Marvel Adventures: Super Heroes #2

Before we get started, could I just say that I hate Marvel’s trade dress for this comic? When you’re hiding the actual title of the comic way down at the bottom of the cover, while putting the very large logo for a completely different comic up at the top, it makes it very hard to identify the comic in the stores, and it makes it harder to build new fans for the series — if they liked last issue, they’ll be looking for an Iron Man comic, ’cause he was on the cover of last issue. Will they look for this issue, when it seems to be a Thor comic? It’s just a poor design/marketing decision.

Now on to the story — it seems that Galactus, Eater of Worlds, needs a new herald — he says he wants to give some human immense cosmic powers so they can fly all over the universe and guide him to new planets to devour. And the funny thing is — he took out a classified to find someone. Wha? Yeah, that’s what the Avengers think, too. So they show up in Austin, of all places, with a few thousand people desperate to get superpowers. When Firelord, one of Galactus’ last heralds, shows up, he announces that the price to get all that cosmic power is… any priceless item.

Well, that kicks off a global crime wave, as people start burglarizing art museums for priceless items. With most of the team protecting the world’s art treasures, can the Invisible Woman, Iron Man, and Black Widow find out what this Galactus plot is really all about?

Verdict: Thumbs up. Excellent hook for this story — Galactus placing a classified ad for a new herald? Firelord handing out paper applications for the position? That really draws you into the story fast, and it definitely keeps you reading. Great story, excellent characterization and development, and good dialogue, too. Spend a little extra time hunting this one down in the store, ’cause it’s worth picking up.

Marvel Super Hero Squad #5

And speaking of problems with the trade dress — this one keeps changing the logo on the cover! It keeps switching from “Marvel Super Hero Squad” to “Super Hero Squad Show.” It’s not too confusing, since the logos look very similar, but I do wish they’d be a bit more consistent.

When one of MODOK’s already outlandish schemes goes even more outlandishly awry, we get stuck with a Hulk made out of high-energy fractal shards, and a bunch of superheroes (but not nearly all of them depicted on the cover) with the Hulk’s strength, rage, and IQ running wild. We also get some connected stories starring Loki and Ant-Man.

Verdict: Thumbs up. This takeoff of Marvel’s recent mini-event on “Hulked-Out Heroes” has all the fun and charm that the original lacked, with 100% less Deadpool. The stories are pretty humorous, but I enjoyed the Ant-Man story at the end the most — great mix of humor and action.

So I finally got the fourth volume of “Yotsuba&!” recently (out of eight — I still need to get a ton more). I was reading along quite merrily when I hit the following sequence that made me laugh like a loon for a good five minutes.

What’s the setup? Yotsuba and her dad have gone to the grocery store, planning out a super-delicious — no, wait, just a regular-delicious meal, filling up their shopping cart with food…

…when Yotsuba’s dad realizes that he left his wallet at home.

And that wasn’t even the funniest moment in the book. The neighbor kid suffering from heartbreak was what led to a couple of the funniest chapters of the story ever…

You guys are reading this series, right? You better get with it or else…

Birds of Prey #1

Huzzah! “Birds of Prey” is back! With Gail Simone still writing it! And with Ed Benes on art! Oh, wait, that’s not good. Ed Benes’ main artistic skill is drawing girls’ butts. Well, at least Gail Simone is writing it!

We start out with Black Canary very gratifyingly beating the snot out of a kidnapper in Russia while Lady Blackhawk provides air cover. Then they and Huntress get a call from Oracle — she’s getting the gang back together. While Lady Blackhawk recruits Hawk and Dove, Barbara tells Huntress and Black Canary why she needs them back — she’s getting blackmailed by someone who’s compiled every important secret there is about every superhero and supervillain in the world. If the Birds of Prey don’t go after him, he’s going to release the entire list in mere hours. And even if they do go after him, he’s going to kill someone on the list once an hour until they stop him. But who’s really behind this scheme? And do the Birds have a chance to survive?

