Batman and Robin #1 – This one just
jumps right into it. In the first three pages, which I think are going to end
up acting as a prologue for the story, we meet the villain. Honestly, I kinda
like when that happens. Not a big fan of vague, mysterious threats. Anyway…this
book is a good one to highlight one of the other things DC’s New 52 is doing.
It’s not undoing the entire history of the past 25 or so years since Crisis on Infinite Earths, but it will
show you those events through a different prism, twisting them. The titular
Robin isn’t one of the ones I’m familiar with, but Damian Wayne, Bruce’s son,
apparently, by Talia al Ghul. Yeeeeaaahhhh…not sure what to make of that
origin, but this kid is arrogant, impulsive, brash and obnoxious…so, pretty
much a teenager. We get to find out a lot about Batman’s psychology in this
issue, and what drives him, as well as how that’s changed with his son started
helping him in his work. It’s a nice bit, honestly, and lets you find out
Batman’s origin in a new way. You also get a not so quiet scene, with Bruce and
Damian working together, which I think highlights quite nicely their different
methods. The arc of the first story is picked up in the last pages, and it
looks like it’s going to end up being a good one, as someone is out to destroy
Batman Inc, and Bruce Wayne personally. Having always been a Batman fan, I think Peter Tomasi’s
characterization is a good one, and Patrick Gleason’s pencils work well in the
darkness that is Gotham.
Batwoman #1 – Well, this was a quick
comic. With seven two-page spreads over the course of the issue, the plot moves
along rapidly, and that’s not a bad thing. There’s a very creepy vibe to the
comic, and a lot that seems to be going on here. We don’t get any detailed sort of
origin story for Kate Kane, aka, Batwoman, only allusions to her sister being a
villain, and her dad being military. We get a lot of focus on the arc of the
first story, which seems to be a supernatural missing kids story. I like the
story idea as well as the writing for this issue, by JH Williams and W. Haden Blackman, and can’t wait to see where it
goes. They even have quite a nice last line to really hook you in. The art, I have to say, is 99%
GORGEOUS! The only thing I have an issue with is how grey and chalky Kate Kane
looks out of costume. It throws me every time I see her. I think I’ll get used
to it, though. I hope I do, because this could quickly become one of my
favorites, not just as a comic, but as a reading experience.
Deathstroke #1 – Again, a pretty good
first issue. You get to find out Deathstroke’s origins pretty quickly, through
the eyes of the, quite literal, young guns he’s forced to team up with. Well
paced, it has a lot of action. I know I risk sounding repetitive, but this
issue sets up the arc nicely, while giving you just enough background info to
learn what you need. Here’s the problem I have: I don’t like Deathstroke’s new costume.
It screams 90s excess to me. It seems to be feeding into his, as well as his clients’, insecurities
about him being too old to handle his job anymore. The art itself, though, is quite nice, lots of detail, good lines. (Yeah, just pretend you know what it means. That’s what I’m doing!) Hopefully, the story, which
I’m guessing will be called Back to
Basics, after this issue, when it’s collected, will see the re-emergence of
his classic costume.
Demon Knights #1 – An unexpected
pleasure this week, Demon Knights really got me going in unexpected ways. I’m a
huge fan of sword and sorcery epics, and this one’s shaping up quite nicely.
Beginning with the Fall of Camelot (Yes, it deserves capitalization, heathen!) ,
we quickly meet the Seven Against the Dark of the credits page. And, honestly,
if you need to be told which of the many, many characters we meet they are,
much less WHERE they meet, you’ve never heard of D&D. Quick, witty,
charming in a kind of obvious way, I am once again reminded that sometimes we
need to force ourselves to try something new.
Frankenstein, Agent of S.H.A.D.E #1 – Took
me two tries to read this one. I wasn’t a big fan of our introduction to
Frank’s base of operations and had to force myself to read it again. Once I
did, though, I realized how inventive of an exposition it was. I also got a few
inklings of foreshadowing, mainly one set of creatures Frank’s going to have to
take down, and another character who, in all likelihood, ends up being the big
bad of the arc. Anyone with any Whedon under their belt will likely see the
same candidates. It'll be interesting to see if I'm just shooting in the dark, or if I get it right. Once I finally got into it, I found the story to be quite a
nice take on the conventional story of the rogue/rough/lone wolf veteran being told to
lead a batch of green recruits. Of course, in this instance, they’re all
monsters. Nothing wrong with that, at all! The only thing that dragged this
book down, for me, was the art. It was a little sketchier than I prefer for my
comics. The script, though, once I got into was quite nice. If you’re into
monster movies at all, you’ll probably dig this.
