![]() Rude Operator - Witchdoctor E.P. Lieferzeit: 1 - 3 Werktage***. Rude Operator's dissonant intro on Witchdoctor synthesizes a half-time beat with jazz. Genre: DnB - Liquid| DnB - Vocal| DnB - Hip Hop / R&B. Und weitere Bootleg 2017-09-08. The Panties E.P.. As you can see from the cover, Harley Quinn is now so goddam popular that she gets to have her own crossover with Scooby-Doo, putting her in rather rarefied company (Previous DC super-people team-ups have included only the A-List of the DC Universe: Batman and Robin, Superman, Wonder Woman. 'I'm really an absolute stone fan of the Stones, and always have been. Their early shows were just shocking, absolutely riveting and stunning and moving and they changed my life completely.(The) Stones will always be the greatest for me. They epitomize British rock for me' - Pete Townshend 'I always admired them because I like their funky music and I like their style' - John Lennon 'They stole my music, but they gave me my name' - Muddy Waters 'Mick Jagger is the perfect pop star. He's rude, he's ugly attractive, he's brilliant. The Rolling Stones are the perfect pop group they don't give a shit' - Elton John 'The Rolling Stones are my life. If it wasn't for them, I would have been a soprano for real' - Steven Van Zandt, member of Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band 'The Rolling Stones are really fabulous' - Paul Simon 'The Rolling Stones are one of Britain's major cultural assets, who should be honored by the kingdom' - Allen Ginsberg, American poet, 1967. It is common currency that the Rolling Stones are fanatics and purveyors of blues and straight R&B/'50s rock and roll. But what is lesser known is their appreciation for other early rock and roll musical styles, especially soul music. The Stones appreciated and befriended many R&B/soul acts. They were fans of James Brown (he blew them away at the 1964 T.A.M.I. Concert), Otis Redding, Solomon Burke, Curtis Mayfield, Al Green, the Temptations, Smokey Robinson & the Miracles, Bobby Womack, and Arthur Alexander. Keith Richards loved Aretha Franklin. ![]() He produced her version of 'Jumpin' Jack Flash' and played guitar on it along with Ron Wood, said her voice was the greatest in rock music, and called her 'a national monument to America'. 'The Human Riff' also called Etta James' singing 'a voice from heaven and hell,' called Sam Cooke one of the Top 3 greatest rock singers of all time, was a big fan of reggae music (he loved Byron Lee, for example), and was an admirer of the Neville Brothers. Mick Jagger was clearly influenced by Joe Tex's and James Brown's stage performances, Wilson Pickett's wickedness, and especially Don Covay's singing style. Jagger also guest starred on the Jackson's 1984 single 'State of Shock,' which included Michael. The song was a #3 US and #14 UK smash. He also worked with Nile Rodgers of Chic and Dr. The legendary Billy Preston, who was significantly credited on a number of Beatles records, played on Sticky Fingers, Exile On Main St., Goats Head Soup, and It's Only Rock 'n Roll, among other records of theirs. Other R&B/soul veterans such as Shirley of Shirley & Lee sang backup on Exile On Main St, and Don Covay and Bobby Womack provided vocals to 'Harlem Shuffle.' R&B/Soul artists invited by the Rolling Stones for performances include Stevie Wonder in 1972, Etta James in 1978, the Meters in 1975 and 1976, Screamin' Jay Hawkins in 1981, the Commodores, and even reggae legends Black Uhuru. Big fans of Ike & Tina Turner, the Stones invited them on their tours in 1966 and 1969, and the duo proved to be serious onstage rivals. The Stones' early albums and live engagements were chockfull of R&B and soul covers. Their albums were peppered with soul influences, whether it was their Out of Our Heads LP or attempts at soul music with 'Long Long While,' 'I Got The Blues,' 'Let It Loose,' and the Staple Singers-influenced 'The Last Time.' The Rolling Stones' greatest song, '(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction,' was written with Otis Redding in mind (it was also inspired by Muddy Waters' record 'I Can't Be Satisfied' and Chuck Berry's 'Thirty Days'). When Otis Redding covered the tune, there was belief that his was the original recording. Both the Stones original and the Redding cover impacted the R&B and pop charts, and in the wake of Redding's success with the song, R&B and soul artists such as Chuck Jackson, Mary Wells, and Aretha Franklin recorded the song before decade's end. 