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.

Reviews of Comics from Wednesday 11/6

All-Crime Comics #2
Story: Erik Warfield and Paul Grimshaw
Art: Steve Gordon and Gibson Quarter

I was late to the game when Art of Fiction released the first issue of All Crime Comics, so I made sure to jump right on the second issue when it was released. From a practical standpoint, you get more bang for your buck with All Crime than any other book on the market. It's at least 40 pages of color material, square bound and silver age size, and it's still only $3.99. In a market with shrinking page counts for more money, that kind of package needs to be given a mention. Under a cover by the always excellent Bruce Timm, we get the next story of Dodger, the master thief we met in the first issue of the series. There are plenty of master thieves in comics (I'll be talking about another one further down, actually), and we're only two issues into knowing Dodger, but the comic does a great job of letting us get to know him, particularly by having the middle chapter of each issue being a flashback to Dodger's past. And while this issue picks up where the previous one left off, and ends on something of a cliffhanger, it's a perfectly self-contained caper involving crooked feds, a private jet, and the World Cup. All Crime hearkens back to the best of pre-Code crime comics, and so if you're a fan of modern comics like Thief of Thieves or Parker, this is definitely worth checking out.

Amazing X-Men #1
Story: Jason Aaron
Art: Ed McGuinness

More than Jean Grey or Professor X, the character whose death I feel has caused the biggest gap in the X-Men titles has been Nightcrawler. Nightcrawler was the heart, soul, and conscience of the X-Men, and no other character has been able to take up this role without coming off as preachy or hypocritical. And so while I'm not a huge fan of the revolving door of death and life in comics, I was glad to see Nightcrawler was returning in the new Amazing X-Men title. I also have to admit a degree of trepidation when I saw the story would involve Azazel, Nightcrawler's father from the almost universally reviled storyline, "The Draco." But Jason Aaron has done a great job in Wolverine & the X-Men of tying continuity together with his stories, and frankly, Nightcrawler fighting pirate demons in heaven is awesome. Aaron has Nightcrawler's voice down pat, with his sense of humor and adventure, as well as the heart that makes him such an amazing character. Meanwhile, on Earth, we see Firestar join the teaching staff of the Jean Grey School. The past couple arcs of Wolverine and the X-Men have not been as centered around the school, so it was nice to see all the teachers interacting there; I'd forgotten how much I like Warbird. Readers finally get something of an answer about the Bamfs that have infested the grounds since the first issue, and we see the X-Men pulled into a war in heaven. Aaron uses Firestar as a point of view character, so if you've never read a comic set at the Jean Grey School, you get a good introduction to everything. All this mixes with Ed McGuinness's bold, dynamic, and just a bit cartoony style, especially great when demonstrating Nightcrawler's acrobatic fighting style, to make for the best X-Men related first issue I've read in a long time. Welcome back, Nightcrawler, I hope you survive the experience.

Doctor Who: Prisoners of Time #10
Story: Scott and David Tipton
Art: Elena Casagrande

Prisoners of Time has been a whirlwind tour of the history of Doctor Who, which each issue focusing on one of the different versions of the wandering Time Lord, The Doctor. Issue #10 is the story for the Tenth Doctor, portrayed by David Tennant, who was my first Doctor, the first one I watched regularly at least, and I have a very soft spot for this Doctor. The issue finds The Doctor bringing Martha Jones, his human companion at the time, to 1950s LA to use the Griffith Observatory to get a good view of his homeworld. But quickly, things go a little sideways, as they are wont to do when The Doctor is around, as The Doctor and Martha wind up on a movie set of a sci-fi film where members of the cast and crew are disappearing. Pretty soon, a classic Doctor Who villain, one originating with the Second Doctor, are revealed in all their wonderfully goofy, classic Who splendor. Scott and David Tipton have done a great job of capturing the distinct voice of each Doctor, and he gives The Doctor a moment when he first confronts his foes in this issue that was so very David Tennant, I could hear his voice and picture exactly how he would move between panels. The mystery of the uber-plot of the series was solved last issue, but now we're building to the grand conclusion, and we tie into a scene from an earlier issue, bringing things full circle. It's a fun issue, similar to the best one off episodes of the series, and worth it for fans of new or classic Doctor Who.

