The Dissector

The Dissector #69.

DISCLAIMER (angry creators, please read)

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

"If you're hunting nerds for sport I'd like you to know I'm PERSONALLY offended." Spider-Man, Amazing Spider-Man V1 #555.

Well, here's the column for last week's comics, and I'm sure a lot of you take it personally, like Spidey. Last week's DT! was correctly assessed by Snarf5181; the post Infinite Crisis Colossal Boy does not grow, he's a giant who shrinks. Badge for ya! The Dissector's Picks Of The Week will be short and sweet; as I'm not feeling very well as I write this (my neck is killing me).

Best Book Of The Week was, hands down, Action Comics #863. A great finale for the Legion arc; it's obvious that Geoff Johns understands the characters, and Gary Frank even managed to make them look a little bit less like heroine addicted schizophrenics. Great dialogue, excellent pacing, amazing action... and awesome moments for the MOT... this is a great year for the Legion, a good 50th anniversary. On the other hand, the Worst Book Of The Week was Cable V2 #2. Inconsistent art, boring plot, crappy pacing. There, presto!
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"EVENTUALLY, HE'LL REMEMBER."

TITLE: Action Comics (DC).

ISSUE: 863.

CULPRIT: Geoff Johns (writer)..

DISSECTION: As usual, important things are missing from Superman's power listing.

DISSECT-O-METER: 4 Bazzars.
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"IT'S MICROMAX'S DAUGHTER!"

TITLE: Cable V2 (Marvel).

ISSUE: 02.

CULPRIT: Ariel Olivetti (artist).

DISSECTION: The size changing of the baby is a bit less outrageous, but it's still happening.

DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
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"BLACK LIGHTINING BELONGS IN ANOTHER BOOK..."

TITLE: Countdown To Final Crisis (DC).

ISSUE: 04.

CULPRIT: Edgar Delgado (cover colorist).

DISSECTION: Mary Marvel's lightning bolt is colored black. Same goes for the interior art, colored by Tom Chu.

DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars. Also, Kyle Rayner's emblem is also colored incorrectly, and there's a panel where people are missing their faces.
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"THEY'RE MAGICAL!"

TITLE: Detective Comics (DC).

ISSUE: 843.

CULPRIT: John Kalisz (colorist).

DISSECTION: Zatanna's sweatpants change color from one page to the other.

DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
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"YOUR PHONEY MACHINE LANGUAGE DOES NOT COMPUTE!"

TITLE: Metal Men V4 (DC).

ISSUE: 07.

CULPRIT: Duncan Rouleau (writer).

DISSECTION: Again the binary speak by U.N.I.O.N. is not right, binary must be divisible by 8.

DISSECT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars. Still, this issue was better than all the rest of the mini... which is waaaaay too long. This story can be told in four issues.
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"HEY, IF HE'S NOT ALLOWED TO DYE HIS HAIR, WHO'S GONNA TELL HIM SO?"

TITLE: Midnighter (DC/Wildstorm).

ISSUE: 18.

CULPRIT: Gabe ElTaeb (colorist).

DISSECTION: Midnighter's hair should be blonde, not brown.

DISSECT-O-METER: 5 Bazzars.
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"EXILED DISSECTION"

TITLE: New Exiles (Marvel).

ISSUE: 04.

CULPRIT: Jordan D. White (assistant editor) and/or Mark Paniccia (editor).

DISSECTION: I rant about this one all the time.


DISSECT-O-METER: 10 Bazzars.
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"ATTACK OF THE TERRIBLE GIRAFFE GIRL!"

TITLE: DC Special: Raven (DC).

ISSUE: 02 of 05.

CULPRIT: Damion Scott (penciller).

DISSECTION: Scott's style is a weird blend of manga and... I don't know what else, but it fits the book. His anatomy is a bit distorted, but it's a stylistic choice, I assume. However, when he does things like that giraffe girl's body below, I got to call him on it.


She looks eight feet tall!

DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
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"SAVAGE MEMORY."

TITLE: Secret Invasion (Marvel).

ISSUE: 01 of 07.

CULPRIT: Brian Michael Bendis (writer) and/or Chris Eliopoulos (letterer).

