Todays Comics Looking to the Past

Since I probably won't be getting any new comics this week and I've not talked about comics in a little while, here's my chance to plug away.

Captain America: The Patriot: Two issues have come out and I'm conflicted on the book. General consensus on the web seems to be as well. Most seem to praise the artwork over the writing (I guess because Kesel is not Brubaker) whereas I'm a bit the other way around. Kesel does seem to be writing Brubaker-lite, but I think he does an admirable job at writing the history of a man whose history is generally known. He succeeds in doing so without actually changing known facts and keeping the focus and point of view on Jeff Mace and his view of things. The art is passable in most places and is in keeping in toning down the gosh-wow factor of superheroes and their costumes that passes for good superhero art these days as half the artists seem embarrassed at drawing superheroes.

The second issue is where it really begins to falter. The problem is that while it is telling a good character-centric story and makes Jeff Mace seem like a decent and likable lunkhead, it and the art never get across why the characters are cool characters. The highlight of the whole issue is when he gets fed up with Namor's snarkiness and attitude and punches him. There you see his passion. Otherwise, as soon as Mace puts on the Captain America costume he becomes a second-rate hero in his own book. Every story of the fill-in Captain Americas center around why they were bad Captain Americas. As this is his chance to shine, it would be nice that the focus went the other way, why he was such a good choice for Captain America. Maybe the best choice for the time period. There are little bits where he shines such as the afore-mentioned conflict with Namor, but otherwise it is more about his shortcomings.

Other little things that bug me, Kesel seems to forget that the Bucky he's writing is not the original Bucky, at least in the way he writes him. Bucky comes off as a better fighter and hero and constantly berating Patriot-Cap, even though Patriot would have been a superhero for much longer. And, this Bucky has only been Bucky for just a couple of months longer than Jeff has been Cap, so it seems especially strange for Bucky to constantly be talking and acting as if he has so much more experience.

Kesel also uses the term "blue ticketed" to explain the discharge of a friend of the Patriot's and his subsequent suicide and why Jeff cannot appear as Captain America at the guy's funeral. It is also used to explain why Jeff would never become the Patriot again as his appearance and impassioned speech at his friend's funeral in the guise of the Patriot would make that identity a pariah. However, what Kesel doesn't do is explain what "blue ticketed" actually meant. He gives us the effect, but the closest he gets to the cause is the Whizzer asking if his buddy had a girlfriend. A Blue Ticket discharge was a way to get undesirables ie blacks and homosexuals out of the service without it actually being a formal dishonorable discharge and such a discharge haunted the men back in civilian life. Sure, we don't want clunky exposition, but it could have been handled a little better.

One of the pleasures was seeing the focus on Miss Patriot in this series. Appearing only once in the Golden-Age, here and her identity as a fellow co-reporter of Jeff Mace's she plays a central role. From the start of the second issue, we get the hints of bad things to come, that is if you know the history of Captain America and Bucky. After WWII, there was an explosion of good-girl art and characters. Most of them were jungle queens, but Timely/Atlas/Marvel explored shapely female heroines along the lines of Sun Girl and Golden Girl. Thinking that Captain America might do better with an adult female sidekick, Bucky is shot by a lady criminal called Lady Lavender and Cap recruits the help of Golden Girl who is Betty Ross, a long recurring character and possible romantic interest in the Golden-age Captain America tales.

That's a lot of threads being tied together in this one comic. We see Mary/Miss Patriot several times with a mention of her Lavender perfume each time. One discussion even centers around Jeff accusing her of hoping that Bucky is shot so that she could become his partner. Then you factor in that Jeff is generally oblivious of her romantic feelings for him and that he pretty much ruins her career as Miss Patriot when he destroys the Patriot's reputation. Mary's path is obviously becoming a sad tragic one. And, when Bucky is shot at the end of the issue with the smell of lavender in the air, Cap will get a future female partner but it will not be Mary. What we don't really get is the feeling that Mary has gone over the edge. We see her as being sad, but we don't actually see the bitterness. You feel sorry for her but don't see that final step or sign that she has gone over the edge, it's a huge gap in the portrayal of her characterization. It might be Kesel just trying to be coy for just a little too long, or a sign that she's not really the villainess (after all other women probably wear the same perfume). Either way, it's obviously going to be a story that doesn't end well for Jeff or Mary.

DC Universe Legacies #5: I had sworn off this book, didn't get issue four because the writing had so many holes and internal discrepancies in it that it was a chore to read to try to figure out exactly what the point of it was. However, issue five shows this book's perspective of Crisis on Infinite Earth's and with it, the wonderful George Perez doing what he does best: drawing scores of superheroes on model in big battle scenes. Not only that, we get an appearance by one of my favorite wonky silver-age characters Ultra, the Multi-Alien, who was left out of the original mega-mini. Couple that with a great little back-up with art by Walt Simonson teaming up Space Ranger, Adam Strange, Captain Comet and Tommy Tomorrow. Other than Adam Strange, the others don't have much to do, but it's great seeing them again looking the way they should.

And, as I usually come down hard on colorists, this is a book where the colorist gets it. His skin tones are natural and subtle, no obvious banding to the point that under most lighting conditions, people's skin appears only to have two tones, you generally don't have bright highlights on skin. No blurring of speed lines and edges of super-speed characters, no obvious texture fills, etc. In general, no special effect that actually draws attention to itself, the coloring instead serves to help the art to tell the story, something important in artwork that's dense like Perez.

While the writing still makes as little sense as ever (we have references to Judomaster as a modern day hero and Captain Atom in a costume he didn't actually wear in the DCU other than as part of government cover-up suggesting a career that was longer than it was), it's at least a book that looks good.
JSA #43: It read like a setup issue by a writer who is not the regular writer of either principle character of the story or title with a plot that has similarities to the upcoming story arc by the new regular writer, the JSA take over the running of a town. Just as Robinson's JLA/JSA arc featured heavily Obsidian going bad/being taken control of immediately after a series culminating with Obsidian stating that would never happen again. Serious, what is the editor doing on this book?

I think part of this was to actually give some kind of reason that Robinson's storyline mattered. Because, otherwise, it's no big deal that Obsidian and Jade cannot be in proximity because other than their days as part of Infiniti Inc, they rarely are featured together, each following different paths and teams. And, she's been dead. So, he needed this bit of durm und strang to make it seem like what just happened was this really big deal. However, just how much time has passed between issues? For everything that Alan Scott has done on the moon it would have to be close to a year at least, that he's been able to master talking to different races in their speech patterns, broker truce treaties with various worlds and realms AND research with Fate Obsidian and Jade's condition and the various futures.

Project Superpowers: Chapter Two #12: The final issue of the second series, the big Claw battle seems almost like an afterthought. In many ways it's a retread of the previous battle with Zeus, the heroes fighting a giant god-like being that they don't have the power to kill. The Claw battle has a bit more of a philosophical/moral dilemma in that his body is made up of innocents and thus to defeat him means killing or condemning thousands of people who don't deserve to die, drawing parallels to dropping the Atomic bomb to end the war with Japan. It's an anti-climactic ending though. Part of that was rendering the heroes ostensibly immortal and another that the Claw is such an ill-defined threat. And, you have the heroes apparently readily accepting Dynamic Man and Power Nelson into the folds despite their traitorous crimes.

In Chapter One and the Death Defying Devil minis, the Claw was a terrorist organization and an almost demonic entity that possessed others. It was a storytelling device that could have been used to fuel quite a few different type of stories or a long series in and of itself ala the mostly excellent JSA vs Kobra mini. But, much of that is dropped in making him a more physical threat. He goes from some kind of long plan insidious goals to one of more direct physical confrontation and easily handled. The actual terror of what he is and what he does doesn't really come across as it has been too far into the background of the storyline that focused more on Zeus and the identity of DDD. What could have been a heart and gut wrenching tale is ho-hum. After all, the Claw only absorbed one person we could even possibly care about.