Verdict: Thumbs up. It’s great that this series is back, especially with Simone in charge. Benes’ more unsubtle cheesecake impulses are at least reined in, which makes his artwork more bearable. I’m not sure how thrilled I am to see Hawk and Dove here — both of them just bore me to tears, but maybe Simone has a plan for ’em. I also wish Misfit were in this one. As for the story itself, I’m pretty pleased with it. The opening scene is just plain awesome, and the impending crisis and the confrontation with the blackmailer on the last pages is very good. Definitely looking forward to reading more of this one.

The Unwritten #13

Tom Taylor has been lying low for a few months, along with Lizzie Hexam and Richard Savoy, as they try to avoid tipping off the authorities that they’re still alive. Meanwhile, the world is abuzz about the brand new Tommy Taylor novel that’s about to be released. The evil literary assassin Pullman is being prepped to kill both Tom and his father Wilson. And it turns out that the new Tommy Taylor novel is a complete fake — the evil conspiracy is publishing a completely crap-quality novel in an attempt to get Wilson Taylor to come out of hiding. Tom and Savoy both run into old acquaintances — one a friend and one a great enemy…

Verdict: Thumbs up. A very nice start to a new storyline. Characterization, dialogue, artwork — this one hits everything it needs to. And hey, pay attention to the captions on the TV reports in the story — there are a few good laughs lurking in there…

B.P.R.D.: King of Fear #5

And here’s the wrapup of another BPRD storyline. In the aftermath of last issue’s disasters, the field team is in the hospital, the islands of Borneo and Sulawesi have been completely destroyed, and a gigantic insectoid leviathan has appeared on the Salton Sea in California — it’s emitting some kind of noxious gas that turns people into monsters. Director Manning, Kate Corrigan, and Johann Kraus are getting raked over the coals by the UN — although the BPRD also gets some very good news out of their interrogation. The field team doesn’t trust Abe Sapien anymore, the frequently evil megacorp Zinco is trying to appear humanitarian, and Liz Sherman turns up alone in Bangkok.

Verdict: Thumbs up. A good finish for a frequently confusing storyarc, with some new status quos for everyone and new mysteries on the horizon. It’s been implied that things are just going to get worse and worse in future storyarcs — hopefully, the storytelling will continue to improve.

Batman: The Return of Bruce Wayne #1

Holy cow, Bruce Wayne is stuck in the distant past?! Why didn’t anyone tell us about this?!

Okay, okay, Batman being stuck in the past wasn’t really much of a secret. Apparently, after Darkseid hit him with the Omega Effect during the “Final Crisis” series, he got shot clear back to prehistory, where he met up with Anthro the First Boy on Earth (just before he dies of old age), and drawing a few superhero symbols on a cave wall. Now Batman, addled and amnesiac from his time trip, meets up with Anthro’s tribe just before they’re attacked by a rival tribe of cavemen led by Vandal Savage. They kill numerous people and capture Bruce, staking him out on the ground overnight. But he’s rescued by Anthro’s grandson, one of the survivors of the attack, who’s gone and suited himself up with an actual domino mask. Batman then attacks Savage, wearing a giant bat skin as a cape and cowl, and then he kicks Savage’s butt with a whole lot of gadgets from his utility belt. But by the time Superman, Green Lantern, Booster Gold, and Rip Hunter make a time-travel trip to retrieve him, Batman has disappeared again.

Verdict: Thumbs up. It’s a weird, weird book — a caveman Robin who makes his own domino mask? It’s even slow-moving, in an odd, first-issue kind of way. But once Bruce Wayne dons the dead bat skin as a costume, it’s all weird in the best, most awesome way possible.

Astro City: The Dark Age – Book Four #4

The final issue of this miniseries has the Pale Horseman killing people for real and imagined crimes, while the Street Angel and Quarrel try to stop him. Charles and Royal Williams are still tracking down Aubrey Jason, the man who killed their parents, but he’s now stealing some of the Pale Horseman’s power to shore up his own rapidly vanishing lifeforce. Will they be able to work with the Silver Agent to stop him, when they blame the Agent for their parents’ deaths almost as much? And is there still a way for the brothers — or Astro City — to pull a happy ending out of this dark, bleak story?

