Monthly Archive for October, 2011

The Week of October 31st

Published on October 31, 2011 in Comics and Reviews-comics. 0 Comments

I hope you feel appreciated and you should, because without you, we are nothing.  You are our shop’s lifeblood.  We had a great time at our Halloween/customer appreciation party and those of you who came out, we hoped you did too.

We will have another event – of some kind – over Thanksgiving weekend and then our Geeky Christmas charity drive will be the first weekend in December.

But back to you feeling appreciated.  Really, truly, you are why we exist.  I type the words “Thank you for being our customer.  If you ever need anything, please don’t hesitate to call, e-mail or just stop in” every week in the weekly e-mail.  We mean it.  We consider you our business family and thank you for your business, because we really do enjoy selling comics as a living.

 

Too Many Books…

There are a bunch of interesting news coming from the editor in chief of Marvel, some good, some bad.  A few more cancelations are coming, including Alpha Flight – which has been a good read.  They are also saying there are new titles coming including a new Garth Ennis Max series with Nick Fury, a Scarlet Spider series and mature reader Dexter (the Showtime series) comics.

Some of this is good and some… well, do we really need a Scarlet Spider series?  (If you want to read more go here.)

I guess if these are wanted, great, but again, I am going to say… how much is too much?  Can we be over publishing comics?  There are more new releases, big releases coming in The Defenders and Avenging Spiderman.

I know I sound like a pessimist (What, You Matt, NEVER!!) but shops only have a finite amount of space.  I guess the big two think we all direct market shops exist in tesseracts (infinite amounts of space existing inside a finite enclosure.)  However, I am sorry to announce this is NOT the case.

Please, I beg you Marvel and DC, Image, IDW and Dark Horse deserve the space on the wall too and at our shop they WILL get it.  I know it comes down to sales, so, I will tell you this – if you come in and pick up smaller, lesser selling books off the wall I HIGHLY suggest you add them to a pull list.

We will have to keep our orders much closer to the mark, because we just don’t have the space to shelve all these new medium to lower selling books.

What brings on this diatribe, it is not announcements of Defenders and Avenging Spider-man, it is the low selling New DC.  The reboot was successful that first month, but there is most certainly another side in month two.  For every book that pushes or does triple digit sales, there is an Omac and a Men of War.  There is also a Green Arrow and a Fury of Firestorm, which have dipped BAD in the second month and we expect those to continue down as people see how much they are spending and the new books they want.

So, why do I harp on this?  I just think better choices are needed from our out of control big comic companies.  They are like a five year old.  They could decide to not hit their brother for no reason, but they make another bad choice and announce a bunch of new number one titles after just rebooting and launching 52 new number ones.  At some point, enough is enough or maybe the end of the industry will be what stops them.

 

#1 Reviews…

So, I rail against the over publishing of books and now I contradict it by reviewing new books – Yeah, but THESE are actually worth reading.

Orchid #1 I never got around to reviewing this a few weeks ago when it came out, but I have to say I loved this more than most that have come out in the same period.  It is a post apocalyptic story of knowing your “place” in society and fighting against it.  The book reminds me of a 1980’s sci-fi movie and I really think that feel is what Tom Morello is going for.  You know the type, Escape from New York or Damnation Alley.  Of course, you get the free download of the Morello song and as you continue to buy the 12 issue miniseries, you will have a code per issue to create a soundtrack for your reading.  And issue one is only a dollar.

 

Spaceman #1 The new Brian Azzerello and Eduardo Risso book (creators behind 100 Bullets) is out and I can say it is strange, odd and intriguing and I don’t think we have seen all it has to offer yet.  It was an immensely enjoyable read that is not a straight sci-fi book and not a full crime book, but some strange amalgam of both.  It also exists in a far future (or is it that far) earth and our main character is the grown test subject who was meant to be the vanguard of space missions to Mars.  He now lives a quiet existence tormented by dreams of what could have been.  Then the crime storytelling we knew would be there comes in.

This book is not for everyone, but if you are looking for something a bit out of the ordinary and NOT mainstream, you should give the first issue a try, it is only $1.00.

 

Wolverine and the X-Men #1 Written by Jason Aaron and drawn by Chris Bachello, this is the return to basics of the X-Men mission and a great read to top it off.  Aaron’s X-Schism split the X-Men in two directions; one staying in San Francisco and on a world “defensive” fight the power and hatred stage and the other restarting the school in New York.

This new X-Book is a very light read – no deadly attacks by mutant haters or killer robots.  The threat is an inspection from the New York Board of Education that Wolverine and co-headmaster Kitty Pryde have to deal with.  A fine read I highly recommend.

 

Incredible Hulk #1 Another Jason Aaron written book, but this one is drawn by Marc Silvestri.  This was a nice new start and #1 issue for the Hulk, but without a restart of the continuity.  Everything that has gone before still exists and this is what has made the new Marvel number ones so refreshing.  The character’s story continues; the company is just using a new volume to increase sales and interest.

Hulk #1 is mostly set up for next stage in the green goliath’s life.  The story starts with Hulk living with a group of Moloids (the guys the Fantastic Four’s villain Mole Man tends to control.)  We delve into the new psyche of the Hulk and how he is living much happier now.  Of course that is interrupted and we find out why… ah, but I’m not going to tell you that.

In the back of the book there is a brief interview with Aaron and he is asked what/why the Hulk.  Aaron responds he really enjoyed the runs of Peter David and Bruce Jones.  This makes an old school Hulk fan see this new start as a good time to get back on board.

 

Abe Sapien #2 Yeah, it is an issue number two, but it is a needed review.  What a great creepy finish to what continues to be a never ending flow of fantastic stories by Dark Horse in the Mignola universe.

If you are not reading thesebooks, including Baltimore, you do yourself a great disservice and missing out on a lot of creepy reads.  This is horror comics done right.

 

 

Facebook…

We are nearing at 1000 people following us on the Facebook.  I can’t believe it.  Just a year and a half ago we were only just over four hundred.  If you are not a fan yet, You can find us here.

 

The Week of October 24th

Published on October 24, 2011 in Comics, Events and Reviews-comics. 0 Comments

Customer Appreciation Day, October 29th…

On Saturday, October 29th, Cup o’ K is having a one day Customer Appreciation Day to say thanks, offer up some discounts and hopefully sell a bunch of sh!t.

The midnight launch of Justice League was such a big hit; we wanted to do something like that again.  So, here it is:

*We will have a big sale all day starting at open and ending at 5:00pm, when the shop will technically close for a not so private Halloween party that will run until close, which is 9:00 or there abouts… and, Yes, by Halloween party we do mean costume party, as well as, if weather permits, movies on the side of the building.

*The Party is open to anyone who is a hold customer, regular coffee customer or just generally a friend of the shop.  Yes, there will be free beer, too!

*Discounts will be a plenty and there will be a lot of new cheap back issues (we’ve been buying a plenty lately – time to sell them to you.)

*Tom Finley will also be on hand to sell and sign his new book “Clever Crocodile.”  He will also have a driftwood art piece on auction to raise money for the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund.

 

Hopefully a good time will be had by all.

 

Now for a look at Your Comic Industry!…

Marvel

So, can someone please explain to me why a company who seems to relish the fact that they publish a ton of comics a month – in what seems to be an ever increasingly in the retailer and comic industry’s  collective face attempt to push all smaller press books off the self – needs to lay off any staff go?

Well, that is what happened on Friday.  Marvel let go some dozen staff (and maybe more to come) in several different departments; including editorial, production and digital.  To make matters worse, the still immensely profitable corporation says the current staff will absorb the duties in house and that none of the lay-offs are quality of work related.  Read this as it is: these layoffs are penny pinching!

When you read about the discontent growing (finally) in this land of ours against the overlords of commerce make sure your eye doesn’t stray any further than your own hobby.  I wish it wasn’t the case.  Comics are supposed to be an escape.  We aren’t supposed to be concerned with this stuff here, but don’t fool yourself for a second.  This is a cut throat, corporate industry driven by ONE thing only, profits.  The surface you see may have art and story as the focus, but the seedy underbelly is profits, profits, profits – ONLY!

I could go on and on and on about this (ask me, I will) but I’m going to leave that to the excellent comic press to do it for me.

For an overview of the layoffs and a general look at the question of why (sorry, it doesn’t come with an answer) head over to the Comics Alliance.  They have an excellent write up.

For more perspective like -if you can announce you have a Punisher TV show coming out on one day and fire staff the next, what the hell is wrong with you?– type perspective head over to the Comics Reporter. Well worth the read.

But for a fantastic look at the Marvel Age of Stinginess head over to The Comic’s Beat.  This is THE article that really gives it to the house of layoffs, like they deserve for this.

 

And, now for the weekly complaint about DC…

It is back… like a malevolent poltergeist, or the psycho killer in the end of the monster movie… This rumor just won’t die, which probably means it isn’t just a rumor.

