East of West, Issue #22 – “A Moment of Silence”

* Part 7 of 14 of the The Apocalypse: Year Two storyline *

Welcome to Ghostliness & Nerfherders Presents: East of West, Issue #22 – “A Moment of Silence”! In the previous installment, we find out that Doma Lux has the capacity to love and it’s quite unsettling. A flashback from a different perspective, it is revealed that Lux was the one who killed Union representative Peter Graves (and not the pilot from the Airplane! movie) during the diplomatic meeting of the heads of the nations. It’s really quite poetic if, like me, you don’t have a concept of real poetry!

Chief Narsimha travels to the Sea of Bones to gain some perspective after a tense meeting with his council. The Endless Nation shouldn’t be cavorting with the PRA or the Union or anyone! Craziness! They send Lux back home alive with the instruction to feign loyalty as they plan to destroy the White Tower and the Union along with it.

Anyone up for a game of Connect Four? This shit is too bleak! Gotta have some fun once in a while.

East of West, Issue #22 [December, 2015]
Written by: Jonathan Hickman
“A Moment of Silence”

East of West, Issue #22

“It never stops. The cycle of power, greed, and revenge.”

Yes, yes, yes. Nihilism, defeatism, pessimism. Even I get tired of that once in a while.

“When they come for you, it will be where you feel safest. In your home, in your bed, in your sleep.”

A large freight container zooms in the sky along a river leading to a large city. The docks are loaded up with an unfathomable amount of stacks of containers. Among the stacks, the flying container finds one single empty hole. It nestles in.

An individual with glasses walks along a catwalk high in the stacks with his little Blackberry phone. He finds a secret door in the container, enters it, and sits in a large chair in front of a super-futuristic whiz-bang computer console. He’s swiping stuff around with his fingers on the holographic screen. The 2065 version of Tinder. Swipe left. Swipe left. Swipe left. Swipe left.

Behind him, a group of men and women in their undergarments start shuffling out of makeshift hole-in-the-wall beds and cots. There’s even a little shower in this room! This is my kind of living, honestly. All I need is a TV loaded up with eight streaming services and freezer full of chicken nuggets and I’m a happy fuckin’ guy!

East of West, Issue #22

Time to kick ass and chew bubblegum! Let’s move move move move move! btw we’re all out of bubblegum.

The computer nerd initiates a countdown sequence that starts at one hour. He gives a thumbs up after the crew behind him puts on their riot ninja gear. The crew MOVES ON OUT OF THERE!

After 13 minutes, the group kills two guards at the House of Mao.

Between 21 and 27 minutes, they scale the curvy, pointy roof of a House of Mao bathhouse and work on cutting through to enter the building. They drop ropes to the floor and scurry down.

One shoots a barrage of ninja stars from his face mask and kills two women in robes. They continue moving through the bathhouse to look for their real target.

They discover a large, empty bed in the middle of a room. Pillows rumpled. Sheets pulled back. They keep moving.

After 41 minutes, they find Xiaolian nude in a spa pool with three servants around the pool’s edge. A ninja dude pulls out his bow and starts launching arrows. The servants leap into the pool for cover, but it’s no use. They die face down in the water while Xiaolian looks up from the bottom of the pool in shock.

As Mr. Bowman slinks around the pool looking for Xiaolian, she leaps up and snaps the dude’s neck with an aggressive twist with her super-strong metal hands. There’s not even a cool comic book onomatopoeia like “SNAP!” or “GRRMPP!” She just twists silently and he’s dead. She looks rather smug about it. She wraps her legs around his neck and flips him backwards into the pool.

East of West, Issue #22

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Modesty.

As to be expected, some Kill Bill happens wherein Xiaolian single handedly takes out these assassins. She stops swords with her impenetrable hands, she kicks and stabs and punches, she has her hella nipples showing. Wholesome action-packed goodness! Bring the kids! Eventually, she shoves the hilt through an assassin’s mouth, breaking his teeth, then shoves the pointy end into his chest.

Two down, four to go. Snapped-neck assassin floats in the pool, which is now completely red with blood, along with the three dead servants. Broken-teeth-stabbed-chest assassin lies crumpled at Xiaolian’s feet.

Xiaolian bends the sword with her strong-ass meathooks and breaks it into two jagged-ended pieces. Two unlucky assassins get the brunt of her quick sword-stabbin’ and hackin’ and slashin’. Now there’s two.

After 52 minutes, which was some Uvalde levels of police incompetence, Xioalian’s guards hussle up and burst down the door.

East of West, Issue #22

Sorry, ma’am. I didn’t mean to interrupt your striptease.

The guards start firing on the two surviving assassins as if the world were ending; as if it were the Apocalypse; as if were the Apocalypse: Year Two (Electric Boogaloo). The assassins haul ass and leap out a window. The guards follow suit.

Landing on the ground and looking behind them, the assassins hesitate as guards up the wazoo land on their feet one by one and train their guns on them.

An assassin lifts his hand, revealing a trigger. The other assassin – the last assassin – heads for the hills. Guards start blasting Mr. Trigger at point blank range, but it’s too late. His thumb had hit the button as his dismembered appendage fell to the ground.

BOOM and whatnot. Then silence. I mean, this whole issue has been silence. Ain’t no talkin’ in this issue. But it’s silent now. You know what I mean.

3 minutes remain.

The last assassin shuffles back to Freight Container HQ where the computer nerd waits. They look at each other for a moment.

With 13 seconds remaining, Computer Nerd takes out the Blackberry phone, which happens to double as a gun, and pulls the trigger.

East of West, Issue #22

I think he’s trying to type “Fair-weather friends, I bid you adieu!”

The only letters we Sunglasses type are shown above. A House of Mao guard storms it right as Sunglasses sends the message. Then he takes the Blackberry gun and shoots himself under the chin.

The recipient of the message (“FAILURE”) is Archibald. He speaks the only words in the whole issue:

“Well now… I’m not gonna lie… This’ll most certainly complicate things.”

Final Thoughts

Woop woop, everyone. Xiaolian not dying is most certainly going to complicate things. I’m not gonna lie.

This marks the very first almost-no-words comic book I have read. I’ve been wondering when that was going to happen.


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Sucky Funnies for September 25, 2022

Welcome yet again to another wonderful fucking Sunday. Oh boy, do I have a “treat” for you! Today’s theme is female leads whose names have five letters!

No Mallard Fillmore today, because screw anyone who associates themselves with Mallard Fillmore. Maybe next week. At least at this moment, if I have to read a duck bitch about reverse racism I’m to flip this table over and shit on Christmas.

