Comics Should Be Good!

A review a day: John Constantine, Hellblazer: Pandemonium

- 1 hours and 56 minutes ago

That's the official title. Blame DC!

The text is a bit raised, so it looks better in real life than on a scan

So, in order to celebrate John Constantine's first appearance (in Swamp Thing #37, which came out in 1985), DC has produced this original graphic novel, written by Jamie Delano, who was the writer on Hellblazer when it was launched in 1988, and drawn by Mark Simpson, who like Frank Quitely works under a pseudonym, in this case Jock. Clem Robins goes along for the ride as the letterer. It's 25 dollars, and given that it's Jock, it's a really handsome comic book.

This is a strange book, because it's tough to review. I mean, it's a John Constantine story, written by the man who had more to do with creating the John Constantine we know today than even his creator. So Delano knows how to write a John Constantine story, and there's nothing really more to it than that. So on the one hand, it's a pleasant enough comic. On the other hand, Delano doesn't really do much more with it. He does a nice thing by taking John out of his comfort zone (London) and sending him to Iraq, where his trenchcoat kind of clashes with the setting (especially when the soldiers make him wear a bulletproof vest), but overall, the story is a fairly standard story. John sees a woman on the tube wearing the full, black burqa, and he's intrigued by her. He follows her to the British Museum, and when a bomb goes off in their vicinity, he gets her out of there and back to her flat. There, she drugs him and sets him to take the fall for the bomb. It turns out it's a grand scheme by British Intelligence to get John to work for them. In Iraq, a prisoner has ... done some strange things. Weird, mystical things that drive men mad. They want John to help, and the only way they can do that, as they can't appeal to his patriotic nature, is to blackmail him. So John goes along, even though he tells them flat out that they can expect a "hefty bill" for it.

Oh, that famous Iraqi humor!

There's a lot more to the plot, as John figures out what the deal is with the prisoner, gets closer to the woman who drugged him (she's an agent for the Brits), and gets involved with the usual stuff - demons and the like. That's why the book isn't great - Delano relies too much on the standard supernatural stuff, and there's nothing here that's terribly fresh. Delano relies a bit too much on gambling, which isn't visually exciting and therefore robs the climax, as well drawn it is, of some tension, and he doesn't get too much into John's psychological issues, so there's no interest there. It's mostly a puzzle box of a book, and while there's nothing wrong with that, it's not that clever, so even as a mental exercise, it falls a bit short.

Poor Brad.

The best part of the book is John's relationship with Aseera, the woman, because Delano keeps peeling back layers of her personality, and John has to adjust to them and move on. She's an interesting character, full of contradictions and hidden depth, and it would have been nice to see more of their relationship. Really, the best thing about Constantine, usually, is how he relates to the women in his life, because he simply doesn't know how to do it right. So the parts with Aseera are very well done, and while the rest of the book isn't bad, it stands in stark contrast to the parts with Aseera.

Who doesn't love a combat jack?

Jock is good, as usual. Unlike a lot of artists who work in the "Vertigo" milieu, he seems much more comfortable with wide-open spaces than dark, enclosed spaces, so the scenes in the desert look tremendous, even though the rest of the book looks good as well. His unfortunate coloring choice for Hell - lots of red - robs that part of the book of some of its power, as the linework is drenched in the colors. I don't mind the red, but it's somewhat overwhelming. Perhaps that's the point, but it doesn't work too well. The rest of the book, however, is very nice.

Why, John's just an old softie!

Delano actually ties some plot points in with his original run on the book, but the nice thing is that if you've never read those issues, it doesn't really matter - it's more of a fun Easter egg for long-time fans of the character. It reminds us how long John has been around, carrying his own series (22 years and counting!). Delano knows John very well, and there's a lot about the book that works. For 25 bucks, it's a bit expensive, mainly because it doesn't do anything new with John. It's just a good, solid John Constantine book that looks great. I hoped for a bit more, but if you're just looking for a decent supernatural tale starring Mr. Constantine, you might want to give this a look.

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DC/Marvel Character Tourney Modern Age Region, Round 1

DC/Marvel Character Tourney Golden Age Region, Round 1

Comics Should Be Good 2010 March Madness

Comics Should Be Good!

- 4 hours and 56 minutes ago

After last year's tournament, I decided it was so fun that we should do it again!

Welcome to the 2010 DC/Marvel Comic Character Tournament!

As the NCAA basketball tournament goes along, so will a series of polls matching various comic book characters against each other. You'll have 24 hours (from when the polls go up) to pick whichever character is your favorite in each match-up (judged by whether they're more interesting, more appealing, whatever criteria you feel like choosing). The winner will advance to the next round, so on and so forth until we get a champion on April 5th!

To seed the characters, I used their rankings from the Top DC/Marvel Characters poll from awhile back, mixed with some subjective re-seeding by me based on changes in characters since then (like Barry Allen becoming a major character again). Also, to make things a bit different from last year, I have split the characters into four regions based on when they debuted, Golden Age, Silver Age, Bronze Age and Modern Age.

Here is the tournament bracket - click on it to get the full bracket and feel free to print it out if you'd like (I dunno if it fits on one page or not).

The voting begins right now for the first two regions and noon (Eastern) tomorrow for the next two regions.

Read on to see a more detailed list of the characters in the four regions....

(NOTE: Feel free to disagree with the following dates - but for the sake of this tourney, these are the dates that I'm using)

GOLDEN AGE (1938-1954)

1. Batman (Bruce Wayne)
2. Captain America (Steve Rogers)
3. Superman
4. The Joker
5. Robin/Nightwing/Batman (Dick Grayson)
6. Wonder Woman (Diana Prince)
7. Green Arrow (Oliver Queen)
8. Black Canary
9. Lex Luthor
10. Captain Marvel (Billy Batson)
11. Hawkman (Carter Hall)
12. Aquaman (Orin)
13. Catwoman (Selina Kyle)
14. Sub-Mariner (Namor McKenzie)
15. Green Lantern (Alan Scott)
16. Black Adam

SILVER AGE (1955-1969)

1. Spider-Man (Peter Parker)
2. Flash (Wally West)
3. Green Lantern (Hal Jordan)
4. Daredevil (Matt Murdock)
5. Dr. Doom
6. The Thing (Ben Grimm)
7. Hulk (Bruce Banner)
8. Iron Man (Tony Stark)
9. Thor
10. Flash (Barry Allen)
11. Hawkeye (Clint Barton)
12. Cyclops
13. Oracle (Barbara Gordon)
14. Magneto
15. Sinestro
16. Doctor Strange

BRONZE AGE (1970-1984)

1. Wolverine (Logan)
2. Nightcrawler
3. Kitty Pryde
4. Punisher
5. Emma Frost
6. Darkseid
7. Madrox
8. Iron Fist
9. Storm
10. Power Girl
11. She-Hulk (Jennifer Walters)
12. Luke Cage
13. Colossus
14. Swamp Thing
15. Rogue
16. Deathstroke the Terminator

MODERN AGE (1985-today)

1. Robin/Red Robin (Tim Drake)
2. Rorschach
3. John Constantine
4. Deadpool
5. Green Lantern (Kyle Rayner)
6. Starman (Jack Knight)
7. Dream/Morpheus
8. Booster Gold
9. Death
10. Jesse Custer
11. Impulse/Kid Flash/Flash (Bart Allen)
12. Spider Jerusalem
13. Yorick Brown
14. Superboy (Connor Kent)
15. Gambit
16. Jewel (Jessica Jones)

Here's the links to the first two regions...

Golden Age Region, Round 1

Modern Age Region, Round 1

Check back tomorrow for the first rounds of the other two regions!

Now go get voting!

2 Comments

At March 18, 2010, Dan Felty wrote:

What, no play-in game between Nexus and Hopey? Shame!
At March 18, 2010, Thok wrote:

Well, just like regular March Madness, I think most of the 9's should be favored over the 8's. :P

The ...

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A Year of Cool Comics - Day 77

Comics Should Be Good!

- 7 hours and 26 minutes ago

Here is the latest in our year-long look at one cool comic (whether it be a self-contained work, an ongoing comic or a run on a long-running title that featured multiple creative teams on it over the years) a day (in no particular order whatsoever)! Here's the archive of the moments posted so far!

Today we take a look at Super Human Resources, by Ken Marcus and Justin Bleep...

Enjoy!

Super Human Resources #1, from writer Ken Marcus and artist Justin Bleep is a delightfully funny comic book.

In fact, I would go so far as to say that it is a remarkable piece of work by Marcus, as he really shows an effortless mixture of amusing dialogue and character-based humor all while advancing the plot in a logical fashion that has a real pay-off at the end of the four-issue mini-series.

