The Dissector

The Dissector #55.

DISCLAIMER (angry creators, please read)

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

"CHUPA-WATCHAMACALLITS!! CHUPA-WATCHAMACALLITS!!! AUUGHH!! GET 'EM OFF ME!!!" A very distressed Human Torch, Fantastic Four: Isla De La Muerte.

Well, as promised, this is the first of my catch-up columns, with dissections from comics published on the week of 12/28. It saddens me to begin this column with the announcement of the death of writer Steve Gerber, a comic book legend. He passed away from complications that arose from his lengthy battle with pulmonary fibrosis, last Sunday, at the age of 60.

Gerber was a comic book fan like us his whole life, having started a fanzine, Headline, in his early teens, eventually finding work as a writer for Marvel in the early 1970s. He's best remembered from his Marvel days for his stints writing The Defenders and Man-Thing, and particularly as the creator of Howard the Duck. He also created Omega the Unknown, and wrote books like Shanna the She-Devil, the Guardians of the Galaxy and Son of Satan. He was one of the best examples of the Marvel writers of the 70s.

After he left Marvel in 1979, Gerber wrote some DC heroes books, and established himself at the forefront of the "independent revolution" of the 1980s, along people like his friend Frank Miller. Many of his plans didn't work out, sadly, and during the '80s he turned to writing for TV, both live action and animation, penning episodes for shows like Dungeons and Dragons, Transformers, Star Trek: The Next Generation (“Contagion”), G.I. Joe and Thundarr the Barbarian, which he created.

In the early '90s, Gerber was one of the founders of Malibu's Ultraverse, and for a time, wrote a handful of image titles. His work during that decade was eclectic, reflective of his sense of humor and personality. In the current decade, Gerber went back to Marvel to write a new Howard the Duck mini, under the MAX banner. His most recent work was with DC, first doing the acclaimed series Hard Time, and he was lately working on the Dr. Fate story appearing in the pages of Countdown to Mystery. He will be fondly remembered, and sorely missed.

This week's picks (don't know how to pick it up after this, but I'll try) will be quick. The Best Book OF The Week was Action Comics #860, great storyline, and great characterization of the legionnaires by Geoff Johns, and good art (despite Gary Frank's "insaneization of all characters). There. And the Worst Book Of The Week is Badger Saves The World #1, with a boring plot by Mike Baron, and horrible art by Kevin Caron.

On another note, I notified most of the winners of the Autopsy Awards, none of them, not even the ones who received a positive award, answered me. Except for one person... David Wiltfong, aka DragynWulf, from the Marvel Handbooks team... and he wasn't happy. I'll leave it at that, but some people don't have a sense of humor.

As the last item before going onto the dissections themselves, we have last regular column's Dissect This! Justin Garrett Blum correctly said that Nightwing's logo was drawn incorrectly.
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"SHORTCHANGED IN THE SUPERPOWERS DEPARTMENT!"

TITLE: Action Comics (DC).

ISSUE: 860.

CULPRIT: Geoff Johns (writer).

DISSECTION: Once again, Superman's powers are defined as "flight, super strength, super sensory powers." No invulnerability, heat vision, super speed, etc?

DISSECT-O-METER: 4 Bazzars.
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"I'M USING THE SAME SUPERPOWERS ACCOUNTING SYSTEM AS SUPES."

TITLE: Action Comics (DC).

ISSUE: 860.

CULPRIT: Geoff Johns (writer).

DISSECTION: Timber Wolf's enhanced agility is also forgotten.

DISSECT-O-METER: 4 Bazzars.
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"FORGET IT..."

TITLE: Amazing Spider-Man V1 (Marvel).

ISSUE: 545.

CULPRIT: None.

DISSECTION: So, One More Day... ah well, it wasn't THAT bad, and it will be eventually taken back in some way or another... But, my dissection has become moot since I checked it and I was the one who was wrong to consider it as one.

DISSECT-O-METER: Nil.
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"YO MAMA IS SO OLD...!"

TITLE: Brave And The Bold V3 (DC).

ISSUE: 09.

CULPRIT: Mark Waid (writer).

DISSECTION: André, of the Boy Commandos, says in French that "Une maman" has Brooklyn (Dan Turpin, if I'm not mistaken); as in a "mummy", since they're in a pyramid. Problem is, the word for "mummy", as in a preserved corpse, in French, is "momie".

DISSECT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars, the joke does not work (the English speaking characters think he's saying that a "mommy" has Brooklyn) if he says "maman" instead of "momie".
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"SPIDER FACTS!"

TITLE: Various Marvel titles published the week of 12/28 (Marvel).

ISSUE: N/A.

CULPRIT: Unknown.