'Satisfaction's' guitar riff was also influenced by Martha & the Vandellas' classic 'Dancing In The Street.' The song's soul influences gave it a #19 R&B showing, staying in the R&B Top 40 for a respectable 7 weeks. Their '19th Nervous Breakdown' and 'Miss You' also hit the Top 40 of the R&B charts, with 'Hot Stuff' rounding out at #84 R&B. This feat is simply astonishing due to the fact that a white guitar-oriented band, who was criticized for stealing 'black music,' found favor with R&B audiences, a crowd hard to please. The Rolling Stones remade Marvin Gaye's classic 'Can I Get a Witness?' In 1964, used it as the basis for their 'Now I've Got a Witness,' and also recorded his gem 'Hitch Hike' in 1965. They also performed other Motown tunes such as the Temptations' perennials 'Ain't Too Proud To Beg,' 'Just My Imagination (Running Away With Me),' and 'I Can't Get Next To You,' Stevie Wonder's 'I Don't Know Why,' and Barrett Strong's 'Money.' But Motown wasn't the only destination ripe for renditions. Solomon Burke's 'Cry To Me' and 'Everybody Needs Somebody To Love,' Irma Thomas' 'Time Is On My Side,' Benny Spellman's 'Fortune Teller,' Don Covay's 'Mercy Mercy,' and Rufus Thomas' 'Walking the Dog,' to name a few, were other numbers that got reworked. It should also be noted that the Stones recorded several classics such as 'Brown Sugar' and 'Wild Horses' at the world-renowned Muscle Shoals. The instrumental jam '2120 South Michigan Avenue' was the address of the legendary Chess Records, a label with a roster history that included Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, John Lee Hooker, Benny Goodman, Buddy Guy, Willie Dixon, the Ramsey Lewis Trio, and Sonny Boy Williamson (Aleck 'Rice' Miller). It also included veteran Chess Records sessions members such as Maurice White, who would later form Earth, Wind & Fire, a soul band that Charlie Watts was a fan of. For all its liberal intent, rock and roll history is full of ironies and hypocrisy just as much as it is full of rebellion and revolution. The Rolling Stones were wild, vulgar and unkempt, which made them obvious targets to the old order. But another source of contention were their sometimes misogynistic ways and alleged racism. Songs such as 'Under My Thumb,' 'Stupid Girl,' and 'Yesterday's Papers' made no secret that it reeked of male chauvinism. Their album Black and Blue was promoted with an infamous billboard on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood where a model was bound and bruised with the line 'I'm Black and Blue from the Rolling Stones - and I love it!' And songs such as 'Ruby Tuesday,' which hinted at a famous groupie, were unsurprising in the context of a rock and roll lifestyle. Even the females they had relationships with were the inspirations to a number of classic Stones songs, whether it was Jagger's Chrissie Shrimpton (the root of 'Stupid Girl'), Jagger's Marianne Faithfull (the source for the infamous lines in 'Let It Bleed'), Bianca Jagger ('Respectable'), or Anita Pallenberg, the lover of three Rolling Stones. And it didn't help matters much that some perceived Faithfull and Pallenberg to be amoral and loose women, not exactly the type of role models that the establishment wanted young girls to look up to. Brian Jones himself was notoriously violent towards Anita Pallenberg, and Bill Wyman had an affair with a female teenager in the 1980s that made headlines. But despite all of this womanizing, the Stones had their bright moments, whether it was tender songs written about the women romantically involved with them such as 'Wild Horses' or the desire of being a better father and lover. The rock and roll girl groups of the '60s not only influenced the British Invasion bands but also received respect and praise from them, whether it was the Beatles loving the Shirelles or the Kinks favoring Martha & the Vandellas. The Rolling Stones in particular toured with the Shangri-Las, the Ronettes and the Chiffons, with the Ronettes being their particular favorites. The blues- and R&B-based British Invasion bands were both championed and derided for their music. Detractors generally accused them of stealing and ripping off black music. But the bigger picture is that these bands had a genuine love for black music and were seminal in re-introducing R&B and blues to the masses. Aside from being fans of Robert Johnson and Slim Harpo to Willie Dixon and Howlin' Wolf, the Rolling Stones have always paid respect and tribute to their musical heroes and have helped to keep their legacies alive. Despite these warm spots, the band still drew controversy. 