Thursday, August 23, 2007

The Nitpicker #36.

DISCLAIMER (angry creators, please read)

[[WARNING! THIS COLUMN MIGHT CONTAIN SPOILERS!]]

"This is Gotham! You can't swing a dead sidekick here without hitting a super-villain!"

Before I get on with his column, I want to do something I should have done in last column, but since some days had already passed, it slipped my mind. I want to dedicate this week's columns to Mike Wieringo, who left in the prime of his life. He was a great artist, and I particularly enjoyed his Spider-Man and Flash. You'll be missed, Mike. More on Wieringo's passing here, and check out this moving tribute piece my friend Trasgo made for Wieringo, featuring Impulse and the Thing grieving for the artist.

Don't know how to pick up the mood from there, but let me just tell you that the quote of the week comes from Countdown #37, and it's spouted by the Trickster while he runs from Poison Ivy. A no-brainer, really, but still funny... the runner up was Rip Hunter's quote about Superboy's reality-punching. On a more positive note, if you're a regular reader you might already know this, but I still have to mention it. The lovely and talented Gail Simone posted some comments on last column, basically taking a rolled-up newspaper to my nose... I dodged, and nitpicked back at her, getting her to confess that, and I quote "I really like this site!" Wow... like I said in the comments, this is a real honor for me, because not only I really enjoy her books, but I look up to her and hope to one day break into the industry the way she did. For those of you who are not aware of it, Gail was noticed by an editor after writing a column for Comic Book Resources called You'll All Be Sorry for a couple of years (go read it, is very funny). She wrote it at first for no money at all, and then, for very little money, but what she accomplished was worth more than money.

She honed her writing skills, both from a stylistic aspect, and from a performance aspect. Not only did she get better at writing, but by setting herself a weekly deadline, she forced herself to write, write and write. It's the same as an athlete, who will polish his form at running by stretching, doing push-ups and so on, but who will only get faster and gain more endurance by... you guessed it, running, running, and running. Not only did she get better at writing, but she proved to editors that she was hard-working, and could keep a deadline. Gail, not only are you one of the best writers in the industry today, but you seem to be a very nice and generous person, and gracious when receiving critique. You are truly an inspiration, and I hope you keep coming back week after week to read my column. I promise not to pick on your books... no, not really. What I can do, is retract when proven wrong. You see, last issue I picked on Gail's latest Gen13 issue when I thought Freefall was referring to Daybreaker as Midnighter. Thing is, I had missed one or two issues of the book, and didn't know (or didn't remember, I might have actually read it, but I read so much I sometimes have a hard time remembering everything) that the actual Midnighter had talked to the team, in this incarnation. So that's one nit less for last column, which actually makes the average go up to 6.4 Bazzars. Wow, that's a real increase!

Brown nosing time is over, it's time to reveal last time's Spooooot The Niiiiiiit... and nobody got it, again. What's going on with you people? In this case, the problem was that Karate Kid and Una (ugh!) are confused by Oracle's use of the expression "web fu", understandable, since it's 21st Century slang. But then she explains "(...) I was trying to block his infiltration of my intranet files (...) he was attacking all these remote system with a very clever, albeit somewhat flawed carnivore virus -- -- that dumped illogical data into computer controlling airports, city power grids even NASA..." and they just stand there, completely lost. May I remind you Jimmy and Justin, that these people come from the 31st Century? Or at the very least, the 30th? That Starman, over in JSA, only a few months ago, solved an equation Mr. Terrific couldn't solve, by using knowledge acquired in elementary school? This, as shown before, gets you 8 Bazzars.

Before we go on with the nits, let's go over the Nitpicker's Picks Of The Week, shall we? Best book went, hands down, to Booster Gold, despite a couple of nits. Great art, and great script; Geoff Johns showing his love for the DCU; and Jeff Katz probably helping as well. From Booster being, well, Booster (in all the ways, the annoying, and the good ones), to setting up and interesting premise, not to forget Superman and Batman giving Booster the recognition he deserves. I mean, if Geo-Force can be in the league, Booster sure can... dammit, in my book, he’s' proven himself more than Black Lightning, Vixen Hawkgirl, and Red Arrow all put together. Most important, he shows that he can do what needs to be done, glory and fame be damned. That's a hero for you.

