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So the interesting thing about these Hanna-Barbera/DC superhero team-up books is how in most cases, some attempt is made at making them…well, if not in continuity with the regular DC universe (such as its continuity is right now), at least not directly contradictory. Well, to be fair, I don’t know if that’s the case in the Suicide Squad/Banana Splits book since I haven’t read it yet, as 1) I’m not a Suicide Squad guy, and 2) my only real experience with the Banana Splits is enjoying the cover of their theme song by the Dickies. But Green Lantern and Adam Strange cross over into alternate universes to meet Space Ghost and the Future Quest gang, respectively…and even Top Cat falls through some interdimensional portal to meet a cowled crusader of some note (setting up what seems to be a very Howard the Duck-ian premise for the forthcoming series). It’s sort of the difference between the early Marvel/DC crossovers where Spider-Man and Superman have just always existed in the same world and they didn’t get around to meeting each other until 1976, versus the Marvel/DC crossovers from a couple of decades later where the Marvel and DC continuities were explicitly described as “different universes,” with even a jointly-owned character who could facilitate said meetings.
The exception seems to be Booster Gold/The Flintstones, which just throws Booster back in time to the Flintstones’ version of the Stone Age, without worrying about, you know, how Anthro fits in, or whatever. This was written by Mark Russell, who writes the regular Flintstones series, and as such this particular crossover fits right in the darkly satirical tone of that book. Russell also scripts the Snagglepuss back-up in the aforementioned Suicide Squad/Banana Splits comic…and of course I read at least that part of the book immediately. Yes, Snagglepuss is, as the writer describes him, a “gay Southern Gothic playwright” in the 1950s, and how he deals with officious types who don’t approve of him and his work. The brief sample we get is a tad more serious than Flintstones, but Snagglepuss’ dialogue is fun to read, and I look forward to hearing more of what that ol’ mountain lion has to say in his upcoming series.
As for the others: Adam Strange/Future Quest is right in line with the Future Quest series, fitting right in with the tone of that comic…I mean, what’s one more weird adventure character like Adam Strange in a book already full of them? Lots of fun, and, oddly enough, semi-connected to Strange’s appearances in the recently-completed Death of Hawkman mini. Green Lantern/Space Ghost has some nice art by Ariel Olivetti (making it match quite nicely with the Olivetti-illustrated Space Ghost mini from a few years back). Maybe a little wordy, with maybe too many small-ish panels, but you definitely get plenty of story for your buck that way. And while I’m generally surprised at just how much Hanna-Barbera has let DC get away with so far, Howard Chaykin’s “Ruff ‘n’ Reddy” is…well, Chaykin-y. Not for kids, though frankly the number of kids who are currently Ruff ‘n’ Reddy fans can probably be counted on one anthropomorphic paw.
Anyway, they’re all weird, and I enjoyed what I’ve read so far, and I expect I’ll enjoy the Banana Splits one, too. Hopefully they’ll do more Hanna-Barbera team-ups, because quite frankly once I thought of the Killer Croc/Wally Gator pairing, I’d had great need to actually see it.
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In other news:
(Some minor SPOILERS AHEAD if you want to go into the new Action fresh.)
So we finally get some answers in Action #975 as to the nature of the Other Clark Kent, with the revelation done in such a way as to provide a nice anniversary issue-style showcase of some of Superman’s other adversaries over the years. They’ve done such a good job keeping this mystery going, and keeping in compelling, that I’m a tad a’feared that momentum will be lost once this plotline is wrapped up, much in the same way the Super-books meandered a bit after the roller coaster ride of the “Death and Return of Superman” storyline. Not that the Mystery of the Extra Clark was so overwhelming a thing that it took over the comics like Superman’s death did, but it was a great hook that kept people talking and wondering.
I’ve noted once or twice that I was hoping the resolution to the mystery did not involve the larger metaplot of the Watchmen incursion into the DC Universe…and, well, it might still, sorta, depending on who this Mr. Oz is that’s been turning up in the books. And it seems to be tied to all the multiverse-rejiggering that’s going on, but I’m glad the revelation involved the character it involved, and it wasn’t all Clark whipping off the fedora and declaring “ah HA, it is I, Dr. Manhattan!” That might have tied into the larger DC Universe activity, sure, but would have felt like a cheat.
