Robert Downey Jr. has his work cut out for him: Graeme 0n 4/11.

Perhaps fittingly, considering what's currently going on in the Marvel Universe, IRON MAN #16 is a rather uncomfortable comic. It's not uncomfortable for the good reasons - It prods places in the reader's mind that they wouldn't want to consider at the best of times, for example, or it offers up some inconvenient truth (Al Gore as Tony Stark; what a concept) - but because it just doesn't hang together well at all. For one thing, Iron Man as a character (That is, Tony Stark when he's wearing his technological supersuit) doesn't really appear in the book, other than in flashback in one scene. The rest of the book revolves around Tony Stark as Director of SHIELD, bring so driven to take down terrorists that he doesn't give a damn about military protocol. Which is a potentially interesting take, but one that doesn't really sit well with his portrayal in other books, where his following the letter of the law over what his instincts may say causes him to, say, set a trap involving a pretend corpse of Captain America (Oh, and also: The book isn't called "Tony Stark: Goateed Defender of America"). Sure, Stark comes across as a dick in this book as much as he does in other books, but it's a different kind of dick, and that sort of thing should be important, somehow. (There's a moment of supreme dickishness towards the end of the issue, where Dum-Dum Dugan is giving Stark a lesson in how to be a good military leader. Dugan says, "As our commanding officer, you will make life-or-death decisions. When you do, you must ask yourself one very important question: Did your decisions today make for a better world tomorrow?" The dickish moment comes when Stark replies, with a smirk, "Yes." It was a rhetorical question, Tony! And even if it wasn't, that smarmy certainty isn't going to win you any points.)

The end of the issue, where Stark speaks at the funeral of fallen SHIELD agents, is one of the few places where the characterisation of Stark seems consistent with the way he appears elsewhere, and it's arguably accidental; speaking in tribute to the fallen soldiers, Stark says "I have had the distinct honor of fighting alongside hundreds of super-heroes in my life... but very few heroes." And it's such an odd line that what I took away was that Stark doesn't consider super-heroes actual heroes. Which, you know, ties in with his Civil War persona of "superheroes are idiots who need to be registered and trained" and all, but at the same time makes you stop and think, Wait, why aren't super-heroes heroes? Is their desire to do the right thing despite their personal cost somehow invalidated by them wearing costumes or something? ("I'm sorry, Spider-Man. Yes, you saved that nun and her band of orphans from certain death in that burning building, but I happen to have the exact mathematical formula for heroism here and, ohhhh, you were just slightly off. Better luck next time.") That said, I'm convinced that such thinking isn't what the writers intended, and instead they were just reaching for just another "You know who the real heroes are, America? Our brave boys and girls in uniform" moment, a la Civil War #7.

But here's the thing: The events of Civil War, for better or worse, have ultimately pushed this character into the position of being not just a super-villain, but a pretty successful super-villain - He has created clones who kill people, manipulated governments, tried to ignite international war, and not only gotten away with it, but been rewarded for it. Books like New Avengers play the character as a villain fairly openly, and it's in that light that you can get away with him devaluing the sacrifice of others while telling people with certainty that he has made a better world. But as a hero himself or even just as a sympathetic character, that arrogance and lack of self-doubt doesn't make for interesting reading. Yes, he will inevitably be heading for a fall and will regain some humility prior to his movie launching, but without any attempt at moral uncertainty at this point, I find myself unable to care. In his own series, not only does Iron Man know that what he's doing is right, but two issues into the new status quo, the creators appear to agree with him; there's no ambiguity here, and that makes for dull reading. Eh.

Readying My Purple Jumpsuit: Jeff's Still Reading the 4/4 Books.

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA CVR A #7: I'm reviewing this issue because I found it a much better read than Cover B. No, no, just kidding. Although it's yet another issue of nearly no action (I'm fully expecting Meltzer to wrap up his run with the conclusion of the god-damned election of the JLA head, or maybe a dramatic motion by the Sargeant-At-Arms to table the reading of the minutes of the last meeting until after everyone's finished eating cookies), I'm a sucker for the uber-reverential tack Meltzer is taking--if Red Arrow didn't get me, the good ol' Hall of Justice would've. One could argue (probably quite successfully, I should add) that this is all just nostalgia and easy symmetry cranked up to 11, cheap fanboy pandering at its hucksterish. And yet I'm digging it, I admit it. Highly Good, and I might even go higher if I wasn't paying fifty-one extra cents every issue. MADMAN ATOMIC COMICS #1: I'm with Hibbs and MacMillan, although I was always kinda lukewarm on Madman for a reason I couldn't quite put my finger on until now. Flipping through the rehash, I realized that Allred was pretty self-indulgent with Madman, crossing the character over with every other god-damned comic hero ever created and not hesitating to use him to promote any other project, comic series, album, movie, or underwear line Allred was undertaking at any given time. So I think it'd be awesome if Madman ends up one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse because, say, Allred's starting up a crazed religious cult (of which he would of course be the charismatic, cartooning, sludgey-guitar-playing head) and he wants to get his message of the End Times (and the purple tracksuited, free-loving individuals only he can save) out to the comic book reading population.

Obviously, I'm not emotionally involved with the character enough to go more than Eh either way, but I obviously (still!) resent having to sit through Astroesque enough that I probably would've stuck to that rating if this had actually been good.

MARVEL ZOMBIES ARMY OF DARKNESS #2: Like Hibbs, I thought the Blob gag and the last page were great. Unlike Hibbs, I probably will pretend that cliffhanger is true and that's the end of the mini. Two Good pages and a whole bunch of stuff I don't care about (actually, now that I think about it, the fact that Dazzler is apparently Ash's idea of a perfect woman is pretty funny too) puts it on either high Eh or low OK.

MIDNIGHTER #6: I picked this up because of Jog's mention of it (although re-reading the post now, I realize I missed his dismissal of the story as "actually really overwrought and kind of awful") and quite liked it. I have no idea where it fits into continuity (I kinda stopped paying attention to the book once Midnighter crushed Hitler's ball--has anyone in modern comix written as much about Hitler's testicle as Garth Ennis?) and kinda don't care. Did I want to read Shogun Assassin with 80% more gay? Turns out I did. Call me crazy, but Good. Here's hoping next issue is The Duelists...with 40% more gay!

OMEGA FLIGHT #1: Oh, man. I remember after Bendis wiped out Alpha Flight in New Avengers, he or Quesada or somebody was all, "Don't worry. We love Alpha Flight and this is just our first step to bringing 'em back in a way Alpha Flight fans are gonna love." So, yeah, you get to the last page of this book where apparently Sasquatch is beat to death by the Wrecking Crew and I gotta tell ya, I could just feel the love coming off the pages. Awful stuff, even with art by Scott Kolins (I know some of you will be inclined to replace "even" with "especially."

It's hard to review when you don't know what you think: Graeme, 4/4.

Here's the odd thing; I didn't really like SAVAGE TALES #1 that much, but I'm not sure I could tell you why. I mean, sure, I could say that three of the four stories in this relaunch of the fantasy anthology are unsatisfying first chapters, not able to find enough of a middle ground between character work and action to provide me with any reason to come back (The one exception to this is Ron Marz and Adriano Batista's opening Red Sonja story, which manages to use what reads as a pretty throwaway scene as a sneaky way to introduce Sonja to any new readers, showing us not only the character herself but also her reputation and the world in which she lives - It's actually a surprisingly successful way around what would otherwise have had to be an exposition dump either in dialogue or narration, and just one of the reasons why this is easily the best story of the issue; I'll get to some of the others later), but I'm unsure whether that opinion is really a failure of the creators or partially a result of my expectations of the title based on its format.

Anthologies like this, you see - Adventure-based anthologies, I guess you could call them - are all, in mind, up against 2000AD as some kind of ideal of what they should be. And not any particular issue of 2000AD, but a dream issue; something that probably never existed, but merges the best of their strips together into some kind of superprog. This is partially because I grew up, like most comic readers from the UK, reading 2000AD every week even when most of the stories were crap even to an undiscerning fourteen-year-old, but also partially because 2000AD did a lot of things right (to me, at least) when it came to working in this format. One of those things in particular was that the writers knew how to write serials in 5-page episodes - they kept things moving, even if it was only the illusion of the advancement of plot, and when they couldn't do that, they'd overwhelm you with dialogue that was funny, or stylish, or incomprehensible or whatever, but which gave each series its own personality. Because of that, there would be episodes where nothing would happen, or everything would happen even if it made no sense (Both of these, admittedly, happened more often as 2000AD got older and its readers started growing up; the writers that started it, Alan Grant, Pat Mills, John Wagner and the like, were old pros at making sure that each five page episode had at least one action sequence, even if it was just a very dramatic argument between characters. I'm thinking now of writers like John Smith or even some of Grant Morrison's stuff like Really and Truly), and you wouldn't care, because the personality of the story was so strong that that was what you were really reading for, coming back for every issue.

