Spoilers: I'm not going to be deliberately spoiling the endings of stories, but these reviews will contain some details of plots, especially for issues that begin multi-issue story arcs. As a rule of thumb, I won't be revealing anything I personally wouldn't want to know prior to reading an issue.

Besides the issues reviewed below (and the Ame-Comi statues of Black Canary and Huntress, which turned up at the comic store this week), my shipment also included the Marvel Divas poster, which as you can see from the graphic I photoshopped into the issue photo above, is the cover of issue one (reviewed here). Bear in mind, if you're just looking at this graphic, that the poster also has the title on it, it's not just pure art - still, it's bright and bold and fun-looking. (And it's here, which is more than I can say for DC's poster of the women of the DCU - what the heck's the hold-up, huh?) Also I got the deluxe edition of the Tarot: Witch of the Black Rose volume seven trade paperback (reviewed here) - same book, but with an extra colour lithograph, as you can see in the photo above. Yeah, it's Tarot's big naked boobs - you know what, I apologise for nothing, so there. Onwards:

Gotham City Sirens #2 ~ Last issue ended on a big cliffhanger - Harley and Ivy demanding Catwoman fess up and reveal Batman's true identity. I don't think that's a good story point - it may have been necessary for it to be addressed (otherwise people would be asking why they didn't ask her) but making a big deal of it just means a lot of time has to be spent addressing it this issue. It's addressed well, with a neat explanation that manages to sound credible without actually giving away anything, backed up by a little flashback, but ultimately there was no way Catwoman was going to out Batman for real, so that whole chunk of the issue was just a technical exercise, not a compelling story. Luckily the story doesn't put all its eggs in one basket - the remainder of the issue isn't as punchy as it could be, since pages are sacrificed to the Batman thing, but there's still a set-up for an interesting antagonist who could prove to be the first big bad for this series. The highlight is Harley showing off her crazy skills tackling a band of kidnappers - it's nice to be reminded that, besides being comic relief, she really does have the ability to keep up with Ivy and her superpowers and Catwoman and her long-established fighting skill; it proves that the three of them can be a forceful team.

Atomic Robo: Shadow from Beyond Time #3 ~ I was actually a bit confused at the start of this issue - I didn't realise that Robo's vehicular assault in the previous one actually did the trick of taking out (in that time) H.P. Lovecrafthulhu, so when this one started several decades later, on an apparently unrelated mission, I wondered whether I'd somehow missed something. It all comes together in the end though - and in hindsight, the sense of temporal dislocation between the issues is actually a benefit, since it's a story about a creature that exists outside time. That's what it'd be like, after all. In other respects it's business as usual for Robo - the main plot (until it intersects with the monster from beyond sanity) concerns an effort to locate the spent booster used by the Soviet Union to put Sputnik into orbit, which in these first days of the space race could offer vital information to the US about what the USSR's missile capabilities are. The meshing of the space race and the arms race doesn't quite feel historically sound the way it's presented - it's got a basis in fact, no question, but (knowing a little about the subject already) I felt it could've been handled better. That's the only misstep though, the majority of the issue is Robo at his best, leading his team of (then newbie) action scientists against the big chaotic critter and its latest malevolent cosmic evil onslaught - it's great fun.

All New Savage She-Hulk #4 ~ Well, that's this miniseries wrapped up. I was mad as hell to learn that Peter David's She-Hulk had been cancelled, but on the other hand when Lyra's story was begun (back in Hulk: Raging Thunder) I was keen to see it continue, so I came to this with mixed feelings. It hasn't had the sophisticated characterisation and humour of PAD's writing, but it's been enjoyable and presented interesting concepts nonetheless, and apart from the second issue feeling a bit uneven it's been a good story well told. This issue sees it go out on a high, not just coasting off the cliffhanger from #3 but stirring it up some more to build a quick-witted and fun finale that gives all the heroes a chance to shine (except the Dark Avengers, but I really don't care that they look like one-dimensional idiots, they pretty much are), and while Lyra really doesn't fill the gap in Marvel's line-up She-Hulk vacated (nothing since has, really), she stands up well enough on her own.

C.E. Murphy's Take A Chance #5 ~ This is the final issue of this miniseries, and while I enjoyed it, I wouldn't say it was a runaway success for me - although not in terms of quality, as such, with both writing and art of a high standard throughout. This issue Chance is up against the wall, having been identified to the police, and with her (justified) shooting of China White having made her a nasty enemy in the form of White's bitchy and murderous boss. She goes about extracting herself from this mess the same way she's done everything so far - by being smart, having had the sense to make sure she was prepared for whatever might confront her, and finally by being really, really daring and too stubborn to quit when it comes to crunch time. As a miniseries I've enjoyed this, but what I really want is an ongoing - the story presented here has all the elements of a really good proper series, with characters and concepts that'd make for great reading over the course of twenty or thirty issues, paced out and explored in interesting ways. A five-issue miniseries just doesn't have the room to really do that, which is why I feel a bit cheated - not just that I want more, but that I think an ongoing Take A Chance comic would certainly shine even more than this mini does. Hopefully one day we'll get just that.

