Hell yeah, it is the return of FINAL ISSUE BLUES here under the Worst Collection Ever umbrella of media offerings. FINAL ISSUE BLUES is a segment were we talk about the last issue of a comic book series.

This time out, we will discuss the end of Marvel’s BLAZE [vol 1] (1994-1995) ending with issue #12 in July 1995.

Blaze — as in Johnny Blaze — is best known as (technically) the second Ghost Rider. He’s wrapping up his (to date) only solo series effort kicking it with the Punisher to fight off a north New Jersey vampire motorcycle club in a graveyard. Also, Wendigo shows up, an invisible man swings a mystical sword, there's some dork named Jesse Pinto hanging around and there is a bunch of fun stuff written on the tombstones.

Promo: CHECKERED PAST (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/checkered-past/id1350233450)

Continue the conversation with Shawn and Jen on Twitter / BlueSky / Threads via @angryheroshawn and @JenStansfield and email the show at [email protected]

Also, get hip to all of our episodes on YouTube in its own playlist! https://bit.ly/WorstCollectionEverYT

Download the podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and wherever you get your favorite shows. Please rate, review, subscribe and tell a friend! Please rate, review, subscribe and tell a friend!

The Punisher [vol 2] #19 (1989)

One of Frank’s drug busts goes sideways and he ends up in the Australian outback seeking vengeance for a slain woman that he JUST saved from choking. It’s complicated but Frank does get to eventually ride a camel and wear a fun hat so it’s not so bad.

Highlights include:

• Frank Castle uses the Village Voice to sell drugs
• the art of the “avalanche divorce”
• Eastman and Laird visit King’s Cross
• Gary Oldman runs an Australian tourist office
• brass-knuckled backhands
• Marvel tries to fantasy cast the PUNISHER movie and sort of gets it right
• a lot of Australian slang that we trample over

Also, a first-hand account of what it is like to buy $1300 worth of comic books in a single sale.

*** PROPER COMIC BOOK DISCUSSION STARTS AT 00:08:53 ***

Promo: INFINITE EARTHS: A GUIDE TO THE DC MULTIVERSE (https://brickcrisis.com/show/ieg/)

Continue the conversation with Shawn (@AngryHeroShawn) and Jen (@JenStansfield) on Twitter / Instagram / Facebook / Threads / Bluesky or email the show at [email protected] 

Also, get hip to all of our episodes on YouTube in its own playlist! https://bit.ly/WorstCollectionEverYT

Download the podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and wherever you get your favorite shows. Please rate, review, subscribe and tell a friend!

DC Comics Presents #25 (1980)

Our vacation in Stupid Town has reached its end as Superman teams up with the Phantom Stranger to rescue Pete Ross’s son from a future timeline. Somehow, this is all Superman’s fault (not wrong) and it has driven Pete Ross insane but most importantly, it has given Superman a stomach ache so it must be addressed at once!

And as a bonus, we get 10 pages of Hourman fighting off bio-hippies and flying garbage cans!

Highlights include:

• Superman’s O-face (not great)
• Phantom Stranger throws a punch
• Stop giving Pete Ross all those posters to rip up!
• The Hall of Failures
• Come see Superman’s fingernail clippings
• Hourman uses his head and probably gets a concussion 

Also, Shawn and Jen chat about some new comics including THE FURY OF FIRESTORM, WONDER MAN and GOTHAM CITY SIRENS!

*** PROPER COMIC BOOK DISCUSSION STARTS AT 00:11:35 ***

Promo: POP CULTURE BASEMENT (https://open.spotify.com/show/6v6QCWVQwlm9SIQ6OsrGbK)

Continue the conversation with Shawn (@AngryHeroShawn) and Jen (@JenStansfield) on Twitter / Instagram / Facebook / Threads / Bluesky or email the show at [email protected]

Also, get hip to all of our episodes on YouTube in its own playlist! https://bit.ly/WorstCollectionEverYT

Download the podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and wherever you get your favorite shows. Please rate, review, subscribe and tell a friend!

DC Comics Presents #24 (1980

Deadman wants to quit being Deadman but the higher powers decide he has business to tend to in Metropolis first such as stopping cardiac-induced earthquakes. Superman finds himself involved and has to burrow into the earth’s core to fix this mess. Also, the mafia!

