Getting it started off.
This week, we got Grant Morrison’s Seven Soldiers #0. I liked it, and think it could be the start of something epic, but two things nag at me. One, there’s a new Shining Knight coming out in conjunction with the epic set of miniseries, and I hope, considering Sir Justin’s recent Identity Crisis appearance, they remember to tell us what happened to the old one. Two, there’s a disturbing probable character-death.
I got:
JLA Classified #4: “I Can’t Believe It’s Not the Justice League” Part 1. I’m the perfect target audience for this book, being such a huge fan of the JLI, the creative team, and my favorite superhero, Blue Beetle. That said, it seemed too light, even for me. The JLI worked best when comedic moments worked to relieve tension, or when really intense events happened to break up the silliness and force the heroes to act HEROIC (like the return of Despero around JLAmerica #38, for example). I’ll still buy this even if it remains a complete sitcom, but I’m hoping for Giffen, DeMatteis, and Maguire to top “Formerly Known As the Justice League” with this one.
Sleeper Season 2 #9: I was really disappointed when Grifter didn’t end up killing Pit Bull and Bloodwulf, two characters I could never stand. Also, I wasn’t thrilled to see Grifter back on his feet after all the character development Joe Casey gave him in Wildcats 3.0 when he was wheelchair-bound, and then projected his brain into Maxine Manchester’s cyborg body. But Grifter was my favorite part of the issue–I always like the guy, and I’m a huge WildC.A.T.s/Wildcats fan. Of course, I think Holden is an imbecile for trusting Miss Misery, who totally sold him out to Tao. Unless he expected it, and this is all part of his master plan…
The Orlando MegaCon comic book convention is this weekend, and I am pumped. I can’t wait to load up on cheap back issues and TPBs!
Legion of SuperHeroes #3: Wow. Just…wow. Fenris was bitching last week about the crappy trend nowadays of story arcs being inflated and stretched out so they could tidily fit stories into TPBs, and books suffer. He longed for the days of self-contained stories that included threads of an overarching plot. Well, look no further than here. There is the possibility that the trend will only last long enough to introduce us to all of the characters, but let’s hope Waid keeps this up.
Ultimate Nightmare #5 (of 5): Very interesting. Very, very interesting. So will our new-found hero be replacing Iron Man in the Ultimates, since Iron Man will be getting his own title next week? I’d like some input from Marvel regulars on how they view the conclusion of this mini: Does this throw a wrench into Marvel’s plan to keep the Ultimate titles less convoluted and confusing, or is the upcoming event necessary? Personally, I like it.
Amazing Spider-Man: Meh. Molten Man Jr. Been there, done that. Yawn. Thing is, it’s written really well so I want to keep reading it. Plus having a second artist for the flashback scenes is a nice touch.
Spider-man/Human Torch: Light hearted fun in a classic comics vein. I liked this issue much more that the first. Plus it was fun to see that it didn’t turn out the way you thought it might with both guys learning a big lesson.
Ultimate Nightmare: Well I gotta say that was a surprise. When I read the revelation, I gotta say it illicited an “Oh crap” out of me. This is the kind of threat the Ultimates were created for. And this can only lead to a Ultimate-wide crossover with every book, which gets me excited. Still, I really wish they’d have left the space travel and aliens out of the Ultimate Universe for a few years. Get things established on earth first. I was disappointed in the Ultimates second arc in the first volume, when it was revealed that Skrulls were the enemies. I’d prefer a more earth central story for now. There aren’t enough Ultimate heroes to handle an invasion.
Legion of Super-Heroes - Agreed. An excellent issue. This is the most engaging incarnation of the Legion that I’ve seen.
Outsiders - I don’t like the art on this book, but the twist at the end is just delicious. And I wonder what’s going on with Bats.
Nightwing - Yay! Flashback to Babs as Batgirl!
Richard Dragon - Okay, Neron intimates that he’s THE devil - which we know isn’t true, but apart form that, an interesting issue. However, according to the Previews catalog, the series will terminate with #12. A shame. I tried to get people to read it, really I did…
Seven Soldiers of Victory #0: I was going to wait for the trades of this whole thing… but I just couldn’t resist (also DC kind of sucks about trades, but that’s another story). I absolutely loved the issue (I’m a big sucker for cowboys) and can’t wait for the upcoming miniseries’. I am a little worried about his use of Zatanna (since she’s the only really high-profile character he’s using), but I’ll reserve judgment until I see it. I wonder who the 7th soldier was supposed to be? Maybe we should start a thread on this like the ID Crisis thread.
Legion of Super-Heroes #3: Love this series! It’s easily my most anticipated read every month, and I think I might end up buying the trades, too, just to have it in an easily accessible format. Just a great book all around.
Although, what was with the crap-o-rama paper quality this time around? Didn’t do the coloring any favors.
Wonder Woman #213: Eh. Whatever. It’s chugging along. If it weren’t for my loyalty to the character, I wouldn’t be buying it.
Why on earth did Athena have to work out some big strategy to give Diana the Medusa head at a specific moment? The monster was practically mindless. Whatever.
I was really, really tempted to pick up Battle Hymn #1, because I’ve been waiting for that series for quite a while, but I think I might just wait for the trade.
Still have to pick up Flash and Sonic the Hedgehog, too.
I picked up this issue in preparation for the next issue’s crossing-over with Flash.
To answer your question :
To give Zeus the opportunity to demonstrate that he was without mercy.
I thought I noticed something different. The shop I got mine from had a gigantic stack of LoSH books - larger than any new book I’ve seen there. I wonder if DC printed tons of extra copies at a reduced cost to vendors and cut corners on their paper stock.
