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ComicBook Showdown Hey Cool Cats and Dangerous Kitties! Welcome to ComicBook Showdown. We love comics and we love talking about comics, and we want to be your one stop for comic news and community. We have a podcast each week that reviews a gob of comics that came out that week. We review 'em and rate 'em so you can be informed as a collector or reader. Our podcast also has listener and e-mail reviews and comments as well as industry pro and creator interviews, contests, and more!

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Review: Flashpoint:Project Superman 2 by Scott Snyder, Lowell Francis and Gene Ha (DC)

Reviewed 7/27/11 by Darin
Flashpoint:Project Superman 2
Subject Zero has company it seems, in a cell elsewhere: 1/2 mile below Metropolis in the testing facility in which he's now held incarcerated. His companion is the strange alien humanoid-looking boy that General Lane has come to call Kal. Everyone else calls him Subject One. The boy exhibits abilities beyond those of mortal men, and his strange alien physiology allows his very cells to act as batteries, giving him a range of many different abilities. Subject Zero, meanwhile, while in captivity, manipulates minute waves of energy to vibrate simulations of sound, and in this way he communicates as whispers in Kal's, ear-teaching him how to use his x-ray vision. Subject Zero warns Kal not to trust the people in his compound. [More]

Review: Wonder Woman 613, Arc: The Odyssey, part 13: Nemesis (DC), written by J. Michael Straczynski and Phil Hester, pencils by Don Kramer and Travis Moore, Inks by Wayne Faucher, Walden Wong and Drew Geraci, Colors by Pete Pantazis

Reviewed 7/27/11 by Judy
Wonder Woman 613
This is the issue where it all comes together. I've been following the Odyssey since the first installment back in issue 600, and as the story progressed, the questions in my mind have been accumulating. Who is this Diana, and how does she fit into Wonder Woman continuity? Why is her memory a blank slate, and why is she younger than the Diana we know and love? When does the story take place? This issue is the pulse-pounding payoff, intrepid comic fans. [More]

Criminal: Last of the Innocent 2 by Ed Brubaker, Sean Phillips and Val Staples (Marvel Icon)

Reviewed 7/27/11 by Darin
Criminal: Last of the Innocent 2
Last issue, our miserable friend Riley decided he has to murder his wealthy wife, Felix (short for Felicity). In this issue, Riley lays the groundwork for his dirty deed. He tells Felix he has to head back to his old home town of Brookview, where his Dad has recently died. His Mom is selling the house and needs help packing and disposing of things. His cheating wife could care less that he'll be gone about a week, and sees it as an opportunity to kick it up with her husband's rival, Teddy. Riley's definitely done his research, and sets up an alibi involving the Jughead to his Archie—a recovering addict who is his best friend. Earlier that evening, in town, Riley managed to dump Visene in the local cop's soda pop, messing up his stomach and giving him poo-poo issues. Later, he gets his buddy to relapse by smoking some weed with him and taking him to a bunch of bars. Freakowski doesn't last long, and when he passes out, Riley borrows his car and hauls ass for two hours back to the city to catch up with his wife and her lover. Riley observes the couple using one of her father's many condos in the city, and while in hiding, notices a nosy neighbor watching the man and woman distastefully. When Teddy the discount Romeo splits just a short while later, Riley slips into the building unnoticed. A little buzzed, Riley momentarily rues his decision asking "Why'd you have to be so damned beautiful?" At the end of this chapter, Riley lashes out with his weapon of choice: an icepick. Throughout the story were treated to simplistic renderings of the characters fleshing out situations in the past with very adult undertones in a vignette called "Life of Riley". These cartoons or "strips" are bizarre with their heavy subject matter and light-hearted cartoony style. At every moment of the story you're aware of what a waste of potential this lazy spoiled loser is, and you keep catching yourself going, "Oh man, what are you doing you jerk off?!"

Criminal: Last of the Innocent 2 by Ed Brubaker, Sean Phillips and Val Staples (Marvel Icon)

Reviewed 7/27/11 by Captain Paul
Criminal: Last of the Innocent 2
Riley seems to have gone with his idea to kill his cheating, lazy wife and in this issue he sets the ball into motion, getting an alibi and a method of dispatch. He goes back to his hometown and sees Lizzie again, and we see that his flame for her has grown even bigger. That does not bode well for the end of the story— after all, this is noir. Riley needs an alibi, so he helps his buddy Freak off the wagon, getting him piss drunk and stoned out of his mind. When Freak is passed out in a puddle of his own puke, Riley heads out to do the deed. He gets home and waits as she rolls around in the sheets with teddy. After Teddy heads out minus some bodily fluids, Riley heads up to the bedroom, places his hand over Felix's mouth and an icepick is ominously close to her eye.

