June 12 Week in Review Preview

Only two parts this week boys and girls as I slack off while heading into the sunset.

Clips for the posts!

The Week of June 12 in Review Part 1 of 2 - Scott Snyder Week

Now we come to why DC should be kissing the ring of Scott Snyder, Superman Unchained #1. I can’t believe I read an in continuity Superman comic and actual enjoyed it. It has been a very long time since that has happened. All Star Superman was not in continuity. I would say it was the Johns/Frank stuff that was the last good Superman work that was done at DC. This issue had the stunt with the poster size page embedded in the book, which is another DC weakness. They are more focused on marketing stunts they producing the best books they can. Fortunately that is not the case with Snyder as the story read great. It showed us Superman in action, gave us the traditional supporting cast (not sure who they are in other books) and gave

us a great mystery to be solved over the course of the story. ……….

The Week of June 12 in Review Part 2 of 2 -  Some High Points for the Week

Joe Hill’s Thumbprint #1 (of 3) may have been the best book I have read this week. It was based on a novella by Hill, written by Jason Ciaramela and art by Vic Malhotra. I was immediately drawn into the story. It is about a young woman who has left the army after being involved in the Abu Ghraib incident during the Iraq War. It was a black eye for the US when the army’s torture of POWs was exposed. We are seeing her story of both what happened to her at Abu Gharib, her adjustment back into civilian life and a mystery threat that is noted by someone leaving an envelope with a thumbprint in it. It is only going to be three issues long and obviously we do not have all the answers in issue #1, but we are getting a picture of Mallory Grennan……………..

Come back Monday and Tuesday for the full length feature attraction.

The Week of June 4 in Review Preview

A slight different slant as I find I can never have a consistent format.  It is only three parts this week.

                               

The Week if June 5 in Review Part 1 of 3 -   Three Marvel Books

Onto the reviews or thoughts I had about books I read this week. This part of the series of posts I want to talk a little bit about what themes intentionally or unintentionally Marvel is writing about in some of there books.

I’m starting with Superior Spider-Man #11. I realized the book is making an interesting point about what it is to be a hero. Peter is now gone and Otto is totally in charge. The book has become more vibrant and alive then it has been in a long time and brought me back into the fold. The reason is that we have the illusion of change and what a great illusion. It is Peter Parker, but he is no longer the Peter we knew, it is now his greatest enemy taking over Peter’s life. Otto seems to be better at it in many ways and is perhaps still a little too aggressive in other ways. From what I have seen the sales are sky high and maybe Otto remains Spider-Man for a long time. Heck he is Peter Parker, so the change is internal and plays to the comic fans while keeping the corporate masters happy. The question becomes what makes someone a hero. Is Superior Spider-Man a hero?

The Preview of The Week of May 29 in Review

I’m back. As you can see my cohorts were lost with out my stunning brilliance that starts off the week. Actually I’m sure I was hardly missed. This week is four parts and the clips are as follows:

               

The Week of May 29 in Review Part 1 of 4 - Daredevil #26 and JLA #4

Okay onto Justice League of America #4, another disappointment. I have less disappointment with this book as my expectations of Geoff Johns are low and David Finch never stays on a book for any length of time. Still when a series is launched with the creative team announced I would hope they would be on it for the first arc. We are on issue #4 and Brett Booth is the artist. Brett does a good job, but it still sucks that there is not even continuity within an arc on a comic at DC many times. Next complaint is how young these character look. Green Arrow is younger then the guy playing him on Arrow TV show. We are supposed to think Vibe and Stargirl are younger but they appear to be close to Ollie’s age. It takes a lot away from the characters. Recently a friend of mine said he feels DC books are almost being written for 12 year olds and now that he pointed that out I’m seeing a “dumbing” down on a lot of their books.

The Top Ten Reasons DC Sucks – Part 2 of 4 The Week of May 29 in Review.

 

7)      Superman. How do you f*ck up with not having this character having the best creative teams. When the movie hits Snyder will be writing one book, but Lobdell is on the other. The lack of planning in the new 52 around Superman has been tragic. The character is undefined at this point and I have avoided his books for the better then a year.

