All Across The Universes

Essentially Mine: Marvel Feature #11

2005-12-10T09:32:00.000+01:00

I love comics, I really do. You can read them anywhere: on the bus, in bed, while eating, on the toilet—they’re just perfect quick reads, and when they’re done well, they’re also very enjoyable indeed. They become equally enjoyable when they’re done just badly enough, at that.

I’m particularly fond of corny, cheesy comics from days of yore. As such, I am a very big fan of Marvel’s line of Essentials, the phonebook-sized black and white reproductions of their back issue library. They started out with all the classic 60s stuff, which is great for someone like me who didn’t start properly collecting until 1996-1997 (after having read European/Belgian strips since I was like 3 years old). But by now they’re also concentrating on a whole bunch of 70s era comics, which I consider to be my “missing decade”.

Being born at the tail end of the 70s, it’s the decade I know the least of. I remember the 80s vividly, having grown up in them, and the 60s I came to know thanks to my parents having grown up in them. The 70s always have been fairly enigmatic to me (in the sense that I never really bothered to find out more, mind you), and that also includes knowing very little about their funky superhero comics. Comics are a nice window into a general mindset of any given era, even with the natural lag between conception and publication.

You can probably imagine that 70s comics are often kooky as all heck. My favourite aspect would be the lack of pretentiousness. I don’t get a “Look at me! Look at how deep my work is! Look at all the linework!” vibe from them. I haven’t come across too many that were just plain moronic (like I often do nowadays) either. So I consider myself a recent fan of 70s comics, making me very grateful that Marvel will be publishing more and more Essentials from that timeframe in the near future.

All that, simply to lead up to this: I just read the first issue collected in Essential Marvel Two-In-One, and it was neat. MTIO was the Thing’s team-up title, just like Spider-Man had Marvel Team-Up and Superman had DC Presents. I guess the Thing must have been quite popular back then to warrant a 100-issue series plus annuals. Of course the real fun is found in all the guest-stars and the potential for a variety of writers and artists. Before MTIO started, the Thing first got two stories in Marvel Feature #11-12, both of which are included in the trade.

Marvel Feature #11 starts out with the Thing feeling sorry for himself (big surprise there, it’s one of his favourite pastimes). He’s being monitored by an old foe—a very old foe, as it turns out, because he hadn’t been seen since all the way back in Fantastic Four #7: the not-so-dreaded Kurrgo, Master of Planet X! Shunned by his miniaturized fellow X’ians, he wants to wreak vengeance on them with the unsolicited help of the strongest one there is—the Hulk! Because this is a team-up story, writer Len Wein duly brings out a Hulk-villain as well, one of the classic ones, the Leader, who is somehow in stasis but still able to communicate telepathically. The two baddies will use their respective foes as champions to fight and whoever wins, will get control over both of the big brawlers plus all the scientific knowledge of their adversary.

Why Kurrgo doesn’t just throw the Leader out of his spaceship is beyond me. He’s in stasis, you dolt! He can’t do anything!

I don’t know what it is about old comics, but in back issue form, things like that read as charming contrivancies. When someone like Loeb or Bendis does it in a modern-day comic, I get all huffy. Go figure.

The Thing and the Hulk get zapped to an abandoned desert town and pound on each other because the script requires them to. I don’t mind though, because Jim Starlin was on top of his game back then and draws a very pleasant knock-down drag-out fight. This issue is entirely plot-driven and said plot is rather flimsy, but dynamic art goes a long way in making it enjoyable nonetheless. So does dialogue like this:

“Hulk does not like this ‘clobbering time’, Thing! Hulk thinks it is dumb! Hulk thinks Thing is dumb, too!” and then Ben gets all pissed because of a “palooka” insulting his intelligence (despite not knowing the difference between a projection and an injection a few pages earlier).

It all wraps up rather quickly: Hulk and Thing are zapped to the ship, where Thing somehow straight away figures out that Kurrgo was cheating by making him stronger than usual, prompting the STILL-STUCK-IN-A-TUBE (!!!) Leader to proclaim himself as winner by default (some winner), which in turn greatly upsets Kurrgo, who sets his silly robot after the two monstrous heroes, who of course bash the tin man with great ease and trash the ship in the process, causing it to blow after the title characters have jumped out (but naturally, Kurrgo and the Leader didn’t escape on panel. Odds on them being dead are infinitesimal though). How’s that for a run-on sentence, eh? :)

It’s just a stupid issue, but I would give it to kids to read in a heartbeat, because it’s sheer, unbridled fun. Good guys, bad guys, slam-dunk action, a really great artist coupled with an equally great inker (Joe Sinnott). There should be more comics like this (of course then I'd be buying even more than I already do. Hmmm, there's a bad side to everything, isn't there? :p).

Comics shouldn’t be like this across the board, but they’re great entryways for kids into the medium, or even simply into reading, without being condescending. Marvel Feature #12 features Starlin’s Blood Brothers and Iron Man, so I’m already looking forward to the next mindless but true-to-form comic-booky fight! (I’m also keeping my fingers crossed for more MTIO collections as well as future MTU ones—team-up stories just boogie! ;))

No time! No time!

2005-12-03T15:26:00.000+01:00

What with work being quite busy and reading a nice big-ass thriller (a 1000-pager, whoo!), I haven't been able to post anything useful lately. Or at least, not on here. Since last week I've started contributing reviews to The Comics Review, a place run by a couple buds and acquaintances of mine. It's worth dropping by, if I do say so myself.

So far I've reviewed Books of Doom #1 and Desolation Jones #4.

I also just put up a review for this week's Adventures of Superman #646. The downside is I have no real option to use purty pictures the way I tend to like on this forum. The upside is I can write faster because I don't have to worry about scanning in the relevant images and laying out the post ;)

I intend to do another review or two this weekend, be it on here or over there (I'll save the new stuff for the site and the back issue blatherings for this place). I also really want to make some more new wallpapers. One of my favorites is this damn old one (which just so happens to feature two pieces of Sal Buscema art, so this is like an unofficial "Our Sal Pal" episode :D). Can't say I'm not fond of this recent one either, even if I do wish the girl in that outfit was my girlfriend rather than Britney ;)

So with some luck I'll post again tomorrow. But who knows what the morn will bring...

Black versus Black

2005-11-22T18:24:00.000+01:00

This is a stray thought I had while I was on the bus to work this morning. There's a bunch of characters that have the word "black" in their moniker: Black Panther, Black Cat, Black Goliath, Black Manta, Black Canary, Black Lightning, Black Widow, Black Orchid, Black Racer, Black Mamba... Now, something that struck me as a bit odd was this: if I split up the previous list of characters, I've got the following male ones:

Black Panther, Black Manta, Black Goliath, Black Lightning, Black Racer.

and the following female ones:

Black Cat, Black Canary, Black Widow, Black Orchid, Black Mamba.

The male ones all happen to be black men, whose powers are described in their nom de plume. The female ones though are all white women, most of which wear outfits involving black leather. While a notable black superheroine, Storm, isn't called "Black Storm". I find this strange (despite several exceptions, like the Black Knight, Blackbolt and Blackheart, none of whom are African-American), and I'm sure it says something about the way superhero writers work, but I couldn't say what that'd be.

I can say though that this made me think of my girlfriend's superheroine/-villainess name being "Black Sequoia", which would involve her having, oh, I dunno, growth powers or plant-related powers, it doesn't really matter, since it's all about the hot, sleek black leather anyway. I can't complain, really, now can I? ;)

I realize this was a pointless post, but then, to paraphrase a really great writer--"aren't they all?"

Friday Evening Loot

2005-11-19T15:26:00.000+01:00

Let’s take a look at yesterday evening’s loot from the comic book store. This week heralded the arrival of All-Star Superman, featuring the talents of Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely. I didn’t used to be much of a fan of Quitely, back on his Authority and New X-Men days, but ever since his work on We3, I’ve come to understand his appeal. Quitely works in the advertising business and you can tell he’s good at design work, based on his excellent page layouts. His faces still aren’t all that great in some places (Superman looks damn awful in this shot) but on other occasions he nails them just perfectly, as with his depiction of Lex Luthor. The story is very straightforward yet cool: there’s a mission to the heart of the sun, it goes awry, Superman saves the day, but at the cost of his own future, it turns out. Morrison starts out pretty nicely with a very compressed way of telling Superman’s origin, just 4 panels and captions that lay out the story in a condensed yet satisfying way. There are also several nice moments where Superman saves innocents in both direct and indirect ways. Moreover, he nails the bumbling nature of Clark Kent, something I’ve always thought adds to his secret identity. He’s such a clumsy, absent-minded goofball as Clark Kent that nobody in their right mind would suspect he’s also the world’s greatest hero, an element that’s been missing from regular Superman comics for all too long now. I’m happy the stories for this series, while forming a larger tapestry, will remain fairly self-contained, as it’s virtually guaranteed that it’ll be a scheduling nightmare, what with Quitely being so notoriously slow (as much as I like his art, I do not understand why, since his pencils are very minimal, and the digital inker does a whole lot of the work in making everything look pretty, cool and impressive—I guess he thinks about each page a lot, perhaps?). So even if it takes two months for the next issue to arrive, at least I can enjoy it in its own right, hopefully as much as I liked this one. Not an outstanding Alan Moore-type comic, but a good one nonetheless.

