Reviews, News, and Reactions.

Marvelman: The biggest news of the past couple of weeks has probably been Marvel announcing the news that they have secured the rights to Marvelman. This has lots of people excited, hoping to see trade collection treatments of the Alan Moore material, the continuation of Neil Gaiman's storyline. Lots of praise about the "creator" of Marvelman getting compensation and Joe Quesada gushing over his talent and such. Which is funny since Marvelman is a Captain Marvel rip-off. When Fawcett chose to accept the courts decision against them regarding Captain Marvel vs Superman instead of appealing and just close shop on comicbooks, it put the publisher of his reprint stories in the UK in a bind as he was immensely popular. Enough so, that they chose to create a series of characters that were even more a copyright infringement of CM than he was of Superman. To the point, that some stories were nothing more than redrawn Fawcett ones! Yeah, a lot of creative genius there.

Quesada has been coy in talking about Marvelman though in regards to Miracle Man though. Or, maybe, no one has really noticed that in all his talking, he doesn't address really where this puts them in regards to the Alan Moore tales. Because, it seems that the copyrights to the character and stories may be as big a mess as ever. What I see in reading the interviews is that Marvel has bought the trademarks and copyrights to the original character of Marvel Man, not necessarily Moore's revisionist work. That would mean a little more work to iron out those details.

Likewise Quesada has not mentioned any details at what the plans are with the character (compared to announcements by DC in regards to Doc Savage and Dynamite with Green Hornet, the announcements were accompanied with some teaser artwork and hints at how the company envisioned acquisitions). Most fans seem to want and expect some kind of faithfulness to Alan Moore's stories and his take. The irony there is that Alan Moore did not create the character nor was his take at all faithful to the original characters and stories but was one of if not "the" first modern revisionist take on a character. Not merely updating a character but setting out to reveal that the old stories were silly, history got it wrong and replacing it with a dark and cynical version of the character. Why should one iota more respect be given to Moore's stories and version than he himself was willing to give what came before?

The other problem with following Moore's take is that when he did it, there was something original to it (even though he could just as easily created a character of his own) but has become incredibly cliched and dated. New readers reading Watchmen don't see how landmark it was. Even watching the movie, so much of it is firmly entrenched in the time. Some of it was deliberate, but a lot of it was thematic as well. In an industry dominated by the likes of the Authority, the Max and Vertigo lines, a team of Avengers being super-villains in disguise, heroes being ultimate bad guys (Superboy-Prime, Alex Luthor) and heroes getting offed in incredibly graphic ways, Moore's Marvelman is a cliche. I would say that it would be truer to his vision to serve as an indictment of what comics have become by returning the hero to a more standard superhero. Show that while comics are no longer juvenile, they have become more sophomoric and prurient. Instead of actually being adult in themes and ideas, they have become adult in shock value. They are the equivalent of teen-age boys sneaking cigarettes, looks at their dads' Playboys and talking about girls using vulgar language without any real idea what to do with one.

The Fighting American: Dynamite didn't want to be outdone so they released some Alex Ross artwork with the announcement that they had been in the talks with Joe Simon and the Kirby estate over the character of the Fighting American. This apparently was a big surprise to Simon who responded that he had said, "no" in no uncertain terms. Was it just last year that Dynamite had released a similar announcement regarding plans for the Phantom, a character that was and is currently being published by Moonstone? Which makes me wonder about Dynamite's sensibilities when pursuing these things as they seem to get their wires crossed rather easily as to when they are negotiating something and when it has been established as a done deal. Maybe, before they make these announcements they should wait until at least lawyers have actually gotten involved.

Not knowing all the facts, I am willing to give them a benefit of the doubt that they were operating in good faith and not trying to pull something over. Simon is in his 90s after all. It's easily possible he misremembers the gist of the conversation, that he thinks he said "no" in uncertain terms but in reality left it a little more in the air and with the Kirby estate on board, they thought Simon was just a formality that needed a little more working on. At that age, it's possible that the original or followup conversations were through someone that handles his business and financial matters and not Simon himself, and he was unaware that it was being pursued even though he wasn't interested.