The Week of May 29 in Review Part 3 of 4 – Five Number Ones

Half Past Danger #1 by Stephen Mooney was a book I went in with almost zero expectations. It was tagged as being about Dames, Dinosaurs and Danger with a burning Nazi flag on the cover. It was shades of Indiana Jones, Jurassic Park, Xenozic Tales and an ERB type of novel. Also I have no idea who the heck Stephen Mooney is, but he wrote and drew the entire thing. It was a fun ride. We start in WWII on the Pacific front. Sgt Tommy “Irish” Flynn is leading his squad on a small island doing reconnoitering with a small squad. They find Germans where there should be none. Take pictures and run into a jungle filled with dinosaurs. Only Tommy survives.

Part 4 of 4 The Week of May 29 in Review – A Few More I Read

The Deep Sea one shot by Jimmy Palmiotti, Justin Gray and Tony Akins was a lot of fun, but ultimately a disappointment. This was obviously the zero issue to an ongoing mini-series. I kept looking to see if the three eight page chapters were in Dark Horse Presents, but I could not find any indication that was the case. So a great start to a cool story, excellent art by Akins and I guess we have to see (pun unintended) if the full story can find a home. Hey Jimmy run a Kickstarter to do the whole series!

Read it on the stands.

The full tilt boogie on Monday and Tuesday.

The Week of May 15 in Review Preview

The Week of May 15 in Review Preview

It was a decent week of books, with the best stuff being from Image, Dark Horse, Dynamite, IDW and anyone but Marvel or DC.

The Dream Review of a Thief and a Merchant – Part 1 of 3 – The Week of May 15 in Review

This leads into the reviews and first up is Dream Thief #1 (of 5) by Jai Nitz and Greg Smallwood. I loved this book. The narrative structure made it take me a few pages to get into the rhythm of the book. The story is an introduction to the main charter John Lincoln. We get to learn about who he is, are given some clues about how he is turned into the Dream Thief. We also see how much crap these powers leave him in at the end of the first issue. At the same time we are given a supporting cast. The narrative structure that threw me for a few pages was the letter from his father. As we are seeing this story being played out we are also being given snippets of the letter. When we get to the end of the letter we are at the end of the story. Not every page has a passage from the letter, but it was a very cool way to gives some background on John and a possible connection between him and his father.

Marvel and DC – Part 2 of 3 – The Week of May 15 in Review

Iron Man #10 was trash. Howard Stark runs an Ocean’s Eleven caper to save the Recorder who apparently has information he can use to save his unborn child (Tony). Retro-conning is the name of the game in this arc. Gillen’s super hero work continues to miss the mark for me. It has my curiosity to see where this is going and based on the last line that Tony has many “parents” I’m guessing a Gattaca type of thing (yawn).

Skip it.

The Alternative Publisher Books I Read – Part 3 of 3 – The Week of May 15 in Review

Bloodshot #11 was a decent read. The problem I had with the book is it covered too much of the same ground that had been covered in other issues of the Harbinger Wars event. It’s a tough call when you have a series that is part of an event as to whether the issue should remain true to the series or be a chapter in the event. Valiant is small enough and the event is contained enough that I believe each book should be a chapter in the overall story. That being said this was a very good issue as we saw some of the same events but learned more about Bloodshot’s point of view and what is going on with his programming. More and more I’m wondering if Bloodshot was ever a person or is he just a machine.

Buy it.

Come back Monday and Tuesday to see it all.

The Week of May 8 in Review – Preview

This week I’m doing six posts, Monday contains a some quick hits on everything I read and Tuesday is five short solo reviews spotlighting five new series from the last two weeks as I missed a week.

The clips:

Some of What I Read, Part 1 of 6 - The Week of May 8 in Review

Batman #20 was just flat out fun. Capullo can draw the crap out of Batman and each issue is just beautiful. Scott does a nice job with Batman defeating Clayface. My one gripe is that Snyder has fallen in love with Batman having more gadgets then ever. On one hand, of course Batman would own every technological advantage possible. On the other hand I like to think ultimately Batman’s brains and physical skill can take down almost anyone. It is a tough line to straddle with the level of foes Batman is up against. All in all this is just a rock solid beautiful book. Another plus is  that this book will not be part of any of other “events” for a little while.

Buy it.

