diary of a guttersnipe 1/07/2013: i can't skate no more

by Shawn Starr

Mini-Reviews

Happy #1 (Top Shelf Productions)
by Josh Simmons

I kept waiting for the bunny story to take a turn...it didn't, but i feel like if i try and read it again that Simmons himself would sneak into my house and add pages when i wasn't looking that would make me end up crying in the shower and trying to forget everything i saw that day.

God and Science: Return of the Ti-Girls (Fantagraphics)
by Jaime Hernandez

This is another one of the "post-Tardi" format books Fantagraphics has locked in on. The paper stock alone makes this book (and just about every other book in this formatting "line") worth a flip through, but that fails to take into account the beautiful artwork of Jaime Hernandez, which is also over-sized i might add.

The story here isn't really anything of note (at least in comparison to what it was running against in its original serialization), it's really just an excuse for Jaime to work out some of his wacky superhero influences with the cast of Locas and bring back some of the wrestling fights he's been unable to utilize for a long while. That said it's still Jaime, and its still one of the best looking books of any year.

Punk Rock Jesus #6 (Vertigo/DC)
by Sean Murphy

Sean Murphy teaches us all he's a better writer than every "professional" writer he's so far been tapped to provide art duties for. This turned out to be the best vertigo book since the last volume of 'Seaguy'.

New Avengers #1 (Marvel)
by Jonathan Hickman, Steve Epting, Rick Magyar, Frank D'Armata

If you were wondering what had to happen for Hickman to get two Avengers books, it's the same thing that happened to Fraction, he had to pay the pied piper of mediocrity. Steve Epting's art is passable (maybe better than passable), but D'Armata's coloring kills anything that would make it stand out from the rest of the mid list.

I wonder if D'Armata will be remembered in an age of digital inking and coloring as the Vince Colletta of his generation. A figure who's every credit lead to a perceived reduction in quality that no one in editorial recognized. I have since looked at some Colletta Kirby pages in the first Fourth World Omnibus and they aren't nearly as offensive to my eyes as what D'Armata does to these pages.

Those Photoshopped clouds....just why...

The story itself makes little sense, The Black Panther meets some kids who solved a puzzle and are therefore the future rulers of Wakanda, but not before a Rhino appears out of a portal for no reason, then they go through the portal and some "badass" aliens tell them how they are going to destroy the world. I was never sure after that moment when they were on the alternative earth or the "real" earth, and Hickman kept implying Black Panther was on one, but the art on the next panel says otherwise.

Also, why do alien super beings dress like 90's rave girls who like guys to cum on their lower back tribal tattoo's ? Is that what comic "creators" are into nowadays? Does it remind them of their their college days? Is this all a sad attempt to recapture their youth masturbating into socks to MTV 'til 4am and trying to explain to their math teacher what house music was ? You decide.

Hellboy in Hell #2 (Dark Horse)
by Mike Mignola, Dave Stewart

This is what i was waiting for from Mignola. Brilliant colors, breathtaking panels, and a just minuscule glimpse of a back story i wish desperately to know, but never want to in fear it will destroy everything.

Django Unchained #1 (Vertigo/DC)
by Quentin Tarantino, R.M. Guera, Jason Latour, Giulia Brusco

Since there was no black people involved in making this comic, does that make it racist?

The Manhattan Projects #8 (Image)
by Jonathan Hickman, Nick Pitarra, Jordie Bellaire

This issue seemed like it was supposed to take place twenty issues later, almost like Hickman compressed years worth of spy games and just skipped right to the first volley of the war.

Prophet #32 (Image)
by Simon Roy

Simon Roy everybody. Simon Roy.

Nothing to Drink

Tucker Stone's best of list makes me want to go to a comic shop and flip a table, punch a hole in the wall, and then read a stack of comics. He's the best advocate for both reading and destroying comics.

I would have sworn to god the Comic Books ARE BURNING IN HELL podcast was playing an elaborate joke on everyone by including 'Annie Sullivan and the Trials of Helen Keller' on all of their "best of" lists (with the exception of Jog i believe). They got me to buy it so i guess ill find out if I'm a rube.

