Comics of September 4, 2013

It’s the first Wednesday after Labor Day, so I might as well wish all those attending school luck. Good luck to everyone reading who is in school this fall. It’s also been a good week for comics in general, at least for the ones I picked up.

The first two issues of this year’s X-men event released today: Battle of the Atom 1 and All New X-Men 16. I’ll be reviewing them together because why not? I also picked up Avengers AI 3, X-Men Legacy 16, Superior Spider-Man 17, X-Factor 262, Batman: Ventriloquist 1, Action Comics Cyborg Superman 1 and Witchblade 169. These are my first impressions – I’ll add links to my full reviews as they’re posted.

Battle of the Atom 1 and All New X-men 16 review

Witchblade 169 review

X-Factor 262 review

Avengers AI 3 was fun. This issue mostly focuses on Vision as he’s introduced to a virtual city full of AI. There are some very interesting ideas in here. Outside, there’s a bit of cleanup related to last issue’s sentinel battle. It’s not as interesting, but it’s still entertaining. As with the first two issues, Doombot is a highlight. I wouldn’t call this series amazing, but it’s off to a good start. If you could find an Avengers title about a team of AI units and experts, this is worth reading.

X-Men Legacy 16 was great. It’s Legion and Blindfold vs. Cyclops’s X-Men team. Despite being ridiculously powerful, the X-Men do provide Legion a decent challenge. If there is a disappointment to be had, it’s that the real grudge match won’t start until the next issue as Legion and Cyclops will duke it out without powers. Still, this is a very entertaining issue with several legitimately funny moments. This series started a bit rough, but now it’s consistently among the most entertaining comics I read each week it releases.

Superior Spider-Man 17 was decent. After all this focus on Spider-Man’s efforts to clean up the city lately, it feels odd that it’s suddenly focusing on Horizon Labs. It’s not necessarily a bad thing though, as it brings Spider-Man’s University girlfriend to a company baseball game and connects these two groups together. It also serves as a way to convincingly bring Spider-Man 2099 to the present. The baseball scene is fun by the way. This storyline with both Spider-Men looks like it will be fun, and this is worth recommending to Spider-Ock fans and/or fans of Spider-man 2099.

Ventriloquist 1 was good. As much as it’s a Batman: Dark Knight book, it’s really about a Batgirl villain written by Gail Simone. Ventriloquist is delightfully creepy in this, and it skims over her backstory while showing her being twisted. It also explains a little more about her animate dummy friend and exactly what he’s about. I wouldn’t recommend this to anyone who doesn’t like the Ventriloquist villain though – man this villain month gimmick is dumb.

Cyborg Superman 1 was great. After the crazy twist at the end of Supergirl 23 regarding the Cyborg, this issue explains his origin story while showing him being coldly evil toward an entire planet. In case you didn’t know, Cyborg Superman in the new 52 is Zor-El, Supergirl’s father. This issue also expands a little on Supergirl’s origin story, but from her father’s perspective. As such, it feels more like a Supergirl issue than a Superman issue, but it’s a good one. It’s an easy recommendation for either regular Supergirl readers or those who want to read about the new version of Cyborg Superman. This and Ventriloquist 1 might be the only issues I buy from villain month though – I just can’t get over how silly this is.