Amazon

Retailing | Rumors have begun to swirl that online retail giant Amazon plans to open a brick-and-mortar store in Seattle within the next few months to help gauge the profitability of a chain. The store reportedly won’t just sell e-readers and tablets, but also books from Amazon’s newly launched publishing division. [Good E-Reader, Gawker]

Publishing | Japanese publisher Shueisha Inc. released the 65th volume of Eiichiro Oda’s pirate manga One Piece last week with a first printing of 4 million copies, tying the record set in November by the previous volume. [The Mainichi Daily News]

Retailing | Howard Ackler writes about the final days of Dragon Lady Comics, the Toronto retailer that closed last week after 33 years in business. [National Post]

Garry Trudeau

Creators | Garry Trudeau reacts to The Chicago Tribune’s refusal to run last Friday’s Doonesbury strip because it included a QR code that led readers to the charity DonorsChoose. The Trib ran a note that said it does not allow comics creators to “promote their self-interests.” Trudeau said, “I’m not sure ‘self-interest’ quite applies, since (a) DonorsChoose is a charity, and (b) I have no formal connection to it,” and he pointed out that the paper ran Thursday’s comic, which included a QR code that directed readers to Trudeau’s own website — “which actually was in my self-interest.” [Comic Riffs]

Creators | J.H. Williams III and W. Haden Blackman discuss their approach to DC Comics’ Batwoman title: “We keep using this mantra of there’s no status quo in the book, and we want everything to continue moving forward and never have an issue where you read it and go, ‘Oh. Tomorrow everything can be back to normal.’ There is no normal,” Blackman said. [USA Today]

Creators | Jeff Parker has begun to post some of his comics scripts on his website, starting with several Marvel Adventures scripts. [Parkerspace]

Creators | J.M. DeMatteis shares an introduction he wrote for a Modern Masters edition focused on his Abadazad collaborator Mike Ploog. [J.M. DeMatteis's Creation Point]

Oyster War

Creators | Panel Bound talks to Ben Towle, illustrator of Amelia Earhart: This Broad Ocean and creator of the webcomic Oyster War: “I run into a lot of people who have ideas for this and ideas for that, but look: ideas are a dime a dozen. ‘A school for wizards.’ That’s a great idea. Lots of people have had that idea. Only one, though, had the perseverance to write Harry Potter while her mother died and her marriage collapsed—and then stick with it after seeing it rejected by twelve publishers.” [Panel Bound]

Commentary | Joy Kim ponders the difference between teams and team-ups. In a team story, such as the pirates of One Piece, the members work together and character development occurs in that context. “In contrast, in a team-up story, the individual characters always trump the idea of the team. While there’s a certain amount of entertainment value in watching the various members of the Justice League react to each other’s styles, that’s also often all there is to the story. The character-changing moments for the members happen, for the most part, within their own monthly titles, not in Justice League; even when they do happen outside the character’s main title (usually as part of some big crossover event), they are more about the character as an individual than about the team as a unit.” [Joy Kim]

Digital comics | Ryan Penagos, editorial director for Marvel Digital Media Group and Marvel.com, discusses Marvel’s digital strategy with host Peter Biddle in a recent episode of MashUp Radio. [MashUp Radio]

Digital comics | Sean Kleefeld sets out to review digital-first comics and finds the pickings are slim; almost all digital comics have a print version as well. So he takes a broader look at the state of digital comics and sees a market that is still in flux. [The Comic Book Bin]

Reviews | Paul Gravett posts a generously illustrated review of James Chapman’s British Comics: A Cultural History. [Paul Gravett]

Justice League #5

Sales | Sales of comic books and graphic novels to comic books stores through Diamond Comic Distributors increased 27.5 percent in January compared to the same month in 2011. Comics were up 32 percent while graphic novels were up 18 percent compared to 2011. DC Comics dominated all 10 spots at the top of the chart, with Justice League #5 coming in at No. 1. Batman: Through the Looking Glass was the top graphic novel for the month. [ICv2]

Passings | British comics artist Mike White, who illustrated Alan Moore’s The Twisted Man and numerous other stories for 2000AD, Lion, Valiant, Action and Score ‘n’ Roar, has passed away after a long illness. [Blimey!]

Publishing | Because the world demanded it, apparently, Random House plans to publish e-books of all the collected editions of Garfield newspaper comics. [Down the Tubes]

A Batmobile replica from Gotham Garage

Legal | Lawyer Jeff Trexler explains the ins and outs of copyright as it applies to the bits and pieces of the comics and movie world — the Batmobile, costumes, Stormtrooper helmets — and how a lawsuit over Mike Tyson’s tattoo could have put all of DC’s characters into the public domain. [The Beat]

Creators | For the past few years, the Pizza Island studio in Brooklyn has been home to seven of the brightest stars in comics these days: Kate Beaton, Domitille Collardey, Sarah Glidden, Meredith Gran, Lisa Hanawalt, Deana Sobel and Julia Wertz. Now they are turning in the keys and heading their separate ways, and Laura Hudson talks to all seven about what their plans are for the future. [Comics Alliance]

Creators | In a video of a presentation at the Fantagraphics bookstore, writers Mark Long and Jim Demonakos discuss the origins of their graphic novel The Silence of Our Friends (illustrated by Nate Powell), which is based in part on Long’s memories of his father, who was a white reporter covering the civil rights struggle in Texas in the late 1960s. [Graphic Eye]

Bucko

Creators | Jeff Parker and Erika Moen talk to Lauren Davis about the end of their webcomic Bucko, which wrapped up last week after a year. Here’s Moen on their collaborative process: “Parker asked me in the beginning what kind of story I’d like to draw, and I told him I enjoy drawing 20-somethings going on misadventures. And then, of course, Parker borrowed liberally from the flotsam and jetsam of my life, such as the name ‘Bucko.’ ‘Bucko’ is my nickname for my brother and has been ever since we were kids. I don’t even think about it, when I answer a call from him I start with ‘Hey Bucko…’ Parker liked that so here we are. The rest of the collaborative process was Parker giving me completed pages and me responding ‘Parker, I can’t draw that, people will lynch me!!’” [Comics Alliance]

Publishing | Tom Spurgeon talks to editor Michael Catron, who has just returned to Fantagraphics after several years’ absence and is already working on a variety of different projects. [The Comics Reporter]

I will not caption this cover "Pistol Packin' Mama"

The big news from April’s solicitations was revealed last week, as DC announced the cancellation of six of the original New-52 books (to be replaced with five new series plus the returning Batman Incorporated). While there’s more to say about this on its merits, I do like DC keeping a fixed number of ongoing series. Nerds love structure, right? (Besides, it’s kind of like programming a television schedule.)

Of course, just two weeks ago I predicted that all of the original New-52 books would get to their twelfth issues, in part so that DC could claim they each “told their stories.” That doesn’t seem to be the case here, at least not from the solicitation texts. Instead, the solicits for each final issue mostly advertise how the series are all going down swinging. We know now, too, that in some ways this isn’t really the end: Mister Terrific’s Karen Starr looks like the Power Girl of the upcoming Worlds’ Finest; Men Of War’s superhero/military mashup should transition smoothly to G.I. Combat; and I don’t think DC will kill off Hawk and Dove again.

Actually, if I were Captain Atom, I’d be a little nervous. According to ICV2′s December sales estimates, Hawk & Dove was the highest-selling New-52 book to be cancelled (18,014 copies at #114), but CA was right behind (17,917; #115).

Anyway, on to the solicits themselves….

* * *

LO, THERE SHALL BE … OH, YOU KNOW

Lots of finality in the April solicits, even beyond the obvious. Mister Terrific signs off with the Blackhawks and (more than likely) the return of Power Girl; and Men Of War guest-stars Frankenstein. Blackhawks and Hawk and Dove tease doom and gloom. Action Comics, Batman, Batwing, and Batman and Robin all wrap up their inaugural arcs (as does OMAC, but its first arc turned out to be its last), and the Justice League Dark/I, Vampire crossover concludes. Batman: Odyssey and THUNDER Agents finish their limited runs, and over at Vertigo, Northlanders ends with #50. Finally, Static Shock’s last issue looks more like an epilogue, hopefully indicating a decent role for the character beyond the end of his latest series.

CROSSOVER MADNESS

Possible groundwork for the next Pandora appearance: dark visions of the future show up in Captain Atom #8 and Teen Titans #8, while the Flash visits the Speed Force in Flash #8. If I wanted to connect it to the Daemonite plots over in Grifter, Voodoo, and Superman, I’d say that the Daemonites realize (somehow) that the former WildStorm Earth was probably a lot easier to conquer without the Justice League in the way, so they’re going after Superman to eliminate the biggest threat first. It’s all very “countdown to Infinite Crisis”-esque, you see.

Since I dropped Teen Titans after issue #1, it’s been surprisingly easy for me to ignore it and still read Superboy. However, I’m worried that might not continue as Superboy becomes more involved with both Titans and the upcoming Ravagers series. Then there’s Superboy’s crossover with Teen Titans and Legion Lost, which I should have seen coming back in September. Ordinarily, that would all be okay, but I have a bad feeling that Ravagers will get dragged into the whole thing, and the Gen13 kids will be there, and it’ll just turn into a whole big mulligan stew of teenaged super-people. Wow, now I really do feel old.

By contrast, the upcoming Resurrection Man/Suicide Squad crossover should be easier to take, just because it looks more isolated. Oh, and who else thinks the Squad’s traitor is involved with Skinny Amanda Waller? She’s got to be a fake, and the real deal will be about twice her size…. Regardless, the old Amanda shows up in Batman Beyond Unlimited #3, so that’ll be good.

ONE LEAGUE UNDER THE SEA

I am probably more excited than is necessary at the prospect of Green Arrow in Justice League. To be sure, I don’t know this version of Ollie that well, having dropped the current Green Arrow after issue #1 for being too bland. Maybe Ann Nocenti will light the proper fire under him, and maybe that will be reflected in his JL #8 characterization? After all, cross-promotion is one of the Justice League’s oldest and most subtle missions.

Meanwhile, it seems eminently appropriate for Batwing to join Justice League International — I’m guessing he’s not the “surprise team member” if he’s on the cover of #8 — but I kind of want him to take a page from his patron, and claim that he’s too busy with his own crusade.

And as long as we’re talking Leagues here, I agree with Scipio that Aquaman’s old team should turn out to have been the Sea Devils.

THIS AND THAT

There is a sort of backhanded precedent for Wonder Woman packing heat (issue #8′s“Pistols of Eros,” snicker). It comes from the end of Greg Rucka’s run, when the Amazons reverse the polarity of their Purple Healing Ray, build an industrial-sized version, and call it the Purple Death Ray. I trusted Rucka to do that, and I trust Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang to make the P’s. of E. work too.

I’ll never turn down George Pérez artwork, so it’s good to see his guest pencils on April’s Supergirl #8. It may also be a nice way to warm up for his work on another Girl of Steel in Worlds’ Finest.

COLLECTIONS

The Infinite Crisis Omnibus mentions “villains uniting,” but it doesn’t seem to collect Villains United. However, the miniseries and specials listed in the solicits only add up to about half of the Omnibus’ page count, so there seems to be room for VU and the Return of Donna Troy miniseries as well.

I have a feeling that the Batman: Prey paperback is meant to capitalize on Catwoman’s role in The Dark Knight Rises, even though “Prey” was primarily a Hugo Strange story. In fact, for my money, “Prey” is the second-most-influential Hugo Strange story, behind the seminal Engelhart/Rogers Detective Comics arc. “Prey” takes one iconic scene from Englehart/Rogers — Hugo as Batman, with a Bruce Wayne mask under the cowl — and extrapolates from that an entire psychosexual obsession with the Darknight Detective, also involving a second Batman impersonator in Hugo’s scheme to destroy our hero. All that and the post-“Year One” origin of the Batmobile too! It’s a good story, is what I’m saying.

I’m not sure about the causal relationship between the various reprint lines. The Archives came before the Showcase Presents books, so there were Challengers of the Unknown Archives and Sgt. Rock Archives before there were SP reprints. However, I bet the sales of the SP volumes supported the upcoming Challengers Omnibus and the latest Sgt. Rock Archives.  In any event, the hardcover market may be more eclectic than I thought.

The character — or at least this phase of his development — doesn’t seem to be remembered that fondly, but I’m looking forward to revisiting the “AzBats” Batman in the new Knightfall Volume 2. What’s funny is that two Batman artists from that period, Graham Nolan and Mike Manley, are now drawing the soap-opera strips Rex Morgan M.D. and Judge Parker. I wonder if their newspaper fans will want to see their superhero work.

I’ve already mentioned the Sea Devils, but I believe their Showcase Presents solicitation helps clarify certain recent events. Reading between the lines, it seems that DC has been working on a hush-hush follow-up to this series called Flame-Headed Watchman 2….

* * *

Well, that’s what jumped out at me this month. What looks good to you?

Justice League #5 was scheduled for release Jan. 18, according to the Previews catalog as well as the publisher’s own website, but recent information from Diamond Comic Distributors suggests it won’t make that date.

Issue 5 isn’t among the titles the distributor has scheduled to ship Wednesday … or the week after. Robot 6 emailed DC comment and a revised release date, but has yet to receive a response.

Although a late title clearly isn’t unheard of, this one is intriguing for two reasons: first, because it’s the flagship of DC’s “New 52,” and second, because the creators involved, writer Geoff Johns and artist Jim Lee, are also company executives who, at least indirectly, oversee the line editors whose responsibility it is to make sure books ship on time. It’s important to note the reason for the lateness can’t be connected to Johns or Lee; the blame could fall on any step of the production chain.

While DC hasn’t responded to our earlier inquiry, we did find a comment made by Co-Publisher Dan DiDio during the lead-up to New 52 regarding this this potential issue.

“[Timeliness is] more hard-line than in the past for several reasons, and one is that it’s the largest concern we’ve heard from retailers on a continual basis,” he said in an interview with Newsarama. “They’ve been concerned in the past about our inability to put out books on a consistent basis, especially the books that people are looking for.”

DiDio stressed that DC has a “contract with the retailers” and the fans for consistent releases, and admitted that sales have suffered when the publisher released late books in the past.

He specifically guaranteed “100 percent delivery,” which this delayed Justice League #5 would break from, saying, “There’s nothing more frustrating for me or any of the fans, I’m sure, to be excited about something then not be really sure when it’s coming out.”

Update (11:17 a.m. PT): A DC spokesperson responded that Justice League #5 is now scheduled for release on Jan. 25, just one week after its original date. The Diamond’s tentative shipping for Jan. 25 list doesn’t yet reflect that information.

Update (3: 38 p.m. PT): A DC representative has since tweeted: “We can confirm that Justice League #5 from @jimlee and @geoffjohns is indeed hitting shelves next week.”

Update (5:19 p.m. PT): DC has clarified its previous statement, tweeting: “Sorry for the confusion: Justice League 5 will hit shelves on January 25th.”

OMAC #7

Since the March solicitations kick off the back half of the New 52′s first year, it’s probably worth noting that the whole line remains unchanged: no “midseason replacements” like Justice Society, but no cancellations either. If I hear relieved sighs from OMAC and Men of War, certainly Dan DiDio and Jim Lee have to be pleased generally that they’ve gotten this far with the 52 intact.

Well, pleased or stubborn, I suppose. Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference.

Ahem.  Away we go…!

HISTORY LESSONS

One of my pet peeves about the New-52 is the sense that it lacks a meaningful “history.” For at least the last few decades, a reader might not have known exactly what had happened or when, but s/he could tell that these characters hadn’t just fallen off the turnip truck. I say this because the solicits for Justice League #7 and Flash #7 both allude to their books’ untold backstories. With Justice League, we’ll learn about membership turnover and other details of the five years between the League’s debut and today. (To be sure, some of that has already been alluded to in the League’s previous present-day appearances, like JL Dark #1.)

Similarly, Flash features the return of Captain Cold and probably some other members of the Rogues’ Gallery, so I presume we’ll hear about their various dealings with the Scarlet Speedster. Now, I don’t expect either of these books to make explicit references to particular Silver Age stories, because I think DC still wants to avoid alienating new readers with (what may be to them) arcane Easter eggs. Regardless, it’s comforting to know that these characters are getting at least some of their history back. (I would like to see an organizational chart explaining the jurisdictions of the main League, the JLI, and JL Dark, though….)

THIS AND THAT

Between OMAC and the Challengers of the Unknown’s Ace turning into a giant monster, I hope Dan DiDio isn’t thinking that’s his new sweet spot. (That and Jack Kirby references, of course — OMAC #7 gives us the new Evil Factory.)

It may be the longtime fan in me, but it’s hard not to think DC has some line-wide crossover planned for the New-52′s first anniversary. (The cynic in me thinks that’s why nothing has been cancelled yet.) While I’m on the fence about such a move’s artistic merits, I applaud the crossovers between I, Vampire and Justice League Dark. Given the former’s setup, it makes perfect sense that the latter would be involved. It’d also be nice to see more acknowledgment that various insidious events are threatening the larger DC universe — the vampire war, the stealthy alien invasions of Grifter and Voodoo, and the hinted connections among Frankenstein and OMAC and Superboy, Teen Titans, and Legion Lost.

