Young Avengers Omnibus by Allan Heinberg, Jim Cheung, et al., Part One

For Christmas, my wife got me the two Loki Modern Era Epic Collections from Marvel, which collect Kieron Gillen's acclaimed run on Journey into Mystery. I already owned Gillen's Thor run, so I was going to read those three collections, and then go from them into Gillen and Jamie McKelvie's Young Avengers run, where Loki appears as well; I've had the omnibus of it since it came out in 2015, but never gotten around to it. 

But I didn't want to read the second Young Avengers without doing the first; I borrowed part of that from the library way back when and enjoyed it a lot, and have always intended to pick up a complete collection of it. And if I was going to read both Young Avenger runs, which feature the Kate Bishop Hawkeye, surely this was the time to read both the Matt Fraction/David Aja and Kelly Thompson/Leonardo Romero runs on Hawkeye, both of which I've long been interested in!

So what soon emerged was one of my characteristically long and complicated comics reading projects, which will take in stories featuring the Young Avengers, Loki, and Hawkeye from Young Avengers vol. 1 (2005-06) to Hawkeye: Kate Bishop (2022), with fourteen stops along the way. The first of those is the first half of the omnibus of the original Allan Heinberg/Jim Cheung Young Avengers run:

Young Avengers by Heinberg & Cheung

stories from Young Avengers vol. 1 #1-12, Young Avengers Special #1, and Civil War: Young Avengers & Runaways #1-4

Collection published: 2022
Contents originally published: 2005-06
Acquired: June 2025
Read: July 2025

Writers: Allan Heinberg, Zeb Wells

Pencilers: Jim Cheung, Andrea Di Vito, Michael Gaydos, Gene Ha, Jae Lee, Bill Sienkiewicz, Pasqual Ferry, Stefano Caselli

Inkers: John Dell with Drew Geraci and Dave Meikis, Drew Hennessy, Andrea Di Vito, Michael Gaydos, Gene Ha, Jae Lee, Bill Sienkiewicz, Pasqual Ferry, Jim Cheung, Rob Stull & Dexter Vines, Jay Leisten, Matt Ryan, Jaime Mendoza, Livesay, Mark Morales, Stefano Caselli

Colorists: Justin Ponsor, José Vilarrubia, Art Lyon, June Chung, Dave McCaig, Daniele Rudoni

Letterer: Cory Petit

The first thirteen issues here are the original twelve-issue run of Young Avengers plus the Young Avengers Special, which are entirely written by Allan Heinberg and mostly illustrated by Jim Cheung (he pencils everything but #7-8 and the special). I think it's a masterclass in how to set up a bunch of a new characters in a preexisting universe and instantly get the reader to actually care about them. The opening six-issue story is about the Avengers (who have been disbanded at this point in time) discovering the teenagers the press has dubbed the "Young Avengers" are running around and deciding to stop them; specifically, the story focuses on Captain America, Iron Man, and Jessica Jones. We discover the mystery of the Young Avengers along with them, as they uncover who these characters are—Patriot, Iron Lad, Hulkling, and Asgardian (later "Wiccan")—and then as two more end up joining the team—Hawkeye and Stature. 

As "Young Avengers," I think Heinberg and Cheung were particularly clever about their backstories because mostly, they are not obviously linked to whom they seem to be linked. Hulkling isn't a mini-Hulk but a shapeshifter (we find out in a later story arc that he's half-Skrull); Wiccan isn't actually an Asgardian but a sorcerer; Iron Lad looks like Iron Man but is actually using the futuristic technology of Kang the Conquerer. At first it seems like only Patriot is who he seems to be, the grandson of Isiah Bradley, the original, black Captain America, but we even eventually discover that his powers don't have anything to do with his grandfather. (When I first read this story, by the way, I had never read Truth: Red, White & Black, so rereading having done so gave me a lot of helpful context. There's even a brief mention of Josiah X from The Crew, who is Patriot's uncle.)