The news about a Watchmen 2 is re-surfacing again and just like that creature at the end of the horror movie it only plans to bring horror and suffering in its latest installment.

No matter what your thoughts of Alan Moore, as a person, no one can deny his immense contribution to this industry.  Personally, I see Watchmen well down on a list of his works, but it is still a great read and a quintessential, must read of comics.  IT DOES NOT NEED A SEQUEL – OF ANY KIND!!!

Click on the link for the Bleeding Cool Article and give forth a load and ringing, exasperated – “SIGH” – of disgust.

 

Spaceman #1…

Alright, done with the bashing.  How about something good from a big comic giant?

There is something nice about starting at the beginning of the next big thing, right?  That may be this week with Spaceman #1.  This is the nine issue mini-series re-uniting 100 Bullets alums Brian Azzerello and Eduardo Risso.

Here is the solicit from Vertigo:

“Set in a post-apocalyptic near future, SPACEMAN tells the story of Orson – a hulking, lonely loser who spends his days collecting scrap metal and dreaming of the startrekking life he was promised.
That is, until he finds himself at the center of a celebrity child kidnapping case. Seeing his chance to be a hero, Orson takes matters into his own hands…but will his actions only cause more heartbreak?”

The first issue is only $1.00.

 

Review Time…

“OH, you hate everything!!!”  “You have a bad attitude!”  “You never say anything nice about Marvel?”

I’m going to take each of these individually this week and do it with a review.

1.  “Oh, YOU hate everything!”

Yeah, well… I know I do, but what do you like?  Again, I throw down the gauntlet, if you have a review or a point of view you would like to have expressed, send it to me.

I’m giving you a link.  Dan Finney has a blog that he has been running for awhile and as part of it movie reviews that are based on a simple premise of five sentences.  It is a good premise.  If you can’t get your point across, “this is good” or “this is bad” in five sentences, you have a problem.

This week is Batman: Year One and based on Dan’s review… I think I might need to see this.

 

2. “You have a bad attitude!”  Nothing makes me want to check my good friend Beede more than when I hear him say this.  I do not have a bad %&#@ attitude!  Alright, maybe a little.

But specifically on comics… it just frustrates me so much to see the industry spiral down the drain when it can be done so well.  One of the books being done right is a little gem from the indie publisher Red Five.  The book is Atomic Robo and it is a top five favorite being published right now.  Written by Brian Clevinger and drawn by Scott Wegener it has been compared to BPRD, which I guess gets it, everyone I know who enjoys Atomic Robo also enjoys BPRD, they both have fantastic dialogue and great character driven stories… and though the overarching storytelling style and writing is similar, the subject matters couldn’t be more different.

Robo is an action science adventurer created by Nikola Tesla nearly a hundred years ago and now oversees the science company Tesla Industries.  The story arcs are set with an overarching theme or adventure to each volume – again similar to BPRD, but NOT the same.

The latest storyline, volume six, has Robo being tricked into rescuing the international space station, but when he gets there he is attacked and nearly killed.  In issue two, I have not read or seen in a movie a better written action sequence – ever!

The trades are not easy to come by and I am lucky to have the first four (with five on the way) stocked and will continue to keep them that way as long as they are in at Diamond.

One last plug – My longtime friend Damond bought volume one on my recommendation alone.  He said he would read it that night.  The very next day he was back telling me to order the other four.  I am so happy to be able to put volume five in his box this Wednesday.

 

3. “You never say anything nice about Marvel!”  I think lately I’ve been pretty nice to the product coming out of Marvel.  Last week I had a stellar review of X-Men Regenisis and by proxy X-Men Schism, but if that wasn’t enough, allow me to give my thoughts on the just finished Fear Itself.

I liked it.  Yes, it was a typical crossover that wanted you to buy a bazillion extra books to read a single interconnected/interwoven story.  Yes, it ended wanting you to keep reading the bazillion books leading out of the crossover.  Yes, it seemed to want to sell action figures at the end more then tell a story, but overall… I liked it.

It was not much more than a big dumb Thor book, but don’t we all need a nice superhero slugfest every once in a while?  I rail against the big two’s corporate dominance with their more times than not bad superhero books, but superhero comics are something we all still love.  I know few who don’t read or have never read superhero comics.  All are not perfect, nor are all offerings from Vertigo perfect.  So, for those of us who still like to see big blonde muscle bound men fight each other – HEY!! I’m not on a couch here, leave my possible latent sexual thoughts alone Sigmund Freud – I liked Fear Itself.

I found the story interesting from a creator/publisher standpoint.  It was written so that you could read the main story and no crossovers and get it.  It was also written with the ability, that if you were reading a side book, it was even better.  Brian Bendis could learn a thing or two from Matt Fraction.

I’ll say this, if nothing else Fear Itself was actually important to the characters of the Marvel Universe and advanced many storywise – Captain America, Iron Man, Hulk, Thor and many other Avengers.  At least it was these characters that partook in this story.  At least, though a giant money grabbing crossover, I didn’t feel quite so dirty selling it as I did Flashpoint – THE WORST CROSSOVER EVENT I’VE EVER READ.  And by read I should say tried to read as it was so bad, I skimmed most of it and looked at the decently pretty pictures.  (How bad was it?  Remember Genesis?  No?  Well, Genesis isn’t the worst written crossover anymore.)

So, in closing… I feel with Fear Itself, Marvel again showed its dominance over DC in simply doing what they have done for years, trying to sell a big giant event and giving people… I guess what they wanted.

The Week of October 17th

Published on October 15, 2011 in Comics, Events and Reviews-comics. 0 Comments

This will be a shorter weekly e-mail then previous ones.  With all the reviews and lists and DC craziness, they were getting a little over the top and driving me more than a smidge mad.  But first…

Customer Appreciation Day, October 29th…

On October 29th, Cup o’ K is having a one day Customer Appreciation Day to say thanks, offer up some discounts and hopefully sell a bunch of sh!t.

The midnight launch of Justice League was such a big hit; we wanted to do something like that again.  So, here it is:

We will have a big sale all day starting at open and ending at 5:00pm, when the shop will technically close for a not so private Halloween party that will run until close, which is 9:00… and by Halloween party we do mean costume party, as well as, if weather permits, movies on the side of the building.

The Party is open to anyone who is a hold customer, regular coffee customer, just generally a friend of the shop.  Yes, there will be free beer!

Discounts will be a plenty and there will be a lot of new cheap back issues (we’ve been buying a plenty lately – time to sell them to you.)

Tom Finley will be on hand to sell and sign his new book “Clever Crocodille.”  He will also have some a driftwood art piece to raise money for the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund.

Hopefully a good time will be had by all.

New York, New York…

The big New York Comic Con is just finishing up.  This has become the fall announcement point for the next quarter’s comic “news.”  I rarely look at what the two big boys are announcing.  Nine times out of ten it is self congratulatory BS that will be rehashed and recycled (and in DC’s case changed a dozen times) before it even sees solicitation.

I like to look at the smaller announcements for indy or the smaller presses publishers or creators.   Take for instance:

 

Brian Wood

Here is someone who has always made waves in the industry and has ALWAYS published quality comics.

It was a week or so ago that Wood was announced as the new writer of Wolverine.  His latest announcement is that he is taking over Conan The Barbarian.  He is doing so with his fellow creator of Local, Becky Cloonan.  At first, this seems like an odd pairing on a book like… Conan, but then I started thinking about it.  What many comics need today is a style and direction shake up, not more of what has been published in the past.  The current readers of Conan are still going to read, this brings a different set of eyes to the book.  Again, Dark Horse uses its head in putting new life into a series, not just relaunching, rebooting or restarting.  It’s not like Brian Wood hasn’t been doing Viking/Barbarian stories for the last several years anyway.

If you would like more info on this there is a nice interview with Brian Wood on Comic Book Resources and some sketch art from Becky Cloonan at Comic Alliance.

 

Another hot creator right now is..

 

Joe Hill

This is the 2011 Eisner Award winner for writing and IDW announced he would be teaming up with his dad, Stephen King, to adapt the co-written tale, Throttle.  They will then co-work on adapting Richard Matheson’s Duel, which helped inspire Throttle.

The comic will be entitled Road Rage and is a few months out (February with Duel in April,) but this shows a continued presence by both Hill and King in the comic industry.  You can find out more on Comic Book Resources, including where the title came from and why the two like the comic style.

 

Praise for IDW…

We have been in business for nearly ten years and it is interesting to have seen the development and growth of IDW over those years.  They continue to grow into a great publisher.  They have really become the companion that Dark Horse needed in larger scale independent publishing.  The company that used to be known as the overpriced company responsible for 30 Days of Night has diversified nicely to include a wide range to licensed properties as well as top notch creator driven stuff too.

 

On the flip side, Vertigo concern…

It is no secret I’m not too happy with the direction DC has taken over the last few months.  This is twofold, as the main company is heading in a dangerous spiral that I’ll get too in a minute, but also the perennially positive light in the darkness, Vertigo, has been causing me some concern too.

