The Lost Buy Pile for December 30th, 2009 (Uncensored)

NOTE: It's not a big deal that CBR chose not to run my last Buy Pile column of 2009. I can count the weeks I've missed on two hands over the six plus years I've been doing this, so I was kind of peeved not to see it, but it's not like I was curing cancer or anything. Anyway, here it is, uncensored, in all its glory, CBR font tags left in because I'm too busy to fix it.

FRONT PAGE BLURB (yes, I write these as well)

Should auld acquaintance be forgot, as the year ends with proof that Namor needs to flap his ankle wings, some of the year's worst comics and trying to brighten up Blackest Night. Happy New Year to you too, pal ...

THE COLUMN

WHAT IS THE BUY PILE?

Every week Hannibal Tabu (journalist/blogger/novelist/poet/karaoke host/jackass on Twitter) goes to a comic book store called Comics Ink in Culver City, CA (Overland and Braddock -- hey Steve, Jason, Vince and Quislet) and grabs a whole lotta comics. These periodicals are quickly sorted (how?) into two piles -- the "buy" pile (a small pile most weeks, comprised of planned purchases) and the "read" pile (often huge, often including comics that are really crappy but have some value to stay abreast of). Thursday afternoons you'll be able to get his thoughts (and they're just the opinions of one guy, so calm down) about all of that ... which goes something like this ...

NOTE: There was only one new comic book sold in US comics shops this week due to reasons both complicated and stupid. Let's never speak of them again. So here's that ... and a few surprises ...

THE BUY PILE FOR DECEMBER 30TH, 2009

Blackest Night #6 (DC Comics)

Jump from the Read Pile. The only book sold on the last week of 2009 ... and it stinks. What's weird is that it doesn't stink in the big, showy way that the previous issue did. No, it goes about it in a workmanlike fashion, dutifully doing ridiculous things and pacing them through the narrative as though they shouldn't be the root cause for relentless mockery.

Why? Okay, let's get into that. First of all, Barry Allen grabs Hal Jordan's green power ring-created chain and runs fast enough to travel "two seconds into the future" to make the Black Lantern rings seeking their resurrected flesh. Wait, what? So ... the "emotional reaction" to Blackest Night Batman ... can be outrun? "As long as we don't jump out of our boots again," Allen said, "the rings won't have anything to grab onto" (no, that's not a word, let's not even get into that, the editors are overworked for the love of pie).

Then there's the weird technology side. A Black Lantern treated being possessed by Boston Brand like he was a digital virus and ejected him. Ganthet made some weird notation and alleged that all the rings are "all based on Oan technology" and "contain the same safeguard." Really? So when the Weaponers of the anti-matter world of Qward made those babies, they followed specs from Oa? Given that the Weaponers hated Oa and GLs in particular? Lemme see, I hate cars, lemme make this metal vehicle with four wheels in a rectangular pattern and send it out to battle them. Really? Wow.

Add in the stunt casting (more fantasy ball versions of "who gets a ring?"), another "color change" that was all too easy and a weird cover gallery of what look like "undead" issues of cancelled series, brought back to feed the crossover ... ugh. It's just distasteful, and ends the year on a bad note.

Wait, the book stinks ... why buy it? Well, it was (again) the only book on sale this week, and supporting your local comics shop is important. There's also ... well, we're getting ahead of ourselves. We'll discuss the other motives for wanting to be in the shop (and therefore supporting it) momentarily ...

WHAT'S THE PROGNOSIS

There were two freebies from the Mouse House of Ideas, "Origins of Siege" (which really has Norman Osborn playing out of his depth alongside some cute one page origin stories which simplify a great deal) and Marvel's 2010 calendar, with ads for a clearly reassembled Avengers (classic style), "Fall of the Hulks" and so on, but without art credits on the pin ups. Meh.

So ... four dollar stinker, meh freebies ... the end of 2009 is as bad as the Buy Pile's trusty smartphone falling down the stairs on the way in and breaking irrevocably. *sigh*

WINNERS AND LOSERS

Ah, here's where it gets interesting.