DISSECTION: The lettering makes it confusing, so it might be another character (it could only be Echo, though, but it doesn't sound like her), because someone says that he/she thought the Savage Land wasn't real. If it's not Echo, it could only be Iron Fist, and even if he's never been there, it still makes little sense for him to say something like that.

DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars. Good start for this event. Not great, but still good.
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"JARVIS... IS THAT YOU?"

TITLE: Secret Invasion (Marvel).

ISSUE: 01 of 07.

CULPRIT: Leinil Yu (penciller).

DISSECTION: Jarvis looks nothing like he should, in fact he doesn't look the same from panel to panel. One panel he looks nothing like he should, but at least he's the right build; next panel he's fat and short as his Ultimate counterpart... sheesh!

DISSECT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars.
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"WELL, EXCEPT FOR THE FIRST.... TWO, OR THREE..."

TITLE: Young X-Men (Marvel).

ISSUE: 01.

CULPRIT: Marc Guggenheim (writer).

DISSECTION: Yay! We needed to reboot more titles and give them lame names like his one!!! Argh, just call this New Mutants V3!!!! It was a passable start; we'll see how it evolves. There is, however, a dissection: Cyclops says that "No Brotherhood (of Evil Mutants) since the first has been led by Magneto." This is not true; even if they were successive, Magneto led a few different line-ups of the Brotherhood. They were different enough to qualify as different teams; and there was at least one of them (the one that was later Mutant Force and the Resistants) that was completely lacking in returning members, so in my opinion, it qualifies as a new incarnation.

DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
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"MUCHO BARATO."

TITLE: Zorro (Dynamite).

ISSUE: 02.

CULPRIT: Matt Wagner (writer) and/or Simon Bowland (letterer).

DISSECTION: Well, well, well. Much better! They've downplayed the mystic element, they've reduced the number of unnecessary Spanish words to 1 in 20 instead of 1 in 10; and they've used tildes and Ñs! Still, it's not devoid of errors. First, they say "señors"; the plural should be "señores". That's the one I'll be rating below; but there's more: first, Ñs and vowels with tildes should be the same size un-tilded vowels or Ns; not smaller to accommodate the tilde, the letterer should adjust his font. Then, opening exclamation marks are missing, Alejandro de la Vega calls his wife "querido" (the word should be "querida", since she's female), and also calls her "amano" (it should be "amada", "amano" doesn't even exist). Lastly, there's a few Spanish words that are missing their tildes; I used to forgive this (even if it's incorrect), but if you use tildes for some word, use tildes for all words that need them.

DISSECT-O-METER: 7 Bazzars. Wow, that's 12 dissections in one book (out of 26 for the whole week)... I could have done this column just on Zorro #2!!!
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Nice week, with a 6.1 Bazzars (hmm...) and of course, Moments Of The Week! Forgive a couple of the MOT being several pages long, they were just too cool. First up, a quick look at the Action Comics LSH storyline's finale:


Simply breathtaking... but less impressive than the previews at the end of the book:


Geoff Johns + George Perez + LSH From Three Worlds = Geekgasm Maximus! Next, Cap has fun with Giant Man:


Kinky! We continue with one of the crappiest names in superhero history (and I'm counting the Triathlon):


John Henry, stick to engineering. Next, Colonel Magnus' (you don't know how hard it is for me to not write "MaGnUs" automatically) BURNS his Metal Men making brother:


That was harsh...And now:


Yes, I know it's not noticeable unless you've read Secret Invasion but... JARVIS IS A SKRULL!!!! So THAT'S why he hasn't looked like himself lately! Almost at the end of our column, The Boys venture where no other comic (that I know of) has: tasting the rainbow:


God, Billy Butcher's face in that first panel is priceless! And if you didn't know what "tasting the rainbow" was before this (apart from a Skittles slogan), now you do. Last, but certainly not least (how many times have I said this?), Young X-Men show team spirit, despite their crappy, John Henry Irons given team name:


Rockslide might be a jerk, but he's a loyal jerk. That's it for now, until next week, I'll be on the outlook for more dissections, because (almost) nothing escapes...

THE DISSECTOR!