It's noir time again as we revisit some Ed Brubaker! This time, we're covering his Catwoman run with artists Darwyn Cooke and Mike Allred which starts in The Dark End of the Street, a collection that contains two whole stories!
The first is Slam Bradley on the hunt for Catwoman which originally ran as backups in Detective Comics 759-762, and then we jump into Catwoman #1-4 from 2002.
And then it's more Batman as we continue Knightfall Chapter 13 with a strange Two-Face tie-in from Showcase '93 #7.
--
Don't forget, Chris & Nick will be doing a live recording of the Your Stupid Minds podcast at Comicpalooza in Houston, TX on Friday, May 26 at 4:30 PM central. They'll be covering the 2004 Catwoman movie!
--
Next Time: X-Men - Days of Future Past (Uncanny X-Men 138-143)
Aliens! Predators! Robots! Androids! Monkeys! Asshole Businessmen! Nerds! Marines! They're all here as we revisit Dark Horse's AvP crossover universe with 1995's Aliens vs Predator: War by Randy Stradley.
We check in with Michiko again now that she's lived with the Predators for a year, and apparently she doesn't like it!
Then we see the fallout of Batman's broken back with Knightfall Chapter 12 in Detective Comics 664.
Next Time: Catwoman: Dark End of the Street by Ed Brubaker & Darwyn Cooke
Ok so Frank Castle (The Punisher) is imbued with the Spirit of Vengeance (Ghost Rider) and he goes back in time to kill Baby Thanos, but instead decides to kidnap and adopt him.
Also, Frank was the herald of Galactus for a bit, and THEY FIGHT SPACE SHARKS. Hell of a premise in 2018's Cosmic Ghost Rider by Donny Cates and Dylan Burnett.
After that, we finally get to the famous bat-back-breaking issue in Knightfall, when Bane scores a big victory in Batman #497.
Next Time - Alien vs Predator: War (1995)
It's time.
Time to revisit one of the worst comics we've ever read on the show... Frank Miller's All Star Batman & Robin, the famously crass and unfinished alternate universe version of "The Goddamn Batman."
Our friend Nick (from the Your Stupid Minds podcast) joined us back when we read the first 6 issues, so of course we had to invite him back to talk about issues 7-10.
We were all desperate for some classic Batman after that, so Nick also joined us as we continued our long read of Batman: Knightfall with Chapter 10 in Detective Comics #663.
Next Time: Cosmic Ghost Rider (2018) + Knightfall #11 (The Breaking of the Batman)
April is nearly upon us, and that means we're about to hit our favorite holiday, April Fools Day, when the world famously decides to all read bad comics together.
For our first bad comic this season, we're reading Secret Invasion, the 2008 Marvel event by Brian Michael Bendis and Leinil Francis Yu. Which heroes are really Skrulls? Does it matter? Is this comic as bad as we remember?
After answering those questions, we continue our long read of Knightfall with Chapter 9 in Batman #496.
Next Time: All-Star Batman & Robin the Boy Wonder Pt. 2 (Issues #7-10)
It's been a long time since we read any Alex Ross but today we decided to take a look at his newest book, Fantastic Four: Full Circle, a story exploring some of the FF's past with the Negative Zone.
Alex Ross abandons his painterly for something a little different, and he also wrote this book too!
Then we continue our long read of Batman: Knightfall with Chapter 8 in Detective Comics 662, a story that focuses on The Riddler while Batman hangs out with a monkey.
Next Time: Secret Invasion #1-8
It's our 200th episode!
And we're celebrating by reading an unfinished comic that can't be purchased anywhere, Alan Moore's 1963 -- A 6-issue Image comic from 1993 that is one big homage to the silver age of comics, with art from frequent Moore collaborators Rick Veitch, Steve Bissette, and Dave Gibbons.
We meet a bunch of brand new heroes who miiiiight tie back into the present day somehow.
Then we move onto Chapter 7 of Knightfall with Batman #495 where Poison Ivy tries to kiss a bunch of rich people!
Next Time: Fantastic Four: Full Circle by Alex Ross
It's time for the 2nd half of our Young Avengers two-parter! We dive into issues #7-12 and learn more about Teddy's birthright while also speed-running the secret of Billy's speedster twin brother (because they gotta wrap this series up ASAP).
