More Excuses than Reviews: Jeff and the 6/15 Books

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Right. Well, not only was it Father's Day yesterday, but Hibbs had the start of an impressive cold on Friday. I'm assuming he'll be down for the count this week, but I'm hoping I'll be as off with this prediction as I was with the last one. As for me, the CE newsletter is on my plate and I spent most of the weekend working on that, but since this week has a little bit of everything (at least in the trades), I thought I would dash off some very quick comments while I can.

Oh, and Batman Begins: pretty good, huh? I thought Hibbs' review was spot on, so I won't add anything.

Also, last week saw the release of Danger: Diabolik on DVD, kind of an amusing compare and contrast to Batman Begins. It's a pretty great package, cheaply priced but lovingly layered with extras (informative fun to be had watching Steve Bissette dissect Mario Bava's visuals). Like the only other Bava film I've seen (Planet of the Vampires), Danger: Diabolik alternated between delightful and deadly dull but I'm really glad I saw it--if you're the type to watch your films while, uh, medicated, I'm sure you'd find it delightful through and through.

And let's see what I can misremember about this week's comix:

ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN #641: Superman encounters OMAC yet again and continues to remain impressively clueless about the whole thing, while the sassy police captain kicks the shit out of Pete Ross--ooo, she beat up not just a helpless ex-president, but also my suspension of disbelief! Hopefully, we'll get to see her push Jimmy Carter down some stairs next ish! As long as OMAC can just show up, kick ass and disappear untraceably, these type of crossovers are gonna be Eh at best, and get tired mighty fast.

AUTHORITY REVOLUTION #9: Remember how Ellis did three four issue arcs with Authority, each one going more over the top until the team essentially beat the shit out of God by the end? I think a similar mix of bombast and concision would have really helped this. Eh.

BATMAN DARK DETECTIVE #4: Pretty much a big ol' time-waster, which this mini (or any mini, frankly) can't afford. And at this rate, by 2030, we'll have Bruce Wayne's entire pre-Batman life mapped out, right down to his dramatic struggle with fear while exiting a bat-shaped birth canal. Eh, because I'm generous that way.

BIRDS OF PREY #83: I think this is supposed to read like a fast-paced, breakneck adventure where the stakes get upped every few pages, but it actually reads to me like an ambitious writer keeps putting more and more on the plate even though there's too much there already. The announcement the other week of Geoff Johns' overseeing the DCU's path into and out of Infinite Crisis couldn't be more timely, because a lot of the DCU writers are starting to Geoff Johnsify their work already. OK.

EX MACHINA #12: Seems on much surer footing than last issue did, which is a relief. Good.

GIANT SIZE X-MEN #3: I doubt there's any way an eight page story is going to be worth this kind of money, no matter how much they were gonna pull out the stops, but I thought felt kinda slapdash with both Whedon and Adams showing their weaknesses (shticky and fussy, respectively) rather than their strengths. Though if Marvel'd just tossed this in an issue of X-Men Unlimited or something, I'm sure it would have felt like a charming little treat. Awful.

HAWKMAN #41: So we finally get one issue where the whole "Hawkman is Conan but he can fly" idea gets the full treatment and people, unsurprisingly, seem kinda skeeved out by it. I thought it was pretty good fun and would gladly read more in the same vein but all the head-loppery and flesh-stabbery underscores how bad a fit that approach is with a character smack in the middle of the DCU. Might be a bit of a moot point what with those last few pages and all but worth pointing out, anyway. OK.

POWERS #11: As someone who's read this book since its very beginnings, this issue kicked my ass up one side of the comic store and down the other. If you're a fan of Powers, I can't imagine this not doing the same. If you're not a fan, I almost want to advise to start reading the book just so you can have the grim pleasure of this issue. Very Good work, to be sure.

SEVEN SOLDIERS KLARION THE WITCH BOY #2: This paid off for me tremendously well, mainly because of all the interlocking bits with SS: Guardian #2, but also because Morrison kept changing up the plot every few pages or so. Lovely, lovely art, too. Very Good.

SIMPSONS COMICS #107: A strong return to form for Boothby, I thought, with finally a bit of a change-up on the splash page joke, and just a lot of amusingly silly situations. If there's something that didn't work for me this issue, I don't remember it--also Very Good.

VIMANARAMA #3: Late but worth it: this easily cleared beat the dashed expectations left after issue #2 and I enjoyed it quite a bit. Maybe because Philip Bond got to focus on the small human interactions where he really excels, or maybe because G-Mo's character developments, which previously felt a bit slapdash, here add up to a sum a bit larger than their parts, or maybe because it reminded me of some of Salman Rushdie's fizzier writing. But whatever the case, felt like a Good read to me.

WOLVERINE #29: That cover made me very uncomfortable, as probably any cover where Wolverine is hurtling his groin at my face might. Fears of forced oral copulation aside, I thought this was better than the last two or three issues as the art and story seem to have a bit more spark to them. Good.

And so we move to this week's trade section, which really made the week for me:

AEIOU GN: On the one hand, this felt like a rehash of too-similar material Brown's already explored, which may well be the point--how many times do we go through the same experience of love, but with different partners, until it finally changes? On the other hand, Brown's keenly observant about the small moments that make and break a relationship, and it's precisely those moments I love reading about. But I got more and more restless as I made my way through the book, suspcious that Brown may feel he has to do one of these for each of his failed relationships to prove that the most recent was as important to him as the first. Some of the dramatic shifts in time and place in the middle of the titled sections were a welcome jolt, and points to an awareness on Brown's part that this material needs to be shaken up a little bit. Maybe it's time for pure fiction, where the observations can inform and be informed by the pleasures of plot? OK.

CAPTAIN AMERICA BY JACK KIRBYBICENTENNIAL BATTLES TPB: Proves the sad truism that anything I buy on Ebay will be collected less than two years later. I love Kirby's material and it's a delight to have this in easy access--plus the issues of CA where Kirby riffs on an idea (a planet of lunatics) straight out of Phil Dick. Bonus points for the occult shiver received by seeing Archie Goodwin listed as consulting editor(!) If you're a Kirby fan, OK to Good.

DER STRUWWELMAAKIES HC: Tony Millionaire's latest Maakies collection, designed again by the mighty Chip Kidd. Surprisingly, it's taking me a bit longer to get into the material than previously, but the gay dentures joke at the start gave me a pretty good laugh and I don't doubt there's more to come. Preliminary prognosis is between OK and Very Good.

ESSENTIAL FANTASTIC FOUR VOL 4 TPB: You know how they say chocolates cause the production of some of the same endorphins as when you're in love? For me, this holds true with Kirby inked by Sinnott. This stuff resonates so deeply in me, it must be lodged near my medulla oblongata--I may well have trembled as I read it. Gorgeous stuff and at the top of my Very Good rating.

SCOTT PILGRIM VOL 2 VS THE WORLD GN: I was almost relieved when I didn't initially take to the opening flashback section--although worried that Bryan Lee O'Malley had hit something like sophomore slump and had already promised more volumes of this narrative than his interest or skills could sustain, I was secretly glad that I wouldn't have to play the role of frothy-mouthed proselytizer, jumping all about like some sex-crazed chimpanzee, telling you about how O'Malley had met or exceeded the potential of Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life and that you should dash out and buy his book and give him all your money for doing something impressive and delightful and great.

And then I got to the end of the flashback section, and the book proceeded to work a horrifying magic on me, and make me an even more fevrent frothy-mouthed proselytizer than I could have imagined. Scott Pilgrim Versus The World is brilliant, and a real delight and you should dash out RIGHT NOW and buy a copy of this book and give O'Malley ALL YOUR MONEY. The references to video games, RPGs, autobbio comix, manga and anime are still there and arguably better than ever (my heart swelled with love over the Mithril Skateboard gag) but, in making Scott a tool who barely pays attention to the hearts he breaks, O'Malley begins to add shadings to the narrative that speak to human nature (who hasn't oblivously broken someone else's heart? Who hasn't had their heart broken by someone oblivious?) and grounds it all in a more emotionally real context than you'd expect. Throw in some real Toronto locations (and the knowledge that O'Malley and his wife Hope Larson have relocated from Toronto to Halifax) and the second volume suggests that the Scott Pilgrim series may end up a far more clear-eyed farewell to youth than all the giddiness and hilarity and finishing moves might indicate.

In short, I absolutely loved this god-damned book. Please check out the first two volumes when you get the chance, please. Excellent.

PICK OF THE WEEK: Scott Pilgrim! Scott Pilgrim! Scott Pilgrim! But if I had to pick a floppy, I'd go with Powers #11, Klarion #2, or Simpsons #107, depending on what you follow. They were all yummy.

PICK OF THE WEAK: I didn't bother much with the stinky stuff this week. From what I follow, I was very disappointed in Batman: Dark Detective #4.

TRADE PICK: Scott Pilgrim! Scott Pilgrim! Scott Pilgrim!

6/15 comics

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It's daddy's birthday today -- I'm 38! Got to work on finishing my TILTING though :(

Here's what CE got this week:

2000 AD #1439 2000 AD #1440 A G SUPER EROTIC ANTHOLOGY #11 ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN #641 ARCHIE & FRIENDS #92 ARCHIE DIGEST #217 AUTHORITY REVOLUTION #9 (OF 12) BATMAN BEGINS MOVIE ADAPTATION BATMAN DARK DETECTIVE #4 (OF 6) BATMAN GOTHAM KNIGHTS #66 BATTLE HYMN #3 (OF 5) BETTY & VERONICA DOUBLE DIGEST #134 BIGFOOT #4 (OF 4) BIRDS OF PREY #83 BLACK DIAMOND ON RAMP BRIAN PULIDOS BELLADONNA #5 (OF 5) BRIAN PULIDOS MEDIEVAL LADY DEATH #3 BRIAN PULIDOS WAR ANGEL #2 (OF 3) CABLE DEADPOOL #16 CAPTAIN GRAVITY AND POWER OF THE VRIL #5 CONAN & THE JEWELS OF GWAHLUR #3 (OF 3) DAREDEVIL #74 DARKNESS VAMPIRELLA ONE SHOT DAY OF VENGEANCE #3 (OF 6) DEATH JR #2 (OF 3) DONALD DUCK AND FRIENDS #329 EX MACHINA #12 FRANK MILLERS ROBOCOP MILLER CVR #8 (Of 9) FREEDOM FORCE #6 (OF 6) GAMBIT #12 GI JOE #0 GIANT SIZE X-MEN #3 GLA #3 (OF 4) HAWKMAN #41 HERCULES #3 (OF 5) HERO CAMP #2 (OF 4) JLA CLASSIFIED #8 JON SABLE FREELANCE BLOODLINE #2 (OF 6) JUDGE DREDD MEGAZINE #232 (C:4) KNIGHTS OF THE DINNER TABLE #103 LAST HERO STANDING #3 (OF 5) LUCIFER #63 MANHUNTER #11 MARVEL ADVENTURES FANTASTIC FOUR #1 MARVEL KNIGHTS 4 #19 MICKEY MOUSE AND FRIENDS #278 MNEMOVORE #3 (OF 6) NYC MECH BETA LOVE #2 PENCIL FIGHT #2 POWER PACK #4 (OF 4) POWERS #11 SCOOBY DOO #97 SEVEN SOLDIERS KLARION THE WITCH BOY #2 (OF 4) SIMPSONS COMICS #107 SKYSCRAPERS OF THE MIDWEST #2 SONIC THE HEDGEHOG #150 SPIDER-MAN BREAKOUT #3 (OF 5) STAR WARS GENERAL GRIEVOUS #3(OF 4) STAR WARS REPUBLIC #76 STORMBREAKER SAGA OF BETA RAYBILL #6 (OF 6) STRANGERS IN PARADISE #74 SUPER MANGA BLAST #52 TALES OF BLOODY MARY #2 (OF 8) TEENS AT PLAY SUMMER SPECIAL TRIGGER #7 UNCANNY X-MEN #461 USAGI YOJIMBO #84 VERONICA #162 VIMANARAMA #3 (OF 3) WESTERN TALES OF TERROR #4 WILDSIDERZ #0 WOLVERINE #29 YEAR ONE BATMAN RAS AL GHUL #1 (OF 2)

Book / Mag / Stuff AEIOU GN ALCATENA DRAWINGS SC ALVAR MAYOR LA CIUDAD DE ORO DE LA PATAGONIA ARGOSY QUARTERLY #3 BATMAN BEGINS THE MOVIE & OTHER TALES OF THE DARK KNIGHT TP BATTLESTAR GALACTICA VOL 1 SAGA OF A STAR WORLD TP BIG BEEFY BOOK OF BART SIMPSON TP BUGS BUNNY VOL 1 WHATS UP DOCTP CAPTAIN AMERICA BY JACK KIRBYBICENTENNIAL BATTLES TP CEREBUS HE DOESNT LOVE YOU T/S LG CEREBUS HE DOESNT LOVE YOU T/S XL CINEFEX #102 DAFFY DUCK VOL 1 YOURE DESPICABLE TP DER STRUWWELMAAKIES HC ESSENTIAL FANTASTIC FOUR VOL 4 TP FOLLOWING CEREBUS #4 GIANT ROBOT #37 HEAVY METAL LIVE VOL 6 PHOTO OF JULIE STRAIN SC HEAVY METALS DRACULA HC HOUSEWIVES AT PLAY TIES THAT BIND GN JSA VOL 8 BLACK REIGN TP MARVEL AGE SPIDER-MAN TEAM UPVOL 1 HELP FRIENDS DIGEST TP METAL GEAR SOLID VOL 1 TP SANDMAN MYSTERY THEATRE VOL 3VAMP TP SCOTT PILGRIM VOL 2 VS THE WORLD GN STRANGE KADDISH TALES YOU WONT HEAR FROM BUBBIE GN 2ND PRTG STRANGERS IN PARADISE MOLLY &POO TP STREET ANGEL VOL 1 TP SUPERMAN GODFALL TP SWORD OF THE DARK ONES VOL 2 VIDEO WATCHDOG JUNE/JULY 2005 #120 WARS END PROFILES FROM BOSNIA1995-96 HC WASTING THE DAWN NOVEL SC ED

Reviews for some 6/8 Books.

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No clever opening for me, I'm afraid. I didn't see the preview of Batman Begins, probably because my luck with movies have been so bad lately: this week I finally got around to seeing Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith (dull, cliched, frustratingly inept), Butterfly Effect (hey, I liked Final Destination 2 so I thought it was worth a shot. Boy was I wrong) and Electra Glide in Blue (starts off as an exemplar of everything great about '70s Hollywood before becoming everything terrible about '70s Hollywood). Thank God, I guess, for HBO on video: just finished watching Season Two of The Wire and loved it: different from Season One, but still great. Oh, and thank god for comix, too. Because this was a pretty decent week:

ACTION COMICS #828: Okay, that Villains United tie-in is pretty gratuitous if not nearly nonsensical. (Rather than wait for Dr. Polaris to get carted off to jail, you're going to grab him right from Superman's hands and tip him off to the formation of your super-gang? That seems…dumb, to say the least.) But this really hit all the right beats for a Superman comic, with a convincingly romantic ending. I hope Gail avoids the urge to grit this up, and Byrne's content to turn out this art, because this is the most I've enjoyed a Super title in too long. Good.

