Blade of the Immortal; Snake Woman; Superman Confidential

Blade of the Immortal # 120

Hiroaki Samura

I actually started reading Blade of the Immortal in high school, that's how long this book has been going. Even then I was two manga collections behind. But I loved the story then, and I think it's still good now. It's weird to jump back into it now though. In case you're wondering, by the way, Blade of the Immortal is about an immortal Samurai who must kill 1,000 evil souls in order to finally die. The story is actually more about this young girl Rin, and her quest for vengence against a samurai clan called the itto-ryu.

Anyways, it's all done by one man. The art is at times breathtaking. The characters are all fully fleshed out three dimensional characters, and just on the whole it's a very classy tale. It is exceptionally violent however. But it balances that out with many moments of stillness and subtlety. When it is finally done, it would not be at all suprising for it to take it's place next to Lone Wolf and Cub as one of the all-time great mangas.

I don't know if I'd reccomend just jumping right in right now though. This is the 3rd part of a 4 part arc, and the book is extremely jargon heavy, and it can be very hard to follow what is being talked about, and whom. There is a handy glossary in the back, but more often than not I chose to be confused than enlightened with it.

Blade of the Immortal is an extremely quality book. If you like Samurai and really good interesting diverse characters, this is a good book to read. But I would definitely try and catch up first.

Snake Woman #6
Zeb Wells-Dean Hyrapiet

I didn't pick these two books to review together intentionally. I swear. It just happens to be a coincidence that Snake Woman is a book about a god that has to kill the reincarnarated souls of sixty-eight british explorers who desecrated an ancient temple in the 18th century. If she fails to kill all sixty-eight within a single lifetime all are reborn again and she has to start over.

Very interesting premise, and the art while it probably would be more interesting stylized diffrently is good enough. The dialouge is okay. The characterizations...meh.

It's really not a wholey remarkable book. There's nothing wrong with it, and if the premise interests you, you might be interested in reading it. I mean, I can't lie, I'm sort of interested in picking this up again, but not thaaat strongly. It's a good mid level book if you're looking to get something that's not Marvel or DC, and not centered around a white male aryan-type character, or just a Zeb Wells fan.

Superman Confidential #3

Darwyn Cooke-Tim Sale

Good lord there's a lot of good Superman books out there these days. And I'm not even reading The Johns-Donner Superman. Superman Confidential combines the wonderful talents of Tim Sale and Darwyn Cook to tell the story of the first time Superman encountered Kryptonite.

The art for this book is wonderful, and you could really read the book without the words. This is two masterful visual storytellers busting out the fat yarns. Unlike Batman Confidential, both the art and the writing are up to snuff, and if you're looking for a third Superman book the chuck on your shelves this is it.

That said, if you're wondering whether to replace All-star Superman with this, don't. It's a good story, but this is not New Frontier or Dark Knight Returns for either of these creators. It's a nice collaboration, and a good to very good book, but it's really just icing ontop of your superman cake.

With all of this talent working on Batman and Superman, I can only question why it is Wonder Woman, the supposed other part of the big three, hasn't got half the talent working on even one of her books, none of which can bother to come out on time.

If it sounds like I'm complaining...I am.

Justice Society of America # 2; Phonogram # 4; Scalped # 1; Crossing Midnight # 2

Justice Society of America# 2

Geoff Johns-Dale Eaglesham-Ruy Jose

As good as Justice League of America by New York times best-selling author Brad Meltzer is--Justice Society of America is just flat out better. You don't have to know anything about the Justice Society to enjoy this.

If you enjoy superhero pathos, multi-dimensional tighted ones, especially ones that haven't had a billion bad TV shows and movies made about them, this is it for you. Honestly, this book has to be read for the Starman character alone. He's easily my favorite thing about this book. His rambles are brilliantly funny and absurd. He's completely out to lunch, and yet somehow is allowed to walk around spouting off madness left and right.

If you're going to be reading a mainstream DC comics book, or any kind of superhero team book, this is the best one out there. I really don't even have to say much in that direction. It's just accepted now. Everyone knows. This is the best superhero team book out there. Deal with it.

Art looks good too. And if you want to stay with the major DC events this year, this is a must buy book because apparently this is where it's going down.

Phonogram # 4
Kieron Gillen-Jamie Mckelvie

So my favorite book came out finally. After reading the first three issues last month, 30 days felt like a death march through all things eternity. I mean, I worried honestly. I shouldn't have. But I did. Would I still love this book at 4? The ante has been raised on every book, can I make an obvious Spinal Tap cliche here? No? Screw you too.

