2015-03-20 bd nostalgia 6

- Action Comics 40- Guardians Team-Up 3- Amazing Spider-Man Special 1- Live Action Movie of Naruto is ON...- Top 5 new Anime to Watch for Winter 2015

Nº6March 20th 2015

Weekly magazine

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ComiCs seCtionsPotLiGHt04- 7 Worst PubLiCity stunts in ComiC books

ComiC neWs12- ALL-neW CAPtAin AmeriCA 514- GuArdiAns teAm-uP 316- ALL-neW X-men 3918- AmAzinG sPider-mAn sPeCiAL 120- Green LAntern: neW GuArdiAns 4021- ACtion ComiCs 4022- deteCtive ComiCs: endGAme 124- dC’s LeAd “ConverGenCe” Writer sHAres seCrets of tHe muLtiverse mAsH-uP

introduCtion30- doom

ComiCs PrevieWs44- buCky bArnes: tHe Winter soLdier 00650- CyCLoPs 01154- bAtGirL endGAme #1

BD Nostalgia is published weekly by SM DESIGN. Editor/ Publisher: Sylvio Martins, Editorial Of-fice: 5330 Desmarteau, Montreal, Quebec, Canada, H1K 2N9 | 514-299-1593. All characters © their respective owners. All material © their creators unless otherwise noted. All editorial matter © their respective authors. ©2015 BD NOSTALGIA. DIGITAL PRINTING IN CANADA.

VOLuMe 3 | NuMBeR 6 MARCH 20TH 2015

Content

With the recent reboot of the dC universe, a lot of people are asking where the industry will go from here. Will this be a genuine new start for the comics or is it just another publicity stunt? this isn’t really new. Publishers are constantly trying new stories and plotlines to at-tract readers. sometimes these changes make the character better. other times, they have no real impact. other times, it’s a complete disaster that angers fans and alienates casual readers, making the character even less popular than before. that’s why we decided to take a look at some of the worst comic book publicity stunts ever. 4

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60- WitCHbLAde #181

ComiC books tHis Week64- ComiC book ListinGs74- Covers of tHe Week

Anime/mAnGA neWs76- Live ACtion movie of nAruto is on...78- AssAssin’s Creed movie is on79- drAGon bALL z: resurreCtion ‘f’80- ALiCe in borderLAnd mAnGA enters finAL ArC81- no GAme, no Life Anime Gets enGLisH dubin-dePtH Anime revieW82- ALdnoAH.zero (10-12)GundAm enCyCLoPediA90- mobiLe suit GundAm 0094- mobiLe suit GundAm 00fA to z to Anime/mAnGA106- toP 5 neW Anime to WAtCH for Winter 2015114- intervieW WitH rumiko tAkAHAsHi!!Anime fLAsHbACk116- mAzinGer zArtWork118- mAGiC kniGHt rAyeArtH

EditorialWHAt i Love About tHissome people ask me, “What i love about this?”, the answer is

easy, i have live all my life living and learning. from one side to the other, people tend to ask me a milion questions. And i answer them one after the other. now, i tell them read the magazine,... by reading it you will know all that you need. And that’s it. Last week I finalized the news website. I found it too big for its purpose,... now it is easier, faster and more intuitive. see ya next week guys. Sylvio Martins

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7 Worst Publicity Stuntsin Comic Books

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7 Worst Publicity Stuntsin Comic Books

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7 WorSt PuBliCity StuntS in ComiC BookSWith the recent reboot of the dC universe, a lot of people are asking where the in-

dustry will go from here. Will this be a genuine new start for the comics or is it just another publicity stunt? this isn’t really new. Publishers are constantly trying new stories and plotlines to attract readers. sometimes these changes make the character better. other times, they have no real impact. other times, it’s a complete disaster that angers fans and alienates casual readers, making the character even less popular than before. that’s why we decided to take a look at some of the worst comic book publicity stunts ever.

7. suPermAn Gets eLeCtriCAL PoWersIn the late nineties, Superman was in trou-

ble. Sales were slipping again, but he had just been killed and brought back to life. So DC came up with a plan to kill Super-man’s identity. They not only changed his costume, but his powers. For vaguely ex-plained reasons, Superman lost all his old powers and suddenly transformed into an energy being with electrical powers. Even

his costume changed, losing the cape. Funny thing, though - readers didn’t care to see the Superman they knew for decades become a completely different superhero. That’s why Superman abruptly got his powers restored and everything went back to normal. Well, sort of.

6. Wonder WomAnLoses Her PoWersIn the 1960’s, Wonder Woman’s popularity

had sunk to her lowest levels. In a desperate attempt to make her relevant and capitalize

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on the popularity of the spy trend, Wonder Woman lost her powers and became a secret agent. While the stunt did get attention, read-ers didn’t exactly embrace the new Wonder Woman. After all, Diana Prince without her powers isn’t really Wonder Woman. She’s just a woman. In the end, no less than noted feminist Gloria Steinem make a public call for Wonder Woman to get her powers back. Which she did.

5. Green LAntern beComes A suPerviLLAin DC wanted to shake things up for Green

Lantern - introduce a newer, younger Green

Lantern. But how to get readers to accept the new Green Lantern? Simple. Make the old Green Lantern Hal Jordan into a mass murderer. In “Emerald Twilight,” Jordan snaps because his city is destroyed, attacks all the other Green Lanterns, and becomes the supervillain Parallax. His reign of ter-ror is only stopped by a new Green Lantern,

Kyle Rayner. Unfortunately, it backfired. Readers were outraged at their beloved hero becoming a villain, and Rayner never really caught on like Jordan. It took ten years to fix this by claiming Jordan was possessed by an alien monster, and readers are still up-set about it. 4. deAtHmAte CrossoverIn the early nineties, the two independent

comic companies Image and Valiant de-cided to collaborate on a crossover event called Deathmate. The premise was that So-lar (one of the flagship superheroes for Val-iant Comics) and Void (one of the flagship

superheroes for Image) would fall in love, but their meeting creates an amalgam uni-verse. An ambitious mini-series that took characters from two different companies, was designated by colors instead of num-bers, spanned over a dozen issues, and was intended to be read in any order, Deathmate was already a challenge. Yet it got worse

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when most of the major writers refused to get involved, and those creators who were involved didn’t really want to do it. Then Image Comics, already known for its repu-tation for unreliability, ran late on their half

of the series. That made Deathmate an even bigger disaster financially, because readers would pre-order the comics, then cancel the pre-orders in frustration when the comics didn’t show up. Then the retailers would re-order the comics, but by then no one wanted to buy them, so the unsold comics sat on shelves. It didn’t help that Deathmate was poorly written and drawn to begin with. This stunt backfired horribly, leading to so much frustration and skepticism about the companies as a whole that sales for both companies’ regular titles plummeted, Image and Valiant closed, and some even blame Deathmate for the comic crash of 1996 that

almost destroyed the comic industry. 3. sPidermAn “reveALed” to be A CLoneI won’t bother to summarize the entire

event of what came to be known as the Clone Saga, because even the writers them-selves didn’t have it figured out. What it boils down to is that Marvel decided that Peter Parker was too happy, what with his wife and child and successful job, so they decided to get rid of it. Specifically, they tried to erase twenty years of continuity by claiming that the Spiderman we knew all those years was just a clone, and the real Spiderman is a homeless guy who would just walk in and take over. The low point

was when a stressed-out Peter Parker back-handed his pregnant wife, MJ. Sales of Spi-derman actually declined during this peri-

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od to the point where they had to retcon it again, and have it turn out that Peter really wasn’t a clone after all, turning the whole thing into a complete mess.

2. sPidermAn’smArriAGe Gets erAsedThe comic book one-shot One More Day

has become almost as reviled among fans as the Clone Saga. After Aunt May is mor-tally shot, Spiderman turns to Mephisto (the Marvel Universe version of the Devil) to save her. Mephisto agrees to do so, only in exchange for Peter Parker and Mary Jane’s marriage. This leads to history itself being rewritten so that Peter and Mary Jane’s

marriage never existed. Marvel was again apparently motivated by a desire to make Parker more accessible, but it turned out just the opposite happened. People have questioned the entire concept, from why Peter Parker would turn to the Devil for help to how to reconcile decades of stories revolving around his marriage. The fallout

is still going on with sales of the book drop-ping (although Marvel insists it’s a gener-al downturn in the industry, not One More Day-related). 1. suPermAn diesYou may be surprised to see this as number

one. After all, for years the comic industry

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has been telling readers that the “Death of Superman” storyline was a triumph. Record sales, bold new characters like Steel, praise from the industry for DC daring to do what no one else dared. All true. What they never talk about it what happened afterward - the collapse of the entire comic book industry. Chuck Rozanski makes a compelling argu-ment that it was the death of Superman that caused the speculation bubble to burst, and comic readers to leave in droves. That’s be-cause of two things.

One, anyone who actually believed Super-man would stay dead felt betrayed when he came back. It established once and for all that nothing is real in comics, and that

publishers were willing to do anything (in-cluding exploit the real feelings we have for our heroes) just to sell a few more copies. Two, the issue where Superman dies ended up being worthless.

That’s when we all collectively realized that if a comic about the death of Superman wasn’t worth anything, nothing was, and the whole comic collecting industry was a big joke. We’re still feeling the effects of this

publicity stunt, because the industry is shrinking, people are more likely to watch a movie about batman than read the latest issue, and paper comics are go-ing unsold on newsstands.

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marvel reviews

All-new Captain America 5sam Wilson trades one loss for another

in “All-new Captain America” #5. rick remender and stuart immonen neatly loop together their plot threads from the previous issues and sam’s triumph is sat-isfying, fast-paced and utterly him. While the issue’s big reveal doesn’t exactly man-age to surprise, it is at least exciting. As this run goes on, marvel’s new Captain America continues to provide he’s damn good at his job.Though I appreciate the approach in prin-

ciple, I still don’t enjoy Remender’s mo-ment-to-moment narration of Sam’s thoughts. The frequent fragments -- “No possible way -- Steve’s voice…” -- are distracting, and they don’t always add anything that the visu-

als don’t already convey. Less is more with an approach that is meant to increase imme-diacy and tension, but Remender doesn’t edit himself down. For example, when Sam uses his powers to control a swarm of birds, there are two captions about his thought process: first, “Focus on them” and, immediately af-ter, “Make them understand.” I know that al-ternate scripting is generally in bad taste but just one of these phrases would have gotten the point across just as strongly and more succinctly. Remender’s approach can work if he pares down and trusts the reader, but he isn’t quite doing that yet. That said, there’s a lot to like in the issue. It’s a classic superhe-ro comic with all the sneak attacks, surprise appearances and improbable escapes that a

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reader could want. Villains and heroes leap in and out of the panels, and punching and stabbing provide most of the solutions. It’s true that the story relies too heavily on coin-cidence and “A-ha!” theatrics. Sam struggles but the solution rarely comes as a result of his endurance or toughness. Instead, a pos-sibly-dead or currently-forgotten character will appear to remove the problem. As a re-sult, there’s sometimes a disconnect between the intensity of Sam’s internal monologue

and the cartoonishness of the plot points. It’s old-school absurd -- luckily, forgivably so. Immonen and Wade von Grawbadger han-dle the pace and panache of the story well. They’re particularly effective on the splash pages, such as the entrance of the Leaper, where their stronger inks and more detailed definition give the pages energy. There isn’t much innovation or visual playfulness here, but it’s all done very solidly and very much

in the Captain American style. It’s no easy task to convey Sam’s state of mind when the reader can’t always see his eyes, but this creative team still manages to convey his ex-haustion and accomplishment.Marte Gracia’s colors are darker than I

expected, with shadowing that really leans into the black inks. It matches the passion and anxiety of Sam’s narration, so I can see why the issue is colored that way, but I’d have loved a touch more brightness. As with

the narrative disconnect mentioned above, sometimes the moment isn’t as serious as the colors might suggest.Despite my reservations, issue #5 has me

sad that “All-New Captain America” will end after the “Secret Wars” event. Remender writes Sam as a tough protagonist who’s a pleasure to cheer for, and I hope we’ll get to see more of him in the near future.

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marvel reviews

Guardians team-up 3With the sixth chapter of “The Black Vor-

tex” filling its pages, “Guardians Team-Up” #3 feels as though this title was created to house a chapter of the event and keep things humming along. However, writer Sam Humphries and artist Mike Mayhew embed Ronan the Accuser into the heart of “The Black Vortex” saga, making a tangential case for applying the term “team-up.”

It matters very little what title is on the cover of this chapter of the saga, as the prin-cipal players in the story remain the same. “The Black Vortex” is a story about the Guardians of the Galaxy and the X-Men. Ronan joins them in a comic that happens to be the sixth chapter of that shared adven-ture, as this story follows the base formula for Marvel’s traditional construction of a team-up: bring together interested parties, pit them against a common foe and send everyone on their merry way after. Histor-

ically, the more successful and memorable issues of “Marvel Team-Up” felt like a Spi-der-Man story with a visiting guest star but, in “Guardians Team-Up” #3, the star of the show is clearly Ronan and, collectively, the Guardians barely register beyond ensemble players in a sprawling cast. Star-Lord gets the most dialogue of the Guardians, but he’s played for laughs more than ability.

“Guardians team-up” #3 gives readers what marvel perceives they want: more stuff with “Guardians of the Galaxy” on it. mayhew’s image of ronan hefting Hala sells the cover but, like the interi-or, it matters very little what else is set as a distractor: this is an image of ronan, take it or leave it. As for “Guardians team-up” as a series, it is underwhelm-ing so far, but i’m still holding tightly to the promise and potential packed into any “team-up” adventure.

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marvel reviews

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All-new X-men 39Chapter five of “The Black Vortex” wel-

comes readers into the brian michael bendis-written and Andrea sorrenti-no-drawn “All-new X-men” #39 with the enhanced Angel bursting through the panels in an inferno while he chastises Laura. readers are quickly afforded an update on Laura’s predicament.

That single image of Warren and Laura with fragmented panels falling away from it magnificently blends Sorrentino’s draw-ings with Marcelo Maiolo’s colors. Letterer Cory Petit follows Bendis’ lead and keeps the dialogue to twenty-six words in four balloons across the spread. That image de-picts the most dynamic action in “All-New X-Men” #39, which is definitely a transi-tion issue that resets the game pieces and adjusts the perspective on the board. Only one other image in the issue combines the talents of the assembled creative team so completely, but that page comes together as an anti-tourism poster for Hala as the Black Vortex-enhanced characters unleash hell upon the Kree homeworld.

Sorrentino’s art is not unlike black and white photocopies that have been run through more than a generation or two: the shadows are black, the highlights are stark white and there really is nothing in between. Whatever the case, the end result is that there are some truly great panels in “All-New X-Men” #39, but there are also some real headscratchers with surprising inconsistencies, as it seems more important that young Jean Grey have freckles on her face than to maintain the shape of her nose or the distance between her nose and lips.

Maiolo’s colors are both a solid match for Sorrentino’s understated drawings and a handicap. He’s tasked to use gradients or

tone variations to compensate for the stark shadows Sorrentino draws, but the suc-cess rate varies from panel to panel. The page depicting the three different cockpits as the marshaled forces of the X-Men and the Guardians split off is one of the most impressive passive panels of the story and is much more visually compelling than the flat-toned shocker panels that are Maiolo’s signature move.

Bendis’ story is one of transition. He slips bits to Sorrentino to keep the story grinding forward but, in reality, “All-New X-Men” #39 is a story about who is going to go where and who is already there. Aside from the panels aflame, a two-panel skirmish punctuates the issue, setting up the story for future chapters as “The Black Vortex” continues to spew forth strife. By using this issue to set up all of the characters that had fallen over in previous chapters, Bendis gives readers a chance to learn more about Laura on the good guys’ side and Thane on the darker side of this collision, but neither character does enough to lock the roving lights down into a spotlight.

“All-New X-Men” #39 marks time be-tween “The Black Vortex: Alpha” and “The Black Vortex: Omega.” As the fifth chapter and near-midway point of the multi-title event, it serves as halftime, giving readers and creators a chance to catch their breath. Rather than providing a pep talk or bolster-ing wounds sustained thus far, this issue does little to inspire further action. It is al-most as though this issue simply could have occurred between panels and the story and readers would be none the worse for miss-ing it. As it stands, however, it may be a struggle to recall just what exactly did occur in “All-New X-Men” #39, save for some dynamic imagery.

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marvel reviews

Amazing Spider-man Special 1“Amazing spider-man special” #1 by

Jeff Loveness and Luca Pizzari is the first issue of a three-part crossover story, “inhuman error,” that will be continued in “inhuman special” #1 and “All-new Captain America special” #1. Although the plot is heavily focused on the inhu-mans, spider-man gets to lead with the first issue and exposition.

Spider-Man fans aren’t going to be disap-pointed on the basis of Spider-Man’s char-acterization. Spidey gets plenty of panel time and cracks plenty of jokes. Loveness’ lines for Spider-Man are the highlight of “Amazing Spider-Man Special” #1. His portrayal of Peter Parker is old school. The

introductory scene at a coffee shop works to establish Peter as a regular guy, although it’s trying a little too hard. Spider-Man’s nonstop, self-deprecating quips and exag-gerated romance problems make the read-ing experience fun, though. Pizzari’s en-ergetic line and sense of timing both carry the humor well. The full-page spread of Spider-Man swinging and singing with his burrito in hand is a hilarious moment. When a kid thinks that Spider-Man is Blade, it’s just ridiculous enough to be funny, even if the event itself strains belief.

