Trade Paperback Tavern

Death of Spider-Man

2011-12-11T14:34:00.001-08:00

Death of Spider-Man- By Brian Michael Bendis

Death sells; this is something comic publishers learned quite some time ago and by God they’ll milk it for as long as they still have characters left to kill. The death of Ultimate Spider-Man has been particularly controversial for a number of reasons, first and foremost because as a general rule resurrection doesn’t happen in the Ultimate universe so Peter Parker is more likely than not gone forever. Secondly Marvel had the gall to replace him with someone who isn’t white, and every closeted racist knows that any new character who isn’t a white male is just the writer trying to be PC.

But we aren’t here to talk about the new Ultimate Spider-Man Miles Morales (whose first few issues are out now); we’re here to talk about Peter Parker.

The death of Peter Parker is arguably more important to the Ultimate universe than all of the deaths in the much maligned event Ultimatum put together. Peter was the star of the first ever Ultimate comic way back in the distant past of 1999, Ultimate Spider-Man #1, and his death is what makes the Ultimate Comics relaunch so significant.

Fittingly the original USM creative team of writer Brian Michael Bendis and Mark Bagley reunite to finish what they started over a decade ago and Death of Spider-Man is as good a send off to the series as they could have possibly managed. A problem many people have with ongoing comics is that their very format stops them from having any real kind of resolution, Batman will never get over the death of his parents, mutants will never be accepted, Wonder Woman will never... uh... whatever it is Wonder Woman wants to happen. Ultimate Peter Parker however gets that resolution, I won’t spoil how but needless to say if Peter’s final moment in the world of the living doesn’t make you tear up then there’s something legitimately wrong with you.

But I’m jumping the gun here, there’s a lot more to Death of Spider-Man than the death of Spider-Man, as odd as that might sound. The gist of the plot is simple enough; Peter is now being trained by the Ultimates due to their concerns over whether he’s too young to be a responsible hero. However before Peter’s training is complete the events of the story Ultimate Avengers vs. New Ultimates kick off and half of the superheroes of the Ultimate universe decide to have a big throw-down in the middle of New York because where the hell else are superheroes supposed to fight. In the chaos Peter is wounded, again I won’t say how but needless to say it’s not pretty. Unfortunately for Peter at the same time a group of his greatest enemies, the Sinister Six, escape from the SHIELD containment centre the Triskelion. Under the leadership of Peter’s arch-nemesis Norman Osborn, aka the Green Goblin, the villains decide to settle their score with Spider-Man once and for all.

Bendis has done an excellent job with these characters since day one and he doesn’t let up here. There are some absolutely fantastic character moments in this story from small, casual interactions early on that perfectly represent why these characters have become so beloved to major developments that show how much they’ve changed over time. My favourite character moment belongs to Doctor Octopus and it showcases how well crafted and three dimensional the character is under Bendis’ pen, continuing the character’s growth since Ultimate Doom. Every character gets a chance to shine although the absence of Kitty Pryde, formerly of the Ultimate X-Men and a major Ultimate Spider-Man supporting character for quite some time, is very noticeable and I can’t help but wish she had been included in this story somehow.

As well as the excellent character work this book also includes some top-notch action, with Spider-Man and his housemates Iceman and the Human Torch slugging it out with the Sinister Six. There’s plenty of variety to the brawling and the book really gives the feeling of a final battle. This isn’t just another fight between Spidey and his foes, this is the final showdown and it’s an absolute delight to witness.

Mark Bagley is an artist who’s taken a lot of flak over the years for his art, the most common criticism being that he draws everyone with the same basic face, something I criticised John Romita Jr. for way back in my first review, and that’s a perfectly valid criticism. However Bagley does seem to have taken this to heart and his faces work has improved to the point where it’s no longer a major issue. Same- faces aside Bagley does an excellent job in this comic, the characters are expressive and the action is fluid and I’ve always liked how Bagley draws more monstrous characters, in particular Ultimate Green Goblin. It’s through Bagley’s pencil work more than Bendis’ writing that Osborn shines through as the force to be reckoned with he is and the sheer physical presence of Bagley’s Goblin again emphasises how much shit has well and truly hit the fan for Spidey.

When it comes down to it this is a well written and drawn book with great character moments and action sequences and that makes it the perfect ending to the story of Ultimate Peter Parker. The final few pages of this comic are some of the most touching and poignant I’ve seen in a modern superhero book and dammit Peter Parker goes out like a champ.

Ultimate Spider-Man has consistently been one of Marvel’s best comics since it launched and the finale is no exception. Goodbye Peter, you’ve earned your perfect score.

10/10

Orc Stain

2011-05-09T14:04:00.000-07:00

Orc Stain Volume 1- By James Stokoe

The problem that seems to plague the majority of comic artists today is a lack of individuality. Very few artists can be distinguished from the pack and often they can only be noticed because they’re noticeably bad as in the cases of John ‘lines everywhere’ Romita Jr. and Greg ‘porn-tracer’ Land. The modern ‘good’ artist is expected to be able to draw panels that are reasonably fluid and characters that are expressive enough to not look like robots (unless of course they are robots) but they aren’t expected to show any real flair.

I’ve been griping to anyone unfortunate enough to find themselves in the same room as myself and a comic for years now that there doesn’t seem to be a single artist around with the sheer creativity of the likes of Jack Kirby. Then I read Orc Stain.

Both written and drawn by James Stokoe, Orc Stain is nothing short of a wonder in this industry of blandly drawn superheroes. The level of detail and imagination put into each issue puts just about every other comic out right now to shame and ever since first reading Orc Stain I’ve struggled to enjoy the artwork of any other new comic.

The opening two-page spread of Orc Stain is so striking and detailed it really does have to be seen to be believed. Even now, having re-read the book several times, I find myself astonished by those pages whenever I see it. Other comic artists take note, THIS IS HOW YOU DO IT.