Ghosted #5
Story: Joshua Williamson
Art: Goran Sudzuka

The initial arc of Image's supernatural caper series, Ghosted, ends with more than one explosion. Night has fallen, the ghosts of the Trask Mansion are on the warpath, and Jackson Winters, master thief, and the rest of the team seem to be thoroughly screwed. But Winters is damned clever (pun entirely intended), and he has an ace up his sleeve. The origins of the curse of the Trask Mansion comes to light, and once you know what it is, it makes perfect sense. All the pieces set up over the first four issues work together to make this issue a satisfying conclusion. Rusak, the psychic whose loyalties have been in question since the end of the first issue shows her true colors, and turns out to be far more the mercenary than I had imagined. Winters's secret is revealed, exactly what has been haunting him from that last caper before he went to jail, and I like that it's not simply survivors guilt; that would have been too pat an answer for a character who is as complex as Winters has been portrayed. And Markus Schrecken, the millionaire who funded the expedition to steal the ghost from the mansion, well he gets exactly what he has coming to him. The issue ends with a great set-up for the second arc of the series, once that it seems will tie in to that last, botched casino robbery. Image has launched a lot of great new series over the past year or so, each of them with a very distinct feel. Ghosted impresses me as one of the most genuinely scary comics I've read in a while, and pulls off a very capable caper while sending chills up your spine. The trade of this first arc will be out shortly, and if you haven't tried it before and like either horror or crime comics, you should check it out.

The Birth of the Comic House and the Rebirth of The Middleman!

So, while I'm really trying to get back on the old schedule of weekly updates, today there will only be this brief post. You see, today I am closing on my house. Why am I telling readers of my comic blog about boring things like real estate, instead of superheroes and monsters? Well, because part of this whole home buying process has been finding a way to store my whole collection in one place to have better access and be able to write more and better posts. So stay tuned for some posts about renovation and the changing of a freestanding garage into a comic house, where all my comics, graphic novels, trade paperbacks, and lots of collectibles will be stored. Oh, and there will be plenty of pictures, before and after. I'm excited, anyway.

And one more note! Just about a year ago, I write a recommended reading for The Middleman, a love letter in comic book form of sorts to pretty much everything I love. It's smart, funny, and has heart. If you haven't read that piece, go and do it and then come back here. Once you've read it, check this out. Sunday marks the end of a crowd funding campaign, aptly titled The Crowd-Funded Franchise Resurrection, to not only get all the previous Middleman graphic novels back in print, but to create a new one that ties the comics and TV continuities together! I've made my contribution, and usually wouldn't hock stuff on here, but I really love this book and believe it should be back in print. The goal has been reached, so it's gonna happen, but the more they make, the closer they are to making even more Middleman. And for $20, you get the new story, "The Pan-Universal Parental Reconciliation" with a book plate signed by the creators. It's a sweet deal, and if you haven't read the comics and only know the characters through TV, here's a chance to make them all available again so you can get more Middleman and Wendy Watson. So, here's the link again, read what Javi has to say, and see what you can give: Sands of Zanzibar, Dubby, the Middleman is back!

And be back here Monday for your regularly scheduled reviews.

Reviews of Comics from Wednesday 10/30

Five Ghosts #6
Story: Frank J Barbiere
Art: Garry Brown

After a few months off after the initial arc, Five Ghosts is back with a tidy and fun little one off. Fabian Gray travels to Japan to answer a summons from an old flame of his, to aid her in stopping a clan that is moving in on her family's lands, and to retrieve a mythic sword, the sword of Masamune, which she tells him is made from the same Dreamstone material that gave Fabian his own unique powers. It's a story of samurai action, with beautifully choreographed fight scenes, betrayal, and Fabian using his powers in some cool ways. It's cool to see more about Fabian's backstory; at one point he gets out of a trap that was crafted to stop him from summoning the ghosts that grant him his abilities, and he points out that he was the world's greatest thief before any of that happened. Little bits like that add to Fabian as a character and make him more well rounded than just being a vehicle for the stuff that happens when he calls one fo the ghosts. Artists garry Brown fills in for regular artist Chris Mooneyham, and does an admirable job of it. His style is different than Mooneyham's, but still creates a great pulp atmosphere. If you haven't tried Five Ghosts yet, this is a perfect issue to try out, and if you're a fan of the pulp atmosphere, you'd be doing yourself a favor.

