General comics review thread

[Philip Ayres]

Oh that one shot stank like a stinky thing.

Sold the LS on eBay and covered the cost of the trade, Result.

I enjoyed the idea of the LS asking questions and not providing the answers. Leaving you to have a think about them. If you expand what you see in the LS to the rest of the MU ,,,,

[Andy Turnbull]

Jim Owsley's (later to be known as Christopher Priest) Green Lantern stories from the post GLC issues and preceding the GL 1990 title are a lot of fun. The Action Comics Weekly run is much ignored and it's a shame, great art from Mark Bright and of course gave us Lord Malvolio. Issues are cheap as chips on Ebay and well worth checking out.

Makes me wish both Action Comics and Detective Comics had gone weekly and stayed weekly. Good lynchpins to build the DCU on.

Andy

[The Doctor]

But...but we have...Countdown!!!

-Ralph

[Andy Turnbull]

Don't remind me.

Andy

[legios]

Apr 21, 2008 19:53:04 GMT The Doctor said:

But...but we have...Countdown!!!

-Ralph

Which surely could be identified as being part of the problem, rather than the solution......

Karl

[Andy Turnbull]

52 while not to my tastes was at least a good effort. Countdown has been botched since the start. They even blew the fact that when Kyle was possessed by Parallax that he easily gets free of him, loses his ION status and becomes a GL again. Way to go.

Andy

[The Doctor]

Apr 21, 2008 21:03:26 GMT Andy Turnbull said:

Don't remind me.

Andy

Thy sorrow is Seidring's joy.

-Ralph

[kayevcee]

Does anyone know what LS stands for? Phil mentions it a few times on the previous page but I can't figure out what it refers to.

-Nick

[Andy Turnbull]

Limited Series.

Andy

[Philip Ayres]

Sorry, aught to have been clearer.

[kayevcee]

No worries, Phil.

Bizarrely, after last week's Brave and the Bold I'm actually looking forward to Final Crisis. Granted, Death of the New Gods and All-Star Superman are the only other DC books I buy so I've no idea what to expect apart from a vague feeling that it will involve Darkseid and Grant Morrison at his cosmic-est, but honestly that's probably all I need to know. I'll give it a first issue, at least.

-Nick

[Philip Ayres]

I'm feeling a bit underwelmed by lots of the stuff I've read this week. Possibly the mood I'm in

X-Factor 30 More of Arcade trying to kill em.

Uncanny X-Men 497 497 ? I can remember seeing 197 on the shelves. More stuff in San Fransisco and Russia, not much advancement but what they do feels good and right.

X-Men Divided We Stand 1 of 2 A selection of short stories surrounding the sundered X-Men and New X-Men. Highlights for me were the Northstar guest spot, and the Nightcrawler vs Scalphunter strip at the end.

Avengers Initiative 11 The last part of Killed In Action. Big wrap up but the best bits were early on with the banter between Gyrich and Blitzkrieg and the revelation that War Machine isn't Jim Rhodes and might be Deathlok

Young Avengers Presents 4 Vision The Vision has fallen for Cassie. Bwuh ? Where did that come from ? Some acknowledgement of the Vision's relationship to the Scarlet Witch is present, which is good.... Stature gets the next round to herself.

Mighty Avengers 12 What Nick Fury did after Secret War. Interesting. But not a lot of Avengers in it. Very interesting last double page spread with circled faces and some doubles there - including the Young Avengers - Weren't they seen at Camp Hammond despite not having registered ?

Captain America 37 Good as ever. New Cap gets to meet a couple of old Cap's friends. And the "Steve" in Zemo's cold store isn't Steve. You might want to be looking up Grand Dictator in the Marvel Universe Book of the Dead.

[Philip Ayres]

4 comics this week. Would have been 5 but there wasn't a spare Iron Fist in the comic shop. Doesn't matter though as I grabbed one off eBay for less than retail when you shove the postage in - it's passed some sellers by that this is a double issue !

Anhyhoo

Ex Machina 36 After a series of one shots we've got back to a longer story. We've got someone jumping off the remaining tower, and Kremlin's mad plot to do .... something ..... to Mitch. Early days for this story yet, lots of pieces in this issue no clear direction for the story overall.

X-Men Legacy 210 More flashback battles in Xavier's head, and the revelation of what Exodus wants Charles for. Charles walks away and seemingly makes clear the entire purpose of this story: To wipe the slate clean of all the misdemeanours and behind the scenes shinanigans that he's been shown to be dealing in these last few years.