By comparison, I also bought and read Supergirl #3, written by Jeph Loeb and drawn by Ian Churchill. They might as well call this Supergruel because I feel it’s some of the worst writing out there. It’s a hodge-podge of halfbaked ideas that attempt to convey significance but are full of meaningless sound and fury (and somewhat creepy titillation) instead. Loeb’s big idea appears to be to pit Supergirl against all of the superpowered teams of the DCU, starting with the JSA, then the Titans, now the Outsiders, and next the Justice League. Perhaps the Legion in #5, who knows? Both Morrison in ASS (yes, I think that acronym is hilarious) and Loeb in SG use mad evil villain Luthor rather than the Wolfman/Byrne businessman Luthor, but Loeb manages to make him sound like a complete idiot rather than a menace. He’s just a loudmouth bully in a suit (Luthor, not Loeb :p) and Supergirl comes across as quite unlikable too. It’s so bad it becomes somewhat entertaining viewed in that light, aided by the penciler being the artistic lovechild of Rob Liefeld and Jim Lee, which is about as backhanded a compliment I can make—but if it wasn’t for the certainty that Loeb is leaving this book in a few issues (along with the titular character, perhaps?) to go write another book for Marvel that will be offensively late as well, I’d be dropping this like a stone. I’ll admit though that the concept of a black-and-silver evil Supergirl outfit is kinda hot ;)

Luckily, the bitter pill of Supergirl was easy to swallow thanks to the writing skills of Dan Slott, Ed Brubaker and Brian Vaughan. Dan Slott was responsible for the fun yet not silly opening issue of the Thing’s new ongoing series. I was most sceptical when I first heard about this but it turns out that my misgivings were unfounded. Paired with artist Andrea DiVito, who previously worked on more cosmic stuff like Thor’s final story-arc and Beta Ray Bill’s mini-series, he tells a tale of a man turned monster, both reviled and revered—which sounds serious and intense, but it’s light and breezy instead. Cauldron the Scalding Man is one of my favorite oddball villains already! The art is sleek, fun, and sexy when it needs to be. The writing is straightforward fun too, as is the plotting, which contrives to team up Ben with Nighthawk and the Constrictor! An unlikely trio if ever I saw one, and nicely reminiscent of the old Thing team-up series, Marvel Two-In-One (I have yet to devour the first Essential of that one, too). Odds are good that Iron Man will show up too since Tony Stark was in the crowd who got transported to the villain’s hide-out as well, so here’s already looking forward to an action-packed second issue. I also get the distinct feeling that Milan Ramada, the meanie responsible for the Thing’s current trouble, will turn out to be a new, female Armadillo. I don’t know why, it could just be the letters of her name, but her doggie makes me think of an armadillo too, and the original Armadillo would’ve made a good foe for the Thing to fight... But anyway, this is a good comic, so my decision to support Slott through single issues rather than trade paperbacks turns out to have been well-founded. As an added bonus I now have an alternative Fantastic Four title to enjoy, since JMS’s FF, Millar’s Ultimate FF and the Marvel Knights FF don’t do it for me and I’ve been missing the presence of an ongoing FF-related adventure to read. I truly wish Dan Slott would take over a Spider-Man title soon, because I’m yearning for some fun Spidey yarns as well. For now both the She-Hulk and Thing series should be enough to tide me over though.

Even though I kept on saying I wouldn’t, I bought Books of Doom #1 and X-Men: Deadly Genesis #1 (I had to settle for the ugly Quesada cover), because I’m an impulsive weakling. Both of these are written by Ed Brubaker, whose work I’ve enjoyed on such titles as Batman, Gotham Central, Catwoman and the current Captain America series (yes, I know I need to read Sleeper and Point Blank, don’t rush me). I may not have been a fan of his Authority maxi-series, but I’m looking forward very much to him taking over the writing on Daredevil with Michael Lark on art chores. In the meantime, both these Doom and X-Men minis should keep me entertained. I’ve only read Deadly Genesis so far, which wasn’t too bad. Frankly, I’ve lost all interest in the X-corner of the Marvel Universe, but I’m willing to sit this one through simply because of Brubaker, although I’ll admit that I’m not opposed to Hairsine’s art either. It all flows well enough and there’s some sense of menace and mystery, so we’ll see where it goes in a few months time (no doubt this one will suffer various delays as well, based on Hairsine’s track record). The back-up story didn’t do much for me, it stayed on the surface too much. Better luck next time. From what I understand, Books of Doom is basically a retelling of FF Annual #2, which featured his entire origin story (beautifully told, too, one of the best Stan and Jack collaborations of the period). I’m assuming things will be fleshed out more and updated for the 21st century. It’s got art by Pablo Raimondi who did a very nice job on last year’s Madrox mini-series, so if I like this first issue, I’ll be around for the full ride. The cover is pleasantly impressive already, so that’s a good start!

Runaways v2 #10 was another pleasant read. Vaughan and Alphona remain a strong creative team and the kids starring in the book are still likable and “realistic”, as far as that goes for superhero comics anyway. What’s odd is that this issue features several of the much-maligned New Avengers, yet does not announce so on the cover. In a way this is good, because Jo Chen keeps on knocking these beautiful covers out of the park, yet considering the sales bump the obvious presence of Spider-Man and Wolverine would’ve given the arc, I’m surprised they don’t let an unwitting audience know about this. Story-wise I have no real complaints, other than being put off by the implied rape scene. I don’t know what it is, but scenes like that simply feel out of place in a world full of brightly coloured superheroes. Turning supervillainous acts into something this base and, well, intimate, is far less entertaining than a plot to destroy/take over the world. But aside from that, I feel that this book remains on track, and I am hopeful for a fun team-up with Spidey next issue. Vaughan is another one of my picks for Amazing Spider-Man, if bloody Straczynsky ever leaves (the day can’t come soon enough), so it’s nice to see him writing one of my favorite superheroes in this fashion.

The last two things I got were Back Issue magazine #1 and Top Ten: Beyond The Farthest Precinct #4. I adored the original Moore-scripted and Cannon/Ha-penciled maxi-series, but this one just doesn’t live up to it, although Jerry Ordway sure does his best to make the pages pop. Maybe this fourth issue will improve the overall quality of the arc, but despite several individual scenes that were okay enough, the story as a whole hasn’t impressed me very much. It may perhaps be unfair to judge the quality of a title based on Alan Moore having written it in the past, but that’s what you get when you publish a sequel that’s not by someone of the same high caliber. In any case, I do like the art and don’t feel like this is a waste of money, so it’s all still good, but if this were written by Moore, there’s no way it’d still be unread, a full day later ;) Back Issue, then, is a comics magazine that focuses on the ‘70s and ‘80s, which is perfect for me since I adore the ‘80s in many regards anyway, especially comics, and know very little about the ‘70s, so it’s a combination of going down memory lane and getting a cool history lesson. This issue has a long interview with Nick Cardy (of original Teen Titans fame) and pieces on the genre comics (martial arts and romance especially) that have gone the way of the dodo. Lots of pencil sketches again too, as usual. One of the best bargains in comics—and a much longer read, to boot! This one’s highly recommended for anyone who likes to read about comics rather than just reading comics. I hope it’ll be around for a good long while to come.

All in all, a good week. I hope next week will be just as good!

The House Ad Fandango #1 - Thunderbolts

2005-11-15T10:26:00.000+01:00

Now this is how you advertise a new series, to me. First, you create a nice backdrop (in this case, the heroes being shunted into the Franklinverse, increasing the need for a new superteam in the MU). Then, you gather a perfect creative team: Kurt Busiek and Mark Bagley are two of the best. Next, you tell your audience that there's "one team, one goal, one dark secret!" It's that last bit that intrigued me in particular. Not being as much of an internet afficionado yet back then, I didn't know there was a list circulating the net giving options as to what the big secret was, so I was happily surprised (stunned is a better word) when they revealed said secret right away (as relatively new as I was to superhero comics, I was pretty sure the secret wouldn't be the starting point--talk about your whoopsies!).

I love how the ad showcases all the characters, who I've always thought had great costumes (apart from maybe Atlas). Bagley did a great job of creating lots of diversity, lots of detail too, but all the same making them mesh together well. I'm particularly fond of the Songbird, Mach-1 and of course Citizen V designs. Citizen V especially is a true classic in my eyes.

Another great thing about this launch was that it was double-sized for only 3 bucks. Ah, days of yore... I don't think anyone back then had expected the Thunderbolts to still be around nearly 9 years later. Sure, they've been on hiatus for a bit, but not for too long. Nobody had expected for Fabian Nicieza to become the main caretaker of the 'Bolts, to boot, or how important Hawkeye would become.

