East of West. Issue #10

East of West, Issue #10 – “Old Magic”

* Part 10 of 15 of the The Apocalypse: Year One storyline *

Welcome to Ghostliness & Nerfherders Presents: East of West, Issue #10 – “Old Magic”! In the previous installment, Death and Oracle strike a deal: she helps him find his son, he gives her one of her eyeballs! Ahh, that old chestnut…

We also get some Crown Prince John Freeman of the Kingdom of Nawlins action. He talks to his King father about getting some money to bail out the financially collapsing Union. His father says “pffft, you’re getting played, son” and tells him to buy the country instead of loaning them money! The Prince seems amused.

As we’ve been seeing in recent issues, there’s a lot of tense shit going down among the Seven Nations of America! So very delicious, and I’m ready with my bottle of A-1 steak sauce (to drink).

East of West, Issue #10 [March, 2014]
Written by: Jonathan Hickman
“Old Magic”

East of West, Issue #10

“You should fear what the future holds.“

That’s how I live. Always fear the future. No looking forward, gotta look back. Back is comfortable. Back already happened and I’m still alive. Forward is where I die!

And maybe even Death is thinking that, because he’s shrieking his stupid white head off at the gouging of his precious blue eyeball. Oracle mocks his fortune, since, you know, she knows how it feels to give and get nothing in return.

Death is irate! He came here voluntarily and now he’s being a crybaby about it. “You’re gonna need that eye to fully appreciate where you’re headin’” he tells her, quivering with eyeball-less empty eye socket indignation!

“What you seek is Heetse’isi’.” the little eyeball nudges, but Death knows what that means! That’s eyeball talk for “a grave”, you bastard! Death aims his gun: “Seen plenty of people crave a bullet in my day, but never one so greedy as this.”

The eyeball stays calm. I think. Who can tell? It’s an eyeball. “Your son is not there, but that’s where you’ll find the man who can tell you where he is.” A wild goose chase it is, is it? Just keep on hitting landmarks, talking to random nomads and spiritual entities, collecting nine crystals from all the dungeons to appease the Tree Gods? Death said that wasn’t the deal he signed up for. SON. NOW!

Oracle has no pity for this hunched-over sack of a cowboy, and gently tells him he can go fuck off if he finds this situation unjust or spiteful. After all, HE wasn’t the one who has been blindly buried under 800 miles of sea. Remember, honey? She also reminds him that the prophetic words, HER words, include a little line as such: “There’s Horsemen on the plains, the sky’s red as blood, and only the blind can see a better end.” So, there you go, that’s an upshot!

East of West, Issue #10

Or, like, a really good beef brisket sandwich.

Death keeps playing his death hand, the only hand he has. It’s like a 2, 4, 7, 8, J. Of guns. So he’s got a flush! Not a bad hand, I guess. And Oracle isn’t safe from Death’s hand just ‘cause she’s special and shit. Remember THAT one, dear.

And when Death says she wasted a trade, she begs to differ. She’ll get her freedom next time he comes around! Her freedom and so much more. Just you wait, sir. It might be another eight million years, but it’s gonna happen! Ha! Until then, she’ll just wait patiently. Maybe try to replay some movies in her head. Look Who’s Talking, that’s a good one. Bruce Willis as the baby.

“They lift themselves up as your betters. Take joy in watching them fall.”

Death and his crew approach Heetse’isi’. Another appalling landmark in the middle of buttfuck desert nowhere. This time they head toward a lonely tree. “It’s not ‘a grave’, Death…it’s ‘The Grave’,” pipes in his faithful Wolf by his side. This is where people who are cast out of the Endless Nation go to, uh, stand on the fence between the waking world and the other realm. Sounds very mysterious! I hope it has HBO and those magic fingers vibrating beds.

Anyway, Wolf is getting awfully nervous hanging around here. It’s where he grew up, his father’s land, and he doesn’t like it anymore. Time to go! But no. Sorry Wolf. “The Lady said this is where I need to be to find out what I need to know,” Death snarls over his shoulder. “So here I am.”

Several bones hang from the trees by rope. Several human bones. SKELETON bones.

Crow seems skittish too. “I can see for miles, Death, and he’s nowhere in sight. Perhaps the Oracle was wrong and he won’t be here.”

That little statement was met with silence. They’re not budging. Be patient, you chucklefucks.

Wolf’s super-shapeshifting wolf limbs start howlin’. He doesn’t need to see him. He can smell his presence. “Five miles west. He’s waiting for us at the Sea of Bones,” Wolf tells his captive audience. Apparently, it’s his “seat of power”. Where he can “fully manifest” and “call his true self over”. While eating “gas station hot pockets” and watching “Season 4 DVDs of Friday Night Lights“.

East of West, Issue #10

The lone cowboy flies solo again, eh? Well ain’t that ducky.

Wolf and Crow aren’t shy about their reservations, but Death doesn’t have any time for whiny piss-pants ‘fraidy-cats! Either come along or stay put like little pussies! Don’t forget, though, this is all prophecy stuff so whatever happens happens and all that. Don’t mean no nevermind to death and such.

Next we return to the Lair of the Beat, where, as you may recall, Death and Xiaolian’s son is hooked up to machines being fed all the universe’s information! Ain’t that cool? The computer continues its endless task of quizzing the kid on various logic puzzles and/or Sphinx riddles, but when it asks the kid questions of a more human ilk, he either doesn’t understand or he answers that he feels nothing. So this kid is just like me!

The Three Horsey Boys are watching from above, petulantly harumphing at the kid’s inability to feel! “Maybe I should see what happens when the thing’s femur is poking through its skin,” says Conquest with very little of that Ezra Orion motherly love. Famine tells Conquest to be a little more fucking patient. Monsters take time to cultivate. Conquest is skeptical that this Young Sheldon twerp is even the Great Beast of the prophecies. War is also skeptical: “The infallibility of The Word is not in question…but its interpretation? How often have we been wrong?” And Conquest says that they haven’t been wrong that much, so don’t worry about it War ol’ Boy. Girl. Whatever.

