Titans/Young Justice: Graduation Day

With a title like 'Graduation Day', you'd think that I would wait until May or June to read this and you'd be right. However, I started reading Volume 1 of Geoff John's 2003 take on the Teen Titans and I realized that I need to read this book first before going on. I'd also need to complete this 3-issue miniseries before going on to Judd Winick's 2003 Outsiders as well. No problem! Besides, the phrase 'Graduation Day' is just that. There's no pomp and circumstance whatsoever in this book.

Our story begins in San Francisco. A major conglomerate has called the Titans to listen to a pitch to sponsor the superheroes in their endeavors. Also invited are the members of Young Justice. In the middle of a break, all hell breaks lose when a malfunctioning android attacks Cyborg, causing him to overload and injury several members of both teams. 

The scene jumps to the nearest trauma center where the medical team are facing meta-human physiologies unlike ever before. A team from STAR Labs arrives just about the same time that the news breaks that a Silicon Valley video game company is under attack by the rogue android. What does this rampaging robot want with a manufacturer of video games? Turns out that the facility is a front for a STAR Labs laboratory where a lot of dangerous technology is being housed; including a robotic version of Superman that has a history of being unreliable and it's just been activated by the cybernetic intruder.

Judd Winick crafts a story that changes a large chunk of the DC Universe. Beloved characters die. Friendships are broken. Teams dismantled. The events of 'Graduation Day' are shocking to say the least.

I'm a big fan of Young Justice. I also like the Teen Titans, though I got to admit, their adventures get a little too soap opera-like for my enjoyment. But I've been sitting on a trove of related material of these teams, including the Outsiders, which I inherited after the death of my best friend. Just recently, the database I had been using for the last 17 years just up and shutdown for no warning. So as I scramble to re-catelogue my vast 12K strong collection, I find myself finally motivated to read some of his stuff in order to determine if I've just been holding onto these book for the sake of my best friend's memory or do I really like these books?

The verdict so far is that the prospects are promising. I definitely want to keep reading those Teen Titans and Outsiders trades. If all goes well, they like this book will definitely be a keeper.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars.

Superior Iron Man, Vol. 1: Infamous

This is an example of how to not judge a book by its cover. I've been sitting on this book for probably 5 years now. It came in a Comic Book Bento Box as a gift from my bride. (Remember CBBB? They're were a graphic novel grab bag subscription service that was so fun to get in the mail each month. Now defunct. Long may it rest...) I had just finished a volume of Iron Man where Tony's brother Arno Stark was set to take on the mantle of Iron Man, when I received this book. I wasn't all that thrilled with Arno and thinking this book was chronicling his adventures, I waited to read it.

I couldn't have been more wrong in my assessment.

Superior Iron Man, Volume 1 takes place immediately after the events of AXIS. For those of you not familiar with Marvel's 2014's crossover event, AXIS was the Freaky Friday storyline where good guys became villains and villains became heroes due to the meddling of the Red Skull. When everybody went back to their normal selves, something went wrong with Tony Stark, screwing up his moral compass. 

So imagine what the billionaire playboy would have become if he never got injured from a land mine and had his life saved by Professor Yinsen. What we have at the beginning of Superior Iron Man is a hedonistic, unrepentant alcoholic Tony Stark intent on imposing his own personal Utopia upon the world. To change the world in his own image, Tony has set up base in San Francisco. He just released his latest version of Extremis as an app which turns users into Kardashian-like versions of themselves. There's a hitch to this however. Tony offered Extremis 3.0 as a trial. Now reverted back to their imperfect selves, the citizens of San Francisco must pay an exorbitant fee daily to feed their addiction to perfection.

I really loved this book. I devoured it in about an hour. Add Daredevil, She-Hulk, Pepper Potts and an all-new villain to the mix and I was hooked. Amoral Tony Stark. It's a brilliant experiment that left me reeling because I don't have volume 2!

I'm going to rate this book with a perfect score. However there was a continuity error that just stuck in my crawl. Towards the beginning of the book, Stark hosts this big event for Extremis 3.0 on Castro Street. However an issue later, Matt Murdock, fully into his internal dialogue says that the event happened on Canton Street. Just so you know, I researched and there isn't a Canton Street in the City by the Bay.

