Want to keep up with the ever-advancing continuity porn of the DC and Marvel universes, but simply don’t have the time or money to buy every ongoing? We’re here to help. The Weekend Week In Review aims to give you ((usually) very) brief synopses of what happened in a select few of DC and Marvel’s titles – with a helping of sarcastic commentary – so that when some nasty old writer wants to punish you by heavily referencing a title you didn’t pick up, you won’t be left in the dark. Of course, that means that spoilers are in abundance, but I figure that you could figure that out.
In this week’s issue of “Before Watchmen: The Comedian” — #3, to be exact — Eddie… threw dog feces in a policeman’s face.
Fuck this, I can’t do this shit anymore.
Ugh, fine, our editor-in-chief is saying I put this burden upon myself, so here we go: after feeling down for being protested on his arrival home in America from Vietnam and only defended by skinheads and their ilk, Eddie thought he would aid the Watts rioters while wearing a smiley face a la blackface. Then, he threw dog shit at a cop’s face, and was scolded by Bobby Kennedy. When will this horror end?
Week two of DC’s Zero Month included “Batman” #0, where we finally learned the answer to the question “Does Scott Snyder have the balls to retcon ‘Batman: Year One,’ the Citizen Kane of origin stories?” The answer is, well, of course not. Instead, this “before the New 52!” tale was set in the convenient period after Bruce’s return to Gotham and before he decided “Yes, Father, I shall become a bat,” thus happening between the pages of the hallowed ‘Year One.’ The comic opened up with the Red Hood Gang, a full group of people wearing those more-helmet-than-hoods that ‘The Killing Joke’ made famous — see, instead of ‘Year One,’ Scott knew he had to overturn something else in Bat-Canon, and what better than the unknown and unloved ‘Killing Joke?’ The head Hood, though, soon realized that one of his co-robbers was a fraud — a disguised Bruce Wayne, in fact. Well, he didn’t realize that said fraud was Wayne, due to aforementioned dis-oh, you get what I mean. In the ensuing Red Hood/G.P.D. firefight, Bruce made a hasty escape through the Gotham sewers to his first Batcave in all but name, set up by crime alley. It seemed like Bruce had shaken the Red Hood Gang off, but the story ended with their leader pulling up by the building and declaring that he planned to blow it to hell, with an unsuspecting Bruce inside. I was wrong about Snyder not having balls — he’s already willing to pull out the continuity out from underneath his own story and kill Bruce in the past while he’s telling stories with Bruce in the present!
On second thought, that seems a bit unlikely. There was also a back-up about all the guys who would grow up to be Robins, as well as Barbara, looking up and going “Woah!” when the Bat Signal was first lit. Gag me, not only because that’s lame, but also because here comes the wave of people saying “STEPH WAS ROBIN TOO WHY DOES SCOTT HATE STEPH?!” on Tumblr and the like.
DC had one origin story this week that did not have the unnecessary #0 on its cover: “The Shade” #12. Back in 19th Century London, Richard Swift was a pleasant enough English importer, with a wife who loved him, two healthy sons, and a good friend named Charles Dickens. If he was a real friend, though, he would have had the heart to tell Dickens that Great Expectations sucked, and to point out whenever his symbolism was too heavy-handed, but I digress. One day, Swift was approached by a certain Mr. Simon Culp, a dwarf of a man who hired Swift to find and acquire a lion for a client of his. Despite Dickens’s mistrust of the little person, Swift was engaged by Culp’s tales of traveling the globe and seeing the unknown, and eventually located a lion for the man. Invited to a gala exhibiting the lion, Swift arrived with Dickens at his side just in time to be strung up for some dark ritual, and not one that involved tapping a swamp. By killing Swift, who was specifically requested, with a primal animal of nature, Culp would be granted unbelievable powers by Scathach, a being of fear. If only A Song of Ice and Fire had been around in those times, Swift might have known not to trust a dwarf. Something, though, went wrong — at least, according to Culp, who might have been played by his otherworldly benefactor — giving Swift the powers and condescending manner we know him for today, and causing him to lash out and brutally kill all of Culp’s cronies in the process. The end.
Continued belowWe waited over ten years for that?
It’s a big week in “AvX”. After no titles last week, this week bombards us me with four titles that I have to now write about for you people. Three of them are relevant, one of them just kinda happens in the same timeline as the others but gets the “AvX” stamp anyway. Not that that’s surprising or anything, but you should at least know you only really need to read about the first three books. Stick around for the last one only if you find my writing style charming.
As “AvX” #11 opens, it is a dark time for the Marvel U. Most of the X-Men led by Rogue (who is currently trapped in an alternate universe in “X-Men Legacy”, for those wondering) have abandoned Scott and Emma, choosing to side with the Avengers after realizing that those two are batshit crazy. Meanwhile, Captain America seeks out the Hulk to ask him to help, which is funny because honestly — how the heck did we not notice that the Hulk was not part of this event? He’s in Avengers Assemble so he’s not “missing from continuity” or anything, and yet somehow we just … never noticed. I guess that just goes to show you what an essential tool the Hulk is to the Marvel U.
It’s also humorous to note that between “Avengers Assemble,” “Incredible Hulk” and “AvX,” there still isn’t a singular way for the Hulk to be written. You’d think with the particular Architect in charge of setting the Hulk up for Marvel NOW! that he might have called Bendis to say no, the Hulk doesn’t speak like a third-grader obsessed with third person narration, but I guess not.