Chad Nevett posted the line up for his 2013 Blogathon, in which i am named, and outclassed by every other contributor. It should provide a good days worth of reading for a good cause.

The Dean Haspiel Comics Reporter interview was a standout.

Jacques Tardi Turned Down The Legion D’Honneur, which i guess is the french equivalent of being knighted. His statement read: "Being fiercely attached to my freedom of thought and creativity, I do not want to receive anything, neither from this government or from any other political power whatsoever. I am therefore refusing this medal with the greatest determination.” I didn't know i could admire Tardi anymore, but he found a way. Also fuck Grant Morrison, that royal lover.

'Basketball Comic' #1, the follow up to 'Cop Comic' #1, by Mickey Z, Michael DeForge and Patrick Kyle was released. That's a solid lineup.

This is definitely how it happened.

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GIVE ME THE MIC AND STEP ASIDE

In addition to making his CBR debut on Comics Should Be Good with a review of Michel Fiffe's 'COPRA', and once again proving he's better than me, Alec Berry also starred in the new hit MTV show "Buckwild". If you were wondering what he was up to, here are my notes from the debut episode.

12pm – Alec mud-wrestles his armless uncle and a pig for the key to the family truck.

1:30pm – Having lost at mud wrestling, Alec does whippets with his pet goat.

4pm – Alec wakes up from a mild whippet overdose.

4:10pm – 4:30pm Alec writes his best of 2012 column.

4:30pm- Alec takes the keys to the family truck, a bottle of moonshine, and takes a local girl to the top of a hill to converse.

4:50pm – Alec comes home, moonshine in hand.

6pm - More Whippets

8pm - Alec and friends go to town and dry hump the night away to a white lead Lil' Jon cover band.

---------------------------

Chris Ware's New Yorker cover on the Newtown shooting, and the follow up essay were stunning.

Rob Liefeld's homage to Robert Crumbs "Keep on Truckin"

Wes Anderson's try out video for the first season of "The Real World" is on youtube.

I don't think i ever linked this, but here's Kate Beaton's Hurricane Sandy comics.

Tom Spurgeon's 50 positive things from comics in 2012 was brilliant.

episode 021: collapse

alec and joey return from the brink of disaster to chat about change #1 by ales kot and morgan jeske, marvel now!, avengers #1 by jonathan hickman and jerome opena, captain america #1 by rick remender and john romita jr., cable and x-force #1 by dennis hopeless and salvador larrocca, amazing spider-man #698 by dan slott and richard elson, everything together: collected stories by sammy harkham, box brown and retrofit comics, copra #1 by michel fiffe, the 'man of steel' trailer, and much more.

music by failure

download

diary of a guttersnipe 12/17/2012: did you see the words? (a.k.a. how many times can i make a kirby reference)

by Shawn Starr

This week we have a bunch of reviews and some more linkblogging (because i know the comics internet can always use more of that)...

Mini-Reviews

Avengers #1 (Marvel)
by Jonathan Hickman, Jerome Opeña, Dean White

This is the first book of the Marvel Now! relaunch (money grab) that i genuinely liked ('FF' passed by on the mammoth shoulders of Mike Allred, 'Captain America' existed in a place of competence, and 'Thor: God Of Thunder' took an issue to really click). As Chad Nevett pointed out (and i think he's the only one too, because besides him NO ONE read 'The Ultimates'), Hickman retreads or overlaps much of this issue's ideas with his short run on 'The Ultimates' just with less teeth. But hey that was the Ultimate Universe and that's only good enough to rip off whole segments from for your movie-films, THIS IS THE 616! and the fuckers gotta sell toys (also did anybody else notice how Opeña drew most of the cast to vaguely resemble their film counterparts? CORPORATE SYNERGY!).

