July '24 Reading Round Up - AI COMICS!

 

Here. We. Go. This past week Colin Kaepernick of all people came out and announced that he’s launching an AI Start-Up called ‘Lumi’ that will create AI Generated Fucking Comic Books.  Now you don’t have to sit down to draw or write a comic book you can take a knee like Colin and suck on AI’s Shlong while it makes you into a regular Jack Kirbynick. I don’t know how we got from ‘You’re not good enough to even get a roster spot on the piss poor quarterback starved Las Vegas Raiders’ to ‘Hey, has AI ruined comic books yet? Get Colin in here!’

 

 

Of course there’s all the standard jargon mumbo jumbo bullshit that makes you think that it’s going to give some disadvantaged kid with a dream who scribble his comic book ideas down with crack pipes dipped in ink: “Lumi’s mission is to democratize storytelling by providing tools for creators”, yeah yeah blah blah. Just be honest and say, "Are you a fat talentless shlub who is finding new ways to be lazy? Wanna tell the AI followers of yours that you’re creating an AI comic book for them? Well here’s Lumi".

 

Lumi? Seriously? Sounds like a cheap as fuck lamp company. Like I just bought some crappy $10 book light from Amazon that doesn’t work, I bet it’s a subsidiary of Lumi. Lumi is the name of some Vegan Café that opens in Silverlake and closes in 3 months due to shitty Yelp reviews. Lumi is the name of that Goth chick you matched with who has way too many tats but a super cute face that ropes you in until she literally ties you up with ropes in her Subaru and puts a ballgag in your mouth. Look, there’s nothing to be done about this app, it was an inevitability. If it wasn’t Colin Kaepernick it would’ve been Ryan Fitzpatrick or Andrew Luck or some other former retired QB. We’re already seeing AI Covers being unknowingly plastered on books by ignorant publishers. I’m sure the Big Poo are looking into how they can leverage AI comics and replace their entire creative team. At this point it would probably be an improvement.

 

Yes, I know, the distance between AI generated Caca and organically produced Human art is an enormous chasm right now. But every day they inch closer and closer together. There’s this notion that ‘Democratizing’ anything will make it better. We’ve done that to music, video content and films. I’m quite sure it hasn’t made anything better. It’s made it so you really have to wade through a swamp of poop to find the diamonds. I’m all for getting rid of the gatekeepers in Entertainment who climb out of Satan’s Bunghole every morning to say no to good people with good ideas. But somebody’s gotta stand on that wall and say ‘Yeah, this sucks, people shouldn’t be exposed to this junk’. Lumi: The Comic Book Version of Unsolicited Dick Pix.

 

Here's what I got into recently:

 

 

I’m trying to figure out why this book ended up on a down note for me. It’s everything I was looking for. An old school/first days of the Bat set in the 30s; a dark gritty backdrop of a book in prestige format. And yo, don’t get me wrong, the first two drops were great, well, maybe not unbelievably great. Like, the end of the first issue was a red flag; the cliffhanger was way over the top. The cliffhanger of the second was also a bit, hmmm, out of character (Bats holding a gun in his hand), although I can let that slide due to it being set in his origin story. If I had to guess, I think the vernacular just got too outta hand for me. I mentioned this before, but every line of dialogue seemed to have some sort of old timey word pulled from a 1930s lexicon of slang and phrases of the day. I mean, it got a bit ridiculous which pulled me out of the story. 

 

