What’s worse than Dick Grayson having a cheap one-nighter with a “best friend” who was recently crippled by his former mentor’s arch-nemesis and trying to sneak out the next morning with nothing but an invite to his wedding to an alien hottie?

Dick Grayson is a devout Christian.

So…TAKE THAT organized religion!!!

These writers appear to feel bad about how poorly Beetle was handled in Countdown, and now they’re going out of their way the OTHER way to make up for his poor treatment in Countdown.

Like I said, I admire the sentiment, but it comes off as far too forced, with the notable exception of Gail Simone’s Birds of Prey, because a Beetle tribute made sense there.

Actually I get the Blue Beetle thing. It’s typical to not appreciate somebody when they are here, and to go over board to compliment them when they are gone. I mean we as a country turned Nixon from a failed and disgraced President to a brilliant but “flawed” man after his death.

They just didn’t want to speak ill of the dead.

I know what you’re saying, but in this case it feels less like the characters speaking naturally and more like the character acting as mouthpieces of the editorial and writing staff. It’s hard to explicitly pinpoint the difference,but it feels like the staff realize how tacky the treatment of Blue Beetle looks in retrospect and are overcompensating in the way they have characters speak about him now. And as usual, DC employs it’s patented “subtle as a jackhammer” characterization and dialogue techniques.

One thing I always find interesting about DC…no matter how well you write at Marvel, in your novels, in your screenplays, etc…once you write for DC you immediately start writing in a “tell don’t show” subtle-as-a-heart attack writing style.

DC had an issue that was built entirely around the concept of every notable DC hero being a dick to Blue Beetle, so this retroactive “he was awesome” stuff just seems silly.

Not to be too crass about it, but did anyone in your high school die? In that case, you would have seen a lot of this. Like the folks said above, this is a very human reaction, and a very honest portrayal of it. It’s like people think that if you speak warmly about someone after they’re dead, it makes up for anything you did wrongto them while they were still alive…

They just didn’t want to speak ill of the dead.

Not that it was referenced in the issue, and hey, I could have my timeline off anyway.

And Guy wasn’t even in Countdown and seemed pretty gung-ho about avenging him in OMAC Project, so those two…who are the only two I’ve seen praise him recently…make sense to me.

Plus, nothing will ever compare to the collective tongue-bath his supposedly huge online fanbase lathered upon him when Countdown came out. Now, a couple of years later, we have people saying, “Enh, he wasn’t all that.” Guess TPTB were right about his appeal after all.

It COMPLETELY makes sense that Starman and Black Canary were having sex. I wouldn’t have thought of it the first time I read the story but I re-read it post Starman and I was like “yeah. That works.”

Has retroactively making two characters have sex ever worked in a comic?
I can only think of Starman and Black Canary – and that only worked because it was REALLY well written.
And at the time it came out, it wasn’t happening in every other story.

WOW! What a dick.

Jesus, if that comic came out when I was still in college, I certainly would have used that in my thesis on super hero sexual identity issues. I mean, jeez, who knew losing your parents made you THAT emotionally distant?

I don’t get the hate for WWIII. I mean, I wouldn’t get it if there was major love for it either, but it seemed to me to be an average, entertaining-if-forgettable way to pass twenty minutes. Not very good, not very bad, not very memorable at all. (Although Young Frankenstein’s last words should have been, “UTTTIN ON A RIZZZZZZ!” I’m so going to bring that character back someday just for all the cheap Mel Brooks jokes.)

The World War III comics stood out to me because they were essentially designed so that there is no way TO write them as a good comic.

That’s rare to see – a comic that doesn’t have a chance to be a good comic from the get-go.

Eh, I didn’t need any annotations to understand this issue. In fairness, I am really familiar with Justice League history, but nothing in here really struck me as potentially confusing. I actually considered JLA #8 it to be Meltzer’s best issue to date by quite a good margin.

And good to hear regarding the egg trick!!

Agreed, but surely that character was introduced about six months ago?

You CAN get a boiled egg into a bottle by putting a lit match in the bottle. The egg will get sucked in by the vacuum.