9/17/14

BEST OF WEEK: THE MULTIVERSITY—SOCIETY OF SUPER-HEROES: CONQUERORS FROM THE COUNTER-WORLD! — More of nothing but The Serious Business, right here. After the initial issue setting up the premise, this is the first regular one-shot of Morrison’s higher-than-Cheech&Chong-concept series, and it’s a strong opening. The first Earth that serves as the setting for these regular one-shots is Earth-20, a retro-pulp science adventure sort of place where Doc Fate has already saved the world once and, twin pistols in hand, has assembled a Society of Super-Heroes to deal with the latest threat. The roster is full of good fun, sporting this universe’s permutations of Lady Blackhawk (captain of an all-female squad), Abin Sur, The Atom, and Immortal Man, an alternate Vandal Savage who also provides us with noir-inflected narration throughout. We’re treated to a seven-page opening scene that does a pitch-perfect job beat for beat of introducing our players and bouncing them off one another, leading up to Doc Fate’s call to arms on the splash page. That latest threat turns out to be an actual Vandal Savage from a parallel Earth who proves to be the eponymous “conqueror from the counter-world!” There are only two pages to set this up and suddenly it’s five years later and he’s already won and our guys are down to their last stand. That’s right, five years later. Given that all this was written three or four years ago (or more?), that’s a pretty neat trick, releasing this right in the middle of the month that all the regular DC books skip forward five years, as well. And there are zombies, natch. More fighting ensues, including Lady Shiva vs the Blackhawk squad. There’s a strong piece of writing where Doc Fate does a monologue on what he’s afraid of. And then, on the cusp of hope, everything heads off in a very ominous direction. And that’s all! This is not unlike the first issue, everything escalates and escalates and then it just ends. I’m not sure if it’s going to pick back up in the final issue or if this is all we get. Chris Sprouse is a very good choice on sequentials. His time on TOM STRONG leaves him better qualified than just about anybody I can think of to execute everything that this genre-bending script requires. This is a hell of a good read that, while entertaining, doesn’t appear (at least until subsequent releases prove me wrong) to be as jam-packed hyperdense with crackling ideas and Easter eggs as the previous issue, which almost makes thematic sense, starting off with this relatively more basic genre and then escalating the complexity month by month. I’m still a little stunned that this thing has finally at long last started coming out.

BATMAN AND ROBIN: FUTURES END #1 — Well, I’m the stupid person who for some reason thought that this event would mean that the regular creatives would get to use this concept as a springboard to incorporate into their own stellar runs and not just as stopgap fill-in issues to get ahead. I was really looking forward to seeing what Tomasi/Gleason/Gray were going to do for five years later. However, hilariously, while I have been impatiently waiting almost half a year for BATMAN ETERNAL to jump into the future as was implied by BATMAN #28, this is for all intents and purposes another issue of ETERNAL. I mean, I believe this is the exact creative team from last week, even, Fawkes/Nguyen/Fridolfs, no? Which is pretty good news to temper the disappointment. I really dug the new Robin and found the entire issue very gripping. Hey, Batman almost died, man! Terrific work from all parties.

WONDER WOMAN: FUTURES END #1 — On the other hand. The truest thing that I can say about this is “fucking offensive hackwork from prolific industry scab Charles Soule.” Would not have bought it if I knew the creator credits but still gave it a chance once I was home and it was in-hand. The gap in quality between this and the regular Azzarello/Chiang situation is jawdropping. The pages are just barely worth thumbing through to check out the ongoing evolution of Rags Morales’s style, but I cannot see how anyone in Editorial thought that this would be an acceptable effort to monthly readers of this series. They should have brought that Tom King who just murdered it on Grayson. That’s how you hire a scripter for a fill-in.

BATMAN ETERNAL #24 — It’s kind of stunning what a piece of shit Stephanie Brown’s dad is. No tolerance for a fella like that.

FUTURES END #20 — AHahahahha! Did Lois Lane just tell Tim Drake that she couldn’t put up with a boyfriend who was living a lie, leading a double life? That’s wonderful. And it looks like those coordinates are a little closer to Hurley’s Numbers than I realized there a couple panels down from that. All of the other plots are grooving along nicely. Though when I woke up today, I wasn’t planning on seeing the top of Bruce Wayne’s head carved open. Not cool, Future Brother Eye!