The drawing AND the coloring improve. In a book like this, cannot really separate the two, but for the most part, the two do merge to make single whole. Although, the style has its shortcomings such as a page that has a 15 panel grid of single heroes in battle. The panels are too small, the detail needed too tight for such over done coloring.

Time Masters: Vanishing Point: The mini suffers from not having any clear direction or plot. We know the over-arcing plot, that the small group of heroes are traveling through time to rescue Batman. But, as his return is the focus of another book, that's obviously not the point of this one. So, instead, we have a battle alongside heroes of other times against other ill-defined threats. Meanwhile some classic mastermind villains are exploring the remains of Booster's headquarters, Vanishing Point, for some clues and power to reshape time. Despite these villains each being scientific masterminds, they are give little to do. The Ultra-Humanite is used mainly to being a short-tempered foil and for his brute strength. Jurgens does little to really explain or characterize many of the characters, some of whom who haven't appeared in comics for decades.

With the second issue, I noticed the art looked off. It looked a bit like Jurgens but it seemed to be more of all of his shortcomings and not his strengths, that bodies looked stiff and disproportionate, reminding me of bad Jim Starlin in places. I looked at the credits and saw that Jurgens was only the layout artist and with two different finishers, explaining the inconsistencies. With issue three, we still just have Jurgens on layouts but at least only one guy doing the finished art. However, it still looks like "bad Jurgens" art. One of the big problems is that with both issues, the art is trying hard to have all the principle characters with their bodies facing the reader. Heroes are constantly fighting threats behind them and looking over their shoulders, having conversations while not facing each other, and so on. One panel has Booster and Starfire talking about being surrounded. Not only are they hardly surrounded, but half of their foes are not even looking at them. It looks more like a group of people just milling around than any kind of threat. The one good news is that either the coloring is not as bad with the computerized effects or it just distracts you from it.

And, why is the Black Beetle almost completely red?

The only reason to get this book is the chance to see Bronze-age characters like Claw and the original Starfire, Despero and Per Degaton in their original looks. For that, I'm a sucker.

Peter Cannon, Whereforth Art Thou?
The story goes that shortly after DC canceled his series and he made a couple of appearances in Justice League Task Force, the rights to Peter Cannon, Thunderbolt returned to his creator Peter Morisi, shortly before he died. As such, he was the only character that was part of a Justice League book to not appear in the JLA/Avengers mini. Of course, there was some justification that that the heroes that appeared in Task Force were never actual JL members and so didn't require an appearance, but he is still the sole notable exception. Even Hourman from the same story was in there.

However, we have Thunderbolt appearing in TWO different DC books this past month. One, alongside the other Charlton heroes in DCUniverse: Legacies #5 which admittedly has other problems in the same panel: the WWII Judomaster and Captain Atom appearing in his red, blue and silver outfit when he wasn't really on the scene at this time, in this costume, both being government fabrications. Meanwhile in Justice League: Generation Lost, we have a retelling of the scene in Kingdom Come where the Charlton heroes alongside Magog track down the Parasite who uses his powers to split open Captain Atom and setting off an atomic explosion and is pretty much the kick-off event of that mini. In the comic, Thunderbolt is identified by name and is show in the more GA Daredevil influenced costume.

Makes you wonder what is going on. Do we have two blatant examples of editors just not doing their jobs and allowing the exact same copyright infringement? Is the original story about the character's rights reverting to Morisi just a comicbook legend? Did DC buy the character back? Of the three, I'd say the latter is the most unlikely. Why buy the rights back and debut him back into the DCU in what are largely throwaway scenes where the character does absolutely nothing? Either of the other two are the most likely though it's strange to see him appear in two completely different books out of the blue. But, no love for the Son of Vulcan (I like the name, design and concept of the character, his actual comic though was beyond bad).
Black Terror Canceled. Been seeing references that the Black Terror book has been canceled. A shame but not surprising. The book never gelled, the plotlines and the stories never actually developed the character other than to add kewl pirate motif elements. What could have been a decent book about a super-powered Batman type character fighting super-criminals and bizarre mysteries never became anything more than a book about a perpetually angry and gruff hero. No supporting cast or characterization was developed over just following up plot threads left over from the Superpowers book itself. A shame as I believe Dynamite was right in focusing on him as a character to launch a single character title. He has one of the more iconic costumes, names and storytelling potential. If only they had approached it as they were telling a single character comic and not a "comic universe" comic and actually looked at the source material that made him such an enduring character and concept to begin with and not just the revisionist ill-tempered Black Terror of Superpowers.

The Return of the Originals: On the subject of pulps, I have started my own blog reviewing various pulp novels and characters. So far, two entries. One, a Secret Agent "X" novel and two, the Doc Savage rift Thunder Jim Wade and his final novel. This blog started off as a pulp and comic review site, but it's difficult to do both subjects justice in one place. Plus, the overlap may not be all that great as many fans and readers of pulps don't translate to being fans of modern comics, as we will see below.

Moonstone is getting ready to launch what they call the "Return of the Originals", ie seeing many of the original pulp heroes into their line of comicbooks. They've already been using Domino Lady although the first issue failed to me in any way other than just being badly done and the Spider has been appearing in some illustrated prose "comics". They have also published a couple of really good books, one being radio scripts of Doc Savage written by Lester Dent and an Avenger anthology of short-stories by modern writers, most of whom get the character far better than anyone at DC does (it could have used an editor overseeing the original stories as many centered around introducing various characters from Richard Benson's past).

This website has a host of interviews with people involved in reprinting and writing modern pulp stories and comics as well as many of the people behind Moonstone's upcoming foray (you'll have to scroll down to get to them).

One of the standard questions they ask is how the interviewee feels about DC's take on Doc and the Avenger and modern revisions/reimaginings of the characters. It's almost funny at the spin that each writer gives as they are all doing pretty much the same thing to different degrees. I give Hopkins a break with the Golden Amazon because she did have a couple of different irreconcilable back-stories. Sort of like the Alec Baldwin Shadow movie which tries to combine both the radio Shadow and the pulp Shadow into one character. The creators behind the Green Ghost and the Phantom Detective both talk about using as much of the original published history as possible. But, both decide to give them powers. While the writer of the Moon Man changes the gender of his chief assistant for no good reason (there's already a capable love interest in the original stories).

The Ghost gets his new powers through a new mask and the Phantom Detective gains abilities through using performance enhancing (and mind altering drugs). What's really funny about this is the Phantom Detective writer brings out all sorts of psycho-babble to justify it, that he feels he's being made obsolete due to the explosion of costumed heroes with real powers. This is sorta true meta-fictionally. The pulp heroes did give way to the costumed comicbook heroes. In fact, the Phantom Detective was also in the comics as his publisher was one of the big companies at the time. HOWEVER, Moonstone does not have that superhero-universe. There are no true super-powered heroes bursting on the scene unless this writer creates them. Plus, it's a flawed argument in that the presence of superheroes does not make police, soldiers, firemen and detectives superfluous. It's a writer that truly does not get the character or subject matter.