The Week of April 24 in Review Preview

Four parts this week and as always filled with opinions and commentary.  A quick side note I read Global Frequency Part 1 by Warren Ellis and various artists, it was about six issues long and every damn issue was one and done and a great read. I miss that type of comic. Also saw Oblivion last night and it was a fun sci-fi action movie with some fun ideas in it. The only problem I had was the ending was turned into a Hollywood ending and the movie was hurt by it. Like Minority Report, adding the sugar coated ending takes away from the movie. Life is not always the perfecting ending. Damn, that was a long preamble.

                     

Clips from the posts:

Jupiter’s Legacy #1 – A Review Part 1 of 4 of the Week of April 24 in Review

As to the actual comic book itself, wow what a great f**king story. Mark Millar and Frank Quietly just knocked it out of the park. First and foremost Frank is one of my favorite comic book artists. His women are drop dead gorgeous, all of his characters are distinct, his story telling is superb, his ability to display emotion with body language and facial expression top notch. The colors by Peter Doherty add to the quality of Frank’s work with flat tones that imparts realism to an unreal world of super heroes. The book is a piece of art.

DCU Death of A Legacy and DC Books I Read Part 2 of 4 of the Week of April 24 in Review

In reading Jupiter’s Legacy it reminded me that the new DCU has destroyed the legacy of the DCU Universe. It is my opinion this is perhaps the biggest problem with the new DCU. DC tired to have it both ways by starting five years into the new DCU but has found that their severe lack of planning has made many continuity elements unfeasible, but they try to make them work anyway.

Marvel Books I Read Part 3 of 4 of the Week of April 24 in Review

Guardians of the Galaxy #2 was another solid issue in this new series. I did find it immediately amusing the Steve (I’m not producing 20 pages in a month ever) McNiven is already only doing part of the book. What I love about multiple artists on this book is how Marvel made it work. The pages given to Sara Pichelli are a different story line and colored very differently. That means not having the same art was not jarring at all, plus she is a very strong artist in her own right. So many of Benidis’ books have the pace set in geological terms, but this book is moving at a great clip. The battle in London is full of action, the “B” story line is setting up the confrontation to come and the conclusion was a brilliant cliff hanger. Also I never thought integrating Iron Man into this title would work, but so far it is working to perfection.

Buy it.

Alternative Press Books I Read Part 4 of 4 of the Week of April 24 in Review

Clone #6 by David Schuler, Aaron Ginsburg and Wade McIntire as writers with Juan Jose Ryp as artist is a very good sci-fi thriller. Luke, the Alpha clone, is trying to escape from his father and the camp of clones to save his wife. With some help he escapes and sends a mad killer (another clone of himself but younger) in the direction of the camp by accident. His wife is being held captive and apparently there is steroid clone Mark at that facility. A lot of plot elements are going on fast and furiously but the book holds together well. At its core is Luke trying to save his wife and child. Ryp’s art is solid as always and goes a long way in making this book work.

Buy it.

The full length features coming Monday and Tuesday.

The Week of April 17 in Review Preview

I made it very simple this week and wrote about every book that I got around to reading. I then broke it into two posts to keep the length reasonable.

A clip from each post:

What I Read – The Week of April 17 in Review – Part 1 of 2

Nova #3, the kid looks like he is 12 and going to high school. I hate the ultra young heroes. That is why I could care less about 12 year old Ultimate Spider-Man and I’m having issues with this book. I was shocked to hear Loeb and McGuinness are off the book after five issues, maybe that means we can get more story per issue. McGuinness big bold panels mean you get less story per issue then almost any other comic. To give Loeb credit he tries to pack as much as he can into the book. This issue Nova goes to Moon, meets the Watcher, gets trained by Gamora and Rocket and then goes off to scout out the invading bad guys coming in from space. It is a fun ride and a decent book, but again paying the extra buck for the digital comic is not worth it.

Read it on the stands, it will only take a minute.

What I Read – The Week of April 17 in Review – Part 2 of 2

Miniature Jesus #1 by Ted McKeever was interesting. A recovering drunk is seeing things and at a church a miniature Jesus comes off the cross and comes to life. The whacky preacher goes to step on Jesus and that was the issue. It is also oversized and in black and white. I’m an idiot so I will buy the next issue, but this is obviously a graphic novel being split into solo issues to underwrite the hoped for trade. Not enough occurred to draw me in 100% but McKeever’s work is nothing if not interesting.