Worse book of the week is Superman/Batman. It barely had a nit, but it's so bland, so boring, and so uncompelling, that I really don't know why I keep reading this book... anyway, let's get on with the nits.
<-------------------------------->
"I CAN'T GO A DAY WITHOUT CHANGING MY EYE COLOR!"

TITLE: Amazons Attack.

ISSUE: 05 of 06.

CULPRIT: Brad Anderson (colorist).

NIT-TO-PICK: Yawn, wake me when it's over. Oh, next issue? Good! In this particular issue, on page five, Grace's eyes are colored green, when she usually wears violet-colored contacts. Yes, she could be wearing different contacts, but considering Anderson colored her eyes blue on issue 3, and it doesn't seem she would have time to go around switching lenses, I'm going to rate this higher than the 1 I gave it two issues ago.

NIT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"IF THE GLOVE FITS... THEN CHANGE IT!"

TITLE: Black Canary V3.

ISSUE: 06 of 06.

CULPRIT: Paulo Siqueira & Joe Prado (pencillers) and I.L.L. (colorist).

NIT-TO-PICK: On page 10, Merlyn is now wearing gloves that correctly cover all his fingers but his thumb and pinky. This wouldn't be a nit, except for the fact that he was wearing different gloves last time, as you all know. Yes, this could be considered correcting a nit, but it still reeks of just plain not paying attention, particularly when considering the next nit.

NIT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars, you could look at last issue, could you?
<-------------------------------->
"AND CHANGE IT AGAIN!"

TITLE: Black Canary V3.

ISSUE: 06 of 06.

CULPRIT: Paulo Siqueira & Joe Prado (pencillers) and I.L.L. (colorist).

NIT-TO-PICK: On page 13, Merlyn is back to wearing the gloves that cover his thumb, index and middle fingers. WTF?

NIT-O-METER: 10 Bazzars, this is out of control...
<-------------------------------->
"THIS TIME AROUND YOU'LL GET IT!"

TITLE: Black Canary V3.

ISSUE: 06 of 06.

CULPRIT: Paulo Siqueira & Joe Prado (pencillers).

NIT-TO-PICK: You know what? Black Canary gets to be featured in Spoooooooooooooooot The Niiiiiiiit once again! Since you all had a hard time with the last two, I am cutting you some slack this time. It's really, really easy; because it's a big one, and I'm not giving you a whole page, but three images from pages 20 and 21. Plus, you also know it's a pencilling nit, so... come on, it's really easy to spot.


NIT-O-METER: I was going to give this 10 Bazzars, but that'd be too much... it gets an 8, because it's blatant, but really, unimportant at the end.
<-------------------------------->
MAGIC FISHNETS!"

TITLE: Black Canary V3.

ISSUE: 06 of 06.

CULPRIT: Paulo Siqueira & Joe Prado (pencillers).

NIT-TO-PICK: On panel 2, Black Canary's fishnet's can't be seen. This time around, it's pretty minor, since she's seen from the distance and we can't even see her facial features.

NIT-O-METER: 2 Bazzars, but if pure laziness was nitpicked, it'd get a higher rating.
<-------------------------------->
"SAY WHAT?"

TITLE: Booster Gold V2.

ISSUE: 01.

CULPRIT: Geoff Johns & Jeff Katz (writers).

NIT-TO-PICK: Well, you already know I liked this book, but as I said before, it doesn't mean there's no nits to be picked. On the first page after the cover (page 1 or 2, depends on how you're counting), Skeets tells Booster that "The Ace android of this era has yet to be upgraded to zero-point energy fuel cells. That means his optically accessible neural net is vulnerable." But Booster asks him to put it in "Twenty-first Century English"... I speak 21st Century English, and I understand what he said... Booster, same as with last week's Spot The Nit, is from the future, in this case, the 25th Century... so he should be more than able to understand what Skeets is saying.

NIT-O-METER: 4 Bazzars, he could be joking.
<-------------------------------->
"WHERE DID THOSE COME FROM?"

