Free Comic Book Day 2016: Where You Should Go and What You Should Read

So, I've done this every year, and I'm going to again this year. Tomorrow is Free Comic Book Day, the annual day when you can go to your local comic book shop and pick up any number of 40 special free comics. This year, as most other years, I will be working up at my old stomping grounds, Dewey's Comic City, where there will be an artists alley, a cosplay contest, drawings, and reps from Valiant Comics. If you're in the South Jersey or Philadelphia area, I also want to recommend heading over to my current store, Stormwatch Comics, for an artist, a sale, and more surprises. No matter where you go, it's gonna be a great time, but I can tell you for a fact these stores do it up right.

Now, as I do every year, here's my little PSA. While these comics are free to you, they aren't free for retailers. They are sold to retailers at a steep discount compared to normal comics, but at the volume they're buying, it's still a lot of money, and that's not counting anything they're paying for advertising and their events. So, it might be nice for you to buy a little something. And while you're at it and getting the free stuff, try something that you normally wouldn't. If you read Marvel and/or DC mostly, try something from Fantagraphics. If Manga is your thing, maybe it's time to sample a superhero comic. The price is right to give something different a shot. I've discovered a couple of my favorite comics, Atomic Robo and The Sixth Gun, thanks to their Free Comic Book Day offerings.

Now, as I also have done each yeah, here are a handful of comics that I think are worth your attention tomorrow.

Legend of Korra/How to Train Your Dragon/Plants Vs. Zombies

One of Dark Horse Comics two offerings this year, this issue features three popular all ages properties, two of which are new to Dark Horse's stable (pun intended). While Avatar: The Last Airbender has been a fixture of Dark Horse's FCBD offerings, this is the first year featuring its spin-off/sequel. The Legend of Korra. The story is set before the time of the series, and is the story of how Korra, the avatar, met her animal guide, Naga, the polar bear dog. It's a short, sweet story, and good for readers not familiar with the world of Korra. While I'm not familiar with the Plants Vs. Zombies games, its story is also accessible. But the highlight of this issue is the How to Train Your Dragon story. The story starts in media res, with the young dragon trainers trapped inside a makeshift shelter with wild dragons attacking them. The story is actually a series of shorts, as each person tells a story of the late chief of the tribe, Stoic the Vast, many of them effecting. What really makes the story is the art by Doug Wheatley, best known for his work on Star Wars comics, whose hyper-detailed characters and especially dragons are a visual treat. This is an all ages book.

Love and Rockets

Love and Rockets is the legendary, long running series from the Hernandez Brothers. Each issue features two unrelated stories, one by each brother. Gilbert Hernandez's stories follow a woman named Luba and her family, from their time in Central America to their time in California. Jaime Hernandez chronicles the lives of Hopey, a former punk rocker, her sometimes girlfriend Maggie, and their extended circle of friends. Love and Rockets is one of those epic pieces of continuing graphic literature that I have always found daunting to dig into, but this issue gives you a good sampling of what the series is like and a good way to judge if it's something you would appreciate and enjoy. This comic is appropriate fro readers seventeen and up.

March

There are few comics being published that I can say are unquestioningly important, but one of them is definitely March, the graphic memoir of Congressman John Lewis and his time with the Civil Rights movement in the 1960s. Two of the three volumes have been released, with the third due out this August. The FCBD issue from Top Shelf/IDW features brief excerpts from each of the three, and they are astounding, with beautiful art and important historical context that feels important in the times we live in. This is appropriate for any age, but I would suggest anyone under a teen read it with parents to answer questions.

Serenity/Hellboy/Aliens

Yes, both of Dark Horse's FCBD issues made this list. Of the three stories, the Aliens one is the one I was least invested in, and was fine for what it is, a bunch of people fighting aliens, which is about what I expect. The Hellboy story is a Mike Mignola written, Richard Corben tale of a younger Hellboy investigating a magic mirror that is said to have demons trapped in it. Mignola knows exactly how to write into Corben's wheelhouse, giving some true, cringe inducing horror. But it's the Serenity story that's an A-plus here. There's still little enough in the ways of stories from the Serenity 'verse that each one is something to be treasured, and this one is a real emotional roller coaster. Left to babysit Zoe and Wash's baby, River tells a story of how the crew gathered and their travails as a fairy tale to the baby; picture a Firefly version of the classic "Kitty's Fairy Tale" issue of Uncanny X-Men and you'll get the idea. Told from River's point of view, the story is as telling of what River thinks about the others on the crew and herself as it is of the story itself. If you've heard how great Firefly/Serenity is and you've wanted to dip your toe in, this isn't a bad place to start. This book is good for teens on up.

Valiant: 4001 A.D. Special

Valiant put together a sampler of many of their recent high profile releases for FCBD this year, along with a prequel to their new event series, 4001 A.D., which launched this week. This issue is strong because of the sum of its parts; no one story really carries the books, but if you've been curious about trying Valiant's output, or expanding what you're reading, this is a good place to start. The 4001 A.D. story does a good job of setting up the stakes of the new event, and the four previews include three books that have been well reviewed on this very blog: Archer & Armstrong, Divinity II, Faith, as well as a fourth preivew for an upcoming arc from Bloodshot Reborn. I am constantly impressed at how well Valiant holds together a coherent universe while not making it feel like you have to read any more than the titles you want, and the samples here stand on their own and are all of slightly different flavors, so you should be able to find something for anyone in here. This is a book I'd recommend for teens and up.

Reviews of Comics from Wednesday 2/24

Faith #2
Story: Jody Hauser
Art: Francis Portella, Marguerite Sauvage, & Andrew Dalhouse

The second issue of Faith is as absolutely enjoyable as the first, making it one of the most fun books on the racks right now. Having survived the explosion from the end of the first issue (not a surprise, as the comic is named after her after all), Faith now has an even more personal stake in hunting down the people who are kidnapping psiots. But Faith has a whole other life as Summer Smith, and she's not willing to give up her secret identity, so she also has to deal with work. And her boss at Zipline assigns Summer a takedown piece on Torque, who unbeknownst to the editor is Faith's ex-boyfriend, superhero turned reality star. Before I talk about that, I want to mention we're also getting a better feeling for what's happening to the kidnapped psiots, with them imprisoned somewhere surrounded by wealthy and beautiful people, once of whom seems to be sympathetic, but most who are vapid and unfeeling. Combine this with Torque not being willing to help Faith hunt down the missing psiots and his stereotypical reality star girlfriend, and we're seeing a theme of the callous upper class and society in general standing contrasted with Faith's caring. Faith also has her Torque piece rewritten by her boos because it didn't have enough bite, and the police aren't investigating the disappearance of Sam, the young psiot who Faith has been looking for. The fact that he disappeared when going to a fandom event gives him a kinship to both Faith and the readers, the majority of whom I'm sure have all gone to some convention, signing, or the like. But it's not all Faith at work and investigating. While doing that, Faith is discovered by the people who are hunting psiots, and Faith's relative naivete when it comes to secret identities (it's not the same as in the comics), gets her in quite a bind at the end of the issue. Faith is wonderfully well rounded character, so genuinely good, but with her own foibles and doubts, and the fantasy sequences drawn by Marguerite Sauvage are a great window into her head. Jody Hauser not only does a great job of giving us a well rounded heroine, but the references to Faith's previous adventures are not so dense that readers who have no previous exposure to the character get lost, but are tantalizing enough that its making me want to track down Harbinger trades. Faith #2 has a great balance of superheroics and character, and continues to build a mystery that has me waiting on bated breath for the next issue.

Hellboy and the B.P.R.D.: 1953- Beyond the Fences #1
Story: Mike Mignola & Chris Roberson
Art: Paolo Rivera, Joe Rivera, & Dave Stewart

I'm fairly sure I've said this before, but in case I haven't, Hellboy and the B.P.R.D. is a breath of fresh air in the overwhelming gloom of the current Hellboy-verse status quo. I love the stuff set in the present too, but everything there is so dire, so end of the world. We're around sixty years before hell on Earth here, so while there is still danger, things are allowed to be lighter, and Hellboy has always been the brightest light in these books, full of quips, humor, and more humanity than most humans. This mini-sereis sees Hellboy, Agent Susan Xiang (the psychic who shared a spotlight with Hellboy in the Hellboy Winter Special), and Agent Jacob Stegner to investigate what may be a monster killing children in Pasadena, California; children and pets have been disappearing, and the first adult victim has been found savaged, so the possibility of monster calls for the B.P.R.D. Xiang and Stegner are perfect opposites: Xiang is a person who tries to reach out to others and cares, enhanced by her natural empathic abilities, while Stegner is a sarcastic bastard who doesn't demonstrate the smallest amount of empathy. The mystery deepens as a scientist at local lab appears to have stolen a sample of enkeladite, an extradimensional mineral introduced in B.P.R.D.: 1948. The real charm of this issue is seeing Hellboy interact with kids. In the Hellboy comics, Hellboy was never a secret like in the movies, so he's a well known personality. As the cover above hints, Hellboy is popular with kids, and a bunch of them come looking for autographs, and when Hellboy gets away from them he finds a boy crying because his dog has gone missing, and Hellboy does his best to comfort the boy. It's a charming scene, and I've become so used to Hellboy dealing with monsters and the damned, I forget how good he is with people. It's nice to see this current series tying in aspects from the earlier B.P.R.D. series set in the '40s and the previous stories with Xiang; it adds to the tapestry of Hellboy's universe. This series is drawn by Paolo Rivera, a newcomer to the Mignolaverse, and just... wow. I love Rivera's work on Daredevil and The Valiant, and he absolutely hits a homerun here. His style isn't as moody and expressionistic as many artists who have worked on Hellboy comic before, but this story, set in the suburbs and much of it in the daytime, works with his more realistic style, but that's not to say he can't draw weird. The two page spread of Stegner and B.P.R.D. agents fighting monsters in 1948 is a sight to behold, and the monster at the end of the issue is not what I would have expected but looks great. I'm happy that there's more Hellboy out in the world, and if you're looking for a good Hellboy story that isn't heavy on the continuity, this is a great choice.

Orphan Black: Helsinki #4
Story: John Fawcett, Graeme Manson, & Heli Kennedy
Art: Wayne Nichols, Fico Ossio, & Sebastian Cheng

Orphan Black is one of the tensest shows I've ever seen on television, one that slowly ratchets up that tension to keep readers on the edge of their seats and asking all sorts of questions. The current tie-in mini-series, detailing events hinted at in the series, about a clone massacre in Helsinki,
has reached the point where the tension has my skin crawling in a good way. Our protagonist clone, Veera, has been captured by the people who are conducting the clone experiments, and the beginning of the issue is the action part of the issue, as Veera and Jade, a clone who has been kept at the facility and tested, make their escape. And once their escape has been made, the two of them, along with Niki, a third clone attempt to bring the cloning experiments to light. Even though I know the inevitable ending of this is going to be ugly, it's exciting to see the slow build, as the clones attempt to get out from under the Dyad Group, and the monitors close in. Series writer Heli Kennedy, working with Orphan Black creators John Fawcett and Graeme Manson, have created a group of new clone characters that the reader can really engage with and care about, and that is going to make their eventual demise all the more painful, and matter all the more. The comic also takes us deeper into the relationship between self-aware clone Rachel, who works for Dyad, and Ferdinand, the cleaner (the nice term for their corporate killer) who works for them. The relationship was made clear in Ferdinand's appearances in the TV series, but seeing exactly how Rachel played him and got her to submit to her desires gives more dimension to both characters. Helsinki is a worthy addition to the mythology of Orphan Black, and a must read for any fan of the show.

Rick and Morty #11
Story:
Art:

A lot of tie-in comics try their hardest to capture he feeling of their source material, and while the hit to miss ratio feels better recently than in the past, its really rare to find an issue of a comic that feels like it could have been an episode of its source material. The Rick and Morty series from Oni is one hat pretty much always hits, and this week's issue is so delightfully and perfectly warped, it captures all the flavor of the series. As is standard in an episode of R&M, there are two plots here, a Rick and Morty plot and a plot revolving around the rest of the family. Rick and Morty's plot, while definitely the wackier, is he less character-centric here. Rick enrolls Morty in a virtual alien high school so he can get through the whole high school experience in one day. Of course, as with everything Rick has Morty do, there's way more danger involved here. Every time Morty fails, he has to rerun the lesson until he gets it right. A particularly funny one involves a little... risky business, shall we say. And just when Morty tells Rick to go shove it and seems to be making out OK on his own, well, things get kinda lethal and there's a callback to what seemed like a throwaway line a the beginning of the issue that comes back in a hilarious fashion. The b-plot, which is far more strange and character driven involves Morty's sister, Summer, and their hapless dad, Jerry, going full on Freak Friday thanks to messing with Rick's tech. Instead of having some great adventure together where they come to understand each other better, Jerry takes Summer's friends on a camping trip which seems to go over well, and Summer, well, she gets a call from Beth, her mom, who is ready for, "Beth and Jerry's Crazy Sexy Weekend Part two: Naughtytown for Me and You." We cut away from that pretty quickly, but the end of the story, and Beth's reaction, indicates nothing untoward happened, and that seems to have improved things between Beth and Jerry. The look on Summer's face as she glares at Jerry once they're back in their bodies is one of the best panels in the issue, as is Morty's reaction to Rick once Rick tries to get all sentimental on him. That sort of unexpected twist on the usual emotional beats of a family story is central to Rick and Morty, as is the warped takes on classic sci-fi tales, two things this issue has in spades and makes it perfect reading for fans of the show.

And Dan Grote reviews the much delayed and anticipated return of Warren Ellis's Karnak...

Karnak #2

Story by Warren Ellis

Art by Gerardo Zaffino, Antonio Fuso and Dan Brown

A personal matter in the life of artist Gerardo Zaffino sidelined one of All-New, All-Different Marvel’s first books, but writer Warren Ellis’ latest jerk protagonist is back with an issue that is almost entirely action.

Zaffino and co-artist Antonio Fuso make up for the wait with an issue full of martial-arts ultraviolence. Necks get snapped, faces get bashed in, eyes get gouged out and guns are shattered with the wave of a hand, all in a blur of action lines and hatch marks. Little seems to stand still. Everything, and nearly everyone, is destroyed.

Oh and hey, there’s a story, too.

Karnak, at the behest of SHIELD (see last issue) has been tasked with going after an AIM splinter cell that has kidnapped a boy who underwent terrigenesis – the transformation by which Inhumans acquire their powers – only to find the process did little more than clear up his allergies. The baddies’ base is run by a priest who claims the boy is a messiah who went with them of his own volition.

Also, said priest can make guns out of zen, which wins the award for Most Warren Ellis Thing This Issue.

Karnak dispatches the priest, but the boy is nowhere to be found. Before Karnak kills him, the priest tells him the boy is someplace called the Chapel of the Single Shadow, promising his killer a journey of discovery.

A flashback at the beginning of the issue reveals there’s some discovery to be had. We see a young Karnak stacking blocks while his parents – off-camera – argue about whether to expose their son to the Terrigen Mists, mostly because it didn’t work out so hot for his older brother, Triton, the merman-looking one. The priest knows this about Karnak, calls him “The Fake Inhuman.” The issue ends with Karnak alone outside a German bistro, watching couples do couple-y things on the street. Does a man who finds basic human needs a weakness still feel those needs himself? Hopefully we don’t have to wait another four months to find out.

Reviews of Comics from Wednesday 1/27 Part 1

Lats week was such a big week of comics, and I liked so many, that I decided to divide up the reviews into two days! Today, there will be reviews of books from DC & Dark Horse, and come back tomorrow for books from Image and IDW...

Black Canary #7
Story: Brenden Fletcher
Art: Annie Wu & Lee Loguhridge

Black Canary is one of the best books to come out of DC's most recent wave of titles (the other one will be popping up in a review a bit farther down the page), and the final issue of this first arc is a great example of everything this book does right. The origins of the mysterious Ditto are revealed, and it's a crazy sci-fi concept that still feels perfectly right in a comic that is mostly grounded in some of the more real aspects of a superhero universe. The thing that keeps the book grounded are the relationships between the characters. Despite Ditto having a seriously wacky and awesome sci-fi origin, the fact that everyone cares about her so much that it keeps them all grounded. And when Dinah tells the others to leave, that she's the one who will stand to defend Ditto against what is coming, no one else goes because, to quote Lord Byron (the band member, not the poet), "We're more than a band now, Dinah. We're a team, for better or worse." That journey, to be more than just a group of people driving around in a van, has been the core of this arc. And it's Ditto that allows everyone to come to a peace not just with each other but with their enemy, Bo Maeve, who also cares about Ditto. The origins of the band, why they're together and who brought them together, makes perfect sense in retrospect, as well. It's nice when the mysteries at the foundation of a book come together so nicely, and the answer about how Maeve got her powers and why it seemed like the same people helping the band were also working with their enemies. I also have to stress how impressed I am that Brenden Fletcher found a way to make me really like Kurt Lance, a character whose appearances in Team 7 and Birds of Prey made me think of him as a convenient plot device more than a character. The relationship between him and Dinah makes sense after this issue; you see that he's more than just some spy guy, but a decent man who really cares about people and is clever. There is a good potion of the issue that is a battle of the band against a creature called The Quietus, a thing that eats sound, and so much of the issue is silent, and Annie Wu, whose work has been astounding so far, steps up with her best work on the book. The Quietus itself is a great design, a roiling maelstrom on feet, and the sequence where first the band fights the monster with music and when Dinah and the mysterious white ninja attack the thing more physically are great. You can follow the action perfectly without any guidance of text, and it's exciting to watch. Not like any other book on the stands right now, or any other version of the character, Black Canary is a great book that had an ending to its inaugural arc as exciting as everything that lead up to it.

Grayson #16
Story: Tom King & Tim Seeley
Art: Mikel Janin & Jeremy Cox

After a detour into the "Robin War" crossover, Grayson returns to its standard form, a wall to wall international espionage action with plenty of joyful cheesecake shots of its lead. I'm sure we'll get some answers in the future about Dick's role with the Parliament of Owls, but as much as I'm curious where that goes, I'm glad Grayson returned to tie up the threads about Dick's war with Spyral, his previous employer. The majority of the issue is Dick and The Tiger, also known as the former Agent One of Spyral, both of whom have gone rogue and know something is rotten in Spyral progressively taking down one Spyral agent after another and bantering. The bantering is mostly from Dick, granted, as the Tiger really doesn't banter, but is more talkative than Batman, who usually is the recipient of Dick's friendly banter, and his grumping back at Dick is almost as funny as Dick's jokes. There is some really phenomenal art in this issue, including a Dick and Tiger walking out of the water shot right out of James Bond movies, and the montage accompanied by Dick singing his personal theme song set to the tune of "Goldfinger" also intentionally evoke Bond, and that theme song will be caught in your head. For days. DAYS. The few scenes that aren't Dick and Tiger's excellent adventure are dedicated to Matron, Helena Bertinelli, the current head of Spyral, growing more and more frustrated by Dick and Tiger's exploits. There is also a meeting of the Syndicate, the best spies in the world, who we have seen hints of, but now who stand revealed, and who will go after Dick and Tiger soon, and they're a group of pretty big names who I'm excited to see in action. To stand against them, Dick makes a seeming deal with the devil, but I won't say who that devil is; you'll have to read the issue to find out. Grayson is getting more exciting with each issue, and I'm curious to see what happens when Dick finally faces down Spyral. Because after all, he's Grayson. Dick Grayson.

Hellboy Winter Special
Story: Various
Art Various

While nobody writes and draws Hellboy and his world like Mike Mignola, but one of the best things about the whole universe is the different visions we get from other artists and writers, and so these occasional Hellboy anthologies allow for some new visions. The Hellboy Winter Special features four stories (well, three and one two-page gag strip) that bring some new creators into Hellboy's world and lets them tell stories of the Hellboy universe's past.

Broken Vessels (Story by Mike Mignola & Scott Allie; Art by Tim Sale and Dave Stewart): One of the stories set farthest back in the history of the Hellboy Universe, the story finds the original wielder of a magical blade that has been featured in B.P.R.D. back in the ice age running a foul of a sorcerer talking about the mystical Vril energy and then fighting ghosts. It's the first time Tim Sale has drawn the Hellboy universe, and the story is well suited to his dark and moody style

Wandering Souls (Story by Mike Mignola & Chris Roberson; Art by Michael Walsh & Dave Stewart): The longest of the stories in the anthology, this story takes place right in the middle of the current Hellboy and the B.P.R.D.: 1953 series of one-shot and minis. Hellboy and Agent Susan Xiang are on a mission in Wyoming to investigate a haunting. They follow the local sheriff, who is quickly possessed by the ghosts, and while Hellboy fights him, Xiang communicates with the spirits to learn about why they're haunting, and we see that this isn't a simple case of angry spirits who need to be smashed. Chris Roberson will soon be taking over as regular co-writer of Hellboy and the B.P.R.D., and if this is any indication, he'll it in just fine, and Michael Walsh is one of my favorite artists in comics right now, and I;m glad to see him working on Hellboy.

Mood Swings (Story: Chelsea Cain; Art: Michael Avon Oeming & Dave Stewart): Novelist Chelsea Cain steps up to tell a story about Christmas with Hellboy, Prof. Bruttenholm, and a teenage Liz Sherman. And the only thing scarier than a teenager is a teenager who can burn you alive with a thought. And when her Christmas present from the professor doesn't go over well, Liz runs into the woods, where a sweet gift of a ring of festive snowmen from Hellboy turns horrible when they're possessed. Michael Avon Oeming draws some really creepy monster snowmen until, well, just think about a pyrokinetic fighting snowmen. Guess who wins, and it makes me want to see more stories of teen Liz.

Kung Pao Lobster (Story & Art: Dean Rankine): A two page gag strip where Lobster Johnson orders Chinese food, and, well weird stuff happens. It's a funny little story, and that's pretty much what you can stay about it.

None of these stories require any previous knowledge of Hellboy and his world, so if you're a new fan, a lapsed one, or one of the faithful, this is a great one-shot to check out.

Scooby-Doo Team-Up #14
Story: Sholly Fisch
Art: Dario Brizuela & Franco Riesco

When telling Scooby-Doo stories, the trick to keeping them fresh is not changing the formula, but finding ways to play with that formula for fun effect. Sholly Fisch's Scooby-Doo Team-Up always finds a way to take the Mystery Inc. gang, have them meet superheroes, and make it feel fresh while not violating any of the tropes of either world. When the gang gets invited on a cruise ship because of monster problems, it turns out the monsters are, shock of shocks, guys in suits, and with the help of Aquaman, they easily catch the undersea robbers. But pretty soon, it turns out this was all part of a plot by Aquaman's arch-enemies, Black Manta and Ocean Master, to distract Aquaman so they can conquer Atlantis. There's an homage to a classic Aquaman story, with Black Manta having kidnapped Aquaman's baby son, Arthur Jr., but being this is an all ages comic, the ending is much happier than in the DC Universe. There are cameos by much of Aquaman's classic supporting cast, including Aqualad, Tula, Topo the Octopus, Tusky the Walrus, and royal adviser Vulko, who is drawn way more ripped than I have ever seen him; animation treats Vulko pretty well. There are the usual gags with Scooby being a coward and Shaggy having the munchies, but the best classic Scooby-Doo gag that gets twisted here is Freddy continually trying to unmask villains underwater, and Velma and Aquaman having to remind him that if he does, these people will, well, drown. Oh, Freddy...

We Are Robin #8
Story: Lee Bermejo
Art: Jorge Corona, Rob Haynes, & Trish Mulvihill

The other highlight of the new DC titles, We Are Robin, also comes out of "Robin War" with a clean playing field and a new menace on the horizon. The focal points of this issue are two characters, our normal series lead, Duke Thomas, and Johnny Bender, a young man leaving juvie who after a failed surgery to solve facial paralysis is left with a permanent grin. And it should surprise no one that a Gotham kid with behavior problems and a fixed grin is going to idolize not Batman but his opposite number. We do see the other principle Robins being watched over by Alfred (I especially like Andre working out his anger in Midnighter cosplay (I'm trying to think what Midnighter's junior partner would be. The Nooner? Kid 10 p.m.?), so it's still an ensemble, but we're mostly following Duke and Bender. Duke is still on the quest to find his parents, and SPOILERS, he does find them. This kind of caught me off guard, since the end of the last issue of Batman teased Duke finding his parents, but this is his home book at this point, I suppose. It's a bittersweet reunion, as they are still effected by the Joker's toxin and don't remember Duke. Joe Corona draws the scene with true pathos, as you can see Duke's joy turn to pain and you watch his heart break. Meanwhile, Bender's reunion with his parents is no better. They're clearly pretty terrible people, superficial and unpleasant, and it's easy to see why their son looks for someone else to look up to, and unfortunately it has to be Joker. His decision to kill his parents is not surprising, as his narration has been disquieting since page one, and the pages and story are structured to really set Duke and him as opposite numbers in their own right. Between Batman and especially here in We Are Robin, the character work on Duke Thomas has made him and engaging and worthy member of the Batman family, and so giving him an archenemy seems like the next logical step. This clearly feels like it's the beginning of the Jokers, a gang that has its roots in Batman Beyond (yes, they're Jokerz there, but that's such a '90s future thing), and since so many of the aspects of that show have been entering the DCU since Convergence, it makes perfect sense and seems appropriate in this title. This is the beginning of the second arc for We Are Robin, and a great place to jump on.

Reviews of Comics from Wednesday 10/28

Batgirl #45
Story: Cameron Stewart & Brenden Fletcher
Art: Babs Tarr & Serge LaPointe

I love an October wedding, probably because I had one myself. This month's issue of Batgirl features the wedding of Barbara's best friend and former roommate Alysia, and her fiancée, Jo. And fortunately, since neither of them are actual super people, there is no supervillain attack. That's not to say everything goes off without a hitch, because Barbara is maid of honor and has brought her new boyfriend, Luke Fox, formerly he superhero Batwing and son of Batman's ally Lucius Fox, as her date just as Dick Grayson shows up unexpectadly to have a talk with Barbara. Dick's return to Gotham and "from the dead" has been handled very deftly in Grayson and Batman & Robin Eternal, and this issue takes a different, but no less important and emotionally resonant, turn with it. Because Dick has come back to woo Barbara, and Barbara will have none of it, so Dick lifts Alysia's wedding ring pre-ceremony, and has Barbara chase him. And when they stop, he gives a very heartfelt speech about how she's the rock that's kept him going while he was embedded in the spy organization Spyral, goes in for a kiss, and... Barbara shoots him down. I love Barbara and Dick, they're one of my favorite comic book couples, and I'm happy Gail Simone gave the pre-Flashpoint versions a happy wedding in Convergence, since in this case, Barbara is completely in the right. Dick's actions are selfish, and are making a day that should be about Alysia and Jo about him, and this is not at all out of character for Dick, who loves grand gestures and big moments, but has never been too good in the day-to-day of a relationship. And I'll be honest, as much as I want to dislike Luke Fox for getting between them, Stewart and Fletcher have made him incredibly likeable and a good match for Barbara. And so the two make peace as friends and part ways, with Barbara having outgrown Dick as he is now. The art from regular series artist Babs Tarr is even more astounding than usual this issue, not just in the chase between Barbara and Dick, which she draws beautifully (and can we get her to draw some more Grayson? She has such a great sense of motion she's made for Dick's acrobatic style), but the actual wedding sequences are gorgeous. Alysia is a lovely bride, and the designs for all the dresses and outfits are perfect. I've always been a fan of quiet, character based issues breaking up the action in between big superhero battles, and Batgirl #45 is one of the best I've read in years.

Black Magick #1
Story: Greg Rucka
Art: Nicola Scott & Chiara Arena

Greg Rucka is one of my favorite writers period; his comics thrill me every month, and his novels are some of the ones I look forward to the most each year. And so a new creator owned Rucka series from Image, with art from Secret Six artist Nicola Scott, was high on my list of new series I was looking forward to this year. And the first issue of Black Magick did not disappoint. Rucka is a writer best known for writing in the crime, spy, and thriller genres, bringing touches of these even into his superhero work, and like his other creator owned series for Image, Lazarus, a near-future dytopian political thriller, Black Magick is a genre bender, a mix of police procedural and occult thriller. The first issue is all about mood, atmosphere, and establishing our protagonist, Rowan Black. The issue starts out at a witches' ceremony, with chanting and a circle, drawn in black and white, timeless and all sorts of creepy until a cell phone goes off, breaking not just the ritual, but the sense that this could be any time, firmly rooting it in the now. The phone belongs to Rowan, and she is being called away for work; Rowan is a police detective, and a hostage taker is demanding to talk to her and only her. The book moves immediately from the supernatural atmosphere seamlessly into a police stand off, as Rowan and the hostage negotiators talk to the nameless man who is holding four people hostage, demanding Rowan come in and talk to him privately. It's not a scenario unique to this comic, it's something that anyone who's a fan of crime drama has scene many times before, but Rucka handles it well, letting the reader get to know Rowan through how she interacts with the other officers and the criminal. And once she gets in, and the hostages get out, things get supernatural again, as the man, who refuses to let Rowan have his name, knows that she is a witch, and has been sent by someone or something, something that is in his head, to kill her. Rowan is able to cast a spell to stop her own death and turn it on him, but there are a lot of questions left, about who sent him and what Rowan means when she calls someone at the end of the issue to tell him that it's starting again. Nicola Scott's art is even better than I remember from Secret Six, and only helped by the "black and white with just the occasional hint of color" coloring she did along with color assists from Chiara Arena. And as with Lazarus there is extensive backmatter that aids in the world building that Rucka is starting. Oh, and as an aside, there was also a new issue of Stumptown, Rucka's private eye comic, from Oni this week that is also definitely worth a look. There are few writers who do crime comics like Greg Rucka, and Black Magick's blend of supernatural and crime is a nice twist on his crime work that's fresh and innovative.

Hellboy and the B.P.R.D.: 1953-  The Phantom Hand and The Kelpie
Story: Mike Mignola
Art: Ben Stenbeck & Dave Stewart

The current realities of the world of Hellboy and his allies are pretty grim: Hellboy is dead and in Hell, the B.P.R.D. is fighting the Black Flame and the giant monsters that ravage the world, and Abe Sapien is still on his walkabout, unsure of what he truly is. Those of us who have ben long time fans of Hellboy and his friends remember a time when things were a little more whimsical, when we regularly got stories like "The Corpse" and "Pancakes" (this isn't a condemnation of the current era of Hellboy stories, just a statement about their evolution). This new one-shot, going back to Hellboy's earliest days with the Bureau of Paranormal Research and Defense, hearkens back to some of those earlier stories, as in "The Phantom Hand," where Hellboy heads off to England with his mentor and father figure, Prof. Trevor Bruttenholm, and Bruttenholm's friend, paranormal researcher Harry Middleton, to investigate the case of a hand that roams the night on its own. The story of the hand's origin is a dark one, as few Hellboy stories are that light, but when Hellboy and the hand start to fight, it becomes a big brawl when what has been animating the hand comes out. It's fun to see Hellboy just punching the crap out of something, and equally fun to see Bruttenholm's frustration with Hellboy's, shall we say, hands on approach to paranormal investigation. The second story in the issue, "The Kelpie," is a tale of Bruttenholm and Middleton as young men, heading out of their first paranormal investigation with a third man, Billy Connolly, and how this ties in to the Celtic myth of the Kelpie, a horse that lives beneath the sea. It's darker than "The Phantom Hand" but does what a lot of great Hellboy stories do, which is tie classic myths into the modern world of Hellboy. Kudos also must go to artist Ben Stenbeck, who worked with Mignola on many of his Baltimore comics (stories of Lord Baltimore, the vampire hunter, not the city of Poe and bird themed sports teams), who draws a great Hellboy, some excellent demons, and one creepy horse monster. If you enjoy Hellboy stories, but have shied away from the epic stories running through the current titles, this is a great one-shot to get some old school Hellboy action.

Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #1
Story: Ryan North
Art: Erica Henderson & Rico Renzi

After a short hiatus, Squirrel Girl is back in her second ongoing of this very year, a point both the cover and the narration in the bottom gutter, Ryan North's answer to rollover text in web comics, make. There's a lot to love about Squirrel Girl, both the comic and the character, and one of the great things is how self-aware it is. There's this joke about number one churn, and another about how Squirrel Girl is not biologically or LEGALLY a mutant, which some have taken as a decree from Marvel on high, and I take as North having some fun with his readers; he knows that fans are aware if the world of comics, and lets us in on the joke. The issue itself is more than just a string of inside baseball jokes, and while it doesn't pick up directly from where the previous volume left off, it's not a book where the time gap is full of mysteries. We open with Squirrel Girl and her animal themed super friends, Chipmunk Hunk and Koi Boi, helping rescue people from a fire, so we get a glimpse at the superhero cast of the title before the main plot of the issue kicks off, as Squirrel Girl and her roommate, Nancy, move into a new apartment and meet Squirrel Girl's mom, Maureen, for lunch. Maureen is a great addition to the cast, funny and so deeply proud of her daughter; she's the mom with the baby pictures and the stories ready to go at a moment's notice, to Nancy's delight and Squirrel Girl's chagrin. And upon returning to their apartment from lunch, they are seemingly attacked by Brain Drain, a z-list villain with ties to Hydra, who they find wrestling with Tippy Toe, Squirrel Girl's right hand squirrel, and Mew, Nancy's cat. But as things have proven often when Squirrel Girl has fought a supervillain in her own title, there's way more going on here, and the fight itself is resolved in a way that isn't about the punching, but instead with talking and computer literacy, since Squirrel Girl and Nancy are studying computer science at Marvel's famous Empire State University. That sort of non-traditional dynamic is a key element and a real charm for this title; Squirrel Girl really wants to make everyone's life better, wants to do the right thing, and this means the villain often winds up being befriended by Squirrel Girl (not always, but she never fails to try). This makes for probably the most all-ages friendly superhero book coming out from any publisher right now. It is also, far and away, the most densely written and drawn comic I picked up last week (and believe me, that's saying something; I only review about a fifth of what I pick up week in and week out). And that's not a dig. You sit down with Unbeatable Squirrel Girl and you're due for at least two to three times the normal read time of a mainstream comic, when you factor in the full script and the narration text in the gutter, and even more time if you pour over every one of Erica Henderson's panels for all the jokes she has going on in them, this issue's highlight being the food court on Avengers Island, home of the New Avengers, the team Squirrel Girl has joined post-Secret Wars. With a  new number one, there's no better time to check out the adventures of Squirrel Girl and her friends, both human and animal.


Dan Grote comes back for the finale of he mini-series about Death's two paramours, Deadpool Vs. Thanos...

Deadpool vs. Thanos #4

Story: Tim Seeley

Art: Elmo Bondoc and Ruth Redmond

Deadpool and Thanos’ quest to rescue the living embodiment of Death and restore order to the universe has gotten bigger with each issue, from a visit to the chicken-hooded voodoo priest Black Talon, to a fight with the Guardians of the Galaxy, to a war among the lords of Hell, to, finally, a place outside time and space, where giant characters like Eternity and the In-Betweener stand in a ceiling-paint-white void being everything.

On the one hand, it makes fans of old-school cosmic Marvel want to go running for their old Jim Starlin comics. On the other, Tim Seeley and Elmo Bondoc also found room to pepper in Easter eggs from the most arcane parts of Deadpool’s continuity, from Sluggo to Slayback to Ajax.

In issue #4, we learn that Eternity, the living embodiment of all that is, is keeping his sister, Death, locked in a cage beyond existence, despite a plea from the In-Betweener, who represents the balance between order and chaos, to maybe chillax a bit. Fresh from the underworld, DP, Thanos, and Black Talon teleport into the void and spring Death from her prison, at which point she sets her two thralls against her brother, in a grand bid to kill everything.

When Deadpool realizes his on-again, off-again girlfriend (Worry not, Thursdays with Wade fans, we’ll be getting to this soon) has lost it, he turns on Thanos, who throws him into Eternity, at which point a floating space monkey turns him into Captain Universe.

Altogether now: COMICS, EVERYBODY!

Deadpool uses his newfound Uni-Power to defeat Thanos, restore the peace between Eternity and Death (discover Eternity is ticklish), teach everyone a lesson about the beauty of a finite life, and consider the merchandising rights to a Captain Uni-Pool action figure variant.

In the end, Deadpool is mortal once more, Black Talon gives up death worship, and Thanos is sent away by Death, “until she has further use for him, in some Secret War yet to come” (capitalization mine).

Like most Deadpool minis of the modern era, you don’t need to read Deadpool vs. Thanos for any sort of important continuity moments, but, also like most Deadpool minis of the modern era, it’s hyperviolent, a lot of fun, and contains many a gift for longtime fans. If you love Wade, or even cosmic Marvel, and you one day stumble upon the trade in a cheap-o bin, definitely pick it up.

And the Autumn Moon is Bright: Werewolves in Comics

Recently, I read a column where someone asked the writer a question about werewolves in superhero comics, and the writer identified himself as a vampire fan more than a werewolf fan. Well, I like vampires fine, and I know zombies are the monster du jour in the public zeitgeist right now, but for me? It's all about the werewolf. I feel like werewolves are about the internal struggle of humanity between its better nature and its baser instincts, and since the person is not always he monster, it allows an incite into the person who is the monster, whether they fight the monster or embrace it. Also, you get to turn into a giant wolf or wolfman. How cool is that?

So, I spent the past couple weeks digging through my collection to pull out some of the best werewolf comics I could find. I'm avoiding a couple of the more obvious ones that are either not full on werewolf stories but more superhero stories (the infamous "Capwolf" story where Captain America becomes a werewolf, for instance, or the excellent Batman #255, "Moon of the Wolf," which was also adapted into a great episode of Batman: The Animated Series), although I am going to hit a couple of those, but mostly I'm sticking to horror and comedy versions, because there are a couple of really good werewolf comedy stories. So, if you want to check out some interesting werewolf stories, read on.

The Astounding Wolf-Man

So, not everything Robert Kirkman writes is Walking Dead or Invincible, these massively long running series, but that's not to say they aren't great comics. The Astounding Wolf-Man, which ran for twenty-five issues, was co-created by Kirkman and Jason Howard, who went on to work with Kirkman on Super Dinosaur and is now the artist on Warren Ellis's Trees,  is the story of Gary Hampton, a wealthy family fan who, while on vacation, is attacked by a werewolf and decides that he wants to use his powers to become a superhero. I know I said above I was avoiding superhero stories, and while Kirkman's story has a lot of superhero in it,there is a hart of horror to it, both because Gary's archfoe is a vampire, Zechariah (this won't be the last werewolf vs. vampire story on this list), but because much of Gary's struggle is with the beast within. Because while he can transform pretty much at will any night, when the full moon rises he becomes an out of control monster, and much of the series has to do with the ramifications of what Gary has done in werewolf form. There's a whole series of events involving another elder werewolf, plus a lot of action and superheroics. Kikman wrapped up most of the plot threads of the series, which is collected and available in four trade paperbacks, and Wolf-Man does occasionally pop up as a supporting or background hero in various books in the Invincible family.

Curse

A four issue mini-series from Boom Studios from a couple years back, Curse asks the question of how far someone will go to save someone they love. Michael Moreci and Tim Daniel write the story of Laney Griffin, a former football star who has fallen on hard times, not just financially but also in that his son is dying of an illness he can barely afford to pay the hospital to treat. But when a series of savage killings occur, and a price is placed on the head of man or animal that is committing them, Laney goes on the hunt. And he finds the killer is a bit of both, a werewolf who has lived for centuries. And so Laney captures the werewolf and spends time considering if the curse could be the salvation of his son, while others hunt the monster and Laney is caught up in other peoples plans. It's a solid story, but the art is what really gabs you. Colin Lorimer draws the lion's share, but Riley Rossmo, whose work on many other great horror comics makes him a  modern master, creates a rangy, long limbed terror in his werewolf design that is unique to the series and makes it a standout.

Riven

Bo Hampton and Robert Tinnel craft a story of one young woman's horror in Riven. Opening in Romania, readers see an American couple desperate to find a baby to adopt, and they are given Katya, a seemingly normal young girl, but the orphanage is... off. Flash forward ten years to a teen Katya, now Katy, who after an accident enters a coma where once a month, tied to the full moon, she has strange spike in brain activity. Waking from the coma after five years, Katy recovers from years of inactivity faster than anyone expected, yet still, once a month, has fits where she now can tell people she sees horrors. Katy watches a werewolf killing, and she soon realizes that the killings are getting closer. Katy is another example of someone who seems to be fighting with her own urges, although within Katy they seem less violent and more about her own awakening sexuality, which is another aspect often linked to werewolfism, especially in women (the film Ginger Snaps is a great example of this). But after she is attacked by a stalker, Katy is aided by someone who has come from Romania to help her. From here the story becomes an international chase as Katy returns to Romania to find the truth about her family, the werewolf, and what it all means to her. Followed by her adoptive family and her friends, the stage is set for a bloody confrontation with her biological family. Hampton draws the story as well as co-writing it, and his painted art is beautiful and terrifying. His werewolf is traditional, a monstrous, huge wolfman who dwarfs all around him or her. An original graphic novel, the book is still available from Dark Horse Comics.

Scary Godmother: Wild About Harry

Looking for a werewolf story that's a little more friendly to the young ones? Well, try Scary Godmother: Wild about Harry. Scary Godmother was created by Jill Thompson, an artist best known for these books and her work with Neil Gaiman on The Sandman, and is about Hannah Marie, a little girl who discovers that monsters aren't as scary as she thinks when she meets the Scary Godmother, a witch, and her monster friends. Harry is the resident werewolf, whose both a geek who lives in his gypsy mother's basement and a glutton. But when Harry's mom gets sick of him mooching, she throws him out, and the mini-series follows Harry's (failed) attempts to survive in the world. This isn't a scary story, but a very funny one, as all he Scary Godmother stories are, and is good all ages fare. It is collected in the Scary Godmother Comics Stories volume. Also, as we talk about Jill Thompson books, you should check out Beasts of Burden: Animal Rites, the first collection of Evan Dorkin and Jill Thompson's stories of a group of animals who defend their town against evil spirits and monsters. It features a story of a dog and his werewolf-boy that is touching and sad, and everything else in it is just as good.

Werewolf By Night

Comicdoms most famous werewolf is Jack Russell, the seventies horror hero known as Werewolf By Night. Yes you could probably argue Wolfsbane of the X-titles has larger fan base, but she's a mutant, not a supernatural werewolf, so for a Halloween post she doesn't really count. While admittedly not as strong a title as Marvel's horror masterpiece Tomb of Dracula, Werewolf by Night is still a great series. It follows jack Russell as he searches for a cure for his lycanthropy, while doing his best to control his feral form on the three nights a month he changes; picture the Incredible Hulk TV series if Banner was a werewolf and fought a lot of monsters. He is supported by Topaz, an empath and mystic who was a love interest as well as ally. Russell would meet and crossover with Dracula, finding ties between his history and that of the count. After first appearing in issues two through four of Marvel Spotlight, Russell's own series ran a respectable forty-three issues. One of the series most lasting legacies is that issue thirty-two introduced Moon Knight, while Marvel Spotlight #4 introduced the concept of the Darkhold, the Mavel Universe's answer to the Necronomicon, a book that has popped up in nearly all of Marvel's horror and supernatural series at one point or another. Werewolf by Night continues to appear semi-regularly throughout the Marvel line, most recently in Mark Waid's Daredevil run, proving you can't keep a good werewolf down.

Werewolves On the Moon Versus Vampires

Again, welcome to a more comedic take on the werewolf. This is a very funny story about three werewolf buddies, Ted, Jeff, and Stan, who figure that if they only change when the moon is full, if they're ON the moon, they'll be in wolf form all the time. And while they're right, there are a few things they didn't count on: one is Maggie Pilgrim, a Moon Patrol captain. The other is a nest of vampires. A fun three issue mini-series, the werewolves are likable, if a bit dim, and the stakes are high despite the comic being a comedy. Alas it is out of print in trade, and the promised sequel Werewolves on the Moon: Moon Mummy Madness has never materialized either, but I would sure read that.

Wolf Moon

Cullen Bunn and Jeremy Haun crafted this year's Vertigo mini-series Wolf Moon around the concept that the werewolf curse doesn't just reshape flesh, I reshapes lives. Not he curse in the way we're used to seeing it, the werewolf in Wolf Moon jumps to a new host every month, destroying everything around them and then leaving them to pick up the pieces. Dillon Chase is a former host of the wolf, who has allied himself with others o try to track it down and kill it. But he's not the only one hunting the wolf, and as he nears another hunter who may or may not be a serial killer murdering former hosts, Dillon has to make some choices about his life and how he can reshape it. Vertigo has been the home of so many great horror comics, it's nice that they were able to add a werewolf series to their catalog, and Wolf Moon is an interesting take on the classic werewolf myth.

The Wolves of Saint August

"The Wolves of Saint August," originally presented in Dark Horse Presents, then reprinted as a prestige format, and currently in Hellboy Vol. 3: The Chained Coffin, is Hellboy's biggest encounter with werewolves, as he goes to investigate a murdered priest and a haunted chapel, only to find a story of a long lasing curse. I'm calling this out for two reasons, despite it being a much shorter work then the longer works I've featured here. One is it's the first appearance of Kate Corrigan, my favorite of the B.P.R.D. cast members. And secondly, you've got Mike Mignola drawing werewolves! How cool is that?

This is just scratching the surface (bad pun not intended but absolutely embraced) of werewolves in comics. There are two series I skipped because I plan to feature them in the future: Joe Kelly's Bad Dog and Art and Franco's Patrick the Wolf Boy that are as different as night and day from each other but are two great comics with a werewolf in the lead.

And that's it for this year's Halloween posts. Enjoy the holiday tomorrow, and we'll see you again. If you survive... ooooOOOOoooo. Ok, you'll all survive, so just have a great time.

Reviews of Comics from Wednesday 8/26

Batman '66 #26
Story: Jeff Parker
Art: Jesse Hamm & Kelly Fitzpatrick

OK, I admit it: I have absolutely fallen in love with Jeff Parker introducing more modern Batman villains into the universe of the classic TV show. This issue, in case you couldn't tell by the cover, introduces the '66 version of Poison Ivy. Side note: I've read in various places that Ivy was created in the comics as a character to be used on the show, but the show was cancelled before she could transition over. If this is true, and while I imagine it is, I haven't found any primary sources to confirm it, it makes an interesting full circle to have her appear in the comic. The plot is pretty much what any plot of the Batman TV show or this comic is: criminal arrives in Gotham and Batman must thwart her or him. But it's the details that sell the comic. One thing I really enjoyed was how the story ties Ivy in with a foe created for the show: Milton Berle's Louie the Lilac. Louie had all these deadly plant hybrids, so saying that he purchased them from Ivy makes absolute perfect sense. Ivy herself is more playful and lighter than her traditional comic book counterpart; this is much more the thieving criminal Ivy of the 60s and 70s than the eco-warrior Ivy that Batman: The Animated Series created. Artist Jesse Hamm gives her some really great body language, with a couple panels of her moving that makes me think he envisioned her as moving like a dancer, with big kicks. Parker wrote her with a southern accent, something that hearkens back to her original appearances in the comics (thanks to Jeff Parker for replying to my tweet about this). The middle of the issue also had a cliffhanger moment that felt perfectly in line with the best cliffhangers of the show, with Batman and Robin about to be devoured by Ivy's Jupiter Flytrap (because Jupiter is a big planet, and this is a huge flytrap, naturally), which has a great joke about Robin talking about taking up the mantle of the Bat and Batman totally telling him to back off in that funnily passive aggressive way only Batman '66 can. Even if this isn't the Bruce Wayne of my heart, it's nice to have Bruce popping up in couple places as Batman while Jim Gordon runs around in the Bat armor over in the main DCU (which is a good story, but I need my fix of more traditional Batman). If you're missing some Bruce Wayne Batman, this is good stop to make while we wait for his return elsewhere.

Hellboy in Hell #7
Story: Mike Mignola
Art: Mike Mignola & Dave Stewart

Hellboy's back! Whoo-hoo! There are some comics where massive gaps between issues kill momentum and make you frustrated, but Hellboy, in any of its myriad forms, is not one of them. Mignola keeps the premise of the series simple and direct, and so when you come back in, you're back at home, and it feels good. This issue opens with Hellboy... unconscious I guess is the right word, even though he's dead he still seems to be able to slip in and out of consciousness, where he has a vision of Alice, the girl he might have loved if he had more time, and the world tree that she says he left behind in Enland upon his death. He awakes in Hell, found by two doctors who say he has an ectoplasmic parasite, and they lead him to a third doctor, Dr. Hoffman, who they say can aid him in freeing him of the parasite. But because nothing's ever easy, Hellboy finds Dr. Hoffman on trial. Hoffman gets off, but Dr. Coppelius, who is the plaintiff, is pretty pissed about it. Dr. Hoffman is able to help Hellboy, but not cure him before Coppelius, whose rage has turned him into a giant rage monster comes after Hoffman. Hellboy in Hell is a book you experience as much as read, and you just have to let it wash over you. The plot doesn't reflect half of what's going on in Mignola's incredible art, and with the way the book is written, with flashes of other things happening, and communicating with Hellboy, a synopsis doesn't work. The puppet theatre that Mignola used back in issue 1 is back, now performing the witches from Macbeth, which is a great visual. And it wouldn't be Hellboy without a touch of bizarre humor, in this case part of the backstory of the rivalry between Hoffman and Coppelius has to do with a golem who's obsessed with fish. If that line doesn't sell you on this story, well, Hellboy probably isn't for you.

Princeless Book 4: Be Yourself #3
Story: Jeremy Whitley
Art: Emily Martin & Brett Gruning

Hey, I don't think I write about enough Jeremy Whitley comics last week, so I'm doing another one this week!  We're into the third issue of the new volume of Princeless, the story of Princess Adrienne and her friends attempting to rescue her sisters from the towers her father imprisoned them in, and things are going about as well as usual. Adrienne and Bedelia are travelling across a swamp to find the tower of the gothiest princess in all the land, Angoisse, while her dragon, Sparky, is staying to help defend a tribe of goblins from a monster called the Grimmorax. Before the issue is done, Adrienne will arrive at her sister's tower and Sparky will defeat the Grimmorax, but what struck me in this issue was a consistency of theme; specifically the theme of the use and abuse of power. The goblin plot reveals that the Grimmorax was actually purchased by the leader of the goblins to be a threat to his people that he could defend them against, thus cementing his leadership. We also learn there's a monster farm, where nobility goes to purchase creatures like the Grimmorax (and Sparky, as it turns out), to serve as guardians. The goblin king is breaking the tacit agreement between a ruler and his people by not ruling for them, but putting his own desire to be ruler over the benefit of his people. This isn't too far off what King Ash has done to his daughters (also, is it just me, or are all goblin rulers jerks? Jareth from Labyrinth, Xergiok from Adventure Time, and now this dude. Not a line of work you want to get into, unless you're already a jerk I suppose). At the tower, we get to see Angoisse and her vampire boyfriend, Raphael. Raphael comes off as this slick, mannerly prince type, but when he realizes the huge bounty on Adrienne's head, he asks Angoisse to drug her so he can bring her to King Ash and collect. He actually uses the, "If you really love me, you'll do this," argument, which is the absolute worst, and an abuse of the power two people give each other when they form a relationship. Vampires are rarely good guys, and it's pretty clear Raphael isn't one either. Princeless does a good job of playing with the themes of fairy tales, but also reaches out to more modern issues women, especially the young women who are the target demographic for the book, might face. I'm hoping the final issue of the series let's Angoisse see exactly what kind of guy Raphael is.