This was an odd comic. Written by R.L. Stine, best known for the Goosebumps series of horror novels for young folks, it takes a tongue-in-cheek-ish approach to Marvel’s swamp monster as he tries in vain to get his movie career going. It’s actually a fun read, even though a talking Man-Thing, with the mind of Ted Sallis now fully functioning within, still takes me getting some used to. I know, I know, none of this is in regular Marvel continuity, I suspect, so I should just go with it, but I’m just used to there being more of a line between the kind of swamp creature Swamp Thing was (human trapped in a monstrous body trying to find a cure) and the kind Man-Thing was (mindless monster with practically no memory of the human it used to be). But that’s my problem, not yours. It’s certainly a different direction for the character, and I’m perfectly okay to see where it goes.
I haven’t even had a chance to read this yet, and I should probably be worried that the last time cross-company crossovers were so prevalent we were in the midst of an industry-wide slump and everyone was hanging together so they wouldn’t hang separately…but I gotta be honest, I love these nutty things. The first issue of Planet of the Apes/Green Lantern was mostly all set-up, so I’m looking forward to whatever weirdness awaits me in the new issue. Plus, the regular covers have been great, but the variants:
…are to die for.
Mostly, I’m just glad that we’re 56 issues into this reprint series, and it’s still going. The series is nearing the end of the Dell Comics run (with #65), and I’m hoping it continues into the Gold Key era (even though some of those are 80-pagers). Ideally, I’d love to have them reprint all the way through the 1970s Charlton Comics Popeye by George Wildman, though that’s probably unlikely. I’m guessing the emphasis is on getting all of Bud Sagendorf’s Popeye work back into print, which would include some of the Gold Key books, so maybe those will get printed after all! At the very least (and I know I’ve said this before) I’ve love to have a new printing of this cover.
So the previous issue of Scooby-Doo! Team-up (featuring Frankenstein Jr.) was a little disappointing, in that there were little-to-no backgrounds in any of the panels. The figure drawing was fine, the writing was at its usual witty standard…but without the backgrounds, they might has well have all been floating in space, rather than in the concert hall the story was supposedly set in. This new issue is a vast improvement in that regard, with the Scooby gang running into Quick Draw McGraw in a dusty western town, with plenty of mountains and deserts caves and streets an’ all. A little scenery goes a long way to establishing some kind of time and place for the goings-on, and the Frankenstein Jr. story suffered without it. …Another aspect of this series I wanted to mention is how they could have very easily had the Scooby-Doo crew team up with a different DC superhero every issue in attempt to grab those direct market sales, but I’m glad they’re balancing issues with Harley Quinn with issues co-starring…well, Quick Draw McGraw, for example. Now, if only we can get Swamp Thing into this comic…
The current Hellboy storylines seem to be at an end, for now, and I’ve no idea if there’s going to be any forward motion in the Mignolaverse anytime in the near future. There is, however, no end of comics filling in the backstory and the missing years of Hellboy ‘n’ company, and the latest is The Visitor How & Why He Stayed, following up on the aliens that briefly appeared at the very beginnings of Hellboy’s funnybook adventures. I remember during a reread of the Hellboy comics thinking “what was up with the aliens?” and just figured that was an abandoned plot point which no longer fit into Mignola’s evolving storytelling for this series. Thus, this book comes as bit of a surprise, but a welcome one, and certainly a different take on the franchise’s past outside the “here’s another early adventure with Hellboy and the BPRD,” Not that those aren’t fine and great, of course, but The Visitor feels new, like a stretching of the premise. We may not be moving ahead in the Mignolaverse’s timeline just yet, but at least we’re pulling that previously-existing timeline into some different directions. …By the way, if you like the Adventures of Kid Hellboy, this will be a good comic for you to pick up.