After some mulling over, Famine has a quirky little thought: maybe they are wrong! And they all kind of start coming to the same hunch. Whatever it may be. So their next task is to follow that hunch. Whatever it may be. And if there’s credence to their hunch, they’ll kill the boy.

And then they leave. And then the ruse is over.

East of West, Issue #10

Good show, everyone! That’s a wrap! We have eight more performances of this run before we take it to Broadway, baby!

Once Sonny Boy makes sure the coast is clear, the computer confirms that he is in grave danger. The forecast is about a month of survival, with a chance of meatballs, and after that the future becomes too unclear to predict based on algorithms and megabytes and Winsock TCP/IP gnomes. Time to switch gears! Enough theory, time for practical. With respect to the outside world, the not-hooked-up-to-a-computer world, “Teach me that world’s current geopolitical alliances. Also, please show me schematics for all related and relevant weaponry.”

And looks like Opie’s gonna learn the Art of War! Lesson One: blow everything the fuck up, for serious.

Enough of this child. Death arrives at the Sea of Bones, which isn’t much of a sea, but there certainly are a lot of bones. A paltry collection of bones this ain’t. It’s a lot of bones. There’s an Endless Nation shaman-type sitting atop a small hillock of bones. “I saw you here in a dream,” says Mr. Bones, “And caught a glimpse of what follows…” This is quite a mysterious, bony encounter.

Endless Nation Shaman, ol’ Bonesy, he tells Death that his attempt to fight fate is fruitless. He has no quarrel here at the Bony Sea of Bones.

“Your real enemy is yourself,” says Shaman.
“Well I beg to fuckin’ differ,” Death says with his trademark grimace and his monotone good looks.

Shaman recognizes Crow, snorting at her masquerading as some sort of human being.

Shaman recognizes Wolf too.

East of West, Issue #10

Daaaaaaaaad, you’re embarrassing me!

No wonder Wolf didn’t want to come. Yet another daddy issue wedged into this series. I’m looking forward to seeing Andrew Archibald Chamberlain maintain composure in front of his 130-year-old father in a future issue.

Wolf and Dad exchange pleasantries, but it’s time to cut to the chase. Cough up Death’s little boy or else you get the WOLF ARMS! RAWR! And Shaman Jones is like “ha, yeah, uh huh, that’s rich coming from you.” Wolf is not comfortable at all with this face-to-face reunion. He squirms and stammers, defending his decision to leave on account of, ya know, differences! But enough of that! “Please father… the boy.”

And Pops is all “nope”. Prophecy. The Message. What’s done is done! “We will all become what we must in these…the last days.” says Dad before completely evaporating in a plume of crimson smoke. This angers the Death-Man even more, and he’s always already pretty angry. “Here we go! He’s broke the plane and tunnelin’ pure dead time.” he hollers maniacally like a one-eyed piece of shit.

A lot of stuff starts going down, like the tornado scene in the Wizard of Oz. Death hangs on tight to the ground and asks Wolf what his dear old dad uses to anchor himself between the two worlds: the living world and the dead world. Uhhh, I dunno, an anchor maybe? Ha. Well, Wolfy doesn’t know. It all depends on how he chooses to manifest himself. Dad’s a decamorph, you know. Some real Dungeons & Dragons shit. He needs to reveal his final form, like a boss in Final Fantasy that takes four hours to beat.

“Show yourself, you son of a bitch,” Death yells at the torrent of wind and dust. Then there’s a deafening roar of a large skullface wooly mammoth thing. Nice final form, did you get that at the toilet store? Heh. Anchorman.

East of West, Issue #10

Gesundheit.

This thing is massive, easily 50 feet tall. *gets out measuring tape*… 53 feet tall. Crow recognizes the bastard as Cheveyo, who has barely had any screen time so far in this series, but you may remember him as Frowny Pigtail Man of the Chosen, introduced in Issue #2. Big Magic of the Endless Nation. Father of Wolf (Blitzer). Make a note of it.

Crow calls him a poseur, then Cheveyo roars, then another big explosion go boom happens, then a vertiable MURDER of crows starts swarming Horse Man and his Cronies. Crow-nies.

One tries to fuck with Death. “KAW! KAW!” it shrieks, trying to steal his gun. Death looks terrified and enraged; starts trying to blast the damn bird full of bullets. One cuts through its tail, then I guess a big stone spike appears…and then Wolf grabs the spike, launches into the air, apologizes for the sin he’s about to commit, and then stabs Wooly Mammoth Dad right in the chest. Understandably, this is pretty effective.

“You left me no choice,” Wolf claims as his father morphs back down to his dour, human self. Don’t worry, Wolf. Your dad isn’t mad. Just disappointed. “One path is The Message. The other…is not.” How profound.

Flashback time. Cheveyo taught Wolf everything he knows. Just like he taught John Freeman the VIII everything he knows. Now one is on the path. The other is lost.

Wolf begs for his father’s understanding while his father, like, is dying. “I stepped outside of our people the same as you… I did so because I believe in the things you taught us. But I also know your understanding of them is flawed. It’s why I had to leave.” So, in short, before you kick the fucking bucket right in front of me like a total butthole, tell me where Death’s son is right now or, so help me god, I will give you the biggest noogie this side of the Mississippi!

East of West, Issue #10

And in Dead Country, the one-eyed man is King.

Death, being the insecure pissant that he is, puffs out his chest and asserts his dominance. Listen pal, do you think you’re running the show here? In a place called Dead Country? HA! Cute.

Here I realize that Cheveyo has become a pile of red goo with a head attached. Death dishes out more tough guy Dirty Harry shit and gives him an ultimatum. “Tell me what I want to know and you live to see another day, Cheveyo,” he says, and who could resist such a deal! Looking like a Slimy Little Pile from Earthbound from now on.

