November '22 Reading Round Up

 

Two spectacular books came to an end this month: Catwoman, Lonely City and Aquaman's Andromeda. They were both like a hot sizzling drop dead gorgeous babe that you would sometimes meet who showed up from out of town for an award show in Los Angeles. If you're lucky enough she chooses you to spend time with and you have an amazing fling. It goes by sooo quickly and before you know it the perfect week is over and you're driving her to LAX on that Sunday night. As you're driving you're fondling her boobies with one hand and she's stroking your knob with one of her hands. Nobody in the soul crushing traffic line that crawls into the LAX terminals can understand why and how the two of you are so happy when everyone else is miserable. 

Hey it's my blog and I get to make an analogy between a great comic book and a car knobber if I want to!

Now these books are gone, sniffle, and Wonder Woman Historia is ending soon along with the White Knight, the best Batman book out there right now. Wondering if any undeniably great comics are going to come out in the next month or so is like having to go to art gallery reception hoping you'll meet a cutie there. I mean, it's possible. It's also possible you'll be saying 'Oh so you're a Lesbian' and 'Oh so, you think that since I'm Jewish I must run the world and therefor be evil, gotcha' more often than you care to. One can only dream.

Here are the books that made their mark, be it good or bad, for yours truly this month...

Catwoman: Lonely City #4

Hitomi #1 

Night of the Ghoul #1

Miracleman: Silver Age #1 

Dark Spaces: Wildfire #4

Mind MGMT: Bootleg #4 

Daredevil #4

Detective Comics #1064-1065 

Chicken Devils #1

Andromeda #3 

 

Happy reading!

ANDROMEDA #3 - Review

 

It’s Black Friday! Rather than being sucked into the shopping vortex I decided to make it Black Label Friday! Another deep dive into the murky depths of the spectacular Andromeda book took the place of surfing through endless coupons from failing and flailng businesses begging you to purchase their wonky wares. I don’t how you felt about it, but this year’s Black Friday didn’t really seem like a Black Friday, it felt like a Grey Wednesday. I wasn’t blown away by any of the deals. Nothing was eye poppingly wow omg, must get before it be gone. If you’re sending out 10, 20 or 30% nonsense that’s not Black Friday that’s Wack Buyday. Come on retail, look, y’all need to pump out some 80% off/below cost/we’re losing money here type deals.

 

Black Friday means...you lose. YOU LOSE! It's the one day consumers devoid of a soul can get their stuffy stuff for next to nada. You take a bath Retail! A bath in your losses and soak up the suds of your items flying off the shelves like they were in a flash mob in San Francisco. And for goodness sake, don’t give me these ‘Up to 60% off’ or ‘Up to 75% off’ bullshit. We’re not stupid. We know that means, ‘Yeah most of our stuff, the good stuff will be 25-30 but SOME will be 75 and that some will be pure crapola’. Then there were all the streaming losers with their ‘Two bucks a month for 3 months’ nonsense. No, you reduce your overpriced platform to less than half and suck it up. HBOMax? $7 a month…for…a…year! Stop roping us into these promo price shenanigans! NBA was like, get our league pass for 50 off but they wouldn’t let me get 50 off their monthly price for individual teams. I want the Knicks to gouge my happiness three times a week not every frikkin' team I know and care nothing about. Eff. All of you. You know what was worth $7? This comic. This was a grand blissful achievement that surpassed all of my expectations and more. I am stuffed with joy like a Turkey stuffed with breadcrumbs made out of Marvel comics from the 60s.

 

There are not enough superlatives to describe the majesty that was this story. It was brilliantly spun by Ram V and next level drawn by Christian Ward. I felt like I was watching a movie within a book. The visuals and words worked so perfectly together it sometimes felt like I was hearing them in my head and seeing them dance in front of me. It took me more than a day to finish, not because it was painstakingly long but because I wanted to savor it. I didn’t want this to end but it was tied up so perfectly and given a coda in such a sublime way that I really couldn’t ask for anything more but to close the cover and say thank you. Between this and Catwoman: Lonely City, DC has put out two of the best works of comic book goodness in years. Add the unfuckingbelievable Wonder Woman Historia, which will make your eyes bleed all the awful art they’ve ever seen before laying eyes on the art in these books, and you have a holy trinity of Superhero books that are going to ultimately be looked upon as sky posts to which hero book creators should aspire to. It is not lost on me that I just mentioned books that were based on Aquaman, Wonder Woman and Catwoman; three characters that I have barely paid attention to over my comic book life and yet here I am begging their creators for more.

 

The back stories on all of the crew of the Andromeda were so well thought out and so emotionally engaging that I am still thinking of them, especially Ivanov’s story of dragging refugees by a boat during war torn Sarajevo. This is what comics have the power to do. To weave tales and art together in a way that will spark our imaginations to create and seek out comparable works of art. I know I rag on Marvel a lot. I do it because I know they too can be putting out this type of content if they really wanted to or if creators were given the leeway to do so. As it stands, they’re stuck in a hamster wheel of feeding a bottom line and it’s sickening to see them toil in mediocrity.

