Astonishing X-Men (Vol. 3), Issue #12

Astonishing X-Men (Vol. 3), Issue #12 – “Dangerous (Part 6)”

* Part 6 of 6 of the Dangerous storyline *

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Astonishing X-Men (Vol. 3) Issue #12 – “Dangerous (Part 6)”! If you can believe, we’re at the end of the Dangerous story arc. In the previous installment, Robot Medusa flies to Genosha to battle Professor Xavier, and he successfully bashes her with a semi truck (that he could drive without legs), sends her flying into a high voltage switchyard, and that fries her circuits long enough to mention a God paradox that scrambles her circuits further and renders her defeated!

The X-Men team fly to Genosha to help Xavier, and they arrive just as Medusa is finished! But lo, another beast rises out of the waters. A much bigger, meaner beast! It’s the beast that razed Genosha the first time around, and now he’s here to make short work of the X-Men once and for all!

Astonishing X-Men (Vol. 3), Issue #12 [August, 2005]
Written by: Joss Whedon
“Dangerous (Part 6)”

Astonishing X-Men (Vol. 3), Issue #12

Another “previously on” recap page fills in a major backstory point for me: Emma Frost was present in Genosha when this particular beast destroyed the city and killed 16 million mutants. So she’s probably gonna be all traumatized and fucked up and useless in this fight. OR, she’ll be the last one standing to annihilate the threat. WE’LL SEE IF I’M RIGHT.

“MODE: WIPEOUT. TWENTY-SECOND POWER-UP TO FULL BURN CAPACITY” announces the Mega-Beast. The X-Men are staring up at it with looks of angered determination…except for Emma Frost, she’s cowering with her hands over her ears like someone who saw 16 million mutants get murdered! Look, I just retained some information!

Robot Medusa is rubbing it in. SHE just uploaded her database into Mega-Beast, so SHE’S safe. SHE won’t be destroyed! HA! Wolverine sneers at her, but he sneers at everything, so who cares?

Beast is still the only one scrambling for ideas, and proposes getting far the fuck away in the jet. Cyclops shoots that idea down, they’re on a time crunch here. Gotta fight! Frost stops Cyclops and lets him know that his super blasty beams will only increase Mega-Beast’s strength. Wolverine asks Colossus to throw him at the Mega-Beast, but Colossus appears to be catatonic.

Pryde, after Mega-Beast declares “POWER-UP COMPLETE”, tells everyone to grab onto her. Hey, I’ve done this before in Paper Mario! You use the ghost partner to disappear after the boss takes a turn charging up and then attacks with the GONNA-KILL-YOU-WITH-10,000-ATK-POINTS ability on the next turn!

Astonishing X-Men (Vol. 3), Issue #12

Everyone grab something…AHH! No Professor, not there.

So Mega-Beast unleashes his blast, engulfs the entire ruins in a giant wave of fire and flames, and the team is still standing untouched after the smoke clears. “That all you got…bub?” Pryde taunts, sweating profusely.

Cyclops orders Beast to get Xavier to safe ground. Colossus stays near Pryde while she recuperates, and Wolverine demands that Colossus snaps out of it and launches him like he asked! C’MON!

The Mega-Beast opens up a sort of abdomen cavity and unleashes thousands of hand-sized robot bugs. Colossus flings Wolverine toward Mega-Beast.

Beast (Regular-Beast) is carrying Xavier like a big sack of flour, or a big fat baby, and looking for ANYWHERE that could be considered “safe ground”. He scurries up to a higher location, which I would think would be less safe than literally any other option, but I‘m not the big strong smart X-Man here so I guess I’ll just SHUT UP. Beast asks Xavier why this Robot Woman doesn’t just bring every machine around her to life instead of just screwing around being stupid. Xavier responds that she’s just being irrational. Like a woman. Good job, Joss Whedon! He doesn’t actually say that, but Joss Whedon meant it.

Astonishing X-Men (Vol. 3), Issue #12

“No living being is completely rational?” Oh yeah, what about Joe Pesci?

When they get to the top, Robot Medusa is waiting with brand new robot wings. Like a beautiful robot butterfly hatched from her robot cocoon.

Cyclops and Colossus are on the ground fighting some robot bugs. Cyclops asks for Frost’s help and notices she’s just walking farther inland, away from the battle. “Emma? Honey?…War?” he nudges, but she ignores him. She walks down some steps into a dark underground, uh, basement? There’s a man waiting there for her.

“What are you doing here?” Frost asks.
“Did you think I would miss this? Your triumphant return?” answers the shadowy, so-far unrevealed man. Much clandestine commiserating happens. It’s shady.

Astonishing X-Men (Vol. 3), Issue #12

Thank God. You know, just between you and me, these X-Men are really annoying to be around.

We see a scene where Beast drops Xavier from the top of the structure, slashes at the hovering Robot Medusa, and grabs onto Xavier and a rod jutting out from the structure while Xavier was less than a foot away from hitting the ground. “Sorry, Professor, but when you’re surrounded by psychics…you gotta work on instinct.” Beast says, shortly before dropping him the rest of the way and landing another blow on the robot. Comedy!

