My Invention!

My belief with this webcomic blog is to be true to myself. Unfortunately for you, I am inconsistent and sometimes all over the place as a comics creator. It's hard for me to make a strip if I don't believe in it (even if it is just a poop joke). I know I keep my readers waiting and I'm sorry for that. I'd rather put out a strip that's really nice looking instead of just rapidly cobbling them together.

Here's the poll outcome from last time:

What is the magical essence the crystal ball speaks of?

Poo voodoo (48%)

moisturizing lotion (11%)

babe power (18%)

a secret potion (11%)

DCnU Reviews, Week 1: Animal Man; Swamp Thing

(Back in June when the new DCU titles were announced, I ranked all 52 titles on my likelihood of buying them. Only fair then to look back and see if my initial assessments hold up. My plan is to review each of the new titles as they come out.)

Animal Man #1
by Jeff Lemire, Travel Foreman & Dan Green

Original Rank/Assessment: 8 (Yes, with Reservations) - Every Animal Man take since Morrison's has disappointed, but I have hopes for Jeff Lemire giving it a shot.

See, now this is how you re-establish a long-running character in a new issue. Lemire doesn't completely ignore all the past iterations of Animal Man, but efficiently cues us in on what parts of Buddy Baker's past he deems important, while getting us comfortable with the character's current status quo and setting up the future conflicts. Fans of the previous Vertigo-esque versions of Animal Man will be fine, even though the spandex is back; while his recent outer space adventures are mentioned in passing but can likely be safely ignored. Some may not find Foreman & Green's art to their liking, but I find the loose and thin-lined art to be fitting. Also, note how Foreman uses negative space and the lack thereof to reflecy the different facets of Buddy's life: his scenes at home are open, while as a super-hero the panels are more crowded, and the bits in the dreamscape are mushed together and off-kilter. Then there is Lovern Kindzierski's colors, with a subtle blue & yellow palate that echo Animal Man's traditional costume colors. This is an Animal Man comic I want to read.

Rating: 3.5 (of 5).

Swamp Thing #1
by Scott Snyder & Yanick Paquette

Original Rank/Assessment:  18 (Yes, with Reservations) - Not completely sold on the reboot premise, but I like the creative team.

Just in case you missed it at the end of Brightest Day or in the 3-issue BD Aftermath, Swamp Thing and Alec Holland are now separated, and this is bad for the green. Snyder & Paquette spend most of this first issue setting this all up once again, though thankfully they are more efficient at it than the dragged-out Aftermath. This will have to be considered a work-in-progress until we see what they do with Swamp Thing now that the preliminaries are out of the way. I'm still optimistic, though still cautiously as well.

Rating: 3 (of 5).

DCnU Reviews, Week 1: Hawk & Dove; Static Shock

(Back in June when the new DCU titles were announced, I ranked all 52 titles on my likelihood of buying them. Only fair then to look back and see if my initial assessments hold up. My plan is to review each of the new titles as they come out.)

Hawk & Dove #1
by Sterling Gates & Rob Liefeld

Original Rank/Assessment: 20 (Maybe/Provisional) - It'll be a race to see whether this or Batman: The Dark Knight is the first DCnU title to fall behind.

Of all the the DCnU titles, this one perhaps raised the most eyebrows when first announced. Writer Sterling Gates (of Morning Glories Supergirl fame) teaming up with critical punching bag Rob Liefeld, on Liefeld's return to the characters that marked his entry into comics way back in 1988. And it is pretty much what one would expect. All of Liefeld's artistic sensibilities are on display, from posing action shots to interesting anatomical choices. You know by now if you like it or not (and there is a non-trivial segment of the comics buying population that likes it quite a lot). Gates's story does the job, opening with an action set piece, then moving into exposition and adding in a couple of mysteries. Basically, this is exactly the comic it set out to be, and that you were probably expecting.

Rating: 2.5 (of 5)

Static Shock #1
by John Rozum, Scott McDaniel, Jonathan Glapion & Le Beau Underwood

Original Rank/Assessment: 9 (Yes, with Reservations) - One of my favorite Milestone characters. I wish Rozum were still doing Xombi, but hey, I'll take what I can get.

Along with Xombi & Icon, Static was one of my favorite of the old Milestone line. Now he is lightly integrated into the new DCU; so lightly in fact that this could easily follow right on the old Static series with no trouble at all. Virgil "Static" Hawkins has relocated to NYC with his family, and with funding/support from Hardware is continuing his super-hero ways. I'm not a fan of Static's new costume, but other than that the art is vibrant and alive in the way that you want for a comic about an electricity-based super. Let's just hope that the last-page 'shocker' is simply a ruse, because otherwise that's one aspect of the old DCU sensibility-of-late that I don't want to see in the new DC, especially Static.

Rating: 3 (of 5).