If “Inhuman Error” is meant to be another springboard for the Inhumans, it fails. Me-dusa has her usual effect of grandeur and

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inapproachability. Her interaction with Spi-der-Man is amusing, but it doesn’t deepen her characterization to have her play the straight man to his funny man. Despite at-tempts at team banter and a sequence of Spider-Man shaking everyone’s hand, the Inhumans remain bland. The plot moves quickly, but nothing much occurs. The vil-lain is revealed at the end of the issue, and

neither his cliché-ridden dialogue nor his revenge motive creates a lot of suspense.

Pizzari’s anatomy is off in the more am-bitious panels, but his line has an attractive amount of bounce and variation. The am-bition itself is commendable. Spider-Man looks lithe and acrobatic in the large variety of poses that Pizzari puts him in, even if the details in bones and muscles are occasional-ly wrong. In certain panels, he nails the dra-matic effect, like in first appearance of the “floating island of doom.” Woodard’s color-

ing is good example of how a coloring can squander the effects of pretty pencil work. Woodard interrupts the effects of some of Pizzari’s background details by using flat monotones or garishly mismatched color tones that look muddy on the page. The only exception is how he makes Medusa’s hair look liquid and powerful, enhancing Pizzari’s muscular linework for her tresses.

specials and Annuals have a bad repu-tation for stories that don’t matter and, unfortunately, “Amazing spider-man Special” #1 fits that stereotype. The A-list characters stay A-listers and the b-listers don’t get reflected glory. The dull plot di-minishes the brightness of Loveness’ hu-mor and Pizzari’s visual energy. maybe things will get spiced up when sam Wil-son shows up, but the story feels light-weight and minor so far, and the inhu-mans don’t improve their appeal enough to make them matter to the reader.

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DC Comics reviews

Green lantern: new Guardians 40douG zAWiszAWhile the June DC Comics solicits seem

to tip readers off to spoilers at the end of “Green Lantern: New Guardians” #40, writ-er Justin Jordan and the art combo of Dio-genes Neves and Roge Antonio do not feed directly into that solicitation text. Instead,

the creators focus on wrapping up Kyle Rayner’s struggle with the Life Equation.

Uneven artwork from Neves and Antonio (with inks from Marc Deering and Daniel Henriques) limit the sizzle that “Green Lan-tern: New Guardians” #40 delivers. Neves’ style is cleaner and more inline with what could be perceived as a DC house style

while Antonio is sketchier, slightly more daring and unpredictable. Antonio handles the dynamic final confrontation between Rayner and Oblivion, making that single exchange the most visually dynamic page in this comic. Colorist Wil Quintana con-

tributes to the dynamic with glows and effects that blend seamlessly with Anto-nio’s art. While Quintana fills the panels, letterer Dave Sharpe brings a wide array of effects to the word balloons. Some of Sharpe’s exclamatory font choices lack fire, but the choices for Oblivion’s dia-logue and the White Lantern’s words re-sound through their balloons.

Jordan uses the extra pages of the is-sue to button up the loose ends and drive through the checklist of series’ conclu-sion requirements, including characters flying off towards the reader, declaring a new beginning. Rayner and Star Sap-phire Carol Ferris remain at the heart of the story, but Jordan checks in on a handful of other characters in the battle against Oblivion. Saint Walker and Me-henash Exeter, in particular, carry them-selves well throughout this comic as Jor-dan continues to check boxes on his way out the door.

With “Convergence” on the horizon and a host of titles set to end, DC is sure to have some stories that under-

whelm just as surely as it will have some tales that surprise readers. Unfortunately, “Green Lantern: New Guardians” #40 just hits enough notes to do the job of finishing the series without bringing anything spec-tacular or memorable. Jordan, Neves, An-tonio, Quintana and Sharpe give readers a complete tale that has some nice moments, but it simply burns out too early.

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Action Comics 40GreG mCeLHAtton

With a “Bizarro” miniseries set to drop post-”Convergence,” it makes perfect sense that Greg Pak, Aaron Kuder and Wil Quintana would squeeze a Bizarro story into “Action Comics” #40 before the book goes on hiatus for two months. Unfortunately, the comic is a little light on plot or drama, without having enough punch lines to distract you from those vacancies.The thrust of “Action Comics”

#40 is fairly simple; Superman has pulled through a rip in the di-mensions to Bizarroworld, where planets are square and moons re-ally are made of cheese. When Doomsday makes an appearance, things start to get really strange. Pak’s script follows up on the idea of there being a Doomsday virus and just what that would mean on Bizarroworld. As funny as the end result is, it’s an isolated moment in a book that otherwise rehashes everything we’ve seen about Bizarro over the years. There’s nothing new or particularly original being presented to the reader.Where “Action Comics” #40 does succeed

is Kuder and Wil Quintana’s art. Kuder’s rip-pling, fluid art looks great when drawing slap-stick, which is exactly how to best describe

Aquaman swinging a narwhal by its horn in order to attack. Bizarro himself looks wonder-fully over-inflated and ridiculous, exactly as this strange parody of Superman should. The depiction of Bizarro infected with the Dooms-day virus is even more absurd, taking the hid-eous Doomsday character design and making it ludicrous. The best part of the comic is the

conclusion, though, when Kuder and Quintana ramp everything up for the end result of Doomzarro’s rampage. The cuteness is accentu-ated only by the blinding colors; the two deliberately go as over-board as possible to emphasize the end result. The art does the heavy lifting here, bringing a little spark to where the story just never quite gets moving.As a primer/refresher for who Bi-

zarro is, “Action Comics” #40 suc-ceeds. However, reading this comic, I don’t feel a huge burning desire to pick up “Bizarro” in June, and that’s frustrating. The humor isn’t present nearly enough to compensate from the lack of anything out of the ordinary. It’s perfectly average once you factor in the art, but that’s not the note that I wanted “Action Comics” to go out on for a few months until “Convergence” comes to a close.

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DC Comics reviews

With “Convergence” on the horizon and “endgame” currently running its course in the pages of “batman,” writ-er brian buccellato grabs artists roge Antonio and ronan Cliquet to detail the event’s wide-ranging affects in the streets of Gotham. unfortunately, “de-tective Comics: endgame” #1 feels less like a tie-in and more like an inventory story to lock down shelf space.

This comic floats in space a bit, trying to be part of the larger narrative, but ul-timately spinning in its own orbit. That is compounded by a story that grabs a here-tofore untold thread, layers over well-in-tended sentiment and runs rampant with convenience.

The thread focuses on a kid named Lon-nie who is trying to reconnect with his mom while all of Gotham goes crazy in the wake of the Joker’s chemical attack. The sentiment taps into a visiting a char-acter co-created by Norm Breyfogle: Anarky.

The story puts masks where they’re needed, drops Lonnie in with a group of similar teens who just so happen to want to help him and a trail of breadcrumbs that leads the teens to follow Lonnie as he happens across the extended Bat-fami-ly in battle. There’s also a rare typo from letterer Dave Sharpe (“What the neck?!”) and broken story flow where the artists change guard. There are so many story leaps, as a matter of fact, that it felt like pages or panels were missing at several points in the narrative. Buccellato clearly means well and makes an effort to intro-duce new characters, but this issue just tries to be too much.

Roge Antonio draws the first half of the issue. His style is a shadowy, sketchier version of the work that Rafael Albuquer-que does, but it fits the story and brings just enough of a visual essence of Breyfo-gle to move this story along and make it feel like a tribute. He doesn’t overdo the backgrounds by any stretch, but that real-ly doesn’t matter in a story that struggles to find its footing.

Ronan Cliquet picks up the tale as Lon-nie leaps between buildings but gives readers the end result. Lonnie is shown solidly on the roof but, when Antonio left him, he had just leapt. From there, Cli-quet’s art lacks pizzazz whenever one of the Bat-family is not on panel.

When they are around, however, the art still has moments where it struggles to completely come together. Spoiler is too tall when she’s introduced. Lonnie runs right next to a crazed mob to scare them, and the tranquilizer guns that convenient-ly appear lack ingenuity beyond simply being a syringe-based version of a rub-berband gun.

Introducing Lonnie and his compatriots, Dax, Dre and Riko (even though we ar-en’t given clarification between Dre and Riko), Buccellato is certainly planting seeds for future tales but doing so in a most haphazard manner. However, where the stories grow from and the shape they take will certainly be an interesting sight to see.

the overall execution of “detective Comics: endgame” #1 is rushed and distractingly uneven, making this a sto-ry that will struggle to be remembered as part of “endgame.”

Detective Comics: Endgame 1

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DC Comics reviews

DC’s lead “Convergence” Writer Shares Secrets of the multiverse mash-upJeff kinG mAy be A neW fACe

to ComiCs, but He’s An oLd HAnd WHen it Comes to deAL-inG WitH ALternAte univers-es.The television writer has contributed sto-

ries to such alternate reality-heavy series as “Stargate SG-1” and “Continuum,” a re-sume which put him on DC Comics’ radar for “Convergence” -- the upcoming event series that reopens the pandora’s box of the publisher’s multiple realities. Over the course of April and May, “Convergence” will take over the DC line. In addition to the King-led eight-part “Convergence” series that serves as the event’s main storyline, 40 different 2-part series will revive lost characters from past major cross-universal events like “Crisis On Infinite Earths” and “Zero Hour,” along with more recent ones, including the currently running “Multiver-sity.”Joined in the event-opening #0 issue by

“Futures End” co-writer Dan Jurgens and on various chapters by comics veteran Scott Lobdell, King is charting the course of where the entire DC Universe will go and what it will become, alongside a wealth of artists including Ethan Van Sciver, Andy Kubert, Ed Benes and more. DC’s Earth 2 heroes star in the event -- after their own planet was destroyed as part of the weekly “World’s End” series -- along with a cos-mically enhanced Brainiac. When Brainiac begets a new threat called Telos, every real-ity the Superman foe has collected samples from will crash into the lives of Alan Scott, Jay Garrick and the rest of the Earth 2 sur-vivors.

dC Promises biG CHAnGes As “ConverGenCe” Winds doWn in mAyWith so many stories and so much history

flowing into this event, CBR News spoke with King to get a better sense of his master

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plan for the worlds of the DCU. In our talk, King describes his own history as a read-er of DC Comics, how DC’s legacy heroes present the perfect opportunity to craft a mega event that doubles as a relatable fam-ily tale, the way in which Telos twists the expectations for Brainiac stories to come, and what, exactly, will be left of the New 52 when all is said and done.

CBR News: What was it that served as the most compelling hook for you when you were offered the chance to essentially de-stroy and then rebuild the DCU. How did you approach the task of telling this story that’s built on all the work done in “The New 52: Futures End” and “Earth 2: World’s End”?

Jeff King: First off, I’m kind of standing on the shoulders of giants here because it’s not just those books, it’s the 75-year history. And specifi-cally, it’s everything since “Crisis” and how that’s changed the landscape of the characters. For me, I’ve learned a lot from Dan Jurgens on #0 and Scott Lobdell, who’s been helping me out on parts of #1 though 8, but it’s also been talking to people like Brian Azzarello and Scott Snyder and Geoff Johns and Daniel Wilson coming out of the “Earth 2” books. We all get, give and share information. DC Editorial also plays a huge role in that -- es-pecially in a huge event like this.What I did was come to the project with

a background in TV series with big, rich histories and world building, like “Star-

gate SG-1,” or “Continuum,” more recent-ly. What I did was take a starting point of “Earth 2” heroes that are coming into my series. There’s a gorgeous Ivan Reis/Joe Prado cover where you’ll see some of the people who will be featured prominently in the series, including my villain, Telos. But everyone knows that Green Lantern will be involved in a big way. We’re also picking up not only from “World’s End” and “Futures End,” but we’re also picking up threads from “Doomed” and “Action Comics” and also from Grant Morrison’s “Multiversity.”

It’s really connected, in a meta way, to all of those things.

Readers of DC Comics can fall into any number of camps in terms of their familiar-ity with the deep details of DC’s cosmol-ogy. From a passing familiarity with the Justice League all the way up to having a PhD in DC continuity, where would you place yourself on the spectrum coming into “Convergence”? And where did you end up as a result of writing it?My background with DC was mostly the

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DC Comics reviews

old Kirby books -- “New Gods” and “For-ever People” -- and also things like “Metal Men.” Obviously, I knew the Batman and Superman world too, but that stuff was re-ally my introduction to DC. It’s only been coming into “Convergence” that I’ve really been able to appreciate the 30 years of DC

history since “Crisis.” I don’t think I appre-ciated how daunting this project was going to be when I agreed to do it. [Laughs] I think I probably should have run for my life.Part of the appeal of the whole “Conver-

gence” event is that anyone who’s ever

loved a weird part of the DC Universe has a chance of that character or idea appearing somewhere in this event. But as the person who’s tasked with making this a coherent story that’s more than odd worlds, who is the character that grounds you in what’s go-ing on and drives the story forward?

Well, I’ve got a great set of characters, again, that you see in that first cover. You’ll see Superman Val Zon, Alan Scott as Green Lantern, Jay Garrick Flash, Thomas Wayne Bat-man -- you’ll also see the Dick Grayson from Earth 2. All of those characters brings the his-tory they’ve just experienced in “World’s End” to this, but they also bring a new set of expecta-tions because they’ve grown and changed in those books.What really stoked me from

the beginning is what I get to do with those characters. I really wanted to let Thomas Wayne and Bruce Wayne meet for the first time, and I wanted to have Dick Grayson be a part of that. You’ll see various characters’ connec-tion with their analogues from other universes. Imagine Alan Scott meeting up with Hal Jor-dan and with Kyle Rayner and John Stewart. Imagine Jay Gar-rick meeting up Barry Allen and with Wally West and the kids. Fastbak [from the Zoo Crew] may even make an appearance! That’s what was remarkable for me: to take the characters with a

defined role in the story, put them up against a great villain like Telos and then have the rest of the DCU fold into it.Brainiac has been stealing these cities and

these various timelines all the way through the 75 years of the DC Universe, and par-

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ticularly since the time of “Crisis,” so we’ll see all of those characters making appear-ances at some point. Some of the monthly solicitations give you snapshots into the characters that we’ll feature.One of the ideas that’s frequently cited as

a unique facet of the DC Universe is one of

legacy. What does that idea offer you, the-matically, as you crash these various ana-logues together?One way or another, each of these char-

acters has some kind of defining event that I looked at as being pieces of an evolution almost of a single person. In another way, it makes them all brothers and sisters in a family, and that’s what I look for in a sto-ry. I look for a family relationship, whether it’s a parent and a child, or a pair of sib-lings. Because from a commonality stand-

point, we’re all that on some level. We’re all somebody’s daughter or father, depending on where we are in our own timeline, just like the characters of the DCU.As you spread out the tapestry of the DCU

-- especially when people like you are such good curators of the history, and you bring

new fans in to talk about them and get more educated -- it means people can understand, appreciate and have more access to this his-tory. Even if your favorite character hap-pens to be Hal Jordan, you have a feeling or an appreciation for where Kyle fits into that story. Or John, or however the larger life of the story extends. That makes a story like this that much richer for the fans.On the opposite side of those heroes, I get

the sense that there’s a villainous aspect to the same idea here. We’ve known Brainiac

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as a collector of worlds, but Telos as a new force seems to be an offshoot of him that has his own ideas. Where does this new charac-ter diverge from his “Father” and how does that complicate the story?

You must be prescient! Have you ever been a mind reader? [Laughs] Without say-ing too much about it, I will say that Braini-ac and Telos are intimately connected, and we’re going to reveal something about the meta history of Brainiac’s role in the DCU. That’s connected to what Grant Morrison has been doing in “Multiversity,” and it

speaks to some ideas that came through in “Doomed” and in “Action Comics” #35. I can tell you that we’re going to have a rich understanding of those characters, and you’re going to see a very complicated re-

lationship between Brainiac and Telos. Initially, the odds for our heroes are not going to be pretty because of that.As all this is going on, there

is this multitude of two-issue tie-in series which revisit past eras of the DC Multiverse. And we’ve noticed that those min-is roll out week-by-week with each new wave addressing a dif-ferent event in DC’s past from “Flashpoint” to “Zero Hour” to “Crisis” and so on. Can we as-sume that the story of the main “Convergence” series will also kind of rotate through those past eras as each new weekly issue arrives?That’s a really good question

-- and the answer is that, in the unfolding of the conflicts that have been set up by Brainiac’s original plan, you’ll see an in-tention to go back through that timeline -- that series of consec-utive events. But other than that, everything is leading up to one final conflict, and you’ll see that in our story.As you’re very new to writing

comic books, how have you re-sponded to playing in the DC

Universe? Is there any one character or franchise that you’ve found yourself most drawn to as you go?Oh jeez. [Laughs] I think the relationships

in the Bat family and also all of the con-nections between the characters I didn’t formerly understand or appreciate that I do now -- I couldn’t even begin to start! Ev-

DC Comics reviews

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ery event that’s happened up to this point, whether it be “Flashpoint” or “Zero Hour” or “Kingdom Come,” all inform and serve as background for what’s to come in “Con-vergence,” but with a twist.One thing a lot of readers associate with

these series is reboots, and DC has already announced a slew of new, diverse titles coming out after “Convergence” wraps. As all the stories you’re referencing here re-shape the DCU in their own way, can you say if, when your series is done whether the universe will be in exactly the same shape it is, slightly different than it is or completely different than it is now?While “Convergence” has proven to be an

even bigger challenge than King expected, he’d love to come back to the DCU for a return engagement[Laughs] I feel like, as the new kid, it’d be

presumptuous of me to go right in and de-stroy everything. I think the fans are going to love the story that we tell, but I do feel like, coming out of “Convergence,” we’re setting the table for a whole new generation of stories to be told with characters old and new that in the past, either by continuity or by canon, would be the thing where a nay-

sayer might have said, “You can’t do that.” Now, the possibility is there that we can.Looking forward for yourself, now that

you’ve gotten into comics and the DCU, are you feeling like there are characters or con-cepts you want to continue to write moving forward?I’ve been a lifelong fanboy and always

wanted to have the opportunity to take the time to write a comic, so this is a bucket list item for me, for sure. And the answer is, “Absolutely.” It’s all a matter of whether my schedule works out to allow me the things I’d like to do, though we’ve been talking a bit. So if people like “Convergence,” maybe I’ll be lucky enough to get a chance to do this again.And finally, for people stepping into

“Convergence” cold without having read all the background issues when your #0 issue arrives on April 1, what is the ele-ment or scene early in the story that they should watch out for to carry them for-ward into the series?you should look for brainiac. you

should look for the relationship between brainiac and telos, because that will tell you a lot about the story going forward.

