Buck Rogers #1

I wasn’t actually planning on picking this one up, but I flipped through it and found one specific thing that guaranteed I’d be bringing it home.

This is essentially a new, rebooted origin for Buck Rogers, the swashbuckling sci-fi pulp hero who got his start back in the late ’20s. Much of the story is fairly familiar — hot-headed pilot Buck Rogers is accidentally put into suspended animation aboard his experimental spaceship and wakes up several hundred years in the future. Not knowing where (or when) he is, he crashlands his ship in a convenient stretch of forest and is rescued by Colonel Wilma Deering. Unfortunately, they’re both stuck in a hunting zone used by an organization called the Pack, and they both get attacked by one of the Pack hunters…

Let that soak in — a cybernetically enhanced grizzly bear with a raygun.

Yes, welcome to your shiny, futuristic new home in Awesometown.

Verdict: Thumbs up. Yes, yes, the cyber-bear is fun, but as for the rest of the story… I’m cautiously optimistic. So far, the writing is solid and the art is solid. Can they keep this going, with or without awesome cyber-bears? Let’s hope so.

Secret Six #10

The Six get hired by someone claiming to be their old benefactor, Mockingbird, to escort a large and dangerous-looking box to a jungle compound. It quickly becomes clear (to the readers, particularly, if not the team itself) that the folks who just hired them are particularly cruel slavers, willing to execute any number of their workers just to punish a single rebellious slave. Of course, the Six aren’t really very nice people — they’re doing the job so they can get paid, not because they want to work with fine, upstanding citizens. But do the slavers have some unpleasant plans for the Six themselves? On top of that, Scandal Savage and Bane continue to grow closer, and the extremely weird romance between Deadshot and Jeanette keeps getting weirder.

Verdict: Thumbs up. Our main villains’ ruthlessness is demonstrated very brutally in the first four pages of the comic, and again, more unexpectedly, in the last two. These are definitely rotten customers, and I’ve got my fingers crossed that a few of them get entertainingly killed before the end of the storyarc. Also, excellent dialogue and characterization for Bane, Scandal, Deadshot, and Jeanette.

I picked up a couple of comics yesterday starring people named either Buck or Bucky. Sometimes, the themes just fall into your lap. Let’s see how they shaped up…

Captain America #50

James “Bucky” Barnes, better known as the current Captain America, as well as the old Captain America’s original sidekick, is getting chased by a bunch of armored terrorists — not the best way to spend his birthday. And really, that’s about it as far as the plot goes — most of this is taken up with flashbacks to some of Bucky’s earlier birthdays during World War II, including one in the stockade and one with him, Cap, the Human Torch, and Toro being attacked by Nazi ubermensch.

Verdict: Thumbs up. Yeah, not a lot of plot, but the action is outstanding, the flashbacks are grand fun, and the dialogue and characterization are first-rate. Ed Brubaker and Luke Ross are really producing a great comic book here.

Buck Rogers #0

It took me a while to realize that this one was sitting by the counter with a price tag of just 25 cents. It’s embarrassing that it took me so long to pick up on a bargain like that.

A preview issue for a new ongoing series about the sci-fi hero, this one starts with Buck captured by invading aliens who are actually giant-sized cells. He’s able to give them the slip for a while, but they’re on the verge of conquering the Earth. Will Buck Rogers have to sacrifice himself to save the planet?

Verdict: Thumbs up, mainly because it’s just a quarter. A quarter! That’s almost as good as “All in color for a dime”! Not entirely sure I’m enthused about the story — excellent artwork, interesting aliens, but I’m not sure there’s enough in this preview to give me the ammo to recommend it or not.