Hellboy: The Crooked Man #1

Okay, “Hellboy II: The Golden Army” opens in theaters today, so let’s review a new “Hellboy” comic to get in the mood. This story is set back in 1958, with Hellboy going on walkabout in the Appalachian Mountains. He meets up with a guy named Tom Ferrell, who sold his soul to the devil but then chickened out on the deal and took off. Now he’s come back, and he and Hellboy head out to lay the smackdown on the witches, demons, and devil worshippers plaguing the area.

Verdict: Thumbs up. First of all, it’s written by Mike Mignola, who is absolutely aces on pulp horror. And it’s illustrated by Richard Corben, who, as I’ve mentioned recently, is an awesomely slam-bang horror artist. And this story is chock-full of cool horror imagery, from the emptied witch-skin to the defaced Bible to the near-skeletal horse to the evil Crooked Man himself. The only less-than-awesome thing is that Hellboy himself doesn’t have much to do here — he’s mostly asking questions and listening while Tom Ferrell tells him what’s going on. But I trust it won’t be long before he’s hitting demons with that big stone fist…

House of Mystery #3

Well, I don’t have any other new Hellboy or B.P.R.D. comics to review right now, so let’s keep things in the same dark-fantasy genre. Fig, the House’s new permanent resident, tries in vain to escape over the wall that surrounds the property, but it’s no use — she’s one of the five people who can never leave the property unless invited by the ominous coachman who sometimes visits the House. Meanwhile, in the spotlight story, a low-level gangster spins a yarn about a very close shave against some tough mobsters.

Verdict: Thumbs up. The spotlight story is a bit dull, and not at all horror, but the rest of the book is suitably spooky, especially the segment at the end with the coachman and Rina, the last person to be allowed to leave the House. And I gotta say, I’m really digging these covers by Sam Weber — so far, they’ve all been beautiful masterpieces of creepiness, and I entirely approve.

Batman #678

The Club of Villains is stalking Robin and Nightwing and has attacked Alfred, and there’s nothing Batman can do, because Bruce Wayne has been shot full of crystal meth and heroin and is wandering the streets of Gotham unable to remember who he is. His guide is a homeless man who Batman helped an issue or two ago, but who now appears to have unusual abilities of his own. And by the end, there’s the biggest, weirdest change of costumes I think I’ll ever see.

Verdict: Thumbs up, I think. I really do wish it wasn’t necessary to guess at all the obscure comic references Grant Morrison is dropping on us. (All the “Zur-En-Arrh” stuff is a reference to a Batman story from 1958 where Bats traveled to another planet.) But homeless guys who may not be there, evil mimes, Bat-Mite cameos, and wildly drugged-up stream-of-consciousness Bruce Wayne actually ends up going a long way toward making this work.

1985 #2

Toby has run into the Hulk and the Juggernaut — which is a little weird, since where he’s from, both of them are just comic book characters. Of course, no one believes there are real supervillains around, but the bad guys are tired of being cooped up in that old house, so some of them go out to stir up some mayhem.

Verdict: I’m gonna have to give it a thumbs down. The primary problem here is the art — I know I liked it last issue, but that was one or two normal people and a bunch of supervillains in costume. In this issue, we have several costumed villains, but we have a lot more normals — and it’s really hard to tell one normal person from the next. There need to be some sort of clear identifiers to tell everyone apart, even if it’s just some captions here and there…

Astonishing X-Men #25

Warren Ellis and Simone Bianchi take over this series from the departing Joss Whedon and John Cassaday. We lose Shadowcat and Colossus, but get Storm (and a few others to be named later) in return. Everyone has moved into their new HQ in San Francisco and is investigating the mysterious death of a guy who’s a kinda-sorta-not-really-a-mutant. And to discover the truth, the whole team is going to have to travel to Indonesia to visit an unregulated spaceship junkyard.

Verdict: Well, listen, first of all, there are a lot of cool moments in this one. I love Storm’s conversation with Emma Frost about wanting someone around she can argue with. I love the concept of a spaceship graveyard. I’m not as thrilled about the new “We’re kinda wearing street clothes so the cops don’t freak out about superheroes” uniforms. And the idea of Hank McCoy singing blues songs is just a bit weirder than I can handle. And this entire issue is oddly action-free. The dialogue is still darn nice, so I’m gonna give it a thumbs up. But I don’t know if I’ll be picking up any future issues.