Review: Green Lantern Emerald Warriors 12 (DC), written by Peter Tomasi, pencils by Chris Batista, inks by John Dell

Reviewed 7/27/11 by Judy
Green Lantern Emerald Warriors 12
In the interest of full disclosure, I need to let you know that I love comics starring Guy Gardner. He's one of my favorite lanterns, and I have no idea why. He's the kind of guy I go out of my way to avoid in real life. You know the type—he's the testosterone-fueled party animal you don't want to invite to your get-together because he's going to drink too much, start a fight, puke in your plants, hit on all the women and call them lesbians if they don't respond to his advances, and mouth off to the police after they come to shut things down because he's been using a bull-horn with the karaoke machine, and the neighbors have had enough. What's to like? Guy's rude, bellicose nature makes him a whole lot of fun when he's on Oa and not in my living room intimidating my guests. And it's just what's needed in the situation the Guardians are facing in this issue. [More]

X-men Schism 2 by Jason Aaron and Frank Cho (Marvel)

Reviewed 7/27/11 by Captain Paul
X-men Schism 2
At the start of the issue the Iranian president is rallying his crowd and trying to start an old and dilapidated sentinel. It of course backfires and starts massacring innocent civilians. The President is saved by the female X-men and personally saved by the Jewish female X-dame Kitty Pride. Wolverine and Cyclops have a tussle over what to do with Quire when he presents himself to them on a silver platter seeking asylum in Utopia. At issue's end things have heated up, as Killgore and a young female accomplice murder some alien arms dealers and steal a deadly slug. Cyclops decides a show of force is the best option to keep the humans in check and sends his heavy hitters to a mutant rights unveiling since there will be cameras.

The Cape 2 by Joe Hill, Jason Ciaramella and Zach Howard (IDW)

Reviewed 7/27/11 by Darin
The Cape 2
This chapter starts with Nick examining the post-autopsy cadaver of his former childhood friend and unrequited crush, Angie, who also happens to be his deadbeat brother Eric's ex-longtime girlfriend. Angie is the victim of death by falling 12 stories, but she was found in a park where there's nothing that high to fall from. We're then treated to a flashback scene depicting Nick and Eric as kids, shortly after Eric's accident. It's revealed that Nick and Eric played a superhero "Good guy vs. Bad guy" game where Eric was a guy called "The Bolt" (which would explain the bolt on his cape), and Nick was a masked guy called The Streak." Nick tells Eric it's best that they not mention the fact that Eric was seemingly suspended in midair by that cape, until it ripped and sent him hurtling earthbound, leaving him in his current bedridden state. Later, when their Mom arrives, Nick leaves the room, and she tells Eric she's gotten rid of the cape when he asks about it. Back in the present, detectives question Eric. They have zero leads on the case involving his ex-girlfriend Angie, and, after all, he was her ex-boyfriend. Eric's a bad liar, and the detectives immediately suspect he has information he's not telling them. They leave, but before they get very far, Eric hatches an ill-conceived plan involving his enchanted cape and a crazed grizzly bear from a nearby zoo. The plan prevents the police detectives from sharing their suspicions with anyone. Eric is on his cell phone with his brother when he enacts his scheme, and upon returning home where he's currently living in his mom's basement, he discovers after he lands that she was watching out the window, and now knows his special secret!

Captain America and Bucky 620 by Ed Brubaker, Marc Andreyko, and Chris Samnee (Marvel)

Reviewed 7/27/11 by Captain Paul
Captain America and Bucky 620
We get to learn about Bucky Barnes in this issue, and the amazing art of Chris Samnee certainly helps bring it to life. Bucky's mom died when his younger sister was little, so Bucky helps his dad by taking care of her, but Bucky has a temper. When his dad dies after an accident on the army base and his sister is sent to a boarding school, and Bucky stays on base selling cigs and porn to army men. He gets a sergeant for whom he procured a magazine of naked ladies for to take him to a bar. Bucky of course tries to dance with a dashing damsel and gets into it with a few of the locals. Bucky's whisked away and put in the brig but his antics seem to have caught the eye of the brass. He's sent off for training, but no one will say why. Bucky becomes quite a skilled soldier. In between training sessions, he watches reels of Cap slugging bad guys and becomes enamored with him. At issue's end we and Bucky learn why he was being trained and groomed: he will be Cap's sidekick.

Uncanny X-Force 12 by Rick Remender, Mark Brooks, and Andrew Currie (Marvel)

Reviewed 7/27/11 by Darin
Uncanny X-Force 12
Last issue found our gang of lovable mutant assassins stuck in the Age of Apocolypse, where Wolverine was being confronted by that reality's Jean Grey. This issue finds the hidden fortress under attack by a Sentinel scout. Everyone blames the Sentinel on the newly arrived X-Force, saying that-they'd been there for years, and all the sudden-X-Force shows up and what do you know? A sentinel "happens" to find them. It's discovered that the aboriginal mutant, Gateway, exists in this dimension. Gateway has the ability to get X-Force back home to their reality, however, he's being held prisoner in a highly secure prison building, so a strategy meeting is held. Two teams form. Wolvie's team will free Gateway while Fantomex's team harvests 2 totally different life seeds from a Celestial corpse. Before the teams depart-Fantomex continues his creepy pursuit of another guy's girl. When ,he frustrates Psylocke to the point that after she punches him in the face, she allows him to kiss her. Saving that hassle for later, the teams take on their missions. Logan's team infiltrates the prison and almost makes it to their objective, but they're ambushed by an AOA security contingent of various altered 616 characters. The team finally makes it to Gateway's holding cell when Wolverine finds out who this reality's new Apocalypse is. He's got one hand, calls the daughter he just vaporized "pumpkin," and has three claws that go "snikt" when he unleashes them.
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