Maybe it's allergies and not a cold at all. All I know is, between it and all the Walgreen's Rest Easy Nighttime Cough syrup(compare to the active ingredients in Vicks Nyquil Cough) I've been consuming, I'm simultaneously most of the Seven Dwarfs at once: Grumpy, Sneezy, Sleepy, Doc and Dopey (good Christ, do I feel Dopey!) plus a few others left out of the original--Lazy, Coughy, Whiney and Rarely Ambulatory. Any words of condolence you wish to proffer to my wife will be duly forwarded.

On the other hand: comic books! They're a pip, ain't they?

52 WEEK #12: I mean, check out 52. I dug this issue quite a lot, although part of that is undoubtedly me being smack-dab in the middle of that "Wow, that JoAnna Cameron was sexy" demographic they're courting with the debut of Isis, and part of it is being able to close the book without the taste of "Jurgenized" continuity in my mouth. But I'd also submit the longer scenes of the last few issues help stave off the sense of the book running in place, and some of the threads are finally coming together. As long as I can pretend that's not really Captain Marvel and not really Ralph Dibny but shabby impersonators, then I can think of this as a solidly Good issue.

ACTION COMICS #841: I also liked this as well, as Busiek has a solid handle on how to keep a Superman story interesting (keep it very, very busy) and the art was solid. There's a few things I could gripe about, but that's probably the cough syrup talking and if they're still bothering me next issue, maybe I'll mention 'em. Good.

AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #534: From what I can tell, JMS is running through a snug gauntlet of continuity (this issue crosses into his FF issue, and parts of it seems to take place between the pages of Civil War #3) and he does a solid little job with it--as I think I've said before, Straczynski seems to have a better handle on how to make the Civil War resonant than Millar does--even though it's really tough to buy that Spider-Man, one of the few Marvel heroes to be genuinely hunted by the authorities, would actually help perpetuate the burden under which he suffered. It kinda works as long as it's kept very rhetorical questionish--"if I'm doing good, why do I feel so bad about it?"--but once Spidey (or the audience) thinks about it for more than fifteen seconds (as he should have by now), things should be changing a lot more quickly than they are (or, presumably, will be). In short, I can feel the plot dampers in place, keeping anything from happening until the story outlines say it should, and that's kind of a drag. OK, though.

ANNIHILATION NOVA #4: One of the books I didn't review last week that I'm throwing in this week, because, you know, how could I have collected comics for over thirty years without becoming strangely compulsive in weird, hard-to-explain ways? Overall, this wrap-up did what it was supposed to do (with the added bonus of making me like Quasar before, of course, killing him off): Annihilus seems like a bad-ass; the Nova/Drax apprenticeship makes sense; and the mini wrapped up without seeming like too much of a blind money-grab. It was pretty OK, and left my chops at least mildly whetted for the Annhilation event.

ANNIHILATION RONAN #4: This ended up my favorite of the four minis and most successful overall, even though the art took an unexpected dive in the last issue because the artist was rushed, or decided to ink with thick sharpies, or something went awry in the repro process and fucked up the fine linework I'd been grooving on. It kinda sorta tied into the Annihilation happenings by having the wave arrive and fuck up everyone's Christmas (apologies to MC Chris for the incorrect use of the term). Also, the Marvel Universe isn't complete without at least one of all-powerful dude with a cosmic stick stuck up his ass, and the creative team made a fine case why Ronan The Accuser is the right man for that job. Good, even though, man, that art was just so tasty in the first three issue and just so very meh in the finale. I cry a little. I really do.

AQUAMAN SWORD OF ATLANTIS #43: Pretty Good, despite being unable to truly please anyone. Hibbs doesn't like it that it's too focused on Atlantis and he doesn't care about Atlantis. I don't like it that it's still too rooted in the DCU, and every other goddamned book is set in the DCU and I want an underwater Conan book dammit. Poor Aquaman: is Itunes the only place he can ever truly win?

ASTRO CITY SAMARITAN SPECIAL: Even though Hibbs probably won't write reviews this week (he has me in some sort of horrific Catch-22/quantum conundrum where if I post, he insists that he doesn't have to, even if all I'm is writing a plea for him to please just put aside some motherfucking time and motherfucking post), I won't cockblock his review and tell you all the cool things he thought about this issue. Instead, I'll just say this was a Very Good Astro-City story, which really doesn't require the reading of any previous issue (except maybe the very first) and posits an interesting twist on the "mad genius" archetype that a "Superman" archetype such as Samaritan might end up with. It reminded me of those later issues of Moore's Miracleman where the writer convincingly portrays the mindset of a vast and timeless intelligence. I liked it.

BATMAN #655: Kinda shocked I didn't love this. The truly deranged opening was a nifty piss-take on the current grimmer-than-grim take on Batman, but rather than it being framed as a dream sequence or a story-within-a-story, Morrison puts forward the idea that Batman and the authorities threw a gunshot Joker in a dumpster and then just drove off. Hmmmmm.... If you can get around that little bit of mission statement asserting itself as continuity (and, to be honest, I couldn't), the rest of the issue is pretty good, with Kubert being a surprisingly strong bridge between the Jim Lee Batman and a more retro (think Adams & Aparo) Batman, and all the story pieces being set into place with wit and charm. With severe reservations, I'll say this was Good, if only because I'm really looking forward to next issue's nine million Man-Bat ninjas.

BIRDS OF PREY #96: As ever with Birds of Prey, I truly love all the character stuff and can barely remember the action stuff. It took me five minutes to remember that the Birds had gotten tricked into fighting Black Alice and, honestly, I still can't remember how the issue ends--at all. (Although, you know, let's be fair and blame all the cough syrup.) (Oh, hey, wait. I remembered the ending! I guess we should blame the cough syrup.) This book is highly OK and Gail is clearly actively working to kick things up a notch and hold the reader's attention span, but in this reader's case, it's still not working. Wish I could say why.

BLACK PANTHER #18: I could spend 3,000 words on this issue and barely begin to touch on why it creeped me out but let me try to concisely summarize, at the risk of being misconstrued and mischaracterized: Say what you will about Chris Claremont, but for many years (before the psychic-rape fixation really kicked in) he made a African (and American) woman a popular figure in a genre that didn't exactly boast a surplus of such characters (or a surplus of such readers, for that matter) and she commanded, for quite a while, a lot of dignity and respect. And say what you will about Reginald Hudlin, but in making Storm a perfect mate for the Black Panther--she's now a princess, she now has family, she now has a love of her life for which she's always pined--he's stripped the character of anything recognizable apart from superpowers and physical appearance. Feminists looking for examples of the whole "marriage as slavery" argument will find a lot of interesting metatext in this issue as, despite Storm being a popular character in the most popular comic book of the last thirty years and the Panther being a cool character who can barely keep a book for the last six, the achievements bandied about by the BET presenters (and what a creepily self-serving plug that is, coming from the President of Entertainment for BET) are nearly all the Panther's, and all of the famous friends--"Reed and Sue Richards, Captain America, Iron Man"--are the Panther's, as well as it being the Panther's rules by which they marry, the Panther's country, the Panther's god which Ororo must appease, etc., etc., etc. In short, the book is creepy, cynical, self-serving, patriarchal and--seeing at it forgets that Ororo already received the approval of the Panther God in that recent X-Men Annual that ties into this story--sloppy. No, sir, I didn't like it. It was Crap.

BLUE BEETLE #5: The guest artist threw this issue off its game--that heavily symbolic showdown at the U.S. border looked more like a slugout in the parking lot of a Petco--but not by much: I'm still enjoying the charm of the writing and the design of the title character. It's a Good book. I hope you're reading it.

CAPTAIN AMERICA #20: The first of two stellar Brubaker books this week. I've groused (Christ knows, I've groused) about Bucky, pacing and what-have-you on this book, but this issue really pulled it all together. Dynamically paced, this was an effortlessly enjoyable read where you could feel every bit of careful character definition start to pay off. Throw in the return of an old-school character that looked enitrely creepy and menacing and you've got yourself one Very Good issue of Captain America.

CASANOVA #2: Last issue, I compared Fraction to Tarantino. This issue, I'm comparing him to Dave Eggers, not least because his afternotes seem, like Egger's preface to A Staggering Work of Heartbreaking Genius, the work of a clever and witty second-guessing control freak deathly afraid of being seen as a second-guessing control freak. Don't get me wrong, it's a very fun issue, and solidly Good work, but I hope the emphasis in the notes of later issues try a little less to jujitsu me into complying with authorial intent.

CASTLE WAITING VOL II #1: Wait, but... is this all-new, or the stuff that Medley left out of the trade but with some new? I'm deeply confused and so held off on reading it although it looks really stellar. I should just cave in and buy it and the hardcover, despite all my original issues languishing somewhere in my storage space.

CIVIL WAR FRONT LINE #4: Looking back through issue #3, I realized I was kind of harsh--I liked the main story and the Speedball story, but the other two pieces really annoyed me. Here, the annoyance is even greater--Paul Jenkins adapts a Billy Joel song about Vietnam into the most cringe-worthy back-up yet--but I liked main story and the Speedball story, aided considerably by Steve Lieber's art, was really good. So I don't know: Ehful? CrEhp? It's been a while since a title's needed the Comic Book Centrifuge to separate out the good and the horrid.

DAREDEVIL #87: The second half of Brubaker's stellar week: this storyline was incredibly well-handled from start to finish, just a stellar transition from Bendis and Maleev to Brubaker and Lark. My only complaint is one of Brubaker's cool little twists got spoiled (Although I really have no one to blame but myself. Well, and Marvel. And the Internet. Come to think of it, those are usually my top three suspects for everything's that wrong with my life...) I'm really excited to see where this book goes next and hope Brubaker can continue to hold on to this high level of quality as his workload increases. Very Good stuff.

ETERNALS #2: Far less inept than issue #1, which is a solid relief. Kind of taking its time, though, which seems to miss a very important component of Kirby's work right there. Hopefully, it'll continue to pick up the pace. OK.

GUMBY #1: If I'd done reviews last week, this probably would've been Pick of the Week--it's funny and charming and kind of melancholy and odd. If they can get Steve Purcell to do an issue as well, I'll be in cutesy clay-kid heaven. Very Good.

JACK OF FABLES #1: You know those shows you've watched maybe one episode of, and every time it comes on TV, it's the same god-damned episode? For some reason, every time I try to pick up a Fables title, I get an issue with naked Goldilocks in it. I have no idea what this says about me, but it's not a good sign since I never pick up another issue. Nonetheless, this seemed OK enough that I'll check out next issue. If anyone has any clues as to my Freudian naked-Goldilocks block, feel free to email me.

NIGHTWING #122: So. Nightwing and what's-her-name defeat one guy by talking about how inadequate he is in bed, and Jason Todd defeats the other guy by ingesting him and regurgitating him. I'm gonna go out on a limb here and guess that Bruce Jones lives in Los Angeles, home of the "sexual bitchery/eating disorder" one-two punch. I think an entire generation of fanboys have learned a vital lesson here: never bitch about Devin Grayson's scripts ever again. Basest Crap.

POWERS #19: There's a fine thesis out there waiting to be written about Bendis's conflation of sexual potency and destructive superpowers in Powers, but to do so a keener mind than mine will have to unravel what happened in those last few Night Queen pages. Her husband walked in on her? She walked her in on herself? Huh? Who? Wha? OK, in a "why did this book get 90% more naked all of a sudden?" kind of way.

