9/9/10

NEW AVENGERS #4 – Most folks I talk to seem to be digging this one slightly more than what Bendis/JRjr and crew have going on in the sister title. I’m not quite there, maybe it’s that I’m more into time travel or less so into magic (or, let’s be honest here, Brother Voodoo), but it doesn’t really matter which one provides more entertainment, because they’re both just a hell of a ride. This month, Luke Cage manages a “Sweet Christmas.” Has that actually been said since Bendis rehabilitated him from puffy-shirted 70s obscurity via the pretty shaky premise of sodomizing his wife-to-be? I feel like it’s just been teased—the line, not the sodomy, oh no, that business went down—but can’t recall it actually having been uttered. Immonen/Martin knock the dimensional rift business out of the park. Just this one right here, much less on top of the other ones, they feel like more of an event than any of Marvel’s efforts since, oh, the Age of Apocalypse, like even though they’re going to come out month after month until the end of time, something that matters is really happening and that this time Bendis won’t fumble the ball at the goalline. Really digging it.

THE INVINCIBLE IRON MAN #30 – Quite the cover. Well-written scene in the car. Just that one panel alone, when he asks, “Do I look like a man afraid of becoming obsolete to you?” the look on his face juxtaposed against the bow tie, brilliant. Larocca nails it. And the “wait, what is Steve calling S.H.I.E.L.D. these days?” is perfect. I’m also a fan of that drone swarm via phone apps idea, just the right sort of crackling idea that this book should have dribbling out from between its pages. Looks like we might be in the middle of another year-long arc. Oh, Tony, such plans Fraction has for you!

AMERICAN VAMPIRE #6 – I really dug the first double-arc, but was dubious about hanging out for 22 pages at $4, but I’ve got to give Snyder credit for setting up a pretty solid hook that will bring me back at least next month. All new protagonists, only one page of our lead, and it all looks gorgeous, thanks to Albuquerque. We’ll miss Sai King, but not that much, it seems.

JUSTICE LEAGUE: GENERATION LOST #9 – Mm, it looks like Giffen has moved on, and I’m thinking I might as well. This isn’t bad, per se, it’s just not terribly compelling, and, you know, it’s got to be almost twice as good as average to justify the biweekly pace. A fan of the characters, but think I’ll just track down #37 of the old Giffen/Dematteis run and finish that one up, at long last. (IN OTHER NEWS: HOLY SHIT WAS THAT A NEW FACE ON THE EVENT ADS?!? LIKE, A TOTALLY DIFFERENT CHARACTER? THEY’VE BEEN HOLDING HER BACK? ALL THIS TIME? GETTING READY FOR THE LAST-MINUTE BLITZKRIEG? MIND-BLOWING! FOR REALS!)

GREEN LANTERN #57 – Man, everyone’s hitting Vegas, we’ve got Carol and company in this issue, X-Factor next month, and IDW/Brian Lynch looking to bleed their licensing dry by sending Spike there for 8 glorious issues at $3.99/pop. Pretty funny beat there, re: advisability of Larfleeze Takes Las Vegas. Maybe I’m just a sucker for a big kiss splash page, but that one shore was purty. I wonder how far ahead Johns has plotted this thing, he really seems to only be picking up speed six years and two monster crossovers in.

ADVENTURE COMICS #518 – Ha, Superboy bailing on PG was hilarious. Kevin Sharpe’s pencils seem to be tightening up a bit now that he’s got a couple issues under his belt. Though I have to say, Scott Clark’s making a hell of a campaign for the job with that cover. Can’t believe the market can sustain two monthly Legion books, actually come to think of it, don’t even know how well these are selling, but Levitz is sure writing the hell out of them. Am also getting into Lemire’s ATOM back-up as it picks up speed. Need to pick up that ESSEX COUNTY trilogy of his.

BATMAN & ROBIN #14 – Is this really the next-to-last Morrison issue? The time, it has roared on by. Wonderful bits in here, Pyg is as gloriously completely fucking insane as ever (or, as the first three issues), and Joker is note-perfect. That page after Damian’s scratched and the poison kicks in, Morrison drops a bit of his signature meta- in, the bit about an old pro not seeing the potential in Damian is actually Morrison himself, the original plan was to kill the little guy at the end of his first arc. Can you imagine? We never would have gotten this wonderful series. But yeah, that page, the bit about the crowbar and “You might be the funniest one yet,” yup, that’s Joker. Is it meant to be unclear how Dick got from preventing the Batmobile self-destructing to the Batcave? That was a bit more jarring than even usual. Irving’s stark tones might be a hard sell to someone who wants their spandex drawn with a little bit more cross-hatching, but I think it’s a perfect fit for this final arc.

BEST OF WEEK: DAYTRIPPER #10 – What a haunting, affecting, beautiful piece of work. I’ve loved everything I’ve seen and read from Ba and Moon, but you can tell how important this project was to them, can feel them pouring their hearts and souls into the words and panels. And Dave Stewart, my God. It’s too bad that he and Laura Martin probably won’t ever make a baby. I sat down Tuesday night and reread the first nine issues in a single sitting and I can’t recommend that highly enough. These issues felt so done-in-one, I completely missed the little Easter eggs that paid off down the line, things like Bras’s wife from #4 showing up at the end of #3, the novel on his father’s desk in #4 . . . several cool little things like that. Before #1 first came out, I strongly considered waiting for the trade, but in the end, couldn’t resist picking up the singles. Very glad I did, as there was quite a bit here to digest in the month-by-month, but there’s no question that it’s going to read better in trade, if only because there won’t be ads opposite the FINAL FOUR PAGES OF THE SERIES, just an unforgivable break in narrative flow, for my money, to be expected in, say, AVENGERS, but I expect better from a Vertigo mini of this artistic caliber.

But I’m really just talking about the series. How’s the issue? Well, it’s a little bit different. After last month’s perfectly satisfactory romp (and by satisfactory, I think I already said last month that if it had been the final issue, I would’ve been delighted), I really had no idea what to expect, but I guess this was the only place left that they could take it. There’s a tendency, more so amongst the critical fanboy set, probably, to overanalyze everything and try to nail down exactly what happened, and this series is surely a teethgrinder for those fellas, because there are no clearly defined answers. I mean, really. What just happened? Did we just check out a series of parallel worlds? Or certain days in the life of an obituary writer that wandered off into the hypothetical in the last couple of pages every month? What happened after this final last page? How much of what we read was real? (and you in the back, laughing that none of it was real, I know where you live and I won’t stand for it). In the end, I believe that that last letter gives us the only answer that matters: Let Go. It doesn’t really matter how the events that we read fit into a cohesive linear narrative framework as much as it matters what lessons Bras de Oliva Domingos takes from them, how they shape his world-view and influence the man that he becomes. And what he, in turn, passes down the line.

This series was about death, but it was also about everything else that matters, the things that give the end such weight and importance: love and family and the pursuit of happiness and the maximization of potential and hopes and dreams and the fleeting mirage of these lives we lead that can cut off at any instant for any reason, and the abiding importance of at last letting all of these things go, like the tide rolling back out to sea.