Castro Street in San Francisco is a historic area known for Harvey Milk and the fight for gay rights. Could writer Tom Taylor have received some flak from fans for setting that scene at such an iconic locale, that Marvel had to retcon things? If so, why didn't they change the name of the scene for this trade? I can see where having Tony Stark offer the people of San Francisco a way to change themselves into what they've always dreamed of being set on Castro Street as being perceived insensitive to the struggle of the LGBT+ community. I'm just flummoxed over the nit and I want to know more about the mistake.

The artwork by Yildiray Cinar and Laura Braga was amazing. One of the best sets of Iron Man armor ever!

Be on the lookout for the Full House Easter egg tribute! So clever!

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 10 out of 10 stars.

We Are Pirates by Daniel Handler

I read another traditional book- in less than a month. And it was a novel to boot! What am I, sick or something?
   
   In We Are Pirates, a young girl named Gwen is going through the growing pains of becoming a young woman. Feeling unwanted and bored, she goes on a shoplifting spree. Caught by security, Gwen is forced by her parents to volunteer at a retirement home as punishment. Assigned to a patient who was a former Navy man and amateur nautical historian, Gwen becomes enamored with the idea of becoming a pirate. With elderly Errol, his nurse Manny, Gwen's new best friend Amber, and an accidently shanghaied boy named Cody, Gwen leads the team to steal a fake pirate ship and lay scourge to San Francisco Bay.

  In We Are Pirates, Phil Needle is under the gun to finish production on a new radio program about American outlaws. Without a title and an assistant, Phil Needle makes some rash decisions in order to complete his first episode in time for a broadcasting convention. This leads Phil Needle to hire a young girl named Alma as his new secretary, but his choice may lead him down a path that could ruin his career, marriage, and relationship with his wayward daughter Gwen.

    Now, I didn't suffer a wrinkle in time or anything like that. We Are Pirates is basically two stories in one, with seemingly mundane events in one plot making lasting impacts on the other. But that doesn't make for easy reading.

   We Are Pirates was written by the crafty mind behind Lemony Snicket. But he doesn't just write prose for kids. Wen writing under his real name of Daniel Handler, the author also writes adult novels. I stress the word 'ADULT' here. This book has sex, graphic murder, sex, language, angst... did I mention the sex? So don't go buying this book for your children under the assumption that this is an innocent as one of Snicket's Series of Unfortunate Events (which I did!) This book has adult themes, adult ideas, and some very frank talk about sex acts.

  Another problem I had with this book is that Daniel Handler does not seem to know how to transition from the past to the present. He'll mention a memory of either Gwen's or Phil Needle's, then get back to the present and then out of the blue, we're back in the past without any sort of warning from the writer. Handler's paragraphs seem to go on forever whereas grammar classes teach us that a well-structured paragraph should be around 3-5 sentences each.

(By the way- if every time you read the words 'We Are Pirates' you then hear the 'bum-bum-bumpbump, bada-bum-bum-bumbum-bump' from those Farmer's Insurance commercials well you're not alone.")

   Also, in terms of timing, each chapter is split into two parts. One-half of each chapter will revolve around Phil Needle with the other starring Gwen. However, Phil Needle's part might take place a week before Independence Day while Gwen's segment occurs during the last week of May. Yet for some reason except for the first and last chapter, the author doesn't tell the reader when said events occur in the timeline. Even worse the story jumps around in each chapter and doesn't follow a linear sequence of events meaning Gwen's actions in chapter 3 may take place a month before what she did in chapter 2. (Again without any acknowledgement that the story jumped back in time.)

   I would rate this book very low if it wasn't for the crafty way Handler ties everything in by the final page. It's quite clever on the level of 'Reservoir Dogs' or 'The Usual Suspects.' But I don't want to give away too much in order to ruin the twists and turns that evolve in this novel.

   So does that mean what you think I'm thinking...

 That's right, I'm recommending this book and I also consider it Worth Consuming. Just trust me when I say you need to push through as some segments won't make any sense until the very end. Believe me, it's worth the wait and the read.

   Worth Consuming

  Rating: 8 out of 10 stars.

(Oh, any to answer the question: NO, I'm not sick. I've just been in the mood to tackle some non-comic book summer reads. As the great Phil Needle says 'It'll pass. It's just a phase."