I’ve liked Chip Kidd’s design work, including his showcases of Batman memorabilia, so I’m curious to see how that translates into writing Batman: Death By Design. With his clean, uncomplicated approach, Dave Taylor is a good match for this project, because he’s versatile enough to handle what I expect will be a wide range of styles. He also did one of the World’s Finest miniseries about ten years ago, and he drew a pretty good Batman in that.

COMINGS AND GOINGS

New creative teams abound: Joe Harris comes in for Gail Simone as Firestorm’s co-writer, while co-writer Ethan Van Sciver draws issue #7 in place of Yildray Cinar. Ann Nocenti and Harvey Tolibao are your new Green Arrow writer and artist.  James Bonny joins Tony Daniel as Hawkman’s co-writer. Keith Giffen and Dan Jurgens write, and Jurgens pencils, Superman. After Sterling Gates’ departure, Rob Liefeld flies solo on Hawk & Dove. Paul Jenkins takes over writing Stormwatch from Paul Cornell (who then becomes free to write his own Saucer Country series, which looks quite good); Marc Bernardin takes over writing Static Shock; and Tom DeFalco is the new Legion Lost writer.

Also, Gene Ha fills in for Jim Lee on Justice League #7.  Fine by me!

MINISERIES

DC Universe Online Legends wraps up in March with issue #26, and as late as it may be for me, I am somewhat tempted to check it out. Essentially it’s an alternate take on the pre-New-52 status quo, which makes me feel oddly nostalgic. (Also concluding in March are October’s trio of 6-issue miniseries, Huntress, My Greatest Adventure, and Legion: Secret Origin.)

A couple of weeks back I wondered if there weren’t a new Night Force in the works, and what do you know? March brings another Night Force miniseries, courtesy of co-creator Marv Wolfman and appropriately-moody artist Tom Mandrake. I’m a little surprised that the solicitation just assumes everyone knows about Wolfman and the late Gene Colan’s team of supernaturally-oriented investigators.

Okay, I like THUNDER Agents pretty well, and I’m planning on getting all of the new miniseries — but why start a two-part backup story featuring one of the more obscure Agents in the next-to-last issue of what may be your final miniseries?

COLLECTIONS

The first four New-52 collections are solicited here, although they come out in May. While I know it’s not unusual to have a small gap between the last issue collected and the current issue on the stands, I like that readers who want to jump aboard with the monthly issues need only find (at most) three single issues to get caught up.

Alternatively, it’s entirely possible to see the New-52 collections as cousins to the superhero line’s original graphic novels (e.g., Luthor, Joker, and the “Earth One” books), with these first four kicking off an every-six-months schedule. If I were completely new to the superhero line, or otherwise didn’t want to commit to the weekly grind, that could be a fairly reasonable schedule.

Having “lived through” the “No Man’s Land” storyline back in 1999, I’ve not been that eager to revisit it. Therefore, the timing of these new paperback editions must be right. “NML” may even read better in big collections; because as effective as it was to watch Gotham abandoned and rebuilt in real time over the course of a calendar year, the experience surely becomes more attractive if it goes by more quickly.

I’m also glad that DC will be reprinting all of the “Knightfall/KnightQuest/KnightsEnd” saga in hefty paperback form. Like “NML” (which obviously took its format from the earlier events), these stories were serialized a week or two at a time, and played out over about eighteen months. In light of Bane’s upcoming star turn, it’s much easier to understand why DC is reprinting “Knightfall” again, but these remain some pretty entertaining comics regardless. Similarly, the “Venom” arc from Legends of the Dark Knight laid the groundwork for Batman’s eventual nemesis, but it stood on its own for at least a couple of years as well.

Although I seem to be saying this a lot more than I expected to, thanks DC for continuing the Archives line, this time with a new Green Lantern Archives volume. I was glad to get the first six, and I’ll be glad to see no. 7. Similarly, I’m glad to see the second volume of Secret Society Of Super-Villains solicited. The uneven tale of miscreants (and Captain Comet) operating on the margins of the Multiverse remains, with all its flaws, a fine example of DC’s superhero books in the 1970s. Plus, if my chronology is correct, it wraps up with the JLA arc which helped inspire Identity Crisis.

Speaking of the Multiverse, don’t get me wrong — it’s great that DC is collecting All-Star Squadron, the ‘80s series featuring Earth-Two’s Golden Agers fighting the Axis and other wartime bad guys. However, I do wish it was coming out in color, like those ‘70s Justice Society paperbacks from a few years back. Regardless, if the solicitation is accurate as to the issues collected, SPASS vol. 1 should include the five-part JLA/JSA crossover which bounces from the ‘80s to World War II to the Cuban Missile Crisis and involves three parallel Earths. Never could keep that one straight….

Finally, my stat-nerd heart is warmed by the thought of a Secrets of the Fortress of Solitude collection, and I bet yours is too.

* * *

Well, that’s what jumped out at me this month. What looks good to you?

DC Comics has unveiled Jim Lee’s T-shirt design for Free Comic Book Day 2012 featuring the current lineup of the Justice League. The image is an homage to a classic Justice League of America illustration by José Luis García-López, which you can see below.

The T-shirts will be available for order in January’s Previews catalog, with proceeds benefiting promotional efforts for FCBD.

Justice League #3

Sales | The comic book market was up more than 19 percent in November when compared with the same period last year, with comics up 23 percent and graphic novels up 12 percent. So far this year the comics and graphics novel market is up 1.87 percent versus the first 11 months of 2010. If December cooperates, this could be the first up year for the market since 2008.

DC Comics was once again the top company in terms of market share. The company took six of the top 10 spots on Diamond’s Top 100 Comics list, with Justice League #3, Batman #3, Action Comics #3, Green Lantern #3 and Marvel’s Point One #1 making up the top five comics of the month. Batman: Noel took the No. 1 spot on the Top 100 Graphic Novels list. [The Comichron]

Publishing | IDW Publishing has promoted Chief Operating Officer Greg Goldstein to president, with a focus on new markets and acquisitions. He joined the company in 2008 from Upper Deck. [ICv2.com]

Creators | Ron Marz is selling signed copies of comics he wrote, with plans to use the money he makes to buy toys for his area Toys for Tots program. [Messages from Marz]

Creators | Darwyn Cooke is again hosting “12 Days of Christmas” art auctions to benefit the Hero Initiative. [Almost Darwyn Cooke's Blog]

Frankenstein #4

Creators | Frankenstein writer Jeff Lemire says to expect a twist in Issue 7 of the DC Comics title: “You can’t sustain an on-going with monster battles. Monsters beating up monsters every month is really fun for like five or six issues, but it gets stale and formulaic to keep repeating it. The fun and interesting thing to do is to shift the tone around that time, halfway through the first year. We’ll still have the action and the adventure and the sci-fi concepts, but I’m going to focus a lot more on Frankenstein himself, his past, where he came from and how he became how he is. Build him up as a character and give some depth to him. I want to expand who this guy is and the role he plays in this larger New DC Universe. So I really needed to shift the tone in somewhat of a more serious direction. The readers need to know who Frank was and why he’s important and why they should care about him before going back to the big action stuff again.” [Paste Magazine]

Creators | The BBC’s Nick Higham talks to Art Spiegelman about Maus and MetaMaus inside Gosh Comics in London. Eddie Campbell then uses the location of the interview to have some fun. [BBC]

Digital comics | Johanna Draper Carlson reviews the iPad version of Jason Shiga’s choose-your-own-adventure tale Meanwhile: “Instead of having to be careful to visually follow the right path, the app handles all the mechanics for you, allowing you to focus on the art, story, and choices. Even when you’re reading in a sequence, you move from panel to panel via a yellow highlight, tapping whenever you’re ready to move on.” The iPad seems like the natural medium for this particular work. [Comics Worth Reading]

Digital comics | Artists Doug Hills, Joshua Hale Fialkov and Gabriel Hardman discuss how they deal with the challenge of presenting double-page spreads in digital comics. [Graphicly blog]

Exhibits | Curator Martin Brauen discusses an exhibit at New York’s Rubin Museum that features “the most complete collection of comics related to Tibet ever assembled.” [Salon]

Commentary | Comic Book Resources’ Kiel Phegley reviews a comic he found in a cereal box, General Mills Presents: Justice League #1: Unstoppable Forces. [The Cool Kids Table]

Justice League America #61

Don’t ask me how I remember this, but it was just about twenty years ago that the first previews of Dan Jurgens’ Justice League began appearing. After five years, the “bwah-ha-ha” era was winding down, and Keith Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis were leaving Justice League America. Giffen was also stepping away from plots and breakdowns for Justice League Europe, with JLE’s scripter Gerard Jones taking over as the book’s only writer; and Brian Augustyn replaced Andy Helfer as both books’ editor.

With a number of the New 52 titles changing creative teams before they’re even a year old, it’s too early to start talking about any long-lived, let alone definitive, runs on a particular book. Still, DC clearly hopes these books will be around for a while, even without the folks who launched ‘em. It got me thinking about past changes of the guard, and how they have followed some well-established interpretations.

* * *

Let’s begin with the Jurgens League, which was a big part of a wider effort to establish the Justice League as a mini-franchise. In the spring of 1992, the League family included JLA and JLE, as well as the oversized anthology Justice League Quarterly. “Breakdowns,” an epic crossover between the two monthly books, left the two teams pretty much disbanded, only to reunite (with some newer, higher-profile members) in the one-shot Justice League Spectacular. Although the overall effect made JLA and JLE less wacky, the changes also tried to give the books more of a high-adventure feel, deliberately trying to evoke the Silver Age team. The covers of JLA #61 and JLE #37 each paid homage to early Justice League of America moments, with JLA’s copying Justice League of America #1 and JLE’s parodying the original team’s origin (from JLofA #9).

Justice League Europe #37

In hindsight, it was part of a cycle which should be familiar to longtime Justice League fans. As a response to the “Detroit League’s” lineup of lesser-knowns, Giffen, DeMatteis, and penciller Kevin Maguire had built Justice League International around veterans from the original team (Batman, Black Canary, Martian Manhunter), familiar characters with no previous League affiliation (Mr. Miracle, Dr. Fate, Captain Marvel), and those newer to the spotlight (Blue Beetle, Booster Gold, Captain Atom, Guy Gardner, Dr. Light). For years the JLI was successful without the likes of Superman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, or Hal Jordan, mostly because it poked fun at the kind of omnipotent super-team to which they would belong. However, when Jurgens and Jones (and JLE’s new artist Ron Randall) took over, the two Leagues expanded to accommodate exactly those characters. Superman joined Beetle, Booster, Guy, Fire, and Ice in Justice League America, while Power Girl, Flash, Crimson Fox, and Elongated Man welcomed Hal, Aquaman, (eventually) Wonder Woman, and (for the first arc) Batman into Justice League Europe.

Strange as it may sound, this was a big deal at the time. After a few years of post-Crisis On Infinite Earths creative renovations, DC was starting to rediscover the Silver Age. Jurgens’ first villain was Xotar the Weapons Master, not seen since 1960′s Brave and the Bold #29, and his last big storyline involved Doctor Destiny and a twisted version of the Satellite League. Intervening was 1992′s “Death Of Superman” storyline, and since Superman was part of the League, Doomsday got to sideline Booster and put Beetle in a coma. There’s some metatextual hay to be made out of a Silver Age pastiche featuring self-referential post-Crisis characters being decimated by an early-‘90s stunt-plot built around killing one of the world’s most recognizable pop-culture figures, but in the end it was just a big mess. Jurgens’ JLA ended up with Wonder Woman, Guy Gardner, Maxima, the Ray, Black Condor, Agent Liberty, and Bloodwynd, and Jurgens left soon thereafter. When the JL books were reshuffled a year or so later, Gerard Jones was the new writer, and the cycle began anew.

Teen Titans vol. 2 #1

As it happened, Jurgens also ended up taking over the Teen Titans from longtime writer Marv Wolfman. Of course, Wolfman’s association with the Titans went back to the late ‘60s, but he’d really made his mark in 1980, in collaboration with artist George Pérez. Wolfman stayed on New (Teen) Titans for some fifteen years, and by the time Nightwing put the book to bed with issue #130, there didn’t seem to be much more to do with those characters. Accordingly, Jurgens started fresh in Teen Titans #1 (October 1996), with a group of super-powered youngsters sharing a common origin. Leading the group was the Atom, stuck in the body of a 16-year-old following a temporal accident, and helping to mentor them was Mr. Jupiter, a figure from one of the original Titans’ other relaunches. Jurgens’ Titans lasted two years, although issue #12 featured the originals in the start of a four-part storyline and Captain Marvel Jr. joined around issue #17. The book ended with issue #24, but the original Titans reunited in 1998′s JLA/Titans miniseries, and one of Jurgens’ characters (Argent) joined the subsequent Titans title. Argent even appeared in the seminal JLA storyline “Rock Of Ages,” albeit as one of the last superheroes standing after Darkseid’s global conquest. With the Titans’ New-52 history uncertain, who knows when they might pop up; but for the most part, they made it through the past few crossovers relatively unscathed. However, DC hasn’t tried a completely-new Titans book since then (not counting the recent all-villains Titans, that is), and I would say the feature is subject to the same ebb and flow of big-name characters as Justice League is.

Speaking of ex-Titans, The Flash vol. 2 was lucky enough to have only a handful of writers during its twenty-year run. Mark Waid spent some six-and-a-half years writing (or co-writing with Brian Augustyn) Wally West’s adventures, most notably letting Wally come to grips with his place in the Flash legacy. Waid also gave Wally a distinctive, matter-of-fact voice appropriate to a character who’d spent most of his life with super-speed. Accordingly, when Geoff Johns took over Flash, he inherited a well-adjusted protagonist and didn’t try to fix what wasn’t broken. Instead, Johns focused on Wally’s surroundings: breathing life into the blue-collar, hockey-loving Keystone City; offering new perspectives via detectives Chyre and Morillo; and famously focusing on the Flash’s Rogues’ Gallery. Johns stayed on Flash for five years, effectively wrapping it up in time for an Infinite Crisis-related relaunch.

So, can we draw some conclusions from these three disparate examples? I doubt there are any hard-and-fast rules, but I do have some observations. First, despite writing and drawing both, Dan Jurgens was asked to do two different things on Justice League America and Teen Titans. Essentially, JLA picked up where Giffen and DeMatteis left it, except that a) Jurgens tried to fold it into the Superman titles and b) Jurgens wasn’t nearly as funny. (His recent Booster Gold work was a lot better by comparison.) Conversely, Teen Titans was supposed to be something new (if grounded in the familiar DC universe) and turned into something pretty familiar when the new stuff failed to catch on. By contrast, the new stuff in Johns’ Flash was mostly new perspectives on familiar elements, like Keystone City and the Rogues.

We tend to forget it because Gail Simone was associated with the characters for so long, but Chuck Dixon was the original Birds Of Prey writer, guiding Black Canary and Oracle through various one-shots and miniseries before writing the first forty-six issues of the original ongoing series. (Terry Moore and Gilbert Hernandez each wrote a few issues in between Dixon and Simone.) Dixon’s BOP was a distaff version of his other DC work, which at the time included Nightwing, Robin, and Green Arrow. It was hard-nosed, no-nonsense storytelling; and although there were some relationship issues, the series was more action-oriented. Today, naturally, we remember Simone’s BOP for its characters: Babs, Dinah, Helena, Zinda, Charlie, et al. Again, like Johns, Simone took what Dixon left and gave it her own perspective. (I try not to sound like Paula Abdul, but there it is.) Simone ended up writing more issues of Birds Of Prey than Dixon did, and now she surely comes to mind more readily than he does. Still, the fundamentals of the feature didn’t change all that much.

Doctor Fate #25

Of course, other titles underwent more radical changes. When J.M. DeMatteis and Shawn McManus left Dr. Fate after two years, writer William Messner-Loebs and artists Vince Giaranno and Peter Gross changed casts almost completely. Stay with me, because this can get complicated: Dr. Fate was originally Kent Nelson, bearer of a mystic helmet which housed Nabu, an omnipotent Lord of Order. By the time DeMatteis and McManus launched their series, Nelson had died and Nabu was inhabiting his body, and Fate was a guy named Eric Strauss (magically aged to adulthood) and occasionally also Eric’s stepmother Linda. However, thanks to a series of events much too complicated to be summarized, the protagonists for Moore and Gross’s run were Inza Nelson (Kent’s wife) and Kent himself, back from limbo (or someplace effectively similar), with Kent’s original body now the home to a Lord of Chaos named Shat-Ru. Thus, different faces on comparable roles. Both DeMatteis and Messner-Loebs used Dr. Fate to explore broad philosophical questions, although each writer went in a different direction. Where DeMatteis was more concerned with larger issues of creation, destruction, and significance, Messner-Loebs had Inza transform her neighborhood for the better, literally removing evil impulses from her neighbors and behaving like a benevolent deity. It was an engaging run, although it only lasted a little over a year before the book was cancelled.

