On 10 May, 2006

When I go to my LCS, usually mid-afternoon on Wednesday of late, there typically aren't many people there. I usually just chat with S. who, as it turns out, is a Marvel kinda guy. T., a DC guy, is cool, too, and knows what I like to read better than I do by now, but S. and I have more to talk about. At least, that's how it seems.

This week, though, I chatted a bit with another customer instead. He was a middle-aged (I think) guy, wearing an ID card from a local hospital (already, a good first impression!), just browsing the comics on the wall as I was. Comfortable guy. So I asked him what I now realize is probably just an idiot newbie question, which I swear I'll never ask again: "So, are you a Marvel, DC, or indie guy?" Or maybe it was "fan," not "guy." Something like that. Whatever. You get the gist. Dumb question however it's phrased. He's a DC, some Marvel. He asked me in turn. "Mostly Marvel." We chatted a bit, mostly about Infinite Crisis, how to understand it I might have to pick up the first Crisis. He pulled Crisis on Multiple Earths 4 off the shelf, flipped through it. Volume 4? Yeesh. He explained that it really wasn't a part of Crisis on Infinite Earths, but... still. (S. is probably right; there are better things for me to spend my money on, meaning things I actually care about.) Anyway... A quick chat about how many layers the DC 'verse has, how much simpler Marvel's is. I came off sounding like a simple-minded idiot but... eh. (I don't want to have to keep track of three competing Captain Americas on a regular basis. That's not wrong, is it?)

So I went to check out, with my three Marvels and two indies. He followed shortly thereafter, a copy of Infinite Crisis #7 proudly in hand. I sort of showed him what I had, but with that She-Hulk cover in there... Okay, yeah, awkward.

At that, I paid, and went on my embarrassed little way, back to the mind-numbing boredom of student work, and the anticipation of reading my modest little haul.

FYI. On an unrelated note, David of Yet Another Comics Blog is generously holding Free Comic Book Month 2, and there is still time to enter.

Reading music: Liz Carroll and John Doyle: In Play

--Warning: Spoilers ahead--

Image

Lions, Tigers and Bears Vol 2. #1 : Oh, gosh, that's adorable. Living stuffed animals and good little children versus the evil beasties. I think this might be something worth passing on to my younger cousins. Might even be worth finishing out, since it's a mini-series, not an ongoing. Hard not to enjoy this. So mind-numbingly cute...

Do I Know What I Just Read? Yes
Do I Care? Sort of, yeah.

Marvel

Fantastic Four: First Family #3: Okay. Sue displays force-field powers early on (and is therefore not totally useless), in a way that actually fits with the established origin. Plus, it's awesome. There's enough hostage-bait Sue in the early Kirby/Lee days. We don't need any more of that in this day and age.

Not sure what to make of Reed's adversary, especially since he shows up (sort of) in the middle of a big fight with that giant iguana monster. (It was a most excellent battle.)

Do I Know What I Just Read? Yes.
Do I Care? Yes.

She-Hulk 2 #7: Let it be first noted that Dan Slott has found a way to make the Hank Pym joke without coming across as crass. Hardly the highlight of the issue, but still worth noting.

But really, on to the comic. Starfox is creepy. Everybody knows this. He is, apparently, endowed with enough power to turn a straight man gay. Not (in the immortal words of Jerry Seinfeld) that there's anything wrong with that, at least not the sexual orientation aspect. But the turning? There is something awfully wrong about that. I don't care who the victim was. But Eros of Titan gets what's coming to him, as does She-Hulk's gamma charger in a related event, and the whole scene is more satisfying than it really has any right to be. (Needless to say, Starfox may not be wooing anybody for a while, in the event that he ever does again.)

Meanwhile, on the romantic entanglement front, Jen is still deeply in love with John Jameson to the point of submission, which scares the Wasp; and Mallory is all over Awesome Andy like Wanda on Vision, which scares me. The whole thing also disturbs Pug and creeps out Stu Cicero, whose metacommentary is starting to make me wonder if Stu isn't the Marvel incarnation of Dan Slott.

Do I Know What I Just Read? Yes.
Do I Care?


Edit/Note: This issue has generated a bit of controversy. Not a huge surprise, given the subject matter, but it's also not something I really want to get into, at least not here, in this blog. So...

LET'S MOVE ON, SHALL WE?

You know, I'm really not sure what to make of X-Men: The 198 #5. The ending is ambiguous at best. Okay, let's recap. A big fight, a showdown with Absolon, Johnny Dee working behind the scenes against Absolon and his crew, the apparent death and possible rebirth (or evolution or something) of Absolon.

