I read LOTS of Comics...

So, I read comics (duh, with a handle like, "SpiderMitch")... I read everything from the big boys like DC & Marvel, to the mid-sized Image, Dark Horse, IDW, & Aspen, to the independent and smaller publishers like Big Dog Inc & Zenescope...
Anyway, I thought it would be kinda cool to see if I could do a few write-ups after I finish reading comics. You may not necessarily agree with what I have to say, but that's the fun of reading comics: each person has different interpretation and tastes. Here I hope to share my experience (whether it be good or not so good), and have a little fun and humor along the way!

I'll try not to give away too many spoilers, but it's my hope you read these reviews after you've read the issue, so you can comment if you want!

I'm a little behind on what I read, since I try to do so chronologically. This often has me jumping from title to title to fit everything in a massive reading order. Generally I read simultaneous publishers / events at a time.
It may be handy to use the navigation filters above to jump to specific publishers, events, or specific characters!


P.S. I'll be using my phone & tablets to both read the comics & write these reviews, so if there's spelling mistakes / layout issues, sorry!

Monday, April 27, 2015

Dynamite - Warlord of Mars #1-6 (Everyone's Naked!)


In 2012, Disney put out a movie, riding the coattails of the Pirates of the Caribbean successes, that aimed to put Edgar Rice Burroughs’ character John Carter on the map.  The movie didn’t do well at all; partly due to misdirection in advertising, target demographic changes, and the title, itself, not enthusiastically drawing in audiences.  I mean, calling a movie a familiar name like Tarzan will resonate with people.  Calling it John Carter makes people scratch their heads.  That said, at one point they dropped the ‘of Mars’ section of the title, which may have been done so the conclusion of the movie could include it in the outro, but doing so gave up a descriptive section of the movie’s name that could have worked to their advantage.  “Wanna go see John Carter?”  “Who the hell is that?”  vs “Let’s go see that Mars movie… John Carter of Mars.”

Regardless, recently I found myself watching said movie for the first time since seeing it in the theater.  And if not flawed in some of the execution, I found the movie enjoyable and entertaining.  They shove so much lore in there that, I conclude, it baffled audiences, leading to bad word-of-mouth and negative recommendations.  However, I wanted to understand a bit more about the lore and what this science-fiction-founding character was all about.  Which brings me to the comics.  While not source material, there is enough taken from the novels and embedded into them that I felt they would give a good representation of what may have been left from the movies (or crammed in), to give them a go.

Rather than dig through the multi-panel 60’s and 70’s comics of yore, I decided to jump into the 2010 Dynamite series (which was no doubt created to raise interest in the character prior to the movie).  Thus, I would find a compatible-enough version of the character to begin my journey into the ‘of Mars’ comic books.  First up is “Warlord of Mars,” the first arc being “A Tale of Two Planets.”

The character of John Carter, himself, is part cowboy, part carvery-man, part superhero and part romantic.  He’s definitely an every-man character the audience can identify with.  Throughout reading this book, I’m consistently reminded of Ben-Hur, He-man, Conan, Hercules, and Superman as John leaps around and performs acts of strength.  What is great is that you can imagine if you were there on Mars, you could do the same feats.  While they give some plausible excuse for him being able to do these feats, the one underlying truth is that due to John being human, he can do these things and so could anyone else from Earth (Jasoom).  This is kinda a reverse-Superman effect, and it really helps a reader become that everyman who’s in a strange place with strange powers.

John meets green-skinned, four armed locals on Mars (Barsoom), and is brought – without reluctance on John’s part – to their territory.  Personally, I don’t think I would have immediately gone with the first tusked-weapon-wielding, four-armed green people I saw, but, good ol’ John goes right along!

What’s interesting about the narrative is that it’s told from the main character’s recollection (or journal), often giving the reader insight into the current predicament that John won’t know until his musings.  This adds a really cool layer to a story where too many culture misunderstandings would leave the reader as bewildered as John.  In some cases all you get is a, “I would later find out just what that gesture meant,” kind of foreshadowing, but it still makes this feel much more like a tale he’s recalling.  This may change after the initial origin arc, but I hope it stays this way.

The exposition past-tense fun notwithstanding, I do have some issues with this character’s motivation.  Namely, how seemingly quick his integration into Tharkian society is and how quickly he rises through the ranks, falls for a beautiful girl, and gets wrapped up in all things Mars, all-the-while wanting to get back to his cave of gold.  I hope rest of the books go a little deeper into John Carter’s unwillingness to fight in the war, perhaps showing the death of his family as motivation for desertion, and subsequently his need to find a cave of gold.  I think there’s a lot more to build on with the backstory of his character, which helps support his decisions to readers while on Mars.