SHARK-MAN #1: The main draw is the loveliest work I've ever seen from Steve Pugh (by far) but this very odd superhero book (it's Batman crossed with Aquaman, to put it bluntly) really does everything a first issue should--gives you cool imagery, introduces you to likeable characters and an interesting status quo, and then sets that status quo on its head and throws those likeable characters into hot water right at the end. It's an impressively solid piece of work, with maybe some interesting anti-work-for-hire snarkery going on sub-rosa. Believe it or not, Very Good and worth picking up if you see it.

SHE-HULK 2 #9: Another top-notch little issue. Hibbs, out of his mind on loco weed, thought the spit-take page was a waste. I thought it was hilarious. Very Good.

SUPERGIRL #8: Manages to lay off the ick factor thanks to several choice reveals, but still manages to make barely a lick of sense. Ripping a few pages from Howard Mackie's '90s playbook of "we can't tell you what the mysterious secret is because we haven't figured it out ourselves, but we're going to make it seem really, really ominuous" probably isn't the best maneuver, either. Eh.

XENA #1: Appears to have everything a Xena fan would want. Sadly, I'm not a Xena fan, so it's only OK to me.

PICK OF THE WEEK(S): Captain America #20 or Daredevil #87, definitely, if you've been following 'em. Otherwise, Gumby #1 or Shark-Man #1.

PICK OF THE WEAK: Boy, I did not like Black Panther #18, did I?

TRADE PICK: My loving analysis of Joe Sacco's But I Like It HC will have to wait for another week (it's busy as hell at the moment). But it was great, even if you had that issue of Yahoo from way back when (which I did). At $14.99, (I think?) that Hellblazer: All His Engines SC is more than worth the coin, as is Polly & The Pirates TPB, Museum of Terror and probably a lot more I didn't read. I'd also be a liar (by exclusion) if I didn't confess to the mesmeric hold that Dear John: Alex Toth Doodlebook had over me as well. There appear to be several full stories from Eerie wedged into there!

Labels: Jeff

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Order form day, swamped. k thx bye.

2000 AD #1494
2000 AD #1495
52 WEEK #13
A G SUPER EROTIC ANTHOLOGY #38 (A)
AGENTS OF ATLAS #1 (OF 6)
ALL NEW ATOM #2
ARCHIE #568
ARCHIE DOUBLE DIGEST #172
ARTESIA BESIEGED #2 (OF 6)
BATTLER BRITTON #2 (OF 5)
BETTY #158
BOMB QUEEN VS BLACKLIGHT ONE SHOT
BPRD UNIVERSAL MACHINE #5 (OF5)
CREEPER #1 (OF 6)
DAVE JOHNSON FC SKETCHBOOK 2006
DETECTIVE COMICS #822
DEVILS PANTIES #3
DOLL & CREATURE #4 (OF 4)
DRACULA VS KING ARTHUR #4 (OF4)
DRAGONPRO #1
DUMMYS GUIDE TO DANGER #1 (OF4)
DUSTY STAR #1
EMISSARY #2
EX MACHINA #22
EXTERMINATORS #8
FALLEN ANGEL IDW #7
FANTASTIC FOUR #539 CW
FRIENDLY NEIGHBORHOOD SPIDER-MAN #11
HEAD #15 (A)
INVINCIBLE #34
JONAH HEX #10
JUDGE DREDD MEGAZINE #247
JUSTICE LEAGUE UNLIMITED #24
LEADING MAN #2 (OF 5)
LOONEY TUNES #141
MANIFEST ETERNITY #3
MARVEL ADVENTURES SPIDER-MAN #18
MARVEL MILESTONES MILLIE THE MODEL & PATSY WALKER
MARVEL TEAM-UP #23
MOON KNIGHT #4
MOUSE GUARD #4 (OF 6)
NEW AVENGERS #22 CW
NEW EXCALIBUR #10
NOBLE CAUSES #22
OMAC #2 (OF 8)
ORIGINAL ADVENTURES OF CHOLLYAND FLYTRAP #2 (OF 2)
OUTSIDERS #39
OZ WONDERLAND CHRONICLES NOTOCVR B #1 (OF 4)
POWER OF 6 TWISTED APPLES PART 1
PUNISHER #36
SPRINGHEELED JACK NEW PTG #1 (OF 3)
STARGATE ATLANTIS WRAITHFALL #1 (OF 3)
ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #98
UNCANNY X-MEN #477
USAGI YOJIMBO #95
WORMWOOD GENTLEMAN CORPSE #1
Y THE LAST MAN #48

Books / Mags / Stuff
ABSOLUTE KINGDOM COME EDITIONHC
AFTERLIFE VOL 1 GN (OF 3)
BATMAN SON OF THE DEMON NEW PTG
BORIS VALLEJO JULIE BELL FANTASY 2007 WALL CALENDAR
CAVALCADE OF BOYS COMPLETE COLLECTION TP
CONCRETE VOL 6 STRANGER ARMORTP
EXTERMINATORS BUG BROTHERS TP
FAMOUS MONSTER MOVIE ART OF BASIL GOGOS SC NEW PTG
FINDER TP VOL 8 FIVE CRAZY WOMEN
FORTEAN TIMES #212
FRAGILE PROPHET GN
I AM GOING TO BE SMALL GN
I CANT STOP LOVING YOU VOL 1 GN (A)
JUXTAPOZ AUG 2006 VOL 14 #8
KAFKA TP
LOUCHE & INSALUBRIOUS ESCAPADES OF ART DECCO TP
MORE THAN SPARROWS GN
NAT TURNER VOL 1 TP
NBX STORYBOOK HC ( NEW PTG)
NEW X-MEN CHILDHOODS END VOL 2 TP
OUT OF PICTURE TP
PEACH GIRL SAES STORY VOL 1 GN (OF 2)
PHANTOM LAW OF THE JUNGLE GN
RETURN TO LABYRINTH VOL 1 GN (OF 3)
SHORT STROKES VOL 2 GN (A)
SKIBBER BEE BYE HC
SOMETHING FISHY THIS WAY COMES TP
SPIDER-MAN 2007 WALL CALENDAR
SPIDER-MAN VISIONARIES KURT BUSIEK VOL 1 TP
STRANGERS IN PARADISE VOL 18 LOVE & LIES TP
SUPERMAN 2007 WALL CALENDAR
TOUGH LOVE HIGH SCHOOL CONFIDENTIAL GN



What looks good to you?

-B Click Here to Read More...

Is it just me, or is the idea of a Robert Kirkman scripted, Todd McFarlane drawn comic (http://forum.newsarama.com/showthread.php?t=77952) pretty much a guaranteed recipe for the latest comic book ever?


52 WEEK #12
ACTION COMICS #841
ALL NEW OFF HANDBOOK MARVEL UNIVERSE A TO Z #7
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #534 CW
AMERICAN WAY #6 (OF 8)
ANGEL SCRIPTBOOK #5
ANGEL SPOTLIGHT DOYLE ONE SHOT
ANNIHILATION RONAN #4 (OF 4)
ARMY OF DARKNESS #9
ASTRO CITY SAMARITAN SPECIAL
AUTUMN #5
AVENGERS & POWER PACK ASSEMBLE #4 (OF 4)
BATMAN #655
BATTLE POPE COLOR #9 (RES)
BIG BANG PRESENTS #1 PROTOPLASMAN
BIRDS OF PREY #96
BLACK PANTHER #18 CW
BLACK PLAGUE ONE SHOT
BLUE BEETLE #5
CAPTAIN AMERICA #20
CARTOON NETWORK BLOCK PARTY #23
CASTLE WAITING VOL II #1
CIVIL WAR FRONT LINE #4 (OF 10)
CIVIL WAR YOUNG AVENGERS & RUNAWAYS #1 (OF 4)
CORPORATE NINJA #3
CRISIS AFTERMATH THE SPECTRE #3 (OF 3)
DAREDEVIL #87
EXILES #84
FEAR AGENT #6 (RES)
FUTURAMA COMICS #26
FUZZ & PLUCK IN SPLITSVILLE #4 (OF 5)
GODLAND #12
HAWKGIRL #54
HIGHLANDER #0
HOUSEWIVES AT PLAY #16 (A)
JACK OF FABLES #1
JEREMIAH HARM #4
JLA CLASSIFIED #25
JSA CLASSIFIED #14
JUGHEAD #175
LOVELESS #9
MARVEL SPOTLIGHT ROBERT KIRKMAN GREG LAND
MEAT CAKE #15
NEIL GAIMANS NEVERWHERE #8 (OF 9)
NEW AVENGERS #22 CW
NIGHTWING #122
POWERS #19
PS238 #17
RED SONJA #12
REVVED #1
ROAD TO HELL #1 (OF 3)
ROCKETO #10
SAVAGE DRAGON #0
SECOND WAVE WAR O/T WORLDS #5
SHARK-MAN #1
SHE DRAGON #1
SIDEKICK #2 (OF 5)
SPAWN #158
SPIDER-MAN LOVES MARY JANE #8
SPIKE VS DRACULA #4 (OF 5)
SPUNKY KNIGHT XXX #7 (OF 7) (A)
STAR WARS KNIGHTS OF THE OLD REPUBLIC #7
STORM #6 (OF 6)
STRANGERS IN PARADISE #83
SUPERGIRL #8 (RES)
TALES FROM RIVERDALE DIGEST #13
TAROT WITCH OF THE BLACK ROSE #39
TEEN TITANS GO #33
TOUPYDOOPS #3
TRANSFORMERS GENERATIONS (IDW) #5
WARLORD #6
WOLVERINE #44 CW
XENA #1
X-MEN #189



Books / Mags / Stuff
30 DAYS OF NIGHT THREE TALES TP
AFTERWORKS VOL 2 GN
ALPHABETICAL BALLAD OF CARNALITY A BLAB STORYBOOK HC
BLUESMAN VOL 3 GN
BROWNSVILLE TP
BUMPERBOY & LOUD LOUD MOUNTAIN GN
BUT I LIKE IT HC
CAPT HARDON GN (A)
CAPTAIN AMERICA RED MENACE VOL 1 TP
CHEWING GUM IN CHURCH A YIKESCOLLECTION SC
CLASH VOL 1 TP
DEAR JOHN ALEX TOTH DOODLEBOOK TP
FANTASTIC FOUR BOOKS OF DOOM PREMIERE HC
FRUITS BASKET VOL 14 GN (OF 19)
HALO GRAPHIC NOVEL HC
HELLBLAZER ALL HIS ENGINES SC
LITTLE LIT DARK AND SILLY NIGHT HC (O/A)
LOVE AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE OMNIBUS VOL 1 TP
LUCIFER VOL 10 MORNINGSTAR TP
MUSEUM OF TERROR VOL 1 TP
NANCY DREW VOL 6 MR CHEETERS IS MISSING GN
NEW EXCALIBUR VOL 1 DEFENDERSOF THE REALM TP
PATHFINDER TP
POLLY & PIRATES VOL 1 TP
PREVIEWS VOL XVI #8
R CRUMBS JAZZ GREATS T/C BOX
ROUGH STUFF #1
SPIKE TP
STAR WARS CLONE WARS VOL 9 TP
TEEN TITANS VOL 5 LIFE AND DEATH TP
TEENS AT PLAY LIKE MOTHER LIKE DAUGHTER GN (A)
TESTAMENT AKEDAH TP
UNCLE SCROOGE #356
WALT DISNEY TREASURES VOL 1 75 YEARS OF DISNEY COMICS TP
WALT DISNEYS COMICS & STORIES #671
WIZARD COMICS MAGAZINE SPIDER-MAN EXPOSED CIVIL WAR CVR #179
WONDER WOMAN MISSIONS END TP


One note: NEW AVENGERS #22 appears to have been allocated ~50% to any retailer serviced out of Diamond-LA. It's probably going to be VERY HARD to find this on your store's shelves if you're west of the Rockies. However, I fully expect the balance of the allocation to arrive next week, so don't be a dumb-ass and try to buy all of the copies at your LCS or something, thinking it is "rare" or some shit. It isn't any different than the HAL GN arriving on the west this week when it was out in the rest of the country last week...