The majority of the spread is dominated by a depiction of a massive army of Orcs on the rampage, with a dozen or so highly detailed monstrosities taking up the foreground. These Orcs alone are extremely impressive, with their scrap-like armour and snarling faces showcasing the incredible amount of effort Stokoe must have put into his work. One in particular is facing the reader and pointing towards the incredible scene taking up the rest of the page as if to say “Isn’t that awesome?” Thousands of tiny little Orcs litter the landscape with a hundred or so individually drawn Orcs, positioned between the horde and our pointing Orc, fighting their battle. Each of these hundred Orcs is either climbing or fighting or doing something else that clearly took up more thought and effort than almost any other artist would have put into it.

The art quality is consistent throughout the five issues collected in this volume; there isn’t a single page or panel that isn’t a fantastic display of creativity and detail. I really can’t praise the art enough, it’s pretty much perfect.

In other words, I really like the art.

I suppose I’ll have to talk about the story now, damn. It’s not that the story is bad, it’s pretty good, but it doesn’t light the world on fire like the art does.

The plot of Orc Stain sees a powerful Orc chieftain names The Orctzar uniting the vast Orc tribes of their homeland and unleashing them upon the rest of the world. In the aftermath of his latest conquest the Orctzar comes across a seer who knows how to find something called the Ganga Gronch. As a quick note, a Gronch is an Orc-dick, Orcs take each other’s dicks as prizes and chop them up into currency. Y‘know, as you do. Anyway, according to the seer this particular Gronch can only be found with the aid of ‘The One-Eyed Orc’ so the Orctzar sets about trying to find this particular one-eyed Orc. It’s then that we are introduced to our protagonist, an Orc named One-Eye.

I’m sure that’s just a coincidence.

The story then follows One-Eye and a colourful cast of side characters, including rival Orc Pointyface, nymph poison-thrower Bowie and my personal favourite, Bowie’s bizarre hair monster Zazu. What slays me about Zazu is the wonderfully matter-of-fact way he talks, my favourite Zazu quote regarding Orcs being “All Zazu needs to know about the filthy creatures is that they burst when he squeezes them”. Oh Zazu you card.

Another thing that makes Orc Stain stand out is that the culture of the Orcs is quite fascinating. For the most part it appears to be a crude yet very advanced form of tribalism, with hints of magic use and surprising technological advancement thrown in. Their entire society seems to built on contradictions, killing other Orcs over petty insults is applauded and yet they’ve managed to achieve a level of technological and architectural advancement that you would usually associate with a less violent and crude race.

‘Crude’ actually sums up the Orcs nicely, and I love them for it. Really, any group that says things like “I’m gonna mangle yer gronch into confetti and dance around in it!” is a group that I’ll enjoy reading about.

It’s comics like Orc Stain that make me grateful that Image survived its early EXTREEEEEEEME days, this comic is clearly a labour of love for Stokoe and there’s no way in hell either Marvel or DC would have printed this.

The only real problem with this book is that it ends without anything being resolved, the issue by issue episodic format works fine if you’re reading it monthly (or rather it would if there hadn’t been a long delay between issues five and six) but it leads to an unsatisfying end with a long wait for resolution in this format. Still, the comic is good enough that it leaves you wanting more and willing to wait.

Orc Stain is nothing short of a triumph of the medium; the artwork is fantastic and brings to life this vibrant world and its colourful characters. Orc Stain gets my full recommendation, buy this volume and see if your local comic shop has issue six, I guarantee you won’t be disappointed.

10/10

The Return of Bruce Wayne

2011-04-25T08:44:00.000-07:00

The Return of Bruce Wayne- By Grant Morrison

Grant Morrison is a controversial figure in the comic industry. There are figures who are more unanimously hated like Joe Quesada, former Marvel Editor in Chief and the mind behind Spiderman’s marriage destroying deal with the devil in One More Day, but no one brings in equal amounts of praise and criticism quite like Morrison. Except maybe Mark ‘look at how controversial I am Millar, but that’s a whole other topic.

I’m generally a Morrison fan, All Star Superman showed that Morrison can take a popular character with decades of growth and mythology and strip him down to a purer, more perfect form. As good as ASS (guess why nobody else every abbreviates that name) is my favourite Morrison work has to be WE3, a series of such astonishing emotional power that I can still be reduced to a weeping mess by the mere thought of the words “NO DEE-COMM-ISH WE3”.

In fact, most of Morrison’s body of work is generally liked by the majority of comic fans who’ve actually read it. The controversy regarding Morrison kicked off in late 2006 when he took over duties writing Batman. Morrison’s Batman can be summed up with the two words ‘ideas everywhere’ and while some say this gives his Bat-epic and level of depth not often seen in monthly ongoings others say that the results in the series feeling unfocussed and occasionally nonsensical. I sit somewhere between the two camps, while I’m glad that Morrison is at least trying to do something different with his run instead of the usual “Two Face does something naughty so Batman punches him in the faces” trap that a lot of lazier writers fall into his ideas don’t always work and some of them are never as well explored as I would like.

Anyway, spoilers for Morrison’s big event story Final Crisis are ahead and if you care about them it might be best to skip this review altogether until you’ve read that book or at the very least a plot summary.

Towards the end of Final Crisis Batman ‘died’ which I’m sure would have been shocking were it not for two things. The first being that no one except Spiderman’s Uncle Ben stays dead in comics and even he’s only still in the grave so he can continue to guilt Peter into spending his life wearing flamboyant pyjamas and getting beaten up by other men in equally flamboyant pyjamas . The second thing is that we found out that Batman wasn’t really dead one whole issue later. Oh Morrison you master of suspense.

