Lumberjanes Volume 4: Out of Time

My 1000th entry on this blog!!!!

Bought this last summer at Newbury Comics, Hyannis MA USA.

Title: Lumberjanes Volume 4: Out of Time
Date: July, 2016
Publisher: Boom! Studios (Boom Box)
Writer: Noelle Stevenson, Shannon Watters
Artist: Brooke Allen, Joy Ang, Kassandra Heller, Ricardo Bessa, Hope Larson, Kat Philbin, Carolyn Nowak, Jen Wang
Colorist: Maarta Laiho
Letterer: Aubrey Aiese
Cover:  Noelle Stevenson
Editor: Dafna Pleban, Whitney Leopard

When a sudden blizzard separates Jen from her campers, she is rescued by a mysterious hunter and taken to a house in the woods full of taxidermied monster trophies.

As the girls try to organize a search for Jen, they learn some of the past history of the Lumberjanes Scouts, and of the conflicts that divided the past generation of campers.

Now, those past conflicts boil up as a lifelong obsession with an ancient and powerful being jeopardizes the camp, the woods, and possible everything else.

The backstory that this collection added to the Lumberjanes mythology brought a whole new direction to the ongoing story, and served to shift the perspective of the reader as a whole trove of long-simmering secrets were hinted at.

The flashback sequences involving Rosie, Nellie, and Abigail are great and add a lot to those characters.

This four-issue arc also put Jo squarely in the spotlight, as she gets into a conflict with Barney of the Scouting Lads, which serves to bring out some of Jo's internal conflict, while at the same time providing a space for examining issues around transgender identity.

There was also plenty of excellent action, an interesting "Big Bad" threat, and all the weirdness and wit that has been great throughout this series.

Rating: 9/10

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story #1

The Kiddo picked this one out at one of the Newbury Comics locations when we were in the US this past summer.

Title: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
Issue: 1
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Date: June 2017
Writer: Jody Houser
Artist: Emilio Laiso, Oscar Bazaldua
Colorist: Rachelle Rosenberg
Letterer: VC's Clayton Cowles
Editor: Heather Antos

First of all, let me just say that I LOVE these action figure variant covers. So much fun!

This is the first issue of the official adaptation of Rogue One. It moves at a pretty fast pace to get to the point where present-time Jyn Erso is introduced and then takes its time a bit more from there.

The fight scenes look good, and the story becomes more focused in the second half of the issue, with the adaptation making some good choices in what to emphasize or cut.

This is competent and visually appealing, but there is a limit to what a comic can do adapting a film, and the result is something that never gets much past feeling like it's a competent adaptation

Rating: 5.5/10

Locke & Key: Alpha #1 (Newbury Comics Retailer Variant)

Third book in today's review marathon. Nine to go to finish the stack. Four more to get me back on track for one per day to finish the stack before we leave on Friday.

Title: Locke & Key: Alpha
Issue: #1
Date: August, 2013
Publisher: IDW Publishing
Writer: Joe Hill
Artist: Gabriel Rodriguez
Colorist: Jay Fotos
Letterer: Robbie Robbins
Editor: Chris Ryall

Newbury Comics retailer variant cover!

This is a big climactic battle, and, having not read much of what led up to this, I was a bit lost in terms of who everyone was. No fault of the comic's. It even provided a quick recap on the inside front cover. I would just point out that if you are new to Locke & Key, as I was, this is probably not the best jumping-in point, in spite of the "issue #1" on the front cover (which I am guessing is why I bought this in the first place).

All of that being said, this was an awesomely epic good vs. evil confrontation, featuring a really horrifying villain, a seemingly hopeless situation for the good guys, and a heroic final stand. It was fun, with plenty of gore and horror elements, all used very well.

I wasn't even too bothered by the villain's excessive talking about his plans for world domination when he should probably just have been getting on with making good on his threats to the captive heroes. The villain here is so obnoxious that it's worth it hearing some of his over-the-top soliloquizing, even if he's playing into a classic trope.