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DOOM

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Real name: Victor von DoomOccupation: MonarchIdentity: Public (What does Doom have to fear?)Legal status: King of Latveria, with full diplomatic im-munity in the United States (The Fantastic Four can’t even touch Doom, but I guess America sees Doom’s ways are correct.)Place of birth: Gypsy camp outside of Haasenstadt, Latveria (now Doomstadt) the capital of Latveria.Group affiliation: MENSAFirst appearance: FANTASTIC FOUR Vol. 1, #5.Height: 6’ 2” (with armor 6’ 7”)Weight: 225 lbs.(with armor 415 lbs.)Eyes: Brown / Green (depending on artist)Hair: BrownFace: Scarred

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known superhuman Powers: doom is a genius in physics, robotics, cyber-netics, genetics, weapons technology, bio-chemistry, and time travel. He is also self-taught in the mystic arts. doom is a natural leader, a brilliant strategist, and a sly deceiver. doom can exchange minds with others. He possesses some mystical abilities, such as casting bolts of eldritch energy and invoking mysti-cal entities (principalities) for additional support. While empowered by the Haaz-areth, his mystical powers were on a par with those of dr. strange.

Doom’s many inventions include a vari-ety of robots, such as robot duplicates of himself (Doombots), Latveria’s robot po-lice force (Servo-Guards), an army of un-stoppable robots designed only to destroy (Killer Robots), as well as robots designed for slave labor and non-humanoid models used for special posts; his time machine, with which he can travel through space and time; and a shrink ray.

Doom wears a sophisticated nuclear-pow-ered titanium battlesuit which grants him superhuman strength, contains jets for flight, houses a personal force field, and discharges concussive force blasts; he can also electrify his armor’s surface. The ar-mor contains a 4-hour air supply, and can be sealed for travel into outer space or underwater. Special attachments to the ar-mor have included a molecular-expander, which can cause molecules to expand into the size of boulders, and various devices for absorbing the energies of others (such as the Silver Surfer).

History: Victor von Doom was born to the Zefiro travelers (“Gypsies”) Werner and Cynthia in Latveria, a small European country which grew out of Hungary and was ruled by King Vladimir Vassily Gone-reo Tristian Mangegi Fortunov, Baron of Sabbat, Baron of Haasen, Baron of Kro-zi. Victor barely knew his mother, a witch who had invoked the demon Mephisto for power, which raged out of control before she was finally slain by a soldier. Before

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dying, she asked Werner to protect young Victor from Mephisto. Victor’s father, a doctor, was forced to treat King Vladimir’s wife. When Werner could not cure her can-cer, Vladimir blamed him for his wife’s death, and Werner fled with Victor. Wer-ner died from exposure to the cold while protecting his son. Before dying, Wer-ner placed Victor into the care of his best friend, Boris, and tried to warn his son of the fearful life he foresaw him falling into, but he died before he could make Victor understand. Discovering his mother’s mystical arti-

facts, Victor schooled himself in sorcery. He began an annual contest against the might of Mephisto, attempting to set his mother’s soul free. By the time he was a teenager, he had also become a scientific genius and used his inventions to wage a one-man war against the monarchy of Lat-veria, always a step ahead of them. His ge-nius was heard of even in America, and he was invited to New York’s State Univer-sity on a scholarship. Victor had been in

love with Boris’ granddaughter Valeria, but he left her behind as his desire to acquire knowledge and the means to seek revenge on others consumed him. Arriving at State, Doom was greet-

ed by Reed Richards, a fellow student who was interested in rooming with him, but Doom rejected his offer of friendship. Throughout his university days, Doom pursued a petty rivalry with Richards, convinced of his own superior intellect. Doom’s greatest invention was a machine designed to rescue his mother’s soul from the netherworld. Richards tried to warn him of a flaw in his calculations, but Doom was too proud to listen. He activated the machine, and it literally exploded in his face. Expelled for the explosion, Doom sustained only a few facial scars, but be-lieved his looks had been ruined. Filled with self-loathing, he left America for Ti-bet, seeking new enlightenment. There, he found the Aged Genghis, one of the enig-matic Immortal Nine; the now senile sor-cerer directed him to seek out a long-lost

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order of monks. Doom made them his ser-vants and had them forge his first suit of armor, designed to hide his features from the world. Doom had them press the mask to his face before it had cooled, ensuring that if his face had not been hideous be-fore, it was now.

Dr. Doom then conquered Latveria, slay-ing King Vladimir, imprisoning his son Rudolfo, and having a robot duplicate of Rudolfo surrender the Latverian crown to him, after which he renamed the capital city, Haasenstadt, as Doomstadt. He used his genius and technology to transform Latveria into a paradise where no citizen wants, no one is threatened by war, and all praise Doom-- or face the consequences. Doom maintained a puppet prime minister; the outside world was largely unaware of Doom’s status as ruler, tending to dismiss his existence as a myth. Doom stepped up his scientific prowess, designing a time machine and robotic duplicates of himself (Doombots). In one of his earliest time travels he journeyed back to World War II and considered killing Adolf Hitler for the crimes his Nazi regime had inflicted upon the Zefiro and other travelers, but ultimate-ly decided to leave him to his own fate. Armed with his genius and the

might of Latveria, Victor set for himself three goals: to rescue his mother, to prove his superiority over Reed Richards, and to conquer the world. By this time, Reed and his friends had become the Fantastic Four, so Dr. Doom sought them out and abduct-ed the Invisible Girl. He forced the other members to journey back in time to recov-er the gems of the legendary sorcerer Mer-lin for him; but Mr. Fantastic tricked him, bringing back a chest full of chains instead. Although the FF survived Doom’s attacks, Doom escaped them by using a Doombot as a decoy. Dr. Doom next formed an alli-ance with the Sub-Mariner, believing that their mutual hatred of the FF made for a natural partnership. Doom nearly cast the Baxter Building into the sun, but the

Sub-Mariner turned on him, and Doom was cast adrift into space.

He was saved by the alien Ovoids, who taught him how to exchange bodies with others. With this new power, he had Mar-vel Comics creators Stan Lee and Jack Kirby lure Mr. Fantastic into a trap so that he could take over his body. However, the Fantastic Four saw through Doom’s facade and he was forced back into his own body, then accidentally cast into the Microverse.

But the Microverse proved to be merely a new challenge for Dr. Doom’s genius rather than a prison. Doom conquered Mir-wood, the kingdom of Princess Pearla, and brought the Fantastic Four there as prison-ers. Aided by Ant-Man (Hank Pym), the Fantastic Four escaped and followed Doom back to Earth, where they battled him aboard his Flying Fortress, from which he threatened to unleash chaos throughout the globe--when the FF thwarted his plan, he escaped again. Doom soon attempted to re-claim his abandoned Flying Fortress from military custody, but the newly-formed Avengers intervened and he was forced to destroy it. Dr. Doom next empowered and sent the Terrible Trio (“Bull” Brogin, Yogi Dakor & Harry Phillips) against the Fantastic Four, but this plot also failed, and ended with Doom cast into space by a So-lar Wave, a fate he had meant for the FF. He was rescued by the time traveler Ra-ma-Tut, who was so impressed with Doom that upon his return to his own time, he created for himself the masked identity of Kang the Conqueror. Rama-Tut had sug-gested to Doom at the time that they might actually be the same person, though this eventually proved false.

Dr. Doom next engaged Reed in a mental battle at the Latverian Embassy to deter-mine who had the greater intellect. They employed an encephalo-gun which would cast the loser into Limbo, and Doom seemed to win the contest; but Reed had

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actually hypnotized Doom into believing Reed was cast into Limbo. When Doom was freed from the mesmerism by a Latve-rian hypnotist, he again targeted the Fan-tastic Four, who had temporarily lost their powers, but was humiliated in the ensuing battle when the Thing regained his powers and angrily crushed Doom’s hands inside his gauntlets then allowed him to slink away, furious that he had been forced to become the Thing in order to stop Doom. Doom, in turn, never forgot the Thing’s ac-tions that day.

When Reed Richards was to wed Sue Storm, a spiteful Doom used an Emotion Charger to send scores of super-villains to the wedding site, but they were defeated by the FF and their super-heroic wedding guests. Reed ultimately undid the assault with a sub-atronic time displacer which sent all of the villains back to before Doom summoned them with no memory of what had occurred. Reed and Sue’s wedding

took place without further incident. Doom engaged in new schemes, once stealing the Silver Surfer’s powers, which he lost by challenging the barrier Galactus had placed around the Earth. He also swapped bodies with Daredevil, but this farce was foiled by the FF. Doom’s obsession with the FF once nearly led him to sacrifice an entire Latverian village to kill them. Doom has also played deadly games with his ro-bot, the Prime-Mover, games which have manipulated Nick Fury and Shang-Chi into battling robot duplicates of enemies such as the Yellow Claw and Razor-Fist.

Diablo once tried to force Doom into a partnership by holding his long-lost love Valeria hostage, but Doom used his time machine to cast Diablo into the future. He saved Valeria, but then lost her again--Va-leria was ashamed of Doom’s petty gloat-ing over Diablo’s fate. Doom’s throne was threatened by its rightful heir, Prince Rudolfo, who was assisted by the extra-

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terrestrial Faceless One. Doom also had to contend with his rogue creation the Dooms-man, and with the Red Skull, who attempt-ed to claim Latveria for himself. The Black Panther, ruler of Wakanda, foiled Doom’s attempt to steal Wakanda’s Vibranium, but Doom intended to make an ally of T’Chal-la one day. Doom also accumulated vari-ous power objects, culminating in his us-ing the Cosmic Cube to usurp Galactus’s power, but Reed stole the Cube, reversed its effects, and erased the events from ev-eryone’s memory. Doom once fought side-by-side with the FF to save the Earth from the Over-Mind, acknowledging that while he had no love for them, he would not al-low anyone to threaten Latveria.

When the Faceless One sponsored anoth-er Latverian revolt, Doom hired Luke Cage to spy on them in the United States; how-ever, he then refused to pay Cage for his services, so Cage tracked Doom down in Latveria and fought him to a standstill until Doom finally agreed to pay Cage what he

was due. After rejecting Doom’s offer of a new alliance, Namor reluctantly sought Doom’s aid when the people of Atlantis were rendered comatose and Mr. Fantastic could not revive them. Namor aided Doom against Andro, formerly the Doomsman, who had brought many of Doom’s robots under his control through a self-created re-ligion; Doom in turn aided Namor against his enemies Dr. Dorcas, Tiger Shark, Krang and Attuma. Still, Namor could not bring himself to fully trust Doom, so Doom ru-ined the water rebreather suit Namor need-ed to survive at that time, and threatened to destroy Atlantis unless Namor pledged his allegiance to him. Namor was forced to comply.

Learning of Namor’s fate, the FF came to Latveria to aid him, only to discover that the United States had signed a non-aggres-sion pact with Latveria, forcing them to de-part. Surviving an assassination attempt by the vigilante Shroud, Doom subsequently mind-controlled the Avengers into fighting

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Attuma for him. Finally, after receiving Namor’s aid against the Red Skull, who had slain Rudolfo and briefly usurped control of Latveria, Doom made good on his bar-gain, restoring the Atlanteans to conscious-ness; Namor then ended their partnership. Following this, Doom spread a neuro-gas into Earth’s atmosphere to bind the entire world’s population to his will. His authori-ty was challenged by the mutant Magneto, and they fought, manipulating the Cham-pions of Los Angeles, Avengers and Hulk into fighting for their sides. When Doom was attacked by the Ghost Rider, his mask overheated and he was forced to remove it, inhaling his own neuro-gas; this rendered him unable to control anyone affected by the gas. Via power gained from the Neg-ative Zone, Doom accessed the nether-world, only to be overwhelmed by spirits

posing as his parents. Realizing that his villainous ac-

tions had injured Latveria’s reputation, Doom planned to abdicate the throne to his “son,” actually a clone of himself named Victor von Doom II; but his son’s true ori-gins were exposed, and Doom was forced to slay the clone when it turned against him. However, this plot had merely been a ruse for Doom to take mental control of the United Nations using his Solartron Com-plex. After he was exposed to multiple im-ages of his own face projected by the So-lartron, Doom went completely insane and was imprisoned. Prince Zorba, Rudolfo’s younger brother, reclaimed his family’s throne from Doom, but Doom was freed by Boris and regained his sanity.

Aided by the Puppet Master, Doom had

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the Fantastic Four’s minds placed into miniature synthetic bodies, living a most-ly-idyllic life in the miniature town of “Liddleville” within his Adirondack cas-tle. Doom hoped this would prevent the FF from interfering with his attempts to

regain the throne, but the FF managed to turn the tables on him and he wound up imprisoned within a synthetic body in Liddleville. The Puppet Master, furious at how his stepdaughter Alicia had been treat-ed by Doom’s world, led an army against

him there. Doom sought aid from the alien Micronauts when they passed through, but was finally rescued when his Doombots activated a contingency plan to return his consciousness to his own body. Learn-ing that Latveria had fallen into anarchy without him, Doom convinced the Fantas-tic Four to assist him in overthrowing the now-insane Zorba and retaking his throne; Doom himself slew Zorba. A young Lat-verian boy named Kristoff Vernard was or-phaned by Zorba’s forces, and Doom took the child under his protection, making him his heir. Another man, Alexander Flynn, claimed to be Doom’s true son, but that was later shown to be a falsehood created by the mutant telepath Shadow King.

Unleashing Terrax against the Fantas-tic Four, Doom was disintegrated when Terrax exploded in a blast of cosmic en-ergy. Using the Ovoid technique, Doom transferred his mind into the body of an onlooker, Norman McArthur, instants be-fore his death. He eventually regained his original body from the Beyonder, who sent him back a short distance in time to par-ticipate in the “Secret Wars” on his arti-ficially created Battleworld. There Doom briefly usurped the immense power of not only Galactus, but the Beyonder himself, though he eventually lost all of his sto-len power. Back on Earth, Doom once more achieved world domination, using the Purple Man’s mind control powers to subjugate the global population. Al-though Doom was able to solve most of

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the world’s problems by using his work in Latveria as a model, he found the mindless obedience of humanity unsatisfying, and ultimately allowed the Purple Man to slip from his grasp during a conflict with the Avengers and Namor. After Terrax seemingly killed Doom, his

Doombots had activated a contingency plan whereby Doom’s past experiences

were implanted within Kristoff’s mind so that he could assume Doom’s role. Kristoff went mad, believing he was Doom trapped in the body of a child. While Kristoff ruled Latveria, one of the Doombots, believing itself to be the true Doom, made a weak attempt at overthrowing him. Finally, the true Dr. Doom returned to Latveria follow-ing a time travel adventure, and he retook the throne from Kristoff. Soon after this, he helped cure Ms. Marvel (Sharon Ventura),

a new member of the FF who had become a grotesque “She-Thing.” Doom used her to spy on the FF, but she eventually gave in to her conscience and turned against him. He transformed her into an even more gro-tesque creature as punishment.Doom often attributes his many defeats to

his Doombots; perhaps the most humiliat-ing case is when Squirrel Girl defeated a

Doombot by sending her squirrels to chew apart the wiring in its ar-mor. Another Doombot partici-pated in the “Acts of Vengeance,” teaming up with the other prime movers--who were unknowing-ly pawns of the Asgardian trick-ster-god Loki--against new foes. Other Doombots, such as Mecha-doom, have even turned against Doom and pursued their own goals, though such betrayal rarely long survives Doom’s discovery. Doom has seen to it that Latveria’s history is constantly revised to suit his needs, employing the mysteri-ous Editor to affect all such chang-es. Doom tends to blame failures on underlings--such as Gustav and Gert Hauptmann--who seldom live to fail again. Doom claims to have a contingency plan for every situa-tion, and regards the FF’s victories over him as mere setbacks. Doom’s greatest victory came when, after years of combating Mephisto, he and Dr. Strange finally rescued the soul of Cynthia von Doom from Hell, allowing her to pass on to a better afterlife.