Okay, we still don’t have any definitive answers as to who this Other Clark Kent is, but at this point my initial fear that this story would resolve as part of the larger Watchmen-in-the-DC-Universe metastory has lessened a bit. This appears to be a more conventional “someone we know in disguise as Clark” story (wouldn’t be something if it was Matrix, who somehow survived along with the pre-Flashpoint Clark ‘n’ Lois into the New 52 universe?), but we’ll see what happens. I do still think that the Superman books, as interesting as they are right now, are due for some event crossover rejiggering, with Dr. Manhattan merging timelines together so that the New 52 Superman never existed, the current Superman has always been Superman, the same Lois has always been around, etc. That leaves the fate of Jon, Clark and Lois’s son, with an indeterminate future, but that all depends on how the Super-Sons title fares, I guess. Or maybe that book can just start teaming up with kids of other superheroes. …Can’t think of a whole bunch of them right now, but I definitely pictured Damian Wayne teaming up with the Ghost of Aquababy. …Hey, look, if Richie Rich can team up with Casper….
Big news is that Rick Veitch has released a new installment of Roarin’ Rick’s Rare Bit Fiends as a print-on-demand book via Amazon…I ordered that sucker as soon as the news hit my feed reader on Monday, and had a copy in my hands by Wednesday. Unfortunately whoever packed my copy didn’t do a great job of it, and it showed up damaged. I should have a hopefully undamaged replacement arriving around the time you’re reading this, assuming you’re reading this sometime in the morning or early afternoon on Friday, December 9th, 2016. However, flipping through it was a welcome return to Veitch’s dream diaries, and I hope we see more installments of Rare Bit Fiends in the future. You can order it here, and you can take a gander at some sample pages on Veitch’s site.
I also keep meaning to order his other print-on-demand book Super Catchy. Maybe after I’m done with the Christmas shopping, which I should probably start someday.
UPDATE: A copy in more acceptable condition was delivered today…after being initially delivered to another address. Ah well, at least I got it eventually.
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Other comics this week:
Flintstones #6 continues its bizarrely dark take on the Hanna Barbera characters, which is a phrase that in most cases would rightly send you running in the other direction, but here that “dark take” works absolutely marvelously. The social satire, the horrible lives of the animal-appliances, poor old lonely Mr. Slate, the pitch-black humor, all working together to make what may be my favorite comic on the stands right now. I never would have imagined that would be the case when these HB relaunches were announced way back when, but man, I love this comic.
Star Wars: Doctor Aphra brings to the Star Wars comic franchise something desperately needed: some measure of unpredictability. I’ve been enjoying all of Marvel’s new Star Wars books so far, but despite the twists and turns of each storyline, we know where the main characters end up, as the majority of the books take place between Episodes IV and V. Aphra is new to the comics, a supporting character from the Darth Vader series, who has her own original-to-the-comics supporting cast accompanying her, so the characters aren’t restricted to specific paths. I mean, not to say the creators haven’t been doing a good job telling stories with Luke, Han and Leia in this period…perhaps a better way of saying this is that with Aphra, we have a new character that is fresh to us, for whom we don’t know her eventual fate, which makes her story perhaps a little more compelling. Plus, her supporting cast is basically Star Trek’s Mirror Universe of other familiar members of the Star Wars family, with Evil Artoo, Threepio, and Chewbacca analogues, all of whom are a lot of fun.
Now if this paves the way for the eventual Jaxxon solo series, that would be the best.
So with Reggie and Me #1, this makes the second of the Archie relaunches to be narrated by a dog, I believe? Which is fine…it gives us a sympathetic outsider’s view of Reggie’s life, which this first issue is devoted to setting up. Not so much a story as a character sketch, it establishes his mostly adversarial relationships vis-à-vis the rest of the Archie Universe. One of the main appeals of Reggie in the original Archie comics is that he may be a jerk, but he’s a funny jerk…it’s funny to watch him be a giant ego monster and eventually (at least sometimes) get his comeuppance. The Revamp Reggie with its slightly more (and please pardon the expression, particularly in a comic with a dog narrator) “realistic” young-adult bent doesn’t really have a lot of laughs, particularly when compared to the classic Reggie comic presented as a back-up in this issue. I did like the comic, but I hope the mood does lighten a little in future issues.
ATTENTION! THIS IS NOT A DRILL: Swamp Thing appears in this week’s Superman Annual #1:
Aside from the fact that this is the…fourth? “Superman Annual #1” to be released by DC over the years, it’s not a bad comic. Swamp Thing confronts Superman about the fact he’s not really from this universe, the harm that’s causing and what must be done to fix it. Somewhat reminiscent of DC Comics Presents #85, another story where Swamp Thing has to come to Superman’s aid, only this time Swampy is all up in Superman’s face, as opposed to surreptitiously doing so in that old team-up book. Maybe a little too heavy on the fight scenes, but it does establish Swamp Thing as being able to hold his own against the Man of Steel, which was fun to see.