ACTION PHILOSOPHERS ALL SEX SPECIAL: Previously, Action Philosophers was more of a book I felt I should like than a book I actually liked, but this issue was flat-out great: Dunlavey and Van Lente's work reminds me of Larry Gonick here, able to tackle complex issues with a light touch that doesn't undermine the subjects. Covering St. Augustine, Jefferson and Ayn Rand in one issue also was a great touch, as one can track how the philosophical breakthroughs of one allowed for the very different philosophical developments of the other. It's far from perfect (Van Lente's work is expressive and cleaner than I remember it, but it's a shame that he couldn't nail that Kirby Manichaeism sequence as much as evoke it) but it's a full 32 pgs. of fun and fascinating reading for $2.95; how can I not give it a Very Good?

BATMAN DARK DETECTIVE #3: For better or for worse, times have changed. Back in the '70s, one probably could get some genuine pathos out of the idea of Two-Face gaining and losing a second chance at life via a Harvey Dent clone, but now it just seems embarrassingly quaint. Throw in a heavy dose of emotional speechifying and I'd be hard-pressed to give this an OK for more than sentimental reasons, if it wasn't for some beautifully evocative Marshall Rogers art—I'd probably give this a high OK for that alone.

BATMAN LEGENDS OF THE DARK KNIGHT #192: The Chase team of Williams and Johnson turn in a rock-solid script, but it's Seth Fisher's art that really gives this some oomph: it's filled with little details to an almost Geoff Darrowish degree. We'll see where this story ends up going, but for now, a really Good issue.

BETE NOIRE #1: The $9.95 price tag puts this very much in a half-empty/half-full conundrum: compared to Kramer's Ergot, this is a chance to sample similarly outré cartoonists for a much cheaper price. However, compared to Hoax #2, this is an anthology that's three times the price and of varying or equivalent value (I ended up much preferring Hoax, frankly). Apart from a few of the Japanese cartoonists (lumped together toward the front, oddly), I wasn't much struck by much of the material here and at least pricey anthologies like Kramer's or Non (or, of course, the progenitor, Raw) have appeal in and of themselves as attractive objects—this, by contrast, feels distressingly like an overpriced comic book. Please keep in mind all my many biases (I almost always preferred the narrative to non-narrative pieces in Raw, for example) when I tell you this ranked squarely on the Eh side of things for me.

GOTHAM CENTRAL #32: On the one hand, a very nice done-in-one about crooked cops in the GCPD. On the other hand, I'd gladly read about these guys in every issue and the ending makes that seem a bit unlikely. Still, Very Good.

GRAVITY #1: Cute, and my blessed ignorance of mid-'90s Marvel characters (Hibbs reassured me Rage really is a character and really was both an Avenger and a New Warrior) actually made this even more amusing and McKeever's script hit all the right beats. In fact, although it's probably soon to say this, there weren't any real surprises—the first issue read just like I imagined it might. And although the art is clean, I wish it could have captured more of a sense of New York--the simultaneity of its grit and its splendor, to say nothing of the sheer crush of its population (that double-page splash is the only time we see more than eight people in the background). But I'm willing to go up to a low Good for this first issue because it's a promising start and I'm still relieved to pick up a book from either Marvel or DC that isn't trying to eyerape me with its gritty ultra-importance.

HOAX #2: As I said above, I preferred this to Bete Noire, although that's due largely to both price and a preference for narrative--Nate Neal's contributions are solidly told and entertaining, if a little heavy on the authorial sneer, and I thought Lydia Gregg's "Law of Bone Healing," which mixes Gonick style educational comix with a piece of war abuse propaganda, was an effective and promising piece of work. Only "Reflex" struck me as not worth the pagecount, but overall this issue conjured some of the enjoyment I had reading issues of Weirdo the first time around (minus the patented Crumb genius, of course): the sense that cartoonists are struggling to develop a style and engage with the world, and that the struggle is not just worth having, but worth reading. Good.

HOLMES PERIPHERY FLIP BOOK: A very clever idea (Holmes being a dope-addled fiend; Watson his Dr. Feelgood) that never gets off the ground--and by "ground," I mean "inside cover" where the idea is pitched outright. While that certainly makes the book very inviting to new readers, I found it troubling it more or less had to spelled out at the beginning. There's just not enough to the story, which starts as a Holmes pastiche and quickly ends up an outtake from a Victorian Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas. For me, the enjoyment would come from seeing the story work as both simultaneously, but instead all of the elements are just haphazardly thrown into the pot in the hopes it'll end up as a really good soup. That it didn't is quite a bummer. Going with the Eh here.

ICE HAVEN GN: The great thing about working in a comic store like CE on a slowish Friday morning is being able to sit down with a book like this and compare it page to page with the original issue of Eightball. The slicing of each page into two pages worked much better than I thought it would, and the new material (what would have accounted for, at most , three pages in the original Eightball) did a brilliant job of bringing the reader's focus more explicitly on the book's themes and a plot point or two (the ending in particular underscores an important part of the plot that had previously zipped right over my head). Very Good work (in fact, if this had been the original issue of Eightball with the additional material I think it'd be Excellent), but it's three times the price for very much the same material and I kinda can't get away from that fact. I'm sure of far greater interest (and relevance to the book's success) will be reviews from people coming to the material completely fresh, but if, like me, you've already got the original issue, I say inveigle your local library into getting a copy and check it out then.

JLA #115: Liked this because the focus was more on the Injustice Gang and the JLA deciding to tell Batman, than any sort of Bat-histrionics as promised on the cover (although I'm sure that'll come later). Also, a lot more character scenes and a lot less of the relentless crash and bash than Johns' scripts have had lately. So I'll go with a high Good and hope it goes to some interesting places from here.

LITTLE STAR #3: Latest issue didn't knock me on my ass quite as much as last issue because the dramatic change-up felt both a little too subtle and too sudden-- a few too many pages about the partnership between parents that felt a bit redundant in the face of previous issues, maybe--but still near the top of my Very Good rating. I'm really enjoying this book.

MARVEL KNIGHTS SPIDER-MAN #15: Why I read this, I can't really say although, thanks to the Mark Buckingham flashback pages, I liked it a lot more than the previous two issues. But particularly on the face of the recent JMS story, having another of Peter Parker's unpopular ex-classmates seemed very, very groanworthy. Throw in a very gratuitous Punisher sequence and I'm still gonna go with Awful.

NEW WARRIORS #1: Skottie Young's art is dynamic, fluid and colorful, but bleeds so fully into the cute edge of the spectrum (it seems almost more Disney-influenced than manga or anime), I can't imagine your typical Marvel fan--or whatever remaining New Warrior fans might still survive--enjoying this. Nonetheless, I liked this fine, and hope Frank Tieri, doing a very similar concept in Hercules, looks to this as primer on how to get a miniseries up and running quickly and smoothly. Will win no awards but a very high OK, nonetheless.

NIGHTWING #109: No need for that Villains United crossover blurb on the cover, if you ask me. And I'm still incredulous from previous revelations (mainly that all the mooks know that Dick Grayson is Dick Grayson) so this really can't get better than OK although I liked it fine.

PULSE #9: Would make me want to read Secret War, if the issues I'd already read of that hadn't felt like a waste of time and money. Also, having your bimonthly book tie in so closely to your quarterly (at best) miniseries is not the savviest use of marketing synergy. Will I remember any resultant desire by the time Secret War hits the stands? Maybe in Bendis's dayplanner, but not here in the real world, I'm afraid. A high OK.

PUNISHER #22: The art seemed a little flat this issue, or maybe the coloring washed it out (although I got the impression the colorist was actually trying to do the opposite) but this still continues to be the best arc since the reboot. I wasn't sold that Frank is so out of control he can't help but knowingly put his ass into that trap but maybe I might've if this had been paced a bit differently. OK.

RANN THANAGAR WAR #2: I made it to page three before a crippling case of the don't-cares set in. The art did make me want to dig up my old copy of Superman Versus Muhammad Ali, I'll give it that. A very low Eh.

STARDUST KID #1: Mike Ploog's still got fearsome chops, but I've never been a mighty big fan of DeMatteis in winsome mode—he practically makes Ray Bradbury read like Ernest Hemingway by comparison—so I can't really say this deep fried my twinkie. But it sure did look mighty great, and maybe it'll work better for its intended audience than it did for me. OK, at the very least.

STRANGE GIRL #1: Some luminous coloring initially obscured some real shortcomings in the storytelling and art, I think, and I was also more engaged with the first half when the Rapture comes than the second half where the demons have sway over all and our heroine is all grown up—I would have much rather continued reading about that young girl and how she manages to survive than jumping forward in the narrative so the artist can now feel comfortable centering the panels around her ass. I'll give it an OK because I really was drawn into the first part, but if it goes downhill from here I won't be a bit surprised.

STRAY BULLETS #38: That psycho Huss is a perfect foil for Virginia (who's not particularly well-adjusted either) and Lapham still excels at putting his characters in uncomfortable situations and making the reader feel they're right there with them. On the upper edge of Good, but my dissatisfaction Lapham's use of flat and rounded characters (too much of the former, not enough of the latter) keeps me from going higher.

ULTIMATE FANTASTIC FOUR #19: Back before Galactus, Stan and Jack's FF stories seemed centered around the team running down trap-laden hallways, so this was a really great update by Mike Carey and Jae Lee of a very old trope. If you're a seriously old school FF fan, you might also find this Very Good.

ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #78: Hey, an issue of USM where Brian Bendis actually seems to know what he's doing! Remember when we used to get that every issue? Although I can't tell if there was more than one case of misdirected captions, and can't tell if everything's gonna go right back to frustrating, Good is Good.

X-MEN #171: Unsubtle soap opera with blatantly sexual themes that seem to assume the worst about human nature—are we sure Chuck Austen's not back on the book? I think this was big pile of Awful.

PICK OF THE WEEK: As I said, a lot of good stuff this week, I thought, but ACTION PHILOSOPHERS ALL SEX SPECIAL was an enjoyable, educational and thought-provoking read. UFF #19 was also a nice cheap shot of good fun.

PICK OF THE WEAK: MARVEL KNIGHTS SPIDER-MAN #15 didn't work for me, to put it lightly.

TRADE PICK: Get Ice Haven into your public library, and get Age of Bronze Vol. 2 TPB into your own. Eric Shanower's retelling of the Trojan War is top-notch comix.

Want to see BATMAN BEGINS for free?

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We duly handled our first batch of tickets for Tuesday's showing as the promotions compnay asked us to... but today we got in multiple envelopes of tickets for a showing on MONDAY JUNE 13th at 7:30 PM (at the Metreon), and we have no instructions on these. Therefore, I exercise executive privilege, and will give first crack to those of you reading this website.

Here's what you have to do: come into the store while *I* am working (Friday 2-7, Saturday 2-4 or thereabouts) and ask *me* for one. DO NOT ask Rob or Jeff about them, that will get you automagically disqualified.

Now I will probably ask you a question or two to prove you actually READ this blog, and you aren't just some guy, but other than that, that's that -- no purchase necessary and all of that jazz.

I've got maybe 10 passes left, and they're (unlikely most passes) "admit ONE" -- I will strictly only be giving out 1 per person, so factor that in your calculations.

Hopefully we'll see you tomorrow or Saturday, and we can talk funny books!

-B

Hibbs' earlyreview of BATMAN BEGINS

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Just got back from a preview screening of BATMAN BEGINS. (and how cool is this? I went with my Dad.) Let's get some initial thoughts down while everything is fairly fresh in me head. I'm going to try to be as spoiler-free as I can, because, y'know, the thing don't come out for 10 days or whatever, but this is a review, and I might let something slip. You have been warned. It's a very good movie, but it's not like the second coming of superhero films, or anything like that. Several reviewers are way overselling it, man.

It's got a brilliant first act, it has a very solid second act -- the third act though, eh, didn't work too well for me.

Part of the problem is how the action is staged -- virtually every fight is cut so fast from angles where you really can't tell what the fuck is going on. Since the third act depends so much in the Set Piece Big Fight, that isn't how I would have staged it.

A good example might be the first fight Batman gets in -- Batman is treated nearly like the alien in, well, ALIEN -- you hardly catch a glimpse of him, people start dropping, someone hits... don't know, Batman? their partner? I can't tell, there's shooting, but it is at shadow, and it's all too damn fast. It's like watching it from the POV of the thugs being taken down. That's how THEY see Batman. Which is great, but I want to see what he's doing... that's the fun of Batman, isn't it?

But, of course, you can't really show Batman doing all that stuff, because it'd look like shit. You'd never be able to believe that costume, in motion, could possibly move that much, that fast. Thankfully you almost never see the full Batman costume, because it looks pretty silly. In the few shots where it was just shoulders up, talking, it looked like Bale would topple over from the top-heaviness of the suit.

They generally do an excellent job of covering their limitations in most places -- Batman haul-ass runs more than once, but the angle and cape effects cover for it great; and there's plenty of excellent "Batman as gargoyle shots"

Another part of the problem is that the movie is BIG, I don't mean in a "Hollywood Blockbuster" kind of way (though it is that, too), but in that a whole whole WHOLE lot of subplots happens, and there's tons upon tons of characters, so everyone has to be able to get to DO something in the third act, which leads to more than a few awkward moments I thought (I'd single out one of the Batmobile's drivers, he said, trying desperately to remain spoiler free).

The performances are pretty uniformly excellent. They'd almost have to be with the cast assembled here -- I thought Katie Holmes was probably the weakest, but then her character wasn't much of a character (though a thousand times more of a character than any *other* Obligatory Female in a Batman film) -- she exists as childhood friend, crusading DA, and moral center, but those are plot roles rather than personal character. Not Katie Holmes' fault though.

I generally liked the changes to the Batman mythos itself. While I always resent "Nemesis comes from origin" as a storytelling crutch (cf: Joker in the first Burton film), the bits of that they do here usually fundamentally work, because they're actually *about* something. They have psychological weight, if nothing else.

On the other hand, I thinking changing Ra's motivation in the way that they did probably weakens the character. I mean with comic book Ra's I might even be with him pretty much everywhere up to "so, then we kill 90% of the population!" This one I was definitely less down with.

There's something else I'm not mentioning because it would totally be a spoiler, but I thought it was very very cool. You'll know it when you see it.

Gary Oldman did a whole damn lot with very very little. Morgan Freeman was Morgan Freeman, which rocks. And Michael Caine... well I liked him, but a "lower class" Alfred is so strange. It's like "Whot's tha', guv'ner? Batman? Roight! I'm game!"

Bale, himself, I thought was the best screen portayal of Batman so far.

