Image Previews Picks: September 2021
Above-the-Board Recommendation
Monstress vol. 6: The Vow
There are some quality first-volumes coming out in September. Like the two that I’ll be talking about after the break. I’m giving the nod to the latest volume of “Monstress” instead for a couple reasons. One is that the series has been very good so far and I’m expecting that trend to continue with this latest volume. The other is that I’m going to make an effort to re-read the previous five volumes before this one comes out. While those previous five volumes have been good, the intricacy of the story being told always has me doing some mental gymnastics as I struggle to remember everyone in the title’s vast cast and what they were previously up to. While I think that a new volume of an ongoing series shouldn’t make me do something like that “Monstress” has shown that it’s worth the effort to do so — particularly with the most recent volume. Who knows, maybe this will start a trend and I’ll start re-reading other series as their newest volumes come out instead of waiting until the end to do so.
Nocterra vol. 1: Full Throttle Dark: Back when Scott Snyder teamed up with Charles Soule to write “Undiscovered Country,” I joked that the latter’s involvement was to make sure the series came out on time. This is after “American Vampire: Second Cycle” suffered a multitude of delays over the course of its eleven-issue serialization and his horror series with Jock, “Wytches” only wound up delivering a single one-shot as a follow-up. Flash forward to the present day and Snyder’s solo-written “Nocterra,” about a trucker transporting goods on an Earth where the sun was swallowed by darkness and monsters now roam the earth, is soliciting its first volume without any delays. Congrats to Snyder and artist Tony Daniel on managing this. Now it’s just time to see if the writer can finally deliver a creator-owned title that’s on par with his “Batman” work. Or at least as good as “American Vampire.”
Ultramega vol. 1: This is James Harren doing giant “Ultraman”-level kaiju battles, and that should be enough to get any serious comics fan to pick this up. The artist delivered some of the most memorable monsters and action during his tenure on “B.P.R.D.” and while he also delivered the goods for the first half of “Rumble’s” serialization, subsequent work on issues of “Thor” and “Seven to Eternity” had me wondering why he wasn’t working more regularly. This was apparently the reason and even if its human drama turns out to be boring and conventional as they are in just about every story about giant monsters, I feel confident in saying that the action is likely to make up for any shortcomings there. Harren is just that good.
Primordial #1 (of 6): Huh. It turns out that “Mazebook” isn’t the only new miniseries from Jeff Lemire and Andrea Sorrentino debuting in this round of solicitations. However, that series sounds like the more interesting of the two. “Primordial” posits that the first animals in space, Russian dog Laika, and American monkeys Able and Baker, weren’t lost in space but actually taken. Now they’re coming back. Whether or not they’re here to be the saviors of humanity or the harbingers of its destruction is for the reader to find out. I’ll admit that this is a promising setup for a series… in the hands of a writer like Jason Aaron or Jonathan Hickman, creators who know how to lean into craziness and weaponize it as part of their stories. In Lemire’s hands, this sounds like a credibly weird premise that will dissolve into sentimental mush by the end. It’ll still look great because you can always count on Sorrentino to deliver the goods. Even if “Mazebook” sounds like the series that will play better to his imaginative design sensibilities.
Frontiersman #1: From the solicitation text, “Classic Green Arrow-style adventure blends with the thoughtfulness of Concrete in a super-hero odyssey for mature but uncynical readers! Frontiersman is coaxed out of retirement by an environmentalist group, only to find that being a spokesperson makes him a target for old and new enemies alike!” I’m not familiar with this title’s creators, writer Patrick Kindlon and artist Marco Ferrari, but this solicitation reads like it was written by someone who doesn’t realize how close to self-parody this all sounds. If that was the creators’ intent, good for them. I just don’t think it was…
Adventureman #5: Matt Fraction and Terry Dodson’s pulp-adventure series returns for another arc. Which reminds me that I should probably give the first one a read. Either when it hits paperback or when the hardcover gets a deep enough discount.
