Confessions of a Comic Book Guy is a weekly column by Steve Bennett of Super-Fly Comics and Games in Yellow Springs, Ohio.  This week, Bennett covers April Fools, John Carter, race in Archie, a New 52 story, and Airboy.

Maybe because it fell on a Sunday and I was away from my computer all day but I seem to have missed out on most of this year's crop of April Fools phony news stories.  But I'll happily confess I completely fell for one of them.  IDW Pubslihing's press release concerning Mars Attacks: 21st Century Slaughter, the supposed upcoming Broadway musical based on the infamous collector card franchise.  And I don't feel the least bit gullible about it either, seeing as how it was released on March 28th.  I've only been a victim of April Fools jokes and having never played any myself maybe I don't know all of -the rules, but isn't that kind of cheating?  But I've got to admit I was convinced mostly because in a world where life has begun imitating headlines from The Onion it's become increasingly more difficult to come up with anything, which isn't just stupid and/or crazy enough to be true.  Especially when it comes to the entertainment industry.

It's something that hit while going through the last couple of issues of Entertainment Weekly all of which cover featured genre movies and TV shows such as The Walking Dead, Game of Thrones and The Hunger Games, plus Shades of Gray, a book that began life as Twilight fan fiction, is apparently the hottest novel in American and is being fast tracked as a movie.  If that doesn't sound like a phony April Fool's day story I don't know what does.

While we're on the subject of EW, in the March 23rd issue along with featuring four Games of Thrones collectors covers (I think it's long past time the direct sales market apologized for its part in helping to propagate that particular marketing trick) there was a piece titled "John Carter and the Top 10 Bombs."  In case you missed it the film is now part of the hierarchy of Hollywood's biggest financial disappointments, standing right alongside Town and Country and Ishtar.  But not only that, it's become the punch-line of a lot of late night comedians’ jokes; here's one I recently heard on Conan: "What do you call a fanatic fan of John Carter?  That guy."

Once a narrative is planted into people's minds it’s notoriously difficult to shift it, even in the face of, you know, facts.  Forbes magazine continues its support of the movie with a piece by Carol Pinchefsky dated April 2nd titled "John Carter's Trip to Mars Finally Earns Its Budget" which reported thanks to overseas box office it's already made its money back.  It's proven especially popular in China where it's been the #1 film two weeks in a row; pundits are ascribing this to the nation's love of big, American movie blockbusters.  But I'd prefer thinking that an epic featuring warring nations, a reluctant hero, beautiful princess and lots and lots of swordplay might seem familiar to Chinese audiences.

As you’ll recall the miscegenation barrier got broken in the Archie Universe back in Archie #608 with a kiss between Archie and Valerie from Josie and the Pussycats (see "Confessions of a Comic Book Guy--Diversity Delayed").  Since the world didn't end we have Archie #631 which sets up yet another alternative imaginary timeline, one in which Archie marries Val and they have a daughter.  And if that's not enough to make racists go full-tilt insane #631 also features Betty Cooper, America's Sweetheart, repeatedly and willfully kissing Val's brother Trev.

In case you weren't following the DC New 52 relaunch of Batman: The Legend of Dark Knight the initial storyline was a multi-issue epic and with the final issue (#7), Batman very narrowly defeated Bane.  And in the end Gotham City's sworn protector can't be bothered to make an effort and actually capture the man who's caused untold amounts of death and destruction in it.  Even if you don’t ascribe to my hopelessly outdated idea that villains in superhero comics should be punished, allowing the bad guy to float away peacefully while standing around and essentially saying, "Eh, we'll get him next time" is a damn poor way to end a story.

As you can imagine, given my deep and abiding love for Golden Age comics, I've been looking forward to Antarctic Press' Airboy: Deadeye #1 and I'm happy to report I wasn't disappointed by it.  It's a miniseries that teams writer Chuck Dixon, the man who helped revive the character for the publisher Eclipse back in the 1980s, with Ben Dunn.  He's not someone you'd normally associate with doing Golden Age material.  though it makes more sense once you know that this 1940's period piece deals with post-war conditions in Japan.  If you haven't thought about getting this one for your store, maybe you should.

The opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the writer, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial staff of ICv2.com.