Just Stay at Home

Heroclix is back from the dead!

For those of you who can't access that article, Heroclix, the superhero-comic-themed tabletop strategy game I've written about on occasion, seemed to have died when its company, Wizkids, was closed by its parent company, Topps. But the involvement of another company, NECA, has brought Heroclix back to life, with a Marvel set coming out this fall (Hammer of Thor) and a DC set in the Spring (Brave & The Bold).

To celebrate, I offer you this map of an abandoned churchyard and graveyard as a venue for a Black Lantern themed game.

Candidates for a Black Lantern team include figures that represent characters whom we've seen, or know we will see, resurrected as Black Lanterns (e.g., Hawkman, Hawkgirl, Martian Manhunter, Elongated Man, Sue Dibny, Amon Sur, Golden Age Superman, Hawk, the original Firestorm, the Spectre, Deadman). Candidates for a team to oppose them include those whom we have seeing fighting the BLs (e.g., Superman, Superboy, Flash, Hal Jordan, Guy Gardner, John Stewart, Star Sapphire, Sinestro, the living Titans, Deadman, Phantom Stranger, Hawkman, Hawkgirl). Don't put the same ch character on each team, LOL!

Also: the Black Lantern team MUST have Black Hand on it. Any of his teammates whom he can see may automatically heal one click as a free action of the beginning of their turn. And if his team KOs a figure, he can 'bring it back from the dead' as a power action and put it on his team. Resurrected figures reappear wherever they fell, and start on their last click. Because the odds are obviously in the Black Lanterns favor, all the opposing team has to do is KO Black Hand, and flee off the edge of the board. If they can.

It's not likely there will be Black Lantern heroclix made any time soon, so if you want some, you might look for a customer clix maker to create them for you...!

In all honesty, I have very little of interest to say about the acquisition of Marvel by Disney. Since I don't read anything Marvel produces and have very little interest in their movies or other properties.

That said, I hope this will finally put to rest the tired old canard trotted out by some Marvel zombies that Marvel is somehow more "pure" than DC because it isn't (or rather wasn't) owned by a bigger corporation.

Of course, they'll probably find a way anyway..

"We must find Dusty, Hangman! I've searched all his regular haunts -- the Candy Store, the Malt Shoppe, the Daisy BB gun Emporium -- to no avail! Let's take a look in this Escherian Quonset hut.

"Washington's wig! It's a Nazi tank factory--here, on Florida Avenue! And over there, captive, and forced to wear one of those Stanley Marcus's skin-tight, Rosie the Riveter style outfits suggested by the War Production Board's regulation L-85, just like I read about in McCall's-- it's Joan Crawford! The fiends!

"She's being held in one of those new-fangled necklace fitters. And good gravy--! They've capture Kilroy!!!

"Okay, Hangman, here's the plan: we move to--

"Hangman?

"Dang it, Hangman, where are--? Ah, jeez, he's dropping from the catwalk. Alright, then, we'll just wing it. Lord, how I miss Dusty!"

Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen Special #2 is the most important comic you didn't read this week.

That is, of course, assuming you didn't read it. If you did, you know what I'm talking about.

If you read it you know that there were stunning revelations, the return of characters long unseen, references to old series that almost nobody read (I, of course, have the complete run). There's all that and a death on the last page. The death of one of the most important characters in the history of DC Comics.

Of course, I doubt the aforementioned dead person is really dead. You know how these things go. Still, most of my points still stand. There is a lot in SPJOS #2 (quite a mouthful) that sets up even more important things for the future.

If you've been following the current ongoing Superman event and didn't read that comic you need to run to your LCS immediately. Go now. I'll wait.

Today's topics: the incomparable Starman!

Drama, thy name is Doog
Vurm, infuriated
Starman provides my birthday list
You fiend!
I have seen the Light
The Green Arab
Starman versus the Nameless Underling
Assist me to the couch!
Drama beyond verbs
Overshadowed by the Light
Starman's poetry cosmic
Starman did everything first.
Radio drama
The Living Death
Haiku and Farewell
I dare not relax for an instant
Hello!
Another reason to love Starman
Starman versus the bear
Starman leads the 300
Starman sasses you derisively
Starman explains it all for you
Starman requests peer review
Starman saves Colonel Taylor
Starman gets oomphy
Starman goes shopping