Keith Giffen's Blue and Gold

I haven't seen anyone else talking about this, but then again I haven't been really looking: Did you know that Keith Giffen wrote the newest issue of Justice League Unlimited (issue #43)? It came out last Wednesday, and although I occasionally pick up the comic to read to my kids (depending on how many other kids comics come out that week--usually anything Power Pack or Teen Titans Go!-related takes precedence), I totally missed this last issue because I had no idea it was something special: Keith Giffen returning to write a Blue Beetle/Booster Gold story. If you don't think that's a big deal, then you are a heartless human being.


In the story, Booster and Beetle attempt to show the Justice League how awesome they are so they can join up and, as the page here indicates, "cash in!" You really can't go wrong with Giffen on this duo, and the animated-series-style artwork fits the tone of a Giffen Justice League story perfectly. There's even a nice moment or two as Batman tries to keep Booster and Beetle's heads from swelling too much.

It's a fun comic, and you probably missed it when it first came out. I know I did.

I Like Comics: 1/23/08

I read a huge pile of today's comics, and it's probably because I've been listening to too many podcasts lately--Bendis, then Loeb, then Fraction on Word Balloon, most specifically--but I'm continuing to feel the pull of the Marvel books at the expense of the increasingly lackluster DC output. I grew up as a DC guy, but even when I was a teenager, I didn't think so much in terms of companies as I did creators. I liked Chaykin, so I read American Flagg, and I liked Steve Rude, so I read Nexus, and back in those days Marvel didn't have much of interest to me, except when Miller or Sienkiewicz (or both) came back to play. The DC icons always interested me more, as characters, as visuals, as concepts, and clearly DC put out far superior comics than Marvel in the 1980s. It's not even close. But this Quesada-era Marvel has something special going on. Say what you will about Quesada raping your childhood, and pretend that you're going to boycott something that you really won't, but Quesada has not only turned Marvel into the best mainstream company this decade, but he's brought in creators who are just beginning to heat up. Jason Aaron is sure to impress on Wolverine and Ghost Rider, Fraction will be on half a dozen titles by the end of 2008 (and my guess is that one of them will be the Young X-Men with Yanick Paquette--if the preview art is to be believed. EDITED TO NOTE: The April solicits, just posted, confirm my guess about Paquette, but Guggenheim, not Fraction, will be writing. That just gives Fraction the freedom to write more Thor!), and Brubaker is writing the best super-hero stuff of his career. Brand New Day has convincingly turned the main Spidey titles around, and even stuff that seems like it has been bled dry, like the Marvel Zombies and Ultimate Universe "franchises" continue to amuse me.

Countdown, on the other hand, even now that it's reaching its climax, still feels life-draining. By the way, why is the Ion trade paperback out of print? That seemingly inconsequential miniseries is the DIRECT lead-in to Countdown-- it establishes Captain Atom as the new Monarch, and it also ties in to the upcoming Tangent Universe stuff. If DC REALLY cares about Countdown as much as they seem to, why not keep that series in print and promote it as the "road to Countdown" or whatever the hell Marvel seems to do so successfully? Seems like a missed opportunity that would have helped sell books and make more sense out of the admittedly still poor Countdown title. I don't know why I even care, but I do, because I want DC to be better than it has been lately.

You know what is good at DC, though? You guessed it! Blue Beetle! The newest issue (#23) might be my favorite of the entire series thus far, and I've been raving about this book for over a year, so you can imagine that the newest issue is, in fact, really damn good. As I read it, I realized that John Rogers would be a PERFECT choice to take over the Legion of Super-Heroes once Jim Shooter completes his run. (I have no clue how long Shooter plans on sticking around, but if he leaves anytime in the next year or so, PUT ROGERS ON THAT BOOK!) Rogers mixes super-hero science with aliens with a kid learning to use his powers in an unconventional way with family drama and makes excellent comics out of it. Rafael Albuquerque could come along as the artist on Legion too. He's pretty great already, and I have a feeling he's going to get even better.

Teen Titans was also quite good this week, showing that Marvel did make a huge mistake in letting Sean McKeever slip away. Marvel never gave him a shot on a big book, and here he proves that his ability to write meaningful characterization can carry a story even without a billion guest stars punching eachother (which is what happened in the previous arc--and I liked the previous "Titans Army" stuff that he just completed, but in issue #55 it's all about the characters and it's GREAT).

