DC Retroactive 1970s Justice League of America #1 review

Longtime DC comics editor Julie Schwartz was known for a number of things – reviving the Golden Age characters, pioneering parallel worlds, stories packed with scientific facts, tales based on unlikely cover images … but who know he was a keen housebreaker (click on images to enlarge)? That’s what happens when heroes come to visit […]

DC Retroactive 1970s Green Lantern #1 review

Hal Jordan meets a relative of Abin Sur who arrives on Earth in a parallel to the incident which saw Hal named Green Lantern of Sector 3814. Green Arrow must track down a mad archer who shoots both Black Canary and a grasping lawyer. They’re the strands which writer Denny O’Neil plays with in this […]

DC Retroactive 1970s Superman #1 review

Superman’s having a bad week in this DC Comics Retroactive special. Criminals are popping up when they shouldn’t, doing things that are beyond them – Metallo’s flying, Bizarro am speaking perfect English, that sort of thing. Lois Lane is annoyed at Superman paying attention to Lana Lang, Supergirl and Van-Zee think their Kryptonian cousin is super-cranky, Clark Kent’s colleagues […]

Wonder Woman #613 review

It’s part 842 of the Odyssey story and the finish line is in sight. In this issue, Diana fights Nemesis, goddess of Exposition. Clad in Diana’s original form – the star-spangled heroine of the regular DC Universe – Nemesis battles the new model we’ve been following for the past year. And finally, readers get answers. […]

SPECIAL GUEST POST: Barbarian #3 review

Now this is an odd little comic. Starting out as your average hack-n-slash barbarian vs sharp-toothed, purple-skinned monsters tale, complete with retro sound effects (I’ll see your ‘koom!’ and raise you a ‘rraar!’ and a ‘thawack!’), manga-style visuals and the odd hacked-off limb, it morphs into a cautionary sci-fi story where the big, scary monsters are actually saccharine-sweet, peace-loving veggie good […]

Legion of Doom #2 review

Heatwave continues his bid to break out of flying prison the Hall of Doom, aided by Eel O’Brien, the stretchable stinker who hates to be known as Plastic Man. They battle unofficial prison guards Atomic Skull and Animal Man, and find out who’s controlling the executing Amazo android that put paid to KGBeast, Slipknot and […]

Power Girl #26 review

Last month regular writer Judd Winick ended his current association with Power Girl with a story that paid tribute to Karen Starr, as a hero and a person. If the next two issues of the series, fill-ins before the post-Flashpoint DC Universe wipes out this book, were stinkers, we could easily pretend the comic ended […]

DC Retroactive 1970s Batman #1 review

The still of the Gotham night is broken by a new threat to the citizenry, the Terrible Trio, cheering a bored Batman up no end. The Fox, the Shark and the Vulture have stolen the MO of the Silver Age villains of the same name, and they manage to outwit Batman twice before the Gotham […]

SPECIAL PREVIEW REVIEW: Princeless #1 review

Postmodern takes on fairy tale tropes aren’t new. In comics there’s Fables, the big screen gave us Enchanted and Tangled, TV had The Charmings and the musical stage, Into the Woods. That doesn’t mean there’s no room for another entry in the mini-genre, especially when it’s as good as Princeless #1, which is barbed yet […]

Supergods review

SUPERGODS: Our World in the Age of the SuperheroBy Grant Morrison Jonathan Cape, 444pp, £17.99 HALFWAY through his memoir, Scottish comic book writer Grant Morrison – he’s just about to revamp Superman from the ground up for DC Comics – mentions going on holiday to Kathmandu. When he was there, he claims, beings from a […]