Sunday, March 30, 2008

New comics 3/19/08

Thanks to Easter last weekend and the Siegel ruling this week, it's time to play catch-up. Here are last week's books.

Let's start with Captain America #36 (written by Ed Brubaker, pencilled by Butch Guice, inked by Mike Perkins), a mostly-action issue which eventually finds our hero failing to fill his mentor's inspirational role. It's a moment I'd been anticipating for a couple of issues -- except for the heckling, naturally -- and it speaks to the power of that costume. James B. Barnes looks like Captain America, fights like Captain America (if a little dirtier), and carries Cap's shield. As far as the "living symbol" stuff goes, though, the people aren't convinced. On the action side of the equation, the extended fight scene which takes up the first part of the issue is exciting enough. However, its capper -- Cap being thrown through a window, landing on a hovercar, and blowing away his attacker -- ends up a little static. Maybe some speed lines would have helped me, or maybe devoting just one panel to the fall drained some of the suspense. Overall, though, a consistently satisfying title.

It was a weird issue of Birds Of Prey (#116 written by Sean McKeever, pencilled by Nicola Scott, inked by Doug Hazlewood). I didn't think Black Alice was supposed to be that ... well, mean; and there was a very unsettling vibe running through the Lady Blackhawk/Killer Shark/Huntress scenes. I never expected to see Huntress in a damsel-in-distress situation in this title, that's for sure. Oh well, at least Scott & Hazlewood aren't going anywhere, right?

Like the cover blurb, I'm hesitant to call The Brave and the Bold #11 (written by Mark Waid, pencilled by Jerry Ordway, inked by Bob Wiacek) a "team-up." Instead, it trades mostly on a reversed Superman setup to amusing effect. Ordway fits Superman like a glove, not surprisingly. I think I even saw some of his old Daily Planet staffers (especially "Whit") in the background. I'm sure he'll do fine on the rest of the DC characters, but this issue was a perfect way to kick off his tenure.

Not so successful, unfortunately, was Superman/Batman Annual #2 (written by Joe Kelly, drawn by Scott Kolins), a reworking of a World's Finest two-parter from 1968. A mystical bad guy takes away Superman's powers and renders Batman helpless, and it's only through feeling good about themselves that they get their mojoes back. Really, I might have liked this issue more if not for the extraordinarily dark color work of Jorge Molina. Everything seems to occur against an indigo backdrop, and when you're talking about the black-robed villain, the deep blues, grays, and blacks of our heroes' costumes, and even the muted red and yellow of Robin's costume, it's like reading through sunglasses. Kelly's script doesn't help, since it neither sets up nor resolves the central problem (Superman's loss) with adequate explanation. I like these retro-style stories, obviously, but here things just didn't work out.

Serenity: Better Days #1 (written by Joss Whedon and Brett Matthews, drawn by Will Conrad) kicks off the second Dark Horse miniseries featuring the crew of everyone's favorite Firefly-class freighter, and the good news is, it reads like a pretty decent episode of the TV show. The bad news is, it took me a few passes to figure out how the big action sequence at the beginning was concluded. This was apparently not my week for action sequences. Art is fine; everyone looks about like you'd expect, with only a panel or two where Inara might be mistaken for River, or vice versa. Dialogue is typical for a Whedon-run production, although not too satisfied with itself. Better on subsequent readings, which helps justify me, y'know, buying it.

Unfortunately, I don't know that I can buy (see what I did there?) the central premise of The Flash #238 (drawn by Freddie Williams II), the first issue for new ongoing writer Tom Peyer. It's the old "Wally needs a job" plot, explored by Bill Messner-Loebs several years ago, but still. This time it's augmented by the "Wally openly admits he'd feel better getting paid" subplot; and again, I thoguht we'd settled this. When Wally's Flash identity was public knowledge, somebody (Messner-Loebs, I think) said he got trust-fund income from a charitable foundation set up in Barry Allen's name. When Geoff Johns restored his secret identity, he got a job as an auto mechanic. I guess that's gone away in the flurry of a) being thought dead and b) living on another planet for around a year. Anyway, the central question is, do Peyer and Williams sell this new development? Does the issue work? By those criteria, yeah; I guess so. The new money concerns are exacerbated by a new mind-controlling supervillain. I'm still not entirely sure Williams is a good fit for the Flash -- he's better on Wally's physique, but some of his expressions seem off. Peyer I like a lot, so I'll give him some time to convince me.

I probably should have figured out that Justice League of America #19 (written by Alan Burnett, pencilled by Ed Benes, inked by Sandra Hope, Mariah Benes, and Ruy Jose) wouldn't really cross over with the Salvation Run miniseries. Therefore, I should give it some credit for the misdirection, and some more for bringing back a classic JLA villain as the real menace. That's about it, though. For a one-and-out issue (which this is, essentially, despite its two issues' worth of lead-in), said villain gets defeated much too quickly, because there's too much time spent on Earth arguing over the civil rights issues of exiling supervillains. At least these crossover issues are coming to an end.

Ah, but speaking of which, here's Tangent: Superman's Reign #1 (written by Dan Jurgens, pencilled by Matthew Clark, inked by Jesse Delperdang), the story I almost wish was in JLA instead of its own miniseries. Basically, the Flash and Green Lantern travel to a parallel Earth quite different from their own, where they meet a Flash and Green Lantern who are the same in name only. The issue also introduces an all-new Mirror Master, well-suited for DC's multiverse, and has a nice "Deep Space Nine" reference. The plot isn't anything innovative -- Tangent's Superman is now the absolute ruler of his Earth, and I presume our heroes will spend the next 11 issues trying to overthrow him. However, it's nice to see a multiversal crossover where the only similarities are the names, and even the archetypes are different. Clark's figures are a little too splashy at times, but overall the issue flows well. I also can't fault Jurgens' dialogue, and believe me that's not something I say every day.

Clark used to draw Adventures of Superman from the scripts of one Greg Rucka, who continues the tour-de-force wrap-up of his run on Checkmate (#25 co-written by Eric Trautmann, pencilled by Joe Bennett and inked by Jack Jadson) with an extended guest appearance by the Man of Steel and certain other high-profile superheroes. It's been a change of pace for the title, but it gets no complaints from me. This arc not only answers the "why don't they get Superman to do it?" complaint, it draws some pretty clear lines between the world of bright spandex and the world of Checkmate. Bennett and Jadson are a little more suited for the superhero side of things, but that's a stylistic nitpick. They're good storytellers, and they keep a number of balls in the air. The only good thing about the end of this team's run is the fact that I won't feel bad about not following their replacements.

Finally, Countdown #6 (written by Paul Dini and Adam Beechen, story consultant Keith Giffen, pencilled by Mike Norton, inked by Jimmy Palmiotti) kicks off the End Of The World ... or, more precisely, the "Great Disaster" which will lay the foundation for Kamandi's Earth. It has the same doomsday appeal as the apocalyptic flashbacks in post-apocalyptic movies, only this time with people turning into animals and vice versa. Mike Norton's pencils are a little too clean, simple, and just plain pleasant for this sort of descent, although Beechen's script chooses wisely to have survivor Buddy Blank narrate it. For once, I approve of first-person narration! We know how this ends, though: the boat sinks. The question is whether Leo DiCaprio dies. For that, tune in next time....

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