Day 114: Four-Color Funnybooks for 05-29-08
This was an expensive week. A lot of really great stuff came out, including DC’s big crossover, Final Crisis. Hopefully both Crisis and Secret Invasion will both be worth it, as there are maybe, at best, five books I buy monthly (not trade) that aren’t connected to the big two, so if they suck, I’m out a lot of cash.
The Mighty Avengers #14 - This issue does two things; it spells out that Iron Man’s faithful man servant, Jarvis, has been replaced by a Skrull and probably for some time now, and it lets us know the Skrulls’ plans for the Sentry: traumatize him to the point where he flies into the sun and kills himself.
I’ve said it before, but I’m not a huge Bendis fan. However his using the two Avengers books to fill in details, and create character moments without sacrificing space in the actual mini is genius, especially since every side issue has been really well done, and extremely interesting.
Having said that, I fucking hate the Sentry as a character. He’s Superman, but he’s a former junkie, and he feels guilty to the point where he’s useless. Every fight with the Sentry involves him being badass for like eight seconds, and then he freaks out, then bitches out and flies away. Honest to God, he’s the most boring character, ever. Making him psychologically scarred, and having him create an evil version of his own psyche to undo all the good he’s done, means jack shit if it’s the same thing every single time.
Just put Thor back on the Avengers, already.
The New Avengers #41 - Like this month’s Mighty Avengers this issue fills us in with the side stories and other bits of important, but not vital, info. In this case, what’s the Savage Land been up to since the first New Avengers arc? A little of the “Bendis? Bendis” dialogue sneaks in, but it passes quickly. Again, the issue is not vital, but it is neat to see how the whole “Who Do You Trust?” thing is being felt throughout the Marvel U.
Batman #677 - A great issue with some truly sub-par art. It’s not bad; it’s just boring, and there’s no pop to it; nothing that makes it stand out. However, if you can get past how it looks, the Batman RIP storyline really gets started here. Batman’s sanity is called into question, the Black Glove launches their first shot at Batman and it is a doozy. I cannot wait to see where this story is going. This feels as new, different, and exciting as Morrison’s work on New X-Men¸ which means most fans will like it and it’ll change things forever, and then after Morrison leaves the book, everything will be quickly and quietly retconned back to the status-quo. Enjoy the ride while it lasts.
Daredevil #107 - I think I’m going to drop this book. I got into it because I love Brubaker’s work, but his run, and Bendis’ run before it is just Murdock getting the shit kicked out of him, and it’s honestly getting old. The mystery surrounding this arc isn’t worth it to keep reading and seeing Murdock getting torn up over a woman again. It’s been done before and done quite well, and I just don’t want to read it again, even if Brubaker is writing it. If you loved Bendis’ run and like seeing a man knocked down and kicked over and over again for a hundred issues, here’s your book. It’s a well written, and the art is excellent, it’s just boring if you’ve been reading Daredevil for 15 years.
Final Crisis #1 - The first issue of DC’s big crossover doesn’t have the visceral and immediate impact of Marvel’s Secret Invasion but this is Grant Morrison we’re talking about, so every line of dialogue, every panel, every line is a potential clue, and he’s just setting the ground work for what could be a hugely epic story starting with Anthro, the first boy on Earth, all the way to Kamandi the last boy on Earth.
I mean, how can you not love a line like, “there was a war in heaven and Evil won?” Slow start, but I expect great things.
Green Lantern #31 - I’m really liking this story-arc, mostly because it’s about how awesome Hal Jordan is, and I’m a huge Hal Jordan fan. We get to see basic training on Oa, and see what happens when Kilowog faces someone already broken by a drill sergeant. The story is neat, and it basically resets the Green Lantern mythos after Infinite Crisis and Superboy Prime’s reality punching.
Ivan Reis continues to grow as an artist, though apparently he did this month’s cover, with a different inker, Dave McCaig. As good a job as Oclair Albert’s been on colors, and Reis’ inking his own pencils, the art on the cover looks amazing. I wouldn’t mind if that’s how the book looked from now on.
The Immortal Iron Fist #15 - Apparently this is Fraction’s last issue, and that sucks. The book has been incredible, and somehow Iron Fist has gone from martial artist with a goofy costume to one of Marvel’s most interesting and rich characters. Hopefully Fraction will come back from time to time to do a “Tale of the Iron Fist” story and expand the mythos. This issue about a Chinese Iron Fist defying Britain and the height of its colonial collecting power is fun, and like every issue just makes the world bigger, neater, and more exotic.
All Star Superman #11 - I figured out why this week was so great: a whole lot of Grant Morrison. His strange and wonderful book mixing Silver and Modern age heroics and futuristic science-fiction keeps moving forward. Granted it comes out whenever the hell it likes, but we take greatness when we can get it. This is what Superman should be: the world’s greatest hero facing universe-spanning threats. Superman is the cutting edge of pop comics cool. He’s creating super robots, keeping sun eaters as pets, and facing down tyrant stars from the future. All comics should be this much fun.
Thor #9 - You know, I really hated J. Michael Straczynski’s run on Spider-man. The premise and the initial idea was neat but it all went to hell pretty quick, and rapidly became unreadable. He tried to incorporate fantasy into what is, at its core, a science-fiction* book. I remember reading a review of one of the recent Spidey stories where they used magic to clean up a lot of loose ends and stuff, and the writer said, “it’s like if in Lord of the Rings a space ship landed in Rivendell and offered to fly the ring to Mt. Doom.” Fantasy, magic, and motherfucking “spider totems” do not belong in a Spider-man book.
*veeeeeeery loosely
Thus, I was heart-broken to find out the man who drove me from Spider-man was getting picked to re-launch Thor. I ignored the book, even though the excellent Olivier Coipel would be on pencils. However, people, people whose opinions I trusted, kept talking up the book, so when I found an opened volume one trade at Borders I figured, “why the hell not?”
And it’s really good. This is the book Straczynski should have always been on from the beginning. The mysticism, fantasy, and big broad ideas work perfectly with the Asgardians. If you like fantasy, smashing things with hammers, and thunder gods check this book out.
Giant Size Astonishing X-Men - A great issue, with pitch-perfect characterization across the Marvel U’s huge cast (but especially Spider-man) though the ending, great as it may be, is diminished by the book being perpetually late, and the ending having been guessed by everyone months ago. The art is great, surprising no one as John Cassaday is probably my favorite artists not named Kirby, so perhaps I’m a bit biased. The issue does manage to have a lot of surprises even though the ending has been spoiled, and I wish Joss Whedon could get stuff out monthly, because it very rarely disappoints.
The X-Men were the first characters I got into, and were in fact the first comic I ever bought that didn’t have a toy line or cartoon (Transformers, GI Joe) so reading a solid, not continuity buried issue of X-Men is a joy, and reading a great X-Men story is like seeing old friends again.
This run of Astonishing though late by like two years (cumulatively speaking) has been awesome in all the right ways. I even loved the arc no one else liked (Danger). Get it in trade, dig through the bins, wait for the omnibus, whatever, read this book if you’ve ever even had a passing interest in the X-Men. As a bonus, it ties into Morrison’s run on New X-Men so not everyone has ignored it.
So, what did you read this week?
Matt