We Interrupt Your Regularly Scheduled Programming

...is going on hiatus for a bit. Be good.

Animals and Babies

Never fails.

Wasted Effort

Wasted effort is one of the few things that really annoys me. Mine or somebody else's, it never fails to push my buttons. Well, button. I've only got the one. Right on my-
Never mind.
So, remember when I mentioned this?
Yeah, not so much now. I was looking forward to a new Hardware series. I really was.
...
It's become a bit of an ongoing thing with DC, hasn't it? The whole 'buying-up-properties-we-won't-actually-use-a-year-from-now' thing, I mean. The Red Circle characters are the newest additions to DC's unkempt Augean Stables, but we've got Doc Savage coming soon (not to mention his pulp contemporaries), and, of course, McDuffie's Milestone brand. Good brands all, but I doubt DC will put much effort into them beyond what's necessary to secure copyright. Much the same as when they have to do a new series with a character no one has heard of in thirty years because the rights are on the verge of lapsing.
It seems a bit wasteful, doesn't it? To pin down characters and concepts when you aren't planning to use them?
Oh, business-wise it makes perfect sense...why let someone else have access to a potential goldmine, right?
As usual, 4thletter says it better than I could. More eruditely, at least.

Say What You Will About Earth X...

But hot damn is that an awesome image of Galactus splitting a Celestial like a wishbone with his super-cosmic-gun of Celestial-wishbone-splitting. I mean seriously. Best part of that series right there.

Some Days, It Just Rains Bullets

Villains with Potential-Goldbug

Goldbug is one of those villains with a rationale straight out of James Bond. He loves gold. He's a skinny Auric Goldfinger. And frankly, that's good enough.
Obsession isn't rational. Isn't logical. And neither is the Goldbug. But dangerous? Oh my, yes.
He's a Silver Age DC villain plopped down into the Marvel Universe and he should be treated as such. Gold-themed deathtraps, henchmen wearing gilded battle armor, goldgoldgold. Ridiculous, but also, perhaps, insanely terrifying.
Most villains in the Marvel U. have an intensely pragmatic streak. They know when they're going to lose, or when an objective is no longer feasible. Goldbug lacks that streak. He's a monomaniac with a gold-gun and he's not afraid to use it! He will turn Fisk Tower to 4-K and not blink, man!
Maybe he's taken to collecting certain people he admires (celebrities, politicians, Wall Street tyros, etc.) and dipping them in his own special gold solution to create living statues. Oh, is that Tony Stark? I don't have one of those...
Or, even better, remember the Elements of Doom? Yeah, them. Maybe he's on a hunt for the one made of Gold, desiring it because, well, it's sentient gold. Imagine what he could do with that. Imagine what he'd want to do with that.
Yeah. No. Don't imagine it. Especially you, the one in the corner breathing heavy.
But, you say, he's dead, isn't he? One of the Punisher's victims during the Civil War, right? Easy enough to solve, but let's get creative. I mentioned the Elements of Doom? What if Goldbug had a plan...a plan that involved downloading his consciousness into a lovely, perfect body of pure, animated gold? Oh the things he could do, when he was at last as one with that most holy of elements, oh Muse, oh heavenly metal.
Imagine Goldbug using his new, ever regenerating form to create so much gold that it becomes valueless. Or, maybe, he creates his own Gold Corps variation on the Elements (gold has a lot of derivative compounds, chemical and otherwise. Gold cyanide, anyone?). Maybe he begins investing, using his new abilities to sell raw gold to the various interests that could use it. The electronics industry, the food industry, the medical industry. The list goes on.
A corporate web, and at the center, a spider made of pure, savage gold...

The More Things Change

It's good to know there are some constants in the Marvel Universe. Even if they do get turned into cyborgs. From The Fantastic Five series, written by Tom DeFalco.

Revenge of Ben Grimm, Ladies Man

In fairness, I suppose I should point out that that is an overly aggressive clone of the Thing (created by a rogue Watcher no less) trying to beat the ginger out of Titania. Which he does later in the issue, making for the fifth consecutive time Titania is reduced to tears by a male superhero. I'm not sure whether it's latent misogynistic subtext, or whether everyone just finds Titania really, really annoying.

Insert Joke

Showdown of the Century

Click the cover to head over to Diversions of the Groovy Kind, where the ever-generous Groovester has put up the entirety of the above issue, featuring the showdown of the century between the Shadow and the Avenger. Full of old school pulp goodness, plus added bodycount, at no extra cost. Be sure to tell the man thank you when you're done.