1. "Hawkman" by Kyle Baker. The T-Rex/Hawkman fight that had seemed inevitable for so long finally comes to a head, and boy does Baker figure a way to make a satisfying start. I will not lie: the reason this is #1 (apart from the fact that many of the strips don't seem as good this time) is because not only does Katar Hol bash a T-Rex's snout with his mace, he then has the gall to make fun of his thoroughly pissed opponent for not being able to touch his nose. If anyone was saying before that Baker didn't really have a handle on Hawkman's personality, at least this seems sort of in keeping with the way in which the DC universe often has him portrayed: a thoroughly arrogant warrior type, who Kevin Smith tried to convince us was also a Republican (remember, he used to be a cop). The T-Rex responds by whomping Hawkman twice in the face with his tail, the action of which isn't rendered exactly clear, but at least we have a sense that this may be a losing battle for Hawkman. Only Aquaman can save him now, I guess.
2. "Wonder Woman" by Ben Caldwell. Etta Candy is forced to take some sort of drug, and freaks out. Meanwhile, the drab color scheme at the beginning of Caldwell's tenure begins to make more sense, as we are moving more and more into full-on technicolor mode. Which is made all the more obvious as Diana finally picks up her costume and reclaims her shiny tiara and bracelets from Cheetah. Caldwell's layouts continue to be brilliant, again using the space provided to play with forward motion and have our eyes directed leftward as opposed to the usual right. It also happens that the plot is coming together, but unlike many of the other comics, it doesn't seem either like there is a danger of the strip ending prematurely, nor do I have any worries that Caldwell will leave any big questions unanswered. This strip has continued to be one of the primary reasons why Wednesday Comics is really worth your money--even at its most average, it has more going on, and more to look at, than several of the other lower-tier comics combined. The WW/Cheetah fight also stands out as its own perfectly-composed beast. Too bad there's no Dr. Psycho, though.
3. "Metal Men" by Dan DiDio, Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez and Kevin Nowlan. Panel of the week award will probably have to go to the snail's eye shot of poor Lead forced to act as a sealant as Chemo threatens to reach critical mass. Things are starting to get more serious, and finally Magnus' metrosexual enemy Dr. Pretorius has made himself scarce, so one expects that terrible things might indeed happen to the Metal Men this time around. Except, as we all know, Magnus can always make new ones. This strip continues to not get very much attention in part I suppose because DiDio is writing it and people love to complain; really, it's as good-looking a strip as any, it's certainly funnier on a more consistent level than something like "Supergirl," and frankly ever since Chemo showed up, the whole team has been amping up the laughs, the excitement, and the pathos in equal measure, without resorting to cutesiness, gimmickiness, or simply meandering. It also has managed to keep from lagging, which is another reason why I put it at #3.
4. "Strange Adventures" by Paul Pope. Pope's depiction of zeta beams look awesome, and they should be the standard bearer for other artists. My initial disappointment about Pope not bringing out any new creatures after introducing the hideously Pope-ian mandrillus sphinx monkeys has waned quite a bit, but this is still more of a transition issue than anything. I suppose next week we get to see the money shot, of Korgo being a regular monkey trapped in a cage in a zoo or something. Both this book and "Kamandi" have shown that it's difficult to pull off massive panels when they are more or less confined to two pages, but "Strange Adventures" has never been about the huge battles anyway. It's about the weirdness and the pulpiness, as filtered through Pope, and in that respect, at least, the strip continues to live up to its title. Pope or someone else might want to consider a sequel, though.
5. "Metamorpho, The Element Man" by Neil Gaiman and Mike Allred. I have been harsh, perhaps too harsh, on Gaiman's "Metamorpho" in the past, in part because I tend to expect a lot from both the writer and artist. This is a comic that works better when it sticks to the story, as opposed to when it tries to play games with the larger format (the opposite of something like "Flash Comics"). So this time around, I find Gaiman's style fits the content far better. Allred also gets a few creepy points for whatever is wearing a poorly fitting mask of the departed Simpkins. And Algon looks crazy as well, and apparently isn't as proficient in Latin as one would imagine him to be. Java's interjections continue to be cute, and I had been going back and forth on whether or not they would or wouldn't tell us something about Java that had to do with the plot. At this point, though, I'll stick with just "cute." It's ironic that although Metamorpho and Urania died in the last issue, it's this issue that I start actually caring about what happens, now that I know that the whole earth is threatened, and Algon is frighteningly close to destroying it for no reason.
