Featured Archives - Comic Book Herald: Recent Episodes
Featured Archives - Comic Book Herald
If you’re here it probably means you or your child have recently fallen head over heels into the Dog Man Universe, and as a Dad fully immersed in that universe, let me extend you a Supa Welcome! While the continuity and narrative crossover of Dog Man stories is not especially complex, the books don’t prioritize telling you where each graphic novel and various spinoffs fall in order. Since Dav Pilkey’s comics are the surest gateway to reading since bribing children with candy, it’s well worth making the series list chronology easier for everybody.
Do you have to read Dog Man in order? Absolutely not. I’m yet to meet a kid who wasn’t perfectly content mostly reading the graphic novels out of order (then again, I’m yet to meet myself as a child via time travel, so never say never!). Nonetheless, there are a variety of characters who appear and develop over the course of these works, particularly Petey the Cat and Lil’ Petey. It will make more sense to read through the books in order the first time – and then like an absolute maniac the next 10,000 or so times.
As I type this in 2025, there are 14 Dog Man graphic novels by Dav Pilkey, and 5 Cat Kid Comic Club spinoffs (Also by Pilkey – to date, no other comics creators have entered the Dog Man Universe). While new Dog Man graphic novels have released pretty consistently since 2016, it’s been a full two years since the last (fifth) Cat Kid comic. Cat Kid Comic Club #6 has been rumored for a while now, and is currently estimated to see print in 2026.
The other biggest question parents often have is what reading level should a kid be before trying Dog Man? Speaking only from the unimpeachable authority that comes with the self-appointed title Big Daddy, both my oldest kids gravitated to reading Dog Man pretty soon after learning to read. Officially, I’d say Dog Man is perfect for kids 6 to 9, so first, second or third grade. That said, kids come to reading at different speeds and with varying enthusiasm – if you’ve got a kid who never wants to read and suddenly they’re giving Dog Man a go, heck yeah! In terms of whether or not Dog Man is appropriate for your young reader, there’s no cursing, no excessive violence, and extraordinarily minimal tackling of mature themes. These are books for kids to love, and Dav Pilkey knows what kids love. Unfortunately, that does also mean there’s plenty of potty humor. We are talking here about the author of Captain Underpants and the Sensational Saga of Sir-Stinks-A-Lot. Your kids will love it, and if you’re like me, you’ll probably grimace but enjoy their joy. Mileage may vary!
Now, inevitably after your child reads Dog Man, you are both going to be looking for more comics like Dog Man. There are two good options here, and coincidentally, they’re both written by me! First off, try out Comic Book Herald’s best comics for kids! Then, try the article I wrote for Popverse specifically about good comics for kids who just saw the Dog Man movie! Otherwise, find a complete Dog Man reading order below, and enjoy the comics!
Dog Man Reading List:Dog Man: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Dog Man Graphic Novel #1
Prequels:
- Captain Underpants and the Terrifying Return of Tippy Tinkletrousers (Captain Underpants #9)
- Captain Underpants and the Sensational Saga of Sir Stinks-A-Lot (Captain Underpants #12)
Ok, so technically, Dog Man is a creation of George and Harold, the star child genius comic book makers from Dav Pilkey’s earliest claim to fame, Captain Underpants. George and Harold reveal “The Adventures of Dog Man” as one of their earliest collaborations in Captain Underpants #9. While you don’t need to read all of Captain Underpants to understand Dog Man, it does kind of help to know who George and Harold are, since they also introduce the Dog Man graphic novels! My kids had read all the Dog Man books backwards and forwards a billion times before they went back for Captain Underpants, though, so this is more “interesting” than necessary (a good tagline for Comic Book Herald!).
Dog Man Unleashed: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Dog Man Graphic Novel #2
Dog Man: A Tale of Two Kitties: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Dog Man Graphic Novel #3
Better than Dickens. It needed to be said.
“A Tale of Two Kitties” is the Dog Man story that really sends the series into the sales stratosphere, introducing the infinitely affable Lil’ Petey. This is the book most thoroughly inspiring the movie and the (superior) musical!
Dog Man and Cat Kid: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Dog Man Graphic Novel #4
Dog Man: Lord of the Fleas: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Dog Man Graphic Novel #5
Dog Man: Brawl of the Wild: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Dog Man Graphic Novel #6
Dog Man: For Whom the Ball Rolls
Collects: Dog Man Graphic Novel #7
Dog Man: Fetch-22: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Dog Man Graphic Novel #8
This marks the point in time when you are now officially ready for the best musical of the 2000s: Dog Man the Musical. You may be chuckling at my apparent humor – that happens to a lot of readers! – but I promise you, I’ve never been more serious about anything in my life. The absence of a single Tony for Jamie Laverdiere’s performance as Petey the Cat is the greatest crime in awards history. If Dog Man The Musical doesn’t instantly make it into your family’s kid-friendly playlists, I’ll give you your money for reading this free article back!
Cat Kid Comic Club: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Cat Kid Comic Club Graphic Novel #1
Most guides looking at when to read Cat Kid alongside Dog Man will base their placement on mere release date, like common court jesters. But you and I, we’ve read Dog Man for bedtime reading too many times to be made into fools! While Cat Kid’s first graphic novel is published right after Dog Man #9, it actually fits neatly after Dog Man #8, particularly regarding the developments for Flippy and the Tadpoles, who make up most of the Comic Club.
I’ve written as much elsewhere on my lists for best comics for kids, but Cat Kid Comics Club is my favorite work from Dav Pilkey, experimenting with different styles and tones as he encourages creativity with glorious passion and humor. If as a parent, you’re a little tired of the Dog Man Universe, just wait until you get to bounce to Cat Kid and learn about the history of Frederic Wertham from the perspective of manic tadpoles!
Dog Man: Grime and Punishment: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Dog Man Graphic Novel #9
Dog Man: Mothering Heights: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Dog Man Graphic Novel #10
Cat Kid Comic Club: Perspectives: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Cat Kid Comic Club Graphic Novel #2
Cat Kid Comic Club: On Purpose: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Cat Kid Comic Club Graphic Novel #3
Cat Kid Comic Club: Collaborations: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Cat Kid Comic Club Graphic Novel #4
Following the first graphic novel, the Cat Kid series primarily keeps to itself and doesn’t overcomplicate connections to the Dog Man stories surrounding it. This is just fine by me considering how many kids are simply grabbing one of these books off a school library cart, reading order be gosh-darned!
Dog Man: Twenty Thousand Fleas Under the Sea
Collects: Dog Man Graphic Novel #11
The Adventures of Captain Underpants (Now With a Dog Man Comic!): 25 1/2 Anniversary Edition
Darn tootin’ we’re including the Dog Man minicomic Dog Man and the League of Misfits included the anniversary edition of Captain Underpants.
Cat Kid Comic Club: Influencers: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Cat Kid Comic Club Graphic Novel #5
You have now formally entered the point where you can (and should) find Cat Kid Comic Club The Musical!
Dog Man: The Scarlet Shedder: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Dog Man Graphic Novel #12
This marks the right moment to roll out the Dog Man: Mission Impawsible video game, which is a deceptively fun Mario-esque side-scroller with a darn catchy soundtrack. Did I play this for fun after the kids went to bed? I’m not on trial here your honor!
Dog Man: Big Jim Begins: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Dog Man Graphic Novel #13
Dog Man: Big Jim Believes: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Dog Man Graphic Novel #14
The latest and greatest in the Dog Man saga, as of this article’s publication in 2025. Again, if you’re starved for more graphic novels from here (understandable), check out the rest of Dav Pilkey’s works or a personal favorite in our house: Investigators!
Dog Man Epic CollectionsDog Man: The Supa Epic Collection
Collects: Dog Man #1-6 Box Set
Dog Man: The Supa Buddies Mega Collection
Collects: Dog Man #1-10 Box Set
Cat Kid Comics In Order:Obviously I’ve listed them above in the Dog Man reading order, but if you just want all things Cat Kid – and frankly, I get it – you can check out each graphic novel in order below, alongside the Box Sets.
Cat Kid Comic Club: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Cat Kid Comic Club Graphic Novel #1
Cat Kid Comic Club: Perspectives: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Cat Kid Comic Club Graphic Novel #2
Cat Kid Comic Club: On Purpose: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Cat Kid Comic Club Graphic Novel #3
Cat Kid Comic Club: Collaborations: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Cat Kid Comic Club Graphic Novel #4
Cat Kid Comic Club: Influencers: A Graphic Novel
Collects: Cat Kid Comic Club Graphic Novel #5
Cat Kid Boxed SetsThe Cat Kid Comic Club Collection
Collects: Cat Kid Comic Club #1-3 Boxed Set
The Cat Kid Comic Club Collection A Graphic Novel #1-5 Book Set
Collects: Cat Kid Comic Club #1-5 Boxed Set
There you have it. Every comic and graphic novel in the Dog Man Universe. Keep those thumbs damp for Flip-O-Ramas and enjoy the comics!
The post Dog Man Reading Order appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte, and Zack have a very chaotic series of conversations about whatever this week. Want Avatar talk? It’s here! Want 25 minutes of Dave silently listening to Charlotte and Zack talk about D&D podcasts? You got it!
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2012 pt. 6
| Fantastic Four / FF | #605-606 / 17-18 … #611 / #23 | Alternate every 2 issues of Fantastic Four and FF: https://www.comicbookherald.com/jonathan-hickman-marvel-universe-reading-order-2008-to-2016/#hickman4 | | Astonishing X-Men | #50-#51, 56-57 | Underrated Marjorie Liu run |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
A Marvel Unlimited subscription!
[Disclosure: Affiliate link – CBH may earn from qualifying subscriptions]
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post My Marvelous Year 2012 Variant C: DC Movies/TV, the end of the Ultimate line, and our favorite RPG podcasts! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Zack, the monster above all monsters, and underwater grouch Charlotte wrap up our two part series on the works of Juni Ba. On this episode we cover the latest works by Ba.
Comics covered in this episode:-Robin: Boy Wonder, The Unlikely Story of Felix and Macabber, & Mobilis
Topics discussed:
– What themes emerge as artistic preoccupations of Ba’s after having read all his work?
– Does focusing on similar themes with each comic strengthen each or produce diminishing returns?
– Where does Ba’s career go from here?
Next up, we’re doing a six month series covering the work of Osuma Tezuka:
1. Metropolis & Astro Boy2. Kimba the White Lion, Princess Knight, & Dororo3. Swallowing the Earth, Apollo’s Song, Ode to Kirihito, The Book of Human Insects & MW4. Ayako & Buddha5. Black Jack6. Message To Adolf & Phoenix
You can our other Marvel Comics podcast on Comic Book Herald at mymarvelousyear.com
Music for Extra Issues is credited to FM Skyline.
You can support Extra Issues via Patreon for as little as $1 a month at patreon.com/mymarvelousyear
The post Extra Issues – Juni Ba pt. 2: Robin: Boy Wonder, The Unlikely Story of Felix and Macabber, & Mobilis appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
As we all predicted, the third feature-length movie in the James Gunn led reboot of the DC Universe, following Superman and Supergirl, will of course be… uh… Clayface! And I’m excited about it! (If you’re reading this from the future and I should not have been excited about it, please reply in the comments marked as “from the future”!)
Like a few of Gotham’s most wanted – Mister Freeze and Harley Quinn chief among them – Clayface’s most memorable story may well come from Batman the Animated series in season one’s Feat of Clay. Personally, I’m partial to Alan Tudyk’s hammy portrayal in the Harley Quinn animated series. Appropriately, both renditions have shown how malleable the villain can be.
Fitting for a character who can change their shape and take on the appearance of another, there have been a surprising amount of different individuals to occupy the role of Clayface since the character’s introduction in the pages of Detective Comics in 1940. Below you’ll find a guide through all these variations, with a focus on key essential Clayface comics over the past 85 years!
Batman Arkham: Clayface
Collects: Detective Comics #40, #298, #478-479, Outsiders #21, Secret Origins #44, Batman #550, Catwoman #4, Batman Gotham Knights #69, 70, 71, And Batman Secret Files And Origins Villain #1
The Arkham villains collection is the most sizable Clayface “greatest hits” to date, so I’ll break out the issues below. Again, because of the malleability of the villain, these issues cover different identities and eras of the character. I’ll italicize the issues included in this collection below. If an issue is written out bolded and linked, that means it’s separate from the “Arkham” collection, but fits chronologically in that position.
Detective Comics #40 (1940)
Introduction of the original Clayface, Basil Karlo, by Bill Finger, Bob Kane, and Jerry Robinson.
Detective comics #49 (1941)
Detective Comics #298 (1961)
The second Clayface, Matt Hagen, by Bill Finger, Sheldon Moldoff and Charles Paris.
Detective Comics #304 (1962)
Detective Comics #312 (1963)
Batman #159 (1963)
Detective Comics #478-479 (1978)
As you guessed, the intro of the third Clayface, Preston Payne by Len Wein, Marshall Rogers and Dick Giordano.
Outsiders #21 (1987)
Mike W. Barr and Jim Aparo’s Outsiders introduces Sondra Fuller as a new Clayface, although she also tries to make the name “Looker” happen, which reminds me of the time in college I introduced myself as Studmuffin for a semester.
Batman Annual #11 (1987)
Strangely, the Alan Moore written story about the third Clayface falling in love with a mannequin (you read that right) is not included in the “Arkham” greatest hits. Extremely funny to me that this Moore addition to the DCU was published the same year Watchmen ended.
Secret Origins #44 (1989)
Mike W. Barr and Keith Giffen reframe the story of Basil Karlo in Detective Comics #40, before the rest of the issue gives a glimpse into the lives of each of the Clayfaces’s in Batman’s past. It’s not collected in the same “Arkham” volume, but this sets the stage for the Clays to come together as the Mudpack in the listing below.
Batman: The Dark Knight Detective Vol. 2
Alan Grant and Norm Breyfogle bring the Clays together as the Mudpack in Detective Comics #604 to #607.
Batman Legends of the Dark Knight #89-90
“Clay” by Alan Grant and Quique Alcatena.
Batman Shadow of the Bat #26-27, #75, #88 (1994, 1998)
In the first story arc, “Child’s Clay” (comics!), we meet the Clayface baby (what a sentence to be able to write). Then, a couple minor Clayface roles set during Cataclysm and No Man’s Land. Notable for Mark Buckingham and Dan Jurgens drawing each issue respectively, and for an all-time bad Mister Freeze pun in the former.
Shadow of the Bat #88 kicks off the “Fruit of the Earth” crossover written by Greg Rucka. The story continues in Batman #568 and then Detective Comics #735.
Batman #550 (1998)
Another Clayface?! With a pun so bad I lost a year of my life, Doug Moench and J.H. Williams introduce Cassius “Clay” Payne, the son of two former Clayfaces (Clayfasci?). Perhaps most notable for the introduction of Chase, a character J.H. Williams would do some excellent work on!
Catwoman #4 (2002)
The backhalf of the “Arkham” collection finally taps into non-intro stories, here with some Clayface action from the excellent Catwoman run by Ed Brubaker, Darwyn Cooke and Mike Allred.
Batman: Gotham Knights #68-71 (2006)
The four-part Clayface in the Gotham underworld story by AJ Lieberman and Al Barrionuevo.
Batman: Joker’s Asylum (2010)
Joker takes on the role of Cryptkeeper weaving tales about Batman’s rogue’s gallery. Part two features a Clayface special by Kevin Shinick and Kelley Jones. Definitely not Jones’s best Batman work, but there’s at least one shot of the Caped Crusader’s, well, cape worth the read.
Batgirl #13 (2010)
Batman by Scott Snyder & Greg Capullo Omnibus Vol. 1
Snyder and Capullo’s legendary New 52 Batman run took a two issue detour between mega Joker and Zero Year stories for a lil’ Clayface quickie (issues #19 and #20 of their Batman run).
Batman: The Dark Knight #23.3 (2013)
DC’s New 52 had a “Villains Month” special, and Clayface gets the focus here from John Layman and Cliff Richards.
Batman: The Dark Knight (2011-2014) Vol. 4: Clay
Collects: Batman: The Dark Knight #22 to #29
New 52 focus on Clayface’s origins.
Arkham Manor
In probably the least essential/goofiest inclusion on the list, a stray piece of Clayface’s body gains sentience and is imprisoned in Arkham Manor, the prison inside Batman’s house. Can you even call yourself a Clayhead if you don’t know about Clownface?
Batwoman Vol. 6: The Unknowns (2015)
Collects: Batwoman #35 to #40, Batwoman Annual #2
Batman: The Rise and Fall of the Batmen (2016-2020)
Clayface is a regular during the James Tynion IV written Detective Comics, in probably the defining modern take on the character.
Batman One Bad Day: Clayface (2023)
By Jackson Lanzing, Collin Kelly and Xermanico.
Batman and Robin Year One (2025)
He’s not even the leading face-based villain, but Clayface plays a role in the quite good Year One series by Mark Waid and Chris Samnee.
Harley Quinn #47 (2025)
The Clayface reunion party.
The post Clayface Reading Order appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Charlotte, Dave, and Zack wrestle for control of the multiverse while discussing the end of Hickman’s Fantastic Four run.
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Fantastic Four / FF | #600 / #12… #604 / #16 | Alternate issues of Fantastic Four and FF: https://www.comicbookherald.com/jonathan-hickman-marvel-universe-reading-order-2008-to-2016/#hickman4 | | Winter Soldier | #1 to #3 | Brubaker and Lark on Bucky. |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2012 pt. 6
| Fantastic Four / FF | #605-606 / 17-18 … #611 / #23 | Alternate every 2 issues of Fantastic Four and FF: https://www.comicbookherald.com/jonathan-hickman-marvel-universe-reading-order-2008-to-2016/#hickman4 | | Astonishing X-Men | #50-#51, 56-57 | Underrated Marjorie Liu run |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
A Marvel Unlimited subscription!
[Disclosure: Affiliate link – CBH may earn from qualifying subscriptions]
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post My Marvelous Year 2012 Pt. 5: More Hickman FF and a Winter Soldier solo series! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
The best comics of 2025 keep getting stronger, as this month’s list is full of banger after banger, including three new graphic novels inside my top 15 of the year.
In addition to this month’s favorite reads, you can also check out Comic Book Herald’s official Mid-Year top 30 comics.
You can find the (near) full 2025 list of all my favorite comics this year on Bookshop. I’m up over 85 for the year! Don’t hesitate to let me know any of your favorites I may have missed via dave@comicbookherald.com!
To get these picks sent directly to your mailbox every month, sign up here for free.
Gaza in My PhoneFor 120 pages, Mazen Kerbaj holds up the horrors of Gaza and the ongoing slaughter, one brutal political cartoon at a time. Kerbaj is a Lebanese cartoonist and musician, born in Beirut, and tackles the “complexity” of Gaza with clear-eyed humanist simplicity. Sometimes Kerbaj simply states a factual detail so horrifying it leaves me nauseous – a doctor amputating his own son’s leg without anesthesia, and his son dying during the operation – and sometimes the page is boiling with rage, tears and righteous indignity – “They cannot silence us all”. For the duration, Kerbaj makes one demand of his readers: Don’t look away from the horror. Don’t get used to it. This cannot stand.
The Knives (Criminal)It’s been true for a while, but evaluating Brubaker and Philips annual graphic novels is more an exercise in comparisons to their own incredible catalog than it is “the field.” Passing on an entry in their noir-comics perfection is the equivalent of passing on pizza for dinner. The question isn’t whether you want pizza; it’s how does this pizza compare to other pizzas (I swear I’m not writing this from a Lou Malnati’s, although now that you mention it…).
While less overtly “comics about comics” than the excellent “Bad Weekend,” The Knives pulls from Brubaker and Phillips experiences with Hollywood adaptations, and the allure of thinking you made it in Tinseltown. It’s an interesting way of circling back with the Criminal Universe that’s been in our lives now for nearly 20 years, but I had a strange sensation of the work feeling almost too close to autobiography. Like… I think I’d rather listen to Ed Brubaker talk about these Hollywood experiences in real life. Maybe I’m too inside baseball, but honestly, I just learned who Cal Releigh was yesterday, so that can’t be right.
For me, The Knives is at its best focusing on Angie, making huge mistakes, running prank Black Cat burglaries, and falling into vast criminal networks. I do feel like her relationship with Jacob is a little too close to what this duo produces in Reckless, but honestly, when it’s this expertly crafted, how about we just enjoy the ride.
Listen, The Knives is good. I love reading anything by this creative team. It’s not among my favorites of their work, though. The expectations are SKY HIGH. I bet the next one will hit.
Also, if you’re going to have a character working on a comic strip called ‘Basil Beaver, Private Eye’ about a Beaver detective, you should be legally obligated to produce versions of that strip within your graphic novel. I’ll see the entire Criminal team in court.
Trouble! At Coal CreekThe older I get, the more value I see in adages. Doomed to repeat history feels particularly pertinent these days, as American regimes of power favor muting, silencing or outright censoring history instead of the hard work of learning from it and improving. It’s an embarrassment, but on a personal level, curiosity and discovery can help me mitigate the feelings of hopelessness. Austin Sauerbrei’s new graphic novel Trouble at Coal Creek is an effective antidote in this regard, telling the story of the 1891 Coal Creek War in Tennessee.
Sauerbrei’s cartooning roots the seemingly complicated historical rebellion of Tennessee coal miners in personal relationships, combining the factual with relatable imagination. The long and short of the history here is the Coal Creek miners were abused and forced into awful contracts with the mining corporations, who had the full backing of the Tennessee government’s overreliance on a massive coal economy. When the miners went on strike, predominantly (entirely?) black prison laborers were brought in as forced labor in part of a “convict leasing system” that was as good as slavery.
It’s impossible to avoid the modern parallels of this saga – now 135 in our nation’s past – whether rooted in Ava Duvernay’s 13th documentary, or the ways big money shape policy. If it was just an interesting historical situation, though, I could just tell you to read up like an old history dad. Sauerbrei brings excellent pacing and storytelling to the graphic novel, particularly during a primarily wordless sequence highlighting the life and abuses of one of the “convicts’ forced into scabbing. A high quality piece of work about a story that shouldn’t be forgotten.
I Ate The Whole World to Find YouTwo out of three pull quotes on Rachel Ang’s Drawn & Quarterly graphic novel debut describe her work as “strange,” which is a good signifier of Ang’s surrealist approach to storytelling and making comics entirely her way. I Ate The Whole World to Find You is a collection of 5 stories – which I personally read as connected across different points in a central character’s life – which glide in and out of humor, darkness, and unreality with ease. Ang is focused here on a poetry of expression, both in a deliberately loose penciling and elimination between the barriers of linear narrative. Recapping plot here would be about as valuable as Elvis Costello’s famous “dancing about architecture.” The point is the feeling evoked in an unrequited fetish, in a cousin’s sexual abuse, and the dissolution of a relationship during pregnancy.
Drawn & Quarterly owns the corner on meditative, challenging graphic novels about relationships, and though they’re always respected, they don’t always have the steam to captivate for a whole book’s worth of attention. Ang doesn’t have that problem, with a truly unpredictable muse making for fascinating decisions over and over.
Godzilla’s Monsterpiece TheatreI’m just going to say it: This s****’s better than League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Do you really need cartoonist Tom Scioli’s Kirby-obsessed retro version of Godzilla landing smack in the middle of the Great Gatsby? Yes. Yes you do.
There’s a loving absurdity of literary I.P (hang on, let’s give F. Scott a moment to roll over in his grave) smashing together this recklessly, accompanied by the purity of a 4 year old suddenly inserting a giant dinosaur-dragon into every opportunity. For my money, the incredibly talented Scioli is always at his best at least a half-step removed from Kirby, which is probably why his IDW mash-ups are such a good time (Transformers vs G.I. Joe was another great ride before it was cool). Gatsby’s the driving center of our theatre here, but Scioli also finds time for Sherlock Holmes and H.G. Wells The Time Machine.
Now, you may be asking yourself… why? What the hell does Godzilla have to do with literary classics. And reading these issues, I was served a glorious reminder. Sometimes, the thrill of making great comics is about asking the more important question: Why the F*** not?!
Absolute Martian ManhunterWhen it was announced Deniz Camp (20th Century Men, The Ultimates) and Javier Rodriguez (Zatanna: Bring Down the House, Defenders) were teaming up for the second wave of DC’s Absolute Universe, there was no doubt that their take on Martian Manhunter would be the most idiosyncratic, high-art rendition within the smash-hit line. True to form, Camp and Rodriguez mindmeld to form a hallucinogenic kaleidoscope story about FBI agent John Johns discovering a “Martian” living inside his head, working against the oncoming threat of the White Martian (ironically, this is also what the guys in my men’s league call me on the court, but that’s neither here nor there).
Camp’s at his most Morrisonian here, particularly mirroring Marvel Boy and that oddly concerning gift of Morrison’s to speak distant space alien just a little too convincingly. Camp’s one of the few writers in the Big 2 umbrella who can effectively blend the pop-action sci fi of superhero comics with a seamless integration of what it’s like to be alive in 2025. Not surprisingly, Camp’s current independent work, Assorted Crisis Events, is more direct in its zeitgeist reflection, whereas Absolute Martian Manhunter feels positively 70s Kirby New Gods or Madbomb. Reverence for the King is hardly a bad thing, but it all feels a little more celebratory of what comics have been as opposed to what they could be. Of course, even as I right that, I have to admit Absolute Martian Manhunter pushes more boundaries than anything else in the line. The bar is high for this one.
In an Absolute line defined by the visuals of Nick Dragotta and Hayden Sherman, Javier Rodriguez is the first contender to really answer the challenge, somehow seemingly improving with each new critically acclaimed venture. I’ll never really understand how Rodriguez hasn’t accelerated to Marcos Martin or David Aja style heights in popularity (maybe if we gave him a fun nickname like J Rod? It’s worked before!). Alongside Camp, Rodriguez is free here to really, truly push for unrestrained expression – unlimited Martian vision – making the rest of the Absolute line look downright traditionalist by comparison. It’s a funky fit for the nascent universe – in some ways like Peach Momoko’s untethered approach on Ultimate X-Men – although ironically, I think it’s also the first Absolute line book to directly collide with the Darkseid of this universe’s origins. Would it have been better as a Black Label standalone work? Perhaps. I’m more of the mindset that you need these kinds of curveballs in the hot young universes to give newer readers their first explosive taste of Bachalo on Shade, The Changing Man or Sienkiewicz on New Mutants. You need that book that has readers tearing at their hair thinking “I don’t know what’s happening but I love it!”
So what happens in Absolute Martian Manhunter? I don’t know. But I kinda love it!
This Place Kills MeI’m starting to think the Tamaki’s might have had complicated high school experiences. This Place Kills Me joins writer Mariko Tamaki’s resume of instant classic teen dramas that includes This One Summer, Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me, and Roaming, this time out with Nicole Goux. Whether it’s with her cousin Jillian, Rosemary Valero-O’Connell or now Goux, Mariko Tamaki writing a new graphic novel is one of the surest bets in comics, particularly if you enjoy emotionally fraught teen dramas with captivating queer leads.
This Place Kills Me is told at an all girl’s prep school, where the newcomer Abby Kita stumbles upon a murder mystery that spirals into a larger school conspiracy among the Wilberton Acadmey drama society. The infusion of Nancy Drew genre into Tamaki’s now familiar skill building character and navigating sexuality is welcome, with just enough red herrings to keep the death of the story’s Juliet up in the air throughout. The lead Abby Kita, new to this school, ostracized and bullied, is arguably my favorite new character in a now loaded bibliography, and Goux is the perfect collaborator to bring her to life. Goux is a trained expert at character acting, with an innate understanding of just the right amount of orange-pink blush to add to cheeks to convey romance, embarrassment, and teen angst. Goux’s palette and approach is less splashy than Valero-O’Connell’s starmaking turn on Laura Dean (for my money, still the best of a great crop), but this duo is adept at playing to each other’s strengths to create a near 300 page work that never falters.
This Place Kills Me works as a standalone, but it also opens the door for an ongoing series of mysteries in a way Tamaki’s previous non-DC work does not. Hopefully, the work’s inevitable position among many critical year-end best of lists ensures we’re on our way to This Place Kills Me Too.
Version 1.0.0The Confessional2025 is a bit of a downer (wah wah!) for a lot of very large and meaningful reasons (personally, I would like to live in a period of history where the words genocide and authoritarianism were significantly less applicable), but the reported downfall of Silver Sprocket is the smallest niche bummer that upset my comics equilibrium the most. I fell hard for the publisher last year, selecting them as my favorite publisher of 2025, and whether or not an individual work made it onto my personal favorites, I always enjoyed making time for a house that so effectively curated predominantly queer, diverse cartoonists telling stories their way. When Sprocket launched a fundraising campaign last year I bought two annual subscriptions. I really believed in the product.
Then, as so often happens, the beauty of the art ran into the reality of mismanagement and – that old saw – MONEY. Rumblings of late/questionable creator payment approaches exploded into an expose by Zach Rabiroff on The Comics Journal. I talked to several Sprocket cartoonists at CAKE, and all of them expressed a sense of unease, and uncertainty whether or not they’d work with the publisher again. There’s a lot more to say, but all of it cemented something I’ve been growing towards: Believe in and support creators and editors, not the institutions they serve.
As I alluded, the reason Silver Sprocket’s troubles are such a bummer is because they were/are an institution with incredible taste and ability to foster fantastic alt-comix. That’s fully on display in the amazing debut graphic novel The Confessional by Paige Hender. Set in 1922 New Orleans, 2 years into Prohibition, Hender’s stunningly illustrated work follows a young vampire Cora and her sisters/colleagues/friends as they work (and feed) at a local brothel. Cora is particularly uneasy with the state of vampiric feeding on humans (especially because she can’t feed without killing) and begins seeking the church for absolution and the hot priest (shouts to Fleabag!). Everything takes a turn when hot priest reveals he’s using patrons confessions to seek out and dispose of the worst sinners, enlisting Cora in an increasingly unhealthy relationship as they hunt together.
Hender’s fully in control of a gripping work, blending a light pink base tone with explosively sensual or violent reds, and comfortably alternating in and patiently building to the earned transformations of Cora in her full vampiric form. There’s an impressive narrative patience here as well, where Hender doesn’t play her hand too overtly until its clear hot priest has gone too far. It’s really an astonishing debut – debut! – from a cartoonist I hope to see published by anyone and everyone reading!
The MongooseI’ve been really impressed by the taste and young talent being developed by Montreal’s Pow Pow Press, including last year’s Eisner-winning The Jellyfish by Boum among my favorite comics of 2024. They’re back in the conversation for best of the year with Joana Mosi’s The Mongoose, an award-winning Portuguese graphic novel from 2023, now translated into English.
Mosi’s effortlessly easy style and focus on character psychologically reminds me of Nick Drnaso’s Sabrina, here in a story about a woman struggling in the aftermath of losing her husband, now obsessed with what she has decided is uprooting her small backyard garden: A questionably real Mongoose. Mosi’s cartooning is initially almost too minimalist (we may be setting a record for the sheer number of faces with zero detail on them – just blank circles of void), but quickly offset by two incredible gifts: formal innovation and pitch-perfect character-building dialog. Mosi uses panel layouts to convey invading thoughts, whether it’s that dastardly (fictional?) Mongoose, or Julia’s memories of a walk on the beach with her husband. The instincts for pacing are incredible, with Mosi completely unafraid to commit pages to two spread out panels of a garden-bed at rest.
Julia’s family is incredibly well detailed here as well, with a brother struggling to get back in a changing job market, and a “means well” but constantly critical mother masquerading critiques as aid in the way only moms can. Meanwhile, Julia gets more and more obsessed with Mongoose facts, reminding me of the way my kids get when they get a new animal facts book, but without all the clear trauma displacement. Julia’s growing obsession is this incredible line of darkly funny – panels of that cute lil’ imaginary Timon-lookin’ goof underlined by Julia’s internal “I’m going to kill him” – and increasingly tender and sad. Mosi avoids easy answers, or grand epiphanies, and roots the story in the real. Sometimes in this life, we never find that damn Mongoose after all.
DromeI interviewed Jesse Lonergan in 2023, and while preparing for that interview, I read through the in progress pages of what would become Drome (Droma/Prime) via his Patreon. I was blown away, and more or less guaranteed that whenever the full work saw the light of day, it would be the best comic of the year.
Did Lonergan deliver on my high praise? He’s certainly close! Where past Lonergan releases have showcased a uniquely analytical visionary applying their skillset to sci-fi (Hedra, Planet Paradise, Man’s Best), on Drome Lonergan fully embraces mythology, fantasy, and a delightful love of creature design. The result is a Kirby/Starlin infused creation myth full of warriors, epic fights, and the bitter resentments of humanity.
Lonergan thinks in grids more than perhaps any comics artist I’ve ever seen, and Drome is pointedly broken into a 5×7 panel structure (even the cover displays the grid template!). If you’ve read Hedra or Planet Paradise, you know that Lonergan utilizes his panels unlike anyone, conveying movement across borders and fluent action described on the page in a way most artists leave to the imagined movement of the gutters. Drome takes the same approach but on an epic scale, carrying 300+ pages of primarily wordless story in such a way that I was completely absorbed. There’s a danger for silent comics to slip into “fast” reading, flying through pages without full immersion. Lonergan avoids that with a complexity of decisions going into every battle, every scene, where the reader needs to give themselves to the approach or be left under the cosmic stars confused and cold.
While visually stunning – just look at what comics can do! – I’ll admit the approach does come at the cost of character. Lonergan’s figures are memorable, and intriguingly crafted, but ultimately, there’s a flatness. I don’t know that I’d go so far as to say Lonergan is too calculated – there’s a tenderness to the Blue and Red Warrior’s romance, and a “somebody yeet this man into the sun” energy with the toxic masculinity of the villain. Nonetheless, there’s a layer of emotional resonance missing from Drome. Kirby’s 4th World manages it with familial drama, and Scott and Barda – but in general that’s tough to pull off with creation myths. We don’t crown our kings for nothing I suppose.
In terms of vision, ambition and sheer love of what comics can be, Drome is a triumph, and Lonergan’s most impressive work to date. If you’re a fan of the aforementioned cosmic OGs, or Copra, or anything that celebrates cartoonists putting pencil to paper and imagining new ways for lines to form, Drome is a must.
Catch up on all CBH’s favorite graphic novels of 2025 right here!
The post My Favorite Graphic Novels of September 2025 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
I resisted making a Peacemaker reading order for the entire first season of James Gunn and John Cena’s HBO Peacemaker, even though I committed to learning the full choreography of Wig Wam’s “Do You Wanna Taste It”. It just seemed like there wasn’t enough meat on the bone for Peacemaker’s actual comic book history to justify a full guide.
Well, turns out a role as one of the most celebrated and shockingly critical players in the new DC film universe leads to more printed comic books for our boy Peace. So sure, it doesn’t have the history and depth of the Superman reading order, but let’s give Peace a chance!
Below you’ll find a complete guide for Peacemaker comics, from his 60s origins with Charlton Comics to his 80s reinvention with DC after DC purchased the rights to the Charlton characters in 1983.
DC Finest: Peacemaker – Kill for Peace
Collects: The Fightin’ 5 #40-41, Peacemaker Vol. 1 #1 to #5 (1967), Peacemaker #1-4 (1987), and his cameos from the pages of Checkmate #16-26, #28, and #32-33, Suicide Squad #27-30, Vigilante #36-38 and #41-43, Showcase ’93 #6-#11, and Eclipso #11-13
The newer DC Finest selection covers off on pretty much the complete collected Charlton Comics origins and 80s DC revival for Peacemaker.
Note that the Suicide Squad and Checkmate issues initially crossover as part of “The Janus Directive.” They can be read as follows:
Suicide Squad #27
Checkmate #16
Suicide Squad #28
Checkmate #17
Suicide Squad #29
Checkmate #18
Suicide Squad #30
And from there you can proceed to Checkmate #19 through issue #33.
Watchmen
For decades, Peacemaker was most notable as the Charlton Comics character who served as the basis for Alan Moore, Dave Gibbons and John Higgin’s Comedian. Honestly the most remarkable feat James Gunn has achieved with the DC Universe is breaking Peacemaker free from that shadow.
For obvious reasons, you should read Watchmen. But as part of the Peacemaker journey, this is more what-if comic book history.
Peacemaker (1987)
Collects: Peacemaker #1 to #4 (1987)
The post-Watchmen, “Uh, we better keep this Peacemaker IP out of Moore and Gibbon’s hands before they make him unusable for our plans for a 2020s character revival!”
Blue Beetle (2006 to 2009)
The Keith Giffen and John Rogers run that introduced Jaime Reyes brings the Charlton bros together, with a nearly unrecognizable Peacemaker playing a sort of mentor to Jaime.
Multiversity – Pax Americana
Morrison and Quitely’s final word on Watchmen, complete with the Charlton Comics inspirations for their better known Watchmen-verse versions.
For more on what’s happening here, check out our excellent Who Watched the Watchmen essay from Ritesh!
Modern John Cena Peacemaker Comics (2020s)Suicide Squad Vol. 1: Give Peace a Chance
Collects: Future State: Suicide Squad #1-2 and Suicide Squad #1-6
Suicide Squad Vol. 2: Ambushed!
Collects: Suicide Squad #7-12 and Suicide Squad 2021 Annual
War for Earth-3
Collects: The Flash #780; Suicide Squad #13; Teen Titans Academy#13; and War for Earth-3 #1-2
War for Earth-3 reading checklist:
War for Earth-3 #1
Suicide Squad #13
The Flash #780
Teen Titans Academy #13
War for Earth-3 #2
Suicide Squad #14
Peacemaker: Disturbing the Peace
Collects: Peacemaker: Disturbing the Peace #1 (2022)
Garth Ennis jumps in for an over-sized one-shot between Gunn’s Suicide Squad and Peacemaker series. As a result, Ennis is taking Peacemaker entirely serious, more in line with the type of work he’s done on Frank Castle in Punisher.
Suicide Squad: Blaze
Hellblazer team extraordinaire Si Spurrier and Aaron Campbell team-up for a Peacemaker era Suicide Squad tale for DC’s Black Label. Apart from Pax Americana, the best-looking comics Peacemaker has ever been a part of!
Peacemaker Tries Hard!
Collects: Peacemaker Tries Hard! #1-6
This is the read for HBO series fans, as Kyle Starks and Steve Pugh match the comic mania of John Cena’s yoked lunatic.
Unstoppable Doom Patrol
Collects: Unstoppable Doom Patrol #1 to #7
Peacemaker leads Task Force X on the hunt for the metahumans in and around Doom Patrol!
Green Arrow Vol. 1: Reunion
Collects: Green Arrow (2023) #1 to #6
Peacemaker (and the new Peacewrecker) cameo in the rebooted Dawn of DC Green Arrow. Eventually, Peacemaker also makes his way to the 2024 Absolute Power event through the pages of Green Arrow.
Peacemaker Presents: Vigilante: Double Feature
Collects: Peacemaker Presents: The Vigilante/Eagly Double Feature! #1-5
No finer proof that Peacemaker is a hit than Vigilante and Eagly sharing a miniseries.
Absolute Superman
Jason Aaron has a riff on Peacemaker in his Absolute Superman reimagining. You can see more in the full DC Absolute Universe reading order.
The post Peacemaker Reading Order appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Charlotte, Dave, and Zack get into a friendship ending argument in the first 30 seconds of the podcast and spend the next 90 minutes duking it out around the world!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Avengers vs. X-Men | #1 to #12 | Read the tie-ins IF YOU DARE | | Uncanny X-Men | #12-14 | Added by Patreon backer Justin W. AvX tie-ins | | Wolverine & the X-Men | #17 | Added by Patreon backer Kyle S. |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2012 pt. 5
| Fantastic Four / FF | #600 / #12… #604 / #16 | Alternate issues of Fantastic Four and FF: https://www.comicbookherald.com/jonathan-hickman-marvel-universe-reading-order-2008-to-2016/#hickman4 | | Winter Soldier | #1 to #3 | Brubaker and Lark on Bucky. |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
A Marvel Unlimited subscription!
[Disclosure: Affiliate link – CBH may earn from qualifying subscriptions]
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post My Marvelous Year 2012 Pt. 4: Avengers vs. X-Men! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave forces Zack to weigh in on “Video Game Difficulty Discourse” irt Silksong, and Charlotte pitches “The French Method” of comic publishing.
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2012 pt. 4
| Avengers vs. X-Men | #1 to #12 | Read the tie-ins IF YOU DARE | | Uncanny X-Men | #12-14 | Added by Patreon backer Justin W. AvX tie-ins | | Wolverine & the X-Men | #17 | Added by Patreon backer Kyle S. |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
A Marvel Unlimited subscription!
[Disclosure: Affiliate link – CBH may earn from qualifying subscriptions]
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post My Marvelous Year 2012 Variant B: We solve comics publishing, and talk Silksong! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Wonder Man’s a lot like Wonder Bread in that there’s always a better option not far away. No comic book in history has ever been improved by the inclusion of Wonder Man. Honestly, the best thing Simon Williams ever did was accidentally lone his brainwaves to the creation of The Vision.
This of course begs the question, if I loathe Wonder Man so much, why am I wasting my time on a reading order. Aside from the obvious (I’m a dirty lil’ traffic man), I see it as my duty to recognize that with a Disney+ MCU series starring Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Ben Kingsley, and Ed Harris, there will be comics fans curious to read related comics. And given that sad fact, somebody – some hero – needs to stand up and point them in the right direction.
The right direction being other, better comics.
So, below you will find a complete Wonder Man reading order, alongside my recommendation for the comic book you should read instead. Enjoy the comics!
Wonder Man: The Early Years Omnibus
Collects: Avengers (1963) #9, 52, 131-132, 151-153, 157-160, 164-166, 181, 192-194, 197, 203, 207-208, 211, 239; Giant-Size Avengers (1974) #3; Marvel Team-Up (1972) #78, 136; Marvel Premiere (1972) #55; Marvel Two-in-One (1974) #78; Vision and the Scarlet Witch (1982) #3; Vision and the Scarlet Witch (1985) #2
This massive omnibus is the best collected version of Wonder Man’s Avengers debut and Bronze Age presence on the team, including his long, sordid relationships with Grim Reaper, Vision, Scarlet Witch and Ultron. The omnibus includes more, but I recommend you stop before the West Coast Avengers portion of Simon’s career, as those are collected more fully below.
Better Reading: For a superior example of Marvel characters that suck at being villains, check out The Superior Foes of Spider-Man.
Worst Coast Avenger: The Wonder Man ExperienceAvengers West Coast Epic Collection: How the West Was Won
Collects: West Coast Avengers (1984) #1-4, Iron Man Annual #7, Avengers (1963) #250, West Coast Avengers (1985) #1-7, Vision And The Scarlet Witch (1985) #1-2, Wonder Man (1986) #1.
Better Reading: For a better example of powerhouses taking their talents to Hollywood, check out Brubaker and Phillips The Fade Out.
Avengers West Coast Epic Collection: Lost In Space-Time
Collects: West Coast Avengers (1985) #8-24, Annual #1; Avengers Annual #15.
Better Reading: For a better example of getting lost in space, check out Fear Agent.
Avengers West Coast Epic Collection: Tales To Astonish
Collects: West Coast Avengers (1985) #25-37, West Coast Avengers Annual (1986) #2, Avengers Annual (1967) #16, Marvel Graphic Novel (1982) #27: Emperor Doom.
Against all good taste, Wonder Man is borderline the lead in the non-Doom portions of the otherwise interesting Emperor Doom graphic novel.
Better Reading: For a better, more appropriately Doom-centric version of Victor Von Doom ruling the world, check out Secret Wars (2015) or One World Under Doom.
Avengers West Coast Epic Collection: Vision Quest
Collects: West Coast Avengers (1985) #38-46, Avengers West Coast (1989) #47-52, West Coast Avengers Annual (1986) #3, Avengers West Coast Annual (1989) #4, material from Avengers Spotlight (1989) #23.
Better Reading: For better comics about strange relationships between step-siblings, check out The Umbrella Academy.
Avengers West Coast Epic Collection: Darker Than Scarlet
Collects: Avengers West Coast (1989) #53-64, Avengers West Coast Annual (1989) #5, Avengers (1963) #311-313; material from Avengers Annual (1967) #19, What The–?! (1988) #6.
Better Reading: For better comics about emotionally manipulative baddies you be crushing on, check out Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me.
Avengers West Coast Epic Collection: California Screaming
Collects: Avengers West Coast #65-82, Annual #6.
Avengers Epic Collection: Operation Galactic Storm
Collects: Avengers #345-347; Avengers West Coast #80-82; Quasar #32-36; Wonder Man #7-9; Iron Man #278-279; Thor #445-446; material from Captain America #398-400.
As you may observe, a Wonder Man solo series is a part of the Operation Galactic Storm reading order. You may also observe that Wonder Man’s first and only substantive ongoing series is so unmemorable, Marvel has literally never bothered to collect it. I purchased every issue on a back issue sale at my local comic shop, and I haven’t regretted a decision so thoroughly since I bought a copy of Weezer’s Make Believe in high school.
Better Reading: For better Marvel events about the Kree Supreme Intelligence being a giant A-hole, check out Jonathan Hickman’s Fantastic Four.
Avengers West Coast Epic Collection: Ultron Unbound
Collects: Avengers West Coast #83-95, Annual #7-8; and material from Darkhawk Annual #1, Iron Man Annual #13.
Technically, Wonder Man’s solo series is also a part of the Infinity War and Infinity Crusade Jim Starlin events that take place in the early 90s. But if you’re reading Jim Starlin’s cosmic opera for Wonder Man, I hope you get the help you need.
Avengers: The Death of Mockingbird
Collects: Avengers West Coast #92-100, 102; Spider-Woman (1993) #1-4; material from Marvel Comics Presents (1988) #143-144.
Avengers/Iron Man: Force Works
Collects: Force Works #1–15, Force Works: Ashcan Edition; Century: Distant Sons #1; material from Iron Man/Force Works Collectors’ Preview.
Wonder Man In the 2000s Still Stinks!Avengers By Kurt Busiek & George Perez Omnibus Vol. 1
Collects: Avengers (1998) #1-23, 0, 1 Rough Cut; Iron Man (1998) #7; Captain America (1998) #8; Quicksilver #10; Avengers Annual ’98, ’99; Avengers Forever (1998) #1-12.
To their credit, Busiek and Perez really made a go of making Wonder Man fetch, particularly through the ways his story continuities all over Ultron, Vision, Hank and Janet Pym, Grim Reaper, and presumably some other lesser second cousins who never get mentioned in these twisted family dramas. Busiek seems particularly interested in what it means for Wonder Man if Scarlet Witch married the Android based on his brain patterns, highlighting the hilarious fact that when given the choice between duplicates, Wanda choose the robot over Simon. And she was right!
Better Reading: For better comics about wonder by George Perez, check out George Perez’s Wonder Woman.
Wonder Man: The Saga Of Simon Williams
Collects: Avengers Two: Wonder Man & the Beast (2000) #1-3
The “Saga of Simon Williams” is both the most boring Saga in the history of mankind, and a much larger collection than what I have listed here. Nonetheless, it’s the cleanest way to get a collection with this Wonder Man and Beast spinoff. Being Avengers friends with Beast is probably the second best trait of Wonder Man, but it’s also the second worst trait of Henry McCoy (the worst being all the genocide he got into during Krakoa!).
Better Reading: For a better comic about unlikely friends, check out Chew.
Avengers by Kurt Busiek & George Perez Omnibus Vol. 2
Collects: Avengers #24-56, 1 1/2, Annual 2000-2001; Thunderbolts #42-44; Maximum Security: Dangerous Planet; Maximum Security #1-3; Avengers: The Ultron Imperative.
The best of Wonder Man is right here! During the Kang Dynasty he and Wanda are romantic star crossed lovers in a prison.
Better Reading: For better comics about finding love in a hopeless place, try Jason Lutes’ Berlin.
Wonder Man: My Fair Super Hero
Collects: Wonder Man: My Fair Super Hero #1-5.
Mighty Avengers by Brian Michael Bendis: The Complete Collection
Collects: Mighty Avengers #1-20
I read Mighty Avengers for the My Marvelous Year club somewhat recently, and I honestly could not have told you Wonder Man was in these comics.
Wonder Man Still Sucks but He’s In Some Decent Comics For a Minute!Uncanny Avengers Vol. 1: The Red Shadow
Collects: Uncanny Avengers vol. 1 #1-5
As usual, Wonder Man is the least interesting member of a team made up of Wolverine, Sunfire, Scarlet Witch, Havok, Captain America, Thor, Wasp and Rogue. His role is mostly “uselessly pine after Wanda,” which to be fair, is what he’s best at. The run itself is interesting though, hot on the heels of Remender’s time writing Uncanny X-Force.
Uncanny Avengers Vol. 2: The Apocalypse Twins
Collects: Uncanny Avengers vol. 1 #6-11, 8AU
Better Reading: For better comics about complicated families, try My Favorite Thing is Monsters.
Uncanny Avengers Vol. 3: Ragnarok Now
Collects: Uncanny Avengers vol. 1 #12-17.
Uncanny Avengers Vol. 4: Avenge the Earth
Collects: Uncanny Avengers vol. 1 #18-22.
Uncanny Avengers Vol. 5: AXIS Prelude
Collects: Uncanny Avengers #23-25, Magneto #9-10, Uncanny Avengers Annual #1
I think Wonder Man actually bails for end of Remender’s Uncanny Avengers arc before Axis, giving you extra incentive to finish the run here.
The Uncanny Avengers Unity 4: Red Skull
Collects: Uncanny Avengers #18-#23
Uncanny Avengers reboots as a series after the Remender run, and while it seems that the run is safe from Wonder Man at first, eventually his big dumb useless face reappears.
Uncanny Avengers: Unity Vol. 5: Stars and Garters
Collects: Uncanny Avengers #26-30.
Avengers: No Surrender
Collects: Avengers (2016) #675-690.
War of the Realms: Journey Into Mystery
Collects: War of the Realms: Journey Into Mystery #1-5
A War of the Realms tie-in written by The McElroys (of podcast fame), drawn by the amazing Andrew Lima Araujo, and fitting Wonder Man into one his best roles yet: confused guy who doesn’t know how to set up a car seat.
Better Reading: For better comics drawn by Andre Lima Araujo, check out A Righteous Thirst for Vengeance.
X-Force Volume 9
Collects: X-Force #49-50
Beast’s Krakoa era character assassination finally runs into the one thing worse than his arc: a reunion with Wonder Man.
West Coast Avengers (2024)
Collects: West Coast Avengers #6 to #7
Gerry Duggan has the very good idea to give someone else the name Wonder Man and see if that works better than Simon Williams. How could it not?
The post Wonder Man (Anti) Reading Order appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Does the world need a DC Compact Classics reading order? Some would say no. Many would say absolutely not. And yet… here I am! Welcome to the world’s only guide to read all the DC Compact Comics editions chronologically!
What are Compact Classics? These savvy collected editions, measuring a convenient 5.5″ x 8.5″, pack major storylines into a more manageable, reader-friendly format, making them a uniquely popular draw for new fans looking for clear entry points or seasoned veterans wanting to revisit classics without breaking the bank (in America, the books go for $9.99). For years, superhero comics audiences have wondered how DC and Marvel could mirror the success of manga. Turns out affordable wee collections of famous stories was the answer!
For reasons I can’t fully explain, I pulled together a comprehensive reading order for all the DC Compact Comics, laid out chronologically so you can journey through decades of incredible storytelling. From the gritty streets of Gotham to the cosmic reaches of the DC Multiverse, this list is your streamlined guide to experiencing some of the best of DC Comics history, all presented in an order that takes you from 1986 to present day. The books certainly won’t need to be read in order to be enjoyed (for that, there’s Comic Book Herald’s full DC Comics Reading Order), but it’s kind of interesting to see the progression of the publisher and characters like Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman over the decades.
The OGs: Late 80’s Graphic Novels Defining DCBatman: The Dark Knight Returns
Collects: Batman: The Dark Knight Returns #1–4
This seminal work by Frank Miller and Lynn Varley reimagines Batman in a dystopian future, forcing an aging Bruce Wayne out of retirement for one last, brutal stand.
It’s one of my 10 favorite comics of all time!
Watchmen
Collects: Watchmen #1–12
If you’re looking for the groundbreaking graphic novel that changed comics forever, this Compact Classic provides the complete, impactful experience in a perfectly portable package.
It’s my favorite comic book of all time!
Batman: Arkham Asylum
Collects: Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth OGN
Batman does a dungeon crawler (just like the Video Game) but brought to life by an up-and-coming Grant Morrison and the visual mastery of Dave McKean.
90s Babies: DC Classics from the 1990sKingdom Come
Collects: Kingdom Come #1–4
Mark Waid and Alex Ross tackle the next generation of superheroes in a world where an older Clark, Bruce and Diana are beginning to feel dated.
Batman: The Long Halloween
Collects: Batman: The Long Halloween #1–13
Follow Batman during his early years as he hunts a mysterious serial killer targeting Gotham’s crime families only on holidays, masterfully crafted by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale.
One of my 50 favorite comics of all time!
The Authority: Relentless
Collects: The Authority (vol. 1) #1–12, Planetary/The Authority: Ruling the World #1, “Requiem” from WildStorm: A Celebration of 25 Years
There’s really no question that The Authority belongs among DC’s Compact Comics, especially with James Gunn’s plans to integrate the franchise into his DC Movie Universe. Bryan Hitch’s famous “Wide-screen” action absolutely revolutionizes the way comic book stories are told in the new millenium. Unfortunately, though, the book is written by Warren Ellis, an incredibly famous comic book writer who was revealed to have manipulated and groomed over 60 women and non-binary individuals during his career. You can read more about that here.
DC Comics of the Early 2000sCatwoman: Trail Of The Catwoman
Collects: Catwoman: Selina’s Big Score, Catwoman (vol. 3) #1–9, “Trail of the Catwoman” from Detective Comics #759–762
Comic book legends Darwyn Cooke and Ed Brubaker team up for the quintessential modern Selina Kyle story, only rivaled this millennium by Cliff Chiang’s Catwoman Lonely City!
Batman: Hush
Collects: Batman #608–619
I’ve got my quibbles, but Hush by Jeph Loeb and Jim Lee is an excellent new readers selection that will leave you craving more Batman. Come for Jim Lee’s amazing Killer Croc, stay for the mystery of the criminal mastermind pulling the strings.
Superman: Red Son
Collects: Superman: Red Son #1–3
Imagine a world where Superman’s rocket landed in the Soviet Union instead of Kansas, leading to a fascinating alternate history where the Man of Steel becomes a champion of communism, by Mark Millar and Dave Johnson.
Superman: Birthright
Collects: Superman: Birthright #1–12
A modern retelling of Superman’s origin from Mark Waid and Leinil Francis Yu.
Gotham Central
Collects: Gotham Central #1–10
The streets of Gotham from the perspective of the ordinary police detectives who deal with the fallout of Batman’s war on crime, from the acclaimed team of Ed Brubaker, Greg Rucka and Michael Lark. If you like what you read here, definitely track down more Gotham Central because the next story arc is an all-time Joker story titled “Soft Targets.”
One of my 50 favorite comics of all time!
Superman/Batman: Book One
Collects: Superman/Batman (vol. 1) #1–6, 8-13, “When Clark Met Bruce” from Superman/Batman Secret Files & Origins 2003
The Jeph Loeb and Ed McGuinness run is most well known as the modern reintroduction of Supergirl.
DC: The New Frontier
Collects: DC: The New Frontier #1–6, Justice League: The New Frontier Special
Travel back to the 1950s in this retro-futuristic masterpiece, exploring the dawn of the Silver Age of heroes and the challenges they face in a world grappling with the Cold War and social change, from the legendary Darwyn Cooke.
DC From the Mid Aughts up to the New 52All-Star Superman
Collects: All-Star Superman #1–12
The first compact edition I bought… and I already own an over-sized hardcover copy of the Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely classic! Honestly, I’m looking at the beautiful Quitely art brought to life in miniature on my desk right now and… I’ll be right back… in an hour or so.
One of my 50 favorite comics of all time!
Green Arrow: Year One
Collects: Green Arrow: Year One #1-6
Andy Diggle and Jock reimagine the origins of Oliver Queen, inspiring the hit CW series, Arrow, that followed a few years later.
Joker
Collects: Joker (graphic novel)
Whatever you think about Brian Azzarello and Lee Bermejo’s Joker, the graphic novel’s inclusion among the Compact Classics line highlights how willingly DC will print wildly fluctuating page counts for “premium” work. Many of the compacts are in excess of 300 pages of story. In the case of The Dark Knight Returns coming in at 200 pages, I’d argue in favor of the perennial best-seller/all-timer. In the case of the Joker compact edition coming in at 136 pages for the same $9.99 price point? That’s a bad deal!
I don’t know exactly what the answer is – In theory, DC could have blended Azzarello and Bermejo’s Luthor graphic novel into this collection for a more in-line page count – but to me this is a striking rare example where the compact line misses.
Batwoman: Elegy
Collects: Detective Comics #854–863
The defining Batwoman run from Greg Rucka and J.H. Williams. If you want to see some of the most stylish, inventive page layouts in comics, look no farther.
The Flash: Rebirth
Collects: The Flash: Rebirth #1–6, The Flash (vol. 3) #1–7
The return of Barry Allen as the Flash. If you’ve read nothing but compact classics so far, you have no idea he ever left! Personally, I don’t think this is a good introduction to The Flash, so hopefully there’s an update coming in hot off the cosmic treadmill soon!
Harley Quinn and the Gotham City Sirens
Collects: Gotham City Sirens #1–13
Harley, Poison Ivy and Catwoman run this town! Paul Dini (of Paul Dini and Bruce Timm’s Batman The Animated Series fame) and artist Guillem March prove just how much room there is in Gotham City for comics in a delightful series focused on the trio of anti-heroes. This run plays off Dini’s work on Detective Comics, so get ready for Eddy Nigma’s time as a detective!
DC’s New 52 (2011 to 2016)Batman: The Court of Owls Saga
Collects: Batman (vol. 2) #1–11
The start of Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo’s iconic New 52 Batman run, introducing the Court of Owls and their connection to the legacy of Gotham.
If you want to see where these comics fit in the era, check out Comic Book Herald’s New 52 reading order.
Wonder Woman: Blood And Guts
Collects: Wonder Woman (vol. 4) #1–12
New 52 Wonder Woman is somewhat controversial in how Brian Azzarello reimagines Diana and Themyscira’s origins, but what isn’t controversial is that Cliff Chiang should be drawing Greek mythology whenever he darn well pleases.
Harley Quinn: Wild at Heart
Collects: Harley Quinn #0–13
Husband and wife duo Amanda Connor and Jimmy Palmiotti helped usher in the modern Harley Quinnaissance, and the Margot Robbie driven surge of popularity that’s followed. While it’s otherwise a somewhat odd pick for the first three New 52 runs to highlight, it’s Harley’s world, and we’re just living in it.
DC’s Newest Hit Comics (2017 to Present Day)Batman: White Knight
Collects: Batman: White Knight #1–8
Sean Gordon Murphy and Matt Hollingsworth’s take on an out-of-continuity Batman alternate universe where a “redeemed” Joker is the one hunting the Batman.
DCeased
Collects: DCeased #1–6, DCeased: A Good Day to Die #1
While it’s not Tom Taylor’s best reimagining of the DC Universe (that would be Injustice), DCeased is another spin on the DCU that works far better than it has any right to. Yeah, it’s Marvel Zombies for DC, but Taylor and Trevor Hairsine have their own vision for the zombie apocalypse.
Green Lantern: Far Sector
Collects: Far Sector #1–12
In retrospect, it’s kind of a miracle DC got N.K. Jemesin to write a Green Lantern limited series, like Marvel getting Scorsese to direct 6 episodes of The Hood on Disney+ (a man can dream!). Far Sector is as good as advertised, with Jamal Campbell in top form, and a new Green Lantern, Jo Mullein, added to the DC fabric.
Wonder Woman: Earth One
Collects: Wonder Woman: Earth One Vol. 1–3
Ironically, this would probably be my very last pick for Grant Morrison written DC comics to highlight, but I do appreciate the Wonder Woman love DC is attempting.
Nightwing: Leaping into the Light
Collects: Nightwing (vol. 4) #78–88
Tom Taylor and Bruno Redondo attempt to answer what Dick Grayson would do with Bruce Wayne’s wealth.
Static: Season One
Collects: Static: Season One #1–6
You love to see Static and the Milestone Universe getting some love. Finally!
Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow
Collects: Supergirl: Woman of Tomorow #1−8
With a James Gunn celebrity endorsement, an impending Supergirl movie inspired by the work, and star-making visuals from Bilquis Evely, Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow might be DC’s biggest hit of the 2020s. Ironically, it’s still Tom King’s most tedious narration, but the fact of the matter is a hit’s a hit!
Vertigo Compact ClassicsVertigo was DC’s “mature” oriented comics line from 1992 to 2020 (and seemingly relaunched again for the future!). The line is home to many of my favorite comics like Hellblazer, Preacher and Daytripper, generally (but not always!) set outside of the DC superhero universe. DC’s compacting select entries from the catalog of Vertigo classics, as seen below.
Y: The Last Man: Unmanned
Collects: Y: The Last Man #1–10
One of my 50 favorite comics of all time!
We3
Collects: We3 #1–3
American Vampire: Book One
Collects: American Vampire #1–11
What’s Coming Next?* V for Vendetta * Batman: Gotham by Gaslight * Batman: Under the Red Hood * Batgirl of Burnside * Injustice: Gods Among Us – Year One
What Else Should DC Turn Into a Compact Comics Edition?These are my picks for stories I’d love to see turned into compact comics in upcoming rounds for DC. Primarily these are taken from my picks for the best comics of all time, but I do take into account the nature of compact comics trying to fit complete stories into each package, making longer runs more difficult to promote this way.
Jack Kirby’s New Gods
While I understand why the compact classics don’t offer anything produced before 1986, DC’s ignoring almost 50 years of history! Let’s rectify that and take a swipe at Marvel with a compact of Kirby’s first year at DC building his Fourth World mythos. The original Fourth World omnibus was just under 400 pages, so honestly, give or take a few issues of Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen and you can fit in Kirby’s first salvo covering the first three issues of The Forever People, New Gods, and Mister Miracle. You’re telling me comics readers won’t be here for the origins of Darkseid? Get out of town ya clown!
Legion of Super-Heroes: The Great Darkness Saga
Speaking of older Darkseid classics, Paul Levitz and Keith Giffen’s Great Darkness Saga is my favorite Legion of Super-Heroes story, and a great intro to the franchise for all kinds of readers.
Justice League International
All these people watching the 2025 Superman movie, and so few of them understanding the depth of Nathan Fillion’s haircut’s backstory! This one could easily fit the first six issues (titled Justice league), the first rebrand issue (Justice League International #7), and JLI Annual #1. One punch. One punch!
Hellblazer – Dangerous Habits
From the writer of The Boys and Preacher, you’ve got one of the best John Constantine Hellblazer arcs. I’d love to get more of Garth Ennis with his Preacher cohort Steve Dillon’s run on Hellblazer in here, but Dangerous Habits is definitely the place to start.
Batman: Dark Victory
Direct sequel to Long Halloween, with Tim Sale just as strong as ever. You’re gonna compact only the first half of a story? This one’s a no-brainer.
JLA by Grant Morrison
The current state of compact classics are quite lite on the Justice League, and this is the best way to fix that. Mirror the old paperbacks and reproduce the first 9 issues of the run to get that Justice League Unlimited flavor back in people’s lives!
Secret Six
The best Suicide Squad run of the 2000s, with Gail Simone, Nicola Scott, Dale Eaglesham and friends turning Catman, Ragdoll, and Scandal Savage into must read DC Universe staples. The trickiest part here is whether you include the Villains United lead-in to Infinite Crisis or just start straight from Secret Six as its own series.
Gotham Academy
Becky Cloonan, Brendan Fletcher and Karl Kerschl’s Gotham Academy is sweet, charming, and full of the mystery you expect from a classic kids at a boarding school story. The best thing about adding Gotham Academy is it gives another compact edition for younger readers so the kids don’t think it’s all “Jack Kirby” this and “Alan Moore” that.
Midnighter by Steve Orlando
If DC’s looking to promote The Authority, the best modern run comes from Steve Orlando and Aco. This taps into everything that makes the Midnighter so cool – like Batman on performance enhancing drugs – with a queer author who better understands how to characterize a gay man in this position of power.
Mister Miracle
Tom King and Mitch Gerad’s best work. An absolute no-brainer. I’m upset I even have to say it!
The post DC Compact Comics Edition Reading List (2025)! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave and Zack give a send off to one of the best Marvel comics of the millennia so far.
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Uncanny X-Force | #24 – #35 | Final Execution. End of the Run. |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2012 pt. 3
| Carnage U.S.A. | #1 to #5 | Zeb Wells and Clayton Crain. Cool covers? | | Scarlet Spider | #1 to #3 | I remember this being surprisingly good. Stopping in the middle of the first volume in case not! | | Deadpool Kills the Marvel Universe | #1 to #4 | Wonder what’s gonna happen |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
A Marvel Unlimited subscription!
[Disclosure: Affiliate link – CBH may earn from qualifying subscriptions]
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Pod Feed
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The post My Marvelous Year 2012 Pt. 3: Finale of Remender’s X-Force! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Take it from someone who’s tried: If you want to read the complete history of Batman in comics, and you don’t want to do it digitally, you have your work cut out for you! Take a look at Comic Book Herald’s complete Batman reading order and you’ll see an (expertly curated) list of a wide variety of collected editions, many of which have long since gone out of print and are no longer available at an affordable retail price. The journey through the history of the Bat in print collections hasn’t felt especially achievable – all that may be changing soon.
DC’s 2024 has focused on a number of tangible efforts to make their comics more available and affordable, starting with this year’s earlier Compact Classics, which took all-time great stories like Watchmen and All-Star Superman and packaged them into Manga sized digests (5.51 x 0.75 x 8.46 inches) for $9.99 a pop in the U.S. The collected efforts continue in late 2024 with DC Finest.
DC Finest paperback editions are now available, representing DC’s move into comprehensive collected editions for all their core characters like Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, the Justice League and on and on. The collections launch in 2024 at $39.99 a piece for approximately 600 pages of comics. Unlike more familiar best sellers in DC’s line like Batman: Year One, which collects the four issues that make up one Batman story, or All-Star Superman which collects the must-read twelve issues from creators Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely, DC Finest collections represent a continuous collection of comics as they were released in publication order. This means each paperback collects about 1 to 3 years of consecutive Batman or Justice League comics, warts and all!
This is a new wave for DC, and fills a void they weren’t really fulfilling in the book market for the real continuity focused, gotta have it all comics collector. In theory, if the line is supported, it could eventually cover the full DC Comics reading order. The closest comp in DC was the old Showcase Presents line which gave you about 500 pages of black-and-white comics for under $20 from 2005 to 2016, although these were limited to comics from DC’s Silver Age (between 1955 to 1975). DC Finest is more expensive, yes, but it’s more comics, in color, from every era of the publisher’s now near 90 year history. Size-wise, each DC Finest collection is the exact length (10 and 1/4 in) and width (7 in) of a modern single issue floppy comic, with of course a much thicker spine (~1 in) to accommodate its 600 pages.
For the purposes of this review, DC sent me the following launch books. Please note, the five launch books were a gift from DC Comics, but what follows is my honest review.
Batman: Year One & Two
632 pages of comics collecting post Crisis on Infinite Earths Batman comics from November 1986 to October 1987, including of course, Batman Year One by Frank Miller and David Mazzuchelli, and Batman Year Two by Mike W. Barr, Alan Davis and Todd McFarlane.
Collects: Batman #401 to #412, Batman Annual #11, and Detective Comics #568 to #579
Wonder Woman: Origins and Omens
580 pages of comics collecting Gail Simone, Terry & Rachel Dodson’s run on Wonder Woman from October 2007 to October 2009
Collects: Wonder Woman #14 to #35, Outsiders: Five of a Kind – Wonder Woman/Grace #1, The Brave and the Bold #7
Superman: The First Superhero
582 pages of comics collecting the original Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster Golden Age Superman comics from June 1938 to June 1940
Collects: Action Comics #1 to #25, Superman #1 to #5, New York World’s Fair Comics #1
Justice League of America: The Bridge Between Earths
614 pages of comics collecting the original Earth-One and Earth-Two Justice League crossovers from June 1966 to June 1969
Collects: Justice League of America #45 to #72
Upcoming DC Finest Collections (2025)Other volumes teased or announced so far include the following. Note that this list includes continuing volumes from some of the launch books, for example the Batman: Killing Joke collection follows directly after Batman: Year One & Two.
Justice Society of America: For America and Democracy
From 1940 to 1942
Plastic Man: The Origin of Plastic Man
Collects: Police Comics #1-36; Plastic Man #1-2
Superboy: The Super-Dog from Krypton
Collects: Adventure Comics #199-216; Superboy #33-43
Aquaman: The King of Atlantis
Comics from 1956 to 1964
Science Fiction: The Gorilla World
Collects: Action Comics #183-196; Strange Adventures #35-48; Mystery in Space #16-22
Supergirl: The Girl of Steel
Collects: Action Comics #252 to #270
The Flash: The Human Thunderbolt
Comics from 1956 to 1961
Green Lantern: The Defeat of Green Lantern
Comics from 1963 to 1965
Superman Family: The Giant Turtle Man
Collects: Action Comics #266, #277; Superman #142-143, #147; Superman’s Girl Friend Lois Lane #19-28; Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen #47-56
Doom Patrol: The World’s Strangest Heroes
Collects: The Brave and the Bold #65; Doom Patrol #86-102; Challengers of the Unknown #48; My Greatest Adventure #80-85; Teen Titans #6
Metamorpho: The Element Man
Collects: Justice League of America #42; The Brave and the Bold #57-58, #66, #68, #88, #101; Metamorpho #1-17
Legion of Super-Heroes: Zap Goes the Legion
Comics from 1968 to 1974
Superman: Kryptonite Nevermore
Collects: Action Comics #393-406; Superman #233-238, #240-246
Team-Ups: Chase to the End of Time
Collects: DC Comics Presents #1-14; The Brave and the Bold #141-155
Wonder Woman: The Legend of Wonder Woman
Collects: Wonder Woman #306-329; DC Comics Presents #76; Blue Devil #10; The Legend of Wonder Woman #1-4
Teen Titans: The Judas Contract
Collects: Action Comics #546; World’s Finest Comics #300; The New Teen Titans #33-40; The New Teen Titans Annual #2; Tales of the Teen Titans #41-47; Tales of the Teen Titans Annual #3; The Vigilante #3
Peacemaker: Kill for Peace
Collects: Fightin’ Five #40-41; Suicide Squad #27-30; Checkmate #16-26, #28, #32-33; Eclipso #11-13; Showcase ’93 #6-11; Peacemaker #1-4; The Vigilante #36-38, #41-43; The Peacemaker #1-5
Green Arrow: The Longbow Hunters
Comics from 1987 to 1988
Batman: The Killing Joke and Other Stories
Collects: Batman: The Killing Joke #1; Batman #413-422; Detective Comics #580-589; and Batman: Son of the Demon #1
Suicide Squad: Trial by Fire
Collects: Suicide Squad #1-10; Secret Origins #14; Detective Comics #582; The Fury of Firestorm #62-64; Firestorm: The Nuclear Man Annual #5; Legends #1-6; Millennium #4
Catwoman: Life Lines
Comics from 1988 to 1994
Catwoman: Vengeance and Vindication
Collects: Catwoman #0, #13-32; and Catwoman Annual #2-3
Harley Quinn: Birth of the Mirth
Collects: Action Comics #765; Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #126; The Batman Adventures #12; Azrael: Agent of the Bat #60; Batman #570, #573-574; Batman: Shadow of the Bat #93; Detective Comics #737, #740-741; Catwoman #82-84, #89; The Batman Adventures: Mad Love #1; The Batgirl Adventures #1; Batman: Harley Quinn #1; Batman: Gotham Knights #14; Harley Quinn #1-8
Events: Zero Hour Part One
Comics during 1994’s Zero Hour event
Events: Zero Hour Part Two
Collects: The Flash #0; Green Arrow #90; Adventures of Superman #516; Justice League America #92; Action Comics #703; Justice League International #68; Legion of Super-Heroes #61; Green Lantern #0; Superman: The Man of Steel #0; Guy Gardner: Warrior #24; Justice League Task Force #16; Catwoman #14; Robin #10; Showcase ’94 #10; Damage #0, #6; Zero Hour: Crisis in Time #0-2; Anima #7
Batgirl: Nobody Dies Tonight
Collects: Batgirl #7-27, Superboy #85, and Supergirl #63
DC Finest Reviews: The Launch CollectionsFor the purposes of this review, I’m most interested in the full collections of DC Finest, and how they compares to other collected options. So I’m a little less focused on the merit of the stories themselves – for example, Batman Year One by Miller and Mazzuchelli is among my 50 favorite comics ever, so the question isn’t whether Year One is a worthy read, but whether it’s a good idea to read it in this format.
Speaking of, let’s start with the Batman collection because it’s the oddest of the bunch, and probably the best example of the full scope of DC Finest at its most comprehensive. Throughout 1985, Marv Wolfman and George Perez spearheaded the massive 12 issue Crisis on Infinite Earths event which codified the DC Multiverse and effectively draws a line in the sand for Pre-Crisis and Post-Crisis DC Comics. A lot of Comic Book Herald DC Reading Guides more or less start with Post-Crisis as a point reflective of the “modern” era of DC, and you see this reflected across the publisher’s main characters, where Superman is reset in John Byrne’s Man of Steel, Wonder Woman in George Perez’s run, and Batman in Year One.
What often gets lost in that approach is how many comics are published alongside those more well-known stand-alones, and that’s what Batman: Year One & Two really emphasizes. There are over 160 pages of story – 7 issues – before you even get to Year One in this DC Finest package. Operating under chronological publication order, the DC Finest collection hops between issues of Batman (starting with #401) and Detective Comics (starting with issue #568). This means you’re exposed to a wide variety of creators working on the Dark Knight before the character settles into anything resembling a groove. The book begins with Barbara J. Randall and Trevor Von Eeden, before segueing into a surprise Jim Starlin appearance and eventually the more consistent work of Mike W. Barr with Alan Davis and Paul Neary. If you’re a longtime comics fan, the likes of Starlin and Davis, or latter Dave Cockrum will be instantly recognizable. Likewise, Davis and Neary’s work on Batman is quite fun, revealing a wry smirking protector of Gotham alongside the early days of Jason Todd as a more eager Robin. It’s fascinating to experience the actual in-the-moment progression of Batman comics on the road to the transformative Year One.
Speaking of: Holy Classics, Batman, Year One stands out SO MUCH in contrast to everything in this collection. I already had tremendous respect for Miller and Mazzuchelli’s work, with Richmond Lewis colors and Todd Klein’s dueling journaled letters, but when yo u read it as it would have stood compared to fairly aimless Bat-yarns still echoing the shadows of 60s Batman TV, Year One feels like a damn lightning bolt. I quite appreciate the collection in a historical context because it’s easy to lose sight of how revolutionary a comic may have been in its era, especially if you didn’t live through it (and Year One is before my time). That said, if you’re totally new to Bat-comics, I’d recommend simply starting with the four issue Year One, either through a $9.99 trade or a DC Universe Infinite subscription. The DC Finest approach is really more for the Bat-fanatic who wants every piece of the Dark Knight’s history on their shelf. I’d suspect new readers will be disappointed to learn the Batman comics surrounding Year One are neither tonally nor narratively connected (newer fans will be best served by the new Compact Classics too).
I had never read poor Year Two before, but man, imagine trying to follow in the wake of Miller and Mazzuchelli. Again, as comics history goes, it’s compelling to watch early pre-Spawn, pre-Superstardom Todd McFarlane on Chapters 2 to 4 of Year Two, with several inklings of the artist and Image revolution to follow. You can see McFarlane’s early sense of 90s cool in Batman’s surreal flowing cape, the Reaper’s bloody conquests, and the artist’s fondness for long, thin vertical panels splicing the action.
It’s worth pointing out here too that if you’re the kind of collector who wants Year Two in print, DC Finest is your best, most affordable option unless you luck into a copy at your local comic shop or a garage sale. As for the glue in between Years One and Two, this is your only collected print option. And that’s kind of the point and appeal of DC Finest: You get everything from a certain time period, whether or would curate neatly into a standalone collection or not.
The Simone, Aaron Lopestri, Dodson Wonder Woman run is far more straightforward than the Batman collection – the DC Finest softcover mostly gives you one long run by a consistent creative team, ensuring a story with connective tissue throughout. The only wrinkle in the value here is that this run also got an Omnibus reprint in late 2023, and from what I can tell, is still in stock and often listed at half off it’s retail price of $100. For the uninitiated, a DC Omnibus, is a massive hardcover collection of a huge creative “run” or event, usually over 1,000 pages long (the smallest one I own is Grant Morrison’s Seven Soldiers at over 760 pages of comics). Omnibus collections are thrilling in their immensity, often eagerly sought out and likely to go out of print, and completely preposterous to actually read (although I’ve always said, if you’re not simultaneously reading comics, weightlifting, and forming a lifelong indent on your chest, are you even reading?). That said, if you can get the Wonder Woman omnibus’s 816 pages of the full run through issue #44 for about $50, or the DC Finest version of the run ending at issue #35 for $39.99, I’d actually recommend the omni. It’s unusual they’d be this close in price though.
For the Justice League of America, some of these comics would be included in DC’s various Crisis on Multiple Earths paperbacks, but only a handful at a time instead of a consecutive run in publication order from ’66 to ’69 like this. Most of these comics were collected in Justice League of America Vol. 2: The Silver Age Omnibus, but those are now out of print and at best running for 3x the price of a DC Finest collection. The issues are available on DC Universe Infinite, but if you want to read and own in print, the DC Finest collection is your best option.
Finally, previous Golden Age Superman collections are out of print and WAY overpriced – the Golden Age Vol. 1 currently lists a $99 paperback on Amazon – making the DC Finest approach a pretty easy recommendation, again, if you want these in print and on your shelf. And really, that’s what it boils down to – If a work has been out of print for a long time, a la The Legend of Wonder Woman by Kurt Busiek and Trina Robbins, the upcoming DC Finest option suggests a (hopefully sustained) opportunity to see it returned to print and not scalped on the used book market for triple the retail price. Same goes for the occasional instance where a work hasn’t been digitized and made available through DC Universe Infinite, a la Police Comics #1 to #36, The Origins of Plastic Man that will be available through DC Finest in early 2025.
This is the aspect of DC Finest that I’m most pleased to see at launch – there’s a surprising, and often exciting variety to the selected comics giving shine to Metamorpho, Plastic Man, Jimmy Olsen’s Giant-Turtle era, and, uh, Gorilla World! This indicates a real commitment to the full breadth and possibilities of DC Comics. It also increases the chances that some lesser known diamonds in the rough can have their day, and that I’ll feel inclined to explore corners of DC’s history that I haven’t touched before. I suspect the number one question serious collectors will have is whether DC plans to see this through – the last thing collector’s want is a shelf with 9 years of Justice League of America before the imprint gets tossed and rebooted under a different style a few years down the line. At least at launch, this feels like the real thing.
At the end of the day, these are the key questions to ask when considering a DC Finest collection.
- Do you want to read in print over digital?
- Would you like to own the full published history of your favorite characters instead of more curated selections of their “best” stories?
- Have you checked if a DC Omnibus already exists at a comparable price point that might give you a similar or expanded value?
If the answers are yes, go ahead and get excited about DC Finest!
The post Collect The Complete DC Comics Reading Order Through DC Finest Collections appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Zack, and Charlotte celebrate the 300th episode of MMY with a flashback (aka Gardner Monroe) of our 300 favorite memories of the podcast!
Up Next: My Marvel Year — 2009 pt. 2
| Secret Warriors / Dark Reign: Fantastic Four/ Fantastic Four | #1 to #10 / #1 to 5/ #570 to #574 | Sunuvagun the best Nick Fury book in years./ Hickman’s run on Fantastic Four is here! |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2009 Variant Cover A: The 300th Episode Spectacular, Flashback Edition! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Zack and Charlotte kick off 2009 with an introduction to Dark Reign!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Dark Reign: The Cabal / Dark Avengers / Utopia | #1 / #1 to #4 / Reading Order | Bendis’ new Avengers squad for Dark Reign |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2009 pt. 2
| Secret Warriors / Fantastic Four | #1 to #10 / #570 to #574 | Sunuvagun the best Nick Fury book in years. / Hickman’s run on Fantastic Four is here! (Technically starts in Dark Reign: Fantastic Four #1 to #5) |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2009 Pt. 1: Dark Reign appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
We’re officially approaching “time to finalize those best of the year lists” season, yet the good comics keep coming! This month, I give two of the best superhero books their due, before formally announcing my indie small press era.
Don’t hesitate to let me know any of your favorites I may have missed via dave@comicbookherald.com!
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Dracula: Book One – The ImpalerI went deep on Dracula this month (phrasing, David) as I prepared to interview Matt Wagner and Kelley Jones about their kickstarted work on Dracula’s origins (Book Two – The Brides has been funded on Kickstarter throughout October ’24). This meant reading the novel for the first time (woot!), reading Alberto Breccia’s Dracula for the first time (woot woot!), and watching Nosferatu in full for the first time (silent woots!).
All that intense fascination with the lord of Vampires (not to mention full reads of Wagner’s Grendel and Jones’ work on Batman: Red Rain) led to a deep appreciation for what the beloved comics creator’s are doing here with their planned 4 book series. Dracula’s origins is a tricky beast to tackle, but Wagner and Jones are perfectly suited to take the enigmatic references from Stoker’s novel (Van Helsing talks about Dracula going to Satan’s school like it’s flippin’ Oxford!) and transform them into a fully fleshed (so fleshy!) journey. It’s a damn good time for a damn bad monster, and pairs neatly with Tynion IV/Simmonds Universal Monsters: Dracula from earlier this year, as well as the new J.H. Williams III Dracula storybook that just released from Image Comics!
The Winter KingI’ve officially entered my “I will support any small press comics” era, although it started off with real disappointment when I finally got a break to check Matt Emmons table at C2E2 only to find he’d sold out in the first couple days! I’m catching up with the Council of Frogs master of supernatural ecology comics, and recently got my hands on this year’s The Winter King, a wordless tale of a coyote navigating everything from hunting wabbits, to ghost funeral processions to encroaching haunted skeleton monsters. It all makes a strange sense under Emmons careful hand, blending the animal world with the fantastic in these beautiful self-printed short works. If I ever need to vote on an award for “Best Bramble Artist,” it’s a no-brainer.
Emmons self-publishes through Second At Best Press, and they’re currently running a Kickstarter for two new comics (including a choose-your-own-adventure!) which I’ve eagerly backed. I’d recommend getting your hands on a copy of Council of Frogs first to see if you’re into it. I suspect you will be.
UM Volume OneI mentioned my interview with Matt Wagner and Kelley Jones above, and one of the most resonant thoughts they shared with me is the value of allowing eccentricity in comics. How the artform tends to fall flat when you’re working under corporatized constraints and trying to fit into expectations of how a comic is supposed to look/read/feel.
If you want pure eccentricity, in its most complimentary form, look no further than Buttercup’s UM Volume One, out now from Radiator Press, and edited by Jamilia Rowser (Wash Day Diaries) and Steenz (Heart of the City). Trying to define UM is a fool’s errand, but seeing as I’m a fool, let’s try: what if four black, queer friends got caught in ancient cycles of magic surrounding midwifes, in a comic that merges the slice-of-life humor of John Allison with the unencumbered magical fantasy of Dandadan anime.
It’s a work that refuses to play by the rules of comics, and thank god. Strange, funny, gorgeous and uncomfortably sad, all at once.
Somna“Could Stanly Kubrick make an artistic porn?,” is one of my favorite faux-intellectual college dorm conversations because it’s mostly an excuse to talk about your favorite sex videos while remaining oh so high-minded. It also gleefully overlooks the robust history of erotic literature, cinema, and yes, comics, that quite clearly illustrate sex and art can be pals! Becky Cloonan and Tula Lotay are the latest to prove the peanut-butter/chocolate symbiosis (speaking of erotic!) with Somna, a supernatural renaissance horror burning with demon-lust.
New Vertigo-void aiming comics publisher DSTLRY (I can’t believe I didn’t think to call it CMCBKHRLD) walked into their first Eisner for Best New Series behind Cloonan and Lotay’s Somna, featuring colorists Lee Loughridge and Dee Cuffiffe, and letterer Lucas Gattoni. It’s not hard to see why. This is a gorgeous hardcover collection, with Cloonan and Lotay trading storytelling depending on the surreal nature of the scene (until, of course, the dreamworld and reality begin to collide and there’s no telling if the demon-sex is pure fantasy or hard reality). Much was made about Mitch Gerads and Doc Shaner sharing interiors on the Tom King-written Strange Adventures, but Somna is a much smoother integration, backed by a couple of incredible talents who can truly do it all.
Somna is not subtle about its point-of-view on how male-dominated societies repress female sexuality for their own sad grasps at power, and it doesn’t need to be. The conversation is as relevant today as it was during a time when the new hot thing could be named Sigurd. It’s why The Handmaid’s Tale had such a strong second-life on Hulu, and why comics awards are able to recognize the power of a work like this. Nonetheless, just because witchhunts are familiar doesn’t make them any less real, or any less applicable, and it still takes a great deal of power and control to sell what makes this one different. For me, that comes down to the swirling ambiguity of Lotay and Cloonan’s underworld, and their unique bond as creative voices.
Hirayasumi Vol. 1 & 2I bristle at the use of cozy to describe art. Even knowing full well that I often seek genres of comfort-food relaxation in music and comics, it bothers me to reduce art to a warm cup of tea. This is especially prevalent in slice-of-life manga, where stories and mangaka are allowed the space for introspection. Enter Keigo Shinzo’s – clenches with rage – cozy Hirayasumi, a Viz Signatura manga about a 29 year-old former actor living with his college-aged would-be manga artist cousin.
Where certain publishers (What’s up Seven Seas!) would have turned this into I’m Falling In Love With My Would-Be Manga Artist Cousin!, Shinzo instead focuses on the challenges and social anxiety of getting older, and how the beautiful zen outlook of Hiroto Ikuta helps those around them find purpose in their day. On the surface, yes, I can see how the laconic set-ups of Hirayasumi could be considered cozy, but dig a little deeper, and the feelings of inadequacy and imposter syndrome are tremendously relatable and thought-provoking. Shinzo isn’t here to hide the stressful realities of life, so much as spotlighting how they are realities for everyone. It’s a manga filled with wonderful characters you’ll want to spend time with, sure, but more than that, it’s an inspiring meditation on a purpose-driven life beyond the day-to-day grind of work, money, and power that it’s so easy to get swept in.
Reading volume 2 on the heels of Tatsuki Fujimoto’s Look Back, I was also struck how effectively Shinzo captures Natsumi’s internal pressures of creating, and how the feelings that you’ll never measure up to some impossible standard can prevent so much breathtaking creation. Shinzo avoids the Bakuman-style focus on manga-about-manga, but the addition of Natsumi’s journey to become a published manga-author is obvious catnip for readers like myself.
Return to EdenI had the strange experience of reading Paco Roca’s Return to Eden, a new graphic novel out from Fantagraphics, shortly after learning that my grandfather-in-law had passed. As we’ve known this moment was coming for some time now, my wife had thoughtfully been collecting stories from her grandpa’s past, and I had the chance to read and edit. Following a loved one’s memories is an intimate journey, informative, surprising, tear-jerking and humorous. As he passes, the deep feelings of loss are augmented by this unexpected retention of his story. I’ve never known him better and now he’s gone. His story remains.
Paco Roca channels similar feelings into a moving portrait of his mother, with a focus on her early teen years in post WWII Francisco Franco Spain. Roca’s central question is why a beach photo of his mother’s family remains so essential to her in her final years, and uses this framing to effectively explore the family tree, complete with the awareness that the happy days of the past were never quite so true. It’s a masterful, careful consideration of the author’s lineage and the context that shaped those he calls family.
I’ve had more of Roca’s work sitting on my to-read shelf for too long, and this is precisely the kick needed to explore more of what this brilliant cartoonist has to offer.
Ultimate Spider-Man Vol. 1: Married With ChildrenI went into Jonathan Hickman and Marco Checchetto’s Ultimate Spider-Man, the launch series of the Ultimate 2niverse, and one of the most successful Marvel Comics of the last decade, with grand dreams. This is, after all, the Jonathan Hickman who wrote the best Marvel event of all time, and redefined what X-Men comics could be, if only fleetingly in the grand scheme. What sci-fi twist would Hickman unleash upon the Spidey mythos to do something no one had ever tried before? The surprise, then, is not any particular high concept, but the subversive approach of telling the grounded story of a Peter Parker getting his powers not at 15 but at 35. When Peter first gets his powers he’s married to Mary Jane Watson, with two young children, and well-ensconced at the Daily Bugle as a working class professional. It’s Miracleman by way of The Incredibles, and what it lacks in freshness it more than makes up for in a playfully earnest desire to recapture everything we love about Spider-Man, but with 60 years of those experiences under our belts.
The “mic drops” here are all rooted in the familiar – If Peter Parker doesn’t get his powers at 15, Uncle Ben is still alive and kicking, as a gloriously charming journalist-in-arms with his best friend (and perhaps more) J. Jonah Jameson. We get to experience the Ditko / Lee / Romita classics – Peter meets Harry, Peter meets Gwen, Peter meets what may well be this universe’s Venom (ok that came later) – in a world controlled by the Maker’s hand-chosen Shadow elites, who eagerly count down the 18 months until this Universe’s Maker is freed. Hickman and Checchetto – fresh off an excellent stint on Daredevil, and born to draw web-slinging – approach the big picture from a distance, with Peter first going up against Wilson Fisk, involved but a mere pawn in the schemes of the Maker. There’s the thrill of the original Ultimate Universe comics attempting to truly recreate the OGs for a modern era – how will Hickman and Checchetto do the Sinister Six is pure plain spider-fun – alongside the thrill of delivering the Spider-Family fans have clamored for since 2007’s One More Day. At the end of the day, though, it’s fan-service with purpose, behind the hands of two comics creators (alongside David Messina filling in on art for issues 4 and 5 of the first volume) who are among the best working regularly in the Big 2 superhero landscape. For my money, the work has only gotten better into the second volume, and Ultimate Spider-Man has been one of my favorite monthly reads of 2024.
The King’s WarriorSpeaking of my small-press indie comics era, Huahua Zhu’s The King’s Warrior is my favorite comic yet from Bulgilhan Press, like Berserk by way of Zelda, as a young warrior seeks their lost brother with the aid of a Lionsteed (a Lion-horse companion they bested in gladiator-esque combat, of course!). Zhu’s vision is pure indie fantasy, with a tactile, textured style and coloring that feels like your picking up the pieces of an epic quest directly off the artist’s workspace floor. The work alternates modes of supernatural grotesquery, sword-and-shield action, and monster-hunter warzones, but it’s in Zhu’s understanding of pacing and perspective that I found myself actively dreading the end of a mere 74 pages. Whether through coloring, layout, or angles, Zhu finds a way to cram (complimentary!) a full graphic novel’s worth of framing into a novella.
Batman Detective Comics 3: Gotham Nocturne: Act IIIt’s not like Detective Comics slipped under my radar. DC’s Batman comics are among the most familiar works in the American direct market, and Ram V is one of my favorite modern writers (see last month’s Rare Flavours write-up for proof!). Nonetheless, I certainly whiffed on seeing the totality of vision, scope and craft in Ram V’s Detective Comics. The literal operatic structure, tone-cementing Evan Cagle covers and all-around style oozes ambition, but it wasn’t until the run ended this month with Detective Comics #1089 that a full read-through revealed the aims of that ambition to me. And in sinking into Ram’s vision for Batman more fully, I realized a truth about myself: I’d completely lost sight of what I desire in superhero comics.
I didn’t know you could make a long run like this any more.
Detective spans 2 and a half years, and over 30 issues, including annuals (plus, note here that single issues of Detective all include relevant backup features written by Si Spurrier and Dan Watters). In its totality, Detective Comics reveals a truly remarkable case for the long-form ongoing comic book, and the value of empowering a wide variety of creative voices to fulfill their visions. Yes, Ram V is directing, but it’s the astonishing blend of so many artists – Stefano Raffaele, Ivan Reis, Dustin Nguyen, Francesco Francavilla, Caspar Wijngaard, Hayden Sherman, and on and on and on… – that embodies a refusal to pursue anything less than creative excellence (not to mention a herculean feat of editorial scheduling!). In a Batman run in conversation with the greats of the past – including Grant Morrison first and foremost – you have a spiritual successor to early Vertigo Hellblazer, or Mike Carey, Dean Ormsten and Peter Gross’s Lucifer. It’s a gloriously patient work that reminds me: Ongoing superhero comics can be this good!
The most recent volume collects Detective Comics #1071 to #1075, but again, I would highly encourage a read-through the run as a whole, which is clearly how it’s meant to be read. This is why comic book fans clamor for the days of the years-long ongoing, and reject the obsession with the 5 issue miniseries. Artists giving themselves to a meal this satisfying is simply why I read these stories in the first place. And in the struggle of Bruce Wayne and the Orghams a second truth emerges too: There are long-term benefits to the corporate overlords when a run builds new characters, designs and plot so successfully. Crass commercialism and authentic art intersect to make everyone happy!
Do Geese See GodLet me start you off with a Flash Fact so you don’t feel as dumb as I did: Do Geese See God is a palindrome. In fact, it’s a pretty well known one, to the point that if you search the name, you’ll get an anthology of palindromes! Cartoonist Nicholas Offerman is aware of this as well, structuring this heartfelt, inspiring, cathartic graphic novel with a palindromic color chart, and at times what seems to be a palindromic layout, although seeing as I wasn’t looking for that at all, I suspect there are more formalistic secrets that I missed!
Of course, none of that is really critical to getting Offerman’s Do Geese See God (and no, as far as I can tell, there’s no relation between this Offerman and Parks and Rec‘s woodsman). This work is a deeply felt meditation on loss, both in the death of a friend, but also in the death of a friendship, in becoming adults and growing apart and sacrificing those eternal bonds of insane bike rides through the rain for the adulthood you think you’re supposed to achieve. Despite that heaviness – and make no mistake, it’s an emotional journey, and one that resonates intensely – Offerman finds a sly humor, particularly in the lunatic bus driver, Bob, that helps keep the work afloat in would could become a lake of despair. Offerman’s cartooning is paced with great care and his character’s expressions are clear and engrossing. With a shifting two or three-tone color palette, Offerman completely controls Otto’s journey looking to reshape his life following the suicide of his best friend. It’s a critical darling indie film waiting to happen, and it does so with a full embrace of comics as a medium.
I went into Do Geese See God with no idea what to expect, pursuing it solely based on inclusion in the New York Public Library’s list of favorite 2024 graphic novels for adults. I leave it having enjoyed one of my favorite graphic novels of the year.
The post My Favorite Graphic Novels of October 2024 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Zack was rig…
Rigging Convincible the whole time! It was a sham! The cards were stacked against me!
This is Convincible, where we try to convince each other whether Invincible is one of the best or worst superhero comics of all time.
This episode, Zack and Charlotte finish the whole series. This is the end.
On Convincible #7 we read:
| Invincible Vol. 20: Friends | Invincible #109–114 | | Invincible Vol. 21: Modern Family | Invincible #115–120 | | Invincible Vol. 22: Reboot? | Invincible #121–126 | | Invincible Vol. 23: Full House | Invincible #127–132 | | Invincible Vol. 24: The End of All Things, Part 1 | Invincible #133–138 | | Invincible Vol. 25: The End of All Things, Part 2 | Invincible #139–144 |
Previously on Convincible:
Convincible #1
Convincible #2
Convincible #3
Convincible #4
Convincible #5
Convincible #6
Up Next: My Marvel Year — 2009 pt. 1
| Dark Reign: The Cabal / Dark Avengers / Utopia | #1 / #1 to #4 / Reading Order | Bendis’ new Avengers squad for Dark Reign |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post Convincible #7: Invincible Ends appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Today, we go all in on Dracula with Matt Wagner (Grendel) and Kelley Jones (Batman) as they gear up for Volume 2 of their planned 4 part series of graphic novels on the secret history of The Impaler.
Dracula Book 1: The ImpalerPublisher: Dark Horse Books
Writer: Matt Wagner
Artist: Kelley Jones, Jose Villarrubia
The post Matt Wagner & Kelley Jones Interview! The Secret History of Dracula | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Today, I’m talking to one of my favorite comics critics about some of our favorite indie comic books and graphic novels of 2024 so far! Come listen up for some recommendations for great reads, and share your own picks in the chat and comments.
Dave’s Top 10:Mary Tyler Moorehawk – Dave Baker
Tender – Beth Hetland
The Jellyfish – Boum
Hexagon Bridge – Richard Blake
Self-Esteem and the End of the World – Luke Healy
Attaboy – Tony McMillan
Blurry – Dash Shaw
Swan Songs – W. Maxwell Prince, Every Cool Artist
The Gulf – Adam de Souza
Tokyo These Days – Taiyo Matsumoto
Arpad’s Top 10:The Gulf – Adam de Souza
The King’s Warrior – Huahua Zhu
When to Pick a Pomegranate – Yasmeen Abedifard
Frontier – Guillaume Singelin
The Winter King – Matt Emmons
Makinaphobe – Rafael Zaiats
Soft: Director’s Cut – Jane Mai
Knapsack Vol. 1: Cassette – Lucky Pocket Press anthology
Food School – Jade Armstrong
Ash’s Cabin – Jen Wang
The post Favorite Indie Comics of 2024 w/ Arpad Okay! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave and Zack have a BOYZ NITE to talk about their reunion in Chicago, news out of New York Comic Con, and Zack’s manga recs.
Up Next: My Marvel Year — 2009 pt. 1
| Dark Reign: The Cabal / Dark Avengers / Utopia | #1 / #1 to #4 / Reading Order | Bendis’ new Avengers squad for Dark Reign |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2008 Variant Cover C: Dave/Zack Hugs, Absolute Batman, & the state of Marvel Comics (2024) appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Today, we go all in on Detective Comics with writer Ram V following the conclusion of his 2+ year Batman saga. Then we’ll talk Ram’s big 2024 in creator-owned works – Rare Flavours! Dawnrunner! The One Hand/Six Fingers! – and what’s to come in DC’s New Gods at the end of the year.
This Week’s Comics
Rare Flavours
Dawnrunner
The Onehand/Six Fingers
New Gods
The post Ram V Interview! The End of Detective Comics & The Start of New Gods! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Zack Brad Larry and Charasl end our two part series on Jeff Smith, one of the most famous and important figures in independent comics publishing. This week, we cover the work that comes after one of the biggest successes in comics, an interesting but flawed experience.
Comics covered in this episode:
– RASL
Topics discussed:
– How much of Bone can you see in RASL?
– What happens when you remove the comedy from Bone?
– If you’re a Teslacel, is this comic a better experience?
Our next miniseries on Sandman will be broken into six episodes (all available on DC Universe Infinite Ultra):
– Preludes & Nocturnes, The Doll’s House, and Dream Country: Sandman #1-20
– Seasons of Mist, A Game of You, and Fables and Reflections: Sandman # 21-50 & The Sandman Special #1
– Brief Lives, Worlds’ End, The Kindly Ones, The Wake: Sandman #51-75
– Sandman: Overture, The Sandman: Endless Nights, Death: The High Cost of Living, Death: The Time of Your Life, Sandman: The Dream Hunters (comic edition, not prose)
– Lucifer Omnibus Vol. 1: Sandman Presents: Lucifer #1–3 & Lucifer #1-35 & Lucifer: Nirvana #1
– Lucifer Omnibus Vol. 2: Lucifer #36-75 & House of Mystery Halloween Annual #2: Infernal Bargains: Just Say No!
You can find Charlotte at twitter.com/mymarvelousyear
You can our other Marvel Comics podcast on Comic Book Herald at mymarvelousyear.com
Music for Extra Issues is credited to FM Skyline.
You can support Extra Issues via Patreon for as little as $1 a month at patreon.com/mymarvelousyear
The post Extra Issues – Jeff Smith’s RASL (2013) appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Eisner-Award Determining Dave, Eisner-Award Stealing Zack and the Eisner-Award Winning Tiffany Babb gather to discuss a fascinating slate of 2008 comics, including two Patron recommendations with The Incredible Hercules and Adam: The Legend of Blue Marvel. Plus, we talk that underrated Captain Britain, and a fan-favorite, Eisner-nominated Spider-Man Annual written by Matt Fraction.
Check here for Tiffany’s Kickstarter for the Comics Courier!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Captain Britain and MI: 13 | #5 to #9 | Paul Cornell and Stuart Immonen’s excellent relaunch of Captain Britain spiraling out of Secret Invasion. | | Adam: Legend of the Blue Marvel | #1 to 5 | Added by Patreon Backer Justin W. (for Jacob) | | Incredible Herclues | #121-125 | Love and War (the worse one) requested by Patreon backer Justin W. (could go in 2009) | | The Sensational Spider-Man Annual | #1 | Eisner War |
Up Next: My Marvel Year — 2009 pt. 1
| Dark Reign: The Cabal / Dark Avengers / Utopia | #1 / #1 to #4 / Reading Order | Bendis’ new Avengers squad for Dark Reign |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2008 Pt. 8: Captain Britain, Blue Marvel, Incredible Hercules, & Sensational Spider-Man appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
This month’s journey through the best comics of 2024 was especially fun because we’re deep enough into the year that I got to perform my annual ritual of organizing and bingeing all the floppies sitting in my to-read longboxes. My office floor is literally covered with Kaya, What’s the Furthest Place From Here, Usagi Yojimbo, Ice Cream Man, Robin: the Boy Wonder, and more (some of which you’ll see below!). While I’m often critical of the pre-order system and month-to-month experience of reading direct market comics, I do LOVE powering through physical mag after physical mag once enough have accumulated to properly enjoy a full story.
Don’t hesitate to let me know any of your favorites I may have missed via dave@comicbookherald.com!
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Blue Lock Vol. 14Man, I don’t even like soccer (dumb American, I know!), but Muneyuki Kaneshiro’s story about what it takes to get Japan a win in the World Cup is one of my favorite sports manga since I read Slam Dunk. Kaneshiro combines tactical soccer acumen, Hunger Games-like training regimens, and treating competitors like Pokemon (from the synopsis of their skills down to the blending of almost supernatural effects depicting their abilities). Whereas a lot of the sports manga that hasn’t gripped me (Haikyu!) focuses on a more standard journey through competitive school sports (this is the Slam Dunk template), Blue Lock cracks open enough corners of strangeness and desperation to be the champ that sets it apart. I’m all caught up with present day in the span of 3 months – highly recommend getting on board!
A Phone Call AwayThis tight graphic novella from Rich Douek, Russell Mark Olson, and Mad Cave is a classic lite-mystery reflecting on a culture obsessed with influencer celebrity. It’s like if Pokerface did an episode on the parents of Jon Benet Ramsey after her parents rose to fame raising a lookalike sibling. Everything about A Phone Call Away is predictable, but in an oddly comforting, entirely controlled way. It’s a story built on anticipating exactly (or approximately!) how an evil scheme is going to unravel, and celebrating the tension as a couple vile individuals get what they have coming. Douek and Olson have a great handle on dialog and character expression throughout, playing with enough familiar tropes to shortcut through a gripping read. It’s a one-sitting read, and a nice one at that.
Madame Choi and the Monsters: A True StoryThe story of Kim Jong-Il’s kidnapping of South Korea’s film stars Choi Eun-hee and her ex-husband (and director) Shin Sang-ok is already one of the wildest historical stories you’re liable to hear (to the tune of a bestselling work, A Kim Jong-Il Production, written by Paul Fischer.) Purely on the power of truth-is-stranger-than-fiction, a rising Dictactor kidnapping film stars to make his own movies (dude loved Cinema!) is so incredible, it makes for a fascinating Wikipedia deep dive on its own terms.
In Madame Choi and the Monsters, Patrick Spat and Sheree Domingo avoid a straightforward retelling by mixing Eun-hee’s story with a recreation of the 1962 film Bulgasari, based on old Korean myths starring an iron-eating monster resembling Godzilla. The effect put me off balance but curious. It isn’t until the book’s midway point that Kim Jong-Il re-enters the picture, and the seemingly unrelated stories co-mingle into a singular vision. Despite the drama of the truth – rising dictators and desperate escapes for the American embassy – Domingo’s style is often restrained and exuberant in its jovial cartooning. This is true in early sequences of the mercurial dictator or the Godzilla-esque Bulgasari, but undone during Eun-hee’s moments of despair at being kidnapped and removed from her children. By the work’s end I simply couldn’t help but admire the ambition of this approach, and how committed Spat and Domingo are to telling the full story of Bulgasari amidst the history.
Bear Pirate Viking QueenOn the surface, BPVQ isn’t so much a story as it is raw mythological magnetism on the page. Jonathan Marks Barravecchia’s Sienkiewicz-infused abstractions collage and collide across the page, a swirling high-seas painted dream of oceanic Bears, Norse-god pirate-monsters, and the inevitable violence that comes from both. You can get lost in a Barravecchia page, particularly in instances where images compile upon images, in a kaleidoscope maze of fantasy. Sienkiewicz is the clear godfather influence for all our modern abstractionists – Martin Simmonds and Stipan Morian quickly come to mind – but the comparison is too easy without delineating modes of Bill: His Moon Knight isn’t his New Mutants isn’t his Stray Toasters after all. For much of its blood-soaked tale of vengeance, Bear Pirate Viking Queen leans more heavily towards Stray Toasters, that pure abstract expression that screams send all your linear narrative comics rules to the fiery pits of hell.
At its heart, though, Sean Lewis and Barrevecchia combine to execute a more purposeful message than the opening number might lead you to expect. It’s a story of pirates and a Bear that rises out of the ocean, yes, but it’s also a screed against the history of imperialism as represented by The Queen (there’s a particular panel of The Queen with a crown made out of a palace that is a wonderful example of Barravecchia’s mile-a-minute explosion of metaphorical imagery throughout). It would be easy to critique BPVQ as mere “great art tho” but that thoroughly misses the point and the purpose. There’s real poetry in Lewis’ telling, real anger in the evils being confronted. So come, look that evil in the eye; just try not to sink too deeply into the circles of its rage.
What’s the Furthest Place From Here Vol. 3If I evaluated comics purely based on how much I like holding single issues in my hands, Tyler Boss, Matt Rosenberg, and Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou’s What’s the Furthest Place From Here would be in the running for best of the year. For example, issue #18, the final issue in the third volume, comes in at a whooping 39 pages of art, plus chapter breaks and credits, all for the perfectly reasonable Image standard of $3.99. I suppose the downside to this great value is only 4 new issues of the series will be released in 2024, but if you binge the meaty beauts in volume-sized increments, the only downside is hoping you remember what happened last time! As a whole, it’s one of the easiest books to recommend actually collecting from your local comic shop issue by issue.
Boss and Rosenberg’s 4 Kids Walk Into a Bank is one of my favorite comics – straight up – and they bring that energy and humor to a gang of youths in a much grimmer post-apocalyptic landscape. It’s Fallout by way of Warriors, but mixed with the irreverence of Wes Anderson, and it all works seamlessly. Their third volume – issues #14 to #18 – moves the plot forward more than anything since the early issues, as the Academy gang struggles to find their way back together, and the secrets of why there are almost no adults in this world are revealed. It’s an impressive direct-market book, where I’m invested in character (Alabama and Syd rule), mystery (what is up with this world), and the pure style Boss and Otsmane-Elhaou bring to every page. I look forward to my annual binge next year when I hold these wonderful comics and think, now this, this is heaven!
Peepee Poopoo #1I’ll admit it: It took Caroline Cash’s slice-of-life Comix anthology winning an Eisner for me to even consider reading a comix anthology called Peepee Poopoo. I at least in part blame Dogman and the fact that the Dad in me HAS to resist my kid’s favorite joke. I don’t know why I couldn’t just embrace the juvenile fun of launching an anthology with an issue #420 and issue #69 before the first issue; I think it’s an innate resistance to the R. Crumb worshipping antiquated Comix culture and the snobbery that comes with it. I don’t know; 50 year old guys swooning over Crumb feels like the 16 year-olds I knew in high school swearing up and down that Pink Floyd was the only real music, man. There are so many good alternative-comics scenes, and so much rich independent art available, that it feels depressingly backwards to fixate so whole-heartedly movements rooted in 60s counterculture. There’s enough culture to want to counter as is!
