The Internet is On Fire With Great Ideas and Nobody is Calling the Hose Company.
Today is a day of liberation for the comics Internet! It is only one day after Brian Michael Bendis called down lightning from the heavens to strike open the dam that was suppressing the true desires of each and every fan, and already the cries of greatful succor report from once-arid fields of wheat and corn and grain and comic book pitches. Behold:
Power Man/Iron Fist/Blue Beetle/Booster Gold
Dracula/John Constantine/Archie
Jimmy Corrigan/Jim Corrigan
Mickey Mouse/Frank
As we all can see, the industry will soon be healed of its every ailment and disability. I have already forwarded pertinent documents to Vatican City as evidence of a miracle. All we must do now is raise our rings to the sky and let our powers combine to form Captain The Books That The Fans Demand. Then I guess he’ll get Joe Quesada to resign or something. And he'll stop pollution.
POLLUTION OF BAD COMICS, THAT IS!!!!!
Ok, seriously, you need to see this:
I agree with most of what Brian Hibbs had to say about this issue. It really is just a bunch of awful people doing awful things, and then Frank gets pointed in their direction and they die. Garth Ennis, however, is quite good at doing these simple things: the loathsome folks are effectively evil (the ‘game’ Maginty plays with little Billy made me want to wash my hands) and Frank has enough obstacles put in his way to at least sort of sustain the story for multiple issues. This one feels less padded than last issue, although Garth is really starting to wear himself thin with all the characters: there’s about five major villains now, not counting the sinister special forces people who’ve hooked up with Frank. The evil River Rat lady and the evil Gang Boss’ Wife have virtually nothing to distinguish them personality-wise, and the others are notable mainly by way of their physical ugliness. I will say that there’s still some funny bits in the book, even if it’s not as much a proper comedy anymore (“You think there’s any chance he’s still alive?” “Well, if he is, he’s hoppin’ everywhere an’ sittin’ down to piss.”)
Frank and his English pals have a young Irish fellow locked in the torture/exposition chamber, where he fills in all the background details that Garth has withheld. The underlying scheme doesn’t seem to make much sense: some of the players want to kill all the others and shake down a lawyer for some vital information, while others think they can get the same information by extorting/killing some of the other players themselves. If a lawyer really does have all the necessary info, I don’t know why all of the gangs don’t just go after him. Then again, most of the characters here aren’t terribly bright (intentionally). And it’s suggested (by Frank no less) that the whole game is just an excuse to get everyone killed. I’m siding with the title character on this one.
Man, there’s still two issues of this left? It looks like we're pretty close to the end. It's been a padded storyline, but I'm still enjoying it on some hazy level.
Nothing Much Else Today.
Oh, and I picked up issue #1 of the new “Challengers of the Unknown” and I fucking loved it. What did I get instead of this the week it came out? “Scratch”? Ugggggh. I’m getting the other two issues on Wednesday, and I’ll review the whole thing then. Man… I understand that the characters very well might rub some readers the wrong way, and the satire (thus far) is broad as a fucking barn door, but I think some interesting things can be done in the sledgehammer style of social critique. And Chaykin’s storytelling is really tight, with scene-shifts rolling almost page-by-page but laid out with mathematical precision. Nice playful repetition of captions and layouts. The Matrix outfits were a bit much. But it was fun stuff.
Tomorrow, we’ll discuss comics by Nick Bertozzi.
Power Man/Iron Fist/Blue Beetle/Booster Gold
Dracula/John Constantine/Archie
Jimmy Corrigan/Jim Corrigan
Mickey Mouse/Frank
As we all can see, the industry will soon be healed of its every ailment and disability. I have already forwarded pertinent documents to Vatican City as evidence of a miracle. All we must do now is raise our rings to the sky and let our powers combine to form Captain The Books That The Fans Demand. Then I guess he’ll get Joe Quesada to resign or something. And he'll stop pollution.
POLLUTION OF BAD COMICS, THAT IS!!!!!
Ok, seriously, you need to see this:
It's a short 3d animated film based on Jim Woodring's "Frank", directed by Taruto Fuyama. Maybe a tad slow, but very well designed. Check it out!!! (found on the TCJ Board)
The Punisher MAX #10I agree with most of what Brian Hibbs had to say about this issue. It really is just a bunch of awful people doing awful things, and then Frank gets pointed in their direction and they die. Garth Ennis, however, is quite good at doing these simple things: the loathsome folks are effectively evil (the ‘game’ Maginty plays with little Billy made me want to wash my hands) and Frank has enough obstacles put in his way to at least sort of sustain the story for multiple issues. This one feels less padded than last issue, although Garth is really starting to wear himself thin with all the characters: there’s about five major villains now, not counting the sinister special forces people who’ve hooked up with Frank. The evil River Rat lady and the evil Gang Boss’ Wife have virtually nothing to distinguish them personality-wise, and the others are notable mainly by way of their physical ugliness. I will say that there’s still some funny bits in the book, even if it’s not as much a proper comedy anymore (“You think there’s any chance he’s still alive?” “Well, if he is, he’s hoppin’ everywhere an’ sittin’ down to piss.”)
Frank and his English pals have a young Irish fellow locked in the torture/exposition chamber, where he fills in all the background details that Garth has withheld. The underlying scheme doesn’t seem to make much sense: some of the players want to kill all the others and shake down a lawyer for some vital information, while others think they can get the same information by extorting/killing some of the other players themselves. If a lawyer really does have all the necessary info, I don’t know why all of the gangs don’t just go after him. Then again, most of the characters here aren’t terribly bright (intentionally). And it’s suggested (by Frank no less) that the whole game is just an excuse to get everyone killed. I’m siding with the title character on this one.
Man, there’s still two issues of this left? It looks like we're pretty close to the end. It's been a padded storyline, but I'm still enjoying it on some hazy level.
Nothing Much Else Today.
Oh, and I picked up issue #1 of the new “Challengers of the Unknown” and I fucking loved it. What did I get instead of this the week it came out? “Scratch”? Ugggggh. I’m getting the other two issues on Wednesday, and I’ll review the whole thing then. Man… I understand that the characters very well might rub some readers the wrong way, and the satire (thus far) is broad as a fucking barn door, but I think some interesting things can be done in the sledgehammer style of social critique. And Chaykin’s storytelling is really tight, with scene-shifts rolling almost page-by-page but laid out with mathematical precision. Nice playful repetition of captions and layouts. The Matrix outfits were a bit much. But it was fun stuff.
Tomorrow, we’ll discuss comics by Nick Bertozzi.
posted by Jog at 10:47 PM
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