Not pictured: the Crew callback. You can't say Allan Heinberg doesn't love his Marvel universe, but I really appreciate that he loves all of it, not just the stuff he would have read as a kid.
from Young Avengers vol. 1 #3 (script by Allan Heinberg, art by Jim Cheung & John Dell)

But the characters aren't just successful in continuity terms—otherwise I don't think Young Avengers would have become the long-lasting series it is. Rather, every one of them leaps off the page as people with personalities. Patriot's earnestness but also lack of self-confidence, Iron Lad's determination not to fulfill his destiny, Hawkeye's playfulness and authority, Stature's lack of confidence, and so on. I basically loved all the characters right away, though I particularly liked Hawkeye, Stature, and Patriot. Patriot (Eli Bradley) I've discussed already, but I do like his determination to overcome his own powerlessness (even if I am a bit skeptical to the decision to make the one black character the one who is using drugs!) and do the right thing. 

Kate Bishop as Hawkeye is fun right from the off: powerless like Patriot, but unlike him, confident in her abilities, taking down bad guys in the middle of her sister's wedding while wearing a bridesmaid's outfit and deciding to become a superhero right there on the spur of the moment. You can see why she became a breakout success.

I like that it's the two team members who joined late to keep the team going after Iron Lad "quits"; it's a nice touch.
from Young Avengers vol. 1 #6 (script by Allan Heinberg, art by Jim Cheung & John Dell, with Dave Meikis & Jay Leisten)

I also really like Cassie Lang as Stature. She's the daughter of Ant-Man, and she aspires to heroism, but has spent her childhood largely isolated from her (dead) father, with a mother who wants her away from that life, and a cop stepfather who still sees her dad as the criminal he used to be. Like her father, she can control her size, shrinking and growing; it's the kind of on-the-nose metaphor that works so perfectly in superhero comics, that makes them what they are: this girl who feels like she's nothing can literally become nothing, but can also finally make herself seen.

I like Iron Lad a lot, which makes it a shame that the very nature of the character basically makes it impossible to use him in any stories other than his first one.
from Young Avengers vol. 1 #5 (script by Allan Heinberg, art by Jim Cheung & John Dell)

This first six issues are a single story, "Sidekicks," about the Young Avengers coming together and trying to avert Iron Lad's future as Kang the Conqueror. It's a great story, about what we have to do to avoid becoming who we're afraid we might be, and how sometimes we have to take steps we thought we never could. Cheung is a great artist, able to do action and character. I'm surprised he hasn't done more big stories than this, he seems like he ought to be one of the greats. (Maybe I'm wrong and he has.) Justin Ponsor also does great stuff on colors, manipulating tone and atmosphere effectively—the story is bright when it needs to be, gloomy when it needs to be, and he brings out the facial details really well.

The weak part in the first twelve issues is thus, not surprisingly, the second story illustrated by Andrea Di Vito, "Secret Identities": he just doesn't have Cheung's command of character in a story that really needs it. Other than that, the story is fine; this is where we learn that Patriot didn't really inherit anything from his grandfather, but rather is using "mutant growth hormone" to give himself powers. But he also learns that he can be strong without it.

I miss Jessica Jones. Maybe I should have added my unread Alias Omnibus to this project? ...no, cut it out!
from Young Avengers Special #1 (script by Allan Heinberg, art by Michael Gaydos)

After this is the Young Avengers Special, where Jessica Jones interviews all the Young Avengers; we get a frame story illustrated by Jessica's co-creator, Michael Gaydos, and then short flashback tales for each of the Young Avengers by a variety of artists, including greats like Gene Ha and Bill Sienkiewicz. They're small but strong moments, deepening our understanding of these great characters.

Then comes the final story of volume 1, "Family Matters," where the Super-Skrull comes looking for Hulkling... because it turns out that Hulkling (Teddy Altman) is half-Skrull, half-Kree, and the rightful emperor of the Skrulls! It's a good set-up for a story, but I found the death of Teddy's mother an overly gratuitous moment that seems ultimately self-defeating: surely there was good drama to be mined from the revelations here, and surely this is a kind of trauma the series ultimately won't be able to cope with; it'll just be downplayed unrealistically. Dude saw his mother burnt to death right in front of him!