So between this, Swamp Thing appearing in Batman in a month or two, and Swampy’s appearance in Wonder Woman a couple of years back, the old muck-encrusted mockery of a guest-star has completed his tour of the recent versions of the DC Trinity, post-Flashpoint/Rebirth. Now to get him to pop up for brief team-ups in DC’s other superhero books…like, I don’t think he’s been in The Flash ever. Well, the Flash has been in Justice League Dark with him a couple of times, but clearly we need a Flash/Swamp Thing race in the Flash comic itself.
Hey, in 2021 it’ll be Swamp Thing’s 50th anniversary. We gotta start planning for this stuff now.
Now I haven’t been keeping up with interviews or news stories about what may or may not be happening with the “Mignolaverse” in which Hellboy, Abe Sapien, the B.P.R.D. and whathaveyou from this point forward, now that the “present day” stories in that milieu seem to have come to their conclusion in this week’s B.P.R.D. #147, with Hellboy and Abe’s own current storylines having come to a stop within the last few months. Of course, we’ll continue having the flashback Hellboy and the B.P.R.D. series, and surely more Witchfinder and Lobster Johnson stories, and then there’s this series about the aliens that appeared very early on in the Hellboy comics.
Anyway, I’m hoping there will be more stories at some point continuing the story after the B.P.R.D., but for now I’m glad things have reached some kind of conclusion. The current short-run Hellboy projects are probably a lot more accessible for casual readers, as even for someone who’s been reading comics in this particular universe since the get-go, I got a little lost sometime with who was doing what and did or did not like whom and even who was a mummy (which, I mentioned before, I couldn’t believe I had forgotten). I suspect, however, once the palate has been cleared a bit, we’ll get some kind of new B.P.R.D. relaunch picking up where the old series left off. Unless someone’s mentioned that, yes, this is exactly what they’re doing, in which case I’ll really suspect that’s their plans.
I’m also hoping for some kind of all-Mignola Return of Hellboy comic book series in the future. Hey, there’s a tiny possibility it could happen, and there ain’t no law against wishin’.
I’m trying to like Infamous Iron Man, which is essentially a solo Doctor Doom comic where he seems to be trying to turn over a new leaf as a superhero. I admit, it’s the bashful blue-eyed Thing’s appearances in the comic that got me to pick it up, though watching Ben act like an ass in the Latverian embassy was equal parts amusing and feeling maybe just a little out of character, maybe? I mean, just straight up destroying historically and artistically significant items was a wee bit jerkier than I’m accustomed to from him. But, you know, I can manage. And I know this certain style of talky dialogue throughout the book is Bendis’s trademark, but for someone like me who hasn’t read much of his work, it takes some getting used to. I’m all for reading a Doctor Doom series, however, so I’ll stick around and see where it goes.
When I opened my store, I gave up a lot of my personal collection for in-store stock, including all my Thanos-related comics. All those Infinity Gauntlets and Silver Surfers and so on, and had I realized a lot of these same books were going to turn up over and over again in collections people would try to sell to me at the shop, maybe I would have held onto them. What’s done is done, however, and by giving up those comics, that sort of dissuaded me from reading new installments of the character’s saga in, for example, those recent Jim Starlin graphic novels. I figured, eh, I’d read enough over the decades, I’m done with that big purple guy.
And then this new first issue shows up, and it’s written by Jeff Lemire, and I like the cover, so I end up reading a new Thanos comic again. It’s all set-up, reestablishing Thanos as a Bad Dude and prepping a couple of other folks for a confrontation with him, and it feels kinda Starlin-y, sorta maybe, if perhaps a little less weird, a little more somber. I mean, not that Starlin’s Thanos couldn’t be dark, given that he wanted to kill most everybody and rule what was left, but it was all so out-there and strange and wacky that it seemed breezy and fun. This new Thanos #1 is not breezy, but still an enjoyable reintroduction to the character, and relatively continuity-lite for anyone new to the character after seeing his brief appearances in the Marvel films.
