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[Cannon]

I suppose manga would be a seperate topic, but I'd prefer a big, screw-all American comic thread to split-offs which inexorably perish (though that's up to the insane admin, really). Also, I'm pretty sure Romosome isn't here to kvetch about it.

Kill 'em all, and let Nekron sort 'em out. As the sole remaining nerd on Earth to still be reading Countdown, I will be picking up the issue zero and this, obviously. It's interesting that Morrison dreamed up the Alpha Lanterns, is giving the Corps a big role in Final Crisis, and enjoys Johns's work on GL. Granted, I don't think ex-52 partners would be on bad creative terms. Personally, I would think otherwise about that last one.

By the way, you should probably be reading Salvation Run. Just don't expect Villains United, people.

I... Just don't know how to talk about books that aren't published by DC. So much for a lone nerd doing his part to further a wonderful medium dominated by the "guys who scowl, yell a lot, and punch each other" genre.

[Thad]

I'll buy anything with Morrison's name on it.  His latest issues of Batman are a refreshing return to form after that goddamn crossover, though I'll save my praise on those for the Batman thread.

This was a great damn week and I still have a hell of a lot of good stuff I haven't gotten through yet, including Walking Dead, Astro City, DMZ, Booster, and Millar and Hitch's debut on Fantastic Four.

The FF book I HAVE read this week is The Lost Adventure.  It's pretty cool -- an unpublished Kirby story that was partially recycled in #108.  It feels a little disjointed, particularly because most of Stan's dialogue is recycled from #108 and does not actually FIT Kirby's original version of the story.  (#108 is included for comparison, as are Jack's original pencils.)

For example, [spoiler]in #108, the Nega Man is some sort of evil double of Janus, whereas in this version he's actually his twin brother.  Yet they keep the dialogue which implies he's not his brother but some kind of freakish experiment.[/spoiler]

It's a little pricey at $5, but for cryin' out loud, it's the last Jack Kirby Fantastic Four you're ever going to see.

[Thad]

Fantastic Four #554: love it love it love it.

Fantastic Four is a tightrope -- so much tradition, and yet the thing that made it so great was its creativity and originality.

Millar and Hitch seem to have a handle on the balance.  Millar's dialogue evokes Stan Lee -- it's corny but it's fun.  And of course it's a damn sight more realistic than Lee's ever was.

He's got the characters down -- Ben playing with kids at his old school, Reed excitedly describing the minute details of his Galactus defense plan and boring everyone around him.  There wasn't nearly enough Johnny but he was spot-on for the few pages there, off on a new adventure as the ultimate celebrity superhero.  But the best was the part teased in the previews a few months back, Sue starting a new charity with the Wasp and She-Hulk for victims of superhuman violence.  (EDIT: No reference as yet to the fact that Jan herself has been a victim of domestic violence.  Given that this is the team from The Ultimates, I would expect that to come up at some point.)  I particularly liked Hitch's design on She-Hulk; she's so much BIGGER than Sue or Jan but it doesn't affect her pose at all.

Hitch evokes Kirby not so much in his specific style but in his sphere of influence.  His runs on Authority and Ultimates basically defined the modern "widescreen" approach to comics, and there are some really nice two-page spreads here.

All in all, a great start, and I have high hopes for this run.  They've struck the right balance between the old and the new, the action and the family, the cosmic and the everyday, and I want more.

[Cannon]

Rob Schrab (who is better than you) is finishing Scud: The Disposable Assassin. Now I'm not familiar with the main run, but after things are wrapped up in issue twenty four, Image will be posting an omnibus edition of all two dozen installments. Basically, it's very kinetic, cartoonish, and expressive stuff that brings Jhonen Vasquez to mind, except that it endures and can deal with its own absurdity.

...No, I totally don't sound like a shill at this point.

[Thad]

Busiek, Nicieza, and Bagley to reunite for Trinity, the NEW weekly.

God dammit.  I got 26 issues into Countdown despite hating most of it just because I was willing to keep giving it a chance because Dini's name was on it.  And NOW we're talking about the team from Untold Tales of Spider-Man and Thunderbolts.

...On the plus side, I get to stop reading Superman.