TITLE: Booster Gold V2.

ISSUE: 01.

CULPRIT: Dan Jurgens (pencil layouts) and/or Norm Rapmund (finished pencils).

NIT-TO-PICK: On page 8 (still counting after the cover), panel 2, Booster is holding something (apparently newspapers) under his arm, which he wasn't before.

NIT-O-METER: 5 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"MANY YEARS AGO..."

TITLE: Booster Gold V2.

ISSUE: 01.

CULPRIT: Geoff Johns & Jeff Katz (writers).

NIT-TO-PICK: On page 29, the shadowy figure that stole the Supernova costume approaches a young Katma Tui on her planet, Korugar. She looks 8-10 years old, 12 at the most, by Earth standards. The caption reads "8 years ago."; are we supposed to believe that the very much adult Katma Tui that trained and then married John Stewart (and oh yeah, died) was a kid 8 years ago? That she was, at most, in her late teens when she died, if we are to assume that was just two years ago that she died? I don't think so.

Yes, some people at Newsarama suggested that "time is broken", or that Korugarians mature faster than humans, but I don't take it.

NIT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars, I'm willing to go softer because of what I said above.
<-------------------------------->
"IT'S OUT OF JUICE!"

TITLE: Brave And The Bold V3 (and not V2, like I've said in the past).

ISSUE: 06.

CULPRIT: Mark Waid (writer).

NIT-TO-PICK: On page 8, Hal Jordan says that his ring doesn't have enough reserve to go back to Earth from Rann... you do remember you can charge it, right Hal? Particularly when on page 13, and after being used for some stuff, your ring has enough power to fuel a Zeta-beam that brings Batman to the present.

NIT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars, it would have been better to say there was no time to charge it.
<-------------------------------->
"FOR AND OLD MAN, HE SURE PACKS A MEAN PUNCH..."

TITLE: Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man.

ISSUE: 23

CULPRIT: Peter David (writer).

NIT-TO-PICK: Peter Parker allows himself to be beaten up by J. Jonah Jameson, who turns his face into a pulp. Please, this is Spider-Man, who even if he doesn't defend himself, still has a measure of invulnerability (a durability of 5, according to Marvel's own OHOTMU ratings, corresponding to "bulletproof"); while Jameson is a normal human, who's at least well into his sixties. Jameson is not rated on Marvel's website, but as a normal human, he shouldn't have more than a rating of 2 in strength, meaning "able to lift over own body weight, up to twice own body weight".

Spider-Man has taken blows from superhuman foes without getting hurt, or at least not as hurt as he's shown here. Come on, are we really supposed to believe that Jameson can really leave Peter looking like this?


NIT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"SO JONAH, HOW DID YOU REALLY HURT YOURSELF?"

TITLE: Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man.

ISSUE: 23

CULPRIT: Todd Nauck (penciller).

NIT-TO-PICK: Jameson is hurt when a door hits him in the face, but he's got too black eyes, and absolutely no bruises in his nose or forehead. It's not consistent, in my opinion.

NIT-O-METER: 5 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"HEEL OR FACE?"

TITLE: Countdown.

ISSUE: 37 of 52.

CULPRIT: David Lopez & Mike Norton (pencillers).

NIT-TO-PICK: Agh! Who injected botox on every woman's lips for this book? That aside, on page 5, panel 3, Mary Marvel's boot don't have heels as pronounced as they should be.

NIT-O-METER: 7 Bazzars, I'll keep it steady.
<-------------------------------->
"SDRAWKCAB SEOD TON NAEM SDRAWKCAB!"

TITLE: Countdown.

ISSUE: 37 of 52.

CULPRIT: Adam Beechen (writer).

NIT-TO-PICK: On pages 5 Zattana's spell is written incorrectly, not only the words are backwards, but the sentence is. It says "Emoh su ekat.", when it should be "Ekat su emoh.". Her spell is correctly worded on page 7, though.

NIT-O-METER: 5 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"ARRR! WHERE BE THE WENCHES?"

TITLE: Marvel Illustrated: Treasure Island.