Wait for the trade.

Come back Monday and Tuesday to see it all!

Preview of the Week of April 10 in Review

This week consists of four detailed reviews instead of the massively long short commentaries of everything I read. Consistency in a format is something I actually strive against.

                

Some snippets from each post:

Sex #2 - A Review Part 1 of 4 The Week of April 10 in Review

What I enjoy about so many comic book stories is how they all rely on various iconic super heroes to give us a short hand method of understanding them. In this book the main character Simon Cooke is playing a Batman role. We understand the character from the jump because we all have a working knowledge of Batman. We see Simon as a hero who retired and lost the battle for the soul of the city. He has come back to run his industrial empire. What caused him to retire and what has created all the uncertainty in him is being revealed in drips and drabs. Will he be pulled back into the life or will he be able to adjust to just being the CEO.

  

The Week of April 3 Preview Review

I went simple this week, yes this is an easy line for one of my co-bloggers to insult me with. Three parts by the main groupings I use for my list of what I get every week. 

A clip from each post:

Marvel Comics I Read – Part 1 of 3 of the Week of April 3 in Review

Indestructible Hulk #6 by Mark Waid and Walter Simonson.  I was not sure going in what I would think as sometime Simonson’s work is very, very loose, but this book was a blast. It felt exactly like what they were going for a Hulk story that invoked the memory of Walter’s great run on Thor. I would add Walter to my artist list but he never sells his work. This is not a mind bending or thought invoking saga this is a pure out and out character bits and fight scenes. The best Marvel book I got this week.

Buy it.

DC Books I Read Part 2 of 3 of The Week of April 3 in Review

Green Lantern #19 by Geoff Johns, Adrian Syaf and Szymon Kudranski. I can’t wait for issue #20 to drop this book. I don’t care that a new writer I like is taking over. DC interferes way too much in these books for me to want to buy into a new creative team. Plus if it is really great I can buy the inevitable trade. The Wrath of the First Lantern has been atrocious. The First Lantern powering up from all the emotions is just insipid comic book stuff.  The First Lantern destroys Sinestro’s world and absorbs the emotional energy or something inane to that effect. I will say the planet destruction ratio in GL books beats any other comic series. Add to that Hal is being drawn to look like Geoff Johns is just stupid; at least Hal killed himself in this issue if we are lucky he stays dead.

Don’t Buy It. 

Alternative Press Books I Read Part 3of 3 The Week of April 3 in Review

Godzilla Half Century War #5 (of 5) by James Stokoe. What a great mini-series. Stokoe puts so much into every page it is amazing. I’m guessing that he included a ton of the various monsters from the gazillion Godzilla movies made. I don’t know them but I have to assume it was all homage. What made this book is it was about two men who fought Godzilla over the course of fifty years. It had all the monster fighting and madness you could want but was a great story as well. John Layman did an excellent Godizilla mini and Stokoe’s was also excellent. I hope IDW can line us some other strong creative crews to do some mini-series. For my money it is the only way to go with Godzilla as the ongoing series is not a true viable option in my view.

Buy the trade.

Come back Monday and Tuesday for all three full length posts.

The Week of March 27 in Review Preview

Just two parts this week, but Part 2 a long one as I cover 17 books with brief remarks and commentary. The clips for this week:

Think Tank #6 – One of the Best Books – The Week of March 27 in Review – Part 1 of 2

Think Tank #6 is by Matt Hawkins and Rahsan Ekedal. This book I would put up there with Action Philosophers as a book that is both entertaining and educational. At the same time it is a taut thriller on the order of a Tom Clancy novel as our hero is a smart guy caught up in military adventures. Then on top of that it is a very cool almost science fiction feel to it as it takes the technology of today and sometimes pushes into tomorrow. Finally it is a character study and the story of a genius Dr. David Loren trying to make the world he lives in work.

The Week of March 20 in Review Preview

Well I threw out the entire normal idea for the week in review and we will start with a 2 part diatribe by Shawn and myself on DC.  A snippet follows - I hope to have a third part done to include some brief highlights of books I read. The DC thing is now just beyond the pale and has disheartened die DC fans like Shawn and I. 