But those two comics, as excellent as they were (and Shooter's new Legion comic wasn't bad either--although it had about eight times too many "future swears" which seemed silly in their use. If you read it, I'm sure you found them annoying too), they can't stand up to the barrage of Marvel quality: Fraction and Kitson's The Order #7, a series that's cancelled just as it's hitting its stride--and this new issue is a great example of the way Fraction uses spectacle (aka super-hero punching) as backdrop to the main conflict, which is the intellectual face-off between Henry Hellrung and Namor. Brubaker uses spectacle in a similar way in the first issue of the Young Avengers Presents Patriot, as the story centers on what it means to carry on a legacy, but it still has enough punching and kicking to keep the kids coming back to the comics shop for more. The strategy seems to be: lure them in with the punching, but keep them with the characters. That's the real Marvel Method, and Fraction and Brubaker do it as well as anyone. I even enjoyed Ultimates 3 #2 this week (Marc Caputo, are you still breathing?) with its super-exaggerated spectacle at the EXPENSE of character. The coloring is still ugly as hell, but at least Loeb filled in some of the "huh?" gaps that we were left with after issue #1. He explains why Thor acts differently all of a sudden, and you may think the reason is stupid, but at least he had a reason. And, really, the new issue isn't about logic anyway. But it does feature THREE big guest stars, one being a fun interpretation of Ultimate Spider-Man, one being a certain mutant badass, and the other being an even bigger mutant badass (you can judge which is which if you've read the book). It was fun in its excess.

Marvel: even their crap books are good today. DC: still a whole lot of counting down to go.

Quick Comic Reviews: Week of 11/28/07

I haven't done a quick review post in quite a while, and I've been reading a ton of stuff each week (to balance out my lack of moviegoing, apparently), so I'm overdue. Here goes, in no particular order...

Ultimate Spider-Man #116: I'm getting used to Immonen's new Shadowcat costume, and, honestly, Immonen is about 10 steps up from Bagley in the artistic-quality department. Bendis does his thing, and it's good. This comic is the best Spider-Man title out there, and I know that's not saying much right now, but it's pretty much everything Spider-Man should be.

Batman and the Outsiders #2: I can count on zero hands how many Chuck Dixon comics I've actually enjoyed (although, he was involved in the Batgirl: Year One series, wasn't he? That was good stuff), and I'm not all that impressed with this title, either. Conceptually, I like Batman leading this kind of dirty-jobs type of team, but this issue felt like a way for Dixon to clear the deck and abandon the Five of a Kind team that was handed to him. That's not necessarily his fault, but it doesn't make for good reading.

All-Star Batman and Robin the Boy Wonder #8: I still don't know what the point of all of this is, but I have to admit that I put this issue on the very top of the pile when I came home from the comics shop. I can't wait to see what Miller and Lee try to pull off each month or three. I like Miller's take on the Joker, even if it just sort of appears out of nowhere eight issues into this series. And I like the Green Lantern appearance, even as a fan of the character--he is kind of a goof. How does any of this add up to an actual story? 8 issues in, it doesn't. But it's certainly not dull.

Black Panther #32: Remember when Hudlin abandoned his own revamp of continuity and reconnected to the Marvel Universe through a global road trip of wife-seekery? Then the married couple traveled around diplomatically during Civil War? Then Black Panther and Storm joined the Fantastic Four and hopped around the universe with them? Doesn't the Black Panther ever stay in one place for more than a month? Apparently not, as he jumps to some Skrull-mockery of an Al Capone world from some previous FF story that I probably read years ago. The best thing about this book is Francis Portella's art. Next issue: Gladiatorial Combat! We've seen it before, frankly.

Casanova #11: There are good monthly comics, like Ultimate Spider-Man, and then there are comics like Casanova. Fraction and Moon's work will stand, decades from now, as an example of how to do great comics. Why? Each issue moves forward, swiftly. Each issue is full of insanity, allusions, and humor (like All-Star Batman and Robin) but with a coherent plot structure both within each issue and within the overall story arc (unlike All-Star Batman and Robin). Casanova is even better than you think it is.

Crime Bible: Five Lessons of Blood #2: I'm usually more interested in the contents of a book than the way it's marketed, but doesn't the name The Question have any kind of cache? It does in my house. Yet, no mention of the character anywhere in the title or caption. And the cover art is so stylized, a reader could be forgiven for interpreting the blank face on the cover as a visual metaphor. Seems a bit unnecessarily abstruse for a straightforward superhero detective story. The contents do little to rise above what might be expected.

Lord Havok and the Extremists #2: This, on the other hand, is better than you might expect. I expected absolutely nothing from this series, and it's decent. It's fun to see the Marvel analogues twisted into a mockery of a post-Civil War malaise, and this particular issue delves into the fractured psyche of the Doc Ock analogue, Gorgon, in a story that unfortunately ends with bathos. The ending is ridiculous, both in pacing and content (as Gorgon learns the "truth" about his life in a series of expository panels), but I was enjoying the comic quite a bit until those final pages. I do like the final image of the comic, with Lord Hovok (aka Dr. Doom) giving the symbolic metal finger to Monarch.

Teen Titans #53: McKeever has quickly righted this particular ship. I love the direction of this arc, and if the trend toward maximalism has become a bit played out (Justice League UNLIMITED, Injustice SOCIETY, and here: Titan ARMY), at least it's amazingly, freakin' awesome. I'll take awesome over dullness any day, and that's what McKeever brings. Eddy Barrows art looks sharper here than it did on Countdown to Adventure, and any comic which has Blue Beetle facing down an overwhelming horde of evil Starro-infected Titans is worth the cover charge.

Superman/Batman #43: Mike McKone has become one of the best superhero artists of the decade, and this issue showcases his work nicely. Unfortunately, the story is nothing special, although it's a step above the previous arc, which felt like a quickly burned off inventory story (DC clearly doesn't want Fourth World stuff sitting around once the Death of the New Gods ends--hence we get overloaded with stories about the New Gods like we saw in this series and Superman Confidential). A pretty comic, though.

Green Lantern Corps #18: This whole Sinestro Corps thing has gone on too long, honestly. And I don't like how DC justifies it by saying things (I'm paraphrasing), like "we didn't expect it to be such a hit, so we allowed the creators more time to tell the story," instead of honestly saying, "we're milking it." The expansion of the story has killed its momentum, and since we know how it ends, basically, because of Kyle Rayner and Superman-Prime's appearances in Countdown it all seems kind of silly at this point. Yet, and issue where an Ion-powered Daxamite throws down with a Kryptonian can't be all bad. Too bad the story has been deflated by external DC events.

Superman Annual #13: I really could not care less about this "Camelot Falls" arc. What a waste of talent.

Batman #671: This was my least-favorite Morrison issue of Batman thus far. It seems like exactly what it is, a Bat-family crossover arc that hits all of its marks, but has none of the inspiration of Morrison's usual work. It's a solid issue, but nothing more.

Madman Atomic Comics #5: Mike Allred is one of my top five favorite comic book artists ever. Okay, maybe not top five, but he's definitely in the top seven. And, as I blogged about last summer, his metaphysical, quasi-religious exploration continues in the Madman universe. This issue features the Atomics, zombie-beatniks-turned-fashionable-superheroes, and it looks amazing. The pacing has picked up now that Frank Einstein has returned from his metafictional space jaunt, and I have nothing bad to say about this comic. It is what it is, and what it is is very, very good. (That was not the best sentence I've ever constructed, I know.)

Blue Beetle #21: This has been an excellent monthly series for DC. Like Ultimate Spider-Man, it mixes humor with adolescent drama and a young man trying to figure out how to be a hero. Both comics have interesting supporting casts, tight dialogue, and dynamic artwork. Unlike Ultimate Spider-Man, however, this series doesn't rely on decades of past stories for its foundation. Blue Beetle exists in relation to its past incarnations, but it doesn't retread old ground--it moves the Beetle legacy forward, and it does so with style. This issue, a fill-in, maintains the quality of the series admirably, as Jaime Reyes confronts issues of justice and vengeance in the form of the Spectre. It's the type of comic I can read aloud to my son (and I do), and enjoy fully as an adult as well. Blue Beetle won't break any artistic ground, but it is an excellent superhero comic.

Daredevil #102: Brubaker is hitting his stride on this title now, and with the appearances of the Enforcers, the Wrecker, and Razor Fist, I really couldn't be happier with this issue. Daredevil has become one of Marvel's most tortured heroes, and as much as I like to see him struggle in his own web of lies and hubris, I like to see him kicking supervillains in the face. Brubaker balances both nicely.

Supergirl and the Legion of Super-Heroes #36: Tony Bedard was clearly brought in to set the table for Jim Shooter. Bring back the superheroics: Check. Get rid of Supergirl: Check. Keep it dramatic but less political: Check. Introduce Wildfire: Check (although Shooter apparently dislikes the character--so was that something Bedard did just to screw with him?). Anyway, I think this Legion Threeboot has been a reasonably interesting take on the team--Waid and Kitson's run read much better as a single story, and Bedard and Calero have illuminated new corners in the Threeboot universe. I would have been perfectly happy to see where Bedard and Calero would have taken this series over the next years, but after seeing Manipul's designs and covers for Shooter's upcoming run, I'm actually excited to see what will happen next. Shooter's Legion might be a failure--last time he came back to write the series, he was the epitome of blandness--but maybe he's hungry, maybe he's going to shock us all. I'm looking forward to issue #37, I don't know about you.