Cheveyo, begrudgingly, starts mumbling about a lair, but Death cuts him off right away because his ears ain’t taking too kindly to this disrespectful mumblin’! “I said, we built a lair for the beast–you’ll find your son there.” It’s in a hidden forest, in a hole dug deep into the Earth. Where is it specifically, you ask? Well, it’s… it’s… IT’S… hold on… it’s… *cough*… the lair, you say?… well, the lair… the lair is… the lair is located… the lair… *cough*… it’s… it’s… hold on, I’m getting a call… what?… what?… no, you have the wrong number… I said you have the wrong number… well, actually that sounds like a pretty good offer… I have been paying too much on my car insurance, yes… ok, thank you… anyway… the lair… *cough*… *wheeze*… you can find it right by the McDonald’s at 23rd and–

Dead.

So Cheveyo explodes into a swirling black gorey pile of nothing. Death is furious.

We pan from the Sea of Bones, over the river, through the woods, miles away, revealing a sniper with a rocket launcher dog. Bel Solomon’s hired assassin, the judge-killing Ranger, assigned to murder each and every one of the Chosen.

“That’s one.” he says.

Final Thoughts

Could you have any worse timing, Death? Jesus H. Christ, sir, I thought you were punctual. Nice going. Good luck finding your little poindexter of a son now, Whitey.


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Sucky Funnies for April 17, 2022

Yo, it’s Easter, and the comics page largely doesn’t seem to know this. We’re also in the middle of Ramadan and Passover, but do you think the American newspapers are even going to touch those with a 400-foot pole? Hardly!

A small handful of strips do acknowledge Easter. Certainly those pesky Family Circus children will spend the 62nd year of their childhood attending church! Let’s take a look.

Zits

Zits - April 17, 2022

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Teenagers are insufferable, am I right? You try to do a nice thing for one of them, preparing a charitable little Easter basket, and they just go and pour a laundry detergent bottle of milk all over the contents. Typical. One step closer to type 2 diabetes.

tarball: “Hopefully those aren’t plastic eggs with surprises in them.”
Brian Bickley: “Wait till tomorrow morning. Those eggs are going to come out rough.”
mmt3k: “Wait until Jeremy discovers that Connie painted hollowed-out eggs instead of hardboiled ones!”

You got that right, everyone! Jeremy’s eating plastic for breakfast! Crazy stuff!

Family Circus

Family Circus - April 17, 2022

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My own dad was born in 1956, and I’m almost 100% sure that at least Billy should be older than he is. I feel sorry for the Family Circus parents, I don’t think they knew what they were getting into. Child-rearing isn’t supposed to take six decades. Just an infernal existence caring for ageless little urchins. Jeffy looks like Regis Philbin.

Are they attending a megachurch? Are they going to Joel Osteen’s Easter service, which probably costs $400 per person for a seat?

MadmanTX: “Wait til the crowd tramples each other getting out of the church when mass is over and then flips each other off in the parking lot trying to get out of their spaces.”
Bill F.: “We know the underwear comment wasn’t made by Thel…she goes Commando!”
MadmanTX: “The only family that the priest hands free condoms to at the door of the church.”
Bill F.: “Look at that satisfied smile, PJ’s just relieved himself!”

Looks like MadmanTX and Bill F. are the ones to watch for devilishly bawdy Family Circus commentary! Middle fingers? Mommy not wearing underpants? I don’t want to go to Hell for accidentally reading such ribald subject matter on Easter Sunday! :[ :[ :[

Curtis

Curtis - April 17, 2022

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Look at these good Christians! The Wilkins brothers are always attending church without their heathen atheist parents, and one of the proudest recurring Curtis traditions is throwing shade about all the women’s hats. As in, nothing throws shade quite like these hats! See, I can do it too.

Bucinka: “Have a blessed holiday, all, and don’t forget to rock your best Black Church Hat! (I like the pink one in panel 5… .)”
David Rickard: “He sneaks all that junk food in with him, Barry. And for the sake of your mental health–and to avoid losing your breakfast–don’t ask where he hides it.”
Bluegirl285: “Barry always chews Curtis out for making fun of the ladies hats, yet he’s the one laughing at those stale jokes.”

Oh boy, we certainly have fun here, don’t we? And yes, Bluegirl285, that is part of the joke! Thanks for stopping by.


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Supergirl (Vol. 6), Issue #5

Supergirl (Vol. 6), Issue #5 – “Homecoming”

* Part 5 of 7 of the Last Daughter of Krypton storyline *

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Supergirl (Vol. 6), Issue #5 – “Homecoming”! In the previous installment, which was aptly titled “Escape”, Supergirl escapes all right. She shoots laser eyes at the central core of Simon Tycho’s space station and blows it up to smithereens. Tycho’s completely messed up now; they attached what’s left of his already shitty body to the Brain.

Supergirl got away with her sunstone, which may contain a message from her father, but it’s cracked. So now she contemplates just picking a direction in the vast wasteland of outer space and, hopefully, ending up back at her home planet. Which is gone. Which Superman already told her. But she doesn’t trust him. So she’s in a pickle!

There’s a spot of blood on the uniform of one of Tycho’s guards who tried to pick a fight with Supergirl. It’s Supergirl’s blood. Tycho’s gonna do fucked up stuff with that blood.

This is a pretty good story so far! Let’s hope it stays that way.

Supergirl (Vol. 6), Issue #5 [March, 2012]
Written by: Michael Green & Mike Johnson
“Homecoming”

Supergirl (Vol. 6), Issue #5

“In the ruins of Argo…a showdown with Reign!” Why, look at me all gobsmacked! A showdown with THEE Reign? In the ruins of Argo, you say! That sounds fantabulous! Ha ha! Listen to me, you smug comic book cover, I don’t know what either of those things are. I’m a BRAND NEW, TENDER, VIRGIN SUPERGIRL reader here, and I cannot be swayed by any promises of Argo or Reign in the pages within. Nice try.

Fragile, precious sunstone in hand, Supergirl blasts like a dangerous planet-destroying cosmic ray straight into the depths of space. “The Kryptonian girl is leaving the small planet on which she crashed. Shall we engage her now?” asks an unseen entity, possibly feminine, judging from the pink and purple text boxes. Supergirl flies alongside Saturn. “No. We follow,” answers a similarly possibly-feminine entity. “Interesting. She is following a course back. Back the way we came.” These two decide to follow her back through “the jump”, and then one of them (REIGN? FROM THE RUINS OF ARGO?) will engage her alone.