I need to go back and read some of what lead up to this.

Rating: 8/10

Jessica Jones #2

Last of the small batch of comics I bought in the US (at Newbury Comics, Braintree MA) in November during my short trip home.

Title: Jessica Jones
Issue: 2
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Date: January, 2017
Writer: Brian Michael Bendis
Artist: Michael Gaydos
Colorist: Matt Hollingsworth
Letterer: VC's Cory Petit
Editor: Tom Brevoort, Alanna Smith
Cover: David Mack

Luke Cage confronts Jessica over the whereabouts of their child, and Jessica tries to find a safe place to rest after the case she's working on falls apart around her.

There was a lot to like in this story. The conflict between Luke and Jessica is great because there is no clear objective right or wrong, just two parents who love their child and are trying to protect that child as best they know how.

I also love the appearances of superheroes in the background, keeping the story gritty and street-level while constantly reminding the reader that Jessica Jones resides in Marvel's New York City, which super-powered beings are part of the background of everyday life.

There were some intriguing plot twists and good pacing as the story moved along. A flashback added some depth to the relationship between Luke Cage and Jessica Jones without overstaying its welcome. Ending was a solid cliffhanger.

Rating: 7/10

Batman/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures #1

Fourth comic out of five somewhat random recent releases that I got at Newbury Comics in Braintree MA during my short trip back to the US recently.

Title: Batman/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures
Issue: #1
Date: 2016
Publisher: DC Comics / IDW
Writer: Matthew K. Manning
Artist: Jon Sommariva
Inker: Sean Parsons
Colorist: Leonardo Ito
Letterer: Shawn Lee
Editor: Bobby Curnow
Cover: Hilary Barta, Jason Millet


This is the "Incentive Cover" variant.


All-ages (animated series versions, basically) crossover featuring Batman and TMNT. The problem with these crossovers is the amount of setup involved in introducing the characters to each others worlds (and to each other). This comic suffers from that problem a bit, but at least makes a concerted effort to tackle it in an efficient way.


The story builds a bit slowly. The Turtles and the Batman do not actually meet face-to-face in this issue.

The basic scenario has a bunch of the Batman rogues gallery dumped into the Tuirtles' version of New York by way of an alien portal. Batman has an encounter with Two-Face that gives him his first clue that something is amiss. Meanwhile, the Turtles, who are familiar with the portal technology, battle Clayface in the New York sewers.


There's an attempt a a "shocking" ending bit, although it somewhat fails because it's actually badly out of character for the villains involved.

 There was nothing really awful about this story so far, but not much to get excited about either.

Rating: 5/10

Mockingbird #5

Third in the stack of five recent comics I bought on my brief trip back to the US. These were purchased at Newbury Comics' Braintree MA location.

Title: Mockingbird
Issue: 5
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Date: September 2016
Writer: Chelsea Cain
Artist: Ibrahim Moustafa
Colorist: Rachelle Rosenberg
Letterer: VC's Joe Caramagna
Editor: Katie Kubert
Cover: Joelle Jones, Rachelle Rosenberg

I'd heard good things about the Mockingbird series and issue #5 happened to be the one in stock at the store I visited.

The basic idea here is that SHIELD agent Bobbi Morse is has been infected with a virus that gives her superpowers. Well, really it's the virus itself has superpowers and it lets her use them.

The virus also reanimates corpses into zombies, which is a problem because Agent Morse is in the SHIELD medical facility, which happens to have a good supply of donated-to-science bodies.

Also, Spider-Man (Miles Morales, I think) and Howard the Duck. No, really.

This was very witty. Good joke density too. It was absolutely loaded with snark, and the creative team didn't let the plot get in the way of opportunities for more snark. Seriously, there was an entire page devoted to Bobby going off on an illustrated tangential rant about bad ideas in history.

This was pretty entertaining, even if it was mostly a throwaway story up until a final plot twist that seemed like it was going to shape the direction of the story moving forward.

Did I mention there is a page of paper dolls that includes a severed zombie head?

Funny stuff. I enjoyed this.

