Friday, March 27, 2009

The Dissector #112.

DISCLAIMER (angry creators, please read)

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

"FOUL HOMUNCULUS. THY VERY EXISTENCE DOES INSULT TO THE TRUE GOD OF THUNDER." Thor, to Clor, Avengers: The Initiative #21.

With this column, we catch up... partially, as the month of January comes to an end. Granted, it was a "longer month", since the comics that should have been released one 08/12/31 came out on 09/01/02, adding a month to what are otherwise standard four-week months. The DT! from last column was cracked by DrSilent, who correctly spotted that Deathstroke's eyepatch was missing one of the strings holding it in place. Badge for you, Lieutenant. I still want to remind everyone that voting for the Autopsy Awards 2008 is open until the end of March.

Now, before the dissections, The Dissector's Picks Of The Week. Best Book Of The Week goes to Star Wars: Legacy #32; best Star Wars book being published... enough connections to the original mythos to be likeable, enough removal to be original. And no Clone Wars era, that's always a bonus. Worst Book Of The Week is Legion Of Super-Heroes #50 *draws breath* IT FUCKING SUCKED! DC Comics cancels the book, fucks up Jim Shooter's storyline (by ending the storyline in a hurry, getting an editor to wreck it), and releases a book with a creative team that doesn't match what was promised. "Justin Thyme" writes the book, possibly because Shooter wanted nothing to do wit this travesty, and Francis Manapul is pulled out of the project to work on something else, turning the art chores over Ramon Bachs, who ought to have his hands chopped off... or perhaps, it's already happened, the way he draws...

Not only do his characters look hideous, but they also change designs inside the same issue. Actually, I've seen stuff by him before, and it wasn't bad... so this means that he either drew this issue in 15 minutes, while drunk; or that he paid his ten year old nephew to draw it for him. How does DC top this? By saying goodbye with a "We greatly appreciate the support of our loyal readers!" Yeah, that's why you fucked them over with this comic. Thanks!
<-------------------------------->
"THESE HERE IS ARE COMIC!"

TITLE: The 3 Geeks: Slab Madness! (3 Finger Prints).

ISSUE: 01 of 03.

CULPRIT: Rich Koslowski (writer).

DISSECTION: One of the characters asks "Where'd we buy are books?" instead of "our books".

DISSECT-O-METER: 4 Bazzars.
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"TACAÑANDO EL TAMAÑO."

TITLE: Avengers: The Initiative (Marvel).

ISSUE: 21.

CULPRIT: Christos N. Gage (writer) and/or VC's Joe Caramagna (letterer).

DISSECTION: Melee, who is Hispanic, uses the word "tacaños", "cheapskates", and as was to be expected, the "ñ" is smaller than it should be.

DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
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"IF ME COLUMN WRITE."

TITLE: The Dissector (Studio Robota).

ISSUE: 111.

CULPRIT: MaGnUs (writer).

DISSECTION: Snakebyte noted that I screwed up in a couple of senteces in the last column, for example, I wrote "Superman says that if he Ultraman touch", when I meant "Superman says that if he AND Ultraman touch".

DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars. Two badges for Snakebyte. By the way, I decided that the amount of badges required for each ranks were too low, so I readjusted them as follows:

High Admiral 131-infinite
Admiral 101-130
Rear Admiral 81-100
Vice Admiral 66-80
Commodore 51-65
Captain 41-50
Commander 26-40
Lieutenant Commander 16-25
Lieutenant 6-15
Ensign 1-5

Those who have less badges than what's now required for a rank will not lose their rank, but they will have to reach the amount necessary for the next rank in order to rise. For example, Snakebyte holds the rank of Vice Admiral, which before required 36 badges to reach, and now requires 66. Even though he only has 39 badges, he still retains his Vice Admiral rank, but he'll need to reach 81 to be Rear Admiral. As before, there is no way to reach the rank of Grand Admiral, which is reserved for me. Snake, nothing personal, but you were rising through the ranks too fast, and so were others, and I noticed that the increase in badge requirements had to be sharper as ranks got higher. These are the current ranks of the Honorary Dissector Scout Corps:

Grand Admiral MaGnUs
High Admiral Nysie (Honorary)
Vice Admiral Snakebyte 39
Cmdr. Dominik B. 23
Lt. Cmdr. Miss Kitty Fantastico 16
Lt. Cmdr. Guvnor 16
Lieutenant DrSilent 10
Lieutenant Sully 9
Lieutenant Snarf5181 6
Ensign Roy 5
Ensign Bea 3
Ensign Bored 3
Ensign Lucas Siegel 3
Ensign Tylo 2
Ensign Shadz 2
Ensign Mato 2
Ensign Matt Brady 1
Ensign Paul O'Brien 1
Ensign Trasgo 1
Ensign Mean Jeff 1
Ensign Ilustr8r 1
Ensign leahcim 1
Ensign TokerTheKid 1
Ensign Teukro 1
Ensign Wolfie 1
Ensign Jordan 1
Ensign Gary Greenwood 1
Ensign J. Corbin 5
<-------------------------------->
"PROTECTED ACCENTS."