Despite appearances, definitely not for kids! Archie’s Dan Parent continues with this weird parody of comics and the comics market, which starts of with an ersatz “classic” 1960s Kitty story in which she teams up with the Casper the Friendly Ghost like-a-look Dippy, which feeds into the back half of the book where Dippy has returned to kill Kitty! It’s a full-on Harvey Comics parody drawn by an Archie artist, which is amusing just in and of itself, and I think you all know how much I like Harvey Comics. In a weird way, this comic reminded me of that long ago first issue of Miracleman from Eclipse Comics, which started off with a vintage Marvel/Miracleman story (redialogued by Alan Moore), then followed it with the new, updated, gritty, “realistic” version of the character. Kind of the same thing here, only slightly more for laughs, and a little more explicitly self-referential in its commentary on comics publishing. Fits right in as a thematic cousin to all those reflective superhero reboots, like Moore’s Surpreme.
While I’ve commented before on the unusually complicated yet compelling premise of the current Superman titles, I haven’t said much about Lex Luthor’s development in these post-Rebirth comics. Picking up on threads from the latter part of DC’s New 52 era, Luthor has seemingly decided to become a superhero…literally, with the New 52’s Superman’s death, becoming Superman, with the “S” logo and everything. It seems apparent that Luthor is trying to force himself into a role for which he is ill-prepared, though via his own egotistical self-aggrandizement he feels he is the better fit for the job than his predecessor.
Now, given Luthor’s portrayals in the past, we, the readers, know this almost certainly can’t end well. From our perspective, we’ve seen how Luthor behaves, we’ve seen the crimes he’s committed, we’ve seen him brag about his misdeeds…we know, despite the many changes he may have undergone over the years, that there is a rotten core that is always present, no matter how respectable the exterior appears. The other characters in the comics know this as well…they of course are limited to whatever experiences they are allowed within the latest permutation of their shared fictional universe, but a Luthor never changes his spots, as it were, and despite any superficial efforts at semi-redemption, the inertia of Luthor’s portrayal over the decades will certainly result in a return to form.
In this week’s issue of Action, this bears out, given that visitors from the future have come back to the present to put a stop to Luthor before he becomes a universal scourge, a tyrannical madman with ultimate power crushing all before him. We don’t have the full story yet about this, of course, but totally within possibility knowing what we know about him.
Interestingly, undermining Luthor’s perhaps spurious attempts at redefinition is a secondary plotline, hinted at in this issue of Action but primarily playing out in Superwoman, is the fact that he is currently under the influence of enemy agency. Specifically, it’s his estranged sister Lena, exerting control over him for her own nefarious ends, while Luthor tries to continue following his own agenda, as tinged as it may be by Lena’s own.
At any rate, we’ll see how these particular plotlines work out over, oh, I don’t know, the next four to eight years.
§ October 28th, 2016 § Filed under pal plugging, this week's comics Comments Off on Your mom was probably a woman.
I intended to have more of this week’s comics read for an end-of-week reviews post, but I’ve only managed to read a couple from this week’s rather sizable haul. Part of the reason is that I’ve been distracted by this massive tome that details Atari’s artistic history, from the covers of the Atari 2600 game cartridge boxes, to ad campaigns, to designs of their arcade cabinets. Not just pretty pictures, but also includes a history of the company and commentary from the artists. For a guy like me, who still thinks of the original Nintendo system as “that newfangled video gaming machine,” and still has his original, working Atari hooked up to the big ol’ widescreen, this hits pretty much all my nostalgia triggers.
Just so there is at least a tangential relation to comics, the various Superman games are briefly covered. For you longtime ProgRuin readers, you may remember the 2600 Superman was used for the image on my 404 “file not found” page:
I did manage to read a few comics…Flash #9 pushes ahead the whole “Watchmen? In the DC Universe? WHA–!?” metaplot by an inch or two; Swamp Thing is still in The Hellblazer as of issue #3, which also brings back another character from the title’s Vertigo days; and then there’s this comic:
…which still remains fresh and entertaining with each issue. This is a solid done-in-one story in case you wanted to sample the book, in which the Surfer and his pal Dawn get stuck on a gambling planet and have to bet their way to freedom. It’s a lot of fun, and is topped off by a great cover gag:
One other comic I read was the digital-only release of the new BOO! Halloween Stories anthology:
…available right here from Comixology. A bunch of my pals are involved, including Ken Lowery, Matt Digges, Andrew Weiss, Dave Lartigue, Joe Hunter, Dan Butler (who drew my Twitter icon!), Andrew Ihla, Dylan Todd, Josh Krach, Matthew Allen Smith, Pete Toms, and some other folks I haven’t really interacted with but are swell creators anyway. C’mon, it’s only $2…it’s really good, I promise.
