Two days late but I'm still bringing the pain and praise for the week in comics...a bit more pain this week.
It's weeks like this that I'm really grateful to Conan, because Conan delivers.
Conan #19
Month in, month out Conan is just a pleasure to read. So this issue picks up with Conan in a swamp a few days after all his comrades were killed in a vicious battle, he's sick, either from an infection of his wounds or from the raw rats and assorted swamp vermin he's been surviving on, then, he sees a vision. It's Almalric, the former commander of the mercenary band that Conan eventually lead to their demise. Usually in this situation you'd assume it was just a result of Conan's fever but this being a series were the main character sometimes fights demons and snake people it could very well be a ghost. Almalric is none to pleased that Conan has lead his men to their ruin and demands an explanation. Conan provides, and thus we get the meat of our story. Conan is leading his men into battles, tearing across the country side taking what they please (though Conan does not permit rape, the purchasing of whores with stolen loot sure, but not rape).
Meanwhile a super hot, half naked princess is sold into a harem...
...but our princess is more then she claims. It seems she's there for perfidious matters of assassination. Artist Tomas Giorello who has been sharing art duties throughout the Conan relaunch gets this issue all to himself and he delivers. He's pretty much the perfect guy to follow in Cary Nord's foot steps, combining a lot of the raw passion and grittiness the Nord brought but with his own style and sensibilities. Truman's scripting meanwhile is the best Conan has seen since the early Busiek issues. So yeah, bloody battles, seductive harem assassins, fights with ghosts, and this is only the first issue of the story arc. Also, has a few pretty good jokes, some of them about fucking horses but hey, it's a Conan book, what do you expect?
Wolverine: Weapon X #11
It's pages like this that elevate Aaron and Garney's Wolverine from good to great. You'd think it would be pages like the one were a dude made out of granite has his head chopped of by a cyborg assassin from the future...and well you'd be partly right since that was pretty awesome, but the devil is in the details as they say and these guys get it. And by it, I mean Wolverine, and by extension the other Marvel characters that guest star in the various issues. Lots of people have drawn Logan in cowboy boots and a hat, but not many add a Native American belt buckle. Meanwhile you have Steve in the combat/hiking boots, with the star buckle and it's just so perfect. Then you have the dialog, no talk about heroing just two old men talking about bars and a changing world. Also, you're damn right Logan listens to Hank Williams Sr. My only complaint here is that poor Nightcrawler isn't even allowed to hangout in the bar with them, he's just sitting outside in the Blackbird waiting to drive them around. Come on Logan that's like your best friend not some damn chafer, I realize he's your DD but at least let the dude hangout with you guys. Oh yeah, and there are a bunch of Deathlocks trying to kill Captain America next issue and Wolverine and Cap (Bucky) get to fight them, so that'll be pretty sweet.
Invincible Iron Man #24
So I had a lot of problems with this issue but Doc Strange taking a dudes gun apart with magic before laying into him with kung-fu, absolutely no problem with that. I've said a lot of positive things about the Fraction/Larroca run on Iron Man and I still think the book over all is pretty good but this issue was a big let down. This is the conclusion of this story arc as Tony is being rebooted and fighting his way through his own mind to regain consciousness just in time to defeat a super villain. Sounds pretty awesome but for some reason wasn't as exciting as one would hope. Then we get to my big issue, the end. If you remember right before Secret Invasion there was a lot of talk about Tony being a Skrull, since they'd basically made him into a villain with Civil War. Everybody pretty much agreed that this would be a huge cop out and in the end it turned out that Tony was indeed Tony Stark and thus responsible for all his bad decisions. Well it turns out the memories that Stark saved for his reboot were made Pre-Civil War so now they can easily brush that all aside. I know it's comics and it's a long standing tradition to come up with some over the top sci-fi reason to redeem a creators favorite character (*cough* yellow space bug *cough*) but Stark wasn't that far gone, he could have been redeemed the old fashion way, by working for it. Now Fraction might still be planing some sort of apology/forgiveness sub plot between Stark and the other Avengers but isn't it largely hollow now? This version of Tony Stark never did those things so how can he truly overcome them?
Detective Comics #862
So remember a few months ago when some people said that once J.H. Williams III left this book everyone would realize how utterly average it was? Those people were right.