TITLE: Fantastic Four V1 (Marvel).

ISSUE: 563.

CULPRIT: VC's Rus Wooton (letterer).

DISSECTION: The accented letters in the word "protégé" are smaller than the rest.

DISSECT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
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"BEAR NAKED LADIES."

TITLE: Incredible Hercules (Marvel).

ISSUE: 125.

CULPRIT: Greg Pak & Fred Van Lente (writers).

DISSECTION: The word "bares" is used instead of "bears".

DISSECT-O-METER: 4 Bazzars. Also, Invisible Woman's hair is short on the cover, and long inside.
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"SMASH THE COLORS!"

TITLE: Justice Society Of America V3 (DC).

ISSUE: 23.

CULPRIT: Hi-Fi (colorist).

DISSECTION: Atom Smasher's hair is colored brown, instead of red, as it should be.

DISSECT-O-METER: 7 Bazzars.
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"CHANGE, AS FAST AS A GAZELLE RUNS."

TITLE: Legion Of Super-Heroes V5 (DC).

ISSUE: 50.

CULPRIT: Ramon Bachs (penciller).

DISSECTION: Remember back in column #103, when I noted that Francis Manapul had radically changed Gazelle's design, from obviously alien, to slightly changed human (perhaps only cosmetically so)? Well, Bachs does one worse! Below, you can see in the upper left corner, Gazelle's first appearance in issue #37; and next to it, Manapul's rendition on issue #48. Then on the row below, Gazelle from the first pages of issue #50. Bach changes her hair, loses the markings on her face, and makes her features even more human (or what passes for human with Bach's art in this book). He also modifies her costume... but he doesn't stop there; because he even changes her appearance radically by the final pages of the book, and slightly in the same page:


My God, this is fucking outrageous! By the end of the book, she looks like a furry!!! Colorist JD Smith helps Bachs commit this crime, too.

DISSECT-O-METER: 10 Bazzars.
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"MARVLS."

TITLE: Marvels: Eye Of The Camera (Marvel).

ISSUE: 03 of 06.

CULPRIT: Jay Anacleto (artist) or Richard Starkings & Comicraft (letterers).

DISSECTION: A newspaper says "retricts" instead of "restricts".

DISSECT-O-METER: 2 Bazzars.
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"COMIC IS THE MEDIUM READ."

TITLE: Ms. Marvel V2 (Marvel).

ISSUE: 36.

CULPRIT: Brian Reed (writer).

DISSECTION: The phrase "Choking is the poison ingested..." doesn't make much sense. It was probably meant to be "Choking as the poison is ingested..."

DISSECT-O-METER: 3 Bazzars.
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"NORTH LANDERS."

TITLE: Northlanders (DC/Vertigo).

ISSUE: 14.

CULPRIT: Travis Lanham (letterer).

DISSECTION: The words "stress" and "of" are ran together in a caption box.

DISSECT-O-METER: 2 Bazzars.
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"REIGN IN CZARNIA."

TITLE: Reign In Hell (DC).

ISSUE: 07 of 08.

CULPRIT: Keith Giffen (writer).

DISSECTION: Black Alice absorbs Lobo's powers, but her power is to absorb magical abilities; and Lobo is not magical.

DISSECT-O-METER: 9 Bazzars. Also, what does the word "selvage" mean in the books context? Nothing that makes sense.
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"MALARKY."

TITLE: She-Hulk V2 (Marvel)

ISSUE: 37.

CULPRIT: Peter David (writer) and/or Dave Sharpe (letterer).

DISSECTION: Mallory Book is called "Malloy" in this issue.

DISSECT-O-METER: 5 Bazzars.
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"IT'S IN YOUR HANDS."

TITLE: Star Wars: Legacy (Dark Horse).

ISSUE: 32.

CULPRIT: Omar Francia (artist).

DISSECTION: Mon Calamari hands are not depicted as they have been in canon (Star Wars: The Clone Wars animated series), but I'll give Francia some leeway, since he probably drew this before the animated episode was aired, and nobody even told him about the new design.

DISSECT-O-METER: 3 Bazzars.
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"PHANTOM POWERS."

TITLE: Superman V1 (DC).

ISSUE: 684.

CULPRIT: James Robinson (writer).

