Converging Reviews

Well!  More Convergence books than you can shake a stick at!  Let us dive right into the pool, as it were.

Aquaman#1

For rather obscure reasons, Aquaman was trapped in Metropolis when the "dome" went up, and has been having a hard time adjusting.  Dane Dorrance from the Sea Devils is now at S.T.A.R. labs, and is apparently about the only friend that Arthur has, since he's gone a bit buggy over being cut off from his telepathy and Mera and sea water and such.

But he is trying to do his heroic duty, when the Dome comes down and Deathblow of all people shows up and starts killing off people willy nilly.  I wasn't aware that Deathblow was such a tool, but apparently so.

It's the same schtick, the various cities from various universes all have to fight each other for some reason or another.  It still doesn't make much sense.  All the cities seem to be either Gotham or Metropolis, the heroes get "domed" and lose their powers, the dome comes down and they fight.

To be perfectly honest it is rather pointless of me to go through each of the Convergence books and talk about them, because the plot is exactly the same in each and every one of them.

Green Arrow, has Ollie run into Connor Hawke and be flabberghasted that he has a son.  And the Dome comes down and they fight.

Green Lantern has Kyle, which is nice, who was a Green Lantern for about a week before the Dome came down, and Hal is sitting in jail in Metropolis, wracked with guilt for destroying the Corps and the Guardians when he was Parallax.  Then the Dome comes down, Hal is Parallax again and fighting some wing nuts from Electropolis.  They are real jerks, so I assume they lose too.

The JLI is stuck in Metropolis for some reason, and it has Blue Beetle, J'onn, Fire, Ice, Red Tornado and Captain Shinypants.  No Guy for some reason.  Bummer.  Nobody has powers except Reddy, which doesn't really matter since he is such a loser.  Ted is running the team, and using his brains and technology to fight Metallo and stuff.

J'onn thinks they should be trying harder to get out of the Dome, while Ted wearily explains that they have tried, and sometimes all you can do is hold on and do the best you can.  Then of course, the dome comes down, they all get their powers back and now have to fight the Justice League from Kingdom Come.

I love these guys, but I think they are toast.

In Suicide Squad, I only bought it because I wanted to see fat old Amanda Waller.  And she is lovely as ever.  And blah blah blah...the same plot.  With Oracle and Lex Luthor thrown into the mix.

You obviously don't have to buy all of the books in this crossover, because really...there is the exact same thing happening in all of them.  There is the pleasure of seeing characters that haven't been used, or have been killed off by DC, but really, that is about the only reason that I have even bought these.  It's pretty damned dull, actually.  Could we...maybe...try something a little less hackneyed next time DC?

Sheesh!

Sensation Comics/Wonder Woman #9

This is fabulous of course.  We have two stories, with the first starring Diana, going up against Cheeta , Circe AND Medusa!   Batman has been turned to stone by Medusa, and Superman was turned into a pig by Circe and keeps running around squealing. It's...adorable.

And then you realize that the whole story is a game being played by a young girl with her sister's dolls.  Her big sister doesn't play with dolls anymore, but she is still not happy that  the younger girl painted dots all over one of her barbies to make a Cheeta.  So Mom grounds the younger girl, and says she has to clean them up and can't go to the movies.  Naturally, she starts to play another game, involving the bucket of soap and water, which becomes the invisible jet, a cat, and a dog, and she somehow saves her big sister from the dog by throwing the bucket/invisible jet at the dog.

So they decide to play together.   And it is simply lovely.

The second story is fun too, with Wonder Woman being interviewed by Lois Lane.  Neither is particularly happy about it, because Lois has a list of inane questions  given to her by her editor, and Diana is resentful that nobody asks Superman what type of shampoo he uses or what he wears to bed. 

Fortunately, a giant robot crashes into the room, so Diana can do her thing, and Lois is thrilled that she has a real story, and tries to help out.  Diana is a little annoyed that she has to look out for Lois as well, but Lois as is her wont, is trying to get the story and actually does manage to help.  But to save her, Diana has to toss her up to the fire escapes and uses her lariat to do so, which causes Lois to blurt out all sorts of truths that she would prefer to keep secret, such as dying her hair, and that she thinks Clark is cute. 

The day is saved, and they go out for drinks later.  The art is lovey, and it is a fun story, with each of the characters being written very well indeed.

Lovely again.

Loki: Agent of Asgard #13

Oh, things are at a sorry pass for poor Loki.  He's been beaten up by Thor, cast out of Asgard, shunned and betrayed, and even Verity has stomped off in a huff.  He's been captured and tied up by evil Old Loki, and told that his attempts to change worked...for a whole ten years, and that he finally snapped and decided to go back to being bad, because no matter what, nobody every really trusted him.

Of course Odin still loves him, and Verity calls and deep down, you know that Thor loves him too.

But evil old Loki sets him on fire and sends him to that weird metaphorical space where the original Loki and Kid Loki are hanging out, along with a couple of ravens.  Each of them is dead. Original Loki confesses that he tried every trick in the book, but he is actually really dead, and he's not happy about it.  And Kid Loki is cranky too, because he tried so hard to do good, and died anyway...but he did manage to eke out a win, by not dying as a worthless copy but by writing his own story.

So presumably, this is where the new Loki has come to die as well  He is the echo of Loki, he is the God of Lies, and he can't win against evil Old Loki, who has been manipulating everyone including time.  Either he takes the crown and becomes evil Loki, or he dies, and evil Loki still wins.  It's a no-win situation, and fortunately, his cell phone rings, and it is Verity. 

That's good coverage incidentally!  Verity is apologetic and worried about him.  He's feeling pretty defeated and depressed, for good reason. She tries to convince him not to give up and what does the God of Lies even mean?

What does it mean anyway?  Well, Loki is still smart and he starts thinking and realizes that a lie is just a story.  He has a friend who believes in him, and his father and his brother  and he's not going to be defined by anyone, least of all himself. 

This is not the outcome that evil old Loki was planning for, and things explode and suddenly he is eight months in the future, and  another earth is hanging outside the window.  Oops.  And a beaten battered version of Loki shows up at Verity's door.

Man, I do love this book.

Thor #7

Roz Solomon is still fighting Roxxon, , but this takes place some weeks in the past.  She finds out from Coulson that Thor has lost his Hammer and is sulking on the moon, so she flies up to see him, and he's not there, but the Hammer is...and...

Hmmmm.

Back in the present, she is fighting the Destroyer, which was sent by Odin, who is a much bigger jerk here than he is in Loki's book.  He has put Cul, his evil brother into the Destroyer, and manages to get hold of Mjolnir for a minute or two. Meanwhile Malekith and Agger are still plotting and smirking,and I have to admit that these two are a hoot.  Deadly, but a hoot.  They decide to invade  Alfheim, simply because they want to kill some pixies apparently.

Meanwhile Odinson has decided to show up with some backup, mainly Freya, Sif, Brunnhilde, Wanda, Captain Marvel and a host of women warriors to help out. It's going to be...epic.

I enjoyed the Wonder Woman book and the two Marvel Asgardian books a whole heck of a lot more than the Convergence books, which as I pointed out...are simply the same thing over and over and over.  But it was nice to see Ted Kord.