It was a small week (only 9 titles, 6 Marvel & 3 DC) with a lot of good books. Spider-man took center-stage with two Amazing offerings to go a long with his appearance in the New Avengers. Despite being on the lighter side of the fare, two out of three of the DC books acquitted themselves nicely. The Spirit continues to be a fun and well-produced read and DC Legacies was a real treat.
The Score Card
SPIRIT #3 ★★★★★
AMAZING SPIDERMAN # 634 ★★★★☆
NEW AVENGERS #1 ★★★★☆
DC UNIVERSE LEGACIES #2 ★★★★☆
NEW MUTANTS #14 ★★★★☆
AMAZING SPIDERMAN #633 ★★★☆☆
BRIGHTEST DAY #4 ★☆☆☆☆
BLACK WIDOW #3 ★★★☆☆
AGE OF HEROES #2 ★★☆☆☆
LEGEND
★★★★★ = Really, really good.
★★★★☆ = Better than average.
★★★☆☆ = Average.
★★☆☆☆ = Below average.
★☆☆☆☆ = Not good.
☢ = Unreadable.
Breaking it Down
The Top Dog (Greg’s Top Pick of the Week)
SPIRIT #3 ★★★★★ (w: Mark Schultz/ a: Moritat) The Spirit is quickly becoming one of my favorite books. The Angel Smert story arc comes to its exciting conclusion. The Octopus makes his first (?) appearance as the world of the Spirit continues to bloom. Moritat’s artwork is still one of the high points in the Spirit adding a sense of genuine “pulp” feel in his Miller-esque style. The back-up story (w: Michael Uslan & F.J. De Santo/a: Justiano) is equally pleasing.
The Good
AMAZING SPIDERMAN # 634 ★★★★☆ (w: Joe Kelly/a: Michael Lark & Stefano Gaudiano) The Guantlet is over! (Finally)... and all this time the Gauntlet has been leading to (perhaps the least hyped Spidey story arc of all time), the Grim Hunt. The Kraven’s long germinating plan finally leads them into direct contact with Spidey. Kaine, Madam Web and a couple of Spider-ladies are on hand to round out the party. One of them even comes to an untimely (if not final) end. There is a lot of story in this one little book and that’s even before you get to the two bonus features (both are pretty good by the way).
NEW AVENGERS #1 ★★★★☆ (w: Brian Michael Bendis/a: Stuart Immonen) Luke Cage, Spider-man, Wolverine, the Thing, and Ms. Marvel – this is going to be the “fun Avengers”! The new team starts off well enough, with Steve Rogers negotiating Cage into the fold. Cage actually has a pretty interesting argument for not being an Avenger, but of course knuckles under (former) Cap’s peer pressure. His selection of team mates is interesting, my best guess was he picked them by the number of covers they appeared on last month (“Hey, you were on 11 covers last month, you must be good!”). The actual story arc that starts in New Avengers #1 lands the new team smack dab in the middle of a battle royale of the heavy hitters of Marvel’s magic universe. Very few comics “do” magic well, there’s no reason to think that this story arc will be any different, but it is off to a good start.
DC UNIVERSE LEGACIES #2 ★★★★☆ (w: Len Wein/a Andy & Joe Kubert) Legacies continues to be a surprisingly good read. Legacies #2 chronicles the rise and “fall” of the Justice Society and the effect that their presence had on the world at large. From their emergence to the McCarthyism challenge (wow, take that Civil War) that sent away, Legacies #2 follows the same present-day narration and back-then “live action” sequencing that the first issue used tying in events of the “common folk” with the happenings of the cape & tights brigade. The back-up feature for Legacies #2 is a quick, but well executed, introduction to the Seven Soldiers of Victory (much more satisfying than Morrison’s @$$-backwards epic ultra-maxi series of a few years back).
NEW MUTANTS #14 ★★★★☆ (w: Zeb Wells/ a: Ibraim Roberson, Lan Medina & Nathan Fox) The Nimrods (in the present) put up much more of a fight this issue as the battle inside the Dome is not going very well for the X-men. Legion joins the battle (and believe it or not, that’s a good thing), while the casualties and fatalities continue to mount. Meanwhile, X-Factor continues their assault on the future and a very powerful, familiar face prepares to enter the fray. And Hope takes another step towards actually fulfilling her destiny in yet another good (very good) installment in the Second Coming saga.