If you've kept up with the commentary tracks for this column (running over at The Hundred and Four, you'd know about the showdown between a school teacher and a lawyer over whether or not Namor needs to flap the wings on his ankles to fly.

First, back it up. Early in 2009, in a store full of customers on a Wednesday, The Counselor brought up the idea that Namor needed to flap the aforementioned ankle wings to fly. This was widely mocked and laughed at, especially given that The Counselor (a successful divorce lawyer) had apparently gotten housed on a Legion of Super-Heroes related discussion involving Quislet some time before. This time, however, he was determined. Week after week he came back, quoting some obscure panel ("Daredevil" this, Matt Cherniss' mini series that) and was rebuffed, ultimately given the word from another Comics Ink employee (Vince Moore of Comics Waiting Room fame) that a John Byrne panel proved Namor was just a crazy man in panties and could fly any darned well time he felt like it, flapping or no flapping.

However, Vince turned out to be the Kato Kaelin of this case, because further examination of the entirety of Byrne's Namor run (and that takes either dedication or insanity) proved that Vince had misread and misquoted and has since been shunned and mocked like the guy two guys back who climbed off of Madonna. The Counselor was given a new trial before an appellate court (presided over by this columnist with a jury of whoever comes in the shop for this madness) but had to present his case on a Wednesday before the end of 2009.

So ... well, it all went down today and it was big. Wrestlemania big. The Counselor stood with a stack of evidentiary exhibits, an eight page brief on his case and a fresh suit. The defense, a degenerate in deadbeat's clothes, simply flustered and tried to get his leather vest not to chafe. It was crazy. The whole PDF may go online, depending on how some emails might go. Keep watching that blog for updates (and videos, if we can get them off of Facebook). It's hard to try to encapsulate being there for such a show of comics scholarship (one of the finest examples this reviewer has ever seen that didn't involve the named Waid or Busiek), fanwankery (as he doesn't get paid for this) or sheer awesomeness (the wonderful juxtaposition of the two). Simply an outstanding moment to love comics and more than makes up for ... well, "Blackest Night" #6.

That's winners. Losers? Well, let's look at some of the worst comic books of 2009 ...

- "Ambush Bug Year None" #7, which actually seemed to hate the fans more than the last issue of "Wanted."

- "Captain America: Reborn" #4, with the Red Skull ... look, we can't even talk about it in detail because Cap's running around and the last issue of this mini still hides in the Mouse House of Ideas.

- "Adventure Comics" #5, which literally took Superboy Prime into the offices of DC Comics in a move so goofily meta that it made "Ex Machina" look like Tolstoy.

- "Fantastic Four" #567, with the dream sequence and the "Marquis of Death" and really, what's up with this run being so terrible, since "Nightly News" alone proved Jonathan Hickman's a freaking genius?

There were lots of bad comics -- "Nomad: Girl Without a World" leaps to mind, or maybe "Titans" as examples of books that hate America and hate puppies -- but these four were so abysmal that even cursory glances over the reviews in question could cause nausea.

So there's that. Happy new year, pal.

THE BUSINESS

Got a comic you think should be reviewed in The Buy Pile? If we get a PDF of a fairly normal length comic (i.e. "less than 64 pages") by no later than 24 hours before the actual issue arrives in stores (and sorry, we can only review comics people can go to stores and buy), we guarantee the work will get reviewed, if remembered. Physical comics? Geddouttahere. Too much drama to store with diminishing resources. If you send it in more than two days before comics come out, the possibility of it being forgotten increases exponentially.

There are now two official ways to get Hannibal Tabu's blog-related wisdom. For all personal things, there's Hannibal's relaunched Soapbox and for his views on the weird, wild world there's The Hundred and Four.

Playing (Music): "Hard" by Rihanna feat. Young Jeezy ('cause that Hannibal reign just won't let up)