Then we continue Batman: Knightfall with Chapter 6 in Detective Comics #661, where we learn to NEVER mess with the firefighter's union.
We're jumping back to mid-2000s Marvel with a 2-part look at Allan Heinberg and Jim Cheung's Young Avengers, a brand new teen superhero team starring Kate Bishop, Cassie Lang, and some other friends from the MCU!
We also get to spend plenty of time with Jessica Jones, Captain America, and Iron Man as they try to figure out just who the Young Avengers are and why Kang is involved.
Then the Joker hires a Scarecrow-knockoff in Chapter 5 of Knightfall in Batman #494.
Next Time: We finish Young Avengers with issues 7-12!
Can Wolverine run a school? That's the premise of Jason Aaron and Chris Bachalo's "Wolverine and the X-Men" from 2011.
There's more to it than that: A new Hellfire Club is attacking. The Department of Education is inspecting. One of the students should probably be in jail.
We read the first 4 issues to see how Wolverine survives. Then we continue Knightfall with Chapter 4 in Detective Comics #660.
As one of Japan's most popular characters, of course Mario would have his own manga. It's been running for 30 years but somehow it just got its first English translation in 2020 with a greatest hits compilation called Super Mario Manga Mania.
And you can't get a digital copy anywhere. This is the comic that finally broke the show. Nevertheless we persevere.
And of course we also read the next chapter of the Knightfall saga in Batman #493 in which Zsasz threatens to slice up a bunch of people, and Batman is just plain tired.
Next Time: Wolverine and the X-Men #1-4 by Jason Aaron & Chris Bachalo
Website: allmyfriendsarerighthere.com (go check it out, Vince paid $18 for the domain)
Ho ho ho ho, it's time for another holiday special!
This year we take a look at the DCU Infinite Holiday Special from 2006 featuring stories about Green Lantern, Supergirl, Batwoman, Shadowpact, Flash, Superman, and... Shazam? Let's just say the card is subject to change.
Then we continue the Knightfall storyline in Detective Comics #659 where the Ventriloquist tries a bunch of new hand puppets!
Next Time: Super Mario Manga Mania
Instead of reading comics, we thought we'd put a focus on watching cartoons for this episode so that we could look back at some of Kevin Conroy's best work as the voice of Batman in some of his favorite episodes.
First, we cover an episode titled "Perchance to Dream" from Batman the Animated Series where Bruce Wayne dreams of a life with his parents still alive. Then "This Little Piggy" from Justice League Unlimited, where wonder Woman gets turned into a pig and Batman has to save her.
Then we jump into Knightfall proper with the first episode of the Broken Bat Saga in Batman #492 where lots of villains have just been freed from Arkham!
It's been a while but we finally revisit the Age of Apocalypse with the next miniseries on our list, X-Calibre, which is basically the Nightcrawler and Mystique show.
It's got pirates and senseless murder and piles and piles of dead bodies. Cool.
Then we start our longread of Batman: Knightfall with a special Vengeance of Bane one-shot that tells us about how Bane was sentenced to prison as a baby. Wait, that can't be right...
Next Time: We break format to remember Kevin Conroy with a pair of animated TV episodes
Plus we start Batman: Knightfall properly with Batman #492
With Namor appearing in the movies soon for the first time in Black Panther, we go waaaaay back in the past to 1939 to read the first appearance of the Sub-Mariner in Marvel Comics #1, published back when they were called Timely Comics.
Then we read the Namor stories from Marvel Mystery Comics #7-10 to see him attack New York and fight the Human Torch and basically be the biggest a-hole of all time. It's very entertaining!
Then we finish our tour through the life of Earth-2's Batman with Brave and the Bold #197, in which Batman recalls the way he and Catwoman fell in love.
Next Time:
As the spooky season nears its end, we take a look at some various scarious one-offs.
First up is Spider-Man: The Short Halloween, a comedy one-shot by SNL's Bill Hader & Seth Meyers.
Then we go back to some classic 80's X-Men when Storm turned into a vampire in issue #159, and then again when Dracula returns in X-Men Annual #6.
Then we continue our trip to Earth-2 with The Brave and The Bold #182 where Earth-1 Batman teams up with Earth-2 Robin!
The spooky season creepiness continues as we revisit Locke and Key with Volume 3: Crown of Shadows. We've got ghosts, dead bodies, and weird teenagers trying to go to a Muse concert. Scary stuff!
