Collected Editions

Review: Superman: New Krypton Vol. 2 hardcover/paperback (DC Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 14:02:00 +0000

Don't get me wrong -- Superman: New Krypton is good comics. Whether this second volume is good Superman is debatable, as is the question of whether this seemingly quite decompressed storyline couldn't have been collected in two hardcovers instead of three. That aside, I recently listed the "New Krypton" series at Speed Force as among my top three comics I couldn't do without; here's why.

What I continue to love about New Krypton is its scope. It's easy to have a hero fighting a villain and a couple of subplots -- New Krypton has a gigantic cast of characters, each with their own motivation and reasons for action in the series. Thinking about this, I was struck specifically by the modern incarnation of Reactron -- alongside Metallo, he's one of many classic Superman villains pitted by General Sam Lane against the Kryptonians, but at the same time Reactron's working toward his own ends to gain a new body, and exacting his specific vendetta against Supergirl. There's nary a character taking part here, from the Daily Planet staff to the Kryptonians to the US government, who doesn't have some double loyalty (as, of course, does Superman) and it gives every scene special resonance.

This volume's trio of writers -- Geoff Johns, James Robinson, and Sterling Gates -- also work hard to keep the surprises coming. There's no less than two startling deaths in this volume, one surprising betrayal, and the volume's widescreen conclusion; surely this volume is as much a page-turner as the comics must have been weekly "first reads." At least three of the characters have mysterious secret identities (about which the writers liberally tease us), and that's not to mention a number of hanging, unexplored threads like Robinson's Atlas character or what an errant Legion flight ring might have to do with all of this. New Krypton is packed, just packed, with so much stuff that the reader can't help but thrill to the ride.

Superman's villains get the spotlight in this second volume; short of Mr. Mxyzptlk, just about every classic Superman villain appears here. Most of them don't have a role yet -- having been rounded up by the Kryptonians and shunted to the Phantom Zone -- but it's obvious from how the writers rejuvenate Metallo and Reactron that good things portend for Superman's bad guys. There's a great nod especially to the Lex Luthor/Brainiac team-ups of yore, though I didn't much like Luthor getting his comeuppance from Sam Lane; master villain Luthor ought be the one pulling the strings, and hopefully we'll see that before too long.

Volume two technically wraps up the "New Krypton" saga -- even though volume three is also labeled "New Krypton," it actually contains the subsequent New Krypton miniseries whereas these issues close the initial ten-part "New Krypton" crossover. Maybe, one could argue, that's why this hardcover contains just six issues, but still it feels awfully short. I'd have preferred perhaps another issue or two tucked into the first volume and a couple more into the third; while certainly "events transpire" in volume two, it sometimes feels like a collection of cliffhangers sandwiched between repetitive conversations (mostly Superman and Supergirl's mother Alura), when perhaps some of it could possibly have been truncated to save the reader buying three hardcovers.

As well, I remain disappointed by Superman's own role in New Krypton. This time around, as I mentioned, he spends nearly all his time making moralistic demands on Alura. Superman's right, of course, but he comes across stodgy and unbending as he demands over and over the names of Kryptonians wanted for murdering Metropolis policemen -- instead of, say, putting those reporting skills to good use and trying to souse out the killers himself.

I still struggle, however, to see New Krypton as a real Superman story. Something like Last Son, where Superman fights Zod over Metropolis and gets pulled to some exotic locations in the process, is to me a Superman story, but Superman considering living on New Krypton -- away from the Daily Planet, away from his role inspiring humanity and his fellow heroes -- I'm not sure I see how that helps define Superman himself (though I still have faith in the writers to get us there). I can think of exceptions, of course -- two of my favorite Superman stories, Panic in the Sky and Exile, both have Superman off-planet, though in a different way than this. My hope remains that when the New Krypton dust clears, these same writers have some more traditional Superman stories up their sleeves, too.

Irrespective, New Krypton is so well structured and well characterized that it continually keeps me coming back for more. I'm hooked, and if you're not already reading this, do yourself a favor and get hooked, too.

[Contains full and variant covers]

More Blackest Night collections, Cry for Justice, Adventures of Superboy

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 21:05:00 +0000

Eagle-eyed Collected Editions blog reader Chris Hilker just pointed out a bunch more Blackest Night hardcover trade collections now solicited. To wit:

- Blackest Night: Rise of the Black Lanterns, by Geoff Johns, etc.
- Blackest Night: Black Lantern Corps Vol. 1, by James Robinson, etc.
- Blackest Night: Black Lantern Corps Vol. 2
- Blackest Night: Tales of the Corps Vol. 1

Granted, the authors listed for these books may just be placeholders, but here's my speculation, branching off our earlier conversation as to how you would collect Blackest Night:

- James Robinson, as you know, writes both Blackest Night: Superman and Blackest Night: JSA. My bet is that between the two volumes, Blackest Night: Black Lantern Corps collect the six main spin-off miniseries (that is, also Batman, Flash, Wonder Woman, and Titans). Pure speculation, based on Robinson's name being there.

- Blackest Night: Tales of the Corps is, at least, the three-part Tales story that came out in July. That's not enough for a hardcover, though, and the solicitation says volume one (of an expected two volumes). Could this be, perhaps, where we'll see the relevant Green Lantern Corps issues collected?

- Rise of the Black Lanterns, by Geoff Johns, almost sounds like a lead-in volume, not unlike the volume of collected stories that relate to Johns' current run, Green Lantern: In Brightest Day. "Rise" could also refer to the various "cancelled issues" coming out in January, collected here in one volume (or it could be, strangely enough, a collection of the issues where the various Black Lanterns *died*).

Very interesting ...

Some other notables:

* Adventures of Superboy Book One

This book collects very early Superboy stories by Don Cameron, Joe Shuster, and Stan Kaye. Part of DC's recent Superboy lawsuit has to do with Superboy stories that Don Cameron wrote for DC while Joe Shuster served in the army; obviously things are rosier if DC now sees fit to release this collection.

* Justice League: Cry for Justice

Love it or hate it, James Robinson's Justice League miniseries certainly has people talking. I'll likely pick up this hardcover and hope I don't regret it.

* World's Finest

Just as the first issue hits the stand, here's word of the collection of the Sterling Gates/Phil Noto Super-Family/Bat-Family crossover.

* Supergirl: Friends and Fugitives

The next collection of Sterling Gates' Supergirl run. Who is Superwoman? ends with issue #42; this will either pick up with #43, or if #43-46 are in the Codename: Patriot collection, maybe #47.

Let the Blackest Night speculation continue!

Wednesday Comics, Superboy, Final Crisis and Batman RIP paperbacks solicited

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 17:47:00 +0000

The DC Comics trade paperback solicitations for 2010 keep rolling out, with these new graphic novels for the upcoming summer. Some interesting first release hardcovers and paperbacks, but also some significant second run paperbacks as well.

* Wednesday Comics HC

DC Comics announced the Wednesday Comics collection earlier this month, and it's now available for pre-order. At $50, cheaper than many Absolute editions, this 11 x 17 volume collects all 12 issues of the weekly series, reorganized to read by character.

* Superboy: The Redemption

Perhaps my favorite item on this list, DC collects Geoff Johns and Francis Manapul's first six issues on Adventure Comics in hardcover format. I've heard nothing but good things about this story ... and it's Superboy (!) ... and it's written by Geoff Johns. I'm counting the days.

* Gotham Central Book 3: On the Freak Beat

The next Gotham Central hardcover collection. The first hardcover collected the first two Gotham Central trade paperbacks, In the Line of Duty and Half a Life, and the second included the trade paperback Unresolved Targets plus some previously uncollected issues. That second volume had twelve issues; this third volume could include the trade paperback The Quick and the Dead plus the previously uncollected issues #26 and 27 at eight issues total, with one more Gotham Central hardcover to follow.

* JSA vs. Kobra
* The Shield Vol. 1: Kicking Down the Door

After Checkmate, Eric Trautmann became one of my new favorite writers (Sterling Gates is in that circle, too). I'm super-excited for this upcoming paperback, which I see as essentially a spin-off of some of my favorite Checkmate storylines. Also solicited is the first volume of Trautmann's Shield series, including the introductory Red Circle special by J. Michael Straczynski.

* Batgirl Vol. 1: Batgirl Rising

I have high hopes that this Batgirl will become the DC Universe's next, lasting Batgirl. The first two storylines, about six issues long, could comprise this first trade.

* Superman: New Krypton Vol. 4

Listed as a paperback, but price-wise, and given that the first three of these were hardcover, I expect this is hardcover as well. Probably collects most, if not all, of the final issues of the Superman: World of Krypton miniseries.

* Wonder Woman: Warkiller

DC previously solicited Wonder Woman: Rise of the Olympian as a hardcover and paperback to be released on the same day, but now it appears only the hardcover will be available. With Warkiller, the series switches to paperback only; not a great sign for a series that DC's trying to set as a foundation of the DC Universe.

* Atomic Knights

John Broome and Murphy Anderson created the Atomic Knights in 1960; this hardcover collects their early stories. Interesting that DC is collecting these without any sort of header (DC Classics Library, etc.); it remains to be seen if this is the start of a new set of classic collections.

* Titans Vol. 3: Fractured

This trade collects the one-shot "Day in the Life" stories that followed the Deathtrap crossover, including a Blackest Night prelude and a Starfire issue in the aftermath of Final Crisis. Likely includes issues #14-22.

* Justice Society of America: The Bad Seed

Even as I'm gearing up to buy a deluxe edition of Bill Willingham's Fables, I have severe reservations about his ongoing run on Justice Society; we'll see. The series is now being released in paperback only. Collects at least issues #29-33, leading up to the JSA All-Stars spin-off series.

* Doom Patrol Vol. 1: We Who Are About to Die

* Red Tornado: Family Reunion

Paperbacks - if you've really been waiting for the trade, your wait is over; Final Crisis and Batman RIP are on their way in paperback, along with a couple ancilliary volumes:

* Final Crisis

* Batman R.I.P.

* Batman: Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?

* Superman: Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow

* Superman: New Krypton Vol. 1: Birth

* Green Lantern: Rage of the Red Lanterns

Make your preferences known -- what's on your to-buy list?

Review: Booster Gold: Reality Lost trade paperback (DC Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 14:02:00 +0000

A week or so ago we looked at Dan Jurgens' Tangent: Superman's Reign, and in contrast here's Booster Gold: Reality Lost with art by Jurgens and writing by Jurgens and Chuck Dixon. This volume of Booster Gold goes firmly in the "more fun comics" pile; not very much happens here right up until the very end, but having Dan Jurgens write and very solidly draw again the character he created -- especially in a rollicking tale of time paradoxes -- is worth the price of admission all on its own.

[Contains spoilers for Booster Gold: Reality Lost]

Jurgens and Dixon enlist a healthy dose of time-travel conceits in Reality Lost, and each serves to remind us why time travel stories are so much fun. To prevent a time anomaly, Booster must prevent the past Batman, Robin, and Batgirl from foiling a robbery by Killer Moth; the resulting chaos results in a scene where time-separated versions of Booster play almost every different character's role in the same scene, like something out of the Three Stooges.

Subsequently, Booster finds himself in such far-flung locations as ancient Egypt and World War I; he even intersects with his own previous adventures and teams up with himself. This isn't the first time Jurgens has drawn time-travel (see one of my favorites, Superman: Time and Time Again), and this story is highly reminiscent of that one. The cameo by Enemy Ace, for instance, is largely gratuitous, but there's a certain thrill in seeing modern heroes cast into war-torn Europe that you can only find in stories such as these.

One central idea examined in Reality Lost is how Booster and his compatriots are routinely manipulated -- by Time Master Rip Hunter, by the duties they've undertaken, even by time itself. The story takes a while to come around to this (not in the least because Jurgens picks up and alters the story Dixon starts), but we see it most strongly in Booster's being flung through time by a trio of chronally-charged knives, and in Booster's sister Goldstar's near-breakdown at realizing she's been resurrected from the dead.

I'm not familiar with Goldstar from Booster's original series, so I haven't been quite sure what to make of her bubbly, almost air-headed portrayal in Booster Gold: Blue and Gold and then her falling apart this time around. The quick change from happy to sad suggests an air of mania which, if this is Jurgens goal, he achieves aptly. Only, I hope Goldstar's disappearance at the end of this story doesn't signal the character's departure from the series (which would make her re-entrance last time something of a waste), but rather an indication that Jurgens has further tricks up his sleeve.

I also enjoyed the look at how Booster has matured, illustrated by the interaction Booster has with his own past self. While there's perhaps a bit too much shoulder-patting in this volume (if I have to hear Booster decry how he's the greatest hero the world will never know one more time, I'll scream), as we reach the twelfth issue (the end of the first full year), it's interesting to see how much more driven and darkened Booster is than when the series began.

Granted, there's only one volume between the beginning and this story, but obviously losing Blue Beetle -- a second time -- has taken its toll. It's in this way that I can appreciate Reality Lost as a sort of "checking in" on the Booster Gold series; nothing really happens other than Goldstar's departure, but in essence Jurgen takes stock of where the characters are after two volumes of the book and deals with the more subtle implications of Blue and Gold. As the new (returning) writer of Booster Gold after Geoff Johns, I can spot Jurgens one book of treading water before the title finds a direction again (and solicitations suggest it has indeed).

I'd be remiss if I didn't mention, in the days of title delays and rotating artists and inkers, that it's a sheer joy to read a collection of seven issues all drawn by Dan Jurgens with inks by Norm Rapmund. As someone who remembers fondly the days of Jurgens and inker Brett Breeding (and less fondly Jurgens with inks by Joe Rubinstein), I'd say Jurgens is at his best in this Booster Gold volume. I'm struck by how his art has grown more "widescreen" since the days of panels that didn't bleed off the page, and at the same time preserves Jurgens' trademark full and muscular figures . Having consistent art -- and good art, to boot -- in a collection makes a difference, and it's another reason why I rate this volume so highly.

Booster Gold: Reality Lost isn't a staggering, moving collection, but it's a quality comics tale, and hopefully we'll find it makes a nice bridge between the great previous volume and good things to come.

[Contains full covers, "Origins & Omens" tale]

Review: Showcase Presents: House of Secrets Vol. 1 trade paperback (DC Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 13:02:00 +0000

[This review comes from Collected Editions contributor Derek Roper]

There is this house, see, and it has had its fair share of occupants; a drifter and more recently a group of six mercenaries. But before them, there was a man named Abel and his “imaginary friend” Goldie, they spent many nights alone in this house. Although old and rickety it held many strange tales hidden within its walls. This house--The House of Secrets--is back with its strange and gruesome tales in Showcase Presents: The House of Secrets Volume 1. Scream!

I have to play realtor for a minute. The house was built by Kentucky Sen. Sandsfield. As the tales goes; he built it by hand. Every inch of the place is made with 100 percent Kentuckian material. He claimed that if the house wasn’t built with pieces of Kentucky, it wasn’t a real Kentucky home. It should be noted that the senator’s wife went mad in the house--yup, mad as a hatter.

After that, the house went through four owners who weren’t pure Kentuckian and so the house set dormant for a little while until a man by the name of Mr. Barkus purchased it and decided to have it hauled away on a trailer. But he too did not last long, as it was told; the house detached itself and knocked Barkus off a cliff where he met a gruesome death. The next owner, Abel, who was a pitiful man, was talked into looking at a house by a creepy realtor who disappeared and filled Abel with the entire house’s tales. Next up was a girl--a drifter--by the name of Rain Harper. She moved in (in the Vertigo series) and found that a closet held the Juris, a group of spirits who judged people whether they liked it or not. Eventually, the house was said to be demolished after the girl left. The last guests to move into the house before the events of Infinite Crisis were a group of six mercenaries who called themselves the Secret Six.

Now that you have the history, the collection in question boasts over 500 pages of horror and suspense tales, and collects The House of Secrets #81-98 and even some stories from its sister book The House of Mystery.

Each issue has stand-alone stories but also an underlying arc featuring the narrator Abel (think Rod Serling) who gets acclimated with the house. He is very timid at first but after his spooky introduction via the realtor he learns the ropes of the house and becomes just as creepy as the stories that are hidden within the halls. He is frequently visited by his brother Cain who lives across the way at the House of Mystery. The two frequently fight over who has the scarier stories.

Being that this was written in the 1970s, don’t look for modern dialogue; it is very proper and uses slang from that era. It is easy to read but if one has come into comics in the 1980s on, words like “shnook” don’t really pack much of a punch.

For fans of horror literature, most of the surprises in the stories can be seen from a mile away. It is kind of disappointing because they seem like a rehash of stories from the Twilight Zone and The Dark Side. Nostalgia is the only thing that can get one through these stories, and they’re in black in white to boot.

The black and white pages are cheaper economically but sometimes detract from the story. In the stories that have a dark setting, the mood doesn’t come across as strong. In the story “The Little Old Winemaker,” the ending effect of the red wine was supposed to resemble blood, but given that it is black it doesn’t do much for the story. Lighting and the creatures in subsequent stories also need color and not just zebra colored pages. I’ve had the honor of seeing the color pages and they have a sort of color to them that is reminiscent of the old Scooby-Doo cartoons. Plus, art by Alex Toth, Neal Adams, and Jim Aparo deserves to have its artwork in color.

Still, plenty of highlights stand out in this book. “Trick or Treat,” featuring a theif who meets an unfortunate end, is downright scary. An early version of the modern Swamp Thing also appears in issue #92,  with story and art by Len Wein and Bernie Wrighton respectively.

In between the stories are “Able’s Fables,” which are like a spooky version of Tony Millionaire’s Makkies. They feature eccentric and sometimes downright dangerous situations like a little boy on the other side of a “Peep Show” stand blowing a dart through a straw towards the cornea of a business man wanting a thrill.

The tales from the House are the perfect collection to read to the kiddies or ones suffering from horror nostalgia, but for horror aficionados, this is better left on the shelf.

The next volume, Showcase Presents: House of Secrets Vol. 2 will feature issues #99-119 and also promises 500 pages of on-the-edge-of-your-seat-tales.

Happy Halloween from Collected Editions!

Review: The Spectre: Tales of the Unexpected trade paperback (DC Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 13:02:00 +0000

Collected Editions is celebrating Halloween with not one, but two scary reviews this week! If you want a gory, gruesome comic book for your Halloween celebration, The Spectre: Tales of the Unexpected is a trade paperback for you (if not for me).

I face a reviewer's dilemma in writing about Tales of the Unexpected. I didn't like this book and would likely never read it again, and yet I fully realize it's not the book, it's me. Writer David Lapham, known for his crime fiction, presents a blood-soaked story in the spirit of the old EC horror comics and the well-known Michael Fleisher/Jim Aparo depictions of the Spectre. To that end, trying to judge this book on its own merits, I would have to say yes, it accomplishes successfully the goals it sets for itself and had a place as thoughtfully-written comic book literature. But personally -- I was done even before the scene of the sobbing man being forced to kill himself by devouring his own intestines.

Fool me twice, I guess. I picked up this book even though I had a similar reaction to the first volume, Crisis Aftermath: The Spectre, mainly because this book promised to involve Batman -- significant because this iteration of the Spectre is former Gotham Central cop Crispus Allen. Be not misled, however -- Batman appears for one issue only, and he doesn't discern Allen's identity as predicted (though Lapham does deal with Allen's identity, and a number of Gotham Central guest stars, later in the book). I did enjoy, however, Lapham's perspective that Batman sees the Spectre not as a fellow hero, but as a serial killer, one that we know Batman would just as soon see in Arkham if only he was able.

But better than Batman's appearance is one by the Phantom Stranger, in a chapter illustrated by former Spectre artist Tom Mandrake (whose great run, with John Ostrander, begs for a full series of collections). Here, Lapham lets the Stranger allude to all sorts of things regarding the murky relationship between Allen and the Spectre entity -- that Allen can control the Spectre instead of just going along for the ride, that Allen can choose the Spectre's victims or temper the Spectre's anger, and that Allen and the Spectre may not be two entities, but rather that Allen's in control and just can't accept the horrors he's committing.

This suggested a deeper plot thread for Tales of the Unexpected, more than just the Spectre revealing who committed the murder at Gotham's Granville apartments, but rather some story about Crispus Allen and the nature of his new "life" as the Spectre. Unfortunately, I felt this was one area Lapham didn't quite finish what he started; we get an inkling that Allen can save a victim or slow the Spectre's vengeance when he tries, but this was not so clear as to give the reader a good sense of the "rules" of the post-Infinite Crisis Spectre. Perhaps it's that I hoped for some happy or hopeful ending to this story, but true to form, Lapham leaves us with a gritty of Allen essentially cursed to follow morbidly along behind the Spectre's mayhem.

If you did enjoy the first volume, you'll find that Lapham took good care with the hints he dropped about Granville along the way, and ties all the clues into the denouement. No doubt it's clear from the outset that more than just one tenant participated in the murder of Granville's seedy landlord, but who did what -- and in the end, to what additional lengths they go to hide their secrets -- is satisfactorily explained, if you have the stomach for it. Me, I'll take my Spectre a little more superhero-y and a little less bloody, thanks.

