Hawkeye Misses His Target...AGAIN.

What's up with Hawkeye #22?  

Issue #21 was finally released in April 2015, five months after #20.  And there were several lapses in the comics prior to that.  Now instead of releasing (forever delayed) #22, Marvel Comics goes ahead and releases an "All-New" Hawkeye series?  FAIL.  

Who hires these bozos?  You can't meet a deadline?  Writer?  Artist?  Editor?  Etc.?  Did Kevin Smith write this book?  Hello?  Anyone home? 

Tell ya what, Marvel, you can keep Hawkeye #22.  My collection ended with #21.  

With the Avengers movies riding a huge financial wave, you'd think they'd want to capitalize on one of the main characters by producing a consistent series.  By the way, it also helps that when you have a Hawkeye comic, that you include that superhero (the Clint Barton version) instead of focusing on the "other" (lame) Hawkeye (Kate Bishop).  And just why can't she get her own moniker anyway?  So, Marvel, you can keep All-New Hawkeye, too, because I'm not buying into it when you can't even include the main character in his own book.   

I've always loved Hawkeye and was a HUGE fan of him during the West Coast Avengers days, so I was excited when he was included in the silver screen version of the Avengers and got his own series.  Sadly, while Marvel Studios seems to know what to do with Hawkeye, it seems Marvel Comics doesn't.

Better... Stronger... Faster.

As a child of the 70s, I loved the Six Million Dollar Man and the Bionic Woman.  While superheroes seemed like fantasy, these two were normal, everyday people who received special abilities.  Like, of course, this could really happen with modern technology.  

I watched both TV shows (and their TV special reunions), and had all of the dolls (Steve Austin, Jaime Sommers, Oscar Goldman, and Bigfoot), and their accompanying playsets.  I never did get that Fembot doll, though -- dammit! -- which, I'm convinced, was the inspiration for Austin Powers' fembots (minus the gun nipples).  

Bionic Man #1

I was excited when Dynamite Comics started to release Kevin Smith's Bionic Man monthly comic book.  I was even more excited that it was released monthly, as scheduled.  Kevin Smith doesn't have the best track record with completing his assignments on time.  Dynamite probably knew that and that's why they took the basic story idea(s) from him and had someone else more reliable actually scribe it.  The series started out really good and then started to get a bit lackluster.  It lost its character edge and everyone seemed so generic and uninteresting in the latter single digit issues.  

Bionic Man #11

With issue #11 (the first one not bearing Kevin Smith's name across the top), character development was at its peak.  Steve's adventure-filled life comes to a slow crawl as he returns to his family's farm.  Here, we meet Steve's dying father, his strong-willed but tender mother, and his doting sister.  They all thought Steve was dead (because that's what the news reported) and are surprised and happy to see that he's still alive.  His secret soon comes out, though, and they realize that he's no longer just a man anymore. But while this story was the best in the series so far with character development, it also felt a bit weak at the same time.  The family doesn't seem truly overjoyed with the news that Steve is alive.  It was as if Steve just told his family that he got a small promotion of work and his mother replying, "That's nice, dear."  

The story does have some tender moments, though, and I'm glad that we, the readers, got to meet Steve's family.  Ironically, it made him more human than previous issues depicted.  

After reading issue #11, I can honestly now say that I'm looking forward to the next installment of the Bionic Man.  Why?  Toward the end of issue #11, we get a glimpse of something watching Steve from the woods.  It's no secret who/what it is, though, because they reveal the secret already in the "next issue" column: it's Bigfoot.  I love the image, too, because not only is it Bigfoot, Steve's nemesis from the old TV show, but Steve's wearing the red track suit (that the Steve Austin doll came with).  Euphoria washed over me seeing that nostalgic image.  

On a related note, like the TV show, Jaime Sommers was so popular in the Bionic Man series that Dynamite gave her her own monthly series in Spring 2012.  After two issues, though, the series was apparently abandoned.  I guess sales weren't as good as they had hoped, but I was really getting into the story...and I always did prefer Jaime Sommers over Steve Austin.  

I hope Dynamite continues producing a great monthly comic and that we one day will see the return of the Bionic Woman. 