Not overly fond of Dynamite's track record, so I am glad. I think a couple of years ago with all of the deaths and bleakness at the big two and the death of Captain America, the time was ripe for Archie or somebody to revive the Shield/Fighting American/Minute Man as a more optimistic superhero in Gruenwald Captain America style stories: full of colorful heroes and villains in non-decompressed storylines. To serve as a counterpoint to Bru's Captain America specifically and the cynicism and bleakness that pervades modern superhero comics in general. I'd like to see the Fighting American in straightforward superhero stories.

In that regards, not too thrilled with Dynamite getting Captain Victory or Silver Star either unless it allows Busiek to finish his aborted story lines. Have we seen Ross or Dynamite really do something that has that feel of grandeur that Kirby effortlessly lent everything he did? Nowadays, Kirby seems almost an embarrassment to the companies, his work getting retconned and heavily redesigned and remodelled. New Gods. Eternals. Omac. Atlas. Captain America and Bucky. Or titles like Galactic Bounty Hunters that are parody and pastiche of his work.

Captain America: Speaking of... so, the method to bring Captain America back is through some kind of time travel gun? Yet, Brubaker and his defenders talk about the realism he brought to the book concerning his takes on Captain America and Bucky? The "Reborn" title even has Cap in even more of a retcon styled costume, complete with stylized helmet, weapons belt and the buccaneer boots more of a stylized design attached to real boots. Sheesh.

In talking about his upcoming Marvel project, besides the ridiculousness of the Angel's costume (which is along the lines of Superman's), Brubaker talks about how much he loves history and the chance to bring history into the stories. He gives lip service to that love of history in that he brought on comic historian (especially of Timely Comics and all things Alan Moore) Jess Nevins for research. Which is good if you want to be sure to get the characters and context correct. However, Brubaker doesn't even get the broad strokes correct without feeling the need to rewrite it to fit his own vision and sensibilities. He loves history so much that he feels the need to correct it, to re-write the two most iconic, definitive and repeated stories of Bucky: his origin and his death. At least Brubaker acknowledges Jess' help and involvement. More than I got from ABC/DC for providing character information and copies of Pantha stories for the Terra Obscura minis.

One of the first complaints I had against his Captain America stories was that after a year, we were basically on the very same story, what was being passed on as stories were nothing less than chapters (otherwise as stories, they are structurally bad and unsound and unending sameness). After a year, there was little to no resolution to various plot elements brought up at the very beginning, the rhythm and meter was of a very long work (and Captain America was just a putz in his own book, reacting to things but not really serving as an interesting protagonist or driving force, but that's another issue). And, frankly, I didn't wish to dish out over a hundred dollars and several years of involvement for one story. At the time, most of his defenders told me I was wrong, that they were individual stories. Look around now at the talk and reviews and everyone is talking about how this has been a 3-year building story with still no definite end in sight and praising him for this epic. This type of book may be very successful in the limited market that comics are today, but story lines like this is going to keep comics from ever breaking out past a collector mentality market. It works on shows like LOST but viewers don't actually pay for the honor of watching LOST or soap operas (which are dying by the way). And, the gimmick shows signs of aging. Don't really hear people talking about it and other long-plotted shows like 24 like they used to.

Geoff Johns somehow keeps skating by as this great superhero fan and writer while killing scores of classic characters and writing some of the bleakest comics in history. While bringing back the Flash, he killed several Wally West villains, and brought back Max Mercury and Johnny Quick long enough to really kill Johnny Quick by skeletonizing him. Geez, what was the point then?

Editorially, it was a stupid decision to boot. DC actually owns Johnny Quick. Max Mercury on the other hand... DC does not own the copyrights to the Quality characters. Max Mercury is a nightmare trademark wise as well, he was originally Quicksilver but as their marvelous competition has a trademarked superhero speedster by that name, the original has his name changed. Not necessary but it simplifies things. Still, the choice is to then kill the character they own but NOT the character that isn't really theirs to begin with and they jump through hoops to justify using? Of course, for all I know, the next issue Johns may very well just decide to kill Max Mercury nee Quicksilver as well...