Verdict: Thumbs up. It is a dark, bleak story, crammed full of more shadows than you’d expect, but it ends on the right note, with the Pale Horseman and Aubrey Jason getting the proper comeuppance, and all done with the right amount of heroism. And then the epilogue makes it all even cooler. Low-key, calm, quiet, but still cool.

Astonishing Spider-Man and Wolverine #1

Spidey and Wolverine have found themselves transported back to prehistoric times. While Spidey has turned into a hermit, caging up giant spiders, letting his beard grow, and doing hardcore research into the time period, Wolverine has taken up a role as the leader of a stone-age tribe, teaching them how to fend off larger and more barbaric cavemen. But Spidey’s discovered that an extinction-event meteor is on its way, and they’re all going to die tomorrow. Is there any hope for anyone to survive?

Verdict: Thumbs up. This had a very nice set-up and fun dialogue. Petey and Logan have been stuck out here for quite a while, and their limited interaction was pretty cool. Not sure we’re going to have any deeply meaningful story here — this is mainly an excuse to get Wolverine and Spider-Man involved in some fun time-travel stuff. There are some things that bug me — humans and dinosaurs never existed at the same time, and how did Peter Parker manage to refine glass lenses to make a telescope? — but those are minor quibbles in a very enjoyable story.

JSA All-Stars #6

A botched spell by Anna Fortune has somehow brought the terrible Subtle Realms to our own dimension — and released the monstrous King of Tears from captivity. Meanwhile, Stargirl has just discovered that the Atom-Smasher who she’s been traveling with for the past month is actually Johnny Sorrow in disguise — he’s been trying to get her to fall in love with him so he can sacrifice her to bring himself back to life. Is there any way for the team to destroy the King of Tears, stop Johnny Sorrow, and rescue Stargirl and the real Atom-Smasher?

Verdict: Amazingly, thumbs up. The art is still awful, but the story and pacing finally make up for it. We get multiple storylines with focuses on numerous JSA members, and they all make sense, and they all get decent coverage. That’s something that this book hasn’t managed yet, and I’m hoping it means good things for this title’s future.

Hey! It’s International Linkdump Day! Yes, I just invented that day myself. The important thing is that we all get the day off! YAY, DAY OFF! Also, we get a bunch of links to click on. YAY, LINKS TO CLICK ON!

• Lubbock artist Dustin Wallace — who I got to meet at the Lubbock Comic Book Expo — got a nice mention in Boing Boing. He makes metal insect-lizard monsters that look fantastically cool.
• DC is bringing back all their old Silver Age characters, at the expense of the tiny bit of racial diversity they’d tried to build up in recent years. Chris Sims provides the excellent analysis.
• Green Ronin Publishing, the company that makes the highly-excellent “Mutants and Masterminds” RPG, is going to be publishing the new DC Comics RPG.
• An eight-year-old girl who loves horror movies requested a zombie-themed birthday party, so her mom made this awesome cake. Awesome eight-year-old girl and mother? Or AWESOMEST eight-year-old girl and mother?
• KISS goes to Homecoming.
• Raymond Scott’s “Powerhouse” played on GIANT HARMONICAS!
• You all love “Twin Peaks,” right? I mean, that gum you like is going to come back in style! Did you know David Lynch made a bunch of “Twin Peaks” ads for a Japanese coffee company? Well, he did!
• This is a little bit rude, but very funny. Grownups only, please, may go read about dinosaurs and sodomy.

And now for the most important part of International Linkdump Day — the ceremonial Sending Gigantic Checks to the Dude Running the Comic Book Blog…

iZombie #1

This is the first issue of the new series by Chris Roberson and Michael Allred, and it’s available for just a buck, which means you should go pick it up, ’cause nowadays, that’s dirt cheap.

Not a whole lot of plot in this first issue — just introducing our cast of characters. Our lead is Gwen Dylan, a gravedigger with a secret — she’s dead as a doornail. Luckily, as long as she eats one fresh brain a month, she won’t go all “Night of the Living Dead” on anyone. But for a week after she eats that one brain, she’s going to have the deceased person’s memories, and she’s going to try to take care of their unfinished business. Her friends include a ’60s-era ghost named Ellie and a wereterrier named Spot, and other supernatural types in the area include a bunch of vampire babes who run a paintball course and a couple of monster hunters.

Verdict: Thumbs up. Nice art, decent dialogue, nice setup for the characters, and again, it’s just a dollar! Go get it already!

Brightest Day #1

A white power battery has appeared, and no one seems to be able to lift it. Deadman finds himself on board a ship smuggling children and is unable to help, but Aquaman and Mera appear and save the kids — with the aid of some unexpected zombie sea creatures. Meanwhile, the villain formerly known as Black Manta is working out of a seaside fish shop — when he hears that Aquaman has returned to life, he kills all his customers and gets his armor out of storage. Ronnie Raymond and Jason Rusch are unable to separate from the Firestorm matrix, and the Martian Manhunter, trying to terraform Mars, has a vision of himself murdering Professor Erdel, the Earth scientist who accidentally brought him to Earth. And Hawkman and Hawkgirl pursue a bunch of criminals who have stolen the bones of Prince Khufu and Princess Chay-Ara — the original versions of the Hawks from Ancient Egypt.

Verdict: Thumbs down. We get a lot of different stories, all just barely addressed before we rush off to some other barely-addressed story. It’s a rotten way to tell a story — it’s only a way to stretch out a crossover. And there are worse problems than that. In the zero issue, Aquaman was afraid to go in the water — now he’s swimming around just fine. We also get calls-back to the “Blackest Night” crossover, with Aquaman’s zombie sea minions and the partial reappearance of Martian Manhunter’s Black Lantern costume when he has his vision of Professor Erdel. And quite honestly, as much fun as “Blackest Night” was, it’s not a good sign when your first crossover afterwards is already running back to that well again.

And on top of that, the implied promise of “Brightest Day” — a more hopeful, more “Silver Age,” less mindlessly murderous future for DC’s comics — has already been completely abandoned. A zombie shark gorily dismembers someone, a blood-drenched Black Manta slaughters three people at more-or-less random, and we get treated to detailed closeups of some commandos getting shot in the back of the head. Sure, I expected DC to go back to lazy massacres soon, but I never imagined it’d happen so quickly. I thought for sure Geoff Johns could go at least a few issues before splattering some guy’s blood across the page.

I’m giving this one just one more chance. I don’t have infinite patience for crossovers any more.

It’s been a long, crazy week, and the one thing we all need to get the weekend started right is a nice little dose of the old ultraviolence in the form of… FRIDAY NIGHT FIGHTS!

This one’s crazier than most. It comes from Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen #139 by Jack Kirby and Vince Colletta. Kirby had just recently started work at DC, and he’d asked to take over the low-sales Jimmy Olsen book ’cause he figured DC would let him go wild with crazy ideas to try to pump up the sales. (EDIT: See RAB’s comment for another explanation. I’d always heard it this way, but his explanation has merit, too.) He hatched up an idea to have a celebrity guest star — insult comic Don Rickles. But Don didn’t even appear right away — the first issue was dominated by Don’s bizarre lookalike, Goody Rickles, who’s enthusiastically nice, works for Morgan Edge, and likes to wear a superhero costume, even though he’s got no powers or fighting skills.

So this is what happens when Jimmy Olsen and Goody Rickles get attacked by Intergang’s goons:

Don showed up an issue later and was entirely horrified by his good twin. Then Goody and Jimmy caught fire for a while. Seriously. Jack Kirby was the King… but man, I don’t know where he came up with some of this stuff…

Thor and the Warriors Four #2

I’ve never really been into Power Pack. And I freely admit that the entire reason I started collecting this miniseries is because I saw a preview of this cover, which made me laugh like a hyena.

