Welcome to KFR’s new weekly Monday feature, super-cheesily titled “The Rodeo Roundup”, where we give quick reviews of whatever comics we were able to read over the weekend, for you to enjoy while you should be working. Please feel free to leave comments to tell us how wrong we are.

All-Star Superman #3
by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely

After the stunning first 2 issues, Grant Morrison’s run on All-Star Superman seems poised to become one of the all-time great Superman tales, if not one of the best superhero stories ever. Issue #3 picks up with Lois Lane trying out her new 1-day superpowers — a gift from Supes for her birthday — but it quickly goes off on a classicly strange Morrison tangent. While the story disappoints only because it doesn’t fully exploit the idea of what Lois (or anyone) would do if they had Superman’s powers for a day, the breathtaking shot of Superman kissing Lois on the moon is suitable for framing, and will be long remembered. A-

Robin #148
by Adam Beechen and Karl Kerschl

While most of DC’s One Year Later books seem to be mucking up the company’s continuity as opposed to streamlining it, thus making it difficult for new readers to jump in, Robin is off to a promising start. Sporting a stellar new costume (closely resembling Batman: The Animated Series’s redesign of the character), Robin gets the crapola beaten out of him by an unseen foe, and when the smoke clears, is framed for the murder of Batgirl. He quickly begins a quest to clear his name and solve the murder (don’t worry, it wasn’t really Batgirl who was killed) at the same time. A solid Robin story, seemingly worth sticking around for. B+

Blue Beetle #1
by Keith Giffen, John Rogers, and Cully Hamner

After DC Countdown made the Blue Beetle relevant (by finally giving him something important to do, and then killing him off), it was only a matter of time before a new Beetle was introduced. Surprisingly, DC took the Marvel flawed-youngster-as-hero route: the new Blue Beetle is named Jaime, a high school junior with a loving, working-class family, bickering friends, and new powers for which he did not ask, nor completely understand. Very fun stuff with lots of potential, and one of the best costume designs in a long time. B+

New Avengers #17
by Brian Michael Bendis and Mike Deodato

One of Marvel’s more frustrating titles, as it’s either excellent or deeply disappointing, the latest New Avengers falls somewhere in the middle. The mysterious being who killed Alpha Flight and countless others in #16 is still an unnerving threat, but the New Avengers’ trip to Harlem to scare away drug dealers is laughable.
Still, Mike Deodato’s art is sensational, and with Brian Michael Bendis just getting his hands on Ms. Marvel, now is not the time to jump ship. B

Wolverine #40
by Daniel Way, Javier Saltares, and Mark Texeira

A satisfactory ending to the otherwise disappointing, disjointed “Origins and Endings” story arc. As the springboard for Wolverine’s new ongoing series, Wolverine: Origins, “Origins and Endings” was meant to act as a prelude that would give reason to Wolverine exploring his past and exacting some revenge on those who did him wrong. Instead, it was a mostly hard-to-follow mess, involving the Silver Samurai, and later, The Winter Soldier (a.k.a. Bucky), in a forced, contrived subplot. Only in issue #40 do we get some bonafide, explained revelations and a satisfying setup for Origins, but the letdown of this story has done enough to cool my enthusiasm for the upcoming ongoing series (also to be written by Daniel Way). To understand what happened in this arc (because you won’t from reading the comics), check out Way’s message board post explaining everything here (12th post down). As far as plots go, it’s great; something just went wrong in the execution. Don’t even bother with the trade. C+

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