Number of the Beast #6

The Paladins and their supervillain foes finally escape from their virtual reality prison after the High “kills” them all within the artificial world. They emerge angry into the Nevada desert and end up taking on the Authority, which should be a pretty short and bloody battle but probably won’t be, so they can keep the Paladins alive…

Verdict: Thumbs up. I’m still enjoying it, but the last two issues will be the deciding factors in whether this entire series is ultimately good or bad…

 

Billy Batson and the Magic of Shazam! #1

Huzzah, a new all-ages book! Sometimes it seems like all-ages books are the best comics Marvel and DC are producing. In this case, it’s a spinoff from last year’s “Shazam!: The Monster Society of Evil” by Jeff Smith, this time written and drawn by Mike Kunkel, best known for his impossibly adorable “Herobear and the Kid” series.

We get a great introduction to our characters — orphaned kid Billy Batson, who can turn into the World’s Mightiest Mortal, Captain Marvel; his sister Mary, who can turn into the World’s Fastest and Most Hyperactive Sister, Mary Marvel; the wizard Shazam, who gives the kids their powers; moody pre-teen Theo Adam, who can’t remember the magic word that will turn him into the World’s Mightiest Villain, Black Adam.

Hijinx galore ensue. Cap and Mary save a circus train, but just barely. Billy changes into Captain Marvel so he can masquerade as his own father so the two orphans can stay in school, and Cap gets a sabotaged wrecking ball under control.

Verdict: Thumbs up. This is really a big winner. The art is just awesome, and the writing is lots of fun, too. The high point is probably Captain Marvel dressed in a suit, sweet-talking his own principal, and trying to get Mary in trouble by claiming she’s a troublemaker. The circus train is also fun. I don’t care if you’re a kid or an adult — you should go read this.

 

Blue Beetle #28

El Paso is being terrorized by a giant green dog-monster, and no one knows where it came from. Well, except for Peacemaker and Dani Garrett, who’ve figured out that Dr. Mephistopheles, a one-time foe of the original Blue Beetle, Dan Garrett, is responsible. When Jaime finally runs into the monster, the battle doesn’t really go the way anyone expected.

Verdict: Thumbs up. I gotta admit that I’m glad that, even with John Rogers no longer writing the book, the foundation he laid down is still letting writers create great stories with these characters.

 

The War that Time Forgot #3

More time-lost soldiers vs. dinosaurs. That’s really about it.

Verdict: Thumbs down. This is a case study on why you shouldn’t pad your miniseries out too much — there’s obviously not enough story here to fill 12 issues, so everything is dragging down so they can stretch out the plot. The only interesting characters left are Enemy Ace and G.I. Robot, and they don’t get much face-time at all…

 

Remember me telling you just a week ago about the Lubbock Comic Book Workshop, coming up on August 9th? Well, there have already been big changes made in the event, so listen up.

The workshop is still set for August 9th — still not 100% positive on the times, but 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. looks most likely. The workshop will still take place at the Lubbock Garden and Arts Center, at 4215 University Avenue.

This is now an all-day event designed to provide classes and training for comic book professionals and for people who want to become comic book professionals. The cost is $25 per person — lunch and materials will be provided.

A creator and vendor area was originally planned as part of the event, it is no longer part of the workshop. However, a new creator/vendor fair — basically a mini-con — may be in the works.

Four classes will be taught at the workshop — digital coloring and lettering; inking; laying out a comic book page; and creating an illustration from concept to finish. The classes are two hours each, with breaks in between.

Pre-registration is required — please send e-mail to Sarazann Greenwood for more information.

Again, the workshop is now just about classes, and it costs $25 for all four classes. No creators this time, no vendors this time. But if you’re an aspiring comic creator, it’s still gonna be worth your time. Go check their website.

I’m not gonna make you read my movie reviews of non-comic movies very often, but I really gotta say, WALL-E is just about the best movie I’ve seen in the last couple of years.

I didn’t go into this expecting a whole lot. I was kinda expecting that the very positive reviews I’d read before were a case of overhype. But man, was I wrong. This was just a plain awesome movie.

WALL-E and EVE are just impossibly charming and emotional and perfect, even though they have very, very little dialogue. Nearly all the robots — and there are an awful lot of them — are very, very cool. John and Mary, the future people who rediscover the beauty of the world outside of virtual reality, are also wonderful, fun characters. And the Captain makes for one of the least likely but most inspiring heroes I’ve ever seen. Even the fairly villainous AUTO is cool and decently badass, what with that wicked-kewl voice.

