Social Election

Prez #2

The presidential election has ended in a tie, and the House of Representatives are playing games to get the candidates to offer them bigger and better bribes. Beth Ross is mostly a background player — she’s only in the running as a joke, with just Ohio in her electoral total. Her father dies of cat flu, and most of her time is devoted to taking care of her life, without worrying about the increasingly ridiculous election bribery.

More Congressmen start giving their votes to Beth in each ballot in order to spur the two main candidates to offer them better goodies — but at last, one state too many gives their gag vote to Beth, and all of a sudden, she’s the President of the United States. Can a figure from the past show her the ropes and keep her from being assassinated?

Verdict: Thumbs up. A political humor comic with a giant dose of heart and characterization at its core. The best moments really don’t have anything to do with politics — there’s a couple pages early on in the hospital, where a ridiculous robot bear calling himself Carl the End-of-Life Bear barges into the room with Beth and her father, offers everyone some marijuana, and then appears to be about to smother Beth’s dad with a pillow. (He’s actually propping up her dad’s head to make him more comfortable.)

Immediately after this page of surreal goofball humor, there’s a couple pages of Beth’s dad waxing poetic on the miracles of the human brain and declaring banana pudding to be evidence of the worth of human evolution. And then he dies. It’s beautiful and tragic, and it’s amazing storytelling. And I think we can plan on this comic being something worth reading.

All-New Hawkeye #4

Most of our story here is set in the past at the circus where the Barton brothers spent their childhoods. While the Swordsman teaches Clint archery, he teaches Barney pickpocketing. Clint doesn’t approve, but that doesn’t stop Barney, who knows he has to turn in enough money to let both boys stay at the circus. But Ms. Carson, the bearded lady who runs the criminal sideshow, wants Clint to start stealing, too. Meanwhile, in the brief glimpses we get of the modern day, the forces of Hydra invade the apartment to try to take the cyber-brain mutant kids into custody, and Clint and Kate fight back.

Verdict: Thumbs up. Wasn’t prepared to like this much, because Ramon Perez’s pastel-colored past gets a little hard to look at after you read it for page after page after page. But the storytelling is solid, the characterization and plotting are great, and the artwork is gorgeous.