Hey so we are back and continuing the summary of the new mini-series by Dark Horse Comics featuring the mighty Slayer with “Slayer: Repentless”, It’s issue number two now and if you missed my narrative about the debut issue you’ll want to click on THIS LINK to be more up to speed on the goings on. When we last left, our hero had just received his powers and was learning that with great powers comes great responsibility. Oh wait, that’s a different character altogether but our main protagonist did meet Slayer at the closing pages of the issue. Sort of like when Rey finally reached Luke Skywalker in “The Force Awakens” and the credits began to roll as soon as he turned around.
The “hero” of the tale is Wyatt and he is on a mission of vengeance having just suffered a tremendous loss and the odds against him are rather high since he is facing off against a militant Neo-Nazi order with whom he once had a close association to. Fortunately, he has the guys in Slayer to help fight the battle and as noted in the previous summary, this is the Slayer of now in today’s musical geography. The violence is at an all-time high in this one and the language somewhat colorful and as you read through you will likely chuckle at the occasional Slayer song lyric reference being dropped. I won’t spoil where they are for you of course and leave that to your reading. Continue reading An Overview Of Dark Horse Comics: “Slayer: Repentless” #2→
As a lifelong comic book reader and a bunch of decades deep in the Metal fan I love when the larger than life figures on the stages of the world head onto the comic book pages because it’s usually something rather interesting. Now we’ve seen both KISS and Alice Cooper appear in titles over the years and there was even a “Cryptic Writings Of Megadeth” at one point and now it’s Slayer’s turn with “Slayer: Repentless” that come care of Dark Horse Comics. I grabbed the first issue off the stands the other day and am here to give you a quick, hopefully non-spoiler overview of the issue.
I should stress that this is NOT a superhero comic in any way shape or form, and is instead more of a super gritty, super violent tale that makes the doings seen on both “Oz” and “Sons Of Anarchy” placed into a comic book. The tale comes care of scribe Jon Schnepp who did the “The Death Of Superman Returns” film (which you should really watch) and artists Guiu Villanova and Mauricio Wallace and it follows the traumatic life of Wyatt who was raised in a hateful place of neo-Nazi, White Supremacy and is fighting to get out of that life in the best possible fashion. His former family hates him and hunts him but Wyatt is no stranger to this life of violence and hunts the hunters back with deadly skills and suffice it to say this is not a comic book that you want the younger reader in your family breezing through. Continue reading An Overview Of Dark Horse Comics: “Slayer: Repentless” #1→
After having reviewed what seems to be a teeming amount of the releases from DC Comics under their “The New 52” initiative, I admit that I have come to really enjoy presenting some views to our readers and fellow fans of the hobby. Newcomers might not realize that DC Comics started their relaunch back in September 2011, and so far its been broken up into a number of waves. Some titles from back when this began are already long gone and in some sense even a couple of replacements have been cancelled but the new titles always leave us with 52 different titles a month. That being said, we are now at The Fourth Wave of titles and what is interesting to me is how it has been about ten months since we last saw a wave be introduced. The unaffected family of titles falls to the Superman and Green Lantern ones (each currently have four titles per month) but there will be some more coming later in the year for these. I will discuss those at that time.
Starting in February of this still brand new year 2013, DC Comics will hit us hard with their Fourth Wave of The New 52 titles and while I will get to the new titles in a few sentences, let’s first take a look at the titles that will be going away. On the cancellation block are “Blue Beetle”, “Frankenstein, Agent Of S.H.A.D.E.”, “Grifter”, GI Combat” and “Legion Lost”. Of the batch of them I think I am really only going to miss the “Franksenstein” title since it was a fun read and quirky at times. Maybe we will find him being called upon in the “Justice League Dark” title since he seems to fit the criteria of being one of DC Universe’s “weirdies”. The reasons I will not really miss the rest are simple. I have not enjoyed the integration of the Wildstorm characters into the traditional DC Universe so that means “Grifter” didn’t win me over. It did have some moments but I always felt these characters were out of place. This was so much different an integration from when DC took all the Charlton Comics characters under their wing after the “Crisis On Infinite Earths”. The war titles I have never been sold on and they are a far cry from the original greatness of Kanigher and Kubert and titles like “The Haunted Tank”, “Sgt. Rock” etc. I preferred the original Blue Beetle title (well, the one with Ted Kord at least) and I felt that The Legion Of Super Heroes was best left in the future with the occasional trip to the past. That’s all I have to say about that.
