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Last Week's Comics In Seventeen Panels

Published Wed, 31 Oct 2012 04:57:18 -0500

Dr Manolis V writes the internet's most opinionated (and Greek) comics column.

I'm warning you, it's a Marvel-festation this week – and it's all good (well, you know me, "mostly"). Murderous psychopaths, unclean supermen, hulk fists, hawk boobs, many tearful goodbyes and SO MUCH MORE violence against children than you are probably comfortable with. Unless it's really really fluffy…

(and let me just say quickly before we move on to the silliness, our hearts here in Greece go out to you guys in New York, I hope everyone has been ok after the destruction has subsided)

Anyway, where were we? Oh right:

AN EXPLOSION OF CUTENESS

The Avengers and X-Men may have been bickering like spoiled children for the past half year during AVX, but their pint-sized cutesy wutesy baby counterparts in Skottie Young and Gurihiru's A-BABIES VS X-BABIES #1 fight like true heroes and show them how it's done! Honestly, I could go with a whole 12-issue year-long epic of this, they're just so darn adorable, and the creators have put a lot of thought and imagination into their action sequences and design details.

Summer 2013: MARVEL DIAPER WARS, anyone?

THE MADDER YOU GET

In Nick Spencer we trust. BEDLAM, his new creator-owned Image series (following his critical darlings FORGETLESS, INFINITE VACATION, EXISTENCE 2.0 and of course MORNING GLORIES) kicks off its run with a two-and-something-sized #1 setting up the story and character – nay, say monster of the protagonist. The nefarious MADDER RED, an insane mix of Joker and Saw on a massive pop cultural craziness fix, was Bedlam city's most notorious and public serial killer with thousands of senseless kills under his name before his "death" while in police custody.

Ten years later, the somehow reformed (?) sociopath is dealing with the lingering shadow of relapse by… contacting the police to act as their serial killer expert!?

Nick Spencer has shown he has the abilities and PR maven-ness to become the next Kirkman, the next BKV, the next Millar of independent comics. His short time with DC and Marvel was an unfortunate detour, an experiment gone meh if you may, but now he is back where he belongs, helming another ambitious and haunting series,filled with his trademark twisted reality, sense of drama and impeccable sense of pacing and build-up. Plus, it's already f***ed the hell up.

SUPERSLOB

Is it too early to call it yet? SUPERMAN #13 (much like #0 last month, Lobdell's first issue on the book) is the best Superman book in years. I'm not one to slight Morrison, but I've been missing the "man" in Superman, the humanity, the fun, the person inside. Lobdell manages to make Superman a believable, heck, relatable guy this issue through a series of small intimate details and quirks – and he doesn't shy away from the action either, with a gargantuan menace and an innovative "new" super-power.

THIS IS THE WAY THE STORY ENDS, NOT WITH A BANG BUT WITH A…

…JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY #645, another last issue of a great (but sadly not as lengthy) run. Yeah, I couldn't resist. It took several read-throughs to really get the full effect of the issue. Trying to find a hidden meaning, an escape clause in these brillint twisty word games that Kid Loki (and Gillen by extension) so love to play. This last issue indeed twists way back to the start of Gillen and Loki's journey on this book, weaving the entire story, and its musings on the nature of the story, into its tragic theme. This Journey has been for Marvel the equivalent of Moore's run on Swamp Thing or Gaiman's on Sandman. It's tragic to see it cut so short, but at least there's a definite sense of closure. I won't spoil it for any readers who have yet to embark on it, or have abandoned it half-course.

FANTASTIC FAREWELLS

Like many friends and fans I talk to (at least in my circle), readers sort of fazed out of Hickman's FF run towards the always-in-the-horizon big apocalyptic end-world climax of his mega-story. I personally have no idea how it all wrapped up, how the clues fit in, if it was worthy of the drawn-out complicated build-up.

FF #23, the last issue of his run, is what happens after the big end, it's the goodbyes, the putting of the toys back in the box after the big excitement, but not before one last fun ride – or ten. And THIS, this is definitely worth it. It doesn't matter how, or why, or whatever happened with the big plot stuff. This is adult Franklin and Valeria, and Hickman, saying goodbye to their younger selves and their family, and it has everything that makes a PERFECT issue of the Fantastic Four:

Crazy unhinged imagination, grandiose battle scenes, childish playfulness, moments, peeks, of profound intelligent design and a last parents-child farewell that is the most human and recognizable (and thus heart-rending) true moment that we could see inside this "fantastic" family.