 

 

 

Guardians of the Galaxy #8
Story: Brian Michael Bendis
Art: Francesco Francavilla

Guardians of the Galaxy has been a pleasant surprise since its reboot. I was a very big fan of the last incarnation of the book, the one written by Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning, and featuring a sprawling cast that included most of the current members, plus a bunch of others, including Adam Warlock, my favorite Marvel character of all time, and Cosmo, a telepathic Russian dog. So the streamlined team was a worry, since I felt one of the things that I enjoyed about the last series was all the different relationships; although the new series did still include Peter Quill, Starlord, a character Abnett and Lanning spent a lot of time fleshing out, cosmic mainstays Drax and Gamora, and fan favorites Rocket Raccoon and Groot. The stories so far have been fun, and the characters read like themselves, if slightly Bendis-ized versions. This issue begins Guardians' crossover with Marvel's big Summer/Fall event, Infinity. The main Infinity series has been ok, if a bit lacking in focus in my opinionso it's nice to see a crossover that has a nice tight focus. The Guardians have been contacted by Abagail Brand, the head of SWORD, the Earth organization in charge of dealing with extraterrestrial incursion, asking for them to free her from Thanos's forces on The Peak, the Sword space station headquarters. There's some great action scenes, as Starlord and Rocket infiltrate the Peak, free Brand, and go to try to retake the station. But the highlight of the issue is some great character work at the beginning. With Thanos making trouble again, Gamora, who was raised by Thanos, confronts Starlord and Drax about exactly how Thanos and Starlord escaped being trapped in a collapsed dimensions together, and how Drax is alive again. She gets little answer, and Gamora's anger at Starlord, and her own decision to go storming off to confront the father figure who has haunted her for her entire adult life, not to mention killed her on at least once occasion, does a lot to further develop her character and the reactions of the others helps flesh them out. Add the usual incredible art by the busiest man in comics, Francesco Francavilla, who draws a particularly great Rocket Raccoon, and you have a book that is living up to it's concept and its pedigree.

Itty Bitty Hellboy #3
Story & Art: Art Baltazar and Franco Aureliani

If only every comic could get Itty Bitty, I think we'd have much happier fans. After Tiny Titans and Superman Family Adventures, I didn't expect Art and Franco would next move to the macabre world of Mike Mignola's Hellboy, but not terribly surprising, it's still a joyful and amusing romp. Every issue is packed with humor and fun little character beats. This month's issue of Itty Bitty Hellboy opens with Hellboy preparing his favorite dish, pancakes (or "pamcakes" as he calls them, which readers of regular Hellboy comics know saved him from becoming evil), with the help of Liz Sherman's fire powers. Hellboy gets Baba Yaga to make one of his pancakes gigantic using her magic, and before you know it, everyone is asking Baba to make something huge. She banishes Hellboy and his friends to Hades, and the demons rally around Hellboy, only to have him use his pamcake making skills to keep them from destroying Earth. Lobster Johnson and Lobster Smith, his pet Lobster, dig their way out to try to help the world. And Roger the Homunculus finds a little love with Baba Yaga and Hecate. I can't really do the issue justice, since so much of it is about the punchline to the wonderful set-ups Art and Franco come up with, and the adorable visuals. I've said something like this with eveything I've ever reviewed by Art and Franco, but if you're looking for a change of pace from the usually grim and grity comics of today, you couldn't do better than trying out Itty Bitty Hellboy.

The Sandman: Overture #1
Story: Neil Gaiman
Art: JH Williams III

I wish I could type an approximation of a squeal of delight, because that would be the only thing that could do this wonderful comic justice. Neil Gaiman's The Sandman is one of the touchstone comics of the modern age and possibly of all time, and it is my favorite piece of longform graphic storytelling.  New work from Neil Gaiman is something I always look forward to, and this past year has been an embarrassment of riches, between The Ocean at the End of the Lane, his first novel for adults in years, two new childrens' books, Chu's Day and Fortunately the Milk, and now a return to the world of the Endless, with a story set before the first issue of The Sandman. Dream, or Morpheus if you'd rather, the protagonist of The Sandman, appears in this issue as he did in the many flashbacks that took place before his imprisonment in the first issue of the series; he is imperious, cold, and callous, something made clear in his tone when addressing Lucien, the librarian of dreams, a character who is a loyal retainer who Dream dismisses with barely an acknowledgment. The tone of Dream is chilling, as he prepares for war, something we saw a couple times over the course of The Sandman, and any reader familiar with it knows this can only mean trouble. Gaiman has lost none of his feeling for the characters that we know and love from The Sandman. It's interesting to see the Corinthian, the nightmare serial killer with mouths for eyes, again, and to see exactly what made him slip out of the Dreaming and into the waking world in the time of Dream's imprisonment. We also meet some new characters, including George Portcullis, a dreamer who manages Dream's London office, and Gaiman uses him to demonstrate the malleability of identity in dreams; identity was one of the themes often played with in Sandman. The final pages reveal something about the Endless and Dream that will hopefully be as surprising to the reader as it is to Dream himself.

