50 Word Review-Drax #1: CM Punk’s Pipe-Bomb Comic Book Fails to Ignite

Writers: CM Punk & Cullen Bunn
Artist: Scott Hepburn
Publisher: Marvel (Disney)
Released: 4th November 2015


Smart butt one-liners, quips, self-aware jokes, the book laughs at itself. Empty protagonist Drax runs on revenge/hatred. Punk commenting on his own life? CM railed against corporate WWE system of dull conformity, too legit, he quit. Here, he puts his name to just another corporate comic book. Fandom, or money?


Rating: 4/10

Drax #1 is ex-WWE wrestler CM Punk’s second attempt at (part) writing a comic book (the first was in the Feb 25th 2015 Thor annual). It’s co-written by established writer Cullen Bunn, and to me, the book reads like just another safe, corporate, Cullen Bunn narrative. It’s character based, daft, uncontroversial (not like Punk at all) and pretty much indistinguishable from any other Marvel comic book that you will find today. The story exists as mere background to the characters as they engage in witty banter, ‘cool’ dialogue, knowing asides and smart a*** comments. It’s going for that comic book ‘cool’ factor that made the last Avengers movie such an interminably bore to sit through, and I’m not impressed. CM Punk was all about anti-authority, rebellion and telling it like it is (or at least as he saw it), but I don’t detect ANY hint of that anti-corporate rebellion in this comic book. Pipe bomb? Nope, it’s not even a softly deflating balloon. It’s just another comic book, and as CM Punk was more than just another wrestler, this one has to go into my ever-increasing pile of comics bearing the scribbled legend, ‘Disappointing.’ I’m reading little of worth in contemporary comic books, and that’s why I’m starting to write my own webcomics on this blog. Please check them out. I know that the art is bad, but at least I’m trying to say something, and that’s a lot more than you can say about Drax #1.

Comic review: The Shadow #2- Starring Poor Old Mr Crowley

Writer: Cullen Bunn
Art: Giovanni Timpano
Publisher: Dynamite Entertainment
Released: 2nd September 2015


I do like me a bit of Shadow in the morning, a bit of occult daftness, a bit of red scarfed visual stimulation, and a bit of double printed text, just to keep me on my toes.

Double printed text?

Yeah, they messed up in ‘The Shadow #2’ duplicating the same text on two pages, but with slightly different art panels. I haven’t had my coffee yet, but I noticed it, oops.

The other thing I noticed about the book was Aleister Crowley, the beastly blokey who is lurking in the back of that famous Beatles album cover (Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band), and a name that often crops up when people talk about the occult. He was a bit of a pathetic creature in this book, ageing out, depressed and afraid. I hope that Mr. Bunn is duping us all and that he has a bit more for him to do, as so far, it just seemed like a bit of a waste of a fascinating real life personality that you could do so much more with.

The plot of the book involves a cabal of villainous magicians that want to get their hands on ‘the last illusion,’ a secret that Harry Houdini took with him to the grave. It’s up to our shadowy hero to stop them, because if they get it, well, they’ll get up to all kinds of mischief, I guess. That’s simple, that’s easy, and that’s exactly what I want in my Shadow books. This particular issue was a bit talky, but it had to be to set up what is coming next, and it had a good cliff hanger, so that’s enough for me to return next month.

The Shadow #2 then is a simple, old-fashioned pulp comic book. I like that. Keep it simple, keep the mainstream statist/collectivist programming to a minimum, don’t lecture me with Marxist identity politics and tell a good, clear story. I can read the book, enjoy it, and forget it. There was nothing here to irritate me, and hey man that’s good enough for me.

Okay then, so that’s the first review of the new week done. Time to get me some coffee and to see if 2000AD is out in W.H Smith's yet. The Shadow #2 has that textual duplication error, but I enjoyed the book, mainly for the appearance of the Great Beast, but as I said in the first line of this review, I do like me a bit of Shadow in the morning, always have done, for some reason.