This issue is pretty standard fair for Hickman as it deals heavily with the idea of futurism. In this issue Iron Man and Cap create a team of unique individuals to work as their replacements (or to work alongside them) for when the next big disaster happens. Luckily that disaster is happening right NOW!. The Future! IS. NOW.

Anyways team intercepts some new bad guys (are they new? I have no clue) on Mars who work for some galactic being (NOT GALACTUS!) (...maybe Galactus?) (...) who is going to fuck earth's shit up. Themes of evolution, science, and the interaction of the two are touched upon. Then everyone gets fucked up and they mail Cap back to AMERICA to tell everyone about how hardcore their underground punk band is.

Opeña is better than everyone else at Marvel as always (ok. Ribic and Allred are equals).

I guess cylindrical circles are the new Kirby Dots.

Hawkeye #5 (Marvel)
by Matt Fraction, Javier Pulido, Matt Hollingsworth

Worth it for the panel they swiped from Kirby alone (also the pretty art and solid script are pluses....up until the last page which is a giant cop out. Fuck you, Hawkeye murdered that dude, and i don't care what you say. HawkEYESTABBER!).

2001: A Space Odyssey #1 (Marvel)
by Jack Kirby, Mike Royer, George Roussous

The fine folks at Marvel decided to purchase the rights to adapt Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke's Sci-Fi masterpiece "2001: A Space Odyssey" into a comic series. What an odd idea.

Odder yet is that they gave that project to Jack Kirby. JACK "PUNCHING NAZI'S IN THE FACE" KIRBY. A master of subtlety if i ever knew one.

Kirby, similar to his adaptation of "Planet of the Apes" (which DC decided not to licence, and instead just have Kirby "adapt" it liberally under the name 'Kamandi') runs wild with the concept. Unlike many writers and artists who faithfully adapt their source material, creating a self-aware derivative work which never lives up to the source material (hey guys i took this story you like and made it into a book!), Kirby simply takes the basic premise (a monolith which jump starts evolution) and creates his own universe around it. Taking Kubrick's near three hour long (mostly) silent masterpiece and turning it into a violent, jarring, unsubtle Kirby-esque nightmare of action and noise.

Jack Kirby's Silver Star (Image)
by Jack Kirby, Mike Royer, D. Bruce Berry

Kirby.

Blacklung (Fantagraphics)
by Chris Wright

Started out slow, got strong in the middle, ended up reaching for so much more than i expected. Not sure if it accomplished all of it though, but it's undeniably a beautifully rendered, written, and produced book.

RANDOM HAUNTS ~~~~BOO

Oily Comics opened up their subscription service again. Them's some good comics.

Jog on new Ditko comics is a must.

The images in this review / discussion of 'Sad Sex' are interesting...seems like a book that i need to look at.

Jaime and Gilbert Hernandez interview.

...the fuck.

Frank Santoro being named to the Eisner award committee is going to be very important (as everyone else has said). I wonder if his involvement is a move by the awards to not have another one of those "Not even nominating Jaime Hernandez for a single award" issues they suffered from last year (Seriously no love for 'The Love Bunglers'?). Or the slightly the less offensive splitting of the "Best Original Graphic Novel" between 'Wilson' and The (oh so) Dapper Men. Eisners, y'all mother fuckers be acting crazy these last few years! So anyways i guess we can all rest assured that Chris Ware will atl east get a nod, and possibly win, and a couple of those micro publishers alongside the stalwarts Fantagraphics and Drawn and Quarterly might sneak through to the cracks. That or they'll fuck up again...

I saw "The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou" and it is my new favorite Wes Anderson film.

NEW KAMANDI OMNIBUS!

I picked up Basil Wolverton's 'Spacehawk' after Tim Callahan's review, and i have to agree with his assessment of it as a under-reported proto-art comic classic. Its got all the idea's of Bronze Age Kirby and an art style that's difficult to look at without recalling Jim Woodring and Robert Crumb. Also the production value on this book is beyond words. Fantagraphics continues to put out the best books for you dollar of any company in the field.

