Heya. So the idea was that Friday I was supposed to do another installment of This Character in Panels because it was the 4 year anniversary of this weekly segment. Then when working on it, I remembered that it takes like ten times as long to do one of those updates as it does this. Yeah, so I’ll try to have that done tomorrow. The last week’s been a complete mess for me and I’m super glad to have it all done away with.

Elsewhere, I’ve written a review of Street Fighter Origins: Akuma that got posted at Den of Geek US.

This week ends Villains Month at DC, meaning I can go back to knowing what it is I want to read from that company. Thanks to Matlock, who read about 95% of that experiment and gave me panels for it. Also thanks to contributors Gaijin Dan and Space Jawa.

Action Comics #23.4
Sholly Fisch and Steve Pugh

Aquaman #23.2
Geoff Johns, Tony Bedard and Geraldo Borges

Avengers #20 (Matlock’s pick)
Jonathan Hickman and Leinil Francis Yu

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Welcome to This Year in Panels, something I’ve been doing every 52 or so weeks since starting This Week in Panels. As you should know by now, This Week in Panels is all about taking the comics that me and my buddies (Was Taters, Gaijin Dan, Space Jawa, Jody, Matlock, Brobe, Dickeye and anyone else I might be forgetting) have read and cut them down into one representative panel. The kids love it.

ThYiP is a little best-of take on it where I only choose one panel from each week but I can’t double-dip on the same series. For some nostalgia, here’s Year 1, Year 2 and Year 3.

Begin!

Action Comics #18
Grant Morrison, Rags Morales, Brad Walker, Sholly Fisch and Chris Sprouse

Age of Apocalypse #12
David Lapham and Renato Arlem

All-New X-Men #8
Brian Michael Bendis and David Marquez

All-Star Western #19
Justin Gray, Jimmy Palmiotti, Moritat and Staz Johnson

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Hey! It’s you! I’m busy as hell this week, but I’m still going to be doing a bunch of ThWiP off-shoots over the next couple days. Tomorrow it’s This Year in Panels while this Friday I’ll be doing the return of This Character in Panels. Why? Because it’ll have been four years as of Friday, that’s why. Ah, the days of ThWiP Week 1 in 2009.

Back when people still remembered Skaar.

So anyway, this week brings us the end of Injustice: Gods Among Us for the time being. “Year One” just ended and there’ll be an Annual in November. Then it relaunches in January. In the meantime, I’ve written a retrospective/review of sorts for Den of Geek US the other day. Speaking of which, I’m going to be doing more hands-on stuff with that site, so that’s pretty exciting for me.

This week I have my fellow Injustice reader Matlock, who is still reading up on most of the DC villains comics. Gaijin Dan still has his manga and Was Taters makes her grand return. Let’s get to it.

Action Comics #23.3
Charles Soule and Raymund Bermudez

Batman #23.3
Frank Tieri and Christian Duce

Batman ’66 #12
Jeff Parker and Sandy Jarrell

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Howdy. I didn’t read too much this week (though I did pick up the Street Fighter Origins: Akuma comic, which was neat), but Matlock went the distance. Goddamn. He’s flanked by Gaijin Dan and Space Jawa. Normally, I’d follow up this update with This Year in Panels, but next week is closer to the actual ThWiP anniversary, so I’ll do it then.

Which is a reminder that if you want to contribute to the second attempt at This Character in Panels, you’re more than welcome. I’ll be doing that update on Friday the 27th.

Apologies for the low level of updates here. It’s been busy times for me. I’m working full hours at my job, I’m doing the Den of Geek thing and I have assignments to do for my sketch writing class. Once that last part is finished with, I’m sure I’ll be a bit more prolific here. In the meantime, I have two new Den of Geek articles up. One for the 10 Most Uplifting Moments in Professional Wrestling and another in the form of a guide to the current TMNT storyline City Fall.

Now this is the part of Sprockets where we show panels.

Action Comics #23.2
Greg Pak and Ken Lashley

Aquaman #23.1 (Gavin’s pick)
Geoff Johns, Tony Bedard and Claude St. Aubin

Aquaman #23.1 (Matlock’s pick)
Geoff Johns, Tony Bedard and Claude St. Aubin

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Welcome back for another week of showcasing what we’ve read through single panels. I’m helped out by Matlock, Gaijin Dan and Space Jawa. Matlock went the distance, as he appears to want to read all of the Villains Month crap from DC. Better him than me. The one omission is Green Lantern as the entire issue is splash pages and that’s against the rules for ThWiP. Still, nice art.

I have a new article up at Den of Geek US. 10 Awesome Scenes from Bad Movies. Go give that motherfucker a read! I have a couple more articles slated to be posted there over the next week, including a really fun wrestling-based one.