Cash quite clearly owns this, channels this, and blows up the stereotypes of Comix with her humorous, queer, richly detailed of life in Chicago (and beyond!). As an anthology, Peepee Poopoo is deeply indebted to Alison Bechdel, and Daniel Clowes’ Eightball, but through a modern lens of how cartooning has progressed in the 35 years since. I love Cash’s ability to tell a gag short-story about getting stoned and lost in Philadelphia, or about the first attempts at dating in the Pandemic. There’s a real honesty, heart and self-awareness to Cash’s work that instantly pulled me in.
Listen, Peepee Poopoo is awesome. Tell everyone you know.
Kaya Vol. 3Full disclosure: When I was sorting my issues of Kaya, I realized that around issue #12 (where this third volume starts) Wes Craig and the Kaya team started boasting of their 2023 year-end best-of rankings, including the nod from yours truly at Comic Book Herald. So now that I am officially an investor, collaborator, and co-creator of Kaya, it’s inevitable that it receives my most boisterous full-throated support. I don’t write to try to get my name in pull quotes on floppies, but damn if it doesn’t feel good!
Fortunately, I don’t have to lie for the sake of my ego to continue supporting Craig and Kaya. The adventures of Kaya and Jin through Craig’s powerfully uninhibited fantasy landscape of mutants, robots, lizard-people and magic are among the best all-ages comics since Bone. It’s an adventure full of mystery, prophecy, darkness and a core exploring the bonds of family. Plus, all those years on Deadly Class have turned Craig into one of the surest cartoonists in the market, with a brilliant sense of expression, pacing and character design. Craig knows exactly when to turn the key to unleash the dragon (sometimes literally!) and when to build these worlds through expository dialog.
Fans are catching on too. Craig shared earlier this month that pre-orders for Kaya #21 are higher than they were for issue #20, a defiant sign of growth amid the natural tendency for comics to decrease in orders over their shelf-life. Perhaps great longform storytelling can benefit from word of mouth and – gasp! – best of the year lists! As long as it means Kaya is here for years to come, it’s a great thing.
Houses of the Unholy / FridayAt this point, you should be pretty sure where you stand on Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips, and you should be pretty sure you stand on the side of: make good ass comics. Since the powerhouse duo officially moved from single issues of Criminal to standalone graphic novels, they’ve released Pulp (great), 5 books in the Reckless series (quite good), last year’s Night Fever (weakest of the bunch) and Where the Body Was (good!). Add in 2024’s Houses of the Unholy, and that’s 9 good graphic novels in the span of five years, or as Jay-Z would say, a 9 hot comics every 5 year average. With Sean’s son Jacob in tow as colorist, there’s simply a baseline to a Brubaker/Phillips release that promises a higher certainty of quality than literally anything else in comics.
Here comes the but (my four favorite words in the English language): The last two years of releases since putting Reckless on hiatus haven’t seen the duo’s best work. So as much as I enjoy Houses of the Unholy (it’s here on the best comics of 2024 list, and it has every right to be), it’s also hard not to read it and think… why isn’t this just the next Reckless? It’s a compelling story of 80s Satanic Panic and the ways it intersects with modern conspiracy theories run amok, but it’s also very much the template for story we’ve seen this powerhouse team use since Fatale. The details change, but I’ve heard them play this song before. The good news of course is they WROTE the song, and they play it better than anybody. The question I keep asking: Do they have any tricks left up their sleeve?
That’s where Friday comes into the picture. It took four years for all 9 issues of Friday by Brubaker, Marcos Martin, and Munsta Vicente, but now that the full story is available (for pay-what-you-want at Panel Syndicate), it’s second only to Pulp among my favorite Brubaker works since the last round of Criminal ended. Friday‘s already been celebrated plenty – and if you haven’t experienced the works of Marcos Martin and Munsta Vicente through Spider-Man or Private Eye with Brian K. Vaughan get ready for a TREAT – but the final issues released in 2024 reminded me of something: I love it when Ed gets weird. Friday is a gorgeous, funny, clever comic riffing on Nancy Drew and The Boxcar Children, but as the work develops it sinks deeper and deeper into the supernatural. In the Scooby Doo mystery, the mysterious, murderous White Lady is revealed to be the wife of a Lumber Tycoon hellbent on revenge; in Friday she’s actually a mysterious-ass White Lady of the Forest!
It’s not like Brubaker and Phillips have been afraid to do the unexpected – again, demonic supernatural forces are all over Fatale and Kill or Be Killed – but Friday is a glorious glimpse into what it might be like to bring some of those stranger influences back. Maybe that’s not the answer either, but I find myself looking forward to the next work of theirs that leaves me thinking: I didn’t see that coming.
3 Moons 3 WorldsOh boy. This is a big one! 3m3w is the Substack Comics Universe launched by Jonathan Hickman, Mike Del Mundo, and Mike Huddleston in August 2021. Remember Substack Comics? This was one of two MASSIVE launch projects (the other was James Tynion IV leaving Batman for Substack money and what is now the quite good Tiny Onion Studios). Three years later and Substack’s moment as The Next Big Thing in comics is long gone, the grant money has dried up, and 3m3w just released their second big package of physical comics to my door. Now, there are two conversations to be had regarding 3m3w. The first is whether it’s worth it to pay for a Hickman-fronted project that has in 3 years physically delivered 2 sourcebooks with about 100 pages of comics per, 2 preview-edition floppy comics, a boatload of concept art prints, and 1 newspaper style cut-out of “Academy” with incredible art by Steve Epting. That’s not the question I’m answering today, although I suspect most of you can answer for yourselves!
The question for right now is: Are the 3 Moons 3 Worlds comics any good? Specifically, are the new 3m3w comics delivered in 2024 worth reading? Broadly, speaking… yeah! Hickman, Del Mundo, Huddleston, and for the last year, Nick Spencer (in some entirely unclear capacity) have created a genuinely fascinating science-fiction universe, and when they or their invited collaborators settle in to tell a story in this universe, it’s of the highest quality. For my money, the greatest skill of 3m3w is TASTE, as this crew has a knack for bringing in the best artists and creative teams to tell their slice-of-universe stories. Throughout 2024, Deniz Camp and Stipan Morian (20th Century Men), Alex Paknadel and Caspar Wijngaard (All Against All), and Dan Watters and DaNi (Coffin Bound), all entered the universe to tell stories as part of the Legends collection of short stories told across this universe (other entrants include Al Ewing, Tini Howard, Phil Hester and Rich Douek!). It’s unusual to see comics creators approach storytelling in this way, but the end result is a playground for some of the best creative teams in the business to compile a really compelling Sci-Fi Anthology.
For the most part, that’s been the 3m3w model to this point – Sci-Fi Anthology of short stories spread across this nascent universe with minimal tethers connecting to one another. That’s what you get in the Sourcebooks as well, with Del Mundo and Huddleston conceptualizing the incredible visuals, and Hickman and various collaborators (Juni Ba! Andre Lima Araujo! James Stokoe!) stepping in to bring them to (brief) life. These are regularly good but the end result does feel a lot like reading the first 10 pages of 30 new comics series. The potential far outweighs the actual satisfaction. But gods, that potential is devilishly tempting.
The one “core” narrative with any development right now follows the story of the adventurer Tajo Vallar, lost and thought-dead on the magical moon Kaoso. The recent physical editions include two Tajo stories: 1) “Academy” with Hickman and Steve Epting telling a Flash Gordon style story of what happened to Tajo after he was lost on Kaoso and 2) “The Vallars,” the most traditional ongoing comic in the line, a prequel story of Tajo as a boy on Therra, from Hickman, Jason Howard, Frank Martin and Rus Wooton. Ironically, on their own merits, neither of these works would live up to best of the year status (and honestly, in the catalog of Hickman’s creator-owned work would barely measure up to anything he’s done in the last decade). Nonetheless, as part of this developing greater whole, I quite enjoyed my time at the Rock of Vallar and the Academy Ruins.
At the end of the day, there are hundreds of words to be spilled on the nature of this project, but none of it changes that a new sci-fi universe of this scope and scale is endlessly ripe for great comics. I’d argue we’ve seen too few of those, but a Hickman/James Stokoe short-story about pirates and mythology is worth its weight in gold. The stories that do exist are unlike anything else in comics.
Single MotheringI expected to find Anna Harmala’s semi-autobiographical Single Mothering an emotional gut-punch, but instead Harmala’s delightful cartooning is one of the funniest and cutting works I’ve read in comics this year. Single Mothering is an informative look at what it’s like to be the (oft) lone new single mother in a group of parents, but Harmala’s quips cut both ways, targeting the misbehaviors of those around her as often as she’s revealing her own navel-gazing faux-pauxs. Set in Helsinki, Harmala also offers a strong glimpse into world culture for this dumb American (I showed my wife a scene of parents leaving their babies in strollers to nap outside a café like I’d just discovered a conspiracy of heretofore unimaginable grotesquery! She calmly informed me that apparently this is quite common!).
Gorgeous, smart, insightful to a specific point-of-view, Single Mothering has everything I look for in a comic book, and it made me laugh out loud to boot. Highly recommended.
Rare FlavoursIt’s so exciting when creators pair-up and form an instant sure thing for great comics. It’s why comics fans perk up for Morrison/Quitely, Brubaker/Phillips, and Gillen/McKelvie. Certain teams can build a reputation that assures some of the best of what comics have to offer, and Ram V and Filipe Andrade are on the fast track to locking in one of comics’ greatest modern partnerships. Following up on the massive success of the EXCELLENT The Many Deaths of Laila Starr, Ram and Andrade return with Rare Flavours, a six issue series from Boom Studios about a demigod/daemon who eats people and consumes their stories but is now hellbent on making a documentary about, uh, food.
There are sensational supernatural hooks we demand of comics – Cannibal Gods! Bounty Hunter assassins! A completely full theater to watch a documentary! – but the genius of Rare Flavours lies in structure and message. The creative powerhouse strike this stunning balance between filmmaking, flashbacks, and recipes, with each of the six issues centered around the ways certain dishes are routed in human lives and stories. This leads our lovable cannibal-god Rubin Baksh to wax poetic about the beauty of being human, as Ram and Andrade powerfully hammer home the value of adding your own depth of flavour to any art you create. It’s an inspiring, melancholy and cathartic work that belongs alongside The Many Deaths of Laila Starr as a modern classic. Best case, you’ll leave Rare Flavours inspired to create your own great works, and worst case, you’ll leave with a better understanding of how to make great triple schezwan rice.
BlurryFun fact: For the first 30 pages of Blurry, I confused Dash Shaw with Dax Shepard, and was therefore furious that the actor married to Kristen Bell was this good at making comics out of the gate. I don’t have strong Shepard opinions (I guess other than his parents forgot an ‘R’), but I do bristle at the idea that somebody already granted success in one medium could step in and produce something this… undeniable. Don’t worry, Blurry isn’t the work of some Hollywood-come-lately (you already knew that), instead the carefully considered progression of Shaw’s 20+ years cartooning and releasing critically-acclaimed works primarily through Fantagraphics.
More succinctly: Blurry‘s right in the conversation for graphic novel of the year. Shaw pulls off one of the trickiest feats in comics – a perpetual reset of starting new stories within stories – with such smooth skill I never once got tired of the trick. Every time two characters meet and ask about each other, it’s a chance to jump from one carefully considered life to another, feeling the weight of each individual’s own unique path and the choices that led them to this point. The end result is 10+ character’s who could fill a graphic novel on their own, from an art professor in a failing marriage to the queer black model in his art class to a novelist in search of a second book… the possibilities are endless, and Shaw devotes fully to each slice-of-life quest. The throughline is thematic, centered around a woman’s inability to choose flavors of ice cream, as each character faces life-altering choices of their own. I’ll be reading everything else Shaw has ever done, and never mistaking him for Dax Shepard again; this is instant classic work right here.
The post My Favorite Graphic Novels of September 2024 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Today, we go all in on the first 3 months of the X-Men From the Ashes era. How are X-Men comics holding up after Krakoa? And where do X-Men comic books go from here? We’ll look at the debuts of X-Men, Uncanny X-Men, Exceptional X-Men and the whole line of mutant launches, digging into what’s working, what’s not, and what could be!
The post X-Men From the Ashes Deep Dive w/ Anna Peppard & Adam Reck! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave and Charlotte finish the Ellis/Deodato Thunderbolts before digging into the launch of the much-celebrated, Eisner-winning “The Invincible Iron Man” by Matt Fraction and Salvador Larocca.
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Thunderbolts | #116 to #121 | Ellis and Deodato run concludes. | | Avengers: The Initiative | #13 | Added by Patreon Backer David A. | | Invincible Iron Man | #1 to #7 | Fraction and Larocca run begins |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2008 pt. 7
| Secret Invasion | Reading Order | Can you even trust your own co-hosts? |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2008 Pt. 6: Thunderbolts, Avengers The Initiative, & Invincible Iron Man appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Today, we go all in on Three Moons / Three Worlds, the new sci-fi comics universe from Jonathan Hickman, Mike Del Mundo and Mike Huddleston. This is year 3 of the Substack comics project, and despite Hickman’s status as the biggest American comics writer, a lot of fans don’t know what to make of 3m3w. We’ll break it all down here including what comics exist, what’s working and what’s not, and whether or 3m3w is worth it for paid subscribers
This Week’s Comic
Three Moons/Three Worlds by Jonathan Hickman
The post Hickman’s 3 Moons/3 Worlds Comics Deep Dive w/ Spike Stonehand! | CBH Live appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Today we’re talking the first issues of Wolverine and Exceptional X-Men, Ultimate Black Panther, Immortal Thor, and Gail Simone’s Uncanny X-Men.
This Week’s ComicsUncanny X-Men #2
Ultimate Black Panther #8
Wolverine #1
The Immortal Thor #15
Exceptional X-Men #1
New Comic of Next WeekSingle Mothering by Anna Harmala
Classic Comic of the WeekOnward to Our Noble Deaths
The post Wolverine #1! Uncanny X-Men #2! Ultimate Black Panther! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack talk about Charlotte watching Agatha All Along, Dave wonders when MMY could end, and friends recommend comics, video games, movies and places!
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2008 pt. 6
| Thunderbolts | #116 to #121 | Ellis and Deodato run concludes. | | Avengers: The Initiative | #13 | Added by Patreon Backer David A. | | Invincible Iron Man | #1 to #7 | Fraction and Larocca run begins |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2008 Variant Cover B: When Does MMY End?, Agatha, and Friends Recommend Friends appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Zack and Charlotte settle the debates on Bucky’s status as Captain America and American protesting. It’s an all CAP special (No cap).
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Captain America | #34 to #45 | The NEW Captain America |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2008 pt. 6
| Thunderbolts | #116 to #121 | Ellis and Deodato run concludes. | | Avengers: The Initiative | #13 | Added by Patreon Backer David A. | | Invincible Iron Man | #1 to #7 | Fraction and Larocca run begins |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2008 Pt. 5: Captain America appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Zack Creature and Charbone start our two part series on Jeff Smith, one of the most famous and important figures in independent comics publishing. This week, we cover perhaps the most checked out comic book from the kid’s section of the library ever: Bone.
Comics covered in this episode:
– Bone (issues 1-55)
Topics discussed:
– Is Bone truly the best all-ages hand-to-anyone universal comic recommendation?
– Does Bone balance its comedy and drama all the way through?
– Does Bone fulfill the promise of “Scrooge McDuck’s Odyssey”?
Our next episode on Jeff Smith will be:
Ep 2: RASL
Our next miniseries on Sandman will be broken into six episodes (all available on DC Universe Infinite Ultra):
– Preludes & Nocturnes, The Doll’s House, and Dream Country: Sandman #1-20
– Seasons of Mist, A Game of You, and Fables and Reflections: Sandman # 21-50 & The Sandman Special #1
– Brief Lives, Worlds’ End, The Kindly Ones, The Wake: Sandman #51-75
– Sandman: Overture, The Sandman: Endless Nights, Death: The High Cost of Living, Death: The Time of Your Life, Sandman: The Dream Hunters (comic edition, not prose)
– Lucifer Omnibus Vol. 1: Sandman Presents: Lucifer #1–3 & Lucifer #1-35 & Lucifer: Nirvana #1
– Lucifer Omnibus Vol. 2: Lucifer #36-75 & House of Mystery Halloween Annual #2: Infernal Bargains: Just Say No!
You can find Charlotte at twitter.com/mymarvelousyear
You can our other Marvel Comics podcast on Comic Book Herald at mymarvelousyear.com
Music for Extra Issues is credited to FM Skyline.
You can support Extra Issues via Patreon for as little as $1 a month at patreon.com/mymarvelousyear
The post Extra Issues – Jeff Smith’s Bone (1991) appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Charlotte and Zack tackle the launch of Guardians of the Galaxy and Nova after Annihilation and Annihilation Conquest.
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Guardians of the Galaxy / Nova | #1 to #3 / #8 to #15 | The Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning Guardians revamp takes off after Annihilation Conquest. |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2008 pt. 5
| Captain America | #34 to #45 | The NEW Captain America |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2008 Pt. 4: Nova & Guardians of the Galaxy appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Today, we go all in on Ultimate X-Men with the series script adaptor Zack Davisson. What’s it like working on this comic with Peach Momoko? What comes next? It’s all here!
Afterwards, I’ll chat about the latest in comic book news and releases, including the latest in the X-Men From the Ashes era.
The post Ultimate X-Men with Writer/Translator Zack Davisson! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Today we’re talking the first issues of Alien vs. Avengers and Wolverine: Revenge, catching up on X-Men (From the Ashes and Ultimate Universe), and Dave’s picks for new and classic comic of the week!
This Week’s Comics
Alien vs. Avenger #1
X-Men #3
Nyx #2
The post 2 New Hickman Comics! Alien vs Avengers! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave and Zack talk about Marvel Comics for Dummies vs DC Compact Classics, whether the direct market approach to comics still has a place, and a listener letter reflecting on the impact of X-Men God Loves Man Kills!
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2008 pt. 4
| Guardians of the Galaxy / Nova | #1 to #3 / #8 to #15 | The Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning Guardians revamp takes off after Annihilation Conquest. |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2008 Variant Cover A: Marvel Comics for Dummies, Zack Saves Comics & More! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
For some reason this month I decided I could read as many Manga picks as possible from Briana Lawrence’s The Essential Manga Guide, read the first 35 issues of Lucifer for the Extra Issues podcast, AND keep up with all the best new graphic novels and trades in August 2024. As always, my appetite for comics consumption is always greater than the realities of time. Nonetheless I persist, and pound-for-pound, I think this is the best monthly list published this year!
Don’t hesitate to let me know any of your favorites I may have missed via dave@comicbookherald.com!
To get these picks sent directly to your mailbox every month, sign up here for free.
SubgenreAt the exact moment I was ready to put Subgenre down, and move on to a stacked pile of amazing looking graphic novels, Matt Kindt and Wilfredo Torres hit me with the hook: Subgenre is a literal years-in-the-making answer to one of the greatest mysteries in Matt Kindt comics! For the first couple issues, this is not clear, or at least I didn’t anticipate it. In many ways, Subgenre is a careening genre mash-up by way of psychotic break, following a lead unable to tell the reality of his life as a P.I. or a warrior barbarian. And while I often like this ambition – see 1949 below! – through two issues it felt a bit like Kindt and Torres were simply going through the paces of Double Indemnity and Conan impressions. Intensely talented creators playing cover songs. I was getting tired.
Spoilers follow in the next paragraph!When the hook hit and I realized just how deeply Kindt was staring at his own navel, I laughed out loud with joy. Subgenre offers social commentary on A.I. ‘creation’ and the state of intellectual property, but more than that, it’s Kindt finally reconciling a character who has appeared in (I think) all of his comics since Super Spy. When I got to talk through a deep dive on Mind MGMT (one of my favorite comics of all time) with Kindt, we talked a little bit about the recurring nature of Philip K. Verve (or Verge at times), and how Kindt had devious plans for this strange villain occupying all the various realms of his own multiverse. As it turns out, Subgenre is that book, making use of the en vogue multiverse craze to tackle Verve’s place in Kindt’s canon. I can’t imagine this hook holds the same weight for those who aren’t devotees of the author, but personally, seeing Kindt’s long-running meta cut-ups of Mind MGMT and Dept. H in a comic celebrating a decade-plus long con is the kind of only-in-comics storytelling that makes me smile from ear to ear.
Search and Destroy Book 1Considering Pluto is the first manga I loved, and binged faster than pre-Covid Noah Lyles, it shouldn’t be too surprising that I’m deeply curious about any of the – many! – riffs on the works of Osamu Tezuka, aka the God of Manga. Search and Destroy is the latest in line, the dystopian Sci-Fi vision of Atsushi Kaneko adapting Dororo, the story of a young girl who had her 48 organs stolen and sold to “devils” and now seeks them out as a revenge cyborg! While I found the initial pacing sluggish and confusing – part of this might be that Fantagraphics’ English translation reads from right to left on each page (like Manga!), but the page turns are left to right (Like non-Manga!) – Search and Destroy gains clarity through chapters three and four, and is building a series I’ll look forward to continuing (Book 2 is already scheduled for a March 2025 release).
The opening essay describes Kaneko’s punk energy in these pages (hence the false hope that you’ve picked up a Stooges manga), and while it’s felt in the mere act of maturing and spraying blood across an acclaimed classic, I felt it most in the artist’s uncompromised vision for scenic quiet moments and hyper-kinetic, constantly escaping-the-eye action. Whereas Urasawa is meticulous and clean in Pluto, Kaneko is far more willing to smash-cut from seemingly unrelated body parts and scenic texture to create atmosphere. Again, at times the end result is a lack of coherence, and the emotional resonance of the involved characters is muted in the early going. As Search and Destroy picks up steam, though, it’s hard to put down, and harder still to wait for the remainder.
Kill Your DarlingsThe eight issues of Kill Your Darlings feel familiar, tickling memories of I Kill Giants, Die, Wednesday and much more, but in the way where I couldn’t put the story down until I found out how it all ended. I devoured this supernatural tragi-fantasy in a single sitting, as Ethan S. Parker, Griffin Sheridan, Bob Quinn and John J. Hill show off their bonafides in a heart-wrenching coming-of-age knockout. Kill Your Darlings begins with an 8-year-old Rose conjuring visions of anthropomorphic warrior kingdoms, only for a lurking evil to take hold and crossover into the real world with harrowing consequences. The world explodes from there, taking The Neverending Story and layering in modern reflections on imagination, mental health, and the appropriate dialect for an Elepig (Australian, obviously).
I was a big fan of Bob Quinn’s Krakoa X-Men contributions in the pages of Way of X (I still have a swashbuckling Quinn Nightcrawler set as my laptop background), but it feels like Quinn and Hill get to let loose in especially freeing ways across the cuddly yet devastated kingdom of Rose’s young mind. As far as I know, this is Parker and Sheridan’s first major release, and they come out of the gates fully formed, with an instantly adaptable (complimentary!) feature.
1949Marvel and Jonathan Hickman fans are likely to know Dustin Weaver as the artist and co-creator of the comically long-gestating SHIELD miniseries. Weaver’s work on SHIELD is excellent, selling the sci-fi grandeur and intrigue of that expansion of the Marvel mythos, and it’s always interesting watching a creator known as an artist venture into writing and drawing their own stories. This can be the turn to superstardom (as in the case of so many like Frank Miller, Walt Simonson, Todd McFarlane, etc) or it can be a fascinating window into the value of a professional storyteller guiding and scripting the proceedings! In Weaver’s case, 1949 isn’t exactly his first writing credit, as I learned recently reading some Bebop and Rocksteady work of his to my kids. Likewise, 1949 is actually a part of Weaver’s Image-published sci-fi anthology Paklis, which has been coming out since 2017.
All of that is mere prologue to the salient point: 1949 rules. Weaver seamlessly blends black-and-white noir murder mystery with full-shine cyber sci-fi. The end result is Blade Runner by way of Modesty Blaise with a healthy dose of Raymond Chandler. Fans of the Matrix or Altered Carbon won’t find Sci-Fi they’ve never seen before, but most comics readers will see beloved genre-mashing in the hands of an ambitious, deeply talented creator. Weaver’s ability to channel Frank Miller’s Sin City in black-and-white supernatural murder mystery and then seamlessly segue into the glowing polished metals of their past SHIELD work is worth the price of admission alone.
DwellingsJay Stephens’ Dwellings is an absolute triumph of following your passions with all your ability, even when your passions are Chibi/Archie comics infused with all the blood, guts and horror the haunted town of Elwich can manage! And listen, a round-headed cartoon strip hero from days of yore cursing like a sailor and murdering adorable characters with an axe-puppet has a certain level of intrigue. But what makes Dwellings special is once you get past the “gimmick,” you very clearly see – quite early in the work – that Stephens is deep in this world, and channeling Junji Ito-esque hauntings. There’s a surreal poetry to the darkness, sometimes literally as characters quote literature, and oft-adjacent, with Stephens breaking up story with false old-school comic book advertisements for all manner of odd, twisted ephemera. It’s the kind of comic that I’m just happy to see exist, unabridged and with all its edges unsawed. Stephens could continue these horror stories in Dwellings for as long as he wants as far as I’m concerned, and I’ll keep reading.
The Library Mule of CordobaWhat a delightful surprise. I went into The Library Mule of Cordoba from Ablaze publishing hoping for some interesting slices of history, and left with deeply resonant characters, regularly inventive formal uses of the medium, and a thoughtful treatise on the value of art and what you’d do to keep it alive. And also, all the best sequences of a Eunuch fighting a Donkey in the history of comics. The French duo of Wilfrid Lupano and Leonard Chemineau team up for the story of the librarian, transcriber, and apprentice-turned-thief (plus his good-for-nothing mule!) trying to salvage as many books as they can from the greatest library in the world before the new Caliph burns the books in the name of religion and power. It’s funny, insightful and full of captivating characters, plus Ablaze includes some fascinating historical reference work that the fable is based on. Admittedly, the book drags its heels at times, but we can chalk that up to fully inhabiting the spirit of the mule tasked with carrying the knowledge of an entire civilization.
Loving, OhioThose teens! Always coming of age! Loving, Ohio is Matthew Erman and Sam Beck’s heartfelt, richly characterized story of jaded high-schoolers desperate to escape their dead-end town AND the supernatural horror that haunts them. There are a LOT of good comics in this realm in 2024 – What’s up The Gulf and Nights on this very list! – but what makes Loving, Ohio stand out is Beck’s ability to visually transform sound into pulsating terror, and Erman’s sincere exploration of the insidiously casual nature of religious cultism. The town of Loving is the heart of a cult/religion (this book makes it hard to tell the difference, which is its own kind of successful commentary) called The Chorus. The friend-posse’s fathers are members of The Chorus, and come to deeply resent it the same way I came to resent Church services (I particularly remember gravitating to the Jim O’Rourke line: “I don’t wanna desecrate, my only day to sleep in late”). Over the course of the work, we see Sloane’s father completely taken in by The Chorus, to the point that he loses his daughter and doesn’t even realize it’s happening. It’s an incredibly effective and believable emotional core.
First, though, the teens have to survive the David Lynch villain with knives in his octopus arms, in a town where teen death seems to be about as common as the cold. I don’t know how intentional it is, but I certainly felt the weight of mass shootings in the way Loving sighs and plows onward after tragedy, and I wonder how much Erman and Beck thought about similar national attitudes towards mass trauma. Regardless, there’s a weight and beauty to this graphic novel that held me captive through a single sitting. By books end you’ll know these teens, and you’ll care for them, and you’ll want them to escape this corner of the world they’ve known as much as they do.
How It All EndsThis will come as a shock to many of you, but I am not a teen girl about to enter high school. And I think I’ve been frank in these monthly reviews, that the shine of the middle-grade / YA graphic novel market has worn thin for me lately, with too many Telgemeir clones playing it safe with the formula of emotive Issues(TM) that has worked for these younger readers. So believe me when I say How it All Ends by Emma Hunsinger is an absolutely joyful breath of fresh air. It’s a deeply inhabited, laugh-out-loud funny journey into the window of a teenage girl skipping straight from 7th-grade to high school. There’s not a lot I’ve read that more effectively captures the anxiety of starting high-school, the pressures of looking cool, or the sheer charm of making a new best friend (and maybe more). I loved this book – this should be a middle-grade staple for years to come.
Putty PygmalionEvery new release from Silver Sprocket offers the possibility of greatness. Obviously, not everything can be a favorite or an instant classic, but the publisher’s ethos of expressive, unadulterated creativity from a wide variety of diverse creators is bursting with potential. This month, it’s Lonnie Garcia’s Putty Pygmalion as one of my favorite works of the year, in a 70+ page graphic novella I absolutely couldn’t put down.
Impossible mash-ups of vintage photos, clay dogs, Misery-vibin’ root vegetables are like putty in Lonnie Garcia’s hands, in this story about a lonely nerd who (illegally) Frankenstein’s to life a companion made from misuse of an old children’s putty product. Imagine play-do creations could come to life, and a deeply sad individual used it to replace their roommate/crush! Narratively, there’s a great deal of Black Mirror tension in this poor creation infused with an adult-male consciousness but unable to leave the house for fear of being undone. The real trick to Garcia’s work is in the details, though, with an inimitable style of relatively simple characters standing in stark contrast to washed out old photos of familial spaces (in the liner notes that conclude the work, Garcia reveals the photos are from a miniature playhouse he bought on Facebook marketplace! One horror story straight into another!). It would be so easy for Garcia to lose control of clarity amid all the ambition, but honestly, that only really happens during the work’s climax, and that’s by design! Putty Pygmalion is truly excellent arthouse comic-making, and well worth your time.
Brittle JointsMaria Sweeney’s debut graphic novel from Street Noise Books is one of the most striking, earnest works I’ve read this year, an incredible window into invisible illness, living with disability, and the American healthcare experience. Sweeney’s gorgeous painted autobiography of living with an exceedingly rare Bruck’s syndrome finds a challenging balance between completely foreign daily complexity and deeply relatable struggles that follow from those around you questioning how “real” your pain and ailments may be. Sweeney lives with impossibly brittle bones and constant pain, but finds a way to communicate her life with poetic empathy that never drifts into hollow platitude or exaggerated optimism. Told in bite-sized chapters, Brittle Joints is an effective, memorable meditation on the value of a life often consumed by chronic pain.
Given my own struggles with migraines that leave me frustratingly dizzy and limited for days on end, I found Sweeney’s ability to push through decidedly more invasive pain recognizable and encouraging, even in their deep frustration. In depicting the specifics of a Doctor that ignores her symptoms and chart, and denies hope of new solution, Sweeney taps into an all-too familiar experience of many Americans let down by medical systems. Sweeney is not simply driving awareness for Bruck’s syndrome either; Brittle Joints is a call to consider the internal ails of all those around you, to hold back your own judgments about others medical needs, and to remember that yours is not the only battle.
NightsI’ve heard so many good things about Nights this year, and it did not disappoint. Wyatt Kennedy’s writing is the kind of skillful mastery of comedy and human dialect that reminds me just how far great dialog can carry a comic. Sure, the worldbuilding of Nights is a wonderful mix of familiar elements (vampires!) placed in unfamiliar situations (there’s only one in a Spain-controlled Florida, and she’s an unemployable kletopmaniac!). And sure, Luigi Formisano sells the expression of everything from a Ghost out for a jog to a star-nosed mole named Starven (like Steven but he’s a star-nosed… you got it). But sometimes it’s that good old-fashioned ability to put words in bubbles and make you laugh. It’s so simple, but it’s so hard to do well!
Even more than that, Kennedy and Formisano transcend concept, taking a coming-of-age teenage wasteland set in a casually supernatural Florida, and infusing it with abrupt page turns, non-sequitur panel visions, and all manner of “wait, what was THAT” moments. In the wrong hands this could be chaos, but I get the feeling Nights Season One is a special moment for both creators, and they’re completely at ease with the confidence it takes to break rules like this. I don’t want to get in trouble, but yeah, it’s Morrisonian. Can’t wait for season two.
Young Hag and the Witch’s QuestOne of my favorite things about exploring comics is the medium is so full of incredible, varied work that I can go from never-heard-of-em to Isabel Greenberg is one of my favorite contemporary graphic novelists in the span of 2 months. My local library turned me on to Greenberg’s The One Hundred Nights of Hero, an instant classic about a lesbian couple that has to keep an abusive oaf distracted with fairy tales for 100 nights, and because of that recent luck, when I saw Young Hag and the Witch’s Quest in the new releases, my eyes lit with excitement. Greenberg’s latest follows a grandmother, mother and daughter (the titular Young Hag), Britain’s last witches as magic has left the land. The story is told 50 years after the fall of Camelot, tying its history to King Arthur, Merlin, Morgan Le Fay, and all the great mythologies you’ve encountered in some version across so many tales.
Greenberg shares a Vertigo-infused love of stories-within-stories, all captured through her exuberant cartooning and command of narrative structure. This allows Young Hag to flow through the familial witch’s quest and intertwining Arthurian legends, but all told through Greenberg’s feminist interpretation of stories left untold. Greenberg’s approach gives her a great deal of imaginative terrain for characters like Morgan Le Fay and The Lady of the Lake (she had a name!) who get short-shrift as betrayers or plot devices in many versions of the legends. It’s a smart, captivating journey, with deeply relatable relationships between the likes of Young Hag, Ancient Crone, and eventually even Tom.
My Favorite Thing is Monsters Book 2I sat intimidated by Emil Ferris’ long-awaited follow-up to 2017’s much-celebrated My Favorite Thing is Monsters for weeks. The massive tome lurked on my shelf like a sentient homunculus taunting me with jeers: “Don’t bother picking us up, you’ll never finish this great work before the library due date any way! Mwahahaha!” I can’t say I’ve been waiting 7 long years, but it’s hard not to feel the weight of Ferris’ journey to seeing Book 2 to publication (especially given what I know about the literal lawsuits Ferris and publisher Fantagraphics fought through along the way). It’s the sequel to an instant comics canon classic, and that’s actually quite rare in the critically-acclaimed graphic novel space – there’s simply a heft to a work like this that is rare in comics.
So naturally, once I started, I finished the whole thing in three days, and it went down smooth as a nice Chianti.
Ferris’ notebook journaling remains an incredibly effective storytelling device for the charming Karen Reyes, our would-be young lesbian werewolf detective. This work lives and breathes Chicago, July, 1968 so effectively, it’s impossible not to feel yourself transported like Karen and Deeze taking the el to the Art Museum. The core cast of characters – the Brain, the memory of Anka, the addition of Karen’s new girlfriend, Shelly – are bursting with their own worlds of story and perspectives on the scene. You take all that, and Karen’s continued efforts to solve Anka’s murder as she navigates the world after the death of her mother, and you add-in Ferris’ generationally unique densly-hatched Monster Mag covers interspersed purposefully throughout the narrative, and you have everything that made this book such a massive hit in 2017.
The worst thing I can say about My Favorite Thing is Monsters Book 2 is that it’s more of the same. But considering “the same” is perhaps the most unanimously praised graphic novel of the last decade (I have Book 1 ranked inside my 20 favorite comics of all time!), that doesn’t seem like an especially effective slam. The one pervasive question I can’t shake is whether a Book 2 is especially additive, and on those grounds, I’m conflicted. Plot-wise, the answer is no – the murder-mystery aspects of Monsters aren’t that compelling or frankly even that ambiguous. So I suppose if you’re a reader deeply invested in Anka’s past, and Deeze’s exact, specific, spelled-out role, Monsters Book 2 is especially unsatisfying. For my money, all those details are functionally just an excuse to live in Karen’s world, to see through her eyes, and to watch Ferris’ reinvent her storytelling style every third page.
Ironically, Book 2 ends on even more of a cliffhanger than Book 1, and although I’m sure the work could end here, Ferris has left the door wide open for a Book 3. I wonder if Ferris will have a hard time letting this world go. I couldn’t blame her. After all, we extend comics of all kinds the endless shelflife of ongoing continuities – but Ferris has to wrap up Monters with a tidy bow in two books? If I let go of the idea of a smoking-gun conclusion that pulls everything together, and open myself to the possibility of revisiting this world every few years, well, let’s just say it doesn’t sound especially monstrous. My Favorite Thing is Great Comics. Why not enjoy some more?
The post My Favorite Graphic Novels of August 2024 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Daverine, Charlogan, and Old Man Zack talk about a million Wolverine comics, including Old Man Logan!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Wolverine / Wolverine: Old Man Logan Giant Size / Wolverine Origins / Logan | #56, #62 to #65, #66 to #72 / #1 / #10 / #1 to #3 | Wolverine in “Get Mystique” by Jason Aaron, Old Man Logan, Wolverine Origin check-in, and Brian K. Vaughn miniseries about Logan in Japan! |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2008 pt. 4
| Guardians of the Galaxy / Nova | #1 to #3 / #8 to #15 | The Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning Guardians revamp takes off after Annihilation Conquest. |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2008 Pt. 3: Wolverine (Old Man Logan!) appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Today I dig into the best manga of all time with Crunchyroll senior editor and author of The Essential Manga Guide Briana Lawrence! From Berserk to Dragon Ball to Chainsaw Man what makes Briana’s cut, and what are the notable omissions?
The Essential Manga GuideAuthor: Briana Lawrence
Publisher: Running Press Adult
The post The Essential Manga Reads of All Time w/ Briana Lawrence | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Charlotte and Zack settle in for Spider-Man: Brand New Day!
| Amazing Spider-Man | #546 to #551, #567 to #573, #574 to #579 | Brand New Day – Ok, so Spidey begins TRIPLE shipping in 2008, meaning the full year’s worth of Spider-Man comics takes us from AMS #546 to #581. If you’re a true webhead you can absolutely try to read all of them! For everyone who’s getting panic attacks just thinking about cramming that into a month, I’ve selected a few of my favorites. |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2008 pt. 3
| Wolverine / Wolverine: Old Man Logan Giant Size / Wolverine Origins / Logan | #56, #62 to #65, #66 to #72 / #1 / #10 / #1 to #3 | Wolverine in “Get Mystique” by Jason Aaron, Old Man Logan, Wolverine Origin check-in, and Brian K. Vaughn miniseries about Logan in Japan! |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2008 Pt. 2: Amazing Spider-Man appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Zack the King of the Eggs and Nosferatu Charlotte finish our two part series on Kentaro Miura’s seminal dark fantasy manga series Berserk. This episode covers volumes 4-14.
Comics covered in this episode:
– Berserk Vol. 4-13
Topics discussed:
– Does this arc retroactively elevate The Black Swordsman arc?
– What exactly works (or doesn’t work) about the way Miura portrays sexual violence?
– Was Charlotte named after a 90s manga character?
Our next miniseries will be on Jeff Smith:
Ep 1: Bone, and Rose (A Bone prequel)
Ep 2: RASL
After Jeff Smith, we’ll be covering Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman and M.R. Carey’s Lucifer, as well as some spin off titles. The episode breakdown will be finalized soon.
You can find Charlotte at twitter.com/mymarvelousyear
You can our other Marvel Comics podcast on Comic Book Herald at mymarvelousyear.com
Music for Extra Issues is credited to FM Skyline.
You can support Extra Issues via Patreon for as little as $1 a month at patreon.com/mymarvelousyear
The post Extra Issues – Berserk Part #2 – Vol. 4-14 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack kick off 2008 with the big question: Is the Red Hulk the dumbest Marvel Comics we’ve ever read?
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Hulk (2008) | #1 to #6 | Red Hulk! | | Thor | #7 to #12 | JMS and Coipel run continues |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2008 pt. 2
| Amazing Spider-Man | #546 to #551, #567 to #573, #574 to #579 | Brand New Day – Ok, so Spidey begins TRIPLE shipping in 2008, meaning the full year’s worth of Spider-Man comics takes us from AMS #546 to #581. If you’re a true webhead you can absolutely try to read all of them! For everyone who’s getting panic attacks just thinking about cramming that into a month, I’ve selected a few of my favorites. |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2008 Pt. 1: Hulk & Thor appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Today we’re talking the first issue of Marvel’s new Uncanny X-Men, all the Ultimate Universe comics of the last 2 weeks, and Dave’s picks for new and classic comic of the week!
This Week’s Comics
Uncanny X-Men #1
Ultimate Black Panther #7
Avengers #17
The Boy Wonder #4
The Deviant #7
The Power Fantasy #1
Kaya #20
Ultimate Spider-Man #7
The Immortal Thor #13
X-Force #1
The Department of Truth #24
The post Uncanny X-Men #1 by Simone & Marquez! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
I don’t know what’s more impressive: how many good comics there are every month, or my ability to curate them. You’re right, it’s probably a tie.
Don’t hesitate to let me know any of your favorites I may have missed via dave@comicbookherald.com!
To get these picks sent directly to your mailbox every month, sign up here for free.
Smoking Behind the Supermarket With YouThere are approximately 4-5 public sources I trust for comics recommendations these days: Sktchd, Comics Beat, Book Riot, CBCC, and my local library. The rare 6th option is floating past a rec on the artist formerly known as social media, which is exactly how I learned of Smoking Behind the Supermarket With You, a rom-com manga from Junishi via SquareEnix Manga. As is my way, an inability to find the manga via any of my normal sources led me to purchase a copy through my local comic shop (my decidedly not “with it” cashier said, “Here’s the one you ordered… uh… it has a long name.”) It’s hardly going to be one I hang on to pass on to my children, but it’s a simple, sweet and silly manga that provided just what I needed to detox with in between more serious works.
The premise is that a middle-aged man stuck in a boring corporate job has but one joy in life: seeing the young beautiful cashier who sells him cigarettes. While many jokes are made at his expense, it’s a deliberately non-sexual infatuation, which only grows as that cashier puts on a disguise and begins – you guessed it! – smoking behind the supermarket with the clueless, sweaty guy (you can put that description on my tombstone). Tonally, it reminds me a lot of Kaguya-Sama: Love is War, although it’s nowhere near as funny. Nonetheless, it’s a nice, feel-good read and a light change of pace.
Mark Twain’s War PrayerThis Fantagraphics graphic novel is a bit of a historical/literary curio, as Mark Twain’s War Prayer is a satirical, poetic short story written in 1910 (the year Twain died). Illustrator Seymour Chwast accompanies Twain’s scathing indictment of religious celebration of war – Twain is particularly savage towards prayers for the troops, and all that entails for the other side – with a mixture of cartooning, collage, textual design, and artistic virtuosity. Chwast really finds their groove selling the indignity and atrocity of war as Twain hits his stride with the actual parodic prayer and lines like “help us to turn them out roofless with little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land.” It’s perfectly and sadly evergreen dark humor poking right at the heart of our many, many modern religious crusades, and a fresh reminder of Twain’s vitality.
My Fairy GodfatherHere’s the challenge with My Fairy Godfather, a new Fantagraphics graphic novel out now from Robert Mailer Anderson and Jon Sack: It plays like a classic movie. This is both praise and my hesitation in evaluating the work. On one hand, the characters and world of My Fairy Godfather, where a teen girl loses her parents and moves in with her gay godfather in the decidedly conservative Liberal, Kansas, are pitch perfect. Anderson writes deeply compelling interactions and small-town tensions, and Sack sells the characterizations with the skill of Daniel Clowes at his most earnest. It’s teen angst mixed up in middle-America bigotry, with a healthy side of finding connection through art.
What’s the hold up?
You know this story. You know every beat of this story. There are no alarms, and no surprises throughout the entire work. So yes, while I enjoyed and recommend the read, somewhere past the halfway point I realized that everything was playing just a bit too much like a movie I’ve seen before. Nonetheless, My Fairy Godfather is a really well-produced affirmation of found family, queer acceptance and allowing people to improve.
Korgi: The Complete TaleYou may never forgive me for this, but I have to speak my truth: I don’t like dogs. I didn’t have dogs growing up, and was chased and threatened by them multiple times. Subconsciously, I associate dogs with a similar threat level to seeing a coyote walking down the street, except I’m more confident the coyote will run away. Now, as an adult I’ve known many wonderful, loving dogs, and certainly respect the bond between canine and pet-owner. But I also know quite clearly that until my kids start to demand a pet, and I inevitably lose, I won’t be a dog person.
Fortunately, this is no way impedes my ability to enjoy Christian Slade’s Korgi. Slade is a preposterously gifted illustrator, launching a young girl and her dog into all kinds of wordless fantastical journeys with nothing but a heavily detailed pen. Korgi is reminiscent of Jim Woodring’s Frank, another wordless series of strange black-and-white worlds driven entirely by their creators artistic prowess and ability to sell story entirely through visuals. There’s a real thrill to the endless possibility of one cartoonist’s pen in Korgi, with weird, strange mystical fantasy that always take four left turns you don’t expect, and looks great doing so.
The Last DeliveryEvan Dahm is a fantastic cartoonist, and The Last Delivery is a gorgeous yet sinister glimpse into the haunted house of their imagination. This anthropomorphic fantasy world finds an innocent Turtle delivery boy seeking to deliver a single package, only to sink deeper and deeper into an Edgar Allen Poe-esque party of horrors, where each new party-goer seems more deranged than the next. There’s a surprise nausea to the madness as the cute and deluded designs indicate a light-hearted comedy, and the ensuing fever dream of Alice in Wonderland inspired head-chopping is anything but light.
This would all be enough to satisfy that classic appetite to see Kermit the Frog tortured endlessly, but where Dahm excels is through a flexible metaphor for the impact on the grotesquely rich on the genuine salt of the Earth committed to their meaningless work. So, yes, there’s the shock from watching our poor last deliverer sustain near mortal wounds, but there’s a more unsettling effect via a work that reminds me I’m wasting my damn time on a dead end job! Far be it from me to use nausea multiple times to sell the effectiveness of a comic I quite like, but it works, dammit!
BardaI love that DC’s committed to a middle-grade line of graphic novels, but mostly they haven’t been for me (often quite literally: I’m only middle-grade at heart when someone starts blasting Linkin Park). Ngozi Ukazu’s Barda is a rare exception, a compelling and heartfelt look into the early days of Big Barda and Scott Free on Apokolips. Ukazu’s Check, Please is among my favorite comics of all time, but it’s fascinating watching her navigate Jack Kirby’s 4th World with reverence, horror, and awe, and very little of the webcomic humor that made Check, Please such a runaway hit.
The graphic novel is at its most effective exploring the traumas Granny Goodness inflicts upon Barda and her Female Furies to bludgeon them into the weapons Darkseid’s Apokolips requires. If you’ve read Kirby’s 4th World – or virtually any DC Comic involving Barda since – you know how this ends, but Ukazu still sells the difficulty of Barda overcoming the pain and manipulations inflicted upon her, and the lessons she’s been taught all her life. The saga of Aurelie is particularly haunting, even within the confines of middle-grade, and Barda renewed my passion for the Fourth World as a whole!
Age 16At an absolute minimum, I love Rosena Fung’s structural ambition and scope in Age 16, out now from Annick Press. The gorgeous graphic novel tracks one Chinese-Canadian family line, a grandmother, mother, and daughter, with chapters of what each of them were like and experienced at the Age of 16. So we begin with 16-year old Roz, in the more familiar (for me at least!) setting of Toronto in 2000, before cutting back to her mother’s time in 1972 Hong Kong and her mother’s time in 1954 Guangdong. It’s a brilliant way to examine why parents act the way they do, and what forces shaped them to fixate on the things that occupy their brains. Fung not only expertly illustrates how Roz’s mother (Lydia) plays into her developing eating disorder, but how Lydia experienced similar cutting comments from her mother about her weight and eating in Hong Kong. Fung draws consistent mirrors between the women’s experiences at 16 despite their vast regional and cultural differences. It’s the kind of rare insight every 16 year old craves when they look at their parent and shout “Why are you like this?!”
Fung is a wonderful artist, capable of expressive character action and strategic yet captivating color choices dictating the flavor of each shift in era. The Toronto era teenage angst reminds me in part of the recent, critically-lauded Roaming by Mariko Tamaki, with the blending backdrop of history that made Feeding Ghosts one of my favorite graphic novels from earlier in the year. Age 16 is a striking portrait of 50 years of shared family history, and how the past shapes behavior and relationships across generations.
Food SchoolJade Armstrong’s 2022 Shortbox Comics Fair entry gets a physical graphic novel release from Conundrum Press, and it’s another common win for the Zainab Akhtar curated comics fair. Food School is Armstrong’s self-described Josei slice-of-life look at young non-binary character named Olive as they navigate a three month stint in a program designed to help with their eating disorder. Armstrong treats the illness with compassion and careful examination, but also finds plenty of space for comedy, characterization, and relatable relationship drama. Armstrong’s cartooning is simple which belies the complexity of facial expression selling emotion and feeling. Likewise, the clean panels help exaggerate the Manga-influenced explosion of emotion during pivotal scenes.
At 78 pages and an adorably wee package, it’s a literal light read, but perfectly satisfying in narrative density. Armstrong is an immensely talented cartoonist, and when I wasn’t laughing or learning, I was impressed by Armstrong’s subtle ability to weave in gender dysphoria into a work already full of complicated, sensitive topics.
Final CutThere’s a real comfort, an excited relief, in sinking into the work of a celebrated comics master. I find this especially true for living legend cartoonists who so clearly see the literary potential of graphic novels, and trod along at their own pace and process far outside the week-to-week grind of the direct marketplace ecosystem. It’s the feeling I have with new comics by Chris Ware, Emil Ferris or Lynda Barry, last year’s Monica by Daniel Clowes, and now Final Cut by Charles Burns. Readers most likely know Burns via Black Hole, an all-time great work completed from 1995 to 2005. Otherwise, apart from the oft-overlooked X’ed Out trilogy, Burns’s oeuvre is a bit less clear than say Clowes’ or Ware’s, making them a more mysterious, seemingly reclusive cartoonist. That changes to some extent in 2024 with two releases from Burns: Kommix, a series of comic book covers from imagined comics of the Silver Age, and Final Cut, a full graphic novel released via Pantheon.
In Final Cut, Burns returns to the lens of confused young adults set amid a backdrop of nostalgic vague Americana. The work centers on a young man’s artistic obsessions, and how these dreams interfere with human connection. Through the lens of Brian, the young would-be filmmaker, and his lead actress, artistic muse, and crush, Laurie, Burns subtly blends reality and filmmaker’s visions into a coalesced whole where it’s not always clear what is or isn’t happening. Unlike the X’ed Out trilogy, though, Final Cut never fully succumbs to Burns’ more surreal nightmares. There’s ample tension created by the B-movie horror obsessions, particularly with Invasion of the Body-Snatchers, but Burns never quite lets on whether or not the work is about to go full pulp. It’s a challenging blend, adding a layer of gripping uncertainty to what would otherwise be a fairly straightforward story of young artists finding their way through a project that can never quite measure up to the visions they have for it. Burns fully inhabits Brian in particular, through gorgeous alien invaders and versatile sketchbook drawings of everything from alien self-portraits to lushly rendered sketches of Laurie. It’s a lived-in, esoteric and compelling work that encourages re-reads.
AttaboyHoly Samus Aran, I love this comic. Attaboy is the self-published graphic novella of cartoonist Tony McMillan, now given wider publishing by Mad Cave Studios, and it’s the secret in-depth history of a classic video game that may or may not be real. The author sets out to describe and document an instruction manual of their memories of the childhood favorite, unlocking the unreality of the mysterious classic as the book progresses. It’s a gorgeously illustrated love letter to Megaman and Metroidvania, with an unexpected gut-punching message at the center.
McMillan works in the DIY tactile style of Michel Fiffe (Copra) or Jesse Lonergan (Planet Paradise), with this brilliant blend of childlike enthusiasm of taking colored pencil to paper, and the completely untouchable skill of a tenured professional. Attaboy is awash in swirling, kinetic dreams of a videogame universe, as the narration builds towards deeper meaning and understanding how art helps us process the real struggles of our day to day. It’s particularly focused on absent father figures and single mothers, and how children relate to both, but even more broadly Attaboy uses its svelte weight to reiterate the power of our entertainment at its best. This is one of my absolute favorite comics of 2024, and I can’t wait to read more from McMillen in the future.
The post My Favorite Graphic Novels of July 2024 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack review Deadpool and Wolverine before discussing the Doctor Doom news that broke at San Diego Comic Con and what comes next for the MCU.
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2008 pt. 1
| Hulk (2008) | #1 to #6 | Red Hulk! | | Thor | #7 to #12 | JMS and Coipel run continues |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2007 Variant Cover C: Deadpool & Wolverine, Doctor Doom, & the Future of the MCU! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Today we’re talking the first volume of Ultimate Black Panther, two new X-Men #1 issues, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles relaunch, and Dave’s picks for new and classic comic of the week!
This Week’s Comics
Ultimate Black Panther #6
TMNT #1
Nyx #1
Monstress #53
The Nice House by the Sea #1
Ultimate X-Men #5
Immortal Thor Annual #1
Phoenix #1
The post Ultimate Black Panther vol. 1 Review! Phoenix and Nyx #1! | CBH Live appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Charlotte and special guest Luka Nieto Gray talk all things Marvel Cosmic!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Nova / Annihilation Conquest | AC Prologue #1 / Nova #1 to #7 / AC #1 to #6 | See the Reading Order | | Silver Surfer: In Thy Name | #1-4 | Added by Patron Robert H. |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2008 pt. 1
| Hulk (2008) | #1 to #6 | Red Hulk! | | Thor | #7 to #12 | JMS and Coipel run continues |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2007 Pt. 8: Nova/Annihilation Conquest & Silver Surfer appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Zuck the Fairy and Charlotte “Iron Slab” Fierro begin our two part series on Kentaro Miura’s seminal dark fantasy manga series Berserk. This episode covers the first 3 volumes, and the next episode will cover volumes 4-14. The manga series continues after that but 14 concludes the first big portion and provides a satisfying conclusion if committing to 42 (and counting) volumes seems intimidating.
Comics covered in this episode:
– Berserk Vol. 1-3
Topics discussed:
– Do these opening volumes “sell” Berserk to its audience?
– Why Guts so sad?
– Is Puck the Rick Jones of Berserk?
Our next miniseries will be on Kentaro Miura’s Berserk:
Ep 2: Vol 4-13 (trust us, splitting it up like this makes sense)
Following that, we’ll be doing a miniseries on Jeff Smith:
Ep 1: Bone, and Rose (A Bone prequel)
Ep 2: RASL
After Jeff Smith, we’ll be covering Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman and M.R. Carey’s Lucifer, as well as some spin off titles. The episode breakdown will be finalized soon.
You can find Charlotte at twitter.com/mymarvelousyear
You can our other Marvel Comics podcast on Comic Book Herald at mymarvelousyear.com
Music for Extra Issues is credited to FM Skyline.
You can support Extra Issues via Patreon for as little as $1 a month at patreon.com/mymarvelousyear
The post Extra Issues – Berserk Part #1 – Vol. 1-3 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack talk all things WORLD WAR HULK!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| World War Hulk | World War Hulk reading order – We’ll read issues of Incredible Hulk & World War Walk / Aftermath for the club. | See the Reading Order |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2007 pt. 8
| Nova / Annihilation Conquest | AC Prologue #1 / Nova #1 to #7 / AC #1 to #6 | See the Reading Order | | Silver Surfer: In Thy Name | #1-4 | Added by Patron Robert H. |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2007 Pt. 7: World War Hulk appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Today we’re talking the first issue of X-Men #1 in the From the Ashes reboot, before looking at Ultimates #2 and the continuation of the new Ultimate Universe.
This Week’s Comics
X-Men #1
Ultimates #2
Ice Cream Man #40
The Boy Wonder #3
The post X-Men #1 From The Ashes Review! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack finish Astonishing X-Men and cover the whole X-Men Messiah CompleX event!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Astonishing X-Men / Giant-Size Astonishing X-Men / Wolverine | #19 to #24 / 1/ #56 | End of Whedon / Cassaday, and an issue of Wolverine I don’t remember! | | X-Men: Messiah CompleX | Messiah CompleX reading order | See the RO |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2007 pt. 7
| World War Hulk | World War Hulk reading order – We’ll read issues of Incredible Hulk & World War Walk / Aftermath for the club. | See the RO |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2007 Pt. 6: Astonishing X-Men & X-Men: Messiah CompelX appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Watching my son become a veracious graphic novel reader is one of the purest delights of my entire adult life. After several years of only very gently pushing Marvel superhero toys to replace or join his dinosaurs (didn’t take), offering to read him the Marvel encyclopedia instead of the Pokedex in kindergarten (wasn’t interested), and trying to get his first words to be “All Hail Doctor Doom” (that one worked, Doom be praised), turns out I just calmly needed to wait for him to learn to read and I wouldn’t be able to tear him away from comics.
My wife and I have always enjoyed reading to the kids, but in Kindergarten (somewhere in the 5 to 6 year old range) my son started blazing through books on his own and hasn’t looked back. Every week now is full of library visits filling up our basket with as many Magic Treehouse chapter books and comics that we can carry.
Below you’ll find our favorites through less than two years of his reading journey. Keep in mind, this is quite different than my own personal favorite comics. Although that list includes popular all-ages fare like Jeff Smith’s Bone, my kids haven’t been quite ready to dive into that one yet (although I did talk him into me reading some short stories from the Tall Tales collection!). So you can check out the CBH best comics of all time for assorted all ages or middle grade picks that I think sit among the best of the best, but this list is pure, unADULTurated kid-friendly comics.
InvestigatorsWhile it’s not the series of kids graphic novels that has most thoroughly become an identity (and here, I am course talking about our identity as parents), John Patrick Green’s Investigators were our first shared love, and remain a favorite. Investigators follows Mango and Brash, two Alligators and agents of S.U.I.T., as they stop evil schemes, take on myriad disguises, and throw out more puns than a dad on the last leg of his six pack. It’s funny, heartfelt, and quite good at teaching wordplay in the English language. Plus, even though the anthropomorphic investigators travel through sewer pipes to get to their secret base and exit-and-enter through toilets, the series is lighter on potty humor than most of the comparable comics (this is for you, not the kids!).
If your little one enjoys Investigators – and I’ll be baffled if they don’t! – the spinoff series, Agents of SUIT is a must. Plus, the spinoffs are co-written with Dr. McNinja and Gwenpool creator Christopher Hastings, guaranteeing an extra infusion of zany antics.
Why your Kid Will Love It: Goofy alligators and animals crack jokes and stop light-hearted crimes.
Why you’ll love it: More puns per part than just about any comic, and super fun to read together.
DogmanThere have been three major obsessions that permeated our household through seven years: Dinosaurs, Pokemon, and Dogman. Nothing has done more to fan the flames of my son’s love of reading than Dav Pilkey’s irreverent, comedic, and frequently inane Dogman. It’s the kind of comic that as an adult I completely didn’t understand (I’ve read Bone, and you good sir, are NO BONE dog whimpers), and after watching my 6 going on 7 year old read, I completely endorse. Pilkey fully embraces the wackiness, potty humor, and attention spans of new readers, and has created a comics universe unlike anything else in the young reader space.
Odds are that if your kids haven’t already started Dogman, you’ll soon be asking “what are other comics like Dogman?” It’s straight up the young reader standard. For my money, once your child hits their 75th read of “A Tale of Two Kitties,” they’ll be asking you the same. I’d highly recommend Dogman: The Musical as an extra soundtrack during this phase (Genuinely baffled how this didn’t win all the Tonys) , as well as the next item on the list!
Why your Kid Will Love It: Flip O Ramas! Sniffin’ butts! Dogman!
Why you’ll love it: God, it’s great seeing a kid read the same book 50 times!
Cat* Kid Comic ClubI was very skeptical when I heard there was a Dogman spinoff comic, but it’s my favorite of Pilkey’s works. My boys love them, and we’re going to grow up on a whole generation of new comic book creators who got their start pouring over these pages. Where Dogman was the start of my kid’s voracious appetite to read comics, Cat Kid Comic Club was the start of his desire to make comics*. The spinoff graphic novels are endlessly positive and inspiring, encouraging kids everywhere, with any interests, to make their own stories. It’s full of good advice, too, both big picture and small, with insights on how to draw, creating with perspective, and the benefits of failing (the club’s first assignment is to make a super bad comic!).
Plus, Cat Kid Comic Club highlights how meta Pilkey’s work can get, which is quite fun to see introduced for a whole new generation of young readers. Dogman is itself crafted by Harold and George, two tween creators (also the duo famously responsible for Pilkey’s first mega-hit, Captain Underpants). And then within that creation, you have the comics made by the kids of Cat Kid Comic Club. It’s a creative explosion of different styles of comics with Pilkey inhabiting the persona, tone and style of each child’s attempted first comics.
Why your Kid Will Love It: More Dogman Universe!
Why you’ll love it: Few kids graphic novels are better at encouraging children to make their own art.
Calvin & HobbesFinally, something for you and the kids! For my wedding, my brother-in-law got my wife and I the complete hardcover collection of Bill Watterson’s iconic newspaper comic strip. I cracked a strip every once in a blue moon, but it wasn’t until my son hit kindergarten that I considered maybe it’d be fun to read them together. I’m so glad I did because it turns out we both love reading Calvin & Hobbes together.
There are plenty of Watterson’s musings that fly over the kiddo’s heads, but mostly the lil’ stinker’s parent-pranks, schoolyard antics, and incredible imaginative transformations completely captivate my boys. No joke, if my 7 year old is about to melt down, I can just quietly slide a volume of Calvin & Hobbes his way, and an hour later he’ll be pouring over it none the wiser. It’s one of man’s greatest discoveries since fire.
Why your Kid Will Love It: Calvin is a 6 year old menace with an unstoppable imagination. Just like your little one.
Why you’ll love it: Bill Watterson’s work is one of the 15 best comic books of all time!
Hilo When I interviewed Brian Michael Bendis earlier this year, he told me one of his favorite tricks to raising kids, and encouraging their passions, was that instead of telling them how much you think they’ll like a work of art, to just leave it laying around their space. Their natural curiosity will pull them into obsession in a way their developing realization that their parents are deeply uncool would never allow! This is how I got my son hooked on Hilo by Judd Winnick, leaving the first volume on his pillow, and then watching him go off to the races!
Winnick’s Hilo is the story of a young alien cyborg crashed to Earth, and the kids who find him and discover their own bravery with family, friends and school along the way. It’s a wonderful combination of silly and heartfelt, with a host of aliens, robots, and a diverse cast of characters.
Why your Kid Will Love It: Hilo’s confusion at humanity is quite funny to kids, and the catchphrase “Outstanding!” during crashes plays very well at the playground.
Why you’ll love it: Judd Winnick cut his oats writing Marvel’s Exiles and knows how to craft some compelling comics.
Spider-Man: Cosmic Chaos / Spidey and his Amazing FriendsOne of the most common questions parents have is where to find all the Marvel superhero comics for kids (or, you know, DC comics for kids, I don’t want to make this political!). We’ve covered this on CBH in the past, but honestly, now that I have young readers, I fully realize how confusing and oddly challenging it can be to find proper Marvel comics for kids. The animated Spidey and His Amazing Friends is one of the first pieces of superhero media that connected with my kids (my dreams of watching 90’s X-Men and Batman with toddlers have been thoroughly dashed to date), and there are good, simple versions of these comics for new readers. The last few years, Marvel has even made print versions available for Free Comic Book Day at your local comic book store. (For the DC version, the DC Super Hero Girls line of comics are really well regarded!)
A little more under the radar, Marvel has outsourced their young readers comics to a variety of different publishers (I simply do not have time to get into this!), and Abrams Comics recently released Spider-Man: Cosmic Chaos from Mike Maihack. This is the third volume in Maihack’s Mighty Marvel Team-Up series, and it’s excellent early readers versions of Spidey from a talented author and illustrator. Too many kids versions of Marvel comics are just watered down facsimiles of better stories, but these are truly high quality original work designed for your kids.
(As a bonus recommendation, we’ve enjoyed watching the newer Moon Girl & Devil Dinosaur on Disney+ as a family, and there’s a new young readers graphic novel out now called Moon Girl & Devil Dinosaur: Wreck and Roll!)
Why your Kid Will Love It: Find me the kid who doesn’t want to put on a Spidey costume and jump off the couch.
Why you’ll love it: You get to share your passion for supes and comics with the kids!
Mayor Good BoyDuring 1st-grade summer break, we set up a slip ‘n slide in the backyard, and watched with fascinated horror as our sweet innocent first-grader asked us to record only to yelp, “Hey, it’s your boy, like and subscribe,” before doing some sweet moves down the slick water. When I asked him – with impressive calm, restraint! – where he learned the phrase, he sweetly said, “From Mayor Good Boy!” You know, the graphic novel about a town with a dog for a mayor, which I purchased from author Dave Scheidt at Chicago Comic Con after he assured me it would be great for fans of Dogman. I’ve created a Gen Alpha influencer, and entirely through encouraging his love of reading!
The real takeaway, of course, is that my kids love reading Mayor Good Boy – now 3 books deep into the series – to the point that it’s influencing their catchphrases.
Why your Kid Will Love It: My oldest says, “When they go to the zoo all the animals escape and you get to see all the animals. Literally. I love that.”
Why you’ll love it: Cute, heartfelt and great for dog lovers.
The Mighty BiteOne of the clearest indicators that I’ve shifted from cool young bachelor to cool young father/bachelor is my eagerness to receive review copies of graphic novels has shifted dramatically to books my kids might love. I hit the jackpot with Nathan Hale’s The Mighty Bite, a goofball graphic novel where a crew of prehistoric creatures mostly try to get internet famous. It’s in the Dogman vein of silliness and compelling characters, and my boys love both the first book and the sequel, The Mighty Bite: Walrus Brawl at the Mall.
Apart from famously regretting that he had but one life to live for his country, Hale is most well-known for the series of American history graphic novels Nathan Hale’s Hazardous Tales. These seem quite good for young readers as well, although I can’t vouch for them personally!
Why your Kid Will Love It: Dinosaur-adjacent characters who act like tiny little nuts.
Why you’ll love it: You’ll be looking for “books like Dogman” for most of your waking hours, and this hits the bill.
Paker’s Review: I like Amber because it reminds of a Crocodile, and I like reptiles.
Dinosaur SanctuaryI think Itaru Kinoshita’s Dinosaur Sanctuary is the first manga I bought for myself with the expectation that I could also read or share with the kids. The Seven Seas series is “What if Jurassic Park didn’t always go to hell,” with a focus on the zookeepers who care for the dinosaurs that were discovered on an island in 1946. It’s a great way for kids to get their dinosaur fix without the scares of Jurassic World, and Kinoshita crafts a sweet look at the young caretakers who keep these rare creatures in health.
Realistically, Dinosaur Sanctuary is written for all ages, meaning the pacing and vocabulary can be a bit advanced for younger readers. Nonetheless, it’s a good challenge, and an enjoyable shared read.
Why your Kid Will Love It: Dinosaurs! Zoos! Dinosaur Zoooooooooos!
Why you’ll love it: It’s nice to mix in some genuine all ages manga with the kiddos!
Pokémon: Sword and ShieldWhen I first tried reading manga, I read Attack on Titan backwards for 17 pages before I realized what was happening. This will never happen to my kids, not because I’ll teach them, but because Pokémon manga exists. There are loads more Pokémon manga to choose from, and they all seem to capture virtually the same spirit of the more familiar anime. We started with the 10 volume Sword and Shield series manga since that’s the video game we started with as well.
This is a good, clean easy series of first reads that accomplishes its one mission critical objective: Lots of Pokémon and battles!
Why your Kid Will Love It: A chance to relive their Pokémon adventures from the anime or video games.
Why you’ll love it: I want to be the very best, like no one ever was BUM BuM BUM to catch them is my request, to train them is my cause DAD DANCES EVERYWHERE
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Saturday Morning AdventuresOne of our Uncles introduced TMNT Shredder’s Revenge to the boys on Switch (great early video game to play as a family!), and it was off to the sewers from there. While I quite like IDW’s Ninja Turtles comics (the Sophie Campbell run is particularly radical), they’re decidedly not for young readers. The Saturday Morning Adventures collections recapture the vibe, spirit and characters of the 1987 cartoon, and the cartoon theme song you know and love. Erik Burnham and Tim Lattie make sure to fill the pages with all the old faves – Shredder, Bebop, Rocksteady, Casey Jones – in kid-friendly fair.
If your kids grew up on different animated Turtles fair, it’s pretty easy to find collections that capture the designs and attitude of later generations. For example, my boys have primarily caught the 2018 Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on Netflix, and there’s a complete adventures comic book collection as well.
Why your Kid Will Love It: Leonardo’s cool, Donatello does machines
Why you’ll love it: Raphael is cool but crude (gimme a break), Michelangelo is a party dude (PAAAARRRRTTAAAAYYYY!)
Dinosaur ExplorersWhen I was a kid, my parents wouldn’t let me watch Power Rangers (and frankly, I’ve never recovered). I think most 90s kids in religious households have some variation of this – I’ve heard it from Rugrats to The Simpsons. As a cool, hot millennial, I’ve obviously held out against restraining media for silly reasons like “it will turn you into a violent ninja.” Dinosaur Explorers pushes those limits.
This series of graphic novels is the absolute leader in “Comics I can’t stand but my kid really likes.” One of the primary reasons he likes it is the kids say words he’s not allowed to (don’t worry, this is of the ‘S-word = Stupid’ variety). But also this is a quick fix of Carcharodontosaurus v. Camarasaurus action, and when you love dinos like these kids do, that’s always gonna hit.
Why your Kid Will Love It: Dinosaurs battling everywhere and it speaks their language.
Why you’ll love it: You won’t, but your kid will be in their room reading for half an hour, and take the win where you can, right?
Cretaceous / JurassicIf your household is anything like ours, you haven’t seen the floor in years, and you can never have enough dinosaur books. Cretaceous and Jurassic are two of our favorite all dinos all the time works. Despite the similar era-based names, they’re from entirely different publishers and artists. Cretaceous is from Todd Galusha and Oni Press (the publisher of Scott Pilgrim vs. the World), and is a wordless story focusing on a lost T-Rex. Jurassic is from Ted Rechlin and Rextooth Studios, and alternates between stories of a lost baby Brontosaurus, and a Big Momma Allosaurus. If you’re worried about providing a wordless story for new readers, I do think there’s value in processing the visual storytelling and language of comics as well. This is especially great before your toddlers are quite reading, as we’ve seen our non-readers pour over the pages of comics before they recognize any of the words on their own.
In addition to enjoying their own reads, my youngest toddler has recently adopted Jurassic as his bedtime reading. Nothing says sweet dreams like “Thunder Lizards” and Allosaurus vs. Torvosaurus fights over territory and Stegosaurus carcasses. My oldest particularly likes Cretaceous because it shows all the dinosaurs names at the end, and it’s great for providing reference materials for drawing.
Why your Kid Will Love It: Have I mentioned how cool dinosaurs are?
Why you’ll love it: Really cool dinosaur art and coloring, and if you like drawing with your kids, you’ll come back to this one again and again.
The post The Best Comics For Kids Age 7 and Under (New Readers)! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
What did Zack and Charlotte talk about on this very special variant cover? Listen to find out!
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2007 pt. 6
| Astonishing X-Men / Giant-Size Astonishing X-Men / Wolverine | #19 to #24 / 1/ #56 | End of Whedon / Cassaday, and an issue of Wolverine I don’t remember! | | X-Men: Messiah CompleX | Messiah CompleX reading order | See the RO |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
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I honestly don’t know how these demanding editors* expect me to read every Garth Ennis comic I haven’t read before in preparation for an interview with the legendary creator, AND keep up with all the new great comics released around June 2024. Yet here I am, once again performing feats of intense comics obsession.
*There are no editors. I do this entirely to myself.
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Deer EditorI haven’t hemmed and hawed about including a book in CBH’s 2024 favorites more than with Deer Editor, a three-issue noir series from Ryan K. Lindsay, Sami Kivela, Lauren Affe, Jim Campbell and Mad Cave Studios. I’m not even that torn on the quality of the work – this is a lovingly recreated crime-noir with a hilarious premise played entirely straight – but I think I read it to close in proximity to Blacksad. And if you’re going to read an anthropomorphic crime-noir in close proximity to Blacksad, well, that’s simply not fair.
Deer Editor grabbed my attention through sheer punnery – the Bogart in our saga is the editor of a local paper, and uh, a Deer – but Lindsay and Kivela create an entire world of corruption and scandal even Chinatown would frown its cute little woodland nose at. At time, Deer Editor leans into the anthropomorphic-absurdity – Bucky, our lead, is seemingly the only ‘Animal’ character here – but the book works hard to avoid the comedy it could have been. Admittedly, I often find the plots of even my favorite noirs byzantine to the point of deep confusion, and generally find its better to simply get swept up in the P.I. vibes than connect the Pepe Silva dots of narrative. Deer Editor certainly falls in that category, but you know, I’ve already hesitated far too long – this is one of my favorite comics of the year!
DraculaIf we’re being honest – and I think we can be honest among friends here – Martin Simmonds could adapt my least favorite books of all time (what’s up, Hemingway and Hunger Games!), and I’d still want to include them among my favorite comics of 2024. Simmonds is a tour-de-force, and while I certainly prefer their nightmare-explosions etched over James Tynion IV’s breakdowns of conspiracy culture in The Department of Truth, it’s pretty damn cool to see the duo adapting Dracula.
I’m far from a Dracula purist – a VAST majority of my knowledge comes from the Marvel Comics version and the Monster Mash – but even I can tell Tynion IV and Simmonds are closer to the right track than the Netflix adaptation by the Sherlock folks. So sure, if you’ve got quibbles about the concentration on say, Renfield v. Mina, I won’t stand in your way. But clearly the point here is to put Simmonds in position to make Dracula as cool, scary, and sexy as humanly possible, so guess what? Mission accomplished!
Hack/Slash: Back to SchoolI quite like Tim Seeley, but I’m not a huge Hack/Slash devotee (I currently have it at 611 out of 1,096 ranked comics – which is not bad, but fairly middle of the pack!). There are only a handful of cartoonists who could get me to fully into a four issue miniseries set at the start of the long-running slasher-comedy, and Zoe Thorogood is right at the top of that list. It’s Lonely at the Centre of the Earth is on my Mt. Rushmore of essential comics of the 2020s (even though they misspelled center – how embarrassing!), and on Hack/Slash, Thorogood gets to fulfill all her best Juni Ito / Tatsuki Fujimoto parasite demon dreams, while fulfilling the badass, sexy action of Seeley’s original Cassie Hack. I’m definitely more excited by the prospect of Thorogood’s next creator-owned work, but it’s an incredibly smart strategic move from Seeley to encourage an up-and-coming superstar to put their stamp on his breakout work.
Rogue Trooper: Blighty ValleyMy first 2000AD pick of 2024, and likely not my last, as this plus last month’s Garth Ennis reawakening has me doing the 2000AD deep dive I’ve always wanted to do but never made time for! I had zero knowledge of Rogue Trooper (an early 80s Dave Gibbons and friends co-creation for 2000AD) but didn’t find much of an impediment to jumping right in with the standalone Blighty Valley graphic novel from Ennis and Patrick Goddard. Rogue Trooper is a soldier from a future Nu_Earth, with three fellow soldier’s consciousness embedded into his weapons (they’re given voice by three numbered skulls). Blighty Valley kicks off with Rogue sucked through a Black Hole straight outta the future and into the frontlines of World War I.
The inciting incident puts Ennis firmly in his modern comfort zone, war stories and the endless cycles of violence, with the sci-fi elements of Rogue Trooper setting up an extremely effective full circle moment cementing the terror of these cycles. There’s an impressive timelessness to Blighty Valley too, with both Ennis and Goddard operating in a mode revealing human truths that could come straight out of the pages of essential 2000AD from the early 1980s just as easily as it can now.
The NWord of GodMark Doox’s “literary graphic novel” (isn’t that virtually everything Fantagraphics puts in the market?) is one of the most challenging explorations of race, America and religion I’ve ever read, in any medium. Following the cultural push of anti-racist readings in the wake of George Floyd’s murder by police, it’s eye-opening to read satire so unflinching. To put it plainly: I don’t always know who is the butt of Doox’s jokes, and precisely the points he’s making. The satire is at times so sarcastic I can tell Doox is criticizing institutional racism, but he’s not as careful* about it as I’ve been taught to expect! This is not a failing of the work, and instead a re-awareness that these issues are muddy, muddled and require active engagement and thought to perceive more clearly.
The NWord of God* is an inventive merger of graphic novel illustration and Biblical parody, and left me shaking my head with smirking awe at the wordplay. Doox is dissecting heavy themes, but he also appears to be having a blast poking fun and tearing down every sacred cow in scripture, constitution and history. It’s a fascinating project, and well worth your time.
How to BabyAs a father of three boys, I’ve obviously mastered every facet of parenting, but I’ve never seen an author (and a cartoonist to boot!) so effectively capture what it’s like to go through every phase of BABY, from consideration to birth to walking reality! Liana Finck combines wry observations and loose, humorous figures and diagrams in a truly masterful, engaging depiction of motherhood. I recognized many similar elements my wife and I went through, and was freshly reminded of the many, many experiences I don’t understand especially well.
Finck is careful to avoid crafting an advice book, instead focusing on the lived experience, and the variety of topics and issues you’re likely to experience. I’d expect the work resonates far more with fairly recent or soon-to-be parents, but again, purely on a craft level, I’m awed by the mileage Finck can get out of a jumbled anatomy-free penned sketch of a frazzled mother. It’s a Scott McCloud esque testament to the power of forms and icons, and Finck wields that ability with understated power.
The Mushroom KnightOliver Bly’s The Mushroom Knight is a small miracle. Yes, that’s partly just my annoying inner comedian smirking at the tiny little Mushrooms that make up our core cast, but it’s also true: anthropomorphic fantasies aren’t usually this committed to ecology and a scientific fascination with nature. Bly brings a texture of care – of authentic interest in the fungus beneath our feet – all while playing in the grand tradition of Lilliputian warriors and magic-wielders navigating a world of giants (us!). And just when you think you have a hold on The Mushroom Knight‘s center, Bly seamlessly injects the heartbreaking story of a bullied girl and her lost dog. I almost stopped reading, not because the comic lost my interest, but simply because my heart hurt.
Oh, and here’s the other thing: The Mushroom Knight is gorgeous! Bly is a brilliant artist, and I can’t wait to see what’s next in the Mushroom kingdom.
The EssentialsIt’s a shockingly good year for sci-fi comics taking an artist anthology approach to a singular narrative (shouts to The Singularity). A Hollywood co-writing pair of Luke Arnold (plays John Silver on Black Sails) and Chris Wyatt (writer-producer across TMNT, Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes and mores) kickstarted this excellent team-up graphic novel from Lab Press. The Essentials is primarily told by Jason Howard, but artistic collaborators also include Glenn Fabry, Vince Locke, Brendan McCarthy, Andrea Mutti, M.K. Perker and DaNi.
It’s a classic recipe for too many cooks in the kitchen, not to mention get-rich-quick TV pilot, but The Essentials simply works. The sci-fi apocalypse centers around genius tech-bro mathematician Harris Pax who sees the end of the world coming, but can’t get anyone to listen to him. A multiversal alien invasion ensues, with civilization driven – at best – into visions of unreality that keep them placated or take them off the board. The end result is a strange, shifting sci-fi apocalypse with a unique angle and compelling characters. Is it essential? It just might be.
Self-Esteem and the End of the WorldLuke Healy’s second graphic novel is a hilarious, heartfelt, contemplative look at aging into catastrophe, both expected and otherwise. It’s a reflection on family, on finding yourself, and (“he loves that meta sh**”) trying to make it as a cartoonist. More than any of that, Self-Esteem and The End of the World, out now from Drawn & Quarterly, is one of the best comics of the year, as well as one of the best comics of recent years.
Healy’s rigid 6-panel structures at times play like newspaper gag strips, and at times like long-form memoir, blending the best recurring comedy of the former with the pathos of the latter. Once you get in Healy’s rhythms, and adapt to the unique blend of self-lacerating wry humor, it’s a laugh out loud funny work that doubles as some of the best mother-son relationship work I’ve read in the medium. Plus, as a fellow sucker for the meta, Healy includes an honest-to-god reproduction of the fictional work he references as the comic of his that gets adapted into a movie. That’s commitment to the bit, and a damn fine read in and of itself. I love this comic, and I’ll be recommending it for a good long while.
The post My Favorite Graphic Novels of June 2024 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Listen, I appreciate that you’re taking the time to read this intro, but every second you waste here is a second you could have spent reading one of the many great new comic books in 2024. So, again, thank you for considering that I might be able to write something here worth reading, but in the name of Jack Kirby, let’s get moving to the best comics so far this year!
For the mid-year, I’m keeping the picks to my favorite 30 completed graphic novels and trades released in 2024. This means favorites I’ve been reading entirely in single issue (Ultimate Spider-Man, The Deviant, I Heart Skullcrusher) are largely absent (but will probably be on the year-end list!). Likewise, I ruled out including any compendiums (what’s up Sex Criminals: The Cumplete Collection) or favorite reads that came out late in 2023 (sorry Mobilis and Worm: A Cuban American Odyssey!).
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Otherwise, without further ado, check out the best comics of 2024, listed from my 30th favorite to my absolute favorite below!
InfluencaIt’s a danger to give a comic too much credit just for its premise, but Influenca‘s is so damn good. In Jade LFT Peter’s graphic novella from Silver Sprocket, a zombie apocalypse marks the 7th apocalypse the world has been through (and can remember!), and the story follows the online influencers (named here for a combination of Influenza and Influencer) who hunt zombies. It’s an erotic, queer, funny and at times tense look at the ways we both fight and post our way through what feels like the end of the world, and the relationships that help us do it.
Immortal Thor Vol. 1: All Weather Turns To StormAt the core of Al Ewing and Martin Coccolo’s Immortal Thor, there is a lingering question: What does the Immortal legacy mean to Ewing?
Through the critical and commercial success of Immortal Hulk, Ewing established “Immortal” as his sacred ground for mature, nuanced superhero storytelling, a cut well above the typical standards of the monthly corporate rat race. Immortal Thor is Ewing’s second attempt at chasing those lofty ideals, but the methods feel distinctly changed to meet what Thor needs. An easy answer would have been to chase the “horror” genre thrills of Hulk, or the cosmic doors to hell, but that was the Hulk story that needed telling. And Thor has so many more stories at his beck and call.
“Too long have you chosen illusion over change!”
There’s a really fascinating undercurrent of tension in Ewing’s narration, much talk of the magic of story, and the associated costs that lie in wait for Thor. It’s a fairly challenging blend of superhero highs and Asgardian tales, and meta-commentary on the stagnation of the medium and what must happen to shake Thor out of it. In this first volume, Ewing is more nebulous in his motives, more mysterious in his aims, than he ever was on Immortal Hulk. The vision is not quite solidified, but the promise is there. In the meantime, here are Storm, Thor, Loki, Jane Foster and Beta Ray Bill playing pass the hammer to defeat an ancient god.
So be it.
How to BabyAs a father of three boys, I’ve obviously mastered every facet of parenting, but I’ve never seen an author (and a cartoonist to boot!) so effectively capture what it’s like to go through every phase of BABY, from consideration to birth to walking reality! Liana Finck combines wry observations and loose, humorous figures and diagrams in a truly masterful, engaging depiction of motherhood. I recognized many similar elements my wife and I went through, and was freshly reminded of the many, many experiences I don’t understand especially well.
Finck is careful to avoid crafting an advice book, instead focusing on the lived experience, and the variety of topics and issues you’re likely to experience. I’d expect the work resonates far more with fairly recent or soon-to-be parents, but again, purely on a craft level, I’m awed by the mileage Finck can get out of a jumbled anatomy-free penned sketch of a frazzled mother. It’s a Scott McCloud-esque testament to the power of forms and icons, and Finck wields that ability with understated power.
The Enfield Gang MassacreChris Condon and Jacob Phillips’s That Texas Blood is one of my favorite ongoing comics since its launch in mid-2020. The creative team is smart about taking breaks between installments to allow for quality (and presumably their own scheduling sanity), meaning each arc feels like a carefully calibrated document of small-town Texas crime. The latest “hiatus” took the form of a spinoff arc set entirely in the town’s past, documenting a somewhat mysterious massacre of outlaws hundreds of years ago. It’s a bold risk, and only loosely connected (at least on the surface) to the immediate action of That Texas Blood, but Condon and Phillips fully commit to the vision.
Under Phillips’s brush every setting sun makes me think, “Well maybe I would like to spend more time in Texas” (I wouldn’t!), and Condon’s dedication to backmatter ephemera highlights a unique hyper-obsessive loyalty to the worlds being created. It’s one thing to allude to a town’s past, it’s another to tell a story from hundreds of years ago, and then it’s an unprecedented third level to write the investigative journalism chronicling the discovery of truth about that story from inside the fictional universe. It’s the kind of “Alan Moore just straight up wrote an article on ornithology” level of craft that tells me I’m in the hands of storytellers who care so much. And that just innately makes me care too!
Hobtown Mystery Stories: The Case of the Missing MenIf you told me Kris Bertin and Alexander Forbes were adapting a popular series of middle-grade novels from the 1970s, the Hobtown Mystery Stories, I’d fully believe you. The serialized title and small-town America environment feel pulled out of time from used book store shelves, dusting off their thrills, horrors, and downright strangeness for a new comics audience in the 2020s. Yet in reality, the Hobtown Mystery Stories (which as far as I can tell ran for two volumes) are being reprinted by Oni Press after their release via Conundrum in 2017.
At times, The Case of the Missing Men feels like reading an adaptation of Boxcar Children directed by Twin Peaks-era David Lynch. Or like if Ed Brubaker was writing Friday with Dan Clowes instead of Marcos Martin. The premise is a high school group of teens form a detective club and are pulled deeper and deeper into a deeply strange town-wide conspiracy. While this is ripe for simple pleasures, Bertin and Forbes imbue the work with such tension, nightmare, and surreal imagery that The Case of the Missing Men is hard to put down.
Transformers Vol. 1: Robots in DisguiseDaniel Warren Johnson and Mike Spicer are a walking advertisement to pursue your creative vision without compromise. This is perhaps surprising given their latest entry – an instantly Eisner-nominated Transformers run – is part of the hottest corporate IP synergy in 2024 comics, with the Robert Kirkman driven Energon Universe. Yet even within those boundaries, Johnson and Spicer produce a work akin to their masterful catalog of gems like Murder Falcon, Do a Powerbomb, and Extremity. It’s the platonic ideal of how big-name comics should work – all the audience of a nostalgia-franchise with all the creative freedom of a creator-owned book.
I’ll tell you right now: they’re gonna win a damn Eisner for best ongoing comic with this formula. Marvel and DC, where’s your head at?
Personally, I don’t get the same charm and literally out-of-this-world characterization as Transformers: More than Meets the Eye by James Roberts and Nick Roche, and if I’m being well and truly honest, Johnson’s very much in danger of repeating himself to the point of cliché (he’s Jeff Lemire’ing all over these sad Dad stories!). Nonetheless, there is an unquestionable thrill in the tactile, pen-to-paper sheer style, and the way Johnson and Spicer make you believe Cybertronian wrestling makes metal look like it’s made of Gumby. The approach injects Optimus Prime with pathos, isn’t shy about sidelining or destroying your childhood faves, and is the kind of comic you can hold up and wave about at a protest of AI taking over the creative arts. It’s good. And I’ll tell you again: It’s gonna win a damn Eisner!
Bad Dreams in the NightI start at least one comic review every month with a reflection on my own ignorance about the world of comics, and this month it’s webcomics superstar Adam Ellis’ Bad Dreams in the Night. Despite tremendous popularity (dude has over 1 million followers on every social platform), I of course had never heard of Adam Ellis. It’s yet another fantastic reminder that staring too hard at the bullpens of Marvel and DC can make you intensely ignorant of where people are actually reading their comics.
Bad Dreams in the Night is a collection of short horror stories, oscillating between humorous depictions of millennial fears and genuinely unsettling body horror. The tenor, pacing and characterizations of all these initially innocuous settings building to their ultimate dread reminds me of Junji Ito filtered through the artwork of Chip Zdarsky. You can feel Ellis trying on different styles and approaches here as well, in a refreshingly honest display of an artist not afraid to experiment in a published graphic novel. Frankly, this is my kind of horror – too grim and unsettling to be considered exclusively YA, but often with just enough nod and wink under the surface that I don’t lose sleep (with the exception of Ellis’ brief recounting of a harassment campaign levied against him in 2017 – as always, real life monsters are the scariest of them all). It’s great work from Ellis, and I’m eager to explore more.
Chainsaw Man Vol. 14You can tell Tatsuki Fujimoto is playing a jazz solo only he can hear right now because in Chainsaw Man Vol. 14 one of the biggest mangas in the WORLD goes an entire volume without a SINGLE chainsaw. While the early thrill of Chainsaw Man was Fujimoto’s explosive, hyper-dynamic horror-action, recent volumes have amplified the idiosyncrasies of a creator trying to make sense of landing on top of the world. I’m consistently in awe of just how strange Chainsaw Man can be in part because it’s so difficult to imagine any of the top superhero comics with the courage to sideline their own main players for such extended periods of time (at least without the tired death and rebirth cycles). It’s also tremendously rewarding to see audiences willing to ride out Fujimoto’s quirks, and to evolve with the work through an on-the-fly creative rebirth. Don’t worry, there’s still a fair share of demon-monsters and the dry-as-desert-sand humor that the book has excelled at since jump, but again: A whole volume. No chains!
How is he getting away with this?!
The Ribbon QueenWith Hellblazer, Preacher, and The Boys to his name, Garth Ennis is widely regarded as one of the best and most successful comic book writers of the past 35 years. Post-Boys, though, I was under the impression Ennis had fully retreated to his love of War Comics, a genre I simply didn’t care to follow. So just like that, a modern master completely fell off my radar: I haven’t read a Garth Ennis book since the spiteful cynicism of a Boys binge turned me off to the comics well over 6 or 7 years ago.
After reading The Ribbon Queen, I suspect I have a lot of catching up to do. Ennis partners with Jacen Burrows (speaking of underrated recent resumes) on The Ribbon Queen, via the “oh yeah, remember them!” AWA publisher, and it’s a gripping smooth ride through terror, revenge, and more flayed skin than New 52 Joker could even stomach. It’d be one thing if Ennis and Burrows were just flexing on all the ways to set up evil men getting their skin peeled off layer by layer by an ancient spirit, but the ambitions of The Ribbon Queen are astonishingly multifaceted. Ennis and Burrow’s lead, Detective Sun, is an Asian woman on the NYPD, and the book bounces back and forth between issues of policing through Black Lives Matter, institutional racism, patriarchal society, and a host more. They’re the kind of issues that Boys era Ennis would have treated with all the wrong amounts of Juvenile shocks, and the kind Preacher era Ennis and Steve Dillon could have lent a needed outside viewpoint towards. The Ribbon Queen leans more towards the ladder, rarely overstaying the length of the sermon, and organically weaving it into what is ultimate a horror-comic asking the question: could a human jaw go down a bath drain? Deeply impressive work from masters I’ll be reading more of as soon as I’m able.
Lunar New Year Love StoryA new First Second graphic novel from Gene Luen Yang (American Born Chinese, Dragon Hoops, Shang-Chi) is one of those “pencil it onto everyone’s best of the year list” books, so it’s no surprise that this near-perfect teen rom-com with LeUyen Pham is a preposterously well-constructed read. Yang’s ability to capture teenage emotion and dialog only continues to grow, but for me, it’s Pham who stole the show with a deeply versatile style. Pham’s supernatural St. Valentine is the wonderfully gothic old horror spirit, while her Lion Dancing (a Vietnamese and Korean cultural element this book taught me about for the first time) is pure Kirby monster energy. Pham utilizes a unique tactile approach where images are frayed at the edges, where uncolored slots of white seem to reveal the page beneath – it’s the kind of AI-assassinating artistic effect that subtly iterates, yes, a real person made this with their own two hands.
You’re going to hear about Lunar New Year Love Story this year. The only question is do you read it now, or wait for the best-of accolades at year end?
Death Strikes: The Emperor of AtlantisPurely based on graphic novel title and publication by Dark Horse, you’d be forgiven for assuming Death Strikes: The Emperor of Atlantis is a well-worn genre thriller looking to expand upon the sandy shores of Aquaman and Namor. Cursory inspection reveals it’s anything but, though, as Dave Maass and Patrick Lay are actually adapting a suppressed 1943 opera by Jewish artists created inside a Nazi Germany concentration camp. The history alone, and the miracle of any retained art surviving the Holocaust is worth the price of admission. The comic looks to adapt Der Kaiser von Atlantis, created by Peter Kien and Viktor Ullman from within the Terezin concentration camp, and seeks to share how “beauty and humor can be found even in the face of doom.”
A work like this is in danger of flatlining at curious historical project, but Maass and Lay modernize and elevate the opera for comics with tremendous, care, relevance and precision. Death Strikes is funny, at times like Joseph Heller’s Catch-22 (a personal favorite), and the ink-washed grays are gorgeous. You’ll want to read the historical analysis that bookends the comic, but readers could pick this up without any of that context and simply enjoy a parodic dig into the rise of fascism and the endless ills of war. This is genuinely special work from Maass and Lay, living up to the weight of adapting something created in such historically harrowing circumstances.
Victory ParadeWhen Leela Corman sets out to make a graphic novel, she makes a graphic novel built to win awards. The early 2010’s Unterzakhn is a tremendous work, following twin sisters navigating New York’s Lower East side as Jewish immigrants circa 1910. Corman wields an innate ability to transform history into an emotionally resonant present, with casts of fierce women encompassing the full spectrums of humor, heart, and heart of fully realized lives. Victory Parade walks a similar emotional path, following the lives of Brooklyn women navigating World War II in America as German-Jewish refugees.
In Victory Parade, Corman eschews the black-and-white thick inks for a lush and times surreal palette of softly melting watercolors. The oversized Pantheon Graphic Library hardcover allows for a wider canvas, which Corman uses to full effect, particularly during hallucinogenic dream sequences full of dissected anatomy depicting subconscious trauma in the lives of these characters. Even so, the ‘realism’ of the history is only augmented through fever dreams and flashbacks, whether it’s memories of pre-Nazi Germany or Sam’s nightmares of seeing the post-liberation Buchenwald concentration camp. Corman’s quite carefully considered in depicting the rampant blend of misogyny and xenophobia of the era as well, even down to lettering that snakes around a lead character’s neck like a noose of jeers.
Corman’s ambitions – in tone, pacing, character focus – all seem larger than the inevitable Unterzakhn comparisons, and not always to her benefit. Ruth’s journey into women’s professional wrestling of the era could likely have been a whole graphic novel of its own, but within Victory Parade, it’s a bit clouded in all the moving parts. Nonetheless, this is fascinating work from an incredible talent, and well worth seeing in print.
ZodiacLike most deep philosophical art critics, I picked up Ai Weiwei’s graphic memoir Zodiac because the cover is very pretty and shiny. I’d love to say here that this is another one of my many classic jests, but I’m 100% sincere. I had no idea Ai Weiwei was a legendary Chinese performance artist (not to mention political prisoner & exile) – I just really loved the gloss on Ten Speed Press’s hardcover design, and the feel of Gianluca Costantini’s pencils from a quick scan.
I’m glad I’m so easily impressed because Zodiac is a fascinating read, oscillating between meditative and almost surreal discussions of art, politics, and human purpose. The memoir is structured via 12 chapters, each corresponding to the twelve signs of the Chinese zodiac. At times this framing is very intentional, with Weiwei and Costantini sharing the folklore inspirations of the zodiac, but more often than not it’s a metaphorical framing tied to discussions of everything from the Chinese Cultural Revolution to Chairman Mao to Weiwei’s most famous works. Unlike most memoirs that trade in linear autobio, Zodiac walks a fine line between history and theory, between concrete and ethereal, and somehow Costantini’s lines are so precise yet tactical the pacing never feels stodgy. A highly compelling work that I’d recommend.
DOOM (2024)Sanford Greene and Jonathan Hickman’s DOOM one-shot is my favorite Marvel comic book of the past 4 years, and in a perfect world, would serve as the launching template for a Marvel Black Label series of creator-driven out-of-continuity prestige comics. Tying Hickman to a project will get the lion’s share of attention – especially on a character he’s so well known for across Fantastic Four and Secret Wars – and he plays to his love of Valeria Richards and Doom’s relationship, calling back to many of his Doom’s greatest hits moments.
The real star, though, is Greene, the artist of the excellent Bitter Root, making a star turn as co-plotter and artist across 48 pages of Marvel cosmic glory. The premise is hardly unprecedented – Doom vs Galactus at the end of the Marvel Universe as we’ve known it – but Greene’s virtuosic visualizations give the rarest of joys across modern Marvel Comics: an artist fully empowered to explore their own style with the full use of these toys we’ve built such adoration for over decades. It calls to mind the potential of Peach Momoko’s Ultimate X-Men, or better, Tradd Moore’s artistic showcase on Doctor Strange: Fall Sunrise.
It is joyful, it is so rich and living with detail you could pour over these pages for a full childhood, and by DOOM, it’s why I can’t quit Marvel Comics.
In UteroI was on the fence about trying In Utero, but the pull quote from Jeff Lemire on the back cover calling Chris Gooch “his new favorite cartoonist” convinced me. I’m glad because Gooch’s In Utero is “best of the year” stuff, a masterfully in control, tense, creeping sci-fi, with enough youthful lightness to keep from sinking into the monstrous muck. The graphic novel takes place a decade after a mysterious massive explosion shook Australia, in a dilapidated old shopping mall now overrun with… well, something mysterious! It’s a heartfelt and earnest story with expert creative design and tonal control. Gooch is an artist I’ll be following into the future.
SingularitySingularity is a concept comic from composer Bear McCreary (who scored everything from God of War to Outlander to The Rings of Power) with scripting from Mat Groom and more art teams than you could fit inside a black hole (including personal fave Rod Reis). The 144 page comic released via Image is a companion piece to the concept album of the same name, and while this would normally make the comic an afterthought, it’s actually quite good. I read the whole thing in a single sitting and love the sci-fi premise, the use of new art teams for every reincarnated life, and the message on the ultimate question: what’s all this for?
So here’s the challenge: For a Jonathan Hickman scholar (see also: nerd) like myself, Singularity reads like a greatest hits of Hickman’s works across Powers of X, Decorum, Secret Wars, and beyond(er). There are two ways of interpreting this. One is some nebulous accusation of plagiarism, which I don’t buy (Bear McCreary might not even known who Jonathan Hickman is!). The other is that some Hickman comics are a source of inspiration, in much the same way Claire North’s The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August inspired Hickman’s own narratives for Moira in House and Powers of X. All art is influenced one way or another, this one simply wears it on its sleeve very openly, or shares DNA with a very popular source. But within those inspirations, everyone involved does great work!
At the end of the day, here’s what matters: At its best, Singularity improves on some of Hickman’s concepts, and on average, lovingly recreates visual spectacles of a reincarnated life across the multiverse. It’s not as if there aren’t plenty of other sci-fi reference points outside of Hickman anyway: It’s Tom Cruise in Edge of Tomorrow but across alien planets throughout the entire multiverse, with a heaping dose of Jim Starlin’s cosmic entities mixed in for good measure. It’s a really satisfying graphic novel executed through an anthology approach that makes narrative sense. And yeah, RIYL Hickman comics!
The Werewolf at Dusk: And Other StoriesI talk about this a lot, but I’m endlessly tantalized by how much I don’t know about comics. I feel like I have a pretty good grasp on the major celebrated works of the 2010’s, but then here’s David Small, an artist I’ve never encountered before, with a graphic memoir, Stitches, so beloved it’s blurbed by R. Crumb and Stan Lee! Small’s so good he has Gene Luen Yang saying, “David Small is among the most masterful storytellers alive today.” I don’t know anything about anything. It’s great!
Small’s latest is a series of three short stories: The Werewolf at Dusk, A Walk in the Old City (the only of the three also written by Small), and The Tiger in Vogue. The works are compulsively readable, and compulsively inspiring, with Small working in an almost child-like partially sketched pen that makes me want to stop what I’m doing and draw my own aging werewolves. The difference of course is that Small knows what he’s doing with the absence of a line, or a detail-less grocery aisle, allowing character expression and a laconic narrative do the heavy lifting. For my money, The Tiger in Vogue is the standout, a surreal adaptation of Jean Ferry’s story about the rise of fascism in early 1920’s Germany, as told by a man attending a musical with a woman and a literal tiger as the star attractions. It taps into the same themes as the previous works – aging as the world changes and shifts the ground beneath your feet – but while also capturing the madness inducing fear that comes from watching a small mustached man controlling a crowd in ways only you seem to fully understand.
In PerpetuityMaria and Peter Hoey’s In Perpetuity, out now from Top Shelf Productions, is a brilliant exercise in comic-making restraint. Stylistically like Chris Ware’s slice-of-life decompression meets the staccato movements of Robot Chicken figures, In Perpetuity is told primarily through stilted, matter-of-fact third-person narration. “Jim walked over to his car.” “He took the bus to make it more believable.” “Kimberly continued on and did not look back.” The repetition and simplicity captures the mundanity of In Perpetuity‘s Afterlife, a vision not of heaven nor hell, but instead one of tedium and limited pleasures. The lead character works as a gas station attendant, with days largely broken apart by crossword puzzles and cigarettes, until an old acquaintance from life pulls him into a criminal enterprise contacting the living from the A.L.
As In Perpetuity develops, its reimagining of the Greek afterlife mixes in noirish mystery, conspiracy, and ultimately a confrontation with the ruler of the A.L, Hades. It’s a masterful mixture of genre, both compelling as narrative and contemplative of the joys we take for granted of in this life.
Beneath The Trees Where Nobody SeesWhile my intent is to keep these monthly favorites to full graphic novels or trades released in a given month, I had such a good time reading the first three issues of Patrick Horvath and Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou’s Beneath the Trees Where Nobody Sees that I have to put it on the list. Horvath combines the warmth of small-town anthropomorphic forest creatures with the cold, calculating serial killing of Dexter. Except unlike Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey, Horvath is in complete command of the tone and pacing of the work, allowing it to traverse a read that is at once as charming as it is deadly mysterious. This one has The Juice. Expect to see it on most best of the year lists in 2024!
Punk Rock KaraokeIf Bianca Xunise’s Punk Rock Karaoke was just a playlist of punk rock deep cuts interspersed with canon classics by X-Ray Spex and Fugazi, it’d still be one of my favorite comics of the year. Fortunately, the “now playing” soundtrack recs are mere icing on a beautifully designed world of punk rockers and Chicago friends navigating the steps from high school to adulthood. Xunise’s Southside is full of a lived-in amateur music scene, wondrously full queer characters, and a fluid style of Chibi by way of Bryan Lee O’Malley. Punk Rock Karaoke is bursting with charm, radiant colors, and the importance of the bonds of community.
No joke, queuing up the referenced punk cuts while I read this graphic novel was one of my favorite comics experiences of the entire year. The only good reason to stop reading at any point is if you’re not in a good place to blast Ministry. Punk Rock Karaoke is one of my favorite comic books of the year.
GleemOriginally published in 2019, Freddy Carrasco’s “selection of spectacular short stories” is so good Drawn & Quarterly picked up the out-of-print work for a new edition this year. I’m very glad they did, as Carrasco’s fully-realized sci-fi worlds walk an incredible blend between Taiyo Matsumoto’s Tekkon Kinkreet and the cosmos-shattering spiritualism of Jim Starlin reincarnated in the pen of Ronin-era Frank Miller. Gleem is composed of three distinct stories, one a bored kid’s accidental spiritual journey at a future megachurch, another what happens when bored kids add a defective robot AI to their crew, and a final that I can best describe as what it’s like for bored kids to do future-drugs at the coolest rave I’ll never get invited to.
Carrasco’s cartooning is confident and inspiring, the kind that often invites you to make your own comics even as its displaying a control of the page that can only come from immense creative experience. In his book blurb, Michael DeForge writes, “Nobody’s doing space and time the way Freddy Carrasco does space and time,” and it’s hard to argue otherwise. Sequences where a teen at church loses himself in a swirling fever dream made up of lust and a fish asking him if he’s paid his taxes are, uh, hard to pull off! Within Gleem‘s walls it all makes a delirious amount of sense.
From here on out, I’ll be reading anything Carrasco releases, no questions asked.
Tokyo These Days – Taiyu MatsumotoHonestly, all I needed to know was Viz Signature was releasing a new series from Taiyo Matsumoto (thanks to Ritesh Babu for that nudge!). I’m a manga noob sure, but Matsumoto is one of the artists I’m most caught up on, having read both Tekkon Kinkreet and Ping Pong within the last year.
This is “Inside Manga” from a celebrated master, a slice of life manga about a lifer who retires from his job editing manga, and the writers, artists, editors and “jobbers” that surround him. The work begins as a character study taking us behind the curtain of who comics are made but evolves into both an inspirational reflection on artistry, aging, and how we choose to spend our days. This could easily go down as another all-time classic, but with only volume 1 released in English, I’ll have to eagerly wait and see.
Feeding Ghosts: A Graphic MemoirFor vast stretches of its 300+ pages I was convinced Feeding Ghosts is the graphic novel of the year. Tessa Hulls’ multigenerational memoir, tracking the lives and relationships of her grandmother, mother, and herself, is an almost impossibly ambitious document of Chinese history, immigrant experience, mental health, generational strands of trauma, and therapeutic self-examination. Hulls treats the entire work with a laboriously designed swirl of creeping ink, a descending black-and-white instability ready to spin the entire work of its axis but never giving way to outright madness. Put another way, Feeding Ghosts can be out of this world gorgeous, and designed unlike anything else I’ve read this year.
At the same time, Feeding Ghosts is dense. You feel the weight of the labor, the toll of the personal introspection, the weight of every family tree branch crashing from the ether into a fully formed published document. It’s not just that the book isn’t light reading; it’s that information often feels repetitive, or tediously drawn out. Feeding Ghosts is so much from start to finish that it seems inevitable the work will oscillate between the most fascinating examinations in comics and stories a close friend has told you several times before.
For a work this personal, though, I’m more than willing to look past the rocky stretches, and celebrate the magnificence of Hulls’ accomplishments. Much of Feeding Ghosts is among the best memoirs I’ve read, whether we’re talking Fun Home, Blankets, The Best We Could Do, or anything else in comics (and beyond). I learned so much about Mao’s China, and the psychological toll that took on generations of Chinese, and Hulls benefits from the unique existence of her grandmother’s memoir about escaping Mao’s China to Hong Kong! It’s a must-read, and will be for years to come.
The GulfComics are full of teenage coming-of-age journeys where an otherwise mundane experience is amplified by the angst and promise of youth. For obvious reasons, cartoonists love tapping into this emotionally resonant adult ground zero, from Craig Thompson’s Blankets, to Mariko and Jillian Tamaki’s This One Summer or Roaming, to Tillie Walden’s catalog, and on and on. Adam de Souza’s The Gulf is the latest standout in the genre, a masterfully put together graphic novel about high school friends seeking the idyllic promise of a Canadian commune over the stale possibility of a life spent collecting paychecks for insignificant contributions to the capitalistic machine.
de Souza’s work excels due to an excellent lead character, the wise-cracking, fiery, complex Oli, who steps right up to the legacy of Enid Coleslaw as memorable comics creations. With one brilliant exception, de Souza avoids the spectacle of the supernatural, and plays the journey straight: these are just three high school graduates navigating the woods and trails of Canada over the course of two days. There’s the messy backdrop of high school sexuality, bullying, and parents with no idea how to parent teens, but at the end of the day, it’s just a few awesome, confused kids finding their way and asking the question we’re all asking regardless of age: What is all this for?
Swan SongsIf you’ve followed my picks for favorite comics at any point over the last 6 years, you’ve probably gathered that I am decidedly in the bag for W. Maxwell Prince. Ice Cream Man has been my favorite ongoing comic book for about 5 years, and the spiritual (and final-issue crossover!) sibling Swan Songs was among my favorite works of 2023. I don’t think anyone in comics is more thoroughly and effectively dedicated to the art of the single issue than Prince, giving every 20+ page floppy work its own flavor, approach and experience. Alongside some of the best creative collaborators in the business, Prince justifies monthly comic shop sojourns better than anyone in the business.
Swan Songs is a series of 6 one-shots with a new artist on each issue (Martin Simmonds! Caspar Wjingaard! Filipe Andrade! Caitlin Yarsky! Alex Eckma-Lawn! And Ice Cream Man‘s own Martin Morazzo), and each issue is about the end of… something. We get the end of a life, the end of the world, the end of a marriage, the end of a sentence, the end of depression, and in a parody of Shel Silverstein, the end of the sidewalk. In Prince’s manner, each issue offers something entirely new, while trading in black humor, existential dread, and sneaking, buried, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it hope. Issue two reimagines the end of a marriage as a series of genre-laced battles between the splitting couple, issue 5 reimagines therapy as a hypnotic sojourn into a collaged dreamscape, and issue 6 reimagines the aforementioned Silverstein.