[Contains full covers.]

More scary stuff coming up later in the week with Showcase Presents: House of Secrets. Don't miss it!

Review: Teen Titans: Changing of the Guard trade paperback (DC Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 13:02:00 +0000

[Contains spoilers for Teen Titans: Changing of the Guard]

In Teen Titans: Changing of the Guard, writer Sean McKeever improves on many of the difficulties found in his previous Teen Titan volumes, though unfortunately it all still falls way short of Geoff Johns' stories that began this book.

The structure of Changing of the Guard is rather ingenious, matter of fact. McKeever presents two four-chapter stories, "Pawns and Kings" and "The New Deal"; in each, the first two issues could essentially be read as individual stories. If mildly formulaic, it allows McKeever to break the "Teen Titans fight Team X" pattern that dragged down his previous volumes. Wonder Girl and Red Devil are the respective main players in the two stories, but the slow build gives McKeever time to focus on Robin, Bombshell, and a bevy of new new Titans at the same time. McKeever also improves this time around by keeping the Titans (few as they are) together as a team, instead of splitting them to face individual challenges.

Unfortunately, I couldn't help but think this time that McKeever went for both easy stories, and easy solutions. Since Titans East, Teen Titans has dealt with (1) Wonder Girl's transformation to a whiny basket case in the wake of Superboy's death, and (2) Red Devil's deal with the demon Neron to hand over his soul on his eighteenth birthday. McKeever builds these stories relatively well, but then resolves them with almost ridiculous ease -- a follower of Ares seemingly kills Wonder Girl, only to have her emerges to save the day with a new costume and unexplained powers; Red Devil apparently finds out he never signed his contract with Neron (yeah, like Neron's that careless) and *poof* no more soul-selling.

The stories are "explained away" rather than "resolved," and as such didn't leave me overly satisfied. I liked that Red Devil's storyline tied into the Keith Giffen miniseries Reign in Hell, though resolving Red Devil's issues with Neron ever even making an appearance was something of a letdown.

I also noticed that McKeever traded Ravager for Bombshell in this volume -- that is, one stereotypical tough talking, "so over it" character for another. As in Teen Titans: On the Clock, McKeever undercuts a number of supposedly poignant Titans moments with Bombshell's smart aleck remarks, and he does his writing a disservice -- the moments are corny enough that Bombshell's attitude only reinforces what the reader is already thinking, and Bombshell's comments aren't so clever as to make the reader like her. The Titans come off in these moments as kids, and not kids you'd especially want to hang out with; McKeever essentially takes the air out of his own stories.

After much back and forth (and some equally just-not-that-funny scenes with a potential Titan called The Face), the new Titans team resolves itself as Wonder Girl, Aquagirl, Kid Eternity, Red Devil, Static, Bombshell, Miss Martian, and Blue Beetle. It's a non-traditional lineup at Titans teams go (no clear legacies short of Wonder Girl and Aquagirl), but one with potential: Beetle, Devil, and Static could be a great trio if Static weren't acting uncharacteristically holier than thou; I've also enjoyed the Miss Martian character since Johns introduced her. Aquagirl seems the only weak spot, a character without a lot of personality previously established, and I wonder how McKeever intends her to function in the team.

Teen Titans -- like Nightwing, Robin, Birds of Prey, Justice League, and once upon a time, Supergirl -- is one of those DC Comics titles stuck in an awkward place where it can't quite seem to get a steady creative team or momentum under its storylines. Many times, as with the Bat-titles, this cycle ends with the title's cancellation; Supergirl, after a number of rotating creative teams, seems lucky enough to have found its footing with writer Sterling Gates. In a volume or so, McKeever will be replaced on Teen Titans by Felicia Henderson, who'll hopefully "pull a Sterling" on Teen Titans -- I don't think DC will cancel this book, but I don't think it could take another writer and another course correction.

[Contains full covers, "Origins & Omens" pages.]

Review: Robin: Search for a Hero trade paperback (DC Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 13:02:00 +0000

[Contains spoilers for Robin: Search for a Hero and just about everything Batman-related these days, including the "Batman Reborn" storyline and the new Batgirl series.]

Writer Fabian Nicieza pinch-hits on Robin: Search for a Hero, charged with the unenviable task of both bringing this long and often troubled series to a close, and also pointing it in the direction that a whole committee of Bat-writers have decided it should go. What results is a story that serves as a fair retrospective of the Robin series, though evoking sometimes as much the bad as the good. It also defines Robin's future in a way seemingly incongruous with the rest of the Bat-titles, though I did wonder at points if it wasn't the other Bat-titles that were the ones out of step.

To read Peter Tomasi's Nightwing: The Great Leap, you'd think Batman spent his entire life praising the first Robin Dick Grayson and calling him "chum," so happily nostalgic is Dick about his upbringing. Indeed in the post-Infinite Crisis era of the kinder, gentler Batman, it's hard to imagine any of Batman's wards angry with the Dark Knight. Enter Nicieza's third Robin Tim Drake, however, who spends the entire story with a chip on his shoulder and even, it seems, feels partially gratified to be taking over from a dead Batman. Where does this attitude come from?

On one hand, Nicieza's Robin feels artificially angry. Tim's exact reasons for being suspicious of Batman and using a new, more violent approach come out in drips and vaguely-worded drabs, and it seems -- since Tim wasn't this mad at Batman only a few issues ago -- perhaps Nicieza needed Tim to be mad at Batman for the story, rather than this welling from any concrete story moments. Also, Tim's anger didn't impress me, if you will; he spends much of the book in an obsessive attempt to control every aspect of Gotham City, an attempt that the reader knows is ill-advised and as such, can only sit and wait for the character to wake up from what's by now a comic book cliche.

On the other hand, the more I thought about it, the more I considered a scenario where, while everyone else has basked in the glow of happy Batman, Tim Drake's become the forgotten son of the Bat-family. Nicieza makes the point -- backed up with scenes from Grant Morrison's Batman run and elsewhere -- that no sooner did Bruce Wayne adopt Tim Drake as his son did Talia al Ghul drop in Batman's lap his real son Damian. In addition, in a plot-necessitating throwback to Batman's bad old days, apparently Bruce suspected that Robin's girlfriend Spoiler wasn't really dead, without telling his partner -- all of which adds up to some friction between the Dynamic Duo.

It's all mildly silly. Given the momentus struggle other writers in other titles have undertaken to show the ways in which Batman has changed, that he's still portrayed as underhanded in Robin (to which I don't fault Nicieza, but the plotline he inherited) seems repetitive and tired. This is made worse by a storyline in Search for a Hero where Batman conspires with Spoiler to pit Robin's fiercest enemies against him -- a ridiculous redux of the Flash Wally West versus Zoom that falls flat here.

(And, for those keeping track, it's one -- count 'em, one -- trade since DC Comics resurrected Spoiler that not only does Spoiler screw up and help ignite a gang war [yes, just like in Batman: War Games], get told by Robin that he never, ever wants to see her out as Spoiler again [yes, just like Batman did in Robin before], but gets shot and taken captive by a villain in a creepy sexually suggestive scene [see again War Games]. Those fans who thought DC began cleaning up its depiction of women when they brought Spoiler back can commence head-shaking again. I'm eager to read the new Spoiler-lead Batgirl series, but I greatly hope someone will realize that bringing this character back from the dead is an excuse to begin writing her with brains -- no one wants to read about a screw-up for this long, and this depiction of Spoiler is well beyond repetitive.)

Nightwing: The Great Leap, I noted, puts too happy a face on Batman's history; we know Batman's relationship with his Robins has been tempestuous over the years. But Robin: Search for a Hero seems an angry kiss-off, a story that denigrates the time Tim Drake spent partnered with Batman. Considering this is the end of the Robin series, I'll take the Nightwing approach instead; just like you want to believe your favorite television characters live happily after the series finale, so too ought the final story of the almost 200-issue Robin series evoke something meaningful about the Robin character, even despite the fact that Tim Drake picks right up in a new title.

I did appreciate the wealth of Robin villains that Nicieza features here as part of the gang war storyline. Of late, given a bevy of writers and shifting status quos, Robin hasn't had a real rogues gallery to speak of, and it was fun to see Nicieza bring back a bunch of new and old heavy hitters -- Anarky, the General, Lynx, Lady Shiva, Scarab, and Jaeger. It reminds me, frankly, of just how good Chuck Dixon's original run on this series was, and how the title hasn't been the same since. It's proof positive why this "Batman Reborn" plot was necessary, as much for Batman as to clean house on the ancillary Batman titles.

[Contains full covers, Origins and Omens page]

Read another review of Robin: Search for a Hero at Oz and Ends.

Trade Perspectives: How would you collect Blackest Night?

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 13:02:00 +0000

Now that we know that the trade Blackest Night hardcover collection is on the horizon (though not, unfortunately, in a deluxe edition), it's time to start considering how YOU would want to see Blackest Night collected.

[If you enjoy this post, please share it with others.]

Even more than Final Crisis, it seems Blackest Night has a whole bunch of moving parts that need to be included in this. Let's take a look at them.

* Blackest Night: The Series

Final Crisis was seven issues; Blackest Night clocks in at eight issues, the first of which is an oversized 48-pages and the rest at least 40 pages (though likely issue #6 or #8 might be oversized, too). Right off the bat, that's 328 pages, whereas the Amazon listing for Blackest Night only cites 304 pages. Though a page count this early is usually just a placeholder and could change, it makes it very unlikely that the Green Lantern and Green Lantern Corps crossover issues will be included in this volume.

As discussed in the comments of our original post on this, there's some debate as to how the Green Lantern and Green Lantern Corps issues will read separate from Blackest Night (the former perhaps better than the latter, but basically, there doesn't seem to be room in the hardcover for any). Chances are we're looking at a Blackest Night hardcover, and then Green Lantern: Blackest Night and Green Lantern Corps: Blackest Night companion hardcover volumes, which'll make about as much sense on their own as the Final Crisis crossover "Last Rites" in Batman RIP, but such is the life of reading comics in collected format.

Another interesting suggestion in the previous post is that we might actually be looking at two volumes of the main Blackest Night hardcover, which could then include the Green Lantern titles. DC did this for The Sinestro Corps War, though that was a largely in-title event; a two-volume crossover collection would be a first for DC Comics.

* Blackest Night: Tie-in Miniseries

None of that takes into account, however, a whole slew of ancillary Blackest Night miniseries published in addition to the main title and the Green Lantern books. Not only is there the three-part Blackest Night: Tales of the Corps, there's also six three-issue miniseries starring DC Comics heroes -- Batman, Superman, Titans, Wonder Woman, Flash, and JSA -- and eight "resurrected" issues DC just announced for January. That's twenty-nine (!) more Blackest Night issues that must (of course), be collected.