We Are Robin #3
Story: Lee Bermejo
Art: Joe Corona & Trish Mulvihill and Khary Randolph & Emilio Lopez

There were rumors last week of DC Comics wanting its creators to stop "Batgirling" titles and go back to more traditional superhero comics. If this is true, it's a real shame, because I've found the two titles I've enjoyed the most coming out of Convergence are two of these less traditional series: Black Canary and We Are Robin. This week's issue of We Are Robin pushes the events of the first two into a climax, as a team of Robins try to defuse the bombs set to destroy the hall of records, while others attempt to halt the riot the people from Gotham Underground has started. We're starting to get more of a feel for various members of the Robin Squad (Robin Brigade? Robin Gang?), and while I like Riko and Shug, it's still Duke Thomas who I find myself coming back to. While appearing in Batman as well, it's here that Duke gets a spotlight. He's a perfect Robin: smart, brave, and willing to do whatever it takes to help those in need. The issue has a countdown clock ticking, as the bombs near the point they'll explode, while Team Robin (there we go! I like that one) work to defuse them while ducking subway trains that pass by the bombs. The tension is high, and Lee Bermejo ratchets it up slowly until the issue comes to its explosive conclusion. Character death is often cheap in comics now, but I feel like the moments at the end, where a Robin sacrifices himself in a vain attempt to stop the explosion, hits home, partially because of the character's youth, and partly because of the nobility of the choice. The moment where the Batman (Jim Gordon) arrives at the riot and orders the Robins to disperse along with the rioters, the moment where they seem to realize that it's not Batman whose drawn them together breaks your heart, and Joe Corona flashes between Robins to show their varied reactions. And while the revelation of who is behind The Nest wasn't shocking to me (I, like many I've talked to, has seen it coming since the series beginning), to see that character's reaction, cements so much of the emotion of this title. I'm hoping that DC gives this book the time it needs to find its readership, because I think it's one of the best books DC is releasing right now, with a diverse and interesting cast, and potential to introduce a lot of new characters to the DCU.

Reviews of Comics from Wednesday 12/4

Ok, and here I am back from what will hopefully the last of these extended absences. House is squared away mostly, should be moving in this weekend, and then construction of the comic house will begin. But for now, reviews!

Adventure Time Vol.2: Pixel Princesses TPB
Story: Danielle Corsetto
Art: Zack Sterling

One of the best parts of Adventure Time, both the animated series and its comic book adaptations, is the large and quirky cast. There are characters who appear only in the background, but you can just tell that an animator put a lot of work into making that character and has a whole crazy backstory for her or him. Pixel Princesses, the second original Adventure Time graphic novel, does not feature a single appearance by either of the series leads, Finn the Human or Jake the Dog. It doesn't even have their closest associates and enemies, like Princess Bubblegum, Marceline the Vampire Queen, or the Ice King in more than a couple of panels. No, this is a story featuring the "C-List" characters (hey, even Finn calls them that in an episode), headlined by the always amusing Lumpy Space Princess (LSP) in all her snotty glory. LSP wants to throw herself a surprise party with all the other princesses of the Land of Ooo as guests, but when only a handful show up, LSP throws her usual fit, and when BMO, the artificially intelligent video game system, spies on them and wishes he had what it took to be a princess inside him, the wandering mischief maker known as The Magic Man casts a spell to pull the princesses into BMO's game world. From there, it's a classic "people must fight there way to the end of the video game to escape" plot, but featuring the princesses. We get a good look into the personalities of Breakfast Princess, Skeleton Princess, Embryo Princess, Muscle Princess, and Turtle Princess, character who have only appeared in a handful of episodes, and usually with little to no dialogue. There's even a lesson at the end about being who you are and that everyone is a princess in their own right, but you're not reading this for the lesson, you're reading it for the sheer kooky madness of Adventure Time. Where else are you going to find a skeleton destroying cute baby animals with pointy teeth with a sword, monsters distracted by pancakes, and a gender neutral video game system deciding to be a mommy or a pretty princess? This is the kind of thing that is par for the course in Adventure Time, and creators Danielle Corsetto and Zack Sterling capture all of it perfectly. And if that isn't enough, you get a back-up story featuring Gunter, the Ice King's pet penguin, throwing a party for the other penguins. If you're not familiar with Adventure Time, there's no real previous knowledge needed here, and it reads very well as a standalone story, so give it a try as your first journey into Ooo.

Hellboy in Hell #5
Story & Art: Mike Mignola

It's been a few months, but Hellboy in Hell is back, and Mike Mignola hasn't missed a beat. Not exactly surprising, since anytime Mignola step up to the plate for a new Hellboy story, he hits it out of the park. After the first four issues of this new series, all of which were heavily entrenched in the mythology of the series, " The Three Gold Whips," is a one off that feels like those classic Hellboy stories where Hellboy stumbles onto someone in trouble and winds up quickly over his head. Inspired by the Grimm Fairy Tale, "The Devil and His Grandmother," Hellboy finds a soldier wandering the streets of Hell who has one last chance to save his soul by answering the riddle of the demon who he bargained with. Hellboy and the man go to where the man was directed, to the grave of the demon's grandmother where she agrees to hide them so they can hear the answer that will save the man. There are hints to the bigger plot of the series, with another reference to Hellboy's bloody knife hand, but the story mostly stands on its own. As with any work by Mignola, the story is as much a visual masterwork as anything else, with Mignola's design for the devil and his grandmother, and the trippy bits of a shrunken Hellboy and his companion dropped into a skull to hide them standing out in my mind. This story was a nice Christmas gift to all Hellboy fans; there might not be any Santa, but the other guy in red does his best to lift all our spirits.

Herobear and the Kid: The Inheritance #5
Story & Art: Mike Kunkel

For a series that's ten years old, I was pleasantly surprised to not see the twist coming at the end of this, the reprint of the original Herobear and the Kid series. You'd think somewhere I would have stumbled across it, but nope, and the new stories that have appeared over the past year seem to have almost intentionally avoided that big reveal for people like me, who didn't read the series the first time through. So, in deference to that, I'm not going to reveal it either. The story itself wraps up the threads from the previous issues in a way that leaves it well open for a new set of stories featuring Tyler and his teddy bear/best friend/superhero bear, but its a perfect story on its own. The final issue is about belief, and the kind of belief that all of us who have grown up have a hard time wrapping our heads around, the pure innocent belief of a child. Herobear and the Kid  have a final battle with the robot of Von Klon, the archenemy they don't realize they have, and Tyler gets the final piece of his inheritance from his grandfather, something that made my heart grow three sizes when I read it. Herobear and the Kid, more than any other comic book I can think of, perfectly captures the wonderment of being a child, when anything is possible. Tyler is so likable, but at the same time perfectly human, not some idealized perfect kid. I hope that, with this material back in print, Kunkel doesn't make us wait another decade for more of these wonderful characters.