Last year, I went to NY Comic Con, stared Artist Alley in the eye and laid down the gauntlet for the Venom Plus Prop Challenge. The bounty was wonderful. Naturally, I’d have to think of a new subject for my sketchbook during this year’s Comic Con trip. Venom is out and Juggernaut is in.

The theme is simple: Juggernaut and another object. Any object. It’s not for me to suggest what it is, but for the artist to come up with the idea. Luckily, nobody gave him a hammer because look where that put him. Depowered and off Marvel’s best book. And nobody drew Colossus in a Juggernaut helmet because that’s lame and smelly. You know it’s true.

Let’s see what we got.

Juggernaut with Umbrella
by Chris Giarusso

Juggernaut with Cell Phone
by Jacob Chabot

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I can’t believe I’ve been doing this crap for two years. I just did the 100th installment of This Week in Panels a month ago, so this is less of a big deal, but whatever. This Week in Panels has been about me and people who read this for whatever reason picking out panels that best represent the comics we read. What is the comic? Sell it with one panel without the context. Let the readers figure it out.

Going with what I did a year ago, I decided to do a little look back at the past 52 weeks. The challenge is to showcase a panel from each week without double-dipping on the same series. Let’s see what the last year have given us.

Amazing Spider-Man #664
Dan Slott, Christos Gage, Giuseppe Camuncoli and Max Fiumara

Astonishing Spider-Man & Wolverine #5
Jason Aaron and Adam Kubert

Axe Cop: Bad Guy Earth #2
Malachai Nicolle and Ethan Nicolle

Batman and Robin #15
Grant Morrison and Frazer Irving

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This installment is bordering on lateness and with good reason. I’m exhausted and busy as hell this week due to some crazy work scheduling and other real life factors. That explains why the promised New Ultimate Edit Week 5 is pushed back a week. Don’t worry, it’s most certainly on its way. During all this madness, I forgot to get around to reading the latest SHIELD, so consider that one missing from the list.

This time around I’m helped by David Brothers and Was Taters.

Amazing Spider-Man #654.1
Dan Slott and Humberto Ramos

Avengers Academy #9
Christos Gage and Mike McKone

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Why, hello there! Feels nice to be doing a post that for once isn’t about guys in tights fake fighting. Wait, shit.

David Brothers and regular contributor Was Taters each have their share of panels to throw into the pile. Remember, if there’s a series you read that we don’t, always feel free to throw a panel my way. Email’s to the side.

Sorry for the lack of a good starter image. I like JRJR most of the time, but his Avengers work is really turning me off. In a way, NOT having to see his rendition of the Hood makes for a better panel.

Avengers #7
Brian Michael Bendis and John Romita Jr.

Azrael #14
David Hine and Cliff Richards

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First off, Halloween happened. That led to this.

Thankfully, I didn’t come across anyone dressed as Lawrence Taylor or Major Payne.

Now to panels. This week I’m joined by Space Jawa. There are other kinds of Jawas?

Action Comics #894
Paul Cornell, Pete Woods, Nick Spencer and RB Silva

Avengers #6
Brian Michael Bendis and John Romita Jr.

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40 isn’t a very special number, but we got a lot on the plate this time around anyway, so let’s pretend it matters. Oh, and we also get three doses of Grant Morrison. Well… only two of them count, but whatever.

Amazing Spider-Man #635
Joe Kelly and Michael Lark among others

American Vampire #4
Scott Snyder, Rafael Albuquerque and Stephen King

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Just got back from CHIKARA’s King of Trios and I’m completely exhausted. I’ll do a little trip report of sorts later. For now, it’s panel time.

Amazing Spider-Man #628
Roger Stern, Lee Weeks, Mark Waid, Tom Peyer and Todd Nauck

American Vampire #2
Scott Snyder, Rafael Albuquerque, Stephen King and Rafael Albuquerque

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CBR posted a little announcement and interview today dealing with the next chapter in Thunderbolts. With Osborn on the outs, what’s going to happen to the team? Who’s going to be the leader and who will he be commanding?

Get a load of this:

I’m starting to believe that Jeff Parker is God’s gift to me. I’m especially pumped. As an aside, looking at that cover, whoever unloaded on Cage should be thankful that he didn’t hit a nipple. That’ll set him off.

In addition to Luke Cage, the initial line up of Thunderbolts has been revealed to include Juggernaut, Crossbones, Ghost, Moonstone, and Man-Thing. Is there anything you can say about these characters motivations for being on the Thunderbolts?