Anyways, Kieron Gillen broke my brain on this one. Like there was some tipping point in the book where everything I was keeping track of went in on itself one to many times, and I crashed. And what I was left with, was really freaking cool pictures by McKelvie, and really freaking cool words by Gillen. I don't mean it to sound backhanded to say that even an idiot hillbilly could enjoy this book. It's kind of a thing where...do words and pictures stimulate you at all--because this is a full on sexing.

Issue four is basically everything the book's been talking about to this point, made real. And honestly, there had to have been a ton of trepidation about that. It's fun to talk about something as an allusion to what it might be, but to actually go through, show it, and have it live up to what you've been talking around, is exceptional. If either the art or the writing had failed at any time it all would have come crumbling down in a pile of silly mash. That this didn't happen only further illistrates that the cats making this book are on the level.

It'd be silly of me after all of this time to only say buy the book you retarded tree diddler. But that's all I've got.

Scalped
Jason Aaron-R.M. Guera

Jason Aaron only continues to impress. First off, you should be reading his other book The Other Side and now you should be reading his fascinating Sopranos on the reservation book Scalped.

The book follows an anti-hero named Dashiell Bad Horse who has returned to the third world apocolypse that is contemporary reservation life. The book makes no bones about the fact that native americans in this country live in a state that could easily be described as third world. And right in the heart of america no less. The adversarial tone of reservation life towards american government, makes this with The Other Side a timely book.

Honestly if I have a complaint with the book, it's that the art sometimes seems jumbeled. Sometimes it nails it, sometimes it doesn't. The color tones I think take something away from teh story making it look too much like 100 Bullets when it's really something else. The dialgoue of the book, as with his other book, is fantastic though. And the characterizations are exceptionally strong.

I actually like the writing of Scalped more than The Other Side but the artistic visioin isn't quite as strong as Cameron Stewarts. And though I know it's not fair to compare, but hey, what the heck. I am.

If like me you've always found reservation tales compelling, or like hard boiled noirish type stories, this is a good book to check out.

Crossing Midnight # 2
Mike Carey-Jim Fern-Mark Pennington

Crossing Midnight is that japanese story of two twins born on each side of midnight, one with the powers of invulnerablity granted by a japanese god, and the other...not. It's a very interesting change of pace book, in line with a kind of adult fairy tale.

It's not fast paced at all, but everytime you reach the end of an issue, you just have to read the next issue. The most intriguing thing about the book is actually the non-mythological familial disfunction that the story weaves around and through. The book has the blunted feel of a family on the skids.

It's amazing to remember this is the same guy who is writing X-men right now for Marvel, and just makes me more interested to check out Mike Carey's other books. He's not an overt stylist of dialouge like Garth Ennis. Nor are his stories playing crazy and loose with the paneling like a Bendis project. But he's definitely got his own voice. And there are some incredibly clever moments in this book.

It can sometimes feel like a lot of these books just kind of run together in pacing style, Crossing Midnight is a book that takes it's time. It's the assured narrative of a master storyteller. Mike Carey's confidence in this project is what carries it through in it's execution. He makes you believe that your patience in the book will be rewarded, and that you are in for the measured construction of something really beautiful.

In it's own way, it's unlike anything out there right now.

Action Philosophers Giant Book 1; The Killer 2; Punisher War Journal 2

Action Philosophers Giant Size Book 1
Fred Van Lente-Ryan Dunlavey

Oh the halicoyn days of my "I...uh...think I maybe want to sort of major in philosophy" youth. I was so young and idealistic. All those bright sexy young ideas floating around. Yes. Those were the days. Action Philosophers reminds of those funtime special carnival freakshot days. It's got that wide eyed fun of big ideas by big people living in important times.

Backing up, in case it's not self-explanitory, what Action Philosphers is, is a comic that kind of distills about three philosphers or great thinkers down to their essence, and through the magic of comic humor makes what would otherwise be very daunting to understand, very easy to learn. The art is bombastic in that grand old cartooning sense. The jokes for the most part work. But on the whole, what you are in for, is something that at times might feel slightly textbooky. There is definitely a sense reading this book of "hey, wait a minute, you're trying to educate me, aren't you?" But it is a lot of fun.

It's a book that is completely diffrent from what else is out there, and in small doses, is really nice. If you are at all interested in philosophy then this is a great comic for you. If you also like a good humor book Action Philosphers will also appeal to you. You'll be better for having read it, that's for sure. Though your enjoyment level could vary depending on what you came into the book looking for.

