Yeah, I'm totally lazy.
Coming in a couple of days will be the first ever "Comics I Read Last Week". Hopefully that will make amends to you viewers. All two of you.
I bought several things this week, though I wasn't totally pleased with the results. Here's what we got. I'm listening to Torche's Meanderthal as I write this, so expect my sentences to punctuate in concordance with their totally awesome heavy metal rhythms.
--
- ALL-STAR SUPERMAN #12
Writer: Grant Morrison
Artist: Frank Quitely
The final issue of the Morrison/Quitely run of the series!
Was I excited! Hell yes! However, I must add that that excitement was mixed with sort of a melancholic longing for the book to continue on. Even though it's been, what, 4 years for these 12 issues to come out, the three or months between the sharply written and drawn, mostly done-in-one stories is part of what made seeing it on the stands such a thrill.
Unfortunately, as much as I was looking forward to this one, this closer was kind of a letdown.
Maybe my expectations were just absurdly high. Maybe I thought it would close with a Quitely-stylized Superman bursting from the pages into my living room, telling me all the
things deceased friends had wanted to tell me while they were alive, and smiling as he departed into the sunlit sky.
You know what, I take it back. I don't feel that bad about expecting that. Morrison is (or at least he alleges he is) a chaos magician after all, in addition to being a wonderful writer, so why can't he combine his magic with his wit and imagination and make something like this happen? If he can't, then what's the point of the whole magic business in the first place? It's certainly not making him grow any hair.
Anyhoo - this issue had some smart moments and some surprises. Superman using a gravity gun isn't just "Wouldn't it be cool if Superman used a gun? LOL" fangasming, but actually has a purpose (I expect nothing less from Morrison). The dialogue was smart, the end of Lex Luthor's plan was actually satisfying (unlike most Superman stories in which his overconfidence provides a gaping weakness), but I still felt like it could have been so much more.
Take the ending to issue #10 for example, in which the world that Superman created eventually came to mirror our own world more than the one contained within the pages and closed with Siegel and Shuster's creation of the character. Can't you imagine Morrison ending the book with Superman dying, but his existence as a fictional character in the world he created ending up saving more lifes and providing more inspiration than his own life ever could have?
Wouldn't that have been neat? Or would that have been too obvious, too wannabe Animal Man?
In an interview at the NY Comic Con in the spring of '08, Morrison mentioned he loved writing this book so much that he wouldn't mind continuing with another artist. I can't wait for that. - THE WALKING DEAD #52
Writer: Robert Kirkman
Aritst: Charlie Adlard
This is a stark contrast to All-Star Superman. Why? Because here's a book in which I can't stand how long it often takes to come out. It's so addictive, that I want it weekly, dammit. It can't be that hard to pull off. Kirkman could make it his full time job and hire a few extra artists.
This book is pure comic book heroin. And like heroin, usage doesn't so much make you feel good or satisfied as it merely temporarily lulls your addiction. Actually, I've never used heroin before, but that's my best guess as to what it's like.
My take on this book is constantly changing. One month, I'm saying it's the best comic out right now that's coming out in issues, with each issue having a solid kick to the gut punchline. Another month I'll be saying that nothing happens in the comic, wondering why I read it in the first place, and threatening to cancel my subscription if it goes on like this for another few issues.
This month's issue fell more into the latter. Not much advanced the story, not much that was terribly original happened that you can't already guess from the cover. To boot, the thing took less than 5 minutes to read. Kirkman's down to using an average of like 2 panels per page now, perhaps under the mistaken impression that most people that read comics need reading glasses and can't make out the small panels of a 6 to 9 panel grid.
Give me my three bucks worth. - WAR HEROES #2
Writer: Mark Millar
Art: Tony Harris
It's picking up. The last issue was pretty dull, mostly giving kind of a retrospective look at the last few years in a world in which the military decided to start giving superpowers to ordinary soldiers in order to increase enlistment and give an edge to the soldiers on the ground in Iraq. There was only a slight introduction to the main characters and what would be the main story, and so now we're getting to see more of it.