This is also the first Pixar movie to include any live-action footage, which is fairly cool — Fred Willard is a lot of fun here — but you end up forgetting this pretty quickly, because the live-action stuff is so well integrated into the rest of the story — and because Pixar’s animation looks so outstanding.

It’s bizarre to read that there are really people out there who are complaining that the movie has pro-environmental themes. I mean, hasn’t post-apocalyptism nearly always been a big part of science fiction? Heck, conservative Ultimate Hero Charlton Heston was in “Planet of the Apes,” where humans wiped themselves out in a war, and “Soylent Green,” where a shady megacorp is making food out of corpses — anyone here wanna say Charlie Heston was a liberal, tree-hugging, capitalism-hating pansy? Yeah, I thought not.

Really, I’m just amazed that anyone could come out of this movie thinking something other than, “Wow, that was a really cool movie.” If you come out of a movie as touching and inspiring and exciting and fun as this one, and all you can think about is how angry you are over what you imagine the movie’s politics to be, maybe you need to get yer head examined. You’ve officially lost track of everything that really matters.

In summation: If you ain’t seen “WALL-E” yet, go see it ASAP.

Well, July 4th may be over, but it’s never too late for flag-waving superheroes! Once again, some of the issues of the new “American Dream” series got delivered to some stores a tad late, so I’m gonna go ahead and review them together again.

American Dream #4

American Dream has been captured by the crystal monsters controlled by Silikong, Ion Man, and the Red Queen while her teammates in the Avengers race around the city trying to find her. Dream easily escapes from her captivity and releases the illegal immigrants who Silikong had been transforming into the crystal monsters, then beats the tar out of Ion Man, Red Queen, and their minions. Unfortunately, Silikong and his monsters are going to be a lot tougher to beat…

American Dream #5

In the final issue of the miniseries, Dream has to figure out a way to stop the seemingly unstoppable Silikong, all while delivering additional beatdowns on Ion Man and Red Queen. All this while the Avengers track her down and work on stopping the crystal monsters once and for all.

Verdict: Thumbs up for both. Good action, good characterization. Marvel is clearly hoping this has the stuff for an ongoing series, something all-ages and girl-friendly, and with any luck, the sales have been good enough to make it happen. However, I think I’d like to see a bit more of the Avengers — the whole team spent most of the series on the periphery of the action, and I think an ongoing series would benefit from having more characters for Dream to interact with…

If you were trying to come up with the ultimate conservative superhero, it’d be hard to miss with Captain America, don’tcha think? I mean, the guy was a soldier, so desperate to serve his country that he volunteered for a dangerous chemical experiment and agreed to wear just about the gaudiest red, white, and blue costume imaginable. He was plucked out of the 1940s and revived about 20-40 years later, depending on what version of Marvel continuity you go with. By all rights, he should be almost a cartoon of nationalistic fervor. Indeed, he’s often been parodied as an over-the-top patriotic extremist.

But Cap really is a dream assignment for anyone who wants to write about public affairs, the nature of patriotism, or the state of the nation. One of his most amazing appearances came in a comic that was actually outside of Marvel’s regular continuity.

In 1984’s What If? #44 by Peter B. Gillis, Sal Buscema, and Dave Simons, we take a look at a parallel universe where Cap’s disappearance leads to the creation of an alternate Cap. But the new Cap’s patriotism comes in a decidedly dark flavor. His paranoia about Communism leads him to denounce anything that threatens the status quo, and he becomes a propagandist opposing civil rights and free speech. In time, a faked assassination attempt on him allows a group called the Secret Empire to take over the country and declare martial law.

The real Captain America thaws out of his iceberg many years later, awakening to an America that looks more like Nazi Germany than the United States. Jackbooted thugs wearing Cap’s “A” on their jackets terrorize the populace, no one has any rights to speak of, and everyone is required, almost by law, to idolize Captain America, for fear that the Commies will take over if the nation shows any weakness.

Of course, there’s a terrific battle between the two Caps, with both spouting off entire political soliloquies between every punch. As expected, the real Captain America emerges triumphant. But that’s not the end of it. Cap makes a grand oratory to the crowds who just watched him beat up the fake Cap, and the result is both shocking and inspiring.

Here it is, along with my transcription, just in case you can’t read the text in the panels.

“Listen to me — all of you out there! You were told by this man — your hero — that America is the greatest country in the world!”

“He told you that Americans were the greatest people — that America could be refined like silver, could have the impurities hammered out of it, and shine more brightly!

