Ralphina

You all need to be reading Formerly Known As the Justice League and its sequel I Can't Believe It's Not the Justice League. If it doesn't switch you to the DCU for life, absolutely nothing will (except maybe Blue Beetle).

More funny panels will be coming later, but I want to focus on the most depressing aspect of the series:

(Ralph mistakenly thinks that Sue is pregnant).

I hated the art when I first saw it, but it's kind of growing on me. The faces are so expressive. Just look at Ralph's goofy smile in panel 2.

Ralph and Sue are seen as one of the best couples in comicdom. They're really cute together and they actually love each other. All their interactions in this series are great, but unfortunately in the back of my mind, all I could think was...

Not only does Sue end up dying, but she ends up being burned to death, which could not have been an easy death. Is there anything more soul crushingly depressing than the formerly jaunty Ralph wailing in the rain while clutching the burned husk of his wife?

Oh, and here's what makes it WORSE: in the first set of panels, Ralph is delighted at the idea of becoming a father. It's later revealed that Sue had become pregnant right before her death. COME ON, DC!

Also sad: I LOVE Max Lord in FKATJL. He's kind of a fussy, manipulative jerk, but also really funny (and I'm pretty sure he has a cute crush on Sue). But I couldn't completely enjoy him because I know that someday he will go crazy, shoot Ted in the head, and then have his neck snapped by Wonder Woman. DC: WHERE DREAMS GO TO DIE.

Poor G'nort. All he wants is to pee!

That slash is in the title for a few reasons

I recently watched Superman/Batman: Apocalypse, and it got me back into Superman/Batman. I haven't read the series for awhile because it stopped making much sense after Jeph Loeb left, but it's getting (somewhat) better, due in no small part to the first annual issue, written by Joe Kelly. I believe it's a reimagining of an older story, so it's in a different timeline than the rest of the series. Hence, why Clark and Bruce don't know each other.

I don't remember much of the background because I was too enthralled with the blatant homoeroticism, but Lois and Clark are on a cruise to do some kind of story for the Daily Planet and Bruce is also there to do his womanizing playboy thing (more than any other chara

cter, it is SO WEIRD to see him without his costume. I think in part because his superhero personality and civilian personality are so different).

The whole thing reads like a romantic comedy. I'm not even kidding. It's not just a little

homoerotic and you can kind of see it if you're trying to see it. It's BLATANT. Clark and Bruce first start arguing when checking in, and then quickly realize that someone screwed up their reservations.

I'm not kidding. They have to share a room. Not like I've seen that in a billion teen shows and romantic comedies or anything. Lois is amused. I'm fairly sure they're dating or married at this point, so why she won't let him share her room, I honestly have no idea.

But it gets better.

Yes. They have to share a bed. And it looks like a twin or something. I absolutely love that Clark left his glasses on to sleep. This is the peril of not having a well thought out disguise: when the only thing separating you from Superman is a curl and glasses, what happens when you have to lose both of them?

Deadpool NotDeathstroke knows what's up.

You might ask, how can this get gayer than two men with a history of homoerotic subtext being forced to sleep in the same bed? Well...

Yes. Clark undressed Bruce. And not just with his eyes, like he usually does.

Joe Kelly=a national treasure.

Poor Streaky

"Figure out my secret identity yet? It's not like I wear a mask or anything. And sometimes I show up in my Super

man identity while looking like Clark Kent." For God's sakes, it even took his own WIFE forever to figure it out.

If the Secret Six take over the world, we're screwed because Ragdoll will be ruling us. I'm not sure if that's better or worse than having Deadshot as a ruler. But nowhere near as bad as Cheshire or Parademon. If this happens, I'm moving to Africa.

Fans of Power Girl may be going, "Wait! Streaky's actually orange!" Well, it takes about three issues of her comic to realize that Streaky is covered in dust from his kitty litter, Peej=worst pet owner ever.

KRAK

Ha ha ha ha. Oh Steph. You should expect this by now.

Kilowog's a mothereffin' BAMF! Love that guy. Best GLs: 1. Guy Gardner 2. Kilowog 3. Kyle Rayner 4. G'nort. I will fight anyone who says otherwise.

I love this because it makes so much sense. Everyone loves the DC heroes, but everyone hates the Marvel sueprheroes. So when the Marvel heroes go to the DCU, they're very discombobulated by the attention they receive.

Unterrifying

Okay, come on now. There's gratuitous, and then there's cheesecake, and then there's this.