Avengers Initiative 12 Graduation. My interest in this has been falkling away a bit the last few issues I'm afraid. It may be Rhodes inside War Machine after all - in which case what happened to him ? Nice to see Gyrich squirm.

New Avengers 40 Same problem as the last Mighty Avengers - see previous post - which I forgot to highlight at the time: This isn't an Avengers story, it's some background to a story the Avengers are involved with. Final page reveal isn't unexpected.

[The Doctor]

Thor: Something Something. You know, the Matt Fraction one. Buggered if I can recall the title, damn it's hot today. It was fantastic and urinates all over the fucking awful JMS Thor comic.

The Order 10: Decent end to the series, though like the previous issue marred my multiple artists unable to keep to the same character designs. I'm not convinced this was designed as a 10-issue run, there are plot points and character arcs dangling all over the place. I enjoyed what we had though, and hope the characters do not vanish into the Marvel Obscurity Vault.

FCBD X-Men: Ah, we are in Wales. So there has to be trouble down a mine. Crap. Competant, but crap. And Greg Land can fuck off with his magic tracer.

DC Universe #0. Even though it was free, I still want my money back. The most fucking terrible professional comic I have ever read that Prat Lee wasn't near.

-Ralph

[legios]

May 6, 2008 20:31:50 GMT The Doctor said:

Thor: Something Something. You know, the Matt Fraction one. Buggered if I can recall the title,

Thor: Ages of Thunder. (Says Karl, cheating and looking at the copy sitting on the keyboard shelf to his left.)

A bit of a bumper pile this time, so without further ado:-

Legion of Superheroes in the 31st Century#13: Basically an all-ages riff on parts of "Man of Steel" - back in the 21st Century a young Clark Kent and Lois Lane are working as fact-checkers for the Daily Planet and trying to get gigs as reporters, so they jump at the chance to cover Lex Luthor's unveiling of his new "Lex-O-Skeleton 3000". Of course things go wrong and it looks very much like a job for Superman. Good solid stuff that I would happily give to young relatives to get them into Superhero comics. It isn't clever, deep of innovative but it does a good job on riffing on its inspirations. It appears that they may be laying the ground-work for the books first on-going plot thread too.

Powers Annual #1: Not quite sure what to make of this to be honest. Nice to see Oeming taking the writers position on the book but it feels a little... inconsequential. Harking back to the last story arc of the Image run it feels a little like cut-content rather than anything with much weight of its own. It isn't bad by any means. It just doesn't quite feel up to snuff.

Powers#28: I'd drifted away from "Powers" for a while, so I thought I would dip back in and I am glad I did. We're very much back to the cop stuff, with one of the regular cast going undercover in an attempt to catch a serial killer, only for it all to go horribly wrong as some of the on-going sub-plots run straight into the main plot. I find myself enjoying "Powers" the most when it has a good strong spine of police drama holding things together, and on that level this arc looks like it will deliver.

Legion of Superheroes#41: Still managing to juggle multiple plot threads very effectively. A large cast team-book (and there are few with larger casts than the Legion) benefits from having enough going on to keep everyone occupied where possible, and that is something that Shooter is delivering nicely. The plots are being kept on the boil and moving along at a reasonable enough pace that you don't feel short-changed by their variable amounts of spotlight time. Also liked the little in-joke that made the cover of this issue - a gag that works on one level for new readers, and has a second self-referential level for old-timers. The two pages of techno-babble explanation of the Flight Rings, their workings and other properties is quite entertaining as well. Good solid stuff, not a-list material by any means but very good at what it sets out to do.

Thor: Ages of Thunder:

Matt Fraction and a couple of art teams do Thor, and they do it very well. Somewhat different to the current "mainstream" Marvel Thor. This is a version that is somewhat closer to the original version, so he lives in a world of warrior gods and mighty battles against the Frost Giants. Very good stuff, reinventing Thor in a way that feels like it keeps faith both with the Marvel version and with the mythological roots. Not only that but with two stories in the one issue not only do you certainly get your moneys worth, but even though it serves as a prequel to an upcoming mini-series the two stories still read fine in their own right. Well written, with some lovely art to go along with it, and actually feels like a comic about Thor, god of Thunder, War and general smitingness. If only the regular Thor title was even half as good as this.

Knights of the Old Republic#27: Another good slice of pulpy nonsense - an evil talisman has fallen into the wrong hands, and it is up to our heroes to save the day... that is if they can actually get past the fact that they border on being the unluckiest people in the galaxy. There is something endearing about a lead character who actually realises that the things that happen to him sound absurd to everyone else, and actually just acknowledges that with a shrug, and then gets back to thwarting evil. Breezy, enjoyable and a long way over the top in the nicest pulpy way.

