Battle Scars #3 – OK it’s not that this series is bad.  In fact, the characters being used and the action we are seeing is actually pretty interesting (I love me some Taskmaster), but I don’t feel like we are getting anywhere.  Here we are in the 3rd issue of the series and we still don’t know anything about Marcus Johnson, this supposedly majorly important character.  I know they are trying to keep us in suspense but in addition to not telling us, they aren’t really dropping any clues to keep us interested really.  If we don’t get some real revelations about his background (and QUICK) I will get officially bored with this series.  Luckily there are only 3 issues left.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season 9 #5 – And here we go!  We had the opening arc to show us where everyone was and how they were doing, and now the story starts!  The First Slayer!  Dream hijacking Fairies!  And the broken Slayer Scythe can fix everything!  Now this is how you get a story going!  I am sad to see Willow go, but, I understand, she needs her magic back to be complete.  I just hope that we get a limited series for her or that this book still follows her instead of having her disappear for months and then coming back with the solution.  Her goodbye-but-not-goodbye with Buffy was so sad, Buffy is always watching Willow leave her lately.And that little bastard Andrew trying to through her out, the nerve of him.  Doesn’t he know that she carrying vampire/slayer babies!?  Can’t wait to see how this all turns out.

Carnage U.S.A. #2 – Bleh.  After last issue’s spectacular opening, I was expecting more from this newest installment but it was a bit dry.  I’m not as interested in the whole Carnage-possessing-people angle as I thought I would be, but there’s still time for them to pull it out of the fire.  I AM thrilled to see Dr. Nieves (aka Scorn) return after her appearances in the last Carnage series, I think we can expect great things from her in the coming issues.  We haven’t had a really cool new symbiote in a while.  Other than that I am just hoping for the best in the next 3 issues.

Journey into Mystery #633 – Nothing even really happened in this issue…and it was still awesome!  That’s the sign of a good issue right there!  This opening installment of the latest JIM arc started a bit slow and with lots of build-up.  Still lots of shadiness coming from the All-Mothers, more whackiness from Loki and Leah (who I love more and more every issue), and Daimon Hellstrom too (who seems to be getting a lot of page time lately in a few places)!  Also, I think the more we see the Disir, the cooler they get.  They started out as just mindless zombie servants but the writers have really taken care to develop these cursed hags into their own individuals.  I look forward to more adventures with the Princeling of Lies every single issue.

Magneto: Not a Hero #3 – Woah!  I am not even sure what’s going on in this one…but its great.  OK the lame Brother of Evil Mutants knock-offs are retarded, but Joseph and Astra are awesome!  It’s nice to see that “Old Man” Magneto can still face off again his own younger self and make it out alive, even if it did required skewering Astra to do it.  And speaking of Astra, what could possibly have been locked in her head to make her scream like that when the Three-in-One found it??  I still have hope that Joseph will live after this and maybe we will get a Magneto in both X-men camps, but I suspect that this would be hoping for entirely too much.  Oh! And it was fun seeing Pixie talk to Anole and Rockslide, I love how they are keeping continuity and connections between the two mutant base camps.

New Avengers #20 – Alright, now THIS is battling Avengers style!  This book continues to be the best Avengers book in print (and considering how many Avengers books there are now, that says a lot).  Its great to see Daredevil finally really mixing it up with the rest of the team (I thought him joining was gonna be like when Thing joined the Avengers West Coast and he was never going to ACTUALLY be a part of them).  Now as for these new Dark Avengers…  I am still not sure really who all of these people are.  Last time Osborn got big name villains and gave them Avengers costumes, but this round he picked a bunch of second string types to fill up his rank (I mean really Skaar?  Baby Hulk??  And who the hell is this “Scarlet Witch blond chick???).  The big shocker for me this time though was Norman throwing Luke Cage the distance of a football field or 3.  Is it Super Soldier Serum? Infinity Formula?  The Goblin Formula?? (shiver…)  Who knows, but I bet we can find out next issue, assuming of course that the team lives after their battle with Ragnarok.

X-Factor #230 – ReGenesis finally hits X-Factor!  And what a great set-up this was!  The team is falling apart and no one knows who to trust (except Layla, they all know that they don’t trust Layla).  An unexpected visitor in Wolverine makes everyone very nervous…especially in light of the apparent death of their leader Jaime Madrox.  Some fun scenes with the group as a whole (like Rahne/Rictor/Shatterstar or M/Longshot/Guido/Banshee)  And speaking of Guido…what’s up with the no soul??  I can’t wait until we finally see some reprecussions from this development.  And of course the long-spoiled “surprise” ending…HAVOK AND POLARIS ARE BACK!  When X-Factor is in need of a leader (again) who better to step in and fix thing then the former leaders who brought the team back the first time! Now Guido and Rahne were on X-Factor with them before and Shatterstar, Rictor and Banshee (then Siryn) were on X-Force but they saw his leadership so I don’t think they will give any problems.  I wonder how Monet will react to these people (who are basically strangers to her) waltzing in an trying to take over Jaime’s business.  I see M either becoming friendly with Layla again over this or just flat out leaving.

X-men: Legacy #260.1 – What is there to say? This title is always good!  I couldn’t give a rat’s ass about Gambit, but having Rachel and Frenzy on Rogue’s squad  can only make this book better and better.  I know Rogue’s here to explore her inner teacher more, but something tells me that HER squad will be there one that plays clean-up crew for the new campus.  And what better way to break in the new team then by bringing back some old friends...er…I mean enemies.  They established way back in Uncanny X-men #96 that the N’Gari cairn will always regenerate and the N’Gari will eventually find a way to return through it and I am so glad to see that newer writers haven’t done away with old continuity such as this.  If they keep this up then this book will eventually blow Uncanny right out of the water, and coming from a die-hard Uncanny fan that says a lot!

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