Highlights include:

• BEEF~!
• Harley Race: earth scientst
• Superman enters the Kumite
• Deadman ruins Midsommar
• The end of PEARL but with Superman
• A special appearance by Abe Vigoda

Also, Shawn and Jen buy A LOT of comics at the All C’s Collectibles Spring Showcase and even a nice little portfolio book.

*** PROPER COMIC BOOK DISCUSSION STARTS AT 00:10:32 ***

Promo: POP CULTURE BASEMENT (https://open.spotify.com/show/6v6QCWVQwlm9SIQ6OsrGbK)

Continue the conversation with Shawn and Jen on Twitter / Instagram / Facebook / Threads / Bluesky or email the show at [email protected]

Also, get hip to all of our episodes on YouTube in its own playlist! https://bit.ly/WorstCollectionEverYT

Download the podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and wherever you get your favorite shows. Please rate, review, subscribe and tell a friend!

DC Comics Presents #23 (1980)

Superman contends with a suddenly appearing privateer vessel and it is most likely S.T.A.R. Labs’s fault. Thankfully Doctor Fate shows up to handle the mystic end of things, not because Superman can’t but because his wife Inza is cursed by this ship and turning into Swamp Thing. 

Highlights include:

• Superman and the Flash crop-dust Batman
• Doctor Fate’s salad fetish
• Inza’s bad day at the witch spa
• Visit "T.A.R." Labs for your cigarette needs
• Jimmy Olsen is saved by a giant forehead
• You should never go full Nabu

Also, Shawn and Jen talk about the new SUPERMAN/SPIDER-MAN and risqué events happening in THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD between Batman and Black Canary!

*** PROPER COMIC BOOK DISCUSSION STARTS AT 00:15:50 ***

Promo: POP CULTURE BASEMENT (https://open.spotify.com/show/6v6QCWVQwlm9SIQ6OsrGbK)

Continue the conversation with Shawn and Jen on Twitter / Instagram / Facebook / Threads / Bluesky or email the show at [email protected]

Also, get hip to all of our episodes on YouTube in its own playlist! https://bit.ly/WorstCollectionEverYT

Download the podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and wherever you get your favorite shows. Please rate, review, subscribe and tell a friend!

Daredevil #276 (1990)

Daredevil and the Inhumans are tasked with saving their cyborg ladyfriend from an emotionally conflicted Ultron so it is time to pull out ALL the stops!

Highlights include:

• Karnak channels the wisdom of the Three Stooges
• Daredevil might have been decapitated for a minute
• The end of Jet Li’s THE ONE but with Ultron heads
• Number Nine and her five o’clock shadow
• Why is no one confronting Skip Ash, the genetic terrorist?
• FATRON~! defends hot dog carts in peril

Also, Jen comments on the SIRENS: LOVE HURTS mini-series and Shawn finally reads the 1990 Marvel Annuals he’s been hoarding.

*** PROPER COMIC BOOK DISCUSSION STARTS AT 00:12:13 ***

Promo: MAGAZINES & MONSTERS (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/magazines-and-monsters/id1459643898)

Continue the conversation with Shawn and Jen on Twitter / Instagram / Facebook / Threads / Bluesky or email the show at [email protected]

Also, get hip to all of our episodes on YouTube in its own playlist! https://bit.ly/WorstCollectionEverYT

Download the podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and wherever you get your favorite shows. Please rate, review, subscribe and tell a friend!

Daredevil #275 (1989)

The Acts of Vengeance are upon us as Daredevil and the Inhumans encounter a lovelorn Ultron in the upstate New York wilderness!

Highlights include:

• Introducing FATRON~! aka Ultron 8
• Daredevil sits in a room full of skulls
• Doctor Doom won’t stop looking at me!
• Skip Ash…more like Skip Trash
• Ann Nocenti back when she was normal
• the Terrigen Mists will come for us all eventually

Also, Shawn makes DC Comics characters in WWE 2K26 and we share some thoughts on the forthcoming season of DAREDEVIL: BORN AGAIN

*** PROPER COMIC BOOK DISCUSSION STARTS AT 00:06:23 ***

Promo: MAGAZINES & MONSTERS (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/magazines-and-monsters/id1459643898)

Continue the conversation with Shawn and Jen on Twitter / Instagram / Facebook / Threads / Bluesky or email the show at [email protected]

Also, get hip to all of our episodes on YouTube in its own playlist! https://bit.ly/WorstCollectionEverYT

Download the podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and wherever you get your favorite shows. Please rate, review, subscribe and tell a friend!

