Morning Glories #15

I realize this is perhaps a bit late in the review cycle, but the count would be in hours as to the amount of time we spend talking about this title in my local comic book store.  Issue 15 came out last week and it delivers everything we’ve come to expect from this quality book, all at the $2.99 price point.  Several times through my reading of this book I looked at the pages left to go, wondering when the alternate ‘preview’ feature would kick in, surely I couldn’t get all that story for such a small price.  But yes, I did.  20 minutes worth.  Cheap entertainment.

Zoe and Hunter are the last two remaining from their team on the somewhat broken-in-concept woodland camp out.  Broken because of the overriding premise of survival based on flags and destroying your other teams, this isn’t fun and games, it’s survival of the fittest through any means necessary.  But Hunter gets to talk to his favorite crush, a girl in one of his classes he didn’t even know he liked.  That isn’t going to go down well with Zoe.  The I in Team afterall.

We learn so much in so few pages, as with all these books, we see how deep these characters will go and how terribly broken they all are.  To describe this book to the non comic reader would be to call it a book full of broken, powerful personalities without consequences.  Even that doesn’t do it justice.  Just read it, get the trades, whatever you have to do, even the beautiful hard cover recently released.  It’s pure gold. -Bretzke

Uncanny X-Men #5

Uncanny X-Men of late has been, well, crap.  It came out the poorer cousin in the Schism debarkle and for the most part has the less interesting characters.  But this issue, less so.  It’s more about the story but the frustration is, most of this story happened in another book!

Uncanny X-Force just finished it’s arc where Apocalypse came back in Archangel and there had to be a somewhat permanent intervention involving death, and subsequent rebirth.  This is Marvel after all – nobody dies forever.  Archangel’s experimentation with the Life Seed left some permanent markers, including an entire town missing and a 130 million year old ecosystem in it’s place.  Odd, right?

So the X-Men are sent to investigate.  Sticky thing being Cyclops doesn’t know about the reformed X-Force and Betsy’s already mired involvement.  But Magneto is smarter than all that, or so you’ll see.

I really enjoyed the book, but I’d read X-Force before.  Without that it’s going to seem odd and fractured, like the delirious recounting of a fevered dream.  So it’s a recommendation with a rider, and I don’t think that’s really a recommendation at all.  If a book can’t stand on it’s own, then it can’t stand at all. -Bretzke

Amazing Spider-Man #678

So Spider-Man has it all together.  A decent job in a wonderful city, life is so good he decides it’s best to walk to work.  See, there’s a fatal flaw in his thinking; whenever things are going well for Peter Parker, it’s a great time to get out of New York, because the place is about to end up destroyed.

At the corporation he works for, Peter is asked to review one of his peers work, to make sure it’s not a complete waste of time.  His colleague has made (Shock!) a doorway!  The doorway to Tomorrow!  In all literal senses, it transports you to the room next door, but tomorrow’s version.  If you’ve done any physics, you get what the title means; the story that both does and doesn’t exist.

When Peter steps through the door, all hell breaks loose and he’s left with a huge problem – how can he fix it when he doesn’t even know what caused it?

This is Spidey at his desperate best.  I’m not sure what it is, but when the chips are down Spidey will just about bust himself in half to put things right.  It’s a stellar read with shining stars all around.  Spider-Man ends up being my favorite supers book most weeks, it deserves far more attention. -Bretzke

Hellblazer #287

The paranormal fiction category within bookstores has bloated out into an untameable beast, fueled by teenage desire to become vampire bait for pasty skinned broody teens with a desire to beat up furries.  There was a time where paranormal fiction didn’t have a name of it’s own, it existed as a subset of fantasy called dark fantasy.  That’s when the stories were good, it’s from that era that sprang Hellblazer.

Constantine has himself a problem.  His niece has shacked up with the nastiest piece of work she can; the father of Constantine’s fresh, nubile wife.  All this in a desperate attempt to get back at Constantine for deeds ill done long before.  So to get back on track, to set things straight, he’s going back to hell.  If you’re familiar with the movies, you know a cat is normally involved.  Not this time, it’s snakes.  But hell has it’s own issues to deal with, as you would expect.  Things have a way of catching up with Constantine, never for the better.

The book is well drawn with a solid story and a complete lack of badly acted girl parts.  To me it’s what the genre should be and anyone who dare confess to reading ‘Twilight’ needs to read this to cleanse their pallet and understand what good ‘paranormal’ fiction is.  - Bretzke

Generation Hope #15

Generation Hope has been the kind of flagship of the new Mutant movement, in that it’s from this origin story that ultimately came Schism and the split in titles.  You’d think then, for such an important show pony, Marvel would actually take it out for a walk once in a while and not leave it rotting in the stable.

Hope and the Lights (Not a ’70′s glam rock outfit) brought back Sebastian Shaw from central Asia.  He has no memory, due to the intervention of one Emma Frost.  She got a little annoyed back in an issue of Legacy and took things into her own hands.  But now there’s some explaining to do.  For some reason Scott just takes it, the treachery from his better half, the deception and above all, the fact that Sebastian Shaw is going to be around for a while.  But wait, there’s more.

The lesser mutants (Mutants from stories that never quite caught on) resent the Lights and want a piece of the action, they’re willing to take it!  Trademark infighting ensues.  Really, this is what we’re doing with show ponies now?

This book is unforgivably awful, utter filler and really it only transitions into the next, god awful chapter.  If I wasn’t such a mutant addict I’d drop it immediately.  No possible recommendation other than to leave it on the shelf. -Bretzke

Uncanny X-Force #20

By my own admission, my only real experience with Captain Britain is through an instructional text on cartooning I read cover to cover when I was a child.  He was portrayed as a massive, kind individual burdened by the decay of his country around him.  I am left to wonder whether it is the same Braddock I’m reading about in this issue of X-Force.  I’m told it is, I find it hard to believe.