All in all, I think this house ad just provides you with the right kind of vibe to check out the first issue. And as I will talk about another time, that first issue sure had a great hook to make you come back for the second! Last year's New Avengers #1 may have sold like hotcakes (relatively speaking anyway, in these dire times for comic book publishing) but Thunderbolts #1 is where it was at, baby!

"... He Soars Alone" - Silver Surfer (v3) #111

2005-11-13T21:42:00.000+01:00

Today I felt like rereading an old issue of Silver Surfer, #111—also entitled “111”—and billed as the “first issue in a bold new era of greatness!” It’s also the first issue written (but sadly not drawn) by “Gentleman” George Perez. The art is by Tom Grindberg, whom I used to severely dislike, but whose work I’ve come to appreciate over the years. He and inker Bill Anderson did a good job in making the Surfer and his surroundings look alien and different without making things ugly. I’m particularly fond of the way they would over-emphasize his silvery sheen, showing his face or hands reflected in his chest or shoulders and such.

Colorist Tom Vincent also deserves credit in the way he gives the Surfer an intriguingly metallic look; combined with the rippling muscles, you get an alien who’s at once sleek and bulky, which in this particular instance I find appealing. I’m pretty certain that a lot of people would disagree, but that’s why they say you can’t argue taste!

The story here is a nice mix of typical Surfer fare with a sci-fi slant: several beings designated in binary code (1010, 101, 100, the titular 111) attempt to breach our universe. Those who fail are faintly perceived by such beings as the Asgardian Heimdall, the alien Beta Ray Bill, and protector of the universe Quasar, but none of them can make any sense of it. It’s a nice way of showing the cosmic corner of the MU (and of course we get the obligatory plug for another title, the Starmasters mini-series, which was written by editor Mark Gruenwald—I should really get around to mailordering those back issues one day!)

111 though, in actuality called Oclin, collides with the Silver Surfer and is able to make contact while the Surfer floats unconsciously through space; it’s “as if [they] have entered each other’s brain”. Through this connection, Norrin Radd flashes back to the destruction of the planet Inasis—courtesy of a creature ominously called the Blackbody. It’s not really a flashback though, but a vision experienced by the planet’s leader, Grand Practitioner Harquis Tey (I’m really digging the alien names here).

The nice wrinkle is that the flashback/vision may be Tey’s, but the Surfer experiences it as if the people on planet are those he knows and/or cares about: Shalla-Bal, the FF, and so on. Even Galactus shows up, but he too is consumed by the energy-absorbing Blackbody. If the Blackbody looks familiar, then there’s good reason for that, which back then, when I first read it, I didn’t pick up on. Looking back on it now, I like how it's obvious, yet not.

One of the downsides of the story is that it gets bogged down in very lengthy dialogue (or rather, monologue) that tries to explain the back story by telling, not showing. I realize that by showing they’d end up with a double-sized issue, but you know something, that would’ve been preferable over the few pages that were crammed with words. What it boils down to is that the Blackbody will destroy Inasis unless outside help arrives. The Outriders, as they were called, were designated to find said help in our galaxy, which is on the other side of the known universe from their point of view. The only way to reach them swiftly is by going back the way they came, through the cosmic swells, a way fraught with danger, but of course perfectly suited for a character who rides a cosmic surfboard!

Oclin dies as he terminates his link with the Surfer, who then ruminates on his previous mission of atonement and this new destiny that’s been given him: to go where he’s never gone before, starting over in the process and aid those who are in need of it, rather than being reviled for being Galactus’s herald in the past. The Watcher observes him as he decides to fly off to the cosmic swells, and so ends this first issue of Perez’s run.

Summarized like this it’s as if nothing much happens, which is in essence true. Yet enough does happen so that, even though it’s really a prologue to the saga as a whole, it stands on its own while giving one the sense of a new beginning where new things can happen. I clearly remember liking this a lot when I read it originally, and I still do (though not as much). As far as set-up issues go, this is a good one. Knowing that all the set-up will lead somewhere interesting is even better.

Despite Perez’s problems with too many word balloons on certain pages, he manages to make everything sound alien enough without making everything so distant as to be incomprehensible. There’s a nice enough empathic hook, there’s some cool imagery when the Blackbody does its thing, and the Surfer does sound like the self-reflecting, noble skyrider that Stan and Jack envisioned him to be.

Art-wise I have no complaints, really. Cool opening shots of the exploding alien ship and of Heimdall on the Rainbow Bridge, although I must say that the rendition of Quasar is a bit shifty. The bulgy look doesn’t work as well on someone who’s meant to be clearly human. Making the inhabitants of Inasis humanoid yet thoroughly alien on the outside is also well done. I like Grindberg’s layouts quite a bit, they’re dynamic but not messy, there’s a nice flow throughout the issue. His depiction of the Blackbody laying waste to all before him/it is pretty eerie in a cool, cosmic way too.

I must say I miss having a Silver Surfer comic around. It’s the perfect avenue to tell some large-scale stories that can still have a decent philosophical impact. It’s a fine line though, and when the scale tips too much in either direction, the book becomes dull real fast. Still, I hold out hope against hope that eventually someone’ll do the Surfer justice again. Who knows, maybe the rumoured JMS (of Babylon 5, Rising Stars, Supreme Power and Amazing Spider-Man fame) mini-series will be just the thing. Or maybe he’ll have Shalla-Bal boink Galactus or Morg and Norrin Radd has to deal with her artificially aged twin children, who happen to look exactly like him and her, while the actual father is someone else entirely. Yes, I’m still all bitter about that ASM storyline, what of it? :p

In any case, on a scale of 6, where 1 is your average Liefeld comic and 6 is your average Alan Moore story, this issue gets a 4. It gets better though, just you wait!

Our Pal Sal #2 - Captain America #168

2005-11-02T16:09:00.000+01:00

In this second installment of my traipsing through Sal Buscema’s penciling career, I’ve decided to concentrate on Captain America #168 (cover-dated December 1973), featuring the origin of Baron Helmut Zemo, he of Thunderbolts fame who, back then, adopted a moniker that would attain far greater significance down the road in an entirely different series—indeed, the current-day Baron Zemo
was first known as the one and only original Phoenix, hoo-ha!

This one-shot story—entitled “...And A Phoenix Shall Arise!”—was co-written by Roy Thomas and Tony Isabella; Sal’s pencils were embellished by John Tartag and George Roussos. I much prefer when he inks his own pencils though, like he did most of the time during his run on Spectacular Spider-Man. There’s a much sharper and defined look to the pages when he’s his own inker.

The cover tells us that we’ll gasp when we learn the villain's startling secret identity. These days it’d be hyped months in advance, back then it was just a blurb meant to draw in readers. Interestingly, they decided not to be too obvious about it from the get-go by substituting “Adhesive X” for “molten lava” and “death ray” for “laser blast” in the Phoenix’s word balloon. It’s a good, fun cover, even if it looks like Cap’s toes are dipped in the supposed lava. You’d think the heat alone would make him a bit uncomfortable.

Our tale opens with Cap and his partner, the Falcon, patrolling the rooftops. They engage in the Exposition Shuffle for a moment, but they’re interrupted by a big old FZASSK! Cap calls Falc a duck as the chimney behind them is blown to smithereens. When they look up, they are greeted by the sight of a man in a costume that is likely meant to look cool or something but, much as I love Sal, isn’t. Sorry, Sal. You gotta love 70s comic book dialogue, by the way. I particularly like how Phoenix has a very flexible definition of wit:

So there’s some running and shooting, Sam pounds on the red-and-yellow-garbed freak and gets some bigoted comments for his trouble, which I take it is meant to be a clue. Poor Falcon is about to be toasted, but wouldn’t you know it, the lasergun conveniently conks out and Phoenix decides to take a run for it, while Cap has forgotten all about this handy shield he carries around and which he tends to use to, you know, throw at people? Sheesh :)

Because the Phoenix spoke of vengeance, Cap decides to run down his list of enemies, figuring he has “more arch-enemies than most people have relatives.” He then proceeds to list, wait for it, five enemies, two of whom are (presumed) dead. Yeah Cap, that was some deep thinking you did there. Since Captain America is even less of a detective than post-Crisis Batman, he comes up with the bright idea to turn himself into bait, in the hopes of drawing out this newest foe. Falcon wants to help out but Steve is afraid something bad’ll happen to Sam, so rather than telling him this, he acts like a jerk (“So, go play with your pet birdies somewhere else, okay?” That sounded oddly dirty...). Ah, the tried and true superhero approach of not using your head. At all.

The ongoing plot of Cap having his good name sullied on the radio is paid some lip-service while our hero swings through town. For some reason either Buscema or his inker or the colorist decided not to give Cap any eyes in this panel:

Luckily Cap regains his eyes just in time to notice someone approaching him in a panic, who tells him how he was attacked by a nutjob who tried to kill him. Cap’s response to the man standing strangely still with his back to him in the alley? Throw his shield, right? No, of course not. Instead, Cap headbutts him in the back (“smash” is a sound now?) and the man falls apart. Literally, because it is a trap (duh) and Cap gets gassed. The scared guy turns out to be the Phoenix, who now obviously has the upper hand and could easily blow his hated enemy’s head off with his death-ray.

