Hey @$$holes, lead compiler Gregory Scott here.
So we've been dabbling in a little Rational-Emotive Therapy around the @$$hole Clubhouse lately, and as things often happen, I'm afraid it's found its way into our column. We're a little confrontational this week. So confrontational that I hereby dub this column...
But Greg, you ask, aren't you guys always angry about someting?
Au contraire, mon frere. This week we take it to a new level:
- Arrrgh!! Vroom Socko hands AVENGERS #501 its @$$, with a somewhat surly demeanor!
- Eurrah!! Ambush Bug opens his vents on HULK/THING: HARD KNOCKS #1, and doesn't say "please," "thank you," or "excuse me." At all.
- RRaaa-Oh wait, Buzz actually gives a nice review of SWAMP THING #7. All this outrage can get a little exhausting, so it's nice to have a little break; maybe sit back with a little chamomile.
- Brahh!!! Then Ambush Bug is back with an all-new faux-returning feature, THE @$$HOLE RANT OF THE WEEK! Feelings may be hurt!
- Plus Cheap Shots, Tales from the Crevice, and more!
The healing can't begin until we let it all out, so let's get started.
(Click title to go directly to the review)
SYLVIA FAUST #1
HULK/THING: HARD KNOCKS #1
THE BATMAN/JUDGE DREDD FILES (TPB)
BULLSEYE: GREATEST HITS #1
AVENGERS #501
SWAMP THING #7
Cheap Shots!
@$$hole Rant of the Week!
Tales from the Crevice: ECLIPSE & VEGA
SYLVIA FAUST #1
Written by Jason Henderson
Art by Greg Scott
Published by Image Comics
Reviewed by Buzz Maverik
Do you guys ever check out the Diamond Shipping List site? Sometimes, I'll go down the list before going to Two Guys From Middle Earth Comics, see an intriguing title and decide to take a look when I'm in the shop. Just the name SYLVIA FAUST on the Image list intrigued me.
I was more intrigued when I saw the book itself. It is sharp looking and droll as hell, with a realistic, yet witchy cover. What really put it on my shoplift list, though, was the artist: Greg Scott!
Could this be the editor of @$$holes Comic Reviews Cabaret and Column?
Probably not. It's probably just another guy with the same name. Our beloved editor is the world's greatest SUPERMAN fan. SYLVIA FAUST is better suited to the artist currently known as Dave Farabee, or Lizzybeth, or yours truly. And I only use Greg's name when I'm writing checks.
So there's a Greg Scott: Comic Book Artist (from Image's SWORD O' DRACULA) and a Greg Scott: Comic Book Critic. Any of you remember the cool issue of LUKE CAGE, POWER MAN where the villain Erik Josten, later to be known as Goliath and Atlas, looked up Luke Cage and attacked him in the Gem Theater. It seems Josten didn't take to Mr. Cage using the name Power Man, Josten's nom de crime as a loser supervillain. Josten was fighting for the name and Cage was fighting to protect the people in the theater. If I recall correctly, a little girl got hurt and when Josten revealed why he was attacking, Cage gave him the royal stomp and kept the name once and for all.
Wouldn't it be great if the two Greg Scotts could fight over the name in a grindhouse theater? I'd go, depending what was on the bill.
What's SYLVIA FAUST? Sylvia is a modern young woman in New York City who has to find a job, even though that's the last thing she wants to do. She has magickal powers and is able to conjure illusions and magickal beings. Sensibly, she'd rather just do these things to help herself along in life, but her mentor, Annie, has other ideas. We glimpse Sylvia's misadventures as she attempts bicycle messengering and telemarketing.
Back home, in a mystic realm, some sorcerer type who has a Cthuloid looming over him, is sending out his son to apparently reclaim Sylvia. This was the weakest element in the book. The dialogue seemed terribly disjointed, as if the two drawings were reading from different scripts and not reacting to each other. And the wizard's son, Fade, is already contradicting himself from panel to panel. First, he is stating that "the princess" doesn't want to come back, then he's laughing when Cthulhu eats a flunky.