Likewise, the interview concerning the Black Bat goes along the same lines. The character debuted the same time as Batman with a similar look. More importantly though, his origin was pretty much lifted for both Dr. Mid-nite and Two-Face, at a trial he has a vial of acid thrown at his face which scars him (and leaves him blind). After a secret experimental surgery, he discovers he can see in the day and night and with a small gang of aides, he fights crime. He's not above killing criminals especially the ringleaders beyond the touch of the Law, but he doesn't set out to kill them. Of course in the one online preview, we see him killing drug dealers execution style and driven by voices in his head. Yet, this complete revision of the character isn't seen as being the same as Azzarello's handling of Doc Savage? Maybe it's because they talk about how much they love the characters vs his professed disdain of the source material.

What's sad is that this was not their approach to the Phantom. They wrote the character as he was classically but with modern threats and credibility. The character stayed in keeping with the way he was portrayed in the strips. You could go from their comic to the newspaper to old reprints and still see character as being completely recognizable, that you're obviously reading about the same character. But, their interviews are along Ross' and Dynamite's promos and talking about their Phantom comic. "Here's how much I love the character, so I'm going to change all this stuff about him."

Secret Agent "X" is about the only one we know that's going to be appearing that they haven't talked about. "X" has a lot of potential, especially as his past is a complete mystery so there's plenty that could be developed. However, based on what we've seen so far, I expect a lot to be changed concerning what the character already is.

A little interesting tidbit, the principle characters we know are being used, this is not their first time in the comics. As noted, the Phantom Detective appeared in the Golden-age comics, mostly intact. Secret Agent "X", Black Bat, and Captain Future all had their first stories pretty much straight-forwardly adapted though they all became Phantom Fed "X", the Mask, and Major Mars (the Captain Future id was used by a "standard" superhero). The Moon Man also made it into comics but with a name and costume change to that of the Raven. The Ghost got re-imagined in comics as superhero magician with true magic powers, dumping much of his pulp influences.

The comic store I frequent actually has several pulp fans, about five I think. Plus, he just got one more whose tastes seem to mirror mine own in modern comics only he gets even fewer than I do. However, he's only getting one issue each of these books and it's not going on the shelf. As the longest customer apart from the owner, more than likely I'll get first refusal. But, it doesn't speak well when the books don't even seem designed to appeal to those who should be their most core basic audience. Especially considering that pulp reprints are fairly popular these days and very pricey. If we're willing to spend $12-$16 for a forty year old reprint, we might be very willing to buy a comic for a fraction of that price if it at least played fair with us instead of pulling a bait and switch.

Justice Incorporated!

I haven't been getting Erik Larsen's Savage Dragon for some years, but the cover for the upcoming issue has me intrigued enough to get it. The storyline has had the Dragon teaming up with some other Image luminaries (Spawn, Witchblade, Invincible and Shadowhawk) to take down the Superman-esque Solarman who has been using unnecessary lethal force on villains. And, seems willing to do the same to heroes who stand in his way. In the next issue various golden-age characters seem to be jumping in to lend a hand. Featured on the cover: from Fox are Thor, the Flame, and Samson; Standard's Black Terror, Pyroman and Wonder Man; Lev Gleason's Silver Streak and Daredevil; Columbia's Skyman, Harvey's Captain Freedom; and Fawcett's Bulletman. If nothing else, the story ought to be fun.

Don't know what happened to Image's Issue After Next project, the series that was doing the "next" issue of public domain comics and characters, featuring all new stories of golden-age characters. The first, Fantastic Comics was a very mixed bag of pastiche, parody and not-sure-what. They were all too self-aware, self referential; none really being just plain stories featuring the characters.

Thankfully, Moonstone pretty much dodges that bullet with The Avenger Chronicles, their tpb collection of short-stories featuring the Street & Smith pulp hero. It's a great collection of writers, drawing from pulp historians, comics, fantasy and sci fi writers, and even a new story by Ron Goulart who had penned a few new Avenger novels back when the character was being reprinted in the 1970's. I've not gotten completely through the book, but the stories seem to capture the feel of the original pulp stories without being mocking, even in a gently manner. The creators take the character and their stories seriously even while delivering plots that would have been at home 60 years ago. The flaws in the stories would be flaws regardless. Will Murray is writing a bit more like he's writing one of his Doc Savage epics and the format doesn't have room for his prose. Thus, the reader is short-changed on the resolution. The motivation and unmasking of the villain hinges on personal information that was always known by the Avenger but is kept from the reader until the big reveal. It's a cheat and lazy writing. Several stories all have elements of the Avenger's past, from before the days of his war on crime. The Avenger always was a bit more psychological of pulp characters, but this is a bit of modern writing creeping in, the desire to mine the past, to delve further into the character's history and past. While one or two of these type stories are interesting, when you get several in a row, it telegraphs the twist and ending of the story to a degree. M. Night's The Sixth Sense works largely because he was a new creator, one wasn't expecting a twist. But, once you know what to look for, that twist doesn't come as a surprise.

Interestingly, when this came out, I was halfway through one of those 1970s paperback reprints of the Avenger: Midnight Murder. The story is a bit more of an espionage thriller than I would normally expect but that seems to be one of the strengths of the Avenger character. Created by committee of Walter "Shadow" Gibson and Lester "Doc Savage" Dent, the character embodies character concepts of both and is at home as both a detective and scientific hero. The plot is an airplane is testing a top secret device and seems to deliberately crash into a mountain. Crooks seem to be after the device, the scientists are striving to recover and keep it secret, and the Avenger and his crew are trying to find out what truly caused the plane to crash and put this gang of international crooks out of business. The two head crooks are portrayed in a wonderful over the top suave and dangerous manner that would serve them well in a James Bond flick. What's also great about this novel are the Avenger's aides. They come across as being efficient and capable, not needing his constant rescuing even though they get into as much trouble as any pulp's second bananas.

I feel I should at least give some props to the latest issue of Golden-Age Men of Mystery by AC Comics. Issue 11 has what initially attracted me to these reprints. The inside cover gives a history of the stories contained therein, credit to where the stories AND reprints came from. It tells how the Cat-Man story is a completely second and incompatible version of his and Kitten's origins as well as how the Phantom Lady story reprinted was originally a story of a non-costumed heroine called Spitfire Sanders with the lead re-drawn and the script changed so that it referenced the Commies and not the Nazis. When he lately seems to more often confuse history by making changes to stories and texts, it's refreshing to see him shedding light on some of the often convoluted real history of the characters and stories.

My Own Worst Enemy has gotten the axe in the first round of cancellations it appears. This is one of those shows where the central concept has interest but it's badly thought out, yet the stories and characters are interesting and sympathetic. The conceit is that Christian Slater plays a man entering the intelligence field (at some point in college apparently), and agrees to a procedure that will split his personality into two. Henry, his second personality is given a whole new background and he's free to marry and have kids without knowing about his other self, Edward who goes around as a super-spy. Edward knows about Henry, but as soon as a mission is over, he goes to sleep and Henry wakes up and goes about his life until Edward is needed again and he's awoken by the agency. The problem is that the characters are now waking up on their own in each other's lives. Henry isn't good at the spy stuff and Edward isn't all that good at being a faithful husband and dependable dad.

The problem is the premise makes zero sense. Even if you buy that they would go to such expense and trouble for cover identities for just two spies, why give Henry a fake history and life when Edward is the one that's not really living a life? Much of the show is spent of Henry trying to figure out how much of his life and memories are really fake when it makes more sense to reverse the two.

Much of the show spends time dealing with the very obvious problems that anyone could predict would happen under this type of setup and that you'd think a competent spy organization spending this kind of money would know they couldn't keep a lid on. While the spies Edward and Tom know about their dual lives, their respective identities and spouses do not. Naturally, one spouse gets suspicious, especially when she decides to surprise him on one of his "business" trips by waiting for him in his hotel room in one city while he's really on the other side of the globe. That episode is further undermined by a later episode that reveals Henry's wife was not the woman that the company had picked out for him, he was supposed to marry another agent to help keep tabs on him. It follows then that the company had also picked out a wife for Tom, are we to assume this company was so inept that they failed twice in the same area?