As super-villains are wont to do though, he instead trusses up the hero of the piece to a big metal slab hanging above a cauldron filled with something hot and bubbly and starts to talk about the reasons behind this entire exercise of revenge. When he announces the vat is filled with Adhesive X, Cap is surprised, since its inventor, Baron Heinrich Zemo, has been dead for years now. Sal Buscema gives us a nice shot of a face filled with rage before we fade into the moodily illustrated flashback origin scene, which even includes the reason why the original Baron Zemo hated Cap so much, for those who came in late.

After Helmut discovered that Captain America had been revived (back in Avengers #4) and then was present when the elder Zemo was buried under a mountain of rubble (Avengers #15), he set out on his path of revenge, reinventing his father’s Adhesive X and the Death Ray. Now I can dig the Death Ray, it’s your standard villainous prop. But Adhesive X is basically super-duper-glue, so I’m less clear on the nefarious purposes for that one. Especially since its properties appear to be very plot-convenient (note how when Heinrich got doused in the adhesive, only his mask wouldn’t come off, but his gloves and clothes still did—and wouldn’t his eyes be glued shut too? Oh well, best not to think about it, I suppose.)

Cap remains remarkably calm, trying to talk Zemo out of his killing mood, but the man ain’t having it. Luckily for the Captain, Sam Wilson suddenly jumps into the warehouse, since he hadn’t bought Cap’s earlier attempt to get rid of him and had planted a SHIELD tracer on Cap’s shield. Yes, SHIELD on shield, that’s funny. Or not. While Falc and Phoenix/Zemo are engaged in battle, Cap gets really upset about the possibility of Sam hurting the psycho who’s been trying to ice him, and not in the “I’ll be unfrozen to hype Marvel’s newest teambook” type of way—so upset that he not only breaks from his shackles, but somehow is also able to jump away from the slab, rather than actually falling into the cauldron as your average laws of physics would indicate.

The Captain tells Falcon that they have to try reasoning with Zemo rather than continuing the cycle of hatred. Zemo himself is less interested in that sentiment and makes a grab for Cap’s own shield, intending to kill him with it by throwing it at him. Smart move, Helmut, because whoopsie, the shield boomerangs back (how it does that I don’t know, it’s not as if frisbees do that sort of thing, do they?) and SWAPP!s the Phoenix right into the boiling Adhesive X. We get a nice shot of Zemo’s hand as he goes under, dying a gruesome death.

For future plot purposes, the writers decide to have Cap walk away all downbeat rather than, I don’t know, salvage the body from the vat, as he feels guilty for reviving “a whole generation’s hatreds”. Self-important much?

So, here we are, the first appearance of the self-same Helmut Zemo who would one day become one of my favorite villains. Back in this issue though, he was a bit of a throwaway fill-in villain, and would in fact not be seen again for nearly 10 years, when Marc DeMatteis finally decides to return him from the dead (which I will talk about sometime soon).

The art isn’t anything altogether special, to be honest, but I’m going to blame that on the combination of Sal being far less experienced back then and the inkers he was working with. There’s some cool shots though, and the art services the story well enough, such as it is, so I can’t complain too much. I can imagine that if I were a kid back in the 70s, I would’ve liked this or even loved this, although it does puzzle me that apparently nobody wanted to see the character again in all those years, or they would’ve brought him back sooner, wouldn’t they? Makes me think that perhaps even the ‘70s audience wrote this one off as filler. Little did Thomas and Isabella realize the potential for great villainy they had created, but that, as they say, is a story for another time...

Comics Done Right - New Thunderbolts #14

2005-10-31T21:39:00.000+01:00

For me, New Thunderbolts #14 is a prime example of what I want in modern-day superhero comics: brightly colored costumes, a fast-clipped pace, a mix of characterization and subplots while there’s a big brawl going on, snappy one-liners and ominous foreboding—this one has it all! By no means is any of it deep, as such, but that’s just the thing: it’s fun to sit down and read about these very flawed characters interacting and growing without stretching the point. Seeing Songbird turn into an ever better leader, for example, is good stuff; her being coerced to put the smackdown on the New (and stupid) Avengers only makes things more compelling because the positive growth is marred by negative actions.

In regards to the New Avengers guest-starring, it was odd that Wolverine wasn’t around. Nicieza probably covered it in the previous issue, but considering that the inclusion of both Spider-Man and Wolverine in this band of heroes is a big part of their appeal, it’s baffling that Wolverine is nowhere to be found in this issue or in any of the other stories featuring the New Avengers in a guest slot this month (She-Hulk, Runaways, Young Avengers...). No skin off my nose, since I dislike seeing Wolverine all over the place to begin with, but it seems at odds with the sentiment of turning the Avengers into a group showcasing their high-profile marketing/merchandise characters (plus Bendis’s favorites, of course).

But since this is not about Bendis’s Avengers, let’s concentrate on the issue at hand, and why it was good. We start off on a good note already with the recap/credits page, which is written in the form of an internal memo from Carol Danvers (the once and former Ms Marvel, presently Warbird) about the so-called “Operation: Hubris”, i.e. the Thunderbolts being engaged to humiliate the New Avengers for intriguing reasons. It’s a great way to bring people up to speed about the plot while also giving us insight in Carol’s own character.

The opening double-page spread of the confrontation between both teams is also a great deal of fun. I’m a big fan of Tom Grummett’s art, as it is a nice example of concentrating on the essentials rather than an overwhelming amount of lines that cover up meaning rather than enhancing it. As stiff and unattractive as Erskine’s pencils are over in the pages of Jack Cross, I think his embellishments here complement well with Grummett’s pencils. Add to that colors that pop off the page and crisp lettering, and you’ve got yourself a nice-looking comic.

It doesn’t hurt at all that the story-page/ad ratio is more than decent. An opening chunk of 6 pages of story, then the usual story/ad/story/ad routine for a few pages, then 3 pages of story, 1 ad, 3 more pages of story, back to story/ad/story/ad and finally another 4 pages of story only broken up by the letters page—speaking of said page, I can’t for the life of me figure out why both Marvel’s letter columns and the DC In Demand pages are so often two pages before the end rather than at the final page. Wouldn’t that make more sense? I assume it’s a printing thing, but since the letter column here corresponds with a page of art in the beginning of the book, same as it would’ve if it were the very last page, I’m left scratching my head here. In any case, unlike some other books Marvel produces, this one has a reasonable flow to it. Things actually happening also helps, naturally :p

Another reason why this was good: I got through the entire issue without having to grimace in annoyance. Quite the opposite, I was often amused by the dialogue or the situations, not to mention intrigued by the subplot about Techno and Abe needing the thrown-out Blizzard to save the world. Now, Zemo and Techno have a history of working together, so I’m assuming they’re in league once more, unless it’ll turn out that they’re actually at odds, because Nicieza does like his twisty-twists, after all. Whatever the case may be, it’s great that the coming months will focus on Zemo and his mad schemes and the way the team will get embroiled in them.

Ever since the start of the first Thunderbolts series, nearly 9 years ago, Baron Helmut Zemo has been a joy to behold as a cunning, ruthless, multi-faceted character who is obviously a villain yet has bizarre heroic tendencies. Kurt Busiek carved out that path for him, to be sure, but Nicieza surely expanded on it. After a year without Zemo, it’s good to have him back—having him revealed as the mastermind behind most of the team’s troubles and misadventures since the relaunch is only icing on the cake.

Highlights of the issue for me were:

The cover spotlighting a cool-looking Radioactive Man and the beaten Avengers (shown symbolically by a damaged shield, a torn off mask, a battered helmet) with a worn-out Songbird in the back
Spidey using Atlas as a “building” to attach his webs to (and Atlas subsequently shrinking down)
Atlas literally stomping on Iron Man
Spider-Woman and Joystick going through a vicious catfight (over 2 hours!)
The Avengers realizing that the government is not best pleased with them
Melissa just leaving Luke Cage hanging for a fight
Zemo showing up, bringing portents of doom and destruction, always my favorite bit of course :)

To finish up, I want to extoll Grummett’s artistic virtues once more. The man has an excellent eye for laying out a page, always keeping things dynamic without them being confusing. Just look at this page of Joystick and Jessica Drew duking it out, or this one (bonus points for making Spider-Woman look hot but not gross :p). I’m very fond of the way Grummett will tend to shift the panels around, never really making two pages look alike without overdoing it and turning things into a confusing jumble of images. I also get a real sense of things quietening down just from looking at the more organized panels once the fight is over. Writer and artists have a great synergy going on throughout the entire issue, with caption boxes and dialogue adding to the flow of the story rather than clashing with it. Everything just keeps on moving. The final panel zooming in on Zemo makes for a great image to end the issue on (although Spider-Woman’s butt shot only a few pages before that isn’t half bad either :D)

I hope that this Thunderbolts series will be around for a good long time to come because it’s one of my favorite titles on the stands, and it has been since that day in February 1997 when I was stunned—stunned I tell you!—by the out-of-the-blue revelation at the end of the first issue. This book may not be for anyone, as it is not “sophisticated” or anything like that, and admittedly Nicieza has a tendency to get bogged down in McGuffins and plot mechanics rather than telling a straightforward story, but there’s no denying the density of this book; decompression is totally lacking here and that’s just how I like it.

