Avengers vs. the Pet Avengers, Into the Fire, Mickey Mouse Vol. 1, Contemporary Comic Book Superhero
Avengers vs. the Pet Avengers by Chris Eliopoulos and Ig Guara
The Pet Avengers fight some dragons, then the dragons fight the Avengers, then the Pet Avengers fight the Avengers. Then everything’s okay! I only had the vaguest idea of what was going on here or who anyone was, but it was still pretty cute.
Into the Fire by Suzanne Brockmann
Vinh Murphy’s wife was murdered by the neo-Nazi “Freedom Network” during Hot Target, and he’s only beginning to put his life back together - with the help of his late wife’s best friend, ex-cop Hannah Whitfield - when he discovers that the Freedom Network’s leader has been murdered and that he’s the prime suspect. Unsure whether he did the deed while drunk, Murphy starts investigating, only to discover that the Freedom Network is hiding a few more big secrets and he may have just put another woman he loves in danger. Meanwhile, Navy SEALs Izzy Zanella falls pretty much instantly in love with his SEAL rival’s teenage sister Eden Gillman the minute he sees her, so when she shows up six months pregnant and claiming the baby is his, he goes along with it and marries her in order to get her health insurance. Meanwhile meanwhile, Nerdy Ex-CIA Dave is in love with Ex-Forced-Harem Girl Sophia, who is in love with Troubled Ex-Black Ops Guy Decker, who is more concerned with his One True Bromance with Even More Troubled Ex-Black Ops Guy Nash, who is deliberately distancing himself from his wife, Spunky Tess, because of Reasons. Eventually all the ladies are kidnapped and then there’s a big rescue sequence (and by rescue, I mean the ladies kick ass).
Whew! So:
Murphy and Hannah were fine, if somewhat dull (to me, at least). I felt like they took a lot of turns carrying the Idiot Ball - there’s a lot of “IT’S TOO DANGEROUS, I’LL GO WITH YOU” / “I’M GOING TO DO SOMETHING EXTREMELY RISKY TO SAVE YOU EVEN THOUGH IT’S KIND OF STUPID AND POINTLESS,” all with lots of Drama and pounding of chests and God, just. You have like two dozen Troubleshooters around who can help, why do you keep flinging yourselves in front of bullets? On the other hand, Hannah is deaf, which is actually really interesting and I’ve never seen that before in a romance novel. So that was kind of cool.
I was looking forward to Izzy’s book because I like the comic relief, and I actually really really liked Eden, who is fucked up and skittish and a pathological liar but also kind of spunky and great? But Izzy wound up sending up like a million red flags (Like, since he’s doing her a favor by marrying her, they decide not to have sex, but he’s allowed to have sex outside the marriage - and she’s not. What.) and also Brockmann’s baby crazy is in full force with this book and there’s a lot of talk about how hot pregnant women are and it’s just. It’s very weird.
As for the background crazy with Decker and Nash and Dave and Sophia and like a billion other characters…well, on the one hand, I have never cared about Decker and Nash and want them to go away, but on the other hand, I completely loved Dave? And I am actually super impressed that Brockmann managed to write a nerdy guy in love with his beautiful female best friend and have him not be a Nice Guy. I think it’s largely because he’s so considerate of her past sexual trauma and very frank and honest about his own sexual past; he’s genuinely more interested in being the supportive best friend she needs than mopily seducing her with the power of his own patheticness. Also because Sophia is a fully realized character in her own right who has a lot of feelings about other ladies noticing Dave’s butt. And then! The end! and I just need the next book (DAVE IS BEING TORTURED OH NOES) right away.
IN CONCLUSION, if this book had been about these awesome ladies breaking out of the Freedom Network compound and then Sophia kissing Dave all up in the face, it would have been perfect.
Walt Disney’s Mickey Mouse, Volume 1: Race to Death Valley by Floyd Gottfredson
This absolutely beautiful book is the first collection of Floyd Gottfredson’s famous Mickey newspaper strips, covering 1930-1931. There’s also a ton of supplementary material on all the staffers involved with the early strip as well as early Mickeymania and the development of the characters in the comic as opposed to in the cartoons. I honestly found that more interesting than the strips themselves, which are beautiful work but kind of slow and a little hard to get through - they’re more interesting to me as historical artifacts than funny cartoons. I expect it’ll pick up a bit as Gottfredson finds his rhythm (and I have Volume 2 waiting for me!).
The Contemporary Comic Book Superhero edited by Angela Ndalianis
This is very dry and in large part about the big deconstructy writers (Miller, Moore, Morrison, Gaiman, etc.), which it turns out I don't really care about? I am super interested in analyzing comic books, but not Important Comic Books - I'm more interested in how the mainstream (and yes, I realize that those guys are now part of the mainstream) reflects dominant cultural narratives. I picked and chose chapters based on what comics I've read and skimmed others, but if you're interested in analyzing, um, contemporary comic book superheroes, then this book will be of interest to you!