Green Lantern #1 – Here it is, the one
I have been most excited about since I found out it was going to be a part of
this whole New 52 experiment of DC’s, Green Lantern! I’m a huge GL fan…bordering on fanboi…in fact, likely the only thing
stopping that is that I don’t have enough money to buy all of the GL stuff.
Well, that and my family. And, ya know, I’m not big on arguing about minor
issues of plot detail and Kyle vs Hal vs Guy vs John. (For the record: Hal, all
the way, and anybody who says otherwise is wrong. I mean, unless they say G'nort. I guess that could be allowed.) Again, though, there’s a lot of history here that, since I haven’t
been reading for a while, I’m just not privy to. In fact, I only have the
broadest of sketches of the continuity that’s taken place since Rebirth. But, like
with most of these titles, that doesn’t appear to be an issue yet. This story
seems to be focusing on Sinestro, and how he wants to leave the GL Corps and
once again lead the Sinestro Corps. There are two quite interesting bits in
this one: The first is that we see one Guardian, Ganthet, questioning and
criticizing the other Guardians’ decision to allow Sinestro back into the
Corps. Nothing unusual in and of itself…how those other Guardians deal with
that, though is…startling, to say the least. The other thing is that it depicts
Hal as a hero to his core...unfortunately his judgment isn’t the best. Geoff
Johns (Because who else is going to write GL?) seems to have turned Hal into
some sort of post-modern, grown up Pete Parker: Evicted from his apartment, no car (He
always had the ring!), arrested for crashing into a movie shoot (He thought a
woman was in trouble…and it’s not his fault that he couldn’t see the camera
crew!), no job and pissing off Carol. (That's, uh...nothing new, though.) I’d likely keep this one in my pull box,
even if I didn’t like this issue, but, as I mentioned last time, I trust Geoff
Johns pretty implicitly, so I’m willing to see where this goes. As for Doug
Mahnke’s art, it’s perfect. I can’t really say anything against it…aside from
the fact that, side by side, I’d be hard pressed to tell his apart from Rags
Morales’s…and that’s a good thing.
Grifter #1 – I never read any of the
Wildstorm comics growing up, but I was somewhat familiar with the characters,
at least to be able to pick them out of a line-up. Of all of them, Grifter was one of
them for me. Again, no particular feeling for the character, but I dug this
issue. A con man caught up in events larger than he ever could have imagined,
Nathan Edmondson’s script really makes you feel bad for the guy: His partner
think he betrayed her, his brother is sicced on him because the US government
thinks he’s a terrorist, and to top it all off, aliens want his body!
Well-paced, tightly scripted, it was a good first act of a movie. The art
varied for me, though, mainly between really damn good and “Well, it’s all right,
I guess.” Pick it up if you’re a fan of con men action films.
Legion Lost #1 – Yay for time travel!
Well, kinda. I’m more than a little lost by some of the references here,
especially to Flashpoint. (look, I'm sorry I was too broke to buy comics.) I’m sure that’s something I need to catch up on, and I’m
sure I will, but for now, I’m guessing it’s going to be one of those things
that, if ya know it, ya know it, if ya don’t, well, try to keep up. Ya know what this felt like to me? An issue
of The Exiles, from the 20-30s of their run. The characters and relationships
are established, people care about who they are, their mission is well known.
Too bad that this was issue number one. Aside from that, there are some
good things going on here. You get a glimpse into a greater conflict, and then
you get the story, a group of time travelers are stuck in the present (Well,
our present, their past, relatively speaking. Yeesh…there’s a reason that Dr. Dan Streetmentioner's Time
Traveler's Handbook of 1001 Tense Formations is blank after a certain point.) possibly with a villain, and
definitely with no way home yet. I’m a fan of time travel stories, especially
“closed loop” ones, so I’ll keep reading this.
Recommedation
– Trade Paperback, if only because time travel stories typically read
better that way.
Mister Terrific #1 – Not sure that I’m
digging this one as much as the others, yet I can’t quite tell you why. The
plot is one that I haven’t seen often in a science hero context, mainly a
fantastical one. Essentially, something is turning average people into super-smart
beings who decide to eliminate threats and wastes to society…so what happens
when the world’s third-smartest man is infected? But there’s just something
kind of off-putting about this comic. Maybe it’s the way we’re force-fed his
origin all at once, which I’m not a fan of, although at least this way was
better than most. Mainly, I think it was the art. I’ll likely drop this one
once it’s all out, honestly, unless something really cool happens by the end of
this arc.