 

As for Aquaman, he was presented as King, a fairy tale, a haunted vision, a boy with a past, and a man with an ethereal responsibility that reaches back eons to a time before time. If this is Aquaman DC, I am all in. It feels weird to write that. I mean, I’m a Batman guy. Maybe I’m shedding my bad girl, naughty Latina vibe for a regal hot blonde vibe. I can get with that. Andromeda. A book for the ages. Grab it and swim to the depths.

 

Rating; 10.0

Verdict: Pull and Frame.

CHICKEN DEVILS #1 - Review

What am I thankful for? I’m thankful for great comic books that make me forget about the world for a brief moment in time. I’m thankful that I haven’t succumbed to buying 100 mediocre Batman Titles even though I love Batman. I’m thankful that DC has the balls to put out amazing Black Label books that burst with creativity. I’m thankful that Marvel has saved me so much money every month by not enticing me to buy almost everything they put out. I’m thankful that I completely lost track of the Marvel MCU Phase thingy and what’s coming up and what’s connected to what film that I can completely ignore all of them and phase them out of my existence. I’m thankful for wacky off the wall out of the box comics that remind me why comics are great in the first place.

 

One of those great comics was Pearl which just wrapped up it’s final issue this past month. It was solid, not necessarily spectacular. It went out with a twist of a bang and a yearning for Bendis to keep churning more Pearl stories out. I can definitely see Pearl as a streaming show although what you’d lose is the eye popping wowza art of Michael Gaydos who has cemented himself as a Titan of the industry. Another great wacky off the wall comic of the year has been…Chicken Devil.

 

If you haven’t read the first arc of Chicken Devil you’re missing out. Yeah, it’s nothing unbelievably original: regular guy running a fast food hot chicken joint has a business partner involved in drugs with the Russian Mob. Murders, explosions and mayhem ensues with regular guy pushed to the brink. We’ve seen it all before. What we haven’t seen is a Hot Chicken guy in LA dressed in a full on Chicken Body Suit going on a revenge spree that includes outsmarting and beating the Russian Mob. It was written and drawn to perfection and totally has TV show written all over it if you ask me. There’s family drama. There’s chicken recipes and chicken menus. How is this place not a Pop Up in LA already? I don’t even do the hot chicken thing but I would to pay my respects to this series…as long as its not on the West Side or in Silverlake/Echo Park. West Side is a pain in the ass to drive to and Silverlake/Echopark has third world country roads that wreaks havoc on my classic car. Just open up in WeHo or Melrose District like normal pop ups and save me the aggravation.

 

Anyway, the second installment ‘Chicken Devils’ dropped and issue one is basically all set-up, but what a set-up it is. We get an Albanian Bike Gang, a marriage on the rocks and a couple of LAPD Detectives ready to don some fucking hot chicken outfits and take down the crime element of La La Land. PLEASE let this be real! I think LA is at the point where if I see a bunch of Chicken Suit people running after thieves and murderers in LA with AK’s and machetes I’d finally feel like something is getting done here to tackle the crime. If you ask me, I think an army of Chicken Suit Vigilantes is exactly what this city needs. New York had the Guardian Angels back in the 80s. LA needs the Chicken Devils. I wanna see Chicken Suit people patrolling the streets and chasing down assholes that do donuts in the middle of the street with their unregistered stolen cars. I wanna see Chicken Suit dudes and dudettes running after every and anyone who’s been getting away with whatever they want because this pathetically run city refuses to do anything about it.

 

You know I’m right and that it would be a global phenomenon. Hot Chicken People save Los Angeles. My goodness. Now THAT, would be something everybody who loves this city could be thankful for.  When a comic book has what it takes to save an enormous metropolitan city from itself that’s a comic book worth supporting.

 

Rating: 9.0

Verdict: Pull

DETECTIVE COMICS #1064-1065 - Review

Sigh. Good not great. A lot of times in life we settle for good not great. Why? Because it’s good! What’s wrong with good? Everything can’t be great! True. But we should always strive for greatness. There must be an attempt. In art and entertainment I’m sure creative beings always want something to be great but it doesn’t always turn out that way. Sometimes the transition from thought to rough sketch to being done and taken in by a complete stranger is a nasty ride. Everything can’t always be great especially when it’s Batman comic books and there’s five hundred titles a month to choose from.

 

I believe you should choose comics to read based on a feeling not a brand. If you see something come out or hear about something that excites you pick it up! Conversely if you’re reading something and it doesn’t make you go ‘Ooh I should read blank blank today, that’ll be fun’ then stop reading it. Comic books are like dating. If whomever you’re dating doesn’t give you a great feeling and inspire you to want to see them then you should stop seeing them; don’t waste their time.