The Killer
Matz-Luc Jacamon

This book is just the epitome of french cool. If you love stuff like the Professional, Ghost Dog, Le Samarouai, this book is for you. It mixes all of that into a very cynical world view that isn't afraid to engage contemporary politics(as much as one can be that was originally written in 1998 in France).

Just a really slick book. I've actually reviewed it before, but I wanted to reitterate that if you haven't started picking it up you are missing out.

In this issue we start to see the sanity of our hitman slip. The way this is shown through the art, is very cool. In fact that's the best word for this book. Cool.

Archaia Studios Press puts out fantastic quality books, and this is one of them. Do be reading.

Punisher War Journal # 2
Matt Fraction-Alive Olivetti

The writing in issue two takes a bit of a dive, with a seemingly inconsistent portrayal of Frank Castle, at times to embarrassingly silly degrees. It feels constrained and rushed in the writing. And the voice is not nearly as strong as it was in the first issue. But I can almost entirely blame all of this to being forced to tie into Marvel's Civil War. It's clear Fraction doesn't really enjoy wasting his time under the constrains of what's going on in Millar's book. Fraction's book almost seems to show contempt for the hoops Millar has thrown the Punisher through. The suspension of belief in Civil War that Cap and Punisher would work together that led to probably the best line of the entire series, is basically shredded to pieces in this book as being completely ridiculous. There is a real sense of contempt in Fraction's book when you really get down to it.

The art remains outstanding. I love to just look at this book. I love everything about the art. Even if I didn't have confidence in Fraction pulling this book off, I'd probably still pick it up just to enjoy the art. I mean, it's not like...life changing art or anything. But it's a lot of fun.

Getting back to Fraction though, if you look at the seems of this book, in combination with the stellar debut issue, I think it's clear this is going to be a fantastic run. Fractions vision of the Punisher is a huge contrast to what Ennis is doing, but it is just as compelling. The Bridge character and his pursuit of Castle is one of the best aspects of the book so far. Pretty much everything in this book that isn't shoe-horned into the Civil War story, is excellent, which bodes well for the future of this book. I think much like Ennis, the editors at Marvel will be best served to walk away and let Fraction go crazy.

I think a lot of people who picked this issue up, but not the first issue, might not give it a chance, and that would be a huge mistake. I think Fraction has a big future with the Big Two, and this Punisher run should serve as an effective salvo ushering in a bright new talent(Read Cassanova too, please).

Civil War #6; Strange Girl # 12; Battle Pope # 12

Civil War # 6
Mark Millar-Steve McNiven

If this isn't the most maligned good book out there I don't know what is. It's the book everyone buys to complain about to the smallest of details and I just plain don't understand it. I love Civil War. Not so much the exterior books, I've mostly stuck to the main book, and for my money it's wonderful. Politcal commentary on the state of america and civil liberties and how those things have been dictated by history, just flies off the pages of this book to gobsmack the reader in the face. So many readers are truly upset because the book is not supposed to take sides, but they feel it's slanted against Tony Stark's authoratian regime, which is a stand-in really for Dubya's Neo-Con vision of america and the world. Not to pull their cards, but I imagine most of them are closet republicans, and they deserve to feel a little uncomfortable, a little guilty, a little embarrassed by what's taken place in this country the last several years.

I'd say that's beside the point, and it's time to discuss the comic, but really that's the point of this book. Like Millar's The Ultimates this is not a book to stand idly by on the sideline of. The ad campaign says very directly Choose a Side. You're either for freedom and all the dangers that implies, or you're against it and all the baggage that carries.

My main complaint with Civil War is that in spite of the overly complained about delays, the book is going by too fast. This is a year long story really, like The Ultimates. I just don't see how this can come to a reasonable conclusion in 7 issues. The major battles are condensed to good looking skirmishes because of this. It's a 12 issue book that feels crammed into 7(which I believe is an extension of the original size the series was supposed to run). But aside from that, the writing is terrific--there's a line in here about the Punisher by Spider-man comparing him to Captain America that may be the best line of the whole series to this point--and the art--the art is amazing. So much of this book is being carried in the expressions and body language of the heroes, and McNiven has yet to disapoint. If you got rid of the words, the story would still make perfect sense, which is a testament to Millar-McNiven as a storytelling team.

Only one issue left on this series, so it's hard to say get out and read this right now if you aren't already, but this is basically shaping the Marvel 616 for the next year, and if you want to understand Marvel comics this year, it's a series you need to find time for.

*As good as this is, Millar's The Ultimates is this times better.


