Special Guest Reviewer: Danny Rand, Iron Fist

Got so lucky this Wednesday--walked into the local Slipperworld to use the mens' room (some undercooked KFC did me in) and who did I run into? Danny Rand, wielder of the Iron Fist, current New Avenger and principal player in the Book of the Week. Surprisingly, he wasn't too busy to sit down and peruse my comics haul for the week...

Book of the Week: Avengers #31--

Tim: After a few months' advance warning, Bendis springs his latest internet-cleaving plot twist. And because he cares enough to spell things out to you, Bendis has this week's special guest give your confusion focus and deliver the Line of the Year...

Um...

(Danny, that's your cue.)


















Tim: Here's what it means. It means I'm going to be buying many, many more issues of New Avengers. Dammit.

Justice #12 (series finale!) -
You first this time, Danny.



















Tim: It means that Justice is completed, after 2 years. With that much time invested, you'd think there'd be a more memorable story told. With no real issue-by-issue cliffhangers, it seems pretty obvious that this story was always intended to be read as a single collected work. So why not just sell it that way? Probably because suckers like me will invest $40 in the singles, then turn around and blow $60 on some Absolute Justice hardcover too.

As series closers go, Justice has its share of good moments: a Wonder Twins reference, yet another addition to the surprisingly large collection of cool scenes involving Batman and Lex Luthor, and a Joker sequence that you can just tell Alex Ross has been waiting to use since he first formed his religion, Superfriendsruledology.

Punisher War Journal #8 -

Tim: Writer Matt Fraction continues to give us the Charles Bronson/Jan Michael Vincent/Tom Laughlin Punisher that you'd think we'd always had. As a 70's child, you've got to dig this action, right Danny?



















Tim: (sighing) It means that with Super Nazis besmirching Captain America's legacy and terrorizing an entire town, Frank's going to be shooting a lot of people in the face soon (as we were promised at the arc's opening). And Fraction's villains are so edge-of-preposterous loathesome, you'll hope your $2.99 goes straight to Frank Castle's bullet fund.


That's all the meaning I can dole out for now, true believers. Watch this space next week, as I hope to sit down with Black Lightning, so he can explain whatever the hell's just happened in Justice League of America #10. (And I'm going to check IDs this time--I'm starting to think that I didn't just talk to Iron Fist at all. I think it was just some dude, trying to score what was left of my Chicken and Biscuit Bowl)