Episode 13: Irredeemable and Incorruptible

The latest and luckiest episode of How I Got My Boyfriend to Read Comics is up! Zoe and Chris present their 13th episode, discussing comics news, interesting articles, what they’ve been reading and the interesting dichotomy presented by the Irredeemable and Incorruptible series, created and written by Mark Waid. They thank Thatcher for introducing and lending them the comics for this recording.

In comics news we discuss:

 

Zoe has been reading a variety of novels including Ursula Le Guin’s The Word for World is Forest, and trades such as the Jonah Hex: Bury Me In Hell, Kyle Higgins’ Supreme Power: Gods and Soldiers, and Simone’s Wonder Woman: Rise of the Olympian.  The huge amount of Leverage both she and Chris have been watching is mentioned. Chris has been still following the DCnU closely, mentioning his opinions on the #5’s including Red Hood and the Outlaws, Catwoman, Aquaman, Flash, Justice League Dark, All Star Western, Deadman, Captain Atom and his favourite Batman.

The main topic of discussion is the merits of Irredeemable and Incorruptible, two complementary series by Mark Waid. The use of analogues enables a detailed and well told story of both when the world’s greatest hero goes bad as well as when the world’s greatest villian goes good and the associated ethics.

We would like to hear your feedback! Please leave us a comment, either on this blog post or our facebook page. You can tweet to @thewolverina or email thewolverina@gmail.com.  If you enjoyed listening, you can even leave a comment on our itunes page. You can also receive notifications for all our podcast updates via the How I Got My Boyfriend To Read Comics homepage.

The Late Christmas Special Podcast Notes

Posting up our Christmas edition podcast late Christmas Eve. We recorded a week ago but Chris and I have been flat out so editing got left on the wayside.  Listen to Zoe and Chris chat via skype this week, as they discuss comic news, what they’ve been reading, what the best options for comic gifts for friends are,  Christmas comic specials and generally silly comics. Our recommendations discussion makes suggestions for a wide variety of friends, and is much too large to list.

News:

People on tumblring about re-release of No Man’s Land as a complete set of graphic novels, including missing stories.

We have mixed feelings on the new Byran Q Miller Smallville graphic project announced.

Changes to the DCNU roosters:

Greg Rucka talks about reading Warren Ellis’s FreakAngels. Zoe loves, Chris takes the chance to complain about FreakAngels.

Marvel cancelled the last of it’s lady centred comics.

Tiny Titans will be cancelled with #50 in March. 🙁

“Fanboy Rampage”. Facebook bitchfight between J M Stracksinski, Spiderman’s editor and Dan Slott (current Spiderman writer). Mark Waid also joins in.

The Ray #1 of a miniseries has come out, to fantastic reviews.

What We’ve Been Reading: 

Chris is still keeping up with the new 52 and not alot else.

Zoe talks about the Jane Yolen novel, Jonah Hex GNs, and re-reading Secret Six

Feedback:

… And finally, we love feedback and news tips! To give us your opinions, feel free to leave us a comment, either on this blog post or our facebook page. You can twit to @thewolverina or email thewolverina@gmail.com.  If you enjoyed the podcast, you can even leave a comment on our itunes page. You can also receive notifications for all our podcast updates via all this blog subscription, itunes, facebook or twitter.

Enjoy your holidays guys!

DCnU in October

Last month, I did a summary of my opinions on the #1’s released in September. I didn’t really rank them properly, just tried to get a vague order of what I enjoyed – tricky at the best of times, and the whole retelling-the-origin thing made it harder. I felt like I was rating an author on their ability to pitch a story quickly, and their ability to do an origin and ‘quick’ start, rather than quality story telling. Therefore, have another list! Again, vaguely ranked from most enjoyable to least, and again, I can’t be fucked reading all of the #2’s especially given how dreadful some of the #1’s were. But anyway:

Cover of Nightwing single issue 2

I look at this cover and all I can think is "too easy"

