Crazy Blogger Ryan’s back, everyone! What zany, madcap format does he have for us this week?!?!?
Well, none, actually. Been a crazy couple of weeks at the store. Pair that with all our excitement over things like Iron Man 3 on DVD and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. hitting the airwaves, and we could use a bit of normalcy.
Of course, “normalcy” for us isn’t what the general public would call it. I won’t use their words because I try to keep this page somewhat family-friendly. But enough about that, let’s get to some reviews!
The Trial of the Punisher 1 (Guggenheim/ Yu): Before the Geneva convention, before a trial by one’s peers, before written law, there was punishment - smacking the guy that done you wrong. Frank Castle lost respect for “more civilized” legal systems a while back, but now he’s going to get a new perspective on them.
Manhunts organized by police, armies, and superheroes couldn’t capture the Punisher, but his own code of ethics might. He visits a NYPD precinct to confess for the murder of an assistant district attorney and a few weeks later, sees the inside of a courtroom. He’s treated poorly by his prison neighbors and some of the guards. His court-appointed attorney is trying to do right by him, went to law school because she was smart, and concludes that whatever brought Castle to court, it wasn’t a guilty conscience.
Last we saw Castle, he was doing community service with the Thunderbolts, that bunch of rare-do-wells on a slippery path of reformation. Before that, he lost an eye and helped break a cop-killer out of jail. He’s mercurial. He goes through phases. In other words, people write him differently. People don’t really read a Punisher story for the character because he changes all the time. People read Punisher stories because they want to see how many bad guys he can break before it ends. Only a few go down in this issue, but it promises more. I mean it, the only way it could more blatantly promise is if Castle wrote and signed an affidavit swearing he would kill X+4 more people each issue or something.
As serious in tone as this is, I’m not sure what to make of pushing an organized legal system onto someone that’s built himself on the idea that he doesn’t respect that system’s ability. I could be overthinking it, but I doubt it.
Sex Criminals 1 (Fraction/ Zdarsky): If you’re looking for a book about strange people engaging in criminal acts for a sexual thrill, why? And for that matter, why are you looking for them in a comic shop? You don’t need to, and even if you were, you wouldn’t find them here. As one might expect from Matt Fraction, Sex Criminals is a lot more complex that what it looks like.
Suzie has daddy issues. Books are about the only thing on the planet that taught her anything useful, and she loves them for it. Like many book lovers, her head can get cluttered, and there’s one thing in particular that’ll calm it down. It’s not something she shares with many people, people having proved poor subjects to share with. Then a guy named Jon comes along, quotes some literature-inspired-song lyrics, and her quiet place suddenly has a visitor.
At the risk of sounding genophobic, I’m pretty sure Sex Criminals is trying to hurt its readers. It builds one concept up, gradually and naturally, only to blindside it with a concept that, while not contradictory (CC Note: heh heh, “dic”), is NOT where you expect it to go. It does this several times throughout the book, which is a well-endowed (CC Note: you’re doing this on purpose now, aren’t you?) 33 pages long. (Don’t know what you’re talking about.) It is absolutely only for mature readers, which it explains in plain language on the back cover right above the barcode, yet it’s the best bang on the market for the $3.50 asking price. (CC Note: That! That right there, that’s what you’re doing!)
I really, REALLY wanted to use this entire blog entry reviewing the latest issues from the creative teams of Vaughan/ Staples and Casey/ Kowalski so I could devote an entire week to explaining how Saga is better than Sex, but instead I’m going to just take a bit to say this is a smart, darkly funny book. It’s not a book to prove to anyone how mature you are, but if you’re legally able it’s worth picking up.
Batman 23.4 - Joker’s Daughter (Nocenti/ Jeanty): I haven’t been digging the Villain’s Month books, personally. Sometimes they’re barely veiled tributes to other stories, other times they come off as reinventions that don’t explain crucial changes, but they’re not all bad. The threat of Joker’s Daughter has been quietly building for a few months now, mostly in the “Channel 52” blurbs, so now that there’s some full attention being pointed at this mystery, we can figure something out.
Once upon a time, there was a little girl who was born into a nice family that would give her anything she wanted… so long as it was pretty. The girl liked ugly things; shaggy mutts, broken toys, dog-eared books, they all made her smile, but her family wouldn’t let her keep them. So she ran to where the ugly things are, the underground waterworld of Gotham City. She found a way of life too ugly for even her to be comfortable with, a leader far too pretty for her comfort, and a new face, one that was last seen beaten off the Joker by his arch-nemesis. With a face like that, very few people are going to tell her “no”, and those that do are going to have to deal with her amateur plastic surgery hobby.
