Aquaman #38: Decent Calafiore art, okay PAD story. Mildly recommended. $1.75/$2.50Cn

"Vulkomaniac" Award to Aquaman #38

Aquaman "Open For Business": There's three crisscrossing plotlines in this issue. 1) Rhombus, an old foe of Tsunami's (and for a moment I thought it would be Eclipso) is back to be psychotic some more. 2) Poseidonis is open for tourists, with most of the gags that implies (I bet Leah wants one of those Tempest dolls from the cover art). 3) The ongoing soap opera surrounding Arthur's interpersonal relationships. Vulko's resentment comes to a head. Dolphin tries to dump Arthur gently (a little late for that, really). Deep Blue, well, she's being baffling at the moment, and is interrupted by Rhombus before she can clarify her motives.

Rhombus, while a bit dippy in visual design and name, is at least interesting in that he's going to dredge up all sorts of backstory in his wake. This is because he thinks he's Deep Blue's father, something Deep Blue denies, and in the process more of her past is going to come up. Unfortunately, he's also a casual killer, killing people practically on a whim, and hence is probably not going to be terribly interesting on his own (face it, psychotic murderers tend to have limited depth in fiction).

Now, if you've read enough of my reviews, you'll know I often take PAD to task for pushing too hard to make a gag work. But one gag, I think, actually did work well this issue, and that's the crab. From the dippy adman talking to it like it's an advisor to the sightgag of the crab on Deep Blue's head, the crab was one of the more amusing things in the book. Maybe it can crossover with the Goat.