Hulk #18 — Writer: Jeph Loeb; Pencils: Whilce Portacio; Inks: Danny Miki
Dark Wolverine #81 — Writers: Daniel Way and Marjorie Liu; Pencils: Guiseppe Camuncoli; Inks: Onofrio Catacchio
Inexplicably, although each of these books has 22 pages of story, with the same paper and packaging, DW is $2.99 and Hulk is $3.99. It’s not just the prices that are puzzling here, though — it’s that Marvel, apparently, thinks you’ll buy just about anything. Superhero comics are supposed to be about flash, excitement, danger and dazzling action, right? In Hulk, we have Doc Samson spending an entire issue being psychoanalyzed; in Dark Wolverine, Daken and Karla Soften have tea. Oh, each book also has a flashback sequence or two, with some action, but basically the plots involve people sitting around talking. What else do they have in common? For one, both are marking time — DW until Siege changes the game, and Hulk until Fall of the Hulks begins — which explains why nothing happens in them; they’re just taking up space until the real action begins. For another, both have bad art: Portacio was always one of the worst Image artists (that’s why they kept Rob Liefeld around, right? OK, maybe Valentino too…), and doesn’t seem to have learned much over the years, while Camuncoli just draws ugly faces (his characters’ grimaces and dark shadows around their eyes make them all look like angry raccoons); between the lack of action and the unattractive visuals… well, $2.99, $3.99 or $.01, there’s no reason to buy these.
Batman #694 — Writer/Artist: Tony Daniel; Inks: Sandu Florea
Batman 80-Page Giant #1 — Creators: Various
Daniels can draw pretty pinup pictures, suitable for posters — look at the last-page splash here — but he isn’t very good at laying out a multiple-panel page, or making the action easy to read, and when it comes to writing and plotting… no: Muddled, boring and pretentious is no way to go through life, son. The 80-Page Giant is, like last week’s DC Universe Holiday Special, a bunch of short stories by people you’ve never heard of (the highest profile belongs to Steve Niles, but he does a one-pager with art by Stephanie Buscema, who, if she isn’t John Buscema’s 12-year-old granddaughter, certainly draws like her). A Catwoman story has painted art that’s eye-catching at first, until you notice the weird anatomy; there’s a panel of her punching a bad guy that makes it look like her arm is broken in at least two places. Eight stories, all of them slight, stupid, stereotypical or semipro, often at the same time: your $5.99 could surely go somewhere better.
Chimichanga #1 — Writer/Artist: Eric Powell
Powell, of The Goon, creates a protagonist here who’s 180 degrees from his two-fisted brawler: a little girl who also happens to be the bearded woman attraction in a run-down carnival. Nobody does “run-down” quite like Powell (see also “rickety,” “gnarled,” “grizzled” and “low-rent”), and he throws in vultures, a witch and the monstrous title character, too. There’s a gentle, offbeat charm here that’s largely absent from his other title — and, weirdly, that’s actually a problem: manic cruelty and darkly humorous violence are his strong suits, and this book (at least so far) sanitizes all of that; it’s like he deliberately set out to do a child-friendly version of his fantasy world, and without the transgressive bad taste to spice it up it comes off as too bland. This is probably unfair — and, if this book were by an unknown creator, I’d likely be talking it up as a hallucinatory, subversive little kid’s-lit discovery — but when you’ve set the bar as high as Powell has (Goon makes the short list of the best comic of the decade), then heightened expectations come with it, and this doesn’t quite live up to them.
Forgetless #1 — Writer: Nick Spencer; Artists: Scott Forbes and Marley Zarcone
Forgetless is a once-hot New York City club that’s closing, and its last night is the link between the two stories here. The first has art reminiscent of the Luna Brothers, and uses a lot of coloring and high-gloss tricks to camouflage the artist’s uneven ability to draw action and faces. The high-concept story involves low-level fashion models who make money on the side by contract killing, and the first hit for the younger one is a guy who’s at said club. Like the art, it’s uneven, but the byplay between the two girls, and some of the snarky asides, give the whole thing a certain hipster charm. The second story is about three New Jersey kids trying to get to the club, with art that shows both Paul Pope and manga influences, and it has a lot of charm — you get the feeling that the creators know kids just like these, or once were them — but is only six pages long (next issue it looks like it’ll be the main story, though). If you’re looking for a quirky nonsuperhero book with some potential, you could do worse than this.
Brave and the Bold #30 — Writer: J. Michael Straczynski; Artist: Jesus Saiz
Straczynski’s been offering perfectly professional little one-issue stories so far here — they’re in continuity, show knowledge of the characters, have reasonable, heartfelt themes and everything — but there’s no fizz to them; you just nod your head after reading them and go, yeah, that was OK. It’s like he set himself an Iron Chef challenge: take an egg, some cheese, a slice of ham, and five minutes, and make a meal. It’s edible, but it’s the same damn omelet, every time, and it doesn’t take very many repetitions until you start to yearn for something juicier, more elaborate and more interesting.
Phil Mateer