DISSECTION: Again, Nick Fury's files, this time, and this time the problem is that it has things that clash with Spidey's new status quo, for example, Nick Fury and Daredevil knowing Spidey's secret ID, when Marvel has said it's secret to everyone.

DISSECT-O-METER: 9 Bazzars for the clashing with Spidey's new status quo, plus one more at level 6 for stuff that can't be used at all by Nick Fury. This time, however, there are no real world information about his movies or such.
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"UUUH..."

TITLE: Countdown To Adventure (DC).

ISSUE: 05 of 08 (and previous issues).

CULPRIT: Adam Beechen (writer).

DISSECTION: Starfire and Animal Man are using solar panels to reflect sunlight; solar panels, by definition, absorb solar energy.

DISSECT-O-METER: 10 Bazzars.
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"RUN, IT'S EVIL DIANA!!!"

TITLE: Countdown To Final Crisis (DC).

ISSUE: 18.

CULPRIT: Howard Porter (artist for backup origin story).

DISSECTION: On the first page, Wonder Woman's bustier is colored dark blue or black.

DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
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"WE LETTERS HAVE TO STICK TOGETHER"

TITLE: The Danger's Dozen (First Salvo).

ISSUE: 01.

CULPRIT: Gabe ElTaeb (letterer, backup story).

DISSECTION: On page 22, panel one, the words "it" and "Captain" have no space between them.

DISSECT-O-METER: 1 Bazzar.
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"NEXT UP, CAPTAIN-AMERICA."

TITLE: The Dissector (Studio Robota).

ISSUE: 53.

CULPRIT: MaGnUs (writer).

DISSECTION: I wrote "Iron-Man" instead of "Iron Man" in an Ultimate Iron Man II dissection.

DISSECT-O-METER: 2 Bazzars.
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"CORRETC THIS."

TITLE: The Dissector (Studio Robota).

ISSUE: 54.

CULPRIT: MaGnUs (writer).

DISSECTION: In the reveal of the Dissect This! for the previous column, I wrote "correctlyt " instead of "correctly", and I probably ignored it in the spell check, because it was between "Miss Kitty Fantastico" (whose "Fantastico" I should probably have added to Word's dictionary, there, just did it) and "Salakk" (ditto).

DISSECT-O-METER: 1 Bazzar.
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"THE THING? WHO?"

TITLE: Fantastic Four: Isla De La Muerte (Marvel).

ISSUE: One-shot.

CULPRIT: Tom Beland (writer).

DISSECTION: Good book, but the Thing talks about how in a small town in Puerto Rico people did not recognize him... the Fantastic Four are celebrities, and they've been on TV... and there's TV in Puerto Rico, I'll have you know.

DISSECT-O-METER: 3 Bazzars. All in all, no Spanish mistakes for an issue I was afraid would have tons... but the editor (and I think the artist too) are Hispanic, so that explains it.
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"I'M THE REPLACEMENT BUTTLER."

TITLE: Giant-Size Avengers V2 (Marvel).

ISSUE: 01.

CULPRIT: Nelson (artist... yes, just "Nelson") and Andrew Crossley (colorist).

DISSECTION: Edwin Jarvis looks nothing like he should, particularly his gray hair at the point of Avengers history this story happens at.

DISSECT-O-METER: 5 Bazzars.
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"SPEED DRAWING."

TITLE: The Flash V2 (DC).

ISSUE: 235.

CULPRIT: Freddie E. Williams II (artist).

DISSECTION: Take a look at the next panel, spot what's wrong here... no, it's not the horrible face on Wonder Woman...


DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
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"THOSE GUYS FROM THE SUICIDE SQUAD, THEY NOW WORK FOR THE MAN!"

TITLE: Gotham Underground (DC).

ISSUE: 03 of 09.

CULPRIT: Frank Tieri (writer).

DISSECTION: The Scarecrow says "Suicide Squad has worked for the government in the past (...)"... they've ALWAYS Worked for the government!

DISSECT-O-METER: 2 Bazzars.
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"WHAT'S UP WITH THESE RINGS?"

TITLE: Green Lantern/Sinestro Corps Secret Files And Origins (DC).

ISSUE: 01.

CULPRIT: Geoff Johns & Sterling Gates (writers).

DISSECTION: Well, these handbook type issues always have potential for more errors, being mostly written text. This one has a lot of them than say, the infamous Civil War Battle Damage Report, but to the latter's defense, this one has much less text per entry.

First dissection is that the GL power rings are described as having the old 24 hour power limit. As far as has been established, the current rings follow Kyle ring's limitations, and his does not have that particular one. Also, it's said that a Lantern can carry his battery in an invisible state, and call it to him/her from anywhere in his sector, something that gives weight to my claims of mistakes when Hal Jordan has been shown not to have his lantern with him.