Meanwhile, Supergirl is like “I’m totally fucking up right now” as she continues to hold her breath and fly into the wild black yonder. She doesn’t even know if her powers will suddenly go POOF! Gone! Leaving her frozen, oxygen all diffusing out of her bloodstream into the vacuum of space, floating around dead for eternity. Ha! Yeah, don’t think about that. You’ll be fine. Or not, heh. But don’t think about it.

While she continues to have a deep space anxiety attack, her sunstone begins to pulsate and emit a powerful red glow! Is this like when you receive a red envelope that yells at you in Harry Potter? SUPERGIRL! IT’S DINNER TIME! YOU’RE NOT SUPPOSED TO LEAVE OUR SITE IN THE BACKYARD. GET YOUR PASTY ASS BACK HOME BEFORE YOU GET A WHUPPIN’!

Supergirl (Vol. 6), Issue #5

Off to P3X-797. Open the iris!

But no, it’s like in the N64 Paper Mario game when you get that stone that blinks in the desert area and leads you to treasure. It’s like that, you guys, that’s what happens. The sunstone blinks and draws her toward one of them Stargates that just happen to be floating around space. But Supergirl is skeptical. It could be a trap! It could be one of them Stargates that leads you to one of those planets where the uncivilized folk hunt the women for sport! Or, perhaps this is all part of Father’s plan… hmm, better not risk it, and-

Oh well! Supergirl passes through the gate without much further hesitation! Well that settles that. No alien savages with spears here, just more space. She notices the stars are all different now, and therefore quickly realizes she has been transported to somewhere completely different in the universe. It would’ve taken Superman about an extra hour to figure that out, the dummy. By then he would’ve been torn apart and consumed by Space Gerbils.

The sunstone continues to tug on the poor flying girl through space, leading her to…SOMEWHERE. She’s hoping home, which is a blown-up planet, so I know it’s not that. The glowing red vibrator is herding her toward a small blue star (“but it can’t be Krypton’s sun. Rao is RED! Wah!!”), specifically a small seemingly-populated asteroid. “Does Father want me to come here? Is this where he and Mother are…?”

Supergirl (Vol. 6), Issue #5

They better have dinner ready on the fucking table.

But certainly not! They’re DEAD, Kara! They fucking DIED, little girl! Kaputt! Nothing left! Do you know what this is? This is a large chunk of urban-Krypton that had been ripped apart and sent hurtling through the cosmos. She gets closer and recognizes Argo City, but not the way she remembers it! THAT Argo City was very much populated and still connected to a planet! THIS one is complete and total bullshit!

She zips around the ruins saying “fuck! shit! fuck! shit! fuck!” while pointing out landmarks and trying to make sense of all this cockamamie nonsense. “And what about…HOME?!” she cries and she swoops into her old abode. The house looks untouched; her parents’ bed with a rumpled bedsheet, as if they had just fucked in it and went downstairs to get a post-coital snack. However, they didn’t just fuck in it at all, sorry to say! The whole house is coated in dust, as if no one had been through the rooms for years. (Because they’re all DEAD and also it’s the future).

She invites herself downstairs into Father’s Lab, one of the last places she was before Shit Got Weird. “Feels like I was just here. We were talking about the Trials, how I needed to study…”

She approaches an apparatus that looks uncannily like the claw of an arcade crane game, only inverted. The sunstone continues a-pulsin’. “It’s cracked, but hopefully I can still access what’s on it.” Supergirl tells herself, as if the information in the pointy red crystal will be useful at all. “Take care of yourself, lady.” it’ll say. She might as well throw it in the trash. The Argo Trash!

The sunstone doesn’t react to the, like, answering machine thing she tries to put it in. Supergirl remembers being able to heat herself up by concentrating hard enough, so she tries that to power the sunstone (cassette tape) back up. It works! Huzzah! Excelsior!

A hologram of Kara’s father pops up before her. He looks like an extra-hairy Kirk Douglas. “If you can hear this, it means that my greatest hope has been fulfilled: you are alive.” Oh how sweet and touching! You’re alive and alone! Congrats, you inherited fragments of an exploded world! Hurray, go fuck an alien and divvy up the planet pieces to your kin, kiddo.

He goes on to inform his daughter that he had put her in stasis and placed the BIG RED PENIS in her pod just in case she didn’t get fucked up during stasis and was eventually able to go back the home answering machine and watch this message! Success. Check.

“Perhaps you have already learned the terrible truth. As I record this, Krypton is mere cycles away from its destruction. There is nothing we can do. I am so sorry.” And she does already know this! That one guy on Earth told her, the one dressed up like her. But she gasps anyway.

Supergirl (Vol. 6), Issue #5

Don’t you want to just grab the guy by the big, bushy sideburns and plant a wet one right on his kisser? Hubba hubba.

Big Brain Dad had a plan, though, as you can see. Looks like it didn’t work! Everyone’s gone and dead! Maybe it did work, though, for a little while. What are we, about 30 years in the future or something? I forget. It depends upon how old Clark Kent is in this series. 25? 59? Somewhere in between? 74?

Supergirl’s dad thought the plan was too risky to try to include Kara. His hope is that he and her mother had removed her from stasis, and the super kewl protective pod, themselves once they had found a possible new home for Argo. Ha! Nope!

So, if his hopes had been dashed (as he expects anyway), then tough luck, sister. The memory of Argo City lives on in Kara and only Kara. “On this sunstone you will find a full historical record of Krypton, all of my research, and the truth about what happened to–” Bzzt! Disconnected!

Actually, what happens here is that some uninvited guest enters the room where Kara’s father was recording the message. “Who’s there? I gave explicit instructions that– YOU! How did you get in here?! What are you doing?! STOP! YOU CAN’T–” Bzzt! Disconnected!