The plot behind the series is that a young would-be-accountant named Tim gets a temp job at Super Crises International, the company that bankrolls a bunch of superheroes (paying off damages from superhero fights and hopefully recouping the money from licensing fees). I doubt that the name of the company is unintentional, as if you liked the comedic stylings of Keith Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis' similarly-named Justice League International, then this is the comic for you, as that particular brand of humor is almost exactly the style that Marcus goes for in this series, and remarkably for such a new work, pretty much achieves.

I sometimes felt that Bleep's unique art style did not exactly match Marcus' dialogue-driven, humanistic humor, but it surely did not HURT the comic at all. And Bleep's design sense is impeccable, and I imagine he designed a great deal of the characters who populate the comic, so in that regard, he does a great job.

Here are nine preview pages that the guys have made available on their ComicSpace page.

In just these sample pages, you already get a feel for the offbeat humor Marcus provides, as well as the nifty dialogue and comedic timing (as seen in the scene with the Bog). My personal favorite bit is where the robot makes himself NEARLY invisible so as to avoid paying the money he owes, but, well, nearly invisible is not nearly invisible enough! Classic.

It's also impressive how quickly Marcus establishes personalities for these characters, which is useful when he can then later play against the type he established himself.

As a whole, the series is really a fun read filled with engaging personalities and a lot of interesting comedic plotlines, and not nearly as many as you would think are the standard "making fun of superhero conventions" types.

At the heart of this comic, the humor comes from the offbeat personalities that Marcus establishes - it just so happens that at least half of the personalities are superheroes.

NOTE: This is basically what I said when these issues first came out - BC

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1,robots,robot,regard,design

Kick Ass Sneaker Giveaway

Bill Jaaska has Passed Away - Can Anyone Confirm?

A review a day: Crogan's March

Comics Should Be Good!

- 1 days and 1 hours ago

Why isn't there an ongoing about a person in the French Foreign Legion? That would rock. Dang, I hope no one steals that from me before I can pitch it to Vertigo!

The second volume of Chris Schweizer's Crogan Adventures is out! It's called Crogan's March, it's published by Oni Press, and it costs $14.95. That's fifteen bucks for over 200 pages of early twentieth-century Foreign Legion action! How can you resist???

Well, you shouldn't resist. Much like the first volume, Crogan's Vengeance, the latest is pretty danged excellent. It's a bit darker than the first, which is, as a pirate tale, more swashbuckling. In this book, Schweizer tackles some more pertinent issues to current events, as the debate throughout the book is whether the French are doing any actual good in north Africa. It's nice that in what is something that teenagers can read (the book is "rated" for people 13 and up), we get some interesting geopolitical debate. It's far more interesting than we usually get in comics, I'll tell you that much!

The set-up of the book is the same as the first, as will probably remain for the series. In the present, Dr. Crogan discovers his sons, Cory and Eric, doing something that requires a life lesson. In this case, Eric (the older brother) is trying to tell Cory what he can do with his money, because his parents told him he needed to "watch out for him." Cory claims he can make his own decisions, while Eric disagrees. Dr. Crogan tells them that this idea - whether someone can take away someone else's choices - has a long history, especially with regard to colonialism. Schweizer's conceit in this series is that the Crogan family has an impossibly impressive pedigree - we see the family tree at the beginning of each book, and it's full of stereotypical "action" heroes, from "Catfoot" Crogan the pirate to a Japanese ninja (yes, really) to a Wild West gunfighter to a diamond miner to a secret agent to Peter Crogan, the hero of this book. And they all live stories that help teach life lessons! Fancy that! Dr. Crogan explains to his sons that the French Foreign Legion was a group of soldiers from different countries (which isn't totally true, as many French natives fought in it) who fought for France, always in colonial adventures (Dr. Crogan uses the past tense, but the Foreign Legion still exists). In 1912, Peter Crogan was in the Legion, stationed in north Africa. And so the adventure begins!

Schweizer acknowledges the debt to Percival Christopher Wren, who wrote Beau Geste and set the standard for fiction about the Legion, and in many ways, this book is extremely old school (I've never read Beau Geste, so I can't say it's like that), with plenty of action and adventure and soldiers awaggering about the Algerian desert. There's a martinet sergeant, a dashing, heroic major, mysterious raiders who swarm out of the hills and besiege a fort, and a desperate trek through the mountains to safety. If you enjoy action, you'll love this. But Schweizer adds plenty of depth to the book, too. The martinet sergeant is certainly tough, but he also understands a great deal about what the Legion is doing in Africa. Captain Roitelet is a hero to the men, but when he first shows up, he has been demoted (from major to captain) for unknown reasons (but it's implied it's because he's too "heroic" for the stodgy officer corps). Peter Crogan is more thoughtful than the rest of the men, but even he admires Roitelet and doesn't understand why Sergeant Ludlow isn't besotted with him. Ludlow explains himself and his objections to Roitelet, and then Roitelet himself tells Crogan his philosophy. It's the principle that Dr. Crogan and his kids were debating at the beginning of the book: Ludlow believes that the rights of the French Revolution - "liberty, equality, fraternity" - shouldn't be exclusive to France, and the common people who live in slavery in north Africa deserve a chance for freedom. Roitelet, on the other hand, believes they're nothing but savages who should be thankful that France is paying them any attention. What's interesting about this argument is that while Ludlow is more enlightened than Roitelet, he still doesn't believe the natives are capable of gaining freedom on their own. Is he any better than Roitelet?

Later on, when Crogan gets separated from the rest of his unit, he ends up in the mountains helping a bunch of native refugees get to the main French fort. One of the natives, an old woman, argues with him constantly about the French presence in north Africa. It's a fascinating argument, and it keeps getting interrupted by events, where the two often find common ground. Schweizer never beats us over the head with it, and just because the old woman has her moments doesn't mean she's going to form a different opinion of Crogan or the French. It's impressive how Schweizer manages to bring up his points while the group moves through dark caves in which lurk dangerous things. The sequence remains tense even as the two characters argue political and cultural points.

Crogan's March is more downbeat than the first book, possibly because Schweizer is dealing with things that are still relevant today. Piracy might still be around, but the idea of colonialism remains a difficult point of contention among colonialists and the colonized. Schweizer does an excellent job of giving us rip-roaring action, but there's always an undercurrent of tragedy (mainly because it's often tragic) that leads us closer and closer to a conclusion that gives us no easy answers. Dr. Crogan ends his tale in a wonderful spot, explaining exactly why he do so but also making sure the readers understand the futility of war without being graphic about it. It's really a tremendous ending to a great book.

Schweizer's the kind of artist who, on the surface, looks a bit cartoony and therefore perhaps lacking in "realistic" details. However, he blends his exaggerated character features with wonderful attention to detail. Check out, for instance, our first glimpse of Tafizet:

02-27-2010 09;49;08AM

We get this throughout the book. The battle scenes are frantic, the scenes in the cave are claustrophobic, and the characters, while they are a bit exaggerated, are still memorably drawn. Each panel gives us plenty of visual information, even the ones that are all black (and there are a few). Schweizer is very good. You know it's true!

If you missed Crogan's Vengeance, you should probably rectify that right away. However, if pirating doesn't sound like your thing but legionairing does, you should definitely check this out. You don't need to have read the first volume, and it's quite excellent.

02-27-2010 09;51;01AM

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Committed: ECCC: Mr. Crowley goes to Oz

Comics Should Be Good!

- 1 days and 3 hours ago

I've come to the conclusion that people are attending cons wrong. At least I think that must be the problem, since they find them so very draining. People I know prepare for comic conventions as if they are prepping for the Iditarod, rather than a relaxing weekend with like-minded people.

Growing up in Europe, we'd make fun of the Americans and the way they'd go on vacation. "We saw 4 countries in 2 days!" they would proudly exclaim, as if running at top speed through an entire country was something to be applauded. The aim of a vacation in Europe is to soak up the foreign culture, which can only be done by spending leisurely hours wandering cities and villages, eating in local cafés, shopping in weird markets, and generally doing nothing much for as long as possible. Rather than zipping from one country to another, we try to spend as long as possible in one place, winding down and generally getting the speedy pace of modern life out of our systems.

This is how I grew up thinking of vacations, and this is still how I approach all of them, including the ones at comic book conventions. It's only this year that I realize how different my attitude is to my friends and colleagues, who push themselves to the very limit. I see now that the trepidation and anxiety with which they anticipate this season is entirely down to their own approach to it. There are many intimidating articles with "useful tips" about how to "survive" comic cons, and it is well-intentioned advice like this which can spread this kind of feverish approach to comic book convention attendance.