Pre New 52 GA

The New 52 GA

Shawn: You covered all kinds of ground. Let me try picking some of your points apart, not because I want to disagree, but because they are worth closer scrutiny. We could debate Lemire, Azzarello, and Snyder’s current output, but they are not the problem. (Though there is a case to be made for taxing your talent too much. They cannot write everything.) DC Comics does not have a deep bench of proven and popular writers. Do they currently have a crop of gifted indie talent? Yes; however, one thing that has become apparent is that DC does not know how to cultivate young talent. Not in the current editorial climate at the very least.

As much as I dislike aspects of the New52 (*cough*where the hell is Wally West?! * cough*), I think the overall editorial vision of the relaunch fails not because of poor planning, but because they never truly owned their relaunch. What I mean by that is that DC has been largely reactionary since the launch. Eight months in? The first wave of axing and replacing began. Creative shifts have moved closer together and books come and go faster than you can keep track of. DC has little faith in their product, and unless it falls under the Bat-umbrella or are one of the very few exceptions, the editors are second-guessing their directions for their books. The overall complaints writers have had, whether they leave graciously or loudly, are the changes editors want to force on their books AFTER stories have been approved and the writers have written their stories

The Week of March 16 in Review Preview – Done in Five Part Harmony

So this week a snippet from each part.

The Kid’s Are Not Alright – Avenger’s Arena #6 – A Commentary – Part 1 of 5 The Week of March 13 in Review

This book made me realize that Marvel has sucked when it comes to making kid characters I care about. I have limited interest in Young Avengers, especially when the core of the book appears to be about a gay romance. I don’t give a whit about them being gay, I just don’t want to read Young Romance and if I do read Young Romance I’d rather read something I can relate to a little more (of course a happy marriage about a guy in his fifties and his wife would probably not sell). The bottom line is that regardless of the story I find it hard to stay with Young Avengers and Avengers Arena. Oddly Kate Bishop in the Hawkeye book appears to no longer be a kid hero and I love her in that book.

Random Thoughts The Week of March 13 in Review Part 2 of 5

The bru-ha-ha caused by Jerry Ordway is all over the place. When I read it I felt Jerry’s pain a little. He was bemoaning the fates that he signed an exclusive and had not worried about asking about guaranteed work. Not sure what the exclusive deal did for him then, but it is common mistake that when dealing with a corporation you forget they have lawyers drawing up this stuff. People trust the person they are dealing with and mistake the person for the company. I tell people all the time a corporation is a soulless entity and will do what ever it needs to do that best serves its goal which is to make money.  There are people in those companies who will treat people fairly, but you can’t depend on that. Jerry was lamenting the changing of the guard that goes on in every walk of life.

The Week In Review Preview

Three parts this week. Part 1 about the 40 issues epic of Rotworld.

Part 2 is on All New X-Men #8 and how much fun this book is and what it shows up.

Part 3 is about Sex, Joe Casey and the Age of Ultron. Are the best comics from Alternative publishers or not?

To mix things up a clip from each part.

A final note is Joe Casey in his back matter basic talks about the best stuff is going on in the alternative publishers, a better word then independents. His remarks are that Marvel and DC are so stagnant that he finds it hard to believe almost every blogger and others he reads still have Marvel and DC dominating what they talk about. I’m certainly guilty of an over focus on Marvel and DC myself at times; it is like we are all locked into a death spiral. Heck out of everything I have read this week Sex was the best of the week. In defense of the cape and cowl set, Joe’s work is building off our familiarity with that genre to tell his story. It speaks of an obvious affection that Joe has for the material. I think that stagnation is what causes writers to try and do as much as they can to change things up. Tying the first two parts to this diatribe, Animal Man and Swamp Thing wanted to change the characters in a profound way going forward. I guess they succeeded, but DC can hit the reset button at anytime. 

The Week of February 27 in Review Preview

Two clips from Monday's post that also reveal my grand design for Monday and Tuesday.

This week I have a set of three posts for the week in review and one is a cheat of sorts. The first post is about Batman Inc #8 and will of course contain many spoilers. It is impossible for me to talk about this book without ruining the issue, but let’s face it DC has tried to guarantee that everyone knows about. The second post will be another “Random Thoughts” post. Lee had plenty of stuff for Friday so I held onto this post but feel it only works if it is timely and even by Monday afternoon it is going to be stale. The final part will be commentary on a few other books that I read from this week. Sadly I keep falling behind on my reading and need to catch up so I try and read current stuff every week and save other books for later.

