What’s your pleasure? Horror? Superheroes? Comedy? Kids comics? Trying to find out what’s good and what’s not before you drop the big bucks? Don’t have time to read those tedious, plodding reviews you get from Brand X? The Comixtreme.com
Done-in-One review thread is for you! Our quick, concise reviews of plenty of new comics will tell you everything you need to know before you crack open your wallet.
Archie #589 (Archie Comics)
By Batton Lash & Bill Galvan
In part three of "Freshman Year," Archie volunteers to work backstage on the school play so he can spend some time with Veronica. A makeover of his old tomboy pal Betty, however, sends Arch's heart spinning into chaos -- which girl does he like more? And thus, the eternal triangle begins. What's really great about this storyline is how Batton Lash has several character storylines and subplots running simultaneously. Even as Archie begins his constant floundering between Betty and Veronica, we see Moose come to him in the hopes that Archie can help him win the heart of Midge Klump. At the same time, a new teacher at Riverdale may spell trouble for the new principal, Mr. Weatherbee. The book is remarkably well-balanced, and it really does feel like an organic, perfectly suited "origin" tale and not just something that was shoehorned into continuity. This is hands-down one of the best Archie stories in a very long time.
Rating: 5/5 --Blake M. Petit
Chuck #4 (DC Comics/Wildstorm)
By Peter Johnson, Zev Borow, Jeremy Haun, Kristian Donaldson & Phil Noto
Chuck's day begins with a plunge off a waterfall, lands him in a Swiss retreat being attended by several bikini-clad babes, and as is so often the case, concludes with him in a race for his life. The story here is beginning to wear a little thin -- while the writers are still displaying a real grip on the characters and their universe, the story feels like it's being stretched a bit. The main advantage to taking the TV show to the comic book format is the chance to do locations and set pieces that would be difficult on a TV budget. On the other hand, you've also got to know when to kill your darlings. The book feels like it's going all over the place just because it can, and the story is getting stretched a little. The back-up story, on the plus side, is very funny -- a quick chat with Captain Awesome about the importance of dental hygiene, as depicted by Phil Noto. This is a fun comic, but the story needs to be stronger.
Rating: 3/5 --Blake M. Petit
Cthulhu Tales #5 (Boom! Studios)
By Michael Alan Nelson, Mateus Santolouco, Eduardo Medeiros, Todd Lepre, Milton Sobreiro, & Felipe Sobreiro
This issue has only two stories, but still has something that could appeal to almost anyone. The first story, about doorkeepers who keep the Old Ones at bay, is pretty good, even if there are a few unanswered questions. The art is a kind of modern style, a bit cartoonish and a bit graffiti style with screaming colors, and it just didn’t appeal to me at all. The other story has great art by Sobrerio, and it concerns a man in the early twentieth century who feels that all this newfangled technology is leaving his business in the dust. So he starts financing a strange man who seems to think electricity will solve of humanity’s problems … only he’s evil, of course, and up to something. The story starts off slow, and while the payoff’s decent, you may get impatient waiting for it. But it’s nice to look at. So, in true anthology fashion, a real mixed bag.
Rating: 3/5 --Andrea Speed
Dead She Said #3 (IDW Publishing)
By Steve Niles, Bernie Wrightson, & Grant Goleash
This mad scientist/dead detective/horror-mystery mash up comes to an abrupt end, with an issue that feels shorter than it actually is. Although it starts great, with our dead protagonist getting disemboweled and embalmed (willingly) in an attempt to stop his own rotting and falling to bits, the end comes swiftly for the bad guy, the mystery resolving itself so quickly and neatly it almost feels like a television script (although I’m not sure what network would show a show like this). And I hate to say that, because this has been an enjoyable read, and the Wrightson art is just fricking gorgeous (if not occasionally grisly). That alone is worth the admission price. But dang, if they just added a couple of pages to issue one and two, they could have wrapped it up there, and I wouldn’t have felt a tad cheated. Still a good read, and all horror/mystery/Wrightson fans should pick it up in trade. This issue just felt like a race to finish the line, for reasons unknown.