DISSECTION: While law enforcement officers at Metropolis extract criminals from the Phantom Zone, the Parasite absorbs Mon-El's powers, even if for just a moment... you mean Superman didn't tell them to watch out for that?

DISSECT-O-METER: 5 Bazzars.
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"UMBROLLA ACADOMY."

TITLE: Umbrella Academy: Dallas (Dark Horse).

ISSUE: 03 of 06.

CULPRIT: Gerard Way (writer) and/or Blambot's Nate Piekos (letterer).

DISSECTION: I guess it should be "anomalies" instead of "anomolies".

DISSECT-O-METER: 3 Bazzars.
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"WONDER DISSECTION!"

TITLE: Wonder Woman V3 (DC).

ISSUE: 28.

CULPRIT: Gail Simone (writer) and/or Steve Wands (letterer).

DISSECTION: Spot me this one:


DISSECT-O-METER: 5 Bazzars. Also, Wonder Girl's lasso and Vixen's Totem are missing.
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"X-FARCE."

TITLE: X-Force V3 (Marvel).

ISSUE: 11.

CULPRIT: Craig Kyle & Christopher Yost (writers) and/or VC's Cory Petit (letterer).

DISSECTION: These kind of dissections are boring... "sacred" instead of "scared".

DISSECT-O-METER: 2 Bazzars.
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"COMPLEAT GUIDE TO PRONUNCIATION."

TITLE: Young X-Men (Marvel).

ISSUE: 10.

CULPRIT: Marc Guggenheim (writer).

DISSECTION: New character "Cipher" insists that her name is "Cipher" and not "Cypher"... while talking... both spellings of the word have the same pronounciation.

DISSECT-O-METER: 4 Bazzars. I guess the writer meant to signify that Graymalkin (whose speech patterns are outdated) pronounces it the way the British spell it... but there's no difference in pronunciation, regardless of how you spell it. Also, Anole's regenerated arm is smaller than it should be.
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A more or less low average of 5.3 Bazzars in twenty-eight dissections... Now it's time for the Moments Of The Week. First up, Johnny Storm knows how to party:


Those are, obviously, not the real Storm and Scarlet Witch, but girls playing dress-up... good thing Johnny has his own apartment away from the rest of the FF, or else, this would be hard to explain to Franklin and Valeria Richards! Next up, and again from Fantastic Four, talk about engagement presents:


Thanks Black Panther! And for our grand finale, the New Avengers react to the Dark Avengers:


Priceless. That's it for now, until next time, I'll be on the outlook for more dissections, because (almost) nothing escapes...

THE DISSECTOR!

6 comments:

MaGnUs said...

DT! cracked over at the ICS.

Jordan said...

Dammed..
Was it that Hawkman should be taller than Nemesis?

nice column this week :)

MaGnUs said...

Dude, that's not Hawkman, it's Wonder Woman wearing some weird armor. And glad you liked the column.

MaGnUs said...

Comments originally posted on ICS.net, right after the column was posted (Part I):

Nick S.: ...I don't have anything to add to this particular column, but I just realized you never mentioned the gigantic freaking continuity error in Uncanny X-Men Annual #2.

You must do this.


Martín "MaGnUs" Pérez: You know, I went over that again when I was culling my dissections for that particular week, and while it read awfully, I didn't really find a specific point to counter. You're welcome to write it up yourself, and I'll include it in next column if I can verify it.


DrSilent: I have no idea what the DT is... Is that not his right name? No clue. :x

That being said, depending on continuity I'm pretty sure the latest Vixen miniseries esteablished that she didn't need her totam anymore to use her powers.


Martín "MaGnUs" Pérez: Actually, while she doesn't strictly need it, she will easily lose control if she doesn't wear it. So, while lower-ranked, it's still a dissection. Batman doesn't need his utility belt, but it's a mistake to draw him without one, unless he specifically is parted with it.


Sullivan E.: They misspelled Tresser's name.

"Justin Thyme" writes the book, possibly because Shooter wanted nothing to do wit this travesty



And you misspelled "with."

MaGnUs said...

Comments originally posted on ICS.net, right after the column was posted (Part II):

Nick S.: We went through this before, this is what I forgot to e-mail about.

Let me go through this step by step.

Namor's presence indicates that this took place after Fantastic Four #4, as prior to that he was an amnesiac bum. (May 1962)

Tony Stark's general demeanor and drunken-ness indicates that he was most likely not Iron Man, therefore indicating that this takes place prior to Tales Of Suspense #39 (March 1963), or failing that during his alcoholism, at any time prior to Iron Man #184 (July 1984).

