You Would Think Otherwise, But...

You might think that Marvels: Eye of the Camera, the long-awaited sequel to Busiek and Ross's Marvels would be pretty good. Busiek returns as the writer, and artist Jay Anacleto is a capable enough painter. Marvels was a great series, right? Probably the best thing Alex Ross has ever been involved with?

Maybe, but Eye of the Camera is terrible. The art is too soft and airy, the regular humans look bland, the entire purpose of their existence lost without the glorious costumed heroes to contrast them with. The story is all the worst bits of Phil Sheldon mixed with a distinct lack of the "marvel"-lous. It's what Marvels could have been, in lesser hands. And it's apparently what Busiek produces when he works with someone who's not Alex Ross.

Augie liked the first issue a lot. I didn't. At all. After seeing an advance copy, I'm definitely not going to be picking it up at the shop this week, and as everyone knows, I buy EVERYTHING. So, if I'm skipping it, it can't be very good at all.

What I will be getting, though, is the Punisher Max X-Mas Special, which might end up being my favorite comic of the week. I read an advanced copy of this too, and I loved it.

If someone told me a year ago that I would prefer a Punisher Christmas one-shot to the Busiek-written sequel to Marvels, I would have thought they were silly. But, it turns out they were not silly at all. Punisher Max X-Mas is what it's all about. Eye of the Camera, not so much.

Did I mention that the Punisher comic is written by Jason Aaron? Yeah, it's good.

Speaking of the Punisher, I decided to write 3,000 words about the character for this week's "When Words Collide." And I don't even particularly like the Punisher.