Reviews of Comics from Wednesday 3/16

This week' we'll be starting off with Dan Grote's review of the first issue of the new series starring everyone's favorite drunken immortal and naive assassin, Archer and Armstrong. Welcome to the Valiant fold, my friend...

A&A: The Adventures of Archer and Armstrong #1

Story by Rafer Roberts

Art by David LaFuente, Ryan Winn and Brian Reber

Sometimes you pick up a comic and you wonder why you waited so long to make it a part of your life.

Matt’s written pretty consistently about Archer and Armstrong, always making it a point to note the book’s humor. As somebody whose favorite comics include Deadpool and Chew, it’s always sounded right up my alley yet somehow just out of reach. Fortunately, this relaunch is extremely new-reader friendly.

There’s not much you need to know going in. Armstrong, aka Aram Anni-Padda, is a millennia-old, bear-sized immortal with a hunger for adventure and a thirst for booze. Obadiah Archer is a teenager trained from birth in every form of combat but is so pure of heart that he substitutes swearing for phrases like “mumble-fudgers” and “Son of a lady dog!” And his sister, Mary-Maria, leads a cult of ninja nuns and is mostly evil.

Pretty darned accessible for characters that have been around since 1992.

In this latest iteration of the title, Armstrong has gotten himself stuck in his bottomless satchel (think Mary Poppins’ carpetbag, but cooler) trying to retrieve a bottle of 1907 Lagavulin whiskey he stole from some Mafia guys in 1953. Because the satchel is left open (Armstrong is tethered to the bed in his motel room by a length of rope), the monsters that dwell inside are free to escape. Archer, who was out making a vending machine run, returns to the room to subdue the monsters and make them watch Maury Povich. He then has the plot explained to him by another creature that escaped the bag, a talking mackerel named Davey who dresses like an old gumshoe.

(It was about this point I decided I was on board.)

Archer dives into the satchel to find his partner, but not before begging Mary-Maria to watch the bag, and not steal it.

Inside the satchel is a giant library out of an M.C. Escher painting, run by goblins of indeterminate gender. Deeper inside is Bacchus, the half-human, half-goat god of wine and merriment, whom Armstrong apparently stuck in the bag thousands of years ago but doesn’t remember, much to Bacchus’ disappointment.

“Whatever, I don’t care. It’s not like I’ve been planning this moment for 3,000 years or anything,” he says when he confronts a reunited Archer and Armstrong.

Nevertheless, he sets his trash golems upon the pair, who now must rely on Mary-Maria to save them. Except she’s already decided to cut the rope and steal the satchel, so whoopsadoodle on trusting her.

The book opens with a flashback showing Armstrong and an old friend punching Mafioso and stealing the plot-driving booze. Mission accomplished, the two rest a spell on a park bench and toast to a job well done.

“Here’s to the successful end of another stupid and poorly planned adventure,” Armstrong says. May all A&A’s adventures be this stupid and poorly planned.

Clean Room #6
Story: Gail Simone
Art: Jon Davis-Hunt & Quinton Winter

I've enjoyed a lot of the recent Vertigo launches, but of them,Gail Simone and Jon Davis-Hunt's Clean Room has been the strongest. This issue, the final part of the first arc, gives us some answers... and asks a whole bunch of questions based on those answers. The past couple issue's plot of Astrid Mueller, self hope guru and knower of mysteries, trapped in a locked room with one of the demons may have ended last issue, but this issue places out series's main character, journalist in just as tenuous a place. The demon, Spark, who possessed one of her neighbors gives Chloe an insight into the suicide of her fiancee, the thing that set her on the quest to find out about Mueller and her cult, but then it... tries to save her from another demon-possessed man, this one called The Surgeon, and when Mueller finds out, she does everything  she can to save Chloe, including revealing her secret plans. We find out what Mueller was doing with the strange Dr. Hagen from a couple issues back, and while I remembered Hagen the minute he was mentioned, I hadn't thought about him since the one scene that introduced him. Simone is a clever writer who knows how to seed hints and backstory so that when it becomes relevant, the reader slaps their forehead and smiles because it all makes sense now. But even with these answers, there are now more questions: are there factions in these possessing creatures? What exactly is their physical home? How did Astird find out about Chloe's ability to communicate with the dead? And what does The Surgeon's final cryptic line mean? The balance between mystery and reveal is hard to keep in a suspense/horror comic, but Simone has it down pat. But on top of this, the emotional life of Chloe is so rich, and her reactions left me feeling deeply for her. And Astrid Mueller remains a mystery to me; even though we got some insight into what she's doing, and why, she moves from reacting with what seems like passion to cold calculation so quickly I'm still not sure how much Chloe, and the reader, can trust her. And Jon Davis-Hunt's art is some of the top notch creepiest I've seen in a while. His distorted, monstrous faces of the possessed make your skin crawl because they balance what should be with what most assuredly not. Clean Room is a great horror comic, and one I'm glad is published by Vertigo: Vertigo started as a horror imprint, after all, and Clean Room belongs in the long line of skin crawling horror that traces back to Sandman and Hellblazer.