Wukuan Cardini's Orion sketch is pretty killer. He also has a new issue of 'Vortex' out.

The Comic Books Are Burning in Hell's episode on 'Dal Tokyo' was a great listen. 'Dal Tokyo' is a difficult work to grasp or even explain to someone who hasn't had direct contact with it, and they did a good job. Also oddly enough it's one of their funniest episodes.

direct message 004: the manhattan projects

by Alec Berry and Chad Nevett  

We didn’t die; we didn’t quit.

We just slept.

Chad and Alec return to Direct Message and pick up where they left off to discuss The Manhattan Projects by Jonathan Hickman and Nick Pitarra.

Aren’t you glad?

Alec Berry: Hickman’s taking a bit of a leap here. While there’s still his usual sensibilities of design and a fascination with powerful figures, he’s approaching his grand thoughts through simpler, more traditional comic book means by placing an emphasis on the cast and pushing an assortment of bombastic occurrences. It could be a result of the Marvel gig, but The Manhattan Projects just seems to be aware of its pop-historical core. Hickman isn’t writing some hardball mini series like The Nightly News. Instead, he’s crafting an ongoing series in which Einstein has been replaced by an evil counterpart. The idea demands a specific approach, and Hickman’s clearly writing to that approach - a sign of a writer bending his abilities for his story.

And I enjoy the result. The Manhattan Projects evokes something innocent and free spirited versus his more contemplative mini series of the past few years. This book doesn’t seem preoccupied with proving its significance and trying to reach a non-comics reading audience by twisting the form into some sort of graphic literature. The plot’s wacky, and the pacing is a little more lucid in some ways. The sub-plots keep stacking with each new issue. The detailed relations between cast members remind an experienced reader of the usual mechanics of a superhero team book - each character complete with his or her own costume and unique specialty. And, if it weren’t enough, the color palette brings a bright, vibrant appearance with its bleeding reds, greens, blues and yellows.

Yet though free spirited, Hickman isn’t without some larger ideas and takeaways. He’s playing with the time period and investigating the major transition in technology, science and outlook after WWII. It’s a Cold War comic book bent on general themes of knowledge, discovery, responsibility, curiosity and ability, and Hickman may be linking all of that to our current interest and desire to constantly progress without hesitation - a skill most every member of The Manhattan Projects cast possesses. Or it could just suggest that with every good comes a bad.

Any point you wish to derive from it is yours, but The Manhattan Projects certainly has my interest, and it’s easily way better than Saga, so Chad, hit me. What do you like about it?

Chad Nevett: I like the pretty blues and reds.

It’s funny that you call it a “Cold War comic book” when the most recent issue seems to be pointing to a different direction. It’s a series that’s been deviating more and more from our world as it’s gone along and, cancelling out the Cold War is another step. It won’t be limited by such bland conflicts -- it seems poised to keep exploring the idea of genius unrestrained. As I write this, I’m rereading The Boys and there’s a similarity between what Hickman is doing with the genius scientists here and what Garth Ennis did with superheroes there. Each group is immensely powerful (in it’s own way) and we’re unaccustomed to seeing either completely unrestrained, free to do as it will. In both cases, death and destruction follows. Granted, Hickman is stacking the deck with his faux Oppenheimer and Einstein, but there’s still an undeniable core in this comic of wondering what would happen if these mad geniuses could simply do what they want. What is the leash were off? In some cases, that means purposeful abuse and monstrosities; in others, it means the pursuit of pure science without considering the consequences. Mostly, it means genocide.

I hadn’t considered its place in Hickman’s creator-owned work. It’s the first ongoing work he’s done, so that no doubt explains, partly, why there’s a looser, more character-driven feel to this title. The constraints of a singular idea or a tightly-woven plot aren’t there. He can spend an entire issue with a character, advancing the plot only a fraction. Hell, it wasn’t until recently that any sort of larger plot became apparent. It’s like a wacky S.H.I.E.L.D. But, you know, better.

