JSA Annual # 1

In the comic shops this week is the Justice Society of American Annual #1 (A1 from here on). I found it a very enjoyable read. Before I continue, let me state the following:

*** SPOILER ALERT! ***

**Do not continue reading** if you don't want to know what happens!!

In A1, Power Girl (PG from here on) is transported to a universe that is called Earth 2. For a more thorough explanation, go to Wikipedia's entry on it. I'll give the shorthand version here. Earth 2 (E2 from here on) is the universe that PG is originally from. In a recent storyline in the JSA title, PG had been teleported from the regular DC universe to this E2. The character that had sent her there was granting her her fondest wish - to go home - and that's what he did.

She emerges out of the wormhole and finds herself back on Earth. But not the Earth she just left. She has trouble believing it at first, but it appears to be - E2! Or is it? The heroes of this E2 universe remember the Crisis years when the skies turned red, after which they lost all contact with other universes. However, in PG's current universe, her E2 had been folded along with 5 other parallel universes into one "mainline" universe.

So - is this PG's E2 or not? I'll give my theories in just a bit, but let me continue with a complication that had arisen in the story - PG came face-to-face with: PG! This other PG was wearing the current PG's old costume, which has a scoop neckline that rides low enough to show cleavage. Here's a pic:

















And here's a pic on how her costume looks now:



















(By the way, both artworks were done by Amanda Conner. I love how she depicts PG).

Anyway, the other PG punched our PG, accusing her of being a fraud. After another punch, our PG goes into hiding, with the rest of the E2 heroes searching for her.

So what's going on here? My guess is that somehow, E2 managed to split from this "folding" event so that there were two E2s - one that got folded into the composite Earth that makes up the current DC universe, and another that somehow managed to continue on, isolated from other parallel universes. The other PG is the one that is native to the E2 in the story. Our PG is not. Her E2 is likely gone forever. Poor PG. Sigh.

Anyway, that's my theory. We'll see if I'm right in the next issue of JSA.

Why do superheroes wear costumes?

I thought I'd go ahead and answer a common question: Why do superheroes wear costumes? Part of the answer to that happens to be the reason that many of them also have secret identities.

For one, people with super powers tend to be larger than life, and a costume is symbolic of that. These godlike abilities draw attention anyway, so the costume is just a continuation of that attention-drawing.

Part of it is also psychological. If a bad guy saw Bruce Wayne charging at them, he'd probably laugh himself silly - but if he saw Batman charging towards him, he may soil his pants in fear. The costume also often reflects a change in personality for the hero in it - an alter ego, in other words.

Peter Parker, Clark Kent, Steve Rogers, Karen Starr. Just the names of regular folks. But Spiderman, Superman, Captain America, and Power Girl are another matter. When they don the costume, they also put on a different personality, and one that is more likely to get attention and respect from the bad guys.

And of course, part of the reason for superheroes to wear costumes is to protect their families, friends, and others that know their secret identity personally. If the bad guys knew a hero’s secret identity, they would kidnap or even kill their families or friends in order to get to the hero, because often the villain is that unstable.

That’s why you folks know nothing about me as Andromeda the busty superhero chick other than what I tell you. It’s for the protection of people I know. Basically then, we have to function as vigilantes – as outside the law.

Of course operating in such a vigilante fashion has its own problems, because a lot of what a hero does to stop a villain depends heavily upon the hero’s own moral code. If the hero has the moral code of a Captain America or Superman, then few problems arise on questioning their intentions. But if it is a hero with the moral code of The Punisher, then it gets problematic.

However, if it weren’t for our secret identities, we might not do what we do. These secret identities and vigilante ways are a compromise for our services. We do want to help, but we also want our loved ones out of harm’s way as much as possible. Wouldn’t you do the same in such circumstances?

I've had this, too

A friend of mine sent me a link to these comic strips from a webcomic titled Wapsi Square. The name of the woman wearing the black top is Monica.

I'm sure you can figure out why my friend sent me these particular strips, right? ;-)

It's funny, but I've had those kinds of questions, too. Most especially, "Are they real?" Not that it's any of their business, but yes, they are. No plastic or silicon.