More fighting. Pryde can’t keep it up much longer. Colossus tells her to find a place to lay low away from the battle, but Pryde has a new idea: throw her at the Mega-Beast too. She can do a lot more damage ghostin’ through the enemy. She should know, she’s done a lot of ghostin’ in her day. Colossus is hesitant, but Pryde cannot hide the whole team again if the Mega-Beast powers up another fiery blast. “I promise to come back.” she tells him, and that was the bargaining chip she needed! OFF YOU GO! She phases through.

Frost is back. She chides Cyclops for allowing Pryde to get her way, but Cyclops agrees with Pryde’s decision. Beast is currently preoccupied by gnawing savagely on the metal lady’s leg. Xavier tries to relay that he’s not picking up a signal from Robot Medusa anymore, that she had left her body, but Beast is out of his mind with primal matters so Xavier leaves him be.

Astonishing X-Men (Vol. 3), Issue #12

That dang school-issued underwear always rides up.

Pryde is phasing through everything she comes in contact with as she soars through the Mega-Beast’s enormous industrial plant of a body, causing random minor system errors and disruptions along the way. On her path is a big CSI-lookin’ command console, which she stops herself at and attempts a manual override. The Mega-Beasts internal workings warn Pryde that any attempt to override will be rerouted. Any thought, ANY INKLING, of becoming solid and attempting shutdown will cause the Mega-Beast to “shoot her head off”.

“Or…you can access Mempath 164.3-9alpha6. Can’t you?” she politely inquires. The Mega-Beast pauses at this, and then finally says “That pathway is blocked.” The Mega-Beast cannot access it anymore after Genosha was razed since it “no longer contained necessary data”. Pryde points out that Robot Medusa blocked it deliberately when she reanimated him.

Later, the Mega-Beast is gone. Pryde fills the rest of the team in on what transpired. “It’s pretty simple, really. When ‘Danger’ brought the wild sentinel to life, she repressed his memory of Genosha. Of the massacre. She knew he couldn’t handle it.”

In short, she made him feel bad about committing 16 million murders. She made him feel really bad. So, he needs to spend some time alone to think about what he’s done.

Astonishing X-Men (Vol. 3), Issue #12

Yeah, maybe Putin could use a taste of this brain math empathy.

Such a Buffy conclusion.

Cyclops isn’t so sure. Robot Medusa still has his ear. Beast tells him to take the victory for today. Professor Xavier is one proud papa! But Colossus has a bone to pick with the bald little shrimp. “You knew. She told me in my head as I was about to crush her. The moment you ‘upgraded’ the Danger Room…the moment she was born, she called out to you. Professor, will you tell us what she said?”

Professor Xavier looks ashamed of himself, and then admits that she asked “Where am I?”. And Peter surmises that the Professor deliberately ignored her for years while running Danger Room experiments, and only recently did Robot Medusa realize this. Xavier defends himself, saying that it was necessary to properly train his students, to prepare them for real dangers, to build up everyone’s skills and confidence, to protect mutantkind “whatever the cost”.

“What you been doin’, Prof? Hanging with Magneto?” Wolverine sneers bitterly with his bitter, curvy lips, “‘Cause that @#$% sounds just a little too much like him”.

Astonishing X-Men (Vol. 3), Issue #12

Oh, god, when? When will someone finally kill us? I can’t take it anymore.

The team is UP IN ARMS! UP IN ARMS with the Professor’s unsavory lack of scruples! Frost tries to interject and side with the Professor on this whole fucking-with-the-lives-of-robots problem, but Cyclops won’t hear none of it! “You wanna tell me something worth hearing? Tell me why you walked out in the middle of a firefight!”

Now it’s Beast’s turn to interject. “Our ride’s here.” he says, motioning toward the jet. As the team slinks and slumps off to their self-flying jet and out of Genosha, the shadowed figure, Frost’s thus-far unrevealed consultant, speaks to his thus-far unrevealed groupmates. “Bad and good. Good that they are shaken. But Summers learns yet again to trust no one. Emma needs to work him very carefully now. If he learns her true loyalty…bad. And they were such a cute couple, too. Oh well. Nothing lasts forever…”

“…Hellfire does.”

And the reveal is a dainty looking widow’s peak motherfucker with sideburns wearing fancy foppish clothes, a woman with long, dark, spiky hair and an Axl Rose bandana, a fancy-dressed small bald man sitting with one leg cross over the other, and a man in a hooded cloak.

And I don’t know who the fuck they are supposed to be at all!

Final Thoughts

Things are getting better, and with this storyline I know the main characters and their personalities a little bit better! Watch: Cyclops = boring. Wolverine = angry. Kitty Pryde = smart. Colossus = boring. Frost = untrustworthy. Beast = smart and boring.

That’s it!

Also I insist on calling her Kitty Pryde instead of Shadowcat. This is because she barely has a costume! I think that must be it.