You know what this book was like? It’s like going on a date with a babe who you’re completely thrilled about. You’re talking about her to your friends, you’re checking out her socials and loving every bit of it. You’re looking at Astro compatability (yes you fucking are, admit it) and your signs check all the boxes. You meet up, she looks amazing…and then she starts talking. And, well, there’s something about her voice that feels like bread knife on the back of your skull. You can’t be sure but it feels like with every word that zings out of her mouth your sinuses hurt more. She’s also putting you to sleep, there’s a distinct droning that activates your melatonin and before you know it you’re drowsy at 7pm. Yeah, somebody poured her into her dress but her sound is a car alarm that doesn’t quit at 2am. Most male animals would just think, ah, well, I’ll bang her and be done with it. But you know better. You know that the noises she’ll make while in the throes of passion will ruin sex for you for at least 5 years. Your friends will ask you ‘What happened???’ You’ll want to say she sounded like a donkey being run through a wood chipper but all that will come out will be ‘I dunno, something was off’. And your friends will look at you with a gleam in their eye while thinking ‘Wow, he’s not all about looks, he really cares about vibe and what’s going on in the inside of a woman’. But you’ll know. You’ll know. First Knight was hot. But it hurt my sinuses. 8.7

I was first hipped to the work of Juni Ba in the delightful ‘Deep Cuts’ mini series that consisted of 6 different jazz vignettes. His installment was absolutely fantastic. It actually blew the other installments away it was that good. Looks like the industry is catching on to his immense talent and the jobs are coming in. I was also immensely psyched to see this in the solicits but, I dunno. It’s definitely got a  fairy-tale/stylized Netflix anime series vibe to it which is cool but, I’m not sure it fully works. One thing he did accomplish was to clarify all of the Robin characters. Juni’s succinctly summed up each of them well enough where I could at least pass a Robin quiz whereas before I would definitely fail. Let’s be honest: Tim Drake and Jason Todd are weak as fuck names for Robin. As far as I see it, it’s Dick Grayson and then bubkes. Damien is straight outta ‘The Omen’ and I’d rather see Bats all verklempt around Thalia than deal with a spitfire kid.

 

This feels like a YA title. There’s an ‘aww shucks, air this at 3pm for the after school crowd kinda’ energy about it. My sense of this series is that DC peeped Juni’s unbelievable work in “Deep Cuts” and put him on a project they had in mind. I think Juni’s story is solid if not unspectacular but the art is for sure bananas. I don’t think Juni is really a capes and tights guy and hopefully he’s got a plethora of projects in his noodle that he’s psyched to unleash upon the world. 7.9

 

 

 

 

 

Now this what I’m talkin’ bout. Dude. Yay. I mean, for goodness sake, it’s a Spidey Comic. I just wanna read Spidey fighting shit, slinging some webs and his verbal zingers. After two BS issues of backstory bingo, one that was a complete utter dinner party bore and one that was interesting yet could’ve been boiled down to a few pages, the real creative team of this book is back and delivering the goods. I read it. It was fun. I enjoyed the escapism. Nobody was interjecting their personal bullshit it was all pure superhero in tights goodness done by two dudes at the top of their game. Can it all be so simple? Yes it can. Time to clone Hicksy and Marco and put them on every single Marvisney book until a new fresh crop of writers and artists are ready to come in and return this brand back to what made it great in the first place. 9.1

 

 

 

 

 

I somehow missed this when it came out several months ago, weird. I would have definitely grabbed it so I’m wondering how this slipped through my fingers. Perhaps it’s the Universe saving me $9, I thought. With my pulls being so low these days I had my LCS grab one for me and well, all I gotsta say is sometimes you gotta trust that the Universe has your back. My goodness this was gross, yuck. Yuck. Brian Azz, this is Yuck. You get the azz. I’m all for Westerns but this was a gory yuckfest about some steely eyed d-bag criminal who gets out of a Mexican jail and goes on his revenge spree. This includes finding his wife, who has since married a Reverend, and killing her husband. There’s lots of images of dead dogs who have been shot and a brutally intense image of a mother of a murdered family that the D-Bag and his fellow D-Bags come upon, who’s clearly been tied up, bound and, well, you get the idea, bleccch. The last straw was when one of the Wife’s three kids has a piece of his ear bitten off by one of the D-Bag’s henchman simply because the ears looked too big. Eff you B Azz, jeez. Go to therapy and work out your anger issues and Venmo me $9. Consider this DSTLRY’s first major dud. 4.5

 