So.... what looks good to you?

-B Click Here to Read More...

Is it just me, or was San Diego completely devoid of any surprising announcements from either Marvel or DC? I mean, when the most interesting news story is Oni putting out a comic based on Stephen Colbert’s Lady Nocturne 9: A Tek Janssen Adventure, then that says something about the state of the Big Two, right?

If you want something else to be said about the Big Two, then you had to look no further than this week’s releases: Civil War! Batwoman’s first appearance in 52! Justice League of America #0! It’s all ground-breaking originality this week!

*Ahem*

52 WEEK ELEVEN: Why did it take me this long to realize that Greg Rucka – who I would lay money wrote the majority of this issue, centering as it does around the Renee Montoya/Batwoman plot, although there’s a scene in here that’s very very close to a scene in Geoff Johns’ first arc in the current Green Lantern title, so maybe he had some say in there as well – is the new Chris Claremont? I mean, okay, so everyone and their sister knew that Rucka shares Claremont’s fetish for the take-no-shit strong female character type, but when the main Intergang bad guys here turn out to be half-forgotten characters from Rucka’s Detective Comics run years ago (much in the same way that Rucka’s OMAC Project series was centered around a character and unresolved plot from his Detective run, giving said characters superpowers and a new ongoing series of her own), then it all becomes very clear; he shares Claremont’s self-referentialism as well. Of course! That said, this is pretty much Eh. Batwoman’s appearance isn’t too annoying (although it would’ve been nice if she’d had a personality while in the outfit and Joe Bennett could’ve turned down the posturing when she appeared without the outfit), and there’s some forward motion on both the Montoya and Cult of Conner plots. The best part of the issue may be the last four pages, however – not that the History of The DC Universe all of a sudden becomes good or anything, just that it finishes its run with this issue.

CIVIL WAR #3: I give up. By the time I finished this issue, I have no idea what Civil War is really about anymore, because all this mini seems to do is set up plots for other series to follow up on. It’s not about the destruction of Stamford, because that becomes more and more of a McGuffin (and set-up for the Wolverine crossover issues) with each page; no-one seems to care about dealing with rebuilding the town, or discussing how the tragedy has even really affected anyone outside of “Well, they passed a law because it’s so appalling”. It’s not about the Superhero Registration Act, either, because that too has become a McGuffin, a reason for the characters to fight and little else; any discussion of the pros or cons of such an act was either made off-panel or in crossover books, and the Act passed in the middle of the last issue. It’s not about Spider-Man unmasking, despite the amount of space dedicated to that happening last issue, because that’s hardly referenced this issue – any follow-up happens, of course, in the Spider-Man books. Instead, it’s about… Well, I really don’t know. Super-heroes fighting, I guess? The more I read of this series, the more it feels like it’s been plotted by a twelve-year old. You can almost imagine a kid making the story up (“And then there’s this big disaster and Iron Man wants everyone to, like, sign up to be superhero policemen or something and Captain America says NO! and they fight and Captain America has this thing that switches Iron Man’s armor off, but then Spider-Man beats up Captain America while Iron Man gets his armor working and then THOR COMES BACK FROM THE DEAD AND WINS BY HITTING EVERYONE WITH LIGHTNING! Cool! And get this – Tony Stark used to fuck Emma Frost!”) because everything happens without consequence or context here – characters act out of character to service a plot that’s centered around “the big event” of the issue, as opposed to anything else. There seems to be less and less actual story each issue, just action set pieces that don’t have any dramatic punch because, we know by now, nothing will get followed up on in this book. Crossovers, maybe, but this series? This is where you see the “highlights,” edited in such a way to be meaningless. I know that some people will turn up and again accuse me of anti-Marvel bias, but, really; this was Crap.

CIVIL WAR: X-MEN #1: And this was… Okay, I guess. It’s entirely unnecessary, and I’m not entirely sure what it has to do with Civil War at this point, because it seems more like a continuation of the House of M/Decimation/198 plot than anything to do with this year’s big crossover, even with an Iron Man guest-shot and throwaway lines of dialogue talking about the Superhero Registration Act. Unless there’s some stunning revelation within the next four issues where we discover a real connection to whatever Civil War ends up being about, then this is probably another example of Marvel using mini-series to tell stories that could, and probably should, be told in one of the three ongoing X-Men series. Yannick Paquette’s Kevin-Nowlan-lite art is always nice to look at, though.

THE FLASH: THE FASTEST MAN ALIVE #2: I skipped issue 1 of this revamp, but I’ll tell you this: The title is the best thing about this book. There’s a scene in the middle of the book that perfectly encapsulates what’s wrong with the whole thing: Supporting character Valerie Perez gets a telephone call. The first panel has her saying “How did you get this number?!” The second goes for a closer look (with the legs of her glasses disappearing, for some reason), with her continuing to talk: “No, I told you never to call me again, anywhere…” and then the third panel has her gritting her teeth and anger lines coming off her face, as she finishes with “…I don’t care if you are my father!!!” Yes, three exclamation points. Any comic with foreshadowing that obvious, with dialogue that bad, is not a good comic, my friends. It’s not the worst comic ever made, just clumsy and kind of amateurish. Crap may be the word, in fact, but I’m surprised that I got through that review without fanboyishly complaining about DC getting rid of Wally West without realizing the unique position he had within the DC Universe (The only sidekick to have grown up, assumed his mentor’s mantle and be accepted by the mentor’s peers, more or less) and instead replacing him with a generic conflicted-but-fated-to-be-great-if-only-he’d-accept-his-destiny eponymous lead.

Oh, wait.

Damn.

JACK KIRBY’S GALACTIC BOUNTY HUNTERS #1: Think that “Galactic Bounty Hunters” is a surprisingly un-Kirby-like name? Well, one of the two text pieces at the back of this first issue about the creation of the book lets loose the fact that they were originally called “the Wonder Warriors,” which is much closer to what you’d expect (it’s also as good a name as Galactic Bounty Hunters, and fits the story better, which kind of makes you wonder why it was changed). Shock of the week: This isn’t as bad as I’d expected. In fact, there are parts where the dialogue (for the most part, atrocious) achieves some kind of comedic zen badness – when the monster is captured at the start of the book, one of the main characters warns another: “Careful, Tyr… She bites!” “And I have rabies!” the monster replies – and the art isn’t as slavishly Kirby-esque as, say, the art in Godland (In fact, it’s similar to what Ron Frenz inked by Karl Kesel – who inks part of this book – would look like)… It’s all just very dated, which is (sadly) to be expected, probably. It’s worth an Eh, at the very least, and if this were twenty years ago, I’d probably be eating it up with a spoon.

GUMBY #1: I met Art Clokey in San Diego, kind of. He was there, behind the table at a booth, looking more than a little bewildered by everything that was going on, while someone – possibly Mel Smith, who edited this book – tried to explain Gumby to me. We didn’t have Gumby when I was a kid, you see, we had Morph, so when someone jumps out and says “Hey, you wanna meet Art Clokey, creator of Gumby?” to me, my first response is pretty much “Who…?” All of which gave a strange context to reading this first issue of new Gumby adventures, because I couldn’t shake Matt Maxwell’s explanation that, even though Clokey was straight, there always seemed to be an LSD influence to the character that I was just experiencing for the first time.

That said, this was a surprisingly Good book. Yes, there are the weird parts about criminal clowns and lines about children should be locked in cages, but there was something sweet about Gumby’s awkwardness around his new girl friend that came from somewhere much more innocent and touching. I’m not convinced that I would ever need to experience Gumby again, mind you, but still…

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #0: I don’t know if I should admit my impure love for Bravo’s camp classic “Project Runway” in public or not, but picking up this to read with its cover line “Who’s In?” while Heidi Klum is onscreen telling the Runway competitors that fashion is a business that you can never tell who’s in and who’s out provided a special pop-culture crossover moment that the rest of this book failed to reach no matter how hard it tried. Ignoring the fact that it kind of ruins Wonder Woman’s “Who will Wonder Woman be?” plot – Diana, and in a slightly revised costume that makes its first appearance here, for those who care – Brad Meltzer just tries too hard to convince us that Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman are all pals again despite their past differences. We’ve all read Infinite Crisis, Brad, and they all seemed pretty chummy at the end of that series, thanks. The flashbacks and –forwards are cute, with art of varying degrees of greatness (Eric Wight, you win again), but… there’s no point to the book at all. No forward motion that we didn’t already know about, and the looks back are too short to really provide any new insight. We don’t even really get a feel for what the new series is going to be like, because there’s no real story here. All I can tell you is that it looks like Meltzer will continue to use his narration that makes Jeph Loeb look concise, and new series artist Ed Benes really really likes the 1990s Image artists. So, um, huzzah? Eh.

THE SADHU: I never read any Crossgen books, but this is exactly how I imagined them to be – Generic dialogue filling a slow story with hints of mythology, illustrated by non-descript artists whose work is made to look a lot better thanks to some pretty good coloring work. As with most things this week, Eh.

PICK OF THE WEEK turned out, practically by process of elimination, to be Gumby. Who would’ve suspected that? To be fair, my real pick of the week is also my TRADE OF THE WEEK, and it’s something that has been out for awhile but only just picked up by me in San Diego after meeting the author: Bone Sharps, Cowboys and Thunder Lizards, by Jim Ottaviani and “Big Time Attic” (Really artists Zander and Kevin Cannon, as well as Shad Petosky). If you can imagine a graphic novel about the real life battle between two scientists fighting over the discovery of dinosaur bones in the late 1800s Wild West (and slightly less Wild East), written in a style that crosses Matt Fraction’s recent Five Fists of Science with history nerd goddess Sarah Vowell that guest-stars PT Barnum, Buffalo Bill Cody and President Ulysses S. Grant and not get excited about it, then you’re a stronger man than me (Here's Bri reviewing it when it came out, last year). PICK OF THE WEAK, meanwhile, is Civil War, because even though Flash was probably a worse comic overall, Civil War is more of a wasted opportunity…

What did the rest of you buy this week? Click Here to Read More...

Finally, I am sick. Months after Hibbs and the GMc became deathly ill and recovered, I was struck--on my last four days of vacation--with an ultra-phlegmatic cold that makes me incapable of concentrating on anything but recently rented video games (which, now that I think of it, I was supposed to return last night. Crap.) as opposed to comic books and movies and a writing deadline for the next newsletter. Yes, pity me, boo hoo and all that. It does suck, though, when you return to work and a coworker cheerfully asks you, "Hey, welcome back! How was your time off?" But, before you can answer, you all but yank the tendons out of your neck turning away so you can release a wrenching set of coughs followed by a wheeze that sounds like half-death rattle, half-squeak toy. Good times, my friend. Good times.