Surprisingly optimistic takeaway for a kid whose mother was just brutally murdered hours earlier. He's weirdly chummy with the Super-Skrull!
from Young Avengers vol. 1 #11 (script by Allan Heinberg, art by Jim Cheung & John Dell, with Jay Leisten, Jamie Mendoza, & Livesay)

This is also the story that introduces "Speed," Tommy Shepherd, who is apparently the twin brother of Wiccan (Billy Kaplan) despite different parents—both the lost souls of the children of Scarlet Witch and Vision from some storyline I've never read. As I've indicated, the series is deeply embedded in the mythos of the Marvel universe all long, but this is probably the point where it got a bit too complicated for me; there's a lot to keep up with. I wasn't too sure about Speed as a person, either; a bit too nasty for what I like in a superhero comic. He feels like a Geoff Johns creation, and that's not a compliment. 

If there is a flaw in the opening twelve issues, it's that—as you can tell from my summaries—that they're all bound up in the mythologies of the characters themselves. The stories are about Iron Lad's history, Patriot's history, Hulking's history, and clearly building toward something about Wiccan and Speed's history. This is all fine in isolation, but it stops Young Avengers from feeling like it has an ongoing premise. What are these characters trying to do when they're not dealing with their own backstories? What good are they accomplishing in the world? That's what I like to see in my superhero comics, and it's not here. This feels more like a movie, not a premise for an ongoing comic book. As John Seavey says, good superhero concepts should be "storytelling engines," but the Young Avengers don't have one yet... even if I think they could.

Oddly, then, it's up to a totally different creative team to try to come up with one. The last story I read was the Young Avengers tie-in to the Civil War event, which was a crossover with Runaways. This is written by Zeb Wells and illustrated by Stefano Caselli. Civil War was about an attempt by the government to create a superhero registry; some superheroes were opposed (led by Captain America), some on board (led by Iron Man). The Young Avengers are opposed, but Cap won't let them get into action because they're still young and untrained. The government is rounding up unregistered superheroes, and when the Young Avengers hear that the "Runaways" have been targeted, they spring into action.

I haven't read Runaways, but the basic premise is explained here: they're kids that discovered their parents were members of a supervillain group called "the Pride" and, well, ran away. They don't want to be heroes or villains, they just want to be left alone. Unfortunately, the events of Civil War means they can't be. Of course, when they first meet the Young Avengers, there's friction, but the two groups soon learn to work together to escape the threat of a government that's gone too far. There are some interesting connections between the groups; for example, the Runaways have their own Super-Skrull who is at first excited and then disappointed to learn that Hulkling is his prince, but refuses to embrace his destiny.

Whoops.
from Civil War: Young Avengers & Runaways #3 (script by Zeb Wells, art by Stefano Caselli)

As an introduction to an ongoing storytelling engine for the Young Avengers, Wells does a good job. Here they are not dealing with their own backstories, but they are earnest, inexperienced do-gooders, eager to help, especially help people they think are like themselves. As they learn, they are different from the Runaways; the Runaways don't want to help others, they just want to stay out of trouble. As the first person to write the Young Avengers other than Heinberg, he has a good handle on their characters. They're not really taken further here, but they all get good moments and feel true to themselves. I was surprised to particularly like how he writes Speed, who has a charming big-brother relationship with Molly, the youngest of the Runaways.

Just two juvenile delinquents having fun together.
from Civil War: Young Avengers & Runaways #3 (script by Zeb Wells, art by Stefano Caselli)

Unfortunately, I didn't care for the art of Stefano Caselli; I don't know if I could quite explain why, but it has a vibe I associate with mid-2000s DeviantArt that is just not my style, and it leans into the grotesque a lot. Probably the dark, murky coloring from Danille Rudoni doesn't help; it's often hard to see what's actually happening.

Still, I had kind of expected the first non-Heinberg/Cheung Young Avengers tale to be bad, and this isn't bad at all. Indeed, it made me think I should have included Runaways to this series of posts... but no, it's long enough, and I don't want to move backwards anyway. It looks like Marvel did a four-volume "Complete Collection" series of trade paperbacks; this story is collected in volume three. Someday I'll go back and read the previous fortysomething issues so I can get the full context... but not today, I have enough going on right now!