I honestly can’t with this book anymore. I’ve grown weary of opening these gorgeous pages drawn by Sana Takeda. Yes, they’re gorgeous. I’ve been dating this gorgeous comic for almost 10 years now and there’s no other way to say it but she’s gone completely fucking bonkers. She just babbles incessantly about the same shit, just on a different day. I don’t see how Marj Liu can expect anyone to pick this book up after a month or so of having read the previous issue and not squint their eyes, rub their forehead and go ‘what the fuck is going on here???’. The longest relationship I’ve been in has been a little over 3 years so I don’t know how to break up with someone I’ve been with for 9 plus years. Maybe I need to take this book to comic book therapy and hash things out, is there such a thing? Can someone make it and book me for an appointment? I feel like Monstress is one of the casualties of the Mandela Effect. Maybe we’re in the alternative Universe where Monstress is a shit show and in the previous Universe it was spelled Monsstress or maybe Monstresses and it was fucking awesome. Somehow I feel in the Multiverse every Monstress version is hurting people’s brains. Monstress is a multiversal multidimensional punch to your pull list no matter where you exist. I feel like the only ones, besides myself, who are reading this book at this point are those who dress up like cats and pee in litter box that's been placed in the bathroom for them. 6.0

 

 

 

 

 

Greatness in serialized Comics requires consistency, a none too easy task especially in this day and age of hiatuses, variant cover madness and the subservience to the trade market. Yet every now and then something comes along that defies genre and the shortcomings of the industry to deliver a timeless story that will stay with you long after you add it to your long box. Rare Flavours was just that. The title encapsulated the book itself: a rare feat and a taste of something truly special. Every single offering of this six issue course was an enchanting delight, deftly written and wonderfully drawn by two masters of their craft. Rare Flavours transcended their logline and elevator pitch. It was this ephemeral paragon of storytelling, myth and family that will stay with their audience long after the embers that cooked up this beauty of a book die out. 10.0

 

 

 

 

There's a story in here where Conan turns into a Werewolf and has to fight a town that has already turned into Werewolves. GTFOH. Dude. As Stan Lee used to say: Nuff said. 9.4

That's all I got. I'm off to work on a new AI start-up called 'Homie'. It will democratize comic book blogs for everyone by providing the tools necessary to write and post blogs to the masses as if they were written by a Cholo from LA.

 

Happy Reading!

  

DOOM #1 - Review

 

Every now and then I’ll get a comic and I’ll realize just by flipping a few pages that it’s going to special. What happens next is I’ll put it front and center on my comic book rack (yes I have an actual comic book rack, I got it when an LCS in Silver Lake went with newer décor and sold off their pieces) and I’ll leave it there. It effectively becomes my ‘In Case of Reading a Bunch of Shitty Comics in a Row, Break Glass’ comic. It gets saved for that moment when I’m so disgusted or frustrated by the caca poo poo that’s being plopped out by the comic book industry that I need something to remind me why Comics are great and why I drop hard earned cheddar for these books to begin with.

 

It’s no secret that I’ve grown to despise Marvisney and what passes as their comic book offerings. It feels like they’ve gone to great lengths to ruin their brand (Star Wars included) and to kill any interest in this medium that people like you and I cherish and hold dear to our hearts. At the risk of getting political,  I would say whoever has actually been in control of the Presidency of our Country (clearly it’s not the Turnip Brain that shuffles around and poops himself) has also been actively looking for ways to destroy our country from within. Yet it actually seems easier to decipher the motives of a clandestine group of anonymous psychopaths within the walls of our government than it does to figure out why Marvel Comics suck donkey balls and rot brain cells on a daily basis. Seriously, they’re unreadable.

 

I try, believe me I try. Don’t tell me I’m too old. Don’t tell me they’re for a new generation. Great Comics are great for anyone, no matter what they look like or how long they’ve traipsed around on this planet. There’s no easy answer, but if you take a temperature reading of all the respected comic book pundits online as well as those who actually run the stores they’ll tell you that the medium is dying, no thanks to the Big Poo whose stories just seem like filler for the Variant Cover market that apparently nets them more income than actually producing great stories.

