Pick of the Week Podcast – Episode #403 – Deadpool #16
Josh returns, and we stumble slightly less through this new era. Paul doesn't want to sound like he does, and let's talk about greater NYC area carpet commercials. Also, there are a lot of comics that need to get covered, and by gum, we cover them. Hey Lord Vader, can you take a picture for us?
00:01:40 – Deadpool #16
00:11:20 – Astro City #4
00:17:22 – Captain America #11
00:21:51 – Star Wars #9
00:26:01 – Smallville: Season 11
00:32:21 – Locke & Key: Alpha #1
00:34:07 – Ghosted #3
00:35:06 – X-Men #5
00:36:59 – Ultimate Comics: The Ultimates #30
00:38:38 – Justice League #23.2
00:43:22 – The Walking Dead #114
Audience Questions:
00:46:28 – Joel from Washington likes Aquaman, so who is this Jeff Parker guy?
00:50:06 – Shane wants to talk about all the time disturbances going on in the Marvel Universe.
00:53:26 – Marshall from Ontario asks why heroes switch around books, but villains usually don't.
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koryrosh says:
Deadpool was my pick of the week as well. When he says "she was too beautiful" and "do you remember the first time you looked at your son," that got me welling up. It's so true about how when you have a funny/comedic book or character, the shift to a more serious tone is all the more powerful.
BIG AL WILLIAMS says:
Is it weird for me to have that Cheshire cat smile every time I see a new podcast up?
Master Destructo says:
Paul, I agree with your Looney Tunes comment. There are a bunch of sub-par later episodes where the animation was suddenly more of a Filmation-style. But Looney Tunes are still the greatest toons of all time.
Regarding villains switching around books, I thought of a sports analogy. Sports fans and comic readers are both more excited by encounters between arch-rivals. I'm always more excited when my team is playing intra-conference or intra-division than when they're playing some outside team. Same with superheros. Batman vs. Joker is always compelling, but Aquaman vs. Joker? I'm not buying that book. Wait…it would probably involve Joker fish. Okay, bad example, cause I would totally buy that!
Conor and Josh, had you guys practiced that carpet commercial before? Either way, that there was a nice bit of comedy.
When might one expect the book to explode? This week?
Nope. That was all on-the-spot improv.
Probably not this week. Most likely next.
I think the only real example of a major villain switching their antagonist has been the Kingpin becoming a Daredevil villain. Also, on smaller scale, over time Deathstroke has become a Batman villain and Cyborg Superman is more of a Green Lantern villain because he destroyed Coast City.
Vader's photos always turn out a bit on the dark side.
HailScott says:
cubman987 says:
It was a great bit, but I don't know why it has to be Vader. I figured it was a Death Star Intern, someone whose job was to take staff photos and turn them into a yearbook/ website. The kind of person who just had a job on the Death Star because it would look good on a college application, and whose Dad knew somebody in Death Star human resources. Somebody with hopes and dreams, who loved puppies and was looking forward to going to a state school on Tatooine.
Somebody who died a fiery death because of Luke Skywalker. That's who took those pictures, I think.
Bryce31 says:
It's a weird time in comics when Deadpool is one of my favorite big two titles.
Great show, guys!
I don't know what your plans are for the middle part of the show but I for one really hope you dedicate some time to trades and original graphic novels as I have come across some really excellent trades and GNs thanks to your guys' recommendations so I really hope that continues even without the site itself.
Seconded. Either that or Michael Kaine and Eddie Vedder doing carpet commercials.
scherem says:
Not sure if you've been doing this for awhile, but I appreciate the announcement of the book for booksplode. It gives me a week (or two?) to dig up my copy of Batman Year One Hundred and read it in time for the podcast.
Seconded for a second time. That book has been on my amazon list for awhile so I think I'll go pick it up for the show.
Spoons says:
I was also surprised by how quickly, rushed is too strong word, they decided to wrap up Locke and Key. Maybe not more issues or a whole new mini-series but a higher page count for the last few issues of Omega would have gone a long way to give the art a chance to let the plot and character work breath.
In retrospect I really wish I could've offered a more in depth critique of Locke & Key, but it's one of those handful of books I try not to spoil on the show regardless of our standing spoiler warning. Too many people read it in trade and enjoy it that way for me to risk ruining their experience with it. That said, there's so much going on in this issue, it was hard for even me to keep track of it all. I've been reading in issues for ages now and that slow build is all unravelling so quickly here in the end. Big, pivotal beats failed to resonate without sufficient room to breathe. I went into the week hoping to give Locke & Key it's first Pick of the Week nod, but when I finished the issue I found myself disappointed in the book for perhaps the first time. I'm still very excited for he next and final issue though.
cav says:
Great show guys! Not that your shows were ever bad, but you seem revitalized coming out of scaling back the site. I look forward to the new segments you teased 🙂
Locke & Key and The Walking Dead in the same episode. Excellent.
I enjoyed Locke & Key. It agree that it moved very quickly, but it still worked for me.
I agree that Kirkman REALLY likes writing Negan. Which is cool, because I'm enjoying the character. If only he said "fuck" more often.
ArKay says:
For the record, Batman #23.2 ("Riddler #1") is NOT a One Shot, how could it be?
It says "To Be Continued in Batman #25: Zero Year " on the last page. Whoever said that probably hasn't really read the issue.
I said that and I did read the issue but the "To Be Continued" bit seems more like a general "The Riddler will meet Batman again in Batman #25" kind of TBC. It's not like the story is going to continue in that issue. This issue takes place "Now" during FOREVER EVIL with Batman supposedly "dead", not in the past with "Zero Year". It's still basically a Riddler one-shot that is unconnected to anything else.