World's Greatest Comic Magazine, indeed.

A FAREWELL TO CAPS

This week also marks the end of Brubaker's already-legendary 8-year Cap run with CAPTAIN AMERICA #19 (don't attempt the math, it's all lost in a maelstrom of three consequent renumberings and retitlings). Cap visits the Cap of the 50s (Cap fanboy driven to excessive plastic surgery and racism through faulty super soldier serum dosage) in hospital and sort of, well, tells him the story of Cap from a unique perspective. The man who started the legacy talking to his biggest fan about the weight and importance of Being Captain America.

Like FF, this is a more or less stand-alone story, but latching onto the important events and milestones from his own run and those that came before, as Brubaker closes the door on Cap's most popular run in decades.

QUICK ROUND

The rest of the week in panels:

GOOD THINGS END IN THREES

Well, not always. Fraction and Larroca's INVINCIBLE IRON MAN #527 tries a different approach as their book's closing issue, shunning the emotionally-driven approach of CAP and FF for a more "closing of the books" wrap-up on dangling plots, resulting in a final issue that reads more like a fill-in. Unfortunate.

GOOD THINGS END IN THREES POINT ONE

Heh. Daniel Way's farewell to DEADPOOL with #63 is a bit of a dud after one of the Merc with the Mouth's most popular runs that clearly had its ups and downs and ill-advised overexposure. For all the potential of this closing story, it sort of fizzled out to a few convenient twists and a rather abrupt and anti-climactic disappointment.

NICOTINE BLUES

Brandon Graham has seen the future — and judging by MULTIPLE WARHEADS #1, it's full of sex craziness, gods, living things and funny-sounding stuff or people. Ah, and puns. Lots and lots of puns. It's not so much PROPHET, as its cartoon cousin on acid – although you can still catch the similarities (=obsessions) here and way out there.

HAVE YOU MET THE NEW HAWKWOMAN?

I call her Hawkboobs Phoenixrotch. Don't ask why her entire body is covered in bulky armour apart for her bare midriff. It's likely a Thanagarian thing. Check the rest of SAVAGE HAWKMAN #13 for more .

LIAR LIAR WEBS ON FIRE

Peter Parker, you're not fooling a soul. Dan Slott has been very cheeky with Spidey's secret identity issues of late, even as "Spidey's scientist best friend" is running around web-shooting like a boss in the middle of the epic Hobgoblin Vs Hobgoblin showdown of AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #696.

BANNER IN HULK FISTS!

Possibly the coolest panel of the week! INCREDIBLE HULK #15 wraps up Jason Aaron's stellar yet underappreciated run on the book as Eeeeeevil Banner (who's not so evil any more) and the Hulk team up in their head against the Doombots' hired Mind Assassin. Plus, radioactive feces! All the toys are VERY conveniently put back in the box, after all the build-up of the evil (no, excuse me, Eeeeeevil) Banner, but oh well. It's still the funnest Hulk run since PAD was in charge..

HOSTILE 'HOOD SPIDER-MAN

Spidey punching on a helpless, trussed up Frank Castle? Say it ain't so, True Believer! PUNISHER WAR ZONE #1 picks up on the situation from the finale of the last PUNISHER series, still with Rucka at the helm, as Spidey rallies the Avengers to take Frank Castle down. Forecast looks bloody with chance of hail of bullets.

PAYBACK IS A BITCH

Deathlok Jan is pissed off. This, the introduction of the AVENGERS OF THE UNDEAD (kinda cool, even if DnA had already done it first) and the naked Valkyrie in Space action really make SECRET AVENGERS #33 stand out. Ironically this comes out the same week as, well…

MIND THE SPOILERS

I've warned you guys. No pussy-footing beyond this line!

GUESS WHO'S BAAAAC*– OH NOONE REALLY CARES, HONEY

She kinda "died" heroically as a random act of Crossover Sacrifice (TM) to the gods of summer blockbusters, yet… a) noone really bought it, b) noone actually cared and most importantly c) noone demanded her return.

Yet, in AVENGERS #32 here she is. As Joe Q says "Dead Means Off On Holidays For 3 Years".

