Every month the staff at Critical Blast combs the cosplay community for up-and-coming cosplayers who deserve to have a broader audience for their work, taking into account not only costuming skills and spirit, but also how they use that ability in service to others. Through this, we've not only met some talented cosplayers, but also some fine human beings.

With Thanksgiving just around the corner, it may be a struggle after this trying year we've all had to find things for which to be thankful. Social distancing and self-isolation are new, contributing factors impacting many as a cloying, smothering hopelessness. But there are lights in the darkness, and yes, we can find those lights among the cosplayers we encounter through our search for this monthly feature. So the time is not just ripe, but well past due, for us to introduce you one and all to our...

Of my forty-five plus years of reading comic books, my list of favorite characters has never really grown beyond two. The first to make my list was Batman. I've always told myself it was because he was just a normal guy who proved you could do anything with the proper training, mindset, and a billion dollars laying around, but truthfully it was because the television show kept me glued on my little four-year-old butt every time it came on.

The second was The Flash. The iconic yet simple costume, the thinking that went into the multiple applications of what was essentially a single super ability, and the Flash Facts that instilled a curiosity for science.

Robert Greenberger once again takes on the unenviable task of distilling eight decades of adventures into a concentrated list of 100 greatest memories, a task made even more daunting when taking into consideration the fact that there have been a handful of people to wear the mantle of the scarlet speedster.

Fifty years ago, Saturday mornings were the place for young kids to rock out with their favorite animated characters. And in 1970, Hanna-Barbera, a giant in the animation industry, brought to life a spinoff out of Archie Comics: JOSIE AND THE PUSSYCATS. The teen trio of Josie McCoy, Valerie Brown, and Melody Valentine would travel the world from gig to gig, accompanied by their road crew of Alan M (veteran voice actor Jerry Dexter) and twin troublemakers Alexander Cabot III (radio legend Casey Kasem) and his sister Alexandra Cabot (Sherry Alberoni of FAMILY AFFAIR, who would later go on to provide the voice of Wendy on SUPER FRIENDS).

There's a lot to unpack here, so get comfortable. You may want to order in, have a drink ready. Maybe even go pee first. But the tl'dr of this review is this: Cecil Castellucci sent Batgirl out on a self-centered, narcisisstic, self-aggrandizing, self-righteous, holier-than-thou, solipsistic whimper of a comic book that was less written than it was defecated.

So let's start with the first story of this terrible trio, "Little Wonders" with art from Emanuela Lupacchino with inks from Wade Von Grawbadger, Mick Gray, and Scott Hanna. As you can surmise, the art style is going to shift throughout this tale due to the amount of cooks in the kitchen. It shows as we go from scene to scene, following Barbara from the graveyard with her father, to the Batcave with the Bats, to the streets of Gotham that are in chaos.

Warning: This review will contain major spoilers for BATMAN: THREE JOKERS #3.

There's a part of me that wants to review BATMAN: THREE JOKERS based solely on the three issues of the series. That may sound odd to some, but you have to place the story in its original context: that it has been anticipated story for several years now, ever since writer Geoff Johns first dropped the hint when he was writing JUSTICE LEAGUE. But more on that in a little while.

The idea of utilizing toys, dolls and puppets as the antagonists in horror films is a risky endeavor for filmmakers. While it’s true that such figures oftentimes contain an inherent creepiness to them--who hasn’t been convinced the round, unblinking eyes of a doll have watched them from afar?--the absurdity in making a mere child’s bauble the vehicle for purest evil is frequently too great to overcome. From Chucky to Annabelle to Full Moon’s Puppetmaster series, every possible permutation of this (very) limited subgenre has seemingly been toyed with already to anemic effect, yet Hollywood still believes it can bleed another imaginative drop from the storytelling corpse.

This week's giveaway is a double bonus for whomever is selected at random as our winner.

Jefferson Pierce (Cress Williams) is the electrifying hero of Freeland in this CW series based on the DC Comics character BLACK LIGHTNING, created by Tony Isabella with Trevor Von Eeden. Together with his super-powered daughters, Black Lightning struggles to keep his city free of violence, both from low-level street gangs and high-level authoritarians.

Critical Blast now offers our readers the opportunity to win both Season 2 and Season 3 on Blu-ray with this special 2-for-1 promotional giveaway. Use the options on the form below to enter, and maximize your odds by taking all the options you want. Be sure you are familiar with Critical Blasts Rules and Regulations for these giveaways.

Lightning can strike twice.

Keres, Goddess of Death, hosts another GRIMM TALES OF TERROR anthology, just in time for Halloween. The horror anthology comic has long been a staple of the comic book industry -- playing a large role in what nearly killed it during the Wertham era, and then a regular go-to for twist-ending shorts from the likes of DC's HOUSE OF MYSTERY, Charlton's MIDNIGHT TALES, and PC's TWISTED TALES.

I can't recall the last time two seasons of an ongoing television show have been released back-to-back, but that's what Warner Brothers is doing with their CW superhero show, BLACK LIGHTNING, a series that began outside of the Arrowverse of their other DC Comics-inspired series that later became incorporated, loosely, through the "Crisis on Infinite Earths" crossover event -- an event that, while it didn't have an official crossover episode with BLACK LIGHTNING in the proper sense, still made its presence felt.

Ahhhh, sweet nostalgia. To yearn for those simple, bygone days of Camaros with cassette decks, high school science projects and hopeless crushes, of listening to Heart LP’s and praying a freshly-resurrected demonic entity doesn’t possess your best friend. Who could forget such blood-splattered innocence?