 

A lot of times we continue seeing people because you think ‘hey, I don’t have anybody else and I’m comfy with them’. I’m sure many girls have thought that about me ‘Yeesh, he’s so frikkin’ loud and I can’t stand it when he stares at me like he’s Prince but, I dunno, at least he’s not like my last meth head boyfriend who put a hot curling iron on my bare ass because he wanted to brand me like a cow'.

 

When I look over to my comic book rack (yes I have an actual wooden comic book rack that I keep my current comics in, best thing everrrr) I see a bunch of titles I have yet to read. There’s the final issue of Pearl which I am totally psyched about. Chicken Devil has just launched a new arc, fuck yes. Andromeda, by the same writer of the two Detective Comics I’m going to get to in a second, is wrapping up and that has been one of the best of the year. Actually, all three of these titles are great, top of the line can’t miss issues. So when I flip through the rack and see that I have two Detective Comics issues backed up because I didn’t read one last month it’s pretty obvious I need to break up with them.

 

If I was dating them, and clearly it would not be exclusive, I would take them to museums, art galleries, a hike, maybe a cool coffee spot, but all things that cost zero money.

 

I would Netflix and chill them.

 

Hulu and Woo Woo them.

 

HBO Max and Wax them.

 

Amazon Prime them and slime them.

 

I wouldn’t wine them and dine them.

 

To the comic. This Bat Book feels like it should be epic…but it isn’t. It wants to be epic…but it isn’t. It’s a little muddy and, I dunno, cornball? Has that 80s 90s Bat Book feel. Court of Owls by Snyder and Capullo was fucking epic. The first White Knight story was holy shit epic. Even Jock’s One Dark Knight had a hint of epic. This feels like Batman on a Tuesday night. No particular reason. The Orghams are these demonic European creepazoids on a ship sailing to reclaim their Arkham name or something. They submitted their DNA to 23 & Me and were like 'Yo, we own a prison for Bat Villains in Gotham let's go get that shit! Put your creepy contact lenses in and get that devil's dust so we can fuck with that Two Face loser who still owes us from the Fantasy Football league we won a few years ago'.

Talia As Ghul is Bats' Baby Momma right? I can't keep up with Bats and his girlfriends. They're fighting on a dock for alimony? He liked a Kim Bassinger post last week? He took Damian out for a steak when she's trying to keep him Vegan? He told her Bernie Sanders is a kooky loser after she donated a cool mill to him? They look great fighting. Bats fights a lot of dangerous hot babes in hot outfits. Maybe, I dunno Bruce, go to Erewhon sometime and pick up a wacky Actress chick see if that's a better fit. You have the house, the car and the money and your dark secret isn't that you're really gay and off to Palm Springs for a weekly White Party extravaganza; they'll be totally psyched to date you.

 

I mean, look, the creative team is as good as it gets and they all do a really good job. But see, if you’re gonna put out oodles of Bat books then I’m gonna want to read the great ones. I’m not throwing down a hundy a month on Bats cuz I have a Bat fetish. I can’t pick up every number one issue, you’re gonna have to grab me. And if you don’t I don’t care cuz I know there’s a dozen Bat books coming down the pike. This is why you don’t boo comedians. If they suck, so what, there’s a whole line waiting backstage to try to tickle your funny femur. If it’s the Headliner and they suck, yes, boo, they deserve it since they’re getting paid the big bucks and they’re on the marquee. Detective Comics is a headliner.

 

Boooo.

 

Rating: 7.3

Verdict: Drop

DAREDEVIL #4 - Review

 

How much set-up can one story have??? We’re in Issue 4 of the Fist vs the Hand and it’s been one extended fist/hand story jerk off with zero lube. What am I reading, Dr. Zhivago with Halloween costumes? It’s a comic book not a Jane Austen novel for goodness sake! I just sped through this issue because, well, it’s quick and fluffalicious and I’m still not getting a Fist vs the Hand anything. I had to put the comic down and pop-lock for a few minutes with Electric Boogaloo in the background so I could get my fists and hands involved. I then popped on Vogue by Madonna to get all the hands and fists out of my system since Daredevil couldn’t deliver.

 

Here’s the deal, I feel like they could’ve put everything that they’ve had in the past four issues into one comic, there was no need to draw (no pun intended) this out so long. Is this an editorial decision? Was Chip like, ‘Hey I have a great 5 issue Fist Hand story’ and Marvel suits grabbed him by his nuts in the steam room and said ‘No you don’t Zdarsky! No you don’t! You have a 12 issue Fist Hand Story! 12! Fucking Tuhhhh-wellllve’ and then did they get real handy with him? Is that where all the writers have to go to pitch their series? The steam room where they can’t really see the suits and their 4 issue stories get turned into 10-12 issues, a movie, a Disney show and a Kabuki play for the elites at Bohemian Grove?