ISSUE: 03 of 06.

CULPRIT: Roy Thomas (writer) or Mario Gully (penciller).

NIT-TO-PICK: On a few pages, women can be seen as part of the crew... I don't remember women in the crew in the book, but I could be wrong.

NIT-O-METER: 4 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"MY CHEEK IS DOWN HERE!"

TITLE: Marvel Illustrated: Treasure Island.

ISSUE: 03 of 06.

CULPRIT: Roy Thomas (writer) or Mario Gully (penciller).

NIT-TO-PICK: On page 17, Abraham Gray is said to get a "knife-cut on the side of the cheek"; but the art shows him bleeding from what appears to be a cut from his cheekbone to his forehead.

NIT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"WE CALL IT STEROIDS."

TITLE: Superman/Batman.

ISSUE: 39.

CULPRIT: Alan Burnett (writer).

NIT-TO-PICK: Batman mentions, on page 12, that Jonathan "Scarecrow" Crane is "Lazy, really. Even his musculature is chemically enhanced."; which is not entirely correct. Jonathan Crane, as the Scarecrow, has no physical abilities, although he has transformed, in occasions, into the Scarebeast, a creature of superhuman strength and durability.

NIT-O-METER: 4 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"THOSE OTHER TWO WHERE JUST POSERS!"

TITLE: The Flash V3.

ISSUE: 231.

CULPRIT: Mark Waid (writer).

NIT-TO-PICK: From the beginning of the story, the narration says stuff like "But miracles don't happen in Keystone. They haven't for over a year. Not since the city lost its angel.", and a reporter says "(...) what would appear to be the first super-heroes this city has seen since the disappearance of the Flash!"

Yes, Wally West disappeared over a year ago, during Infinite Crisis, but up until what can't be more than a month or two, Bart Allen was the Flash, and he was based in Keystone from the time he started operating to when he moved to Los Angeles. And Jay Garrick, who is also the Flash, and a super-hero on his own right, has been operating out of Keystone since, like, forever...

NIT-O-METER: 10 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"KIDS SURE GROW FAST... BACKWARDS, AND CHANGE!"

TITLE: The Flash V3.

ISSUE: 231.

CULPRIT: Daniel Acuña (artist, correctly credited with a "ñ").

NIT-TO-PICK: I like the Tornado Twins, but they look nothing like they did when they appeared in Justice League of America:


(sorry for the horrible quality of the JLA pic) The ages are consistent, as Iris seems to be about two years older than Jai in both instances. However, in JLA they look like they're in their pre-teens to early and mid-teens (say 10-13 for Jai, and 12-16 for Iris); while in this book they look like they are 8-10 and 10-12 respectively. Jay now has black hair, when they were both red-haired; and in JLA, Iris was definitely a teenager, she even had a decidedly feminine figure (I know there seems to be a hint of breasts on the current picture, but it's not present in the rest of the book).

Yes, I know they aged at superspeed; they might have aged back and forward for all we know. Oh, and Jai could have dyed his hair... but still... One more thing, I don't see why Wally and Linda would be so eager to have their kids be superheroes. I understand that it's their family business (on dad's side, at least), and that they need training with their powers... I could even see him taking them along as sidekicks when they're (mentally and physically) about 15 or so, to help in disasters and such.

But I couldn't bring myself to take my kid along to battle supervillains or supernatural monsters. Well, I guess that kids with superpowers who know their dad is a hero will want to go out, and as a father, I'd rather have my kid come along with me instead of striking out on his own. I still wouldn't allow them to wear costumes that show their hair and most of their faces, though. "Hey, have you seen the brother and sister who just moved into the neighborhood? Yes, they boy's the Asian-looking kid and she's the redhead. Don't they look exactly like those superheroes we saw on TV?" Good going there, Wally.