Recommendation:
Trade Paperback
Red Lanterns #1 – There are few things
scarier than the image of an angry kitty, blood streaming from its mouth. When
it’s the second and third pages of the comic you’re trying to read, it sets a
definite tone for the story! What I like about this is that, since I didn’t get
to see the rise of the different color rings, you get a glimpse into how they
came to be. (Handling two origins at once, the team's and Atrocitus's. No mean feat, I assure you!) Beings of capable of pure rage are granted rings not unlike those
of the Green Lanterns, allowing them similar control. There’s a lot going on here,
plot-wise, and it’ll be nice to see how they feed into each other. Atrocitus struggles with the mellowing of his
rage, which leads to a potential rebellion by the other Red Lanterns.
Meanwhile, there are at least two people on Earth who appear to be capable of
great rage. (I'm guessing there's a psych-out with one of them, honestly. We'll see.) Not a bad first issue, all told, and I look forward to seeing
things pan out. I’ve a feeling that the latter story will somehow end up
resolving the former, but I’m not quite sure how.
Resurrection Man #1 – Here’s a nicely
odd concept: A man has the ability to “un-die,” (They better pay royalties to
Stephen Pastis!) and each time he does, he gets new powers. Again, a primo,
grade A first issue. You get a good look at the characters, conflicts and chaos
that is his life, and a nice set-up to what the story is. One of the things I
liked about it is how well the art fed into the writing, and vice versa. The
best example, and there are two of them, from this book are when he un-dies.
Both times, he’s very obviously struggling, both with the sensation of being
alive again, and with figuring out his new powers and mission. I look forward
to issue two. However, I have a fear for this comic, and I hope that it doesn’t
happen: I hope that, whatever they do, they use his resurrection ability as a
plot device, not the entirety of the plot. That is to say, I don’t want this to
be entirely about the new and inventive ways they can kill him, and the awkward
situations in which he can find himself alive again. I don’t think that will
happen, though, while Dan Abnett is on the book.
Suicide Squad #1 – I’ve always liked
the concept of the Suicide Squad. It’s a team of villains given, as the name
would imply, suicide missions by the government. That said, there wasn’t much
here for me to really connect to. I’m not familiar with most of the characters,
aside from recognizing the names. I do know Deadshot, who’s pretty much a
staple of this team, and Harlequin, who was…pretty damn creepy here. Aside from
that, I don’t have too much to say about the plot. You find out who the
characters are, but I don’t really have any particular feeling about any of
them, aside from the aforementioned Harley. The art, by Frederico Dallochio,
Ransom Getty & Scott Hanna, is nice to look at, if kinda…gory, which I
suppose works. This ones’s likely going to be dropped after the arc, unless
something REALLY gets me going about it.
Superboy #1 – I have always liked
Superboy, especially the clone Superboy, first introduced in the 90s Reign of
the Supermen storyline. This take on him seems to make more sense than that
one, and I am grateful for it. Here, ‘Boy is struggling with his identity, on
several levels. Basically, he’s learning who he is from the ground up. We also
see the scientists of N.O.W.H.E.R.E. (What IS it with dc, and their acronyms,
lately? NOWHERE, OMAC, STARLabs, CADMUS…now, I like them as much as the next
guy, but, c’mon, can we have a line somewhere? No more than so many acronymic
agencies?) Anyway. It’s been an open secret for some time now that ‘Boy’s
donors are Superman and Lex Luthor. I can’t wait to find out how they got the
dna for this experiemtn, honestly. The other thing I like is watching the
scientists try to parse ‘Boy’s subconscious, figuring out which aspects of his
personality, such as it is, come from the human donor, and which from the
alien. I’s a fun story, with at least one of NOWHERE’s men feeding info to Lois
Lane. It’s going to be nice to see all of these elements come together. I’m
pretty excited about this one.
BONUS REVIEW – Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 9 #1 – I should point out, I am a
hardcore Whedonite, but, again, decidedly not
a fanboi who thinks he can do no wrong. I thought, for instance, there were
some mis-steps in the latter issues of BtVS, S8, plot wise, but knowing the
restrictions they placed themselves under, storywise, I can see why they did
what they did. That said, this feeds right into that ending, in an intriguing
way. The first arc is called Freefall,
and that perfectly describes every single aspect of Buffy’s life. She moves in
with some, for lack of a better word, Muggles, and has a house warming party
that she doesn’t remember much of. Her slaying duties are hampered by the
fallout of the end of season 8 (I won’t spoil it for now, but they were
suitably monumental.), and a demon is being sent after her. (Of course, why
not?) In all honesty, this issue felt like the pre-credits and first act of a
good Buffy episode. Like I said, I trust Whedon’s storytelling, so I can’t wait
to see where this goes.
In other news, once I'm on track, I'm going to alternate posts between my reviews and posts about my life, a nerdy dad trying to introduce his girls (Yes, even my wife!) into the culture, while stalking that incresingly elusive animal: A job!
See ya next time!
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