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Location: Blogs Atomic FalloutCritical Mass |
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| Posted by: Jake Bell |
Friday, April 27, 2007 12:03 PM |
In case anyone was wondering, I pick my pick of the week on my own, I don’t just pick the the big order books. I felt really bad when a guy came in this last week and wanted the Nightwing Annual because he read my review and I was all out of it. I am trying to plan a little more in advance so I can have more copies in the store (not many more, I know that there are very few of you.) I hope if you are reading this that it means that I will see you in my store and open a subscription box and we can avoid these terrible oversights. OK, ranting done and here’s my pick of the week:
Outsiders Annual #1: FINALLY!!! An explanation of why the Outsiders are wanted criminals. The battle at Belle Reve is finally revealed. We find out what happened to Shift and why Arsenal (now Red Arrow) left the team and Captain Boomerang II replaced him as resident redhead. Great muppety Odin was this book packed with all sortsa crazy action and skull cracking. Black Lightning is in jail under a fake name and there is a hit out on him to boot. Arsenal and company show up to bust him out and al hell breaks loose.
Amazons Attack #1: How awesome is this? It’s LEGENDARY!! Actually, mythical is more appropriate. The Amazons are back and now they’re ticked. They invade DC (both comics and Washington) with a vengeance. Old characters are back from the dead and current characters have no idea how to cope with any of it. I equate this book to Silent War. While it is terribly awesome, it is overshadowed by the upcoming countdown and last week’s WWIII. For those of you who do not get my comparison, keep reading and I’ll get to Silent War in a few paragraphs. Back to Amazons Attack, my only real question is who this president is. Those of you who read Uncle Sam and the Freedom Fighters know how messed up Washington DC has been of late, so is this the same Washington DC? So confusing. Overall AA gets a solid A in my book. It would get an A+ but I think that there is too much backlogged reading needed to make it a great jump point book.
Wonder Woman #8: Man oh man, Nemesis is AWESOME!!! He’s gonna be the new Steve Trevor. For those of you who do not know who I am referring to, please consult the nearest copy of Greatest Wonder Woman Stories Ever Told to learn more. I like it when a book seamlessly ties into a big summer event. My faith in the Wonder Woman franchise has been renewed. Hienberg really burned a lot of people on this book with the initial tardiness of the first four issues, so hopefully between the title’s inherent awesomeness and Amazons Attack we will see more of Agents Diana Prince and Tom Tresser in other books. A+
Fallen Son: Avengers: So everyone handles grief differently. Some throw themselves into their work and others try and ignore it until they explode. We see how the Avengers (both teams) deal with the tragic loss of Cap. I feel like this series should have been weekly and started the week after they offed Cap. It seems like they are dragging out the agony by making it monthly. Other than that it was a great read and Ed McGuiness really knocks it outta the park, artwise. A+
JSA Classified #25: Why can’t all books be this good? Allan Scott in solo action is forced to pull an old enemy out of retirement in order to figure out a major crime. The emotions dredged up in this book made me nearly cry. It’s so hard to write about this book without spoiling anything so I am just going to tell you to read it. Oh for the love of all things good read this. A++
Connor Hawke: Dragon’s Blood #6 of 6: Man this is just a fun Chuck Dixon powered slugfest. If you have not been reading this you are missing some really great Green Arrow flashbacks. I mean there is Longbow Hunters stuff and the post Oliver Queen stuff coming back to make the second GA’s life miserable. Really a lot of fun for Arrow fans, but probably really hard to follow for the casual comic reader. Overall, this book gets an A in my book but a B- since it would be a really hard book just to pick up randomly if I was not me.
52 week 51: I don’t really know what else to say about 52 that I haven’t said already. If you aren’t reading this you are missing out on one of the coolest books in the last 10 years. Buddy Baker returns home, we find out why Skeets has been nuts, and Lobo has one of the most powerful object in the know universe??? A solid A overall for the entire damn series.
Batman Confidential #5: There is no better creative team than Andy Diggle and Whilce Portacio... name wise. Their names are just so much fun to say. This book is good but not amazing and the designs for that bat-cycle are terrible from a design standpoint. C overall.
Firestorm the Nuclear Man #35: LAST ISSUE!!!!!!! NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!! I know he’s supposed to be all over Countdown, but why cancel an awesome book? Looks like I am sending Didio another angry letter. Firestorm goes toe to toe with Kalibak.