 

The other day, after perusing through the solicits for the next few months, I actually wondered to myself ‘Hmm, maybe I need to read more novels than comics. Maybe it’s time to phase this part of my life out and just wait for the trades, become a morbid soulless adult. That’s when I knew it was time to ‘Break the Glass’ and flip open what I hoped to be a ‘fuck yeah this rocks’ comic. Thank goodness I was right - This comic fucking rocked.  

 

Why? Pure simplicity and the maturity to let the character breathe without extraneous bullshit being heaped on due to a need to ‘make an impact as an author’. Hickman’s one of the best in the biz, he can write anything. I’d love for him to FINISH writing a couple series that just stopped. Maybe it was his way of showing Matt Fraction ‘Hey, I can just walk away from a dope comic as well homie, what else ya got?’. What Hickman did with Doom was create a basic premise ‘Doom just got his ass kicked by Galactus and is floating in space’ and went from there; no frills, no complications. That also allowed this fucking beast of an artist, Sanford Greene, to just unleash an eyegasm of art that is the best work I’ve seen in a Marvisney book in a long time. It felt classic and new at the same time. These pages were fucking bonkers. Look at this one:

 

 

 

We’ve seen a layout like this before, a gaggle of heroes flying at a villain in a way that allows you to see all of them at the same time. The best part of this is Howard the Fucking Duck being inserted as one of the heroes. If you ask me that’s all Hickman. This book had a real old school intergalactic Marvel feel about it and putting Howie there just reinforced the vibe. The best book Marvisney put out last year in my opinion was ‘Avengers: War Across Time’ which was written by a Katz’s Deli regular and was a paean to old school technicolor Marvel books of the 60s. This was kinda like that one but more sophisticated and modernized. Jeez, can Marvisney just take this One Shot as a template and educate their writers ‘Hey this is how we want it done?’ A One Shot. Oy. It’s like they’re saying ‘Okay, we’ll make a fucking awesome comic, BUT ONLY ONCE’ then back to the poop!’.

 

What’s astonishing about this issue is that there isn’t really an ending to it. It feels like one immense set up for an epic battle that we never get to see. Yet for some reason it works. It’s almost like we don’t need to see it. Seeing it would somehow ruin the book; that’s great writing. I feel like most of the Marvisney Misfits would have made sure the epic battle happened in the middle of the book so that there’s enough time for all the characters to swap dicks and tits with each other.

 

One gripe that I did have is the ‘Sketches’. Oy. Sketches. I don’t need to see your raw sketches. I don’t need to see your ‘process’. It’s all filler. It's cheap soybeans! It’s Magnesium Stearate! Filler! It’s the bread basket at the Italian Restaurant. Stop feeding me bread baskets for pages! There was like, 10 pages of sketches! Is that why this was $7 and not $5? Are Marvel Editors sitting in Satan's Lap and telling him about their $5 Doom one-shot and Satan goes 'Make it $7'. And the Editors wail and cry 'How???' and Satan says 'Sketches'. Ooh, here's all the different types of sketches the artist did while doodling on a beach in Tulum. I mean, at least it's better than a backstory which 99 times out of 100 is going to pale in comparison to the main story. Backmatter is tricky, sometimes it's amazing, most of the times it's flip flip flip whatever. It's not like it ruined this book by any means, but I would've rather have seen more story. 

Bottom line: Hickman wins again. Sanford Greene is a Star. Satan gets an extra $2.

 

RATING: 9.1

VERDICT: Still rooting for Disney Stock to Crater.

June '24 Reading Round Up

 

 

I pulled a piddly 9 comics in June. Nine. Nine times. I pulled Niiiiine Times. Yes, Rooney’s ‘Nine Times’ from Ferris Bueller is ringing in my head. 