And that, maybe, is what is missing in the strips in Savage Tales: Personality. Each strip, including the Marz Red Sonja one, is pretty homogenous. There's a sameness of tone to them, a manneredness to the writing that restrains the dialogue and the imagination just as it keeps the visuals to a pretty generic superhero book level (with the notable exception of Pablo Marcos's work on one strip, which is completely elevated - I'm tempted to say "saved" - by the coloring that gives it a painted finish), and that might be the one thing that disappointed me more than anything else. I mean, yes, Leah Moore and John Reppion's story is all set-up and no actual story (Showing two panels of a mystery man in a hood with glowing eyes doesn't count), and Luke Lieberman and Mike Oeming focus on action at the expense of coherent storytelling and, you know, telling the reader the name of their main character (No-one is really given any introduction, and as a result, it's hard to care about the story because we have no idea of the context), but there's no variation in tone between them, nothing to make them stand out against everything else in the book. The same goes for Mike Raicht's Lovecraftian story at the back of the book - Yes, there's more of a horror element, but it's treated in exactly the same way as the other stories: Po-faced, earnest and without any sense of humor; Marz's story opens with comedy, which is another of its saving graces. As, for that matter, is that it's the only story that attempts a cliffhanger to draw the reader back for issue 2 - The hero is in direct, if somewhat vague, peril as opposed to the other three stories, all of which close on "slight sense of unease with foreboding last line."

So, yeah. It's not that the stories are bad, as much as bland. But when you have such little space to work in or offer the reader some reason to come back next month, then maybe that blandness is the worst thing that this title could have to offer. Technically, it's Okay, I'm sure; if I had more affinity to the subject matter, maybe I would like it more, but to me...? Eh.

Late To The Party: More Review from Jeff of the 4/4 Books.

I'm finally watching season three of Battlestar Galactica, on maybe episode eight or something, and....wow. I'll be curious to see what they do with the next ten or twelve episodes but, occasional clunker or two notwithstanding, it's one hell of a season so far. In other late adapter news, I just read my first volume of Naruto last week.

And next week, the missus and I are getting one of them new-fangled rotary-dial telephones! No more party lines for us!

Oh, and what a drag Johnny Hart died just a day short of Easter Sunday, huh? I think the timing of that would've made him grin a litttle. I'll spare you the standard story, but suffice it to say my brothers and I had about 15 to 20 B.C. paperbacks growing up and read 'em until the spines dissolved.

And, anyway:

DARK TOWER GUNSLINGER BORN #3: I don't know; I'm getting a little more underwhelmed with each issue. I mean, it looks lovely, but it reads like Cormac McCarthy doing a rewrite of The Sword and The Sorceror. And while that was initially okay, it's getting a little dullish--the big action in this issue is a dude batting a decapitated head twenty feet, and someone getting their finger knocked off with a slingshot. At this rate, we're gonna have people blinding each other with straw wrappers and/or falling after running with scissors by issue #5. Lovely but really when you factor in the price and the back-patting extra features? Eh.

DETECTIVE COMICS #831: I run hot and cold on the art team of Kramer & Faucher--if nothing else, whenever the Ventriloquist pops up I can't help but notice how much everyone looks like a mannequin--but some fault also lies with Dini who, as Hibbs pointed out in the store on Friday, still writes his action scenes for animation. I'm also not down with Harley being rehabilitated (if nothing else, I think it's the third rogue to do so in Dini's run, which suggests either a very slowly developed story arc or a distracted writer) but, on the other hand, it's a pretty competent done-in-one and us Batman fans gotta take our thrills where we can get 'em these days. So, OK.

FALLEN SON DEATH OF CAPTAIN AMERICA WOLVERINE: Nice art, but I got to the point where Wolverine recruits Daredevil for DD's heightened senses and I never quite recovered. (Isn't that like Iron Man recruiting War Machine because he needs someone with armor and high-tech weaponry?) I'll probably keep checking these out, if only to see if Loeb falls back on his crutch of excerpting lengthy historical speeches for cheap and easy resonance. Please don't mistake that for a recommendation: pretty pictures pull this up to Eh.

IMMORTAL IRON FIST #4: Ups the awesome by about 200% and probably just in time--dashed-off steampunk hyperbole meets wacky kung-fu hijinks and old-school convoluted Marvel continuity to give you that classic '70s comic book feeling of a book that can access every genre conceivable and still have guys in funny suits punching people in the face. Also reminded me a bit of reading Ellis's superhero work but without the nagging feeling the author was vomiting in a wastebasket every four pages. Very Good stuff, in short. I liked it quite a bit.

IRON MAN HYPERVELOCITY #4: In a way, this is almost like Adam Warren's rewrite of Livewires, as you get a lot of the same ideas and motifs--a fixation on "mecha" culture, artificial personality and cat-and-mouse games with high-tech covert intelligence agencies--but all of the dullness carved away: Warren not only throws his protagonist from the frying pan into the fire at the end of every issue (as he notes on the last page here) but at least once more per issue, as well. It's currently running the risk of being too one-note at this point, but I'm inclined to believe he'll change things up for the final act. Highly Good stuff, and it'll either make an awesome trade or an exhausting one. I'll be curious to see where it goes.

JONAH HEX #18: If the nation's Grindhouse fever keeps up for more than a week or two--or happened at all, if the movie's earnings are any indication--maybe DC could figure out how to advertise this book in a way that makes explicit the links between this and those scuzzy theaters with their cheap and nasty double features. Like many of those lovely films, this issue was a nasty piece of work with little more in mind than putting its arm around you, offering to school you in mankind's most detestable behavior, and then punching you in the stomach when you drop your guard and lean in closer to listen. Pretty OK, although just about every issue I put down feels about two to five pages too short.

Bunny or No Bunny: Graeme runs at some more 4/4 books.

I really need to look at calendars more often. It's Easter already? Where's my egg? 52 WEEK FORTY-EIGHT: If Richard Corben and Phil Jiminez had a baby, it would be Darick Robertson's art in this issue, which manages to jump back and forth over the line that separates looking rushed and particularly stylized. We're in the rather rushed end-run of the series, now, and it's coming more into focus that things aren't going to really come to a complete conclusion in the next four issues -Intergang may be trying to turn Gotham City into Apokolips (It's the fire pits that gave it away, even though commentators over at Doug Wolk's blog think that they're actually Lazarus Pits), but I can't see any way for that plot to even be properly introduced never mind completed, considering the other plots that still have to be dealt with. Unlike Hibbs, I'm not so happy about the idea of Batwoman dying this issue, if only it feels like the character never really transcended the hype surrounding her sexuality and debut in the New York Times. I mean, sure, it explains why we've not seen the character outside of this series, but still, it's a waste of whatever potential was in there in the first place. Okay, but at this point, I don't want to see characters dying and issues spent entirely on one plotline anymore.

DANGER GIRL: BODYSHOTS #1: It's Alias meets Charlie's Angels, and curiously enjoyable in a trashy kind of way. I've avoided Danger Girl until this series, mostly because I didn't really see the point, but... Eh. It's fun, if you set your sights low enough, and always interesting to see a creator-owned book continue without any input from said creator.

THE IMMORTAL IRON FIST #4: By this point, the co-writing team of Ed Brubaker and Matt Fraction has shifted more towards a Fraction-esque direction - When airships crash into mythical cities and men in top hats emerge with guns, you start to wonder whether Matt's taking more of a lead in plotting, or whether Ed has started to be infected by his writing partner. Balancing expositionary introduction of the Iron Fist history with kung-fu and shootin' action and corporate takeovers, this continues to be much more enjoyable than it has any right to be. Good, even as I'm not the biggest fan of the Steel Serpent.

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #7: I'm such a sap. I really shouldn't enjoy this; the individual scenes don't work, I don't buy half of the character development, but... I kind of dig the new Hall of Justice/Watchtower headquarters. I'm happy that Dinah gets to be the chair of the team in this new setup. And even as the "fate decided the team" theme voiced by the characters mirrors the first three issues of Bendis' New Avengers too much for my liking, I have to admit that this seemed surprisingly Good to me. I'm sure that everyone else may find it somewhat less impressive, but, feh. This completely sucked up to my DC fanboyishness, and won me over.

OMEGA FLIGHT #1: Again with the slow build! Only two of the characters on the cover appear inside this way-too-self-conscious first issue of a series that shows surprisingly clearly that whoever decided that this shouldn't be an ongoing book after all made the right decision. Bri had it right, pointing out that this book is far too American-centric for a Canadian team. When the whole concept seems to be "American supervillains are invading Canada, so American superheroes have to save the Canadians," there's something weirdly patronizing going on. But why am I surprised? Crap.