Top things off with a nice letter column and we can come full circle: this one did have it all. I just wish it were biweekly all the time!

Saturday Morning Loot

2005-10-29T16:23:00.000+02:00

Every Saturday morning I drive into town to get the latest batch of comics on my pull list. While I’m there anyway, I tend to go through several other stores and buy various stuff that catches my interest. This week my bag of loot included the following:

The second halves of the CSI season 3 and 4 dvd sets (13 episodes each)
Two classic Lucasarts games: The Dig and Full Throttle
Another game called Heaven & Hell
As for comics: Wonder Woman v2 #222, Jack Cross #3, Adventures of Superman #645, JSA Classified #4, Defenders #4, Hulk: Destruction #4, New Thunderbolts #14, Young Avengers #8, She-Hulk #1 and to round off, Bart Simpson’s Treehouse Of Horror #11.

If it hadn’t been for the twenty dollar discount at the comics store, this would’ve cost me 105 euros in total (54 for the dvd’s, 21 for the games and another 30 for the comics). Still, this should keep me entertained for a good long while. Some thoughts:

Why oh why does it always have to be Cat and Grissom on the CSI covers? I’d love a Sara/Greg one, or a Sara/Brass one—how hard can it be? (Note that I really want Jorja Fox on the cover, heh.) For some reason they release them as half-season sets here. Heck, the first season even had a different opening theme, something instrumental and ooh-ah'y rather than The Who's "Who Are You". Go figure out us weird Europeans, eh? ;)

The Dig and Full Throttle are two Lucasarts adventure games that I had to pass on back when they came out because I was a mere high school student and couldn’t afford them. I’m glad I didn’t fork down the high price for them back then too, because so far they don’t look like they’d offer the same kind of entertainment as, say, Day of the Tentacle did. I went through the introduction scenes of both and played them a little bit and thus far they’re not that exciting. The Dig is sci-fi oriented and supposedly has lots of puzzles; I’ll believe it when I see it.

Full Throttle is a biker’s quest to stop his gang from being ambushed, which is rather insipid as adventure-quests go (not quite up to the level of King Graham trying to save his family from an evil sorcerer and encountering a bevy of magical creatures along the way, back in the glory days of King’s Quest). Lucasarts games were great because of their awesome use of humour and quirky storylines and puzzles (I’m thinking of Sam & Max Hit The Road in particular here). From what I’ve heard, these two were duds in comparison, but for 6 bucks each, I won’t complain if the rumors turn out to be true!

Heaven & Hell caught my eye because it reminded me of the supremely fun Majesty. You can choose between being a benevolent god or an evil demon and your purpose is to try and convert as many people as possible and then bring about the End of the World. The screenshots seemed fun and I always like when they combine strategy games with out-there concepts, so who knows, maybe this’ll be just as fun as Majesty, which was highly addictive back when I was first exposed to it. I played the tutorial level so far and it had nice visuals and sounds, so I’m not disappointed yet.

On the comic book front I’ve read 4 of the 10 comics I bought so far. Adventures of Superman #645 promises to be written by Rucka and drawn by Kerschl on the cover, but in reality Rucka only plotted with DeFilippis/Weir from New X-Men fame (meh) scripting the issue, while Kerschl only pencilled two thirds of the story and Renato Guedes did the final third. I call that either false advertising or simply not giving credit where it is due. Even though the issue is juggling several balls at once (Ruin’s identity and benefactor, Luthor’s schemes, the half-assed OMAC assault, Lois’s investigation into who shot her) it still manages to end up feeling rather flimsy in the end.

It’s clear Rucka had a plan when he started his run, but it feels like they’re doing a lot of stretching and padding here just to keep things unresolved. Frankly, it’s annoying/boring more than it is exciting. Kerschl’s pages look sweet as usual, delicate yet bold, and Guedes’s fill-in pages aren’t horrible either, but the styles don’t seem to mesh altogether well. I’m also not fond of Kerschl needing help all the time, he’s barely done a full issue of his own since he started a few months ago (same deal with Rags Morales on Wonder Woman). Sidebar: having Perry exclaim that the world may be ending, but they still have to report it, was far better executed and poignant back when they had him say it during The Final Night. Ah, Kesel and Immonen, good times, good times... I loved Luthor’s evil smirk on the cover, at that.

JSA Classified #4 concluded the Power Girl origin story. I’m not quite sure why we needed 4 issues to tell us this, because it seems pretty straightforward despite the parallel universe mumbo-jumbo. It feels like Johns is trying to complicate rather than trying to present a clear picture, and I don’t see why. Amanda Conner’s art is fun and whimsical though, and I’ve always liked the Psycho Pirate, so I was happy enough with this—besides, I have no quarrel with any Infinite Crisis-related stories.

DC does need to do something about the vaunted open-endedness of almost all their current storylines though; the to-be-continued-in-another-book endings are likely to be bothersome to a great deal of the readers. Not so much to me though, since I tend to buy them already anyway, but still :) Next issue features the Injustice Society, which includes the Gentleman Ghost. This makes me very, very happy indeed, because Gentleman Jim Craddock kicks butt! (almost as much as Jorja Fox does, mmm ;))

Wonder Woman was written by Rucka and featured guest-art by the unfortunately named Cliff Richards. I just always get flashes of “Living Doll” featuring the Young Ones when I hear that name. Ray Snyder provides the inks, giving the book a delicate, pseudo-shadowy yet fairly flat look. It’s not bad, but it’s not all that great either. I don’t know how Cheetah’s appearance here (not to mention Diana’s) works with the events as portrayed in Infinite Crisis #1, but that’s par for the course with DC lately, not yet having grasped the concept of a clear timeline. I liked her caption boxes, very nice effect there with the yellow/spotted look (ditto for the Psycho Pirate’s captions over in JSA Classified).

It was odd to see Wonder Woman taken to The Hague, but I guess that adds some seriousness to the situation? I’m sure they made several stupid mistakes though, but I’ll try not to care. Interesting how Barry Allen was involved in a murder trial as well before they killed him off during the Crisis. Hmm... More OMACs too in this one. They’re everywhere, aren’t they, and they’re about as effective as your average fruitfly, it seems. Nevertheless, Rucka and company continue to try to make it look impressive and foreboding whenever they show up, but it’s not quite working. I can’t say I was all that enthralled by this issue, but it didn’t make me gag either. Considering the pivotal role Wonder Woman is playing in this entire Crisis business, I was expecting something more though. Pity.

Finally, I also bought and already read last week’s She-Hulk #1 because of the good reviews. Even though I think Slott isn’t looking at the big picture when he complains about those waiting for the trades in-story, I’ll give him what he wants and I’ll buy both She-Hulk and the Thing in ongoing, monthly form rather than holding out for the superior product. Since Slott is good at making a single issue very enjoyable in its own right though (wonderfully assisted by Juan Bobillo on art chores), I don’t think I’ll regret my decision.

Slott’s way to potentially bring back Hawkeye is a classic one, I’m sure they’ve tried it in various sci-fi stories, but it should still be a lot of fun to see him playing with perceptions and expectations and then doing some nice, inspired twisting. Here’s hoping. In the meantime I’ll join the crowd in giving this two thumbs up, as it’s just pure fun, and that’s all I need in a comic, really.

Speaking of fun, the eleventh Treehouse Of Horror special looks like it will be too. I’m lucky my store still had a copy (they had 3, actually) because it features a Wolfman/Colan spoof on their acclaimed Tomb of Dracula and a Wein/Wrightson parody of their equally acclaimed Swamp Thing. It’s worth the price of admission for those two stories alone, I’m sure, but the 5-dollar price tag ends me up with 56 pages of story with additional art by John Severin and Mark Schultz, among others. Very nice deal, and I expect it to be enjoyable if not outright hilarious.

As for the rest, I’m really looking forward to reading New Thunderbolts #14 because Nicieza continues to write engaging yarns about these characters and of course Tom Grummett on art is always a good thing. Exciting-looking cover, too. Meanwhile, Defenders is still trying to recapture the old Giffen/DeMatteis/Maguire Justice League vibe, and while it’s not quite succeeding, it’s still a joy to read DeMatteis’s one-liners and let my eyes roam over Maguire’s scrumptious pencils.

I flipped through Hulk: Destruction (whose cover made me think of the Hulk/Wolverine one that Adam Kubert started his run on the Hulk with--I'll have to write about that sometime because it was a neat run) to count the story pages because the issue somehow felt thicker and I was hoping for an extra-sized final chapter, but it turns out it’s just your regular 23 pages with each page followed by an ad. Truly pathetic.