AB: It’s actually a lot like S.H.I.E.L.D. when you mention it, and you have to wonder if Hickman just threw his hands in the air, abandoned S.H.I.E.L.D. and chose to try it again with this.The approach didn’t work that time, and I’m sure the Marvel constraints weren’t allowing him to go as far as he wanted to go (plus, all of those delays and the dragged-out publishing schedule certainly inhibited things).  

The fact of it being an ongoing does allow Hickman room to run and write at a different speed, but I also feel Nick Pitarra is essential to understanding the beat of this book. He’s an artist who places attention on character body language and the way in which they interact with their environment. There’s a great scene in issue 3 when Feynman enters Einstein’s lab for the first time, and you watch as Feynman studies the room and shows some sense of bewilderment. A small touch, but it adds so much to a scene. And it’s 100% visual.

Also, his line tends to depict emotive faces through the numerous marks put on the page, and the bumpy quality of it shows the characters to be ugly rather than clean cut - which is obviously an extension of what Hickman’s writing.

Visual developments.

These things just inherently give The Manhattan Projects a lively quality and move it from Hickman’s usual ice cube tone, and Pitarra certainly dictates much of this comic’s attitude (along with colorist Jordie Bellaira and the numerous others from earlier issues) that way. The style’s similar to a Geoff Darrow, sure, but beneath the style it’s evident Pitarra grabs chunks of the story, makes them his own and expands the entire thing. He’s even loosened up a bit since the first issue. A sign of the artist’s confidence growing …

On your point about characters running rampant with power and getting to see that, does The Manhattan Projects remind you at all of something like, say, The Authority, and is this a subject you like to see?

CN: You’re dead on about the visuals, Alec. When we discuss the focus on ‘character’ in The Manhattan Projects, a big part of that is Pitarra’s visual depiction of these characters. I’m so writing-oriented that I often forget the effect an artist has on what I interpret as the writing. I’ve always enjoyed the art and said so, but... did I know to the full extent? I don’t think so. You talking about it immediately made it click into place and I could see a rush of visuals speed past my eyes and it’s like “Holy shit, the art on this comic is amazing! I had no idea! What the fuck is wrong with me?” Another “Art Discussion Month” is needed probably...

Oppenheimer’s twisted body language is my favourite visual bit, I think. You just see his evil, fucked up brain through his whole body...

There’s definitely an appeal in watching people with power run unchecked to a degree. What would happen if the biggest brains the US government could round up were set loose to do as they will? There are so many possibilities, so much potential for wonders of the imagination. For comics to do what comics can do: you know, anything. There’s an off-handed casualness to the way that Hickman presents the genius unrestrained, too, that I enjoy. They kill off an entire race and it just happens over a few pages. It’s a minor plot point in many ways as we see the march towards global domination by threatening all aliens that Earthmen Are Not To Be Fucked With.

Going back to S.H.I.E.L.D., this title isn’t as cute as that one. That one featured the mythic geniuses of the past five hundred or so years, men who have progressed beyond men and into a weird realm where them all hanging out and working as part of this organisation alongside Mr. Fantastic and Iron Man’s dads seems... cute. Here, though, many of these characters knew one another, so there isn’t a giant leap from our world to this one. Turn a couple evil, take the leashes off, and see what happens.

AB: You’re right, and I think the close connection MP has with our own world only adds to the comic’s sinister bite simply by reminding us of what the atom bomb signaled and pushing the point that that could’ve only been the beginning. Oddly enough, there’s also an urgency to this work. It may seem slow in plot, but the visuals suggest an ever-present race against the clock. Especially the colors. The palette and bright hues create a violent sense of lighting. Sequences using the blues and reds usually accompany dialogue. Pitarra will grid these scenes out in small panels, and the back and forth between blue and red take a reader from a hot to cold light. You feel submerged and then exposed, and there’s a motion associated with that, so you feel sort of out of breath even in a scene with old white guys sitting around a table. It’s wacky and bizarre, yet it’s frightening and disorienting as well.

