The Awards Continue

No need for an introduction, let's get right back into it.

Best Villain of 2009:

Norman Osborn

Now I know that most people would've voted for Black Hand what with the whole resurrecting dead heroes of the DC Universe to form a legion of evil super-powered corpses to destroy planets and what not. But does he understand due process? Or the ins and outs of habeas corpus? Probably not, but Osborn does. Norman Osborn has had a busy year. He was in charge of the Thunderbolts and ended up becoming a national hero after landing a kill shot on the Skrull leader during 'Invasion', put Tony Stark out of a job and became the director of SHIELD and converted it into his own army known as HAMMER. He formed his own Dark Avengers by putting former villains into the roles and costumes of former Avengers like Hawk-Eye and Ms. Marvel, and also dubbed himself Iron Patriot. But it didn't stop there, he also tried to eliminate an entire race when he fought the X-Men and pretty much the entire mutant race, who now live on an island off the coast of San Francisco. And he did all this while secretly running an evil cabal with the most powerful sinister minds in the Marvel universe. The guy is everywhere and has his hands in ever little maniacal pie there is. The man can multi-task and for that he gets the award for best villain of 2009.

Please Hang Up The Shoes:

Howard Chaykin

Now I know that it is important to give credit where credit is due, and I do respect Howard Chaykin for the artwork he has done in the past, but it's time to call it quits. Most artists are like good scotch, they get better with age. Jim Lee, Rob Liefeld, Tim Sale. All artists who have progressed with their style and skill, but Chaykin has actually gone backwards. His characters all look the same, his layouts are sometimes impossible to follow, and his overall storytelling is just off. His art was literally the reason I stopped reading Wolverine. We thank you for everything you've done Howard but please, just hang up your comic shoes.

Biggest Letdown Of 2009:

It's a tie between ULTIMATUM and Final Crisis

ULTIMATUM and Final Crisis were supposed to be the huge cataclysmic events that shook the pillars of the comic world. But what readers got was extremely depressing and not at all what they were hoping for.

ULTIMATUM:

The Ultimate Universe in Marvel comics was introduced back when Y2K was still a threat to computer calendars. It's purpose was to re-boot the Marvel universe with updated and re-imagined versions of Marvel characters. So younger readers were able to see the origin of Spider-Man, or the formation of the original X-Men team, or what Nick Fury would look like if he was black. It started with the best of intentions, but when it got to the point that the stories were no longer fresh Marvel decided to press the reset button on the Ultimate universe. So what better way to do that than have a four issue long finale? Nothing really, but Jeph Loeb decided to show everyone he can be overly cruel and kill off a plethora of characters. Thirty-two to be exact! It seemed like an easy and cheap way to bring an end to the Ultimate universe and it left die-hard fans wanting more. Thanks Jeph for phoning it in.

Final Crisis:

I'm going to try and breeze through this as quick as possible because if I think about Final Crisis for too long I get a nose bleed. Every extreme comic nerd knows that the Grant Morrison isn't the real Grant Morrison. The real Grant Morrison is living 80 feet below ground in an abandoned missile silo paying an actor to go out into public and pretend to be him for conventions and book signings. That kind of lifestyle can cause anyone to go a little crazy-pants. That became clear during the 7 issue boring and confusing mess that was Final Crisis. I would like to tell you the exact specifics of Final Crisis, but for the life of me I don't fully understand what happened. It was a mish-mash of people being killed, people being brought back to life, Darkseid made a cameo, Batman was in 20 places at once, and Martian Manhunter got burned alive. Oh and Jason Todd is back. You know you dropped the ball when the Editor-in-Chief doesn't even know what the hell happened in the comic book you wrote.

Biggest Event in Comic Books of 2009:

The election of a comic book nerd as president!

Yeah, sure. He was technically elected President back in 2008. But he wasn't inaugurated until 09, and that's when the President started getting his name plastered across the covers of comic books. People lined up outside of major comic shops across the nation to get a copy of Obama's Spider-Man appearance, he made a shadowy cameo in Secret Warriors, received campaign support from The Savage Dragon (not sure if that really helped), and was saved from zombies by Ash, just to name a few.

Not only did Mr. President make comic book debuts but he also showed his geek side. During a push to have the Olympic games come to Chicago he invited the American fencing team to the White House. To demonstrate his sword skills Obama whipped out his own personal lightsaber.

So thank you Electoral College for electing Barrack Obama as our 44th president. Geeks really don't care about what kind of condition the country is in as long as the president is someone they can relate too, that's why Clinton was so successful with Frat guys and un-loyal husbands.

Well that's it for the Atomic Kid Cartoon Comic Book Awards of 2009. I gotta go out and buy a new word of the day calendar and some $12 champagne for when the ball drops tonight. Enjoy your hangovers.

If you need more of a comic fix help yourself to the Comics Alliance Best Single Issues of 2009.

Currently Listening To: Green Jacket -- Deerhunter