Grendel: Devil's Legacy #1

Another random comic from the unread comics stack.

Title: Grendel: Devil's Legacy
Issue: 1
Date: March, 2000
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Writer: Matt Wagner
Penciller: Arnold Pander, Jacob Pander
Inker: Jay Geldhof
Colorist: Jeromy Cox
Letterer: Steve Haynie
Editor: Diana Schutz, Tim Ervin-Gore
Cover: Matt Wagner

This reprints Comico's Grendel #1 with new coloring by Jeromy Cox. The original publication was one of those early books I bought in my first run of seriously collecting comics in the 1980s. The story focuses on Christine Spar, granddaughter of the original Grendel, Hunter Rose. Comfortable in her life as a newspaper editor and the author of a book on her infamous ancestor, Christine is drawn into the legacy of Grendel when her son vanishes under mysterious and horrifying circumstances.

This story features one of the most disturbing villains in comics, a strong cast of supporting characters, and the looming presence of the Grendel mythology that Matt Wagner does such a great job of weaving into his multigenerational saga.

As good a read now as when I first read it. The first meeting between Christine Spar and Tujiro XIV is still as creepy as I'd remembered.

Rating: 8.5/10

Robotech: The Macross Saga #23

Nostalgia time! While I was a Marvel fan as a kid, this was the first comic series I seriously collected when I got into comics again after high school.

Title: Robotech: The Macross Saga
Issue: 23
Date: November 1987
Publisher: Comico
Writer: Markalan Joplin
Penciler: Mike Leeke
Inker: Mike Chen
Letterer: Bob Pinaha
Editor: Maggie Brenner
Cover: Mike Leeke, Mike Chen

Comic adaptation of the English-language TV adaptation of the Macross anime.

We open in the midst of a full-scale Zentraedi attack on Macross City, but it's quickly revealed that there is more going on here than meets the eye. In the midst of the chaos, Zentraedi are attempting to defect to the Micronian (human) side.

Meanwhile Rick Hunter walks in on Minmei and Kyle in an awkward moment. Melodrama ensues.

The second half of the book is almost all dialogue (there is one brief battle toward the end), and this is where the strengths of this series really come through. There is some pretty intense political intrigue and maneuvering going on both on the Zentraedi side and the human side. There is also a great scene between Lisa Hayes and Rick Hunter as they discuss past and present loves (all the while dancing around the topic of their own feeling for each other) over tea. What really makes this scene work is that it is given plenty of time, so the conversation flows naturally. The small talk develops the characters and deepens the backgrounds of the supporting cast, while it builds up the romantic tension between Rick and Lisa. This was as good a "quiet" scene as I've seen done in comics.

Nice mix of space-opera and soap-opera.

Rating: 7.5/10

I'm selling my copy of this comic here.