So, yes, I enjoyed it -- it had depth, it was thoughtful, it built its themes, and it all comes down to explosions and punches, as such things do. Without the need to give pretty much every character some sort of role in the climax, I think it might have been more satisfying.

I can't explain what I thought much better without spoiling the hell out of it.

You do want to see this in the theatre, and you actually DO want to see this in a theatre with a bunch of people and not wait for a DVD or something, it will be more fun with the oohs and the ahs and the laughs. So, yeah: VERY GOOD.

Oh, and the new DC logo at the top of the film? It doesn't move or spin, as I thought it would. And the comics flashes (What DID flash up there? anyone know?) weren't connected at all TO the logo. Foo!

-B

Reviews of 6/2 books

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Right, so, as always very little time - Ben and Tzipora are out at the playground, so we do this in what would be, in any decent and just universe, my videogame time. But it's not a just universe, so how about some reviews, instead? FIRESTORM #14: I know they put the "America's #1 Nuclear Powered Hero!" on the cover as code that this was a good "jumping on" point, as Stuart Moore's first issue, but god, how tacky was that? Also, it was on the wrong side of the cover. Most stores either rack left-to-right overlapping, or top-to-bottom overlapping, and the blurb is barely visible from the latter and INvisible from the former. Ah, well, that's what the ivory tower brings you. Actually, in a world with a smart marketing department, they would have waited a year and let the series go fallow until it could be fully relaunched. This said as a man who despises "fake" #1s. Thing is, this may as well have been a brand new #1 -- while (2? 3?) of the characters are the same, it is a whole new rethinking. That might have even worked had the bait-and-switch of "Ronnie's back!" not just happened, surely leaving "original Firestorm" readers even colder than they were to begin with. Ultimately, I can't see much of a new audience coming in for #14 as they've had 2 chances to jump on now, with this being try #3 in around a year. Now, having said that, I thought this issue worked pretty well -- solid setup and new status quo. The art is competent, and the writing solid. In fact, I can fairly easily give this a low GOOD -- I just don't think it will make any difference.

HOUSE OF M #1: Certainly there's plenty of crisp writing here, with good character voices and POVs. It's also pretty slow, and not much of anything happens until that last page. Sales were slow this weekend -- probably running around half of what I expected, and I think one of the problems is no one really knows what the series is ABOUT. There's been a lot of vagueness, and promotional tools like the sketchbook were so intensely underwhelming, I don't think anyone feels impelled to add another mini-series. On the plus side, that should mean I'm stocked just fine when #8 comes out, something that is always hard to say with Marvel comics. I can imagine what I THINK this mini-series might and should end up doing (changing reality organically to make some of the universe-backstory start making sense once more. [example: Magneto is anchored to WW2. The time differential is starting to cause problems]), but who knows if I'm right or wrong? Not enough to tell from this first issue at least. In addition, I was faintly shocked that in all of the conversation of "how do we stop our crazy friend with God-powers?" at no time did any X-Man bring up Jean Grey. Pregnant pause in the middle of the comic for this reader at least. Hard to rate this, really, not enough occurred, but I can go with, I guess, a low GOOD.

JSA #74: I just want to say that the new DC logo looks pretty good when rendered in a variety of colors. There's an exception though: JSA *just* got a new logo, one that extends out to the edges of the cover, and the DC logo looks like complete ass, sitting on top of it. The new logo also looks like shit on the Johnny DC books -- the recently redesigned trade dress is artistically opposed to the "now!" of the new DC logo. As for JSA itself, I don't have much to say - there's good character moments in every scene, but there's so much Boom! Boom! in every issue, I'm starting to long for a quieter arc soon. Again, a low GOOD.

LAST HERO STANDING #1: What's odd is that I can't even give away SPIDER-GIRL. I have one subscription customer for it, but most of the time when I buy a rack copy, it ends up in the dollar box. We even had a subscriber add it to her list, trying to support titles with a female lead, but she dropped it 2 months later. "Wow, that's really awful!" she laughed. I don't know WHY I decided to order 5 copies of this SPIDER-GIRL "spinoff" -- certainly, it wasn't the SAFE move, and, especially when it's a weekly mini-series, which means order adjustments, the norm on Marvel books, become practically meaningless, and reorders will run a week behind (I'll be able to restock #1, if they have any to sell, when #3 is released). It's really the kind of book stores HATE to order, yet I gave it some support -- and we sold all of them by day #2. So, that's why retail can drive you crazy some days. Now, it is possible that people didn't REALIZE it was a SPIDER-GIRL "spin off" (that cover DOES mostly feature contemporary-looking characters), but, I dunno. Anyway, typical Tom DeFalco comic, in the "classic Marvel Style". I didn't care ABOUT any of it, set in the possible-future as it is, but I was entertained enough as I read it. Pure cotton candy, and probably worth an EH.

NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET #1: I like Ryp's artwork a whole lot, and I have a weird fascination with Freddy (I've seen each installment in the theatre -- even when I had to go to the seedy, sticky-floored, smell-emporium down on Market st. for it. It was never worth it, really), so I'm altogether too biased. But I thought Pulido did a pretty good job on this one: good use of "getting killed by what you think makes you you", and there was almost a point to the story (as opposed to a scenerio just to kill people) -- unlike TEXAS CHAINSAW MASACRE #1, also this week, with which I was completely befuddled, as it didn't go at all with my recollection of the (original) film. This was not high art, by any means, but for a licensed comic, it held a high standard, and I wouldn't mind seeing more of the same. I'm surprised too, I'm giving it a GOOD. (TCM #1 gets an AWFUL)

ORORO BEFORE THE STORM #1: Action packed street-urchin adventure! Which is about as exciting as it sounds. Filled with kids who talk like adults, this might have been a better fit in the ADVENTURES line, though I wonder how good it really is to sell kids a role model who is a pickpocket and a thief? A big EH.

SEVEN SOLDIERS ZATANNA #2: Liekd it much better than #1, and I might have even liked it better than GUARDIAN #2. If all American comics were this smart and crisp, this blog would be called THE RAINBOW CRITIC. Great terrific fun, and VERY GOOD.

SON OF VULCAN #1: Didn't really like the ameri-manga art. And I thought the use and explanation for Woodrue was pretty babble-tastic. And I really don't at all remember the original Son Of Vulcan (Charlton character -- maybe some sort of sword-and-sorcery thing, maybe?), and yet I thought this was kinda fun. "What if Batman was killed on Robin's first day out?" could be the one-line high concept. I thought the minuses (esp the art) will keep it down to an OK, but I'll be keeping one eye on this series as the next issues develop.

SUPER FUCKERS #1: James Kochalka's ode to the LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES (pretty much), and it perversely wants me to see him do it straight. I got some grins and giggles, but I think it was probably priced too high for its content, so I'll go with a very low GOOD.

SUPERMAN BATMAN #20: Like many people, I now wish I hadn't read Jeph Loeb's interview on Newsarama -- I might have missed some of the specific jabs. All of that is unnecessary. Hand to God, "friendly rivalry" is a wonderful thing between 2 publishers. It's sorta charming, even. This jarring and personal trash-talking that's going on these days? It doesn't make me like comics any better, kids. I liked the lunacy of some of this -- I thought Bat-zarro's captions mirroring his words was the most perfectly-perfect idea in perfect idea land, for example -- but wtf was up with Superman pretty casually murdering another character? I hate shit like that, it doesn't make me long for the next issue so we can see what kind of dream hoax or imaginary story it might have been -- it makes me think, "How could you possibly be so irresponsible as to show Superman murder someone, regardless of the context?" So continues my love/hate relationship with SUPERMAN/BATMAN. A very splitting-the-difference OK.

That's it, sick of writing. Not many books, but much longer entries this time.

Obviously, my PICK OF THE WEEK is ZATANNA #2. I'm going to skip the WEAK this week because I didn't bother to write it up. Maybe you could try and guess?

As for BOOK/TP OF THE WEEK, I have 2 entries for you -- MIRRORMASK ILLUSTRATED SCRIPT HC, which is Neil Gaiman's script, and Dave McKean's storyboards, for their, I-hope-it-will-be-released film. I haven't read the guts of the book yet, so I can't say whether or not it is any good, but I really liked the introductions, and the 2 outroductions, and the book looks well worth it.

I can also strongly recommend Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely's WE 3 TP -- what an astonishingly good story, even if it is 25% more expensive than the serialization (!!). It's also selling like a MONSTER -- without one single doubt our largest dollar SKU of June, even with 24 days to go in the month.

So that's it, what did YOU think?

-B

Groggy Morning Breakdown: A Few Reviews from 6/1 Comics.

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Guh. I'd planned to wait one more week before diving back into the funnybook game but since Hibbs is apparently an even lazier bastard than me, lemme eke out just a review or two.... AQUAMAN #31: I flipped through this pretty fast, but I get the sense the writer wrote it slightly faster. We get flashbacks to Aquagirl getting her ass beat by the serial killer and then disappearing (thus creating whatever actual tension the issue has) and then at the end of the comic she just pops up, safe and unharmed. Why and how? Oh, because the issue's over? Oh, okay. Awful.

EMO BOY #1: Wrong cover if you ask me, because it suggests we should take Emo Boy and his emoness somewhat compassionately, something the cartoonist has no interest in doing whatsoever. I guess if you really, really hate yourself some emo, you'll like this, but I usually like my "ha ha ha, everyone sucks" humor to either have more compassion or more obvious talent, which is why I find, say, Clowes' takedowns to be brilliant, and this to be merely Eh.

EXILES #65: Clever, but there better be a clever "similar but different" change-up in the next issue or this book'll have no reason to exist. Hibbs and I spent an absurdly long amount of time as to whether "lost and get home" series (Lost In Space, Quantum Leap, Sliders, etc.) really work for longer than three years before everyone loses interest. He says yes, I say hell, no. Either way, though, these guys may have clevered themselves out of a job unless they have a dynamite follow-up. OK.

HOUSE OF M #1: Bendis' most accomplished big hero spectacular to date, which is mighty faint praise, I know. It's more or less a very accomplished issue of Secret Wars II (all the superheroes get together to debate whether an unstable person with reality-changing powers should be iced) with a last page twisteroo that made me yawn. But Xavier and Magneto at least sound like themselves and not like David Mamet, and the art is pretty so what the hell? A very high OK, I guess.

INCREDIBLE HULK #82: A fill-in issue with really pretty art. Nothing more, nothing less and on its own terms, Good.

SEVEN SOLDIERS ZATANNA #2: I'm more or less underwhelmed--although this wasn't terrible or anything. Art's good; dialogue is witty; and I guess it's kind of clever that there's an Emily The Strange analog running around, but there's some crucial way I'm not connecting with the material I can't quite figure out--I guess I kinda can't figure out what Zatanna's whole deal is here. A lowish Good because it's still pretty good compared to what's out there this week but I have me some reservations, yessir.

SHANNA THE SHE DEVIL #5: Yes, yes, dinosaurs, boobies, "Holy Buckets," got it. If I was ten years old, or it turned out Frank Cho was, maybe I'd be thrilled. On the other hand, if I was ten, I'd probably still be wondering why this was seven issues instead of two. My disgruntlement inclines me toward Awful.

STRANGE #6: Well, at least Clea turned out to be from another dimension after all. So I guess there's that but the rest of it stank pretty heavily. As long as all involved pretend to forget it ever happened, I'm willing to let it off with an Awful.

SUPER FUCKERS #1: If this had been $2.95, no problem: it's a cute little spin on The Legion of Superheroes, if they had really acted like teenagers. But seven-fuckin'-bucks? I can't wrap my head around why this book has to cost that much. The price tag makes it Awful.

SUPERMAN BATMAN #20: Loeb's bizarro dialogue really hurt my head, but Batzarro was really fuckin' hilarious regardless. But the real problem was the rest of the book--it seems to be working up to a critique of the Ultimates approach to grim and gritty rebootings of classic superheroes, a position Loeb would be better suited to criticize if he hadn't just had an arc where Superman strangled Wonder Woman with her golden lasso and other creepy shit. On the other hand, Loeb is such a lunatic when it comes to plotting, who can really say where this'll end up? A very high OK just for Batzarro alone.

TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE #1: Like this week's Nightmare book, a much better representation of the films than the previous Friday the 13th one-shot, although this suffers from being tied to the recent remake and its cast of thousands approach. Burrows' art is also surprisingly perfunctory in a lot of places, although his gore is as nasty-looking as ever. OK.

WALKING DEAD #19: The book I liked the best this week although I also have some quibblage about it. (Those zombies from Block A sure arrived at one hell of a convenient time, didn't they?) Still, let's call it a Good and hope the pacing evens out a little--I feel like Kirkman is driven to produce bigger and bigger shocks each issue and that may end up missing some good character beats. But somewhere between Good and Very Good.

PICK OF THE WEEK: King Crabbypants liked Walking Dead #19, but what the hell do I know? I spent most of this weekend reading Sgt. Frog, Vol. 2.

PICK OF THE WEAK: Shanna The She-Devil #5 and Strange #6 are so much less than the sum of their parts, I'll give it to both of them.

TRADE PICK: WE3, no question. Don't know why the higher price point than Seaguy (yes, yes, nice paperstock and all, but...why?) but so darn lovely I guess I don't care. The one to get.

Shipping 6/8

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Not all that exciting of a week, really. Should be back in a few hours with at least some reviews, so check back....