It turns out that Batman wasn’t actually killed during the event but was instead sent back through time for reasons we wouldn’t get to find out for quite some time, so former original Robin Dick Grayson took up the cowl because what all Batman fans were crying out for was for Batman to fuck off. I kid, from this switch we not only got a chance to see Dick shine in general but we also got sixteen wonderful of a new Morrison penned series called Batman and Robin, the definite highpoint of Morrison’s Bat-Epic. And Bruce Wayne? We’d find out what happened to him in this book, the imaginatively titled The Return of Bruce Wayne.

Fuck me that was a long intro, this is why I avoid talking about Morrison, regardless of whether someone loves or hates him they will give their opinion and it will be unnecessarily long-winded.

Anyway, Raisins on Belgian Waffles sees Batman travelling through time in an attempt to return home so he can get his weekly dose of Joker punching done before he starts having withdrawal symptoms.

Starting with the Stone Age and continuing through the ages of witch hunts, piracy, and the wild west before bringing Batman back to a more familiar time period it’s clear that Morrison decided to get as many different time travel stories out of his system as he could while writing Revenge of Baron Wilhelm.

The changes of setting between issue are accompanied by changes in artist which unfortunately gives the book an inconsistent feel. This worked fine when the book was coming out an issue at a time but doesn’t in the collected format we’re discussing here. This is something that I actually praised Morrison for when the issues were first coming out, the shift to four to six issue story arcs to better suit trade paperback release means that while this works out perfectly for paperback buyers anyone who is reading the story as it comes out often has to spend up to half a year reading through the same relatively short story before they get any resolution. On the other hand without time to appreciate each individual issue the radically different issues in this series come across as inconsistent instead of individual.

The first issue is a good start with solid art by Chris Sprouse, essentially it’s just Batman in the Stone Age getting into a scrap with cavemen, and it’s a fun little story with some nice nods the regular DC universe. The second and third issues, respectively the witch hunt and pirate issues, are largely of the same vein. Batman gets into time period relevant shenanigans and we get to come along for the ride, the pirate issue even has Blackbeard and if you ask me an appearance from Blackbeard can improve anything.

The art for the second issue is by Frazer Irving (who also worked on Morrison’s final issues of Batman and Robin) and Irving’s art is something I’ve wanted to discuss for a while now. The thing about Irving’s art is that ultimately I don’t think it’s suited to comics, he flourishes when given something suitably dramatic to draw but when he’s writing a quiet or subdued scene it doesn’t work, his dark and striking style isn’t effective if there isn’t something dark or striking happening. Yanick Paquette’s art for the third issue is nicely detailed and overall issue three is probably my favourite of the whole series mostly due to Bat-Pirate.

To quickly finish discussing the art, issue four by Georges Jeanty is a touch lifeless, issue five (mostly) by Ryan Sook (mostly) has a nice noir vibe, Pere Perez contributes to issues five and six and does solid work with Lee Garbett also doing a good job on the rest of issue six. In short the art for the series is mixed but good overall. Now back to the writing.

It’s at the halfway point of Rinse off Bath Water that the main problems of the series start to occur. The main problem is that the time travel shenanigans couldn’t keep going on without really building up to anything and Morrison decided to tie it deeper into the character of Doctor Hurt and the Black Glove. Hurt had been cropping up in Morrison’s Batman almost since the beginning and it was high time we found out exactly what his deal was. The answer we got was every bit as convoluted as we feared and to this day I still see the occasional forum post from someone who has just finished reading through Morrison’s Batman and has no idea what was going on towards the end.

Issue four features a cowboy Batman, although he’s around for surprisingly little of the issue, and lays foundations for the remaining issues. Issue five takes Batman back to the days shortly after his parents’ deaths and ties very heavily into the Black Glove with issue six finally returning Bruce Wayne. I can’t really talk about the final two issues, particularly the last one, even in a vague way without giving away spoilers. I’ll simply say that if you didn’t like Final Crisis you’ll hate the final issue of this series and if you didn’t like the Black Glove/RIP era of Morrison’s Batman you’ll hate the entire second half of this series.

That’s ultimately what this all comes down to, how much you’ll enjoy Recipe of Beef Wellington is dependant entirely on how much you’ve enjoyed Morrison’s recent work and in particular his Batman work leading into Final Crisis. The problem with that is that if you have read Morrison’s other Bat-books you’ve already read this and probably discussed it on the internet yourself, and if you’re a new reader then this, the final arc in a four year epic, is the worst starting point you could possibly choose. So who is the review for? I have no idea. How do I justify it even existing? I don’t have to, ANTI-LIFE JUSTIFIES MY REVIEW.

Terrible and predictable jokes aside Return of Bruce Wayne is an inconsistent series in this collected form, the switch in artists and settings between issues make this a jarring read in a single sitting. Towards the end the series becomes too mired in the Hurt/Black Glove story that has long since outstayed its welcome by this point. Even as someone who liked quite a lot of Morrison’s Batman I can’t give it much of a pass, it’s an okay but fairly unspectacular end to the ‘first season’ of Morrison’s take on the world of Batman. In short, if you like Morrison Batman buy it and if not find an online synopsis, as for me I’m going to go and cry in the corner for a bit because I’m still thinking about WE3.

5/10

Girl Comics

2011-04-11T16:24:00.000-07:00

Girl Comics- By Various

Recently it occurred to Marvel Comics that they are somewhat of a sausage-fest, the vast majority of their writers and artists, including all of their big names, are men. The same can be said of Marvel’s characters, one only needs to look at the current Avengers line-up and its single female member to see that women aren’t that well represented by the company. With the 30^th anniversary of the first appearance of She-Hulk, Marvel’s most consistently successful and popular heroine, Marvel decided to celebrate in style with the ‘Women of Marvel’ banner, putting the spotlight on its sadly overlooked creators and characters. At the heart of this idea would be a three issue miniseries made up of over a dozen (18 to be exact) short stories by a variety of female writers and artists, Girl Comics.