The Order#10: And so it ends, as it was always going to - with a tinge of tragedy to it. A pretty good ending to things, giving the cast a chance to show that it isn't superpowers that make you a hero - it's the fact of standing up and deciding that you are going to do what you can to make things better. Definitely doesn't feel like it was plotted for ten issues though - I felt a need to check to see that I hadn't actually missed an issue or something. There is a lot of unresolved business with these characters, which I would love to see revisited at a later date. I'd agree that there are too many artists on it though - it makes it feel bitty and annoyingly disjointed. By no means a bad ending to the series though, I just wish it wasn't actually ending as it just feels that these characters have the potential in them for more.

DC Universe#0: I got this for free from someone who also got it for free, and I still feel like this comic mugged both of us. Billed as a stand-alone story and an ideal starting point for new readers it manages to fail on both counts. There isn't actually a story in here - instead it is a set of teasers for other comics. Effectively the equivalent of the trailer reel before a film. Basically you get three or four page segments that are meant to make you want to pick up these other DC comics. Unfortunately they are in general so impenetrable that I can't imagine them selling the titles to people who don't already know about them. To actually understand the various segments you need to already have a fair grasp of DC lore. The Green Lantern segment is the worst offender here - one page of stuff that sounds like it makes sense to the characters and then a double-page spread that is just gibberish unless you already understand a major revelation that has taken place recently in the Green Lantern books. The only segment that comes close to making sense without already knowing lots of stuff about other DC comics is the Batman section. Which basically tells you that "This summer Batman will face a new enemy who wants to defeat him". Um yes.
Impenetrable rubbish for a new reader, not even an actual story.... This thing fails epically on every count that it attempts. DCU#0, go straight to the recycle bin, do not pass go and do not collecr your 200 shannix

Karl

[Philip Ayres]

Immortal Iron Fist 14 Seven Capital Cities off Heaven Part 7. Slightly off the pace of recent issues in a way I can't quite put my finger on but still good. Xao drops an almighty bombshell as he goes to meet his maker. Not many more Fraction issues of this to go.

[Andy Turnbull]

DC Universe #0

Fucking awful.

ClanDestine #2 

Enjoyable romp for fans of both the initial ClanDestine series as well as the Cross-Time Era Excalibur. Inexcusably the colour art on the book is bloody awful. It's overpowering and you can see when they've dicked about with the levels so much that the lineart gets muddy in places. Pretty much summing up what is wrong with computer colouring.

Andy

[Philip Ayres]

Anyone pick up the Fraction/LaRocca Invincible Iron Man #1 ?

[legios]

May 9, 2008 16:47:01 GMT Philip Ayres said:

Anyone pick up the Fraction/LaRocca Invincible Iron Man #1 ?

I take it that came out this week? I haven't been near a comics shop, and likely won't get a chance until the start of next week. If it is out though I shall be picking it up then.

Karl

[kayevcee]

Picked it up. Haven't read it*. Studying.

-Nick

*Yet.

[The Doctor]

I am Iron man!

-Ralph

[legios]

Invincible Iron Man#1:

I wasn't sure whether I was going to like this title to be honest. I've long had a soft spot for Iron Man, and I like Matt Fraction's work, but the way the Marvel Universe has positioned Iron Man as a character makes it hard for me to do anything other than dislike him. Fortunately Fraction manages to square that circle. It is still visibly the Pro-registration, order-minded Tony Stark, but it is a Stark who makes hard decisions based on strong opinions - and then worries as to whether he has made the right ones. There's a nice strand of self-doubt that makes him a far more appealing character than he has been of late.
The rest of the book is pretty good too - leaving the politiking and convoluted stuff at the door and focusing on the fact that Iron Man is a high-end, high-spec superhero in a dangerously high-tech world seems like it has a lot of potential.
The supporting cast also seems to have a lot of potential as well - the villian of the piece feels a lot like a younger, hungrier echo of Tony, and the reinvention of Pepper Potts (into something much more like the films capable, forthright and slightly flirtatious) seems to spark nicely against Fractions Iron Man.
In honesty then only thing that doesn't really do anything for me is Salvador Larroca's artwork on the book. Not sure why, but it doesn't really appeal to me.
Overall I think I am going to like this - Iron Man back doing superheroics instead of (supposedly) "socially relevant" stuff.

(In honesty, Fraction had me on-board at Starks whistful comment "I wanted to go to Houston to watch the shuttle land. They don't show it on the news anymore. They don't show it on the news unless people die.")