NIT-O-METER: 10 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
That's it for this week, but not before I introduce you to a new feature. I regularly pick on the bad, lazy, or just plain wrong stuff I find on books; and I usually took the time to say if I liked a book or not. Then I came up with the Nitpicker's Pick of the Week to actually spotlight one good book, and one bad book each week. Still, not being a bad book, or great book, or having a tons of nits, does not mean that there won't be a page or moment that will make me go "WTF?!?!" or "DAYAMN!" So, starting this week, I give you the "WTF OR DAYMAN MOMENT OF THE WEEK!" This week, it's most definitely a WTF moment... allow me to introduce you to... THE VAGINA MEN FROM KEYSTONE CITY!!!


Ewwwwww... Flash and the Tornado Twins really need new foes, they can't battle escapees from Penthouse Comix every week from now on, can they? Before we go, let me just add that this week we had another regular 6.3 Bazzars average. That's it for now, until next week, I'll be on the outlook for more nits, because (almost) nothing escapes...

THE NITPICKER!

11 comments:

roy said...

Very easy nit!
That ring is for Ben Grimm's fingers or maybe Hulk's. Canary could wear it as a collar...

MaGnUs said...

He shoots, he scores! I did say it was easy.. that f'ing ring is humongously large!

Anonymous said...

I'm not sure about those 31st Century nits - yes, we understand them, but maybe to someone from the Legion's time (or Booster's) things like 'intranet' and 'carnivore virus' are the equivalent of someone trying to explain a sailing ship to us. You jibbock the mains'l, d'y see, and bring 'er about on a leeward tack, or whatever all that is. Just because the Legion people are well-educated in their time doesn't mean they understand the jargon for our primitive junk - I like to think I'm kind of smart, and I know I can handle a small trimaran (more or less, with a moderate amount of trial and error), but I'm sure I'd be lost if someone tried to explain how it's done. Same for Booster - assuming he even paid attention in school, Rip would still probably be talking about stuff that's the equivalent of vacuum tubes to him. We know what zero point energy and optical neural nets are because they're contemporary to us (and common pulp sci-fi), but to someome from the future it could just be so much gibberish.

Agreed that the thing with Zatanna's sentence order is probably a nit in that case, but she has spoken sentences in reverse before, in circumstances that made it seem like it was intentional - reversing the sentence as well as the individual words seemed to be her way of giving the spell an extra bit of oomph. In Seven Soldiers of Victory she does most of her magic the usual way, but when she really needs the big stuff, she reverses whole sentences. As I said, it's likely a nit that she did it just to go home (unless using the 'extra oomph' phrasing is necessary to reach her home, as a kind of security measure), but there's precedent for it to happen sometimes.

Nitpicking the nitpicker: 'Dayamn' became 'Dayman' in the last section. Only one Bazzar, it's an easy slip of the keyboard to make ;)

On the subject of typos, there were a couple of minor ones in the otherwise savagely-fun Bomb Queen III #4 - I didn't note down the pages, but there was definitely a misused it's/its (which is a pet peeve of mine) at some point.

I actually didn't notice how large the ring was - shows how these obvious ones can slip by, I guess - but though it may be a trick of perspective, it looks like the stone is larger in the lower panel than it is in the upper one.

(And if I can steal a moment to self-promote, I launched a mini-website this week - nothing fancy, just thoughts on comics I read and action figures I buy. It's called Heroine Addict! (cuz I love heroines, obviously), and it's the link I'm now using for my posts here. I'm still tinkering with some bits of it, but there'll be a more comprehensive links section soon, and I'll put this blog on it.)

MaGnUs said...

Miss Kitty Fantastico said "I'm not sure about those 31st Century nits - yes, we understand them, but maybe to someone from the Legion's time (or Booster's)"

I understand what you're saying, but the Legionaires should at least understand that's she's talking about "virus", "net", and "infiltrate", so they shouldn't stand there looking like they're people from the 16th century being talked about that stuff. Same for Booster, he doesn't need to understand what zero point is, but Skeets says "optically accessible" and "vulenrable", that should be enough for Booster to know he has to shoot Ace's eyes. Plus, you're saying that we know what zero point energy and optical neural nets are because we're from the 21st Century... and Booster is not asking him to put it in "plain English" (like the Thing does to Mr. Fantastic, or the X-Men to Beast), but in "21st Century English". (I'm a stubborn man :P)

Miss Kitty Fantastico said "Agreed that the thing with Zatanna's sentence order is probably a nit in that case, but she has spoken sentences in reverse before, in circumstances that made it seem like it was intentional - reversing the sentence as well as the individual words seemed to be her way of giving the spell an extra bit of oomph. In Seven Soldiers of Victory she does most of her magic the usual way, but when she really needs the big stuff, she reverses whole sentences. As I said, it's likely a nit that she did it just to go home (unless using the 'extra oomph' phrasing is necessary to reach her home, as a kind of security measure), but there's precedent for it to happen sometimes."