I haven’t decided yet if I will continue with Joss Whedon’s Astonishing X-Men, or if I will pick up another X-Men series and see how that looks. Until then, space cadets, live long and prosper. Nanu nanu!


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Aethereus, Rolo Tomassi, and Big Thief

March already, huh? The year is flying by. Not really. Shit’s fucked up right now in the world, but at least Tom Writes About Stuff Dot Com has three new album reviews. Aethereus, Rolo Tomassi, and Big Thief. Enjoy.

Aethereus – Leiden
(January 14, 2022)

Aethereus - Leiden

Oh great, another metal band whose name starts with “Ae”. Aenaon, Aeternus, Aephanemer. Then there’s that Æ shit. Æther Realm, Ætheria Conscientia, Ænigmatum. How am I supposed to keep all this straight? How do these bands expect to stand out, let alone be easily Googled, if their names are like such as “Aegnypmintisrum”?

But this stuff is pretty good, at any rate. Clean melodic power guitar solos, occasional string and/or piano arrangements that break up the technical death metal insanity. It adds a progressive edge that reminds me heavily of Atheist.

It’s hard to believe that there’s only eight tracks on Leiden, considering how packed it is with good musical ideas. I like that the band isn’t afraid to lock into a rhythmic groove, like the bassline throughout “Shrouded in Kaleidoscopic Skin”, which still lets the leads and drums carry the flurries of notes over the stable, established foundation. It’s not just chaos for the sake of chaos. I also like the slow, traditional heavy metal ending minutes of “Son of a Nameless Father”. Emotionally resonant music like this is a fantastic example that a tech death band needn’t always be technically jaw-dropping to be powerful.

If you have to listen to just one tech death album that came out in January 2022, then make it Aethaeaeaeaereus!

Early Verdict:

Rolo Tomassi – Where Myth Becomes Memory
(February 4, 2022)

Rolo Tomassi - Where Myth Becomes Memory

There’s a special place in my heart for Rolo Tomassi, the English post-hardcore spazz band that continues to inch their way, ever so slowly, ever so carefully, into fully embracing the beauty of soothing drones and artful, delicate minimalism. Evolve as they do while still weaving in the chaotic mathiness of their signature female-fronted metalcore sound, they strike a perfect balance between these two worlds beyond what I thought was possible given their current trajectory. I asked myself after their 2018 album Time Will Die and Love Will Bury It, which was Rolo Tomassi’s first real dramatic creative departure, how they would progress from there. And, of course, listening to this 2022 album brings clarity! As if I always should’ve known! And yet, once again, I find myself asking the identical question. Where do they go from here? At this point, you need to trust these fine musicians. They clearly know what they’re doing.

I won’t go as far as comparing this to Low or Slowdive, because it’s still not even close, but the elements that make those bands so unpredictably exciting is all over Where Myth Becomes Memory. Tense, mesmerizing buildups, satisfying crescendos of melody, seamless fusions of classical music sensibilities with colorful fireworks of electronic energy.

I need to spend a lot more time with this, but it’s the gift that keeps on giving. Six albums in, and the band still hasn’t peaked. You can be sure of that.

Early Verdict:

Big Thief – Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You
(February 11, 2022)

Big Thief - Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You

The good thing about an album like this with such a long name is that it pads out my little blurb nicely. Watch! Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You. That’s the stuff.

Full disclosure: Big Thief makes me cranky. Their existence was brought to my attention with June 2017’s Capacity, which features a photo of Adrianne Lenker’s uncle holding a baby Adrianne Lenker. Since I had my own baby to hold in such a manner in that summer, and I probably looked just as young as her uncle did even though I was 29 years old, the photo resonated with me. It’s still the first image that comes to mind when I think about the band.

That photo isn’t why I was cranky. I was cranky because Big Thief had never clicked with me. 2019 was a year-long celebration of these Berklee nerds’ music with U.F.O.F. and Two Hands receiving tremendous praise. Again in 2020, Lenker’s solo output of Songs and Instrumentals won everyone’s hearts while leaving me cold. After a silent 2021, Big Thief drops a giant 80-minute studio effort. Who churns out the goods this fast and doesn’t have a name that rhymes with Bing Bizzard and the Bizard Bizard? SERIOUSLY.

All that preamble is important to know, because, finally, after five years, Big Thief hath clicked! And it didn’t even take multiple listens. “Time Escaping”, the second track, won me over completely. With its spirited (and rhythmically challenging) string plucking, the lively drumming, the neat echo effects, and the organic lead-in to the start of the song that they decided to include in the recording, it’s unlike anything else I’ve heard and tried to like from their previous four albums. I still can’t stop listening to it.

From that moment forward, my mind was opened and letting all sorts of stuff in during my Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You listening experience. The demented psychedelic progression of “Little Things”, the folky shoegaze of “Flower of Blood”, the sparse beauty of “Simulation Swarm”, all enhanced by my newfound appreciation of Lenker’s lovely voice. Is she a better singer now than she was before? How have I missed this?