GREATLAND is the film that 2020 demanded be made.

Imagine the stated dream of every protester made manifest -- a phantasmagorical Utopia absent of genders and judgments, draped in candy-coated neon pastels, where everything is provided for free by "Mother." Where boys are married to trees, rabbits can be your children, and the Virus is the latest prevailing religion.

This is the dream of "The CHAD" made manifest, placed under the dome of THE TRUMAN SHOW and viewed through the 3D (non)binary lenses of BRAZIL and A CLOCKWORK ORANGE. It's an absolute amazeballs experience, simultaneously hysterically funny and frightening.

Check out the trailer below and prepare to be astonished. And remember: this is the dream!

Vaping has become common among many people, and this is because of the benefits it has over smoking. It is quite different from smoking cigarettes since it involves the inhaling of vapor instead of smoke. This also adds to the experience that vapers get. According to resourceful data, vapers could outnumber smokers in the coming years. Apart from more new entrants into vaping, many smokers are changing camp to get this new experience and reduce the health risks associated with smoking.

The consumable part of a vape device is the e-juice, which comes in many flavors and types. Some have a high ratio of propylene glycol to vegetable glycerin or vice versa. Today, there are healthy e-juices that are made of marijuana, hemp, and other natural herbs with medicinal purposes. All of these options leave users in a dilemma and it is sometimes hard to choose exactly what you want.

Tony and Lisa are two awkward teenagers, stumbling through life cluelessly, interacting with peers mired down in their own quirks of hypersexuality and impulsivity. Among all of them, Tony and Lisa are perfect for each other. They're shy, inexperienced, and ready to take that next step with each other.

There's just one problem: they're siblings. Not "Greg and Marsha Brady" siblings. Not half-siblings. Full on same set of parents siblings.

CALL ME BROTHER is a slice of AMERICAN PIE, baked up by MALLRATS and served by NAPOLEON DYNAMITE. It's distinctly independent, and not as prurient as the plot may lead you to believe. While the film is full of sex acts and innuendo, it's off panel or well blocked -- not a stitch of nudity, so if you're looking for that, keep it in your pants, perv.

Fugue (fyoog), n, a period of amnesia which the affected person seems to be conscious and make rational decisions, yet upon recovery remembers nothing of the period.

There is an easily identifiable link between the remote location of the Rock Street Films North production, Fugue, and the foggy isolation associated with memory loss. When Malcolm (Jack Foley) awakes in the mid-afternoon, dressed in his pajamas and unaware of his identity, the vast secluded countryside surrounding his house mirrors his own deserted mental state, and the calm opening scenes as he gropes for tiny familiarity amid everyday routines eases viewers into a world where no one is who they seem and time itself becomes a puzzle.

Blake has had enough, and is ready to call it quits. Not his relationship or his job -- Blake's ready to check out completely. Buy that farm, kick that bucket.

And it's not that he hasn't tried. He's tried. He's tried a lot. The problem is, he keeps getting back up, no matter method he employs to end his life. Nothing kills him -- even though it still hurts like hell. As the tagline says, "Suicide is the worst way to find out you're a superhero."

Anyone collecting comics in the 1990s will remember Youngblood as being one of the tentpoles of the Image Comics revolution, vaulting creator Rob Liefeld from stardom to super-stardom in the industry. With the entire philosophy of Image being one of creator ownership, it came as something of a surprise a few years ago when it was discovered Rob Liefeld no longer owned the team that had become so popular. That property, as well as another Liefeld property, Supreme, now belong to one Andrew Rev, a name once known in the comics industry for taken over the yoke of Comico and sending the comics publisher that had, once upon a time, rivalled Marvel in terms of units, into a nosedive.

Horror has always been a land of allegory. From the nervous awakenings of the sexual revolution in Rosemary’s Baby to the zombie-consumerist underpinnings of Dawn of the Dead and the politico-anarchism of The Purge, the darkest of all entertainment genres allows creators an outlet for societal commentary unmatched in other venues. Romantic comedies, after all, aren’t known for gazing deep into life’s abyss to see what stares back at them.

HBO's six-part series THE PLOT AGAINST AMERICA is an adaption of the Philip Roth novel of the same name, chronicling an alternate history of World War II in which Franklin Delano Roosevelt lost his third bid for the presidency to Republican candidate and aviation hero, Charles Lindbergh. In this reshuffling of events, the election of Lindbergh gave way to a populist upheaval in America, which led to a rise of antisemitism and fascism, particularly against Jewish citizens.

Sixteen year old Mary Shelley carries a 197-year-old burden. She's the great, great, great, great, GREAT granddaughter of the original Mary Shelley -- you know, the lady who invented the science fiction genre with her story about a doctor who revives the dead? Right, that Mary Shelley, and that book. And ever since that fateful publication, the Shelley lineage has been populated with authors, including modern Mary's grandmother (recipes) and her mother, Tawny, who writes a mega-successful mystery series about a crime-solving sleuth, also named Tawny.

Mary is the one next in line, with the expectations that she, also, will find her voice and take up the pen. But there's a problem with that.

She doesn't want to. In fact, she doesn't know what it is exactly that she wants to do, but she knows it isn't that.

Superhero movies are mostly seen as overly expensive special effects flicks that carry a fraction of artistic value. Nevertheless, even through their simplified narrative, superhero movies and tv shows point out the value of friendship, positive attitude, and persistence towards achieving a goal. All these messages are vital for college students because they can provide a guideline for overcoming the challenges of academic life.

We asked students for their opinion, and here is a list of 10 favorite superhero flix among college students.