Wednesday's New Things: South of the Border

1) For most of the summer, I've been working my way through Gilbert and Jamie Hernandez's Love and Rockets stories. Although I approached the project with what I thought were fresh eyes, it turns out that I had read Heartbreak Soup before and, apparently, forgotten about it; after my rereading, my forgetfulness is clearly insane. I like Jamie's work a lot, but its spiky, sometimes caustic, whereas Beto's work, even when it's violent, is sweet, tender (I think that the may read different because of how the two comicsmiths structure their stories, Jamie like a serial, Gilbert more episodically). While the Maggie and Hopey stories are probably more interesting, I think I like Heartbreak Soup just a little bit more, maybe because it leaves room for the possibility of books like The Children of Palomar. The book, which features stories set in the early days of the little Central American town, promises mystery and a little bit of magic, something Jamie, Maggie and Hopey left behind in their own younger days. 

2) Seriously, how great is it that 100 Bullets is back? It's been a long time since the first or second best crime book of this era ended its run.  I read this mini's first issue when it came out a couple of months ago, and it was sort of like going home; everything that made the original series great, Risso's brutal art, Azzarello's twisted mind, was there for the taking. This, in spite of the fact that, so many years on, so many comic books later, I could barely remember who Lono was, why I cared about him. I suppose it doesn't really matter, since these two are so good that the book works in context or out of it. I just wonder if it wouldn't have been more interesting, and more effective, if they tried it with some new characters.

3) While I'm playing Wednesday morning quarterback, doesn't Marvel's Nova series seem like a missed opportunity? I know that the premise has shades of Younger Avengers, but I think that there could be some good stuff here, a chance to do a fun book with good art that's appealing for a bunch of age groups, like Thor: The Mighty Avenger but in continuity. The preview, featuring the new creative team of Zeb Wells and Paco Medina is fine, but it seems a little bit rote. Nova's inexperienced! Doc Spidey is a jerk! Yawn. Look, Nova's a kid-- send him into space, make me worry about him, about what it means to be a kid with a super powered helmet. Next month's issue looks promising; let's see how it goes.

4) Joy Division? Aztecs? Time travel? What could be bad? I bought the first issue of this when it came out a couple of years ago, but I had to do it online and, as the issues came out inconsistently, I basically lost track of it after that. I think I'll probably pick up this hardcover, or at least the trade when it comes out-- Sam Humprhies had some crazy stuff up his sleeve for this one, I bet. Some preview pages here.

Marvel!NOW and Jason Aaron's Great God Thor

I'm in the middle of the second part of my big move, this time going from Chicago to Austin, TX, my final destination and my home for the foreseeable future. Tonight, I'm in Joplin, Missouri, and I didn't fall asleep right away after an almost ten hour drive, leaving me some time to catch up on my books. Among the lot of good stuff that came out on Wednesday was the last issue of the first arc of Jason Aaron's Thor: God of Thunder; although I was suspicious about this title's potential when it was announced, my fears were quickly assuaged. Aaron is a very talented storyteller, and one with many hats, and Esad Ribic shook off some trouble with facial expressions at the starting line, becoming one of the better Frank Frazetta-influenced comics illustrators I've ever seen.

As the books that were relaunched as part of Marvel!NOW begin to reach their first birthdays, its been interesting to me thinking about their relative success or failure, in light of the creative failure of DC's New 52 initiative, which is now almost two. Whereas DC reinvented their characters and their universe, they didn't really do anything interesting or exciting with their talent pool. Mostly they just shuffled around some creators to see what stuck. To a certain extent, Marvel did the same thing with Marvel!NOW-- they just did a better job of it. Putting Jason Aaron on Thor was an inspired move; he was willing to separate the character from the very good, although somewhat onerous, past few years of story, which freed him to write a very, very good book. Aaron's Thor is dark fairytale about what it means to be a god and whether or not gods are good. What he ends up suggesting, at least in passing, is that people need things to believe in and that gods, good or bad, are as good a thing as any. In other words, its just the sort of pop-philosophy that makes Marvel so great, done in the high adventure/sci-fi combo that Thor is just right for.

This is exactly why Marvel!NOW worked where the New 52 seems to have failed; Marvel gave me a reason to give their new stuff a try, reinventing old ideas rather than recycling them, while DC seemed to be trying to make me take a pass. This isn't to say that the books are uniformly better at Marvel right now than they are at DC, just that, a year on from the relaunch, the House of Ideas is at the high point of a recent creative resurgence. Aaron and Ribic seem like a good bet to keep it going; let's hope the rest of the publisher's good books can, too. 

Coming Soon To A Spinner Rack Near You: Paul Hornschemeier

From Paul Hornschemeier's blog:

What’s inside? Some of the contents will be from upcoming projects, projects that fell through the cracks, discussions of various processes, and interviews with nonexistent people. There will be scripts, short stories, gags, enlarged arms, and links to secret things you otherwise won’t get to see. Probably there’s a fart joke in there somewhere. Maybe a philosopher or two. 

Wednesday's New Thing: Saga! Hickman! Hickman!

1) Boy oh boy, Saga is back. I sort of like that Brian K Vaughn and Fiona Staples take a break every six issues. I understand that it gives the time to do better work, but what I mean is that I like it from a reader's perspective-- the six months on two months off schedule gives the book the feel of a real serial, reinforcing the idea that this potentially infinite story comes in finite chunks, each one with its distinct beginning, middle, and end. It's a neat sort of way of taming the series, inflicting the one benefit of a collection on that section of the reading public too enamored of Saga to trade wait it. Preview here.

2) One of Jonathan Hickman's many ongoing projects, East Of West is flawed, a little hard to follow. My hope is that this opacity is purposeful, and that all will be revealed in time to the readers who are paying close enough attention. It may be that each issue East of West is more rewarding on the second read than on the first; I haven't tried rereading any of them but, lest you be scared away, Nick Dragotta's art should be enough to keep you satisfied on that first go round.

3) Speaking of Hickman, today sees the release of the first issue of his Infinity crossover for Marvel. Given the fetid mediocrity that was Age of Ultron, I'm keeping my expectations for this one low; with that said, and although the last issue of the otherwise sterling New Avengers was basically incomprehensible, I figure that, if anyone can do this well, its Hickman. It'll be interesting to see how he pulls together the unrelated impending destruction of the world threads from Avengers and New Avengers, and what Thanos has to do with it. That Jim Cheung's on the art here helps, as does the setup of the series, which only asks me to buy three books outside of my normal pull list, and those over the course of only two months. Preview here.

Chatter: Nick Dragotta

For a while I drew my comics and over-acted everything. Wide eyes, open mouths, everything was over the top. Now I think it’s much better to use that sparingly and let the reader inject themselves into the character by trying to draw more of a subtle emotion. Do the eyes have a soul? For me that’s were I try to start, and then over time the characters will just start to come alive. Comics visually speak a universal language, add to that just the right words and you can feel it in the gut.

--Nick Dragotta, talking to Robot 6