Weekly Miscellanea: July 2-9

[noelct]

Everything I've read, watched, and contributed to in the last week.

Stuff I've Done

At Deconstructing Moya:

• Ship of Ghosts, a Farscape novel

At I Hate/Love Remakes:

• Episode 18, Part 1: April Fool's Day (1986)
  

At The Super Saturday Short-Lived Showcase:

• Inhumanoids, Final Thoughts

Stuff I've Read/Watched

Comics:

• Adrenaline #2 (2009) Recommended. The writing is so sharp and clever and instantly pulls us into each new character as they're introduced. Now if only the art wasn't so amateurishly shitty.
• All-Star Superman #3 (2005) Recommended. So sweet that it trumps Morrison's loonishness.
• The Amazing Spider-Man #2 "Duel to the Death with the Vulture" (1963) Recommended.
• The Amazing Spider-Man #2 "The Uncanny Threat of the Terrible Tinkerer" (1963) Not Recommended. Completely disposable in every way.
• American Terrorist #2 (2011) Recommended.
• Animal Man #3 "The Nature of the Beast" (1988) Recommended. Scattered and messy, but interesting and unique.
• Atlantis Chronicles #4 "Full Scale War" (1990) Recommended. Very very highly.
• Atomic Robo fourth series #1 "Revenge of the Vampire Dimension" (2010) Recommended. BWAHAHAHAHAHA.
• Batgirl fourth series #9 "Night of the Owls: In the Line of Fire" (2012) Recommended.
• Batwing #5 "Like a Nightmare Coming to Life" (2012) Recommended.
• The Bionic Man #8 "War Machines" (2012) Recommended.
• The Bionic Woman #2 (2012) Recommended.
• Birds of Prey #4 "The Ravens Strike" (1999) Recommended. Though I probably should take offense at all the Minnesota humor. :)
• Blue Beetle eighth series #4 "Person of Interest" (2006) Recommended.
• The Boys #30 "Rodeo Fuck" (2009) Recommended. Just when you think it can't possible get more dark, Garth Ennis says "Fuck it! Let's go darker!"
• Captain Victory and the Galaxy Rangers #1 (1981) Recommended. Space opera glory crafted in the grand Kirby tradition. I dug every panel of it.
• Catwoman #2 "I Could Say That I'll Sleep Better, But That's a Lie" (2011) Recommended. I'm very quickly falling in love with this book.
• Charlatan Ball #1 "Nothing Up My Sleeve" (2008) Recommended. I love you, Joe Casey's brain.
• Cover Girl #3 "... and This Time, It's Personal" (2007) Recommended.
• Dungeons & Dragons #4 "Shadowplague, Part 4: Going down" (2011) Recommended.
• The Elementals #1 "The Natural Order, Part 1: The Spontaneous Generation" (1984) Recommended. It's a little clumsy around the edges and doesn't exactly break the mold of superhero team books, but well done with good characters and a nice mystery at its core.
• Epic Illustrated #1 "Metamorphosis Odyssey, Chapter 1: Aknaton" (1980) Not Recommended. The spectacle of the story is drowned by the blandness of the dry infodump, in much the same way Starlin's delicately detailed art doesn't save the fact it's portraying silly designs.
• The Green Hornet NOW series #1 "My Last Case" (1989) Recommended. A strongly written finale for the Golden Age Hornet manages to rise above boring art and the narrative misfire of bridging the eras at the end through a massive dump of text.
• The Green Hornet NOW series #2 (1989) Not Recommended. There's a few interesting story bits, but it's lost in dry, clumsy writing and awful art.
• Hack/Slash: Slice Hard (2006) Recommended. Though the shifting collection of artists can be jarring, and not all of them click with the material.
• Hellraiser Boom series Annual #1 "Closer to God" (2012) Recommended. One word: FRANK!
• I Hunt Monsters #1 (2004) Recommended. More than a little scattered and jarring, but also a lot of fun.
• The Intrinsic #1 "Torment" (2011) Recommended. It's not without some clumsiness, but for a free preview issues, I was blown away by the strong hook, interesting characters, and some fresh ideas. Definitely coming back for a second taste.
• Irredeemable #1 (2009) Recommended. Mark Waid is a writer I haven't really explored yet, and this debut issue knocked my socks off and makes me hunger for more.
• I, Zombie #2 "Working Stiffs" (2010) Dropping the book. It's a good book, it just isn't clicking with me at all and I'm not interested in pursuing it further.
• Jennifer Blood #5 "Dogfight" (2011) Recommended. It still amazes me what Garth Ennis gets away with at times. :)
• Joe the Barbarian #1 "Hypo" (2010) Conflicted. I honestly can't say if I liked this or not, nor whether or not I want to continue. It's nicely scripted and drawn, but I found the hook more confusing than intriguing. In other words, exactly how I feel about most of Morrison's stuff. :)
• Jon Sable - Freelance #1 "The Iron Mobster" (1983) Recommended. Great art, slick writing, and an interesting spin on the private eye genre, but there isn't much to the character and I'm wondering if I'll get anything deeper from this series or if it'll just be a series of one-off assignments. Which wouldn't make it bad if it were, just not something I have much personal interest in investing in.
• Journey into Mystery #91 "The Mighty Thor Battles Sandu, Master of the Supernatural" (1963) Not Recommended. Golden Age style slog.
• Justice League Dark #1 "In the Dark, Part 1: Imaginary Women" (2011) Not Recommended. The art's gorgeous, but the story is a confusing mess of craziness for the sake of craziness that confuses far more than it cultivates curiosity, and none of the introductions of the main players leaves an engaging impression. A fail. Only great moment is Superman being attacked by teeth.
• Justice League International #1 "The Signal Masters, Part 1" (2011) Recommended. This, on the other hand, is an absolute blast of a debut issue, quickly throwing our characters together so we can see how they play off one another as they leap into their first mission. Smart, sharp, and a lot of fun.
• Justice Machine Texas series Annual #1 "The Elementals: The Shape of Things to Come" (1983) Recommended. Clumsy and derivative, but still a decent ice-breaker of an intro piece for the team.
• The Losers #1 "Dead Man's Hand" (2003) Recommended. But only mildly. It's a clever heist plot and has some slick writing, but the art's a bit flat, and heist stories revolve around the members of the team and their dynamics being instantly distinct, which we don't get here. I have a vague idea of who these people are and why they're doing things, but I don't feel it, I don't care.
• Next Men #1 "Breakout" (1992) Recommended. It's still a little early to really get a sense of everyone, but I like Byrne's gradual setting of the stage and laying in of conflicts.
• The Strangers #1 "Jumpstart" (1993) Recommended. Very clumsy in both writing and art, but fun, with a good spirit and characters I'm curious to keep following.
• Strange Tales #107 "The Human Torch, Face-to-Face with Prince Namor, the Mighty Sub-Mariner" (1963) Recommended. Aside from the nonsensical Random Statue Of Hypnosis, this was a fun back-alley dustup between Torch and Namor.
• Tales of Suspense #40 "Iron Man versus Gargantus" (1963) Not Recommended. There's some good little moments of character building, like Tony going through multiple dates and the first of his constant armor modifications, but this story is otherwise totally disposable nonsense. Good art, though.
• Tales to Astonish #42 "Ant-Man: The Voice of Doom" (1963) Recommended. Marvelous story with a deceptively simple villain who cleverly escalates into a very real, surprisingly massive threat. Ant-Man himself is still bland, but the story makes great logical use of his powers and intellect. A winner all around!