Power Girl #3 ~ This issue is an improvement on #2, which is just as well, since that one was diabolically poorly conceived. This time fewer mistakes are made - Power Girl gets the credit she deserves as a brave and intelligent hero, and Ultra-Humanite is kept to one side, adding a bit to the story but not overwhelming it like he pointlssly did before. It's far from perfect - notably the civilians back at Peegee's company serve absolutely no purpose to the story, and just eat up a bit of time telegraphing the reactions that Gray & Palmiotti obviously think are insightful, but in fact are just predictable and trite. On the other hand, the dilemma of how to get Manhattan down from its position suspended above the Earth is handled with a modicum of intelligence and planning, enough that you don't have to suspend too much disbelief to accept it. Overall this first arc has been good enough to keep reading and see what happens next, but by a narrow margin - compared to something like Gail Simone's Wonder Woman the writing has been rather immature and careless, and it's disappointing that Gray & Palmiotti, and DC, think that's good enough for Power Girl.

Guardians of the Galaxy #16 ~ This issue is all about Darkhawk's nabbing of a handful of the Guardians and teleporting them off to... where? The future, it turns out, the future that will result if whatever horrible thing it is that's going to happen to the fabric of reality happens, the catastrophic end-of-everything scenario Darkhawk's been warning us all about, and Adam Warlock has been worried might happen. Well, in the 31st Century it has happened, and all that's left are a handful of futuristic heroes (their generation's Guardians of the Galaxy), the newly-arrived teleportees, and luckily a bunch of belligerent bad guys for them to fight in a last-ditch effort to somehow get back and warn the present what'll happen if they muck things up. Since this is the nightmare scenario this title has been worrying about since day one there's not really any new information in this issue - and with the whole premise being that this is the future we have to avoid, the details of this issue's plot are kind of irrelevant to the bigger picture - but in focusing solely on this one slice of the story, Abnett and Lanning give themselves room to have good fun with it, with their usual brand of balls-to-the-wall space opera weirdness and honest-to-goodness superhero adventure. It's pretty much as close as this series has come to a one-shot adventure so far, and given the promise that the big plot is still there in the background, it's fun to take a moment in this little side-pocket of it to kick back and enjoy the fireworks.

Farscape: Gone & Back #1 ~ The third 'episode' of the Farscape comic begins with the crew back in Hyneria, so Rygel's best doctor can have a look at John and Aeryn's baby Deke and figure out why he's got an extra gland that seems to mess with time. but before long Crichton's been accidentally hurled into a parallel universe ("unrealised reality," in Scaper parlance) where, he discovers, Aeryn never boarded Moya, and many things turned out very differently as a result. John's attitude is interesting - this is a more traditional alternate reality than the crazy possibilities used before, and possibly because of its closer ties to the world he's familiar with, Crichton is drawn into caring about what's happened to Aeryn here, even as he has trouble dealing with his 'family' in this reality (Katralla and their daughter, in a nice callback to season two). It's a bit of a change, since last time John visited an unrealised reality he more or less brualised it - but of course doing so scarred him, and it's understandable he'd not be so cavalier this time. And, of course, it's all about Aeryn - it always is with John, only this time (so far as he knows) 'his' Aeryn is fine, but there's a different Aeryn in the new reality he feels he needs to reach out to. How well this'll go as a storyline it's difficult to predict - its treatment of the reality could be a bit more Star Trek than Farscape, but it's too early to say for sure, and it could as easily turn out just fine as a part of the series.

Ms. Marvel #42 ~ Carol's back (all glowy-eyed, too), and she and Karla don't like each other one bit. That's pretty much the bulk of this issue, Ms. Marvel vs Ms. Marvel, and since this is the first issue of the 'War of the Marvels' storyline, it's no surprise that we don't really get much of a definitive resolution to the contest - there's a logical reason for the immediate fight to stop happening, and that's it. Sana Takeda's art (the painted stuff that's been used for Karla before) is up to the task of some pretty hectic, explosive visuals, and all in all as fight scenes go it's a good one. I do still feel I could've used a bit more of Karla as Ms. Marvel before bringing Carol back - a lot of the anger on her side comes from the fear that she'll lose the Ms. Marvel name now that Carol's back, and while she's certainly insane enough to warrant throwing punches for screwed-up reasons, it would've been nice to see her 'bond' with her Ms. Marvel persona and role a bit more before using it to justify her fury here.

Executive Assistant Iris #2 ~ This issue is what I was hoping for - the eventual story, by the looks of things, will be Iris rebelling against the amoral role her life has led her to inhabit, but for now the writers are doing the best thing possible, which is not rush things. We get flashbacks to Iris's formative years in the nutjob training school that seems to have produced all the underworld's best executive assistant/assassins, and Iris's narration - though not quite as punchy as last issue - continues to be a source of character for her, as well as fulfilling the exposition role, but she's still very much what she was made to be, a cold, heartless operative. Besides slowly setting the stage for Iris's personal journey, this issue also foreshadows another conflict for her, as her boss's orders place her in opposition to another of the academy's graduates, Rose - for the moment it's a simple fight, but there's plenty of potential to explore the implications of agents like Iris being trained together and later sold to employers who may set them against each other - especially what the academy's own stance on that kind of thing is, hinted at here. All in all, a strong issue.