Madman #1(Image/Atomic Comics, W: Mike Allred, A: Mike Allred)
Overview: Madman was a comic I read rabidly years ago when I was first into comics, that died for the most part awhile ago. The basic story is about Frank Einstein, a corpse that two scientists re-animated as part of an experiment. He eventually becomes some kind of a super hero and has really bizarre adventures. It was a pretty weird comic that was usually pretty funny as well.
Current Storyline: This first issue basically re-capped the back story as Madman finds himself alone amongst a city full of dead people. Some kind of robot drone tries to talk him through it and help him figure out where he is and why he's gotten to this point. This is a pretty lackluster review but it's a good comic, albeit a little too "zap-pow-the 50's were neato!" for me. And I feel like too many assholes who like hot rods and pin up girls would be into this, and that's one of my least favorite sub-groups of shitty people. That said, it's a pretty sweet book.
New Universal #5(Marvel, W: Warren Ellis, A: Salvador Larroca)
Overview: The "white event", which is the sky turning all white and bright everywhere at once happens. "Happens" is as much as I'm going to try to make sense of it, because this comic is so fucking confusing. I think you have to have spent way more of your childhood and later life being into science fiction and D&D or whatever other shit has exceptionally elaborate and specific rules to the way things work to understand stuff like this. If you're the sort of person who's ever actually sat down to watch Stargate or one of those shows, this is probably no big deal. But since I've wasted my life with different kinds of pointless aspects of our culture, this shit is all greek to me. Which is strange, because I'm a fairly intelligent person, and it's not so much that I can't follow it as I can't pay attention well enough to keep all the different threads of logic and plot together. I'm sure if it were about underdog sports movies I'd be enthralled. Oh well.
Current Storyline: In all the above rambling I forgot to mention that when this white event thing happened it gave some people powers or something. And now aliens that look like people, or maybe other powered people have shown up for whatever reason. And there's an old Indian who's also in the C.I.A. In the interest of full disclosure, I only bought this originally because Warren Ellis writes it, and I kept buying it because I thought it was a mini-series. I have a problem where once I start "collecting" something, it's hard to stop, and so I figured I'd just buy these 6 issues or whatever and then stop, but I might have to actually force myself to stop before the end because it's getting kind of boring. Whew.
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And now onto last week's batch...
Army @ Love #2(Vertigo, W:Rick Vietch, A: Rick Vietch)
Overview: In the very near future the war still rages in Afbaghistan. (Not a typo, I'll elaborate more on that in a second.) To slow the depleting numbers of enlistments but still avoid a full scale draft, the government hires middle management people out of the biggest and most successful corporations to make the army more appealing to kids. This is where the department of "Motivation and Morale" comes in, quietly (as far as the public is concerned) making the army a nonstop party and upgrading technology to the highest available degree to appeal to a generation of kids who grew up playing video games. OK. So this is cool concept and all, and so far in the first two issues it's been carried out pretty well, but the number one thing that drives me crazy is the re-naming of everything. Afghanistan=Afbaghistan, Hummer=Bummer, Hope Depot=Home Cheap-O, etc. Seriously. The only time that's acceptable is in Mad Magazine movie parodies where Superman is Stuporman and April O'Neil is April O'Feel, and so forth. It's really obnoxious and I really hope Rick Vietch doesn't think it's clever, and that it's all because of some bizarre legal issue that somehow affects this comic and not every other one that uses real names for things. Fucking christ, it really bothers me, maybe more than it should.
Current Storyline: Pretty much everyone "over there" and everyone "back here" is an asshole, screwing around behind their spouses backs, stealing, doing drugs, basically like real life. No big story has developed yet, though in fairness its just the second issue so things are still being set up. I guess my general gripe is that the whole comic seems way too proud of itself for being so clever and controversial, there's just an overall tone "my my, this sure is SOMETHING ELSE. Smirk smirk."
That said, I'll keep buying it for awhile, at least until I can tell where it's going.
Cable/Deadpool #39*(Marvel, W: Fabian Nicieza, A: Ron Lim)
Overview: Cable is somewhere else and Deadpool is being the wiseass "merc with a mouth" guy that he usually is. This book can be funny at times, but it's pretty much on the verge of "too dumb and cartoony" for me to really get into. It happened to be a slow week for comics, so I picked this up. And sadly I'll probably keep buying it because of my aforementioned problem with collecting things. Fuck, I don't know.
Current Storyline: There's some bad guy that came back to fuck with Deadpool who claims to be Wade Wilson (Deadpool's real name) and they fight a bunch. The guy at the comic shop made a point out of telling me how cool that was and how that was the reason he bought it, and blah blah, and I made a point of trying to remember not to take my headphones off when checking out.