Rating: 7/10

Batgirl and the Birds of Prey: Rebirth #1

Second of the five recent comics I picked up at Newbury Comics in Braintree MA during my quick trip back to the US.

Title: Batgirl and the Birds of Prey: Rebirth
Issue: #1
Date: September, 2016
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Julie Benson, Shawna Benson
Artist: Claire Roe
Colorist: Allen Passalaqua
Letterer: Steve Wands
Editor: Dave Wielgosz, Chris Conroy
Cover:Yanick Paquette, Nathan Fairbairn

I had mixed feelings on the amount of time this issue devoted to origin-recapping. It's part of DC's "Rebirth", so it wasn't unexpected, and there were some insights that I thought were pretty good. But in the end, yet another retelling of the events of The Killing Joke felt unwelcome and I enjoyed this story more once I was past that part.

The story itself has Batgirl, having been operating for a while now in her return to the Batgirl identity (since the New 52), discovering that someone else has taken over the identity of Oracle, and is providing the information that Oracle used to deal in to the bad guys.

Black Canary gets recruited for the case, and Huntress soon returns, although for the moment she's not exactly acting as one of the good guys. There was also a lot of references to plot points that I wasn't familiar with as far as Huntress goes, but there was also enough direction to the main plot here that I didn't have a problem putting the backstory aside and just going with the flow.

The revelations at the end did a nice job of setting the stage for some big plot points to follow.

The book has a nice look to it, and it makes a good effort to incorporate a lot of the continuity and flavor that has been put into Batgirl over the last few years.

Rating: 6.5/10

Jessica Jones #1

Last week I got the news that my Grandmother passed away. She was 92 years old, and my only living grandparent. I made a quick decision that I needed to be there for the wake and funeral, and bought a ticket to head home. This was last Tuesday. I flew out from Ho Chi Minh City just before Midnight on Wednesday, and through the magic of the rotation of the Earth, arrived in Boston on Thursday afternoon. Wake was Friday. Funeral was Saturday. I left Boston for Vietnam on Sunday morning and was back at work on Tuesday. The rest of this week has passed in a bit of a jetlagged haze, which I am now finally somewhat recovered from.

During the brief trip home I got to see a lot of family members and celebrate Nana's life together with them.

I also managed to catch a showing of Arrival, which was not released in Vietnam (loved it!) with a friend, and met up with a bunch of friends at the South Shore Plaza in Braintree on Saturday night for dinner.

Since I got to the mall early, I also visited Newbury Comics and bought a somewhat random selection of five recent comic releases, which will be featured in my next few reviews.

Title: Jessica Jones
Issue: 1
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Date: December 2016
Writer: Brian Michael Bendis
Artist: Michael Gaydos
Colorist: Matt Hollingsworth
Letterer: VC's Cory Petit
Editor: Tom Brevoort
Cover: David Mack

I know almost nothing about Jessica Jones. I completely missed her earlier appearances in Alias and other Marvel titles, and I've never watched the TV show. Really all I know about her is what little I've read from reviews of the show, which was quite popular with a lot of my friends.

So I saw the second issue of this series (from Marvel's "Marvel Now" soft reboot) in the "new releases" section at Newbury Comics, and also saw that they had #1 in stock, so I figured I'd check it out.

Sound decision so far. This was really good on a lot of levels.

The characters, Jessica especially, make sense. There is a gritty feel to the story, but it's still grounded in the full-fledged Marvel Universe. It has a snarky sense of humor, including the occasional in-joke, but the pacing is such that the jokes enhance, rather than detract from the overall story.

That story begins with Jessica being released from jail and trying to get back to work. She's got a case that may involve parallel universes and Spider-Man, or it might just be a husband who has gone a bit crazy and a wife who wants to find out why.

And she's also got some personal problems that are showing up at her doorstep in the form of costumed heroes for hire.

The story had excellent pacing, and most importantly for me, it served as a really good introduction without having to retell an origin or over-explain. By the time I was done with this issue I felt fully invested in the story.