The Pet Avengers fight some dragons, then the dragons fight the Avengers, then the Pet Avengers fight the Avengers. Then everything’s okay! I only had the vaguest idea of what was going on here or who anyone was, but it was still pretty cute.
Into the Fire by Suzanne Brockmann
Vinh Murphy’s wife was murdered by the neo-Nazi “Freedom Network” during Hot Target, and he’s only beginning to put his life back together - with the help of his late wife’s best friend, ex-cop Hannah Whitfield - when he discovers that the Freedom Network’s leader has been murdered and that he’s the prime suspect. Unsure whether he did the deed while drunk, Murphy starts investigating, only to discover that the Freedom Network is hiding a few more big secrets and he may have just put another woman he loves in danger. Meanwhile, Navy SEALs Izzy Zanella falls pretty much instantly in love with his SEAL rival’s teenage sister Eden Gillman the minute he sees her, so when she shows up six months pregnant and claiming the baby is his, he goes along with it and marries her in order to get her health insurance. Meanwhile meanwhile, Nerdy Ex-CIA Dave is in love with Ex-Forced-Harem Girl Sophia, who is in love with Troubled Ex-Black Ops Guy Decker, who is more concerned with his One True Bromance with Even More Troubled Ex-Black Ops Guy Nash, who is deliberately distancing himself from his wife, Spunky Tess, because of Reasons. Eventually all the ladies are kidnapped and then there’s a big rescue sequence (and by rescue, I mean the ladies kick ass).
Whew! So:
Murphy and Hannah were fine, if somewhat dull (to me, at least). I felt like they took a lot of turns carrying the Idiot Ball - there’s a lot of “IT’S TOO DANGEROUS, I’LL GO WITH YOU” / “I’M GOING TO DO SOMETHING EXTREMELY RISKY TO SAVE YOU EVEN THOUGH IT’S KIND OF STUPID AND POINTLESS,” all with lots of Drama and pounding of chests and God, just. You have like two dozen Troubleshooters around who can help, why do you keep flinging yourselves in front of bullets? On the other hand, Hannah is deaf, which is actually really interesting and I’ve never seen that before in a romance novel. So that was kind of cool.
I was looking forward to Izzy’s book because I like the comic relief, and I actually really really liked Eden, who is fucked up and skittish and a pathological liar but also kind of spunky and great? But Izzy wound up sending up like a million red flags (Like, since he’s doing her a favor by marrying her, they decide not to have sex, but he’s allowed to have sex outside the marriage - and she’s not. What.) and also Brockmann’s baby crazy is in full force with this book and there’s a lot of talk about how hot pregnant women are and it’s just. It’s very weird.
As for the background crazy with Decker and Nash and Dave and Sophia and like a billion other characters…well, on the one hand, I have never cared about Decker and Nash and want them to go away, but on the other hand, I completely loved Dave? And I am actually super impressed that Brockmann managed to write a nerdy guy in love with his beautiful female best friend and have him not be a Nice Guy. I think it’s largely because he’s so considerate of her past sexual trauma and very frank and honest about his own sexual past; he’s genuinely more interested in being the supportive best friend she needs than mopily seducing her with the power of his own patheticness. Also because Sophia is a fully realized character in her own right who has a lot of feelings about other ladies noticing Dave’s butt. And then! The end! and I just need the next book (DAVE IS BEING TORTURED OH NOES) right away.
IN CONCLUSION, if this book had been about these awesome ladies breaking out of the Freedom Network compound and then Sophia kissing Dave all up in the face, it would have been perfect.
Walt Disney’s Mickey Mouse, Volume 1: Race to Death Valley by Floyd Gottfredson
This absolutely beautiful book is the first collection of Floyd Gottfredson’s famous Mickey newspaper strips, covering 1930-1931. There’s also a ton of supplementary material on all the staffers involved with the early strip as well as early Mickeymania and the development of the characters in the comic as opposed to in the cartoons. I honestly found that more interesting than the strips themselves, which are beautiful work but kind of slow and a little hard to get through - they’re more interesting to me as historical artifacts than funny cartoons. I expect it’ll pick up a bit as Gottfredson finds his rhythm (and I have Volume 2 waiting for me!).
The Contemporary Comic Book Superhero edited by Angela Ndalianis
This is very dry and in large part about the big deconstructy writers (Miller, Moore, Morrison, Gaiman, etc.), which it turns out I don't really care about? I am super interested in analyzing comic books, but not Important Comic Books - I'm more interested in how the mainstream (and yes, I realize that those guys are now part of the mainstream) reflects dominant cultural narratives. I picked and chose chapters based on what comics I've read and skimmed others, but if you're interested in analyzing, um, contemporary comic book superheroes, then this book will be of interest to you!