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Speaking of money, here are a couple of worthy and/or interesting causes you may consider contributing to:
First, Matt Brady, proprietor of the “Warren-Peace Sings the Blues” comics blog that I’ve linked to a few times, is currently seeking some assistance paying legal fees for a difficult divorce proceeding that’s already drained many of his resources. If you can spare a little, please help him out.
Second, not that this particular endeavor needs my help given the coverage it’s received, but there’s a Kickstarter for a game based on the infamous and voluminous works of Chuck Tingle. If you know who that is, well, you can guess the link is perhaps just slightly Not Safe for Work, if your job can’t handle the idea of butts and what may or may not be done to them. The primary reason I’m linking to it is that one of the game’s writers is pal Karla Pacheco, she of Inspector Pancakes fame, and frankly I can think of no better match for a project of this majesty. The other reason I’m linking is that the write-up on that Kickstarter page is hilarious. Even the dollar amount the Kickstarter is seeking is hilarious. Chuck Tingle, this world hardly deserves you.
• • •
One final note, given
what’s happened in the comics industry this week: certain dudes out there, stop being jerks to women. C’mon, nobody needs this.
So I love oddball promotional materials sent to retailers by comic book companies. My favorite is probably the bottle of Armstrong Ale that Valiant Comics sent to promote Archer & Armstrong back in the ’90s. (In fact, I’m pretty sure my old boss still has that bottle in the back room somewhere.)
This week, the weird promo item was an honest-to-Philips audio cassette tape to tie into this week’s release of Cave Carson Has A Cybernetic Eye (which is one hell of a title, one must admit). It has a brief playing time, with a song (“Into the Cave We Wander”) on one side and an alleged documentary excerpt from Carson’s investigation of Poggy’s Cavern on the other, essentially making it a “cassingle” in the parlance of Ye Olden Times. (As opposed to a C-Dingle in the parlance of Slightly Less Olden Times.) Anyway, it’s weird, since I doubt too many stores nowadays have an in-store cassette player to pipe the tunes/spoken word track to their customers’ ears, but, you know, maybe some do. Or it can be used as a contest giveaway (buy a copy of the comic, get entered in the drawing…er, depending on your state’s lottery rules, maybe, I’m no lawyer), or if you like obscure-ish recordings, like I do, it’s yet another goodie to add to the collection. …A little investigation reveals that this was also given away at a “Young Animal” panel at a recent convention, and I suspect these tracks will be made available in wider release, probably as digital downloads, at some point, if they’re not already.
In case you’re wondering, the comic itself is fine…probably the most “traditional,” I suppose, of the three titles so far released under the Young Animal imprint. If you thought Doom Patrol and Shade the Changing Girl were a little too “out there” for you, this feels more like a simple updating of a Silver Age character that might be a little more accessible. But overall I think I like the aesthetic of the imprint…dense and complicated but mostly clearly told and enjoyable comics that don’t necessarily feel beholden to whatever related comics preceded them. This has me wondering about what Mother Panic, the first entirely original character (I believe), will be like, but if it’s presented in the same fashion as the others, I’m looking forward to it.
I had no idea how much I missed Love and Rockets in its magazine format until I was finally holding a new issue in my hands. Not to say I didn’t appreciate L&R or related works in whatever format I could get my mitts on, but there’s a bit of a nostalgic “going home again” sense in seeing it like this. In fact, I think I prefer the magazine format to the previous annual format, particularly since if the magazine comes out on a regular basis that means more Los Bros Hernandez pages per year, and who can say no to that? Also, it’s a bit easier to sell something at $4.99 a few times a year than it is to sell a $14.99 book even just once a year, which probably sounds strange but that’s just been my experience. Anyway, I’m glad Love and Rockets is still around in any configuration.