FABLES #144 — Okay, wow and damn, of course it makes sense that I’m invested in these characters after this damn many issues, but it still really surprised me how sorry I was to see these people go. Willingham and friends’ level of craft is so high, these character deaths really do hit Martin/Whedon levels of cut-your-heart-out sadness. I mean, I never saw it coming in a million years, was just having a ball enjoying the pretty words and pictures. Here, we enter some point-of-no-return territory with our apparent (!) antagonist, and it is suddenly thrown into stark unflinching relief that the final six issues of this title are going to be gutwrenching and utterly merciless. This one was really rough to get through and even worse to just be hanging out with.

THE UNWRITTEN: APOCALYPSE #9 — It is always a pleasure to see Tolkien & Lewis on the first page of anything, but rarely, if ever, more so than in this title. Everything escalates pretty seriously as Carey gives us the secret origin of Wilson Taylor and all that has gone before and, in doing so, spells out exactly what’s been at stake for the entire series, and it’s nothing left than using fiction to set humanity’s potential free from being suppressed by the unwritten cabal. Which is, of course, perfect. This is an immaculately crafted flashback issue that performs that most hallowed feat of sequential fiction, making the reader rabid for What Happens Next in the present-day storyline.

ANNIHILATOR #1 — This is a really interesting piece of work. Very obviously not Morrison’s first rodeo, this is the craft of a master circling back around to themes that he has been addressing throughout his career. The deal here is an examination of how what we create either saves or destroys us. Or maybe both. Ray Spass (prounonced “space,” natch) is a young screenwriter with a couple of big hits under his belt who now finds himself up against the wall and in sore need of sticking the landing on a new major franchise about a haunted house in outer space. Coming up short, he decides to rent a house with a sordid past and promptly starts dumping the details from everything around him into the work, which turns out to be about Max Novak, a creepy anti-hero type who wears an insect mask and sets up shop at a space station with its own sordid past that also happens to exist right outside the event horizon of a supermassive black hole. There are obvious parallels bouncing back and forth between the twin narratives, but this is all nothing more than laying groundwork, getting started before things really start spinning out of control. Frazer Irving, Morrison’s previous collaborator on KLARION, THE WITCH BOY and that really horrifying arc of BATMAN AND ROBIN, is a perfect choice for art on this, delivering atmospheric visuals that conjure up all of the darkness and horror called for in these two situations. This is predictably strong and intriguing material that’s clearly just barely getting started. Very interested to see how far out they’re going to take it because there certainly is a vast event horizon looming there in the distance. (I think this came out the previous week, but I somehow missed it. Slipping!)

THE WICKED + THE DIVINE #5 — All right, Gillen reeled me back in a bit with this one. First of all, that “Read on, with your eyes and your seeing mind,” bit on the front inside cover is just wonderful. McKelvie can cop those TRON designs all year long if he wants to. Wilson really makes those colors pop. I’m still not sure that I’ve seen enough potential so far to keep this thing going for around 45 issues like Gillen says in the letters column (and I do hope that that allows for at least a PHONOGRAM volume 3 in the meantime), but I’m hanging out and seeing what happens this next little bit.

SATELLITE SAM #10 — Now, that is one seriously knowledgeable sales girl at the lingerie counter. And thank you, Fraction, for having Mike tell Dick that they “have this,” not “got this.” That splash of color with the fruit bowl was quite the surprising page turn, great work, there. I guess we can go ahead and call this a mid-season finale, as the boys go on hiatus to stock up for the five-part finale next year. Chaykin has produced some really strong black and white work here, and I’m definitely interested to see where all of the soap operatic hijinx land when they return. 

SUPREME: BLUE ROSE #3 — What a strange, strange book. Tula Lotay continues to produce beautiful work while calling the Allreds to mind in the best of ways. I love the fact that we’re probably not going to see the title character until the very end of the series, if then. Is the fact that we only get two pages per issue of PROFESSOR NIGHT the reason that I want to consume all of the PROFESSOR NIGHT that ever was? Possibly. It’s wonderful that they reveal the details of his alter ego in the character design sketches in the backmatter. These singles are instantly recognizable as beautiful artifacts.

TREES #5 — Man, the pacing on this is a languorous twisting thing that actually calls to mind the eponymous alien invaders. Or their ships? Everything floats along to such an extent that I tend not to remember characters’ names from month to month but remain invested in their various situations. The enormity of Jason Howard’s contribution to this cannot be overstated, the guy is throwing down the work of his career, here. And good on him!

ASTRO CITY #15 — The plot twist was a pretty easy spot for anyone who was remotely trying, but as is par for the course with this book, the pleasure lay in the execution. Nice wordplay at the end with the emboldened “sweet” leading to the honey-harvesting reserve. This title remains nothing but quality.