'Some Girls,' which was seen as chauvinistic due to its subject matter dealing with women around the world, featured the notorious line 'black girls just wanna get fucked all night' which incurred the ire of black organizations. But Mick Jagger tried his best to quell the tension by stating that the song parodied racial beliefs. 'Brown Sugar' took it one step further with its topic of slave rape and explicit sexual acts. Again, black and feminist groups were not pleased. But on a positive note, the Rolling Stones did record a song called 'Sweet Black Angel' that paid tribute to civil rights leader Angela Davis. In addition, they had befriended, championed, and helped many R&B and blues acts. To simply write off artists such as Elvis Presley, the Beatles, and the Rolling Stones as simply racist and exploitative is ignorant as all three have expressed tremendous and genuine love and respect for black music and its contributions. In addition, they have befriended many black artists and have influenced black music. The Rolling Stones were friends with many in the rock industry, whether it was longtime friends Bobby Womack and Billy Preston in R&B/soul circles to Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page (the latter two were seen as possible Rolling Stones members more than once). In addition, the Stones' love of blues artists such as Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf not only imprinted these bluesmen onto the wide masses but also earned them personal respect from their heroes. Aside from invigorating and reinvigorating the careers of blues and R&B/rock artists, the Rolling Stones also played an important role in the Beach Boys' popularity in the UK. In 1963, the Beach Boys scored a minor UK Top 40 hit in 'Surfin' USA,' but when Mick Jagger in particular talked effusively of how great 'I Get Around' was in 1964, it helped that particular record reach the UK Top 10, thus beginning a series of major hits and a dedicated UK following for the greatest American rock and roll band of all time. The Beach Boys even credited the Rolling Stones for helping them garner fame in the UK, and the two performed at the legendary T.A.M.I. Show in 1964. The Rolling Stones even had some hip-hop influence. Early hip-hop DJs such as legends Afrika Bambaataa and Grandmaster Flash played Rolling Stones records. 'Hot Stuff' and 'Honky Tonk Women' were particular favorites of Bam. The Stones worked with Phil Spector, David Bowie, Peter Tosh, Gene Pitney, Jack Nitzsche, Ry Cooder, Sonny Rollins, and a host of others, and attracted the attention of famous media figures such as Truman Capote and Andy Warhol and historic labels such as Atlantic Records and Chess Records. Besides the Stones' diverse pool of influences and varied influence, they also implemented different instrumentation and session players that added to their critical appraisal. The marimba, autoharp, sitar, bell, harpsichord, accordion, harmonica, organ, English flute, oboe, dulcimer, trumpet, trombone, saxophone, tambourine, bongos, congas, maracas, timpani, kazoo, piano, vibraphone, synthesizer, dobro, the theremin and the mellotron have all figured into their recordings. The Rolling Stones have been compared to the Beatles for a number of reasons, whether it was the sharp contrast of their images in their early days to who epitomized rock and roll more. While the media made the two giants to be arch rival enemies in the 1960s, the truth is that they befriended each other and shared many of the same fans. The pattern of the Rolling Stones deliberately capitalizing on the Beatles' innovations and popularizations is well-documented. In 1970, John Lennon told Rolling Stone magazine's Jann Wenner that, 'I would like to just list what we did and what the Stones did two months after, on every fucking album and every fucking thing we did.' While 'every fucking thing we did' is an exaggeration, there is some truth behind it. When the Beatles issued 'Yesterday' as a single in 1965, the Stones released the similarly-styled 'As Tears Go By' several weeks later. 