This last weekend at the Emerald City ComicCon in Seattle I took a relaxing couple of day off from work spending time with friends around the comic books we all love. Since my flight arrived late on Friday (bit of rain in San Francisco held us up for 3 hours, which really makes you wonder how any planes get off the ground in the UK, but I digress...) I didn't get in till 2am, so I slept in till 11am on Saturday and wandered to the convention center. Now in theory I'd have loved to have been out bright and early to enjoy as much of the convention as possible, but let's be realistic for a second, this is a week in which I moved house and switched jobs. Having a nice hotel room meant sleeping in and taking a leisurely shower, it was necessary to my mental and physical health. Would a couple of hours spent on-line to get in have made my experience any better? And those couple of hours gained inside the con; would they impact my life dramatically enough to be worth losing sleep over? Not in my opinion.

Once inside, I met up with my brother Sam (who had been dragging his sleep-deprived arse around for hours), and we went to say hello to some people. We managed to visit Josh Ellingson, Darick Roberston, and Ben Templesmith for little chats before we decided that what we really needed was a slap-up lunch. Sam and I left the convention center and went down the street to a nifty sushi place I'd passed earlier. We knew that any food obtained in the center wouldn't be as good, and we needed some fresh air (plus a break from the swarming masses of people wasn't too bad either). After that I went back for a couple of hours, which gave me time to say catch up with my old friends from iFanboy, as well as saying hello to Mike and Laura Allred. Towards the end of the day I met Nathan Fox and had to force myself not to buy artwork (moving house has made me realize that I own too much stuff), but I still managed to get a fab little drawing of Zodiac out of him.

The next day I slept in again. I knew I only had one hour at the convention until I had to catch my flight back to San Francisco, but I knew that this would be plenty of time. In that one hour I had the best little talk with Kieron Gillen, (who understands about haircuts, as evinced by the marvelous dos in Phonogram), and a fascinating talk with Jim Rugg about his book Afrodisiac, (and his theories about the internet, access to information, and the implications upon the class structure.) Almost in passing I met Steven Seagle and found out that he wrote House of Secrets - which I was crazy about when it was coming out, but because I'm terrible with names, had entirely missed that - so I was delighted to talk to him. After that I had time for a quick glance at comic books and trades on sale. Unless it's something rare or strange I don't want to drag heavy books home, so I didn't buy anything. At the end of the day it's more fun to buy books from my favorite comic shop and support local business.

...

Now all told, I probably spent 5, maybe 6 hours at the convention. It was relaxing, lots of fun, and I feel like I got exactly as much culture and commentary as I could deal with in a day and a half. Imagine how it could have gone, if I'd approached it as the "pros" do: My two solid 8 hour days of intense exploration would have precluded all of those chance encounters, or made them intensely rushed. In addition, I would have been too tired to socialize in the evenings (which is half the fun) and I would have returned to San Francisco to a half-moved-in house feeling very unprepared.

For me, the classic approach to cons was summed up by a con-virgin I saw leaving on Saturday. When I asked what she thought of her first comic book convention, she looked at me with haunted, frantic eyes and paused before saying; "... this morning was very intense, there were so many people and so much stuff that I almost had a panic attack... I left for a little break and then came back... So I managed the whole day, but I don't think I want to come to another one of these." What a shame! The poor woman was shattered and quite reasonably so. She was in that stuffy convention center for hours and I can't understand why she'd make her first convention experience so horrible. Perhaps it's that all of the advice she got came from people who go to these things with the intention of maximizing their experience of comic conventions, i.e. quantity over quality of experience.

I think perhaps It's time for a new approach to conventions. We're adults and we need someone to write the "Zen and the Art of Comic Con" or something like that. You know the kind of thing, where you get to eat breakfast in bed, meander about and take lots of breaks. I'd take a pass at it, but in all honesty it might be the kind of thing that we'll spoil by laying down rules for it. Half the fun of my comic book convention vacations is doing what I want on my own schedule, and I can't figure out how to write a list of how-to's for that, unless it's Aleister Crowley's "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law."

1 Comments

At March 17, 2010, Wesley Smith wrote:

I haven't been to many conventions, but you couldn't drag me to something like SDCC to save my life. Just ...

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6,4,3,2,love

A Year of Cool Comics - Day 76

Comics Should Be Good!

- 1 days and 4 hours ago

Here is the latest in our year-long look at one cool comic (whether it be a self-contained work, an ongoing comic or a run on a long-running title that featured multiple creative teams on it over the years) a day (in no particular order whatsoever)! Here's the archive of the moments posted so far!

Today we take a look at Chris Yost and Scott Wegener's Killer of Demons...

Enjoy!

The gist of Killer of Demons can be described in these sample pages from this fun 3-issue mini-series from Image last year.

As you can see, demons exist on Earth. They are not allowed to KILL humans, but they can seduce them into killing each other (or do various other repugnant things, like commit adultery or do hardcore drugs).

So Dave Sloan is tasked to kill the demons, with the help of his angel advisor.

The problem is that only Dave can see the demons, so it brings to mind the question - is Dave killing these demons because that's what God wants, or is he just imagining things and he is actually one of the worst mass murderers alive?

Those are the questions Killer of Demons grapples with (along with the fact that Dave's significant other happens to be a police officer, so that brings the pair into conflict on the whole "seeming mass murder" thing.

It is a really fun comic book, especially the stuff that the demons get humans to do - demons are everywhere, including at the fast food drive-in trying to get you to super-size your order!

Chris Yost really does a wonderful job getting all the humor out of the concept that he can, and everyone already knows from Atomic Robo how great of an artist Scott Wegener is, so I don't need to say how great he is (He's great, by the way).

This is a blast of a series, and I really hope this initial series isn't the last that we see of these characters!!

1 Comments

At March 17, 2010, Matt K wrote:

Dammit Brian, you forgot to talk about Dave's brother, a FBI agent in the MMO division.

Honestly probably the ...

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3,images,angels,blasts,supers

Neat Comic for St. Patrick's Day

Random Thoughts! (March 16, 2010)

Comics Should Be Good!

- 2 days ago

Random Thought! A special edition of random thoughts this week, people! It's random thoughts time! Get excited!

Link Thought! Quickie Reviews (Mar 10 2010) (The Unwritten makes a small comeback!). Is it Just Children? (or is it okay to kill everyone?). High Road/Low Road on Chris Jericho/Edge at WrestleMania (I really love this, but still have to argue against it... dammit). Wrestling 4Rs featuring my review of the first edition of TNA Impact in its new semi-live Monday night timespot (spoiler: I thought it was shit). Fuck Me? (people who comment on wrestling sites are much funnier than those who comment on comics sites). Wrestler of the Week (only two weeks left...). Art Discussion Month 2010 (it passes the halfway mark today... I'm mostly done! Also, check out Frank Teran's comment in my discussion of the Hellblazer issue he drew... it's all gossipy and fun!). The Splash Page Podcast Episode 8.1 (Tim swears, but I had to bleep it out to keep the podcast clean). The Splash Page Podcast Episode 8.2 (I swear, but I had to bleep it out to keep the podcast clean). An interview with Keith Champagne on WWE Heroes (yes, it's on this blog, but people miss things...).

Random Thought! I'm oddly comforted by the thought that, if I lived in Russia, comics would be reviewing me... (Taken from my Twitter feed on Sunday.)

Random Thought! I have no interest in that Young Allies book beyond how awesome the name Bastards of Evil is. That's not just a good bad guy team name, it's a Joe Casey-esque bad guy team name, and no one does supervillains who revel in their villainy as well as Casey these days, so nicely done, Mr. McKeever.

Random Thought! Because it gives me focus, the rest of the column will be my "I'ds of March" to follow-up on Brian's annual posting. Sure, that was yesterday, but I don't want to step on his toes, let him do his thing and I'll keep mine in this column. If I remember next year, the 15th will be on a Tuesday and mine will actually go up on the day. I did this previously, on my blog, two years ago. (Linking to that so I won't repeat myself...)

I'd... have ended Secret Invasion with Noh-Varr helping to turn the tide against the Skrulls and, then, turning on the heroes, because he intends to take over the planet himself and remake it in Hala's image. Not taking over then, Norman Osborn could still be in charge and Dark Reign happens mostly as planned, but Noh-Varr is set up as a threat, someone who isn't working for the same goals as anyone.

I'd... have brought Steve Rogers back in Captain America as a regular arc with Butch Guice as the artist, kicking off his run on the book. Not necessarily as smart a sales/business move, but I think it would have worked artistically better.