The rest of the story concerns Tim, the owner of a Greenwich Village movie theater called The Apocalypse Drafthouse. Writer Jason Henderson has stated in interviews that the Apocalypse is based on The Alamo Drafthouse, a movie and beer joint highly favored by our founder Harry Knowles and his posse. Both theaters, real and fictional, appear to be cool places to see a kung fu triple feature from the '70s. In the comic, Tim is struggling to deal with a David Carradine style burnout who is hosting festival of his CRYING FIST kung fu flicks. Tim's story is funny and interesting. He's a character to whom we can all relate as he struggles to hold things together. His path is about the intersect with Sylvia's.
The only thing wrong with the art is that when Tim first appears, he looks like a slightly chubby teenager. Maybe we're supposed to see how the day is stressing him, but later, he looks like a seedy, late-twentysomething hipster. Finally, he looks like Jeff Bridges in semi-Dude mode.
The book is likable fun. Sylvia and Annie have the same mystic skylight in their Greenwich Village pad that Marvel's Dr. Strange has in his. Maybe they're subletting.
Sylvia is very human, very much like the readers of her comic. Tim is just a guy trying to make things work in an arena that should be fun but can be hellish because he's relying on geeks, stoners and weirdos...which is what putting out a comic, or comic book column, must be like.
HULK/THING: HARD KNOCKS #1
Writer: Bruce Jones
Art: Jae Lee
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Tortured: Ambush Bug
I’m not going to rant again about how bad Bruce Jones writes the Hulk. What’s that, you say? Yes, Marvel still publishes the Hulk and aside from some amazing art from Mike Deodato Jr. recently, that book has had absolutely nothing going for it. Bruce Jones may be some type of great best-selling author, but he can’t write comics for shit. The ongoing Hulk title is so convoluted, so disconnected from any form of continuity or reason, so badly drawn out, that even the most dedicated of Marvel Zombies have jumped ship. THE INCREDIBLE HULK series is a smear on a once great ongoing comic book.
So of course, when Marvel decides to publish a miniseries centering on a traditional rivalry between two of the strongest titans in the Marvel U, they nab the guy who has been running the once great name of the Hulk deep, deep, deep into the ground to pen it.
If you’re looking for a three-issue throw down featuring artist Jae Lee’s powerful images, look elsewhere. The Thing meets up with the Hulk in a rundown coffee shop and tells him a story. A dull story at that. Something about Dr. Doom and a robot and some dire situation. The plot is forgettable from the get go because when you pick up a comic featuring the Incredible One and the Ever-Lovin’ Blue Eyed One, you don’t want to see them sharing a Cup O' Joe. Some of you may cry, it’s pacing, Bug. They are building up to a showdown. I say, fuck that. Why not break ground and break a little ground? Why does everything have to move so goddamn slow and talk so goddamn much? The Bendis-ization of Marvel continues in this book. The difference? Jones doesn’t have the gift for gab that Bendy does, so the witty banter between the Thing and the truly uninteresting Smart Hulk caused me to break out the toothpicks to prop open my eyes to get to the end of this book.
But I don’t really want to focus on the story here. It reeks. It’s bad. And that’s that. What I want to focus on is the art. We @$$holes usually write a long-winded review centering on story, or pacing, or continuity, or whatever writing aspects that pop out when we read a book. Too often the focus on the art is an afterthought and shows up as a one paragraph blurb before the closer. Well, let me break forum for a bit.
I actually like Jae Lee’s art. I’ve been a big fan of his for ages. I remember when he debuted in that old Byrne NAMOR series and redesigned Tiger Shark to be a badass underwater Sabretooth. I liked his use of darks and shadows. I liked his moody INHUMANS redesigns. I really think he’s an artist who has been developing a style that is distinct throughout the years. Every now and then, an artist switches gears. He tries something new. He evolves or experiments with new artistic methods and techniques. Jae Lee has done that with this book and I commend him for trying something new.
The problem is that Jae Lee draws some of the ugliest Hulks and Things I have ever seen. I know these guys are supposed to be monsters and that this may be the point of what passes as this story, but I really felt ill looking at these two characters. The Hulk looks sleepy in every panel. His face is wrinkled and saggy. This isn’t a monster of muscle. It’s a tired old green man.
But that’s nothing compared to his depiction of the Thing. In this book, the Thing looks like something orange that I ate and shat. His skin droops. His frame is miniscule. He’s basically a normal looking big guy with orange wrinkles, not the mountain of rock that has cracked as much wise as skulls since I began reading comics. If the Thing looked like this in the upcoming FANTASTIC FOUR film, you’d better believe the fanboys would be up in arms. Jae Lee’s Thing looks like a wrestler with badly glued on make-up effects. If Troma did a FF film, this is the way the Thing would look.
I understand Lee is taking a more realistic approach. I understand that he wants to humanize the characters and focus on how fantastic these powers would be if normal humans had them. And even though it is played out for the billionth time, I can understand the concept of deconstructing these iconic appearances and fitting them into what may pass as reality these days. All I know is that this book made me feel nauseous as I read it. Both characters look as if they just walked off the terminal cancer ward and it made me queasy seeing my heroes in that light.
Other than the depictions of the two stars, Lee is still a good artist. He pulls off some interesting panels on a few pages and moves the snail-paced plot along by mixing up the angles a bit. He does what he can with the lack of story he has to work with. But even that didn’t save this book for me. I expected very little story-wise when I saw Jones' name on the cover, but I was hoping that like Deodato’s art on the HULK, the book would at least have that going for it. After reading the book, I set the book down and was so put off from this book that I felt a shower was in order. So after one issue, we have yet to see a fight other than the Thing smacking around Banner in order to induce “the change,” a meandering story, and hurl-inducing art. Kudos for Lee to try something new, but hopefully, this experimental style will end with this series and he can give another avenue in comic book art a chance.
THE BATMAN/JUDGE DREDD FILES (TPB)
Writers: Alan Grant & John Wagner
Artists: Simon Bisley, Carl Crichtlow & Glenn Fabry
Publisher: DC Comics/2000 AD
Reviewed by Dave
“I smell vigilante. And I don’t like vigilantes!” - Judge Dredd to Batman
“The Hell with your law!” - Batman to Judge Dredd
Are ya like me? Do you have Judge Dredd fever in anticipation of DC’s pending publication of some of the favorite adventures of Great Britain’s beloved fascist hero?
No?
Well maybe you should. Of all the protagonists headlining foreign comics, from Tintin to Lone Wolf and Cub’s Ogami to Hugo Pratt’s Corto Maltese, Judge Dredd is perhaps the most attuned to American superhero sensibilities - iconic visuals, heavy on the action, and lots of bad, bad dudes getting their asses stomped in the name of justice. His story’s even set in a futuristic American megalopolis. That Dredd’s sense of justice has always been couched in blackly humorous Gestapo tactics might seem a particularly British sensibility, but as we Yanks shudder under the specter of “four more years,” well...howsabout we just try and relate?
Collected in this volume are three prestige format one-shots from the ‘90s that teamed Mega-City One’s futuristic lawman with Gotham’s favorite Dark Knight detective, The Batman. All are fully painted in that particularly overwrought Brit style that combines the bulk and three dimensionality of Rich Corben’s fantasy art with the gleaming sheen of lowrider airbrush paintings. If it sounds a bit garish, well, it is, but it definitely fits the ultra-masculinity that characterizes all the stories. Like their style or not, artists like Simon Bisley (LOBO) and Glenn Fabry (guy who did the PREACHER covers) are the best there is at what they do, and what they do is render muscles, armor, violence, monsters, and large-breasted women with utter sincerity of purpose.
In the first story, one of the Big Bad’s of Dredd’s future – the spectral body-snatcher, Judge Death – finds himself in Gotham after getting his hands on an experimental belt with dimension-hopping capabilities. Hey, it’s comics. Even as he wreaks gory havoc in Gotham (and writers Alan Grant and John Wagner do seem to enjoy spotlighting the bad guys being bad), Batman ends up teleported to Mega-City One – and that’s where the fun really kicks off. Turns out it’s not the gangs that Bats has to worry about so much as Dredd and his ultra-fascist fellow cops. They get the drop on Batman, lock him up in the stir, and when he faces off against Dredd during an interrogation...ah, good times! Goofy, utterly weightless good times, to be sure, but pitting these two hardass heroes against each other was definitely inspired. Dredd keeps upping Batman’s hypothetical prison sentence, and Batman, while amusingly frustrated, remains completely unintimidated:
Dredd: “You’ve still got time to serve.”
Batman: “Don’t kid yourself.”
Of course they eventually do team-up. Curvy telepath Judge Anderson pokes around a bit in Batman’s mind to see that his story checks out, and faster than you can say “buddy cop movie,” our two stubborn heroes are on the trail of Judge Death, each getting a number of spotlight moments to shine. Bats has his muscle, gadgets, and Batmobile, Dredd has his muscle, gun, and huge-ass motorcycle. The carnage moves to Gotham, where Judge Death has teamed with Scarecrow with ghoulish plans for a headbanger concert, and simple as the plot is, Wagner and Grant keep it jumpin’ with plenty of black humor. Favorite such moment: the splash page where Scarecrow’s fear gas has zombie-like Judge Death quivering before a vision of that which most terrifies him: a cavalcade of cartoon ducks, ultra-cute plush bears and doe-eyed flying horses! Rendered by Bisley with the same immaculate zeal as all the gore and macho stuff, it’s an almost sublime splash page. Actually, all of Bisley’s splash pages stand quite nicely as their own works of art, and he draws a mean Batmobile to boot. Guy’s not much for backgrounds and I rarely like his work anywhere else, but his style’s so overwhelmingly appropriate to the subject matter that you have to be forgiving.
I’ll skip the details on the latter two stories, but both continue the pissed-off rivalry between Bats and Dredd (now tempered with grudging respect), and I was especially happy to note the continuity running between all of them. The dimension-hopping belt recurs as catalyst (it’s found its way into the hands of the Joker), and the action gets going quickly because Dredd and Batman already know each other by now. Works very nicely in this trade format, where recaps would’ve been a bore.
One story has Batman and Dredd captured and forced to fight for their lives in an extra-dimensional gladiator arena, the other has Joker running amok in Mega-City One. All are dense with carnage, but there’s a sort of giddy, dark humor vibe as well that keeps much of it from being taken seriously. So Judge Death and his cohorts kill off a few hundred ultra-hippies (the “Seventh Day Hedonists”)? No biggie! S’all in service to the raucous, macho fun with Bats and Dredd as comicdom’s answer to Riggs and Murtaugh.
I’m recommending this volume with the caveat that it’s completely insubstantial, but as inter-company team-ups go that’s sort of the standard, innit? What elevates it is the sense of anarchic fun that pervades throughout and the quite entertaining dynamic established between the two heroes.
Novice to Brit comics that I am, I was also interested to note that co-writer John Wagner is in fact the co-creator of Judge Dredd, so obviously we’re getting about as credible a depiction of the character as you’re likely to find in THE BATMAN/JUDGE DREDD FILES – no distorted Americanizations. If you’re interested in checking out his world in advance of the upcoming “best of” style collections (which will open with a Garth Ennis collection)...good entry point here.
BULLSEYE: GREATEST HITS #1
Written by Daniel Way
Art by Steve Dillon
Published by Marvel Knights
Reviewed by Buzz Maverik
Villain series used to be okay because they didn't come up too often. They were a novelty. Marvel had SUPERVILLAIN TEAM-UP. DC had a JOKER series and CREEPER series. Dr. Doom even starred in a series than ran, in of all places, MARVEL SUPERHEROES.
Now, we have DR. OCTOPUS, LOKI, EMMA FROST, VENOM, SABRETOOTH, THANOS, etc. I can appreciate any good series, but weird as it sounds, I like to root for the good guys.
@$$hole Comic Reviewer Dave Farabee has told me that I'm just not man enough for evil. That's not true. I'm a very evil person. I just like my comic books to star good people.
Anybody ever watch reruns of the MARY TYLER MOORE SHOW? Personally, I prefer her as Laura Petrie on THE DICK VAN DYKE SHOW with the Capri pants and the sleeveless blouses, but MTM was pretty good too. In one episode, Mary is dating a divorced guy with a 12 year old son. The kid comes over one afternoon and he's a sullen little shit. He's reading a swamp monster comic. Mary, trying desperately to have something to talk to the little bastard about, asks if the swamp monster is a good guy or a bad guy. Dripping with contempt, the young geek tells her, "They don't give bad guys their own comics."
