The Dissector

The Dissector #105.

DISCLAIMER (angry creators, please read)

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

I. Am. The. New. God. All is one in Darkseid. This mighty body is my church. When I command your surrender, I speak with three billion voices... When I make a fist to crush your resistance. IT IS WITH THREE BILLION HANDS! When I stare into your eyes and shatter your dreams. And break your heart. IT IS WITH SIX BILLION EYES! NOTHING LIKE DARKSEID HAS EVER COME AMONG YOU: NOTHING WILL AGAIN. I WILL TAKE YOU TO A HELL WITHOUT EXIT OR END. AND THERE I WILL MURDER YOUR SOULS! AND MAKE YOU CRAWL AND BEG! AND DIE! DIE! DIE FOR DARKSEID!" Darkseid and his choir of thralls, Final Crisis #5

That is one kick-ass evil invasion speech, given by one of the masters of evil invasions... Here we are with the second week of December, 12/10, and since I was too quick to post this column after the last one, nobody caught the DT! from #103, although the Guvnor should gave it a shot. The problem with that panel was that Agent Coulson, played in the Iron Man movie by Clark Gregg, was not blonde, but brown haired. Man, I'm not very fond of Gwyneth Paltrow (she don't do much for me usually); but I sure can't help but looking at her as Pepper Potts and thinking "Man, I would dunk my pepper in her pot anytime..." Uhm, sorry...

Move along, move along.... let's get to The Dissector's Picks Of The Week; Best Book Of The Week was once more Amazing Spider-Man, issue #580. Once again, we get a thinking Peter Parker, who doesn't just punch his way through problems. Worst Book Of The Week was Astonishing X-Men: Ghost Boxes #2; whereas the first one had cool Victorian X-Men, this one has... ZZZZZZZZZZZZZ.... sorry, I fell asleep. Are we done? Are we ready for the dissections now? Yeah, cool.
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"GHOST WORDS."

TITLE: Astonishing X-Men: Ghost Boxes (Marvel).

ISSUE: 02 of 02.

CULPRIT: Warren Ellis (writer) and/or Joe Caramagna (letterer).

DISSECTION: I think I was saying something about this book before, but I can't remember... ah, well... Dissection here is that a narration box from Armor says "I wouldn't be around to see..." when it's actually meant to be "I wouldn't want to be around to see..."

DISSECT-O-METER: 3 Bazzars.
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"OOOH... LET'S MENTION CURRENT EVENTS AND BE TRENDY LIKE BENDIS!"

TITLE: Batman Confidential (DC).

ISSUE: 24.

CULPRIT: Andrew Kreisberg (writer).

DISSECTION: Now, this is a story that takes place during the early years of the Batman's career; the Joker has just been "discovered", and we get a lot of other signs that squarely places this tale in the beginning of Bruce's time as Batman. Why, then, do we get references to events that happened recently, like the trial of Saddam Hussein?

DISSECT-O-METER: 7 Bazzars.
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"A MEXICAN MAGNETO. THE BAND? NO, PLEASE NO!"

TITLE: Final Crisis (DC).

ISSUE: 05 of 07.

CULPRIT: Grant Morrison (writer).

DISSECTION: This book getting a bit better, but there's too much going on and two slowly! On one page, Imán, a Mexican superhero, speaks in Spanish, saying "... mi armadura esta inútil... pesa un tonel... ¿Que hariá Superman?"; which is quite wrong... "my armor is useless" would be "mi armadura es inútil" or "mi armadura está inutilizada", "it weights a ton" would be "pesa una tonelada"; while “What would Superman do?” would be “¿Que haría Superman?”

Not to mention several problems with tilde sizes, which go to the letterer (Travis Lanham), and two words spelled incorrectly by Morrison (“esta” and “hariá” should be “está” and “haría”), of course.

Thanks to Gary Greenwood at The Annotated Final Crisis, and originally to Douglas Wolk at Final Crisis Annotations, for identifying Imán for me. Check out both of their blogs, they're very useful in following this storyline... also, thanks to Gary for spotting a switcheroo of speech bubbles in this issue, he gets a badge and an induction as Ensign into the Honorary Dissector Scout Corps!

DISSECT-O-METER: 7 Bazzars.
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"ARROWS OF DISSECTION."

TITLE: Green Arrow/Black Canary (DC).

ISSUE: 15.

CULPRIT: David Baron (colorist).

DISSECTION: See if you can hit a bullseye with this one:


DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
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"TWO-EYES."

TITLE: Nightwing (DC).

ISSUE: 151.