Meanwhile at the Hall of Panels…

Action Comics #23.1 (Gavin’s pick)
Michael Alan Nelson and Mike Hawthorne

Action Comics #23.1 (Matlock’s pick)
Michael Alan Nelson and Mike Hawthorne

All New X-Men #16 (Matlock’s pick)
Brian Michael Bendis and Stuart Immonen

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Greetings. Pretty big week, very Avengers-centric. Well, except for Avengers Arena because we all have some standards. By “we” I mean myself, Matlock, Gaijin Dan, Space Jawa and Dickeye.

Dickeye’s choice for Thor: God of Thunder reminds me that at the end of the month, I’m bringing back another round of This Character in Panels. If you missed out last time, send me a line!

All-Star Western #23 (Gavin’s pick)
Jimmy Palmiotti, Justin Gray and Moritat

All-Star Western #23 (Matlock’s pick)
Jimmy Palmiotti, Justin Gray and Moritat

Aquaman #23
Geoff Johns and Paul Pelletier

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Yo! Welcome to a manga-less edition of ThWiP. Due to some kind of big Japanese holiday, Gaijin Dan doesn’t have any ammo, so he’s taking the week off. My backup comes in the form of Matlock and Space Jawa.

I did an article for Den of Geek of Top 25 Comic Characters Who Owe Everything to an Actor’s Portrayal. That was a fun one to write. Too bad it pissed off Reddit. Apparently, they took the “Everything” part a bit too literal. Ah, well. My next list article is bound to piss off even more people. It already got my editor mad for me saying that Popeye is a bad movie.

The best omissions I’ve heard from readers are Josh Pais as movie Raphael, Peter Cullen as Optimus Prime and maybe Tom Hiddleston as Loki.

Now for comic panels.

Animal Man #23
Jeff Lemire, Steve Pugh and Francis Portela

Avengers #18
Jonathan Hickman and Leinil Francis Yu

Avengers Assemble #18
Kelly Sue DeConnick and Barry Kitson

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Hey! Panels! Yeah! Pretty light week, though. Even Gaijin Dan has less than usual and Space Jawa and Dickeye only have one panel to toss my way each. That’s okay, though. Infinity kicked enough ass to satiate my hunger.

Elsewhere, I wrote some stuff from Den of Geek. I did a review of the Mega Man/Sonic crossover Worlds Collide and also a review of Phineas and Ferb: Mission Marvel, the cartoon crossover that involves Venom ringing doorbells and running away. I have a huge article ready and done, hopefully to be posted sometime in the next few days.

Batman #23
Scott Snyder, Greg Capullo, James Tynion IV and Rafael Albuquerque

Batman ’66 #7
Jeff Parker and Joe Quinones

Batman: L’il Gotham #5
Dustin Nguyen and Derek Fridolfs

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Yo, hey! ThWiP time. Light week this time around, what with it being me, Gaijin Dan, Space Jawa and Jody. First time in forever there’s been no overlap in panel choices, so that’s a thing.

I have a review up of the newest Axe Cop cartoon at Den of Geek. Tomorrow it’ll have my review of the Archie Comics Sonic/Mega Man crossover, so give that a look if you remember.

This week I read Burn the Orphanage from Image, which I highly suggest. It’s essentially any given Final Fight/Streets of Rage brawler game written in comic book form, starring the well-rounded hero, the big, strong guy and the street-smart young woman. No turkeys found in drums in this issue, sad to say.

Okay, let’s do this like Brutus.

Atomic Robo: The Savage Sword of Dr. Dinosaur #2
Brian Clevinger and Scott Wegener

Avengers #17
Jonathan Hickman, Nick Spencer, Stefano Caselli, Marco Rudy and Marco Checchetto

Batman ’66 #6
Jeff Parker and Jonathan Case

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It’s a week of endings. Grant Morrison finishes up his lengthy work with Batman by showing that, “Batman and Robin will never die!” is in actuality a form of Hell. The Sonic the Hedgehog/Mega Man team-up ends after its 12th issue, meaning that the Dr. Wily/Dr. Eggman bromance is gone for good. Then we got the last issue of the latest What If.

Guys, you know me. You know that I’ve read every single issue of What If. I know all of them from the great to the terrible. I can honestly say that of the 200+ entries of that series, What If: Avengers vs. X-Men is the absolute worst one. Yes, even worse than What If the Avengers Lost the Evolutionary War? At least that story was able to be bad in one issue.

I’m helped out by Gaijin Dan, Was Taters, Space Jawa, Jody and Matlock. Let the games begin.

Animal Man Annual #2
Jeff Lemire and Travel Foreman

Batman ’66 #5
Jeff Parker and Ty Templeton

Batman Annual #2
Scott Snyder, Marguerite Bennett and Wes Craig

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