Rating: 3.5/5 --Andrea Speed
Fall of Cthulhu: GodWar #2 (Boom! Studios)
By Michael Alan Nelson, Mark Dos Santos, & Renato Faccini
The funny thing is, this is an issue with a lot of talking and a chunk of exposition, and yet it read really well and wasn’t overly static, which is something. Dirk and Lucifer, with the help of mentally broken Cy, try and figure out how to end the god war without getting all of humanity killed in the process, while Arkham and his friends intensify the killing spree, and prepare for what’s coming. Some moves are predictable, some are not, and Cy’s preoccupation with boxes is both funny and sad at the same time. The art is what troubles me the most about this issue. The vibrant coloring is visually appealing, and the scenes with Arkham are well rendered. But sometimes the facial expressions not only seem like repeats, but odd ones at that (there are many pop eyed looks of grim surprise), and the postures are stiff. For every good moment (Cy in his couch cushion fort) there’s a bad one (Dirk and Lucifer talking; the end bit where they all gather at Arkham’s house). Once they shake the bugs out of the art - no pun intended - this should be getting higher ratings in my book.
Rating: 3.5/5 --Andrea Speed
Jack of Fables #26 (DC Comics/Vertigo)
By Bill Willingham, Matthew Sturges, Russ Braun & Brian Bolland
The spotlight on the Page sisters continues as, this issue, Eliza focuses on Priscilla. The ugly duckling of the Page girls, Priscilla finds popularity by becoming something she's not, a transformation that still plagues her today. This issue also raises an interesting question about the parentage of some of the girls, Jack makes a bet that should be a tidy challenge even for him, and of course, we're treated to another of Babe the Blue Ox's fantasy adventures. Really, they could collect all of those one-page gags into a book of their own and I'd still love 'em. The Page girls have bee a really interesting addition to the Fables universe, so it's a natural choice to spend a little time delving into their histories. This book continues to be a lot of fun.
Rating: 4/5 --Blake M. Petit
Legion of Super-Heroes #46 (DC Comics)
By Jim Shooter & Francis Manapul
Seems like whenever things start to look up for the Legion, there's an inevitable step back. Sure, they've got a new benefactor that not only whipped up some new uniforms, but got them favored status with the United Planets, and Dream Girl and Phantom Girl start to bond over a few classic comic books. But then again, Dream Girl is facing a psychiatric test that's bound to show her inner rage, and Invisible Kid happened to stumble upon Saturn Girl and Ultra Boy in a moment of togetherness that's bound to upset Imra's boyfriend, and the team leader, Lightning Lad. The book has really blended together great sci-fi action with more solid character moments, which is one of the hallmarks of all the best versions of the team. Francis Manapul's artwork still sparks, and the new costume introduced this issue, like the rest of the redesigns, has a retro feel but still gives us a modern sensibility. Plenty of goodness here.
Rating: 4/5 --Blake M. Petit
Perhapanauts #4 (Image Comics)
By Todd Dezago, Craig Rousseau & Jason Armstrong
The Perhaps return home to Bedlam to find the base under an emergency evacutation in light of the recent invasion. But the people pulling the strings may not exactly have the project's best interesting at heart. Choopie has to deal with his Gremlin subjects, and Peter's emotions come back to haunt him. The bizarre stuff keeps coming with this book -- it's weird, it's crazy, and it's so much fun that it rises to the top of the read pile every week it comes out. Dezago and Rosseau have shaped a really weird world with really interesting, believable characters. If you haven't read this book yet, you're missing out on something exceptionally cool.
Rating: 4.5/5 --Blake M. Petit
Star Wars: Legacy #28 (Dark Horse Comics)
By John Ostrander, Jan Duursema & Travis Charest
The Legacy crossover begins its final leg as Cade Skywalker and his ragtag crew prepare for their gambit to overthrow Darth Krayt. As the journey continues, they run across the drifting vessel of Celeste Morne, a Jedi who has spent 3000 years bonded to an artifact possessed by the spirit of a Sith lord. Knowing of the Skywalker legacy through encounters with Luke and Darth Vader, Celeste's encounter with Cade takes a surprisingly different turn. While the sections of this story in Dark Times and Rebellion were both pretty good, they also felt somewhat inconsequential i terms of those books' overall story. Here, however, with the whole future of the Star Wars universe available to play with, it doesn't feel at all impossible that John Ostrander would take advantage of this crossover to make some lasting changes to the Legacy status quo. Really good issue.