Looking forward to reading #2.

Rating: 8/10

Bullet For My Valentine: Scream Aim Fire: The Comics

This comes to me by way of Record Store Day, 2008. Normally a day to pick up some free music samples and buy special limited edition records on vinyl or CD, it can also feature a variety of promotional items and freebies, including zines and comics. The actual venue I visited from Record Store Day was one of the Newbury Comics locations.

Title: Bullet For My Valentine: Scream Aim Fire: The Comics
Publisher: Bullet For My Valentine
Date: April, 2008
Writer: Bullet For My Valentine, Tom Manning
Artist: Tom Manning

This is a promotional comic for the band Bullet For My Valentine, as part of 2008's Record Store Day.

The two stories are based on lyrics from the songs "Scream Aim Fire" and "Take It Out On Me" respectively. Of the two, "Take It Out On Me" had more story going on, with a scene from an incident of domestic violence (including some potentially disturbing images). "Scream Aim Fire" is more of a set of images rather than a story.

I wasn't familiar with the band so I looked up both songs on Youtube. I'm not a music expert, and I'm not into splitting hairs and getting into distinguishing musical
subgenres. I'd just describe their music as uptempo hard rock. Pretty catchy, actually. I may be giving more of their stuff a listen.

As for the comic, the art fits very nicely with the music and lyrics, and the book did its job of getting me interested enough to give the band a listen.

Rating: 7/10

Detective Comics #934

Another of the new comic purchases I made over the summer. This one came from one of the Newbury Comics locations I visited.

Title: Detective Comics
Issue: #934
Date: August, 2016
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: James Tynion IV
Penciler: Eddy Barrows
Inker: Eber Ferreira
Colorist:Adriano Lucas
Letterer: Marilyn Patrizio
Editor: Chris Conroy, Dave Wielgosz

First of all, I'm happy to see Detective Comics restored to its original numbering! When the New 52 started, one of the little things that I was most disappointed with was the renumbering of the "legacy" books, Action and Detective, to new #1's. I was cool with all the other titles, but these two have had their consistent numbering through all of my comic-reading, and way back to the beginning of DC. So I'm not surprised, but I am pleased to see the original numbering restored.

As for the story, well, Detective has been a lot of things in over 900 issues. With Rebirth, Detective is becoming a team book. The Batman and Batwoman are leading and training a team consisting of basically two Robins and a Batgirl (Tim Drake, Stephanie Brown, and Cassandra Cain), plus Clayface, for no real reason that makes any sense to me.

They're up against a new threat/conspiracy that seems to be closely tied to the Batman, and is operating with powerful technology and a seemingly omnipresent reach in Gotham. So, basically the Society of Owls, but not. The Batman's reaction to this new threat felt horribly out of character, but it was really all just an excuse to put the team together, and its the interactions within that team that will make this an interesting story (or not).

So far, it was entertaining, even if one needs to swallow the urge to apply logic. Clayface is fun, even it his presence in the group is ridiculous. Cassandra Cain, who calls herself Orphan these days, continues to be annoying as a character, and the interaction between Tim and Stephanie slipped too easily into stereotypical gender roles. Kate and Bruce were a lot better in that regard, although the ending interaction of "there's something you're not telling us..." felt like a tired cliche. For the love of Pete, just go ahead and tell them, Bruce! That holding back information stuff never ends well.

The book has a nice look, although the opening fight scene felt clunky due to limitations in showing much detail on the (Batman-imitating) villain.

This had a lot of weaknesses, but still had an overall sense of momentum and potential.

And also, onward to #1000!

Rating: 5.5/10

Wonder Woman Rebirth #1

This is one of the recent DC books I picked up at Newbury Comics in Hyannis MA on our summer visit home.