UNDER HIS WING

BATMAN INCORPORATED #4 reveals the secret identity of the new WIGMAN, leader of Batman Inc as… Jason Todd? Young Damian seems just as livid about the continuity incoherence of this all as the fans are – especially seeing as Jason Todd has been pretty busy in his own book and in his appearances across the various Bat-books during the crossover and in the recent Robins reunion in Tomasi's BATMAN AND ROBIN.

It's not really the continuity/feasibility of his appearances that gets me, it's Damian's extreme reaction to seeing him work for his dad, when he's already been sorta reintegrated back into the Bat-Family through the other Bat-books. It's really a larger issue of Morrison's long-ago plotted out mega-arc trying to work itself out in a new continuity (DCNu) that is clearly organically foreign to it.

BULLPEN BITS

Everything else you missed this week:

– AVX CONSEQUENCES #3 Cyclops in Cell Block X. The one Marvel comic where he has retained both his balls and sanity.

– GAMBIT #4 versus other-dimensional Guatemalan Dragon Gods – well of course it's all for a girl and/or a gem.

– ULTIMATE COMICS ULTIMATES #17 Thor's time-travelling cuckoo son, Modi, is tearing apart Ultimate President Cap's America! Didn't these used to be cool and accessible at some point?

– WOLVERINE #315 versus the Murderous Lion and his crazy old man ninja braid!

– WOLVERINE MAX #1 he will GUT A SHARK!

– THE FLASH #13, the world's slowest moving superhero comic magazine!

– RED LANTERNS #13 Don't get too attached to new kool Lanterns premiering in the pages of the RISE OF THE THIRD ARMY crossover.

– JUSTICE LEAGUE DARK #13 it's a Vertigo Extravaganza! House of Secrets versus House of Mystery, Nick Necro versus John Constantine for the Books of Magic!

– THE TALON #1 it's open season on the Court of Owls!

– TEEN TITANS #13 Shhh it's the secret origin of Wonder Girl and the Silent Armour…

– NATIONAL COMICS: MADAME X ONESHOT it's Medium meets Madame Xanadu, down by the bayou in the last of the first wave of NC oneshots

– FABLES #122 Gene Ha and a flashback to Bigby's Bigger and Badder Wolf days!

– GHOST #1 the mystery woman who eats at diners and obsesses over ancient greek myth!

THE TALLY

Hey, I apologized in advance for the Marvelfest that was this week!

No less than SIX long-running Marvel titles wrapped up this week. The shortest amongst them was Jason Aaron's magnificent 16-issue run. Others like Brubaker's CAP, Fraction's IRON MAN and Hickman's FF were real monster-sized epics, the likes of which we had thought we would never see again after the 00s rolled in.

They are all "sacrificed" to make room (and build up hype) around MARVEL NOW which promises to launch a number of creative runs aspiring to meet this great precedent and surpass it, the "next classic run" on these books.

I say "sacrifice", even though these codas all feel "right" timing-wise, and their writers seem happy to close their chapters on these heroes and try their hand at something new. Perhaps the sting we feel is the trepidation about the new era dawning and how it will live up to the impossible hype it's following. This isn't Marvel doing a DC and relaunching after a somewhat stagnant creative era. This is Marvel chopping down its best titles at their creative peak to build something (hopefully) even cooler.

The only loss I'd characterise as truly tragic is that of JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY, a book that still felt like it had a lot yet to give, that had not necessarily ran its course yet. Still, even with things finishing as painfully as they did, this is a very tightly-knit story about redemption, destiny, growing up and the nature of the story itself that will live on and only build in legend and notoriety as time goes on.

Over at Image and DC, SUPERMAN finally seems to be heading in an exciting direction post-DCNu and pulling the rest of the Super-family ahead with it, while BEDLAM promises a run worthy of Nick Spencer's hype.

Here are my picks for the best books of the week, check back with your retailer tomorrow if you've missed them:

JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY #645
FF #23
A-BABIES VS X-BABIES #1
SUPERMAN #13
BEDLAM #1
CAPTAIN AMERICA #19
THE INCREDIBLE HULK #15
AVX CONSEQUENCES #3
MULTIPLE WARHEADS #1
SECRET AVENGERS #33

Be sure to follow me on twitter @theComicsGreek as I tweet and nag about the week's releases and chime in through the comments section about what you thought of this week's endings and new beginnings.

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