I'd... have not marketed Joe Casey's tenure on Superman/Batman as a follow-up to "Our Worlds at War" and would have also let people know that was writing the book when the first issue came out in October and made it clear what was going on.

I'd... hire Jim Starlin to take over one of the Marvel cosmic books. With Thanos coming back, all we need is Starlin. It would lighten the load for Abnett and Lanning a bit and also give the line a little bit more diversity in writing. I've enjoyed the unified vision, but, come on, DnA and Starlin writing those characters? That would be amazing.

I'd... have hired J.M. DeMatteis to write Spider-Man: The Clone Saga. Or, at least, a back-up strip to give the series a little more flavour and breathing room. I'd have also included some extra material like one-page interviews on the story throughout the series. Small things to make it a better experience.

I'd... have not made Wednesday Comics exclusively 12-part serialised stories. Do some one-offs and short serials, mix things up a bit, play with the newspaper format.

I'd... have released the "Final Crisis Aftermath" book in a different manner, maybe not all at the same time nor with such similar titles. They all sort of blended together that way when they might have done better by making their differences more obvious and trying to target each book's specific audience more directly.

I'd... release Paul Jenkins's Hellblazer run in trades. Plus, I do a trade or two of the remaining uncollected issues from that series. The one- and two-parters that popped up over the years.

I'd... have hired almost any other artist than Philip Tan for the second Batman & Robin arc. That arc sticks out like a sore thumb and DC could have found someone much better suited to Morrison's writing -- and someone whose work doesn't look ten times worse in the middle of Frank Quitely- and Cameron Stewart-drawn arcs.

I'd... have hounded Chip Zdarsky to contribute to Strange Tales... because he's great.

I'd... hire Paul Cornell and Leonard Kirk to do a second Dark X-Men mini-series later in 2010 to explore what happens to the characters without Norman Osborn in charge. That could be very interesting and act as a nice sequel to the recently-concluded mini.

I'd... have hired a writer with sensibilities much more in common with Grant Morrison than Keith Giffen to write The Authority: The Lost Year. A cool idea for a book that went wrong by hiring the wrong writer to do it. That needed someone much more in tune with the way Morrison writes.

I'd... have chosen more Spider-Woman over the motion comics animated thing.

I'd... have made those Dark Reign: The List issues actually... you know... mean something...? Like, made them count for something lasting and important within the "Dark Reign" story rather than just coming out and... not really doing much of anything.

I'd... hound and pester Craig Ferguson until he agrees to write an Aquaman comic, dammit!

Random Thought! That was fun.

***

Random Comments! Your comments. My replies. Rather obvious. Trying something new by replying to portions of comments directly. If it's confusing or people don't like it, let me know.

Bill Reed said: People actually watched Corner Gas? Really? Did they enjoy it? Does one have to be Canadian to enjoy it? Some station or another here in God's United States aired it for a bit there, and I stumbled upon it one day... it's like some kind of terrifying black hole of quality.

Corner Gas is a decent, middle-of-the-road sitcom. It only produces a couple of chuckles in an episode, but gets the odd big laugh. Or, it did when it was on. I don't think it's a uniquely Canadian thing, but who knows with you Americans?

I'm tired of this shtick already. Deadpool isn't that overexposed. I proved it with maths. Still, he does have a surprising amount of solo titles, more than I think the market will be able to support. In a year's time, he'll probably be back to one, unless the movie comes out.

Just because other characters appear in more books, doesn't mean Deadpool isn't overexposed. Something like that is relative to the character and how much exposure is too much. Spider-Man and Batman appear in more books? Fine, but we're also used to them appearing in a lot of books. There's a longtime demand for them to appear in numerous books. As of yet, there's an apparent shortterm demand for Deadpool that could easily turn against the character like happened to Punisher and Ghost Rider. Your math, while interesting, doesn't tell the whole story.

CW said: The whole 'Deadpool overexposure' thing is really weird for me. Not because I hate the character, or I'm offended by the character being rammed down my throat, but I guess I'm from the time when Joe Kelly and Ed McGuness couldn't buy readers for his solo series. I grew up with Deadpool as a third-rate Wolverine knock-off (violent guy with an attitude) fighting second-rate characters (Black Tom?) from a second rate X-book (Leifeld-era X-Force, you suck!). That Joe Kelly was able to take the character and make something truely moving and halarious is nothing short of miraculous. The book was constantly fighting cancelation, and although it never really recovered after McGuness left the book, it was still one of the best books Marvel was publishing at the time.

Everything being published today featuring the character is a pale shadow of what was done in that first series. I don't believe that later work of any creator or of any character can diminish the original work, but what's being published as Deadpool comics these days makes me almost say he's been ruined. As it is, I see those books as being the one shining gem in a big pile of turd. And it makes me realize just how funny and vindictive the fates must be to make *now* be when Deadpool is at his most popular among the hoi poi. It's almost like something... Deadpool would come up with.

Agreed. Having read Deadpool books for reviewing purposes at CBR, I can vouch for the lack of funny. They're cute. There's maybe one funny moment per issue. Then again, humour is relative, so maybe lots of people are finding the current books very funny. I did enjoy Deadpool's recent guest-spot in Amazing Spider-Man by Joe Kelly and Eric Canete. That was great.

Mecha-Shiva said: Frisky Dingo, man... what a great show. I ran into Adam Reed at my mechanic's (I had no idea what he looked like, but he started talking to someone at the counter and I'm wondering why this guy sounds like Xander Crews then he said his name and it made sense) but lacked the balls to say hello or anything. I don't understand why Frisky Dingo (or the all-too-brief Xtacles spinoff) never got the same kind of attention as the Venture Bros. Not to take anything away from the Venture Bros., which is great, but... other than the crappy animation, I see nothing not to like about Frisky Dingo. Ka-kow.

I can understand why: The Venture Bros. do self-contained episodes. Frisky Dingo opted for episodes that told one big story, much like a comics storyarc written for the trade. That doesn't make it less good, it just makes it harder for people to get into it. That, and The Venture Bros. is better. Sorry.

Mario said: People who don't like Deadpool or constantly whine about his overexposure are simply in denial of their desire to read a comic that will have no "serious" long term effect. Deadpool comics are all about enjoyment (in the best and worse ways possible).

No, I'm all for those books. I've read recent Deadpool books and they're just not good. Not funny or entertaining.

Jason Arron's Wolvering doesn't suck.

No, Jason Aaron's Wolverine book doesn't suck. That's what made me realise that I just don't care for the character. I'd read an issue here and there and enjoy what I've read, and, yet, I felt no desire to read another issue.

FunkyGreenJerusalem said: That's because it's by an Australian director Gregor Jordan, who makes the most empty and souless films of all time. He won a big short film competition in Australia with a clever short... although apparently it's VERY similar to another short, or scene from an old film. He then made a crime film which wouldn't have gone anywhere, except it had Bryan Brown swearing a lot, and was the breakthrough (in Australia, which led to US work) of Heath Ledger. That got him signed up to a five picture film, and it's been a slow and steady output of dribble ever since. (I know his career because I keep thinking every film will be his last, and am just shocked at watching his mediocrity continue to live). Having seen The Informers the other week, don't stress Chad, just about every character in it will die of AIDS soon after the credits. (Although I think we're supposed to ignore that by combining the stories, and making them all happen at once, nearly every character had, presumably, unprotected sex with someone who had slept with another character, all leading back to the girl who dies of AIDS at the end... AIDS of course being added in, as it's not in the novel, to give the film some kind of ending).

I haven't read the collection in a while, but, yeah, I don't remember AIDS being in any of the stories. Hell, the girl doesn't even die necessarily in the book. Thanks for the background info. From what I read, the director really fucked with the script and cut it down considerably.

I loved when that book hinted that Xavier was in their heads and manipulating the X-Men the whole time. That never went anywhere.

That was very frustrating. Xavier was perfectly happy to alter Magneto's memories and mind, but wouldn't act on a larger scale to solve the problems with mutants and humanity -- or, at least, influence the minds of the right people to move things along. Again, small-scale, status quo-feeding bullshit.

So you're praising Ellis for writing a nice outline of a story, and then publishing it as a story? From memory, the book has a scene where the main characters - all of whom have nothing original or distinguishing about them - are standing in a warehouse. The police are intercut with the heroes talking, surrounding a warehouse, and they kick down the door... but they have the wrong warehouse. That's Chuck Austen level of writing.

No, Ellis wrote a conclusion to his story, but part of it was introducing ideas that could be more fully explored in the future. And that scene happened, but it, you know, made sense in context and wasn't bad. But, I'm not going to change your mind.

Willie Everstop said: Random Thought! What the hell is up with comic characters leaving the word what out of the phrase "What the hell" lately? Is it a creator quirk or just some weird way to avoid censorship? It always seems out of place to me.

I say 'the hell?' or 'the fuck?' Just a variation on the phrase that some people use.

TimCallahan said: Hey, I was an English major and I read ALL the assigned books. (Problem was: I usually didn't read them until the day before the final, and Chaucer isn't really all that great when you read him like that. He may not be great for other reasons -- the jury is still out on that.)

I did that with Moby-Dick since it was the one book in my American lit class in undergrad that we had to discuss in an essay on the final exam. By the halfway mark, I was skipping the chapters on whales, sticking to the narrative. Good times.

Rome said: BTW, did you like the new Iron Man 2 trailer? Any thoughts on the Suitcase Armor?

Looks decent. No real thoughts or judgements since the first movie was good enough to earn the sequel a viewing. So, I'm trying not to care too much, preferring to leave my thoughts until I see the finished product with everything in its proper context.

Jack Norris said: As soon as the words "hero's journey" pop up in an argument, I automatically feel less obligated to read on in a respectful manner. It's become the fans & critics (oh, and let's not forget some creators as well) version of "because, uh... because Jesus, God and the Bible, that's why!" in the way that it's just an empty appeal to authority.

Agreed. But, the endpoint of Peter's progression into adulthood is leaving Spider-Man behind and learning about real responsibility. Just the way it is.

Mike Loughlin said: My problem with JMS' better comics (Midnight Nation, Rising Stars, Supreme Power) is that he spent an awful lot of time on set-up, and very little on delivery. I read all 18 issues of Supreme Power, but got the impression that the story JMS wanted to tell would have taken at least 50 more. Rising Stars started out great (although the art was sub-par), but ended limply. Midnight Nation is a self-contained story, at least, but they seemed to spend most of the issues lurching toward a rather predictable conclusion (I liked it, despite its flaws). I think JMS is good at world-building, but falters when it comes to structuring.

Yeah, that's why Babylon 5 was so great: he had the room to set up plots and characters and world build without it cutting short the eventual payoffs. Comics are limited by page-count and the speed at which they come out and JMS seems to need more room to work. He hasn't adapted to the medium as much as he should have by this point.

That's it. Thanks for reading. Later.

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Guest Spot: Scalped and the Stereotype That Wasn't There

Comics Should Be Good!

- 2 days ago

by John Lees (check out John's column, Comic Book Club, at ProjectFanboy here)

Okay, so who reads Scalped? For those of you unfamiliar with the series, Scalped is a sprawling crime drama by writer Jason Aaron and (for the most part) artist R.M. Guera, published by DC Comics’ celebrated Vertigo imprint. Set on the Prairie Rose Indian Reservation in South Dakota, it tells the story of Dashiell Bad Horse, a prodigal son returning to his childhood home and falling under the sway of community leader turned gangster Chief Red Crow. The comic has been widely met with critical acclaim, not least from here at Comic Book Resources. As well as regularly reviewing the book, CBR has prominently featured Scalped right here on the Comics Should Be Good blog. The comic is a constant fixture on What I Bought by Greg Burgas, who offers plenty of insightful commentary on the developing narrative. Brian Cronin, meanwhile, devoted an entire week of 2009’s Year of Cool Comic Book Moments to Scalped. CBR ranked the series at #5 in its Best of 2009 list. Looking beyond this site, Jerome Maida of the Philadelphia Daily News not only ranked Scalped as the best comic of 2009, but as one of the greatest comics of all time.

But the response to the book has not been universally positive. Some detractors have accused the comic of
perpetuating negative Native American stereotypes, even going so far as to condemn those who praise Scalped as part of the problem. As readers of Scalped, are we guilty of promoting racism? Well first, I would suggest arguing on these lines takes us up a blind alley where we don’t look too closely into the facts and simply accept that Scalped and its author are racist, knowingly or otherwise. So I am going to take things back a notch, and ask: is Scalped really racist?

To answer this question, we need to take a closer look at Scalped, and see how the comic itself holds up against such accusations. The most common complaint is the idea that the comic portrays all Native Americans as criminals and lowlifes. While yes, there are violent characters in Scalped and many laws are broken, this is a crime story, and is therefore by its very definition going to focus on criminals. But it should also be noted that thoroughly decent, law-abiding Native characters such as Granny Poor Bear and Franklin Falls Down challenge the notion that the book presents all Indians as scum, while the very worst figures in the book, those most devoid of redeeming qualities â€“ such as psychotic killer Diesel or the amoral, vindictive FBI agent Nitz â€“ are white.

One line of criticism I have encountered demanded more balance, that for every Native American engaging in crime or wallowing in drunken despair we should see another doing good for the local community or enjoying a happy and contented life on The Rez. This to me seemed like an odd request, not only because it would be utterly incongruent with the somber tone established in this particular comic, but because it clashes with the very dynamics of the genre as a whole. Should a comedy have balance by having half its content be harrowing drama? Should a horror have balance with extended sequences devoid of any suspense or peril? Why should the crime genre not be too much about crime? Perhaps, as I shall touch on later, it is more to do with the color of the characters committing the crimes.

I think part of the problem could be that much of this criticism is based on the first few issues of Scalped, or on the first graphic novel collecting the series: Indian Country. In these early chapters, the focus seems to be less on character than action, and while I wouldn’t necessarily say the characters are presented as racial stereotypes, one could see them as noir archetypes: the outsider, the gangster, the wise old drunk, the femme fatale. While there were some glimpses of the depth that was to come â€“ take, for example, the series of near-misses and miscommunications that prevent Gina Bad Horse from getting in touch with her son in issue #4, which in the next issue are given tragic significance - in its beginning, the series felt more like a conventional crime thriller, well told. I’d argue that it was with the collection of issues contained in the second graphic novel, Casino Boogie, that Jason Aaron really began to stretch his wings and the book’s unique voice was truly established. From this point on, the intricate experimentation with time and chronological structure made Scalped less about constant action than dwelling on a single moment, reflecting on it from different perspectives and examining its causes and consequences. Characterization came to the forefront, and those archetypes began to get a lot more complicated, turning into nuanced, multi-faceted individuals. As a result, critiques based solely on the first handful of issues don’t just seem outdated, but rather it’s like they miss the point of Scalped entirely, almost as if they were talking about a different comic.

As an example of this, one character that has been a target of particular scorn is Lincoln Red Crow. Based on his first appearance in the first issue, it might be easy to dismiss him as a one-note caricature, just a typical gangster heavy. In his first appearance, he has just finished scalping some unknown victim, so it is perhaps understandable to assume the character is to become a stereotypical Indian villain. But as the series develops, Red Crow evolves into a fascinating, tragic figure. Red Crow’s soul has been steadily eroded by the moral compromises and Faustian pacts he has made to open his casino. Driven by a desire to bring prosperity to the struggling Oglala Lakota tribe, this casino for him represents these lifelong dreams becoming a reality.

After decades of fighting to secure his people’s future, he has succeeded, but at the cost of becoming the very thing he hates the most. “You done spent too long playin’ the part a’ the poor, old pissed-off â€˜skin who wouldn’t be caught dead workin’ for the man,” sneers one associate, “Cause now you are the man, and you don’t know what the hell to do with yourself.”

But still, some would continue to disregard this complexity, concluding that the book’s readers will only view him as a “savage Indian” or a “greedy Indian”. Not only is this an inaccurate appraisal of Red Crow’s story â€“ classic themes like “the loss of idealism” and “power corrupts” are universal, not exclusively Indian - but it severely underestimates the intelligence and morality of the comic’s readers, assuming they must all be as racist as its author is imagined to be. What is the more likely scenario? That deep down, all readers of Scalped secretly hate Indians, and they were attracted to a comic with Native criminals through an insatiable desire to validate their own bigotry? Or that readers of Scalped just happen to like strong storytelling and compelling characters?

Red Crow is a mass of contradictions, with Aaron encouraging the reader to alternatively view him as a tragic hero, a monster, an optimist, a tyrant, a loving father, an abusive father, a mentor, a traitor, courageous, cowardly, spiritual, violent, a man on a downward spiral of despair. But these racially-charged arguments against the book can only see Red Crow as an Indian, with all these other aspects of his character becoming secondary, simply ways of commenting on him as an Indian. In this line of thought, it seems a white criminal can be a fully-fledged character in his own right, but an Indian criminal must be seen as a representation of all Indians. Who then, out of Aaron and his detractors, is more racially progressive?

Here is a scene featuring Red Crow from the conclusion of a 2009 storyline...