Supergirl (Vol. 6), Issue #5

There goes my last dildo. Sigh.

Actually, not quite yet! Someone blasts this bastard right in the chest with a weapon. She watches him die! Now it’s disconnected! And would you look at all this homework her dad’s making her do now? Historical record of Krypton?! BORING.

The sunstone crumbles into a dormant, darkened pile of useless shards and dust. Kara starts crying and breaking things. And I mean really starts breaking things. It looks like she destroys her father’s lab, she blasts a hole through the house, she starts busting up concrete everywhere, kicking down ruined buildings, her eyes alight with red fire! “Yes, my child, let the universe bear witness to your pain. Grieve the life you knew.” This voice comes from some speech bubbles that are as similarly feminine as the text boxes from earlier! ARE WE GOING TO MEET REIGN IN THE ARGO RUINS?!

Yes!

“My name is Reign. And I’m here to offer you a new life.”

You already know what Reign looks like, she was on the cover. I knew a girl named Rheyn in elementary school. It’s quite a hippy-dippy name. I suspect that this Reign is neither hippy nor dippy. Doesn’t matter, Supergirl is in NO mood for this lady’s offerings.

“DID YOU DO THIS?!” Supergirl screams as she starts reigning blows upon Reign! Just punching the hell out of her, throwing her through walls, kind of the same treatment she gave dear old Superman. Reign’s pretty calm about this pummelling. Maybe it doesn’t actually hurt that much to get pummelled by Supergirl. Maybe she needed to go through her Trials to, like, level up.

Supergirl (Vol. 6), Issue #5

KRAKOWW! Bang! Zoom! Straight to Poland!

Reign tells her that she did not do this to her beloved Argo City. In fact, Supergirl is the first to set foot on the ruined city since it started orbiting this forsaken blue star. Reign DOES know that Kara is one of the only survivors of the Kryptonian Kaplooey, and she, like Kara, seeks answers.

Supergirl ain’t listening though. She starts attacking Reign again like some kind of out-of-control angsty teenager, but Reign stops her fist with an open palm. “Enough of this. I come to help you, not to fight you.” Reign tells the girl rather pleasantly. And we’ve already seen this before with Superman. Kara doesn’t care. She moans and groans in Reign’s grip while Reign observes that her distance from the MAGIC YELLOW SUN OF EARTH is weakening her resolve. So cut it the fuck out! You’re not going to win here, lassie. Reign just wants to chit-chat.

“Tell me,” Reign starts, “What do you know of the Worldkillers?” And I remember Superman mentioning them back in Issue #2 after Supergirl threw him through the Great Wall of China! It turns out that Supergirl does know quite a bit: “They were weapons outlawed by the ruling council on Krypton eons ago. All anybody knows is that they were too dangerous to exist.”

What does Reign say to this?:

Supergirl (Vol. 6), Issue #5

Dead dad mockery, huh? Nice.

Well you just gone and done it again, haven’t you, Reigny Reign. Reign Wilson. Supergirl launches at her again and starts punching the stuffing out of her face. “WHAT HAPPENED TO ARGO?! WHAT HAPPENED TO MY FAMILY?!” she yells, frothing.

Reign growls like a wild animal and clocks Supergirl upside the chin with the hilt of her giant scythe-y sword. Stunned and knocked to the floor, Supergirl watches as Reign winds up a forward slash. Supergirl stops the blade mid-slash with her bare hand; she crumples the thing like paper with a “SHHRAKK” and completely snaps the blade off near the hilt.

Reign seems impressed that this child just tore apart her big-ass sword, but then she pushes her back down to the ground and connects a series of punches to her jaw. “I was wrong about you. I thought you were ready. I thought you were worthy. But you are not.”

Now Reign lifts the dazed and bloodied girl off the ground by the scruff and gives her a real hardass come to Jesus monologue: “The Worldkillers are real. They are weapons of limitless destruction, yes. But they are not things. They are living beings. They came to Argo on a mission to discover the mystery of their own creation, knowing only that Kryptonians were somehow responsible. But they found Argo as dead as you did.”

“How do I know so much about the Worldkillers?” Reign takes what’s left of her sword and pins Supergirl to the wall by her cape.

“Because I AM one.”

Supergirl (Vol. 6), Issue #5

But all that fighting and slaughtering and conquering doesn’t seem to quell the feeling. Maybe I’m just hungry?

Supergirl hangs there like a limp noodle. Reign goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on about having this strange, innate desire to fight and conquer and maim and punish and hurt and disfigure and trounce! But she has no idea why! She lost her memory, or something. She awoke from an “age-old slumber” knowing nothing but her own name and her purpose, and an inkling that all her answers could be found on Krypton.

But, fuck me sideways, Krypton blew up! Reign discovered this floating remnant of Argo City with Daddy’s Under the Dome forcefield broken and a bunch of suffocated losers. Everything Reign had pieced together led her to Earth, the refuge of the final Kryptonians, and she doesn’t think it’s entirely because of the magic yellow sun. There’s something MORE to it! And she’s going to find out what it is, goddamnit.

Reign mistakenly thought Supergirl was a kindred spirit who could help her conquer Earth, but hell, she’ll just do it without this sassy Kryptonian wench. “But there’s something you should know,” Reign continues, “Argo’s orbit around the blue sun is decaying. Soon it will burn up, and all traces of this place will finally disappear.” Eek! Ook! Ope!

At this point, Reign is done with Supergirl. She blasts off toward Earth. “Try to follow me…before you die with all the remains of your home.”

Final Thoughts

Man, Supergirl can’t catch a break. Destroyed home planet. Dead family. Weirdo billionaire sociopaths. Red-headed Worldkillers.

Simon Tycho still has Supergirl’s blood. How will that tie in to whatever the fuck is going on here? Time will tell, Supergirl fans! Time will tell. But it probably won’t.