DISSECT-O-METER: 3 Bazzars, it might be that the new rings are not exactly like Kyle's, but saying explicitly would help.
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"GREN LAANTEERN."

TITLE: Green Lantern/Sinestro Corps Secret Files And Origins (DC).

ISSUE: 01.

CULPRIT: Geoff Johns & Sterling Gates (writers).

DISSECTION: Once more, Salakk is called "Salaak". I even went and checked in his first appearance comic, and he's "Salakk", though, to the writer's defense, it's misspelled as "Salaak" once in the same book, and even "Sallak". Still, he's called "Salakk" the first two times he's mentiond and has been called "Salakk" all along (including Who's Who profiles), so until someone from DC comes out and says "Salaak" is the correct spelling, I'll keep saying it's a mistake. Of course, being a transliteration of an alien language, both spellings could be correct.

Guys, look at the image below. The interface is in Spanish, but the text is in English and the layout is the same as in the English language version of Word:


When writing a script that features Salakk being mentioned by name, you just need to add "Salakk" to your personal.dic file, so when "1" happens, then select "2" and press "3". Easy, innit? Hey, I just realized I myself wrote his name incorrectly at one point (and not to refer to your mistakes), and my spell checker caught it! If you don't use MS Word, I'm sure whatever you write your scripts (I know specialized script-writing software is used) has a spell check function.

DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
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"ION, NOT SO POWERFUL AFTER ALL..."

TITLE: Green Lantern/Sinestro Corps Secret Files And Origins (DC).

ISSUE: 01.

CULPRIT: Geoff Johns (writer).

DISSECTION: Actually, this would go only to Geoff Johns, or maybe to the writer of Green Lantern Corps too, since it comes from the actual storyline and not this handbook. Sodam Yat got lead poisoning on Earth before receiving the Ion power, so now he needs to keep the ring on in order to prevent the lead from killing him. It makes no sense, Ion gives him the power of a ring, and even more!

DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
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"ÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑ!"

TITLE: Green Lantern/Sinestro Corps Secret Files And Origins (DC).

ISSUE: 01.

CULPRIT: Adam Schlagman & Eddie Berganza (editors), for lack of a better culprit..

DISSECTION: Cowgirl's entry art says it's been done by Daniel "Acuna", it's "Acuña". Please, respect the way someone's name is spelled.

DISSECT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars.
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"IN HUNGRIEST DAY, IN MUNCHIEST NIGHT!"

TITLE: Green Lantern/Sinestro Corps Secret Files And Origins (DC).

ISSUE: 01.

CULPRIT: Geoff Johns & Sterling Gates (writers).

DISSECTION: Schlagg-Man, Sinestro Corpsman for Sector 3493 (who incidentally, is named after editor Adam Schlagman, I just realized) is said to be a native of Bismoll, and it's strongly inferred that he shares the powers of the 30th century Bismoll. Now, most history seen, whether is old Legion continuity, or V4 (Valor seeding) continuity (although no mention is made in V5 Legion continuity) has it so Bismollians don't develop their abilities for a few centuries.

DISSECT-O-METER: 2 Bazzars.
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"IT MUST BE SOMETHING I ATE."

TITLE: Green Lantern/Sinestro Corps Secret Files And Origins (DC).

ISSUE: 01.

CULPRIT: One of the following: JD Smith, Art Lyon, Moose Baumann, Digikore, or Guru EFX (colorists).

DISSECTION: Schlagg-Man's skin is painted pink, when Bismollians look exactly like humans.

DISSECT-O-METER: 4 Bazzars.
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"PLEASE, SPELL MY NAME RIGHT!"

TITLE: Green Lantern V4 (DC).

ISSUE: 26.

CULPRIT: Geoff Johns (writer) and/or Rob Leigh (letterer).

DISSECTION: Salaak, again.

DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
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"AND STOP CUTTING MY UNIFORM!"

TITLE: Green Lantern V4 (DC).

ISSUE: 26.

CULPRIT: Mike McKone (penciller).

DISSECTION: Salakk's uniform boots and gloves are not drawn correctly, fingerless and toeless.

DISSECT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars..
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"SUPERMAN WHO?"

TITLE: JLA: Classified (DC).

ISSUE: 49.

CULPRIT: Andrew Kreisberg (writer).

DISSECTION: At the end of the story, Superman and Lois Lane, possibly to avoid any eavesdropping (although Clark usually knows if there's anyone listening in) speak as though they're not married. However, Lois says "I know we don't know each other well", and as far as anyone is concerned, Lois Lane is one of the people who knows Superman the best.

DISSECT-O-METER: 7 Bazzars.
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"LIGHTNING, EVERCHANGING."

TITLE: JSA: Classified (DC).

ISSUE: 33.

CULPRIT: Staz Johnson & Mike Norton (pencillers).