DMZ #18(Vertigo, W: Brian Wood, A: Riccardo Burchielli)
Overview: DMZ probably rounds out my top three current comics along w/ Fell and Punisher Max. I only say probably because while it's easily in that league, for whatever reason it's usually one of the last things I read when it's in my bin that week. I guess that's probably because reading DMZ is a more involved thing that actually takes time rather than burning through the new Wolverine comic in about 4 minutes, so I tend to put it off until I have time to actually sit and read it. Anyfart**, the premise of the series is that a new civil war has erupted in the US between the "Free States" and the Federal Government, and the center of the whole thing is New York City, which has has become a war zone, some parts controlled by the Free States, some by the Army, some a DMZ (Demilitarized Zone for dummies) and some just plain chaos. Basically Wood has supplanted the war in Iraq onto American soil and amongst Americans, but without being high-handed or obnoxious about it. The series follows different characters and story arcs, all related to the war but not necessarily to each other. Along with Fell, a comic I'd recommend to absolutely anyone, comic fan or not. And thanks to Chuck SS for suggesting it, so glad I started picking it up when I did.
Current Storyline: The Army is holding a military tribunal to investigate the Day 204 massacre when the Army gunned down over a hundred unarmed peace protesters. This issue is the first of this story arc and Matty Roth, an independent journalist who was the focus of the previous arc, "Public Works", goes to the military prison to interview a soldier who was part of the slaughter.
Moon Knight #9(Marvel, W: Charlie Huston, A: David Finch)
Overview: Moon Knight aka Marc Spector has been a lot of things, mercenary, vigilante, superpowered guy, but right now, he's rehabbing a broken back and is bat shit crazy. That last part is all you really need to know, and it's what makes this comic worth reading. He has imaginary friends that tell him to do crazy shit, and he doesn't really trust anyone, he just found out one of his oldest friends and mercenary buddies is gay and was in love with him but now has no legs, and basically his whole world is a wreck. Which generally make super hero comics way more interesting than "My my, what a lovely day. Stopped all the crime, great girl, loyal dog, ahhhh."
Current Storyline: The son of some bad guy that Moon Knight killed has come back and kicks the shit out of him, but doesn't kill him because he basically just wants Moon Knight's attention and for MK to try and stop his crimes which Moon Knight had been ignoring before. And somehow the Punisher is in the end, and despite the cover, they're probably going to fight. So I'm assuming/hoping Moon Knight is fucked next issue.
Ultimate Spider-Man #108(Marvel, W: Brian Michael Bendis, A: Mark Bagley)
Overview: So as I mentioned in last weeks New Avengers write up, Brian Michael Bendis is probably the best dude in the comics game when it comes to writing straight up Super Hero comics and making them more interesting than they should be. As with all the "Ultimate" books, he's taken the characters and reinserted them into something of an alternate Marvel Universe and retold their stories from day one. Certain nerds (cough, Joe, cough) hate this sort of thing because it doesn't follow continuity and I guess that violently jostles the rod stuck up their collective asses. But as a person that doesn't give a rat's ass about that sort of thing, I think it's great. So basically this entire series is a whole new take on Spider-Man, but not in the future like those garbage 2099 books years ago. Basically it's set in the present day, but Peter Parker is still in high school. Which is awesome because Bendis blends all sorts of Dawsons Creek-ish high school drama between Peter and Mary Jane and other girls too. Which, if you weren't aware, is something I'm pretty into, extending into comics from shitty teen movies.
Current Storyline: Spider Man enters into an alliance of sorts with Daredevil, Iron Fist and Moon Knight (and maybe some other karate guy, I can't remember) to take down the Kingpin. But Moon Knight is totally out of his gourd, well beyond even the way he's nuts in the current Moon Knight comic, and his split personalities are fracturing even further with the addition of a new identity, Ronin. He's going "undercover" as Ronin to apply to be the Kingpin's new assassin and thereby get close enough to him to take him down. But his first assignment is to bring Kingpin Spider-Man, and HE MIGHT JUST BE INSANE ENOUGH TO HAND HIM OVER. DUN-NUH-NUHHHHN.
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So last week was a pretty light load. Here's what I picked up today, which will be up next week or sooner if I tear through them quickly enough:
Daredevil #96
The Exterminators #16
Fallen Son: Avengers
Powers #24
The Punisher Presents: Barracuda #3
The Walking Dead #37
Wolverine #53
The Walking Dead and The Exterminators are two books I've never read, so I'm interested to see how they go. I have high hopes for The Walking Dead because Chuck recommended that as well, and The Exterminators looks decent and is put out by Vertigo so it can't be HORRIBLE. In theory.
Ta ta.
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