It is dark, it is funny, it is imaginative, and always, always, always: it is what comics were meant to be.
Self-Esteem and the End of the WorldLuke Healy’s second graphic novel is a hilarious, heartfelt, contemplative look at aging into catastrophe, both expected and otherwise. It’s a reflection on family, on finding yourself, and (“he loves that meta sh**”) trying to make it as a cartoonist. More than any of that, Self-Esteem and The End of the World, out now from Drawn & Quarterly, is one of the best comics of the year, as well as one of the best comics of recent years.
Healy’s rigid 6-panel structures at times play like newspaper gag strips, and at times like long-form memoir, blending the best recurring comedy of the former with the pathos of the latter. Once you get in Healy’s rhythms, and adapt to the unique blend of self-lacerating wry humor, it’s a laugh out loud funny work that doubles as some of the best mother-son relationship work I’ve read in the medium. Plus, as a fellow sucker for the meta, Healy includes an honest-to-god reproduction of the fictional work he references as the comic of his that gets adapted into a movie. That’s commitment to the bit, and a damn fine read in and of itself. I love this comic, and I’ll be recommending it for a good long while.
Hexagon BridgeLike any sane comics fan, I passed on Richard Blake’s Hexagon Bridge because the clean, striking covers looked like Jesse Lonergan’s work on Planet Paradise or Hedra, and I thought maybe they were an egregious form of imitation. Ya know, instead of getting excited about a new artist sharing Lonergan’s sense of space and design. As usual, I’m an idiot, and Blake’s Hexagon Bridge is one of my favorite comics in recent years.
Hexagon Bridge is glorious cartoonist sci-fi, and the single closest approximation of a Christopher Nolan film via comics that I think I’ve ever read (complimentary!). The fact that this is Blake’s graphic novel debut is concerning. No one should be this good this fast unless they’ve already been replaced by the advanced AI navigating the mysterious maps of Blake’s work! Yes, Hexagon Bridge has huge RIYL Hickman/Nolan/Asimov energy, but it captures a wholly unique atmosphere, not to mention a rare innate ability to trust the reader to take care of the damn exposition themselves. It’s AI sci-fi but without any of the ripped-from-the-headlines ham-fisted approaches the genre is currently overwhelmed with. Much like Adley’s parents, Hexagon Bridge is a whole world to get lost in, and if you’re like me, the only time you’ll feel dissatisfaction is when the work suddenly ends against all your wishes.
The JellyfishOne of my favorite surprise graphic novels of the year, simply due to my lack of familiarity with the artist Boum and Pow Pow Press. The Jellyfish is a gorgeous, touching, queer work, and one of the better explorations of what it feels like when doctors can’t tell you what the hell is wrong! The premise is that Odette, a young Canadian woman, develops a unique condition where she has a… Jellyfish… in her eye. This condition is stated as both unique and completely matter-of-fact, as Boum depicts literal floating black spots of jellyfish circling around Odette, growing in number as Odette’s condition worsens. Doctor visits confirm Odette does in fact have Jellyfish in her eyes, but aren’t able to offer much by of solution, apart from more doctor visits and prescriptions that maybe might help but who really knows (I’ve been there so hard!). In the midst of all this, Odette falls for another young woman experiencing the traumatizing abuses of her father/boss. It’s a sweet, touching romance in the face of impending health failure and resonates deeply.
It’s a hyper-specific thing, too, but I love how The Jellyfish seamlessly incorporates a sick mid-aughts indie dance rock playlist of songs by groups like Gorillaz and The Rapture. Obviously comics can’t capture sound, but I do find that reference points are an effective way to present scene, tone and time period. This is especially true when all the songs are tracks I know – I danced to Gorillaz in 2006 too! – but plenty of times it’s led to discovery (I’m thinking here of when I interviewed Stephen Franck and discovered “Honky Tonk Hardwood Floor” in his L.A. country bar noir). Again, the end result is a work of art that feels intensely lived-in, and intensely relatable, only adding to the ways it completely pulled me into this world of all-consuming Jelly.
TenderBeth Hetland’s graphic novel debut from Fantagraphics looked me directly in the eyes, crawled under the lids, and rooted around in the slimiest corners of my brain all night. If that’s a little too gross, Tender might not be for you! This astounding work combines modern social pressures, body horror, fever dreams, expectations, grief, eating cats, and trauma like nothing I’ve ever read. Ok, fine, that’s a pretty specific combination, but hot damn if it doesn’t work under Hetland’s carefully constructed nightmare.
Tender effortlessly oscillates between the familiar patterns of adulthood (first comes love, then comes marriage, then a baby in a baby carriage!) and a creeping, sinister darkness under the current that grows to a nauseating critical mass where there’s no hiding it. Hetland isn’t the first artist to try and turn suburbia into horror, but the blend of yearning for a perfect family you can brag about onto Instagram alongside exaggerated truly grotesque scenes of self-mutilation is a rare kind of resonant. Hetland shows a confident grasp of restraint, setting scenes of suburbia in ink-washed grays and blues, but unleashing the destructive forces of angry reds and yellows during 12+panel pages of psycho-kinetic terror. I couldn’t put Tender down, even knowing it would wreak havoc on my dreams, and I’ll be reading anything from Hetland in the future.
Mary Tyler MoorehawkRight up front, I’ll admit that the mere suggestion of a comic pulling from David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest and Mark Z. Danielewski’s House of Leaves is exactly the kind of English Major snobbery lab-tested to impress me. At the same time, those are outlandish claims to make about your graphic novel, especially for an up-and-coming creator like Dave Baker. Heading into Baker’s Mary Tyler Moorehawk I was both prepared to be floored and pretty skeptical that the work could live up to its own literary ambition.
Mary Tyler Moorehawk is the front-runner for my favorite comic book of 2024, and on the shortlist for my WIP Mt. Rushmore of vital reads this decade. Baker’s combination of DIY adventure comics, like a fanzine riffing on Alan Moore and co.’s Tom Strong, and magazine columns from a not-so-far-flung American future where physical media has been purged, wears all its ambitions so earnestly that I couldn’t help but fall in love. It captures one of the underlying similarities of all my “Mt. Rushmore” contenders this decade: Naked, raw ambition and the bravery to say, ‘This is what comics can be in MY hands.’ It’s the kind of comic that makes me want to make comics, read comics, live comics, breath comics.
The post The Best Comics of 2024 (So Far) appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave (Hot Cold Summer era), Charlotte, and special guest Zachary Deane tackle the revamped, post Civil War Thunderbolts, the Inhumans vs Marvel Universe event Silent War, more Marvel Zombies, and for some ungodly reason, the first issue of Omega Flight.
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Thunderbolts | #110 to #115 | Good now? | | Silent War | #1 to #6 | The war nobody talks about (because it’s silent) | | Omega Flight | #1-5 | This has always been on the list (Dammit, Zack) |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2007 pt. 6
| Astonishing X-Men / Giant-Size Astonishing X-Men / Wolverine | #19 to #24 / 1/ #56 | End of Whedon / Cassaday, and an issue of Wolverine I don’t remember! | | X-Men: Messiah CompleX | Messiah CompleX reading order | See the RO |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2007 Pt. 5: Thunderbolts, Silent War, MZomz 2, Omega Flight appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Today we’re talking the first volume of Hickman and Chechetto’s Ultimate Spider-Man, the almost first volume of Ultimate Black Panther, and what else is interesting and good in the world of comics. Then Dave’s sharing his 2024 favorite comics of the year power rankings.
This Week’s Comics
Ultimate Black Panther #5
Ultimate Spider-Man #6
The Department of Truth #23
Monstress #52
Rare Flavours #6
The post Ultimate Spider-Man Vol. 1: Married with Children by Hickman & Chechetto Review! | CBH Live appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On Comic Book Herald’s interviews I’ll be interviewing some of my favorite creators in comics about specific runs, graphic novels or series, looking for their insights on the inspirations behind the work and ideas or hidden material readers may have missed. The goal is a fun guide to enjoying the intricacies and thinking in the art. Thanks for listening, and enjoy the comics!
Rogue TrooperWriter: Garth Ennis
Artist: Patrick Goddard
Publisher: 2000 AD
Ribbon QueenWriter: Garth Ennis
Artist: Jacen Burrows
Publisher: AWA Studios
The BoysWriter: Garth Ennis
Artist: Darick Robertson
Publisher: Dynamite Entertainment
The post Garth Ennis Interview! Rogue Trooper, Ribbon Queen, The Boys & More! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack go to the Brubakery to talk the debut of Immortal Iron Fist, and Ed Brubaker and Michael Lark on Daredevil!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Immortal Iron Fist | #1 to #7 | Flippin great – I’d recommend just continuing through issue #14 | | Daredevil | #93 to #99 | Because you demanded it! |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2007 pt.5
| Thunderbolts | #110 to #115 | Good now? | | Silent War | #1 to #6 | The war nobody talks about (because it’s silent) | | Omega Flight | #1-5 | This has always been on the list (Dammit, Zack) |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2007 Pt. 4: Immortal Iron Fist & Daredevil appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Today we’re talking the conclusion of GODS by Hickman and Schiti, Ultimate X-Men #4 by Peach Momoko, and who is the Heir of Apocalypse? Then Dave’s sharing his 2024 favorite comics of the year power rankings.
This Week’s Comics
GODS #8
Ultimate X-Men #4
X-Men Heir of Apocalypse
Transformers #9
Remote Space #1
Into the Unbeing #1
The post The End of Hickman’s GODS! Ultimate X-Men #4! Best of 2024 Power Rankings! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave and Zack talk One More Day listener feedback, parenthood, Garth Ennis & The Boys, and much more in this limited edition Big Daddy special!
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2007 pt.4
| Immortal Iron Fist | #1 to #7 | Flippin great – I’d recommend just continuing through issue #14 | | Daredevil | #93 to #99 | Because you demanded it! |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2007 Variant Cover A: Big Daddy Day Special appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Charlotte “Booba” Costigan, Tonantzack, and special guest Sara Century wrap up the series covering the renowned comic book publisher Fantagraphics. This is the secondof two episodes covering Love and Rockets, focused on the work of Gilbert Hernandez. Our first episode, five months ago, covered Jaime Hernandez’ work.
Comics covered in this episode:
– Love and Rockets Library Editions:
– Heartbreak Soup
– Human Diastrophism
– Beyond Palomar
Topics discussed:
– These comics can be unapproachable… does that make them stronger in the long run?
– How does Beto make this town feel so grounded but also mythical?
– Why does no one have a Luba tattoo?
Our next miniseries will be on Kentaro Miura’s Berserk:
Ep 1: Vol. 1-3
Ep 2: Vol 4-13 (trust us, splitting it up like this makes sense)
Following that, we’ll be doing a miniseries on Jeff Smith:
Ep 1: Bone, and Rose (A Bone prequel)
Ep 2: RASL
You can find Sara Century’s work at https://saracentury.com/
You can find Charlotte at twitter.com/mymarvelousyear
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at mymarvelousyear.com
Music for Extra Issues is credited to FM Skyline.
You can support Extra Issues via Patreon for as little as $1 a month at patreon.com/mymarvelousyear
The post Extra Issues – Fantagraphics #6: Love and Rockets – Gilbert Hernandez appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Today we’re talking the launch the new Ultimates, and the final, for real this time, ending of Krakoa X-Men in X-Men #700.
This Week’s Comics
The Ultimates #1
X-Men #700
Birds of Prey #10
The Boy Wonder #2
Get Fury #2
Kaya #19
Precious Metal #1
The post The Ultimates #1! X-Men #700! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack go IN on the controversial Spider-Man: One More Day, and then kick off the relaunched Thor by JMS and Oliver Coipel!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Amazing Spider-Man | #539 to #543 / #544 (One More Day) #545 | Back in Black and One More Day | | Thor | #1 to #6 | JMS/Coipel Thor relaunch |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2007 pt.4
| Immortal Iron Fist | #1 to #7 | Flippin great – I’d recommend just continuing through issue #14 | | Daredevil | #93 to #99 | Because you demanded it! |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2007 Pt. 3: Amazing Spider-Man & Thor appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
I would simply request that all of comics slow down releasing so many interesting graphic novels and collected editions. Despite my many substantial gifts and abilities, at the end of the day, I am only one innocent man.
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Hobtown Mystery Stories: The Case of the Missing MenIf you told me Kris Bertin and Alexander Forbes were adapting a popular series of middle-grade novels from the 1970s, the Hobtown Mystery Stories, I’d fully believe you. The serialized title and small-town America environment feel pulled out of time from used book store shelves, dusting off their thrills, horrors, and downright strangeness for a new comics audience in the 2020s. Yet in reality, the Hobtown Mystery Stories (which as far as I can tell ran for two volumes) are being reprinted by Oni Press after their release via Conundrum in 2017.
At times, The Case of the Missing Men feels like reading an adaptation of Boxcar Children directed by Twin Peaks-era David Lynch. Or like if Ed Brubaker was writing Friday with Dan Clowes instead of Marcos Martin. The premise is a high school group of teens form a detective club and are pulled deeper and deeper into a deeply strange town-wide conspiracy. While this is ripe for simple pleasures, Bertin and Forbes imbue the work with such tension, nightmare, and surreal imagery that The Case of the Missing Men is hard to put down.
Bad Dreams in the NightI start at least one comic review every month with a reflection on my own ignorance about the world of comics, and this month it’s webcomics superstar Adam Ellis’ Bad Dreams in the Night. Despite tremendous popularity (dude has over 1 million followers on every social platform), I of course had never heard of Adam Ellis. It’s yet another fantastic reminder that staring too hard at the bullpens of Marvel and DC can make you intensely ignorant of where people are actually reading their comics.
Bad Dreams in the Night is a collection of short horror stories, oscillating between humorous depictions of millennial fears and genuinely unsettling body horror. The tenor, pacing and characterizations of all these initially innocuous settings building to their ultimate dread reminds me of Junji Ito filtered through the artwork of Chip Zdarsky. You can feel Ellis trying on different styles and approaches here as well, in a refreshingly honest display of an artist not afraid to experiment in a published graphic novel. Frankly, this is my kind of horror – too grim and unsettling to be considered exclusively YA, but often with just enough nod and wink under the surface that I don’t lose sleep (with the exception of Ellis’ brief recounting of a harassment campaign levied against him in 2017 – as always, real life monsters are the scariest of them all). It’s great work from Ellis, and I’m eager to explore more.
InfluencaIt’s a danger to give a comic too much credit just for its premise, but Influenca‘s is so damn good. In Jade LFT Peter’s graphic novella from Silver Sprocket, a zombie apocalypse marks the 7th apocalypse the world has been through (and can remember!), and the story follows the online influencers (named here for a combination of Influenza and Influencer) who hunt zombies. It’s an erotic, queer, funny and at time tense look at the ways we both fight and post our way through what feels like the end of the world, and the relationships that help us do it.
The HarrowingOne of the easiest, surface-level lines of critical thinking in comics is identifying and celebrating when a story looks different than the norm. This can be a very simple positive – nobody paints figures like Alex Ross in Marvels, therefore it stands out to all sorts of readers – but it can also lead to some of the most reductive complaining. Name an artist, now matter how good or critically adored, and I guarantee you there is somebody (probably somebodies) calling their art trash on a pirated comic site, message board or Youtube comment. While it is not an inherent net positive, I am always, and increasingly, more partial to storytelling that feels unique, authentic and personal. Blend that with a style and approach that fits the collaborative narrative, and you have what makes comics special.
On The Harrowing, Rye Hickman and Kristen Kiesling seem to understand this. I have read so many versions of this exact YA graphic novel told with flat 6-panel grids and lifeless characters. Yes, it’s Minority Report meets One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest meets Professor Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters. But that doesn’t mean anything until we see the subtle use of color to highlight memory and premonition, or the way these teen girl’s faces scrunch into knowing panic when they brush hands with would-be assailants. Rye Hickman captures a full suite of emotion from the main cast of characters, while also recreating some haunting and violent visions of murders-to-be. Together with Kiesling, the creators build a fully-realized world around Rowan, including a full school full of girls who can predict violent crime. And then, when you inject Philip K. Dick into X-Men, with a book with this much style? Now we’re talking!
King in LimboAi Tanaka’s King in Limbo, given an English translation for the first time by Kodansha this year, feels like post-pandemic science-fiction. I was fully ready to kick off this introduction talking about my limited appetite for pandemic-fiction, and how hard it is to pull that off in comics, only to realize that Tanaka first released the manga in Japan in 2016! While it’s hardly the first sci-fi to deal with the horrors of rampant disease (what’s up junior high Dave reading Andromeda Strain!), King in Limbo is just prescient enough to anticipate elements of social upheaval caused by the mass casualty of a pandemic. Better yet, Tanaka’s sci-fi is a calm, meticulous exploration of Andromeda Strain meets Inception, with The Sleep as the big virus, and “Dream Divers” as the only individuals who can help pull the infected out of their sleeping death.
It’s a relatively slow burn, but builds to an intriguing world of conspiracy and Big Pharma secrets without sounding like Aaron Rodgers after a weekend at a darkness retreat.
Transformers Vol. 1: Robots in DisguiseDaniel Warren Johnson and Mike Spicer are a walking advertisement to pursue your creative vision without compromise. This is perhaps surprising given their latest entry – an instantly Eisner-nominated Transformers run – is part of the hottest corporate IP synergy in 2024 comics, with the Robert Kirkman driven Energon Universe. Yet even within those boundaries, Johnson and Spicer produce a work akin to their masterful catalog of gems like Murder Falcon, Do a Powerbomb, and Extremity. It’s the platonic ideal of how big-name comics should work – all the audience of a nostalgia-franchise with all the creative freedom of a creator-owned book.
I’ll tell you right now: they’re gonna win a damn Eisner for best ongoing comic with this formula. Marvel and DC, where’s your head at?
Personally, I don’t get the same charm and literally out-of-this-world characterization as Transformers: More than Meets the Eye by James Roberts and Nick Roche, and if I’m being well and truly honest, Johnson’s very much in danger of repeating himself to the point of cliché (he’s Jeff Lemire’ing all over these sad Dad stories!). Nonetheless, there is an unquestionable thrill in the tactile, pen-to-paper sheer style, and the way Johnson and Spicer make you believe Cybertronian wrestling makes metal look like it’s made of Gumby. The approach injects Optimus Prime with pathos, isn’t shy about sidelining or destroying your childhood faves, and is the kind of comic you can hold up and wave about at a protest of AI taking over the creative arts. It’s good. And I’ll tell you again: It’s gonna win a damn Eisner!
The Ribbon QueenWith Hellblazer, Preacher, and The Boys to his name, Garth Ennis is widely regarded as one of the best and most successful comic book writers of the past 35 years. Post-Boys, though, I was under the impression Ennis had fully retreated to his love of War Comics, a genre I simply didn’t care to follow. So just like that, a modern master completely fell off my radar: I haven’t read a Garth Ennis book since the spiteful cynicism of a Boys binge turned me off to the comics well over 6 or 7 years ago.
After reading The Ribbon Queen, I suspect I have a lot of catching up to do. Ennis partners with Jacen Burrows (speaking of underrated recent resumes) on The Ribbon Queen, via the “oh yeah, remember them!” AWA publisher, and it’s a gripping smooth ride through terror, revenge, and more flayed skin than New 52 Joker could even stomach. It’d be one thing if Ennis and Burrows were just flexing on all the ways to set up evil men getting their skin peeled off layer by layer by an ancient spirit, but the ambitions of The Ribbon Queen are astonishingly multifaceted. Ennis and Burrow’s lead, Detective Sun, is an Asian woman on the NYPD, and the book bounces back and forth between issues of policing through Black Lives Matter, institutional racism, patriarchal society, and a host more. They’re the kind of issues that Boys era Ennis would have treated with all the wrong amounts of Juvenile shocks, and the kind Preacher era Ennis and Steve Dillon could have lent a needed outside viewpoint towards. The Ribbon Queen leans more towards the ladder, rarely overstaying the length of the sermon, and organically weaving it into what is ultimate a horror-comic asking the question: could a human jaw go down a bath drain? Deeply impressive work from masters I’ll be reading more of as soon as I’m able.
SingularitySingularity is a concept comic from composer Bear McCreary (who scored everything from God of War to Outlander to The Rings of Power) with scripting from Mat Groom and more art teams than you could fit inside a black hole (including personal fave Rod Reis). The 144 page comic released via Image is a companion piece to the concept album of the same name, and while this would normally make the comic an afterthought, it’s actually quite good. I read the whole thing in a single sitting and love the sci-fi premise, the use of new art teams for every reincarnated life, and the message on the ultimate question: what’s all this for?
So here’s the challenge: For a Jonathan Hickman scholar (see also: nerd) like myself, Singularity reads like a greatest hits of Hickman’s works across Powers of X, Decorum, Secret Wars, and beyond(er). There are two ways of interpreting this. One is some nebulous accusation of plagiarism, which I don’t buy (Bear McCreary might not even known who Jonathan Hickman is!). The other is that some Hickman comics are a source of inspiration, in much the same way Claire North’s The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August inspired Hickman’s own narratives for Moira in House and Powers of X. All art is influenced one way or another, this one simply wears it on its sleeve very openly, or shares DNA with a very popular source. But within those inspirations, everyone involved does great work!
At the end of the day, here’s what matters: At its best, Singularity improves on some of Hickman’s concepts, and on average, lovingly recreates visual spectacles of a reincarnated life across the multiverse. It’s not as if there aren’t plenty of other sci-fi reference points outside of Hickman anyway: It’s Tom Cruise in Edge of Tomorrow but across alien planets throughout the entire multiverse, with a heaping dose of Jim Starlin’s cosmic entities mixed in for good measure. It’s a really satisfying graphic novel executed through an anthology approach that makes narrative sense. And yeah, RIYL Hickman comics!
Worm: A Cuban American OdysseyLike a lot of Americans, I’ve come to two realizations as I’ve entered my 30s (I should hope I’ve come to at least two revelations, but let’s not get cocky): 1) There are chasms of American history that we barely grazed in school and 2) Holy mother of Topanga do immigration stories call into focus how effortlessly I take my lot in life for granted. Edel Rodriguez’s Worm: A Cuban American Odyssey, an autobiographical, gorgeously articulated account of Cuban history, leaving Cuba during the 1980s, and making a life in America, is the latest wonderful example of art that helps close those gaps.
Through evocatively textured reds and blacks, Rodriguez expertly blends the rise of Fidel Castro’s communism with his lived experience growing up in Cuba, and the terror-tension of trying to get out. As a generation removed from truly understanding the pressure of Cold War communism, I’m often somewhat skeptical of the vilification of the ideology. Is it really so cut-and-dry evil, or is that just the American propaganda version of events? Works like Worm (and recent favorite reads like Feeding Ghosts: A Graphic Memoir) to highlight life from inside the red walls, and how desperate Rodriguez’s family was to escape the tyrannical control of materials and the constant, prying eyes into their every movement. It’s miraculous perseverance, unthinkable choices for a parent to have to make, and essential comics-making.
Hexagon BridgeLike any sane comics fan, I passed on Richard Blake’s Hexagon Bridge because the clean, striking covers looked like Jesse Lonergan’s work on Planet Paradise or Hedra, and I thought maybe they were an egregious form of imitation. Ya know, instead of getting excited about a new artist sharing Lonergan’s sense of space and design. As usual, I’m an idiot, and Blake’s Hexagon Bridge is one of my favorite comics in recent years.
Hexagon Bridge is glorious cartoonist sci-fi, and the single closest approximation of a Christopher Nolan film via comics that I think I’ve ever read (complimentary!). The fact that this is Blake’s graphic novel debut is concerning. No one should be this good this fast unless they’ve already been replaced by the advanced AI navigating the mysterious maps of Blake’s work! Yes, Hexagon Bridge has huge RIYL Hickman/Nolan/Asimov energy, but it captures a wholly unique atmosphere, not to mention a rare innate ability to trust the reader to take care of the damn exposition themselves. It’s AI sci-fi but without any of the ripped-from-the-headlines ham-fisted approaches the genre is currently overwhelmed with. Much like Adley’s parents, Hexagon Bridge is a whole world to get lost in, and if you’re like me, the only time you’ll feel dissatisfaction is when the work suddenly ends against all your wishes.
DOOM (2024)Sanford Greene and Jonathan Hickman’s DOOM one-shot is my favorite Marvel comic book of the past 4 years, and in a perfect world, would serve as the launching template for a Marvel Black Label series of creator-driven out-of-continuity prestige comics. Tying Hickman to a project will get the lion’s share of attention – especially on a character he’s so well known for across Fantastic Four and Secret Wars – and he plays to his love of Valeria Richards and Doom’s relationship, calling back to many of his Doom’s greatest hits moments.
The real star, though, is Greene, the artist of the excellent Bitter Root, making a star turn as co-plotter and artist across 48 pages of Marvel cosmic glory. The premise is hardly unprecedented – Doom vs Galactus at the end of the Marvel Universe as we’ve known it – but Greene’s virtuosic visualizations give the rarest of joys across modern Marvel Comics: an artist fully empowered to explore their own style with the full use of these toys we’ve built such adoration for over decades. It calls to mind the potential of Peach Momoko’s Ultimate X-Men, or better, Tradd Moore’s artistic showcase on Doctor Strange: Fall Sunrise.
It is joyful, it is so rich and living with detail you could pour over these pages for a full childhood, and by DOOM, it’s why I can’t quit Marvel Comics.
Punk Rock KaraokeIf Bianca Xunise’s Punk Rock Karaoke was just a playlist of punk rock deep cuts interspersed with canon classics by X-Ray Spex and Fugazi, it’d still be one of my favorite comics of the year. Fortunately, the “now playing” soundtrack recs are mere icing on a beautifully designed world of punk rockers and Chicago friends navigating the steps from high school to adulthood. Xunise’s Southside is full of a lived-in amateur music scene, wondrously full queer characters, and a fluid style of Chibi by way of Bryan Lee O’Malley. Punk Rock Karaoke is bursting with charm, radiant colors, and the importance of the bonds of community.
No joke, queuing up the referenced punk cuts while I read this graphic novel was one of my favorite comics experiences of the entire year. The only good reason to stop reading at any point is if you’re not in a good place to blast Ministry. Punk Rock Karaoke is one of my favorite comic books of the year.
The post My Favorite Graphic Novels of May 2024 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
I’m joined by Ernie (Blerd Without Fear) and Open Mike Eagle to talk about the conclusion of Krakoa era X-Men comics! How did it end? What will we remember from the journey? What comes next?
This Week’s Comics
Ultimate Spider-Man #5
Wolverine #50
Rise of the Powers of X #5
X-Men Wedding Special #1
The post X-Men Krakoa Era Post-Game Show! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave is still reading Invincible. Zack thinks it stinks. Charlotte hates to watch Dads fight.
This is Convincible, where we try to convince each other whether Invincible is one of the best or worst superhero comics of all time.
This episode, a major sea change happens in our argument about the comic.
On Convincible #6 we read:
| Invincible Vol. 17: What’s Happening? | Invincible #91–96 | | Invincible Vol. 18: The Death of Everyone | Invincible #97–102 | | Invincible Vol. 19: The War at Home | Invincible #103–108 | | Invincible Vol. 20: Friends | Invincible #109–114 |
Previously on Convincible:
Convincible #1
Convincible #2
Convincible #3
Convincible #4
Convincible #5
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2007 pt. 3
Play Along With:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
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mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
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The post Convincible #6: Invincible #91 to something, but not the end, thanks Zack appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Note: This Column was originally written in October 2023 for the CBH newsletter. Minor edits have been made to reflect publication again in May 2024!
Close to 5 years ago, I awaited the birth of my second son, and was so caught up in House of X / Powers of X fever, that I spent downtime in the hospital reading as many Marvel Comics involving the Phalanx as I could think of. I did this because the Phalanx had recently appeared in Jonathan Hickman and R.B. Silva’s Powers of X, and I was writing out Krakin’ Krakoa episode #4, a complete history of the Phalanx. I had just started posting the series to Youtube and the CBH podcast a few weeks prior with a complete history of Professor X, and couldn’t have been having more fun. The obsessive excitement of deep-diving into every element of X-Men lore as a new instant classic spawned fans everywhere is oddly ingrained in my memories of my second-born’s first moments.
The boy is even named Douglock.
(No, not really!!!)
Five years later, lil’ Douglock is a fully grown man working a 9 to 5, and the Krakoa era of X-Men comics is at its end. The build to an end has been in the works for some time (the announcement of Tom Breevort taking over as X-line editor for Jordan D. White came in the fall of 2023), but it really wasn’t until last week that I fully, finally admitted this is really ending. This struck me in full when I read Kieron Gillen’s newsletter announcing he was leaving X-Men Comics (and Marvel as a whole) after The Rise of the Powers of X, and alluded to Al Ewing leaving as well, with the chance to conclude his X-Men saga. Given that Gillen and Ewing have been writing my favorite X-Men comics since the Destiny of X started in 2022, this put a concrete expiration date on the Krakoan Age. Even though it wasn’t especially surprising, the confirmation nonetheless left me genuinely sad. All good stories should end, but it doesn’t mean it isn’t bittersweet.
The Krakoa Era as a whole is a complex mixture of the best X-Men comics of the 2000’s and unfulfilled promise, sometimes all at the same time. Depending on the day and my mood, I could make a case for either quite easily! Regardless of which side of the line you fall on, I’ve certainly never been more interested and committed to X-Men comics, and that speaks to the power of the foundations built by Hickman and the X-Office. The Krakoa era always had a chance to offer the best of Marvel, both present day and historically, and that’s about all you can ask for from a creative vision for these long-running perpetually recycled characters and concepts. With the end in sight, I appreciate that I got to live through this era. It was a true rarity.
By next summer, X-Men Comics will be relaunching. This is not hyperbole, as Tom Breevort recently confirmed in his newsletter that he’s actively working on said relaunch! Throughout my coverage of this era, I’ve always tried to maintain a healthy calm to counteract fandom’s reliable fits of panic. I was skeptical that Hickman was truly leaving X-Men Comics for good (he did), I insisted the era could survive without Hickman (it did!), and I’ve been on the frontlines saying the end of this Krakoan age doesn’t necessarily dictate the end of Krakoa a nation state during the Tom Breevort era (it doesn’t… but it’s not looking good for Davestiny!). As the end approaches, though, I have to admit the writing on the wall. More often than not when I step in to urge calm, Marvel shortly thereafter confirms that fandom’s concerns are, in fact, correct. So, no, Breevort’s relaunched X-Men comics moving away from the 5 year Krakoan experiment doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll be bad (a weirdly common assumption), but it does almost certainly mean he’s not interested in relaunching under the shadow of a “second Krakoan Age.” I think Marvel Comics feels this experiment has run its course, and I’m done defending the idea that maybe they’ll want to protect the most interesting foundation for the franchise since Morrison.
It’s funny, one of the earliest warnings I had for X-Men fans was what happened to X-Men comics after the Morrison era of New X-Men ended. After signs of vaguely experimental progress, there is always a regression “back to basics.” So naturally, as history repeats, I overlooked it because it didn’t want it to be true. But history tells us that’s what’s coming, and we ignore her warnings too often. You can wait and see the creative teams and titles that get announced (Davestiny’s got an eye on James Tynion IV and Elena Casagrande’s Uncanny X-Men #1, and Jed MacKay and Alessandro Cappuccio’s New X-Men #1), but I promise, you don’t have to wait and see if the new regime’s going to focus on more familiar players in more familiar settings.
The most interesting piece to consider is what lessons were learned (or should have been learned) during the 5 year Krakoan experiment? There are a lot, but here are the first 3 that come to mind:
1) Linewide Collaborations Are Too LimitedThere’s this platonic ideal of a shared superhero universe where all the various creative partners are working in perfect synchronicity, and their various comic books are all locked in a tightly wound shared continuity. The whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts by virtue of all comics rising to a clear shared goal, and every piece of the puzzle feels vital as a result (Most often this attempts to recreate the vision of the Stan, Jack, Steve days, or in the case of Jim Shooter’s early 90’s Valiant Comics, it’s the whole hook!). For most of the Krakoan Era, this is the portrait we were sold of the X-Office, a uniquely collaborative environment of storytelling, closer to a TV writer’s room than the isolated aloofness of comic books. In the first couple years, this was routinely celebrated, and you had fans wondering why the Spider-Man office couldn’t function the same way.
It was probably very hard work for everyone involved, not least of which includes editorial organization, and it definitely did create a sense of titles working in tandem that superhero comics often struggle with. One of the most exciting parts of the Dawn of X was seeing each of the 6 launch titles release, and figuring out which elements of the new foundation they’d get to tap into.
Within a year the cracks were showing, and 4 years later, it lacks any real selling power.
Here’s the thing: I love the premise! I get sucked into that platonic ideal, too, and I think the X-Office, for a time, got as close as I think I’ve ever seen a Big 2 network get to nailing it.
But even they fell short. Now, a big part of this is Marvel Comics sales tactics mean substantially too many comic books need to be published every month, so the X-Line’s 6 launch titles – perhaps a manageable allotment – continued to balloon until the benefits of a shared collaboration evaporated. Nonetheless, my takeaway is that the grand writer’s room approach to a Marvel book can only work in the short-term. Otherwise it’s best to let each individual creative unit move towards their own vision (with guiding foundational principles that are standard in a shared universe, of course).
2) Finish What You StartTwo things are simultaneously true: On one hand, X-Men readers who bailed after Jonathan Hickman left the line missed out on 3-4 of the best comics of the entire era (Immortal X-Men, X-Men Red, Sabretooth, and maybe Children of the Vault), and on the other, Hickman leaving after building House of X / Powers of X and ~30 issues of X-Men set-up is one of the great ‘What Ifs’ in Marvel history. Readers were wrong to assume X-Men comics would die without Hickman, but they were right to feel that the era could never be the same. I compared Hickman’s exodus to the Oklahoma City Thunder trading James Harden after the 2012 NBA Finals, and it’s a flawed analogy, but the center feels right: in hindsight, these franchises had a very real chance to elevate to the best in the world, and instead they got close but never won the title.
The lesson, though, is that I don’t think you can have superstar creators build the foundations for a beloved franchise, but not see it through to a form of conclusion. I don’t think comics fans will ever really accept it. It’s just not the way the medium has worked in Big 2 comics. This notion that Hickman could create this wonderful tapestry for how X-Men comics or the Ultimate Universe will function sounds nice in theory, but it breaks fan’s brains to then hear it won’t also be him taking part in that execution.
At the end of the day, this may be entirely outside editorial control. James Tynion IV left Batman because Substack threw Scrooge McDuck’s vault at him, not because they didn’t want to grant him the runway for a story. Hickman’s exit is partially a similar story. But to whatever degree possible, success of any established direction is going to ride on the creators who build it. They should be protected at all costs.
3) Never Stop Never StoppingIn football, this thing often happens with less experienced coaches where they get a big lead, and they promptly clam up. Suddenly they’re protecting something instead of building something, and their decision-making gets safe. They stop taking chances and doing the things that got them the lead in the first place, and before you know it, they’re staring down a roaring comeback and an embarrassing loss.
House of X didn’t drive the greatest resurgence in X-Men comics in my lifetime by playing it safe. X-Men Blue and X-Men Gold didn’t take the world by storm by declaring X-Men teams would be playing softball again. Yet at too many moments, in too many comics throughout the Krakoa era, the X-Office felt far too comfortable resting on their laurels. Much like Professor X and Magneto, they believed this paradise could well and truly last forever, and paced their storytelling accordingly.
Patience is a virtue, I am told. It can be a virtue in storytelling too. Just look at Chris Claremont’s multi-year build to Inferno or Hickman’s years-in-the-making reveal of Rabum Alal. A successful slow build is one of the most satisfying feelings as a comics fan, an affirmation of the focus and time put into a narrative honed by a master of the craft.
What too many fans forget when they highlight the masters of the long con is that they remembered to keep their works decidedly exciting and purpose-driven along the way. One of the hooks of the Krakoa era was the feeling that these stories could be told for ages, but more often than not, creators felt that they had too much time. This led to withholding the truly exciting moments for snail-like pace, and overly predictable windows for a final payoff (ahemHellfire Galaahem). During the Realm of X, which was admittedly heavily influenced by the unpredictability the COVID-19 pandemic first brought to the market, Hickman even admitted “they punted” story. As in, they weren’t trying to score, they were just keeping the game going until everything could line up. You can feel that as a reader, and it’s not just during this COVID influenced moment when that was true.
On one hand, I want to push for the continued opportunities for creators to hone long-form storytelling over years, especially since it is one of the medium’s great strengths. I also definitely empathize with the creative challenge of writing both for the month-to-month readers, and the much larger crowd that will binge the whole work in collections or via digital like Marvel Unlimited. But superhero comics have to convey a sense of urgency and direction. If you have storytelling cash, SPEND IT. If you have all the good will in the world, take a swing! If you wait too long, it has a funny way of becoming too late.
The post On the End of Krakoa X-Men Comics appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
We talk two weeks worth of comics.
This Week’s Comics
X-Men Forever #4
Ultimate Black Panther #4
Ultimate X-Men #3
Immortal Thor
The post X-Men Forever Ends! Ultimate Black Panther, X-Men, Immortal Thor! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack go all in on the Bendis Avengers, including the debut of the Illuminati. The results will surprise you!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Mighty Avengers / New Avengers / New Avengers: Illuminati | #1 to #6 / #27 to #37 / #1 to #5 | Enter the Illuminati! |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2007 pt. 3
| Amazing Spider-Man | #539 to #543 / #544 (One More Day) #545 | Back in Black and One More Day | | Thor | #1 to #6 | JMS/Coipel Thor relaunch |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2007 Pt. 2: Mighty Avengers, New Avengers, New Avengers: Illuminati appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
I’m joined by Rob from Comics Explained for our X-Men ’97 Post-Game Show. Season one in review and tackling unanswered questions and set-up for season two!
This Week’s Comics
Ultimate X-Men #3
Doom #1
X-Men Forever #1
Ice Cream Man #39
The post X-Men ’97 Post-Game Show with Comics Explained! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack tackle Civil War fallout through the Death of Captain America and Avengers Initiative!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Captain America / Civil War: Fallen Son / Captain America | #25 / #1 to #5 / #26 to #33 | Civil War fallout, Brubaker Cap in a new era | | Civil War: The Confession | #1 | Added by Patron David A. | | Avengers: The Initiative | #1-2 | Added by Patron David A. |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2007 pt. 2
| Mighty Avengers / New Avengers / New Avengers: Illuminati | #1 to #6 / #27 to #37 / #1 to #5 | Enter the Illuminati! |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2007 Pt. 1: Captain America, Civil War: The Confession, Avengers: The Initiative appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
A sexually transmitted Zack-sease and De-Charlotte 21 are covering two Fantagraphics releases graphic novels:
– Black Hole (1995) by Charles Burn
– Dementia 21 (2018) by Shintaro Kago
Topics discussed:
– Does the “bug” mean much as a metaphor in Black Hole? Is reading the comic looking for one a mistake?
– Is it possible to talk about a comedy comic without just listing our favorite bits?
Upcoming episodes in our Fantagraphics miniseries: – Love & Rockets (Gilbert Hernandez)
– Love and Rockets Library Editions:
– Heartbreak Soup
– Human Diastrophism
– Beyond Palomar
You can find Charlotte at twitter.com/mymarvelousyear
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at mymarvelousyear.com
Music for Extra Issues is credited to FM Skyline.
You can support Extra Issues via Patreon for as little as $1 a month at patreon.com/mymarvelousyear
The post Extra Issues – Fantagraphics #5: Black Hole (1995) & Dementia 21 (2018) appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Brian Michael Bendis joins to talk about their new all ages graphic novel Phenomena Book 2 with Andre Lima Araujo, plus we talk Bendis’ creator-owned Jinxworld comics, and history with Marvel Comics.
Phenomena Book 2: Matilde’s JourneyWriter: Brian Micheal Bendis
Artist: Andre Lima Araujo
Publisher: Abrams
The post Brian Michael Bendis Interview! CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Charlotte and Zack watched Ghost Rider. Do you dare enter the Cage?
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2007 pt. 1
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
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The post 2006 Variant Cover E: Ghost Rider (2007) appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Andre Lima Araujo joins to talk about their new all ages graphic novel Phenomena Book 2 with writer Brian Michael Bendis.
Phenomena Book 2: Matilde’s Quest
Writer: Brian Michael Bendis
Artist: Andre Lima Araujo
Publisher: Abrams
The post Andre Lima Araujo Interview! Phenomena on Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack talk Marvel’s Civil War. Whose side are you on?
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Civil War | Civil War #1 to #7 | Full reading order: https://www.comicbookherald.com/the-complete-marvel-reading-order-guide/guide-part-7-civil-war/ |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2007 pt. 1
| Captain America / Civil War: Fallen Son / Captain America | #25 / #1 to #5 / #26 to #33 | Civil War fallout, Brubaker Cap in a new era | | Civil War: The Confession | #1 | Added by Patron David A. | | Avengers: The Initiative | #1-2 | Added by Patron David A. |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2006 Pt. 10: Civil War! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Come join us live to get in your own questions and have them discussed on the show!
This Week’s Comics
Immortal Thor #10
X-Men #34
Rise of the Powers of X #4
GODS #7
X-Men Forever #2
The post C2E2 & Comics Catch Up! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
This April’s absolutely overloaded with a concerning amount of great graphic novels. These are my favorites.
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ResonantIf you asked me my appetite for new zombie-apocalypse comics, I’d probably put it at somewhere between “none” and “why are you asking me that?” Resonant by DB Andry, Skylar Patridge, Jason Wordie and Deron Bennett works around the familiar trappings, and much like The Last of Us, finds a post-apocalypse approach that feels fresh, engaging, and full of characters you have to root for. The series was originally published for 10 issues between 2019-2021 via Vault Comics, and is back for a complete collection edition. If you missed the first go (like I did), it’s worth reconsidering.
Patridge and Wordie are a particularly effective art team, able to capture the quiet moments of a broken world as well as the chaos of what happens during invasive swarms. Andry accompanies them with a smart mixture of The Road inspired dread and child-heroes trying to survive the impossible. It’s scary, charming, and thrilling, all the things good post-apocalypse comics should be.
The Enfield Gang MassacreChris Condon and Jacob Phillips’s That Texas Blood is one of my favorite ongoing comics since its launch in mid-2020. The creative team is smart about taking breaks between installments to allow for quality (and presumably their own scheduling sanity), meaning each arc feels like a carefully calibrated document of small-town Texas crime. The latest “hiatus” took the form of a spinoff arc set entirely in the town’s past, documenting a somewhat mysterious massacre of outlaws hundreds of years ago. It’s a bold risk, and only loosely connected (at least on the surface) to the immediate action of That Texas Blood, but Condon and Phillips fully commit to the vision.
Under Phillips’s brush every setting sun makes me think, “Well maybe I would like to spend more time in Texas” (I wouldn’t!), and Condon’s dedication to backmatter ephemera highlights a unique hyper-obsessive loyalty to the worlds being created. It’s one thing to allude to a town’s past, it’s another to tell a story from hundreds of years ago, and then it’s an unprecedented third level to write the investigative journalism chronicling the discovery of truth about that story from inside the fictional universe. It’s the kind of “Alan Moore just straight up wrote an article on ornithology” level of craft that tells me I’m in the hands of storytellers who care so much. And that just innately makes me care too!
100 BulletsOccasionally, my monthly scans of the League of Comic Geeks’ new trade releases lead to a… spot of confusion. For example, I might see that 100 Bullets Book 1 is receiving a compendium release and think, “Aha, my chance to dive headfirst into Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso’s crime opus!” But what I might not realize, dear reader, is that this “new” release is merely a variant cover on a collected edition older than all of my children combined.
So, no, there’s not really anything new here with 100 Bullets, but the good news is I finally sat down to read this 6-timer Eisner winner that ran via DC’s Vertigo from 2000 to 2009, and you’re not gonna believe this, but I like it a lot. I have a fuzzy memory of trying the first 3-5 issues way back when, and finding Risso’s fluid character work off-putting, and I’d like to borrow Doctor Doom’s time platform so I can properly flog myself for this horrible opinion. Risso is a marvel throughout 100 Bullets, mastering shadow like he’s Gene Colan or Mike Mignola, and although I can nitpick that too many of the Minutemen look kinda the same (which is only a problem insofar as I had a hard time distinguishing major players even 20+ issues in), that’s far overshadowed by brilliant pacing, angles and dramatic perspective.
At the time of this writing, I’m still finalizing my way through 100 Bullets Book 2 (up to issue #36), but the pairing of Azzarello and Risso is a great one, enough that I was very excited to dive into their more recent 28 issue Image work, Moonshine. Ideally, I’d fall hard enough for 100 Bullets that I could rank it as my 100th favorite comic of all time, but that seems like a tall order. Nonetheless, can it make the cut off for the published top 500? I fully think so, even though I’ve heard rumblings the back half doesn’t match the front!
Death Strikes: The Emperor of AtlantisPurely based on graphic novel title and publication by Dark Horse, you’d be forgiven for assuming Death Strikes: The Emperor of Atlantis is a well-worn genre thriller looking to expand upon the sandy shores of Aquaman and Namor. Cursory inspection reveals it’s anything but, though, as Dave Maass and Patrick Lay are actually adapting a suppressed 1943 opera by Jewish artists created inside a Nazi Germany concentration camp. The history alone, and the miracle of any retained art surviving the Holocaust is worth the price of admission. The comic looks to adapt Der Kaiser von Atlantis, created by Peter Kien and Viktor Ullman from within the Terezin concentration camp, and seeks to share how “beauty and humor can be found even in the face of doom.”
A work like this is in danger of flatlining at curious historical project, but Maass and Lay modernize and elevate the opera for comics with tremendous, care, relevance and precision. Death Strikes is funny, at times like Joseph Heller’s Catch-22 (a personal favorite), and the ink-washed grays are gorgeous. You’ll want to read the historical analysis that bookends the comic, but readers could pick this up without any of that context and simply enjoy a parodic dig into the rise of fascism and the endless ills of war. This is genuinely special work from Maass and Lay, living up to the weight of adapting something created in such historically harrowing circumstances.
The Werewolf at Dusk: And Other StoriesI talk about this a lot, but I’m endlessly tantalized by how much I don’t know about comics. I feel like I have a pretty good grasp on the major celebrated works of the 2010’s, but then here’s David Small, an artist I’ve never encountered before, with a graphic memoir, Stitches, so beloved it’s blurbed by R. Crumb and Stan Lee! Small’s so good he has Gene Luen Yang saying, “David Small is among the most masterful storytellers alive today.” I don’t know anything about anything. It’s great!
Small’s latest is a series of three short stories: The Werewolf at Dusk, A Walk in the Old City (the only of the three also written by Small), and The Tiger in Vogue. The works are compulsively readable, and compulsively inspiring, with Small working in an almost child-like partially sketched pen that makes me want to stop what I’m doing and draw my own aging werewolves. The difference of course is that Small knows what he’s doing with the absence of a line, or a detail-less grocery aisle, allowing character expression and a laconic narrative do the heavy lifting. For my money, The Tiger in Vogue is the standout, a surreal adaptation of Jean Ferry’s story about the rise of fascism in early 1920’s Germany, as told by a man attending a musical with a woman and a literal tiger as the star attractions. It taps into the same themes as the previous works – aging as the world changes and shifts the ground beneath your feet – but while also capturing the madness inducing fear that comes from watching a small mustached man controlling a crowd in ways only you seem to fully understand.
Victory ParadeWhen Leela Corman sets out to make a graphic novel, she makes a graphic novel built to win awards. The early 2010’s Unterzakhn is a tremendous work, following twin sisters navigating New York’s Lower East side as Jewish immigrants circa 1910. Corman wields an innate ability to transform history into an emotionally resonant present, with casts of fierce women encompassing the full spectrums of humor, heart, and heart of fully realized lives. Victory Parade walks a similar emotional path, following the lives of Brooklyn women navigating World War II in America as German-Jewish refugees.
In Victory Parade, Corman eschews the black-and-white thick inks for a lush and times surreal palette of softly melting watercolors. The oversized Pantheon Graphic Library hardcover allows for a wider canvas, which Corman uses to full effect, particularly during hallucinogenic dream sequences full of dissected anatomy depicting subconscious trauma in the lives of these characters. Even so, the ‘realism’ of the history is only augmented through fever dreams and flashbacks, whether it’s memories of pre-Nazi Germany or Sam’s nightmares of seeing the post-liberation Buchenwald concentration camp. Corman’s quite carefully considered in depicting the rampant blend of misogyny and xenophobia of the era as well, even down to lettering that snakes around a lead character’s neck like a noose of jeers.
Corman’s ambitions – in tone, pacing, character focus – all seem larger than the inevitable Unterzakhn comparisons, and not always to her benefit. Ruth’s journey into women’s professional wrestling of the era could likely have been a whole graphic novel of its own, but within Victory Parade, it’s a bit clouded in all the moving parts. Nonetheless, this is fascinating work from an incredible talent, and well worth seeing in print.
In PerpetuityMaria and Peter Hoey’s In Perpetuity, out now from Top Shelf Productions, is a brilliant exercise in comic-making restraint. Stylistically like Chris Ware’s slice-of-life decompression meets the staccato movements of Robot Chicken figures, In Perpetuity is told primarily through stilted, matter-of-fact third-person narration. “Jim walked over to his car.” “He took the bus to make it more believable.” “Kimberly continued on and did not look back.” The repetition and simplicity captures the mundanity of In Perpetuity‘s Afterlife, a vision not of heaven nor hell, but instead one of tedium and limited pleasures. The lead character works as a gas station attendant, with days largely broken apart by crossword puzzles and cigarettes, until an old acquaintance from life pulls him into a criminal enterprise contacting the living from the A.L.
As In Perpetuity develops, its reimagining of the Greek afterlife mixes in noirish mystery, conspiracy, and ultimately a confrontation with the ruler of the A.L, Hades. It’s a masterful mixture of genre, both compelling as narrative and contemplative of the joys we take for granted of in this life.
GleemOriginally published in 2019, Freddy Carrasco’s “selection of spectacular short stories” is so good Drawn & Quarterly picked up the out-of-print work for a new edition this year. I’m very glad they did, as Carrasco’s fully-realized sci-fi worlds walk an incredible blend between Taiyo Matsumoto’s Tekkon Kinkreet and the cosmos-shattering spiritualism of Jim Starlin reincarnated in the pen of Ronin-era Frank Miller. Gleem is composed of three distinct stories, one a bored kid’s accidental spiritual journey at a future megachurch, another what happens when bored kids add a defective robot AI to their crew, and a final that I can best describe as what it’s like for bored kids to do future-drugs at the coolest rave I’ll never get invited to.
Carrasco’s cartooning is confident and inspiring, the kind that often invites you to make your own comics even as its displaying a control of the page that can only come from immense creative experience. In his book blurb, Michael DeForge writes, “Nobody’s doing space and time the way Freddy Carrasco does space and time,” and it’s hard to argue otherwise. Sequences where a teen at church loses himself in a swirling fever dream made up of lust and a fish asking him if he’s paid his taxes are, uh, hard to pull off! Within Gleem‘s walls it all makes a delirious amount of sense.
From here on out, I’ll be reading anything Carrasco releases, no questions asked.
The JellyfishOne of my favorite surprise graphic novels of the year, simply due to my lack of familiarity with the artist Boum and Pow Pow Press. The Jellyfish is a gorgeous, touching, queer work, and one of the better explorations of what it feels like when doctors can’t tell you what the hell is wrong! The premise is that Odette, a young Canadian woman, develops a unique condition where she has a… Jellyfish… in her eye. This condition is stated as both unique and completely matter-of-fact, as Boum depicts literal floating black spots of jellyfish circling around Odette, growing in number as Odette’s condition worsens. Doctor visits confirm Odette does in fact have Jellyfish in her eyes, but aren’t able to offer much by of solution, apart from more doctor visits and prescriptions that maybe might help but who really knows (I’ve been there so hard!). In the midst of all this, Odette falls for another young woman experiencing the traumatizing abuses of her father/boss. It’s a sweet, touching romance in the face of impending health failure and resonates deeply.
It’s a hyper-specific thing, too, but I love how The Jellyfish seamlessly incorporates a sick mid-aughts indie dance rock playlist of songs by groups like Gorillaz and The Rapture. Obviously comics can’t capture sound, but I do find that reference points are an effective way to present scene, tone and time period. This is especially true when all the songs are tracks I know – I danced to Gorillaz in 2006 too! – but plenty of times it’s led to discovery (I’m thinking here of when I interviewed Stephen Franck and discovered “Honky Tonk Hardwood Floor” in his L.A. country bar noir). Again, the end result is a work of art that feels intensely lived-in, and intensely relatable, only adding to the ways it completely pulled me into this world of all-consuming Jelly.
TenderBeth Hetland’s graphic novel debut from Fantagraphics looked me directly in the eyes, crawled under the lids, and rooted around in the slimiest corners of my brain all night. If that’s a little too gross, Tender might not be for you! This astounding work combines modern social pressures, body horror, fever dreams, expectations, grief, eating cats, and trauma like nothing I’ve ever read. Ok, fine, that’s a pretty specific combination, but hot damn if it doesn’t work under Hetland’s carefully constructed nightmare.
Tender effortlessly oscillates between the familiar patterns of adulthood (first comes love, then comes marriage, then a baby in a baby carriage!) and a creeping, sinister darkness under the current that grows to a nauseating critical mass where there’s no hiding it. Hetland isn’t the first artist to try and turn suburbia into horror, but the blend of yearning for a perfect family you can brag about onto Instagram alongside exaggerated truly grotesque scenes of self-mutilation is a rare kind of resonant. Hetland shows a confident grasp of restraint, setting scenes of suburbia in ink-washed grays and blues, but unleashing the destructive forces of angry reds and yellows during 12+panel pages of psycho-kinetic terror. I couldn’t put Tender down, even knowing it would wreak havoc on my dreams, and I’ll be reading anything from Hetland in the future.
The post My Favorite Graphic Novels of April 2024 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Charlotte and Zack get ready for CIVIL WAR.
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| The Road to Civil War | Amazing Spider-Man #529New Avengers: IlluminatiAmazing Spider-Man #530Fantastic Four #536 – #537Amazing Spider-Man #531Civil War: Opening Shot #1 | The Road to Civil War |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2006 pt. 10
| Civil War | Civil War #1 to #7 | Full Reading Order: link |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2006 Pt. 9: The Road to Civil War appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Going all in on the Marvel Ultimate Universe with special guest Owen Likes Comics! We’ll talk Ultimate Invasion, Ultimate Spider-Man, Ultimate X-Men, Ultimate Black Panther, and the upcoming Ultimates. What we make of the direction so far, and theories on where we think it might be going!
Find more from Owen here
This Week’s Comics
Ultimate Spider-Man #4
G.O.D.S. #7
Rise of the Powers of X #4
X-Men Forever #2
Dawnrunner #2
Rare Flavours #5
Man’s Best #2
The post Marvel’s New Ultimate Universe Breakdown w/ Owen Likes Comics | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Big news week! We’re talking reports of Kevin Feige’s role in Marvel Comics making Kamala Khan a mutant, the newest Jonathan Hickman Marvel comic, Fall of the House of X, Al Ewing’s Roxxon Thor, and X-Men ’97! Plus, what’s new in comics!
This Week’s Comics
Ultimate Black Panther #3
Fall of the House of X #4
Dead X-Men #4
Roxxon Presents: Thor #1
The post X-Men ’97, Fall of the House of X, Hickman on…Alien vs. Avengers?! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave and special guest Spike Stonehand share their top 5 favorite comics and graphic novels of 2024 so far, as well as picks for the best of Marvel and DC this year.
You can find more from Spike at his website.
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2006 pt. 9
| The Road to Civil War | Amazing Spider-Man #529New Avengers: IlluminatiAmazing Spider-Man #530Fantastic Four #536 – #537Amazing Spider-Man #531Civil War: Opening Shot #1 | The Road to Civil War |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2006 Variant Cover D: Best Comics of 2024 (So Far!) w/ Spike Stonehand appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Zackula, Charlacabra, and Tiffany “Blah!”-bb are covering two monstrous graphic novels:
– My Favorite Thing is Monsters (2017) by Emil Ferris
– Monsters (2021) by Barry Windsor Smith
Topics discussed:
– How much does the authorial vs. character voice matter to the success of My Favorite Thing is Monsters?
– Is Monsters a genre work or literary work? Both? Neither?
– What do both these books have in common besides their titles? More than you think!
Upcoming episodes in our Fantagraphics miniseries: – Black Hole/ Dementia 21
– Love & Rockets (Gilbert Hernandez)
– Love and Rockets Library Editions:
– Heartbreak Soup
– Human Diastrophism
– Beyond Palomar
You can find Charlotte at twitter.com/mymarvelousyear
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at mymarvelousyear.com
Music for Extra Issues is credited to FM Skyline.
You can support Extra Issues via Patreon for as little as $1 a month at patreon.com/mymarvelousyear
The post Extra Issues – Fantagraphics #4: My Favorite Thing is Monsters (2017) & Monsters (2021) appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack wonder with “The Oath” is the best modern Doctor Strange story, talk about the wedding of Storm and Black Panther, and dig deep into what makes Marvel Zombies tick.
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Doctor Strange: The Oath | #1 to #5 | Brian K. Vaughn and Marcos Martin in the best Dr. Strange miniseries of the 2000’s. | | Marvel Zombies | #1 to #5 | Kirkman’s best zombie comic? | | Black Panther | #15 to #17 | Bride of the Storm |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2006 pt. 9
| The Road to Civil War | Amazing Spider-Man #529New Avengers: IlluminatiAmazing Spider-Man #530Fantastic Four #536 – #537Amazing Spider-Man #531Civil War: Opening Shot #1 | The Road to Civil War |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2006 Pt. 8: Doctor Strange, Marvel Zombies, & Black Panther appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Digging into the second issue of Momoko’s Ultimate X-Men, plus the end of Al Ewing’s Resurrection of Magneto (and time on X-Men!). Plus, what’s new in comics!
This Week’s Comics
Ultimate X-Men #2
Resurrection of Magneto #4
Ms. Marvel Mutant Menace #2
Beneath the Trees Where Nobody Sees #5
The post Is Ultimate X-Men by Peach Momoko Good? | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave loves (loved?) Invincible. Zack thinks it stinks. Charlotte hates to watch Dads fight.
This is Convincible, where we try to convince each other whether Invincible is one of the best or worst superhero comics of all time.
This episode, a major sea change happens in our argument about the comic.
On Convincible #5 we read:
| Invincible Vol. 14: The Viltrumite War | Invincible #71–78 | | Invincible Vol. 15: Get Smart | Invincible #79–84 | | Invincible Vol. 16: Family Ties | Invincible #85–90 |
Previously on Convincible:
Convincible #1
Convincible #2
Convincible #3
Convincible #4
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2006 pt. 8
Play Along With:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post Convincible #5: Invincible #71-#90 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
One of my favorite things about comics is how they’re always the best. Below you’ll find my favorite graphic novels or collected editions released in March 2024. I’ve ordered the selections in relative preference, in ascending order.
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The Marble QueenI talk about this all the time, but one of the most important things I try to keep in mind is how to respect the craft, aims and effect of a work when it’s very clearly not targeting “aging Dad with a sick step-back three” as its primary audience. The Marble Queen by Anna Kopp and Gabrielle Kari is a great example, a Sapphic YA graphic novel from Dark Horse following a Princess brought to a faraway Kingdom to marry the realm’s Queen for the sake of both their kingdoms. The work is undeniably written for a younger audience, and more deliberately speaks to queer audiences navigating early feelings of romance and the cultural hostility or “othering” that follows. Nonetheless, I read half the graphic novel in a single sitting, fully pulled in by Kopp and Kari’s pacing, Manga-esque comedic expression, and beautiful storytelling. The Marble Queen is especially good at capturing the creeping dread of anxiety, and the ways its tendrils sneak into your world at the most unsuspecting otherwise blissful times.
Admittedly, the plot-based palace intrigue didn’t pull me through the book’s back half. Nonetheless, I can tell this is some fine work worthy of its audience.
Immortal Thor Vol. 1: All Weather Turns To StormAt the core of Al Ewing and Martin Coccolo’s Immortal Thor, there is a lingering question: What does the Immortal legacy mean to Ewing?
Through the critical and commercial success of Immortal Hulk, Ewing established “Immortal” as his sacred ground for mature, nuanced superhero storytelling, a cut well above the typical standards of the monthly corporate rat race. Immortal Thor is Ewing’s second attempt at chasing those lofty ideals, but the methods feel distinctly changed to meet what Thor needs. An easy answer would have been to chase the “horror” genre thrills of Hulk, or the cosmic doors to hell, but that was the Hulk story that needed telling. And Thor has so many more stories at his beck and call.
“Too long have you chosen illusion over change!”
There’s a really fascinating undercurrent of tension in Ewing’s narration, much talk of the magic of story, and the associated costs that lie in wait for Thor. It’s a fairly challenging blend of superhero highs and Asgardian tales, and meta-commentary on the stagnation of the medium and what must happen to shake Thor out of it. In this first volume, Ewing is more nebulous in his motives, more mysterious in his aims, than he ever was on Immortal Hulk. The vision is not quite solidified, but the promise is there. In the meantime, here are Storm, Thor, Loki, Jane Foster and Beta Ray Bill playing pass the hammer to defeat an ancient god.
So be it.
A Firehose of Falsehood: The Story of DisinformationExplanations of chronologies of disinformation – in the immortal words of Billie Joe Armstrong, “Now everybody do the propaganda!” – are increasingly and sadly needed more than ever. It’s a huge reason why I fell so hard for James Tynion IV and Martin Simmonds The Department of Truth; to me, it seemed a miracle to be able to translate the era of “Fake News” and accelerating lies and conspiracies into fast-paced fiction. How do you articulate what is happening when shameless lies are told to the rapturous applause of an ahistorical rabid fanbase feeding purely off emotion?
A Firehose of Falsehood feels like the other side of the coin, where Teri Kanefield and Pat Dorian expertly navigate the full historical breadth of disinformation. It’s an engaging, simply told history of a complex subject, and one that made me realize truths I hadn’t quite seen. For example, I knew Donald Trump was Exhibit A in the contemporary American political scene of “Fake News,” but I did not realize how directly many of his tactics were taken from Italy’s Benito Mussolini. It is a difficult read, frankly, knowing where our world is at. But seeing that disinformation has been weaponized for millennia, and that inevitably its evils have been overcome is oddly comforting.
DescenderI used the release of a Descender compendium to catch-up on Jeff Lemire and Dustin Nguyen’s Descender, an Image Comics sci-fi series that launched in 2015 and ran until its 32nd issue in 2018. Since that time, Lemire has release approximately 684,000 new creator-owned comic books and has become the Robert Pollard of comics creators. Nonetheless, it was quite thrilling to revisit an underrated time when Lemire had a clearer sense of quality control, and when Nguyen’s watercolor landscapes captured some of the purest cosmic energy of anything in comics.
Descender is effectively the answer to the question “What if Jeff Lemire read Isaac Asimov’s Robot novels” and I’m mostly here for it, although it’s hard not to feel diminishing returns over the run’s back half. Plot-wise the sci-fi doesn’t break any new ground, but Lemire is creative enough to mix up the delivery utilizing Nguyen’s strengths, most notably in a standout triptych with three separate narratives told one atop the other on each page for the whole issue. Likewise, it wouldn’t be a Lemire comic without a sincere effort to find the tear-jerking pathos of a robot built to drill mines. All in all, it’s a memorable if flawed run.
Hockey Girl Loves Drama BoyI suspect I’m undervaluing Faith Erin Hicks. Despite the fact that she’s a pretty big name in all-ages cartoonists, I’ve never found my in with the creator. The Nameless City doesn’t quite measure up to my all-ages faves (Bone, Amulet, Nimona, Mister Invincible, etc), and Hick’s popular licensed work on Avatar and The Last of Us is simply the kind of spinoff comic I tend to ignore (aka comics from media I’ve already enjoyed better!).
As such, it was an enjoyable awakening to see Hicks at her full powers on Hockey Girl Loves Drama Boy, a queer teen romance from the absurdly reliable First Second Books. It’s clear with the first 30 pages that Hicks sense of pacing, space, character, and emotion is all masterwork, art from the hands of a cartoonist fully in control of the themes they wish to convey. Even the premise is a clever subtle subversion of sports-romance tropes, where our star athlete is the high school girl being bullied, and the queer drama boy becomes her mentor (and maybe more). I took minor issue with the high school sports bullying taking place seemingly right in front of the coach (come on, coach! Speak up!), but this is coming from a guy who regularly reads comics about a 200 hundred year old man with knife hands. Believe what you will.
Sex Criminals: The Cumplete Story (…Do you get it?)One of the weird things about coming of age and falling in love with comics during the Image renaissance of the early 2010s is there are a lot of comics that I think of as some of my favorites ever that I actually never finished. Due to various combinations of delays and personal life there are multiple series that I fell in love with from 2012-2014, and kept collecting, but never actually went back and read. Over the last 5 years, I came to this realization with Deadly Class, East of West, Black Science, Chew, Invincible, and now, the permanent #69 on my favorite comics of all time list, Sex Criminals.
Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky’s cum comic (their words) is particularly egregious because it turns out I only ever made it to issue #7 of a run that spanned #1-#30 and ends with an issue #69. So yes, let me reiterate that dirty, naughty secret: I’ve been recommending a comic as the 69th best of all time based on 22.5% of the run. I’m a nasty, freaky lil fraud! Punish me!
This re-release of the whole dang story in one sizable package prompted me to hit my longboxes and pull out the run. Hitting my own stacks for a run I haven’t finished (or read in a while) is in my top 2% of favorite things to do, and it was especially thrilling to – for the first time – cut open the NSFW variant pink polybags for a few of my comics (including a Bryan Lee O’Malley NSFW variant that can only be described as “I’ll never play Mario the same way again”). But the other rewarding part of this sexperience was confirmation that Fraction and Zdarsky kept Sex Criminals great all the way throughout! This could have easily been a short-term adrenaline rush of taboo humor and dick jokes, but instead it’s decidedly character driven, and thoughtful in its depictions of the messiness and complications of sexuality and gender. Even in moments when I stop finding Sex Criminals especially funny, I’m still eager to continue with the creator’s imaginative fantasies, explosions of formal expectations, or deeply self-conscious meta commentary.
It would be no surprise if a book featuring Cumworld didn’t hold up a decade later. The miracle of Fraction and Zdarsky’s collaboration is that it reads as fresh now as it did then – it’s like they came together and stopped time.
ZodiacLike most deep philosophical art critics, I picked up Ai Weiwei’s graphic memoir Zodiac because the cover is very pretty and shiny. I’d love to say here that this is another one of my many classic jests, but I’m 100% sincere. I had no idea Ai Weiwei was a legendary Chinese performance artist (not to mention political prisoner & exile) – I just really loved the gloss on Ten Speed Press’s hardcover design, and the feel of Gianluca Costantini’s pencils from a quick scan.
I’m glad I’m so easily impressed because Zodiac is a fascinating read, oscillating between meditative and almost surreal discussions of art, politics, and human purpose. The memoir is structured via 12 chapters, each corresponding to the twelve signs of the Chinese zodiac. At times this framing is very intentional, with Weiwei and Costantini sharing the folklore inspirations of the zodiac, but more often than not it’s a metaphorical framing tied to discussions of everything from the Chinese Cultural Revolution to Chairman Mao to Weiwei’s most famous works. Unlike most memoirs that trade in linear autobio, Zodiac walks a fine line between history and theory, between concrete and ethereal, and somehow Costantini’s lines are so precise yet tactical the pacing never feels stodgy. A highly compelling work that I’d recommend.
Feeding Ghosts: A Graphic MemoirFor vast stretches of its 300+ pages I was convinced Feeding Ghosts is the graphic novel of the year. Tessa Hulls’ multigenerational memoir, tracking the lives and relationships of her grandmother, mother, and herself, is an almost impossibly ambitious document of Chinese history, immigrant experience, mental health, generational strands of trauma, and therapeutic self-examination. Hulls treats the entire work with a laboriously designed swirl of creeping ink, a descending black-and-white instability ready to spin the entire work of its axis but never giving way to outright madness. Put another way, Feeding Ghosts can be out of this world gorgeous, and designed unlike anything else I’ve read this year.
At the same time, Feeding Ghosts is dense. You feel the weight of the labor, the toll of the personal introspection, the weight of every family tree branch crashing from the ether into a fully formed published document. It’s not just that the book isn’t light reading; it’s that information often feels repetitive, or tediously drawn out. Feeding Ghosts is so much from start to finish that it seems inevitable the work will oscillate between the most fascinating examinations in comics and stories a close friend has told you several times before.
For a work this personal, though, I’m more than willing to look past the rocky stretches, and celebrate the magnificence of Hulls’ accomplishments. Much of Feeding Ghosts is among the best memoirs I’ve read, whether we’re talking Fun Home, Blankets, The Best We Could Do, or anything else in comics (and beyond). I learned so much about Mao’s China, and the psychological toll that took on generations of Chinese, and Hulls benefits from the unique existence of her grandmother’s memoir about escaping Mao’s China to Hong Kong! It’s a must-read, and will be for years to come.
The GulfComics are full of teenage coming-of-age journeys where an otherwise mundane experience is amplified by the angst and promise of youth. For obvious reasons, cartoonists love tapping into this emotionally resonant adult ground zero, from Craig Thompson’s Blankets, to Mariko and Jillian Tamaki’s This One Summer or Roaming, to Tillie Walden’s catalog, and on and on. Adam de Souza’s The Gulf is the latest standout in the genre, a masterfully put together graphic novel about high school friends seeking the idyllic promise of a Canadian commune over the stale possibility of a life spent collecting paychecks for insignificant contributions to the capitalistic machine.
de Souza’s work excels due to an excellent lead character, the wise-cracking, fiery, complex Oli, who steps right up to the legacy of Enid Coleslaw as memorable comics creations. With one brilliant exception, de Souza avoids the spectacle of the supernatural, and plays the journey straight: these are just three high school graduates navigating the woods and trails of Canada over the course of two days. There’s the messy backdrop of high school sexuality, bullying, and parents with no idea how to parent teens, but at the end of the day, it’s just a few awesome, confused kids finding their way and asking the question we’re all asking regardless of age: What is all this for?
Swan SongsIf you’ve followed my picks for favorite comics at any point over the last 6 years, you’ve probably gathered that I am decidedly in the bag for W. Maxwell Prince. Ice Cream Man has been my favorite ongoing comic book for about 5 years, and the spiritual (and final-issue crossover!) sibling Swan Songs was among my favorite works of 2023. I don’t think anyone in comics is more thoroughly and effectively dedicated to the art of the single issue than Prince, giving every 20+ page floppy work its own flavor, approach and experience. Alongside some of the best creative collaborators in the business, Prince justifies monthly comic shop sojourns better than anyone in the business.
Swan Songs is a series of 6 one-shots with a new artist on each issue (Martin Simmonds! Caspar Wjingaard! Filipe Andrade! Caitlin Yarsky! Alex Eckma-Lawn! And Ice Cream Man‘s own Martin Morazzo), and each issue is about the end of… something. We get the end of a life, the end of the world, the end of a marriage, the end of a sentence, the end of depression, and in a parody of Shel Silverstein, the end of the sidewalk. In Prince’s manner, each issue offers something entirely new, while trading in black humor, existential dread, and sneaking, buried, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it hope. Issue two reimagines the end of a marriage as a series of genre-laced battles between the splitting couple, issue 5 reimagines therapy as a hypnotic sojourn into a collaged dreamscape, and issue 6 reimagines the aforementioned Silverstein.
It is dark, it is funny, it is imaginative, and always, always, always: it is what comics were meant to be.
Mobilis: My Life With Captain NemoThis is unquestionably a 2023 release, but I finally read my hardcover this month, and it’s one of my favorite reads in recent years, so on with the show! I first got wind of Mobilis, Juni Ba’s follow-up to his similarly excellent TKO graphic novel debut, Djeliya, a few days before I interviewed Juni and Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou about their collaborative Dark Horse graphic novel The Unlikely Story of Felix and Macabber. The cutoff for review copies had already passed, making it one of the first interviews I’ve ever done where I knowingly walked into a conversation without having read an author’s most recent work. In my arrogance, I assumed I kind of knew what the book was! After all, I’m a big fan of Juni’s Djeliya, Monkey Meat, and the aforementioned Unlikely Story. I’ve even read his Ninja Turtles work! Surely, no surprises lie in wait.
And, on the surface, Mobilis is not a book that trades in surprise. Both narratively and visually, Mobilis is very much Juni Ba’s modern re-imagining of a Captain Nemo on a never-ending underseas mission, with a young girl rescued and in tow. A tale as old as time! The surprise, then, is the totality of Ba’s vision, the consistency of his handle on tone, spectacle, pacing and emotion. Juni should not be this in control this quickly. Where Djeliya and Monkey Meat both felt like like works created with the energy of someone bursting with ideas and who had to get them down on the page before the next idea wormed its way in, Mobilis feels like the carefully considered craft of a years-in-the-making study. Yet somehow, the work doesn’t lose that thrilling energy – I sat down to read a few pages, and lo and behold I finished the work in a single night.
Juni Ba was already a must-buy cartoonist for me, but honesty I can’t say enough good things about Mobilis – this is a must-buy, and I would strongly encourage the hardcover print package over digital to fully enjoy the vision at its fullest.
An Unordered list of other New Comics I Read and Mostly Enjoyed!: Masters of the Nefarious – by Pierre La Police * Transitions: A Mother’s Journey – Elodie Durand * Ultimate Invasion – Jonathan Hickman / Bryan Hitch * Firebugs – Nino Bulling * Viscera Objectica* – Yugo Limbo
The post My Favorite Graphic Novels of March 2024 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
Catching up on last week’s issues of Rise of the Powers of X, Ultimate Spider-Man, GODS, and the conclusion of X-Force. Plus, what’s new in comics!
This Week’s Comics
Rise of the Powers of X #3
Ultimate Spider-Man #3
G.O.D.S. #6
X-Force #50
Immortal Thor #9
The post Rise of the Powers of X #3! Ultimate Spider-Man #3! Immortal Thor! | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Annihilation refreshes Marvel Cosmic, and nearly kills our podcast.
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Annihilation | Annihilation Prologue, Annihilation #1 to #6 | Full Reading Order: link |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2006 pt. 8
| Doctor Strange: The Oath | #1 to #5 | Brian K. Vaughn and Marcos Martin in the best Dr. Strange miniseries of the 2000’s. | | Marvel Zombies | #1 to #5 | Kirkman’s best zombie comic? | | Black Panther | #15 to #17 | Bride of the Pather |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2006 Pt. 7: Annihilation appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave and Charlotte talk reactions to the X-Men ’97 debut, and then the gang chats with Zack about their most exciting month-to-month comics collecting experiences.
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2006 pt. 7
| Annihilation | Annihilation Prologue, Annihilation #1 to #6 | Full Reading Order: link |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
This week’s episode is brought to you by:
https://go.foursigmatic.com/mmy (enter code MMY at checkout for 30% off!)
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2006 Variant Cover C: X-Men ’97, Best Month-to-Month Comics Experiences, Annihilation Aftercare! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave and special guest Charles Pulliam Moore talk the end of Morrison’s New X-Men and the start of Joss Whedon and John Cassaday’s Astonishing X-Men!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| New X-Men | #151 to #154 | Morrison run concludes with issue #154 | | Astonishing X-Men / Madrox | #1 to #6 / #1 to #5 | The Joss Whedon and John Cassaday X-Men series begins, then Peter David’s X-Factor begins with a noir Madrox murder mystery. |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2004 pt. 7
| Identity Disc | #1 to #5 | Requested by Patreon Backer Johannes K. | | Loki | #1 to #4 | By Rob Rodi and Esad Ribic | | Cable & Deadpool | #1, #7 to #10 | Simultaneously one of the best Cable and Deadpool books of all time! |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2004 Pt. 6: New X-Men Ends & Astonishing X-Men Begins! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Comic Book Herald Live, I review the week’s most interesting comics and related news, and answer your big questions LIVE. This week:
We review the day’s comics, I get pulled into a 15 minute rant on the state of comics coverage on Youtube, and I share the latest additions to CBH’s best comics of 2023. Plus… what’s up with Marvel’s G.O.D.S. pricing and marketing?
This Week’s Comics
Immortal X-Men #15
X-Men #26
W0RLDTR33
SWOLEMATES
The post So Who’s Buying G.O.D.S. #1? Immortal X-Men #15! X-Men #26 | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Charlotte and Zack discuss Marvel Knights Spider-Man and Wolverine: Enemy of the State!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Marvel Knights Spider-Man | #1 to #8 | Mark Millar’s run on Marvel Knights Spidey | | Wolverine | #20 to #25 | Mark Millar’s “Enemy of the State” |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2004 pt. 6
| New X-Men | #151 to #154 | Morrison run concludes with issue #154 | | Astonishing X-Men / Madrox | #1 to #6 / #1 to #5 | The Joss Whedon and John Cassaday X-Men series begins, then Peter David’s X-Factor begins with a noir Madrox murder mystery. |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2004 Pt. 5: Marvel Knights Spider-Man & Wolverine appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack talk about the state of Marvel Comics, the most overrated comics of all time, and other listener questions! Plus, My Mangaless Year returns with more Berserk. Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2004 pt. 5 Marvel Knights Spider-Man #1 to #8 Mark Millar’s run on Marvel Knights Spidey Wolverine #20 to […]
The post 2004 Variant Cover B: The Most Overrated Comics Of All Time appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below: Al Ewing is modern Marvel. Talking Al Ewing’s impact on Marvel Comics, new Immortal Thor, and today’s new X-Men comics. PLUS, the death […]
The post On Ewing & a Prayer! Immortal Thor #1 (2023), Realm of X #1, Jean Grey #!1 | CBH Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Angela has a complicated history, this time not because of convoluted plots or time-travel shenanigans. She started as an Image Comics character, but Neil Gaiman sued Todd McFarlane for some of his characters’ ownership and won the battle for Angela’s rights. After that, Neil Gaiman sold her to Marvel. In Image, she was part of […]
The post Angela Reading Order appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack dive even deeper into Brian Michael Bendis comics with Secret War (no, not the plural ones) and Jessica Jones in a huge Green Goblin story in The Pulse. On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited): Secret War #1 to #5 Not plural. The Pulse #1 to #5 […]
The post 2004 Pt. 4: Secret War & The Pulse appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
There is something both incredibly heartwarming and deeply frustrating about Across the Spider-Verse‘s transness. Let’s start with the heartwarming part: as a trans woman myself, as well as a Spider-Gwen fan who has for many years now interpreted the character as trans, there is a deep joy in seeing that the people who made this […]
The post Spider-Gwen & the Trans Subtext of Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below: Big day in X-Men comics with 5 new releases, AND we talk about the big news that Marvel editor Tom Breevort will be taking […]
The post Breevort on X-Men! Uncanny Avengers #1 (2023), Dark X-Men #1, & More! | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Zack, Charlotte, and special guest Dave Busting continue our first miniseries on Superhero Subversions with a discussion of the Alan Moore run of Miracleman (1982). We cover all the issues in the newly released Omnibus. Topics discussed: – Is Alan Moore critiquing superhero comics? Taking them very seriously? Mocking them? Or a combination or the […]
The post Extra Issues – Superhero Subversions, ep 4: Miracleman appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below: What does the 2023 Hellfire Gala mean for X-Men comics and Krakoa going forward? Is the Fall of X wayyyyy more interesting than I […]
The post X-Men Hellfire Gala (2023) Post-Game Show! | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below: The road to the 2023 X-Men Hellfire Gala examined! This Week’s Comics Before the Fall – Heralds of Apocalypse Before the Fall – The […]
The post X-Men Hellfire Gala (2023) Pre-Game Show! | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack kick off the modern era of Marvel events with Avengers Disassembled! Great jumping on point! On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited): Avengers Disassembled Full CBH reading order OR Avengers #500 to #503, Avengers Finale #1 You can definitely just read the core event issues. That […]
The post 2004 Pt. 3: Avengers Disassembled! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Peach Momoko is one of the most popular cover artists now, thanks to her distinct and almost dream-like style inspired by horror and Japanese cinema. In 2021, Momoko also filled the insides of comics with her watercolors in the “Momomo-verse,” starting with Demon Days: X-Men #1. Its premise is to create a new Marvel universe, […]
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Dave, Charlotte and Zack talk Secret Invasion, and the upcoming new Invincible podcast! Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2004 pt. 3 Avengers Disassembled Full CBH reading order OR Avengers #500 to #503, Avengers Finale #1 You can definitely just read the core event issues. That said, this begins the modern era of Marvel events, which means there […]
The post 2004 Variant Cover A: Should the MCU Be on TV? appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack learn whether all Things go to heaven, watch Tony Stark straight up join the Bush administration, and kick off the Dan Slott written era of She-Hulk! On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited): Fantastic Four #509 to #513 Waid and Wieringo run into the Hereafter […]
The post 2004 Pt. 2: Fantastic Four, Iron Man, & She-Hulk appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave sings, and Charlotte and Zack conclude the first volume of Runaways and talk more Daredevil by Bendis and Maleev. On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited): Daredevil #56 to #64 Bendis and Maleev continue with “King of Hell’s Kitchen” Runaways #13 to #18 The conclusion of the first Runaways arc by Brian […]
The post 2004 Pt. 1: Daredevil & Runaways appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Charlotte and Zack watched 2003’s Daredevil. Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2004 pt. 1 Daredevil #56 to #64 Bendis and Maleev continue with “King of Hell’s Kitchen” Runaways #13 to #18 The conclusion of the first Runaways arc by Brian K. Vaughn and Adrian Alphona. Play along with: Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order Downloadable […]
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You don’t see nearly as many successful legacy characters in Marvel as you do in DC, but Captain Marvel (and Ms. Marvel) makes for one of Marvel’s strongest progressions through time. You have sevearl separate core characters that have occupied a “Marvel” title over time, and to make matters even more complicated, DC of course has […]
The post Captain Marvel / Ms. Marvel Reading Order appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack talk all of Alias (aka Jessica Jones) by Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Gaydos, before being held hostage and forced to read Marvel 1602 (which most of them like). On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited): Marvel 1602 #1 to #8 Neil Gaiman written, and included per an exclusive […]
The post 2003 Pt. 8: Marvel 1602 & Alias appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
From Riot at Xavier’s to Planet X, it’s a New X-Men special! On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited): New X-Men (2001-2004) #134 to #150 Grant Morrison’s X-Men epic comes to a fiery end. Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2003 pt.8 Marvel 1602 #1 to #8 Neil Gaiman […]
The post 2003 Pt. 7: New X-Men appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
From the classic tales of Ted Kord to the modern exploits of Jaime Reyes, Blue Beetle has undergone an incredible evolution over the years, offering one of the more intriguing examples of legacy in the DC Universe. The mantle is deeply rooted in comics history with Golden Age origins, transformation by Steve Ditko, seeds of […]
The post Blue Beetle Reading Order! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
I was in a weird place with superhero comics. After about 10 years of reading them I found myself more frequently going through dry spells. Before I was a Wednesday Warrior, reading comics as soon as they came out each week, but now I would go months without picking one up. I’d still read through […]
The post Massive-Verse Comics Reading Order: From Radiant Black to Rogue Sun & Beyond! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack talk about Secret Invasion episode one, and then look at Zack’s rankings of the best and worst Marvel Comics of all time! Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2003 pt. 7 New X-Men (2001-2004) #134 to #150 Grant Morrison’s X-Men epic comes to a fiery end. Play along with: Comic Book […]
The post 2003 Variant Cover C: Secret Invasion on Disney+! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below: Marvel’s Ultimate Invasions promises to bring back the Ultimate Universe! Let’s talk about it! [Powerpress] This Week’s Comics Ultimate Invasion #1 X-Men Red #12 […]
The post Hickman’s Ultimate Invasion #1! | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Charlotte and Zack take on Exiles, X-Statix and a Patreon-listener suggestion to read Wolverine & Doop! On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited): Exiles #23 to #24, #33 to #34 Multiverse hopping with gay smooches! X-Statix #12 to #18 Wolverine/ Doop #1-2 Added by Patreon Backer Jacob C. Up Next: My Marvelous Year […]
The post 2003 Pt. 6: Exiles, X-Statix, & Wolverine/Doop appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Zack and Charlotte talk about Amazing Spider-Man, Doctor Octopus: Negative Exposure (by Brian K. Vaughan!), and Daredevil by Bendis and Maleev! On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited): Amazing Spider-Man (1999-2013) / Doctor Octopus: Negative Exposure #47 to #50, #57-#58, #500 / #1 to #5 Don’t skip Negative Exposure, a great Doc Ock […]
The post 2003 Pt. 5: Amazing Spider-Man & Daredevil appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
The third season of X-Men: The Animated Series is a showcase of all the qualities that make the series memorable in their distilled, purest forms. Season-long plots? Here in spades. Multi-episode story arcs? We’ve got four of those, including adaptations of both The Phoenix Saga and The Dark Phoenix Saga told across nine episodes in […]
The post X-Men: The Animated Series Season 3 Rewatch! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below: X-Men comics are slowly but surely building to the big Orchis showdown in this year’s Hellfire Gala setting up the Fall of X. This […]
The post Road to the X-Men: Hellfire Gala 2023 | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack talk all things Across the Spider-Verse! Spoilers Follow!
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2003 pt. 5
| Amazing Spider-Man (1999-2013) / Doctor Octopus: Negative Exposure | #47 to #50, #57-#58, #500 / #1 to #5 | Don’t skip Negative Exposure, a great Doc Ock miniseries from Comic Book royalty Brian K. Vaughn. | | Daredevil (1998-2011) | #41 to #50 | The Bendis Maleev era of DD continues to impress. |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
This week’s episode is brought to you by:
https://go.foursigmatic.com/mmy (enter code MMY at checkout for 30% off!)
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2003 Variant Cover B: Across the Spider-Verse appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Zack, Charlotte, and special guest Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou continue our first miniseries on Superhero Subversions with a discussion of Kieron Gillen and Caspar Wijngaard’s Peter Cannon: Thunderbolt (2019)
Topics discussed:
– Does Peter Cannon make a successful argument for fresh modes of comic creation?
– How valuable is the legacy of Watchmen?
– What kind of creative expression does a letterer bring to a comic?
Please check out Panel X Panel! With no hyperbole, I think it is the best place for high quality comics criticism out there. Huge thanks to Hass for guesting on this episode!
Upcoming episodes in our Superhero Subversion miniseries:
– The Boys, 2006
– Miracleman, 1982
– Sleeper, 2003
You can find Charlotte at twitter.com/mymarvelousyear
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at mymarvelousyear.com
Music for Extra Issues is credited to FM Skyline.
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The post Extra Issues – Superhero Subversions ep. 3: Peter Cannon, Thunderbolt appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack talk Brian K. Vaughan launching Mystique and Runaways, before talking single issues from Wolverine and Emma Frost!
| Mystique | #1 to #3 | Mystique AND Runaways are series launches from the Y: The Last Man and Saga writer. | | Runaways | #1 to #6 | | Wolverine | #6 | Greg Rucka and Darick Roberson | | Emma Frost | #1 | Emma Frost was a teen. Just like me! |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2003 pt. 5
| Amazing Spider-Man (1999-2013) / Doctor Octopus: Negative Exposure | #47 to #50, #57-#58, #500 / #1 to #5 | Don’t skip Negative Exposure, a great Doc Ock miniseries from Comic Book royalty Brian K. Vaughn. | | Daredevil (1998-2011) | #41 to #50 | The Bendis Maleev era of DD continues to impress. |
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For decades, the Invincible Iron Man has been a character defined through constant cycles of self-destruction and reinvention, rising above the problems of today to look towards tomorrow. But what becomes of this hero when he is confronted with an ever-darkening future? How will he reckon with the impossible choices he’s made? And how much of himself will he lose along the way?
In 2006, Marvel Comics released Civil War, an event that fractured the superhero community and forever changed the trajectory of its characters. Brought to life through writer Mark Millar and artist Steve McNiven, Civil War is still seen as one of the most polarizing comics ever made, drawing from real-world tragedies and events while doing very little to comment on them in an insightful way. While the event was (and is) still maligned by many, its aftermath saw a number of major shifts within the Marvel Universe, namely the death of Captain America, the founding of the “Fifty-State Initiative,” and Iron Man’s ascension as the head of the global intelligence agency S.H.I.E.L.D. It’s this era, largely penned by the father-and-son writing team of Charles and Daniel Knauf, that would take the armored avenger into some of the darkest stories of his history, warping a hopeful icon of the future into a man tormented by the darker world that he helped build.
Primarily known for their work in television, the Knaufs arrived at Marvel with a definitive plan for their favorite character, building on the new status quo of 2005’s Extremis while grounding Iron Man through a focus on present-day politics and international espionage. Staying on for 21 issues between 2006 and 2008, the Knaufs’ tenure on the character was short but incredibly impactful, putting decades’ worth of storytelling under a new lens, and building a legacy that would haunt the character for years to come.
THE LONG WAY DOWNNowadays, the genius billionaire playboy philanthropist Tony Stark is a household name, thanks in a large part to Robert Downey Jr.’s depiction in the mega-franchise that is the Marvel Cinematic Universe. However, Iron Man is also a character with a varied, complex history, one intrinsically tied to America’s relationship with science fiction. Debuting at the height of America’s involvement in the Vietnam War, Iron Man began as a pretty shameless propaganda icon; an embodiment of the “superiority” of western innovation. While Stark’s background as a billionaire industrialist would remain the same, the underlying tone and scope of his adventures would change over the decades, with more high-concept fantastical adventures through the ‘70’s, a focus on recovery and reinvention through the ‘80’s, and a whole bunch of weirdness in the 90’s. I’m not gonna talk about it. It’s bad.
Each era is distinct in its subject matter, but they all serve the same underlying message: that technology is a form of empowerment, giving us the tools to better ourselves and the world at large. While this approach would continue up through Kurt Busiek and Sean Chen’s seminal run on the character, America’s relationship to superheroes, technology, and authority figures would start to shift in the early 2000’s, with the hero steadily taking on the themes and aspects of this newer, more frightful age. While Extremis effectively made Iron Man a post-human superhero, later stories (including 2006’s New Avengers and The Inevitable) would explore the real effects of this change, moving Stark away from his superhero roots to combat all manner of threats from the information age.
This friction between the old and new world of superheroes could come to a head in Civil War, with Iron Man’s support of the Superhuman Registration Act turning him on his fellow heroes, and leading to his ascendance as the new head of S.H.I.E.L.D. It’s within this new status quo that the Knaufs’ entire run takes place, setting Iron Man’s elevated status against his own inner doubts to cast a new light on everything that’s unfolded over the past decade and beyond.
“Stark is not like Bruce Wayne. You can’t just put your finger on some external event that created him,” muses Daniel Knauf. “It’s a lot of things– his sense of alienation, his guilt and frustration at man’s unerring tendency to war, his substance abuse, his intelligence.
I think the problem with Tony is he likes to think if he can just take a step forward he’ll leave all that behind him. That’s his greatest strength as sort of a futurist and inventor…but it’s also his biggest weakness. You don’t come away unscathed from a situation like ‘Civil War’ or the loss of so many friends. All those incidents, losses and tragedies are nipping at his heels.”
If Civil War was the ham-fisted exploration of national tragedy, muddling its message and focusing on the spectacle of its destruction, the Knaufs’ run on Iron Man does the exact opposite, using the event’s aftermath to explore the transformation of the armored avenger as both a character with decades of history, and a symbol of the culture that shaped him.
(From Iron Man: Director of SHIELD #16 by Daniel Knauf, Charles Knauf, and Roberto De La Torre)WITH IRON HANDSThe biggest change in the Knaufs’ approach to Iron Man is the more realistic perspective they give to the hero and his surroundings. Since its foundation, the Marvel Universe has always been seen as a heightened version of “the world outside your window,” with its creators using characters and concepts to explore real-world issues through a colorful, fantastic lens. Grittier takes on superheroes were pretty much standard in the 2000’s, but rather than using it to ground their hero, the Knaufs would use their hybrid-realist approach to give a bigger weight to the commentary behind their story. Iron Man has always acted as a conduit for our relationship to technology in a given age, and through the Knaufs’ murky spy epic, he is transformed into a frightful reflection of a post-crisis America: a hero robbed of his humanity through his reliance on the weapons of war.
(From Iron Man: Director of SHIELD #15 by Daniel Knauf, Charles Knauf, and Roberto De La Torre)These elements of sci-fi and spycraft have been with the character since his beginnings. This isn’t even the first time he’s worked alongside S.H.I.E.L.D. But by using the fear and paranoia of the War on Terror, the Knaufs are able to shift the commentary behind the title from an aspirational fantasy to a darker cautionary tale, subverting the character’s pro-military origins and interrogating how far the hero (and the country he represents) have really come in half a century. The majority of these stories are brought to life through penciller Roberto De La Torre, whose shadowy, ultra-detailed lines show the emotional weight behind Stark’s mission, coupled with a color palette that’s slowly overcome with shades of deep red and gold (courtesy of Dean White, Edgar Tadeo, and Joel Seguin) to show the hero slowly being consumed by his alter ego. It’s a subtle but chilling twist on the character’s identity: once seen as a means of moving beyond his past mistakes, the Iron Man has become what Stark hates most about himself: the face of a military-industrial machine built to keep the peace through fear.
The writers waste no time in exploring this new status quo for the character. In place of fights with lone supervillains like the Titanium Man or the Living Laser, Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. opens with Stark and his organization pursuing augmented terrorists on a global scale. The book’s opening issues have a very procedural tone, steering clear of political commentary in favor of giving time to Stark and the military hierarchy he’s a part of. At first glance, the book’s presentation even gives it a bit of a pro-initiative (and by extension, pro-patriot-act) slant, but this starts to change over the course of the series, using Stark and his allies’ actions to critique America’s history of shady military intervention. Each encounter only heightens the paranoia within S.H.I.E.L.D., prompting Stark to run illegal operations to chase down leads, and keep an uneasy alliance with doctor Maya Hansen to suppress her work on Extremis. It’s a paranoia rooted in real-world tragedy as well as the character’s history. While it’s no secret that Civil War’s story drew heavily from the September 11th terror attacks and the rise of the Patriot Act, the Knaufs use Stark’s development as a character to make the comparison more personal, mirroring the hero’s past traumas and desire for control with America’s own militarization in the 2000’s, and repeatedly calling this shift into question.
(From Iron Man: Director of SHIELD #18 by Daniel Knauf, Charles Knauf, and Roberto De La Torre)Iron Man has always been a character defined through his flaws, but the book’s relentless approach, coupled with marvel’s onslaught of ongoing events, use these flaws to completely tear the hero apart as he digs himself deeper with each mistake. Stark’s personal feelings for Maya blind him to her betrayal, an attempt to pacify the Hulk leads to his return as “the world-breaker,” corruption inside The Initiative leads to the death of a young hero, and Extremis, the enhancile that re-invented Iron Man, is transformed into a biological weapon that leads to the deaths of Stark’s friends.
Through these innumerable consequences, Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. becomes the ultimate meditation on self-destruction and science fiction, channeling our fear of the future into Iron Man and giving him the means to confront the mistakes he’s made head-on.
“He’s deeply flawed. And the roots of those flaws are complex and internal, which is how things are generally in real-life,” Knauf states.
“He built this suit to protect him from the world, and in doing so he built a prison, which is very interesting to me. It’s a trap a lot of people fall into: the more they try to protect themselves from the world, the more escape-proof a prison they build for themselves. I liked the thematic potential of that.”
If the run’s first half explores a hero corrupted by the system he’s trying to reform, its latter half sees Iron Man brought face-to-face with that very corruption. stripped of his Extremis powers by S.H.I.E.L.D. and plagued by visions of the people he’s failed (long story), Stark begins to uncover the links between the Initiative, the government, and the global conspiracy they’ve been hunting, all orchestrated by one of his oldest enemies…and unfortunately, this is where the book’s commentary starts to fall apart a little.
While most of the run acts as an examination of America’s part in the war on terror, the reveal of long-time villain The Mandarin as puppet master is a baffling choice, especially given the character’s reliance on “foreign enemy” tropes from Iron Man’s pro-military origins. Paired with the hero’s temporary ousting from S.H.I.E.L.D. the story’s climax might come off as a little cheap, letting Stark resume his old heroics without facing any lasting consequences. Of course Marvel’s world has never been a direct copy of the real world, but a heightened version of it, with creators exploring larger societal issues through simpler battles of good vs evil. Some nuance is bound to be lost in the translation. Still, given how much of the run builds itself on Iron Man accepting the weight of his mistakes, transplanting all of his guilt onto a convenient bad guy feels kind of like cheating.
It’s also possible that this is all in the service of a larger message that got lost in the shuffle between creators. While the Knaufs would leave the title on a high note with issue #28, the book’s final arc under Stuart Moore is spent walking back this victory, with Stark meditating on the human cost of the world he helped build. Once the symbol of an aspirational future, Stark has been transformed into something alien and unrecognizable; a hero who’s traded his humanity for the illusion of safety. The villains of tomorrow are gone for now, but the legacy of what was lost to beat them will haunt the hero forever.
(From Iron Man: Director of SHIELD #32 by Stuart Moore, Carlo Pagulayan, and Steve Kurth)SALVAGING A FALLEN HERODespite the massive impact it had on Iron Man and the Marvel Universe at large, the legacy behind Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. is complicated to say the least. The run was largely denounced as character assassination during and after its initial release, with readers assuming the book’s story continued the angle of Civil War, which tried (and failed) to argue in favor of Iron Man’s proto-fascist regime. A lot of this can be attributed to an unwillingness to fully commit to the political commentary present in the stories, with the Knaufs downplaying real-world parallels in favor of a more sympathetic take on the character. Of course, saying something isn’t political doesn’t actually make it so.
All art is a product of the culture and perspectives of its time, and by shifting Iron man from another sci-fi adventurer into the icon of a broken nation, the story becomes a commentary on how acting out of fear can have lasting consequences on the individual and the world at large. Subsequent creators would continue to build on this commentary through developments like Norman Osborn’s Dark Reign, with supervillains taking over S.H.I.E.L.D. and using Stark’s resources to terrorize his fellow heroes, something that still plagues the character today. It’s fitting that these events all tie back to a character defined through cycles of destruction and reinvention, giving the people who grew up in this climate the means to process the fear and prejudice of the time, while envisioning a path forward.
While not well-received in its day, Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. demonstrates the importance and weight of a character like Iron Man, elevating him into the symbol of a conflicted and war-torn America before paving the way to a more traditional redemption arc under Matt Fraction. We can’t move ourselves or our heroes forward without confronting our failures, no matter how large. This process can be painful. But it’s through this pain that we can finally start the long road to recovery…and make ourselves and our future into something worth fighting for again.
Sources:https://www.cbr.com/the-invincible-iron-dan-daniel-knauf-talks-iron-man/
https://www.cbr.com/waxing-shellhead-2-knaufs-talk-iron-man-director-of-s-h-i-e-l-d/
The post DIRECTOR OF SHIELD | The Fall of the Invincible Iron Man appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave is joined by the creative pair of Ollie Hicks and Emma Oosterhous to talk about their new graphic novel, Grand Slam Romance. We talk about magical softball, queer comedy, sports manga and more!
On Comic Book Herald’s Interviews I’ll be interviewing some of my favorite creators in comics about specific runs, graphic novels or series, looking for their insights on the inspirations behind the work and ideas or hidden material readers may have missed. CBH Interviews is an audio annotative guide to enjoying the intricacies and thinking in the art. Thanks for listening, and enjoy the comics!
Grand Slam Romance
Writer: Ollie Hicks
Artist: Emma Oosterhous
Publisher: Abrams ComicArts–Surely
About the Authors:
Ollie Hicks is a Black British comics creator with a PhD in comics studies and works with their wife, cartoonist and illustrator Emma Oosterhous, on fun gay stories. Grand Slam is their debut graphic novel.
Link to Emma’s website!
Link to Ollie’s website!
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The post “Grand Slam Romance” w/ Ollie Hicks & Emma Oosterhous | CBH Interviews #112 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave and Charlotte talk about Jim Starlin’s first ever Thanos ongoing comic, and the rebooted Captain Marvel written by Peter David!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Captain Marvel (2002-2004) | #1 to #6 | Peter David’s Captain Marvel relaunched and really takes off | | Marvel Universe: The End / Thanos | #1 to #6 / #1 to #6 | Jim Starlin and Thanos end the Marvel Universe! |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2003 pt. 4
| Mystique | #1 to #3 | Mystique AND Runaways are series launches from the Y: The Last Man and Saga writer. | | Runaways | #1 to #6 | | Wolverine | #6 | Greg Rucka and Darick Roberson | | Emma Frost | #1 | Emma Frost was a teen. Just like me! |
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
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The post 2003 Pt. 3: Captain Marvel, Thanos, & Marvel Universe The End! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Avengers Assemble, the 10-part finale of Jason Aaron’s 80-issue-plus Avengers run that began in 2018 finally came to an end in April. More than the end of his run, it was the culmination of a longterm build that began early on his run and, then, specifically in Avengers #50 (or, if you’re inclined to count it, Free Comic Book Day 2021: Avengers/Hulk). The focus of Avengers and the launch of a spinoff Avengers Forever directly led to this finale with multiversal Avengers, traveling through time to thwart Mephisto’s schemes, and, generally, feeling like the book was on a treadmill until the real story could actually begin. Which is why, when Avengers Assemble finally began, it felt so underwhelming. Over a year and 23 issues (not to mention the pre-issue 50 issues that set up various elements of the story through subplots in Avengers) the payoff is a meandering, inconsistently paced story featuring bad guys that won’t stay defeated despite looking quite dead for… ‘reasons’ until Deus Ex Machina and good guys win! At least, that was my first impression.
In rereading Avengers Assemble and the issues that preceded it, my view has tempered. That initial backlash has subsided, to an extent. Reading from Avengers #50 on through Avengers Assemble Omega over a few days, various threads connected better, some beats landed better, and the general shape of what Aaron achieved was more apparent. However, other, new flaws were also revealed. Avengers Assemble is a deeply flawed story that aims for a timeless, epic feel and falls well short. But, the ways in which it fails fascinate me. Aaron ends his Avengers run with a story about Mephisto scheming to kill everything backed by multiversal variations of himself and a small group of villains that are opposed by a shockingly small army of Avengers led by the very first Avengers villain. It’s almost an achievement for something this weird to read so mediocre.
But, Avengers Assemble is not only the end of this specific run on a specific franchise. It is the last major work for Marvel by the sole remaining Architect (technically, Jonathan Hickman left; that he came back does not change that), a group of five Marvel writers that I can’t seem to escape writing about. Consisting of Brian Michael Bendis, Ed Brubaker, Matt Fraction, Hickman, and Aaron, they dominated Marvel for, roughly, the decade or so between 2004 and 2016. The culmination of their collaborations was Avengers vs. X-Men, which they co-wrote. After that event, over the ensuing half-decade, all of them left Marvel save Aaron. He was the final Architect and this is, according to him, his last major Marvel work for the foreseeable future.
I will begin with Avengers Assemble and, eventually, get to architecture…
Authenticity and AbstractsThe success of Avengers Assemble and its build largely lie in how much you believe in the idea of the Avengers presented in these comics. It feels ingenuous to point at Aaron favouring his chosen cast of Avengers as a negative given that is how every team book writer in the history of superhero comics has approached their epic stories. Part of the fun of these books is seeing which characters writers select to be on their team. Who are their Avengers? Their Leaguers? Their X-Men? And, to a point, Aaron’s run worked with that idea well enough. But, I would argue that it becomes something different when your story centres on an “Avenger Prime” gathering an army of Avengers from across the multiverse and, if anything, your Avengers cast gets narrowed, drawing on the extensive history of the group as little as possible. Instead of going beyond his core team of Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Captain Marvel, Black Panther, Starbrand, Echo (the new Phoenix), and Ghost Rider (other characters like Namor, Valkyrie, Blade, and Nighthawk are part of the team at various points in this large story, but, I would argue that they are largely incidental in the grand scheme of the story, itself a different problem), Aaron focuses as intensely on that group to build his story up. If you see multiverse versions of characters not them, then it’s only as a quick background appearance, for the most part. The history of the Avengers is narrowed to such a fine point that it barely exists as far as this story is concerned.
There’s a sense of the rich and lengthy history of the Avengers being erased in Avengers Assemble. Compare it to the Heroes Return three-part story that began the Kurt Busiek and George Perez Avengers run, a story that found a place for, literally, every character who had been an Avenger to that point, or even The Avengers Finale, where, after destroying the Avengers in Avengers Disassembled, Brian Michael Bendis teamed with a long lineup of artists to eulogise the group and honour its past triumphs, Avengers Assemble is somewhat hollow. Aside from the Avengers from Earth-818, the only variations we see in Avengers Assemble from the ‘Pillars’ (variants of the core cast I noted above) come as background panel fodder in Avengers Assemble Alpha drawn by Bryan Hitch, Andrew Currie, and Alex Sinclair. Jump ahead to the siege on Avengers Tower in the God Quarry by the Mephisto Army in part three of the story, Avengers Forever #12 (drawn by Aaron Kuder, Mark Farmer, and Frank Martin), and those background Avengers don’t even make an appearance. Nor do they for the rest of the story. It is a shockingly small group of Avengers, mostly bolstered by the Howling Commandos and Carol Corps for numbers. But, what it doesn’t do is showcase Avengers history.
Avengers Assemble provides a version of the ‘real’ Avengers. The Avengers that matter.
That narrow focus presents another problem: by building around such a small subset of Avengers, the core cast of Avengers is diminished. What makes the versions of these characters so special when they’re surrounded by endless variations of themselves? When Captain America settles into a role as a faceless soldier in the Howling Commandos, the ‘grunts’ of the multiversal Avengers army, how is he different from any of his fellow Steve Rogers? What makes him special? They become part of an idea of what the Avengers mean as far as Aaron is concerned here, but that turns them from characters into abstracts. The Captain America of our Marvel Universe (616) becomes another representation of the Platonic Ideal of Captain Americas and the same applies to the rest. Should they fall, a slightly different looking version of them would rise to take their place. While Aaron’s Avengers never placed a premium on character development, losing them in the faceless sea of themselves is anti-development.
Aside, of course, from the Avengers in his cast that have no alternates. Those are the characters that get spotlight issues (Valkyrie, Nighthawk… before them, (She-)Hulk and Blade) in the build up to Avengers Assemble. In actually giving those characters some development and advancement, Aaron does fit into Avengers history, a part of the lineage where characters like Hawkeye, the Scarlet Witch, Vision, Wonder Man, Black Widow, Hercules, the Black Knight, Hank Pym, the Wasp, and Luke Cage among so many others were made Avengers and given the focus in favour of Marvel mainstays. As I alluded to earlier, the writer ‘playing favourites’ with certain characters is all part of the fun. And, by the end of Avengers Assemble, Aaron does give special moments to some of his pet characters; yet, many of these characters get lost in the shuffle. Just as much as the characters with endless variations disappear, so too do the likes of Valkyrie and Nighthawk. Made smaller against the singular, small idea presented here of what the core of the Avengers is. They aren’t ‘Pillars.’ They’re just there, random Avengers part of one of three teams all vying for a spotlight.
Ancient and AntithesisJason Aaron’s Avengers run begins with a splash page drawn by Ed McGuinness, Mark Morales, and David Curiel depicting the Stone Age Avengers. The captain reads “Earth. One million years ago.” Odin is front and centre, raising a cup of mead with his left hand, Mjolnir in his right. He’s backed up by Phoenix, Black Panther, Iron Fist, Starbrand, Ghost Rider, and the Sorcerer Supreme. Actually, sorry, the run begins with the cover of Avengers #1 by the same art team that shows the initial cast of the title in the same pose (albeit with an extra member) with specifically connected characters in the same position: Thor, Black Panther, Ghost Rider, and Dr. Strange. Turn the cover to the first page and it’s like a fade out to the past, from the Avengers of now to the very first Avengers. This is the moment where the Avengers became a little less special. A little less noteworthy. A little less historic. The Avengers became less.