Legion of Three Worlds: I will admit to hypocrisy here. It doesn't overly bother me this book was late other than just on principle. As I don't really care about the story, the villain, the crossover it was supposed to be a part of it and was just getting it for Perez drawing bunches of super-characters fighting an all out superhero brawl, the timeliness of it really didn't matter. In that, it didn't disappoint. I don't know enough about the various Legion incarnations to really care about most of them. The story had plot elements that made no sense, Superboy is immune to magic because there was none from his universe? Uh, things don't work that way, it would mean he was MORE vulnerable to magic, not less (if anything that could be used to explain why Superman has had more problems with magic, that there was next to none left on Krypton). Superboy was vulnerable to kryptonite created by that one Element Lad because that Legion was from Earth Prime... huh? As Element Lad's powers are pseudo science-fiction, it stands to reason he changes things from one element to another, he doesn't actually magically create matter. Thus, any kryptonite or element he creates would be that universe's, he's using the atoms and molecules on hand. If all that mattered was creating kryptonite with a specific radiation, then any Element Lad could do it, Brainiac would easily be able to come up with the right formation. Yes, I'm giving it more thought than it deserves, it's superhero comics after all and that comes with it bad science. But, even in context the extrapolation and explanations have to make some kind of sense. Least, it all looked good.

BPRD: With the last issue of the latest arc of the War of the Frogs, I gave up on the ongoing series of minis as each was really just telling one longer story that was getting tiresome and boring. Yet, just when I thought I was out... two new minis start up, BPRD: 1947 and Witchfinder. Both are set in the past and have more of that gothic horror/dread going for it. Yes, I know, it's obvious that 1947 is set in the past and the other is actually set in the Victorian age so naturally the horror has more that gothic feel. Both just seem to get at the type of stories and tales that BPRD was built on whereas the present day series just seems to have lost that classic retro horror vibe that Hellboy began. I also read the hardback novel Baltimore but that's a different post.

Captain Britain and MI:13: I enjoy watching movie serials at times. They can be problematic nowadays as you rarely watch one at a time a week apart but can usually power through a couple of episodes at a time before repitition sets in. What they are known for are their cliffhanger endings of each chapter. Hero is fighting bad guy on an out of control truck. Bad guy knocks hero out. Sees truck is about to go over the cliff and jumps to safety. Truck immediately plummets over the cliff and hero is surely dead (unless the previews for next week ruin it for you). The following week begins where the other left off. It may truncate some of it but what seemed to happen in just mere seconds is stretched out. The truck is not as close to doom as it seemed, the hero has time to come to, see his danger and likewise make his escape. He was never in any real danger. I bring this up because I think that it's one of the flaws of Paul Cornell's writing. He often seems to be writing backwards. Details like how Dracula's men survive on the moon are brought up two issues after the concept is brought up. There is no story reason to do so other than it's a plothole that just didn't get noticed until later. Or his revising of the mission of MI:13, over the course of several issues we get different explanations. Then you have this last issue. Two issues ago, Dracula was looking all but completely triumphant. Last issue we get that serial cliffhanger trick where it goes back and shows us that there was more going on that was conveniently left out, that they used the being Plotka to give Dracula what he most wanted. Still, Dracula seems a major threat despite that setback and things still not going very well for the heroes. This issue then pulls the same trick as it backs up and shows us how almost all of this was planned out. It would be ingenious if it didn't also remove almost ALL dramatic tension from the storyline much as the finale to the first Agents of Atlas mini. It completely immasculates Dracula as a villain and the whole plot. Likewise Dracula gets taken out in a completely lame way by the writers pet Mary Sue character.

Some of this could be attributed to Cornell having to wrap up all his little plotlines and subplots. Except it has been a pattern of his writing. Just as continuing to have little plotholes and conversations that don't really make sense, only in this case there's no follow up issue. How did Dane's heart get healed, how did Jackie become vampiric when she never was before (she even aged naturally), why did Doom send Megan or if it was a betrayal, why did he betray Dracula, how is Faiza's father not an inhuman monster as he's now a vampire, etc?