This is where I venture we'll see a Blackest Night Companion like the Infinite Crisis and Final Crisis companions before it. And twenty-nine issues probably means Blackest NIght Companion volumes one, two, and maybe three -- as this moves farther from Blackest Night proper, I'd hope to see paperbacks of these.

* Crossover Titles

As of November, DC Comics has solicited a number of in-series Blackest Night crossovers -- Adventure Comics, Booster Gold, Doom Patrol, and more. And I say: Well played, DC, well played.

See, I wait for the trade, on one hand, and on the other hand, my budget isn't what it used to be. So when I'm faced with two new series, for instance, and I have to think, "Do I want to buy Power Girl: A New Beginning, given that I read the introductory Power Girl trade and I follow Justice Society, or do I want to pick up R.E.B.E.L.S.: The Coming of Starro?" R.E.B.E.L.S. is brand-new and I don't already follow the series ... BUT I know that the next R.E.B.E.L.S. trade is going to contain the Blackest Night crossover, and if I want to be up-to-date for that, I might pick up R.E.B.E.L.S. instead (or, frankly, in addition). The same is true of Doom Patrol, a title on which I might otherwise have passed for a while.

Kudos to DC, by the way, for including a bevy of the "Origins & Omens" pages in the requisite trades. They're included as far as I know in Nightwing: The Great Leap, Robin: Search for a Hero, Booster Gold: Reality Lost, and Teen Titans: Changing of the Guard, and I'm sure there's more. If I knew a trade that I otherwise might not pick up (few as they are) had the "Origins & Omens" pages in it, would the completist in me then want to pick it up ...? Probably. Well played, DC, well played.

* Conclusion

So that is, frankly, an almost dizzying amount of material due to land on our doorsteps in 2010 related to Blackest Night.

I open it up to you now: how do you want to see Blackest Night collected, what will you buy, what could you do without ... and will the final product be thick enough that you can beat zombies with it when the dead will rise? Chime in!

Blackest Night trade collection, Showcase Presents Suicide Squad solicited

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 16:35:00 +0000

The various retail sites are now announcing the Blackest Night hardcover to be released in July 2010.

Given the increasing popularity of deluxe format editions (Batman: RIP, Batman & Robin, Superman: Secret Origins, I wouldn't have been surprised to see Blackest Night also in deluxe format -- but a hardcover will do just nicely!

We'll be back a little later to talk more about the Blackest Night collection. In the meantime, also forthcoming from DC Comics:

* Batman: Long Shadows

This hardcover collection by Judd Winick definitely includes the four part Batman story from #688-691, and potentially also the issue 687 Battle for the Cowl epilogue.

* Outsiders: The Hunting

Following The Deep, which collects Outsiders #15-20, this collection picks up with artist Tom Mandrake joining Peter Tomasi, and likely includes a Blackest Night tie-in issue.

* Batman: Streets of Gotham Vol. 1: Hush Money

The real question about this hardcover collection of Paul Dini's new series Streets of Gotham is whether it'll also contain Detective Comics #852 and Batman #685, which bridged Dini's Detective Comics and Streets of Gotham runs.

* DC Greatest Imaginary Stories Vol. 2: Batman & Robin

In 2005, DC published a volume of their "greatest imaginary stories," including Superman-Red and Superman-Blue. That volume contained a number of Superman stories; this new one, as you can see, focuses on Batman and Robin. If it's successful, might Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, Flash, and other volumes be on the way?

* Showcase Presents Suicide Squad Vol. 1

Suicide Squad was one of the Showcase volumes announced and then cancelled due to royalty issues a few years back. Maybe this is an erroneous entry, but I sure would be glad to see this back on the table.

* Icon Vol. 2: The Mothership Connection

Milestone title Icon formerly received only one collection of issues #1-8. A second collection of issues #9-14 would take this right up to the Worlds Collide crossover with the then-separate DC Universe.

* Green Arrow/Black Canary Vol. 5: Big Game

At this point, Green Arrow/Black Canary splits into a feature and co-feature, though interviews have suggested these two will be collected in the same volume.

UPDATED:

* Batman: Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?

* Superman: Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow

These two books, released as deluxe hardcovers last year, now in paperback.

* JSA vs. Kobra

Very excited by the news that Greg Rucka and Eric Trautmann's final Checkmate story will appear in the Kobra: Resurrection trade paperback -- this trade by Trautmann continues that story.

* Batgirl Vol. 1: Batgirl Rising

* Azrael: Death's Dark Knight

Two more "Batman Reborn" titles, both in paperback.

So other than Blackest Night (naturally), what's on your to-buy list?

Collected Editions blog link browsing for 10/13/09

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 15:37:00 +0000

* If you're visiting the Collected Editions blog today, be sure to hop over to the Collected Comics Library. Chris Marshall celebrates ten years of his excellent blog and podcast -- go wish Chris well, and browse the site while you're there.

* At the Baltimore Retailer Summit, DC Comics announced that that they will release Wednesday Comics as a $49.99, 11 x 17 hardcover. The original series measured 14 x 20, so the hardcover is mildly smaller, but will be considerably more manageable to hold on your lap!

This is not a must-read for me, but I'm sure I'll pick it up eventually, maybe around the next holidays. It'll be interesting to see each characters' comic sequential, when before one would read them interspersed each week; I wonder how that might change the reading experience. [Via The Source, care of Robot 6.]

Review: Nightwing: The Great Leap trade paperback (DC Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 13:02:00 +0000

[Contains spoilers for Battle of the Cowl and the general new Batman direction]

Peter Tomasi offers an impressive end to a troubled book in Nightwing: The Great Leap. In many ways it seems the "Batman Reborn" storyline coming out of Batman: RIP is less about the popular Grant-Morrison-helmed Batman title itself than about the ancilliary Bat-titles, none of which were hitting the top of the charts given numerous rotating creative teams. Each must now bow out, and there are right and wrong ways to do so; Tomasi gets it right, and believably sets up Nightwing for the next phase in his life.

Nightwing, most readers know by now, becomes the new Batman in the wake of Battle for the Cowl; this trajectory is something I couldn't help but see in The Great Leap, and as well surely something that Tomasi intends. One of the winningest moments of this book is when Tomasi has Dick Grayson leave his home in New York and take the train in to Gotham City, much as a young Bruce Wayne, in Batman: Year One took the train into Gotham after his travels abroad.

In this, Tomasi suggests that all of Nightwing's past to this point is prologue, and his role now as Gotham's protector is where the real story begins. Tomasi ends the story clearing away much of the baggage that other writers created between Batman and Nightwing, leaving it that Bruce Wayne cared for Dick Grayson, and now Dick will care for Gotham in Bruce's stead. There's plenty of ways in which this is too easy or quick, but certainly it's the happy ending that the Nightwing title always needed to end with, and I very much admire Tomasi for delivering it.

In the wake of Batman's disappearance, the Harvey Dent aspect of Two-Face recruits Nightwing to help save an endangered trial witness from Two-Face himself. The encounter with Two-Face reminds Nightwing of their early defining battle when he was Robin, even as the Bat-family comes to grips with Batman's apparent death. Nightwing must later contend with Ra's al Ghul while deciding what his role will be in a Gotham without Batman.

Roundabouts Batman: Prodigal, another story that saw Nightwing considering life post-Batman, someone at DC noticed that Two-Face factored heavily into the origins of Robins Jason Todd and Tim Drake, and as such retroactively added a major fight between Dick Grayson and Two-Face. Viola; instant arch-enemy. Though not much has been done with that story since, Tomasi picks it up here, giving Nightwing and Two-Face a relationship somewhat akin to Wally West and Zoom in Flash -- Two-Face becomes like Nightwing's "other father," opposite of Batman, who introduced Dick to fear rather than hope from a young age.

Most notably, Tomasi offers an epilogue to "The Great Leap" storyline (with great art by Doug Mahnke) where Nightwing and Two-Face simply talk, and where Nightwing notes that he does not see the former Harvey Dent when he looks at Two-Face, only the villain. This is a startling difference between Nightwing and Batman, well-concieved by Tomasi, and it's part of Tomasi's characterization of Nightwing in this book that helps one see Nightwing not so much as his own man, but as a worthy successor to the Batman. Nightwing appears here as having learned the lessons of his mentor, enough such that as Batman he would do his mentor proud.

There's many such instances like that in this book. Deb, Tomasi's romantic complication du jour for Dick Grayson, breaks up with him in one of the most bloodless and amicable splits in comic book (and certainly Batman) history; Dick accepts that his life is now meant to be spent in service of Gotham City and he takes only that role without the angst we've seen before. When Nightwing assists the Justice League with the building of a heroes' memorial, we see in Nightwing the friendship with other heroes that Batman couldn't accomplish; when Dick Grayson jumps out of an airplance, breaking records only he will know about, we see his peace in an inner life that Bruce Wayne never had. This is a Nightwing, the reader understands, who has learned both from Batman's tutelage and mistakes, and as such his ascension to the cowl makes a perfect sense when at times it couldn't have seemed more unlikely.

For me, The Great Leap cements Peter Tomasi as a writer to watch. The climactic fight that he writes between Nightwing and Two-Face, with scarred acidic pennies raining from the sky and Nightwing jumping between flying dirigibles to reach Two-Face is nothing short of an astounding action scene (with credit, too, to Doug Kramer and Rags Morales for selling these concepts throughout the book). One of my favorite Batman stories is Marv Wolfman's A Lonely Place of Dying, which introduced Tim Drake but also pits Batman against Two-Face; Two-Face is in his hokey glory here with exploding death traps and "two"-related clues; it was that kind of widescreen, manic, Bat-action joy that I felt Tomasi captured. I've liked Tomasi's work on Green Lantern Corps, and the action and heart he brings to The Great Leap make me eager for what this writer might do next.

[Contains full and variant covers, Origins & Omens pages]

Read another review of Nightwing: The Great Leap at Oz and Ends.

Review: Secret Six: Unhinged trade paperback (DC Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 13:02:00 +0000

[This review comes from Collected Editions contributor Derek Roper]

When we last left the Six, they were in tatters in Birds of Prey. Knockout had been killed in the events leading up to Final Crisis, Harley Quinn left because it got too dangerous, and the rest were imprisoned on a planet in Salvation Run. What was a group of mercenaries to do? Get an ongoing series, that’s what.

Catman, Deadshot, Scandal, and Ragdoll return to the House of Secrets in Secret Six: Unhinged (collects issues #1-7). But they are not alone: a certain A-List Batman villain, Bane, and a wealthy casino owner, Jeanette, join the group as they try to deliver something that has every villain and some heroes scrambling after them.

