Dark Horse Penguin Picks: September 2024
Above-the-Board Recommendation:
Minor Threats vol. 2: The Fastest Way Down
“Minor Threats” has become something of a minor success for Dark Horse, having already spawned two spinoff miniseries and now this proper follow-up series. The hope is that “The Fastest Way Down” can keep the momentum going, and I think it has a decent chance based on the setup for this volume. After Playtime became the new Queenpin of Redport, she was looking forward to making things better for her fellow supervillains and enjoying the respect the position afforded her. Except that now she’s faced with big issues like trying to become a legitimate businesswoman, continuing to further everyone’s criminal ambitions, dealing with rival gangs, and her own mental health after how things ended in vol. 1. Co-writers Patton Oswalt and Jordan Blum delivered a story that entertained well beyond the initial fun of its spot-the-reference setup, and Scott Hepburn drew the hell out of it. Vol. 2 sounds like more of the first, only bigger and more ambitious, which means it should make for a hell of a read.
Headless Horseman Halloween Annual 2024: I can’t recall if this is part of some previous “Headless Horseman” miniseries or special, but no matter. This is an anthology of stories (two, it looks like) from a solid creative team. That would be the people who gave us “Count Crowley,” writer David Dastmachian and artist Lukas Ketner. Except, it doesn’t look like they’re working together. Ketner is credited here as a writer and artist, so it stands to reason that he’s writing something for himself to illustrate, while Matt Smith is credited as an artist, which leads me to guess that Dastmalchian is writing for him.
Maybe I’m right, maybe I’m wrong, but this might be worth picking up for fans of the creators to see what they’ve done here. No, really. There’s no indication as to what these stories are about except for the “Headless Horseman” bit. Though, it would be neat if Ketner’s cover of a headless scientist animating a human corpse with a horse’s head had something to do with this.
The Oddly Pedestrian Life of Christopher Chaos Halloween Special #1: Not wanting to be left out of the Halloween Anthology business in these solicitations is this series from co-writers James Tynion IV and Tate Brombal. I haven’t given it a second thought since it debuted in these solicitations as none of the comics sites I visit talk it up at all. Still, the main series is now on issue #13, which is a rarity for a Dark Horse series these days and that means it must be doing something right. As for this Special, it caught my eye because it features art from a really great artist who doesn’t do a whole lot of work these days: Phil Jimenez. He’s teaming with Brombal for a story about “a wild new monster far above the Arctic Circle.” So it should look great, if nothing else.
Where Monsters Lie: Cull-de-Sac #1: Now this is a great surprise! I really enjoyed the previous miniseries from writer Kyle Starks and artist Piotr Kowalski about where slasher movie villains live and what they get up to in between their killing sprees. Things did end with a good deal of closure the first time around, but not so much that the creators have to break anything in order to get this one started. Though, protagonist and Final Guy Connor Hayes is likely going to wish they hadn’t bothered at all. Can’t wait for more of this, and to see if they can give us something nuttier than the dick-guillotine.
Backflash: From “Incognegro” writer Mat Johnson and “Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen” artist Steve Lieber comes this series about a man with an unusual superpower: Nostalgia. Whenever he touches his family memorabilia, he mentally travels back in time to revisit his memories associated with the object. Which is great since his current situation is one of shame, failure, and massive debt. But hey, maybe he can use this power to solve the mystery of the father he never knew before his life becomes completely unraveled by this power. It sounds interesting, and it’s coming from creators who I’ve read good work from before. Can’t shake the feeling that there’s some underlying message about the protagonist’s superpower, you know…
Empowered vol. 12 & The Legacy of Luther Arkwright: OH COME ON NOW! This is, what, the fifth time each of these comics have shown up in Dark Horse solicitations? At this point I’d feel better about Adam Warren and Bryan Talbot being perfectionists about their work here and not wanting to release it until they’re done. Because the alternative is that the dissolution of Dark Horse parent company The Embracer Group has hurt the publisher a lot more than initially thought. To the point where it can’t put out new work from some of its most established creators.
The Goon: Bunch of Old Crap Omnibus: Then again, we are getting a reissue of this omnibus collecting volumes 0, and 1-3 of “The Goon.” You know, back when it was really, consistently good.
Mob Psycho 100 vol. 15: The penultimate volume sees Tome, head of Salt Middle School’s Telepathy Club, trying to make good on a lifelong dream: Establishing mental contact with aliens. She wants to do this before she graduates, which is why she’s enlisted Mob and Reigen to go on a mountain pilgrimage with her to see if that will do the trick. Which I’m sure it will because this series has shown that there really isn’t anything Mob and Reigen can do when they’re working together. I’m hoping world domination is next on their list, because you’ve seen the state of the world these days. Right?