Was that stated explictly? I haven't read Seven Soldiers of Victory, but from what I hear, Grant Morrison didn't exactly pay much attention to continuity and those kind of things when he wrote it.

Miss Kitty Fantastico said "Nitpicking the nitpicker: 'Dayamn' became 'Dayman' in the last section. Only one Bazzar, it's an easy slip of the keyboard to make ;)"

Gotcha, I don't know how the hell the spellchecker, who feels the need to question my every word, even if they're correctly spelled, would allow dayman to go past it... I probably didn't notice the misspelling and just hit "ignore". Look for your HNS Badge in your next box of cereals (or your next jar of vegemite).

Miss Kitty Fantastico said "On the subject of typos, there were a couple of minor ones in the otherwise savagely-fun Bomb Queen III #4 - I didn't note down the pages, but there was definitely a misused it's/its (which is a pet peeve of mine) at some point."

Haven't read Bomb Queen, thank you for the report, but I really don't feel like reading a book just for a few typos. :P

Miss Kitty Fantastico said "I actually didn't notice how large the ring was - shows how these obvious ones can slip by, I guess - but though it may be a trick of perspective, it looks like the stone is larger in the lower panel than it is in the upper one."

Yes, the stone looks larger, so I guess it's a combo nit or something like that... but perspective can't excuse the sheer sice of the ring, because we're seeing her hand at the same distance, and it still looks like four of her fingers fit in that ring. It's like my wife holding up my ring, almost. :>

Miss Kitty Fantastico said "(And if I can steal a moment to self-promote, I launched a mini-website this week - nothing fancy, just thoughts on comics I read and action figures I buy. It's called Heroine Addict! (cuz I love heroines, obviously), and it's the link I'm now using for my posts here. I'm still tinkering with some bits of it, but there'll be a more comprehensive links section soon, and I'll put this blog on it.) "

Go ahead and promote all you want, I'll even go ahead and do you some publicity on next week's column. I'll add the link right now. Hey, looking at the site.. it looks good, but you don't have an option for comments! I wanted to say that I pretty much agree with your comments about The Order. Issue #1 was readable, issue #2 was good.

Anonymous said...

Thanks! As for comments, I'd love to, but I have no idea how. I do all my HTML in the sophisticated setting of Wordpad, y'see... Until I find out how it's done, in the automated sense, I'm stuck with just the email link, and adding any comments I get sent to next week's page.

So far as Zee goes, I never read her prior to Seven Soldiers, but the use of reversed sentences in there struck me as something that could well have been intentional - given how fond Morrison is of putting meaning into minute details. From memory, there's three instances where the sentence structure is reversed as well as the words - one of them is an escape spell in a situation where her life is is immediate danger, the other two are what I guess you'd call 'killing blows' in battle - I can't find a spot where she (or her apprentice at the time) uses a normally-phrased spell in a similarly important situation. Both standard and full-reverse spells are used over the course of the Zatanna series and in the final Seven Soldiers issue (which was some time later), so it doesn't seem like something Morrison just misremembered after a break. And you have to admit, it makes sense on a thematic level - her magic works by reversing, so reversing more should have more power. It's not stated explicitly, but nothing in Seven Soldiers is explicit.

MaGnUs said...

Too bad about the comments... I really feel like leaving them, since you're such a faithful reader of mine. :P

And about Zee, I get what you mean, not enough still to make me retract, though. :P

Anonymous said...

I'm looking into it - if I turn up some simple comment script that I can incorporate into the page, without confusing the hell out of myself, I'll try it out.