Then it really heats up with:

I’m bitterly disappointed the Damian died and I also totally understand why he died. Grant Morrison with Chris Burnham (and his art is great Gwen, regardless of what you call fat faces) have been killer on this book and in many ways it has been the best Batman book on the stands. The “but” is that the great work being done by Snyder and the heavy shift that the new 52 caused in Grant’s storyline relegated this book to a second tier status. As a straight up comic book this issue was excellent. The heroic death of Damian was well played. The character interaction between Dick and Damian made me long for the Batman and Robin series that featured Dick as Batman. The artwork was stunning, I’m sure work I could never afford an original page and Jason Masters’s work, while not as strong as Chris Burnham’s held up. I did notice Jason’s four page sequence did not feature Damian. The final two pages were flat out amazing as we see Damian die and then see Batman die a little as he holds his dead son in his arms.

Now what I want to talk more about is the character Damian, what Grant did for the Batman franchise and why I think it is funny how in one issue Grant has overshadowed all the other Bat books. 

The Week of February 20 Review Preview

This week we have four parts. Below a clip from Part 1 and the titles of the other parts.

Comic Book Covers – The Week of February 20 in Review Part 1 of 4

Okay with that bit of housekeeping out of the way, I wanted to talk about comic book covers. I was five or six years old when I first starting buying comic books. On Saturday night my Dad would drive to a local newsstand and buy the two Baltimore Sunday papers, the News American and the Baltimore Sun. It was a corner newsstand that had one magazine rack devoted to comic books. My Dad would usually give me up to a dollar to spend and that meant I could get up to eight comic books at 12 cents a shot. I had to choose and I could not take all day so it was the cover that helped make the decision. Over time I knew what series I wanted to follow and the cover was no longer a deciding factor, but if it was something new the cover could often sway my choice.

That was decades ago and the industry has radically changed and covers seem to serve multiple functions. We have variants, we have the WTF gatefold covers, we have enhanced covers, wraparound covers, blank covers and we are still awaiting the first talking cover and edible covers, but you get the point. Also we have a lot of artists who almost do exclusively covers. Adam Hughes, until his recent hiatus to draw an actual comic book, was only doing covers for years. Brian Bolland only does covers anymore. To me having one artist do the cover is a cheat, because the interior and the cover artist should be one and the same. Variant covers are BS also. Often I see some wonderful cover that is a variant and the regular cover is just okay. If the cover was meant to help sell a comic that best cover should be the main one. 

Number Ones – Will I Still Love You Tomorrow? The Week of February 20 in Review Part 2 of 4

DC How Do I Hate Thee Let Me Count The Ways – The Week of February 20 in Review Part 3 

of 4

Now These Books I Liked – The Week of February 20 in Review Part 4 of 4

The Week in Review - Preview

Again a short blurb from Part 1 of 3 hitting on Monday at 12:01 AM US East Coast time. Part 1 focuses on the new Secret Avengers #1.

I guess I should thank Marvel for saving me $3.99 a month (or more as they publish as often as 18 issues of some books a year) by kicking me off this book. I enjoyed the last iteration of the book and was curious as to where this version of the book would go. It didn’t take too many pages in for me to decide this was a one and done.

Before we get too deep into my opinion let me make it clear that I believe Nick Spencer is a decent comic book writer. He has yet to make me a huge fan of his work but he knows how to write a comic book. Next is the artist, Luke Ross is a good artist. Like many artists he knows how to tell a story. He is never going to make my list of artists I want to buy artwork from, but nevertheless a competent professional.

Now the flip side of that coin is that why do I want to pay $4 for an issue from the team of Nick Spencer and Luke Ross, neither are considered “A” list talent at this point in their careers. Sure I get a “free” digital copy for the extra buck and they have the “AR” feature in the book, but I think the $4 price point should be reserved for the top tier stuff.  I tried out two of the AR features, one was a joke piece and the second was Nick Spencer’s voiceover a page saying how this is going to be a great series and a lot of fun. Give me the creators talking about the book or why these characters are ones they love or something. The AR is very hit or miss. I will say this that at least Marvel is trying, DC does nothing cool with modern tech in their printed books.

The rest as well as part 2 later in the day on Monday.