Title: Wonder Woman: Rebirth
Issue: 1
Date: August, 2016
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Greg Rucka
Artist: Matthew Clark, Jeremy Colwell, Sean Parsons, Liam Sharp
Colorist: Jeremy Colwell, Laura Martin
Letterer: Jodi Wynne
Editor: Chris Conroy, Mark Doyle
Cover: Liam Sharp, Laura Martin

One problem with the constant reboots of continuity that DC and Marvel have been doing more and more frequently, really ever since Crisis on Infinite Earths, is that it is very easy to fall back on an "everything you know is a lie" type of story.

That's what's happening here in this Wonder Woman reboot. There is a random action sequence with a self-reflective monologue thrown on top of it, questioning the various inconsistencies in Diana's origin story, while giving glimpses of a "current version" of a retold origin.

This transitions into a sequence where Diana uses the Lasso on herself in an effort to discover the truth about her origins. Clever idea, but not as well executed as I was hoping it might be.

This leads us to Olympus, some generic fighting, and nothing resolved.

Oh, and by the way, everything we have been told is a lie. Maybe.

Visually beautiful (awesome cover, and the interior art delivers too), but not much substance beyond some half-formed ideas.

Rating: 4.5/10

Poe Dameron #1

I stopped in at Newbury Comics in Manchester NH during our wanderings on our summer US visit, and got the first two issues of this series for the Kiddo, who continues to be a big Star Wars fan.

Title: Poe Dameron
Issue: 1
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Date: June 2016
Writer: Charles Soule
Artist: Phil Noto
Letterer: VC's Clayton Cowles
Editor: Heather Antos, Jordan D. White

In this Star Wars: The Force Awakens preview, Poe Dameron is searching for clues to Luke Skywalker's whereabouts, along with BB-8 and a new "Black Squadron" team of Resistance pilots.

After flying through a maze of caves, Poe finds himself in a tense standoff with a group that stands guard over a mysterious egg.

I liked the handling of the negotiations between Poe and the cave-dwellers. Neither side really wants to fight, but it's still a tense situation.

The new characters in Poe's squadron only get brief introductions, but it's enough to make them interesting. The hints of a possible traitor among them are a little heavyhanded, but I did like the snippets of history that added to the backstory for The Force Awakens.

This was a good start to a nice original story that fits in well with the new film.

Rating: 7.5/10

Batman: Rebirth #1

Look! An actual NEW comic! That's the result of being back in the USA with east access to comic stores for the next few weeks.

Since returning, I have...

1) Picked up a small haul of items purchased via crowdfunding sites in the past year (and shipped to a US address), A couple of graphic novels are among those items, and I'll be taking those back with me to Vietnam to read and review over the next year.

2) Visited Newbury Comics in Hyannis. Newbury Comics has a 50%-off sale on all standard-format DC comics right now, so I bought a few of the new Rebirth books to see what all the hype was about. Included in the purchase was the Rebirth special itself, but I ended up starting with the Batman tie-in (see below).

3) Retrieved a big stack of random unread comics from my storage unit. Lots of indie and minicomic titles in this batch. These will also be heading back to Vietnam with me to provide some reading/reviewing fodder. I also managed to get the whole batch bagged and boarded for travel.

I still have two conventions and lots of comic shop visits coming up on this trip, so I'm looking to add some more good reading material to the stack I take back to Vietnam with me. In the meantime, here's my review of an actual recent release!

Title: Batman: Rebirth
Issue: 1
Date: August, 2016
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Scott Snyder, Tom King
Artist: Mikel Janin
Colorist: June Chung
Letterer: Deron Bennett
Editor: Mark Doyle, Rebecca Taylor
Cover: Mikel Janin

So... Calendar Man.

Not exactly the most exciting villain to start off my Rebirth reading. That being said, the interpretation of Calendar Man here is what I would consider a valiant attempt at making the character interesting. He's found a way to accelerate the changing of the seasons in Gotham, and is attempting to unleash deadly spores on the city as soon as Spring rolls around. In four days.

There's also a fun scene with Lucius Fox including some insight into Thomas Wayne, plus the beginning of the career of the Batman's latest partner. Not a new Robin, but a new costumed identity entirely. I wasn't familiar with the character who will be under the mask, but he seemed interesting enough that I'd like to see more.