Oh, and he’s naked.  And the Tharks are naked.  Dejah Thoris is almost always naked; little pasties and what would barely cover a landing-strip.  The White Apes have little dongles that are always shadowed.  That's a lot of martians running around in their birthday best!  Generally when there's sci-fi that puts itself on a different planet and their costumes are all strange, you accept it, but never really give it a lot of thought.  An unexpected side effect of all this nakedness, is that while not politically correct running around in skivvies here on Earth, it's perfectly acceptable on Mars, and while that's kinda funny to think about (and see in comics that aren't erotica/hentai), it really sets your mind into thinking, "Oh well, that's their society and it's different."  And thinking like this is terrific for a story that transports you to a completely different planet... Or maybe that's just me trying to justify having Dejah Thoris all sexied up.  The moment I thought of the enlightenment I layed out in the above statements, I realized that into 4 issues with a sexy Dejah Throis on the cover, she hadn't actually showed up in the story.  Heh.  Seems sex sales, no matter how a cultural ban on clothing makes sense in the book.



In any case, I'm looking forward to further adventures on Mars/Barsoom, and see how the politics, people, relationships of the story can be explored in the comic format (rather than crammed into a hail-mary pass from Disney).

Wednesday, April 22, 2015

DC New52 - Superman #0 (No One Ever Listens to GorEl)

Man I'm really tired of reading Superman's origin. Tired of seeing it on the big screen too.  I get that a lot went down on Krypton prior to the sundering, but I don't want to read about the adventures of the House of El during this time.  We get it by now: GorEl was awesome, knew shit was going down & nobody effing listened!  This story doesn't really give us too much we didn't know, although there is a hint of a time-traveling paradox, which will hopefully culminate into a causality loop... that would be sweet & make this rerereretold origin actually something of note.  (Remember, dear readers, I'm still playing catch-up and reading in chronological order.  This sudden appearance of Superman left me scratching my head going, "Huh?" But it was still a really cool, "Oh I gotta keep reading Supes to see what that's about!" moment.  As of the time of this writing, I'm sure this was already addressed, and may have been so when the zero issue came out.  This may have been another person's nod saying "Oh that's when he went back in time..." but to me, it's like seeing Marty crawling around on the scaffolding before you knew he went back to the moment he was singing Johnny B. Good.)



Oh and by the way: in case anyone was wondering... GorEl and Lara don't make it, but KalEl does...
(Spoilers, I know!)

Oh and what the hell is up with Kryptonian fashion?  I wonder if they thought of making a 'fashion police' guild?

Tuesday, April 21, 2015

DC New52 - Auqaman #0 (I canz punch sharks!)

Auqaman is always ridiculed.  I think a lot of this stems from guys like me growing up watching the Super Friends.  And while all the characters were campy and over the top, Auqaman seems to have suffered the most, often being the blunt of jokes and SNL / Mad TV / the State skits and sketches.  Many writers have tried to change that image of this character, including a great story about the loss of his son, his right hand, and his kingdom for a time.  He was even reimagined to have long hair, loosing the orange scale shirt & a harpoon hand. Not to mention having a magic water hand which he could manipulate into stabbing weps ala Terminator.

So all that's going to be fixed with the New52 right? Well... maybe.  The first arc in the Auqaman series pits a disconnected Auqaman against monsters surfacing and feeding on people from the deep.  And there's some meta references in there in the form of locals poking fun at him, which i personally think is not only bold but needed.  Once the audience can get over their initial "go talk to some fish" jokes, hopefully they'll give this Auqaman refresh a chance.

This story takes place from Aquaman's childhood and gives us his revamped backstory in which (spoilers) his dad bites it, tells him to tell his mom he loved her, and that, you know, she's in the sea, so... Good Luck!  and croaks.  So apparently a science dude is telling everyone that Arthur is from Altlanis and everyone's pestering him.  He jumps into the water, resucues a boat, meets the rescuees and they tell him where someone claiming to be from Atlantis lives.  He goes there and there's a long exposition that culminates in his mother dead, his brother killing her, and now ruling Atlantis.  Arthur's like "Let's go, old man!" and they take off and go to Atlantis.  Boom... Aquaman Begins! </spoiler>


So this is the thing: even though this felt pretty rushed and almost like a cookie-cutter superhero origin.  I dug it.  The panels with Arthur dealing with the media outside yelling at him about his (mostly unknown to him) Atlantian roots was a really relatable moment.  It echoed the scene from Man of Steel where young Clark's in the closet (not as dirty as it sounds).  But instead of having a parental figure to coax him off that ledge, Arthur shoves through the crowd & throws himself into the ocean.
From that moment it seems like a movie.  Every panel gives a credit to the writer, artist, colorist, etc... and it honestly draws you into the fact that you're on this journey with him too!  Geoff Johns really delivers here, as he always does, with dialog only where it's needed and letting the artwork tell a beautiful story.  While the exposition dialog from the old guy was a little lengthy, I can totally forgive it for drawing me in, the way it did with it's cinematic-like visual panels.




Oh and he punches a shark & tells him to eff off.  Gotta love that.  Who wouldn't want to punch a shark in the teeth?


It's really too bad that alot of people are going to pass this title up.  Having read the following 1st Auqaman arc of the New52, it really looks like they're giving the right treatment to a character that alot of people have already written off as a joke.  Remember kiddos: before we got Nolan's awesome Batman Begins, we had to sit through the travesty that was Joel Schumacher's horrid Batman & Robin.