Luann

Luann - September 25, 202

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Oh look, the newest copy of Libido magazine just came out! Features include “20 Innovative Ways to Hump Your Pillow” and “Girls: Yes They Poop, How To Stay Attracted”.

Yes, Luann is breaking the fourth wall by commenting that she has been a teenager for the last 24 years. I’ve been a teenager for the last 22 years, man. It feels like it. I’m actually 34, but aren’t we all just perpetual teenagers…

Sorry, I didn’t mean to get pensive and philosophical. Here, let’s take out minds off of these existential problems with one of Libido’s newest features: “Is That Cute Guy Over There Winking at Me, or Does He Just Have Bell’s Palsy?”

Nancy

Nancy - September 25, 202

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If looks could kill, Nancy’s face could level a major metropolitan area. Little does she know that if she decided to make a giant scene in front of her friends, they would most certainly still be thinking about her. She should’ve thrown a giant tantrum, slamming her fists on the floor and smearing pounds of her own feces all over the walls with her face. They literally wouldn’t be able to think about anything else

Instead, Narcissistic Nancy throws her own pity party. No feces involved at all. Nothing has been learned here.

Agnes

Agnes - September 25, 202

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I don’t know much about Agnes, but I get the impression that she’s quite a bit like Marcie from Peanuts in every rip-off way you can imagine. Temperament. Appearance. I don’t know if she calls any female characters “sir”, but if the Frazz guy can completely steal every idea from an actual beloved comic strip, then why not Tony Cochran of Agnes?

It takes a long time to get the punchline, but it’s not worth it whatsoever because it’s really awful. Tony Cochran instead wanted to spend the bulk of his strip’s size limitations shoehorning in his esoteric Bob Dylan opinions! So much so, that he spent exactly two seconds coming up with the “humorous” part. If this is a representative Agnes strip, then I’ll have many more to comment upon in the future.


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Action Comics (Vol. 1), Issue #760 – “…Never-Ending Battle…”

* Part 3 of 9 of the Superman: No Limits collection *

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Action Comics (Vol. 1), Issue #760 – “…Never-Ending Battle…!” In the previous issue of the Superman: No Limits collection, Jimmy almost discovers Clark’s secret identity while visiting Lois and Clark’s apartment, but some quick thinking prevails! No time for that, though! LexCorp stole something from Antarctica near the remnants of the Fortress of Solitude, and Superman finds out that human activity near the area causes WEIRD RIFTS in the WHOOZITS and WUZZAH-WHA! Kryptonian dinosaurs! Rawr!

It was dumb as shit, but he stopped it I suppose.

Also, John Henry Irons showed up to Metropolis with his big dumb suit idea to help their police force. This guy is a total kiss-ass and I hated him in New 52 Action Comics and I hate him now!

So forget all of that, because here in Action Comics we’re gonna get some real action, baby! Guns and fisticuffs! Bar brawls and car chases! Diffusing bombs and flicking cigarettes into a puddles of gasoline, causing major explosions! It’s all here! Presumably.

Action Comics (Vol. 1), Issue #760 [December, 1999]
Written by: Joe Kelly
“…Never-Ending Battle…”

Action Comics (Vol. 1), Issue #760

“Faith gets us through the night when we’re uncertain a dawn will come…it also gives us the Bogeyman bigger, bloodier fangs.” – Clark Kent, Daily Planet, Oct. 1999

Ha, really? What kind of puff piece was Clark writing about here? How did the chief editor let “Bogeyman” pass?

“Today…everything changes! Today, respect! Today, power! Today…METROPOLIS IS MINE!”

And who’s this fanciful, flamboyantly dressed man speaking so exuberantly? Why, it’s Doctor Spectro! He wears large red sunglasses like Bono, he wears a polkadot clown suit, he wears a ridiculous silver belt, and his over-the-top smile reminds me of a manic Tom Cruise.

“I wish I could see them…the insignificant toads who scoffed at my brilliance…who mocked my holographic creations and choice of dress…” he yells like a raving lunatic to himself. Doctor Spectro is on top of a building sending a Superman signal in the sky, like a second-rate Metropolis version of Commissioner Gordon. And, would you look at that, it worked! Superman hath been summoned.

Superman does mock the unoriginality of the Superman-Signal, so at least ACTION COMICS has some self-awareness at the turn of the millennium. “Crack wise while you can, ‘Man of Tomorrow’, for today, your tomorrows are at an end!!” exclaims the very silly Spectro. He’s a very silly man.

Action Comics (Vol. 1), Issue #760

Surprise! Happy Birthday!! Hope you like it!!!

Doctor Spectro came prepared! Superman fell right into his trap! The trap was tricking Superman into being summoned so he could show up and be tricked! Ingenious!

KRYPTONITE!!! As you can see, he delightfully screams this in kryptonite-green letters as the glowing chunk of rock radiates toward the caped dumbass. HA HA HA HA HA HA!!

It doesn’t work. Doctor Spectro is put out very quickly.

“I…uh…oh, please…not the face,” pleads the Good Doctor, humbly conceding a swift defeat.
“All right,” Superman says, crunching the Superman signal into a twisted pile of scrap, “not the face.”

Doctor Spectro sits hunched over with a sourpuss face. He had a celebration for himself prepared! He booked a private room at the club! This was supposed to be his day! THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE THE SUMMER OF SPECTRO!!

Superman grins his toothy grin. Look on the bright side, buddy: you annoyed him for about two minutes! That’s worth something, eh? Chin up!

Plus, are you kidding? A rock spray-painted with green phosphorescent paint? Really? What did you think was going to happen, Sparky? “I mean, it’s not radioactive…it’s not crystalline…and look, see? The paint is flaking off right here…” Superman says, holding the rock in his hand.

Doctor Spectro gets irate now! He was hoodwinked! Swindled, baby! All he got was a mere paperweight! By a “Latin Lotharia”! A real seductress! So help him god he’s going to… he’ll… HE’LL TAKE HER TO COURT!

Superman doesn’t have time for this blubbering shell of a man, but another soon-to-be blubbering shell of man makes his appearance. “Superman!! Your time is up!!”

Yeesh, this day really sucks. A guy wearing a clock head, and his four clock-tunicked cronies, ambush the hero. Two of them are holding glowing rocks at an arm’s length, intending to stymie the superb man.

“Hey…how come he ain’t cringin’ in pain, like the lady said?” asks the one donned in an elaborate cuckoo clock affair.