Looks like Young Avengers is just as bad in that respect. And Slott wonders why people prefer to buy trades instead? No freaking ads, baby! I hope that Jim Cheung is back next issue because just getting a cover from him isn’t all that satisfactory—DiVito’s not bad but by contrast he’s a bit boring. Jack Cross, meanwhile, features a pretty dull cover promising me a gunfight on Guantanamo Bay. If it wasn’t Warren Ellis writing this, I don’t think I’d be bothered. I still might drop it after next issue concludes the current arc because unlike his far superior Fell, this one is dragged down by all of Ellis’s usual flaws, not helped at all by Erskine’s oddly stale art.

And that, as they say, is that. Now, to decide what to watch, read or play next...

Judging A Book By Its Cover: Firestorm #18

2005-10-25T18:26:00.000+02:00

The other week I was reminded that sometimes the cover of a superhero comic can seemingly kick all kinds of ass without actually representing the tone of the story to be found within. When I first chanced upon the cover to Firestorm #18 as drawn by Matt Haley--in Previews, a couple of months ago--I was very much looking forward to an issue that'd show Jason Rusch, the current-day Firestorm, being absorbed by the gone-crazy OMAC Project, potentially even becoming villainous for the length of the recently started Infinite Crisis. At least, that's the impression I got from the cover image, which did a good job on incorporating the Brother Eye image with Firestorm's outfit.

While the actual story told by Stuart Moore isn't a bad one, I found it disappointing simply because it has nothing whatsoever in common with the cover and doesn't live up to its seeming intensity. It's the 21st-century equivalent of the original Crisis's "red skies crossover", really: OMACs attack, OMACs get beaten and then "mysteriously" disappear. After seeing this in virtually every DC comic I buy (and there's a lot of them) in the past six months, I'm really, really, really getting tired of it. I wouldn't mind it as much if the cover wouldn't imply something far more menacing and troublesome than what we actually got.

There's a distinct upside though: the issue was penciled by Pat Olliffe, who in my mind is right up there with Sal Buscema ("our pal Pat?" :)) Neither one of these guys is flashy or anything, but they know how to lay out a page, how to tell a story visually, how to draw me into the story. The inks by Simon Coleby--a name I'm not familiar with--are somewhat rougher than what I'm used to in the pages of the very entertaining Spider-Girl, but both Al Williamson and Sal Buscema, Olliffe's usual inkers, do have a rather crisp style.

I wouldn't mind at all if Olliffe got to do some more work over at DC. I love him on Spider-Girl but enjoy Ron Frenz there as well, so I'm all for Pat taking on heroes like Superman and Batman. He knows how to economize his pages so he'd be fun for a team-up type book with a lot of characters rotating, I think--although that's probably what they've got lined up for either one of the Kuberts, and if so, I'll likely be buying it. But that's a whole other story...

In any case, I think it's a bit of a shame that a cover that implies some serious danger ends up being rather mellow. It's okay in its own right, but I would've preferred something more exciting. I dare hope that we're just slowly building up to a bigger, more epic type of story, since the character of Firestorm does tend to lend itself to large-scale mayhem.

All in all: a good cover, but it provided a bit of a let-down for me.

Something I Miss In Current Comics...

2005-10-23T16:03:00.000+02:00

I've really come to miss numbered pages in modern-day comics. It used to be that numbering was actually included by the artists themselves, an approach I always found very pleasant and handy in that you can actually refer to specific parts of a story without having to count pages yourself.

Of course, the companies managed to make it confusing in the 80s and early 90s by numbering the pages while counting the ads, but at least there were still numbers to refer to. In the later 90s, which is when I began reading American comics on a weekly basis, there were also some cool ways of numbering individual pages; in the various Spider-Man titles, for instance, they'd use a little web behind the number, or a Spidey-mask-eye, or a Spidey-mask-as-a-whole, all very cute, but I guess in the end it was too expensive or something to have these added by the letterers, I presume (or too difficult?) and both Marvel and DC have dropped numbering completely, as far as I can tell.

I don't understand why an artist can't include the page number in a corner though (the way Sal Velluto did during his great run on Black Panther). Belgian strips still do it all the time--heck, they use them for every actual band of art, so that's 4 times the numbers American comics need. Whenever I read an old back issue and I see those numbers, I yearn for them to make their big comeback one day. If letterpages can slowly creep back into Marvel comics, I can only hope the same will happen to numbering! (though preferably in DC books first, because I read more of them currently--how times have changed in those 8 or 9 years...)

Yes, I get caught up in the little things, sue me :)

A Neat Idea Made Neater Still

2005-10-22T20:31:00.000+02:00

In that selfsame issue of Captain America I mentioned in the previous post, there was also a Hostess Fruit Pie ad featuring the Thing versus an animated building:

I’ve always liked the idea of inanimate objects made sentient, and it becomes all the cooler with buildings, so I looked up a few images that sprang to mind when I saw that ad. John Byrne also used the concept in Superman v2 #11, when Mr. Mxyzptlk—which I pronounce “Muhxeezuhputluk” no matter what others think. I also say/think “Darkseed”, not “Darkside”, so there :p —brought the Daily Planet building to life as one of his first post-Crisis stunts:

Alan Moore ran with a similar idea in his second issue of Tom Strong, introducing the Modular Man to us, an inventor called Temple Baldry, who had created a special kind of immortality by putting his sentience into critter-like modules that replicated themselves like a virus and were able to take over scores of buildings and the like in no time. Chris Sprouse gave Moddy (I’m like Spider-Man in my desire to shorten villains’ names) a very eerie design, and I’m particularly fond of Todd Klein’s echoey font for Baldry:

Alex Ross and Jim Krueger took it one step further still in their Universe X series, very ably drawn by Dougie Braithwaite, who should really do more in comics because he’s great. He’s currently penciling the JUSTICE maxi-series, which Alex Ross then paints over—looks really sharp, even if the story is a bit slow, so far. But I don’t care with art that nice-looking. In any case, back during Universe X, they had the Absorbing Man absorbing the whole of New York City (!) turning him into this:

Best of all: the Big Apple sticks around like this, shaped like a giant Crusher Creel, with all the buildings at bizarre angles and such, making the city look incredibly surreal. I think it’s a quite original idea; it was one of my personal highlights of the entire X-trilogy and wish they had shown more of how the people adapted to living in a New York looking all odd like this.

I’m sure there’s many more examples of buildings come to life, but these are the ones I thought of straight away. I wonder if there’s a Scrooge story where the money bin either gains sentience or is attacked by another sentient building...

The Bullpen Blunderbus: July 1980

2005-10-22T19:59:00.000+02:00

One of the easiest ways to jump in a makeshift comic-related time machine is by grabbing an old comic and looking at the Comic Book Checklist to get an idea of what was being published years ago. In this case I pulled out Captain America #247, the first Stern/Byrne issue (more on that some other time), cover-dated July 1980 (which makes the actual date either March or April), and took a peek at the Bullpen Bulletins of that month. It’s neat, the things you find out about Marvel’s publication history in these lists, without needing the help of Peter Sanderson, one-time Marvel librarian and historian (who wrote some really cool stuff in books like Marvel Age and Marvel Vision, some of which I hope to recount in the following weeks, months, perhaps even years). Here are some of my findings:

There were 41 Marvel comics and magazines in total on the stands that month. Only 9 of these formed the core Marvel Universe: Amazing Spider-Man, Avengers, Captain America, Daredevil, Fantastic Four, Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, Thor and X-Men. You could buy those titles for less than 4 dollars in total! And only one X-book, whoo! (Which was in the midst of the Dark Phoenix Saga, by the way, while 4 or 5 of the others all had fill-ins or inventory stories that month...)

10 of them were what I think of as the fringe titles and/or spin-offs: Spectacular Spider-Man and Marvel Team-Up added to people’s Spider-Man fix; Dazzler joined She-Hulk and Spider-Woman as heroines with their own ongoings (notice how She-Hulk and Spider-Woman are back in the spotlight at Marvel in the present); the Thing’s team-up book, Marvel Two-In-One, was still going strong (note how the Thing is getting his own ongoing series once more very soon now); Defenders could feature just about anybody because of its non-team status, odd as that may sound (Defenders is also back on the stands in the form of a mini-series by Giffen, DeMatteis and Maguire, which is more than enough reason for me to be buying it); Ghost Rider and Man-Thing were for the leftover fans of the spooky (Garth Ennis is bringing Ghost Rider back into style at the moment—anyone else sensing a trend here? House of ideas indeed...); and Marvel Spotlight was a try-out book.

No less than 7 different Marvel titles on the market were reprint series featuring the various classic characters and teams from my so-called core MU. There was also one title, Spidey Super Stories, that showcased “easy-to-read tales”, presumably for a younger crowd. I think it’s amazing that so many reprint titles could sustain themselves back then. But then, it was so much easier to keep track of the MU in general that the reprints held a bigger appeal to the kids, I think.

Marvel also had its share of license comics: Star Trek and Star Wars were published alongside Battlestar Galactica, and of course Bill Mantlo wrote the hell out of Rom and Micronauts, or so I’ve heard. I’ve never been all that interested in the stuff that didn't really originate in the MU itself, so I never properly read these. I may end up doing so one day if I find the back issues for cheap though, especially the Rom ones since I believe Sal Buscema penciled a lot of them.