Anyway, I've read Wapsi Square from time to time. It's mostly about Monica dealing with supernatural creatures and her personal demons given form. AND more than the occasional boob joke. And you thought I was bad talking about boobs! :-D

Satan is a vulcan!

Check out this comic cover of DC's Trinity #8!
































For one, I wonder why Batman is standing in front of the tarot card of the devil? Two, I wonder why Satan is flashing Mr. Spock's vulcan hand sign? Is Satan a Trekkie?

Women running in heels!

Just watching these ladies run in heels made my ankles hurt! You have to have super ankles to not kill yourself running such a race!

The 10 Most Bizarre Batmans

Brought to you from the female-friendly magazine known as Maxim is The 10 Most Bizarre Batmans Ever. Enjoy!

Wonder Woman's muscles again

The boss tweaked the image below in Photoshop to reduce the amount of lines in Wonder Woman's muscles, to see if it made them less "scary". What do you think?

Now you can subscribe to my blog!

I just figured out how to place that RSS thing onto my blog, so now you can subscribe to my blog and not miss a thing when I post! Ain't the Internet cool? :-D

From muscles to boobs

I had promised that I wouldn't talk boobs so much, but the recent comment on WW's overdeveloped muscles made me wonder, "If there is a line for too much muscle on a woman, then how big is too big for boobs?" I think we have the answer:





















Her name is Red Monika, and her boob size is ridiculous. No woman could do her hero thing with boobs that big! Granted, it's comics and you can get away with anything in comics, but if there were a line which defined "too big for boobs", then this definitely is it.

Update on my comics

At least one of you asked, and there are no doubt others who are also wondering as to when there will be some art of my stories coming. I've talked with the boss, and he assures me that it's coming. I'll keep after him about this, trust me.

New poll: Red Hulk vs. Thor!

New poll, folks! In an upcoming issue of Hulk (#5), Red Hulk goes toe-to-toe with Thor! (What does 'toe-to-toe' mean, anyway? Is that some sort of footsie?).














So - which of the two is going to win this battle of steroid junkies? My guess: Thor, because not only is he a god, he now also has the "Odinpower" by being the ruler of Asgard. Surely that has to count for something.

Super women and their super musculature

Check out this pic of Wonder Woman from Trinity #5:














Is it me, or are those muscles - especially those biceps - just a tad big, even for Wonder Woman? Granted, she's supposed to be strong, but she looks like she munches on steriod cereal for breakfast! If the question is "How musclebound can a woman look before it starts looking TOO musclebound?", then I think that this is the start of it.

Comics talk

Finally, a blog entry that doesn't talk about boobs! ;-)

Over the weekend, I re-read Marvel's Civil War and World War Hulk, and I remembered why I wasn't happy with how both of them ended. To me, after big build-ups and after very entertaining stories, they petered out in the end. Now we have Marvel's next Big Event, the Secret Invasion. Let's hope that they don't screw this one up. If they do, I might stop reading Marvel altogether.

Quick question, then I'll be talking more about comics

I'm going to answer one quick question because some of you have asked, then my blog will concentrate more on comics from here on.

Some of you have asked how it's possible that I wouldn't be aware that stuff like darts and a wrapped gift had fallen into my cleavage. "Wouldn't you feel something in there?"

Yes, I would feel something in there, because they're my boobs! However, here's the deal: My costume doesn't have pockets, so I keep my stuff in my bra. That is, I'm USED to feeling something in my bra. SO with that, if something fell in or were put in there, I wouldn't think anything of feeling something in there, because I'm used to it anyway!

I already mentioned that I keep my cellphone in there. I will also keep other stuff in there from time to time. Hey's they're big boobs, so it's a big cleavage! It's like my own desk drawer! It would be nothing for someone to drop something in there if I were distracted enough. I hope this answers that question on how I wouldn't be aware that something had fallen into my bra.

With that, from here on I'm going to talk more about comics on my blog. Don't fret, there will still be boob-related issues brought up from time to time, but the whole intent for this blog in the first place was to talk about comics and what it feels like to be a superhero.

BSC