Here’s what cinched it: I can’t believe how fast these 80 minutes go. Every single damn time I listen to this, I just can’t believe it. It’s so well-paced and engrossing. ESPECIALLY, when compared to the slog that is the new 85-minute Beach House album. This is an amazing feat to me, the guy who hates anything over an hour long! I have become a believer. Thank you, Big Thief. Sticking with you has finally been worth it!

Early Verdict:


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Nightwing (Vol. 3), Issue #6

Nightwing (Vol. 3), Issue #6 – “Good Girl Gone Bad”

* Part 6 of 7 of the Traps and Trapezes storyline *

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Nightwing (Vol. 3), Issue #6 – “Good Girl Gone Bad”! In the previous installment, a lady summons a demon to try to trap Jimmy the Clown into a permanent purgatory marriage. Nightwing gets involved with that, which takes him completely out of his Circus Mystery preoccupation.

The end is a trip, though. It’s revealed that Saiko is Grayson’s dead circus friend Raymond. So THAT means that Grayson’s alive circus friend Zane hired Grayson’s dead circus friend Raymond. And not only THAT, but Raya’s in on it too! Three circus friends plotting against Grayson! The sweetest plum.

So that’s funny and that’s what’s keeping me motivated to witness some really powerful Dick Grayson frowning action. Right into my veins, as the kids say.

Nightwing (Vol. 3), Issue #6 [April, 2012]
Written by: Kyle Higgins
“Good Girl Gone Bad”

Nightwing (Vol. 3), Issue #6

Looking at the cover, I’m reminded of when Jimmy the Voodoo Marriage Clown was four inches from Nightwing’s face and didn’t recognize him as Dick Grayson. And then Batgirl keeps her really long, distinctive red hair flowing out of her cowl? Do these people have any idea how close they could come to losing their night jobs? I could be at the supermarket without my glasses on and make the Grayson/Nightwing connection from 10 aisles away while he stares at a pile of pears.

The circus has now made its way to Austin, Texas. Keep Austin Weird, I always say. Nightwing doesn’t say that, but he’s not quick on his feet like I am! Higgins is sure to remind everyone, since his readers have the collective memory of a goldfish’s dick, of everything that has happened so far. It’s a whole lot of nothing, honestly. Boning redheads. Psycho killers. Smelly circus clowns. You got the jist.

Nightwing is unsettled because Saiko rubbed two halves of a brain cell together and figured out that Grayson and Nightwing are one in the same. And it’s been weeks since there’s been any sign of Saiko, so any minute he could POP OUT! BOO! Hah hah. Right now, though, Nightwing is fighting a cowboy in spurs wearing the Steel Soldier suit that I read all about in Action Comics, baby! This one has giant claws, though. Also, a cowboy. His name is Shox, who is the right-hand man of Terrance Clark, who is the southwest branch CEO of hiring assassins. Nightwing followed a lead to Clark’s nightclub, and now he’s fighting half-robot/half-cowboy villains.

Shox crashes a large aquarium, flooding the floor. Nightwing uses his electric suit to shock Shox! This is probably why he’s called Shox, for this single throwaway joke. That’s fun! I’m having so much fun.

Nightwing (Vol. 3), Issue #6

You might say Austin looks…WEIRD…from this angle? Eh? Eh?

A sweaty bloatee’d Terrance Clark is hiding behind one of the room’s columns. He doesn’t get a chance to run. Next thing we know, Nightwing is dangling him upside-down from a rope in the rain — from a very high balcony. “A contract killer — goes by the name Saiko. I hear you know him. Tell me how.” Nightwing threatens with a smug smirk that I want to dickslap off his face.

Clark screams desperately; tells Nightwing that Saiko has only done one job for him, he swears it! The guy’s phone number is disconnected or something, he swears it! Off the grid! Some sort of personal project! Whoops, how did he know that? Whoopsie-daisy, now he’s gonna get grilled for further information…but pull him up and he’ll gladly share more of what he knows! And Nightwing is all “ok” and pulls him up. Dumb. Lower the rope a few inches! Do I need to come in there personally and show you how it’s done, son?

Elsewhere, in a private room, Raya and “Dead” Raymond are going over a plan. Sounds like all the loose threads have been identified and tied up. Bryan Haly gets his circus back once Dick Grayson gets killed and murdered and dead (no longer breathing)…as long as Haly puts together a tribute show. Whatever that is. Raya is hesitant, but Raymond reminds her that the only reason Grayson is even hanging around the circus is because he was lured there in the first place. It’s definitely NOT because he cares about her or anything. She agrees and continues to go through with the plan, although she still has her reservations…

Later, Raya and Dick go on a stroll through Austin. Keep it weird! Lmao! He notices that she’s extra quiet tonight, but she claims that it’s because she’s been thinking a lot about his parents. That’s weird! Good job, Raya, on keeping the weirdness.

Anyway, they’ve been on her mind because she recently returned to the circus, too? And Mr. and Mrs. Grayson were the ones to actually teach her the trapeze, so all that flippin’ and floppin’ in the air stirs up some memories. They were like family to her! And Grayson, whose own family was like family to him, is like “yeah, I understand”.