The introduction of the Stone Age Avengers is the first hint that Aaron’s view of the Avengers is one of a lineage where the heroes that we know are not unique. It’s a misguided approach best summed up by the fact that it has Odin occupy the same role as Thor: the Mjolnir-wielding Asgardian protecting the Earth. It takes a key element of Thor in his love of Earth and his inability to choose Asgard over it and dilutes it needlessly. That is the Stone Age Avengers in a nutshell. Each one waters down a character from the present Marvel Universe in some way and Aaron doubles down on the idea in Avengers #57-62, the “History’s Mightiest Heroes” arc.
Attempting to travel back to the time of the Stone Age Avengers, the present Avengers are waylaid by Mephisto at various times, encountering past versions of Sorcerers Supreme, Ghost Riders, Starbrands, and Phoenixes until they can actually get where they’re trying to go. Various unknown-until-now heroes whose stories somehow never came up that take the idea of the Marvel Age of Heroes and make it more and more insignificant. What has always been a burst of champions just when Earth needs them, a miraculous confluence of power and might in the service of good becomes a nonstop line of The Way Things Have Always Been Actually. I understand that Aaron does it to place the Avengers and other heroes within a legacy that makes them part of something bigger, but all it does it take away parts of what make them so special.
Part of the power of the stories of characters like Jean Grey and her struggles with the Phoenix is that a cosmic force sought her out. Beginning with Avengers vs. X-Men, the Phoenix has been a trick that Aaron keeps returning to, including the Stone Age version, Echo as the new present day Phoenix, a Dark Phoenix in the Multiversal Masters of Evil, the future Old Man Phoenix, and, in Avengers #59, an old west Phoenix as well. If it keeps happening, what makes Jean so special? If there have always been Avengers, what makes the present day versions matter so much? Why are they special or key to winning the day? In the rush to showcase the Avengers throughout history and across the multiverse, Aaron never clarifies that point.
Instead, they’re set down next to the Stone Age Avengers to battle the Multiversal Masters of Evil (after the two Avengers teams fight one another, of course) before eventually moving on to the God Quarry to stop Mephisto’s final plan. Some members play larger roles than others, but they mostly exist to take up space that could be used by the present day Avengers or outshine them in various ways. Once you add in the multiversal Avengers, the insistence on three specific groups of Avengers creates storytelling chaos that Aaron is never able to rein in entirely.
The ‘Pillars,’ as they were known, made up the incredibly low key Avengers team defending the God Quarry from Mephisto’s army. Gathered by Ghost Rider (the All-Rider), a Deathlok, and Ant-Man Tony Stark, the group never actually coheres as a team proper. Part of that is by clear design, part of that seems to be a lack of focus in establishing them as a central focus of Avengers Assemble despite them being the only other Avengers to fight alongside the regular team and the Ten-Thousand-BC team. Based around five Avengers, no true explanation for the choices are ever provided. In the past, the central core of the Avengers, the group that best exemplifies what the Avengers are, have typically been the founders plus Captain America: Iron Man, Thor, Hulk, Ant-Man, and Wasp. Here, Aaron selects a team based around the core group of Avengers from his run up until the point where Black Panther departed due to events in his monthly title: Tony Stark, Steve Rogers, Thor, T’Challa, and Carol Danvers with the All-Rider acting as the bridge between two Avengers teams.
The Tony Stark, as mentioned, is from Earth-818 and is that world’s Ant-Man. That world is ruled by the brutal Wastelord, the Black Skull (Red Skull with a Symbiote). The All-Rider and a Deathlok help eliminate the Black Skull and, then, multiversal variants that come to that world to take his place. Like many Tony Starks that we would see, this one is an alcoholic, and a builder. What sets him apart, though, is that he’s an archaeologist. This is a Tony Stark that does not look to the future; he looks to the past. When we meet him, we see that he’s been gathering powerful objects from the past in the hopes of using them. He’s actually the final ‘Pillar’ recruited, working as one of the gatherers until it comes down to finding a Tony Stark.
The first actual recruit is in Avengers Forever #6, a T’Challa from a world where Killmonger from the Multiversal Masters of Evil wiped out Wakanda and T’Challa was sent away in a rocket ala Kal-El. He scraps together a vibranium suit and tries to take on Killmonger, but is defeated. Launched into a star, the vibranium reacts somehow and turns him into a literal Superman, the Star Panther. After the Tony Stark that looks to the past instead of the future, the introduction of a superpowered T’Challa, a character normally associated with relying on his intelligence and training, begins to suggest a pattern at play in these ‘Pillars.’
It’s confirmed a couple of issues later in issue seven where Aaron focuses on the Thor Odinson of Earth-56337, an unworthy Thor taunted by the presence of Mjolnir, which stalks him. Unable to wield the hammer at key moments, he’s haunted by his failures and by the way that hammer will not leave him alone, following him wherever he goes. This Thor is a cross between the unworthy version from Aaron’s Thor run and the Endgame Thor (overweight and bearded). Finding himself in the ruins of K’un-Lun, the only survivor of the Masters of Evil, the Thunderer, trains Thor in the art of the Iron Fist. Eventually, Thor develops into the God of Fists, choosing to eschew Mjolnir, marking himself as purposefully unworthy, in a way. These ‘Pillars’ are purposefully opposite versions of the Avengers from Earth-616. Not in the moral sense that’s typically associated with opposite alternate versions of characters. Instead, they’re opposites in choices and motivations, while remaining heroes. A Tony Stark that looks to the past, a T’Challa that has superhuman strength and flight, a Thor that willingly turns his back on being worthy of Mjolnir…
And Steve Rogers that don’t lead, but follow. In the previous issue of Avengers Forever, Aaron and Kuder tell a solid story about four Steve Rogers brought to an unknown place where they continually get a chance to escape through an obstacle course of sort. At first, only one of them attempts it and, slowly, over time, they form a small unit and manage to succeed as a group. The big reveal, of course, is that it’s a test for them to join the Howling Commandos group of Steve Rogers to fight for Avengers Tower. While always a soldier, a key element of Captain America is his singular existence. He was never one of a legion of super-soldiers. He was always the sole one, thrust into a position of leadership and uniqueness instead of the faceless conformity of most soldiers.
The Carol Danvers issue ends in a similar fashion with the revelation of a Hellicarrier full of variants that form the Carol Corps. If Steve Rogers makes up the army, Carol Danvers is the air force. This ‘Pillar’ is less an opposite than a throwing up of the hands and giving the easiest version of the character possible. It’s an anti-climax after a really affecting issue focusing on an enslaved Carol that dreams of flying and featuring some of Kuder’s best line work and compositions. The panel of Carol flying after breaking free is one of the best moments of the entire run, honestly. A perfect moment of pacing and execution that I have to mention.
Unfortunately, the ‘Pillars’ never get a true chance to shine. They have some small moments in Avengers Assemble that don’t amount to much. Their usage against the Mephisto army is somewhat misplaced while both teams of Avengers from Earth-616 (past and present) fight the Multiversal Masters of Evil as every member of the ‘Pillars’ that we focus on (save any of the Steves) has a direct connection to the Masters of Evil. Ant-Man’s world was ruled by the Black Skull, Star Panther fought Killmonger, Thor’s Asgard was burned by the group, and the Carol whose story we’re told lived under the Dark Phoenix. The group of multiversal Avengers seems assembled to be the counterparts of the Multiversal Masters of Evil, yet they never fight one another. It’s a baffling creative decision after the eventual conflict is foreshadowed in each of their origin stories.
More than that, the ‘Pillars’ team is largely overshadowed not just by the two Earth-616 Avengers team, but by King Thor’s granddaughter and Old Man Phoenix who join the battle at the God Quarry at the end of part three of Avengers Assemble and really make their presence known in part five, almost single-handedly taking down the majority of the Mephistos. Aside from acting as grunts against the Mephistos, their inclusion is fairly minor. The single largest moment any of them get is when Star Panther punches a hole through Doom the Living Planet after the Mephistos are supplanted by the All-Doom’s forces. Just as the present day 616 Avengers seem there simply to deliver the Starbrand for a key moment at the end of the story, the ‘Pillars’ group is there to get the All-Rider to the Tower for his moment at the end.
Like the Stone Age Avengers, the ‘Pillars’ don’t come across as essential enough to the story to warrant as much time and attention in the build-up to Avengers Assemble as they received. Basically, the entire run of Avengers Forever until that point (11 issues) is devoted to the ‘Pillars’ and the payoff is minimal. They aren’t set against their natural counterparts, the Masters of Evil, nor is much made of the fact that they are set in opposition to the Avengers of Earth-616. Given how purposeful Aaron’s choices in determining specifically which variants of each character would be chosen for this group, the idea of two teams of Avengers representing polar opposites conceptually working together to defeat this evil might have come up. It did not. It’s so overlooked that calling it subtext would be a generous reading.
Instead, both the ‘Pillars’ and Stone Age Avengers are just large enough of distractions to ensure that the Avengers that have been the stars of Aaron’s run are pushed aside and not given a central enough role. The three teams along with the extras that show up along the way all make for a muddled mess of heroes where no group of characters is given enough time and space to make a true impact.
Antagonists and AssemblerAs alluded to, the big bads of Avengers Assemble are Mephisto and the Multiversal Masters of Evil. Mephisto turned up fairly early in Aaron’s run, teased endlessly, and even directly responsible for the Heroes Reborn alternate reality. The entire run pointed toward him at the very end with a suitably large scheme. That Mephisto has largely been a bit of an also-ran villain, more style than substance, lessened his threat not a bit. Forget the time that he was Thanos’s lackey… or Loki’s lackey… or the many, many times he was defeated in his own realm at the height of his power. This time would be different and, instead of showing this, Aaron told us this. Again and again. An entire storyarc about Moon Knight conquering the world was about the threat of Mephisto (two Moon Knight variants appear in Avengers Assemble in minor roles). By the time the title reaches Avengers #50, the entire focus is on Mephisto and his master plan.
Part of his plan is enlisting Doom Supreme to weaken and subjugate Earths across the multiverse. This All-Doom does so by recruiting his own Masters of Evil team: the Black Skull, King Killmonger that wears the Asgardian Destroyer armour, Dark Phoenix and her mindless berserker Logan slave, a Norman Osborn that rips the heads off Ghost Riders to use as bombs called the Ghost Goblin, and Kid Thanos. They go from Earth to Earth, often strangling any burgeoning heroes in their cribs, basically, bragging about the ease with which they slaughter Odins and Thors and Phoenixes and Steve Rogers and every other hero. This group, over the course of the issue building to Avengers Assemble and the story itself, present two specific problems.
The first is that, instead of drawing upon villains typically associated with the Avengers, Aaron either chose ones associated with specific Avengers in their solo adventures or well known Marvel villains. Only Thanos has a history of specifically fighting the Avengers enough to be called an ‘Avengers villain.’ The rest are associated with specific heroes, some not part of the Avengers during the Aaron run. Typical Avengers villains like Ultron, Kang, Baron Zemo, Graviton, Count Nefaria, or even Loki aren’t chosen for the group. With Mephisto’s large role in the story and him not necessarily being an Avengers-specific villain, putting together a team of largely non-Avengers villains gives it less impact. The group seems placed into a role that doesn’t necessarily suit the chosen characters. The Masters of Evil conjure up specific images of Avengers villains, particularly for those who have read stories like Under Siege and this group does not fit that, undercutting the idea of them as the ultimate opposing force in the multiverse to the Avengers.
The second problem is that, after their continual build as world beaters and slaughters of an endless parade of the heroes we know… they’re defeated by those same heroes. They’re made out to be such huge, unbeatable foes that, when they are taken down, it undercuts everything we’ve been told and seen. Or, in at least one case, possibly more, they’re defeated and replaced with identical versions so easily that we know with certainty that not all are unique or actually as powerful as they’re made out to be. How truly threatening is the Black Skull when he can be defeated by the All-Rider and, the next time we see the Masters of Evil, a new, identical version of him is in the group? Now, that could be purposefully done to suggest to the reader that these guys aren’t as dangerous as they like to brag that they are – except they do ravage the dozens (hundreds?) of worlds that they say they do. There’s no sense of consistency in how truly powerful they are. Nor does their defeat, on the whole, come in such a way as to feel earned through a massive struggle and breaking through limits as is typical of heroes that overcome overwhelming threats.
Ultimately, they’re simply pawns of Mephisto, as are the rest of the Mephistos. The Mephistos suffer from what I refer to as ‘The Citadel of Ricks Problem’ where the main Rick in Rick and Morty is an unstoppable badass and all of his alternate reality selves are not. They are easily misled, fairly foolish, and cannon fodder in any episodes they appear in. A whole army of Mephistos should pose a threat and, for about an issue or so, they almost seem like they will until they are routed and largely defeated. At least, when the 616 Mephisto is revealed as the most powerful, Aaron does explain that as him feeding off the energies of the Earths that the Masters of Evil conquered. Perhaps the most understated element of Avengers Assemble is the joke at the heart of Mephisto’s plan to end all existence. He talks of growing weary and bored as ruler of his private Hell, but it always reads as he’s tired of being a devil so easily outclassed consistently. The only way he can truly win is to go for broke and destroy all of reality by unleashing the anti-matter-like foundational energy kept locked away in the God Quarry. Any scheme that could put him in a position of power would require more temperance and invite defeat; only truly suicidal nihilism has a chance in hell of succeeding. And, of course, it doesn’t.
In the end, Mephisto is a bit of a letdown as the built-up villain of Aaron’s entire run. The justification for wiping out existence doesn’t quite land and he himself is not much of a threat. He’s easily and repeatedly beat down – though, in a clever twist, often purposefully, leaning into his tendency to be defeated. He becomes less the central threat and the point on which the multiverse-threatening McGuffin turns. There’s no emotional satisfaction in his defeat. It’s almost fait accompli that he will lose and return to his hell, adding on yet another layer of meaninglessness.
If there’s one thing that could possibly justify the revelation that a Loki is the fabled Avenger Prime, the pinnacle of Avengers, manning the Tower in the God Quarry, tasking Deathloks, and assembling Avengers to protect the multiverse, it’s the past interactions of Loki and Mephisto as, lacking a better term, frenemies. Their shared history is of alliances quickly brokered and quickly dissolved, constant attempts to one-up one another, and races to see who can backstab one another the quickest. The idea that it’s a Loki standing between Mephisto and his goal has a ring of truth to it. But only just.
Aaron’s decision to have the central figure of the Avengers in the multiverse be Loki is the most misguided one of his run. It seeks to take the idea that, because the Avengers formed to stop Loki’s schemes, he is the unifying figure in their history and turns that into a positive action. The last word on Loki accidentally creating the Avengers should have been the gag in Thunderstrike #21 where his attempt to pit Thunderstrike against She-Hulk results in him facing down those two heroes in addition to War Machine and the Scott Lang Ant-Man, causing him to scream “Not again!” faced with the legacy versions of the original team. That Loki led to the creation to the Avengers is to his eternal shame and regret. When Aaron had Loki brag about the times he brought the Avengers together back in issue eight of this run, the appropriate reaction is to roll your eyes.
Moreover, due to the addition of the Stone Age Avengers and the endless variations of the multiverse, an important question is raised: if there have always been Avengers, why does their formation to battle Loki in Avengers #1 matter at all? Various elements of Aaron’s story structure undercut one another far too easily. Every new bit of Avengers lore and history that puts them into a superhuman continuum stretching back to 10000 BCE makes the fact that they formed to defeat Loki that much more meaningless.
Adding insult to injury, the revelation that Avenger Prime is the Lokiest Loki, one that managed to take the throne of Asgard, prevent the formation of the Avengers, and, then, kill his entire universe genuinely goes nowhere. It’s a shock tactic that adds nothing of value to the story from that point on. Avenger Prime brings the Stone Age and present day Avengers to the God Quarry, throws out a magic blast or two and, largely, fades into the background. The revelation is meaningless in the grand scheme of things, because, for all he contributes to the story, Avenger Prime could have been literally any character. His identity is rooted in hollow symbolism that Aaron positions as more and more irrelevant as the story continues.
Apex and AwesomeTwo concepts weigh on Avengers Assemble and the stories that lead to it: the idea of the best version of a character and the love that Jason Aaron has for ‘cool’ ideas. The former is new, while the latter is, as Michael Cole would say, ‘vintage Aaron.’ Within the context of a multiverse story, it’s easy to see the temptation a writer faces to introduce the ‘best’ versions of characters. It’s a quick and seemingly effective way to make the story bigger, better, and hit harder. You think you’ve seen an Avengers story before? Well, here comes the Apex Avengers from across the multiverse to take on the ultimate Multiversal Masters of Evil, all of whom are the most powerful and deadly versions of these already overpowered Marvel villains! Sounds great, right? The problem, of course, is that, once you introduce that idea, you need to follow through with it and actually do something interesting with it. Unfortunately, Aaron doesn’t do too much with the ‘best’ versions of characters except introduce them, tell us that they are the best, and, then, they either take a backseat or get defeated. In some cases, it’s not entirely clear if the characters are meant to be the ‘best’ versions or not. Are the ‘Pillars’ the best? Are they simply the opposites of the best? No true explanation is given when they’re brought together.
There are, however, two ‘best’ versions of characters that somewhat live up to their reputations: Doom Supreme and the All-Rider. Aaron puts the work into establishing Doom Supreme as the ultimate Doom, particularly in Avengers Forever #5 where his history is given along with the way that he collects and breaks Dooms from the Earths the Masters of Evil ravage. While much of what separates him from other Dooms is left to a hand-wave of being exceedingly powerful, Aaron imbues him with the proper attitude and perspective, always setting himself apart from the Masters of Evil and, then, supplanting Mephisto as the grand threat in Avengers Assemble with his army of Dooms. Unfortunately, they suffer the same fate as the army of Mephistos is how easily they’re cast aside and defeated – though, he proves a tougher opponent. The smartest thing that Aaron does is never has the Earth-616 Doom appear, leaving open the idea that Doom Supreme would not actually measure up to the Doom that we know. Leaving open Doom Supreme’s unchallenged greatness seems counterintuitive, but it makes it plausible that he is the greatest Doom only because he hasn’t met the true Doom Supreme.
The transition from Ghost Rider to All-Rider for Robbie Reyes is another successful ‘best’ version by Aaron. Like Doom Supreme, it’s because the work is put in to show again and again just how great he is. From the first Avengers arc, Aaron has done a consistent job of building up Ghost Rider as incredibly powerful and, often, integral to the Avengers’ success. The idea that he can ride anything is an interesting one that Aaron revisits in interesting ways, like him ‘riding’ the Black Skull’s Symbiote. There’s an element of prophecy and fate to Robbie’s role in saving the multiverse that verges on happening because it’s said enough times so it must be true, granted; largely, it works because Aaron finds enough ways to show it. Even small touches like the revelation that this is the only Robbie Reyes to become Ghost Rider in the entire multiverse give credence to his singular greatness. My only real quibble is that the All-Rider’s action to save the multiverse doesn’t exactly hinge on his specific powers. It’s a sacrificial move that, like the identity of Avenger Prime, could have been anyone. If the All-Rider is diminished, it’s only by the denouement.
Related to the idea of characters being the ‘best’ is Aaron’s obsession with awesome ideas. His work is filled with them, small and big moments that exist only to produce a reaction of “Aw, cool!” Ka-Zar showing up as a herald of Galactus to sic the big guy on Doom the Living Planet? A Deathlok possessing the dead Celestial? Thor’s granddaughters raining down a whole host of Mjolnirs? These and a host of other moments pop up through Avengers Assemble with the expressed purpose of being awesome. Some work, some don’t. I would argue that, too often, they’re distractions that get in the way of telling a clear, unified story. The best of them catch you off guard while feeling organic; the worst seem like they were welded on with no regard for logic.
If Aaron has always had a weakness as a writer, it’s been his inability to tell those two from one another. It’s also part of his charm. He can’t help but think that the Orb is the greatest character of all time or that the only better than one Phoenix is four. Or that Thor becoming the ‘God of Fists’ is an amazingly cool concept. Even when I can’t help but roll my eyes, I’m somewhat charmed by the sincerity of Aaron’s enthusiasm for genuinely dumb ideas that he thinks are awesome. As much as I want to write many of them off, Avengers Assemble wouldn’t be an epic Aaron finale without them.
Affectation and ArchitectureAs critics Vishal Gullapalli and Ritesh Babu pointed out two years ago on this very site, Jason Aaron’s Avengers is based largely in replicating the format of Grant Morrison’s JLA. Big action, attempts at iconic character beats, and pointing towards an apocalyptic threat to conclude things. Post-issue 50, Aaron adds in another Morrison work as a primary influence, Multiversity. Avengers Assemble specifically reads like Aaron took the final arc of JLA, “World War III” and combined it with Multiversity. The “World War III” similarities lie specifically in the confrontation with a much-talked-about bad guy with Mephisto taking the place of Mageddon, the weapon of the Old Gods that created death and war wherever it goes. This central villain figure is paired with the Multiversal Masters of Evil acting as the second iteration of the Injustice Gang. The Stone Age Avengers are akin to the Justice Society, while the ‘Pillars’ group is like the Justice League team assembled in Multiversity of variants of familiar heroes from across the multiverse.
The lack of balance in Avengers Assemble when compared to “World War III” and Multiversity is the largest problem. Taking two robust, complete stories and smashing them together creates an overstuffed story that doesn’t allow for the proper focus. While Morrison was always good about giving many characters their moments, they also knew to keep a sharp focus on a small group of key characters – preferably the ones that readers would think of as key characters. By “World War III,” their JLA cast has ballooned, but that didn’t stop that story from honing in on the original seven from the beginning of the run.
The second version of the Injustice Gang actually points to the flaw in Aaron’s Multiversal Masters of Evil. The first version of the villain group was made up exclusively of one-to-one counterparts of the JLA from their solo adventures. When that team failed, Lex Luthor opted to gather a group of villains that nearly defeated the JLA by themselves. That second iteration was made up exclusively of villains from earlier JLA stories (save Killer Bee, who was an updated version of a class Justice League villain). Instead of basing his Multiversal Masters of Evil around villains from his Avengers run until that point, Aaron copied the idea of random solo villains thrust together and it comes off disjointed.
Morrison’s focus on his core group of seven (while still giving small moments to other Leaguers) provides the emotional connection necessary for “World War III.” As readers focus in on a smaller group of characters, the stakes feel bigger. Avengers Assemble never gives that same human-level perspective that allows the scale and scope of the story to hit home. Multiversity works the same way in its bookend issues, focusing on a very specific singular team, while the one-shot issues create a stacking effect of the evil being wrought. The disconnected nature of each is what gives the impression of the larger scheme at work. Aaron attempts that in the recruitment of the ‘Pillars,’ but since there is no true, meaningful payoff to that, the same effect isn’t created. We get the sense of the evil done by the Masters of Evil across the multiverse, yet it feels disconnected from the events of Avengers Assemble.
Perhaps the most damning failed emulation of Morrison comes at the end of Avengers Assemble when Aaron uses the Stone Age Phoenix and present day Starbrand to heal the multiverse. It recalls elements of Final Crisis, Multiversity, and even the end of Morrison’s New X-Men where Jean healed the timeline in her love of Scott. In Morrison’s work, moments like this are transcendent and meaningful. In Avengers Assemble, the scene lacks an emotional core and element of poetry to land the same way. In a somewhat sad/fitting bit, Aaron’s inability to include Black Panther in Avengers Assemble despite that being the obvious plan does recall Morrison constantly changing their plans to accommodate the events of various characters’ solo titles.
Beyond the basic problem that Jason Aaron is not Grant Morrison and cannot write the same as them, there are others. As Vishal and Ritesh argued at length, Aaron’s attempts to apply DC-style logic to Marvel’s premier hero group does not work. The construction of the two universes is so different that what works in a DC story actively diminishes Marvel heroes in theirs. At this point, DC is built on lineage and legacy and, while Marvel has elements of that, it’s much more about the spontaneous eruption of 20th century American ingenuity and power. Although, as Ritesh recently argued in his examination of DC’s Crisis stories, applying DC concepts to Marvel can work quite well when done correctly.
The larger problem is that I’m not sure what Aaron is trying to accomplish. In Morrison’s stories, the goal was to showcase the heroes of his story. From that perspective, it seems like Avengers Assemble would be about showcasing the idea of the Avengers and the specific group of Avengers as they exist now triumphing over evil in an epic battle. That’s not what happens, though. It sort of happens. You can see Aaron actively struggling to make it happen, but something gets in the way. And it’s not that Aaron’s Avengers include characters like Ghost Rider, Starbrand, Valkyrie, or Nighthawk. It does in that he’s trying to mimic Morrison stories centred around the foundational core of the Justice League with Avengers that are not anyone’s definition of the foundational core. Nonetheless, he still has Captain America, Iron Man, and Thor as central characters, and those are the big three of the Avengers. If he had pulled in his focus to them, he might have been able to pull it off.
But, he couldn’t pull in his focus, because this isn’t just the culmination of Aaron’s Avengers run, it’s also the culmination of his work at Marvel. That’s why so much of the story is given to Thor’s granddaughters and Old Man Phoenix. Or why Ghost Rider is a central figure in saving the multiverse. Or the inclusion of a Kid Thanos straight from the pages of Thanos Rising. The punishment of Mephisto to be back in his hell with Orb at his side is entirely about Aaron putting a favourite character of his in one more time. Avengers Assemble packs in as many references and characters from his time at Marvel as he can manage. Instead of being a good Avengers story, it’s a mediocre Aaron story. While Morrison’s stories were conclusions to runs or stages of their career, they never had the weary quality that Avengers Assemble possesses where, in the effort to shoehorn in his pet characters and the sad nihilism of his big villain’s plot, there’s a sense of Aaron being done. It’s been around 15 years of writing for Marvel consistently, the last decade largely as the last holdover from the previous era that was built by him and his fellow Architects. As the last one standing who had never left Marvel, always balanced his creator-owned ambitions with his company duties, the end of this Avengers run is like the final nail in that time’s particular coffin.
In some spots, Aaron manages to integrate his past work into Avengers fairly well. While it’s easy to forget, the Robbie Reyes Ghost Rider was a Big Deal since the first arc of this run, making his central role from issue 50 and on a logical continuation. Or, adding Valkyrie to the Avengers lineup is a solid way to take the lead from arguably Aaron’s most beloved run and giving her a role in the final leg of Avengers. Prior to Avengers, Aaron had three major in-canon non-Star Wars Marvel runs: Ghost Rider, Wolverine/Wolverine and the X-Men/Amazing X-Men, and Thor (sorry, fans of his Hulk run). The first and the last are represented well in Avengers Assemble, while the middle one gets the odd nod here and there. One of the best tip of the caps comes from learning that Mystique is the Dark Phoenix of the Masters of Evil, and actually took the Phoenix from Old Man Phoenix, calling back to a major conflict from his Wolverine run. Had all of these details been either as well integrated as Ghost Rider was throughout the entire run of Avengers and Avengers Forever, or kept as a minor wink to long-term fans, then Aaron might have kept the balance of the story intact. Instead, he overstuffed it and threw off the balance of the three Avengers teams by dramatically increasing the roles of characters from previous runs.
The worst thing that I can say about Avengers Assemble is that it revealed that Jason Aaron had little new or interesting to say, in the end, about the Avengers. The 10-part story is slowly paced, lacks focus, doesn’t follow through on seemingly integral characters, lacks a genuine feeling of high stakes, and relies on you taking every statement about the greatness of characters at face value without the comics doing anything to back it up. It reads like a story by a writer who is Done. And, honestly, after 15 years at Marvel, he should be. The most excited Aaron has sounded in a while has been his most recent newsletter where he talks about his Marvel exclusive being done and looking towards more creator-owned work aside once a few minor things come out over the next few months. I’ve been a fan of his going back to Ghost Rider, adore his Thor run, and stuck with Avengers out of sheer loyalty and hope that he could land it. He didn’t. And that sucks. I hope that if/when the next time we see Jason Aaron’s name on a work-for-hire comic, it’s with a renewed excitement and sense of purpose.
The post The Final Architect: The End of Jason Aaron’s Avengers and a Marvel Era appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below:
You better believe we’re talking Amazing Spider-Man #26 announcements about the Death of (Surely you’ve heard by now, haven’t you?). Then we’ll catch up on the day’s interesting comics.
This Weeks’ Comics
X-Men #22
X-Force #40
Fantastic Four #7
Amazing Spider-Man #26
The post Spider-Man Killed Who?! | Comic Book Herald Live appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave and Zack dissect (too soon?) Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 and what it means for the MCU!
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2003 pt. 3
| Captain Marvel (2002-2004) | #1 to #6 | Peter David’s Captain Marvel relaunched and really takes off | | Marvel Universe: The End / Thanos | #1 to #6 / #1 to #6 | Jim Starlin and Thanos end the Marvel Universe! |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
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The post 2003 Variant Cover A: Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 Review! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below:
Catching up on two weeks worth of X-Men books, including the Free Comic Book Day set-up for X-Men Fall of X!
This Week’s Comics
Immortal X-Men #11
Before the Fall — Sons of X
X-Men Red #11
Wolverine #33
Amazing Spider-Man #25
And more!
The post The Road to Fall of X: Week of 5.10.23! | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Jesse Lonergan joins to talk about the upcoming Mignola-verse comic Miss Truesdale and the Fall of Hyperborea, as well as their sci-fi graphic novel Arca. Dave and Jesse talk about the success of Hedra’s innovative layouts, working with Mike Mignola, designing pages to slow down readers, how Droma/Prime might be Jesse’s “magnum opus” and much more!
On Comic Book Herald’s Interviews I’ll be interviewing some of my favorite creators in comics about specific runs, graphic novels or series, looking for their insights on the inspirations behind the work and ideas or hidden material readers may have missed. CBH Interviews is an audio annotative guide to enjoying the intricacies and thinking in the art. Thanks for listening, and enjoy the comics!
Arca
Writer: Van Jensen
Artist: Jesse Lonergan
Publisher: IDW
Miss Truesdale and the Fall of Hyperborea
Creators: Mike Mignola, Jesse Lonergan
Publisher: Dark Horse
About the Author:
Jesse Lonergan is a comic writer and artist whose most recent claim to fame is his Eisner-Nominated comic Hedra (2020), but also created works such as Planet Paradise.
Link to his website!
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Music for Best Comics Ever by Anthony Weis. Check out more music at anthonyweis.com.
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The post “Arca” & the Mignola-verse w/ Jesse Lonergan | CBH Interviews #111 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte & special guest Ernie from Blerd Without Fear talk Truth: Red, White and Black and The Crew.
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Truth: Red, White & Black | #1 to #7 | Seriously relevant, and referenced in Falcon and Winter Soldier in the MCU | | The Crew | #1 to #7 |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2003 pt. 3
| Captain Marvel (2002-2004) | #1 to #6 | Peter David’s Captain Marvel relaunched and really takes off | | Marvel Universe: The End / Thanos | #1 to #6 / #1 to #6 | Jim Starlin and Thanos end the Marvel Universe! |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
————————————————————————————-
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2003 Pt. 2: Truth & The Crew (With Ernie/Blerd Without Fear!) appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below:
Sins of Sinister: Dominion ends the crossover event! How was it, and what does it mean for X-Men comics and the Fall of X? Then, we dig into today’s new releases and everything else good.
This Week’s Comics
Sins of Sinister: Dominion #1
The post Sins of Sinister: Event Review Post-Game (w/ Blerd Without Fear!) | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
“The Sacred Heart”
Credits: Si Spurrier writes; Lorenzo Tammetta and Phillip Sevy draw; Rain Beredo colors; Clayton Cowles letters; cover by Leinil Francis Yu and Sunny Gho
I’m very pleased Si Spurrier’s Nightcrawlers mini ended up being the most event-essential in its final entry, and it’s the one that had the most detailed world-building—with its contributions on the mystic side of things baffling some readers who couldn’t see how any of it could ever fit into the main thrust of the narrative. Whoops!
Not only is this issue one of the most event-critical—we get some fun surprises along the way! Right away, fans will be mystified by what appears to be Galactus possessed by a Spirit of Vengeance. The last entry from Spurrier for this event goes down swinging, and it’s a sight more impressive than the other entries for Year 1000. That’s no small thing when the friendly competition is Kieron Gillen and Al Ewing.
SPOILERS AHOY
At the start, Spurrier still has enough page real estate to throw off speculative alt-universe notions such as the Silver Mercator (Mr. M meets and Silver Surfer) and the Low Key Corps (perhaps a nod to the Loki of Neil Gaiman’s American Gods, maybe a riff on the Council of Cross-Time Kangs or the recent TV series). The Spineless Gamers of the Casino Entropic seem to nod to Mojo and Duggan’s Gameworld (X-Men). The bizarre Peregrine Child is actually a Jed MacKay creation from 2021’s Death of Doctor Strange. Historically parasitic and exploitative, the Mojos and the Brood aren’t put out by the ruinous Sinisterization of known space.
What’s really wild is the Phoenix Egg, introduced toward the end of Grant Morrison’s New X-Men run. But here in the far future, Mother Righteous treats it like just another artifact for her centuries-old collection. And this is in line with all the other artifacts that have gone into the making of her Reliquary Perilous.
But most striking are this bleak future’s few recognizable survivors. First off, Nemesis’ final form is a hoot!
However, he’s not just a starship; he’s also been cloning the Nightkin for almost a millennium—but with increasingly diminishing returns. Of course, Mother doesn’t need them smart or even particularly effective; all she needs is easily duped followers. And their willing and credulous suicidal sacrifices, which as revealed here, has allowed Nemesis’ spores to get up close to the forcefield around Sinister’s stolen lab. Still, though, it’s Nightkin’s unquestioned beliefs that have been slowly weakening the field’s imperviousness. Apparently, Mother’s patience is one of her superpowers.
And somehow, while Auntie Fortune (the Domino Nightkin chimera) died long ago, she’s persisted for centuries as an undead specter—only to be the last of the Nightkin to sacrifice herself at Mother’s command. Auntie Fortune’s demise is unquestionably the most poignant moment this issue; the callous waste of 50 generations of life is felt. Presumably, the longest-serving Nightkin’s sacrifice packed enough abject faith to break the Unus field, although it was already weakened by the Juggernaut bullet’s impact(!).
Now recall that Storm in Sins of Sinister #1 mentioned that the Spirits of Vengeance left Earth by Year 10; well, apparently, they went full cosmic by finding their new home in Galactus—a cosmic principle of reality who was quite put out by the universal Sinisterization. But just like the event’s audience Mother isn’t invested in this reality’s survival, unlike her hangers-on. So, she enjoys Galactus’ assassination via Juggernaut-as-relativistic-space-rocket just as much as we do! Recall that the Quiet Council used Cain, egregiously and hilariously, to assassinate Thanos in the long ago, so Mother is just watching shots line up, while it was Destiny who placed the prize in the line of fire 900 years ago.
That’s right—Destiny did in fact see beyond her own death! Not only did she know Storm would kill her (via Khora), but she knew that the cosmic wormhole transfer of the Worldfarm would place it in the path, eventually, of the speeding Juggernaut. So, apparently, mutantdom’s preeminent precog was never duped, after all.
One wonders if she also foresaw the actions of the last players on the board—Mother, Moira, Sinister…
Certainly, Mother didn’t foresee Moira foiling her centuries-long masterplan at the last moment. However, will Moira’s own plan simply echo Mother’s? After all, whichever of these mad geniuses resets the timeline could do so in her favor, with all the knowledge gained from the past thousand years.
Actually, it’s the righteous return of Wagnerine, seeking to rescue her golden babe from Mother’s clutches, that kicks off her comeuppance—and then Moira finishes off Wagnerine’s vengeance.
Now, for the event’s final chapter, will we see Wagnerine, perhaps teaming up somehow with Rasputin, foil Moira’s plans? She’d probably need to be a lot more clued in than she is currently for her to be effective as her reality ends. Still, as Banshee tells her, it does matter that they’ve regained what they lost (his freedom, her child) before the final curtain falls. Life’s meaning is no different in such a doomed reality than it is for us or anyone anywhere in the multiversal simulation doohickey.
Even so, as long as Wagnerine gets to keep her baby, both they and Rasputin IV will hopefully make it to the present-day Earth-616—because they’re interesting new characters with potential, and it doesn’t seem like they would be leaving anything behind in Year 1000 even if it weren’t going to be erased. But it will be, so… they certainly seem to be of more interest than, say, Nate Grey and Sugar Man. Can’t ya just see them relaxing with a drink in the company of AoA Blink in the Green Lagoon?
Nightcrawlers #3 is new Marvel artist Lorenzo Tammetta’s second issue for Marvel (after the recent Murderworld: Game Over one-shot)—although he hasn’t yet had the chance to do full interior art. Still, I do vastly prefer what we see her after Vitti’s scratchy, grungy work on Year 1000. Tammetta seems to bring more versatility and expressiveness, and I look forward to seeing what he does next (Scarlet Witch #6, actually). If you enjoy the crisp, classic stylings of Terry Dodson, Stuart Immonen and the like, you’ll be looking out too!
Also new to Marvel, Phillip Sevy recently drew a Marrow-centered arc for X-Men Unlimited Infinity Comic (#75-79) with ace writer Zac Thompson.
NEXT: The Sins of Sinister finale – Sins of Sinister: Dominion #1
The post “Sins of Sinister” Part 10: Nightcrawlers #3—in Review! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Zack and Charlotte (aka Zackita Wagner and Charlotte Leather) continue our first miniseries on Superhero Subversions with a discussion of Warren Ellis (https://www.somanyofus.com/) and John Cassaday’s Planetary.
Topics discussed:
– Is Planetary just a series of references to pop culture or does it have something to say about those stories?
– Does it work as a series of one-off stories or as a complete tapestry? Both? Neither?!
– Are Ka-Zar and Zabu…. lovers?
Upcoming episodes in our Superhero Subversion miniseries:
– Peter Cannon, Thunderbolt, 2019
– The Boys, 2006
– Miracleman, 1982
– Listeners’ Choice, TBA
You can find Charlotte at twitter.com/mymarvelousyear
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at mymarvelousyear.com
Music for Extra Issues is credited to FM Skyline.
You can support Extra Issues via Patreon for as little as $1 a month at patreon.com/mymarvelousyear
The post Extra Issues – Superhero Subversions ep. 2: Planetary appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack talk Mark Waid and Mike Wieringo’s Fantastic Four when Doctor Doom does the “Unthinkable.” Then, we check out Sentinel and Fantastic Four: Unstable Molecules.
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Fantastic Four: Unstable Molecules | Added by Patreon Backer Rob. M | | Fantastic Four (1998-2012) | #67 to #70, #500 to #502 | Waid and Wieringo in full swing with “Unthinkable”! A classic with huge ramifications | | Sentinel | #1 to #6 |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2003 pt. 2
| Truth: Red, White & Black | #1 to #7 | Seriously relevant, and referenced in Falcon and Winter Soldier in the MCU | | The Crew | #1 to #7 |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
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The post 2003 Pt 1: Fantastic Four “Unthinkable” & Sentinel appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
The Krakoan Era of X-Men comics has done tremendous work invigorating, resetting, creating, and returning characters. Magneto is the only major character in the franchise to die a Permanent Death. How could one of Krakoa’s founders and a principal X-Men character be taken off the board indefinitely? Moreover, why?
Magneto’s journey across this era mimics a full day. House of X & Powers of X are the dawn of his new epoch. He awakens, rinses himself clean of his past, and heads out into the world as a New God. From there, he spends the bulk of the daytime adjusting to Krakoa and its ramifications for his people, his family, and himself. During the daytime of his Krakoan story, Magneto tries to “build something…A great work. The great work” as he later tells Fisher King. That day at work is hard, harder than he imagines and, as dusk settles in, Magneto is left “shattered to pieces.” The evening of Magneto’s tale sees the breakdown of his triumvirate with Moira and Charles, the Trial he endures with his family, and the loss of trust between himself and his fellow Mutant. At night, Magneto lays down to rest but “[he does] not fear a life that ends” because he has raised up a new generation of political leaders to carry on and improve his legacy should he not wake from his sleep.
He did not wake.
That is how Magneto was taken off the board, but the reason why is more subjective. The Krakoan Era has revealed a lot about the three “traditional” leaders of Mutantkind that form the Autumn Seats of the Quiet Council: Apocalypse revealed his true self, [A], and the deep Mutant history that comes with him; Xavier has allowed power and secrets to reveal the depths of his narcissism and egomania; and Magneto struggles between his classic self (vicious, egomaniacal, and grandiose) and his best self (familial, heroic, and commemorative). His best self wins out in the end.
Since his story has come to a close, for now, I wanted to develop a comprehensive reading order for Magneto. Each issue below characterizes Magneto and his relationship with various characters. To that end, I have marked each issue with “thematic signifiers” to help guide reading. “Founders” marks issues that focus on Magneto and Prof. X and/or Moira X. Often, these issues demonstrate Magneto out front as statesman with Prof X., working in the shadows with the founding triumvirate, or both. Issues marked “Family” illuminate the complex familial relationships between Magneto and his relatives. Over the course of the Krakoan Era, his relationships with his daughters are an absolute treat, highlighting the importance of healing intergenerational trauma, and demonstrating the diversity of familial relationships people may have. While not family, Cyclops, Jean, Storm, and eventually Legion and Hope are marked as “Heirs” to Magneto’s name. They aren’t simply leaders of Mutantkind like the Quiet Council, but Mutants who take on Magneto’s legacy by charting their own course and developing new blocs and movements within Mutant politics, specific to the Krakoan Era. Interactions with the current leaders of Krakoa are denoted as “QC” for the Quiet Council.
Similarly, “GR” marks interactions with the Great Ring of Arakko. These two thematic signifiers often demonstrate Magneto’s political maneuvering, for better or worse, and tend to be ripe with exquisite banter and charm. Frequently paired with “GR” is “Brotherhood” for the Brotherhood of Arakko. The “night” of Magneto’s life cannot be understood without seeing him building the Brotherhood of Arakko with Storm and giving his legacy and the legacy of a “Brotherhood of Mutants” to her and Sunspot. “Community” marks the issues that demonstrate what Magneto means to his people and show him interacting with the broader community, negatively or positively. Lastly, “Illuminati” designates important interactions with the Illuminati. While never a member, Magneto is clearly of their caliber in the Krakoan Era and outright challenges their positions and authority in a time of Mutant ascendancy.
Here is the Krakoan reading order for Magneto:
Magneto: DawnThis is the beginning of Magneto’s journey into the Krakoan EraHouse of X & Powers of X 1-6 (Founders, Community)
The dueling books, House of X & Powers of X, are absolutely necessary for the Krakoan Era and Magneto’s journey, specifically. The story radicalizes Prof. X into a compromise with Magneto that will protect Mutantkind while also utilizing their resources to benefit humankind. We see the secret triumvirate between Moira X, Magneto, and Prof. X form, and learn the lengths they will go for their Krakoan Dream. Though we see his darkness with the triumvirate, we also see Magneto proud of the leap forward Mutantkind has taken and his resolve to protect their dreams.
Daytime – Covering the Dawn of X and most of the Reign of X, this is Magneto’s time in the sun. He is building his nation-state and building his relationships with his family, community, and heirs.
X-Men #1 (Heirs, Family, Community)
While Magneto is not the main focus of this issue, he shows off his strength while assisting Storm and Cyclops in a fight against Orchis. In that moment and later on the island, Magneto is a mythic hero, Herculean in strength and stature, but as the Krakoan Age continues he is increasingly humanized and is far more likely to stand next to or take orders from Cyclops and Storm than fly above them. Polaris and Cyclops discuss how renewed he is and that reflects the healing that Krakoa can bring, if allowed.
X-Force #2 (Founders, Heirs)
Xavier’s assassination is a moment of hardening for Magneto. It represents his worst fears about the Krakoa experiment, but he doesn’t let those fears capture him. Instead, Magneto gives Jean her great mission: Proving Krakoa’s feasibility by resurrecting Xavier. Through this mission, Jean embodies Xavier’s declaration “No more.”
X-Force #3 (Founders)
After Charles is resurrected, X-Force begins to form. Charles and Magneto give Jean and the rest of what becomes X-Force a new mission: Destroy Krakoa’s enemies and deny all of it. The Founding Fathers of Krakoa encourage the darker natures of these Mutants just as their triumvirate with Moira X encourages them.
X-Men #4 (Founders, QC, Heirs)
X-Men #4 is one of the all-time best X-Men issues because it shows [A], Magneto, and Prof. X flexing on humans in their bastions of elitism. Magneto is confident and sexy as he checks the Davos attendees while eating steak. He even makes time to help Cyclops as they prevent another assassination attempt. Beyond the confidence, this issue shows growth from Magneto as he didn’t turn to violence in response to the threat of violence. He doesn’t need petty violence to demonstrate that humans have New Gods; he just tells them they do.
X-Factor #1 (Family, QC)
X-Factor #1 shows Magneto doing the business of governing with his fellow Quiet Council members, but it also uses his relationship with Polaris, or lack thereof, to foreground her character arc. Their relationship would be furthered in X-Factor #4, but the audience sees just how little connection they have. He can’t even describe her personality when asked. Magneto becomes an audience surrogate in the moment as they both begin a journey to understand who Polaris is and how she will relate to her father going forward.
X-Men #6 (Founders, QC)
While this issue is primarily a Mystique spotlight, it shows the darker, dehumanizing side of Xavier and Magneto. From statesmen in X-Men #4 to co-conspirators here, this issue shows the ugly side of Krakoa, the alliance of its founders, and the shadow the 10 Lives of Moira X casts on their outlook. Despite the good found in Krakoa’s ascension, when with Prof. X and Moira X, Magneto seems to shift from hero of Mutantkind to puppeteer. He more resembles Prof. X’s peers in the Illuminati than an X-Man.
X-Men/Fantastic Four #1-4 (Founders, QC, Illuminati)
“It is a current priority for the mutant nation of Krakoa to protect and nurture its greatest natural resource: Omega level mutants”. That imperative pushes Magneto and Prof. X into conflict over the allegiance(s) of Franklin Richards. Kate Pryde acts as the humanizing foil to these two because she sees Franklin Richards as a person not just a “natural resource” in service to Krakoa. Once again, the objectifying tendencies of the Founding Fathers is put on display. It is furthered when they confront Mr. Fantastic about his “x-gene masking” technology that he employed on Franklin. Prof. Xavier removes the idea from his mind and, through his ruthlessness, reminds the audience that he is as serious and committed to Krakoa as Magneto.
Wolverine #3 & #4 (Community)
These issues are not italicized because they are not essential to Magneto’s journey in Krakoa but do feature the complicated but sometimes amicable relationship between Wolverine and Magneto. Seeing the ever-serious Master of Magnetism be jovial and joyous over drinks and later embarrassed by Wolverine in The Grove was humanizing and a reminder that, for all his grandeur, he is still just a man.
X-Men #11 (Community)
Jonathan Hickman perfectly spotlights Magneto as both a hero to his people and am admirable superhero for the audience. The utilization of the Empyre event here is brilliant and should be the standard. Magneto is commanding, sexy, and even funny in this issue. If a reader couldn’t buy into Magneto as a hero before, this is the issue to point them to. His viciousness and brutality are in service of a greater good, the embodiment of Krakoa’s promise.
X-Factor #4 (Founders, QC, Family)
X of Swords represents the first test of Krakoa with [A]’s secret, magical schemes revealed, Resurrection Protocols endangered, and the threat of Amenthi invasion looming. Once again, the darker, colder side of Magneto is revealed in his interactions with Polaris and [A]. He seemingly can’t help being unempathetic as Polaris struggles to remember the prophecy and [A] lays close to death in the Healing Gardens. It is hard to observe after issues like X-Men #11 where Magneto’s love for his people is on full display, but that duality is what makes him a compelling character.
X-Men #13 (QC, Family)
This is another non-essential issue where Magneto is a minor character. That said, we have a wonderful moment of Magneto supporting Polaris as she restraints [A] during his physical outburst. It contrasts X-Factor #4 by showing him as a supportive and collaborative father.
X-Men #15 (QC, Heirs)
The choice to separate the X-Men from the Quiet Council is born here. While other Quiet Council members, like Sebastian Shaw, care little for the personal pressure Jean Grey and Cyclops are under with Kid Cable in the Contest of Swords, it is clear that Magneto and Xavier empathize. They also recognize that they do have a nation to govern and cannot risk the collapse of the Krakoan government in Otherworld. The Founding Fathers take the rejection of the Quiet Council’s rules and desires by Scott and Jean with a smile; their “children” have grown up and are stepping out into the world ambitiously.
X-Men #16 (QC, GR, Founders, Heirs)
There is always something delightful about seeing Magneto and Prof. X humbled after so many moments of grandeur and grandstanding and this issue is chock-full of that. The arrival of Arakko and its millions of Mutants shocks them, Isca’s rebuke on their Krakoan Goodwill Trip, and Cyclops and Jean rejecting their council invitations are all great reminders that the Founding Fathers are just men attempting to play a great game, not gods orchestrating their master plan. It is an important moment for Magneto and Prof. X to be reminded that Cyclops and Jean are the next generation of Mutant leaders in their own right, not obedient successors.
S.W.O.R.D. #1 (Community)
Valerio Schiti and Al Ewing open this issue with Magneto flying himself to the S.W.O.R.D. station in case anyone needed a reminder that he’s a badass. We also have some adorable interactions with Kid Cable who serves as the audience surrogate as he fanboys over Magneto. Most importantly, the conversation between Magneto and Abigail Brand sets the stage for X-Men: Red and the eventual confrontation between Brand and Storm, one of Magneto’s heirs.
S.W.O.R.D. #2 (Community)
S.W.O.R.D. #2 offers multiple moments of reflection from characters like Fabian Cortez and Frenzy. These serve as reminders that Magneto isn’t just a contemporary character or hidden away in The Grove; he is a major figure in Mutant culture who has influenced and impacted the lives of multitudes of characters.
S.W.O.R.D. #5 (QC)
Building from issue #2, Magneto gives Fabian Cortez the chance to speak about the Murder No Man law of Krakoa. This issue feels like an entertaining Congressional hearing as Fabian understands himself to be the star, only to find himself embarrassed by Magneto, Peepers, and breakout star Khora of the Burning Heart. Magneto’s performative nature is on full display but so is his growth from the days of being manipulated by Mutant Snake Oil Salesman, Fabian Cortez.
Way of X #1 (QC, Community)
Nightcrawlers’ anxieties surrounding Crucible bring him into conflict with Magneto. Spurrier’s writing positions Nightcrawler as being sensible and Magneto as being brutish and violent but then flips the script. Nightcrawler’s earlier dismissal of Lost and his rejection of Crucible have led Magneto to perform the violent ritual. There is plenty to be said about Magneto’s propensity for violence and the violent nature of Crucible in general, but Nightcrawler’s inaction is also a choice with serious consequences for Lost. It is easy for him to philosophize with the Quiet Council or in the Narthex, but the hard, dirty work of nation-building and governing happens out in the world.
X-Men #20 (Founders, QC)
The Founding Fathers once again objectify Mystique in their quest to stop Nimrod and prevent Destiny’s resurrection. The idea that Prof. X and Magneto were holding Mystique’s wife hostage was disgusting on its face, but the reality that it was in service of Moira X’s anti-Mutant designs is even more tragic. It’s almost Shakespearean that Prof. X and Magneto are preventing Destiny’s return when she is the one who will save Mutantkind from Moira. Their trust in Moira X turns them into clownish puppets, but their disdain for Mystique turns them into cruel ones.
Giant-Size X-Men: Magneto (QC, Illuminati)
With the knowledge of the Hellfire Gala and Planet-Sized X-Men in mind, Giant-Sized X-Men: Magneto is an early preview of the lengths Magneto will go to serve his people. His relationship with Emma Frost is deepened here as they engage as equal rulers of Krakoa and exchange favors. The turn in their relationship in Inferno would be surprising if it were Magneto by himself but it is with Prof. X and Moira X, which always renders people into pieces on a chessboard. Similarly, Namor treats Magneto like a subject of his kingdom and not an equal. Ideally, this would remind Magneto to not be like Namor and center the personhood of his fellow Mutant, but it will take more tragedy and distance from Charles Xavier for that shift to take place.
X-Men #21 (Founders, Illuminati)
After building Mykines, Magneto strolls into the Hellfire Gala in kingly regalia. Though dressed like a ruler, he is not treated like one by Namor who chooses the Illuminati over Mutantkind. There’s a beautiful irony to Namor’s belief that he is better than Krakoa. What he thinks is “just an island” later becomes one piece of “a single archipelago in a sea of stars” in Planet-Size X-Men. Though disrespected, Magneto maintains a quiet confidence because he is playing a much bigger game than Namor could ever imagine.
Hellions #12 (Family)
The Hellfire Gala offers moments of relationship building and engagement between a variety of Krakoans. Seeing Polaris and Magneto interact or, more hilariously, Magneto interact with the Hellions is a treat. The self-serious Master of Magnetism, on the biggest night in Mutant culture, is not a good fit for the likes of Nanny, the Orphan-Maker, or Havok
Planet-Size X-Men (Founders, QC, GR, Heirs, Community)
Once again, Magneto is center stage as he does what he does best: Use his powers to build for Mutantkind. From planning to execution, the terraforming of Mars is Magneto’s brainchild. He understands the scale that Mutants must work and think at to survive this new age. Planet-Size X-Men feels like the synthesis of Magneto’s prior story beats from being rejected by Isca the Unbeaten to building Mykines island for Emma Frost. He works in concert with his fellow Omega-level Mutants to resurrect the cold, red dirt of Mars to provide refuge for his Arakkii cousins, but also lets his ambitions flourish as Krakoa declares the planet the Capital of the Sol System. In terraforming Mars, Magneto also creates the physical space for Storm’s ascent as the Voice of Sol and the building of her own major faction of Mutantkind.
S.W.O.R.D. #6 (Heirs, Family)
The portions of this issue about Storm don’t seem to directly relate to Magneto’s journey, but her ascent to Regent of Arakko and Voice of Sol is critical to his later stories. Storm is becoming a historical leader of Mutantkind much like Prof. X, [A], and Magneto just as Magneto begins his journey into the winter of his life. The arrival of the Scarlet Witch and her death, later in X-Factor #10, send him down the path that leads to his retirement to Arakko, submission to Storm as a leader, and eventual heroic death.
X-Men: The Onslaught Revelation (Founders, QC, Heirs)
Like S.W.O.R.D. #5, The Onslaught Revelation deals with Magneto’s legacy as a leader through Fabian Cortez and, like S.W.O.R.D. #6, deals his children in Onslaught. Way of X begins with Magneto challenging fellow Quiet Council member, Nightcrawler, to be a man of action, and, in The Onslaught Revelation, Nightcrawler returns the favor. Though not the central character of Way of X and The Onslaught Revelation, Magneto’s legacy is at their heart. It was Magneto’s Acolytes that introduced the world to the bereft Fabian Cortez who leeches off of Magneto in spite of his additive power. Fabian’s downward spiral after being fired in S.W.O.R.D. #5 manifests here as he finally faces his actions and his own emptiness. Similarly, The Onslaught Revelation deals with Magneto’s offspring like S.W.O.R.D. #6, but this time it’s Onslaught himself. In some ways, The Onslaught Revelation offers a prelude to Inferno by forcing the audience to deal with messes that Magneto and Charles create when they’re together. Their blind spots in Resurrection Protocols and in the culture of Krakoa threaten to burn the entire island down, but thankfully Nightcrawler is looking for snakes in the garden of Eden. Moreover, Charles’s ultimate blind spot, Legion, helps Nightcrawler by creating an astral Eden for his fellow Mutants to heal in. Magneto will come to need Legion and his Altar during Judgment Day; solidifying another heir to his legacy.
Trial of Magneto, written by Leah Williams, art by Lucas Werneck, David Messina and Edgar Delgado, lettering by Clayton CowlesMagneto: EveningThe following issues see a breakdown of the boundless joy of Krakoa and darkness fall over Magneto and his great work. These issues cover the end of Reign of X into the Destiny of X eras.X-Men: The Trial of Magneto #1-5 (Founders, Family, QC, Heirs)
Throughout the Krakoan Era, we have seen Magneto battle between his darker nature and his heroic, idealized self. The viciousness with which he fights his fellow Krakoans, nearly kills Prof. X, and denigrates Polaris is both real and a mask he wears to hide the pain of the death of the Scarlet Witch. More than her actual death, Magneto is grieving their painful and traumatic relationship. Her redemption is only through trial and more pain, and the only way he can execute his plan is by dressing in his all-black costume and feigning murderous contempt. It’s an act of masochistic self-flagellation to convince everyone that he might have killed his daughter and obscure their deeper scheme. He believes he can take their hate. It is clear by his tears at the end of issues #5 that he cannot and that his violent tantrum is all performance to hide the pain of not being an adequate father to any of his children, particularly Wanda. His inadequacy has gotten her killed in a scheme that, like all of his and Charles’s schemes, never goes as well as planned. This series is the chickens of his publication history coming home to roost and an omen for the burns to come in Inferno. While Scarlet Witch is redeemed and Magneto is exonerated, it’s important to note that this is done through sacrificing Toad, another piece on the chessboard. Lastly, we see the relationship between Hope Summers and Magneto develop as she asserts her own capacity as the catalyst for Krakoan Resurrection.
Hellions #18 (QC)
Much like X-Men #15, the readers of Hellions #18 are caught between the emotional attachments to the cast and the recognition that Krakoa must be a place of laws. It’s painful to watch the Quiet Council sentence Nanny and the Orphan-Maker to the Pit of Exile while understanding that these are the consequences within the unjust criminal system of Krakoa. While not essential, this issue sets the stage for Victor LaValle’s Sabretooth and the further breakdown of trust in the Founding Fathers. There’s also an important moment between Emma Frost and Magneto at the end wherein they recognize that Mr. Sinister is “a cancer” within their society and will only cause them further harm. Like Giant-Size X-Men: Magneto, we see what could be an equal relationship between the two, and a possible triumvirate with Prof. X, but Magneto’s participation in the Parents of Krakoa (Moira X and Prof. X) will always make that impossible.
Inferno #1-4 (Founders, QC)
While fighting Nimrod and Omega Sentinel with Prof. X is one of Magneto’s finest and most badass moments, he is otherwise unheroic in Inferno. Magneto is too caught up with the other Parents of Krakoa, their secrets, and their dehumanizing puppetry to act in an ethical manner towards Emma Frost, Mystique, or Destiny. In fact, Magneto and Prof. X even extend their paternalism to Moira X as they track her movements because she is “too important to lose,” only for them to lose her to Mystique and Destiny. There’s something funny about Magneto trying his hand at grand schemes with Charles and failing so spectacularly; it’s not in his nature. He is a warrior and, at the best of times, he is a hero. Inferno punishes him in a Shakespearean manner for abandoning what makes him great just like in The Trial of Magneto. He burns bridges with other Quiet Council members, turns Moira X into an enemy of Mutantkind, and gets himself killed attempting a Game of Thrones that he has neither the skill nor inhumanity for. It is sad to read the same man who, in X-Men #1, promised the children of Krakoa that he would protect the island from all enemies nearly cause the downfall of Krakoa through his conspiracies against his fellow Mutants.
Sabretooth #1-5 (Founders, QC, Community)
The twilight of Magneto’s Krakoan story is rooted in an over attachment to Prof. X and his methods. Their relationship feeds Magneto’s worst instincts and the criminal punishment system of Krakoa is no exception. The Founding Fathers believe that they have the carceral system of Krakoa under control but, as we see in Inferno and Trial, they are not remotely in control. Sabretooth shows how the news of The Pit of Exile and the “judicial system” of Krakoa stains Prof. X’s reputation, but the same can be imagined for Magneto. The difference is that Magneto’s reputation is balanced by great acts like defending the island during Empyre and terraforming Mars.
Immortal X-Men #1 & #2 (QC, Heirs)
Magneto’s retirement from Krakoa and replacement on the Quiet Council by Hope Summers demonstrate a hero in pain. It’s not clear that Magneto ever realizes that his pain is caused by living in the realm of conspiracy and politics, not in his living on Krakoa itself. He has forgotten that he is a mythic hero, but he never loses his heroic instinct to protect the island. His fight with Storm against the kaiju foreshadows their Mutant Circuits later in X-Men: Red but also the renewed focus on their relationship. With Storm, he performs his last great acts in the eyes of Krakoa and prepares to pass the torch to her. She sees his greatness despite the secretive games he has played with the Quiet Council.
Magneto: NightMagneto’s “night” is dark as he lives out his last days before laying to rest. All of his actions and stories in the Krakoan era are synthesized as he prepares to pass his legacy on to the next generation.X-Men: Red #1-4 (GR, Heirs, Community, Brotherhood)
With Storm as the leader of the Brotherhood, Magneto is able to focus on his true role: Being a hero to his people. Magneto’s heroic acts aren’t simply fighting with the Arakkii against the Progenitors. His deepest act of heroism is killing Tarn the Uncaring, who effectively ran concentration camps during the Amenthi occupation of Arakko. Magneto becomes the hero he needed during his time in Auschwitz. Though he sees his retirement to Arakko as an admission of failure, Magneto is actually freeing himself from conspiracies and games and can fall into his nature as a hero. His journey mirrors Storm’s as she rejects being the “Queen of Mars” to be something better and more natural to her: A hero. Magneto claims himself “a fool” and “a failure” with “nothing to say…nothing left” but in that bereft state, he is able to find his true self. With that at the fore, he deletes his backup and becomes a warrior, a hero of Arakko.
A.X.E. Judgment Day #1 (QC, GR, Brotherhood, Heirs)
Magneto makes a small cameo in A.X.E. Judgment Day #1 which is expanded upon in X-Men: Red and subsequent A.X.E. issues. What’s most important is that his final day starts by relaxing with Cable and Storm; he feels joyous and content prior to Nightcrawler’s arrival. The news of the looming Eternals threat makes Magneto serious because he understands that like humans, the Eternals are threatened by Mutantkind’s ascension. Powerful but marginalized people stepping into the fullness of their power will always threaten the traditional hegemons, and Magneto knows that deeply. Issue #1 of this event also introduces audiences that have not been reading Eternals by Kieron Gillen to Uranos the Undying, the ultimate enemy for Magneto. Similarly, the audience is prepared for the role that Cyclops and Jean Grey will play defending Krakoa while Storm leads the defense of Arakko. His heirs are prepared to lead and protect their people.
X-Men: Red #5 (GR, Brotherhood)
The attack on Arakko was known already but the consequences for Magneto were despair inducing. The Hour of Uranos is filled with horror and destruction as he lays siege to Arakko, the great trauma of their people. For Magneto, the industrialized mass murder that Uranos unleashes is the return of his great trauma too and he will not stand for it. In this moment, he does not stand alone as he fights with the Great Ring but also the Brotherhood that he created with Storm and Sunspot fights for Planet Arakko and its guests. It is further developed in issue #6 but Magneto is executing the first Omega-level Mutant Circuit among Arakkii Mutants in years, possibly centuries. Though they do not succeed in stopping Uranos or his armories, it is narratively critical that the institution they built holds fast for Arakko even without Storm and Magneto leading them. Especially without Magneto to lead them. In this hour of horror, Magneto’s heart is ripped from his chest meaning that the Brotherhood will have to carry on long after his death. For Magneto and Arakko, night has fallen.
X-Men: Red #6 (GR, Heirs, Community, Brotherhood)
Though Storm begins this issue leading the defense of Arakko, it is truly The Hour of Magneto. Magneto pulls off his greatest feat thus far: Using his magnetism to pump the blood in his body as a replacement for his heart. Yes, that is his greatest skill with his magnetism because it requires finesse and pure conviction. To be the Master of Magnetism is to resuscitate oneself and continue to fight even as die. This is the culmination of Magneto’s story. It’s not the grand acts of moving The Peak or building Emma an island; it’s fighting past death to defend a planet of Mutant refugees from a genocidal madman. Being that Uranos has returned to The Exclusion, Magneto and the rest of Arakko must focus on saving as many people as possible and defeating Urano’s death machines. To that end, Magneto and Storm take their rule breaking to new heights as she syncs her powers with his to keep him alive and boost his output. It is beyond a Mutant Circuit; they have become one interdependent fighting force. It is an act of grandeur and humility that embodies the night of Magneto’s life. He is full of power and skill yet willing to sublimate his ego to be the hero that Arakko and Earth need.
Legion of X #6 (Heirs)
Some of this issue takes place at the beginning of the attack on Arakko wherein Legion fights Uranos. Like many young men, Legion desires a hero’s death, to be a legend in martyrdom, in the hopes that maybe then he will have purpose and also acknowledgement by his father. Instead that title goes to Magneto, and it should. It’s the older, wiser members of the community that should give their lives to protect it, not the young people with so much more life to live and such recklessness that they might throw their lives away. As Magneto marches off to his death, he leaves the defense of Arakko to Legion because he is the only one who can do it. Between destroying the death machines and securing people in The Altar, Legion is the only one who can provide the violence and safety needed to survive Judgment Day and Magneto trusts him. In that moment, Legion inherits Magneto’s legacy on Arakko.
A.X.E. Judgment Day #4 (GR, Heirs, Illuminati, Community)
Magneto appears in this issue after Uranos begins to burn the world to the ground. The perpetrator of omni-genocide is faced with the survivor of two genocides and his heir. It is important to note that Storm and Magneto would not have been able to fight Uranos in his armories if not for Tony Stark. Despite the tensions with the Illuminati at the first Hellfire Gala, years of villainy by Magneto himself, and years of strife between Mutants and Humans, it is through collaboration that they save the world. Magneto is not shrouded by the darker portions of his nature or delusions of the supremacy of Mutantkind. He is driven by his core desire to be a hero and the recognition that Uranos is his devil. Most importantly, despite all of the scheming with Prof. X and Moira X, Magneto remains true to his word and allows himself to die. He fights like a man that does “not fear a life that ends.” He leaves the world and the audience with the best of himself and is rewarded with the sight of the daughter he thought lost, Anya. The Progenitor eulogizes him astutely by saying “I think if all were like him, there would be no need for men like him”.
X-Men: Red #7 (GR, Heirs, Brotherhood)
“In the heart of the Earth” Magneto gives Storm his legacy. He has watched as she renewed the name “Brotherhood of Mutants,” took him at his lowest, and pushed him to be a hero of Arakko. In the night of his story, Storm lays Magneto to bed with the promise to keep his dream alive when she wakes in the morning. Much like the Curse of the Quiet Council, knowledge of Moira X, Magneto gives Storm a charge that is as much a duty as a curse: She must protect Krakoa and Mutantkind from Prof X. With Moira X sided with Orchis and Magneto dying, Charles has no countervailing force. Magneto has always been the equal and opposite force to Prof X.; he is willing to be understood as “bad” for Mutantkind just as Prof. X is willing to do anything to be understood as “good.” Storm is the synthesis of their wills, much like Jean, Legion, and Cyclops. Moreover, Storm has led the “undesirable” Mutants that Prof. X never could or would, whether that’s the Morlocks or the Arakkii. She has seen the need to be more than just a “good Mutant” but a hero, like Magneto.
Storm takes this legacy right to her and Magneto’s foil: Isca the Unbeaten. Isca who stands alone, Isca who has betrayed Arakko more than once, Isca who cannot see beyond herself. Storm makes clear that they would all fight Isca even if they would lose, like Magneto just did with Uranos. Isca cannot be beaten but she will never know what it is to be a hero. Fisher King, Magneto’s close friend, makes this clear by challenging her “to a contest of understanding” where the winner “is the one who most truly understands the meaning of loss.” It is important that Fisher King, possibly Magneto’s first human friend in decades, challenges Isca. Like Magneto, he is not afraid of a life that ends and, further like Magneto, he knows loss. Magneto’s shadow looms large as Isca resigns from the Great Ring; he was more of Arakko than she ever was because he could lose and has lost so much, so many times. While she betrayed the Great Ring and killed Idyll, Magneto jumper-cabled himself back to life to keep fighting for his Arakkii cousins; while Isca denigrated others for being weak or ugly or small, Magneto stood tall for those who could not; while Isca and Tarn violated their fellow Mutants in the Abyssal Prisons, Magneto honored his people killed in the Holocaust and on Genosha by taking down Uranos; and while Isca murdered Sunspot for challenging her, Magneto embraced his former student’s challenge and stood against Tarn for all of Arakko.
Storm’s last act recognizes Magneto’s troubled time as a Founding Father by yielding the Seat of All-Around-Us to Lodus Logos. She lets the Arakkii’s greatest artist and dreamer decide their future and embraces Magneto’s legacy by taking the Seat of Loss, his last title, to stand when all else on Arakko has fallen, just as he did.
The post Magneto (Krakoa Era) Reading Order & Analysis! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Zack and Charlotte (aka Rors-Zach and Dr. Transhattan) kick off our first miniseries on Superhero Subversions with a discussion of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ Watchmen.
Topics discussed:
– Is Watchmen really as good as its legacy suggests (yes, it is), or is it just nerds overvaluing a metatextual work (no, it isn’t)?
– Is a personal sense of overwhelming anxiety and despair necessary to appreciate this comic?!?
– How many ways can the 9 panel grid be utilized in one comic?!
Upcoming episodes in our Superhero Subversion miniseries:
– Planetary, 1999
– Peter Cannon, Thunderbolt, 2019
– The Boys, 2006
– Miracleman, 1982
– Listeners’ Choice, TBA
You can find Charlotte at twitter.com/mymarvelousyear
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at mymarvelousyear.com
Music for Extra Issues is credited to FM Skyline.
You can support Extra Issues via Patreon for as little as $1 a month at patreon.com/mymarvelousyear
The post Extra Issues – Superhero Subversions ep. 1: Watchmen appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
I’m joined by writer, artist and animator Stephan Franck to talk his new graphic novel Palomino, a neo-noir meets LA country bars graphic novel being Kickstarted right now! We talk country, Kirby, visual storytelling tricks, and animating Marvel’s What If…!
On Comic Book Herald’s Interviews I’ll be interviewing some of my favorite creators in comics about specific runs, graphic novels or series, looking for their insights on the inspirations behind the work and ideas or hidden material readers may have missed. CBH Interviews is an audio annotative guide to enjoying the intricacies and thinking in the art. Thanks for listening, and enjoy the comics!
Palomino
Writer: Stephan Franck
Publisher: Dark Planet Comics
Kickstarter: link
About the Author:Stephan Franck is an accomplished animator, writer, and director who has worked on iconic stories like The Iron Giant and Marvel Studio’s What If…? animated series. He founded his own publishing company, Dark Planet Comics, and has released fantastic graphic novel stories such as Silver, Rosalynd, and Romance in the Age of the Space God.
Link to website!
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Music for Best Comics Ever by Anthony Weis. Check out more music at anthonyweis.com.
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The post “Palomino” w/ Stephan Franck | CBH Interviews #110 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Zombie Zack explains how Marvel Move mobile fitness will work to Dave and Charlotte, and then the gang answers listener questions including how to handle Kang in the MCU.
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2003 pt. 1
| Fantastic Four: Unstable Molecules | Added by Patreon Backer Rob. M | | Fantastic Four (1998-2012) | #67 to #70, #500 to #502 | Waid and Wieringo in full swing with “Unthinkable”! A classic with huge ramifications | | Sentinel | #1 to #6 |
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The post 2002 Variant Cover C: Marvel Move, MCU Kang & More! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below:
Marvel announced the next Fall of X titles and creative teams including Uncanny Spider-Man, Alpha Flight and Children of the Vault. Then, we dig into today’s new releases including Sins of Sinister and everything else good.
This Week’s Comics
Sins of Sinister: Nightcrawlers #3
X-Force #39
New Mutants: Lethal Legion #2
Bishop: War College #3
The post Which Sins of Sinister Tie-Ins Are Worth It? | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
CBH writer and editor Sean Dillon recently had the opportunity to conduct a career-spanning interview with comics legend J.M. DeMatteis. Check it all out below!
On Magic and Spirituality: Some of your fellow comics writers (like Alan Moore or Grant Morrison) openly practice magic. In particular, they note the inherently mystical nature of art. The act of creating something with meaning out of thin air. Do you agree with this approach to art or is there something else going on?
I do think creating art is magical…perhaps not in the same sense that Moore and Morrison mean it. We open the door to our unconscious, which in turn opens the door to something that exists beyond ourselves (In a way, creativity is a form of spiritual practice that aligns us with Something Bigger, the Self of selves).
I sometimes imagine that there’s a Dimension of Story out there, where all the stories ever told, and all the stories that will be told, exist. And we, as writers, become channels for those stories. But they have to flow through the filter of our individual psyches, our personalities, quirks, obsessions, etc. So the story merges with us and then emerges into the world.
I could talk about this for hours—this is just the tip of the iceberg—but maybe I’ll save that discussion for a book about the creative process!
In some of your works, you use neopronouns for G-d like hir/hir. Was there any specific reasoning for this?
Just that, in my mind, the Divine is ultimately beyond gender—even if that Divinity may sometimes incarnate within a specific gender. So I searched for a combination of “him” and “her” and came up with “hir.”
How would you describe your approach to writing the Divine in general?
I just write from my heart, from my own experiences, and try to be as honest as possible. I also try not to preach, just to present possibilities and say, “Look! Maybe there’s more to this world than what we take it to be. Maybe there’s more to all of us than what we take ourselves to be.”
In the graphic novel, Supergirl: Wings, you take an almost psychogeographic approach to a mystical world. Have you ever considered applying that approach again?
I honestly know nothing about psychogeography—this is the first I’ve heard of it—so it’s hard to answer that one. If you mean the idea of breaking down the spiritual world into specific components, then yes. I’d based that on reading I’d done on the angelic realms and it worked for that story.
Would I do that again? I think that approach is part of the landscape in my new Spellbound Comics series Layla in the Lands of After. Speaking of which…
On His New Projects:Recently, you’ve launched and successfully funded a self-publishing company for a set of new series, under the name Spellbound Comics. Why did you go down this route as opposed to releasing the titles with Berger Books, as you did The Girl in the Bay?
The wonderful thing about crowdfunding is that it removes all the walls between creator and audience. I love the idea of going directly to the people who read, and enjoy, my work; taking these ideas I’d been developing for years and finally getting them out into the world. It was a lot of work—I couldn’t have done it without Spellbound’s David Baldy as a creative and business partner—but it was profoundly gratifying. The books are at the printer and should be in people’s hands by the end of April.
Why did you decide to keep the fifth book a secret instead of announcing the full slate all together?
The fifth book, The Edward Gloom Mysteries, wasn’t planned as part of the original launch, it was a separate project that Vassilis Gogtzilas and I were working on. The first issue was complete and we thought it would be fun to throw it in as a last-minute bonus, a special treat for everyone who was supporting us.
Are there plans to reprint some of your older, currently out of print works like Brooklyn Dreams or Greenberg the Vampire through Spellbound? Any plans to involve other creators to do works outside of the DeMultiverse?
Right now our goal with Spellbound is to move all our launch projects—Layla, Godsend, Wisdom, and Anyman—forward. No plans to bring in any of my other work. That said, that could change tomorrow and I could see eventually bringing back some of my older creator-owned work if the opportunity presents itself.
As for the two projects you asked about specifically: Greenberg is owned by Marvel and the collection that came out a few years back is still available through Comixology. (I hope it’s back in print soon, too.) Brooklyn Dreams will be coming out, either late this year or early next from— Well, I can’t officially announce that yet but it will be a beautiful edition.
If you were to recommend other works to read alongside the various DeMultiverse titles, what would they be?
Of my own? I think the two you’ve mentioned, along with Moonshadow, Seekers Into The Mystery, Abadazad, etc. But, really, these are, in some ways, related to my entire body of work—not just creator-owned work, but my projects for Marvel and DC, as well. The themes and ideas that run through these stories are themes and ideas that have obsessed me my entire life and run through all my stories.
And of works by other creators?
I’d recommend anything by my amazing collaborators—Tom Mandrake, Matthew Dow Smith, Shawn McManus, and David Baldeon.
On Peter Parker and Spider-Man:One of my favorite underrated comics is Soul of the Hunter, wherein Spider-Man comforts the ghost of Kraven the Hunter after fighting his corpse. What made you and Mike decide to take that approach with a follow-up to Kraven’s Last Hunt?
Tom DeFalco, who was Marvel’s editor-in-chief then (and one of the nicest, smartest, most talented guys in the business) had received a letter from a suicide prevention group disturbed about Kraven’s Last Hunt, interpreting the story as a glorification of suicide. Nothing could be further from the truth, of course. Kraven is mentally ill, he’s inherited his mother’s troubled psyche. (Which is why his last words before pulling the trigger are: “They say my mother was insane…”)
Still, it genuinely bothered me that anyone would interpret our story that way, and I certainly didn’t want that to happen again in the future, so I mulled it over and came up with Soul of the Hunter as a way to clarify the Kraven issue and also deal with Peter’s inevitable PTSD. (You don’t get buried alive for weeks and just walk away from it.) I think it makes a nice coda to KLH.
Recently, you’ve done a pair of mini-series exploring unseen aspects the Clone Saga of Spider-Man. Why is that? What drew you to follow up on a rather controversial era of your career?
Plain and simple: I love those characters. Getting to reunite with Ben Reilly on Ben Reilly: Spider-Man was like getting together with an old and dear friend I hadn’t seen in years. We picked up right where we left off. Same with Peter and Mary Jane in Spider-Man: The Lost Hunt. I know these characters—in some ways I know them better than some of my own close friends—and it was a joy to tell stories about them again.
But these weren’t just nostalgia trips. I wouldn’t have done either series if I didn’t believe I could bring something fresh to the table, illuminating these characters in new ways.
On that note, what were your plans for Judas Traveler? Several interviews with other members of the Spider-Man writing team seem to indicate you had a plan for him.
I’m sure I did—he was a character I found fascinating—but, honestly, I’ve forgotten!
You mentioned on your blog that for you, Spider-Man remains a married man. Was there any pushback from editorial when writing The Lost Hunt to make Peter and MJ not-married? What is it about their marriage that appeals to you?
I just always loved the Peter/MJ dynamic. Two people deeply in love, supportive of each other, facing all their struggles and triumphs together. They don’t just love each other, they respect each other, they enjoy each other’s company. They’re lovers, yes, but they’re also the very best of friends. And that, to me, is what makes a great marriage.
And, no, there was no pushback about portraying the marriage. I think it would have been harder portraying them in that period—with Mary Jane so very pregnant—as not married!
Are there any other eras of Spider-Man you would be interested in revisiting, be it your own or someone else’s?
If it’s the right story, I’d pop into any Spidey era…including the current one. It’s less about when the story is set and more about what it has to say.
In the afterword for Maximum Carnage, you describe Peter Parker as embodying “the belief in the ascendency of the human heart, the essential nobility of the common man.” Equally, throughout your runs on Spectacular and Amazing, you emphasize the anger piercing the heart of the character. What drew you to this dichotomy?
Duality is the core of human nature, right? Peter is a truly good and decent man, but that doesn’t mean he—like all of us—doesn’t have demons that he’s wrestling with. What sets Peter apart from some people is the fact that, even though he’s wrestling with the darkness, he will always side with the light. It’s his basic nature. The shadow may creep in, but it will never blot out the light.
Peter Parker is essentially kind and compassionate—but far from perfect. And from the earliest Lee-Ditko stories, it’s that combination of inherent decency and relatable human flaws that has made him such a memorable character.
On Hal Jordan, Green Lantern, and Spectre:In 2001, you worked with Seth Fisher on the brilliant Green Lantern: Willworld. What was it like working with Fisher?
As noted, Seth was massively talented and possessed of a massive imagination. I’d write a wild sequence and he’d add so many incredible visual elements, enriching everything I gave him. It was a magical collaboration. He was also very curious, filled with questions about the story, what I meant, what I intended, what the philosophy was beyond it. So gifted in so many ways. Can you imagine what he’d be doing today, how much he would have grown? What a loss.
Between Willworld and Spectre, you’ve done a tremendous amount of work with Hal Jordan. You were, arguably, before Geoff, the definitive modern Hal Jordan writer, writing him and defining him in the ongoing capacity. Could you talk about your feelings on Hal? Where do you stand with that character? How do you see him? What do you think defines Hal for you, and makes him special? What grabs you about him?
For me, it’s a childhood connection. When I was a kid, I adored Green Lantern. I still think the basic premise of the character—will + imagination = manifestation—isn’t just a perfect recipe for great stories, it’s a perfect recipe for life. So I’ve always had great affection for Hal, both the original 60s version and the slightly altered version Denny O’Neil and Neil Adams put forth in their Green Lantern/Green Arrow series.
What attracted me to Spectre was the chance to tell a redemption tale. Here was this character I loved as a kid and he’d been turned into some kind of mass killer and then, after death, was given this impossible task, to live on as the Spectre. It was a crazy turn of events, I don’t even know if it was a good idea, but I latched onto it, especially the concept of bringing Hal back from that and using the Spectre to explore ideas about redemption, God, the Afterlife. So many worlds open up when you walk through that door.
As for Willworld, it goes back to that formula: will + imagination = manifestation. That story allowed us—and I give credit to the absolutely brilliant Seth Fisher and our editor Joey Cavalieri, both of whom helped hatch the basic idea—to really dive in and explore that concept, to look at Creation itself as an act of pure imagination. I love that graphic novel, more for Seth’s extraordinary art (talk about imagination!) than anything else. That he died so young was a genuine tragedy.
What are your thoughts on John Broome as a writer? You grew up reading his Green Lantern with Gil Kane, so could you talk about what made him distinct/standout as a writer for you? Particularly in his era. And what do you think defined his Green Lantern with Gil?
Broome was one of those writers I was reading when I was very young and his vast imagination certainly fueled mine. The DC comics of the era weren’t necessarily strong on characterization, but they were bursting with amazing concepts—other worlds and dimensions around every corner— that exploded my imagination and showed me the broad scope stories can achieve. I’m sure I carry the imprint of Broome’s stories to this day.
And Gil Kane? Even in the days before credits were common in comics, I somehow knew who Gil Kane was. He remains a god in my comic book pantheon. So dynamic, so fluid, so graceful, so visceral. Truly one of the great storytellers of the era.
In Willworld, you open with Hal Jordan as a cowboy hero. A literal man with no name. Going back to the Paul Newman aspect of the character, it occurs to me that Newman is one of the great cowboys of the 20th century. What is it about the western hero that fits so well with Hal Jordan?
I didn’t do that consciously. I tend to write intuitively, so I don’t have every detail mapped out. Willworld has a lot to do with childhood innocence and imagination, and I suspect my unconscious naturally took me back to my own childhood, when the Western was everywhere. (There was a time, when I was six or seven, when something like three quarters of the TV shows on the air were Westerns!) My young consciousness was imprinted with endless visions of the Old West—or at least 1960s TV writers’ versions of it—and those visions just flowed out into Willworld and, I think, served the story well.
In you Spectre run, you had Hal Jordan don the role of G-d’s spirit of vengeance, who would evolve into one of redemption. In the original Broome/Kane comics, the Green Lanterns as a whole are presented as cosmic angels. Was there any deliberate intention towards portraying Hal in such a light?
My main focus, as noted earlier, was Hal’s journey to redemption, a journey we’re all on in one form or another. I wasn’t really thinking about the GLs as cosmic angels. At the same time, Abin Sur was there with Hal acting as a kind of guardian angel, so maybe I was doing just that, albeit unconsciously!
On Batman and JLI:How do you feel about the modern usages of the JLI characters from the villainous turn of Maxwell Lord to the recent The Human Target?
I’ve heard fantastic things about Human Target, but I haven’t read it. Keith and I have both said that our JLI exists in its own universe—the Giffen-DeMatteis Universe—and that any other versions that have come along, good or bad, have nothing to do with ours. One of the fun things about working on Justice League 3000/3001, which came out around ten years ago, was picking up the threads of our continuity and solidifying our own, very specific, continuity.
What happened with Justice League 3000/3001?
It was cancelled. Giffen and I could have gone on doing that book for years. We were just getting started.
In many of your stories, you portray Batman as a somewhat negative force in the universe. From Superman: Speeding Bullets portraying the identity as a toxic cage from which Bruce Wayne must escape in order to become Superman to Supergirl: Wings having the closest thing it has to a devil portrayed with a Batman silhouette. To say nothing about Batman: Absolution, where the caped crusader is literally spat on by G-d hirself. Was there an intentionality to this?
I don’t recall Batman being spat on by God, so I can’t answer that.
More broadly: I think Batman is open to many interpretations—that’s the beauty of the character—and, in all of them, there’s something fundamental that remains consistent. And, no, I don’t think he’s necessarily a negative force. The Batman in my Legends of the Dark Knight arc, “Going Sane”—which is one of my all-time favorite projects—is very much a force for good, for light. He’s the son of a doctor, a healer, and he’s a kind of doctor himself. His patient is Gotham City. I prefer that version of Batman. I also wrote eight or so episodes of the Batman: The Brave and the Bold animated series, and that was a very bright, but very valid, interpretation of the character.
The whole point of Absolution was that Batman isn’t Bruce Wayne, he’s a mask, but sometimes the man gets lost in the bat-persona and it’s vital that he pulls himself back before Batman consumes him.
How do you feel about the modern age of superheroes? How have things changed in the wake of your career?
Styles change, approaches to visual storytelling change, but the essence of a good story remains the same. So things change and don’t change at all at the same time.
What work of yours do you wish more people talk about?
The average comic book fan knows me from my superhero work—especially Spider-Man and Justice League—so I guess I’d like more people to be aware of my creator-owned work.
With Seekers into the Mystery getting canceled before its time, what plans did you have for the remainder of the series?
I had three years of stories mapped out, but we were cancelled after a year and a half, so, that all went up in cosmic smoke. There was one arc in particular—it would have been the next one in the series and it dealt with reincarnation—that I’ve never let go of. And I may write it yet, just not as a Seekers story.
I’ve noticed that reincarnation tends to pop up a lot in your fiction. Aside from the Seekers story idea, you had an extremely lovely speech about it in your Spectre run about how Hal and Carol will recur in new forms, The Girl in the Bay explores two different incarnations of the same woman (one who got to grow up and one who didn’t), and Supergirl: Wings had its titular character fuse with her charge into something completely different. What draws you to this idea?
I’m fascinated by the soul’s continuity, by the concept that we return, again and again, in different forms, with different faces, to continue our adventures on this Earth.
On His Time In Hollywood:What was the original version of The Girl I Married like? Have you considered adapting it into prose or comics?
As happens with many TV scripts, The Girl.. was rewritten—and, since I was brand new to the TV arena, it probably needed it!—but the essence of my characters and my story was retained. The one thing I objected to was the dismissive attitude the main characters had toward their younger selves. In my version, they respected and honored who they’d been and realized that they’d always carry those people with them, always be grateful to them.
That said, writing for TZ was a great way to break into the business (And I am forever grateful to the great Alan Brennert for opening that door). I have warm memories of being on set, watching them film. It was magical.
And , no, I can’t adapt it because I don’t own it!
What was it like being in the writers room for Superboy?
The Superboy experience was short—I was only down at Universal Studios in Orlando for six weeks, helping them put together the final season—but wonderful. The best part of it, aside from the creative work itself, was getting to know the producer, Stan Berkowitz (who remains a friend; Stan was the guy who brought me on to Justice League Unlimited and launched my animation career), and the other staff writer, Paul Stubenrauch. Paul, too, became a good friend, and it was heartbreaking when he passed away a few years after Superboy ended.
Not many people even know that show existed, but I’m very proud of the work I did—especially “Know Thine Enemy,” a two-parter that explored Lex Luthor’s tragic childhood.
On Moonshadow*:In many regards, Moonshadow is your most ambitious work, an attempt at creating a new form of storytelling within the comics landscape with water color paintings for panels (as delivered by the brilliant Jon Muth) to the storybook stylings of the narrative. In some regards, it’s almost an illustrated novel. What made you decide to go down this path?*
I don’t know if I decided to go down that path or if the path just opened up to me. In that period, the mid-1980s, comics were creatively exploding, barriers were breaking down, we had new formats, new genres, and I wanted to be a part of that.
Moonshadow was an idea I’d had, in a variety of forms, for years (long before I got into comics) but it didn’t really come alive till I actually began writing it. In stepping out of the Marvel/DC Universes, in creating something of my own from the ground up, I dropped all my conceptions of what a comic book should be and just wrote, from the deepest parts of myself. Again, the path opened up and I followed it. Along with way, I found my own distinct voice as a writer.
And, of course, without Jon J Muth we probably wouldn’t be talking about Moonshadow today. He remains one of the most talented people I’ve ever had the pleasure to work with. He cracked that story open, creating a visual world unlike anything seen in comics till then. When you’re working with someone that gifted, you have to up your game. I think Jon challenged me to be better, reach farther, and I think (hope!) I did the same for him.
A fantastic collaboration.
I like to joke with some of my fellow comics critics that you aren’t a real comics company until you publish an edition of Moonshadow. How did that series finally get a definitive home as opposed to bumping around from publisher to publisher?
I wouldn’t say it bumped around. Epic changed their mission statement over the years, so Carl Potts, who was running the imprint at the time, generously gave it back to us and Vertigo, which was really the spiritual successor to the early Epic line, welcomed us with open arms. It stayed with DC/Vertigo for many years, but, again, things change, and we got the book back again and finally landed at Dark Horse, where they did a gorgeous new edition back in 2019 that was nominated for an Eisner. So that’s three publishers in thirty-plus years. No so bad!
Moon will be back in print from Dark Horse, in some surprising new editions, either later this year or early next.
In Moonshadow, one of the central characters is Ira — a beer chugging, cigar chomping, bastard who does unspeakable things and is valorized at the end. This is in stark contrast to a lot of your other “heroic” figures who are largely more sympathetic characters. What drew you to write Ira in such a way?
I don’t know if he was “valorized.” I’d say he was humanized. I always saw Ira as a kind of Dostoyevskian character, tormented, driven by some of the humanity’s worst impulses. The embodiment of our shadow selves. And that, I think, was one reason why Moon loved him, he was drawn to everything he himself wasn’t. In some ways, Ira was acting out all the behaviors Moon would never dare do (Plus Moon was desperate for a father figure and projected that need onto Ira).
But, as with all of us—even the worst of us—there was a vulnerability, a humanity, at Ira’s core that we glimpsed toward the end of the story. I think Moon always knew it was there.
As with any work, some elements of Moonshadow don’t hold up to a more modern lens. In many regards, it’s a consequence to the moral philosophy presented in Seekers into the Mystery, where an attempt to draw out further and further questions leads past answers wanting. How do you approach these elements going forward?
I don’t think that way. As noted, I write intuitively. I just follow the stories and characters where they lead. Trust the story and it will lead you to the right place, regardless of any lens.
With Farewell, Moonshadow, you took a character you already took through the wringer — dealing with various wars, religious competitions, and greedy capitalists — and essentially gave him the Job treatment. Looking back, do you feel like you were being a bit harsh?
No. I’d had that story in mind since the 80s, right after we finished the original run. It was another way to look at Moon, at his spiritual journey, at life itself, from a more mature perspective. And, again, even though he endured terrible suffering, Moonshadow found his light at the end of the tunnel, his truth and meaning, in the end.
Given he worked with you on both Moonshadow and Seekers into the Mystery, have you been in touch with Jon? Any plans on collaborating again?
Jon is a good friend, we talk regularly. I’d work with him again any time. Nothing planned at the moment, but I’m always open to it.
On Music and Melodies:Given you literally called one of your magnum opuses Moonshadow, it’s clear that Yusuf / Cat Stevens is a major influence on your work. And then there’s the extremely charming album you produced in the 90s, How Many Lifetimes. Are there any other musicians who have influenced you so?
The Beatles more than any others, John Lennon especially. He remains my one true rock and roll hero.
I don’t think Yusuf/Stevens was a major influence, but I did love his work back in the day—and still do.
The title for the series came about because I wanted a name evocative of that era. I literally sat down with my albums and flipped through them looking for something that would resonate. When I came across the song “Moonshadow,” it just clicked. Plus, Yusuf/Stevens’ work was very much about the kind of spiritual search Moon was on, so it fit perfectly.
-On that note, how do you feel about How Many Lifetimes with a few decades of remove?
I’m incredibly proud of it. Working on that album remains one of the great creative joys of my life.
Do you have a favorite track from How Many Lifetimes?
Probably the title track, “How Many Lifetimes?” And I’m also very fond of “Diane,” which I wrote for my wife when we were on our honeymoon in India. But, really, I poured heart and soul into all those songs.
Before the album, you were attempting to have a career as a musician, joining numerous bands. You even wrote a review of a Grateful Dead album for Rolling Stone. How did writing for comics compare to writing music? How did you infuse the work of one mode into the other?
That’s true. I’d been playing guitar, writing songs, playing in bands, for years. Music is an essential part of who I am and it definitely spills over into my fiction, especially comics.
I talk in my workshops about the musicality of writing comics: the drum beat, the melodies, the counter melodies. I do tend to see my writing in musical terms but, again, it’s more of an intuitive flow than a conscious decision. Once a musician always a musician, I guess.
I did music journalism for a few years before I made the jump into comics with both feet. It was a way to scratch my music itch and my writing itch at the same time. But I decided that I’d much rather be the guy creating the work and being criticized than the guy sitting in judgement on other people’s creative work. It’s a decision I’ve never regretted.
What music are you listening to now?
I still listen to a lot of Beatles—together and solo. It’s my absolute favorite music and their work has only deepened with the years.
As for others: I have pretty eclectic tastes. Looking at my Spotify playlists, I see everything from Sinatra (another god in my musical pantheon) to Indian music, ambient to Kasey Musgraves, Bob Dylan to Florence +the Machine to movie soundtracks. I have playlists for just about every decade since the 20s, so I can travel to any era from the past to the present, depending on my mood.
My favorite thing about streaming music is that I can read about something new and instantly check it out. That’s the way I discover new artists these days.
-Have you considered doing another album?
I think about it all the time. I’ve got a backlog of so many songs that I’d have to start with a double album and then go from there. I’m a great believer in the universe’s perfect timing, so I hope that, before too long, I find the right group of musicians, head back into the studio, and then get these songs out into the world.
The post The J.M. DeMatteis Interview: The Essence of a Good Story Remains The Same appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
This week I’m talking to Victoria Ying about her new graphic novel Hungry Ghost, out from First Second books. We talk about memoir vs. fiction, writing honestly, manga influences, the upcoming Shang-Chi graphic novel, and much more!
On Comic Book Herald’s Interviews I’ll be interviewing some of my favorite creators in comics about specific runs, graphic novels or series, looking for their insights on the inspirations behind the work and ideas or hidden material readers may have missed. CBH Interviews is an audio annotative guide to enjoying the intricacies and thinking in the art. Thanks for listening, and enjoy the comics!
Hungry Ghost
Writer: Victoria Ying
Shang-Chi and The Quest for Immortality
Writer/Illustrator: Victoria Ying
Publisher: Marvel
About the Author:
Victoria Ying is an accomplished author and artist with credits ranging from big box Disney movies to DC and Marvel Comics! She also boasts a collection of original graphic novels, such as City of Secrets.
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Music for Best Comics Ever by Anthony Weis. Check out more music at anthonyweis.com.
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The post “Hungry Ghost” with Victoria Ying | CBH Interviews #109 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave and Zack talk Jim Starlin’s return to Thanos in Infinity Abyss and Peter David’s conclusion to the Hulk saga in Incredible Hulk: The End.
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Incredible Hulk / Incredible Hulk: The End | #38, 41,42 / #1 | Bruce Jones and John Romita Jr run, which was particularly influential towards the 2008 MCU Hulk movie with Ed Norton. Then Peter David gets to conclude Hulk in a “What If” style story. | | Infinity Abyss | #1 to #6 | Starlin returns to Thanos! |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2003 pt. 1
| Fantastic Four: Unstable Molecules | Added by Patreon Backer Rob. M | | Fantastic Four (1998-2012) | #67 to #70, #500 to #502 | Waid and Wieringo in full swing with “Unthinkable”! A classic with huge ramifications | | Sentinel | #1 to #6 |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
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The post 2002 Pt. 6: Incredible Hulk & Infinity Abyss appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below:
Marvel announced what’s to come for Immortal X-Men and X-Men Red, including the return of Big Daddy A! Then, we dig into today’s new releases including Sins of Sinister and everything else good.
This Week’s Comics
Sins of Sinister: Storm & The Brotherhood #3
X-Men #21
The post Sins of Sinister: Storm & The Brotherhood & Today’s Comics | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
“Our Nine-Hundred-Years-and-Counting Mission”
Credits: Kieron Gillen writes; Alessandro Vitti draws; Rain Beredo colors; Clayton Cowles letters; cover by Leinil Francis Yu and Jesus Aburtov
A millennium into the Sinister Era—or rather, 900 hundred years into the Exodus Dominion (speaking only in the religious sense)—and our plucky heroes, Mister Sinister and his devoted servant Rasputin IV, are winding dramatically toward the conclusion of their centuries-long star romp, whose grim relentlessness must surely echo in tone the source of this issue’s epigraph, literature’s most embittered picaresque, Voltaire’s Candide. The 1759 French novella is most pointedly a rebuttal of Leibniz’s belief that our world must surely be the best of all possible worlds; this is actually the opposite a “multiverse” theory, since Leibniz was saying only one world is, it is this one and since God made this one world, why, it must surely be the best there could possibly be—so, Candide’s cast parades through a sequence of real-world horrors, which they mostly happily rationalize as simply integral to God’s miraculous natural order. And if our reality is so great, what does that say about the lesser options that might have been? Here’s an answer:
Welcome to Sinister X-Men: Warhammer!
Imagine the most loathsome anti-life tendencies of religiosity multiplied throughout the galaxy via Prayerworlds, each a world engine of mindless devotion wrenched from tortured meatpuppet prayerbots to feed a giant Exodus—whose greatest enemy is the next closest Exodus on his own Prayerworld. Warhammer goodness, indeed. The Warhammer universe Emperor is somewhat akin to what we see here from Exodus, in that each day, a thousand souls are sacrificed to sustain his immortality and thus his endless war against heretics, and even mutants! There is no individuality left in this war-ravaged reality (A few years ago, Gillen himself wrote a Warhammer title for Marvel).
But Gillen also continues with his little nods to Star Trek—with the “mission log” narration and even the title (though Star Trek’s missions were typically only five years). The Marauder starship Sinister and Rasputin IV fled in last issue has lost the rest of its crew almost a millennium later. And the survivors are looking ragged. Vitti’s scratchy, shadowy art sells the decrepitude of this grim nowhere future (It’s not clear, though, what we’re supposed to make of the Marauder’s the organic-looking encrustations. Perhaps they’re small bits of the Uedo growths eating up Sol System? Ick).
In the opening scene, the Marauder is in low orbit around an Exodus Prayerworlds, and Rasputin IV teleports into what seems to be its central “cathedral” (for lack of another word) following a clue, which she does glean, telepathically, from one of the tormented clones in endless prayer in their fluid-filled sac—“We should be on the same side.” Sinister remembers Destiny’s words all too well. Again, this was basically just homage to Warhammer, although Vitti also draws a neat parallel between Exodus on his throne and Sinister ensconced in his pilot’s seat: ultimately, each in their own way seems broken, without a real future.
Indeed, the entire universe at this point seems without a real future: Xavier brain fleets battle Sinister bots deployed by Emma’s Red Diamond; the “Materialist Colossus’ citadels” guard against demonic incursions from Magik’s Limbo; and Kate Pryde and her marauding “packs” are literal space pirates—these days, she sounds like a real jerk. Odd Quiet Council additions, Namor and Beast aren’t up to anything special (Beast’s abject subjugation to Emma, as her “Court Scientist,” is somewhat amusing. But really, everything has come to very little cause for amusement).
Destiny’s message sends the Marauder to a moldering satellite that’s survived for a thousand years. From it, Rasputin IV retrieves a wax cylinder whose encoded message can be played via a phonograph—just as Sinister had left one for Destiny in the late 1800s (as seen in Immortal X-Men #8). However, it doesn’t seem like she had an actual vision of her death at that earlier point, only assuring him that she must be dead and his lab hidden again if he’s received this ghostly echo out of the deep past.
Although Destiny has called for her and Sinister to be on the same side in the past, this is the first time she’s flatly stated, “I will join you”—should he succeed in resetting the timeline. She’s desperate, but I doubt that she wouldn’t still have plenty of tricks to play on this diamond fool.
In the message, she refers to Nathaniel Essex’s grief in losing his young son to illness, which, as seen in Peter Milligan’s Further Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix (1996), is what triggered his embrace of Apocalypse’s (Celestial) technological transformation into Mr. Sinister.
Rasputin listens in on Destiny’s message, which calls out Sinister’s ultimate goal “to become a Dominion,” which Destiny assures him is doomed to failure. Her final words of advice are “Give up,” as in figure out how to reset this reality. Until now, his right-hand warrior had been under the impression they were going to save the universe, not destroy it. Rasputin’s shattering sense of betrayal, followed by abject abandonment, neatly parallels Wagnerine’s fate over in Spurrier’s Nightcrawlers.
To be clear, then, if we’re rooting for the heroes in this event, we the readers should be hoping their reality, however horrific from our standpoint, survives and wins, against all odds, some kind of rebirth.
And isn’t “against all odds” exactly what makes our pluckiest heroes most sympathetic to us?
Interestingly, the last page gives us a voice that must belong to Mother Righteous calling out to Rasputin drifting in the void…
The real surprise this issue is that Moira is still alive, and once he’s rid of Rasputin IV, Sinister finds her, following “Irene’s dance steps.” Emma, grown gloriously vapid in her Cyttorak ruby form, learns from Court Scientist Beast that the fugitive pair are alive and pinged.
This will undoubtedly lead the Red Diamond forces to the World Farm, where the Marauder has been downed by a now Odin-like Jon Ironfire—and Sinister, Moira and the last remaining Doombot seem to be his captives. Although surely, Sinister’s conniving ways could get the better of him…
NEXT time in: Storm & the Brotherhood of Mutants #3
The post “Sins of Sinister” Part 8: Immoral X-Men #3—in Review! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack talk Grant Morrison and Jae Lee’s Fantastic Four, Mark Waid and Mike Wieringo’s Fantastic Four, AND the end of the Kang Dynasty. So many comics!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Fantastic Four: 1234 / Fantastic Four | #1 to #4 / #51 to #54, #60 to #61 | Grant Morrison and Jae Lee Marvel Knights series deconstructs the Fantastic Four, before the excellent Waid and Wieringo run begins. | | Avengers | #48 to #56 | The end of the Kang War and the Kurt Busiek Avengers run ends |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2002 pt. 6
| Incredible Hulk / Incredible Hulk: The End | #38, 41,42 / #1 | Bruce Jones and John Romita Jr run, which was particularly influential towards the 2008 MCU Hulk movie with Ed Norton. Then Peter David gets to conclude Hulk in a “What If” style story. | | Infinity Abyss | #1 to #6 | Starlin returns to Thanos! |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!
The post 2002 Pt. 5: Fantastic Four & Avengers appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
“The ones who return are the ones who suffer. Live as if you’ve never lived before.” – Niles Caulder receiving a message from his subconscious. Doom Patrol #73. “The Dream Patrol: Return of the Windowmen,” written by Rachel Pollack.
In his introduction to The Vertigo Tarot, Sandman creator Neil Gaiman mentions the surreal experience of accompanying author Rachel Pollack on a visit to an esoteric shop in Camden to pick up a Tarot deck. This resulted in Gaiman, “feeling like I’d just gone into a record show with someone who, to my surprise, turned out to be one of the Beatles, as Rachel modestly admitted her identity to the lady behind the counter, and signed autographs.”
Last month, Gaiman wrote again about Pollack, but this time under heavier circumstances. “I am writing this at the request of her wife Zoe,” he wrote on his Mastodon account, “to let her friends know that the end is soon, and to let the obituarists know too.”
As befitting a woman who broke ground wherever she went, the sad news sent shockwaves in various circles. Pollack’s biggest claim to fame came as a foremost authority on the Tarot, as her books inspired several generations of practitioners. She was also a pioneering LGBTQIA+ activist, coming out as a trans lesbian in the early 1970s at roughly the same time she discovered the Tarot. Gradually, Pollack also found success as an acclaimed science-fiction author. She won the Arthur C. Clarke Award for her debut Unquenchable Fire in 1989 and, in 1997, her Godmother Night won the World Fantasy Award. She also spent a decade teaching creative writing at Goddard College.
Yet one of her most enduring legacies came with an unlikely third career she picked up in the 1990s when she took over the DC superhero franchise Doom Patrol, boldly embracing the thankless task of following Grant Morrison’s franchise-defining run. While she was only on the book for two years before it was canceled due to declining sales, the 24 issues she wrote (plus an annual and a short story for the Vertigo Jam special) eventually developed a cult following and gained delayed recognition for introducing the first trans superhero in mainstream comic book history.
As befitting her work—which often took place in worlds unmoored from the limiting confines of so-called rationality—Pollack landed the gig thanks to a fortuitous coincidence. Knowing that Morrison was about to depart, editor Tom Peyer was struggling to come up with a candidate that could follow up one of the most radical reboots in DC Comics history. “I had no one at all in mind, and was nervous about it,” Peyer explained in an email interview, “until one night my friend and fellow editor Stuart Moore brought me to a Science Fiction Writers of America cocktail party and introduced me to Rachel. By the time we finished our first conversation, I was pretty sure I’d met the one. A miracle.”
While Pollack’s run only lasted two years, it’s hard to imagine any other writer doing more with a title in the time they were given. Most daringly, in the Finnegans Wake-inspired “Dream Patrol: Return of the Windowmen,” Pollack used dense symbolism to condense the Doom Patrol’s entire convoluted history into a metafictional meditation on the cycle of death and rebirth in comic book stories, all within 24 pages. It was truly heady stuff—in fact the entire story is the dream of a character reduced to the state of a disembodied head—that stood out in an era defined by the muscles-and-guns excesses of the Image Comics crowd.
Let’s not pretend that this was all serious stuff, however; Pollack’s Doom Patrol run was also flat-out hilarious. Just a few issues after taking over the title, she moved the team to a new mansion that was haunted by Sexually Remaindered Spirits (S.R.S. for short, a sly joke that certainly slipped past many readers), the ghosts of victims of surreal autoerotic accidents. Maybe her most famous single issue, “The Laughing Game,” is a parody of the then-popular Image Comics cliché of uber-macho caricatures who prove their virility by lugging around comically huge weapons. It tells the story of The Codpiece, a proto-incel who decides to overcompensate for his imagined shortcomings by attaching a rocket launcher to his groin area and going on a destructive crime spree.
The hero of “The Laughing Game” is Kate Godwin whose debut appearance ends with her dissolving The Codpiece’s deadly faux-phallus. Godwin, a trans lesbian who takes on the name Coagula after gaining superpowers, had tried out for the Justice League of America, who rejected her partly because they are uncomfortable. “I suspect they liked my powers but couldn’t handle me,” Kate says and the story never gives you a reason to believe she’s mistaken.
30 years later, Peyer pointed out that the world is still attempting to catch up with Kate: “You want a trans superhero? Well, here’s one from 30 years ago. She was so far ahead, and it’s sad to think that in 2023 we’re lagging further behind.”
Indeed, the world was not ready for Pollack’s Doom Patrol. Readers were able to adjust to Morrison’s incorporation of the androgynous composite spirit Rebis and the genderfluid sentient Danny the Street into the team but Pollack, in Peyer’s words, “took it further.” She explicitly wrote about sex and gender to a level that made some readers uncomfortable. These elements were easier to understand when Morrison deployed them as surreal metaphors, but readers of the time were less comfortable dealing with, for instance, Kate explicitly defending her womanhood against Cliff Steele’s more old-fashioned beliefs about gender. (To Cliff’s credit, he’s a quick learner.)
“People talk a lot about the subtext of what superheroes are, but one of the things they definitely are is queer,” Pollack told The Comics Journal in an interview last year. “Because they have all these powers that don’t come out until they change their clothes and dare to go out in these wild costumes. And not hide. This gives queer kids the fantasy of being able to be who you truly are and be powerful.”
In making the queer subtext of Morrison’s run the body of the text, Pollack almost certainly limited the potential wide appeal of her Doom Patrol. It also didn’t help that a running gag in the letter column led many to assume she got the highly coveted gig by badgering the editor until he relented. “For decades afterward, there were readers who believed that was what happened,” Peyer notes. “And they weren’t too happy about it.”
Given the popularity of her predecessor, her work was always going to be a tough sell. It took Pollack a few issues to find her voice as a comic book writer and early critics wrongly dismissed her first few stories—which were overt homages to Morrison—as attempts to “out-weird Grant.”