Girl Comics. They called it Girl Comics. Really.

Seriously, that might well be the worst name for a comic I’ve ever come across. For one thing it implies that all other comics are by extension ‘boy comics’, which surely is the exact opposite of what Marvel has tried to achieve with this project. Name related nit picking aside how does the series hold up?

Inevitably with a wide collection of different stories by different people Girl Comics is a mixed bag, some stories are good and some aren’t, but none of them are terrible. In all I’d have to say Girl Comics is definitely a success and shows that the women of the industry really know what they’re doing and need to be given more chances to shine.

Because I can’t write about every single story in each issue I’ll talk about my favourites and the ones that didn’t work as well.

The series starts out rather disappointingly with two less than stellar opening stories. The first, a story about Nightcrawler (one of the few male protagonists of this collection), is just sort of there without leaving any real impression and the following story about Venus has an art-style that I dislike and a rather vapid and uninteresting plot.

Ironically the following story that kept me reading is about that most masculine of characters, the Punisher, a man who spend his time mowing down criminals with his big throbbing gun. I’ll admit right off the bat that I’m a sucker for a good Punisher story and ‘A Brief Rendezvous’ ticks all the right boxes, solid art with a darkly funny and memorable story make this a stand-out story well worth reading.

The second issue is for the most part a very light-hearted and borderline ‘cartoony’ affair, and it makes for a nice light read, none of the stories are hugely memorable but they’re all entertaining and nicely drawn enough to make reading them a very pleasant experience. The final story of the issue starring Dr. Strange is notable darker and was actually a quite jarring tonal shift when I originally read the issue. However the story works better now it has been collected with all three issues as it paves the way for several dark stories in the third issue.

Overall the third issue is by far my favourite of the three, mostly because of the presence of two different but similar stories featuring everyone’s favourite over exposed Canadian (no, not Deadpool) Wolverine! You might be rolling your eyes reading that but bear with me here, the two stories deal with Wolverine’s relationship with his two young protégés, Jubilee and Kitty Pride.

The Jubilee story is probably my favourite of the entire series, despite the fact that I’ve never been a fan of her as a character. The story basically showcases what she is up to these days, having been depowered on M-Day, and having a heart-to-heart with Wolverine. From that simple set up comes not only a scene between the two so touching it can un-ironically be called adorable but it gives me a new respect for the character to see her continuing to fight the good fight despite no longer being a mutant and feeling like an outsider amongst her former teammates.

The Kitty Pride story is less emotional in favour of a lighter tone, telling the story of Wolverine taking Kitty out for her first drink on her twenty-first birthday. From there inevitable drunken shenanigans ensue and although it lacks the sheer heart of Jubilee’s tale we still get a good sense of the genuine love between the two characters. Although many jibes have been made in the past about the fact that Wolverine seems to be overly fond of spending his time with young/underage girls (Ultimate universe Wolverine really was overly fond of teenage girls, attempting to sleep with 15 year old Mary-Jane during his brief stint in Peter Parker’s body during a body-swapping story), these two stories both show the side of Wolverine we don’t get to see that often what with all the Bubs Wolverine is too busy Snickting, the father figure that truly cares for his young friends.

The book also features several full page pin-ups of various Marvel women by various artists and they are for the most part solid. Unfortunately the first of them, a She-Hulk picture, irks me. It’s definitely well drawn and the presence of a jump-rope harkens way back to THAT page from Sensational She-Hulk #40 (look it up) the fact that it’s essentially and almost nude She-Hulk posing suggestively reeks of unnecessary fan service and diminishes the book as a whole. It’s rather ironic that it’s the She-Hulk picture that does this since it was She-Hulk’s anniversary that led to this series’ creation. It’s also odd that there wasn’t a single She-Hulk story in this series, yet we got three Wolverine stories and a Punisher one. Huh.

To get to the point, despite the odd stumble and a terrible name Girl Comics is a solid collection that does what it set out to do, give Marvel’s female writers and artists to show off what they are capable of and I give it a solid recommendation. It isn’t anything you need to read but it’s well worth a look.

7/10

Morning Glories Volume 1

2011-04-04T12:57:00.000-07:00

Morning Glories Volume One- By Nick Spencer

After two reviews of Marvel comics and one DC comic it seemed right to take a look at someone other than the big two, which brings us to Image Comics. Image Comics have a pretty bad reputation left over from the 90’s, mostly due to printed abortions like Youngblood which came to embody the worst aspects of the dark age of comics. But Image’s reputation is undeserved, despite those dark early days the company has gone on to publish some excellent creator owned comics that might never have seen print without Image.

And so we come to Morning Glories.

Morning Glories might well be the best new comic I’ve read all year, and in many ways is the polar opposite of the subject of my last review, Superman: Earth One. Whereas Earth One was a dull boring display of mediocrity about a major character and written by an established writer Morning Glories is an exciting and interesting original tale written by a relative newcomer.

I haven’t read all of writer Nick Spencer’s previous work but what I have read shows the he’s a talent to be watched closely and could very well prove to be one of the best writers in the industry over the next decade.

Joe Eisma’s art is wonderfully expressive and alive, flowing perfectly with the story and mercifully free of the ‘same-face’ phenomenon (in which characters will have the same exact face with only different hairstyles and clothes to set them apart) that plagues many artists. Although it should be noted the Eisma occasionally has an inexplicably bad panel here and there, in which the character’s features may be off or the scene will suddenly become lifeless, I can only assume that Eisma is having scheduling problems and that these panels were rushed, because they don’t meet the solid standard he’s set throughout the rest of the book.

