Am I blind, or has nobody started this thread yet?
52: You will believe a man can fall!
My main reaction to this week’s Green Arrow:
Yay, Mia’s alive!
Also, Deathstroke **really ** wants to be in prison for some reason.
American Virgin: That’s one of the top funeral meltdowns I’ve ever seen. I really enjoy this book, and hope the story is actually going somewhere. Is it meant to be a limited series, like Y: The Last Man? In other words, a specific story told over a set number of issues, then they’re done?
Superman: Lois has a nice butt. ahem Good issue (even aside from Lois being way sexy). Clark’s narration was great. Perry’s a mean, mean man - I’m not quite sure if his list was to punish Clark or just give him a chance to prove he still has his stuff.
52: ‘You will believe a man can fall’ was just brilliant. As was ‘Sweetie, hot.’ I’m still not convinced Supernova isn’t Booster from a little bit in the future.
Fables: Mmmm…Fables. Not the best art the book’s ever had, but a nice story.
Next: I’m loving this book already. Even just their names are great.
Firestorm: I seriously dislike Gehenna. On another subject, is that last panel something, or what?
Nah, it was just a light week and my brother’s run off with my books, so I’m working from memory here.
Superman: Lois and Clark are just the cutest couple ever. I’ve never followed Superman regularly before, was Perry always this mean? It’s very good, but I’m concerned they’ll overplay Clark’s personal and professional struggles.
52: Great stuff with Clark there. I especially enjoyed Lois’ reaction later. Not so funny when it’s your sweetie jumping out of windows for an interview, is it?
Green Lantern: Great work with the Cyborg. As if he wasn’t scary enough without a fistfull of power rings. They should lock him up in Oa next to Superboy Prime. Throw in Ultraman and Bizarro and that’s one hell of a team there.
Green Lantern Corps: Very nice. I’m really enjoying the sci-fi police procedural vibe.
I liked Eternals #1. Never been exposed to the characters before, aside from Sersi. But I am starting to see a recurring theme in Gaiman’s writing:
[spoiler]
Sandman. Stars a group of people called The Endless. Essentially immortal, they interact with other immortals, ranging from a shaman who remembers the smell of mammoths to Indian princes who have eaten magic apples, to Asgardian Gods such as Odin, Thor and (critically to the overarching plot) Loki.
American Gods. Asgardian Gods having outlived the Vikings, causing mischief in North America. Bit of a dull novel, but lots of people seemed to like it. Stars Odin and Loki.
A planetary system triggered by the cosmic-threatening temporal displacement of Captain America causes the creation of our favourite Marvel superheroes four centuries too early. The Asgardian God Thor stars in a neat plot twist, as well as the cosmic immortals known as the Watchers.
The Eternals. This is a new Marvel publication reviving an old Jack Kirby franchise. These people are, you guessed it, immortal and placed on the earth by cosmic beings called the Celestials. Some snappy patter by an old Avenger called Sersi. Some machinations between the immortals. One gets blown up by a nifty hand grenade, after explaining their history. Another seems to have amnesia (which is fine - the vast majority of people in the Marvel universe have amnesia). No sign yet of Asgardian Gods, but really it seems inevitable. [/spoiler]
First Amongst Daves: So what you’re saying is that Neil Gaiman may have an abiding interest in mythology-related themes? It’s a crazy theory, but it just might stick!
I have Eternals in my stack from a week or two ago when it came out, but I haven’t read it yet.
Menocchio: I’m not sure perry was really being mean. I took it more like he was being really blunt and direct in order to shake Clark up. Perry seems like a guy who will figure out who needs a kick in the ass once in awhile, and will give it to them.
An everyman, pleasant if a bit boring, is living a mundane life and is in love with a woman whom the readers can immediately tell is all wrong for him.
Is drawn unwittingly into a hidden world of magic that is hidden in/exist alongside our world, usually through an act of kindness on his part. Often this world is secretly part of his heritage.
Along the way he meets a girl.
There are many adventures, and usually a subplot involving a much darker figure allied to our hero.
After saving the day through courage and cunning, our hero is given the choice between returning to the mundane world or embracing the magical world. He inevitably chooses magic, largely because he’s grown to love the girl he met there, but also because he’s changed for the heroic and exciting by the experience
See Neverwhere, Stardust, Anansi Boys, and with some major variation, American Gods and the Books of Magic.
Granted, Sandman, Coraline, The Day I Swapped my Father For Two Goldfish, and virtually all of his short stories are exceptions, but that’s as true for your theory as it is for mine.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but I, as a matter of fact, am. I’m in the Catskill Mountains, 40 miles away from the nearest comic shop, so I have my local comic shop in the city hold my usual comics until Labor Day. (I’ll probably be back in the city once or twice before then, but for the most part, I’m useless in weekly threads until then.)
Green Lantern Corps #2 – Interesting story here, but very disjointed. I dn’t think Gibbons and Gleason are well matched, because this is where both of them are weakest – connecting the narrative (Gibbons) and having the storytelling flow naturally (Gleason). If Gibbons were pencilling himself, for instance, it’d be a lot easier to follow the action and esp. the scene changes. While a different writer would be easier to follow generally. But it’s not boring, like some of Gibbons’ previous work, so I’m still on board.
The Escapist #1 – The first Kavalier and Clay tie-in comic I’ve read; I like that it’s behind the scenes instead of trying to just do the classic “K&C” run from the “40’s”, because how could anyone make it as good as Chabon described it? The art is lovely, if a little spare.
Y - TLM #whatever – Great issue – I love seeing this side of Dr. Mann, given that she’d been pretty one-note through the series. Although I think Vaguhan could have come up with a better end to the relationship than simply Ali’s gf being a LUG.
The Thing #8 – Sweet way to go out. Didn’t like the resolution to the Ben/Alicia/Arlo triangle because it cut through all the good stuff Slott did with that in prior issues. I’d rather he left it alone so he or someone else could return to it when the market was more forgiving instead of resolving what had been a pretty well crafted subplot in two panels. I’m going to miss this book.
Thanks, cbawlmer, for starting - I was on vacation for a couple days.
I got : Civil War Frontline #3; Ultimate FF #31 where the plot twists in a big way; JLA Classified #24; GL Corps #2; Superman #654; GL #12; Fables #51 and 52 #10.
Dammit, DC - Make up your mind. If you have Ronnie as Firestorm, I’ll buy the book. If not, I won’t. But this Nuclear Man seems to have a weird Half-Life.
I picked up Civil War: Thunderbolts. Yeah, everyone hold onto their seats for the return of the Porcupine. And trusting Zemo, for absolutely no good reason at all.
I also grabbed the first issue of an independent called Revere. As in Paul Revere, patriot, silversmith, and werewolf hunter. I like the concept and the art is interesting. You could do worse.
Yeah! Aaron Stack, the Captain, Monica Rambeau, Dirk Anger… I’m sure it’s another one of those damned coincidences that has plagued the two companies since X-Men/Doom Patrol, but if they’d actually tried to ape Nextwave, this is what it would look like.
