Comics Whining: March 19, 2008

As promised:

Batman and the Outsiders #5 - Well, there was one interesting reveal that ought to make a lot of people happy.
Other than that, still solid but unexceptional.

Birds of Prey #116 - Eh. Nothing outrageously bad, but still generally disappointing. The Zinda/Huntress parts were much stronger than the Oracle/Misfit/Black Alice parts, which were just kind of there.

Brave and the Bold #11 - Heh. Ultraman was amusing. (I note, however, that the bizarre insistence on having both the Grant Morrison anti-matter CSA and an only subtly different Earth-3 CSA coexist is already becoming mildly confusing.) Uncertain whether I’ll stay for the next issue.

Checkmate #24 - Huh. So… the Rooks are a bunch of characters I’ve never heard of, and a brief check of Wikipedia reveals nothing to justify the precautions and buildup. Also, the real true evil plan seems significantly less threatening than the distraction for it. I trust Rucka, so it should all hopefully come together next issue.

Robin #172 - Well, there was one interesting reveal that ought to make a lot of people happy. Much like the other Chuck Dixon book this week. I… question the choice of method of reveal, though; since it’s rather anti-climatic to just have her remove her mask randomly after this much buildup in two different books. (Assuming there isn’t another twist coming; although it’s tough to see what it would be, solicitations indicated several more months before the mystery was to be solved.) Other than that, some interesting stuff going on, and the book remains fairly strong.

Sword #6 - Basically an exposition dump, but a fairly interesting one. The religious connotations are… unexpected. Continues to be one of the books I look forward to the most each month.

Order #9 - Sob. The fact that there’s only going to be one more issue of this is a dire injustice; if the whole or most of the team ends up dying to make the villain of the forthcoming Invincible Iron Man book seem more badass, I’ll be rather irked.