J.M. DeMatteis got another crack at a nigh-omnipotent superhero when he wrote Hal Jordan as The Spectre. Previous writer John Ostrander cast the Spectre as the embodiment of God’s wrath, but DeMatteis gave him a mission of redemption. DeMatteis’ Spectre series (drawn first by Ryan Sook and then by Norm Breyfogle) lasted a little over two years, and with Hal’s subsequent return as Green Lantern, may end up merely as a forgotten footnote to his backstory.

And speaking of footnotes, I felt compelled to hunt down every issue of Who’s Who in the Legion of Super-Heroes just to understand the references in early issues of the “Five-Years Later” version. Following Paul Levitz’s departure, writers Tom and Mary Bierbaum and artist/plotter Keith Giffen relaunched Legion of Super-Heroes in the fall of 1989, but set it in a universe five years removed from the glittering utopia Legion readers had come to love. (Not being a regular Legion reader, I thought this would be a good jumping-on point, but I ended up jumping into a fast-moving stream without a float.) Ironically, while this version of the Legion was grounded firmly in existing continuity, a big chunk of that continuity had been rewritten to accommodate post-Crisis changes to Superman. Even so, the 5YL Legion survived for five years (appropriately enough), until Zero Hour provided the opportunity for a more complete housecleaning.

Firestorm #56, John Ostrander's first issue

Finally, there’s Firestorm, co-created by Gerry Conway in the mid-‘70s and guided largely by Conway for the next ten years. Firestorm, the fusion of student Ronnie Raymond and scientist Martin Stein, first had his own book, which lasted five issues before being cancelled. Because Conway also wrote Justice League of America, he soon brought Firestorm into the League and wrote the character’s contemporaneous backup series in Flash. Not surprisingly, when the ongoing Fury Of Firestorm debuted in 1982, Conway wrote its first fifty-three issues. Essentially, Firestorm was Conway’s baby until John Ostrander came along — and one of the first things Ostrander did was give Martin Stein cancer. That kicked off a whole slew of twists and turns and brought in a raft of new characters. It took both Ronnie and the Professor out of the picture for long stretches, leaving behind an affectless Firestorm who struggled to find his proper function. In fact, the Ostrander run delved deep into the mechanics of the character, laying the groundwork for how he’s perceived today. Ostrander’s Firestorm (drawn by Joe Brozowski, then Tom Grindberg, then Tom Mandrake) was a sweeping saga of hope, survival, and ultimately, transcendence, which took the character from relatively-mundane superheroics to Swamp Thing-style levels of cosmic responsibility. Firestorm was cancelled with issue #100, so Ostrander was on the book a little less than four years, but that was more than enough time to alter the character irrevocably. (It also made the character somewhat unrecognizable, but subsequent appearances got around that.) The Jason Rusch Firestorm revamp built on many of these ideas, and the current Fury Of Firestorms seems to be playing with them as well.

* * *

Naturally, all of these examples would be more appropriate if we were still playing by all the old rules. (It feels more than a little strange to talk about “the old days” and mean “August,” but that’s about where the New-52 has left us.) There aren’t too many New-52 books with long-established creative teams. Geoff Johns has been writing Green Lantern for about seven years now, Paul Levitz has been back with the Legion for a while, and despite the book’s considerable hiatus I guess you could say there’s only been one set of writers on Resurrection Man. For all intents and purposes, we’re probably in the post-Grant Morrison era of Bat-books as well.

Otherwise, though, I don’t feel comfortable pointing to any given New-52 book and predicting a lengthy tenure for its current creative team. That said, I don’t think any of the Bat-writers are going anywhere, Morrison probably has a good bit to say about Superman in Action Comics, and Scott Snyder and Jeff Lemire seem settled-in for the long haul on Swamp Thing and Animal Man. I wouldn’t be surprised if most of the New-52 titles got a good couple of years out of their current creative teams — but I wouldn’t be surprised either if the superhero line looked significantly different two years from now. Maybe it’s because we’re only on the first week of Month 4, but the whole thing has a weird sense of impermanence, like it’s just a more normal version of Flashpoint’s altered reality.

Maybe that’s by design: for good or ill, these folks are telling the stories they want to tell, and when they’re done, they’re done — whether that takes six months, one year, or five years. That’s not a bad way to go. It’s basically what happened with Sandman, Hitman, and Starman, each of which is remembered for its singular vision.

However, not every book has that luxury. I wouldn’t want to be the writer following Geoff Johns on Green Lantern. I suppose the examples above are meant for that person, and I guess one of the big takeaways has to do with a book’s fundamentals. If those fundamentals are maintained, and you can offer readers some new insights into familiar elements, you’re probably set for a decent run. That sounds pretty basic, but these days, there’s more freedom to redefine those fundamentals and/or play with readers’ expectations — and that’s assuming the reader has some expectations. In that respect, Dan Jurgens had it easy on JLA: just add Superman to Giffen and DeMatteis’ comedic cast, and let the reactions write themselves.

Today, though, DC is presenting the New 52 largely on its own merits. Readers may have expectations about Justice League, Superman, or Batman, but they’re not necessarily comparing Duane Swierczynski’s work on Birds Of Prey to Gail Simone’s. Indeed, the New-52 isn’t old enough to encourage such comparisons. Rather, if I’m being charitable, the superhero line is still finding itself in these early months, and DC is figuring out what kinds of readers its New-52 books are attracting. We’ll see in a few years whether they’ve settled down with particular creative teams, and then we can apply these examples more accurately.

If Super Hero Thanksgiving isn’t enough to prove Kerry Callen’s awesomeness, his quartet of animated covers to classic comics ought to do the trick. Comics Alliance has the whole set, including The Amazing Spider-Man #33, Batman: The Dark Knight Returns #1, Iron Man #128, and this one, Justice League of America #6.

[Updated: See the comments below for the explanation, but my not linking directly to Callen's blog where he originally posted these was an oversight on my part. I apologize.]

Action Comics

Publishing | DC Comics joins the Kia Soul, Goldfish, My Little Pony and several others on Advertising Age’s annual list of America’s Hottest Brands: “With decades of stories under their capes and utility belts, Superman — and other DC characters, including Aquaman and the Flash — had ossified. Though relaunching its entire cast and making their adventures available to print and electronic audiences might alienate some hard-core DC fans, it might also gain plenty of new ones. Making DC characters more popular is crucial for its parent company. While the comic-book business is way down from its heyday, its characters fuel big-ticket Hollywood movies that can generate millions of dollars in revenue and licensing. The pressure may be on DC because rival Marvel, now owned by Disney, has churned out superhero film properties on a regular basis for years.” [Advertising Age]

Broadway | Producers of Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark have changed their tune on the $75 million musical; previously they predicted they wouldn’t make back the money invested in the show without franchising it in other cities and countries, but now they predict they’ll make it back entirely from the Broadway run. They also are considering adding in new scenes and a new musical number to the production every year, “making it akin to a new comic book edition, and then urging the show’s fans to buy tickets again.” [The New York Times]

V for Vendetta Guy Fawkes mask

Creators | V for Vendetta writer Alan Moore comments on the use of the book’s notorious Guy Fawkes masks by various protest groups, including the Occupy movement. “I suppose when I was writing V for Vendetta I would in my secret heart of hearts have thought: wouldn’t it be great if these ideas actually made an impact? So when you start to see that idle fantasy intrude on the regular world… It’s peculiar. It feels like a character I created 30 years ago has somehow escaped the realm of fiction.” [The Guardian]

Creators | Tony Millionaire comments on 10 of the musician portraits that are included in his upcoming 500 Portraits book from Fantagraphics: “I’ve always loved David Byrne. When the Talking Heads started, that’s when music totally changed for me. I had been lost with music. I was cutting my hair shorter and shorter. I was like, ‘I don’t want to be a hippie anymore.’ Music was just getting prettier and more refined – Crosby, Stills and Nash, and all that – and suddenly, it was wild again. And then the girls in the bars had big hair, and leather jackets and fishnet stockings. And I was like, ‘Wow!’ So then the Talking Heads came around and there was not only punk rock, but there was also art music – which, I felt like I could some how get more involved with it. The punk rock bouncing around and smashing in to each other thing wasn’t my idea of a good time. But art music, forget about it, I loved it.” [Rolling Stone]

Creators | ICE writer Doug Wagner discusses writing one of the Justice League comics available in various General Mills cereal boxes. [Park Record]

Chew, Vol. 3

Creators | Marc Oliver-Frisch posts an interview with Chew artist Rob Guillory conducted last year that will appear in a German collection of the popular Image series. [Comiks Debris]

Creators | Former Captain America artist Alan Bellman still gets fan mail—and still draws on commission—at the age of 87. [The Miami Herald]

Retailers | In a story on Small Business Saturday, Christopher Brady, owner of 4 Color Fantasies in Rancho Cucamonga, Calif., discusses how his shop took advantage of the American Express-sponsored event. [Contra Costa Times]

Commentary | Lauren Davis looks at one of Robot 6′s perennial favorite webcomics Max Overacts, by Caanan Grall. [ComicsAlliance]

Awards | The Quebec Writers Federation’s young adult novel prize went to a graphic novel, Alan Silberberg’s Milo: Sticky Notes and Brain Freeze. [CBC News]

Fandom | IndyStar.com profiles Kevin Silva, a Batman collector who has nearly 1,600 pieces of Batman memorabilia, including a Gotham City phone book used in the 1960s television show and a Batman lunchbox he took to school as a kid. [IndyStar.com]

History | J.L. Bell chronicles the evolution of the Tin Woodman’s head. [Oz and Ends]

Cosplay | Toy enthusiasts in Jakarta, Indonesia are using the city’s many malls to host Nerf gun battles. Participants dress as movie, comic book and other pop culture characters and battle amongst the shops and food courts, with some malls even setting up designated areas for these “Mall Wars.” [Jakarta Globe]

Absolute All-Star Superman

Comics College is a monthly feature where we provide an introductory guide to some of the comics medium’s most important auteurs and offer our best educated suggestions on how to become familiar with their body of work.

Strap yourself in, kids, because this is going to be a big one, as we run through the lengthy and considerable career of one of mainstream comics’ biggest stars, Grant Morrison.

Why he’s important

If nothing else, Grant Morrison is a writer with a definitive vision. A big believer in the power of the superhero genre to inspire hope and change, his stories often — despite his considerable ability to frighten and disturb – are optimistic affairs, suggesting that even in one’s darkest moments, things are never as bad as they seem. That he can frequently pull this type of sincere optimism without seeming saccharine or winsome is a testament to his skill as a writer.

Morrison is not always an easy writer to read. He’ll frequently break the fourth wall, indulge in non-linear storytelling or throw out obscure references. He expects his readers to meet him halfway and often a bit of work is required to suss out exactly how everyone moved from plot point A to B. Usually this type of effort is rewarded, however, as at his best his writing blends surreal, dense and sometimes elliptical storytelling with a fondness for humanity and a yen for crafting likable, fully rounded characters.

Note: In culling this list together I decided to skip over some of Morrison’s single-issue stories, anthology contributions and unfinished projects (like those two issues of The Authority). Otherwise we’d be here all day. Feel free to yell at me about it in the comments section.

Where to start

Doom Patrol Vol. 1: Crawling From the Wreckage

Morrison’s most well-known and beloved work is easily All-Star Superman, and thus makes as likely and new-reader-friendly a place to begin as any. Working with his best and frequent collaborator Frank Quitely, Morrison penned a loving mash note to the Silver Age, Weisenger-era Superman that didn’t ever once come off as nostalgic sentimentality. In many ways, All-Star Superman is a thoughtful treatise on the fragility and splendor of life, with Morrison asking readers what sort of legacy they’d like to leave behind for friends and family after they’ve gone. The series is available in two softcover volumes, or you can buy the whole shebang in one expensive Absolute edition.

Personally though, I feel that Morrison’s run on Doom Patrol features not only some of his best writing ever, but it’s also one of the best, if not the best, superhero comic of all time. Teaming up with artist Richard Case, Morrison created a comic that reveled in playful sense of surrealism and absurdity. New, bizarre ideas and characters seemed to spring off every page — Paintings that eat cities! A villain that has every super power you can’t think of! — only to be tossed aside to make room for the next big notion. But it’s all grounded by the main cast of characters who, despite their odd appearances and complex problems, remain very sympathetic figures. The series has been collected in five six easy-to-find trade paperbacks: Crawling From the Wreckage, The Painting that Ate Paris, Down Paradise Way, Musclebound, Magic Bus and Planet Love.

From there you should read

Flex Mentallo Man of Muscle Mystery Deluxe Edition

After his run on Doom Patrol concluded, Morrison spun-off one of his creations from the series, Flex Mentallo, into a self-titled four-issue mini-series. The comic followed the “Muscle Man of Mystery” as he tried to find his former friend and fellow crimefighter, The Fact, while also focusing on a burned out rock star calling a suicide prevention line who may or may not be imagining the whole Mentallo storyline. Working again with Quitely (who does some of his best work to date here) Morrison lays out his entire feelings about the superhero genre and why he’s so sweet on it. As manifestos go, it’s a pretty sterling one. Though it’s long been out of print, it’s scheduled to come out in a deluxe hardcover collection early next year.

Morrison’s other great superhero project is the wildly ambitious Seven Soldiers of Victory. The idea was to create a loosely interconnected series of comics, each starring a semi-obscure character from the DC Universe: Klarion, the Guardian, Mister Miracle, the Shining Knight, etc. It all builds up towards an epic battle against a nefarious enemy from the future, the catch being none of the characters ever meet (at least not for more than a few seconds). Really, it all comes together a lot better my meager description would suggest and features some great art from folks like Doug Mahnke, J.H. Williams III, Frazier Irving and Ryan Sook. The whole blessed extravaganza has been collected in two hardcover volumes.

At the same time Morrison was pushing the dada envelope in Doom Patrol, he was cheerfully breaking the fourth wall in Animal Man.The series started off as a familiar second banana character revamp, with art by Chas Truog, but quickly became something deeper and stranger as main character Buddy Baker started fighting for animal rights and inadvertently found his world literally coming apart at the seams, with the end result being a meeting between the character and his creator. The entire storyline is collected in three volumes: Animal Man, Origin of the Species and Deus Ex Machina.

While I disagree somewhat, many consider The Invisibles to be Morrison’s definitive work. Certainly it’s one of his most fondly remembered works and the one that won him a decidedly devoted audience. A superhero/spy story that draws on countless conspiracy theories, the Invisibles follows a clandestine group of operatives who work at overthrowing a shadowy Illuminati-type group that manipulates humanity and history behind the scenes. The first half is excellent, but it begins to falter somewhat in the second half before gaining steam again, perhaps in part due to the fact that Morrison fell gravely ill while writing the series. You can read the whole thing via seven volumes: Say You Want A Revolution, Apocalipstick, Entropy in the U.K., Bloody Hell in America, Counting to None, Kissing Mister Quimper and The Invisible Kingdom.

Rounding out Morrison’s collaborations with Frank Quitely is We3, a surprisingly effective sci-fi revamp of The Incredible Journey with a cybernetically outfitted (and incredibly dangerous) rabbit, cat and dog on the run from the military that wants to “decommission” them and trying to find their original owners. In a rather neat feat, Morrison manages to give all the animals speaking parts without ever having them lose their animal nature or resorting to easy sentimentalism. As violent as this book can be, it’s hard to reach the end with a dry eye.

And then you should read

Seaguy

The Filth was Morrison’s follow-up to The Invisibles and something of a flip side to the latter’s more positive, rebelling against the status quo attitude. I think it’s a more successful book though it certainly has its detractors. It’s about an average schlub of a man who (re)discovers he’s actually the member of a super-secret organization devoted to maintaining the “status q” known as The Hand. Or maybe he’s a pedophile who’s starting to hallucinate because he can’t handle the fact that his beloved cat is dying. Morrison keeps readers guessing the true nature of the story’s “true” reality all the way up to the end and beyond. It’s one of the writer’s densest, most challenging books to date largely, but a hell of a ride, largely due to the considerable artistic abilities of Chris Weston.

Seaguy and its sequel, the yet-to-be-collected Seaguy: The Slaves of Mickey Eye, is an energetic, dystopian superhero fable dealing with a scuba-outfitted hero who slowly comes to realize the seemingly perfect, amusement-park world he’s living in is a facade hiding lots of nefarious goings-on. It’s a fun, affecting ride, largely abetted by the cheerfully clean styling of Cameron Stewart. Morrison has promised a third and final Seaguy series but as of yet nothing has been announced.

Morrison must have a deep fondness for Oscar Wilde. How else to explain Sebastian O, which re-imagines the author of The Importance of Being Earnest as a witty assassin, wrecking havoc on the establishment that sent him to prison decades ago? It all wraps up a little too quickly, but longtime collaborator Steve Yeowell and Morrison manage to spin a clever and occasionally disquieting steampunk ode to Wilde and his contemporaries as well as giving a fat raspberry to the voices of censorship and repression.

