Sunday, January 29, 2006
Recent Comics I Have Read
New Avengers #15: I'm really liking the New Avengers, though I didn't really see the need for the relaunch. This is a great little issue with a narrative (in the form of a blog, no less) by an underused yet overexposed character, Carol Danvers, aka Ms. Marvel, fka Warbird, fka Binary. Also features good, if a little excessively cartoony, artwork by Frank Cho.
Batman #649: I really like Judd Winick, great writer, great with snappy dialogue. I really do NOT like the whole "Return of Jason Todd" thing. Can't ANYONE stay dead in comics? Ever? Jean Gray (DUMBEST. Rebirth. Evar.), Hal Jordan, Ollie Queen, Bucky Frickin' Barnes! And I like "The Exhumation of Jason Todd" even less now that it's tied into the whole Infinite Crisis bit.
Batman Legends of the Dark Knight #199: a crappy end to a clever little three-parter featuring Batman versus an extremely smart loser who looks like Nick Nolte. Bad, bad, ending.
Green Arrow #58: Green Arrow vs. Doctor Light, successfully shown as the lopsided contest it should be. I miss Judd Winick on this book, though. And, geez, do we HAVE to kill Speedy off? Wasn't it bad enough that she has AIDS? Special cameo by Dennis Quaid as the fire chief in an homage to "Frequency." What is it with DC and C-List celebrity guest stars this month?
Infinite Crisis #4: Three pages of exposition by Alexander Luthor revealing the evil ludicrous cumbersome "plot". Superboy-Prime kills a bunch of D-List heroes. Superman-2 is a villain (why?). Oh, and Barry Allen is back. Thank God for that, I was afraid for a minute there that just ONE death in comics would go disinterred. This whole mess is rapidly becoming as bloated, cumbersome and silly as Crisis on Infinite Earths. And unlike the first Crisis, which at least served to clean up DC's convuluted continuity, I have yet to discern a point to all this.
Iron Man #5. Retcon of Iron Man's origin, and very entertaining. I wonder about the timeline, though; Tony Stark is nearly killed by his own landmine in Afghanistan? Doesn't that make Iron Man only having been around for four years?
JSA Classified #7: I like the JSA alot; they represent a continuing history of new heroes (and villains) stepping up to fill the shoes of legends from the past. The artwork was not that great on this issue (which has been a continuing problem with the JSA titles) but the idea of a story narrarated by a semi-reluctant villain, the Icicle, was clever.
Noble Causes #16: I've started to like this book, as it is a sort of superhero soap opera, combined with a modern sense for the cult of media stardom. In this issue, Race Noble's wife is locked up because the Blackthornes are gunning for her.
Ultimate Extinction #1: For a concept that was supposed to ground superheroes in reality, the whole Ultimate line has sure jumped the shark. Now Galactus (sorry, Gah-Lak-Tus) is a 100,000 mile across killing machine from outer space? How is that thing hovering over New York any more "realistic" than a giant purple guy hanging off the Baxter Building? And what's up with the continuity here? This all happens BEFORE the Horde of Evil Foreign Liberals invades America in Ultimates 2 #9?
Batman #649: I really like Judd Winick, great writer, great with snappy dialogue. I really do NOT like the whole "Return of Jason Todd" thing. Can't ANYONE stay dead in comics? Ever? Jean Gray (DUMBEST. Rebirth. Evar.), Hal Jordan, Ollie Queen, Bucky Frickin' Barnes! And I like "The Exhumation of Jason Todd" even less now that it's tied into the whole Infinite Crisis bit.
Batman Legends of the Dark Knight #199: a crappy end to a clever little three-parter featuring Batman versus an extremely smart loser who looks like Nick Nolte. Bad, bad, ending.
Green Arrow #58: Green Arrow vs. Doctor Light, successfully shown as the lopsided contest it should be. I miss Judd Winick on this book, though. And, geez, do we HAVE to kill Speedy off? Wasn't it bad enough that she has AIDS? Special cameo by Dennis Quaid as the fire chief in an homage to "Frequency." What is it with DC and C-List celebrity guest stars this month?
Infinite Crisis #4: Three pages of exposition by Alexander Luthor revealing the evil ludicrous cumbersome "plot". Superboy-Prime kills a bunch of D-List heroes. Superman-2 is a villain (why?). Oh, and Barry Allen is back. Thank God for that, I was afraid for a minute there that just ONE death in comics would go disinterred. This whole mess is rapidly becoming as bloated, cumbersome and silly as Crisis on Infinite Earths. And unlike the first Crisis, which at least served to clean up DC's convuluted continuity, I have yet to discern a point to all this.
Iron Man #5. Retcon of Iron Man's origin, and very entertaining. I wonder about the timeline, though; Tony Stark is nearly killed by his own landmine in Afghanistan? Doesn't that make Iron Man only having been around for four years?
JSA Classified #7: I like the JSA alot; they represent a continuing history of new heroes (and villains) stepping up to fill the shoes of legends from the past. The artwork was not that great on this issue (which has been a continuing problem with the JSA titles) but the idea of a story narrarated by a semi-reluctant villain, the Icicle, was clever.
Noble Causes #16: I've started to like this book, as it is a sort of superhero soap opera, combined with a modern sense for the cult of media stardom. In this issue, Race Noble's wife is locked up because the Blackthornes are gunning for her.
Ultimate Extinction #1: For a concept that was supposed to ground superheroes in reality, the whole Ultimate line has sure jumped the shark. Now Galactus (sorry, Gah-Lak-Tus) is a 100,000 mile across killing machine from outer space? How is that thing hovering over New York any more "realistic" than a giant purple guy hanging off the Baxter Building? And what's up with the continuity here? This all happens BEFORE the Horde of Evil Foreign Liberals invades America in Ultimates 2 #9?