 

Daredevil was, maybe is, not sure, the only great thing coming out of Marvel comic book offices. Maybe Zdarsky was done. He got a call from Fraction on a great new spinoff of Sex Criminals and was ready to bounce when Beelzebub cornered him the Marvel Cafeteria with Taiki Waikikidiki and told him in no uncertain MJ terms ‘Your butt is mine’. Let’s go save Chip! Who’s with me? Actually scratch that, the traffic on the 110 to the 134 to Burbank is more brutal than watching CNN for more than five minutes. Chip you’re on your own.

 

I just read, and this has been out for longer than I knew, that Disney is bringing back the original cast of the greatest Hero TV show in the history of the Universe: Netflix’s Daredevil. I have so many mixed emotions about this: Wildly thrilled and deeply pessimistic. Is it possible that Disney could leave the creative team alone and let them work their gritty, intense, spellbinding magic? Or will they smear their Disney anus on each and every script and table read until the entire production ends up like a goofier version of She Hulk?

 

For goodness sake, I just want great Marvel content, how hard can this be??? Why does everything feel so cheap and greasy??? It’s like street meat tacos at 3am wrapped up in a shiny spandex wrapper. You go ‘ooh what’s that’, eat it and then have to reach up your butt with both hands to wring your intestines until every morsel is out of your system lest you end up looking like Mickey Rourke.

 

And yes, there was a game changing moment between Hornhead & Elektra at the end but in my opinion I don't feel the moment was necessarily earned. Anyway, this comic just hit a speed bump for the first time ever which is ironic since it’s spinning its wheels and going nowhere fast. I’ll be back but if someone out there wants to start a GoFundMe for Zdarsky’s rescue let me know and I’ll throw in a couple shekels.

 

Rating: 7.0

Verdict: #SaveDardevilandZdarsky

MIND MGMT: BOOTLEG #4 - Review

  

Marketing. It’s everywhere. It’s insidious. It’s pervasive. Our lives sometimes feel like we’re the product in the product placement; a data bullseye for the world of cost benefit paralysis. Comic books have always been filled with ads. You had to love those muscle ads that showed a scrawny nerd getting sand kicked in his face at the beach or the cheap plastic army ads from the 60s and 70s. Marvel always had tons of ads for its toys and it’s shows, whatever, no biggie. Comics have been intertwined with movies and video games yadda yadda so yeah, I get when a suit in a comic book office is like ‘Hey we can sell this AND this…at the same time!’ and other suits get a little duck butter in their pants.

 

I’ve always been of the mind of ‘Look, as long as you’re up front about what you’re doing and what you’re selling then it’s up to me if I want in or not’. What rankles me is when I realize ‘Hey I’ve just been sold, this was just a sales a pitch’. This attitude does not work well in dating apps since nothing is up front or real and you have zero idea who’s selling what or what they’re selling, if they’re even selling or if there’s even something to sell.

 

So this comic? A big sales pitch framed as a comic book. Seriously Dark Horse?

 

I absolutely loved Mind MGMT the series. It was a mind bending brilliant story of psychic espionage that encapsulated the world with eclectic bizarro characters that Matt Kindt spun perfectly amidst his fuzzy artistic style. It was a tour de force. So when I saw this ‘Bootleg’ thing come up I got pumped ‘Sweet, Mind MGMT is back, gimme gimme’ Little did I realize it was going to turn into a turd story designed to get you to buy a board game for 60 bux. Now, the game might be a dazzling table pursuit but don’t wrap me up in a comic tease about getting a coherent well developed Mind MGMT story when clearly this was all about a holiday stocking stuffer. I feel stuffed with Marketing energy. Blecch. Dark Horse, wtf?

 

I bought the variant issue for the final 4^th issue. Eight bux. It included a card for the game. I didn’t realize that every issue had a variant that had a card for the game. So you could pay 32 bux to have the right to pay another 60 bux, yee haw. This is the card I got:

 

It’s supposed to be the best card in the game. Great. That’s like saying you have a super duper get her to respond to your message bomb diggity dating powerup for a dating app that you’ve just deleted. Of course you’re going to think, hmm, that chick with the big tucchus in Encino who ghosted me, maybe I could use this! Of course I’m googling the game because well, marketing works duh, and blah blah how do you play it and are these my own thoughts or a suit's thoughts, blecch. Maybe this was what Mind MGMT the series was all about: A slow slow marketing campaign for a boardgame. Maybe it was always about the boardgame! As far as the comic itself, I mean, it gets gruesomely bad.

 

The Psychic Kids end up on an island to take down Mr Hyde and his disinformation memes. Instead of commandeering a speedboat and venturing out on a King Kongish mission they just could’ve flown coach to Silicon Valley and tracked down Zuckerberg’s clone instead (what is that thing that says he’s Mark, serious skinjob creepies).

