As before, use this space to discuss comics hitting the stores this week.
PAD
9 comments on “STASH WEDNESDAY”
Four comics:
Battle for the Cowl 1 was readable and entertaining, but doesn’t need to be as long as it is, and I think it’s likely to be anticlimactic. Tony Daniel’s script is, for the most part, good, and his art is great.
Fables 82 was a good follow-up to the previous arc, though it ends abruptly, and it now leads into a nine part crossover that will force me to buy six comics I wouldn’t otherwise. The things we do for continuity’s sake.
REBELS 2 continues to show promise, but they better get the team together faster. Things could schlep out. And a visit to a familiar but unPC world from DC’s past is a bit jarring.
Booster Gold 18 is just OK. Good ending, but otherwise starting to get a bit dull. I miss Geoff and Jeff.
Spider-Man and the Human Torch in Bahia de los Muertos.
I honestly don’t get why they even put Spider-Man in this issue. Not only did they make Spidey reluctant to even help out Johnny. In fact, throughout most of the issue, Peter behaves pretty much like Johnny would. He’s nothing more than comic relief. And bad comic relief at that.
He’s not allowed to be intelligent, not allowed to in any way solve the problem. All he’s there for is to give Johnny something to talk to, and use, so that Johnny can come out looking smart and capable. Hëll, if he’d just borrowed Johnny his webshooters, he wouldn’t have even needed to be there at all. (and don’t even get me started on the writer once again, nagging about the cost of webbing. Four web cartridges do not cost enough to be worth a months paycheck. The guy used to cary over a dozen of them in the past. And no recession is NOT that bad. No matter what Quesada likes to claim.
I don’t mind an issue focusing on Johnny. And giving him a boost, but the least they should then do, is allow Spider-Man some competence as well. But nope, can’t have any of that.
And it’s not like there aren’t any moments where they can highlight that Peter is normally the smart one. Just take out the moment where Johnny gets information from Reed, and have Peter be the one coming up with that stuff. And in one moment you make Peter look better, without taking away any of Johnny’s accomplishments.
Don’t want Spidey to go along with Johnny to quickly? Then why not, instead of having him nag because he wants to play a video game, have him complain because he has to work and earn money to pay his rent, or you know, because he’s busy with something as Spider-Man? Instant, make Peter look better moment. But nope, what we get instead are moments that make Spider-Man look like an immature jerk who doesn’t care about anyone or anything.
Typical BND bûllšhìŧ. To avoid, unless you’re just a Human Torch fan and don’t really care for Spider-Man.
This issue would have been soooo much better if they’d used the Thing instead of Spidey as Johnny’s back up.
Spider-Man and the X-men p 4 on the other hand was a lot more fun. This series might not be a deep thought, or something I’d come back to again and again, like some other past series. But the portrayals of the characters was ok and I liked the way it ended.
Iron Man
As far as I know, PAD has never written an issue of Iron Man. That might be rather interesting.
This issue: While I like the concept that Tony Stark plans ahead–and it fits the current character–it also is a little too convenient. That said, this issue works for the most part.
I am more impressed with the writing than the plot. Rather than show everything, Fraction treats the reader as having enough intelligence to fill in the blanks between scenes. The story obviously is filling space during Dark Reign, taking place in a short amount of time. But there is still clear movement forward in the plot. It doesn’t feel like filler. I appreciate the fact that he is weaving a story.
My only complaint about the current status quo goes back to how extremis was introduced. The idea that Tony’s suits are slow runs counter to a lot of continuity. The suit he wears in this issue should be enough on par with War Machine to handle the fight. It is nice, though, to see Fraction make it clear that Tony is good at thinking through strategy.
Nice to see Iron Man written with intelligence and direction.
Iowa Jim
And here’s Mr UK playing Tailgunner Jo again… (Thursday is new comics day over here)
Spider-Man – only Spidey stuff I’ve read since OMD is Ultimate Spidey. DC, I’m really only buying Vertigo titles from their lists, plus Legion and now REBELS, which may also get dropeed unless something new and fresh starts to happen.