Destroy All Monsters: A Reckless Book: Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips’ “Reckless” series of OGNs hits its third volume. Just in time too because the order I placed for the second one FINALLY shipped last week. Now it’s just taking its time to get here as it’s waiting to be accepted at the post office. Anyway, contrary to this volume’s title, protagonist Ethan Reckless will not be fighting kaiju for the fate of all mankind. This time around he’s just investigating the secrets of a real estate mogul in what should be a relatively straightforward case. Except if it was, we wouldn’t likely be reading about it in this volume. Is that Zen, or just circular thinking? Regardless of that, the first volume was pretty good and I’ll have a better idea of how excited I should be for this one when it arrives (in October) after vol. 2 FINALLY arrives at my doorstep.
Geiger #6: Geoff Johns and Gary Frank’s postapocalyptic series reaches the end of its first arc in a double-sized issue. You may think that the series would take a month or two off before continuing with issue #7, but that doesn’t seem to be the case here. The solicitation text lets us know that this issue will contain a preview of Johns and Frank’s next series in the “Geigerverse.” Which could mean that they’ll be starting up another series while continuing to put out new issues of “Geiger,” but likely means this series will be going on hiatus while they do this new one. That’s a curious decision to make since while I believe this title to be selling well, it’s certainly not doing well enough to support a “Geigerverse” at this time. Or maybe the quality is there and reading the first volume will make a believer out of me. We’ll see.
Sea of Stars #11: Jason Aaron, Dennis “Hopeless” Hallum and Stephen Green’s saga of a space trucker trying to rescue his son reaches his end. Which is shocking because Aaron hasn’t had the best record of bringing his creator-owned titles to completion at Image. I’m still waiting for word on when he and Jason Latoru will be bringing back “Southern Bastards.” Still, it’s nice to see that this series will be reaching its conclusion and since I did buy the first volume, I’ll be picking up the second to see how it all ends.
Luther Strode Complete Series: All three volumes are collected in one paperback edition. For a series that started off with the premise of, “What if those bodybuilding ads in the back of comics actually delivered on their promises?” it sure went in some outrageously violent directions. While this isn’t a very deep series, it did deliver some of the most outrageously creative, over-the-top, and ludicrously bloody action scenes I’ve ever seen in American or Japanese comics. “Luther Strode” is definitely worth reading to witness them, provided that kind of thing appeals to you like it does to me.
Stray Dogs: This series is about a dog who has been separated from her master and has wound up in a baaaaaad place. You might remember the cover to the first issue, which gave off serious “Don Bluth meets Stephen King” vibes, while the solicitation text pitches this as “Lady and the Tramp” meets “Silence of the Lambs.” Both promise their own special kind of horror, and while I’m very much a cat person, these descriptions and the book’s look make me curious to find out just what kind this series is peddling.
Deadly Class vol. 10: Save Your Generation: Collects issues 45-48. Which means that this isn’t the end of the series. I’m fine with that since this series is still firing on most cylinders. That said, I’m more concerned about what happened to Saya’s hand than whether Marcus killed anyone in the final-page cliffhanger. I mean, I’d be surprised if he did, but that kind of fade-to-black ending strongly implies that we’re only meant to think he did. So, who wants to guess what kind of right hand Saya will have in this volume. Hook? Knife? Pistol? SMG? Or did she get the family katana attached to it? I really want to think the last one is the case, but it honestly seems a bit impractical for a killer of her caliber.
Head Lopper vol. 4: Andrew MacLean’s “Not-Conan” series reaches its fourth volume and sees its title character climbing a stairway to heaven. No, really. He and his comrades are seeking Mulgrid the All-Knowing in order to find a way to get all the assassins stalking them off of their backs. I’m down with that as the first three volumes have delivered some very solid sword-and-sorcery action, with the last one delivering some promising hints of an ongoing story that may bring them all together. Even if vol. 4 doesn’t deliver more of that, there’s a pretty good chance that the action MacLean serves up will be worth the cover price alone.
Scumbag vol. 2: So do you remember earlier when I said that the second volume of “Reckless” was still in the mail? Guess what other volume is coming along with it. That’s right, the first volume of Rick Remender and company’s series about the worst person in the world becoming its best secret agent is also part of that shipment. So I don’t know how excited I should be for this second volume. That said, Bengal, Reminder’s artistic partner on “Death or Glory,” and frequent Simon Spurrier collaborator Matais Bergara, are each illustrating an issue of this volume, so I can at least look forward to that.