Karl

[The Doctor]

FCBB Superman: Reprints All-Star Superman #1. It was ok, but I was looking for something amazing considering the legendarily slow output the title has and it was just a very average Superman comic. Hmmm. Yeah.

-Ralph

[Philip Ayres]

It's been a whiel since I read All Star Superman 1 - and I read it in the trade - but I recall it not being quite as good as what follows. Try and borrow the rst from someone.

en route: Last Defeneders 2 & 3, Invincible Iron Man 1 and The new Iron Manual

[Andy Turnbull]

I'll loan you the hardcover Ralph of ASS it's really very good.

Andy

[Philip Ayres]

I think the issues that have been released since the HC are better.

[Andy Turnbull]

I'm waiting for the second HC but yeah having flicked through one or two I'd agree. Superman's Last Will being the best Superman story I've read in years.

Andy

[legios]

"Clandestine"#4: Yeah, pretty much a case of "if you like Clandestine, you'll like this". I quite like this series, but I fear I cannot see how this is going to straighten itself out to go for an ending in one issues time. I have a feeling it may end up leaving most things open for another mini to deal with. Enjoyable enough, but very much one for the converted.

"Captain Britain and MI13"#1: Worth reading the text page at the very front of the issue really, as the rest of the story clearly feels that you are already reading other Marvel comics and don't need much a primer as to why Captain Britain and the Black Knight are punching aliens. And is there ever a lot of alien punching in this issue. I'm a little bit in two minds about this title at the moment. Cornell seems to be having his characters dispense and awful lot of lethal force - including a "punching head off shoulders" moment that feels more like "The Authority" than anything I have seen Captain Britain in before. I'm not averse to fictional characters using lethal force - I just think that fighting wars is what soldiers are for, superheroes are for something else entirely. It just feels like an odd tone for characters like Cap Britain and the Black Knight. That aside, this isn't a bad debut issue - it starts somewhat "in media res", but there is nothing wrong with that . Paul Cornell seems to have a nice ear for most of the characters (although I remain to be convinced about his Captain Britain) and folk do at least sound reasonably English. I'm happy to give this a second issue to see where it is going with things. I've certainly seen worse debuts.

"Guardians of the Galaxy"#1: I think this title had me on-board from the moment that Rocket Raccoon bantered that they should call themselves "Ass-kickers of the Fantastic". That was the moment that I was convinced that this title wasn't going to take itself 100% seriously. Another "in media res" opening here - this time opening with the team in battle against an old Cosmic Marvel standby - the Church of Universal Truth - with flash-forwards to the post-mission debriefs serving as nice little character vignettes.
Somehow the aggressive tactics of the Guardians sit far better with me than those over in "Captain Britain". I think it is the difference in style. The Guardians look less like a group of superheroes and much more like a movie-style special forces unit. Indeed, the tone of the book is much more in-line with an action TV series than with superhero comics. Not that the title seems to have any pretensions to weightiness - the tone is very much "there are these blokes, they've all got together to protect the universe by going out and proactively preventing trouble escalating", and besides any pretention at all would soon be deflated by the fact that one of the team is an anthropomorphic racoon with a mini-gun. Yes, it deploys a lot of cliches, but in full awareness they are cliches and the intent of subverting them a little (the scene where they recruit Rocket Racoon and Groot just looks absurd, and works all the better for it). Not a title that is threatening to break into an attack of "relevance", "Guardians" seems set on providing larger than life space action with a strand of humor running through it. Given the choice between "Secret Invasion" and this I know which I would plump for.
(Hey, I actually did have the choice didn't I.......)

Karl
(Also "Guardians of the Galaxy" has as a supporting character Cosmo, who is beink a talking, telepathic Cosmonaut Dog from Soviet Russia. They are just fishing for bonus points with me now..)

[Philip Ayres]

I might try this in trades. I struggle with comics set in space - and even more with sci fi space comics - they frequently don't work for me.

Invincible Iron Man 1: Ok stuff. Lots of charging around with shield which i can get in the other book if I wanted it - some old fashioned Iron Man superheroics would have been nice. Not sure I can see myself buying monthly but maybe a trade buy.

Last Defenders 2: Things go really rather wrong for Kyle's team in this issue. Not so much of the cut aways to other locations this issue. 3's in the mail to me.

[The Doctor]

May 16, 2008 9:38:40 GMT Andy Turnbull said:

I'll loan you the hardcover Ralph of ASS it's really very good.

Andy

To my surprise, I found a copy in a library. Read #2 in 7 minutes flat. Gods, it bored me silly. Very dull to look at too.

I'm just not feeling the joy with this series.

-Ralph