Not a bad start for Rebirth. But really, guys... Calendar Man?

Rating: 6/10

Magic: The Gathering: Theros #4

Last of my three recent purchases at Newbury Comics in Hyannis.

Title: Magic: The Gathering: Theros
Issue: 4
Date: January, 2014
Publisher: IDW Publishing
Writer: Jason Ciaramella
Artist: Chris Evenhuis
Colorist: Joana Lafuente
Letterer: Tom B. Long
Editor: Carlos Guzman
Cover: Anthony Francisco


So, the cover has gone pretty much full-on Infinity Gauntlet. Oh, and the promo card is Acquire. Which I totally bought this comic for.

This is the beginning of a new story arc. Dack Fayden is having nightmares. Unfortunately, as it turns out, these days in Theros, nightmares lead to sleepwalking, followed by sleepspellcasting, including sleepfireballing and other sleepmayhem.

Dack manages to stop a mage in the midst of most of the above, and she repays his kindness by conveniently infodumping.

And that is pretty much it. The new story has been set up, if perhaps a bit heavyhandedly. I did like the artwork on the people and scenery of Theros in this issue. The city setting provided a nice opportunity to showcase that.

Rating: 5.5/10

My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic #9

I took the Kiddo to Newbury Comics in Hyannis recently. I was looking for a couple of the new Magic: The Gathering comics (one of those was reviewed here, the second is up for review sometime in the next few days), and I let him pick out one comic from the all-ages shelf. This was his choice.

Title: My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
Issue: 9
Date: July 2013
Publisher: IDW Publishing
Writer: Katie Cook
Artist: Andy Price
Colorist: Heather Breckel
Letterer: Neil Uyetake
Editor: Bobby Curnow

This is the Newbury Comics retailer variant cover for this comic.

Big Mac has to repair the gazebo at the apple farm, but he's run out of nails. So it's into town for a hardware store run. Unfortunately, it's festival day in town, and everyone wants something from him. There are also repeating encounters with a group of ponies who are trying to launch a large package of fireworks from a catapult.

The most amusing aspect of this story is that Mac's dialogue consists almost entirely of "yup" and "nope", no matter what manner of mayhem (and there is plenty!) that he gets recruited into. He does get a bit more internal monologue via the captions, but whenever he's talking to anyone else it's just "yup" or "nope".

There were also a lot of nice little bits of side dialogue that added some good laughs to the story, and a very amusing full-page map panel showing a bunch of quick adventures that added to the excitement (or exhaustion) of Mac's day.

I felt that this dragged in places, but part of that was from not knowing the minor characters very well. There were some good jokes, and the overall storyline of Mac being unable to get his simple errand done was effective.

The kiddo enjoyed the parts involving things blowing up.

Rating: 6/10

Magic: The Gathering: Theros #3

Back to Newbury Comics in Hyannis tonight with the Kiddo. Picked up two more MTG comics for me (for the promo cards!), and a comic for the Kiddo. Here is the first of those reviews.

Title: Magic: The Gathering: Theros
Issue: 3
Date: December, 2013
Publisher: IDW Publishing
Writer: Jason Ciaramella
Artist: Martin Coccolo, Chris Evenhuis
Colorist: Joana Lafuente
Letterer: Tom B. Long
Editor: Carlos Guzman
Cover: Volkan Baga

This wrapped up the storyline, which came as a surprise to me, since I bought the fourth issue at the same time as I bought this one. I'm not sure how many issues this is scheduled to run.

Promo card was Wash Out. Yes, I bought this for the promo card. But you knew that.

So, Dack Fayden has assembled the two pieces of his mysterious artifact and it's, well actually it bears a rather striking resemblance to the Infinity Gauntlet. A Gauntlet of Might or Gauntlet of Power, maybe? The Gauntlet of Power makes more sense since it seems to boost Dack's blue magic.