It has been said that the reader generates just as much meaning from a text as a writer does, and as such no matter how fair and nuanced writers become in their depictions of Natives, the possibility of someone (over)reading a subversive racist subtext into everything will always remain. I believe Scalped to be the victim of what I call the stereotype that wasn’t there. By this, I mean that it is easy to assert that a creator is racist, but it is more difficult for said creator to conclusively prove that they’re not, meaning a piece of fiction can be burdened with a vague stigma of racism even without any substantial evidence to actually confirm what, with Scalped, too often amounts to overreaching assertions built on skewed interpretations.

Sadly, this mindset only hinders the representation of Natives (and other minorities) in fiction. It can be a vicious cycle, with writers reluctant to tackle minority-based stories for fear of being perceived as racist and so contributing to the underrepresentation of these minorities in fiction. And when a minority character does see the light of day, are they to be portrayed in a manner more “sensitive” (some would say patronizing) than their white counterparts, so as not to offend anyone? What a regressive view of minority characters, where their loftiest aspiration should be to not be offensive! Some critiques go so far as to suggest we should only allow white characters to be featured in crime stories, to be sure no one can equate any minority to criminality. I would say this is a dangerous precedent to be setting in the name of “equality”. It seems like backwards logic to me, that because there aren’t enough minority-focused stories out there, we should further limit them by branding certain genres out-of-bounds for anything but white characters. Isn’t it a better solution to stop viewing characters as “white criminals” or “Indian criminals”, to look past their color for more substantial ways of defining them?

With Scalped, Jason Aaron demonstrates that a Native American character can be just as flawed and damaged as a white character. Far from being racist, I would suggest that is a necessary step towards that sought-after equality.

One could argue that Scalped is too violent, too foul-mouthed, too unrelentingly bleak and depressing. These are all complaints based on what is right there on the page, ready to be received by its audience in one way or another. Accusing the book of racism, however, is dependent on leaps of logic and speculation on both the writer’s intention and the response of other readers that are insulting to both writer and reader alike. For those yet to read the book, my recommendation would be to check out Scalped for yourself â€“ there are currently five graphic novel collections available â€“ and make up your own mind about it. But please, judge it on its merits as a crime story or a character drama rather than on its stereotypes or lack thereof, because Scalped is so much more than just an “Indian comic”.

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A review a day: Graylight

Comics Should Be Good!

- 2 days and 1 hours ago

This book came out two months ago, but I waited until I had some other stuff to review so I could do a few days of "reviews a day." I don't mind waiting a while with standalone long-form novels, though, because it's not like the Next Big Event will be spoiled if you don't read this right away! And there's some minor nudity below. You can handle it!

Spoooooky!!!!

Naomi Nowak's latest book, Graylight, is published by NBM and costs a mere $12.95. I'm extremely torn about this book. I don't love it, but I do think it's a work that can be enjoyable. Allow me to explain!

02-16-2010 03;36;05PM

On the recommendable side, Nowak's art is astonishing (uh-oh, I just gave away what's not recommendable about it). A quoted review on the back calls it "Pre-Raphaelite," which isn't a bad description (it's actually the coloring of the book that's called that, but it does apply to the design of the book as well, or at least what I know of the Pre-Raphaelites seems to apply) - Nowak's art is lush, almost Edenic, with a bold color palette that I hesitate to call "girlie," but I'm sorry - that's the word I thought of. Nowak uses lots of deep greens and blues and purples, and she puts her characters deep into nature, so that flowers and butterflies threaten to overwhelm the pages. She designs the book so that each page (or double-page spread) is a complete drawing, eschewing panels quite often to build a page in which the separate drawings bleed into each other, highlighting the riotousness of nature even more. She does use panels, but lays them out on the page so that they crash into each other at jagged angles, overlap each other, and generally look "sloppy" - it's not sloppy, because Nowak is going for a deliberate effect, but it's not a "traditional" design or even a frenetic design like we often see in "edgy" comics. It's much more of a melding of the panels, as Nowak uses the panels like she does the larger splashes - as ways to create a holistically pleasing scene. Nowak's attention to detail is tremendous, even though it doesn't, surprisingly, extend too much to her characters. With a few exceptions on a few pages, the characters remain inexpressive, which is rather odd. Occasionally we can see that Nowak can do more with faces, so the fact that she doesn't is a bit perplexing. Nowak is Swedish, and this book apparently takes place during a northern summer, meaning the daylight lasts most of the day - we get a sense of dreaminess from the endless light, which is a nice trick. Because we get a sense that these people just aren't getting enough sleep, we get a feel that they are somehow dreaming while they're awake, and it heightens the sense of strangeness that is pervasive in the book. Nowak's art is a true treat.

02-16-2010 03;40;51PM

However ... the writing doesn't keep up. Nowak is going for a very impressionistic kind of comic here, which is fine, but she does have a story to tell, and she doesn't do a great job. She's telling the story of a young lady named Sasha and the unusual love triangle in which she finds herself. But Nowak, in trying to avoid overexplaining, gives us hardly any narrative whatsoever. What we get is a lot of dreamy scenes where people say things that often have no connection with what anyone else is saying. It's a tough go. It begins on the first few pages. We see a woman holding a baby, and then we see the father leaving. She then tells the baby that she'll never let a woman "capable of this devastation" come into the baby's life, and that he'll "never end up" like his father. The father then committed suicide. It's obvious that the father cheated on the mother and she threw him out, which is not a bad way to start the story, but we can already see that Nowak is going more for a mood than anything else. This becomes problematic as we move along.

02-16-2010 03;43;10PM

In the present, we meet a girl named Sasha, who's a thief. In the woods one day, she meets a man she's seen hanging around town named Erik, who is off to interview a reclusive author for his newspaper. He invites Sasha to come along as his "photographer," but the author - the same woman we saw in the beginning - doesn't like this, and Sasha has to leave ... but not before she steals a book from a shelf in the house. The woman's son, Edmund - the same baby we saw in the beginning - then tries to track down the book, with less-than-desirable results. Sasha is romantically involved with Erik, but Edmund desires her as well. His mother, Aurora, who promised to protect him from women like Sasha, takes some extreme measures. And that's all I really want to say of the general plot, because I don't want to spoil it.

02-16-2010 03;45;31PM

Nowak makes us work too much, however. Sasha doesn't seem to be that evil, despite her thievery. She doesn't really "act" upon Edmund too much, and Edmund doesn't seem to fall too far under her spell, such as it is. Sasha's relationship with Erik comes completely out of nowhere - on one page, they seem to have no connection whatsoever, and the next, they're naked together, and a few pages later, they're arguing about whether Sasha should tell her friends she's in a relationship. This makes the "love triangle" that forms with Edmund even more enervating, because not only do Sasha and Edmund not have much of a relationship, neither do Sasha and Erik. So when Aurora decides to take action, we not only don't completely understand her motivation (as much as we can figure it out; and Edmund is still a grown man, so maybe she should let go a bit), but we don't understand why this random girl has raised her ire. There's a vague explanation, but it doesn't help too much. This weakens the climax of the book.

02-16-2010 03;48;12PM

Nowak, as I wrote, is counting on us to do a lot of the lifting. That's fine - more comic writers should do that. She leaves it up to us to make connections, and for the most part we can, but where the writing really fails is with the characterization. If we're going to infer major plot points, we need to have a clearer grasp of the characters. If Nowak wants Aurora to be seen not as an overbearing mother or a martyr for her child's happiness but some of both, she needs to do a better job with Aurora herself. If she wants us to care about Sasha and her odd kleptomania, Sasha needs to be more compelling. The love triangle falls apart because all three characters are ciphers, and therefore we don't feel anything for any of them. It gets back to the Nordic setting - if Nowak is matching the aloofness of the characters with the dreamlike and slightly surreal surroundings, well I guess she succeeded, but it doesn't necessarily make the book worth reading.

02-16-2010 03;50;43PM

As I always feel when I read a comic by someone who is clearly talented and is also working outside the superhero mainstream, I hate that I don't like this more. If you're interested in Nowak's art, I would recommend it highly. If you're looking for that art to work in conjunction with a solid story, you'll probably be disappointed. Nowak has done two other graphic novels, and I'm actually interested in getting at least one to see how her writing is in those. That's how cool her art is. But on the whole, Graylight falls a bit short. It's too bad.

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A Year of Cool Comics - Day 75

Comics Should Be Good!

- 2 days and 4 hours ago

Here is the latest in our year-long look at one cool comic (whether it be a self-contained work, an ongoing comic or a run on a long-running title that featured multiple creative teams on it over the years) a day (in no particular order whatsoever)! Here's the archive of the moments posted so far!

Today we take a look at the initial story arc from Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Gaydos' Alias...

Enjoy!

With the news that Jessica Jones would be returning to the superhero game in New Avengers, I thought it'd be a fun idea to re-visit the early days of Jessica Jones in the pages of Alias.

When we first meet Jessica, she is accosted by a jerk of a client and she ends up throwing him through her door after he tries to hit her.

Thus we learn her background...

And soon after, we discover that she is in a dark, dark place in her life right now...

At the end of issue #1, after Jessica is hired to find the sister of a woman, she tapes the sister with a man, who turns out to be, well, someone that Jessica did not expect...

Jessica is then thrown into a whole big mess of a conspiracy that goes all the way to the highest level of national politics, and it all revolves around the world of superheroing that Jessica left behind long ago.

The greatest thing about Alias is that Brian Michael Bendis did such a good job creating a multi-faceted character in Jessica that he basically can just throw her into different situations just to see how she will react.

It makes Alias a very interesting book to read, especially because she's a likable enough character that you WANT to see her make the most out of her life.

Michael Gaydos handles the darkness of the tale quite well - he is a strong storyteller and the sequences in the book are top rate.

This first storyline is collected in the first Alias trade, along with the following story arc.

If you enjoyed Bendis' earlier crime comics, then Alias is right up your alley as it has the same character-driven focus that his crime comics had. Very well crafted comics.

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Scott's Classic Comics Corner: A Showcase of Bargains

Comics Should Be Good!

- 2 days and 4 hours ago

Showcase is one of the great titles of the Silver Age. Alas, many of the best known books from that series (Showcase #4, Showcase #34 and Showcase #60 are all examples) are very pricey. This week I'm taking a look at some later issues that are less well known, but are noteworthy all the same and can be found for relative peanuts:

Showcase #72
I love westerns, and you should, too! Johnny Thunder is one of the greatest western strips of all-time and Showcase #72 reprints the story “Unseen Allies” from All-American Western #104. It also has a fun late 50s Trigger Twins story originally published in All-Star Western #101. There’s also a short 3-page Joe Kubert story about the Texas Rangers. Toth, Infantino and Kubert all in one place? And a new Russ Heath cover? Priceless, you say? We all VGish copy recently sold for $1.04 on eBay.

Showcase #78
Created by Len Wein and Marv Wolfman, Jonathan Sebastian "Jonny" Double is a penniless private eye located in San Francisco. He’s a cross between Sam Spade and Alan Ginsberg, dig? It may seem a bit dated today, but it’s a fun â€˜hippie noir’ concoction and Jack Sparling’s inventive layouts lets the reader know that DC is up for a little experimentation. A VG copy recently sold on eBay for $2.75

Showcase #79
What can I say about Showcase #79 that hasn’t already been said? It is simply one of the most beautiful books put out by DC during the 60s. Dolphin’s origin tale “The Fantasy at 14 Fathoms” was written and drawn by Jay Scott Pike, one of the most talented artists of the 50s and 60s. It is a beautiful thing and should be a part of everyone's collection. As an added bonus, this issue also includes a reprint of Aqualad's origin with terrific Ramona Fradon artwork. I have not seen any recent sales, but I'd imagine a copy in VG could be found for well under $10.

showcase87

Showcase #87 to #89
These issues featured Joe Kubert’s Firehair, and is a must read for a Kubert fans. This is a different character than the Firehair who had her own title for Fiction House circa 1950 but the overall concept is the same. DC’s writers and editors obviously noted the shift that was going on in Hollywood vis-à-vis how westerns were constructed or, more appropriately, deconstructed. Kubert had become the Kubert that we all know and love at this stage and he was really playing around with layouts. The fever dream that is issue #89 is particularly impressive. Last week, a 2 book lot of issues 86 and 87 in VGish sell for $4.25.

showcase92

Showcase #91 to #93
Manhunter 2070 is a terrific strip that ran in the final three issues of the first incarnation of Showcase. An interplanetary bounty hunter named Starker is the star of this strip and the combination of exotic locales, a witty robot assistant and Mike Sekowsky artwork give it a real â€˜Star Hawkins’ vibe. Personally, I think DC was onto something here as these stories were very entertaining and I’ll always believe there’s room on the spinner rack for sci-fi noir. Showcase ended on a high note. These are dirt cheap as issues #92 & #93 (VG+ and VG-) recently sold for $1.01 and all 3 issues in VGish sold for $5.50.

There's also the likes of Nightmaster and Jason's Quest among others from the last few years of Showcase, but I'd suggest starting with the ones I've noted above. For more comic book talk - stop by my blog Seduction of the Indifferent

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4,1,3,2,love

Keith Champagne on WWE Heroes

Comics Should Be Good!

- 2 days and 6 hours ago

Next week, the first issue of Titan's WWE Heroes comic series comes out and, being a big wrestling and comics fan, I wanted to get some more info on the series, so I went straight to the most logical source: Keith Champaigne, the writer of the book. He provides some background on the series and how it fits into the WWE Universe below the cut.

Chad Nevett: For those unaware, what's the basic premise of WWE Heroes?

Keith Champagne: First off, thanks for your interest and help in promoting these comics, it's much appreciated.

WWE Heroes is, more than anything, concerned with the eternal rivalry between two brothers: The Firstborn and The King Of Shadows. Since the dawn of time, these two have been fighting for dominance and their conflict has actually helped to shape recorded history. For instance, it's inferred that the fall of Rome was largely brought about by the machinations of the King Of Shadows.

So there's a mythology that we've created for this series and it actually has a deep connection to the WWE, something that will pull our favorite WWE Superstars and Divas smack dab into a war they could have never imagined.

What makes it different from the weekly WWE TV shows?

I'd say the stakes are much higher than the typical RAW or SMACKDOWN match. We have a lot of wrestling action, don't get me wrong but here, the matches are an important part of the story, a tool of a sorts in the over-arching story that becomes more increasingly important as we go, something that envelopes the entire roster.

It's not unlike the build up to a pay-per-view show in terms of structure. We just approach it from a different way.

How are you approaching the characters? How loyal to their on-screen personas are you remaining?

Wrestlers switch allegiances quite a bit so I'm not so concerned with portraying individuals as good or evil, but as real people who have been swept up in a horrible situation. If there's a long standing relationship, say between Triple H or Shawn Michaels, I try to texture that into the story but I'm really approaching the WWE superstars as the men and women behind the tights, not their public characters.

Are there any specific WWE superstars you'll be focusing on as the leads?

Primarily the most well-known, main event players: Triple H, Undertaker, and Shawn Michaels probably get the most attention. Vince has a large role. Big Show and John Cena are prominent. And I try to get face time for as many of the mid-card guys as I can but the spotlight is definitely on the biggest names.

Is there a specific time in the WWE's history that you're working from continuity-wise?

Nah. WWE continuity changes so much, so quickly that trying to tie it into a specific period would drive me mad. We're creating our own continuity.

Having said that, I would like to do something that begins in the boom of the 80's, hits the peak in the 90's, and concludes today. It's tricky to pull off because of likeness rights but it's not impossible.

With wrestlers changing from heel to face (or vice versa), obviously some allegiances wouldn't be possible in the WWE now -- do you think that will be problematic for readers? Was that at all problematic for you as a writer? (For example, since the comic appears to have been written and drawn prior to Batista's heel turn, him working with John
Cena would fly in the face of their current feud.)

This is one of the biggest reasons why we decided to create our own continuity for the comics. Every turn would force continual re-writing and recasting of rolls in the comic and force me to jump off a building. We took the safer, saner path.

Have you consulted with any WWE superstars on their characters in the comic?

No, but I'm told that more than a few of the WWE superstars are excited to see how they're treated in the comic. So for the record, Big Show? I'm sorry. It was for the story.

The WWE superstars are welcome to contact me if they have ideas for their characters they'd like me to try to implement.

Wrestling is very action-oriented, often quickly paced with fluid movements whereas comics are a more static medium. What can happen in the ring in two or three seconds could take a page to convey. How have you approached the in-ring action in the comic to make it work for the medium?

A good wrestling match tells a story and I've tried to approach that the same way in the comic. In some cases, the context of the match is defined by the story. In others, the match becomes the story we're telling. But every match is designed to peak and valley and unfolds with its own rhythm. The matches have been ridiculously thought out.

Is there a specific audience you're writing for? Obviously, like any fan community, wrestling fans look for different things. Since the WWE has been targeting kids strongly in the past year, is the comic aimed at children more than, say, smarks who read the dirt sheets and online sites for spoilers, rumours, and backstage gossip? Or are you trying to appeal to as much of the fanbase as possible?

I consider myself a lifelong wrestling fan and I'm writing a wrestling comic that I'd like to read. That's really my only gauge for any of this. There's nothing in there that would preclude the younger audience from enjoying it and there's nothing in it that would alienate the older demographic. But mostly, I asked myself what I'd like to see in a wrestling comic and started from there.

I don't know how to ask this without seeming too snarky, but you've said online that you're a wrestling fan, so how about we conclude things with a few quick 'prove your fan cred' questions? Favourite wrestler of all time? Favourite current wrestler? Favourite match of all time? (If it helps, I'd say my favourite wrestler of all time is Bret Hart, my current favourite is Chris Jericho, and my favourite match is the 1991 Intercontinental Championship match between Bret
Hart and Mr. Perfect.)

My all-time favorite wrestler is Andre The Giant. Kind of an obvious choice but I just always loved Andre when I was young. I make no apologies for it. I was also a big fan of Mil Mascaras and the original Tiger Mask.

Keeping things focused on WWE, as far as in-ring work, I think it's really hard to top Shawn Michaels. He's one of the all-time greats. As far as characters, Rick Martel as "The Model" always cracked me up. His blindfold match w/ Jake Roberts is a classic!

Of the current, newer crop of wrestlers I like David Hart Smith, I'm interested in seeing where he and Dibiase Jr go with their careers.

And my all-time favorite match? It's tough to narrow it to just one, maybe one of the 60 minute Flair/Steamboat classics from the 80's. Steamboat/Savage from Wrestlemania 3. The Rock and Triple H had a great ladder match at Summerslam 98, which I was backstage for. Does that give me wrestling cred?

***

Thanks to Keith and Titan. WWE Heroes #1 is on sale March 23 and you can view the trailer for the issue here.

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Comic Critics #109!

Danielle Leigh's Reading Diary -- Biomega volume 1

Comics Should Be Good!

- 2 days and 21 hours ago

Tsutomu Nihei's Biomega is a bleak, nihilistic vision of the future that is also surprisingly entertaining.

Biomega

In the first pages of the book, a man on a motorcycle enters a town populated by people who've been zombified by a disease simply known as "N5S," which is currently ravaging the planet.Â He's looking for a young woman whose biology may be the key to modifying the disease and fighting off virtual human extinction .Â The subsequent pages follow him as he battles not only zombies, but sentient bears as well (yes, you read that right) in his quest to recover the girl and to stop a shadowy organization's conspiracy to spread the disease to every part of the earth.

Unlike a lot of science-fiction or fantasy manga, there is no sense that Nihei is spending much time world-building, so much as the brutal world that the protagonist encounters just exists.Â The art is the real star of the book and it often feels as though we are perched right inside the main character's brain, making it incredibly easy to follow the action.Â David Welsh aptly compared the book to a first person shooter video game in his excellent review, noting "With its fast pace and progressively escalating stakes, Biomega actually does a better job capturing the experience of playing a video game than comics that are actually adaptations of existing franchises."Â Not being a fan of first person shooter games, I found the experience quite novel in comic book form.Â It made the book easy to digest, but also a strangely light, airless reading experience in spite of the heavy subject matter (human body parts fly quite a bit in parts of the book).Â While there is next to no character development, there is a strong sense of real space and time, as the strange motorcyclist proceeds to fight his way from one fantastically realized humanity-deprived environment to the next.

Oddly, I found reading the book enjoyable but am not entirely sure if I liked the comic.Â Post-apocalyptic manga may be a well-worn genre but there is certainly enough weirdness here (once again, the talking bear, who is wielding a rifle, is incredibly memorable) to distinguish this title from other artists' attempts to destroy the earth as we know it.Â What may set Nihei's vision apart is his ability to tear apart the fabric of human existence so stylishly.

3 Comments

At March 15, 2010, Eric Rupe wrote:

Despite my general loathing of all things zombie related, I really enjoyed this. Not so much for the plot, which ...
At March 15, 2010, Bill Reed wrote:

Having seen the panel with the be-rifled bear, I think this might be the manga that gets me reading manga.
At March 15, 2010, Danielle Leigh wrote:

Eric -- yeah, I'm totally not into zombies and yet this comic went over pretty well with me. And ...

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A review a day: Omega Comics Presents #1

Comics Should Be Good!

- 3 days and 1 hours ago

As Our Dread Lord and Master explains, if you send us something in the mail, we will review it ... no matter what! So beware! Be aware!

So very indy!

Now, that's not to say Omega Comics Presents #1, which is published by Pop! Goes the Icon and costs $3.50, is a bad comic. But it's not terribly memorable, either. It's an anthology book, so you just never know what you're going to get, but at least if one story sucks, you'll get another one in that very issue! So let's check out the stories in this, okay?

The lead story gives the comic its name, as it's called "Omega." Much like Marvel comics, above the splash page is a brief paragraph explaining the scenario: In the aftermath of 9/11, a covert domestic anti-terror unit called Strike Force Omega has been sniffing out threats and stopping the bad guys. Omega is made up of agents who have superpowers, as well. So we're off!

This is the first chapter of the story, so the creator, PJ Perez, has to set things up quickly. Terrorists take over Hoover Dam and a high-school tour group in the process. Strike Force Omega is notified and a few of them take off for Nevada. That's it, plot-wise. Before they leave, we get some hints about future installments, as they believe that they have a mole inside the team (it's just like CTU!), a fear that is only exacerbated when they realize the dam was taken without them getting any intelligence about it. Their boss, Colonel Lamar Washington, believes it's Al-Qaeda, but he's not sure. He also only sends two members of the team, because they need to keep it quiet. So there's a bit more going on beyond just the plot. Not a lot, but enough to be intriguing. Perez's art is somewhat typical of this kind of low-budget indy comic - he has talent, certainly, but needs work on fluidity and nuance. His characters are very stiff and a bit disproportionate, with very little variation in their facial features and emotional range. Perez doesn't really have a ton of action in this chapter, which is probably a good thing, as from the way he draws his characters it appears he might have difficulty with that. But there's potential.

The next story, "Odd Job," is the best in terms of writing. Robert Durham's art is nothing spectacular (it reminds me a bit of Chris Wozniak's, which, unfortunately, isn't really a compliment), but it is more intricate than Perez's, which is necessary for this story, which takes place in an old mansion and therefore needs some atmosphere. Durham is fine with that, but again, his figure work is stiff. But Alex De-Gruchy's story is a nifty little ghost story with a nice twist, as a couple hires a friend to clean out their mansion before they move in. The mansion belonged to the woman's great-grandfather, who was a mobster during the 1920s. He and his wife now haunt the house, and both, naturally, show up when Hank starts his job. It's actually fairly clever - nothing great, but De-Gruchy has a decent sense of pacing and timing and even knows when to let Durham tell some of the story. It's an interesting ghost story, which is kind of hard to pull off.

The third story, "Making No Magnifisense," unfortunately, is pretty terrible. John Dimes writes and draws it, and there's really nothing redeeming about it. The art is ugly, very rough and uneven, sketchy in places and more detailed in others, never really cohering. Dimes does have a halfway decent double-page spread in the middle of the story that shows a battle on the psychic plane, but otherwise, it's poor. And the story, about a superhero who is approached by an odd little man who is more than he seems, is lousy too. Dimes plays it completely straight even though both characters are ridiculous, and it reads like a half-baked Stan Lee script, with utter bombast and a strange idea that comes out of nowhere and resolves just as quickly. I get that the writers need to be quick about it in an anthology, but "Odd Job," which is three pages longer than this, is packed with plot, while this is simply goofy. I hate criticizing something in a tiny indy comic that is obviously a labor of love, but this story is just no good.

The final story, "(All We Are Saying is) Give Pizza a Chance," is written by Dino Caruso and notably drawn by Jason Copland, the only creator in this book that I've heard of. Jason is a pretty cool guy (plus he likes Marillion, so you know he's jake) and a good artist, and it's no surprise that this two-pager is the most professional looking of the issue, with solid figure work, a good eye for detail, and people who look like actual people. The story is set in a pizza parlor and is a rather silly joke, but it raises a chuckle, and that's fine and dandy. It's difficult to believe that there are people as stupid as the pizza parlor proprietor in the world, but perhaps there are! But it's a fun little joke.

As this is a seriously independent comic, I doubt if you'll find it lying around your local comics shoppe. You can go to the web site and buy it there. I can't recommend it completely, but if you're looking for something a bit off the beaten track, check it out. It's a typical first issue from a tiny press, which means there's room for improvement. But the fun of comics comes through rather well, and there's nothing wrong with that!

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