Then there were the last few genre comics (non-superhero, that is, naturally): Tomb of Dracula, Conan as well as Savage Sword of Conan, Master of Kung Fu, and Shogun Warriors. Since Tomb of Dracula has been extensively Essentialized in the past few years, and since they are somehow able to put out an Essential Godzilla soon, I’m hoping for some Essential Conan and Essential MoKF...

Lastly, there was Crazy magazine, all about the “madcap comedy” by a bevy of Marvel staffers, and also Marvel Fun And Games, full of supposed “brain twisters”. Kinda curious what those were like, to be honest...

And oh, there was the Hulk magazine, later declared out of continuity—which in this month featured the first appearance of Dominic Fortune! You might ask “who?” and I can’t blame you, heh—as well as a Marvel Treasury book reprinting a Hulk story with Modok and the Harpy and none other than the fabulous Bi-Beast! I love the Bi-Beast, and not (just) because of this double-headed android’s name. What’s piquing my interest even more though is an announced team-up between Hercules and none other than Wolverine. Seriously, I have to find this now just to see how on earth you pair up those two!

To end: this was definitely John Byrne month, as he penciled X-Men 135, Cap 247 and FF 220 (which he also wrote). I may not like the man, but I sure like his old comic book stories, and he sure did a lot of them... One wonders if he knew, back then in early 1980, that he was participating in some seminal comic book work. I have to track down that FF issue since it's from before he started his proper run as writer/artist, and it's about aliens invading Canada. Sounds like a potential hoot to me! :)

Our Pal Sal #1

2005-10-17T20:42:00.000+02:00

This will be something of a regular feature: a look on why I think Sal Buscema is an awesome superhero artist, particularly on the character I associate him with the most, the Spectacular Spider-Man! When the Darkwing Duck cartoon of the mid-90s encouraged me to try out those superheroic funnybooks at the supermarket (because of the quirky villains like Megavolt and Quackerjack—I wanted to see their “real” inspirations), it was Sal Buscema’s Green Goblin from “The Child Within” that really grabbed my goat (I still don’t know where that goat went to until this very day).

Since “The Child Within” merits a very detailed look, being one of my all-time favorite stories, in no small part due to Sal’s artwork, I will instead kick off this recurring piece of appreciation with the cover to Spectacular Spider-Man #175. Sal Buscema didn’t get to portray Doctor Octopus all that often, despite having drawn more Spidey stories than just about anyone apart from John Romita Jr. As far as I remember, the Doctor was in Spectacular #173-175 and in “Web Of Death” several years later, where Sal’s pencils of a creepy-cool Ock were embellished by none other than an ink-crazy Bill Sienkiewicz. The art in those issues looks like Bill S. snorted the ink up his nose and then went wild; I cannot say I minded :p

In any case, let me focus on the cover (and issue) in question. Spectacular Spider-Man #175 was the second part of a fun two-parter featuring Doc Ock versus none other than J. Jonah Jameson! Yes, back then two- and three-parters, not to mention single issue stories, were still the rule rather than the exception. I miss those days... Now, I know a lot of people are no fan of blurbs on the cover, but I’m rather fond of the words here, they made me chuckle back then, and they still do now. This probably also has to do with me being rather lame :D

What I like very much about this cover is that it gives you a sense of urgency. Even though you know that, duh!, of course Spider-Man isn’t going to drown, it’s nonetheless a cool, dynamic image with a great angle, without any frills but with enough detail to make it pop (I’m particularly fond of the air bubbles, for some reason). I’m quite happy that Buscema chose to go for the Doctor-in-a-suit, as revamped by Erik Larsen, one of my preferred redesigns that I wish had stuck around, rather than going back to the old green jumpsuit. Octavius just exudes more menace when he looks a bit classy, which is far more effective than making him look like a dork or loser. As far as I’m concerned, Doctor Octopus is Spider-Man’s best and coolest villain, so anything that makes him stand out is a plus for me.

The story itself, called “Spouse Trap” (Michelinie loves his pun-titles even more than Peter David), is very straightforward, and you needn’t even have read the previous part to be able to enjoy this one (I know, it’s crazy, right?!) Doctor Octopus wants to get a big load of cash from Jameson, otherwise he’ll collapse the newly rebuilt Daily Bugle. Spider-Man thwarts this plan, but Octavius takes it to the next level by kidnapping Jonah’s wife Marla and asking a ransom in exchange for her safe return. We get some great shots of a hard-assed yet emotional JJJ, as well as some more casual coolness combined with hilarious hystrionics by the good (bad) doctor. Naturally Spidey interferes yet again and saves Marla.

It’s all very basic, going from point A to point B with ease, but that’s what makes it so enjoyable for me. There’s no cosmic menaces, no reset buttons, no big sprawling agendas, just a story featuring a bad guy, a good guy, and a guy somewhere in-between. Exactly because it’s such a basic plot, the art has to carry a lot of the story (although Michelinie has always been good at making the dialogue sound real without making things trite), and Sal really pulls it off. If anyone knows how to use lines to their best effect, making the panels flow smoothly while keeping things uncluttered, it’s Sal Buscema. Facial features, especially on Jonah and Ock, are iconic rather than ultra-realistic and as such pack a bigger punch.

Although Buscema doesn’t go crazy with Ock’s arms like Erik Larsen would whenever he’d get to draw the Doc, he does use them to great effect, while the story gives Spidey enough opportunities to unbalance Octavius despite his clear advantage. This all adds up to a great little comic that is well and truly enhanced by the sharp, stylistic art of our pal Sal, with a cover that kicks some major Spider-butt! :)

A Week Of Firsts, part 2

2005-10-16T19:44:00.000+02:00

It’s been quite a while since Peter David first started out in comics with his Spider-Man stories. The Sin-Eater Saga and its sequel remain two of my favorite ‘80s storylines; after growing used to Wieringo’s style I quite enjoyed his art on Sensational Spider-Man during the late ‘90s. By virtue of mixing these two together, I was originally quite enthused when their new ongoing series, Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, was announced.

I was far less enthused when I found out that the first four issues would all be tangled in a crossover revolving around a J. Michael Straczynski storyline that I wasn’t very fond of, to say the least. Luckily this issue ignores most of the crossover bits for now and focuses mainly on Spidey’s new status as an Avenger and on the new villain, Tracer. Despite his fairly ugly design I find him a quite fun addition to Spidey’s foes, a bit of a mirror image of Peter in that he likes to use snark and acts like a goofball, only in a villainous way. Oddly refreshing. He apparently has the ability to send bullets after specific targets—they won’t stop until they hit what they were meant to.

In that respect, I don’t think it was all that intelligent of Spider-Man to just turn around and try to freaking catch speeding bullets with his bare hands. While it was good to see that it backfired on him (mainly to get us to the crossover plot though, where something is wrong with his blood, no doubt related to the radioactive spider-bite), I’m left wondering why he didn’t try deflecting the bullets with, oh, I dunno, webbing perhaps? A manhole cover? Anything that would stop a mini-missile from tracing you, other than your own unprotected hands?

By having him wounded, we get introduced to a new character: the doctor treating him, an old acquaintance of both Reed and Captain America. Kind of odd that, as Spidey says, we’ve never heard of her before, but oh well, guess it can’t always be Curt Connors who he turns to. According to this doctor Castillo, Spider-Man “dresses up like something icky”. I always thought his name was ickier-sounding than his get-up, which is darn bright and colorful and fun-looking, rather than scary; now the black suit I can see being scary, but the red-and-blue one isn’t all that spideresque, is it?

Back on the home front, it felt like MJ was slightly overreacting (once again—they never learn, do they?) in her unwillingness to let Peter go out and find Tracer. If he can survive powerhouses like Doctor Octopus and Venom, why would a guy with “magic bullets” be that much more dangerous? It’s not as if Peter doesn’t know his gimmick now and can prepare for it. It comes across as a way to insert some cheap drama in the story. I can totally see her being worried, but more in an “I’ll send Captain America on his trail” rather than a “You’re insane!” kind of way. Good-looking MJ by Wieringo though.

Speaking of Wieringo, his J. Jonah Jameson is quite sharp-looking too. And so is his Spidey, of course. I’ve seen complaints that it’s too cartoony but I’m very fond of it, as I prefer an iconic representation over the more realistic yet more boring work of other artists. Kesel brings the right kind of quality to Wieringo’s pencils, so I hope they’ll stay paired for some time to come. The coloring by Paul Mounts is fresh and slick as well. It’s a nicely produced package (I even like the crossover banner’s design), but I do wonder if it wouldn’t be better for me to wait until the inevitable trade of the entire storyline and start picking up Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man monthly once PAD and ‘Ringo can forge their own direction.

I’ll see what the next two parts do for me, but I’m very much not looking forward to the acts written by Hudlin and JMS, two writers who have annoyed me more than anything else. I’ll probably sit the crossover itself out, since I can’t get worked up at all over Morlun or anything totem-related, but I’m genuinely looking forward to #5, when we can get on with things and see what this team can do on its own.