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Ms. Marvel (Vol. 3), Issue #2

Ms. Marvel (Vol. 3), Issue #2 – “All Mankind”

* Part 2 of 5 of the No Normal storyline *

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Ms. Marvel (Vol. 3), Issue #2 – “All Mankind”! In the previous installment, Kamala Khan is a typical Pakistani-American teenager in what I presume to be a very stereotypical Pakistani-American household in Jersey City. She has racist high school peers, she feels weird and alone and abnormal, and she writes a lot of Avengers fanfiction!

One evening, in typical teen movie fashion, Kamala wants to go to a party but her father forbids it. She sneaks out of her house anyway, goes to the party for three minutes, and gets racisted at! She walks away in a pout when her friend Bruno tries to help. A fog envelops her on her walk about, she sees visions of the Avengers and they grant her superhero status!

You’re all caught up. Let’s see where the fuck this is actually going!

SMITE YOUR ENEMIES, MS. MARVEL. LET’S SEE SOME SMITING.

Ms. Marvel (Vol. 3), Issue #2 [May, 2014]
Written by: G. Willow Wilson
“All Mankind”

Ms. Marvel (Vol. 3), Issue #2

Jersey City – 12 Hours After the Terrigen Bomb – Well, I don’t know what Terrigen is or whether or not I should be capitalizing it at all, but that explains the strange fog that started to envelop the city.

“Okay. So. I passed out in the fog and had a dream that I asked Captain Marvel to make me like her. Apparently she took me literally.” Kamala Khan is all dressed up like a superhero, man. Orange hair, raccoon eye mask, tasteful gray spandex. Yes, that’ll do nicely.

Kamala’s not taking it well, though. She keeps trying to wake up from a dream. Her muscles are all tight and tense. She’s gonna hurl…

…but then she doesn’t, and she’s back to normal. In her normal clothes. She calms down, but then it happens again: all garbed up and doubling over. Her limbs and fingers stretch uncontrollably like putty to impossible lengths. Something ain’t right with Kamala Khan! She tries to stumble her way to a familiar street, phasing in and out of her super form.

Ms. Marvel (Vol. 3), Issue #2

I personally wouldn’t want to be caught dead out in public in a superhero costume, let alone out in public accidentally in a superhero costume.

She passes through the peculiar fog, noting that there’s something wrong with that too. As if it “smells like secrets” (and whoever smelt it dealt it, as the old universal law dictates). But she didn’t deal this! Maybe! Or did she? Maybe we’ll find out that she did, indeed, dealt it.

She makes her way back to the waterfront, near the party, and a view of the city skyline shrouded in misty fog. Three helicopters hover, patrolling the area. Maybe something governmenty is going on! Nah, never.

INTRODUCTION SPLASH PAGE! “Meet Kamala Khan. She’s 16 years old. Into Avengers fan fiction. Good at school. Bad at fitting in. So when a strange mist descends and morphs Kamala into a shape-shifting superhuman…fitting in is the least of her problems.”

Thank you, introduction splash page, for filling in some knowledge gaps that, you know, proper storytelling would have been suitable enough for the task! Also, I’d like to point out that I almost wrote “shape-shifting” as “shape-fisting”. Let me tell you, WAY more of an impressive superpower.

Back to normal, at least for now, Kamala keeps on walking and ruminating. Was there something besides vodka in that drink? It felt real though! “Right down to the horrifying realization that superhero costumes don’t include underwear.” Yeesh, that’s dreadful! So Captain America is only a few loose threads away from completely hangin’ brain during an epic fight? Atrocious.

Kamala tries to replicate the event consciously, but nothing happens. Same ol’ boring Kamala. In the sky, though, she sees a humanoid streak of red light zipping away! Maybe something happened to someone else! Or maybe that’s Iron Man? Thor? Captain Marvel? Todd Rundgren? Frank Costanza? Bert and Ernie?

As she thinks, she hears drunk singing coming out of the fog. “Great, it’s Zoe. The party must be winding down.” Josh is completely trashed, and Zoe is annoyed. And then it happens again! Super Kamala! As if it’s an involuntary reflex. As if it happens because she feels the need to not be herself at this moment. Like she has to be “someone cool”. She frowns sheepishly.

Instead of feeling cool, she feels small.

So she shrinks to match. For the first time since the fog rolled in, Kamala is impressed with herself and reveling in the magic.

That is, until she finds her first villain…

Ms. Marvel (Vol. 3), Issue #2

Get some bug powers while you’re at it, like that Spidey Boy. What’s his name again? Ol’ Spider Face?

So Kamala jumps around, screaming like a bug herself, while Josh continues to stumble around and yell like a drunk piece of shit. They’re near the end of a small wooden pier. Josh keeps asking and forcing Zoe to dance while Zoe keeps trying to push him away.

And wouldn’t ya know it, Zoe falls into the water! Josh starts howlin’! “HELP, SOMEONE, HELP! BLAHHHBA! BLAAAHB!”

Kamala, having successfully extracted the cockroach from her current situation, has been watching this scene the whole time. “He’s drunk and she’s panicking. If he jumps in, they’ll both drown,” she thinks, priming herself for some real deal superhero action!

Coming to mind immediately is a quote from the Qu’ran that she often hears her father tutting while watching TV: “Whoever kills one person, it is as if he has killed all of mankind – and whoever saves one person, it is as if he has saved all of mankind.”

Hmm? Kill or save? Kill or save? Kill? Save? Kill! Wait, no! Save! Save! Save?…no, kill! Yeah, kill! I mean, save!

Ms. Marvel (Vol. 3), Issue #2

Ooooh, “embiggen”. Very cromulent word.

So Ms. Marvel springs into action! Not even really knowing the full extent of her powers yet! Is that wise? I don’t think so! But fuck it, it’s too late now! She pushes Josh out of the way and starts trying to give Zoe words to help her calm enough to stop thrashing around in the dang, like, three-feet deep water. That doesn’t work! So she uses an extendo-hand and reaches in to grab the blond wretch. She scoops up a giant handful of wet dirt, garbage, and Zoe.