This is the first in a series of posts about the Young Avengers, Loki, and Hawkeye. The next installment covers Young Avengers Presents.

Faster than a DC Bullet: Gotham Central, Part Ø: Batman: Gordon of Gotham

Before plunging into my next comics project, I want to cycle back to some old ones and read some books related to them that have come out since then. The first of these is Gotham Central, which I read over five years ago now.

Comic trade paperback, n.pag.
Published 2014 (contents: 1996-98)
Borrowed from the library
Read March 2016

Batman: Gordon of Gotham

Writers: Chuck Dixon, Dennis O'Neil
Artists: Klaus Janson, Jim Aparo, Bill Sienkiewicz, Dick Giordano
Colorists: Kevin Somers, Ian Laughlin, Pam Rambo, Jamison

Letterers: John Costanza, Clem Robins

This book collects three four-issue miniseries that feature Commissioner Gordon and/or the Gotham City Police Department; it's a precursor of sorts to Gotham Central, though I am pretty sure that the only main character here who is also a main character there is the ubiquitous Renee Montoya. Each of the stories here has a slightly different focus.

"Gordon's Law" is pretty squarely focused on Commissioner Gordon himself, as he discovers that there's possibly some corruption in the GCPD, which means he can't trust anyone on the force-- and to make things worse, he only wants cops to go after cops, which means he rejects Batman's offer of assistance as well. The story is kinda complicated; there are a lot of characters, and most of them were new to me (if not new to everyone), and though I really like the gritty tone established by Klaus Janson's artwork, he didn't always make it easy to remember who was who. Its biggest weakness is probably that it's one of those stories where tons of "old friends" we've never seen before turn up, and the narrative expects us to be surprised when an "old friend" we've never seen before turns out to not be altogether trustworthy. And that's not the only obvious twist, but there were some good ones as well. Overall, it's an okay tale: some good crime fiction influences, but it doesn't really have anything to say about Gordon, about the GCPD, or about Batman.

I love how sleazy/creepy the face of this guy (he's an informant) looks.
from Batman: Gordon's Law #1 (script by Chuck Dixon, art by Klaus Janson)

"GCPD" is the most like Gotham Central of all the stories here; the commissioner is just a minor part of a sprawling, ensemble tale of various members of the GCPD pursuing various cases. Harvey Bullock struggled with anger management, a new partner, and a serial killer; Renee Montoya goes undercover as a diplomat's wife to help catch an assassin; two cops named Kitch (a trained lawyer) and Cav (a grizzled old vet) track down art thieves and an insurance same; an administrator named Hendricks tries to figure out who's stealing stationery. As you might imagine, some of these stories are better than others: I always enjoy a Montoya tale, but Chuck Dixon doesn't really her very unique, and the circumstance she ends up in seems incredibly contrived to say the least. (Do local cops really handle assassination plots against foreign officials? Would there really be no plan for cancelling the operation when it all goes wrong and the diplomat deliberately endangers Montoya's life?) On the other hand, I did enjoy the Harvey Bullock plot. This was my first real exposure to the character (he was retired during Gotham Central), and he gets to do some good old-fashioned investigating that shows off his intelligence as well as his human side, and I liked his contentious relationship with his new partner.

Jim Aparo just can't resist giving Gordon that dandyesque mustache curl, though.
from Batman: GCPD #3 (script by Chuck Dixon, art by Jim Aparo & Bill Sienkiewicz)

The Kitch/Cav plot had its moments, but some of its beats were very familiar. Is the lawyer-turned-cop who is mocked for his education by the cops and for his slumming it by the lawyers, and flirts with going back to law only to be reminded that lawyers are corrupt, a thing? I am pretty sure I read this exact story last year in Fort Freak. I liked Cav, though. The best character of all, however, was Hendricks: of course a desk officer grimly determined to catch an office supplies thief in the fact of mockery from his colleagues was my fave. The law begins and ends with him! I've previously struggled with Jim Aparo art on stories of the "gritty" type, but to my surprise, he paired really well with Bill Sienkiewicz on inks: Aparo does great figures and great storytelling, but Sienkiewicz's rough inks add the right tone for an urban cop story. Best art in the book.