SUPERMAN #661: As much as I enjoy Kurt Busiek's one-shots, I have to admit, I'm pretty much done with fill-ins by now. It's not that I'm desperate to get back to the ongoing Camelot Falls arc (Although I am, and it's interesting that the four months of filler on Action Comics is getting such bad press, but the four months of fill-in skip by without commentary on this title; Maybe because regular writer Busiek has been on the book all along?), but there's something almost weightless, in a way, about this issue; a feeling that no-one, not even the creators, really cared about it that much. It's enjoyable enough, but there's something very Eh about the whole thing.

Coming up either tomorrow or Tuesday, we'll see if I can get my thoughts about the Savage Tales relaunch to amount to more than just "It's not Ron Mars, whoever spellchecks the Dynamite books..."

Sky-Blue But Stinking of Vinegar: Jeff's Opening Reviews for the 04/04 Books.

Writing comic book reviews on Easter Sunday morning? I cannot tell if I am to be admired or pitied on this, one of our more deeply confusing holidays [cue the whole Jesus/Easter Bunny/salvation/colored egg thing, done to death by thousands of stand-ups, here). Hats off to Dave Robson, who told me he was going to spend Easter morning watching Grindhouse. I can only hope this will become a trend that will transform the face of the holiday, and 100 years from now parents will have to explain how looking for Easter eggs and watching "Hobo With A Shotgun" ties in to the story of Jesus.... 52 WEEK #48: Montoya becomes The Question and it's highly OK but I was really underwhelmed. I find that especially troubling because I'd argue that Montoya's story arc has been the most solid one in 52, overall: the character beats are there; the motivation is there; verbal and visual metaphorical use of the Question motif, etc. In talking about it with Hibbs, he suggested that maybe because it was a foregone conclusion it didn't have the "oomph" it might have, and there's something to that.

But I still blame the '80s. Yes, that's right. I blame an entire decade for my general listlessness to the Montoya/Question storyline, because if there's one thing that decade taught me to be wary of, it's a woman in a fedora.

As you young whippersnappers probably know from history class, MTV started back in the '80s and in those early, pre-Real World days they actually showed music videos. Music videos in those days were infamous for showing you unreal things filmed cheaply out in the real world, and leaving it to you to sort out what was real and what wasn't. I think it took me over ten years to realize that if you drop a rose on a checkered ceramic floor, it doesn't shatter like glass. Also, if you are in the water with a woman--say, at the beach or a tropical lagoon--and the two of you come out of the water at the same time, you have other options than gripping each other at the arms and screaming. Even if you are in slow motion. Also, no matter how much you clean it first, a sexy woman is not going to dance all over your car. It's just not going to happen.

So whenever I see a woman in a fedora, I find myself getting anxious. It's true. Up until she became the Question, every scene in which Montoya tugged on her hat led me to believe she would next be in a shoving-dancing match with her pimp, rubbing herself all over her hair-metal boyfriend's car, or dancing with a suspendered cartoon cat. I think this may have hampered my enjoyment of 52 #48 which was, as I said, probably a pretty OK issue, overall.

ALL NEW ATOM #10: I wonder if something got changed in the drafting process--you know, another pass to tighten up the plotting that changed the character's relationships, maybe--because I really, really can't buy that (a) Ryan is still going to be friends with the woman who married the dude who savagely beat him before her eyes and would have murdered him if fate hadn't intervened; or (b) that woman would have married the dude who savagely beat her friend almost to death before her eyes. And maybe it'll pick up next issue, but I also wish it was a little less Sometimes They Come Back and a little more Chinese Ghost Story (parts 1 or 2). Still some stuff to like, but lower end of Eh for me.

AVENGERS INITIATIVE #1: I wasn't fond of the death scene, partly because it seemed pretty telegraphed, but more than that I found the book kinda muddle-headed. Here, the Initiative is being an extension of the military whereas the other Civil War comparisons I've seen liken it to police firefighting service--which I think really affects the tenor of the thing. If registering your superpowers is like registering a handgun, and you have to pass some sort of very basic training in order to be licensed, that's one thing. But if it means you're shipped off to a base where people holler at you and you crawl in the mud and get accidentally killed, then that's essentially a draft and I think there would be a very different national reaction to it. (I know there are lots of factors in play, but I think a huge difference between the current war and the Vietnam War is that there is no draft hanging over the head of today's college kids and, as a result, a lot less protesting.) Considering half of the book's hook is the Initiative, it'd be great if, now that Civil War is over and there's not as much tightly-knit deadline sensitive cross-continuity going on, Marvel might take the time to really iron out all their ideas on it. (And considering the other half of the hook was the Avengers in the title, it'd be great if we got to see more than Yellowjacket.) Slott does a an okay job with what he's got, but instead of war movie cliches with a superhero gloss, we got some deeply wonky military nut who could use the previous history of our armed forces as a basis for the behind-the-scenes drama of military men who need to figure out standardized training for people with non-standardized powers. To paraphrase the great bluesmen, "Well, the men don't know, but the Tom Clancy fans understand."

Anyway, for those who prefer their reviews without so much Monday (or, in this case, Sunday) morning quarterbacking: deeply Eh.

BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER #2: I agree with the G; this was much stronger than the first issue (which I liked just fine) and so like this even more. Another thing that I think Graeme nailed in his review is his reference to Joss's "swagger." A couple of people on our comments and elsewhere have protested that they don't understand Whedon's popularity, and I'd say it's precisely this swagger that makes Whedon stand out. It's not that he's especially great at any one thing (although his sitcom training tends to give his dialogue both a lot of zest and a tendency to sound all the same, sometimes) but more that he's good enough at a lot of things to know how the rules of how they work and how to break those rules when it suits him. (For example, he's done that sudden change-up to a dream or fantasy sequence several times before but he nailed me with it here because of how he plays with the page pacing.) The high level of craft plus that extra bit of zing is what can make him a very entertaining writer and, when he's on, you get Very Good work like you do here.

More tomorrow, most likely. Happy Easter!

Mad, Bad and Depressing to Know: Graeme on Allred, 4/4.

Continuing the trend from Brian's last post: Something else that Annalee liked? Grindhouse, which she and the lovely Charlie Anders invited Kate, myself and a theater row of others to watch at the Bridge last night. Perhaps because I am young, innocent and Scottish, I'm not so familiar with the whole grindhouse thing - I've seen some of the movies and trailers themselves, but outside of the context of grindhouse culture, so the whole package that surrounded the movie last night (Including about half an hour of trailers for genuine grindhouse movies) was both surprising and very, very enjoyable. The actual movie was both only moreso, especially the Rodriguez half, which just piles more and more over-the-topness throughout itself to give you the feeling that This may be the greatest achievement in cinema history more than once. Tarantino's half starts slowly, but just when you're getting worried that you're going to be bored by the whole thing, kicks in the awesome to such an extent that you'll be cheering along with the best of them. Kate's and my love of Rose McGowan aside - and that's a pretty big thing to put aside, let me tell you - the best thing in the movie for me may be the trailers between the two movies: "Don't!" being something that makes me laugh much more than it should even a day later. Consider the movie Very Good... But anyway! Because I said I would yesterday! MADMAN ATOMIC COMICS #1: Wow, what a spectacular misfire. Whenever I think of Madman, I tend to think of absurd, colorful, retro fun that occasionally strays into the existential, sure, but fun nonetheless. Maybe I've only got this impression because I've not read enough Madman in the past, and the series itself has actually always been a downer with a surface glee, because if there's one thing that this opening issue of the new ongoing series isn't, it's fun in the slightest.

The plot of the issue, such as it is, is the following: Frank Einstein, the eponymous Madman, finds that everyone in the world is dead. After reliving his past in the exposition-heavy bulk of the issue, he's told that that past wasn't real, and he's not a superhero at all, he's actually the personification of one of the Four Horsemen of The Apocalypse; he's actually Death. The end. I've got quite a few problems with this, the first one being - You spend an entire issue on exposition summing up the character's history, only to spend the last three pages saying that none of it is true? Then haven't you just wasted everyone's time and money...? That really seems like the case here, especially considering that the exposition isn't particularly inventively done; it reads more or less like a Marvel Saga issue, but less so, not focusing on recurring themes or the big events but apparently just recapping almost every issue (with the exception of the cross-company crossovers, although Superman, Nexus and the Savage Dragon all appear in there). Why spend so many pages building up a history that doesn't matter for, I assume, new readers like me, only to pull it away at the last moment? The shock "That's not who you are" reveal doesn't work, because we've only really been told who Frank thought he was, instead of shown, and the shift in tone (Frank isn't a fun superhero, he's Death!) doesn't even seem particularly jarring, because the book started with the horror theme of Frank finding rotting corpses everywhere. It just seems... dull, kind of.