Kanan #12
Story: Greg Weisman
Art: Andrea Broccardo & David Curiel

A year's worth of origins story comes to a conclusion in the final issue of Marvel's Star Wars: Rebels tie-in series, Kanan. The animated series has been a great success, getting better with each episode, and this series has been enjoyable; telling the stories of how Jedi Padawam Caleb Dume became rogue Kanan Jarrus feels like the book that embodies the transition from The Clone Wars to Rebels. This issue, set entirely in the present of the series, meaning during the Rebellion era, wraps up all the threads from the series, bringing in the characters that Caleb met as a Padawan and that he met when he first changed his name to Kanan to hide from the Empire, and now having them meet Kanan as an adult, and a master in his own right. Much of the issue has Kanan and his Padawan, Ezra going to save one of those long ago friends. The issue also has a cameo from one of the animated series big bads and features an appearance from an Imperial character from the first new continuity novel, A New Dawn, which was the story of how Kanan met Hera, another of the leads of Rebels. I've always liked when the comics and the novels tie together nicely, and with the new Lucasfilm Story Group overseeing all other media to make one streamlined continuity, I've been hoping for this kind of tight tie-in before, and it's the first time I've seen that kind of tie-in. But most important the little one off issue gives you everything that is good in a Star Wars story: action, aliens, strange worlds, Stormtroopers, and Jedi. I like that even thought this features characters introduced over eleven issues and a novel, the issue stands alone, making an exciting Star Wars adventure.

Steven Universe and the Crystal Gems #1
Story: Josceline Fenton
Art: Chrystin Garland & Leigh Luna

I came late to the Steven Universe party; I only started watching the series a few months ago, deep into the animated series' second season, but fell quickly in love with the deep characterization and the message at the heart of the series, that love is universal and that it brings us together and makes us better than we are alone. And so a new mini-series featuring Steven and his fellow Crystal Gems seemed like a good issue to pick up. For those who don't know the show, Steven Universe is an eternally optimistic half human/half alien boy who spends his time having adventures with the Crystal Gems, aliens who served with his mother to defend Earth from their homeworld that planned to conquer it: confident Garnet, fussy Pearl, and prankster Amethyst. One word adjective descriptors don't do any of these characters justice, as they are all remarkably deep characters. One of the things that makes the series fun is that the Gems, despite being thousands of years old, don't really get the whole human thing, and Steven often tries to explain these things to them, things like birthdays and slumber parties. This mini-series starts with Steven having another of these adventures, this time taking the Gems on a camping trip. The fish out of water aspect as the Gems try to do normal camping things makes for great comedy: Pearl (my favorite character on the show) putting up a tent to be aesthetically pleasing and using all the parts, not realizing there were instructions to make it functional, is the kind of thing that makes for great comedy. The centerpiece of the issue is the highlight of a camping trip for Steven, the telling of scary stories around the fire. Steven's story, a riff on the classic "The call's coming from inside the house!" urban legend falls flat as the Gems overthink the scare. But then Pearl decides to tell the story she and Garnet used to keep Amethyst, the youngest gem, from wandering off when she was younger, the story of the Glass Ghost. The scary stories are colored differently from the main story, and differently from each other, and the muted color palette helps give them a spooky vibe. The issue is well structured, mixing it's scares with its jokes, and a moment with Steven finding broken glass when he went to look for firewood means the story of the Glass Ghost is obviously going to be tied into the real world; I don't think it's a real spoiler to reveal Steven sees a Glass Ghost at issue's end, and it's design is phenomenal. Chrystin Garland perfectly captures the characters looks and designs, and the art is as vibrant as the animation on the cartoon. Steven Universe and the Crystal Gems #1 is a great issue for fans of the cartoon, but works just as well as an introduction to Steven and his friends.