I am happy to report, it looks like the concern about Vertigo is unfounded.

Why was I so concerned?  Well, a few months ago I started counting up how many of Vertigo’s current slate of books were heading to an end; that they were either ending their runs because that is what the stories were intended to be or ones that were cancelled (one on each side belong to Brian Wood.)

The numbers include Nothlanders, DMZ, Scalped, House of Mystery and Sweet Tooth.  When a large number of titles are slated to end from a publisher, there is obvious concerns.  I can put them to rest now with the interesting announcement from Paul Cornell.

The writer of Demon Knights and Stormwatch is launching a new book Saucer Country from Vertigo early next year.  Cornell describes the new series as the West Wing meets the X-Files and will

deal a presidential candidate that is abducted by aliens.  Cornell adds that the stories will be in arcs with bridges between them being “true stories” from the “murky world of flying saucers.”  For more info you can head over to Bleeding Cool for a write up and here too for an interview with artist Ryan Kelly about the book too.

 

Now onto the other half of the company, DC…

There is a very disturbing bit of rumor mill writing over at Bleeding Cool about the current state of DC comics.  I highly recommend taking a look at it.  The article helps me in not thinking I’m going completely crazy.

How DC has acted, made announcements and generally interacted with the world of comics since making their bold announcement of a reboot – that “isn’t a reboot” – that we now know is just that, a reboot – has reminded me of someone else’s tenure at another comic company some ten years ago.

It is no secret I’ve been a little disenfranchised with DC lately and when it started I wondered why?  Over the last couple weeks, I started putting my finger on it.

I’ve always been a fan of both Marvel and DC, as a collector.  It wasn’t until I became a retailer that I developed a rather strong hatred of Marvel.  This dislike was fueled by basically one man’s reign – of terror – Bill Jemas.  It was his era as head of Marvel that drove a wedge in my professional and personal love of the company.  Marvel, under Jemas, did a number of things that are just now being reigned in and brought back under control, the least of which being how the company dealt with retailers and larger issue of how it acted creatively.

I can tell you, without a shadow of a doubt, Marvel is the best it has been in decades right now under Chief Axel Alonso.  Compared to the early years of the shop’s existence, it is like night and day.

But if the pendulum has swung so hard in one direction with one company, does it HAVE to swing the other way with DC?  Go read the article and you understand EXACTLY what I’ve been wondering about DC and much of the strange announcements, non-disclosure agreements, movement of personnel and general lack of transparency to retailers.

It just makes me wait for Dan Didio to make like the Red Skull, pull off the rubber mask and reveal he is actually Bill Jemas and cackle, “I have fooled you all!!  Now I’ll destroy your Marvel comics and take out Captain America in one fell swoop!  Grah-ha-ha!!!”

 

Review time…

Tia and I are switching hats this week.  She is reviewing my favorite and I’m reviewing an X-book.  I’ll get to the X-review in a sec, but first…

A couple of really good reads were had last week with probably the best being Baltimore; The Curse Bells.  I can not tell you how much this books gives me the heebie-jeebies.  There is not a better pure horror book on the self, period.

I was also pleasantly surprised at the continued quality coming from Alpha Flight.  Yes, I am an old school fan of the Canadian Super group and was unsure how they could fit in to Marvel today.  Luckily we have moved past the stupid Brian Bendis thoughts that this team was a joke.

The creative team of writers Greg Pak and Fred Van Lentte and artist Dale Eaglesham have stayed on and they have just continued with the storyline developed during the loose Fear Itself crossover.

Basically, the team is being hunted by its government, a evil (is there any other kind) fascist brainwashing militaristic group working with the old Flight villain The Master.  This has been a very enjoyable old school superhero comic that is obviously playing off of a bunch of the civil discontent existing in the real world at large.

Hell this last issue (five) had a reference to Noam Chomsky and made me look up a quote from Dr. Samuel Johnson.  You can’t beat a book that references a hero of yours and makes you learn something… oh, and there are Canadians in it.

I greatly enjoyed Orchid’s first issue (only $1.00.)  I’m only going to tell you it is a post apocalyptic storyline written by Tom Morello.  It is more than worth the price (you get a free song download with the purchase of each comic) and will have me reading and listening every month.  It was also announced as a maxi-series of 12 issues.

But the big surprise was X-Men Regenesis.  I can’t begin to tell you how much I’ve enjoyed the X-Schism storyline.  The X-books are showing how to do the big shake-up right.  I know that the prevailing winds of comics have about a two year plot development and then big changes or a shake-up.  The X-Men have slowly been building a developing story for about five or six and much of that has finally reached a breaking point.

There are two thoughts in X-continuity, the one that they should be a teacher/student group and one that they should fight for the future of mutant kind.  Well, with the 20 year (man, has it been that long) of X-Men #1 and the Blue and Gold teams, it is a fantastic time to re-visit that thought process.

So, who is on which team and who is leading who where?  Normally when a big company does a bridge book to set up continuity it is nearly always a pass.  They tend to get inferior creative teams and have a throw away story just to get some extra cash out of the gullible obsessed readers, but Marvel has moved away from this and is starting to make these stories matter.

X-Men Regenesis shows the decision process behind the moves to the two teams and was done in a great way though a “fake” fight to the death set only in the minds (?) of our two main combatants, Wolverine and Cyclops.  You are left at the end of the book asking yourself and being asked, literally, who’s side do you choose and the book lists out several of the main characters who will be on the two main teams… who will NOT be interacting amongst themselves, that is for sure.

This is how you do a “re-start” to your comics.  It makes sense, it works with the past, present and future continuity and has a clear and easy jumping on point.  It allows past stories to become MORE relevant, not less and, frankly, is just been damn enjoyable to follow and read.  IT DOES NOT REBOOT.  If you have read X-Men in the past and strayed or lapsed, now is the time to get back on board… seriously, Schism has been so much better than 90% of these terrible re-booted no continuity DC books.  (Oh, this is going to hurt) Make mine Marvel.

 

Matt loves the X-Men… this week.

Yes – you read that right – Matt LOVED The X-Men this week.

Because of this, he simply couldn’t stop himself from writing a glowing and loving review on his favorite mutants.  Since this mutant love prevented me an X-review, I took it as a challenge to write a brief review on one of HIS scary horror books.

Now, to preface this, there is nothing in the world that scares me more than ghosts and supernatural stuff.  I’m as skittish as a tiny kitten and have nightmares that keep me up for days if I watch a scary movie.  So, “challenge” is an understatement, but here we go:

 

Abe Sapien – The Devil Does Not Jest:

I wandered into this book with the promise of creep and gore, and it certainly didn’t disappoint.  In fact, the first page is generally the stuff nightmares are made of.

The story follows Abe and the grandson of… a demonologist(?), as they investigate the mysterious 50-year-old disappearance of said demonologist(?).

That’s a pretty nice setup for a horror book, if you ask me.

A few pages in, there’s a good amount of uncle on nephew axe violence, but that’s simply the precursor to some super bizarre and gross stuff that Abe encounters further into the book.

Some creepy floating skull (actually things that are in my nightmares!), demon dog/alligator things, and at the very last bit, the absolute scariest “pool” containing…maybe…a giant goat person’s body?  I don’t really know, but you should have seen my face when I came to this page.

The final creepy surprise is absolutely beyond gross…and uncomfortable. But you’d really need to see it yourselves so I won’t ruin the surprise.

Overall, I’m definitely pleased that I read this, but, I was pulling some awfully silly faces while I did.  I’m hooked into the mystery now, and I’ll most definitely keep reading. The artwork is a thing of beauty, and most certainly does the weird stuff justice.  It’s effective and creepy!

 

Published on October 10, 2011 in Comics, Reviews-comics and Ronnie's Reviews. 0 Comments

I’ve had some people say they wanted the old me to come back and really bash something.  Well, I’m not doing that exactly today (but if you would like me to go off on why I HATE Columbus, er, Genocide Day… find my Facebook page.)  But I’ve had my three shot latte and feel a long winded rant coming on.  But first…

 

Customer Appreciation Day…

We are going to have a special customer appreciation day on October 29th.  This will consist of a day of special sales and discounts followed by a closed shop party for customers in the evening.

Remember, we do these things because we love you all, without you, we wouldn’t exist.

 

Rachel Rising, Diamond sucks and why comic ordering is hard…

We all know about the new DC books being shoveled into comic shops over the last month and a half.  I’ll get to some of my thoughts on these in a bit, but I wanted to point out another new book and both the good and bad troubles this book is having by being pure and untainted by corporate publisher hands.

So, instead of Action or Batman or Firestorm or Justice League Dark, the best new book being published in the last two months is Rachel Rising.  Hands down, end of discussion.  (Don’t believe me, ask Kyle.  We all know he can’t lie, he has long hair.)

“What is this, never heard of it,” you say.  Well, it is an independently released comic by easily the best writer/artist in the industry, Terry Moore, creator of Strangers in Paradise and Echo.  Rachel Rising is a horror/supernatural book only on issue two and is showing great success, but with this success comes hard decisions.