After briefly usurping the cosmic energies of Aron the Watcher, Doom was severely wounded while seeking the power of the alien Hunger. Doom attempted to take Reed with him and the pair were seeming-ly disintegrated in a powerful energy blast; however, the immensely powerful Hyper-storm had teleported them away. Long believed dead, Doom was freed from his extradimensional prison by the Fantastic

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Four and Kristoff, and aided them against Hyperstorm. Returning to Earth, Doom seemingly died yet again, this time along-side Earth’s heroes battling Onslaught; but Doom and the others were preserved in the new Counter-Earth, created by Franklin Richards, and Doom lived out a new life in which he was an old friend of Bruce Ban-ner, Reed Richards and Tony Stark, who had all been members of a fraternity called “Knights of the Atomic Table.”

But history repeated itself, and Doom be-came a villain on this Earth as well. When the heroes regained their memories, Doom helped them return to their own Earth via the Negative Zone, but when he attempt-ed to abscond with Franklin, Doom was assaulted by Thor and cast back to Count-er-Earth. With no super heroes to oppose him, Doom soon became ruler of Count-er-Earth. He recruited Divinity, Dorma,

Lancer, Shakti and Technarx as lieuten-ants, and won a decisive victory over the powerful Dreaming Celestial, which had attempted to claim Counter-Earth for it-self. For a while, Doom ruled both Count-er-Earth and Latveria simultaneously by projecting holograms back to Earth, but he ultimately found that Counter-Earth could never equal the utopia of his Latveria, so he returned to Earth to resume his duties in Latveria, leaving Lancer to rule Count-er-Earth in his stead. Doom has shown an infatuation with the X-Men’s Storm (Oro-ro Munroe). Via the powers of a defective Cosmic Cube, Doom once merged two realities, creating one in which he ruled Earth as emperor, with Storm as his queen. Like all of such efforts to achieve supreme power, however, the power was eventually usurped from him, and normal reality re-stored.

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When Thor led an unauthorized invasion of Slokovia, a country neighboring Lat-veria, Doom aided the Avengers in fight-ing their rogue ally-manipulating events so that when Slokovia’s government col-lapsed, Doom moved in and annexed the

country, adding it to Latveria. Dr. Doom assisted in the birth of Reed and Susan’s daughter Valeria Richards, who was named after Doom’s childhood love, but Doom only performed this act of kindness as part of a grander scheme. Having recog-nized that it was in magic that he was truly Reed’s superior, Doom forged an alliance with the demon Haazareth and sacrificed to them his greatest love, Valeria. The Haazareth increased his mystical might to the point where he was a threat to even Dr.

Strange. Dr. Doom fashioned for himself new armor from his former lover’s body and made Valeria Richards his famil-iar. He wielded his new mystical power against the Fantastic Four, attempting to break them as he never had before, send-

ing Franklin Richards to Hell and torturing the FF. Once again, Reed defeat-ed him by both master-ing some magic himself and turning Doom’s own pride against him by hav-ing him claim to acknowl-edge no superior in front of the Haazareth. The Haazareth took Doom into Hell with them, but he left “parting gifts”-- a traumatized Franklin and a scar down the left side of Reed’s face.

Determined to devise a final solution to Doom, Reed created an infinitely large Mobius dimension to serve as Doom’s pris-on, and had all of Doom’s backup equipment in Lat-veria destroyed. Doom briefly escaped the prison by taking mental posses-sion of the FF, but was ul-timately forced back into his own body.Doom escaped from the

Mobius dimension while chasing after the Mjolnir (Thor’s hammer) which was flying through the dimensions following the fall of Asgard. Returning to Latveria, Doom assumed that he was worthy of the hammer since it appeared for him and went with a troupe of robots to obtain it. He was met by the FF, who wished to stop him. Doom reached the hammer, but found he was not worthy of lifting it. Angered, Doom returned to Lat-veria, where he currently resides.

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ComiC BookS thiS WEEk

ComicList: New Comic Book Releases List for Wednesday, March 18, 2015. This work, a list of the com-ic books, graphic novels, and other products that should be available in your local or online comic book shop this week, is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License, and is © 1995-2015 Charles S. LePage. Information provided by our friends at Things From Another World. Visit GoCollect and use their next-generation, near real-time comic book price guide. To find a local comic book shop, please browse The Master List of Comic Book & Trading Card Stores. Check out the Comiclist Community Page, the Comics Price Guide Forum, Facebook and Twitter for discussions about your favorite comics.

PLEASE NOTE- Not all of these titles will arrive in all stores. Let me know if any of the names or numbers are wrong. Items with release dates not been verified by Diamond Distribution are individually noted.

PUBLISHERTITLE, ISSUE NUMBER, PRICE IN U.S. DOLLARS (“AR” means “ask your retailer for the price”)

12-GAuGe ComiCsI.C.E. Critical Mass #4 (Of 4)(not verified by Diamond), $3.99

ALternA ComiCsBilly The Pyro Volume 1 GN, $14.99

ALtus PressDoc Savage The New Adventures Volume 8 The War Makers SC, $24.95

AmP! ComiCs for kidsBig Nate Say Good-Bye To Dork City TP, $9.99

AndreWs mCmeeLPearls Before Swine King Of The Comics TP, $14.99

AntArCtiC PressFurry Tails #1 (One Shot), $4.99Steam Tales #2, $3.99Tales From The Creep #1 (One Shot), $3.99

ArCHie ComiC PubLiCAtionsSonic Saga Volume 7 Dark Mirror TP, $11.99

AsPen ComiCsFathom Kiani Volume 4 #2 (Cover A Giuseppe Cafaro), $3.99Fathom Kiani Volume 4 #2 (Cover B Alex Konat), $3.99Fathom Kiani Volume 4 #2 (Cover C Agnes Garbowska), AR

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AtomiC book ComPAnyMuseum Of Mistakes The Fart Party Collection TP, $24.00

bonGo ComiCsSimpsons Comics #219, $2.99

boom! studiosBee And Puppycat #1 (Jeremy Sorese SDCC Variant Cover), $9.99Bravest Warriors 2014 Impossibear Special #1 (Jeremy Sorese SDCC Variant Cover), $9.99Burning Fields #3 (Of 8)(Cover A Colin Lorimer), $3.99Burning Fields #3 (Of 8)(Cover B Riley Rossmo), ARDay Men Pen And Ink #2 (Cover A Brian Stelfreeze), $14.99Eternal #3 (Of 4)(Cover A Frazer Irving), $3.99Giant Days #1 (Cover A Lissa Treiman), $3.99Giant Days #1 (Cover B Shelli Paroline & Braden Lamb), ARGiant Days #1 (Cover C Meredith Gran), ARLumberjanes #12 (Cover A Carolyn Nowak), $3.99Lumberjanes #12 (Cover B Brittney Williams), ARPeanuts #26 (Cover A Charles M. Schulz), $3.99Plunder #2 (Cover A Skuds McKinley), $3.99Regular Show #21 (Cover A Andy Hirsch), $3.99Regular Show #21 (Cover B Ilias Kyriazis), $3.99Robocop #1 (Mike Henderson Baltimore Comic-Con Variant Cover), $9.99Rocket Salvage #4 (Of 6)(Cover A Bachan), $3.99Sons Of Anarchy #19 (Cover A Toni Infante), $3.99

CArtoon booksTuki Save The Humans #3, $3.99

ComiC sHoP neWsComic Shop News #1448, ARComic Shop News Spring 2015 Preview, AR

CosmiC timesGiant Robot Warrior Maintenance Crew GN, $9.99

dAnGer zoneZombie Tramp #9 (Dan Mendoza Variant Cover), $4.99Zombie Tramp #9 (TMChu Regular Cover), $3.99Zombie Tramp #9 (TMChu Risque Variant Cover), $4.99Zombie Tramp #9 (Winston Young Vampblade Variant Cover), $4.99

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dArk Horse ComiCsAngel And Faith Season 9 Library Edition Volume 1 HC, $29.99B.P.R.D. Hell On Earth #129, $3.50B.P.R.D. Hell On Earth Volume 10 The Devil’s Wings TP, $19.99Baltimore Volume 5 The Apostle And The Witch Of Harju HC, $24.99Buffy The Vampire Slayer Panel To Panel Seasons 8 And 9 TP, $24.99Buffy The Vampire Slayer Season 10 #13 (Cover A Steve Morris), $3.50Buffy The Vampire Slayer Season 10 #13 (Cover B Rebekah Isaacs), $3.50Chronicles Of Conan Volume 29 The Shape In The Shadow And Other Stories TP, $19.99Chronicles Of King Conan Volume 10 The Warlord Of Koth And Other Stories TP, $19.99Courageous Princess Volume 1 Beyond The Hundred Kingdoms HC (3rd Edition), $19.99Dark Horse Presents #8 (Cover A Francesco Francavilla), $4.99Dark Horse Presents #8 (Cover B Mike Grell), $4.99Deep Gravity TP, $14.99EI8HT #2 (Of 5), $3.50Frankenstein Underground #1 (Of 5), $3.50Groo Friends And Foes #3, $3.99Mind MGMT #31, $3.99Oh My Goddess Volume 47 TP, $12.99Oink Heaven’s Butcher TP, $17.99Shaper #1 (Of 5), $3.99Strain The Night Eternal #7, $3.99Tex The Lonesome Rider HC, $49.99Usagi Yojimbo Saga Volume 2 Limited Edition HC, $79.99Usagi Yojimbo Saga Volume 2 TP, $24.99

dC ComiCsBatgirl #40 (Cameron Stewart Movie Poster Variant Cover), ARBatgirl #40 (Cameron Stewart Regular Cover), $2.99Batgirl Endgame #1 (One Shot), $2.99Batman Eternal #50, $2.99Batman Superman #20 (Ardian Syaf & Sandra Hope Combo Pack Cover), $4.99Batman Superman #20 (Ardian Syaf & Sandra Hope Regular Cover), $3.99Batman Superman #20 (Tony Harris Movie Poster Variant Cover), ARBatman Superman #20 (Tradd Moore Variant Cover), ARBatwoman #40, $2.99Earth 2 World’s End #24, $2.99Green Lantern New Guardians #40, $3.99Infinite Crisis The Fight For The Multiverse #9, $3.99Injustice Gods Among Us Year Three #12, $2.99Justice League Of America Volume 2 Survivors Of Evil TP, $16.99Kitchen #5 (Of 8), $2.99New 52 Futures End #46, $2.99

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Ocean Orbiter Deluxe Edition HC, $29.99Red Hood And The Outlaws #40, $2.99Sensation Comics Featuring Wonder Woman #8, $3.99Strange Sports Stories #1 (Of 4)(Mike Mitchell Variant Cover), ARStrange Sports Stories #1 (Of 4)(Paul Pope Regular Cover), $4.99Supergirl #40 (Emanuela Lupacchino Regular Cover), $2.99Supergirl #40 (Marco D’Alfonso Movie Poster Variant Cover), ARSuperman #39 (John Romita Harley Quinn Variant Cover), ARSuperman #39 (John Romita Jr. & Klaus Janson Combo Pack Cover), $4.99Superman #39 (John Romita Jr. & Klaus Janson Regular Cover), $3.99Superman #39 (John Romita Jr. & Klaus Janson Variant Cover), ARSuperman #39 (Shane Davis Variant Cover), ARSuperman Wonder Woman Volume 1 Power Couple TP, $16.99Superman Wonder Woman Volume 2 War And Peace HC, $24.99Teen Titans #8 (Alex Garner Movie Poster Variant Cover), ARTeen Titans #8 (Bengal Regular Cover), $2.99Teen Titans #8 (Blank Variant Cover), ARTrinity Of Sin #6, $2.99

deviLs due PubLisHinGSolitary #2 (Of 4)(not verified by Diamond), $3.99

diAmond PubLiCAtionsGame Trade Magazine #182 (not verified by Diamond), $3.99

dynAmite entertAinmentAltered States Doc Savage #1 (One Shot)(Billy Tan Black & White Variant Cover), ARAltered States Doc Savage #1 (One Shot)(Cover A Billy Tan), $3.99Altered States Red Sonja #1 (One Shot)(Billy Tan Virgin Variant Cover), ARBlood Queen Vs Dracula #1 (Of 4)(Jay Anacleto Virgin Variant Cover), ARBob’s Burgers Volume 1 TP, $17.99John Carter Warlord Of Mars Special (Cover A Lucio Parrillo), $4.99Lady Demon #3 (Cedric Poulat Virgin Variant Cover), ARLady Demon #3 (Cover A Joyce Chin), $3.99Lady Demon #3 (Cover B Cedric Poulat), $3.99Lady Demon #3 (Cover C Mike Mayhew), $3.99Lady Demon #3 (Joyce Chin Black & White Variant Cover), ARLady Demon #3 (Mike Mayhew Artboard Variant Cover), ARLady Rawhide Lady Zorro #1 (Of 4)(Cover A Mike Mayhew), $3.99Lady Rawhide Lady Zorro #1 (Of 4)(Mike Mayhew Black & White Variant Cover), ARLegenderry Red Sonja #2 (Of 5)(Cover A Sergio Fernandez Davila), $3.99Legenderry Red Sonja #2 (Of 5)(Sergio Fernandez Davila Black & White Variant Cover), ARProject Superpowers Blackcross #1 (Of 6)(Tula Lotay Virgin Variant Cover), AR

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Red Sonja Vulture’s Circle #3 (Cover A Jay Anacleto), $3.99Red Sonja Vulture’s Circle #3 (Cover B Walter Geovani), $3.99Red Sonja Vulture’s Circle #3 (Cover C Lucio Parrillo), $3.99Red Sonja Vulture’s Circle #3 (Jay Anacleto Black & White Variant Cover), ARRed Sonja Vulture’s Circle #3 (Walter Geovani Black & White Variant Cover), ARSolar Man Of The Atom #10 (Cover A Marc Laming), $3.99Solar Man Of The Atom #10 (Cover B Jonathan Lau), $3.99Solar Man Of The Atom #10 (Jonathan Lau Black & White Variant Cover), ARSolar Man Of The Atom #10 (Marc Laming Black & White Variant Cover), AR

eAGLemoss PubLiCAtionsDC Batman Automobilia Figurine Collection Magazine #53 (Batman #52 Joker Roadster), $20.00DC Batman Automobilia Figurine Collection Magazine #54 (Legends Of The Dark Knight #80), $20.00DC Superhero Chess Figurine Collection Magazine #78 (Desaad Black Pawn), $16.00DC Superhero Chess Figurine Collection Magazine #79 (Stargirl White Pawn), $16.00Marvel Chess Figurine Collection Magazine #28 (Bullseye Black Pawn), $16.00Marvel Chess Figurine Collection Magazine #29 (Scarlet Witch White Pawn), $16.00Marvel Chess Figurine Collection Magazine Special #2 (Rocket Raccoon & Groot), $38.00Star Trek The Official Starships Figurine Collection Magazine #36 (Oberth Class), $20.00

idW PubLisHinGAngry Birds Transformers #4 (Of 4)(Cover A Marcelo Ferrerira), $3.99Angry Birds Transformers #4 (Of 4)(Cover SUB Guido Guidi), $3.99Bigger Bang #4 (Of 4)(Cover A Vassilis Gogtzilas), $3.99Borderlands #7 (Cover A Agustin Padilla), $3.99Borderlands #7 (Cover SUB Salvador Velazquez), $3.99Dragonlance Chronicles Volume 1 Dragons Of Autumn Twilight TP, $24.99Dungeons And Dragons Legends Of Baldur’s Gate #5 (Cover A Sarah Stone), $3.99Dungeons And Dragons Legends Of Baldur’s Gate #5 (Cover RI Tyler Jacobson), ARDungeons And Dragons Legends Of Baldur’s Gate #5 (Cover SUB Max Dunbar), $3.99Fly Outbreak #1 (Of 5)(Cover A Menton J. Matthews III), $3.99Fly Outbreak #1 (Of 5)(Cover RI Jason Edmiston), ARFly Outbreak #1 (Of 5)(Cover SUB Lukas Ketner), $3.99G.I. JOE A Real American Hero #211 (Cover A S.L. Gallant), $3.99G.I. JOE A Real American Hero #211 (Cover RI Larry Hama), ARG.I. JOE A Real American Hero #211 (Cover SUB Ron Wagner), $3.99Garbage Pail Kids Love Stinks #1 (One Shot)(Cover DC Dean Haspiel), $4.99Jack Kirby Mister Miracle Artist’s Edition HC, ARJudge Dredd #28 (Cover A Mark Torres), $3.99Judge Dredd #28 (Cover SUB James O’Barr), $3.99Little Nemo Return To Slumberland #4 (Cover A Gabriel Rodriguez), $3.99Little Nemo Return To Slumberland #4 (Cover SUB Eric Shanower), $3.99Millennium #2 (Of 5)(Cover A Menton J. Matthews III), $3.99