Gaiman has often said he writes for his artists when he is working on a comics projects, playing to their strengths, and this issue is a perfect example of that. I've loved JH Williams III's work since Chase in the 90s, and his work has grown exponentially over the years, and this issue is a masterpiece. His use of nearly entirely two page spreads, his frightful Corinthian, the alien world at the beginning of he issue and it's population of sentient flowers, are all drawn in exquisite detail. Williams draws a Death who is especially beautiful, and the soft look he gives her stands in sharp contrast to the harsher lines he uses to draw her darker brother, Dream. The issue is a feast for the eyes, and I hope that the eventual collection is in landscape format to allow the art to be appreciated in its entirety by those who want to read the story in that format. When a creator returns to a legendary work there's always the concern they will have lost whatever it was that made that work something special. I am glad to say none of the magic that made Sandman has been lost over the intervening years; go, read it, and plesant dreams.

Trick-or-Treating in Gotham- Batman: Haunted Knight

We hear at The Matt Signal (and by we, I mean, well, me) love October, and especially Halloween; candy, monsters, and something spooky around every corner. I imagine this is surprising to anyone who has never read this blog before and has no idea about my love of Batman and horror comics, but we're all old friends here, so let's gather round the fire and I'm going to tell you about some of my favorite Halloween themed Batman comics.

When most readers think about Batman related Halloween comics, the stories that spring to mind are Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale's two maxi-series, The Long Halloween and Dark Victory. And can I blame them? Heck, no. Frankly, The Long Halloween is one of, if not my all time, favorite Batman stories, even if the ending isn't perfect. I remember reading the series as it came out, issue by issue, piecing together the mystery of who is Holiday. But Loeb and Sale had a history with Batman before that.

For three Halloweens before those series, Loeb and Sale created prestige format Halloween specials, under the banner of Legends of the Dark Knight, the title that was being released at the time that was a creator showcase for Batman stories that were out of continuity or tales set in the past. Over the course of the three specials, they touched on many of the great Batman villains, as well as his allies, and fleshed out the early years of Batman. These stories were collected in the trade, Haunted Knight, and I think they don't get as much credit as they're due. So here's a little discussion of each of them.

Choices (or alternately Fears) is a story featuring the perfect Batman villain for Halloween, the Scarecrow, the master of fear. On one of his early rampages, Batman is pursuing the Scarecrow, while Bruce Wayne has a new love interest. While Batman duels with Scarecrow, the slowly revealed revelation of the black widow planning to take everything from Bruce makes for a great parallel. There are some amazing visuals in this story, especially as Batman attempts to find his way through a maze of thorny hedges poisoned with Scarecrow's fear toxin. Fear is central in all Scarecrow stories, but this one really uses the idea that as terrifying as Scarecrow is, it's Batman who is the truly frightening one, and that Scarecrow has something to fear when he confronts Batman. Jillian Maxwell, the black widow killer, has her own fears, and the final page is a great moment showing exactly how far the fear of the Dark Knight can reach.

The second special, Madness, is my favorite of the three stories. A story of not only Batman, but of Jim and Barbara Gordon, this is set firmly in the post-Crisis on Infinite Earths continuity where Barbara was Jim's adopted daughter, the biological daughter of Jim's brother. Shortly after Barbara is adopted it's Halloween in Gotham, and the two fight over whether Barbara can go out on her own, and the teenage Barbara storms out, only to be abducted by the Mad Hatter, making her his most recent Alice. Batman pursues the Hatter, as does Jim, and the two rescue Barbara. I love how spunky and tough young Barbara is, foreshadowing her time as Batgirl. I also have to give Loeb credit for writing a creepy Mad Hatter story. The Hatter is often portrayed as just another villain with a weird fetish (I mean that in the obsession sense, not in the sexual one, although Gail Simone portrayed it as such to wonderfully disturbing effect in Secret Six) for hats. This is one of the first stories that really plays up the Alice in Wonderland themes and the creepy child abduction angle. It has a happy ending, naturally, but it probably the most spine-chilling of the stories here.

