Power Girl, Volume 2: Aliens and Apes Review (Amanda Conner, Jimmy Palmiotti)

It’s the breast superhero DC have, the character who should probably be called Boob Window Girl after what everyone really remembers her for: Kara Zor-L aka Powah Girl!

Fishbone's Song by Gary Paulsen Review

An orphan remembers the hillbilly geezer who raised him, Fishbone, down South where they lived in a country shack, drank ‘shine, hunted, and drawled Southern blather that most people would find too obvious to say out loud but these simpletons consider wisdom. Plot? What’re you, a communiss?! We don’t need no stinkin’ plot! (Gets out banjo, plucks Deliverance ditty) Mmm, I declare that thar pig sure looks mighty purty today… 

Deadpool & the Mercs for Money, Volume 0: Merc Madness Review (Cullen Bunn, Salvador Espin)

Deadpool and his Mercs for Money - Stingray, Terror, Foolkiller, Slapstick, Solo, and Masacre (the Spanish Deadpool!) – find themselves in possession of a supposedly future-predicting robot. Do they use it to learn how to avoid mistakes in the present or help people prepare for the future? Nope, they tries to make bank by selling it to the highest bidding supervillain!

X-23, Volume 1: The Killing Dream Review (Marjorie Liu, Will Conrad)

Laura Kinney is X-23, so-called as she’s the 23rd DNA sample from Weapon X/Wolverine and survived the lab that was trying to make her into another Weapon X. She’s Wolverine’s clone/daughter with all of his powers from a healing factor to the snikting claws!

In The Killing Dream, Laura deals with mental scarring as she confronts her traumatic past as well as a shape-shifting demon(?!) and then later teams up with the ragin’ Cajun himself Gambit to take on Mister Sinister – who’s trapped in a woman’s body?!?! 

Dark Reign: Deadpool/Thunderbolts Review (Daniel Way, Andy Diggle)

Set during Dark Reign after Secret Invasion, Deadpool knows something about Norman Osborn that he doesn’t want others to know so Norman sends the Thunderbolts out to kill Deadpool. But they don’t have to look far as he’s after Norman himself for owing him cash - time for a good old-fashioned supervillain smackdown! 

Comics Class by Matthew Forsythe Review

Comics Class is a short memoir of when Matthew Forsythe attempted to teach comics to a class of disinterested 11 year olds – and it’s hilarious! 

The Age of Earthquakes: A Guide to the Extreme Present Review (Douglas Coupland, Shumon Basar)

Want to read something enormously pretentious? Try The Age of Earthquakes by Shumon Basar, Douglas Coupland, and Hans Ulrich Obrist! 

I picked this one up because I’m a Douglas Coupland fan and thought a nonfiction book about the current state of the world sounded interesting. Be warned though: this is a not a real book in the sense that you think. It’s a PowerPoint presentation masquerading as a book, and a really crappy one at that! 

Batman/Aliens Review (Ron Marz, Bernie Wrightson)

Batman and Aliens, together at last! I read the Batman/Predator crossover last year and it was really, really bad so maybe it’s because my expectations for this one were so low but I found Batman/Aliens to be a surprisingly pretty decent! 

Bruce Wayne “sends” Batman to South America after a Wayne Enterprises employee goes missing in the jungle and then encounters an American special ops squad looking for a nearby hidden alien spaceship. The two join forces, head into an ominous ruined temple and… well, you know. 

Wayward, Volume 2: Ties That Bind Review (Jim Zub, Steve Cummings)

Set three months after the end of the first volume, we’re introduced to a new main character from the start: Ohara Emi, another Japanese teenager in Rori’s school who’s suddenly begun manifesting magical powers for no reason. And, though it’s only the second volume, this is where I say goodbye to Wayward! 

Uncanny X-Men: Superior, Volume 1: Survival of the Fittest Review (Cullen Bunn, Greg Land)

This is the third and final main X-Men book currently being published and, yup, it’s also a stinker - 0 for 3, Marvel, take a bow! 

Masters of Atlantis by Charles Portis Review

A couple of gullible fools are conned into believing a book of gibberish contains the mysteries of the universe. They establish a secret society based around the text and spend the rest of their lives being idiots. 