-B

A G SUPER EROTIC ANTHOLOGY #14 ACTION COMICS #828 ACTION PHILOSOPHERS ALL SEX SPECIAL AGE OF BRONZE #20 ARMY OF DARKNESS SHOP TIL YOUDROP DEAD #3 BATMAN DARK DETECTIVE #3 (OF 6) BATMAN LEGENDS OF THE DARK KNIGHT #192 BATMAN STRIKES #10 BETE NOIRE #1 (OF 4) BETTY & VERONICA #209 BETTY & VERONICA DIGEST #157 BLADE OF THE IMMORTAL #102 BREACH #6 CITY OF HEROES #2 DUTCH TREAT FABLES #38 FATHOM #1 FLAK RIOT #1 FUTURAMA COMICS #20 GOTHAM CENTRAL #32 GRAVITY #1 (OF 5) GREEN ARROW #51 HOAX #2 HOLMES PERIPHERY FLIP BOOK JLA #115 JUGHEADS DOUBLE DIGEST #113 JUSTICE LEAGUE ELITE #12 (OF 12) LAST HERO STANDING #2 (OF 5) LEX LUTHOR MAN OF STEEL #4 (OF 5) LITTLE STAR #3 MAJESTIC #6 MARVEL KNIGHTS SPIDER-MAN #15 MARVEL NEMESIS IMPERFECTS #2 (OF 6) MARY JANE HOMECOMING #4 (OF 4) NEW THUNDERBOLTS #9 NEW WARRIORS #1 (OF 6) NIGHTWING #109 NODWICK #28 PULSE #9 PUNISHER #22 RANN THANAGAR WAR #2 (OF 6) SEX WARRIOR ISANE XXX #5 SHONEN JUMP JULY 2005 VOL 3 #7 STARDUST KID #1 (OF 5) STRANGE GIRL #1 STRAY BULLETS #38 STUDENTS OF THE UNUSUAL #5 TEMPORARY THE REAL ME PART 2 #3 TENTH DARKK DAWN ONE SHOT TOM STRONG #33 TOP COW TRIPLE PLAY TOXIN #3 (OF 6) ULTIMATE FANTASTIC FOUR #19 ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #78 X-DISTRICT X #14 X-MEN #171 X-MEN THE END HEROES AND MARTYRS #4 (OF 6)

AGE OF BRONZE VOL 2 SACRIFICETP ALTER EGO #49 CLIVE BARKERS THIEF OF ALWAYSVOL 3 TP EARTHBOY JACOBOUS GN EDUCATION OF A COMIC ARTIST TP FANTASTIC FOUR VISIONARIES GEORGE PEREZ VOL 1 TP FRENCH KISS #13 GRAY AREA VOL 1 ALL OF THIS CAN BE YOURS TP ICE HAVEN GN LEES TOY REVIEW JUNE 2005 #152 LIFES A BITCH TP MAD XL #34 MARVEL 1602 TP MODERN ARF GN MONSTER COLLECTION VOL 2 NEGATIVE BURN WINTER 2005 PHANTOM JACK COLL ED TP SCI FI ENTERTAINMENT AUG05 SILENT HILL THE GRINNING MAN SIZZLE #26 TOYFARE FANTASTIC FOUR MOVIE TOYS CVR #96 ULTIMATE FANTASTIC FOUR VOL 1HC ULTIMATE FANTASTIC FOUR VOL 3N-ZONE TP UNAUTHORIZED PUFFED MOVIE ADAPTATION TP

Comics arriving 6/1

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Don't forget: no comics tomorrow! Memorial Day and all that -- if you go to the store, you'll be disapointed! COMICS ARE THURSDAY. Bit hungover today -- Garth Ennis (and his loverly wife, Ruth) were in town, so we did the Toronado's pilgramage. A splendid time was had by all. I've got a really cute picture of Garth and Ben that I need to get off the camera, and I'll see if we can get it up here at some point soon.

Anyway, here's your list of stuff arriving on Thursday:

2000 AD #1437 2000 AD #1438 AMAZING FANTASY #9 AQUAMAN #31 ATOMIKA #3 BATMAN VILLAINS SECRET FILES 2005 BEOWULF #2 BETTY #147 BLOOD OF THE DEMON #4 BURGLAR BILL #3 (OF 6) CAL MCDONALD SUPERNATURAL FREAK MACHINE #3 (OF 5) CASEFILES SAM & TWITCH #17 CONCRETE HUMAN DILEMMA #6 (OF6) DETECTIVE COMICS #807 DRACULA VS KING ARTHUR #1 (OF4) ECHOES OF THE LOST BOYS OF SUDAN EMO BOY #1 EXILES #65 FANTASTIC FOUR FOES #5 (OF 6) FATHOM PRELUDE #1 FIRESTORM #14 GAMBIT #11 GIRL + GIRL #3 (OF 3) HOUSE OF M #1 (OF 8) HUMAN RACE #3 (OF 7) IMAGINARIES CVR A MILLER #2 (OF 4) INCREDIBLE HULK #82 INTIMATES #8 INVINCIBLE #23 JSA #74 JUGHEAD AND FRIENDS DIGEST #2 JUSTICE LEAGUE UNLIMITED #10 LAST HERO STANDING #1 (OF 5) LETHAL INSTINCT #1 LOONEY TUNES #127 MANGA CALIENTE #5 MARVEL ADVENTURES SPIDER-MAN #4 MARVEL TEAM-UP #9 MATADOR #2 (OF 6) METAL GEAR SOLID #9 MORA #3 NEXT EXIT #4 NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET SP WRAPAROUND CVR #1 NOBLE CAUSES #10 NOT QUITE DEAD #5 ORORO BEFORE THE STORM #1 (OF4) PACT #2 (OF 4) PALS N GALS DOUBLE DIGEST #94 PHANTOM #6 SEVEN SOLDIERS ZATANNA #2 (OF4) SHADOWHAWK #2 SHANNA THE SHE DEVIL #5 (OF 7) SHI JU NEN #4 (Of 4) SMALL GODS #9 SON OF VULCAN #1 (OF 6) SPAWN #146 SPIDER-GIRL #87 STRANGE #6 (OF 6) SUPER FUCKERS #1 SUPERMAN #218 SUPERMAN BATMAN #20 SWAMP THING #16 TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE SP WRAPAROUND CVR #1 TRIGGER #6 TWILIGHT EXPERIMENT #5 (OF 6) UNCANNY X-MEN #460 VILLAINS UNITED #2 (OF 6) WALKING DEAD #19 X-FORCE SHATTERSTAR #4 (OF 4) X-MEN UNLIMITED #9 Y THE LAST MAN #34 ZACHERLEYS MIDNITE TERRORS #3 ZED #6

Books / Mags / Stuff BATMAN ARCHIVES VOL 6 HC BATMAN WAR GAMES ACT TWO TP BLACK BEAUTY GN BLADE OF THE IMMORTAL VOL 14 LAST BLOOD TP BLUE MONDAY VOL 4 PAINTED MOON TP BOLLAND STRIPS TP BRAN MAK MORN THE LAST KING TP COMIC BOOK MARKETPLACE #121 DOCTEUR MYSTERE VOL 2 THE WAROF THE WORLDS HC DUE GN FANTASTIC FOUR CLOBBERIN TIMEDIGEST TP FORTEAN TIMES #197 FRANKENSTEIN PUFFIN GN HULK GRAY TP I WAS SOMEONE DEAD NOVELLA JUXTAPOZ JULY AUG 2005 VOL 13 #8 MAXIMORTAL TP NEW PTG MIRRORMASK ILLUSTRATED SCRIPT HC MYSTERIES OF THE RED MOON VOL1 NEAL ADAMS SAVAGE SKETCHBOOK NEW TEEN TITANS WHO IS DONNA TROY TP PAUL MOVES OUT HC PC GAMER MAGAZINE JULY 05 W/DVD PILGRIM & SON FESTIVAL RITUALTP REALITY SHOW GN RED BADGE OF COURAGE GN RUROUNI KENSHIN VOL 15 TP SMOKE #1 (OF 3) TERMINATOR 2 ENDOSKELETON 18-IN AF TIJUANA BIBLES VOL 6 TP TREASURY VICTORIAN MURDER VOL7 MURDER ABRAHAM LINCOLN HC UNEXPURGATED TALE OF LORDIE JONES GN WALT DISNEYS VACATION PARADE #2 WE 3 TP XXXHOLIC VOL 5 GN

A handful of reviews of 5/25 books

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Even less time than normal this week -- have to get the order form done, and the next month’s sub set up, plus it's a holiday weekend, and the store has been rocking. Jeff's out of town, so this is all the Critic you get this week. I'm barely halfway through this week's books, but I was writing as I was reading, and if I don;t post this now, I don't know when I would. We're pretty purely mainstream stuff this week as a result

Evidently, I was also extra-cranky this week...

ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN #640: I very much liked the formal experiment (the top 2/3rds was completely told in pictures -- from a scrapbook, or a magazine, or a broadcast -- if you didn't notice), and the story was very well crafted, but that big reveal seems pretty preposterous to me. OK

AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #520: Probably this should be called "The Avenging Spider-Man", since it's all-Avengers, all the time. As an issue of Spider-Man, I didn't care for it, but as an issue of Avengers it entertained me more than the recent stuff, so I can go with OK, I guess.

BATMAN #640: Effective art, and the Red Hood sequences were clever enough, but, man, that Superman/Batman scene was pretty damn pointless, wasn't it? A mild OK from me.

CAPTAIN AMERICA #6: Perfectly strong issue, I guess (though the last page undercut the Big Reveal -- sorta like how the season ender of LOST undercut itself by not ending one commercial earlier), though it seems to me that it would be difficult for it to be The Actual Bucky. He'd be in his 70s or 80s now then, right? Brube's point of B's death being a retcon is stictly true, but he's going to have to work really hard to make this new story make more "sense" then the 30 years of "Dead means dead" we've grown up with. I, personally, do rather hope this is a feint. A strong OK.

DAY OF VENGEANCE #2: None of these characters are remotely in what I'd consider to be "in character", and much of this don't make no sense (magic in the DCU seldom does), and yet it was breezy enough with fun dialogue and nice art, that I'll go with OK.

DC SPECIAL THE RETURN OF DONNA TROY #1: Um... what? How was Donna brought back? Just a quick "I was resurrected" in the middle of the data dump with no explanation? Then page after page of "Who's he?" and "I don't care" fighting and blah blah blah. I never liked the "New Titans" idea in the first place. This is clunky stuff, and hardly what I'd want to present as my first impression to DC. Since it is the "collector's item" first appearance of the new DC logo, and all. Garcia Lopez and Perez's art (both of whom I love individually) really doesn't gel very well here -- GL was always about the fluidity of line for me, and Perez about the obsessive doodling, together it "hardens" GLs line to me and looks blocky and too heavy. Or something, I don't have the vocabulary to properly discuss art. This is one of the places where the usual critic scale fails me -- it's worse than "EH", but "AWFUL" seems to harsh.

FANTASTIC FOUR #527: well-written, pretty to look at, and some solid ideas. Won't win an Eisner, but it's a GOOD issue of FF. The copy machine joke died, though -- Nick just had said only 2 copies were allowed.

FLASH #222: Still suffering a bit from the Too Many Characters and Too Many Plans syndrome, and the Let's Space out the Reveal on Boomerang's Mom Some More annoyed the piss out of me, but good solid action comic here, alright. a strong OK.

GIRLS #1: I thought ULTRA was keen from the first issue -- this grabbed me much less, what with the "get me wet" and "squeeze my melons" and the other "we're aiming lower than we might" stuff. While it's hard to judge from one issue, my first instinct is "Sophomore Slump". Looks pretty, though. OK.

GREEN LANTERN #1: I hate to say it -- I mean, I REALLY hate to say it because there's not a bigger Hal fan than me -- but this was pretty dull. Crafted well enough, but I would have expected a much bigger opening and scope. Coast City really seems weird and creepy, too, and I can't imagine anyone living there -- that could actually be a clever little running backstory, but it doesn't feel like one that fits in a GL comic. Plus, whatever happened to "Haven", the crashed alien ship/city thing? There was a quick line in REBIRTH that they vanished, but you'd think that space-savvy Hal would make that a top priority. Well, sure, it was never a good idea to begin with (do you remember the initial press, about how this would be a major facet of the DCU and lots of writers were planning on touching upon it, and yadda?), but it seems like a pretty major thing to just leave hanging. Anyway, glad to see Hal back, but I don't really care about pilots and piloting very much. Sadly, a very low OK.

INCREDIBLE HULK #81: Meh: was it real or not? I mean, he "rides off" at the end -- but if it was all a nightmare, as it were, then where the hell is he riding TO? And the coda was really unnecessary. Nice cover, though. OK

JLA #114: Buh? Look when you start changing costumes and all that it, then set it in a pitched space battle, it becomes pretty damn confusing who is who and doing what and how. Plus, I think I can speak for everyone who is me and say "No, we don't want them to TEAM UP, sheesh!" The Construct angle was clunkily resolved, and I really really didn't buy any of the last page of League speechifying about why the let the CSA get away. Having said all that, I think I'd be interested in reading a Busiek CSA book that stayed 100% in the evil universe -- he throws out lots of cute little bits throughout the issue and arc. Still, this individual comic was pretty incoherent, so: AWFUL.

MACHINE TEEN #1: Slow slow slow; especially since the Big Reveal is sorta spoiled by the TITLE of the book. What surprised me was the art -- it simply doesn't look polished enough for a Marvel title, does it. A great big whopping EH from me.

NEW X-MEN HELLIONS #1: really horrendously long way to go to get that set-up together. And it feels kinda awkward and clunky at that. There's really no reason this shouldn't have just be an arc in the regular title rather than its own mini-series, or, in fact, even had to be a "Hellions" story. A big fat OK.

OMAC PROJECT #2: I liked the first couple of pages, though was frustrated when they cut away because the rest has to happen in another comic book. Don't really care much about the Machiavellian goings on in Checkmate, so most of the rest of the issue was wasted on me. I'll go with OK, though I basically Don't Care.

OUTSIDERS #24: Man, you'd think they'd put a cover blurb on this that says "INSIDERS 2 of 4!" or something so that all of the people who don't religiously follow comic news sites and buy both titles would know they're walking in the middle of a crossover. I feel sorry for the poor shmuck who just reads OUTSIDERS and not TITANS who reads #23 then reads this. "Wait, what now?" Then the rest just devolves into a dumb fight scene, and you're left wondering, "Why didn't she just kill them all, ESPECIALLY after announcing that she had an advantage they didn't -- they had no idea who she was or what she could do" "This has all been part of a plan" is fine, I guess, if the plan is any good. This is not. AWFUL.

RUNAWAYS #4: Kind of a wasted issue -- extraordinarily little happens in the first half, while the second half is yet another "let's walk through the possibilities". The last page fills me with a smidge of hope, though I will gently observe that DD already has/had an heir, so it feels like treading back over ground we've seen before.

SLEEPER SEASON TWO #12: satisfying wrap-up, yes. Successfully went both ways and ate some cake, too. I can give this a VERY GOOD.

ULTIMATE IRON MAN #2: Again, not any Iron Man I've ever read before, but, judging on it's own merits this is solid enough comics. Big quibble in the "tape dissolves, but he can still wear shoes" thing, but, whatever, I'll go with a muted and mild GOOD.

ULTIMATES 2 #6: Nice idea of using "The Defenders" as they did -- that worked really well, I thought. Wish the last page had been a smidge more specific: NO ONE would say "We crippled a nation this morning", they'd say, "We crippled France", or whatever. Other than that, a solid VERY GOOD.

PICK OF THE WEEK: SLEEPER v2 #12

PICK OF THE WEAK: From what I've read so far, OUTSIDERS #24.

