These reviews are late. Hopefully this won't be a running theme on this blog. I don't really have an excuse this week other than that I bought a whole crap load of comics and totally was not looking forward to writing reviews for all of them. That's still the case somewhat, but since I've already picked up my comics for this week I figured I ought to get these ones done. Anyways, let's get to it...
Everybody knows that everything in the world ever is a competition, so every week the publishers of the comics I read will be fighting for ultimate supremacy; hence "DC versus Marvel". I'm not limiting contestants to only DC and Marvel; I just shortened it for the sake of a catchier blog title. Books will be ranked from -1 to +1 which will add to or subtract from each publisher's overall score. Two +2 scores will be given per week for "Best Comic" of the week and "My Favorite Comic" of the week. I hope it never comes to this (because I don't usually like to buy bad comics), but if a book is just super terrible I may give a score of -2. When all scores are added up I will declare a winner and all other publishers will be killed. Thankfully, this is comics so nobody ever stays dead and we'll start right back over next week.
Here's what I picked up:
Uncanny X-Force #7
Punisher Max #12
Justice League: Generation Lost #23
Cinderella: Fables are Forever #3
Ultimate Comics Spider-Man #157
Booster Gold #43
Batgirl #20
T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents #6
Black Panther: The Man Without Fear #517
Casanova: Gula #4
Batman & Robin #22
S.H.I.E.L.D. #Infinity
The Unwritten #24
The Li'l Depressed Boy #3
Secret Warriors #26
Aaaaaannnnndddd.......... FIGHT!
Ok, so the first thing I need to get out of the way is that I didn't actually read all of these books. There's a couple series that I'm still reading my way through and haven't caught up to the point where I can read the newest issue. Those series are Cinderella, Ultimate Comics Spider-Man and Booster Gold.
For general review purposes, I'm just going to give each of these books an automatic +1, because based on my previous experience with each of these series I'm betting these comics are awesome and I look forward to reading them very much. Unfortunately, these +1's aren't being added to the final scores. Sorry, guys. Deal with it.
As far as the books I actually did read, well Jason Aaron's Punisher Max #12 was a pretty awesome one. This issue starts off the story arc in which Frank Castle is incarcerated. I'd been wondering since the end of the last issue (which was also awesome) how Mr. Aaron would pull this story off, and I must say I'm liking the direction this is headed. Frank is still recovering from his fight with Bullseye and he spend the entire issue in a prison hospital bed while two separate groups of inmates come to kill him. I won't give away what happens, but it's pretty cool. Art-wise, if you've ever read any comic book ever drawn by Steve Dillon you know exactly what you're getting. He's like the Too $hort of comics art. He's never changed his style in years. But you know what? It works. And it works very well for this series. Also, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the gorgeous cover by Dave Johnson. That guy pretty much rocks it every time.SCORE: +1
If you had told me just a year or two ago that a book called X-Force would be one of the best books coming out, I would have punched you in the throat. Seriously. I would have. Ok, maybe not. It has happened before, after all. Remember Milligan and Allred's amazing X-Force run that led into X-Statix? But that was Milligan and Allred. And that may as well have been a creator owned thing since they came up with all their own characters. This book, though, stars a cast of some of the 90s-est of 90s comic book characters. It should be terrible. It should be god-awful. But it's amazing. It's....... uncanny. See what I did there? Anyways, this issue gives us a one-and-done story where the gang goes up against the Shadow King and I'm pretty sure Rick Remender is setting out to prove he can make even the most flagrant of comic book follies into something completely awesome. Psylocke's psychic armor comes off as pretty badass and Archangel is actually pretty scary. You're gonna want to read this.
SCORE: +1
Sometimes I'll read a comic and realize part way through it that I'm not as smart as I hoped I was. Secret Warriors #26 is one of those comics that makes me feel stupid. Actually, a lot of the time it's a Secret Warriors comic that makes me feel stupid. There's just a lot of intricacies and intrigue and betrayals and reveals and macguffins. Lot's of macguffins. Macguffins out the wahoo. It's a pretty good comic, I guess, from what I got from it. There were actually a couple of really cool scenes that didn't make me feel stupid. Once the series does wrap up, I'm going to sit down one weekend and blast through it all in one shot. Jonathan Hickman is one of my favorite writers and that fact is what has kept me on board with this book through all of its stages and story arcs. Anyways, I think it was the issue just before this, the one where Nick Fury's son is killed while on a misison, maybe it was two issues before this one, but that issue was perfect. And it gave me hope that the series would be wrapping up on that level of storytelling. Maybe it is, I don't know. I'm still trying to figure it out. SCORE: 0
First of all, this comic is ADORABLE. I mean that in the best possible way. It reminds me a lot of what I enjoy about Brian Wood's comics in that it very convincingly captures the feel of being a young person. In the case of The Li'l Depressed Boy #3, that young person is basically a life-size voodoo doll who wears ironic t-shirts and says things like, "I smash hipsters." Like I said, it's ADORABLE. Last issue LDB and his new, um, girlfriend? friend-girl? romantic interest, we'll say... last issue they went style-points bowling and got kicked out of the bowling alley when LDB threw a hadouken. It was seriously the cutest thing I've ever seen in a comic and I have no problem admitting that as a 29 year old man. This issue the romantic interest, whose name is Jaz, is having a birthday party. While not as adorable as the first couple of issues, this one still has a lot of great moments and it's already one of my favorite comics every month.