 

When the kids get to the island everyone is involved in a torturous masked sexcapade, an animalistic bacchanalia. One of the kids is then apprehended and taken to the dais where Mr. Hyde (who looks like the Gay Thief from the Black Flamingo comic that just came out) stands in front of his grinning cat meme.

 

He then proceeds to slice her throat open. Umm what? Are we on Epstein’s island? Did Matt go to Epstein’s island or did the entire editorial staff of Dark Horse go? Is this their big reveal? Their Kubrick Eyes Wide Shut moment? I’m floored. What happens next is predictable, kids find Gay Flamingo, win, island burns, back to one. Nice little reveal in the last panel but so what, the back inside cover is what it’s really about…60 bux baybee, buy me buy me!

 

Look, during the lockdown insanity I went to a friends house who had a real social life and we played board games, it was great. One of the games I discovered is this game called ‘Ticket to Ride’ it’s highly addictive and fun, I highly recommend it. Well, my friend became one of the many many friends in my life who moved out of LA because it’s become an absolute shithole run by a bunch of incompetent nitwits. When she moved so did game night. So I got it in my head, man, that ticket to ride was great. I should get it. So I bought it at Target. Yay!

 

 

It’s been sitting unopened in my living room for months. Nobody’s coming over for game night. Nobody wants to. They’re too busy figuring out which state to escape to. I know a few who escaped to Portland. Listen, break into Dark Horse and demand that they send me the boardgame for the mental anguish I’ve endured by reading this fekukhta (Yiddish for crappy) mini-series that should have been called Marketing MGMT: 60 Buckaroonskis. It can sit next to my other unopened boardgame. Maybe I can give this Boardgame card to the cute Whole Foods employee next time I see her. Tell you what Dark Horse. If I give my 8 buck variant card to the Whole Foods employee and she gives me her insta so I can send my DMs to the vortex of her indifference then I'll give you a pass, deal? 

 

Rating: 6.0

Verdict: Have $60 on hand before purchasing.

DARK SPACES: WILDFIRE #4 - Review

Do you get the whole crypto thing? I don’t, not really. I mean, I know it’s based on bullshit, an idea, a pie in the sky illusion of value. Look, our whole financial system is based on nothing so it’s not really much different. Money is created out of thin air. Value is based on belief. If you believe nothing is worth something than it makes it so. It’s kind of how variant covers work. It’s based on this illusion that if we make a few of them and say they’re hard to get than they’ll be worth more than a comic book made 50 years ago that was created by actual legends of the comic book medium.

 

Variant covers are like crypto currencies, everybody’s frothing at the mouth rushing to get them and inflate the value of their collection when in reality they’re holding bubkes in their hands. Eventually our financial system will switch back to a gold/precious metal based system where the currency is actually tied to something of value and the entire fiat currency that we’ve been wallowing in for the past 100 years or so goes bye bye.

 

Who’s setting these variant cover prices??? Has anybody ever asked that? I want a complete investigation! If you go down the rabbit hole of the variant world you’ll probably come upon an imaginary Japanese figure like Sakoshi Nakamoto the imaginary person/persons that created bitcoin. Maybe he won’t even be Japanese, maybe he’ll be a crusty pudgy geek sitting in the basement of an old warehouse in Queens where un-purchased retail comic books go to die. Maybe he’s not even alive anymore, maybe his head is suspended in a tube and hooked up to an AI super computer that calculates the nonsensical value of variants. I wouldn’t be surprised. Look, doesn’t the fact that it’s assumed that whomever created Bitcoin is not real but a pseudonym for a bunch of people that nobody knows the identity of make the whole crypto thing an enormous load of snake oil???

 

I bring all this crypto stuff up because ‘Dark Spaces’ is about a group of convicts who are tasked for clearing brush fires. During one of their outings a member recognizes an abandoned remote home in the middle of nowhere that belonged to a wealthy guy that has billions of crypto stored on a server in the house. So the women agree to bumrush the house, transfer the crypto onto a flash drive, and then bounce before anyone finds out. Of course it all goes wrong and mercenaries descend upon the house and fire upon the ladies hitting one of them. Thing is, by the time all of this goes down and assuming it’s present day, the value of that crypto on that server might be worth the price of a several thousand Marvel and DC comics from the 90s: squat. The price of crypto is falling faster than a hippo on a Slip-n-Slide.

 

Google FTX and all the shady practices it’s been involved in while it’s claimed bankruptcy; it’s a shit show. I’d like to see this happen to the Variant Cover market. I’d like all those 1:100’s fall faster than Wile E Coyote off a cliff with an anvil on each ankle. At any rate, this series has been solid but unspectacular. The characters are all still very underdeveloped and I feel like the art has gotten sloppier through each issue. Nevertheless, Snyder drops an intriguing twist at the end of this issue and with the conclusion only one more issue away I feel compelled to see how it all plays out. Of course by the time the final issue comes out it may seem silly to see comic book characters fighting to the death over something worth less than a pack of gum but hey, it’s never too late to turn a drama into a comedy.