Future collaborator Joe Corallo dismisses such criticism. “I think there were people in the past that looked at it as being absurd for the sake of absurdity,” wrote to me in an email interview, “but it’s really not. Rachel could tell you where everything was derived or inspired from, including myths and folklore from all over the world, trans activists she had been friends with, Kabbalah, and some of her favorite comic characters from her childhood like The Fox and The Crow.”
When Ted McKeever hopped aboard in issue #75 to replace Linda Medley as the book’s primary artist, his increasingly abstract cartooning style ushered in a change in the series’ tone. If Pollack’s first year of Doom Patrol felt like a self-conscious attempt to honor the picaresque plotting of the Morrison era, her second year found her more seriously incorporating spiritual and mystical elements into the book. Medley’s work emphasized the (occasionally grotesque) solidness of the characters and their surroundings, while McKeever’s minimalism marked an increased emphasis on the world of ideas.
In “The Teiresias Wars” arc, she had the Doom Patrol join forces with a mythical nonbinary entity named after T.S. Eliot to bring down The Tower of Babel. Yes, the one from the Bible. Also, Bill Clinton is a supporting character in this arc. In her final arc, “Imagine Ari’s Friends,” Pollack incorporated elements from the history of Kabbalism in the same ways that other comic book writers would incorporate Greek and Norse mythology.
The conclusion of “Imagine Ari’s Friends” was published in Doom Patrol #87 in February 1995, after which the title was canceled and then mostly ignored. When John Arcudi revived the title, he killed off the character Kate Godwin in a flashback and put Dorothy Spinner, the arguable protagonist of Pollack’s run, into an irreversible coma. While Morrison’s run was collected and celebrated, the final two years of the comic as written by Pollack went uncollected. For more than two decades afterward, your best bet in being able to read her run involved combing comic book bins for unwanted back issues.
For a while, the industry forgot her, which was a minor tragedy. While Pollack’s time working for DC Comics was relatively brief, she was quite prolific at her peak. For Vertigo, she re-imagined Brother Power, the Geek and Tomahawk. For the short-lived Helix imprint, she wrote Time Breakers, featuring the early work of artist Chris Weston. She even got to follow in the footsteps of the unrivaled Jack Kirby by spearheading a short-lived New Gods revival.
Unsurprisingly, Pollack’s most widely publicized work for DC combined her love for comics with her primary focus in life. Conceived during a time when The Sandman was essentially keeping the entire Vertigo imprint afloat, Gaiman quickly realized the only person who could help create and write the accompanying text for the Dave McKean-designed cards was Pollack. The Vertigo Tarot, containing an explanatory text by Pollack, went through several printings and ended up being the first deck for a whole generation of goths, comic book geeks and angsty drama students.
When the Vertigo wave crested, Pollack returned to her primary role as a world-renowned Tarot teacher. While those of us who mostly knew Pollack for her comics work thought she had disappeared, she continued to write, teach and even create her own jewelry.
Although her creative output slowed in later years due to recurring bouts with cancer, Pollack eventually returned to the comics world. For Comixology, she collaborated with Joe Corallo for the miniseries The Never-Ending Party which will be scheduled to be released as a TPB by Dark Horse Comics this summer. The story, about a group of partiers in the 1990s who strike a disastrous deal with Dionysus to keep a rave going well past its scheduled end, was partly inspired by Pollack’s own experiences.
“This was absolutely an idea meant to be a celebration of Rachel’s return to comics after so many years,” Corallo says. “Obviously, Tarot is a big part of Rachel’s life, which appears prominently throughout this comic. We also tackle some of the changes in attitudes towards LGBTQIA+ people in those 25 years since Rachel had been active in mainstream comics.”
While that world wasn’t quite ready for her comic book work, especially Doom Patrol, it slowly developed a cult following. It didn’t hurt when DC Universe (and then eventually HBO Max) began airing a live-action Doom Patrol series that eventually began incorporating elements of Pollack’s run, including sex ghosts modeled on the S.R.S. and an appearance by The Codpiece himself. Eventually, DC Comics released an omnibus collecting all of her Doom Patrol-related stories last October, belatedly recognizing the importance of her work.
In her introduction to the newly collected omnibus, Pollack talks about how she encounters comic fans that feel guilty about knowing about her thanks to a few dozen comic books she wrote in the mid-90s and not her award-winning science fiction novels, her rockstar status in the tarot world, or her life as a political activist. In response, she mentions receiving a letter from a young trans girl who wrote to the comic that discovering Kate Godwin helped dissuade her from committing suicide. It helped just knowing there were others like her out there.
“This letter is what comes to mind when someone assumes it was some sort of lesser project,” Pollack writes. “Some years ago, at a transgender literary festival, I made an amazing discovery. Those stories, and Kate, were an inspiration to a whole generation of transgender cartoonists. A long time had passed and I’d had no idea that the work was even remembered. This is the real superpower of Doom Patrol, to help people believe in themselves.”
The post Doom Patrol by Rachel Pollack: They Liked My Powers But Couldn’t Handle Me appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Steve Orlando’s Marauders #10-12—Annotated!Marauders #9-12
Credits: Steve Orlando writes; Eleonora Carlini draws; Matt Milla colors; Travis Lanham letters; covers by Peach Momoko (#9-10) and Kim Jacinto (#11-12).
This is the final of three annotated entries on the recently ended Marauders volume 2, a whirlwind of cosmic and timey-wimey adventure that perhaps tried to do too much in too little time and space (ironically enough!)—but should provide plenty of worthwhile fodder for further mutant adventures.
The first entry annotates issues #1-5; the second covers issues #6-9.
Here, we look at the wrap-up to the title’s main story, about the human/mutant Threshold society—which also, oddly enough, contains the seed of the origin of Krakoa itself! Unfortunately, without the rest of this gonzo deep-time history, it’s very unclear what the storytellers were trying to achieve with Threshold. Seriously, given the ease with which Mars was terraformed… why not just give them a whole new planet, which they can verify isn’t already home to indigenous life and won’t be open to damaging time paradoxes. Perhaps there was a plan here, but for the foreseeable future, we just won’t know.
That said, whatever your feelings about this title, no one can deny our storytellers here took big swings and wild risks to do something different. In an industry where nothing is ever guaranteed, they took bold moves to see how far they could get before the corporate guillotine fell. If the series wasn’t for you, hopefully, you didn’t sink much, if any, cost into it—and if you still like X comics years down the line, who knows, maybe someone will take some of the most interesting material laid out here and give it another go in a story that can run its course. Sometimes, it never happens, but if it feels relevant to the right creator, the raw story stuff from prior runs does get told, even if it’s piecemeal, by different creators over time. That is just the biz.
Marauders #9-10—“Here Comes Yesterday” finaleBefore the ultimate revelation on Threshold society, we have the first bomb-drop: In their war of survival against the anaerobic “Unbreathing,” the Thresholders created the bacterial weapons that Cassandra identifies as Arkea and Sublime! The latter was introduced in Grant Morrison’s New X-Men Annual and played a critical antagonistic role throughout their run. Sublime’s “sibling” was the primary antagonist of Brian Wood’s X-Men volume 4, perhaps the most forgettable iteration of the title; “she” was killed there, only apparently. In the long ago, these “siblings” fought for control of Earth, ending with the “sister” exiled to outer space.
It was the weapons, we learn, that wiped out their makers. In issue #10, Cassandra handily defeats them both at the same time. From here, we can assume that over the next two billion years, Arkea and Sublime eventually reformed and remembered themselves—or however that’s supposed to work!
Unfortunately for Cassandra, Kate plans to leave her in the past (with Emma’s support apparently), and Grove has agreed to her captivity at Threshold (The climactic action here feels very rushed and obscure).
Cassandra, after all, is just about the worst Marvel villain ever, and one among her 16 million kills was Kate’s father Carmen (as revealed in 2002’s X-Men Unlimited #36). It’s a nice twist that stranding her somewhere she couldn’t easily return from was the whole reason Kate really invited her on to the team. She had us all fooled for a hot minute! Emma, of course, is a survivor of Genosha, and Cassandra’s status as mutant is very sketchy, anyway. Jean in X-Men: Red volume 1 did, however, turn her into a defender of mutantkind; a little too pat, if you ask me.
Even so, Kate does emphatically acknowledge that without Cassandra with them in the past, none of them would have survived. She was the key—but by the same token, she will only ever answer to herself alone, and that is Kate’s ultimate concern.
Looking back at issue #8: Not yet knowing the Thresholders originally came from her own near future, Kate is determined to travel back in time to save Earth’s “first” mutants. Tempo has an interesting argument for why traveling further back in time is safer from time paradoxes—because messing about in the deep past allows for the overall arc of history to self-correct. Hmmm… You almost had me there, Steve!
Oh, and apparently Sublime and Arkea’s names were born of them hearing the time-traveling Marauders use them 2 billion years ago—so there’s a time paradox!
The team travels back in time from Cooterman’s Creek, the X-Men’s late ’80s Australian Outback base, which is here said to have been the site of Threshold—which is strange, because until now, we were told that Threshold society spanned a continent. Two billion years ago, that would have been Gondwanaland.
Issue #9 fully introduces Threshold’s “defector,” “Nightfount,” who’s clearly—Stryfe! More importantly, this is the debut of the Thresholder… Grove! More on her in a moment.
And we’re also introduced to the notion of the Seed, the name for the box Kate received in the annual—which is a later version of what we see here in issue #9, in the deep past. Eventually, we know, she will place a map of Krakoa in it—leading her earlier/present-day self to Cassandra. Theia says the Thresholders came from this little mysterium container, opening in the birthing sea and filling it with life. As such, this is another hint this integrated society of mutants and humans come from the future. The title’s last two issues fully answer the Seed’s mystery.
Still, we can infer here that Kate’s future self will create the Threshold’s Seed…
Issue #10 reveals a little: Stryfe’s plan was to kill off the Thresholders and reshape history himself—although why he had to wait until Threshold existed to travel back in time for this end… well, whatever. Time travel never makes sense. And if this Stryfe born of genetic information sent back in time means there are others, essentially clones (of clones of clones, etc.), up and down the timestream, well, what do you expect?! Duggan already acknowledged in Cable that this most operatic of ’90s villains is our fave clonal chaos agent. The question, though, is that if Kate didn’t send this bozo back in time via the Seed, who did?
(Note also that Blaquesmith pops up in our first splashy look at Threshold in issue #4. Did he have his eye on “Nightfount?” And who put him into the Seed? Or maybe this future time traveler arrived elsewise?)
This is the arc’s final issue, the series is now ended—and the apparent big bad, Stryfe, has simply vanished! Maybe he’ll un-merge from Amass at some point?
Actually, I don’t think Orlando was really going for a big bad in this arc. The story was Threshold.
Grove is the real revelation here: It turns out she’s the future Okkara. That’s right! She will one day become an island (She kind of reminds me of Nature Girl, too, but anyway)! Readers can’t say there wasn’t foreshadowing, for Amass in issue #8 did say he thought Krakoa seemed familiar (And it’s no accident that the Quiet Council meets in a chamber of the same name, but there’s no deeper connection, except for potential recognition that the real governing body of Krakoa is itself, which perhaps also harbors within Thresholder minds).
Theia and Amass are left behind when the Marauders leave, to live out their natural lives—but they’re resurrected, along with Crave, upon their return. Hurrah!
Marauders #11-12—“Pre-Genesis”The government of Santo Marco, an embarrassingly anonymous “tea cup nation” of Latin America (debuting in 1964’s X-Men #4, as a short-lived fiefdom for Magneto), has been using the mutant Feedback (real obscure Beta Flight member, Alpha Flight #118-130, 1993) to power their electrical grid. This atrocity has backfired at the start of the issue, with Feedback’s powers overloading and causing a huge explosion, killing and injuring many innocents and ruining infrastructure. Initially, the Marauders believe the disaster was caused by a mutant terrorist attack.
After helping with crisis relief, the team travels to Genosha’s Hammer Bay (where we see the memorial that Toad, Polaris and others built back in Morrison’s New X-Men #132)—where Kate declares her plan to resurrect the Genoshan dead (whose remains are still there on the shattered island), including the humans who died there. Polaris will shape the box, Cerebra will scan Genosha for DNA, which will go in the Seed, and Tempo will send it way back in time (which isn’t at all how Tempo’s powers “traditionally” work, lol).
Genoshan survivor Wicked (from Claremont’s 2004 Excalibur) shows up to contact the “necroplasm” of the dead—not the ghosts, who she acknowledges are currently in the Waiting Room (“passing notes”), but rather their “manifestations” from the moment of death. This means they can ask and get consent before sending each dead individual off to the deep past to be resurrected there as part of Threshold. Significantly, this death whisperer did once summon Carmen Pryde’s (necroplasmic) spirit for Kate, on Hanukkah (2018’s Merry X-Men Holiday Special, the story “Never Again” by Claremont and the Dodsons); and she sees him again here in Marauders #11.
The necroplasmic Carmen (not his ghost!) appears here again, along with other Genoshan, er, necroplasms, to help Kate create the map that then goes in the Seed box. With that incomprehensible plot tie-up squared (?), the team goes back in time again, presumably now a really long time before Threshold’s emergence, since it wouldn’t have popped up overnight. As to how the anachronistic humans and mutants adapted to primordial Earth and then achieved the social and technological sophistication to create their city-state, well—maybe this, too, is supposed to be a story for another day?
For that matter, what exactly was the point of Threshold, except, incidentally (from the in-universe POV), providing a time-paradox origin for Krakoa?
There are some touching moments here, but for this reader, the glaring holes in this truncated story neutralized my overall appreciation for the storytellers’ outsized ambitions. Perhaps, one day, another run by Orlando or someone else will give us the bigger picture. For now, I have to say, this one missed the trees for the forest. Then again, if creators only took risks when the timing was just right for guaranteed success, well, little of substance would ever get created!!!
A quick note on Bushwacker dust-up in issue #12: New character Esera Seanoa is said by Cerebra to be Northstar 2099’s great-granddad; he’s one of the mutant artists Bushwacker had been targeting. Again, we get this scene to tell us that we might expect an intermittent build toward the Marvel 2099 universe, someday, as that future’s past becomes the present’s near-future—right?
NEXT: There are never too many possibilities, right?!The post Steve Orlando’s Marauders—Annotated, Part 3! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below:
Marvel announced the post Fall of X comics slate for X-Men, and we’ll talk about what books are coming and what to expect. Then, we dig into today’s new releases including Sins of Sinister and Wolverine vs. Beast!
This Week’s Comics
Sins of Sinister: Immoral X-Men #3
Wolverine #32
Rogue & Gambit #2
The post Fall of X Comics Announcement & Today’s X-Men! | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Marauders #6-8
Credits: Steve Orlando writes; Eleonora Carlini (#7-8) and Andrea Broccardo (#6) draw; Matt Milla colors; Ariana Maher letters; covers by Kael Ngu (#6-7) and Peach Momoko (#8).
This is the second of three annotated entries on the recently ended Marauders volume 2, a whirlwind of cosmic and timey-wimey adventure that perhaps tried to do too much in too little time and space (ironically enough!)—but should provide plenty of worthwhile fodder for further mutant adventures.
The first entry annotates issues #1-5; the third covers issues #9-12.
While the last entry speculates on where the title’s deepest revelations, regarding the origins of Krakoa itself, might be headed beyond Marauders #12, this one 1) provides some backstory reference for each Marauder, per their character-revealing therapy sessions; 2) covers the obscure pulls Orlando utilizes for the B plot (which unfortunately likely won’t get picked on again for quite a while); and 3) lays out the basics of the title’s main story, about the human/mutant Threshold society 2 billion years ago.
Marauders #6: “Even Odds of Destruction,” a peripheral A.X.E.: Judgment Day tie-inIf this issue hadn’t been an event tie-in, it would’ve been a downtime moment, and it’s clearly in homage to a 1992 classic, X-Factor #87 by Peter David and Joe Quesada—“X-Aminations,” wherein each teammember sits down for therapy with Dr. Leonard Samson to discuss traumas new and old, much like Orlando does here with his Marauders, returning from deep space.
For the Marauders’ therapy, another ’90s callback is their therapist—Birdy, who debuted in X-Men #6 (1992) by Scott Lobdell and Jim Lee, as a captive of Sabretooth with quite the case of Stockholm syndrome, also appearing in the first Sabretooth mini, by Larry Hama and Mark Texeira, where she died at the hands of Sabretooth and Mystique’s son Graydon Creed, because he hates his dad so much and it was the era for fridging women characters left and right. A mutant empath, she’s a natural in her new role on Krakoa, and she’s officially on Nightcrawler’s Legionaire team (Legion of X #3-4, 9) and also appeared in infinity comic X-Men Unlimited #44 by Orlando, her first Krakoa-era appearance, alongside the Marauders as a kind of crisis relief worker (From this latter issue’s emergency team, Triage also reappears in Marauders #11 for healing those wounded from Santo Marco’s Feedback/reactor disaster; see below).
Birdy tries talking each member of the team through their A.X.E.: Judgment Day moment. First, Bishop is haunted by his dead friends and XSE colleagues Malcolm and Randall (see Uncanny X-Men #282-287).
In Aurora’s mindscape, we see her myriad personalities. She fought the very obscure, mind-controlling Headlok in 1990’s Alpha Flight #93-94 by Fabian Nicieza. The Progenitor’s bizarre choice of avatar here deals out real-world Inner Active Cards, which actually look pretty neat; the art for this set, he says, is by “prophetic mutant painter” Nemesio Pietri, of Orlando favorite District X (#6-12, 2004) by David Hine.
The Progenitor appears to Tempo as the deceased Sumo, her erstwhile teammate from the MLF; he debuted in 1990’s New Mutants #93, very early Liefeld days, only to be killed by Cable in 1992’s Cable: Blood and Metal #1 by Fabian Nicieza and John Romita, Jr.
[Tempo’s mention of an MLF run-in with New Warriors villain Eugenix is new, an untold story.]Kwannon’s daughter was introduced as a digitized mind in the universally panned Fallen Angels (2019), and the only copy of her consciousness was destroyed at the end of the much-missed Hellions by Zeb Wells.We also get a reminder of why Akihiro has been given a new codename, albeit one that really doesn’t work: Daken is Japanese for “mongrel,” a racist slur.
As for the Brimstone Love/Theater of Pain B plot, introduced in Orlando’s 2021 Marauders Annual #1 (preceding the title’s first issue) unfortunately, this never goes anywhere due to the title’s abrupt cancellation. Alas! But here, we see Lockheed (Kate Pryde’s bestie alien friend from 1983’s Uncanny X-Men #166 on) has been keeping an eye on the Theater of Pain, led by a pre-2099 Brimstone Love, who doesn’t show up again until issues #11-12. No doubt, Orlando’s aim was for a larger story than what we got. This bizarre cult is anti-Krakoan but pro-integrationist (à la the Xavier of yore), although their methods are rather sadistic.
The villainous Brimstone Love of X-Men 2099 popped up sporadically throughout the mid-’90s.
Unfortunately, the most memorable aspect of this unfinished plot is that it is simply stuffed with rando ’90s pulls. As it never found its feet, its core justification, this truncated plot thread reads as though written by an overexcited fanboy just throwing out references that for beg for a handbook for most readers. I know that Orlando must have had much more planned here, but we may never know.
In the annual, the one recognizable mutant member of the Theater (beside Love himself) was the Morlock Carver. Now, we find Scratch, originally a goose-stepping servant of the Red Queen Madelyne Pryor of parallel universe 998, introduced in late-stage X-Man (#63, 67-70) at that time by Warren Ellis. His power is his immunity from other mutants’ powers. Survivor of a failed assassination, knives to the brain, he lives on in a state of perpetual bloodthirsty rage.
[We never learn who the poor mutant corpse is on the table!]Here, we also see Dirtnap, the mouse with a red smiley face on its back. This mutant once appeared human until he used his mutant absorption power on a rat, while in flight from a savage Wolverine, and so he got stuck (in his debut, 1995’s Wolverine #95 by Larry Hama; see also Hama’s Generation X #33-39). He was never depowered, though! At least not until his seeming death at the hands, er, claws, of Daken, um, Fang, in Marauders #11.Issue #7 gives us the Mr.-Fantastic-like Stringfellow, former Sunspot bodyguard, slain by Scratch. Stringfellow’s first and only other appearance is Claremont’s 2004 X-Treme X-Men #35.
And that’s the Theater of Pain’s mutant roster—yikes! In fact, we can go ahead and wrap up the wrap-up on Brimstone and his followers in the title’s last two issues, where it’s just a nub of a B plot that never took off: Fang brings in forgotten (body horror) mutant Johnny Dee for help in his revenge quest against Brimstone. Dee can create voodoo dolls of those whose DNA he’s consumed via his sentient chest mouth; yeah, weird (see David Hine’s X-Men: The 198 and Civil War: X-Men, mid-2000s). Krakoan amnesty must have got this erstwhile terrorist released from jail. A bizarre pull, but Orlando does love him some David Hine—and it all works in Brimstone’s grisly defeat!
Might the Theater of Pain return in Orlando’s “epilogue” to his run, in the June release of the one-shot Before the Fall – Mutants’ First Strike?
Issue #7’s other bookend offers a new plot thread, this one featuring the villainous shrink Judas Traveller, who debuted in the much ballyhooed “Clone Saga” (Web of Spider-Man #117, 1994)—although Orlando did reintroduce the mutant telepath slightly earlier with foreshadowing in Giant-Size X-Men: Thunderbird and more fully in infinity comic X-Men Unlimited #45. For unknown reasons he’s joined up with Orchis and commands a high-ranking position. He hasn’t been seen since Marauders #6.
We covered 2099’s Cerebra in the first annotation entry. She reappears next issue, where she helps resurrect the three Threshold mutants, and in issue #12, where she fights Bushwacker alongside Psylocke and Aurora. Hopefully, the mutant biometricist finds her full potential going forward.
Per issue #12, Bushwacker, originally a Daredevil villain (debuting in 1987’s Daredevil #248, a classic from Ann Nocenti), did indeed once enjoy hunting down mutant artists, although outside the Nocenti run, this wasn’t something other creators focused on with the scuzzy assassin. Still, it works—and Psylocke gets to psychically turn him into a harmless artist himself (small comfort to those he’s killed, though). This scene seems to function merely as a reminder that the 2099 Cerebra should still be in play going forward.
Marauders #7-10—“Here Comes Yesterday,” pt1This arc’s title is in homage to Grant Morrison’s final New X-Men arc, “Here Comes Tomorrow.”
In an action-packed vignette that’s not a prologue, the Marauders visit the town of Captain America, NE (from Mark Waid’s Captain America #695, 2017), which was rechristened after Steve Cap rescued it from white supremacists; now, it’s been taken over by the Watchdogs, a right-wing militia that debuted in 1987’s Captain America #335 by Mark Gruenwald (they played a scarily relevant role throughout the rest of Gruenwald’s beloved Cap run and reappeared for much of the excellent Ta-Nehisi Coates era).
The mutant “meatcastle” Horsepower debuts here, unless you count his Orlando 2099 version (from Spider-Man 2099: Exodus #5). He is very ’90s, and not in an exciting way. It might be interesting to see how Cerebra reacts to this mutant she’ll know decades later.
This arc really starts with the resurrection of the Thresholders Theia, Amass and Crave, previously stored digitally on the “timedrive” that the team recovered in issue #5. This is where Cerebra’s biometric powers come in handy; she can also create backups of mutants out of range of Cerebro.
Bishop randomly has foreknowledge of an obscure but critical moment almost 2.5 billion years ago, which will play a role in the plot going forward (not that he would know that yet!). The Great Oxidation Event that wiped out most of ancient Earth’s anaerobic life is not common knowledge, however fascinating. But then, maybe Bishop’s curiosity about the past encompasses more than just fanboy X-Men lore.
Anyhow, even with the Aaron Avengers retcon of the Progenitor’s death on Earth four billion years ago being responsible for the eventual emergence of superpowered Earthlings, the Threshold society existing many hundreds of millions of years before Homo erectus makes zero sense.
Furthermore, the Thresholders somehow evolved from the primordial soup without being attacked by vengeful anaerobic sentients until they were an extremely advanced civilization. That really defies logic!
That’s okay! Cassandra knew they were hiding something from the beginning—and we’ll find out what soon. Still, it’s nice to see erstwhile time refugee Bishop welcoming more such refugees, albeit from the deep past (Oddly, Theia looks very Shi’ar, but it’s great that she and Tempo might have a shot…).
NEXT: The conclusion to Orlando and Carlini’s Marauders—and the mystery of Threshold…The post Steve Orlando’s Marauders—Annotated, Part 2! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Comics are good. These are the best of 2023.
Related Best Of Lists:Best Comics of 2022
Best Comics of All Time
Below you’ll find all the best comics released in 2023, updated throughout the year as I read more great books. See a graphic novel or series you love missing from the list? Let us know in the comments!
Best New Comics of 2023Why Don’t You Love Me?
With digital streaming services and review copies, it’s a rarity these days that I buy a whole graphic novel from a creator I don’t know sight unseen, but that’s what happened when I saw Zack Quantaince raving about P.B. Rainey’s “Why Don’t You Love Me?”. Zack (formerly Comics Bookcase, now of Comics Beat) called the Drawn and Quarterly book “the first must-read graphic novel of 2023” and “one of the most surprising graphic novels in years.” Color me hooked!
Now, “Why Don’t You Love Me?” is a little tricky to talk about because it revolves heavily around some twists and turns, and I think knowing what they are would undo much of the work’s spell. In his back-cover blurb, Neil Gaiman (Sandman, Netflix Sandman, not Flint Marko) says, “…I thought it read like any number of… vapid early 2000s stories… the cartoonist’s way of telling you they hated everyone and everything. And then it came into focus and it wasn’t that thing at all… What a masterwork.” This sums it up quite nicely, but it also highlights the difficulty of Rainey’s magic trick. In order to see the full picture, and get to the payoff, there’s a lot of uncomfortable cruelty to wade through, particularly as a parent. The entire work is told in Sunday newspaper strip style black-and-white, detailing a man and woman’s challenges navigating the routines of family life, work and relationships. I found myself alternating between intrigue, disgust, laughter and heartache. Sometimes it hurts. Sometimes I had to put the book down and say – not today. Sometimes I couldn’t put it down!
Masterwork? I don’t know. I’m still on-the-fence on that one. But a 2023 must-read, and one of the more fascinating graphic novels this year? Absolutely.
Damn Them All
One of the more memorable interactions I’ve had in an interview came when I asked Si Spurrier about his run on Hellblazer – critically adored, and cut down after only 12 issues – and he had such an honest, open air of disappointment and sadness to his answer (paraphrased here from memory): “Sometimes you get to write the book you were born to write… and it just doesn’t work out.” I found it heartbreaking.
So, few things in comics this year give me greater joy than watching Spurrier and Charlie Adlard just do a Constantine book and call it something else via Boom Studios! Damn Them All is essentially the story of Constantine’s niece, after his death, and her challenges navigating his occult lessons and related baggage, as well as her own personal demons. Adlard and Sofie Dodgson’s rendering of the impossibly demonic avoid the unknowable in favor of renditions the human mind can comprehend, which works quite well in a book where the demons of hell are mysteriously made feeble and subservient. Likewise, Spurrier’s time in the X-Office pays off with incorporated textual interstitials laying out Alfie’s last will and testament (our Constantine substitute) and encyclopedic entries on the occult. Maybe this is the book Spurrier was born to write; damn all those who try to stop it!
Kaya
Wes Craig’s work on 8 years and 56 issues of Deadly Class with Rick Remender is honestly some of the most underrated storytelling of the past decade, despite the book’s success. Even knowing that I slept on the first three issues of Kaya, but now that I’m caught up, this is clearly one of the best comics of the year. Craig’s fantasy world design is reminiscent of Horizon Zero Dawn by way of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, with enough splash pages of lizard-warriors and giant spiders to thrill the Jeff Smith fan in all of us. At its core, though, Kaya is the story of a hardened warrior sister and her little brother, who’ve lost their tribe and need to find their way in a threatening, complicated world. It’s a time-tested formula told magnificently, and well on its way to status as an all-ages classic.
Mister Mammoth
What if Sherlock Holmes looked like slasher-film Ben Grimm, was a world-renowned pacifist, and found themselves placed right in the middle of The Maltese Falcon? That’s where Matt Kindt kicks things off with French artist Jean-Denis Pendanx, in the first straight-to-graphic-novel release from Kindt’s Flux House imprint at Dark Horse Comics. While Kindt has established a very particular world of whimsical espionage across a wide variety of some of my favorite comics (Mind MGMT, Black Badge, or even this year’s Spy Superb), Mister Mammoth is pure detective-noir, with the world’s greatest crime-solver set to uncover a mystery that gets increasingly complex and personal with each new revelation. This work marks Pendanx’s US debut, and it’s marvelous, evoking similar mystery thrills of Blacksad. 120 pages of gorgeous modern-noir with a 7-foot tall comic book figure in the lead? Sign me up. Plus, Mister Mammoth builds to one of the better puzzles in Kindt’s oeuvre.
Ashes
Including Ashes as a new 2023 graphic novel is a mild misdirect, considering Alvaro Ortiz’s work debuted in Spain over 10 years ago. But considering this marks the first time Top Shelf Productions has translated Ortiz’s work into English, it’s going to be many readers first time exploring the artist’s work, and it’s more than worth stretching the rules to encourage more familiarity.
Ashes is the story of three 30-something, estranged friends reconnecting for a road trip after the fourth member of their former crew dies suddenly. They are tasked with delivering his ashes to a mysterious “X marks the spot” he left behind. While full of the pathos and relatable isolation that stems from friendships gone stale, Ortiz’s humor, pacing and unexpected whimsy separate Ashes from the long line of melancholy odes to loneliness. There are quirky roughnecks on the friends’ trail, Mojo’s pet monkey, and a brilliant use of one-page asides to either explore the history of cremation, or, well, that aforementioned monkey. The end result is a delightful graphic novel desperately waiting for a movie adaptation, and yet another explosion of attention.
Shubeik Lubeik
For another English translation of a modern masterwork, we have Deena Mohamed’s Shubeik Lubeik, now translated from the original Arabic via Pantheon (the series originally ran as 3 distinct parts from 2017 to 2021). Mohamed’s carefully constructed economy of magic wishes drives an astonishingly rich not-so-alternate reality where the wealthy can afford “1st Class” wishes that can grant them nearly anything, and those in need are left to take their chances with risky “3rd Class” wishes. Through all the detailed exploration of wish manufacture, sale, and legality, there’s a character driven, intersecting story of a Kiosk vendor with three licensed first-class wishes just waiting to be sold and used.
Shubeik Lubeik draws from Salman Rushdie, Arabian Nights, modern marketing techniques, and Jonathan Hickman-esque infographics to craft something wholly unique and captivating. It’s a brilliant use of fantasy to elucidate a metaphor so plain it’s like staring out the window. Even after 500+ pages, I still wish there was more.
Hungry Ghost
Victoria Ying’s First Second publishing debut is a gorgeous yet unsettling depiction of disordered eating in a high school girl named Valerie. While you might feel like you know this story through media, Ying is careful to focus on the ways disordered eating, and the cultural and familial pressures in Val’s life, come to dominate her every waking action and thought. This can be a hard read, especially if you or someone you know struggles with disordered eating, or even addiction, but it’s also a hopeful read culminating in the values of friendship, identity and family.
To this point Ying’s work on City of Secrets and Diana: Princess of the Amazons is geared towards younger readers, but on Hungry Ghost the struggles and mental toll are meant for a slightly more mature audience, and Ying captures this teenage experience with deft awareness. The recurring use of pink and turquoise adds a calming, almost meditative quality, interrupted by dark greys and brown during the tensest moments. I won’t spoil the conclusion, but I was also fascinated by finding hope in an ending despite, as Trung Le Ngyuen puts it on the back-cover blurb “people in your life who might stand in the way of… self-love.” It’s a smart, engaging read with the potential to really help someone who needs it.
Mimosa
I remember in my early 20s, in the earliest stages of Comic Book Herald, I started to get emails from artists promoting their comics on Kickstarter, or simply looking for coverage. And I distinctly remember how some of those would hinge all their marketing on the fact that the comic was queer, or featured LGBT+ (the acronym usually stopped there in those days!) characters. I won’t lie, at this point in my life, I didn’t get it. There wasn’t aversion to the purported queerness of the work so much as confusion as to why these artists would emphasize that at the expense of telling me what kind of story was going to be told.
A decade later, and the situation is largely inverted. I am a lot more likely to give works promoting their queerness a chance, simply because I’ve seen how these marginalized creators can otherwise go ignored or undercelebrated. Plus, from a self-interest standpoint, new queer perspectives offer the possibility of a tonal specificity that I won’t find in other works from more familiar creators, and that often leads to interesting work. The thing that the “anti-woke” dog-whistle of “We just want good stories” misses, or willfully ignores, is that often times the clearest path to a quality fresh narrative is through diverse voices that can capture aspects of worlds you don’t already know.
This is all a long-winded way of saying that on the surface Archie Bongiovanni’s new graphic novel, “Mimosa”, doesn’t sound all that inventive. A group of four friends are getting older, and their personal lives start getting in the way of their relationships, so they plan a new dance-party meet-up for thirty-somethings. There is virtually no hook when the premise is stated so flatly!
But that’s not the story. The story is queer! And here that means Bongviovanni reflecting queer life through tone, character, dialog, action and story. The value of all of this is graphic novel with a very specific lens into a fictional world that feels like it could quite easily be happening anywhere from Chicago to LA right now. Importantly, too, Bongiovanni’s characters are messy, at times funny, cruel, sensual and petty. All the things fully realized friends can and should be. In many ways, Mimosa reminds me of Fire Island and an ability to uniquely give life to facets of queer experience.
The Legacy OngoingsMonstress
Marjorie Liu and Sana Takeda’s Monstress has now been in publication for 8 years, approaching 45 to 50 issues in one of the best fantasy comics of all time. While Liu and Takeda teaming up for the new Night-Eaters series of graphic novels is of course exciting, don’t let it distract from the ongoing truth: Monstress will be one of the best possible comics on shelves until the story of half-wolfs, old gods, and cursing kittens decides to reach an end!
I’m Fine I’m Fine Just Understand
Nate Stevenson’s ongoing Substack email diary comics are appointment viewing week in and week out. Whether Stevenson is detailing all the emotion of their journey with gender, identity and body image, or sharing infectiously sweet inside jokes with their partner Molly Knox Ostertag, the work is inspired, heartfelt and moving.
Much ado was made about big-name American comics creators taking big paychecks to publish comics via Substack, yet Stevenson is the only creator whose e-mails I actually open and read with any kind of regularity. I’m still skeptical about comics in your inbox as a publishing model; this is the exception.
Very Likely To Be Added As More Issues Are Released in 2023!
- Fantastic Four by Ryan North and Iban Coello
- Immortal X-Men / X-Men Red
- Night Fever by Brubaker and Phillips
- What’s the Furthest Place From Here
- That Texas Blood
- Ice Cream Man
The post The Best Comics of 2023 (So Far)! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Alan Moore’s relationship with superheroes in the wake of Watchmen has been… contentious, to say the least. This is due in no small part to Alan’s relationship with DC Comics. To be perfectly blunt, DC Comics’ attitude to Alan Moore can be best compared to an abusive ex-boyfriend who has never gotten over being dumped. So he (DC) routinely calls his former girlfriend (Alan) at the dead of night, engineering schemes to get her back, all the while badmouthing the poor woman to anyone he can pull into listening to him ramble like an incoherent drunk at a third rate bar that doesn’t even have any decent rats. All the while the woman is just trying to move on with her life, but everyone from old friends to complete strangers to new co-workers simply won’t stop asking her about the ex.
At one point, she’s working in the same office as her ex (because the son of a bitch bought out the whole building without her knowledge), and she makes it perfectly clear that she wants nothing to do with her ex. And, for a short while, the guy acquiesces. But when she begins to work on something personal and difficult, something that could get the ex into trouble with the sort of people you should make life more miserable for (and one thing that was so arbitrary, you have to assume he knew it’d piss her off but did it anyways), the ex decides to butt in and make it impossible for her to do the gig. So, naturally, she quits.
Then, one day, the son of a bitch sends one of her old friends—a term used loosely given what’s about to happen—to ask her to help with something they did together a few years back. She says that she wants absolutely nothing to do with it, but won’t say anything negative about it. Offhandedly, the friend notes, “that’s good, he said you would be quietly compliant.” At this, she explodes at the world, cuts off most of her friends who stood by the abusive ex while he did unconscionable things to her, and badmouths the sons of bitches who weren’t there but think nothing truly unconscionable happened (or, rather, profit off the unconscionable). In response, the ex decides to hurt her best friend, whose brother is in hospital at the time with something that looks fatal.
So yeah, Alan Moore and DC have a rocky relationship, to say the least.
But in the year I began curating this project, Alan Moore released a short story collection, Illuminations. In it, there was a novella entitled “What We Can Know About Thunderman,” which, if we must continue this strained analogy, is the sort of tell all that comes from decades of bullshit from a complete and utter fuckboy. It is flagrantly a story about the comics industry that Alan Moore fled from. A corrupt, inhospitable place that attracts either the most vicious and cruel members of society or sad, lonely people who are torn apart and transformed into worse monstrosities. It follows a set of writers from throughout the history of comics as they try to deal with the abomination in their own ways.
It is extremely tempting to approach “What We Can Know About Thunderman” as a sort of one-to-one parable about the comics industry. A sort of “take that!” towards all the people who Alan hates and wants to see suffer for their transgressions. And there are certainly points where this becomes unavoidable (One bit in particular comes to mind wherein a character by the name of Satanic Sam—who is, let’s say, not Stan Lee—is approached by an agent of the CIA [who might be a hallucination] to revitalize people’s faith in American Nuclear Power by creating heroic mutants. All things considered, Marvel Comics being a CIA psy-op is more plausible than other things comics fans have claimed to be CIA psy-ops).
However, approaching things from this angle ultimately distracts from the core of the story. Yes, there are some pretty funny inside baseball jokes about how much John Byrne sucks or the very idea of Alan Moore spending an entire month watching all of Smallville and then, for good measure, watching the first season of Riverdale before fleeing for the far more sensible landscape of Northampton decay. But the heart of the story is simply not there.
There are two fronts on which one can note Moore’s critique not being (completely) the case. The first and most obvious one is that I am not hurt when I read this novella. I am a fan of superhero comics who has spent years of my life writing reviews, fan fiction, and books based on or around characters within the superhero sphere. And while I see several aspects of fans I have encountered in the past (especially the inker from Part 3 who murders his girlfriend because he doesn’t want to give up his decades old comic book collection), I am not among the cast of characters.
I should note that I am not asking for a comics reviewer to appear in the novella. Rather, I am thinking about the motion picture, The Banshees of Inisherin. The movie explores the relationship between two Irish men from the beginning of the 20th century and how their relationship falls apart. It is a movie in which I am literally as far away from the two protagonists as I can get. However, I have been both of these men. I have been the cruel son of a gun who has shut out people I was once close to for, frankly, no good reason whatsoever. And I have also been the pathetic dweeb who has made things worse simply out of my desire for closure and reconciliation, if not explanation. I have hurt people and, in watching what is my second favorite film of 2022, I am hurt by this mirror.
By contrast, “What We Can Know About Thunderman” is very much within my wheelhouse. It is a novella that—were its core interest to hurt everyone who ever wanted to be a writer, artist, or what have you over at Marvel/DC—should be blatantly capable of hurting me. It should hurt the people who are trying to say capes comics can be more than the equivalent of a crap wank fantasy or a heroin addiction. And yet, it doesn’t. Instead, it makes me look down upon the sad, lonely, often terrible people with, at best, pity. All of which is to say, if you’re going to damn the whole industry, you might as well damn the people who want their cake and to eat it too.
The second is rather more critical of Alan Moore, and that’s with regards to his claim that Superheroes are responsible for the rise of fascism in early 21st century America.
I should note that Alan is not wrong per se about the nature of superhero fiction having a tie to the rise of fascism in the early 21st century. While many comics fans would love to disclaim the superhero as being by any means tied to fascism—often citing stories about Captain America being the Nazi ideal turned against the fascists or repeating the word hope over and over again until the critic leaves to talk to a human being—the fact of the matter is that fascists love superhero stories. They love the tales of Frank Castle mowing down filth. They cheer as Bruce Wayne fights anarchists. They’re thrilled while Tony Stark declares himself to be Iron Man before committing mass genocide. And, well, a lot of them cosplay as their heroes.
Rather, Moore’s critique of the superhero field is a bit of an overreach. The core of the argument comes towards the end of the book in the form of an essay by a minor character, Milton Finefinger, called “A Spandex Wrapper for the Naked Lunch,” wherein, as the title suggests, Moore compares comic book fans to drug addicts (Though, in practice, not enough space is spent engaging with the implications therein, thus making it a pithy, catchphrase version of a concept Garth Ennis portrayed with a single panel. Indeed, most of the argument hinges on the aesthetics of Superheroes rather than what most fans would be addicted to: serialized storytelling). But more noteworthy is when the chapter takes place: January 2021. More specifically, it takes place during the attempted coup that took place that month.
Moore makes no bones about the implications of the contrast between these two elements. Indeed, in one of the more overreaching sections, Moore has a Reddit user muse that the QAnon conspiracy has its roots in an issue of Thunderman. Moore likewise cites the history of masked avengers, including revisiting a point from his last interview by noting that Klansmen also fit within the Masked Avenger mold.
Perhaps the most biting of these engagements is the nine-panel script explaining the entire history of Thunderman, focusing on the creators of said character who were fucked over by the industry in order to get all the profits. In turn, as Moore notes in the thoughts of that script’s writer, Dan Wheems, “In Thunderman, he had a microcosm of the comics industry, while in the industry he had a microcosm of America.”
The problem, given that Moore has approached the critique outside of the context of “What We Can Know About Thunderman” with little to no change, is that the microcosm is not the whole. The rise of fascism, as with many things in the world, is a complex situation wherein a variety of interrelated, unrelated, and/or counter-related elements combined into a mess. There is no rudder to place the world under and god help those who think they can.
Consider, for example, the riots on January 6, 2021. While it’s certainly true that many of the people following Q and Donald Trump into an attempted coup were fans of superhero comics, it’s also true that many were into video games. Indeed, one could argue that video games—a medium superheroes spent decades infamously ill-equipped to exist within (Superhero games still can’t make Superman work)—are more actively responsible for the rise of fascism in the early 21st century than comic books.
After all, #GamerGate laid the foundation for Steve Bannon to develop a voter base for Donald Trump. Even before then, video games were (and still are) awash with military fantasies wherein the player actively participates in mass slaughters in order to progress through the level. The Call of Duty franchise alone has players drop nuclear weapons, use drones to strike combatants, and murder civilians (Indeed, the Call of Duty franchise was created to tell stories about the nobility of soldiers with a frequent emphasis on Western powers. The antagonist are often characterized as a horde of faceless monsters to the point where an entire campaign makes this literal). And all of it is justified in simplistic tales of good and evil that sometimes—though not often—frame themselves as being morally grey because the characters are more brutal. By having the player control the character, they—more than in any inactive media—identify with the soldier, the CIA agent, the committer of genocide to such a degree that narrative isn’t even necessary.
(It is tempting to engage with the fact that among #GamerGate’s direct to video sequels was the #ComicsGate movement, however #ComicsGate was one of those movements that tried to be a thing so many times that engaging it would be akin to trying to make fetch happen.)
One could note that this is a simplistic framing of the video game medium, that there are games outside of the big budget first-person shooters. The same could be said of Moore’s critique of comics. But, as with Moore’s specific critiques, there’s worth to engaging with what many people think of when they consider video games. For many, the first-person shooters are video games. Just as superheroes are comics. The point is that there’s a larger context to consider. As above, so below. But the below is so much larger than merely comics.
In some regards, the failures of Moore’s critique of the superhero are akin to what ultimately breaks the critiques of Noah Berlatsky. It’s not being wrong that’s the problem (indeed, Berlatsky’s wrongness in claiming things like “Crisis on Infinite Earths is about American homogeny as demonstrated by this inexplicable tangent where Uncle Sam explains freedom” is ultimately what makes him a fascinating and worthwhile critic in contrast to a Bob Chipman, whose wrongness merely highlights what not to do), but rather how he got to that point. Moore is getting it wrong without ever once being wrong about superheroes at any specific moment.
Indeed, the core failing of Moore’s critique is, ultimately, one many a critic (myself included) has fallen into: he emphasized the wrong bit for the sake of a clickbaity headline. While there is an accuracy to arguing the relationship between fascism and superheroes, there’s a degree to which this simplifies the argument by placing it at the core. Moore certainly engages with what should be the crux of the argument (more on that in a bit), but his framing of it in terms of the concept being inherently fascistic misses the ways in which it can avoid being fascistic in works like Kieron Gillen and Jamie McKelvie’s Young Avengers.
(That said, Alan’s deeper look into the industry of developing superhero comics as one of a decaying hellscape from which the only escape is a false one—that there is no exit strategy, no way out, no way forward, by design; where even getting out the way Alan supposedly did is impossible (it will always come back)—is completely apt and on point. If anything, Alan Moore doesn’t go hard enough.)
But as I’ve said, “What We Can Know About Thunderman” isn’t about Superheroes or even the writers, artists, inkers, and editors who work on them.
So then, what is it about?
Stories.
More specifically, it’s about how stories are horrific and monstrous and will kill us all if we’re lucky. How, despite our claims to the contrary, our lives are controlled by stories. In some regards, it’s the dark mirror to Jerusalem. Where Jerusalem, in its 1,266 pages, frames the act of storytelling—of creating art—as a means of preservation, “What We Can Know About Thunderman” views it more critically, more like an addiction or a prison. Something you can never escape, no matter how much you want to. A ship in a bottle may be preserved, but it can never sail the seas without defeating the purpose of putting it into a bottle. And even then, sometimes what’s preserved is a fucking monster that has corroded into something worse and worse.
It’s all over the novella. It’s in Julius Metzenberger claiming to identify with Thunderman before shunning the comic as anything other than “a story” when some unfortunate implications are brought up. It’s in the tragic, self-destructive fall of Dick Duckley, who believed every story everyone told him, right up until it killed him. It’s in the ascension of Worsley Porlock into the upper echelons of comics publishing (with all the grandeur and monstrosity that entails) and the daydreams of Satanic Sam Blatz. And it’s in the most cutting of Moore’s critiques of the superhero:
Popular culture is the only glue that holds America together, and I guess that’s why it all needs stealing from the people who created it, and gifting to some big, trustworthy corporation with capitalism’s best interests at heart, and who’ll guard these valuable properties more closely than some writer or some artist with their crazy ideas and their crazy politics. You wouldn’t want these national assets to be in the hands of radicals, or black people, or women — not unless they were already corporate mutants such as Mimi Drucker or whatever it is that Gene Pullman’s meant to be, where the class and race and gender stuff is no big deal next to the tentacles and Cyclops eye.
Were this the crux of Moore’s argument—the necessity for the superhero to be an agent of the status quo rather than a radical, mask-wearing anarchist—then his argument would be much stronger. Indeed, it is this very reason why the superhero often curdles into fantastical fascist fantasia: because the status quo often hews towards conservativism and, subsequently, fascism. It’s not that Moore isn’t aware of this—he blatantly is—but rather he emphasizes the consequence rather than the cause.
As such, the more apt comparison for the superhero that highlights the rotten core at the heart of its failure isn’t the Neo-Nazi storming the capitol maskless, but rather the manufactured pop idol typically seen on the Disney Channel who has the potential to become something else entirely once freed from the shackles of their corporate masters. But the system — corporate entities comparable to Dr. Luke or Col. Tom Parker — refuses to allow them to be anything more than a cute slab of poison. So, often though not always, they collapse into something that feels wrong.
But perhaps the most vital of the characters to understand this, the one who highlights this theme, is Dan Wheems. Dan, for as relative as this sounds, is a sympathetic character. He’s someone who spends the majority of the book horrified by the various actions going on (though still complicit in some of them), oftentimes unintelligible due to a tendency to bite his lip. By the time he’s uncovered a porn archive bigger than most libraries—complete with collection of jizz rags—and been an active participant in burning said archive so as to avoid controversy, Dan has become disillusioned with the industry. He can’t help but think of the madness and horror people go through and turn into by being a part of the industry. He wants to quit, he wants to get out. And so, he does. He writes a comic script, releases an interview with a beloved and dead editor, and he disappears from the industry entirely.
And, for the first time in decades, he’s happy. He feels as if a great weight has been lifted off his shoulders. He can do anything now. He has ideas—actual ideas, and not someone else’s ideas done shittier (or, as Worsley Porlock demonstrates, somehow less than that [though, sadly, not as effective at demonstrating this as Dark Crisis on Infinite Earths])—that he can use to write a non-graphic novel. Dan can even speak without sounding like a drowning hippo! He moves back to the mid-west, to a small, isolated town in Indiana. Basically only two houses. There’s a man next door, working in his garden. They talk for a bit, and Dan recognizes him.
The man was Frank Giardino, the nephew of a gangster who used the comics industry as a front for bootlegging (The industry hasn’t changed much since then). Supposedly, Frank died some years back, but there are those who claim he’s in Witness Protection. So when Dan notes that the man working the garden looks like Frank, and is just vague enough not to make clear what profession he was in out of embarrassment, Frank thinks for a moment. The two enter Frank’s home and have a nice chat. Then, something that sounds like a cough is heard.
At the end of the day, there is no escape. No chance to become someone better. The world has been consumed by an imaginary story (Which may never happen, but then again may) about a perfect man who came from the sky and did only good. And it’s horrifying to behold. All of our lives revolve around this shitty story and all the stories like it. We are—all of us—consumed by our stories. Be they the ones we tell ourselves, the ones we tell to children, or the ones we wish were true. Or, for that matter, the ones that are.
Even the so-called adult stories turn out to be just as vicious and cruel as the childish ones many of us cling onto. Stories about gangsters who kill people for fun and profit. People who could do whatever they want without having to face the consequences. It’s a game where the rules are just as simplistic as the morality. It should be noted that one of the most famous gangster stories is about the horror of a childhood fantasy coming true.
At the end of the day, the superhero—as we know it now—is just an attempt at repackaging our childhoods with a new coat of paint. The problem is that not everyone had the same childhood. As a result, you end up with all these maladjusted adults pretending at adulthood with no idea what the real thing is. Only the negative space, only the thing that it isn’t. And by the time we find something truly adult, we fail to recognize how childish it all is. Because there are no adults in the room—not anymore. Where they went, who the fuck knows.
The fantasy might be different. For some, it’s superheroes. For others, cowboys. Toy soldiers. Spies in disguise. Cops and robbers. But the result is still the same. We live in a world of children where tantrums are resolved through placation rather than engagement. Where motivations for cruelty are often arbitrary—existing solely to justify the cruelty. Where no one truly has any idea what they’re doing, and they just keep doing it because it’s always worked. Because we can’t imagine anything else.
We are going to be murdered by fucking children because none of us knows what the fuck an adult is.
This is Watchmen’s Legacy.
For more in “Who Watched the Watchmen”…
And yet…I know that’s not true. It’s an easy answer, far too easy to lay at Moore’s feet. To blame the failures of the world on some comic that people misread and treated as if it was either gospel or heresy. To damn Moore to the hell of being the man who must always talk about some stupid comic. And, more than that, if there is one thing that defines adults, one thing that can never be childish, it’s complexity.
Not merely the convolution systems of cruelty desire us to embrace. Those merely force the mind to shut down and simplify things further so as to not have to look at the mind numbing madness of the system. To reject watching entirely in favor of mindless consumption. Rather, complexity is the layers added to a story. The contradictions, the mess, the failures and successes, all of these and so much more make up this stupid, absurd world of ours.
As much as “What We Can Know About Thunderman” rails against the industry as it is today, there’s a complexity to its engagement. Dan Wheems, shortly before leaving the industry for good, decides to read the work he did back in the nineties on The Vindictives.
He found that he still enjoyed them, couldn’t put them down, so it was nearly three o’clock before he got to bed. He remained proud of all his work, which in the early nineties had been so innovative. That scene where he’d had the original Vindictives meeting up again after some years, as older individuals. The atmosphere and the comparative realism of his dialogue, like the famous interchange between Ormazda and the Brute – nobody else had been attempting stuff like that back then. He could be justly satisfied with what he’d done, and yet…
And yet, the work, it wasn’t really his. He’d not created the beloved characters that everybody bought the book for, the established icons that lent all Dan’s knowing modern riffs their resonance. He hadn’t come up with the National Guard, the Brute, the Human Tank, Ormazda, Miniman and Minimaid, or the idea of sticking them together in one book called The Vindictives. That was all Sam Blatz and Joe Gold, which was just the same as saying it was all Joe Gold. A tough kid from the tenements, blessed with a comic book imagination more fertile than anyone had ever seen, who’d had everything taken from him by Sam Blatz and Massive Comics, and who, if you added up the billions that the Massive superhero films had made already out of his creations, was a victim of the single biggest theft from any individual in human history. Was this, then, all that Dan was proud of, his complicity in robbing someone genuinely talented of what was theirs? Was this the best that today’s industry professionals could say about themselves, about their work? He took these thoughts to bed with him, and, in the morning, saw he had no choice: he knew he couldn’t take it any more.
The failure isn’t simply that superhero comics are bad, have always been bad, will always be bad. Rather, it’s in the notion that nothing new is being made. There is a contentedness in the work itself, but the context that it exists within is viewed with nothing but contempt. Of exploitation and horror and cruelty. It’s the same shit being regurgitated over and over again. That’s where the problem lies. As the late Denny Wellworth notes:
The comics business made the same dumbass mistake that all industry made, which was assuming the resource they were exploiting to be infinite and inexhaustible. They figured that they could beat up and rob a Joe Gold with impunity, because there’d be another talent just as good and just as robbable along within a year or two. Now, you and I both know the sun will have grown old and dim and there still won’t have been another Gold, but management are not creative individuals and they have never understood the first thing about how creators work. So, when a new Joe Gold fails to show up, you give his books to artists who can do lame versions of Gold’s style, but can’t invent a single thing that’s new. And when there’s no replacement Sherman Glad, because he tried to form a union so they fired him, then they’re just left with the eager-beaver fans they hired to take the place of Sherman and Heinz Messner and the rest, people like Brandon Chuff. These people, they’re not artists, they’re not writers, they’re just fans of artists and of writers, and the generation that comes after them will be the fans of fans, and so on, to the directionless mess we’re in at present.
By attempting to make things work by force, by treating the world with simplicity, the superhero—an idea built for children—is the fountainhead of something extremely childish. To be an adult, then, is to accept that the world is more complicated than some made up bullshit like if Superman is a cop or how much a bottle of water costs.
And that, ultimately, is what Watchmen did: it complicated things. It had a primary mover who’s a real piece of shit, but whose moralistic perspective belies a number of pathologies and complexities worth diving into. It told a story of a man who desired a better world, who genuinely desired that better world, did monstrous things to achieve it, and (however briefly) won. It focused not just on the giants whose epic battles determined the fate of the world, but also on the little people. The people who, ultimately, were there for one another when things went horribly wrong.
More than anything else, Watchmen wanted to make the superhero complicated. The problem was that many fans—be they readers, writers, or critics—despise complexity. Look at the view counts on video essays with “X Explained” in the titles. How much of the criticism of the modern era is nothing more than someone “explaining” why a movie sucks, a comic is bad and should be burned, why the woke SJWs are ruining cinema, or even something as small as what the plot was about, as if fiction can be sieved down to a Wikipedia article. There’s no room for the ambiguity of something like The Wall or Inland Empire or even more traditional fare like Final Crisis or Watchmen.
Everything has to be packaged neatly into the canon of what was, like a museum of cum rags dated for each moment of ejaculation. Everything has to be explained or else destroyed. Everything must be ideal. Everyone must be good. Any bad must be removed on sight. That’s why Doomsday Clock exists and why many comics fans can see it as ambitious for attempting to “be about reconstructing superheroes and be an influential story about what Watchmen had done to superhero stuff.”
And that’s why, ultimately, Superhero fiction veers towards fascism. At the end of the day, fascism is a childish system built on simplicity. It tells us that all the world’s problems are their fault (whoever they might be) and that the solution is to destroy them totally. It’s a simplistic mindset that many a comics fan embraces. Because we want to hold our fictions with us but refuse to allow them to change with us, and as such refuse to change ourselves.
Consider the end of “Thunderman,” where the last of the protagonists finds himself ascending to the heavens, to the horrible land of his dreams. Where Thunderman stands unchanging from his childhood. And it’s horrifying. It’s monstrous and awful. It’s everything he has ever wanted, and it’s all so horrible. Because nothing was allowed to grow.
What, then, is the ultimate legacy of Watchmen? I truly cannot say. There is heartbreak and horror and cruelty in its legacy just as there is beauty and wonder and joy. But more than that, there are complexities. And, for all my misgivings with the world as it is right now, all my sorrow, all my rage, all my terror, there is also beauty and wonder to be found within it.
All you have to do is see it.
The post Who Watched the Watchmen? Alan Moore’s “What We Can Know About Thunderman” appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Charlotte and Zack talk about X2: X-Men United, a perfect movie, and also wrestling I guess?
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2002 pt. 5
| Fantastic Four: 1234 / Fantastic Four | #1 to #4 / #51 to #54, #60 to #61 | Grant Morrison and Jae Lee Marvel Knights series deconstructs the Fantastic Four, before the excellent Waid and Wieringo run begins. | | Avengers | #48 to #56 | The end of the Kang War and the Kurt Busiek Avengers run ends |
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No.
For more in “Who Watched the Watchmen”…
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“No Hope”
Credits: Al Ewing writes; Andrea Di Vito draws; Jim Charalampidis and Rachelle Rosenberg color; Ariana Maher letters; cover by Leinil Francis Yu and Jesus Aburtov
SPOILERS AHOY!
Mystique certainly comes off far better this issue than Destiny—finally! And Irene’s death by Khora here is quite a relief; she’s played her bit at this point. Mystique’s last words to her—“If you love something, set it free, Irene”—are the best we’ve got from her at least since Hickman’s early Krakoa days.
Raven’s break with Destiny, free from being an eternal “keepsake in her vault,” and her heroic last stand against Sinister’s forces are crushing blows to Destiny’s fragile ego—at which point, she really is done.
We heard mention of Mystique’s Freedom Force in Immoral X-Men #2, where Hope reported her death off-panel—quite the bomb-drop considering this entire alt future exists not simply because of Sinister but Destiny’s fear that any other future timeline would’ve had her losing Mystique. Well, in this time, she did get to be with her for 100 years! That’s better than anyone else gets, right?
(Mystique’s Freedom Force here is a true rebel outfit, but her original team of the same name, which had Destiny as a member as well, was anything but; it was a tool of the NSA and Val Cooper. Debuting in 1985’s Uncanny X-Men #199, it also included Blob, Pyro, Avalanche and, best of all, Spiral. The inclusion of Hercules and (a female) Nova in this alt future version is an homage to Ewing’s Guardians work, but including the Arakkii Sevyr Blackmore is a nice rando pick from Percy’s Wolverine.)
But of course, now Destiny wants out—bawling that she’s lost “everything,” directly comparing this loss with the destruction of Earth and Arakko and the near-total Sinisterization of her own species. At this point, I hope we can say we’ve all had enough of her nonsense. Goodbye, Destiny of X! Seriously, she’s little better than Moira.
So, when will we get Storm of X???
Well, it won’t be in the “Sins of Sinister,” clearly (although, who knows what Year 1000 will bring in April), so it’ll have to be after “Fall of X”—but I sure hope Al Ewing writes it. We need some more cosmic storms!
In Immoral X-Men #2, we heard about the Interstellar Compact of Marvel’s major cosmic empires allying against the Red Diamond forces, but here we get the first mention that Orbis Stellaris is behind the alliance, which we can expect to be well and truly done when we jump to Year 1000. Orbis’ powerbase is effectively neutered by issue’s end with Storm’s sublime heist of not just Sinister’s lab but the entire World Farm (and its Progenitors); cutting all life support, he kills his minions, but will he himself survive? Regardless, he seems to be out of the game for good. His plans for “Dominion” are shattered.
Why “No Hope,” then? Because Storm’s dead, of course, burned out from opening the wormhole that swallowed a star-system-sized construct. And how the heck did she manage that? I wonder if her sorcery was boosted at all by her omega mutant power, or whether it was “just” Khora’s own power amplification. Regardless, Storm does have an established “sorcerous line,” going back to 1985’s New Mutants #32, wherein Magik and Dani Moonstar time travel to ancient Egypt and meet Ashake, ancestral sorceress of Ororo. Also mentioned here is Ayesha—not the onrece latively well-known cosmic female counterpart of Adam Warlock, but the Rain Queen of Balobedu of the Hyborian Age, 10,000 BCE, i.e., Conan’s age. She’s only ever been mentioned once in the comics, 2007’s Marvel Tarot #1, which reported that she served as Earth’s Sorcerer Supreme for 4000 years, following a great mage battle for the honor. So, yeah, that’s no mean lineage (Amun and Hauhet, however, are two of the eight primordial Egyptian gods)!
Of course, it was 1983’s Magik miniseries written by Claremont that established Storm as a powerful sorceress in old age, in the alternate future in Limbo in which she was trapped with Illyana and lived out the rest of her life.
By the way, in the climax of Old Woman Storm’s electric speech, she does grand homage to her lost friend Jean Grey: “I offer you fire! And a life incarnate!” echoes Jean’s debut as Phoenix in Claremont’s X-Men #101.
What other goodies do we get this issue? Another Ewing favorite, Noh Varr (the erstwhile Marvel Boy) is still alive, another Old Man. He appears to be one of Storm’s top commanders, and he has always known his way about a space opera venue, so that makes sense. He’s now adopted the title of Accuser, which is funny (Ronan’s the most well-known Kree to have taken up this role of judge and executioner or whatever). Destiny’s own starship is the Ananke, named for the Greek serpent goddess of Fate, or Necessity; that’s apt enough. It’s amazing how long-lived everyone is here—Jon Ironfire, Khora of the Burning Heart, although Cable/Xilo (now “X-Man,” lol) is no surprise (AoA Nate Grey had a long-running late ’90s solo title as X-Man, despite never really going by that name).
Ganna, aka Shockjock, is new; seems like she could be a powerhouse. Will she be more than a one-off?
Destiny’s last stand shows us how her power might be weaponized in the field: She envisions a victory against Orbis in his giant starship Dyson sphere, and this vision is boosted by Khora, which Cable reads telepathically, as he broadcasts it to the other X-Fighters, essentially mapping out their tactics for them—basically a self-fulfilling prophecy in the heat of battle. (The Star Wars homage is heavy here, as the rebellion’s fighter pilots go up against the Death Star of Orbis’ great orb.)
[Love how Storm’s classic tiara has been recast as an Omega-style symbol on that starship.]
Of course, there’s an inconsistency here with Destiny’s powers, right? Fundamental to Moira’s narrative and the Destiny Diaries, and many other stories besides, is that Irene can see past her own death—but here, Storm is fooling everyone that she intends to reboot the timeline (and it’s questionable her explosives, however powerful, could have breached the Unus barrier around the Moira lab with absolute certainty). Destiny should’ve been able to see through Storm’s ruse. So, how do we no-prize this? Ororo’s sorcery!!! And hey, that aspect of her powers is in play here, so… hell yeah, let’s go with that.
Now, why doesn’t Storm want to destroy this timeline? The unwillingness to destroy a universe, no matter how broken from our perception, or Destiny’s, or Earth’s, is perfectly in line with Storm’s character historically. And it’s the same with her swearing off resurrection, which she did much readily than Magneto (remember, she’s never died until now).
Mother Righteous shows up for a page, trying to glom onto Ironfire’s faith in Storm. More interesting is Ironfire mentioning his backstory with Storm in the mysterious Genesis War (sometime before Year 10). But she’s actually there, astrally, to “watch the show,” this stage of the war that she claims “proves her right.” I think we can take this to mean Storm’s use of magic in taking out the cosmically science-minded Orbis. She’ll be hoping (perhaps quite literally) for the same in her final push to crack the Moira lab and/or achieve her own version of “dominion.”
In the meantime, the World Farm will become the next Arakko… Can’t wait for Year 1000!
Re: the pop sci-fi homages, I’ve seen fan comps mapping Star Trek homages onto Gillen’s Immoral X-Men and Star Wars homages onto Ewing’s Storm & the Brotherhood—but that is much too programmatic for these great storytellers. Sure, the nods to these properties are there, but so are other ones, mixed in throughout! In a CBR interview last December, Gillen said each time period would comp with different well-known venues or styles: cyberpunk for Year 10, “evil Star Trek” for Year 100, and (most titillating of all)“the operatic, gothic vibe of Warhammer 40,000” for Year 1000 (Gillen has written some comics for this franchise, as well). But that was Gillen speaking.
Shortly after, Ewing had his own CBR interview, where he said “instead of cyberpunk, my +10 is a near-future ‘squad of outsiders take on the dystopia’ story. Instead of Star Trek, my +100 is Star Wars or maybe Buck Rogers. And +1000 is taking that Warhammer feel […] and telling a kind of far-future-Camelot story about a heroic last stand against impossible odds and the importance of hope. So I guess it’s like Transformers: The Movie.” So, basically, as good storytellers, they have their influences and inspirations, but there is nothing so programmatic as any kind of one-to-one correspondence going on.
In January, Spurrier had his CBR interview, and it’s his response to the comp question I like best by far: Nope. No, thank you. That is all much too reductive to be of any interest to me. Spurrier’s interest is in overarching themes, one for each era. Still, he says, “If it’s references you want, there’s a lot of A Canticle of Leibowitz here.” Seriously, check out the link; what he has to say should have anyone on the fence appreciate his work more.
That said, we are clearly building up a surprising hagiography in each mini: Gillen has Exodus kill off Hope in establishing his own kind of Sinisterized imperial mutant church; Spurrier has Mother creating her own kind of cynical religion, with Wagnerine as the “apostate,” which in turn could take on greater religious significance here; and Ewing has made an unintentional martyr of Storm. If I were pressed to subscribe to faith in anything here, it would obviously be to Storm Messiah—so let’s get it rolling on already! Bring on what is…
NEXT: Year 1000, part 1—Immoral X-Men #3
The post “Sins of Sinister” Part 7: Storm and the Brotherhood of Mutants #2—in Review! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below:
Jonathan Hickman and Valerio Schiti’s G.O.D.S. #1 is officially announced for Fall 2023 from Marvel Comics! We’ll talk about the announcement, Davestiny getting yet another prediction right, and today’s comics!
This Week’s Comics
Captain Britain #2
Sabretooth & The Exiles #5
X-Men: Unforgiven #1
Invincible Iron Man #4
The post Hickman’s G.O.D.S. Marvel Comic Announcement! | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Credits: Gerry Duggan writes; Joshua Cassara arts; Guru-eFX colors; Clayton Cowles letters; covers by Martin Coccolo (#15, #17), Giuseppe Camuncoli (#16) with colors by Jesus Aburtov (#15-16) an Neeraj Menon (#17)
“Collapse Theory” / “The Mutant We Left Behind” / “Size Matters”This three-issue Children of the Vault arc is the first Forge-centric story we’ve had in many years, and it’s three issues! Granted, it’s not entirely focused on Forge, but this was a major spotlight for the character, albeit not exactly the most flattering one!
For 21st-century readers who know that Forge (birth name unknown) is a Cheyenne Native American but don’t understand why he’s never depicted as connecting with his heritage, Claremont’s foundational work with the character will show you his fraught relationship with his cultural upbringing. Forge’s limelight is pretty much restricted to the Claremont run, especially in the years after his 1984 debut in Uncanny X-Men #184, (also Rachel Summers’ fourth ever appearance and Selene’s fifth—foundational indeed!). There was also Howard Mackie’s late-stage X-Factor run of the late ’90s, really the last gasp for Forge fans.
If you’re pressed for time and want some wonderful audio entertainment instead, I highly recommend checking out Connor Goldsmith’s recent Cerebro episode on Forge with guest Josh Trujillo, comics writer for Adventure Time, Captain America, Rick and Morty and most recently Blue Beetle, as well, and also part Cheyenne himself.
Here we can say, long story cut much too short, Forge sees himself as a man of science and technology who wants nothing to do with the very real mysticism that was part of his upbringing as a shaman in training. And the devastating trauma behind this aversion at least seems mostly unrelated from more fraught territory that white writers like Claremont and after were not prepared to deal with, that is, those all-too common stories of white society nearly wholesale destruction of indigenous culture and the tortured process of assimilation, which has frequently involved much self-shame and even hatred while white people look on oblivious (speaking as someone whose family encompasses both perspectives in the long history of Southern poverty, and I certainly don’t feel equipped to this story from a Native (Choctaw and Cherokee) perspective, either).
Forge’s personal story treads more lightly over the history of white genocide against Native Americans, although Claremont certainly acknowledged the reality as far as comics of the time would allow (which was far more than most creators back then), and instead focuses on his experiences in the Vietnam War—something many Americans of all colors would have identified with less than a decade after the US defeat and withdrawal there (much more disastrous even than the tragic chaos of our pullout from Afghanistan*).
After losing a hand and leg in a “friendly fire” B-52 attack, Forge called on his abilities as a mystic and, utilizing the souls of his dead comrades all around him, summoned the Adversary to kill enemy soldiers as they closed in on the bomb-devastated area. The cost of summoning a chaos demon? His fallen friends tormented eternally in a hell dimension, apparently. To be clear, though, this was a decision he made during an unimaginably horrifying trauma—in excruciating pain, rage and fear in a foreign jungle at night. Add to that, Forge’s subsequent horror and desolation at his own knee-jerk reaction.
He had so much power on call, and the first time he really used it, it did not go well for anyone—except that he lived, albeit with horrific survivor’s guilt. So, yeah, he swore off the magic after that. And as a mutant techno-genius, he built himself some gloriously chrome prostheses, proud of his (lightly) cyborg nature now.
So, when you look at Forge and think, Oh, there’s that techy quad squad jock, there is a lot of pain that went in to making this Tony Stark of Krakoa.
That brings us to his morally muddy and murky decision-making regarding Caliban in Duggan’s X-Men. But Duggan knows what he’s doing with Forge like no one since Claremont. Forge’s opening epigraph, where we see him framing Krakoa as of a kind with the modern militarized nation-state, i.e., his employers in the US national security apparatus during the 1980s, answering to the likes of the NSA’s Valerie Cooper and the NSC’s Henry Peter Gyrich. In his 1984 debut, he had recently created a superpower neutralizer for the DOD, which many fans since have found suspect if not simply an act of extreme naivete. However, partly because Marvel no longer has the rights to concurrent ROM titles, readers forget or aren’t aware that he created this weapon to be used against the inimical space threat of the Dire Wraiths, a major story that bled into many ongoing titles of the day. In 1985’s ROM #65, Forge and ROM use the Neo-Neutralizer, massively scaled up from the handgun, to banish the evilly mystical Wraithworld (already in Earth’s orbit) to Limbo; that was indeed the whole point of the invention—to halt an alien invasion. But Gyrich’s intention was to turn it on Earth itself, to wipe out superhumans in one blast; of course, the heroes stop him.
All this isn’t to say that Claremont’s Forge stories don’t deal in the unforeseen consequences of innovation weaponized—this is so much of what they’re about. But the point is that Forge is not a self-hating mutant nor stupidly gullible; Earth was facing annihilation, and he made a hard decision to create a devastating weapon, which, yes, pretty quickly backfired. Yet Earth’s survival was guaranteed; it just didn’t happen in an X title!
Duggan’s story is something of an homage, then, to Claremont’s foundational Forge narrative, albeit with probably lighter consequences; it’s unlikely Caliban as a piece of technology* will have the tortured history that Forge’s Neutralizer has had. But his instrumentalization of another human being (potato potahto), whatever Caliban’s alleged, i.e., uninformed, willingness to sacrifice himself for the greater good, offers up an undeniably unsavory side to his extremely utilitarian perspective.
*Caliban’s mutant power is tracking other mutants, and apparently his sentience is required to make this work, unlike the other mutants’ DNA in this strange chimera-harness: Mystique’s and presumably Tempo’s (Although, I have to say, the shape-changing is way underutilized in the actual story).
Love it or hate it, Duggan has done something new and different with a once central X-Man who’s been neglected for far too long. This story (unlike whatever Forge was doing in Percy’s X-Force—i.e., nothing substantive) will give subsequent creators a lot to work with. I definitely do not see it as character assassination, but it is very troubling, rather in line with his characterization historically, when anyone has cared to develop it.
But you can bet there’s more to come from Duggan’s Forge! The biggest thing, at least with consequences beyond any one character, is Project Blackbox (as Xavier mysteriously called it in conference with Forge back in the 2022 Hellfire Gala issue, also by Duggan). If any outside party discovered this invention, what government or other adversarial agency wouldn’t want a Matrix-style simulation trap outside an enemy’s front door? Well, it’s far from the first time we’ve seen a simulated reality in a comic book, let alone pop culture generally, but while it’ll contain the Children of the Vault for the time being, what happens when they themselves hack it? After all, isn’t that an inevitability? Hope Forge thought of some fail-safes!
I mean, if the Children have access to any mutant DNA, and they would, they should manage to figure out a way out of Forge’s “vault” (which allows only mutants to pass through), once they get past the simulation trap. And Serafina now knows that the world outside is not what it seems. In fact, Serafina’s whereabouts after this arc may be closer to Krakoa than anyone suspects…
Issue #16’s last page is Forge’s field notes, where he “humbly suggests” Tony Stark and Reed Richards be clued into to Project Blackbox’s existence at the Vault site in South America. That’s a good start! After all, the Children are a serious global threat.
[The frightening dreams of the Children in their Matrix simulation.]Obviously, there are many other things happening in these issues! All of them are beautifully drawn by Cassara, whose work on this title I largely prefer over what he did with Percy on X-Force and X Lives; we get to see what he can do outside of Percy’s relentless grimdark.This arc is a follow-up to my favorite part of Hickman’s X-Men run—issues #18-19, in which Synch and Wolverine (Laura) escape the Vault, centuries after they’d entered it with Darwin in issue #5. Darwin’s fate remained a mystery, except for Synch’s knowledge that the Children had captured him and were running some sort of ghastly experiment on him to benefit their own evolutionary adaptations; and we’re talking comic-book style evolution here, meaning they can now evolve even faster (and considering the acceleration of time inside the Vault, that’s really fast). Laura’s apparent death occurred off-panel, as she fought back and allowed Everett to make for the exit, but we do see him killed, albeit just outside the Vault, where he’s able to shoot off a telepathic message to Xavier, allowing for his full backup at the moment of his demise.
Everett saw what was happening to Darwin, which was extreme torture, but he couldn’t say he was dying, however much he’d like to have him back (as through resurrection). But he was certain that Laura had died, and so she was resurrected. Of course, she doesn’t have any memory of what happened in the Vault, like her and Darwin’s centuries-long love for one another.
Or, at least many of us assumed Darwin wasn’t resurrected, since we haven’t seen him since. However, Forge, when finding Laura, says, “I thought the Five only accidentally resurrected one mutant, not two.” Three mutants were, in fact, resurrected in Hickman’s X-Men #19, we just didn’t see the third, who remained unnamed—meaning, we couldn’t verify Darwin’s resurrection.
At the end of Duggan’s X-Men #16, however, Forge finds that now millennia-old Laura in the Vault, albeit in an induced coma. The team assumed that, using his mutant-tracking Caliban vest, he’d find Darwin, but alas, we still don’t know what happened to him. So, now we have two Lauras!
Of course, Scout is a clone of Laura, but they do not share the same memories. These two Lauras do have one identity in common, up until the “original” Laura’s entry into the Vault. Obviously, Synch is ecstatic that his love has returned.
Why would Duggan make this story decision? In-universe, instrumentalist Forge feels his higher priority is finding Darwin—he has the means to retrieve only one mutant from the Vault. Is this twist in the story justified? In any case, Forge’s confirmation of the “original” Darwin’s continued existence comes later, when in issue #17, he appears to Forge in a simulated vision (of a utopian city-state version of Krakoa, appealing to Forge) that matches Project Blackbox’s persuasiveness—he has long since uploaded his mind into the Vault’s computer system.
Now, if you think about this issue’s last data page, a medical report from Cecilia Reyes, the implication is that Darwin somehow transferred himself to Forge’s mind (“Now Forge’s backups are larger than some of our most powerful telepaths”) and then left Forge, unseen of course, for presumably elsewhere on Krakoa, leaving his erstwhile host’s latest backup back to normal (“within the expected strike zone”).
Where is he now? Again, we haven’t seen him since. Still, Darwin was rescued from the Vault! It turns out, mission accomplished anyway! And hey, this isn’t the first time a Marvel character meets their alt future self!
Or, maybe Forge’s abnormally large backup coming out of the Vault wasn’t Darwin hitching a ride but Serafina. After all, she is a mind-controlling technopath, as demonstrated to devastating effect with Cannonball in her debut arc, way back in X-Men vol 2 #188-192 by Mike Carey and Chris Bachalo (2006). Those cables plugging into Forge before his utopian vision of Krakoa, wherein he briefly communes with the digitized Darwin, could well have been Serafina’s. She certainly looks much more “advanced” from the last time we saw her, so the notion that she, too, could stow away inside another mind does not seem far-fetched. That could mean the mutant nation is now open to sneak attack from both Nimrod and the Children. Thus, the “Fall of X?”
Anyhow, it is, of course, highly unlikely that Old Woman Wolverine (er, Talon?) will live out the year. But who knows. Seriously, Old Man Logan stuck around a lot longer. The more important question is whether both Lauras die and have their backups merged into the subsequent resurrected Laura. That would be a jarring experience, but hey, even this would be far from the first such identity merge in Marvel Comics (looking at you Jean/Maddie!).
The post X-Men #15-17 in Review—Return to the Vault! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
This week I interviewed return guest Matt Kindt about his new Flux House imprint, evil (or not evil) cats, writing with Keanu Reeves, and a lot more! We dig into all the new releases Matt has in the works like Mister Mammoth, Hairball, and Spy Superb!
On Comic Book Herald’s Interviews I’ll be interviewing some of my favorite creators in comics about specific runs, graphic novels or series, looking for their insights on the inspirations behind the work and ideas or hidden material readers may have missed. CBH Interviews is an audio annotative guide to enjoying the intricacies and thinking in the art. Thanks for listening, and enjoy the comics!
Mister Mammoth
Writer: Matt Kindt
Artist: Jean-Denis Pendanx
Publisher: Dark Horse Books
About the Author:
Matt Kindt is a Harvey Award winning author and artist of works such as Mind MGMT, Pistolwhip, Frankenstein: Agent of S.H.A.D.E., and a whole bunch more.
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Music for Best Comics Ever by Anthony Weis. Check out more music at anthonyweis.com.
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The post “Mister Mammoth”, “Spy Superb” & “Hairball” with Matt Kindt | CBH Interviews #108 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Zack and Charlotte talk all weird X-spinoffs, with X-Statix, Chamber, and Exiles!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| X-Force / X-Statix | #122 to #129 / #1 to #5 | The Milligan and Allred oddball X-series continues, and officially migrates to X-Statix. | | Chamber | #1-4 | Requested by Patreon Backer Kyle S.! | | Exiles | #8 to #15 | So much fun. |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2002 pt. 5
| Fantastic Four: 1234 / Fantastic Four | #1 to #4 / #51 to #54, #60 to #61 | Grant Morrison and Jae Lee Marvel Knights series deconstructs the Fantastic Four, before the excellent Waid and Wieringo run begins. | | Avengers | #48 to #56 | The end of the Kang War and the Kurt Busiek Avengers run ends |
Play along with:
Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
Downloadable Checklist!
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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:
mymarvelousyear.com
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Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
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The post 2002 Pt. 4: X-Force, Chamber, & Exiles appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
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It is often said that Watchmen is the most influential comic ever to be released. That comics wouldn’t be where they are without it, for good and for ill. But how did we get here, exactly? More to the point, just what influence did Watchmen provide to the larger world of comics? What, ultimately, is the legacy of Watchmen? Who watched the Watchmen?
Rebirth hadn’t yet happened.
Doomsday Clock was not a thing.
Rorschach and the Watchmen TV show didn’t exist.
Only Before Watchmen did.
DC had only made one serious attempt to milk Watchmen and cash-in on it before. And it had bombed, big time. Nobody liked it or cared for it. It was over. They knew it. Everybody did.
And so there was that brief period of time- the quiet calm, the gap between the first big attempt and the next big attempt-wherein it felt like we could perhaps move forward from Watchmen nostalgia. Wherein we could get past it all. And if we were to engage with it, it wouldn’t be literally, by sequelizing it or using characters from it, but rather through the challenges it offered via its formal daring and political critique.
And so let us journey backwards, into that frozen moment, that small gap of time, where the prospect of creators reckoning with Watchmen held a spark of real intrigue.
Welcome to The Multiversity: Pax Americana #1.
A one-shot story utilizing the original Charlton characters upon whom the Watchmen characters were based, constructed for an all new post-Watchmen, post-9/11 world and climate.
Brought to us by the creative team of Grant Morrison, Frank Quitely, Nathan Fairbairn, and Rob Leigh. ——————————————————————————————————
I- Imperium—————–The American President is assassinated.
That’s how it starts.
A familiar image. An infamous image. A bullet to the head of the President in his car.
It is meant to evoke the assassination of John F. Kennedy, whilst the slow playback, with time running backwards, feels like the comics equivalent of the Zapruder Film. Something to be played back over and over, backwards and forwards, to ascertain some sense of meaning. An event of immense importance and endless speculation. A cauldron for conspiracy and madness. A sequence to haunt American consciousness and psyche, like a ghost, playing on endless repeat.
That’s how Pax Americana opens.
And if its title wasn’t a dead giveaway as to what it would be about, the opening certainly is.
This is a book about America. This is a book about ‘American Peace,’ that Pax Americana that succeeded the ‘British Peace’ of Pax Britannica, who felt they were succeeding the ‘Roman Peace’ of Pax Romana. This is a book about a symbol of peace on fire. That is its first image, displayed on the cover itself, in the style of Watchmen. It is about the fundamental nature of ‘Peace’ as understood and administer by Imperiums, whose idea of peace is having the biggest stick in the playground by which to say ‘Obey me, or else.‘
Where Watchmen begins with the assassination of The Comedian by Ozymandias, Pax is the reverse. It begins with Peacemaker, the archetypal inspiration for The Comedian, assassinating President Harley of the United States, who came to power in 2008, following the Bush Administration.
Over the course of the issue we see the life-story of President Harley, following the events that led up to his murder, and we see what follows after his death, moving backwards and forwards all at once. And it’s made clear and evident for us all throughout here that Harley is our Ozymandias-figure of the book (particularly given the rights of Peter Cannon: Thunderbolt, the Charlton hero who inspired Ozymandias, reverted back to the Creator’s estate in a rare case, thus DC no longer owning him), with the cold capitalist replaced instead by the plotting politician.
This is only one level of reversal and twisting in relation to Watchmen. Pax Americana is a book doing it on numerous levels. From its name alone, derived from the Roman ‘Pax Romana,’ given Watchmen’s title derives from the Roman satires of Juvenal, via the Latin quote Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? (translated as ‘Who watches the Watchmen?’)
And where Watchmen uses its iconic 9-panel grid, Pax utilizes a distinct 8-panel grid. If Watchmen had each issue punctuated by quotes on the final panel, with the cover of each issue being the technical ‘first panel,’ then Pax would have its covers be both the first panel and the last panel at once, with the quote on the cover itself:
It’s a book in dialogue with Watchmen, certainly.
It’s a book that feels like it was birthed after the reading of this notable Alan Moore quote:
I got quite distressed that after Watchmen, nobody had taken up the challenge of Watchmen. I’d seen Watchmen, and I thought ‘This is an important comic because of the storytelling devices that we’ve come up with.’ That is the only thing that is important about it. It’s not that it’s a darker view of superheroes. I’d already done Marvelman by that point. That wasn’t the main point. It was just ‘How to tell the story in a way no one’s done it before.’ But the things the rest of the creative community seemed to take from Watchmen, they didn’t take any of the admittedly difficult storytelling techniques.
Indeed, if one were to sit down with the Director’s Cut of the issue, it is pretty much affirmed by the very first page of the script shown there:
But what the script here also reveals to us how it is not just Watchmen. Indeed, the specific mention and invocation of Frank Miller and Lynn Varley’s The Dark Knight Returns is revealing, with the book’s 8-panel grid often morphing and breaking into its doubled numerical equivalent of the 16-panel grid, which that book is so iconic for. And beyond that, the notion of the American President and the American Superhero together? That goes right back to TDKR‘s popular usage of Superman and Ronald Reagan together.
But at the same time, Morrison/Quitely’s work here isn’t a piece of 1980’s cold war era fiction, which is what those two were. It is instead a 21st century text of the 2010s, made for a Post-9/11 era, the world of The Authority, The Ultimates, and the MCU. And crucially, Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely both had a hand in shaping the landscape, as Morrison is the reason why Mark Millar had a career, was hired on to do The Authority with Frank Quitely, and Morrison is also why Millar ended up doing The Ultimates with Bryan Hitch. And Pax is rooted in that, too:
Here you have a proper ‘cinematic’ sequence by iconic ex-Authority artist Frank Quitely, showcasing a post-9/11 attack on America by Foreign Terrorists who hate the American Empire. And, of course, the all-American superhero out and about to stop it all. It feels so utterly fitting as an encapsulation of The Ultimates, especially given you also have George W. Bush right on-page, just like in The Ultimates.
What does this tell us?
That while Pax wants to take up the challenge of Watchmen, that while it borrows its storytelling tools and techniques and is in direct dialogue with it in doing so, particularly given Moore-Morrison’s long history and relationship, it’s not about Watchmen, per se. And neither is it about TDKR or The Authority or The Ultimates, though it is a comic in that long lineage. It is not so much a comic about comics, as it is a comic utilizing what has come before to be about real things we recognize and deal with.
It’s about America. It’s about the American Empire and their dreams and nightmares. It is about American Peace and Violence, and the nature of that very notion- the Pax Americana.
Because if you actually pay attention to Watchmen or TDKR or The Authority or The Ultimates, that’s also what all of those works are about, too. It is what they are rooted in, with the awareness or reckoning with that being varied. They are all, also, if you squint and take note, British comics works on America. They are the British creators, from the land of the Pax Britannica that was superseded by Pax Americana, reckoning with the nature of The American Empire through the ultimate genre expression of American Power- the American Superhero.
II- Aevum————–Time has been a career-long obsession for Grant Morrison and their work. In fact, their very first comics story ever, drawn by Morrison, was titled Time Is A Four Letter Word. Their favorite TV show is Doctor Who, and if you let them, they’ll go off about how universes are grown like larvae in time by mercurial hyper-sprites from a higher dimension where time does not exist. It’s how you get much of The Invisibles, and their obsession with time is all over their body of work, from the pages of Batman and Superman to even the very construction of ‘Hypertime.’ Time and Reality are things Morrison is totally taken with.
Frank Quitely is one of our great modern masters of art and sequential storytelling. He is among the best artists still working, and he’s only gotten better and better with time, which feels absurd. He’s an artist of impeccable technical skill and range, who also has big, bold formal ambitions and the vital capacity to fulfill said lofty ambitions. He’s just the best there is at what he does. And what he does is magnificent.
Morrison and Quitely came on up together, over three decades, and they are one of our great iconic duos in comics. Their collaborations ever more ambitious and interesting, with the two wanting to never do anything less than their best.
Time is a recurring interest for both of them, as they are both obsessive formalists. They’re taken with what the medium can do, and pushing it. And time in comics is a curious thing, because it is a form where Time and Space are one and the same. So the manipulation of space is, in effect, manipulation of time. That’s what leads us to one of their chief works in this regard:
Here’s Morrison/Quitely redefining how the presentation of time on page can work in We3. It’s a simple action sequence in which a cat is mowing through a bunch of soldiers, and you’d normally see it laid flat on page, as one single, flowing and continuous image. You’d expect to see one long cinematic shot of action, which depicts time in a traditional way we are used to seeing. But they do not! Instead, they’re forcing us to view and experience the sequence 8 different times via 8 different panels here which ‘divide’ the space and thus ‘divide’ time here. Time is a physical dimension on the page, malleable via manipulation of space. Quitely and Morrison understand this.
Rather than opt for a typical cinematic ‘observer’ perspective like in film, which would be a ‘frontal’ perspective, Quitely/Morrison tilt the panels and emphasize the dimension of Time, with the natural reality as it exists for us in ‘boxes’ and us getting to see the characters move through the space between that reality, from the side, like some being from a higher dimension. The space and dimension of time beyond that which we experience as regular people and thus cannot see. It’s a fascinating perspective and condensation of time from two remarkable creators clearly taken with the subject of time.
Pax is part of this tradition and is their latest effort to date, and perhaps their finest in a formal sense.
But to get into that, let’s take a look at the classical, influential grids that inform the work. Particularly, the 16-panel grid from which the book draws upon while using its 8-panel grid:
The 9 panel grid of Watchmen is a classical grid. It’s a 3×3. It’s three panels in a row, in three tiers. Each breaks down neatly into three beats. Set-Up/Build-Up/Pay-Off. There’s a nice basic quality to the 3×3 of the 9 panel grid. Three panels are the most simple way to tell a story and it’s why so many classic newspaper comic strips are built on it. Now do 3 rows of such panels to create a singular unit- and you have the grid. It’s an easy, controlled way to tell a story that can be read easily by anyone, even those who’ve never a comic before. The 4×4 of the 16 panel grid is somewhat similar but a totally different beast. It adds an extra 4th panel onto every row, and you have an extra 4th tier added at the bottom. That changes things. It gives you structure and a clean way to read it, but in a much different way. It’s a grid and structure that operates off a very different rhythm, which makes a very different sound, than the 9 panel grid.
The 9 panel grid feels minimalist in comparison to the 16 panel grid, rooted in a simplicity and ease, while the 16 panel grid is actively maximalist. It’s an extra panel, an extra row, it’s the traditional grid that pushes things right to the edge, because 5 panels in a single row? You can’t exactly ask an artist to draw a 5×5 grid and structure every page to do a 25 panel grid. That’s ridiculous and absurd, and any artist would yell at you for doing so. It’s a nigh-impossible headache and one that shrinks the panel size down even impossibly more to accommodate the extra panels. It also seriously limits compositional possibilities and strains the artist and the 1-2-3-4-5 rhythm of it just isn’t as natural. 5×5? That just that feels like too much. 4×4 feels like the edge, the limit, the max.
It’s the grid structure that gives you a fully even, internally consistent steady rhythm that at once maximizes the amount of time you have.
When you have 7 extra panels or ‘windows of time’ in every single page compared to the 9 panel grid? You simply just have more time. That’s almost a whole other page’s worth of time without having to need an extra page. It’s a great, efficient usage of page-real estate. It’s the ultimate bang-for-your-buck device to buy you more time. You can do more, and you can put in even more, and let the reader ruminate and linger in it.
It allows you to both ‘speed up’ time by varying the visuals shown in the smaller panels now you have, as opposed to the 3×3 grid, or ‘slow down’ time by repetition of imagery and emphasis. It’s a tool with a lot of power that allows you to ‘break down’ moments and make them last longer. And it’s how Miller is using it here, not to speed up time, which the 4×4 grid allows, but to slow it down. His emphasis and use of deliberate repetition is the reason we have this effect. A moment passing takes longer within this usage of the grid structure and system. Notice the above scene from TDKR wherein Bruce is flashing back, and how well the 16 panel grid works for this slow-motion flashback. It takes a single beat of the parents being shot and makes it last for an eternity, rather like a film reel you can go over endlessly. It really lets you live in a moment and ‘freeze’ time usefully.
But of course, that’s not the only thing TDKR is known for. If anything, the more famous aspects of the book are visuals such as these:
It was an operatic epic, full of glorious splash pages such as these. It was an action comic of great maximalist power, packed to the brim. And against the enormity of these supreme all-powerful American figures, everyone else looks minuscule, tiny, packed into little boxes of four. Arguing petulantly about them, unable to ever truly grasp them or their enormity as puny human figures. It was pure Frank Miller, showcasing primal figures of power, akin to chiseled Greek statues.
But it is also this approach, alongside Watchmen, that helps inspire much of the way the modern militarized superhero of the American Empire exists and has been molded. And even beyond that, there’s a direct lineage from Frank Miller’s work to the 1990’s Image Revolution of Todd McFarlane (Spawn), Jim Lee (Wild.C.A.T.S.), and Rob Liefeld (Youngblood), as they all created all-new militarized superhumans rooted in the Millerian mold as writer/artists. Miller’s work, especially on TDKR, is all over those early Image books. And it’s there, after all, at Image in Jim Lee’s Wildstorm Studios, that the future would be forged by the likes of Bryan Hitch and Frank Quitely. There’s a strong link from TDKR to the modern militarized superhero figure.
Morrison and Quitely understand this. They get that without this:
We don’t get this:
They draw the straight line from the Frank Miller operatic splashes and TDKR approach to the Bryan Hitch Cinematic Comics of the modern era. Particularly when working with Mark Millar (pronounced Miller, like Frank Miller), the sort of more structured, formal gridded thinking goes out the window for the pure primal expression of cinematic spectacle. And Quitely helped that early 2000s Cinematic school of comics along when he did The Authority with Millar as well, which felt like the test run for their much more successful and superior run of The Ultimates with Hitch. That’s how you get those full War-On-Terror era post-9/11 America Reacts comics full of George Bushes, Cap screaming about how the A on his head doesn’t stand for France and more. It’s a straight line from Miller to Millar and Hitch.
All of which leads us to the apotheosis of Pax Americana visually, wherein it does an incredible two-pager like this:
Take a look at that. Really take that in, and consider the above pages and what they’re doing.
They are fascinating.
Quitely has drawn a single cinematic visual, a grand double page-spread of a room, in the vein of Hitch and Quitely classics. It’s one big gigantic spread. But that larger image has then been segmented into a Miller 16-panel grid here, but through the principles of Watchmen’s 9 panel grid. And it’s all to serve one purpose- Time.
Comics is a medium wherein Time and Space are one and the same. They are indivisible and blend together, and it is through the manipulation and ‘division’ of space that we denote and express time. It is, as critic Harry Kassen termed it, a concept that can simply be expressed as Timespace.
Here, we’re seeing one big cinematic setting and place – a room drawn in exquisite detail, but we’re seeing it across three whole different points in time, all at once. In the brightly sunlit panels of the morning, you have Peacemaker and his partner Nora O’Rourke together before he heads off to kill Harley. In the milder glow of night time lighting, we see Nora alone, as she’s reckoning with an intruder who’s broken in, who eventually bludgeons her to death. In the shady panels lit by only by a flashlight, we then see The Question investigating the crime scene some nights later.
And we’re getting all of this at once.
It takes the idea of how a figure like Manhattan with a ‘higher dimensional perspective’ might experience time and translates that visually for the actual reader. And it does this all the while synthesizing many different texts and artists into a singular whole. It’s Moore/Gibbons (Watchmen), it’s Miller (TDKR), it’s Millar/Hitch (Ultimates), it’s Millar/Quitely (Authority), all at once, all blended together into a potently idiosyncratic unified voice of a modern, evolved Morrison/Quitely. It’s a natural evolution of their work and approach on We3, and it’s a fascinating perspective of time, as we’re experiencing it from a ‘higher’ perspective wherein we’re ‘outside’ time, wherein the past, present, and the future are all occurring and happening all at once, and we can go backwards or forwards, however we like.
Notice the many ways and orders by which that spread can be read and experienced to get vastly different experiences of time and perspective, with every panel being the exact same size, none being ‘bigger’ or more important than another. All moments exist at once, like square boxes.
What have you here is almost akin to a beautifully ambitious polyptych, making wonderful use of the way time operates and can be expressed in a visual form like comics.
There’s an entire story being told across these pages and it’s one we could just sit in the loop of forever.
It’s a crystallization of Symmetrical Time, as Morrison terms it, on page.
It’s a different beast from Watchmen. Consider a similar sequence that opens Watchmen following a crime scene investigation:
Here, we’re moving back and forth between two perspectives and times. The first being the present with the investigators at the scene, as we see things alongside them like a companion to their investigation. The second being the flashes of the past in red, taking us back to the actual crime itself, with us seeing things from the perspective of the murderer. They’re very much done as clean contrasts, and there’s very little ‘shared space’ here. We see the sofa and TV from one low angle, and then in the next we cut to a wholly different angle where they’ve fallen over. These are all ‘quick cuts’ as it were, and it’s rooted in minimalism.
But with Pax here? We’re ‘above’ it all, getting to view and experience the entire event, what precedes it, what follows it, at once like the perspective of a god. And while contrast exists via color to denote time, it’s one big grand, shared tapestry of an image. The ‘camera’ isn’t moving on the whole, it’s staying still, unlike in the case of Watchmen. Only the people are moving. And so rather than a ‘quick cut’ method wherein we switch to numerous angles, it’s an intense focused meditation that does not change. It’s like god’s eye, ever watching, ever observing, all-seeing. It forces us to focus and take it all in, to process it slowly and repeatedly, over and over, again and again. We’re made to feel the flow of time, and the pristine ‘minimalism’ of Watchmen is instead replaced by a heightened existential maximalism.
It reflects the works perfectly, especially given Watchmen is a work that is essentially ticking away like a clock, where while Doctor Manhattan can view time all at once, it’s all building like a ticking time bomb to an explosive conclusion that cannot be seen or prevented. That is the nature of it and it’s what the grid serves in its 9-Panel Grid. A very steady, rhythm, 1-2-3, 1-2-3 pattern that is largely minimalist. It starts small on a murder and ends large on an explosive incident.
Pax is not that at all. Pax is not ‘ticking away’ to anything. In fact, the big ‘explosive’ incident isn’t saved for the end, but happens on the very first page, and instead the inciting murder is the small ‘ending’ of the issue, until it’s essentially looping back to that cover image of the peace symbol on fire with the quote. Pax is a firm reversal that disavows any of that steady minimalist ‘build’ or rhythm for a constant overload of experience with time, as the 8/16 Panel Grid slows us down and eternally drags us through a 1-2-3-4 rhythm on each tier, while the book traps us in a loop, with us knowing the ending from the beginning. The grid here serves both the grand scale storytelling and canvas of the ‘cinematic’ comics school and is perfect for action storytelling while also being wonderfully useful for the sharper, slower work playing with work. The maximalism has purpose here.
And while the 3×3 grid of Watchmen has a singular ‘central’ middle image across each tier, notice how the 4×4 grid does not. Watchmen is focused, and it’s affixing you in a moment of time, there’s always a consistent ‘central image’ at each point to focus on, which draws in your eye. But the 4×4 grid? No. It decenters you and the reading experience, depriving you of such a ‘central’ or focused middle panel or image. Everything is much more neatly in order, and you’re ‘pulled out’ from such focusing on any moment in time, which is to say- you’re pulled out of time. You’re pulled into the pattern and rhythm and structure of it all rather than any given, singular moment in each one. You’re caught in this loop, this rhythm, unable to let go.
It’s a comic that wants us to feel what it would be like to actually experience everything everywhere all at once. It’s overwhelming.
It’s why that Quitely spread is so crucial, and so powerful.
The entirety of Pax Americana, the comic, is sort of a larger expression of that very spread and ideas it captures.
Because what happens when you’re in a loop and the footage runs out?
It all loops around. We hit replay.
III- Atrium—————The tale of Pax Americana is the tale of President Harley, our American leader, our Ozymandias.
It is the tale of his plan to save the world and maintain world peace.
But what is that, really? And is it a viable thing at all? And what compels him to pursue said plan?
That’s what we’re meant to discover and piece together across the story, as the entire issue is a loop centered around his life, from his demise to his origins, with the book beginning on his murder and ending on the incident that led to him pursuing the path that he did.
President Harley is, in effect, a ‘What If?’ playing on the idea of The Good American President, in the vein of JFK, but not for the 1960’s America, but rather the modern, contemporary post-9/11 America of the 21st century. It is why he is elected right after George W. Bush, in the place of Barack Obama. It’s an idea Morrison has historically been taken with, going as far as to create Calvin Ellis, an alternate universe iteration of Superman whose premise was ‘What If Obama was also secretly Superman?’. The American Superhero and The American President as one, the fantasy of both’s decency and goodness and aspirational morality bound together.
What if there were the supposed ‘good’ President to save the world and make it better? It is a clear Liberal fantasy, the kind that believes Joe Biden could really come through for us all and save us, when the reality is he cannot. He will not. But that is the notion that Harley is meant to represent and play into, as crystalized by the very opening evoking the fall of JFK. The book then is about that fantasy, the symbol of The Good American President as codified by a tragic figure like JFK and how it would really play out in our modern world now.
That’s what births President Harley.
But who he is really? And what drives him to his post and purpose?
Harley is the son of a Vietnam veteran-turned comic book artist, who drew a title called Janus The Everyman but died mysteriously. Unknown to all but his son, Harley was secretly the world’s first real superhero- Yellowjacket, operating in the 1970’s until vanishing upon his death. Yellowjacket was ‘special’ in that he was a ‘true’ superhero, unlike all the other ‘super’ figures who worked with the state or were productions of military programs. He was just a guy in his outfit, like the superheroes he wrote about, who went out and night and did his thing. President Harley grew up with his superheroic father, loving him and admiring him. And he’s a dreamer, just like his father before him. But here’s the thing:
President Harley killed his father.
Playing around as a child, taking on his father’s all-too-big gun, he shoots his own father dead out of fear, as an instinctive response. And so falls his own father. So dies America’s first real superhero.
Harley is haunted by his murder of his own beloved father, his own beloved superhero, the man who brought him into this world, gave him life and nourished him. Patricide is an act that plagues his soul endlessly into adulthood, as he can never get over it, for how could you?
He sits at this father’s grave and wonders and wonders- Why? How? Wrecked by guilt and pain, unable to discern a path forward he searches for some semblance of understanding or meaning, trying to make sense of the madness.
And that’s when he has this moment of profound realization, visualized to us like so. It is a grand epiphany about the nature of existence, the universe, and the way of things. It displays the first and only real meaningful deviation and ‘shattering’ of the 8/16 panel grid design throughout the book. While the book has moments wherein panels or rows and tiers of panels are combined to make bigger panels or play with composition, the book mostly follows its design principles and rules of it all being within this 8 system (and its multiple 16). But here, that is deliberately shattered, as panels tilt and twist and rub against each other and the clean design and order is replaced with disastrous chaos. The ‘simplicity’ of ‘ordered life’ and ‘reality’ replaced with a flood of complexity and a multitude of images too much too process in far too much chaos, rather like life itself.
It is this moment that animates Harley, wherein he comes to an understanding, and pursues his plan to save the world.
He has seen ‘the design’ of things, ‘the way of things’, the ‘structure’ of reality that bends it towards the very path it is on. He terms it Algorithm 8.
He means, of course, the 8-panel grid (including its multiple, the 16 panel grid) which governs reality.
One of the lessons of Watchmen is that form should be indivisible from the contents of the work. They must be inseparable, with the form being a visual expression of the work’s identity and whole. And so much like the 9 Panel Grid becomes the avatar of Watchmen’s own vision and perspective of the world, so too does the 8-panel grid become the avatar of Pax Americana’s own vision and perspective of the world.
The 8 isn’t a mere ‘8’ here. Instead it doubles as a symbol for ‘Infinity’, an endless forever loop. Like an ouroboros writ large on a grander, cosmic scale. And with that layer of meaning, they present something very specific:
This isn’t some cheap, lazy parlor trick of ‘being Meta teehee’ or ‘breaking the fourth wall’ or whatever. It is adopting a hyper-realistic approach of using the 8-panel grid as a visualization and crystalization of a real idea.
That is to say, the 8-panel grid in Pax Americana represents the infinite hold and structuring pattern of Western Power and Imperialism. It is The Way Of The Western World that bends all else in relation to it. But most specifically, it is a symbol of Pax Americana as a concept itself on-page. That’s what the 8 panel grid is a visual metaphor and symbol of- American Peace, American Power, and American Empire.
The 8 Panel Grid is the symbol of The Forever War, as waged by the West, by America, as Empires do to maintain their power.
The 8 Panel Grid is the endless infinite loop of imperiums in this book, which is why the book begins and ends with murder. It’s why the first panel of the book is on the cover, but so is the last panel of the book, with the quote firmly placed upon it.
Time is a loop, and so is Empire.
This is where we come to finally realize and truly understand Harley’s plan, you see.
President Harley’s got a plan to save the world, just like Ozymandias did in Watchmen. He has a vision and a way to unite the world and save it in this post-9/11 age, the way Adrian Veidt did for a world of the Cold War period.
And the plan? The murder of The American President at the hands of the Peacemaker, once again returning to that initial reversal of the Comedian/Ozymandias murder. Here, the Ozymandias figure’s murder happens via the super-soldier and the murder is, like in Watchmen, part of a larger conspiracy and plot. And that greater plot? The plot which involves Harley having himself assassinated?
The resurrection of The American President by The American Superhero, a true American Superhero, unlike all the rest.
The murder of The American President by The Ultimate All-American Supersoldier, Peacemaker, will trigger an anti-superhero response, shutting down and shuttering the American Superhero as they exist in their current state, which is agents and champions of the American Military Industrial Complex. And then Captain Atom, that divine true superman, will return and resurrect the fallen American President for all of the world to watch, purging the sin from the superhero, and representing a new heroic ideal. Healing rather than hurting. Resurrection over Death. He will make The Dream Of The Superhero real, and thus will come world peace.
That’s the idea at least. That’s the plan.
It is the ideological opposite of Ozymandias’ plot in Watchmen, wherein Adrian believed that the terror and fear of The Other, the conjured Squid, the alien horror, would unite all of humanity in fear and ensure world peace, thus ‘saving’ it. Harley doesn’t believe in the power of fear, having seen and lived in a Post-9/11 world, wherein fear doesn’t unite, it only divides. It makes monsters of people, ensures hierarchies and leaves us worse than ever. The machinery of fear only makes the world worse. No, the world doesn’t need more fear and paranoia. Instead Harley’s betting on Inspiration over Fear. He’s counting on Wonder over Horror. He wants the American President to be resurrected like Jesus Christ risen from the grave, to boldly usher in a new era and age of golden peace. It is the dream of a world saved by wonder and inspiration.
That’s the idea at least. That’s the plan.
It’s why upon becoming President, Harley organizes the Pax (the peace), a team of American super-soldiers serving its imperial Military Industrial Complex who all dress in colorful outfits and bear classical American Superhero names, in the vein of Harley’s father and the characters he drew.
He wants to make the superhero real, and the superhero must be American. For only the American Superhero and the American President together can save the world. Only together can they redeem the lost potential and possibility of his father and the future he represented, at least in Harley’s eyes.
That’s what animates it all, you see? Guilt. The blood on his hands.
Which is why, of course, Harley opts to become the President Of United States Of America, to get further blood on his hands, empowering its imperialist military industrial complex and giving it a new colorful coat of comic book paint. Giving them the ironic title of the Pax, the peace, though they are crusaders of imperialist violence and murder. And it is, in the end, of course, this very strain of monstrous imperialist American Supersoldier that Harley entrusts his dreams and secrets, asking him to slay him.
Harley believes The Death of The American President will be punishment enough, that it will be absolution enough, that it will be the symbolic act to help exorcise and heal the world and push it onward, with the resurrection and rebirth of the American President and American Superhero to follow bringing about final salvation.
That’s the idea at least. That’s the plan.
It is all, of course, completely ludicrous and utterly insane and stupid.
It is nonsensical and naive and childish. It is the dream of a deluded child who never got over his father, who never got over the American power fantasy of the superhero, and who truly believes that the American President and the American Superhero can save the world.
Grant Morrison in their book Supergods once noted, in analyzing Watchmen:
Ultimately, in order for Watchmen’s plot to ring true, we were required to entertain the belief that the world’s smartest man would do the world’s stupidest thing after thinking about it all his life. It’s there where Watchmen’s rigorous logic runs out, where its irony is drawn so tight that the bowstring gives. Its road ends.
And that same criticism Morrison levies at Watchmen, frankly, holds just as true, if not more true, in the case of Pax Americana.
Harley’s not the world’s smartest man, but his entire plan is deeply stupid. Arguably far stupider than Ozymandias’ own machinations.
It is a deeply Grant Morrisonian idea, and Harley is very much a Morrisonian figure. He loves superheroes, he idolizes his working class larger-than-life father, and while keenly aware of the superhero’s destructive power, he believes in their transcendent power and possibility all the same. He wants the American superheroes to save us. He believes the American superheroes exist to save us. And his masterplan?