Jen is out sick this week so let’s pilot something called LAST ISSUE BLUES…

Comic books ending their runs, whether on purpose or due to cancellation, interests me so let’s get a little deeper. And by deeper, I mean we will look at the last issue of a series, talk about the character, the run, go thru the final issue and its effectiveness as an ending and maybe hypothesize why it went away. This being a pilot and what not means we might be a bit clunky but hopefully the point will get across.

This time out, we will discuss the end of:

BLUE BEETLE [vol 6] (1986 to 1988)

Ted Kord’s having a bad day at the office, getting pushed out the company he helped save when his father fell off and, on top of that, a vengeful suit of armor has walked the floor of the Atlantic Ocean to come give him grief. Could be fun!

Promo: MOVING KRYPTONIAN IMAGES (https://podcasts.apple.com/eg/podcast/it-all-comes-back-to-superman/id1720158262)

Continue the conversation with Shawn and Jen on Twitter / BlueSky / Threads via @angryheroshawn and @JenStansfield and email the show at [email protected]

Also, get hip to all of our episodes on YouTube in its own playlist! https://bit.ly/WorstCollectionEverYT

Download the podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and wherever you get your favorite shows. Please rate, review, subscribe and tell a friend! Please rate, review, subscribe and tell a friend!

The Spectre [vol 2] #6 (1987)

Jim Corrigan is determined to find out who murdered him during Crisis even if he has to “fold into” the Spectre and possible feel up a demon along the way.

Highlights include:

• What exactly is a “good bar”?
• How they hanging?
• Phantom Stranger wants you to step inside his office
• the literal Midnight Meat Train
• The address of the devil
• Casting CHOPPING MALL with the DC Universe (we don’t get far)

Also, Shawn and Jen really want to see THE TOWERING INFERNO!

*** PROPER COMIC BOOK DISCUSSION STARTS AT 00:10:56 ***

Promo: PLAY COMICS (https://playcomics.com/)

Continue the conversation with Shawn and Jen on Twitter / Instagram / Facebook / Threads / Bluesky or email the show at [email protected]

Also, get hip to all of our episodes on YouTube in its own playlist! https://bit.ly/WorstCollectionEverYT

Download the podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and wherever you get your favorite shows. Please rate, review, subscribe and tell a friend!

The Spectre [vol 2] #5 (1987)

It is exactly what you think it is….

The Spectre returns as he is once again tethered to his human host Jim Corrigan. Of course, Jim was dead but Madame Xanadu put his corporeal body in a really big vase and kept him fresh, so he’s doing good now.

Highlights include:

• The Spectre is in a slump
• Batman’s Italian jean shorts designer
• An evil subway worker encounters a pirate
• The Spectre does clerical work
• Makeout sessions with red mist
• Domino’s pizza is soothing for child trauma

Also, Shawn and Jen sell comics and action figures at a collectibles show and it goes ok!

*** PROPER COMIC BOOK DISCUSSION STARTS AT 00:15:22 ***

Promo: PLAY COMICS (https://playcomics.com/)

Continue the conversation with Shawn and Jen on Twitter / Instagram / Facebook / Threads / Bluesky or email the show at [email protected]

Also, get hip to all of our episodes on YouTube in its own playlist! https://bit.ly/WorstCollectionEverYT

Download the podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and wherever you get your favorite shows. Please rate, review, subscribe and tell a friend!

Here we go with another edition of HAVE YOU HEARD ABOUT…?” a semi-recurring segment where we look at random characters that we encounter in the books we read. Lots of strange, unusual folks out here that you need to know about.

As we move on from Wonder Man and friends, let’s make a quick detour to chat out Marvel’s Spinner of Lies (and one-time Wonder Man tormentor) MEPHISTO! Chances are that if you are listening to this podcast, you have an idea of who Mephisto is. But…were you privy to the time he tried to marry Witchblade or that he once crashed Nighcrawler’s birthday party? We weren’t and therefore, it is worth mentioning.

Promo: OPAL CITY CONFIDENTIAL (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7dWav22KbKD2BLOe_O59tw)

Continue the conversation with Shawn and Jen on Twitter / BlueSky / Threads via @angryheroshawn and @JenStansfield and email the show at [email protected]

Also, get hip to all of our episodes on YouTube in its own playlist! https://bit.ly/WorstCollectionEverYT

Download the podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and wherever you get your favorite shows. Please rate, review, subscribe and tell a friend! Please rate, review, subscribe and tell a friend!