It's no surprise the book is being cancelled. Take the title. Imagine 40 years ago someone at DC said, "I have this great idea for a superhero book. We'll call it 'Aquaman and the League.'" Or, instead of "Star Trek" it was called "Sulu and the Enterprise", the "Andy Griffith Show" becomes "Aunt Bee's life in Mayberry." The book could have been called The Black Knight and MI:13 and been just as an accurate title. Somewhere, an editor or someone basically screwed up. Titles and covers are advertising and promotion for the book. There is a reason those things are trademarked. It's contradictory and counterproductive to be advertising that you have enough confidence in Captain Britain's name to prominently display it as the title by which you are going to solicit sales for and then reduce the character to second banana even in an ensemble setting, perpetually taking a backseat to the most non-descript character in the book, as if you really don't have confidence in him to carry the book. Someone needed to sit down and decide "do we or do we not think that Captain Britain is popular enough to equal sales success on the book. If 'yes', the writing and stories need to show that. If 'no', then don't give him first billing in naming the book after him and call it Excalibur or Avalon or something."

It's much like the Hawkeye series some years ago that had covers by Scott Kollins with Hawkeye in full color and costumed superhero mode while the interior art was dark and moody and Hawkeye did not appear in costume until the final issue. Of course the book failed. What was being used to promote the book (the covers and a recognizeable superhero title) had absolutely nothing to do with the actual content.

And, now that Marvel has Marvelman, what will that mean for Captain Britain? With luck, Marvelman will be kept out of continuity allowing for the two to both exist.

Wednesday Comics: I got the first two weeks and then decided against. Some of the features look really good and have a sense of fun to them. I even liked the Metamorpho chapters with the art by Allred, whose artwork I generally find a bit cold and off putting, too deliberate in its pop-art sensibilities. However, in this day and age of expensive comics where I cannot even buy a regular comic for the most part and get a complete story, spending the same amount on a weekly comic that boasts a bunch of stories one page at a time for almost four months just seems too much. I'm not getting a satisfying read with any of them and as it's a fixed title, any that are less than satisfactory are doomed to be there until the end, no new interesting titles in the next installment.

One of the beauties of anthologies is the nature of variety. Some stories are longer than others and may continue over several months, some maybe just a couple of issues, some maybe just this one issue, some are ending, others are beginning. An organic and shifting nature. Then, there's also actual variety. Not just adventure, but maybe a western, a humor feature, a text feature, etc. Other than Sgt. Rock, there's an overall sameness to these.

I will give DC props for at least getting solid professionals for the tales. While the artwork on some like Wonder Woman tend to a little bizarre, none actually look amateurish as anthology comics often seem to eventually devolve into, work by creators not really ready to work at this level.

Doesn't mean I like them all. The Superman story looks lush, but the painted work ultimately doesn't really work for me here. Looks like perpetually sunset or dawn, Batman seems to be from a still from the movie, and the textures all seem the same. I generally find Pope's work ugly which I could get past but I don't understand why Rann suddenly looks like ERB's Mars. I get that the titles are out-of-continuity but that should mean they should be more on-model in general look and feel, especially in a format that's not going to let you explore and explain the necessities of this version being different than an on-model one. It's just change for change's sake. Go off model this much and just tweak the script some and there's no reason for it to be an Adam Strange story at all. I don't see the appeal though it seems to be one of the more critically acclaimed and I just think, "Really? What am I missing?" I thought I was going to like Baker's Hawkman, but it's a Hawkman that casually kills and the artwork seems to be striving for an identity. At times it's strong stuff, but other times it seems like it's just playing around with the Neal Adams style like a child playing dress up.

I figure most if not all will be collected in a couple of trade volumes and I pick which ones I want. It's a decision made easier by the fact that they ARE non-continuity tales which means their stories won't be as dated by the time the trades roll around. 'Cause I'd like to see how Kamandi, the Deadman, Supergirl and Catwoman & the Demon stories do pan out. And, I can read the whole story without having to pull out each issue and read them one page at a time.

09/06 This months good reads!

Books

As comics have been getting less interesting, I’ve been reading more pulps. There’s more creativity, more super-heroism found in the likes of G-8, the Phantom Detective, Jim Anthony, and the Spider than in most so called superhero comics these days. While it’s cool to see the Shroud make an appearance in MS MARVEL and know that he’s a conglomeration of the Shadow, the Green Lama, and the Black Bat of the pulps, it’s great at going back and seeing the originals.

One of the forums I frequent ran a Shadow comic cover and trivia “Survival” style contest. Ultimately, I won, the prize being a reprint of a Shadow pulp, “The Invincible Shiwan Khan”.

