Legion Sprocked

ScienceFiction.com has an exclusive preview of the upcoming DC New 52 title Legion Lost #1, written by Fabian Nicieza with pencils by Pete Woods. You can check it out here.

I’ve never been a big Legion of Super Heroes fan; it’s hard to take seriously a group of super heroes that include one who’s power is apparently based on Skittles and the neverending battle with Type 2 diabetes, and many other who were invented by 12-year-olds mailing in character ideas. So while this book is on my pull list for the first issue, it wasn’t one I anticipated adding to my monthly pull list… until I got a look at this page:

Are Babies More Entertaining Than A Punch To The Stomach?

As I mentioned before, I’ve been giving the DCnU books a lot of attention. Babies, even baby comics universes, have a way of being attention stealers. There’s other comic book news happening out there, though. Morgan Spurlock’s love letter to sweaty cosplayersSan Diego Comic Con documentary premiered yesterday. Also, a comic book store owner has come up with a new marketing strategy:

AlleyCat Comics in Chicago’s Andersonville neighborhood has an unorthodox approach to rewarding frequent customers: Shoppers that hit 50 purchases get to punch a store employee in the stomach.

Excuse me. I have to fly to Chicago. BRB

And, Newsarama has posted some Marvel previews. Here are some of the issues I think I’ll be picking up soon (click through for larger images):

Low Hanging Fruit

Paging the copy editor for the Bluewater Productions Web site: you have a typo on your September 2011 releases page. A hilariously awesome typo:

FAME: Justine Bieber 2

The sound you just heard was the hearts of little 10 year old girls around the world breaking, accompanied by the collective whooshing fist pump of little 17 year old lesbians who are now optimistic that Beebs might actually play for their team. Good work!

GD Fundamentalists

There’s a panel in Action Comics #1 where Superman is shot by a tank, and he utters, well… he utters this:

Which is not the worst thing I’ve seen in a comic book this week – that would be The Big Lie by Rick Veitch, which makes Hawk & Dove look like Great Expectations, and which I’ll probably rant about tomorrow – but apparently it made the owner of The Comics Conspiracy, a comic store in North Carolina, go apeshit ballistic based on their Facebook page:

As of today’s release of Action Comics #1 by Grant Morrison, The Comic Conspiracy, will until further notice, be boycotting all future Grant Morrison books. If you want Action Comics, you will have to buy it elsewhere…

Christian comic book readers and shop owners. Join us in the Grant Morrison Boycott. Action Comics #1 is a slap in the face to Superman, Christians and Superman creators Siegel and Shuster!!

…It grieves me to see a liberal Scottish schmuck like Grant Morrison take these liberties. I’m sorry, Superman would NEVER take God’s name in vain. In the words of the late Jim Croce, “You don’t tug on Superman’s cape.

The dude’s blowup got a lot of play in the comics press, including Bleeding Cool, Geeks of Doom, and about a million other sites including Reddit. And I’m guessing that DC Comics, who’re in the middle of the New 52 press juggernaut, didn’t want to alienate the huge Christian fundamentalist market segment, who are well known for their love for comic books and other genre fiction, because they trotted Action Comics writer Grant Morrison out onto the DC Source blog:

Raiders of The Lost Stash

Last Sunday at Atlanta’s Dragon*Con, Jim Steranko showed off his four concept paintings of Indiana Jones for pre-production of Raiders of The Lost Ark.

Keep in mind that Steranko painted this, and these others, before a frame was shot and before Harrison Ford – or even Magnum P.I. – was cast, and you’ll finally realize that, between Steranko on Raiders and Ralph McQuarrie on Star Wars, the greatest contribution George Lucas personally made to either project was “Faster”, “More Intense” and “Hire N-Sync so my rat kids shut the fuck up.”

Spielberg and Lucas were so impressed by the initial work that the duo approached Steranko to do fifty more paintings, “one a day up until Christmas,” as it was November at the time at the time of their second meeting…

Spielberg offered an extension until the first of the year, which Steranko candidly declined.