Isle of 100,000 Graves Review (Jason, Fabien Vehlmann)

Set in Pirate Times, Gwenny’s pop went a-sailing to find the legendary treasure of the Isle of 100,000 graves but never returned. Then Gwenny finds a map to the island in a bottle and joins a swashbuckling crew of pirates to find out what happened to him. But what she discovers is something completely unexpected…

Deadpool, Volume 2: Dark Reign Review (Daniel Way, Paco Medina)

There’s a scene in this where Deadpool’s got an arrow in his head and he’s staggering towards the reader saying “DUUUUHHHRRR” that made me laugh so much, if the rest of the book had sucked, it’d still have been worth reading. But actually there’s a lot here to enjoy so it’s one highlight among many!

Spent by Joe Matt Review

Look at that cover. This book’s exactly that: a cartoonist wanking himself into oblivion, literally and figuratively - and it’s brilliant!

I loves the superhero comics but if it weren’t for great indie cartoonists like Joe Matt, I’d probably have left the medium behind years ago. When indie creators are as compelling and gifted as Joe Matt is, reading about an ordinary schmuck talking about his life in an empty room is vastly more exciting and gripping than seeing the Green and Red Lanterns fighting in space for the fate of eternity or whatever for the umpteenth bloody time!

Angel Catbird, Volume 1 Review (Margaret Atwood, Johnnie Christmas)

Quite a few genre novelists have turned their hands to comics in the past - Greg Rucka, Brad Meltzer, Gregg Hurwitz and Caitlin Kittredge to name a few - some of them successfully too, but there’s been a weird trend recently of literary writers having a go at comics as well. Chuck Palahniuk’s much anticipated sequel, Fight Club 2, and Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Black Panther for Marvel are two high profile examples from the last year with Margaret Atwood’s Angel Catbird being the latest. And, like Palahniuk and Coates’ efforts, Atwood’s is complete rubbish! 

Dead Drop Review (Ales Kot, Adam Gorham)

A virus that threatens mass extinction of the human race is on the loose - it’s up to Valiant’s Iron Man, XO Manowar, their Hawkeye, Archer, and their joke Cyborg, Beta-Max, to save the day!

Dead Drop stinks. XO Manowar’s on the cover but he’s only really in the first issue. The second issue is Archer’s, the third is Beta-Max’s, and the fourth ties them all together.

Rebirth: Batman #1 Review (Tom King, David Finch)

Though the quality tapered off towards the end, Scott Snyder’s Batman run is definitely up there with the best if only for Death of the Family and Zero Year. So Grayson co-writer Tom King has a lot to live up to by picking up where he left off - and actually he doesn’t do a bad job, at least as far as this first issue goes. 

Bloodshot Reborn, Volume 2: The Hunt Review (Jeff Lemire, Butch Guice)

Bloodshot continues to hunt down the remaining nanites that have infected some unwitting human hosts - until he realises there’s another out there also hunting the remaining infected in an effort to become Bloodshot themselves! 

Pronghorns of the Third Reich by CJ Box Review

Set in Wyoming, Lyle and Juan kidnap Paul, a lawyer whom Lyle believes cheated him out of his grandpappy’s inheritance and take him to a ranch whose bookshelves hold a dubious “treasure”…

Deadpool, Volume 1: Secret Invasion Review (Daniel Way, Paco Medina)

Daniel Way is THE BEST Deadpool writer, as far as I’m concerned anyway! Hell, he’s a great writer full stop, I’m kinda shocked he barely works these days - his last gig was 2013’s Thunderbolts! I’ve yet to read a Daniel Way Deadpool comic that’s not any good and his first book at the start of his 2008 run, Secret Invasion, is one of the best Deadpool books I’ve ever read.

Wayward, Volume 1: String Theory Review (Jim Zub, Steve Cummings)

Rori is a half-Irish, half-Japanese whippersnapper who’s gone to live with her mother in Tokyo. But Rori’s going to find out that Japan is magical - literally! - as she meets new friends… and new enemies! 

Wayward Volume 1 has a lot going for it like great art and likeable characters as well as a vaguely defined but enticing plot - and it’s got more than a few problems too, like Jim Zub’s flawed, awkward script! 

Wrath of the Eternal Warrior, Volume 1: Risen Review (Robert Venditti, Raul Allen)

Spoilers ahead if you haven’t read Book of Death and are planning to. If you’re not, this one has a truncated version of that story anyway so you can get all caught up without suffering through that nonsense!