As far as I can make out, this is the 3rd of the Shiwan Khan novels, the first two were actually reprinted in hardback that I have in my collection, and I read the first story, long enough that I really don't remember the details.

There are interesting little tidbits to this novel. One, it uses quite a few of the more obscure Shadow agents such as Dr. Roy Tam, Jericho, and Myra Reldon in addition to appearances by Harry Vincent, Hawkeye, Shrevy, and Cliff Marsland. Also in appearance are not only Cardona, but other Shadow novel police regulars Commissioner Weston, and FBI agent Vic Marquette. I think this ultimately weakens the novel in that it diffuses all of the characters to being just little more than names and expositional devices. With such a cast and memorable villain, one would expect a huge epic of a battle and it never really quite achieves that. Nor does it really achieve the Gothic atmosphere that the novels usually contain.

Another interesting bit is that there is no real getting around the fact that Shiwan Khan does have mystic abilities, able to communicate and control various people telepathically usually through some kind of aromatic medium. And his mystics likewise have some abilities such as able to generate an electrical field that works on some kind of psychic level, a strongly inebriated or trained mind is proof to it.

But, the chief interesting angle is it's pretty obvious if the people that made the Shadow movie read only one pulp novel it was this one. There's Roy Tam, not a very regular Shadow agent, I'm not sure if he was in the other two novels or in any of the others that I’ve read. There's the telepathy (admittedly in the other Shiwan Khan novels). More telling is the use of the knives called Phurbas, blades that can be given a life of their own by the Tibetan mystics! It's obvious by the way they are mentioned, that this is the first appearance of them in the Shadow novels. However, the way they get used, it's not clear if there is something to the claims (as some of the magic done by the mystics and Shiwan Khan have no rational explanation behind them) or if it's all slight of hand as the few times they do get used suggests. The first time we see one of the knives take a life seemingly of its own accord, also figuring prominently in the scene is a mummy case! Both are rather significant in the movie.

Next up, the tilting floor of Shiwan Khan's throne room in the movie (it was just on last night, so I was reminded of this detail), in the novel his throne room was smaller and didn't have a mechanical floor. However, it was designed so that the room was built at deceptive angles that would throw off one's aim and movements as they subconsciously adjusted even though they thought it was all perpendicular. It's not hard to see the movie taking something that works well in prose but not in film unless you have someone explaining it, and coming up with something like the mechanical floor that the result is almost the same but far more visually active that doesn't require any clunky exposition explaining what's happening.

I’ve always viewed the movie as an interesting hybrid of the pulp and radio Shadow. This reinforces that, the Shadow and Margo Lane seem drawn a bit more like their radio persona's at least in personality and style, while visually the Shadow is himself from the covers and comics. But, a lot of the elements of Shiwan Khan seem to be taken straight from the pulps, not just made up for the movie.

So, the end result is that the novel is interesting, but it's not really because of its own story telling ability. As a novel it's not really terribly exciting or driven. The plot has several holes in it such as Shiwan Khan is in Chinatown but he makes use of a Caucasian woman that he controls telepathically and has her make herself up as an Asian and uses her as being a messenger to various men of wealth and ability that he's seeking to control. It's a bit hard to believe that he cannot use his abilities and resources to get an actual Chinese woman. It makes a bit more sense that the Shadow uses Myra Reldon in an almost duplicate manner as she grew up in China and is a willing confederate who's proven herself capable. Khan's overall plan isn't terribly interesting either, as he's just basically brainwashing citizens to go back to live in his Tibetan kingdom. (An actual flaw to Gibson’s writing, really. He was good on atmosphere and such, but his imagination for plotting was often lacking, his criminals were hardly grandiose despite themselves to the point that even a villain like Shiwan Khan is ultimately a bit mundane) And the Shadow being on hand for the climactic scene is through such a lucky incident that even Edgar Rice Burroughs would have been embarrassed to write the scene. And, by the novel's end, sadly much is left unresolved.

Comics

Comics I have enjoyed of late:
BPRD
THE ATOM
THE SECRET SIX
BIRDS OF PREY
AQUAMAN
THE THING (sadly no more)
SHE-HULK
JUSTICE
JUSTICE LEAGUE UNLIMITED
JSA

BPRD: An enjoyable read with appropriately creepy art by Guy Davis. At the very least, you should get these in trade paperback, it really is one of the most enjoyable series of mini-series with actual story plotting and characterization.

