Reviewing the Mail: Week of 3/14

Another week has come and gone, and what do we have to show for it?

Well, for the part of "we" that is me, I've got at least a few paper-based entertainment products that arrived in my mailbox over that week. I didn't ask for these, which makes them even better, and I'm continually impressed and amused by the odd things that get published. (And that sell hugely, and become international cult successes, and win awards -- the world is big and full of strange things.) This week, I have one book and two comics to mention, and, as usual, I haven't actually read any of them yet.)

(This is true even this week, when I could probably take half an hour or so right now, read them, and get back to this post. But I refuse to do that, because...um...I'm sure I have a reason...well, let's say because it would ruin the gestalt I've established over the past seven years and move on quickly, shall we?)

The book is an illustrated paperback called Gene Simmons Is a Powerful and Attractive Man: And Other Irrefutable Facts, which is written by Christina Vitagliano (founder of the Monster Mini Golf chain, a fact so random I can't help but mention it) and illustrated by the twin dynamos of Monster Mini Golf's art department, Corey and Craig Marier. It's a Simmons-centric version of all of those jokey webpages about how some person is totally awesome and bends reality to his will: I believe Chuck Norris is the canonical original, but there have been plenty of them by now. Vitagliano's particular take is that Simmons is the modern god of sex, more or less, so this is full of one-liners about the powers of his tongue and other body parts, as well as the usual "the sun needs Simmons's permission to come up" silliness. It has a foreword from the man himself, written in the third person, and it will be a Plume trade paperback in April. If you are sexually obsessed with Simmons, this will be the only book you need this year.

Both comics are from DC, and both are Batman books -- first up is Detective Comics: Endgame #1, one of a series of one-shots tying into a current storyline in which Joker unleashes mass chaos and death in Gotham City. (What, again?) It's written by Brian Buccellato, drawn by Roge Antonio and Roman Cliquet, and appears to be entirely a sidebar.

The other is Batman Arkham Knight #1, yet another story about Joker yadda yadda Gotham City in flames and ruins blah blah blah mass deaths and horror et cetera. It's set in between two of the video games -- nothing against them, personally, since I still hope to play several of them -- and was originally published in three smaller parts digitally. It was written by Peter J. Tomasi and drawn by Viktor Bogdanovic and Art Thibert. I'm not clear about whether this is also a one-shot or not -- it has a "Next!" box at the end, but that could easily be leading into the game. Either way, it a piece of Batman story that fits in between two of the most popular pieces of Batman story of the past few years.