Keep your politics outta my comics!

Obama appears in Amazing Spider-Man #583 (Now in its third printing!!!), with little to no warning from Marvel to the poor comic stores, and people lose their minds.

Obama appears in Youngblood #8....(crickets chirp)..."Hi, I'm Rob Liefeld. You may remember me from many poorly drawn comics from the 90's, as well as Heroes Reborn and other crap that sucked. I've noticed that not many of you out there are reading Youngblood, perhaps you don't remember how X-TREME it was back in the day. But, that is all going to change once everyone floods their local comic stores to get their hands on the highly collectible and totally RAD Obama issue! Try to guess how many pouches will be drawn on Obama, the winner gets some original artwork of Cable without ankles or proportion!"

Yeesh. Come on, people."Are you feelin' ok, Cap?"

New Beta Ray Bill Project

This article from Newsrama is mostly about an upcoming Sabretooth origin story, which is cool I guess, but the big news is Kieron Gillen is also working on a new Beta Ray Bill one-shot. And we all know that what we need is more Beta Ray!

Detective Comics #852: This issue is part of the "Faces of Evil" thing they are doing at DC right now, and part 1 of a two part Hush vs Catwoman story written by Paul Dini. I consider myself a fan of Paul Dini, especially when he writes Batman, and I have to admit that I was never a big fan Hush. But I do like what Dini has done with Hush so far, he has found a way to make him interesting and more a threat to Batman.

Unfortunately, DC went and screwed up, basically removing Batman from Dini's hands for their stupid "Battle for the Cowl" garbage. I see this whole "Batman R.I.P." story as a cheap imitation of Marvel's killing of Captain America. If you have been paying attention, this is the second time in the last 2 years that DC has played copy-cat to Marvel by using Batman. The previous was the obviously rushed and completely pointless "The Reserrection of Ra's al Ghul" story that went up against "World War Hulk." I predict that the winner of "The Cowl" will not retain it for long, and good old Bruce will return.

What to read in 2009

The new year starts and finds us at the end of another DC crisis, missing a Batman, and the Marvel Universe cleaning up after an invasion. It hasn't all been good, so I'm offering my picks on what to read going into the year.

Marvel's Noir series: I've read Spiderman and X-men so far, and I've enjoyed them very much. Give these a look if you like crime stories and mystery set during The Great Depression.

Dark Avengers: The Skrull invasion is over, and now it finally looks like the heroes of the Marvel universe will be fighting villians again. Say what you want about Norman Osborn not being a big enough villian to spearhead this, I don't care. I've followed his arc in Thunderbolts over the past year and he is a perfect choice. He has become the Anti-Tony Stark, which I hope will lead to the rejuvination of the real Tony Stark into a hero again. It looks like the pieces set into place by Thunderbolts will be picked up in Dark Avengers, and I for one cannot wait.

B.P.R.D. 1947: I read B.P.R.D. 1946 and loved it. Any story that brings together Nazis, vampires, Demons disguised as little Russian girls, Cybernetic War-Apes and WWII as well as this story did gets top marks from me. And now a sequel which promises more early Hellboy as well, sign me up!

Those are the titles I'm looking forward to. What are you excited about?