The way in which Hickman has revealed the story has also added to that urgency. While the plot meanders, I always feel each issue either has a point or supplies enough interesting interactions or ideas to combat the sluggishness, and the time Hickman takes allows this elaborate version of our world to spread itself and take more shape. And yeah, there’s time taken, but I always felt from page one that Hickman had automatically written in some greater threat or secret just off-panel where we couldn’t see, and by slowing the reader down, taking this time, he builds the suspense, urging us to read on. As is every Hickman project, it seems, but the wait is more bearable when Oppenheimer savagely killing and eating a member of an alien race is at our reading disposal.

There’s definitely an engrossing ‘what if’ element when it comes to the subject at hand, and you’re right in that Hickman’s interest lies in showing the evil of it all. Feynman offers somewhat of a balance, though. He’s the young guy of the crew, the rookie, and Hickman uses him as the series perspective at times, or at least gives him a narrative duty with the quotes from his memoir introducing and concluding each issue. The touch sandwiches all events between his words and gives the story a reflective quality. As portrayed here, Feynman is in on the acts of The Manhattan Projects, but Hickman writes him with a sense of question always present. I’m not sure he’s a good man, but he seems like a character who hasn’t accepted his internal evil yet. Issue 2’s scene with him in the mirror, performing his morning ritual of “good morning Mr. Feynman. You’re a very special person.” suggests that he persistently needs to reassure himself of his own worth; it shows that he truly sees himself as a good man. Or that he’s really just self-conscious that he might in fact not be. The opening quote in issue 1 sort of backs this up.

“For when the time came, I could find no good in myself, only mischief.” - The Recorded Feynman

How do you read this character and his role in the series? I imagine his arc will be a main one. And, while we’re at it, is there anything about The Manhattan Projects that doesn’t work for you? We’ve been pretty positive, but I’m interested if you’ve had any negative reactions or complaints.

CN: Were I to guess, I’d say that Feynman is both our perspective character and the one that will act as a summation of the others. He’s the ‘innocent’ in many ways and we will see him corrupted. We will see him without limits do monstrous things and go too far. It’s easy to see how many of the others can do those things, but him? When he falls, it will mean something. He’s the central genius and what he does is what matters most in many ways. He’s the moral barometer, I guess.

There’s only one thing about this comic that I don’t particularly like and that’s the second Einstein. After the series began with Oppenheimer’s evil twin brother replacing him, to see that Einstein was replaced by an evil alternate version of himself was disappointing. It’s like, we saw this already. It also makes it too easy for these men to go too far. There’s no real fall, no pushing of the limits in a way that necessarily means anything. Evil versions of characters do evil things is not exactly interesting. There’s no true conflict there. It also takes away from the sinister twist on our world. Well, no shit, if the best and brightest minds were replaced with serial killers, things would have turned out differently! The agency and corruption is taken away to a degree. One evil doppelganger is enough. Two is kind of dull. I almost wish we’d seen Einstein be forced to kill his lesser, more sinister alternate self. An act of self-defence that opens a doorway for him.

How about you?

AB: Even though I asked the question, I gotta admit that I really have had no complaint about these comics. Maybe that makes me a bad critic, but The Manhattan Projects has supplied something worthwhile and entertaining each issue. It’s doing what I want comics to do. There’s room to think and dig, but on the surface a layer of outlandish fiction thrives. And the craft is there, on both sides of the line. It’s one of the best monthly titles.

But you raise a good point, and I may agree. To play devil’s advocate and to try and understand Hickman’s reasoning though, I can see why he has strayed away from an internal conflict when writing Einstein. For one, the effort needed to pursue that direction would outweigh what he’s currently writing (which sort of backs you, because that just means lazy writing), but also by creating a separate Einstein and externalizing the conflict, it communicates the struggle in a clearer fashion, and in an action comic it serves the action when a protagonist can actually hit his or her antagonist. And as for him already killing anti-Einstein (as I will dub him), it would be too early. That’s going to happen, I feel. Einstein will find his way back through the portal, and the moment will feel more climactic for the wait. Like much of the comic, Hickman seems comfortable with a slow burn.

It does feel repetitive when you realize Oppenheimer’s situation is the same, but Hickman does write Oppenheimer’s evil as more naturally ingrained in the character. His twin was the root of his evil - operating as an external example of the character’s own faults, most like - and this twin shared the womb with Oppenheimer. Einstein’s other half is merely an alternate version from another dimension and had to travel to replace him. Those little touches change the situations and suggest some attributes and truths about the characters. Plus, good Opp dies while good Einstein lives. Slight differences in the details, but they are differences, and I’m sure there’s a point to the contrast Hickman is seeding between the two characters. I have faith.

I feel lame for not having a complaint and trashing this comic somehow, but I keep thinking and find nothing. Oh well.

Anything else worth mentioning? If not to leave this piece without mentioning the art team again, Nick Pitarra, Jordie Bellaire, Cris Peter and Rachelle Rosenberg fucking nailed it and deserve a lot of credit. They’ve brought The Manhattan Projects to life, and Hickman owes them for that. From design to interiors, it’s certainly a visual standout on the shelf, and the aesthetic says it all.

CN: It does. So I guess I’ll just shut my big mouth ...

There's also this podcast on which Alec said much of the same stuff. 

diary of a guttersnipe 10/29/12: earth a.d. ("after disaster")

by Shawn Starr

It's a short one this week because i spent three days in Maine being a lush, so Happy Halloween and try not to die in that hurricane.

Mini-Reviews

Kamandi: The Last Boy On Earth, Volume One (DC)
by Jack Kirby, D. Bruce Berry, Mike Royer

If someone asked me to name the perfect action adventure comic, i could think of no better example than Jack Kirby's 'Kamandi: The Last Boy On Earth'. Every single issue of this book, fuck that, every single PAGE of this book is exploding with the best choreographed action ever drawn, and idea's so purely Kirby that they defy explanation. Giving a plot summary of any of these issues is nearly impossible, because it loses something in translation. They're Kirby, that is all.

I think a lot of the "age of awesome" of the mid 2000's and the recent crop of high concept books try to ape whats going on in this book, but all they do is throw all these ideas at you that are primarily just references to other things (i.e. The 'Family Guy' method of comedy) and trusts the reader to identify them as cool (because hey i saw that movie once). 'Kamandi' on the other hand just sweats awesome, it doesn't need to reference anything because Kirby can just create something twenty times better than whatever movie you were thinking of. 'Kamandi' itself even started life as a "Planet of the Apes" rip off and then Kirby turned it into an entire world with so many possible stories and alternate histories that he could have stayed there forever and still had material to mine, something the latter "Planet of the Apes" films failed to do.

In conclusion, Fuck every other comic, i got 'Kamandi'.

Batman Incorporated #4 (DC)
by Grant Morrison, Chris Burnham, Nathan Fairbairn

I thought we all knew who Wingman was the second he was introduced?

Wolverine MAX #1 (Marvel)
by Jason Starr, Roland Boschi, Connur Willumsen, Dan Brown

I can't think of a book that's had such a dramatic shift in the general level of skill between artists as they trade off pages, Roland Boschi is a competent "mainstream" artist that doesn't do anything past exist and fill pages; while Connor Willumsen has this amazing Crumb mixed with Miller (circa 'Ronin') kind of style (along with a dozen other influences) that just blows Boschi off the page in every conceivable way. Which makes their pairing all the stranger, they don't complement each other in the slightest, one just highlights how terrible the other one is.

It also now seems Willumsen is off the book, which saves me from needing to worry about its existence anymore. Good game Marvel!

Godzilla: The Half-Century War #3 (IDW)
by James Stokoe

Stokoe-Monster-Battle-Royale.

FF #23 (Marvel)
by Jonathan Hickman, Nick Dragotta, Cris Peter

The point of this issue (and what Hickman supposedly sees his run as ultimately saying) is that "Intelligence without imagination is pretty much useless, Creating is harder than knowing". He then goes on to "imagine" the completely original idea of Cowboys vs Dinosaurs vs Jello Knights.

I liked this issue (and Hickman's tenure on 'Fantastic Four' in general) but it doesn't work as an epilogue to the run it tries to encapsulate because Hickman's imagination ran out after the first arc. After the first arc was where Hickman began to focus on his hyper detailed mega-plot full of "awesome" moments and issues packed with exposition, and didn't show up again until 'FF' launched, and even that relied way to heavily on having all the exposition spelled out in 'Fantastic Four' and letting 'FF' exist as a side book (while occasionally still putting in fill-in exposition left out of the main book). Maybe having (old) Franklin push his younger self to have more fun is Hickman admitting he lost the thread a bit and perhaps urging Fraction to up his game a little bit for his upcoming run on the franchise.

==============MISS, GET OUT OF THE CAR ===============

Shifty Nifty

A bunch of "legendary" runs ended this week, and I am not sure what that means besides that they were long and generally well received. None of them changed comics, and they wont have any real lasting effect outside of being put on some publishers' "MUST READ" PR list whenever the next movie involving those characters comes out. Sure Fraction's 'Invincible Iron Man' is probably the best modern Iron Man run out there, but that doesn't make it "legendary", does it? Being the best run of something doesn't make your run "legendary", it makes it exist. If i wrote the "best" 'Witchblade' comic, does that mean i had a legendary run ? or does it mean that the level of competency on that book was so low that anything above shit was heralded as the next 'Watchmen'.? The better question is does it stand up to Jack Kirby's 'Fantastic Four', Frank Miller's 'Daredevil', Alan Moore's 'Swamp Thing' ? I don't think so. The only one which would possibly meet that criteria is maybe Brubaker's 'Captain America', but i couldn't read that comic past the first Omnibus because Frank D'armata is a terrible colorist. I mean he's like the worst colorist to ever color anything ever. It's the same reason i couldn't read Fraction's 'Invincible Iron Man' for any extended period of time because Frank D'armata colors everything in this vague shade of shit that makes me want to burn anything his over rendered hand touches. Maybe that was their lasting effect, teaching me that the colorists do matter.

That "Evil Dead" remake trailer looks atrocious, in the sense that it seems to be remaking "The Evil Dead" into a bland retread of every other horror movie from the past decade and dropping everything that made anyone care about the film in the first place by the wayside. Which brings the question of why remake a film that is so purely an expression of a single director and actor ? Especially when said film has very limited wide spread recognition (most people have a vague recollection of who Freddy Kruger and Jason are, no one knows who Ash is honestly), especially when you remake it into a broad base horror film that could have been named anything else and reached the same target audience (a.k.a. teenagers trying to feel up there girlfriends on a Friday night). (Editor's Note: while i totally agree with your take on the new trailer, can we at least agree that the star Jane Levy is really fucking gorgeous - Joey)

This was a interesting discussion on Ware's 'Building Stories'.

"Argo" was a solid film.

I watched "Demolition Man" recently and that film still holds up surprisingly well visually (Joey pointed out this as well with the 1995 "Judge Dredd" film recently on a Chemical Box episode), the production quality really sells the future setting. In this film the "underground society" looks like an "underground society" and the "Utopian" world looks "Utopian". They also do a great job of layering in both a "vague" history (the franchise wars, Schwarzenegger as president) along with new and interesting technology (what are the shells for?) to make it into an actual film.

"OMAC lives.... so that man may live !"

New Dash Shaw! Good,  i was starting to wonder where that guy went (besides animation).

A new Ben Marra comic came out, i somehow didn't hear anything about this until after it was released. I guess I'm slacking.

I liked this review of EC Comics by Chris Mautner.

Marvel solicited a trade collecting various female X-Men stories and anchored it with the Milo Manara / Chris Claremont 'X-Women' one-shot, because Marvel doesn't understand woman.

----Random Gulacy Kung-Fu to finish us out----