*laugh track*

*Cosby Show theme*

*Bill Cosby spikes your drink*

Action Comics (Vol. 1), Issue #760

“E-Mail”? “Cell phones”? You’re talking crazy talk, Lois.

For some reason, Lois Lane likes to spend her coffee breaks standing on top of the Daily Planet building, even though she falls off a building or through a window roughly nine teams per week. Of course, no coffee for her. Clark isn’t allowing it anymore, because, like a woman, she’s been too high-strung and hyper lately as it is. Yes, yes, a few breathfulls of that stank Metropolis air does the job all on its own! Heh heh. *hack* *cough*

Hey, continuity! Perry White told Clark in Superman (Vol. 2), Issue #151 that he was going to give him the job of foreign correspondent as long as it didn’t put a strain on the marriage. And it looks like it’s putting a strain on the marriage!

Keep out of their marriage, you creepy old man. Go home and rub your dick against your mom’s sweaters, ya turkey.

So Clark’s supposed to be in Japan right, and I’m sure he still “is”. As in, it probably takes him seven minutes to fly from Japan to the United States so I’m sure he just excused himself for a bathroom break and booked it across the Pacific Ocean.

Perry White offers Lois to come to his office if things get tough, which sounds incredibly inappropriate to me, but Lois takes it in stride.

Lucky for Lois, Superman hovers right below the extremely low rails of the roof. Low enough to topple over if someone were to just…give her a quick nudge. Too bad Doctor Spectro didn’t think of THAT.

Perry White goes inside. Superman pops up to briefly kanoodle nauseatingly with his wife. He grabs her and they fly away. How romantic. That’s just another Friday for me.

“You’d better take that super-mouth of yours and kiss me with it, Smallville, before I forget why I missed you,” Lois says coyly. Gross. Thinking about skipping ahead. Like, when do they get divorced? I want to start there instead.

Action Comics (Vol. 1), Issue #760

Oh man, one thing that can kill you? Oh, you poor baby. That must be rough, being vulnerable to one single thing that doesn’t even occur on Earth naturally.

Lois asks her hubby if he was afraid of the fake kryptonite. He makes one of his patented 48 IQ faces and delves into a long-winded soliloquy about his personal relationship with the dreaded, loathsome substance! In short…nah. Even though it’s the only thing that can hurt me and there are about 17 billion people on the planet who would use it the first chance they got…nah.

“The only thing I’m ever afraid of when I put on this suit and do my thing… is that I might not see you again,” Superman coos.

Blech. Barf. I’ve got some divorce paper templates drafted up, just say the word.

SUBJECT CHANGE! Lois Lane was poking around this newfangled internet and she may have found the woman who ripped off Doctor Spectro! But she’s not going to tell him just yet! It’s a fun surprise! Tee hee.

Oh snap. I was pretty close with my seven-minute estimate on the trans-Pacific flight from Japan to the United States. It is actually five minutes, my mistake. Sorry, Superman, I hope you forgive my claims that you’re actually a slowpoke of a tortoise.

Clark Kent attends a gala event at the Japanese estate of one Ivan Blackwell, a real smug, ostentatious motherfucker. A real showoff. A big insecure loser.

“I’m a true admirer of your writing, Kent– your fiction as well as your newspaper work,” Blackwell gushes. What an asshole. These two exchange pleasantries for a few moments while Superman screams inside. There’s nothing more he’d like to do right now than follow-up on this hag Lois was talking about, but he’s stuck snooting it up in Japan. This false kryptonite thing is egregious. EGREGIOUS!

Action Comics (Vol. 1), Issue #760

Yo, can’t a fella take a bong hit in peace??

Seems like Clark Kent’s main problem with fake kryptonite is that every wannabe evil doomsdayer is going to want to bean him in the head with a rock, and that sounds bothersome.

Ivan Blackbutt stands up at the dais of the ballroom and announces to the room that he has come into the possession of something very valuable! *removes sheet from mystery glass box, revealing Hitler’s penis*

KRYPTONITE!

The ONE THING that can kill Superman! Lucky him! It doesn’t even occur on Earth naturally! I’m told.

“…and I intend to use it as a cornerstone of an anti-metahuman campaign focused on my beloved Japan…” Ivan Blacklung continues boringly. Clark facepalms. Even his best friend in the world, this Japanese guy no one has ever heard of before, hates Superman! It never ends! Maybe he should tell this guy that he bought a useless spray-painted rock. Or maybe he should become Superman and eat it so that he can “prove” it doesn’t work so that no one will try to hurt him with real kryptonite. Maybe Superman should eat a dang pile of rocks.

FINALLY, THIS IS WHERE THE ACTION BEGINS! Some very large, armored muscle-man riding a gigantic lion made of rock crashes through the wall and stops this farce in its tracks! “You will relinquish that ill-gotten rock to its rightful owner! So commands Ishi-Shujou, the Stone Emperor!!!”

How dumb could you get? This is dumb! ACTION!

“Back away from my property, Capitalist, or my granite ninjas will rend you limb from limb!!” he screams, bounding straight toward a confused Ivan Blacksabbath. Clark facepalms again. He’ll be doing that a lot.

So this Stone Emperor guy, he knows that this “trollop” has been hocking kryptonite. However, the fake kryptonite was stolen from the Stone Emperor in the first place. And he wants that shit back for some reason! Because he thinks it’s real too. Everyone wants the Superman-killing chunk of rock.

Superman shows up OUT OF NOWHERE and throws objects at the Stone Emperor. Tells him to vamoose!

Stone Emperor is all like “FUCK YOU, GRINGO! THIS AIN’T AMERICA! THIS IS JAPAN! THE RULES ARE DIFFERENT! BACK OFF, KEMOSABE! CAPICHE?”

Superman does not capiche. He claps his hands forcefully with an onomatopoeic “FATHOM” (?) which crumbles his stone lion into…pebbles, I guess. GRR!! YOU WIN THIS ROUND!! He gives up quickly. “We will meet again, Cape…and you will know my wrath.”

Action Comics (Vol. 1), Issue #760

Look, lady, I’ll buy all your rocks for $45.

Yawn. What’s next? Oh, ok, the Stone Emperor dissolves into a puff of scarlet smoke and a fine powder, revealing the TRUE assailant! A sultry, ample-bosomed woman! The trollop! And her name is La Encantadora! Which I think roughly translates to “the trollop”! But my Spanish is rusty…

She immediately attempts to seduce Superman and it sort of works. She advises him to use those x-ray eyeballs of his and look through her dress! He almost does it. He probably took a quick peak. I’m telling Lois.