I almost wish that I had been reading the series long-term, just because I wonder what the reaction of longer-term readers would be to the ending of the issue. Would it seem more dramatic? Or would they, as Brian seems to be, have been turned off by the essentially-issue-length recap of things that they already knew up to that point?

(Also, for that matter, if we're to believe that the end of this issue isn't a giant swerve, hasn't Mike Allred just killed demand for his expensive Madman Gargantua collection by saying that none of it happened in continuity? Or don't people care about things like that?)

It's a strange move, I think, spending your first issue more or less spinning your wheels before trying an "everything you know is wrong!" ending - You haven't earned the gravity that that ending should have because, hey, it's a first issue (Yes, the book has been around in many other incarnations by this point, but you don't fill an issue with recap unless you think that you're reaching new readers who haven't read that stuff before, so obviously on some level Allred is treating this as a first issue - "First smashing issue! Jump on for the ride of this life!" as the cover blurb screams), and so it feels like a cheat and kind of like shock for the sake of shock, which tends to kill goodwill from the reader. There's something oddly reminiscent of early '90s Image in it, the way that Liefeld and Lee and all the rest tried to pull X-Men style reveals on characters that they'd introduced at most two issues earlier, so maybe the whole thing is some meta joke now that this book is being published by Image, but... I don't know.

Don't get me wrong, the new direction, if it takes (and I kind of hope that it does; not that I like the new direction, because either Frank goes along with it and becomes Death which is, you know, not what I want from this book at all, or he doesn't, and becomes the cliched "monster who denies his destiny and tries to do good" that Hellboy has had covered for the last decade and a bit, so... But at this point, I feel like Allred can't just reveal that this is an entire fake-out because if it is, then he really has just wasted that first issue entirely) may end up being the best thing since sliced bread, and the book is still pretty damn pretty to look at. But that doesn't change the fact that this is a very disappointing first issue, not only because of the lack of fun, but also because of the worthlessness of pulling the rug out from people who weren't standing on it in the first place. Crap.

Brain and brain, what is brain? Hibbs continues 4/4

Wow, how cool would it have been if "Spock's Brain" was about zombies, huh? That's my mini-theme this entry, with two zombie reviews:

MARVEL ZOMBIES / ARMY OF DARKNESS #2: I actually can't tell you how much I'd like it if that cliffhanger were true, and that was the last we saw of Ash -- what a perfect, absurd ending that would have been.

In fact, I'll even say that that last page may be my favorite last page of a comic book so far in 2007.

I also really really laughed hard and out loud at the Blob sequence, even though it was background and only a page long.

So, yeah (and I honestly don't beleive I am typing this): GOOD.

RAISE THE DEAD: Also under the auspices of Dynamite, this is a lot more pedestrian. I feel like I've read "trapped in a truck stop diner" ten thousand times before, even though I have probably not.

The characters are reasonably well voiced, the suspense level is adequate, and despite the slightly awkward, "our gun is from children" bits, this is generally compelling drama. But there's nothing, in this first issue at least, that really STANDS OUT -- nothing to differentiate this from, say, WALKING DEAD (sorry, sorry! Too obvious a compariosn, I know, but there it is). Or 20 or 30 different movies or TV episodes or something that I've watched over the years. In a genre as well-mined as "zombie survival", you need to have something DIFFERENT to get to a worn out soul like mine. And while this was competant, maybe even very much so, I didn't get much of a tingle from this first issue.

I'll check back with it, because, y'know, I own a comic book shop and I can read comics for free, but not because of "Wow! That was fresh/new/exciting!". Which is pretty much the cardinal sin for a new (ongoing? I think?) title.

A strong OK, but only OK.

What did you think?

-B

PS: Analee liked OPTIC NERVE #11

Hank Pym: The Next Pussycat Doll. Graeme, more 4/4.

So, for once I actually get time to sit down and write reviews ahead of time, and then Brian manages to beat me to every single one. I was going to post about Madman today, but considering Hibbs' review is below, I'll do that one tomorrow, and today go for... AVENGERS: THE INITIATIVE #1: Color me surprised that Hibbs disliked this more than I did, and also that he didn't mention the really, really bum note that opened the book - It starts in Iraq, where one of the new characters is introduced fighting terrorist insurgents... who are from the Marvel Universe terrorist organization, Hydra. Now, as much as I liked Hydra and know that they've never really been portrayed as a joke within Marvel's books, and as much as I know that Marvel really really wants to be socially relevant and set in "the real world," there's something really odd and kind of cheap about seeing carbombers in Iraq yelling "Hail Hydra! Cut off a limb, two more will take its place!" as they try to drive into American soldiers. Is it weird that that disturbed me so much? It's literally one panel, but there was something about it...

Anyway, kind of like Hibbs, the first thing I thought about this book was that it was trying too hard to be serious and dark - I kind of feel for Dan Slott, whose previous recent series for Marvel have been lighter, more an old-school mix of action and comedy, and relative failures in the marketplace. Then he does this book, which is almost comedically bleak (The good guy with the heart of gold gets killed accidentally saving someone's life! Life is pain), and Marvel upgrades it from a miniseries to an ongoing before the first issue is even released; there's a lesson there, and it's not necessarily a good one. The thing is, I don't see what here could support an ongoing book; the characters certainly can't, as introduced here (Brian's right, there aren't many sympathetic ones), and the concept is essentially "Superheroes get trained to be superheroes," which we've seen waaaay too many times before, without too much of a twist. Or too much of an open twist, anyway.

The reason I mention an open twist is that there's a weird subtext in the structure and dialogue of the book. We're introduced to the main characters of the issue, but in the process, one of the characters screws up and is sent home, and the issue finishes with them walking off into the sunset... like some kind of reality show. And at first, that seems like a stretch, but here's the dialogue from the scene where she's told that she's leaving:

"I'm sorry, Armory, you've been washed out of the Initiative. We'll be confiscating your weapon. You're grounded."

Referring to the title of the book in the dialogue? "You've been washed out of the Initiative"? "You're grounded"? Am I the only person who can see this as the follow-up to "In fashion, some days you're in, some days you're out... I'm sorry [name of contestant], you're out" or "You're no longer in the running to become America's Next Top Model"? The introduction that the new characters get to their new situation is also kind of Tyra-esque:

"Here at Camp Hammond, you will be put through Avengers basic training. This includes combat, first aid, and superhuman ethics. Once you pass, your registration card will be upgraded to a full hero's license. And if you're among the best and brightest... You'll be offered a spot on of our fifty nationwide teams. Do that, and you've made it to 'The Show'."

Yes, he really offers them a chance to make it to "The Show" (whatever that is supposed to be - Has anyone ever referred to being a superhero as "The Show" before?). Maybe it's just me, but there's a definite reality show feeling to this book; I'm just not sure if it's intentional or not. Nonetheless, that also drives the feeling that this isn't a book that should be ongoing - There is, surely, a finite end to this story (When America's Next Top Avenger is crowned), and the idea of the series just shifting towards another cast at that point isn't an exciting one; similarly, the idea that none of these characters will ever become competent enough to graduate the Initiative or the series strains the credibility of the whole enterprise. I know this book has the Avengers name on it (even though, really, it doesn't need it - The characters are getting "Avengers basic training," whatever that is, but that's about the only link to the team in the entire first issue), and that means that Marvel will want to capitalize on their franchise for as long as possible, but this is really a book too far. Crap.

Sad about the MAD: Hibbs continues 4/4

MADMAN ATOMIC COMICS! #1: I have to admit I was deeply disapointed in this. Admittedly, MADMAN has been off the market since... 2000 or so? And so I guess I understand the intellectual decision to make this an All-Recap issue, but the problem with a plot-driven recap is that it doesn't give an idea, really at all, of how FUN Madman could be. And, despite Allred clearly being driven to get to his uber-plot of "The Four" and all of that, that was probably the bits of the previous run(s) that I liked the least.

I had really thought, especially with a title like "Madman Atomic Comics!" (with the exclamation point and all), that this was going to focus on the Ginchy Fun bits -- sort of like that Paul Rivoche pin-up towards the back; but, instead (especailly with that ending), it was actually kind of dour.

Because its all (or, at least, primarily) flashback, I suspect many long-time Mad-Heads are going to be like me (disapointed), and new-to-the-character readers won't exactly understand what the appeal was.

And appeal there very much WAS I really really want to sing you the praises of MADMAN... maybe next issue?

