The Week In Ink, 1-11-06

So what came out this week? Not frigg'n much. Although it may be of interest to certain sketchy characters out that the new issue of Milk hit the stands yesterday, and the store ended up with an extra copy.

See, somebody out there finally came to their senses and dropped it from their sub, leaving us with an extra copy for the next three months and cutting out just in time to miss this issue's Josie and the Pussycats-as-hermaphrodites piece. So if you're into that sort of thing--and who isn't?--drop by the Wiz and ask for it by name. I'll be the one quietly judging you.

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Comics

Desolation Jones #5: Between the best Warren Ellis tough-guy lines since Spider Jerusalem and JH Williams' incredible art, I'm pretty sure Jones is on his way to becoming the first Great Comics Badass of the 21st Century. The Chandleresque stuff keeps coming in this issue, with Our Protagonist putting on a bit of a parlor scene laid up against an ambulance before indulging in a few acts of violence. It's fantastic, and it's all wrapped around a joke about Hitler's dirty movies, and that's just how I like my comics.

DMZ #3: Wood and Burchielli wrap up their first story-arc about three issues earlier than I expected them to, which is a good thing. All of the set-up clutter's gone, and with everything established and ready to go, I've got pretty high hopes for what's coming next. Plus, as an added bonus, I think this issue's as close as I'm going to get to the scene I really wanted to see:

Seriously, though, it's good stuff, even though it does have all the subtlety of WASP's flaming codpiece, and I'm looking forward to what comes next.

Fables #45: I'm always a little bit suspicious of someone who doesn't like Fables, even friends of mine that I've known for years. It's like finding out they don't like pie. I'm just not sure how that sort of things can happen, what with Willingham's slick, entertaining, and occasionally vicious stories and Buckingham's incredible artwork and page layouts. The most recent story's full of that sort of thing, with the great characterization of Old King Cole and Baba Yaga, who might be my new favorite character in the book.

New Thumderbolts #17: If there's a good reason why this issue didn't have "At last! The Swordsman Revealed!" emblazoned across the cover in bold type, I'd certainly like to hear it. It's a well-done and interesting read, and although I'm not too keen on the way it contradicts Mark Millar's "Enemy of the State" from Wolverine, it at least goes through the trouble of referencing and addressing that story. Still, this was the best issue in a while, and the reveal was a surprise, if more than a little morbid. It's a good series, but I'm not sure what's keeping me reading it other than a vague curiosity about what's going to happen next.

She-Hulk #4: I liked this issue a heck of a lot, specifically because of the Green Cross, a Marvel Universe charity organization that goes around helping people rebuild their cities after the Hulk comes smashing through during a fight with the Rhino. I think that's great. I'm just curious as to whether they ever get into turf wars with Damage Control when they swing through New York. Maybe Dwayne McDuffie and Dan Slott can hash it out once and for all to see who gets rebuilding rights.

Ultimate Extinction: I only ended up buying seven comics this week, which for me is incredibly light. Still, if this week was a representative sample, that means that 28% of the comics I buy are written by Warren Ellis. Which, yeah, sounds about right. This issue continues his Ultimate Galactus trend of introducing new third-tier characters to Ultimate Marvel, this time in the form of Misty Knight, which was thoroughly enjoyable.

Ultimate X-Men #66: As much as I liked the Brian K. Vaughan run, it felt a lot more like he was playing with the cards he was dealt as opposed to the off-the-wall tweaking of Claremont/Byrne X-Men that Mark Millar did so much when the book started. This issue's "big reveal" seemed to put Robert Kirkman more in tune with the latter, and I'm pretty excited about it.

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Graphic Novels

Batman by Neal Adams v.3 Hardcover: Ah, nothing like a fifty dollar hardcover to balance out a light comics week. It's finally out, which means I can finally sit down and read all three in a row like I've planned from the beginning, which is a prospect I'm pretty excited about. Volume One, after all, includes a Brave and the Bold issue where Batman teams up with the Flash, who runs to the sun and back for some tenuous reason while fighting Bork, and Volume 2 has the classic "The Joker's Five-Way Revenge," but this one is where it's at: It's got all the O'Neil/Adams Ra's al-Ghul stories, baby. And that means one of my favorite panels of all time:

That's right. Shirtless Batman is in the hizzy.

Did I mention I got a scanner?

Next: Who is he? WHAT is he?! Don't miss a single pulse-pounding moment as the ISB reveals the single greatest villain of the Golden Age of Comics!