I think everyone’s prime motivation is: I do not want to rot in this cell. I would rather have Luke Cage screaming at me as I run into the probability of certain death than rot in this cell. Except for the Man-Thing, of course – no one can ever tell what he’s thinking. And no one asked him anyway.

How would you describe the initial dynamic between these characters? Is there anybody Luke can trust on this team?

That’s what Luke would like to know! Moonstone is in and out of the program. She shows promise and then, bam – she lets you down. Ghost also seems promising, but then there’s quirks, like him trying to kill Iron Man. Juggernaut, some people think he’s a hero too.

This shows a ton of promise. Let’s look at the line-up, one by one.

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Back in the day, hermanos used to have all those cool “4th Letter is for…” graphics. Hm… his name does start with D. Yeah, let’s do it.

Neat!

10) Separate Ways
Cable/Deadpool #42 (2007)
Writer: Fabian Nicieza

Cable’s “death” in the comics was oddly done. It took place in X-Men #200 with this Cable/Deadpool issue acting like deleted scenes. Deadpool doesn’t even get a cameo in the big X-Men issue. No respect.

Having just done away with Sabretooth and having smoothed over things with Deadpool for the umpteenth time in their relationship, Cable explains that he needs to destroy the island and destroy all the future-related information in his computers. Deadpool volunteers to find where Cable keeps the backup of that information so he can help take care of it. Right before Deadpool can take off, Cable stops him.

Cable walks through the wreckage of his island paradise and thinks, “Thank you. I’m proud of you. Goodbye.”

I couldn’t imagine a better final moment between the two.

With Cable fighting Gambit and Sunfire, Deadpool is off to find that computer backup while taking on the Acolyte Senyaka. Cable is on the losing end of his fight and thinks about the concepts of sacrifice. Before the island can explode, he makes sure to teleport Deadpool off the island and back to his apartment.

“You sacrifice yourself to keep your dream from being corrupted. But most of all… you do it for the people in your life who matter the most…”

Back in his apartment, the layout is similar to the opening scenes of Cable/Deadpool #1. Deadpool immediately destroys Cable’s computer backup, looks out the window and says, “I wasn’t worth it…”

He turns on the TV to see news of Providence exploding, validating that Cable’s out of the picture. Going from sad to serious, Deadpool ends the issue promising, “…and I won’t let you down…”

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Based on one of the comments in an earlier article, I should probably mention that despite Deadpool being awesome in other forms of media (some of them, at least), I’m only counting comic book stuff for this countdown.

Sorry, no inclusions of the time in Ultimate Alliance where he talks to Weasel about the time he stabbed him in the leg for taking the last cheese puff. Or the conversation where he tries to convince Black Bolt to say “spatula”.

This also means no inclusions of animated Deadpool shooting Hulk and Wolverine with a crapload of tranquilizer darts before saying, “Hey, Logan! It’s me, Deadpool! I shot youuuuu!” Which is a shame in of itself because Hulk vs. Wolverine is such a brilliant depiction of the mouthed merc.

50) Rock ‘n’ Roll!
Identity Disc #2 (2004)
Writer: Rob Rodi

For those who haven’t heard of it, Identity Disc is a miniseries from a few years back that is essentially what happened when a writer decided to take The Usual Suspects and rewrite it with six supervillains. Five of the villains are interesting characters and help sell the series, but the other one sucks and is somehow the main character. Hint: I’m talking about Vulture.

Deadpool is part of this group in search for the Identity Disc, which has the identities of every superhero. In one scene, he hangs out with Bullseye, waiting to strike a facility and steal a skeleton key device. The two talk about what the Kaiser Soze knockoff of a villain has on them to make them play ball. For Deadpool, he’ll get information on where his ex-wife is. I don’t even think they meant Mercedes from the Kelly run, which makes it more of a continuity clusterfuck. For Bullseye, he’s tried working both sides of a gang war and it’s blown up in his face. If he does his job here, the slate will be wiped clean.

Finally, it hits nightfall and after all that waiting, they can finally get to business. Bullseye says, “Time to rock ‘n’ roll,” as the two sneak around the building. After all the lead-up, all that happens is Bulleye knocks a security guard out by flicking a piece of gravel onto his forehead and then finds the safe and gets the prize. Deadpool is angry over the complete lack of action and the fact that he wasn’t even needed to begin with.

To make up for it…

And there it is. The only scene from Identity Disc you’ll see on the list.

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