 

 

That’s the first time in over 15 years (the two months of global shutdown notwithstanding) since I’ve been keeping track of my pulls that I went a month where I pulled in the single digits. I wish the country’s inflation problem was like my comic pulls; the price of good organic hummus wouldn’t make me cry anymore. Why just 9? I suppose I’m at the point where I see shit come down the pike and say to myself ‘Yeah, I ain’t falling for the banana in the tailpipe again’. I can tell when something that looks good is going to suck. Let me clarify: I can tell when a comic that looks good is going to suck, a woman…not so much. I can also tell when a comic that seems like it can be okay is not worth my dillies. 

 

 

With The Big Poo releasing drivel, decent books at least 5 or 6 bux a pop, really great prestige books around $9 a pop, and with new drops almost always being a limited series it’s been easier to give books that I normally might pull or continue to pull the Heisman. That said, at the halfway point of 2024 I’ve still pulled a little more than I did at this point last year yet last year was my lowest annual pull in 15 years as well. I would say it’s been a better year so far for the quality of comics that have come out versus last year. Image has kinda sucked but DSTLRY, Titan and Tom King may very well save the comic book industry if they keep on their current trajectory. Looking through July and August I don’t see much other than what I’m grabbing now. With that segue, here’s what I’ve been grabbing:

 

 

 

Christian Ward is not allowed to do any comics that are not in Prestige format ever again. I have gotten so used to seeing his amazing art plastered across enormous oversized pages that mushing it back into a standard comic size would be blasphemy. It seems like the Industry agrees with me as I feel like all of his recent books have been Super Sized. As expected, his work on this book is nothing short of absolutely fucking gorgeous. As for Tynion, I’m not really a huge fan. I know a lot of geeks geek out on his work and he’s regarded as one of the best by the publishers but he just doesn’t do it for me. The last two projects of his that I checked out was ‘Nice House on the Lake’ which started off wonderfully and by the midway point it had devolved into a wack CW Show inspired piece of poop. Same thing happened with ‘Department of Truth’. It started off with a bang/slap on the ass and spiraled into a whimpering fetal position of a book. The premise of Spectregraph is immensely strong and they’ve set it up perfectly. It remains to be seen if Tynion can handle maintaining the story arc. We know that Ward is going bring the ruffneck bizness to the art. Maybe that’ll jolt Tynion into actually finishing what he started. Otherwise, this is another solid release by DSTLRY which is fast becoming the Jewel of the Industry for the non Tights & Capes titles. 9.5

 

 

 

This 3 Issue Jock-O-Rama series ended with a resounding thud and put a stink on the first ever initial release from DSTLRY. Since this offering they have been slaying the marketplace with their spectacular books so they haven’t looked back. As I’ve said before these 3 issue Prestige Format releases that cost a grip are hard for the consumer to navigate through. As long as the premise and presentation of the initial issue grabs you, you’ll be on board for Issue 2, where it seems like more often than not that it goes off the rails; which it did in this series. Then you’re left wondering, well, I’ve already dropped $16-18 and there’s only one issue left, might as well get it, maybe it will have a great ending. In this case it didn’t. In this case it turned into a bumbling disconnected plot of Mommy & Daddy issues, Zombies, intergalactic politics and general poop on a page dialogue. They’re in a ship. They’re in a different ship. They want to come back to this ship. Nobody’s on the ship. We’re running from this ship. The other ship is running from something else. Now he’s on the ship. Zombies everywhere. Boom Bam. Zombies. Ships. Space. There, I just saved you $9, no need to get this now. Man, finishing a Sucky 3 Issue Prestige really punches you in the stomach. Mark Simpson, AKA Jock, really dropped the ball on this one. Shame. His ‘One Dark Knight’ was one of the best of 2022 so naturally one would assume he would knock this out of the park too. Nope. Your $27 be Gone. And Nelson is going Ha Ha to you like your name was Bart Simpson. 5.6

 

 

 