I’ve had my own troubles getting copies to fill demand – which I’ll get to – but the book has been selling out nationwide and at Diamond, so no reorders.  This presents the question to the creator, re-print or let it go and make the people find these copies.  Moore wrote on his blog this week that they are struggling with the decisions of going back to press.  He discusses the numbers they have sent to Diamond and what was “lost” in Diamond’s warehouse.  He also discusses who pays for going back to press – answer; him and out of his own pocket, but you can tell this is an agonizing decision.  HE doesn’t want to possibly loose a customer and hence by saying this he doesn’t want us retailers to lose a customer.

This blog post was probably prompted from retailers like me who found sales of issue one of Rachel over five times higher than issue thirty of his previous book Echo.  I’m really glad the book is selling, but depressed that I can’t get people issue two.  I know people will just not pick up issue three if they can’t get issue two and sales growth will stop.

Made worse is the mismanagement Diamond Distributors have shown lately, but on this book in particular.  We put in a reorder of ten copies on issue two – with our initial order just barely covering our hold list requests (and finding out later it didn’t cover those.)  Common is the cut-down quotient in retailing.  Issue two sells about 50 to 75% of issue one – mostly.  You have to figure out which of the books are going to grow and if you don’t you lose that momentum.

Sorry, for that side bar, back to the troubles.  Throw on top of this the four copies of the initial order being damaged, my utter hated for selling a damaged book, all of the reorders going to backorder and even the damaged copies going to backorder (which translated to non-retailer terms means Diamond didn’t have enough copies to cover even damage replacements… a major issue they have NOT been dealing with lately, especially on independent books.)

I hope this shows some of the issues that we go through in ordering.  I find a creator like Terry Moore, independent and of the highest quality, agonizing over the loss of a customer an interesting parallel to my own agonizing in selling to a great book to you.  I wish all the bad books would go away and people would only order good quality… sorry, was day dreaming there for a second.

 

Why Barnes and Noble sucks Just a little less today…

Seems giant corporate monsters don’t always get alone all time like we would think.

It seems Barnes and Noble, DC and Amazon are in a little love triangle and someone feels slighted.  This interesting little story of back room corporate dealings has turned quite interesting over the last day or so.

DC has gone and promised Amazon 100 or so of its top selling graphic collections for exclusive distribution to whatever they call their impersonal digital reader.  This pissed the holy hell out of impersonal big box Barnes and Noble who sells these collections in their stores, but wouldn’t be able to sell them on THEIR impersonal digital reader.  So, they told DC to screw off and pulled these 100 or so collections off their shelves on Friday.

I don’t like big box bookstores at all.  As a collective group they can %$#@ off, but I have to say, “kudos, sir.  Good play chap.”  It happens so infrequently, I’m amazed to see a corporate whore show some balls.

But, do you think DC actually understands the irony here?  How a back room secret deal pisses someone off when that deal goes against the good will you’ve tried to build with your partner of decades.  Do you think anyone in B&N management gets the irony the direct market feels towards this?  Don’t hurt yourself thinking too hard on this one, I’ll answer that question, NO!  It is completely lost on everyone concerned, especially DC and makes me shake my head at just how clueless this company has become over the last year.

For a little more info on this, try Bleeding Cool or Comic Book Resources.

 

(Earlier I used the term graphic collection, I want to explain this.  The media says graphic novel and refers to every single trade or collection published.  Now we know the media is dumber than a sack of hammers, collectively, and I want some definition of terms here.  We comic collectors know that a graphic novel is an original, first time printed, large scale, bound format story.  A trade paperback is a collection of originally printed comics.  Big difference, not every trade is a graphic novel.  Get your terminology correct media idiots!  Sorry, I digress.  By the way, want to know about comics, we got Scott McCloud’s indispensible “Understanding Comics” back in stock last week.  If you have never read this, and call yourself a hard-core comic collector…)

 

 

X-Schism, relaunches and why continuity is important…

Thanks for ruining everything DC.

I have had a few people try and get my personal feelings out of me on what I think of the new DC relaunch.  The past couple of weeks I have had others reviewing these books.  If you are smart, you can figure out why I would do such a thing.  Bad mouthing a product you are selling runs contrary to your ability to make money off said product – and at the end of the day my disgust with capitalism is tempered by actually being part of the system, i.e. I ain’t no dummy!

I permitted reviews that were not positive because, in the end, I think you are all smart enough to see these reviews as opinion and would decide for yourself.  It tends to not work that way when I review something poorly.  I will always tell you my opinion of a product if asked, but… you need to understand it has to be tempered, my lively hood depends on it.

That said, I will tell you now, I am not happy with the new DC.  I’m not reading much of it – can’t tell you it sucks if I don’t read it – and don’t really care too and all of it goes to the haphazard way they have released this new continuity.

I am an old school collector.  I date back to my first comic over 30 years ago and have obviously read much before that now.  I have runs of over 500 issues of Detective Comics, Superman, Batman and Action are approaching this, but none of that matters anymore.  DC Continuity, though we joked about this when we held our wake a month ago, is dead.

In its place has been set a big plate of steaming gruel, a mass, a mixture of… something.  What this something is, we do not know, though it is starting to come out.  Last week, on his Facebook page, Dan Didio – head of DC publishing – announced that none of the Crisis books exist in this new continuity.  WHAT?!?

So you used your own, personal, social media to make an announcement that majorly impacts parts of previous continuity, maybe the most important parts of DC’s continuity over the last 25 years that is now no longer part of this bold new continuity.  That, sir, is stupid and dangerous.

 

Is this how this company is being run now?

“Oh, I woke up this morning and decided I don’t like Dick Grayson anymore.  Kill him off.”  “I didn’t vote for Jason Todd to die in Batman #426 when I was younger, so, I’ll bring him back.  NAH!” “Is this in continuity?  You don’t care, I can do whatever I want ‘cause I’m getting a huge paycheck and helping to design new movies and video games that make this company more money than these stupid comic books… sweet!”

There is no such thing anymore as a cohesive set of rules, no set of laws to tell editors what is and is not contradictory from one book or another, past – which technically doesn’t exist – present – which no one is sure of – and future – which I guess is just the Legion and they seem to have not missed a beat from pre-reboot continuity.  This is all so very confusing.

Comics have relied on their continuity to help, in “universe” set storytelling, for as long as comics have existed.  To jump into the deep end with no set of governing rules gives the writers free reign, but readers no sense of a grounding and no reason to buy anything that has come before.

When DC “restarted” after Crisis on Infinite Earths they actually released a book called, History of the DC Universe.  Today, the convoluted new DC is as I’ve said, a mass of jumbled stories.  I could go into all the contradictions I’ve found so far, but I’m just going to stay with the most recent crisis – Final Crisis.  If this does not exist anymore, Batman RIP CAN NOT exist.  If Final Crisis doesn’t exist, the return of Bruce Wayne doesn’t exist than Batman Inc. does not exist and you start to see how it is difficult to release anymore of this story, though they have solicited the next part in the October previews.

 

Marvel has got it right.

Change happens and some stories are needed to be hushed or altered.  Marvel Comics is showing the right way to do this.  Mark Waid’s Daredevil and Jason Aaron’s X-Schism are both great examples.  Schism does not throw the baby out with the bathwater.  It alters the status quo, tells a good story and moves us onto the next big relaunch, NOT reboot.  Mark Waid is not altering one bit of any continuity that has come before in Daredevil, he is just not relying on it as strongly as say Ed Brubaker relied on what Brian Bendis had done when he came on the book.  He is picking and choosing what is important in his storytelling, but not throwing everything out.

 

Why do I harp on this?

I have already seen some of those new customers starting to disappear.  A big launch happened when Marvel restarted their heroes in Heroes Reborn, then sales started to sag and it was eventually abandoned.  However, Marvel kept their old books going so it’s core was still placated.  DC has done nothing like this and essentially abandoned its core collector base.  This should be a wake-up call to you the ten, twenty, thirty, forty year collector.  DC does not care about you.  OR, this is an ultimate launch and no one was told.  If this is the case, how angry will the core be when we are given back our heroes after we bought this… gruel.

If you like these stories, I am the first person who is happy to sell them to you.  I have no beef with you.  My beef is with a company that discards its core audience like an unwanted wrapper on candy bar.  If you throw away the thing that keeps us here, we will leave and THAT could be the end of comics as we know them… well, at least DC comics.

 

Matty J’s Top Five New DC Books:

I think they are all… okay, these were at the very least good stories:

1. All Star Western

2. Batman

3. Animal Man

4. Action Comics – but issue two was pretty weak, in my opinion.

I don’t have a number five FAVORITE.  I’m not reading most of the 52.  Just like Ultimate Marvel, this is not my continuity, so, what reason do I have to care.

I’ll continue to read all four GL books, the two Legion titles and Swamp Thing, but can’t bother with the rest when I can pick up ANYTHING from Dark Horse and be happier!