"But it's not leading up to, spinning out of something. This is its own event. It does draw on things that have been established in the DC Universe over the years but not anything that has the drums beat for it and said, 'Look here, building up to or counting down to.' It's just the way I use history and continuity threads to explore the rich possibilities of the DC Universe.["]

Busiek said "Trinity" can be compared to a crossover in a box, and quite frankly, that's its beauty.

"It's absolutely, front and center DC Universe. It's something the ongoing DC fans are probably going to like a lot because it deals with the heart of what they like about DC, but its also something that if you a brand new reader, you won't have any trouble following it.

[...]

"All the way along we were saying, what's going to happen in 'Final Crisis' and how are we going to fit that in. And finally, we said, 'No, we're not going to trying to bread this into everything else. This is its own story and we are going to pedal to the metal and go. And for somebody who only reads 'Trinity,' they are going to get everything they need."

Oh, Kurt, how I love you.

[Büge]

I looked at the fourth issue of One More Day in the store. It was really sort of dull, actually. There was just nothing terribly spectacular about it. There was no Liefeldian contempt, but there wasn't anything Morrisonically challenging, either. It was just another big Marvel™ reset button. Except with more laudatory quotes on the back page to justify Quesada's decisionpraise Straczynski's writing.

Edited because photobucket hates gigantic images

[Cannon]

...On the plus side, I get to stop reading Superman.

Erm. You're not dropping All-Star, though, I take it. Certainly not after last issue.

[Thad]

May I direct you to

I'll buy anything with Morrison's name on it.

EDIT/AFTERTHOUGHT: Also, it's not like a book that comes out twice a year is putting much strain on my wallet.

[Arc]

Hitch evokes Kirby not so much in his specific style but in his sphere of influence.  His runs on Authority and Ultimates basically defined the modern "widescreen" approach to comics, and there are some really nice two-page spreads here.

The reveal at the end was portrait worthy, but his approach of making everyone stare at the reader is still grating. Very saturated coloring compared to Authority/Ultimates. Also, Takashi from Akira looked freakin' younger than those school kids.

[Thad]

Wednesday observations:

1. My God this was an expensive week.  New Jeff Smith book (with no price anywhere on it!), Morrison Batman, a Millar/RoJu book titled "Kick-Ass"...

2. I've known for years that the current TMNT series was a money sink that Laird was financing from his vast personal fortune, but for those of you who want a picture of just HOW badly it's selling...I showed up at receiving time today and discovered the store only ordered one copy of this month's issue.  I AM THE ONLY PERSON WHO BUYS IT.

3. I have to read Black Panther first.  Because it says "Black to the Future" on the cover.

[Rosencrantz]

2. I've known for years that the current TMNT series was a money sink that Laird was financing from his vast personal fortune, but for those of you who want a picture of just HOW badly it's selling...I showed up at receiving time today and discovered the store only ordered one copy of this month's issue.  I AM THE ONLY PERSON WHO BUYS IT.

Shit, is the main TMNT series back again? I haven't had a monthly saver since I moved a couple months ago and before that there was only Tales since at least around the time the movie came out. Well, I need to start up a new comic saver now that I discovered a store that's about 15 minutes away as opposed to an hour away.

Also, what's this new Jeff Smith book? If it's good (and I doubt it isn't), I'll be sure to grab that, as well.

[Thad]

Shit, is the main TMNT series back again?

No, Tales, sorry for my lack of clarity.

The main trunk is due back in May and will be digitally distributed through a site called wowio.com -- it currently has the first fourteen issues up.

Also, what's this new Jeff Smith book? If it's good (and I doubt it isn't), I'll be sure to grab that, as well.

It's called Rasl.  Haven't read it yet, just flipped through it at the store.

I have to read Black Panther first.  Because it says "Black to the Future" on the cover.

Black to the Future is lousy.  The dialogue is stilled and overly expository, and the major events are all told in narrated flashbacks.  Priest's version of the Panther's future, while far too violent for my tastes, was much better executed -- it did a better job of showing how the cast developed over the years and had better pacing and conflict.

That said, BttF has some decent enough crowd scenes, even though I'm not crazy about the art.  I don't buy Silver Surfer fighting for the US government, though.

[Thad]

...Expect more multi-posting while I work my way through the stack.

Action #862 is the moment we've all been waiting for, the appearance of the Substitutes.  This series has been a weird mesh of the utopian Silver Age whimsy of the Legion continuity and a dark, dystopian future story; the Subs' appearance shifts it well into the comedy category.  Johns also slyly sneaks in some connections to his Green Lantern colors/emotions cosmology.