6. "Flash Comics" by Karl Kerschl and Brenden Fletcher. So, as far as I can tell, present Barry Allen has someone ended up 50 years in the future in an alternate timeline where Grodd was able to utilize the Flash's speed to rip open a hole in time and go back and remake the earth as monkeys. And Grodd in retrospect doesn't seem to remember this, but is upset that the Flash has gone in time because it seems now as if HE is replacing the timeline so that humans are back in charge. In the center of this maelstrom, for some reason, is Iris. Kerschl's innovative technique is certainly the reason to read this strip, which has been piling on the time travel headaches as of late. It's cool stuff, but like almost everything else here, it's still in transition. Compared to last week's feat of brilliance, where Kerschl reimagined the courtship of Barry and Iris through the lens of famous Sunday cartoons, this is pedestrian. Compared to almost anything else, it's still brilliant.
7. "Sgt. Rock and Easy Co." by Adam Kubert and Joe Kubert. Continuing along at a snail's pace, this increasingly cool-looking strip manages to subvert my expectations for once, as Sgt. Rock finally gets the drop on someone, even with welts taking over his already hideous face. So it seems as if Sarge is probably going to make it out this time. Although he seems to do badly at taking out multiple guards at once, he will probably have no problem shooting the last Nazi in the vicinity (hopefully). And if that doesn't work out, the rest of Easy Co. has made it into the fort. At the very least, Adam Kubert is a good enough writer to know how to wind down organically. This strip, which has always managed to take decompression to a new level, is still one of the best-looking examples of Joe Kubert's art. It is for that reason alone that I continue to like it as much as I do. I'm sure that most others feel the same.
8. "Deadman" by Dave Bullock and Vinton Heuck. "Deadman," on the other hand, seems to have reached its denouement, unless I'm figuring something wrong here. With two issues left to go, there seems to not be enough time for Kalak to come back and fight our hero again, so it looks like all that is left is for Boston Brand to rejoin the surface world and say goodbye to the spirit lady he kissed earlier. So that's disappointing, in a way, even if the strip continues to be stylistically one of the coolest to look at and possibly frame in the future. The fight with Kalak is itself a marvel of stylish momentum, with a great money shot at the end. Don't have much more to say about it than that.
9. "The Demon and Catwoman" by Walt Simonson and Brian Stelfreeze. Not much to say here, either, except that while other comics are winding down, this is finally starting to get somewhere. Not a good sign. For reasons that continue to not be very apparent, Catwoman has just turned, just as she throws a sword through Morgaine Le Fay. Etrigan does something useful, for once, removing the collar on Catwoman that kept her from fighting. And yet it seems that as usual he is easily overpowered by Le Fay, for reasons that once again probably won't be apparent. Stelfreeze's art continues to grow on me. He particularly nails the last panel one-two of Catwoman going from scared to evil. Will we finally see Etrigan do what Etrigan does best? He'd better, in two pages or less.
10. "Batman" by Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso. This is one of those comics which seems to be headly strictly into aimless, biding time territory, fairly soon. Why else would you have Batman about to easily overtake the woman he had been sleeping with (for no reason, it seems so far), before he is suddenly beaten back by attack dogs. It's a very video game thing going on here: Batman can't get to the boss yet, and we know easily he would overpower her anyway, so first he'll have to contend with some fierce dogs that come out of nowhere. Is it just me, or does this seem to happen a lot with Batman? He should know by now how to take down multiple ravenous dogs, because the Joker sics them on him all the time. Otherwise, Risso's stuff looks pretty great. If Luna manages to put up a fight next issue, that might make things a bit more interesting. As of now, I'm predicting some more standard film noir play at work.