If someone rushed into my home and said ‘Quick, the Zombie Apocalypse is here, they’re minutes away and they’re mangling everyone in their path. You only have time to take your Dog and 3 comic books with you’, I’d say ‘Well, is that like, 3 comics I’d have to read over and over or could I keep pulling them?’. They’d say ‘What?’ I’d say, ‘Like, could I keep pulling the issues so I could continue following the story while I flee the Zombies’ They’d say ‘Well, of course your LCS is being relocated to within a safe enclosed fortress so they’ll still be able to distribute media to its customers’. I’d then rush over to my rack and take Conan the Barbarian first without question. I’d probably take Love Everlasting next and debate whether I should take Helen of Wyndhorn or fucking Saga. There’d be nothing worse if BKV still took 6 month hiatuses during a Zombie Apocalypse. Dude. You’re in a barbed wire enclosed fortress with Fiona, y’all should be pumping out Saga bi-weekly my guy. Anyway, this Conan comic is the fucking best. 9.8

 

 

 

After I stirred up all this Hullabaloo on LOCG (League of Comic Geeks) by proclaiming Ultimate Spidey 4 a Boring AF comic since it was nothing more than a dinner conversation, I had a stink eye prepped for this issue as the solicit told me it was going to be another one of those Backstory Bingos that publishers/creators use to deal with Artist hiatuses. I’m okay with a Backstory Bingo/Tangential Issue or Episode for a secondary character, but it has to be memorable AF - clearly my feeling of this book requires multiple AFs. I always use the recent example of the episode in the final season of Ted Lasso that was dedicated solely to Beard. He leaves Ted and goes on this wild and wacky adventure throughout London; it was fantastic and in a way I remember that episode more than I do the others of that season. So it can be done, but man, you better come wit dat ruffneck bidness if you’re going to do it. Did Hickman bring a ‘Beard’ issue to the table? Not really. It was a solid and interesting Backstory Bingo and Hickman’s such a fucking great writer he can make anything intriguing. Yet at the end of the page count, it’s still a Backstory Bingo Bonanza that could have been dripped in with subsequent issues that moved the story forward. 

 

If you ask me, Hickman could have taken the 2 months off that he used for Issue 4 & 5 of this book and, oh, I dunno, FINISHED THE BLACK MONDAY MURDERS!!! Hicksy! WTF?!?! That book is still hanging in the ether! Finish that shit! It was amazing! And while you’re at it FINISH THE DYING AND THE DEAD!!!! WTF is wrong with you??? I feel like a nerdy chick who just got picked up, banged and dumped by Brian Wood at a Comic Con. Get to work on those Dammit! Yeesh. Man, Issue 6 of this book better be the Shizzznit or I’m dropping this like a booger on a plane seat. 6.6

 

 

 

 

I am really loving this Dubz run. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Best Dubz run since the New 52 dropped out of the sky and Azzarello and Chiang absolutely destroyed this book with their combined genius. I do have a bone to pick here though. So at the end of last issue Dubz heroically overcomes her captor’s ‘Rope of Lies’ or whatever and is able to slough off her restraints and reach his neck with her hands. Next thing we see is that she’s in a prison cell in the dark with no windows. Umm, how did we get here? This is the same Dubz from a previous issue that was taking on the entire U.S. Army and was throwing tanks around like I throw doggie toys around my home. This is the same Dubz who took the blow of half of the Washington Monument being throttled on top of her, and yet, she couldn’t subdue a bunch of soldiers in a room, nor escape a guarded cell for months??? She had to eat a rat? Really? Then lost her mind and befriended another rat? 

 

Of course she ate the male rat and befriended the female rat who was its mate. I bet the male rat was a bumbling husband who had a gut and drank beer and had no respect from his rat wife but since she was so noble and had a heart she found it in herself to love the animal with no brains cuz that’s what females do when it comes to husbands since all husbands are Al Bundyesque idiots. You think I wouldn’t pick up on that King? C’mon dude. I’ll forgive you for the fact that you felt the need for some Steve McQueen ‘Papillon’ shit but let’s get back to main narrative. From the cliffhanger I can tell you’re ready to do so, so, bring the ruckus and dat roughneck Dubz bizness. 7.7

 

 

 