 

Rating: 7.8

Verdict: Pull

 

MIRACLEMAN: THE SILVER AGE #1

 

Miracleman! It’s a miracle that Alan Moore hasn’t trudged over half naked to Marvel’s offices and broken down the door with a sledgehammer demanding that all work on Miracleman cease immediately. Maybe he could track down Neil Gaiman half naked with a scythe and slash at the sanctimonious putz that he’s become in the past several months especially when it came to his Sand Dude show. For the record I have almost four pages of a review for ‘The Sandman’ show but couldn’t make my way past the halfway point, it was mind numbingly bad.

 

Basically what I’m asking for is for Alan Moore to begin terrorizing the comic book community. The thing that fell out of the sky in the new LOTR show looks a bit like Alan Moore. I wish that thing would tromp through every editorial office and shrill until all the mealy mouthed editors in the industry sleeked off into the Netherlands.

 

Alan Moore is the Shakespeare of the Comic Book Universe. You’re not going to improve upon anything that he’s done. It’s not possible. The Miracleman run of the 80s is one of the most mind blowing WTF are you kidding me wow comic book events of the century. It is the gold standard of alt-hero books and probably influenced every brilliant comic book creator of the past forty years. Gaiman’s run is nothing to sneeze at. If there was anybody who could take the reins for the book it could only be him and he did a bang up job so even with the threat of Alan Moore rattling my door I had to pick up the continuation of this series. Thing is, I’d forgotten most of it and there was no way I was going to a. dig through dozens of comic book boxes to find the older issues or b. pony up a sizable chunk of change to read the omni-mega-gargantuan-colossus-bus that they just popped out into stores.

 

First of all, I have to rip Marvel a new one for their #0 issue that preceded this one. I thought it would be somewhat of recap/refresh of the series to get me up to speed; it was nothing of the sort. It was one of those ‘Hey we’re gonna get a bunch of writers and artists together to write and draw a bunch of stuff about the character/story! None of it will be amazing. None of it will satisfy you. Thanks for the 5 Bux!’ Can we please have a moratorium on these writer/artist comic festivals where everyone contributes something? Comic books aren’t ‘We are the World’ songs. They’re not a short film festival. You put a dozen or so different writer/artist styles in book it just becomes a mish-mash where nobody is given enough time and nothing is memorable. Stop with the Comicbook Gang Bangs!

 

Anyway, this comic. Kid Miracleman wakes up in the Miracleman Parthenon of Miracle People and is retold his true story. That’s basically it. We get a bunch of Miracle kids which I assume are the offspring of Miracle’s nuts. Gaiman has to get the word ‘Diversity’ popped in by a character. I wonder if he goes to the coffee shop and says ‘Do you have a diverse flavor profile for your lattes?’ When he’s giving head does he go ‘There are a diverse amount of ways I could search for your nubby nub’ Does he look in the toilet and marvel at his diverse poop shapes?

 

Buckingham’s art is wonderful. Bellaire’s words are perfect. Despite any gripes I may have with the history of this book there’s no way I’m not inhaling every panel that gets put out there. Let’s hope Neil has a tremendous path he intends to take with the conclusion of this story otherwise I’ll have to find a diverse amount of adjectives to rip him a new one too.

 

Rating: 8.4

Verdict: Pull

NIGHT OF THE GHOUL #1 - Review

 

Can a comic book actually scare you? I mean, honestly, has there ever been a comic that you’ve read where after you’ve read it you’ve been legit spooked? I see a lot of horror comics out there these days. Seems like they’re heavy on the gore and light on the mind. Not all of them but most of them. I think an actual book can scare the bejeezus out of you because your imagination is way more powerful than anything in the Universe and can freak you out right into a therapy couch. For the record I’ve never been to therapy. No need. I’ve taken acting classes for several decades. Winning!

 

The last comic book that I can think of that actually had me a wee bit on the edge of my seat/creeped out was Wytches by Scott Synder with art by Jock which way back in 2014. You really have to be a master of building up suspense and of panel sequencing in order to derive some actual shrieks from a comic and Snyder and Jock did it. Thing was, once we saw what the Wytches actually were the fear factor kind of evaporated. Why? Because our imagination per usual was way worse than the drawn thing. Yet for six issues I think that was as horrifying as a comic could be.