Joining “The New 52” for this Fourth Wave are “Justice League of America”, “Justice League of America’s Vibe”, “Katana”, “Threshold” and “Constantine”. So what do I think for this go round? I’m very open to an additional Justice League title but am not sure what to expect of this particular team. “JLI” was interesting in it’s own right so let’s see what happens. “Vibe” was never a compelling character to me when he was in the way back in the day “JLA” of the 90’s so his getting a title struck me rather strange. “Katana” I always enjoyed from her original appearance as an Outsider and she did fine with the Birds Of Prey so perhaps this one will stick. “Threshold” brings some characters from other titles into a more cosmic playing field and I think we needed that outside of what Green Lantern or Superman often give us. “Constantine” will be the one with the most attention as it finds the Brit now fully entrenched in the conventional DC Universe as opposed to Vertigo where his “Hellblazer” title just finished at issue #300. Constantine is also a member of the Justice League Dark but this new title will likely allow him to interact with other heroes and villains of the DCU. I’m most intrigued about his happenings. So what do you readers think? The comments are open for opinions and of course we shall be striving to review many of these titles going forward.
I’ve been reviewing as many of the titles as possible here on the PiercingMetal Musings blog for the big September 2011 initiative by DC Comics that they called “The New 52” and now that the first and second wave have passed it is time for, yep you guessed it, the Third Wave. It sure seems kind of soon but oh well, I am not in charge of how they do things over at DC Comics. So what does this one entail? Well according to what I have read the latest titles to get the chopping block are “Justice League International”, “Captain Atom”, “Resurrection Man”, and “Voodoo”. I was always kind of 50/50 on these books in the first place and am not surprised to see some of them go. I did enjoy “JLI” and “Resurrection Man” but even the redo of this last character was better the first time around. “Captain Atom” kind of lost me, and “Voodoo” never really did it for me. Sorry to those creative teams who put them out there, I mean no offense to your work. I guess I am getting fussy about what I sit down and read these days.
The other day DC Comics let on what the Third Wave of titles would be and those are “Talon”, “Sword of Sorcery”, “Phantom Stranger”, and “Team 7”. Let’s look at where they will land as far as the existing family of titles go. Nothing is being added to the Justice League, Young Justice, Green Lantern or Superman titles with this bunch but “Talon” falls to the “Batman” related titles and now gives that family of releases thirteen titles. Holy printing press Batman that is a lot of titles to keep up on. One title joins “The Edge” roster and two more become part of “The Dark”.
PiercingMetal Thoughts: What do I think for this go round? I’m curious about how “The Phantom Stranger” will do in a full on title because the overall mysterious nature of the character leaves him to be most exciting when used in a sparing fashion. “Sword Of Sorcery” brings back Amethyst Princess Of Gemworld to the DC Universe and offers a backing feature with Beowulf. As far as Team 7 goes, I am not sure. I was only ever a casual fan of the title when it was originally in the Wildstorm world so let’s see what happens. What do you readers think?
I’ve been keeping up with my overviews of the issues of the superhero comedy series “The Misadventures Of Electrolyte and The Justice Purveyors” that I had been given by their writer Patrick Reilly at the 2011 New York Comic Con. Before I get into my thoughts about issue #4, you can peruse what I thought about Issue #1, Issue #2 and Issue #3 by clicking that highlighted text. Now let’s get funny!!!
“Electrolyte & The Justice Purveyors” #4
Issue #4 Overview: We last saw Electrolyte being kidnapped by the forces of Wales and being returned to his villainous corporate citadel after a brief battle with the multiple villain Super 8. It’s hear that we learn that the new plan is for Electrolyte to be cloned and all his powers absorbed by Wales who is once again wearing the hero’s costume. Super 8 lines out his abilities and how they work which gives the hero a look at the potential Achilles heel if he is paying attention but before the entire plot can unfold The Purple Claw returns and saves Electrolyte from harm. The regular Justice Purveyors had their book club meeting and did not come to his aid because they were warned not to miss a night. Pretty funny. Of course Electrolyte is cloned but they are reject models and have powers that are not much use when it comes down to it. As the story progresses the villainous Wales seems to get the upper hand before a union of The Justice Purveyors and The Perfect 4 (now led by a once again confident Mr. Perfect) help to save the day. Overall the tale ends on a high note and finds Electrolyte feeling very heroic, useful and aiming for a bright future. Continue reading Reading “The Misadventures Of Electrolyte and The Justice Purveyors” #4→
