Monday, April 14, 2008

Brief Reviews for 4/9/08 Comics

I read a few other comics this week that I didn't review in full. Here's what I thought (with five-star rankings):

AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #556: I still love Chris Bachalo's art on this story arc. It's certainly enough to get me to pick up the comic. The story has potential with inter-demensional Mayan guys or something like that. We'll see how it all plays out in the conclusion next month. I do like the snow-related humor and the dialogue with the homeless dude isn't too bad. I'd say this is decent enough Spider-Man comics. Really, though, the conclusion will make or break the story. ***1/2

BOOSTER GOLD #8: Kick-Ass had me thinking about DC's lame 1980's Wild Dog character and here he is showing up in this very issue! I like the rag-tag Justice League of this alternate reality, and this was one of the better issues of the series. Unlike previous issues, it wasn't just visiting a past event from DC continuity. This one was all about what happens when guys like Wild Dog are left to defend the planet. A good, but not great, comic. ***

COUNTDOWN TO FINAL CRISIS 3: Nothing undermines this climactic battle between Darkseid and the forces of dull Countdownery than the press for Final Crisis which revealed that the Darkseid shown in this comic is just some kind of projection of a much greater cosmic threat. It's a 52 issue series culminating in a mini-boss battle. It's like getting stuck on Level One of Donkey Kong for 52 straight weeks. *

GREEN ARROW BLACK CANARY #7: Mike Norton does a really good Cliff Chiang impression here. It looks pretty good. I assume the inker helped smooth over some things, but this may be the best Mike Norton work yet (the second best being his art on Gravity a few years back). Wow. This just looks so much better than his stuff on the Atom recently. Still, it's written by Judd Winick. It's not that bad, actually. I kind of liked this issue with the Scooby Doo reveal and all. Not too shabby, boys. ***1/2

GREEN LANTERN CORPS #23: Bad stuff looms. ***

JUSTICE SOCIETY OF AMERICA #14: Geoff Johns must have spent all of his awesomeness on last weeks Action Comics issue, because this thing is no good at all. He does a terrible job juggling the gigantic cast of characters (which makes me cringe actually, because that doesn't bode well for his big Legion project this summer), and if he is this generation's Roy Thomas (which he is), then this is like one of those middle-of-the-run All-Star Squadron issues that had too many characters and not enough characterization or plot. **

SUPERMAN CONFIDENTIAL #14: I expect better from B. Clay Moore. This story felt too safe. It didn't have anything to recommend it other than the nice Phil Hester art, really. It's not a bad comic, it's just completely average. Bring some of your voice to the DC Universe, B. Clay! Don't water it down. **1/2

TITANS #1: I didn't buy this. I thought about it. I haven't hated Winick's recent work (or maybe I'm just getting soft), so I flipped through it in the store. It looked unreadable. Lots of ugly splash pages and little plot. So, let me know if I missed out on a hidden gem here. Somehow, I doubt it.

WOLVERINE #64: I loved this issue. This is definitely Garney's best art work. I've never seen him look so good, and we all know that Jason Aaron is a comic book force with which to be reckoned. Aaron would have been great on that canceled Mystique comic, don't you think? It would have had more of an edge, which is what it needed. Anyway, if you're not reading Aaron's Wolverine, you are a big ugly doofus head. That's a verifiable fact. ****

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I actually had the time to read the past week's comics. And look, I'm actually posting here. Isn't that amazing?

I agree, sir! Jason Aaron and Ron Garney on Wolverine have been fantastic. It's been good, solid, cohesive storytelling focusing on a long-standing and nigh-immortal (for all intents and purposes) character - who, for whatever reason, most writers just tend to add more ho-hum stuff to.

Samurai? Ho-hum. Long lost son in Origins? Ho-hum. I could continue, but need I really do so? And it's a mess that even BKV, for all his awesomeness, has seemed to have fallen into with his Logan mini-series.

Fresh take, good writing, good art, good stuff.