CHILL OUT JIM!
from Batman: Gordon of Gotham #1 (script by Dennis O'Neil, art by Dick Giordano & Klaus Janson)

"Gordon of Gotham" is even less about the GCPD than "Gordon's Law," as it's mostly a present-day Gordon telling Batman about his last year as a Chicago cop, leading into the events of Batman: Year One. As anyone who read my review of that story would know, I love Jim Gordon, and Dennis O'Neil really captures what it is that I like about him. Gordon is just a man trying to do the right thing in a world that will never reward him for it, because it is a world that needs Batman. Gordon argues with his wife (there's a callback to his struggle with domestic violence from Night Cries, another quality Jim Gordon tale), but ends up stopping a diner holdup almost by accident, then decides to go after corruption, but the world itself is corrupt, and he quickly gets in deeply over his head and ends up making choices that violate his moral core... or so he had thought. O'Neil piles on the twists and the action in a compelling way, and I really liked how this set us up for the  Gordon on Year One, down to his decision to grow a mustache. The only real weakness is the frame; I wonder why they didn't just do this story in pure flashback.

I didn't quite buy that everyone would recognize a "hero cop" so readily, but I guess more people watched local tv news back in the 1980s.
from Batman: Gordon of Gotham #1 (script by Dennis O'Neil, art by Dick Giordano & Klaus Janson)

Next Week: And now I'll be catching up on the expanded universe of The Sandman, beginning with the long-delayed collected edition of The Children's Crusade, Free Country!

Review: The Starman Omnibus, Volume Six by James Robinson with David S. Goyer

Comic hardcover, n.pag.
Published 2011 (contents: 2000-10)
Acquired January 2011
Read December 2013

The Starman Omnibus, Volume Six

Writer: James Robinson
Artist: Peter Snejbjerg
Colorist: Gregory Wright
Letterer: Bill Oakley
Co-Story on "1951": David S. Goyer
Additional Artists: Paul Smith, Russ Heath, Fernando Dagnino & Bill Sienkiewicz
Additional Colorist: Matt Hollingsworth
Additional Letterer: John J. Hill

Typing out the list of credits, one immediately notices that this is the most artistically consistent volume of Starman thus far. I liked Tony Harris, but there's something to be said for a unified artistic vision-- only three fill-ins! Peter Snejbjerg is on fine form, too; now that he's inking himself, his artwork looks utterly magnificent. There's a real darkness to it that's utterly perfect for Opal City and the story's climax.

And what a climax. I've said it before, but the thing that will always make the "comic book" superior to the "graphic novel" is its ability to weave a number of number of smaller stories into one huge one. It's the reason why Preludes and Nocturnes and The Doll's House were okay but Brief Lives and The Kindly Ones are magnificent; they build on what has gone before. So too does this volume, as almost all of the various heroes we've seen throughout the series come together against the worst threat that Opal City has ever seen-- apparently the Shade gone evil. It's absolutely perfect in every way. I initially felt a little disappointed that at times Jack seems like a bystander in his own story, but emotionally, he's always the center of this, especially that heartrending, amazing climax. What a way to go.

The "1951" story that follows this up is necessary, but less effective; I felt that learning who the Starman of 1951 had been would have been better if it had been the same person all along, not one person most of time and another for just a month. But seeing the young, distraught Ted Knight is touching and fitting.

Starman has been an interesting journey, with highs and lows. You can see its creators grow across it-- compare Robinson's deft plotting here to the jumpiness of Volume One-- and its characters, too. It has the occasional misstep, but it's a rewarding read through and through.

