The Comic Book Thread

[SuperKevin]

DC Comics has announced production of a new monthly Masters of The Universe series to start in April. 8 year old SuperKevin is ecstatic right now

[christguz]

I'll do my review and what not on "Death of the Family" tomorrow once i pick up this weeks and last weeks issues.

[calgaryballer]

Avengers Vol 1 Premier HC
Brian Michael Bendis and John Romita

I've started to get further in to comics culture recently, downloading various podcasts and such, and one theme on my favorite (House to Astonish) has been a dislike of Bendis. I found this weird, as I've always enjoyed his stuff. Avengers Vol 1 continues that trend, as I found it a fun romp in the aftermath of Civil War. Steve Rogers puts the Avengers back together, but under the command of Maria Hill. Bucky Barnes wears the Cap mantle early in this series, and is joined by Tony, Spider Man, Spider Woman, Wolverine and Hawkeye (and later Noh-Varr of the Kree).

It's a time travel story, in which Kang the Conquerer has broken the time stream after watching 20 wars against a future Ultron. The Avengers future kids have done what they can with the help of the Hulk and Future Tony, but they require the help of the reformed Avengers to disrupt the timestream and set it back to the proper way. Romita's art is it's usual solid to very good and you have to think that some of Bendis' Age of Ultron starts here

[calgaryballer]

I started reading Hickman's Manahattan Projects. Really like it so far. Basically, the premise is that all the geniuses in New Mexico (einstein, oppenheimer, etc) are working on the Atomic Project, but that is only a cover for the rest of the fucked up shit they are doing. Love the art, especially the use of colour for Oppenheimer (he is the most fucked up so far, but I think Einstein has some shit going on too)

[calgaryballer]

Contains Walking Dead 100. All I have to say is - holy fuck. I've always read Walking Dead in trades, so am behind most of the message boards and such. I managed to avoid all the spoilers, but knew something big happened. When it came, it came out of nowhere and I let out a huge HOLY FUCK to my wife. Only another 6 months for Vol 18...

Spoiler for what happened

 

Glen gets brutally murdered by Negan. Fucking barbwire bat to the head.

Trying to plow through as many backlogged comics as I can tonight while sitting on the couch watching Golden Globes with the wife. Think Dr. Strange Season 1 is up next, followed by Saga

[calgaryballer]

Avengers Vol 2 Premiere HC

Not a bad follow up to Vol 1. Red Hulk is introduced and if you read the story carefully (The Watcher basically gives it away), you can tell it's Thunderbolt Ross even though they never name him outright. In this volume, minor baddy The Hood discovers the location of the Infinity Gems that the Illuminatti have hidden away. Tony makes the decision to tell Steve Rogers, who is pissed that Tony is keeping such a major secret from him so soon after Civil War. From there it's a quest book as the various Avengers teams race to get the additional gems. A pretty plot heavy book in which you can guess all the major points well ahead. I like any story involving the Gems, but felt this didn't take advantage of them enough. Frankly, unless Thanos is wearing them, no one knows how to control them.Big twist at the end though.

I thought that Vol 3 was next, as I have that out of the library already. Realized that there is a Fear Itself volume in between, so should get that sometime this week.

I'd give this volume a 4/5

[calgaryballer]

I forgot I have Morrisons run on JLA out of the library. I love Morrison, but man i am finding it a slog. I don't think it helps that this was the period DC made some changes to superman and he is wearing a stupid blue suit with new powers

[calgaryballer]

Fear Itself
Matt Fraction

Read this at the library while waiting for volunteering. Fear Itself Avengers was the next in my reading, but I figured I should read the base series first (on the first page it lists like 20 tie ins. Fucking stupid). I can't say I'm sad I didn't read this first time around. I like Fraction, and Immonen's art is real nice, but I just didn't get the sense of gravitas that I think they were going for in this series. Basically, Odin has a brother who comes back and wants to kill him. Odin says fuck off, I am going to kill all of Earth so that doesn't happen. Thor says, fuck you dad, I am going to save Earth. And he does. Whoopee.

2.5/5

I have the Avengers tie in at home so I will read that. Maybe the tie ins are better. I know my library also has Thunderbolts and Secret Avengers tie ins, but other than the first couple Thunderbolts when Norman Osborn ran it, I wouldn't know the back story of either team so I left them behind.

[SuperKevin]

The entire Fear Itself run isn't that bad.

My library doesn't have graphic novels

[calgaryballer]

The entire Fear Itself run isn't that bad.

My library doesn't have graphic novels

I will give mine mega props. They have a very good selection and seem to do their best to grow it. Almost all the New 52 series are there, including some really irrelevant ones. I'd have never picked up stuff like Batgirl without it

[IamMedellin]

Glad Kieron Gillen is writing this series, as Ive enjoyed everything he's written at Marvel, good setup and even though Im a lil puzzled about a few things, lookin forward to the nxt issue

mainly

• Where's Patriot?
• Kate Bishop is a slut now?
• who is this Captain Mamacita?

[SuperKevin]

I'm picking that one up tomorrow

[calgaryballer]

Couple things to post - first I have a code for anyone to get a digital copy of the Dr Strange Season One Graphic Novel. If it's gone, means someone beat you to claiming it

 

Dssp1x7z3iax

marvel.com/redeem

[calgaryballer]

Defenders
Matt Fraction

Took this one out of the library. Conveniently, it came out of the Fear Itself event as the team is dealing with one of the rampaging Gods that escaped at the end of the event. Now, I like team books, especially ones that contain more 'obtuse' characters. This team is Dr Strange, Iron Fist, Namor, She Hulk and Silver Surfer. Is there a more disparate group of hero's that could work together? I've been a big fan of Iron Fist since Brubaker and Fraction concluded their run on his solo series, and I've never really been able to get enough of him since. I shared the Dr Strange code, and he's another I quite like but who is usually shunted to the back of team books.

The gist of this collection is two fold - one, the World Breaker from Fear Itself is rampaging towards Wundagore Mountain. Two, what they find at Wundagore Mountain is a nice set up for the second collection. I don't want to share too much for fear of spoiling it, but it's safe to say that Captain Nemo from 20,000 Leagues is somehow tied in to the story.

I really liked this collection, and can't wait for Vol 2 to come out

Five Iron Fists out of Five

[calgaryballer]

Avengers: Fear Itself
Brian Michael Bendis

I mentioned in an earlier post that some people don't like Bendis. I've read more and it seems to be that he is too talky. That's fine. And if that's how you feel, this book isn't for you. However, I ABSOLUTELY LOVED this book. The talkiness does it for me, especially in this volume of Avengers. This book kind of runs parallel to Fear Itself, but I think would stand OK on its own.

This book is done in an oral history interview style. Each Avenger has their time in front of the camera, with their interviews spliced to make a cohesive narrative of what happened during the Red Skulls attack, how they felt, the decisions they made, etc. Some characters got more face time than others, with the stand out (for me) being Jessica Drew aka Spider Woman. You see her inner thoughts, how she knows (or feels) that none of the Avengers trust her because of her past with Hydra. How she feels that she's never really done that big 'thing' that lets the world know I AM AN AVENGER! It's nice to see behind the mask and get the heroes worries and concerns while the world is burning down.

There are some New Avengers stories in this collection as well, including one about Luke Cage's nanny, Squirrel Girl. It's charming and kind of fun. I liked it and had never heard of this character before hand.

Biggest drawback to this probably comes from the condensed time frame in which it had to release in single issue. I think there are three artists in this collection, and the difference between them is stark. I think they were all pretty well done, but it doesn't lend itself to a cohesive look. Regardless it gets Five Squirrel Girls out of Five