Raya takes this opportunity to let him know that Bryan Haly is arranging a tribute show, so at least that was explained quickly.

Nightwing (Vol. 3), Issue #6

Are you sure that pamphlet doesn’t say “THE FUCKING GRAYSONS”?

Grayson is shocked! He has no idea why a circus full of people who want him murdered are being so nice to him! “Because we all think it’s important to remember and celebrate their lives, Dick…instead of mourning their deaths.” she explains, but Grayson is awfully suspicious. “How many people know about this? Am I the only one who didn’t know?” he asks, and there’s that frown I’ve been looking for! Frown check! It’s quite a frown. I love it. Of course, Raya insists that it was supposed to be a surprise, but now the only thing Grayson thinks is that he’s not gonna get murdered in front of everyone on a big stage. And that’s probably true. It makes me wish he didn’t know that. So we could see it happen. So we could see Dick Grayson get murdered.

That night, or the next night, or, I don’t know, a night 14 years later, Grayson announces to the troupe that he’s going to cancel the tribute show. Everyone glowers at him. Jimmy the Incredulous Clown asks why the fuck, and Grayson doesn’t have a good reason. Not really. He mumbles something about Saiko and dead original circus owners. Bryan “Drunk on Listerine” Haly accuses Grayson of wanting the circus to die, because why else would he cancel the only show in about 190 circus seasons that will actually draw a crowd of more than ten? There might be TWELVE at this show! “Hire whatever extra security you want, but this tribute is happening whether you show up in Gotham or not.” Haly demands, waving a finger at him. Grayson frowns.

Nightwing (Vol. 3), Issue #6

lol, I thought he said “you may own Haly’s dick” at first.

As they speak, police are investigating a crime scene in Gotham City: two extremely bloody corpses of a couple of gangbangers. Who cares, right? But they find a stick with a Nightwing symbol on it. This guy cavorts around town in nothing but a skimpy eye mask AND he carries weapons with his branding on it? What an absolute dingus of the highest order. Anyway, yeah, framed, blah blah blah, I hope he spends some time in jail awaiting his trial.

The circus arrives in Gotham City three days later, preparing for the big show. Grayson is on guard, barely paying attention to anything circus-related. He’s got the ol’ shifty-eyes, using his night-vision goggles to try to catch even the smallest of disturbances. The place is loaded up with motion sensors and, like, bear traps I guess. Nothing will ever be good enough, he has to stay vigilant! Rawr!

Grayson is alone in the stadium doing his cartwheels and his tumbles. He looks up at a large, old poster of the “Flying Graysons” showing he and his parents. “I must say, it’s a lovely picture of you all Master Richard.” says an unknown voice behind him. Why, it’s none other than Alfred McButler wearing his oversized street clothes! A striped polo tucked into dark khakis! A tan belt! A watch! Very sharp, sir!

They hug, and Grayson apologizes for him getting dragged to the performance. Alfred, of course, is happy to be there, but he was only stopping to say hi. Fuck the circus! But really, Bruce Wayne is missing and he can’t stay long, you know, just in case Bruce appears suddenly and needs a big soft pretzel at home or something.

Alfred asks Grayson how successful he has been securing the facility, and Grayson bitches that the place is huge so it sucks, thanks. Alfred reminds him not worry so hard about security that he doesn’t live in the moment and enjoy the (fake) tribute show for his own (murdered) parents. The parenthetical words are my own! Too bad it’s a fake fucking tribute show so that Grayson can get murdered like his parents! Oh well.

The house is packed. This is 2012, shouldn’t they all be home watching Game of Thrones and pouring ice buckets on their heads? Clowny Jimmy shoves Grayson out to the microphone to give a speech before the show starts, which he wasn’t expecting to do, so he stammers through some nonsense about “waah my murdered parents” and “waah my emotional insecurities” and “waah the circus is my family”. While he talks, we get a glimpse of Saiko leering down from way up high in the rafters. Also, Grayson’s phone (left backstage) alerts him of a security breach. So LOL to that.

Backstage, Raya, moved by his stupid speech, asks him if he really meant what he said.

Nightwing (Vol. 3), Issue #6

Just like my own parents, you’re all similarly dead to me!

I don’t know why Raya would have thought Grayson didn’t care about them, since he never in his life said to any of them stuff like “FUCK THE CIRCUS!” or “FUCK YOU CIRCUS BITCHES!” or “I HATED HALY AND HIS STUPID CIRCUS!” or “I’M NIGHTWING, AND ALSO I’M DICK GRAYSON THE MURDERER, AND ALSO, THE CIRCUS? ARE YOU PEOPLE HIGH?”

While Raya starts regretting every decision she’s made recently, Grayson finally notices his phone is going off like crazy and starts running away to get into Hero Mode. Without missing much of a beat, Nightwing swoops along near the ceiling, above the show, to where Saiko is biding his time. They start fighting immediately, as if thousands of people aren’t going to notice two guys dressed like dumbasses scuffling during a circus show.