Indeed, the setup would make far more sense if Henry is the real identity (as in the classic Jekyll-Hyde story). He agrees to the split personality, his real identity is brain-washed only to the degree to make him think he decided NOT to pursue a career in the intelligence field. Edward also does not realize he's two people or that he has a life outside of being a spy, the brainwashing is to prevent him from questioning his own lack of identity too closely. This makes him efficient and deadly as he doesn't realize he has any family ties, anything to lose. The tension arises as the brainwashing starts breaking down and the two become somewhat aware of each other. Henry is trying to find out just who he is and how much of his life is a lie (because the company does have to keep tabs on him) while Edward wants the life his other half has and thus at times is either sabotaging it or trying to take it over. And, then you have the mystery of just who this company really is or their goals, that some in it may have plans for Henry-Edward to be the ultimate sleeper terrorist with the right verbal command.

I've been enjoying Crusoe, more than I thought it would. Part of me hopes that it's really just a long mini-series as the central idea seems like it would be limiting in story types. Already the show had to take steps to address the Gilligan's Island scenario of having other people constantly finding the island to set up conflict between them and Crusoe and Friday yet end with them not getting off the island. In this case, they stranded a ship that had been taken over by mutineers also on the island. Some of the original crew get along fine with Crusoe but the mutineers are in charge and would kill him on sight. But, they respect his and Friday's knowledge of the island well enough to keep to the beach until they can get the ship repaired and leave. Thus the show has a cast and storytelling possibilities larger than two people on an island, even one as big as this one seems to be.

The flashbacks are also intriguing, that slowly give the story of how Crusoe ended up on the island and the life that he left behind. It serves as reminding each week how imperative it is to him to risk his life and leave this tropical paradise, that he has wife and family he loves and must get back to. Likewise, there are conspiracies afoot that slowly unfold. Is Sam Neil's character really the benevolent family friend he seems to be or is there something more sinister to him?

It's not without flaws. We are told that Friday is a cannibal, yet is able to speak six languages and picked up English very quickly. The creators strive to make Friday a sympathetic and strong character, reinforcing the fact that he is Crusoe's friend and equal and in some ways such as language as well as survival skills, his superior. Where would a cannibal become fluent in six languages? It has to be politically correct. Friday cannot be treated as a true native savage would be and their relationship has to be more palatable than what one from that time period would normally have been. As the show starts with them already friends, a lot of them coming to terms is glossed over. His intelligence is played up as is Crusoe's lack of cultural prejudices. In a sense, that's a shame as that would be quite a bit of fodder for story material. The show does give props in recognizing that the time period isn't one of racial and gender equality though. Even Crusoe can be shown to have some sexist attitudes, a more acceptable form of prejudice than racism.

The other chief flaw is the one that people made fun of concerning the Professor on Gilligan's Island: Crusoe is capable of making a huge tree house with so many gadgets feasible for the time and yet is unable to build a decent raft. Even when he has a small boat that is almost completely fixed, he's unable to make it water tight. And, Friday is equally deficient in this knowledge, even though he's from a culture that makes sea-worthy canoes. Sure, the tree house and gadgets are cool looking, but they over-ride the credibility of the central conceit of the show, the two are stranded on this island with no way off.

Things Coming up Phantom

So, I went to India for two weeks to visit my gal's family in Mumbai and Nasik. I didn't see many comic books. There was one with an Indian superhero at a news-stand at the train stop, but things were a little hectic with our misadventure there and foolishly, I thought I'd see more. I saw a little noisemaker with an image of Shaktimaan on it. I now know that he was a fairly big superhero on Indian television around 10 years ago. And they have the translated Power Rangers and similar shows. Not that need be as Casey and Isabella who only know English wanted to watch Power Rangers despite not knowing the language. And in the Sunday paper, there was the Phantom. Not the Sunday funnies as we have them over here, just a few very reduced strips near the back of the paper as they have every day, but only on Sundays is the Phantom. This paper was also in English, so I don't really know about the Hindu version.

About halfway through the trip, we are visiting one uncle and Pamela's sister notices how much weight he'd lost and says, "Where's your Phantom-muscles? You're so thin, what happened to our Phantom?"

Near the end of the trip we're doing some shopping. I stop in one used-book mart and across the way there's a children's book nook. It wouldn't have occurred to me because over here comics aren't really thought of as being kid's stuff, except by those that don't read them but Pamela asks the guy if they have comics. He starts pulling out some Asterix and Tin Tin books, just like the ones over here, and then a similar sized Phantom book, with two stories of the Frew Phantom. Not what I was looking for, but Wow. And then another. And another. Apparently the publisher did 15 issues of these and this guy had all of them. He also pulls out a stack of regular comics, American ones: Green Lantern, Archie, Superman... and in the midst a Frew Phantom! Or rather a Frew Phantom, reprinted in India.

While I was hoping for an authentic Indian superhero comic, I left with the Frew Phantom and 4 of the larger Phantom books. We also got a Phantom book and an Asterix for Casey who's ten. I imagine his mother will be able to tell him who the Phantom is.

I get back and I read that Dynamite has secured the rights to The Phantom comic, a surprise to Moonstone. A shame. Dynamite hasn't really knocked anything out of the park for me and while Moonstone's Phantom had a shakey and inconsistant start, that's really changed in the past year. The other thing that bugs me a little is in the interview, Dynamite talks about modernizing the character. Other than stories specifically set in the past, the Phantom has always existed in the modern day, he and his fictional Africa have changed to keep up with the times. Sure, the Billy Zane movie took place in the Phantom's original time period, but by and large, the character hasn't been kept there, not in the comic strips and not in the current comic books.

So, I read "modernizing" and I interpret it as them thinking the character is too old fashioned in look and concept. Images of Liefeld's modernizing Captain America comes to mind. Or the current Bucky-Cap. Or maybe just more grim and gritty storytelling, he carries guns, maybe he shoots to kill. Who knows? Just a shame when Moonstone's version seemed to settle into a rock solid comic and a nice alternative to the superheroes of the DC/Marvel cosmologies.

The Frew Phantom comic I got has a bit of "The tail wagging the dog" type story, to borrow that term. In this case, it's a story that acknowledges an inspiration by claiming to be the source of it. Peter David did this when he has the Hulk borrow a strategy from the movie REAL GENIUS and claiming the movie got it from something Banner and pals did while in college. It would be like Superman travelling to the 1930's and tells a neophyte Doc Savage about his Fortress of Solitude, and Doc thinks that's not a half-bad idea. Most times these stories kind of annoy me, because there are readers out there that just might not realize that it's a backwards way of homage, that REAL GENIUS is not influenced by the writings of Peter David or Stan Lee, that Doc Savage had the Fortress of Solitude in the Arctic years before Superman.

In the Phantom comic, the focus is on Edgar, a Jungle Patrol officer who is a bit inept and a wonder he even got in the Patrol as he washed out everywhere else. All he really wants to do is write and return to America to marry his girlfriend. Instead he gets an assignment to go with a professor and his assistants into the jungles, looking to track down a legendary jungle-man who is said to be lord of the jungle, even able to talk to the animals. As the professor is injured and his assistants captured by natives, the rest of the patrol leaves to get more help, and Edgar is left to watch over the scientist. And, of course he meets up with the mythological jungle-man, the Phantom and the two of them manage a rescue of the professor's assistants. After the adventure, Edgar does go back to the States and get married. And he writes a fictional account of the story for the pulps, titled "Tarzan of the Apes."

