5/30/12

SUPERMAN FAMILY ADVENTURES #1—Baltazar & Franco return with nothing more or less than their TINY TITANSesque take on the Superman mythos, which without doubt makes the world a better place. The plot of this debut issue is fairly standard boilerplate, Superman and family against a bunch of giant Luthor-controlled robots, but the fun is in the execution. And Super-pets. Now there is a mouse! Looking forward to the new continuity these boys are already hard at work building.

BEST OF WEEK: FF #20—As the weeks roll by, it’s getting increasingly more and more difficult not to degenerate into incoherent adulation of the beast this Hickman FF run has become. It’s really one of my favorite long runs of all time and never fails, two or three times a month, to deliver entertaining shocking story beats that payoff over the long haul and consistently reward the folks who have been around since the beginning. This one’s got most of the main team training Frank on the far side of the galaxy and leaving Johnny to substitute-teach with the Future Foundation kids. Which is of course a disaster right off the bat. Serious hijinx that are perfectly in-character building to a hilarious last page that makes all kinds of sense. I really pity the poor slob who’s going to get stuck with replacing Hickman, one day in the far far future, hopefully.

AMERICA’S GOT POWERS #2—This series is shaping up to be quite the strong outing. The art team, in particular, blows it up with every single page. The two inkers blend their styles to great success. Ross is doing strong character work, here. Which is just gravy, because Bryan Hitch’s pages have never looked better. 24 pages, no ads, this one is well worth picking up in singles. Full marks, all around.

AMERICAN VAMPIRE #27—Wow, it turns out this two-parter was really just an extended chance to meet Hobbes, who’s turning out to be quite the forceful presence in the mythos. Real on the hook here to see what happens next, this series is managing to keep burning quite nicely as it sets into its third year.

BATMAN ANNUAL #1—Snyder and his buddy who helped out on that excellent GATES OF GOTHAM mini show up with Jason Fabok and drop a pretty convincing ultimate origin for Mr. Freeze, combining the beloved Paul Dini animated version with your more traditional Gotham sociopath. Freeze is the protagonist of this, Batman doesn’t appear until the final eight pages (and it’s a pretty grand entrance when he finally shows up, kudos to Fabok’s staging for blowing the doors wide open at the perfect moment). You can hold this one up next to the eleventh and fourteenth villain-centric annuals from the original run, truly one for the ages.