Faster than a DC Bullet: The Sandman Spin-Offs, Part XVII: Endless Nights

Comic hardcover, 152 pages
Published 2003
Borrowed from the library
Read August 2012

The Sandman: Endless Nights

Written by: Neil Gaiman

Lettered by: Todd Klein

Neil Gaiman's triumphal return to The Sandman is a series of seven short stories, each one covering a different member of the Endless, those squabbling anthropomorphic personifications who exist beyond gods and time. Each one is drawn by a different artist, and they take place across a whole range of times.

Death: "Death and Venice"

Artist: P. Craig Russell

Colorist/Separator: Lovern Kindzierski

I'd actually read this story before, in The Absolute Death. You bet I love any chance to experience P. Craig Russell's glorious art, and it's as sharp and clean here as ever. He draws Death at her absolute prettiest, and that's how I prefer her. The story has its moments-- many of them, in fact-- but somehow never fully engages me. I'd nearly completely forgotten it until I reread it, except for the dancing paper men, and though that's not super-important, it's not a bad thing to remember, either.

Desire: "What I've tasted of Desire"

Artist: Milo Manara

This is about a Celtic village in the pre-Roman period, or something like that anyway, where a woman gains the power of Desire in order to make a man want her. Unexpected craziness ensues. Like before, there are some very great moments, but I'm not sure what they're all in aid of. Milo Manara's art looks like he's been tracing glamour models: every woman has big pouty lips, has long perfect legs, and is always on the verge of showing her ass if she leans over just a little bit more in that short skirt. It turns "desire" into something crass, which is against the whole idea here.

Dream: "The Heart of a Star"

Artist: Miguelanxo Prado

Though this story is about Dream, the character, it's not really about dreams. If anything it's more about Desire, the character, than "What I've tasted of Desire" was! Set near the beginning of the universe, this story shows Dream bringing his girlfriend Killalla of the Glow to a party with a number of the Endless in attendance. It's supposed to explain the antipathy between Dream and Desire, but it doesn't really. At the beginning of story, Dream has some super-exposition dialogue about how much he loves Desire, then Desire betrays him. We neither see the friendship between them nor understand the motive for betrayal.

There are some awesome ideas here, though, playing with the toys of the DC universe in a way that The Sandman has avoided for a long time, but what works about the story has little to do with Dream or dreams, as we understand neither better at its end.

Despair: "Fifteen Portraits of Despair"

Artist: Barron Storey
Designer: Dave McKean

This is not a comic story, but a series of collages, words overlaid on text, about people in moments of despair. You feel depressed and anguished after reading these things; they're definitely the best and most appropriate stories in the book.

Delirium: "Going Inside"

Artist: Bill Sienkiewicz

A number of delirious people are recruited for a mission by Daniel, the second Dream. Bill Sienkiewicz's art really captures the art and the concept, and though the ending doesn't make any sense, it's hard to imagine how a story about Delirium could. Matthew the Raven puts in a brief appearance, which is always nice. I think by the time this was published he had died in The Dreaming. Oh, and Barnabas is here, too. I like him. This story is clearly a fragment of a larger picture, one we'll probably never see, but it's probably better that way.

Destruction: "On the Peninsula"

Artist: Glenn Fabry

This one-- about an archaeologist digging up artifacts from the future-- is a nice little story. Probably my second-favorite in the book. A simple, personal story, and we get good appearances from Destruction and Delirium, picking up right from the previous story, in fact.

Destiny: "Endless Nights"

Artist: Frank Quitely

The art by Frank Quitely is of course very nice, but it's not a story. More a kind of poem maybe? Destiny: A Chronicle of Deaths Foretold was pretty pointless, so maybe it's for the best that there's no attempt to use Destiny as the key character in a story.


I wanted to like this book more than I did. Most of the art is top-notch, and the imagery and ideas are great. But as I often find with Neil Gaiman, there's a noticeable gap between the story we did get and the story we could have gotten. These things could stand to be in focus a little bit more. Though, I suppose that if they were, he wouldn't be Neil Gaiman anymore.

