This "Colossus" looks like he should be from Badger, but...

Since we saw a book from this duo earlier this week, let's wrap up with another Mike Baron/Bill Reinhold comic: from 2002, Legends of the Dark Knight #155, "Colossus, part two." Kind of wish I had part one handy, so I could recap the plot, but these things happen. Per the GCD, "Someone is killing everyone connected to the long-dead designer of the Gotham Civic Center." Fine. This ish, Batman drives down to the worst part of down, and beats down a ream of thugs before leaving them to "watch" the Batmobile. Then the Batmobile beats down the thugs that mess with it...

Reinhold sneaks a Badger logo on the first thug there, too. The Batmobile gets two pages to defend its honor, which is actually pretty entertaining. There's also an honorable villain for Batman to deal with--you know the type, one that takes the law into his own hands with the best of intentions and murder, and that has to die at the end of the story. Still a solid read...if I could find part one...



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"Robin's Day Out, or Driving Object Lessons."

Click to enlarge. Or squint. See if I care!




I have a Super Powers Batmobile, but no actual Super Powers figures. It was an eBay score, and there are the occasional figures that fit in it.

I love the old Animated style Robin, because he seems that much smaller than Batman or any of the bad guys, and stands out in contrast. This whole strip was little more than having Robin and some figures that would fit in the Batmobile in the same box. Incidentally, it was a box that hadn't seen a lot of use, since most of the toys I buy and display lately are larger-scale.

Plus, and this is another one of those things I could be completely misremembering, but in Batman: the Animated Series, wasn't Tim Drake initially only interested in getting revenge on Two-Face for killing his dad? And then Batman makes him Robin to keep him from getting killed, and get a new sidekick out of the deal? Kind of press-ganged Tim into the gig. Still, the voicework on Tim was better than you would've thought, and Tim seemed to have a relatively normal childhood--playing videogames and slacking off, that is--despite his dad's death, brutal training from Batman, life and death situations on a weekly basis, etc.

I do miss this style of Batmobile, though: one that's neither tank nor gothic monstrosity.

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"Things I Don't Get, Real or Imagined, Part Two."

Short one this week, so click to enlarge, and, um, read slowly.
The last two panels are my personal expression of disbelief, that I own a Masters of the Universe Bashin' Beetle, but don't have a Legends/DCUC scaled Batmobile, Fantasticar, Mach 5, anything. That Iron Man coupe is starting to look pretty good. I had that Super Powers Batmobile out for what was supposed to be a single shot, that turned into another strip for later. I do have two other versions of the last two panels on flickr, and will put those up here later, mostly just because I had too much fun putting it together.

I thought I needed to work on the text piece for this one, but I was thinking next week's, which is another short strip with an absurdly long writeup. The topic? My least favorite action figure accessory, ever. Take a guess or name your own, and I can guaran-damn-tee nobody guesses it. Hell, some people might even want it. (Not like I'm giving it away either, but...) Read more!

Presented without commentary...aw, hell, there's commentary.
The Youngest set this up. I had given him a little pile of Simpsons toys, since he loves the movie, and I had brought that Corgi Batmobile from my desk at work for another strip...that I haven't had time to take any photos for. Hell.

I took Monday off, since it was a busy, busy weekend. The Oldest's tenth birthday ended up running for three days: Saturday with Free Comic Book Day and Iron Man, Sunday with a barbecue and party at his grandparents, and Monday with lunch and more presents from my folks. Rest assured, he got a ton of stuff, a ton of cake, and generally spoiled rotten. Oh, and Iron Man was all kinds of fun, and even with a ton of other comic book movies coming out this year, it's going to be a tough one to beat.

A quick note on Free Comic Book Day: as usual, the Comic Book Shop fixed me and the boys up. My personal favorite? Probably the Marvel Spider-Man/Iron Man/Hulk one, although the Atomic Robo story was solid, and I did like the Hellboy one a lot, but it loses a few points for being a bit tied up in the current storylines.