We start things off in the midst of last issue's kraken-unleashing, and there is some degree of mayhem until Dack goes all Infinity Gauntlet on the Kraken's posterior region. There is a gorgeous two-page spread of the kraken battle, but the rest of the action was rather stale with the Kraken mostly just looming there without really doing all that much.

Then we get some annoyingly vague backstory on Captain Vog and all of a sudden we are epiloguing. That felt way too quick.

Which is how I will keep this review.

Rating: 5/10

Magic: The Gathering: Theros #2

Bought this one tonight at Newbury Comics at the Independence Mall in Kingston MA. And yes, bought it for the promo card (which was a nice version of Gaze of Granite).

Title: Magic: The Gathering: Theros
Issue: 2
Date: November, 2013
Publisher: IDW Publishing
Writer: Jason Ciaramella
Artist: Martin Coccolo
Colorist: Joana Lafuente
Letterer: Tom B. Long
Editor: Carlos Guzman
Cover: Dan Scott

This goes a long way toward fixing the problems of the first issue. In fact, it is perfectly possible to start the series here. As it turns out, there was nothing in issue #1 that couldn't be summarized.

I love the fact that planeswalker Dack Fayden turns out to be prone to seasickness. Please let them remember this in future continuity!

After spending a voyage leaning over the lee rail, Fayden arrives at a mysterious island which houses part of an artifact that he is seeking. He slings spells at a gorgon and some sort of sorceress and manages to make his escape with the goods.

The villains then proceed to the unleashing-the-kraken portion of our adventure.

This was fun and well-paced, with some good character development sprinkled in.

Rating: 7/10

Miracleman #1

A new comic! I picked this one up tonight at my local Newbury Comics along with the new Springsteen album. I've been trying to avoid buying too many new comics, seeing how many are still in the massive unread stack, but I had to pick this one up. I have a complete run of the original Miracleman, but I'm looking forward to rereading those classic stories with all of the extras that Marvel is throwing in.

Title: Miracleman
Issue: 1
Date: March, 2014
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Writer: The Original Writer, Mick Anglo
Artist: Garry Leach, Don Lawrence, Mick Anglo
Colorist: Steve Oliff
Letterer: Chris Eliopoulos
Editor: Axel Alonso

Marvel's acquisition and reprinting of Miracleman is not without its share of controversy, a fact that is evident right on the first page where the story credit is simply listed as The Original Writer. Alan Moore refused to allow his name to be attached to this version of his classic deconstruction of the superhero myth. Moore has asked that his name not be used for any of his work that he does not retain ownership of.

Miracleman was originally the British version of Captain Marvel, and was printed under the name Marvelman in the UK in the 1950s. Originally created by Mick Anglo, and based on Fawcett's Captain Marvel character, the story featured a boy named Mickey Moran who had been given the secret to powerful superhuman abilities, which were activated by him speaking the word "Kimota" ("atomic" spelled phonetically and backward!). The stories from the 1950s were classic superhero fare with Marvelman fighting evil foreign agents, mad scientists, and invaders from outer space.

This book reprints Miracleman #1, with some additional material. The original comic started out with a classic Marvelman story and then moves to the present day, where Mickey Moran, now in middle age, married, and troubled by mysterious dreams, suddenly remembers "kimota" and releases the power that had been locked away from his memory.

Then he has to explain it all to his wife.

The storytelling is already powerful, especially the interaction between Liz and Miracleman when he comes home to her in his new form.

In addition to the material from Miracleman #1, this issue contains three classic b/w Marvelman stories from the 1950s. I love the transformation scenes, which consist of a small panel with a drawing of a mushroom cloud and the sound effect WOOF! These stories were goofy fun, with Marvelman taking on foreign spies (from Boromania!) and a mad scientist who steals people's reflections to turn them into evil doppelgangers.

A text history of the publication of Captain Marvel and Marvelman is also included, along with excerpts from an interview that Joe Quesada did with original Marvelman creator Mick Anglo before he passed away in 2011.

The original issues of Miracleman are hard to find (and you can't have mine!), so if you haven't read this, it's really worth it. Fans of the original will also find plenty of nice extras in this reprint.