Reading Morning Glories reminded me of watching the first season of Lost, despite the fact that towards the end the show can only be described as having derped itself into oblivion that first season was remarkably well made and absolutely everyone was constantly on the edge of their seats. Remember when Jack and Locke finally opened the hatch and then the series ended? That’s how I felt upon finishing this book, I had immensely enjoyed everything I’d seen and by God I wanted to find out what happened next right that second.

It can be difficult to discuss the plot of Morning Glories without giving away spoilers, so I’ll keep this as simple as I can. Described by Spencer himself as “Runaways meets Lost” (I’d throw a dash of 1984 in there too) Morning Glories is essentially about the six newest recruits of the mysterious Morning Glory Academy, and while that might not sound like a must-read setup as with the Academy itself there’s a lot more to Morning Glories than you might suspect.

To say that Morning Glory Academy has dark secrets is an understatement on par with describing Hitler as a bit of a dick. Again I’m trying to avoid spoilers, but the staff of the Academy prove themselves very willing to do whatever it takes to achieve their goals. What are their goals? Damned if I know, but I can’t wait to find out.

Every scrap of information we receive about what is going on only seems to add to the mystery and I guarantee that you’ll be hooked by the end of the first issue. The story is constantly twisting and turning and it’s literally impossible to guess what’s going to happen next, this is a comic that never feels in danger of becoming boring.

But it’s the characters that might well be Morning Glories’ strongest aspect, Spencer nails down the six teenagers perfectly and manages to make each one of them likable in their own way, from possible future Hitler Ike (a magnificent bastard if I ever saw one) to the emotionally fragile Jade. My personal favourite is probably Hunter, identified by promotional material as ‘Most likely to quote Star Wars at inappropriate times’, something I may or may not do. *Cough*

The characters seem to leap off the page at times and it’s clear that Spencer took the time and effort to know each of them inside and out in order to make them as human and believable as possible. These kids aren’t just vehicles to drive the story along, they’re people you grow to care about and I genuinely hope that everything turns out okay for each of them (even Ike).

A problem many comics, more specifically Marvel/DC cape comics, have is that no matter what happens to their characters they’ll be alright soon enough, they even come back from the dead with annoying regularity. Whenever the Flash or Wolverine are in trouble the reader has no reason to care, even if by some freak chance they die they’ll almost certainly be back, probably within a year or two. The kids of Morning Glory have no such luxury and every time one of them finds themselves in danger I found myself on the edge of my seat praying they’d make it out alright.

Few comics have pulled me into the story as quickly and as strongly as Morning Glories and I really can’t wait for the next volume to come out.

In short Morning Glories is a well written and solidly drawn story, albeit with the odd art hiccup, packed to the brim with interesting plot twists and the most likable and engaging cast of characters this side of Transmetropolitan. As an extra bonus like many Image releases it is a lot cheaper than your average Marvel/DC trade, so I command you all to go and buy the paperback right this second.

9/10

One week hiatus.

2011-03-28T15:03:00.001-07:00

Due to various factors the blog will be delayed by one week.

Check in next Monday for a review of 'Morning Glories: Volume One'!

Superman: Earth One

2011-03-21T12:25:00.000-07:00

Superman: Earth One- By J. Michael Straczynski

In 2009 award winning writer J. Michael Straczynski left Marvel Comics, for whom he had been writing since 2001, and began working for rival company DC. Straczynski’s stint at Marvel was highly successful, his long run on Spiderman is considered by some fans, including myself, to be one of the best Spiderman runs ever and the same can be said for his Thor run, which in my own humble opinion is one of the best runs on any ongoing series in the last decade.

And what of Straczynski’s work at DC? Well, between leaving Marvel and coming to DC something appears to have happened to Straczynski, as if a part of himself were lost along the way. Straczynski took over writing duties for both Superman and Wonder Woman’s monthly ongoings and by god was the comic community excited. Then they came out.

Straczynski’s Superman and Wonder Woman stories have, thus far, been absolutely wretched. I’ve read my fair share of bad comics and I struggle to think of much that I can genuinely call worse. But you don’t have to take my word for it, if you aren’t one of them yourself find the nearest person who’s been reading Superman and ask them what they think of ‘Grounded’. You’d best bring along a swear jar.

But all was not lost, for a graphic novel was also in the works, the first in DC’s new Earth One line which would re-tell the origins of DC’s most famous heroes for a modern audience. Superman: Earth One, is the biggest single release from DC in years and all eyes were on Straczynski, who, after the disasters of his DC monthly offerings, needed to prove himself.

You might have noticed that I’m taking my time in actually starting to talk about the book itself, mostly because I’m taking my time intentionally. Why? Because Superman: Earth One is the biggest pile of bland nothingness I’ve come across in a long time. It is taking me significant effort to type every word of this review and I’m struggling to find the enthusiasm to continue. The only reason I’m bothering is because this is a big release and DC has been short on them lately.

Even as I write I’m pouring through the book in an effort to find something that left any kind of impression on me and I’m failing to find anything.

The story is predictable enough, it’s just Superman’s origin, a story that everyone already knows. A baby sent from dying planet Krypton to earth, there his is found by a married couple who decide to take him in and raise him as their son. He grows up and develops super powers, goes to the city of Metropolis blah blah blah, capes and Lois Lane. What does this do differently? Well for one thing the destruction of Krypton is made rather less tragic, being destroyed now as a result of war rather than exploding due to age and an unstable core. This makes the planet’s end less of a tragic disaster and more back-story for a standard revenge tale.