It is to make the entire world go through this:
He wants the entire world to experience a traumatic death, like he did, and then reflect upon that, and then watch in awe at a miracle of transcendence occurs. He wants the entire world to have an awakening the way he did, their minds opened to something greater, something larger and more significant. He wants the ‘shattering’ of Algorithm 8 as he experienced it to happen to the entirety of the world, thus freeing it from the chains of the pattern.
President Harley wants to free the world from the 8 panel grid, which symbolizes this infinite loop of American Power, of American Imperialism. He wants to shatter the loop of the Forever War of his empire. He wants to shatter the realities of Pax Americana to push the world to a utopian future of true peace, a true Pax, beyond the ones of American Empire and its imperial strength.
He sees himself as a martyr, a sacrificial savior with a larger purpose. A villain, the ultimate villain, the father-killer, the perpetrator of patricide, the king of the American War Crime Mountain, the lord of the American Empire, who must die and be reborn and be cleansed by a ritual of exorcism by The Man Of Tomorrow, that superhero, that superman.
But that’s just it, isn’t it? It’s delusional. It’s the dream of a madman who has not grown past the adolescent he once was. He’s a fool who pursues fantasies over any kind of material action for betterment.
Harley is a man naive enough to believe that American Power can be innocent.
After all, it’s how and why he believes the American President, after helping enforce the ruthless Pax and being culpable and complicit in plenty of horrors, can still be redeemed. That The American President can still be good, like when we all just kids and liked to believe so and think so, and everything felt slightly more possible. It’s a man trying desperately to force reality to adhere to his fantasies, which is why he has Captain Atom conjure up three towers in the very same place as the fallen two towers of 9/11:
Reality isn’t good enough. So fantasy and illusion must take its place. Delusions (or dreams if one were being kinder) must win out. And so in the place of those fallen towers, in place of that wound to American strength, American confidence and power, there’s erected 2 new towers and monuments, along with an extra third. It’s overcompensating big time, but that’s what empires do with their marks of weakness and how they lick their wounds, no? Project even greater strength in place of pain, make more empty symbolic gestures and spectacles that do not address any root causes or real issues that plague their times and the people who suffer underneath them.
It is this American Savior fantasy, the fantasy of the imperialist’s redemption, the ‘here’s how the American Empire can still win,’ that finally firmly lays bare the foolishness. It is the idea that the master’s tools could tear down and somehow salvage the master’s house. It is the idea that the only way to resolve the situation of monstrous imperialism and oppression, of American Power as made manifest and material in the flesh and blood in the form of The American Superhero? It’s to further reinvest even harder into said symbol and figure of imperialist horror–the superhero.
It is looking at your super-cops and their horrific cruelties, realizing they aren’t making things better, and somehow deciding they need even more faith and funding and support. It is belief in Supreme Leaders and Super-Champions and the powers and wisdoms of Great Men over any kind of collectivism or shared vision that invites everybody and gives them a seat at the table for a better world. Instead, it is a vision of faux-progressiveness feigning at being forward thinking. It is the delusion of the naive Harley who is privileged enough to live amidst his fantasies, without ever having to reckon with much else. It’s all about him, his guilt, his need and obsession, rather than the people at large.
It is the self-centered ideology of the emperor, much like Ozymandias.
It is the ideology of empires that sit atop the world, seeing themselves as benign emperors.
But that’s just it.
There’s no such thing as a benign emperor.
Much like there is no benign superman of any empire.
They all have blood on their hands, and it’s never going away.
IV- Infinitum——————The dream/delusion of Harley is drawn, of course, from something very tangible and real that pervades the entirety of Pax Americana- JFK. After all, alongside the visual of Robert Redford, John F. Kennedy was the real world basis for Ozymandias in Watchmen:
Thus Pax’s decision to orient itself entirely around a figure also evoking Kennedy makes sense. Even contextually, the title fits into a memorable speech Kennedy gave at the American University’s 1963 Commencement Address, which the issue quotes directly:
What kind of peace do I mean? What kind of peace do we seek? Not a Pax Americana enforced on the world by American weapons of war. Not the peace of the grave or the security of the slave. I am talking about genuine peace, the kind of peace that makes life on earth worth living, the kind that enables men and nations to grow and to hope and to build a better life for their children–not merely peace for Americans but peace for all men and women–not merely peace in our time but peace for all time.
It is why the issue opens on an evocation of JFK’s assassination and is rooted in the sensibility of a Zapruder Film. It is why it centers upon the notion of The Good American President who hopes to redeem America, rooted in that idea of JFK as ‘The Last Good President’ who is looked upon as a beacon of progressive possibility. JFK haunts the book so strongly that Harley’s plot literally involves a post-9/11 recreation of the JFK assassination, an incident that is traumatic to American memory and bound so tightly to its modern world of conspiracies. It’s the incident Harley doesn’t believe they’ve ever healed from and in recreating it once more and reversing the tragedy and trauma, Harley hopes to mend the wound and replace the pain and horror with joy and wonder of the American people. It’s why that must be the act to bring about true world peace. The whole affair is an echo rooted in that idea that JFK describes in his speech here, the idea of true utopian peace, beyond Pax Americana. A peace achievable by America if it tries hard enough.
And sure enough, it sounds nice, it sounds sweet.
But that’s all it is. It’s a bunch of sweet words.
It’s beautiful words that are easy enough to utter for those sitting atop empires, but feel impossible for so many underneath their boot-heel. It is words given from atop a platform, from a place of power, a place of strength, atop an empire built upon a mountain of countless bodies, for whom true justice and reparations have never been given. It is said in an empire that glorifies its many monsters, and readily equates the necessary violence of the oppressed with the violence of the oppressor.
So peace for who, exactly? It’s nice to say ‘peace for everyone,’ it’s a sweet thing to say, but in context of the American Empire and its numerous horrors, which all of its presidents, including JFK, were complicit in? There’s a bitterness in hearing it for whose who’ve seen the true nature of this empire. These are the platitudes and slogans and pretty speeches of the powerful, who have not suffered the ignominies of the systems they sit upon. They might know them in abstract, from reading about them or hearing about them from others, but they do not truly understand. And thus they have limits, they have blinders, and theirs is a perspective from atop the palace, gazing downward, a far cry from the perspective of those on the streets looking up.
The rhetoric applied now, in a post-9/11 modern American political landscape of an even more broken system wherein the options are Super Right Wing and Somewhat Less Right Wing? It exposes the horror even more clearly. We live in a landscape wherein such pretty speeches are made about trying to attain peace for everyone, justice for all, equality for everyone, with ending racism and bigotry across all lines, even as all the monstrous systems and machinations that enable these horrors are well-maintained and provided ever-increasing funding. All the while the actual valuable, good, and necessary systems are drained dry, understaffed and unsupported, with things barely clinging on.
This is the nature of Empire, and until one is prepared to truly reckon with the nature of empire, the horror of empire, putting aside the narratives of a ‘good’ nation, of nationalistic obsession, to really collectively take stock of the wrongs done? Nothing can happen. An empire and its emperor cannot speak of peace atop a platform and place of strength. They must get down, stand down as equals and must be prepared to apologize, admit wrongdoing, and be ready to compensate and be accountable for it in action, to give back to the people from whom it has taken.
The idea of peace is appealing. But peace on whose terms? That is crucial, isn’t it? Because for all that America and its masters may speak of such pretty, noble higher ideas, they are ever reluctant to let go of the absolute privileges that genocide, murder, theft, and colonial monstrosity has afforded them. It’s why they rewrite the story, alter histories and teach things beyond truth to convey American Exceptionalism and a more noble, heroic story. They say they wish to be beyond Pax Americana, but do they really? They like the power they hold, the might they have inherited, the sway they hold, and they do not want to be any less. They do not want to get down or lower themselves. They want to forever stand on top of the world. They do not want to lose much, but want to attain a whole lot, with others meeting them on their terms.
They want to be heroes of the world, the heroes of history, doing the right thing, with no idea of what that even means. They’ve never had to. It’s easy when you believe in the fantastical image of your own self-righteousness and decency, all because you hold greater power than all others. It is easy to see oneself as the protagonist of all reality and history- America, the savior, the redeemer, the hero of humanity.
It is, of course, why they even make art about how sad they feel about having to do what they have done. About the tragic terrible burden they bear as American Heroes and Soldiers, with books, films, TV shows, games, and yes, even comics, centering them and their pain, their sorrow, their trauma, their guilt, their endless infinite humanity, over those they have forever ruined. Even the very real oppression, pain, horror and remnants of the people they destroy become background wallpaper and an exotic setting like in a video game, full of NPCs, for them to prove the depths of their humanity, their struggle, their hardships. All those people become supporting characters and sidekicks or antagonists in their grand tale, helping along or hurting their own personal progression and arcs. It’s all about them. Their imperialist eyes by which to view the entire world.
And the imperium encourages this. It fuels it, fosters it, fawns over it, with boundless compassion for the burdens of the imperialist, for his sacred American soul, for his sacrificial story, as those he helped oppress fade into the background of his great mythic tale. Imperial culture obsesses over the complexities, the ‘ambiguities’, the vulnerabilities and nuances of this great champion of their imperialist machinery. It valorizes and admires such stories, viewing them with a nigh religious awe- never even thinking to offer a morsel of such dignity or consideration to the countless people such ‘champions’ hurt or helped harm forever. Because all those people out there, all those Brown people? They’re not as real or as humane or as essential like our guy here. They’re not us. They’re not an imperial citizen: an American. They are The Other, The Foreigner, a number and a statistic. Or perhaps not even that.
In the end, America loves a hero- no matter the evils and horrific systems they are actively complicit in. It needs its hero story, no matter the price of it. America first. They matter most, their pain and trauma over all else, all others, the people they’ve stepped upon, who they’ll never center or give a real voice to. All else is subsumed under the vision and protagonism of America and The Great American Hero, who gives his life to serve and protect the world, and thus Pax Americana itself.
This is how they see the world.
For America is the world.
This is what President Harley’s delusion is rooted in.
For why should the world at large see The American President, an imperialist monster, be murdered and then return to life, and commit themselves to world-peace in a general broad-strokes sense? Why must the world over find such transcendent meaning in The American President and The American Superhero? What makes them so special, beyond the American Exceptionalist idea that they just are?
Hell, forget the world over. Take America alone. We live in a world of absurd conspiracies, where people can’t even believe in a goddamn vaccine and its necessity and ability to help us against a deadly Virus. We live in a world of QAnon and Fox News and Alex Jones. Would folks not think the whole thing was some elaborate hoax or doctored footage or conspiracy, with the President having never died in the first place, it all being a fake acted-out set-up? Would not a million conspiracies taking the piss out of the whole thing and dismissing it all just some other nonsensical thing keep going? And even of those who believed, would they be any more than President-worshipping naive children?
And forget saving the world and achieving world peace. What of domestic peace? You’re dealing with a country that denies its own people healthcare, destroys any real chance of financial safety and security, and pushes people into poverty, and then utilizes their poverty to recruit them into its Military Industrial Complex of violence. It’s one that preaches peace, but peace for whom, exactly? The billionaires making money off the wars? The bastards at the top thriving off the sales of guns, even as poor children have to endure the gun violence in schools? It cannot grant peace to its own children, whom it claims to love so much and care for so dearly, even as it does everything in its power to make life hell for them. It’s a monstrous empire dead set on destroying both those within its boundaries and those beyond it. It’s one that spends more money on murder and imperialism than actually feeding children, educating them in schools, or ensuring their health and livelihoods. Who is it saving and bringing peace to here, really? It is a fascist machine dedicated to destabilizing any sense of modicum of ‘peace’ to keep its bloody cycle of violent horror going. Peace? It has no concept of it.
And yet the empire and its masters view themselves as akin to divine emissaries and prophets, chosen by god, to bring about salvation to the universe, like noble philosopher kings performing heroic sacrifices.
It is a touching idea and notion to want to shatter this endless pattern, this symbol of Western Power, of American Empire, of Pax Americana. It is a worthy notion to want to shatter the pattern of imperiums, to destroy the loop of Forever War. But is this it? Is this the best way to do such a thing? Is this idea at all useful?
No. It is an idea that only reinforces the empire’s power, if anything, in a different way. The American Superhero and The American President cannot change the world. Only the people who granted them both the power via their collective belief can. And Pax is a comic that on some level understands this, but Harley’s vision of the public being inspired to rise up and stand for world peace is what it presents. It cannot imagine the people’s ascendance beyond such figures of almighty powers without those very powers inspiring them in some shape or form, for that is the perspective of Harley, its lead. In a way, it’s a fittingly paternalistic and empire-centric mindset befitting Harley. An attempt at breaking through a loop that only exists to seemingly reaffirm it. He is a true Liberal, with deep limitations. A far cry from a real Leftist progressive with any kind of active imagination.
As such, Pax Americana is a tragedy. It operates as a tragedy where nobody wins, where everyone loses, for powerful people and their designs doom everyone. It is Watchmen‘s kin in this regard, though it is also at once thoroughly Morrison/Quitely.
And its deployment of the 8 Panel Grid which divides into Frank Miller’s 16 panel grid as a symbol of The Forever War? It’s endlessly compelling.
“What if Frank Miller’s 16 panel grid, which divides down into an 8 panel grid, was the symbolic device and visual expression of America’s eternal obsession with violence in the name of peace?”
That’s a legitimately striking and loaded idea, particularly given Frank Miller’s deeply troubling politics and evolution Post-9/11, going onto pitch a comic that he himself described as “a piece of propaganda,” [in which] Batman kicks Al-Qaeda’s ass.” DC would reject the project, but it would see print under Legendary Comics.
Thus would emerge Frank Miller’s Holy Terror (2011).
It would be a work wherein Miller would himself follow the lineage of his 16-Panel Grid approach to the American superhero in the 1980’s to its natural contemporary conclusion- the Hitch Cinematic school.
It would be the absolute zenith of the expression of the idea of The American Superhero as a genre symbol and representation of American Power, with Miller doing a deeply, deeply right-wing comic starring Not-Batman taking on the evil Islamic terrorists who dare to disturb the Pax Americana of his beloved empire. Vengeance must be sought, blood for blood, eye for an eye, against those inhumane, exotic, and monstrous brown terrorists threatening the peace of America.
It’s a work of jingoism and vile Islamophobia that is a crystallization of the American response to 9/11 in a certain kind of naked, unfiltered fashion that is telling. There is no veneer of pretense to its racism and hate or bigotry – it’s loud, clear, on-its-sleeve and indulged proudly. It is the empire’s vision shown with the honesty of a man who’s deeply bought into its horrible propaganda, and is thus able to churn out his own propaganda to prop it all up.
It is monstrous, evil work that should’ve never seen print, but it did, and in doing so, it lays bare ugly truths.
It takes the idea of The American Superhero’s ‘neverending battle’, whether against Crime, Criminality, Villainy, just this idea of conflict against an abstract opposition, of enemies and a threat, and reframes it in relation to the Forever War. The American Superhero and their never-ending story and struggle become the endless War On Terror. Miller bridged the American superhero with post-9/11 rhetoric and American imperialism more strongly and more sincerely than anyone else.
It’s revealing work.
And on a formal level, it’s also work wherein Miller himself shows the reader the direct impact of shifting the beat rhythm from 1-2-3 to 1-2-3-4, as he even goes further and adds an extra tier to both the 9 panel grid and a 16 panel grid, to create a 12 panel grid page and a 20 panel grid page. He keeps on adding a panel on a tier and an extra tier each time, displaying the effect of it- it overwhelms the reader. It becomes too much.
Holy Terror uses this effect with the panels as effective ‘photos’ of fallen American citizenry of the empire, to convey a sense of incalculable lives lost, all to justify its vile propaganda. For American lives, the lives of the imperial citizens, matter more than any others. The American lives are more real, more human, than any others.
But that maximalist effect displayed via the initial switch from 1-2-3 to -1-2-3-4? It’s useful. And that maximalist 1-2-3-4 rhythm can be wielded differently. It can be used better, stronger, and smarter, which is what Frank Quitely does with it. In his hands, the tool transforms, as it does in the hands of any brilliant artist.
And so that 8/16 grid as a symbol of Forever War, of the loops of imperiums and the patterns they’re caught in? It makes sense. It works.
As Morrison themselves puts it:
It’s about America and specifically about America’s self-image as the world’s policeman. It tries to make a mind-devouring narrative Mobius strip out of the complicated, contradictory idea of using violence to enforce “peace.”
It’s an inspired usage of the form to make a point, because why not? If the 9 Panel Grid can be used to visually symbolize the colonialist cage under which the oppressed struggle, then why not use the 8/16 grid to symbolize the loop of forever war that plagues the imperial mindset?
It fits.
And the emphasis and focus on a neoliberal figure like President Harley is appropriate, especially given how much of a Morrisonian figure he is. Afterall, here is a figure who loves superheroes deeply and believes in their transformative power, as written by the writer of Flex Mentallo, which is rooted in the divine, transformative power of our superheroes. Here is a person who associates the America with both bloody death and superheroic salvation, which reflects Morrison’s own reality as the child of Glaswegian Anti-Nuclear Activists who spent their youth terrified and fascinated by America. America had The Bomb, but America also had Superheroes. America was the realm of Destroyers and also the realm of Creators. The nervous tension and relationship Morrison has with America is filtered through to Harley here. Harley is someone who believes the idea of the American superhero and a superman can triumph over the idea of the American bomb and thus save America.
But perhaps more tellingly his imperial mindset and limitedness is best reflected via the nature of Morrison themselves. Afterall, Morrison is a Scot and a second-generation Irish writer with intense distaste and critical views of Empire, Imperiums, from America to the British Empire. They’ve written plenty of work with well intention-ed progressive values being critical of such imperiums.
But they also went ahead and accepted an MBE, making them a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire. They could have rejected it and taken a real meaningful stance and stood by their beliefs in real life beyond just the page, but they went ahead and went to the palace of those royals, and accepted the ‘honor’ from Prince Charles. It’s the kind of thing you couldn’t imagine Alan Moore even entertaining, but Morrison went ahead and did it. Morrison is a writer smart enough and aware enough to know all the reasons to not take it and refuse it, but in the end they took the Queen and the Empire’s special honor. They accepted the honors and medals of Pax Britannica, which gave way to our current Pax Americana.
Morrison is capable of being critical of imperiums while also accepting imperial honors that bring about intense distaste, which many more principled individuals have rejected. That’s a truth. They’re trying to have their cake and eat it, too. And so Morrison writing President Harley as a figure very aware of the problems of imperium but so thoroughly bound to that very same imperium?
It fits.
In a work so thoroughly about limits, limitations, and confines, Morrison’s own are laid bare in a way that gels with the material.
But do those limits then take away from the work and its own point and purpose? That’s a fair question, and it’s one where the answer will vary depending on the person. Personally, to this reader, the work as a gestalt of Morrison, Quitely, Fairbairn, and Leigh transcends beyond their makers, like any great work of art. The work stands on its own, and can be evaluated and engaged with as such, it’s what it is there for. And as a work so rooted in exploring the mind and faith of a neoliberal? It’s effective, it’s sharp, both intentionally and unintentionally, at once. There’s an honesty here that feels revealing and thus useful. If the work were about endless possibility rather than binding limitations, one might feel differently and the work might likely fail. But it is rooted in the inescapable chains that bind. It’s a tragedy and a loop about a modern ‘progressive’ who is aware and critical of Pax and yet is complicit in and benefits from it all at once. So it works.
The flaws of the creator help underline and enlighten the flaws of character, who is forged from the intimate fears and faiths of their psyche.
At the same time, however, Pax is also rooted in Morrison’s penchant for something else. Morrison loves doing single issues that chart entire lifetimes to tell a story, whether it be the classic ‘Best Man Fall‘ in The Invisibles #12 or ‘The Life and Times Of Joe Christmas‘ in Klaus. And with Frank Quitely, one of the best to ever do it, taking years to craft this life-story? The end result is impressive. It’s a fascinating artistic synthesis of a book, by all counts. But perhaps most interesting in its capture of a whole life lived is the usage of the quote on the cover, which operates at once as the first and last image of the story.
This quote by the American Poet Delmore Schwartz is an enticing and revealing choice. A child of Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe, Delmore burst onto the scene in the 1930’s like a blazing star, full of possibility. He was hailed as brilliant and his poetry, at its best, was full of an aching beauty. The above quote, which Morrison uses for Pax, is taken from his poem Calmly we walk through this April’s day, which takes place in 1937 and is a reflection by Schwartz on the nature of time and memory and life. ‘Time is the school in which we learn, time is the fire in which we burn’ echoes and repeats throughout the poem, punctuating the beats of his various reflections, like the eternal constant of time itself. It is a tribute to many things, like much of Schwartz’s work, from the names of friends and family he knew or held dear to the city life he experienced, but above all it is a tribute to time. It is an ode to time as the eternal, endless flame that subsumes and consumes us all, wherein we are at once people and memory, as the infinite loop.
It’s a fitting choice in the context and contents of the issue, which is so much about loops and time, but at the same time, there’s another layer here. Schwartz’s story is, ultimately, a tragic. Bursting onto scene as a ball of fire, he was a genius who would go onto have a turbulent life that would be snuffed out at the age of 52, a far cry from the figure he was once seen as possibly being. Schwartz’s life was a bundle of possibility that didn’t see true fruition. His is a tale of tragedy, of a bright young man who it feels like could have and should have ended up anywhere except where he did. His life is the great ‘What could have been!’.
If there was ever a quote to sum up Schwartz, the above would be as good as any. But it works in the context of Harley, too.
Notice how the domino mask doubles as an 8 and a symbol of infinity- a loopHere is a boy that was once a bundle of possibility, that had a fire in him, and he could have been anything. Here was a young blazing star of possibility.
And yet he ended up becoming what he did. An American President. The Lord Of The Imperialists. The Imperialist Who Believes In Imperialist Redemption. The Deluded Fool Desperate To Redeem Empire.
A far cry from his working class artistic father. But perhaps that rose-tinted view of his own father doesn’t hold, given the elder Harley was in Vietnam and served there. He too was part of the imperialist machinery, one way or another. We only see him and know him and understand him through Harley’s own idealization of him, Harley’s rose-tinted memory of him. We don’t know the man himself. But the facts we know paint a depressing picture. There is complicity and blood on everyone’s hands here.
Tellingly, the elder Harley dies in 1974, which is the same year President Richard Nixon resigned after his disastrous Watergate mess and got pardoned for by his successor Gerald Ford. It was the symbolic death of American Justice, and the firm public cementing of a lot of pretenses falling away, as bastards like Nixon could do anything and get away with it, no matter what. It exposed the terrible horror of the whole system.
And the date of Nixon’s resignation is pertinent to Pax here, as critic Harry Kassen has frequently noted. Because the date, my friends? It’s August 8th.
The 8th day of the 8th month of the year.
8-8.
Infinite Loops. Forever War. Forever are we trapped in imperial cycles.
It’s sad, really. And that’s what Pax Americana as a comic wants us to take in. How sad this whole business and enterprise really is. How depressing and tiresome this whole damn loop, this goddamn 8 loop of infinity is. That no matter how good a man you put up to sit on that imperialist throne, who believes he’ll ‘break’ the cycle, he inevitably ends up being subsumed by it and becomes part of it.
It’s a book demonstrating a childish fantasy with a deadly consequence. And it is rather fitting, isn’t it?
After all, is this not the perfect encapsulation of America? A little white boy playing pretend with a gun, shooting recklessly with fear, and killing the very things that gave life to him and his world? A sad little boy with blood on his hands who gestures to higher, nobler aspirations, while climbing atop ever growing mountains of bloody bodies. All in the name of his dream. His peace. The cleansing of his soul, his satisfaction, his redemption, and his hero’s journey wherein he returns from the abyss to bring about salvation for mankind.
So what is the Pax Americana? It is a reflection of the world it stems from, much like Watchmen before it. It is the rare exception that understands that Watchmen is a challenge asking you to push forward rather than simply mimic or evoke in order to illuminate truth in bold ways. And so it does.
It lays bare an evident truth about the nature of imperial powers, and the champions it fosters.
It captures the ideology of such places and the people who populate it.
It crystalizes visually the eternal loop they are forever caught in.
God bless America.
God bless American Peace.
And God save those who dare disturb it.
For more in “Who Watched the Watchmen”…
The post Pax Americana and The Infinite Loop Of Imperiums appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below:
This week we’re jumping 100 years into the Sins of Sinister, and talking about the rest of what’s interesting in the day’s comics!
This Week’s Comics
Sins of Sinister: Storm & The Brotherhood of Mutants #2
Marauders #12
The post Fall of X Teasers & Al Ewing’s Sins of Sinister | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
“Four-Letter Words”Credits: Kieron Gillen writes; Andrea Di Vito draws; Jim Charalampidis colors; Clayton Cowles letters; cover by Leinil Francis Yu and Jesus Aburtov
SPOILERS AHOY!
A hundred years into the Sinister Era, the Quiet Council has brought its war against neighboring empires nearly to its conclusion—at the edge of Pax, as in Pax Britannica, “peace under British imperial rule,” or Roman, or Sinister and his EsseX factors!
And of course, the role of the Council’s martial command is filled by Hope, who is looking increasingly like her father, the now Xilo-esque Cable. Her mission log offhandedly mentions having killed Mystique, but we’ll have to wait till Ewing’s entry up next to find out whether that’s true (If so, it would sure upend Destiny’s whole reason for wanting to be in this timeline!). She’s forged a chimeric planet-buster to destroy interstellar empires, and it’s hard to imagine a mutant WMD that could top her L-bomb, combining astronomical teleportation from Lila Cheney, nuclear fission from Firestar, mass manipulation from Harry Leland and size alteration from Micromax.
Hope’s starship crew are likely run-of-the-mill chimerae who don’t have to worry about upstaging their messiah captain. (For a deep Easter egg, note that Gillen’s first Generation Hope story arc–way back in 2010!–was titled “The Future Is a Four-Letter Word;” he’s got a soft spot for the character whom he did so much to define.)
But we do see an exciting new chimera who will upstage all the Sinisters—Rasputin IV!
Unfortunately, this is not the same Rasputin IV we gushed over in Hickman’s 2019 Powers of X. Fortunately, the Sinister future’s first stable five-gift chimera is still a kick-ass character, and moreover Gillen delves much more into Rasputin IV’s chimeric nature than we saw previously (After all, she was much more a mystery than anything clearly defined on the page, before she was eaten by a black hole). So, fourth time the charm (as in four generations of the Rasputin chimera) and four letters—the G, T, C and A of DNA. And hey, there are four Sinisters, or there were, although indeed, we know who the real one is if we’ve read our Further Adventures of Cyclops & Phoenix* (Peter Milligan and John Paul Leon, 1996—where Nathaniel Essex, not a clone, receives his modern form from Apocalypse). We see Super-Skrull’s last stand with four Ronan hammers, as well. Is that all the fours here accounted for?
No, wait! The future is a four-letter word—and it’s Rasputin IV! Er. What I mean to say is, she is the hope of the future! …Or at least, Sinister’s future. Well, let’s hope she gets to be more than that. You bet she will.
Unlike Sinister’s four-letter science, Mother’s magic makes use of the whole alphabet. Another sly dad pun from Kieron (As for the best visual gag here, we have Sinister Xavier looking very much like the fascist Nick Fury/Cap villain, Baron von Strucker, directly comping the Red Diamond empire with Hydra).
*The four-gift chimerae, like the L-bombs, were always unstable, we’re told. Indeed, they were hopeless! Sinister has outdone himself with a five-gifter. And the rest of the Council thinks so too: They believe that he’s reached his final limit in further progress with chimera engineering. He knows the ax is about to fall.
Mother’s surprise visit indicates the further cross-pollination between the three event minis, which we should expect more of from here on out, but even more than the Council’s threats, perhaps, Mother puts him on notice. This is her first ever to the Red Diamond Sinister, who does have the human Essex’s memories from well before he created four divergent clones of himself, indeed pre-dating his encounter with Apocalypse, also (from whom he got his posthuman powers to begin with). The result, though, is that he’s now as clued-in to the reality of the situation as his remaining “siblings,” which gives him a leg up compared to literally everyone else.
Returning to Rasputin IV, her five gifts come from Colossus, Kate Pryde (“a stable pair”—what a hoot that is!), Unus the Untouchable, Quentin Quire (instead of Jean Grey) and Wolverine Laura. Quire’s omega telepathy is indeed sensible, since we do know what’s wrong that Grey strain—which Hope mentions earlier in the issue. Like Jean, she “doesn’t clone well.” As revealed in Claremont “Inferno” classic Uncanny X-Men #241 (1989), Jean clone Madelyne Pryor’s X genes weren’t activated until the Phoenix Force paid her a visit (the flashback there is chronologically before her Uncanny #168 debut).
That vat of Hope parts in the Reliquary Arbor—yeesh! Btw, what is it with Sinisters and Reliquaries these days…?
What Gillen also leaves tantalizingly unclear is whether the difficulty with cloning and resurrecting Hope has to do with the Phoenix, as well. After all, per another classic Gillen comic from way back, Uncanny X-Men vol 2 #10 (2012), Hope’s future involves becoming an avatar for the Phoenix. That was over a decade ago, publication-wise, so who knows—and since 2012’s AvX, such avatars no longer seem so uniquely destined; they’re just your favorite comic book characters amped up with cosmic powers. This mystery, however, is of course beyond the purview of the present event!
I think Gillen is just having fun writing another Hope-centric comic, with little Easter eggs and references to his earlier work—as with the first villain Hope shot (Sinister) as an X-Man; see Uncanny X-Men vol 2 #2, part 2 of “Everything Is Sinister!”
But that doesn’t mean he can’t kill his darlings! Surprisingly, Sinister Exodus bumps off the gloating messiah easily enough—having realized that he is the church and a messiah’s death only strengths that foundation of belief. So, in a sense, all those zombified chimerae among her starship crew do upstage Hope, after all! Recall, too, that Hope’s body parts are sufficient to allow the resurrections to continue.
Speaking of zombified crew, those on the little starship Rasputin IV commandeers after Sinister frees her from his “genetic chains” and begs her to “Save us from my sins.” We’ve never seen Essex so camp-free, but really he’s hamming it up admirably for his simple saint-like heroine.
Immoral X-Men #2 is equally a Rasputin-IV-centric comic, where she is, again, the true hope…
Just as Wagnerine will prove Mother’s ultimate archnemesis, at least in this alt reality, Sinister may end up on the wrong side of Rasputin IV’s Soulsword (and where he got that for her I’d like to know!)—but so far, their master-servant relationship is much less tragic.
Let’s see how the next five—er, I mean, 900 years go! (After a few centuries on that little starship, they’re going to eventually need some space from each other.)
Art-wise, Andrea Di Vito’s entries are my favorite so far, and his consistency these past two issues bodes well for what’s…
NEXT: Storm & the Brotherhood of Mutants #3—Storm lives!
The post “Sins of Sinister” Part 6: Immoral X-Men #2—in Review! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
“There is no ‘The’ future. There is no Destiny.” – Destiny
It’s an age of reckoning for mutantkind. Krakoa has grown from an isolated island nation into an empire that spans the cosmos, but even the strongest empires can fall to the weaknesses inside their walls. The heads of this prosperous new society have endured an inferno…but the sparks of something greater have just been lit.
In 2019, writer Jonathan Hickman launched the X-Men into a bold new status quo through House of X/Powers of X, following the mutants as they forged a new nation and fought to change a seemingly immutable future. Working with countless collaborators, Hickman would continue this master narrative across the Dawn of X and the Reign of X, with each new writer adding their own voice to the story of Krakoa. However, the office would suffer a major shakeup in 2022, with Hickman announcing his departure in the wake of the upcoming Inferno event, leaving his plans for the line seemingly unfinished. But what some saw as an ending, Hickman’s collaborators saw as a beginning. Building on the foundation the writer had helped create, this team would work to forge their own ambitious new chapter, shaped through countless ideas for “the Mutant Metaphor,” and the heroes who embody it.
For the first time, the X-Men have the power to choose their destiny, leaving the question…what comes next?
(Spoilers for each title and the line-wide story to follow)
The Death of Futures PastSuperhero comics have always been cyclical by nature, built around revolving teams of writers, artists, and editors building on decades of existing stories. Jonathan Hickman’s departure from the X-Office was far from sudden, in fact, the writer had helped lay the groundwork for the line’s next chapter through the development of his Inferno miniseries, with many of the line’s updated plots reflected within the event itself. That said, the transition still had its share of growing pains after Hickman’s departure, with many coming to a head in the line’s immediate follow-up event: The X Lives/X Deaths of Wolverine.
Picking up in the immediate aftermath of Inferno, X Lives is both a coda and pastiche of Hickman’s time on the line, even using HoX/PoX’s dual narrative structure to track the journeys of Wolverine and Moira X, each on their own mission to save their versions of the future. Unfortunately, X Lives/X Deaths doesn’t have HoX/PoX’s deftness for continuity, with so many timelines crossing over each other that it becomes hard to decipher what anyone’s doing here. Omega Red’s mad, I guess? Plot-wise, it’s a big continuity-jumble that raises as many questions as it answers, but read in the larger context of the line it becomes something incredibly sincere: an event-long send-off to the creator who laid the foundation for what was to come.
(From X Lives/X Deaths of Wolverine, by Benjamin Percy and Joshua Cassara)While the aftermath of X Lives/X Deaths is pretty messy, just kinda dropping the long-running Phalanx plot and rendering Moira into a cackling supervillain, what’s done has been done. Much like under Hickman, the X-Office have kick-started an all-new status quo of their own. In place of HoX/PoX’s singular mission of survival, mutantkind’s future has become a series of branching possibilities, shown through the eyes of Destiny, a former outsider to Krakoa. These nebulous visions are still a far cry from the eternal paradise Krakoa is supposed to be, but the underlying theme of this change is clear: confronting the failings that led to Hickman’s Inferno has fundamentally changed the nation, and as a result, the mutant identity has evolved on its own.
In place of the larger war with Orchis, which blurred the lines between Krakoa and its enemies, we see a bigger focus on the “Mutant Metaphor” than ever before, with titles throughout the line showing mutants finally transcend the norms that held them back. While Vita Ayala and Rod Reis’s New Mutants has explored themes of identity and trauma since the Dawn of X, their final few issues see mutants evolving beyond that trauma, as Illyana Rasputin uses her community to give old villains and young mutants closure and peace. These themes of reclamation and transformation continue across the rest of the line, with mutants working to redefine themselves as individuals and parts of the larger Krakoan nation. Steve Orlando and Eleonara Carlini’s relaunched Marauders sees Kate Pryde and crew jumping into the past to reclaim the species’ history. Other titles have been transformed entirely. Following Nightcrawler’s attempt to found a mutant church, Si Spurrier and Jan Bazaldua’s Legion of X sees the Mutants working to build an entirely new approach to justice, transforming Krakoa’s 3 laws into something less rigid and more interpretive:
“I’ve wanted to do a precinct-style ensemble story since I first read HOUSE OF X,” states Spurrier. “For the first time, the Marvel Universe has this densely packed, beautifully volatile population of super-humans, all in one place. It needs peacekeepers, sure…but you don’t get far in Krakoa if the limit of your imagination is beating people up or reaching for a gun. Mutant civilization needs those who think differently.”
If the X-Line under Hickman was the story of a great society undone by the evils done in its name, Destiny of X acts as a complete transformation, with countless creators celebrating Krakoa’s impact while working to shape it into something less morally gray.
(From AXE: Judgment Day, by Kieron Gillen and Ivan Fiorelli )Mutantkind’s public image undergoes a major evolution in this chapter, depicted in all its glory through Kieron Gillen’s Judgment Day crossover, with the X-Men taking their place alongside the Avengers and Eternals in a grand 3-pillar event, and, for the first time, sharing their nation’s gifts with the outside world.
It’s hard to understate the meaning of this moment, especially within an event built around critiquing morality. Orchis and its allies still remain, and as a whole, Krakoa is still an imperfect system. But for the first time, the mutant nation has opened itself up to the rest of the world, and forged a connection they had thought impossible. This focus on connection has become the X-Line’s driving force post-Inferno, allowing the many voices of the X-Office to transform the nation of Krakoa beyond its original scope. But even still, Hickman’s influence looms large, as the mutant nation’s many secrets start to poison its people.
Paradise LostSince its beginnings, the “Krakoan Era” of X-Men has largely been seen as Hickman’s vision, mostly through the tone, themes, and overarching story the author oversaw through Inferno. While this dynamic would change leading into the writer’s departure, Destiny feels wholly defined by Hickman’s absence. Instead of lone plots carried across the entire line, Destiny’s story feels more thematic in nature, as each title delves into the lives of people chafing against Krakoa’s supposedly perfect society. Debuting directly after X Lives/X Deaths, Victor LaValle and Leonard Kirk’s Sabretooth is a complete inversion of the more heroic elements of the line, using the evolution of the pit to show how Krakoa’s leadership has only grown closer to their human enemies, creating an expansive prison to hold anyone who they believe threatens the nation:
“I’ve enjoyed the Krakoa era, in part, because it’s never been hidden that the villains remain villains. They haven’t had a change of heart, if anything it’s the heroes who have to do the most changing,” states LaValle. “It was easy…to understand or accept why Sabretooth went down…but I wanted the other mutants to be people who readers wished would receive mercy or understanding…and then they don’t. The point wasn’t to say that Xavier or Magneto are evil, but to say that if “justice” is capricious then it isn’t true justice. The history of X-Men comics…is one of wrestling with serious political and cultural issues so this seemed like the perfect lane for me to be in if I wanted to bring these issues up.”
This division between Krakoa’s leadership and its people has been a mainstay of the X-Line since its relaunch. However, through Destiny’s increased focus on individual stories instead of an overarching narrative, this schism feels more pronounced than ever before. Nyla Rose, Steve Orlando, and David Cutler’s Thunderbird one-shot gives an especially deep look into the struggles of Krakoa’s outsiders, with a recently-resurrected John Proudstar fighting to reconcile his place in a community that feels completely alien to him.
(From Giant-Size X-Men: Thunderbird, by Nyla Rose, Steve Orlando, and David Cutler)This theme of individual heroes fighting their own system only grows more apparent with each title, as more and more of Krakoa’s institutions begin to exploit the very people they were made to protect. Alongside Adam Kubert, Federico Vicentini, Robert Gill, Christopher Allen, and Edgar Salazar, Benjamin Percy uses the dueling stories of Wolverine and X-Force to show the progression of Krakoan special ops from necessary evil to fascistic puppeteering, as Hank McCoy’s oversight of X-Force grows crueler and colder, even regressing Wolverine to a state similar to his days in Weapon X. Tini Howard and Bob Quinn’s relaunched Knights of X expands on this theme even further, as Betsy Braddock’s party of heroes finally break their ties with the self-interested Majestrix Saturnyne, becoming a roving band sworn to protect the Mutants of Otherworld. However, the deepest look into the nation’s failings comes through Al Ewing and Stefano Caselli’s X-Men Red, which turns the mutant world of Arakko into an interrogation of colonialism and exploitation, pitting Storm’s more heroic Brotherhood of Mutants against Abigail Brand and the imperialism of S.W.O.R.D.:
“The X-Office is unique in that at the macro level, we’re all telling one story, with more…cohesion than I think you’d find anywhere else…” muses Ewing. “We’ll see (this) in X-Men Red. Storm’s someone who always…questions authority, even her own if necessary. Crowns and thrones represent a kind of unquestioned, unrepresentative power that I just can’t see her being tempted by at all. But she’s not shying away from her responsibilities, either — to the planet or to the people. It’s hopefully obvious…that there are two different ideological approaches at work here. Are they going to be part of Arakko society, or are they another team coming in from outside?”
As Krakoa’s heroes continue to evolve beyond the constraints of their nation, these critiques become another defining factor for the X-Line, kicking off a series of revelations that recolor everything we’ve experienced so far. With more and more of Krakoa’s enemies stepping into the light, the line’s grandest revelation finally comes into focus: the nation’s worst enemies have come from within.
A Snake In The GardenWhile much of Destiny of X’s stories are focused on moving beyond the framework Hickman put in place with HoX/PoX, its third act reveal takes it all back to Krakoa’s foundation, and a question that’s hung in the air since the formation of the quiet council: can mutantkind put aside its old divisions to serve a greater good?
To many, the nation is a troubled but worthwhile paradise, allowing mutants young and old to find peace and meaning through a community of their own. Krakoa’s Quiet Council, however, tells a different story. The effects of Moira’s betrayal have only worsened post-Inferno, with the shaky unity of earlier chapters giving way to countless conflicting agendas. The splintering of Krakoa’s leadership is charted further through Kieron Gillen, Lucas Werneck and Michele Bandini’s Immortal X-Men, which follows each member of the Quiet Council as they try to hold on to their own plans while their nation continues to change around them. It’s clear that some members are more dedicated to the idea of Krakoa than others, but Gillen uses Immortal to go even deeper, hopping across time to explore a plot point that had been seeded in the beginnings of Hickman’s run: a betrayal literal centuries in the making.
(From Immortal X-Men by Kieron Gillen and Lucas Werneck)Through a series of revelations, Gillen takes a number of concepts from Hickman’s tenure and inverts them, retracing Mister Sinister‘s path as he slowly shapes Krakoa’s history to his own terrifying ends:
“In some ways, Sinister is a wonderful dark mirror to Krakoa,” muses Gillen. “The mutant circuits are some of the best stuff…in this era, the idea that there are ritualized ways that mutants help each other, and that’s what Sinister does with the chimera, but it’s utterly unethical. Sinister literally objectifies people. (He) is a colonialist and an exploiter, and…having someone as bad as (him) on the Quiet Council is a reminder of the deal they made to have all of this. What I think the mutant story is about, or superhero stories generally, is a way to dramatize things that feel like something. Sinister is implicit for the original sin of any form of nation-building. There is always something nasty in the room you’ve got to deal with, and in this case, it’s that guy.”
Through Sinister’s corruption of Krakoa, the X-Office are able to definitively move beyond their predecessor’s vision, taking the subtext of previous chapters and elevating it into a battle for the soul of the Mutant Nation. Through connection and collaboration, the species has transcended the systems of hate and fear that kept them down. But does all the good Krakoa gives to its people outweigh the evils its founders have committed? And do the nation’s imperfections render it unfit to continue?
While a common critique of the era was that the “X-Men are bad guys now,” the creators behind the line have a more balanced answer in mind. Just like in the real world, no nation arrives perfect. Progress isn’t something that’s seized all at once, but built up over time, with different generations adding great works of their own.
Jonathan Hickman and his grand plans for Krakoa are gone, but his successors have set a promising new foundation through Destiny of X, highlighting the many stories of the nation’s people and setting the stage for a conflict where they’ll all have a part to play. For a moment the Krakoan empire is thriving, but it’s only a matter of time before its founders’ many sins finally catch up with them.
Sources:https://comicbook.com/marvel/news/x-men-red-al-ewing-interview-marvel-destiny-of-x/
https://www.cbr.com/marvel-gillen-immortal-x-men-interview/
https://ew.com/books/kieron-gillen-teases-the-krakoan-politics-of-immortal-x-men/
https://bleedingcool.com/comics/destiny-of-x-news-drops-today-break-the-internet-si-spurrier/
https://comicbook.com/marvel/news/x-men-red-al-ewing-interview-marvel-destiny-of-x/
https://aiptcomics.com/2022/04/18/x-men-monday-152-al-ewing-x-men-red-1/
https://aiptcomics.com/2022/07/18/x-men-monday-victor-lavalle-sabretooth-2/
https://comicbook.com/marvel/news/x-men-sins-of-sinister-kieron-gillen-interview-marvel/
The post DESTINY OF X | The Krakoan Empire Divided appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
This week I interviewed Alex Segura about his novel Secret Identity and his comics career! We talk about the comics industry of the 1970s, the rise of intellectual property challenging creator rights, and writing for Comixology Originals, among a whole lot more!
On Comic Book Herald’s Interviews I’ll be interviewing some of my favorite creators in comics about specific runs, graphic novels or series, looking for their insights on the inspirations behind the work and ideas or hidden material readers may have missed. CBH Interviews is an audio annotative guide to enjoying the intricacies and thinking in the art. Thanks for listening, and enjoy the comics!
Secret Identity
Writer: Alex Segura
Publisher: Flatiron Books
About the Author:
Alex Segura is the SVP – Sales and Marketing at Oni Press and the author of Star Wars Poe Dameron: Free Fall and the acclaimed Pete Fernandez Mystery series. He has also written a number of comic books, most notably the superhero noir The Black Ghost, the YA music series The Archies, and the “Archie Meets” collection of crossovers.——————————————————————————————————-
Music for Best Comics Ever by Anthony Weis. Check out more music at anthonyweis.com.
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The post “Secret Identity” with Alex Segura | CBH Interviews #107 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack talk the Brian Michael Bendis and Alex Maleev run on Daredevil, and then Greg Rucka’s time on Elektra!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Elektra | #7 to #10 | Greg Rucka run | | Daredevil | #26 to #37 | The Bendis and Alex Maleev Daredevil run begins, the finest take on Matt Murdock since Frank Miller. |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2002 pt. 4
| X-Force / X-Statix | #122 to #129 / #1 to #5 | The Milligan and Allred oddball X-series continues, and officially migrates to X-Statix. | | Chamber | #1-4 | Requested by Patreon Backer Kyle S.! | | Exiles | #8 to #15 | So much fun. |
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Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
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Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
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The post 2002 Pt. 3: Daredevil & Elektra appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below:
This week we’re jumping 100 years into the Sins of Sinister, and talking about the rest of what’s interesting in the day’s comics!
This Week’s Comics
Sins of Sinister: Immoral X-Men #2
Bishop: War College #2
Wolverine #31
The post Immoral X-Men #2 and Wolverine vs. Dark Beast! | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
The roaring and immediate success of the first season of X-Men: The Animated Series skyrocketed the Fox to the top of the Saturday morning television charts and made the nascent network a serious competitor of ABC, NBC, and CBS in the ratings game for the first time. This triumph naturally meant the pressure was on to maintain excitement for season two. The series writers had to balance the high-quality storytelling that made the first season a smash hit with increased scrutiny from the Fox higher-ups over their precious new property. As related in X-Men: The Art and Making of the Animated Series, the series creators received a mandate from above “that the series could no longer be ‘serialized’: Each episode must stand alone.”
This presented a significant change from the structure of the show’s first season, which threaded connective tissue throughout its thirteen episodes to tell a story of the X-Men’s fight against humanity and the Sentinel program. With the directive against serialization, the writers had to work to find a middle ground that satisfied the bosses without completely sacrificing the comics-style long-form storytelling that set the series apart.
The NarrativeWhere season one plots regularly planted seeds that informed the larger arc, season two’s focus is primarily on expanding the world of the X-Men and fleshing out the backstories of individual team members. Nearly every member of the team – with the notable exceptions of Professor X (off doing Savage Land things) and Jubilee (understandable, given how heavily she was featured in season one) – receives a spotlight episode exploring their life outside the Xavier School. Each of these installments then features a tag at the end progressing the story of Xavier and Magneto trapped in the Savage Land, all of which eventually connect to the two-part episodes that begin and end the season. These episodes are all about season two’s real “Big Bad,” revealed to be Mister Sinister, as was suggested at the end of the season one finale. While the intervening episodes challenge each member of the X-Men individually, it’s Sinister’s obsession with the potential within the genetics of the X-Men in general and Cyclops and Jean Grey in particular that most directly threatens the team as a whole at the front and back ends of the season.
The Key EpisodesThe second part of the opening story, “Till Death Do Us Part, Part 2,” introduces a number of threads that have a substantial impact on the X-Men in their sophomore season. The X-Men are forced to face antagonists on two fronts, first taking on the anti-mutant Friends of Humanity, led by Graydon Creed, before having to rescue the newly-married Cyclops and Jean Grey from Mister Sinister and his Nasty Boys. The latter make their first proper appearance here and are immediately memorable, thanks to the unique powers on display and some very distinctive voice work, most notably by Chris Britton as Sinister. This episode also has some great Evil Morph action as he impersonates Professor X before luring him and Magneto to the Savage Land to kick off the B-plot that runs all season long.
After this two-parter, over half of the remaining episodes are standalone tales diving deeper into the histories of individual team members. The best of these for my money are “Repo Man” and “A Rogue’s Tale,” which focus on Wolverine and Rogue, respectively. There’s an argument that these were the two most fleshed out X-Men in season one, and they get the most engaging stories this time around as well. In Logan’s episode, he is lured back to Canada by Department H and we are treated to an appearance by Alpha Flight and a nicely distilled version of Wolverine’s Weapon X origins. Rogue, meanwhile, is forced to confront repressed memories of her time with Mystique and the Brotherhood of Mutants, which included a mission during which she permanently absorbed Ms. Marvel’s powers – and a portion of her psyche – and put the hero in a coma. Both episodes do a great job connecting this version of the X-Men to the Marvel Universe at large, and pretty accurately adapt key elements of both characters’ origins.
“Mojovision,” the season’s 11th episode, offers something completely different in tone from anything the series has done to this point. The bouncy score gives this episode a playfulness befitting of this lighter take on interdimensional content creator Mojo, and the animators are clearly having a great time paying homage to ‘80s TV as the X-Men are put through the paces to boost Mojo’s ratings.
It all comes to a head in the season two finale, “Reunion, Part 2,” which reveals the identity of the mastermind controlling the Savage Land (duh, it’s Mr. Sinister). With the combined might of the Nasty Boys and the Savage Land Mutates, Sinister is able to capture all of the X-Men and spends plenty of time vamping and pontificating about his plan to mix all of their genes to create an army of super-mutants. Classic Sinister stuff! Throw all of the wildest elements of the Savage Land into the pot – Ka-Zar, Zabu, and Sauron all make significant appearances – and this finale serves as a great payoff for expanding the X-Men’s world all season.
Standout MomentsWolverine copes in the Danger Room: X-Men: The Animated Series Wolverine loves nothing more than to pine after Jean Grey. He’s a lonely, pained man whose prized possessions include a framed photo of his love (and uh, her boyfriend), which he likes to caress when he’s feeling down. So it should come as no surprise that Logan does not take Scott and Jean’s wedding – which opens season two – very well at all. In fact, his response is to violently decapitate a robotic doppelganger of Cyclops in the Danger Room. My favorite part of this scene is that Wolverine took the time to get into his full wedding tux before deciding to go berserk on the Scott-bot.
Apocalypse looms large: Apocalypse is only featured in the two-part “Time Fugitives” story that serves as an only OK sequel to season one’s “Days of Future Past,” but he nonetheless has an (ahem) outsized presence. After the X-Men discover his plot to infect the Earth’s population with a mutated plague and destroy the virus – though unnamed, this is clearly the show’s version of the Legacy Virus of the comics – Apocalypse rages as he is wont to do. He grows to an enormous height and seemingly kills the mutant heroes (don’t worry, time-traveling Cable undoes it!). It’s a brief moment, but one that hammers home just how much of a threat he poses.
Graydon Creed’s downfall: The mutant-hating Friends of Humanity feature heavily throughout season 2. They are frequently shown committing terrorist acts and working to manipulate events such that mutants take the blame and public opinion turns against homo superior. It’s the grandest form of comeuppance, then, when Wolverine puts two and two together and realizes that the group’s leader, Graydon Creed, is Sabretooth’s son – truly, how many unrelated snarling men named Creed could there be in this world? In front of Graydon’s followers, Wolverine projects a hologram of Victor in front of his son and, his mutant lineage exposed to his followers, Graydon breaks down into hysterics.
Wolverine & Ka-Zar ride a pterodactyl: Thanks to his new buddy, Ka-Zar, Wolverine learns pretty quickly that there is no better way to get around the Savage Land than on the back of a pterodactyl. The two wild men storming Magneto’s old citadel on a flying dinosaur is a sight to make any X-Men fan smile. It’s a testament to the show’s writers’ love for the comics that they dove head first into some of the strangest corners of the X-Men and Marvel universe in season two.
Standout CharactersThere are guest stars aplenty from the wider X-Men and Marvel worlds in season two, and a lot of them have quite memorable appearances. Mr. Sinister is an obvious pick here given his status as the season’s overarching villain, and he makes an outsized impression. He is quite the menacing figure, with the distorted quality of his voice, his design – which includes sharp teeth that are not seen in the comics – and the cadre of minions he has collected to torment the X-Men.
As I’ve mentioned, season two adds some truly out-there characters to the animated series’ world, so Sinister is by no means the only guest star that deserves a highlight here. Mojo appears in only one episode, but his corner of the multiverse is unique among the rest of the conflicts the X-Men deal with. What drives him – the never ending quest for higher ratings – makes him unpredictable and a standout among the mutants’ other more terrestrial foes.
I’d also be remiss if I didn’t call out some of the characters who stand out mostly because of the, shall we say, insane choices made in their vocal performances. Let’s start with two of the Savage Land Mutates, Amphibius and Brainchild. Amphibius – who is exactly what you would expect him to be, a bipedal frog man – speaks with the dulcet tones of a coffee grinder at the bottom of the ocean. It is a truly horrible sound. Brainchild’s voice, meanwhile, hits a pitch fit to shatter glass, making him somehow more annoying than Nasty Boy Ruckus, whose power is to literally scream. Alpha Flight’s Puck takes the cake for silliest voice on the heroes’ side, as he manages to sound less intimidating than he looks by a factor of ten.
Comic Book InspirationWhile some classic elements of X-Men history make their way on screen – I’m thinking mostly of the pretty faithful telling of Rogue’s backstory from Avengers Annual #10 and Storm’s history with the Shadow King – season two pulls an impressive amount of inspiration from storylines and characters that had only recently debuted in X-Men comics at the time of production; so if you ask me, the best era to turn to if you’re looking for some context on this season is the X-Men comics from the early ‘90s. The big bad of the season, Mister Sinister, reemerged leading/babysitting the Nasty Boys in 1991’s X-Factor #75 by Peter David, less than two years before season two premiered, after a three-year Inferno-related absence. Omega Red, villain of the Wolverine and Colossus-centric episode, “Red Dawn,” similarly appeared for the first time in late 1991 in John Byrne and Jim Lee’s X-Men #4.
These aren’t even the most recent of the new incarnations that populate season two, and with the decades of comics history available, it’s a testament to the X-Men’s soaring popularity at the time that the writers drew so heavily from contemporary stories in their adaptation. Graydon Creed makes his first comics appearance in Uncanny X-Men #299, by writer Scott Lobdell with art by Brandon Peterson, which hit spinner racks in April 1993, a mere six months before the second season premiere. And the X-Ternal worshiped by the Assassins and Thieves – or as Gambit would say, Teeves – Guilds of Gambit’s past doesn’t debut until October 1993’s Gambit #1, by Howard Mackie and artist Lee Weeks. The character was so new in fact that the series’ artists had no design from Marvel for the character that would eventually become Candra the X-Ternal, so the ethereal being that appears in “X-Ternally Yours” is, per Eric and Julia Lewald, “the only completely original model…designed for the show.” Quite frankly, though, it might have been wise to look elsewhere for a Gambit-centric story, as the X-Ternal is ill-defined as a character, which helps to make “X-Ternally Yours” easily one of the weakest episodes of the season.
In “Time Fugitives,” a two-parter with no direct equivalent in the comics as far as I can tell, Bishop and Cable independently travel back to the ‘90s to fix their respective presents. This is an ambitious story – the first episode is told from Bishop’s perspective, while Cable is the point-of-view character of the second – and thus a lot of credit should be given to the writers for trying something bold. But “Time Fugitives” tries to do a lot, and I think it fails to excel at any single one of them. Not only does this serve as a sequel to the excellent “Days of Future Past” episodes from season one. Not only does it pull in the ongoing Graydon Creed/Friends of Humanity conflict and introduce the show’s version of the Legacy Virus – which had been recently introduced in X-Force. It also recontextualizes its adaptation of Cable – who was featured fairly prominently in the first season as a generic soldier with ties to Genosha – to align better with his characterization in Cable comics of 1993 as a freedom fighter from the future battling against the forces of Apocalypse. There is a lot of fun stuff in these two episodes, and again, the ambition is commendable, but the story told fails to equal the sum of its parts.
Final ThoughtsOverall, season two feels like a natural progression for X-Men: The Animated Series. With so many characters to juggle, it was important for the series to find time to spotlight each X-Man. The season effectively builds out the team members’ backstories and adds depth to what are already visually engaging and interesting characters. The fact that it does so using largely contemporary early-’90s source material means the show thoroughly captures the tone and aesthetic of the X-Men at the time. This focus on character combined with the show’s willingness to dive head first into some of the strangest, most out-there aspects of the X-Men’s universe makes for a truly enjoyable sophomore year.
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“The Apostate”
Credits: Si Spurrier writes; Andrea Di Vito draws; Jim Charalampidis colors; Clayton Cowles letters; cover by Leinil Francis Yu and Jesus Aburtov
Veteran Marvel artist Andrea Di Vito blows us away this issue with his best work to date. Readers may be familiar with his stint on Larry Hama’s five-issue Wolverine: Patch mini last year, where his bold linework and dynamic figurework were on full display, as well—but here, he gets to fully flex his fantasy/sci-fi stylings thanks to Si Spurrier’s wildly imaginative scripting for our first foray into the far future of “Sins of Sinister.”
SPOILERS AHOY!
Of course, 100 years into the Sinister-infected Earth isn’t as unimaginable as a millennium hence, which we’ll get with the third issues of our three minis—but a horrific alien apocalypse has already come and gone from our dear dead homeworld, and we are fully into Sinister mutant terror in space. At first, I thought it odd that our first foray into the 100-year-plus chapter would be Spurrier’s heavily magic-themed book, but now it makes perfect sense: In issue #2, we finally get to see what sort of super-powered malevolence Mother Righteous is easily capable of; it’s clear that she is going to prove a formidable antagonist not just to the other Sinisters but whatever remains of the resistance. And while a lone wolf for the time being, Wagnerine (a chimera of Nightcrawler and Wolverine, of course) finds herself by issue’s end as one of Mother’s enemies. Her many decades of service in the role a morally neutral magical artifact pirate and thief, plus the anguish of her experience as a grieving mother in the final pages, provide so much ground for future character work—and so far, she deserves to emerge from this event as the breakout new character (especially when you consider the lack of real distinctiveness we as readers are expected to be satisfied with when it comes to Marvel pushing for those they want to be the next breakout). It would be fascinating to see her escape this reality and return to the current 616 to see her interact with both Nightcrawler and her longtime comrade Banshee, to say nothing of her existential war against her tormentor.
Note also that Wagnerine’s baby daddy is Summernight, meaning that through the blessed Nightgene, Wolverine and Cyclops have now canonically had a child! Also, like Sinister stealing baby Nathan, Righteous has likewise abducted yet another Summers baby! She’s not so different, after all.
As for Summernight’s fate here, there’s much going on that isn’t yet spelled out, but while it appears that those Nightkin who don’t die in the field eventually fall back under the sway of their original Sinisterization, and Mother Righteous has constructed a rite of passage for euthanizing each chimera at this point: They teleport into the impenetrable face of Sinister’s stolen lab at the Worldfarm. Over the decades, we see that thousands of skeletons have amassed in close orbit around that black sphere.
The bones of true believers are nothing if not holy, right? Think of what Mother is building that might need a great deal of belief built up around it for it to work. We’ll return to this below.
Of course, while Wagnerine has a much clearer backstory than another alt-future chimera that X fans have been clamoring for more of since Rasputin IV’s few and only appearances in 2019’s Powers of X, we might expect that the event’s next installment, Immoral X-Men #2, will steal some of Spurrier’s thunder. Regardless, Spurrier has done an amazing job introducing and building up a new character, and Wagnerine will deserve just as much clamoring as Rasputin IV (it’s not clear yet how she could be the same chimera we’re familiar with). I can only hope Wagnerine will reappear before the event’s penultimate chapter, which will be the next and last issue of this mini, as well. Despite her ridiculous name, she deserves to be more than a tragic figure of rage and loss that doesn’t break out of her home timeline, a reality we will inevitably leave behind very quickly once the event is over. At the least, every villain needs their archnemesis, and Mother Righteous has hers right here.
Still, Nightcrawlers #2 makes this dystopian future AU as memorable as possible, from the mystic angle, especially. While I wasn’t completely sold on the notion that an artifact hunt would amount to all that much in this heavily science fictional reality, Spurrier and Di Vito really do sell the equal importance here of Marvel’s mystical elements, alongside the cosmic. For of course, would-be universe conquerors must be equally prepared to take on the Shi’ar and Otherworld—and we see both dealt with this issue, albeit briefly but brutally and beautifully (in terms of diabolically creative ingenuity).
We also get a one-page flashback telling us what happened with Legion sometime in the past: Something of a god now, or close enough, he raptured into a kind of noetic transcendence, definitively turning down the paltry offer of a transparently mercenary alliance from Mother Righteous. Who knows how many mutants David saved, sheltered inside the Altar in his mind, at the edge of astral infinity. Perhaps we will see this omega mutant gone singularity once more, when it comes time to topple the Dominion of the most dangerous Sinister left standing (inside a pod, perhaps)!
But Nightcrawler’s Krakoan home, the Narthex, is still around, now as the prow of a grand starship, where the Nightkin and Mother Righteous have made their space-faring home, apparently safe from space wars.
(The Narthex name refers not just to the entrance to an ancient church, but to the symbolic use it was put to in such a church: Tellingly, it was the closest some penitents were allowed to get to the church’s sanctuary, which is to say the furthest point. In other words, Kurt wasn’t merely devout in naming his home, but painfully self-deprecating, unsurprisingly. No wonder this trait remains dominant among his descendants.)
The present action of the story, though, is Asgard’s fall to Sinister Magik and her bizarre forces, above all the Frost Giants, which appear to be chimeras of Jotunheim’s traditional denizens amalgamated with Iceman, Colossus and possibly Emma Frost. But a Thor in absolute despair just calls them “Fimbulwinter,” the winter to end all winters, as prelude to Ragnarok. In Sins of Sinister #1, Magik’s Muspel sword sundered Asgard from Midgard. Ninety years later, she returns with some of the wildest chimeras yet seen, with recognizable elements from Sabretooth, Archangel, Chamber, Cyclops/Eye-Boy, possibly Omega Red and who knows what else (Abyss of AOA?).
And the grimly beautiful cover does not lie: The stars are villains stealing an old man’s hammer! But they’re not really villainous; the Nightkin operate under Mother’s orders without rancor or even passion. Yet they’re not quite satisfied with just being her tools. Their ambivalent potential here makes them interesting. For decades, they’ve been stealthily making off with mystical artifacts from already dying venues, civilizations beyond Earth, their doom sealed as soon as they become active targets of the Quiet Council. They’ve been “Dancing between the raindrops of war,” as Wagnerine poetically describes in her narration. Sometimes, they announce their intention before the Sinister invasion has begun (Otherworld); others, the end is already actively at hand (the Shi’ar, Asgard, Xandar). All this booty will go into some crucible out of which Mother Righteous will somehow forge her so-called Reliquary Perilous, which I’m sure we’ll see next time. She seems to magically smelt these objects down between her bare hands.
(The cover does lie, however, in that none among the Nightkin is worthy of lifting Mjolnir. Within, we see that they made off with the hammer courtesy of a Lost/Nightcrawler chimera, able to use her gravity powers to walk off with it. Also note the silly airburst Heirburst Bomb pun—three powerful heirs in one, with Legion-style big hair, no less.)
To achieve this end, Mother has forged her Nightkin minions—whose numbers Vox Ignis has grown throughout the decades since Nightcrawlers #1, by repeating the mystical ambush we saw them perform there, releasing the Quiet Council’s Nightcrawler-themed chimeras from Sinister Red Diamond control. Amazingly, their creator appears to have been making so many of them that he only recently noticed that they were escaping his control; of course, much has already slipped his grasp. While 90 years on, Wagnerine is still very much in her prime, given her healing factor, the only one remaining from her cohort appears to be Auntie Fortune (perhaps given Domino’s luck?), and with Mother Righteous faking the death of Wagnerine’s baby, she seems to making quite a gamble given all the other chimeras’ infertility. She must be getting close to finishing her Reliquary, which we can assume requires faith to become operational. Knowing it would take decades, though, she cynically manipulated her minions’ deep religious sensibility, engineering narrowly cultic beliefs that will likely backfire on her. Instead of the three laws of Krakoa, she’s concocted a perverse send-up as the foundation of her sway over the chimeric clones of Nightcrawler; this is the “heist liturgy,” the “countdown credo:”
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Blessed Be the Nightgene.
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Blessed Be the Reliquary Perilous.
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Blessed Be The Spark.
Mother’s further insults to Kurt that we see this issue are her possession of the Hope Sword his adoptive mother pulled from his chest (in Legion of X #10) and her, well, murdering the sad monster that he had long ago become.
Again, this isn’t just ornamental world-building. Mother needs others’ faith in her for her agenda to work. With the blessed Nightgene bones crowding around Sinister’s lab and Wagnerine’s stolen baby who we see full of the Spark’s light, she must be getting close to making her Perilous Reliquary operational…
Or maybe it’ll take another 900 years?
Wagnerine turning “apostate” and escaping the Narthex will prove the biggest detriment to Mother’s plans, and again, if Mother escapes this future, I hope the apostate outlasts this event as well.
In the Council’s destruction of worlds, Spurrier takes the cake so far for most inventive one-off uses of chimeric monstrosities. This is the wonderful thing about AUs (alternate universes)—the only limits to imaginative destruction are whatever can destroy such a universe; this sandbox can burn to ash. But hopefully, a few refugees make it Earth-616; at least Wagnerine! Maybe the unlikeliness of this happening makes it that much more compelling.
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Dave interviews writer Paul Jenkins about helping to launch Marvel Knights, writing Wolverine’s Origin, his work on characters like Spider-Man and Sentry, and a whole lot more!
Up Next:
My Marvelous Year — 2002 pt. 3
| Elektra | #7 to #10 | Greg Rucka run | | Daredevil | #26 to #37 | The Bendis and Alex Maleev Daredevil run begins, the finest take on Matt Murdock since Frank Miller. |
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The films of Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight Trilogy – Batman Begins (2005), The Dark Knight (2008), The Dark Knight Rises (2012) – are often cited among some of the most influential films in recent memory, certainly responsible for revitalizing the superhero genre in the public consciousness, but perhaps also changing the landscape of big-budget blockbuster Hollywood filmmaking. Nolan’s grounded approach to superhero films, seeped with realism, has influenced every franchise since, for better or worse.
It is easy to note and cite the influences these films have had since their release, but art is not born out of a vacuum. And while I do think “everything is a remix” can be a rather pessimistic way to look at things – if nothing is truly “original,” what is even the point, right? – it is important to look back, not just to gain a deeper understanding of a work, but also to acquire a new outlook with which to look forward.
So, what are the influences of The Dark Knight Trilogy? It is, of course, a marriage of two mediums, taking a character predominantly associated with comic books and bringing him onto the big screen, so it must have had influences from both films and comic books. What films informed the cinematography of this trilogy? And what stories from the character’s rich publication history were mined to tell the tale Nolan et al. were trying to tell with their films?
Batman BeginsAfter the disastrous Batman & Robin (1997), the Batman film franchise needed a revival. After several attempts to find the right filmmaker to helm the project, the powers that be at Warner Bros. finally settled on Christopher Nolan, who at the time was coming hot off the heels of the commercial and critical success of Memento (2000) and Insomnia (2002). David S. Goyer was hired soon enough, providing Nolan with the insight he needed to stay faithful to the mythos from the comic books.
As Goyer told The Guardian in 2013:
“Chris had never read comic books: he didn’t know the world. So he trusted me on that franchise […] to know what was canon: what could be changed and what couldn’t be changed.”
Together, the duo set out to revitalize both the franchise and the character. It helped that they both saw potential in a certain aspect of the character that previous films had failed to explore: Batman’s origin.
Years ago, in an effort quite similar to the one Nolan and Goyer were undertaking at the turn of the century, DC Comics hired Frank Miller and David Mazzucchelli to reforge Batman’s origin, offering a definitive take that could forever be enshrined in their new canon for a new age; something that became necessary following Crisis on Infinite Earths, which did away with decades of continuity with the intention of providing a new starting point to the readers. Miller was a young auteur in the comic book industry at the time, having reinvented Daredevil at Marvel Comics and done something of a final Batman story at DC Comics. As Dennis O’Neil so eloquently put in his introduction to the trade paperback collection of Year One, “Having done Batman’s omega, Miller was willing and anxious to do Batman’s alpha.”
Miller and Mazzucchelli attempted to neither alter nor retell the “who he is and how he came to be” that the character’s creators, Bill Finger and Bob Kane, told in Detective Comics #33, just a few months after his debut in Detective Comics #27. Instead, they focused on what came after, when a young Bruce Wayne returned to Gotham after trekking the world for twelve years, training under the tutelage of various masters, honing his craft and sharpening himself for his fight as the caped crusader. Goyer was fascinated by these “lost years,” so to speak.
“The moment in Year One when Bruce Wayne is returning to Gotham after a multi-year absence. I was captivated by that. I wanted to explore what had happened in those intervening years,” Goyer told SFX in 2004. “And I also wanted to depict the moment when he decides to leave Gotham – what he would say to Alfred, his foster father, and how that would take a terrible toll on his heart… And because we were using Rā’s al Ghūl, we definitely used some of the Denny O’Neil issues as a point of reference.”
One Dennis O’Neil written story in particular – “The Man Who Falls,” illustrated by Dick Giordano and first published as the only original story in the 1989 Secret Origins trade paperback collection – would serve as the structural influence for the film, as cited in Genesis of the Bat, a short documentary featured in the DVD collection for Batman Begins.
Nolan too was captivated by Year One, but perhaps not in the same way as Goyer was. He was coming into the project from a filmmaker’s perspective and was looking for themes he could furnish the film’s world with. He was, however, interested in grounding Batman in contemporary reality and, as he told The Guardian in 2005, “wanted to try to do it in a more realistic fashion than anyone had ever tried to a superhero film before.” So, he traded the “fears, frustrations and hopes […] of 20th-century urban life” that Miller and Mazzucchelli, with colorist Richmond Lewis and letterer Todd Klein, had brought to life in Year One with that of the 21st-century. Nolan and Goyer’s Batman thus became a post-9/11 War on Terror Batman, militaristic in his approach to both crime-fighting and the gadgets that would help him in his war on crime.
Since this was Nolan’s first foray into the superhero genre, he leaned for inspiration on the very first superhero film of the modern age to truly capture the public’s imagination at large: Richard Donner’s Superman (1978). Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter in 2015, Nolan elaborated on the impact the film had made on him and how it served as the blueprint for his take on Batman:
“I can remember the trailers for it, I can remember about Superman the movie, all of that. And it was very clear to me that however brilliant – and it was very brilliant – Tim Burton’s take on Batman was in 1989, and it was obviously a worldwide smash, it wasn’t that sort of origin story, it wasn’t that real-world kind of epic movie; it was very Tim Burton, a very idiosyncratic, gothic kind of masterpiece. But it left this interesting gap in pop-culture, which is, you know, you had Superman in 1978, but they never did the sort of 1978 Batman, where you see the origin story, where the world is pretty much the world we live in but there’s this extraordinary figure there, which is what worked so well in Dick Donner’s Superman film. And so I was able to get in the studio and say, ‘Well, that’s what I would do with it.’”
Nolan was insistent in presenting Batman’s world as realistically as possible, so Chicago became Gotham, much like how New York became Metropolis in Donner’s Superman. He did have to compromise to a certain degree, though. Finding himself unable to shoot on location, unlike how much of the subsequent films in the trilogy were shot, Nolan and crew had to “build the streets of Gotham in large part.” This is where Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner (1982) came into the picture as another influence, as Nolan told Forbes in 2015:
“I immediately gravitated toward the visual treatment that Ridley Scott had come up with, in terms of how you shoot these massive sets to make them feel real and not like impressive sets. And immediately we started looking at the rain, the handheld cameras, the longer lenses…”
The Dark KnightEscalation is the name of the game by the time Nolan and Goyer get to The Dark Knight. Interested in exploring how Batman’s war on crime would prompt criminals to retaliate with an increase in both intensity and intent, Nolan and Goyer spent months developing the key plot points for the film. As Goyer told Empire in 2012:
“With these three films […] we always said, ‘What kind of story do we wanna tell about our protagonist, what kinda challenges do we want to have them face?’ And then, ‘What character in the rogues’ gallery will be best equipped to put our hero through those?’”
The Joker seemed an obvious pick, having already been teased at the end of Batman Begins, even though Nolan had no plans for a sequel then, as he himself admitted to Empire in 2009:
“I didn’t have any intention of making a sequel to Batman Begins and I was quite surprised to find myself wanting to do it. I just got caught up in the process of imagining how you would see a character like The Joker through the prism of what we did in the first film.”
The Dark Knight’s Joker thus became “pure evil through pure anarchy” to the military might of Batman, tying into the film’s themes of escalation of terrorism, leading to some very real world parallels; to the point that, as The Atlantic reported in 2016, it prompted former US President Barack Obama to cite the film’s portrayal of the Joker as an analogy to explain the growth of the ISIL to his inner circle.
Heath Ledger’s legendary performance as the Joker is revered now, but back when his casting was announced, it was met with quite the backlash, from fans and critics alike. Jack Nicholson’s iconic portrayal of the Joker in Batman (1989) was seeped into the public consciousness and Ledger certainly had big shoes to fill. Nevertheless, Nolan trusted Ledger’s vision and, essentially, gave him free rein to develop the character.
“We talked a lot about Alex in A Clockwork Orange, people like that. He’d come up with the same things independently. I looked into his eyes and I just saw… This guy knows he can do something here, he wants to get in and do this thing. And that was without even a script! I always felt – because people were uncertain about the casting; other people were a little surprised by it, I think – but I always felt very strongly that he was going to really put everything into his performance and really do something extraordinary,” Nolan told Empire in 2009.
Speaking to MTV in 2008, Nolan argued how the films in The Dark Knight Trilogy are “a very large survey of the comic history.” That is particularly true for the books Ledger used to draw inspirations from for his performance. The Killing Joke by Alan Moore and Brain Bolland became a crucial influence to base the narrative that Ledger’s Joker wants to drive home in the film’s climax; which is, as Nolan told IndieWire in 2008, “pull everybody down to his level and show that he’s not an unusual monster and that everyone else can be debased and corrupted like he is.” In a way, Nolan and Ledger’s Joker is quite similar to the Joker the characters’ creators, Jerry Robinson, Bill Finger, and Bob Kane, envisioned back in Batman #1 – something that Nolan acknowledged while speaking with IndieWire in 2008:
“If you look at the first two appearances of The Joker ever in the Batman comics, we were quite startled to look back at those and realize how close that character is to what Heath’s done and what our story is. I think it’s very close to the original incarnation of the character some sixty-five years ago.”
In the end, “it’s a combination of reading all the comic books I could that were relevant to the script and then just closing my eyes and meditating on it,” Ledger noted while speaking with Empire in 2007:
“I sat around in a hotel room in London for about a month, locked myself away, formed a little diary and experimented with voices – it was important to try to find a somewhat iconic voice and laugh. I ended up landing more in the realm of a psychopath – someone with very little to no conscience towards his acts. He’s just an absolute sociopath, a cold-blooded, mass-murdering clown, and Chris has given me free rein. Which is fun, because there are no real boundaries to what The Joker would say or do. Nothing intimidates him, and everything is a big joke.”
Ledger’s “Joker diary”, “filled with images and thoughts helpful to the Joker backstory,” and his method-acting approach to find his vision for the character came under added scrutiny following his unfortunate demise before the film’s release. Grant Morrison, whose seven-year run on Batman has become somewhat of an ultimate take on the character, noted the inclusion of their stories in that diary, particularly Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth and “The Clown at Midnight.”
“He actually had a whole list – blind babies, doctors, accidents – really horrible stuff,” Morrison told MTV in 2008. “Heath wrote it all down. So yeah, I can see there’s a lot of [Arkham Asylum and “The Clown at Midnight”] in his Joker.”
Interested in grounding the character, as they had done with Batman, Nolan and Goyer went the opposite way of what Tim Burton did with his version of the character in Batman (1989), and what the duo themselves had done with Batman in Batman Begins. That is, they opted to not explore the Joker’s origin, but keep him rather mysterious in that aspect. Instead, the only member from the main cast who goes through something of a character arc in the film is Harvey Dent, who has a triumphant rise as the city’s new District Attorney, an ally to Batman and Gordon, to a tragic fall as Two-Face, forever on the opposite side of the law.
In both its intent – exploring the forces of acceleration that led to the transition of Batman’s rogues gallery from mobsters to supervillains and to tell the origins of Two-Face – the film drew heavily from The Long Halloween, the 13-issue limited series by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale. Speaking to MTV in 2008, Nolan went into the details of precisely what pulled him into the book, “The Long Halloween has a great, triangular relationship between Harvey Dent and Gordon and Batman, and that’s something we very much drew from.”
The idea for The Long Halloween, as Loeb reveals in his introduction for the trade paperback collection, germinated when Archie Goodwin, editor extraordinaire, approached Loeb and Sale, who at that time were working for Marvel Comics, with an intriguing hook, “I just was sort of wondering what happened to The Roman and all those other gangsters from Batman: Year One. I don’t think Frank [Miller] is going to revisit that material, and maybe you two should.” Perhaps Nolan and Goyer, and Nolan’s brother, Jonathan, who joined the team to develop the screenplay, were also wondering the same, which is why The Dark Knight feels a lot like a crime drama that has escalated to envelope an entire city than a traditional superhero film focused on the fight between good and evil.
“In the case of The Dark Knight, we’re attempting to tell a very large, city story or the story of a city. In the same way that, I don’t know, Michael Mann’s films, like Heat or something. That was sort of an inspiration,” Nolan told IGN in 2007. “If you want to take on Gotham, you want to give Gotham a kind of weight and breadth and depth in there. So you wind up dealing with the political figures, the media figures. That’s part of the whole fabric of how a city is bound together.”
Nolan credits Heat for not just inspiring the central themes running through The Dark Knight, but also for the visual language of the film. As he explains in the interviews for The Nolan Variations:
“We’re going to shoot in a real city, with real streets and real buildings, because the scale of that can be massive. We are going to use IMAX cameras so we can shoot the full height of the buildings and we’re going to give you an antagonist who’s interfering with the very fabric of the city. Just from the way we shoot it, the Joker walking down the street will be a huge image. Heat was very much an influence, because Mann is a fanatic for architecture, too; he understands the grandeur of a city and how it can become a kind of epic playground.”
The Dark Knight RisesDespite the commercial and critical success of The Dark Knight, and that the film became such a global cultural phenomenon, Nolan was hesitant in making a third film in the series. “How many good third movies in a franchise can people name?” he joked in an interview with the LA Times in 2008. While that may be true, Hollywood logic would tell you otherwise. And so, after much delay, work began on the final entry in the trilogy. Goyer had written a three-film treatment back in 2005, various elements of which had been incorporated into Batman Begins and The Dark Knight. Using that as a rough framework, Nolan completed a story outline which was then handed over to his brother to develop a screenplay out of:
“Without getting into specifics, the key thing that makes the third film a great possibility for us is that we want to finish our story,” Nolan told LA Times in 2008. “And in viewing it as the finishing of a story rather than infinitely blowing up the balloon and expanding the story.” Another thing that went contrary to Hollywood logic. But, Nolan, it would seem, had put his foot down. This would be the end of his version of Batman. “Unlike the comics, these things don’t go on forever in film and viewing it as a story with an end is useful. Viewing it as an ending, that sets you very much on the right track about the appropriate conclusion and the essence of what tale we’re telling. And it harkens back to that priority of trying to find the reality in these fantastic stories. That’s what we do,” he told LA Times in 2008.
The question then became who do you pit Batman against for his final story? The question plagued Frank Miller too when, years ago, he fired a “barrage of scenes” at Dick Giordano, who had then been promoted to an editorial position at DC Comics and had asked Miller to develop a Batman story. In Miller’s own words for the introduction to The Dark Knight Returns, a book so revolutionary that it continues to influence the superhero genre to this day, as it certainly did The Dark Knight Rises, he describes how he pitched a “raw, rambling narrative […] not yet a story at all, a mixed bag of cool things Batman will do and say that winds up with an ending that could never work.” Miller’s story would put Batman against the Mutants and their powerhouse of a leader and end with a showdown with Superman. Nolan’s is perhaps less sumptuous in its design, but is equally grand in its ambitions. The Dark Knight Rises gets a lot of its best ideas from The Dark Knight Returns, beginning with the core premise of a retired Batman coming back for one last fight, against an enemy that threatens to destroy his city.
In the case of The Dark Knight Rises, that enemy is Bane. “The fact is that The Joker is an anarchist. He has a plan, but not really, but kinda sorta he does… And the question that energizes The Dark Knight is: does he really wanna kill Batman or not? And the twist is that he doesn’t. He wants to kill everybody else. That opened up the possibility for a third film in which you have a more literal villain,” Jonathan Nolan told Empire in 2012, elaborating on the team’s choice to go with Bane as the villain for the film, a character perhaps far less familiar to the casual moviegoer than Joker:
“This is a much more driven character. Bane is a resourceful, cunning and committed villain who knows exactly what he wants. He wants Batman dead and Gotham in ruins. That’s fitting for a third film.”
Debuting in the “Knightfall” storyline that ran through the Batman line of books at DC Comics in the early 90s, Bane was created, in the words of the character’s co-creator, to be “Batman’s equal both physically and intellectually.” The film stays true to that, but chooses to drop the “fanciful” elements of the character, particularly his addiction to Venom, a highly effective strength-enhancing drug. His luchador-inspired look from the comics was also at odds with Nolan’s insistence to ground the character in contemporary reality. So, Nolan’s version of Bane became a militant leader, a revolutionary, and an Occupy Wall Street protester all rolled into one.
“Chris and David started developing the story in 2008 right after the second film came out. Before the recession. Before Occupy Wall Street or any of that,” Jonathan Nolan told the Washington Examiner in 2012, arguing against the parallels between the film’s pivotal moments and the Occupy Wall Street movement in New York City. “Rather than being influenced by that, I was looking to old good books and good movies. Good literature for inspiration… What I always felt like we needed to do in a third film was, for lack of a better term, go there. All of these films have threatened to turn Gotham inside out and to collapse it on itself. None of them have actually achieved that until this film. A Tale of Two Cities was, to me, one of the most harrowing portrait of a relatable, recognizable civilization that completely folded to pieces with the terrors in Paris in France in that period. It’s hard to imagine that things can go that badly wrong.”
A sentiment his brother seemed to agree to. “There’s an attempt to visualize certain things in this film on this large scale that are troubling and genuinely threatening to the idea of an American city. Or, to put it another way: revolutions and the destabilizing of society have happened everywhere in the world, so why not here?” Nolan told Empire in 2012.
Filming a revolution, fictionalized as it may be, is not an easy task, especially on the scale Nolan wanted for his final Batman film. He took inspiration from an extraordinary 1966 film called The Battle of Algiers, a film that “captured the chaos and fear of an uprising” so vividly that its exhibitions in America carried the disclaimer that “not one foot” of newsreel had been used in the film. Chronicling the eponymous Battle of Algiers during the Algerian War (1954–1962), it is a brutal film that does not shy away from highlighting the human cost of war and the atrocities committed under colonial rule. Its documentary-style presentation of organized guerilla resistance was so authentic, and continues to be so, that even though the film was banned in France for several years, state authorities could not help but praise it when it finally released there in 1971.
It is appropriate then that Nolan described The Dark Knight Rises as a “war film.” Elaborating on the influences of The Dark Knight Rises, he told Empire in 2012:
“It’s a revolutionary epic. It’s looking back to the grand-scale epics of the past, really, and for me that goes as far back as silent films. I’ve been watching a lot of silent films with my kids on Blu-Ray. We’ve shot over a third of the movie on the IMAX format and that naturally puts you more in the mode of staging very large events for the camera. It’s my attempt to get as close to making a Fritz Lang film as I could.”
It is easy to see how Lang’s iconic 1927 film, Metropolis, inspired much of the visual language of class warfare that The Dark Knight Rises aims to convey to its audience. “In an era when films had to communicate purely with the visual, the relationship between the themes of the story and the architecture of the setting is clear and expressive,” Nolan told Yahoo! Movies in 2012, listing the films that inspired The Dark Knight Rises.
The Dark Knight Trilogy is certainly not a perfect set of films, but do I admire how every entry into the trilogy is ever so slightly different from the previous, yet stays within the tropes established by its predecessors. Take the superhero elements out of these films and, Batman Begins is very much a hero’s journey film, The Dark Knight is a crime drama, and The Dark Knight Rises is akin to a war epic. In fact, these films only reinforce how you can tell any story you want to with Batman, that the character is that versatile.
Maybe Frank Miller put it best when he compared the character to “kind of like a diamond” while speaking to Entertainment Weekly in 2016:
“Batman’s just a terrific character, open to wildly different interpretations. […] he’s astonishingly versatile. He’s kind of like a diamond. You can throw him against the wall and you can pound him with a hammer, but you can’t break him. Every interpretation seems to work. […] You can do it badly, but you can’t really do it wrong.”
And perhaps that is why we keep going back, diving ever deeper into the character’s rich publication history, to mine these disparate interpretations for that spark of inspiration that can thrust us forward to tell an excitingly new Batman story. We pull from other mediums when need be. To experiment, of course, but also, isn’t it human nature itself? To see if it worked for them, can it work for us? It helps to study stories (and the storytelling techniques) of the past – and not look at them with nostalgia-tinted glasses – so that we can tell exhilarating new stories for the future. The Dark Knight Trilogy certainly wears its influences on its sleeves, but it never crumbles under the weight of them or comes across as a cheap knock-off. It took its influences and presented a bold new interpretation off them, thereby becoming the influence for legions of interpretations to come, and thus leaving a towering legacy.
The post The Dark Knight Trilogy 15 Years Later: Film & Comic Influences! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below:
This week we’re jumping 100 years into the Sins of Sinister, and talking about the rest of what’s interesting in the day’s comics!
This Week’s Comics
Sins of Sinister: Nightcrawlers #2
Scarlet Witch #3
New Mutants: Lethal Legion #1
X-Men #20
The post Sins of Sinister: Nightcrawlers, X-Men #20, New Mutants: Lethal Legion #1 | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack review the MCU’s latest: Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania!
Up Next:
My Marvelous Year — 2002 pt. 3
| Elektra | #7 to #10 | Greg Rucka run | | Daredevil | #26 to #37 | The Bendis and Alex Maleev Daredevil run begins, the finest take on Matt Murdock since Frank Miller. |
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The post 2002 Variant A: Ant-Man & Wasp Quantumania TAKEDOWN! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Marauders #1-5Credits: Steve Orlando writes; Eleonora Carlini draws #1-4, Andrea Broccardo on issue #5; Matt Milla colors; Ariana Maher letters; covers by Kael Ngu
By turns poignant and silly, rousing and baffling, Steve Orlando’s Marauders is, regardless of your stance, chock-full of fascinating pulls from and allusions to Silver and Bronze Age X-Men comics—and of course, the greatest era of all, the x-treme ’90s. Steve is trying to do a lot with this title, cramming in all he can as if he might not get to keep it for more than a year; and these days, who knows. He’s in the big leagues now and making a name for himself at Marvel, the chance of a lifetime. So, he’s got to make his mark quick, and do it splashy, garish and even ghoulish—because that’s what we remember, plus his distinctive surname that keeps popping up on covers across the MU. Nowadays, even seasoned vets aren’t guaranteed more than half a year on any given title, so Steve’s frenetic penchant for everything and the kitchen sink makes sense—indeed, it’s strategic.
Really, who can say—We might be witnessing the stewing up of the primordial soup of the Orlando-verse, just as there was the Hickman-verse of the 2010s and now the Ewing-verse coming to fruition in the 2020s. Will the 2030s be Steve Orlando’s?
Again, who knows—but Steve is clearly having a lot of fun giving fans old and new endless Easter egg hunts, and all this mulching could one day become a lush wild garden from which to pick many a season’s harvest. And whether or not he is one of those future gardeners (Elder of the MU or not), he’s still bequeathing those creators much to chew on if time is taken to unpack his compressed ideas and oddball character beats.
That said, I’m betting that the Shi’ar elements, particularly Xandra, will be more fully folded into the story of Krakoa later this year with the “Fall of X.”
So, let’s look at some of what he’s been drawing from and see if we can suss out where it all might be going… starting with Marauders #1-4. At the very least, you’ll discover or rediscover some fun comics, however classic or pure rubbish or both, along the way.
The question for Orlando is what he might do with all this mulch, when a majority of these obscure pulls get more focus instead of feeling like tossed off moments that have the feel of gratuitous referentiality.
That said, the first arc does open with such a moment that is definitely saved by the poignancy of its pathos…
Marauders vol 2 #1-5: “Extinction Agenda”The second volume of Marauders opens with the new team rescuing the obscure mutant Fever Pitch who debuted as a teen member of the Dark Beast’s Gene Nation in 1999’s Generation X #50 by Jay Faerber and Terry Dodson. With only twenty appearances since, he’s certainly an obscure Orlando ’90s pull. Seemingly killed by X-Man in his second appearance, he next popped up in Joe Casey’s brief Uncanny run (#402-406, 2002) where powerful illusionist Lady Mastermind Martinique Wyngarde had mind-controlled several thuggish mutants into serving X-Corps, Banshee’s fascist mutant police force in Europe, with Sean the one brutally controlling Mastermind himself; once she found her moment, her enthralled minions rampaged through the streets of Paris to undermine mutantkind’s public image. This walking man on fire with no face must have been a favorite of mid-2000s writer David Hine, for he had him keep his powers after M-Day, and he was a supporting cast member of Hine’s X-Men: 198 and Civil War: X-Men minis. Grisly fate sealed as the 2000s got grimmer, he was abducted by human terrorists the Sapient League, injected with the Legacy Virus and dropped off in Wyoming where his powers went haywire, and he exploded, killing hundreds of innocents including himself. However, he apparently did survive, albeit as electromagnetic energy—a science fantasy specter.
Another Hine pull we see is Gregor Smerdyakov, pulled from 2004’s District X, wherein he gradually evolved into a sentient tree, per his X gene activation, and bearing a “boost fruit” activating or enhancing mutant powers. He’s never even had another mention until Orlando’s Marauders—Smerdyakov fans everywhere are, of course, beside themselves with ecstatic surprise and a confidence-boosting sense of geekdom recognition. Best of all, their guy now gets to be a vital team player.
Now, anyone who read Grant Morrison’s fan-favorite New X-Men run from the early 2000s remembers Cassandra Nova, who debuted in the run’s first issue, #114, which was followed by her genocide via Sentinels of 16 million mutants on Genosha. A few writers have indirectly attempted to use her again, but really she was trapped inside the shapeshifty Shi’ar bio-computer named Stuff (since New X-Men #126) until she wasn’t—many years later in Tom Taylor’s X-Men: Red, where she tried for a terrorist comeback, only to be bested by the recently resurrected Jean Grey. Morrison had originally intended for her to undergo reform within the bio-computer, but that plot thread was left dangling; Taylor got her there otherwise, but the end result was the same: Cassandra Nova’s repentance seemed genuine, and now Orlando is going to develop this further, while reminding us that this wicked spirit twin of Charles Xavier remains wickedly unpredictable and terrifyingly powerful but now on the side of mutantkind.
And she did in fact conquer the Shi’ar empire (while possessing her dear brother’s body) in New X-Men #122-126—all off-panel too!
Bishop mentions his erstwhile paramilitary outfit, the XSE, from his native dystopian alternate future; teammates and friends Randall and Malcolm who arrived with him in the present day of 1991’s Uncanny #282 by Whilce Portacio and John Byrne were soon killed while hunting their quarry Trevor Fitzroy. Bishop’s memories are haunted by these two, as we’ll see in “Judgment Day” tie-in issue #6.
Orlando indirectly references Bishop’s character assassination during the late 2000s, when he turned evil and hunted Cable and baby Hope across myriad dystopian futures, believing only Hope’s death would prevent his own broken future. It was not a good look, and Marvel has since pretended it never happened. Since Marauders #1, there have been a few superficial acknowledgments of that dark period, but it’s probably best if we all just forget about it—it was insanely out of character.
The following is a little Easter egg from the first issue’s second data page, a recorded conversation between Mr. Sinister and Doctors Cecilia Reyes (who debuted in 1997’s X-Men #65 but is sadly underserved currently, on the page, despite being critical to Krakoa’s Healing Gardens) and Nemesis:
Nemesis was indeed originally known as Doctor Death during 1993’s Invaders vol 2 #1-4 by Roy Thomas. But when he next appeared, in Matt Fraction’s late 2000s Uncanny run, it was under his current alias (starting with issue #504); he’s played a supporting role ever since, although after Si Spurrier’s 2014 X-Force (vol 4), his presence faded until 2019. While Fraction gave him a somewhat deeper backstory (born 1906), in Thomas’ original conception James Bradley was portrayed as a domestic US agent for the Nazis, persuaded to join the Reich by how much he felt his heroic genius undervalued by his own government; indeed, his Battle-Axis team he composed of other disillusioned superheroes. Pretty weird, huh? Now, they don’t seem to have been depicted as antisemitic or even racist—they simply wanted the US to withdraw and become isolationist. Of course, in the real world, ideological isolationism is never so cartoonishly simple. However, as soon as he showed up in the Fraction era, readers were assured he’d long been making good by establishing himself, under the Nemesis name, as a fearsome Nazi hunter.
But why this background? Probably, it was Fraction being the deep Marvel head that he is, and knowing that Roy Thomas had wanted to use the Golden Age Doctor Nemesis from the short-lived Timely Comics (from whose ashes Marvel later emerged)—though editorial had kept him from using this heroic figure for Nazi employ. In other words, Fraction’s intention was to rehabilitate this character absolutely no one else cared about and made him a mutant genius to boot! Like I said, strange.
That’s what we love about Marvel, though, right?!
Whereas Oracle has been around since 1977’s X-Men #107, which first introduced the Imperial Guard, and was forced to serve the usurping Emperor Vulcan (Gabriel Summers), like fellow Guardsmen (as seen in the 2007/2009 minis X-Men: Emperor Vulcan and X-Men: Kingbreaker), the quite short-lived Delphos is rather obscure. Her first and only appearances were 2000’s Inhumans #3-4 by Rafael Marin and Jose Ladronn followed by Tini Howard’s Secret X-Men #1. This obscurity makes her ideal as a sleeper agent for Orlando’s retcon of an ancient Shi’ar sect that views its authority as superseding the Imperial Majestrix or Majestor (indeed, preceding the Empire’s existence), “when the Shi’ar were little more than galactic raiders”—as shown later in Marauders #4.
The Stygian mutiny, which Delphos mentions dismissively, was sparked on a Shi’ar colony world (homeworld of the Stygians) by the empire’s disastrous financial policies, as seen in Hickman’s X-Men #17. Having Storm save Empress Xandra’s life and symbolically defend a rapacious empire was an odd choice, especially because the clash of values between these intergalactic allies has never been adequately addressed.
The first Shi’ar to appear in comics, in X-Men #97, the oddly named Eric the Red always felt like he was meant to be someone else—at least as a double agent inside S.H.I.E.L.D. or the US armed forces, spying or who knows what at Emperor D’Ken’s behest. But we never see him in any other guise than the future-retro leather-and-steel kink that actually feels just a bit more family-friendly on the closing page of Marauders #1. As far as we know, his strength, hypnosis, and blastin’ powers come from his techno-barbarian armor, so he’s gotten an upgrade here. His new outfit comes with more super-science tech and flamboyance. Snazzy.
For the more numerous and obscure but titillating callbacks and creative remixing in Marauders #2-3, I recommend seeing my earlier review of these issues, where you’ll find all the relevant annotations laid out And if you want more on Eric the Red’s history since the Claremont days, including his Crystal Claws, which is referenced in Marauders #4, see my first-issue review.
In Marauders #4, we have a wildly obscure reference to Lupak gland, an extra-dimensional organ that’s home to the soul of each Lupak (the sort of Wolverine-ish aliens debuting in the classic X-Men #107, 1977, in the person of Fang, along with the rest of the Shi’ar Imperial Guard). The strange notion of this gland was introduced much later, in Charles Soule’s Wolverines (2014-2015), but in Orlando’s Marauders, we see that the Kin keep the gland of their living Chronicle, a grimly happily imprisoned Lupak, in physical space, which is odd since this allows Akihiro to easily destroy it—and thus the Kin’s Chronicle historical record. That seems like a lapse in security protocols on their part.
Presumably just for fun, Claremont and Cockrum in the classic X-Men #107 did have Wolverine steal and wear Fang’s costume after his own is ruined. In Marauders #5, another Lupak offers it and the moniker to Akihiro, who did tussle with the Fang of the mid-2010s in Wolverines. Honestly, this feels silly, and it’s hard to imagine this sticking, even if we move on from “Daken.”
Oddly, the very obscure Elder of the Universe the Obliterator is shown in Marauders #4 to be a hired thug, albeit with doomsday weapons (which won’t prove sufficient against the Thresholders), of the Shi’ar of yore. Maht Pacle debuted in 1987’s Silver Surfer vol 3 #4 by Steve Englehart; he’s the sole survivor of his kind after he wiped them all out himself, but his immortal Elder status made him an Overman over and above his fellow mortals. He’d been missing from publication for almost a quarter century until briefly in 2016 with Al Ewing’s Contest of Champions, but just a couple months ago, superb artist Patrick Zircher used him in his Avengers Unlimited Infinity Comic arc, aptly titled “The Doomsday Man.”
The Avalon station went down in flames when “Age of Apocalypse” son of Apocalypse Nemesis (née Holocaust) randomly attacked after getting the boot from his destroyed home reality. His battle with Acolyte leader Exodus hastened the station’s destruction. See 1995’s X-Men #42-43 by Fabian Nicieza. And that is a pretty random place for a time-frozen Threshold refugee pod to pop up from the primeval past!
Years later in publication time, his unfortunate name was retconned to Nemesis, and he found himself booted from the AoA reality to the 616 without the AoA crystal containment suit allowing him to maintain his form; in his next 616 appearance, in X-Force #49, Sebastian Shaw hired him to capture X-Force (which he did, quite easily) in exchange for a new suit of armor—the one we see in Marauders #4-5. Now, clearly, Orlando or editorial just wanted readers to recognize everyone in this time-jump to Avalon to appear instantly recognizable (even the Acolytes did not appear then in their trademark costumes, and three of four of them weren’t in X-Men #42-43). Maybe the Marauders’ time-traveling caused everyone’s memories of this past event to change, or… Really, who cares? The basics are still more or less consistent.
The adolescent Shi’ar Warbird is from Jason Aaron’s Wolverine & The X-Men (2011-2014) but since then, she’s never really made much of an appearance. Her childhood backstory in slavery and sexual exploitation is rather troubling material to work with, however removed exoticized in the context of far-off space opera, which certainly doesn’t make it any less problematic—but perhaps she’ll get a new lease on comics notoriety with something a bit more interesting to offer now, since Cassandra, after being bonded with and healed by Zzxz, the mutant symbiote previously enslaved to the Kin Crimson (see the issue #1 review link above), passes it on, clearly in agreement with the symbiote’s apparent wishes, to Warbird’s martial use.
Somnus in Marauders #5 says Aussie-martial artist Red Lotus (from early in Claremont’s X-Treme X-Men) taught him martial arts in a night, via Somnus’ his oneiromantic time dilation. He’s later seen sleeping with Imperial Guard Neutron, clearly a new recruit after the previous one’s death in Ewing’s S.W.O.R.D. #9 (he’s from Stygia, which planetary culture we briefly touched on above).
Lastly for now, at the very end of Marauders #5, an alternate version of the 2099 universe mutant Cerebra shows up, newly resurrected on Krakoa (as we find out in issue #6), where she died upon arrival from 2099, carried into the past by a medium-young () Cable (whom we don’t get to see here; sigh)—except, you can totally see him and Cerebra’s first appearance, where she is indeed mortally wounded by a Sentinel, in Orlando’s recent Spider-Man 2099: Exodus #5, penultimate issue of his “Spider-Man 2099” event.
The Cerebra from the original early ’90s 2099 universe debuted as a member of the future-dystopia X-Men in 1993’s X-Men 2099 #1, and a couple years later she founded X-Nation, which was actually a small group of mutants who were allowed to live in a city-state ruled by the Doom of 2099.
Both Orlando’s Earth-2099 Cerebra and the original Earth-928 version from the ’90s have the ability to detect the presence of other mutants telepathically (X-factor detection); however, the “original” could also manipulate others’ (autonomic) nervous systems while the one we get in Marauders can record DNA and minds—just like the Cerebro helmets (since the Krakoa-era retcon revealed that’s what they’ve been doing for many years now, thanks in large part to Forge).
But why two separate 2099 realities? Simple: The original got pretty dated (And it didn’t evolve over time since that universe didn’t enjoy any new stories beyond the ’90s)! Credit for the new 2099 belongs to creators Nick Spencer and Viktor Bogdanovic (typically a DC artist), with 2019’s 2099 Alpha #1, which kicked off a brief, two-month mini-event that was unfortunately rather forgettable. Overall, Orlando’s crack at this venue suffered from a similar flaw: Too broad a canvas in too short a window. That is, of course, simply the way the game must be played nowadays, if you want to revive a whole slate of neglected material. It probably didn’t convince many of an urgent need or interest for a revisit any time soon, but at least it’s updated for the 2020s now—though if neglected again for too long, we’ll need another update in 30 years. After that, this separate timestream will be on a swift approach for its vanishing point in the real-world 2099!
NEXT: A quick continuity therapy dive followed by a deep time quest against microbial tyranny—Marauders #6-10!
The post Steve Orlando’s Marauders #1-5—Annotated! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
“The Bond Age” (with the dad puns, Kieron?!)
Credits: Kieron Gillen; writes; Paco Medina draws; Walden Wong and Victor Olazaba ink; Jay David Ramos and Chris Sotomayor colors; Clayton Cowles letters; cover by Leinil Francis Yu and Sunny Gho
Immoral X-Men #1 (of 3) is another excellent set-up chapter for “Sins of Sinister”—though to my surprise, it’s not as immediately strong, for me, as the previous two entries, Storm & the Brotherhood of Mutants #1, the sublime follow-up, from Storm’s perspective, to the opening Sins of Sinister one-shot, and Nightcrawlers #1, which introduced the surprisingly affecting Nightkin and threaded in an intriguing occult magic element to a future dystopian venue that typically goes all in with the post-cyberpunk sensibility without the leavening that fantasy tropes lend to the everyday Marvel Universe; indeed, magic is a kind of x-factor for this sort of event, which we’ll see play out throughout the Nightcrawlers mini. In any case, this is Gillen’s second entry, and it really does read like Chapter 2, with Gillen settling into the groove of his new Sinister-ized Council, giving us a wicked character study of the Sinister-twisted Emma.
While every page doesn’t feel essential in the way that the opening oversized one-shot had, this issue does some fine character work, not just with Emma but the Sinister-ized Xavier and of course Sinister himself. This chapter opens with what seems to be the very last remnants of resistance, led by Nick Fury, Jr., preparing for a bold assault—that immediately turns out to be their death courtesy of Xavier’s telepathy, never used so dastardly as here: While the targets are desensitized, they’re sent plummeting to their deaths from the heights of a skyscraper. Obviously, the moment has nothing to do with them and everything to do with poor ol’ Chuck, still partially himself, holding to the dream, but unable to see another way but Sinister’s.
??????????But we’re effectively reminded this issue that these once majestic heroes are not under the sway of Sinister himself but the Sinister virus—and exploring the ramifications of this, increasingly to Sinister’s own dismay, will be the remit of the Immoral X-Men miniseries.
And the way Gillen recasts Emma, under the Sinister thralldom, is boldly unpleasant. Readers who don’t remember Claremont’s original White Queen, or who’ve been happy to forget she ever existed, might be taken aback that their diamond-skinned fave has taken such a (delightfully) nasty heel-turn here. But I think it works; after all, Emma’s character has never been free of cynicism, and she did once gleefully participate in much of the nastiness of the Hellfire Club of her own accord (contra the best forgotten Bollers solo series that gave early 2000s readers a damnably inauthentic account of this complex powerhouse), however much she did come from a place of trauma. Note in this reversion, her condescending view of “the children,” which folds her profound latter-day protectiveness (over her charges and by extension all mutants) back into that deep cynicism of old.
Of course, she’s been taking full advantage of Sinister’s chimera work, hilariously unbeknownst to Sinister himself. There’s a delightful inevitability of character here, but regardless, it’s still a surprise to see Emma regrow her shattered arm from her “Logan patch,” an inspired pun that isn’t too obvious (Her reference to Sinister “disarming” her before is to Gillen’s classic “Everything Is Sinister” arc, Uncanny X-Men vol 2 #1-3, 2011).
(Interestingly, she also doesn’t see Sinister’s chimeras as sentient beings; they’re just “living statues” to her, and indeed, except for the Nightkin over in Nightcrawlers, what we’ve seen in this alt future so far seems like a far cry from those we saw in Powers of X quite different reality. I wonder if we’ll get to explore this contrast, or whether some version of POX’s chimeric Rasputin will emerge out of this new paradigm. Immoral X-Men #1 briefly introduces us to the Nasty Boys, from X-Factor #75, 1992, each amalgamated with Cyclops, a fun callback to a particularly cartoonish, and fun, Sinister creation of the ’90s.)
Also crucial to this miniseries, however, is that the Quiet Council doesn’t know that Sinister still has at least one advantage up his tasselly cape: They’re entirely clueless about his Moira lab, which if they knew about, as he acknowledges to his ill-fated clone (always keeping a one on hand as a sounding board that is wretchedly easy to dispose of)—they’d all want their hands on. So, he is perhaps unintentionally heroic here in withholding the most frightening reality weapon imaginable from a fractious council of Sinisters.
Still, the hilarity of this situation remains fresh and surprising as the consequences of Sinister’s coup d’etat continue to evolve: It is astonishingly dim-witted for a mad scientist to turn everyone he’s surrounded by, most of them much more powerful than himself, into eccentric amalgamations of his own amoral self. Obviously, that’s going to backfire!
Hopefully, the next two issues give us other perspectives on what remains of the far-future Quiet Council.
This issue does give us some tantalizing set up for what the next one is likely to have in store: The data page from Hope clarifies what we’ve already been expecting since Sins of Sinister #1: The expectation that intergalactic imperial superpowers will inevitably gang up on the runaway Sinister-ized Earth, which Sinister of course doesn’t care about, much to the bafflement of his supposed minions, because they don’t know about his reset option. In any case, we should expect to see in Immoral X-Men #2 at least the aftermath of an attempt by a vast alliance of Shi’ar, Kree and Skrull forces to destroy the world Sinister has created, whatever the cost.
[The quietly obvious is, of course, that Sinister will help maintain the status quo for the powerful mutant Sinisters he’s created.]The only real knock against this issue, if I must quibble, is that Paco Medina’s art feels rushed this time. There was a hint of that in Nightcrawlers #1, but it was so minor, it didn’t merit bringing up in review then. And I really enjoy what Medina has to offer, especially in his past work with Al Ewing (U.S.Avengers), so this is actually just a critique of industry work scheduling. I know what three consecutive Medina issues can look like, and this isn’t it—meaning there was a rush to get these books through production. And that seems strange since one would think there would’ve been plenty of time set aside for this fairly self-contained event production-wise. Any artist doing three books in a month is very impressive, but the ideal of course is that they’re given time to make each one a home run.This not being the case by the time we get to Immoral X-Men #1 is attested to by the necessity of not one but two inkers stepping in this issue, when Paco Medina typically inks his own pencils. There’s also credit for an additional colorer, the excellent Sotomayor; still, the extra hands are telling.
I’m quibbling about this now to get it out and not harp on it again when we get to Andrea Di Vito and Alessandro Vitti’s respective third issue in a month (March and April, respectively). In fact, I would rather wait for the best an artist can do than rush them to keep to an industrial schedule. How many fans feel likewise? It’s hard to say. My entry into comics as a small child was as a budding artist taught by my father, (who had once drawn the fashion section of the Chicago Sun-Times when that was a thing artists did). But neither Marvel nor DC is the place for the healthiest long-term schedule for the typical artist (not everyone can be a Mark Bagley).
Yet we can reasonably expect the event’s final issue, Sins of Sinister: Dominion #1, to be a visual knockout, though I’m curious to see how the art duties are going to be split up between the two credits we have for it: Lucas Werneck (who drew the opening chapter, as well as Immortal X-Men) and Paco Medina.