 

But I am only one opinion.  Many, probably a majority, think these books are great.

My employee, Ronnie the Awesome, is not one of them, here is his hysterical rant:

If you’ll notice on my list, none of the books I really liked required the reboot to make it work, they worked in spite of The Didio-cide.  Batman #1 could have been Detective Comics #900.  Both Swamp Thing and Animal Man could have been published at any time in the last 5 years, no ret-con required, and they would be just as awesome and relevant.  Action Comics is just another in a long line of Superman origin re-imaginings.  However, we were due for one, it’s been at least a year since the last one… and a generation since a good one… and Batwoman was written something like two years ago, then rescheduled and advertised repeatedly for the last 18 months.

 

The (unaffected?!?) Batman continuity suffers greatly from the Geoff Johns/Jim Lee meddling, mainly in the disregard for any sort of sense in timeline.  Every major Gotham story/event is at risk of disappearing.  If Bruce Wayne is anything, he is the sum of his experiences.  How many teenage sidekicks in how many years?  Apparently Year One was two weeks, Jim Gordon has a Lazarus Pit, Dick Grayson was Batman after apprenticing as Robin for 6-18 months (but not a Teen Titan, possibly never a teenager at any point), Joker has no face, Tim Drake is now Black Condor, and Barbara…

 

Poor Barbara.  I have heard so many passionate arguments from both sides on this.  They all have valid points.  However, could Barbra’s recovery and return to street vigilantism been handled any worse?  If it had to have been done, then Gail should be the writer, no question there… but not like this… Ever!  I bet Simone agrees too.  As of issue #1 Oracle, the role that made Barbara Gordon one of the strongest, most unique characters in DC, is ignored.  20+ years of story ignored.  She deserved better than that.  I think she deserved a mini-series detailing her recovery and training and a well guarded surprise ending of her putting on the mask again. Maybe a mask and codename of her own design?  Without the ‘girl’ tacked on to the end of it?  Maybe she should have struggled with PTSD and overcame it before she went out adventuring?  Maybe we could get her reason to be in tights again at all?

 

Or she could have stayed the Oracle!

 

And Jason Todd could have stayed dead.  His death created the modern Batman.  You think that 900 number still works?

 

I did try some of the other series.  In my opinion, out of all the elements the reboot changed, it doesn’t seem to have improved upon any of them.  And once the dust settled, very, very few of the titles had legs to stand on.  Green Arrow – ruined.  Batgirl – ruined.  Superman’s underwear – ruined.  Starfire – will be the reason we will be forced with a Comics Code Authority again.

 

I truly believe comics are better now than they have ever been.  Just not DC comics.

 

These are my thoughts as a reader.  As a comics retail employee, the whole scene changes and brings with it many more concerns.  That is a much longer, more hysterical rant.

Didio-cide. Heh, I should trademark that.

 

Ronnie’s Top 5 New DC Titles

5. Batwoman/Action Comics (tie)

4. Batman (Snyder saved it)

3. Animal Man

2. Swamp Thing

1. Don’t have a #1 because the reboot did not make anything better.

 

A middle ground between Ronnie’s thoughts and pure joy is Pat.  One of my Reviews of the first month he had this to say when asked for his thoughts:

 

I’ll admit that when the announcement of a line-wide relaunch came across, I was probably one of the few people who didn’t go insane and start bashing it all over the internet.  Once the creative teams starting being revealed I thought it was going to be pretty good.  The continuity basically stayed the same with Batman (Editor’s note: sorry Pat, DC lied to you) and Green Lantern so I was ok with DC messing around with everyone else.  I mean, who really liked those arcs on Superman and Wonder Woman?  They had moments, but that’s because Chris Roberson and Phil Hester, both of which don’t have new series in this new DC, did the best they could with the JMS turd sandwich they were left.

DC has wanted to make Superman more “modern” and “relevant” for a while now.  They picked the perfect person in Grant Morrison, as he gets the character like writers in the last few years have not.

Aquaman is looking like it could be one of the best series DC has to offer after creators couldn’t think of what to do with the character and he was just killed off, probably for lack of a better use for him.

I also feel several series have reached the goal of a fresh start and new readers can come in and enjoy a character from the very beginning.  Blue Beetle is probably the best example.

On the other hand, if you read a series like Green Lantern or Legion of Superheroes, you probably have no clue what’s going on if you’re a new reader.  They just start up immediately from where they left off before the relaunch.  Why is this?

I also have enjoyed the reluanch because I picked up books that I probably would have never gotten before.  I knew it would be a fresh start and I could pick it up and go, which is DC’s ultimate goal I’m sure.  New coninuity = sales to readers who didn’t want convoluted character histories to catch up on.  I picked up Batgirl, Batwoman, Animal Man, Swamp Thing, and Blue Beetle when I had never really gotten into any of these characters before.  I love what these creative teams are doing with these characters and can’t wait for issue 2 for these series (#2 of Swamp Thing and Animal Man have come out, and holy cow they are awesome, no fluke on those first issues).

So, long story short, I really liked the relaunch.  I’m a reader that enjoys a good story with good characterization.  I just hope DC sticks to its guns and doesn’t reset the DCnU in a year with a big event comic.

And, please DC, keep Grant Morrison on Superman for the rest of his life.  He knows the character so well and has actually been the only person who made him translate into the modern world, which as I stated has been the goal for a while.  It’s going to be interesting to see how long the creative teams stay on each series.  These starting teams seem to really have good things going for them, at least on the series I liked, and it would be nice to see their ideas come to fruition.

Pat’s Top Five New DC Books:

1. Action Comics (this is probably impacted by the fact that issue 2 has come out and it rocked)

2. Batman

3. Swamp Thing

4. Batgirl

5. Green Lantern

 

And now for another point of view, but not all that different than Pat, is RJ, the self professed Marvel Zombie, with a recap/review:

What an amazing and interesting journey.  BIG thanks to Matt and Cup of Kryptonite, without his “Hate It, Return It” policy, I doubt I would have tried so many of the books (I read 43 of the 52 new books).  And honestly, had I not tried such a large sampling, I really would have missed out on some books I ended up liking quite a bit.  There is a lot of good stuff out there, and I can honestly say that DC succeeded in ensuring that there’s truly ‘something for everyone’.  If you’re of an age to get yourself to a comic book store and have the money and desire to buy a comic book, and still can’t find something out of these 52 books that you enjoy; you’re probably not really trying and maybe shouldn’t be reading comics anymore.

 

Seriously, DC offers everything from an adorable (yet frightening) space faring kitty that spews napalm from its mouth to an oversexed alien idiot that hangs out with skinny dudes with lousy fashion sense.  Long term fans should be able to wrap themselves comfortably at night in the unchanged continuity of Batman (Editor’s Note: Again, you were lied to) and Green Lantern; nostalgia fanatics (and fanboys with a dream that never died) have Barbara Gordon back as Batgirl and Barry Allen as the Flash; fans of Game of Thrones and DragonAge have Demon Knights;  the most vehement feminist comic book readers who haunt the web have seemed greatly satisfied by the new Birds of Prey and Batwoman; and I’ve heard that even Brian Bendis himself is a fan of the insanely decompressed and yawn inducing Justice League (okay, I made that last part up…).

 

That being said…out of the 43 books I read, only 15 have secured a place on my pull list for at least the next 6 months.  There are a few that I read and enjoyed, but ultimately have no real need to continue buying.  Justice League International was a really good, old school team book, but what does it provide that I don’t get from Alpha Flight (for example)?  It, and others are books that I would not dissuade anyone from reading, but for the sake of money and space I need to maintain some restraint in my monthly buying habits.  To be completely fair, there are only two books that I would actively recommend people to avoid: Justice League and Suicide Squad. Those books were not only poorly done, but seemed to fail miserably when compared to the books that preceded them.  Justice League is a cash grab with both the company’s “Big” names attached to it, a stretched out storyline and an extra $1 in cost.  Suicide Squad…well…put it this way: If the 1980’s Ostrander Suicide Squad was the original ‘Star Wars’, and Secret Six was ‘The Empire Strikes Back’, then this new series is ‘Attack of the Clones’.

 

But why focus on the ‘bad’ when there’s so much good that was found in these books?  If I can be permitted, let’s take a look at some of the things that made me smile:

Peter Milligan.  The man had about a 25% success rate with me coming into this.  The only Milligan book I ever read and enjoyed was his X-Force/X-Statix run.  Everything else seemed completely mired in confusion.  Not only did he perform a feat that I would have found IMPOSSIBLE 30 days ago (crafting a coherent first issue of Red Lanterns), but with Justice League Dark, he produced probably the finest debut issue of a not-a-team-team-book I’ve read in years (yeah, it even beat Villians United #1 in my eyes).

Paul Cornell has apparently been wowing the heck out of people with his other work and I’ve been too obtuse to enjoy it.  Stormwatch and Demon Knights about both books I wasn’t planning on buying but now have homes on my monthly pull list.

