The Competitive Edge

Always remember that History is written by the winners.

Tonight (that being Thursday night) was the Bedrock City Comics Christmas Party, which is a super awesome private party/sale that they have for their regular customers. If some of you are saying “Hey, you elitist jerk, we don’t want to hear about the awesome party that you got to go to but we didn’t.” bear with me because I bring this up for two reasons. First, if you’re in the Houston area then go get yourself a box at one of the four convenient BRC locations, support your local comic shop, and next year you’ll get an invitation to their Christmas party where we can hang out and be elitist jerks together, wearing our monocles and top hats, sipping martinis and going “Tut! Tut!” watching the plebeians going off into the inner bowels of the city where they move the hands of giant clocks to keep the power moving through the wonderful Utopia we live in. Secondly, I had to share with you the awesomeness that was The Sign:

Each of those letters is about four feet tall and while it’s hard to see the faces on “REK” I can assure you that the full cast is there. Kris and I saw this in BRC on Wednesday when we went to pick up our comics. It was sitting along the wall and we spent a long time looking at it trying to figure out where we could put it if we were able to obtain it. It was an amusing intellectual exercise until it became a realistic question when I won a raffle prize at the party. I was given a choice of whatever prize they were going to give me or The Sign. It took a good 15 minutes of contemplation, complete with checking with Kris who was stuck working and couldn’t make it to the party, to make sure that we really had no place at his house or mine where we could possible set this up. Alas, I couldn’t think of one so I didn’t take it. The college students that one the next raffle drawing did, however, so it found a good home.

Newsarama had an very good interview with Phil Hester, who is taking over for JMS on Wonder Woman. Kris and I have really been enjoying the new direction that Wonder Woman was going and were afraid something would get lost when someone else took over. After reading this interview, I’m much more comfortable with the idea. I like what Hester has to say and I think he’ll be able to keep things as interesting as they currently are. We at Ret-Conned HQ especially love this quote:

She [Wonder Woman] won’t be infallible, but she will always be striving for justice. Sometimes that results in mercy and understanding, sometimes in ass-kicking.



Awesome.

Travis, what’s on your pull list?

• Atomic Robo & The Deadly Art of Science #2 - This issue was more fun than #1, but still doesn’t seem as enjoyable as the previous volumes. I can’t tell whether it’s the writing that’s off or whether my tastes have changed.
• Birds of Prey #7 - I’m really interested to see how Oracle is going to die and what comes next. There were some great moments and one-liners throughout this issue. I love Zinda Blake.
• Darkwing Duck #7
• The Unwritten #20 - Tommy’s search for The Source has taken an unexpected turn. It’s really hard to describe this book and how much I enjoy it other than to insist you read it.

Kris, what’s on your pull list?

• Batman #705 - Tony Daniels is doing a great job with this book. I’m glad he’s combining old and new characters.
• Batman & Robin #18
• Batman Orphans #2
• Birds of Prey #7 - Good issue, but not up tthe bar set by the last arc. I hope the ‘Death of Oracle’ ends up being something great.
• Brightest Day #16 - Yay Water Swords! Aqualad is shaping up to be interesting character. Also, Deathstorm is obnoxious and evil, but in a good way.
• Green Lantern #60 - Good issue, I hope Johns is going somewhere with this, but it seem to be coming to a head faster than I would like.
• Green Lantern Emerald Warriors #5 - Excellent. Kilowog is a great character and is becoming the heart of the GL universe. I also love Blezz in every shot she’s in.
• Green Lantern/Plastic Man: Weapon of Mass Deception #1
• Supergirl #59 - Creepy and heart-warming, exactly what I expect from Sterling Gates.
• Superman #706 - Preachy, uninteresting, and ultimately pointless. Cutting edge blogger tricked by photoshopped picture, newspaper editors are old and out of touch, etc.
• Time Masters: Vanishing Point #5 - The weakest issue of the series so far, but I think the conclusion will make up for it.
• Titans #30 - A decent issue, but Wallace is failing to make me care about his cast of villains outside of Deathstroke.
• Uncanny X-Force #3
• Velocity #3 - Strong female character in the tone of Joss Whedon. She quirky, confident, and has enough one liners to keep you Bwa-haha-ing all the way to the end.