'Norwegian Wood' featured sitar, and this instrument was later found on the Stones' 'Paint It Black.' The Stones' album covers to Their Satanic Majesties Request and Beggars Banquet recalled the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band and the 'white' album, respectively. Even recently, when the Beatles Anthology book hit store shelves, the Stones had According To the Rolling Stones in a similar book format. Granted, both bands did have their striking differences, but this monkey-see-monkey-do approach demonstrates the Beatles' big influence on even their major rivals. Exile On Main St. Let It Bleed 3. Sticky Fingers 4. Beggars Banquet 5. Aftermath (After-Math) 6. Some Girls 7. The Rolling Stones/England's Newest Hitmakers 8. Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out! Out of Our Heads 10. Between The Buttons 11. The Rolling Stones No. 2/The Rolling Stones, Now! Tattoo You 13. Goats Head Soup 15. It's Only Rock 'n Roll 16. December's Children (And Everybody's) 17. Their Satanic Majesty's Request 18. Emotional Rescue 19. Black And Blue 20. Steel Wheels 21. Voodoo Lounge 22. A Bigger Bang 24. Undercover 25. Batman & Robin Eternal #1 (DC Comics) I rather sorely missed the weekly Batman Eternal when it finally wrapped up, so used to getting a new, usually pretty good issue of a Batman comic every single Wednesday for so long. This is the sequel series, and it's just different enough in cast, premise and creative team that how well it will live up to its predecessor is still an open question. The story still comes courtesy of Scott Snyder and James Tynion IV, although they've swapped the order in which they're credited here, and Tynion handles the script as he often did in Batman Eternal. There will be a new writing staff taking turns scripting, however, although none are credited with this issue. Additionally, in the current status quo, Batman is no longer Bruce Wayne, who lost his memory at the end of Snyder's 'Endgame' story arc, but former police commissioner James Gordon, wearing a mechanical battle-suit. Robin is.well, the current Robin isn't in this issue at all; technically, the official Robin of the moment is the recently resurrected Damian Wayne, but he's out of the country for at least a year, as chronicled in his own book, Robin: Son of Batman. It seems as if the focus will be on former Robin (and former Batman) Dick Grayson, and his fellow former Robins Jason 'Red Hood' Todd and Tim 'Red Robin' Drake. Some other Batman lieutenants will also apparently play a role, as well: Harper 'Bluebird' Row appears extensively in this issue, Stephanie 'Spoiler' Brown is mentioned, and Cassandra Cain makes her very, very stupid New 52 debut. So, here's what happens in this comic book. 'Several years ago' in Cairo, Batman's origin is visited upon a young Egyptian boy: His parents are gunned down as they leave a movie theater with him. We then flash to 'Then,' where Batman is swinging through Gotham with a heavily armored Robin who looks like he's wearing a combination of Tim Drake, Damian Wayne and NFL SuperPro's costumes (this being the darker, grittier, more serious, more 'realistic' New 52-iverse, the original Robin costume never existed). Then we flash to 'Now,' where artist Tony Daniel draws a completely inept, unintelligible, five-page action scene in which the former Robins are all introduced. Dick Grayson, now just going by 'Grayson,' is chasing a bad guy up the side of a building on some kind of super-motorcycles. Red Hood, waring his newer, dumber costume, appears to be rappelling from.somewhere.shooting up, while his bullets rain down. Then the bad guy crashes his motorcycle, but there's no such thing as gravity.? So he sticks to the side of the building. And then Red Robin swoops in, and he sticks to the side of the building like Spider-Man, too (Having read, re-read and re-re-read this scene, I think I've figured out what Daniel was trying to draw, but there's no establishing shot to communicate what the building looks like, and the lay-outs are sub-amateur; just pin-ups shrunk down to a size that a comic book page can accomodate three-to-five of them. It's really poor storytelling; this was the book I was most looking forward to this week, and it was by far the worst-drawn). That's followed by a scene in which the current Batman tries in vain to bust Bluebird, but is soundly defeated by her. Then Dick puts on a Clark Kent disguise and attends an event at a school where he and Batman once fought the Scarecrow many years ago, when he was still Robin (and by 