The Next Great book out of Image may have finally dropped after a long run of mediocrity and mnyeh from the Publisher that once could do no wrong. With Falling in Love On the Path to Hell Duggan & Co. have concocted a premise so bonkers and yet somehow so perfect that there’s almost no way you won’t be coming back for seconds. Sometimes reckless passion executed with acute simplicity is all you need to deliver something great. When creators go ‘Hey, what if we did this?’ and then laugh and get wildly excited about it at the same time it provides the breeding ground for creating a piece that people will never forget it. No need for me to break down their premise or explain the elements. Just go grab the first issue of this if you can and remind yourself why you love comic books so much. 9.1

 

 

 

 

Umm, this Masterpiece issue was kinda crappy and a general eye roll/flip ahead. Not sure why other than it felt like Bendis was trying to be too cool with the dialogue and character development. Maybe the premise of this book was wack from the get go. A billionaire who supposedly murdered a husband and wife who were thieves that stole from him is now after their kid because, she’s their kid. I think it’s a commentary on how the super rich are so narcissistic that whatever they want is justified, even if it means killing a kid. The kid's assembling a team with an array of cool spy type abilities was really neato, but maybe this premise needed to stay in the oven for a bit longer. It feels soft in the middle. Just one issue to go which feels a little wonky since there seems to be a lot of unresolved shit to tie up after these 5 issues. This was fun for a bit but it’s nowhere near as amazing as ‘Pearl’, Bendis’ last must read book. Still, give me a Bendis/Maleev half baked premise over The Big Poo’s $3.99 jam packed advertisements any day of the week. 7.0

 

 

Great Comics come and go pretty fast. If you don't stop reading caca Tie-In Events from Marvel and DC you might miss them - Pherris Schmuckler

 

Miracleman: The Silver Age #7 - Deleted Scene

 

Are these two about to punch each other or about to kiss each other on the cover? Hard to say, but whatever it is MiracleMan has finally come to an end! Well, not really, but, at least this ‘Age’ is over. It was a – well, a decent but not stupendous finale to what ended up boiling down to a disagreement over a smoocheroo that came out of the blue. This run of 7 issues had its ups and downs for sure. Some moments popped, some dropped and some just elicited a copious amount of eye rolls.

 

Sure it’s still one of the greatest comic book concepts in the history of comic books. However, it’s as if the Beatles were working on their final album and then handed it off to someone else, perhaps Dylan or Elton or even the Stones, perish the thought. No matter what they would have done with it, it never would have been as great; just different. So perhaps we should have expected different but not great from the great Neil Gaiman.

 

Anyway, guess what I got my hands on??? A scene that was cut from the final issue of the Silver Age. Don’t ask me how I got it, it wasn’t easy. Every time I walked into Whole Foods I kept hearing everyone murmuring about this “insane” deleted scene from MM that’s been circulating on the dark web. Some have apparently seen it on the periphery of their Apple Vision Pro experiences; always out of reach. Well, after a lot of nasty business I’m going to present it to you in all its glory. Don’t ever tell me I don’t do right by you guys.

 

It takes place right after this page when MM flies to Jordan to meet Dicky.

 

 

Dicky slithers around the corner of the mountain and puts his hands on his hips.

 

Dicky: You’re a tart

 

MM: A what?

 

Dicky: Tart, as in a whore, you’re a Miraculous Tart.

 

MM: Dicky -

 

Dicky: Don’t call me that, your little tart nickname of me.

 

MM: I don’t -

 

Dicky: What’s my real name? Neville? Earnest? Oswald?

 

MM: It’s always been Dicky

 

Dicky: Yes it’s always been your little cock fantasy hasn’t it. What did you do? Get together with Gargunza the Troll to create a tidy man-hole to play with to satisfy your wicked perversions

 

MM: I did nothing of the sort.

 

Dicky: Lying little bitch.

 

MM: You’re part of the Pantheon. You’re -

 

Dicky: I’m part of your little wet hole brothel in the sky! What, you think you dress us up in fancy Miracle garb it makes us anything else other than a sucky fucky whenever you want us.

 

MM: Dauntless –

 

Dicky: Couldn’t just subsist on your Tart-Theon you had to plant one on me eh?