Strange Girl
Rick Remender-Nick Stakal

I am really becoming quite the Rick Remender fan. Last week I gave a thumbs up to Fear Agent this week Strange Girl gets the same reccomendation. Granted I don't know much of what's going on with the series, beyond we seem to have this girl, with possibly sorcerous powers, going into hell, to rescue someone she loves, that old tale, with nice little bits cribbed from Dante, it's good stuff.

The art is pretty striking and does a really good job of depeciting the blob of hell that our hero is going into. Narratively speaking, the story is kind of on a loop, which sets a nice tension that underscores all of the interactions. You really do fall into doubt with our hero Bethany.

The book is actually quite diffrent from Fear Agent. It really doesn't have the kind of ascerbic biting tone, and is definitely more gothic in flavor. The mood is entirely diffrent, which is something I like to see, because there's a lot of writers out there who seem to be writing the same wolf in diffrent skins.

But yeah if you're looking for something a little off the beaten path, kind of in that Hellboy type of mold, then this is a good book to check out.

Battle Pope
Robert Kirkman-Tony Moore

Yeah so you can't accuse me of not giving Kirkman every chance to hit me with something I like. For an author I wasn't initially enamored with, I've ended up picking up a lot of his titles, and I've finally found one(well two if you count Ultimate X-Men, though I'm still waiting to see on that) I really like. It's name is Battle Pope. And it's everything you could imagine a book called that would be.

The Pope basically rolls around town, punching people, having sex with loose women--basically the Pope for all intents and purposes is Project Pat. I don't really know the circumstances of the world he lives in, but it's very fascinating, with very incompetent demons running around trying to cause trouble. Santa Claus and Jesus as the Pope's useless deputies. It's a very fun enjoyable book, and really shows off Kirkman's wit, which he also put on display in Marvel Zombies to great effect.

The art by Tony Moore is very nice as well. It's very crisp. The coloring by Staples is really well done as well, in so far as I can judge things like that. But yeah, another really quality image book. There's a lot of them.

Styx Taxi: A little Twilight Music

Styx Taxi is an indie book put out by FWDbooks about a taxi company that picks up the recently deceased and drives them around for two hours before they go to their final resting place.

This collection is a series of short stories that have as their central theme the influence of music. Unfortunately the bulk of the stories seem like they would have done better without the constriction. There is definitely quality work here though and if you're in the mood for a more existential meditative book this is definitely something to look into.

"Sing Along"
Steve Goldman-Dan Goldman

I really enjoyed the art of this short. The concept of kind of a collage of people the drivers deal with is a plenty good one, and it's carried off pretty well. Though the captions with the song verse kind of impeded my ability to feel the weight of the story as a whole. It was hard to see through them to the page narratively speaking, I know they were working in concert with the panels, but I guess I'm not much for reading lyrics in text, and as a central narrative voice for the story, it didn't seem to work as well as you'd want something like that to work.

The little snippets of each person's story worked really well though, and I thought ignoring the captions yielded a more powerful and immediate story, which I enjoyed more.

"A Vita Coda"
Elizabeth Genco-Leland Purvis

This story about the driver Charon's love for a girl who plays the violin in the park has many of the same strengths and weaknesses of the earlier piece, though the art doesn't seem to be as consistently strong. Dom's interaction with Charon seems strange, and the way that he seems to throw a block in front of Charon that directly corresponds to what Charon is desiring is one of those things that you either buy or don't buy, and part of the reason that you don't buy it here is because the issue isn't really masked in anything, because of the compression that this story was put under, there wasn't a lot of room to beat around the bush, yet this is a story that is very much about a mood, and could use more space to stretch out in.

"Encore for My Babies"
Steve Goldman-Rami Efal

The best story of the book, really fantastic art. The lyrics on top of the first person captions on the first page were very difficult to read, and I was glad when it stopped. The dialouge was good, but lacked the succinct brilliance of the first story in the collection. But all in all, definitely the most satisfying story of the collection.

Ultimate Spiderman 1-103; Fear Agent 9; X-23: Target X 1

Ultimate Spider-man 1-103(Entire Run to this point)
Brian Michael Bendis-Mark Bagley

Yeah so the whole run. From an author I kind of really don't like and an artist who draws Mary Jane more like the Green Goblin than his Green Goblin. But I did it. I gave in. Plowed through it. And did it. And you know what sucks? I really enjoyed it. I enjoyed it moreso than any Spider-man story in my entire childhood. This was the Spider-man I had in my minds eye growing up from '82 to present. These were the fumes that I was feeling in those awful Maximum Carnage and Clone Saga days.