SPOILER ALERT: She is NOT the biological product of the Joker. She’s not a fan or a groupy, and she’s got no beef with anything Batty. I like this. She’s a unique character with her own agenda, her own methods. Why adopt Joker’s ID? Because it was there for the taking, she wants cred fast, and Mistah Jay’s not in a position to call foul anytime soon. It’s a high-stake move, but one that she can get away with for a while, maybe long enough to adopt a moniker more suited to her own methodology. The story is about a 20-minute takeover of an entire Gotham City district, the writing a bit exposition-heavy, but not too much so, and if anyone’s reading Buffy right now, they know just how well Jeanty can portray young women fighting the world.
This isn’t the best book on the shelves this week, but it’s far from the worst. If you’re curious at all about the new kid under the block, this would be a good investment.
Criminal Macabre The Eyes of Frankenstein 1 (Niles/ Mitten): I look at the calendar and realize it’s the last week of September. Next week will be October, and the Halloween season will be in full swing. Only fitting then that a new chapter of Criminal Macabre start up. Let’s take a look.
Cal Macdonald likes to complain, perhaps for good reason. He saw his first death of another person at the age of six, he’s been haunted since he hit puberty, and now he’s dead. That said, he’s gainfully employed, friends bring him cars, and for a dead guy he’s still finding tiny joys as well as walking among the living. Seems like a sweet gig to me. Now the monster created by Dr. Frankenstein, he’s got worries. He’s never going to be able to walk among the normals, the guy’s got more daddy issues than a team of therapists could possibly imagine, and to top it all off he’s losing his eyesight, and for a guy that loves to read, that truly blows. Cal’s got about 99 problems (his fellow ghouls are laying down and dying, which shouldn’t be possible), but he’s gonna help the freshly named Adam find a new pair of peepers.
This is a great jumping-on point for readers unfamiliar with the series. Who, What, When, and Where get covered in the first three pages, and Why builds throughout the issue. It’s hard to get lost. For a horror book, a little lost is a good thing, so as far as tone goes this feels very off. This should be where more experienced fans will find their footing. There’s plenty of history behind everyone and everything in this book, which’ll make returning readers feel right at home.
Criminal Macabre isn’t for everyone, but then it never was. It treats the monstrous with a casual form of dark humor that strikes me almost as vaudeville noir. If that’s your thing - or if you want a book that’s just like Supernatural but don’t want to fall into that clique - then this is a good book for you.
(CC Note: Hey, wait a minute, these are all issue 1’s! I thought this was supposed to be a standard review blog update!)
(They are standard reviews. Of number 1’s. Sucker!)
That’s it for this week, everyone! Let’s try this again next week, shall we?
Well, none, actually. Been a crazy couple of weeks at the store. Pair that with all our excitement over things like Iron Man 3 on DVD and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. hitting the airwaves, and we could use a bit of normalcy.
Of course, “normalcy” for us isn’t what the general public would call it. I won’t use their words because I try to keep this page somewhat family-friendly. But enough about that, let’s get to some reviews!
The Trial of the Punisher 1 (Guggenheim/ Yu): Before the Geneva convention, before a trial by one’s peers, before written law, there was punishment - smacking the guy that done you wrong. Frank Castle lost respect for “more civilized” legal systems a while back, but now he’s going to get a new perspective on them.
Manhunts organized by police, armies, and superheroes couldn’t capture the Punisher, but his own code of ethics might. He visits a NYPD precinct to confess for the murder of an assistant district attorney and a few weeks later, sees the inside of a courtroom. He’s treated poorly by his prison neighbors and some of the guards. His court-appointed attorney is trying to do right by him, went to law school because she was smart, and concludes that whatever brought Castle to court, it wasn’t a guilty conscience.
Last we saw Castle, he was doing community service with the Thunderbolts, that bunch of rare-do-wells on a slippery path of reformation. Before that, he lost an eye and helped break a cop-killer out of jail. He’s mercurial. He goes through phases. In other words, people write him differently. People don’t really read a Punisher story for the character because he changes all the time. People read Punisher stories because they want to see how many bad guys he can break before it ends. Only a few go down in this issue, but it promises more. I mean it, the only way it could more blatantly promise is if Castle wrote and signed an affidavit swearing he would kill X+4 more people each issue or something.
As serious in tone as this is, I’m not sure what to make of pushing an organized legal system onto someone that’s built himself on the idea that he doesn’t respect that system’s ability. I could be overthinking it, but I doubt it.
Sex Criminals 1 (Fraction/ Zdarsky): If you’re looking for a book about strange people engaging in criminal acts for a sexual thrill, why? And for that matter, why are you looking for them in a comic shop? You don’t need to, and even if you were, you wouldn’t find them here. As one might expect from Matt Fraction, Sex Criminals is a lot more complex that what it looks like.
Suzie has daddy issues. Books are about the only thing on the planet that taught her anything useful, and she loves them for it. Like many book lovers, her head can get cluttered, and there’s one thing in particular that’ll calm it down. It’s not something she shares with many people, people having proved poor subjects to share with. Then a guy named Jon comes along, quotes some literature-inspired-song lyrics, and her quiet place suddenly has a visitor.
At the risk of sounding genophobic, I’m pretty sure Sex Criminals is trying to hurt its readers. It builds one concept up, gradually and naturally, only to blindside it with a concept that, while not contradictory (CC Note: heh heh, “dic”), is NOT where you expect it to go. It does this several times throughout the book, which is a well-endowed (CC Note: you’re doing this on purpose now, aren’t you?) 33 pages long. (Don’t know what you’re talking about.) It is absolutely only for mature readers, which it explains in plain language on the back cover right above the barcode, yet it’s the best bang on the market for the $3.50 asking price. (CC Note: That! That right there, that’s what you’re doing!)
I really, REALLY wanted to use this entire blog entry reviewing the latest issues from the creative teams of Vaughan/ Staples and Casey/ Kowalski so I could devote an entire week to explaining how Saga is better than Sex, but instead I’m going to just take a bit to say this is a smart, darkly funny book. It’s not a book to prove to anyone how mature you are, but if you’re legally able it’s worth picking up.
Batman 23.4 - Joker’s Daughter (Nocenti/ Jeanty): I haven’t been digging the Villain’s Month books, personally. Sometimes they’re barely veiled tributes to other stories, other times they come off as reinventions that don’t explain crucial changes, but they’re not all bad. The threat of Joker’s Daughter has been quietly building for a few months now, mostly in the “Channel 52” blurbs, so now that there’s some full attention being pointed at this mystery, we can figure something out.
Once upon a time, there was a little girl who was born into a nice family that would give her anything she wanted… so long as it was pretty. The girl liked ugly things; shaggy mutts, broken toys, dog-eared books, they all made her smile, but her family wouldn’t let her keep them. So she ran to where the ugly things are, the underground waterworld of Gotham City. She found a way of life too ugly for even her to be comfortable with, a leader far too pretty for her comfort, and a new face, one that was last seen beaten off the Joker by his arch-nemesis. With a face like that, very few people are going to tell her “no”, and those that do are going to have to deal with her amateur plastic surgery hobby.
SPOILER ALERT: She is NOT the biological product of the Joker. She’s not a fan or a groupy, and she’s got no beef with anything Batty. I like this. She’s a unique character with her own agenda, her own methods. Why adopt Joker’s ID? Because it was there for the taking, she wants cred fast, and Mistah Jay’s not in a position to call foul anytime soon. It’s a high-stake move, but one that she can get away with for a while, maybe long enough to adopt a moniker more suited to her own methodology. The story is about a 20-minute takeover of an entire Gotham City district, the writing a bit exposition-heavy, but not too much so, and if anyone’s reading Buffy right now, they know just how well Jeanty can portray young women fighting the world.
This isn’t the best book on the shelves this week, but it’s far from the worst. If you’re curious at all about the new kid under the block, this would be a good investment.
Criminal Macabre The Eyes of Frankenstein 1 (Niles/ Mitten): I look at the calendar and realize it’s the last week of September. Next week will be October, and the Halloween season will be in full swing. Only fitting then that a new chapter of Criminal Macabre start up. Let’s take a look.
Cal Macdonald likes to complain, perhaps for good reason. He saw his first death of another person at the age of six, he’s been haunted since he hit puberty, and now he’s dead. That said, he’s gainfully employed, friends bring him cars, and for a dead guy he’s still finding tiny joys as well as walking among the living. Seems like a sweet gig to me. Now the monster created by Dr. Frankenstein, he’s got worries. He’s never going to be able to walk among the normals, the guy’s got more daddy issues than a team of therapists could possibly imagine, and to top it all off he’s losing his eyesight, and for a guy that loves to read, that truly blows. Cal’s got about 99 problems (his fellow ghouls are laying down and dying, which shouldn’t be possible), but he’s gonna help the freshly named Adam find a new pair of peepers.
This is a great jumping-on point for readers unfamiliar with the series. Who, What, When, and Where get covered in the first three pages, and Why builds throughout the issue. It’s hard to get lost. For a horror book, a little lost is a good thing, so as far as tone goes this feels very off. This should be where more experienced fans will find their footing. There’s plenty of history behind everyone and everything in this book, which’ll make returning readers feel right at home.
Criminal Macabre isn’t for everyone, but then it never was. It treats the monstrous with a casual form of dark humor that strikes me almost as vaudeville noir. If that’s your thing - or if you want a book that’s just like Supernatural but don’t want to fall into that clique - then this is a good book for you.
(CC Note: Hey, wait a minute, these are all issue 1’s! I thought this was supposed to be a standard review blog update!)
(They are standard reviews. Of number 1’s. Sucker!)
That’s it for this week, everyone! Let’s try this again next week, shall we?
Looking for older Variant Coverage Blogs by Ryan Walsh for Comic Carnival? They're here: Variant Coverage Blog Back Issues