Snapping out of it, Superman’s all like “stop selling rocks” and ‘Dora is all like “no”. She proffers one of her delicious looking green rocks, and Superman is all like “that ain’t even real, I can smell the paint fumes already and– HAAAKGCH!”

Well, that one is real. Dozens of members of the press start snapping photos of Superman writhing on the floor like a wuss. Bidding starts at ten million dollars! She’ll meet anybody with a serious offer in Tijuana. Pay for your own drinks.

Superman continues to lurch and heave trying to stop her, but it’s a fruitless and dumb pursuit. So he tries asking her to please stop, but it’s not a sincere “please” whatsoever. I wouldn’t listen to him either if he’s going to be RUDE about it.

The press already has this pathetic display all over the television and internet. Just a full screen of Superman looking like a lump on the floor. The yokels over at the Daily Planet throw in their own two cents about it. “Almost took the big mane out… and every character with a grudge and a TV just saw her do it!” says Jimmy Olsen, speaking to nobody. Speaking to himself. As usual.

Lois is distressed. Remember, she knows who Superman is now! He’s… *checks marriage certificate with “Superman” scribbled out and “Clark Kent* rewritten* …her husband! She has to stay stoic and brave though! She has a job to do! Something about reporting the news, I think. It’s hazy.

Next thing we all see is Superman flying away confidently. He complains about the agony, but he looks fine to me. I’ve seen green shit come out of his nose due to kryptonite. This ain’t nothing.

This La Encantadora floozy is just distracting Superman so that she can continue to make money off of suckers and incels! Two can play it this game! Superman can attract incels, too!

Action Comics (Vol. 1), Issue #760

Matthew Lesko has seen better days.

The Riddler is in Tijuana for some inexplicable reason, never minding the clear fact that he should be in Gotham City harassing Batman instead. He and a bunch of other bad-guy ne’er-do-wells want to buy some of ‘Dora’s rocks. She smiles like she’s going to spit poison any minute now and lets them all know there’s plenty to go around! For like a trillion dollars each, please.

Superman must have GPS, because in no time at all he busts into this joint and starts pummeling fools left and right. “–got about three seconds before Encantadora realizes what’s happening, her synapses fire, and she thinks to open that box.”

Sounds like a thought that takes three seconds, to me, but no. Superman must have super-thinking power too, but based on his track record that’s impossible!

He takes the box from her hands and flings it into space. Bye! Say hi to Krypton for me! Oh wait, it’s gone and Superman’s whole family is dead! lol

Encantadora is like “fuck this!” It took her forever to find this hideout, and he busts it up in four minutes? Go fuck yourself.

“Don’t flatter yourself. The Riddler parked his green and purple van outside,” he tells her after she gets a little dig in that Superman has worked harder than any other man to get to her. She attempts the old sex gambit again. She asks for a peckaroonie on the ol’ lips…a-roonie. The choker around her neck starts giving him the tinglies, but not the good tinglies. The kryptonite tinglies. She looks confused and admits that it’s made out of more fake rocks, but he doubles over and goes BLUB BLUURRHHRB BRUAHABAAABABAB, which makes all the bad guys in the room snicker and chuckle and guffaw.

Riddler is the first one to kick him while he’s down, so to speak. He cracks both hands against the side of Superman’s neck, but then a rough KKRRRICHH!!! indicates that he quite literally cracks both hands! He shoves off sore and irritated.

Action Comics (Vol. 1), Issue #760

Even in pain this guy finds the energy to Sphinx around.

It feels like kryptonite pain, but he’s still IMPERVIOUS TO SKINNY WIMPS? What’s going on here?

La Encantadora laughs and says “bye chumps” and leaves them all in the lurch! Off to San Francisco to sucker more dumb men out of their money! Adios!

A quick stop in Metropolis to say hi to Lois Lane before leaving somewhere else again. Lois scrounged up everything about La Encantadora that she could find on GeoCities in 1999, but it’s not much. There’s no pattern to her behavior. Thanks for nothing, Lois! I thought you were smart!

In San Francisco, ‘Dora has just sold a bullshit rock to some aggro-Spice Girl looking ladies. Superman is already there, hovering dick-to-face level with the one holding the rock up. She smiles, looking forward to taking Superman down and, I don’t know, humping his unconscious face?

It doesn’t work. He ties them up together with rope and leaves them hanging from the bridge. Next!

Superman bounces all over the world. The Arctic. China. New York. Metropolis. Berlin. Half a mile under the sea. Miami. He keeps shaking down new buyers of useless rocks for more information. He doesn’t really get any further in his pursuit. I would’ve just thrown ‘Dora in a pit or something and moved on with my life.

She seems to be moving faster than him, somehow. He ends his pursuit in the Sahara Desert, where he meets up with a blowjob named Ra’s al Ghul and his daughter Talia. I don’t know who these people are, but they look stern and unfriendly!

“You’re not as clever as the Detective,” proclaims Ra’s al Ghul, possibly referring to Batman, “the Detective would never have been led ‘round like a dog on a leash, fear-blind to clues within his grasp.”

Action Comics (Vol. 1), Issue #760

Ra’s al Ghul puts the “action” in “Action Comics”. Keep that in mind, nerd.

They’re already bored with this guy, so they leave. Talia, on her way out, tells him that he needs to go to Spain now. Have fun! Run with some bulls while you’re there.

Superman looks bewildered, forlorn, and simple-minded! Also fugly. “Fear-blind to clues… what am I missing here?”

Sounds like we’re getting some DETECTIVE WORK in my Action Comics! Stay in your lane, bro.

In northern Spain, Encantadora is chilling on a bench waiting for a particular buyer to show up. She looks bored. “Should have known better than to take this meet. Mxyzptlk isn’t even a real name…how could he have a bank account?”

Luckily, someone shows up! It’s not Mryxtysyxyslk, but it’s Superman and all the Supervillains whom ‘Dora has wronged in the last five pages! All ready to kick some ass!

Here’s what’s ducky about this: she knows the jig is up. She doesn’t even look confident anymore. Sad and nervous. She looks for a way to weasel out of this one like a snake, but instead she has to own up to her actions. Like a weasel.

‘Dora touches the charm on her necklace, attempting to release some sweet, sweet, intoxicating, scarlet smoke and possibly harm Superman, but something fast SWOOPS DOWN and snatches it from her neck!

Looks like the conwoman has become the connee! It took a while, lots of strenuous thinking on Superman’s part which he DOES NOT do very well with.

