Comics

Smallville Season Eleven: Detective

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Smallville Season Eleven: DetectiveWhen the news first broke that Bryan Q. Miller was introducing Batman to the Smallville Universe and bringing Stephanie Brown with him I was excited. DC Editorial decision to substitute Batman’s partner for Barbara Gordon (who they were currently pushing as part of the New 52 reboot) had just the adverse effect. So I’d stayed away from the storyline until I recently picked up the collected trade paperback. Sure, I’d rather have Steph than Babs, and this version of Batman’s costume is a little too much like Knight for my liking, but it’s still pretty good.

The story centers around Batman and Nightwing coming to Metropolis in search of Joe Chill as the Dark Knight Detective has finally got a lead on the man who murdered his parents. Offering us the first meeting between Batman and Superman, in classic comic fashion as the pair fight before later cementing their friendship, the storyline also features Mister Freeze and the Prankster who team-up to take down the heroes with Kryptonite bullets and an insidious plan using the likeness of one of comic’s greatest heroes as a ploy to steal weaponized drones.

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Dexter’s Laboratory #1

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Dexter's Laboratory #1Continuing to grow Cartoon Network presence in their comics, the first issue of the new four-issue mini-series introduces the characters from Dexter’s Laboratory into the IDW universe. Fans of the show and those, like me, with only vague memories Genndy Tartakovsky‘s cartoon which ran for four season is the late 90s and early 2000s should enjoy themselves here.

After his sister Dee Dee destroys yet another of his experiments, Dexter comes up with a new plan and wastes no time to create his newest invention which he believes will fulfill his wishes while he dreams and get rid of that pesky sister once and for all.

With the opening issue ending on a cliffhanger as Dexter tries out his invention for the first time we’ll have to wait another month to discover its fallout. The tone and pace Derek Fridolfs and Ryan Jampole and create here is a hellova lot of fun while crafting an intriguing idea for a story that I’ll definitely come back for more of. Worth a look.

[IDW, $3.99]

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Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: New Animated Adventures #10

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Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: New Animated Adventures #10When Spider Bytez starts kidnapping people from the surface and dragging them down into his lair the Turtles hop into action, but are soon caught like flies in his web. Thankfully Michelangelo‘s plan to cover himself in pizza, based on his presumption that the disappearances are he result of the Kraang working with ghosts and Big Foot, proves to be the key to getting the Turtles out of another sticky situation.

Mikey slips out of the webs and distracts the villain, allowing Donatello, Raphael, and Leonardo time to escape and free the hostages before taking Mikey’s lead and further infuriating Spider Bytez with a few insults of their own.

The goofy adventure (set bizarrely around Valentine’s Day for a late April comic) is fun while highlighting another of the Turtles’ weirder villains. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: New Animated Adventures #10 also includes a Mikey back-up story where the Turtle’s one-track mind races his brothers into a desperate situation (which turns out to be pizza). Worth a look.

[IDW, $3.99]

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Atomic Robo: The Knights of the Golden Circle #1

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Atomic Robo: The Knights of the Golden Circle #1If you’re an atomic-powered robotic scientific-adventurer lost 140 some years in the past in the middle of the Old West the smart thing to do would be to lay low. Following the events of Atomic Robo and The Savage Sword of Dr. Dinosaur that’s just what our hero has been doing for more than a decade, but when an outlaw gang shoots an old-timer within earshot of Atomic Robo, propriety be damned.

Writer Brian Clevinger and artist Scott Wegener’s latest adventure for our scientific adventurer is certainly a doozy. Whether you want to call him the robot with no name or Ironhide, the first issue of the latest five-issue mini-series sets up two enemies for Atomic Robo to face: the Butcher Boys and history itself to which our hero must try not make any big changes. Throw in a wild card like Doc Holiday and there’s no telling what might happen next.

It didn’t take long to sell me on the new series, and even after receiving a free digital review copy of the comic I gladly spent the money to grab a print copy. Giddyap Robo, I’m ready to ride! Worth a look.

[Red 5, $3.50]

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Daredevil #2

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Daredevil #2After the last issue offered readers a glimpse of things to come in Matt Murdock‘s life down the line, Daredevil #2 returns to the present and the newly-relocated hero/lawyer to San Fransisco alongside his new law partner Kristen McDuffie. We don’t get any more information on Foggy Nelson (other than the fact the world appears to believe he is dead), but the new version of the title does offer Daredevil with an opportunity to do something rather unusual – go up against another blind vigilante.

Pulling the Shroud out of half-forgotten Marvel mothballs, writer Mark Waid and Chris Samnee dust the vigilante off first as a rival for Daredevil, but later the character is be revealed as the new (sorta ridiculous) kingpin of crime in the city.

A poor man’s Daredevil in several respects, the Shroud is an interesting first choice to pit against the hero, although it does make me wonder how far Waid and Samnee will have to scrape the bottom of the Marvel barrel for West Coast threats going forward. Worth a look.

[Marvel, $3.99]

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