DISSECTION: As usual, Jay Garrick's chest emblem is wrong.

DISSECT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars.
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"HE'S BUT A SHADOW OF THE MAN HE WAS..."

TITLE: JSA: Classified (DC).

ISSUE: 33.

CULPRIT: Junior Thomas (writer).

DISSECTION: Alan Scott leaves the JSA's Christmas' Eve celebration, because his daughter is dead, and he has to spend Christmas Eve alone, and yadda yadda yadda. Hey, Junior, Alan's son, Obsidian, lives in the JSA's headquarters.

DISSECT-O-METER: 10 Bazzars.
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"CONTACTS?"

TITLE: The Legion of Super-Heroes V5 (DC).

ISSUE:

CULPRIT: Nathan Eyring (colorist).

DISSECTION: Light Lass eyes are colored green, instead of blue, as they should be. God, am I excited that Jim Shooter is back!!! And Francis Manapul isn't bad, either.

DISSECT-O-METER: 5 Bazzars.
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"QOU VADSI!"

TITLE: Pax Romana.

ISSUE: 01 of

CULPRIT: Jonathan Hickman (writer, artist, and presumed letterer).

DISSECTION: This book is good, even though it's slightly hard to read because of it's layout... just a minor dissection, it reads "gaurd" instead of "guard" at one point.

DISSECT-O-METER: 1 Bazzar. By the way, here's a preview of this first issue.
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"I'M A SHAPESHIFTER, CHECK OUT MY QUESTION IMPRESSION!"

TITLE: Teen Titans V3 (DC).

ISSUE: 54.

CULPRIT: Eddy Barrows, Joe Prado & Greg Tocchini (pencillers).

DISSECTION: Page 10, panel four, why does Miss Martian have no face?

DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
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"ÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑÑ!"

TITLE: X-Men: Messiah Complex - Mutant Files (Marvel).

ISSUE: One-shot.

CULPRIT: Any of the several writers.

DISSECTION: Ah, here I am again attracting the wrath of the Marvel Handbooks' team! Darwin's real name is given as Armando Munoz, when it's "Muñoz".

DISSECT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars.
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"THIS IS A NEW SWORD."

TITLE: X-Men: Messiah Complex - Mutant Files (Marvel).

ISSUE: One-shot.

CULPRIT: Any of the several writers.

DISSECTION: Several wrong things about Excalibur's entry, first of all, it considers the current incarnation of Excalibur as a separate one from the previous team (even though it shares one founding member, and one other later member), giving its first appearance as New Excalibur #5. I'd consider Professor X's Excalibur in Genosha (which I don't think was ever called that outside the book's name) a completely separate team.

The team roster includes Lionheart, who was never shown to actually join the team, and the former members section is of course lacking all the former members like Colossus, Nightcrawler, Shadowcat, Lockheed, etc. On another note, the Handbooks team at least acknowledges Morph as actually been Proteus.

DISSECT-O-METER: This counts as just one 7 Bazzars dissection.
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"THESE ARE KITCHEN KNIVES, ACTUALLY..."

TITLE: X-Men V2 (Marvel).

ISSUE: 206.

CULPRIT: Chris Bachalo (penciller).

DISSECTION: Warpath's knives looks nothing like they should.

DISSECT-O-METER: 3 Bazzars.
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So, let's go for the Moments of the Week, shall we? The first one comes from The Avengers Initiative #8, the Taskmaster shows you that the larger they are, the harder they fall:


Bra-vo! Then, Batman does what we've all dreamed of doing. Bagging Catwoman? No, pimp-slapping Snapper Carr!


Then, from Countdown Arena #4, one of the few good things about this book, an army of almost all the 52 Captain Atoms (except for a couple that died, and Monarch, of course) to face Monarch:


Too bad they all get their quantum asses handed to them, and Monarch absorbs their powers. Next, from Fantastic Four: Isla de la Muerte, we learn who The Thing was with during Civil War:


Sweet Aunt Petunia!!! From the same book, we get the Thing celebrated as a local hero in a Puerto Rico town.


¡Viva! Now, from Giant-Size Avengers V2 #1, Jarvis teaches Thor some manners:


Now that's having some brass ones! And last but not least, coming from the same book, we have Iron Man's last ditch attack protocol:


Very graphic. So, this week's average was just 5.3 Bazzars, pretty low, but I'm just warming up. This column took longer than I expected, partly because I was enjoying my vacation, partly because my home computer is slower than the one at work (and I use the web browser to do a lot of research and such) and partly because I kinda forgot about my "just-write-up-
the-best-dissections-but-count-all-of-them" new policy, as I wanted to get the hang of writing the column again. Next column will be more succinct. That's it for now, until next week, I'll be on the outlook for more dissections, because (almost) nothing escapes...

THE DISSECTOR!