YAY I'M BACK!!!! Blue Beetle - #24 Review :D

Blue Beetle - #24



Synopsis: Jaime's family crawls out of the ruins of his house (destroyed by the Reach), saved by Traci 13 who introduces herself as Jaime's g/f XD They all hop into Paco's car and race off.

On the Reach spaceship, the Negotiator (from now on called Neggy :D) throws Jaime in a cell for further analysis as he refuses to believe that Jaime overcame the Scarab's programming through his own will and goodness. He takes the Scarab (which he declares is "dead") to be scanned.

Alone and nekkid in his cell, Jaime gets back up and speaks in the Reach language which allows him to open the door and get the jump on the surprised guard outside. xD Jaime hijacks a pod in the launch bay and instead of trying to escape, heads deeper into the ship instead! :D

Back in El Paso, Dawur (the big mean looking Reach person) shows up on orders of Neggy to destroy Jaime's family but is faced by the collective powers of Traci 13, Peacemaker and the Posse who say that they owe Jaime for saving the family of one of their members! :D

Jaime, now powerless and clothed with goggles similar to Ted Kord's starts speaking in Reach and tells Neggy that he's going to overload the engines and destroy the ship and that the Beetle gave him all the knowledge of the Reach (that they got from Peacemaker earlier) before they took it out. ^-^ In response, Neggy orders a complete shutdown of the engines even though that will decloak the ship. :o

On Earth, the fight is fast and frantic but Darwur manages to discover where Jaime's family is (as they've been cloaked by a magic user in the Posse). However before he can destroy them, La Dama, Brenda's crime boss aunt arrives with her own men and magic users! :D They provide arms for Jaime's parents and join in the fight! :D

In the ship, Jaime reaches the engine room but Neggy says that the engines are down. However, Jaime has another plan, and he inputs an algorithm into the Reach's computers :O Neggy and his cute little scientists ppls can't figure out what it is and in anger Neggy orders Jaime brought to him and sends ships to finish off Jaime's family and friends (and enemies!) D:

Jaime's mom tells Brenda to take Milagro to safety and Brenda orders Paco with her. However there's an explosion and Brenda's knocked out cold :( Something lands behind the good guys.

Neggy holds Jaime at gunpoint and demands to know what the program is. Jaime refuses and says only "Khaji Da!" (Dan Garrett's original magic word to transform into the Blue Beetle) in response! :O


Review: :OOOO

I remember when Jaime first appeared as the successor of Ted Kord in Infinite Crisis, I think everybody wrote him off. Even I was a bit skeptical b/c it seemed a little done. Regular teen boy in a small town? Check. Best friend and potential love interest? Check. Not wanting to be a hero? Check. Given a super alien killing machine? Check. But I also had hope that it would not be like that at all :D

I remember reading a review in IGN talking about how unconvinced they were that Jaime would be nething other than just another "regular kid dealing with a killing machine" trope. But just like he has in his own story, Jaime has defied everybody's low expectations and become something special. :D

I mean this entire issue is rly a great pay off to everything that's been building up for the last 23 issues :D And it's SO BLUE BEETLE!! Which is what I luff so much :D B/c he's always won his fights not thru sheer force, but thru negotiation and friendship. He's done good things for his villains, and in this issue it all pays off as everybody (good, bad or otherwise) involved in Jaime's life shows up, on their own free will, to defend his family! :D

That's Jaime's superpower, and that's exactly what the whole thing with Neggy is about. It's not the Scarab suit, that just allows Jaime to do more, but he's inherently a GOOD PERSON, a kind person and somebody who helps unconditionally, and that means ppl, good and bad, respect him and like him :)

It's often hard to throw in "surprise saves" more than once in an "seige" setting, but Rogers does it expertly with Traci 13, Peacemaker and the Posse and La Dama all showing up at the right times, and it doesn't seem corny, but instead it made me wanna cheer b/c I luff all those characters since they've been DEVELOPED throughout the series and it's just great to see them all together making a stand for a common cause :D The Reach dunno what they're up against. XD

I also luff that Jaime's family doesn't just run or scream or hide. They grab weapons and fight back! Even Brenda takes charge and orders Paco with her when tasked to take Milagro to safety! :D No WiR here! :D

I'm sad that she got knocked out so easily tho, but b/c it's so odd for the story (that she'd take charge only to be knocked out), I suspect there's more that's gonna be happening and Brenda will rly come thru next issue! :D Also the landing party may not be who we think it is, since next issue stars Booster Gold, Fire, Ice and Guy Gardner apparently! :D

I think Rogers has rly shown the perfect way to introduce a "legacy" hero. I mean he came in with the whole "We love Ted Kord, how could you kill him and replace him with a stupid kid?" thing on his back and not only did he make us love Jaime, he honoured Ted Kord's legacy. Jaime studied Ted's notes, a lot of his thinking comes from learning from Ted's way of thinking. And Ted's friends have made appearances too, not just to give Jaime a stamp of approval for the fans, but to get to know him and to help teach him as a hero. :)

So it would be great to see them help him in the final issue of Rogers' run :D

I luff that Jaime is STILL a fairly non-violent hero, one who uses his brains and his compassion to overcome his obstacles :D I luff that he takes advantage of the linear thinking of the Reach and their overconfidence to undermine and defeat them, and I luff how brave he's become :D