Madame Xanadu gets my award for “Breakout Character” in the New 52, appearing in no fewer than 3 books, and being an exciting part of all of them.  She’s gone from “yeah, I think she’s that blind Vertigo chick” to “Hey, she’s pretty cool” in 4 short weeks.

Action Comics.  I like a Superman comic.  I mean, I REALLY LIKE a Superman comic.  That right there is something I never, EVER thought I would say or type.

And…of course…Batgirl.  I freakin get a freakin monthly Barbara Gordon BatfreakinGirl book.  This is seriously something I’ve wanted for about 2/3 of my life, and it’s FINALLY here…and it’s good.  Really, really good.

RJ’s Top Five New DC Books:

1. JUSTICE LEAGUE DARK – It’s Justice League…and it’s Dark…but beautiful.

2. DEMON KNIGHTS – By day I read comics, by night I read A Song of Fire and Ice (you HBO subscribers call that “Game of Thrones”).  This book is the best of both worlds.

3. BATGIRL

4. RED LANTERNS

5. I, VAMPIRE

Yeah, seriously; I,Vampire trumped Action, Wonder Woman, Stormwatch

 

I also asked some customers and friends to give me their Top Five of this New DC:

 

Alicia’s Top Five New DC Books, with commentary:

5. Justice League Dark

WTF is happening in this book?!  Bunches of crazy stuff, that’s what!  And I loved every minute of it.  While it was light on action, it almost was guaranteed to be that way, in order to set up the story.  Zatanna pulling one over on Bruce Wayne Bats provided me with some cathartic relief (although I disagree with her statement that her death wouldn’t be important; increase your self esteem girl!) & the ominous tone of the book is filled with promise.  I know nothing of Enchantress or her history, but she seems to be at the center of the craziness going on in some of these other books, like Swamp Thing & Animal Man.  I am seeing plenty of parallels in the Dark books & whatever’s coming is going to be HUGE.  Again, Mikel Janin’s disconcerting art complimented Peter Milligan’s story perfectly.

4. All-Star Western (Tie)

An 1800s Gotham crime story? Yes, please! Who is this Jonah Hex guy, never read any of his books before, but I completely dig him, (might need to pick up some back issues.)

Justin Gray & Jimmy Palmiotti didn’t disappoint.  The team up between Jonah Hex & Doctor Arkham provides a few moments of comic relief in an otherwise dark plot & Moritat’s art reflects the time period impeccably.  This book probably has one of the best stories in the whole New 52, it’s classic, it’s the perfect division of poor & rich in the corrupt city of Gotham.  Someone’s killing prostitutes & the culprit is one of the richest, most powerful men in the city.  I have no doubt that Jonah Hex will find him & make him pay, dearly.

4. The Huntress (Tie)

Helena is a killer.  She’s also a babe.  I have to say, the cover art on The Huntress was kind of a turn-off.  Why are her boobs so big?  The composition is awkward, (why is her thigh so crazy large?) but I’m not a huge fan of Guillem March (*cough* Catwoman) so, moving on…

The inside of the book definitely made up for it.  Magnificent.  Kudos to Marcus To.

This issue was just a rollicking good time & the story of vindication and revenge is ultimately satisfying (see guys, this is what happens when you exploit women, take note). Good job, Paul Levitz.  Actually, I’m sad that this is only a mini-series lasting 6 issues, yet EVERY male Robin has a book?  Can I get a WHA THE…?

3. Animal Man

This one surprised me.  Mostly because I didn’t know who Buddy Baker was, but I put complete faith and trust in Jeff Lemire (Sweet Tooth) & obviously for good reason.  The format of the book, with the story of Buddy in the front was helpful for those of us who had never heard of him.  The tension between being a family man & Animal Man is definitely prominent here & you can see the consequences of living with that dichotomy at the end of the book.  There’s a hell of a “Big Bad” in The Hunters Three & Buddy has hallucinations about just how bad.  And it is not pretty, in fact, what he envisions is the definition of macabre.

The art, however, is pitch perfect.  I had never heard of Travel Foreman but he definitely impressed me. It just suits the story so well.

2. Wonder Woman

I’ve never read a Wonder Woman title in my life.  I’m fairly new to comics & you could say I’m a little picky about what I select.  I can honestly say that Brian Azzarello’s take on Diana had me hooked from page one.  And if the story didn’t hook me, Cliff Chiang’s art would have… completely gorgeous, completely.  And thanks to Chiang for not making Diana & the rest of the women look like strippers or victims of plastic surgery.  When Azzarello said this was going to be a horror story, he wasn’t kidding.  The antagonist is terrifying; the son of a god with his own unknown agenda.  Again, I can’t wait for #2 so I can know more about where the story is going.

1. Batwoman

Duh!  The art’s BEAUTIFUL, Kate’s totally badass, and I’d be lying if I didn’t say I’d been looking forward to the book for over a year.  And it definitely did NOT disappoint.  I’m intrigued to see where JH Williams’ story is going; the Weeping Woman is undeniably creepy.  I can’t wait to see what happens between Detective Sawyer & Kate and don’t forget that Cameron Chase is another of Williams’ strong female creations, as well as her ooky boss, from the DEO, has popped up and are hot on the Batwoman’s tail.

Again, thanks to JH Williams for not feeling the need to objectify the female form; the women look proportional. All I can say is I can’t wait for #2!  If there is a gripe, my only one would be this issue seems to be unchanged from the original story, so it may make it difficult for new DC readers to follow.

 

Jess’s Top Five New DC Books:

5. Batman

4. Wonder Woman

3. All Star Western

2. Batwoman

1. Animal Man

 

Mike N’s Top Five New DC Books:

1. Demon Knights

2. Batgirl

3. All Star Western

4. Nightwing

5. Justice League Dark

Some of these even surprised me.

 

Tia’s Top Five New DC Books:

1. Red Lanterns

2. Animal Man

3. Green Lantern

4. New Guardians

5. Justice League

 

Chad’s Top Five New DC Books:

1. Animal Man

2. Swamp Thing

3. All Star Western

4. Batman

5. Action Comics

 

Week of October 3rd

Published on October 2, 2011 in Censorship, Comics and Reviews-comics. 0 Comments

Who would have guessed that two of the best books you would read in a week would be Westerns?  Crazy times we collect in these days.

 

 

 

 

Again, if you missed out on any of the new number one issues and don’t care about them being first prints, let me know and I’ll get you a second print.  None of these number one issues (except a few of the variants) will be worth anything more than cover price in a few months, so, please don’t look at this as your child’s college fund.

However, if you do want to try them, need a read or just want to see what the hype is all about, we will have second prints or have access to get them.

 

Hate it, Return it Policy…

Related subject – We are still offering you the ability to return any of those pesky DC New #1 comics you bought and now regret.  Want to help fund the second issues of the ones you liked, brig in the number ones you hated and we’ll give you a dollar of in-store credit for each one that is in re-sellable condition, i.e. you didn’t chuck across the room because an overrated writer felt they needed to downgrade the main character of the new book rather than show how strong of a character he is… can you guess what book I hated last week?  I think it will get better and both of my reviewers LOVED it.  I had some issues with the writing.

 

…but I’ll get to those reviews, some links and some pod casts in a bit, but first I want to showcase some interesting news and preview of a book shipping next week.

 

CBLDF owns Comics Code…

In one of the most bizarre twists of comic history, the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund assumed control of the intellectual property rights of the Comics Code Seal of Approval last week… during Banned Book Week.

The CBLDF will now use the image and license products for sale to help fund the organization.  CBLDF Executive Director Charles Brownstein says, “It’s a progressive change that the Comics Code seal, which is yesterday’s symbol of comics censorship, will now be used to raise money to protect the First Amendment challenges comics face in the future. That goal probably would have been unimaginable to the Code’s founders, who were part of a generation of comics professionals that were fleeing a witch-hunt that nearly trampled comics and any notion that they deserved any First Amendment protection.”

For more information go to CBLDF.org.

 

Dave Stewart, Color Master…

There is always a lot of discussion about who is the best artist in comics.  My tastes are not the same anyone else.  We can be similar, but no one is the same.

However, there is one person working in the industry that there is NO argument on his greatness, Dave Stewart.  If you are saying, who is Dave Stewart, you don’t read enough Hellboy.  I know Kyle and I have opened a book and said, “Wow, this art looks… oh, it’s colored by Stewart, no wonder.”  You can see his style and work instantly and realize it is his, he is that good.

Dave Stewart has won the Eisner Awards for Outstanding Achievement in the Area of Coloring every year for several years now. Editor (the best editor in the industry too) Scott Allie over at Dark Horse has a fantastic write up about his friend and the superior work Stewart puts in on every book be works on.

It reminds you that colorists and letterers are important parts of this medium and should not be over looked.

 

Next Week, Orchid #1…

There is a book I’m very high on that releases next week called Orchid.  It is from Dark Horse and written by Tom Morello of Rage against the machine fame.  Each issue will come with a download for a free song that will play as your “soundtrack” for the issue and issue one will only be a dollar.