11. "Kamandi: The Last Boy On Earth!" by Dave Gibbons and Ryan Sook. Sook's art continues to look weaker and weaker, with a fraction of the beauty of the money shots Sook scattered around in the first few issues. The poor U.S. Capitol in the background of the first panel looks half-rendered. Never has the battle between lions, tigers and monkeys seemed less exciting. Particularly since, like "Strange Adventures," the battle is more or less fought and ended in a few panels, and now all that's left we assume is some brutal monkey torture. My personal favorite shot here is of Dr. Canus helping along, firing a machine gun with his bandaged arm (remember, he survived being in a crashing blimp earlier). I can't even tell at this point whether Gibbons' prose seems as substandard as it always is or if everyone is just starting to slum it. Mark Chiarello deserves major props for keeping as many teams together as he did, but in the case of Kamandi, this may be the only comic that seems to be experiencing a natural downslide in terms of quality.
12. "Superman" by John ARcudi and Lee Bermejo. The first panel looks really cool, at least as long as you ignore the slightly off-looking Supergirl. This comic has always come a close second to "Sgt. Rock and Easy Co." in terms of sheer decompression, but unlike that comic, this didn't have a very coherent or groundbreaking artistic style. Oh, Bermejo certainly knows how to draw some good looking figures, but that's not the same as using that skill to compose the story in ways that use the benefits of an over-sized format. I love his Darkseid and his Lex Luthor, even if the reasons for drawing them are completely gratuitous (I'm reminded of Captain America: Reborn, where there are a lot of gratuitous old-school action shots of Captain America doing his thing from 70s comics, as drawn by Bryan Hitch). As for the plot, who knows? Not much has made sense or even been particularly relevant, although people seem to be more happy with Superman punching things than they are with him moping. Me, I happen to be the opposite. Or at least I like a little of both.
13. "Supergirl" by Jimmy Palmiotti and Amanda Conner. Conner certainly knows how to draw a cool-looking spaceship in the sun. Also, the picture of Supergirl wearing sunglasses and applying sunscreen is funny. However, it seems too late in the game for aliens to be introduced into the story (see "Green Lantern"). And so far, these aliens have yet to distinguish themselves as anything other than evil jackbooted harvesters of solar flares. Sometimes this comic is good, and it usually looks pretty good, but the pacing is always somewhat off. Next issue will probably see some more Streaky/Krypto action, and I have no idea if it will turn out for good or ill. This is one comic that will probably work better in trade form.
14. "Green Lantern" by Kurt Busiek and Joe Quinones. I read somewhere that Busiek wrote the latter half of this comic in about a day: this makes sense to me. Busiek certainly knows his silver age stuff, which might be why he is perhaps indulging in some of the worst tendencies of the period: to keep repeating the same stories, over and over again, and thinking that somehow having the aliens look or sound different qualifies as a different plot. We see enough alien invasions elsewhere in Wednesday Comics, but these ones are particularly uninspired. And what exactly is Joe Dillon talking about? Lord, maybe it's just the glut of Blackest Night stuff, but Hal Jordan just seems so overplayed.
15. "Teen Titans" by Eddie Berganza and Sean Galloway. Still can't tell what's going on, where people are, etc. Still can't see what this guy Trident is up to and why it matters. Still can't tell if this is supposed to be something more or less in-continuity. Still can't figure if Berganza intends this as a civilian-eye view on the damages that super-teams can sometimes cause. Don't know who the guy with the green goggles is at the end. Amazingly, Dr. Light's son is under the impression that because the Spectre turned his dad into a candle, this is somehow the Titans' fault. And that at some point Robin and Nightwing and the rest will become evil tyrants. And where did Nightwing go, anyway? And etc.
hi nathan!
ReplyDeletei just wanted to say that your comments have been fun, and very interesting. i'll miss them when it's' all over!
cheers
ben c