One of Morrison’s most recent Vertigo books is the just-collected Joe the Barbarian, a charming fantasy story about a boy who, in the midst of a diabetic seizure, imagines himself transported to a fantasy kingdom where he is “the chosen one” who can save their world (Notice a pattern here? Morrison’s big on the ability of imagination and fantasy to transform everyday life.) Despite the Vertigo label and seemingly convoluted storyline, this is one of Morrison’s most direct, straightforward works ever and his first and only all-ages styled book to date. He and artist Sean Murphy do such a fine job here that you wonder why he doesn’t try his hand at this type of thing more often.

Though the bulk of his work has been done for DC/Vertigo, Morrison spent some time a decade or so ago at Marvel. The most notable fruit of his labors there was his run on the New X-Men, where he shook up and in some cases completely altered the status quo on the long-standing, convoluted superhero soap opera series, laying lots of established back story to literal waste and giving a hipper sci-fi edge to the proceedings, all while re-emphasizing the adolescent angst that gave the series’ its heart. It all suffers quite a bit from the revolving door of artists that came in to handle various arcs or fill-in issues (Igor Kordey’s best work is certainly not represented here). But still, there are some great ideas at work here and some really stunning sequences, usually involving Frank Quitely (there he is again). The best way to experience the series is probably through the latest three-volume set of omnibuses (omnibi?).

Further reading

Final Crisis

Morrison teamed up with Duncan Fegredo for Kid Eternity, a three-issue prestige-styled mini series that was yet another dark revamping of a long-forgotten superhero character, in this case a boy who could summon classic (and dead) characters from history just by saying the word “Eternity.” Teamed up here with a hapless stand-up comedian, the series is basically Morrison’s take on Dante’s Inferno, as the pair wend their way to hell and back in order to save the Kid’s mentor and possibly the human race. It’s a bit muddled at times, but still entertaining.

Having attempted a convoluted mega-crossover series with Seven Soldiers, Morrison got the chance to try something similar with DC’s A-listers in Final Crisis, one of those super-duper “event” stories that plague superhero comics these days. Morrison basically dares to ask the question “What if Darkseid really won?” and then goes on to explore how the Superman and friends manage to pick up the pieces and restore order and justice to the universe. It’s kind of a mess — the divergent elements don’t cohere very well, part of which may be due to the fact that artist J.G. Jones was replaced early on in the series by a variety of artists, including Doug Mahnke. And I recall being very irritated at figuring out at the end that I needed to read some of the tie-in series in order to figure out what was going on. Still, all that tie-in stuff has been included in the collected edition, so maybe it all reads better in book form.

Morrison first made his name in 1989 with Arkham Asylum, a heavily-hyped standalone graphic novel that teamed him up with a pre-Cages Dave McKean. The book had Batman wending his way through the titular mental institution, combating various villains and Jungian archetypes along the way. At the time (and despite the strong sales) it was derided by some fans as being needlessly convoluted and self-important, but I think it’s held up rather well over time, though it does perhaps take itself a bit too seriously.

Those looking for a more straightforward Batman story should check out Gothic, which was originally serialized in Legends of the Dark Knight. The story, featuring some nice art by Klaus Janson, pits the caped crusader against a seemingly immortal killer named Mr. Whisper who’s secret origins may tie into Wayne’s own personal history. It’s one of Morrison’s most simplest and straightforward stories ever and perfect for those who are just looking for a nice Batman story without all the surreal frou-frou.

If you haven’t guessed yet, Batman is clearly Morrison’s favorite superhero. Or, at any rate, he’s the superhero he’s spent the most time with, having not only done the previous two books but also having written the eponymous Batman series from 2007 to 2010. Here he attempted to incorporate every single aspect of the character’s mythos from the past 70-odd years, from the silly to the profound. Again, it’s hard to fault his ambition, but it’s clear certain artists weren’t on the same page as Morrison or weren’t capable of matching his vision and thus the quality and tone vary wildly. Morrison’s run is collected in Batman and Son, The Black Glove (the best of the bunch, with some great art by J.H. Williams III), The Resurrection of Ra’s Al Ghul (another multi-series crossover Morrison took part in), Batman R.I.P. (where everything comes to a head), and the coda, Time and the Batman, which also re-explains some events from Final Crisis.

Morrison hit the ground running from his Batman run with Batman and Robin, which imagines first Robin Dick Grayson taking over the Batman role in Bruce Wayne’s absence, joined by Wayne’s cocky illegitimate son Damian. This was a deliberate attempt to harken back to the goofy TV show and carefree era of the 60s, while maintaining a bit of menace and gravitas. Overall it’s a more successful run than Batman, though, once again, there are some really awful stumbles depending on who’s handling the artistic chores. You can read the whole thing in  Batman Reborn, Batman vs. Robin and Batman and Robin Must Die!

The whole saga came to a head in Batman: The Return of Bruce Wayne, which found Bruce Wayne traveling through time — here a caveman, there a puritan — but still solving crimes and righting wrongs. Honestly, the whole thing feels a bit perfunctory and is not one of Morrison’s better works.  Much better is the series it led into, Batman Inc., which finds Wayne expanding his superhero empire around the globe. So far that series has been pretty solid and though it’s currently on hiatus, there’s no reason to suspect the quality will dip down once it returns.

Even further reading

Vinanarama

Morrison went Bollywood with Vimanarama, a three-issue mini-series he did with Philip Bond about a nebbishy British Asian man who finds himself battling ancient giant monsters bent on destroying the world as well as juggling various personal crises, most notably his impending arranged marriage. On the whole this is slight and more than a bit silly (deliberately so), but it has a devoted fan base among Morrison devotees.

Along with New X-Men, Morrison worked on the series Marvel Boy with artist J.G. Jones. The short-lived comic featured a surly Kree warrior as its anti-hero, who, after having his ship destroyed and friends killed, felt little love for humanity and was more than happy to carve a giant “F.U.” into the New York landscape, in between battles with a villainous armored millionaire who craves his technology. After X-Men, it’s probably Morrison’s best work at the House of Ideas.

Apart from the X-Men, Morrison didn’t get to handle to many of Marvel’s iconic characters, though he did get to offer his take on the FF with Fantastic Four: 1234. This short, slight story features some nice, moody art by Jae Lee as the Richards family find themselves beset with doubt, with Doctor Doom moves in for the kill. The best part in the whole thing is Sue Storm’s verbal takedown of Doom.

Finally, there’s Skull Kill Krew, which Morrison worked on with Mark Millar and Steve Yeowell. The comic, about a group of misfit anti-heroes hell-bent on destroying the Skrulls hiding in society (and presumably plotting world domination) adopts a cheerfully amoral and anarchistic tone as the group merrily goes about slaughtering aliens left and right (and in the end decimates an entire town). The defiant, tongue-in-cheek attitude isn’t for everyone certainly, but there’s something to be said for a superhero comic that comes off as having an attitude without seeming like a cynical marketing ploy.

Millar and Morrison also collaborated on Aztek the Ultimate Man, an original superhero character blessed with a magic suit of armor and given a quest to save the world from … well, you know the drill. N. Steven Harris’ angular art gives the whole thing an off-kilter, claustrophobic edge, which works to the story’s advantage, considering it takes place in an allegedly “sick city.” Beyond the simple “hero saves world” plot is a nice running commentary on the uber-violent, “dark” superheroes that were all the rage in the 1990s that gives the series a little kick.

Aztec’s final fate is revealed toward the end of Morrison’s run on JLA, better known as Justice League of America to simple souls like myself. Morrison took over the then moribund-title in 1997, attempting both a back to basics approach by bringing in heavy hitters like Superman and Batman and giving the series an epic scale by having them face off against some seemingly staggeringly tough opponents. It was an enormous success and garnered a new group of fans for Morrison that had previously found his work alienating or confusing. In retrospect, however, the series suffers a bit from repetition: each plot involves the JLA facing being painted in a corner, either by a super villain or a universe-shattering event, only to come through at the last possible second. The series was also a slave to the vagaries of various plot threads going on in other books, which can be irritating (Superman’s blue and electric! Now he’s normal again! Wonder Woman’s dead! Now she’s not!). And then there’s Howard Porter’s art, which is serviceable at best. The entire run is collected in four oversize volumes, the fourth of which collects also collects JLA: Earth-2, a stand-alone story where the heroes face evil versions of themselves. It’s far, far better than the bulk of the rest of the JLA material, perhaps due in large part to the fact that — you guessed it — it was drawn by Frank Quitely.

Ancillary materials

Morrison teamed up with Mark Waid, Geoff Johns and Greg Rucka for 52, a year-long, weekly series that juggled various plot threads to reveal what was going on in the DC universe after the events of Infinite Crisis. It’s a bit all over the place, but still entertaining. One of the most fun parts is trying to figure out what sections were written by Morrison.

Remember Virgin Comics? At one point they planned a multi-part animated Internet-0nly series based on the classic Indian text the Mahabharata, to be written by Morrison. It all fell apart when Virgin collapsed, but you can read Morrison’s lengthy story pitch and some of his initial scripts in 18 Days, published by Dynamite. The book also features some lavish illustrations by Mukesh Singh that, combined with Morrison’s conceptual ideas, make you wish the project had come to fruition.

An enormous amount of Morrison’s early work, especially his work for 2000AD and other British comic magazines, has yet to be collected in the states, including Big Dave, Bible John and the New Adventures of Hitler. Some of these are available online in various illegal fashions. Probably his most notable early work is Zenith, another epic superhero saga starring a snotty youth who would rather be a pop star than fight crime. It’s a bit too jam-packed, though it settles itself out a bit as it goes on, and you can see a lot of his initial ideas on the superhero genre being laid out here. Eclipse published two volumes of Zenith but those have sadly long since fallen out of print. Supposedly a collected edition will be coming out from 2000AD sometime in the near future but I wouldn’t hold your breath waiting, as Morrison and the publisher have supposedly been at loggerheads about who truly owns the rights to the character.

One early Morrison comic that did get reprinted here in the states was St. Swithin’s Day, which Oni released only to let fall back out of print again. The comic, featuring some lovely art by Paul Grist, follows a sullen teenager who may or may not be plotting to kill Margaret Thatcher (Morrison has gone on record as saying the comic is at least partly autobiographical). The whole thing’s terribly earnest, but sweet in its own way and worth tracking down.

Fans of the classic British TV show The Avengers will want to check out Steed and Mrs. Peel, in which Morrison and Ian Gibson dream up new adventures for the classic spy duo. It’s pretty amusing, but really only if you’re a fan of the source material. BOOM! plans to re-release these comics in January.

Finally there’s Dare, a modern politicalized rethinking of the classic British Dan Dare sci-fi comic done with artist Rian Hughes. As with The Avengers, it helps to be familiar with the source material. Dark but still entertaining, the comic is more of a showcase for Hughes’ considerable talents work than for Morrison’s writing. The story can be found in the Hughes collection Yesterday’s Tomorrows, which is well worth tracking done because Hughes is such a masterful artist.

Avoid

The Mystery Play

Don’t let the subtitle to Supergods fool you. The book is not really about “What Masked Vigilantes, Miraculous Mutants and a Sun God from Smallville Can Teach Us About Being Human.” Instead what you get is a rambling, warmed-over, rather problematic (to put it mildly) look at comics history, along with some rather self-aggrandizing reminiscences by Morrison. On the other hand, it is a good place to find out more about a number of events the author has hinted at in various interviews, particularly a transcendental experience he had in Katmandu. More than anything, though, this book was in really bad need of a good editor.

The news that Morrison was going to return to Superman in Action Comics as part of the new DC revamp was heralded by many, but so far the series has proven to be something of a disappointment, feeling tired and rote where it should be vibrant and fun. Perhaps it will improve as it progresses …

Morrison can be a little too “on the nose” sometimes, and that’s absolutely the case with The Mystery Play, a graphic novel team-up with Jon J. Muth that reeks of symbolism and allegory to the point where you want to scream “Enough already.” The story takes place during the modern re-enactment of a medieval mystery play, see, only God gets murdered in the first act. The rest of the book is more of the same painfully obvious allusions that cause the reader (or me at any rate) to wince inwardly when reading them.

That “on the nose” thing also plagues  Kill Your Boyfriend a “youth on the run” comic with Philip Bond that despite its apparent desire to shock and awe seems a bit too overly familiar and annoyingly cute. You don’t necessarily have to “avoid” it but I’d recommend saving it for last.

Next month: Jessica Abel

Hiya kids, it’s time for What Are You Reading?, a weekly look into what the Robot 6 crew has been reading lately. Today’s special guest is Thom Zahler, creator of the delightful superhero/romantic comedy comic Love and Capes.

To find out what Thom and the Robot 6 crew have been reading lately, click below.

*****

Michael May

Baltimore

I didn’t get to Baltimore: The Plague Ships before Halloween like I’d planned. I had illusions about reading the novel it’s based on first, but I’m slow with prose and the graphic novel was just sitting there on my reading table; taunting me with its gorgeously gruesome Mignola cover and its peg-legged, harpoon-wielding hero. I’m sure that I would have gotten more out of it had I read the novel first, but Mignola and Christopher Golden did a fine job (as they will) of keeping the comic self-contained and filling in enough details to explain the world (an alternate reality in which WWI was cancelled on account of vampire-plague) and What’s Come Before (Lord Henry Baltimore may have sort of caused the whole vampire-plague and is hunting the Vampire-in-Charge for reasons having as much to do with Revenge as Saving the World).

Ben Stenbeck’s art has a great look (he’s got a special gift for fungus-zombies) and in the sketchbook part he explains how closely he worked with Mignola on creature designs. And thanks to Dave Stewart’s colors, The Plague Ships feels very much like part of the Hellboy-verse even though it’s not.

I wasn’t planning to say anything about Justice League #3, because I’m still frustrated by the price tag, but I have to mention how perfectly and succinctly Geoff Johns updated Wonder Woman’s mission for the post-Flashpoint DCU. “This place…is filled with so many wonderful things…but there is also a darkness that lurks here too. One I’m going to fight. That’s what I’m here for. That’s why I’m staying. To fight.” The post-Crisis missionary-of-peace/Amazon-warrior dichotomy never worked for me, but this essentially updates her Golden Age motivation for coming to our world and it’s awesome in its simplicity.

Brigid Alverson

Tesoro

Natsume Ono’s Tesoro is a collection of her short stories that were published between 1998 and 2008. Ono has a lovely, linear drawing style, and we can see it develop from scribbly to more controlled between the earlier and the later stories. Her storytelling technique improved as well. I like Ono’s work because her characters are so human; a lot of manga characters behave in stereotyped ways, almost like little person-bots, but hers have moments of real doubt, awkwardness, and silliness. Several of the stories are set in Italy, as were her manga Gente and Ristorante Paradiso, and others reflect small incidents in everyday life in Japan. The book is beautifully produced with French flaps and earth-toned inks, and it really feels like something special. While genre manga such as Naruto and Vampire Knight will always dominate the American market, it’s nice to see Viz bringing over more literary titles like this one.

It’s well known that Osamu Tezuka was an admirer of Walt Disney, and that shines through in his Princess Knight, which was originally published in 1953. The edition I am reading, published by Vertical, is actually a retelling of the story that Tezuka did in the early 1960s, but the Disney connection is still there; this is a children’s story, and it is filled with adorable animals and cutely rounded angels and villains. The pacing also makes me think of animated cartoons, with lots of short gags and asides. Princess Knight was one of the early shoujo manga that set the style and the conventions for many manga that followed, but it is quite enjoyable in its own right, aside from any historical significance.

Tim O’Shea

Supergirl #3

Supergirl #3: As I settled into the third issue of this series, I realized something I should have realized at the outset of this series. Why did DC set up a new universe where right out of the gates it’s clear that Superman is not the sole survivor of the destruction of Krypton? Why did the new Supergirl have to be so oddly related to Superman, essentially in the same way it was in the old DC universe? I was distracted in the first two issues as the new Supergirl gathered her wits about her. In this third issue, I just found myself bored, feeling like the series has settled into another Supergirl series that will suffer ultimately lackluster sales and tread on the brink of cancellation. But I am getting ahead of myself, for right now, with this issue #3, I realize I have no interest in returning for issue 4.

Blue Beetle #3: Again a new DCU retreading much of the same ground as the last Blue Beetle series. But in this instance, there’s a major difference in that I find myself still interested. And the reason likely is the supporting cast—namely Jamie’s strong family ties. In this issue, writer Tony Bedard allows Jamie’s mom (and her love of her son) to shine through with a really great, intense scene. Also the villains in this round of the Blue Beetle seem a bit more violent than the last one (not an asset, or a detriment, merely an observation).

Captain America #4

Captain America #4: For the first arc of a new Ed Brubaker Captain America title, this plot is sluggish and not engaging at all. What really astounded me in this issue was Steve McNiven’s art; more specifically his portrayal of Sharon Carter in one scene. Worried about the fate of Steve Rogers, McNiven has Carter nervously bite her lip. It would be understood she’d worry about Steve, but to have a longtime, accomplished SHIELD agent and a member of the Secret Avengers bite her lip? The helpless female lip bite is beneath Carter’s character, no matter how much she may care for Rogers. (Plus it shows minimal faith in a guy that just a year or so ago proved he could come back from the friggin dead)

Birds of Prey #3: This new incarnation of the Birds of Prey has little in common with the old one, but to my delight it continues to work for me. Writer Duane Swierczynski does a great job of juggling all of the cast members and giving them little moments to impact the storyline, while still moving it forward and engaging.