Rating: 8/10

Worlds' Finest #1

Another foray into the seemingly endless backlog of unread comics. I picked this one up at my local Newbury Comics a while back during one of those "Well, it's issue #1. You never know." moments.

Title: Worlds' Finest
Issue: 1
Publisher: DC Comics 
Date: July 2012
Writer: Paul Levits
Penciler: George Perez, Kevin Maguire
Inker: Scott Koblish, Kevin Maguire
Colorist: Rosemary Cheetham, Hi-Fi
Letterer: Carlos M. Mangual
Cover: George Perez, Hi-Fi
Editor:  Wil Moss

A reboot of the classic "World's Finest" comic, which traditionally has been a Batman/Superman team-up book. Notice the clever placement of the apostrophe in the title. "Worlds' Finest", as in multiple worlds. If you're not into silly DC-Multiverse multiple-Earth stuff, you might not want to get started with this.

This book features Huntress, formerly Robin of Earth-2, and Power Girl, formerly Supergirl of Earth-2. Huntress, AKA Helena Wayne, is the daughter of Earth-2's Batman, who was killed by Darkseid along with Earth-2's Superman and Wonder Woman. Also, this version of the Huntress has apparently been assuming the identity of the previous Huntress, Helena Bertinelli, who was killed in the past on Earth-1.

If this all makes perfect sense to you, you might be a DC Comics fan.

Actually, if you can get past all of the multiple-worlds nonsense, this book was a lot of fun. The interplay between the two characters generally wins out over continuity confusion, even through multiple flashback scenes. Helena and Karen have a really good vibe between them, and their loyalty to each other and determination to make the best of being stranded in a strange world come shining through nicely.

Some attempts to joke about the scantiness of Power Girl's traditional costume are more eyeroll-inducing than clever, but generally the the dialogue and interaction are entertaining. The story exists mostly to set up the new background and current situation of the heroines, with a villain being introduced on the last page in a cliffhanger that leave the reader feeling like the villain is the one who's really in peril here.

Generally harmless fun.

Rating: 6.5/10

Lex Luthor #1

Here is the last of the small batch of comics I picked up this past week at Newbury Comics. I recently reviewed Forever Evil #1 and wasn't that impressed, certainly not impressed enough to buy the zillion crossover comics needed to get the whole story.

However, hype is hype, and the holographic covers for this "Villains Month" event certainly got plenty of hype. So I figured I'd at least check out one.

Title: Lex Luthor
Issue: 1
Date: November 2013
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Charles Soule
Penciler: Raymond Bermudez
Inker: Dan Green
Colorist: Ulises Arreola
Letterer: Dezi Sienty
Editor: Anthony Marques, Eddie Berganza

Apparently, this is actually Action Comics #23.3. No, really. We've gone to fractions.

I picked this issue up, somewhat at random, from among the 3-d holographic cover versions of the Villains Month comics that were in stock at the store I visited last week. These have been selling quite well, so a lot of titles were sold out, and I just went with a character that I knew reasonably well.

The cover itself is the most impressive 3-d effect I've seen on a comic, one of the best I've ever seen in print. It is also headache-inducing to look at.

The story is pretty straightforward. Luthor gets out of jail and immediately manipulates a bunch of evil schemes, all of which fall into place perfectly because we are supposed to believe that he is an evil genius. Some of the details were fairly clever, and the pacing of the writing was good, but there really was never any doubt as to the outcome of anything. And like most stories of this type, the more you think about it the less impressive it is, because really, Luthor needs to have ridiculous amounts of luck on his side for his plans to actually work. This is always my gripe with stories like this one, and given that, this particular issue did a better job than most with the evil scheming.

This issue also turns out to be a very direct prequel to Forever Evil #1, which made it a good choice if I was only going to read one crossover comic. The story here is actually pretty nicely self-contained, which I also took as an added bonus, considering what I could have been getting into.

Not terrible if you want to see Lex Luthor behaving badly, but nothing especially insightful either.

Rating: 5.5/10