Not a bad story. The only real flaw to the story is the first page is an explanation of how strict the requirements are to get into the Patrol, that one has to wonder just how Edgar managed it. Before he broke into the pulps, ERB didn't have a string of failures in various militaries, but he did have trouble holding down a steady job during those uncertain times. It should be also said that he didn't write Tarzan first. While that is indeed his most famous creation, it was John Carter and the "Princess of Mars" that he wrote first. One can only wonder about what encounter must have inspired that one. As an added bonus, there's also a Mandrake story, this one looking like it's straight from the comic strip.

The current issue from Moonstone continues his epic battle against the forces that strive to tear Begalla apart. His longtime friend President Luaga has been apparently assassinated and taken out of the picture and the populace and remaining rulers are dupes or under the sway of drug-induced paranoia. The Phantom meanwhile strikes from the shadows. We have the re-appearance of a missing character, but the stakes are taken higher as it's revealed the Phantom's kids have also been kidnapped. There are so many villains forming this conglomeration of evil that one needs a score-card to keep track of who's who. It also makes the Phantom being successful all that much harder as these are all threats and just taking out one or two won't get the job done. The art by Silvestre Szilagyi is top notch. I hope we hear more from him when this comic is no more.

Amazing Spider-Girl #21: Playing off other Spider-books, this one has the nice little heading of being a "Brand New May". It's not necessarily a trick either as Norman Osborne takes Peter Parker on a little field trip to one of his grandfather's old sites where in stasis is a duplicate of Peter's daughter May in a stasis tube and the signs point to her being Peter's real daughter, the one we've been reading about some kind of changeling substituted at birth. Otherwise, May is feeling the various pressures of responsibilities to her boyfriend, her friends, and those who would be her friends if she got an even break. But, then this wouldn't really be a Spider-verse book would it? Good solid fun as always.

American Dream #4 and 5: If you're a fan of Spider-girl, you're doing yourself a disservice not getting this mini-series. Tom DeFalco delivers on good old fashioned superheroic story-telling. He succeeds with both titles by populating the books with people you want to care about and who at times are all too human. Under another writer, this really would be all about the superfolk or wow-ing us with the "realistic" bad guys by peppering their language with expletives. Heck, the good guys would be matching them word-for-word. Here, there's a heart to this superhero action story. As the storyline progresses, we learn about what motivates American Dream, how much she worked to get here as she ruminates on just who she is beyond the mask, the person she has kind of forgotten about in her single-mindedness to pursuing her dream.

Likewise, the action angle of the plot has various sub-stories going on. The cop and the heroes that just wants to do their jobs, but being hamstringed by SHIELD agents who don't quite realize how much they are in over their head. The missing illegal immigrants including one girl's boyfriend who comes to American Dream for help. That pesky human element rearing its head again. While the forces for law, order, and justice are fractured because of their various self-interests, the villains on the other hand are unified in theirs. The scientist and his soldiers. Ion Man and Red Queen who just wants to kill an Avenger. And the silicone men and their master who just wants power and money.

There's really only one bad moment, the master of the silicone men, Silikong. See, I've long had this habit of when I read, I don't really think phonetically. After years of reading Kudzu, I was reading a particularly funny Sunday strip out loud to a friend. Being Sunday, it focused on the preacher as it often did, the Rev. Will B. Dunn. I'm reading it, and halfway through before I get to the punchline, I start laughing. I had just gotten the joke of the preacher's name. I wonder if DeFalco and his editors suffer from doing likewise. That's the only reason I can come up with that they'd let the master villain's name actually make it to print. I would have thought it was deliberate if the hero had at least started making fun of the name. Silly Kong? Seriously?

All New Atom #25: Just to state the obvious, another gorgeously done Ladronn cover. I'm going to miss those. Maybe he'll pick up some covers on another book that I get. The man has come along way from his channeling Kirby days. The story wants to have its cake and eat it too. A lot of it falls under the "final issue" storytelling cliche of wrapping a lot of things up in some neat little packages and having some big apocalyptic happenings (deaths, marriages, births, that type of thing). While the recent storyline does get all tied up, we don't really get what the Chronos' were after nor why Lady Chronos happens to be Ryan's first love from way too many issues ago and best left forgotten. And the villainous Dwarfstar is her son. It's one of those cutesy, tie things back to the beginning, every character related elements that comics trope out a little too often. Frankly, it seems to cheapen Dwarf Star in my opinion. That he was just some hired psycho-killer given duplicate powers of the Atom made him a whole lot more interesting. We have the return of Ray Palmer as a guest star, adding a fake conflict to the title. We know it's the last issue, so will Ryan live or die and will Ray return to being the Atom or not is implicit with his appearance here that really wouldn't be the case if we knew that there were 12 more issues after this one. There's the death of a long-term supporting cast member and the birth of a baby. Awww. Then, at the end, the book acknowledges it's at an end as Ray Palmer asks if Ryan's going to take some time off, retire, focus on teaching, you know, all the things one expects a character to do when his book ends. Instead, he says he still needs to capture the Chronos-es and Dwarf Star who got away. So the book ends, but wooh-ha, the adventure continues. Until he gets killed off in the pages of another book or just completely forgotten. Still, a good run and we'll miss you.

Captain Britain and MI13 #2: And Captain Britain is still dead in his own title. A good and interesting read as the country feels the death of their numero uno hero and those left behind have to continue the fight. Don't really buy that the Skrulls could invade the realm of fairies and English magic and do as well as they were doing when they could hardly hold their own against the Black Knight, a half vampiric Spitfire or Captain Britain in a realm where science works normally. And defeating the Green Knight by cutting off his head? Recovering from that is sorta his thing. A fun story but then I'm wondering, what about areas of magic in other countries... So far, so good. Going to have to stick around for awhile on this one I think.

The Last Defenders #4: The book is more of the same, feeling like a long prelude to a different book and team as we see Nighthawk shuffle through team-members to get a team that ultimately is not quite the Defenders with Son of Satan, She-Hulk, and Krang being not-Dr. Strange, not-Hulk, and not-Namor. With the promos of a Nighthawk with his face covered, speculation is rampant on the theme being carried through with a not-Nighthawk either as the African American SHIELD agent taking over that role. Between the long drawn out prelude type feel and the heavy reliance on the weak Civil War superhero registration angle, real story elements don't really get addressed as no one's asking what the Sons of Serpents were doing raising Aztec gods in Las Vegas. Or course, this issue deals with tearing up a bit of Atlantic City, maybe someone is trying to destroy all the gambling hot spots of the Americas? Seriously, the only reason I included this review was that the next issue blurb contains my brother's favorite word when we find out "the Son of Satan's in a defenestrating mood." Kyle Richmond may want to stay away from windows.

FX #5: Great cover evoking Ray Harryhausen (or a more recent reference, ARMY OF DARKNESS movie poster). We get some answers as we learn about the Aegis Group are a sanctuary for various worlds and beings of myth and magic including the golden calf, Nessie, Big Foot, Thor's hammer and Captain America's shield. Cool stuff. A friend is taken over by dark forces and becomes a big bad and we are introduced to another cool looking group of heroes, Home Front. The story might have finally gotten a little big as a little sub-plot from the last issue seems forgotten when we saw various characters suffering some sort of blackouts. Such a minor part of the previous issue, that it's liable to be completely forgotten about by the time it gets revisited.