NEXT: Nightcrawlers #2!
The post “Sins of Sinister” Part 4: Immoral X-Men #1 in Review! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
“Voices of Fire”
Credits: Si Spurrier writes; Paco Medina draws; Jay David Ramos colors; Clayton Cowles letters; cover by Leinil Francis Yu and Jesus Aburtov
Spurrier’s Nightcrawlers mini promises to bring the magic and mysticism to this semi-blockbuster X event (semi because not all the titles are involved)—which is both expected and unexpected, because while we’ve seen the sorcerous Mother Righteous in the pages of Legion of X, and everyone for at least a few months now has correctly assumed she’d unmask as the fourth “suit” of Sinister among the mainline Essex clones, we don’t really know what it means or how exactly it will play out as this mash-up of mad science and sorcery is explored in her full identity and origin. But the time has come… almost.
SPOILERS AHOY!
Like Ewing and Medina’s Storm & the Brotherhood of Mutants #1, Spurrier’s first “Sins of Sinister” entry is much worldbuilding setup and suggestive mystery. I do think the former was more successfully executed; partly that’s just the Ewing magic, but it’s likely also that Spurrier is continuing unresolved story threads from the most recent issues of Legion of X.
But the presence of three of the Sinister “suits” in Nightcrawlers #1 had me thinking about these characters more generally, as well.
One, it’s hilarious that the (“Nightkin”) minions of Mother Righteous immediately offed Doctor Stasis. After all, this event isn’t a Gerry Duggan joint! (Doctor Stasis’ debut was in Duggan’s ongoing X-Men.) But really, I never liked this first intimation of other Sinisters; the revelation of the club tattoo beneath the mask was, to this reader at least, groan-inducing.
And yet I think Orbis Stellaris (the Sinister of spades, or swords—more on Tarot card theory below) is great, but only because Ewing has him ensconced in the still titillating and mysterious cosmic Ewing-verse venue of the Worldfarm, and he clearly has cosmic-sized ambitions toward Dominion.
For her part, Mother Righteous is a fascinating addition because she is Sinister somehow transfigured into astral mistress of magic, a radical shift from the masculine wands (diamonds) and swords (spades) energy of the gendered male Sinisters to the impossible to pin down feminine flow of hearts (cups or rivers; and please understand that none of this gender talk should be taken as biological essentialism). She is indeed strikingly, almost certainly intentionally, similar to the occultic mythic figure of “The Scarlet Woman” praised by notorious occultist Aleister Crowley (1875-1947) and his Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn—which is in all likelihood the referent in Immortal X-Men #8 when the Nathaniel Essex of the 19th century rambles on to Destiny about his visions of the future to come.
In other words, the original Essex also worshiped at the occultic altar of the Scarlet Woman, at least symbolically if not as a socially active occultist—which, who knows! There’s some fun potential for story!
Legion of X #1 was titled “Do What Thou Wilt,” taken from a famous Crowley/Golden Dawn dictum, whose second half is “shall be the whole of the law” (which, hey, has as well a Khonshu connection for Moon Knight heads out there; obviously, pop culture creators have been enamored of Western occultism for a long time). These real-world occult connections are actually how Mother Righteous’ identity was sussed out ahead of time by astute fans—plus, again, the original Essex laying out two telling visions of combating the eventual rise of AI: “the science of the stars” (Orbis Stellaris is a giveaway here) and “science-tamed superstition” (Sinister turned sorceress, i.e., Mother Righteous).
(The other options he foresaw were, respectively, human and mutant stratagems—thus, Sinister focused on mutants and Stasis prefers working with humans, as Duggan has made clear in X-Men, specifically of the Orchis variety nowadays—and this is why Dr. Clubs is out of the running in “Sins of Sinister”: humans have in this future become a dead-end.)
Have we touched on Tarot cards yet? Okay—we’ll return there in a sec!
First, let’s assess what we think of these four Sinisters because it seems like the strength of this event, at least how each reader is going to make that judgment for themself, is going to come down to how compelling they are as nemeses of one another and of the mutants who retain autonomy (which could turn out to number far more than what we see at the event’s opening). For me, I like these figures conceptually but beyond the Sinister we’ve all known and loved since… well, we can just say, Gillen’s classic 2012 story “Everything Is Sinister” (Uncanny X-Men vol 2 #1-3), they don’t hold any interest as fleshed-out characters with compelling personalities. Are their interesting contrasting conceptual angles enough?
Based on the strength of the creators involved—probably yes!
Orbis Stellaris is interesting only because of his ambition to achieve Dominion intelligence status, probably via unconventional means (which options are briefly alluded to in Nightcrawlers #1’s second data page), but obviously what will be most compelling will be how the remaining autonomous Krakoans (including Storm and co., but also possibly Destiny and Mystique) work this to their own advantage. Mother Righteous has potential, but I have no idea yet what use she might make of “the instruments of the gods,” mystic artifacts that include the Siege Perilous, Mjolnir, the Eye of Agamotto, etc. (they’re not even in her possession yet; this will be the mission of her Nightkind—see below). Of course, he of the Red Diamond will continue to play a central role in the Gillen-written material, and that is sufficient to make those pages sing, increasingly with the happy relief of a heaping dose of comedy (Gillen is making the Krakoa Sinister more of a buffoon with every issue, and it is a delight).
Okay—‘nuff speculation. This first Spurrier issue of the event is good, but I’m not feeling it quite as much as the last two, by Gillen and Ewing, respectively. But each of these issues is still in set-up mode, and I’m just happy to be along for the ride right now.
So, what are some noteworthy details and Easter eggs in Nightcrawlers #1?
Ten years on from now, Vox Ignis (the two-in-one entity of Banshee and the Spirit of Variance) are still working for Mother Righteous (whom the Spirit sincerely calls “Mother”). David (Legion) is still in a coma due to his father’s vile (but oh so “well-meaning”) betrayal, via his neural Daedalus device. Kurt (Nightcrawler) is still a drooling monstrosity (as we already saw in Sins of Sinister #1)—but Sinister has become bored with this “pet” and had him removed to Xavier’s original Westchester School (which has long since been converted to Sinister’s main cloning facility) and placed under the care of Doctor Nemesis (who’s just as chained as the sleepy beast).
Oh! And Nemesis still has a giant fun-guy head—from Margali Szardos’ sorcery in Legion of X #9.
[Hilariously, Nightcrawler is apparently fed on a diet of semi-sentient Uedo protein—from the villainous Kenji Uedo (Zero) of Gillen’s 2010/2011 Generation Hope series, if you were wondering when he was going to show up again! This substance seems to be lacking his psi powers.]Margali’s sorcery, specifically her mythomantic spell (which we saw at work throughout Legion of X #7-10, transforming mutants so that they looked like mythic creatures) has still been in effect for ten years, affecting any mutant the Sinister of Krakoa has genetically tampered with—until Mother Righteous figured out how to break it (possibly by ritually killing Margali, which seems strongly visually implied, though the art is ambiguous, and there’s no textual explanation regarding this wordless flashback). Obviously, as far as Sinister’s plans for Krakoan chimeras, this would be a major, decade-long setback! But with that curse removed, he’s recently been able to create from Nightcrawler’s X gene, the “Nightkin.”Just as clearly, Stasis is upset that she’s given the Krakoan Sinister a leg up by breaking the spell, which again, as we saw in LOX #10, Margali had worked out with Orchis. Of course, Mother Righteous’ aim here was self-interest, her method for this sorcerous breakthrough obviously kept dark from Vox Ignis—who is surprised when their “Scream o’ Change” breaks the enthrallment of Sinister’s newly created Nightkin. However, we’ll see by issue’s end the “Sinister Strain” threatens to reassert control of the freed chimeras. Again, we don’t know how Righteous is performing this sorcery as she’s still very much behind the scenes; Vox Ignis and then the freed Nightkin’s role is to be her cat’s-paws and thieves.
Mother Righteous has become quite the thief-master—of orphan thieves, no less! She really is bringing back 19th century London!
The Nightkin aren’t just chimeras connected by way of Nightcrawler’s genetics; somehow, there’s something about Nightcrawler and his quality of hopefulness, the Spark, that they share in. Is it just that they’ve been freed of the “Sinister Strain” or has it been with them since they were hatched on what’s left of Krakoa?
Taking on the MU’s magic angle, Spurrier may have more goodies in store for this event—or not. Seemingly, Doctor Strange (or whoever the current Sorcerer Supreme might be) has fled Earth for Otherworld; at least all the “occult eejits,” as Banshee calls them, have gone that route. At the opening, Vox Ignis is already hunting or scavenging for “items of power,” as part of Mother Righteous’s overall strategy, which otherwise remains unexplained, except her intent, with these gathered relics, to somehow create what she calls the Reliquary Perilous, “a holy weapon” to “purge the Sinister Strain from the heart of eery mutant—with the white-hot fire of faith.”
Speaking of, there’s a callback to Margali’s discovery and theft of the Hopesword from Kurt’s soul in LOX #10, where Margali pairs faith with “fanaticism,” dismissing both in favor of the power of hope (not hers, which is probably nonexistent now, but her foster son’s). In contrast, in Nightcrawlers #1, Mother Righteous denigrates hope’s “shoddy currency” while favoring faith’s potential as a commodity in trade. At first, this sounds vague, but it becomes clear enough that she fetishizes artifacts of mysticism (to what specific end we don’t yet know)—though her sorcerous practices clearly have a kind of black market value, as she intimates when meeting with her fellow Sinister “brothers” (Orbis and Stasis) at the former Summer House on Luna: “Spells…sacrifices…deals.”
Dismissing Mother’s “fuzzy huckster magic” as remotely any kind of threat to his Dominion ambitions, Orbis also tells her that “the sword does not fear the cup,” another arrogant dismissal—based an analogies drawn from the Tarot: In the Tarot’s four suits, Swords are analogous to mind, Cups to heart; a classic duality. (Traditional playing card suits are, in other words, substituted for more esoteric meanings—Wands (spirit/fire) for Diamonds and Pentacles (body/nature/abundance) for Clubs.) And these occult symbolic systems are really showing up throughout the work of not just Spurrier but Ewing (with his Defenders material, as well; and a respectful use of Kabbalah has been prominent for him too), and of course, Tini Howard mapped out and named the “X of Swords” event likewise. Of course, each Tarot suit has many, many, many more fascinating qualities than what those unfamiliar might surmise from just the schema laid out by each of these villainous clones; after all, this tradition has been built and elaborated upon for several centuries now, with a particularly sophisticated symbolic layering occurring during the Enlightenment era and once again during the Decadent/Theosophical 1880s-1900s.
We end with what Righteous must’ve known would be a suicide mission on the part of one of her Nightkin: a recon attempt on the living (genetically Unuscione) force field around Sinister’s stolen Moira lab sequestered within the Worldfarm. Effectively, Spurrier chooses his young teen Spidey-’Crawler chimera, “Wallcrawler,” to ’port to his doom against the field’s unforgiving surface. There’s a strong sense here that this was a deliberate tragedy to foster a deep feeling among the grieving Nightkin of having blood in the game, binding them strongly to Mother Righteous’ quest—whose self-interested nature she hides behind speechifying on the selfishness of those she claims they can’t work with, like Storm.
Only one person here is clearly beginning to doubt her—Vox Ignis; and with the Spirit’s deep bond with her, the likelihood of rebellion from that quarter will be hard-fought.
NEXT: Immoral X-Men #1 by Gillen & Medina!
The post “Sins of Sinister” Part 3: Nightcrawlers #1—in Review! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Zack and Charlotte END their coverage of the Ultimate Marvel line of comics!
Topics discussed include:
– What kind of animal is a shallot?
– Are fetishes in the DNA?
– Does the Ultimate Universe end with a bang or a whimper?
Comics covered in this episode:
-Ultimate FF #1 – #6
-Ultimate Spider-Man #200
-Miles Morales: Ultimate Spider-Man #1 – #12
-All-New Ultimates #1 – #12
Up Next Month:
Nothing, it’s over! JK, we’re beginning a new pod: Extra Issues, which will be release on the Patreon six months early before releasing on the MMY public feed.
Our first topic will be superhero subversions, and our first episode will be about Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ Watchmen!
You can find Charlotte at https://twitter.com/mymarvelousyear
You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at mymarvelousyear.com
Music for My Ultimate Year is credited to By Divine Right. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.
Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed
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The post My Ultimate Year #34: Final Episode! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
What on earth was Morrison’s take on Judge Dredd? And why is it something that seems to almost never come up when people talk about their work? Why is it almost buried and forgotten? What did they even try to do there?
We’ll explore that here, picking up where we left off….
Book Of The Dead- The Dredd Of Two Worlds!Morrison’s second Dredd story was to be a collaboration with writer Mark Millar, alongside artist Dermot Power, and letterers Tom Frame and John Aldridge forming the creative team. And having done The Big Judge Dredd Epic in Inferno, with the legend Carlos Ezquerra drawing it, Morrison seemed to loosen up. What follows is a suite of stories that very much feel like two mates riffing and making each other laugh and having fun, and in this case those two mates are Grant Morrison and Mark Millar.
The only question is- Are we laughing with them, or are we laughing at them?
Spread out across 8 parts, each a 6 page story, Book Of The Dead would be Morrison and Millar doing their 2000AD take on the familiar superhero convention of The Alternate Version. Much like you had The International Batmen and The Intergalactic Supermen in Silver Age Batman and Superman comics, or even narratives like The Flash Of Two Worlds, here you had Judge Dredd coming face to face with The Judges Of Egypt from the city of Luxor. Dredd is picked as the representative for a cultural exchange program between the two cities and their Judge systems, and so Dredd heads off to Luxor, while Egypt’s representative Judge Ramses heads off to Mega City-One.
And the end result?
A deeply Orientalist fantasy by two Scottish writers and Irish artist tackling Egypt. Which is to say, even as it is exaggerated future sci-fi, it feels like a very exoticized, Other-ing construction of a people and a culture that is more rooted in Western assumptions than it is in any material life or truth of the Egyptian people.
You have imagery like this which feels like it’s straight out of an Orientalistic painting, exoticizing the hell out of them, forever ossifying them in their ‘ancient’ culture and society which is defined perpetually by its otherness and ‘foreign’ nature rather than something humanized and rooted in reality of those people. Because the presumed audience and perspective the story caters to and is written to is one close to Morrison and Millar, to whom these are The Exotic Other to be observed and studied from a distance. Tellingly, despite the story being one of an exchange of two cities, we never get the perspective of Ramses in Mega City-One. And neither do we really get the perspective of Judge Kamun, who oversees and supports Dredd in Luxor. No, we see everything through Dredd’s perspective. And while some may very generously try to say that then the story is just satirically depicting Dredd’s own troubling Orientalist perspective and vision, that is very much not the case in my opinion, and would be ascribing far greater deliberation and intent to a story that is far too often deeply careless.
Instead, it feels like an indulgence in Orientalist aesthetics and ideas, particularly fetishizing ideas that exoticize the non-white cultures, which is very much a through-line of both Millar’s own long body of work, as well as particularly Morrison’s oeuvre as well. Hell, even in Inferno, Morrison introduces us to an Indian Judge named ‘Judge Bhaji,’ which roughly translates to ‘Judge Curry.’
One might as well make an Italian Judge and name them JUDGE PASTA or JUDGE PIZZA or a Japanese Judge named JUDGE SUSHI. And of course, Judge Bhaji is a exotic, shamanic figure of psychic/spiritual wisdom spouting off random tidbits of Hindu myth references that Morrison’s memorized. It’s shallow caricature and stereotyping that is tiresome in its lack of any real truth. It all feels deeply…white, and perhaps if one were being impossibly generous- tokenistic at best, but really in all honestly…downright insulting or fetishistic.
And just when you think you’re finished sighing, the story goes from dumb to dumber, as it reveals Judge Kamun to be an insane cultist obsessed with ancient Egyptian prophecies and myths of a Deathless Beast-Faced God, who hopes to sacrifice him and anybody else he wants to his depraved master. And all throughout, we’re shown sequences of this mummified monster figure that haunts the streets of Luxor and becomes the inevitable Big Bad and Lord and Master of the cultist monsters’ plot.
The whole affair breaks down into tiredly cliche stereotypical Orientalist storytelling centering the renegade White protagonist of the Western Civilization in a strange land of exotic, ancient Brown people, with strange gods and beliefs who are to be taken on and stopped, for they are barbaric forces that must be tamed. It’s the same old tired song you’ve heard a billion times, but written by Mark Millar and Grant Morrison this time. It’s deeply boring and hollow, before even getting to it being offensive.
One might be generous and say the idea of a typical superhero crossover/team-up being inverted, with The Judge Counterpart being a depraved monster is a clever twist and a fun spin on a classic superhero trope and idea. But even if one were to be that generous, here’s the thing: it’s not actually done well. Execution is everything, and here it is deeply lacking. There’s nothing really here to dig into or be compelled by. Anything and everything done here feels like the absolute bare minimum. And if one were to take the extra step of generosity and say the story is attempting to be a satire of the orientalist stories of the white hero vs the exotic other, a question worth asking is this:
What is this satire really saying or offering up for us? What is its keen, pointed insight? Or if it is merely dedicated to just taking the piss, what’s the biting bit that really clicks?
What one finds is a void in the case of a work like this. There’s nothing terribly fun or funny here to really enjoy, and if Inferno felt like watching someone tick off a check-list, Book Of the Dead feels like watching a bad comedy routine that should’ve stopped the second after it started…except it just keeps going.
And by the time you get to the end, when you get to the final punchline and ‘gag’ to close it out, with Judge Ramses being a cartoonish failure in bandages and a wheelchair, the stupid ol’ Egyptian guy who couldn’t hack it in the American system of the West? When you get to it all being a laugh about how he’s chump compared to the American Dredd?
It’s not very funny, or fun. It’s just tiresome and obvious, invoking a large sigh. There’s no point here beyond a juvenile action-movie ‘Dredd is so awesome, heh.’ It is the only way and the level upon which the story asks for engagement from its readership.
In the end what could have been a fun expansion and exploration of the absurdly horrific world of Judge Dredd world’s Egypt and its own policing system ends up being just a shallow Orientalist indulgence fable about exotic Egyptian cults and death-god figures that just others Egyptian people. And that’s ultimately what you’re left thinking about. What could have been. There could have been an interesting satire about the dynamics and comparisons between the policing ideas and mechanisms of America and Egypt, with their respective histories, through a wild sci-fi genre lens. There could have been a considered perspective from the Egyptian side that didn’t just reduce them to Orientalist caricatures and stereotypes. There could’ve been so much more, anything more, and yet there wasn’t.
What you ultimately get is Morrison, Millar, and Power’s Orientalist fun-house that feels as empty as the Orientalist constructs it presents. There’s not much the creators have to say here, and if there’s anything they do have to say- it’s that. Just letting you know how little they have to say.
It’s why it’s forgotten and buried.
[Book Of The Dead is collected in Judge Dredd: The Complete Case Files 20]
Crusade– The Dredd Of Many Worlds!And that brings us to the final Judge Dredd story by Grant Morrison, wherein they’re once again co-writing with frequent collaborator and once apprentice Mark Millar. With the terrific Mick Austin onboard as their artistic collaborator, and Tom Frame lettering, what we get is a farewell party for Morrison in the world of Dredd.
Split across 10 parts, all 6 pagers, Crusade is a tale that follows a hunting mission that involves Judges from numerous parts of the globe competing to win. They’ve all been deployed by their respective cities to be the one to retrieve the remains of a space-ship. They’re all here to do it, which means Judge Dredd is, too.
Building off their ‘The Hero Meets Their Other Counterpart’ story in Book Of The Dead with the Egyptian Judges of Luxor, this was the inevitable next step for Morrison and Millar. They took the conceit to the natural endpoint, going all in on that sort of Silver Age-y ‘International Batmen’ notion by going beyond just one international colleague. These time you had a whole veritable league of them. And if the prior story was a shock-driven setup wherein the Egyptian Judge betrays Judge Dredd rather than prove to be his peer in a team-up, this time around that notion is laid bare. It’s clear cut from the jump that these people are not here to team up and have a joyous ‘crossover.’ No, they’re not fighting with each other. They’re fighting against each other, and they’ll do anything it takes to win. They’ll do anything and everything they have to get one over the other guy, and walk away with the prize they’ve been asked to collect. They’re like bounty hunters after the same target, and thus it is a game of backstabbing from the start, and you know to be naturally wary and suspicious.
And if one had higher hopes and dared to raise expectations from the previous effort by Morrison and Millar, this ‘let’s take it to the next level’ story of escalation…would very much disappoint. One need only look at the Japanese Judge (who is a woman) being named JUDGE SHOJO. Shojo means Girl. It is a name that quite literally means Judge Girl.
And, of course, we also see the return of the one-note-gag character of Ramses, the Egyptian Judge from Book Of The Dead, too. He continues to exist to solely be that dull gag of The Chump extended on for another whole story. The story is, after-all, the inevitable successor to Book Of The Dead.
And what follows is by and large, a cavalcade of caricatures or stereotypes put together from all across the globe. Perhaps best expressed by the introduction of Judge Sharma, who talks about how Indo-City and his fellow Indians are only interested in the spiritual significance of the matter at hand, because of course they are. And they somehow seem to even more ludicrously believe that this space-ship, housing a White American named Eckhart, is carrying the new avatar of the Hindu God Vishnu, with Eckhart being The One. Morrison and Millar are clearly gesturing to the Kalki myth here, but it’s not an evocation/gesture or idea any actual Indian writer familiar with these myths or grew up with them would make in this context, because it is utterly laughable. It’s one that only a White creators with a very distant outward understanding and reliance on stereotyping would go for.
However, even amidst this rubble of poor caricatures and messes, there IS however one standout addition and creation that Morrison and Millar help bring to the table. And that is Judge Cesare, aka The Vatican Judge, who boasts an absolutely sick design from Mick Austin. He looks like a heavy metal gothic religious Batman, which is to say he looks a hell of a lot like Azrael, but by way of Judge Dredd’s aestheticism. And the end result? An absolutely fun and sick character design and idea that feels like the first cool thing Morrison’s really brought to the table here. If you’re going to go for simplistic shallow action movie thrills inspired by superhero fare, and if you’re going to make global counterparts to the Judges, this at least feels more fun. Making a brutal agent of the Church feels like a much more natural terrain for Morrison and Millar to tread rather than touching Indian, Egyptian or African Judges. It feels much more like their lane.
And while the story itself isn’t very good good, and he doesn’t make it out of the story alive, much like most of these international Judges here, the very idea of such a Vatican Judge as imagined wonderfully well by Mick Austin is a solid enough addition to the enterprise of Dredd.
But beyond that? It’s tough. It’s disappointing.
The Many Failings of Grant MorrisonLooking over at the whole set-up, the best summation on all these international judges and their cities across the global map of the Dredd world? One is reminded of 2000AD and Judge Dredd’s historic limitations and failings, the insular and isolating nature of its British perspective that Others so many so casually, and operates in broad stereotypes or caricatures:
“It is one viewed through a late twentieth-century post-colonial British gaze, reflecting the knowledge and priorities of a worldview dominated by classroom lessons about ‘the Commonwealth,’ news headlines from the 1970s and 80s, and both reading of tales of and assumptions of the ‘exotic other.’ The way other mega-cities are designed and portrayed betrays attitudes about the world beyond the English Channel that have not moved with the times.” – Michael Molcher, 2000AD
That’s largely the case, and a fairly correct analysis of the material. And the fact of the matter is, per Morrison, both they and Mark Millar understood these historic problems, limitations, and failings of 2000AD itself and its material as a magazine. And when they took it over for the Summer Offensive in 1993, it was something very much on their mind. Here is Morrison in an interview just from this year reflecting on that period, that takeover of 2000AD, with the context being a discussion of their controversial Big Dave series:
2000 AD was so uptight. It’s like, they were really manly masculine guys with all of these masculine characters and people forget what it was like. We really thought we were satirists and we were poking fun at the racism and the sexism of 2000 AD as we actually genuinely saw it.
Back in that day though, it felt more like we were operating on these super levels of irony in order to point out that 2000 AD has been incredibly racist and bigoted throughout its history. It felt like we were doing a moral duty or something I suppose. – Grant Morrison
While Big Dave is not the subject at hand here, the idea and understanding that Morrison and Millar were creators coming from a fundamental place of recognizing the many failings and problems of 2000AD’s material up to that point is useful. They knew, even back in 1993, and it’s not some newly discovered or found wisdom of the past decade that these comics were or could be bigoted or racist. And that Morrison and Millar wanted to actively take aim at and poke fun at and even satirize that poor history of the magazine at that period? That’s useful to keep in mind.
It’s useful to keep in mind because both Morrison and Millar’s own works had up to that point been full of plenty of casual bigotry and poor handling of race, and as discussed here, they would have that issue in the material here of this period too. And crucially, they would have plenty of bigotry even afterwards, after 1993, full of careless choices and poor decisions going all the way into the modern era. And the key is, they’re not deliberately vile bigotries of the right-wing kind. They’re a different kind. They’re poor racial stereotypes and caricatures, deployment of tired, terrible, offensive tropes that service certain troubling narratives and ideas, that reduce or dehumanize the characters at hand and even resort to fetishizing them.
At its ‘best’, it often veers into a sort of Complimentary Racism aka Complimentary Caricature, a sort of ‘benevolent’ racism, the kind of ‘complimentary’ rhethoric that acts like Asians must automatically be very good at Math and Martial Arts or like Black people all collectively and naturally just being gifted athletes, destined to play basketball. It’s a flattening that reduces you down in cheap and insulting ways based upon stereotypes, regardless of the supposed intention. It’s how you get the above Judge Bhaji/Curry, the Indian man with the spiritual wisdom.
It’s how even 10 years after this, well into the 2000s, where you’d expect Morrison to perhaps have learnt more and be better, you get Morrison and Philip Bond’s Vimanarama, which is their (British) take on Desi characters in modern day Britain. A creator-owned work published at Vertigo, it was a 3-issue mini-series. It is as Morrison puts it:
It’s a nice Arabian Nights update, and I guess it does make its little comments about the situation in the Middle East. It uses the old mythology of Pakistan and India, the Ramayana, talks about the mighty Rama empire, which fought the Atlanteans using these flying machines or vimanas. It’s quite ridiculous and quite timely.
And if that quote betrays deep, deep ignorance, with Morrison lumping together both Arabian Nights and the Middle East and Pakistan and India together, because hey, Arabs, Indians, it’s all the same, it’s all Brown people amirite? Then the book itself betrays even further ignorance. There’s the fact that describing The Ramayana, a myth of Hindu text (with a political context Morrison clearly does not understand or grasp) being described as ‘the old mythology of Pakistan and India’ is absurd and ludicrous, it being a broad strokes 1001 Arabian Nights and Middle East thing on top of all that? It is pretty much the definition of Orientalism, with all the horribly dreadful and careless cultural mishmash done by a European outsider looking in to exoticize while talking about Arranged Marriages and other things they have no clue about.
It’s a horribly broken and inaccurately exoticized butchering of virtually everything it believes it is riffing upon. The Desi leads are framed in accordance with terribly nonsensical sci-fi vision of an Orientalist Pantheon and Mythology rooted in whatever disastrous mishmash Morrison sought between very broken fragments of Hindu Mythology/Arabian Nights, and it feels cheap. There’s no truth or resonance here. It’s an outsider using their Orientalist lens in a way that is deeply tiresome. And when you have to see Muslim leads named Ali in relation to super-gods named ‘Ben Rama’ of The Rama Empire, along with the lettering even trying to cheaply evoke Hindi in orientalist ways? The whole thing is a reductive disaster that would feel shocking to see exist if not for the fact that this is Morrison and their work has plenty of examples like this. It’s Morrison being deeply out of their lane and face-planting hard and not even knowing that they’re doing it. It ends up a work that is deeply Orientalist and insulting- a poor attempt to write about The Other by White creators in a celebratory fashion that is the farthest thing from celebration. It just others even more.
And that’s just one example. The list goes on and on, whether it be the magical Honor Jackson in Batman R.I.P. who exists solely to service Bruce’s narrative and never ever pops up again, or Morrison’s incredibly offensively blatant Jezebel Jet or the misogynistic racist mix of Dragon Lady + Brown Peril nonsense with Talia Al Ghul or their many mishandlings in New X-Men (from the racial context of Xorn-Magneto to their disaster with Magneto in the end to everything with Angel Salvadore and more) amongst a whole plethora of problems. Morrison’s had a poor history with many characters of color, but it’s especially true of their Women Of Color in particular. It’s where Morrison’s failings as a writer and their perspective become most clear. They have been consistently very poor there.
And all of the above is how and why you get them doing a Black Steve Trevor in Wonder Woman: Earth One in the 2010s, with the reasoning revolving around Black people knowing what it’s like to be bound by chains, which really feels like a disastrously poor situation of a well-meaning White Progressive attempt at writing about solidarity and intersections of oppression. Steve is largely a complementary caricature that lacks interiority and exists more like a prop to make a ham-fisted point, whilst Morrison’s messy handling of Race continues. Once again, both deeply out of their lane (especially so given they have little of actual value or meaningful quality to say via Steve about the oppression of Black people) and ultimately relying upon and leaning on obvious stereotypical ideas that often reduce rather than illuminate. It’s a common thread across much of their work, which you’d have to be blind not to notice, or at least willfully ignorant.
And this is all just keeping to fairly modern material, wherein you’d expect them to fare much better, without getting into The Invisibles back in the 1990s, which followed the Dredd work here and is also is loaded with plenty of dated disastrous choices, particularly with race. You’d think if a writer like Morrison could read and learn from monstrous and deeply racist figures like Aleister Crowley, they could also read Edward Said and Chinua Achebe and learn and grow in doing so, understanding their clear critiques of Western White Society’s view of Race and the reduction and treatment of The Other. If Morrison can discuss Guy Debord’s concept of The Spectacle or Francis Fukuyama’s End Of History and Post-Modernism, then they can certainly, at the very least, be considerate of Said’s work in Orientalism. There is simply no excuse here for a writer granted the respect, stature and literary credit that they are. You’d expect better from a writer like Morrison. But that’s the thing isn’t it? Expectations are not reality. The fact is, Morrison’s work (but it applies to Millar’s work too, who’s often even worse with Race) has long indulged in Orientalism and the above mentioned Exoticizing, both fetishistically and in more cruel fashion, with the work happy to lean into Complimentary Racism/Complimentary Caricature, as illustrated in just these stories alone. And this is all just the tip of the iceberg. One could keep going and never stop, given the wealth of material these creators have, and the sheer number of times they’ve messed up carelessly.
Point being: Morrison and Millar are creators who are very much guilty of the very things they say they’re railing against. It’s nice to have good intentions, critical intentions, but the work is not the intention. The work is the work. The intention does not negate or absolve the outcome at the end of the day. And even if they claim the license of satire and the label of being satirists, they’re not particularly good ones here, not really. And their wider body of work displays their limitations and failings even outside of these ‘satirical’ attempts at being critical of racism, sexism and bigotries.
In the end, Morrison and Millar are just as much a part of the very problem they identify, and they’ve actively indulged in that which they criticize, helping perpetuate it. They’re just as guilty. And while they critique the founders and forefathers of British Comics here, their predecessors at 2000AD, they are and they have been, whether they realize it or not, just as poor as them. They don’t get a free-pass or the benefit of being above it all. They are not absolved and neither do they get to play holier-than-thou with the legends of the past. It’s akin to the pot calling the kettle black. They’re just as complicit here.
By the time Crusade ends, with The Vatican Judge dead, and Dredd seemingly victorious, there’s perhaps only one kernel worth really addressing. It’s wherein Judge Wilde, the Irish Judge, is revealed to be the real threat, working secretly for The Vatican as a back-up agent. The Irish Judges of Emerald Isle (Ireland) are a specialty in that they’ve actually gotten to be done by Irish creators like Garth Ennis and Michael Caroll. And here, whilst Wilde is initially presented as a caricature happy to be there just for the drink, the story tries to elevate him from that, calling into question that assumption. And given Morrison is second-generation Irish, the choice feels like it has some weight over most of the other things done in the book.
And once it’s all said and done, Dredd is rescued by good ol’ Judge Bhaji (aka Judge Curry), because of course that was going to be how it all ended.
If Inferno felt obligatory, like checking off a list, and Book Of The Dead felt like a poor gag between mates stretched too long, Crusade feels like a kernel of a neat idea wrapped up in too much nonsense that takes away from it. So there are little kernels of spirit and fun, like The Vatican bits, particularly because of Mick Austin’s stellar design-work. But those are bound to and wrapped up in so much other poor nonsense that drags down the whole effort or is broached and handled in the most dull manner possible, such that what you end up with is truly dull and boring in a way it feels maddening to see.
There are echoes here of Morrison’s iconic stories- Inferno being The Idea vs The More Realistic Version Of The Idea, Book Of The Dead being The Hero vs Death and Crusade being The Clash Of The Various Aspects Of An Idea. You can see the bare bones construction, but it doesn’t work here. These stories do not sing or flow in the way so many other stories by Morrison would go onto be. Beyond just reminding you of the better Judge Dredd stories you could be reading, they remind you plain and simply of the superior Morrison comics you could be reading instead, which bear these same core spines or base story conceit, and do it so much better.
Once you’ve read these stories, you truly come to understand why they are glanced over and a minor footnote in Morrison’s career. There’s not much here, not really, when you compare it to the plethora of other rich, dynamic work done by plenty of other great talent to grace the doors of 2000AD. It feels shallow, simplistic, juvenile, and worse- it’s mostly boring. It’s got amazing artists that feel like they are doing their best with what they have been given- which is subpar material.
[Crusade is collected in Judge Dredd: The Complete Case Files 22]
If all of that feels like a shame, it’s because it is. But that’s just how it is sometimes.
Care for something taken too far becomes petrifying reverence, like in the case of Garth Ennis and Dredd. But the complete absence of care can lead to hollow, disposable and neutered work, like in the case of Grant Morrison and Dredd. If at the very least, Morrison had found some way to animate their lack of care for Dredd or even drawn out some contempt towards the character, the way Garth Ennis so frequently does with American superheroes, then there could have been something. The anger, rage, fury and contempt of a young punk from the working class streets of Glasgow could have been interesting if aimed properly at Dredd, the ultimate Lawman of British comics. But Morrison never does. They never found a ‘way in’. They never bridged that gap or did much of anything that could move you in the context of Dredd. And so the end result is just sort of…there, like a badge to say ‘Well, I’ve done it now. I did Judge Dredd, as all British Comics Writers do!’.
You got neither love nor contempt towards the figures in the book. Just a dull apathy that seemed to permeate every page, and that hardly makes for good work.
But it happens. Sometimes things don’t work out. Sometimes things just don’t fit. Some endeavors are just bad match-ups, and doomed for disharmony. And while the superhero would enchant the imagination of Grant Morrison time and time again- Judge Dredd just never seemed to.
But the ways in which Morrison fails here, the ways in which the work displays their limitations, that is useful and illustrative. It helps provide a clearer portrait of an iconic artist of our form. And that is the value here- in the realm of Mega City-One.
It is the world one enters to be judged.
The post Grant Morrison’s Judge Dredd, Part III appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack talk all Spidey all the time! The JMS and Romita Jr run continues with major developments for Peter Parker, and then we dig into some classic or underrated Spider-Man stories all from the same year!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Spider-Man: Blue | #1 to #6 | Loeb and Sale color series continued. | | Amazing Spider-Man / Peter Parker: Spider-Man | #38 to 40 / #44 to #47 | JMS and JR JR run continues, before Green Goblin follow-up in Peter Parker. #39 added by backer Dustin! | | Spider-Man’s Tangled Web | #11, #19 | Issue #11 is a pretty wonderful dive inside from the Daily Bugle from the late, great Darwyn Cooke. Then, issue #19 stars Grizzly Bear and Rhino in an odd couple set-up. |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2002 pt. 3
| Elektra | #7 to #10 | Greg Rucka run | | Daredevil | #26 to #37 | The Bendis and Alex Maleev Daredevil run begins, the finest take on Matt Murdock since Frank Miller. |
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The post 2002 Pt. 2: Spider-Man appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
What on earth was Morrison’s take on Judge Dredd? And why is it something that seems to almost never come up when people talk about their work? Why is it almost buried and forgotten? What did they even try to do there?
We’ll explore that here, picking up where we left off….
Inferno– The Prototypical Dredd EpicMorrison’s first Judge Dredd story would also be their biggest. They were joined by the legendary, defining artist of British comics and 2000AD, the co-creator of Judge Dredd himself–the inimitable Carlos Ezquerra. Ezquerra is a titan of British comics. If one were trying to find comparisons or American equivalents to contextualize for those unfamiliar with him, only Jack Kirby would do. He was an artist none could mimic, none could truly echo or capture in the same way, for he was too distinct, too idiosyncratic, and too special. His textured figures and worlds, as well as his dynamic composition and the maximalism of his expression, all of them expressed a unique voice that could not be recreated. And with letterer Tom Frame on-board, the stage was set, and the team was assembled for a new vision of Dredd.
Morrison could not have asked for a better artist, because they simply got the best. There was nobody else like Ezquerra, and there never will be. If you wanted defining, definitive Judge Dredd, you got Ezquerra. And so Morrison working with this absolute titan to craft a Dredd story? It meant something special. And the approach Morrison went for with the story was well-reasoned, too.
Inferno, as it was called, was to be a Judge Dredd Epic. The Epics being the sprawling ‘event-esque’ stories of great scope and consequence, which had at this point become tradition. And Carlos Ezquerra had drawn many of them, with his loud style suiting such bombastic mayhem of violence and chaos. And whilst there were many Epics over the years, the idea of a ‘Judge Dredd Epic’ was firmly codified and cemented in its ultimate expression- the iconic Apocalypse War storyline.
A masterful work of genre-art, The Apocalypse War was the ultimate Judge Dredd story. Penned by John Wagner, the character’s co-creator and King Of Judge Dredd Epics, alongside writer Alan Grant, with a plethora of talented artists, including Ezquerra, it was an expression of Cold War era sentiments. It saw the American Mega-City One at war with its Soviet counterpart East Meg-One, as two visions of Judges clashed and all hell broke lose. Many event comics like to claim that they will be ‘Earth-Shattering,’ but the thing that made The Apocalypse War so special was the fact that it…actually was. It was Earth-shattering, both figuratively and literally. It was an explosive, charged storyline that took everything about Judge Dredd and turned the volume up to 11 and then left the reader in awe. It put its character in tricky, difficult positions and made them make choices that haunted you. And more than anyone else, it was Judge Dredd’s own choice that hit home. Dredd was willing to openly commit mass genocide on an unbelievably seismic scale and in such a way that it was hard to not be horrified. And the impact of that, the fall out of all that? It’s still being reckoned with in the Dredd comics to this day. It was that momentous, and for all that it was epic, earning the title of a Judge Dredd Epic, it was effective because it was rooted in character. It was rooted in their choices and the character drama that emerged from that.
It was a story wherein you could see and pinpoint the precise moment a young Garth Ennis’ mind exploded and re-assembled itself again. As he himself put it rather succinctly:
Finally, there’s the best bit of all, to me the greatest moment in comics history: part 22 of The Apocalypse War. Having fought a losing battle against the invaders, seen half of Mega-City One destroyed, massacred collaborators and euthanized the critically wounded, Dredd has led an elite team of Judges into an East-Meg missile silo. Following one of the best action sequences I’ve ever read in a comic, the Judges find themselves unable to gain access to the operations room, until Dredd simply bangs on the door with his pistol and shoots the curious halfwit who opens it point-blank. Our boys storm the ops room and seal the door. Anderson, the telepath (and only volunteer in the Apocalypse Squad- no peacenik cosmic wandering in those days) pulls the launch codes out of the silo commander’s mind. The nukes are targeted on East-Meg One. “Please, Dredd,” begs the commander, “There are half a billion people in my city–half a billion human beings! You can’t just wipe them out with the push of a button!” And Dredd doesn’t hesitate, not even for a second.
“Can’t I?”
He can and he does. I still think about that today; what it meant about the character, and about the comic I was reading (aged 12). Even now I don’t know if Dredd was right or if he was wrong. It was the only way to win, to avoid the further slaughter and enslavement of his own people–but it was genocide. It was moral courage on an almost unimaginable level–but it was appalling. In the end, it was a dilemma not unlike those faced by a number of good and bad men in our own history, and if I had to sum it up in one line, I’d say this: what are you prepared to do when there isn’t any easy way out?
And that, I think, is why I’ve never been able to care about Batman, or Wolverine, or Iron Man… or any of them, really. Not because of what characters like that would or wouldn’t do, but because their publishers would never have the courage to have them written into such a situation.
A belated–but sincere–Happy Thirty-Second Birthday to the Galaxy’s Greatest Comic. –Garth Ennis
And it was this sort of legacy that Morrison was coming into in trying to construct a Judge Dredd Epic, particularly one that would be illustrated by a titan like Ezquerra.
So what was the end result?
Inferno would be a 12-part storyline, split into 6-pagers each, and it was almost designed and engineered to be a prototypical Judge Dredd Epic. It had all the necessary ingredients and pieces that one might deem as a requirement for such an enterprise.
But it rings hollow.
The storyline, centering upon an invasion of ex-Judges after their escape from an intergalactic prison, felt like a rough echo of many of the Epics before, particularly The Apocalypse War. You had Judge Dredd and his Mega City-One Judges confronted by their Dark Mirror Judges, you had all the familiar beats such a story involved from the Fall Of The Judges to the takeover of the City by the Dark Mirror Judges, and then the inevitable mounted final counter-attack led by Dredd to take it all back and save the day. You had the Walter the Wobot return appearance to wink to the audience, as well as a final conclusion centered upon a choice Judge Dredd makes that is meant to inspire horrific awe, like in The Apocalypse War.
And it’s not so much that repetition or echoing of the familiar beats is inherently a problem, as much as what that repetition and what those beats actually serve. What goes along with them, augments them, puts meat on those bones, and makes them weigh and mean something? In the case of Inferno, it turned out it wasn’t much. The strength of Wagner and Grant’s work with Dredd was precisely what that sentence implies: Dredd. The Lawman Of The Future was the most compelling part of the material, and it was their razor sharp unfurling of character that always resonated most. It’s why The Apocalypse War worked, and why that moment Ennis describes had such profound power. It was an interest in humanity, in people, and their monstrosity that gave it the sting it had. The bitterness felt personal rather than impersonal, it felt close and real. It’s why you felt it.
But you read Morrison and Ezquerra’s Inferno, and while Ezquerra’s a terrific draftsman as always, drawing page after page of bombastic action with characteristic power, it lacks weight. Morrison’s Dredd isn’t much of a character, as much as a thin caricature. He was a stock figure and a shallow action-archetype that felt more like an aesthetic than an individual. Like an action figure that says a ‘cool’ or ‘badass’ line when you pressed a button.
While Ennis’ distance with American Superheroes seemed to offer him an advantage and fresh perspective and a place for fun and fury, helping him pen Hitmans, Section Eights, and Punisher classics, Morrison’s distance with Judge Dredd and 2000AD seemed to only offer them…apathy. Ennis could use that apathy as fuel to find a reason to care or angle with bite to it, and thus weave a story with weight, but Morrison’s seemed to be totally incapable of doing that here. There was a sense of ‘going through the motions’ as it were, like a ‘Let’s just get it over with’ at an obligatory dance party.
And so when at the end of the story, Judge Dredd decides to press a button, like he did all those years ago in The Apocalypse War, to commit mass-murder upon the captured villainous Judges? It doesn’t evoke the responses that the classics it echoes do. It instead feels like a ‘Well, this is what people want, right? This is what they like and want out of these Dredd comics? So let’s just give it to them.’ It feels engineered in the way a McDonalds burger is engineered.
It feels like posturing. It lacks the sincere commitment to the bitter horror and humanity that Wagner and Grant’s best work had. It feels like it treats Dredd less like a character and more like a cool tattoo, like a Ghost Rider or a Spawn. And perhaps that makes some sense from Morrison’s perspective, as around the same time frame they’d just done a Spawn three-parter with Greg Capullo for Todd McFarlane. And the approach there was very much one of ‘Let’s give these kids who buy Spawn something cool and action-y, let’s give these Image audiences what they show up for!’ It wasn’t Morrison cutting loose to be most Morrison, but trying to write to an assumption of the task at hand. And in Spawn’s case, it seemed to work, particularly because the history and legacy of Spawn wasn’t terribly great, thus making Morrison’s competent multi-part story standout as strong material in that lineage. But in case of Judge Dredd? Where there is such a strong history with amazing, classical work reaching great heights? Such an approach plays very differently.
But perhaps, in fairness to Morrison, they were honest about it. They didn’t hide their feelings on the character in interviews:
What was it like writing Judge Dredd? Do you feel you’ve made any significant changes to him?
Grant: No. Not at all. The thing with Dredd is that he’s completely one-dimensional. Someone like Batman has at least two dimensions because he has a secret identity and a certain degree of psychological motivation and tension. Dredd’s just a big bastard with a gun, never anything else. There’s nothing under the mask. So I thought long and hard and then just wrote him as a one dimensional bastard with a gun. I did make a definite decision not to do a kind of quirky ‘isn’t life strange in Mega-City One?’ thing, since Garth has been blowing that trumpet with varying degrees of success throughout his run on Dredd. I wanted to do a Dredd story which was just like a Big Arnie film, so ‘Inferno’ is full of mammoth explosions and things falling over and fast cuts and useless one liners. That’s probably the big difference between my Dredd and the others we’ve seen; mine cracks more shitty jokes.
This tracks with the work presented in the pages of Inferno. Rather than try to bridge the gap of apathy and disinterest Morrison felt towards the character, rather than find an ‘in’ of sorts, Morrison elected to stick with their initial gut vision of Dredd as a flat one-dimensional figure. He’s a simple action caricature in shallow aesthetic action plots, dropping ‘badass’ one-liners. The whole enterprise, with Morrison writing to Ezquerra’s artwork, feels like watching a talented chef who is deliberately trying to cook up something very basic by following a recipe to the T, and it feels like a waste of their time and talents. You’d hope for something more, something better than that. You want to be surprised given the chef involved, and yet you’re not. All you find is a result that is…bland.
In the end, Inferno reads like a book that reminds you of how much better and stronger the works it echoes actually are. It makes you appreciate the Judge Dredd Epics that came before, because you understand what it truly took to make them so good. Inferno becomes an empty evocation of the past, a poor cover song that only accentuates the beauty of the original.
It’s a waste of potential and possibility.
[Inferno is collected in Judge Dredd: The Complete Case Files 19]
But could Morrison do better in their next attempt? Or at least something different, at the very least? This was only the first try, after-all. Having gotten this dull gesturing over with, would Morrison go bolder and dare to something new?
What awaited Morrison after this initial burst with Judge Dredd?
It wouldn’t be long before we got our answer.
Next: Part III- Book Of The DeadPrevious: Part IThe post Grant Morrison’s Judge Dredd, Part II appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Grant Morrison has done pretty much everything. In a career spanning 4 decades, starting from their late teens into their now early-sixties, Morrison has trekked across most of the Western comics landscape. They’ve done a great deal of work, both big and small. Whether it be redefining major flagships like The X-Men or Batman in Big Two superheroes, helping pioneer the Vertigo weirdness with The Invisibles and The Filth, or being part of the wave of new creator-owned books of Image and Boom in the early 2010s with Nameless and Klaus, they’ve been around and done it. They’ve done Original Graphic Novels, they’ve done mini-series, they’ve done maxi-series, they’ve done one-shots, and lengthy ongoing series, and they’ve even done zines. They were a Musician, with much music of their own, they’ve performed with Gerard Way in MCR Music Videos like Na Na Na and SING. They were even a comics critic and columnist back in the day. And now they work in Hollywood as a screenwriter, as they have done for over a decade now.
Much has been, and continues to be, said about their work.
And yet there is a gap.
There is an odd little gap.
A gap that exists not because nobody’s noticed it, but because it is seen and then brushed past.
Grant Morrison’s Judge Dredd.
People seem to go ‘Oh! They did that!’ and then they move right on. They tend to forget, more often than not. Those that remember, particularly 2000AD lifers, have already gotten an established consensus that hangs in the air, so it’s not something paid much attention to. It’s a thing of the distant past, like a vague shape that exists. You recall it, but then forget it.
The 2000AD work by Morrison that instead seems to really register is their long-running series Zenith with co-creator Steve Yeowell. A book that is very much a British Superhero Comic. Of all their work on 2000AD, it is the superhero work, echoing their eventual American superhero work, that seems to really stick with people.
But what about their Judge Dredd?
What the hell was it? What on Earth was Morrison’s take on Judge Dredd? And why is it something that seems to almost never come up when people talk about their work? Why is it almost buried and forgotten? What did they even try to do there?
We’ll explore that here.
The Roots Of MorrisonGrant Morrison came into American Comics like most of their peers – through that rigorous British Comics boot-camp that is 2000AD. It is The Galaxy’s Greatest Magazine, wherein writers hone their craft and learn to tell a complete story in very few pages. It is a science-fiction anthology where a wild frenzy of ideas is not just encouraged but is a necessity. A perfect breeding ground for a series of generational talents like Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Grant Morrison, Garth Ennis, and plenty more. A wave of talent that came through the house that legendary British icons Pat Mills and John Wagner built over at IPC (International Publishing Company), back when 2000AD was still owned by them.
Back in the 1970’s, IPC (London) and DC Thomson (Dundee) were the two big rival comics publishers of the United Kingdom. While most know IPC as the house from which 2000AD sprang, DC Thomson too had rich history, being the home of classics like The Beano and war-magazines like Commando, which Garth Ennis adored as a child. Both were competing big time, and in fact, Pat Mills and John Wagner were both freelancers who’d worked at DC Thomson. That’s where they learned to edit and honed their skills as writers – skills they would put to use when helping build what would become The Galaxy’s Greatest Comic.
It was here at DC Thomson that a young Morrison was trained and whipped up into shape, taught how to tell a story in a professional manner, and to put together a comic for a wide commercial market. They wrote stories in magazines like Starblazer, weaving tales of space-opera and strangeness, and learned how to be a professional comics creator. And they would, eventually, like all of their peers, go on to work at 2000AD. They’d do plenty of sci-fi short stories in the magazine (dubbed Futureshocks), but their success would end up being on Zenith with co-creator Steve Yeowell, their effort about a young legacy hero who was akin to a self-centered pop-star in Thatcher’s Britain.
From there, Morrison was off and away, moving onto American Comics and the world of Big Two superhero publishing. The success of a British Superhero Comic had ended up a stepping stone to get to the root of superhero stories – the American figures such as Superman and Batman who Morrison read voraciously. Morrison would enter the DC Universe they’d so adored, penning short-stories in anthologies like Secret Origins, doing runs in titles like Animal Man and Doom Patrol, and even crafting original graphic novels such as Arkham Asylum in the year of the Tim Burton/Michael Keaton Batman.
But they would consistently have a toe dipped into British comics, too, as they worked on under-discussed works such as St. Swithin’s Day (perhaps the finest Morrison work of all time) with Paul Grist, about a boy who wanted to kill Margaret Thatcher (which made waves enough to be discussed in the British parliament at the time). They’d take classic British sci-fi icons and heroes like Dan Dare and deconstruct them alongside Rian Hughes in Dare, examining the pulpy sci-fi hero of the 1950s-1960’s era in the age of Thatcher’s Britain. They’d do even more controversial works like The New Adventures Of Hitler with Steve Yeowell, which is pretty much exactly what it sounds like.
While Morrison penned a new vision and revival of the superhero in America inspired by Jorge Luis Borges, surrealism, Dada, and absurdity, their more ‘minor’ British comics work seemed to be of a very different mode. There was a perpetual sense of grime and dirt that Morrison portrayed in these books in a way their American works never quite touched. There was a spirit of wild abandon that one would not find even in their most ‘cut-loose’ American mainstream work. No, these works felt different. They felt distinctly small press, with an air or provocation that felt like it would be snuffed out far sooner in the American Direct Market.
And as all things do, Morrison’s time in British comics, this balancing act, seemed to approach a crescendo.
And the big final blow-out party would be in the summer of 1993. Grant Morrison, Mark Millar, and John Smith would take over 2000AD for 8 whole issues across July and August of 1993. This would be dubbed The Summer Offensive.
It was finally going to happen.
Grant Morrison was going to take their big swing at Judge Dredd.
And everyone would get to see it.
It was time.
The Morrisonian Judge Dredd2000AD was a classic institution of British comics. Everybody knew of it, and they knew of Dredd. Creators like Warren Ellis and Garth Ennis were famously devout readers of the magazine, and that’s not an uncommon sentiment, as even the likes of modern creators like Al Ewing grew up reading the magazine religiously. And that meant reading Dredd, obviously, which most did. How could they not, given the legions of talented creators working upon the enterprise? Everybody who was anybody in British comics seemed to at one point have a hand in that pie.
This wasn’t the case for Grant Morrison, who did grow up on British comics, but not 2000AD’s brand of action sci-fi. Instead, they primarily read and enjoyed British Girls Comics, particularly titles Judy and Diana from the 1960’s, both published by DC Thomson, and titles like Misty from the 1970’s (which had the legendary Pat Mills on it!) published by Fleetway, which would eventually become part of IPC. Morrison’s long said that they preferred these girls comics and their diversity over those British boys comics, which they saw as being far too centered around war, violence and masculine figures that they didn’t find appealing. Pretty much in stark contrast to Garth Ennis, who loved DC Thomson’s Commando and its tale of soldiers.
So they had a different basis when it came to ‘British comics,’ and a vastly different set of interests. And beyond that space, they had largely grown up with American Superhero comics (which many British readers did, particularly via reprints) featuring the colorful casts of characters like Superman, The Flash, and Batman. And they loved them – they loved the American superheroes dearly. They found them life-changingly potent and powerful, with Superman in particular being crucial to them:
What is it about superheroes that fascinates you?
They came along when I most needed them. My parents were anti-nuclear activists, so the bomb was a big frightening specter in our household. Then I discovered superhero comics and realized that here was an idea that was bigger than the bomb. Superman can withstand an atom bomb explosion. They literally saved me from the horror of the atom bomb.
And so those were Morrison’s loves of youth, their fascinations, which did not veer anywhere near the 2000AD landscape or Judge Dredd in the slightest. They had more fealty towards the comics of Jim Starlin, Steve Englehart, Don McGregor, Steve Gerber from the 1970’s America than any Prog of 2000AD prior. They had no special love or childhood obsession or nostalgia in the slightest for the Galaxy’s Greatest Magazine or The Lawman Of The Future.
And they were quite honest about that truth in the press as well:
Morrison: I mean, I didn’t ever read 2000AD when I was younger. I wasn’t particularly interested in comics at that time. I’d seen 2000AD and I was aware of Judge Dredd but it just seemed like a load of old toss, as far as I was concerned. First time I actually read one was in 1985, when I was trying to get work and someone loaned me a pile of Alan Moore ‘Future Shocks’ to give me some idea of what was required. I was never particularly impressed but I like the idea of 2000AD being in some sense a punk comic when it started out. As far as I can gather, it had a certain radical edge and that’s something we’re trying to capture for a different generation. We’re looking for a sense of danger and recklessness and cheap thrills. Whether we’ve achieved it is something the readers will have to decide. Obviously, I think we’ve succeeded amazingly.
They came to it with a detachment and distance, a lack of attachment that can be quite useful. They were not a fan. They could be critical, and they wouldn’t be precious in the way a diehard lifer might. They were almost in the precise opposite position as Garth Ennis, who was a devout fan, and spoke about the difficulty that brought to then doing Judge Dredd:
Ennis: I can’t do Dredd right because I’m too close to it, too reverential. I like it too much. The instinct that allows me to go in and piss all over American superheroes and end up writing quite entertaining stories about them – where Batman and Green Lantern turn up in Hitman and are thoroughly pilloried or where Wolverine and Spiderman and Daredevil appear in Punisher and have a terrible time – that instinct to go in and tear characters apart and come up with entertaining if controversial stories, that just isn’t there for me when it comes to Dredd.
Morrison, it seemed, had the same benefit and advantage that Ennis had with the American superheroes, but just with Judge Dredd. That offered possibilities, it was reason to be excited.
What would Morrison do? What would it be like? How would it build or differ from what had come before? What would it add?
The answer would come in the form of 3 stories, one penned solo by Morrison, and the other two co-written with Mark Millar. Each would be be 6-page serials and would run through multiple Progs of 2000AD to tell a larger story. And together, they would layout the Morrisonian vision on Judge Dredd.
Next: Part II- Inferno!The post Grant Morrison’s Judge Dredd, Part I appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Storm & the Brotherhood #1 is an exciting start to the trio of three-issue miniseries that will form the core of the “Sins of Sinister” event. Of course, overall the story here isn’t a radical departure from the prologue, Sins of Sinister #1, which covered a lot of groundwork in its double-size format. Still, it’s beautifully told, and there are surprise twists by the end. Judging from this issue, we can expect the other #1’s will also establish the Year 10+ status quo for this Sinister-dominated future before giving us a twisty cliffhanger leading us to a ninety-year jump—and then skipping on 900 years for the final issues. This is going to be heady stuff.
“Storm’s Seven” (echoes of Ocean’s Eleven)
Credits: Al Ewing writes; Paco Medina draws; Jay David Ramos colors; Ariana Maher letters; design by Tom Muller with Jay Bowen; cover by Leinil Francis Yu and Sunny Gho
Impressively, the amazingly talented Paco Medina (regular artist on Al Ewing’s New Avengers, 2014) has drawn each of the mini’s #1’s—so the visuals for Year 10+ will be consistent. This is unique for an event, but already the event’s very structure is highly original, mirroring the timeline format of Hickman’s Powers of X but with a fun-house-mirror twist, for this is a radically different but instantly recognizable future timeline.
One element of instant recognition for you “Age of Apocalypse” fans out there is Sugar Man, whom we already saw in Sins of Sinister #1; Storm & the Brotherhood starts with the same scene, the destruction of Arakko/Mars (by Sinister’s forces), now drawn in Paco Medina’s chic dynamic style, rather than Caselli’s. Recall that this atrocity was five years into the Sinister-dominated future…
Another five years on, so +10 Years from the present Earth-616, Storm and her Brotherhood are off to break into Sinister’s lab beneath Moira’s Muir Island complex, with the aid of Destiny and Mystique… SPOILERS WILL FOLLOW.
Sins of Sinister #1 ended with Sinister realizing someone had stolen his Moira clone lab, and in this issue we find out who pulled it off and how. What’s wonderful about this is that takes the three most prominent fan speculations, which most of us saw as mutually exclusive—but here Ewing neatly ties them all together with an agonizing twist of the knife in Machiavellian treachery.
Destiny and Mystique almost gleefully betray Storm and the Brotherhood after the latter break into and steal the lab for them—and they’re in cahoots with… Orbis Stellaris?!
In Sins of Sinister #1, after Storm fled the Sinister-fied Council (sometime before Arakko’s destruction), Destiny and Mystique approached her with the offer of an alliance—and she allowed herself to be convinced that it wasn’t the time right then for an Arakkii assault against Sinister’s Krakoa. As we find out here, she still marshaled her forces, but Sinister got the jump on her and Arakko; the resulting atrocity saw the loss of Storm’s closest allies (including Sunspot, Nova and the Great Ring), except for Cable, Khora and Wiz Kid; indeed, the Arakkii seem to have been almost completely wiped out—although (multiple?) Ora Serrata apparently slaughtered her own people as a Sinister ally or lackey (it’s just the one panel, so who knows).
So, Storm & the Brotherhood opens some five years later (in a new venue, Asteroid S, hidden in the rubble that was once Arakko) with Storm, looking more regal than ever, questioning Destiny’s motives. After all, the only explanation for Destiny being wrong in her advice is that her predictions are woefully fallible or they’re not at all.
The woman appearing as Destiny, however, keeps mum—until a member of the Brotherhood debuting here for the first time, Jon Ironfire (of the molten metal blood), impales her, revealing Mystique, who of course gets better right quick (But then, this turns out not be Raven, after all! See below).
And now, we find out how Sinister’s Moira farm went missing: Destiny and Mystique’s plan is for Storm and her Brotherhood to bust infiltrate the Muir Island complex, specifically, the secret underground facility Sinister has kept there since the present day (and about which only Destiny and Mystique know). Inside, they’ll destroy the clones and reset the current timeline to Earth-616’s present-day reality (which means saving Arakko too).
With Destiny and Mystique, things do not go according to plan, naturally. They merely let Storm think that she’s gotten to the bottom of their ruse with the reveal of Raven posing as her wife. The reality is far worse, and our heroes suffer for it.
To be clear, Destiny and Mystique are the primary antagonists of this issue, and Destiny heads in particular will be upset how self-centered she comes off here—but it’s entirely unsurprising given her history. However, there is the bigger question of what she’s trying to gain for mutantkind, since she clearly did hew to ideals once upon a time. But who is she now? That’s a question for issue #2.
Once the team has bodyslid to Muir Island, Ironfire does begin questioning Mystique, but oddly enough, Wiz Kid intervenes to derail this voicing of doubt.
Another Brotherhood member unfamiliar to readers is Quick—given name Loolo—who has been seen once before, in X-Men Red #6, where she’s a small child protected by NASA scientist Craig Marshall while Uranos’ forces wreak havoc across Arakko. We see here that she adopted his surname sometime after that.
The interstitial page providing the team roster gives us some titillating info not found elsewhere in the issue: After Arakko’s destruction, Cable “bonded with the collective mind Xilo to become living history.” Fascinating—but again, we don’t know what this means in practice yet. But the old man is definitely looking a bit, um, rooty.
On Muir Island, the team is set upon by a delightfully nasty pack of Sinister chimeras: an amalgamation of Maggot and Marrow—throwin’ bone daggers with maggoty piranha mouths!
The team finds another sort of chimera below ground in Sinister’s lab; a black “living forcefield” surrounding the unseen Moira clone farm, it was created from the genes of Unus the Untouchable (or erstwhile Acolyte Carmella Unuscione, his daughter)—possibly along with samplings of Skids and Armor.
Jon Ironfire has impressive showing here, and apparently he fought in something called the “Genesis War,” which Storm experienced as well—so it’s something that occurred in this alt-future timeline. Hopefully, we’ll find out more about this next time!
That’s right: Apocalypse and Genesis might show up… Or we’ll at least get an alt-future flashback. After all, if they’re still around, why aren’t they in the fight now, too?
Wiz Kid wows everyone by simply teleporting the Moira clone farm elsewhere, forcefield and all, seemingly so that they can penetrate it at their leisure—but it turns out that Takeshi probably died years ago, unknown to all but Destiny and Mystique—who’s taken his place in all that time since—and the Mystique figure nearby is simply a hard-light hologram!
Storm’s Brotherhood is left betrayed and humiliated; Storm herself is at death’s door, likely crippled. And the Moira clones have been whisked away all the way to the far-off World Farm of the Progenitors, that is, Orbis Stellaris’ home base—where Destiny takes tea through her mask while gazing on at scenes from dystopian and mad-science venues beamed in on floating screens.
Her companion, the Sinister of Spades, has his own designs—and they are Dominion…
This is not a double-sized issue, and there’s only the one plot thread, albeit sufficiently complex for now, and it’s actually nice that the dramatic action is clear, complete and coherent. This is unusual for an event comic and a good sign for the issues to come. What’s most exciting, of course, is where all these twists and turns will be taking us—and how the three miniseries narratives braid together by the end. The event’s trajectory remains delightfully unpredictable, and we still have vast tracts of space and time to cross with our faves turned on their heads and made strange by Sinister doings.
NEXT: Nightcrawlers #1 by Si Spurrier and Paco Medina
The post Sins of Sinister, Part 2: Storm & the Brotherhood of Mutants #1—in Review! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I first dig into the announcement of Jonathan Hickman and Bryan Hitch’s upcoming Ultimate Invasion! Then, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below:
This week we’re talking Kieron Gillen’s first issue of Immoral X-Men in the Sins of Sinister, and the rest of what’s interesting in the day’s comics!
This Week’s Comics
Immoral X-Men #1
Captain Britain #1
Sabretooth & The Exiles #4
Deadpool #4
The post Sins of Sinister: Immoral X-Men #1! Plus, Sabretooth, Captain Britain | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Credits: Si Spurrier writes; Netho Diaz draws; Sean Parsons and Álvaro López ink; Federico Blee, Java Tartaglia and Ruth Redmond color; Clayton Cowles letters; covers by Ben Harvey
Catching up late with the first arc of Legion of X (#1-5) after not making it past the first issue, I was surprised with how enjoyable the reading experience was—certainly benefiting from reading it all in one go. And now, I’ve found the second mini-epic, a mere four issues (#7-10), a much greater accomplishment, making this title one of the best Big 2 titles of 2022—bearing in mind that it threads deeply into the ongoing Krakoa narrative. That said, what Si Spurrier has done with the Krakoan material, going all the way back to Powers of X (2019) in swiftly but thoroughly developing further the Warlock and Phalanx threads that Hickman left and mining Spurrier’s own more recent material on Legion and his father Xavier’s fraught (non)relationship (and the general vibe of Xavier being the worst kind of jerk), comes together beautifully, effectively and dramatically. I’m not sure of Legion of X’s future, since the only Spurrier/Legion solicit we have post-“Sins of Sinister” is May 3’s X-Men: Before the Fall – Sons of X one-shot, which looks to be the full conclusion of this storyline, with art by Phil Noto.
In fact, it’s unclear when exactly Legion of X #7-10 takes place. Kurt has horns but no further mutations in the “Sins of Sinister” lead-up, Immortal X-Men #9-10 by event architect Kieron Gillen—whose Sins of Sinister #1 features, five years into the Sinister-dominated future, a Nightcrawler fully mutated into animal-like monstrosity. But if this Legion of X arc takes place between the reveal of Sinister’s post-Hope-resurrection possession of the psychics of the Quiet Council and that alt-future dystopia, then how do we get such pathos between Xavier and David in issue #10 here? My guess is, as we saw even at the +10 Year point in the event’s opening one-shot, those who were possessed so early on still mostly exhibit their normal agency and apparent autonomy.
In other words, Sinister probably didn’t see a reason to show his hand on Xavier’s strings too soon and interfere with the father’s interactions with his son, from initial egregious betrayal to joining together in a mutant circuit to save David’s mind and thus the Altar and everyone still in it from the Technarch shark from the Astral Plane.
However, we can assume, unfortunately (given the fact that only three X titles are on pause for this event and just the nature of solicits), that the future of Sinister dominion will reset to a point somewhere in the midst of Kurt’s current travails, as he continues to mutate in a fit of terrifying mythomancy… We know Gillen and Ewing’s titles will continue but what about Spurrier? The Before the Fall – Sons of X one-shot looks like a potential conclusion.
So, irony of ironies, Legion of X, a title I once dismissed may be over just as I realized what I was missing. Then again, it’s best to go out on a high note than stretch a story out just because that’s what fans want. Regardless, what Si Spurrier does next will undoubtedly be very much worth following (he’s grown by leaps and bounds as a writer and storyteller since his Legion-centric X-Men Legacy (volume 2) a decade back)—and this hard to please reader will be happy to follow.
(There could also be some timey-wimey knottedness between Legion of X #10, the Nightcrawlers mini and the Sons of X one-shot; we just don’t know yet. We should expect Mother Righteous to be a throughline, regardless.)
FULL REVIEW: SPOILERS ABOUND
Double Trojan HorsedIf there’s one serious flaw in this story arc, it’s that new artist Netho Diaz does not sell the sublime terror of the technoid angler fish-like Technarchy predator coming for Krakoa and David’s mind (including the Altar). But Spurrier’s storytelling here is strong enough that readers can still feel the distressing weight of this threat, whose coming was effectively foreshadowed early in the arc (along with a hint as to Pauli’s killer in the previous one, occurring as it did on the astral plane, where machine entities appear more organic).
Much more impressively, Spurrier does an excellent job portraying with care and ultimately cathartic pathos a character flaw that is often all too easy to resort to these days, Xavier’s absolute stupidity as both a father and a decent human being: For he dropped his son David into a withering catatonic state with a minuscule device embedded in him as soon as the Professor showed up on his (the Altar’s) doorstep. So, not only is the one person who could fend off this astral attack out of action at the worst possible moment, the betrayal inherent in the debilitating device’s design is heartbreaking:
Issue #10’s interstitial excerpt from Xavier’s diary tells us how this Daedalus device works, and its worst aspect is that its attack state is “triggered by a moment of pride, pleasure or pain.” Now, when Xavier shows up to visit David, his son is clearly taken aback but happy, as if his father wants to see the wonderful home he’s made for himself and so many Krakoans looking to heal themselves and/or relax. It’s David’s moment to feel perhaps for the first time in his life proud, and as they take a tour, he feels the same emotion from this man whose attention he’s always wanted when it could be, very reasonably, on his terms (not seen as an invalid or an unintentional/uncontrolled hazard to others). He’s pleased, perhaps even pained by this belated visit—which, however genuinely felt on Charles’ part, is also primarily a dastardly ruse.
It’s even more heartbreaking that Xavier’s betrayal is preceded by this psychic call from Blindfold, showing Xavier implicitly how much recognition David deserves, especially from the sort of father that the Professor simply isn’t capable of being (while Magneto did very, very briefly fill that role before he died recently).
The tragedy here is effective, and Ben Harvey’s issue #10 cover captures well the textbook tragic nature of it: It’s Xavier’s idiotic hubris, his belief that David was out to get him, to endanger Krakoa, the good Professor’s countless “children,” that leads to the critical endangerment of his entire life’s work in this moment—except, the denouement and temporary resolution is in fact happy enough, as he belatedly realizes his mistake and, uniquely here, acts as a amplifying conduit for David’s vastly diminished powers—a mutant circuit that allows Legion his triumph against both the Technarch and his father’s stupidity in one sublime, heartbreaking instant.
(Notably, Daedalus recalls the gifted inventor of Greek myth whose son Icarus disobeyed his warnings and used one of Daedalus’ inventions to fly too close to the sun. Parallels? Well, the father does blame himself for the fiery tragedy. Perhaps Spurrier is adding a revisionary subtext as well: Xavier wants to force his son to stay grounded, to be kept under control—but this too leads to the father’s humiliated regret.
Painfully tragic as well is the heroic fate of Forget-Me-Not, who in issue #10 proves his incredible worth to us readers if not his friends. His instantly forgotten sacrifice to save Krakoa, albeit at the cost of Warlock, who was already compromised, will certainly haunt Spurrier’s Krakoan tales going forward.)
TechnomancyHowever (and speaking of Greek myth), Xavier isn’t the only one in this story arc to infiltrate a sacred space with a Trojan Horse: Unwittingly, Warlock has come back from the astral plane, where his father was killed (albeit far distant from the Altar, which is a vanishingly small speck in that ethereal realm), carrying Nimrod into the heart of Krakoa—almost literally. After all, Warlock’s techno-organic substance has been integrated with Krakoa’s since Xavier dropped Doug/Warlock off on Krakoa to work on interfacing with the living island way back in that Powers of X flashback (the full revelation of which occurs in Hickman’s Inferno).
Note that Doug feels his soul breaking with the loss of his connection to Warlock, as the latter is sequestered and absorbed by Nimrod, and Kurt suffers a parallel setback when his foster mother makes off with his hope in the shape of (the never-before-seen) Hopesword, “hollowing” him out (more on this below).
Hey, there’s even a parallel between Warlock as a mutant Technarch, his mutancy being greater awareness and the capacity to self-reflect and empathize, and the Spirit of Variance, whose mutation is a similar swerve away from the two-dimensional single-mindedness of his forebears, the Spirits of Vengeance.
[Kurt’s windowless, doorless and thoroughly monadic home gets a name (Narthex) and further description here than before, at the moment of its brutal outside infiltration (by Sentinels via a Nimrod-possessed Warlock) and subsequent near total ruin.]There is a lot to chew on with Legion of X, which is highest praise, even when the art sometimes lets us down. I’ll need more time to think on what Spurrier is doing with father issues here: Xavier is terrible and delusional when it comes to being a father (failing his real son and puffing himself up as the patriarch of all Krakoans), and Warlock never got much from his father (Magus), but he can reflect on that traumatizing tyrant with pity and some degree of sorrow at the news of Magus’ death—and the Phalanx is ultimately their shared progenitor, and their the worst sort of patriarchy, however synthetic and seemingly inhuman.But it’s not just patriarchs who get a bad rap in these issues…
And this is before we even get to Mother Righteous.
Further, beyond the central themes, Spurrier has provided a number of brief memorable moments drawing from past character dynamics, all of which we won’t get to here, but suffice to say, these beats are a sheer delight for longtime X fans. Lastly—anyone notice how Spurrier has subtly deepened our understanding of the Phalanx in their higher-dimensionality? Perhaps this will have some bearing on Nightcrawlers in “Sins of Sinister?” And maybe Mother Righteous is having visions of astral cherry plums for values of Dominion… Do we even need to wonder?
(Oh, and by the way: Did anyone notice Nimrod now has the keys to Krakoa?)
MythomancyOf course, I’ve jumped ahead to issues #9-10, so let’s step back two issues and see where we left off, first, with Kurt bereft of his brief fling with Weaponless Zsen (LOX 1-5)—who left him with a portrait of his true self, which so far has been for Kurt’s eyes only. When issue #7 opens, we’re surprised to find he’s grown horns, so it wouldn’t have been unreasonable at all to think this was something to do with the portrait’s truth-telling (for Zsen’s power is to show the core truth of whomever via their portraiture, literal or psychic/astral). However, by story arc’s end, we discover the provenance of his “demonic” transformation lay with his mother, his adoptive one, that is: Margali Szardos (who debuted in 1980’s X-Men Annual #4).
[The character reactions here are slyly telling, and looking back on this makes me feel sorry for both Nemesis and Pixie, who is certainly outclassed by Margali of the Winding Way.]Yet the devastating reality of Zsen’s portrait of Kurt, kept all this time in his home (the Narthex, which is key to this arc; more below), is strongly hinted at in issue #9—when Forget-Me-Not, before his death that will be forgotten by everyone for a time, sees it and radios back to his mates a couple of salient details: Nightcrawler appears “hollow” and “there’s a sword.” And the very next issue, Margali draws a sword out of her foster son, the never-before-seen Hopesword, thus stealing something crucial of his very essence. So, Margali’s attacks that have turned many mutants into mythic monsters have resulted, at least in Kurt’s case, in transformations that aren’t just random; her distorting magic reveals something about her victim’s inner nature.Undoubtedly, we’ll get more clarification on all this with the Before the Fall – Sons of X one-shot this May. Notably, in line with the making-monsters-of-outcasts theme, Kurt’s team discovers Margali in Ingolstadt, Germany, the Bavarian town where Frankenstein’s monster was created.
But why has she so horrifically attacked her own adopted son? As suggested by the Winding Way data page in issue #10, Margali is not in her right mind because she’s caught up in an esoteric ebb and flow of thaumaturgical power (i.e., sorcery). (We’ll get more into Kurt’s adoptive mother with a review of Sons of X in May, but suffice to say here that much of her post-X-Men Annual #4 story can be found in the last years of the original Excalibur, especially issues #76-77 and #96-103). Regardless, she’s really done a number of Nightcrawler, Nemesis and the whole team (awesome that Spurrier’s new Black Knight joined up, even if she’s barely surviving the experience).
Effectively devastating work this time around, Mr. Spurrier. Kudos. Let’s hope he stays in the X Office for as long as he has story to burn.
(For previous CBH reviews of LOX, we covered the opening arc and the excellent “A.X.E.” tie-in issue.)
NEXT: Nightcrawlers!
The post Legion of X #7-10 in Review—Sins of their Parents! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Credits: Ben Percy writes; Robert Gill draws; Guru-eFX colors; Joe Caramagna letters; Josh Cassara and Dean White kill the hell out of the covers, the only thing worthwhile here—all else is zombified compulsion
The last time I could give Mr. Percy’s Krakoan CIA title the benefit of the doubt was probably just before the Percy-helmed pseudo-event X Lives/X Deaths of Wolverine. Since then, both X-Force and Wolverine, but particularly the former and longer-running title, have taken embarrassing nose-dives.
I might check out the nearly finished, five-part “Beast Agenda” over in Wolverine once it’s all up on MU and report back here. But after this mid-game report on X-Force*, that’s it for me—until the true end, when we can all look back and marvel at Percy’s braided-narrative masterpiece, for the shaggiest of shaggy dogs that we already know it to be.
Impressively, it’s Wolverine*’s longest arc so far, consecutively, that is—guess that qualification is necessary! But the Danger and then Kraven debacles were each a waste of four whole issues, so my hopes aren’t up. Of course, “Beast Agenda” will segue into “Weapons of X,” about which Beast dropped a real heavy hint in an issue #31 data page that will titillate only the Percy diehards. These will likely prove to be a single “epic,” for what that’s worth.
So how the heck is it that Mr. Percy, a talented horror turned science-fantasy techno-thriller novelist, has managed to gobble up so much Krakoan real estate (i.e., page space) for so damn long? Sales, dummy! Wolverine and X-Force sell like crap print-job guns given a cheap chrome finish with fake blood splatter. Honestly, I haven’t looked at sales numbers in months now, but anything with “Wolverine” in the title will always be a top seller for Marvel, and the X-Force property is typically solidly (upper) mid-tier sales-wise.
Pretty sweet gigs if you get ’em—sweeter still to hold on to them for a hot minute.
One way of doing that is by coasting. There isn’t a high demand to take real risks and make bold moves when a mediocre job that superficially hides its mediocrity by continually deploying wild ADD-like turns to the cast and plot.
By far the most positive aspects of Percy’s overall Krakoa tenure have been: 1) the rise of artist Josh Cassara on X-Force (culminating with X Lives before he moved on to his current gig with Duggan on X-Men); 2) the return of legend Adam Kubert to Wolverine (it’s just too bad the stories haven’t matched his genius, though of course it’s far from the first time); and 3) the all-too-brief Krakoan tour of another rising star, Federico Vicentini, with X Deaths and Wolverine #24-25 (before moving to Miles Morales: Spider-Man with talented new writer Cody Zigler).
Following X Lives/X Deaths, new talent Robert Gill has become X-Force’s regular artist, and while he gets top marks for consistency, I don’t find his work inspiring or even much engaging. A great story could still shine through, but here, we just see how stripped the story’s inner workings actually are—it all adds up to nothing more than a cheap toy for dour boys. Mr. Percy knows his audience, I guess. I know they are not my people, whoever they are; they’re likely half my age or younger, so why go on with this.
Well, here indeed is the most interesting takeaway:
Mr. Percy as the author of these two titles almost perfectly echoes recent Vita Ayala New Mutants antagonist Amahl Farouk under the thrall of the poisonous Shadow King—or rather his centuries-long memory of being the Shadow King’s puppet. In other words, Percy’s constant cynicism and fatalism regarding Krakoa is akin to someone habitually reacting from a traumatized state. I have no interest in psychoanalysis here, but when Amahl’s fearmongering and that found throughout the pages of X-Force and Wolverine can be paraphrased almost identically, it’s impossible not to take note and wonder why the fictional character is sent packing for long-term therapy and the one-note writerly persona* Mr. Percy developed in the X Office continues to occupy space on this island that most fans and creators don’t actually think of as utopia (outside the Percy titles, oddly enough), but rather a place to experiment with new ideas and arrangements. Over and again, Mr. Percy uses Wolverine and co. to hammer home that “nothing is forever” in order to justify not trying to seize that fleeting opportunity to do things differently for however long is possible.
Before he realizes he’s free of the Shadow King, Amahl insists that mutants must never, not for a moment, lose sight of the threat posed by humanity and be armed and ready against them (an us-vs.-them mentality)—and the entire Krakoan experiment is a coddling waste of time. It’s all strikingly similar to the throughline of Percy’s X titles.
Percy’s X titles are actually good examples of cynicism and fatalism coming to the same thing—hopelessness. But what does save* them from messaging just negativity is the humbling sense of duty characters like Logan (with his “bushido” ways) and even Domino convey (not, of course, Beast).
[Though one wonders why a prominent recipient of Logan’s indefatigable sense of honor must be someone so patently despicable. How long are we supposed to keep mucking about in the irony of it all?]See, when someone says to me “nothing lasts forever,” I think: “We better start having fun while we can,” meaning, “Let’s try something different, surprising, new.” To this reader at least, Ben Percy as a writer is stuck like frozen mud in a single formula, a dour persona that at times is very eloquent about his dourness and the meager charms of being the sourpuss at the party—which is almost always portrayed with heavy-handed visual and verbal gestures at dissolution and hedonism. Artist Josh Cassara’s had a hand here, and his art is stunning and very effective in establishing a gothic noir atmosphere. I love it. And the debut of the Green Lagoon—that splash page is an absolute classic (X-Force #9). But over time, the tonal insistence has worn thin, and only in the pages of Percy’s titles do we find this fixation on Green Lagoon as dive bar and site of Sage’s alcoholic dissipation (which has only recently been touched on and not well; see below). It’s also just very explicit in these books that people relaxing and having a good time in a place that feels safe are hopelessly delusional; it’s a bit much.(Sure, we see party people in Spurrier’s Legion of X, but they’re far from seeming dissolute. Soft? Maybe. Yet that’s the point of retreating to the Altar for a time, to let your guard down and relax. Leah Williams isn’t exactly plumbing the depths of pathos with X-Terminators, but it feels like a well-earned vacation.)
It’s as if Percy has a beef with what he sees as hedonism, when it, or just people enjoying themselves, is sprinkled throughout the franchise, but in his books it’s framed as an embarrassingly delusional state that everyone on the island is suffering from—and only Logan and the mutant CIA (excepting the bloated Beast, I guess) can see through the gauche haze to the true red tooth and claw savagery of the real world.
(And why is it only in Percy’s titles that we see apparently dangerous wild beasts endemic to the island? Note that they seem scary almost always because they’re already in a death-match with Wolverine; there was that one that was stalking Beast—which frankly just seemed like commonsense pest control, before Logan swooped in.)
When you beat that drum over and again, you either sound like a Republican or someone who’s suffered too much and hasn’t found the opportunity to begin relaxing from a perpetual fight or flight state—after shaking out all those fear toxins, however long that takes. We are halfway through Percy’s Krakoa tenure, and there has been no let up in the grim, joyless relentlessness of his tonal and narrative cynicism.
Still, the Cassara covers are tops.
(Look at Forge recently: In Duggan’s X-Men, he’s thinking about the future possibilities of life on Krakoa; we got nothing even close to that when he was an X-Force cast member. Not in the least; not for one panel—although I will give a very small and brief one a generous reading; see below.)
Again, I am not talking about Percy as a person here at all but as a writer. By all accounts, he’s a great guy, which is wonderful. But the storytelling persona he’s developed for these titles isn’t. Back to an earlier nod, he is truly a talented genre novelist; his recent “space metal turns people into metahumans” series of novels is a lot of fun—highly recommended for the sf thriller set.
How does he keep enough of his comics readers engaged and not bored to tears by this stylistic monotony? Structurally, he’s all over the place, so he must be keeping followers sufficiently distracted by the novelty of a new foe every other month interspersed with a rotating rogues gallery powered by menacing suggestion rather than actually compelling and thematically relevant character work. Plus, his two titles are where to go for mindless bloodletting—so let’s not underestimate the appeal of juvenile puerility. Percy wears that badge with honor, so I’m sure he wouldn’t be offended by this charge. Maybe he even revels in such complaints.
So… moving on… For those of us who just want to keep track of Krakoan doings, what are the dirty deets from X-Force 2022 that we might hang our hats on?
Hmmm… There’s very little here with which one can try to even begin building steam from a grain of salt; except, as any seasoned reader knows, the most sublime baroque epics can be read even from rat entrails. So, what’ve we got in these hoarfrosted guts?
Quite literally: Ground up Deadpool, though somehow his head is one piece—from which a baby’s body grows, though he needs a veg body suit courtesy of Black Tom to get back in the fight with Kraven’s clone. Oh vey (And we’re talking ice bear guts here, to be fair).
Note that Kraven’s clone offhandedly slays Jay Guthrie (aka Icarus), one of the Guthrie siblings, in X-Force #32; this kid! He already suffered a wretched murder in a Purifiers/Nimrod scheme years ago in 2006’s New X-Men #26-27 by Kyle and Yost—a dark era that was not kind to such as this gentle emo Kentuckian angel boy. Neither is Mr. Percy above a little cartoon sadism, albeit in a flip and knowing mood (characteristically, he’s a master of grimdark nostalgia with a wink and a nod; his style isn’t really grimdark).
The only redeeming content in X-Force 2022 is a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment:
Forge exited X-Force with the Cerebrax debut, issue #27, before moving on, to Duggan’s X-Men Year 2, where already he’s been utilized and portrayed in a much more compelling manner than anything Percy came up with over the past handful of years. His X-Force departure is almost entirely a waste (bowing out from the title with his brains scooped out for a snack), except it’s very briefly noted that he opted to die fighting in the Arena’s Crucible ritual after Moira depowered him with his own neutralizer gun in X Deaths #4. But since Trial of Magneto introduced the Waiting Room (which is accessible to depowered mutants without experiencing death), there’s been no other mention of anyone opting for the Crucible.
Is this an error, then? No! This is Forge we’re talking about! And this is the deepest characterization that Percy has offered him in this title; it’s barely anything, and the reasoning is entirely unspoken, implicit. You just have to know his character. It’s the same reason he kept his prosthetic limbs; not because they’re cool and full of useful gadgetry (although there is that): The brilliant mutant inventor keeps these reminders of the self-inflicted tragedy in Vietnam that cost him an arm and a leg after he used his training as a mystic(!) to call down a horde of demons on the Viet Cong who had just slaughtered his company, but the price paid for unleashing this supernatural violence was his own fellow soldiers’ very souls. It was in the heat of battle, and he was spurred by the thought of avenging their deaths, but in the process, he eternally damned them. There is a lot of history to this man that we haven’t seen in years (see particularly Uncanny X-Men #227), but if you ever wonder why he spends all his time tirelessly working for the cause of Krakoa as well as punishing his body with those gym squats—look to that foundational trauma and his notorious invention for the US government(!), the neutralizer gun (UX #184-186, an absolutely classic sequence made confusing by the “Wraith War” references, since Marvel no longer has the rights to the ROM comic series).
Seriously, this is the only worthwhile panel in nine issues of X-Force, and it’s barely even there. And maybe I’m giving even this a very generous reading here—of course, otherwise, as Forge’s bow-out from the title? This is lame, lame, lame; Mr. Quad Squad, or rather this once fascinatingly complex Native American caught between two worlds in all their trauma and wonder, needs an apology.
Moving on, let’s acknowledge what we all know: Beast is ludicrously incompetent at his job as CIA chief. It’s wild to me that Xavier’s given carte blanche to someone so clearly unqualified for this position. And why, oh why is the Krakoan “CIA” so damn small? This has to be the most understaffed state security agency in the history of intelligence agencies; just saying.
Now, we won’t get hung up on quibbling little inconsistencies, but one or two pop up every other issue—and this doesn’t seem to be a problem in Percy’s novels, so… idk, these are monthly comics and the IP isn’t his, so whatever.
(A slightly trickier inconsistency is Beast arguing for the destruction of Omega Red’s backups to prevent his resurrection for all time; this ignores the existence of the Waiting Room. There’s the issue of Russia as adversary as well, but perhaps that’s out of Percy’s hands with real-world geopolitics right now; however, even before Russia’s horrific invasion of Ukraine, Percy’s use of an actual dictatorship as vague foe in a comic book was already a bad idea—and comics history is littered with this folly, whatever the ideology, for the result is always without fail an ideological morass that dates poorly quickly.)
It’s very dissatisfying that Sage only begins to take a first step in undermining Beast’s authority in issue #27, and at that point, her biggest challenge turns out to be her alcoholism, which has been a consistent theme throughout the title but never dealt with until recently—and I can only say as someone who grew up around alcoholics, Percy does not move or impress here. Fictional treatments of addiction can come in all forms, and they don’t necessarily need to be handled with “sensitivity,” depending on what the author wants, but it’s never been clear what Percy’s intention is with this, like most of his themes, outside “poison,” yeah!
(Speaking of: Sevyr Blackmore, Arakkii pirate of the acid fluids—ooh, yeah, he’s pure “poison!” Really? This is Percy’s second addition to Arakko following Solem? Is he actually supposed to be compelling, or are we just looking at more sophomore shenanigans with a nostalgic yen for ’90s rad bad vibes? Yeeaah.)
That Beast knowingly pushed Sage further into her alcoholism (explicitly acknowledge in issue #34) is just eyeroll inducing at this point. Beast’s reputation is now far worse than almost any non-Nazi-themed villain. Surely, he is beyond redemption no matter what ingenious fantasy solution some future creator devises. Never mind his frigging “prison moons” (issues #34-35), very reminiscent here to Nazis and other ghouls experimenting in varieties of sadistic body horror.
Shall we go on to a giddily drunken Sage introducing Omega Red to the Danger-Room-like Shadow Room that can be used privately to indulge his most sadistic fantasies as a coping mechanism for his addiction?
Nope!
Obviously, Sage’s plan to use Omega Red as a secret weapon/double agent against Mikhail Rasputin isn’t going to work out with Mikhail’s brother and sleeper agent Colossus on the Council.
Colossus is back in X-Force soon, meaning Percy’s Mikhail/Chronicler plot with him will likely wrap sometime in the next year or two; his time in Immortal X-Men was the most passive he or any X-Man has ever been in an ongoing X book—weird. He was just a secret camera back to Russia, I guess. That said, Piotr does say in an issue #27 data page that the more Russian mutants on the island the better for Krakoa geopolitically in relation to Russia, and several issues later, he gets his wish when Red ferries back a shipload of mutant asylum seekers from Russia. Is this part of Mikhail’s plot? Probably.
How’s any of this different from what the Marauders have already been doing for years now and why is Beast upset about this one instance out of what must surely be an ongoing process? Only Percy knows. Krakoa’s already shown far more outreach to humanity than Beast’s disingenuous attempt in X-Force #30.
For newer readers, note that Beast’s on-off relationship with Abigail Brand started in the early 2000s with Joss Whedon and John Cassaday’s Astonishing X-Men run, where she debuted. But never has whatever they have going on with one another been so ick.
As for Cerebrax… Nope!
Quentin Quire? Nope!
Logan suddenly distrusting Krakoa in the wake of Quentin’s disappearance? Nope!
Percy has done nothing in X-Force to make Quentin Quire interesting. He’s potentially compelling, but certainly not here. He disappears after taking out Cerebrax, seemingly dead and un-resurrectable. Boo-hoo (He must be the only omega obsessed with being the “omega of omegas,” which, embarrassingly for him, seems to completely misunderstand what being an omega means).
(After all, somebody somewhere is the omega of lame. One omega cannot out-omega another; the point is that there’s only one omega–or merely strictly equally capable omegas, I guess–for each category of ability.)
The Cuckoos are written as vapid teen girls more interested in parties than taking anything seriously, which is ludicrously out of character for them. The notion that they’d ignore a warning from Jean is nonsensical. Percy is incapable of writing with any interest from a younger perspective. His teen characters are simply flat and without interest (and that includes Quentin, despite Percy’s half-baked efforts there).
Having absorbed Polaris’ powers, Cerebrax contorts Wolvie’s adamantium Magneto-style à la X-Men #25 (1992), albeit without leaching it all off. Both the earlier incident and this one belie the fact that this metal is supposed to be, by definition, indestructible—here, we see its structural integrity radically warped (i.e., destroyed).
Kraven’s clone for four issues? Nope!
Deadpool’s head on a stick? Nope!
A decade from now, X-Force 2022 will be a black hole most Marvel and/or mutant heads pass over, and Percy seems to understand that whatever his original plans for both series, this is now their fate as he coasts to the finish line. Before last year, he had already established Beast as reprehensible; recent issues have merely become fodder for a litany of further crimes.
All the same, Wolverine must be one of the toughest titles to write for because almost everything about Logan’s character is so rigidly set—and Percy’s solution has been to double down on his sourpuss nature, which means he’ll be that much harder to work with for any future writer wanting to try a different tack. So, the Wolverine we have now is too terminally himself, an immortal cussed Sisyphus.
So much for reading into the ice bear’s rimey entrails. Don’t be masochists, kids—drop these titles while you’re ahead; forget the sunk-cost fallacy and be kind to yourself and your wallet!
NEXT: Check back with the last issue of X-Force sometime next year, after it’s all up on Marvel Unlimited.
The post X-Force 2022 in Review! Where Krakoa Keeps Selling Out appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave, Charlotte and Zack kick off 2002 returning to Grant Morrison’s X-Men, and the dramatic reveal of Wolverine: Origins!
On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):
| Origin | #1 to #6 | Wolverine’s origins told for the first time. | | New X-Men | #121 to #127 | The Grant Morrison era continues, conclusion of the Cassandra Nova saga |
Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2002 Pt. 2
| Spider-Man: Blue | #1 to #6 | Loeb and Sale color series continued. | | Amazing Spider-Man / Peter Parker: Spider-Man | #38 to 40 / #44 to #47 | JMS and JR JR run continues, before Green Goblin follow-up in Peter Parker. #39 added by backer Dustin! | | Spider-Man’s Tangled Web | #11, #19 | Issue #11 is a pretty wonderful dive inside from the Daily Bugle from the late, great Darwyn Cooke. Then, issue #19 stars Grizzly Bear and Rhino in an odd couple set-up. |
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Comic Book Herald’s Marvel Reading Order
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The post 2002 Pt. 1: New X-Men & Origin appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
You’ve heard the word. You know the story.
Crisis.
The iconic, defining, definitive word of DC stories.
The word Crisis feels inseparable from the fabric of DC. It holds sway over its past, it informs its present, and it will certainly influence the future. You can’t think of DC and not think of Crisis at some point. The very idea of it has been bound to the very idea of DC that tightly.
And the response to the word and its invocation is intense as well. It comes with a lot of assumptions and baggage. Given that is the case, given it has become ubiquitous, inevitable, and all-pervading with DC itself, it’s worth discussing what has become of it. What has emerged from this focusing and this obsession over Crisis in DC? What has it led to?
The matter of Crisis must be unpacked, and that’s what we’re here to do.
Picking up where we left off…
Endless EscalationBy now, the problems of DC Comics and its Crisis storytelling ought to be evident and obvious. Consider the above page from Death Metal for instance.
Scott Snyder wants it to be a cool, slick, inviting party to rock out at in pure celebration of the past. And that’s cool! The art by Greg Capullo and colorist FCO very much fits that metal party vibe. It looks cool and conveys a sense of the ‘epic,’ depicting a wide tapestry and rich history. It feels like a party invite for the reader into the absurd realms of DC.
But then onto that gorgeous Greg Capullo artwork, on this great Double-Page Spread conveying scope and screaming Cool, you attach a billion droning caption boxes of text that seems to only drown out its impact. On and on the text goes about all these things you need to know, as it becomes a busy exposition overload in needlessly long, tedious fashion. It’s not just that there’s too many words; it’s that they’re all the wrong words here. They detract from the strength of Capullo’s terrific art. They tire you out, and you don’t end the page on the initial ‘Oh, cool, sick visuals,’ you instead end up exhausted. All it paints is a picture of endless, constant, tiresome escalations, as things keep getting Bigger and Badder, to almost parodic degree, and it doesn’t present a thrilling landscape at all that Capullo’s art seems to try to convey. It conveys one lost up its own ass in insular fashion.
If you ever have to write like that and do that much to do a basic sell of your event, you’ve evidently gone wrong somewhere. That absurdly busy page, stacked with text-boxes, is perhaps the best encapsulation of the issue here.
It’s constant escalation that means nothing. It’s an issue so obvious, so blaring, and so glaring, even Grant Morrison themselves pointed it out in a biting piss-take during 2020’s Green Lanterns: Blackstars series:
It’s a truth that feels inevitable and obvious to almost everyone with clarity, as even Morrison’s mockery here is one from a place of self-awareness. Morrison is well aware of their own complicity in this trend, particularly given their JLA was and still is the foundational model for that ‘every arc is massive and earth-shattering like an Event,’ and even their works since have somewhat contributed towards that endless parodic escalation of things.
We have gone from ‘The Anti-Monitor, aka DC’s Galactus but Universes instead of Planets’ as The Big Bad to Alexander Luthor and Superboy Prime. We’ve gone from Darkseid and Mandrakk to Doctor Manhattan. Even Barbatos who was a more minor figure in Peter Milligan and Grant Morrison’s works became The Big Bad in a Crisis. And since then? We’ve kept it going.
We somehow got to ‘The Anti-Monitor’s Mom is The Big Bad’ as a serious idea as opposed to a joke comment. And then we got to The Batman Who Laughs, who in the stories is powered up to supergod status by Doctor Manhattan powers due to a Bruce Wayne/Doctor Manhattan amalgam from the Dark Multiverse. Now, if that sounds like a set of absolutely insane words, it’s because they are. That’s how we’ve been escalating. And now we have The Great Darkness and The Dark Army, collecting all of DC’s big event antagonists into an even more ever-escalating plot of multiversal disaster involving both ‘Pariah’ and Deathstroke.
Consider how we ever got to insane pages like this:
Which, the more you look at it, the more it feels like the comics equivalent and version of the Pepe Silvia meme:
These things have been derailed and lost sight of what matters most, or why people care about any of this. People keep doing stories all built around being Bigger, Badder, and Wilder than the last guy before them. They want to ‘top’ the past, and the only way they seem to be able to conceive of doing that is to try and raise the scope, scale, and bombast even higher, with even bigger nonsensical cosmic threats, as even louder and age old arguments about DC Comics are had.
But they forget none of that noise is why people ever cared or liked these stories. It was purely character. It was compelling character writing. And crucially, character not as representative or vehicle to wage insular fan arguments over nonsensical DC crap no one really cares about. It’s character writing rooted in real things, real feelings, real experiences and emotions, things beyond just the fabrics of DC comics publishing and its universal lore.
And the problem with these ever-escalating stories is they distract from that. The character(s) get lost in all that noise. What’s interesting about characters is watching them make choices, difficult choices, decisions that are hard, which require significant dramatic conflict, which carry a lot of weight and stakes, and have consequences that will be felt. It’s why people love, say, All-Star Superman or Watchmen, despite those being radically different books. They’re not tirades or fan arguments insular to the superhero. No, instead they strip away all that noise and tell really strong character-focused, thematically-driven genre stories with these figures that speak to larger struggles, realities, and universal feelings.
What this mode of endlessly escalating event storytelling that has been so bound up with the word ‘Crisis’ does is present the veneer of character and choice- whilst offering none. The characters get ‘choices’ in these books, sure, but they’re not really choices. They’re obvious, easy, predictable things that need to happen to serve and facilitate the plot. They’re reactions the characters need to have in a reactive manner to make the event ‘work.’ They carry the veneer of ‘challenge’ and ‘dramatic conflict’ but really have none. And neither does the decision/choice, as the consequence is just some other aspect of meaningless plot or ‘set-up’ for the next big event comic that’ll repeat all this.
Everything feeds the next Big Thing, and keeps the machine running, and it’s all Stuff Happens comics that you’ll forget by the time the next one rolls around, because that’s how it works, and that’s how they get you to pay up. It’s cheap, hollow, and it does a disservice to both the characters and the readers who hope to read them.
(The Absence Of) Dramatic Conflict and Real ChoicesIf you’ve read this far, you’ve likely wondered at least once ‘Why no mention of Identity Crisis, which came before Infinite Crisis? And why no Heroes In Crisis?’, and that’s understandable. They’ve been excluded up until this moment because this is precisely where they make the most sense to discuss.
We’ve discussed the importance and necessity of Crisis stories moving away from the ever-increasing escalation featuring ever larger supreme antagonists like That One Alan Moore OC, This Riff On An Alan Moore OC, or Anti-Monitor’s Uncle. There’s gotta be a different approach to ‘Crisis’ comics that takes a break from all that mad mayhem and increasingly bombastic reality-breaking affair with the whole multiverse on the cusp of redefinition every Wednesday.
And that alternative has historically been represented by the mode in which these two Crisis books work and operate. Brad Meltzer and Rags Morales’ Identity Crisis was technically speaking the first real ‘Crisis’ comic of the modern era, and one overseen and approved by Dan Didio himself. It would lay the groundwork that’d be picked up on and become story for Johns’ Infinite Crisis and even 52. It was the beginning of the Didio ‘Crisis’ era of modern DC comics, being among the first things Didio oversaw when he came to the Publisher under the tutelage of Paul Levitz.
And if Identity Crisis was a shock-wave that led to a Geoff Johns event that was all Fan Arguments staged as comics, then Tom King and Clay Mann’s Heroes In Crisis was a different beast. Heroes In Crisis followed on from Johns’ DC Rebirth, and rather than preceding the Fan Argument Comics, it would be a response to some of the ideas in those comics. Both books are quite different, evidently, but at the same time they have more in common than not. For one, Brad Meltzer is a direct inspiration and influence for Tom King, and both Meltzer and King share a desire to take a novelistic approach that feels a bit different from other Crisis attempts. Plus, both are Watchmen-inspired comics to the bone- murder mystery dramas steeped in the troubling secrets, coverups, and failures of the leading heroes and the superhero community. If Identity Crisis merely seemed to try and (in juvenile fashion) mimic the trappings of a ‘mature’ superhero comic like Watchmen, Heroes In Crisis would try to much more actively take from its form as well, deploying King’s love of 9-panel grids, all topped off with a whole blatant ‘I did it 35 minutes ago’ reference.
Both were comics that weren’t about the end of the world, but were human dramas about the community and struggles and pain of these people within them, and how they dealt with that. They both hinged around and focused on choices. Characters made notable, messy choices and decisions that had clear repercussions in the story, and also carried many implications. Both stories actively problematized and brought a discomfort to their superheroic cast of characters and their communities.
But the problem is…both were deeply, deeply poor works. Both comics are, for instance, laced with really poor handling of the female characters. Identity Crisis in particular, given its whole premise is ‘What if the Justice League dealt with a case of horrible sexual assault within their community?’, with the story being the worst possible answer to that question. It’s hard to look at the book and not see the almost raging, bone-deep misogyny in that book, with horrid evocation and shock-value deployment of Sexual Assault. But even beyond that, Identity Crisis is a deeply poor mystery that opts for said misogyny in its revelations and resolution, when doing so actively breaks its mystery completely and totally beyond any sense or believability. It’s a book that has the choice between having a workable mystery or being misogynistic, and it opts for the latter. When it reveals that Jean Loring, the Atom’s Wife, has been The Secret Mystery Bad Guy All Along, it’s baffling. Its a book whose characterizations of its cast operate in shallow caricature, its idea of human drama deeply juvenile and insipid, and generally feeling like the worst kind of attempt by out of touch try-hard guys to say ‘Comics are Mature now, man!’.
It’s a book that understands that character choices, decisions, and agency are interesting, and that human drama is compelling. It’s just that the only way it can seem to do that and manifest that is in awful, rubbish stories involving women’s rape, coverups and mind-wipes that screw with people’s memories. It’s all shock with no real substance. It’s an empty void of a book with no soul. It’s hollow mimicry without any grasp or understanding, and it brings is ruin. For to confuse shock with story is to not know story at all. The end result is something that thinks it is deliberately uncomfortable in the literary sense, but in truth is just repulsive rubbish with little to say. There’s nothing up on offer here, and no humanity to hold onto. It’s an idiot’s idea of Prestige TV and Alan Moore comics.
Heroes In Crisis on the other hand is less of a mess, but still deeply stupid. Its handling of its women in contrast to the men, from Batgirl to the way Mann’s pages at times present Lois Lane in a way that takes away from what the story wants to be about, is poor. King’s work in general has tended to write women in a set of noir archetypes, and nowhere is the limitation and the flaw of that more clear than here. But even beyond that, while trying to make a comic about mental health and mental illness and how ‘just go to therapy’ isn’t a fix, and how the heroes absolutely bungle and mess up this therapy program isn’t inherently bad, the end result here does feel like the worst possible version of it.
Worse is the fact that King had talked about how the story’s inception was rooted in School Shootings of America, and thinking about what happens when spaces meant to be sacred and safe are violated like that and covered in violence. Here’s King himself speaking on that matter for press, as reported by Polygon:
We already knew that Heroes in Crisis would be a murder mystery, but at San Diego Comic-Con King revealed the scale of that mystery. The inciting moment won’t just be a murder, but a mass shooting.
“It starts with something we see everyday in America,” King told reporters in San Diego, “Something I saw when I was overseas and I never thought would come here, but it’s here and it’s fucking everywhere. And it starts with a massacre at Sanctuary — in this space, in this safe place, in this place that Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman dedicated their lives to keeping safe — a dozen heroes are killed and they don’t know who killed them.”
Polygon asked King how the idea of using a mass shooting in the story came about, and his answer was simple. His youngest child was about to enter kindergarten, and he’d realized that among all the usual fears about how his son would fit in with his classmates, was the fear that he’d be harmed by a school shooter.
“And because I have a fucked up job, I was like, ‘Oh, that’s a great idea for a story,’” King said. “That’s how I was thinking of Sanctuary. It’s a safe zone; it is someplace that you can’t violate. And that would happen there, there would be a massacre in the one place that that shouldn’t happen. That’s where the idea came from.”
And the end result of that becomes a story that feels like it evokes all the worst parts of those real life School Shootings themselves, wherein the real victims who suffered and died in the tragedy are reduced to small tiny boxes and testimonies to punctuate their tragedy, to serve their role as The Victims and little else, while Wally West who is behind these deaths is given central focus as the leading man and star with all the interiority and complex motivations in the world. Wally West becomes the White School Shooter figure, the monster media covers ad nauseum and tries to paint as a sympathetic figure to ‘understand’ while reducing the actual victims to footnotes.
There are character choices and decisions and human drama, but they’re ill-considered ones that feel carelessly implemented without the meaning and implications really worked though.
Perhaps the only real arena in which Heroes In Crisis works is its response/counter-examination of Wally West’s horrifying existence. Johns in Rebirth makes the pretense that this man who had lost all his history, his entire life and all his achievements, everything he ever did, his wife, the love of his life, his kids, none of that existing…would seemingly be okay. That he could and would be the symbol of Hope and Optimism. A symbol, not a man or a real person with real feelings and emotions. Even in Rebirth books, when Wally eventually meets Superman (who has his family despite the reality shenanigans) he just gets a ‘Well, it’s worked out for me! Hope it does for you man, see ya!’ rather than any measure of real comfort.
What would losing everything you ever were, ever did, ever had do to you? What would your wife, the love of your life not even knowing you or recognizing you do to you? What would losing your kids do to your mental state? How would having everything you ever did undone hurt you? And how would that all hit you even more when people grasped your shoulder and you that you were ‘Hope’ and people admired your ‘Optimism’ and ‘Heroism,’ when you didn’t want that, you just wanted your family, your love, and your life back?
What happens when people prop you up and turn you into a symbol of Hope like that, without caring for or considering your feelings and wrecked emotional state? How would it actually feel to be a legacy hero whose very legacy had been completely erased?
These are the questions Heroes In Crisis delves into with its Wally West, and it tries to be emotionally honest about them, suggesting that the shallow ‘hope’ spiels of Rebirth are emotionally dishonest. And that we should consider the feelings and emotional realities of Wally West as a character, as a person, rather than prop him up as some abstract symbol, because that’s not what made him fun or interesting. Barry was the symbol. Wally was the man. And it’s not wrong on this front. The problem is just that given the inception and nature of the story, and the eventual choices it makes, where it takes Wally become deeply poor decision-making. And not ‘poor decision-making’ in a dramatically compelling, deliberate fashion, but poor decisions as in ‘This does not work and it really needed reconsidering and more thought.’
It’s all the worst and most careless parts of Tom King’s work writ large, particularly with its framing that casts Wally West in a role akin to a White School Shooter. And when you’ve ended up there, with a sentence like that, you know things have gone irrevocably wrong. It’s a problem that tracks with the brand of Whiteness and emphasis on White men of violence that is characteristic of ex-CIA agent Tom King’s work. And its essential failure is perhaps best captured here, in a brutal honesty that may be hard to find elsewhere. It’s a book bound to King’s particular background, with the concept of ‘Sanctuary’ being informed by the mental health/help/therapy situation of American veterans and military men who are dealing with PTSD, and how the whole thing is a disastrous mess. It’s why despite many fans pinning all the failings on Dan Didio or Editorial, the idea that the book isn’t really King’s is deeply dishonest and misled. No, the very concept was bound to Mass Shootings in America, particularly in Safe Spaces like schools. That is the way the book is to be read, for it is its essence, and it is indivisible from King’s own troubling background and baggage.