If you need more coxing, go check out the “trailer” for the comic up on Dark Horse’s website.

 

The Wake…

Not so much a Pod-cast as it is just an episode of stupid geekiness, I offer to you The Wake in honor of the fallen DC continuity.

You can find it here: http://www.youtube.com/user/SouthSiderStudios or for free download on Itunes.

When we did it, it was little more than jest, but now a month into the NÜ DC Universe, this might be more relevant than I thought at the time.  It is also pretty funny.

Long Live the Parliament of Trees!

 

DC’s New Standard of “Excellence”…

Last week I made a few comments on the Catwoman and Red Hood books that were released.  Both of these issue ones were, in my opinion, the sexist, stupid typical lowest common denominator that exists in today’s world of comics.  What we should be moving away from, not offering to “new customers,” especially when you put an inappropriate suggested rating of the content inside the book.

And it seems I’m not alone in my thoughts.  I posted a long review from Comic Book Resources last week and I add to it with a podcast and another link.

Every year I go to Chicago for a retailer summit before C2E2 in the spring and have become friends with the manager of the northern most Graham Crackers Comics.  (It is nice to have someone else to mock the BS being shoveled by the publishers in this industry.)

Shanna and a friend have started a female opinion based podcast called Geek Minded Broads and launched it last week… “shockingly” with plenty to talk about.  They also were none too pleased with the lack of intelligence displayed by DC either.  Go check them out, Geek Minded Broads on Facebook and you can listen to the podcast here on their website: geekmindedbroads.libsyn.com.

Also, a friend sent me a fantastic blog post about her daughter of seven and what these comics mean to her.  It says a lot about what is important.  You can find it here.

 

Reviews…

The four best books I read last week actually included a New DC book… that had nothing to do with the current “whatever you call this” continuity.  It was All Star Western.  Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Grey have been putting in superb work on Jonah Hex for years, so this came as no shock.  Maybe the shock was that we sold out of over four times what I would normally sell of Jonah Hex.

The story diverges from their typical Hex storytelling of single issue, one and done style.  This is a murder mystery set in late 1800’s Gotham City and has Jonah Hex working with the ancestor of Doctor Jeremiah Arkham.

I hope that if you enjoyed this issue you will take a look at Palmiotti and Grey’s previous series Jonah Hex.  If you didn’t get a copy of issue one, let me know and I’ll get a second print in for you.

The other Western I loved was American Vampire #19.  What was even better about this comic though was the back story between two main characters, yes, but the art by Jordi Bernet.  Freak’n awesome!!  If you are not reading American Vampire, you should be.  We have a trade paperback of the first story arc, the one that includes Stephen King’s work, in this week.  Seriously, do yourself a favor and read this book.

The other two books that rose above the rest were both of another genre, horror.  The new Abe Sapien miniseries was started with a very scary bang and a whole lot of Lovecraft – not that BPRD and Hellboy don’t drip with it already – thrown in for good measure.  A great read with little back story of the characters needed.  There is a BPRD, they investigate monsters and strange sh!t.  Done, now read the book.

…and then there was Rachel Rising #2.  I am reluctant to mention this as I sold out and need more copies to even cover the initial orders, but this book was the best thing – by far – that I read last week.  I liked the first issue, but it was the second and all the developing back story laid down with-in conversations two characters are having that made me believe this will be another fantastic read from Terry Moore.

 

Now for some comments about a few books released in the last week of DC’s big bold new re-start.  RJ and PAT, take it away:

 

Aquaman #1

RJ:FINALLY!  This is the first Geoff Johns written book of this entire reboot that I read and ‘got’  why DC has so much faith in him as a writer!

Aquaman is a character that I’m only familiar with because of the cultural zeitgeist.   I’ve read comics that he’s been in, but I’ve never read an Aquaman comic or a comic with an Aquaman story.  To be fair, I’m much more of a Mera fan than I am Aquaman, and the only reason I picked this up was because I knew she’d be playing a strong supporting role.  She doesn’t sneak in until near the end of this book, but even if she hadn’t made an appearance in this first issue I would have been happy to have picked it up.

Not only will I label this a ‘fun’ book to read, but I have a sneaking suspicion that Geoff Johns had fun writing it too.  There’s a real bit of meta-commentary going on here that plays itself very tongue-in-cheek for the majority of the story.  Johns addresses a lot of the criticism and dismissive attitude that plagues the title character and delivers it in…well, maybe not a ‘laugh out loud’ manner, but if you still have a bit of joy left in your soul, you’ll at least chortle audibly.

I can’t even tell you the last time Aquaman’s had a solo series, or how much time he’s spent as a solo hero lately, but I’m sure these moments will produce ire in continuity driven hardcore fans (if there truly are any), but coming in with only the broadest idea of what Aquaman is capable of  and a decent notion of how he’s perceived, I found it very entertaining (though I’m worried about it being a continuous plot point…it helped to introduce Aquaman, but I can imagine that it will get really old if every issue from here on out is as heavy handed with the fish out of water comments as this book was at times).

The antagonist seems new (or at least new to me), and seems like a legitimate sea-born threat to the surface world so Aquaman’s new role will keep him out of his undersea kingdom and in the sunlight for the time being (and if you stick strictly with super hero books, it may very well be the most gruesome villains you see this week).

The art is very nice on the eyes.  Mera is drawn very regally and lovely while Aquaman…godhelpme…is rather quite hot.  Like ‘makes up for last week’s disappointing not-sexy Nightwing’ hot.  One of the greatest things about Reis’s art though is that he really seems to capture emotion on everyone’s face, not just the main characters.  You can see the embarrassment the cops feel in the beginning, the disdain and smug superiority in the hipster blogger’s eyes, and the sheer joy of the waitress…none of whom will probably be seen again.  So, big points to an artist who understands that the background characters are not just there to fill space.  Aquaman didn’t make my Top 5 books of the relaunch, but it secured a place on my Pull List with the hopes that going forward it stays as fresh as this debut was.

 

PAT:

I need to get this out of the way: HOLY S***, THIS WAS SO ****ING AWESOME!

Ok, I’m good and composed now.  The team that did Blackest Night (and who didn’t enjoy that?) makes Aquaman cool again.  This was so great.  Geoff Johns takes every single thing you can use to rip on Aquaman about and uses it to such a great effect.  I mean, he helps cops out and they are embarrassed that they had to have help from him.

Loved the art. The designs of these new trench monster/creatures are awesome.  They look exactly like what a deep sea creature would, with the gigantic eyes and lots of pointy teeth.  I was waiting for this all month and the build-up was totally worth the wait.  Geoff Johns needs to stay on this for as long as possible because it could turn into the best comic of the re-launch.

 

 

Justice League Dark #1

RJ:  52 books.  52 new DC Comics this month, and I’ve read 38 of them.  And out of those 38 comics, this, this book right here?  It’s the best of the bunch.

I fell in love with this comic when I saw the cover.  Apparently it’s by someone named Ryan Sook (I want to marry him because of this cover…) but until I saw that in the credits I would have bet my next paycheck on it being Adam Hughes.  And honestly, there’s so much ‘Win’ in this book, I don’t even know where to start.

The title has it right on the money: this book is dark.  Darker maybe than it should be with just a ‘T’ rating, but definitely not as dark as it could be if it were a Vertigo book.  There are some scenes that are implied that are just disturbing as all hell, and some things that happen that seriously make you wonder “Who the hell thinks up stuff like this!?”

The characters (to me) are vaguely familiar in so much as Madame Xanadu has popped up a couple of times already in these new books (Resurrection Man and Demon Knights), Zatanna has made appearances in the JLU cartoon and in Smallville, and both Shade and The Enchantress were solid parts of the 1980’s Suicide Squad book (though not at the same time, if memory serves correctly)… Constantine… well, I assume that this is the character that the movie Constantine was based off of, right?

Almost  every character here  is given at least a cursory introduction here since they’re not really all that well known by the general populace, including the actual members of the Justice League (and I just can’t *not* mention that there are more Justice League members in this book than there are in the actual Justice League book).  The only misstep that this book makes may be the general assumption that anyone going into it knows that June Moone and the Enchantress are/were/are? the same person.

It may seem like I’m (still) harping about the missteps that Justice League #1 had, but when I think the comparison here is as valid as it was with Justice League International back on Week One.  This book, with its cast of lesser known characters, could have almost been forgiven if it had started with a slow burn like we got in the Johns/Lee Justice League proper, but Milligan has once again shown that if you’re up to the challenge, a writer can properly introduce complicated characters and concepts in a first issue.  After reading this book, Red Lanterns, Demon Knights, Stormwatch, and Justice League International, the glacial storytelling pace of Justice League becomes less and less forgivable.

The art here by Mikel Janin is superb, and with the assist from colorist Ulises Arreola (wait…seriously, his last name is Arreola?!), it’s the second best looking of the New 52, next to Batwoman.