Guardians of the Galaxy #2: For the most part, my assessment of the first issue still stands. There is some well done humor, but for the most part it's looking at characters that should be familiar and I'm just not seeing it. Sort of like Peter David in his heyday on the Hulk. As a book where you don't have any interest really in the characters, it's a somewhat enjoyable romp. But, it just doesn't feel authentic as it lets the humor and clever scripting gloss over making the characters feel real. But, I do like Vance Astro (the version from the original Guardians of the Galaxy, not Justice) and so I'm interested in seeing where that goes.

Justice League of America #22: What's annoying about using a comic as a tie-in to another series, especially as handled recently? How the book you're reading keeps having cliffhangers and issues raised in it and resolved elsewhere, especially when those issues should be germaine to the book you're reading. It makes the League just look especially sloppy as you don't see them following up on things. If you're reading this book, you don't know that the Martian Manhunter who was shown to have been taken by the villains last issue has been apparently killed. No, this issue has McDuffie finally getting around to resolving all the various plot lines that hot writer Brad Meltzer felt like opening but never addressing such as Vixen's powers and getting the Red Tornado back into an android body. We get logical cameos by some of DC's top resident scientists. Overall, a solidly written tale with logical ramifications and decisions as Vixen finally comes clean about her powers and Black Canary boots her off the team as her decisions had endangered them. A little strong as Superman and Arsenal were complicit, even if a little bit after the fact and they suffer no consequences for keeping the information to themselves (or even Batman for that matter who had deduced the whole thing but kept it to himself). If Vixen must go, then they should share in the punishment as they pretty much made the same decision to help her keep it secret.

The sparring between Arsenal and Hawkgirl just reads false to me. Arsenal is using real arrows. The whole purpose of sparring is to train under controlled conditions, if he's using real arrows, the risk of injury is high. At best it's counter-productive as it's training him to make sure he misses his opponent. Be far different if we are shown that the arrows are rubber tipped (they'd still hurt) or if it was just hand-to-hand. In war games, soldiers don't use live ammo.

Benes is back on the art, so it's back to being over-rendered further muddied by an over photoshopped coloring job.
JSA Classified #39: Another final issue, this one ties up the recent Wildcat two-parter. There's enough material out there, that a Wildcat TPB wouldn't be such a bad idea from his team-up with the Spectre, guest-stars in The Brave & The Bold, and few mini's and here. Other than it would almost seem like a boxing mini-series. A good story as he is helped out by friends to get his mind back and he goes after the organization that stole his skills in the first place. Mike Barr hints at Wildcat having a plan, but that quickly goes nowhere as they do gang up on him and his fight against all the fighters with his skills is over way too quickly and only really works if you don't think about it too much. Ultimately he wins because the lead villains aren't willing to do what it takes to win, ie download all the skills of all the fighters they've accumulated into themselves, each is scared just what it might do to his mind. While they dilly-dally, Wildcat is able to clean out their gang and take them out. It ends with a bit of that heart and human element, as it shows Ted Grant helping out an old friend through physical therapy much as the JSA were able to help him earlier and a little blurb honoring Bob Haney, the writer of those The Brave and the Bold stories.

Cannot say it's a surprise JSA and JLA Classified books didn't last long. They rarely do. Why? Lack of consistancy probably. There are no central characters. No central creators, each arc is by a different team, usually not a headlining combination of talent between them. Any one of those elements are stumbling blocks for a book in today's market. And, neither really lived up to their potential. For most of the existence of the JLA book (until it's last couple of arcs) and all of the JSA one, it focused on the current incarnations of the teams. None of them ever played up with the "Classified" angle, stories from the past that remained secret for some reason until now (Thomas' All-Star Squadron Annual years ago is a perfect Classified story as we find out that the JSA had protected future Presidents from assassination and failed in one case). Ultimately, they were mostly opportunities to tell some different type stories with some of the lesser seen characters or character combinations squandered for giving us yet another Green Lantern - Vandal Savage face off. Imagine an opportunity to do a team-up between the two with classic combinations of the teams, even a pre-crisis one where we finally see a team-up of just the counterparts. The JSA title would have been better titled "Spotlight" instead of "Classified" as it focused individual adventures. Most were as good as almost anything else out there, but nothing that really grabbed your attention unless you were already reading the books.

Star Trek: Assignment: Earth #3: A definite improvement over the last two issues as we get a little more into the characters and the time period as well as indications of a bigger plot at work as Gary Seven notes that they keep coming across technology that should be beyond the capabilities of the time. A little put off by a secondary character who is preaching non-violence is able to deliver a Chuck Norris round-house kick to the head when the situation calls for it. A solid read none-the-less with a bitter sweet ending.

Superpowers #4: Likewise, one of the more solid issues than the last several as the storyline gets addressed and we see characters and story elements being pulled together. Dynamic Man is still proving to be the big bad here, meanwhile there are things wrong with the ghost of Bruce Carter's ancestor. Seems he's a ghost because of a curse, that he failed George Washington somehow and was branded a traitor. The problem being, who's telling the truth. While he kept secrets, Carter seems to think that he's falsely branded a traitor and he sees his descendent and the Fighting Yank as a way to restore his honor and save him, while the American Spirit seems to think he really is a traitor and dragging his descendent down with him in his cursed nature. The ghost leaves in a huff and looking fairly demonic, vowing vengeance on the Spirit. Pyroman and Hydro nee Hydroman are kept pretty much to their original portrayals, though the text in the back says Pyroman "died" and reborn as a being of electricity and energy. Not really the case as he, like many electric heroes, survived what should have been electrocution, in his case execution by the electric chair. In the line-up in the back, we see heroes with names changed to protect presumably the trademarks somehow: Blue Beetle is Big Blue (what would IBM say about that?) and Yellowjacket is just Jack. Neither of those are really improvements, come across more as nicknames for them than actual superhero names.

The Twelve #6: This book continues its interesting dichotomy in that it's both written badly and well. The page where the Phantom Reporter has writer's block. The scene does a great job at communicating that. However, it takes a whole page when it could have taken just a few panels. This is where decompressed story-telling is bad for comics, the whole mini has been decompressed, not just this one page and it gives the story a plodding feel. We have pages and pages telling the stories in a very passive manner, giving all these character driven vignettes and not actual story, and they are all designed to show us how pathetic the various characters are, each in their own way. It feels like obvious manipulation in cases like the Blue Blade and Laughing Mask where it's over the top in the writing and the artwork.

Speaking of the Blue Blade, thought that his routine and all was supposed to be re-tooled and made more palatable for it to get the ok, yet it looks like it made it to the air pretty much intact? Are we sure this is the same JMS that actually worked in television?

The story of Rockman's origin is very poignant, managing to outdo both Captain Wonder and Mister E's stories. However, it completely re-writes the history of the character into being something completely different than he was before. And any future growth of the character out of this is basically stone-walled as the decision is made not to tell the character the truth. I had two problems with that. On the General's part, I just think that's a bone-headed and wrong decision. Deny telling someone the truth like that and you deny them from remembering all that's good as well, the real love he had, the family he still has and an opportunity to truly grieve and move on.

The other problem is from a storytelling point of view. It sets up a sort of false pathos and conflict. If the comic was Rockman's and this story was the major storyline, there'd be meat to it as we wonder will he discover the truth, what will he do when he finds out the general lied, what about the rest of Rockman's real family, etc. That'd be the story and the conflict. However, in the set-up that we got, the pathos and conflict is, Rockman doesn't know the truth but we the readers do. Thus we feel sorry for him, an empathy borne out by knowing something is bad but unable to help make it better. If the character dies, he does so without knowing the truth of the family out there, it makes the death more tragic in our eyes. It's different than the pathos of Captain Wonder who knows his family is dead and who lives with the fact they died without knowing what happened to him and from Mister E's family who rejects him and won't see the truth of him as being a hero even when presented with evidence of it. We still feel empathy, but it's because the pathos exists for the characters in the story, the conflict exists for them to work through and come to terms with. With Rockman, it's built on the fact we know something he doesn't, it's JMS manipulating us and our feelings. Rockman's story doesn't have to develop any further now, the easy decision would be to kill the character off for maximum payoff on what's set up here. Six issues to go, I hope there's more to the story. We see him slowly getting his memory back, from his backstory, the guy was a hero before he got powers. With his memory and all, he could be a great addition to the ongoing Marvel U. Considering the erratic and decompressed nature of the plotting and all, who knows if there is room for that kind of follow through?