But enough about me. What about the remarkably healthy comic book industry?

52 WEEK #10: It gives me pause that this has one of the best scenes in the series so far--Clark Kent getting that scoop, old-school style--and it's about a character who's more or less not a character in the book. 52, it seems, suffers from a surfeit of ambition, in more or less the same way that a four-year old does when given two or three too many glasses of Kool-Aid: there's a lot of pointing and shouting and jumping, and one certainly gets the feeling something pretty damn cool is trying to be conveyed, but it's too diffuse to really care about. Rather than convincing me the DCU is one big place, 52 has convinced me of almost the opposite: the DCU is actually a very small place, where whatever Booster Gold is whining about this week is far more important than how people in devastated cities are trying to rebuild their lives...and that's kind of sad. OK, I guess, but I'm a little worried by how many storylines are up in the air 20% of the way through.

AMERICAN VIRGIN #5: This book is notoriously good at making me hate it just as I'm beginning to like it, and vice-versa. At the core of it is, I think, Seagle's essential, um, "fratboyishness" when it comes to sex and religion--respectful to the subjects' faces, but essentially mocking and disdainful at the core of things: how else are we to regard a scene where the hero, overcome in a confusion of religious and sexual longing, tries to fuck a closed casket? Is it anything other than the creator's acknowledgment that he can't take the protagonist's plight too seriously? (Twin Peaks fans, by the way, may remember a similar casket scene, which ended up casting a rather chilling insight on the grieving character when later facts came out.) If American Virgin was written by someone truly mesmerized by sex and religion--and say what you will about Alejandro Jodorowsky but Santa Sangre conveys more in any given 45 seconds about those subjects than American Virgin has in five issues--then I'd be down with it. Similarly, someone with a healthy skepticism, if not blatant disgust, at religious and sexual longings (like, I dunno, Philip Roth?), I'd be down with that, too. But American Virgin can't really decide on the tone it wants and so settles for a very Eddie Haskellish, "Why, yes, Mrs. Cleaver. The desire to know God is a truly wonderful thing. I've frequently said the same thing to Anthony myself." As the notorious comic book critic Revelations 3 put it, "I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So because thou art lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spew thee out of my mouth." Sub-Eh.

ANNIHILATION SILVER SURFER #4: Seemed like a whole lot of work for the end result (Silver Surfer's walking the streets again for Galactus the Pimp? Makes for a pleasing arc for the character, I think) but at least it wasn't the big-ol' suckout of Annihilation Super Skrull. OK, but you should keep in mind I can't remember any details from issue #3 at all, so it might be either better or worse than that.

ANNIHILATION SUPER SKRULL #4: Like I said, big ol' suckout. I know the creative team was trying to be clever with their "Aha! You thought the supporting cast you didn't care about would die so that the title character you don't care about would live, didn't you?" maneuver but it's six of one, half-dozen of the other. So the supporting characters we don't care about are never seen again, and the title character we don't care about will show up in eighteen months, probably without any acknowledgment this mini ever happened. Big whoop. Awful.

CIVIL WAR DIRECTORS CUT #1: Flipped through this just to see the big ol' DD spoiler everyone's been talking about, but I ended up being caught by a chunk of Millar's earlier draft where the inciting incident to the event is the death of Happy Hogan. In Millar's script, Hogan's next to last line in this lifetime is:

[Witty banter]

to which Pepper Potts responds something like:

[Laughter, probably something about Tony Stark]

This has both amused me, and unsettled me, for close to a week now. Do you know how many conversations in the Marvel universe run right along the lines of: [Witty banter] [laughter, probably something about [name-drop important Marvel character here]]? Fucking all of them, that's how many. I can't tell what creeps me out more, that Millar is so obviously aware of it, or that he's so obviously aware of it and still can't be bothered to put it in his early drafts because that's how unimportant it is to his "this is my face when I'm fucking Marvel continuity in the ass" mega-event. Sorry, Speedball; better you than Happy. OK for the painful insight.

CIVIL WAR FRONT LINE #3: I admit it: I read this just to see what piece of verse or concept of national pride Jenkins will screw up in his back-up strip. (Between these and Jurgen's History of the DCU over in 52, we're kind of in a Golden Age of amazingly shitty back-up strips, aren't we?) It was something about some guy who fought in the (first? real?) Civil War and whose last thought before dying was Captain America holding his shield high in the air where it's not protecting anything except Captain America's big ol' forearm. I can't wait for the other seven issues to see how American history gets hilariously trivialized, I really can't. Awful.

ESCAPISTS #1: Liked this when I was paying too much for those damn Escapist anthologies, and I like it here for a buck. Like Jog, I loved Chris Ware's "I Guess," but unlike Jog, I very much enjoyed that story's narrative trick being briefly revisited here. Jog, in fact, condemns this issue as being too cute by half but let's face it, Chabon's The Adventures of Kavalier & Clay is also too cute by half (or more, depending on how you feel about The Escapist saving Salvador Dali from drowning at a cocktail party) so I think it's quite a good pairing. As long as we don't have to wait another eight months for the next issue, I'm hopeful. Very Good, even if I had to pay regular comic book prices but for a dollar? Go get it, is what I'm saying.

GHOST RIDER #1: I didn't like the preceding mini, so it's not particularly surprising I wouldn't like this, right? But I didn't like the Ennis mini because he obviously thought GR was a crap character: here, it's the inept execution. The Ghost Rider has to stay in Hell because he wasn't honest with a shady character he just met? If nothing else, Hell must be filled with women who go to bars and people who answer telemarketer calls at dinner time. Pretty art, though. Eh.

GREEN ARROW #64: I'll be honest, I was gonna cap on this. It has this two page intro to a character we never see again--a dude who owns a movie theater who's been showing the same movie for six months to packed houses but is trying to smuggle the popcorn and oil back into this cordoned off neighborhood when he stumbles across the fight--that's obviously meant as no more than your averrage "average bystander/local color" hook straight out of a '70s Marvel comic, but which I found tremendously interesting, moreso than anything that Green Arrow and his buddy Grout were going to do for the rest of the book. So this review was gonna point that out, that writers should either avoid making their local color more interesting than the main plot of the book, or else realize what that says about their main plot--but thinking back on it, I seem to recall Scott McDaniel did a great job giving the "heroes surrounded by junkie zombies" scenario an intense claustrophobic feel--like something from classic John Carpenter. So the capping is called off. McDaniel's work, which I normally find scratchy and rushed, saves the day, and this was actually pretty OK.

GREEN LANTERN #12: Such is the rough magic of Geoff Johns: he can actually take three concepts I pretty much loathe--that annoying Cyborg guy, the manhunters, and Hal Jordan, as written by Geoff Johns--and draw connections between the three of them that actually intrigue me. That the Cyborg, also in his way a test pilot like Hal Jordan, ends up being the new head of the Manhunters (who are similarly a dark mirror to the Green Lantern Corps) is one of those nifty ways of playing with continuity that's one of the true joys for an old-school comic nerd like me. I'll go Good, even though if someone other than Van Sciver was drawing those Manhunter Transformer robot thingies, I'd realize it was only just okay.

MAN CALLED KEV #1: I skipped the last Kev story (or maybe two) because although I liked the character, he didn't work well with The Authority. So, although I've seen critics I trust suggesting the Kev stories have already been played out, I wouldn't know, frankly, and so quite enjoyed this: it was the first bit of Ennis in a while that really reminded me of his lovely work on Hitman, where you're laughing at lowbrow humor on one page and actually touched when a character dies on the next. So if you're semi-clueless like me: Good.

MS MARVEL #5: Wow. This isn't cancelled yet? So dull Frank Springer should be drawing it. Awful.

NEXT #1: DC really specializes at the pretty-looking crash-and-burn, for which this can serve as Exhibit A. Tad Williams, from what I can tell, has written fifty-two kajillion fantasy books (the titles of at least two of which, The Dragonbone Chair and Tailchaser's Song made me laugh like Beavis and/or Butthead for five minutes), at least two of which are trilogies, and seems to assume, like any good fantasy writer, that a truly interesting set-up is worth explaining, and over-explaining, until the reader finally understands how truly interesing this set-up is. Also, like any good fantasy writer, Williams has a sense of humor a little too high on the whimsy side of things for my taste so the captions read as if written by someone over-exposed to the lethal radioactive elements Douglas Adamsium and Monty Pythonite-230. What I'm saying? Is that I thought this was pretty Eh but I realize it's not written for me, it's written for the two dudes in the Firefly dusters I'm gonna be stuck behind for 45 minutes at Worldcon two years from now while waiting in line to see the Wonder Woman trailer, and one of those dudes is gonna say that Tad William's Next was underappreciated, and the other dude is gonna emphatically agree and then they'll both talk about how awesome The Dragonbone Chair was. And who am I to disagree?

PINK SNIPER GN: We got this in and I was bummed it wasn't some insane "Spice Girls Meets Golgo 13" Killer Princesses type title, but regular creepy ol' pr0n? According to the solicit info, "Med school student Niibia is abducted by the sexiest and horniest goddess of the school, Haruana! Pink Sniper is filled with half-animal people, flying sci-fi vehicles, loose women, and Haruana’s giant breasts!" Which begs at least two questions: (1) how many goddesses does any given med school have? and (2) Does any of that sound cooler than a "Hello Kitty" sniper rifle?

ROKKIN #1: A terrible book but an awesome title. A barbarian called Rokkin? My only hope is that he teams up with the thief, Poppin, a mage, Free-Sty-Lin, and together they can successfully loot the mysterious treasure of Beeattt Street. Seriously, though, this suffers from some very lame approach to the narrative and a real deficit of imagination, but the art is occasionally striking and odd--if you can imagine someone trying to make the Ralph Bashki film Wizards look more like the work of J. Scott Campbell, you'll kind of get an idea of the influences--but given a choice in generic barbarian hijinks, I'll take the uglier but more accomplished Claw. Awful, I'm afraid.

SHAOLIN COWBOY #6: The art wasn't at its usual "Sweet Jesus!" level, because everything seemed a little too dark. (The printing process maybe?) But the book had at least two mind-blowing moments--the Cowboy fleeing a pack of attacking sharks by leaping from body to body, and that amazing cross-section panel of the shark (and the head inside the shark's mouth)--and a genuine laugh or two. Not up to its usual standards of making my hair stand on end, but Very Good nonetheless.

SUPERMAN #654: How long until well-done Superman stories get dull? Hey, I'm just glad we've got the chance to worry about it! (We've had far too long to ponder the answer to the "how long until poorly done Superman stories get dull" question.) Like Graeme, I really liked this. Unlike Graeme, I don't have many compelling reasons as to why--if forced, I'd say that by putting the tension on how Clark's gonna keep his job rather than how Superman's gonna save the day is a very, very smart choice and very well handled. Very Good.