'many' I mean, like, maybe five), but something goes weird.there are a bunch of creepy kids with guns, and one of Dick's Spyral allies betrays him. And then this happens. It took me a really long time to figure out what the fuck Cassandra Cain (that's Cassandra Cain, by the way) is supposed to be posing on in that last panel. My best guess is that she's standing in an open dumpster, that is under a bridge for some reason. Why she's standing in a dumpster, I can't imagine. She knocks Dick around for nine panels that make little sense (at one point she punches him down into the dumpster she was just posing in), while Daniel's art tries to suggest some kind of Cass vision by highlighting random parts of Dick's body with little red circles (I think these are meant to be his tells, but, again, there's no real logic to which ones are chose; sometimes they seem to be where she's striking, while at other times they seem to be what she's focusing on to predict his moves). When Dick talks to her, she says 'Mother' a few times and then hands him a flash-drive that Batman apparently gave her specifically to give to Dick. Why did she kick him off a motorcycle and beat him up first? I don't know.? Then new villain The Orphan, who looks a little too much like The Scarecrow from the Arkham games, shows up in Harper's apartment to kill her. Then Dick arrives in the Batcave, and opens the flash drive that Cassandra gave him, and there's a list of names, including Richard Grayson, Jason Todd, Timothy Drake, Harper Row, Cassandra Cain and six half-names (one of which is 'Jean-P,' with the rest cut off; Jean-Paul? As in Valley?). Then Batman appears via hologram to tell Dick some rambling, vague clues. And then we flash back to Egypt, where we see the shooter of the boy's parents.Oh my God it's Batman himself and he has a smoking gun what is even going on? So, Tynion and Snyder have given us a bit of a mystery to puzzle over, here: Who's this 'Mother' everyone keeps referring to, who's The Orphan, what was up with those mind-controlled kids, what might this have to do with The Scarecrow, what's the deal with Batman's apparent child-stalking of potential sidekicks, what's going on in Cairo, etc. It's kind of too bad Daniel got to draw the first issue. Presumably, the artists will change with some frequency, as they did in Batman Eternal, but Daniel just doesn't have the drawing chops to handle much more than covers or splashes, so much of the art is just visual gibberish. That said, the first issue of Batman Eternal was pretty poorly drawn to, with a key moment drawn in such a way that it was completely ruined, and it got better as time went on. One of the virtues of the previous weekly was that it allowed for so much focus on all of the many interesting Batman characters that didn't get much spotlight in the Batman-starring books, and Tynion and Snyder seem poised to run with that idea here, as Batman himself is unavailable to appear in this title at the moment. By necessity, then, this has to focus on all his sidekicks, partners and allies. I'm not so sure that's going to work out that great, however, as focusing on Batman and Robin history is only going to keep calling attention to the fact that it doesn't really make sense. Bruce Wayne only became Batman somewhere around six or seven years ago (five years between Justice League #1 and Batman #1, plus one year between Detective Comics #1 and 'Death of the Family') and, in that time, we've now had three Batmen and four Robins. I'm intrigued enough by the questions to want to keep reading, and confident enough that the art will change for the better that it will likely be worth slogging through the rough stuff like this. But man, this was a very rough start. Jughead #1 (Archie Comics) Well, the first three issues of the new, rebooted Archie were not a fluke, nor was the fact that they were so good due entirely to the efforts of writer Mark Waid and artist Fiona Staples. Or, at least, Waid and Staples aren't the only creative team capable of telling a fun, funny, all-ages story in the new, more modern, more representationally-drawn milieu of post-reboot Riverdale. Because writer Chip Zdarsky and artist Erica Henderson (whose work I last saw on the excellent Squirrel Girl, maybe Marvel's best ongoing that isn't Ms. Marvel) knocked the first issue of Jughead right out of the park. While Henderson's style is pretty far removed from Staples', she