Bendis doesn't just get Spider-man, he knocks him out of the park. So much so that even though I think the art is annoying, especially compared to the art in the all-time great Spidey stories, I think this should be the canonical version of Spider-man. Like 200 hundred years from now if I was trying to impart to someone the essence of what Spider-man was and was about, I would give them the wonderful Raimi movies, and this monster of a run.

Don't get me wrong, some things in the run really made me angry. The way Gwen Stacy was handled in the book almost made me stop reading. It's been awhile since I've been that angry at a book. If I hadn't been reading it like a year or two after it happened, I would have written an extremely angry letter.

In fact after that point the series sort of hit a lull. Though Spider-man's interactions with Kitty Pryde were possibly my favorite things in the book. For all his failures with Gwen Stacy, Bendis nails MJ and Kittie Pryde. Maybe he has a thing against blondes? Who knows. But Peter's relationships with both women are incredibly sweet and heartfelt.

But the Clone Saga, which is the current arc. Whoa. The Clone Saga was such a lame thing in the 616 universe, that it got me to stop reading Spider-man altogether. In fact considering what a lull the book was in, I was really dreading coming to it. But this version of the Clone Saga, is possibly the worst most horrific thing to do to a main character in a universe. You basically get to watch every single thing that Bendis has built up into Peter's life over 100 issues get ripped apart in the most cruel manner possible. I mean it's built into the Peter Parker character that he's this guilt ridden kid who always seems to lose even when he's winning, but you almost feel like this is too far. I have no idea how Peter is going to come out on the other side of this arc believably but I am really interested to see him try.

I know there's a lot of doubts about the Ultimate Universe at times, and hell, at times it seems like a horrible idea, because bad writers think it's just their place to simply retell the old stories they read as kids, but the good writers see it as an opportunity to give us something new and dare I say better. If at the end of the day the Ultimate Universe really only gives us Ultimate Spider-man and The Ultimates as enduring works, that's fine, because both may be some of the best most significant pieces to come out of Marvel in 20 years. Even though it's a lot to catch up on with Bendis run, it's very much worth it. A lot of the guy's stuff annoys the crap out of me, but his visions of Spider-man and Daredevil are as good as anyones.

Fear Agent # 9
Rick Remender-Jerome Opena

This was the first issue of Fear Agent that I've read so I'm at a bit of a loss as to how to describe the emotional impact of the things that happen in the book, but I can say it's a book I plan to keep up with. The book can best be described as something like a cross between Batman, Buck Rogers, and the X-Files. It's gritty first person narration combined with lasertastic action against weird aliens.

The art by Opena is very good and really fits the mixture of the above elements. The main reason I plan to keep reading though is Remender's writing, which though at times a little unpolished(mainly though in the form of oddly placed captions, which isn't something I normally notice, but there's a few of them that unnecessarily break up the narration simply for the sake of putting one in a panel) is a lot of fun. There's been discussion on some message boards I post at who should be the next Detective Comics writer after Paul Dini finishes up, and my top two for that gig would have to be either Matt Fraction or Rick Remender. I think either one would do an exceptional job at it. This isn't to say that Fear Agent isn't enough. It's just that I like Remender's writing in Fear Agent so much, I'd like to see it in more books that I read. Because I'm lazy like that. Rather than chase the author, I'd appreciate it if he would just come to the books I read.

Add another one to the pull list. Fear Agent is good for what ails ye.

X-23: Target X
Craig Kyle and Chris Yost-Mike Choi and Sonia Oback

Books like these, with two authors(and in this case two artists as well) make me wish I had a writing partner. I think it'd be a blast. But I digress. Does X-23 qualify as a guilty pleasure? Because I read the first X-23 story, and felt guilty about really enjoying it, and I've got that same feeling here. It's not a life changing meditation on some great universal truth. It's not savagely political. It's just a nice yarn about this cloned from wolverine lonely psycho girl with toe claws.

She of that long line of blank slate psycho girl killing machines. Harboring dark childhood traumas. Hmm...maybe it is savagely political. Perhaps if Kathleen Hanna were writing this book...hmmm that would be cool.

Anywho. The art is really clean nice eye candy, though at times X-23(or "Laura") looks a little wonky. But all in all, like the story solid.

There's nothing truly outstanding about this book. But there's nothing wrong with it either. I will be sticking with it, much like Supergirl because I like the character, but if you're not terribly interested in the character, there's nothing here that would really compel you to bump something else off your list for this.