ULTIMATE FANTASTIC FOUR #31: You know, when Millar's not trying to fuck somebody or other in the ass, he can actually tell a neat little story. I liked the turns in this one, even if they were told with a remarkable lack of nuance. ("Reed... why was Doom...crying?") Land's art tends to sucks the action from a scene, however, and when he's in a rush, as here, you don't get any of that lovely "wow, it's like the most awesome van art ever!" feeling from it. It's just ugly and inert. Let's call the whole thing OK.

ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #97: Bagley's art (or maybe the finishing inks) also seemed rushed here--I assume he's trying to get through drawing his entire run on USM before he drops dead from exhaustion--but don't take my word for it: I didn't even notice this was the part one of the "Ultimate Clone" saga until I finished the book. (Yeah, that'll instill some confidence in my reviews....) Kind of a bummer because I thought Ultimate Scorpion was actually pretty cool before the reveal. Only three issues until the bug-eating? That's coming up quick. Good.

WALKING DEAD #29: Kinda surprised Kirkman chose to milk the misery for another issue, as I thought the big bloody finish to this arc would've started by now, but whatevs. What I found interesting were the number of people in the store who objected to the rape scene as being "too much" despite the fact that it was entirely off-panel. I thought it did an excellent job of being repellent without exploitative, and would only object to it if it turns out to have been done for little more than padding out the issue's page count. Good.

WASTELAND #1: I think the artist dropped the ball here if you ask me--I know it's a challenge to draw dozens of people dressed in rags in a desert near a shantytown and make it visually compelling--but the answer to such a challenge is not a bunch of cheap shortcuts. If nothing else, the reader really could have felt the loss of that tiny little town at the end of the story if more work had been put into it. And don't even get me started on the fights, most of which looked two folded pairs of curtains blowing about in a wind. By contrast, the scripting was very competent and did a good job putting all the pieces and hooks in place, but it seemed dutiful, rather than inspired--more like ultra-competent work-for-hire than the long-brewing personal project Johnston says it is on the text page. The page-to-price ratio is incredibly generous, so let's say call the book OK, but it's gonna take more than this--a lot more--for the book to catch on. I hope it finds what it needs.

PICK OF THE WEEK: Reprint or not, Escapists #1 is a Very Good comic at a great price. Too-dark printing or not, Shaolin Cowboy #6 continues to make a compelling argument that Geoff Darrow be crowned King Crazypants of Comic Book Town and soon.

PICK OF THE WEAK: Almost too many choices, huh? I'll go with Rokkin just so you can imagine me yelling that in a stoner voice while playing air guitar: Rokkin!

TRADE PICK: Dunno--I'd say Buddha Vol. 2 SC but that's just guesswork on my part. But that second Showcase of silver-age Superman stories has been blowing my mind for several weeks. If you haven't checked that out yet...

MANGA FIX: I don't know how many copies of the first volume of Dragon Head Hibbs sold, but it apparently it wasn't enough for him to bother with Volume 2. Lemme get back to you on this one.

NEXT WEEK: San Diego! I'm not going! Are you?

Labels: Jeff

Click Here to Read More...

Am I the only one sick and tired of hearing about the San Diego Comic Con?

I forgot to post last week's ship list, sorry -- but here's this week's batch:

52 WEEK #11
A G SUPER EROTIC ANTHOLOGY #37 (A)
ANNIHILATION NOVA #4 (OF 4)
ANT #7 (RES)
AQUAMAN SWORD OF ATLANTIS #43
ARCHIE & FRIENDS #102
ARCHIE DIGEST #227
BEARERS O/T BLADE SP
BETTY & VERONICA DOUBLE DIGEST #144
BITE CLUB VAMPIRE CRIME UNIT #4 (OF 5)
BLADE OF THE IMMORTAL #115
CABLE DEADPOOL #30 CW
CASANOVA #2
CATWOMAN #57
CHECKMATE #4
CIVIL WAR #3 (OF 7)
CIVIL WAR X-MEN #1 (OF 4)
CLAW THE UNCONQUERED #2
CONAN #30
CRISIS AFTERMATH THE BATTLE FOR BLUDHAVEN #6 (OF 6)
DAILY BUGLE CIVIL WAR NEWSPAPER SPECIAL CW
DAUGHTERS OF THE DRAGON #6 (OF 6)
DEAD EYES OPEN #5
DONALD DUCK AND FRIENDS #342
ELEPHANTMEN #1
ETERNALS #2 (OF 6)
FLASH THE FASTEST MAN ALIVE #2
FRIENDLY NEIGHBORHOOD SPIDER-MAN #10
GIRLS #15
GUMBY #1
HAUNT OF HORROR EDGAR ALLAN POE #3 (OF 3)
HELLBLAZER #222
ION #4 (OF 12)
JACK KIRBYS GALACTIC BOUNTY HUNTERS #1
JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #0
LIVING IN INFAMY #4 (OF 4)
MAN-BAT #4 (OF 5)
MANHUNTER #24
MARVEL ADVENTURES AVENGERS #3
MARVEL WESTERNS WESTERN LEGENDS
MICKEY MOUSE AND FRIENDS #291
NEW X-MEN #28
NEXT EXIT #9
PLANET HULK GLADIATOR GUIDEBOOK
PRINCESS NATASHA #2 (OF 4)
PUBLIC ENEMY #1
RED STAR SWORD OF LIES
ROBIN #152
RUNAWAYS #18
RUSH CITY #1 (OF 6)
SADHU #1
SCOOBY DOO #110
SCREWTOOTH #1
SHADOWPACT #3
SHE-HULK 2 #9
SIMPSONS COMICS #120
STAR WARS REBELLION #4
STRANGE EGGS PRESENTS BOXING BUCKET
SUPERGIRL AND THE LEGION OF SUPER HEROES #20
SUPERMAN BATMAN #28
TESTAMENT #8
TOP COW 2006 PREVIEW
TRANSFORMERS STORMBRINGER #1 (OF 4)
ULTIMATE X-MEN #72
UNCANNY X-MEN #476
UNCLE SAM AND THE FREEDOM FIGHTERS #1 (OF 8)
WITCHBLADE SILVESTRI CVR #100
WITCHBLADE TURNER CVR #100
WOLVERINE ORIGINS DIRECTORS CUT
X-FACTOR #9 CW
X-MEN FAIRY TALES #3 (OF 4)
ZOMBIES #2

Books / Mags / Stuff
24 SEVEN GN
AFTERWORKS VOL 1 GN
ANIMATION MAGAZINE AUG 2006 #163
ATOMIKA VOL 1 TP
BACK ISSUE #17
COMICS JAM WAR ONE SHOT
COMICS JOURNAL #277
ESSENTIAL MARVEL TEAM-UP VOL 1 TP NEW PTG
EXCALIBUR CLASSIC VOL 2 TWO EDGED SWORD TP
GRANDE FINALE SC
HOW TO CREATE COMICS FROM SCRIPT TO PRINT TP
IRON MAN EXTREMIS PREMIERE HC
LEES TOY REVIEW JULY 2006 #165
MARVEL SELECT MOON KNIGHT AF
MODERN MASTERS VOL 8 WALT SIMONSON SC
MYTHOLOGY ALEX ROSS ART OF DC2007 WALL CALENDAR
RED DIARIES TP
SILENT DRAGON TP
SLOTH HC
SUDDEN GRAVITY TP
SUPERMAN BATMAN VOL 4 VENGEANCE HC
SWAN VOL 7
TEEN TITANS GO VOL 4 READY FOR ACTION TP
TWISTED TOYFARE THEATRE VOL 7TP
ULTIMATE FANTASTIC FOUR VOL 2HC
USAGI YOJIMBO VOL 20 GLIMPSESOF DEATH TP
VIDEO WATCHDOG #126
WALKING DEAD VOL 1 HC
WRITE NOW #13


What looks good to you?

-B Click Here to Read More...

It’s a short week here at my wing of Savage Critic Towers; my family is still in town, and we’re celebrating by spending this afternoon going on a tour around the city on a fire engine or something. I’m still not entirely clear about what Kate and I have agreed to, apart from it being very exciting to my niece and nephews that we agreed to it in the first place (Yesterday, we spent part of the afternoon taking them to the pirate store at 826 Valencia, where we discovered that Kate and I – 29 and 31 years old, respectively – found the jokes there much funnier than my 3, 6 and 9 year old child companions). Also, it was a pretty dull week in terms of things coming out this week, wasn’t it? Or maybe that was just me.

THE ESCAPISTS #1: Okay, it’s a reprint of the first chapter of Brian K. Vaughan’s sequel to “The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay”, which had formely seen life in the over-priced and under-read Amazing Adventures of The Escapist anthology, but still: this is good stuff. For one issue only, sadly, you get art by Philip Bond and amazing colors from Dave Stewart – really, the best coloring that Bond’s art has ever had – and a story that for the most part avoids the cuteness that’s started to creep into Vaughan’s writing lately (although the list of “alternative” influences from one of the characters is getting close to it), and all for only one dollar. It’s a good deal and a Very Good book.

SUPERMAN #654: I’m sure that there’s a train of thought that continually complains that the problem with Superman as a continuing series is that the same stories keep being told over and over again, and this issue – Kurt Busiek’s first solo one, and the debut of new art team Carlos Pacheco and Jesus Merino – isn’t something that’s going to convince anyone otherwise. It’s a fairly stock plot (Superheroic business interferes with Clark Kent’s personal and professional life), but it’s all about the execution; despite the familiarity, this is a Very Good Superman story. Busiek plays with the familiarity through the characters’ own reactions, and uses that to offset the superheroics that would otherwise threaten to overpower the more important domestic story. It’s wonderful that Busiek starts with this kind of story, as well; it harkens back to the stories that are in the recent Showcase collections from the ‘50s, where all of the fantastical elements were there as window-dressing to much more mundane plots (“How will I ever get Superman to marry me? Maybe the time-travelling Hercules, who’s gained super-powers by gaining all of his god friends’ abilities, can help me!”), and I’m a complete sucker for stories where Lois saves Clark’s ass while he’s saving everyone else’s. Pacheco and Merino, meanwhile, provide the glossy idealized superhero art you’ve come to expect from them, albeit with a couple of oddly ugly Superman panels and a Lois Lane who’s picked up hair tips from Ramona Flowers. It’s not the same kind of book as All Star Superman, but it’s almost as good, in its own way. Yes, I know, heresy. They’ll be taking my Grant Morrison Fanclub membership card away from me next.

X-MEN #188: And continuing my blasphemy trend, this book – Mike Carey’s first issue as regular writer – was much more enjoyable than Ed Brubaker’s first issue last week, although I’m not entirely sure why. There seemed to be less continuity porn, despite similar plots (last week, Polaris was being hunted by people for some reason I didn’t understand, and this week, Sabretooth is being hunted by people for some reason I didn’t understand – the difference being, I think, that I’m not supposed to understand why Sabretooth is being hunted yet), and the dialogue seemed less generic. The saving grace for the book, however, might be Chris Bachalo’s artwork, which has some beautiful storytelling and design – the move from the action scenes on page 6 to the open double-page spread on pages 7 and 8 is impressive in what it does to the pacing and atmosphere – elevating what I may, otherwise, have thought an awkward opener. I still have the problem of feeling that, more than anything, it’s an X-Men book and therefore kind of review-proof, mind you. It was Good for me, but Paul O’Brien might be the man to turn to if you’re more of an X-Fan than me.