Oh, man, I’m gonna have to explain this for people who aren’t up on their Thor continuity, aren’t I? The big guy there is Beta Ray Bill, an alien who was the first non-Asgardian to be worthy enough of being able to pick up Mjolnir, Thor’s hammer. Odin gave him powers like Thor’s, and both of them consider each other great friends, if not outright brothers. And yes, he really does look like a horsey.

Aaaaaanyway, in this issue, the Power Pack kids make their way to the Rainbow Bridge that leads from our world in Midgard to the home of the Norse gods in Asgard. They meet a kindly peddler who offers them some more appropriate, Viking-esque clothing to help them disguise themselves, then march into Asgard and start their own superheroic careers as the Warriors Four. In time, this gets them a meeting with Thor himself, and the heroes swap stories — Thor’s being properly mythological and heroic, and the Power kids’ being a bit less so. The Powers tell Thor and Bill that their grandmother is dying, and they want to take some of the gods’ Golden Apples to her to make her well. Before Thor can tell them that it can’t be done, a frost giant attacks, and the kids help defeat it. But it’s all part of someone else’s evil plot — the kindly peddler was really Loki in disguise and he uses the kids’ Norse costumes to… Well, that would be telling.

And then there’s the backup story by Colleen Coover, as Hercules and the Power Pack beat the stuffing out of HYDRA, all while Herc tells the kids stories about his Twelve Labors. But can they complete the greatest labor of all — cleaning up the house?

Verdict: Thumbs up. Very funny, very awesome, and much like Mjolnir, very much worthy of being picked up. Outstanding cartooning all around, and great funny lines and situations. Yes, Katie Power drives Bill half crazy by wanting him to be a big magical pony, which is hilarious and adorable… as are the dreadful fates visited upon Thor, Bill, and Odin…

Batman and Robin #12

Damian’s mother has secretly implanted control devices into his new artificial spine, allowing Deathstroke to take control of his body and attack Dick Grayson. The good news is that the neural interface isn’t perfect, and it lets Batman hurt Slade by punching Robin. It takes Deathstroke out of the fight and gives Robin control of his body back. Batman and Robin travel to Talia’s hideout and beat up her goons. Damian tells her that he’s perfectly happy being Robin, and Talia tells him she respects his decision — but she’s disowning him, because she’s growing his clone, who’s going to be her new son. Returning to Gotham City, Batman, Robin, and Alfred discover evidence that Bruce Wayne is lost in time, Dr. Hurt prepares the forces of the Black Glove for more attacks, and Dick Grayson discovers that Oberon Sexton is really… Well, that would be telling.

Verdict: Thumbs up. It’s good. It’s really just fantastically good, every step of the way through.

Madame Xanadu #22

As Nimue and mysteriously superhuman detective John Jones hurry to stop Morgana’s schemes in 1950s America, Morgana is enjoying being worshiped by a bunch of mind-controlled cultists. Nimue and Mr. Jones have intercepted one of Morgana’s artifacts — the war helmet of Morgana’s son, Mordred — and her frustration with its loss leads her to gruesomely kill two of her cultists. When our heroes arrive, they have little trouble with Morgana’s cultists, but her spells prove to be a lot more difficult to shrug off.

Verdict: Thumbs up. Again, it’s great fun to see the Martian Manhunter in action here. Heck, even when Morgana is being her most rotten, it’s mainly an irritation that John Jones isn’t front and center, showing off…

Jonah Hex #55

So five years ago, a bunch of saloon robbers tore into a bar, killed the owner and his wife, and got captured by Jonah Hex, leaving little Billy, a explosives-obsessed toddler, orphaned. The kid steals Hex’s gun away and kills the surviving robbers himself, with four bullets and four perfect headshots. Years pass, and another bunch of banditos show up to rob the joint. Billy, now calling himself Billy Dynamite, owns the place now, and he stuffs an oversized firecracker in the leader’s mouth. The rest of the gang set the bar on fire, strap Billy with dynamite, and throw him inside. Hex gets persuaded to do something about it, so he catches the gang, ties ’em up, and leaves ’em suspended over multiple packs of explosives before blowing ’em all to kingdom come.