manages to keep the designs all consistent, even if her Juggy is a little less jagged and pointed. This Jughead is also a little sharp than the one in Archie, but then, his role is different; there, he's Archie's best friend, conscience and ally, while here, he's the star of his own comedic comic, in which Archie is merely a relatively minor supporting character. The 20-page story re-reintroduces Jughead, as a slothful, gluttonous, blase teen with a great deal of imagination and smarts that he never really employs.unless a dire situation calls for it. Zdarsky gives him one such situation. He ignores Betty's attempts to gather signatures to stop Hiram Lodge from developing a local forest, and he could care less about Mr. Weatherbee being replaced by a new principal.at least until that principal makes some changes in the cafeteria. After a first-third introducing the players and the conflict, Zdarksy and Henderson detour into an extended fantasy/dream sequence (a Game of Thrones parody entitled 'Game of Jones'.which must work if you're wholly ignorant of the source material, as I am and most of the kids reading this will presumably be), and then return to reality where Jughead learns an incredibly important life lesson–It turns out, you can make food. Jughead seems to be set a little further in the future than Archie is, as the Veronica, her dad and Reggie are all firmly established here, while they're still being introduced and integrated in the book's sister title, but it's very much of the same style and tone of Archie. And, more importantly, of the same level of quality. Paying $3.99 for a 20-page Archie comic seems a little wrong to me, but thankfully Archie softens the blow by including a reprint of an eight-page classic Jughead story introduced by Zdarsky, and keeping the handful of ads at the back of the book. If we must have $4 comics, this is the way to do them, I guess. Paper Girls #1 (Image Comics) I've heard creators enthuse about the Image model, and I've heard creators unhappy with how it works out for them financially. As a reader though, I certainly appreciated getting a 40-page, ad-free comic, followed by a two-page letter col and a four-page character pin-up section, for just $2.99. Particularly on a Wednesday in which Marvel was selling first issues of new series featuring Dr. Strange, Iron Man and Spider-Man for $4 a pop. This is the latest by writer Brian K. Vaughan, working with artist Cliff Chiang, for a sort of dream team team-up of an EDILW-favorite writer with an EDILW-favorite artist. Set in (fictional) Stony Stream, Ohio, an apparent suburb of (real) Cleveland, it stars 12-year-old Erin, who gets up before 5 a.m. To deliver the (fictional) Cleveland Preserver. She's rescued from some bully boy teenagers by a trio of fellow paper girls, and they decide to do their route together that night/morning. Things go awry in a very weird way though, and gets weirder and weirder until a sci-fi twist ending that seems to allude to time travel of some sort. The year is 1988, and the trappings are all pretty 1988–from Erin's Far Side desk calendar to bad girl Mac's causal use of 'faggot' as a slur. Erin has a Monster Squad poster in her room, and that's a pretty good signifier for what Vaughan and Chiang seem to be going for here, in terms of tone and content: Normal, suburban kids dealing with the fantastic. Chiang's art is, as always, unfuckwithable, and while Vaughan's story is clearly still unfolding in a way that makes the premise difficult to assess (as a first, draw-you-in issue though? Strong stuff), I liked it well enough to want to read the next issue. That said, as an Ohioan who was a pre-teen in the 1980s and read the Cleveland Plain Dealer, there's a pretty good chance I'm biased in favor of this book's surface trappings. Scooby-Doo Team-Up #12 (DC) This actually came out last week, but I missed it. As you can see from the cover, Harley Quinn is now so goddam popular that she gets to have her own crossover with Scooby-Doo, putting her in rather rarefied company (Previous DC super-people team-ups have included only the A-List of the DC Universe: Batman and Robin, Superman, Wonder Woman and the Superfriends version of the Justice League). Actually, while I've no doubt it's Harley's newly found market muscle that lead to this particular team-up–I look forward to seeing the sales data from this month, to see if Scooby-Doo Team-Up received any noticeable