However, while it is picking up, it's still not completely there yet. There were a lot of fangasm splash page moments of soldiers doing ridiculous things like lifting up tanks or shooting fire and ice, in addition to there being a Mark Millar shock value moment, but aside from that, I still don't feel like the meat of the story has really been hit yet.
It's funny - in an interview for Fresh Ink, Millar mentioned that if the U.S. Governemnt really did give out superpowers, he would happily enlist and fight in some Middle Eastern country. He is in fact, totally horny for soldiers lifting up tanks and using super speed, and seemed to imply that he sincerely intended this book to be more of a "Wouldn't it be awesome?" idea than a hypothetical, what-Big-Government-will-do-to-win-a-war book. Which in my opinion, is kind of a breath of fresh air, because the latter take is very heavy handed and obvious. - UNCANNY X-MEN #502
Writer: Matt Fraction & Ed Brubaker
Artist: Greg Land
Uncanny X-Men has turned out to be a pretty solid book ever since the end of Messiah Complex, way back in issue #495. Basically, all of the characters from Astonishing X-Men got bored of only seeing the light every four months, so they invaded the pages of Uncanny and kicked out a lot of the characters that weren't as popular. Star power always wins out, and the mutant world is no exception. Though I don't really feel all that bad for that douchebag Havok.
The X-Men have been living in San Francisco, taking it easy, and now are fighting a reincarnation of the Hellfire Club. The last issue was pretty cool, though this issue felt a little more standard to me. There's a brawl, there's Cyclops acting tough and decisive, and an enemy telepath. Mostly, it felt like a transitionary issue.
As much as I have a crush on Matt Fraction's writing, I'm a little disappointed with his wit in this book. He kept mentioning in interviews that he was really excited about writing Cyclops, and my response was "Yeah! We'll get to see him exhibit at least two dimensions... possibly three!" But so far, it seems like we've mostly just seen the tough decisions, hard-ass leader Cyclops, and less of the conflicted and emotionally isolated side of him that makes him interesting.
Fuck - talking about how Cyclops can be interesting just makes me really really want to read Joss Whedon's run of Astonishing X-Men again. Then again, maybe my standards are unfair - I certainly wasn't that impressed three issues into his run. - ACTION COMICS #869
Writer: Geoff Johns
Artist: Gary Frank
I've actually been digging Geoff Johns' run on the big blue guy. You'd think I'd be an artsy fartsy snob and say that nobody but Grant Morrison should write the character, but nuh-uh. I've been picking up the book since Escape From Bizarro World debuted, and honestly, I thought at the time that storyline came out, the book was better than All-Star.
In retrospect, it's clear that Escape has really been the strongest part of the run. The combination of the storytelling talents of Eric Powell and Richard Donner obviously aided the book tremendously... but even the aesthetic of that story was really strong. It was a mostly standalone story; a graphic novel that just happened to be released in three issues in one of the main Superman books. You didn't have to do know what was going on in the book, and it certainly wasn't contrived to lead into anything else. What made it so strong, in addition to the wonderful storytelling, was a sentimentalism that most Superman writers lack when they write the character. It wasn't just referencing Superman's small-town Americana upbringing, it was retelling it and feeding it to you in a way that made you understand why his small-town perceptions of the people and the big world sur
rounding really defined his charity.
Since then, the stories have been more typical of DCU books - they're big big stories with lots of characters and big sci-fi elements. This Brainiac story that has been going has been okay. The main twist to it is that all the Brainiac robots we've seen in the past weren't Brainiac himself, but merely drones sent out from the original Brainiac. We finally see the original Brainiac - a big green alien guy. Lots of continuity buffs are really bummed about this revelation. Not having read any in-continuity Superman stories, I don't really care too much and kind of appreciate the twist. Gary Frank's artwork is also seriously awesome. When I look at his depiction of Superman, I literally see Christopher Reeve.
I'm still kind of confused as to what is going on. Apparently Brainiac can physically overpower Big Blue and his similarly overpowered cousin with ease, and I'm not really sure as to why. Also, the cover is incredibly misleading. Nowhere in the issue is Superman taking it easy with Pa Kent in Smallville, and nowhere is there a Brainiac moon that looks like a level from Starfox.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment