Review: "Heads or Tails," the Two-Face segment from Walt Simonson's "The Judas Coin" (2012)
Four months have passed since the release of Walt Simonson's excellent new graphic novel, The Judas Coin, so I think it's finally time for me to examine the story's Two-Face segment, Heads or Tails, in full, exhaustive, spoilery, scan-heavy detail.
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Aw.
... but this was the best Two-Face story I've read in years.
Hooray!
... so it very well might have been just you.
Aw.
However, I like your take much better.
Hooray!
Judas Coin is the first I ever heard of Simonson...
Egad! His Thor run is worth checking out, as I understand it's one of the most celebrated runs in all of Marvel's history. I still need to read the whole thing, if I can ever get my hands on 'em. I'd love the get the massive, recolored (coloring was often such shit back then) hardcover omnibus, but sadly, I don't have $150 to throw around.
... but it has me wishing he'd write a Batman comic...
Oh, you and me both! The closest he's ever come to doing a full Batman comic is with his serialized Manhunter story, which ran as back-ups in Detective Comics during the 70's and featured Batman as co-star. It was a very popular story in its day, although I must confess, I don't remember much about it. I have no idea how it holds up. I thought I heard that it was going to be reprinted for the first time in a decade, but I can't find any info anywhere. Aha, found it! It will be reprinted in a collection of writer/editor Archie Goodwin's Batman work! I wonder if it will include the bonus story that Simonson did in the last volume as a tribute to the late Goodwin that wraps up the loose ends from the Manhunter saga? I hope so, but it doesn't seem like it's listed.
Simonson also did the Orion solo series from the late 90's, which was the only time that the New Gods (as done by someone other than Jack Kirby) have ever been interesting to me. Well, that and DeMatteis' Mister Miracle run, but that's something else entirely.
Oh, and one more neat work by Simonson that you can read in its entirety: his adaptation of Alien, which ran in the pages of Heavy Metal. It's recently been rereleased as a massive artist's edition that's also very worth checking out. It really is much, much better than the average comics adaptation of a movie.
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I'd say it holds up pretty darn well, myself. I have it collected in 'Manhunter: The Special Edition', with a shiny gold cover and the bonus story included. I got it years ago, back in the late '90's or so, so it's probably out of print, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was knocking around Amazon somewhere.
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Still, I would check out the other Thor volumes, but cash is much tighter than ever. My days of willy-nilly picking up comics that interest me are over for the time being. It's either my local library system (which has a decent selection, but sadly, no Simonson), or whatever else I can find online.
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Also, if your library does have a decent selection, they probably have someone behind the scenes who at least knows a little bit about comics, so you might try putting in an order for them. (I specify this detail because if that wasn't the case, It wouldn't be worth it; I called up my local library once to ask if they had some graphic novel or other, and I had to spend a good five minutes explaining to someone what a graphic novel was before he said 'hang on, I'll check'. Needless to say, they didn't have it.)
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Oh.
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And yeah, I had wanted to find appropriate Zoidberg screenshots, but ehhhh, too much effort.
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