“How did you figure it out?” ‘Dora asks quizzically, setting up a nice, convenient denouement! That’s French for “anticlimax”.

“I almost didn’t. I was so busy trying to compensate for my weakness… that I never looked for yours,” Superman guffaws as he holds up a cube. It turns out that she unknowingly betrayed her own damn self!

“Oh, by the way, Doctor Spectro sends his regards from jail,” Superman says, clicking on the Bat-Signal thing he had at the beginning of this issue; roughly 900,000 words ago on this blog post. Holy shit is this a long comic. The real Superman was the one who swooped in to steal the necklace. The fake Superman and all his fake supervillain buddies were actually fakes! Cooked up from the Bat-Signal thing!

‘Dora explains that her necklace smoke allows her to manipulate her targets. No shit. She was using Superman to get him to show up and beat these villains up so that she could sneak away with the money and no one was the wiser! Great plan! Except for the fact that it was foiled! Ha ha ha ha ha!

She gushes with respect for him, which is just another ploy to get a hunk of that boner inside of her. He tells her handcuffs will be involved, but it’s not going to be as sexy as she envisions. She kisses him right on the mouth, tongue flopping around in there.

He asks her why she did that.

“Consider it a show of good faith… at the beginning of a long-term relationship, darling.”
“You think so…?”
“Oh baby… I know so.”

Final Thoughts

What the fuck was THAT ending?

This post is already too long as it is. Let me just sum up my feelings with one word:

*fart*


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Monster (2003)

Tagline:
The first female serial killer of America.

Wide Release Date:
December 24, 2003

Directed by:
Patty Jenkins
Written by:
Patty Jenkins
Produced by:
Donald Kushner, Brad Wyman, Charlize Theron, Mark Damon, Clark Peterson

Starring:
Charlize Theron
Christina Ricci
Bruce Dern

Monster

PREGAME THOUGHTS

I have a lame claim-to-fame connection to Aileen Wuornos! She went to the same high school I did. Granted, I think she went to about seventeen high schools in four years and she likely never graduated from any of them, let alone five of them, let alone seventeen of them. But hey, a claim-to-fame is a claim-to-fame! I was also childhood friends with Olympic gold medalist figure skater Charlie White, but who gives a shit about that? We’re talking about serial killers here!

Wuornos was executed when I was a sophomore in high school, and I remember there was a lot of discussion about it floating through the hallways at the time. Our monthly high school magazine had a feature that covered her life and her imprisonment, and I found everything about it fascinating. Not fascinating enough, obviously to watch this movie when it came out. I’m fixing that now almost 20 years later, so rise up off my nuts.

THE 550(ish)-WORD SYNOPSIS

Monster presents the progression of Aileen Wuoros (Charlize Theron) as she goes from suicidal prostitute to homicidal prostitute! This is 1989 in podunk Florida, so there’s a lot of shitty haircuts and people who look like they haven’t showered in months.

Aileen, or “Lee”, as she’s called throughout the film, angrily hoots and hollers in a gay bar and attracts the attention of probably barely-18 Selby Wall (Christina Ricci). They get to know each other throughout the night, bonding over, like, monster trucks and Rolling Rock or whatever. They bond, and Selby invites Lee to spend the night at her aunt’s place where she’s staying after getting kicked out of her parents’ house. They share a twin-size bed. The wall behind them looks like a high school hallway.

Monster - Lee and Selby share a dang ol' bed

I bet you’ve never slept in a real twin size bed before, huh?

All this creepy infatuation leads to a roller rink outing and then some back alley smoochin’! Lee seems like a real person with real emotional range and not at all a cold sociopath. She seems to care about Selby.

HOWEVER, Lee has a plan to hit the road and get a legitimate job and she begs Selby to tag along with her to start a new life. The job hunt doesn’t go very well, and broke as fuck, she settles back into her prostitution habit. A dude tries rape her, so she kills him in self-defense. A horrified Lee confesses to Selby, who is already embarking on a structureless nightmare spearheaded by the most unstable woman in Florida. Instead of bailing, which would be way smarter since Selby has been frustrated and unhappy with Lee’s failures as a breadwinner, she continues hanging on to this loser and getting strung along.

Lee starts methodically killing and robbing her clients to maintain financial stability. She gets more unhinged as the movie goes on, justifying her actions by claiming that every single client was trying to rape her. Lee even crashes the car into a friendly, elderly couple’s lawn with Selby in the passenger seat and they have to run away. It’s pretty chaotic and stressful.

To showcase an instance of empathy, Lee takes frustrated pity and spares the life of a real sad-sack of a man who gets nervous and cries because he’s never had sex before. In another instance, a man stops by her on the highway not to take advantage of her less-than-sultry prostitution-related services, but to offer her genuine help. When he notices her gun, he tries to weasel out of the interaction completely. In an act of self-preservation, Lee feels she is left no choice but to get him out of the car and shoot him, against the bearing of what seems to be her real moral compass.

Selby starts connecting the dots on Lee’s murderer murders from the daily newspapers. After a confrontation, Selby fucks on out of her life. Later, in a biker bar, Lee is confronted by two bounty hunters. Her only friend in the world, Thomas (Bruce Dern), tries to get her to leave the bar with him. Not trusting men anymore, Lee declines. She gets arrested. Selby gives her up during a tapped call and testifies against her in Lee’s trial. Lee gets shoved off to the Pokey.

Monster - Lee has some dang ol' blood on her

Just a little blood, right? No reason to get all traumatized about it!

TOM’S DISCUSSION CORNER

TOPIC 1 — Humanization

Like all good movies dealing with unpleasant societal subject matter, morality isn’t delivered in black or white. I’ve read opinions that Charlize Theron’s performance is one of the best in all of cinema (with respect to portraying a real person), and although I haven’t REFINED MY APPRECIATION OF ACTORS AND ACTRESSES ACTING to the point where I can’t really tell the difference between great acting and so-bad-it’s-great acting, Theron’s acting is pretty good here! How’s that for taking a stance?

And yes, absolutely, the point of this narrative is to give you mixed feelings about Lee. Even at her worst, she’s never actually detached from reality or emotionally unresponsive. In fact, she’s pretty volatile in her emotions, usually flipping between panic and anger. The most heart-breaking scene was near the end when a man stopped on the road to offer help. He noticed the gun, and Lee decided there was no other choice but to kill him. You could tell that she hated that she had to do it, but she was too far-gone by then in her complete lack of trust in men that she couldn’t fathom an alternative.

Plus, her care for Selby is genuine, but that’s likely only because Selby is the only person in her life that cared for her first.