 

Well Synder’s back to rankle your nerves with Night of the Ghoul. The Premise? Guy and his son travel down a dusty road to the middle of nowhere looking for an old folks home that has a resident who (goes by a different name now) supposedly was the director of a legendary horror film in the 40s that never saw the light of day. Of course it’s a masterpiece and of course the elements of the movie are real and part of the facility. Right off the bat I’m like, why the hell are they doing construction for a facility like this in the middle of nowhere? Good luck getting a pizza or meal prep boxes like Blue Apron out here. Amazon Prime would be absolutely useless and the wifi’s gonna suck. I’m already upset at the logistics. It’s horrifying but not life or death…well actually it’s ‘first world champagne problems’ life or death.

 

The father goes to interview the decrepit director while the kid hangs near the front desk and chats with his estranged mom. Predictably he decides he wants to leave just as his phone cuts out while talking to a cabby who says the location is not on GPS. Yeah, no way this kid was getting any re-frikkin-ception to begin with let alone a call to a cab company. So does this story take place today or is it from a recent timeline. Because if it’s today the kid would be totally sitting there on TikTok scrolling through jiggling ass tok toks and streaming himself while he posed with the creepy old people.

 

Another gripe I have is that the ‘footage’ of the film was destroyed or burned so throughout the comic you see it the final frame of some footage burnt at the edges. Yet it just picks up again at another point and then burns out again. Is it burnt or not? Film doesn’t burn in separate chunks and if it’s burnt what was salvageable is going to look like sludge. I get that you need to suspend disbelief but now I’m suspending the basic laws of wifi tik-tok UberEats and film footage???

 

There was a series that came out last year called ‘The Lot’. It was bit similar to this one in that a horror movie was shot that was never finished and never saw the light of day but it somehow profoundly affected all those who were involved in the production. A Production Assistant end up tracking everyone down and gets to the bottom of the sinister secrets. It was wonderfully drawn and the story, though not terrifying, was gripping enough to follow to the last issue. I can’t say this series matches the spine rattling intensity out of the gate that ‘The Lot’ did. I’m going to give Snyder the benefit of the doubt here but he’s on thin ‘burnt footage’ ice.

 

I actually began reading this late at night on Halloween with just my reading lamp on and the lights off. I wanted to give myself every opportunity to get scared by a comic book. Didn’t work. In order to prevent trick or treaters from knocking on my door which would drive my doggie absolutely bonkers I decided to get a large plastic bowl and fill it with candy. I figured, hey, let the sugar addicts sort the rationing out for themselves. The bowl lasted for a couple hours and then it got dark. Now THAT was frightening. Having to creep outside to retrieve an empty candy bowl with zero intention of refilling it. I had to time it perfectly. One small misstep and I’d be tied up to my couch while teenagers dressed up as characters from The Purge would be pouring my bags of coconut sugar down their throats and laughing at my pile of comic books. I’d say:

 

Hey, that Night of the Ghoul book is actually scary

 

They’d pick it up, flip through it and go:

 

Shouldn’t this kid be live streaming?

 

Then they’d live stream from their phone as they made me drive to Whole Foods for more sugar. I’d beg them to allow me to take my phone and they’d say no. Then all the Whole Foods Amazon Prime discounts wouldn’t matter. I’m shaking. Deeply shaking. There Snyder, there, that’s horror. Write that in Issue 2 and I’ll fork over another 5 bux a pop for however long this snoozefest goes.

 

Rating: 7.1

Verdict: Pull on Alert

HITOMI #1 - Review

It’s Election Day! Shenanigans. Chicanery. Red. Blue. Purple? Can we vote Purple? It’s been raining here in LA for the past few days, clearly a lot of weather modification is going on so they can dissuade people from going to vote. As Angelenos sit in rainy snail crawling traffic they’ll just go ‘eff it’ and go home. This will allow the evil wackjobs to  ignore the will of the people and decide the winner by thumb wrestling naked at 2am in a pool filled with fish scales and rotting street meat tacos while hooded aliens look on. You know that’s what happens.

 

I had to step away from the intense pick pick me energy of the day and escape to another time, another space another way of life. So I picked up the first issue of Hitomi and flipped it open. Well, it’s definitely not modern Los Angeles although it’s probably quicker to get where you want to go by walking through a snowy forest drunk on sake back then than it is to brave the freeways here. Right off the bat I love the art and the feel of the book. The story? Hmm…

 

I mean it’s not doing anything special. A kid, this time a young Japanese girl, is spared while her parents and siblings are massacred. I don’t know why they were massacred. Were they election deniers? Did they bang on garbage cans to cheat at Samurai games? Did they say that Akira the Anime Movie was overrated? All valid reasons but we have no idea at this point. 