Last issue, Fantomex was abducted by the forces of Capt Britain to stand trial for the crime of executing the child Apocalypse.  Now, to place this in context, these forces of Britain, they are in charge of the Omniverse Tower, a building that exists outside of time and space where one can travel to any of the alternate universes.. universii.. parallel worlds!  It sounds nonsense and fantastical, but somehow it works.  My ignorance gave me a Captain Britain that was kind, but the version shown us here is far better.  He is driven, pained, but above all he is principled.  So much so that he abducted Betsy as well, just to give her another chance at life.

Fantomex is put on trial in one of the best arguments I’ve seen for and against predetermination.  If you saw Minority Report you’ll have flashbacks, but that’s not relevant.  This is well written and you’ll be rooting for one side or another.  X-Force go to investigate but that’s a non-event.  The meat and potatoes of this is the Trial.

This is not an easy book to read and the graphics jump a little in places but it’s worth your while, and well worth the pittance you’ll pay for it.  -Bretzke

Daredevil #8

Be warned, this is a two of two that started in Spider-Man last week, but wow is it worth going back for.  I give you what some will consider the perfect comic.

Black Cat has been framed for the theft of a holo-device from the Laboratory that Peter Parker works for.  Spidey and Daredevil track her down and hand her over to the authorities.  That was last issue in Spider-Man (The Ramos cover with the gents on the ground).  We pick up during the expository beat down that Black Cat offers up.  It’s spicy!

We find out that Black Cat is framed and now it’s up to DD and Spidey to find out who’s framing her, why and most importantly, who to punch in the face.

This book is filled with everything that makes Daredevil the straight talking, urban ninja we love, along with the things that make Spider-Man the heavy-yet-light book we love to read.  Levity is balanced with the comedic wit and thrust of the webbed, while DD brings his A game in higher order thinking.  Black Cat is really good at what she does, seducing men and breaking into things.  It’s win-win all around.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough.  The story is perfect with amazing art by Kano and a real feel for what each character is doing, Waid got into everyone’s head and stayed a while, writing a story that feels bigger than it is.  Go out, get last weeks Spider-Man and this issue of Daredevil, then call me and tell me how awesome it was. -Bretzke

Batgirl #5

Recently we’ve seen Batgirl get a bit too intelligent, a touch too much of the meta happening in her antics.  This issue shows a shine of that but it looks like Simone has shied away somewhat, returning to what Batgirl is all about; putting a young thing in harms way and watching the crowd for reactions.  While that may seem overly reductive, the reason why we read Batgirl and say not perhaps Batman is that vulnerability – we identify that Barbara is that little bit more human than Bruce.  Some argue that Bruce Wayne is the disguise and his true form is that of the Bat, not so with Barbara – she’s a person first, cape second.

In this issue we see fallout from a crime family that simply doesn’t make sense.  Certainly we’re used to a certain amount of “What the…” from Gotham but this peaks the scale well above ‘Highly Unlikely’ (those of you who have ever done a risk assessment just smiled a little).  Gretel is in town and she seems to have a thing for the souls of the recently departed.  The best way to get your hit on that is to, well, incite a bunch of violence and enjoy the mayhem.  Batgirl is going to have some obvious issues with this.

The recurring theme of 338 draws Batgirl to a conclusion and once that’s revealed we know how the book is going to end, with reasonable accuracy.  This 338 brainstorm happens around page 16 so the rest of the book is akin to watching Discovery Channel for the disaster movies – it’s all so much destruction.

While I may mock what’s within, it’s still a quality book – these are all minor quibbles on an excellent piece of fiction, like chastising Da Vinci for making the Mona Lisa’s smile too mysterious. -Bretzke

Tank Girl - Bad Wind Rising TPB

When last I ventured into the world of Tank Girl, I was immersed in a raunchy adventure of tits and dick jokes. And while it was a hoot, I suspected that I’d eventually tire of the endless gags. So when the time came to dive in to Bad Wind Rising, I felt like I knew what to expect, and I was right. Same schtick, new adventures. This book is a quick read though I suppose you could spend hours trying to figure out whether the plot actually makes any sense at all. But that seems like it would be beside the point. Martin and Dayglo ask you to just go with it. Have a little fun, for chrissakes!

And it is fun! I love the intensity of Dayglo’s art, and the humor is a nice escape from most of the other comics I make time for these days. I do have to say that the story here (time travel and chaos), combined with the single color approach made it feel like I was reading a knock-off version of the original Casanova by Matt Fraction and Ba/Moon. But that was a book that I hold in extremely high esteem so a little overlap is OK. The vibe is right and the meal is satisfying if a little skanky. -Scott

Demon Knights #5

So last issue was a wash to find out the boy/girl knight’s story.  This issue has some actual meat to it, thankfully we can get our teeth into something.

The Questing Queen and her compatriot are looking to avert this battle, a battle with a small town filled to the brim with seven heroes, each a legend in their own place or time, brought together by happenstance to resist the assault of the Horde.  Very normal fantasy stuff here.

Armed with an orb of Scrying (A least that’s what it is in DnD), she communicates to each of the heroes in turn, trying to bribe their affection or loyalty, desiring a quick end to this combat.  Each conversation is unique and it allows us a window into the character of these mysterious names and faces.  The outcome is predictable however.  If you know Savage like we’ve been shown in Secret Six, the ending of this is a no brainer.

The art is great and the story is solid, Cornell is carrying forward the momentum established from the New 52 more than adequately, more than enough to deserve a read and an ongoing interest in the title. -Bretzke