PICK OF THE WEEK is probably The Escapists #1, despite it being a reprint with horrible horrible design and a pretty weak Frank Miller cover. PICK OF THE WEAK is a tough one, seeing as I read so little this week… I guess that it’s probably X-Men, but that was still pretty good, you know? There were lots of things I didn’t even pick up this week, so why not say that, um, Civil War Frontline #3 is my pick of the weak, instead? I’d probably have hated that more than X-Men. I couldn’t even tell you what my TRADE OF THE WEEK is, because I’m still reading that Elongated Man Showcase from last week (Carmine Infantino, you really could draw up a storm back then); if you haven’t bought that one yet, go and demand it. Everyone needs a Ductile Detective in their lives.

Next week: I will be in a state of shock – I’m doing the blogging panel in San Diego on Friday lunchtime, so you shouldn’t be surprised if all I write next weekend is a variation on “Heidi MacDonald… killed by Chris Butcher… Spurgeon was fast, but not fast enough to save her…” Consider yourself warned, friends. Click Here to Read More...

The plan is to keep it short, since I'm down to my last four days of vacation and there's all sorts of things still to do before getting my ass back to work. To keep things moving, I've added a few relevant movie reviews in the mix as well, rather than talking about 'em up top. (Christ, this is taking too long already. I miss having a smart brain.)

52 WEEK #9: I've read DC Comics for a long time so you'd think I'd be inured to dull fight scenes by now. But, no. That "punch-fly-land-talk-repeat" fight between Steel and Natasha was stultifying. I can see why Devilance is the God of Pursuit and not, like, the God of Catching Stuff if Also, if Animal Man, Adam Strange, and Starfire can escape in four pages from an entire planet he built to trap them. As a bonus, having Dan Jurgens summarize Identity Crisis in four pages is funny: it's like having your five year old little brother summarize an episode of Knight Rider for you. Eh.

ALL NEW ATOM #1: Really shows the problem with The Atom: if half your adventures come from almost getting killed when you use your superpower, you are not a good superhero. (This is why Captain I've-Got-Bleach-In-My-Eyes never caught on either.) Also, Gail Simone and John Byrne aren't a good match for telling Grant Morrison stories for exactly the same reason you'd never get Jo Anne Worley and Sebastian Cabot to tell Emo Philips jokes--one hams up the laffs a little too much and the other doesn't understand there's a joke being told in the first place. But then, I guess you couldn't get Peter Milligan and Tony Millionaire in on this, could you? Eh.

BEYOND #1: Surprisingly decent. Of course, I like Scott Kolins' art (which I know some of you don't) but Paul Mounts' colors give the work an extra burst of vibrancy. And Dwayne McDuffie crafts a quick-moving little story where the characters are likeable and the motivations convincing. If you like seeing a bunch of Marvel C-listers slug it out, you could do much, much worse. Good.

CONAN & THE SONGS OF THE DEAD #1: As should've been expected, Lansdale and Truman can barely keep a straight face, as Lansdale peppers his dialogue with anachronisms and foul-mouthed jokiness, and Trumans throws in some impressively unsubtle penis-and-vagina imagery. But it looks great and is a fun read, so if you're not a Conan purist, you'll find this at least highly OK.

DARK HORSE TWENTY YEARS: Some great pin-ups for a quarter and the round-robin concept worked perfectly up until either (a) the Emily The Strange team tried to think of an iconic Rick Geary character and their heads exploded, or (b) Joss Whedon was told to think of an iconic Rick Geary character and couldn't be bothered. Either way, some nice stuff with the Eric Powell Darth Vader page probably worth the two bits all by itself. Good.

DEATH JR VOL 2 #1: I wish I wasn't such a fair-weather Ted Naifeh fan: here I am sitting on all six issues of Polly & The Pirates and haven't cracked a single cover, but I tore right into the first issue of his work-for-hire Death Jr. It's fun all-ages stuff and Naifeh's art looks gorgeous in color. If you wish your kid's Nicktoons had a little more Charles Adaams to them, you should pick this up pronto. Good.

DETECTIVE COMICS #821: Hmmm. It wasn't until I got to the end of the issue that I realized Dini was presenting us with a genuine mystery, with clues and suspects and stuff--I'm so used to the typical Bat-hack trick of "run down the pages with small talk and then have villain pop up for climactic fistfight," I was caught off-guard when someone was unmasked and explanations were proffered like I should have been paying attention. Honestly, some fault with that lies with either J.H. Williams III or John Kalisz: casting the Bruce Wayne sequences in different monochromatic shades seemed like a great idea but it drained all attention away from the background and the background characters. On the other hand, it looked absurdly gorgeous and is worth the coin for that alone. But, honestly, this could've been better than highly OK if the creators had been able to correctly guide the reader as to how they should read the book. I'll be curious to see how future Dini Detective scripts play out without such a strong artist controllig the material.

DEVI #1: Thanks to a canny accumulation of international talent, Virgin Comics can now produce a perfect duplicate of an Image Witchblade comic from 1995! If you ask me, they needed a lot less Shekhar Kapur and a lot more Mukul Anand (God rest his soul). At best, Eh.

GOON #18: With one line ("Is it just me, or has our entire existence boiled down to nasty little things that want to chew our faces off?") Powell sums up the pleasures and the problems with his book eighteen issues in. Am I still enjoying this book? Oh, hell yes. Do I kind of wish The Goon would take to the high seas and have an adventure fighting the sea hag and maybe meet his pappy (poopdeck optional)? Hell yes to that as well. Surely there's a way to do that and have the book keep its high quality, yeah? Good, except that I'm a whiny cry-baby and there's no pleasing me.

HATE ANNUAL #6: Can't shake the feeling that Bagge is throwing in the Buddy Bradley material to make sure people buy this and he can't paid twice off his Weekly World News and Matrix material. All it really does is make me wish he'd return to the material with something like consistency--Bagge's take on the characters and my take on the characters are growing divergent enough to where I probably won't bother picking this up next time. More Eh from the cry-baby.

INCREDIBLE HULK #96: It'd still be nice if they could get an artist who really sunk his teeth into this kind of material, but it's probably the best issue of the storyline I've read yet. Hope they take their time with the material and don't just go for the big finish in issue #100. A high OK.

JONAH HEX #9: The second issue in a row I've read where the in media res approach is taken to the point of me having no idea what the hell is happening. Is this happening to anyone else? No rating because, frankly: huh?

KRRISH: As Treacher predicted, I thought Krrish was krrrap. Considering I liked Koi...Mil Gaya, an amazing cinematic combo E.T., Flowers for Algernon and Spider-Man, I figured my bars were properly lowered for Krrrish. But I was wrong. While I figured that there most of the superheroics would be in the second half, I had no idea the first half would be an awful summer-camp style romantic comedy nor that the filmmakers would figure the best movie they could choose to rip off for the last third of the film would be Paycheck. (I mean, Jesus! Paycheck?!) Interestingly, Krrish has a lot more of the traditional Superman-Lois dynamic (in that feisty gal reporter Priya stages a life-endangering stunt or two to force Krishna to reveal himself as superhero Krrish) then Superman Returns does. But that's maybe the only interesting thing about it. It sucked, frankly.

LOVE THE WAY YOU LOVE #1: Imagine watching Absolute Beginners in a South Park animation style and you get a sense as to how bad this is. I think they were trying for a similar energy to Scott Pilgrim, maybe, but O'Malley's line, although simple, is energetic and here the artwork is stiffer than petrified wood. I wanted to like it, but, wow, I really didn't. And for the price? Awful.

OCCULT CRIMES TASKFORCE #1: After the initial thrill of going "Hey, that looks just like Rosario Dawson!" at every panel wears off, you are left with nothing except a hole in your wallet where $2.99 used to be. Ghostbusters+Rosario Dawson+fumetti=boring? Who coulda guessed? Awful.

OUTSIDERS #38: If you read Teen Titans first and then this, then I guess the continuity kind of works out, I guess. Doesn't help with all the dumb scenes that happen for no reason (like Nightwing slapping down Captain Boomerang), however. Awful.

SEX & FURY: If you want a perfect, insane little movie that manages to out-Lady Snowblood the Lady Snowblood movies, you should rent this. Reiko Ike plays the lady gambler Ocho, searching for the three mysterious gangsters who slew her father when she was young. This movie has nudity every four minutes and an astonishing visual every seven, for more or less the entire movie. I thought the sequel, Female Yakuza Tale, was dull (with so much rape even Mark Millar would get bored of the concept) but Sex & Fury is a perfectly executed little exploitation film. If you dig that sort of thing, you should check it out.

SUPERGIRL #7: Ewwwwww! That panel of Kara kissing evil Superman while he's got his hand on her super-caboose is just the nastiest thing I've seen in a DC comic in a long time. (Sadly, that's an achievement.) If they can turn the classic "Nightwing and Flamebird in Kandor City" story into such a creepy, nonsensical morass, then the re-introduction of Comet The Superhorse and the Legion of Super-Pets oughta make Pier Paolo Pasolini blanch. ASS-tacaular.

SUPERMAN RETURNS (the film not the graphic adaptation): I liked it. Plotwise, it was just an outrageous mess and the script suffered from not having the time to dramatize what it wanted to convey (and so just told you, at great lengths, instead) but Singer, the real-life equivalent of The Simpsons' Steven Spielbergo, is finally picking up some of Spielberg's visual wit, Kevin Spacey made a great Lex Luthor, and nearly all of the cast was decent, and occasionally exceptional. Also, I can honestly say the comments thread on Brian's post is one of the few times my appreciation for a film has honestly been deepened by the Internet so that helps, too. Highly OK.

THEY FOUND THE CAR: I didn't read this. I just noticed the title in the list of arriving comics and was transfixed. Has anyone written a story about a kidnap victim held captive at a publishing company who sends increasingly desperate messages out as comic book solicits? It'd be worth it just for the panel of the comic retailer looking at Previews and going, "Hmmm. Sweet Jesus, They're Cutting Off My Toes With Gardening Shears? I could probably sell three copies of that...."

THING #8: Incredibly charming wrap-up to a very charming little book, even if the Ben & Alicia thing had to be really rushed to make it into those final pages. Guys like me can whine all we want, but the market knows what it wants, and it wants grim, not Grimm. Bummer. Very Good.

UNCANNY X-MEN #475: I liked this a helluva lot more than Graham, it seems. I'm sure in three issues I'll feel like a sucker for thinking Proudstar is pretty cool with his vibranium blades and super-action poses and all, but, dammit, I thought he was pretty cool. And Brubaker's take on the characters and characterization is what I want from an X-Men book. Like I said, call me a sucker but I thought this was Good.

PICK OF THE WEEK: Pretty vanilla tastes this week: Beyond #1, Uncanny X-Men #475, Death Jr. v.2 #1.

PICK OF THE WEAK: Is there any doubt at all? Supergirl #7, by a mile.

TRADE PICK: A lot of stuff that I haven't sat down to read yet. Hibbs pointed out that the ALAN MOORE COMPLETE FUTURE SHOCK TPB is indeed complete, containing stories that didn't make it into the previous Shocking Futures and Twisted Times trades; I'm enough of a Kirby ho to buy the second volume of BLACK PANTHER stories (with four guys--the very odd quartet of Jim Shooter, Ed Hannigan, Jerry Bingham and Gene Day--needed to wrap up what one guy was doing all by himself); and volumes 5 AND 6 of Death Note are right here waiting for me. So, if you excuse me, I'm gonna get right to 'em.

