Archive for December, 2007
December 10, 2007 | Comics
Northlanders #1
Brian Wood, Davide Gianfelice
Vertigo/DC Comics
$3.65/$2.99 US
**** (out of five)
Brian Wood sure has a knack for telling strong stories about people and communities.
His series like DMZ and Local are outstanding because they establish deep and complex characters and, just as importantly, flesh out the places they live in just as in-depth a manner.
Oh, sure, Northlanders — set in northern Scotland in the Viking age in 980 A.D. — is a bit of a departure from the vast cityscapes that Wood’s readers may be used to, but the same formula is there.
This debut issue, drawn in gruesome glory by Davide Gianfelice, follows Sven, a young warrior who has long since abandoned his family’s homeland and now captains a ship on the southern seas, as he returns to the harsh and rugged north to confront his uncle and reclaim what is rightfully his.
With the same grit and depth that makes DMZ such a compelling title, Wood opens up the ancient world in Northlanders in a series that is sure to resonate with modern readers.
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December 10, 2007 | Comics
Salvation Run #1 (of 7)
Bill Willingham, Sean Chen, Walden Wong
DC Comics
$3.65/$2.99 US
**** (out of five)
Welcome to Murder World.
Thanks to the continued death and destruction they reap, the villains of the DC Universe are going on a little (forced) vacation.
Instead of locking them up in the prisons that they so routinely escape from, they are being rounded up by Amanda Waller’s Suicide Squad and transported to a planet on the other side of the galaxy where they can live out their days without harming another innocent soul.
Yeah, right.
With sneaks like the Flash’s Rogues (Captain Cold, Heat Wave, Weather Wizard, Mirror Master), Batman’s baddies (the Joker, Clayface, Mr. Freeze, Killer Croc) and a dozen others, with more on the way, there’s not much chance they’re going to sit quietly.
Now, thanks to writer Bill Willingham and artists Sean Chen and Walden Wong, we all get to sit back and watch the DCU’s version of ultimate Survivor — knowing the winners are going to be supremely pissed off when they figure out how to get home.
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December 10, 2007 | Comics
Wonder Woman #14
Gail Simone, Terry Dodson, Rachel Dodson
DC Comics
$3.65/$2.99 US
**** (out of five)
As the old adage goes: Every comic book writer’s got a Superman story.
Only a select few, however, have one for Wonder Woman.
Gail Simone has made a name for herself as one of the top writers in the industry with remarkable runs on series like Birds Of Prey, Action Comics and Secret Six, but a part of her heart and mind have always been on the Amazon Princess.
She knew that one day she’d get her shot and, thankfully for readers, that day is here.
Simone, along with the husband-and-wife art team of Terry and Rachel Dodson, kicks off her run telling the monthly adventures of Wonder Woman by pitting her in a deadly battle against sentient gorillas and later revealing the Department of Metahuman Affairs has opened a covert investigation of Diana Prince (the warrior’s human alias) and that her Amazon homeland of Themyscira is in danger on two deadly fronts.
Simone’s passion for the character is already bubbling to the surface and her turn telling Wonder Woman’s adventures promises to be epic.
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December 10, 2007 | Comics
Batman And The Outsiders #1
Chuck Dixon, Julian Lopez, Bit
DC Comics
$3.65/$2.99 US
*** 1/2 (out of five)
Desperate times call for desperate measures and nobody knows that better than Batman.
Realizing that the Justice League needs to keep its actions completely above board, the Dark Knight gathers the remnants of the most recent group of heroes to call themselves the Outsiders (Metamorpho, Thunder, Grace, Katana), added a few familiar faces (Catwoman, Martian Manhunter) and created a team that could do some real dirty work.
This debut issue sees the new team infiltrating a high-tech facility that could contain some really nasty radioactive materials — only to discover what they’re really hiding is much, much worse.
Seeing how far Batman and the Outsiders will go in the pursuit of justice ought to make this a monthly book worth reading.
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December 10, 2007 | Comics
Crawl Space #1
Rick Remender, Kieron Dwyer, Tony Moore
Image Comics
$2.99 US
**** (out of five)
Zombies and 70s porno in one sweet series: Welcome to the Crawl Space.
Jenny and Scott are new to the adult movie business and are expecting a few bumps (if you’ll pardon the pun), but they have no way to be ready for a zombie plague that sweeps across Los Angeles and right on to the set of their movie — where one of the undead ends up in the action!
From Rick Remender, Kieron Dwyer and Tony Moore — the former two the minds that brought you the vampire-pirate comic, Sea Of Red — comes one of the sickest, funniest and most wonderfully wrong books of the year.
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December 10, 2007 | Comics
Fearless #1 (of 4)
Mark Sable, David Roth, P.J. Holden
Image Comics
$2.99 US
*** 1/2 (out of five)
The only thing crime has to fear is Fear himself.
Millionaire Adam Rygert, once a painfully anxious child who was tormented by other kids, has learned to conquer his fear using a unique chemical compound developed by his mentor and he uses it along with a high-tech supersuit to battle crime as the hero, Fear.
When his campaign brings him into conflict with a powerful crime family, they villains are determined to strike back and Adam comes face to face with one of his worst nightmares.
Written by Mark Sable, the man behind the highly entertaining miniseries Grounded, and drawn by David Roth and P.J. Holden, Fearless looks to be a real nail-biter of an action-adventure.
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December 10, 2007 | Comics
Proof #1
Alex Grecian, Riley Rossmo, Tyler Jenkins
Image Comics
$3.25/$2.99 US
*** 1/2 (out of five)
Ginger Brown has seen some truly inexplicable things in her job as a New York City cop, but none of it could prepare her for meeting her new partner.
After encountering a real, live (or dead, as the case may be) Golem while trying to break up a diamond store robbery, Ginger’s report on the incident earns her scorn from her superiors, but also catches the eyes of some people involved with a very special agency.
Next thing you know and Ginger has been transferred to Washington state and finds her self face-to-face with a nine-foot tall Bigfoot named John “Proof” Prufrock — her new partner — and the two get their first assignment: Stop a people-hungry Chupacabra (a.k.a. the Mexican Bigfoot) from snacking in a Minnesota state park.
Likeable characters and an interesting setup make Proof a new comic to watch.
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December 10, 2007 | Comics
Teen Titans East Special #1
Judd Winick, Ian Churchill, Norm Rapmund
DC Comics
$4.75/$3.99 US
*** 1/2 (out of five)
The Titans are back in New York City — or at least they were for a few hours.
Vic Stone, a.k.a. Cyborg, is ready to revive the Titans on the East Coast (the current Teen Titans moved out West several years ago), and after getting rejected by longtime members like Nightwing, The Flash, Starfire, Raven, Beast Boy and others, he sets his sights in a new direction.
Thus is born a team made up of Hawk and Dove, Power Boy, Little Barda, Anima, Son of Vulcan and, ahem, Lagoon Boy.
But on the their first training mission — a war game where the new squad tries to capture Power Boy — tragedy strikes and the new team is attacked and left bloodied and broken.
Who will be left to pick up the pieces?
After a pretty solid setup issue, readers now have to wait for the answer in the all-new Titans #1, featuring the return of some of those longtime members mentioned earlier, coming sometime (don’t ask me when) in 2008.
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