Avengers Academy

Avengers Academy #22: I was glad to read writer Christos Gage tweet that the book is not at risk for cancellation (unless the rumors of its cancellation negatively impacts the number of people buying it, then we have the infernal self-fulfilling prophecy), so I can respect his request for folks to pre-order the book. For Quicksilver fans wanting to know if he was ever going to talk to dad (Magneto) in this series, you get your answer in this issue. Clearly Gage had been loading up and looking forward to writing this issue, but in his haste to tackle the meet-up at every single angle, he dropped the ball slightly. I still love the series, do not get me wrong. But when given the chance to unleash a major character reveal, the reaction to the news is muddled and lost amongst the other action ongoing in the issue. It is my hope this reveal has rippling impacts. In the meantime, however, I still consider this the best Avengers book Marvel is publishing.

Thunderbolts #165: Regular WAYR readers will not be surprised. A book written by Jeff Parker? O’Shea loves it. Indeed, but this is an extra enjoyable Parker story (no really), because it is a time travel story. Parker getting to play in 1940s Marvel, with the Invaders is never a bad thing in my book. With this issue, Parker is at his best with the Namor and Satana scenes (though the dialogue and action from Moonstone is a close second).

Thom Zahler

Daredevil

Mark Waid’s Daredevil has been raking in its share of accolades. You now why? It’s fantastic! Everything they say is true. Mark’s writing a comic book in the very best sense of the world: long stories, short stories, overreaching arcs and yet ever 20 page issue is a satisfying chunk. What’s most remarkable to me is how quickly he manages to pivot Daredevil from the bleak character he’s been to a more shiny happy character, and yet it doesn’t feel forced but effortless.

Mark, along with his artists Paolo Rivera and Marcos Martin are also finding new ways to show and to use Daredevil’s powers. That’s not an insignificant task for a character who’s been around as long as The Man Without Fear has. They manage to visually illustrate Daredevil’s very non-visual senses in just a stunning way.

Really, I love everything about it. It’s Shakespeare the way it was meant to be seen.

Over at DC, I find myself loving Action Comics. That’s a superhuman feat in itself because the new telling of Superman’s early years is not the one I’ve gotten used to, or even the one I’d prefer. But Grant Morrison is harkening back to the early 30’s rough-and-tumble Superman and carrying me along for the ride. It’s a Superman with a bit of an edge, and if you’d pitched it to me that was I would have turned it down. But it seems to be working.

Grant Morrison has a way of embracing all the varied, and sometimes conflicting, facets of a character. He’s making this book one of the ones I have to read as soon as it comes out. And the art by Rags Morales is just beautiful. That guy must have gone to a good school. (Kubies rule!)

You may have missed it, but Dracula the Unconquered was one of the highlights of Halloween. The other was seeing the Tim Burton exhibition at the LACMA, but that’s not important right now. The book, written by Chris Sims with art by Steve Downer and Josh Krach is the type of comic I want to see more of. I think in complimenting Chris on it, I compared it to a Twix bar. It’s got all sorts of sugary goodness to it, but enough of a solid crunchy core to it that it’s not empty calories.

Dracula the Unconquered

Dracula the Unconquered takes place in 1901 as Dracula is freed from his imprisonment in the Tower of London by nefarious people for nefarious plans. I don’t want to spoil anything more than that. Here’s the thing: it’s an all-ages comic. My goddaughter will love it when I give it to her, and I love it to. It doesn’t make the common all-ages mistake of talking down to its audience. She will like the fun art and the frenetic pace of the story.

Most interesting to me is that Dracula here seems to have the bloody past from the novels, and yet the character is instantly engaging and likable. I’m looking forward to seeing how Chris straddles that line.

Also, the comic is embracing digital only. It’s a 24-page story all for just a dollar! (Listen up Big Two.) It’s the perfect price that you can’t say “no” to, and distributed in a way that wouldn’t be possible years before. I thing digital and print books can co-exist, and I’ going to enjoy seeing Action Age help carve this path.

The Dreamer

Lastly, while I haven’t finished reading it yet, I adore Lora Innes’s The Dreamer, published by IDW. The second collection of Lora’s time-traveling historical romance just came out this week, and so far it’s just as good as the first. Lora writes and draws the book, with colors by Julie Wright.

Lora excels at portraying very grounded, human characters doing grounded, human things. It’s an artist’s compliment, but I envy her ability to portray fashion and fabric in a way which eludes so many of us. Yet, her art is never overwrought and has a Disneylike quality to it. It’s just so… smooth.

It’s also a historical piece and Lora doesn’t skimp on the history. She’s clearly got a love for the American Revolution time period and it shines out of every inch of the book. She doesn’t sacrifice storytelling for accuracy or the other way around either, it’s very much a well-balanced approach. I find myself thinking “I wonder if that really happened” and then, more often than not, find out that it did indeed. It’s great to see someone who cares so much about the accuracy of the world they’re building and the story they’re telling.

The book also exists as a webcomic, too, so give it a look at http://www.thedreamercomic.com/.

Justice League #3

“Should Batman kill the Joker?” is a perennial favorite among superhero fan conversation topics, always leading to a variety of different answers. A Golden Age appearance aside, Batman’s bosses at DC Comics have always answered the question the same way, however: Hell no.

Part of the reason for that is practical. You don’t kill off a popular, money-making character (well, you can now and then if it will make more money, but then you have to bring the character back to life somehow). Part of it is smart franchise management. If Batman kills off his enemies, then he runs out of guys to fight awfully quickly. There’s a reason Spider-Man has such a big and colorful rogue’s gallery to fill movies, cartoon and toy lines with, while The Punisher  doesn’t. But a big part of it has to do with Batman’s characterization. Maybe it doesn’t make sense to not kill a mass-murderer you find yourself in deadly combat with on a bi-monthly basis, and sure, it makes even less sense to go out of your way to save the life of said mass-murderer as Batman regularly does for The Joker and his other foes, but then, dressing up as a bat to fight crime doesn’t make much sense either—Batman’s weird, and that’s what makes him so appealing. Of course his moral code is weird too.

The red, un-crossable line Batman has drawn between beating someone within an inch of their life and actually killing them is one shared by most superheroes. The hero pushed to the limit finally getting the villain at their mercy at the climax and forced to decide whether or not to end the villain’s life of evil once and for all is a staple of super-comics.

And it hasn’t changed all that much in the years since, say, “The Trial of The Flash.” Particularly in the DC Universe (The Marvel heroes embraced killing foes en masse during 2008′s Secret Invasion, in which they went to war with the alien Skrulls).

Wonder Woman famously killed Max Lord in the heat of battle in 2005, and it lead to year’s worth of stories in which her fellow heroes debated with her over whether or not it was a just act. She was even on trial in the international criminal court for a while.

Green Arrow killed the villain Prometheus at the climax of controversial 2009-2010 series Justice League: Cry For Justice, and it lead to a weird storyline in which his fellow Leaguers tried to bust him and he ended up being exiled form his hometown.

And during the 2009 story arc that introduced the Red Lanterns in Green Lantern, space policeman Hal Jordan wrestled with the idea of his bosses executing his mentor-turned-archenemy Sinestro.

As you may have heard, the DC Universe has changed quite a bit since then.

I haven’t been reading very many of “The New 52″ books as they’ve been released. In fact, I can count the number I’ve been reading on one hand: Justice League, Justice League Dark, Aquaman, Green Lantern and Wonder Woman.  But even among that very small sampling, I’ve noticed a trend emerging.

In the pages of Aquaman #2, by Geoff Johns, Ivan Reis and Joe Prado, Aquaman and Mera confront the humanoid creatures called The Trench:

In last week’s Green Lantern #3, by Johns, Doug Mahnke and a whole mess of inkers, Jordan is confronted my a member of the yellow Sinestro Corps, and deals with him thusly:

And in this week’s Justice League #3, once more written by Johns and drawn by Jim Lee and Scott Williams, the various heroes of the Justice League confront Darkseid’s armies of parademons. I was a little surprised to see such an aggressive, ruthless Superman doling out pain to his foes:

But I was more surprised still to see this image, in which Superman takes off a Parademon’s arm and head:

Even the new sword-wielding Wonder Woman, who chose a maiming blade over a capturing magic lasso in her first appearance and, in this particular issue, chops limbs off like she was chopping vegetables, doesn’t take anyone’s head off in this issue.

I suppose the argument could be made that these aren’t human lives. The Trench are humanoid, though, and speak, so they’re clearly a bit more evolved than animals. That yellow Lantern is an alien instead of a human, but so too are all Lanterns save a handful (and hey, Superman’s an alien too, and maybe Mera, or are people from different dimensions more ultraterrestrial than extraterrestrial…?). I’m not sure how “alive” the new Parademons are, and they certainly have a lot of mechanical and/or robotic looking bits to them, but they also bleed, and I didn’t see Superman X-Raying their chests before ripping them apart, or Aquaman checking one’s pulse before shoving his trident into its back.

Basically, the New 52 Joker might want to lay low until the New 52 Justice League work through their collective issues.

Mudman

Welcome to Food or Comics?, where every week we talk about what comics we’d buy at our local comic shop based on certain spending limits — $15 and $30 — as well as what we’d get if we had extra money or a gift card to spend on a “Splurge” item.

Check out Diamond’s release list or ComicList, and tell us what you’re getting in our comments field.

Graeme McMillan

What’s that, you say? Paul Grist’s new Mudman series starts this week (#1, Image Comics, $3.50)? Well, that’s how I’m starting my $15 haul this week. While I’m at it, let’s add Avengers Origins: Luke Cage #1 (Marvel, $3.99) and Kirby Genesis: Captain Victory #1 (Dynamite, $3.99), before finishing up with the third issue of Wonder Woman (DC, $2.99) for a superheroic week that goes from the earth to the gods, with some blaxploitation and aliens thrown in the middle for flavor.

DC would dominate the other half of my budget if I had $30. I’d be grabbing the third issues of Green Lantern Corps, Justice League and Supergirl ($2.99 each, except Justice League for $3.99), but I’m surprising myself as much as anyone else by grabbing The Bionic Man #4 (Dynamite, $3.99) for my final pick – I read the first three issues in a bunch this weekend and really enjoyed the book to date much more than I’d been expecting.

If I were to splurge this week, my money would probably end up going to Dark Horse, because I’m kind of tempted by Drawing Down The Moon: The Art of Charles Vess ($29.99). I’ve liked Vess’ art ever since I first saw it, which was possibly in his Spider-Man graphic novel in the late 1980s…? Nonetheless, this is more than likely something I’ll end up loving the hell out of.

Chris Arrant

Wonder Woman #3

If I had $15, I’d grab (with both hands) Wonder Woman #3 (DC, $2.99). The only time I’ve bought three issues in a row of Wonder Woman was the Amazons Attack crossover Pete Woods drew years ago, but this team-up between Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang has been consistently amazing. Next up I’d go from amazons to vikings for Northlanders #46 (DC/Vertigo, $2.99); I’ve bought every issue of this in singles, but seeing artist Paul Azaceta’s arc on this re-invigorated my appreciation for the title. Getting my super-hero fix on, next I’d get Avengers #19 (Marvel, $3.99). I admit seeing Norman Osborn’s Dark Avengers isn’t high on my list, but I’ve continually enjoyed what Bendis has done to varying degrees and seeing Daniel Acuna join the book is a big bonus in my book. Lastly, I’d be one of the zombie horde to buy Walking Dead #91 (Image, $2.99).

If I had $30, I’d thankfully double-back to get Greg Capullo’s ongoing return in Batman #3 (DC, $2.99) – seriously, I think Capullo is entrenching himself as a top artist in mainstream comics (again). Next up I’d get two Marvel joints – Thunderbolts #165 (Marvel, $2.99) and Venom #9 (Marvel, $2.99). After that, I’d get me weekly fix of Pilot Season with Seraph (Image/Top Cow, $3.99) then get Justice League #3 (DC, $3.99).

For splurging, there would be no question that I’d get the trade paperback edition of Drawing Down The Moon (Dark Horse, $29.99). I missed this when it came out in hardcover in 2009, so I’m glad to see it coming back into print. I seriously think Vess is one of the overlooked great in comics, but only because he hasn’t done a standard “run” on a title like seems to be needed to ingratiate yourself with the comic buying world at large. Regardless, Vess is a master and I’m glad to finally get my hands on this for a decent price.

Chris Mautner

Butcher Baker Candlestickmaker

If I had $15: It’s a quiet week for me for the most part, so I’d probably limit my initial purchases to the fifth issue of The Boys‘ spin-off Butcher Baker Candlestickmaker. For some reason I was under the delusion that it was a four-issue series and not six. Oh well.

If I had $30: A lot of people who’s opinions I respect really like the work of Golden Age artist Bob Powell, so I’d at least take a gander through Bob Powell’s Terror, a Craig Yoe-edited collection of ghoulish tales.

Splurge: That $150 one-volume anniversary edition of Bone would probably make a good Christmas present for somebody on my gift list. If I was splurging for myself though, I’d grab another Yoe-edited book, Felix the Cat: The Great Comic Book Tails, a collection of long-form stories done for Dell and Harvey back in the day by Otto Messmer, who did the original Felix comic strip as well.

Brigid Alverson

Saturn Apartments

If I had $15: I would end up leaving some of it on the table, because this is a good week for manga, and all the manga costs less than $15. Viz has three new volumes coming out this week, and my first choice among them is volume four of Saturn Apartments ($12.99), which I mentioned in What Are You Reading? this past weekend. It’s a lovely sci-fi story about a window washer in a space colony and the people he encounters. I’m hooked, and I’m ready for volume four.

If I had $30: I would add Tesoro, an anthology of short stories by Natsume Ono. Viz has been publishing a lot of Ono’s work lately, and it’s all beautiful. Her stories are more literary and romantic than your standard run of teenage manga, and she has a clean, linear style that is easy on the eyes. With the leftover money, I’d pick up Atomic Robo and the Ghost of Station X #3, just for something different–and because I find Atomic Robo irresistible.

Splurge: Let’s start with the third Viz release of the week, vol. 10 of Real. It’s a splurge for me because it’s a bit of a risk–I haven’t been keeping up with the series, and I don’t know anything about basketball, let alone wheelchair basketball. But volume 1 was amazing, and I’d like to see more. And if I’m really binging, I’d add the first volume of Fantagraphics’ Pogo collection ($39.99) and Drawn & Quarterly’s The Adventures of Herge ($19.95), a graphic biography of the creator of Tintin, drawn in his own ligne claire style.

Michael May

If I had #15, I’d spend most of it on DC. Eventually, I’m going to have to cut back on the number of series I’m buying from them, but not this week. I’m still enjoying Batman ($2.99), Birds of Prey ($2.99), Supergirl ($2.99), and Wonder Woman ($2.99) and want the third issues of each of them. Finishing off my budget, I’d grab Fear Itself: The Fearless #3 ($2.99). I caught up on it last night and even though I didn’t read Fear Itself, I’m going to enjoy Valkyrie’s globe-trotting adventures tracking down a bunch of MacGuffiny weapons and fighting vampires and Avengers along the way.

If I had $30, I’d quickly add Planet of the Apes #8 ($3.99), Bonnie Lass #3 ($2.99), and Atomic Robo and the Ghost of Station X #3 ($3.50). And like Graeme, I’d be sure to try out Paul Grist’s Mudman #1.

Splurge-wise, how unfair is the universe for making the color, one-volume Bone ($150.00) available on the same day as Fantagraphic’s Pogo: The Complete Syndicated Comic Strips, Volume 1 ($39.99)? And that’s on top of DC’s Legends of the Dark Knight: Marshall Rogers collection ($49.99) and SLG’s Royal Historian of Oz ($14.95). Bone and Pogo are especially impossible to pick between, even with the massive price difference.

Explorer: The Mystery Boxes

It’s time once again for our monthly trip through Previews looking for cool, new comics. As usual, we’re focusing on graphic novels, collected volumes and first issues so that I don’t have to come up with a new way to say, “ Mouse Guard is still awesome!” every month. And I’ll continue letting Tom and Carla do the heavy lifting in regards to DC and Marvel’s solicitations.

Also, please feel free to play along in the comments. Tell me what I missed that you’re looking forward to or – if you’re a comics creator – mention your own stuff.

Amulet

Explorer: The Mystery Boxes - With the Flight anthologies done, the all-ages version, Flight Explorer has morphed into this. I expect it to be as lovely as its predecessors and especially like the Mystery Box theme.

Archie

Jinx – J Torres and Rick Burchett’s graphic novel aimed at tween girls.

Kevin Keller, Volume 1 and Kevin Keller #1 – Archie collects the first appearances and mini-series of their major, gay character and also launches his ongoing series.