What's great is that this didn't happen overnight. It took 24 issues to get here, and in each one he slowly learned a little more about what it means to be a hero, and also about himself and who he is inside. Jaime was always a hero, he just never got the chance to rly show it until he got the scarab, and that's what's so great about this series :)

Also he has an AMAZING supporting cast that exist as characters in and of themselves as well as to SUPPORT him and not just to be cannon fodder for him to grieve over! :D

Also he's had mentors, which is a nice change, and more of a fantasy story hero thing than a comic book hero who tends to just jump into things. :) I rly like that he's learnt from Peacemaker, Batman, Guy Gardner, Ted Kord (from his notes) and to some degree Booster Gold. :D Also Superman XD These aren't guest stars for the sake of it like in Supergirl, these guest stars are important to his development as a hero. :) He learns and he grows and now he's taking on a foe that's supposedly way beyond him (and his OWN enemy, I like how his series stands alone) :D

Personally, I feel bad for Pfeifer. XD I LIKE him, and I think he can be a good writer, but to me issues 1-25 will be the definitive Jaime Reyes Blue Beetle story. He got the scarab and learnt how to be a hero and finally confronts the bad guys at the end and defeats them :D

I'm sure the future stories can be good too, but even if they're not, 1-25 told a complete story for me and I'd be happy even if they completely ruin Jaime, kill off his entire family, rip out his eye, and have him make a deal with the devil so that he and Traci 13 never dated. >_>

DC should collect 1-25 in some sort of giant TPB! xDDD

Oh!! OH!!!

Also also!

The Scarab is great! :D And we all know it's just playing dead neways cuz Neggy said to hook it up to the ship to scan it. For a race of intergalactic geniuses, the Reach are pretty DUMB xD Tho I guess it's cuz they're so overconfident. Once the Scarab is hooked up, you know it's gonna wake up as part of Jaime's plan.

In fact I think that's what him saying Dan Garrett's magic word was about (again this is great legacy hero writing :D ), that it had special programming that the Reach doesn't know about that can turn it on and off. And that's the explanation as to why Garrett was able to use it. And that's what Jaime's doing: waking it up. And then it'll wreak some havoc on the Reach ship! :D

I always find it funny tho that the bad guys dun seem to be able to do ONE WAY SCANS. It's always some scan that allows the good guys to reverse it. xD Like that scan on Superman's mind in the Third Kryptonian conclusion where Superman reads the other guy's mind instead XDDD That still makes NO SENSE.

Hmm... what else... :o

All the women in Jaime's life rock! :D That's why I'm hoping Brenda wakes up. OH OH, what happened to Jaime's hacker friends? They haven't shown up yet. HMMMM... mebbe they will? :D But La Dama is great, and Jaime's mom grabs a gun and fights along with Jaime's dad and Peacemaker! :D And Traci 13 is teh awesome with her magic bees!!! :DDD

No WiR here :D In fact, there's no cheap "dead father or best friend" substitute either, which is GREAT. I mean this is my whole problem with it, that there are characters created (or brought in in the case of family members) just to be offed to give the hero grief, and there's none of that. Everybody fights back! >:D

Besides, Jaime doesn't need cheap WiR gimmicks to develop his character of make his villains look villainous! :D That's just how good the book is :]

Plus, all the female chars look like regular girls and women, and aren't running around in clothing that doesn't suit the char just for male titillation! :D B/c as I said, Blue Beetle doesn't need and doesn't want those gimmicks to get fans :D And it's ttlly awesome and great b/c of it :D

I feel like I'm giving an eulogy to the book in a way, since next issue is the last one Rogers is doing. :(

Oh, I also like how Traci 13 is an established char and therefore not likely to be killed off in the future just to give BB angst or nething and that they have a relationship of equals and he's not lying to her or nething. In fact he's not lying to ANYBODY which is GREAT that he actually TRUSTS his family with his sekrit. And that usual Spider-Man bs about "if I tell you it puts you in danger?" thoroughly gets it's ass whupped here b/c a) they're gonna be in danger neways b) they can take care of themselves! :D

Oh! And they had faith that Jaime would be okay and Jaime had faith that they'd be okay. He focussed on escaping thinking to himself that his family was okay. :) I like how the chars all trust and have faith in each other like that. It's an incredible advantage for a hero to have to be able to trust that the ppl he cares about, even if they are targets, will not just be victims and can handle themselves while he focusses on the task at hand. :D

YAY BLUE BEETLE!!!!!!!!! :D

(that's actually what I shouted out to an empty cafeteria after I read this xDDD)

:D

This is prolly one of my favourite issues of the whole series. The whole battle royale involving all his friends and family (and supposed enemies) just made the whole book for me! :D

I can't wait for the final issue of the arc!!!! But at the same time I'll be sad cuz then Rogers will be gone. :(

THO

#26 is supposedly all in Spanish and I bet THAT will be neat! :D I hope it's done WELL. :]

Angelwings Rating: 5 great supporting casts out of 5 awesome Jaime Reyes :D
Recommendation: GET IT OR SUFFER THE WRATH OF AMI-DOOM!!!! >:OOO