Comics Reviews, Take Two

Next weekend I'm going to Lucy's housewarming party (where no doubt I'll see many other Bay Area journallers). But on top of that, Trish asked if I wanted to do something that same night, and John invited me to join some folks who are going to an Italian restaurant after helping one of his cow-orkers move. Geez, it's amazing!

Meanwhile, tomorrow night it sounds like we might be playing Bridge, though it's not certain yet. John loaned me a book on the precision bidding system, which I have (just barely) cracked. Ben and Becky both came up to me in the lunch room after I had mentioned it in e-mail and said something like, "Are you really going to start playing precision?" Well, maybe. We'll see. (I think they're both wondering if John's promised to start playing Bridge again regularly as my partner if I learn precision, which is not actually the case.)

Meanwhile, at work today I verified all my outstanding bugs waiting to be verified, and started figuring out what I need to do to fix some of the ones that are now my responsibility as a developer. Whee!

As promised, here's the conclusion to my round-up of notable comics books I'm reading lately. For the sake of full disclosure, these two entries represent maybe 25% of the comics I buy monthly. Yeah, I buy a lot of stuff. I'm actually trying to cut back somewhat, although I just have this weakness for certain kinds of lightweight superhero books (Flash, for instance, or JSA). Although on the other hand, there is an awful lot of good stuff being published lately. For instance, I'm not even reviewing Thieves & Kings in these entries!

The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (America's Best Comics) just wrapped up its 6-issue run. Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill present a pastiche of pulp and literary heroes from the late 19th century gathered together by the British secret service (or its precursor) to carry out a mission, which turns out to mean something other than what they're originally told.

The League consists of: Mina Murray (nee Harker), Captain Nemo, Doctor Jeckyll and his alter-ego, the Invisible Man, and adventurer Alan Quatermain. Various other characters show up during the course of the series. (Jess Nevins has written an annotation of the series for the Web.) O'Neill's quirky artwork suits the series just about perfectly, and the story, although wrapping up rather too neatly in the final issue, is quite good. Apparently a sequel series is planned; I look forward to it.

As I've mentioned many times before, Planetary (Wildstorm) is one of my favorite comics being published. Although I've found much of writer Warren Ellis' other work to be too self-indulgent or edgy for my tastes, this one is just about perfect: A trio of adventurers investigates the secret history of the 20th century in the Wildstorm universe, much of which involves characters and events that are homages (i.e., thinly-disguised rip-offs) of popular cultural icons. There's a Justice League, a Doc Savage, a Godzilla, a Fantastic Four, and so forth.

What sets this book apart is that the source material is then taken and changed to serve the purposes of our heroes' investigations, which involve some sort of long-term conspiracy to change or control the world. The main character is Elijah Snow, who was born in 1900 and is physically about 40 years old. He's a crotchety old man who's starting to learn that things have been going on around him without his knowledge, or that his memory has been changed. In this latest issue, #11, he goes to John Stone, the best secret agent in the world, to help him unravel some of what's happening. I've gotten the impression that Planetary will last about 24 issues, so we're nearly halfway done.

Supporting Ellis' stories is the fantastic artwork of John Cassaday, who has come a long way from his lushly-rendered but rather stuff work for Marvel Comics, and who is now a top-notch layout man as well. His final page in this issue, although perfectly simple, is also beautiful and powerful. It's the sort of thing that makes me remember exactly why this is such a great art form.

By contrast, Michael Avon Oeming's art for Powers (Image; #4 shown) is intended to be somewhat cartoony, and Brian Michael Bendis' story is rather pulpish in nature. Christian Walker and Deena Pilgrim are detectives investigating the murder of a super-heroine named Retro-Girl. They take fairly straightforward police avenues to their investigation: Talking to friends and acquaintances of the victim, and grilling various enemies she's acquired. Meanwhile, Walker seems more wrapped up in the case than one might expect, which makes Pilgrim curious as to the reasons.

Powers is slow-moving, but entertaining for what it is. It has the potential to be truly great, but it may be a little while before it lives up to its potential. It's much better than Alan Moore's very overrated Top Ten comic for ABC, though.

The Red Star (Image; #2 shown) is, I've heard, a parable about the fall of the Soviet Union. It takes place in a dark fantasy world, where the Union's counterpart is attempting to conquer a region called Nistaan (which appears to be an analogue for Afghanistan, but again, I'm not sure). Things go horribly wrong. The story is mostly told by Maya Antares, a sorceress who was at the battle, and who is reminiscing at the grave of her husband, who was killed in the battle. It's not clear whether the state has fallen or is in the process of falling.

The art is often stunning, with computer-enhanced imagery, and a peculiar mix of detail and sparseness, and of technology and magic. As with Powers, the story is moving rather slowly, but there seems to be a lot of potential here. It's a dark and brooding story, and as long as it treats its subject seriously, I think it will be quite good.

(I'm not sure exactly who the creators are, since #2 only has one of those cutesy credit pages where the creators are listed on fictional business cards, in some cases with what seem to be made-up titles. Few things bug me more than this. List the creators - both first and last names - and explain what they worked on, and get on with it. I really hated how they did this in the Sandman collections, too. Grr.)

Finally we have Sentry #2 (Marvel) by Paul Jenkins and Jae Lee is of a sort of superhero book which is becoming increasingly popular lately: The "something happened in our heroes' past and no one remembers what it was, but it finally comes back to haunt them" stripe. In this case, the Sentry was a Superman-like hero who existed in the Marvel Universe back when the heroes were just getting their start. He was best friends with Reed Richards, who was best man at his wedding.

Now, Bob Reynolds remembers being the Sentry, but only in a dream, and no one else remembers. Finally, Bob exercises his powers and flies to the Fantastic Four's headquarters in this issue, where he confronts Reed, jogging Reed's memory. This seems to be a very bad thing, since it appears that Sentry's existence was wiped from everyone's memory for a reason, and we don't yet know what this reason is.

Jenkins' story advances things a little bit in each of the first two issues, and I expect all hell will break loose next issue. Lee's art is sketchy and dark, which works here, although I admit I'm not his biggest fan. I think this is another 6-issue series; it's worth a look.

So that's a look at what I'm reading lately. Is there anything out there that you think I ought to check out? Feel free to drop me a line...