House to Astonish Episode 164
Paul and I are back with a compact and bijou hour and twenty of comics chat for you, with discussion of the departures of Diane Nelson and Geoff Johns from DC, Johns’s new imprint and his recently-announced 3 Jokers and Shazam series, Vertigo’s relaunch, the DC Zoom and DC Ink slates, Ellis and Howard’s Cemetery Beach, Brandon Sanderson’s partnering with Vault Comics, Edge of Spider-Geddon and Asgardians of the Galaxy. We’ve also got reviews of Immortal Hulk and Justice League, and the Official Handbook of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe knows that eight is enough. All this plus the Greg Land hurricane warning, Organ Theft Aquaman and Daredevil Dinosaur.
The podcast is here, or here on Mixcloud, or available via the embedded player below. Let us know what you think, in the comments below, on Twitter, via email or on our Facebook fan page.
As a reminder, you can come and see me teaming with Kelly Kanayama of the Frank Discussions podcast at Glasgow Comic-Con on 30 June, where we’ll be giving the Punisher a live makeover (strange as that may sound). Tickets are on sale here.
And hey, it’s June! I love how that House to Astonish t-shirt looks on you… wait, you don’t have one? How embarrassing. Here, click on this link before someone sees you.
Kevin Masteron as Thunderstrike was set up in a mini series a few years back by DeFalco and Frenz. Wasn’t too bad actually, but turned out to be another viable teen character left to rot on the vine. He’s not really enough to get ne to check out Asgardians of the Galaxy, not least because Duggan’s GOTG run (which I assume it’s replacing) was promising to get back to what made the DnA version work so well.
You can walk in and buy in Waterstones or Borders, huh?
Al, better sit down, I have some bad news from the far-flung year of 2018… :p
The title Cemetery Beach just makes me think of 50s ghosts using headstones as surfboards.
That AotG doesn’t have Beta Ray Bill on the team confuses and amazes me, especially after the role he’s played in other Marvel Cosmic books. He should be the team leader (leading to some internal strife over being a non-Asgardian in charge).
Regarding the New Age of Heroes books: I think that the real motivation for saying they were artist led was to create some IP which artists had a stake in. Presumably this is with the hope the characters might be exploited in other media, and I would guess it’s a way to keep the artists (and the writers) at DC.
Collective Action sounds like the communist version of Multiple Man.
“You’ve got to get rid of Wonder Man, he’s extra baggage and adds nothing to the concept”: The Simon Williams Story.
I’m very disappointed that Vertigo’s Hex Wives isn’t some kind of Western, possibly involving several women who think they married Jonah meeting at his funeral and reluctantly working together to figure out where he stashed all his bounties.
When I saw the covers of DC Zoom and DC Ink, I honestly thought they were novels with illustrations. That’s very poor.
Apparently, Lex has a very specific reason for wanting the Joker on the team, based on his new Philosophy of Villainy post-No Justice. We’ll see.