A.V. Club's website released an 'exclusive' preview of the Rebirth edition of TRINITY and to put it simply: Rebirth Batman appears to be a giant, arrogant douchebag with no regard for subtlety.

Francis Manapul is flying solo on this title as writer, artist and colorist. Makes me wonder if he's doing it all from the comfort of his Bat-bed while wearing Bat-pajamas complete with cape and cowl. The setting is the Kent farm, with Lois Lane providing narration while Wonder Woman arrives discreetly in her invisible jet. Landing carefully, before emerging with a dead boar around her neck, Diana calls out to Batman looking for re-assurance that he's on his way.

Alters #1

Written by: Paul Jenkins
Art by: Leila Leiz
Colored by: Tamra Bonvillain
Lettered by: Ryane Hill

Published by: Aftershock
Cover Price:  $3.99

Welcome back to Critical Blast’s weekly look at what new comics you should check out each week.   Just a warning, I make these picks pretty much a week BEFORE I actually get to read any of these comics, so if something is a stinker, I take no blame on that.  Let's get to it!

Comics shipping this week

Even though this book is called The Scourge, it is anything but. For fans of Jennifer Nielsen’s The False Prince, they will find a similar love in Ani and Weevil the stars of her latest dystopian middle grade novel. And if you haven’t checked out The False Prince, I highly recommend it alongside The Scourge.

The Scourge follows the story of Ani Mells, a bit of a troublemaker, who finds herself captured by the governor’s wardens. When her best friend Weevil tries to rescue her, the wardens arrest him as well. In prison, the governor has Ani tested for the scourge, a deadly plague that is ravaging her country. When her tests surprisingly (or not) come back positive, she is sent to a colony where scourge victims live out their remaining days before death. Weevil manages to weasel himself onto the boat to the colony alongside his friend despite remaining untested from the scourge.

The Head and the Heart, an indie folk band from the Seattle area, has been unfairly grouped with the singalong bands The Lumineers and Of Monsters and Men. While all leaped into the opening created by Mumford & Sons, what differentiates the band from their banjo-blending peers are excellent songs. The group is composed of songwriters Jonathan Russell and Josiah Johnson along with pianist Kenny Hensley, bassist Chris Zasche, violinist (and sometimes fan favorite vocalist) Charity Rose Thielen, and drummer Tyler Williams. Their debut was self-released in 2010 and later picked up by Sub Pop. The album was a breath of fresh air, with 11 terrific songs that didn’t rely on the banjo inflection (or bro-fans). While not breaking any new ground, their 2nd album, Let’s Be Still, released 2 years later in 2012, continued their journey to open hearts and ears with acoustic guitars, pianos and heartfelt songs.

The 2016 - 2017 Broadway Series at the Fabulous Fox Theatre in St. Louis got underway with the national tour of the Tony Award-winning A GENTLEMAN'S GUIDE TO LOVE & MURDER. The story comes from a novel written by Roy Horniman way back in 1907 called ISRAEL RANK: THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A CRIMINAL. That tales was the basis of film called KIND HEARTS AND CORONETS starring Sir Alec Guinness. The production clearly has a classic pedigree, and yet, I didn't like the Robert L. Freedman and Steven Lutvak, production, directed by Darko Tresnjak, as much as I'd expected to. Maybe my expectations were too high. Maybe I'm getting harder to please in my old age. Maybe you'll absolutely love it and I'm completely fine with that!

A year after the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles took down their nemesis, Shredder (Brian Tee), and sent him to prison, they are still living under the radar in the sewers, sneaking into basketball games and enjoying pizza. It's not a perfect existence, but more or less they are happy. However, their friend April (Megan Fox) learns that scientist Baxter Stockton (Tyler Perry) is somehow planning to help Shredder break out during a prisoner transfer. Despite Donatello (Jeremy Howard), Leonardo (Pete Ploszek), Michaelangelo (Noel Fisher), and Raphael (Alan Ritchson) racing to stop this, Shredder manages to escape with the help of Stockton's teleportation device. When the Turtles realize Shredder's plans to open a portal and ensure his rising power, they race to stop him.

Raimy Sullivan (Peyton List) is a police officer celebrating her 28th birthday. But for the past 20 years she's lived under a cloud. Her father, Frank Sullivan (Riley Smith), also a policeman, was killed days after her 8th birthday. The story was that he was so deep undercover that he forgot what side he fought for.

When a lightning storm reactivates her father's ham radio (you have to love lightning; that's two series now on CW that rely on it as a kick starter), Raimy finds herself talking to someone who claims to be Frank Sullivan. As the two converse the next few nights, it becomes undeniable to either of them that they are indeed conversing across the space of twenty years. And with that, you have the new CW series, FREQUENCY.

Video rental stores are nothing new, and as we have seen over the years they have all been dying out one by one due to the market and the sudden boom in video streaming apps we use today such as Hulu, Netflix, Amazon Prime and more. But there was always that small store that stood around longer than the others and wasn't afraid to try something new and exciting.

Now, it's now it's no shock knowing this was eventually bound to happen, and I believe those of us who were fortunate enough to have had a local Hastings near us knew it was coming but hoped the day never did because we'd grown to love this store and all the entertaining content it provided for us. Hastings started off as a video and game rental company. As I child I spent many of my days in Hastings looking over the latest games that had arrived on the shelf, or to check back and see if anyone had returned a game I had been waiting to rent.

The city of Townsville! I must admit it has been some time sense I've last stepped foot in good Ole Townsville but if there is one thing I've remembered that still hasn't changed, it is that there is always trouble lurking in the dark parts of this peaceful city and the good old citizens of Townsville are always in the need of someone to save them. Danger is always on the rise and is as annoying as it can be, dealing with Jack Kirby influenced monsters, snotty little rich brats, a monkey bent on subjugating the world to him, and the evil Gender Bender or whatever he is.

