BatSledge's Profile

THIS! I knew from the first few issues that Fraction was playing the long game, doling out enough good character development and forward plot movement to slowly build towards a big payoff. I feel like this issue is the beginning of that payoff. This issue’s storytelling has a very cinematic pace and quality to it, courtesy of Fraction and Sook, who does a fantastic fill-in job once again. Things b oil over as Team Batman races against the clock, and against Savage’s special TUCO unit, to destroy their remote bases around the city before they are penetrated and their equipment seized. They’re too late in a few instances, and there were moments in this issue where I truly wondered if certain characters might not survive the assault. One character does get apprehended in a very dramatic moment, while a legacy location that has been in the Bat-family for decades is destroyed, à la the USS Enterprise in Star Trek III.

I thoroughly enjoyed everything about this issue and am already eager for a re-read! Amazing things are happening in this book at last, and it’s gonna be one helluva ride!more

This edition is superior to the DC/Marvel one from last month. While I loved last month’s Waid/Mora lead story, the backup stories in that one were a mixed bag. This version, however, has an even better, dare I say EXCELLENT, lead story by Brad Meltzer and the amazing Pepe Larraz on art chores. The story features a nice blend of action, suspense, and emotional character work as Superman helps to a ssuage Peter’s guilt at not being able to save everyone. Larraz’s art has a nice, classic 70s Neal Adams quality to it, a style which I see very little of these days. The final pages with the family dinner and the early pages with Supes and Spidey in a death trap were the key highlights for me, and the venom appearance was fun, too.

Among the backups, all of which I enjoyed to varying degrees, the standouts were Slott’s Spider-Man Noir story, the Mysterio/Superman story by Johns and Frank, Simonson’s Hobgoblin/Steel story, the Ghost Spider/Supergirl story, and Loeb’s brief Spidey/Supes wrap-up at the end. I feel like greater editorial care was taken with the selection of back-up stories, character team-ups, and creative teams than with the DC book or either of the 2 Deadpool/Batman collections from last fall.

Most definitely worth your $7.99! I got the awesome Greg Capullo cover, btw, but there were so many great ones to choose from at my store.more

This issue is a must-have for any SWAMP THING fan past or present, as well as collectors of milestone issues. It’s a beautifully told story of Swampy’s time-traveling encounter with Jesus, his disciples, and the Romans, culminating in the Crucifixion. There’s a wonderful essay included in the issue by Stephen Bissette that gives proper background and context to the series in 1989, along with a loo k at the cultural underpinnings taking place that year in entertainment and politics that DC was being influenced by in terms of their decision to cancel the publication of issue 88. It’s easy to see some of those same turbulent political and cultural forces still in play here in 2026, which makes DC’s decision to finally publish the issue very commendable.

What’s especially cool about the issue to this 47-year comic collector is that the issue features both the original DC house ads from May 1988 as well as a nifty “Johnny DC” column, done in the style of the original columns DC featured at the time, right down to that week’s checklist of May 1988 issues.

From the amazing story and script to the beautiful art, colors and lettering, this book is worthy of your attention and your dollars. Better late than never!more

What has happened to this book? Last issue’s #600 was underwhelming, but not bad by any means. However, this issue, which was supposed to feature Kyle in the spotlight, gives him 11 of 22 pages, with Hal getting the other half. Fair enough, as I’m still a Hal fan as well. But it gets worse from there…With a green golf club, followed by a sledgehammer, Kyle takes down a ferocious alien escapee who’ s disrupting traffic and named Gridlock. Apparently, he was originally imprisoned after trying to destroy a planet’s core and after murdering a bunch of GLs; it took 10 to take him down. Kyle does it with a wink and a smirk. He then spends the rest of the issue in Odyssey’s acting job interview playing his own new gig: second banana.