Wrath of the Eternal Warrior #5
Story: Robert Venditti
Art: Juan Jose Ryp & Jordie Bellaire

The first arc of Wrath of the Eternal Warrior took place in the afterlife, and followed Gilad Anni-Padda (younger brother of Armstrong from Archer and Armstrong. Of course, younger is a relative term when they're both over six thousand years old) as he left the paradise where the family he has built over his long life dwells on his quest back to life. This issue is actually a flashback to a time millenia ago, in ancient Mesopotamia. One of the great things about having a long lived protagonist is that you can do this kind of story, a tale of their past that illuminates something about what they are currently going through or will go through soon. Gilad is out hunting when a raiding party finds the village that he is living in and massacres everyone and takes his son. Upon returning home, he finds the wreck of the village and goes to hunt down those who perpetrated the atrocity. During the hunt, the panels have three color schemes: full color for the present of Gilad's hunt, yellow for what he's able to determine of those who killed Janna, his wife, and took Kalam, his son, and red for flashbacks to Gilad and Janna during the time that led up to this. It makes what happened all the more tragic as you understand the choices that Gilad made to lead to having a child with a woman he knew he would outlive, a child he knew he would also outlive. Gilad is the fist and steel of Earth, the guardian of the planet and the Geomancers, the world's guardians, and so it's not often that he is presented as emotional. This series has been building a fuller, more three dimensional Gilad, a tragic hero; here we see Gilad make a decision that there might be more than just that life for him, and we see what comes of it. It's cool to watch him use his skills as a tracker and hunter to find his way to the city of the men who took Kalam, a character we saw in the afterlife, and I think we'll learn more of why Kalam resented Gilad in that world. The art on this issue is decidedly different from the previous arc; Juan Jose Ryp made his bones working with Warren Ellis over at Avatar Press, and his style is informed by those origins: his art is hyper detailed and he draws carnage like few others. His Gilad is a muscled barbarian, befitting the time and setting, and the look on his face as he sees what has been done to those he loves and the cold determination to save his son and revenge himself are chilling. I'm looking forward to see what Gilad does next issue, and I hope that these flashback stories with different artists become a staple of this title. Gilad was my favorite character from the classic Valiant universe, and every issue of this series makes me glad to see him get the series he has deserved since his reintroduction.

Reviews of Comics from Wednesday 4/1

Gotham Academy: Endgame #1

Story: Becky Cloonand & Brenden Fletcher

Art: Jeff Stokely, Clio Chiang, Joy Ang, Vera Brosgol

I firmly believe that scary stories are best told out loud, to a group of people, and in the dark. The communal scare is a binding experience. So, as the Joker's rampage continues through Gotham, the students of Gotham Academy, including series protagonists Olive, Maps, and Pomeline, are sealed up in the school gym in tents to avoid the chaos and share a series of Joker themed tales of terror. Olive tells the tale of a stolen Laughing Mask that haunts the boy who stole it. Professor MacPherson, who teaches history, tells a particularly macabre and gory tale from her native Scotland about the Wandering Jester, who if you don't laugh with him, you become a part of his act straight out the worst of EC Comics. And Olive shares a story told by her mother about Gotham's own version of Bloody Mary, the Smiling Man (a nod to Snyder's conceit in the main Batman title that the Joker is in fact an immortal who has been haunting Gotham for centuries, I believe). Each of these tales of terror is drawn by a different artist, giving them a unique look that still fits nicely with the style of the monthly comic. It's also interesting to see how jaded Maps is, how she brushes off the presence of the Joker as someone who interrupted her cartoons a couple times a year and then as stopped by Batman. When you look at how the adults and the superheroes are all affected by the Joker in all the other tie-ins, this reaction is fascinating: when you grow up with something like the Joker making the world as terrible as it can be, you just get used to it. There's also the mention of another of Gotham Academy's legends, The Custodian, who defends the campus from all threats external to the school, and as some of the people infected by Joker Venom begin to raid the school, a man dressed in antique garb with swords begins to fight them off. And where exactly is Headmaster Hammer in all this? If you've been picking up "Endgame" and not Gotham Academy, or vice versa, this is a great way to get a taste of the other series. And if you haven't read either, and just like a good spooky story, then pick it up.