AMAZING SPIDERMAN #633 ★★★☆☆ (w: Zeb Wells/ a: Chris Bachalo) The Lizard’s “Shed” story-arc wraps up the very long running Gauntlet. The new (old) Lizard has evolved into something entirely new and his new powers are much more devastating than he has ever been before. Gone is the bite-first and ask questions Lizard, the new (old) Lizard has some kick-@$$ psionic powers going for him. “Shed” may actually be better than a 3-★ effort, but the story itself feels as if there is a sequence missing between the middle and the big finish. The same can be said for the resolution (?) of the Aunt May subplot that has been going on for way too long for it to simply be over like that.
BLACK WIDOW #3 ★★★☆☆ (w: Marjorie Liu/a: Daniel Acuna) The Black Rose story arc continues, with Elektra on hand to slow things to a grinding halt. Remember the good old days when two comic characters would meet unexpectedly, mistakenly pick a fight and then be best buds just in time to take on the bad guy. Yeah, not so much of that in this issue, there’s a little bit of fighting, a whole lot of posturing and menacing and way too little advancement of an already thin story arc. The Avengers (except for Natasha, of course) are gone and Widow is left on her own. The Black Rose story is almost interesting, but the twists and turns are overly contrived (like reading the last Red Robin series) and are a poor substitute for more substantial writing. Up to this point, the Black Widow series has gotten by on its artwork and guest stars. Too soon to give up yet, but with the already announced impending departure of Acuna, something tells me this title won’t be on the pull-list much longer.
AGE OF HEROES #2 ★★☆☆☆ Straight from the Heroic Age comes four new tasty appetizers to wet your whistle. The best of the lot are the two very short vignettes, Young Masters and The Gauntlet, at the end of the issue. The Gravity (Sean McKeever, David Baldeon & N. Bowling) story sets the stage for McKeever’s homegrown talent’s appearance in last week’s Young Allies series, but somehow lacks the charm that the original series held. A skeptic might think it has something to do with Gravity’s preamble: “Of course nothing went the way I wanted or expected… and then suddenly I’m dead. Then resurrected. Then leading a team of super heroes… I had my secret identity revelaed to the world an then magically forgotten…” a pretty far cry from his humble beginnings, on the other hand if Peter Parker ever retires, this guy should send in his resume. The American Son story (Brian Reed, Chad HARDIN & Victor Olazaba)… uh… no, just say no. The American Son was bad enough, now an American Son mystery… no. The Young Masters (Paul Cornell & Mark Brooks) is intriguing (especially the art), but it is so short that you have to know who these characters are to make any sense of it. While the Gauntlet (Dan Slott & Ty Templeton) offering is a one-page tribute to the Armed Forces.
The Bad
BRIGHTEST DAY #4 ★☆☆☆☆ (written by: Geoff Johns & Peter Tomasi/ art: Ivan Reis, Ardian Syaf, Scott Clark, Oclair Albert) The first three issues of Brightest Day had just enough actual storytelling to pull the rest of the choppy, ridiculous vignettes through to the end of the book. That is not the case for Brightest Day #4, which is more like a collection of bits of stories (which you probably wouldn’t buy if they weren’t over-marketed) than any semblance of a coherent issue. The Deadman story doesn’t get any worse (surprisingly), but doesn’t really take a good turn as he starts hanging out with Dove & Hawk. The Hawks (man & woman) have always had a lot of potential, and when their stories are done well they are done really well. The Hawks’ curse may not be the worst part of their very complex origin(s), but it certainly isn’t being handled very well in Brightest Day. On the other hand it’s good thing for they’ve probably seen Avatar too or they’d probably be really worried about those giant floating mountains. Yes, I know, not exactly original to Avatar either… but too soon DC. Too soon. Don’t blink or you will miss the introduction of the new Aqualad, because you know we need a new one because they just killed the last one. You see how the angle is working now right? “The revolving door of death” is fixed (yeah right) in the DCU, now we’ll just fit new characters into new (think: Buy these toys kids!) costumes. No one will notice. And when they do, we’ll just bring back the originals! (Think the Atom). The Firestorm story is a (dim and shaky) bright spot, in an otherwise very dismal offering.
The Reading Order
AGE OF HEROES #2 ★★☆☆☆
AMAZING SPIDERMAN #633 ★★★☆☆
NEW AVENGERS #1 ★★★★☆
BRIGHTEST DAY #4 ★☆☆☆☆
DC UNIVERSE LEGACIES #2 ★★★★☆
AMAZING SPIDERMAN # 634 ★★★★☆
BLACK WIDOW #3 ★★★☆☆
NEW MUTANTS #14 ★★★★☆
SPIRIT #3 ★★★★★