Ardden

Flash Gordon: Vengeance of Ming – The third volume in Ardden’s Flash Gordon series.

Ferals

Avatar

Ferals #1 – David Lapham writes werewolves.

Atmospherics, Color Edition – Warren Ellis and Ken Meyer’s re-mastered and newly painted story about a woman who’s either a disturbed witness to a UFO attack or a heroin-using serial killer.

Bongo

Simpsons Illustrated #1 – Bongo launches a Best Of series collecting material from various Simpsons titles.

Boom!

Steed and Mrs. Peel #1 – Reprinting Grant Morrison and Ian Gibson’s 1990 Eclipse Comics story of the other Avengers.

Peanuts #1 – Kicking off the regular, monthly series with new stories as well as reprints of Schulz’s Sunday strips.

Campfire

Jungle Book - Campfire’s artwork can often be perfunctory, but I like the whimsy of Amit Tayal’s cover for this one.

Cartoon Books

Bone: Quest for the Spark, Book 2 – The second installment in Tom Sniegoski’s series of novels set in Jeff Smith’s world (with illustrations by Smith himself).

Lobster Johnson: The Burning Hand

Dark Horse

Lobster Johnson: The Burning Hand #1 – Mike Mignola’s pulp hero returns for a five-issue mini-series.

The Monstermen and Other Scary Stories - I love Gary Gianni’s linework anyway, but I especially dug his Corpus Monstrum/Monstermen stories that appeared for a while as back-up features in Hellboy comics. This volume features Gianni’s tuxedo-wearing, medieval knight fighting zombie cowboys, squid pirates, abominable snowmen, and mustachioed skulls.

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic – War #1 – I’m pretty much done with the Star Wars Expanded Universe, but if you’re not or are curious about it, Dark Horse is billing this as a major jump-on point to the part that covers the ancient period of the Star Wars galaxy.

Compleat Terminal City - All fourteen issues of Dean Motter and Michael Lark’s retro-scifi/noir series.

Mighty Samson: Judgment - Probably as close as we’re going to get to a Thundarr the Barbarian comic.

King Conan: The Phoenix on the Sword #1 – This four-issue mini-series adapts Robert E Howard’s first Conan story.

Dark Horse Presents #8 – Features a BPRD eulogy for Hellboy and a new Tarzan story.

DC

Justice League #5 – Looks like the team’s finally together.

Frankenstein vs. OMAC

Frankenstein: Agent of SHADE #5 and OMAC #5 – As a faithful reader of Jeff Lemire’s Frankenstein, I”m actually kind of excited that this will give me some motivation to check out OMAC, which I’m hearing good things about.

Xombi - The biggest casualty (for me, anyway) of the New 52 gets its collection.

Drawn and Quarterly

Goliath - The David and Goliath story told from Goliath’s viewpoint through the filter of corporate bureaucracy and presented in a lovely, minimalist style.

Dynamite

The Lone Ranger #1 – I tried Dynamite’s first Lone Ranger series, was disappointed that it wanted to stretch the familiar origin story into a multi-issue arc, and immediately dropped it. Assuming that won’t be the case this time – and noticing that it’s written by Ande Parks, whose writing I’ve enjoyed very much on other things – I’m up for another try.

First Second

Olympians, Volume 4: Hades, Lord of the Dead – The latest in George O’Connor’s wonderfully exciting and insightful review of the the most important characters from Greek mythology. Hades has always been a favorite of mine, so I’m especially looking forward to this one.

Silence of Our Friends - “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” Edmund Burke is supposed to have originated that quote, but it was driven home for me by Vicente Amorim’s 2008 film, Good about good Germans who were too afraid of the Nazis to assist their Jewish neighbors in WWII. But even that gave me some comfortable, historical and geographical distance from the people and events it was talking about. I expect that Silence of Our Friends, about the civil rights movement in the ’60s, will hit even closer to home.

The Sincerest Form of Parody

Fantagraphics

The Sincerest Form of Parody: The Best 1950s MAD-Inspired Satirical Comics - I can’t decided if I’m more interested in the historical context of what folks were parodying in the ’50s or just looking at some cool Jack Davis and Kirby art that I’ve never seen before.

Hermes

The Phantom: The Complete Sundays, Volume 1: 1939-1943 – I like daily strips too, but Sunday comics are the best.

Humanoids

Whispers in the Walls – Guillermo del Toro’s co-writer from The Devil’s Backbone goes solo on this tale of horror at a Czechoslovakian children’s hospital in the late ’40s.

IDW

Infestation 2 #1 – Since I’m not a zombie fan, I passed up the first Infestation even while I was loving the idea of connecting all those weird, incongruous universes. This time around it’s Lovecraftian demons, which is not only a more appealing concept to me personally; it also makes a lot of sense from a dimension-crossing standpoint. That something exists tying 30 Days of Night and Dungeons and Dragons together with Transformers and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles gives me all the joy I’ll ever need.

Danger Girl: The Danger-Sized Treasury Edition - I’ve been wanting to check out Danger Girl for a while now. This collects the first three stories to get me started.

Danger Girl: Revolver

Danger Girl: Revolver #1 – And here’s the new story.

Womanthology: Heroic - The controversial Kickstarter sensation comes to life.

Doctor Who #13 – Occasionally I have to break my rule about only mentioning new series. Josh Fialkov’s taking over Doctor Who for four issues to put the Doctor in 1941 Casablanca is one of those occasions. It starts here.

Steve Canyon, Volume 1: 1947-1948 - I read these stories when Checker published them and was eager for more. Unfortunately, Checker quit, but now Milton Caniff’s globe-trotting pilot is at IDW in a great-looking hardcover.

Image

Fatale #1 – Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips’ supernatural noir comic has everyone’s mouths watering, including mine. I’d buy it for the “Beauty” cover alone, though the “Beast” one looks cool too.

Prophet #21 – Two of my favorite artists, Brandon Graham and Simon Roy are collaborating on this, with a cover by Marian Churchland. That’s the exact opposite team of whatever I expected from a continuation of a Rob Liefeld book. Seriously: good on Liefeld. I’m also impressed that he’s not just starting the numbering over again with #1. Seems like that would be the obvious thing, especially with the book going in such a new direction, creatively, but it’s because it’s surprising and counter-intuitive that I like it. And it’s not even like he’s cashing in on a milestone issue-number. If my calculations are correct, he’s counting two mini-series (one, ten-issues; the other, nine), a one-shot, and an annual to get to 21. If this is what we can expect from the new Extreme, and apparently it is, my interest is piqued.

Whispers #1 – I find the Luna Brothers interesting enough that a new, supernatural thriller by one of them gets a check-out.

The Intrepids

The Intrepids, Volume 1 - Teens vs mad scientists (and a cyborg bear).

Marvel

Scarlet Spider #1 – The latest spin-off for the Spider-Man franchise.

Amazing Spider-Man #677 and Daredevil #8 – I like a couple of things about this crossover. First, like DC’s Frankenstein/OMAC one, it’s pretty unobtrusive. Second, Mark Waid’s writing both parts of it.

Alpha Flight #8 – SOB! I’ll miss you, Alpha Flight!

Wolverine and X-Men Alpha and Omega #1 – I’d usually feel ungenerous towards a mini-series spin-off of a comic that’s only four issues old, but Brian Wood is writing it and that bears looking into.

X-Men Legacy #260.1 – Christos Gage takes over from Mike Carey. I’m sad to see Carey go, but intrigued to see what Gage has planned. I hear good things about his Avengers Academy.

Daredevil by Mark Waid, Volume 1 - Waid and Paolo Rivera’s critically acclaimed run for trade-waiters.

Moonstone

The Big Book of Kolchak: The Night Stalker – Collects the first seven, long-out-of-print Moonstone Kolchak stories.

Oni

Possessions, Volume 3: Better House Trap - Sadly, it’s only recently that Ray Fawkes’ name has been on my radar. Now that it is, I want to check out his slapstick series about a possessed little girl trying to escape the loving, nurturing environment of the haunted house that traps her.

Wasteland

Wasteland #33 – Oni is celebrating Antony Johnston’s post-apocalyptic series’ going monthly with a $1 kick-off issue. I’ve fallen extremely behind in reading it, but it was one of my favorite comics at the time I decided to trade-wait it.

The Avalon Chronicles, Volume 1: Once in a Blue Moon – I’m a sucker for stories about young people who get transported to magical worlds where they discover things about themselves. Especially ones as nicely drawn as this one.

Papercutz

Monster Mess - Lewis Trondheim’s story of two kids who discover their ability to bring monsters to life (and have them fight each other) just by drawing them.

Putnam

Fangbone! Third-Grade Barbarian, Volumes 1 and 2 - It’s a cute enough concept, but Michael Rex’s art and Fangbone’s deadly serious expression on the covers are what sells it.

Russ Cochran

Sunday Funnies #1 – This is kind of brilliant. I’ll just let the publisher describe it:  ” A monthly, 32-page, full-size comic section containing historic Sunday pages from as far back as 1895, and including favorites such as Gasoline Alley, Little Nemo, Krazy Kat, and many other classic Sunday pages that you’ve probably never seen before. Each issue … will be a full-size 22″x16″ comic section, containing full page Sunday comics in full color. These pages are coming from the archives of Ohio State University, which, thanks to Bill Blackbeard, has the largest and most comprehensive collection of Sunday comics in existence. The retail price will be $10 and I will be selling subscriptions, 12 monthly issues for $100.” Should go well next to Wednesday Comics collections.

Bettie Page in Danger

SHH

Bettie Page in Danger #1 – Even more brilliant. A fumetti using real Bettie Page photos to tell a story about the pin-up queen’s career fighting zombies, mad scientists, and other naked ladies.

SLG

Sparko – This sounds a little like Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere with the Thames replacing London’s Underground. I don’t mean to make that sound like a bad thing. Coming from SLG and including a murder mystery, goth goblins, and a pickpocket named Belle, I trust that it’s not.

Tor

Girl Genius Omnibus, Volume 1: Agatha Awakens – The Hugo-winning, steampunk webcomic gets the deluxe hardcover treatment.

And that’s it for me. What did I miss?

Closing time at Wayne Manor: 1969's Batman #217

Last week I asked why the Silver Age is so pervasive in DC lore. Even though that’s something of a rhetorical question, I felt like it was left largely unanswered. The short answer is that the Silver Age represents the modern DC Universe’s origin story, so you’re never going to get rid of it entirely, regardless of reboots, relaunches, and/or legacy characters. However, in terms of style and tone, things are naturally more complicated.

It’s hard for me to talk about the Silver Age without relating it to the subsequent Bronze Age, mostly because I grew up with the comics of the mid-1970s. I see the Silver Age as an era of wild ideas, told in standalone stories which were light on consequences, whereas the Bronze took those stories and ideas and extrapolated a more “realistic” status quo from them. This is not to say that the Bronze Age was some vast improvement, since realism in superhero comics is a tricky prospect at best.

However, to me that point of compartmentalization, at which a previous creative team’s run goes from an ongoing concern to a finished body of work, is highly significant. That’s when the rules governing a feature are established (or amended), and therefore that’s when the people in charge of that feature decide how (and how much) it can grow. The same applies in the aggregate to the universe those features share.

* * *

For the sake of discussion, let’s say the Silver Age started in 1956 with its version of the Flash, and ended in 1969, following such developments as the Doom Patrol’s deaths (1968) and a Robin-less Batman’s move out of Wayne Manor (Batman #217). We might also make a strong case for the end coming with Green Lantern #75 (March 1970), the last issue before Neal Adams joined Denny O’Neil for the landmark #76.

This lets us classify the Silver Age generally in terms of the aforementioned wild, standalone, consequence-free stories. Any changes or continuing subplots were short-lived and/or insignificant: Alfred’s “death,” Hal Jordan’s job-hopping, weddings in Flash and Doom Patrol, etc. By contrast, the characters “grew up” (sometimes literally) during the Bronze Age. The other Teen Titans graduated from high school, if not their original codenames. Clark Kent moved to broadcast journalism. Barry Allen grew out his crewcut, and both he and Jimmy Olsen gave up their bowties. And, of course, Green Lantern and Green Arrow questioned the very purpose of their superhero careers as they journeyed across America.

Here’s where it starts to get tricky. In a practical sense, you don’t get to the Bronze Age without going through the Silver. The great Green Arrow soliloquy from GL #76, which basically asks “what are we doing chasing bad guys when the real world is falling apart around us,” loses much of its impact if the reader isn’t at least aware that these guys have had long, colorful, and (allegedly) frivolous adventures. The specifics of those adventures are less relevant than their mere existence, because cumulatively those stories have established a certain familiar style — if not an outright formula — which in the Bronze Age can then be manipulated. It’s enough to note that the Flash was once turned into a puppet, or had a giant head, because those can serve later as nostalgic and/or ironic callbacks.

Accordingly, back in the day, I wasn’t overly invested in the specifics of the Silver Age. (Note: I didn’t read much of the Legion of Super-Heroes, which might have made a difference.) For a while Justice League of America had a two-page feature called “100 Issues Ago,” which was just what it sounds like. Along with the tabloid-sized reprints, it was my introduction to the Gardner Fox/Mike Sekowsky days, and I have to say, those stories seemed kind of weird to my grade-school eyes. In JLA #44 (May 1966), a villain called the Unimaginable (who had been trying to join the League, and was spurned) caused a handful of Leaguers to double in size, with further tragedy surely to follow. I don’t remember the exact plot, but the picture of an oversized Batman and Green Lantern freaked-out in tattered uniforms remains striking, and a little disturbing. Likewise, “Deadly Dreams Of Doctor Destiny!” (JLA #34, March 1965) features Wonder Woman forced to fight crime under an expressionless porcelain mask (alongside teammates saddled with similarly-debilitating gear); and while its plot has stuck with me more, the images are indelible. Maybe it was just Sekowsky — who, incidentally, drew Hawkman’s mask with these huge, dead, ever-staring eyes — but it was a far cry from the more naturalistic style of his successor Dick Dillin, who pencilled JLA from the late ‘60s until his death in 1980.

So to me the Silver Age was just different. Other creative changes, especially on the artistic side, reinforced these differences. Carmine Infantino was long gone, and Irv Novick was the regular penciller, by the time I started reading The Flash; and Mike Grell had a lot more in common with Neal Adams than with Gil Kane on Green Lantern. Although the difference isn’t really style over substance, the Silver Age’s distinctive style appears to be more enduring than its specifics.  To a degree this is understandable, if one’s goal is to make sense of DC’s output during the period. We think of the Silver Age — not unreasonably — as dominated by Infantino, Fox, Sekowsky, Kane, Julius Schwartz, and John Broome. However, the Mort Weisinger-edited Superman titles were also going strong, as were (for a few years, at least) Jack Schiff’s Batman line, still in its sci-fi period. Trying to harmonize all those disparate influences, let alone shape them into a cohesive, functional shared universe, is more of an aspiration than a plan. (Not that there aren’t some impressive timelines out there.)

Naturally, not every Silver Age story could survive the transition into Bronze Age realism, so DC’s fictional history tends to get lost in misty watercolored memories the farther back you go. There’s no DC equivalent of Fantastic Four #1 to mark clearly where everything kicked off, leaving us only with discrete scenes — an exploding planet, a botched robbery, a queen’s answered prayer — to stitch together into an impression of the DCU’s early days. Compare the treatment of the Golden Age stories in the context of Earth-2, where the original Action Comics #1, Detective Comics #27, etc., could be inserted with minimal fuss into that universe’s timeline. Such fidelity makes that Earth separate and distinct enough that today, we can take it or leave it, like a box of old photos stored in the attic.

However — and here I will indulge in yet another erudite metaphor — the Silver Age has long since left its narrative form behind, transcending it to become a state of mind. Talking about Identity Crisis and his Justice League stint, Brad Meltzer said that

One of the clear goals of Identity Crisis was to pull all those Silver Age stories back into continuity, and to acknowledge the glorious past. That doesn’t mean every story has to come in with the (way overused term) “grim and gritty.” But we also shouldn’t let them all be brushed aside either.

In fact, Identity Crisis centered largely around a JLA three-parter from the Bronze Age late-‘70s (#s 166-68, May-July 1979), and featured a beloved supporting character introduced during the Silver Age, and murdered by another Silver Age stalwart. Without getting deeper into a Meltzer/IC critique, it’s enough to note that reinforcing the canonical nature of those old stories is, on one level, “acknowledging the glorious past.” Yes, Jimmy Olsen was turned into all manner of creatures; yes, there was a Bat-Hound. In that sense, the Silver Age was a clear influence on DC’s superhero line for some fifty-five years. I’m not sure how much of those references will crop up in the New 52, but I doubt they will ever go away completely.

Regardless, Identity Crisis was not a Silver Age story. Neither was “Snapper” Carr’s return as a reluctant villain in JLA vol. 1 #s 149-50 (December 1977-January 1978), nor the brief reintroduction of Guy Gardner (soon to fall into a coma) in mid-‘70s issues of Green Lantern, nor the search for the Doom Patrol’s killers in New Teen Titans #s 13-15. We may want to reclaim the anything-goes spirit of the Silver Age — and in the ‘90s, Gerard Jones, Pat Broderick, and Mark Bright’s Green Lantern, Mark Waid and company’s Flash, and Grant Morrison and Howard Porter’s JLA came very close — but it takes more than a fondness for Easter eggs and an earnest devotion to continuity.