Graveyard Shift #4

Story: Jay Faerber

Art: Fran Bueno

Jay Faerber and Fran Bueno's tale of vampiric terror, Graveyard Shift, comes to an action packed conclusion in this exciting fourth issue. Having identified where the vampires who turned Hope have been working out of, Liam and his vampire fiancee head to confront them. But Cromeyer, the master vampire, is prepared, and Hope is brought to his photography studio while Liam is brought down into his dungeon. We follow our two leads as they fight very different threats. Faerber sticks to all the classic vampire rules, so Liam come prepared with an arsenal that the cocky vampires don't even search him for, while Crommeyer attempts to lure Hope over to the dark side (Yes, a bad pun, but I stick by it). This was a really well structured series, starting out with an exciting, action filled first issue, then slowly building the world over the next couple issues to set up this final confrontation. It really gave Fran Bueno a chance to shine, showing some great fight scenes, and some really monstrous vampire faces.  When the dust settles, Liam and Hope set off for future adventures to try to find a cure for Hope's vampirism. Yes, that gives away some of how the series ends, but this is a classic monster movie: good is going to defeat evil. And if you are even the slightest fan of vampire movies and tv, you are going to get the biggest smile when you see the last page; I'm not going to give that away. Graveyard Shift was a great horror story in a model that isn't often used anymore: the monsters were villains and the good guys were good guys. If you like The Lost Boys, Near Dark, or The Monster Squad, you can't go wrong with Graveyard Shift.

Guardians of the Galaxy: Best Story Ever

Story: Tim Seeley

Art: Reilly Brown, Iban Coelle, Jacopo Camagini

There are a lot of fans who don't like one shots because, unless they're part of major stories they, "don't matter." And fans of that particular mindset probably skipped this one-shot, and if they did, they missed a very fun comic. Star-Lord and Rocket are in prison, and in a cell together begin telling the story of one of the Guardians escapades; with Thanos on trial for his crimes before a gathering of cosmic entities, like Eternity, Infinity, and the Loving Trilobite ("Living Tribunal! Don't they teach you anything on Earth?"), Nebula is going to help free him, and the Guardians stand in their way. While the guards are distracted, the remaining Guardians are sneaking into the facility for reasons unknown. The bickering Rocket and Star-Lord sequence is a lot of fun, as writer Tim Seeley does a good job of capturing both of their voices. It's also cool to see Nebula backed up by the Graces, a group of female warriors introduced in the run up to the original Annihilation crossover brought together and trained by Gamora in one of her darker times, of which Nebula was a member. This is one of those plot threads I always hoped would be picked up somewhere, and I'm happy to see them used again. Rocket and Star-Lord wrap up their story as the caper works out and the Guardians make their escape, but we then get a different version of the ending, one that is a bit more thoughtful, and continues to draw the relationship between Gamora and Nebula a bit closer to the movie continuity without feeling forced. There's the final reveal of the McGuffin that the Guardians were trying to steal, which is just singularly ridiculous and perfect for the "Guardians as rag tag band" concept that has been their recent shtick. If you enjoyed last summer's Guardians of the Galaxy movie, this is a great issue to give you a better idea of their comic book status quo.

Kanan: The Last Padawan #1

Story: Greg Weisman

Art: Pepe Larraz

While I haven't disliked Marvel's new Star Wars line, I've grown less and less wowed by it. It's not that it's bad, it's just that it doesn't feel like anything new; after twenty plus years of stories set in that period between Episodes IV and V, there's not much new to be mined. But the debut of the first Marvel series set in another time period has rekindled my hope. Kanan: The Last Padawan tells the backstory of Kanan Jarrus, the lead of Disney's well received Star Wars: Rebels cartoon. Set as the Clone Wars are coming to an end, we see Caleb Dume, Kanan's  real name that he abandoned to go on the run from the Empire, and his master, Depa Billaba, leading their clone battalion to retake the world of Kaller from the Separatist Droid Army of General Kleeve. After victory is assured, the Republic forces find themselves less than welcome by the natives, with Kalleran leader Gamut Key downright rude to Master Billaba, something she takes far better than her Padawan. Moving out of the city, we get a thoughtful discussion of how young Caleb is adjusting to being a Padawan instead of just a youngling at the Jedi Temple, how he fits in with clones, like Commander Grey and Captain Styles, and the Jedi's role in the war, something Billaba sees as heading in the wrong direction for the order. We also see more of Caleb as the inquisitive student, an impression first hinted at in the novel A New Dawn, another recent Star Wars tale that shone a light on another aspect of Kannan's backstory. The issue ends on a dark note, as writer Greg Weisman doesn't drag out the suspense leading up to what all Star Wars fans know is coming: Styles receives the transmission from the newly christened Emperor to execute Order 66, meaning next issue will begin Caleb's flight for his life and heading towards becoming Kanan. Greg Weisman, showrunner of the first season of Star Wars: Rebels and creator of one of the greatest modern animated series (Gargoyles) and showrunner of the one of the best superhero cartoons ever (Young Justice), does his usual deft work of establishing character and setting, and gives old fans of the Star Wars Expanded Universe hope that not everything has been forgotten; his reference to Master Billaba being known to be unstable is a clear reference to her fall to the dark side in the novel Shatterpoint. That bit of knowledge, or any foreknowledge of Rebels, is completely unnecessary, though, to enjoy a Star Wars comic that stands up well with many of the Dark Horse tales of the Clone Wars.