Harley bump–the cover actually reads, 'Featuring: The Gotham Girls!' And, in fact, Harley's roommate and partner in crime Poison Ivy isn't the only other Gotham gal to show up in this issue. Regular writer Sholly Fisch has Scooby and Mystery, Inc standing atop a building in Gotham City near a gargoyle, expecting to meet Batman. Instead they meet Harley and Ivy, who want to have the teen sleuths help them deal with a haunting: Ever since they stole a particular opal, they've been haunted by bad luck, to the extent that Harley believes they're being cursed by a ghost. Spoiler alert: They're not. Artist Dario Brizuela uses the character designs from the first season of Batman: The Animated Series for the Gothamites who appear.or, at least, their costumes. The guest-stars are all drawn in a more Scooby-Doo-lie, more straight, unfiltered Brizuela design, then Bruce Timm-derived designs. Not the best issue of the series so far, but interesting in both its choice of guest-stars and in how Brizuela chooses to render them. Sensation Comics Featuring Wonder Woman #15 (DC) This 30-page issue bears a generic but not-terrible cover by Jenny Frison (what's up with that eagle though? It seems to be in the background, but it's flying in front of the lasso in the foreground.?), which, given Sensation's history of covers, counts as a good one. Speaking of generic, the lead story is written by Adam Beechen and drawn by Jose Luis Garcia Lopez, whose typically stunning pencil work is inked by first Kevin Nowlan and then Scott Hanna. Beechen's story opens in court, as a crusading attorney questions Wonder Woman about her latest battle with The Cheetah ( version), as he wants to see the super-villain put away in a maximum security super-prison, rather than transfered to some easier-to-escape-from place where she can get psychiatric help. It's an interesting enough story about supervillan recidivism, and the way that the cyclical, serial nature of superhero narratives inevitably means no villain ever really gets better or goes straight or even just stays locked up, but escapes to commit more crimes in the future. The thing is, it's not really a Wonder Woman story, despite the fact that Wonder Woman and The Cheetah are in it–Beechen could have plugged any superhero and supervillain into the story, and nothing of note would have changed, only which characters Garcia Lopez drew. In fact, this seems more like a Batman story than one for any other hero, as he's the superhero whose villains are almost uniformly assigned to a place meant to cure them of their criminal insanity only to escape a few months later.or, given the sheer number of Batman comics published these days, a few weeks later. Notably, Beechen uses The Scarecrow in a flashback explaining why the attorney is so strident in making sure supervillains get locked up as tightly as possible. Actually, using Wonder Woman–a hero with relatively few well-known repeat-business supervillains who are of the sort that could be jailed–probably works against the drama of Beechen's story. Particularly since he's using the Domaine version of The Cheetah, who has only appeared in a handful of stories and no stories that I can think of post- Crisis, rather than the more well-known Priscilla Rich or Barbara Minerva versions. The artwork on this opening story is predictably solid, but suffers a bit from the weird spacing that some of DC's digital-first books do, with a distractingly wide gutter that splits each page lay-out in half. The back-up is a 10-pager written and drawn by Carla Speed McNeil. The set-up's a little on the unusual side. There's a guy who had a pet lion, but the lion got hard to take care of, and he became a shitty lion-owner, and so after mistreating the lion for a long time, he's going to unload it.until Wonder Woman stages an intervention.? Points for originality, anyway. Speed McNeil does showcase one of Wonder Woman's least-used powers–her ability to talk to animals–in an amusing way, and there's a neat four-and-a-half-page sequence set during Diana's girlhood on Themyscira, which is so often a great source for good Wonder Woman comics (as Sensation has ably proven; I guess it's nice that Wondy appears in Superman/Wonder Woman as well as Wonder Woman these days, but the second Wonder Woman book that DC really needs to do is a Wonder Girl one.as in Wonder Woman's adventures as a girl). Her art is just as good as Garcia