As someone who discovered DC’s superheroes well into their new-for-the-‘70s forms, I remain eager to see what they were like before all that. Certainly DC is happy to sell all manner of reprints to fans like me, and just this week I got an unexpected thrill re-reading the first comic-book pairing of Superman and Batman in World’s Finest Archives vol. 1. I’ll always appreciate Easter eggs and continuity references, although I understand how they might alienate new readers.

Still, if a new reader can get past that alienation, or can find a story which avoids the issue entirely, a shared universe with a rich history can be a fertile field of exploration. This is part of why I’ve been glad to see the “Retro-Active” specials and the Games graphic novel, and part of why I lobbied for a classically-minded Challengers of the Unknown revival last week. Getting in on the ground floor is exciting enough, but getting into something so big it’ll constantly seem new can be even more rewarding. The fact that the Silver Age has become this idealized state of mind, and not just a collection of wacky stories, only adds to its appeal.

That’s why, regardless of its relevance to the New 52, I think the Silver Age will endure. Not only was it too important to DC’s superhero line for too long, it has morphed into a general spirit of optimistic experimentation which, these days, can be a nice contrast. If current sales are any indication, DC can get along pretty well without those old references and retro-style plots — but I think that sooner or later, it will choose not to.

Setting the Standard: Comics by Alex Toth 1952-1954

Welcome to What Are You Reading?, where each week we talk about what comics, graphic novels, books and what-have-you we’ve been reading lately. This week our special guest is Brian Ralph, creator of Daybreak, Cave-In and Reggie 12.

To see what Brian and the Robot 6 crew have been reading lately, click below.

*****

Michael May

BPRD 1947

I almost got caught up on BPRD last Halloween – pretty much from the beginning of the series – and it was an excellent way to spend October. I think I’m going to make a tradition out of it: catching up on the last year’s worth of BPRD stories this time each year. This week, I picked up where I left off with Volume 13, BPRD: 1947. I don’t know why Gabriel Bá and Fábio Moon hadn’t done a Hellboy story before this one, but I’m not complaining. It was worth waiting for. Especially using their different styles to depict two different worlds: sometimes figuratively; sometimes literally.

My favorite part of the book though comes at the very end when Trevor Bruttenholm’s debriefing about the adventure with a colleague. The last several hours have been harrowing and Bruttenholm’s been ignoring young Hellboy because he’s distracted by the very dangerous case. As he and his friend – a former Catholic priest – talk, his elderly companion makes an observation about the nature of religion as the panels pan around Bruttenholm’s office, focusing on his diverse collection of idols and fetishes. “Man has given a thousand different names to his God,” the priest says, “but look into the face of each one long enough and hard enough – you will find one Truth.”

The old man doesn’t say what it is and I’m not enough of a religion scholar to know what he meant for sure, but my personal belief is that God – however people think of him – is all about our being good to each other. I was thrilled to see that idea born out in the story. The priest seems to imply that Bruttenholm should destroy the demonic Hellboy while he can, but the professor instead goes out and plays catch with the child he’s been neglecting. It’s a beautiful moment, made more touching by the knowledge of how Bruttenholm’s love for his “son” will eventually overcome Hellboy’s supernatural programming towards evil. This kind of stuff is why Mike Mignola and Company’s comics are the best damn ones on the shelves.

Brigid Alverson

Mangaman

Barry Lyga and Colleen Doran’s Mangaman is like the novelization of Scott McCloud’s Understanding Comics. It’s the story of a manga character, Ryoko, who gets pulled through a rip in the universe to an ordinary American town, where he is sent to an ordinary American high school. The catch is that Ryoko retains his manga characteristics—speed lines appear when he is excited, then drop to the ground for the janitor to sweep up, people he is thinking about appear in the panel, and his eyes turn into hearts when he sees the lovely Marissa, the homecoming queen who is dissatisfied with her life and shows up every day in a different costume. On the one hand, it’s the traditional story of a stranger in a strange land, but on the other hand, it’s a metafictional meditation on the comics medium. Either way, it’s laugh-out-loud funny in places and a great read.

In a much more traditional vein, Psyren, the latest manga in Viz’s Shonen Jump line, is a fairly standard shonen manga story about a tough guy (with a heart of gold) who is thrust into a series of challenges. Ageha starts off the book by beating up a bunch of gang members, so you know he’s badass, but he has a soft spot in his heart for the bespectacled Sakurako, who was a childhood friend. So when Sakurako disappears, and Ageha realizes it has something to do with a shadowy organization that recruits people with phone cards, he jumps right in and winds up fighting off killer arthropod robots in a desolate landscape. There’s nothing in this first volume that I haven’t seen before in some other manga, but it’s well drawn and a good read, so no complaints.

Tim O’Shea

Justice League

Justice League #2: Not sure which plot point annoyed me more. When Green Lantern and Batman whispered in the heat of battle, so the guy with super-hearing could not hear them. Um, right. Or maybe a Hal Jordan/Green Lantern so new to the secret identity aspect, he says Flash’s first name (when expressing concern that Flash had revealed an aspect of his secret identity by telling Batman he worked in a crime lab). I’m done with this title.

Birds of Prey #2: Trying to do a book like this in the new DC universe (one without Oracle) is a challenge. But I think writer Duane Swierczynski has found the right cast member replacement (for Oracle) with Starling in the role of Black Canary confidant. I am intrigued to see how Katana (who joined the cast in this issue, along with someone else) changes up the mix. I’ll be back for issue #3.

Herc #9: This series has already been cancelled, but I cannot help but continue to buy it as this series in particular allows the writing team of Greg Pak and Fred Van Lente to indulge their comedic tendencies. It’s a fun read, but sadly not one that attracted enough readership. This issue in particular allows for some hilarious bits between Herc and his dad, Zeus.

Nightwing #2: I am pleased with writer Kyle Higgins’ repurposing of the Haly Circus for this new series. In rebooting the DC universe, I am glad they did not majorly revamp the Batfamily. Dick Grayson remains one of my favorite characters in the DCU, new or old. In general, I wish there were more heroes that smiled more often, like Nightwing.

Batman #2: Depending on how this first arc plays out, I may proclaim Batman to be one of my favorite new DC titles to date. Some people have grown tired of the story device where the reader is thrown into the middle of the plot and then brought back to that point via flashback (hell I am confused trying to describe it). But that plot device worked really well in this issue. As much as I enjoy writer Scott Snyder, artist Greg Capullo is the one that sells the kineticism that ripples through this issue’s action.

Brian Ralph

Captain Easy

Roy Crane’s Captain Easy Vol. 2. (Fantagraphics)

I absolutely fell in love with volume one when it came out. These were comics people had recommended to me over the years, but I had only caught glimpses of it until that first volume came out. It did not disappoint! Roy Crane draws these huge adventure strips featuring a soldier-of-fortune, Captain Easy. He wanders the globe helping dames and punching out goons and villains. It’s a fun combination of action and laughs. Sometimes very serious and other times very cartoony, in both story and art style. I just love the way Roy Crane draws these goons.

And the colors! The palettes are unusual and beautiful. A comic artist could just go through here and steal these lively color palettes. Volume 2 is a little more goofy than Volume 1, the stories seem a little less urgent. But I still love it.

The books are also really beautifully designed and very nicely packaged.

Lynd Ward: Six Novels in Woodcuts. (The Library of America)

I received this box set for my birthday. This is a collection of 6 stories by Lynd Ward and has a forward by Art Spiegelman.

Originally I had discovered Lynd Ward and these early silent woodcut graphic novels while I was rooting around in the RISD library as a student. I became very interested in them. I took up scratchboard as a way of imitating the woodcut look. It taught me a lot about working in black and white. By looking at these stories I learned how to unlock that puzzle of placing areas of white next to dense black to create vivid and rich imagery.

When you think about it, woodcuts are such a laborious process and yet these stories seem really fresh and lively.

It’s a handsome box set, and you’ll look like a real smarty for having it on your shelf. That is, if people ever come over your house.

Melvin Monster

Melvin Monster: John Stanley Library. (D+Q)

Actually my seven-year-old son Miles has been reading this, along with the other books in the John Stanley library. (Even “Tubby” has his own book now!)

The Melvin Monster series features this good-hearted little monster kid, who despite being a monster wants to do good things. This frustrates his Frankenstein Dad and his Mummy Mom. His “Baddy” Dad wants him to do bad stuff! I think my son likes it because it’s kind of edgy and twisted at times. They are beautiful books of course, nice hardcovers, real rough-and-tumble style for the kids. I imagine someday passing these down to my grand kids.

These books are engaging to Miles, he’ll sit there giggling and reading, and Dad can get some “Me” time.

Setting the Standard: Comics by Alex Toth 1952-1954 (Fantagraphics)

These are short comics by Alex Toth, quick 3-4 pagers that would appear in comics like “Thrilling Romance” or “Crime Files” in the 50′s.

I’ll read one of these before I go to bed. I like that in a short page count he quickly develops a rich story and twilight zoney twist. Sometimes it’s a bizarre romance or horror story with a stunning conclusion. They’re a fun read.

The art! Alex Toth really did some cool things with chiaroscuro. And the panel compositions are really unique and interesting. He did some dramatic and unexpected things with the arrangement of the characters and the still-life elements. It’s inspiring. I think all cartoonists should pick this up and borrow some ideas from Alex Toth.

Cartooning: Philosophy and Practice. Ivan Brunetti (Yale University Press)

This originally came out a few years ago, but it’s been recently republished. I love this little book. Ivan presents a class on cartooning, but I think his approach is very unique. The tone of the book is kind of conversational and informal, like you are actually in Ivan’s class. I recommend this book to my students, but I’d always recommend it to anyone who is interested in comics and cartoons and the thought process that goes into putting them together. It fits nicely in your pocket.

"I throw him a growl I've brought all the way from Africa"

I was going to open with some snotty Wow, the holidays went by super-quickly! comment, but then I read the first issue of Justice League in seven weeks. Sometimes DC gets ahead of itself; sometimes it’s a little behind.  Happens to the best of us — sometimes you do two solicitation roundups in three weeks….

Anyway, with the January solicitations, the New-52 books each turn five issues old. Series wrapping up their first arcs this month include Blackhawks, Batwoman, Animal Man, and the Deadman feature in DC Universe Presents.  (Not to worry about the latter, because there is a lot of Deadman in these solicits.)  I’m not sure why five issues is such a wonky number for story arcs — there are five-issue miniseries all the time and they collect just fine. Still, I expected most of the New-52 books to take six issues for their introductory stories, and most of them may yet do that. Only a few books look to finish their first arcs after December’s issue #4s (Hawkman and Frankenstein, probably OMAC, maybe Batgirl), and those plus this month’s are barely an eighth of the relaunched line. It makes next month’s solicits more intriguing, I suppose.

Regardless, we live in the now (as it were…) so — onward to January!

JUSTICE LEAGUES

When I saw the solicit for Justice League #5, I thought it was another indication that Geoff Johns and Jim Lee were telling a more decompressed story, as issue #1 threatened. Accordingly, I imagined that Cyborg would be ready to go at the end of the issue, with the big Darkseid battle taking up an oversized issue #6. However, I was pleasantly surprised that issue #2 was such an improvement over #1. It moved more quickly, it brought together more of the future Leaguers, it kicked off Cyborg’s origin in earnest, and it teased another big Parademon fight. Plus it worked in a Gorilla Grodd reference, which I wouldn’t have expected so soon in the New-52 DCU. So now my mood has swung more to the manic side, and I am expecting the big fight to start in #5.

When a solicitation threatens that “[o]ne of these heroes will not make it out alive,” as Justice League Dark #5′s does, normally you think it’d be Mindwarp, the least familiar of the group. However, I then realized it could be a trick question, since that group includes Deadman — who’s not going into whatever-it-is alive….

CREATIVE TEAM SHUFFLING

I know that Tony Akins’ two-issue fill-in on Wonder Woman was planned, in order to give Cliff Chiang some flexibility, but the solicitation copy makes it sound like the issues come at least at the end (if not in the middle) of WW’s first arc. Maybe there’s some shift in the story’s tone which a different artist might help reinforce. By the same token, I can’t wait to see Darwyn Cooke and J. Bone’s guest-shot on The Shade #4.

Part of me is ready to give Green Arrow another shot, what with the three issues from Keith Giffen and Dan Jurgens and the upcoming Ann Nocenti Era, but part of me just thinks that this version of Ollie is almost too boring to fix. If anyone needed to lose his fortune, stop shaving, and go all #OccupyStarCity, it’s him.

Static Shock #5 is the first written entirely by Scott McDaniel, following the mysterious (but apparently amicable) departure of John Rozum. Walt Simonson pencils Legion of Super-Heroes #5, and contributes to THUNDER Agents #3.

THIS AND THAT

“Aquaman stranded in the desert” was actually a cliffhanger from 1985′s DC Challenge miniseries, and I want to say Aquaman killed a bird and drank its blood in order to get the liquid he needed to stay alive. Or maybe that was Watchmen; I always get those two confused. (They were both twelve issues….) Still, I bet the All-New, All-Hardcore Aquaman would totally rip out a bird’s throat with his teeth.

Considering he’s not part of the Doom Patrol, and his assistant is apparently a New-52 reworking of an old DP enemy, Robotman’s New-52 origin (as revealed in My Greatest Adventure #4) probably won’t feature the classic team. In fact, from what I saw of the New-52 Robotman in MGA #1, it looks like the Doom Patrol has gone the way of the original Teen Titans. Maybe the MGA feature is testing the waters for yet another Doom Patrol revival?

The “seduction of Damian” subplot described in the solicit for Batman And Robin #5 sounds good, although it seems like Grant Morrison covered similar ground when Damian faced his mother and the rest of the League of Assassins back around issue #12 of the previous series. Likewise, I look forward to Gail Simone’s Batgirl take on the old “female hero fights female villain who controls men’s minds” story, but I kinda want her to drop in a reference to Marsha, Queen of Diamonds.

SYNERGY

There have been plenty of guest appearances so far, but is the OMAC/Frankenstein intertitle crossover the first for the New 52? It may depend on how you categorize the connections between Superman and Stormwatch and/or Stormwatch and Demon Knights.

Speaking of which, only Hawkman can see “horrifying visions of the dead,” and so he “question[s] his own sanity?” Maybe he should talk to Grifter about that.

The solicitation for I, Vampire #5 — featuring a Batman appearance — makes me think I was right about the series’ vampires-vs.-superheroes aspect. That’s not a bad thing (apparently the original character met Batman in the pages of Brave and the Bold, as discussed below) but I wonder how much the series will go to that well.

I was surprised (synergy again!) to see Deadman figuring prominently into Hawk & Dove #5.  While they all were introduced in the late 1960s, I always associated Deadman and Hawk & Dove with different generations.  See, I keep forgetting that Hawk and the late Dove were teenagers back then, and adjunct members of the Teen Titans as well. And not to digress, but I have been thinking about the ways in which that generation of characters has been taken out of the New 52.  While I never put Hawk in that group (or the new Dove either, but I’m not sure how old she’s supposed to be), he should be there. Thus, DC hasn’t completely eliminated the Original-Titans generation from the New 52, because there’s Nightwing, Hawk, and Red Arrow. I should be satisfied with that, right?

(Again, not to digress.)

COLLECTIONS

Prior to the new I, Vampire series, the only exposure I had to this character was in the good-natured mockery of Tales of the Unexpected’s “Architecture & Mortality.” However, I have to say, I am totally ready for the omnibus I, Vampire paperback, reprinting the serial from House Of Mystery and Brave and the Bold vol. 1 #195. Ironically, while I am most interested in it as a rare example of main-line ‘80s DC doing a non-superhero story, I’m very curious to see the Batman team-up….

Hardly surprising considering the artist’s role in the New-52 relaunch, DC collects the original Karl & Barbara Kesel/Rob Liefeld Hawk & Dove miniseries (5 issues!). I didn’t read the miniseries when it came out (and still haven’t), but now I am curious to see what a strong inker like Karl Kesel did with a relatively-new penciller like Liefeld. I do remember thinking that regular-series penciller Greg Guler meshed with Kesel better.

For those who might have missed it the first time around, the Batman: Year One hardcover is well worth getting. Even if you have the original issues or an earlier collection, the hardcover (and maybe a 2007 paperback, but I’m not sure) features new coloring by Richmond Lewis which really makes David Mazzucchelli’s work pop even more. Plus, the hardcover is more durable, and you will want to look at this book a lot.