Ghosts, the final of the three Halloween specials, takes the classic A Christmas Carol and sets it instead at Halloween, with Batman in the Scrooge roll. It's a natural fit, and isn't the only Batman/A Christmas Carol mash up in the history of the character, but is my favorite. Thomas Wayne takes the roll of Jacob Marley, and Poisons Ivy, the Joker, and a skeletal Bruce in a Bat costume are the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Yet to Come, respectively. I like the little redemptive moment at the end of the issue, where Bruce learns his lesson, like Scrooge, that one cannot be separate from people and cannot be just Batman, because that way lies despair and loneliness.

Loeb's stories are solid here, and are early work in his career, and while they're good reads, the star is often Tim Sale's art. His versions of Batman and his enemies are distinct and not realistic in a traditional sense, with his Mad Hatter and Penguin being oddly dwarfish, his Joker snaggle toothed with a strangely distended jaw, and his Scarecrow seeming to be more his namesake than a human being in a costume. Sale is one of my favorite artists in all of comics, and his Batman work is the best of that.

Haunted Knight is in print as a trade, with new cover dress a few years ago to make it fit with the current printings of The Long Halloween and Dark Victory. If you have read and enjoyed either of those stories, or just enjoy a good Batman story, this is a trade well worth picking up, and perfect for those long nights when the wind makes the eves creak and you might just be hearing the sound of a madman laugh somewhere out there...

Reviews of Comics from Wednesday 10/23

Daredevil #32
Story: Mark Waid
Art: Chris Samnee

Now that it's been confirmed that Mark Waid's excellent run on Daredevil is wrapping up, every issue is a treasure. And this issue features appearances by the Legion of Monsters! Now the appearance is small, and at the end of the issue, setting up next issue, but I still love these characters, especially Werewolf by Night, also known as Jack Russell (yeah, for those unfamiliar with him, you heard that right). But that's just something that speaks to my inner fanboy, which would be enough to get me to write the issue up, but there's so much more great about the issue. The opening scene, where the villain, The Jester, has left a dummy of a hanged Foggy Nelson, is one of the cleverest examples of Waid's use of Daredevil's powers and the lack of understanding others have of it. The Jester's surety that the horrible site of Foggy hung up before him would cause a reaction from Daredevil, but draws none, is clever and Jester's reaction was amusing, and this is inverted when Matt assumes that a mob in the small southern town he heads to at the end of the issue is preparing a race based lynching, when instead they are hunting monsters, something he couldn't tell with no site. Waid has done a tremendous job of writing scenes that remind the reader that Daredevil is blind and that radar sense is not the same as sight. It's also nice to see Daredevil and Foggy working together to help find an answer to the problem with the Sons of the Serpent; Foggy's cancer hasn't removed him from the book, but it's nice to see him doing something other than sitting in a bed. Four issues left, and the wild ride of Waid and Samnee's Daredevil doesn't look like it's slowing down.

Kiss Me, Satan! #2
Story: Victor Gischler
Art: Juan Ferreyra

I know I just wrote about the first issue of this Dark Horse horror comic last week, but when a good second issue comes around, I might as well keep writing. Barnabus Black continues to protect the witches from a line of bounty hunters. Writer Victor Gischler uses this to continue to expand the world he has created, introducing vampires, necromancers, and ninja zombies. I feel like Gischler has a whole world in his head, with all sorts of supernatural craziness, and he's slowly rolling it out. We also get to see more of our villain, Cassian Steele, werewolf chieftain, and I have to say, this is one bad guy. Sure, kill another werewolf in cold blood to maintain your power base, that's pack infighting; tell your pregnant wife you're going to kill the baby and you can always try again until you get a werewolf baby? OK, he's an A-1 bastard. The story is great, but what pushes the comic over the top is the art from Juan Ferreyra. The main action piece of the issue, a battle between Barnabus and animated ninja corpses, that starts out on cars and moves to a graveyard, is a sight to behold. Ferreyra mixes action with great body language and facial expressions. October is the spookiest time of the year, and this is the perfect comic for a chilly October night.