BOOK / TP oF THE WEEK: either GOTHAM CENTRAL HALF A LIFE TP, TRUE STORY SWEAR TO GOD VOL 2THIS ONE GOES TO 11 TP, or WRATH OF THE SPECTRE TP -- all three are great books

Shipping 5/25

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MASSIVE god-damn week. 100 BULLETS #61 A G SUPER EROTIC ANTHOLOGY #13 ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN #640 AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #520 ARCHIE #557 ARCHIE DOUBLE DIGEST #161 ARMOR X #3 BARBAROSSA AND THE LOST CORSAIRS #2 BATGIRL #64 BATMAN #640 BILLY THE KIDS OLD TIME ODDITIES #2 (OF 4) CAPTAIN AMERICA #6 CARTOON NETWORK BLOCK PARTY #9 CATWOMAN #43 CITY OF TOMORROW #2 (OF 6) COMMON FOE #1 (OF 4) DAY OF VENGEANCE #2 (OF 6) DC SPECIAL THE RETURN OF DONNA TROY #1 (OF 4) DESPERADO PRIMER DOOM PATROL #12 EXCALIBUR #14 EXPATRIATE #2 FANTASTIC FOUR #527 FLASH #222 GI JOE #43 GI JOE MASTER & APPRENTICE VOL II UDON CVR A #4 GIRLS #1 GOLDEN PLATES #2 (OF 12) GREEN LANTERN #1 GRIMOIRE #3 HELLBLAZER #208 HUNGER #1 INCREDIBLE HULK #81 JADE FIRE #1 JLA #114 KARNEY #2 (OF 4) LEGEND #4 (OF 4) LEGION OF SUPER HEROES #6 LOSERS #24 MACHINE TEEN #1 (OF 5) MARVEL ADVENTURES FANTASTIC FOUR #0 NEW WEST #2 NEW X-MEN HELLIONS #1 (OF 4) NIGHTJAR #4 (Of 4) OMAC PROJECT #2 (OF 6) OTHERWORLD #3 (OF 12) OUTSIDERS #24 POWER PACK #3 (OF 4) ROGUE #11 RUNAWAYS #4 SECRET WAR FROM FILES OF NICKFURY SEVENTH SHRINE #2 (OF 2) SLEEPER SEASON TWO #12 (OF 12) SPELLBINDERS #3 (OF 6) STORMBREAKER SAGA OF BETA RAYBILL #5 (OF 6) TAROT WITCH OF THE BLACK ROSE #32 TEEN TITANS GO #19 ULTIMATE IRON MAN #2 (OF 5) ULTIMATES 2 #6 UNCLE SCROOGE #342 WALT DISNEYS COMICS & STORIES #657 WOLVERINE SOULTAKER #4 (OF 5) X-23 #6 (OF 6) X-MEN #170 YEAR ONE BATMAN SCARECROW #1 (OF 2) ZORRO #1

Books / Mags / Stuff ALIEN LEGION FOOTSLOGGERS TP AMAZING SPIDER-MAN VOL 9 SKINDEEP TP BATMAN BROKEN CITY TP COMICS JOURNAL #268 DEAD AT 17 VOL 3 REVOLUTION TP DEEP SLEEPER TP DIFFERENT UGLINESS DIFFERENT MADNESS TP EMMA FROST VOL 3 BLOOM DIGESTTP ESSENTIAL THOR VOL 2 TP FANTASTIC FOUR VOL 6 RISING STORM TP FIRST APPEARANCE SERIES 3 INNER CASE ASST GALS VOL 2 GOTHAM CENTRAL HALF A LIFE TP JIMMY CORRIGAN POPULAR ED VINYL FIG KING OF WOLVES TP MEGAMANGA VOL 21 SUPER TABOO EXTREME TP MEGAMANGA VOL 22 SEX WARRIOR ISANE TP NIGHTCRAWLER DEVIL INSIDE TP NIGHTWING ON THE RAZORS EDGE TP PUNCH AND JUDY TP R. CRUMB HANDBOOK HC W/ CD RAVENOUS GN SCREAM QUEEN GN THE BALLAD OF SLEEPING BEAUTYTP TRUE STORY SWEAR TO GOD VOL 2THIS ONE GOES TO 11 TP VAMPIRE HUNTER D VOL 1 NOVEL SC WINSOR MCCAY VOL 5 EARLY WORKS WIZARD COMICS MAGAZINE FANTASTIC 4 PHOTO CVR #165 WRATH OF THE SPECTRE TP

Jeff's Reviews on 5/18 Books

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Oh, that Hibbs. He manages to coax more responses out of you guys than we've ever gotten, knocks a couple reviews out of the park, than tells me he probably won't post until Monday at the earliest because of some crazy shit like, "It's going to be a beautiful weekend and we have plans on both days to take Ben somewhere new. Just post something whenever you can, and I'll follow up. Maybe." Gee, thanks, Mr. Sinatra. I'll be more than happy to warm up the crowd for a few hours until you feel like coming on stage... Oh, and somehow this wasn't supposed to be umpteen million words of blabbity-blab. It just ended up that way.

BATMAN DARK DETECTIVE #2: I liked everything up until the patented "Scarecrow gives Batman a hallucinatory freak-out scene" and even that was crafted in such a way (once Bruce figures out the Scarecrow's responsible, he has to figure out if that means Scarecrow is actually in the batcave with him and Silver) as to add some secondary suspense. If I have anything close to a major complaint, it's that "Hush" has turned every Batman arc into The Love Boat. Look, it's The Joker and Two-Face! And Scarecrow and Penguin! And Tom Bosley and Bea Arthur! I can understand it with this team since they're doing the equivalent of a greatest hits tour, but it's really undercut by having it happen in every other Batman book, all the time, and for a few years now. OK.

BIRDS OF PREY #82: I didn't really see much point to the repetition of those captions about Ted Grant's boxing career other than the second time through I realized how well written they were. Things like that and some of the bits throughout (I liked the litte factoid about fighting on sand) and some super-nice art make me wanna give this a Good, but I really have to qualify it: there's still some kinks in the pacing (Barbara's scenes felt tacked on; a story about breaking up a drug ring is becoming a story about Diana and Ted's fight to not compromise their ethics--which is laudable (and arguably more dramatic)--but also points out what a poor match they were for the assignment in the first place) that keep me from being genuinely enthusiastic about it. A wishy-washy Good vote from me, I guess.

BLACK PANTHER #4: The best of the issues by far and Hudlin has a genuinely interesting idea here (the nationality of the invading villains reflect the countries that colonized and plundered Africa, giving the story an almost allegorical resonance and tension) but the execution is still lacking--like many other filmmakers who've come to comics, he seems reluctant to edit anything out or tighten anything up--and none of it is half as interesting or thought-provoking as his response on a letter page to an accusation of racial bias. Taken in tandem though, I'd give this a very high OK.

CABLE DEADPOOL #15: I felt a few self-conscious twinges when Rob L'Heureux mentioned this book specifically as an example of crap in our comments section because, against all odds, Fabian Nicieza has made this book I enjoy reading simply by showing a degree of intelligence and craft that I wouldn't expect from the material. It's a pretty trashy pleasure and I do my best to qualify it as such, but for what it sets out to do, it does it well. There. With that shiningly qualified defense of Cable Deadpool put forward, let me say this issue didn't work for me at all (cue the guy going "wah-wahhhh" on the trombone). Deadpool wasn't particularly funny, the fight scenes weren't particularly interesting, and oh sweet Jebus, that recent Age of Apocalypse thingy makes me never want to see that setting again. It's an Eh issue, but I'll still see where it's at next ish.

CHEMISTRY ONE-SHOT: Steve Peters has a fine drawing line, a weakness for magical thinking, and a tendency to overanalyze things to within an inch of their life. This one-shot, drawn at the rate of a panel a day, starts as a stream of consciousness adventure that becomes an allegorical analysis of a relationship's failings and it alternately charmed and alienated me. It's charming because the facile line art is strikingly detailed and clean, and Peters seems like a sweet guy capable of injecting humor and insight into his narrative. It's alienating because, like a religious zealot or a guy whacked out on drugs or someone with mild Asperger's, he takes something relatively obvious and, incapable of seeing it, keeps insisting it's something complex and oblique. Chemistry looks at a rebound relationship that didn't work out and examines every possible reason it didn't work out (bad karma, self-sabotage, premonitions of emotional dishonesty) except the most obvious one--the girl was looking for a light, fun fling and Steve couldn't bring the light and fun. Although it can take a certain amount of time for something like that to sink in (and such a problem is certainly a fertile ground for great art), Chemistry made me anxious and depressed, in the same way being trapped in a conversation with the zealot, the stoner or the Asperger's person can, as the obsessiveness of its approach goes on to yield no greater insight. Chemistry actually gets an OK from me because I kept reading it, and there were parts of it I found greatly enjoyable. If you like work that honestly communicates how someone else's mind works, you'll like Chemistry. If you like thinking about why a piece of art works and why it doesn't, you'll like Chemistry (particularly if you've read Geoffrey Brown's stuff which covers very similar ground in utterly dissimilar ways). But if you're the type of person who wants to help people fix their problems, or even see them solve their problems themselves, caveat emptor in a very big way.

DAREDEVIL #73: Changes up what seemed like the rules of the arc and that's likely a good thing, but I'm going to miss the modular done-in-one approach. Made it very easy to review. Now, I have to give this a high OK because where it goes from here will tell whether this issue worked at all or not. Maleev's art is fucking rad, though: this issue's art really knocked me out.

DESOLATION JONES #1: Yeah, came out last week, but I just wanted to say that double-page spread where Jones gouges that guy's eye out should go in The Double-Page Spread Hall of Fame. I'm just in awe of it--it gave me that same giddy nauseous brain-slap I got when Sonny Chiba breaks that guy's skull in x-ray during The Streetfighter, and may well work as both brilliant impressionistic storytelling and wicked pop art meta-commentary. No matter how you slice it (and I think Jones is actually an evolution, not a retread, of the classic Ellis character), that spread alone is worth your dollars. Very Good.

EX MACHINA #11: You know when you're in a plane and it loses altitude and your ears pop? Kinda how I felt this issue as Vaughan really changes up his pacing, drops any B story (after ten issues of scrupulously working the A-B story format), and focuses all of his scenes on Tony's drive to close down New York's fortune tellers. On the one hand, the story shot ahead like a rocket and it felt like a shitload happened. On the other hand, none of it really connected with me emotionally which made it even harder for me to buy the premise. Throw in some outrageously bad body language in the opening scenes (it looks like the police commissioner is communicating to Tony strictly through the medium of interpretative dance) and you've got your first Eh issue of this book. Considering how little I liked the wrap-up of the last arc, I hope that's not an indicator of things to come. Fingers are officially crossed.

EXILES #64: Boy, I really miss Mike McKone's art on this book: that guy can really sell a scene, you know? The plot and the writing are fine--in fact, it's pretty good despite some quibblage--but the art has kept everything at the same pitch for the last three arcs: it's the Exiles versus unstoppable bad guy Hyperion, who seems just like unstoppable bad guy Armageddon, who seems just like unstoppable bad guy Sasquatch god. There's always a danger of things flattening out when the storytellers keep going over the top again and again, but I think the art has really abetted that here. I feel like I'm right at the moment I get with a decent pop song on a radio--where the repetition drives me from really liking it to never wanting to hear it again. Call that a very manic OK.

FRIDAY THE 13TH #1: I think this tongue-in-cheek one-shot really misunderstands the nature of the Friday the 13th films which mercilessly exploit teens' fascination and disgust with bodies and their functions--the body's desire to have sex; its ability to break, crack and spurt, all viewed and tested by a brutal, unthinking puritan (by which I mean not only Jason, but also the mindset of a pre-teen child which still lingers in the thinking of a teenger). So, cleaving a body in half with a machete so the insides can be examined like a medical dummy (as happens on page 2): On target. Jason hitting people so hard their heads come out their asses: Very deeply off-target (really, it sounds so much better than it is). Throw in two oblivious teens having sex in a way that parodies all those other oblivious teens having sex and you have a Friday the 13th one-shot perfect for people who really don't like Friday the 13th movies. I say Awful, but I could well be so high on my artsy-fartsy crackpot theories I'm completely off-base.

GOON #12: Mmmm. Goon. The last two issues have really used the coloring to take things to a whole 'nother level, haven't they? And that boxing match with the robot was just a thing of sheer and simple beauty. The story, by its nature, feels a bit redundant but all the little touches more than make up for it. Very Good.

GREEN LANTERN SECRET FILES 2005: That lead story was a little too crafted (the third time someone said "You've never flown with me," I double-checked the credits to see if it'd been based on a Harry Chapin song or something) but undeniably gorgeous-looking, and I thought Cooke switching his typical Toth-based style to a Kane-influenced style in that middle section was clever and audacious. The second story read like a pile of script outtakes from Rebirth and seemed like the sort of thing you'd show people coming on to acid to guarantee that they'd have a really shitty trip. Considering I hardly like Secret Files issues (and I guess really hate people coming on to acid), that all adds up to Good, believe it or not.

HAWKMAN #40: My hope is there's some very clever bait-and-switch going on with the funeral thing, but either way, I just didn't like this issue very much. It's just--I dunno. It reads like a deliberate mimicing of Geoff Johns' patented Classic Character Dogpile, but it lacks Johns' ability to indicate what makes each character in the dogpile unique. The art's darn pretty, but barely rates an Eh.

HERCULES #2: Okay, so much for all the good will I granted Frank Tieri last issue. He's got a good idea he has no interest in actually executing: He's only got three issues left and Hercules hasn't started any of his twelve labors yet! Are we going to get five pages per labor? Perhaps part of the problem is that Tieri is writing this as a comedy, and he and I have two very different ideas about how comedy should work--I think it should be funny, and he doesn't. Awful.

JANES WORLD #19: Pleasant enough soap opera, and the humor runs the gamut from witty to overdone (I really liked the sports bra joke before it was run straight into the ground). But it feels like Braddock is still learning her craft--very solid cartooning chops, but the writing frequently clunks, and an inability to speed up the storytelling leads to a really high pagecount. Said count may explain the $5.95 price tag but that just seems way too high a price for a book this emotionally slight (at least in a comic book store; it may sell just fine on the racks of a GLBT bookstore). Pricing and other problems drops it to Eh for me, but this was actually a very pleasant little read.

LIVEWIRES #4: This book is drenched in clever touches but I think it's not enough for me: a scene like the discussion of the emotion hack should feel like a clever bit of tantalization, but I read it annoyed that it didn't actually reveal anything. I really like Adam Warren's work a lot but somehow this all went wrong somewhere (I guess that really wheel-spinning second issue) and I'm just not with the program. Eh.

MARVEL KNIGHTS SPIDER-MAN #14: Starts with a really lousy scene--Spidey flips out because Wolverine cuts him, to the point he actually passes out from blood loss, but at no point do the artist or the colorist feel any urge to put, oh, you know, blood, anywhere in the scene--and pretty much goes downhill from there. Initial amusement over the Clark Kent analogue shoving Peter Parker into a supply closet turned to utter incredulity as the analogue apparently convinces Peter to pray(!) so he can conveniently heal him with his Sentryvision or something. My hope is Hibbs gets some really pointy sticks installed in the store so I can just stab myself in the head with them instead of reading the next issue. It would be much less painful. Awful.

PLASTIC MAN #16: Spins its wheels and vamps, even by the standard set by previous issues: I get the sense Baker has fun thinking of some of this stuff, and takes almost no pleasure drawing it--the tip-off being how the quality of art shifts so dramatically upward whenever he's drawing a female character. As a kid's book, Good, as my book that I'm paying $2.99 for: Eh.

