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Showing posts from May, 2022

Atom Smashed - JSA #75

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  Black Vengeance, Part III JSA #75 Cover Date: September 2005 Released: 7th July 2005 ⋅ Writers: Geoff Johns ⋅ Colourists: John Kalisz ⋅ ⋅ Pencilers: D on Kramer / Leonard Kirk / Stephen Sadowski ⋅   Inkers: Keith Champagne / Michael Bair  ⋅ Letterers: Rob Leigh ⋅  ⋅ Editors: Peter Tomasi / Harvey Richards   ⋅  This is not a Power Girl Story! I know I've been saying this a lot, but all team books occasionally take time out to focus on a single character. And as is common it often seems to happen when the character is on the way out, and this issue it's poor Atom Smashers time. We get flashes of his past from a young kid deciding to do good, joining the JSA and eventually being offered a chance to help Black Adam, all done in a suitable sepia tone. Finally, he grows to giant size, well beyond his normal limits, and takes on the, also suitable gigantic Spectre. In the end, Atom Smasher chooses to sacrifice his life so that Spectre will stop looking for vengeance here, who

Can you feel the Force? - Power Girl #1

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Threads! Power Girl #1 Cover Date:  June1988 Released:  1st March 1988 ⋅ Writers:  Paul Kupperberg  ⋅ Pencilers:  Rick Hoberg   ⋅     ⋅   Inkers:  Arne Starr  ⋅  Colourists:  Julianna Ferriter  ⋅ ⋅  Letterers:  Bob Pinaha   ⋅  Editors:  Robert Greenberger   ⋅  After what seems like forever of her either being in a team or hardly appearing at all, it's nice to see an issue around just Power Girl! And I've got to say this issue introduces a lot of things that I consider the standard from Power Girl '09. To start with we're in New York City, and yes I know the JSA was generally in New York but to me, it never felt like it was the focus, whilst from the first page, New York is front and center!   We start with her day job as the head of Starrware, dealing with a potential takeover bid from top software company owned by Sayles Wilde. Karen, as Kara's in her civilian identity (for a change), is not happy about this having not been told about it and says no whilst mentio

Kara through the Looking Glass - Infinity Inc #50

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  It's A Grimmworld After All Infinity Inc #50 Cover Date: May 1988 Released: 26th January1988 ⋅ Writers:  Roy Thomas ⋅ Pencilers: Vince Argondezzi ⋅   ⋅   Inkers: Tony DeZuniga ⋅ Colourists: Liz Berube ⋅ ⋅  Letterers: Jean Simek ⋅ Editors: Roy Thomas ⋅  In what's the dying embers of Infinity Inc, a comic that doesn't quite fit in a post Crisis world, Power Girl weirdly is bought back into the folds for this weird little tale. We start our tale with Skyman (aka The Star-Spangled Kid) and Jade, Jade having given a lift for Skyman back to his pad. In the elevator, he's confronted by a bunch of characters from fairytales. Falling out of the lift he's caught by Power Girl, who didn't see or more importantly hear anything he just encountered. We get a brief mention of her trip to Skartaris (Warlord) and a meeting between Kara and Jonni Thunder (a character I wished I'd seen more of), whilst Sylvester get changed into his Skyman costume. Power Girl cal

No appearing (mostly) in this comic - Tangent Comics: Powergirl #1

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Power Struggle Tangent Comics: Powergirl #1 Cover Date:  September 1998 Released:  29th July 1998 ⋅ Writers:  Ron Marz  ⋅ Pencilers:  Dusty Abell  ⋅   Inkers:  Dexter Vines  ⋅ ⋅  Colourists:  James  Sinclair  ⋅  Letterers:  Chris  Eliopoulos   ⋅  ⋅   Editors:  Eddie Berganza   ⋅  It's  Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month so what better time to explore another Power Girl, this time from Earth-9 the Tangent universe. Basically, it's a chance to start from zero, whilst the names are the same as the basic DC Universe everything is looked at from a different angle, mostly as if supers were relatively new in '98.   Being a comic called Power Girl obviously, she doesn't appear much in the comic, in fact, the threat of her spurs different groups into action. As this revolves around China creating Metahumans it could very easily be a metaphor for nuclear powers. If it is it's very subtly done as there doesn't seem to be any clues given about such things. We start wit