THE ATOM/THE SECRET SIX/BIRDS OF PREY: All have one thing in common, Gail Simone. Seriously, people that say Geoff Johns and Grant Morrison are the best superhero comics writers around are just off in their head as Gail combines the strengths of both and none of their weaknesses. Wannabe writers like Judd Winnick and Chuck Austen could stand to study her work and understand what writing really is. Gail can do strange and odd-ball with almost meta references without actually feeling like she’s ridiculing it. Instead, she comes across as someone that truly loves the characters she writes. she actually delivers on characterization, giving characters distinctive voices that feel right. Nor does she let her own prejudices get in the way of how she writes a character. Thanks to the way he’s been handled in the past (and even currently), she has no love for Green Arrow, but when he appears in BIRDS OF PREY, she doesn’t write him as such. Instead you can almost feel the heartache between Ollie and Dinah. And, even with all that, she delivers clever plots and plot twists, stories that grow out of the characters involved. THE ATOM teams her up with Byrne at least in the opening story, and it’s a wonderful pairing. Byrne’s style has changed, I don’t think his figure work carries quite the same power or punch that it used to, but he’s no slouch on story-telling and drawing distinctive and recognizable characters. I don’t have to analyze a panel of his work to understand what the artist was trying to get across, it’s there in front of you.

AQUAMAN: At times I think Guice draws the current character a little too old looking and whoever thought pairing him up with Dezuniga on this last issue made a big mistake. And I wish we had the real Aquaman. Yet, despite all that, Busiek delivers epic drawn story, Again, there’s actual plotting going on, it’s a bit episodic but there is storytelling in every issue, not a chase scene, some fights and a little dialogue.

THE THING/SHE-HULK: These two likewise share a writer, in this case Dan Slott. Both books are rather cutesy in some regards to being self-referential, a little too much so in the latter. But, both are pretty good superhero books as well, light-hearted and at times heartfelt in their approach to their characters. They both also tended to share some good clear superhero style artwork. Still, I’ll freely admit the real reason I’m getting SHE-HULK is because of the Two-Gun Kid.

JUSTICE: In many ways, the way the Justice League should be. I have only one gripe is that a central plot concerns, why isn’t the world perfect with superheroes? Well, most of the problems raised with this question are problems that are fixable today. Given our technology, that we pay farmers NOT to grow crops and such, why does the world still have people living in shacks, 850 million starving, etc? And a world that has both superheroes AND supervillains, maybe we should wonder why those worlds are as stable and well off as they are. I think superheroes can be used to illustrate social issues and inspire change. But, it’s a mistake to actually bring such concerns into the comic and ask why haven’t they solved them? And then come up with some comic book explanation in order to make the heroes not look ineffectual. Even if superheroes existed, we’d still have many of the same problems unless you go the route of SQUADRON SUPREME (about the only way to really address that type of question). But, JUSTICE has some gorgeous art, Alex Ross works better on top of another artist when it comes to storytelling.

JUSTICE LEAGUE UNLIMITED: Thanks to the unceasing moroseness of the regular DC and Marvel Universes in general, I find myself looking outside their main books for reading material. Of interesting note is that in JLU, one can find a guest appearance of the original Shining Knight, Vigilante, and the Freedom Fighters. You can see Vixen, Gypsy and Vibe be real heroes and not see themselves as general losers. I read it to remind myself that comics can be just plain fun. If they’d just eschew the animation style artwork and add just a tiny bit more meat to the stories, you’d have a great all-ages book. As it is, it’s one superhero book that is great for pre-teens and kids, if you want to hand out books for Halloween or stocking stuffers, this is the one.