“He went on about how precious America was — how you needed to make sure it remained great!

“And he told you anything was justified to preserve that great treasure, that pearl of great treasure that is America!”

“Well, I say America is nothing! Without its ideals — its commitment to the freedom of all men, America is a piece of trash!

“A nation is nothing! A flag is a piece of cloth!!”

“I fought Adolf Hitler not because America was great, but because it was fragile! I knew that liberty could as easily be snuffed out here as in Nazi Germany! As a people, we were no different from them!

“When I returned, I saw that you nearly did turn America into nothing!

“And the only reason you’re not less than nothing — ”

“– is that it’s still possible for you to bring freedom back to America!”

Caption: “There is a long silence, then…”

Spectator: “Th-That is him!! That’s the real Captain America!”

Those five panels are just amazing. Everything you need to know about the dangers of blind nationalistic jingoism, everything you need to know about our susceptability to power-hungry demogogues, everything you need to know about the fragility of democracy and freedom. Everything you need to know about what a real patriot is like, minus the funky chainmail costume…

Cut it out, send it to your Congressional representatives, to your preferred presidential candidates, to your favorite Supreme Court justice. Send it to your local hate-radio blowhard, to the howling TV pundits, to the national columnists who still insist that any criticism of the figurehead in charge of the government is the same thing as high treason.

Happy Independence Day to everyone. Celebrate with some burgers and hot dogs, with some fireworks, by listening to some of those great old Sousa marches. But don’t forget to spend some time celebrating your nation by reading this and by reading this. Heck, if you’ve got time, here are some more links to great things you should read this July 4th.

(Lots of folks like this comic book a lot. For more in-depth analysis, read this, this, this, and this)

 

Captain America #39

There’s a new Captain America in town. No, not Bucky Barnes, Cap’s former sidekick who’s taken up the shield. I mean there’s another new Cap, and he’s a brainwashed tool of the Red Skull! He foils an assassination attempt on a Senator Wright — but it was a staged attempt, and the senator is also one of the Skull’s agents, running for president so he can help wipe America off the map. The fake Cap is all over the news, trumpeted as “the return of Captain America.” He endorses Wright and helps legitimize his campaign. Meanwhile, Sharon Carter makes her escape attempt from the Red Skull’s infirmary and delivers a healthy beat-down on Sin, the Red Skull’s daughter. And Bucky pays a visit to Senator Wright’s office, but he gets a nasty surprise when he meets up with the brainwashed Cap…

Verdict: Thumbs up. Lots of intrigue, both the espionage and political varieties. The fight between Sharon and Sin is one-sided, but fun. Next issue should be fun — expect an awful lot of Cap vs. Cap fighting…

And speaking of multiple Captain Americas… Please don’t miss out on tomorrow’s Fourth of July edition of “Politics in Comics” — I’ll have all the “Good Captain America vs. Evil Captain America” you’ll ever need.

It’s been too long since we looked at any horror comics, ain’t it?

 

Pigeons from Hell #3

Joe R. Lansdale’s adaptation of Robert E. Howard’s classic horror story continues, as the Blassenville sisters and the roaming sheriff make a narrow escape from the old haunted plantation mansion. Whatever’s inside doesn’t follow them, but they can’t simply leave — they have a friend who may still be trapped in the house. So they retreat to a nearby shack, where an ancient hoodoo man spins them the tales of the old house’s horrific history. Will knowing the house’s secrets help them fight the evil spirit inside? Or is it too strong for anyone to withstand?

Verdict: Thumbs up. Good and creepy, and excellent suspense as well.

 

B.P.R.D.: The Ectoplasmic Man

This is essentially the origin story of Johann Kraus, the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense’s resident disembodied medium. Back in 2002, the story goes, he was leading a seance, assumed an ectoplasmic form to commune with the spirit world, and inadvertently became part of a global supernatural disaster that destroyed thousands of spirits — the psychic feedback killed Kraus’ body and the other participants in the seance, but left Kraus as a bodiless ectoplasmic spirit. But soon, he discovers a new menace in a nearby cemetery, a demon that feeds on the souls of the recently deceased. But how can an intangible ghost stop such a powerful demon?

Verdict: Another thumbs up. A wonderful done-in-one story that adds quite a bit to Kraus’ backstory. The demon is nicely monstrous, and Johann’s solution to the problem, while entirely predictable for anyone who knows the character now, is still done very well.