They do now.
BULLSEYE: GREATEST HITS #1 was an interesting look at Daredevil's least favorite human being. This could be the origin of Bullseye, or Bullseye could be handing a crock of shit to the two special agents interviewing him in one of those creepy comic book type prisons. It's especially cool of writer Daniel Way to have the agents even considering that Bullseye could be handing them a self serving story.
I liked this book much better than I thought I would. The build up, with the agents entering the prison, was just right. We begin to anticipate Bullseye, to remember what a monster he is. One agent is the scarred, sole survivor of the team that captured Bullseye (it was through a lucky break, something the agent hates to hear). Agents Hoskins and Baldry came off favorably like a pair of James Ellroy's mismatched but equally nasty cops. Hoskins is the angrier, more macho one. Baldry is scrawnier, more idiosyncratic, but also colder, more calculating, maybe more dangerous. In a cool moment, Baldry excuses himself, goes into the can, and meditates before he confronts Bullseye.
Bullseye's story from his childhood is effective. Maybe too effective, as Agent Hoskins notes. We see how a remorseless killer could have emerged, but we're hearing it from the voice of one of Marvel's most notorious sociopaths.
Bullseye as a terrorist? Well, I guess a character should not be locked into a rigid series of behaviors. Bullseye's first caper in DAREDEVIL was a bit of terrorism. He was out to murder a number of citizens unless the city ponied up his cash demands. But after that, he was most effectively used as the Kingpin's top hitman and chief enforcer, or the Anti-Daredevil. With the character's history of mental problems and repeated defeats by DD, I can see why the mob would stop hiring him. He'd have to branch out. I know, I know. Kevin Smith, blah, blah, blah.
I'm not too fond of the target head look for Bullseye. I hated the DAREDEVIL movie. Bullseye's look there was simply a comic book company volunteering to sell out their own character. It was worse than Bob Kane agreeing to camp up BATMAN. It was Marvel's idea.
Steve Dillon draws the right kind of Bullseye, though. The character is lean and powerful. No excess to slow him down. Dillon gives him a lively, emotional, psychotic face.
I wish Dillon had done the cover. Instead, Mike Deodato Jr. apparently trotted out an old Venom drawing, complete with fangs and drool, and added some concentric circles. The flying playing cards are a nice touch, though. In a way, it's a cool, comic booky thing that characters are killed by playing cards. But I sorta preferred Frank Miller's take with Bullseye throwing ninja stars.
AVENGERS #501
Brian Michael Bendis: Writer
David Finch: Artist
Marvel Comics: Publisher
Vroom Socko: This book has it coming
“There’s a bunch of books I shouldn’t be writing.”
Brian Michael Bendis, From his AICN interview.
That’s sure the truth. Unfortunately, it’s proving to be true about his run on AVENGERS. Halfway into his first arc, Bendis has yet to distinguish himself on the title he’s decided to destroy. While his trademark dialogue is still sharp, and David Finch’s art is pretty damn cool, neither is as good as the previous issue. And THAT sucker wasn’t all that sharp to begin with.
There is one, just one scene in this issue that approaches good. It’s the two pages of Yellowjacket sitting over the sickbed of the Wasp. While marred by elements taken from Chuck Austen’s run of shit, (I don’t care what Chuck thinks, Hank and Jan were a much better, and happier couple divorced than at any other point in Marvel history,) this section was masterfully drawn and movingly written. This was the best section of the comic. Finch also did a sweet as all hell job on the closing double page splash, which I hope to hell Marvel turns into a poster. The rest, however…
The rest of this book sucked. My god did it suck. The conclusion to the She-Hulk rampage was horrid. Both Wasp and Captain Britain end up in critical condition over this, and looking at the art I couldn’t tell you why. As for how Shulkie is finally subdued - well, it’s stupid. Phenomenally stupid. She-Hulk’s taken worse than that before, and since she’s riding on adrenaline and rage… No, I don’t buy it for a second.
