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Just a couple this week. I'm sure you're all devastated.

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Early in the week The Comics Reporter linked to a post featuring early Joe Kubert work, including It made me wonder if Jack Kirby might have seen that at some point prior to creating The Black Racer, the peculiar god of death of the weird pantheon he created for his Fourth World saga who got around by cross country skiing through the air.
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Abhay has a theory on how they should do Wonder Woman. After reading his post though, I wonder if maybe they shouldn't just give her a skateboard...?

(I also wonder how many little kids were horribly killed in the seventies trying to emulate Wonder Woman's skateboard mounting technique? Helmet or no helmet, it's a lot easier to get on the skateboard first, and then start making it go, rather than reversing those two stopes)

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Only ten? I'm pretty confident it is actually "all the time."

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Since I didn't actually read all of Justice League #7, just freaked out about what I saw between the covers, here's an actual review of Justice League #7, by Mr. Don MacPherson. He seems to confirm what I got from the stories by flipping through them.

Today at Robot 6, there's a "Chain Reactions" feature linking to several other reviews of the issue as well.

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That issue, by the way, was the one that shipped with this variant coverupon which the League looks like a collection of grumpy assholes, like they're from the original incarnation of The Defenders instead of the JLA.

Justice League variant covers could be worse, though. Look at this one, which almost makes me want to run away screaming from superhero comics all by itself: There's a lot to dislike about it, from Green Arrow's costume to the sickly faux paint effects, but I'm not sure exactly what it is about it that gives me such a strong, negative reaction to it.

I'm pretty sure it has something to do with Green Lantern ring-generating an "L" to put on on his forehead to make fun of Ollie, though...

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Reminder: Tucker and Abhay are still funny.

I'm glad The Comics Journal has hired Stone as a columnist, as it seems to ensure greater frequency for his "Comics of the Weak" column, which only rarely fails to make me laugh out loud at least once. As for Abhay, no one writes comics convention coverage like him.

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If whoever ends up buying this combines it with parasailing, I am in.

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I actually have no idea how you do Etta Candy outside of the early 1940s. I really like the character, but she doesn't lend herself to updating—any update usually comes across as an overcorrection. I didn't like the Perez version, which slimmed her down, made her older, put her in the Navy and eventually married her off to Steve Trevor, nor did I like what Gail Simone did with her in the previous volume of Wonder Woman, during which she was a sort of secret agent ally of Wondy's in the ODD, or whatever SHIELD-like superhero organization Wonder Woman's then secret identity Diana Prince worked in (I think it was Simone who introduced her to that volume; there were more than a half-dozen cooks in that particular kitchen before J. Michael Straczynski and DC burned it down; if Simone didn't introducer her, she definitely used her as Wondy's girlfriend more than any of the previous writers did).

The best post-Marston portrayal of Candy I've seen was the one in Ben Caldwell's "Wonder Woman" strip in Wednesday Comics , where she at least retained her size, much of her original characterization, and her love of candy. (I've long though Ross Campbell could do justice to Etta Candy in a modern context, too).

I guess she should remain a) a college student, b) overweight and c) really into candy, fighting and saying "woo woo," and not so much into boys. They just have to cut down on the fat jokes, maybe...?

I was rather surprised to see DC Women Kicking Ass (is there a byline on there somewhere?) embracing the "New 52" Etta Candy, who apparently appeared in last Wednesday's Justice League #7. The gist of the post seemed to be that the new Etta is a black woman instead of a white one, which adds a bit more diversity (and is apparently a nod to that Wonder Woman TV show that almost got made).

But then, this is another example of DC using the New 52 redesigns to slim down a traditionally overweight DCU character ala Amanda Waller in Suicide Squad.

It's not the exact same thing, of course. Waller was a bigger character in the DCU that existed between Crisis On Infinite Earths and the New 52boot (1987-2011) than Etta Candy was (I don't think you can say Etta Candy's been a major character in even the Wonder Woman comics since the end of the Golden Age), and they didn't just slim Waller down, but sexied her all up, too.

But it's in the same ballpark.

Maybe, like a-hold teen Billy Batson though, this is part of the hero's journey. Just as Billy is beginning as a jerk and will hopefully grow into a kid you don't want to strangle, perhaps Etta will start as a relatively slim, professional woman before discovering bon-bons and the pleasures of roughhousing...

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If ever there was a comics blog that needed its own letter column, sure it is Mike Sterling's Progressive Ruin.

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(Yes, I know you can leave comments, but it's not the same thing shut up)