The Weekly Round-Up #791 w/ Justice League Unlimited #3, Ultimate Spider-Man #13, and more

Columns, Top Story

Life is just too busy. I’m not even through last week’s comics, but I’ll catch up again some day…

Justiceleagueunlimited

Justice League Unlimited #3 – Mark Waid must enjoy juggling, because he is squeezing a lot into each issue of this series. This issue brings us another attack by Inferno, whoever they are, that has wide-ranging effects on the planet, especially the Green, while the Atom Project continues their work, and we get more development on Air Wave, who is destined to play a big role in this series. Dan Mora continues to work overtime, squeezing dozens of heroes into each issue and making it look effortless. I worried that the massive size of the JLU’s lineup would limit the types of stories being told, but it seems that Waid is able to balance the wide-screen action sequences with some good character work. This is quickly becoming a favourite title of mine.

Absolute Wonder Woman #4 – I love this title. We meet Etta Candy, and her sister, who is a witch, when Steve takes Diana to her shop so she can restore her magical arm, before going to battle with the Tetracide, the gigantic monster threatening the city. Kelly Thompson continues to do a wonderful job of reimagining Diana’s character and world, and Hayden Sherman continues to blow me away with the quality of his art. This book is gorgeous and very compelling.

Blackhammer

Black Hammer: Spiral City #3 – Jeff Lemire continues to roll out the story of various secondary characters (some new) from the Black Hammer universe, as they deal with rampant anti-powered discrimination, and have to make their way in an inhospitable world. It’s not hard to read some anti-immigrant metaphors into this story, seeing how things have been lately. It’s kind of dark and sad, but it’s a very good comic. I’m still thrilled to see new Teddy Kristiansen art on a regular basis again.

Fantastic Four #28 – I hate when characters that I once had a lot of affinity for get misused, and while I’ve been loving Ryan North’s Fantastic Four run since it started, I do not like how he mistreated the Black Knight in this issue. Looking for answers regarding Doctor Doom’s use of magic, Sue suggests that Reed consult with Dane Whitman, a physicist with a magical sword. They find Dane to be a bit of a dolt, but he sends them on a magical time travel adventure that builds into the upcoming One World Under Doom event quite nicely. I just don’t like how Dane is portrayed, even after the story reason for him being this way is explained. This reminds me that I never picked up the Si Spurrier-written Black Knight mini from a couple of years back…

Superman

Superman #22 – An armada of aliens have arrived, insisting that Earth hand over Doomsday to them, but Superman doesn’t trust them. Pretty quickly, their conversation devolves and things get a little wild. Joshua Williamson, and now Dan Mora, are doing great work on this title, constructing ongoing plotlines that survive beyond each story arc, and making me really enjoy Superman, a character I don’t often like all that much. This is some good stuff.

Ultimate Spider-Man #13 – I’ve really been enjoying this series, and love how Jonathan Hickman figured out a way to do a two-part story here, while still having each issue occur in the month that it’s released in. Peter and Harry have been captured by Kraven, who now wants to hunt them in the Savage Land (which is beneath Staten Island in the new Ultimate Universe). During this period while Peter’s been missing, his pico-suit has been filling in for him, and his son has been wearing it to fight crime. This is a really solid issue with lots of great moments, and it has me looking forward to the next issue. Marco Checchetto is not recognized enough for his brilliance in storytelling. This issue looks so good.

Voidrivals

Void Rivals #16 – This is a really big issue, as a side character gets killed, Darak makes contact with the people rebelling against his father, and Solila finds what she’s been looking for, I think. Robert Kirkman and Lorenzo De Felici are building a really exciting and interesting science fiction story here, and with all the other parties making their way to the Sacred Ring, I think this book is due for a Kirkmanian paradigm shift soon; those are always exciting to read.

Wolverine: Revenge #4 – I’m really just reading this series for the Greg Capullo art, but it’s been bugging me since it started. I didn’t like that this is an Elseworlds story of sorts, happening out of continuity, but this issue really left me puzzled. It takes twenty years after the last issue, and in those two decades, Logan has aged more than he did in the previous seventy. Somehow, the world has come back, in a way, and Logan appears to live in an Old West style town filled with former superheroes, including two we saw killed in the first issue, and Forge, who hasn’t aged at all. We also learn that he’s been keeping Sabretooth alive and confined to Xavier’s old floating wheelchair. Creed has a plan for him though, and that leads to a fight with some new characters who are connected to some of the people Logan killed earlier in the series. I don’t know what Capullo and Hickman are trying to say here, and I’m kind of regretting having ordered this book.

W0rldtr33

W0rldtr33 #12 – Returning after a hiatus, James Tynion IV and Fernando Blanco take us back to the early days, when the main characters of this series were teenage hackers messing around in Gabriel Winter’s garage, trying to fend off the malevolent Undernet they discovered. This issue focuses on Sammi, Gabriel’s sister, who would go on to be the naked killer and ambassador to the Undernet, and this series’s main villain character. At this stage, she’s an awkward teenager who is fascinated by her brother’s friends, and some of the other things they get up to when he’s not around. Blanco takes an interesting approach to this issue, covering the page with panels of different sizes to give a sense of the monotony of Sammi’s life, and helping to understand why she started messing with dangerous things. I hope this book is back on a regular schedule and we’ll see more of it, because in the last two months, it feels even more relevant than before.

Music

Black Star – No Fear Of Time – The first Black Star album, from 1998, was a favourite of mine when it was released, and made me a big fan of both Mos Def and Talib Kweli. A couple of years ago, they joined back up (except Mos is Yasiin Bey now) with the super producer Madlib, and put out a sequel, which at first was only available through some podcasting subscription service, or on Youtube bootlegs. As such, I never bothered to listen to it, but once it got a physical release, I figured I needed to add it to my collection. It’s a lot better than I expected. Yasiin Bey is always incredible, as is Madlib, but I was a little concerned about Talib Kweli, since he’s kind of had a falling off in the last ten years or so, and has become a bit of a negative entity in my view. He sounds just as good here as he did in the early 2000s, perhaps because Bey and Madlib created such a positive musical environment. I’m glad I have this, and I’m glad that it exists. I’ve been seeing some talk about Bey collaborating with The Alchemist, and I’m very excited to see what comes from that collaboration.

Jeff Parker ETA IV Tet – The Way Out of Easy – These four recordings were made by Jeff Parker and his band (Josh Johnson, Anna Butterss, and Jay Bellerose) at ETA in Los Angeles in early 2023, and I am so jealous of whoever got to be in the audience for it. These tracks, the longest of which clocks in at twenty-two minutes, are gorgeous explorations of iteration and repetition. I feel like this album stops time, and can spend almost the whole length of it in quiet contemplation and at peace. If my copy hadn’t gotten held up by the Canada Post strike, I’m sure I would have placed this in my top ten releases of 2024. It’s very special.

Get in touch and share your thoughts on what I've written: jfulton@insidepulse.com