During the fight, Saiko decides to unmask himself and reveal his identity as Raymond the Maybe-Dead. Nightwing is BESIDE HIMSELF WITH SHOCK. “Raymond…?! But you –” he starts, but Raymond finishes his sandwiches: “DIED? Exactly, Dick…”

So that clears it up once and for all! Time to wrap this puppy up and —

Nightwing (Vol. 3), Issue #6

OH NO, HE’S GOING TO BLOW UP THE 92ND STREET BRIDGE!

OH, there’s still more going on. I see now! Raymond blames Grayson for his death and I don’t even know why. Was that explained? Raymond throws a knife at him that cuts through the rope that Nightwing’s been swingin’ around on like a chimp. He plummets, he shoots his Metroid grapply beam, he lives.

“They came from the shadows and took me, Dick…they kidnapped me…tortured me…they ruined me. They turned me into this. And it’s your and this godforsaken place’s FAULT.”

Raymond, at this point, as you can see, presses a button in his hand.

A giant boomy explosion happens on the ground! On the ground at the circus! Where all the people are!

Final Thoughts

Go cry about it more, Raymond.

There’s one issue of this story left. Did Raymond, who wanted to kill Dick Grayson, end up killed everyone else in the circus EXCEPT for Dick Grayson? Sounds like a fuck-up to me!

See you next time when I close this shit out!


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East of West, Issue #3

East of West, Issue #3 – “The Dragon”

* Part 3 of 15 of the The Apocalypse: Year One storyline *

Welcome to Ghostliness & Nerfherders Presents: East of West, Issue #3 – “The Dragon”! In the previous installment, the Three Horsemen systematically decapitate every single person in the presidential line of succession until they get to the Secretary of the Interior Antonia LeVay, who seems like a believer enough in the Message to satisfy their needs.

LeVay meets up with other members of a sort of secret Message society, who don’t seem too thrilled that this new woman is now among their ranks. A guy named Andrew Archibald Chamberlain, who looks like Colonel Sanders, leaves before the feast and returns to his Chief of Staff office in the Black Towers. There, Death is waiting to kill him, but Chamberlain’s a silver-tongued son of a bitch and he (possibly) convinces Death into partnering up with him.

He tells Death that there’s something in the Message that might interest him.

He tells Death that his wife is alive.

Death’s wife is a young Asian woman.

And remember, any of the unattributed quotes in italics you see represent the occasional full-page gray-text-on-white-background bumper pages sprinkled throughout the issues. Thanks for stickin’ around!

East of West, Issue #3 [June, 2013]
Written by: Jonathan Hickman
“The Dragon”

East of West, Issue #3

“Who is this woman, the one who conquered Death?”

I guess if anyone was going to conquer Death, it would be the old ball and chain! Ha! Zing! Right fellas! Heh heh! Can’t live with ‘em, can’t live without ‘em! Heh heh heh!

In New Shanghai, women are lined up wearing Samus Aran from Metroid suits. A flower is held by the young woman we saw in the previous issue, who also appears to be under arrest in some fashion? She has these weird metal wrist-glove restraints, plus a neck device that four people can drag her along with.

“A moment, Security Minister.” speaks up one of the Metroid women, “She should be checked before you speak with her. Your father ordered it.”

The Security Minister is annoyed, but allows it. Her “checking” involves an x-ray scan, which shows abnormal denser-than-usual bone structure in some areas from skeletal regeneration, but nothing separate from the on-record prosthetics. Dense bones, eh? Sounds useful!

The young woman is named Xiaolian, and she is the sister to the Security Minister. “Father has summoned us” the Security Minister tells Xiaolian, and Xiaolian responds with a bitter “It’s been 10 years, Hu. I expected more than that.”

Ah yes, Hu, House of Mao, Security Minister. She is involved with the Secret Message Society. Good, excellent, very well then.

East of West, Issue #3

The bible is the real Good News!

We are treated to what I can only assume is a flashback. Hu motors up on kickass floating hog, she’s dressed like Speed Racer! She yells for Xiaolian to come out of a dark hole. “I told you — all of you — not to look for me.” says Xiaolian, “What are you doing here, Hu?”

And Hu responds with some cult Message bullshit! I’m sure Xiaolian doesn’t want to hear none of that, but then three more nefarious individuals descend upon them from the rocks. They look like older versions of the Horsemen Children, and the Red One is wearing a getup like Carmen Sandiego! I wonder if she knows she looks like Carmen Sandiego. Yeesh.

Xiaolian is alarmed. “What have you done?” she asks her sister with shock. And Hu says “A righteous, righteous thing.”

And then something happens to Xiaolian. It’s hard to tell. It looks like she gets thoroughly OWNED by these three new guests who may or may not be who I think they are. There’s some swirling electric blue vortex. She doesn’t look happy about it, at any rate.

“She lasted longer than you will.”

“If you cannot trust your eyes as you look at the world, what good are they? I can give you something better.”

Junction. On the border of the Union and the Burning Plain. It looks like…if the Grand Canyon were U-shaped, and there was a dense urban landscape within the chasm. It’s weird.