Labels: Jeff

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Thanks to the wonders of DirecTV, I’m writing this with the accompaniment of Gorillaz’s “Demon Days Live” – on Freeview all weekend, popfans – and trying my best not to be distracted by Ike Turner milking his piano solo for all it’s worth. Mind you, with the outfit that he was wearing, I can’t say that I wouldn’t have tried the “It takes four minutes for me to walk to the piano” thing myself.

Thirteen comics to review and only an hour to do it in before Kate comes back and we’re supposed to go to Sonoma. REVIEW BRAIN GO!

THE ALL-NEW ATOM #1: With different art, I probably would have liked this a lot more. It’s got a lot going for it – I like the idea of playing the Atom as a scientist who’s just pretending to be a superhero, with a team of mad scientists as his back-up. I like the “microscopic alien invaders that are possessing dogs” subplot, and I like Gail Simone’s dialogue (although the quotes-from-scientists-as-footnotes thing borders on the annoying, especially when the scientists as fictitious; Do we really need to know what Will Magnus, creator of the Metal Men, apparently wrote at some point?). But the art… It just seems weird. It’s Byrne’s strongest work for a long time, I think, helped by Trevor Scott’s inks, but it feels at odds with the tone of the book, far too mainstream superhero for what (writing-wise) seems to want to be an off-kilter alternative to your usual superhero. The incredibly bright, primary-colors don’t help, either… If the book can sort out its identity, it might make it past the first year, but right now, it’s nice-but-inessential, confused, and just OK.

THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #533: Yes, everyone else read this last week, but I hadn’t been to the store in a few weeks before yesterday, so I’m playing catch-up; sorry. Anyway, the start of this “Spider-Man unmasks! The world reacts!” issue almost sold me on the whole idea, as J. Jonah Jameson’s reaction – much, much better than the one-panel joke in Civil War #2 – rang true and suggested that everyone had thought this thing through properly. Shame, then, that the rest of the issue was horrifically clumsy, with “bickering Fantastic Four” jokes, and the ongoing portrayal of Tony Stark as manipulative and eeeeeevil to foreshadow Peter changing sides in a few months. That’s one of the things I don’t understand about Marvel’s continued claim that they’re playing both sides as equally right: Tony Stark, the leader of the pro-registration side, is continually being shown as someone who doesn’t care who he uses or what he had to do in order to get his own way – like, you know, a bad guy. Meanwhile, his opponent is Captain America, who’s Marvel’s purest of the pure. It’s already pretty biased in favor of the anti-registration team before you get to the obvious “Tony Stark was only using Peter Parker, Marvel’s everyman point-of-view character, and Peter’s realization of that forces him to also realize that he made the wrong choice and should be supporting Captain America” plot that’s in motion here. Where’s the evidence that the pro-registration side is in the right? Meh. Getting back to this particular book, though: It’s OK, mostly because of the strength of the JJJ reaction.

BRAVE NEW WORLD: In the little-seen Elseworlds 80-Page Giant that DC put out a few years ago, Tom Peyer wrote a parody of Kingdom Come and various other overblown superhero epics where pages would end with random quotations from classic literature that bore little or no connection to what was actually happening on the page itself, as illustration of the desperate pretention and need to dress up superhero books as something more than what they really are. This collection of six uninspiring previews for DC’s next six minis ends with the by-now-seen-all-over-the-internet double-page spread of the Monitors, and the following caption: “How many goodly creatures are there here! How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world that has such people in it. William Shakespeare, The Tempest”. Nuff, as Stan Lee used to say, Said. Crap, although almost worth it for the awkward politics of the Creeper and Uncle Sam stories.

DETECTIVE COMICS #821: In which Paul Dini and JH Williams take over, and Batman starts acting like a detective again. Not the light-hearted Bat-japery that I was expecting given Dini’s animated pedigree – something that I’m not sure Williams could get away with anyway; I think that his attempt at light-hearted may end up looking creepy, but that might just be me – but enjoyable nonetheless. The solution to the mystery at the end is somewhat random: “The bad guy was someone was a background character in one panel earlier on in the story!”, but there’s something to be said for done-in-one mysteries. Good, but I’m curious to see how Dini’s stories will read without Williams’ overly-designed art. I have the strangest feeling the answer may be “better”…

DEVI #1: Virgin Comics’ first title starts with a “Story So Far” blurb. Somewhere, someone must have thought that wasn’t the smartest idea, right? It’s pretty much an omen; the rest of the book is generic superhero mythology and execution and feels like something that’s been going on for years as opposed to an exciting new comic from an exciting new comic publisher: Characters with dialogue like “You walk into my home and threaten me? Such arrogance must be justly rewarded… by a slow and painful demise” fight each other for no real reason other than the story demands a fight, done with a noticable lack of passion or style. Not a good start for the Power Man and Iron Fist of comic publishers, Richard Branson and Deepak Chopra; hopefully their other books will have something in them that’ll let me remember them for more than five minutes after I finish reading. Crap.

FANTASTIC FOUR #538: Dear J. Michael Straczynski, please stop. Each issue I read of your FF run makes me feel as if you’ve never read any Fantastic Four before, but you’ve been told by someone what the characters are supposed to sound like. It’s a very strange and uncomfortable experience. Crap.

FRANKLIN RICHARDS: SUPER SUMMER SPECTACULAR: You know things are bad when the Calvin and Hobbes rip-off that this is – but Hobbes is Herbie The Robot! Genius! – has more of a Fantastic Four feel than the real Fantastic Four book. I don’t know if this is all-reprint – I’ve definitely read the free comic book day story here before – but it’s gentle enough family comedy for what it is. Brian seemed to really like this, but that may be more to do with his sick robot fetish than the quality of the comic itself. OK.

THE LEADING MAN #1: So, yesterday, Hibbs and Lester were giving me grief for the last New Comics I wrote for Onomatoepia, and the apparently obvious hatred I had for everything I wrote about. Now, I don’t think it was that bad, but then again, sometimes I just get grouchy and it makes me hate everything. That might be what’s going on this week, because I came away from this book, B. Clay Moore’s story of hot American actors who are also hot American spies, with a negative opinion that I’m not sure it really deserves. I mean, I couldn’t tell you why I didn’t like it. It’s a cute idea, and Moore’s dialogue has some nice moments; the art by Jeremy Haun is reminiscent of Michael Lark and Sean Philips’ team-up from “Scene of The Crime” years ago, as well. It’s just… It’s missing a story. There’s a plot, sure, but it’s so vague and undefinied that it’s barely there – there’s nothing that happens this issue that makes me want to come back next month, if that makes sense. I want to say that it reads as if Moore was so in love with the high concept that he forgot to put anything behind it, but like I said, that might just be me being grouchy. Eh, but ask me again when I’m in a better mood.

NEW AVENGERS #21: Or “You thought Howard Chaykin was phoning it in on Hawkgirl? Read this and think again, true believer!” Not that I’m saying that Chaykin is lazy here – although feel free to notice that the cover is just a recolored and flipped version of the last panel in the book – but, man, there’s some shitty Chaykin art in here. Thankfully, Bendis brings his writing to the same level, giving us the internal monologue of Captain America and revealing that he is (a) a moany old bastard – “What do you expect from a society that gets all its news from late-night comedy shows? Or course they don’t care! Everything is a punchline. Everything is just - - No. That’s not true. They care. They just care about themselves more than they care about the world they live in.” You half expect the narration to include “Why, in my day, I lived in a cardboard box.” – and (b) Frank Miller’s Batman (“You tried. At least you did that. Poor kids. Just doing what they’re told. Good soldiers.”). Really, really Ass.

OCT: OCCULT TASK FORCE #1: Tom Spurgeon was right. Ass.

SUPERGIRL #7: Hibbs handed this to me with the intention, I think, of seeing whether my head would explode when I read it. I mean, What the fuck is this? I know it’s part two of a story and all, but I have no idea of what is going on here, apart from Joe Kelly is possibly working out some issues and I am getting more and more freaked out with what DC is doing with Supergirl. From what I can gather, Supergirl is in some kind of parallel universe where there’s an evil Superman and he’s a dictator who Supergirl fights against until she decides that she would rather hook up with him in possibly the most fucked-up Supergirl/Superman scene ever published: Evil Superman: “What do you want that only Kal-El can give you?” Supergirl: “I - - Save me.” And then she kisses him while he cops a feel of her ass. No. I mean, just… no. That’s really, really creepy. And isn’t this Supergirl meant to be sixteen years old or something? Aiee. What’s the worst rating we can give here? Let’s go for Really Disturbing Whatever Happened To Quality Control Dan Didio Jailbait Supergirl Is Not Okay Especially When She’s Swapping Spit With An Evil Version Of Her Cousin Steaming Piles Of Crap From An Ass The Size Of The Moon Creepiness, shall we?

UNCANNY X-MEN #475: In which Ed Brubaker becomes a full-time X-Men writer by becoming a full-time X-Men writer. By which I mean, this doesn’t even read like Bru’s writing, except in small bits of dialogue. On the one hand, huzzah for consistancy for the X-fans, but on the other, Ed’s other writing – even on other Marvel franchise books like Captain America and Daredevil – is much, much better than what he’s offering here. Starting his run on the book with what is apparently wrapping up continuity from old storylines is an odd choice as well, considering that the last four pages of the issue start the real plot of Ed’s first storyline - which is, itself, wrapping up continuity from Ed’s first X-Book, Deadly Genesis. It’s a shame, because when Professor X explains his plan for the next few issues (which starts “First of all, the five of you are going to steal a spaceship…”), your immediate reaction is, “Well that sounds like a lot more fun than what I’ve just read.” Eh, but I’ll probably check out the next few issues because I tend to like Ed on other things.

YOUNG AVENGERS #12: Oh, Allan Heinberg. You should feel happy that I didn’t get around to reviewing your first Wonder Woman issue, because, really? By the time you give Nemesis his own logo without explaining to the reader who he is, I knew it was complete continuity porn as much as I personally enjoyed it. The same thing seemed to happen to this book – the amount of backstory necessary to understand it fully overwhelming the story itself – over the last few issues, but this issue manages to sidestep that by going for the interesting solution of “cramming everything into one issue because the book is going on hiatus”. A lot happens here - The Kree/Skrull battle, Patriot’s getting almost killed then getting superpowers that save his life, Kate getting the name Hawkeye, the Young Avengers apparently becoming official Avengers – but it all happens so quickly and without proper explanation that instead of anything being satisfying, it becomes confusing (Especially the Super Skrull’s fate, considering where he picks up from in Annihiliation). It’s all so rushed that it’s a frustrating and annoying read, which is a shame, considering how enjoyable the book was when it started out. Let’s hope that the return of the series next year sees a return to that level of fun. Eh.

PICK OF THE WEEK is, kind of by default, Detective #821, and PICK OF THE WEAK is very obviously the more-disturbing-than-Tarot Supergirl #7. Luckily for this disappointing week of single issues, it’s a bonanza for trades; I’m waiting for Kate to read the latest Fables collection before I can comment on the quality of it, but thankfully I can bide my time with my TRADE OF THE WEEK: SHOWCASE PRESENTS THE ELONGATED MAN VOLUME 1. Skip past the Flash stories at the start of the book and soak in the sheer brilliance of the Gardner Fox-written, Carmine Infantino-illustrated, detective stories that made Brad Meltzer fall so in love with Ralph and Sue Dibny that he had Sue raped and murdered, reducing Ralph to the depressing character that mopes his way through 52, depressing the hell out’ve everyone. No, wait, that sounded better in my head before I wrote that… Click Here to Read More...