The story ultimately feels bland and hollow, it feels like Clark Kent doesn’t become Superman out a desire to do good or help people, but rather because the plot demands it. That’s the main problem with this book; Straczynski appears to be utterly incapable of capturing the essence of Superman as a character. Superman isn’t just some goody two-shoes man-child in a cape, he’s a living embodiment of goodness, he’s what all other heroes aspire to be and Straczynski’s Superman isn’t that. Straczynski’s Superman has none of the weight or power that Superman should have, ultimately Straczynski tries to make Superman human and believable but takes it too far to the point where the man we’re reading isn’t a ‘super’ man any more.

There are some good character moments early on, mostly between Clark and his adoptive parents, and they start off the story well. Unfortunately all of the well done character moments in the world won’t help if the story doesn’t work and it most definitely doesn’t.

The villain of the story is a new character called Tyrell, and by the gods he is bland. Nothing about Tyrell makes him memorable, his motivation borders on nonexistent, he wants to kill Superman because someone we never get to see asked him to for reasons we never learn, in exchange for a reward we never find out about. Tyrell doesn’t even seem that interested, as if even appearing in the story at all is a chore, and that doesn’t make for an engaging villain. Tyrell never seems all that threatening, he consistently gets slapped around by Superman and has to resort de-powering him to stand a chance, and then he doesn’t have the sense to kill the enemy he’s been hunting for years, instead opting to stroll off to dick about in his ship instead of maybe SHOOTING HIM IN THE FACE OR SOMETHING.

Yeah, Tyrell is one of those villains who completely deserves to lose.

The art by Shane Davis is nicely detailed but also bland. And that word really does sum up Superman: Earth One, bland.

Oh god I’m bored just thinking about it.

In short this is a largely inoffensive but also very boring and bland story, and it can count itself among Straczynski’s recent failures. There are many better Superman stories and several better Superman origin stories. Avoid unless you have an awful lot of time and money to waste.

3/10

Avengers Assembled: Part Two

2011-03-14T17:19:00.000-07:00

Secret Avengers - Volume 1: Mission to Mars- By Ed Brubaker

Those of you who read and paid attention to part one of this review may have noticed that despite Steve Rogers forming an Avengers team he wasn’t actually a part of it, his successor as Captain America, Bucky Barnes, was. So now you might be asking yourself, ‘Well then, what’s Steve doing?’ The answer is simple, not all the threats to the world can be punched in the face by the Avengers, some of them have to covertly punched in the face, hence the Secret Avengers.

Designed to be a shadowy black-ops counterpart to the Avengers, the Secret Avengers are a pre-emptive strike force, eliminating potential threats before they get out of hand and New York becomes a battle ground for the thousandth time. Just behind the main Avengers book this title was the second most exciting book in the re-launch as far as I was concerned and unlike Avengers this book hasn’t let me down.

Writer Ed Brubaker, who was done some excellent work on Captain America in recent years, has assembled possibly the most badass team of second stringers imaginable, War Machine, Black Widow, Valkyrie, Moon Knight, Beast (formerly of the X-Men), Ant Man and Nova, with Steve Rogers himself leading. These guys might not be household names like Spiderman or Wolverine but they can be relied to get the job done and be all kinds of awesome while they’re at it.

The plot of the opening four issue story arc, which along with a fifth issue epilogue is collected here, concerns secret organisations, conspiracies, cover-ups and mystical artefacts and it mostly takes place IN SPAAAAAAAAAAAAACE! In other words, exactly what we expected with outer-space thrown into the mix, and everyone knows space improves everything.

Mike Deodado’s art is vastly better than the art of the previous two Avengers books and suits the book wonderfully; bring both a heavy noir vibe and a very cinematic look to his work.

The characters are better balanced here than in Avengers, with everyone getting their chance to shine, although the story is very much driven by Steve Rogers, as it should be. Brubaker writes the characters well and seems to have a solid grasp on all of them, with one notable exception...

The treatment of Nova in this book is something that had a lot of fans of Marvel’s cosmic wing in somewhat of an uproar. Nova, while being a fairly obscure hero, has arguably done more to protect the Marvel universe than 99% of its many superheroes, having taken part in the struggle against inter-dimensional warlord Annihilus, who was responsible for billions of deaths during the Annihilation event, and personally killed Annihilus. Yet despite his status as a universe saving mega hero in this story Nova is accorded surprisingly little respect from his fellow Secret Avengers, with Rogers himself calling Nova a ‘boy’ several times. Nova is also rendered unable to assist the team early on in the series, leaving it up to Rogers to save him.

Personally I too dislike Nova’s treatment here, his competence having been reduced most probably to compensate for his high power level in comparison to the other team members, several of whom are non-powered. On the other hand it didn’t have me spitting blood like some of my fellows, it was annoying but not book breaking.

Of course Nova’s characterisation won’t matter that much to new readers and ultimately it doesn’t matter that much at all, what with Nova leaving the series at the end of this arc to take part in another cosmic story The Thanos Imperative. What does matter is that this is a well paced, well written, well drawn opening story and I would recommend it to anyone who likes the idea of superhero-subterfuge in space.

This story is available in both hardcover and trade paperback format and I give it a solid recommendation.

8/10

Avengers Academy-Volume One: Permanent Record by Christos Gage

After the Civil War event an program called the Initiative was created, designed to train young superhumans to ensure that untrained amateurs could never inadvertently cause a disaster. Once bastard-extraordinaire Norman Osborn took over the Initiative took a dark turn and young superhumans were subjected to whatever means possible to bring out their powers quickly so that they could be trained as part of Osborn’s personal army, means including torture and experimentation. Avengers Academy is the story of six young survivors of Osborn’s regime being trained by veteran Avengers to be the heroes of tomorrow... or is it?

This opening arc serves primarily to introduce us to our six young heroes and start the ball rolling on their various story arcs that will continue throughout the series. Each of the six gets their own issue to focus on their back-story and character, with other minor development for them here and there in each other’s issues.

