[caption id=“attachment_380” align=“alignleft” width=“197” caption=“FF #13”] [/caption] Eric’s Book: Eric: After a week off for Christmas we’re back with another Comic POW! Dan: It’s too bad we didn’t have an F4 book this week. We could have had a Christmas vs. Chanukah-off! Eric: Indeed! Well, for my entry this week we revisit FF, which I selected for the very first POW! ...

[caption id=“attachment_359” align=“alignleft” width=“195” caption=“Batman and Robin #4”] [/caption] Batman and Robin #4 - The creative team hits their stride as a book I was once sure to drop and collect in trades starts becoming a book I can’t wait to read every month. This issue has Batman and Robin deal with escaping Nobody’s trap as well as Batman’s parenting issues. This run could end up becoming as groundbreaking as everyone says Grant Morrison’s Batman and Robin was. Batgirl #4 - Batgirl’s faceoff with The Mirror! Will she finally win or will it be one of those battles where he escapes at the end? Gail Simone does a good job writing an issue that really makes me feel that Barbara is in good hands. I just wish she’d finally answer whether or not she was Oracle Superboy #4 - Superboy continues to be a bit emo, but it’s fun to watch. I think kids of a certain age would identify with him and I enjoy shaking my head at him. He travels to NYC and has some “fun” there. I’m curious to see just how this first arc ends. [caption id=“attachment_361” align=“alignright” width=“197” caption=“Uncanny X-Force #18”] [/caption] ...

[caption id=“attachment_356” align=“aligncenter” width=“300” caption=“Happy Holidays from Marvel!”] [/caption] No POW! this week as Dan and I prepare for our holiday celebrations. Enjoy these images and we’ll see you next week! [caption id=“attachment_357” align=“aligncenter” width=“300” caption=“Happy Holidays from DC”] [/caption]

Sorry again for the late POW! [caption id=“attachment_336” align=“alignleft” width=“195” caption=“Batwoman #4”] [/caption] Eric’s Book Eric: In an interesting reversal I have decided to choose Batwoman #4 for my Comic POW! entry this week. While I haven’t hated Batwoman, it hadn’t really spoken to me that much for the first three issues. This issue, however, had everything. A powerful story, beautiful art (which the series has had since the beginning) and a shocking ending. Dan, I know you’ve been a huge fan of Batwoman - one of the few Bat-titles you actually enjoy. What’d you think of this issue? ...

We had some emergencies we had to tend to yesterday and so Dan and I weren’t able to work on the POW! I’m hoping to get it up later tonight or tomorrow at the latest.

[caption id="" align=“alignleft” width=“180” caption=“Swamp Thing #4 was about as gory as a comic book can get nowadays”] [/caption] Swamp Thing #4 - I’m sad that Paquette wasn’t on art duties this month, but that didn’t stop the book from being the prettiest of the week. Animal Man #4 - So grotesque all the time, but I’m intrigued with how this will tie in with Swamp Thing Avenging Spider-Man #2 - Fantastic pencils, inking, and colors plus a lot of humor makes for a good book Chew #22 - Speaking of humor…This book is the best series out there right now. Olive is a badass, guys. Moon Knight # 8 - I still really love Maleev’s art on this. It’s so gritty and messy, but spectacular nonetheless. X-23 #18 - I’m gonna miss this when it’s gone. Too bad Phil Noto isn’t still on it… ...

A fairly good week for my pull list. Lots of great comics rivaling The Defenders for this week’s POW! Most, if not all, of the links are out to Comic Vine. X-23 #18 Action Comics #4 - Grant Morrison goes back to a Golden Age (or is it a Silver Age?) story about Braniac bottling up various planets. In the original story it allowed Superman a way to go back home. We’ll see where Grant Morrison goes with it since he usually takes stuff from the old days and then gives it a twist. X-23 #18 - X-23’s attempts to keep the Richards kids continues to spiral out of control. We also get some great moments of emotional growth for X-23 that really make me sad that Marjorie Liu is losing this title. X-23’s remained emotionally stunted for years (decades?) in our real life timeline and Liu has really done great things with her! Amazing Spider-Man #675 - The Vulture arc ratchets up. I’m not 100% sure where things go from here, but it’s nice to see Spidey and Carlie able to work together in the service of fighting crime. X-Men Vol 3 #22 - The International action continues! Action!! A good guilty pleasure! X-Factor #228 ...

[caption id=“attachment_303” align=“alignleft” width=“197” caption=“The Defenders #1”] [/caption] Eric’s Book: Eric: For this week’s Comic POW! I’ve decided to go with one of Marvel’s new titles, The Defenders Dan: I’ve been pretty excited about this book myself thanks to the work its writer, Matt Fraction, did on Casanova. Eric: I was excited by the idea and the Marvel hype that it would look at some of the key foundations of the Marvel Universe. That type of stuff is always fun to me. Now this book, or at least this arc, is a continuation of events set into place by Fear Itself. I largely ignored Fear Itself because I don’t have infinite money and it only seemed to tangentially affect the books I follow, but I DID read Marvel’s one-shot a few weeks ago that previewed 2012 stuff and it had a prologue to this story. Actually, I think it had two prologues. I remember reading a story that described what’s going on with Hulk as well as a story that described Dr. Strange’s friend who he mentions on the fifth page of content. The Hulk prologue explained that this black creature you see on the second page is the result of some Fear Itself mystical-ness that represents the rage that even Hulk has been able to contain. ...

Dan and I have made posts like this every once in a while on our personal blogs. It’s fun to see what search terms people typed into Google, Bing, etc to get here. I went through and picked out some of the fun ones. Here they are, along with my comments. amazing spider-man #673 every page - I think what you’re looking for is to buy this comic at your local comic shop or maybe in the Marvel digital app white rabbit spider island - Was there a white rabbit easter egg in each of the Spider-Island issues or is this the name of some super hero? I’m actually very curious here! sex comics spider man - Hmm….maybe you want to search for Tijuana bibles? swamp thing comic tattoos - So is this a tattoo of a comic? I think that’d definitely be original - to have a tattoo that is the cover to a comic facial expressions of men - this is very generic. I wonder why I am ranked so highly for this in Google. mysterious swamp - I know it was our Swamp Thing POW! That led to this, but I wonder what this person was actually looking for. peter parker freak out - OK…. ultimate comics spider-man #4 download - again, I think you’re looking for the Marvel Comic App pow png comic - I wonder what this person was looking for. swamp - We can’t possibly rank THAT highly for the word “swamp”, can we? guy carlie - Is this someone looking for the guy version of Carlie? Like an alternate universe? spider man sex - Again with the Spidey-sex.

While I’m currently mostly focused on collecting the X-Men trades (because of the very complex storylines over all the involved characters), I decided to pick up the first two volumes of Brand New Day because they were in my local shop’s Buy Two, Get One Free hardcover section. Since it may be a while before I get Volume 3, 1 thought I’d take a look at how well these two volumes fit together within the larger arc of Brand New Day — especially since they were rotating writers at the time. It’s the first attempt at something I’ve been wanting to do here on CP! between POW! entries —go back and look at entire arcs and see how that changes how I view the individual issues. Well, let’s get started! ...