Phil's Reviews — Stuff I Bought #87

Posted on September 7, 2008 by Phil

The Boys #22 — Writer: Garth Ennis;  Art: Darick Robertson A quiet issue (if they were all plane crashes and heads exploding, it wouldn’t be as much fun), and while most of it’s on the history of Vought-American and The Boys, and their first encounter, the real focus is on Hughie and Annie’s slow-but-steady romance. How Ennis handles these two is going to make or break the whole book — they’re the emotional center, and the viewpoint characters, and their story can be either tragic-but-dramatic or predictable-but-satisfying. The latter is what happened in Preacher (Ennis has a reputation for being … Continue reading →

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Phil's Reviews — Stuff I Read and Put Back #87

Posted on September 6, 2008 by Phil

Marvel Apes #1 (of 4) — Writer: Karl Kesel;  Artist: Ramon Bachs In case you really care, this isn’t about the Marvel heroes turning into monkeys; it’s about Marty Blank — The Gibbon — and a female scientist being accidentally transported to an alternate dimension where everybody was an ape to begin with. Thus, we have Iron Mandrill and Spider-Monkey fighting the likes of Doc Ook and Kong the Conqueror. If those names just made you laugh, congratulations — you’re the target audience for this book. For me, while Kesel’s script and Bachs’s art are cute enough (and good at … Continue reading →

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Phil's Reviews — Stuff I Bought #86

Posted on August 31, 2008 by Phil

Final Crisis: Superman Beyond 3D #1 (of 2) — Writer: grant Morrison;  Pencils: Doug Mahnke;  Inks: Christian Alamy with Rodney Ramos, Tom Nguyen, Walden Wong and Mahnke Final Crisis: Rogue’s Revenge #2 (of 3) — Writer: Geoff Johns;  Artist: Scott Kolins DC Universe: Last Will and Testament — Writer: Brad Meltzer;  Pencils: Adam Kubert;  Inks: John Dell and Joe Kubert Unlike Marvel’s Secret Invasion tie-ins, DC’s Crisis mini-series this week are (mostly) worth a look. The Superman Beyond, by Morrison,  is a cosmic adventure-inside-the-adventure wherein Clark is recruited to battle a multiversal disaster, alongside some of his parallel-Earth counterparts like … Continue reading →

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Phil's Reviews — Stuff I Read and Put Back #86

Posted on August 30, 2008 by Phil

The Secret Invasion tie-ins infiltrate most of the Marvel books this week: Nova #16 — Writers: Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning;  Pencillers: Wellington Alves and Deraldo Burges;  Inker: Scott Hanna She-Hulk #32 — Writer: Peter David;  Art: Vincenzo Cucca Black Panther #40 — Writer: Jason Aaron;  Artist: Jefte Palo Avengers: The Initiative #16 — Dan Slott and Christos N. Gage;  Art: Stefano Caselli Amazing Spider-Man: Secret Invasion #1 (of 3) — Writer: Brian Reed;  Pencils: Marco Santucci;  Inks: Mark Pennington Thunderbolts #123 — Writer: Christos N. Gage;  Art: Fernando Blanco None of these are particularly crucial to the story, so … Continue reading →

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Ask the Professor #18 — The First Comic

Posted on August 26, 2008 by Phil

Who first wrote the comic book? That’s an interesting (if ungrammatical) question, but the only true answer is: it depends, on what you mean by “comic,” “book,” and “wrote.”  Candidates range from whomever did those cave paintings in the south of France, 10,000 years ago, to Rudolphe Toppfer (who published books using sequential pictures to tell a story in the first half of the 1800s) to Major Malcolm Wheeler, whose New Fun, published in 1935, is generally considered the first comic in the format we’re familiar with today — a floppy pamphlet, for 10 cents — which consisted mostly of … Continue reading →

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