JSA: With Paul Levitz back at the writing chores, we have about the best arc in this incarnation of the team as we get the secret origin of the Gentleman Ghost. Again showing, that sometimes you can break one of my normal dislikes and deliver something worthwhile. In this case it’s taking a character whose ambiguity and mystery is a big part of who he is and nailing it down and giving us a definitive history. Of course some of this groundwork was already done by the likes of Geoff Johns, so we had already lost some of the mysteriousness around the character, we know he’s not just some nutter with a gimmick pretending to be a ghost. But, Levitz runs with it and even gives us sort of an explanation as to why a ghost would bother stealing. It’s a good tale with all the characters in character and many having great moments. There are a few things out of the blue in the final issue which Levitz didn’t properly set up. There’s a rule in writing that states something to the effect that if you introduce a gun into the plot in the 3rd chapter, it goes off in the 22nd. Well, the inverse should also be true, you don’t have a gun going off in the 22nd, that you didn’t first introduce in the 3rd which is basically what happens here.

And, I’d love a reasonable explanation as to why JSA was cancelled to be re-launched in December/January. With the same writer and presumably art style it has had for most of its run. It’s numbers have been respectable even with Geoff Johns taking a break. Do they really think that a new #1 will bring in so many new readers, it’s worthwhile to not put out a product for several months to give people opportunity to get out of the habit of buying the comic and buying something else? Even story wise there’s no smart explanation for the hiatus, it just sorta ends. The only explanation I can truly think of is there are only so many titles that Time Warner/DC are willing to invest in at any given time. With all of these launches of new product at one time, some of the mediocre titles are given a break to see if some of these others prove themselves as most are marketed as mini-series. Thus the real reason that books like Justice League, Wonder Woman, and JSA have taken publishing breaks before being relaunched. That or Geoff Johns has gotten some dirt on Didio and nobody else is now allowed to write the JSA and so they have to wait until he clears some stuff of his plate.

There are some notable others.

THE ETERNALS: Neil Gaiman seems to be doing a fine job at explaining a bit of the contradictions in the history of the Eternals as well as finding a way of setting up a mystery and telling an audience unfamiliar with the characters about them at the same time. Romita Jr is about the only artist at Marvel these days that can really deliver this type of story and really capture both the mundanity and the epic scale of the characters at the same time. He’s one of the few that really captures the spirit of what Kirby’s art was about without actually aping Kirby’s style. My only complaint is that Junior’s work is delving a bit too much into shorthand, becoming a little overly stylized and caricature of it’s former self such as everyone generally having Bob Hope’s nose or Spider-man’s emaciated body type as opposed to being slender compared to other heroes.

BATMAN AND THE MAD MONK: I almost thought about waiting for the trade on this one. I enjoyed Wagner’s last retelling of a golden-age Batman story: BATMAN AND THE MONSTER MEN which was in the 40’s a rip on a Doc Savage novel. But, there’s really nothing that says it needs to be read in monthly installments, it’s from Batman’s early days and who really cares if it’s in continuity or not. But, I still like picking up comics each week and reading them in installments. Especially if they are fun. To me, this is Batman done right.

THUNDERBOLTS: I think there’s some interesting plotting, and for the most part it has great superhero artwork by Tom Grummett, often either colored or separated a little too garishly and has one recurring appearances by one of my favorite Marvel Characters, the Defender Nighthawk. However, I just don’t really care for any of the main characters or what really happens to them anymore. Zemo is acting just a bit too heroic like, Atlas a bit too whiny and Mach whatever too wishy washy and ineffectual.

Marvel’s Western books: A little hit and miss, but a bit more straightforward and honest with their treatment of the characters than overly gritty BLAZE OF GLORY or the joke fest of the 50’s monster titles. Bits of the larger Marvel Universe popin here and there such as Skrulls and a young Ancient One.

AGENTS OF ATLAS: Just the first issue of this mini-series is out, starring most of the Avengers of the 1950’s: Gorilla Man, Marvel Boy, Venus, the Human Robot, and Jimmy Woo vs. the Yellow Claw. I feel they are taking their gimmick a little too far in excluding 3-D Man soley because he’s a retcon hero, he did not appear in any Timely/Atlas comics of that time period. The first issue is out and is pretty darn good. Further into the series another 1950’s hero will be returning though has been thought to be dead for most of this time.

THE CREEPER: Bought the first issue against my better judgment. It’s amazing how they credit Steve Niles but not Steve Ditko when really the best parts of the story were because they were basically lifting Steve’s first story. Full of ho-hum additions, Jack Ryder is pretty much converted into a character I’m not interested in reading about on a regular basis. Artwork still stinks.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
More Comics and Pulps here!