Episodes:

• Accel World #7 "Restoration" (2012) Recommended.
• Avatar: The Last Airbender #4 "The Warriors of Kyoshi" (2005) Recommended.
• Avatar: The Last Airbender #5 "The King of Omashu" (2005) Recommended. They telegraphed that twist ending a mile ahead, though.
• Avatar: The Last Airbender #6 "Imprisoned" (2005) Recommended. Clumsy first half, very strong second.
• Avatar: The Last Airbender #7 "Winter Solstice, Part 1: The Spirit World" (2005) Recommended. Holy crap, Iroh!
• Avatar: The Last Airbender #8 "Winter Solstice, Part 2: Avatar Roku" (2005) Recommended. Everything just kicked up to a whole new level of awesome.
• Blake's 7 #1 "The Way Back" (1978) Recommended. I haven't exactly been a fan of Terry Nation's chaotic plotting style and wild ideas over the years, because for every marvelous twist he'd throw into the shows I've seen, there'd be three that just plain don't work. Not so, here. This is a sharp, intelligent, original pilot for what looks to be a show full of surprises.
• Dark Shadows #53-70 (1966) Recommended. Yeah, it really does drag for stretches, but just as it nears the point of unbearability, they drop a bomb that reignites everything. And it's great seeing the supernatural element finally come fully into play.
• Eureka #68 "Friendly Fire" (2012) Recommended.
  
• The Newsroom #3 "The 112th Congress" (2012) Recommended. An absolutely marvelous non-linear exploration of when it all started to change.
• Zixx #4 "Level One: Plant Life" (2004) Recommended.
• Zixx #5 "Level One: The Key Ring" (2004) Recommended.
• Zixx #6 "Level One: Anna" (2004) Recommended. The stakes just got a teensy bit more awesome.
• Zixx #7 "Level One: Symbiosis" (2004) Recommended. The deepest, most dramatic episode yet also manages to be the funniest.
• Zixx #8 "Stuck on You" (2004) Recommended.
• Zixx #9 "Four's a Crowd" (2004) Conflicted. There's some good stuff set up, but a lot of the episode hinges on the typically cautious Griff suddenly becoming an idiot, not to mention puts a spotlight on Alex Hood's on screen acting limitations.