JMS writes great scenes, but the structure of his overall storytelling and the decisions that lead to the scenes are greatly flawed. There's good stuff, but the whole things needs another revision or two to tighten up the writing and storytelling. If he's not telling scenes in very boring manner, he's re-writing and recasting characters, making them more mundane and sad. Mastermind Excello is a fascinating character with incredible physical and mental abilities and gadgets and such, he's Nick Fury with a little Professor X thrown in. Mr. E was in the pulp tradition with a vampire as an arch-enemy. Rockman from an underground kingdom. The Witness on the other hand gets a supernatural origin borrowing from the Spectre and even the Black Widow, but it makes the character seem even more pathetic and doesn't really explain his original m.o. that much, that he'd wait until after criminals committed acts instead of stopping them in progress. Well-written, yes. But actually extrapolated from the characters themselves? Not really. As if he doesn't want anything to detract from him wowing us and us recognizing him as a great wordsmith.

We do get a step up in the action and it finally looks like the plot is progressing where it should have several issues ago. Doesn't take much to figure out that it's Dynamic Man deliberately or subconsciously controlling the robotic Electro to take out the men who offended him earlier. Meanwhile he has a nice alibi that he's physically with the rest watching television while the attack is going on. Black Widow may end up being the suspected patsy though because of the other killings she is responsible for.

Both Superpowers and The Twelve make substantial changes to the original characters, but I have to give JMS credit that he at least does so in very moving story vignettes that clearly establish the characters and he seems to be laying down some groundwork for conflict that flows from there. Superpowers makes sweeping changes to the characters but doesn't bother to really define any of them, as if Krueger expects all readers to be as familiar with these characters as they are the Justice League or Captain America so he doesn't have to be bothered with explaining who they are. To the point it's confusing as to whether such changes are plot points or just convenient retcons. I know the characters are different, but then I've spent a lot of time reading and researching golden-age superhero comics. The average reader isn't going to know the relevancy of the original Daredevil being mute, or if the Face had any powers or not.

One thing both books have in common is that there seem to be too many characters for the writers to juggle effectively at their skill level. The Twelve would be better off if they compressed several of the characters. The Phantom Reporter, Mr. E, Laughing Mask, the Witness could fairly easily be combined into one or two characters, and thus giving a few characters a richer background/backstory. Fiery Mask and Electro are so far a non-entities, don't really need them with Captain Wonder, Dynamic Man and Rockman around. Likewise, Mastermind Excello's role so far could easily be folded into the Witness character given the needless add-on of a supernatural origin to the latter (whereas Excello did visualize things as they happened that could be explained away as types of supernatural visions).

Other minor notes.
Leafed through Blue Beetle as I'm wont to do but still cannot bring myself to buy the book. At first, this looked attractive in that it featured Dan Garrett prominently in flashback. Problem though, the writer seems to think that the scarab powered Dan Garrett Blue Beetle is the Blue Beetle from the 40's. He's not. While that Blue Beetle's identity was named Dan Garrett, it was a substantially different character, just as the Carter Hall Hawkman of the 1940's is different than the one from the 1960's. Now, the fluid nature of continuity being what it is, I don't have a real problem with saying that in the DCU, the scarab powered Blue Beetle had this long and illustrious career before dying and passing the mantle if not the power to Ted Kord. However, this means there was a superhero with Superman-esque levels of power that was active for close to 60 years! He'd have been a very big gun who somehow never served with JSA. And, like at the start of this column, it kinda gives the wrong idea of the real history of the character as it's so close to being like the real history but wrong in the details. Yes, there was a GA Blue Beetle. Yes, he was named Dan Garrett and the costumes ARE similar. As most readers don't know a lot about characters from that time, they will assume that the history here is correct. And there's nothing in the story that says it HAS to be in the 40's and not just "2o years ago", when this version of the Blue Beetle blazed forth only briefly.

The War that Time Forgot #3: Cover featuring work by Mark Schultz which was a natural in a title featuring dinosaurs. Cassus and the Mary Sue characters still get a little more play than they deserve but Tomohawk and Firehair showings as well and the story moves forward as we see there is purpose and intelligent design behind this "Secret War" on Dinosaur Island.

Some Comic Book Reviews

Gotten a little behind. News of impending layoff, a car accident and subsequent health dealings and a few days off to spend Valentine’s Day with the one I love can do that to a person. Well, the Hallmark holiday has come and gone, I’m mostly recovered, got a new car and still face an uncertain future on the job front in a couple of months. Hey, here’s a thought. Instead of worrying about immigrant labor taking menial and blue collar jobs while still putting some money back into our economy (they still gotta live and eat while here), how about doing something about all of those jobs being sent overseas to third world countries. Far more Americans are actually losing jobs to outsourcing than laborers being brought in to clean Wal-mart in the pre-dawn hours.

THE SPIRIT #14. A new creative team comes aboard, Aragones, Evanier, Ploog and Farmer. The results… it’s an OK book. It’s actually more akin to the type of book I would expect when someone announces they are bringing back a character like Will Eisner’s Spirit. Stylistically, it’s more akin to Eisner’s work which unfortunately means it’s devoid of any real life because the story is really about capturing the spirit of the creator and not the spirit of the character, the Spirit himself. Darwyn Cooke had taken the character and combined the retro charm and some stylistic flourishes of Eisner and merged them with his own style and storytelling creating a piece of Fusion Jazz in comicbook fun. Whereas this is more of a college band doing a cover tune and just succeeding with it mostly.

ZORRO #1. Like Dynamite’s SUPERPOWERS, there’s a painted look to the comic that I feel sadly undercuts the artwork. It’s a pretty book, but the artist, Francesco Francavilla is capable of such lush linework it seems a shame to lose it. http://www.francescofrancavilla.com/

Like THE SPIRIT, the end result of the book is one of being merely OK. While it’s giving us the origin and background of the character, it does so through flashback and narrative so we still see the title character in action (which they didn’t do with the Lone Ranger book which is why I didn’t get it, I’m sick of monthlies that are written solely for the Trade Collection in mind).

However, I hope that they paid some serious royalties to Isabella Allende as it makes heavy use of her over-hyped novel. Maybe not “over-hyped” since that implies that it was heavily hyped. It just seemed that those that read it loved it whereas I thought it was good but nothing really special. She romanticized the Indians too much in contrasting them with the evils of civilized men. Plus, making Zorro being truly part-Indian weakens the character a bit. His empathy now stems not from just a sense of justice and right & wrong, but partially because he's one of them. He has a vested reason to care. It’s subtle, but I think it’s also very significant as it changes the character’s basic motivation.

I’m not really sure why there needs to be a big focus on the origin story anyways. The concept of Zorro is fairly simple to understand and thanks to movies and such, people already understand the basic nature of the character. A little bit to establish the context and status quo and take us directly into the actual stories. And give him back his mustache! It’s better than no Zorro comic, but if you haven’t read them, I’d recommend going to the store and through the back issues for Topps’ version done by Don McGregor (which he continued as a gorgeous daily newspaper strip that also has been collected).

