New This Week: August 10, 2005

Based on the NCRL list for this week's comics shipping from Diamond, here are a few things to look for at the local comic shop tomorrow:


The Pick of the Week is Paul Chadwick's Concrete, vol. 1: Depths from Dark Horse, the start of a complete reprinting of the entire Concrete saga (in story chronological order). Finding the original Conrete #1 in a quarter bin back in the 80s was one of the events that led me into the wonderful world of non-Marvel/DC back in the day, and it will be good to have all of this stuff back in print, including the scattered short stories.


In other comics:

Alias have the third issue of Penny & Aggie colorized reprints of the Webcomics.

Arcana have the delayed fifth issue of 100 Girls.

DC have the trade collection of the Adam Strange mini; the debut issues of Supergirl and The Winter Men (buy this--John Paul Leon on art!); and new issues of 100 Bullets (#63), Action Comics (#630), Fables (#40), Majestic (#8), Seven Soldiers: Zatanna (#3), and Villains United (#4).

Fantagraphics have Richard Sala's Peculia & The Groon Grove Vampires (which would have been the Pick of the Week if not for Concrete), and also the first volume of Mome.

Image have the debut of Ferro City and the third issue of Pigtale.

Lightspeed Press have the seventh Finder collection by Carla Speed McNeil: The Rescuers (also a potential contender for Pick of the Week--there's a lot of good GNs and collections this week!)

Lost in the Dark have the debut of Fragile Prophet.

Marvel have a collection of Peter David's return to Hulk: Tempest Fugit; new issues of Captain America (#8), Gravity (#3), Mouse of Him (#5), Incredible Hulk (#85), Kabuki: Reflections (#5), The Punisher (#24), and the first Ultimates Annual; plus a big ol' hardcover collection of the first 18 issues of Runaways.

Speakeasy have the debut issue of Hero at Large.

TokyoPop have the debut volume of the OEL manga Bizenghast by M. Alice LeGrow, which--artwise at least--looks pretty damn sweet.

Top Shelf have a trio of new OGNs: Tricked by Alex Robinson; King by Rich Koslowski; and Spiral Bound by Aaron Renier (which has been good some pretty good advance press). It's great that Top Shelf has several good books coming out, but maybe they could have spread them out a bit more?

Viz have the ninth volume of Banana Fish and the third issue of Shojo Beat.

Review: Periphery #1-2

Periphery #1-2
O-P-P
$3.50 each

Anthologies are notoriously hard to pull off, especially if there's no overriding subject or theme. But with Periphery, publisher/writer/artist Omaha Perez has put togther a winner. Ranging from horror to humor to mythology, over the course of two issues the stories in these two 48-page anthologies never fail to entertain.

Prerz provides the art on about half of the entries; other creators involved are Steve Niles, Brian Horton, Mark Fearing, Eli S. Stone, Richard Raleigh, and Matthew Smith.

Niles is best known for his supernatural horror work for IDW & Dark Horse, but his story in issue #1, "Carsickness," drawn ably by Brian Horton, is a thrilling Tarantino-esque story about a convenience store robbery that goes in unexpected directions, with nary a vampire or werewolf in sight. Issue #1 also includes "The Handsomest Man in the World," A tongue-in-cheek spoof by Stone & Perez; "Closed Case," a two-page solo effort by Horton about a police interrogation with a shock twist ending; "In Deep," by Niles & Perez, about two guys who really can't stand each other who get stranded in outter space; and "The Story of Ganesha" by Raleigh & Perez, which I believe is a retelling of a Hindu myth and is probably the best story of the lot.

Both issues include a "Jerry: Caveman Inventor" story by Mark Fearing; both are quite funny with a wry sense of humor that builds to the end.

Iuees #2 also includes "The Novice" by Matthew Smith & Brian Horton, a mostly-silent tale about an unusual encounter between two warriors in the desert; and "Holmes," a solo effort by Perez (and featured as a flip-book), which reimagines Sherlock Holmes as a drugged-out maniac and Dr. Watson as his supplier-enabler. Of all the stories over the two issues, it is this last that didn't quite work for me, although that may be because I'm not much of a Sherlock Holmes fan so perhaps some of the jokes were lost on me.

Overall though this is a quality anthology, providing plenty of entertainment for your comic dollar, and shows that there's still plenty of life in the comic-sized anthology.

Rating: 3.5 (of 5)

(Review copies were provided by the publisher. A copy of Cenozoic #1 was also sent, although I reviewed that previously.)