Considering this was 1979 or so, and that the average comic artist can do a page or two of PENCILS a day, I’m guessing that Spielberg then offered Steranko a mountain of cocaine… and considering the Raiders story conference notes, Lucas probably offered him Marie Osmond. (via i09)

Rhymes With Jism, or: Let’s Fist Again

Newsarama’s got a preview of the first few pages of the finale to X-Men: Schism, the big second tier event Marvel’s running alongside Fear Itself… or maybe it’s the third tier event; in the Spider-Man books, Marvel’s running Spider Island, or: “Deadline? Um… Fuck It; EVERYONE’S Got Spider Powers! I’ll Be At The Bar Until My Check Clears!”

I’m gonna be honest with you: I don’t really follow the X-Men. That’s Amanda’s department. But I like Jason Aaron’s writing (If you’re not reading Scalped, you’re failing at comics), so I’ve been reading this one and generally enjoying it because you can’t go wrong with stories about evil children. Because ALL CHILDREN ARE EVIL; they steal your freedom and your beer and comics money for frivilous things like food and pants. That’s why I encase all my children in latex and flush them down the toilet before they can whimper at me. But I digress. Because I have been drinking. Anyway…

DC to Batgirl From SDCC: Sandwich – I Don’t Have One.

Image via Bleeding Cool. Also, I like pie.

This week, we’ve got thirteen new number ones, plus Justice League #1 from last week. I added it in because it seemed a little silly to give it its own post last week, so I saved it. On September 7, 2011, DC released 14 (really 13, plus 1 from the week before) brand new titles featuring 105 credited creators, 97 male and 8 female. So we’re nearly two percent less than the average amount. If you want to get into a whole percentage of percentage thing, this 7.6% is almost twenty percent below the average total of female creators.

So, holding all those “The New 52” panels hostage while constantly harping about how DC needs more women while you were at the microphone really seems to have worked out, huh, Kyrax2? Don’t you know you were supposed to do the decent thing and walk up to the microphone and say “Mr. Didio, you’re really awesome! How’d you get to be so awesome?”, while shallowly breathing through your mouth to avoid smelling the other sweaty, latex clad superfans gathered in the aisle waiting for their turn to fawn at the throne?

14 down, 38 to go. Maybe DC thinks hiding the Mysterious Woman Of Mystery in every single DCnU #1 is raising the total number of women in its books. Maybe we’ll find out she could be any one of a set of octuplets. Cosmic octuplets. Cosmic octuplets who follow Booster Gold through space and time, because he’s from the future and he knows that it’s important for the future of humanity to up the number of women involved in DC and –

Oh, fuck it. Just come back next year and try again. I have money riding on this.

13 Problems But A Foot Ain’t One

Things will be quiet for the remainder of the broadcast day for one reason.

Okay, for thirteen reasons.

DC’s Crazy Stalker Girlfriend

You promised me Dave Matthews tickets in this timeline! And cuddling!

Who the hell is this chick? DC wants us to play Where’s Waldo and spot the crazy lady in each of the 13 issues of the New 52 that have been released this week, with plans for her to make appearances in each remaining #1. They’re whoring her out more than Ke$ha at a recording industry retreat, “Can a sister drop some mad rhymes on a random kinda celeb’s mixtape? What? Ke$ha. K-E-dollar si- Please? I’m so lonely.”

No one knows who she is, but theories range from some sort of new Harbinger to a gender swapped Time Trapper Keeper. To paraphrase Bill Cosby quoting another guy, “She’s in your home state! She’s outside your front door! And she’s coming to get you!”.

Publicity generator or monster in my closet: you decide! Also, I am not a hoarder.

Oh no! She found me!

Time to start smearing Jell-o and lighting my couch on fire. BRB.

Correlation != Causation

Marvel has a comic book. It’s called Alpha Flight.

It’s set in Canada. Wolverine’s from Canada.

Wolverine’s gonna be in Alpha Flight.