Heroes for Hire #9: SHANG CHI: MASTER OF KUNG FU GETS HIM SOME!!! The Heroes for Hire go to the Savage Land to track down Devil Dinosaur and Moon Boy. Not really that exciting when you think about it. I only read this for Shang Chi. I think the only way this book is going to survive is by tying in to other big events in the Marvel Universe. I feel really bad saying that but it’s true. Overall, even though I like Shang Chi I don’t jump up for joy when I see this book on the shelf and it’s usually one of the last books read each week. Solid art and good but unimportant storylines give this book a C- in my book.
Justice Society of America #5: I...I... I am gonna have to say that this is one of the best ongoing books in the modern age of comics. I can’t... what? It’s time for Sloppy Joes, Starman? OK, be right there. If I review this book I may go crazy just like Thom here so I am just gonna say this is LEGENDARY!!! A+++
New Excalibur #19: I can’t decide whether I like Claremont being back or not. This book was a lot of fun when he was off it and not that he’s back he seems to be trying hard to remind me what he did with it before and HE GAVE NOCTURNE A STROKE FOR NO FRAGGIN’ REASON!!!! I personally think it’s his way of dealing with his own mortality after that relatively near death experience he just had. This book is good but is not a book I really look forward to anymore. We’ll see if it gets better. C+
Silent War #4: This should be a big deal at Marvel, but for some reason it’s been pushed to the wayside. THE FREAKING INHUMANS HAVE DECLARED WAR ON AMERICA! Why haven’t the Avengers been called in? Why aren’t the Illuminati talking Black Bolt down? Where is the continuity? Hine can’t play that Pre-Civil War card again since he references Director Stark. What’s up with this? It’s a cool series. Why is this ignored by the rest of the Marvel U? Atlantis Attacks and the Marvel U was up in arms, but a dude who could blow up New York with the word “Hello” doesn’t rate any crossovers? Someone explain this to me! An A for the story and a D for art averages this book out to a C.
Star Trek: Klingons: Blood Will Tell #1: This is the Rashomon of Star Trek stories. See the Klingon perspective of classic Trek tales. There’s even a Klingon Language Variant Edition for those of you who speak fluent Klingon like total losers. Everyone knows all the cool kids speak Cardassian! A fun overall read but not suggested to people who don’t know Star Trek pretty well. B
Action Comics#848: Religion and Capes don’t mix. Unless your name is Fabian Nicieza, then you can play with that heretical Molotov cocktail all you want. Cable Deadpool scribe Nicieza really proves to you that he can write stuff that doesn’t have to be funny. This book was great but ultimately its just filler till Donner gets off him butt and gets back on the book. A for the effort of making me forget why this story is here in the first place.
Transformers Spotlight: Kup: This is a sad messed up book... in a good way. Kup is one of my favorite characters in Transformers. He’s an old, beat up, stubborn war vet and now he’s a crazy, beat up, stubborn psycho. He’s been lost for years on a barren planet with only the corpse of his friend to talk to. Madness sets in and well, if you have never read a Transformers comic this is a great one to pick up. It shows it’s more than just a buncha huge dudes beating each other up. The art is fantastic as you see the world from both Kup’s brokedown optics and the real thing world as well. Kudos to all the guys at IDW for putting out such an amazingly touching book. A+
Walking Dead 37: This is just a sad issue. ‘nuff said B+
Wisdom #5: So much groinal injury packed into one book. This book is so beyond awesomely nuts that I can’t even begin to explain it. Paul Cornell could be the next Morrsion or Ellis if he keeps this up. A+
Wolverine #53: I don’t like Wolverine because I don’t like teleporting mutants like him and Nightcrawler. For the luvva Mike, he’s on breakworld, in New York with the New Avengers, Westchester with the X-folks and in friggin’ Wakanda too. Now... Now he’s not even a friggin’ Mutant? Too much Retcon! For some reason though, I love this book. Maybe it’s because Loeb is giving me Teen Wolf flashbacks with this story. I think it mostly comes from the fact that Simone Bianchi is an amazing artist and has added new depth to certain characters visually, mainly Sabretooth. I wanna not like this book but I can’t help enjoying it. A
X-Men: First Class #8: Still just a fun little series. I was happy to see more of it coming in the next couple of months. An easy way to introduce novices into the rather complicated world of the X-men. A
Okay, next week begins my coverage of World War Hulk and my comparisons between it and Amazons Attack. Event on Event Action as they go head to head to keep my interest, not to mention Runaways comes out as well. Hope to see you here. If there is a book I did not review and you wanna talk about it look for me on the Atomic Forums. Later all. |
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Comments (1)
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Re: These Things I Read |
By KingdomGone on
Tuesday, May 01, 2007 2:01 AM |
Good reviews as usual - I think both of the confidential books have been dragging on since relaunch.
One place I do have to disagree with you on Fallen Son - I really liked the first issue, but this one felt empty. |
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