Faster than a DC Bullet: The End of Green Arrow, Part I: Green Arrow and Black Canary: Five Stages

Comic trade paperback, n.pag.
Published 2010 (contents: 2010)
Borrowed from the library
Read May 2012

Green Arrow and Black Canary: Five Stages

Writers: Andrew Kreisberg / J. T. Krul

Pencillers: Mike Norton / Renato Guedes / Diogenes Neves

Inkers: Bill Sienkiewicz / José Wilson Magalhães / Ruy José / Vicente Cifuentes
Colorists: David Baron / David Curiel / Chuck Pires
Letterer: Sal Cipriano

From May 2009 to April 2010, I worked my way through every Green Arrow trade paperback and collection ever published, the first time I had ever done so with a comic book character, but something I would go on to do with Gotham Central, Y: The Last Man, Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane, and Jessica Jones, and am still doing with the Sandman. In August 2010, I popped back in for another Green Arrow story that had been published since that April, but since then five more have been published, and not only that, but those five represent the last gasp of the character as I know him, as he was completely rebooted by DC last year. So here it comes: The End of Green Arrow...

I never warmed to Andrew Kreisberg's Green Arrow and Black Canary-- he penned two previous volumes, Enemies List and Big Game. Part of what alienated me was that he sidelined Black Canary in what was theoretically 50% her own title; part was that his new villain Cupid was just pathetic. So I went into Five Stages expecting to be disappointed, and to my surprise, found that Kreisberg's last volume is his best. Not that that takes much. Cupid gets a backstory, and we find out that she's not a random housewife with a Green Arrow fixation, but a trained military operative who snapped on a mission. Though dressing men up as Green Arrow and raping them is still perhaps more than I want to read about, this went a long way to making her work more for me. Especially nice was a set of flashback stories about Cupid's days with COBALT, drawn by Renato Guedes, who has a nice clean style-- I liked it a lot more than Mike Norton's scratchy work on the main title.

It's also nice to see Green Arrow, Black Canary, and Mia working together as a proper team, though this must be the third time in the course of this series that Green Arrow and Black Canary have renewed their commitment to one another despite Ollie's dickishness. (They seem to do it once per writer.) There's some pleasing banter (I like it when Green Arrow put on his "Robin Hood" cap), and they seem to actually all like another. Still no Connor Hawke, though.

It's not all good. There's a lot of generic superhero quipping, which gets on my nerves. "I hope you fellas don't think me unpatriotic," says Black Canary as she kicks some COBALT goons, "but for all I know... you're not my army." Um, what? Who says that?

The worst part of this book is when Lieutenant Hilton, the Star City Police Department cop who has liased with Green Arrow throughout this storyline, gets a knife in the back of his head. At first I was bummed, because he was a likable character, and Green Arrow and Black Canary could really use a recurring cast. But he's not dead! Somehow he's still alive... but if the knife's taken out, he'll die?

what is this i don't even

But it gets worse from there-- the doctors send Hilton home from the hospital with the entire knife still in his head, not even cutting off the hilt and putting a bandage over the whole thing. Then he kills his family and some cops and renames himself... The Hilt. Ugh, really? Who does that? Why do something so implausibly stupid to a decent character? Especially since this was Kreisberg's last issue on the title-- unsurprisingly, the Hilt never made another appearance. Thank God.

I can't in good conscience recommend that someone read any of Kreisberg's run on Green Arrow and Black Canary, but if you read the first two, at least continue on to this last volume, since it's the least bad one.

The proper story of Five Stages ends with Hal Jordan summoning Ollie and Dinah up to the Justice League headquarters to lead into the events of Cry for Justice, but there's one last chapter, which actually takes place after (most of) Cry for Justice, during Blackest Night. Written by J. T. Krul, it sees Oliver as a Black Lantern. Maybe all this would be interesting if I'd read Blackest Night, but I haven't. At least Connor is in it.

