Thursday, May 14, 2015

Comic reviews: Convergence week 4 and lots others

So many comics to write about.  I'll try to keep each review brief.





Justice League 40
I bought this one for the boy band cover and obviously now want to watch Magic Mike, the film it is apparently from.  I did rather like the story too.  Metron is about and meets the anti monitor and all the crises are referenced.  At the end the Amazonian birthed anti-God turns up, which feels less stupid than it did in the WW FCBD story.

Multiversity 2
I think this reestablished the pre 52 Multiversity, with new universes, and established a group of protectors for it, including lady Aquaman.  It also has a panel of Vampire Wondy and Vampire Bats craving coffee.  Which is fun.


Superman 40
This is a very strange comic,  The JL are being written like they are all aged about 18 or 19, or younger.  The plot kind of works, but the way in which it's delivered is weird.  John Romita JR writes and pencils, and the pencils are bloody awful.

X-Men 26
The Krakoa storyline ended.  All but Rachel seem a bit bloodthirsty.  It's a reasonable ending, I suppose.

Bitch Planet 4
I adore this comic and the editorials.  Y'all should read it.

Princeless the Pirate Princess 4
Fecking wonderful, as ever, and Raven is confirmed queer. Love this,

FCBD offering from the CBLDF
This is a bit too much issue focused for me to really enjoy it. I'll pass it on.

FCBD offering: DC's Divergence
Ridiculous.  Commissioner Gordon is the new Batman in the Batsuit that looks like a Blue Beetle suit.  Lois has told the word Clark's secret.  An Amazonian fucked Darkseid and the child is the anti-God.  What a load of crap.

FCBD offering from Dark Horse
The Fight Club story was quite good.  I haven't bothered reading the other two.

FCBD offering from Boom studios
I've flicked through this and it looks good, but I haven't had the headspace to read it in totality.

Convergence 4
I can't be bothered to flick through this and re-acquaint myself.

Convergence: Shazam 1
One of the best Convergence books so far.  It has that innocence the Marvel family used to have, when they were unashamed at being written for kids.  It's got Sivana and Tawky Tawny but isn't written as a nostalgia trip - it's a genuinely good story and a good addition to Marvel canon.

Convergence: Blue Beetle 1
This is about Captain Shinypants, the Question and Blue Beetle, with a guest appearance by Booster.  Pretty Good, even with Shinypants in it.

Convergence: Crime Syndicate 1
Somehow I liked this.  I normally find the Crime Syndicate really really dull, but this was enjoyable.   Nice art too.

Convergence: Booster Gold 1
Pre 52 Booster meets New 52 Booster and if you like traditional Booster you'll like this issue.  the Legion of Superheroes turn up.  Fights ensue.  This was one of the highlights of this week's comics.

Convergence: Detective Comics 1
Helena Wayne and Dick Grayson from the earth where they are proper adult legacy heroes.  I liked their squabbling an the clear characterisation of all involved.

Convergence: Infinity Inc 1
I'm not clear on the background or history for this, but I quite enjoyed it.

Convergence: Plastic Man 1
I get the Freedom Fighters existing in a world where the Nazis won the war, I don't understand what Plastic Man is doing there.  Was he ever part of that world?  I did enjoy the comic and the Freedom Fighters as a team, so that's a job well done by the creators.

Convergence: World's Finest 1
This I did really enjoy.  It feels like a decent standalone story in it's own right.

Convergence: Action Comics 1
Another good one.  Like World's Finest, it simply works as a story by itself.

Convergence: Justice Society of America 1
This week turned out a bunch of corkers.  This feels like it was created by people with real respect for the JSA era and the main guys in the team.  Good work.

JLA Paradise Lost 1
I got this from the comic shop in Brugges in March, but forgot I'd bought it.  It was pretty good.  It has Zauriel in it trying to stop a fellow angel take over Heaven.

JLA Incarnations 6
Also from the Brugges comic shop.  This is the JLI at it's finest and it much better than the Convergence JLI issue.  The first story is led by Booster and Beetle, and proves why they shouldn't be allowed to roam around unsupervised.  The second story is led by Captain Shinypants when he's on Extreme Justice and just proves that team is rather incompetent.  Worth reading for the JLI story.

Superman Krypton Chronicles 1 and 2
These are really good fun, and a bit batshit.  Plot holes a aplenty but as they aren't meant to be serious, who cares?  Clark is asked by the Daily Planet boss to put together an article on Krypton's history, so Clark has to travel to Kandor with Supergirl, now on the planet Rokyn, to meet with Supergirls parents and learn about Kryptonian history.  It's all a bit unhinged, but it allows the writers to have fun, and so the reader has fun too.  The reasoning for getting Kryptonian's history seems a bit bandwagon jumping though:

Superman Confidential issues
These are a great set of issues, and it's a great run.  Superman stories where he's being heroic from different stages of his life.  It's only 14 issues long and the ones I picked up were written by Justin Gray and Jimmy Palmiotti, who nearly always turn out reliably solid work, with the later issues pencilled by Phil Hester, who I adore.

Superman issues, pre 52 ones
One is a Christmas issue which I recall liking a lot, one is a one year later one that I already had, but forgot about and because it had Supergirl on the cover I bought it again.  She's barely in it.

The Adventures of Superman Annual 1997
I'm always disappointed by these pulp heroes annuals that don't have a pulp themed story.  Upon reading this it occurred to me that perhaps it's just that I don't know what it meant by 'pulp'.  The letters section was intriguing as everyone was complaining about the blue and red Superman.  It reminded me of all our kvetching about Supes' new solar flare power.  Oops.  Perhaps we should just roll with it...

No comments: