Read Comics

Florence and I have decided to do reviews of new issues from our pull list as they come out each week. Beware of spoilers, as we’ll be discussing the comics in depth. So far, as you can see, we have a fairly lame and generic title. Let us know if you have any suggestions in the comments.

This week it was just two issues, the new Echo and Invincible. Enjoy.

Echo #7

Florence: Moore’s art has really developed over the years, especially on men, since I’m more used to him drawing women. I feel like he’s doing a good job creating more than one male face. I really like his style, but he does sort of tend to have one face for all women, even though he does woman’s body shapes in more variety, which I really appreciate. I’m most intrigued by the character of Ivy Raven right now. When we were first introduced to her, she was a very sweet and loving mother, and now she’s clearly very formidable. In one panel we see her anger, and it’s scary. It shows that no matter what level of calm she exhibits, she’s dangerous. The last panel of the comic was very difficult to decipher.

Martin: I agree about the last panel being confusing. I won’t describe it for fear of giving it away, but I probably couldn’t if I wanted to, since I have no idea what happened. The old guy on the cover was the only other person at the crash site where Julie got her metal breastplate. Obviously he’s got some of whatever she has stuck to his hand. We only see him for about half a page in the whole comic, which felt weird since he was so prominently featured before we opened the book. I do feel like this was consistent with the rest of the story telling in the series, but the pace seemed to slow down quite a bit here. Not as much happens in this issue, and I guess I was a little disappointed by that.

Florence: That’s really just in contrast to the pacing he’s set already with the other issues in this title. That’s not compared to any normal comic’s pacing. This one has just started big and kept going. He’s set us up to expect that from every issue.

Martin: That’s true, but I guess I did feel like there were unnecessary scenes in this comic. If it doesn’t turn out that there’s a reason for the missing dog, then her asking about it was only to further highlight the stupid pet monkey that’s chained outside their motel room. The monkey got way more panels than necessary, IMHO.

Invincible #54

Florence: It’s your turn to go first.

Martin: Ha! I’m the one typing, and it looks like you were wrong about that prediction! Seriously, WTF? Invincible has sucked for like 4 or 5 issues now. I don’t even remember the last time it was cool. What ever happened to stuff happening in this comic?

Florence: I have detected no deterioration. I think it’s nice that he’s dating Atom Eve. I could have done without the four page spread of their relationship. It seemed to be both past and present. Like a montage.

Martin: I was going to say that, damnit. It was totally a montage! Montages are lame in all their forms. Except when used to make fun of montages, like in Team America: World Police.

Florence: Really though, if this just disappeared and I got twice as many Walking Dead issues, I’d be fine.

Martin: Totally. I never thought it would get to this point. I used to love Invincible SO MUCH. I do have hope for the future though. Maybe someday they’ll get back to the plot line with that one-eyed alien, and Invincible’s dad…

Florence: Now that I think about it, I did really like the future stuff, the stuff with Immortal. It seemed like a plausible path for him.

Martin: I guess this was sort of like a one-off book. I think Kirkman should have written it as an Invincible spin-off with a different title. Maybe another Invincible Presents Atom Eve… No, that one actually had a cool story, and stuff happened in it. Maybe it should have been called Atom Eve loves Invincible.

I loved this issue for a lot of different reasons.

But an Einstein quote printed in the inside of the front cover has been making me think about it for days:

“Now he has departed from this strange world a little ahead of me. That means nothing. People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.” –Albert Einstein

The first time I was reminded of it, I was totally confused. I’m in the process of reading the novel Iron Sunrise, by Charles Stross, and all of a sudden the quote is utterly relevant, and I start paging through the book looking for it. I didn’t remember at first that it had been from this entirely unrelated source.

Then later I was thinking about the first Fear Agent TPB that got me all in such a tizzy last week, (I do, finally, have TPB 2 & 3 waiting for me to read them) and I realized the quote is relevant there also, although it’s a bit more of a stretch. Maybe this is just the month for time travel and death in hard science fiction for me. But surprising that it would come from Echo, which, as far as I can tell, has nothing to do with time travel (thus far) whatsoever!

Other reasons that I loved this issue: The pacing has really picked up. Things are happening fast. Also, the characters! Such interesting and varied characters have appeared that I immediately want to know their backgrounds and stories. Almost badly enough to permit time taken away from the incredibly fascinating story that is unfolding. In general, this issue is more of the same, and by that I mean REALLY REALLY GOOD. I know I tried to read Strangers in Paradise at some point long, long ago. That was well before I’d read many comics, and I just didn’t get into it. Echo is so good that it makes me want to try again.

Topics for this issue: Batman’s Death (we know nothing about this), Secret Invasion (similarities between Black Canary and Mockingbird), Gambit’s accent, Indiana Jones, Spider Man Loves Mary Jane, Joss Whedon, Southland Tales, sex in comics (Cherry Poptart), Iron Man, Starfox, and which superhero gets the most play.

For this podcast we had Martin, Florence, Jason, Mike and Susie.

Listen to ReadComics.org Podcast Episode #006 (32 MB, 70 min)

Lot’s of stuff to write about! 1)Last christmas Florence, and Marty got me the first volume of Absolute Sandman.  It was awesome, the second volume is even better.  The Absolute line (yes the name does make it sound like a promotion for Vodka) from DC is basically a repackaging of some of their most acclaimed series, in oversized, beutifully designed hard covered books.  Usually the art is recolored, and the back of the book is jammed with extra content.  I usually don’t think it is worth buying a second copy of something if the story has not changed, and other Sandman I don’t think I will (although Kingdom Come is tempting).  With Sandman they have reprinted three tpbs, per volume.  Volume 2 contains the Seasons of Mists, a Game of You arcs, and most of the short stories from the Fables and Reflections collection.  Though volume 1 had some really great issues, this is the period in Sandman in my opinion where it came into it’s stride both with the story and the art.  SoM, is an epic that feels like an ancient myth that no one had transcribed yet.  Lucifer decides to quit being the adversary, kicks everyone out of Hell, leaves locking the door behind him.  He gives the key to Dream, whom he had previously vowed to destroy but now just hopes it will make his life a little difficult.  Which it does, as figures from many different pantheons (religious as well as comic book) arrive in the Dreaming seeking the deed to Hell.  Reading it again now, it is amazing how a few small interactions in these early issues set in motion the conclusion of the whole series.   At one time Season of Mists was my favorite arc, but now I feel a Game of You surpasses it.  It is a much smaller scale story than most of the other large arcs, and though Morpheus id in it, he is mostly periphery.  The main character is Barbie, who was a periphery character in the Dollhouse (collected in volume 1).  She had at one time had a very vivid dream life, in which she was a princess in a magic world of talking animals called the Land.  She has however stopped dreaming, and no longer remembers the Land.  In her absence the Land has started to die and is under the thrall of a monster called the Cuckoo.  Barbie does eventually return to the land and the it causes serous damage to the waking world.   The story could just be another “magic land ” like Oz, or Wonderland, but the conclusion id entirely originally.  The supporting cast Barbie’s neighbors: sweet transvestite, Wanda, lesbians Hazel and Foxglove, and the witch Thessaly (the only one to have any importance to the bigger story of Sandman), as well as the Land’s animals, giant dog creature Martin Tenbones, and Wilkinson a cynical rat wearing a trench-coat, are some of the most memorable in the whole series.  These are the stories that where the art  finally moves away from the typical horror comic style (overly lined faces, and colored in sickly purples and greens) .  Despite having some of the most horrific  scenes in the whole series, a man chained to rock in Hell having his chest repeatedly torn open, a pile of decapitated heads singing, the face torn from corpse nailed to wall happily chatting away with it’s wagging tongue.  It was well worth spending seventy dollars for this excellent new printing. 2) I also read echo number 1.  It is Terry Moore’s new creator owned comic.  It appears to be his take on super heroes.  Of course the heroine is one of his beautiful girls.  the first issue is a simple origin story.  Girl taking pictures in the dessert, inadvertently finds herself in the path of a explosion, gain a super powered suit.  That is all that has happened so far.  Except that we know that the owners of the suit seriously nasty, killing the previous wearer of the suit (hence the explosion) just to test it’s durability.  I know in few issues this is going to have completely sucked me in, and the story will be any thing but simple.  This is from the creator of Strangers in Paradise after all. 3) I have totally fallen in Love the album Super Secret from the band Ookla the Mok.  They are by far the geekiest band I have every encountered.  Nearly every high energy song song is a packed with references to comic books, old school science fiction, or alien abductions.  A sample of one of there lyrics from the song Theme from Super Skrull “He can turn one leg invisible, which is not all that practical. Unless you are quite gullible, you won’t get fooled by Super Skrull!”  My favorite song on  the album is called Stop Talking About Comic Books or I will Kill You, but the one I can not stop humming is Guggenheim Love.  The songs are not only catchy, they are hilarious. 4)  In a couple of hours i will head over to my local comic shop and pick up a months a worht of issues.  Including issues of, Buffy, Angel, Runaways, Fables,  Astro City, and the first issue of Serenity: Better Days!  Woo hoo!That is all.