Seven Soldiers: One really nice touch was that the artist drew Vigilante in a Moebius/Lt. Blueberry style, which was a nice touch. I also liked The Whip’s self-conscious fetishism (Calling Carol Danvers!) and Dyn-o-Mite Dan’s fanboy geekiness.
“Johnny Frankenstein”?
Ah, thanks CandidGamera, that makes sense.
One thing (as if there were onyl one) that I didn’t like about this ish was how Zeus turned into an absolute raving maniac all of the sudden.
I also forgot to mention that the double-page spread toward the end of SS #0 is one of the most horrifying comic pages I’ve ever seen. Brr.
Flash - nothing terribly special, but an interesting crossover between Wally and Wondy.
Fantastic Four - Yay! Good stuff.
Invincible - Also good stuff.
PS238 - Great stuff.
Jingle Belle - Funny stuff.
Annnnd… several I haven’t read yet, including Conan, The Witching, Sleeper, and Powers.
I told you to wait for #3, didn’t I? I told you. Issue 1 was necessary to break the path.
Sleeper 2.9. I loved the first season of this title to a ridiculous degree, but the second season’s definitely been a bumpier rider. Despite the occasional flash of the intesity and heartbreak that made the frirst season so wonderful, this season has felt much more mundane, and perhaps never more so than in this issue. Time’s running out for the expected bloodbath to wipe the slate clean before this title ends at #12, and I’m almost disappointed. (At bare minimum, would someone please kill the damn werewolf already?)
Metabarons: Blood and Steel and Metabarons: Poet and Warrior. I loved Jodorowsky’s The White Lama, and when these two volumes of a science fiction series I’ve heard raves about for years showed up in the fifty-percent off boxes at my local comic shop, I pounced on them. Well … at least I really liked The White Lama.
The Metabarons is a space opera tale of a multigenerational warrior dynasty, as told by one thoroughly irritating robot to an even more thoroughly irritating robot. I was once a space opera junkie, and I wish I had encountered it then because I might have enjoyed it more. As it stands, I found it difficult to slog past gratuitous bloodlettings, rapes, dismemberments and mutilations to pay any attention to whatever larger story the author may have been trying to tell. I like a good bloodbath as much as the next girl, but here, it felt like the author was indulging his inner fetishist rahter than telling a story. If you’re looking for lots of images of under-written female characters being mutilated and killed, here’s your book.
But the much praised art? Truly superlative. The images are richly imagined, highly detailed, and lavishly painted. I understand why so many people buy the book for its artwork, for it is a thing of beauty indeed. I’m not sure whether the stunning pictures will be enough to prevent these books from heading straight to eBay, but they just might. It’s that pretty.
Selkie, now that DC is doing nice reprints of all the Humanoids stuff, I’m looking to find something interesting from there that’s not entirely about having violent sex which ends with the woman’s arms being ripped off. (Which, from what I’ve seen of Metabarons and the first volume of Technopriests which someone got me is basically Jodo’s stock-in-trade.) Are you saying that The White Lama doesn’t have all that crap? Becase I’ve seen it around and thought of picking it up several times now but was unnerved by what I’d seen of Jodowarsky in the past.
–Cliffy
Cliffy, all I have read of The White Lama is the first Humanoids volume (pre-DC), but thus far it is blissfully free of sexually charged mutilation and death. It’s not without unpleasant deaths, mind you, but they are brief, non-sexual, non-fetishistic, and appear essential to setting up the plot. I have some concerns that the set-up just begs for a racist interpretation of the events that I presume follow, but I haven’t actually seen that thus far. I will warn that some of the text has that “lost in translation” feeling to it, which may or may not have been changed when DC got their hands on it. There are no “all our base belong to us” mistranslations, but some of it sounds stilted. Metabarons was much worse in that regard, so maybe the text is an accurate depiction of Jodowarsky’s writings.
If you’re looking for a good Humanoids reprint, may I also suggest Miss: Better Living Through Crime? It’s a cracking little noir about an interracial pair of criminals set during Prohibition New York that manages to avoid all the usual cliches. There’s one section where the art does the reader no favors in distinguishing between a couple of key characters, but overall I enjoyed it immensely. There’s apparently now a full color reprint of it, as well as an earlier greyscale one published in English by Humanoids right before the relationship with DC began. At the time the greyscale version was released, I was told that it looked better in greyscale than in full color, but I haven’t seen the color version so I can’t compare.
Didn’t some American write Miss?
There’s also a Road to Cao Bang that looks interesting that I’ll try to get eventually, but this weekend it’s all gonna be about Skizz.
–Cliffy
Skizz, by Alan Moore? Someone reprinted it? It’s pretty good. I remember reading an oversized TPB a couple years back–probably from Titan or another British publisher.
Philippe Thirault is French.
re: Ultimate Nightmare.
I still LOVE Ultimate Captain America. That fight scene with the Soviet quasi-Cap was great. “Fighting is about WINNING!” 
You’re obviously not studying the WCD threads like you should be, Lou. 
DC is reprinting a ton of stuff from 2000AD at the rate of 3 TPB a month. I’d been reviewing them pretty regularly but I haven’t had a chance to pick any up for the last few weeks. By now the backlist is at about a dozen volumes. Anyway, if I recall the schedule right, Skizz came out this Wednesday. Moore’s Halo Jones is planned for sometime this spring. But next time you hit the LCS you should pick up the first Nikolai Dante volume, ‘cuz it’s the bees’ knees.
–Cliffy