The Batman Vs. Bane paperback is a curious thing to me. The Bane of the Demon miniseries was better as a Bane story than as a Bruce-vs.-Bane rematch, mostly because it introduced Bane to Rā’s and Talia al-Ghūl, and (shall we say) gave them some non-Batman options. I don’t remember much about the Batman/Bane special except that it was a tie-in to the infamous Batman And Robin movie, and as such probably confused the heck out of anyone who might have known the character only from that. I understand that (as it happens) this paperback is meant to tie into The Dark Knight Rises, so DC is interested in the more villainous side of Bane, but it might also consider collecting “Tabula Rasa,” a nice little arc from Batman: Gotham Knights #s 33-36. Written by Scott Beatty and drawn by Mike Collins & Bill Sienkiewicz and Roger Robinson & John Floyd, it features Bane’s uneasy alliance with, and unexpected connection to, the Darknight Detective.

This month’s pleasant reprint surprise is Showcase Presents Young Love Volume 1 — more to come, I presume! — which I feel somewhat obligated to buy considering I have dinged DC previously for not reprinting its romance books. Still, I would probably have bought it anyway, just to see some non-superhero work from artists more closely identified with the caped crowd. No doubt some of the stories will be “so bad they’re good,” but on the whole it should be a fun read.

Here’s hoping that sales of the Xombi paperback — a bargain at $14.99, cheaper than the individual issues’ retail prices — are enough to make DC want more elegantly-crafted goodness from John Rozum and Frazer Irving. Xombi was just getting started when the New-52 came along, and I don’t want Rozum to have left Static Shock in vain.

AND FINALLY…

The “Batman: Black & White” line of statues has been pretty appealing so far, even if most of them are outside my price range. However, it’s going to be hard to turn down the Sergio Aragones one. What a great expression!

* * *

Well, that’s what jumped out at me this month. What looks good to you?

Batman #2

Welcome to Food or Comics?, where every week we talk about what comics we’d buy at our local comic shop based on certain spending limits — $15 and $30 — as well as what we’d get if we had extra money or a gift card to spend on a “Splurge” item.

Check out Diamond’s release list or ComicList, and tell us what you’re getting in our comments field.

Michael May

If I had $15, I’d mostly grab the second issues of some DC stuff I enjoyed last month: Batman ($2.99), Birds of Prey ($2.99), and especially Wonder Woman ($2.99). No Justice League for me though. Unlike Action Comics, I didn’t enjoy the first issue enough that I can rationalize paying $4 for it. Instead, I’ll grab Avengers 1959 #2 ($2.99) and Red 5′s Bonnie Lass #2 ($2.95), both of which had strong first issues.

If I had $30, I’d have to put back Bonnie Lass and wait for the collection in order to afford Jonathan Case’s atomic-sea-monster-love-story Dear Creature ($15.99).

If I had some splurge money, I’d likely grab the first issues of the 30 Days of Night ongoing ($3.99) and John Byrne’s Cold War ($3.99) as well as Dark Horse Presents #5 ($7.99). And if I had lots of extra money, I’d take First Second’s Nursery Rhyme Comics ($18.99) and Orcs, Volume 1: Forged for War ($17.99) too. I’ve already read Nursery Rhyme Comics and it’s wonderful; I’m curious to see if Orcs can redeem those creatures from the ennui I feel about them from growing up with Tolkien and D&D. If it was anybody but First Second publishing it, I don’t think I’d give it a chance.

Graeme McMillan

Star Trek/Legion of Superheroes #1

If I had $15 this week, the first thing I’d make a run for in the store would be Star Trek/Legion of Superheroes #1 (IDW, $3.99), Chris Roberson and Jeffrey Moy’s mash-up of two of my favorite SF series and something I have been embarrassingly looking forward to since its original announcement. I’m also finding myself obsessed with Fear Itself #7 (Marvel, $4.99), for slightly different reasons; after a year in which the climaxes of both Flashpoint and Schism underwhelmed, I just want Fear Itself to go out with a bang. Talking of underwhelming, I wasn’t completely on board with the first issue of DC’s new Justice League, but I’ll be picking up #2 (DC, $3.99) to see what happens next nonetheless, and seeing if things improve.

If I had $30, I’d continue my Legion of Super-Heroes love with DC Comics Presents Superboy’s Legion #1 (DC, $7.99), the latter a collection of an Alan Davis/Mark Farmer Elseworlds series that I’ve never read. I’d round out my purchases with another DC $7.99 reprint book – I have money left from the original $15, honest – and grab Vertigo Resurrected: The Eaters (DC, $7.99), which brings a Peter Milligan horror story from the early ’90s back into print for the first time in far, far too long.

If I were going to splurge this week, I could be persuaded to grab Marvel’s 15-Love TP ($14.99), based upon surprisingly good reviews of the mini. I admit, “tennis manga done by American and European creators” doesn’t sound like a great idea to me, but some of those reviews really sold it to me.

Chris Mautner

If I had $15: Butcher Baker, Candlestickmaker #4, the latest issue of the last of The Boys spin-off mini-series would be my first grab. I might also pick up the fourth issue of the newspaper anthology Pood, which, with this issue, features the work of Joe Staton.

If I had $30: Well, I’ve been long intrigued to read Alan Moore’s Neonomicon, especially since it generated such controversy and outright hatred. Now that it’s been collected in trade paperback it seems like I have a golden opportunity.

Nursery Rhyme Comics

On the complete other end of the spectrum I feel obliged to point out that First Second’s Nursery Rhyme Comics anthology, which we highlighted via a series of interviews with contributors on the blog last week, is also out in stores. Even if you don’t have young children at home, it’s a pretty boss book.

Splurge: Let’s see, there’s Vol. 16 of Tezuka’s Black Jack (and it’s always nice to see that’s continuing along) as well as MetaMaus, the “DVD features” companion to Art Spiegelman’s Maus that comes with an actual DVD and (I think) is thicker than the work it references.

But if you really want to splurge, you gotta go for The Metabarons Ultimate Collectors Slipcase edition. $130 gets you all of Alexandro Jodorowsky and Juan Gimenez’s trippy, multi-generational sci-fi epic. Get it for the Eurocomic nerd in your life.

Chris Arrant

If I had $15, my first purchase would be Jason Aaron’s Wolverine #17 (Marvel, $3.99). Re-teaming with his original Wolverine collaborator Ron Garney, this one is billed as a post-Schism tale but the shadows of the last story arc of the title itself cast longer on the series to me. Next up would be Wonder Woman #2 (DC, $2.99), because I’m really interested to see Azzarello explore the mythological worldview that Diana inhabits. Lastly would be the de facto anthology of record in comics currently, Dark Horse Presents #5 (Dark Horse, $7.99). This issue promises a short by Eric Powell about a suicidal space robot, so what’s not to love.

Fear Itself #7

If I had $30, I’d double-back and get the finale of Fear Itself #7 (Marvel, $4.99). Although the writing hasn’t lived up to my expectations compared to previous events or previous work by Matt Fraction, I still enjoy Stuart Immonen’s work here and am interested to see what he pulls out for the final issue. After that I’d get the under-the-radar OGN by Jimmy Palmiotti, Justin Gray and Juan Santacruz – Book Smart (Kickstart, $8.99). This is out of the poorly publicized line of titles that the film company Kickstart is doing in comics, but the stories are strong as is the creators involved.

If I could splurge, I’d splurge all over the Metabarons Ultimate Collection Slip Case (Humanoids, $129.95). Sure I have most of these in earlier editions, but by adding this to my bookshelf I can give away those older ones and spread the love. That’s validation, right? You’ll back me up with my wife when I spent $130 on comics I already have, right? Right?

Optic Nerve #12

Welcome to What Are You Reading? Our special guest today is Chris Duffy, editor of First Second’s Nursery Rhyme Comics. We spotlighted this anthology project all week here on Robot 6; check out our interviews with Chris as well as contributors Scott C., Aaron Reiner, Richard Sala and Eleanor Davis.

And to see what Chris and the Robot 6 crew have been reading, click below.

*****

Tim O’Shea

Resurrection Man

Resurrection Man #2: The writing team of Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning has increasingly grown on me in recent years. But what is really selling me on returning to this series with issue #3 is artist Fernando Dagnino. Whether intentional on his part or not, there are moments that Dagnino’s approach with this book reminds of Butch Guice’s style (the artist on the initial RM run).

Mister Terrific #2: After I read this issue, I mentally kicked myself for the waste of money. The art on this book is just incredibly rushed and uninspiring (by Gianluca Gugliotta — which is a shame as he has a two-page splash at one point with the lead character that is quite exquisite), which could be overlooked if Eric Wallace’s plot did not leave me wanting far more.

Batman and Robin #2: Writer Peter Tomasi constructs some great moments between fathers and sons in this issue (Alfred and Bruce, Bruce and Damian). And after thinking that DC editorial had settled Damian into a traditional sidekick role, I was pleasantly surprised to see Tomasi inject a bit of old (character roots) internal good vs. evil conflict back into the character.

Alpha Flight #5: The art of the bait and switch is something that is used to great effect in this series, repeatedly—and I have to tire of it. Also intriguing to see the character dynamics between Taskmaster and Puck. Glad this series has become an ongoing.

FF

FF #10: This is the best art I have seen from Barry Kitson in a very long time. I am unsure if he was experimenting with a change in his style, or had been rushed, on past assignments—but this issue is visually strong thanks to him. And my FF series rule that the title reads better when Sue Richards appears still holds true (she is in this issue). As a 1970s fan who always loved the surprise cliffhanger, this issue ends on a solid note (and no, it’s not Johnny Storm alive).

Super Dinosaur #5: Robert Kirkman writes an appealing all-ages book with this project. Note I said all ages. Yes, my 12-year-old son book will enjoy this book. But of equal importance, his 43-year-old dad was thrown and hooked by the big reveal in this issue.

Uncanny X-Force: The Apocolypse Solution trade paperback: While I have been reading Rick Remender’s Venom series, I had not checked out this series. The NYCC announcement that he would be taking on Secret Avengers (with one of my favorite artists Gabriel Hardman), I thought it would be a good time to consider the writer’s approach on this X-covert title. Fortunately two of my pals at the local comic book store (thanks Dugan and Mike) steered me toward this first trade collection for the series. Artist Jerome Opeña (who I first took note of when he teamed with writer Stuart Moore in 2004 on Dark Horse/Rocket’s Lone) is perfectly suited for these clandestine affairs. And I like that it seems the dirty work this team must do keeps them out of most X-crossovers that occur, making it even more of an accessible read for me.

The Shade #1: Good giggly wiggly, how did I not know that this maxi-series involved one of my favorite artists, Cully Hamner. Call me crazy, but Hamner’s ever-evolving eye for distinctive and cinematic layouts is steadily making him this comics era’s Alex Toth. I have a new theory about James Robinson’s writing (which was last consistently engaging on his long and beloved Starman run), if he can write a story that has a member of the O’Dare family (or maybe it’s the fact he’s back in Opal City), but something in Robinson relaxes and he delivers a solid story (this maxi-series features Shade’s girlfriend, Hope O’Dare). While the issue opens and closes with a simple three-word phrase: “October brings melancholy”—a great deal happens in between that phrase and its repeating. Welcome back, Opal City. Now if someone can just find a way to bring back Sue and Ralph.

Chris Mautner

In preparation for my upcoming big Comics College post on Grant Morrison, I read his entire run on JLA, which I had more or less avoided up until now. To be honest, I wasn’t terribly impressed by it and am not quite sure why it’s garnered so many accolades. It strikes me overall as very shallow work; very plot heavy and so focused on having a grand, epic narrative that it misses the deeper themes and character touches that I think make Morrison such a noteworthy writer. In short, it’s all rather shallow and nowhere where as rich as say, Doom Patrol, or Invisibles. Plus, while I don’t like ragging on artists, I must say that Howard Porter’s pencils do absolutely nothing for me.

Shade #1

Shade #1 — Why couldn’t the bulk of the new 52 titles be as well plotted and entertaining as this issue? I’ve never read James Robinson’s run on Starman before and know nothing about the Shade, but I found this to be a smartly plotted, entertaining superhero comic that had me curious to eager to find out what happened next. A good deal of this success should be laid at artist Cully Hamner’s feet. My only gripe is regarding the gore at the end that seems a bit excessive to me. I feel like a prude complaining about this stuff, but it feels so out of place in an otherwise disarmingly charming comic.

Tom Bondurant

So there I was, enjoying the heck out of Scott Snyder and Sean Murphy’s American Vampire: Survival of the Fittest #5, when it hit me — didn’t Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang make fun of the whole cool-trend-mashup thing five years ago, when they turned the Nazi Lord Julius into a vampire named Primaul (TM) in “Architecture & Mortality?”

Then I remembered Julius was a Nazi vampire gorilla, and that made it OK.

Kidding aside, SOTF was a really fine adjunct to the main AV series, because man were those Nazi vamps some scary f’ers. Most of issue #5 involves a blow-the-doors-off chase scene, with our heroes using a death ray to melt a path for their motorcycle down the side of a mountain as a giant monster tears into said Nazis and tanks are plummeting off said mountain too closely for comfort. Contrast that with the quiet epilogue, which reminds us why Felicia and Cash were tearing down the mountain in the first place, and you get an excellent example of the skills of all involved.

The Unwritten

The Unwritten #30 (written by Mike Carey, drawn by Peter Gross with Vince Locke) was a melancholy, heartbreaking conclusion to the Golden Age arc “On To Genesis.” I keep wanting to introduce this series to my friends and family who are Harry Potter fans, but it has gone so far beyond Potter pastiche that the comparison no longer applies. “Genesis” brings together a forgotten superhero and Frankenstein’s monster as Tom’s friends and allies in his war with the shadowy forces who seek to rule (to keep ruling?) over … well, over all of human culture and history, I guess. This time, though, the superhero is just one facet of a tragic figure who, like Tom, straddles the line between human being and literary creation. On one hand you’re grateful for the life he has, but really it’s not that great of a life. The events of the issue provoke a final-page act of defiance from Tom, energizing the series for the next big (biweekly!) arc.

Finally, I’ve been going truly old-school with my super-team reading, having picked up a copy of All-Star Comics Archives Vol. 1. So far I’m only through the first story, the Justice Society’s first appearance in issue #3, but — and I know how this sounds — I’m a little surprised at how well it holds up. See, for those who don’t know, the first story isn’t really a JSA adventure in the way we might think of one. Instead, it’s a set of individual adventures united by a framing sequence after Johnny Thunder and his Thunderbolt crash the weekly JSA meeting. (Subsequent stories were apparently more conventional.) What’s more, the individual stories were produced by the characters’ regular creative teams — so Gardner Fox and E.E. Hibbard drew the Flash chapter, Fox and Shelly Moldoff drew the Hawkman chapter, Jerry Siegel and Bernard Baily drew the Spectre chapter, etc. This is hardly an uncommon practice today, but it’s not what I was used to (having grown up on the Justice League and its fancy-dancy single creative team). In fact I found it pretty charming, especially at the end of each story when a wide-eyed Johnny Thunder would get some reassuring moral from Doctor Fate or the Spectre. I’m not used to supernatural figures, who play with forces which would make mere mortals pee their pants in awe and/or terror, sounding like your favorite uncle. There’s eleven more of these Archives, and I have the first of Roy Thomas’ All Star Companions as well — so I may have to buy a new bookshelf….

Chris Duffy

Ilium

Ilium (novel) by Dan Simmons: I read Hyperion this summer by the same author and ate it up! Ilium is less absorbing at first but it builds curiosity and suspense about the fate of humankind as it goes. It’s a book with not one but about 17 high concepts going on at once. (That’s what Hyperion was like as well.) Far-flung future. It stars a handful of old-style humans (like us), a group of robots from Jupiter’s moons (who are more human than humans), and a resurrected Homeric scholar who it watching the story of the Iliad play out…on Mars. It’s actually much stranger than that sounds. This Simmons guy has written a lot and I plan to try more after this.

Action Comics by Morrison and Morales: I really like watching Superman’s origin retold with a new twist: Superman is actually an interesting character. You wonder what makes him tick. Plus there’s a lot of ACTION. Reminds me a bit of the Tom DeHaven Superman novel (which was great).

Anya’s Ghost by Vera Brosgol: I liked it a lot–very well told teenage ghost story (for teens and starring teens, including the ghost).

Duncan the Wonder Dog: I have only read a page, but it looks pretty good. I’m a sucker for stories about animals with human intelligence. That’s what this is, right?

Optic Nerve #12: Buy this floppy! Adrian Tomine is one of a kind. This issue has two stories. The first is “Hortisculpture,” told in daily strip format with a full page Sunday-style comic after every 6 strips. A middle aged landscaper hears the siren call of a new art form–a melding of sculpture and horticulture. Get it? Hortisculpture! The strips move forward in a really endearing way–the kicker panels are always great little character moments. It’s not always hilarious (nor is it always meant to be) but I really like all the people Tomine creates. “Amber Sweet” ran originally in the New York Times. It’s a doppleganger story with a porn twist. It reads perfectly as a short story. The highlight of the issue though: the letters page. Tomine runs letters that are endearing, crazy, angry, condescending, litigious, and broken-hearted. The longest one sounds like it was written by a Tomine character– a student who adapted an Optic Nerve comic into a play and presented it as his own work. Strange enough to do it, but to then write to the cartoonist and fess up? Oh my god, I would read a book of these.