Rating: 4/5 --Blake M. Petit
Station #3 (Boom! Studios)
By Johanna Stokes, Leno Carvalho, & Andrea Barreto
The astronauts initiate repairs while worrying about who the saboteur might be, but that’s secondary to need to fix everything they can so they can survive to argue about it. The problem is, things go wrong, as they are wont to do: bad math, an overlooked structural problem, and a bit more sabotage conspire against the crew, both thinning their ranks and thinning their options. Even if they do figure out who the killer is, it may be a moot point. The art has a soft look, but it's uneven; sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s just adequate. The big action scenes are the best, where everything goes fubar and you get to see it in its horrifying glory. A solid hard sci-fi mystery.
Rating: 3.5/5 --Andrea Speed
Vampirella Halloween Quarterly 2008 (Harris Publications)
By Dan Brereton, John Heebink, & Mike Manley
Vampirella in a (demon) woman’s prison. It sounds like many a geek’s wished for dream: Caged Heat with a buxom woman wearing a suit made of dental floss. But it’s not quite that. Save for some questions about her power level, this is actually a pretty decent read. The salaciousness is kept to a relative minimum (of course Vampi’s going to have a torn, open prison shirt at all times), and while some of the “street patois” is incredibly annoying, there are some good ideas in here, and a creepy image or two that made it worthwhile. The ideas may have been better in concept than execution, but it was so nice to read a straightforward story I’m willing to give it a pass. The art by Heebink and Manley has an old fashioned comic book sort of look that both made some demons appear more grotesque and downplayed some of Vampi’s natural cheesecake, which is another mark in its favor. Not too bad, all things considered.
Rating: 3/5 --Andrea Speed
Walt Disney's Comics and Stories #694 (Gemstone Publishing)
By William Van Horn, Noel Van Horn, Lars Jensen, Chris Spencer, Vicar, David Gerstein, Floyd Gottfredson, Dick Kinney, Al Hubbard, Donald D. Markstein, Xavi Vives Mateu, Carl Barks & Walt Kelly
The good folks at Gemstone have conjured up a strong package for this month's Walt Disney's Comics and Stories. Beginning with "Lost and Clowned," Donald Duck decides to capture a notorious criminal and cash in on the reward, but when your adversary is a master of disguise, everyone in town becomes a suspect. "Fame" is a cool little story -- as the police cart off Mickey's arch-enemy, the Phantom Blot, he tries to insist that he didn't have anything to do with the criminal's capture this time, but each of his friends tells a different tale. The "Rashomon"-like twist makes this a unique little story. Donald and his nephews again take center stage in "A Niche in Crime." Donald sets out to solve a series of museum robberies to prove to the boys that he's a superior detective to the Crime Pup they idolize in their comic books. Next up is a Minnie short culled from the old Mickey Mouse newspaper strip, which is cute, if not spectacular. "Blackboard Bungle" shows Donald trying to cope with the insanity of his cousin, Fethry, and his school of "progressive self-thinking." To be honest, I've never really warmed up to Fethry, so this was my least favorite story in the book. Fans of the character may like him more, though. "Two Heads Are Better Than One" pits the always-entertaining (and not often enough seen, for my tastes) Super Goof in battle against a two-headed nemesis. There's a neat twist on the villain here that makes the story even more fun. Finally, the Carl Barks classic "Playing Hookey" shows Huey, Dewey, and Louie trying to ditch out on their first day of school -- but they'll have to ditch Donald to do it. Overall, a good book wrapped up in a great cover by the legendary Walt Kelly -- a fine package for Disney fans.
Rating: 4/5 --Blake M. Petit
Welcome To Hoxford #2 (IDW Publishing)
By Ben Templesmith
Doctor Ainley is horrified by the non-medicated condition Ray is in, and she grows suspicious, enough that she finds herself caught in an internecine war between werewolves. Meanwhile, the warden prepares for the big night, and Ray just gets crazier and crazier - perhaps too crazy for even werewolves to deal with. We’re gearing up for a hell of a bloodbath, and it’s impossible to say yet who will survive, but I think it’s safe to say not many. While the main thrust of the plot kicks in here - blood, blood, and just a bit more blood, to keep a sense of diversity - and the artwork retains that great Templesmith expressionism, the story itself seems stuck in second gear. Maybe next issue’s massacre will liven things up a bit.
Rating: 3.5/5 --Andrea Speed
September 27th 2008, 07:54 PM
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