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Millennium #2 (Of 5)(Cover SUB Photo), $3.99My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic #28 (Cover A Andy Price), $3.99My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic #28 (Cover B Sara Richards), $3.99My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic #28 (Cover RI Mary Bellamy), AROrphan Black #2 (Cover A Cat Staggs), $3.99Orphan Black #2 (Cover RI Phil Jimenez), AROrphan Black #2 (Cover SUB Photo), $3.99Powerpuff Girls Super Smash-Up #3 (Of 6)(Cover A Derek Charm), $3.99Powerpuff Girls Super Smash-Up #3 (Of 6)(Cover SUB George Caltsoudas), $3.99Rocketeer The Complete Adventures TP, $19.99Star Trek Planet Of The Apes #4 (Of 5)(Cover A Rachael Stott), $3.99Star Trek Planet Of The Apes #4 (Of 5)(Cover RI Photo), ARStar Trek Planet Of The Apes #4 (Of 5)(Cover SUB J.K. Woodward), $3.99Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #44 (Cover A Cory Smith), $3.99Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #44 (Cover B Kevin Eastman), $3.99Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #44 (Cover RI Tadd Galusha), ARTransformers #39 (Cover A Casey W. Coller), $3.99Transformers #39 (Cover RE Travis Sengaus), ARTransformers #39 (Cover RI Sara Pitre-Durocher), ARTransformers #39 (Cover SUB Livio Ramondelli), $3.99Transformers All Hail Megatron Deluxe Limited HC, $125.00X-Files Season 10 #21 (Cover A Francesco Francavilla), $3.99X-Files Season 10 #21 (Cover RI Matthew Dow Smith), ARX-Files Season 10 #21 (Cover SUB Photo), $3.99

imAGe ComiCsAlex + Ada #13, $2.99C.O.W.L. #9, $3.99Chrononauts #1 (Cover A Sean Gordon Murphy & Matt Hollingsworth), $3.50Chrononauts #1 (Cover B Matteo Scalera), $3.50Chrononauts #1 (Cover C Declan Shalvey), $3.50Chrononauts #1 (Cover D Dan Panosian), $3.50Chrononauts #1 (Cover E Fiona Staples), $3.50Chrononauts #1 (Cover F Ryan Ottley), $3.50Deadly Class Volume 2 Kids Of The Black Hole TP, $14.99Invisible Republic #1, $2.99Lazarus Volume 3 Conclave TP, $14.99Madame Frankenstein TP, $16.99Manhattan Projects The Sun Beyond The Stars #1, $3.50Nightworld Volume 1 Midnight Sonata TP, $12.99Nixon’s Pals HC, $19.99Outcast By Kirkman And Azaceta #7, $2.99Prophet Volume 4 Joining TP, $17.99

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Punks The Comic #5, $3.99Red One #1, $2.99Revenge TP, $14.99Reyn #3, $2.99Rumble #2 (James Harren 2nd Printing Variant Cover), $3.50Satellite Sam #12, $3.50Secret Identities #2, $3.50Sexcastle GN, $15.99Spread #6, $3.50Stray Bullets Sunshine And Roses #2, $3.50Thrilling Adventure Hour Presents Sparks Nevada Marshal On Mars #2 (Of 4), $3.50Witchblade #181 (Cover A Gabriel Rearte), $3.99Witchblade #181 (Cover B Stjepan Sejic), $3.99Zero #15 (Cover A Ian Bertram & Tom Muller), $2.99Zero #15 (Cover B Jeff Lemire & Tom Muller), $2.99

kenzer And ComPAnyKnights Of The Dinner Table #218 (not verified by Diamond), $5.99

kodAnsHA ComiCsMy Little Monster Volume 7 GN, $10.99Seven Deadly Sins Volume 7 GN, $10.99

LoCus mAGAzineLocus #650, $7.50

mArrs mediARue Morgue Magazine #153, $9.95

mArveL ComiCsAll-New Captain America #5 (Marguerite Sauvage Women Of Marvel Variant Cover), ARAll-New Captain America #5 (Stuart Immonen Regular Cover), $3.99All-New X-Men #39 (Alexander Lozano Regular Cover), $3.99All-New X-Men #39 (Andrea Sorrentino Cosmically Enhanced Variant Cover), ARAll-New X-Men #39 (Faith Erin Hicks Women Of Marvel Variant Cover), ARAll-New X-Men Volume 6 The Ultimate Adventure HC (Premiere Edition), $24.99Amazing Spider-Man #16.1 (Arthur Adams Regular Cover), $3.99Amazing Spider-Man #16.1 (Simone Bianchi Variant Cover), ARAnt-Man #2 (Mark Brooks 2nd Printing Variant Cover), $3.99Avengers By Kurt Busiek And George Perez Omnibus Volume 1 HC, $125.00Avengers Omnibus Volume 2 HC (Alex Ross Regular Cover), $99.99Avengers Omnibus Volume 2 HC (John Buscema Direct Market Variant Edition), $99.99Black Widow #16 (Phil Noto Regular Cover), $3.99

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Black Widow #16 (Vanesa Del Rey Women Of Marvel Variant Cover), ARBucky Barnes The Winter Soldier #6, $3.99Captain America And The Mighty Avengers #6, $3.99Cyclops #11, $3.99Deadpool’s Art Of War TP, $12.99Guardians Of The Galaxy And X-Men The Black Vortex Alpha #1 (Ed McGuinness 2nd Printing Variant

Cover), $4.99Guardians Of The Galaxy Volume 4 Original Sin HC (Premiere Edition), $24.99Guardians Team-Up #3 (Andrea Sorrentino Cosmically Enhanced Variant Cover), ARGuardians Team-Up #3 (Gustavo Duarte Variant Cover), ARGuardians Team-Up #3 (Mike Mayhew Regular Cover), $3.99Hulk #13, $3.99Loki Agent Of Asgard #12, $3.99Magneto #16, $3.99Marvel Masterworks The Invincible The Iron Man Volume 9 HC, $75.00Marvel Masterworks The Invincible The Iron Man Volume 9 HC (Direct Market Variant Edition 216), $75.00Marvel Universe Avengers Assemble Season Two #5, $2.99Marvel Universe Guardians Of The Galaxy #2 (Of 4), $2.99Moon Knight #13, $3.99Ms. Marvel Volume 2 Generation Why TP, $15.99Princess Leia #2 (Of 5)(Alex Maleev Variant Cover), ARPrincess Leia #2 (Of 5)(Terry Dodson Regular Cover), $3.99Punisher #16, $3.99Silk #2 (Arthur Adams Regular Cover), $3.99Silk #2 (Phantom Variant Cover), ARSilk #2 (W. Scott Forbes Variant Cover), ARStar Wars #1 (John Cassaday Signed Edition)(Bonus Package)(Dynamic Forces), ARStar Wars #1 (John Cassaday Signed Edition)(Dynamic Forces), ARStar Wars #1 (Ken Haeser Remarked Boba Fett Sketch Edition)(Dynamic Forces), ARStar Wars #1 (Ken Haeser Remarked Chewbacca Sketch Edition)(Dynamic Forces), ARStar Wars #1 (Ken Haeser Remarked Darth Vader Sketch Edition)(Dynamic Forces), ARStar Wars #1 (Ken Haeser Remarked Princess Leia Sketch Edition)(Dynamic Forces), ARStorm #9, $3.99Superior Spider-Man Volume 3 HC, $34.99Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #2 (Erica Henderson 2nd Printing Variant Cover), $3.99Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #3 (Erica Henderson Regular Cover), $3.99Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #3 (Gurihiru Women Of Marvel Variant Cover), ARUnbeatable Squirrel Girl #3 (Jill Thompson Variant Cover), ARUnited States Of Murder Inc Volume 1 Truth HC (Premiere Edition), $24.99Wolverines #11, $3.99

moonstoneGreen Lama Unbound Prose Novel SC, $12.99

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nemo PubLisHinGUndersea Adventures Of Capt’n Eli Volume 3 GN, $9.99

nortHWest PressCompletely Unfabulous Social Life Of Ethan Green GN, $24.99Politically Inqueerect Old Ghosts #1 (One Shot), $7.99Rise Comics Against Bullying #1 (not verified by Diamond), $4.99

oni PressCourtney Crumrin Volume 7 Tales Of A Warlock GN, $24.99Princess Ugg #8, $3.99Terrible Lizard #5 (Of 5), $3.99

rebeLLionGrievous Journey Of Ichabod Azrael #1 (Of 6)(Dom Reardon Regular Cover), $3.99Grievous Journey Of Ichabod Azrael #1 (Of 6)(Garbett Variant Cover), $3.99

red AnviLUnit 5 #1, $3.99

sAnCtum ProduCtionsDoc Savage Double Novel Volume 80 SC (James Bama Variant Cover), $14.95Doc Savage Double Novel Volume 80 SC (Robert G. Harris Regular Cover), $14.95Shadow Double Novel Volume 93 SC, $14.95Shadow Super Pack Volume 2 The Origins Collection SC, $44.95

seLfmAdeHeroPride And Prejudice Selfmadehero Edition GN, $19.95

seven seAs entertAinmentD-Frag Volume 4 GN, $12.99Kokoro Connect Volume 3 GN, $12.99Servamp Volume 1 GN, $12.99Strike Witches One-Winged Witches Volume 2 GN, $12.99

time CAPsuLe ProduCtionsAce Magazine #1, $7.99

titAn ComiCsCaptain Stone #4 (Of 6), $3.99Doctor Who The Twelfth Doctor #6 (Blair Shedd Regular Cover), $3.99Doctor Who The Twelfth Doctor #6 (Subscription Photo Cover), $3.99Third Testament Volume 3 The Might Of The Ox HC, $10.99

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udon entertAinmentKatamari Volume 1 HC, $24.99Manga Classics The Scarlet Letter HC, $24.99Manga Classics The Scarlet Letter SC, $19.99

university Press of mississiPPiPeter Bagge Conversations HC, $30.00

vALiAnt entertAinmentDivinity #2 (Of 4)(Cover A Jelena Kevic-Djurdjevic), $3.99Divinity #2 (Of 4)(Cover B Tom Muller), $3.99Divinity #2 (Of 4)(Cover C Rafa Sandoval), ARDivinity #2 (Of 4)(Cover D Diego Bernard), ARDivinity #2 (Of 4)(Cover E Lewis Larosa), ARIvar Timewalker #3 (Cover A Raul Allen), $3.99Ivar Timewalker #3 (Cover B Brian Level), $3.99Ivar Timewalker #3 (Cover C Michael Walsh), ARIvar Timewalker #3 (Cover D Ramon Villalobos), AR

viz mediAMaster Keaton Volume 2 GN, $19.99

yen PressGabby And Gator TP, $10.00

zenesCoPe entertAinmentCharmed Season 10 #6, $3.99Grimm Fairy Tales Presents Robyn Hood #8 (Cover A Chris Delara), $3.99Grimm Fairy Tales Presents Robyn Hood #8 (Cover B Mike Capprotti), $3.99Grimm Fairy Tales Presents Robyn Hood #8 (Cover C Rich Oritz), $3.99Grimm Fairy Tales Presents Tales From Oz Volume 2 TP, $12.99

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Anime/Manga - News

live Action movie of naruto is on...one of the famous shonen Jump series

that roared into a massively popular an-ime series, naruto is adapted into live ac-tion musical play beginning this month in Japan. the play is part of naruto shin Jidai kaimaku Project (naruto’s new era opening Project).The play is still ongoing in Japan, making

tours in a few cities in the country but know-ing the massive appeal of the franchise in South East Asia, the play will also be tour-ing Singapore, Malaysia and Macau too. The Singaporean gig is scheduled around 6-7 June 2015 at Resort’s World Theatre while it will be held in The Venetian, Ma-cao on 22 – 24 May. Now, for the Malay-sian leg, the musical will be happening on 30 – 31 May 2015 at the Malaysian Interna-tional Exhibition & Convention Center near MINES, Seri Kembangan Selangor.How good is their production value and

their costumes? You can check it out below to gauge just how serious they are in bring-ing out the spirit of the franchise and mak-ing it live on stage.Castings are Yuki Kimisawa as the veteran

ninja Hatake Kakashi, Kazuhiro Hinakawa as the Third Hokage who is the leader of a ninja village, Miho Imamura as the myste-rious ninja Haku, and Asahi Uchida as Mo-mochi Zabuza, the main baddie. And final-ly, actor Koudai Matsuoka plays the titular hero Naruto Uzumaki, and Ryuji Sato plays as his rival/close friend Sasuke Uchiha.

Malaysian Naruto fans will have to fork out RM398 (SS) or RM298 (S) or RM198 (A) or RM98 (B) class tickets. TicketPro also gives the diagram to show the position of seats from the stage here:

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Anime/Manga - News

It is on! Micheal Fassbender’s Assassin’s Creed movie is scheduled to hit cinemas on 21 December 2016. What’s more, there is a possibility that Tony Stark himself, aka Robert Downey Jr might appear in the mov-ie not as cameo but as one of the important characters in the Assassin’s Creed flick. Ac-cording to IGN he will reportedly be por-traying Leonardo da Vinci, the famous Ital-ian Renaissance Era inventor.

In a nutshell, Fassbender will be Desmond Miles, who is a seemingly normal bartender but is kidnapped by a sinister corporation to be inserted into a hi-tech machine called “The Animus”. The machine allows its user to relive their ancestor’s lives via DNA memory, which in this case the company wants to use him to retrieve information on “powerful and dangerous artifacts.”

Assassin’s Creed movie is onFassbender said the Assassin’s Creed film

will be respectful of the game but the same time, the actor also pointed out that “we also want to bring new elements to it and perhaps our own vision of things that al-ready exist in the game.“

Sadly the source for IGN’s report, Mov-iePlot has already been taken down which brings some doubts to whether or not Rob-ert Downey Jr will actually appear in the video game based movie or not. So at this point, take it with a pinch of salt.

Nevertheless, fans of the game might be looking forward to the movie in 2016 espe-cially with the movie sporting said actor is definitely icing on the cake.

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Dragon Ball Z: resurrection ‘f’the new trailer features the special

moves of the z warriors, including mas-ter roshi’s kamehameha, Piccolo’s spe-cial beam Cannon, and krillin’s de-structo disc. the trailer also features the Z warriors fighting Frieza’s 1,000-person army, and a small cameo by Jaco from Jaco the Galactic Patrolman.

Dragon Ball Z: Resurrection ‘F’ will pre-miere in both 2D and 3D in theaters across Japan on April 18, although advance screen-ings will be held before then. The film will also be the first Japanese film to open in 3D IMAX Digital Theaters.Funimation will host the North American

premiere on April 11 in Los Angeles. The company then plans to release the film in more theaters with an English dub this sum-mer.Toriyama said in an interview in Novem-

ber that the ‘F’ in the film’s title stands for

“Frieza,” who will be revived in the film. Toriyama noted that he thought of the title while listening to “F” by rock band Max-imum The Hormone, whom he came to know personally through a friend. The song itself features Frieza as a motif, and will be used as a “battle song” during one of the battle scenes in the film. The band original-ly released the song as its eighth single in July 2008.

Toriyama is personally credited with the original concept, screenplay, and character designs of the new movie. Dragon Ball Z animation director Tadayoshi Yamamuro is directing the new movie. Pop idol group Momoiro Clover Z (Sailor Moon Crystal, Bodacious Space Pirates) is performing the film’s theme song, as well as voicing roles in the movie, playing “angels” of hell that reside where the protagonist Son Goku’s enemy Frieza has been imprisoned.

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Anime/Manga - News

Alice in Borderland manga Enters final Arcshogakukan’s Weekly shonen sunday

s announced on Wednesday that Haro Asō’s Alice in Borderland (Imawa no

kuni no Alice) manga is entering its last arc. the magazine also announced that the series will be transferred from shonen

sunday s to Weekly shonen sunday be-ginning with the 19th issue on April 8.

The manga revolves around Ryōhei Arisu (pro-nounced the same way in Japanese as “Alice”), a male high school student who is irritated with his intolerable everyday life. One night, he tags along with his bad friend Karube and Chōbe to hang out in town. However, the town is suddenly cov-ered in giant fireworks, and when he came to his senses, Ryōhei noticed that no one else was around. Finding themselves in a different world, Ryōhei, Karube, and Chota are forced to partic-ipate in survival games, or die right off the bat. The three fight to live, as well as find a way back to their own world.

Asō began serializing the manga in Weekly Shonen Sunday S (formerly Shonen Sunday Chō) in 2010. The manga’s 12th, 13th, and 14th volumes shipped with original video anime (OVA) episodes.

The spinoff series, Alice in Borderland Chi no Kyo-kuchi - Daiya no King-hen

ran from October to February in Weekly Shonen Sunday. A special chapter will de-but in the 19th issue.

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no Game, no life Anime Gets English DubSection23 Films unveiled its July release

slate on Tuesday, announcing that Sentai Filmworks will release No Game, No Life with an English dub in addition to the Jap-anese audio.The series will ship on July 28 in DVD and

Blu-ray for US$59.98 and US$69.98, re-spectively. A special edition Blu-ray/DVD combo pack will also ship for US$129.98.On the internet, they’re legends: the tag-

team duo known as BLANK, famed for their incredible game-playing skills. In the real world, however, the lives of 18 year old Sora and his 11 year old stepsis-ter Shiro have been spiraling out of control. Now existing as shut-ins, they rarely leave their house and are unable to be separated without suffering panic attacks. Games, for them, are the safest retreat from reali-ty. Until they win a chess match against a mysterious opponent known as Tet and find

themselves pulled into a game bigger than any they could have ever imagined. Now, in a world where the outcome of games de-termines the fates of both civilizations and species, they must defend Humanity in the ultimate challenge, vying against a host of otherworldly competitors for the right to rule them all! But if they fail, it means slav-ery or destruction for all mankind. No pres-sure, of course! Can two misfits who can barely handle their own lives somehow rise to the occasion and save the human race? Section23 Films will also release Patla-

bor 2: The Movie, Is the order a rabbit?, The Familiar of Zero F, One Week Friends, Windy Tales, Guardian Ninja Mamoru, and Atelier Escha & Logy: Alchemists of the Dusk Sky in July. Each will be available on either Blu-ray or DVD except Windy Tales and Guardian Ninja Mamoru, which will be DVD-only.