Bottom line here is this: There are a LOT of books out there right now from a lot of different publishers. It’s hard to say to someone who’s already reading a book like the Avengers or Alpha Flight “Hey, you should give Justice League International a try!” But, if you’re a superhero fan but in search of something different then Justice League Dark (along with Demon Knights) should scratch that itch to complete and utter satisfaction.

 

PAT: Well it certainly looks like DC is using the Justice League brand the way Marvel is the Avengers, meaning way too many books with one team name.  This one is infused with plenty of formerly-known-as Vertigo characters.  I’ll admit I never read Vertigo (yes I know, hurl your insults, I can take it.)  I really had nothing invested in characters like John Constantine or Shade.  Peter Milligan’s effort in this book still doesn’t make me want to care about these characters.  They’re the Justice League that’s needed when magic happens!  Oh my!  I don’t get how they can get away with using the League name, other than the fact that DC hopes this label will help sell more issues.  This is a comic I just couldn’t really get into.

The art is nice.  It was very cool to see Dove not drawn by Rob Liefeld, (we could use more of that in her own comic.)  I’m sure Vertigo lovers will like this, as it is probably what I imagine a Vertigo book may be like, but I, personally, am not going to see what happens next.

 

 

I, Vampire

RJ:  Vampires are done to death.  If you’re not sick and tired of them then you’re not paying attention.  True Blood, Twilight, Vampire Diaries… I’ve long thought that Popular Culture should get together and agree on a forced retirement of this genre for about a decade or so and everyone would be happy… but then I, Vampire came around.

Even more shallow than my Nightwing confession last week is this; I bought this book because the main character (Andrew Bennett) looks a lot like Nate Grey from the X-men books and Nate Grey is about the sexiest male comic book character ever.  I didn’t actually plan on reading the book though until I saw Gail Simone screaming at the top of her lungs on Twitter about how good of a book it is.

And surprise, surprise, this book is great.

There’s a line in this book, it’s not even a line of dialogue, but in a letter that one character writes to another, that made me stop and reread the book from the beginning with this …we’ll call it a ‘mission statement’ in mind.  It’s a line that completely changed my opinion about what this book can be and days later, (being the X-Men aficionado that I am) still find myself wishing that it would have been the driving force behind the dreadful trainwreck that was the Mutants vs. Vampires storyline Marvel used to launch the third X-Men book.

My only complaint though is that this book uses a “Then/Now” narrative without really telling you which is “then” and which is “now”.  And maybe it should be obvious, but I find it hard to believe that the ‘now’ part can honestly be happening ‘now’ and not have it spill over into other books.  (any by the way, f you’ve ever wondered what the Walking Dead would be like if the zombies were Vampires…and not Cullen six-pack-a-licious vampires, but really ugly and scary vampires, then you need to pick this book up RIGHT NOW. )

The art is dark, very very dark, but it fits the tone of the book dead-on.  It may be a little muddied in parts, but if you’re hoping or wanting Aaron Lopresti style art on a book like this, well…you’re doing it wrong.

Also intriguing is that there are two characters on the cover, Andrew and his lover/enemy Mary, and the story focuses a lot on their relationship which is both adversarial and romantic.  It almost successfully paints them both in the role of protagonist leaving you a bit unsure who to root for.  Imagine Professor X and Magneto, but instead of being stuffy geriatric men they were both sexy near naked vampires.  It’s an interesting juxtaposition.

Yeah, this book may have some flaws, but when you get right down to it, it’s a vampire book that made a vampire hater into a fan.  Not only is it officially on the pull list, but it makes my Top 5 for the reboot.

 

 

The Flash #1

PAT:  So we get to see one an artist attempt to shine with his writing abilities and he doesn’t do too badly either.

I don’t know if it may have been mandated to him by editorial, or if he just chose it himself, but this book takes full advantage of cherry picking whatever they want out of previous continuity.  Iris is still around (but not married to Barry) and director Singh makes it over from the Geoff John’s run.  We start off seeing Barry on a date, which is just weird to me.  Don’t want to go too much into plot, but we see an old friend of Barry’s pop up a few times this issue, and when he shows up in Barry’s apartment, you kind of know where it’s going and it spoils the end.  So the writing isn’t great, but not horrible.

Now the art.  It’s not that it was bad either, it is very fluid, lightly sketchy and probably much of it is done without inks, just colors under hard pencils.  It looks nice.

There are some issues though.  Seriously, how the hell does that new costume work?  And yes, I could buy the whole costume-coming-out-of-the-ring thing, but… what happens then?  Random pieces of costume fly out of his ring?  Are they under his clothes? I need to know the mechanics!

Also, where’s Wally?!  Wally West was my Flash, and now I don’t even know if he exists.  WTF, DC?  Start explaining yourself.

 

 

Teen Titans

RJ:  The main buzz this title has gotten focuses solely on the supposedly flamboyant gay boy character that Brett Booth announced they were introducing on his Twitter a couple of weeks back.  What Brett Booth forgot to mention was: They aren’t introducing him in this particular issue.

The other item worth noting is that writer Scott Lobdell torched, burned, blew up, and condemned the X-Mansion in the opening pages of this issue.  Considering what he did while writing the X-Men, I find this to be an ironic metaphor rather than a snipe by a jilted writer.

Also, this book ends pretty much the exact same as Superboy #1.  It could have been a flip book.

Meh.  Lots and lots and lots of ‘Meh’.

 

 

Superman#1

PAT:  Wasn’t going to get this.  Was determined not to get it.  So, naturally, I picked it up.  I have to say I’m very glad I did.  What a fun comic.  I know that’s such a general term and you can say that about any comic, but man I had fun reading this.  It seemed like an old 1930′s radio show of Superman with all the narration that wasn’t a character’s voice.  We get to see the life of Clark and Superman in the new status quo.

We do get to see an interesting new villain who literally comes out of nowhere and this villain knows the word Krypton, so that’ll be an interesting development. I will probably keep going with this one, it should prove to be pretty interesting.

 

 

Blackhawks #1 and Green Lantern, The New Guardians #1

RJ:  The sad thing is, if either of these books had come out a few months back and someone had recommended them to me, I’d still be buying it (or planning to buy it). There’s nothing inherently bad about either of these books.  Both of them have rather engaging stories with decent casts of characters (tho, truth be told, I’d rather The New Guardians feature the Old New Guardians from Blackest Night…and Dex-Starr, but that’s neither here nor there) and solid art…but, it all basically boils down to priorities and decision making.

For my money, they’re both ‘bubble books’ or ‘cherry pickings’.  These, along with the previously reviewed Fury of Firestorm are books I’ll keep an eye on and pick up when I’ve got a spare $3 burning a hole in my wallet on any given Wednesday.  So, I guess it’s fair to say: they’re good, they’re just not good enough when put front and center with some of the other books out there (though I think Blackhawks is better than New Guardians).

PAT on Green Lantern, New Guardians #1:

Wally West was my Flash just as much as Kyle Rayner was my Green Lantern.  I definitely partake in plenty of Hal Jordan, but when I was growing up and getting into comics, it was all Kyle as the Green Lantern.  So seeing a new comic with Kyle as the main man is an awesome thing in my opinion.

Yes, an ensemble of various ring colors shows up, but he’s still the main guy. We get to see the origin of Kyle becoming a GL again, with a few new modern nuances like websites and such. Then we see a bunch of rings leave their users and seek him out. Think those various Corps might want them back? Probably.

As I stated last week, I am now a TBFFL, Tony Bedard Fan For Life, so this comic was a must buy for me.  I loved getting to see Kyle back to being a solo GL.  He’s been stuck with the Corps so long.  Really enjoyed the art by Tyler Kirkham too, but if there is one complaint about it, it’s that Kyle’s hair instantly gets gelled up when he puts the ring on.  Is it green ring energy, or does it come with its own hair gel supply? Anyways, if you liked Bedard’s GL Corps run, you’ll really enjoy this.

 

And RJ has a quick review of a series of fantastic Children’s books released last week:

DC Super-Pets – Super Hero Splashdown

(Shhh…we’ll just see if Matt misses this and I can sneak this in here at the end…)

This isn’t a comic so much as it’s a children’s book (on a reading level somewhere between ‘Goodnight Moon’ and ‘Harry Potter’), but the illustrations by Art Baltazar are adorable and it has Dex-Starr and B’dg the Green Lantern chasing each other around a water park and having to deal with Sinestro-Corps dogs and the gluttonous Globulus  from the Orange Lantern Corps (who sees more page time here than in Green Lantern – The New Guardians).

It’s a bit more expensive than your average comic ($4.95), but it takes a bit longer to read than one and it’s far more satisfying too.  I’m bringing this up because I really got some decent entertainment out of it.  It’s not going to blow you away as groundbreaking literature, but it’s worth the price of admission and it reminded me of how absolutely fun these characters can be when the individuals behind the scenes aren’t so intent on making them overly serious and joyless.