King City #4 — Writer/Artist: Brandon Graham
Forgetless #2 — Writer: Nick Spencer; Artists: Jorge Coelho, Marley Zarcon
Tank Girl: Skidmarks #2 (of 4) — Writer: Alan Martin; Art: Rufus Dayglo
Three of the more interesting indy books of the week — King City has been getting some buzz, and Graham’s European-styled art — a mix of Moebius and Geoff Darrow, with some manga thrown in — accounts for a lot of it. Too, he’s put some obvious work into his future-city setting and his intriguing cast of twenty-somethings, and the passion helps to cover up the occasional sense that he’s making it up as he goes along. Twentysomethings and teenagers are the subject of Nick Spencer over in Forgetless, too; in the first story, they’re aspiring sex webvideographers and models/hired assassins (two jobs that would be high on any fantasy employment list of those age groups), while in the second story they’re rootless suburban teenagers trying to stir up some excitement. The second story, at six pages, is better than the 17-page first one, because Zarcon’s grounded, Paul Popish art is more memorable than Coelho’s, which is slicker but has less soul. Meanwhile, Tank Girl offers nostalgia to the twentysomethings that it originally attracted 20 years ago, who, today, take time out from worrying about 401Ks and their kids’ educations to put on British new-wave bands from the late ’80s, read this comic and relive past glories.
Blackest Night: Wonder Woman #2 (of 3) — Writer: Greg Rucka; Pencils: Nicola Scott and Eduardo Pansica; Inks: Jonathan Glapion and Eber Ferreira
Weird Western Tales #71 — Writer: Dan Didio; Art: Renato Arlem
Two Blackest Night tie-ins, obviously — the Wonder Woman is notable because it’s that rare tie-in that’s actually closely connected to the main event, and offers critical plot points that will wrap back into the main title; that alone makes it worth checking out, especially for Diana Prince fans, and the Rucka script helps too. The Weird Western is less interesting, a standard BN zombie story featuring DC’s western characters (Jonah Hex, Scalphunter, Bat Lash, etc.) as black-ring-resurrected ghouls. Dan Didio is the “writer,” but it’s more like “typer,” since the story’s so soulless and mechanical (don’t sweat it, Dan; Bill Jemas couldn’t actually write comics, either); the only thing he does well is give Arlem a few decent shots of the zombies to draw.
Red Robin #8 — Writer: Christopher Yost; Pencils: Marcus To; Inks: Ray McCarthy
Haunt #4 — Writer: Robert Kirkman; Layouts: Greg Capullo; Pencils: Ryan Ottley; Inks: Todd McFarlane
New Mutants #9 — Writer: Zeb Wells; Artist: Paul Davidson
Your standard competent ongoing superhero comics for the week: Red Robin is the most surprising, because it hasn’t reached even this modest level of creative success recently, but Yost (aided by the new name and costume) is able to make Tim seem more like Batman than like a kid assistant; if the art were more interesting, this would be a pretty good comic. Haunt has settled into a nice little midlevel niche: the character’s derivative, but the story motors right along, and knows what its Image audience wants: enough violence and decent visuals to keep most of them coming back. New Mutants offers an old/new fans’ mix of nostalgia (Warlock! Illyana! Doug Ramsey!) and tie-ins to current continuity, with nice characterization by Wells (an Emma Frost/Illyana conversation is particularly good) and clean, eye-catching work from Davidson that delivers interesting facial expressions in the quiet moments and effective-enough widescreen shots in the splash pages.
Punisher Max: Get Castle #1 (of 1) — Writer: Rob Williams; Art: Laurence Campbell
Another competent comic: Punisher, like Wolverine, lends itself to these one-shots that hit all the standard notes of the character, give readers what they want, and then stop. Why Marvel is charging $5 for it is anyone’s guess; it’s 32 pages of story, in the grim Garth Ennis mode, and if you absolutely need another Frank Castle/unstoppable force of vengeance story, here’s one that’s OK.
X-Factor: Nation X #1 (of 1) — Writer: Peter David; Pencils: Valentine de Landro; Inks: Pat Davidson
OK now, see, this one offers 32 pages of story, in the exact same package as the Punisher book, but for $4 instead of $5. Does Marvel think that Punisher readers have more disposable income than X-Factor readers, or merely assume that they’re more desperate to buy comics featuring him, and less likely to note the price? The story itself is at least slightly less generic than Punisher, too, as Jamie and crew travel to Utopia island to debate Scott’s current decisions about having a mutant homeland; the story’s prologue, set during the Holocaust, sets up a parallel between mutants and Jews (and Utopia and Israel) that offers some food for thought, although there’s the usual punching and character interaction, too, and it’s not like anything permanent comes from it.
Marvel Boy: The Uranian #1 (of 3) — Writer: Jeff Parker; Art: Felix Ruiz
An origin recap for the Agents of Atlas character, by that series’s regular writer, set in the ’50s. Yes, “The Uranian” is a really stupid name for both comic and character, but Parker is fully aware of that, and has some fun with it , including a visit to the 1950 offices of Timely Comics. In line with that visit, there are also two early-’50s Marvel Boy reprints: a 12-pager with Russ Heath art, and a four-pager by Bill Everett; those, plus the 22-page main story, equal 38 pages of story for $4, implying that Marvel thinks that Jeff Parker fans, like Peter David ones, have more ability to perform simple mathematical calculations than Punisher fans do.
Phil Mateer