Top Tier
  • Batman #2: Amazing, if a little text-heavy.
  • Nightwing #2: This one. Woah. Wow. #1 dealt with the introduction and this dives headfirst into all the fun and games.
  • Wonder Woman #2: Still bitter about the daddy issue, but otherwise awesome.
  • Batgirl #2: Still feeling a bit rushed.
  • Justice League Dark #2: I am REALLY enjoying this. NFI where it is leading though.
Middling
  • Batwoman #2: Not bad, just the lack of Rucka is showing.
  • The Fury of Firestorm #2: Every time I read or hear the word ‘terrorism’ in something American I just start to tune out. :/
  • Stormwatch #2: Cheerfully bizarre in a British way. Still not sure on the Apollo and Midnighter thing.
  • Superboy #2: Can’t wait for them to give Superboy some personality here. Rose is awesome though.
  • Demon Knights #2: No idea what’s going on, but it’s fun, so who cares.
  • Birds of Prey #2: Still feels like it’s missing the point of what BoP was.
  • Deathstroke #2: Lots of silly fun and action. It’s not bad, just not really my thing. Very much adolescent-female territory.
  • Teen Titans #2: Some creativity, yet so much lazy shit.
Awful
  • Green Lantern – New Guardians #2: Still fucking awful, even my huge crush on Rayner isn’t helping.
  • Green Lantern Corps #2: I didn’t actually mean to read this, and I’m completely regretting it. Not even Guy was cool. 🙁
Cover of Huntress #1 The DCnU mini

In a wise move, DCnU Huntress is 'No Belly Window' Huntress.

Huntress #1 and #2 are pretty awesome too. It felt wrong to put them on the main list, but if they were they’d be in the top tier, maybe because it’s a mini or maybe because the author and artist had an extra month to get their shit sorted. Either way, much higher quality than the bulk of the other DCnU titles.

So October was, on the whole, a lot more enjoyable in terms of DCnU. This is partly due to the fact that I knew what I wanted to avoid, but also a lot less of the work is choppy or looks like the author just didn’t know the best way to introduce the story. Props have to go to Nightwing for being easily the most improved title. Not that the #1 was bad, I suspect it just erred onto the side of too much introduction, which for Dick fans like myself wasn’t necessary.
For the record, no – I don’t think this just because there was a lot more of Grayson’s arse and flesh on display. I’m a lady that likes plot with her pretty pictures, thank you very much.

Podcast Episode Eight is up

So once again I forgot to put up a post for the podcast that went up on Sunday night.

This time Chris and I discuss the latest news coming from DC,  and then move onto a discussion about various types of magic used in the DCU, both old and rebooted, as well as the changing roles these magic users fill. Specific stories discussed include Demon Knights, Justice League Dark, Hellblazer and Zatanna.

 Unfortunately no detailed shownotes today. I’m frantically trying to finish packing for a holiday and I can’t find any of the links.

We love feedback. To give us your opinions, feel free to leave us a comment, either on this blog or our facebook page. You can twitter @thewolverina or email thewolverina@gmail.com and if you enjoyed the podcast, leave a comment on our itunes page! You can also receive notifications for all our podcast updates via these sources.

Rating the DCnU

I’ve finally finished reading most of the new DC titles that I was interested in. I could wank on and on about my opinions, but honestly, you’ll hear most of it anyway if you listen to the podcast, and the internet is already full of opinions.  Instead, I’m just going to rate them in order from most enjoyable to least.  I’ve added some detail with the following key:

*  –   I’ll keep reading or buy the GN when it comes out (as I remain annoyed by buying singles).
B  –   Boring and pointless
S  –   Slow start but has potential
C  –   Confusing
GA  –  Great art
WTFFUCKEDUPSHIT  –  Insanely terrible content that editorial people should be shot over allowing into such a high profile event without realising how bad it makes comics look as a medium and genre

Most at the top:

Wonder Woman #1 (2011)