Someone Needs *Their* Ass Kicked

Because of the success of the first Kick-Ass comic book limited series from 2008 (and the 2010 movie of the same name), a sequel, Kick Ass 2, was proposed.  The first issue of the second series was released on October 20, 2010.  It was extremely successful and sold out within a week. 

It's now the middle of March (that's five months later for those of you without a calendar or calculator handy) and we've yet to see issue #2.  Did someone give this assignment to Kevin Smith or Grant Morrison?  I wish I had a job where I could turn in my assignments five months late.  Can anyone even remember what happened in issue #1?  At this point, does anyone care?

Wide Load Coming Through

Batman: The Widening Gyre #4

I haven't posted anything lately.  I guess I really haven't read anything really noteworthy to discuss.  I did read Kevin Smith's Batman: The Widening Gyre mini-series in its "entirety" about a month ago, though, so I'll write about that.  (You'll see why I put "entirety" in quotes later.)

First, I'll start with the title.  The title is taken from a poem called "The Second Coming" by William Butler Yeats.  The poem was written in 1919 in the aftermath of the WWI. While the various manuscript revisions of the poem refer to the Renaissance, French Revolutions, the Irish rebellion, and those of Germany and of Russia, others suggest the text refers to the Russian Revolution of 1917.  The poem uses Christian imagery regarding the Apocalypse and second coming as allegory to describe the atmosphere in post-war Europe. 

The poem begins:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
    The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
    Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
    Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.

If you're interested, you can find the rest of the poem here.

With that imagery in mind, "the widening gyre" in Batman's case is the appearance of many of his villains all at once.  He's bombarded with different villains in each issue.  Meanwhile, there are subplots of Bruce Wayne/Batman's romance with Silver St. Cloud (that comes with a lot of jealousy from a famous feline lady), as well as the appearance of a new vigilante in town sporting a goat mask by the name of Baphomet.  (You can read about the origins of that name here.)  

"The Widening Gyre" was supposed to be released monthly.  However, like Kevin Smith's Spider-Man and the Black Cat: The Evil That Men Do, there were delays.  The six issues were released in October 2009, November 2009, December 2009 (so far so good), and then February 2010, April 2010, and lastly, September 2010.  Ouch.  Nearly a year for a six-issue mini-series.  (Note to Kevin: if you're not going to write them in timely manner, please don't take or ask for the assignments; there are many, MANY other comic writers out there who would LOVE to have the opportunity to write a mini-series.  Note to DC and Marvel Comics: don't start printing/releasing Kevin's comics until he's completed all issues of a mini-series.)  

Bruce and Silver frolic in the water.

Luckily, I didn't start reading the issues until I had them all, so it was fairly cohesive for me.   I enjoyed Batman facing off against his most popular foes, one after the other.  It reminded me somewhat of "The Gauntlet" storyline that just ran through The Amazing Spider-Man series last year.  Best of all, though, was the romance developments between Bruce Wayne/Batman and Silver St. Cloud.  She's the only non-superhero who could handle being partnered with Bruce Wayne, knowing what he does in his spare time.  She's mature, yet fun.  Attached, yet not clingy.  And she certainly doesn't need the Wayne fortune.  It left me wondering, though, if this series was a dream, took place in the distant past, was an Elseworlds story, was a "what if?" type scenario, etc., because this could seriously change Bruce/Batman emotionally, not to mention his relationship with Catwoman.

Kevin Smith

As I finished reading the sixth/final issue, it ended with a cliffhanger (I won't reveal what) and said to look for Volume Two.  WTF?  When?  2026?  This was supposed to be a six-issue mini-series and now there's more?   I want to know what happens, but I don't want to know on Kevin Smith's time schedule.  Imagine if Dallas had decided to take a three-year break to reveal Who Shot J.R.?  I enjoy Kevin Smith's writing and the stories he comes up with for such superheroes as Batman, Green Arrow, and Spider-Man, but I'm more than a bit frustrated with his lack of dedication, as well as DC and Marvel's acceptance of his flagrant disregard for deadlines.  He's not exactly winning over fans.  Perhaps the "widening gyre" refers to the gap in time between comic releases?