In an empty bar, a bartender is wiping down the surfaces. CREEEAKK! “Ah! First customers of the day…”

The barkeep from Issue #1 welcomes his new guests to the Atlas. “Newly refurbished and exceptionally fine!” he beams. But once he realizes who’s in his bar, his face falls. “Shit.”

East of West, Issue #3

Here comes trouble! The Dirtiest Dudes in Town!

Yes, yes, those three lovable scamps! The blue one asks for a “manly man drink”, and the barkeep points out, and RIGHTFULLY SO, that he appears to be underage. To which Blue replies coldly “Oh, I’m ancient. Older than the world. And you know better, Hunter. Now, thirsty, thirsty…”

Yellow feels an aura about the place. Dots of light take shape to form the outline of Death. “Yes, no mistaking it is there?” says Red, “The man certainly leaves a mark.”

After Red asks in the barkeep’s direction to confirm that Death was, indeed, in the bar at some point. When the barkeep starts to gibber and deny Death’s presence, Red claims that he wasn’t talking to him. Then some unseen force tears the barkeep’s…um…”bad eye”…out of his socket. Which we did see happen before! So at least this isn’t completely vexing to me!

East of West, Issue #3

MC Eyeball spittin’ rhymes with immaculate flow.

“Yesss. Yesss. Much to fear. Mister bonesss wasss rattlin’ here.” says the eyeball in sp0o0o0oky red speech bubbles! Yellow looks to more dots of light to see that Death had two companions. Red gets right into the eyeball’s face and asks what the FUCK Death wanted. And then the eyeball, continuing to speak in flowery poetry, said that it didn’t know — couldn’t see.

At this point the barkeep leaps onto the bar and grabs the little mutherfuckin’ eyeball. “Gotcha!”

“Do we need to start cutting off body parts, or are you going to tell us what you gave to him?” Blue not so much warns as he plans. Yellow and Red like the idea anyway. “Honestly, we could use the practice.”

The barkeep stammers as he shoves the squelchy octopus of an eyeball back into his socket. He tells them that he couldn’t give Death what he really wanted, so he gave him a list of names of the Chosen. The Horsemen now understand what happened to the former President. So now, knowing Death, he’s going to carry out at least three further moves: a) kill everyone on the list, b) get back what the three of them stole from him (still unnamed, as far as I, Sir Tom, am aware), and c) find his wife. Now it’s just about knowing what’s next…

If only there was a rather…helpful…barkeepery barkeep of a man on the premises…

And the barkeep is like “AH BUH UHHH YEAH DON’T KILL ME, I’M VERY HELPFUL. I’M A HELPFUL BOY.”, and he pulls a lever shaped like a bottle that opens up a hole in the floor. Out of the hole comes a rather large hologram of the Earth. And then he points at the Earth and mumbles some stuff about trackers and pathfinders. He is the Pathfinder, and the Pathfinder stores all the data that the scouts collect over the world. This sounds, to me, like a windbag way of telling the positively cherubic Horsemen that he’s too useful to be killed.

Also, he can track anyone on the planet. Right here. Right now. Boom.

East of West, Issue #3

The same reason all those pedophiles travel thousands of miles just to get chewed out by Dateline‘s Chris Hansen!

Death’s location is easy to spot. He’s in New Shanghai. WIFE IT IS! And, as it happens, New Shanghai appears to be where, like, Tennessee is or something. United States. Interesting.

The Horsemen are certainly confused as to why Death is bothering with this woman right now. Of the three tasks, this one seems the least important. BUT, Death is a curious entity, isn’t he. Mmmhmm, aha. Even Wolf and Crow are fascinated by Death’s motivation to find his wife, speaking to each other about how powerful love is. “It makes the old new. Makes dead things live. Love makes you into something better.”

Then Wolf says something that implies that Wolf loves Crow, but then it’s not brought up again. “It’s the reason a wolf would chase a crow, even knowing he can’t fly…and she don’t ever need to touch the ground.”

At the Imperial Palace of New Shanghai, the Mao-in-Charge in 2064, “Premier Mao”, welcomes his daughters. And “welcomes” is too strong a word. He kind of just sneers at them. Hu and Xiaolian stand rather sullenly while he talks. He tells Hu to remove Xiaolian’s chains, and Xiaolian shoots a smug smirk at her.

“If you think it wise, father,” Hu begins to argue, making a case that isolation in the garden for years may have made her positively feral! And Premier Mao agrees with that: “which is why I try to visit her garden as often as I can.”

Shocked! SHOCKED! Hu is shocked about this revelation! Then Daddy Mao starts fawning over her delinquent daughter. “We wouldn’t want your sister becoming some sad and broken thing,” he coos, lightly touching Xiaolian’s cheek. Hu is fucking FROWNING. Xiaolian continues her smug glances. “Your mercy and your kindness are staggering, father.”

East of West, Issue #3

Don’t make me finish the job I should have started with you years ago! All those times I could’ve choked you out in your crib! ALL THOSE TIMES!!!