Hurray, it's me!

SUPERMAN RETURNS: is absolutely a gushing love letter to the 1978 Donner SUPERMAN film. The are repeated shots, structure, even Lex Luthor's plot is basically identical to the one from the first film. And all of this would probably be fine if it didn't keep missing what I took as the best elements of the original.

Here's a for example: both films have a sequence of vignettes of "superman fighting random crime one night". In RETURNS, this is more bombastic: chain guns and bulletproof eyeballs, and lifting cars over his head and whatever. But for me, what made the '78 version work was that Supes stopped to help a little girl get her cat out of a tree, too.

Or how about the climax of Luthor's plot? In '78, Lex sent out TWO missles, in opposite directions, one immediately killing people, and one indirectly doing so. Superman had to make a CHOICE about what to do, and that's where the drama of the character comes from. "save the innocents, or stop me". Nothing even close to that here, even when they had some perfect chances (like, what happened to the Tidal Wave they set up earlier in the film?)

The SUPER parts of SUPERMAN RETURNS -- the plane spectacle, the car catching, lifting a mountain, or flying backwards with his heat vision, or the super-hearing or super-breath elements -- were all really well done. Terrific terrific stuff.

On the other hand, all of the MAN parts were just terrible. Predicated on a few inane concepts -- namely that Superman would leave earth and Lois for half a decade without bothering to say one word to anyone; or that it coincided with "astronomers finding Krypton" and that no one thought to say "oh, right, he's probably looking for home" -- on both sides that just doesn't make sense, and so all the resulting drama feels emotionally false. And all that stuff with the kid? I can't find a way to add up the time-frame to make any of that work.

What's really missing for me, though, was the marraige of the SUPER and the MAN -- I gave 2 examples from the '78 version above, and I'm sure you can all think of several more. And I don't think there was really any of that in RETURNS. A Superman film needs to show why he's SUPERMAN, not just how he's super, and why he's a man. And, yeah, rescuing kittens from trees is part of that.

The performances varied -- Routh looked the role, most of the time, but he had such vanishingly little dialogue to deliver, it's a little hard to call it a performance. He certainly did a fine enough job playing Chris Reeve playing Superman playing Clark Kent. Clrak is basically not in the movie, anyway -- he makes no impact and he has no role, other than, I guess, to see the fax. Spacey's Luthor was fine -- he gave a deal of gusto to whatever he was doing. Bosworth's Lois Lane was the real problem for me, though -- she looks way too young, especially with a five-year gap, and she's far too conventionally pretty to my tastes. Margot Kidder was raspy enough to be a journalist, I thought.

I walked out of the theatre thinking "That was good!", and by the end of the bus ride home, I was way down to "That was merely OK". Today I'm at a VERY low OK, and by this time next week, I could be well down to AWFUL.

Ben liked it though, which is the important bit. I didn't know if he'd sit still through 2.5 hours of film (he was fine, though he asked [whispering!] "Where's Superman?" 2-3 times through the show), or if his interest would hold. For nearly two weeks before Ben woke up every morning and asked first thing if Superman had opened yet. Swear to god. And now that we've seen it, he wants his SUperman figure to talk to him all the time. "Daddy, can Superman talk to me?" -- which actually means, "Daddy will you answer questions for him in a Superman voice?"

Overall, a very low OK from me on the Savage Critic scale.


What did you think of it?


-B Click Here to Read More...

First off, don't forget that because of the Fourth of July holiday, comics are going to be a day late, and will arrive on Thursday. Honestly, don't come in on Wednesday looking for them, because we're laughing at you behind your back once you walk out the door.

Yet another high volume week -- this time on titles, rather than on units, but there's just a metric fuckton of things arriving on this shortened holiday week. Joy.

2000 AD #1490
2000 AD #1491
52 WEEK #9
A G SUPER EROTIC ANTHOLOGY #36 (A)
ALL NEW ATOM #1
ARCHENEMIES #4 (OF 4)
ARES #5 (OF 5)
ART O/T WITCHBLADE ONE SHOT
BABEL #2
BATMAN SECRETS #5 (OF 5)
BATTLER BRITTON #1 (OF 5)
BETTY & VERONICA #219
BEYOND #1 (OF 6)
BLOOD OF THE DEMON #17
BPRD UNIVERSAL MACHINE #4 (OF5)
CASEFILES SAM & TWITCH #24
CLIVE BARKERS GREAT AND SECRET SHOW #4 (OF 12)
CONAN & THE SONGS OF THE DEAD #1 (OF 5)
CYBERFORCE #4
DARK HORSE TWENTY YEARS
DEATH JR VOL 2 #1
DETECTIVE COMICS #821
DEVI #1
DRAGONLANCE CHRONICLES VOL 2 KURTH CVR A #1 (OF 4)
ED THE HAPPY CLOWN #8 (OF 9)
FANTASTIC FOUR FIRST FAMILY #5 (OF 6)
FRANKLIN RICHARDS SON OF A GENIUS SUPER SUMMER SPECTACULAR
FRIDAY THE 13TH FEARBOOK #1
FRIDAY THE 13TH JASON VS JASON X WRAP CVR #2 (OF 2)
FURY PEACEMAKER #6 (OF 6)
GOON #18
GRIMM FAIRY TALES #7
HACK SLASH HARD SLICE
HATE ANNUAL #6
HOAX #4
IN THE HANDS OF BOYS #1 (OF 2)
INCREDIBLE HULK #96
INSOMNIA #2
JONAH HEX #9
JSA #87
JUDGE DREDD MEGAZINE #246
JUGHEAD AND FRIENDS DIGEST #12
JUSTICE LEAGUE UNLIMITED #23
LAST PLANET STANDING #5 (OF 5)
LEADING MAN #1 (OF 5)
LOONEY TUNES #140
LOVE THE WAY YOU LOVE #1
MANIFEST ETERNITY #2
MARVEL ADVENTURES SPIDER-MAN #17
MARVEL TEAM-UP #22
MARVEL WESTERNS KID COLT AND ARIZONA GIRL
MARVELS GREATEST COMICS FANTASTIC FOUR #52
MIDNIGHT SUN #1 (OF 5)
NEGATIVE BURN #2
NEW EXCALIBUR #9
NIGHTMARE ON ELM ST FEARBOOK #1
NIGHTMARE ON ELM ST PARANOID #3 (OF 3)
OCCULT CRIMES TASKFORCE #1 (OF 4)
OMAC #1 (OF 8)
OUTSIDERS #38
PALS N GALS DOUBLE DIGEST #104
PHANTOM #11
PIGTALE #4
POISON ELVES LOST TALES #5
POLLY & THE PIRATES #6 (OF 6)
PUNISHER #35
RAYMOND E FEIST MAGICIAN APPRENTICE #2 CVR A
REVOLUTION ON THE PLANET OF THE APES #5 (OF 6)
SECOND WAVE WAR O/T WORLDS #4
SECRET SIX #2 (OF 6)
SIDEKICK #1 (OF 5)
SKYE RUNNER #3
SUPER TABOO XXX #2 (A)
SUPERGIRL #7
SUPERMAN RETURNS THE MOVIE ADAPTATION
TALENT #2 (OF 4)
TEEN TITANS #37
TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE FEARBOOK #1
TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE GRIND #2 (OF 3)
TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE GRIND #3 (OF 3)
THEY FOUND THE CAR
THING #8
TRANSFORMERS EVOLUTIONS HEARTS OF STEEL #1
UMBRA #2 (OF 3)
UNCANNY X-MEN #475
USAGI YOJIMBO #94
Y THE LAST MAN #47

Books / Mags / Stuff
ALAN MOORE COMPLETE FUTURE SHOCK TP
ALTER EGO COLLECTION VOL 1 TP
BATMAN CITY OF CRIME TP
BLACK PANTHER BY JACK KIRBY VOL 2 TP
BPRD THE BLACK FLAME TP
CONAN AND THE DEMONS OF KHITAI TP
CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS SER2 MASTER CASE ASST
DEATH NOTE VOL 6 TP
EIGHTBALL PUSSEY TP NEW PTG
EPILEPTIC VOL 1 TP PANTHEON ED
FABLES VOL 7 ARABIAN NIGHTS AND DAYS TP
FIENDS OF THE EASTERN FRONT GN
FLIGHT VOL 3 GN
FORTEAN TIMES #211
G FAN #76
GREEN LANTERN PLASTIC BUST BANK
INVINCIBLE VOL 2 ULTIMATE COLL HC
JACK KIRBY COLLECTOR #46
JACKIE AND THE SHADOW SNATCHER HC
JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA SEASON 2 DVD SET
MINERVA VOL 2 (A)
MONOLOGUES FOR THE COMING PLAGUE SC
OLD BOY VOL 1 TP
OZ THE MANGA POCKET MANGA VOL1
PATH OF THE ASSASSIN VOL 1 SERVING IN THE DARK TP
PETE VON SHOLLY EXTREMELY WEIRD STORIES TP
R CRUMBS COUNTRY MUSIC T/C SET (NEW PTG)
SHOWCASE PRESENTS ELONGATED MAN VOL 1 TP
SUPERMAN ANIMATED SERIES VOL 3 DVD SET
SUPERMAN BRAINIACS ATTACKS DVD
SUPERMAN RETURNS THE MOVIE & MORE TALES OF THE MAN OF STEEL
SUPREME POWER HYPERION TP
TAROT WITCH OF THE BLACK ROSEVOL 4 TP
TARZAN THE JOE KUBERT YEARS VOL 3 HC
TOP 10 BEYOND THE FARTHEST PRECINCT TP
WEIRD WORKS OF ROBERT E HOWARD VOL 3 PEOPLE OF DARK TP
WET MOON VOL 2 UNSEEN FEET GN

But we do absolutely have ASSHAT OF THE WEEK this go round, in fact, I'll give you three candidates, and you can choose:

Is it MARVEL COMICS for shipping SIX "Civil War" crossovers last week, and NONE this week?

Is it IMAGE COMICS for releasing issue #4 of PIGTALE a full YEAR after it is due? (July, *2005*)

Is it AVATAR COMICS for deciding it's a terrific little idea to pump out 2 different "Nightmare on Elm Street", 2 different "Friday the 13th" and THREE different "Texas CHainsaw Massacre" comics, all in a single week, ensuring that no one other than *the most* hardcore fans of those properties will buy any of them?

You get to vote, but I have to tell you that I'm basically never going to order an Avatar comic for my rack ever again, because they're such an epicly fucked up, irresponsible, and incompetent publisher. (Though, this still means we'll be *receiving* Avatar comics over the next 6-12 months, since they're chronically late and behind) -- even those Ellis and Ennis comics where they get all of the creative freedom they want. I really and truly want to support Warren and Garth's work, but I'd rather be gang-raped by a group of angry, AIDS-infested, Samoans, then to give Avatar comics a single penny of *my* money EVER again.

Shitheads.

Anyway, with that aside, what looks good to YOU this week?


-B Click Here to Read More...