ROBIN #138: Some really interesting art here with fight scenes where the panel borders disappear entirely (a pretty neat trick). But I just couldn't get through the book to save my life. Look, I don't have the faintest god-damn opinion on how a Robin book should read or look, but every page of this oozed wrongness. Either I'm a cranky opinionated bastard (guilty) or this book has seriously got to get its shit together. Or both. Awful.

SEVEN SOLDIERS GUARDIAN #2: If you liked last issue mainly because of the pirate stuff, you'll like this issue even more. If you liked last issue because of the superhero stuff, you'll like this issue at least a little less (Guardian maybe does more than jumps from one subway car to the next, but I don't remember it). The pirate subway stuff is so much fun (and is that an oblique connection to Klarion The Witch Boy on one page?), I gotta go with Very Good.

SIMPSONS COMICS #106: What should have been a solid gold idea--crossing The Simpsons with those old musical parodies you used to see in Mad Magazine--falls astonishingly flat, mainly because the songs are set to tunes like "I'm Looking Over a Four Leaf Clover." I'm not sure if the editors insisted that the songs be stuff little kids would recognize or what, but it and the weird "we can't be authentic anymore because we're putting it all out on stage" angle just did not work for me at all. Disappointingly Eh.

SPIDER-MAN HUMAN TORCH #4: Well-crafted and if the intention was to create an issue as visually boring as the books from the era in which it was set, mission accomplished. OK, but nothing to write home about.

STRANGE EGGS #1: Starts off with a lot of charm and snap, then suffers a real case of the Shared Universe Anthology Blues--a significant chunk of the cartoonists seem to not care about (or completely loathe) the given constraints and just do what they want. Kind of a shame the whole project ended up as corporate roadkill, but pretty understandable. Eh.

SUPERMAN #217: The first half made no sense but I kind of liked it anyway (Lois had been wiped into the negative zone for the better part of a year, then when she returns, Superman disappears for seven weeks? Ms. Lane, you should file for divorce now: your husband HATES you.) I really hated the second half and realized the first half only existed to give the second half some impact, so I now hate the first half, too. A low Eh, because it's still an improvement over "For Tomorrow."

TEEN TITANS #24: Effective but I'm pretty shocked Winick let Johns use that last page reveal--it really, really belongs in The Outsiders. I also worry that Judd and Geoff will reinforce each other's worst impulses on this upcoming crossover, but I hope I'm wrong. Good.

UNCANNY X-MEN #459: Jesus. Here's a storyline with a intelligent superpowered dinosaurs, the Savage Land, a third faction of supervillains, and it still wraps up in the dullest way possible. And what kind of dinosaur decides to wipe out the rest of the Earth with a new ice age when some judicious overheating would render the rest of the world ready for its culture's repopulation? I'm almost glad Alan Davis is leaving the book: this way I won't feel his skills are being squandered when Nightcrawler and X-23 face off against the Sh'iar Empire in a brutal Pictionary showdown. Sumptious looking but Awful.

WOLVERINE #28: I have no idea what Mark Millar was trying to accomplish with this issue. In fact, I don't think he had any idea either. Is he trying to show he's not homophobic by having Evil Northstar and his team of zombie ninjas run around killing rednecks and gaybashers? What kind of evil master plan does Hydra have going when there's an explanation like: "Well, SHIELD's in ruins and the superheroes are in a panic, so we thought we'd have some fun killing off rednecks?" My mind is still reeling from it. Throw in a really dumb Sentinel sequence (presumably after Romita refused to accept any more pages from Millar that read like: "Pgs. 14-21: Wolverine kills everyone in sight. Really let yourself go on this one, J!") and you've got full-on Eh or lower.

YOUNG AVENGERS #4: As (almost) always, the time travel stuff makes not a lick of sense (and frankly, wouldn't it be cooler if Kang had set the whole thing in motion because he wants his younger self to be an Avenger and thus give his older self insider knowledge that could help beat the team?) But I liked all the other stuff a lot. There's a good balance of revealing bits and pieces about the various members and continuing to add characters to the team. So even without the sense-licking, I'm calling this Good.

PICK OF THE WEEK: Pretty easy. Either Goon #12 or Guardian #2. I'll go with Guardian #2, just because.

PICK OF THE WEAK: Hercules #2 because I was dumb enough to give Frank Tieri the benefit of the doubt last issue. That'll learn me.

TRADE OF THE WEEK: God damn Marvel's greedy eyes: you cannot tell me there was any reason Giant-Size Marvel needed to be twenty-four fucking ninety-nine. This could have been a great breezy read filled with lots of fun stories, a real snapshot of the age. Instead, it's an overpriced vial of Marvel Zombie crack cocaine, and I barely escaped buying it and letting myself be robbed. (Secondary eye-damning goes to DC for making the cover of their Teen Titans trade look like the animated series in the hopes some kids will actually pick it up and be scarred by the Beast Boy vivisection story.) The trade I went home with is Vol. 3 of Walking Dead, so I guess that's my pick.

 

So there you have it. Don't leave me hanging: what'd you think?

"Why are you always so negative?"

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Got a comment in the Talk Back of last week’s reviews that I thought might be bigger consideration than just responding there were no one would see it. A “Brian” (no last name) wrote: "Whew! Thanks for telling me what stinks, guys! Now I know I don't need to come into your shop and spend any money!”

Which, while fabulous in its snarkiness, actually does bring up something I get a lot: “Why are you so negative all of the time?”

So, let’s go over some of the reasons you’ll find negative reviews here.

First, and foremost, I usually hear it from people who say some variant of “You’re a retailer, your job is to sell.” But, here’s the thing: I don’t see my job as being that specifically limited – my job is to sell, sure, but I see that over the long run, not the short run.

It is like with Variant Covers: some retailers adore the things because “It is like getting a free $100 bill!” Which, of course, it is. But I believe that in the long run taking that $100 can cost you THOUSANDS of dollars in sales as we drive people away from the entire hobby.

In exactly the same way, my job isn’t “just to sell” – it’s to sell QUALITY MATERIAL. If I can discourage someone from buying a shitty-ass comic, then it is at least marginally more likely they’ll buy something good; something that puts the burning need to buy MORE comics within their heart.

What you have to understand is that there’s a fine line here that I constantly try to be smart about. What you see in cold hard type isn’t the same thing you’d necessarily hear on the sales floor – I try very hard to remain positive in the store because a customer there may or may not be interested in my opinion. However, if you’re here, on this website, you CLEARLY WANT my opinion.

On the sales floor, I won’t offer my opinion UNLESS it is solicited, and even then, I tend to try and remain neutral in my phrasing (“It isn’t really my kind of book,” that sort of thing)

There seems to be a supposition that what is said here has direct influence upon the sales floor. After 16 years of selling comics for a living, and more than a decade of internet reviewing, I think I can laugh pretty hard at any connection.

Some of the worst reviewed comics here are the tip-toppest sellers in the store. Look at something like Bendis’ AVENGERS: I absolutely think it is pure crap on a stick, but it has steadily been our #1, 2, or 3 Marvel seller each and every month it has been released.

Understand: most (60-90%) periodical comics are sold by the end of the first weekend. It is incredibly rare that Jeff or I get reviews up in time to influence periodical buying.

Further, every effort I’ve ever made to study it shows that negative reviews simply do not impact even upon our long-term sales of periodical comics. People buy what they want, and reviews have only the most minor of impacts upon those choices.

Ultimately, post-Wednesday reviews have almost no impact upon initial sales – at best, they can be addative to the NEXT time you go into a store. But if you’ve already decided to not buy NEW AVENGERS, I’m not going to make you buy it less.

Another key factor for me, at least, is that negative reviews illuminate the interests of the reviewer AT LEAST as much as positive reviews. If you like all of the books that I hate, then you’re going to approach my positive reviews differently than you would otherwise.

Personally, I HATE reviewers that only give positive reviews – this seems intellectually dishonest to me, and “You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar” is really only helpful if you’re trying to catch flies.

What I think is that by being HONEST about my opinions, even if it COULD cost me a sale, means that you’re going to value my recommendations all that more. You know I’m not trying to sell you a bill of goods, or whatever happens to be “hot” or whatever.

Further, judging from my email (though seldom the “Talk Backs”), comics professionals generally “appreciate” a negative review more than positive ones. Quite often I’ll get the “Yeah, it’s flawed, and here’s the behind-the-scenes bit you didn’t know”. Joe Casey, not withstanding. Kurt, Sean, Ed, Warren, etc. all of you read my reviews on a semi-regular basis, maybe you could post in the Talk Back if there’s any value to you in here?

Now, if the criticism is that we (well, mostly I) don’t do a good enough job OF explaining WHY I don’t like something, that one is probably valid. I like to think I bat at least .400 though.

Finally, and the point that really trumps any other one: Jeff and I post largely for ourselves. We make no money from this website. There are no banner ads, this is not a profit-making affair (quite the opposite, in fact). I post on MY time (barring the weird odd occasion like this one where I use the AlphaSmart from the counter), time away from playing video games or hanging out with the family or whatever. We don’t get paid for this, barring an incredibly rare PayPal donation or something, so what I’m hoping for is that I’ll make someone (usually Jeff) laugh.

That’s much easier to do in a negative review than a positive one. When was the last time you laughed when I said for the 86th time “USAGI YOJIMBO is an excellent comic that everyone should be buying”? Yeah, exactly.

This is the internet; people LIKE rants. We get thousands of hits, and are usually featured at or near the top of many “blog rolls” every week because of that. It seems to me we must be doing SOMEthing right.

I’m certainly willing to have a rational conversation about the pros and the cons of the approach we take here – please feel free to use the Talk Back to tell me I’m right or wrong, and I listen to all of it. Though I listen far more to people who sign their full name to their opinions…

What do you think?

-B

EDIT after I wrote that: there's a message that follows "Brian"'s, from "Rob L'Heureux" which I thought should also be put on the front page. Here's the whole thing:

" I usually agree with your reviews and pick up your recommendations that I haven't read and sometimes drop titles if I agree with your criticism. But occasionally I think you just miss the mark, the latest two examples being the ASTONISHING X-MEN and FABLES. The art on both titles is exceptional, well above the current standard and using the medium to advantage ( especially FABLES ), and I always enjoy the storytelling. A book like ASTONISHING, where everything seems to have been done with the characters and the writer has to handle these ‘moneymakers’ so gingerly, I mean, this is a monthly serial but the writer still finds fresh material and presents it in an entertaining fashion.

These books haven’t changed my life but I really think a serious critic ( and retailer ) would encourage this level of work. Readers should be encouraged to support these titles, creators should be encouraged to strive for this level of storytelling ( or better ), and publishers should be encouraged to promote and produce more in kind. All of which would help the comic industry.

Sometimes you seem to hold some titles / creators to a higher standard and I hate you. "

I'm curious as to what other people think, though I will note that I gave ASTONISHING an "OK" and FABLES a "GOOD" (!) Am I TOO harsh?

-B

Arriving at Comix Experience on 5/18

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Look at me, all ahead of the game, and shit... 2000 AD #1435 2000 AD #1436 30 DAYS OF NIGHT BLOODSUCKERSTALES #8 AUTHORITY REVOLUTION #8 (OF 12) BATMAN DARK DETECTIVE #2 (OF 6) BATMAN GOTHAM KNIGHTS #65 BATMAN JEKYLL AND HYDE #2 (OF 6) BETTY & VERONICA SPECTACULAR #70 BIRDS OF PREY #82 BLACK PANTHER #4 BOOKS OF MAGICK LIFE DURING WARTIME #11 BUGTOWN #5 (OF 6) CABLE DEADPOOL #15 CASTLEVANIA THE BELMONT LEGACY #3 (OF 5) CHEMISTRY ONE SHOT CONAN #16 CRIMSON GASH VS HITLER (A) DAREDEVIL #73 DONALD DUCK AND FRIENDS #328 DRIPPYTOWN COMICS & STORIES #4 EASY WAY #2 (OF 4) ERIC REDS CONTAINMENT #5 (OF 5) EX MACHINA #11 EXILES #64 FREAKSHOW #6 FREEDOM FORCE #5 (OF 6) FRIDAY THE 13TH SP WRAPAROUNDCVR #1 GOON #12 GREEN LANTERN SECRET FILES 2005 HAWKMAN #40 HERCULES #2 (OF 5) HERO CAMP #1 (OF 4) JANES WORLD #19 JLA CLASSIFIED #7 JUGHEAD #165 LIONS TIGERS & BEARS #4 (OF 4) LIVEWIRES #4 (OF 6) LUCIFER #62 MANHUNTER #10 MARVEL KNIGHTS 4 #18 MARVEL KNIGHTS SPIDER-MAN #14 MARVEL MUST HAVES NYX #1-3 MICKEY MOUSE AND FRIENDS #277 NEW THUNDERBOLTS #8 NEW X-MEN #14 OFFICIAL HANDBOOK MARVEL UNIVERSE TEAMS 2005 OMAC PROJECT #1 2ND PTG PLASTIC MAN #16 POWERPUFF GIRLS #62 REAR ENTRY #9 (A) ROBIN #138 SEVEN SOLDIERS GUARDIAN #2 (OF 4) SIMPSONS COMICS #106 SONIC THE HEDGEHOG #149 SPIDER-MAN BREAKOUT #2 (OF 5) SPIDER-MAN HUMAN TORCH #4 (OF5) SPUNKY KNIGHT XXX #1 (A) STAR WARS EMPIRE #31 STAR WARS OBSESSION #5 (OF 5) STRANGE EGGS #1 SUPERMAN #217 TALES FROM RIVERDALE DIGEST #2 TALES OF TEENAGE MUTANT NINJATURTLES #10 TEEN TITANS #24 TOXIN #2 (OF 6) ULTIMATE X-MEN #59 UNCANNY X-MEN #459 WOLVERINE #28 YOUNG AVENGERS #4

Books / Mags / Stuff 2000 AD EXTREME ED #9 ABC WARRIORS VOL 2 THE BLACK HOLE TP ANIMATION MAGAZINE JUNE 2005 #149 CLASSIC DAN DARE VOL 5 OPERATION SATURN PART 1 HC COMICS BUYERS GUIDE JULY 2005 #1606 DAMPYR #2 NIGHT TRIBE DARK HORSE BOOK OF THE DEAD HC EVENT HORIZON VOL 1 TP EXCALIBUR VOL 2 SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER TP F STOP GN FIRST KINGDOM VOL 1 TP (OF 4) FRUITS BASKET VOL 9 GN (OF 14) GIANT SIZE MARVEL TP HEAVY METAL JULY 2005 LOSERS TRIFECTA TP MARVEL SELECT EMMA FROST AF MARVEL TEAM-UP VOL 1 GOLDEN CHILD TP OJO TP OLYMPUS TP PETER BAGGE HATE BUDDY BRADLEY DOLL POWERS VOL 8 LEGENDS TP REX MUNDI VOL 2 RIVER UNDERGROUND TP SAMURAI EXECUTIONER VOL 4 TP SEEING THINGS HC SFX #130 TEEN TITANS BEAST BOYS AND GIRLS TP TENJHO TENGE VOL 2 TOMARTS ACTION FIGURE DIGEST #134 WALKING DEAD VOL 3 SAFETY BEHIND BARS TP

What looks good to you?