Monster - Lee gets dang ol' jealous

“Carnivals are fun! See? Can’t you tell I’m havin’ fun?”

TOPIC 2 — Christina Ricci’s Acting

I’ve seen opinionated mutterings around the ol’ World Wide Web that Christina Ricci’s acting was pretty poor. Roger Ebert disagreed; he considered Ricci’s performance “sublime acting in its portrayal of a bad actor”. That’s a funny, roundabout way of admitting that her acting was bad!

Personally, I side with Ebert. Let’s get the elephant in the room out of the way first: any acting would look subpar if you were paired up with Charlize Theron in one of her best performances in her career. That being said, I don’t have a problem with Ricci’s acting. It would be distracting if it were a problem. What I saw was a very young, naïve woman with a pile of social awkwardness and a slight shame with respect to her sexuality. She spends a lot of time trusting Lee even after it became obvious she surely shouldn’t have. Her attempts to join an already-established lesbian social circle is met with overt scorn, and she barely noticed. Her dependence on Lee, who also had no idea how to move forward with any plan, was very childlike. In short, she was pretending to be something she wasn’t: confidence and independent. And she wasn’t selling it. Selby was a bad actor, not Ricci.

You can watch the movie and decide for yourself, but I know women like Selby Wall and Ricci pretty much nailed it.

Monster - Lee and Selby share a dang ol' kiss

Kissin’ in the dark. That’s the stuff right there.

IMDb TRIVIA FUNHOUSE!

Aileen Wuornos, a notoriously uncooperative person, gave writer and director Patty Jenkins access to hundreds of letters she had written and received in order to gain insight into Aileen’s life.
The notorious uncooperative serial killer probably cooperated because she was imagining this movie would finally show her in the positive light she thought she deserved. You know. A movie titled “Monster“.

Charlize Theron won the Academy Award for playing Aileen Wuornos on 29th February 2004, Wuornos’ birthday.
No one was happier for Theron than Wuornos herself, smiling up to her from Hell. Also, February 29 isn’t a real day! Don’t try to pull a fast one on my like that again, IMDb.

Steve Perry, former lead singer of the band Journey, was the music consultant.
lol, why? “Hey, we need some classic rock for this ’80s-era biographical film. Better get Steve Perry on the horn to help us!” No wonder “Don’t Stop Believing”, the worst song ever, was included in this movie’s soundtrack.

Reese Witherspoon campaigned for the lead role.
“Campaigned” makes it sound like Witherspoon assembled a team, threw a ton of money at organizing travel, rallies, and advertising, and lost a vote. Good thing she has killing the planet with NFTs to fall back on these days.

Charlize Theron gained between 20 and 30 pounds and shaved her eyebrows to play Aileen Wuornos. Christina Ricci also gained 20 pounds for the role and both actresses dressed in very un-glamourous clothing.
Wouldn’t it be funny if both Theron and Ricci looked absolutely physically stunning and dressed to the nines while playing a serial killing prostitute and her trashy friend in bumfuck Florida? It’s almost as if that wouldn’t work at all! Good thing there’s this little movie quirk called “acting”.

Monster - Lee smokes a dang ol' cigarette

“Let’s go, Selby! The monster truck show is right ’round the street!”

IS IT WORTH A WATCH?

Yes, absolutely. Period piece dramas always hold up well as long as the production, direction, and writing are competently executed. No pun intended. Monster does a spectacular job of humanizing a serial killer while maintaining all the moral grey areas.

And you’ll see Charlize Theron at her best, no question.


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Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #22 – “Reflections of…”

* Part 1 of 6 of the Legacy storyline *

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #22 – “Reflections of…”! Hot off the heels of Brian Michael Bendis’ All New X-Men, I was itching for more of his Ultimate Spider-Man run. So here we are.

In the previous story arc, Doc Ock wakes up from his coma and discovers his stupid robot arms. He’s pretty mad about it! He seeks justice against Justin Hammer, a Southern businessman who owns facilities rife with human experimentation laboratories.

Hammer gets scared into a heart attack and dies, so that takes care of that. Doc Ock gets taken down by Spider-Man in front of dozens of journalists and TV reporters, which allows Spider-Man to finally give his two cents on live television about his intentions and motives for superheroing around the city.

Oh yeah, there was a Steve Irwin-type TV personality named Kraven the Hunter who vowed to kill Spider-Man on his show to boost ratings. That didn’t pan out whatsoever. It was inconsequential.

I, for one, am excited about another storyline from one of the better comic series that I’m currently tackling. You don’t seem as excited. But this isn’t about you, now is it? It never was.

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #22 [July, 2002]
Written by: Brian Michael Bendis
“Reflections of…”

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #22

The cover tells me this is the return of the Green Goblin. Willem Tha Foe. All hail his greenliness and his goblinness.

It’s just another typical today on the streets of Queens. A bunch of people walking around, looking angry, like always.

We don’t waste any time! A group of street toughs come barrelling down the sidewalk on their rude skateboards and inline skates! They’re wearing delinquent clothes, like sweatshirts, sunglasses, and pants with no belts!

“All right, TAKE ‘EM! TAKE ‘EM ALL!” yells the one with the Scott Summers Cyclops visor, the the four coed thugs begin tazing innocent civilians and steal their various cash-holding accessories!

“I hope you get cancer– you should only get cancer!!” shouts a rather hysterical hot dog vendor. Cyclops Boy only smiles! He smiles at the threats of cancer!

OK, we’re done here! Gooey webs spring up all around them, stopping these ruffians in their tracks. “I can’t believe I had to get out of line at Taco Bell…for this?” swoops in the spindly Spider-Man as he makes short work of these ne’er-do-wells. The ne’er do well, do they? Ne’er e’er.

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #22

I wouldn’t say no, of course. I am, as you kids say, a man grown.

One of the girls tries to hit Spidey with her taser, but he shoots his web goo at it and it causes the thing to shock her instead. Tables turned! This is fun!

“Do you guys know I fight guys with morphing metal arms and actual electric power? I’m A-list, baby,” taunts the spidery one. He finishes taking out these subpar bush league rent-a-hoodlums and dusts his hands off. “If you expect to be taken seriously by guys like me… you’re really gonna have to work on your presentation.”

The adoring public smiles passively at the hero. After a lucious full-page crotch shot, the hallmark of the male superhero, Spider-Man takes his leave and heads to high school where he spends his day eating his boogers and staring at girls’ shoes.