Lopez's, although her style is vastly different. Transformers Vs. Joe #9 (IDW Publishing) This issue is a departure from the eight previous ones in several respects, one of which that writer/artist/colorist/letterer Tom Scioli handles the entire 20 pages solo, with his regular co-writer John Barber MIA until the two-page story commentary at the end of the issue. It's also a departure in terms of content, as we leave the present for a 'spotlight' issue focusing on the history of Destro and his clan, dating back to ancient times. Actually, the book begins with a two-page splash in which the Autobots' ark spacecraft lands on Earth in pre-human history, and then we jump ahead to ancient times, where Destro's ancestor Laird Mac Cullen seeks the counsel of the mysterious serpent priests who guard a 'cave of the gods,' the ruins of that ship from the first spread. As with so much of the book to date, this issue finds Scioli drawing unusual, unexpected connections between the two franchises (and, here, history) that, once laid out, actually kind of make a sort of perfect sense.like the origins of Destro's mask, for example. While the bulk of the issue is set in ancient times, it jumps ahead through the history of the Destro clan, coming to its conclusion in 'the last fading moments of the 20th century,' where Cobra Commander strikes a deal with Destro, and we get a bonkers final page that looks like something out of a Ben Marra comic. And speaking of Ben Marra, guess who drew one of this issue's three covers! Benjamin Marra, of course. The other dramatic departure in this particular issue is just how straightforward Scioli's storytelling is. In fact, it's downright traditional (there are even pages with nine-panel grids!), with little of the volcanic experimentation that's characterized the rest of the series so far. But then, this is a break from the story thus far, a kinda sorta origin of elements of Destro's origin and place in the world, but also hints of various aspects of the ever-widening mythology of Transformers Vs. It's the kind of issue that probably never would have been made were this a limited series, rather than an ongoing. One Of The Jones Boys, I.have no idea what Barber does on TRANSFORMERS VS. JOE, specifically, which is actually kind of weird in that every single issue has the two creators talking about the creation of each issue, huh? I've had the impression that they did it sorta like original 'Marvel style' (does Marvel still do that? I can't imagine they do), in which Barber and Scioli talk for a while about the issue, Scioli draws it up, and Barber writes dialogue.or some of it.or just polishes it? Or works as an editor/sounding board? One of the neat things about their commentaries is it sounds like a pretty common occurrence is for Barber to write an outline or a script, and Scioli to send back something completely different. I'd love to see the two of them at a panel some time, explaining their process. Wayne, That's Harper 'Bluebird' Row. Like everyone else on that cover, she has a terrible costume and is in need of a redesign (I just realized that the Red Hood is now wearing a brown hoodie, so that DC has a character called 'Red Hood' with a brown hood). I like the character, and the codename works, but, her costume is a pretty godawful WildStorm mess.in fact, her first 'draft' costume had a blue, Grifter face rag. A Grifter rag.I bought the issue yesterday and I absolutely agree on those scenes with the motorcycles on the buildings. I looked at Harper Row inside the comic and the costume isn't as intense. The hair isn't extreme, and those straps from the eyes to.wherever.the chin, the collar is only on strap instead of that Y strap. Then again, DC could just have artists drawing the characters wrong. I don't know why this WildStorm-inspired stuff keeps popping up. Pandora made a mistake, we never needed them at all. Caleb Mozzocco is a freelance writer and (extremely) amateur(-ish) artist who lives and works in Ohio. This is his blog. You can reach him at [email protected]. Creators and publishers who would like their books considered for review here and/or anywhere else he contributes can feel free to contact him at the address above. Editors and publishers of respectable publications who would like Caleb to write about comics for them are also welcome to contact him and offer him work. He loves money.
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