Re: Zatanna, as I said initially, I don't disagree with your assessment of the Countdown use as a nit (it's possible her 'go home' spell requires dual-reversal as a security measure to keep less-powerful mages away from her place, but that's me speculating, not something I'm crediting the writer(s) with unless I'm told so in clearer terms). I just mentioned it as an aside, for future reference should a Seven-Soldiers-like situation where it seems intentional arise.

MaGnUs said...

"Mean" Jeff Marsick sent me a couple of e-mails on last wek's column, which I copy with the answers, here:

Mean Jeff said "Oh, did you miss a BEAUTY of a fuck-up, my friend (by the way, long time reader, first time writer-in) in Thunderbolts #116. The heinous crime occurs, top panel, second to last page. Some spudnik calling himself Mindwave (no hypen) is being fired upon by police officers, with a close up on the small arms they are using: Deodato does a decent rendering of the Beretta 9mm. So second to last page, Mindwave (no hypen) stops the rounds all in mid-air, a nanosecond before he is to become Mindswisscheese. Take a look at what's hangin' ten just a foot from his face: entire bullets! So that means these cops fire not just the projectile part of the bullet, but the casing, too! Now, look closer. No, closer still. Deodato drew the casings....with no pointy ends to indicate a projectile portion of the round! Basically, this is what a blank looks like: full casing, flat end. So the police are firing complete blank bullets?!?!? Take a final look at this atrocity. What do you see? Yup. They're not even the right SIZE of casings. These are RIFLE slugs...and the cops are firing them from 9mm Berettas???

That's a hell of a po-leece department. Firing complete blank rounds of rifle bullets from a handgun and hoping to take a bad guy down.

No wonder they need superheroes to help them out.
"

Nice to know you're reading Jeff... no, the comment didn't go through the blog, apparently. I did miss this fuck up, you bet I'll report it next column, with due credit, of course. No wonder they need superheroes to help them out.

Mean Jeff said "To quote Tom Cruise, Herr Magnus: "Much love."

But I need to draw your attention to another issue, and another matter. I checked through your blog to see if I missed it and I don't believe I have, but the egregious foul in JSoA #8 is Johnny Quick's speed
formula, given on page 3 of said issue as a young Jesse Quick is trying to get her powers under control. I'll give you that she mucks it up; she's young. But on the very next page, Dad decides to play showboat
and bursts into uniform by shouting "3X2(94Z)4A!"

Again, was DC's editorial staff on hiatus or did Geoff Johns retcon out the important details? I mean, come on, anyone who knows ANYTHING about the DC Universe's speedsters knows that the formula that JQ shouts is 3X2(9YZ)4A.

It's about as important as knowing where to put the friggin' 'S' on Superman's costume.

You hear that sudden pop? Yeah, that was my brain imploding over this.
"

Thanks for the love... but I'd quote Everlast on the "Much Love", from the song "Still Gotta Lotta Love Lyrics" by House of Pain. As for the Quick's formula, I didn't spot it... some ten years ago I would have spotted it because I used to repeat the formula while trying to make it work :P

Man, that's a bit of an exaggeration, we _are_ talking about Johnny freaking Quick, not Superman, but I get you. Struck a nerve, did they? :>

MaGnUs said...

Mean Jeff said (over e-mail) "Agreed, my aggression may be a little over the top, but I place blame firmly on the pharmaceutical industry. And MTV. But I digress....

The Johnny Quick thing strikes a nerve since I've been a speedster afficionado since back in the day. Not knowing the formula is kind of like saying Wolverine has a titanium endoskeleton.

Peace, brah.
"

It's the same type of nit, but given Johnny Quick's c-lister (sorry bud, but he is a c-lister) status, it won't rank as high.

Anonymous said...

Hey there; no new nits (no new comics until tomorrow), I just wanted to let you know that I've been working on Heroine Addict!, and there'll be a couple of new additions when I upload this week's reviews, including a rudimentary comment option. Assuming the comics shipment isn't delayed (not much point uploading pages if there's nothing new to talk about), the upgrades to the site should be online by this time tomorrow.

MaGnUs said...

Awessome MKF; I'll be sure to stop by and leave some comments.