So the Avengers have an army and march on Utopia, where Cyclops and Emma are having a bit of tiff on how to control the known universe (more on this later). Emma says burn everything to the ground, Cyclops says “uh, no, that’s crazy,” and just when things get really heated (eh? eh?), Xavier shows up on the beach, giving Scott one last chance to stand down. Scott being Scott, he of course says no to such a statement, choosing instead to do the sanest thing his idiot brain can come up with: he steals Emma’s portion of the Phoenix Force, kills Professor Xavier and goes all Dark Phoenix on everybody’s asses.
They say that absolute power corrupts absolutely. Reading “AvX”, you’d see that they’e correct. You know what else corrupts? Years upon years upon years of being a B-List hero, always playing second fiddle to a short angry Canadian with better catch phrases. You know what else corrupts? Spending years upon years upon years training to be a leader, only to have the man who trained you tell you you’re worthless, leading you on a downward spiral as you do your best to protect your people from extinction while they work against you until your best friend leaves to go form his own club on the other half of the country leaving you with glorified “reformed” villains.
You know what? Destroy them all, Cyclops. You deserve this.
Hey, anyone know what’s up with Hope? Or Scarlet Witch? Weren’t they supposed to be important? …. Anyone? …. Anyone at all?
Moving on.
In “Uncanny X-Men” #18, we see the scene of Cyclops and Emma from a different angle. “AvX” #11 featured them very vocally having it out with one another before realizing Xavier and the Avengers are on the beach, ready for a throwdown. In the “UXM” version, Scott and Emma are in their shared psychic space having a lovely dinner whilst in the midst of the battle. Of course, they still discuss the same basic thing — Emma wants to burn to the ground, Scott think’s that’s a bad idea — but with this, there’s a little twist: “AvX” sees Cyclops take Emma’s power selfishly to overthrow his enemies; “UXM” sees Cyclops take Emma’s power because she mentally cheated on him with Namor.
Let’s all pause for a second. Everybody, go grab your Grant Morrison “New X-Men” omnibi or trades or whatever you’ve got, and look up how Emma and Scott got together. I’ll even give you a hint: it involved mental infidelity. Are we all on the same page about how hypocritical it all is? Ok, cool. Especially since Namor and Emma already had a brief physical affair in the arc right before “AvX.” I mean, that’s a lot worse, isn’t it?
Continued belowAh well. On the plus side, the book features what may be Scott’s best line in quite a while:
Yeah! Tell ’em, Scotty! (He does the phrase more justice than Charlie Sheen ever did, that’s for sure.)
Oh, and we also get a sequence between Magik and Colossus, de-powered but still in their Phoenix costumes (more on that later) as Magik reveals that she tricked Colossus into becoming Cyttorak’s champion so that she could show him what it’s like to be a monster like her all the time. The ironic element of the matter is that by doing this to her own brother, she actually became more monstrous, so Colossus can’t actually relate to her on the monster element since he didn’t fuck over his own sister to prove some kind of point. Better luck next time, Magik!
In “New Avengers” #30, we begin to see the aftermath of “AvX” — before “AvX” actually ends mind you. In it, we see Emma being carted off by Daredevil, Luke Cage, Mockingbird and Thing, assumedly to take her to superhero jail. Of course, what’s notable about this is that Emma is in her “regular” “costume,” unlike her Phoenix brethren who have also had their asses kicked recently. I’m just glad they gave her time to change.
But, really, that doesn’t have much to do with anything. I’m just being finicky over the foolish illusion that continuity matters. Because it doesn’t.
The issue is really about Luke Cage, like so many issues of Brian Bendis’ “New Avengers” run. In this one, Luke Cage decides that he is LUKE CAGE NO MORE, choosing to leave the Avengers lifestyle in order to focus on his family. Can you blame him, though? What would you rather do: hang out with your hot wife and adorable daughter, or fight nazi robots and megalomaniac god beings? And yes, a bunch of other stuff happens. Purifiers show up to try and kill Emma and spend the issue spouting off biblical quotes while fighting the four previously mentioned New Avengers — but really, none of that matters. It’s kind of like a Prologue chapter from the A Song Of Ice And Fire series — all that really matters is the first page so you know where you are followed by the last page so you know what happens. Everything else in between is pure fluff.
Finally, we have “Wolverine and the X-Men” #16, which doesn’t really tie into “AvX” in any way that matters but does tell the “origin” story of Kade Kilgore, the current Black King of the Hellfire club. It turns out that he was a disturbed seven year old to the same extent that he’s a disturbed twelve year old, and after his father murdered his mother he went out into the world to murder random people to see if he could. It turns out he can, and he’s great at getting others to kill for him. So one evening when his father brings him to the Hellfire Club to have some alone time with two lovely young ladies, Kade convinces the other members of the Hellfire Club to kill his father — and once they do, he kills them all for the lulz. Kids these days, am I right?
However, if you want to know what the “AvX” tie-in element is, it’s this: Having repurposed the Hellfire Club into an organization that sells Sentinels, the Phoenix Five show up to dismantle all Sentinels and arrest the five young brats that comprise the Hellfire Club. That’s about it. The origin story I already relayed is retold in a fourth-wall breaking sequence by Kade while in prison, and then he breaks himself and his “friends” out as they march on to Salem Center in Westchester County. How? By being sinfully rich.
So, like I said, not really a tie-in. But hey, most tie-ins aren’t really tie-ins anyway. It all evens out in the end.
This Week’s Contributors were:
Walt – “Before Watchmen: The Comedian” #3, “Batman” #0, “The Shade” #12
Matthew – “AvX” #11, “Uncanny X-Men” #18, “New Avengers” #30, “Wolverine and the X-Men” #16
Anything we didn’t get to that you’re interested in? Email me at the link below! This also applies for if you read something that we didn’t and want to share it with others, as I, too, have only so much money and time to spend on comics. Don’t worry, we’ll give you credit.