The other major section of this issue is that staple of Bendis storytelling: Six pages of talking heads. Let me amend that: It’s six pages of talking heads where none of the characters sound like themselves, but they all sure sound like Bendis characters. The worst part is the long speech Hawkeye has about the team not being proactive enough over the years. “We had it coming,” he says.
Now, there’s been several people online who have opined that last issue’s Quinjet crash into Avengers Mansion was a reference to the events of September the 11th. Marvel has categorically denied this, and I believed that initially. But when the second issue features one of your characters paraphrasing the post-attack words of Jerry Falwell, one is forced to reexamine the situation a bit.
What really gets me though, is the notion that the Avengers being a reactionary force is an inherent flaw. Bullshit. Are firefighters weak, are they asking to be injured because they don’t do anything until there’s an actual fire to fight? What about homicide detectives? I’ve seen MINORITY REPORT, I know how flawed that train of thought can be.
Now, I’m not saying that the plotline of this issue itself is awful. There’s a good comic to be had in this, the “last” Avengers story. A story where Avengers HQ is destroyed, with many a team member killed or injured. A story that points out the proactive nature of villains versus the reactive nature of heroes. A story where the last surviving Avengers come together to wage an all out war against those who would destroy them. That WOULD make a cool comic. In fact it did, ten years ago, in a Peter David story that was called (coincidentally enough,) The Last Avengers Story.
Just like last issue, this is all stuff I’ve seen before that was done better the first time around. It’s unoriginal. It’s uninspired. It’s beneath me. Hell, it’s fucking beneath BENDIS! I’m only going to read the next issue to see who dies, and then I’m dropping this worthless non-event storyline. I suggest you do the same.
SWAMP THING #7
Written by Will Pfeifer
Art by Richard Corben
Published by Vertigo/DC Comics
Reviewed by Buzz Maverik
I thought I'd never buy another SWAMP THING comic again. Sometimes, the run of a writer or artist on a comic is so perfect that once you've experienced it (especially if it's as the individual issues are coming out) it feels like the comic should stop when that creator stops doing it. THOR probably should have ended when Walt Simonson left. Chris Claremont was off the book too late, but that should have been the end of the X-MEN. Hell, Vertigo did end SANDMAN when Gaiman left. Although, later...
SWAMP THING was one of those books. Alan Moore didn't create SWAMP THING. Two talented guys named Len Wein and Bernie Wrightson did. But SWAMP THING came to belong to Moore.
As you can probably gather, SWAMP THING #7 was not on my list when I went into Ye Olde Funny Shoppe. But damn, if that powerful, old school horror cover by the great Richard Corben didn't bash me in the head. It was that garish, heavy, darkened logo that screamed, "Horror comic! Horror comic! The apotheosis of horror comic!" And it was Corben's unique, instantly identifiable textured style. Whether, he's doing DEN in HEAVY METAL, TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES, or BANNER or CAGE for Marvel, or whatever, you can tell it's Corben.
But I didn't buy the comic just for the art (hell, I haven't read CAGE and I dig that character, too). Will Pfeifer, billed as guest writer, nailed the right tone for a SWAMP THING story without resorting to an Alan Moore pastiche. But like Moore, he seems to be able to write in multiple voices, evidenced by the excerpts from a cryptozoological book throughout the story.
The book contains a number of exciting ideas and images. It has an especially loathsome villain. Swampy is a bit of cypher here, but that's okay in a swamp monster comic. This is my first issue, so I'm not sure how they're handling the character, but it worked here.
This story is a two parter. Don't miss either part!
AKIRA VOL. 1 HARDCOVER - For those of you who have never read AKIRA, let me
tell you two things. First, you suck. Second, get thee to a Barnes &Noble,
the exclusive home of the first volume of this series in hardcover. A
hardcover that actually costs ten bucks less than the Dark Horse paperback.