In the end, these are really poor comics. They focus upon character choices and decisions, they understand that agency is interesting, they understand that you need dramatic conflict, with the choices having to be spiky and ones that surprise and have impact, as opposed to being obvious or ‘easy’. But they have no idea how to conceptualize that beyond tired, poor frameworks that are in their own ways just as obvious and easy. Rather than spotlighting the humanity and complexity of these characters, the works devolve them into a different kind of caricature.
And that’s a shame, that these two are the only big ‘alternative’ Crisis stories. Mystery Dramas and thrillers are great, and set in a superhero universe? Even better. And rooted in strong character choices/decision-making and messiness and complexity of these figures? Even better! The basic building blocks of this approach, rooted in Moore’s Watchmen, are very good. It’s an approach suited to making some very strong character-driven comics. But we haven’t done it yet. We haven’t had a proper slam dunk, a really good one that hits like a home run. We’ve instead been stuck with these poor failures of the mode, with the stink of them putting off anyone from doing something in this mode, and veering even harder into the more commercially saleable and cynical Escalation/Bombast mode.
And because of that, Crisis is a broken story framework and word in DC’s context. It distracts from that which is essentially great about these characters, it reduces them when it need not, and the whole affair tires and exhausts in ways you really wish it did not.
Another WayBut perhaps it need not be like that. Perhaps there are other ways to do Crisis-esque storytelling, and if Crisis began by riffing upon and being inspired by a Marvel classic like The Galactus Saga, then lessons can be learnt from modern Marvel classics, too. There’s other paths to take to pursue a Crisis, and the hint lies very well in what Scott Snyder himself tried to draw upon during his Justice League/Metal tenure- Jonathan Hickman’s Marvel Saga.
Hickman is a self-proclaimed lifelong DC hardcore, with Grant Morrison being his all-time favorite comics writer. And it shows. His entire Avengers Saga is essentially a ‘What If?’ story exploring Crisis stories and Crisis mythology, with Multiversal Collapse and Cosmic Death as grand, operatic character drama, as you follow the various Marvel characters and their big, bold, wild decisions and choices in the face of things. What does Tony Stark do? What does Steve Rogers do? What decision does T’Challa make? What is Namor’s choice? And what of Reed Richards? On and on. Hickman understands that cosmic abstract nonsense and ‘events/plot’ aren’t what’s compelling or interesting. It’s the decisions and choices characters make in those wild frameworks. Particularly the wild, spiky, charged decisions that won’t get claps or fan cheers, and might reveal their flaws and messiness as people.
The questions it was asking weren’t meaningless, empty broad-strokes nothingburgers like ‘Can X Character Or Team Be/Represent Hope/Optimism? Can they be Heroes and Light and Fight The Villains and Darkness?’. It was not just going ‘Heroes! Villain! Punch Explosion!’ with cheap and empty fanservice. It wasn’t coddling, comfortable stuff resistant to challenging characters. Because, to quote the newly appointed co-CEO of DC Studios and his new mission statement:
“You can’t be telling the same ‘good guy, bad guy, giant thing in the sky, good guys win’ story again,” Gunn said. “You need to tell stories that are more morally complex. You need to tell stories that don’t just pretend to be different genres, but actually are different genres.”
Instead it was asking much more specific questions, putting characters in very specific situations or scenarios that pushed them and pulled them apart, wherein characters vested with great power had to make big, sweeping, powerful choices with that power, and each choice made would reveal their essence and true nature, because it all came at a price. And each choice would have its own array of consequences and impact that the characters could not escape and reckon with. It wasn’t easy. It was hard. It was difficult. And that’s what made it rich and interesting drama, something worth following and reading about.
It’s why when the whole Avengers saga built to his grand event Secret Wars, with Alex Ross covers leaning hard on that Crisis-esque imagery and iconography, it all meant something. It was all rooted in character, and was an outgrowth of character, in a way Snyder’s attempt at DC never really was, often losing that for extra bombast and plot distractions.
But given we are trying to move beyond the tales of multiversal death and reality death and Bigger, Badder Cosmic Disasters, there’s an alternative model. One proposed by Hickman himself, moving past his own prior Marvel work, and just as rooted in his DC influences and sensibilities.
House Of X and Powers Of X – each 6 issues but collectively a 12 issue maxi-series- is perhaps the best modern ‘event’ comic since Secret Wars, and also in essence the best ‘Crisis’ story without being one. It’s a tale of endless cosmic rewrites/repeats/reboots of the superhero reality, like a billion Crisis comics- but it’s all rooted in character, in Moira MacTaggert and her choices, her specific decisions in each life, and her motives as informed by her experiences. The cosmic is the personal, the Crisis is the internal, and it’s rooted in a story of people. It’s rooted in Moira’s views and ideology, how it relates to her mutanthood and view of being one, how she relates to marginalization and her kin, and who she wants to be. The creative team of Jonathan Hickman, Pepe Larraz, and R.B Silva understand that people and character, their ideologies, their decisions and choices as informed by them, that’s what is interesting. Moira doesn’t always make the ‘obvious’ or ‘easy’ choices, and she makes poor choices and messes up, and that’s precisely what is compelling. It adds drama and conflict and gives you things to chew on.
Even its central starting point is ‘Charles Xavier and Magneto have made a decision together, and will now change mutantdom forever.’ It’s one that alters and radically shifts the definition and approach of X-Men comics, as they go from a people seeking acceptance from humanity as an Institute to a Nation of super-humans far beyond asking for acceptance. While previously attempted, the way in which it is done and framed, with even mutant languages being made and an actual culture being formed, these are all meaningful ideas. They’re about something, something tangible and real as opposed to insular Crisis nonsense. And it is all firmly rooted in choices. Choices like how Xavier and Magneto keep secrets that will eventually blow up down the road, or how Moira’s plotting and making choices that will lead to explosive turn of events down the road, so on and so forth. Even choices like ‘Apocalypse becomes a mentor figure working on the newly formed Krakoa, working with Xavier and Magneto’ aren’t obvious choices and offer great dramatic conflict and surprise. They give you tons of rich potential character dynamics and interplay by which to mold story. And easy/cheap gimmicks like character deaths are thrown out the window, as the X-Men are effectively made immortal, and death and how people approach death is re-framed to yield wholly fresh new stories, with a well of possibilities opening up.
And more than anything else, HoXPoX was the story of something being built, something created, of mutants pro-actively creating and constructing something from nothing, and the drama, the thrills and conflicts and surprises and fun of that in a big, wild, sci-fi genre fiction context. It was not another ‘Reacting to Cosmic Disaster’ plot. And that feels like a useful model and mode to consider moving forward, as something that could be learnt from. But of course, it’s not the only model or way to tell powerful genre stories with real ideas, meaningful dramatic conflicts, engaging character dynamics and genuinely surprising choices with challenge. It’s just one model or way out of a billion.
Consider, for instance the recent Eternals revival by Kieron Gillen and Esad Ribic. Gillen is working with a roster and super-society of beings on the scale of The Justice League, if not bigger, who are played along the lines of ‘Superheroes as Mythology’ which DC comics and its creators love so much. They are cyclical characters and figures who have numerous ‘reboots’ and ‘restarts’ and that’s built into the story and played with in the context of genuine science-fiction ideas and storytelling. Emphasis is played on dramatic character choices or decisions, as stories can range from a rigged election and the Eternals choosing to vote in Thanos as their President, essentially, to centering on Asimov-esque laws/principles that guide Eternal existence. Numerous past stories or ‘continuity’ messes are re-framed through an explicitly political lens of ideology, granted newly coherent meaning and purpose.
The Eternals are humanized through the understanding that every time they die and return back to life- there is a cost, a price that is paid. Each time they return to life, a human life is gone. One life for another. And this suddenly colors their entire past and history, their every choice or action without a care about death. And it will now forever color their future, and every Eternal reacts to the knowledge in a specific way, as they come to understand who they are, who they’ve been, and who they want to be. And then they make dramatic decisions stemming from that understanding, which opens up a whole world of fresh storytelling possibilities. Again, these are real science-fiction ideas with weight, rooted in character and character choices. It’s what so many big DC stories have lacked so profoundly for ages now. One need not even like or be a fan of HoXPoX or Eternals to be able to tell the difference between works with an actual honest-to-god high concept and real sci-fi ideas as opposed to the regular hollow recycling gimmicks. And it helps that writers like Hickman and Gillen are very deliberate formalists, with a clear eye and ambition for how to vary rhythm in their issues and how controlled Aesthetic Pages (‘Data Pages’ as X-readership calls them) can alter a reading and the experience. There’s a care and consideration combined with ambitious ideas here that is non-existent in most of these DC efforts. A writer like Gillen is able to lean into culture, ritual, and faith in the context of the Eternals and their many tribes, and what you have is something genuinely compelling to read and experience. It’s how and why you can get the culmination of his story in a sensational event like Judgement Day.
But again, this is just one example of many, much like HoXPoX, which should inspire new work rather than plain mimicry, which, as we’ve discussed, is a major problem. People doing poor mimicry is a good part of why we’re in this mess to begin with, whether it’s Watchmen or Crisis. The fact of the matter however is that we don’t need to be where we are. There are a plethora of ways to do this. There really is no limit. All you need are real ideas that challenge and question the characters and their work in dramatically compelling ways, rather than coddle the readership to stagnate. And crucially, you need writers with a clear, standout voice and vision who can actually execute said ideas, who have the craft and skill to back up those ideas and pull them off. You need more than the fanboys who can recite Superman or Flash’s Social Security Number from memory or win trivia nights. You need more than people obsessively blathering on about the sacred sanctity of a character or IP and ‘how they should be’ and continuity nonsense.
You need writers with a real idiosyncratic perspective, who’re allowed to take these big gigantic enterprises and use them for bold, ambitious personal expression that speaks to something real and moves us. It’s what distinguishes the Hickmans and Gillens from the average workman writer. It’s what distinguishes a Morrison from the rest of the pack. The past doesn’t exist to be rehashed endlessly, but learnt from to genuinely surprise us. The point isn’t to do things that make people point and go ‘Hey, I know that easter egg! I got that reference!’ like a Cinemasins viewer, but to make them point and go ‘I don’t think I’ve seen that before. Now that’s interesting! Huh!’. That’s what true writers do, they find ways to surprise you and move you. And even if they fail, perhaps they’ll fail interestingly, in ways that are worth reading and engaging with, as opposed to failing while just recycling. We do not have to settle for these tiresome gimmick books that none of us will remember a few months from now. Crisis doesn’t have be like this or mean what it does. It need not be something that makes people sigh or tires them out or makes them weary. Crisis should open up a well of possibilities, rather than just be an insular hellhole of pointless repetition and recycling. It’s time to make new music rather than just do cover songs.
Perhaps it’s time we did that and actually moved forward to somewhere useful, as opposed to just relying on cheap and easy nostalgic recreations wherein The Anti-Monitor’s Second Cousin and Grandpa both showed up and possessed Psycho Pirate, Lex Luthor, and That Alan Moore Character to wreak havoc or what have you.
It’s time we stopped re-litigating arguments and debates about moving forward in comics that are all too happy to indulge in moving backwards. It’s time we got beyond the Crisises of the past- to go somewhere new, to make something new. If there are to be more Crisis comics in the future, and there will be, that’s just the nature of this business and enterprise, perhaps they could dare to actually move forward, be bold, be daring, and try to imagine something worthwhile. Because folks? We really do deserve that.
We deserve better than all this.
The post DC and The Matter Of Crisis, Part V appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Credits: Ben Percy writes; Federico Vicentini draws; Frank D’Armata colors; Cory Petit letters; issue #25 backup story art by Greg Land, Juan Ferreyra and others; covers by Adam Kubert and Frank Martin Jr.
As ever, this little Ben Percy Wolverine arc shows us Logan’s continuing obsession with suffering. Not pain, as he would have us believe—because that, like pleasure and the sensation of hot and cold and so on, is transitory. And sure, that’s an easy thing to say when you don’t deal with it chronically, but we all know that is not and never has been the case with Wolverine*. The acute pains of violence fade very quickly for him. It’s the fixation on the wound, the role of the aggrieved sufferer, for which Logan has a passion that is literally undying.
(*The rare exceptions are very hard to recall out of his many thousands of tales in circulation.)
These A.X.E.: Judgment Day tie-ins do not impact the main event in the least. Percy makes the occasion excuse enough to 1) work out Wolverine’s attempt to justify his continued existence in the face of all those for whose deaths he’s responsible, either directly or indirectly, and 2) contrast Solem’s hedonist way of life with Logan’s ultimately heroic stoicism. (In fact, many of those “dead” we see have already been resurrected on Krakoa).
What will hinder Logan is his intense but by now intensely monotonous self-loathing. If he can stay true, however, to his nobler callings, knowing that he’s needed to spare the world further senseless deaths (which, I know, seems like some wild logic), he’ll pass (of course, he ultimately does).
That Logan is allotted two issues and thousands of miles of travel to justify himself before the Progenitor isn’t meant to be noteworthy. That’s just how Percy wanted to tell his story, dammit!
You’ll also find plenty of Percy/Wolvie philosophizing along the way; very deep stuff depending on your age, I guess.
Of course, the point here, as in the event itself, is that whoever’s being judged is in fact working to justify their own existence to themselves; they pass by being true to their sense of self, even if they’re otherwise “villainous.”
Thus, the Hellbride, fresh from Hell seeking revenge against Wolverine and Solem, will be judged on how she follows through with her vengeance. Yet the twist for her is that: Why should she care? Her home is perdition, and she’d be happy to see the world join her and her father. So, the Progenitor is happy enough to allow her to antagonize Logan as he and his unlikely partner make for the North Pole to slay a god; clearly, this doesn’t even come close to playing into the main event—but the cussed Canuck had to try.
Rising star Federico Vicentini’s art is gorgeous as ever. His linework is crisp and almost entrancingly dynamic. There’s an occasional sketchiness, but for me that just adds to the sense of frenetic action. It never looks confusing or befuddled to this eye at least.
In return for helping him, Solem has Logan’s pledge to help him kill the vengeful Hellbride and the Beast, who of course want Logan dead too; actually, the Beast’s interest here is remote, given his dismissiveness toward his daughter, who’s really taken on the revenger role. Jilted, aggrieved and raised in captivity, she’s far more interesting than her pops has ever been—and she essentially stages a coup against her father. So, kudos there, Mr. Percy!
The Beast here is the infernal demon worshiped by the Hand. His daughter is among his most loyal of servants, and this Hellbride was recently jilted at the Hell altar with Solem’s murder of her mortal (ninja) fiancé and Logan and Solem made off with two Muramasa blades (forged in Hell by demonic blacksmith Muramasa; relevant backstory: 1988’s Wolverine #1-3; 2006’s Wolverine #40; 2020’s Wolverine #6 and X-Force #13–the Hellbride’s only previous appearance), these last from “X of Swords.” Percy seems to flub in issue #24 when referring to the blacksmith as Logan’s “teacher;” they just made a deal over a sword.
(Logan secured the blades from the tricksy tipplin’ Solem back in Wolverine #16. As an aside, the Beast debuted in Frank Miller and Bill Sienkiewicz’s 1986 classic Elektra: Assassin.)
Satisfyingly enough, everyone’s intentions go sideways: The Hellbride is felled by a blizzard before finding her quarry, Logan insists killing her in this state would be dishonorable and Solem, despite his irritation here, acquiesces, reluctantly conceding Logan’s point but with a hint at surprising sincerity (of course, he’ll eventually turn out to have a heart too, don’t you doubt it! Mr. Percy is a big softie, eh).
Yet we still get lots of Logan viewing himself and life in the worst possible way, of course. We’ve had years of this now from Mr. Percy, decades more from Wolvie.
Seeing that his infernal pawn seeks her own Satanic glory (how Paradise Lost!), the Progenitor had already prepared its own hoary, sword-wielding avatar of the frozen wastes, siccing it now on Logan and Solem, but the demoness suddenly joins the fray, furious that she might be cheated of her vengeance. Yet the trio actually make a killer team, and she’s impressed with Solem’s showing—who returns with her to Hell, possibly, indeed most likely, for some experimental hedonism (or at least the old college try on the part of this heterodox Arakkii poet-warrior; odd that his stabs at inspired verse find Mr. Percy at his most clichéd, but he seems to hoard the best bits for the cussed Canuck).
Yet Logan does see a change in the Hellbride that surely no one else would have without his narration:
“Punishment’s in her blood. And if you understand doing wrong…”
Once more—Percy briefly picks up a dangling plot thread, gives it a small twist and lays it aside to move on … to “The Beast Agenda”! Oh, you know what’s gonna happen there, right? Nope. Fool me once…
Is it odd that Cap didn’t pass while Logan does here? Not really. Wolverine’s identity isn’t bound up with that of the United States, and he’s always and ever focused on the basic duties of protecting mutants and other loved ones, basically following bushido in the process, every day.
Except when it’s time for a “Bar Brawl!”
The 25th-issue celebration backup celebrates Logan’s eternal flight from his own woundedness, his inability to move on and heal. And we said enough on this last time!
(He reflects, “Time can get slippery for me,” which for him and those who never learn to heal from the past is the same as saying: time is a flat circle. Indeed, Logan does not believe that real change is possible.)
Note that Flamingeaux makes her comics debut here; previously, she appeared in Percy’s podcast drama Wolverine: The Lost Trail.
NEXT: The beginning of the end for the other Beast, the one we all know and loathe now? Fool me twice …The post Wolverine #24-25 in Review—Enemy of Himself! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Credits: Ben Percy writes; Adam Kuberts draws covers & interiors; Frank Martin colors; Cory Petit lettersHow Many Ways Can Percy Play the Faux Grimdark?So, what did Wolvie get up to after, um, saving the time-stream or whatever in X Lives and X Deaths of Wolverine (Jan-Mar 2022)? His busy scribe Ben Percy took a backseat and called old Wade Wilson to phone in the lines for several issues. But in fact the notorious Merc with the Mouth mouthed nothing but pure Percy-isms throughout this four-month arc, never quite sounding like his mordantly buoyant self, cratered and a-boil as it is with those unsightly, indefatigable cankers. It’s Percy’s characteristic mordancy that wins through, the deep bass gravel having long since popped and shredded any sense of buoyancy; however cartoonishly irritating or genuinely leavening the generic loaf of two-dimensional slapstick violence, Deadpool’s trademark levity is inevitably missing from his run-on patter here.
And the title’s tonal message is no different than it’s been since the start: Being Wolverine sucks; his very being is suckled by the sour milk of endless trauma, and that’s what fans have long since been conditioned to with him. Logan as he is will always be caught and frozen inside all the old wounds, as he stares down that abyss, one ragged cave opening up beneath another ad nauseam.
Yet when he’s out supposedly having a good time, as we’ll see in the celebratory issue #25’s backup story, “Bar Brawl,” his drink of choice may be booze—but he’s frozen in time just the same as always. There, he reflects, “Time can get slippery for me,” which for him and those who never learn to heal from the past is the same as saying: time is a flat circle. Indeed, Logan does not believe that real change is possible.
Yep! That’s Percy on vacation—and taking his favorite toxically masculine trauma puppet along for the ride. So, what really happened while the boys went out to play (afraid to face the far more refreshing challenges of making a go at co-creating paradise)?
Why is it that he (along with his amanuensis, Mr. Percy) insists, with that fistful of gravel in his gullet, on either running away from the challenge of building a new way of life or endlessly protesting that it will only ever amount to the shadowy (i.e. unresolved) savagery of the old ways, that is, of our consensus reality (here, in the “authentic” violence of the “real” world we share and co-create, surely at our pleasure, dear reader)? Of course, someone so mired in wallowing in his own trauma, cementing thereby his unique sense of self born out of such extremity (“always and evermore more traumatized than thou, you mediocre schlubs, stuck on your all-too ordinary traumas”) is not going to rise to the challenge of changing his life, much less helping anyone else find a fresh path forward, to see anew with the eyes of innocence … and thus chance, true risk, the playfulness of giving something, anything but further suffering, a try.
Is this really an ungenerous reading for this 50-year-old character always stuck in the same groove?
In other words, Logan has no spark. He wakes to die, endlessly. Truly, he is the metahuman formula for waking death in life, an existence benumbed. What stock character has so mastered the numbing of sorrow and made such easy addicts of us? All he wants to do is forget, and so he repeats, zombie-like, compulsively.
The best we get from Wolvie these days is the knowing but hollowed-out comedy of the most extreme we have every right to expect from the best there is at the worst possible way of life. We’re thoroughly conditioned to just watch this guy get shredded, literally, over and again. And we applaud that he still practices his bushido way or whatever philosophy his scribes have appropriated for him and watered down through an Orientalist filter and mashed up with whatever else required pop culture stylings (it’s all just part of the genre mash, I guess).
If there’s a service that Percy has given us in his limited but restlessly recombinatory portrayal of this macho compulsion to endlessly self-destruct while clenching so cussedly to one’s trauma loops it’s that this is basically what our enervated culture of endlessly re-pulped masculinity demands of our male bodies sustained, miraculously, by synthetic “nutrients” and a tired, weathered script of bitter expectations—a bunch of crap typed up by bored tearless and barren content creators shackled to their sole security in the world, corporate benefactors long since lobotomized by big-data marketing strategies.
Ben, seriously! Why are you willfully fixated on this abyss? Your dream funhouse of distorted mirrors has become a trap—the cartoonish distortions of grizzle and blood toned masculinity have long since reified, calcified and frozen into airlessness.
Is it time for a Morrison-ian wanderjahr, perhaps? Just a thought from a brother on the far side of all this deadpan grimdark slapstick cartoon schadenfreude, this much too hard-candied, cavity-cracking grief aestheticized into an idealized retro-action flick, grey and gritty, and gauzily filtered in style and tone.
Within such a self-limiting scope, the aesthetic perfection here and throughout this title is impressive in so far it’s so willfully wallowing in its own knowing cliches. Impressive?
Come for the Kubert Splatterpunk, Gothic and NoirYet this arc, possibly my least favorite of the title’s current iteration so far, is still worthwhile, at least for free on Marvel Unlimited, and better than most mainstream comics out there. And Ben Percy is very talented and accomplished, even more so as a novelist. It’s the willfulness of his self-limitation in terms of range and tone that’s a bit puzzling, when he has such mastery of his material—like he has a particular yen for, or beef with, all the (limited) permutations of toxic masculinity.
Why is it always toxic? To be clear, I think masculinity can be an untold number of things, but Percy is interested mostly in the negative and constrictive variety, in diagnosing heteronormative masculinity’s ills, which are already quite familiar, at least superficially, to most North Americans. Percy’s perceptiveness here is sharp but, again, willfully self-limiting, as if averse to taking risks and creating examples of modes of being more constructive, dynamic and open (which we are seeing quite a bit of in this franchise—with Vita Ayala and Charlie Jane Anders on New Mutants; Al Ewing on X-Men: Red; and Steve Orlando on Marauders).
As always, Adam Kubert’s layouts are a beauty to behold, knowingly cinematic and usually fully realized even if not always his figurework turns flat and sketchy in some places, especially in the middle.
Forgetting that Deadpool’s on the cover (hopelessly wishing he’d never appear in another X title), I almost thought the opening sequence—a kinetic cinematic rendering of motorcyclist Logan with artsy gutters reminiscent of light poppy ’70s psychedelia—would prove the lead-in to a thoroughly neo-noir adventure.
Nope! Oh, well.
To be clear, though, this is a far cry from the doldrums of the worst Deadpool “romp.” And Percy gets to do his ’90s Liefeld homage while still being 100% his deadpan tongue-in-cheek Minnesottan self.
Kubert does bring something of a cinematic mashup to the whole arc, but the emphasis is on genres and eras that long ago lost their charm. Another ’80s buddy action flick, now with excess splatterpunk fx? Hard snooooozzzzzze—at least this is on MU if I ever really want to subject myself to it again? To each their own.
Kubert’s art is still tops throughout, even if it’s lacking here and there just a couple issues in. He still excels over most of the industry, even now; very few of the younguns got game like Kubert.
(It’s worth noting that his cover art for issue #23 echoes his 1994 Wolverine #88 cover featuring Deadpool in the same pose impaling Logan on his trademark swords.)
On the other hand… there is something about all this that works really well: Allow Mr. Percy his break from higher ambitions (well-deserved even while X Lives/X Deaths quickly proved underwhelming; it didn’t stint on being effortful), and let’s say he’ll have his part in the inevitable showdown between machine intelligence and the Krakoan state. If this is the start of something, this arc’s finale at least (issue #23; see below for more on this one) will be worth a reread. Even otherwise, there are threads left dangling—for whoever wants to square Danger and the X-Men, one more time. And yet, isn’t that exactly the problem with both this title and Percy’s X-Force??? Whatever else their faults, both do give us retro-action galore.
Perhaps the payoff for these series really is just around the corner. Or it’s not! Fool me twice… It seems Percy is open to tossing up new spinning plates that have thematic relevance with the rest of the franchise even while expressly acknowledging that they may not have anywhere to land—see below for DP’s footnote on Hickman’s flash-in-the-pan Sidri subplot; remember that?!
Deadpool & Danger’s Dirty DeetsDeadpool is not remotely a founding member of X-Force—but debuting in New Mutants #98, months away from the title’s relaunch as X-Force, he was part of the regular cast, as nemesis and irritant. Thank you, Rob. We’re just eternally grateful (You did give us Shatterstar and impossibly beef-bubbled Daddy Cable).
As an alum of the Weapon X school of torture, Wade was infused with Wolverine’s DNA—blessing him with that cartoonish healing factor, which is also, of course a curse, cosmetically, as it is not for Wolverine (who’s cursed by it in a manner more purely inward/existential). Deadpool is not a mutant, just as those antagonists who vivisect mutants and graft on their genetics or parts to take on their powers are not. Deadpool’s case is simply faux sad and hopeless.
Blind Al developed Stockholm Syndrome with her longtime captor Deadpool way back in his first ongoing; she not too reluctantly became his irascible surrogate mother. Beyond that foundational era from Joe Kelly, she’s rarely appeared.
The Legacy House’s Madripoor auction of the mindwiped Maverick and what seemed to be Logan’s hand, the CIA’s Delores Ramirez in attendance, occurred back in issues #9-10.
Danger was once indeed the Xavier Mansion’s Danger Room, as revealed in her debut arc in Whedon’s Astonishing X-Men run (#7-12). It was revealed there that Xavier always knew this piece of Shi’ar tech to be sentient but kept mum about it until she rebelled. Thereafter, she infrequently haunted the X-Men, returning either as ally or nemesis but always as a kind of guilty conscience, bearing the burden of guilt that really is Xavier’s alone (but ol’ Chuck’s rarely around to take responsibility for what’s his—huh, funny that).
(Danger’s debut story, “Dangerous,” kicked off with a young depowered student, Wing, committing suicide in the Danger Room. As of Leah Williams’ X-Factor #4, he was recently resurrected and living on Krakoa.)
Now, with AIs being on the outs with Krakoa in this new era, Danger’s reintroduction here could have been put to really interesting use. She was once an X-Man, after all, which is more than Deadpool can say! She even had a place on X-Factor for a hot minute.
Yes, there could have been something here—perhaps in the way that Zeb Wells reintroduced the Right and Cameron Hodge, with Nanny secretly adopting one of the Right’s “baby” AIs. That was an amazing story, short, sweet, sad and fierce. Percy doesn’t even come close to trying for this.
But we do get an answer to the nature of Logan’s seeming hand. No, it’s not a Larry Hama-era easter egg (duplicate Logan skeleton from a parallel timeline)—it’s Danger’s own baby!
Basically, in trying to retrieve his supposed “hand” from the CIA, Wolverine and Deadpool (who’s helping because he wants a spot on the Krakoan X-Force; wild) are caught in the crossfire as Danger attempts to rescue her offspring or whatever from Ramirez (sending an army of X-Men-themed robots after the suits, and later Logan and his hanger-on once they track her down (courtesy of Blind Al’s surprising connections) to the abandoned Xavier Mansion—Danger’s once and future home.
Why did Ramirez want the hand in the first place? She wanted Danger to make those mutant-themed bots for the CIA’s own nefarious purposes. Danger’s baby was collateral.
But why else might Danger agree to make X-Men-lookalike robots?
Logan’s narration in issue #23 criticizes the idea of “going home again,” and while he’s not explicitly criticizing Danger, I guess that’s the idea?
(Remember the Sidri infesting the old school back from Hickman’s Giant-Size: Nightcrawler? Yeah, that never went anywhere—which Percy, through an interstitial page from DP in issue #23, acknowledges. Yeah, that over-sized comic, it was a waste of your money. Hope you read it on MU!)
Along the way, Maverick and Weasel (another early Deapool mainstay, DP’s tech guy) steal the briefcase containing the “hand” from Logan and DP because they* think it contains those Shi’ar logic diamonds that have acted as mostly meaningless plot macguffins since issue #13 of this title.
His recent history is briefly footnoted; see Joe Kelly’s Spider-Man/Deapool* of the late 2010s.
Ultimately, Danger reiterates her motherly feelings toward the X-Men who used to daily use her facilities, never knowing she was in fact watching over them as a sentient being. So, she has her X-Men robots, and they can all be one big happy family again—though now she won’t scruple to keep them safe from herself or her old programming as the Danger Room, metastasized across the whole otherwise abandoned Mansion.
Kudos to Percy for this creepy sci-fi/Shirley Jackson mashup! Unfortunately, it took a lot of nonsense to get this one appropriately gothic and uncanny moment at the old ruins of Xavier’s on a gloomy starless night.
We could’ve perhaps spent more time with this and less with the ’80s splatterpunk action movie stylings—after all, Deadpool wraps up the rest of what happened that night for us while reading the comic book of it and sunning on a Krakoan beach next to Blind Al, who’s feeling much better now thanks to wonder drugs that Logan would of course given her regardless of DP’s assist (and really it was Blind Al’s help throughout that allowed Wolverine to get resolution on that missing “hand” and the rest of it with Danger).
Still, DP gets his chance at being an X-Forcer—appearing next in X-Force #30.
Who says that cussed Canuck can’t be a swell nice guy? Percy reminds us that Logan does in fact always act from the heart—whether out of hurt or affection, he’s all love muscle. Awww.
NEXT: The Progenitor gives Logan more of a chance than anyone else on Earth. Awww. And we finally get some solid Solem moments, mostly to tell us more about how noble our cussed Canuck is. Awww. See, Percy just wants us to love on that lovable unlovable macho mush-mush. So adorbs.
The post Wolverine #20-23 in Review—Danger! Deadpool! Danger! Maverick! Danger! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Try to imagine a solution to everything; not just the problems of the world, or the universe, but everything in existence. How do we reach this perfect world? And what will it cost to bring that vision to life?
Since their creation at the hands of Jack Kirby and Stan Lee, the Fantastic Four have stood as a monument to our limitless hope and imagination: a family bound together through a shared love of adventure. While the team shared countless stories over the years, taking them to the fringes of the unknown, even hope can start to dwindle over time. Decades of fear brought on by the information age would lead to a darker vision of the future, but it would be Marvel’s Civil War that ultimately fractured the four, with Reed Richards’ role in Iron Man’s regime driving a wedge between himself and his family. While talented writers like J. Michael Straczynski and Dwayne McDuffie would take steps to reunite the team, readers were still looking for someone to bring back what made them great in the first place: their desire to explore the unknown, and build the foundations of a better tomorrow.
This return to form would arrive through writer Jonathan Hickman, and a sprawling three-year run that would leave ripples across the entire Marvel Universe, re-establishing the Richards family as its beating heart. Pulling from the team’s past, present, and future, Hickman and an extensive team of artists, inkers, colorists and letterers would deliver a saga that would redefine the Fantastic Four, both as the world’s greatest comic magazine, and the family behind it all.
It Always Begins The Same Way…Even the grandest stories have to begin somewhere, and for writer Jonathan Hickman, the story of his Fantastic Four begins with one man: Reed Richards. Arriving on the book in 2009 with little knowledge about the team, Hickman began devouring the book’s previous stories, where he found two major sources of inspiration: the FF’s dual identity as both team and family, and Reed’s transformation into a colder, more pragmatic figure. While comics in the early 2000’s had been embracing a darker tone for some time, Reed’s involvement in Marvel’s Illuminati and Iron Man’s pro-registration forces were seen as a complete betrayal both in and out of fiction, with the rest of the FF leaving him behind as his desire for a perfect world boiled over into an obsession. Countless writers would address this shift, with Straczynski and McDuffie having Reed and Sue rebuild their marriage while Mark Millar would bring back the team’s high-concept adventures. But for Hickman, Reed’s turn showed something deeper: a shift in his outlook from boundless optimism to something colder and darker. Something that Reed would have to confront within himself for the team to move forward.
(From Dark Reign: Fantastic Four #5 by Jonathan Hickman, Sean Chen, Lorenzo Ruggiero, and John Rauch)Picking up in the wake of Marvel’s Dark Reign, Hickman’s run begins with an incredible discovery: traveling through dimensions on a device called “the bridge,” Reed has come into contact with his multiversal counterparts, who have banded together into a “Council of Reeds,” determined to prevent threats and solve problems on a universal scale. While Hickman had seeded this concept in an earlier (much weirder) story, the writer would spend his first arc defining the Council and what they represent within Reed: his struggles between his own humanity and the greater good he desperately wants. These inner struggles are elevated through Dale Eaglesham’s art, which draws heavily from the imagery of rugged adventurers like Tom Strong and Doc Savage: idealized figures dedicated to the mission above all.
“Reed is more intimidating and forceful, and less the nerdy professor,” Eaglesham states.
“I want villains to be afraid of him physically as well as of his mind. That is not to say I want to wash the humor or any goofiness out of Reed or his relationships, far from it. I want to maintain that, but add to it the imposing presence of a brilliant scientist and powerful superhero. This combination (is) a lot of fun to explore.”
Across these events, Hickman draws a parallel between Reed and his father Nathaniel, another great thinker who left his family to serve what he saw as a higher purpose. It’s this tension that becomes the bedrock of Hickman’s first arc: Which is worth more? Duty, or family?
(From Fantastic Four #570 by Jonathan Hickman, Dale Eaglesham, and Paul Mounts)Through the Council and their actions, the writer elevates Reed into something more mythic than the standard superhero: a great man driven to do great works. Hickman has returned to the concept of “the great man” throughout his career, but Fantastic Four delivers his most pointed commentary on it: Reed’s dedication to science is admirable, but becomes dangerous and self-destructive when left unchecked. Without his family, he is lost…compromised.
“I’ve certainly grown to love him more, but Reed’s my favorite character,” states the author. “Because of Civil War and all the stuff that had happened, he was kind of a dick, right? Reed’s responsible for a lot of stuff – he’s always had all these plans of how to make things work, and if you think about it, he’s been wrong a lot. I felt like I had to fix Reed in a way, and make him a more likable character again.”
Using the council, Hickman takes this character flaw to its natural conclusion, with the group’s machinations bringing about its own destruction; their good deeds crushed under the weight of countless necessary evils. But even in failure, there is hope. While the Council’s obsession traps them in their mission, Reed manages to find a better way, not just embracing his family, but letting them take up his mission alongside him.The path to greatness isn’t just family or duty, but a combination of both. Nobody can build a better world on their own. They need help.
(From Fantastic Four #572 by Jonathan Hickman, Dale Eaglesham, and Paul Mounts)The Prime ElementsThe FF’s dual role as team and family has been a huge part of their stories for decades, but the mix of one versus the other can change depending on who’s writing. For Hickman, the priority was re-balancing the book’s prime elements, setting the Richards’ tight-knit family drama against sprawling universe-hopping adventures.
“I’ve read more FF in the last two-to-three months than I had in my entire life,” recounts the writer. “One of the things that became pretty clear to me was that the Ultimate Fantastic Four title has had a big impact on the regular series. Fantastic Four is about fantastic adventures and the family, but when Ultimate FF was launched, it kind of turned into a science explorers type book. The physics of something isn’t the heart of the book. That’s not what I think we need to get back to. To me, Fantastic Four is about the family structure…it’s about wild, chaotic, fantastic ideas, as opposed to how things work in a functional world.”
While the book’s second arc feels like a return to the classic Lee-Kirby era (complete with family squabbles and little green men), the writer also has something much bigger at play, with countless threads converging into a mysterious prophecy built around the past, present, and future of the Richards family. Four cities, each an inversion of Reed’s “perfect society,” begin appearing across the Marvel universe, with the dark costs of each threatening everything in their path. Long story short, the FF’s enemies have evolved, and overcoming these threats means the group will have to change, too. Free of the Council, Reed and the team meet these new threats with boundless imagination, rejecting the cynicism of the larger scientific community to build a foundation of their own.
What follows is a complete transformation of the FF, as new members join the team, long-dormant plots finally come back into play, and each of the founding members develop larger roles in the Richards’ ever-growing family unit.
As these threads continue to spin Hickman’s master story for the book, the sheer scale of what’s at stake finally comes into focus, as the unshakeable optimism of this new FF starts to collide with each new threat, leaving ripples across the universe. Only one force can prevail here. Hickman’s made it clear that the Richards family is the key to averting disaster, but how can hope endure when everything seems destined to end? How can one family survive a world…where everything dies?
Everything DiesSince his beginnings on the title, Hickman has built his Fantastic Four around two dueling philosophies: the FF’s hope in a better tomorrow, and the grim realities of the universe…everything that begins must also end.
As the team fights threats from across their history, the events in Franklin’s doomsday prophecy continue their march to a horrifying conclusion. This isn’t just another superhero punch-em-up, it’s a war against fate, against an end that seems increasingly inevitable. In sharp contrast to the Kirby-esque iconography of the earlier run, this third arc feels more real, tangible, and human, thanks in part to Steve Epting and Neil Edwards’ more realistic pencils. A far cry from the rugged icons we’ve seen before, the FF’s humanity becomes more apparent than ever as they’re slowly overwhelmed by the forces of a hopeless universe.
Hickman even brings back Nathaniel Richards as a living embodiment of this flawed outlook, revealing his hand in the creation of the Council of Reeds and the countless crises that have spiraled out of their actions. Acting out of his own self-preservation, Nathaniel has only doomed his family, a mistake that forces him to come to terms with his failings as both a father and a scientist.
This wave of nihilism hangs over the book’s third arc, splitting the founding members and pushing them to their limits to achieve the impossible: Reed returning life to a dying star, and Sue holding off a civil war in Atlantis, leaving Johnny and Ben standing between the kids of the Future Foundation and the endless hordes of Annihulus. Some are rewarded for their faith, and for a moment, the writer even hints that everything will work out in the end. But as he’s been saying since the beginning, things are about to change for the Fantastic Four. Even a team built on hope can’t last forever in a universe that devours it. Something has to give, and when it finally does, it enacts a terrible cost.
If Hickman’s earlier stories were a re-invention of what came before, his third arc’s finale, fittingly titled “three,” is his ultimate act of change for the team. Following the surviving members through a month of mourning, the writer and artist Nick Dragotta see the Fantastic Four broken beyond repair for the first time, with Reed, Sue, and Ben all lingering on their own personal abyss.
The loss of Johnny Storm has fundamentally changed everything about the Fantastic Four and what they represent, but Hickman’s crises are still on the horizon, and it’s clear that the Richards family are the only ones who can stop it all. But how does a family endure when its been broken apart? What keeps us going when the world gets too dark to bear? For the writer, that answer is hope. Hope that we can continue to evolve, to push past the impossible, to leave a better tomorrow for the next generation. Hope that what was lost can always be found again.
(From Fantastic Four #588 by Jonathan Hickman, Nick Dragotta, and Paul Mounts)Sources:
https://www.cbr.com/best-things-about-jonathan-hickmans-fantastic-four-run/#a-fantastical-exploration-of-ego
https://www.cbr.com/nycc-hickman-and-eaglesham-talk-fantastic-four/
https://web.archive.org/web/20131110034440/http://www.newsarama.com/1925-jonathan-hickman-secret-warriors-the-ff-and-more.html
http://www.multiversitycomics.com/news-columns/marvel-then-jonathan-hickman-and-family-matters/
The post Fantastic Four by Jonathan Hickman: Family and the Future appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
I always wondered which characters or stories would pull my own kids into the world of Marvel Comics. The animated Spidey, Miles and Ghost-Spider show got the ball rolling, but it was really the first time my son saw Devil Dinosaur in Marvel Snap! that suddenly the floodgates opened. Not surprising because guess what: Kids love dinosaurs.
In recent years, after decades of obscurity, Devil Dinosaur has had a renaissance, paired with Lunella Lafayette aka Moon Girl for one of Marvel’s most young-readers friendly comics, alongside the likes of The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl or The Unstoppable Wasp. Nonetheless, only one of these books has a giant red T-Rex, so naturally there can be only one winner.
Now, the history of Devil Dinosaur is far from all ages, as you’ll see below in a relatively tight guide to the history of their comics.
Below you’ll find a complete guide to the comics of Devil Dinosaur, Moon Girl, and their companions. Enjoy the comics, and RAWR!
The Origins of Devil DinosaurDevil Dinosaur by Jack Kirby: The Complete Collection
Collects: Devil Dinosaur 1-9
For Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur, you really have two distinct eras. The first is from the creation of Devil Dinosaur (and Moon Boy) by Jack Kirby, aka the King of Comics, all the way through the early 2000s. The second is the 2015 re-imagining as Moon Girl and Devil. Given the success of the re-imagining, and the animated series, Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur is the modern context most fans will be familiar with. If you really want the history of Devil and Moon Boy, though, that’s what you’ll find in this first era.
Kirby’s Devil Dinosaur came in 1979, during the King’s late 70s (short-lived) return to Marvel that also saw his creation of the Eternals and Machine Man. Kirby’s always been a creator seeking inspiration from primordial mythology, and those motivations merge here with an interest in evolutionary hominids and drawing tons and tons of dinosaurs. It’s far from Kirby’s most essential, but it’s fun as heck, and always visually engaging.
Godzilla (Marvel)
Collects: Godzilla #21 – #22
Reed Richards and the Fantastic Four use Doctor Doom’s time platform to send Godzilla to the age of Dinosaurs, including our pal Devil. These Marvel Godzilla issues are hard to come by since Marvel no longer has the license, but don’t worry, they aren’t too essential.
Fallen Angels
Collects: Fallen Angels (1987) #1 To #8
Fallen Angels is one of the most chaotic limited series of 1980s Marvel Comics, with a real absurdist collection of characters and happenings from writer Jo Duffy. This includes extremely prominent lobsters named Bill and Don. More relevant to our purposes, it includes the most significant use of Devil Dinosaur and Moon Boy since Kirby debuted the characters nearly a decade prior.
Devil Dinosaur and Moon Boy: 1990s Through Early 2010sDevil Dinosaur: Spring Fling
Collects: Devil Dinosaur – Spring Fling (1997)
The only real question here is why Marvel didn’t commit to a Spring Fling with Devil every year since 1997. In this issue, Devil gets caught up in a prehistoric battle between the Skrulls and Shi’ar (including Gladiator which raises a lot of questions)
Pet Avengers
Collects: Pet Avengers #2
Unfortunately, Devil Dinosaur does not actually join Lockjaw and the Pet Avengers, but they do battle him at one point. Regardless, Pet Avengers is an extremely fun idea and series for all ages.
Nextwave
Collects: Nextwave #12
It is highly questionable to include Nextwave in a Devil Dinosaur reading order, as the character is, well, completely out of character and used as a punchline in the very final issue of this influential comedy series. You won’t need to read this if you actually like Devil Dinosaur, but it’s certainly a memorable appearance.
Heroes for Hire (2006-2007)
Collects: Heroes For Hire (2006-2007) #9 To #11
Few things capture the directionless fate of Moon Boy and Devil quite like Heroes for Hire’s post-Civil War comics focusing on getting them to… register as superpowered beings. Marvel really had no clue what to do with Devil Dinosaur for 35 years!
Avenging Spider-Man
Collects: Avenging Spider-Man #14 To #15
If you like Spider-Man and dinosaurs, boy do we have some comics for you.
Origins of Moon Girl and Devil DinosaurMoon Girl and Devil Dinosaur Vol. 1: BFF
Collects: Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur 1-6
It’s truly incredible how effectively and dramatically Amy Reeder, Brandon Montclare, Natacha Bustos and the creative team transformed Kirby’s concept with 2015’s Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur. The absolutely aimless characters suddenly became some of the most interesting and kid-friendly in all of Marvel Comics, with the brilliant Lunella Lafayette and her Inhuman ability to communicate with Devil Dinosaur. Simply put, if you’re here for Moon Girl and Devil, this is the run of comics you want to read every issue of. The series goes from 2015 to 2019, and reaches 47 issues.
Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur Vol. 2: Cosmic Cooties
Collects: Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur 7-12
Extraordinary X-Men Annual
Collects: Extraordinary X-Men Annual #1 (2016)
Because Lunella’s new to the Marvel Universe, you get a lot of early days interactions with the heroes of the verse, including the X-Men. This annual is quite fun because you Lunella’s intro the mutants, but at a time when Inhumans and mutants are really struggling to share the planet.
Please note if you’re newer to the Marvel Universe, that you generally won’t need to read all of Lunella’s appearances outside of her own comic series in order to understand that core narrative. I list them all here for completion and because sometimes they’re fun!
Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur Vol. 3: The Smartest There Is
Collects: Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur 13-18
The Unstoppable Wasp
Collects: The Unstoppable Wasp #2 To #3
2017’s introduction of Nadia Van Dyne as the Unstoppable Wasp is another strong Marvel re-imagining from the era, and Lunella fits right in with Nadia.
Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur Vol. 4: Girl-Moon
Collects: Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur 19-24
Secret Warriors Vol. 1: Secret Empire
Collects: Secret Warriors (2017) #1-5
One of the oddities of Moon Girl’s comics is that (much like Kamala Khan) she’s made Inhuman because of Marvel’s push for the franchise at the time (thinking they only had the rights to the Inhumans for the MCU, and not the X-Men which they acquired later). As a result, you get this post Secret Empire fallout book of all Inhumans, including Lunella and Devil! Only necessary for the most obsessed fans, but the second volume does include some wild Mister Sinister comics, which are always on my recommended read list.
Secret Warriors Vol. 2: If Trouble Must Come
Collects: Secret Warriors (2017) #6-12
Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur Vol. 5: Fantastic Three
Collects: Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur 25-30
Moon Girl’s dynamic with the Fantastic Four is a shockingly good fit, particularly her butting heads with the world’s purported biggest genius, Reed Richards!
Venom
Collects: Venom (2016) #152 To #153
Land before Crime is a very good story name for a Venom and Devil Dinosaur crossover.
Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur Vol. 6: Save Our School
Collects: Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur 32-36
Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur Vol. 7
Collects: Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur 37-41
Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur Vol. 8: Yancy Street Legends
Collects: Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur #42-47
Other Ways to Collect Moon Girl and Devil DinosaurSo the series listed above are all trade paperbacks that typically include 5-6 issues of the Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur comic book series. There are also larger collections that collect up to 12 issues at a time. You do not need both copies for the story – it’s simply another means of collecting and reading, depending on your preferences and availability.
Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur: The Beginning
Collects: Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur #1-12
Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur: Full Moon
Collects: Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur (2015) #13-24
Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur: Bad Buzz
Collects: Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur (2016) #25-36
Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur: Place In The World
Collects: Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur #37-47
Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur Since 2020FCBD 2022
Collects: Free Comic Book Day 2022: Marvel’s Voices (2022) #1
The first story is a fun Lunella and Devil short.
Marvel’s Voices: Legacy
Collects: Marvel’s Voices: Legacy (2022) #1
Victor LaValle writes a story where Lunella meets and talks to a lost dino of the Savage Land.
Moon Girl: Endangered Species
Collects: Miles Morales & Moon Girl #1, Avengers & Moon Girl #1 And X-Men & Moon Girl #1
Learn how Havok and Moon Girl became best friends!
Marvel’s Voices (Infinity Comic)
Collects: Marvel’s Voices Unlimited #38, #39
A very fun Stephanie Williams written story.
Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur: Menace on Wheels
Collects: Moon Girl (2022) #1 To #5
Hot on the heels of ‘Endangered Species’, creators Jordan Ifueko and Alba Glez take over a new 5 issue miniseries on Moon Girl and Devil.
The post Moon Girl & Devil Dinosaur Reading Order Guide! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Just take a moment to think about what might’ve been now if Magneto hadn’t given his pledge Arakko. With things as they are, Storm, ever uncompromised, has a real chance of helping right reality again.
“Everything Is Sinister”
Credits: Kieron Gillen writes; Lucas Werneck draws, along with guests Geoffrey Shaw, Marco Checchetto, Juan José Ryp, David Baldéon, Federico Vincentini, David Lopez, Joshua Cassara and Stefano Caselli; Bryan Valenza colors; Clayton Cowles letters; cover by Leinil Francis Yu
Welcome to the biggest X event since House of X and Powers of X!
Okay, maybe it’s not the biggest—both X of Swords and A.X.E.: Judgment Day beat it hands down there. Despite that, I will wager here at the very start that this is the big story that will both tie directly back into Hickman’s original HOX/POX vision for this new era of Marvel’s merry mutants and shoot forward into mutantkind’s next major epoch, the “Fall of X” starting in early May.
Obviously, the little gut shot of Inferno is a contender, but that was Hickman’s envoy with a final revelation for ensuing creators to run with.
Here, as we see teased at the end of Sin of Sinister #1, we’re in a deep structural echo of Powers of X that promises to distort the original in exciting and unexpected ways. Following this opening one-shot, we’ll get three three-issue minis followed by the concluding one-shot Sins of Sinister: Dominion #1, which subtitle also echoes the POX AI-cosmology. Each mini’s #1 will take place ten years into this alt Sinister-verse, each #2 will be set 100 years into it and each #3 will take us to +1000 years. Obviously, however, this is not POX’s future dystopia, and yet Gillen is still taking us somewhere that fans of Hickman’s earlier event and of course 1995’s classic “Age of Apocalypse” will readily recognize, with a fine sense of inevitability and much unpredictable fun to satisfy any mutant-centric alt-reality fan.
(There’s also a riff early on in SOS1 where, 10 years from the present, Sinister resurrects a handful of mutants in a direct parody of Xavier doing the same in House of X #1—“To me, my me’s.” How did this happen? See two sections below, where spoilers abound!)
Still, Sins of Sinister could reveal a direct Inferno connection if Sinister turns out to be(come) the so-called “trickster Titan” (“betrayer and coward of its brother and sister machines”) that from a possible future—and acting against its brethren’s purely machinic interests—sent Omega Sentinel back in time in order to ensure the establishment of Orchis (which is only ambivalently allied with machine intelligence; Inferno* #3.
A Titan is the AI power grouping just below Dominion level, as seen in Powers of X*.
Overall TakeawaySins of Sinister #1 is a double-+-size one-shot in the tradition of inaugurating many a comics event, and so while regular Immortal X-Men artist Lucas Werneck does excellent work throughout, it’s less that he needed assistance with this oversized project than the number of non-gratuitous (well-utilized) splash pages presented an opportunity for other fine artists to flex in portraying brief but highly original snippets of this Sinister alt reality future.
It will inevitably draw comparisons with the classic one-shot that kicked off the “Age of Apocalypse” event, X-Men Prime from Fabian Nicieza, Scott Lobdell and a bevy of artists. That wild opening chapter immersed readers directly in a bizarre and frightening alt future without any explanation, in medias res. Back then, the franchise’s popularity was at its all-time high, so such a bold move wasn’t a crazy risk; it was enthralling—and everyone (at least all us Magic-playing middle-schoolers) ate it right up.
But that Gillen takes his time in Sins of Sinister #1 showing us how we get from present-day Krakoa (following Sinister’s condemnation to the Pit for trying to kill the entire Quiet Council; Immortal X-Men #9-10) to a future of Sinister dominion certainly isn’t any less of a bold move. There’s a direct through-line from Gillen’s Immortal X-Men tenure and Hickman’s Powers of X; this isn’t the case with “AoA,” which really seemed to come out of nowhere, infusing fresh excitement in the faltering, post-Claremont line.
It is too bad that Marvel’s not going all-in with every title in the X line committing to Gillen’s Sinister vision, but then again, this is a very different era—and at least we can bank on this event being not just a bit smaller but also higher quality overall, tighter, leaner and hopefully just as memorable, if not more so, because of it. And yet, “Sins of Sinister” will certainly be of an immediate piece with the larger whole of Destiny of X.
Still, if you haven’t been keeping up with every X-title in the last few years—totally okay! As mentioned, we’re looking at a direct callback to Hickman’s HOX/POX, a masterclass for any comics fan. And then, it’s helmed by Gillen and spinning out of his ten issues of Immortal X-Men (of course, A.X.E.: Judgment Day happens during the middle of this and does have ramifications; you can just read the core event series, which goes down pretty quick, all on Marvel Unlimited now); and writers Al Ewing and Si Spurrier are penning two of the minis, each one a distorted, alt future fun-house of their current respective ongoings (Ewing’s X-Men: Red, a follow-up to his S.W.O.R.D. and Spurrier’s Legion of X, which does follow on from his Way of X mini).
Of course, the Sinister element in POX goes all the way back to Gillen’s first foray into the X line—specifically, his classic revamp of the character in Uncanny X-Men vol 2 #1-3 (2012), the short arc known as “Everything Is Sinister”! Obviously, Gillen is calling back to his own work here, as well. And I for one believe that story is always worth a quick reread; it’s an absolute hoot, over the top just like we all love Sinister.
All told, this is still quite a few comics in the background, but not nearly the entirety of the recent X line, and almost every fan and critic following these titles and creators in particular will agree that they’re giving us the best of an all-around strong franchise (and while Spurrier’s had his detractors, I think in time they’ll mostly come back to the collected Legion of X with fresh eyes—despite my reluctance, this already happened to me recently; further, whereas many readers might reasonably prefer, say, Vita Ayala’s more focused, character-rich storytelling, Spurrier’s style is proving wildly fruitful, if seemingly unfocused in the moment, when he has a broad canvas and lots of runway).
What makes their work the best in the line right now? Gillen, Ewing and Spurrier are consistently offering the richest material to chew into with the dramatic chops to make it all hit home with maximum impact.
(Actually, I would definitely include Victor LaValle and his work on the recent minis Sabretooth and Sabretooth and the Exiles—but the very smart and entertaining narrative with a strong moral core that he’s been building across these titles is still as yet on the periphery of the overall Destiny of X architecture; hopefully, his exile tales prove highly relevant to this year’s Fall of X. The same goes for the line’s second extraordinary blessing from the world of novelists of fantasy, sci-fi and horror, Charlie Jane Anders, and her ongoing work with New Mutants.)
SPOILER-STUFFED Synopsis Follows…As for Sins of Sinister #1, the twist toward the end is a wonderful though inevitable surprise—where readers have the delight in recognizing that, of course, Sinister isn’t quite up to snuff when it comes to master plans, unlike, say, Thanos or Doom. He just isn’t quite that scary!
Over a decade ago, Gillen gave us the most frighteningly powerful and, above all, exquisitely campy Sinister yet in Uncanny X-Men vol 2 #1-3; “Everything Is Sinister” debuted the stunning notion of Sinister-as-system that X-Men Legacy scribe Mike Carey briefly revisited but that Hickman really ran with in all-new directions in Powers of X—opening the way for Gillen’s return to the character.
However, now, as we’ll see here, Sinister starts off infecting and reprogramming powerful mutants while allowing them, even in this state of thralldom to retain the integrity of their recognizable individuality, however unfree—unlike Carey’s excellent “Sins of the Father” (X-Men Legacy #211-214), where Xavier narrowly escapes being completely taken over and, presumably, eradicated.
But at the start of SOS1, all that seems certain is that Sinister has won; he has thoroughly conquered Earth. We also find out why he was so hell-bent on assassinating Hope: It turns out that she was, unconsciously, the key to preventing Sinister’s reprogramming of every resurrected mutant; take her out of the equation, and his plans could go forward without a hitch. Well, he did achieve his mission in Immortal X-Men #9, so then, it wasn’t just ol’ Charlie who’d been infected in issue #10 but the three other council telepaths—and from there, anyone else who underwent the Five’s Resurrection Protocols.
Now, it’s pretty amazing that in the five-year gap during which Sinister effectively takes over the world, Storm never dies, nor does she suspect anything, apparently, until most of that time has passed. Whatever. It works for the story.
We don’t yet know why Sinister then felt the need to lobotomize Krakoa, but it does enrage Sinister-mutated humanity against those who are blamed for the crime of the loss of their now forever-lost dead—Orchis; however, it’s hard to imagine the status quo (Orchis’ popularity with humans) not reverting back post-Sins of Sinister. Perhaps Krakoa’s vegetal complexity is too much Sinister’s schemes? In any case, the mutants have Wanda’s Waiting Room always and forever (RIP Wanda!).
Humanity, however, will provide sufficient cerebral mass for the eventual creation of a Sinister Dominion, as a hive mind that will, ideally, rival the Dominions of the Phalanx (Omega Sentinel’s “trickster” ally?).
(Orchis, robo-Moira and Nimrod go down real easy here, which doesn’t inspire confidence in their status as a credible threat going forward!)
As part of the series of splash pages gloriously dominating the second half of the issue, page 34 shows us that Waiting Room now ruled by Krakoa’s ambassador to Hell’s “Infernal Parliament,” Sebastian Shaw (undoubtedly with backup from Magik who now, along with Namor and the Beast, sits on the QC (in lieu of Mystique, Destiny and Sinister himself).
(You can bet Magneto in whatever astral form he’s in now is not hanging around the Waiting Room turned Hell.)
With Sinister’s evil code now running the human world, infected humans presumably continue infecting those last few pockets and individuals left free and, of course, their own offspring.
The future-history splash-page sequence kicks off with the hilarious assassination of Thanos—his head cored by a miniaturized Juggernaut shot from a gun fired by a Domino-inspired Hope. Cain and the corpse are lost to the timestream (which is also a nice oblique nod to Thanos’ current whereabouts post-Eternals).
Again, many of these splash pages are simply a reason for the guest artists to flex and for Gillen to feed us delightful nods and Easter eggs that run the gamut of the Marvel Universe.
In the midst of this catastrophic future, Storm finally gets wise; we don’t know how exactly, but what matters is that she comes to her last QC meeting prepared to fend off a Sinister psi-attack—essentially warded by Lactuca of Arakko’s Great Ring (see recent issues of X-Men: Red for more on this enigmatic Arakkii).
Nightcrawler’s future monstrousness is clearly an extrapolation from his current disarray in Legion of X, and it will continue on, no doubt, into Spurrier’s Nightcrawlers mini. Gillen and Werneck are effective here in showing, albeit very briefly, how devastating this years-long deception must feel to Storm.
When Storm finds herself with the missing Mystique and Destiny, the latter says exactly what she’s said several times now to Sinister, going back decades: “We must be on the same side.” Maybe this time, she can mean it without qualification? Certainly, she’s the far more compromised figure in this new alliance.
But with Arakko/Mars literally destroyed, Storm and company are going to have a much harder time of it acting as the most serious resistance to Sinister (Don’t cry, though—Sugar Man’s back; huzzah! ).
By the end of the issue, we see that Sinister (again, unlike Thanos or Doom) does not have tight control over his pawns, at all: He’s suddenly outvoted on taking the fight to those intergalactic powers that want to preemptively crush the burgeoning loose cannon the Sinister/mutant-dominated Earth has now become. While it’s a war that can’t be won by the mutants, the Krakoans show themselves to still be who they have always been—hopeless heroes, each with their own irascible individuality.
After all, Sinister didn’t want them to lose that individuality because that was exactly what made them useful as puppets. That plan has now gone awry!
So, he escapes to his Muir Isle, Moira-clone farm base (this is the first time we learn of its location, which is merely a bit of sardonic fun on Sinister’s part)—only to discover that it’s been completely stripped and stolen. This means he can no longer kill the current Moira and reset reality to his preferred “save point” (allowing him to start his grand experiment over again with all the knowledge and advantage he’s gained during the ongoing timeline; the Sinister scheme here delightfully echoes Claire North’s First Fifteen Lives of Harry August in the disasters wrought there upon the myriad reiterations of a 20th century concatenated with too many anachronistic technological advances).
Likeliest candidates for this brilliant heist? Obviously, Mystique and Destiny are foremost. But perhaps Moira herself has returned for her own brand of revenge… Or the other Suits of Sinister are still out there, evading the Diamonds Let the endgame begin!
NEXT: Sinister’s Dominion +10 YearsThe post Sins of Sinister #1 Review—The World Magneto Didn’t Live to See appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Dave and Zack talk about AI in comics, their desert island reads, and Zack sneakily interviews Dave about all things CBH!
Up Next:
My Marvelous Year — 2002 pt. 1
| Origin | #1 to #6 | Wolverine’s origins told for the first time. | | New X-Men | #121 to #127 | The Grant Morrison era continues, conclusion of the Cassandra Nova saga |
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You’ve heard the word. You know the story.
Crisis.
The iconic, defining, definitive word of DC stories.
The word Crisis feels inseparable from the fabric of DC. It holds sway over its past, it informs its present, and it will certainly influence the future. You can’t think of DC and not think of Crisis at some point. The very idea of it has been bound to the very idea of DC that tightly.
And the response to the word and its invocation is intense as well. It comes with a lot of assumptions and baggage. Given that is the case, given it has become ubiquitous, inevitable, and all-pervading with DC itself, it’s worth discussing what has become of it. What has emerged from this focusing and this obsession over Crisis in DC? What has it led to?
The matter of Crisis must be unpacked, and that’s what we’re here to do.
Picking up where we left off…
Reality Dies At Dawn, Every DawnAt the end of the first Metal, the Justice League would destroy The Source Wall, the edge of all reality, the boundary of existence as established in DC Cosmology. And with that would come a plethora of story, particularly as Scott Snyder and his collaborators tried to weave together a grand, sprawling opera and epic of DC mythology. You had the introduction of The World Forger, the older brother of The Monitor and The Anti-Monitor, and the explainers on how the DC existence was divided across the three forms of matter- Dark Matter, Positive Matter, and Anti-Matter. All fun stuff, to be sure.
But vitally, you had the invention of The Mother Of The Multiverse: Perpetua. She was to now be the big new threat of DC, with The Batman Who Laughs as her Dark Knight agent of chaos. The effects of Metal’s source wall collapse meant that The Multiverse was now dying, this was the story of Everything Ending, a Crisis saga but told over a larger period to stretch out the drama.
And it was all heading to the only thing it ever could, as The Multiverse finally died and was set to be reborn:
Another Crisis story, but dubbed Metal.
Dark Nights: Death Metal by Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo would dub itself an ‘Anti-Crisis.’ It would evidently be inspired by the work of Jonathan Hickman and Esad Ribic’s Secret Wars, much like most of the Snyder era of Justice League had been informed by Hickman’s own tenure of Avengers rooted in a tale of Multiversal Collapse and cosmic death. You even got a special Metalverse map akin to the Battleworld of Secret Wars.
It would follow the ‘fallen’ heroes of DC after they had ‘lost,’ much in the same way the Marvel heroes had ‘lost,’ with Doom recreating reality into Battleworld. Except the victors here were Perpetua, The Mother Of The Multiverse, and the Dark Knight who betrayed her to take power. The Batman Who Laughs would get the pole position as Chief Antagonist the way Doom got over at Marvel.
And The Batman Who Laughs would be beefed up in power by acquiring Doctor Manhattan’s powers. I do not mean ‘powers like Doctor Manhattan’s from Watchmen’, but I mean explicitly the powers of Doctor Manhattan from Watchmen, with even his speech-balloons morphing to be more akin to Doctor Manhattan’s, only Black instead of the Blue. Because that’s what we are doing here.
And the entire story would, like much of the Snyder Justice League run before it, be about ‘explaining’ everything about DC and its mythology and history, creating a sort of Unified Theory of the whole affair. You got explanations on why every single Crisis kept happening, and how Perpetua and her energies had a part in that, and how ‘everything connects’ and is tied into one large connective tissue and story. And the whole enterprise was thus then heading to a rebirth and recreation of the Multiverse in the hands of Wonder Woman. It became a battle about the recreation of DC Comics and what it is, what it has been, and what it should be.
Which is to say, it devolved into the most tiresomely dull and insular Continuity Porn school of comics that it sought to rebel against by dubbing itself an ‘Anti-Crisis.’ It called itself an Anti-Crisis because rather than ‘simplify’ or ‘clean-up’ the mess, it was an event designed to celebrate it, as you had whole issues dedicated to characters revisiting past Crisis events and comics, and entire lands built around riffing on and references to the old. It was the idea of ‘Everything matters and counts’ as wild celebratory Metal story. But the trouble is, even when you’re an ‘Anti-Crisis,’ you’re still just in reaction to Crisis. You’re still a Crisis, just perhaps not the in the way you might think.
Death Metal is written like a comic that hopes to be the end of the whole Fan Argument mode of Crisis comics, the end of all the ‘explainers’ and ‘universe/continuity/fixers’ as it concludes with a recreation of the DC Multiverse that says ‘no, it’s done, it’s over, everything matters, we’re good now.’ It wanted to be the final nail in the coffin, the last lyric in that endless DC song of resets and rewrites. It evidently wanted to go ‘Let’s just stop all this stuff we do with Crisises and move onward from here.’
And that’s well and good.
But the nature of writing such a responsive text, an Anti-text so steeped in the continuity porn, insular history and the DC crisis past? You absolutely do morph into part of the problem. You’re once again staging discussions and debates on page on what DC Comics is and is not and perhaps should be like. You’re just singing the very song you want to see end, inadvertently. Because the thing about writing comics that go ‘Hey we should stop doing that thing, let’s not, let’s just move on?’ instead of just making a comic totally divorced from that insular dialogue and mode that actually has totally moved on? You are that which you criticize. And perhaps there’s something there on a level of Scott Snyder saying the DC Universe needs to move on from him, too, because he’s part of this old guard, and it needs to be in new hands, but that still doesn’t make for a very compelling comic, sadly.
And the multiversal recreation at the end, with the ‘everything matters’? It once again effectively reaffirms the ‘Infinite Earths’ idea with Infinite Multiverses. It’s what The Multiversity had done. It’s what Convergence had done. It’s what Doomsday Clock had done. And now we had to get the new version of that. Another repetition of how there’s an omniverse out there, all charged up and ready to be used.
The Dan Knight Strikes AgainWhile the infinite earths were apparently back under Snyder’s era, it was still not enough. There had to be more rejiggering of the board, more re-alignment of the pieces and the table itself. The DC Universe had to be remolded and reshaped yet again, and Dan Didio’s 5G initiative was under way. Its plans and timeline would radically alter and redefine the DC Universe yet again, despite it just coming off a massive reality re-shaping event. This was just what DC had become, inevitably, irrevocably.
It would cycle out many ‘key’ leading characters, focus on a new generation and alter the nature of ‘time’ in the DC Universe, trying to give a sense of progression to the entire enterprise and connect everything from the beginning of DC’s history to the now. They’d ‘make sense’ of everything yet again, as they felt they had failed to appropriately do with Crisis On Infinite Earths, and this time, they’d get it right, goddamnit. This time! For sure! Or so Dan Didio believed.
And then Dan Didio was unceremoniously let go from DC. And that was that. DC would pivot to its ‘Future State‘ initiative instead in that 5G slot, and the keys would change hands, as Snyder was off and away, and a new DC Architect was to take his seat.
Infinite Ad InfinitumFollowing this, after the Multiverse/Omniverse had been recreated in Death Metal, Joshua Williamson would take over the role of ‘DC Architect’ in the succeeding era of Infinite Frontier. And if you thought the DC heroes had pretty much dealt with enough ‘Crisis’ and continuity porn and Multiverse recreation stories for a hot-minute, well, here was another coming right after the last.
Williamson would attempt to sequelize Grant Morrison’s The Multiversity, as many had previously attempted, to largely messy and lesser results in evoking a superior work. And in it, would reveal the ‘truth’ of Multiverse-Two from the end of Multiversity. Morrison’s work had seemed to suggest Multiverse-Two would be a place for new stories, new standalone works or stories and fresh creations unbound to the ’52’ multiverses they’d explored. But Williamson instead opts to run with the idea that rather than something new, Multiverse-Two is something old, and actually a reference, being the original Infinite Multiverse destroyed in the first Crisis On Infinite Earths. You can see the brain ticking here that leads to this conclusion, going ‘Well Earth-Two was the old classical thing, so Multiverse-Two should be…’
But it’s decidedly a mode of Fan-Brain that opts to be boring and reference-driven when it could choose to do anything new or fresh or interesting.
It’s perhaps why the Eldritch Horror entities of Morrison, beings of Cosmic Horror, like ‘The Empty’ Hand and The Gentry become generic bad guys for superhero punching and beat-em-up comics that no one will really remember years from now. Figures symbolizing Gentrification and representing any kind of meaning are reduced down to just ‘Lore-Important’ people to play out ‘Who Would Win?’ or Power Level wrestling fights and action-figure smashing with zero-thought. No Meaning, only Lore, as they say. It’s why Williamson would also set-up his own version and story that would finally, once again, as though it had never happened before, ‘explain everything’ about DC and its history and universe.
And if Geoff Johns used Doctor Manhattan, Scott Snyder used Anti-Monitor’s Mom and The Batman Who Laughs, then Williamson would resort to the most classically DC move, and a move evocative of very Geoff Johns-inspired sensibilities: recycle from Alan Moore. And so you had ‘The Great Darkness’ from an issue of Swamp Thing tying into Crisis On Infinite Earths being positioned as The Major Big Bad.
And leaning further into very Johns-esque sensibilities, much like Johns brought back Alexander Luthor, Superboy Prime and the Classic Old Man Superman to wage a big Fan Argument/Debate comic about DC Comics and its direction, Williamson would opt to do so with the one COIE character that even Johns couldn’t be bothered with:
He would be positioned as the other big bad, tapped into The Great Darkness, animated by a frustration over what all had happened in DC Comics. He would become representative of The Nostalgic Recreator who believed The Old Things and The Past were simpler, better, and that we should never have gone away from that good ol’ stuff. The irony being, of course, that the writer doing seemed to enjoy indulging in Nostalgic Recreation and referentialism himself. But perhaps that’s to be expected given the Johns influence- Johns is often that which his comics chastize and rail against and attempt to say is bad. More time is spent in indulging in poor choices and work that exist for the creator to say ‘We should move forward!’ rather than actually moving forward and doing the useful alternative without that Fan Argument/Debate. And Williamson, whose DC work often feels like a Xerox of Geoff Johns that’s been photocopied too many times, is part of that trend and lineage.
It’s perhaps why you get a gimmick story by Williamson titled The Death Of The Justice League for Justice League #75, done purely because of nostalgic recreation and obsession with homaging the old- this time the 1990’s, as opposed to Geoff Johns’ preferred 1980’s. If you’d felt that the Justice League had not ‘died’ enough recently given all the Metal madness, this comic may have been for you.
And all of this is exactly why what follows it is an event titled Dark Crisis.
There was to be no escape from the Johnsian school of Fan Argument Comics. You had ‘Pariah’ as The Nostalgic Recreator, and you had Deathstroke as The Old Man Who Is A Legacy Hater. And all of the ‘big bads’ of prior big DC joints would all be joined under the banner of The Great Darkness and be ‘The Dark Army,’ with The Great Darkness and its influence helping ‘explain’ the various cataclysmic Crisis-driven nature of the DC line. Perpetua was not enough, it seems, and neither was Doctor Manhattan. We needed more Continuity Porn, more Secrets Of The Lore to ‘explain’ everything over and over, with every new ‘architect’ having to get their version of that answer.
It’s likely why after the third issue of the book, DC would put out a whole special press release drumming up noise, with Williamson going on about how they had actually kept the ‘real title’ of the event a secret. And that the true title would ‘spoil’ the great story they had been telling, but now in the fourth issue the title would be revealed, as it would be on the covers from hereon out. And that new title, my dear friends?
Dark Crisis On Infinite Earths.
Yes, another nostalgic recreation and reference, in a story supposedly critical of them. Indulging in that very thing that we’re supposedly trying to speak against and say we need to move forward from.
And of course, we’d play the same song of THE INFINITE EARTHS ARE BACK/REBORN! like it was all-new and novel and special and had never been done before. It would be packaged and presented like it was thunderous, ground-breaking and earth-shattering. All, of course, to serve more tiresome and drawn out comics steeped in DC Fan Debates and Arguments, staged across a cosmic scale, steeped in insular Continuity Porn of DC Crisis comics.
Who are these comics for? Only for DC Diehards and Lifers, not any sane reader just seeking a well made, interesting comic.
And so on and on we would go, trapped forever in the same cycle, of the same old problems, failings, just with a different white-passing comics guy at the helm of it instead. Rather than make sleek, slick, smart superhero comics on the cutting edge, works which truly last the test of time, we instead get the same old beats and nostalgia-driven discussions and arguments as published comics.
It’s perhaps why Dark Crisis, which followed Didio’s firing and ousting of the 5G initiative, even casts Deathstroke as a man almost verbatim repeating oft-mocked and argued-about Dan Didio talking points on Nightwing…directly to Nightwing the character in a comic:
He, of course, gets ‘proven wrong’ and beat up, with those Didio talking-points taken down, in a comic affirming how The Titans are Actually The Bestest Characters in the DC Universe. Rather than actually have any kind of meaningful dramatic conflicts that challenge or push the character, we’re given hollow questions of ‘Can Dick Grayson be The Hope and Optimism and Light of the DC Universe and lead it as The Ultimate Legacy Hero?’, which, we all know the answer there. The comic only operates in binaries of Hero/Villain, Light/Darkness, and how Light>>Darkness.
There’s no real weight or meaning or interiority to the work. Can Grayson get off his ass and beat Deathstroke? The answer is never in doubt or in question. And there’s not a single dramatically compelling or interesting choice that Dick Grayson as a character makes or is allowed to make by the book’s creators. He exists to be moved from Point A to Point B and is more so a meaningless symbol gesturing towards DC marketing slogan words like Hope and Optimism, much like Superman in Doomsday Clock, than any kind of interesting character. The comic refuses to at any point challenge its characters or readership, choosing to constantly cater to their fandom and validate their fandom. And the only real ‘choice’ it seems to hinge on for its lead characters is a hollow one involving Black Adam choosing to be a hero and proclaiming that Legacy Is The Best Actually, because there’s a Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson movie coming that must be fed into synergistically. There is no artistic vision or soul here. Only company gimmicks, insular fan-arguments and cheap fan-service validation for stans living on crumbs.
It becomes rather like reading CBR Boards with super-powered punching at a certain point.
It’s a bunch of comics nerds arguing with each other, whilst forgetting why anybody cared about any of this to ever begin with. It’s the comic book equivalent of insular twitter beef and ‘discourse’ that makes no sense to anyone sane, outside these obsessive circles. These are comics completely devoid of any real ideas, which conflate these fandom sessions for actually meaningful stories. Stories are lost and gone, what remains can no longer even be called ‘stories’ really, as dramatic conflict and compelling character choices all vanish.
All that’s left is a bunch of dudes arguing about nerd nonsense.
If you’re wondering ‘how bad could it be?’, well…
The Flashpoint Two: Electric BoogalooWhile all of this was happening, Geoff Johns would once again return to DC comics to do a Flashpoint sequel book, where he would try to enforce and explain his own absolute, ultimate unified theory of DC. He would even explain the ‘D’ and ‘C’ of ‘DC’ as being ‘Divine Continuum,’ his overarching title for the whole affair, in a move that is truly, absolutely Johns to the max.
Try and read that above panel and parse it. See if that makes any goddamn sense to a normal reader who just wants a cool comic. Consider who that is really for. What manner of reader is that written for? It’s not any sane reader who cares about meaningful stories. It’s written for the most insular wiki-head, the most absurd lore-obsessed people, not any reasonable person with discerning comics taste. It’s the DC Universe/Multiverse/Omniverse/takeyourpick equivalent of Hawkman’s history or Donna Troy’s existence. It’s the most ‘who cares’ material written by people desperately out of touch, who’ve forgotten why any of us ever cared about these things to begin with. It wasn’t this convoluted ‘No, let ME explain and FIX DC and tell you how it all ACTUALLY works’ one-upsmanship contests they call ‘comics.’
Perhaps no better example of this disastrous situation exists than the context of the JSA. Let us consider them for a moment.
Across the past decade, DC’s made a lot of noise about ‘bringing back the JSA!’ starting from Geoff Johns’ DC Rebirth, as much of the enterprise was predicated on that. Here is the finale of Doomsday Clock, ‘bringing them back’:The JSA are back!! Yeah, woo!! Will they actually do anything or get a book? Hell no. Otherwise how could they make the noise about them ‘being back.’
Now, cut to their next big event Dark Nights: Death Metal and its ending:
The JSA are back!! Again! Yeah, woo!! Will they actually do anything or get a book? Hell no. Otherwise how could they make the noise about them ‘being back,’ for real this time!
And now cut to Dark Crisis On Infinite Earth*s*:
The JSA are back!! Again! Another time! Yeah, woo!! Will they actually do anything or get a book? Hell yes. But only by Geoff Johns. Nobody else. Because why go forwards when you can swim in nostalgic backwaters, while saying ‘We need to move forward’ a lot? Gesturing towards something endlessly that which we will never do or commit to, which feels perfectly true of Williamson’s work, given its Johnsian influence and ties.
And so that’s where we stand now, with endless repetition, beats being recycled, press-releases declaring ‘The Infinite Earths are back/reborn!’ or ‘The JSA are back/reborn!’ ‘The Titans matter and are good again!’ every single goddamn year, only for it to happen the next, and the next after that. And of course, it’s all accompanied by the press and slogans and marketing on how once again Hope, Optimism, and Heroism have returned to the DC Universe. It’s all sold to the reader like it’s never been done before, as though this were a novel thing happening for the very first time. It’s an endless series of screams emanating from a dungeon of chaos, as you hear shrieks going ‘We’ve done it! We’ve fixed it! We’ve got our shit together! Hahah! It’s all gonna be okay now, guys! We have a plan! Please trust us!’
Which is perhaps why it’s no surprise that DC Comics’ cinematic equivalent are also exactly the same. It’s the same crucial problem top to bottom- which is that it’s become less and less about the stories and storytelling steeped in character, and more ‘meta’ arguments about what the DC enterprise should be, and who gets to be the one to decide that, waged out in public arenas. It’s just not something conducive to good storytelling.
Crisis has become a curse weighing on the soul of DC given the way many have chosen to interpret and understand that term and title. And all Scott Snyder, bless his heart, seemed to have accomplished with an Anti-Crisis is just becoming part of the very tradition he sought to critique.
But where does that leave us? Where do we even go from here?
Next: The Future (and Past) Of CrisisPrevious: Part IIIThe post DC and The Matter Of Crisis, Part IV appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Credits: Si Spurrier writes; Jan Bazaldua draws; Federico Blee colors; Clayton Cowles letters; covers by Dike Ruan and Matthew Wilson
Despite series writer Si Spurrier’s smorgasbord of ideas for Legion of X, little of which comes into focus until the last issue of the first arc (likely to happen again with the conclusion of the second, issue #10), Spurrier has one simple message throughout, which may or may not help readers appreciate it more:
Love, or Liebenden (German for “Lovers”), defeats (Ever)war.
(“A Canticle for Liebenden,” a riff off the sci-fi classic A Canticle for Liebowitz by Walter Miller, Jr. is the title of issue #5; “Everwar” is what the Arakkii call the centuries of conflict with Amenth.)
Review:When these early issues were coming out, I’d already checked out with issue #1—but rereading them now on Marvel Unlimited, I find them worth returning to a few times over; however, I’m still not going to invest in getting the trade. If the rest of the series turns out to be more memorable, then we’ll see.
Obviously, we now know that some of the material here will be essential to understanding upcoming event Sins of Sinister, with zany Si Spurrier and superb artist Paco Medina penning the Nightcrawler miniseries, one-third of the event’s trio of three-issue minis. Leaving aside the dire spoiler-iness of solicits, it’s logical that Legion of X’s subtly antagonistic mystery figure with the British accent, Mother Righteous, will play something of a Sinister role; after all, event architect Kieron Gillen’s Immortal X-Men villain is Sinister and the third writer involved, the cosmo-spectacular Al Ewing, has revealed another of Essex’s earliest clones, Orbis Stellaris (in “the suit of spades”), in his X-Men: Red.
In other words, after the top-tier “dueling aces” of Immortal X-Men and X-Men: Red, the current X title with the most immediate relevance is indeed Legion of X, however much you can or cannot stand the pace of Spurrier’s everything-and-the-kitchen-sink storytelling style.
Frankly, sometimes a talented creator’s best hope when working on licensed properties (as opposed to creator-owned material) is to generate a bunch of wild ideas for whatever time they have on a given title and so leave it to subsequent creators to pick up whatever threads seem most fruitful—mix-n-match as they will. Almost a year in, this seems to be the case with Legion of X. Hence, if you read it as a zany ideas generator, you’re probably following Spurrier’s intent; thus, he’s succeeded with his remit as far as he views it.
My primary criticism of the book at the start of 2023 is its confusion of protagonists: The Legion title was quickly revealed to be Nightcrawler-centric—but occasionally still also Legion’s spotlight. But last summer, the most prevalent complaint about the series was its tone-deafness concerning social justice issues around crime and punishment, where the alternative intentional society of Krakoa was supposed to be providing models for, well, alternatives to the way we do things so badly in our own reality. The glaring hypocrisy, always intentional on Hickman’s part, was the existence of the Pit and Xavier’s ready willingness to condemn whoever even mildly displeased him … (Had Sinister tendencies already taken over???) However, Legion of X was supposed to provide yet another alternative. It’s right there in the first issue’s solicit:
Krakoa has its laws—but does it have justice? To remain a mutant sanctuary, Krakoa must safeguard itself against those who would damage its peace or traumatize its people. The lost must be found, and the wicked must face redemption—or retribution.
Okay, well—maybe that was the first issue, but apparently Spurrier didn’t think this was his remit for the title as a whole, however it wholly comes together or not. This quote’s last sentence would appear to reference fascinating (but still quite unknown) new mutant Lost (from Spurrier’s Way of X), and the rest of it (which is quite detailed, revelatory of why as a reader I detest solicits!) mentions the other characters “on the beat” (phrasing that refers only to cops, though it’s not otherwise explicit there): Nightcrawler, Pixie (“on point”) and Juggernaut (“a one-man riot squad”).
[First and last briefing at the precinct, issue #1]Just bear in mind, the storytellers on licensed properties do not write the solicits. Yet still, editorial must’ve had some idea from the author as to what the series was to be about! (Was Spurrier pressed in duress to give some accounting of what he, as a clearly experimental and thus process-oriented teller, would’ve rather left unaccountable?)So, it’s perfectly understandable that the popular critique centered on Spurrier’s apparent tone-deafness here: He provides no real, substantive alternative community policing, much less ideas for retribution, or restitution, even once the Krakoan bad guy/chaos-maker, a sorry nobody named Switch, is apprehended (and then executed without Kurt’s knowledge, essentially by his lover, the Arakkii Weaponless Zsen).
And yet taking in the first arc only now, this reader at least left behind any expectation for diligence and depth on this particular hot-button topic with that first issue. I knew there’d be nothing gained there, so simply read to enjoy what could be enjoyed. In doing so, I found more than expected—indeed, too much!
That said, the finest feature of this first arc is the way it almost comes together in issue #5, which however, of course, leaves several mysteries unresolved—though they happily remain, I believe, tantalizing enough.
Yet what it all means? As stated above: Liebe trumps Krieg. For all Spurrier’s zaniness, pretty simple, nein? Well, this might be what formal thematic closure there is to the first arc, but it’s pretty clear that the point is really: To dwell in possibility (to cop a phrase from the inimitable Emily) is the victory against the Death—that is closure. Looking back at the Spurrier oeuvre, isn’t closure itself really the nemesis behind and haunting the scenes, beleaguering the questing artist in the market of a medium increasingly favoring just that, that closing down of possibilities, of interpretive reader response?
Do I read too generously? Perhaps that’s a question that doesn’t yet know what reading can be.
To bring it back to mutant brass tacks, the fan-relevant deets: Legion of X offers the finest characterization of Nightcrawler since … a really long time! Hickman in Powers of X and X-Men #8 gave us his character in choice snippets, amplifying by implication in those all-too-brief moments. Spurrier, however, operates expansively, that is, in a Romantic mode that (however much it, as such, succeeds or not) is pitch perfect for our swashbucklin’ romancer (Imagine how perfect, too: Kurt Wagner as German Expressionist, and depicted in that way. There is the potential of this in the art of Bazaldua).
Think, too, of Spurrier’s new seemingly gonzo creation, the Spirit of Variance—that is, of chance operations; of hazarding a try at something new, different; of breathing in the renewal of the ever-renewing Spark.
Read Spurrier as a writer in the Romantic mode, where the fragment replaces the totality of formal structure (and thus the deadly dry air of closure), and you will have a high fun time. Oddly, though, he reads as more inspired upon reflection rather than in the moment.
Certainly, he is not playing second fiddle to the more formally realized operatics of Gillen’s Quiet Council and Ewing’s Great Circle. Spurrier is writing exactly the series he wants; its import is in another direction; hopefully, we’ll get to see how these three visions of the X mythos converge and compliment and contrast with another in “Sins of Sinister”—of course, in an alt-reality fun-house mirror kind of way. In fact, I’ll bet this event is going to excite new or lapsed readership to Legion of X, when it resumes in, presumably, May.
Here are some useful notes on this arc for readers:First off, while this isn’t a knock against Spurrier’s story, it is a bit irritating that issue #4 cover’s features Loki—false advertising! But in the comic itself, (Silver Age) Loki’s (shadowy) presence is briefly suggested, exciting readers to read on…?
The deity Tumult, “The Trickster Chimaera” (issue #4), is an amalgamation of various tricksters out of Earthling mythology, courtesy of Ora Serrata—both his Inquisitor-style persecutor and initial worshiper. Throughout this arc, until the final issue, he protected his second follower, the opportunistic body-hopper Switch, in what was referred to as a “No-Place” on Krakoa; however, it seems clear that Tumult’s powers are what hid this space from even Warlock’s awareness (Warlock being enmeshed with Krakoa’s). So, this wasn’t another of Xavier/Moira/Magneto’s hidden, “tumorous” No-Places.
At Nightcrawler’s encouragement, Tumult broke out of this space by realizing he was allowed to serve himself and not just be a tool of those who created or made offerings to him.
Having swapped bodies with the body-hopper, Tumult left Arakko in Switch’s body as Switch was slain, apparently, in Tumult’s giant form, in the Circle Perilous. Only time will tell if Spurrier or another picks up his story and deepens it with greater interest. This character would seem to have some interesting potential in a fictional universe that really only has one prominent trickster god, Loki; it will just take the right hands to bring out something original and worthwhile. With his traumatic entry into the world and his anomie (both in the sense of being cast adrift from the certainty of a tradition and of being restless and uncertain from a lack of purpose or higher ideals), this “patchwork”* deity is already more human than divine—he’s relatable.
(Interesting that in Way of X, the apparent shadowy threat there was the Patchwork Man, who turned out to be Legion himself—ahem, him selves*… And who is more patchwork than he???)
As it is, Tumult’s reason for being here is to reveal Ora Serrata’s hollow zealotry and hypocrisy. He is still, unsurprisingly, a child—newborn in the world.
[No one seems to question too closely the almost overwhelmingly bizarre presence of these magic mirrors, courtesy of Mother Righteous, who remains mostly behind the scenes. The possessed Banshee also clearly receives that Hand of Glory from the sorceress (see issue #2).]Ora Serrata summoned this amalgamated deity using limited magical abilities conferred, in an esoteric pact or Faustian bargain, by Mother Righteous (who eloquently enough insists on gratitude from those who receive her questionable gifts—and becoming her hanger-on, as with Banshee and the Spirit of Variance, seems to be the deepest of her satisfactions, so far). Ora’s creepy design fits perfectly with her duties (presumably self-conferred) as the embodiment of Arakko’s domestic law enforcement, such as it is (“justice” for the Arakkii centers on the challenges that take place in the Circle Perilous); her eye at least feels as if it has a panoptic surveillance power (thinking here of the 18th-century “Enlightenment” conception of the carceral Panopticon, amalgamated with the zeal of the Spanish Inquisition, despite the Arbitrix’s screed against gods).The body-hopping “skinjacker” Switch is a deep cut from the late ’90s, fan-favorite John Francis Moore run on X-Force (issues #87-90). He was one of the so-called New Hellions, basically just mutant terrorists (and not under Emma’s purview, although one of her erstwhile Hellion students, Tarot, was on the team, as was ex-New Mutant Magma). No one’s going to be missing him—and he, much like Tumult, is in the story to serve Spurrier’s thematic interest, with Kurt as the vehicle.
Kurt is the appropriate vehicle for questions of moral crime, or sin, and punishment—and redemption; above all, though, Spurrier wants our swashbucklin’ hero to do some shadow work, for which it’s past time, what with not just his codename but his very appearance. It was enough in the early years that Claremont, working off Dave Cockrum’s original visual design, wanted to make a point about being a mutant: Appearing different, or devilish in the eyes of simple-minded yokels, doesn’t mean you can’t be a nice guy, and Nightcrawler is the nicest, most wholesome X-Man ever. But there’s a danger of a Mary Sue there, someone who’s too perfect, too well-rounded, too balanced. I commend Spurrier’s ambition here to explore Kurt’s deeper psychic terrain.
As to the massacre Ora Serrata unleashes in the Altar once Kurt catches her out in her lies and conspiracy to sow chaos via her hounding of Tumult, it’s wild to me that Krakoa did not seek any sort of retribution or even restitution. Well—death is not the end; still, that giant eye seems like a hard though swift way to go (however temporarily).
There are a few interesting lead-ins to the next arc, which is even clearer in hindsight, months later: Zsen leaves Kurt with a portrait of his true self, of which we see only Kurt’s shocked and humbled reaction; Warlock is alarmed at some kind of techno-organic “blooms,” bright little flakes sticking to Juggernaut—who says they “just kinda … drift in outa the Astral Plane” (recall that in the first issue we learned that Magus, Warlock’s father/tyrannical progenitor was slain by Nimrod, which atrocity echoed through “dreamspace,” surprising Legion, who didn’t think “synthetic intelligence” had any kind of presence there; presumably, Xavier is surprised as well); Nightcrawler’s investigative team is now on the case of Paulie’s murderer, who we saw only briefly in issue #4, just his purple arms and rectilinear word balloons—indicating some kind of artificiality, perhaps something techno-organic (he had come to retrieve Switch’s psyche that had been trapped in a kind of jar and watched over, oddly, by Paulie).
Lastly, I do personally prefer Xavier as arrogant but hapless heel rather than Sinister-possessed diabolical mastermind (Immortal X-Men), but the best would be seeing the latter version defeated through his own hilarious idiocy, like so…
NEXT: Nightcrawler wrestles with his devilishness and goes digging in his own dirt—fitting for one named after a worm! Worm! Worm! (Sheesh, those literal-minded Arakkii cannot stand anyone not having the most flowery, byzantine names, like Ora Serrata (hour of sawing? golden sawtooth?), Lodus (Lodos as in muck and mire?) Logos, even Lactuca; she’s what, an amoeboid fungus or a lettuce, or just something else to do with milk?
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The release of 2018’s Black Panther was a bit of a surprise hit for Marvel Studios. One good reason we know that is that the publishing arm of Marvel did not bother to prepare a single hardcover collection in time for the film’s release—something they’ve begun to do for all of their movies. Marvel vowed […]
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On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below: This week we discuss the Omega issue for “Judgement Day” and new comics! This Week’s Comics A.X.E. Judgement Day Omega Sabretooth & The Exiles […]
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This week on Creannotators, I sit down to talk with Jeremy Holt about their work on Made in Korea. We discuss how they are adapting the Great Gatsby and their implementation of science fiction, plus their take on Mantis’s story for Marvel Voices. On Comic Book Herald’s ‘Creannotators’ I’ll be interviewing some of my favorite […]
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The gang reviews Black Panther: Wakanda Forever! Spoilers follow! Up Next: My Marvelous Year – 2000 Pt. 3 Spider-Man: Revenge of the Green Goblin / Amazing Spider-Man / Peter Parker, Spider-Man #1 to #3 / #25 / #25 Perpetually under the radar Spidey vs. Green Goblin story. Heavily inspired by Batman: The Killing Joke. Daredevil […]
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This is the first of several pieces that looks at the core “A.X.E.: Judgment Day” story from start to finish. We’ll focus on the event series A.X.E.: Judgment Day and the tie-ins written by event author and architect and ongoing Immortal X-Men writer Kieron Gillen (working with artists Valerio Schiti, Guiu Vilanova and Lucas Werneck, […]
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This week on Creannotators, I interview comics writer J.M. DeMatteis on “DeMultiverse” launch, Ben Reilly Spider-Man, and Spider-Man: The Lost Hunt. We discuss the new Kickstarted “shared universe” comics, Kraven’s Last Hunt, Justice League, Doctor Fate, when stories take over, and a whole lot more! On Comic Book Herald’s ‘Creannotators’ I’ll be interviewing some of my favorite creators […]
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Dave, Charlotte and Zack talk Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon’s Welcome Back Frank, and a bunch more of Priest’s Black Panther! On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited): Punisher #1 to #12 Ennis and Dillon’s first Punisher arc, Welcome Back, Frank. Runs into March 2001, but makes sense to read altogether […]
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It is often said that Watchmen is the most influential comic ever to be released. That comics wouldn’t be where they are without it, for good and for ill. But how did we get here, exactly? More to the point, just what influence did Watchmen provide to the larger world of comics? What, ultimately, is […]
The post Who Watched the Watchmen? Peter Cannon, Thunderbolt appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
The unthinkable had happened. Bendis had moved to DC. He’d done everything except the one thing people expected him to DC- Justice League. And then he did Justice League. But it was not anything anyone was expecting. So what on earth was it? Let’s continue to dig in, picking up where we left off… The […]
The post Bendis’ Justice League & The Hierarchy Of Power In DC- Part III appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
The unthinkable had happened. Bendis had moved to DC. He’d done everything except the one thing people expected him to DC- Justice League. And then he did Justice League. But it was not anything anybody was expecting. So what on earth was it? Let’s continue to dig in, picking up where we left off… The […]
The post Bendis’ Justice League & The Hierarchy Of Power In DC- Part II appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Charlotte and Zack continue their coverage of the Ultimate Marvel line of comics! Topics discussed include: – Should this event be LONGER? – Is this Zack’s most cancellable verbal slip-up? – Should the French be allowed to vote in US elections? Comics covered in this episode: -Ultimate Comics X-Men #14-18.1 -Ultimate Comics Ultimates #13-18.1 -Ultimate […]
The post MUY #30: Divided We Fall / United We Stand Crossover! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
This week on Creannotators, I interview comic writer Brad Meltzer on his recent series, Stories Change the World which starts with I Am Superman and I Am Batman. We discuss his writing process, his favorite past works, and his thoughts on the impact comic have had in his life. On Comic Book Herald’s ‘Creannotators’ I’ll […]
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The date was November 7th of 2017. It was another day. Just like any other. Until it wasn’t. Everyone began shrieking, whether it was in delight or terror. You had every variation of ‘No way’ ‘Is this a prank?’ ‘OH MY GOD’ ‘Holy shit’ to people screaming ‘YESSSSSSS’ or ‘NOOOOOOO.’ The reaction was instant, massive. […]
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Dave, Charlotte and Zack kick off Marvel Comics of 2000 with the grand Sentry hoax, Grant Morrison’s Marvel Boy, and the less good Marvel Knights team-up! On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited): Sentry #1 to #5 Jenkins and Lee reunited Marvel Boy #1 to #6 Grant Morrison and J.G Jones introduce a […]
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As anyone who knows me learns sooner or later, my first ever fresh-off-the-stands new comic was 2000’s The Amazing Spider-Man (Vol. 2) #17 by Howard Mackie, John Byrne, Dan Green, Joe Rosas, Richard Starkings, and Troy Peteri when I was 4 or 5 years old. Aside from getting me to think Venom was the coolest […]
The post Severed Limbs and Soiled Capes: The Place of the Super-Macabre in Comics appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below: This week we’re talking the end of Marvel’s Judgement Day event! Spoilers Follow This Week’s Comics Wolverine #26 Judgement Day #6 X-Terminators #2 X-Men […]
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It is often said that Watchmen is the most influential comic ever to be released. That comics wouldn’t be where they are without it, for good and for ill. But how did we get here, exactly? More to the point, just what influence did Watchmen provide to the larger world of comics? What, ultimately, is the legacy […]
The post Who Watched the Watchmen? DC Universe Rebirth appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
This week on Creannotators, I interview comic artist and writer Blue Delliquanti about their hit webcomic O Human Star! We discuss the state of webcomics, queer graphic novels, and their new YA graphic novel, Across a Field of Starlight. On Comic Book Herald’s ‘Creannotators’ I’ll be interviewing some of my favorite creators in comics about […]
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Charlotte and Zack review Earth X, a 12 issue alternate reality maxiseries! On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited): Earth X #1 to #12 Extends us into 2000, but you can complete this wackily beautiful out of continuity story from Alex Ross and Jim Krueger all in one. Up Next: […]
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In Gothic: A Romance, a 1990 Batman story from the pages of Legends of the Dark Knight, Batman finds himself battling a satanic monk who attempts to kill everyone in Gotham City, and offer their souls to the devil in exchange for immortality. His plan rests on Gotham’s specific architecture, utilizing a series of cathedrals […]
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This week, I am honored to be interviewing Gene Ha, an artist on volume two of DC’s Black Label Wonder Woman: Historia. Ha is also the writer and artist behind the comic “Mae” and was one of the chief artists involved in his comic “Top 10.” You can hear our full conversation on Comic Book […]
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Picking up where we left off, we now come to the one and only time Geoff Johns ever wrote a proper Shazam/Fawcett solo ongoing, the work that would reshape Black Adam once again. It would prove to be his final farewell to the character and the mythology he’d worked with for so long. Or…would it? […]
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Picking up where we left off, we now come to one of the most important initiatives of modern DC comics, and the work that would reshape Black Adam for good once more. The initiative that still informs what DC is, and which it has never truly been able to escape. We come to The New […]
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Hello and welcome to Comic Book Herald’s Hickmania, a series running through 2022 where we’ll be reading and analyzing the creator-owned works of writer Jonathan Hickman, from his debut The Nightly News through to his most recent output. We’ll be reading one creator-owned work a month through 2022, and each month I’ll release a new […]
The post Hickmania #9: The Black Monday Murders (W/ Harry Kassen!) appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Picking up where we left off, we now come to one of the most important books of modern DC comics, and the book that would reshape Black Adam for good. The book that continues to inform and define much of the identity of DC even now. We come, of course, to 52. [Content/Trigger Warning: Sexual […]
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Often, Geoff Johns is associated with Silver Age figures. Classic heroes of the 1960s revivals like Hal Jordan and Barry Allen. He’s often identified with triggering the revival or ‘rebirths’ of such figures and re-centering them in mythologies and re-positioning them as pivotal leads of the modern era. Johns is often framed as the figure […]
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Charlotte, Dave and Zack review the full season of She-Hulk on Disney+ and Werewolf by Night! Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 2000 Pt. 1 Sentry #1 to #5 Jenkins and Lee reunited Marvel Boy #1 to #6 Grant Morrison and J.G Jones introduce a new character to the Marvel Universe. An important player in […]
The post 1999 Variant Cover B: MCU She-Hulk & Werewolf by Night Review! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
[Jack Kirby cover art; Vince Colletta inking Thor #155; Joe Sinnott inking Fantastic Four Annual #6] If you missed our 1968 entry on The Silver Surfer and Captain Marvel solo series, check it out! As a Marvel Cosmic menace and a classic instance of pulp cosmic-horror, Annihilus is fairly unique. Occasionally approaching the threat level […]
The post The Evolution of Marvel Cosmic, Part 7: Two New Cosmic Horror Bruisers, 1968 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below: This week we’re talking the nine new Judgment Day tie-ins (good grief!) and all the X-Men news that came out at New York Comic […]
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Devil’s Reign, written by Chip Zdarsky with art by Marco Checcheto, colours by Marcia Menyz, and lettering by Clayton Cowles is not Zdarsky and Checcheto’s first time in Hell’s Kitchen. This time however, instead of focusing on Daredevil, Zdarsky and Checcheto tell a story about Wilson Fisk, also known as Kingpin. After discovering that he […]
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It is often said that Watchmen is the most influential comic ever to be released. That comics wouldn’t be where they are without it, for good and for ill. But how did we get here, exactly? More to the point, just what influence did Watchmen provide to the larger world of comics? What, ultimately, is the legacy […]
The post Who Watched the Watchmen? Venom by Donny Cates & Ryan Stegman appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
There is a darkness growing in the world, an evil rooted in the past that has risen up as a blight on the present. To stem this corruption, Levi Kamei must reconnect with his own forgotten past, and embrace a strange new destiny as the next guardian of the Green. Since his first appearance in […]
The post THE SWAMP THING by Ram V & Mike Perkins | Horror, Hope, and Identity appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
I had the chance to interview Brad Meltzer, the writer behind DC’s best-selling Identity Crisis, on his latest works, I Am Superman and I Am Batman as part of his new Stories That Change the World. You can hear our full conversation Comic Book Herald’s “Creannotators,” on the podcast. But since some people prefer the ancient art […]
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This week on Creannotators, I’m joined by comic artist Gene Ha to talk volume two of DC’s Black Label Wonder Woman: Historia. Ha is also the writer and artist behind the comic “Mae” and was one of the chief artists involved in his comic “Top 10.” On Comic Book Herald’s ‘Creannotators’ I’ll be interviewing some […]
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Dave and Charlotte talk X-Men crossovers! Looking at 1999’s “The Hunt for Xavier” and “Magneto War“! At least one of these issues is good! On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited): The Hunt For Xavier Reading Order Uncanny X-Men #362 / X-Men #82 / UXM #363 / X-Men #83 […]
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[covers by John Buscema & Joe Sinnott] If you missed our 1967 entry, check it out! You can link back to previous entries there, as well. Probably Marvel’s second-best cosmic-themed adventure of 1968 (after the debut of the fearsome Mangog in Thor; next time) was the return of Galactus in Fantastic Four #74-77. Of course, […]
The post The Evolution of Marvel Cosmic, Part 6: Cosmic Franchise, 1968 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
I love video games. I suppose I always have. Growing up in the early years of economic liberalisation in India, you took your first steps into the world of gaming on bootlegged consoles, manufactured by local companies that had cropped up all over the country to meet the demands of a large population with growing […]
The post The Inmates Run the Asylum in Rocksteady’s Arkham Trilogy appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
It is often said that Watchmen is the most influential comic ever to be released. That comics wouldn’t be where they are without it, for good and for ill. But how did we get here, exactly? More to the point, just what influence did Watchmen provide to the larger world of comics? What, ultimately, is the legacy […]
The post Who Watched the Watchmen? What Doomsday Clock Gets Wrong appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
This week’s interview is a CBH Creannotators/My Marvelous Year crossover, as I’m joined by comics pro Jimmy Palmiotti to talk about his role co-creating Marvel Knights. We discuss the early days of defining Marvel Knights, saving Marvel Comics, getting creative credit for the MCU, and in the second half of the interview, a whole lot […]
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As always, keeping up with all the comics that are published every year is nigh impossible. And that’s just the traditional publishers! Webcomics are a rapidly growing and easily available cornucopia of fantastic stories or all stripes. Added bonus, it lets small, independent comic creators get their content out to the wider world! To help […]
The post The Best Webtoons of 2022! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Charlotte and Zack continue their coverage of the Ultimate Marvel line of comics! Topics discussed include: – What makes Miles more than just “New Peter Parker”? – How does Ultimate Comics X-Men deal with the Mutant Metaphor being removed? – How much is Spider-Men fan service, and does it matter if it’s good? Comics covered […]
The post MUY #29: Ultimate Spider-Man & Ultimate X-Men appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
On my weekly livestream, Casual Krakoa Live, I review the week’s X-Men comics, and answer big questions about what’s going on with Marvel’s merry mutants! You can listen or watch below: Spoilers Follow This Week’s Comics X-Men #15 AXE Judgement Day tie-ins
The post AXE Avengers #1 & X-Men #15 | Judgement Day Catch-Up! | Comic Book Herald Live! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
It is often said that Watchmen is the most influential comic ever to be released. That comics wouldn’t be where they are without it, for good and for ill. But how did we get here, exactly? More to the point, just what influence did Watchmen provide to the larger world of comics? What, ultimately, is the legacy […]
The post Who Watched the Watchmen? The Omega Men – The End is Here appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
Earlier this year, we met the hero Rogue Sun during Supermassive, but we also learned he would die. So this is the set-up for the Rogue Sun comic. Dylan, the newest person to assume the mantle, has to find out who killed his dad and how to defeat a threat capable of that without knowing […]
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This week on Creannotators, I’m joined by comic artist Dave Acosta to talk about his work on Dragon in concert with graphic novel writer Saladin Ahmed. We discuss the creative process behind Dragon, Terrorwar on Substack, what made Dragon part of the hardest year, and new takes on Dracula. On Comic Book Herald’s ‘Creannotators’ I’ll be […]
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Dave and Zack answer listener questions including comics ripe for adaptation, John Byrne’s Hulk, and why Dave loves Bulletproof Coffin. Plus, My Mangaless Year continues with Naoki Urasawa’s Monster. Up Next: My Marvelous Year — 1999 Pt. 3 The Hunt For Xavier Reading Order Uncanny X-Men #362 / X-Men #82 / UXM #363 / X-Men […]
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[Fantastic Four art by Jack Kirby (p), Joe Sinnott (i), Stan Goldberg (c), Sam Rosen and Artie Simek (l)] For our last entry, see here for a Kirby Thor extravaganza—in another galaxy! The strangest thing about Jack Kirby’s legendary 102-issue run on Fantastic Four isn’t any of his creations, which are of course mostly wonderfully […]
The post The Evolution of Marvel Cosmic, Part 5: Cosmic Embiggening Silver Age-Style, 1967 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
I had a great experience interviewing Brian Michael Bendis and Andre Araujo on their new graphic novel Phenomena: The Golden City of Eyes, which we at Comic Book Herald have ranked as one of the best comics of 2022. You can hear our full conversation on Comic Book Herald’s “Creannotators,” on the podcast. But since […]
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This week on Creannotators, I’m joined by creator Dan Schkade to talk about the return of Lavendar Jack, one of our favorite comics on Webtoon! We talk ending the series after 4+ years, working with Webtoon, noir influences, and what comes next! On Comic Book Herald’s ‘Creannotators’ I’ll be interviewing some of my favorite creators in […]
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Dave, Charlotte, and Zack talk all things Avengers, including Avengers Forever, Dave’s favorite Ultron story, and the Marvel Knights debut of Yelena Belova the Black Widow. On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited): Avengers Forever #1 to #3 Kurt Busiek and Carlos Pacheco’s love letter to the Avengers. Avengers #19 […]
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In 1882, the United States passed a ban on Chinese immigrants, blaming them for the 1874 Depression. In 1924, the Johnson-Reed Act expanded the ban to include Asians and Arabs. By 1936, over a half a century after the original ban…the Chinese were the first generation to come of age under an immigration ban. Following […]
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[covers & interiors by Jack Kirby (p), Vince Colletta (i), Stan Goldberg (c), Artie Simek/Sam Rosen (l)] Before the introduction of the imperial but adorable Rigellians—of the fictional galaxy Rigel, a name taken from a real star in the Milky Way, part of the Orion constellation—Jack Kirby and Stan Lee’s Thor comics were thoroughly rooted […]
The post The Evolution of Marvel Cosmic, Part 4: King Kirby & Princeling Thor’s Mission to Space, 1966 appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
The recent adaptation illustrates how crucial the Sandman’s connections to DC continuity are to Morpheus’ Story. Throughout the press tour in anticipation of Netflix’s adaptation of The Sandman, there’s been focus on a particular diversion from the source material — its lack of connective tissue to a grander universe. This is usually spun as a […]
The post Merely a Monument; Always a Seamark – Sandman and DC Universe Connections appeared first on Comic Book Herald.
This week on Creannotators, I’m joined by storytellers Brian Michael Bendis and Andre Lima Araujo to talk about their new all ages graphic novel Phenomena: The Golden City of Eyes. We discuss storytelling for YA, a design-first creation process, and what’s next in the trilogy. On Comic Book Herald’s ‘Creannotators’ I’ll be interviewing some of my […]
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