Class is already in session. Dr. Science Professor in his pristine lab coat is going to talk about moles. Not the blind dirt diggers, and not the Russian spies. Definitely not the cancerous growths like the ones wished upon by the hot dog man! It’s the boring chemistry one. Look, I don’t have to explain it. You all went to high school, right? Or maybe you didn’t! Maybe you’re still 12. That seems about the right demographic for my inane blog.

Peter Parker sprints to class while this teaching nerd rattles off the Wikipedia article he memorized that morning. And just before the teacher tries to get someone in the room to wake up and answer “Avogadro’s number”, Parker crashes into the classroom. He breaks beakers, he topples test tubes, he flummoxes flasks! Smooth move, Ex-Lax! Up your nose with a rubber hose!

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #22

Way to Kramer your way into class, young Peter Parker! Giddy-up!

Mr. Science asks him WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THIS TARDINESS?? He fell asleep! Next? What is 6.02 x 1023 called? Parker answers it correctly. Whew! That was close!

After school, Mary “MJ” Jane “Marijuana Weed” “Kirsten Dunst” Watson gushes about Spider-Man’s live television fights with Doc Ock and Kraven the Hunter. Parker tells her to cork it while they’re in public.

“Did you hear what happened to that Kraven the Hunter?” MJ smiles, “They cancelled his TV show… they put it on ‘indefinite hiatus’– and I have an uncle who’s a P.A. at NBC and he says that’s French for ‘Sayonara, sailor.’”

Yeah, and Parker has an uncle who works at Nintendo. Just kidding! His uncle is dead!

MJ keeps going on and on about how much of a boner she got watching Spider-Man on TV. She wants to whisk him away to a corner of the school to smooch his peen, but another time. They instead head to the bleachers to watch football practice for some reason. Sounds like a dumb thing to do after school to me. Go home and play Gamecube.

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #22

She said I can’t go out and be Spider-Man for at least three weeks!

The thing about the Doc Ock fight, it was all the way in New Jersey and it took Parker forever to get home. He had to sneak in at 3am. It didn’t work. Aunt May flipped her lid and now he’s grounded. The pits, right? That’s what he said. He was like “this is total pits, Aunt May!”

MJ looks pretty sad and pitiful about Parker’s Predicament! “Can I come over then? We’ll just hang out at your place,” she nudges. Ha, yeah right! Aunt May thinking we’re kissin’ genitals? No thanks. “You are the entire foundation of the grounding,” he says. No more nookie for you two. Start using the shower head like a normal teenager, MJ. Parker’ll hump his toilet seat. It’ll be fine, they’ll get by.

Also, this Spider-Man thing will take a time out, too. “Guess I’ll just catch up on my reading and keep making boo boo kitty faces at Aunt May until she gives in,” Parker says, inscrutably.

Boo boo kitty, huh?

The thing that really sucks? Parker hasn’t been grounded since he was seven years old! Usually Uncle Ben would calm May down. Now she has NO ONE to calm her down! She’s all riled up constantly! Stupid dead husband. Wish I was dead.

He doesn’t like lying to his aunt, but he can’t tell the truth either. And any attempts to fix will just be more lies. She’ll never trust him again. Oh man.

MJ says fuck that old lady. She’s coming over anyway!

“No.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
“I’ll sneak over.”
“No.”
“Seriously?”
“Not if you ever want to see me again.”
“I can’t sneak over?”
“No.”

Never anger the redhead, idiot. “You can have your whole super secret hero thing, and I can’t come over?” she snipes. Why does she even bother? This kid is full of bad decisions.

“Guess we’ll just have to make out under the bleachers during school then,” she smiles devilishly. Parker’s eyes perk up! The bleachers! Of course! Aunt May doesn’t own the bleachers!

Something happens next that makes the two of them completely forget about snogging under the bleachers. You would think it would be a nuclear bomb going off. You wouldn’t think there could be anything else that would accomplish that.

What really happens doesn’t seem that important to me, though! Who cares!

Harry Osborn is back.

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #22

Yo! I’m outta the joint! Let’s go rob somethin’!

Parker and MJ are all like “what are ya doin’ here?!” and Harry is all like “this is where I go to school”. Very coy. We’ve been worried sick, young man. We haven’t seen you in like, fifteen issues! Tom was barely even reading any comics back then!

Look, Harry isn’t ready to talk about it. A lot of shit went down, that’s all you need to know right now. Goblin father, burned-down house…it’s some real grim shit, yo.

“Well lookie lookie. Harry Osborn back from the dead,” says the approaching bowl-cut extraordinaire Flash Thompson. Harry shoots him an icy glare. “Flash,” he says. Icily.

You know what, Flash? All this time, both Peter Parker and MJ wrote and called and emailed and texted and Facebooked and Zoomed and what did you do? Sit on your own penis? Thanks, buddy.

“I thought about it. I just didn’t get to–” Flash starts flailing and sweating and gibbering, but Harry wants to hear NONE OF IT! NUNAVUT! So now is Harry “James Franco” Osborn ditching the freaks and joining the geeks now? Is that how it is?

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #22

Look, man, in 2022 we’re ready for the Harry Osborn / Flash Thompson relationship comics. I’d read the shit out of that!

So Harry starts throwing some homophobic jokes in Flash’s direction to prove, indeed, that Franco’s joining the geeks. Everyone around starts ganging up on Flash, saying that he sucks dicks and stuff. He doesn’t like that. “Allsyalls can kiss my backside!”

Flash storms away. Gwen Stacy, having included herself in the little gangbang, gets all close and cozy with Harry. Her reputation precedes her. They haven’t met yet, but he knows who she is. He heard allllll about her already in the principal’s office. Knowing that the principal is bandying about her name like that makes her day.

So yeah, it’s cool that Harry Osborn is back and all. Sure. That guy is brimming with personality.

“Peter, listen, my father wants you to come over for dinner tonight.”

Oh, your dead father? Sounds great, I’ll just wear my fanciest boutonniere and wait what was that?

Remember when Harry didn’t want to talk about anything, like, a page ago? Well, he doesn’t mind now. Talking about his mom dying in the fire. He saw her die! Crazy stuff. All burned up to a crisp like a Thanksgiving turkey! You know, a turkey from someone who sucks at Thanksgiving. But he had a lot of time to, you know, collapse in a nervous breakdown and stuff. But everything’s better now! Seriously! COME TO DINNER!

“But that thing that attacked our school– you said it–” HA! HA HA! STOP RIGHT THERE! Not Harry’s dad! Not at all! Hahahaha!! He must’ve been already taking those CRAAAAZY pills, wooooo!!! Listen, Harry’s fine! Norman is fine! FINE, GODDAMNIT!! Now come to dinner before his dad beats him again.