Do I Know What I Just Read? Not really, no.
Do I Care? Er... No.

SLG Publishing

The Cemetarians #1: I love a good horror (or horrorish) story, but this one just didn't click for me somehow. An evil mermaid in the sewers as a mastermind behind an evil pyramid scheme involving a fake eternal youth elixer made from manitees? Not really my cup of tea, I guess. Hrm. The running manitee gag was fun, though.

Do I Know What I Just Read? I'm not sure. I think so.
Do I Care? Wish I could say I did. But no.

Week's most memorable moment(s): Sue's unexpected yet lifesaving force field in Fantastic Four: First Family #3.



Tentative checklist for 17 May, 2006

Haunt of Horror: Edgar Allan Poe #1
Marvel Legacy: The 1970s #2
Ms. Marvel #3
Ultimate Wolverine vs. Hulk #3

On 3 May, 2006

It's Spring! What more is there to say? Spring in Michigan is a wonderful, wonderful thing.

Reading music: Serenity soundtrack (Yes, again. It makes for extremely effective background music.)

--Warning: Spoilers ahead--

Dark Horse

Archenemies #2: One of my favorite things about old-school Doonesbury is the unlikely friendship between B.D. (a first generation character, jock and professional soldier) and Phred the Terrorist. B.D. is the "good guy." Back in the day, he was eager to drink, party, and fight both on the football field and in the 'Nam. Phred, a Vietcong terrorist because "his family pressured him into it," saved B.D.'s life (when they were both lost in the jungle) by finding a cache of beer. Needless to say, B.D. overcame his prejudices and got to be good buddies with a sworn enemy. (If you don't believe me, check The Doonesbury Chronicles out of your local library. Or get it used for extremely cheap on Amazon. Either way...)

The relationship between Ethan and Vincent, the Archenemies, has a similar vibe. Ethan is gaining some dimension and becoming more likeable; and Vincent is becoming more sympathetic even as he sets death traps for his roommate. Ethan remains kind of clueless, but he's getting more difficult to dislike. I'm still rooting for Vincent Darko, which seems odd until I remember that, hey, I've always preferred Phred to B.D., too.

Marvel

Amazing Spiderman #531: Okay, I really don't mind reading a comic rife with testimony before a Senate subcommittee. Chalk it up to growing up with a bureaucrat who is heavily into the policy end of things. C'est la vie. Spidey's battle with Titanium Man and Stark's disturbing subterfuge made up for the contrived Abraham Lincoln stuff.

So Marvel keeps asking, "What side are you on?" I started out anti-Registration, but after reading Civil War #1, I'm not so sure anymore. It would probably help if the writers over at Marvel wrote up the actual proposal and published it somewhere for us to read. They probably won't (too dry), but wouldn't it be kind of cool if they did, just to lend a little authenticity to the whole "event?"

Okay, maybe not. Anyway, this is actually some compelling storytelling, the philosophical debate well-balanced with non-gratuitous action sequences. Nice.

Doc Samson #5: Tina Punnett uses her ubergeek skills to free herself from the virtual reality game and her friends (Jack and Whistlepig) from the slot machine; Doc Samson psychoanalyzes his Earth-617 doppelganger; and the team battles nightmarish beasties from the Dream Dimension. And Doc somehow doesn't get banned from the casino for card-counting. That's it. End of series.

The backup story about Whistlepig and the dreamcatcher is adorable, though.

Marvel Romance Redux I Should Have Been A Blonde: Holy crap. That first 18-page story just dragged on. Frankly, the commentary of the captions from page 12 onwards didn't help much. *sigh* "The Language of Love" and "The Girl with Bogart's Brain" weren't much better. The highlights? "Hedy's Uncomfortable Fanmail" and "Patsy Walker's Battlesuits!" Two pages out of, what, 32? cripes. Ah, well, at least it had its moments.

Week's most memorable moment: In Archenemies #2, Vincent sits in front of his computer, sketching a deathtrap for Ethan. The computer monitor displays AEbay, an auction site selling such things as anvils and Laser-guided Penguins.

Tentative checklist for 10 May, 2006

Fantastic Four: First Family #3
She-Hulk 2 #7
X-Men: The 198 #5

Ahead of His Time

Fantastic Four #22 was originally printed in January, 1964, when John Kerry was still an undergrad at Yale. Kerry's tour of duty in Vietnam wouldn't start for another two years or so, and he wouldn't really make a name for himself until he joined the antiwar movement.

He still ended up in those funny pages, though.





Jack Kirby: Ahead of his time.