#So These Are Comic Books

Variant Covers: #OccupyGotham, Bruce Wayne Is A Corpo-Fascist.

Bruce Wayne is a corporate fascist. Imposing his will outside of the jurisdiction of the law, causing Socrates and good willed citizens of the world alike to shake their head.  How many schools could Bruce Wayne build with the amount of money he’s spending to build his fascist rodent state?

Occupy Gotham.
Occupy Metropolis.
Occupy Emerald City.

(This is Variant Covers, your weekly guide to the comics I’m checking out this week. Your pull-list is encouraged to be shared.)

Keep Reading »

Variant Covers: Cyclops and Wolverine’s Unresolved Sexual Tension. Just Kiss, Dudes.

My friends, it is far past the witching hour. Having been awake for 21 hours, my brain frizzled and pops. It shudders under heavy thought – and if you know me, you know heavy for me is nothing much special. Yeah here is a column I vomit up out of my shivering skull pipes and into the Pressing of Word. This is Variant Covers, the column where I tell you what intrigues me in comics this week. It’s generally poor and verbose, this week it’s going to be exceptionally poor and succinct.

Share your pull-list at the beep.

Keep Reading »

Variant Covers: The X-Men Meet A Temporal Mind Warp.

Shucks howdy!, everyone. This is your friendly comic book column. You know, the one where I, the blather monster tell you all the comic books I’m interested in this week. You wrestle with your distaste for me, and ideally then let me know what you’re diggin’ on in the comments box.

Keep Reading »

Variant Covers: Transdimensional Super Spy Swagger.

Oh my gosh! The Flashpoint has come and gone! The DC ‘New 52’ has arrived with all the musty fart pomp-and-circumstance-and-nothing-much-else that you’d expect. Last week saw just the conclusion of the worst storyline to cause a Universe relaunch ever, and the first issue of JL(A). And yeah kids, I’m counting Heroes Reborn as better than this nonsense. It had Onslaught! Franklin Richards! Other stuff! Rob Liefeld! This is a new week though, and filled with new titles from DC that actually get me a bit excited. More importantly, this is the return of Mr. Quinn.

Variant Covers. Your pull-list for the week. Show me. I’m practically begging.

Keep Reading »

Variant Covers: Smile! The DC Relaunch Is Here!

The DC relaunch is here. Hide your children. The DC relaunch is here. Jim Lee is ruining your favorite characters’ costumes. The DC relaunch is here. They’re going to treat the Universe’s continuity like a buffet line. Picking and choosing what to keep. The DC relaunch is here. Their talking heads are spitting double-speak corporate nonsense, starring in embarrassing videos. The DC relaunch is here, they’re taking away our handicapped heroine, dragging Wildstorm and Vertigo characters into their orbit. The DC relaunch is here, and they’re going same-day digital and stabbing your favorite crusty old comic book store in the heart with a solid gold stake.

The DC relaunch is here.

And I think it’s for the best.

Keep Reading »

Variant Covers: Happy Endings, Big Questions, and More.

Comic books. I need them. They’re an antidote to my weekly stressors that neither my therapist nor pharmaceutically-engineered happiness could touch. So I hope Grant Morrison isn’t right. I hope comic books aren’t dying. ‘Cause they’re the salve on the chapped ass of my perpetual existential crisis. Tomorrow is Wednesday, when the batch of momentary reality-ejection drops. What are you buying? What are you interested interested in?

Keep Reading »

Variant Covers: Make My Matt Murdock A Byronic Hero.

It’s a small week for me. Which is okay, because if we’re all pulling down our pull list pants and baring all for one another, I’ll confess that the only comic book I’ve read from last week’s haul is Fear Itself #5. It isn’t that there wasn’t a healthy amount of titles for me to gorge on. It’s just that I’m the prototypical comic book equivalent of an edger. If you’d like to think of my reading comic books as masturbating (because let’s face it for a comic book geek to talk about actual fornication is just killing the motif), then my reading habits have me perpetually hovering around my favorite titles. The time needs to be perfect. To climax with the titles that truly blow my mind. Last week I didn’t climax, my stack of comic books is blue and bulging and asking for release.

I’m not really sure what I’m writing about anymore.

Keep Reading »

Variant Covers: Spiders, Red Wings, and Frankenstein’s Monsters.

Every Wednesday I’m granted a brief reprieve from the quiet of my own mind. Every Wednesday in the form of images and words I’m given a myriad of different Universes to momentarily inhabit. Bulging muscles and metaphysical pontifications. Heroics and psychological demons. Every week. What a gift.

This is Variant Covers. Comic book column. The comics I’m snagging on a given week, or stoked upon. What are you reading? I’m interested.

Keep Reading »

Variant Covers: SHIELD Rob Liefield From The Punisher!

This is a big old piggy of a week here in Variant Covers. The comic books column that serves as a soap-box for spouting off on what me and you are interested in the world of funny books this week. There’s a good amount of sequential art tickling the old taint this week, so let’s have at it.

Don’t forget to show me yours.

Keep Reading »

Variant Covers: Little Boys, Tight Shorts, and Alan Moore.

Another week, another batch of Variant Covers. The comic book column where I give a cursory glance at release lists and tell you what I’m interested in. I encourage you to share your own most desired of picks, cause I have poor taste, a limited attention span, and I’m always looking to try something new.

Keep Reading »