God I hate Clooney's Batman.

DC New52 - Teen Titans #0 (I wanna be Robin, Dammit!)

So since the Teen Titans were formed in the first few issues of their New52 relaunched title, this issue centers solely around Tim Drake and how he became Red Robin.  Nope... it wasn't from depression of the loss of Batman, or do to a new crusade in finding a lost-in-time Bruce... No-sir-ree-Bob... It was because he wanted to separate himself from being a nightly Jason Todd reminder.  Good-lookin out for Batman's psyche, Red Robin!
Anywho, this is a great tale narrated by Batman's own recollection of the events.  It occurs to me that this is not something you couldn't really do to introduce a brand new character, but with an already established one, you can play on the tense.  It's terrific we get to see this executed so well here.  I'm hoping the other New52 zero books will use this technique and be this satisfying.

Monday, April 20, 2015

DC New52 - Superman: Action Comics #0 (I likes me an alien baby blankie!)

Well what do you know? Grant Morrison finally wrote a straightforward story (without paradoxical logic that won't be explained for another 40 issues)!  This was about a simple concept which enabled Morrison to explain some of the head-scratching moments of his Action Comics run.  Namely Jimmy and Clark being roomies & "Where the hell did Kal get all those damn S shirts before the Kryptonian battle armor / suit?"  But beyond the new 52 mythos, a simple one was answered that was always kinda brushed over in the comics: "Is Superman's cape invulnerable?" Well according to the new 52 (& Morrison) it is & the 'Boy Who Stole Superman's Cape' uses it in the coolest way! I'd probably do something dumb like wrap myself in it, jump off a building, only to find I couldn't keep hold of it due to the updraft... This kid's smarter than me.
  
He also asks Supes what the S stands for.  I think at that moment I'd be so worried this crazy invulnerable alien would be pissed at my attempted robbery, he'd beat me into pulp, but again, this kid's got some huevos.

All in all, I think it's a great Superman story, dispute only being put there to address issues brought up by the DC's "New 52" reboot.

Oh and don't read the followup story.  It sux.

Friday, April 17, 2015

DC New52 - Reboot everything! (No wait... maybe not...)

So DC rebooted everything (again) with the launch of their 'New 52' comics line.  This came after the company-wide event "FlashPoint," wherein Flash travels to an alternate reality & sees how screwy everything got, and then travels back.  Now everyone has seams & Superman wears pants....

 

Instead of starting immediately with all the origins, most of the titles jump immediately into the present... MOST of them do this... Some begin with origin stories, which is really confusing if you're like me and trying to fit everything in chronologically.  Teen Titans sees a Red Robin (Tim Drake) organizing the group for the first time, Supergirl lands on earth for the first time, Superboy wakes up in a clone solution.  Throw in a few new characters, and a few others that have just been hanging around (like we as readers should know who they are because they're important now), and you have DC's self-titled "New 52."

What's worse, Action Comics has Supes in jeans jumping around while the Superman titled book has him in some kinda Superman costume with a bunch of intersecting seams and often make the shield symbol... eh...

And all that said, I'm actually cool with a book running that tells the origin while simultaneously another title being the current events line.  The problem is: this is the only character they did that with.  The Justice League first few issues are a sort-of flashback to when they first formed the league, but then the next arch is back to the present.  I wish the origins would have been a mini-series called *trumpet sounds* Justice League Origins...

Other titles are launched in this "New 52" reality by way of continuing their titles as though nothing's different.  Green Lantern, Batman & Damien, etc...

What's still more confusing is that some titles kept the continuity already established except for like one or two minor or major details: Tim Drake was never called Robin.  Only Red Robin.  Okay, so that's minor, but... Barbara Gordon was shot by the Joker... BUT NOT PERMANENTLY PARALYZED!  So she's Batgirl now.  Okay, so that's pretty major... (not sure what happened with Casandra Caine or Stephanie Brown yet, but I guess I'll just have to find them in this crazy new continuity).
Oh, and Supes and Lois aren't doing it.  Not sure if that's major or not but poor Clark's not gettin any, so that's a bummer.

Anyway, with all these changes, it's fair to say it's a reboot, but without completely getting rid of the old continuity, is it really a reboot?  It's a renumbering, for sure... But I think DC had difficulties with this one.  I imagine 1/2 of the writers / editors / execs were on one side saying "Don't change our iconic characters!"  The others were on the other side saying the opposite, "We need a complete reboot with the new numbering!"  They eventually settled on this: "Let's renumber everything, change only SOME of the origins, and after a few months go back and tell all the origins we didn't tell with some zero issues."


And that's where I'm starting from.  I read a few issues into the New52 (mainly Aquaman, Superman, Teen Titans, Supergirl, Batgirl - to name a few), and when I discovered the zero issues went back and told a story about before the New52 on most characters, I began from zero.  That's where this blog starts.  While I won't review in-depth each and every New52 Zero issue, I'll try to collect my thoughts as I transverse the DC Universe from the New52's beginning to the newest DC event: Convergence (beginning the month of this writing - 4/17/15).