Verdict: Thumbs down. This story has some serious problems. First, Billy doesn’t really change in appearance over five years — he starts out looking like he’s five, and by the time he’s ten, he still looks like he’s five. And dangit, you don’t take a saloon-owning pre-teen, make him a pint-sized badass, give him a moniker like “Billy Dynamite,” and then just kill him off. That’s a character with some serious personality, and you keep him around so you can use him again in future stories. You do not just cast him aside like he ain’t awesome. And finally, the ending is just too abrupt. Hex captures and kills the gang in just three pages, and he doesn’t even use a gun to do it — just fifty sticks of dynamite. That don’t seem like the Jonah Hex way, sir. So yeah, a rare (hopefully) Gray-and-Palmiotti misstep here.

Hellboy in Mexico

A cool little tale of Hellboy’s past, released by Dark Horse in time for Cinco de Mayo — back in 1956, he was assigned to travel to Mexico to track down a force that was causing vampires, witches, and monsters to attack and murder whole villages of innocent people. He runs into some allies — three brothers, all luchadore wrestlers, who had a vision in which the Virgin Mary commanded them to go forth and fight evil. They team up with Hellboy, and all four spend their days destroying monsters and their nights partying hard. Hellboy gets along especially well with the youngest brother, Esteban. But they get sloppy one night, and Esteban gets taken by dark forces. Days of searching turns up nothing, no matter how many vampires they torture, until they find a poster advertising a new rudo luchadore, Camazotz — and a scrawled note demanding Hellboy meet him for a wrestling match from hell. Does Hellboy stand a chance against his former friend?

Verdict: Thumbs up. Numerous thumbs up. Multitudinous thumbs up. Combining Hellboy with luchadores and vampires and zombies is something that’s been hinted at from time to time — the character Lobster Johnson’s history includes a number of old Mexican luchadore movies made in his name — but this is just beyond awesome. It’s a little surprising that we haven’t seen stuff like this more often — we’ve followed Hellboy into just about every other corner of the world already. It really does combine the two genres — Mignola-style pulp horror and luchadore fiction — perfectly — part scary, part heartbreaking, part pure kaboom-blasting-brilliant. I want more of this stuff so very, very much.

Detective Comics #864

Looks like our focus is now going to pass from Batwoman back to Batman — this time, we’re getting a story about Dr. Jeremiah Arkham, former director of Arkham Asylum. He’s now an inmate of his asylum, despised by his former inmates but still ultimately ruling over them because he’s such a remorseless psycho badass and because he used to be the mad mob boss Black Mask. But Arkham still has some big plots in place — he’s attached a bomb to the chest of a stockbroker to get him to sabotage the stock of every corporation in Gotham. Batman has a plan to get Arkham to reveal the codes to disarm the bomb — he gives him access to his three secret patients — three emotionally damaged people who Arkham has kept hidden in cells deep in the asylum’s depths — but is Arkham prepared for the strange transformations his patients have undergone?

Verdict: Thumbs up. Weird, weird, weird. Disorienting and skewed, brutal and mad. Just perfect for a story set inside a madhouse.

Spider-Man: Fever #2

Spidey’s soul has been captured by a bunch of interdimensional spider-demons. They plan to eat him, but they perceive that he’s part spider and part human. So they give him a test — travel into the world of the flies and capture something called the Sorror-Fly. Meanwhile, Dr. Strange travels the mad magical dimensions trying to track Spider-Man down. He gets help from some dog creatures and from an Australian sorceress on walkabout. He travels down a magical river in a mystic swan-boat, meets up with sentient matchsticks (“I’m sorry,” he says. “I don’t speak Match.”), and makes his way through one bizarre world after another. Will he be able to save Spider-Man? And how close is Spidey’s relationship to the spider-demons?

Verdict: Thumbs up. Lots of awesomely weird stuff. Brendan McCarthy really unleashes his imagination here, with an incredibly mad plot and fantastic, crazed artwork. Spidey’s costume as he journeys into the desert is really cool, and almost every page is just beautifully rendered. It may not always make perfect sense, but it’s turning into an outstanding ride.