-B

5/11 reviews by Hibbs!

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Still haven't QUITE finished all this week's comics (have about 15 or so to go), but there's enough done to make a stab at this. Jeff Lester tenders his regrets, but he says he'll be unable to review this weekend, so it's just you and me baby!

Speaking of babies, have I told you about Ben's newest tactic? That's right, the little fella is now trying emotional blackmail! He'll want us to do something -- lift him up, get something for him, whatever, and if we won't do it right away, he'll say "I la!", which is Ben-ese for "I love you!" "I la!" I la!" (*makes kissy lip smacking noises*) "I la!"

It doesn't work, of course, but the power of the boy's brain continues to impress the crap out of me.

Anyway, comics:

ACTION COMICS #827: Me, I'm kinda thunderstruck that the return of John Byrne to Superman got about... well, NO marketing behind it whatever. I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, but Byrne's MAN OF STEEL was the highest selling comic that DC had in like 30 years until they killed ol' Supey. Certainly, it sold 8-10 times better than IDENTITY CRISIS. More people read that than know what a "Sue Dibney" is. So why not trumpet it? Is it just me, or does that seem mental? And, the craziest part was this was easily the best Superman comic book I've read in a long-ass time (2 years? 3?) -- fun action, good Lois & Clark scenes, nice use of the worldwide power of Superman, awareness of the universe he's in, yet not bogging down on too many cast members, a fairly strong twist at the end. Good solid craftsmanship all around by Byrne, Simone, and Nelson, if one regarded this as "minimum base quality" for Superman, maybe the character'd sell 100,000 copies an issue again. I'm going to go with VERY GOOD (though the "very" could be a reaction to the last [2 years? 3?] of Superman comics...)

ADAM STRANGE #8: *shrug* I guess the series was fine -- the art was certainly sharp, and the plot was inventive enough. It was probably twice as long as it *needed* to be, what with the Omega Men-this and the Vril Dox-that, and I'm kind of pissed off that the end wasn't exactly an end, but more of a "Hey, now go buy this!", so that's while I'll give this one an EH.

AQUAMAN #30: "Sub Diego" is a decent enough idea -- I do especially like the stabs they're trying to make at showing how the undersea community is trying to cope, the scrabble board idea was fun, although it seems to me that the tiles would just float off -- but it's missing a few things, it seems to me: impact, scope, and a through-line. For the first two, just think what would happen if San Diego cracked in half and fell into the sea. That would be huge, it would be a huger incident than the Towers falling, by far. The effects of such a catastrophe would be enormous -- the economic impact alone to California... such an event should have been touched upon in every DCU book, y'know? I don't think it's ever even been MENTIONED anywhere else. By through-line, I mean, right, so where are you GOING with this? In a lot of way this looks like recognition that "Aquaman in Atlantis is kinda dull", but then you run up against, "well, wait, he's underwater guy, now what?" so they needed to build him Atlantis II. Problem is, unless you actually DO something with it, you're back to "Aquaman in Atlantis is kinda dull". Problem #2 is that a lot of what COULD be neat about rebuilding a city, dealing with the issues involved, don't really work right in a comic. That's an idea probably better suited for a novel. This actual issue of the comic itself, was perfectly OK, but I've come to think the very premise is misguided.

ARANA HEART OF THE SPIDER #4: That's kind of not the advice that I'd see Spidey giving to a little scared girl on a rooftop at night, but, whatever. Otherwise pedestrian: EH.

ASTONISHING X-MEN #10: See, maybe I wouldn't mind this as much if the issues were coming out monthly like they did in the beginning, but with that kind of a wait, part 2 of "fighting the Danger Room", came down to 2 good beats, both revolving around Emma, and a lot of, well... fighting. Extraordinarily well drawn fighting, yes, but it wasn't half as clever as it needed to be to make a middle sequence work. The best I can muster for this is a piece of serialization is an OK

BATMAN LEGENDS OF THE DARK KNIGHT #191: A tidy enough one off Mr. Freeze story, though I was kinda shocked that no remorse was spoken for all of the dead murdered innocents in the explosion. A solid OK.

CAPTAIN AMERICA & THE FALCON #14: Sure, Captain America can just get up from a bullet in the head cuz, cuz, cuz... well, just because, OK?!? Then, just like it never happened, he gets up and enters major combat. Sweet! As for the Falcon... well, dunno. He's not in the issue. His costume is, though -- in just about the most strangely ambiguous ending I've seen lately. Are we to assume that's he's quit? Or maybe he's dead. Or kidnapped, even. No way to know, except to wait for the I guess forthcoming FALCON mini? 14 issues of build-up leads to zero emotional pay-off. Sorry, cholly, I gotta go with AWFUL.

CITY OF HEROES #1: Sure, that was fine, I guess -- a little more backstory for the NPCs of the MMOG is fine. And if you don't play the game, this might have seemed intriguing. Did you know that the character of Statesman, the lead main bad-ass guy, isn't even actually in the game? There's even a mission of "rescue Statesman" but you at no point see him. You just get a little piece of text saying he got away safely. Woo! Anyway, a perfectly OK comic.

DESOLATION JONES #1: Great start to this new bi-monthly ongoing from Warren Ellis and JH Williams III. Imaginative locale, great Ellisian characters, all in all terrific stuff. If you find yourself missing TRANSMETROPOLITAN, this hits a similar vein. VERY GOOD.

DESPERADOES BANNERS OF GOLD #5: I feel like I missed something here: how are they tipping over coal cars and such exactly? Ending the story so the supernatural elements are more the focus than the emotional ones is a real wrong turn. This is the first "Desperadoes" storyline that utterly missed the mark for me. Ow, and $4 each? Sorry: AWFUL.

EXCALIBUR #13: Speaking of Awful, from comics very first "mega crossovers" we've had fans lamenting about "Red Sky crossovers" -- books would say "CRISIS crossover!" on the cover, and inside there'd be a panel of someone saying "Hey, look, the sky is red. Wonder what that's about?" End crossover. Creators and publishers HAVE to know that that kind of thing pisses people off, right? So, when it says "HOUSE OF M prelude" on the cover, I think the thing should probably have more than 3 pages, all three of which were more properly a prelude to the prelude. INCREDIBLE HULK #180 may well have been the first appearance of Wolverine, but the comic that people WANT is #181. Particularly as the VERY FIRST SHOWING of the "House of M" branding, I think this was a serious lost opportunity. On the other hand, I was going to give it an "Awful", until Lester pointed something out that I missed my first read. Charles visits Dr. Strange in his Astral form, right? Then how the hell is he KNOCKING ON THE DOOR? Normally, that would lower a grade, but it made me laugh so hard (and, again, right now when thinking about it!), that I've going to actually raise the grade to an EH.

FABLES #37: I like reading about Fabletown. It feels like it's been six months since we've been there. This is quite good, too, but it's not what I've come to want from the title. A muted GOOD.

FANTASTIC FOUR #526: Clearing the old fill-in drawer out, or so it felt. Extremely EH.

FINDER #36: Terrific stuff. I can't always remember who is who from the delays between issues, to Speed's sometimes fragmentary approach to forward narrative, but the characters were well-drawn (er, not in the illustrative sense, though they are that, too) enough that it didn't matter, I got up to speed fast enough, with the honest emotions on display. Nothing less than VERY GOOD.

GAMBIT #10: Very very cute, though irresponsible enough to publish without a warning for certain communities. "It's OK to lie and steal as long as you're learning! (and leering at topless Storm)" cuz, like, knowing is half the battle or something. Liked it though: on the low side of GOOD.

GOTHAM CENTRAL #31: This arc has felt a little drawn out, but it has still been enjoyable. OK

GREEN ARROW #50: Absolutely fine, the Riddler was even used to good effect. GOOD.

GREEN LANTERN REBIRTH #6: Did what it needed to, put all of the pieces back on the board and in play again, showed Hal's badder than Guy, differentiated between the GLs nicely. Can't fault this comic for much other than a bit of late shipping. VERY GOOD.

JSA #73: Nice new logo. Very nice. Solid enough guts, call it GOOD.

MAN WITH THE SCREAMING BRAIN #1: Liked this quite a bit. Probably liked it more than I would as the movie it will be. Terrific art, funny stuff, VERY GOOD.

MARVEL NEMESIS IMPERFECTS #1: Based on a video game or something? Nothing special, nothing shitty, kinda just there. Only one beat really worked for me, Elektra's "You had me at 'hello'", other than that, extremely EH. We got the newest PREVIEWS advance photocopy yesterday, and I can already tell you the comic of the year is coming from Marvel: MARVEL MEGA MORPHS, based on the new toy line. Seems Tony Stark has invented suits of giant mecha robot armor, and they're to be piloted by Wolverine, Ghost Rider, and the Hulk... sounds GLORIOUS! This video game/toy crossover was textbook EH

MARVEL TEAM-UP #8: You'd think a team-up of Blade and the Punisher would have lots action in it. You'd be wrong. Instead, they pretty much stand on a roof glaring at each other for most of the 22 pages. ACTION! EH.

MNEMOVORE #2: No, still a Sci-Fi channel movie. EH.

NIGHTWING #108: Maybe it's just me but it seems... ill advised, perhaps? for the super-karate using scion of Bruce Wayne to be so open about who he is and what he can do when dealing with mobsters? Don't get me wrong, I'm enjoying this story so far, but it seems to me there's no way this can't fuck up at the end. OK.

OUTSIDERS #23: Um, that was an interesting piece of deductive reasoning, there. You'd think Dick would have something to say, wouldn't you? Plus, where did ol' Roy gain the ability to reprogram a robot from the future again? So, EH.

PUNISHER #21: Pretty brutal stuff there, a good strong issue. GOOD.

PUNISHER CELL ONE SHOT: Not at all sure why this isn't just another pair of issues of Punisher -- not out of tone or place in the normal run. Solid stuff here, too: GOOD.

PVP #17: I'm really glad it went back to "standard" formatting -- that should help sell the book, and avoid all of the rack damage copies took from falling over. A typically funny issue: GOOD.

RANN THANAGAR WAR #1: Well, it's selling great, which sort of surprises me. For me, I don't really care about "Rann" OR "Thanagar" especially -- in 40 years of their history, it's not like anything particularly memorable has happened in either place, with the possible sole exception of the HAWKWORLD run(s). To me, both planets have historically be portrayed as full of unpleasant and unlikable beings (Like: Who'd ever want to hang out with Sardath?), so if they go to war, I'm not sure why I should really carry, other than "war is wrong". It is competently written, and very nicely drawn, but I didn't care even a tiny little smidge, so: EH.

ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #77: Finally, it is over, hooray! Now, let's get back the forward momentum! EH.

USAGI YOJIMBO #83: I've never read an issue I didn't find to be VERY GOOD, and the use of time in this story proved no exception.

WONDER WOMAN #216: Lalalala, get to it already, would you? OK.

No "Excellents" this week, but a pack of "Very Goods" -- ACTION #827, DESOLATION JONES #1, FINDER #36, GREEN LANTERN REBIRTH #6, MAN WITH THE SCREAMING BRAIN #1, and USAGI YOJIMBO #83. You really can't go wrong with any of them. But you're going to make me pick, aren't you? Well, since I expected the least from it, I'll say the PICK OF THE WEEK is THE MAN WITH THE SCREAMING BRAIN #1. Hurray for Bruce Campbell!

For the PICK OF THE WEAK, I'll go with CAPTAIN AMERICA & THE FALCON #14 for the weakest cliffhanger resolution in the history of comic books, and for not bothering to address "What's up with Falc?!?" after building the shit up for more than a year. Sheesh!

My pick for BOOK / TP OF THE WEEK is STRAY BULLETS VOL 2 SOMEWHERE OUT WEST 10TH ANN TP, and while there wasn't much competition this week, this Lapham material is prime prime work. Snap up a copy!

That's what I thought, how about you?

(And, seriously, putting ANY kinda comment in the talkback is welcome -- hits aren't the same as discussion!)

-B

Shipping 5/11

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As I'm sure you've guessed by now, Jeff Lester bet wrong, and FCBD and Mother's Day conspired to give me a one-two punch to not have time for the Critic. Heck, look, it's 2:40 on Wednesday, and I'm just getting up this week's shipping list. On the plus side, thanks to a bus trip to the doctor's office this morning (had to, literally, get the wax cleaned outta my ears!), I've made a very good start on reading this week's comics, and, since I've put this month's TILTING AT WINDMILLS to bed (should be up on Friday, I think), I have every hope, if not expectation, that I'll be able to write a full length Critic for Friday...