What did you think?

-B

Creator On A Tear: Jeff Reviews Adam Warren's Empowered.

EMPOWERED TPB: The first twenty pages of this made me think of that old Matt Groening joke about how paradoxically the French are funny, sex is funny, and comedies are funny, and yet there are no funny French sex comedies. Initially, Adam Warren's sexy superhero manga Empowered is not sexy, uses all the superhero trappings for comedy-based blackout sketches, and Warren, while certainly influenced by manga, is not a manga artist. Really, the first twenty pages or so read like a PG-13 version of Little Annie Fanny where superheroine-in-training Empowered finds herself in one embarrassing (but relatively mild) bondage "story" after another, comically whimpering about how pathetic she is. If this had been a comic book one shot, or the next 220 pages read like the first, I would be telling you to save your money, express general frustration and be done with it. But, in fact, I pretty much exhort you to get out to the store and find a copy of this because Empowered is probably the most enjoyable book I've read in a month or so. Through an act of creative alchemy, Warren takes those first few three page "stories" (created by Warren on commission for someone who collected superheroine-in-bondage art even though Warren himself seems creeped out by such a specialized kink) and sees a deeper potential for the character. What he goes on to do simultaneously is and isn't revelatory--he develops character and mileu by building on continuity. It's not revelatory because that's what superhero comics these days do. What's revelatory is how well Warren does it, and the tricks he uses to accomplish it.

Once Empowered meets a doting hired thug who genuinely admires her, the book's story begins to shift and Warren places the bondage into a context that he feels more comfortable with: "You're, like, a hundred times braver than any of your bigshot, overrated Superhomeys teammates," Thug tells her. "How tough can it be to act all brave and courageous when you're pretty much invulnerable, like most of the Superhomeys? [...] You keep on plugging away. You keep on putting yourself in harm's way. That's brave. Or crazy. Or both." While on the surface this reads like exactly the sort of thing, say, Jim Balent would write while putting his nekked witch Tarot in explicitly titillating positions, it's far more convincing after seventy-plus pages in which we've seen nothing more explicit than a buttcheek or some side-boob. It's easy to read Empowered and feel like Warren is walking the walk while talking the talk--emotional vulnerability is sexy to him, and it's the emotional relationships in the book that go on to resonate. With that in place, Warren goes on to develop the book's mileu with his typically irreverent eye for detail (for example, he gives the Superhomeys one of the more absurd and yet rational origin stories I think I've ever read. And I won't give away any details about Empowered's "roommate" but I thought that too was tremendously amusing and satisfying).

Although I'm not gonna bore you with it, I should at least point out how Warren uses variable length stories to accomplish such a satisfying read. Starting from those brief three to five page "stories" (little more than blackout sketches), Warren builds a dizzying number of tales into the book, some as short as two pages, some as long as eighteen pages. Because Warren's pacing and command of storytelling is so spot-on, each piece pretty much works on its own, but each of these pieces also help contribute to the larger whole of the book. Really, they should probably just be thought of as scenes but that's not quite the case--they're like turbocharged scenes, or as if you got to read the first twelve issues of a superhero book with all the inessential stuff cut out. By the time I put down the book, the characters felt like ones I'd been following forever, and I can't wait for the next volume.

From ambivalently developed, compromised fan commission to extraordinarily satisfying character comedy--Empowered is a triumph of a creator's skill, craft and intuition, a Very Good work and I urge all of you to hunt up a copy. As I said, it's one of the most enjoyable books I've read this month and I can't wait to see more.

A Rolling Stone gathers no Joss: Graeme's accidental theme post about 4/4 books.

This didn't start out as a themed post, but it just kind of turned out that way. See if you can see the subtle connective thread... BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER #2: Maybe I'm just getting into the Whedon swing of things, but this seemed much better than the first issue to me - There seemed to be more to it, in some way; the plot moved forward, there was the reintroduction of more characters from the TV show (although Andrew looked nothing like he did on the show, and was only recognizable through his geekdom and Star Wars references) but also character work that works within the context of the comic series itself. Also, there are zombies and fairy tales, which is always nice. More to the point, there is also some of Whedon's swagger back in play, from the switching of scenes at the start of the issue, to the dream sequence, to Amy's fake-out surrender; it feels like a stronger episode of the show, especially as compared with last issue. Very Good, thankfully, although maybe that's due to my recent reading of...

FRAY: Proof that this here site has been good for me, at least, comes with the fact that I read this purely because of people telling that I should, back when I reviewed the first issue of the new Buffy series and was somewhat underwhelmed. This book - midway between Buffy and Firefly (including the futuristic slang that really annoyed me in Firefly; Alan Moore, I blame you, purely because of your use of it in Halo Jones, all those years ago) - was precisely what I was looking for in that first Buffy issue: Fast, funny, and not reliant on you knowing continuities of anything before you started reading. The final showdown with Urkonn, in particular, resonated with the anything-can-happen feeling of Buffy at its best, along with the comedy of the finale of that scene. More than anything, it felt like the pilot for a series - I finished it and wanted to read more, almost immediately, but that's only a good thing. Perhaps when Whedon is less busy he'll get around to writing some more but, for now, this was solidly Very Good.

As if this wasn't Joss Whedon-y enough, his first issue of RUNAWAYS (#25) is also out this week, and it's... Well, it's Good, but pretty much a disappointment after Brian K. Vaughan's three-or-so years on the book. The pacing seems off, as does the dialogue, but more importantly, the bringing the book into the mainstream Marvel Universe doesn't work. On the previous two occasions that the characters were in New York, there was a feeling that it was something unusual and special, but this time, the Kingpin and Punisher appear and it's just underwhelming for some reason. The feeling may be gone, I guess, but that's not to say that I won't end up liking the new feeling.

Oddly enough, the most Buffy-esque book of the week for me might actually have SUPERGIRL AND THE LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES #28. The first year of this book, and the last four or five months or so, have had a wonderfully episodic-television sense of pacing where each issue is complete in and of itself while still advancing the overall plot, with a blurb at the opening of each issue setting the scene for that continuing story as much as would be needed by any new readers. With the creative team heading towards the end of their run on the book, it's nice to see the clarity of focus that Mark Waid brought to his early issues come back, as well as the feeling that the book is about more than just superheroes in space - Both the first year arc, and this second major arc (although it went through a prolonged birth, thanks to fill-ins and what seemed to be Waid being exhausted by 52) have had an epic feel to them that's missing in most superhero books these days. Very Good again, thankfully.

What did the rest of you think about these books? You've probably picked up at least two of them...

My Country 'Tis of Thee: Hibbs starts on 4/4

A couple from this week, then: 52 WEEK 48: The inevitable comes true, though the cover obviously telegraphs it. Ultimately, I tend to think this is a mistake -- there's few enough strong supporting characters in the world that MOntoya becoming a mask isn't the choice I would have made; but it does work well within the context of both the story, and her own personal arc. I was a little annoyed that "Gotham burns" (Again?!? How can ANYONE in that town afford property insurance?), and there's also something a little strange about Robertson's art, with it's big open page gutters -- at first I thought "is he drawing on the wrong sized paper or something?", but no, many of the pages have a full bleed out to the side. It's a weird stylistic choice, and one that distracted me a lot in the first half of the issue. I also think it would be cool if Kate actually dies, since that would be absolutely unexpected, though she's in the COUNTDOWN ad so probably not, huh? Anyway, quibble quibble quibble, but I still thought this was VERY GOOD.

BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER SEASON EIGHT #2: Yeah, that rocked. Really rocked. And was properly dense, too -- unlike last issue, this felt nearly like a complete TV episode in itself. There's an awkward transitional bit at the end there where it cuts away from Amy and Xander for a minute, but when it cuts back it's away from Xander's beat. But other than that? Letter perfect. My only question: I'm not sure I understood the Giles scene in the beginning? Where is he in relationship to Buffy? Not in the same place? But he's training a larger number of the slayer-ettes then Buffy seems to have around her? Muh? Anyway, an easy EXCELLENT.

I am STUNNED how well the book is selling, also -- our As-Big-As-CIVIL-WAR initial order lasted us 12 days (CW was about 6 weeks or so), we got in the Largest-Single-Reorder-of-a-Comic-That-We've-Ever-Placed for the second printing, and we're halfway through THAT pile already. #1 is easily my best selling 32-page comic in the last 10 years or so -- we're not quite back up to where we were in the SANDMAN days, but if we keep selling 3 or 4 copies a day, like we have been lately, we're going to get damn close...