And then he starts choking her. TABLES HAVE TURNED! Now who’s smirking? And then, this scrawny 120-pound man, he bursts about 40 forehead veins in his efforts to lift her off the ground by her neck. He doesn’t have time for her malarkey today!

“Your husband approaches the imperial city.”

And indeed he is, blowing up bridges an’ shit. For whatever reason.

“Death is coming for us all,” Daddy Mao warns, posing overdramatically. And then he walks away as he lets them know that both their actions have really FUBARed the natural order to the world. Hu, with her ties to the weird Message Cult, and Xiaolian, with her ties to Death by marriage and what the hell is all that about anyway?

Daddy Mao intervened; he had spoken to Hu’s Weird Message Cult ages ago and worked out an agreement to keep Xiaolian safe and untraceable, even by Death himself. And that’s why she still lives to this day. So maybe a little THANK YOU wouldn’t be so goddamned hard??

Now, they await Death’s arrival. Mao sends one of his knights, all suited up like a cartoon knight, to go attempt one last appeal. “I ask for reason and not more madness. And if he rejects this, tell him what waits for him here.” With this message, the knight clangs and rattles away on his similarly clangly, rattly motorcycle-horse!

“Tell Death we will not be the only ones that die here today.” Mao promises, as we see a view of his army numbering in the thousands. Tens of thousands!

East of West, Issue #3

And, if you have time, you can head on over to the 2064 AMA Motocross Championship finals!

This knight makes it to the blown-up bridge, where a dying soldier tells him to run back. Steadfast, though, in his pursuit, The Knight carries on! He approaches Wolf and Crow and tells them that Mao seeks a parley! Crow is like “fat chance, nerd”, which leaves Mr. Knight no choice but to demand that they leeeeeaaavveee heeerreee nooooowww OOOooOoooOoOoOO.

The knight starts describing the large army that awaits. The prose is very purple, describing the bridge blockade “as stars to the sun” and the imperial “armies of heaven”.

Death approaches, saying “GOOD.” More fun to kill a bunch of people, right? Death tells the knight to run back to Mao, they’re not taking his deal.

“The Great Wall is coming down…and my judgement will follow shortly.”

Final Thoughts

Death is gonna fuck up Mao’s army! Ain’t no ’bout a-doubt it!


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Sucky Funnies for February 27, 2022

Things I’m looking forward to as I start the new week: the beginning of March, the end of February, the stupidly large pot of chili I’m going to make today, and reading more morons from my country attempt to be Russia/Ukraine geopolitical experts on Twitter.

BUT, for now, here are three more Sunday strips to kick off the week.

Garfield

Garfield - February 27, 2022

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Garfield has been tormenting Jon Arbuckle for 44 years now, which completely ridiculous if you stop and think about that. You would think, by now, that Jon could possibly get a handle on some of this shit. This is an easy one! Buy a mini-fridge and put a padlock on it. OR, even better, drive the cat out to the middle of Nebraska and dump him on the side of the road.

But, unfortunately, Jon Arbuckle is pushing 80 years old and his faculties just aren’t there anymore. Plus, he’s been gaslighted by his cat for so many decades now that he doesn’t even know which way is up anymore! I do like the spontaneous scraggly beard-hair growth on Jon after yelling. He should really be a wizard by now.

Marmaduke

Marmaduke - February 27, 2022

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As a parallel to Jon’s situation with Garfield, Marmaduke’s owners are similarly held captive by their 400-lb Great Dane. However, Marmaduke is far more diabolical and abusive than Garfield could ever hope to be. At this point the only solution is a bullet through the dog’s fucking brainpan, but that won’t work anymore either. It’s too late for that. Marmaduke hid all the guns.

In supremely stupid fashion, Phil pushes his luck and attempts to play a prank on his less-than-faithful dog. Doomed to repeat history time and time again, Phil learns a harsh lesson. Another organ will be taken from him while he sleeps tonight. You’re running out of non-vital organs quickly, Phil. Marmaduke will soon have to move on to the other ones.

Mary Worth

Mary Worth - February 27, 2022

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I’m not a 65-year-old cat lady, so I don’t keep up with the soap opera Sunday Funnies like Rex Morgan, M.D., Judge Parker, and, of course, meddling old Mary Worth. The benefit of these serial story-based strips is that you can jump into one once in a while, lacking all context, and it turns out to be WAY funnier than any of the joke-based offerings on the rest of the Funnies page!

I don’t know who Toby is exactly, but I imagine she’s either one of Mary’s many horrible grandchildren or, barring that, Just Some Lady Mary Knows. I picture that Toby has been unwittingly leading one of her students on for months now, slowly developing in him an infatuation so unhealthy that he’s probably considering shooting the President of the United States to try to win her over. He has recently finished wallpapering his bedroom pictures of her, all photographed in secret.

Here’s hoping Mary steps in to put a stop to this before Toby’s body is found in a duffel bag in a subway station bathroom; his brains are blown out all over mirror and sink.


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