Elsewhere, Hal Jordan accidentally stumbles upon the missing Guardians, who determine that he’s a threat to all life everywhere and try to chase him down and murder him.PS… The cover is VERY misleading, there’s definitely no Flash in this issue. None. Which is too bad, as it only would’ve helped Kyle’s story.That’s it…that’s the issue in a nutshell. And I’m starting to think that’s where Jeremy Adams belongs. He did a great job writing The Flash, and since then, he’s had a couple good ideas on Green Lantern. However, it seems like he’s run out of gas, and the horrible sales of this book reflect this lack of reader enthusiasm. This book is quickly spiraling, and this issue’s cartoony art by Ig Guara certainly doesn’t help, when even Hal is borderline unrecognizable. Send out an SOS, because this book needs help stat! Ron Marz and Darryl Banks seem to still enjoy writing Kyle. Give them 6 issues to rehab the book and right the ship, boost the sales, and then hand it over to a fresh new writer with a big vision for the book and fresh, exciting ideas. That blueprint has turned out very well for THE FLASH book (exit Spurrier, bring in Waid for 6 exciting issues, then hand off to Ryan North).more

The 2nd issue of Ryan North’s run is even better than his first! I haven’t laughed this hard at a Flash comic in decades, if ever. The various escalating attempts by people to throw themselves in harm’s way and win $10,000 when Flash saves them is a hysterically insane, and funny, premise that soon overwhelms Wally despite his best efforts to stop the madness. Additionally, we get Captain Cold thr own into the mix for even more humor. Things turn serious, quickly, near the end when a major threat to the city presents itself.North and Guidry make an excellent team here. In addition to the brilliant visuals, the dialogue is clever and witty as well. I am ecstatic that we seem to have a new permanent team on the book that will make things fun and inventive and exciting month in and month out.

Help spread the word on this book, as we need the sales to improve, thereby ensuring a long and healthy run for this team, who are healing this book from the damage that Spurrier did to it.more

Issue #3 serves up Pluto Fried Chicken in the form of the bizarre Menagerie assassin cleverly named Big Cock, because he has a giant…chicken mask. This comic keeps batting 1000 every issue so far, and this issue certainly doesn’t disappoint. We see a (slightly) less profane, softer side of Eddie, who helps out his ailing dad with a shitty situation, and in gratitude, his dad offers not to try and murder him for one day. This relationship is the heart and soul of an otherwise bananas storyline that sees the townspeople get a big kick out of watching a rude, foul-mouthed assassin and another rude, monosyllabic fowl beaked assassin beat the living shit out of one another for half the issue in one of the funniest, most bizarre throw downs I’ve ever seen in any comic! I find myself at a loss for words over how to describe the details of this fight, other than to say Eddie gets tossed around like a 180-pound human pinwheel.

This is the funniest, wildest comic that most people aren’t reading, and I’m trying to do my part to change that. I can only hope this comic gets optioned as a movie or HBO series, because only then will it really take off into the stratosphere. Until then, this delightful book will be DC’S (and a few select fans such as myself) naughty little secret!more

This book continues to be a glorious mess, both in terms of writing and now art as well. A new storyline seems to kick off involving an Overseer on Rann called Shade, who is dealing with an insurrectionist (Agent Carter type seems like a good comparison) that comes through a portal aka a zeta beam. This is the main story while in the secondary plot, we are told that Absolute Sinestro is sending a planet-killer called Mogo to Earth and that the Overseer on Rann must prepare his troops (Black Hands) for the arrival of the Tomar.

If any of this shit makes sense to anyone else reading this book, more power to you. I hope you continue to enjoy this book, which from my perspective has turned into an Absolute Mess, written by Al Ewing as a Grant Morrison-wannabe. He has taken all of the intergalactic DCU concepts he could scoop up, ranging from Green Lanterns, Red Lanterns, Fuscia Lanterns, Darkstars, Blackstars, Black Hand, Mr. Hand, Black Head, Gold Face, Brown Arse and so forth, threw them into his Absolute Blender, and vomited it all back up into a Steaming Absolute Pile (the first 6 or so of which were actually quite good). I’m out after 13 issues and I doubt I’ll look in on it in the DC Infinite Ultra App unless there’s nothing else to read in there. Peace out!more

Wow! This is everything a first issue should be, and everything a 44-year FURY OF FIRESTORM fan could hope for. Something new yet familiar, scary and yet fun, mysterious and nail-biting…and a blast of nostalgia seeing familiar faces once again that have been absent far too long. Lemire is one of DC’s best writers when given material that he’s passionate about, and according to his Substack, he’s a fan of the original Gerry Conway material. This love for the characters is on display here with the first issue, which sucks you right in from the first couple pages and doesn’t let go! Lemire has crafted a fascinating mystery here, as Firestorm is most definitely not what he seems. Something is horrifically wrong with him, and the U.S. Military tries to contain him by bringing in a familiar face from his past. We are also treated to what seems to be a fun, 1982-era interlude with the classic Conway version…but is it really happening, or is it a distant memory?