That's such a good deal I'm even thinking of picking it up, and I own the
whole series already. AKIRA is the single greatest comic book ever made. Buy
it and find out for yourself. - Vroom Socko
BIRDS OF PREY #73 - I've championed Gail Simone's BIRDS OF PREY work in the past and no doubt will in the future, but I've noticed a recurring pattern of unsatisfying endings in her longer story arcs and this issue marks the latest example. It's the wrap on a five-parter involving cultists, obscure heroes, and a mysterious computer virus infecting Oracle, and while there's little wasted space, it still seems to've gone on an issue too long. Maybe a few too many twists and red herrings? The moment-to-moment quality remains quite good, though, so some of the disappointment might be coming from the issue's two uninspired guest artists. Yeah, two. - Dave
ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #65 - See, this is why I always give Bendis a second, or
even third chance. After two wreched strick-outs in a row, he and Bagley
have, with this issue, pulled off an inside the park home run. I will never
accept the idea that Gwen Stacy's death was somehow preordained, that she
had to die simply because she's Gwen Stacy. But these guys have managed to
make her death (as meaningless as it was,) have real and heartfelt
ramifications to it. One hard earned stellar issue. That's all it takes for
me to be back on this title. - Vroom Socko.
CLOUDBURST - If I didn’t know this was an Image Comics one-shot, I'd swear it was a HEAVY METAL story. It's a sort of empty-headed futuristic yarn about a colony ship sent to terraform a planet after "evicting" the planet's pre-existing prison colony death-squad style. The lone dissenter is the hot scientist babe in the skintight white suit, drawn throughout with enough ass-emphasis to satisfy even the rigorous standards of a Sir-Mix-A-Lot or Frank Cho. Turns out terraforming the planet wakes up a bunch of underground monster-type aliens (an admittedly fun idea), and the latter half of the book is very PITCH BLACK as prisoners, military types, and The Babe In White all get good and bloody in a pitched battle. Gratuitous blood, gore, sexuality, AND ultra-hokey dialogue? Definitely in HEAVY METAL territory! And like HEAVY METAL, the art is quite nice – rich coloring, heavy paper stock, well drawn asses...you know the look. Recommended for boys ages 12-15 looking for their first glimpse of comic book nudity. Note in particular the innocuous cover and lack of Mature Readers label! Makes this an easy one to sneak past parents and the comic shop clerks between your issues of FLASH and ASTONISHING X-MEN!- Dave
TALES FROM THE BULLY PULPIT - - Fans of TICK-style laughs will likely get a kick out of this prestige-format one-shot from Image featuring the adventures of a time-traveling Teddy Roosevelt and the ghost of Thomas Edison. I'm a little burned-out on quirky humor, m’self, but it's hard to resist Roosevelt lines like, "Ah, bully! This is precisely what I thought the space/time continuum would look like!" Or Edison lines like, "This is the most retarded science I've ever seen!" And in a rare case for such offbeat projects, this one's actually in vibrant color, and fairly attractively drawn too. Not quite my bag, but worth a look if you’re not getting enough Abe Lincoln/Hitler fist fights in your Vertigo reading. – Dave
Y - THE LAST MAN #26 - So we get to know Yorrick's sister little better, in pieces. Taken together, the story makes a suprisingly cohesive and satisfying whole, cliffhanger and all. Sure, the psychology behind Hero's full-fledged delusions of "Victoria," the pooka who gave her psyche solace from the pain brought by the men in her life, later to be embodied by the leader of the gang/cult of "Amazons," is a little dicey. But in a narrative sense, it works terrific. I feel like I got to know Hero better in one issue than I did with Yorrick in twenty, and that includes the arc when he was kidnapped by the secret agent: Psychologically dubious hallucinations and all, the emotional believability was better this time around, or at least easier. Could this be one of my favorites from the series so far? Sure. - Greg
INVINCIBLE #15 - At the end of my enthusiastic review of the first two volumes of Robert Kirkman's INVINCIBLE, I found myself much-amused at the possibilities of this very issue based on its cover. Now that the issue actually rolls around, though...damn, kinda disappointing. The gags over Invincible's forced betrothal to the widowed fish-chick have a sitcom obviousness to them, and the subplots with Invincible's mother, friends and teammates left me uniformly disinterested. I've been a little shaky on the book ever since it lost the father/son focus on which it earned its rep, and with each subsequent issue my interest wanes a bit more. For all that, it's still pretty readable, but no longer a must-read. - Dave
Well, JUBILEE, GAMBIT, ELEKTRA, and BULLSEYE all had number one issues this week. Let Marvel’s over-saturation of the market continue. Now, I don’t know if any of these books are good or not. Hell, maybe they are, but when I come into the store and see four new unnecessary titles on the shelves in one week, it leaves the taste of @$$ in my mouth and it makes me want to spew it forth in a rant.