CULPRIT: Hi-Fi (colorist).

DISSECTION: Two-Face's eye, at least on the unscarred of his face, should be blue, instead of brown/red.

DISSECT-O-METER: 5 Bazzars.
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"MUCHO BUENO!"

TITLE: Secret Six V3 (DC).

ISSUE: 04.

CULPRIT: Gail Simone (writer).

DISSECTION: Gail, I know you mean well, but please check with a native speaker before using Spanish dialogues! E-mail me, I'll do it for free and with gusto!!! In this issue, Tarantula says "el juego del gato", apparently meaning "the cat suit", talking about Catman... but "el juego del gato" is "the game of cat" or "the cat game", not "the cat get up" or something like that, which is what Simone apparently tried to say.

DISSECT-O-METER: 4 Bazzars. I have seen no indication that Tarantula, despite having a Spanish name (Catalina Flores), speaks Spanish well.
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"THAT'S NOT NAMOR!!!"

TITLE: Secret Invasion: Dark Reign (Marvel).

ISSUE: One-shot.

CULPRIT: Brian Michael Bendis (writer).

DISSECTION: Why, pray do tell, is Namor written like a blundering idiot who almost stutters and can't show a shred of dignity when talking to Loki, Emma Frost or others?

DISSECT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars.
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"TOLDJA, IT AIN'T HIM!"

TITLE: Secret Invasion: Dark Reign (Marvel).

ISSUE: One-shot.

CULPRIT: Alex Maalev (artist).

DISSECTION: KILL ALEX MAALEV!!!! KILL HIM!!! Well, maybe that's too much, but why can't he draw a character the way it's supposed to be? Not only his Namor looks nothing like should (see the Moments Of The Week, although I can't consider it a dissection), but he looks nothing like he looked in the end of Secret Invasion: he has a different hairdo, a different hair length, and beard stubble...

DISSECT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars. Also, Norman Osborn lost his tie; you can't be President of the USA without a tie!!! Thanks to the Guvnor for noticing these details, badge for him. One more and you make Lt. Cmdr.; Guv!
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"GETTING FAMILIAR WITH THE JEDI."

TITLE: Star Wars: The Clone Wars (Dark Horse).

ISSUE: 03 of 06.

CULPRIT: Henry Gilroy (writer).

DISSECTION: A clone commando refers to Ahsoka Tano as "Commander Ahsoka", instead of "Commander Tano".

DISSECT-O-METER: 4 Bazzars.
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"YEAH, I LEFT SOME BIDNEZ THERE."

TITLE: Superman & Batman Vs. Vampires & Werewolves (DC).

ISSUE: 05 of 06.

CULPRIT: Kevin VanHook (writer).

DISSECTION: Green Arrow says he's got to return to Seattle... but he hasn't been based there in a long time...

DISSECT-O-METER: 7 Bazzars.
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"OOOOH! SOMEONE WITH POWERS!!!"

TITLE: Wolverine: Flies To A Spider (Marvel).

ISSUE: One-shot.

CULPRIT: Gregg Hurwitz (writer).

DISSECTION: Wolverine attacks some gangbangers, and one of them phones his boss to say that "... the dude has like, these swords attached to his hands or something. (...) I know it sounds crazy, but this guy's like something outta a comic book." Really? In the Marvel Universe? Where superheroes run around everywhere, and Wolverine was a member of a very public team of Avengers, not to mention all his time on the X-Men? PUH-LEASE!!!

DISSECT-O-METER: 7 Bazzars.
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"A GRAVE MATTER."

TITLE: X-Men/Spider-Man (Marvel).

ISSUE: 02 of 04.

CULPRIT: Mario Alberti (artist).

DISSECTION: Kraven's grave reads "Kravinov", when it actually should read (as it's been shown before) "Kravinoff".

DISSECT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars. Also, someone tell Alberti that Wolverine's eyes are blue, not brown.
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That brings us to an average of 6.3 Bazzars on seventeen dissections; less than I expected. Huh, well... here are the Moments Of The Week. First up, on what would have been a WTF moment back in the day:



I told you! That's not Namor, he was busy so he sent Jean Reno!!! Also, Jean Reno did not read his script, so he doesn't know how Namor's supposed to behave, or who he's met or not:



Of course, he smells like croissant!!! And for the finale, Boosters keeps his sister from changing history... with a little help of Skeets:


It cracks me up, those little robot arms stealing the sketch! That's it for now, until next time, I'll be on the outlook for more dissections, because (almost) nothing escapes...

THE DISSECTOR!