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AlDnoAh.ZEro (10-12)by tHeron mArtin

ePisodes #10The end of episode 9 saw Princess Assey-

lum being strangled by Rayet (ironically using the necklace that was supposed to be a good luck charm). While actually keep-ing Asseylum dead this time could have had some interesting potential consequences, it also would have made the story being set up completely unfeasible. Thus she survives, but this time there is no gimmickry about it; given that she was found almost immediate-ly, being revived by proper use of an AED, CPR, and mouth-to-mouth resuscitation is quite feasible. (And that scene was almost certainly storyboarded by someone who has actually been through CPR training, since the details shown are quite precise to the training I have had myself.)

What follows brings to a head Rayet’s sit-uation and feelings and more clearly elabo-rates on why she went after the princess last

episode, as well as laying barer Asseylum’s own feelings of guilt about how the war got started. The former rounds out Rayet’s characterization nicely, while the latter does not carry anywhere near as much gravitas because it has been touched upon far less to this point. Though Rayet is imprisoned for what she did after being subdued (by Inaho, naturally), the impression that she is let off too easily (especially by Inaho) is hard to escape, as whether a confused and emotion-ally taxed girl or not, she did just very deter-minedly try to kill the best hope the Terrans have for ending the war and openly admit that she was a party to conspirators. What her fate will be once the Deucalion makes it to the Earth Forces’ Russian stronghold is left up in the air at the end of the episode.

But that isn’t the only important develop-ment which transpires. On the Vers front Saazbaum shows Slaine the Vers side of what happened at Tanegashima and ex-plains more about the circumstances in

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the Vers Empire which led to the original war 15 years ago and, by implication, have everything to do with the current war. He describes a land mighty on technology due to Aldnoah but short on viable land and re-sources and a rulership which turns to pro-pagandizing against Earth and ultimately war to keep its deprived and discontented citizens in line. Some of the details have parallels a little too close to the rise of to-talitarian states in Germany and Japan in

the 1930s for some kind of allusion to not have been intended. Lt. Marito and Captain Magbaredge’s lingering issues concerning Tanegashima also get another nudge.

So in other words, this is primarily a character development-focused episode, one which looks intended to put the main players in place before the next big dramat-

ic push. And given how the episode ends, where that push is going is quite clear; next episode looks very likely to return to the ac-tion front. In that respect the writing works well enough, though it still does not seem to know what to do about characterizing Inaho and flounders some in handling Asseylum. Essentially, the problems that the series has at this point are long-standing ones rather than any new development, and the things that it has been doing well it continues to

do well.

ePisode 11Been disappointed by the relative dearth of

serious action the past couple of episodes? Episode 11 makes up for it, and in a big way, as it serves up the biggest barrage of action since the Tanegashima incident and some of the series’ most intense sequences to date.

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The start of the episode is a bit slow, as the first 2½ minutes merely recap the end of ep-isode 10. While that is an annoyingly long recap, it does allow a smooth transition into the feature event of episode 11: Saazbaum’s Landing Castle’s strike on the Earth Forces HQ. Even with the base being buried deep, and even with the Deucalion on its side,

questions certainly lingered about how the Earth Forces could possibly hope to defend against the attack that viewers all knew was coming, since they were still out-teched. (In mecha series, superior tech is usually equaled only by superior pilots in terms of importance in deciding the outcome of warfare, and the Earth Forces have not been shown to have the latter edge.) Those ques-

tions quickly became even bigger when the Landing Castle showed that it had a fully array of bunker-busters at its disposal. How, then, could the Earth Forces possibly hope to hold out, even with Inaho’s tactics on their side?

And that’s where the big twist that we knew had to be coming arrives on the scene: Aldnoah tech automatical-ly shuts down when the one who activates it dies (or, apparently, goes into cardiac arrest), but a royal family member can also forcibly shut down even some-thing activated by someone else. As ass-pulls go, it’s a remark-ably logical and reasonable one, and has some extensive ramifi-cations, too; consider how much of a check that gives royalty on unruly subordinates, how messy that could make a civil war, and how that gives Saazbaum an even more powerful and specific tacti-cal reason for wanting the prin-cess dead if he actually knows about it, as it would make her his one vulnerable point. In a narra-tive sense the princess having this ability continues a long-standing tradition from fantasy stories of a female character having the mys-tical power to stop a malevolent force but needing to be escorted to the proper location by the hero so that she can work her mojo.

But that is merely the desperate hope pre-sented to the protagonists. Aside from a scene where Asseylum comes to accept that too many of her own people are too much against her for her to take anything less than the most drastic action, the bulk of the episode is in the action. We get to see that Eddelrittuo isn’t just an escort/handmaiden; she has some serious driving skills of her

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own to handle what looks like a Humvee that well under that much duress. We get to see how circumstances work out for Rayet to end up in a Kataphrakt again. (Yeah, de-spite her being locked up, we all knew that would happen, didn’t we?) And we get to see the almost insanely audacious plan to assault Saazbaum’s Landing Castle directly so that Asseylum can work her mojo – al-though of course that doesn’t happen with-out complications, since this is only still ep-isode 11. So much is going on, in fact, that Slaine largely get left out.

And, for the moment, that’s totally fine. Even without him the episode has no short-age of spectacle, no lack of tension. We may not be seeing much for direct mecha-on-me-cha fights, but this is where the cool factor of this series lies. Bold maneuvers based at least somewhat on logic and tactics, dramat-ic flair, and a good sense of action timing – all of it ties together for a big batch of blow-out fun. Yeah, if you have had a problem with Inaho being a little too perfect or too composed then the events shown here will only reinforce that impression, but episode 11 still reminds us that when the writers and production staff get their act fully together,

they can really deliver.

ePisodes 12For all of its 12-episode run Aldnoah.

Zero has been a story about dramatic events played out at least partly on a stage of heavy-duty mecha battles. The final episode of the first season, aptly-named “Child-hood’s End,” lives up to that with a course of events that is intense, bloody, and in places shocking.

Unlike the previous couple of episodes,

which presaged the opener with a signifi-cant amount of recap as a lead-in, this one starts immediately with the opener then gets right down to business, picking up at the second where episode 11 left off. The Deu-calion has crashed into Saazbaum’s castle, leaving the advance attack team to pry out Princess Seylum. When Saazbaum’s Kataphrakt comes

crashing down, someone has to hold out against him to cover the other two escort-ing the princess, and role naturally falls to Inaho. Like the boss bad guy that he is, Saa-zbaum’s mecha’s ultimate form naturally has traits of all of the previously-seen Vers

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Deep into Anime...

Kataphrakts, but unfortunately for Saaz-baum he’s facing someone who has sur-vived fights with all of those mecha before and knows how to exploit their weaknesses.

Even so, things get hairy, Slaine eventual-ly arrives on the scene, too, and then things get really interesting. And it isn’t over even when the princess manages to play her ace in the hole – not by a longshot.

I will not get into how the episode con-cludes because some things should remain a complete surprise, and there are some stunning turns of events in the final cou-

ple of minutes, including at least one (and possibly two) twists that almost no one will have seen coming. All I will say is that what happens in those last couple of minutes rais-es some massive questions about where the series will go next when it resumes in the Winter 2015 season (a fact which is con-firmed by the episode’s final screen). It isn’t exactly a cliffhanger ending but may have as well been one.

There are some points that can be discussed, however. Many (including yours truly) have complained about Inaho’s emotionless be-havior, and while this episode does not do much to change that, glimmers of him ac-tually emotionally reacting to things do finally start to show, including one telling scene where he actually smiles – and giv-en the timing of that scene, it was doubtless intended to be loaded with meaning. About

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what, exactly, is not entirely clear and will certainly be fodder for much debate. The other Earth Forces mecha pilots finally get to do a bit besides just be decoys and Slaine gets to play the “caught in conflicting loyal-ties” role to the ultimate degree. Saazbaum also has a few interesting things to say here, too, ones which suggest even more strong-ly that the writers are trying to draw paral-lels to real-world situations, especially the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip under Hamas rulership.

The comments he makes are more subtly provocative than those heard in a mecha se-ries like, say, Flag, but they have some edge to them nonetheless.

But for all of the character dramatics, the most critical point here is whether or not the action component works, whether or not the episode fulfills its role as a spectacle, and on

those two points it succeeds strongly. Re-gardless of how one feels about what hap-pens with the characters, this is the flashiest and most involved animation of the entire series. With a musical score that is right on the money whether in full hype or silent running modes, the episode delivers all of the impact and intensity one could hope for, with the only real flaw being that the com-bining power-up sequence for Saazbaum’s Kataphrakt drags on longer than it really needs to.

doubtless the ending is going to generate mixed reactions and a lot of heated dis-cussion. if its goal was to keep talk about it alive during its off-season, though, then on that point it succeeds magnificent-ly. the season has had its shaky points on plotting, backstory plausibility, and character development, but at least it ends with a bang.

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EnCyCloPEDiA:

GunDAm PArt 8

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moBilE Suit GunDAm 00

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Mobile Suit Gundam 00 (Kidō Sen-shi Gandamu Daburu Ō?) is the 11th installment of sunrise’s long-running Gundam franchise.

It is directed by Seiji Mizushima and written by Yōsuke Kuroda, with character designs by Yun Kōga and music by Kenji

Kawai. Uniquely, Gundam 00’s 50 epi-sodes were split into two 25 episode sea-sons, the first Gundam series to do so.

In the year 2307 AD, fossil fuels have all but vanished and the distribution of en-ergy is unbalanced. Humanity now relies on three large-scale solar power systems

controlled by three mul-tinational power blocks: the Union of Solar En-ergy and Free Nations (Union), the Human Reform League (HRL), and the Advanced Eu-ropean Union (AEU). With this nearly in-exhaustible source of energy benefiting only these three powers and their allies, constant warfare erupted around the globe among mi-nor countries for pre-cious fuels and energy. Countries whose econ-omy relied solely on the sale of fossil fuels were plunged into poverty and some even believed that the solar power system threatened the

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“promised land of God”, resulting in the twenty year-long Solar Wars.

Such a chaotic reality has lead to the cre-ation of a paramilitary organization in pos-session of four highly advanced human-oid mobile suits called “Gundams” and a mysterious technology known as the “GN Drive”. They call themselves Celestial Be-ing, and their goal is nothing less than the complete eradication of war through the use of war itself.

seAson 2Four years have passed since the Unit-

ed Nations Forces’ victory over Celestial Being. Humanity, having established the Earth Sphere Federation, forms an inde-pendent police force separate from and with authority over the ESF Army known as the Autonomous Peace-Keeping Force, or A-Laws. Given unfettered discretion, A-Laws is charged with the duties of fur-ther unifying the world’s nations, enforc-ing the will of mankind, and disposing of resistance groups and terrorist cells as they see fit.

Unknown to the general public, howev-er, is that the A-Laws use their unchecked power as a means to oppress freedoms, doctrines, and ideologies through the use of inhumane tactics under the guises of “unity” and “world peace”.

Celestial Being, fully aware of the A-Laws’ misuses of power, has arisen from the ashes of defeat to eradicate the A-Laws and set the world on the true path to peace once more. Armed with Aeolia Schen-berg’s gifts of the Trans-Am and Twin Drive Systems, Celestial Being hopes to correct their past mistakes and atone for the damage caused by the A-Laws, aided by the resistance group Katharon.

unknown to both Celestial being and the A-Laws, however, a third party call-ing themselves the innovators is manip-ulating both sides of the conflict from the shadows, all the while claiming they are carrying out Aeolia schenberg’s true plan.

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moBilE Suit GunDAm 00f

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mobile suit Gundam 00f (00f kidou senshi Gandamu 00f?) is a manga side story that ran in conjunction with sea-son 1 of mobile suit Gundam 00 and the sequel to mobile suit Gundam 00P. it was written by tomohiro Chiba and il-lustrated by Kōichi Tokita.

The manga features the Celestial Being group called Fereshte (Persian: هتشرف lit. angel; Japanese: Fereshute), which deploys the Second Generation Gundams, the GNY series. In the story, Fereshte was proposed by the former Second Generation Gundam Meister, Chall Acustica, and was approved by Veda to support Celestial Being from the shadows. 00F was first published on 2007 in Gundam Ace, which ran the sto-ry between the issues of December 2007 to July 2009. The manga had spanned to 4 volumes. After the story had ended, it was replaced by its manga sequel, Mobile Suit Gundam 00I.Fon Spaak - A criminal forced by Celes-

tial Being to become a Gundam Meister. He dislikes Aeolia Schenberg’s ideals ex-cept the part about using the Gundams to

change the world. As an untrustworthy character, he’s shackled and has an explo-sive brace on his neck. Normally hand-cuffed, when piloting a Gundam, Hanayo will release the handcuff.Chall Acustica - She’s the founder and

leader to Celestial Being group Fereshte. She was recruited into Celestial Being since she was a young girl. She appears to have negative memories about being the pilot to Gundam Plutone.Hanayo - A cat themed Haro that can in-

terface with Veda’s terminal. It’s unclear if this Haro has any unique abilities, but if it’s made like any other Haro it can inter-face with other systems in Celestial Being to communicate and control.Sherilyn Hyde - A young little mechanic

to Fereshte. She’s often seen with her Han-ayo and although young, she was trained by Ian Vashti to repair/maintain the Sec-ond Generation Gundams.Eco Calore - A spare Gundam Meister

who was once a candidate to be a Third Generation Gundam MeisterHixar Fermi - A Gundam Meister on or-

ders from Veda to follow Fon Spaak, who

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has been working independently from Fereshte. While Hixar appears to be the same man from Mobile Suit Gundam 00P, his personality is markedly different and he is shown to have a remotely-detonat-able explosive strapped around his neck.Hayana - A girl who follows Hixar Fer-

mi, Hayana possesses high physical ca-pacities most would not imagine from her appearance. Registered as a Gundam Meister in Veda, she is capable of taking control of a Gundam remotely. Hayana is considered Hanayo’s “sister” and resem-bles her, but views Hanayo with hatred

and attempts to kill her.

CHAPters#f01 [Another Gundam meister]The story begins in between the main

series’ episodes 1 & 2. Fereshte was an-alyzing the current situation of the pri-mary group and making their assessment over their recent battles. Fon Spaak was making his assessment over the Enact and giving his analysis over Celestial Being’s first two missions. As the video of Aeo-lia Schenberg was playing on the screen, Fon revealed that he doesn’t sympathize with Aeolia’s ideals. Eco criticized Fon for what he had said despite being a Gun-

dam Meister, but Fon cleared it out that de-spite not agreeing with Aeolia, he does find it interesting how the Gundams will change the world. Lat-er, while Chall was thinking of her past and current develop-ment of Fereshte, they got their first mission. They have received orders to attack HRL forces located in CS35 area. Chall ordered Fon Spaak to sortie with a masked GNY-001F Gundam Astraea Type F, but he opted for GNY-004 Gundam Plutone. Chall seemed to have an uncomfort-able history behind Plutone and was re-luctant to approve of Fon’s choice as Plu-tone had no mask, but he had Hanayo patch through Veda to get approval. Fon left to sortie with Plutone and told Chall, “I’ll change your past self

with your Plutone!”

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#f02 [Gn-002 vs Gny-002f]The story begins in between the main se-

ries’ episode 4, the Taribia Republic con-flict, when GN-001 Gundam Exia was at-tacked by Graham Aker in his SVMS-01E Union Flag Graham Aker Custom. Eco Calore was surprised by the new Custom Flag and had Fon Spaak give his assess-ment over the new unit. Fon reluctantly described the Custom Flag’s strength and weaknesses. Eco was surprised by Fon Spaak’s ability to give a fast logical as-sessment just by looking, which Fon re-sponded that nothing can escape his sight. While toying around with Eco, Fon Spaak was given a new mission to assist fellow Gundam Meister Lockon Stratos, piloting the GN-002/DG014 Gundam Dynames Torpedo in their intervention at HRL’s or-bital elevator. From there, Fon Spaak is to give Lockon/Dynames support with Gun-dam Sadalsuud over destroying underwa-ter mobile units. While Gundam Dynames Torpedo was attempting to acquire a firing solution, Fon Spaak used Sadalsuud’s sen-sor’s to acquire target and relayed tactical data for Lockon (not aware of Fon Spaak’s assistance). While Fon was laughing in Sadalsuud F, Hanayo revealed a pair of glowing eyes within the shell of the Haro.

#f03 [Azadistan]The main story takes place in between

the main series’ episode 12-13. Fon Spaak participated in the mission in Azadistan using the GNY-003F Gundam Abulhool Type F. During the mission, a barrage of missiles from an unknown source attacked the construction site of Azadistan’s Solar Receiver Facility Fon left the comrade, Lockon Stratos, to follow the source of the missiles. During the pursuit, Flag Fighters, Daryl Dodge and Howard Mason, were also following the target who fired the missiles. To prevent the Flags from catch-ing the target, Fon covers the unit’s escape by firing GN Missiles. While following the target, Fon noticed that it was an Mora-lian Enact. Fon chased the Enact through the desert, and recognized the pilot as Ali

al-Saachez, who at the same time was shocked that someone could pull of a mid-air transformation. After recognizing the mercenary, Fon left the airspace, noting that it was more interesting to let Ali live. Afterwards, while reporting to the crew, he explained that he would let Setsuna F. Seiei deal with Ali. During Setsuna’s de-cision to land Exia on Azadistan unarmed to hand in Rasa Massoud Rachmadi, Fon expressed support on his actions, citing how Setsuna wanted to change the world with his own power.

