The 5 Year Fix: Young Justice

Young Justice has been arresting animation that's been full of action from the word go. Brandon Vietti and Greg Weisman has put together an animation series that's an instant classic and is already one of the greatest shows ever produced. Each episode has been one homerun hit after the other giving every DC fan exactly what we want from each young titan; and some superfriend backup from the JLA. Which leads right into Alienated. I was a little sceptical of the 5 year jump, especially after Zatanna and Rocket had just been introduced. It was some things that hadn't been dealt with, the focus was moving away from the young justice team and it was a little to much JLA. Well.....all my doubts were put to rest.

The show opens up with Bumble Bee and Blue Beetle chasing a Krolotean. The alien escapes thru the sewers and joins Black Manta on a smaller version of the Manta sub. At home base Ms. Martian returns from the zeta team mission with zeta beam intel and the answers to the missing 16hrs of the seven JLA members that was brainwashed by Vandal Savage.

A disturbing development with Ms. Martian's mindreading abilities has been leaving Kroloteans slobbering vegetables, but it leads the teams to a secret island hideout. This is where it really gets good. The island is crawling with manta men and we get to see the Darkknight detective at his kick ass best. Black Manta is revealed as Kaldur'ahm, he opens up his own can of whoop ass on the team and as it looks like the manta men and Kroloteans might overrun our heroes, Superman and Kon-El burst in with Wonder Woman and Wonder girl to turn the tide.

This episode was so good I have to give a shout out to the director MelZweyer and the writer of this episode Kevin Hopps. They get the highest reconition for this one, the ep. had everything. Aquaman had a good showing,

 Nightwing and the Bat family show all kinds of coordinated muscle and finesse.
















  Aqualad's shrewed leadership and combat skills are on full display as well. But the show stopper was the confrontation between Kaldur and superboy, it  had a grown man jumping off of the sofa like a kid. To see his power progression and character growth amplified my interest in the show and DC as a whole. I always talk about how good Geoff Johns has done with Black Manta. Vietti and Weisman are right there with him running neck and neck making Black Manta into a top flight villain.

Kaldur has now taken his fathers mantle as the Black Manta, hopefully when he really sees the light and return to being a hero he'll come back with a new codename and Garth can become Aqualad.

Nightwing has jumped up the ranks on my favorites list. His smart and empathetic leadership added to his fighting and tactical skills are just ..... plus 10. Even as reluctant rivals Kaldur and Nightwing really don't want to hurt each other. Dick showed this by not ambushing him and trying to talk to his friend about the situation. Kaldur showed the same by not killing Kal-El and telling Nightwing exactly how long he had to evacuate the rest of the team so they wouldn't die in the explosion.

Alienated is tough guy awesomness.

Quantum Mechanix:

FIFTH CHAMBER

I'm a character driven kind of guy so my pull list reads like this; Aquaman, Batman, Black Panther, Blade, Hawkeye, IronFist, the Submariner, their spinoff books or books they frequent; toss in a Jedi here and a Green Lantern there and you got a dude that spends alot of damn money on comic books. Now with that being said the Bronze Tiger is one of those characters that I want to read about and he has no book (thanks DC). So here's the second wave of covers of a nine cover series.

fan Artist: Peter Temple

                                                                                                    These two covers are a repanel of fan art that someone at DC should really take a look at and consider what we like.  I plugged in the names of some artist and writer team ups that I enjoyed or would like to see together. When I read see Wakanda and Die from Jason Aaron I was hooked on phonics. His story telling is amazing.  At the bottom I had to give give it up to Jan Duursema. Her work on Legacy, Star Wars Republic and a battery of other projects makes me want to see if she could bring the force to BT vs Kobra.

Everybody knows what Scott Snyder is doing with the court of owls storyline and the team up of Palo and Loughridge speak for itself. Until cover 6. long live the Squad

new 52 mini series: Shadow Hunter

Bronze Tiger vs Lord Naga

The Suicide Squad's resident martial arts bad ass Benjamin Turner; AKA the Bronze Tiger gets his own nine cover mini series. Action, drama, intrigue and Animotion (new term/thanks Mr.Bagwell). BT squares off with Lord Naga, Kobras supreme cult leader and international terrorist. What's lord Naga's mo. technological sorcery, biological warfare, world wide espionage and more terror cells than zero's and one's. The United answer to the problem, release the Shadow of Death the Bronze Tiger.

If Geoff Johns, Ivan Reis and Joe Prado handled this book how do you think it would compare to the six new releases from DC?

Who do you think should be the cast and who should make cameos?

I would surely not do an origin in the series. A one shot would do the job.

This is the first three issues in order. Check out the whip, the Barbies don't have a chance (of escape). just to be clear

the Elementals: Wu-Xing 5 elements of Kung Fu

These are the top 5 fighters from the Marvel and DC Universe that represent the senior animal styles of Kung Fu and the 5 elemental forms known as the Wu-Xing. Each one of these warriors in comics or in writing have shown and do possess this fighting style and elemental power. Where did I pull the information from you ask? Jong Hap Mu Sool, List of martial arts around the world,  internet references, comics of these characters read thru the years, Kung Fu Gold theater and my own interpretation of what I see. Now, with that out the way, how does this Wu-Xing work?