AVENGERS THE INITIATIVE #1: It is competently done, but there's not really any sympathetic characters here (except for maybe Cloud 9, but I think that's more from pity than actual interest), which is a pretty big problem, I think, for an ongoing monthly. Even the situation isn't sympathetic -- people being taken against their will to a training camp, and, when something bad happens, its covered up. This is supposed to be America? I was also kinda shocked there's a scene of "here is your mask, you will NOT use powers without wearing it" for two reasons: a) that seems pretty counter-intuitive to the High Concept of having an accountable nationwide super-hero task force -- I'd think things would be largely the opposite, that all recruits would be issued a visible ID card with a "badge number" they'd hvae to display openly at all times. If I were an American citizen in the Marvel Universe, I sure wouldn't be up for my government handing out MASKS; b) it is immediately undercut a few pages later in the "training room" where not ONE of the seven characters involved wears a mask. I was also deeply bothered by the "we're confiscating your weapon" scene. Take the same scene, and instead of Never-Heard-Of-Her-Girl, cast, say, Iron Man in that spot. Still feel comfortable with it? "We'll just be taking this incredibly powerful tech from you. We're the government, you can trust us." I usually enjoy Slott's work, but this is really a badly thought-out opening sequence to an ongoing *Avengers* comic. As a mini, this might have been the right way to go (and, it got "upgraded" to ongoing when Marvel got the numbers in), but as a "Hey! Buy me for the next five years!" I'd take a serious pass. AWFUL.

OMEGA FLIGHT #1: Wow. I can't even BEGIN to imagine a world where a sovereign government (not on the brink of collapse, or coup, or otherwise facing direct and imminent extinction) would just blithely hand over the reigns of its single most important military asset to a foreign government. I mean, isn't this pretty insulting to Canadians? Especially having a jingoistic nutjob like the USAgent being the first recruit? And the very idea of Mr. I-nuked-Canada-once being draped in the Canadian flag and forced on the team seems, I don't know, beyond insulting? Walter's portrayed as a completely ineffectual, out of touch loser, and there's not even the courtesy of an explanation of how he survived his previous dashed-off death. But, really, the problem is: this portrays Canada as America's 51st state, with all of the due accord being #51 comes with! I am super-curious to hear what a Canadian thinks about all of this, because I'm kind of reading this with my jaw dropping that anyone at Marvel thought this scenario was a good idea. Maybe the best way to read both this, and AVENGERS: THE INITIATIVE, are as horror stories. AWFUL

What did you think?

-B

Out like a lamb: Hibbs wraps 3/28

Right, let's "wrap up" last week -- PICK OF THE WEEK: I'm going to tie between two books I didn't actually write about (I didn't write about many comics this week, did I?): BLUE BEETLE #13, and USAGI YOJIMBO #101. USAGI is USAGI -- every issue is terrific fun stuff full of intrigue and action and humor and chills. It is very nearly a textbook example of "how to do good continuing comics", and this issue is no exception. (issue #100 was an exception, but that's because it was about the comic rather than being a comic itself). I remember having a conversation with someone or another maybe 15-20 years ago about the "celebrity" of the comics artist, and how much money the "top" artists were making in Japan, and how wouldn't it be nice if some day American creators might do as well as Rumiko Takahashi was doing then? (this was before Image, obviously) Today we have a couple of folks that are beginning to enter those kind of rarefied heights -- Frank Miller, I would assume; possibly Alan Moore, or some of his collaborators. I know at least one artist who never has to hustle any longer because of their SANDMAN royalties.

If there was any justice in the world, Stan Sakai would be in that bracket. Why do we live in a world where USAGI doesn't sell 50k an issue?

BLUE BEETLE is another solidly fun book, in "learning the ropes of the supergame" as its core. Obviously things jostle around month-by-month, but this is almost certainly DC's best monthly solo-character super-hero comic -- it has heart, it's filled with fun action, and it is very focused on building its own ambitious mythology within the larger DCU. Everything you want in a super-hero comic, ultimately.

So hurray for both of them!

PCIK OF THE WEAK: Yeah, got to be WONDER WOMAN #6. Picoult, I'm sure, will "get" the verbal/visual blend before too long, but she ain't got it yet. I intensely dislike the current editorial direction of the book, and I can't believe that we've got Circe as the heavy given the first arc of the book. Foo!

BOOK / TP OF THE WEEK: BATMAN: SNOW is absolutely loverly work from Seth Fisher; GREEN LANTERN: REBIRTH was a solid way to get Hal back into the DCU; and boy, it's nice to have GRENDEL: DEVIL BY THE DEED back in print (kinda weird that its the B&W version, wasn't expecting THAT), but the best book of the week is pretty obviously Bryan Talbot's ALICE IN SUNDERLAND. Go buy it.

And, believe it or not, I have a BOOK / TP OF THE WEAK, our first ever: DEAD HIGH YEARBOOK, horror GN aimed at kids (? Really? That's rougher than *I*'d let less-than-15 touch, but the ads for this GN, in this week's DC's [!] seem to suggest they think its for younger than that). I suppose if you've never read a horror comic before this could be fun, but they read about as well as, say, a Gold Key TWILIGHT ZONE story. And the framing sequence was just interminable. It does have GREAT production values -- look at that puffy cover, the bloody smudges on the edges of the page, and so on -- but the content was really dreadfully weak.

Semi-parenthetically to that, I read through CENTURY GUILD CHAMBER OF MYSTERY v1 with a number of pre-Code horror stories. And they are weird and lurid, but they're not really any good at all. What I found the most interesting though was the note in the indicia that said (from memory) "The contents of this book have been significantly modified, so as to constitute a new copyright", which struck me as down right odd and peculiar.

Not owning any of the originals in question, I couldn't tell you want they changed -- the lettering and art certainly looks period. I suppose it could be recolored, even. But could that possibly be enough to assert copyright on something you didn't create in the first place?

Anyway, more tonight.

-B

Wait, what's this comic about again?: Graeme starts 4/4 on time, and late.

I am, in far too many ways, a Jeph Loeb apologist. This isn't because I think that Loeb is some kind of underrated genius or anything - He isn't, although I maintain that his first six issues of Superman/Batman are a lost pop art gem - but just because I think that he gets waaay too much shit online. To read most of the things that have been written about him, you'd think that he was singlehandedly responsible for the downfall of the superhero comic through his work on things like Batman or Supergirl. It's pretty unfair, I think - There are some things that he's very good at; when it comes to big dumb old-school superhero epics that hit every fanboy erogenous zone without caring about such things as "logic", for example, he's pretty much in a league of his own (and I mean that as a compliment, believe it or not). It's just that there are some things that he's not so good at. Subtlety, for one. Sadly, FALLEN SON: THE DEATH OF CAPTAIN AMERICA #1 is the work of the Jeph Loeb who wants to be subtle and sensitive instead of the one who wants to knock your socks off. And it pretty much sucks.

You can tell that it's going to suck from the start of the book, which opens with the somber cover of Civil War: The Confession (Cap's blood-splattered shield!) above the title of the comic, followed by the somber cover of Captain America #25 (Cap's glove, with a handcuff around his wrist, against a blood-splattered newspaper!), proving that Marvel definitely tries to get the most value from their artists, didn't have any other use for those two pages, and want you desperately to feel how serious this comic is going to be. Sadly, that's then followed up with the first page of the story, which ends with dialogue so bad that you start to wonder if the two covers were there to postpone the story until the last possible minute:

"Nobody would want to see what I saw. Don't you get it? It was - - The death of Captain America."

The first thing on the next page? The words "The Death of Captain America" is red, white and blue. By page five of the comic, the phrase "The Death of Captain America" has appeared three times; it's as if someone got worried that you'd forget what comic you were reading, and took appropriate action. Sadly, this is the most interesting thing about the entire book - Everything from that point onwards is a downward spiral of pointlessness. The plot revolves around Wolverine not believing that Captain America is dead (Didn't he see the two reprint covers or the three mentions of the title of the comic?), and breaking into SHIELD headquarters to find out the truth along with Daredevil. Why does he need Daredevil, you may ask? Well, because Daredevil's heightened senses will help him question the man they think shot Cap. Sure, Wolverine himself has heightened senses that could probably do the same thing (Am I completely misremembering scenes where he could literally smell if someone was lying? I almost hope that I am), but then Lenil Yu wouldn't have the chance to draw a "cool" double page spread of Daredevil and Wolverine jumping over each other. By the end of the book, Wolverine finds a corpse (although we don't see the corpse's head except in silhouette, interestingly enough) and seems to be convinced, as he explains to Iron Man in a fine example of Loeb's increasingly odd dialogue:

"I don't see his shield. How you going to play this, Stark? That Steve Rogers is dead, but Captain America will live on? That's what you'd like, right? You people..."

