Three 8/31 Books That I Read So That You Did Not Have To
As always, I tell you about three comics that I did not hear a lot about this week, and then I ask you all to fill me in on comics that I did not read this week.
Special "All DC" Edition!
Flash #225, Robin #141 and Batman: Gotham Knights #68 Spoilers Ahead!
Flash #225
This is the final issue by Geoff Johns, after about seventy issues on the title.
It works as a resolution to all his storylines, but as an actual comic book?
Not so much.
There is a really interesting scene where Howard Porter draws the Flash in the midst of a run, doing the stop-motion type drawing (you know, Flash at one point on the page, then Flash a little to the right, then a little more to the right, with motion lines following), and the "blurred" Flash drawing looked so much better than the rest of his drawings in the issue.
Everything is so over-rendered.
Not good to look at.
The plot of the book is that Zoom has teamed up with the Reverse Flash and just in time, Barry Allen shows up to help Wally. Another annoying thing is that Wally's costume is pretty much identical to Barry's. Johns has Barry point out the only difference (the BELT, for crying out loud), but really, you cannot tell the two apart in the story.
The whole book involves a lot of time travel using the Cosmic treadmill...not much plot going on, and then BAM - everything is over. Not the deepest of a resolution.
The cool scene where Linda Park gets her pregnancy back and delivers twins is nice, though. That was handled well. So the resolution was handled well, but the rest of the comic? Not so much.
Not Recommended!
Robin #141
I thought this was a well handled issue.
The gist of the story is that a friend of Robin's that he thought was killed in War Games has returned from the dead, now as a sort of witch. Her only goal is to kill Robin, and she TELLS this to Tim Drake. So Tim has to think of a way to resolve this situation, and it involves giving Superboy a ring.
The whole "calling on his friend Superboy to pretend to be Robin" story aspect of the comic was a lot of fun, as it was a throwback story without being over the top. The banter between Robin and Superboy was nice. Of course, this was set before the events of current Teen Titans, so we got to miss out on "evil Superboy."
By the by, the cover makes absolutely no sense, as it has nothing to do with the comic inside.
Most of the comic involves Tim trying to convince Darla that the Robin she wants dead IS dead already (pushing the "there are multiple Robins" theory on her). Meanwhile, while they are doing this, there is a lot of nice banter between Tim and Darla over the nature of evil, and how she does not HAVE to kill, that sort of stuff. When it all goes down, and Darla ultimately demonstrates a casualness to her (she thinks) murder of Robin, Tim gives her some tough talk. I liked it. It also was a way for Willingham to set up Robin's involvement in this government paranormal unit (looking to get her help...or find a way to lock her up).
McDaniel's art is not the greatest, but it gets the job done.
Recommended!
Batman: Gotham Knights #68
As bad as Gotham Knights has been recently, Al Barrionuevo's art has been improving in each issue. This issue is a slight setback for Barrionuevo, but still, it basically is the best thing about the comic.
Reading this comic, I am reminded of one of the arguments people make to defend poor work, the ol' "If Popular Writer X was writing this, you would like it." That strikes me as a sort of defense that one defending AJ Lieberman would use, because his work is very reminscient of other, better, writers. The differene is that Lieberman simply fails where those writers succeed, in that his story is not intricate and complex, it is obtuse and incoherent. The leaps in time that other writers use to good effect (I am not a fan of leaps in time period, unless there is a good purpose), Lieberman just seems to use willy-nilly.
And for what?
For what?
It seems like the last 18 issues are all leading up to SOMEthing, but we never really get to know what it is, and the ride just is not very interesting. Then again, he IS dealing with Hush, so that is a drawback right there.
The main plot involves something about a chemical that can become anything, even identical twins of other people - but it eventually breaks down. This is partially why I cannot neccessarily believe that it was Alfred who killed the guy in the previous issue - not when you have shapeshifters up the wazooo.
Finally, am I really supposed to care if Tommy Elliot WASN'T Hush? Is that really going to make me MORE interested in Hush? Hush is lame. Give it up.
Not Recommended!
Now on to the books that I did not read, so I was hoping you might have read them and could tell me what I missed out on:
Emily the Strange #1
Amelia Rules #14
Shadowhawk #4
Thanks!
Special "All DC" Edition!
Flash #225, Robin #141 and Batman: Gotham Knights #68 Spoilers Ahead!