Rating: 6.5/10 (A narrative set up issue, with a beastly guest star)

Ozzy's ode to Mr Crowley

Comic review: The Shadow #1- The Shadow Knows

Writer: Cullen Bunn
Artist: Giovanni Timpano
Publisher: Dynamite Studios
Released: 5th August 2015


This special $1 re-launch of The Shadow is a nice diversion from everyday realities and concerns. It’s set safely in the uncontroversial/mythological past, is about evil magicians, and has a strong moral core to it that will have you rooting for the morally righteous (and I’m not talking about ‘Social Justice’ here) Shadowy crusader.

I enjoyed the book, but there’s always been something about the Shadow that I really liked. It’s the cool red scarf, the hat, the cloak, the black inked voice, and his relentlessness determination to bring people to account, to pay for the consequences of their actions. That’s what I like about him, and that’s why he has always resonated to me as somebody that I enjoy reading about.

Where is a guy like that today when we have criminals like Tony Blair still walking around and reminding us of just how corrupt and evil our world truly is? Here’s an idea: How about bringing the Shadow out of the 1930’s and into this post 9/11 world?

Just think of the possibilities of a new ‘truther’ Shadow as he investigates and punishes those responsible for 9/11, the Iraq war, the Libyan war, the banking bailout of 2008 and all of the other crimes committed by western states since 2001.

Sounds great, don’t you think? So, why isn’t anybody doing it? Perhaps I should do it myself, yeah, I probably should.

Anyway, back to fun time, let’s forget reality for a couple of minutes, and dive back into this comic book.

The Shadow #1 is an enjoyable book, the art is mostly good, sometimes very good, and the story is simple, easy to follow and a lot of fun.

Buy the book (it only costs $1) for a ten-minute fun time diversion that contains a cool, bad ass character that can look into the very heart of a man, detect the guilt, detect the corruption, detect the moral decay and judge as Annubis judges the souls of the dead.

The Shadow is his own man, and that’s why I like him. A man who goes his own way and does what is right rather than what is expedient is rare these days.

The Shadow cares about moral law, about what is right, and what is wrong, and his only mission in life is to make sure that the guilty get exactly what they deserve. Tony Blair knows what he did. The Shadow also knows. Oh yes, the Shadow knows, and justice is coming soon.


Rating: 7/10 (A decent relaunch of The Shadow, and it only costs $1)

Sinestro #7- Godhead Act 2, Part 5- Enjoyable stuff from the talented Mr. Bunn

Writer: Cullen Bunn
Artist: Ethan Van Sciver and Geraldo Borges
Publisher: DC Comics
Released: 3rd December 2014


Sinestro #7 is a good old fashioned comic book with a conniving and calculating villain temporarily working with the good guys in order to defeat a greater threat, but all the time looking for openings, for opportunities that will benefit his own cause when the current conflict is settled.

I particularly enjoyed some of the dialogue from Sinestro himself in this book. Writer Cullen Bunn is doing an excellent job with the character of Sinestro and it’s the complexity that is imbued within his characterisation of the man that makes this comic book such a consistently enjoyable read. Nothing changes during this crossover. Sinestro is the name on the cover, and that is what you get within. This is a book about Sinestro, not just a half assed and resentful add on to the main Godhead arc.

As with any character based narrative there has to be a strong supporting cast of characters to back-up the main protagonist. Bunn’s Sinestro title has two such characters. A conflicted daughter who has joined the Green Lantern corps and is struggling with her duties versus family loyalties and a new leader trying to prove himself a capable replacement for a man (Hal Jordan) that Sinestro has great admiration for.

With this strong foundation of well-drawn (figuratively and literally) characters the narrative doesn’t have to do all of the heavy lifting. It is almost a passenger, subservient to the bigger picture, and when things do happen it’s the reaction of the characters themselves that is of most interest, rather than just the narrative development itself.

That is a great position for a comic book to find itself in, so when at the close of this book a huge narrative development takes place it’s merely the cherry on top of an already very delicious creamy concoction.

This Godhead arc from DC Comics is the only thing that I am reading from Marvel and DC at the moment. I’ve given up on Marvel completely, and until they reboot their entire line of books and writers I have no interest whatsoever in what they are doing. DC has almost lost me as well, but it’s the sci-fi element in the Green Lantern universe that is keeping me hooked in there.

Within the sci-fi genre you can deal with contemporary issues and socio-political concerns under cover of different universes and fictional characters. Clever and aware writers can get away with revealing a lot of truth that might not be allowable in this age of corporate statism and dumbed down media monopolies. When I get that in my comics it is reflected in my ratings here on my blog.

Sinestro #7 doesn’t say anything about the military industrial complex, false flag terrorism or mainstream media manipulation designed to justify the latest wars of empire and conquest. It doesn’t really say anything about our times, about the society that we live in. What it does do however is look into the individual, underlying motivational mechanisms that drive human actions and interactions. It also drives the Godhead arc forward with a fantastic old school denouement/reveal on the final page that makes the reader salivate at what is going to happen next in the crossover series.

Cullen Bunn has, to use a simple metaphor, dribbled the ball with great skill, dodging potential tacklers along the way, and nicely laid off the perfect pass for his team-mate to continue the progression of the move. That move continues in this week’s Green Lantern #37, a book that I’m now very much looking forward to reading and reviewing due to the excellent work done here in Sinestro #7 by a very much on top of his game Mr. Cullen Bunn.

Rating: 8/10

Comic Book Review: Sinestro #3- Sinestro is President Assad of Syria

Writer: Cullen Bunn
Artist: Dale Eaglesham & Rags Morales
Publisher: DC Comics
Released: 2nd July 2014 (Release date for the UK. Book was released on 25th June in the US)

Comic book fans won’t notice this, but that’s to be expected. Comic book fans don’t really notice anything. They like comics, so reality isn’t exactly their strong point. They think that the important issues of our times are highlighted by the corrupt and dying corporate mainstream media, so you have to expect a certain level of ignorance from the group as a whole. The title of this review is ‘Sinestro is President Assad of Syria,’ because that’s exactly what is happening in this book. What writer Cullen Bunn has done here is to take a real world, contemporary situation, change the names, stick it in space, and see if anybody will notice. They won’t notice Cullen, but I did.

Sinestro is a brutal dictator who was massively unpopular with his own people, so he left. But now that he has left his people desperately need him back. Why? Because a group of religious zealots are rampaging through space, slaughtering the helpless ‘Korugians,’ and selling them into slavery, all in the name of their bloodthirsty religious dogma. Does that sound familiar to you?

We are talking I.S.I.S here, aren’t we? And we are talking the Middle East. Saddam Hussein, Muammar Gaddafi, and Bashar al-Assad. Iraq, Libya and Syria.Three countries ruled by dictators. Well, they used to be until our leaders decided to bomb the crap out of them and fund and train the terrorists who are currently turning their countries into Hell on Earth.

Three countries destroyed by the New World Order. Three countries where the surviving people are being slaughtered by Sunni Islamic terrorists funded from Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Qatar and the US. Last week the liberal saviour President Obama revealed that he was going to give a further $500 million to these maniacs, but because he’s ‘liberal’ I guess that’s okay, right?

Comic books will not, in any way shape or form, criticise Islam. But whilst political correctness dictates that you can’t even give the merest hint that it’s Islam we’re talking about here, it’s perfectly acceptable to attack Christianity. So instead of references to a caliphate, suicide bombings, jihad and other familiar terms you get allusions to Christianity with words like ‘Inquisition, ‘Congregation’ and ‘Bishops.’ That’s understandable. Cullen Bunn has to wrap it up in Christianity. If he didn’t then he’d be in big trouble with the thought Police and his career in comic books would be over. But for those paying attention, we know what this is all about, and it’s not what happened in Spain in the late 1400’s.

I want to end this review by congratulating writer Cullen Bunn. He’s demonstrated that you can explore contemporary issues and concerns in modern, feminist liberal comic books, as long as you are clever with it. You have to dodge the politically correct land mines, but it can be done. Most of the readers of this book won’t see any connection between what is happening in the Middle East and Sinestro’s adventures in space, but that’s okay. Cullen Bunn has done some clever writing here, and he’s done it in such a way that he won’t get criticised for it. If anybody points out what that his themes seem strangely familiar and contemporary, he can just smile and tell them not to be so daft. After all, it’s just a silly comic book about a bad guy in space, isn’t it?
Rating: 10/10