SCORE: +1
You know, I was all set to give this issue of Batman & Robin a score of -1 and drop the series from my pull list, but I was talking to a friend of mine on twitter named Luke and he reminded me that during Batman's fight with the White Knight, Batman popped off his bat ears, which then stabbed the White Knight in the face. Honestly, if that's not worth an extra little nudge, I'm not qualified to judge the merits of any book, be they comic or otherwise. I'm still dropping the series, though.SCORE: 0
One day a few months ago the proprietor of my local comics shoppe recommended that I try out this new book called T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents. So I did. And I loved it. So I bought all the issues and have continued to do so ever since. The end.
SCORE: +1
One day almost a year ago I was in New York and I met up with a guy I knew from twitter. A strikingly handsome fellow by the name of David Wolkin. He recommended to me that I read King City. So I bought all the issues and never read them. He also recommended that I read Justice League: Generation Lost. So I bought all the issues and actually did read them. And they were awesome. So I kept buying them. And they kept being awesome. Until this one came out. It wasn't bad, but it also wasn't that good. It's just a lot of movement with nothing substantial to hold it all together. Sound and fury. And, you know what, for this to be the first misstep in a year-long, bi-weekly series? That's pretty great. And the series has been exactly that: pretty great. I was going to give it a -1, but I just talked myself into giving it a 0.
SCORE: 0
Now this is more like it. This comic has been so hit or miss, oftentimes within the pages of a single issue, that it just frustrates to no end. Every time I open a new issue I'm flooded with hope in the potential of every aspect of the story, not least of which is the fact that in the first issue of Black Panther's tenure as lead he kicked a total of seven dudes in the face. This issue had none of the easily avoidable mistakes of the last issue and a hero/hero confrontation that was actually pretty interesting. Plus Francesco Francavilla is pretty much the best at drawing things that happen. Vlad's youngest son still has a bit of an exposition disorder, but honestly that's just being nit picky for the sake of picking nits.
SCORE: +1
Batgirl is awesome. She spent Valentine's Day with Klarion the Witch Boy. She also fought 24 Draculas with Supergirl. Sadly, she doesn't do any of those things in this issue, but this is still one of my favorite comics this week. Also, look at that cover. I mean, come on. Right? Right? Yeah. That's right.
SCORE: +1
I like S.H.I.E.L.D. I like S.H.I.E.L.D. a whole lot. I like S.H.I.E.L.D. so much that I don't really mind having to type out S.H.I.E.L.D. as many times as I did just now. I realize that S.H.I.E.L.D. can be pretty much boiled down to the phrase "softcore history porn." I don't care. I like S.H.I.E.L.D. And this is my favorite issue since the series premiere. The vignette style works really well for a book like this that is still leaving just about every question unanswered. These shorts don't answer any of those questions, but they do add just enough insight to make each little mystery a little bit more mysterious.
SCORE: +1
This book. This book right here. I don't think you'll find anybody on the internet who doesn't like a foul mouthed fairy bunny rabbit wearing a bow tie, and that's EXACTLY what Mr. Mike Carey has given us with this issue. There's also a commentary on faith and zealotry, etc. blah blah blah. Really, all you need to know is that Pauly Bruckner is a bunny rabbit. He wears a bow tie. And he does not speak a sentence without dropping an f-bomb. This is My Favorite Comic Book of the week.
SCORE: +2
The Unwritten #24 would have been The Best Comic Book of the week as well as My Favorite, except for one little thing called Casanova: Gula #4. If I had been writing these reviews back when Casanova was a 16 page book being put out by Image Comics that cost $1.99 you can bet they'd be The Best Comic Book every time. Basically this is Matt Fraction's best work. Even better than Invincible Iron Man. Even better than Immortal Iron Fist. This issue we find out when Cass has been this whole time. It's a bitter sweet thing seeing this issue published again. On the one hand, Casanova is over. And that sucks. It sucked the first time. On the other hand, Avaritia is coming. And that is AWESOME. I absolutely cannot wait for each issue of Avaritia to be The Best Comic Book every time it's released.
SCORE: +2
Ok, so lets see how we did:
Marvel: 4
DC: 2
Image: 1
Icon: 2
Vertigo: 2
Hey, whaddya know! Marvel takes the week, meaning that they won't get shot in the face by Max Lord after figuring out his evil plan. Poor Image, though. With only one point this week, Image got their little necks snapped by Wonder Woman to prevent Superman from being mind controlled.
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