WrestlePro Sept 10 Results

• Triple Threat: Craven Varro def Sonjay Dutt and Delroy Alexander

• Chris Avery Queling def. Dave D-Struction

• Taboo Crew and Fallah Bahh def The Heavenly Bodies

• WrestlePro Title: Bobby Wayward def Anthony Bowens (interference by Chris Avery Queling)

Welcome back to Critical Blast’s weekly look at what new comics you should check out each week.   Just a warning, I make these picks pretty much a week BEFORE I actually get to read any of these comics, so if something is a stinker, I take no blame on that.  Let's get to it!

Comics shipping this week

When Motown 25: Yesterday · Today · Forever aired on NBC on May 16, 1983, it was an immediate sensation and became one of the most talked about concerts and TV specials ever.  In an era before social media, MOTOWN 25 was a true water-cooler event, marking the first time that music fans saw Michael Jackson do the moonwalk (aka: the six seconds that changed the world), in addition to many other buzzworthy moments -- reunions by the Miracles and the Supremes; the first battle of the bands between The Temptations and Four Tops; and the hottest comedian in the world at the time, Richard Pryor, as host.

I have a roommate named Lex. He generally keeps to himself but he can be a little demanding at times. For the most part, we get along pretty well. I like all kinds of music, but he generally prefers hip-hop, from Outkast to Beastie Boys, Ludacris to Method Man, Killer Mike to Snoop Dogg. His number one jam is “Boyz in the Hood” by Eazy-E, but he’s happy with anything from the N.W.A. He loves football, he watches WWE wrestling so much he often refers to himself in the third person like Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson would in his colorful promos. His favorite curse word is the same as Samuel L. Jackson’s, and if you’ve seen any Samuel L. Jackson movies you can probably guess that it’s four syllables long and printed on his wallet. Lex is pretty mellow but he does not like being called a chicken—he’ll get right in your face instantly, ready to throw down. He has a bit of a lisp, like Iron Mike Tyson, but the ladies think it’s cute.

When I volunteered to review THE CONJURING 2 on Blu-ray, I went into it without having seen the film to which this is titularly a sequel. As it turns out, that's quite okay, because in a broader sense it's not only a stand-apart film, but it's also the latest in a long sequence of stories, from different directors and production companies, stringing back to THE AMITYVILLE HORROR. That's because the protagonists of this film are Ed and Lorraine Warren (portrayed as they were in THE CONJURING by PATRICK WILSON and VERA FARMIGA), the same investigators who were called in to investigate the house in Amityville, New York in the 1970s.

I got the chance to see the Harry Potter Concert Series live at Powell Hall last Friday, and it was a fantastic experience! 

One of the best parts of the Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone movie is the iconic score composed by the incomparable John Williams. I remember first seeing the film when it came out and getting chills during "Hedwig's Theme." For such a popular franchise with such great characters, intense action, and magic, I'm so happy John Williams was able to lend his immeasurable talent to the score. 

But the only thing better than seeing the movie in theaters is seeing it on an equally big screen while the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra plays the score live below. The movie Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone plays on a massive screen, but with the music removed - the soundtrack is instead played live by the orchestra.

Justin Freer is performing stage magic. No, he's not pulling rabbits from his hat or sawing women into two pieces. It's much more enchanting than that.

Freer is a conductor and producer of film music, as well as the founder and president of CineConcerts, a company dedicated to the preservation and concert presentation of film, TV and media performances live with film. His current project, HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER'S STONE, is currently playing at the St. Louis Symphony as part of a mind-blowing concept that blends film with live music.

Tell our readers what sets what you're doing apart from your standard afternoon at the symphony.

It seems that Republican Don Kasich was in a bookstore in New Hampshire recently, campaigning for Chris Sununu. Apparently Sununu must be running against Daniel Radcliffe -- odd, since Radcliffe is (a) British and (b) too young to hold office -- because Kasich took the opportunity to seemingly campaign against the actor based on his (rather old) declaration of atheism.

The statement came seemingly from nowhere (or did a library patron whisper a hushed Confundo?), and led into a post hoc ergo propter hoc argument that it might be behind Radcliffe "not taking off" in the movie industry -- you know, after 8 megablockbusters. See the video below and experience the discomfort of the patrons around him as he babbled.

In KANGAROO KISSES, an adorable new picture book written by Nandana Dev Sen and illustrated by Pippa Curnick, a mother struggles to get her daughter ready for bed - when all the little girl wants to do is daydream about her favorite animals. 

Told in a familiar whimsical rhyming style that was always my favorite as a child, Kangaroo Kisses is a short and fun tale perfect for bedtime.

"It's late, darling, hush! 
Let's find your toothbrush. 

Not yet! 

Elephant must floss, 
To make his tusk gloss."

Curnick brings colorful and friendly animals to life on the page, from bears to giraffes to geese to kangaroos, and the illustrations are beautiful. Sometimes I find picture books to be too verbose - especially for sleepy children at bedtime - but this one manages a great balance of minimal words and full-page illustrations. 

I highly recommend this one! Super cute, and definitely an author/illustrator duo to watch. 

CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR was, as we put in our review, Marvel’s biggest blockbuster yet. But even with the bulk of the MCU’s character arsenal all on one screen again, Tom Holland stole the show as the new Peter Parker/Spider-Man. Holland had a great deal of fun with limited screen time, and the result is that rather than feeling fatigued with a third iteration of this character, fans are excited to see more.