Yes, it really does mix bold and italics like that, with the strange emphases; it's like that all through the book, for no immediately obvious reason, as in the following:

"You want me to go back and tell them. Anybody who had hope. Who are in denial. Luke Cage. Spidey. The other Avengers. That I've got proof."

As you can tell, by the end of the book, Wolverine is convinced that Cap is, indeed, dead - Good thing too, considering there's another four issues of this series left - but that still doesn't really give you enough story for 32 pages. It's literally "Wolverine doesn't believe he's dead. Then he sees the body, and he's convinced. The end." Everything else is what we've seen far too much of from Marvel since the start of Civil War: Characters telling each other how important the stories are. That's what the whole issue is about - The idea that Captain America is "really" dead, and that this is serious and for keeps this time (as emphasized at the open of the issue, when the formerly-dead Bucky and Wolverine discuss the fact that people don't tend to stay dead in the Marvel Universe). The only problem is, it's not for keeps; we all know that, and spending 32 pages to try and tell me any differently isn't going to convince me or seem like anything other than a waste of time, an insult to my intelligence, and an attempt to try and milk this storyline for all its worth. Awful, despite the pretty art by Yu.

Counting Hits, Living Crits: Jeff With a Few More 3/28 Reviews

Mentioned work was a big nightmarish, yeah? SENSATIONAL SPIDER-MAN #36: Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa's first few issues really underwhelmed me, but I thought I'd pick this up to see how it's been since. I think the hook for this--a mysterious scientist is picking up orphaned youth and giving them spider powers to see just how anomalous Peter Parker is--was both kinda interesting and charmingly goofy (and the ultimate identity of the mysterious scientist successfully upped the interest and the goofiness). Despite the book's title, it's not really sensational, but it was surprisingly solid, highly OK, and I'll make it a point to check out next issue.

SUPERMAN CONFIDENTIAL #4: Felt kinda dashed-off to me--particularly in Sale's art, which is frequently blocky (but rarely this clumsy), but also in Cooke's script, which just hasn't wowed me here. It's on time (I... think?) and not a fill-in, however, which is more than you can say for the other Super-books. Deeply Eh, if you ask me.

ULTIMATE FANTASTIC FOUR #40: God, it's kind of embarrassing to admit that I was enjoying this book more when Mark Millar was breaking out his usual big moment, comic-book-equivalent-of-power-chords shtick than when Mike Carey whips up intelligent, yet turgid, reinventions of minor FF villains but, to be honest, yeah, I think I did. I don't know if there's some verbal/visual blend that's off, or a mismatch in the creative team, or what, but the first five pages of every issue since Carey has taken over feel like a chore to read. Or maybe it's that the most dynamic interpretation of Diablo is still, let's face it, Diablo. Whatever it is, I found this sadly Eh.

ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #107: A really enjoyable little issue, as Bendis manages to skip all the expected high school drama from the Kitty-Peter showdown but still manages to make it dramatically interesting, and gives us a nifty, potentially complex set-up for a Kingpin story. Another really Good issue and seems like it's back on the rails for good (by which I mean, until the next time Bendis takes on too many assignments or something).

More tomorrow, and hopefully work won't feel like an elephnat standing squarely on my forehead by then.

Je vais prendre ta douleur: Graeme likes the French Canadians, really.

If ever there was a back-cover blurb to strike fear into the heart of the average reader, it's probably going to be one that starts "Guy Delisle is a wry 37-year-old French Canadian cartoonist..." Not, I should immediately add, that I have anything against Mr. Delisle himself, as you're just about to read. But there's just something so matter-of-fact and dry about that opening that your average - if you will - "punter" will read it and more than likely think "Wow, that sounds like something I'd avoid on NPR" and go on to the latest issue of Tarot or something to make fun of it. And that's a shame, because PYONGYANG: A JOURNEY IN NORTH KOREA is Excellent. (A small aside, though, about that NPR line above. I was listening to This American Life the other week, and Ira Glass talked about hearing Summer Roberts from The OC describe his show as "that show by those hipster know-it-alls who talk about how fascinating ordinary people are," and if I didn't already love This American Life, Glass's reaction would've sealed the deal for me: "I had this experience [after hearing that] where I was like, it was like having fictional characters from the Fox network saying... They said my name... And, like, did that just happen? It was totally just like, Is this on everybody's TiVo?" Arune, if you haven't heard this episode, you have to track it down - Glass then talks about his OC fandom (And I feel completely vindicated for loving the show, now; Ira Glass likes it, you snarky bastards) and admits that not only did he and his wife sing the theme song every week, but he also cried during the last episode. It's almost enough to make me sign up for Showtime to see the new TV version of TAL, I'm telling you.)

(Anyway, back to Pyongyang.)

It's not that there's anything wrong about that clinical back-cover blurb, as such - certainly, it's factually correct - it's just that there's so much more to the book than the just-the-facts presentation that the blurb provides. Yes, Delisle does "depict [the] sojourns into the heart of isolation" of working in North Korea as an animation producer while living in "'cold and soulless' hotel rooms where he suffers the usual maladies of the long-term boarder," but it's the way in which he does that that makes the book so special, so worth reading. Delisle's is both present and absent from the book, giving the book warmth and humor without overpowering the experience of the alien culture to the point where all you can perceive are his perceptions. He gives his opinion full rein on the people that he meets, and even on his work experience in North Korea, but allows the reader to make up their own minds when it comes to the oppressive regime of "the world's only Communist dynasty," as he calls it in a throwaway gag midway through the book. It's a skillful mix of reportage and memoir, each balanced perfectly against each other in a way that humanizes the reportage and legitimizes the memoir, if that makes sense - There are two pages towards the end of the book where another cartoonist takes over to tell one of their own experiences, because it adds to Delisle's own experience and also to his own fears and expectations of North Korea itself (perhaps going so far as to fulfill his fears). Going from those pages back to his own, the next line of dialogue is the perfect "It's always interesting to get another perspective on things!" which may be Delisle's guiding principle in the creation of this book.

The art also follows the same principle: Abstracted and cartoony enough so as to allow interpretation, but not so much as to genericize everything. For want of a better way of putting it, Delisle makes himself very French - a particularly European-looking cartoon for reasons I couldn't really explain coherently (It's something about the angles, and the nose in particular) - which helps him stand out against the more detailed Koreans he encounters. The greyscale wash adds weight (both visual and dramatic) to the simple linework, and the whole thing works in unison with the writing, invisible in the best way in service of the overall story.

It's a wonderful book, and highly recommended - I picked up my copy second-hand at Green Apple this weekend on one of my traditional "I have trade-in credit, so feel as if I can take a bit more of a chance on what I'm buying" visits, but as soon as I'd finished it, I immediately wanted to read Delisle's second travelogue, Shenzhen: A Travelogue From China even at full-price. And when you're as cheap as me, that means a lot.

The Name of The Game is... Meh: Graeme finishes his 3/28 reviews, and is sick.

In a stunning return of a Savage Critic theme, I'm sick today. This isn't the usual kind of sickness that one or all three of us tends to befall, though; it's just food poisoning or something, although Kate keeps pointing out that she isn't sick, and she ate the same things as me yesterday. That said, she doesn't write for this blog, so perhaps her immune system is just inherently stronger than mine, who knows? And just as I'm about to post this, I see that Lester's said more or less the same things as me below. Dammit. GUY RITCHIE'S GAMEKEEPER #1: Which, for those with long enough memories to remember Tekno Comics, is roughly equivalent to "Isaac Asimov's I-Bots," which is to say, Guy Ritchie was probably being harrassed continually by Richard Branson to come up with some kind of idea for a comic that would bear his name and came up with something that's less a plot or character concept as much as it is a rushed one-liner created out of desperation and the desire to be left alone.

(There's an interview with Ritchie at the back of the book that shows how little he gives a shit about the project in his use of exceptionally generic responses to each question - "By my creative nature, I am interested in the extreme, animated world... By its design, [comic storytelling is] animated, which to me implies that you can cut to the meat and potatoes and skip the first course." What does that even mean? And why does he keep calling comics animated? Does he even know that a comic isn't a cartoon? The answer to how he got involved with Virgin Comics is hilarious for all the wrong reasons: "Errhh, can't really remember... I think Gotham [Chopra, Virgin's CCO] gave us a call... I am drawn to the arena where film meets highly animated concepts. The call came at the right time.")

