11/06/13

MARVEL KNIGHTS: SPIDER-MAN #2 — More greatness. Really cool usage of the Spider-sense as a hypothetical strategy barometer, clever as hell application from Kindt. I’m also a fan of the eight-panel villain-specific Chris Ware-style cartoons bridging the double-page spreads, very nice graphic design from Rudy. I really dug this entire fight scene, my only quibble with the entire thing was that having Peter figure out next issue’s bad guy in the last panel wasn’t really set up in any sort of believable way at all. He might as well have said turned to the reader and said, “NEXT ISSUE: KINGPIN,” all Deadpool-style. Still, tons of fun to be had, here.

EAST OF WEST #07 — Huh. This series just keeps burrowing all around in new directions. This issue is mainly an extended flashback chronicling the backstory of that Keeper of the Message fellow who showed up last issue and now has some demon from Hell-type thing bonded to his right arm. Gorgeous art, as ever, but for this entire issue to be a character study of this random dude we only just met, Hickman doesn’t provide any sort of hook to make us care about this guy one or another. This might read more devastating after another year’s worth of issues but for now seems like an unnecessary and overlong digression while there are other people we care much more about riding around. At least Dragotta keeps absolutely murdering the art.

CATALYST COMIX #5 — I’m going to miss “Amazing Grace” as the headline feature, she’s definitely my favorite of the batch. I guess this means she’ll wind up being the last page of #9, given the rotation, so that’s all right. This issue, things heat up from platonic to pugilistic with artist Paul Maybury dropping some serious foreshortened greatness there on the penultimate page. Really looking forward to her last main feature next issue. As for the other two, I continue not really connecting so much with “Agents of Change,” it’s not bad but also not really sinking its teeth into me narratively here at the halfway point of the series. “Frank Wells” continues to be good fun, this time riffing on Lennon’s “bed-in.” I dug the “TWO PARTS HYDROGEN! ONE PART OXYGEN!” Kirbyriffic hyperbole.

FATALE #18 — Every band that ever was has always wanted to do this to their drummer. Of course we all know what’s going to happen when Jane starts dancing. And I love the inevitability of 911, you might dodge it once, but that number’s going to be there waiting for you on the last panel, no matter what you do. As usual, I very much enjoyed the backmatter, was actively wondering how much Brubaker dug the end of BREAKING BAD and a Nevins essay on the afterlife of H.P. Lovecraft can never be a bad thing.

MORNING GLORIES #34 — Um, “Par Avion,” anyone? This flashback opening is such a dead-on riffage of L O S T 3.12 that I wish Brother Eisma would have just gone ahead and given us a first panel of a closed eye and then the same shot with it open. And then Jade whispers, “Chah-lie?” One of these days. “How does ANY of it make sense?” is the line of meta-dialogue to beat this week, no problem. And I do have to say that it’s unfortunate that Ike’s coining of the term “sympathy oral” just flies right by unremarked. Lots of memorable dialogue in this one as Jade all but comes out and explicitly states that the church ending of L O S T was total bullshit. Any other book, I’d just be thinking that I was reading too much into it, reaching, but not here. Very interesting last page with the white flash. This book is going to make a hell of a good binge-read one of these days.

TRILLIUM #4 — Which, I guess we can say the exact same thing about this one on both of those counts. Yet another gripping installment in arguably the best mini-series of the year. Events escalate to the point that it doesn’t seem as though there’s going to be any story left to tell! Indeed, when everything is engulfed by white on the last page and then the words THE END appear, it sent me scurrying for my computer to make sure that this was, in fact, an eight-issue series. That was kind of a dick move! I mean, in what way was this the end? This is the fourth issue of eight, right? A small quibble, though, I enjoyed the hell out of this, as ever. Lemire/Villarrubia’s art is a treat to look at while remaining perfectly in service of the story, moving things along at a breakneck pace. This is going to make one hell of a trade, but I am certainly enjoying having it doled out one chapter at a time.

SUPERMAN UNCHAINED #4 — Yes, yes, we get it. Superman is going to die. SOON. Snyder belabors that point to almost absurd effect, stating it no less than four times in the opening ten pages of the issue. “Hey, Jim, what’s for dinner?” “Superman is going to die. Soon.” I started to get bummed when this subject slacked off but then they brought it back a couple more times for the last couple of pages. I’m still really not crazy about retconning a previous Superman into 1938, but we’ll see what the explanation winds up being. The art on this issue is pretty good, I bet that Jim Lee guy can find work wherever he wants it.

DETECTIVE COMICS #25 — After “This is what you get,” on the bottom of the first page, I couldn’t get “Karma Police” out of my head for most of the issue. So, that was weird. This right here is nothing more or less than a solid Lt. Jim Gordon solo issue set during the so-called “Zero Year” when Bruce was still getting it together as a crimefighter. It offers a cool little origin of the Bat-Signal indirectly tracing back to a teenage Barbara Gordon and the art is as fantastic as ever.

BEST OF WEEK: BATMAN: BLACK AND WHITE #3 — This is the first script I’ve seen from Lee Bermejo, haven’t made it over to NOEL yet. Pretty solid. The Spartan metaphor is a bit of a stretch but all eight of those pages are immaculately rendered, good Lord. And then Damion Scott comes in and blows it up, dude has got an insane high-energy hyperkinetic style that really suits this project, basically racing through as much of the rogues gallery as fast as he can. Why not do it in eight pages instead of twelve issues? Yes, that is a dig on HUSH. Then, always a pleasure to see Marv Wolfman back in Gotham, this time chronicling a very sharp little mystery, probably the tightest scripting we’ve seen from this volume so far with DMZ’s Riccardo Burchielli on art. And but oh man, have never seen Rian Hughes interior pages before. That’s why God bless Mark Chiarello! Hughes channels that old ooold time Silver-Age madness, bringing back Tal_Dar of the Inteplanetary Space Police (last seen 52 years ago, natch). That Kirby cross-section of the Bat-Cave is worth the $4.99 all by itself, never even mind the brilliant semiotic literary scripting. Hughes is a beast. This one is easily my favorite story of the whole volume thus far, just too damn clever for its own good. And then who can resist Paul Dini taking us out with a tale of Harley & Ivy operating on the side of the angels for a very few pages while concurrently robbing a bank? With Stéphane Roux providing sumptuous interiors. This is another terrific installment of this wonderful anthology. We expect nothing less at this point.