#f04 [Celestial being vs fereshte]The story happens at the last part of the

main series’ episode 15. In the starting scene, Fon in a AEU-05/05 AEU Hellion Perpetuum watched Exia get bathed by Agrissa’s plasma field. Before the Union, AEU,and HRL performed their joint mil-itary exercise, Fereshte figured out it was trap to capture the Gundams. Chall Acus-tica decided not to help Celestial Being, in accordance to Veda’s orders not to inter-fere with the exercise. Fon Spaak sortied out anyway, wanting to see the outcome of the battle. Before heading out, Fon hinted to a possibility that Veda had been hacked. Back to the present, a new Gun-dam suddenly appeared on the battlefield, rescuing the Gundam Exia and surpris-ing both Fon and Setsuna. Later, back at Fereshte’s base, the team expressed their uncertainty about the new Gundam team and the credibility of Veda with the turn-out of the events. The new group, revealed to be Team Trinity, then came into contact with Fereshte and, acting on Veda’s wish-es, ordered Fereshte to hand over the 0 Gundam with its GN Drive. Without the 0 Gundam’s drive, Fereshte would be effec-tively disbanded. Opposing Team Trinty’s demands, Fon Spaak with Hanayo pilot-ed the Gundam Plutone and battled Team Trinity. Johann Trinity cited Fon’s action as a treason to Celestial Being and had Fon’s neck restraint detonated. A burst of blood immediately covered Fon’s helmet. Despite the fatal injury, Fon continued to

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fight Team Trinity; 10 minutes before his heart starts failing.

#f05 [feelings... and Hopes]Fon Spaak has only ten minutes until his

heart fails as he battles Gundam Throne Zwei. Michael Trinity released the GN Fangs and severely damaged the Gun-dam Plutone. Hanayo activated Gundam

Meister 874 System and took control of Plutone as a last ditch resort to stop Fon from fighting. Nena Trinity read through Fon’s info as she watched the scene. As Michael Trinity was about to rip out the GN Drive from the Plutone, Gundam 874 overload Plutone and escaped with Fon through the Core Fighter. In response, Jo-hann Trinity used the GN Mega Launch-er to shoot them down, but 874 managed to evade. The Team Trinity then retreated and ordered the Fereshte to retrieve the 0 Gundam’s GN Drive as soon as possible. With Team Trinity receiving restricted data from Veda, Fereshte concluded that there was someone with higher access manipulating from the shadows. Mean-

while, Hanayo and Fon continued to drift in space. Fon’s body temperature is drop-ping rapidly and his bleeding stops, but he slipped into a coma. Hanayo decided not to follow Veda’s commands and decides to save Fon’s life.

#f06 [Aeolia]Astraea F’s Trans-Am activation during

Aeolia’s message to the Gundam Meisters.The chapter begins with Joyce Moreno

treating Fon Spaak’s injuries. With Ian Vashti there too, the old Krung Thep Crew were reunited and each of them reminisced the old days. During the conversation, Chall’s tragic past was explored. Moreno offered Chall to meet Ruido and Marlene’s daughter, Feldt, but she said there was no need. After their meeting, time has come to past, spanning from the main series’ epi-sode 17 to 21. Chall and Eco were discuss-ing about the recent events and the con-nection of the traitor to UN’s GNX-603T GN-Xs when the alarms from Fon’s room went on. However, as they checked it out, it was only Fon calling to see them after waking up. The whole crew were glad Fon Spaak was ok. Later on, Fon Spaak and Hanayo sortied in Astraea F to check the situation outside. Meanwhile, on the Moon, Alejandro Corner’s actions set off a system trap. The trap unlocked the ‘Trans-Am System’ on the four Ptolemaios Gun-dams and Gundam Astraea F, giving them access to the full power and capabilities of their GN Drives.

#f07 [Last support]Fon Spaak headed out to face the enemy

UN Forces at the supply docks as Fereshte recover Celestial Being’s essential sup-plies. He encountered a patrolling group of six Orbital Flags at the Supply Dock Area 923 GS and proceeded on elimi-nating them. The Fereshte later managed to save their supplies in 4 of the supply docks. With the relative easiness of the op-erations, Fon began to suspect something. He checked his info on Celestial Being da-tabase and asked Hanayo to check Veda.

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Hanayo confirmed to him that Veda wasn’t “tracking” them and the Ptolemaios. She explained that their data were treated as non-existent and the Meisters still retained their privileges. As she continued to check into Veda, she also found out that the UN Forces had finally defeated Celestial Be-ing and that the traitor behind Veda was Ribbons Almark.Later, Fon and Hanayo headed to the battlefield in Lagrange 1 to salvage anything from Celestial Being they could find.Fon and Hanayo found the GN Drive that Kyrios ejected to the battlefield and were able to retrieve it.They also found the wrecked Nadleeh but Fon decided to leave the unit and the pilot within it.

#f08 [Hixar fermi]Season 2 of Gundam 00F starts; it contin-

ues on what happens during the four years before the return of Celestial Being. The chapter starts out with Hixar Fermi walking through Paris noticing the news of the bat-tle between the PMC and the UN Forces. The PMC defended against the UN Forc-es to preserve their independent army but they were defeated by the UN’s GN-Xs. Fon went to watched the battle in Gundam Abulhool F and immediately left the battle-field afterwards. Back at Fereshte’s secret base on Earth, the team were transferring the GN Drives into Gundam Sadalsuud F from Astraea F2. Chall was thinking about Fereshte’s new purpose as Celestial Be-ing had been defeated and the world was uniting as one. Despite the circumstances, she believed that the GN Drives they pos-sessed would come important in case that Celestial Being decided to return. At that same time, Hayana and Hixar infiltrated Fereshte’s base and went on to steal the Gundam Sadalsuud F with Dynames’ GN Sniper Rifle. Just as they were about to head out, Fon Spaak with Hanayo, piloting the Abulhool F, burst through the wall and challenged Hixar to a fight.

#f09 [the dance of destiny]The story starts with Hayana and Hixar

reading the fate of the World and Celestial

Being through the Tarot Cards.The world was uniting just as “The Em-

peror” (Ribbons Almark) had planned. Despite their destruction though, Celestial Being was fated to return, just as the up-side-down “Death” had promised.Through the cards, Hixar and Hayana’s purpose was shown; the hope (“The Star”).Hixar pointed another card, which showed the Goddess of “Justice”, the Astraea.Back to the current situation, Fon Spaak, pilot-ing the Gundam Abulhool Type F, burst through the wall, ready to fight Hixar.On the side, Chall Acustica was surprised that Hixar Fermi, a comrade of her who was supposed to be dead, was alive all this time. Fon transformed the Gundam Abul-hool Type F to flight mode and rammed it to Gundam Sadalsuud Type F’s cockpit.However, Hixar managed to easily stop the attack.Fon then attacked the Sadalsuud point blank using the Abulhool’s second-ary head vulcan, but it was still ineffective. Sadalsuud then threw Abulhool across the hanger. Hixar was using the Sadalsuud’s featured mini GN-Field to defend against Fon’s attacks. Fon used Abulhool’s vul-can again but Hixar blocked it again with a GN-Field.Hixar and Hayana then ran off with Gundam Sadalsuud Type F through the broken wall that Fon made earlier.Fon decided not to pursue, letting Hixar have the spare GN Drive.However, he later head out to search for Hixar himself, giving in to Fereshte’s request to find him. Later that night, Hayana attacked Hanayo and destroyed the Haro that she was in. At the same time, Fon Spaak found Hixar Fermi at the HRL’s Orbital Elevator.

#f10 [one that observes the World]The scene goes back to when Hayana de-

stroyed Hanayo’s Haro terminal. Hayana threatened to take the Astraea F2 too, but decided to not take it to hide what she had done from Hixar. Chall appeared and asked Hayana about Hixar, and Hayana answered that Hixar was really alive. Before leaving, she revealed a terrorist threat in HRL Or-bital Elevator. Meanwhile, the scene goes

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back to Fon and Hixar at the HRL Orbit-al Elevator. Hixar explained that despite of anything, his true purpose was only to observe. Fon then provided his own inten-tions, “To observe, decide and to act!” The two were suspected by the patrolling HRL guards, but there was nothing in the data-base to hold against them, confirming to Fon that Hixar was also a Gundam Meis-ter protected by Veda. At the same time, Fon also sighted the terrorists who were planning to bomb the HRL Orbital Eleva-tor, but the men immediately detonated the bombs they were carrying upon arrest. The scene changes back to Fereshte as Sherilyn tried to recover Hanayo. Inside Veda, upon seeing Sherilyn, Hanayo pleaded to Veda to make her return to Fereshte.[104] After Veda granted her request, Hanayo saw the situation at the HRL Orbital Elevator and immediately told Sherilyn of what was happening. Back at the Orbital Elevator, the terrorist’s Hellions started heading to the Pillar of the Orbital Elevator. Hixar retreated from the scene using Gundam Sadalsuud’s miniature GN-Field. The UN Forces’ Tieren Antiaircraft Cannon Types took down all but one of the Hellions. Captivated by Fon’s earlier remark (“Ob-serve, Decide and Act”), Hixar shot down the remaining Hellion, ignoring the fact that he was not supposed to interfere with the situation.

#f11 [reason to Live]The chapter begins with Hayana waking

up after having nightmares about Hanayo.She swore to herself she wouldn’t rest until she erased Hanayo’s existence. Hixar, who was present, applaud her for having a rea-son for living, but reminded her not to do any unnecessary actions like what she had done back in Fereshte.Later, the two head-ed to the Midwestern Africa. While there, they bump with Fon Spaak. Despite the in-crease in support for the poverty plagued area under the present UN, anti-UN sen-timents continued to grow. With this, the UN finally decided to weed out the an-ti-UN groups in the area through force and

restricting aids. However, Fon noted that despite the situation, people would still de-cide to fight. Hayana argued that Veda had already stated that the situation is hope-less, but Fon responded that Veda was not absolute. Hixar then questioned if Fon in-cited the people to fight, for it ironically would put Fon against Celestial Being. Fon answered that even if the main Gun-dams were still active, he would gladly fight against them regardless. In Fereshte, Chall went to see Sherilyn’s progress on fixing Hanayo’s terminal. After tending to Sherylin, who was sleeping, Chall talked to Hanayo about Hixar and how she was confused that he was still alive. Later in Africa, the Anti-UN Group in the area started fighting against the UN Forces. Ob-serving in Sadalsuud with Hayana, Hixar was in shock, as Fon’s ability to surpass Veda made him question about his own value. A GN-X has spotted the Sadalsuud, but Fon rescued them in time, stating that Hixar could find his answer as long as he has the original GN Drive.

#f12 [Gundams and the World]A journalist named Anar Ugai has evi-

dence that Gundams still exist and tried to sell the info to various military organiza-tions. Behind the shadows, Hixar observed the situation in accordance to Veda’s or-ders, wondering how the info would affect the world. At Fereshte, Chall and Fon talk-ed about the rapid unification brought by the UN. Fon commented that things like government, ethnicity, and religion were going to be destroyed and ignored in the new world order. Chall argued that despite so, conflicts were still going to be elimi-nated, but Fon noted it was not going to happen; he would still continue to fight. Chall tried to stop him, as it goes against Celestial Being’s ideals, but Fon argued that Celestial Being was already gone. He added that if she believed that the organi-zation was still alive, she should search for it instead. After Fon had sortied out with Astraea F2, Chall was left torn between Fon and her obligations to Celestial Being.

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Going back to Hixar, the journalist who carried the info about the Gundams was killed by the HRL authorities. This made Hixar to conclude that the world was not ready with the idea of Gundams returning. Former Gundam Meister, Setsuna F. Seiei, was also observing the situation. Mean-while, Fon met up with a mysterious Mo-bile Suit Group.

#f13 [Anti-federation forces]The chapter starts out with the chapter

explaining Fon’s past and his past relation with Ali al-Saachez. Back to the present,

it was revealed that it was Fon’s idea to let Anar get an info about the Astraea F2. As Fon’s team gathered, he explained his intentions of using them in his armed in-terventions to get the attention of the peo-ple who looks down from up high in ex-change for his service on fighting the UN Forces. After Fon had left, the members of the Anti-UN group talked to themselves about their thoughts on Fon Spaak.Despite

their doubts, they decided to rely on Fon’s power to succeed in their latest mission plan. Meanwhile at Fereshte, Chall called out Sherilyn and the rest of Fereshte for an emergency briefing. She decided to continue upholding Fereshte’s purpose of supporting Celestial Being. Therefore, she announced that Fon had to be branded a traitor and that they should seek Hixar’s help to hunt him. Despite their doubts on Hixar, Chall decided to make use of Hixar’s skills and intel connections to Fereshte’s advantage. Hanayo contacted Hayana and prepared for the meeting. Back in Africa,

Fon Spaak and the Anti-UN Forces began their mission of invading a military missile base. Their plan was to infiltrate the base and take the armaments that was stored there. During their operation, a group of GNX-607T GN-XIIs suddenly appeared to intercept them. Back at Fereshte, Hixar and Hayana was called into Fereshte, and Chall designated Hixar Fermi as their new Gundam Meister.

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#f14 [A new stage]The chapter starts with Fon fighting with

the three GN-XIIs while the rest of his teammates pressed on to the military base. At Fereshte’s base, Fereshte’s meeting with Hixar and Hayana continues. During the meeting Hayana lunged an attack on the Haro containing Hanayo, but Hixar or-

dered her to stop. Hixar agreed to Chall’s demands and asked for his mission, which Chall explained that he’s to hunt down Traitor A13, Fon Spaak. Back in Africa, the Anti-UN Forces continued to press on to their objective. During the operation, a group of the Anti-UN Forces received an unexpected help from Katharon. In As-traea F2, Fon managed to destroy all of the GN-XIIs in the area. At the end, they managed to invade the military base, but learned that there were no armaments in-side the base aside from outdated rockets. Fon already predicted the situation without

telling the group beforehand and told the group he would use the rockets to launch to space. The Anti-UN Forces then joined with Klaus Grad’s Katharon. As Fon head-ed to space, Hixar and Hayana followed him using the Orbital Elevator Train. Hixar accepted Fereshte’s proposal to get back the real him that he had lost by de-feating Fon Spaak.

#f15 [euclides]The chapter starts with Fon Spaak’s sup-

posed plan of dropping raw material as-teroids down to Earth back in 2299 AD. Fon’s reason for fighting was to take down those who manipulate and twist the rules to their own desires. Back to the present, Fon was planning a scheme to drag out the one who manipulates the UN from the shadows. Meanwhile, Hixar and Hayana launched in CB’s Space Container and de-cided to check Celestial Being’s facilities to search for Fon. The scene then shifts to Celestial Being’s base in Lagrange 2 as Ian and Linda Vashti were discuss-ing about the Twin Drive System and the eventual return of Celestial Being. Back at Fereshte, Chall remembered her first meeting with Fon Spaak. While Sherilyn was working on Hanayo’s Haro, Hanayo talked to herself about Chall’s dilemma and her own desire to help Fon. Not long, Sherilyn finished working and asked Han-ayo to take care of Fon Spaak. She upgrad-ed Hanayo’s Haro so that Hanayo would be able to send her back-up data to other Haro terminals. Using the ability, Hanayo was able to find Fon, who was presently working on launching the Fereshte fac-tory ship, CBS-68 Euclides. As the two were reunited, Hixar Fermi located Fon’s whereabouts. Fon launched in Astraea F2 to face Hixar in Sadalsuud F. Just then, the Euclides was launched from the secret as-teroid base.

#f16 [Assault]The scene returns to Euclides launch-

ing while Fon and Hixar face off. Hixar attempted to shoot down Euclides, but

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Hanayo activated Euclide’s GN Field in defense. With Euclides out of the resource satellite, Fon relayed to Hanayo their re-treat, but Hixar told them to stop. Fon then questioned why Hixar wasn’t attacking him and wondered if Hixar already reached his limit of acting on his own accord. He add-ed that Hixar was deluding himself to be-lieve that he could actually defeat and kill him. Hixar confirmed Fon’s assumption that he feared making a mistake and kill-ing another person important to the Plan; he was still haunted by his past of killing a former comrade, Grave Violento. To force Hixar to make up his mind, Fon activated Astraea F2’s Trans-Am and viciously at-tacked Sadalsuud F. Hixar responded with Sadalsuud F’s Trans-Am, but he still didn’t retaliate. Fon then decided to retreat from the scene, taunting Hixar for refusing to fight him. As Fon head out with Euclides, however, Hixar made up his mind and de-cided to shoot Astraea F2 using Dynames’ Long Range Rifle. The shot damaged post-Trans-Am Astraea F2, but Hixar didn’t pursue as Sadalsuud F’s Trans-Am also came to an end. Back at Fereshte, Sherilyn tried to convince Chall to cease their hunt for Fon, as he was once their close com-rade. However, Chall tearfully explained that she couldn’t bring herself to do that as it would disregard the ideals of Celestial Being that her fallen comrades have fought and sacrificed their lives for. The two then exchanged a tearful embrace, sending their feelings to Fon. Several months later, Fon attacked an Earth Sphere Federation facto-ry in Lagrange 1. From a far, a man pilot-ing a Black Plutone watches over.