Guess it was a Zero Year story after all? 🙂
No? It takes pace during FOREVER EVIL.
Batman #25:
BATMAN: ZERO YEAR reaches a new level as The Riddler sends Gotham City into total darkness! "Dark City" begins in this issue that features an embossed cover.And the ZERO YEAR blackout spreads into other titles this month, affecting heroes across the DC Universe!
seanxxo says:
I'm glad Smallville is being talked aboutt. This Wonder Woman arc has been fantastic and i really like the art.
I've been enjoying the book all the way through but this has definitely been one of the stronger arcs. I think a lot of that has to do with the art being so consistently strong. I wish the art had been this consistently good on the Batman arc.
I definitely agree with your comments on the art. As for the writing the only arc I wasn't overly keen on was the very first (Guardian I think?) other than that I'd say that story wise this is one of the best written superman books right now, which considering that we have books like Adventures of Superman, superman /batman and superman unchained makes me very happy.
BC1 says:
On villains crossing over: If you look at Marvel, this happens a lot. Go back to ASM #600 (the first of months-to-live Doc Ock) and you'll see Ock getting pummeled by a lot of different heroes (Iron Man, Cap, Spider-Man). Magneto did appear in Avengers from time to time, mainly because of Wanda and Pietro. One of Doom's best stories involves him going back to the Arthurian age with Iron Man. More recently, Mole Man, the FIRST FF villain, was in Daredevil, and The Hand (who've been villains in X-Men and Daredevil) were working for Kingpin in Shadowland. The second arc of Bendis' Mighty Avengers had them taking on an invasion of Venom symbiotes. The Intelligencia from Red Hulk was made up of Hulk and FF villains. AIM is getting a lot of cross-over too; they've been Hulk villains, and now they're tangling with the Avengers and the FF. Plus, there's always "Acts of Vengeance" if you want a concentrated dose of this.
It's less common at DC because of: a) the iconic matchups; and b) the repeat archetypes. Mr. Freeze wouldn't likely be paired with Flash, because you have Captain Cold for that. Zod wouldn't take on Batman because he wouldn't care, unless Batman pissed him off enough. Luthor's the only one that really sticks out as a possible cross-over villain (Batman: No Man's Land is a good example of this), but most of the time when that happens it's a Justice League story and Superman is still involved.
I was thinking the same thing, Marvel seems to have villains cross over a lot more than DC. I think to add on to what you have above, another reason it works better in Marvel is because just about everyone is in New York City, and not spread out across other cities like in the DC Universe. The Kingpin is a great example as he's pretty much split between Daredevil and Spider-man because he runs the crime in NYC.
That's true, I hadn't thought about the geographic aspect. Though, one of my favorite examples of villains crossing over was in the 90's X-Men book – the X-Men were either in Madripoor or Hong Kong with Shang Chi, and the big bad was a "resurrected" Kingpin. Not the kind of thing you expect in an X-Men book, which is what made it more fun.
BionicDave says:
I so loved Luthor vs. Batman/Bruce during (and after) No Man's Land! In some ways, I loved it more than any Luthor vs. Superman stories that had been published in the recent past before that. Just great stuff, and I can't help but think some of it might inform the Luthor/Batman clashes in the upcoming 'Batman vs. Superman' movie.
As for why villains don't cross over so much… I think another concern from editors is that it might weaken the image of their superhero. Let's say I read Hero A's title every month, where I see him constantly vexed by his archnemesis – only to see that same bad guy easily stomped and imprisoned in a one-off over in Hero B's title – then it kind of makes Hero A look incompetent.
Actually, I think that gets to Paul's example of Flash vs. Joker – villains are often created with their protagonist in mind, so of course a different hero could likely smash them easily. That's probably why Marvel villains can cross over more easily, since they usually are more universal character types.
I can't believe there was no joke about Vader saying "WHAT?!" in that discussion.
We blew it, and I apologize.
colossusofrhodeisland says:
The first thing I thought about with regards to the "villain cross-over" question was the Acts of Vengeance storyline from the late '80s/early 90s, not sure how many people read it, but the whole point was that villains would fight heroes they never fought before. Haven't read it since then, but I'm kind of surprised marvel's never done Act of Vengeance 2 (or Atlantic Attacks 2, for that matter).
"Acts of Vengeance" is a great example.
I'm really partial to "The Day Death Died!" in THE AVENGERS ANNUAL #16 from 1987. It's one of mya ll-time favorite single issues.
http://comicbookdb.com/issue.php?ID=10132
I know that strictly speaking it wasn't just resurrected villains fighting the The Avengers but it did feature unusual pairings and it blew my 10 year old mind. (Especially with Bucky showing up.)
J-Nel says:
Great show as always, but I really perked up when Paul mentioned a "Batman: Year 100" Booksplode. Can't wait to hear all your thoughts and just reread it (for the 5th time) in preparation.
TomiH says:
Regarding the swapping-villains idea (which I love), sometimes it even benefits the new hero as is the case for Daredevil and Kingpin. Fisk works so much better against Matt Murdock than he ever did in Spider-man. And as far as I'm concerned, I prefer Norman Osborn as an Iron Man villain as seen in the "World's Most Wanted" arc during the underrated (IMO) Dark Reign age. Lex Luthor vs Bruce Wayne works amazingly well too, as does Dr. Doom and Iron Man (Doomquest) and Dr. Doom and Dr. Strange (Triumph and Torment).
I could go on, so I will.
Red Skull vs Magneto (there is so much potential here for more stories beyond what was in Acts of Vengeance)
Thor vs Galactus
Hulk vs Juggernaut