Highlight of the week; Ex Machina Special 4. I’m really enjoying this book, though do sometimes get the feeling thatthere’s a lot of filler getting in the way of progressing the overall storyline(s).
Wildstorm, meanwhile continues to be a mixed bag. Part of me likes that they actually did something drastic to reboot the WS universe, and I’m greatly enjoying Stormwatch and The Authority, largely because the British writers are channeling a lot of Warren Ellis into these books. WildC.A.Ts, is kind of OK. Really still waiting on the book finding it’s own distinctive voice though, or on the storylines tying it in more to what’s happening with the Authority/Stormwatch stuff. Gen 13… Gen 13 is just plain embarrassingly bad. As a rule, I don’t criticise artists – I can’t draw to save my life, so what do I know – but for a company like WS which basically grew out of some red hot artists to put out a book with such dreadful artwork is really taking irony too far. Fan boy confession of the week; I’m only buying Gen 13 for the four pages of crossover back-up material.
BTW,and OT but can someone turn the “suppress blank lines” option off in here? Swear to God, my eyeballs are starting to bleed from wading through some of these blocks of crunched up text!
Cheers!
Hmmm. Still going through my weekly books. One title did leave me cold. REBELS #2. While the art was quite decent, the writing left me flat. Dox as a character seems to work better as part of an ensemble cast rather than as the lead. I plan to drop the title with next month’s order.
Green Arrow and Black Canary #18 – Unfortunately this title has not been as good as Birds of Prey was when it had Black Canary. And this particular story arc is doing nothing to improve things. I’m not sure how much longer this one is going to stick around. When done right, a title with Black Canary in it is a must read. GA&BC hasn’t been that at any point.
Trinity #41 – As I mentioned last week, I’ve really enjoyed what Jeff Loeb has done with this title. Definitely a lot more hits than misses.
Charlatan Ball #6 – Joe Casey is a must try for me. Whenever he has a new project, I have to check it out. This one never really quite hit the right mark with me however so it is the last issue I ordered.
Hexed #3 – Another of those hated $3.99 books. This one is a limited series however, so I’m a little more willing to fork over the extra money on something that I know is finite (esepcially if it is only 4 issues). This has been a fairly interesting series through the first couple of issues (haven’t read the 3rd just yet).
Soul Kiss #2 – Fiarly interesting premise and the first issue was good enough to bring me back for this one. Marco Cinello’s art also grew on me.
Fables #82 – Definitely one of my favorites reads month in and month out. About as close as it comes to a title I can reliably expect to deliver every time out.
Rebels 2–loved the build up, though it would be better to see team put together faster,
Adam the Blue Marvel 5–a solid end to a good series introducing a character far more interesting than Sentry.
Guardian of Galaxy–eh, good writing and all, but, I never cared for the villain and the senerio isn’t my cup of team.
Battle for the cowl #1 I love the idea but it should only be 3 issues. not thrilled w/ daniels as writer. dìçk grayson should be batman.
Green Lantern Corps 34 is another amazing book. GL & GLC are 2 must reads. The idea of mongul as a vsinestro corp was one i loved from the begining and blackest night will be awesome.
Walking dead just gives you so many twists and turns. i love kirkman.
DMZ has its ups and downs.
Simon Dark 18. this sereis from steve niles and scott hampton was so dark and moody. i feel horrible it was canceled.
REBELS 2 is awesome. i feel bad jim shooter wasn’t given a fair shot, but i love where this series is going.
Rucka the new writer of Action Comics. I’m loving that.
Ghost Rider 33 is very good. Jason Aaron is perfect for gr. read scalped and i guarantee you will all be hooked.
Titans 11. i miss winick but i will give it 1 more issue.
Invincible Iron Man was wonderful.
Fable 82. Fables is the best of vertigo. and vertigo has some great reads like scalped, dmz and northlanders.