I am loving Gray Frank's art on this book.  He's just so DIFFERENT.  Superman's supposed to look a certain way, and it's cool to see such a different style on the book.  Bear in mind that, forty years ago, DC wouldn't let Kirby, Jack the motherfucking King Kirby, draw Superman, because his style was too different from the character sheets.  (Al Plastino redrew the titular characters in Kirby's run on Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen.)

[Zaratustra]

IN THE FUTURE NOBODY SLEEPS MORE THAN THREE HOURS A DAY

[Cannon]

Johns also slyly sneaks in some connections to his Green Lantern colors/emotions cosmology.

You know, I've been meaning to ask you for your opinion on this matter, Thad. Some time back, you said the problem with the Sinestro Corps War is that it "got bigger than itself," I believe (or something to that effect). Now, did you have a problem with just the several spin-offs (Tales of the Sinestro Corps), the concept of the emotional spectrum, the Blackest Night, or all three? Please elaborate.

Possible spoiler (in that speculation from my local comic book store's owner only sometimes has merit, but I think he's on to something here): [spoiler]In one of the last panels in the Blackest Night promo at the end of Sinestro Corps War, one of the graves resembles the tombstone of Thomas and Martha Wayne. Perhaps Batman almost being recruited by the yellow power ring was to hint at this.[/spoiler]

Personally, I just hope Johns can turn the cliche' of the comic book resurrection on its ear via the whole "zombies with power rings" thing. But... Zombies with power rings. Why does that seem like something that can be easy to screw up?

Feel free to pipe in, too, Zara. You can be a bit of an energetic sourpuss about these things, but that doesn't mean that I toss your opinions aside by default.

[Thad]

The Sinestro Corps War could have comfortably been four issues shorter and had zero tie-in books.  It was a solid enough story but it just got dragged out too long.

The Blackest Night was a perfectly good thing to follow up on, though it seemed a little anticlimactic compared to Moore's vision of galactic Armageddon.  The emotional spectrum is mostly setup for future stories, and is literally straight out of an unwritten Sonic the Hedgehog fanfic I had bouncing around in my head around age 14.

[Cannon]

Yeah, I guess Johns and Gibbons sat down for a series of chats, and at one point Gibbons threw up his arms and exclaimed "Sod it. It's yours."

I could stand to see more diversity amongst the rainbow Corps than the splash page in the finale offered, but it's still pretty engaging stuff. While I can perfectly understand why hatred, avarice, and (especially) hope would be inspired by the Green Lanterns somehow, after Sinestro's little club entered the scene they're becoming poseurs. I guess I keep wanting the mythology to be yet more imaginative, what with it being space opera and all. Still, this is a minor gripe and I'm looking very much forward to Blackest Night. The drama with the Alpha Lanterns is pretty meaty, too, so that should tide me over.

[Thad]

I think I'm liking the JSA Kingdom Come prequel, but the "WE HAVE TO STOP KINGDOM COME FROM HAPPENING" thing does not impress me much.

[Thad]

I love stories that combine the mundane with the fantastic.  (See: Gaiman, Neil; Busiek, Kurt.)  JMS's Thor has taken this tack from day 1 by putting Asgard in the middle of rural Oklahoma, and #6 continues the trend wonderfully; I love the scene where the Norse gods attend a town hall meeting.

[Thad]

a Millar/RoJu book titled "Kick-Ass"

Hard to tell if this one lives up to its name just yet, but I'd at least say it's solid.  Both creators are up to form; Millar's dialogue is as realistic as you'll find, and JRJr draws real purty.

It's a simple premise -- high school kid decides he's going to be a superhero.  No superpowers, no tragic origin story; this is set in the "real" world (though the narration comes from several years in the future where this trend has caught on).  Average high school kid puts on an outlandish costume, goes out to fight crime, and gets his ass beaten.

It's not groundbreaking or anything, but it's very good; the tone evokes Chosen in its depiction of a regular guy who goes on to be something extraordinary, and of course in its dead-on depiction of how high school kids talk.  The narrative structure makes me think of Priest's Quantum and Woody in how it jumps around between origin story and aftermath.

This is definitely one to watch.  Pick it up.