Some passersby watched the action from the boardwalk. “Dude, no way! Look! It’s Captain Marvel!” exclaims a woman. They run over to take photos. “Oh my God, your old costume looks great!” They ask for autographs. Zoe is grateful to be saved. “I’m never gonna get wasted ever again…”

And there’s just this look on Ms. Marvel’s face. It’s the same look that Jon Arbuckle always has after one of Garfield’s trademark snappy, decimating comebacks! “I…uh…” and her arm is still overgrown. “Gotta go!” she yells and starts running off into the shroud of mist. The lookie-loos are like “the fuck was that?” and then talk amongst themselves about pasting this shit all over the internet.

How embarrassing! That didn’t seem very heroic! Do you think Captain America was all like “buuuhhh hrfrf?” the first time he ever saved someone?? And I say, yeah, probably! That dude is like that all the time.

Ms. Marvel (Vol. 3), Issue #2

Disembiggen? Now you’re just making words up!

I’m starting to notice a distinct FROWN motif here going on, this time when attempting to drag her out-of-control willy-nilly giant extremity around. She hasn’t had much time to get used to all this, I suppose. Feels very alien. Like a sixth sense that doesn’t seem very sensey. She also realizes that “being someone else isn’t liberating. It’s exhausting,” and that’s a fantastic lesson for a teenage girl to figure out all by herself already in Issue #2 of her own series! A lot of growth going on here! Uhh…in more ways than one.

Kamala looks at all she’s got going for her right now. Orange hair! Cool boots! A leotard giving her a big ol’ wedgie! She doesn’t want any of it! Fuck this!

She did like the whole Zoe-saving part though. That was worth it. “Maybe putting on a costume doesn’t make you brave. Maybe it’s something else.” she muses as she wanders back into the city again. A homeless man pushing a shopping cart like Bubble’s Depo gawks at Ms. Marvel; she asks to “borrow” a filthy-looking yellow sweater on his cart. He visually undresses her as she runs off to find her way back home.

Around midnight, aka Mom-and-Dad-are-gonna-be-fucking-pissed-o’clock, Kamala shambles up her street. Lights are still on in the house. Eep. She scales the tree near her bedroom window and regales us with the tales of the two other times in her life she snuck out of the house. ONE!: when she was ten, just to see if she could do it without killing herself. Success! TWO!: when she was a freshman, to go watch the midnight screening of a Harry Potter movie with her delinquent buds Nakia and Bruno.

Ms. Marvel (Vol. 3), Issue #2

See? If you got bit by a bug you could just, you know, bug your way back in.

Kamala’s good-for-nothing loser brother, Whatshisname, is still awake. She doesn’t make a very graceful entrance. Kinda sounds like someone falling out of bed, actually. He stops to check on her. Frantically, before he can turn the lights on, she thinks to herself “Kamala. I’m Kamala. Kamala has dark hair and dark eyes and is sort of short and has actually never owned a pair of thigh-high boots–” Presto! Lights on. Kamala’s home.

“I can explain!” she yells, lookin’ like Kamala wearing a homeless guy’s jerkoff sweater. She doesn’t know she looks like herself yet, so she starts raving about her appearance being a big ol’ magic trick. Ha ha! And her brother is like “uh huh, fucking weirdo”.

But no, he’s concerned. She’s acting strange. She admits something did happen, and her brother is all like “MY STARS! WHAT A HORRIBLE SITUATION! TIME TO GET MY MOSQUE NERD BUDDIES TO COME BEAT UP WHOEVER DID WHATEVER TO YOU! OH ME OH MY!” And Kamala pushes him away, all like “get off me, shitbird, I’m fine.”

And her brother wears an expression of smug righteousness: “Oh. In that case, you’re screwed…because Abu and Ammi know you snuck out.” And wouldn’t you know it, there’s Abu and Ammi now in the bedroom doorway, each spinning a FROWN MOTIF of their very own.

And guess who was the big snitch? NICE GUY BRUNO. Blech.

“He was worried sick about you. He said you disappeared from this shaytani [translation: devilish] party alone and wouldn’t answer him,” her mother howls. Kamala can’t believe what she’s hearing. Fucking BRUNO? What a kiss-ass piece of shit.

Here comes the very special episode stuff. Abu “Danny Tanner” tells Kamala “DJ Tanner” that he and her mother have been worried SICK, young lady, waiting by the landline rotary phone in 2014 for the police cops to call about their DEAD ASS DAUGHTER. DJ Tanner tells Bob Saget that it was just a dumb party. Bob Saget is like “then where did you get this filthy sweater? From some homeless man while you looked like Captain Marvel?” This paragraph is starting to run off the rails! Bob Saget’s fuckin’ dead! I’ll regroup.

Abu ain’t even mad. He’s disappointed. And as we ALL know, that’s so much WORSE! But parents just don’t understand! They have no idea what Kamala’s been through tonight. She saved a LIFE, idiots.

“Then tell me, jaanu [translation: sweetheart]. Tell me why my precious Kamala has suddenly become a reckless, disobedient girl I barely recognize,” Abu asks sadly. Dad’s really laying it on thick here, son. And, certainly, the truth wouldn’t make a lick of sense. So all she can do is apologize and work on it. She’s a teenager. Shit sucks right now.

But Ammi doesn’t like that answer. Not enough for Ammi! Ammi demands justice! Ammi wants blood! And now she starts yelling at pops, blaming him for dragging them to this dumbass country in the first place full of heroin-addicts and Joe Rogan fans! One child is a disobedient maniac! The other is practically homeless!

Abu, always the level-headed one, announces he’s going to bed now. Bye!

Ms. Marvel (Vol. 3), Issue #2

Abu needs his beauty rest, and looking at his face, he’s about 700,000 hours behind.

But first, Kamala. Grounded! School and home only. No fun until everyone can trust your sorry ass again. Bye!

Now that her ass is grounded, she asks herself if she needs to stop here or continue. To save one life is to save all lives, something like that.

And, of course, she will continue.

And the reveal is that the sweater she’s wearing says “It Was a Stooooone Groove”. Lmao

Final Thoughts

Listen to your father, dear.