So you guys all remember pal Ian? The fella who was one of the founding members of ACAPCWOVCCAOE, which is short for, as long-time readers will remember, Associated Comics and Pop Culture Webloggers of Ventura County, CA and Outlying Environs? The kind and gentle editor of the Bill and Ted’s Excellent Comic Book Archives who was good enough to place a credit for me in the collection due to my small bit of production assistance?
Well, pal Ian can use a little help…he’s been out of work for a bit, and while he tries to get more employment in the comics biz, he could stand a bit of assistance to keep himself going in the meantime. If you have a few spare dollars, he’d be most appreciative, so please visit his GoFundMe page and help out if you can. Or just straight-up hire the dude…he’s a good and talented guy! I’ll vouch for him!
• • •
Meanwhile…COMIC BOOKS:
I’m genuinely surprised that Marvel is ending the Darth Vader series, but in retrospect that’s probably a good thing. Too much Vader can spoil whatever mystique is left (I mean, yes, we got a lot of Anakin in various Star Wars-ian media, but Vader is another thing entirely), and we basically know how it all ends for him, so having a short-run adventure with a beginning, middle, and end in the midst of already-established Star Wars “history” is for the best. And it’s also probably just as well that the series bows out now while sales are still strongish, though they were beginning to sag a little…switching up the titles on a regular basis for ones starring different characters keeps things fresh. Yeah, that’s like the exact opposite of what I usually want from Marvel, another parade of new #1s, but Star Wars sales generally remain strong and enthusiasm for new titles is still present in the marketplace, unlike the groans I hear at the same titles being relaunched over and over again, sometimes only months apart.
Now elements of the Darth Vader comic will continue in this new series, and by the way that entire link is a SPOILER in case you haven’t read that last issue. I wonder if the main Star Wars title has a planned conclusion in its future? I suspect not, but I am surprised at the lack of a current comic based on the Rebels cartoon, since the Kanan series wrapped up some time ago. I think an Ahsoka series would probably be like printing money.
We’re beginning to see a little more of a direction in the Doom Patrol series with the second issue, after a very strange, but still quite interesting, debut issue. Glad to see the return of concepts from the Grant Morrison era, which is a couple of decades old now (but usually readily available in trade paperback form at a comic shop near you!) but I still have fond memories of those crazy stories and it looks like this new series should build quite nicely on them without necessarily repeating what we’ve seen.
Every time one of the new Superman comics comes out, like this week’s Action #965, I say the same thing: “this shouldn’t be working.” But it does, somehow, even with the convoluted set-up of the pre-Flashpoint Superman returning to the New 52/Rebirth universe after the reboot Superman died, and then there’s the other non-Superman Clark Kent running around, and two Lois Lanes (or are there) and the Son of Superman, and so on and so forth. It makes for compelling reading, as the reader wants to know what the resolution is going to be, and I sure as heck hope it’s not tied to the larger metaplot of the Watchmen’s involvement in Rebirth. But eventually there’s going to be some sort of “smoothing out” of continuity which results in One Universe, One Superman, One Lois Lane, and I’m about 90% certain No Son of Lois and Clark, and it’ll probably be Dr. Manhattan waving his hands and saying “well, I thought that would work, let me put the pieces back together.” We’ll see.
Anyway, this issue of Action had a couple of great Lois Lane-focused covers, appropriate for the Lois-heavy content within. It was hard to pick which one I wanted for myself, but ultimately went with the one pictured above.
I buy every issue of Haunted Horror (and its sister mag Weird Love)…it reminds me of that late, great series Tales Too Terrible to Tell, without the great historical text pieces discussing the stories and publishers, alas, but it is in color and it’s always great to see what was going on in vintage horror titles that weren’t from EC Comics. The stories can be of…shall we say, varying competency, but they always make for some entertainingly ghoulish reading. Hey kids, comics!
If you told me years ago that in 2015/2016 I’d be reading and enjoying a Howard the Duck comic that wasn’t written by Howard’s creator Steve Gerber, I’d probably be secretly plotting a way to get my hands on your time machine. Also, I would have been surprised by this revelation. It’s not Gerber’s Howard, but it was definitely Zdarsky’s Howard and it’ll be missed. Yeah, this is the last issue. That’s too bad. …Still can’t believe I’m saying that about a non-Gerber Howard. YES, I’M CLINGING DESPERATELY TO THE PAST, WHAT OF IT
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