Northlanders 15 reminds me of 100 bullets but with swords.
• 
Four comics:
Battle for the Cowl 1 was readable and entertaining, but doesn’t need to be as long as it is, and I think it’s likely to be anticlimactic. Tony Daniel’s script is, for the most part, good, and his art is great.
Fables 82 was a good follow-up to the previous arc, though it ends abruptly, and it now leads into a nine part crossover that will force me to buy six comics I wouldn’t otherwise. The things we do for continuity’s sake.
REBELS 2 continues to show promise, but they better get the team together faster. Things could schlep out. And a visit to a familiar but unPC world from DC’s past is a bit jarring.
Booster Gold 18 is just OK. Good ending, but otherwise starting to get a bit dull. I miss Geoff and Jeff.
Spider-Man and the Human Torch in Bahia de los Muertos.
I honestly don’t get why they even put Spider-Man in this issue. Not only did they make Spidey reluctant to even help out Johnny. In fact, throughout most of the issue, Peter behaves pretty much like Johnny would. He’s nothing more than comic relief. And bad comic relief at that.
He’s not allowed to be intelligent, not allowed to in any way solve the problem. All he’s there for is to give Johnny something to talk to, and use, so that Johnny can come out looking smart and capable. Hëll, if he’d just borrowed Johnny his webshooters, he wouldn’t have even needed to be there at all. (and don’t even get me started on the writer once again, nagging about the cost of webbing. Four web cartridges do not cost enough to be worth a months paycheck. The guy used to cary over a dozen of them in the past. And no recession is NOT that bad. No matter what Quesada likes to claim.
I don’t mind an issue focusing on Johnny. And giving him a boost, but the least they should then do, is allow Spider-Man some competence as well. But nope, can’t have any of that.
And it’s not like there aren’t any moments where they can highlight that Peter is normally the smart one. Just take out the moment where Johnny gets information from Reed, and have Peter be the one coming up with that stuff. And in one moment you make Peter look better, without taking away any of Johnny’s accomplishments.
Don’t want Spidey to go along with Johnny to quickly? Then why not, instead of having him nag because he wants to play a video game, have him complain because he has to work and earn money to pay his rent, or you know, because he’s busy with something as Spider-Man? Instant, make Peter look better moment. But nope, what we get instead are moments that make Spider-Man look like an immature jerk who doesn’t care about anyone or anything.
Typical BND bûllšhìŧ. To avoid, unless you’re just a Human Torch fan and don’t really care for Spider-Man.
This issue would have been soooo much better if they’d used the Thing instead of Spidey as Johnny’s back up.
Spider-Man and the X-men p 4 on the other hand was a lot more fun. This series might not be a deep thought, or something I’d come back to again and again, like some other past series. But the portrayals of the characters was ok and I liked the way it ended.
Iron Man
As far as I know, PAD has never written an issue of Iron Man. That might be rather interesting.
This issue: While I like the concept that Tony Stark plans ahead–and it fits the current character–it also is a little too convenient. That said, this issue works for the most part.
I am more impressed with the writing than the plot. Rather than show everything, Fraction treats the reader as having enough intelligence to fill in the blanks between scenes. The story obviously is filling space during Dark Reign, taking place in a short amount of time. But there is still clear movement forward in the plot. It doesn’t feel like filler. I appreciate the fact that he is weaving a story.
My only complaint about the current status quo goes back to how extremis was introduced. The idea that Tony’s suits are slow runs counter to a lot of continuity. The suit he wears in this issue should be enough on par with War Machine to handle the fight. It is nice, though, to see Fraction make it clear that Tony is good at thinking through strategy.
Nice to see Iron Man written with intelligence and direction.
Iowa Jim
And here’s Mr UK playing Tailgunner Jo again… (Thursday is new comics day over here)
Spider-Man – only Spidey stuff I’ve read since OMD is Ultimate Spidey. DC, I’m really only buying Vertigo titles from their lists, plus Legion and now REBELS, which may also get dropeed unless something new and fresh starts to happen.
