Domino Annual #1
Annuals are always off to the side somewhere, and if they’re not going to be important to the plot, they have to find some other way of standing out. The first Domino annual is certainly different: it’s a four-story anthology with four different writers (plus a framing sequence by Leah Williams and Michael Shelfer). So we’re getting a bunch of different perspectives on Domino, a character who’s been written in wildly divergent ways over the years. Does it add up to something coherent?
First up is “Dead Drunk in Dry Gulch”, by regular writer Gail Simone, with art by Victor Ibáñez and Jay David Ramos. This one ties in directly to the regular title, since it’s a flashback to Domino’s first encounter with Outlaw, forming the posse from the regular title. It’s a blatant retcon, equipping Domino with two best friends who she’s never previously been associated with, so a bit of back story probably helps lend it weight.
Charts – 28 September 2018
Now this is a busy week. So bear with me, I’ll be skipping quickly over some of these…
1. Calvin Harris & Sam Smith – “Promises”
Four weeks, though the margins still aren’t huge – it leads by the equivalent of 6,500 sales, and it’s the sales that tip it over the edge, since it’s only at number 3 on the streaming chart. A fourth week makes it Sam Smith’s longest running number one, beating last year’s “Too Good at Goodbyes”. The rest of the top 10 is largely static, with a touch of place-swapping.
10. Lil Peep & XXXTentacion – “Falling Down”
X-Men Blue #33-36: “Surviving the Experience”
If X-Men Gold had the problem of doing a final issue when nothing was really ending, X-Men Blue has a slightly different problem: the time-travelling teens’ tenure in 2018 is tantalisingly close to termination! They look set to return to the sixties! A simpler, more alliterative and exclamatory time! There’s a real ending here!
Or rather, there’s a real ending, but it’s over in Extermination, which isn’t even written by Cullen Bunn. Nor does it particularly lend itself to any kind of plot set-up. So instead X-Men Blue spends its last issues tying up some loose ends and character arcs, and trying to provide a sense of closure to the run.
Charts – 21 September 2018
It’s one of those weeks when we thank heavens for the albums chart, because there’s really nothing going on with the singles…
1. Calvin Harris & Sam Smith – “Promises”
That’s three weeks, clinging on by a very narrow margin (the equivalent of 6,000 sales over Benny Blanco at number 2). Sam Smith managed three weeks with “Too Good at Goodbyes” last year, so if he can manage another week, he’ll set a personal record.
33. Jason Derulo & David Guetta featuring Nicki Minaj & Willy William – “Goodbye”
X-Men Gold #36: “Feared and Hated”
X-Men Gold, 2017-18. It happened.
Marc Guggenheim’s 36-issue X-Men run was a self-consciously retro affair. After years of the X-Men living on offshore islands or demon dimensions, or all the emphasis being on weird time-travelling splinter teams, here was a flagship X-Men title that was about the actual X-Men team, in the X-Men mansion, doing X-Men things. It had been a while, and at least part of the gameplan here was to restate the basics – something a book needs now and again, to remind us of the theme in between the variations.
Domino #1-6: “Killer Instinct”
Domino has been around since the early nineties, and she’s spent that time almost entirely as a team book character. She’s had two previous miniseries, but only now is she getting an ongoing title. When a character gets promoted after that length of time, you can’t help but wonder whether the concept was actually built to carry a solo book.
But Domino is a character who has drifted a bit over the years. She started off as a rather serious mercenary who served mainly as a sounding board for Cable, and her first miniseries, back in 1997, tries to play her as somebody who takes life very seriously. “A young woman often known for being wound too tight”, it calls her. Admittedly, it then goes on to have her spend half the first issue fighting a cyborg dwarf while dressed in a bikini, but that was the nineties for you. That was what serious characters did back then.
Charts – 14 September 2018
It’s “not his best work” week on the singles chart.
1. Calvin Harris & Sam Smith – “Promises”
Two weeks. Unusually, it’s there on sales; Benny Blanco is the streaming number one. Weirdly, “Promises” is also number 11 on the utterly-irrelevant physical sales chart, which is almost totally detached from the world of modern pop music. Have a look if you don’t believe me.
3. Kanye West & Lil Pump – “I Love It”
Clocking in at just over two minutes, this is the track that Kanye West debuted at this week’s inaugural PornHub awards, of which he was the “creative director”. The song itself could be politely described as slight. The video at least goes out of its way to undercut the misogynistic aspects by presenting Kanye and Lil Pump as naughty schoolboys tailing along after Adele Givens. I wonder whether this did unusually well on video streams, because god knows it’s not much to listen to.
Old Man Logan #46-47 – “Northern Flight”
Old Man Logan is, let’s be blunt, patchy. The previous arc, with Bullseye, got by pretty well on its energy. This two-parter, with Alpha Flight, just seems to be marking time as it waits for the series to end.
After a pleasingly understated (and beautifully coloured) opening page of a meteor crashing off the coast of Nova Scotia, we establish that some tentacled monster thing is taking over other animals and crawling its way onto the shore in the little town of Shag Habour. Shag Harbour is a real place, by the way – you’re hardly going to make up a name like that. It’s best known for a supposed UFO crash in 1967, which is presumably what Ed Brisson is referencing here – but since our meteor landed a month ago, it’s basically an easter egg.
Charts – 7 September 2018
[Looks at number of new entries this week. Whimpers. Cracks knuckles.]
1. Calvin Harris & Sam Smith – “Promises”
Climbing to number 1 in its third week. This is Calvin Harris’s tenth number one, the others being “Dance Wiv Me” (2008), “I’m Not Alone” (2009), “We Found Love” (2011), “Sweet Nothing” (2012), “Under Control” (2013), “Summer” (2014), “Blame” (2014), “Feels” (2017), and “One Kiss” (2018). It’s hard to argue with that sort of track record – yes, two of them are “featuring” credits, but they’re very prominent ones – and clearly his change of direction a year or so back has paid dividends. He joins a very, very small list of artists with ten or more number one hits – the others are Take That, Madonna, Cliff Richard, Westlife, the Beatles and Elvis Presley. (He had 21, so there’s still a long way to go…)
Old Man Logan Annual #1
The Old Man Logan Annual may be by regular writer Ed Brisson, but it doesn’t tie in with anything in the regular series. Instead, it’s time for a flashback to the Wastelands and a backdoor pilot for Old Man Punisher. Being a Mark Millar creation, the Wastelands are not subtle; the original idea was that it’s a post-apocalyptic world where the villains are in charge of whatever’s left. This story kind of goes with that, in as much as there’s a gang running around inspired by the Punisher, but it’s really more drifting off into Mad Max territory.
The Punishers seem to be some sort of religious cult built around the Punisher’s War Journal (when was the last time anyone mentioned that thing?), or at least they tolerate having a religious nut hanging around with them – it’s not altogether clear. With the Hulk Gang cleared out of the way by Logan, there’s nobody keeping any sort of order, and so the Punishers are running around just causing all manner of chaos.