The Unwritten #54
Story: Mike Carey & Bill Willingham
Art: Peter Gross, Mark Buckingham, & Dean Ormston

The first volume of The Unwritten wraps up with the conclusion of "The Unwritten Fables," the big crossover between The Unwritten and Fables. The final battle between Tom Taylor and Mr. Dark plays out with a lot of very interesting twists, involving Tom's connection to The Leviathan, the font of all stories. But while much of the story is thoughtful, with Frau Totenkinder trying to explain to Tom exactly what he is and how he fits into the grand scheme of things, the rest of the Fables cast fights with the revanant Boy Blue and Bigby Wolf faces down his wife and children. It's a blood soaked issue, with many favorite characters meeting a final fate. Artists Peter Gross, Mark Buckingham, and Dean Ormston each draw pages suited to their styles, with Gross focusing on Tom, Buckingham on the Fables, and Ormston on the final pages, with scenes of horror as Fran Totenkinder morphs into a monster to hold Mr. Dark off as Tom performs the endgame. It;s a very clever ending, having been set up many issues ago, playing off both the classic poem The Song of Roland and what the readers know about the Tommy Taylor books, the in universe series of children's books. The issues wraps with Tom seemingly ready to find his way back home in time for the final twelve issues of the series, the maxi-series "Apocalypse." It feels like so many of the series I really love are coming to their end. But I can hope the ending will live up to the high quality of the series so far.

Velvet #1
Story: Ed Brubaker
Art: Steve Epting

New work from Ed Brubaker is always something to look forward to, and when he's partnered with one of those artists he has a rapport with, guys like Michael Lark, Sean Phillips, or in this case Steve Epting, you know you're in for a great comic. Velvet is a spy comic in the classic mold; it has touches of James Bond, touches of Tinker, Taylor, Soldier, Spy, and a whole lot of the action you expect when you have Brubaker and Epting together. Velvet Templeton, our lead, seems to be the secretary to one of the director's of Arc-7, a super secret black ops spy organization. But Velvet isn't Miss Moneypenny; Velvet clearly has a background that features plenty of spy training of her own. After an agent Velvet was fond of is killed, she begins investigating his death, and is quickly pulled into a case that features death and deception, and puts Velvet's life in danger. Brubaker wrote the best spy comic on the racks when he was writing Captain America, and he's bringing that same feel for the genre here. Velvet is a complex character, and after one issue you can already tell that she has a complex history. Like all spies, there are things that haunt her. The rest of the cats is sketched out, including Velvet's boss and some of  the other agents, and I'm sure we'll get to know them better, but this issue was the perfect introduction to our protagonist. Epting is an artist whose work has grown tremendously over the years, and this is easily the best work he has ever done. The shadow, the expressions, the action, all are second to none, and perfectly fit the grit of the 70s spy movie. Between Fatale and now Velvet, it's a good time to be a fan of Ed Brubaker.

Reviews of Comics from Wednesday 10/16

With apologies for the month plus without an update, this week will feature a few books that I picked up this past week from previous weeks, but can't really go back all the way to when I last updated. Sorry for that, folks, but I'm in the middle of buying a house, and that has been taking up a lot of my spare time. But that's enough about me. On to the comics.

Bloodhound: Crowbar Medicine #1

Story: Dan Jolley

Art: Leonard Kirk

I was one of the people who read Bloodhound when it was being published by DC (admittedly, I first picked up issue 8, since it had a D-List Batman villain, Zeiss, in it, but I then picked up the first six and was along for the ride for the last two), so when I saw that new Bloodhound stories were coming out from Dark Horse, I was excited. And that excitement paid off with the serial in Dark Horse Presents, and now in the first issue of this mini-series. If you didn't read either the DC adventures of the serial featuring Travis Clevenger, our title character, and his partner/handler Saffron Bell, that's ok. Everything you need to know is made perfectly clear early on: Clev (as he's called) is a guy who hunts people with special powers for the FBI on a sort of work release; it's kind of like the concept of the TV show White Collar, if Matt Bomer was nearly seven feet tall and indestructible, and they were hunting rogue metahumans, not crooked bankers. The first issue let's you meet Clev, see the kind of guy he is, and then see him go on a hunt. The guy who Clev is hunting turns out to not be a bad guy, just a desperate one, and the polive pursuing him seem to be far worse than he is, which gives a nice layer to the world and to the ending of the issue. The last couple pages set up the thrust of the story, when a mystery doctor named Bradley Morgenstern hijacks all TV channels and offers to give people superpowers to protect them from the menace of rogue powered people. It's an argument made for assault rifles in the hands of everyone, and it's a great example of using superpowers as a metaphor for the concerns of the modern world. The chemistry between Clev and Saffron is great, and helps push the book beyond a simple plot driven think piece and into something that readers can get invested in. There's a nice letter page at the back, where writer Dan Jolley talks about getting the entire original creative team back together to do this book, and asks for those of us digging the book to share it, and I am more than happy to oblige. Glad to see you back, Clev.

Fables #134

Story: Bill Willingham

Art: Mark Buckingham

Some of the best issues of Fables are the interlude issues that give the reader a little breather mid-arc before things invariably go completely off the rails. Bigby Wolf is dead and has found his way into an afterlife that is the apotheosis of all forests, where he hunts creatures and lives as the great beast he once was. The sound of a hunting horn calls Bigby to find Boy Blue, who is there to explain some of the ways the afterlife works before he moves on from the borderlands where Bigby's forest is to his personal reward. The two of them have a long conversation about life, death, and the choices that we make in life. Bigby comes to some realizations about his life and his fate, and Blue explains that he has no intention of ever returning to life. There are some fun labs at Stinky, the badger who started the religion around Boy Blue, and it will be interesting to see how he reacts when Bigby returns and tells him exactly what Blue said to him. It's a lovely send off to Boy Blue, and a wonderful final conversation between two of my favorite Fables characters. The final two pages are touching, so touching that they brought a tear to my eye, and brings a resolution to the quest that Bigby was on before his death. 

Kiss Me, Satan #1

Story: Victor Gischler

Art: Juan Ferreyra

I'm a sucker for horror comics, and have a strong preference for werewolves over either vampires or zombies, and when I saw the cover copy, "New Orleans is a Werewolf Town," I had to give this book a try. My only experience with writer Victor Gischler was the Spike mini-series he wrote and a couple short stories, and no familiarity with artist Juan Ferreyra, so I came in fresh. Barnabus is a fallen angel who is trying to earn his way back into the good graces of the almighty, so he's doing freelance work for heaven, all the while ducking squads of demons that want to bring him back to Hell to pay for making a runner. It's a solid core concept, but where are the werewolves? Well, it seems the packleader of the local werewolf clan, Cassian Steele, has a pregnant wife, and the witch who was summoned to test the fetus tells Steele the baby isn't a werewolf. This means that Steele will lose his standing within the pack. Steele kills the only werewolf who knew, and then sends his wolves after the witch and her apprentices. And this is where Barnabus crosses paths with the werewolves, as heaven has sent him to protect the witches. The whole series is set up to move from here, a quick, action based supernatural thriller. Gischler does a great job fleshing out the characters quickly, and Ferreyra's art is astounding. he has a dynamic style, and his werewolves are beautiful, or as beautiful as monsters can be. A perfect comic for this spooky time of year, the second issue hits this week, so grab both for a double dose of horror action on Wednesday.

Superior Spider-Man #17-19

Story: Dan Slott

Art: Ryan Stegman

Yes, these are the first Spider-Man comics I have reviewed on here. I don't have anything against Spidey, but I've never been a big fan either, and haven't had any real interest in the Superior incarnation. However, when Spider-Man 2099, a character I do love, came back for this arc, I couldn't resist it. I read all the Peter David issues of Miguel O'Hara's adventures from the 90s, and I was worried that he wouldn't ring true after all these years, but credit to Dan Slott for getting him exactly right. The story is a classic time travel yarn, with O'Hara going back in time to keep himself from being erased from the timeline by protecting his grandfather, Tiberius Stone, a sleazy scientist who has gotten on the bad side of Spidey, or Doctor Octopus in Spider-Man's body. Having not read a single issue of Superior Spider-Man, or any of Slott's Amazing Spider-Man for that matter, I was worried I would be lost, but Slott does a great job of giving the reader a good feeling of the status quo. The issues are action packed, with plenty of Spider-Man on Spider-Man action, and very cool tie-in to the history of the 2099 universe. This was a great self contained story that does have some payoff to what seem to be long running plotlines and set-ups for the future. And by stories end, there might just be two Spider-Men running around the Marvel Universe. If you remember the 2099 comics with any fondness, this is definitely an arc you'll enjoy.