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Pinch Points, Charli XCX, and Big Big Train

Whoa whoa whoa, do my eyes and ears and brain and butt deceive me, or did I not post a Newer Release Roundup at all last week?! ‘Tis true! I felt like complete decomposing garbage and was like “Fuck THIS, the world doesn’t need my opinions on what essentially amounts to a random series of 1s and 0s today.” Actually, what even is music other than something our brains trick ourselves into thinking is good? Really makes you think.

I don’t wish to make a habit out of skipping these Wednesday updates, though. As you can see, I’m still reeling from the decision. But, moving on! Here are reviews for new records from Pinch Points, Charli XCX, and Big Big Train:

Pinch Points – Process
(March 18, 2022)

Pinch Points - Process

The Australian punk scene has been pretty fun lately. Still gliding along on the momentum of my budding new Amyl and the Sniffers fandom, I’ve discovered another similar group that scratches the same itch. Pinch Points combines fevered, world-weary anger with snotty male and female vocals, making some truly cathartic, political punk music. If you’re looking for art, look elsewhere. This music is about as far as it gets from hitting the brain over the heart.

I’m immediately charmed by the band from the getgo. Track 1, “Reasons to Be Anxious”, was made for people like me: “I get anxious when I get a text/I get anxious when I don’t get a text/I get anxious when my doorbell rings/ I get anxious about fucking anything/I get anxious when I take time off/I get anxious that I’m not good enough/I get anxious going to therapy/To try and treat my anxiety“. It’s like they quite literally plucked all the negative mantras right out of my own head.

These ten songs cover a wide range of subjects, mostly serving to highlight how shitty the planet is in this audaciously transparent, post-pandemic era. “Stock It” touches upon the exploitation of capitalism for instant gratification. “Copper” as about as anti-police a song as you will find outside of gangster rap. “Haruspex” addresses the repetitious cycle of male entitlement and gendered violence. Lead vocals are shouted by bassist Acacia Coates and guitarist Adam Smith (and occasionally also by drummer Isabella Orsini) with irritability and incredulity, vexed by the state of the Western world and its universally piss-poor leadership, basic societal decency, and its apparent backwards trajectory.

As such, with songs like “Am I Okay?” and “Relentlessly Positive”, the band also showcases the importance of the self-care and mental health maintenance required to keep on plugging along. These two tracks especially get pretty corny and sappy, but the sentiment comes from a kind place, and at least it’s still backdropped by their alluring style of seething, lyrics-forward jangle punk. These cats seem cool, is all.

Early Verdict:

Charli XCX – Crash
(March 18, 2022)

Charli XCX - Crash

My love of Sky Ferreira’s debut album from 2013 is why I discovered Charli XCX, but I’ve always been somewhat less than satisfied with Charli’s output. I was underwhelmed by the moody True Romance and the sugary Sucker. I liked a lot of Pop 2 and Charli, although both were scattered and inconsistent. And then how i’m feeling now, arguably the very first pandemic isolation mental health check-in album, left me kind of cold. Perhaps because it was hard to enjoy anything in May 2020.

And now, with a bright, blinking highlighter, Crash surfaces a culmination of everything I’m lukewarm about Charli’s career in the first place. Musically, tracks are a little too decadently polished and sterile, sacrificing the emotionality of the lyrics with lackluster autotuned vocals and weak dance beats. That is to say, a little too pop-happy this time. It goes against the self-aware tongue-in-cheek “pop artist kinda making fun of pop” vibe that I’ve otherwise been feeling from Charli throughout the last decade. A lot of Crash sounds like the work of a budding Youtube star trying to break out.

That being said, certainly, some of these hooks are hard to pass up completely. It takes a while for “Good Ones” to leave my head after hearing it. Same with, coincidentally, “Constant Repeat”. I just wish there was more substance; this album is like Chinese food.

Gotta hand it to her, though. This will be a hard album to top for memorable album covers of 2022. Certainly the sexiest car accident victim I’ve ever seen.

Early Verdict:

Big Big Train – Welcome to the Planet
(January 25, 2022)

Big Big Train - Welcome to the Planet

Uh oh, head for the hills! Modern progressive rock? Nothing good can come from this! It’s a fucking minefield!

Oh! This stuff is actually ok? Not perfect, but not terrible? Whew, thanks for the heads up. I was worried there for a second, you know, because this band was heavily inspired by Genesis and Van der Graaf Generator. It also has the name “Big Big Train”, which sends me on full alert. A childish, innocent name with childish, innocent music.

I’m no stranger to Big Big Train, though! It can be very corny at times, but after plowing through much of their discography over the years I’ve finally decided to let my guard down. I got no gripe with them. Easily one of the most accessible and inoffensive modern prog bands active today.

Here’s their biggest strength: the warmth of the instrumentation keeps this band grounded on Earth. Liberal use of organic flutes, violins, acoustic piano and tasteful electric piano. Conservative use of the Keith Emerson / Rick Wakeman Mellotrons and Moogs. Take all that with a lead singer who has a charmingly pleasant British voice, and you get a band that sounds like a modern take on lush pop rock of the late ’60s and early ’70s.

Unfortunately, charmingly pleasant British lead singer David Longdon literally fell down and died last November, so Welcome to the Planet will be the final Big Big Train album featuring his soothing voice. Don’t worry, though, old British guys who sound like Peter Gabriel/Phil Collins hybrids are a dime a dozen! Ten pence a dozen.

The clear winner on this record by a mile is “The Connection Plan”. It has, by far, the highest energy and the most memorable melody. Plus, those string arrangements are pretty nifty! It’s also the easiest song here to ignore the happy horseshit lyrics. Similarly, some of Welcome to the Planet‘s best moments are the instrumental sections. Smooth lounge jazz trumpet on “Proper Jack Frost”. Accordion on “A Room with No Ceiling”. The electro-percussive breakdowns on “Bats in the Belfry”. It’s a grab bag of “oh, that’s kind of neat” moments packed into a totally digestible 47-minute runtime.

Not life-changing music, but this is the kind of band that can transcend niche interests. Worth a listen for sure.

Early Verdict:


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