Wu-Xing  Elements

Metal-which cuts                                    Metal collects water

Water-which flows                                 Water feeds wood

Wood-which splits                                   Wood feeds fire

Fire-which rises                                 Fire feeds earth

Earth-which contains                                    Earth births metal

And were all connected in the circle of life. On the real, I looked up and over all this stuff trying to figure out who was the top 10 fighters in comics.

I didn't forget

Wolverine, Blade, Deathstroke, Nightwing, Lady Shiva, Shang Chi, Daredevil bla bla bla. Everybody I just named been beat by the guys at the top or been beat by somebody that these guys beat the crap out of so they don't make the top 5 list. But I do want to here how you rank the top 10 in order and why?

Bruce Wayne: Batman / Metal         City: Gotham                                Snake style /  the Vibrating hand

Danny Rand: Iron Fist / Earth               City: New York                          Dragon style /  Iron Fist

T'Challa: Black Panther/Water City: Wakanda                  style Panther / Shadow Fang

Benjamin Turner: BronzeTiger / Fire  City:Central                                Tiger style / Invincible Armor

Steve Rodgers: Captain America Wood                City: New York Eagle style  /  Steel Talon 

Paradise Island: Nubia

Drop me off at this island with Nubia and you don't even need to come back.....matter of fact don't come back I'm straight! I guess you can see why/ so why is Nubia not back into DC continuity? It's 52 ways to relaunch ms Prince back into the books, more even. I'm not going to give you my why's. Just read the facts and on this one I really want to hear from the women of comics, movies and or reviews; especially  the Wonder Woman and Artemis fans.

At the height of Linda Carter's Wonder Woman television series, Nubia was to be introduced to the show. A mego or Barbie doll was also put together to go along with the series. Of course it didn't happen. This is a nice collectors item or toy. The four horsemen from DC Universe classics would be my maker of choice for a Nubia action figure. This would give the guys a way to get one too (just looking out).

Nubia is one of those characters that has everything. Backstory (needs to be updated though) A list connections, unique powers and weapons and a variety of different looks to build off of. So what's the problem? With vixen now being used goods in my eyes  http://betaisdead.blogspot.com/2011/02/black-superheroes-vixen.html Nubia could be the the Love interest of the Bronze Tiger in his own title (DC gives everybody else one) or team title (see TaskforceX/the other league)

Nty-way Wonder Woman should get an animated series and Nubia should get some damn exposure.

GEMINI

TASKFORCE X: covert ops network created to fill the void of the retired JSA.

It originally consisted of two branches, the domestic branch/Argent and the international branch the Suicide Squad. Those groups eventuality dissolved until Amanda Waller put together her own version of this team (legends mini series) utterly ruthless, totally expendable. And what you got was the kick ass regiment of killers from Ostranders celebrated run. Later Project Cadmus and Checkmate were added to TaskforceX. Cadmus as a high tech genetic and weapons research division  

 

And Checkmate the worldwide charterd metahuman monitoring force whos operatives are modelled after pieces of a chessboard. One King one Queen and several Bishops. The Bishops oversaw the Rooks behind the scenes while the Rooks planned missions and supervised the field agents the Knights and Knights support paws.  Now a new system is in place, the rule of two. Each superpowered or enhanced member in  the Royal Family must have an unpowered counterpart in the same position of power.

The name TaskforceX has become synonymous with the Suicide Squad. But TaskforceX is actually a trinity of one. The operatives that work on behest of the government are called TFX. And those operatives that are deployed by Amanda Waller are called the Suicide Squad. The third group that operates as the Suicide Squad are employed or loyal only to Waller which is the true TaskforceX.

I almost got a migraine trying to wrap my head around who or what is TaskforceX. So I give it to you guys to see if you could figure out the enigma that is Amanda Waller.

Justice League Atlantis

Right now Aquaman #7 has me excited about reading comics again.

The introduction of this new team of Atlantians that obviously operates outside of water and have their own distinctive power set is a magnificent builder to the Aquaman mythos.   

The story opens with Kahina being chased thru the jungle searching frantically for Ya'Wara to help, hide or fight with her against the merciless terror of Black Manta. At this point it's learned that Manta is hunting the members of the other league because they each hold an ancient relic of importance and in this we have our next story arch; a mystery that actually started with the defeat of the Trench. Aquaman also has a piece of the puzzle that he takes to Dr.Stephen Shin who unlocks a holographic message.

But before R2 can turn off the message, a portal burst open and a sexy amazon (Atlantian) jumps thru attacks Shin and Mera takes over the fight. This is where we see Ya'Wara use her version of mental telepathy to call her black panther for help.

Let me tell you something true believers. This is the action I've been waiting for. I put together a team and post that almost mirror this team and come to find out, I didn't have to. Geoff and his squad did it for me. In a minute Aquaman may find his way on the A list with Batman,Superman and GreenLatern. And Black Manta with the same A+..... beside Lex, Sinestro and the Joker.