Shaw's quest for a White King indicates rather obviously that he does not HAVE a White King. This is also rather obviously the initial incarnation of the Hellfire Club, Shaw and Emma's presence being the most obvious tells. In the original incarnation of the Hellfire Club, while Shaw was in power, there have only been two white kings. One was a joint position held by Magneto and Storm. I don't have the exact issue number for this one, but it was in New Mutants, around the 50s. Roughly 1987. The previous White King was Donald Pierce, who was later expelled from the club. The expulsion occurred in the New Mutants graphic novel that took place prior to the series. 1982. As Pierce is present in this issue, quite unexpelled, this obviously takes place prior to anything New Mutants related.

So we have a timeline. Probably 1962-1963, definitely 1962-1982. The reference to Shaw's recent coup of taking over the club, and the lack of detailed knowledge on all parties concerned regarding Sentinels, suggest the earlier timeline. Not proving it, but suggesting it; as do the absences of Jason Wyngarde and Harry Leland.

Oh goddamn I just realized something else. Norman Osborn's there. Norman Osborn was presumed dead from June 1973 to 1995-1996, just after the death of Gwen Stacy. That cuts nine years off.

1962-1973.

I suppose I'll have to stop being a smug git and get to the point. =(

The crux of the issue is Selene.

The character of Selene was introduced in New Mutants #9 (November 1983), and did not leave it until New Mutants #11. Prior to that, her spirit had been trapped in Nova Roma for 'centuries', and was not able to leave after an indeterminate amount of time afterward. She joined the Hellfire Club in New Mutants #23 (January 1985).

Thus, it is impossible for Selene to be present because, in reverse chronological order:
A: Tony Stark is drunk
B: Donald Pierce is neither White King nor expelled from the Hellfire Club
C: Norman Osborn is publicly alive.

I rest my case, bitches. :D

MaGnUs said...

Comments originally posted on ICS.net, right after the column was posted (Part III):

Martín "MaGnUs" Pérez: Sully: Right on both counts.

Snake: While I appreciate your hard work, there's nothing to say when, relative to the X-Books, those Iron Man or Spider-Man issues happen, so it's possible that this happens after Pierce's expulsion and Selene's joining the Hellfire Club. It's a stretch, but still possible. Sliding timescales, and all that crap. It's fishy continuity, but it still fits. Again, thanks.


Nick S.: No, it's NOT possible. Pierce is THERE. Pierce is a MEMBER.

Pierce was expelled in the New Mutants graphic novel, which happens before New Mutants #1. Selene was in Nova Roma until New Mutants #11. In this, Pierce is a member.

It. Is. Impossible. Also, there IS something to say when, relative to the X-books, those Iron Man and Spider-Man issues occurred. It's called the Secret Wars. Which occurred AFTER Osborn's death, AFTER Pierce's expulsion, and PRIOR to Selene's joining the Hellfire club.

Secret Wars occurred at the same time, in the same month. April 1984, for all comics involved in it. Surely we can agree that here the relevant titles are Amazing Spider-Man, New Mutants, Uncanny X-Men, Iron Man, and possibly Namor, but I don't have enough data to make any salient points regarding Namor.

Iron Man entered the Secret Wars in Iron Man #181. During this period, it was Jim Rhodes wearing the armor. Simultaneously, Tony Stark was wandering the streets all scruffy and vagrant in a drunken haze, and had been for some time. After that, he did not touch alcohol. Therefore, for a drunk yet prosperous Stark to appear, it must be prior to the Secret Wars.

Norman Osborn was publicly dead from Amazing Spider-Man #122 onwards. Peter Parker entered the Secret Wars in Amazing Spider-Man #251. For Norman Osborn to appear, it must be prior to the Secret Wars.

the X-Men entered the Secret Wars in Uncanny X-Men #180, which was directly followed by New Mutants #15. Donald Pierce had no association with the Hellfire Club after the end of what we can consider New Mutants #0. Selene had no association with the Hellfire Club until New Mutants #23. For Donald Pierce to appear in the Club, it must be prior to the Secret Wars. For Selene to appear with the Hellfire Club, it must be after it, AND Donald Pierce must not be with it.

I win.


Martín "MaGnUs" Pérez: "No, it's NOT possible. Pierce is THERE. Pierce is a MEMBER."

You know, I misread part of your first post. The line I quote above was enough... and you don't win anything but a badge. This is not some kind of competition.


Nick S.: Sure it is. Me versus the horrible atrocities perpetuated by Matt Fraction against my poor X-Men. ._.


Martín "MaGnUs" Pérez: Come on, Matt Fraction might have made a mistake or two, but at least he's not a bad writer... or a has-been (like Claremont).


Nick S.: He's not a bad writer, I just hate him on X-Men.


Martín "MaGnUs" Pérez: Fair enough.