Highlight of the week; Ex Machina Special 4. I’m really enjoying this book, though do sometimes get the feeling thatthere’s a lot of filler getting in the way of progressing the overall storyline(s).
Wildstorm, meanwhile continues to be a mixed bag. Part of me likes that they actually did something drastic to reboot the WS universe, and I’m greatly enjoying Stormwatch and The Authority, largely because the British writers are channeling a lot of Warren Ellis into these books. WildC.A.Ts, is kind of OK. Really still waiting on the book finding it’s own distinctive voice though, or on the storylines tying it in more to what’s happening with the Authority/Stormwatch stuff. Gen 13… Gen 13 is just plain embarrassingly bad. As a rule, I don’t criticise artists – I can’t draw to save my life, so what do I know – but for a company like WS which basically grew out of some red hot artists to put out a book with such dreadful artwork is really taking irony too far. Fan boy confession of the week; I’m only buying Gen 13 for the four pages of crossover back-up material.
BTW,and OT but can someone turn the “suppress blank lines” option off in here? Swear to God, my eyeballs are starting to bleed from wading through some of these blocks of crunched up text!
Cheers!
Hmmm. Still going through my weekly books. One title did leave me cold. REBELS #2. While the art was quite decent, the writing left me flat. Dox as a character seems to work better as part of an ensemble cast rather than as the lead. I plan to drop the title with next month’s order.
Green Arrow and Black Canary #18 – Unfortunately this title has not been as good as Birds of Prey was when it had Black Canary. And this particular story arc is doing nothing to improve things. I’m not sure how much longer this one is going to stick around. When done right, a title with Black Canary in it is a must read. GA&BC hasn’t been that at any point.
Trinity #41 – As I mentioned last week, I’ve really enjoyed what Jeff Loeb has done with this title. Definitely a lot more hits than misses.
Charlatan Ball #6 – Joe Casey is a must try for me. Whenever he has a new project, I have to check it out. This one never really quite hit the right mark with me however so it is the last issue I ordered.
Hexed #3 – Another of those hated $3.99 books. This one is a limited series however, so I’m a little more willing to fork over the extra money on something that I know is finite (esepcially if it is only 4 issues). This has been a fairly interesting series through the first couple of issues (haven’t read the 3rd just yet).
Soul Kiss #2 – Fiarly interesting premise and the first issue was good enough to bring me back for this one. Marco Cinello’s art also grew on me.
Fables #82 – Definitely one of my favorites reads month in and month out. About as close as it comes to a title I can reliably expect to deliver every time out.
Rebels 2–loved the build up, though it would be better to see team put together faster,
Adam the Blue Marvel 5–a solid end to a good series introducing a character far more interesting than Sentry.
Guardian of Galaxy–eh, good writing and all, but, I never cared for the villain and the senerio isn’t my cup of team.
Battle for the cowl #1 I love the idea but it should only be 3 issues. not thrilled w/ daniels as writer. dìçk grayson should be batman.
Green Lantern Corps 34 is another amazing book. GL & GLC are 2 must reads. The idea of mongul as a vsinestro corp was one i loved from the begining and blackest night will be awesome.
Walking dead just gives you so many twists and turns. i love kirkman.
DMZ has its ups and downs.
Simon Dark 18. this sereis from steve niles and scott hampton was so dark and moody. i feel horrible it was canceled.
REBELS 2 is awesome. i feel bad jim shooter wasn’t given a fair shot, but i love where this series is going.
Rucka the new writer of Action Comics. I’m loving that.
Ghost Rider 33 is very good. Jason Aaron is perfect for gr. read scalped and i guarantee you will all be hooked.
Titans 11. i miss winick but i will give it 1 more issue.
Invincible Iron Man was wonderful.
Fable 82. Fables is the best of vertigo. and vertigo has some great reads like scalped, dmz and northlanders.
Northlanders 15 reminds me of 100 bullets but with swords.
Joe V.