Then we continue our trip through Earth-2 with Adventure Comics #462 where we see the death of Earth-2 Batman to one of the most infamous villains of all time.
Next Time: Spider-Man: The Short Halloween + Storm Turns Into a Vampire (Uncanny X-Men #159 & Annual #6)
The spookiest of seasons is upon us, so we decide to take a look at one of Marvel's spookiest comics: Tomb of Dracula! We know this character's not very well known, so we read issues #10-15 which include the first appearance of Blade, a much more popular character.
Plus we get Dracula doing all of his trademark moves like steering a boat and calling his enemies up on the phone.
Then we continue our Earth-2 journey with JLA #160 which features a panel where The Atom is lying on a giant hospital bed. That's all I remember about it. And dinosaurs.
She-Hulk has her own show! And it seems to take a lot of inspiration from the Dan Slott run that we visited a while back.
We dive back into it with Volume 3: Time Trials, which collects #1-5 from the 2005 She-Hulk series. There's cowboys, jealousy, and time cops: the three perfect ingredients in any story.
Then we read our next Earth-2 book with a JLA/JSA team-up in Justice League of America #159.
Next Time: Blade's Origins with Tomb of Dracula #10-15 + Justice League of America #160
We haven't quite hit spooky season yet but we really wanted to get back into some Swamp Thing, so we're diving back into Alan Moore's run from the 80's with the 3rd collected volume which covers issues #35-42.
The series takes on a bit of a different form with the first appearance of Constantine as he sends Swamp Thing on freak-of-the-week adventures around the US.
Then we get into some multiverse shenanigans as we start a scattered new long-read focused on Earth-2 heroes. First up is DC Super-Stars #17, featuring the origin of Batman and Catwoman's daughter: Huntress!
Next Time: She-Hulk (2005) #1-5 (Time Trials) and Justice League of America #159
With the recent passing of Alan Grant, we take a look back at some of the 80's Batman he wrote alongside John Wagner in Detective Comics #583-586, which feature the first appearances of Scarface & The Ventriloquist in the first story and then The Ratcatcher in the next.
They're two quick, fun Batman stories that go down smooth, with nice art by Norm Breyfogle too!
Then we finish our read of Superman For All Seasons by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale with issue #4: Winter! Superman gets his groove back by making a snow angel and stopping a classic winter flood.
It's been a while since we read a Vertigo book, so with today's episode we take our first foray into Jason Aaron and R. M. Guera's Scalped, a Native American noir book with lots of rich history to play off of.
It's a book filled with a bunch of assholes who all hate each other. Classic!
Then we continue our read of Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale's Superman For All Seasons with issue #3, the Fall issue, which takes a slightly different approach than the first two issues did.
Next Time: We remember comics writer Alan Grant with Detective Comics #583-586.
We've got Turtle Fever! The new TMNT game reminded us how great the Ninja Turtles are, so we go back to Eastman and Laird's original series to read the now classic Return to New York story from issues 19-21. Why is it so classic? There's a worm-filled Shredder. Nuff said.
We then continue our long-read of Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale's Superman for All Seasons with issue #2, the Summer issue. It's hot outside too! How topical!
Next Time - Scalped: Indian Country by Jason Aaron & R.M. Guera
A couple years ago we read the Ocarina of Time manga, so we thought we'd revisit the Zelda series with the sequel, Majora's Mask.
Zelda's not even in this story and Link might be dead, or maybe dreaming, or maybe he just fell in a big hole. We're not sure, but we know there are monkeys and that's cool.
We also start our next long-read: the 4-part Superman for All Seasons by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale, in which we get a nice little retelling of Superman's origin.
Next Time: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Return to New York (#19-21)
Our streak of non-superhero comics continues with one of the newest comics we've ever covered on the show: Neil Gaiman's Chivalry which was released just two months ago!
Well, technically it's a short story he wrote in the 90's, but it was just adapted to comics by Colleen Doran and it's a real beauty. Plus it makes us fumble our way through Arthurian mythology, what's not to love?
Then we move onto the finale of the Korvac Saga in Avengers 177 in which waaaaay too many Avengers get killed.
Next Time: The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask manga by Akira Himekawa and Superman: For All Seasons #1