Diana managing to land herself on top of the shitheap otherwise known as DCnU

  • *Wonder Woman – GA
  • *Batman 
  • Justice League Dark
  • *Batgirl 
  • Demon Knights 
  • *Nightwing – S, GA
  • Fury of Firestorm – C, S
  • Batwoman – C, GA
  • Birds of Prey –  C, S
  • Superboy – S
  • Supergirl – S
  • *Teen Titans – C
  • Static Shock  –  S
  • Stormwatch – C
  • Deathstroke – S
  • Green Lantern New Guardians – B, C
  • Mr Terrific – C, B
  • Swamp Thing –  C, B
  • Superman – B
  • Justice League – B
  • Suicide Squad – B, WTFFUCKEDUPSHIT
  • Catwoman – WTFFUCKEDUPSHIT
  • Voodoo – WTFFUCKEDUPSHIT
  • Red Hood and The Outlaws – WTFFUCKEDUPSHIT

It’s funny, titles mostly wound up at the bottom of this list for being either horribly offensive or just really boring. It’s also quite difficult to rate these things. I mean, there’s plenty of average but decent-enough books that are pretty meh, but how do you rate that against a book that seems incredibly uneven, with terrible plots next to some cute lines or character interactions?  Also, introductions that are also entertaining stories on their own are hard to do well when you basically already know everything about the character. Most of the characters haven’t really changed that much outside of the WTF group.

I’ll probably keep reading Teen Titans, less because it seemed that good: Kid Flash looks awful, though Cassie is at least being given more personality than the girl who crushes on Superboy. I can’t stop laughing at Tim’s swan wings. Seriously? Aside from that, while I can appreciate great artwork on a book, I’m a character-and-plot kind of person, so while terrible art might put me off a book, great art won’t necessarily sell it to me, unless it’s doing something unusual in the comics medium.

It’s pretty awesome seeing Wonder Woman at the top of this list. It’s amazing to see that DC has got at least one thing right, and put her where she belongs.  Shame she doesn’t have a lot to compete with.

Podcast Episode Seven

Our most recent podcast went up yesterday on iTunes. I was in a rush to get to work,  so I didn’t have time to write a proper post.

Chris and I discuss the most recent news, DCnU titles and compare The Unknown Soldier: Haunted House with Kinetic.

In an attempt at more detailed shownotes,  all links below are for further information that informed our opinions.

News: Gotham Imposters closed beta invites, DCUO going f2p and the new website for the old comic trekker.

DCnU news: We cover our thoughts on Bunker, the new Teen Titan; the already changing DCnU author roster on Static Shock and Green Arrow; we look at Laura Hudson’s excellent article as well as Shortpacked‘s excellent summary of Red Hood and the Outlaws #1; Nightwing #1 is also discussed, where Chris embarrasses Zoe about her want for more gratuitous Grayson arse.  Also Wonder Woman #1,  Supergirl #1 and which of the New 52 we consider to be the best so far.

Reading: Zoe has read a lot of Ursula Le Guin, wanks on about her new computer and about finishing the rest of Secret Six. Chris talks about The Pro, House of Mystery and other books from the New 52.

Finally, in our comparison of the week, we compare Vertigo’s Vol. 1 of The Unknown Soldier and the DC Focus title, Kinetic.

We love feedback. To give us your opinions, feel free to leave us a comment, either on this blog or our facebook page. You can twitter @thewolverina and if you enjoyed the podcast, leave a comment on our itunes page! You can also receive notifications for all our podcast updates via these sources.

Thank you and enjoy!

Podcast about Batgirls.

A wild podcast has appeared! This time only slightly out of date (took us two days to get this up).

We discuss some of the new DC titles as well as  looking at the various Batgirls and their roles in DCU and DCnU.

We love feedback. To give us your opinions feel free to leave us a comment, either on this blog or our facebook page. You can twitter to @thewolverina and if you enjoyed the podcast, feel free to leave a comment on our itunes page! You can receive notifications for all our podcast updates via these sources.

Thank you and enjoy!

Podcasting is back online!

Podcasting was delayed a few weeks, however we’re back and hopefully on track!

Episode Four is now online, containing our usual discussion of feedback and news. We discuss the Jaime Reyes’ Blue Beetle run and Kevin Smith’s Green Arrow resurrection for a comparison between the ways to reboot superhero titles.

We can still be downloaded for free via itunes. Alternatively, for podcast notifications you can “like” the wolverina.net page on facebook.

Please do give us feedback either on this post,  email, facebook or our itunes page. Hope you all enjoy!