I’m going to get this out of the way, despite its failings (which we’ll get to) this is my favourite of the current Avengers crop. Each of the new students is interesting and over the course of the series we’re getting some nice character development and interactions, with each other and the various established heroes charged with training them.

Then we get to the art... why is it that these Avengers books almost all have bad art? The Avengers is the centre of the Marvel universe, both in storyline and sales, and yet they’re giving art duties to whichever monkey flings the most shit at the page. There are good things about Mike McKone’s art, the proportions are solid and the panels are nicely set out but once again we have facial issues. (Why is it always the faces? From now on I’m calling all poorly drawn faces ‘Avengers faces’.) Anyway, the lack of expression is the main problem in this book, early on in the first issue one Veil, of the students of the Academy, finds out that her powers are slowly killing her. Judging by her facial expression the news of her imminent death is about as important to her as what colour her socks are. At several points the art seems unfinished; more like a sketch to be re-done later rather than a finished product, at one point it is noted that Academy teacher Speedball is threatening someone with blue energy, blue energy that is apparently invisible because it’s nowhere to be seen.

As I’ve said, despite the art failings this book is a good read, the characters and their plight are engaging and I for one can never wait to read the next issue to find out what they’ve been up to. Unfortunately this book is struggling to sell, with a cast of newcomers and a lack of a big name writer like Bendis or Brubaker this book is struggling to maintain its very average sales from month to month. It’s doing even worse in this collected format, after an early surge of sales it has, at the time of writing, dropped down to 50^th place in Amazon’s rankings of currently best selling Avengers books, behind stories that I had forgotten even existed.

In short, good writing and good characters with bad art but an engaging story that needs all the sales it can get. Available in both paperback and hardcover it is my personal top recommendation of the four Avengers books, especially for new readers.

8/10

In conclusion...

The current crop of Avengers ongoings is a mixed bag if I ever saw one, two good books with one bad one and one average one. Three of which have bad art. So is this re-launch a total disaster? No, but it is disappointing. Brian Michael Bendis really needs to up his game with his two Avengers books to keep the franchise strong, and the line has recently been hit by the announcement that issue 12 will be Ed Brubaker’s last issue as writer of Secret Avengers.

This isn’t the worst time to be an Avengers fan or a newcomer, but it isn’t sunshine and rainbows either.

Avengers Assembled: Part One

2011-03-07T14:04:00.000-08:00

In early 2010 Marvel published the 4 issue event ‘Siege’, a story that ended an almost decade long saga of storylines, largely focussed on the Avengers, which had begun with ‘Secret War’ back in 2004. The villains that had tormented the Marvel Universe were vanquished, at least for the moment, and the Heroic Age began.

Along with the arrival of the Heroic Age the various Avengers books ended and the Avengers franchise was re-launched, heralding the first time in over five years that new readers come begin reading Avengers books without fear of stifling amounts of continuity. In this two part first review I’ll be looking at the first volumes of each of the four current Avengers ongoing series, Avengers, New Avengers, Avengers Academy and Secret Avengers.

The problem is that this jumping on point is only of any use if any of the new books are any good, so the question I intend to answer is “are any of the Avengers books worth reading?”

Avengers Volume 1- By Brian Michael Bendis

With Siege out of the way and the classic Avengers line-up all friends again (they had various fall outs, mostly to do with taking opposing sides during the Civil War event) we finally got a classic Avengers team containing the three all time iconic Avengers, Iron Man, Thor and Captain America (not the original, his successor, but it’s close enough) as well as newer members like Spiderman and Wolverine.

When these four series launched Avengers was the title I was looking forward to the most, after all we were getting a team with the best of the old and new Avengers, so it couldn’t go wrong, right? Unfortunately, it goes very wrong very quickly, making it by far the most disappointing of the four Avengers books and also the worst. Oh, and the plot involves time travel and an apocalyptic war in the future between superheroes and a killer robot and yet it still manages to be boring.

The art by John Romita Jr has gotten gradually worse over the years and this book is no exception. My main issue is and always will be the way he insists on drawing lines everywhere, every single person he draws is covered in inexplicable lines and it bothers me more with every panel I read. He also tends to draw every character with the same face, which isn’t a problem when the characters are in costume but when the masks come off it, like the lines, begins to grind.

The story itself sees Steve Rogers, the original Captain America and new head of SHIELD forming a team of Avengers in the aftermath of Siege. Shortly after the team’s formation time travelling villain Kang the Conqueror arrives and delivers a dire warning to the Avengers, that in the future their children will take over the world and destroy it, as well as time itself. And so begins the new team’s debut quest to stop their successors and save... well, everything. It’s an impressive upping of the stakes for an Avengers storyline, which have been more insular and focussed on the Avengers themselves over the last few years as opposed to a large scale story like this one.

Despite the interesting set up the book fails on multiple key levels, the worst offense being that the entire story could have been told more effectively in half as many issues. The story meanders about several times without going anywhere, for example in issues 2 someone turns up to fight the Avengers for a chunk of the issue, whines a bit and then leaves, nothing is achieved and we don’t find out why this is happening. The worst example is the entirety of issue 3, 90% of which could have been cut without affecting the story in the slightest, a villain unrelated to the plot shows up and brawls with the Avengers before disappearing, but whereas the character in issue 2 only took up a portion of the book, 16 pages, about three quarters of the issue, are dedicated to this largely pointless fight. Even if the scene were essential it could have been cut down to two or three pages easily without detracting from the story. The entire story stinks of time wasting and I strongly suspect that writer Brian Michael Bendis simply dragged out his story beyond its time purely to suit its inevitable TPB release.

The story comes across as being a contrived way to show off a timeline hinting at future Marvel events and storylines; we see this time line drawn on a board across two pages which carry the rest of the storyline. That is the ultimate problem with this story; it is not a story in itself but a vague prelude for more interesting stories to come.