The problem with this kind of approach is that it leaves the book with nothing worth reading at its center - There's nothing here that hasn't been done before, and although Andy Diggle does the best he can with such a cliched set-up - The gameskeeper on a Scottish estate is an honorable ex-soldier who has done terrible things! Because war is terrible! But now war has followed him to his new life! And now he has to get his hands dirty again! With lessons learned in war! Which is terrible! - it's nowhere near enough to keep your interest, except perhaps for trying to guess the next line of tough guy narration ("Only a fool would set up camp here. A fool... or a fugitive."). What's maybe more interesting is that everything that happens in this first issue would play much better as a movie, where the action sequences would have more noise and movement to excite, and the dialogue could be saved by performance, but more importantly, you'd get more than just the set-up for whatever comes next (I'm guessing violence and murky morality plays, but I may be wrong) in one sitting; if this issue wasn't a 32-page, $2.99 experience in and of itself but the opening twenty minutes of the next James Bond film or whatever, then I'd probably not have half the problems with it that I did.

It also wouldn't have Mukesh Singh's artwork, which is nice enough but completely wrong for the story; his colors in particular are waaay too bright for what's happening, even factoring in arty noir lighting and everything else - There is no reason for outside scenes to be bright blue when juxtaposed by internal scenes where everything is bright read; it overpowers the flow of the narrative, and just emphasizes how false the whole thing comes over as. The grass is bright green, the sky, bright blue, and it pulls you out of the story enough so that you see it as art that is accompanied by dialogue balloons, as opposed to a complete comic experience.* Overall, then, most definitely not the sum of its parts - Diggle has done better, Guy Ritchie used to be a semi-decent filmmaker once, and Singh would be better used elsewhere. Pretty much Eh, at best.

(* - Yes, I did have to stop myself from spelling comic "comix" just for the pun. Thank you for noticing.)

Tomorrow: A book I really liked, for once.

And Then A Few More: More Reviews of the 3/28 Books from Jeff

Oh, man. The day job has been cuh-razy. Would you believe I've been meaning to post these for over seven hours? But for those of us who aren't as number wonky as B:

CROSSING MIDNIGHT #5: As you may remember, last issue really hit its stride and this issue, while not quite as strong, continues the pace. After all, when you've got the origin of the word "yakuza," mysterious demonic pacts (both figurative and literal), a blind gang leader who has a hyperarticulate henchman explain everything as it unfolds, gorgeous art, and people being sliced to ribbons (oh, and I forgot to mention the line about having sex with strippers after violence to avoid infecting one's wife with negative chi), what more do you need?

No, really, what more do you need? If I had to guess, I'd say it needs a bit less helplessness on the part of its protagonists--like the children in fairy tales, their only power seems to be in bargaining with devils to overthrow each new threat. It's a disempowering read, precisely the opposite of your standard superhero wish-fullfillment. That's not bad, but it makes the book an even tougher sell--and tougher read--than it might be otherwise. Good stuff, but I hope it finds the right balance in its tone as time goes on...and that it has the time to do so.

DAREDEVIL #95: Lots of neat little bits--I liked that we got to see an argument between Foggy, Matt and Becky that actually got resolved, and was more than fodder for a subplot--but the bulk of the story concerns Melvin Potter, The Gladiator, who was probably the weakest of Miller's triumphs from his first run on Daredevil (Miller managed to give the character an extra dimension of pathos, thus bringing the Gladiator's sum dimensionality all the way up to...one). If you still find the old trope of prisoners teasing mentally deficient powerhouses believable or palatable, you'll find this a Very Good issue. I found it highly Good, myself, just built on a bit I don't have much patience for. We'll see if the creative team can woo me when part two of the story comes out.

DEVI #9: Haven't read this for at least nine issues--it went from looking like Witchblade to Witchblade Adventures at some point, which is more of a bummer than you might think. I'd be interesting in checking out the trade of this at some point--they try to make the characters at least a little bit emotionally complex--but this issue was more or less Eh.

DMZ #17: Sorta spaced out around Part 2 of this arc, came back for the end to see how things had progressed. It was interesting enough that I'll probably check out the trade and give you a review of the whole arc later. No Rating, but seemed promising.

ELEPHANTMEN #8: I thought it would be fair to Rich Starkings, after he was kind enough to post here twice, to check out this issue and review it but didn't get a chance. I'll try to get to it next week.

FANTASTIC FOUR #544: For an old school Marvel geek like me, this issue was probably worth it just for the "I mean, who hasn't met the Watcher by now? C'mon, raise your hand if you haven't met the Watcher!" bit. And I'm glad to see there's gonna be some follow-up to that Beyond mini. And the art was nice. So, you know, Good, although if you ask me, Dwayne McDuffie has a big ol' achilles heel and it's called Deathlok. I know he's necessary to get the ball rolling on the storyline but I wonder why, exactly, he had to come along other than, y'know, McDuffie's heel and all that...

GAMEKEEPER #1: So. A Chechen gamekeeper with a mysterious past is the only thing in the path of a mysterious strike team who are after the gamekeeper's employer, who has an even more mysterious past. As you can imagine, it's all so mysterious at this point as to be absolutely 100% generic. However, it is competently done, and I'm always a big fan of "dude with a mysterious past kicks ass of mysterious bad guys" so I'm willing to give it an OK and see what comes next. Weirdly, this and Hellblazer last week both feature characters who use so many anglicisms I'd swear Diggle wasn't from the U.K. Maybe he just overdoes it when trying to write slangy street-smart characters? Really weird.

GREEN LANTERN #18: Like G., I'm in the "art on this was lovely" camp--Acuna's work here makes me think of, I dunno, if Toth had worked in watercolors or something: the characters are all vital and expressive with dynamic brushwork, but there's also a lushness to it. Between it and the back-up story--which like a lot of the old Tales of the Green Lantern Corps stories was less a story and more a little slice of coolness--I'd say this was Good issue, even if the main story was both truncated and kinda cheesy.

Look! Up in the sky!: Graeme takes on DC's trinity for 3/28.

DC's 52 may be a year without Superman, Batman or Wonder Woman, but by coincidence and the magic of fill-ins to try and get books back on schedule, this week couldn't make that claim. Admittedly, now that there are four Batman books and four Superman books (although those numbers both include the All-Star books), every month should, in theory, be able to have a week starring the Big Three... ACTION COMICS #847: I think Hibbs and Lester have already covered most of my feelings about this fill-in - It's well-written, and more substantial than the filler than you may have expected considering its "between the panels of the ongoing story" origin, and provides a return to the classic "Superman is a hero throughout the universe" feel that really hasn't been around in the main books for years - but what really stood out in this high-Okay book for me was the art: Renato Guedes has provided some fill-in art through other DC books over the last year, but his effort here, where he also does the coloring, is really rather wonderful - I'm looking forward to the next three months-worth of Action fill-in now, just to see how lovely the art looks.

BATMAN #664: See, and this is what I expect from Grant Morrison's Batman, unlike the last issue text piece. Dense, sarcastic, throwing camp back into the bat-bowl with abandon ("He says you're cool, like James Bond." "Oh, I'm much cooler than he is," followed by a two page action scene that is very clearly a Bond rip-off), while the two sections of the issue seem to point towards the idea that there's more of a continuing story throughout Morrison's run than was apparent until now. Very Good, and wouldn't it be nice if this is Morrison getting back on track now that 52 is winding down...? Maybe we'll even see some of the missing Wildstorm books before too long.

WONDER WOMAN #6: This is a weird one; there's a lot wrong with this issue, as Hibbs has pointed out already - Since when was Diana so naive, and the Circe reveal at the end of the issue (complete with her amazing shrinking leg, a bum note in otherwise pretty strong art by Drew Johnson - I'd like to see him come back to this title on a regular basis if the Dodson's can't stick around) ruins the one thing left to spoil about the end of Allen Heinberg's unfinished arc - but nonetheless, I actually really enjoyed it. If you can completely ignore everything about continuity or common sense, as I was somehow able to do, then there's a kind of goofy charm to this. It may not actually be good, but somehow it manages to seem Good, if that makes sense.

What's interesting about these three books is the variety of tones between them - Batman and Wonder Woman are both kind of dumb and not-to-be-taken-too-seriously, I guess, but Batman in a more "arched eyebrow" way against Wonder Woman's innocence (both the character and book; it reads like a curiously sincere attempt at the character, even though it also reads out-of-character. Maybe it's that sincerity that I responded to?) - I've seen some complaints online about the lack of consistency in DC's superhero books recently, and Mark Millar's comments that he doesn't know what's going on in the DC Universe anymore, but I tend to see this thing as a strength: Why should a line of 30+ (and I'm being conservative, but I can't think offhand of how many superhero books DC publishes each month and can't be bothered to check) books have one feel, or one throughline of story? As much as I may be responding to some of the post-Civil War Marvel Universe (Hello, Fantastic Four), that's much more to do with the individual creators' efforts than any kind of linewide "new status quo" that's been forced upon everything. I don't know; is this my inherent DC-centricness coming to cloud my mind? Would everyone else want to see some kind of superconsistency in tone on all DC's books?