#f17 [Project start]After the battle, Hanayo alerted Fon

about an incoming GNY-004B Black Gundam Plutone. Fon got a hint of its al-legiance and started attacking it, but the Black Plutone didn’t retaliate and request-ed instead to board the Euclides. With the pilot (Bring Stabity) and questioned his purpose on showing up to them in Plutone. Bring denied having any hidden message

in using the Gundam, explaining that it was being used as a reference for a new line of mobile suits. He then explained that he was there to support Fon, who had the power, they believed, that could replace Celestial Being. Fon was happy to get as-sistance, but made it clear he would only do things his way. Bring didn’t mind, as long as Fon’s actions would benefit man-kind, but Fon doubted that his plans would be of the kind. Bring argued Fon wouldn’t be the judge of that, but Fon threw it back that neither was Bring. With Bring’s si-lence, Fon then revealed that Bring wasn’t human, surprising both Bring and Han-ayo. Bring was forced to reveal the iden-tity of his group, the Innovators.[198] Hanayo expressed her doubts on Bring’s sudden appearance, but Fon still accepted Bring’s offer. Meanwhile, the Fereshte was keeping track of Fon’s condition through Hixar’s reports. Hixar, with Hayana, was still searching for Fon, and vowed to de-feat him and put an end to his Project. Back in the Euclides, Hanayo summarized their plan of dropping asteroids on major mili-tary bases on Earth. Astraea F2 and Black Plutone sortied as guards for the asteroids. On the way, Hixar’s Sadalsuud F appeared and began shooting at the asteroids. Fon went ahead to face Hixar, exposing his back to Plutone. However, Bring didn’t bite and shot Sadalsuud F’s right Sensor Shield instead. The fight between Hixar and Bring began.

#f18 [explosion]This chapter continues with Sadalsuud

F vs. Black Plutone. The Innovator Bring Stabity tried to convince Hixar to stop op-posing the “Project” as it coincide with Aeolia’s Plan. He even added that Hixar was the same as him, an Innovator, a supe-rior race created for carrying out the Plan. Hixar was shocked by the revelation, but argued his life’s purpose was his to decide and not for such Plan. With that, Bring decided that Hixar had rebelled against Aeolia’s Plan and proceeded to fight him. Meanwhile, Ribbons Almark and Regene

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Regetta were also observing the situation, talking about the effect of the asteroid drop on the masses, and the formation of a pow-erful military force as a result of it. At the former Union Tower, ESF forces gathered to protect the structure from the incoming asteroids. At Fereshte, Sherilyn explained her plan of getting in touch with Celestial Being. By using the same concept on how Veda keep track with the solar reactors,

she had planned to increase their solar re-actor’s transmission so that Celestial Be-ing would be able to track their location. Despite the risk of being traced by the Fed-eration, Chall approved of Sherilyn’s plan. Back to Hixar and Bring’s duel, Hixar activated Sadalsuud’s Trans-Am to reach for the discarded GN Sniper Rifle and started firing at the enemy Plutone. Bring responded by activating GN Field. How-ever, Hixar’s attacks managed to penetrate through and ultimately destroyed Plutone, forcing Bring to retreat in the Core Fighter. After seeing Sadalsuud F ending its Trans-

Am, Bring noted that Hixar wouldn’t be able to stop the “Project” anymore. How-ever, Hixar argued that Bring didn’t know Fon’s real nature well enough.At that time, the asteroids that Fon had launched ex-ploded, with its debris spreading to block the sunlight from the Solar Orbital Ring. Fon let out a menacing laugh.

#f19 [veda]

The surface was in chaos because of the power outage that resulted from the spreading debris covering the Solar Ener-gy Generators. The ESF forces scrambled to the Tenchu and La Tour in response, trying to prevent another possible terrorist act on the areas. The first phase of Fon’s plan was completed. Hixar then called out to Fon and demanded an explanation to what Fon’s real motives were. At Lagrange 3, Linda Vashti received the transmission from Fereshte. As it turned out, Fon’s ac-tions worked on the benefit of Fereshte as the ESF at the present was too distracted

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from ever detecting their transmission. With that, the Fereshte couldn’t help but think that Fon hadn’t forgotten about them all this time. Back in Euclides, Fon and the rest were heading to the dark side of the moon. Fon told Hixar that he had found the exact location of Veda, to Hixar’s sur-prise. Fon used the recent crisis to analyze and find the place which was most priori-tized in receiving power during the pow-er outage; the place which was no other than Veda’s location. The two later sortied with their Gundams to face the inevitable Mobile Suit Force waiting ahead of them, one of which was the GN-XXXB Black Gundam Rasiel. Hixar was shocked to see the Rasiel, as it reminded him of his late friend, Grave. Surprisingly, the Gun-dam was piloted by a clone Innovade of himself; a copy of Grave was piloting the GNR-000B Black GN Sefer. Hixar de-cided to face the combined GN-XXXB + GNR-000B Black Sefer Rasiel, while Fon faced the Black Innovator versions of As-traea, Sadalsuud, Abulhool, and Plutone.

#f20 [fon spaak]Fon faced all of the Black versions of

the Second Generation Gundams. Hixar tried to help him, but was intercepted by the Black Sefer Rasiel. The Hixar clone sent some Proto Bits to attack Sadalsuud F, forcing Hixar to counter using Trans-Am. At the same time, Fon activated As-traea F2’s Trans-Am and simultaneously destroyed the enemy Astraea, Abulhool and Sadalsuud. Bring, who returned with the Plutone, tried to shoot down Asraea F2 while it was attacking, but Fon managed to dodge. The two began to fight in close quarters. Back to Hixar’s battle, Sadal-suud F’s Trans-Am had come to an end, but Hixar managed to destroy most of the enemy Proto Bits. The Hixar clone praised him for his skills, which made Hixar re-spond that he was far more than what the clone could ever imagine. He then de-stroyed the GN Sefer pod, which was pi-loted by the Grave clone. Hixar continued that the fact that the two were created only

to be copies set their life to have no value at all. Out of anger, the Hixar clone began rushing to Sadalsuud F. Hixar faced the approaching Rasiel, countering and ulti-mately destroying the enemy Gundam. Before the damaged Sadalsuud F retired from battle, Hixar noted that the difference between them was that the experience of losing the real Grave had made him stron-ger. Back to Fon and Bring’s duel, Bring was to stab Astraea F2 on the chest using the beam saber, but Fon activated As-traea’s GN Reflector, bending the beam saber to hit Astraea F2’s left arm instead. Fon immediately countered and destroyed the Black Plutone, forcing Bring to retreat. After the battle, Fon landed on the moon and went to Veda’s terminal.[253] In there, Fon began talking to Ribbons, whose voice was resonating around the hall. Rib-bons noted that because of Fon’s actions, his plan have moved accordingly. He had prepared Fon’s death in battle as a reward, but Fon still survived the ordeal. Howev-er, Ribbons declared he would not let Fon have Veda and had its main control moved to another terminal. As the last power sup-ply on the Moon had been cut, Ribbons bid Fon a farewell. Fon was last shown with a twisted menacing grin on his face. Forward to sometime in 2311 AD, Chall

Acustica, Eco Calore, and Sherilyn Hyde have returned to Celestial Being. Hixar Fermi and Hayana, on the other hand, con-tinued to pursue Fon for the Fereshte. Fon Spaak had left the Gundam Astraea Type F2 on the moon and had disappeared along with Hanayo, the Euclides and Veda’s old Main Terminal.

After the incident that fon caused, more workers were sent to space, ex-panding the space development around the earth’s orbit. the esf has also de-veloped the A-Laws to effectively count-er terrorism. With the world moving forward, Chall wondered when will fon would make is appearance once again.

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top 5 new Anime to Watch for Winter 2015

Winter is passing by and pickings are slightly slim for new anime. We’re likely to fill our anime-watching schedules with the 2nd and 3rd seasons of durarara, tokyo Ghoul and kuroko no basket. but if you’re looking for more than just the usual popular ones, here are 5 anime that you should give a try this march 2015.

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1. AnsAtsu kyousHitsu(AssAsinAtion CLAssroom)Announced back in November, this pop-

ular manga is finally hitting the telly this winter. There is an evil octopus seeking world domination on the loose and he’s

my teacher! This next anime promises to be as crazy as the introduction sounds. It features a group of students that try their best to kill their homeroom teacher and for good reason. Their teacher claims that he

will destroy Earth within a year but offers mankind a chance to change their fate. He does this by teaching the students not only regular subjects, but the ways of assassina-tion. Meanwhile, the Japanese government has also placed a bounty of ¥10 billion to

whoever among the students succeeds to kill their teacher. But with tentacles and super powers to spare, will the students succeed in killing this octopus?

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2. deAtH PArAdeWe mentioned a while back that this was

coming out and now here it is. Produced by Madhouse, this series is based on a short animated film written and directed by Yuzuru Tachikawa for the Young Animator Training Project (Anime Mirai 2013). Each episode is a separate story where humans that die, do not go to heaven or hell but in-

stead land in a mysterious bar called Queen Decim. Here, the bartender gives these hu-mans a game to play but if they lose, they also lose their lives. Ultimately, it is a test to see how far humans would go in order to fight for the right to live. From the trailer, this promises to be a rather disturbing psy-chological trailer coupled with stunning animation.

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3. sAenAi Hiroin nosodAtekAtA (HoW to rAise A borinG GirLfriend)Ever wondered how to turn your girlfriend

into superwoman? Well this series isn’t entirely about that but it is about Tomoya Aki, a fellow otaku who goes through a few twists in his love life when he has a chance encounter with Megumi Kato, one of the most beautiful girls in his school. The an-

ime follows his aim to create a game to sell at Comiket with a doujin group comprised of Eriri Spencer Sawamura, artist and childhood friend, and Utaha Kasumigao-ka, a game scenario writer. Using Megumi Kato as his game inspiration, one wonders how things will turn out if she realises the kind of heroine Tomoya Aki has turned her into.

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4. THe ROLLING GIRLSThis Pony Canyon production shows po-

tential for having a good plot as well as heartwarming scenes as four girls are sent out to calm a post-war japan. After the Great Tokyo War, each prefecture in Japan was split into independent nations ruled

by different prophets called “Mosa” and an army called “Mob”. As the prefectures battle to take over more territory, four Mob girls from Saitama named Nozomi, Yuki-na, Ai and Chiaya are sent to travel around Japan to mediate the battles between these new nations.

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5. kAntAi CoLLeCtion (kAnkore)Turning card games into animations

seems to be a growing trend. Based on a game by Kadokawa and announced just a while back, the anime is set I a world where mankind has lost control of the seas and the world is threatened to be taken

over by the deep sea fleet. The only ones who can battle the seas and their large creatures are the warship girls, who pos-sess the spirits of naval vessels. As strange as the plot sounds, the trailer shows great action and the girls look pretty cool as they fire missiles and other naval ammunition through their special powers.

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Translated by: Harley Acres

this year big Comic original is cele-brating its 40th anniversary. the cre-

ators and celebrity readers who have supported and appeared in big comic original over the past 40 years will ap-pear in this column! our sixth edition will go one round with the popular “ru-mic theater” creator herself, rumiko takahashi!

[Volume 6 Rumiko Takahashi]

[Profile]: Born October 10, 1957 in Ni-igata Prefecture. In 1978 she debuted in Shonen Sunday with “Those Obnoxious Aliens” followed by “Urusei Yatsura”

which won the Shogakukan Newcomers Award. Subsequently “Maison Ikkoku” was a big hit which appeared in Big Comic Spirits in 1980, followed by “Ranma ½,” “Inuyasha, and “Mermaid Saga” which were also big hits. She first appeared in Original in 1980 with “Wedded Bliss” and in 1987 she began her yearly “Rumic Theater” series with “The Merchants of Romance”. She is the winner of the 26th and 47th Shogakukan Manga Award in the Shonen category and the 18th and 20th Nebula Awards for manga.Original is sort of like udon, it has a large

variety of stories in it.This is Original’s 40th anniversary and

I’ve actually been a happy reader for all 40 years. So many great authors have written for the magazine and were readers before they were creators. In 1987 “Rumic The-ater” debuted in Original and has appeared yearly since that time and has been well-loved by our readers.

Question: Tell us about your first en-counter with original.Takahashi: I was reading from almost the

first issue. I was a high school student at the time, but anyway, I was buying it for “Abu-san”.

Question: so you were a shinji mizushi-ma fan. What was your first impression of the magazine?Takahashi: Other than “Abu-san” I read

“Haguregumo” and I started reading a few other things too I think like Ryohei Saigan’s “San-choume no Yuuhi” (Sunset on Third

Street) and before I debuted his “Profes-sional Retsudan” (Professional Biogra-phies)...

Big Comic original 40th Anniversary interviewrumiko takahashi!!

Interview

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InterviewQuestion: in the early days of the mag-

azine many of the series were in a gekiga style which comes as a bit of a surprise now.Takahashi: I certainly remember (laughs).

Toru Shinohara had a serial, Hitoshi Hira-no’s “Sahara” (written by Kazuo Koike), and Moribi Murano’s “Kakine no Majo”.

Question: As a high school girl in the 70s was it hard to decide what you want-ed to buy?Takahashi: Well, the stories that were ap-

pearing in Original were good. At that time

I was also buying Shonen Sunday, Maga-zine, King and GORO and later even Garo! Whatever Ryoichi Ikegami happened to be publishing in at the time. In general, I would buy them depending on the creators who were publishing there. I didn’t feel embarassed about it. (Note from Harley: These are all boy’s and men’s magazines, I do not know if we should have an edi-tors note clarifying that and there are not typical magazines bought by high school girls).

Question: in “Abu-san” both the pro-tagonist and the author are originally from niigata. do you think there was

some fellow sensibility that you shared with them?Takahashi: Sunday’s “Otoko do Ahou

Koshien” (with Mamoru Sasaki) and Mag-azine’s “Yakyuu-kyo no Uta” were two others that I was really into that Mizushi-ma-sensei did and he always seemed like he was from Osaka to me (laughs). Come to think of it, he came to Niigata for an au-tograph session when I was in high school. I got a drawing of Abu-san standing next to Kyuuichiro Kokuritsu. It is something I still treasure to this day. Abu-san was handsome, he was something I hadn’t seen in shonen manga before, he was an adult.

Question: did you ever think that years later your work would be published alongside Abu-san?Takahashi: Of course it was an

honor. I didn’t have that feeling as much since I am only pub-lished once a year (in Original), but it was still an honor. From the beginning when I pub-

lished “Merchant of Romance” I felt like I was stretching my-self, no doubt about it. It wasn’t because of my age, but anytime

I appear in Original I feel like my works have a more grown-up appearance. It was almost like, “oh Dad is home with

his magazines that kids think are good too.” So ages can vary but they’re stories of fathers and housewives. Every year, in the editorial meetings it seems that it will be a story that really captures a sign of the times, a darker story that still has a happy ending. Maybe because it’s always around the New Year. *laughs* Meanwhile Orig-inal is loaded with radical stories, it’s ad-dictive, there is such a large variety of in-gredients in it, even if you only feel like having udon. This “Big” magazine is sort of like soba. (laughs)

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Anime flashback

mazinger ZMazinger Z (Majingā Zetto?), known

briefly as Tranzor Z in the United States, is a Japanese super robot manga series written and illustrated by Go nagai. the first manga version was serialized in Shueisha’s Weekly Shōnen Jump from october 1972 to August 1973, and it lat-er continued in kodansha tv magazine from october 1973 to september 1974.

It was adapted into an anime television se-ries which aired on Fuji TV from December 1972 to September 1974. A second manga series was released alongside the TV show, this one drawn by Gosaku Ota, which start-ed and ended almost at the same time as the TV show.

Mazinger Z has spawned several sequels

and spinoff series, among them UFO Ro-bot Grendizer and Mazinkaiser. It was a very popular cartoon in Mexico during the 1980s, where it was dubbed into Spanish directly from the Japanese version, keeping the Japanese character names and broad-casting all 92 episodes, unlike the version aired in the U.S.

PlotMazinger Z is an enormous super robot,

constructed with a fictitious metal called Super-Alloy Z (Chōgokin Zetto?), which is forged from a new element (Japanium) mined from a reservoir found only in the sediment of Mt. Fuji, in Japan. The me-cha was built by Professor Juzo Kabuto as a secret weapon against the forces of evil, represented in the series by the Mechan-

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Anime flashbackical Beasts of Dr. Hell. The latter was the German member of a Japanese archeolog-ical team, which discovered ruins of a lost pre-Grecian civilization on an island named Bardos (or Birdos, although some inconsis-tent translations have identified the island as being the actual Greek island of Rhodes); the civilization was loosely based on the an-cient Mycenae, and was called the Mycéne Empire in the series.

One of their findings was that the Mycene used an army of steel titans about 20 meters in height (compare with the Greek legend of Talos). Finding prototypes of those titans underground which could be remote-con-trolled and realizing their immense power on the battlefield, Dr. Hell goes insane and has all the other scientists of his research team killed except for Professor Kabuto,

who manages to escape. The lone survivor goes back to Japan and attempts to warn the world of its imminent danger.

Meanwhile, Dr. Hell establishes his head-quarters on a mobile island, and plans to use the Mechanical Beasts to become the new ruler of the world. To counter this, Kabu-to constructs Mazinger Z and manages to finish it just before being killed by a bomb

planted by Hell’s right-hand ‘man’, Bar-on Ashura, a half-man, half-woman being. As he is dying, he manages to inform his grandson Kouji Kabuto about the robot and its use.

kouji becomes the robot’s pilot, and from that point on battles both the con-tinuous mechanical monsters, and the sinister henchmen sent by doctor Hell.

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