 

Well, she’s older now and searching for the killer who did it, a dark skinned (described as beet root skin in the book) Samurai who’s now been reduced to some sort of a lackey in a traveling sumo wrestling act where he’s throwing the match. It’s giving off female Conan the Barbarian/Kill Bill movie vibes and a lot of other revenge story vibes.  You’re going to root for her by default because she’s a girl in a man’s world. Plus she’s got a mouth on her and an attitude, which I do as well. Hmm, maybe this was me? I mean, I do think I had a past life back in Japan at some point. Did the writer HS Tak do some lucid dreaming and enter my dreamscape to question me on my life as a little obnoxious ornery Asian girl? I wouldn’t put it past him. My question is can I sue for plagiarism?

 

Your honor, clearly my client’s dreams and past lives are his and his alone. Comic book creators just can’t come in and rip off a story from the timeline of –

 

Get the hell out of my courtroom. Now.

 

Your honor, did you have a past life as a Samurai who massacred a –

 

Jail. You’re going to jail. Like, yesterday.

 

Anway, the kid falls through the ice of a lake and of course the beet root Samurai dude grabs her arm and saves her; conflict cliffhanger 101. She’s still unconscious, she wakes up and gives us an ornery look, and….scene.

 

That was quick. Okay. Well, Isabella Manzanti’s art is lovely so I’ll back. I’ve got this Marvel facsimile of Spiderman #1 sitting next to me as well. I think I’m gonna pick that up instead of watching election coverage. If you ask me the entire Marvel Comic Book Universe is a facsimile of a Comic Book Universe. I think what happened is while they were creating all these alternate timeline story lines that one actually worked too well and it bumped our Marvel comic books into another dimension while our dimension got these flimsy wackadoodle stories and cheap paper stock rags. It’s the only explanation I can think of. At any rate, Hitomi is a neat little diversion and Lord knows we need these right now.

 

Rating: 8.0

Verdict: Pull

CATWOMAN: LONELY CITY #4

It was my Birthday this week so I was off doing Birthday things and not a lot of comic booky things. When I finally did sit down I thought ‘Well, for my Birthday I want to read the best comic I have from my recent stash that I just picked up. I rifled through them and came upon the one that was clearly above and beyond the rest: Catwoman Lonely City. My goodness, what a triumph this comic has been. Cliff Chiang you are God amongst mere mortal comic creators.

 

I believe this may be Cliff’s first major book where he’s not only drawn it but written it was well. If that’s the case, more. Not even pretty please just more. Like foot stomping, arms folding, lips pouting, whiny sounding gimme what I want now or else, more. The last Chiang experience I dove into was the greatest Wonder Woman run ever which was back in 2011 when he teamed up with Brian Azzarello to reboot WW for DCs New 52. It was stupendous. I never even really read Wonder Woman before so I don’t have any context for previous runs but suffice it to say no WW creative team has come close at all to replicating the grandeur of those arcs and Chiang’s artwork was beyond stellar.

 

Hell, I never even read a solo Catwoman book before this one. Black Label has me reading Catwoman and Aquaman, holy frikkin moley, and they’re probably both the best books of the year. This is like someone getting me, a Jew, to eat pork. I only eat kosher Bats and maybe a little shellfish Wonder Chick but definitely no swiny cats or fish people. It had been a minute since the last Lonely City so I had to reread issue three and I was immediately brought back to how great this mini series was.

 

The whole idea of middle aged villains trying to pull off a caper in the shadow of the death of the greatest superhero ever is pure genius, especially when those villains are DC Icons. Catwoman’s got creaky knees and a butch haircut with grey streaks, Riddler has a paunch and a daughter, Croc is tubby and farts quite often and Poison Ivy looks like she could be running a Tattoo shop and a taco truck while doing roller derby matches on the weekend. They’re all mortal, they all have their flaws and their flaws rear their ugly head in situation after situation. It feels real and human. These off the wall characters really come to life. Croc was probably the best, a loudmouth fatso in a bar with a Mets shirt on who gets ribbed for his current failures while he boasts of a majestic past.

 

Chiang also has Two Face as an out of control New York City Mayor dealing with a fiery election against Babs Gordon. Gotta say, Harvey gives off major Gavin Newsom vibes. I wouldn’t be surprised if you dipped Newsom in a pool that half of his face falls off. Maybe that was him going after Paul Pelosi with a hammer while he was flipping a coin in his off hand,

 

Nancy: Gavin’s back with a hammer, Paul, run!

 

Paul: Where?!? Shit, I forgot to text him back.

 

Gavin: When I send you dick pix you’re supposed to send some back Paul!

 

Paul: Nancy! I’m stuck in the Sex Swing, help!

 

The conclusion of this book is perfectly executed. There are consequences for actions taken. There are sacrifices made. There are reconciliations. The final battleground of the Batcave is grounded. It’s not some out of control goofy bam pow wham. I can’t say enough about these four issues. Find them. Buy them. Revere them. Cliff, you have a tough act to follow but I’ll be following no matter what. Thanks for the great Birthday present.

 

Rating: 10.0

Verdict: Pull. Put in a Glass Case with a Light shining on it.