The Sword #22
HOLY SHIT LUNA BROTHERS! After 21 issues of shocking violence I didn't think you had anything left that would astound me and make me curse out loud. I was wrong. Chick rips out Dara's uterus! Wow. Two issues left and this will make for a nice collection of trades. Probably the best work The Luna Brothers have done. If your not familiar with The Sword the basic set up is that there are these 4 godlike beings that murder the main character, Dara's, family looking for this mystic sword. Dara survives thanks to The Sword and sets off for revenge. The plot thickens as the past is revealed, there is a lot of brutal and excellent fight scenes, and every arc also focuses on Dara's relationship with one of her dead family members in a way that is really quite touching without being sappy. Like Girls before it The Sword is clearly written for the trade but has had enough great cliff hangers that reading it in issues has been plenty enjoyable.
The Great Ten #5
This is a series no one is talking about, it's about 3 years too late to properly tie into 52 where the characters were introduced and it has absolutely nothing to do with Batman or Blackest Night. The thing is this is a good book. It's not ground breaking but each issue has been a highly enjoyable origin story of some very interesting and unique characters all the while carrying a ongoing plot. Big ups to Bedard and McDaniel (and I guess Morrison and Jones for the original character creation) for turning in a solid book. Honestly I enjoy it more then the Green Lantern stuff (controversy!).
Girl Comics #1
So first off Amanda Conner's cover is great as is Colleen Coover's introduction, both are fantastic artists. Now on to the stories. After I re-read this I realized that it was pretty normal for an anthology, some good, some bad, over all pretty decent, but I gotta tell you my first reaction to this was extreme disappointment. Since it's announcement this comic has been talked up, down, and sideways by the comic bits of the Internet and, well, I was expecting a bit more. Let's take a quick look at the individual stories:
The first story proper is a Nightcrawler tale by G. Willow Wilson and Ming Doyle and it's not very good. It's not terrible it's just very light on content. I guess the point is that Kurt may look like devil but is really an angel, don't judge a book by it's cover and all that which makes up for about 97% of all stories ever told about Nightcrawler and this one doesn't do it particularly well. Not a great start.
Next is the worst story in the book. Tina Robbins and Stephanie Buscema tell the story of the Greek/Roman goddess Aphrodite/Venus coming to Earth on a bet to prove that she can be as good of a superhero as Hercules. She then proceeds to get a job at a fashion magazine and do absolutely no superheroing. Granted the secret identity is a part of being a superhero/heroine but I'm pretty sure there's more to it then that. I suppose she does save the day in the end but this is still pretty terrible. That's two down, not off to a good start at all.
Luckily things drastically improve with a quite excellent Punisher story by Valerie D'Orazio and Nikki Cook. It's a simple idea, Castle pretends to be an underage girl online and then kills the perverts that he attracts. But it strikes the right balance of dark comedy, sickening dredges of humanity, and violence that all good Punisher stories have. Finally we have a winner.
Followed by a very funny 2 page Doc Oc story by Lucy Knisley. Now were talking. Doc Oc in a supermarket, thought bubbles sharing his sad life with the reader in a fun and funny way. These two stories mark the highlight for this issue.
But this one's not too bad, largely due to some great art by Agnes Garbowska. The story by Robin Furth is a slightly sci-fi take on Hansel and Gretel staring Franklin and Valeria of the Fantastic Four and it's pretty darn fun. The art is great, capturing the classic storybook feel while adding just enough gears and cogs to give a bit of a science twist. Good stuff.
Finally we have a story by Devin Grayson and Emma Rios. It's a bit of a revisit of the Jean, Scott, Logan love triangle with a neat twist and Emma Rios is art is terrific. Grayson who I didn't even realize was a woman during her Nightwing run (which I enjoyed) does a decent job here but it's nothing to write home about, thankfully Rios' art which seems to combine elements of manga with flowy European sensibilities makes it a good read.
Looking back on it it's pretty okay but typically these anthologies lead with their best stuff which makes me a bit worried for the remaining issues. Overall not bad, but certainly not the home run a lot of bloggers and creators were hoping for.
That's it for this week, it's way past my bedtime so good night y'all, comment below.
-egs
Oh, so a new Jeph Loeb book came out this week as well. I didn't read it, since, you know, Jeph Loeb, but I though I'd mention that I've come to terms with his books after discovering that kids love them. I'm not entirely sure that they're appropriate for children but they dig them and there should be some comics for people under 20. The only sadness I still have is that Loeb gets artists like Cho and McGuinness while Fraction and Morrison are saddled with artists like Land and Tan. Where is the JUSTICE! in that James Robinson, avid crier for things JUSTICE! related, where is the JUSTICE!
.......JUSTICE!
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