No so Terrific - Mister Terrific 1, 2 & 7

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  Let me start by saying I really like Mister Terrific, though based on an older character by now he's his own character. I'm also not apposed to comics that deal with political themes, after all the All-Star/Adventure era had some subtle and not so subtle political comments (for good or ill). I preface all this for one simple reason, I do not like these comics! And I really don't like being negative, I'm here to spread the joy of comics, especially those hidden gems that people might not have necessarily discovered (like those Warlord comics). And all respect if you enjoy this one, I'm always interested in Luckily Kara isn't in the comic much, though that creates its own problem, and until issue 7 it's not really clear it is our Kara. She's just a pretty blonde woman, who happens to be a successful businesswoman, that sometimes shows up in a scene. Apparently, the two of them are dating, or at least enjoying each other's "company", but you

Loss of one of the Worlds' Finest - Worlds' Finest #1

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  Rebirth Worlds' Finest #1 Cover Date: July 2012 Released:  2nd May 2012 ⋅ Writers: Paul Levitz ⋅ Pencilers: George Pérez / Kevin Maguire ⋅ ⋅ Inkers: Scott Koblish / Kevin Maguire ⋅ ⋅ Colourists: Hi-Fi Design / Rosemary Cheetham ⋅  ⋅ Letterers: Carlos M. Mangual ⋅ Editors: Wil Moss ⋅    Whilst I was planning to cover the New 52 this week, I thought it only fair to skip from the earliest comics to cover this issue. The reason being sadly the death of George Pérez this previous weekend (6th May 2022). From all I've heard Mr.  Pérez was a lovely man who really seemed to enjoy comic books and their fans. I don't think my word could ever do the man justice, but I'd like to dedicate this to his memory. Regardless of what you think of the New 52, you have to admire that it wasn't afraid to experiment and try new things. Things like World's Finest. I dipped into the New 52 when it launched but only a few of the comics I kept collection, a fewer to the bit

Justice a little bit more - JSA #74

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  Black Vengeance, Part II of III JSA #74 Cover Date:  August 2005 Released:  2nd June 2005 So The Spectre has gone crazy and is trying to destroy all magic in the world. And to underline this we open with him attacking two characters I honestly didn't expect to see after the end of Infinity Inc, Hector Hall, who has kinda sorta given up being Doctor Fate, and Lyta who is just sort of hanging around these days. We don't however see what happens to them as we cut to where the main part of the story is taking place Kahndaq, which is being attacked by giant Kaiju Spectre. In a quiet bit we get Power Girl being pretty protective of Star Girl, that aunty character I liked from the end of her time on Infinity Inc (almost). It seems poor Courtney is taking Atom Smashers "betrayal" pretty hard, and there seems to be some beef with her and Captain Marvel (or Shazam, whatever). Which he try's to explain and Kara firmly tells him to just leave it for now. We also get a neat

Justice, just justice - JSA #73

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  Black Vengeance, Part I of III JSA #73 Cover Date:  July 2005 Released:  11th May 2005 So obviously after coming off of one crisis I want to slam into the next one! But the plan has always been to look at either end of the Atlantis era and her rediscovering her Kryptonian origin (again). In fact you'd have to remember she's meant to be Atlantean as most here seem to think that she one of the Kryptonian.  Previously in Countdown to Infinite Crisis poor old Ted Kord (Blue Beetle) was ignoreed by the entire DC Universe and found out Maxwell Lord (who founded the JLI, we'll get to that soon) was actually a villain, fatally. Interesting in that story both Ted and Supes act like Power Girl is Kryptonian, and Superman mentions her powers have been getting a little wonky (Kara appears in a few panels but doesn't do much but arrive and leave). And in the previous issue of JSA whilst traveling forward in time, they were in the WW2 era, she has a bit of a freak out with multiple