Southern Bastards #8

Story: Jason Aaron

Art: Jason Latour

The second arc of Jason Aaron and Jason Latour's southern Gothic, "Gridiron," wraps up the origin of the series antagonist Coash Euless Boss. After the first arc introduced and quickly killed off the character most readers assumed was going to be the series lead, it was an interesting choice to spend the second arc digging deep into the history of the man who killed that character. Aaron's work on Scalped showed that he was fascinated in making all his characters as three dimensional as he can, and so giving us an understanding of who Coach Boss is makes perfect sense. This issue we see the final confrontation between Euless and his abusive father, a confrontation that ends with Euless proving just what he'll do to be involved with football. He gives a speech about why the game matters, why he loves it, and what he loves about it; it's not the winning, it's the beating of the other team, the moment when they're so beaten he can see in their eyes they just want to quit. It's a cold speech, the kind that sends a little chill down your spine. And we see what Boss does to become the young coach, the deal he makes with local mobster Mozel, and how he tells Big, his mentor, that all this is "worth the blood" to be able to be on the field, to be able to do the only thing he's good at in the world. But it's apparent that Big has his misgivings, and the issue ends back at the present where it seems that the events of the first arc and the death of Earl Tubbs, has been the final straw that Big can no longer take. The final pages set up the next arc, as there's another Tubbs headed to Craw County, and there's a storm on the horizon. We might understand Coach Boss, but for me, I sure as hell don't like him, and I hope that storm hits him hard.

And Dan Grote visits Black Bolt in the zero issue of the new title in Marvel's new hoped for franchise...

Uncanny Inhumans #0

Story: Charles Soule

Art: Steve McNiven, Jay Leisten and Justin Ponsor

Uncanny is a loaded word to tack on as the title adjective of the new Inhumans series. It plays into reader concerns about the caste-obsessed subrace supplanting mutants because of movie-rights issues.

But the Uncanny in Uncanny Inhumans doesn’t seem to be so much a shot at Uncanny X-Men as it is an homage to Rick Remender’s first volume of Uncanny Avengers, specifically the subplot about Kang the Conquerer raising the progeny of superheroes.

In Uncanny Avengers, Kang stole the X-Man Archangel’s twin children from a Red Skull concentration camp and raised them to get mutants out of his way so he could rule time properly. In Uncanny Inhumans, Black Bolt – deposed ruler of the Inhumans – asks Kang to send his son, Ahura, into the timestream to save him from the end of the world, aka this summer’s Secret Wars.

The book presents itself as a Black Bolt solo title. We follow him from the streets of Rio de Janeiro, thwarting a crew of poachers hunting terrigenesis cocoons; to New Attilan, where his estranged wife, Medusa, scolds him for past grievances before sending him through a portal; to 1908 Siberia, where Kang is hiding out with Ahura.

The opening of the Siberia sequence is some of Steve McNiven’s best artwork in this issue, as Black Bolt storms Kang’s castle, which is guarded by an army of time-plucked knights and soldiers. When Black Bolt’s done playing games, he whispers “Goodbye” and blows a hole in the wall.

The one real downside to this book is it’s a little heavy on exposition. The poachers explain to each other who Black Bolt is. Medusa recounts recent events. Kang explains to Black Bolt that he is a time traveler as if that were not already evident. And Ahura, moody teen that he is, feels compelled to keep explaining that Black Bolt’s full name is Blackagar Boltagon, one of the more patently ridiculous firsts and lasts in the Marvel Universe.

But first issues have a lot to set up. Writer Charles Soule has built up a lot of good will having written the most recent She-Hulk series, one of this blog’s more beloved titles of the past year, so let’s see where he and McNiven take Marvel’s royal family.