But, as always, no promises :)

Here's what Comix Experience recieved this week, what looks good to you?:

10TH MUSE VOL 2 #1 ACTION COMICS #827 ADAM STRANGE #8 (OF 8) ANGEL ONE SHOT AQUAMAN #30 ARANA HEART OF THE SPIDER #4 ASTONISHING X-MEN #10 BATMAN LEGENDS OF THE DARK KNIGHT #191 BATMAN STRIKES #9 BATTLE HYMN #2 (OF 5) BETTY & VERONICA DOUBLE DIGEST #133 BLADE OF THE IMMORTAL #101 BREACH #5 CAPTAIN AMERICA & THE FALCON #14 CITY OF HEROES PEREZ CVR #1 CONAN & THE JEWELS OF GWAHLUR #2 (OF 3) DARKNESS #20 DEAL WITH THE DEVIL #1 (OF 4) DEATH & CANDY #4 (RES) DESOLATION JONES #1 DESPERADOES BANNERS OF GOLD #5 (OF 5) DISTRICT X #13 ELSINORE #1 (OF 9) ERIKA TELEKINETIKA #3 EXCALIBUR #13 FABLES #37 FANTASTIC FOUR #526 FINDER #36 FREEDOM FORCE #4 (OF 6) GAMBIT #10 GOTHAM CENTRAL #31 GREEN ARROW #50 GREEN LANTERN REBIRTH #6 (OF 6) GRIMJACK KILLER INSTINCT #4 (OF 6) JACK STAFF #8 JSA #73 KILLER STUNTS INC #1 (OF 4) LIVING WITH ZOMBIES #2 MAJESTIC #5 MAN WITH THE SCREAMING BRAIN #1 (OF 4) MARVEL ADVENTURES SPIDER-MAN #3 MARVEL NEMESIS IMPERFECTS #1 (OF 6) MARVEL TEAM-UP #8 MARY JANE HOMECOMING #3 (OF 4) MNEMOVORE #2 (OF 6) NIGHT CLUB #1 (OF 4) NIGHTWING #108 OUTSIDERS #23 PAKKINS LAND VOL 2 #1 PUNISHER #21 PUNISHER CELL ONE SHOT PVP #17 RANN THANAGAR WAR #1 (OF 6) RAYMOND FEISTS WOOD BOY #1 (OF 2) SCOOBY DOO #96 SHONEN JUMP VOL 3 JUNE 2005 #6 (C:3) STAR WARS TALES #23 TALES OF THE THING #3 (OF 3) ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #77 USAGI YOJIMBO #83 VERONICA #161 WITCHBLADE #85 WONDER WOMAN #216 X-MEN THE END HEROES AND MARTYRS #3 (OF 6)

Books / Mags / Stuff ALTER EGO #48 AVENGERS KANG TIME AND TIME AGAIN TP BACK ISSUE #10 BERSERK VOL 7 TP CINEFANTASTIQUE APR JUNE 05 VOL 37 #3 DON BLUTH VOL 1 ART OF ANIMATION DRAWING TP ESSENTIAL FANTASTIC FOUR VOL 1 TP NEW PRINTING HELLBLAZER RED SEPULCHRE TP ILLUSTRATION MAGAZINE #13 JACK KIRBY COLLECTOR #42 JUDGE ANDERSON VOL 1 ANDERSONPSI DIVISION TP KANE VOL 4 39TH TP LAST TRAIN TO DEADSVILLE CAL MCDONALD MYSTERY TP LONE & LEVEL SANDS GN MAD XL #33 MARVEL KNIGHTS SPIDER-MAN VOL3 THE LAST STAND TP METABARONS VOL 3 STEELHEAD AND DONA VICENTA TP MUSASHI #9 VOL 3 PUNISHER MAX VOL 3 MOTHER RUSSIA TP SENCILLA FANTA ASHLEY WOOD SKETCHBOOK SINISTER DEXTER VOL 3 SLAY PER VIEW TP SOULCATCHER GN SOULFIRE COLLECTED ED #1 STRAY BULLETS VOL 2 SOMEWHEREOUT WEST 10TH ANN TP SUPERMAN THE WRATH OF GOG TP TOYFARE BATMAN TABLOID CVR #95 TRIGUN MAXIMUM VOL 5 BREAK OUT TP TSUBASA VOL 5 GN VIDEO WATCHDOG MAY 2005 #119 WANTED HC

Coming Up From The Crack Pipe: Reviews of 5/4 Comics

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I'm sure Hibbs will be around sooner rather than later (I'm betting Free Comic Book Day followed by Mother's Day put him on the ropes, but not down for the count), but here's how things stand with me. After three months of staying away from video games, I fired up the PS2 again. So maybe the books this week didn't wow me because my brain was on God of War, the game I can only describe as a Ray Harryhausen movie on crack—highly recommended for those who would enjoy such a thing. And speaking of crack, I owe a big ol' debt of gratitude to Rob Bennett for turning me on to The Wire. Not quite done with Season One, but the first four discs have some of the best TV I've seen in a while. If you like crime novels that also do the heavy lifting of character studies and social analysis, this is the show for you. It's really, really fucking good. (Oh, and I'd like to re-use that God of War excuse, please, to aplogize for not commenting on the ol' Haloscan this week. Normally, I try not to leave anyone who makes a comment dangling but when you're stuck getting your ass beat by a unending wave of fire-breathing three-headed hell hounds, it gets way too easy to let time get away from you…)

 

So. Now that you know where my brain is at, here's some comic book reviews:

 

AMAZING FANTASY #8: Picked this up because I kinda liked last issue and, surprise, I kinda liked this issue. A lot of the little traps that Arana fell into are neatly avoided here: rather than just being the dutiful agent with the all-knowing back-up team, Scorpion has her own agenda and knowledge base that she’s willing to work with. Yeah, there were the occasional head-scratchers here and there, but very highly OK.

 

BATMAN DARK DETECTIVE #1: My expectations were not high, so it’s not surprising this managed to more or less clear them. Marshall Rogers is one strange artist—great design sense, nice attention to detail, passable body language, and then suddenly there’ll be a panel or two where everything is utterly lifeless—it’s like an illustration of two mannequins facing each other. Very odd. As for Englehart, I was (and am) a huge fan of his '70s Marvel work but remember work in the '80s and '90s that! became! a! little! heavy! on!--well, you get the idea. Fortunately, people here do more than exclaim, and I like his take on The Joker. Is the whole thing still a bit anachronistic and limp? Yes, and yet I would again throw this on the high side of OK because I enjoyed reading it.

 

BLOOD OF THE DEMON #3: Oy, this issue. I don't even know where to begin. The capper for me, however, was Batman refusing to get the League involved because Gotham is his city (lame, but in character, I'd say), Zatanna deciding he's mismatched and contacting the League anyway (okay, gotcha), and then a page showing Zatanna seeing that all the members of the League are fighting menaces of their own. Great. Does Zatanna then go on to help anyone? Take the three minutes to help each hero, get the JLA together, and then transport them to help Batman? No, Zatanna apparently decides to go back to bed, or check her email, or something. So why was it brought up? Because Byrne only wanted the scene to appease crotchety guys who go apeshit when it's not explained why Batman doesn't call the League—people, in short, like John Byrne. In the store, Hibbs seemed to think it was OK, I definitely thought it was Awful.

 

CONCRETE HUMAN DILEMMA #5: Plot-hammered, badly paced, and Chadwick runs a letter in the back that really seems to take the piss out of the sterilization arguments used in the series: in short, not really what I would call a return to form. Weirdly, I find I still have some emotional connection to the characters (I was a very casual Concrete reader at best, way back when) so I sorta hope Chadwick tries again soon—maybe more time at the drawing board will shake off a lot of those faults. 'Til then—Very low Eh.

 

DETECTIVE COMICS #806: Obviously, I missed an issue. Or two. And yet, I can't guarantee that this would have made any sense at all even if I had read them. I thought this arc was going to be Batman meets Bonfire of the Vanities; it seems, instead, a bit more like Batman meets Invasion of the Body Snatchers via some of the more boring stretches of The Godfather. Or something. Take the word Eh, reverse it, and you've got the first two letters of "Help!"

 

EMBROIDERIES OGN: After two exceptionally strong volumes of Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi follows up with an exceptionally well-written, crudely drawn quasi-sequel, as a group of Iranian women trade stories of love and sex. The book's gotten some guff because of the art, and rightly so: the visual-verbal blend is outrageously out of whack; anatomy's off kilter; page layouts are cramped; the women hold their heads up at weird angles and seem to talk out of their throats—everything about it suggests either a book that was rushed to market or an artist whose range of talent is dramatically limited. But, honestly? I don't read Jules Feiffer's work for the art either: I read it for the keen sense of character, irony and insight into the condition of a gender and a culture. (For ten points of extra credit, compare and contrast Feiffer's neurotically anxious and arrogant men with Satrapi's scathingly candid and jocular women. Pick up your papers and begin.) Admittedly, my employee discount might have taken the sting out of this, but if money matters to you, wait for the softcover and/or check it out of a library. You should like it fine. Good.

 

ESSENTIAL DEFENDERS VOL. 1 TPB: Thanks to this, along with the reprint of Tuk The Cave Boy that also came out this week, I am absolutely convinced the Marvel Reprint Department runs on a series of dares and wagers. Unless I'm mistaken, this is the third consecutive Essential to include The Incredible Hulk #126, a hat trick I can see no other explanation for save mischievousness. While this material really shows how far the mainstream's come in more than thirty years (Hibbs was reading some of this stuff aloud in the store on Friday, to hilarious effect), it also shows us how much ground comics book stories themselves used to be able to cover—a Lovecraft derived Dr. Strange story becomes a series of interlocking one-shots spread across three different titles to create a brisk little mini-epic while still juggling a subplot or two from each book. I'm also a sucker for how Marvel books were much more eager to throw their influences into the mix (superheroes fighting Lovecraftian Undying Ones? It'd be awesome if only the artists' interpretation of the latter didn't resemble deformed cat people…) While you have to have a strong constitution (or stronger predisposition) to handle so many pages written in faux Stanglish, I'm enjoying this alot. Good, but surely not for everyone.

 

FELT TRUE TALES OF UNDERGROUND HIP HOP ONE SHOT: I made it about a third of the way through. Although I love Mahfood's work, a lack of familiarity with the main characters really hindered this for me—considering that they are "two of the hottest rappers in the underground hip hop scene today," I don't feel like I can merely chalk this up to me being a fogey ("two of the hottest rappers in the underground hip hop scene today" is kinda like saying "well, they're big in Japan…") There are some transcendent points in the book (like all of Mahfood's loving portraits of women for the section "Dirty Girls") but mainly, this seems like the ultimate CD pack-in transmuted into unsuccessful rack fodder. Damn shame, too. Eh.

 

GLA #2: Humor is not easy: some of the riffs in this I thought were very clever (comparing the superhero loner speech to the "it's not you, it's me" speech, the Magnolia soundtrack gag) and some I thought were very, very lame (that two or three page rejection grid might have worked without the ads breaking it up—maybe—but it sure felt like super-dull filler to me). I actually thought this was more miss than hit, myself, but part of why humor isn't easy is because it's so subjective. A high Eh.

 

LEX LUTHOR MAN OF STEEL #3: What's really maddening about this is that the scenes between Lex and Bruce were so good. In fact, those may have been some of the best "Bruce Wayne, Playboy" scenes I think I've ever read—Azzarello and Bermejo totally sold me on them. But the rest of the issue, putting aside continuity concerns, was both baffling and/or plain ol' Out Of Character. Batman gets kryptonite so Superman beats the crap out of him and takes it? Winner of this week's "Uhhhh…what?" award. If it hadn't been for those scenes between Bruce and Lex, I'd insist that the DCU file a restraining order on Brian Azzarello. But with those scenes: a very frustrated Eh. (The Shrew has an interesting take on the whole thing, by the way, which may just show me up as a DC dilettante, a title I'd be glad to wear if it meant this stuff could make any sense.)

 

MATADOR #1: A lot of ground covered in the first issue, which is all to the good, and the art team is having fun playing with the reader's expectations. Can't put my finger on my misgivings—things happen so quickly they're a little flat, maybe, but that's counterbalanced by not being really sure where it's going to go from here—so let's go with a cautious Good.

 

SEA OF RED #2: Not exactly subtle, is it? What started as kinda clever quickly became kinda obnoxiously dumb. All the smirky in-jokey elements work against, not with, the seriousness of the lead character, and yet nothing ever gets entertainingly insane, the way it might in, say, Eric Powell's hands. I'm at Eh, and ready for things to not get any better, but we'll see.

 

SEVEN SOLDIERS SHINING KNIGHT #2: First issue didn't work for me, and this didn't either—I still have no sense of who the title character is (even with a character named Guilt working him over), the horse didn't get to talk enough, and the rest of it seemed a mess. Sure, the art was pretty but give the knight a rack and this could have been a Top Cow comic. I'm calling it Awful until I get convinced otherwise.

 

SHANNA THE SHE DEVIL #4: Cho deliberately chose to make this uninteresting by not being arsed to give anyone apart from the narrator any personality (and that's hardly more than him saying "Holy buckets!" over and fucking over again). And since one or more of these guys dies gorily every issue, it's becoming really, really tedious, too. Although there's nothing in the story that's remotely similar to The Phantom Menace, there's something eerily familiar in paying to watch someone with talent squander tons of pulpy potential. Awful.

 

SHARKNIFE VOL. 1 OGN: When cornered, I tend to slip in to a high concept babble. For example, I might describe Sharknife as "OMAC meets Iron Wok Jan by way of a Paul Pope influenced graffiti tagger,:" but that certainly wouldn't tell you whether it's good or not. And that's because, frankly, I just don't know. The parts of it I liked, I really liked a lot: its premise is deeply whimsical without, I think, being ironic; the simple giddiness of a fight where finishing moves are performed with hammerhead sharks is infectious; and Corey Lewis does a great job pulling new surprises out of his sleeve just when things might start to feel stale. I couldn't tell a fucking thing that was going on in the fight scenes and yet the sheer kineticism of the design conveyed all the tension and impact needed. But, in the end, it felt a bit like watching three episodes of a giddy Saturday morning cartoon in a row—or maybe like being trapped on a tilt-a-whirl operated by a grinning carnie who didn't much care if I was enjoying myself or not. Sharknife is a helluva ride, but even by the end of its first volume, it's too soon to tell if there's anything more resonant than watching an emerging talent take pleasure in the powers at his command. Good.

 

SUPERMAN #216: Clearly, this was supposed to come out before Day of Vengeance #1, and, clearly, it would have stunk, anyway. But it might have stunk a little less—the Jean Loring thing, in particular—if DC'd had their scheduling a little more together. And does the Spectre decide to destroy all magic because he gets in a pissing match with Shazam? He's the Spirit of Vengeance, not the Spirit of Pettiness… Throw in a ending where Superman is apparently a mindless husk on an iceberg (making him a fine reader surrogate), and you've got the makings of an Awful little issue.

 

SWAMP THING #15: I had no idea what was going on, or what the threat might be (giant amoebas that can use refrigerators?), but I liked the struggling guy with the stroke who shirked Linda Holland way back when—it seems like a good direction to go in, although the execution of the rest of this issue suggests an inability to get there (or anywhere) in any coherent fashion. Kinda Awful.

 

ULTIMATE FANTASTIC FOUR #18: Seemed like a pretty half-hearted attempt to capture the glories of widescreen action (it never got better than that beautiful double-page spread of the shuttle being chased across the desert by that big-ass thing) and/or wrap up the script in about ten minutes. I pretty much blame Kubert, who either thought it'd be funny to put Jawas into script (with gaffi sticks, to boot!) or was on too tight a deadline to design anything new. There were some great little sequences in this arc, but this wrap-up left a bit of a bad taste. Eh.

 

ULTRA VOL 1 SEVEN DAYS TPB: After enjoying the first two issues of the mini, I decided to wait for the trade and I'm glad I did. This was a strong fun read about three friends dealing with their careers and their love lives after their fortunes are read—that the three friends are superheroines is kind of an odd twist, but one that ends up working out in the long run. It's a quick, slick way to ruminate on class differences and the complexity added to romance as a result of female empowerment in our culture. It's not a particularly deep rumination, mind you, but it helps undercut the occasionally calculated feeling the project sometimes has (probably my own biases). If you're a fan of Bendis's lighter work, you should pick this up. Good.

 

VILLAINS UNITED #1: I never should have bought the transformation of Catman into a potentially interesting character, and yet I did, which is a testament to Simone's, Eaglesham's and Von Grawbadger's talents. If it wasn't for that, I don't think I could continue to suspend enough disbelief to keep the whole venture going. ("If we succeed, Cheshire, you will get Asia." Wha? All 1.3 billion people are just gonna go along with anything she says or something?) Interesting enough to make me come back for the second issue. OK.

 

Y THE LAST MAN #33: Too much plot-hammering going on here, I think, even for the old romantic triangle trope. Vaughan's pulled this sort of thing off before but I am currently mightily underwhelmed. Eh.