SAVAGE DRAGON #198 — I will tell you what, Mr. Erik Larsen is good for at the very least a pair of quality double-page splashes every single issue. That second one with fighting all the ant-people while plunging down to the center of the earth, that’s just good comics fun, right there. I continue to enjoy the hell out of this. Much gratitude to Brother Matt Doman for calling my local shop up all the way from Mississippi to have them add it. Even the next issue blurbs can’t be topped!

ALL-NEW X-MEN #032 — This one’s a bit decompressed for my taste, but Mahmud Asrar continues to absolutely blow it up, with Marte Gracia’s colors providing continuity with the original killer art team. That double-page shot of Miles’s life is stunning. And that last shot of Jean, if you just put it in front of my face, I’d swear it was Immonen/von Grawbadger. So, the gang is certainly in the Ultimate Universe.

UNCANNY X-MEN #026 — Man, Bobby is still just really peeved at Scott for killing old Professor Xavier. His perpetual snark is probably my favorite part of this whole deal. It’s a little weird seeing him interact on-panel with Firestar, hearkening back to the whole . . . & His Amazing Friends deal as it does. Kris Anka is a real talent, but I certainly do miss Bachalo on this title and would even be happy to not have it coming out every two weeks if that’s what it took to keep one guy on an unbroken run. Hearken, True Believers, to The Mighty Marvel Age of Greedy Double-Shipping!

UNCANNY AVENGERS #024 — We get Larocca back, so the art takes an upswing, but this issue still has a hard time gathering up enough momentum to be remotely as engaging as the first couple years of this title have conditioned us to expect. I know that Remender is writing the next Big Event, which I can’t believe hasn’t started already, it’s already been a couple of weeks since ORIGINAL SIN finished, so I guess this is going to trap-door into that just real soon and this title is going to become wonderful again? I hope so. Still basically spinning wheels, here.

DAREDEVIL #008 — Well, it isn’t October yet, but Waid started the horror a bit early. I felt really foolish not keying in to those purple tones right off the bat. I almost forgot what a horrifying character Bendis made this guy a few years back. It’s nice to have Waid continually developing Kirsten as a drama-free positive influence in Matt’s life. I totally trust him not to fridge her, that would be just the worst. Her dad trying to induce Matt to write an autobiography is an inspired piece of work. And that ending is chilling! I suppose the real horror will be unleashed next month.

EDGE OF SPIDER-VERSE #002: GWEN STACY, SPIDER-WOMAN — This one is really too much fun. I dearly hope that Marvel greenlights a series of this exact thing by Latour/Rodriguez. The tone of the script is pitch-perfect from the first page on. This feels like exactly what a band rehearsal of The Mary Janes would be like. Great opening, but then there’s that killer double-page splash montage that does so much. First of all, there’s just that shot of her wailing the hell out of her trap set. Rodriguez manages to channel pure Paul Pope. I love the alternate deal about Peter and The Lizard and then of course JJJ ruthlessly orating against Gwen while championing the life of Peter Parker is hilarious. This issue does a fantastic job of giving us a world that already feels fully inhabited and developed, reads very much more like an issue #21 or so than the first time we’ve ever been here. And what a tremendous dynamic with her dad. Man. Marvel would be insane not to let them just run wild with this concept whenever she gets done doing whatever the hell Slott’s got lined up with Everybody.

AVENGERS #035 — It was a dick move of Marvel to spoil that they were doing a time-skip. I mean, really, what person who was not already reading this book was going to hear that fact and think, “Oh wow, eight months later, yeah, what’s this Hickman Avengers book all about, has it been good so far?” That said, Hickman’s first PREVIOUSLY… IN AVENGERS page to feature new narrative captions provides an elegant bit of catch-up, and then it was still a nice jarring effect to turn the page from the roster and still get that all-black EIGHT MONTHS LATER. The round robin of four artists does not, unfortunately, serve the material well. I’m a big fan of Nick Bradshaw, but the way Bobby & Eden are drawn on their first page makes it look like they’re beaming in from Earth-43, or whichever DC universe has all the chibi characters. Or is that Paco Medina’s work, maybe? At any rate, the story packs a wallop. Sam and Izzy are not only living on (I guess?) the Shi’Ar Throneworld, but they had a sweet little baby, as well. Thor appears to not have proven himself worthy of Mjolnir during the break but still be a thirsty sort of fellow. The issue takes a dramatic leap in quality in the final twelve-page scene with Jim Cheung’s art elevating the final string of revelations. Hell of a last page. This is a very exciting new set-up that Hickman has thrown us into, ratcheting up what was already one of the very best Marvel releases for coming up on two years now.