- I haven’t read a good Elektra story since Frank Miller wrote her.
Gambit’s last series failed miserably. Aside from a “love that will never be” type story between him and Rogue, he’s never been that interesting, and he continues to bore the snot out of me in X-Men. So why would I want to read a solo story of him?
- Bullseye had a miniseries that was started and forgotten by a high-profile Hollywood flake that chose to abandon the project in favor of writing bad movies.
- And was anyone really clamoring for a Jubilee series?
C’mon people. Don’t you see you’re being hosed again? Marvel tried this crap in the nineties. They overstuffed the shelves with absolute shit stories, selling out characters, and relying on the dedicated fanboys who would buy a shit stained piece of toilet paper if Marvel published it and titled it
A note to all of you MARVEL Zombies out there who buy each and every issue of a Marvel book: WAKE UP AND SMELL THE BUTTFUCKING!!! Quit buying everything this company publishes. It’ll kick them where it hurts and make them think about it before publishing yet another unneeded series that won’t see past issue 9 and will forever more occupy the 10 bin at the back of your local comic store. Do a favor for the comic store owners who have to gauge the orders on the first three issues without even selling the first one yet. Just say no to this type of bullshit, people. Stray from the flock shepherded by Marvel and Wizard. - Rant provided in part by Ambush Bug and brought to you by the letters F and U.
You know what I really get a kick out of, comics-wise? Fun books. Not necessarily funny books, but fun books. Books that gloriously embrace the inherent silliness of superhero clichés, yet don’t succumb to them. Stuff like FORMERLY KNOWN AS THE JUSTICE LEAGUE, and the current SHE-HULK title. Well, there’s another book you can add to that list, a little book called ECLIPSE & VEGA.
Created by Canada’s own Saul Colt, Eclipse and Vega are Hannah Hills and Shawna Sullivan, two college students who gain superpowers after being exposed to a radioactive asteroid. Naturally, this means they must become superheroes. Seeking out legendary retired Canadian hero Packaging Man (he owns his own parcel company,) the girls quickly become the preeminent heroes of the city of Toronto. The end up confronting everything from mind controlling villains to ninjas to alien invaders, all the while having a ball with such classic situations as training missions and heroes fighting their mentally dominated partners. You know, the fun stuff.
There’s one scene in particular that I just loved. In issue four, ECLIPSE & VEGA: AS SEEN ON TV, Vega (who, naturally, has amnesia,) is visiting the Toronto Tower when a kid breaks through a window. Instinctively, Vega jumps after him, leading to this exchange.
Vega: I’ve got you, everything’s going to be O.K.
Kid: Oh yeah? Well, if you’ve got me, then who’s got you?
Vega: …Oh, that’s right, I can’t fly!
See what I mean? Not a real gutbuster, but SUPERMAN: THE MOVIE jokes are inherently fun. The whole series is like that, packed full of goofy gags and comics in-jokes. But don’t just take my word for it. This week features the release of a special, full color anthology issue, featuring three different tales. The first is a real barnburner, exploring the source of the girls’ powers. The third one… the third actually manages to be quite sweet at the end. But it’s the middle story that I loved, the Secret Origin of Packaging Man. With gags based on the origins of Batman, the Fantastic Four, and Captain America, this story was not only fun, but actually had a few solid laughs in it. There’s one great gag about the Canadian Super Soldier program being used to convince the word that Canadian football is a real sport. I mean really, people actually think that’s football? There are only three downs! That ain’t football! The very idea is ludicrous.
But of course, this whole book is ludicrous, and I mean that in a good way. Head on over to the ECLIPSE & VEGA website and take a look for yourself. Then head to your comics shop and get the ECLIPSE & VEGA SUPER SIZED SPECIAL. I promise you this book’ll put a smile on your face.