There are also major problems with the team itself, and this is a problem that I’ll bring up in the other Avengers books too, the team is too large and unwieldy. The likes of Thor, Iron Man and Noh-Varr get plenty to do but several of the characters, particularly Spider-Woman, spend the story standing in the background presumably feeling awkward and useless. Spiderman spends most of his time wise cracking as he always does which at least gives him something to do, but Bendis insists on making everyone crack jokes which gives the story the feel of a parody more than a dangerous quest to fix time itself.

In short I can’t recommend this book on any level; it is a poorly drawn, boring, plodding, mess of a story full of wasted potential. The only reason to read this is because the glimpse of future events will no doubt prove to be important somewhere down the line, but if you really cared about that you would have read it already.

If you MUST buy it you can find it in Hardcover and Paperback, but please don’t. A poor introduction for new readers and a bland nothing for veterans, avoid.

3/10

New Avengers Volume 1- By Brian Michael Bendis

Whereas Avengers feature Steve Rogers forming a team of Avengers this series focuses on the New Avengers, a team who originally formed in 2005 after the Avengers disbanded in the 2004 story ‘Avengers Disassembled’. The line up went through changes in the early days, mostly due to the Civil War, but in the later years of the initial New Avengers run the team solidified under the leadership of Luke Cage (formerly known as Power Man).

Due to Rodger’s respect for Cage and Cage’s quite frankly adolescent issues with authority (he throws a hissy fit when Rodger’s asks him to be a part of his wider Avengers group because Rogers is now an authority figure, even though Rogers has never given Cage a reason to doubt him and led the anti government control faction in Civil War), Rogers lets Cage continue to lead his team and recruit whoever he wants to it with near total independence. This lets writer Brian Michael Bendis write both an iconic Avengers team and also the team he created.

As a quick side note, Cage is allowed to ask anyone he likes from his old team to stay on, presumably save for the current Captain America, and he does so, also asking the Thing of the Fantastic Four along, everyone except for Spiderwoman that is. Dude, that’s cold, I don’t like her either but still...

The plot of this opening arc focuses on an invasion of the Marvel dimension by an unknown attacking force and all our heroes know is that it is somehow connected to the Eye of Agamotto, the mystical talisman belonging to earth’s Sorcerer Supreme, drawing former SS Doctor Strange and current SS Doctor Voodoo into the mix, as well as Daimon Hellstrom for some reason. And so with their various magical allies the New Avengers must fight off the invaders and save the dimension.

The art here is a lot better than that in the Avengers but has notable flaws of its own. Whereas characters in Avengers suffered from lines all over their skin in New Avengers they are unfortunate enough to lose their eyes unless they’re either surprised or taking up a large chunk of the panel. Immonen also seems to get very lazy when it comes to drawing characters in the background, they become little more than ill defined blurs and the sloppy colouring of Laura Martin doesn’t help, in one panel in the first issues Hawkeye, a purple suited hero, is a blurry, eyeless, yellow blob only recognisable due to the ‘H’ on his head.

Despite some minor art failings this book is better than the main Avengers title, but only enough to make it exceedingly average. A major problem with Bendis’ writing is that regardless of who he’s writing they constantly talk and talk and talk and talk, this isn’t a problem with books like Ultimate Spiderman where the cast is made up of teenagers, a group of people endlessly in love with the sound of their own voices (I’m not condemning here, I was the same way) but it doesn’t really fit, there’s no real need for Ms. Marvel to throw in a quip whilst other characters are discussing how to save their entire dimension. Once again, as with Avengers, this works for Spiderman but not for the whole group.

Bendis seems to be more comfortable with this cast than the cast of his other Avengers book, after all he’s had the last five years to shape this team and let them gel as a cohesive unit, and it shows, everyone on this team gets their moment to shine, even while sharing the book with three magical allies and a horde of inter-dimensional horrors.

A minor issue I have is the presence of Spiderman and Wolverine on this team as well as the main Avengers team, it seems silly to me that with all of the superheroes in the Marvel universe there should be overlap between the two main Avengers teams. There are after all many former Avengers who’ve been left out in the cold apparently without being asked to come back as well as plenty of heroes who would make great Avengers if only they were given the chance. *cough* Storm *cough* But no, instead we get more Spiderman and Wolverine, because we definitely don’t see enough of those guys around.

The story flows better than that of Avengers and manages to stay interesting and reasonably focussed throughout, which made a refreshing read in comparison to its sister title which spent most of an issue on a largely pointless fight scene. It isn’t a great story and it will largely be remembered due to the killing off of a character towards the end (not a spoiler, the cover of that issue announces an impending death) rather than for its own merits.

Ultimately, this book is okay. It’s a solid start for the series, albeit one that may be hard for new readers to jump into unless they know about the back-story of the Sorcerer Supreme, which makes me wonder what the point in the renumbering was if Bendis intended to immediately pick up a plot point from the first volume of New Avengers.

As a last minute note I’d recommend picking up the first paperback of the original NA run instead of this, it’s a lot better than this story and is free of the problems that would come to plague to book throughout most of the original run.

Mixed art, decent story, good characterisation. I neither recommend nor condemn it, unless you REALLY want it I wouldn’t bother. You can find it in hardcover with paperback on the way.

5/10

And so ends part one, next week in part two I’ll look at the two lower selling, less ‘important’ and best books of the current Avengers crop, Secret Avengers and Avengers Academy.

-------------------------------------

Note: Looking back I think I was overly harsh on the art of New Avengers, 95% of it is fine, but the eyes/background thing definitely bothered me. Still, it definitely didn't deserve the amount of criticism I dumped on it, I stand by hating the Avengers art though.