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Mart

Name: Martin Gray

Bio: I'm a journalist in Edinburgh and fond of police procedural telly, biscuits and musicals. I know far more than any decent person should about My Little Pony, having spent years editing British comic books about them; thankfully I also got to edit reprint titles for such folk as Batman and Superman. And the best bit of that? Chatting to the readers in lettercols - no pleasure in life equals being italicised. I review comics for Comic Buyers Guide and go on at appalling length at my own blog, http://dangermart.blogspot.com/

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Reviews

I enjoyed #1 but this wound up way down the reading pile. Partly, it’s because there were so many other…

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Oh dearie Lord, who signed off on this comic? It’s not even dopily entertaining, it’s just annoyingly bad. It’s part…

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Just read 600 and I’m going to moan again about the art. Why does the very competent Olivier Coipel seem…

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Mart's Recent Comments
July 12, 2021 5:31 pm Thanks for another fun show, with the highlight being the discussion of The Nice House By the Lake. I’m definitely not sorry, now, that I passed after the first instalment… it was an OK read but didn’t grab me, and I think you’ve explained why. One big reason was that I just found the cast members unbearable. Smug. X-Men #1 was more my cup of tea, though I could have done with having more questions answered. Why were these mutants voted to be the X-Men, are they the most admired, or the most annoying and the Krakoans want rid of them? Why on Earth would they move into the centre of the city, immediately putting millions in danger? Why are there people in plastic bags outsidd the Treehouse? Josh is dead on about the giant robot, that’s a metal Minion. Anyway, this was a lot of fun overall, even if Cyke still seems shifty to me. I wouldn’t be surprised were the X-Men lulling the world into a false sense of security before they eat them. I get annoyed by the page-long infodumps - I’m glad I missed the Lake House equivalents - and find the logo boring as heck, but I’ll give this comic another look.
June 21, 2021 9:53 am Great art but I hated this issue, it’s not about Supergirl at all. It’s all from the POV of Ruthye, whom King tweeted would be our new favourite character. Drunk, cursing, vomiting Supergirl isn’t the hero here, and if she does wind up killing the dad’s killer - surely that’s a red herring - then that’s me off King for good. How many times must Supergirl be brought to rock bottom or corrupted? How many times must she come to terms with a tragic past? Brian Bendis it has recently shown her being a valued, respected, loved member of the Super family, but here she either has no one who wants to celebrate with her, or she just wants to be alone – I fear this is leading to the lonely, insipid Superwoman of Future State. As for hurting the dog, how low can you go? Tom King gives this to kids to read? This is a story about Hope? Ye gods.
June 14, 2021 5:22 am Top show as ever. What I really liked on the Batman: The Detective art front was that inker Sandra Hope joined the series - Andy Kubert’s work is much better when inked by someone else.
May 25, 2021 8:52 am Intrigued by the idea of Conor ranting about the current state of the Batman line, I popped over to see the recording at Patreon. If a anything, sir, you were far too gentle.
May 6, 2021 10:32 am I also don’t like the idea of Damian, but his co-starring role in Super Sons has been a delight, seriously, try an issue. He was also good with Jon in last week’s Action Comics (fancy you lads ignoring an eating scene!).
April 27, 2021 4:07 am Thanks for a great show and, especially, for my Patron super-power; looking out the window today in Scotland, I can use it. It is, as they say here, dreich. Don’t doubt that you’re entertainers, but you’re also informative and entertaining, the BBC of comic podcasting. Between lockdowns last year we managed to get away to Madrid for a long weekend, and ate at a place called Museo del Jamón... gorgeous ham everywhere! Put it on your To Do list - or better still, franchise it!
March 17, 2021 7:34 pm Cheers for another terrific episode. I was excited to get Non-Stop Spider-Man, but boy, was it wordy. I was also tripped up by the dropping of names of people to whom we’ve not been introduced, and the flashbacks killed whatever momentum there was. It might have been better to start from a point of no forward momentum then build and build - get the exposition out of the way first, then move forward, faster and ever faster. Also, Chris Bachalo has many strengths, but his Peter Parker is spectacularly ugly. It’s also an ‘Amen’ from me as regards the criticisms of the back-up, that was no Zemo, that was a WB sidekick. And ‘yea’ so far as the hip dialogue goes - I’m a middle-aged British git, that payoff line, ‘And they have drip’? What? I looked it up and apparently ‘drip’ = ‘style’ but even that doesn’t give us a killer pay-off. As for the regular Spidey book, it was OK but I couldn’t get over how off-model the great Patrick Gleason’s Peter and JJJ are.
November 18, 2020 4:04 am And Bilqus Evely drew the excellent Sugar & Spike serial, written by Keith Giffen, for DC’s Legends of Tomorrow anthology. It’s huge fun, and collected as a cheap trade.
September 28, 2020 8:00 am I’m enjoying the show, congratulations and thanks for all the entertainment. If not all the fish. Conor mentioned that the only female to write in was ‘Emlyn W’. If I heard that correctly, that’s a chap’s name, apparently meaning ‘around the valley’. Famous Emlyns over here in the UK include footballer Emlyn Hughes and playwright Emlyn Williams.
September 18, 2020 1:23 pm I was also confused by those silent panels of Lana in Superman, but my pal Anj came to the rescue... it sounds plausible. Apparently Brad is from the Christopher Reeve Superman movies. ‘As for Lana’s faces, here is what I think. She sees pics of her in the yearbook with Brad. She’s sort of disgusted … like ‘ugh, I spent time with him when I could have been with Clark.’ Then she sees Clark, shy and unassuming, lingering in the background of the yearbook. Then she sees all the current pics of a smiling, confident Clark hugging Lana. And then she realizes that she really missed out.’