Book of Death Review (Robert Venditti, Robert Gill)

Though they’re a much smaller publisher, Valiant’s superhero event books manage to be every bit as crap as anything Marvel or DC put out! 

The Eternal Warrior protects Geomancers (Earth wizards) like the little girl Tama who’s a Geomancer from the future. Together they must find the evil one to stop a terrible future from occurring. Yeah, it’s as bad and slapped-together as it sounds. 

52, Volume 1 Review (Geoff Johns, Grant Morrison)

52 was a year-long weekly series set in the wake of Infinite Crisis when Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman were taken off the table and the spotlight turned to DC’s B-to-Z list characters for a change. It boasted some of comics’ best writers like Grant Morrison, Mark Waid, Geoff Johns and Greg Rucka, and yet it wasn’t very good. But whyyyy? Well, partly because there are reasons why these characters are unpopular and barely known in the first place and partly because none of the myriad of storylines going on are at all interesting!

Batman: Detective Comics, Volume 7: Anarky Review (Francis Manapul, Brian Buccellato)

The holly jolly holidays have arrived in Gotham which of course means nowt to Batman or his rogues gallery! Mad Hatter’s off his meds and raving about Alice once more surrounded by children’s skulls, and Anarky’s returned to blow up Wayne Tower. Merry Christmas, Dark Knight!

Nope. Another bad Batman book! Sigh… 

X-O Manowar, Volume 9: Dead Hand Review (Robert Venditti, Diego Bernard)

The evil alien warrior Control created the Armor Hunters to track down and destroy all Manowar armors like Shanhara but also came up with a backup plan if they should fail: Dead Hand. A planetoid-sized mass of killer robots, Dead Hand has appeared on Loam, the Vine homeworld, and has plans for the next nearest armor planet: Earth. Aric to the rescue!

The Amazing Spider-Man, Volume 1: Worldwide Review (Dan Slott, Giuseppe Camuncoli)

I think Dan Slott read Grant Morrison’s Batman Incorporated and decided to tell the same story but with Spider-Man.

The relaunched Amazing Spider-Man sees Peter Parker as the wealthy head of Parker Industries as they expand on a worldwide level. There are doubles posing as Spider-Man to throw people’s suspicions away from Peter, his most immediate being Prowler, as well as Spidey with other members of the Spider-Family like Ultimate Spider-Man, Silk, Spider-Woman and others I’m probably forgetting scattered about. He’s battling an evil global organisation like Leviathan called Zodiac and he’s using a lot more gadgets this time around like the Spider-Mobile and the Spider-Plane. Sounds like Batman Incorporated to me! 

Kill or Be Killed #2 Review (Ed Brubaker, Sean Phillips)

My latest review for Need to Consume was Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips' Kill or Be Killed #2. Read the full piece here: http://www.needtoconsume.com/comics/kill-killed-2-review/

Captain Marvel, Volume 1: Rise of Alpha Flight Review (Tara Butters,

Captain Marvel/Carol Danvers is now head of Alpha Flight for some reason! That’s, uh, something meaningful to someone I guess? Off she goes to a space station orbiting Earth to save us from aliens and stuff. Hooray… belch.

Glitterbomb #1 Review (Jim Zub, Djibril Morissette-Phan)

My latest review for Need to Consume was Jim Zub and Djibril Morissette-Phan's Glitterbomb #1. Read the full piece here: http://www.needtoconsume.com/comics/glitterbomb-1-review/

Bloodshot Reborn, Volume 1: Colorado Review (Jeff Lemire, Mico Suayan)

Ray Garrison is a handyman at a Colorado motel, earning his keep by doing oddjobs for the owner. But in the night he’s tormented by horrible memories of murder and has resorted to self-medicating with hard drugs and booze. Ray Garrison isn’t his real name and nor is this one: Bloodshot. But that’s the cat he used to be - a bioengineered super-assassin with nanites in his blood that healed him from any wound!

Barrier #2 Review (Brian K. Vaughan, Marcos Martin)

It’s been a nine month wait since the first issue but Barrier #2 is finally out! 

Liddy, the American cowgirl, and Oscar, a Honduran chap trying to get into America illegally, have been abducted by aliens on the Texas border. But why - and what are the aliens doing on Earth? 

