From the Back Issue Bin- Punisher: Going Out West

Recently, while I was at Emerald City Comic Con, I was able to talk to one of my favorite comic-book writers, Matt Fraction. I was happy that he autographed a few of my Punisher War Journal books that he penned back in 2007. These particular books were special to me because they were part of a storyline called, "Goin' Out West." I enjoyed this storyline a lot because it was a very political story that dealt with the issue of immigration.

The villain here was the Hate-Monger, who was leading a group of high technology-powered Nazis that were killing immigrants, (or would-be immigrants), near the U.S./Mexico border in the Sonoran desert. This was very important because, around the same time, there was a lot of controversy at the Arizona border due to "The Minutemen," armed militia groups who had taken it upon themselves to "patrol" the U.S./Mexico border.

In the story, instead of Minutemen, they are Nazis, which is essentially what they are, and exactly why I like the story so much--because they truly are villains! (Not heroes, or patriots, or whatever someone else might come up with to dress it up).

Frank Castle, the Punisher, does not like what these Nazis are doing. And although he usually spends his time taking out mob bosses or super-villains, he decides to infiltrate them so to best kill them. Although most of the story is about how Frank goes about infiltrating the Nazi camp and the repercussions of that, the beginning of the story does shed some light on some of the reasons why people go come to the U.S. from Mexico. In one whole page, Staurt, (a sort of sidekick to Frank), reads him some information, including this passage:

"Maquilas or maquiladoras, depending on your grasp of Spanish, exist throughout Mexico and Latin America in these--these special zones. No tariffs or taxes. They bring raw goods in and ship finished crap out. They're...dictatorial sweatshops, basically. NAFTA-sanctioned sweatshops."

I like this story so much that I even went ahead and bought a hardcover collected trade and recommend the same to anybody who is looking for a good story. As long as you don't mind a little violence.

Race & Class in Comics: The New Spider-Man

**SPOILER ALERT**

In a previous blog post I talked about a new Spider-Man that was introduced by Marvel Comics last month, and all the outrage it caused among right-wingers because he was a bi-racial teen named Miles Morales. (By the way, he's a Spider-Man set in the Ultimate Universe, which is different from the regular Marvel Comics universe, and where a white Peter Parker still continues to be the regular mainstream Spider-Man).

Well, this month saw the debut of the all new Ultimate Comics Spider-Man #1 where we learn how Miles got his Spider-like powers! It is a very interesting story so far, which is being written by Brian Michael Bendis, (Marvel's top scribe).

More interesting to learn, however, is Miles background. It doesn't seem like he's from a better-off neighborhood. In fact, we learn that the school in their neighborhood is so bad that his parents have added his name for a lottery to get into a charter school, the Brooklyn Visions Academy. Unfortunately, there's only about 40 spots and 700 from his neighborhood have applied.

There is one very touching scene where his parents have all but given up hope, but then the last name--his name--is called and they jump for joy. But Miles sees all the distraught faces on some of the kids who didn't get picked and he does not feel the same joy. "It shouldn't--all these other kids. Should it be like this?" he asks.

This was a very good first issue. We met most of the central characters and found out his origin. I think it's going to be real fun reading this book. Not only watching Miles learn how to be a hero, but also seeing the struggles that any inner-city youth might have growing up. Highly recommended!

Fear of a Black Spider-Man

**SPOILER ALERT**

The comic-book world was a buzz this morning, as it was revealed that the new Spider-Man in the Marvel Comics Ultimate Universe, (not the main universe), would be a half-black, half-Hispanic teen named Miles Morales.

For those of you non-geeks, the Ultimate Universe line of comic-books from Marvel comics was launched in 2000 and featured re-imagined and updated versions of super-heroes from the regular Marvel Universe. This was done, mostly, to attract new readers who did not have to worry about knowing any of the back-story of the original characters--who after being around for many decades do have a lot of back-story!

The Ultimate Universe is constantly making big changes, like killing-off characters. Most recently, they just killed their Ultimate version of Peter Parker, so a new person had to step into the role of Spider-Man. Today, USA Today revealed that in Ultimate Fallout Issue #4, (which will be in stores tomorrow), will make his first appearance as he prepares to take over the gig.

Many fans are excited about the news; This includes, Black actor Donald Glover, who a year ago had started a campaign to get the role of Spider-Man for the upcoming movie reboot. Thru Twitter, he sent one of the writers, Brian Michael Bendis, a message saying, "just wanted to say "wow" and thank you for doing something really cool and interesting! You're tops."

Of course, this news also brings many detractors, some of which are outright racists and others who try to hide their racism with lame comments like, "You cannot reinvent characters." If you look thru the comments in the USA Today article you will see a lot of racist remarks. I won't reprint any here, you can go see them for yourself if you really want; or you can go pick up the book tomorrow and see what the hoopla is all about.

I think comic-book writer, Ron Marz, said it best today (on his Twitter account): "If Black/Latino Spidey, written by a Jewish man and drawn by a woman, is making racist heads explode, I'm totally cool with that."