BRAVE AND THE BOLD #10: This comic keeps getting better and better. Although why they are replacing Perez on the book in what’s the final issue to the current story arc makes no sense, even as much as I love the work of incoming artist Jerry Ordway. At least it’s an artist of a comparable style and skill.

Here it’s still Perez and continuing the story of the classic Challengers of the Unknown reading the Book of Destiny serving as framing stories of various team-ups. We have Superman traveling to the past and teaming up with the Silent Knight and a slightly more recent past as Aquaman teams up with the newly formed Teen Titans on the day of his wedding to Mera. The book deftly shows why Perez is a natural for this title as he is able to draw superheroes, knights, a dragon, kid sidekicks in an underwater environment and make it all work wonderfully. Waid gets credit for actually making me laugh with a comment by Green Arrow about why Speedy wasn’t present.

Waid also makes me groan though with the Silent Knight giving his last name as “Kent”. It’s just too cutesy. Not to mention, wasn’t the Silent Knight one of the Hawk God avatars and thus according to Geoff Johns’ cosmology, a reincarnated Carter Hall? It’s one of the big problems with DCU right now, their continuity is totally screwed up, this time just rebooting and changing things arbitrarily such as the Doom Patrol, the past Justice League membership (again), the various books with different versions of Teen Titans. B&B seems to embrace that convoluted continuity as we have the original Challengers of the Unknown (though Red was wiped out of all existence a reboot or two ago), the current Doom Patrol makeup, but the old Metal Men who have also been recently rebooted if I got the gist of Will Magnus’ involvement in the mega-crossover last year and the current mini-series. So, ignore all the stupid retcons and such and just read this title. It’s more fun anyway, better written and drawn than about anything else put out by DC right now.

The Twelve #2. A good second issue. I only had a few quibbles. Such as why does Captain Wonder's chin look so humongous when he's not wearing the mask but more square jawed generic when he is wearing it? It's just plain distracting. We really don't see anything about Fiery Mask, Laughing Mask, Witness, or Mr. E. That's a pretty large chunk of the cast. Reading a bit about Mr. E's golden-age stories, he strikes me as being far more interesting a character than he's been played as here. He had a vampire as an arch villain! Bringing Electro into the compound makes zero sense in context of the story other than JMS needs him to be there.

Have to wonder about the timing of the narration as well. We know that it's the Phantom Reporter looking back to the early days out, but it implies that he's still ignorant of Vietnam and television especially if he's aware that the Rockman's people had never been discovered. JMS seems to not be able to keep PR's narration sound logically as if it's being done in the present, after the fact that he and the others have returned to active duty and not revealing too much when talking about the events happening in the recent past, so depending on the scene PR sounds as if he's narrating just as it happens. Instead of his narration being fully in the present after the end of the story, it reads as if it’s only in the present of whatever scene is being presented. That’s bad writing. Also, with PR’s job and background, it's a bit hard to bite that he's still out of the loop and having that hard of a time adjusting. The fact that there are still newspapers and such, he'd easily find a job regardless of the loss of "sources". Technology has changed, but a reporter’s job wouldn’t be that different.

My biggest quibble is the main plotline isn't delved into at all, despite it being the final climactic page of the first issue and the first page of this one. Will probably read fine in trade format, but a little frustrating in the monthly. It’s coitus interruptus of comic book storytelling.

However, JMS totally delivers on the heroes out of time bit and looking into different characters. The Captain Wonder scene was completely natural and organic and very powerful. It defines for us the type of man that he is and is heartbreaking in its pathos. I liked in seeing the hints of the Black Widow's dark background. And we feel a bit for Rockman. I hope his origin stays in place though (I don’t really care for mentally ill superheroes). Sure, in today’s context it is a bit fanciful, but this is the Marvel Universe after all. We know there are undersea and underground kingdoms and such. One more isn’t really a stretch.

FANTASTIC COMICS: Erik Larsen had this to say about his book:

And yeah, you may have seen "The Twelve" and maybe even "Superpowers," but this is another animal entirely.

This isn’t a depressing “everything has turned to crap and look how old, tired and silly looking these characters are” story -- we’ve seen those tepid tales time and time again ever since Alan Moore trotted out Marvel Man. This isn’t some pale imitation of an Alan Moore story -- it's an upbeat, energetic “look how cool these characters are and can be” type of thing.

Unfortunately, he’s wrong and this really didn’t live up to its potential. Overall, it was more pastiche than anything else, full of cutesy and slightly mocking elements in its attempts to be lighthearted. A big indicator of where it went wrong is the fact that it chose to mimic the bad paper and printing of 25-60 years ago with rough paper and out of register printing. See, right there it’s not about the story-telling and the characters, it’s about Artifact creation. It’s not about embracing cool characters and looking at what the creators did right in those days and telling stories that live up to that but looking at what was limiting and wrong, the parts you make fun of now that things have advanced past that. And, it’s trying to recreate an experience not through the story itself but through the physicality of the product. This prevents the art and writing to really deliver the story because the product itself is part of the story and as such the whole point is to be aware of the fact that it’s not real but a fake.

The individual stories are a hodge podge themselves. Larsen’s Samson tale illustrates the weaknesses of Larsen as a writer as it’s mostly just fluff mocking the idea of kid sidekicks. I’ve not read SAVAGE DRAGON in some time, but here his artwork looks rushed despite the powerful cover. Captain Kidd and the Golden Knight are the two of the most obscure heroes here, but their stories are also the best of the lot with only a few cutesy groaners. Yank Wilson starts off well, but denigrates into being more cutesy over-the-top parody than an action story. Stardust is an essay disguised as a story in that it’s more or less “about” something than a story in and of itself. Flip Falcon is interesting but it also is an exercise in completely re-inventing the character into something drastically different. Space Smith reads as a chapter in an ongoing story that’s completely pastiche and low on substance. Sub Saunders is appropriately 90% in German in that it makes the text of the story as indecipherable as the hideous artwork.


THE PHANTOM #16. Another book that has been getting better and better lately. The artwork and storytelling has settled into a decent consistency. A couple of story arcs are being tied together, telling a moving opening chapter to the next arc. One thing I liked with the recent issues is they are finally bringing something to the Phantom that was solely needed: villains worthy of the character. When superheroes were starting out, there was a tendancy for the flashy heroes to have a bit more mundane foes. The more mundane the hero though, the flashier his villains were, as if there was only so much un-reality they could put on the page. Eventually, supervillains become more and more prevalent as the public became used to the idea of super-characters and wanted to see adversaries worthy of the heroes, not just situations requiring Superman to bust down a wall (thus, a shift towards the story being about conflict and jeopardy and not just a display of ability). Eventually, Holmes had a Moriarty.

For some reason, the Phantom never really caught up. While he’s been in print for decades in both strips and comic books, his foes seemed to get increasingly mundane. The only fanciful stuff about the Phantom seemed to be the Phantom himself. He needs stories and adversaries that are as colorful as he is. I’m not calling for superpowers, aliens, and true supernatural elements to be brought in, but I am saying I wouldn’t be adverse to seeing a little of the larger-than-life sense of those things to be injected alongside the stories of real concerns of Africa and the jungles.

Also, of interest in this book are two of the ads of upcoming comics by Moonstone. One, the return of Captain Action! As a big Gil Kane fan, there’s a lot this series is going to have to live up to, but I’m hoping for a fun book. And Chuck Dixon is returning to a classic character he helped re-introduce people to 20 years ago: Airboy! A little pet peeve as the ad is a bit misleading that if you aren’t aware of the fact you might assume that Chuck CREATED Airboy himself and not just updated the character for the 80’s.