 

MM: I care for you Dicky

 

Dicky: You’re a bored old perv who can have and have had anybody you’ve ever wanted. I was just another notch on your Man Pussy belt.

 

MM: My Man what?

 

Dicky: Your Naughty Bits Abacus!

 

MM: Let me ask the Qys if that’s some of their tech.

 

Dicky: [tearing up] This would never have happened if your Twat Spigot of a Wife with her 80s Power Bitch Haircut never suggested you snog me.

 

MM: It’s been in me since the dawn of time, I lo –

 

[Dicky transforms into Leslie Jones and Miracle Man transforms into Steven Yeun with Tits.]

 

Dicky: What the actual shit?

 

MM: Oh, bloody hell.

 

Dicky: Is this some joke? You’re about to profess your love to me and you turn into a diminutive Asian man with big knockers?!?

 

MM: It’s Neil.

 

Dicky: Neil?

 

MM: Yes, our Authoritarian Author. He’s decided to be more inclusive and diverse for this moment. Look at yourself.

 

Dicky: What the fuck is this shit? Oh hell fucking no.

 

MM: Yes, he’s prone to these whimsical casting alterations from time to time.

 

Dicky: You tell that –

 

MM: You tell him, I’m more than spent from wheezing to the heavens at him

 

Dicky: [wails to the sky] Look motherfucker, change my ass back or I’m a bust your Gremlin looking fizzace with a quickness.

 

MM: Look at your purple haired girlfriend.

 

Dicky turns to see Meta now transformed into a Handicapped Native American Little Person.

 

Meta: I’m glad you no longer look like Colonizers.

 

Beat

 

Dicky: He did the same shit for his dumb ass Sandman series on Netflix.

 

MM: Yes, he most certainly did.

 

Dicky: That show sucked.

 

MM: I would tend to agree with you.

 

Dicky: Why did he cast Meshell Ndegeocello as Lucien? Amazing musician -

 

MM: Yes I love her work dearly

 

Dicky: Can’t act for shit.

 

MM: There were – many questionable moves.

 

Dicky: That show was drivel.

 

MM: Quite drivelous.

 

Dicky: Driveltastic.

 

MM: The driveliest for sure.

 

Dicky: You’re not allowed to fuck up Sandman.

 

MM: Seems like he did.

 

Dicky: And now he’s fucking us up.

 

MM: I wouldn’t necessarily call it a fuck-up, per se –

 

Dicky: What would you call it??

 

MM: The Miraculous Smooch he always wanted to see.

 

Dicky: Look at us now though, it’s fucking ridiculous

 

MM: It leans into the theater of absurd.

 

Dicky: You are very cute though. You in your Male Asian actor of the moment suit.

 

MM: Yes well –

 

Dicky/Leslie moves in to kiss MM/Steven. MM backs away and holds up his hand.

 

Dicky: What are you doing?

 

MM: What are you doing?

 

Dicky: I’m giving you what you wanted, your Dicky smooch, and maybe more, take your – Christ, where the hell is the zipper on this suit

 

MM: Dicky, please, I’m not really feeling -

 

Dicky: You don’t want to kiss me! You racist!

 

MM: I’m not a racist, please.

 

Dicky: You most certainly are! Oh, you wanted to kiss me as a shiny blonde alabaster boy toy but, what, now I’m too much for you?

 

MM: We all have our predilictions and proclivities and –

 

Dicky: Unfuckingbelievable!

 

MM: [Looks to the sky] Neil! That’s enough! Enough I say!

 

They are transformed back to their original selves.

 

MM: Now, where were we? [leans in for a kiss]

 

Dicky: Eww, gross, back off.

 

MM: Dicky –

 

 

There were a bunch of lines after this but they were redacted for some reason, all blacked out. Well, I hope you enjoyed this little detour onto the cutting room floor of the Great Gaiman. Fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately, MiracleMan is continuing in the ‘Dark Age’, and – no comment.

 

Rating: 8.1

Verdict: Keep Pulling and Yanking