The art by De LaTorre rises to the level of the writing, alternately portraying Firestorm as dark and menacing in some panels, particularly with the horrors that the small Colorado town and its inhabitants are subjected to, and fun and bright in other parts of the story.

Can’t wait to see the mystery unfold, and I seriously hope this book will not be limited to 8 issues. Highly recommended to both old fans and new fans, who will find themselves easily brought up to speed on Firestorm’s origin and a few key historical touchpoints along the way.more

Wow, this issue was a breath of fresh air! Coming off of Waid’s action-packed KO time travel Impulse opus, it’s nice for this new team to do a reset and tee up the tone and style they intend to bring to the book. Waid helped give the book a needed sales boost after the horrific Spurrier run, and now hopefully North and Guidry can bring in new fans who are looking for something fun and interesting with the Fastest Man Alive. They have an intriguing and clever storyline to launch their run, very meta in fact. People are deliberately throwing themselves in harm’s way and live-streaming it so they can collect money from a mysterious entrepreneur when Flash comes to save them. There’s more going on here than meets the eye, and I’m excited to see where this goes. As a bonus, longtime Wally fans will appreciate the second appearance this week of Geoff Johns’ villain, Tar Pit (Waid used him in this week’s JLU, too). Good times!more

I’m a HUGE Kyle Rayner fan, dating back to his introduction in the early 90s in the classic Emerald Twilight arc. The Marz/Banks run was great and Kyle kept the torch alive for 10 years until Geoff Johns brought Hal back and rebooted the Corps. I love that Adams has decided to pivot over to Kyle and make him the focus for a while while Hal leaves to go do….whatever. And this is where the wheels co me off the issue. Following last issue’s failed attempt at a marriage proposal, Adams has Hal run off to go on some journey of self-discovery that started months ago, and yet we are no closer to understanding what that journey is all about. Bringing Kyle back to Earth was great, at least, but Adams didn’t give him anything interesting to do. An escaped space roach takes over a sleazy studio executive. Kyle shuts him down. The End. Contrast this with Ryan North’s FLASH debut this week, with a similar situation: reintroduce readers to Wally West. North hits it out of the park because he made Wally very likable and gave him something interesting and exciting to do, setting up a tantalizing new mystery. However, Adams does none of this. Instead, we get to watch Kyle tour LA with Wally and Kyle’s gal pal, we get a half-baked retelling of Kyle’s origin, and we get a half-baked retelling of Hal’s origin too. None of this makes for an exciting anniversary issue, or even a series jump start.The only highlight for me was having Marz and Banks back together again on a better, if all-too-brief, Kyle story, that dazzles with the artwork (and Kyle’s ring creations in particular) and feels far more like Kyle in tone and dialogue than he did in Adams’ story. Only natural since this duo created Kyle. But it doesn’t serve Adams’ version well.I’m seriously concerned for the future of this book. It is one of DC’s lowest selling ongoing monthly titles, and it shouldn’t be. If this issue was Adams’ best attempt to engage new readers and widen the audience, then it left me underwhelmed. I loved Adams’ run on The Flash, but for some reason, his GL isn’t clicking anymore.more

Peace out, I’m done. I gave this book a year and we barely have any answers to what’s going on, and instead Ewing just keeps throwing more strange mysteries at us. There are 5 other Absolute comics I’d MUCH rather read, with 2 more on the way.

Killer first issue that I bought after reading the preview elsewhere, so I’ll be returning for more. Art and writing form a very nice symmetry here as well meet the characters in the middle of fallout from a heist gone wrong. Definitely owes a nod to John Wick. The dialogue is snappy, filled with profanity, and a lot of funny, dark humor! Not for everyone, but definitely worth checking out.