After Kara/Lobo (and just before Ollie/Deadman) Jaime/Batman was my favourite teamup from Brave and the Bold. Their personalities are completely different: Batman is dark and broody, while Jaime is fun and happy. He really wants to impress Batman, and Bats is just trying to help him be a better superhero.

Where Batman really shines, in any comic that he appears, is when he's trying to teach/help other superheroes. You would think that since Superman is nice and pure that he would be the one to mentor others, but he really isn't. He has the "Super Family" but this mostly consists of people tangentially related to him (Peej being his otherdimensional counterpart's cousin, Kon being his partial clone) who go off and do their own thing. He doesn't even hang out with Krypto that much. Bats actually mentors and teaches all of his sidekicks (by my count: three Batgirls and five Robins) and is involved in their lives and continues to be involved after they evolve (ex: Oracle, Nightwing). Not only that, but as I said before, he often supports the heroes who don't receive much support elsewhere (Booster Gold, Plastic Man). I'm not a huge fan of his mostly because I prefer my comics to be both funny and optimistic in tone, but I really like him for that.

Jarvis is no Alfred, who can extricate himself from virtually every kidnapping situation, but he tries.

Damian replaces Tim as my fave Robin.

There's something you never want to see in your lifetime.

Protip: Never accept help from Shiva. It won't turn out well.

Wonder Woman is always so morally upright and honourable, you never expect her to fight dirty. I believe she's fighting Hercules though, and he always brings out the worst in her.

Oh man, I love these two together. Can they have their own teamup comic please? Steph is great in her own comic but the issues where Damian and Steph worked together were my fave. And Damian in his own comic (Batman and Robin by Grant Morrison) was very underwhelming. They need to be together.

As a whole, I find the women in DC to be way more kickass and memorable than the Marvel ones. The only Marvel female-centric series I read are She-Hulk, Spider-Girl, and the Pulse (but when not in her own series, Jessica always takes a backseat, so much so that my brother assumed she was always a one dimensional character who only existed to be Luke's wife). I'm not sure there are even many others. In the DCU, however, I'm a fan of Wonder Woman, Birds of Prey, Power Girl, and two different series of Batgirl. Come on Marvel. Get your act together.

My stomach was making the rumblies...that only hands could satisfy

"Caaaarl! That kills people, Caaaarl!"

That's awkward, Magog, seeing as how SPOILER Rip's actually Booster's son.

Here's a picture that I've had forever but never used:

A pubescent Spider-Man getting hit in the chest with a very phallic object wielded by Doc Ock. You're welcome.

Guy Gardner makes everything awesome

I'm not going to lie: this is the best stupid/awesome idea I have ever seen. If it was a reality show, I would watch it.

And now, courtesy of Marvel Teamup, we have a couple of fastball specials:

Freedom Ring throwing a skrull!

And Spidey throwing X-23! Here's something to keep in mind whenever you see the fastball special: the person doing the throwing is touching the other one's butt. Yeah, that's something Colossus never mentioned when he was throwing Wolverine.

I also like his flip flops

I didn't love the direction this writer (can't remember who it was) took with the Cass/Connor relationship, but at its beginnings I thought it was adorable (minus Kon's RIDICULOUS costume). I also thought the portrayal of Cass was well done and realistic. She's never been able to be a normal kid, and so she never really developed the social skills that everyone else had. Her confusion about her feelings for the dude whose name I can't remember and Kon was very real and very in character. The thing I like the most about Cass's series (other than that she's a total BAMF) is her quest to overcome her upbringing and be a good and normal person.

Side note: as a whole, I don't think this art was very popular. I didn't mind it though: I like the sharpness of it. It's very angular, and in closeups of Cass she looked so cute. If one thing's off, it's the colouring: it looks like the pages have been left out in the sun for awhile.

I love how fucking distressed this dude looks. He fucked with the WRONG GL. Also amusing: even on vacation, Guy's still a Green Lantern.

Kingpin has never been my favourite Marvel villain (Dr. Doom forever!) but he was awesome in this issue of Spider-Man/Batman. He played R'as al Ghul so hard that dude didn't know what hit him. Plus, his relationship with his wife is very sweet. I still don't understand his deal though. Like, he's not a mutant. Is he just naturally ginormous? In Ultimate Spider-Man, he appeared to be roughly 15 feet tall. His fingers are each like the width of his wife's arm.