Miscelleneous comics & manga impressions
I caught up with volume 6 of Ooku, and while it continues being very good; it does feel like the big edge and quality of the manga faded out after the first two or three volumes. The point of the gender reversal in the setting is less prominent and it becomes a lot of political & some romantic intrigues with too many characters that it is hard to keep track of.
I've also caught up with vol 4-6 of Black Rose Alice, and while I love, it is very very id ficcy.
I also read the second volume of Brides Story, and it's still ridiculously good and gorgeous. Lots of wonderful silent panels that are so expressive and they went and OMG the scenes about the embroidery motives transmitted through generation *GUSH* I kind of love that the author sort of apologises in the annex about fan service. Oh, Kaoru Mori, here, you have my express permission to put in as many female naked bodies in anything you do as you want. Srsly she draws the best naked female bodies ever.
Inanna's Tears
It's a decent story (though the person who decided on the font of the first few pages should be shot), but not as good as what I was hoping. It lacks something, I dunno, some sort of twist to truly make it a story. It's all too predictable.
So I did go a read Stumptown (it's shorter than Q&G), at least the first one (is the second a mini too? I think I'll wait for it to be over to read it); and it's brilliant. Don't have much to say beyond that ^^
Did I mention reading the recently finished run of New Mutants yet? I don't see it in this thread so I assume not. I remember the first time I tried it, while I was starting to get into Marvel, and I was confused and had a hard time getting into it. Man, it is so much better when you already know and like the characters!! Wells' run overall is excellent, very strong and focussed and epic. DnA's has a much more hazier sense of plot and characterisation although it does also have good moments (at least they did try to develop Cypher past bringing him back even if some of those development were weird and still lacking the answer to the question "did anybody bother telling his parents he's not longer dead?"). Some very random shipping though.
Also I read the first volume of Peter Madsens' Valhalla which is... hmm, less good than I was expecting? A bit too much of the sort of humour I don't care much for; but still good and funny.
Iron Man - Armor Wars
Solid enough story, but not very engaging. I think I might just have to give up on Iron Man and stick to fanfics when it comes to him.
Himitsu: the Revelation v5-9
So long since I'm catching up with this one. As always the stories are very good in all their dark & morbid glories (and the storytelling so much more understated than the animated adaptation, what a relief!), with some very fine tension and horror. I'm struck by how much more slashy than I remembered it is though. And somewhat surprised that I don't remember any of the stories from the anime, I guess they made up quite a few.
Also Captain America & Black Widow which was pretty good, if a little bit... quick? I dunno, not everything was, but sometimes it skipped forward in time in a way that felt a bit off. Anyway good characterizations and good use of alternate universe and alternate characters.
I think I ended up shipping evil!Natasha with the person she was working for ^^
Emperor Doom, brilliant in a tragi-comic way and loads of fun.
Super Villain team-up 1-4 (The one with Namor & Doom)
Loads of fun! Those two are so cute together.
Doctor Strange & Doctor Doom: Triumph & Torment
Holy shit that was good. Gorgeous art, gorgeous storytelling, brilliant characterisation. A beautiful bittersweet tragedy lacking the usual comedic tone that Doom's usually got but without trading them for lack of clarity.
The only thing I disliked was the way all the multicultural magicians were made to look like fools and then fawning all over Strange.
Anyway I ended up posting some scans & commentary of this one on tumblr if anyone's interested: http://demoiselledefortune.tumblr.co...ph-and-torment
comments at the original post on Dreamwidth
I've also caught up with vol 4-6 of Black Rose Alice, and while I love, it is very very id ficcy.
I also read the second volume of Brides Story, and it's still ridiculously good and gorgeous. Lots of wonderful silent panels that are so expressive and they went and OMG the scenes about the embroidery motives transmitted through generation *GUSH* I kind of love that the author sort of apologises in the annex about fan service. Oh, Kaoru Mori, here, you have my express permission to put in as many female naked bodies in anything you do as you want. Srsly she draws the best naked female bodies ever.
Inanna's Tears
It's a decent story (though the person who decided on the font of the first few pages should be shot), but not as good as what I was hoping. It lacks something, I dunno, some sort of twist to truly make it a story. It's all too predictable.
So I did go a read Stumptown (it's shorter than Q&G), at least the first one (is the second a mini too? I think I'll wait for it to be over to read it); and it's brilliant. Don't have much to say beyond that ^^
Did I mention reading the recently finished run of New Mutants yet? I don't see it in this thread so I assume not. I remember the first time I tried it, while I was starting to get into Marvel, and I was confused and had a hard time getting into it. Man, it is so much better when you already know and like the characters!! Wells' run overall is excellent, very strong and focussed and epic. DnA's has a much more hazier sense of plot and characterisation although it does also have good moments (at least they did try to develop Cypher past bringing him back even if some of those development were weird and still lacking the answer to the question "did anybody bother telling his parents he's not longer dead?"). Some very random shipping though.
Also I read the first volume of Peter Madsens' Valhalla which is... hmm, less good than I was expecting? A bit too much of the sort of humour I don't care much for; but still good and funny.
Iron Man - Armor Wars
Solid enough story, but not very engaging. I think I might just have to give up on Iron Man and stick to fanfics when it comes to him.
Himitsu: the Revelation v5-9
So long since I'm catching up with this one. As always the stories are very good in all their dark & morbid glories (and the storytelling so much more understated than the animated adaptation, what a relief!), with some very fine tension and horror. I'm struck by how much more slashy than I remembered it is though. And somewhat surprised that I don't remember any of the stories from the anime, I guess they made up quite a few.
Also Captain America & Black Widow which was pretty good, if a little bit... quick? I dunno, not everything was, but sometimes it skipped forward in time in a way that felt a bit off. Anyway good characterizations and good use of alternate universe and alternate characters.
I think I ended up shipping evil!Natasha with the person she was working for ^^
Emperor Doom, brilliant in a tragi-comic way and loads of fun.
Super Villain team-up 1-4 (The one with Namor & Doom)
Loads of fun! Those two are so cute together.
Doctor Strange & Doctor Doom: Triumph & Torment
Holy shit that was good. Gorgeous art, gorgeous storytelling, brilliant characterisation. A beautiful bittersweet tragedy lacking the usual comedic tone that Doom's usually got but without trading them for lack of clarity.
The only thing I disliked was the way all the multicultural magicians were made to look like fools and then fawning all over Strange.
Anyway I ended up posting some scans & commentary of this one on tumblr if anyone's interested: http://demoiselledefortune.tumblr.co...ph-and-torment
comments at the original post on Dreamwidth