Peter Pisspants Parker is grounded. He can’t eat dinner with anybody anymore. Some other time then. Harry’s going to have to go home and hide all the belts.

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #22

“Harry’s Dad knows I’m Spider-Man. He knows!!” screams the kid bouncing around the fucking city in broad daylight Spider-Man-style.

Man, it just keeps happening. Everyone knows your secret identity, kid. Perhaps someone else needs to kick you in the butt again to throw off the scent.

He tells himself to not worry just yet. Maybe the Osborns had nothing to do with the whole goblin thing! Maybe Norman just wants a friendly dinner with some high school kid. I mean, freaks are everywhere anyway. And Norman is the ticket to getting some questions answered, to boot! He knows Parker got bit by that spider, maybe he can help him!

Pfft.

Parker backpedals now and considers himself nuts for even entertaining the idea that Norman Osborn isn’t a complete piece of shit. Just like everyone else! Especially that bitch Aunt May, grounding him, taking away his Game Boy! Unfair.

Seems strange, too, that Harry and Norman show up immediately after the Doc Ock thing falls apart. Very suspicious. “A big, happy family!! Which is, like, the total opposite of what they were last time I saw them. Nahh– this is crap. Big crap.”

So that settles it! Never seeing Norman Osborn again! Maybe he can murder Harry and then he’ll really be free.

“I just want to go to school and be Spider-Man when I want and go to a good college,” Parker muses, wanting only the simple things in life. Plus MJ and her sex organs.

Too bad this kid isn’t in the clear. A limousine is parked outside his house. Inside, a younger woman of the exact same height and build as Aunt May is making herself at home. “Mr. Parker, I’m Ms. Brooke, Mr. Osborn’s personal assistant. A pleasure to meet you,” she says, extending her hand.

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #22

Listen to the spicy, young, elven woman, dear.

Aunt May is beaming. Parker didn’t tell her the Osborns were back in town. What a joy! OF COURSE you can go over there for dinner! They sent a limo!

But he’s grounded! Nope, special dispensation for this one. Go have fun, now. Limousine! Bye bye!

They’re on their way to downtown Manhattan. Ms. Brooke is calm and polite. Peter Parker is trembling and farting his pants. And, soon enough, they arrive at the Osborn’s rich residence building. Probably in Trump Tower. Buttheads.

“I think for the next week we’ll just park a limo outside your house till your aunt forgets you’re grounded,” says Harry, greeting him at the entrance to the building. He’s all smiles; it’s very foreboding. They get in the elevator.

“I can’t believe you and Mary Jane are an item.”
“Who told you that?”
“Mary– I just talked to her for, like, an hour.”
“She’s here?”
“No. Phone. Good lord, is she in love with you.”

Parker gapes. Still likely farting his pants. He forgets all about how scared he is of the Big Bad Norman Osborn and presses Harry for more info about this. And yes, she pretty much said that in those words.

Harry wants to double date. They, he and Gwen Stacy! *growl* That psychopath really melts Harry’s butter. Really sets him aflame! Sets him aflame and kills his mom.

Nine hours later, the elevator reaches the top floor penthouse of the 950,000 floor skyscraper. Harry has to finish his session with his therapist, so he’ll smell you later. Ms. Brooke is a fine conversationalist! Say hi to my dad! Bye! *leaps out window*

So Harry ditches Parker, and he looks sheepish and nervous about it. Ms. Brooke takes Parker to a giant set of double doors that lead into Norman Osborn’s…ahem…private office. *knowing wink*

Parker’s internal monologue runs a mile a minute. Should he run? Does it matter? Norman can’t do anything here, there are too many witnesses. Wow, MJ is in love with him?! Wow! Maybe he should tell Aunt May that he’s Spider-Man. Are those cherry cordials? *munch* OK, fine, let’s face the music.

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #22

Hey, who’s that cute drink of water on TV?

He enters the dimly-lit office, which contains floor-to-ceiling windows, a large built-in aquarium with swimming sharks, and a TV tuned to Norman Osborn’s favorite channel: Spidey+

He watches, frozen in horror, at footage of his fight with Dr. Otto Octavius Octopussy. “HAAHAHAHAHAHAH!!” bellows the hearty Norman Osborn! Hale and healthy, this man, with his giant boat neck t-shirt showing off his sexy collarbone. “I’ve watched this clip so many times this weekend, I thought I was going to burn a hole in my TiVo.”

Ha, TiVo.

“So, you got it out of your system, I hope?” Norman asks pleasantly while playing footage of the infamous spider bite incident. “This Spider-Man crap. You’re done.”

Oooookaaaay, time to go…

But no, Parker stays rooted to his spot. He asks what’s going on and how is Norman alive right now? Here’s what’s going on, son: Norman Osborn owns you. You got bit by a spider in one of his labs. You’re his responsibility, and your days of cavorting around town in your tight-fitting package-accentuating jammies are over. It’s embarrassing.

“As for how I’m alive,” Norman says, pulling out a giant syringe filled with orange liquid, “…I’ve evolved.” Then he jams the syringe needle in his own neck and administers the liquid.

Oooookaaaay, time to go…

But no, Parker stands transfixed.

“OK, watch this, the little scientist in you is gonna get goosebumps,” readies Norman. Oh boy! He starts grunting and thumping his chest like he’s having a goddamn heart attack, but what really happens is he starts Hulking out. Turning green. Serious shit. He gets fifteen kinds of goblined-out!

“Now, what was your question?” the Green Goblin asks, eyes shimmering with orange light. Shirtless and glowing. Shiny. Incredible.

Final Thoughts

Yo, bonus page! “JAY LENO & SPIDER-MAN: ONE NIGHT ONLY (DON’T FORGET TO TIP YOUR WAITRESS)” Part One!

J. Jonah Jameson has an assignment for Peter Parker! General Motors, one of the Daily Bugle’s biggest advertisers, is shooting a commercial downtown! And they’re going to shoot it with Jay Leno! And don’t ask Jameson why, but Jay Leno wants to shoot it with Spider-Man! And since you’re sooooo fucking good at finding Spider-Man, he wants YOU to find Spider-Man and then coax him into doing anything Jay Leno wants! OR ELSE!

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #22

Better do what Newspaper Hitler asks!

Gulp! What a pickle! How is Peter Parker going to talk Spider-Man into THIS?! TUNE IN NEXT TIME TO SEE! *wacky banjo music*


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