Simone once said that the plan was to have a Secret Six and Catman revolving miniseries but in the end the monthly is what we got. This gives her plenty of room to flesh out the characters and give them long story arcs that is set up in this trade.  The plot begins with two brothers, Aaron and Tig, who escort a very nervous man down to a basement in a gay bar called the Bear Trap. He has lost something that belongs to Junior. The crime boss Junior sits in the basement in a trunk with nothing but a rotary phone and a notepad. He apparently runs the entire West Coast action and takes points from the 100 and Intergang.

I must detour for a moment and say how scary this “Junior” is. The villain is shrouded in mystery and the only glimpse we see are two black hands with long fingers. There is something about a villain that is not seen but strikes fear in characters and readers alike. The buildup is very horror movie-ish. It is reminiscent of M. Night Shyamalan’s The Village, where one can just imagine how horrible it is going to be when the creature is unmasked. But unlike the buildup of The Village, Unhinged does not disappoint. The reveal on page 120 is so startling that it makes one wish someone would have prepared them.

OK, back to the plot. The Six are hired by a mysterious client (that pays in advance cash smelling of herring) to bust the Tarantula, Catalina Flores, out of Alcatraz prison and escort her across the country to the eastern seaboard city of Gotham; along with Ms. Flores they have to stop and get a small card that was very precious to Junior. That is where the mayhem breaks out and the blood starts flying.  The group of villains led by Cheshire and Lady Vic go after the item in question and manage to create some horrific moments. The best was a nod to the classic horror movies when the group got to the house where the card is located and get surprised by Cheetah, who has such a serial killer presence it makes one glad that Bane is on the team—even if he does get smashed into a wall. 

It was nice to see that the Origins and Omens story was included. It was rumored the upcoming volume DC Universe: Origins was going to house that material but it is nice to see them being collected with their respected story arcs. This O&O story was essential to the plot of the book because it gives background on who hired the Six.

Simone has an affinity for character dialogue and each rogue has a unique voice, from Deadshots’ colloquial “Go on, Killer. But do me a solid” to Jeanette’s elitist “You look a proper shock.” Equally, Simone’s humor is dark and twisted. After the fight fest on the Gotham Bridge, Jeanette had broken the top and bottom of King Shark’s mouth. She then proceeds to tell him “Why not send the silly little fish-man to swim about and find her?” To which the bandaged and wounded shark replies “Hmmf! Eye Ainff Noo Fiffmanff! Eye a Fark!” It is there that Simone can poke fun at some of the absurd characters of the DC Universe.

The art in Unhinged is superb. Nicola Scott’s introduction to the Six began during her tenure on the now cancelled Birds of Prey. Scott has a very good grasp on characters’ emotions. In the Secret Six: Six Degrees of Devastation trade, the art by Brad Walker wasn’t so clean. A lot of the lines that made up a characters' faces ran together and it was hard to tell if it was a wound or a frown line. The background art in this trade is so clean and crisp. The Gotham City skyline in issue two was absolutely breathtaking and shows that Scott has an eye for depth and scale.

However, I do have a quibble with one of the plot points in the story. Since the Six had to go to Alcatraz, they knew they had to keep the world’s greatest detective at bay. Catman confronts Batman to not only occupy him but to let him know that he is a force to be reckoned with. They fight each other and Catman manages to get a good shot. Batman has trained with Lady Shiva and trained Nightwing and Barbara Gordon and yet Catman gets a good shot at Batman? It makes sense that he has the gusto to fight the Bat, but Catman ought not stand a chance.

I also felt the ending was a bit of a bust in that characters that deserved some longevity were seemingly killed. Hopefully, since DC is a fan of characters coming back from the dead, said characters shouldn’t have too much of a wait. One of the Six walks away with Junior’s item and it will be interesting to see how it plays out in future collections.

Secret Six has always been a wild ride, from their days in Villains United to now. One never knows who is going to live and who is going to die, but they will be promised the three F’s; Filth, Fun, and Fiends.

Review: Final Crisis: Revelations hardcover/paperback (DC Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 13:02:00 +0000

There's few things I like more than a comic by Greg Rucka, and especially a comic by Greg Rucka that includes Renee Montoya as the Question, and also references Renee's history with Gotham Central. By virtue of its Final Crisis ties, this story didn't strike me as quite at the level of its Question: Five Books of Blood predecessor, but Final Crisis: Revelations has got a lot going for it nonetheless.

Revelations tries its best to explore the spiritual side of Final Crisis. Thematically (if not completely on the page), Final Crisis looked at free will and how, in a world of tabloid news and Internet journalism, we daily cede ourselves to the real-life equivalent of Darkseid's Anti-Life equation. Revelations finds God's agents--the vengeful Spectre and the merciful Radiant--impotent against the Anti-Life equation precisely because, the Radiant explains, God imbued mankind with free will and it's mankind who has to take it back. Greg Rucka's voices of the people, the Question and the Huntress, battle the epitome of human evil, the biblical Cain, for mankind's ability to make their own choices.

It sounds riveting on paper, and the story does deliver plenty of what most fans bought the story for: the first meeting between former Gotham Central partners Renee Montoya and Crispus Allen in their new roles as the Question and the Spectre respectively. Rucka's dialogue shines here with Renee's sometimes snappy, sometimes self-effacing one liners, and I continue to enjoy the backdrop of his haunting Religion of Crime.

Rucka also makes the smart decision to separate Renee from the shadow of Batwoman a bit, and instead brings in the Huntress (whom he wrote to great success in the Huntress: Cry for Blood miniseries). Rucka doesn't spend too long on Huntress's religious background, but longtime fans knows she has one (as does Renee, for that matter), and it makes the character a perfect fit for this spiritual story. Much of Revelations brings to close plotlines begun around Infinite Crisis, and it's fitting to find Huntress in a church here just as she was during that earlier crossover.

Different from Final Crisis: Rogues' Revenge, which I thought made great use of the Final Crisis background, Revelations is a good story that feels hampered by Final Crisis. Despite that the Crime Bible mythology had its origins in Apokolips in 52, the role Darkseid plays here, and his relationship to the story's villain Cain, is never completely clear and seems largely tacked on. As with Countdown to Final Crisis and Death of the New Gods, the end of Revelations seemingly solves the Final Crisis on its own, and it's hard to see the necessity of Revelations as part of Final Crisis rather than its own entity.

In addition, the Final Crisis timeline severely hampers the story; Renee and the Spectre could've fought Cain any day of the week, but setting this during Final Crisis severely restricts the story's ability to breathe. Revelations ends up taking place only over a couple of hours, much of it spent with Renee and the Huntress running dizzyingly in and out of a church. Renee and the Spectre get a little time to chat, but there's not as much reflection as I would have liked; let's not forget Renee nearly drank herself to death, at one point, feeling guilty over the death of her former partner.

To be sure, however, I did appreciate some of the work Rucka tries to do on the Crispus Allen Spectre. Like Will Pfeifer and David Lapham before him, Rucka doesn't seem quite the rules and abilities of this new Spectre, but he does pick up on the rather quick death of Allen's son in Pfeifer's miniseries, and applies good story logic to why this death might have been so quick. Was Allen indeed meant to let the Spectre kill his son, the Radiant wonders. Was it a test that Allen failed, or did Allen's son's death prevent further deaths down the line?

They're good questions (as Renee is wont to say), though Rucka doesn't answer them so much as open Allen's eyes to new spectral abilities, such that everything's copacetic in the end. Not, perhaps, the explanations I was hoping for, but at least Rucka begins to distance the Spectre from the Lapham/Fleisher incarnation (not before he takes revenge for the murder of Martian Manhunter, however), seemingly moving the character toward a cosmic interpretation more comfortable with the Justice Society.

(I did wish, however, Rucka hadn't created this opposite number for the Spectre, the Radiant--equally undefined, I've some doubt we'll see her used much again in the DC Universe, and it frustrates me when an author creates a new character when there are so many in the DCU waiting to be used; Radiant might've been the 1990s Superman character Kismet, for instance, or someone else.)

[Contains full and sliver covers, Crime Bible page from Final Crisis Secret Files]

So--while Revelations didn't quite pack the punch of the Final Crisis crossover Rogues' Revenge, fans like me of Greg Rucka's new Question will surely be glad for this volume, and eagerly awaiting the next.

Review: Superman: New Krypton Vol. 1 hardcover/paperback (DC Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 13:02:00 +0000

It's clear from the first volume of Superman: New Krypton that this story has all the makings of an epic. Though New Krypton still seems very much an effort on the writers' part to work out how to tell a Superman story, rather than a Superman story itself, there's such a fine mix of old and new elements here that I'll go happily along for the ride.

What I liked best about New Krypton -- summed up in a rainy late-night meeting between Jimmy Olsen and Lois Lane at the Daily Planet, where they discuss Jimmy's leads on a shadowy government organization -- is the intrigue. Everyone in this story has an angle or a moral ambiguity, from the Guardian with blood on his hands to Lois's connection to the story's mystery villain, to Superman overly trusting a few thousand newly resurrected Kryptonians mainly due to his sorrow over the death of his father. It's one thing to tell a superhero story where superhero X battle villain Y; it's another to tell a story where this character used to fight alongside that character and this one is related to that one ... all this interconnectedness, frankly, is one of the clear signs writer Geoff Johns is involved.

With this intrigue, we're presented with the kind of fully-realized supporting cast for Superman that we haven't seen since the 1990s. Writers Johns, James Robinson, and Sterling Gates surely love the "triangle title" era, as they bring back both the Guardian and Agent Liberty; this, combined with important roles for Lois Lane, her sister Lucy, Jimmy Olsen, Ma Kent, Krypto, Lex Luthor, and a bevy of Kryptonians, combine to make the story feel real and textured. Even better, Superman remains at the forefront despite the large cast, with all their plotlines feeding into his larger struggle.

Admittedly, these elements help the New Krypton story that, on its own, remains a bit predictable. Ten thousand Kryptonians, now resurrected on Earth, immediately begin acting badly, as does a secret government cabal, with Superman stuck in the middle. Superman will undoubtedly emerge as a symbol of the best of both worlds, just before the Kryptonians' eventual demise. And yet, even as everyone acts to their stereotype -- optimistically naive Superman, haughty Kryptonians, xenophobic Earth military -- I'm a sucker for this kind of "trust no one," two-front war storyline, and I love Superman at the center of it with enemies on all sides.

