Manga and Comic Reviews
In my review of vol. 2 I made a number of predictions about what we could expect to see in this concluding volume. This is how they panned out: “[T]hings ending with the death and/or imprisonment of the members of the Paperboy group.” Right on both counts, actually. Not everyone makes it to the finale. […]
The text on the back of this volume spells out its appeal in succinct detail: “The bailiff takes one up his ass.” It’s no secret that the series has been building to the takedown of this character. Anything less would’ve had its audience riot in the street, small as it is. So let me say […]
Writing the first issue of a new comic is one of the most difficult things a writer can do in this industry. There’s the establishment of the core cast, setting up and then upending the established status quo, and providing a compelling hook that has the reader coming back for the second issue. A good […]
It’s been rumored for a while now, but the third “Dark Knight” series is officially a reality. Subtitled “The Master Race,” it will be serialized as an eight-issue miniseries, bi-weekly starting later this year. Frank Miller will again be writing and illustrating this series and that by itself doesn’t really bode well for it. Following […]
Kieron Gillen so flawlessly defined this latest incarnation of the title character over the course of “Journey Into Mystery” and “Young Avengers,” that the idea of another writer chronicling his solo adventures sounded like a recipe for disaster. In one of those instances where I’m quite happy to be wrong, Al Ewing effortlessly picks up […]
Arriving just in time for the new “Avengers” movie is Marvel’s latest original graphic novel. Its title isn’t just a pun on the movie’s, it’s a key part of the book’s plot as it deals with the tortured familial relationship between Hank Pym and his creation, Ultron, with some angst from Vision thrown in as […]
Strip the covers off of your (first print) copies of “Star Wars #1,” send them in to Dark Horse, and get a free variant cover of their new “Barb Wire” series. It was the “April Fool’s” joke that wasn’t. I’d call it schadenfreude, but it really isn’t. Anyway, with over a million copies in circulation […]
Real progress towards sorting out the Goridian’s Knot of Madarame’s love life by the end of the volume. You’ll have to wade through a lot of waffling on the cast’s part to get there, though. That’s because ComiFest time has arrived again and everyone who is not Ogiue (she’s busy prepping her own doujinshi for […]
Wait, didn’t I just do a roundup of my Image backlog yesterday? Yes I did, but this title is a special case. Though I’ve enjoyed a lot of comics that Rick Remender has written over the years, he’s also managed to write one that I gave up on after following it for a little while: […]
After reading a comic, it either passes on to my “to review” pile or straight onto a shelf. Looking at the size of my “to review” pile, it’s clear to me that I have to start burning through some of these things quicker if I want to get this thing down to a manageable level. […]