To end: the neatest image of the issue, apart from Spidey accidentally pounding on JJJ, was Kraven in a tutu (!). Very nice quirky dream image, and also very fitting since of course Kraven once “killed” Spider-Man and actually buried him in yet another one of my favorite storylines, “Fearful Symmetry”, aka “Kraven’s Last Hunt”, back in the mid-‘80s. Mmm, those were some good comics right there. I think those issues merit a reread very soon!

Only A Poor Old Jonah

2005-10-15T09:29:00.000+02:00

Don Rosa is one of my favorite writer/artists ever. Following in the footsteps of Carl Barks, he's penned dozens of supremely entertaining tales featuring Scrooge McDuck as the central character. Imagine my surprise when flicking through an old Untold Tales of Spider-Man annual (the 1997 one, written by another of my faves, Kurt Busiek) and coming across a mock cover mixing the worlds of Peter Parker and Scrooge McDuck, conceived by none other than Don Rosa himself. I'll let the image speak for itself:

I would buy an Uncle Jonah one-shot or even an ongoing series in a heartbeat :D

A Week Of Firsts, part 1

2005-10-14T15:59:00.000+02:00

In a week where Geoff Johns kicks off his project focusing on the de(con)struction of the post-Crisis DC Universe and Peter David fires the opening salvo of the hopefully not too abysmal Spider-Man crossover called “The Other: Evolve Or Die”, both of which I will ruminate on some other time, I felt like turning my attention an entirely different kind of “first”, to wit: the oft-overlooked DC1st Superman/Flash one-shot, cover-dated July 2002.

DC1st consisted out of 4 specials all revolving around a first meeting between two DC characters. Back then I mistakenly assumed that as such, they’d all be flashback stories. I’m not sure about the other three, but this one is squarely set in the then-present and isn’t a retelling at all, although nobody apparently bothered telling the colorist to make sure that Superman’s S-shield would have the black borders he was using at the time as a sign of mourning for those who perished during Our Worlds At War (another long, drawn-out story for another time).

Anyway, the story in a nutshell, or in a rather large soupbowl, actually, as presented by writer Geoff Johns, penciler Rick Burchett and inker Prentis Rollins: rogue-profiler Zolomon Hunter checks out Flash villains Pied Piper and Abra Kadabra, both of whom have seemingly gone kookoo. The Pied Piper stuff is mostly related to a plotline that was set in the pages of the regular FLASH comic and doesn’t feel like it belongs in this issue (nor does it feel like it squares with what was eventually shown in those FLASHes, but maybe I'm misremembering). Five pages in—after a cool yet weird shot of Kadabra in his cell, wearing a straightjacket even though the walls are covered with the words Who am I? in a kazillion different fonts. He really can do magic!—all it takes for the 64th-century tech-wizard to snap out of his catatonic state is Zolomon mentioning Houdini. Good job, Hunter.

The Iron Heights prison is obviously not at all prepared for holding a rogue like Kadabra because he merely has to utter “Door. Abra Kadabra.” in a nifty magic font and CHOOM!—cell door blows off its hinges. Moreover, he turns back to his pre-burnt/scarred look by stating “Skin. Abra Kadabra.” (1) That is some serious mojo right there. With powers like that, why would you try to be a super-criminal rather than simply going “Money. Harem. Private jet. Abra Kadabra.” and enjoy the spoils? I guess it doesn’t work like that, does it? Or at least go back to the 19th century where there weren’t any superheroes yet, if you can time-travel anyway? Perhaps logic isn’t his strong suit (he is more of the black-and-white type...)

Rick Burchett kicks some serious ass when it comes to portraying Kadabra, particularly in these few pages showing his return to form. After disposing of the guards in an appropriately (?) gruesome manner, the wizard lets Zolomon live because “There’s something else... Your future... I’ll be rooting for you.” which was another nice bit of foreshadowing at the role Zolomon would (and still does) play in the Flash’s life. No clue how Kadabra can actually see Zolomon’s future yet not his own, as he will meet defeat in a rather stupid way in the concluding pages of this story.

Before we get there though, we’ve now arrived at the protagonists of our tale, Jay Garrick and Wally West, the original and third Flash, respectively, who are speeding to a used bookstore in Metropolis; how else can we include Superman in Kadabra’s mad scheme? When the magician ambushes them at the bookstore and pulls some giant killer bunnies out of his hat (I’m not making this up), Superman swoops in to save the day, knocking out the bunnies! However, Abra puts a spell on Wally, accelerating his age as he is forced to run, and the only way to save him is by outrunning him and touching him (for which you don’t need to actually outrun Wally, of course, just catching up with him should be fine). The thing is: winner literally takes all, including the spell affecting Wally, and so to the victor goes a speedy death!

During the race between Jay and Clark, they have a bit of a chat about which one of them should make like a frog and croak. I’ve always wondered how talking while super-speeding works. Wouldn’t they be faster than what’s being said, unable to hear? Ah, comic book physics! Jay thinks it should be him because he’s old anyway, Superman believes that he has a better chance of surviving than Jay does because, well, he’s super, isn’t he?

So: they run run run for a couple of pages, then Jay cheats and steals Superman’s speed, which turns out to be exactly what Kadabra has been counting on. Lucky for him that used bookstore wasn’t in Opal City, right? Comic book physics take over once again and the combined speed of the three of them flashes them all straight into the 64th century, the wizard’s own war-torn, dreary era, where he intends to stock up on his trademarked technology that’s so amazing it looks like magic to us before returning to the 21st century to act like a big ol’ boogeyman.

The spell that is now affecting Jay turns out to be a bunch of nanites, and Wally and Clark make swift work of the little buggers because the story is almost over, after all. During the final showdown, Kadabra turns Superman into a marionette (a tip of the hat to the story from FLASH #133) and Jay into a big turtle.

Rather than stopping Wally in the same way, he pulls out a “chaos crystal” that can suck the life energy out of anything nearby, but the Flash uses Jay’s helmet to make all the nasty beams go KWANG KWANG KWANG! (sound effects, you gotta love ‘em) as they bounce back on Abra Kadabra himself, not sucking any life energy out of him as proclaimed mere panels ago, but just imprisoning him, made all tiny, in a big green ball—which is how they deliver him back to Iron Heights. No due process or anything for the guards he callously killed, it’s just back in the cell and Jay “almost feels sorry for him.” (!!!) Yes Jay, poor psycho killer Kadabra!

And of course, while they’re strolling out of the prison, they don’t even glance at their old friend Hartley Rathaway, the once-reformed, now-presumed-crazy Pied Piper who’s rotting away in the penitentiary for a crime Wally should know he didn’t commit. Indeed, “it’s good to have friends”, as the Piper triumphantly proclaims amid a mass of rats in his cell... (which is a mighty fine rendition by Burchett, I might add.)

While it appears clear that there’s holes and contrivancies aplenty in this story, the art goes a long way in skipping past the silly bits and making them more palatable. It doesn’t hurt that I’ve always been a fan of Abra Kadabra and wish he was used to greater effect in more series than just the Flash’s. I have to admit though that I enjoyed the story more while reading it than while recapping it. Still, it’s a 38-pager with a clear, identifiable threat that only takes one issue to resolve, while we’ve got simmering subplots crisscrossing through it.

In other words, a fun enough superhero yarn that’s enjoyable if you’re someone who can overlook strange gaps in logic and the like (which, if you like superhero comics, you’re probably already trained to do anyway). If you ever find it for cheap in a back issue bin, it’s recommended for the Burchett art alone. Even though it takes place right before FLASH v2 #184 I don’t think it was ever reprinted in the relevant trade paperback, so if you’re a Flash completist, this one’s for you too.

Plus, it's got giant killer bunnies. That about says it all, doesn't it?

(1) Kadabra got disfigured during a story-arc penned by Mark Waid from long, long ago, and has been hounding Wally West ever since. Presumably Geoff Johns prefers the original Silver Age look because all of Kadabra’s appearances since this issue in the pages of the FLASH show him in full classic regalia, which is just fine by me. Here's hoping for a Kadabra/Gentleman Ghost team-up against Batman and Hawkman one day!

"Like endless rain into a paper cup"

2005-10-08T16:44:00.000+02:00

Since there's so many different weblogs out there, I figured I might as well join the fray and try to make a practice out of regularly putting up some thoughts of my own. My intent is to pretty much talk about anything fun in the worlds of fiction/entertainment and share cool things and be positive about the things I read/watch/listen to, mostly to counter all my bitching and moaning about what I don't like on other forums :p

This might as well be called "Stray Thoughts" or some such because there won't be that much structure, I don't think. Although I could surprise myself, who knows, and have regular features and all. With some luck I might even be able to convince my girlfriend (who happens to be my best friend and favorite snark-partner) to write mini-reviews and the like together with me, so we could collaborate despite being on different continents :)

As time goes on, I hope to learn some tricks, both in the writing and publishing department, to make this a pleasant little page to visit and comment on. Now, onwards and upwards!