Another problem (as we already begin to see in this volume) is that Superman hanging out with a couple thousand Kryptonians doesn't leave a lot of room for Clark Kent. For my money, a good Superman story involves both sides of Superman's life, both cosmic villainy and the Daily Planet (see, as a random example, "Going to Blazes," or [don't flame me] Superman Returns), while New Krypton seems to employ the guy with the powers only. It's easy, I think, to put Superman in the role of "generic superhero," and pitting him against other Kryptonians -- rather than, say, against the Toyman over Metropolis -- is to examine Superman rather than to write him. Geoff Johns' Green Lantern title has become much the same, exploring Green Lantern rather than writing him, and in a way I'm more eager for what comes after the Superman-rejuvinating New Krypton than I am for New Krypton itself.

James Robinson contributes the most to this book, and I took special note of his work because I had initially disliked (but on second reading, enjoyed a bit more) his first Superman foray, The Coming of Atlas. Some of Robinson's dialogue still lacks the zing I remember from Starman (especially a scene where Clark Kent essentially tells Jimmy Olsen to shut up), but I give him credit for writing a spunky, motorcycling-riding Jimmy whose flight from a pursuing assassin had me cheering. The Guardian story that Robinson contributes doesn't add much to the volume, but overall I liked what Robinson did here enough to assuage some of my previous concerns.

What I've gleaned from interviews is that New Krypton feeds into a 2010 Superman anniversary celebration (or is that a DC Comics anniversary? I'm not clear on this), and my expectation is that we'll see New Krypton at the center of DC Comics' next crossover after Blackest Night. If you're like me, and Hal Jordan out in front of the Justice League (instead of Superman) just looks wrong to you, then you'll share my excitement at a DC crossover with Superman at the center. Here's hoping.

[Contains full covers and variants.]

Review: Uncanny X-Men: Divided We Stand / Wolverine: Get Mystique trade paperbacks (Marvel Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 13:02:00 +0000

[This review comes from Adam J. Noble, a public librarian living in Eastern Canada.]

If you go shopping on Amazon for trade collections of Uncanny X-Men, you’ll find that those unpredictable mad scientists who toil in Amazon’s warehouses have decided to begin numbering the Uncanny X-Men volumes with Matt Fraction’s first crack at writing the Mopey Mutants (eg. Uncanny X-Men Vol. 1: Manifest Destiny; Uncanny X-Men Vol. 2: Lovelorn), which is fair enough. Fraction is doing the nigh-impossible and giving us a fresh, exciting take on the X-Men without venturing too far left of field into hard sci-fi (i.e. Grant Morrison’s New X-Men) or going off in the other direction, into soap opera territory (Joss Whedon’s Astonishing X-Men). Fraction’s been delivering an allegorically charged, witty and fun take on the X-Men that feels like it’s just getting started.

However! Amazon’s unofficial “numbering system” ignores the collection Uncanny X-Men: Divided We Stand, which falls in between Fraction’s run and the Uncanny X-Men/X-Men/X-Force/New X-Men crossover Messiah CompleX. I came up in the 1990s, my brothers and sisters -- I am not going to read an X-Men crossover ever again, if I can help it. (Once Onslaught-en, twice shy.) So I feel completely justified in telling people to skip Messiah CompleX and begin with Divided We Stand -- which features a recap page, if you need it.

But the volume doesn’t feel like the epilogue to a line-wide crossover. It instead feels like a prologue, and a more than serviceable one at that. Any explicit references to prior events feel more like the in media res way that Grant Morrison often begins his books (“Jimmy’s been cursed by a gypsy fortune-teller? Sure, why not…”).

Although Fraction isn’t credited with the writing of this volume, his Immortal Iron Fist collaborator Ed Brubaker is surprisingly on top of his game here, so much so that one suspects that Fraction was involved to a large extent in the plotting. I’ve criticized Brubaker on this site before: he’s capable of crafting great crime comics but writes in such a grim, “realistic” idiom that he shouldn’t be allowed within ten feet (3.048 metres) of a superhero comic writing credit. Yet, here’s a Brubaker-penned story about Cyclops and Emma Frost vacationing in the Savage Land, Angel and Warpath getting hypnotized into thinking that they’re hippies (along with most of San Francisco), and Nightcrawler wearing an Angelina Jolie hologram so that Colossus gets photographed by paparazzi.

Yeah, not so much with the grim.

I suspected briefly that Fraction might even have ghost-written this volume, except it features lots of Brubaker hallmarks like having everybody give long speeches about exactly how they feel (like people do all the time in real life right? *COUGH*) and Emma Frost not sounding the least bit English or, for that matter, bitchy.

But in all, this is the most fun superhero book that Brubaker has attached his name to, and it does a great job of setting the stage for a pretty terrific Fraction run. If you’re looking to get on board with Uncanny X-Men after hearing all the buzz surrounding the current crossover with Dark Avengers, this is a great place to start -- consider it Volume Zero and dig in. Uncanny X-Men: the San-Francisco treat.

Bonus review: Wolverine: Get Mystique, written by Jason Aaron and illustrated by Ron Garney (the creative team behind the excellent ongoing series Wolverine: Weapon X), serves a similar function to Uncanny X-Men: Divided We Stand, in that it acts as a bridge from Messiah CompleX into the new status quo. Mystique -- whom casual X-Fans will remember as being played by naked Rebecca Romijn in the movies -- has betrayed the X-Men’s sympathies once again, and Wolverine has been tasked by Cyclops to bring her down ... permanentlyOOOHSNAP.

Wolverine’s hunt for Mystique across continents and war zones turns out to be a framing device built to showcase a flashback to the pair’s first meeting, in the days of flappers, speakeasies and the Charleston. Wolverine and Mystique’s relationship escalates until it reaches a climax in a boxcar that neither of them could have foreseen. Funny, violent, genuinely disturbing and most of all sad, Wolverine: Get Mystique is not just the best solo Wolverine story ever: it’s also one of the best collected editions Marvel has ever released. And for a $10.99 US cover price, it’s also a bargain.

Get this, then get the collection entitled X-Men: Manifest Destiny, which mostly consists of the Aaron-penned story of what Wolverine gets up to once he moves back to San Francisco with the other X-Men (it involves kung-fu warlords and is perfect). Then, start picking up Wolverine: Weapon X.

Ol’ Sniktbub has never been better at doing what he does. He’s the San Francisco treat. (I already used that joke? Never mind. Just pretend I made a Grateful Dead reference.)

Review: Superman/Batman: Finest Worlds hardcover/paperback (DC Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 13:02:00 +0000

Superman/Batman: Finest Worlds, Michael Green and Mike Johnson's second volume of the series, hearkens strongly back to the classic World's Finest series. In the spirit of the kinds of adventures where Superman and Batman competed for the heart of an alien princess or Bruce Wayne joined Clark Kent at the Daily Planet, Finest Worlds offers three tales, almost Elseworld tales, that mix and mingle the elements of Superman and Batman. But while the wackiness found within well distinguishes this volume, it does unfortunately hurt the overall relevance of the stories.

The main story, "Superbat," finds Superman's powers accidentally, and magically, tranferred to Batman. What follows is by and large exactly what you'd expect: Clark Kent tries to adapt to a normal life while Batman uses his new powers first to clean up Gotham, and later to try in a fit of stark raving madness to eradicate all crime everywhere, until Superman and the JLA must step in to stop him. The writers get no points for bringing any new insights to the characters of Superman and Batman, but yet the story is filled with lots of little moments: Superman teaching Batman to use heat vision, Supergirl's surprisingly moving grief when Superman is injured, Super-Batman fighting both Bane and the Justice League. The story benefits overwhelmingly from art by Identity Crisis's Rags Morales, giving it the semblance of a weight it otherwise wouldn't deserve.

The difficulty with "Superbat" -- and also the funny, charming "Lil' Leaguers" story that sees Superman and Batman teamed with cartoon dopplegangers -- is that they're magic-based stories where all the toys go back in the toybox at the conclusion. Possibly this was editorially-mandated (and possibly, I've heard, the reigns will be looser on Superman/Batman post-Blackest Night), but the writers' previous volume, The Search for Kryptonite, had no such problems. Kryptonite was surprising and interesting and deeply rooted in the current events of the DC Universe; Finest Worlds is a satisfactory volume of Superman/Batman, but it lacks the "oompf" of the previous book.

That said, I must praise the writers for "The Fathers" (which marked the fiftieth issue of Superman/Batman). Surely Green and Johnson aren't the first to posit a meeting between Thomas Wayne and Jor-El, but I loved the mid-issue tease that it all might be a dream -- and finally the revelation that the meeting in fact took place. I hold no illusions that any other writer will ever reference the event ever again, but I credit the writers for "going for it" and not taking the easy out found in the book's other two stories.

The truth is, despite that Finest Worlds is another step away from the direction Superman/Batman needs to go if this title is going to last (read: relevancy), the book is plain, old-fashioned fun. The outlandish campiness of the parallel Superman/Batman narrations (begun by Jepf Loeb and continued here) virtually ensure these stories can't be taken seriously, so there's no choice but to sit back and let them wash over you. Ultimately I decided to view these stories like episodes of the Superman or Batman cartoons, and only then did I feel I really "got" their intended tone.

[Contains full and alternate covers]

Superman/Batman: Finest Worlds is a fair collection for completists, but those waiting for Superman/Batman to really "find its feet" might want to wait for the next team to take over this book (more details recently announced.)

Review: Batman: Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader hardcover/paperback (DC Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 13:02:00 +0000

The important question about Neil Gaiman's Batman: Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader? is, does it indeed function as the "last" Batman story? Yes, it does. Gaiman offers in two issues a deconstruction of the elements of a Batman story, what it means for the Batman to die, and how perhaps so many different interpretations of the Batman can coexist. It is a story that will quickly become dated, much as Alan Moore's Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow? has, but that will likely help define Batman for future writers to come.

Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader? might alternately been called "Batman: This is Your Life." We find Batman present here at his own wake, as allies and enemies recount the story of the death of Batman. Except, each character has a different story of Batman's death, and here the Killing Joke's Joker coexists with the Batman: The Animated Series Joker and a seemingly Golden Age Catwoman.

We find this is not the story of "our" Batman's death -- that is, his apparent Batman RIP/Final Crisis death -- but perhaps the story of "the story of Batman's death," or maybe a story about stories about Batman. Final Crisis plays no overt role here, but there's definite thematic agreement between Caped Crusader and the meta-interpretation of stories in Final Crisis.

Boiled down, the conclusion that Gaiman reaches is that, no matter how Batman dies, he dies fighting. It's true -- I can think of many instances of Batman dying (his un-death in Dark Knight Returns immediately springs to mind), but never a time that Batman gives up. And though it's something one could also say for Superman, Wonder Woman, Spider-Man, and what have you, I think Batman's mortal status gives this a slight edge -- everyone might go down fighting, but Batman goes down fighting and he's "just a man."

Similarly, Gainman whittles down what it takes to make a Batman story such. He tells one imaginary tale where all of Batman's foes are simply actor friends hired by Alfred to humor the mourning Bruce Wayne -- but even this story must by rights include the death of Thomas and Martha Wayne, the presence of Alfred, the Bat-signal, and such. Gaiman closes the story with a terrifically offbeat take on Goodnight Moon where he checks off the requirements for a Batman story -- the Batcave, Alfred, Commissioner Gordon -- and also what might change with time -- "the Boy Wonder" (but not necessarily Dick or Tim); "the Joker and all of you" (the various rogues who come and go). It's a fantastic examination of how to write Batman, and the riff on Goodnight Moon is sweetly bizarre given Batman's status, lets not forget, as the arm-breaking scourge of villainy.

What I found most interesting was the last scene of the book, as the Bat-signal morphs into a pair of hands drawing baby Bruce Wayne from the womb to the world. As Gaiman's Death notes (here in the form of Martha Wayne), Batman's is a backward story -- rather than working hard and receiving his reward at the end of his life, Batman receives his reward first (his time with his parents), and then faces his hard work of being Batman. Only in his death and resurrection does Batman achieve what he otherwise cannot -- the return of his parents -- before he must fight for them once more. It's in this way that Batman's story is different than Superman's, moreso than their powers or secret identities, and bears, I think, additional consideration.

DC Comics pads what would otherwise be a slim volume with a couple of Batman-and-his-foes stories that Gaiman wrote over the years, including a Batman: Black & White story where Batman and the Joker are actors hired to work on the comic book panel. The included origins of Poison Ivy and the Riddler have been many times retconned since their printing; while I understand some readers found these stories to be needless filler, I liked again how they worked with the main story to talk about "stories" -- Batman stories that don't quite fit and don't quite make sense, but which are Batman stories nonetheless.

In twenty years, Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader? will hardly still be the "last" Batman story. I thrilled to a Jean Paul Valley Azrael cameo in one panel (Andy Kubert does a magnificent job of emulating all sorts of Batman artists), but the presence of Batman's newfound son Damian in seemingly every other crowd scene puts this story firmly in the Grant Morrison Batman era, just as Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow? relates to the Silver Age Superman and not the current. But we currently exit a time when Batman was "grim and gritty" and after that a jerk, and Gaiman offers something else: the Batman who never gave up. If that sticks and defines the Batman to come, nothing wrong with that at all.

[Contains full covers, foreword by Neil Gaiman.]

Deluxe format for Johns/Frank's Superman: Secret Origins

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 20:20:00 +0000

From the "Why should Batman have all the fun?" department comes news that Geoff Johns and Gary's Frank's Superman: Secret Origin will be collected in DC Comics' deluxe oversized format.

Previous deluxe books include Batman RIP, Batman: Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?, and the JLA hardcover collections.

As a weigh-station between Absolute format and a regular hardcover or trade paperback, I like the deluxe editions a lot. I've always envisioned comics collections as needing to be more than just a bunch of issues bound together, but rather something that builds on the original comic -- this large-format collection showcases the story and art that appeared in monthly form. I don't mind paying more for a hardcover if it's "special" in this way.

More deluxe Superman volumes on the way?

Also newly solicited from DC: Batwoman: Elegy in hardcover (hopefully more than just the first few issues of the Greg Rucka/J H Williams Detective run) and Sam Keith's Arkham Asylum (newly mentioned on DC's The Source blog; that this shares the name of a popular video game doesn't hurt).

More to come!

Review: Alice in Sunderland hardcover (Dark Horse Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 13:02:00 +0000

[This review comes from Loki Carbis, an Australian pop culture junkie, who cannot resist a good graphic novel. He lives at The Centre Cannot Hold on the web, and in his own imagination, among others.]

Somewhere right about the middle of Alice in Sunderland, Bryan Talbot shows himself beginning to lose faith in the project. It's large and complex and may not have an audience.

But then Scott McCloud appears to him in a vision, and reminds him that comics can be about anything. Reassured, Talbot continues to work on this comic which is not so much about anything, as about everything.

It's a fascinating work, one of the most ambitious things attempted in comics format since From Hell by a writer, and no less ambitious on the art side. Talbot blends photographs, woodcuts, and a range of other artworks along with his own drawing. It sounds like it shouldn't work, but Talbot pulls it off remarkably well, creating something that is part Kirby-collage, part J.H.Williams on Promethea, part something else entirely, and wholly Talbot's own. On one level, the book is a tribute to the possibilities opened to the comic form by Photoshop and other such digital manipulation. But if that's the only reason you're reading it, you've missed the point.

Quite simply, Alice in Sunderland is a tour de force. A sort of documentary in comic form, it investigates the life of Arthur Dodgson (alias Lewis Carroll); the creation, plot and symbolism of Alice in Wonderland; Dodgon's relations with the real Alice's family; and in more general terms, the history of Sunderland and its place as a centre of art in the United Kingdom. Along the way, it shoots down more than one aspect of the legend of Lewis Carroll, leaving a more balanced portrait of the man and his art.

The book is largely told in first person by Talbot, who – in a variety of guises – leads the reader through all of these things in a wildly discursive monologue (or ocasionally a dialogue, when another living person appears), without ever losing sight of his intentions for the narrative. In the end, you're left with the impression that there's neither a word nor an image out of place. The book is both a serious work of history and an elaborate conjuror's trick, and very frequently both at once.

Alice in Sunderland is only available as a coffee table sized hardcover, its pages made from thick, high quality paper and printed in a kaleidoscopic range of colours. It's a little more expensive than most other graphic novels, but it's worth every cent.

Review: Birds of Prey: Platinum Flats trade paperback (DC Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 13:02:00 +0000

It goes without saying that Birds of Prey: Platinum Flats is not the kind of ending Birds of Prey deserved. For a book that not only spawned a short-lived television series, but also had the unique providence of a second writer, Gail Simone, taking over from series creator Chuck Dixon and making the book's second half even better than its first, this melodramatic, flat end leaves much to be desired. Writer Tony Bedard tries hard, and the previous volume Club Kids had some interesting moments, but it's clear now that DC ought have ended this series when Simone went to Wonder Woman.

Bedard's difficulty here, in my opinion, is trying to create drama where there's just none to be found. In Simone's last story especially we also saw Oracle leave Batman's shadow and learn to trust her operatives as friends; good for Oracle, but bad for conflict in the story. Thus we see in Platinum Flats Oracle regressing -- she's spying on former partner Black Canary, she's bringing new operatives to the team while keeping established operatives in the dark, and she's secretly teaming with backstabbing villains. It's incongruous and repetitive, and ends the story on a sour note -- for most of the book Oracle isn't someone the reader especially likes, rather than the hero we've come to respect.

The second problem (and I'm surprised I can't find more about this online) is Bedard's face-off between Oracle and the Joker, who previously shot and paralyzed her. Dixon's Oracle/Joker meeting danced around the issue of how they knew each other; here, Bedard directly addresses their conflict, and the result is appropriately frightening. However, at the end of the series, even as Oracle vows to the Joker, "You took nothing from me," the Joker ultimately beats Oracle quite severely, and then escapes. If there were a clear lesson Bedard meant us to take from this as part of an ongoing arc, this might strike me differently, but on the page Oracle comes off as the loser of the episode at the tail end of the book's other troubles.

I did appreciate that Bedard uses continuity to good effect. He did well tying up a loose end from his excellent Black Canary miniseries in a conversation between Oracle and Black Canary, and I very much enjoyed the use of a mystery villain here from Judd Winick's Outsiders run. I found myself wishing Bedard might've stopped there; the humdrum villains he creates to populate Platinum Flats -- and indeed the city itself, which lacks the texture of Gotham or Coast City -- are far less interesting than the villain Bedard brings back from the dead.

The final two issues of Birds of Prey aren't collected here. The book ends on an uncertain note as Oracle and Black Canary, together again, set off to do battle; if that's really it, it's at least a mildly upwards note, if unfinished. My hope is that we'll see Birds of Prey #125-127 at the beginning of the Oracle: The Cure so at least we see the storyline completed, but my guess is I'll feel the same as now -- no offense to Bedard, but DC ought have quit while they were ahead.

[Contains full covers]

A guest review of Alice in Sunderland next, and then more Batman-related goodness with Whatever Happened to the Dark Knight?.

Review: Terror Titans trade paperback (DC Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 13:02:00 +0000

While not terribly moved by Sean McKeever's work on Teen Titans, I found his collected Terror Titans actually quite enjoyable. In Teen Titans: On the Clock, McKeever portrayed the villains as more "hip" and interesting than the stuffy good guys; here, McKeever has nothing but villains, and his blood-soaked story (well aided by artist Joe Bennett) has a life missing from his Teen Titans and Birds of Prey work. The finer details of the story languish in a bit too much confusion, but it worked enough that I'm eager to read McKeever's further take on these characters in his new Teen Titans Ravager co-feature.

Terror Titans is a villains' tale similar to Salvation Run, in that it's pages upon pages of backstabbings and bloody murders (if you like that kind of thing). The titular Titans emerge here as little more than collateral damage in the struggle between former Teen Titan Ravager and the villain Clock King; McKeever builds the carnage as two different characters see their own fathers murdered, and a third discovers he likely never had a conscience to begin with. McKeever's story gets darker the farther it goes, until the character Dreadbolt admits he's even becoming numb to the death around him. Like a good horror movie, there's an increasing sensation in Terror Titans that no one might get out alive, and it makes for a suspenseful story to the end.

Granted, Ravager doesn't do much more in McKeever's story than trade insults and occasional fisticuffs with the other Terror Titans -- it remains rather unclear why the Clock King lets her hang around in the first place. However, McKeever picks up in the best parts of the Ravager character, that she fights like her father Deathstroke but can also see into the future, making her something of a psychic detective with a chip on her shoulder. The Rose Wilson Ravager has been around since the early 1990s (first introduced in "Titans Hunt," if you can believe it), and while her current characterization is a far cry from then, I'm pleased to see DC finally doing something with the character.

McKeever's most interesting -- and mysterious -- character in Terror Titans is the lead villain, Clock King. Terror Titans takes place in a vague time during or after Final Crisis, and much of my interest came from a suspicion that Clock King was secretly Darkseid himself. We know nearly nothing about the character, whose near limitless powers include prescience four seconds into the future, access to a realm where time stands still, and wealth limitless enough to run a previously Darkseid-driven teen superhero fight club.

Throughout the book, Clock King refers to a secret plot for which he needs to mind-control the teen heroes; this plot turns out to be simply sheer mayhem, only for the purpose of the Clock King's own amusement. The revelation is a mild disappointment, but at the same time reinforces Clock King's mystery -- what we thought would be an answer turns out to be a red herring. Whether the story ends up a success depends largely on whether McKeever picks up the Clock King again in the Ravager co-feature. If he can make it all make sense, Terror Titans will be a successful prologue; if not, it becomes something of a head-scratcher.

In a way similar to Peter Milligan's two Infinity Inc. volumes, much of Terror Titans' appeal comes from waiting to see just what disturbing thing might possibly happen next. Because Terror Titans is in the end really just a minor spin-off miniseries, I can't necessarily recommend it as a "must read," but the uptick in quality does portend good things for McKeever's forthcoming DC Comics work.

[Contains full covers.]

Seven Soldiers of Victory hardcover solicited for 2010

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 19:38:00 +0000

Just received word that DC Comics will release Grant Morrison's Seven Soldiers of Victory in hardcover format in 2010.

This should in truth come as no surprise given the current popularity of (A) hardcover collections and (B) Grant Morrison.

Bigger yet is the news that this will likely not be a four volume set like the Seven Soldiers of Victory paperbacks, but rather two oversized volumes collecting the thirty-part miniseries.

My question to you is: there was much controversy about the way DC originally collected Seven Soldiers (linearly, rather than by character story). So, this time around, would you like to see the collection ordered by character, or presented the same way as the paperbacks?

Review: Daredevil: The Devil, Inside and Out Vol. 1 trade paperback (Marvel Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 13:02:00 +0000

[This review comes from Bob Schoonover, who's annotating NBC's Chuck on his blog.]

Daredevil: The Devil, Inside and Out, Vol. 1 is the beginning of Ed Brubaker's run on Daredevil, and, given the first six pages, ought to have been confusing and required weeks of digging through previous trades to understand what was going on. To be sure, the status quo in Marvel books is changing regularly, and this can be a headache for someone wanting to begin following Marvel characters. Realizing that the first trade in Mr. Brubaker's run begins with Matt Murdock, Daredevil, in prison, can be even more off-putting.

To his credit, Mr. Brubaker deftly pulls off the explanation of Matt Murdock's imprisonment without lengthy flashbacks or relying on the reader to be familiar with Brian Michael Bendis's previous run. In the end, he presents a compelling story of the prisons in Matt Murdock's life - the one Murdock is incarcerated in, the one created by his secret identity, and the one created around him by his family and friends.

The story begins with a Daredevil fighting crime in Hell's Kitchen, while Matt Murdock sits in prison, charged with obstruction of justice (essentially, for being Daredevil). Of course, Murdock is in the same prison as many of his enemies, including The Owl, The Kingpin, and Hammerhead. These two story strands interweave as the Daredevil on the outside interacts with Foggy Nelson and the rest of Murdock's law team, while Matt Murdock takes control of his prison life. By the end of this arc, the second Daredevil is revealed (this would be the Daredevil that was in Civil War), and Matt Murdock begins his quest to find out who set him up to go to prison (a fact that will be made plain in the next review).

My experience with Daredevil had been mostly limited to Frank Miller's run from the '80s and a random trade here or there. However, I enjoyed Brubaker's run on Batmanand Detective Comics, and decided to follow him to the most "Batman-like" character in the Marvel universe. Brubaker comes out swinging for the fences, including Bullseye, The Kingpin, a second Daredevil, and The Punisher in his opening arc. It was clear that from the various conversations and narrations that I had missed a lot in Matt Murdock's life, but Brubaker deftly covered the important parts, allowing the story to flow without the need for editor's boxes, or for me to hit Wikipedia. This was all done while keeping the story moving at a brisk pace, something I always appreciate.

As good as the story is, and it is good, the art by Michael Lark really makes the book stand out. Lark's style works spectacularly in the "realistic" setting of Hell's Kitchen and prison. My first exposure to Lark was in Gotham Central, and I think he really upped his game since then. The last four pages of the TPB contain an interview from Marvel Spotlight with Brubaker and Lark concerning the opening sequence of this trade, and Lark explains some of his techniques and choices - I'm not an art student by any stretch, but after reading the interview and re-reading the trade again, it's clear that Lark had a very specific idea of the world he was working in, and he executed it perfectly.

For those that are curious about continuity, this volume takes place approximately during Civil War. I think Brubaker managed to have the only comic series/property at Marvel that wasn't involved in the battle between heroes, and I'm glad for it. Daredevil's strength, as both a character and a series, comes from him being out on his own or with other street-level heroes. Daredevil may be the best Marvel analog to DC's Batman, but unlike Batman, who has been elevated from a street-level hero to the Bat-God (see Morrison's run on JLA, or even Mark Waid's) so that he can interact with other superheroes and be involved in cosmic events, Daredevil has chosen not to be in the New Avengers, and has largely avoided the bigger events (it does not appear that he was involved in any Secret Invasion crossovers, either, and I haven't seen a Dark Reign tie-in yet).

By avoiding some of these high-octane stories, the writers can keep Daredevil on the street, and don't have to continuously create more ridiculous situations/villains to spur the hero on or make the universe consistent [it's always seemed odd to me that Nightwing has faced Trigon (The New Teen Titans), Batman has faced off against New Gods (JLA: The Rock of Ages) and Martians ( JLA: New World Order), and Robin faces off against Anarky].

For anyone that liked Brubaker's Batman run (or Greg Rucka's run in Detective, for that matter), Frank Miller's Daredevil run, or Batman: Year One, I think Daredevil: The Devil, Inside and Out, Vol. 1 will suit your needs. Brubaker and Lark have crafted a great prison story where everyone - the prisoners, the guards, the people on the outside - has depth, human needs and human emotions, and Daredevil is, as it always seems, put through the wringer.

[Read a review of Daredevil: The Devil, Inside and Out Vol. 2 from Collected Editions contributor Jeffrey Hardy Quah.]

Review: Final Crisis: Rogues' Revenge hardcover/paperback (DC Comics)

noreply@blogger.com (collectededitions) — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 13:02:00 +0000

I wonder if Geoff Johns would hesitate if someone asked him which characters he preferred to write, the Flash or the Rogues?

[Contains spoilers for Final Crisis: Rogues' Revenge]

In Final Crisis: Rogues' Revenge, writer Geoff Johns reunites with artist Scott Kolins and proves sometimes you can get the band back together again. Johns' five-year run on The Flash remains one of my favorites (see my retrospective of Johns' Flash run), and in Rogues' Revenge he not only returns most of the series' main supporting characters for a final bow, he also builds on a couple of the characters in the process. Add to that Rogues' Revenge's perfect position as a bridge between the disparate Countdown to Final Crisis and the miniseries itself, and it combined for a story I literally didn't want to end.

Even more clearly than in Flash, Johns demonstrates here the dichotomy of the Flash's Rogues. These are quite remarkably deadly foes, as Johns proves in the brutal second chapter when the Rogues torture and decimate a group of replacements. At the same time, they are to a one wracked with guilt over having killed the Flash Bart Allen, believing in a warped sense of fair play where they don't kill anyone who wouldn't kill them in turn. But we can't forget that each Rogue emerged from a terrifyingly damaged family situation, so much so that Captain Cold hardly blinks before ordering the death of his own father.

What we find is a group of bad guys near unquantifiable among the other villains of the DC Universe. While every other villain (including, Johns points out, Superman's Lex Luthor) joins Libra in Darkseid's cult of evil, Captain Cold quips that he doesn't believe in evil, only "different shades of grey." All of this is Johns' invention -- the Rogues weren't nearly so complex in previous eras -- but indeed it helps to define them as something different that the patients of Arkham and the Sinestro Corps. The Rogues are on one hand rational villains who commit crimes only for gain, not maliciousness; but they're all also on the bleeding edge of plum crazy, and Johns doesn't let us forget it.

At first I thought it something of a waste that DC included the already-collected Captain Cold profile at the end of this book, but Johns offers so much detail about Cold here that I found myself reading that story again. Johns' posited Cold in his Flash stories as leader of the Rogues and the antithesis of the Flash Wally West -- from a broken home like Wally, Cold is essentially what Wally could have become if not for the guidance of Barry and Iris Allen. Though Cold's arc essentially ended in Flash, Johns unexpectedly brings Cold's abusive father into the scene, and pages of violence are followed by quiet interaction between Cold and his father -- which itself gives way to more violence. The sequence is, if you'll forgive the pun, chilling, and cements Cold as an oft-overlooked villain worth watching.

I also appreciated that Johns took a few pages to fill in a gap in the history of the Weather Wizard. Whether by design or the fallout of retroactive continuity, the Weather Wizard's origin has historically been a little murky; he's at different times been believed to control the weather either on his own or through a staff invented by his brother, who either died of a heart attack or whom the Wizard himself murdered. In Rogues' Revenge, the Rogues end up in the selfsame observatory where Wizard's brother died, and Johns finally reveals the truth -- no big surprise, and indeed the entire scene in the observatory was hardly necessary, but I appreciate that Johns took the time to tie up this loose end.

Like DC Universe: Last Will and Testament, Rogues' Revenge serves as a mediator between Countdown to Final Crisis and Final Crisis, neither one of which itself quite fit into DC Comics continuity. The Rogues murdering Bart Allen was one of the lynchpins of Countdown, and this series addresses that in terms of Final Crisis, as Libra takes special interest in the Rogues for having killed a speedster. This volume acknowledges not only the death of the first Trickster from Countdown, but also the Pied Piper's semi-comprehensible ties to Darkseid's Anti-Life Equation in the same series.

(As a side note, one has to acknowledge that DC Comics has had a pretty rough time of it in the run-up to Final Crisis. Fans generally panned Countdown to Final Crisis, and for the success of Sinestro Corps War there was also the failure of Amazons Attack; more than a handful of the One Year Later titles were cancelled. With Batman RIP and New Krypon, DC seems back on track, but I remember the outcry over the death of Bart Allen, and in that way the Rogues represent a trying time for DC. When Captain Cold delivers a lethal blow to the comics-arbiter of Bart's demise, Interia, in thanks for "one $%@#$@-up year," I have to think the Rogues are getting their revenge on a couple of levels.)

[Contains full covers, Captain Cold and Zoom reprint stories]

Final Crisis: Rogues Revenge is hardly a necessary story. It doesn't add much to Final Crisis on one hand, and likely isn't essential before you read Flash: Rebirth on the other. But this is a good story, a good crime story, a good DC Universe villain story, and hands down one of my top recent favorites.