Greg Land gets a lot of flack for his art being overly photo-referenced, but I liked the FCBD X-Men issue more than I'd expected. Still, and I know she's a pre-existing character from New X-Men, but every time I see Pixie, I'm going to think of some editor telling the writers, "We need a new audience identification figure, like Kitty Pryde or Jubilee. Something like, I don't know, Pixie or something, just not as lame. Oh, and this time, I don't care if she's fourteen or thirty-seven, I want her built."

Saturday morning, before we left the house, the Wife asked me if I knew anything about German Idealism. Not off the top of my head, but I recommended Action Philosophers! which became the first comic books the Wife ever bought or read! Congratulations to Fred van Lente and Ryan Dunlavey, especially since she had proven resistant to just about every other comic. She picked up two trades, and we'll have to dig up the last one later. The Wife's enjoyed them a lot, although she might also be a Marxist now. Well, baby steps--she also loved Iron Man.

Also, I fixed the toilet with my dad, which involved sawing off a plastic lug nut from a stripped bolt. Most people don't have to use garden shears for plumbing, but I say, you can't argue with results. I also took my bike in to get new tubes, so we'll see how long they last me this year. While I was waiting, I dug through the quarter boxes at the Comic Book Shop again, until I found that issue of Balder the Brave that I'm theoretically missing. I also stumbled across this one:

The more things change, huh? But would this work, ever? In high school, for a while I dated a girl that had an older brother who was often the source of my group's booze. Even though I didn't think it was going anywhere, and tried to break up with her more than once, on one occasion I went to see her, bound and determined to end it once and for all right then and there. Except she had got her brother to buy us a Party Ball. I zipped my lip and took one for the team without any hesitation. After all, she was prettier than Denise...

(Anyone else remember the Party Ball? If not, you're either younger than me, weren't a teenage drunkard, or had a bigger social group, like enough friends for a keg. The thing was kind of a pain in the ass, since I think we had to find a pump for it...God, I can't even remember what kind of beer it was. Coors? No?)

Speaking of beer, it comes up a lot in this one, which I read while waiting at the Youngest's therapy:

Switchblade Honey isn't one of his major works, but it is a fun story from Warren Ellis, one he admits in the introduction to be "a joke told in my voice, full of my usual rubbish." It's a fun sci-fi adventure, that's like a dirtier, British Star Trek with drinking, smoking, cursing, and other stuff that makes life, if not worth living, mildly tolerable. Ellis seems to have most of his stuff through Avatar now, so I'm not sure if this one is easily available or not, but it's well worth digging up.

Gah, busy day. New figure comic Wednesday. I know I won't have this much going on between now and then...

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I can recognize like three styles of car from the last 20 years, but I have my Batmobile preference down pat.


I do like the current trend to draw the Batcave with about a dozen Batmobiles in storage, even if Batman probably wouldn't have a 1940's roadster in the current continuity, or even the 60's TV version. It's just cool, and that's all. And, I suppose it would probably make sense for Batman to have specialized Batmobiles: Dark Knight Returns crowd control tank, 1970's Neal Adam's low-key street crime lab, or my personal favorite, Norm Breyfogle's highend racer.

I was looking for Detective Comics #601, which wasn't the start of the Alan Grant/Norm Breyfogle run, but was their return after the three issue "Blind Justice" storyline. The Batmobile gets challenged to a street race on the first page, and the storyline ends with the Demon giving Batman a peck on the cheek. Yeah, it totally makes sense when you read it, so pick it up.

This all came up since the other day my older son put his allowance towards a Cars Lightning McQueen, while I picked up the Corgi 1990's Batmobile, which totally nails Breyfogle's art, down to the curved spoiler fins. And then we had a forty minute conversation about how the Batmobile would totally smoke Lightning McQueen. My point may have got a little muddled when he didn't know the Mach V, but he's got time to learn. Yeah, some people want to make sure their kids are raised Catholic or Orthodox or whatever; I'm just making sure mine know their nerd roots.

(Don't worry: my wife's totally 'street' or whatever; so the kids will be cool nerds. Cooler than me, anyway...)

From Batman #463, "Spirit of the Beast, part two" Written by Alan Grant, pencils by Norm Breyfogle, inks by Steve Mitchell. Read more!