Flash #225
This is the final issue by Geoff Johns, after about seventy issues on the title.
It works as a resolution to all his storylines, but as an actual comic book?
Not so much.
There is a really interesting scene where Howard Porter draws the Flash in the midst of a run, doing the stop-motion type drawing (you know, Flash at one point on the page, then Flash a little to the right, then a little more to the right, with motion lines following), and the "blurred" Flash drawing looked so much better than the rest of his drawings in the issue.
Everything is so over-rendered.
Not good to look at.
The plot of the book is that Zoom has teamed up with the Reverse Flash and just in time, Barry Allen shows up to help Wally. Another annoying thing is that Wally's costume is pretty much identical to Barry's. Johns has Barry point out the only difference (the BELT, for crying out loud), but really, you cannot tell the two apart in the story.
The whole book involves a lot of time travel using the Cosmic treadmill...not much plot going on, and then BAM - everything is over. Not the deepest of a resolution.
The cool scene where Linda Park gets her pregnancy back and delivers twins is nice, though. That was handled well. So the resolution was handled well, but the rest of the comic? Not so much.
Not Recommended!
Robin #141
I thought this was a well handled issue.
The gist of the story is that a friend of Robin's that he thought was killed in War Games has returned from the dead, now as a sort of witch. Her only goal is to kill Robin, and she TELLS this to Tim Drake. So Tim has to think of a way to resolve this situation, and it involves giving Superboy a ring.
The whole "calling on his friend Superboy to pretend to be Robin" story aspect of the comic was a lot of fun, as it was a throwback story without being over the top. The banter between Robin and Superboy was nice. Of course, this was set before the events of current Teen Titans, so we got to miss out on "evil Superboy."
By the by, the cover makes absolutely no sense, as it has nothing to do with the comic inside.
Most of the comic involves Tim trying to convince Darla that the Robin she wants dead IS dead already (pushing the "there are multiple Robins" theory on her). Meanwhile, while they are doing this, there is a lot of nice banter between Tim and Darla over the nature of evil, and how she does not HAVE to kill, that sort of stuff. When it all goes down, and Darla ultimately demonstrates a casualness to her (she thinks) murder of Robin, Tim gives her some tough talk. I liked it. It also was a way for Willingham to set up Robin's involvement in this government paranormal unit (looking to get her help...or find a way to lock her up).
McDaniel's art is not the greatest, but it gets the job done.
Recommended!
Batman: Gotham Knights #68
As bad as Gotham Knights has been recently, Al Barrionuevo's art has been improving in each issue. This issue is a slight setback for Barrionuevo, but still, it basically is the best thing about the comic.
Reading this comic, I am reminded of one of the arguments people make to defend poor work, the ol' "If Popular Writer X was writing this, you would like it." That strikes me as a sort of defense that one defending AJ Lieberman would use, because his work is very reminscient of other, better, writers. The differene is that Lieberman simply fails where those writers succeed, in that his story is not intricate and complex, it is obtuse and incoherent. The leaps in time that other writers use to good effect (I am not a fan of leaps in time period, unless there is a good purpose), Lieberman just seems to use willy-nilly.
And for what?
For what?
It seems like the last 18 issues are all leading up to SOMEthing, but we never really get to know what it is, and the ride just is not very interesting. Then again, he IS dealing with Hush, so that is a drawback right there.
The main plot involves something about a chemical that can become anything, even identical twins of other people - but it eventually breaks down. This is partially why I cannot neccessarily believe that it was Alfred who killed the guy in the previous issue - not when you have shapeshifters up the wazooo.
Finally, am I really supposed to care if Tommy Elliot WASN'T Hush? Is that really going to make me MORE interested in Hush? Hush is lame. Give it up.
Not Recommended!
Now on to the books that I did not read, so I was hoping you might have read them and could tell me what I missed out on:
Emily the Strange #1
Amelia Rules #14
Shadowhawk #4
Thanks!
posted by Brian Cronin at 9/07/2005 07:16:00 PM
1 Comments:
Amelia Rules is one of my favorite all-ages books. The latest issue continues the summer vacation shake-up storyline. Lots of things are going on in Amelia's life, big changes and new friends are all around. There is a funny sequence featuring a parody of Scott McCloud's most famous work that is dead-on, but also fits into the story as a whole. There is a bit of a mystery at the end, and it is hard to tell whether this is something sinister or just another case of little kids not understand everything around them.
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