Star Wars: Darth Vader, Volume 3: The Shu-Torun War Review (Kieron Gillen, Salvador Larroca)

Darth Vader installs a puppet Queen on the mining planet of Shu-Torun after putting down their rebellion against the Empire. But a new rebellion begins and he must return to quash it once more… zzz...

Gauguin: Off the Beaten Track Review (Maximilien Le Roy, Christophe Gaultier)

The celebrated French primitivist artist Paul Gauguin took himself to the ends of the earth in the final years of his life, ending up in French Polynesia where he painted his famous Tahitian paintings before dying in 1903 at the age of 55. Writer Maximilien Le Roy and artist Christophe Gaultier show the reader Gauguin’s day to day life during these times in their pretty decent comic, Gauguin: Off the Beaten Track.

All-New, All-Different Avengers, Volume 1: The Magnificent Seven Review (Mark Waid, Adam Kubert)

I feel like Marvel should have put the “All-New, All-Different” label should be in quotation marks followed by a winking emoji because this Avengers book is only superficially new and different. It’s practically the classic line-up with some new faces in place of the originals. The team is Sam Wilson Cap, female Thor, Vision, Iron Man, Ms Marvel, Miles Morales Spidey, and Nova. 

Star Wars, Volume 3: Rebel Jail Review (Jason Aaron, Kieron Gillen)

Following Vader Down the Rebel Alliance has captured Darth Vader’s accomplice Dr Aphra and Leia and Han’s ex-wife Sana are transporting her to Sunspot Prison - except a blast from Leia’s past is waiting for her there for a surprise reunion! 

Assassination Classroom, Volume 1 by Yusei Matsui Review

Assassination Classroom has an absolutely batshit premise: a talking tentacle monster with a smiley face who can move at Mach 20 destroys most of the moon and will do the same to Earth in a year unless humanity somehow stops him. Oh and the monster - called Koro Sensei after a pun on the Japanese word “koro-senai” meaning “can’t be killed” - wants nothing more than to be a high school teacher! 

New Suicide Squad, Volume 3: Freedom Review (Sean Ryan, Philippe Briones)

Amanda Waller discovers Sage has been manipulating Task Force X aka Suicide Squad as part of a conspiracy and takes herself and the team into deep cover. Meanwhile the Squad are fractured and proving to be more ineffective – is this the end of Suicide Squad? If you read this you’ll probably find yourself eagerly anticipating that!

New Avengers: AIM, Volume 1: Everything Is New Review (Al Ewing, Gerardo Sandoval)

Al Ewing tanks another Marvel title with New Avengers! 

I don’t read everything but I do read a fair amount of Marvel’s output and I don’t remember when Advanced Idea Mechanics (AIM – the beekeeper villains) suddenly became the good guys, but that’s what they are in New Avengers… for reasons, I assume?! I guess Everything Is New, like the subtitle says (an upbeat reversal of Jonathan Hickman’s first New Avengers book, Everything Dies, probably signalling renewal after Secret Wars - fart).

Hawkeye, Volume 6: Hawkeyes Review (Jeff Lemire, Ramon Perez)

This is the first Hawkeye book in years that I haven’t enjoyed - damn you, Jeff Lemire! 

SPOILSIES AHOY! 

Sons of the Devil, Volume 2: Secrets and Lies Review (Brian Buccellato, Toni Infante)

Travis’ dad was David Daly, a cult leader from the ‘80s who made a deal with the Devil to sacrifice his 100 children to bring him to Earth – except a handful of kids survived. Daly was killed and the kids grew up scattered around the country. Now, 25 years later, someone’s picking off the remaining kids – and Travis is on the list. Could Daly have survived somehow… or is the Devil already here…? 

All-Star Section Eight Review (Garth Ennis, John McCrea)

All-Star Section Eight is the funniest comic I’ve read all year. It’s Garth Ennis and John McCrea once more gleefully pissing on superheroes and I laughed all the way through!

The Totally Awesome Hulk, Volume 1: Cho Time Review (Greg Pak, Frank Cho)

Amadeus Cho is the Totally Awesome Hulk who’s also totally in control when he’s the big green giant - but what happened to Bruce Banner? Also an alien monster collector called Lady Hellbender wants to add Hulk to her collection while Enchantress wants to enlist Hulk to fight for her in the War of the Realms storyline currently playing out in Jason Aaron’s Thor.