Faster than a DC Bullet: Jessica Jones, Part I: Alias: Ultimate Collection, Book 1

Comic trade paperback, n.pag.
Published 2009 (contents: 2001-02)
Borrowed from the library
Read March 2012

Alias: Ultimate Collection, Book 1

Writer: Brian Michael Bendis

Art: Michael Gaydos (with Bill Sienkiewicz, David Mack and Mark Bagley & Rodney Ramos)

Colors: Matt Hollingsworth
Letters: Richard Starkings & Wes Abbott, Oscar Gongora & Jason Levine

Not only have I read a lot of superhero stories by this point, I've read a lot of "deconstructions" of superhero stories, stories where the tropes of superhero stories are turned on their head in some way. Sometimes this is done to make a clever point (i.e., Watchmen), but sometimes you wonder why the writer bothered. "Oh, you've proved that it would suck to be a cop in a world full of superheroes. Congratulations, so has everyone else who's written this story."

What differentiates a good deconstruction from a bad one, I think, is doing more than simply subverting a genre convention, but understanding what a genre means. Alias is, thankfully, one such book. It stars Jessica Jones, a former superhero, now a private investigator, and her cases take her into the dark underbelly of the Marvel Universe, as she crosses paths with Daredevil, Captain America, Ms. Marvel, and J. Jonah Jameson. But why bother showing what the Marvel Universe would look like from this perspective?

What writer Brian Michael Bendis understands is that the superhero story is a power fantasy-- and Alias is a story about powerlessness. It tells the tales of people who were superheroes, or can't be superheroes, or have had brushes with superheroes, and contrasts the superheroes against their sheer inability to do anything whatsoever. Jessica Jones is a woman with low self-confidence who very rarely gets what she wants. Nothing can exacerbate the feeling that you can't control your own life like putting you next to people whose lives are magnificent. There are a few sequences in this book where Jessica tries to get in contact with the Avengers or the Fantastic Four, and she can't even get past the phone menu or the receptionists. She's completely powerless.

In her cases, she encounters a number of others trying to find power of various sorts: politicians, an ex-sidekick, a teenage runaway who might be a mutant. They're decent mysteries, but they're even better explorations of what it's like to amount to nothing, and what you might do to amount to something, anything. I particularly enjoyed the story where Jessica was trying to track down Rick Jones, who has been a sidekick to Captain Marvel, the Hulk, and Captain America at various times, which presented a very funny flip-side to the superhero archetype:

"This fucking guy doesn't shut up about the -- about the fucking -- what is it?"

"Kree..."

"Kree-Skull War. And I have no idea what the fuck a Kree-Skull War is! Some big space war and he saved the planet and shit."

And of course, we're all powerless, right? At least that's what Bendis convinces me of by the time that the first volume of Alias is over. He's used the superhero genre to say something interesting and with thematic depth, and though I like a story where Superman-2 fights the Anti-Monitor just as much as the next guy, I like this a whole lot, too.

Bendis is aided in his "deconstruction" by the excellent artwork of Michael Gaydos. I mean, serious excellent. Gaydos as a very realistic style, suited to a grounded story like this, but what's best of all is Gaydos's masterful command of facial expressions. You always know exactly how Jessica (and all the other characters) are thinking and feeling. The art and dialogue move slow at times; there are two-page spreads that include 34 panels, continuously flipping back and forth between two characters. You really feel immersed in a scene and a conversation.

There's a lot of nice, little touches too, and big ones. I like Jessica's not-quite-trusting relationship with Ms. Marvel, and her own "sidekick," and her brewing relationship with nt Man, and every line of dialogue spouted by J. Jonah Jameson (seriously, give that man his own series).

Not to mention that it is the only superhero comic I have ever read where someone sits on the toilet.

Faster than a DC Bullet: Project Star City, Part XXIV: Green Arrow and Black Canary: Big Game

Comic trade paperback, n.pag.
Published 2010 (contents: 2009-10)
Borrowed from the library
Read August 2010

Green Arrow and Black Canary: Big Game

Writer: Andrew Kreisberg
Pencillers: Mike Norton, Renato Guedes
Inkers: Joe Rubinstein, Bill Sienkiewicz, José Wilson Magalhães
Colorists: David Baron, David Curiel, Allen Passalaqua
Letterers: Sal Cipriano, Pat Brosseau

Enumerating everything that is wrong with Green Arrow and Black Canary at this point would take more time than I want to put into it. I'm not sure if this is better or worse than Judd Winick's run on the title.