Marvel Penguin Picks: April 2024
Above-the-Board Recommendation:
Roxxon Presents: Thor #1
I’m still undecided about whether I’ll read Al Ewing’s “Immortal Thor” in print or digitally on Marvel Unlimited ($30 for a regular-sized six-issue collection!?); however, the relaunch itself appears to have gone down pretty well based on word-of-mouth. It also doesn’t look to be short on fun ideas if this one-shot is any indication. Word broke earlier this week that Roxxon, the evilest corporation in the Marvel Universe, had bought Marvel Comics as some kind of meta-event Ewing is planning with this title. As for what that involves, well…
Meet Chad Hammer: He’s the Son of Odin and an A.I. Spokesguru in his civilian identity. He knows that protecting Mama Gaea is a good thing for both corporations and normal people that aren’t corporations. However, when some crazy environmentalists take protecting her TOO FAR, Chad is going to have to lay down the law the only way he knows how. With his hammer.
In case you weren’t sure this was meant to be satire, this issue is marketed as being part of the (still) fictional “Absolute Absolution” event. There’s also more to this issue, but it all sounds thoroughly ridiculous in an entertaining way. Ewing can do era-specific parody – see his issue of “Cable” from the “The Last Annihilation” event – and while Greg Land may seem like an odd choice for this kind of story, he’s got more depth to his work that others have been willing to give him credit for. This may be a one-off issue, but I’ll find some way to read it.
Oh, and for anyone paying for this single issue, it’ll run you $4. Which is a dollar less than the regular price of “Immortal Thor.” Clearly this is a sign that Marvel expects this issue to sell a magnitude more than its parent title and has priced it accordingly. Is Chad Hammer the Sensational Character Find of 2024? You heard it here first, folks.
Blood Hunt #1 (of 5): Wherein the skies over Earth go dark and the vampires come out to play. Naturally Blade is involved in the fightback, but he gets mentioned second to the Avengers in the solicitation text. His daughter Bloodline, Spider-Man, Tigra, Doctor Strange, and Clea are also talked about as taking part in this event. Which has a distinct B-tier feel about it even though it features an A-List artist in Pepe Larraz. “Avengers” Jed MacKay writes and… I’m sure it’ll be fine?
That said, this issue is being published in two formats. One is the standard, unbagged 40-page issue which will run you $6. The other is a polybagged RED BAND edition which contains an extra eight pages that were deemed too violent for the regular issue. That version will cost you $8. While I’d normally be all about extra story pages, this feels like a stunt that’s targeted right at the collector’s market than anything else. I mean, if these eight extra pages were really that important to the story then they’d be selling just one version of this issue.
Deadpool #1: The Merc With a Mouth gets another ongoing series because he’s popular enough to sustain at least one of these at any given time. At least, that appears to be the conventional thinking at Marvel. In reality, after Gerry Duggan’s very successful run (commercially, but not creatively after Brian Posehnn left), all attempts to launch a new ongoing series within the character have floundered. Skottie Young only made it to 15 issues, Kelly Thompson and Alyssa Wong did 10 issues apiece. Will “Spider-Man: Miles Morales” writer Cody Ziglar be the first writer in a while to have a decent run on “Deadpool?” Maybe new artist Roge Antonio will be the secret spice that gets this series past the 10-15 issue mark.
Aliens: What If…? #2 (of 5): I don’t remember this being solicited as a miniseries, but that’s on me I guess. While I still think the idea of “What if Carter Burke Had Lived” is a solid idea for an “Aliens”-based “What If…?” I’m not so sure about the direction the series is going in with this issue. That’s because it’s said to take place 35 years after “the disaster on Hadley’s Hope” with Burke eking out a meager existence on a backwater asteroid and has a daughter who hates him. But he’s got a plan to turn it all around!
The Redemption of Carter Burke does not sound like a promising story idea to me – even if it’s misdirection regarding the idea that he hasn’t learned ANYTHING in the past 35 years. What I was hoping to get out of this storyline was one where his plan to kill the Colonial Marines and implant Ripley and Newt with Xenomorph embryos was successful and took his career, and that of Weyland-Yutani, to greater heights. Heights where exploitation of these aliens put the future of Earth and humanity itself at risk. The kind of storytelling that threatens to go off the rails in pursuit of a crazy idea which is the hallmark of all good “What If…?”-style stories. That, regrettably, does not appear to be what we’re getting here.
Star Wars: Darth Maul – Black, White, and Red #1 (of 4): Marvel’s “Black, White, and Red” miniseries have all been anthologies featuring multiple stories from different creative teams within a single issue. “Darth Maul” looks to break that trend as this issue features a single story from writer Benjamin Percy and artist Stefano Raffaele that sees Maul being tasked with investigating a prison ship that has gone offline from Imperial controls. There’s no indication that this is going to be the story for all four issues or if subsequent ones will return to the short story format. Percy and Raffaele are a solid enough creative team, but it probably says something that I’m more interested in the format of this miniseries than the story they’re telling here.
Iron Man Modern Era Epic Collection vol. 3: World’s Most Wanted: This storyline is fifteen years old? Takes me back… Anyway, this collects the first nineteen issues of “Invincible Iron Man” written by Matt Fraction and illustrated by Salvador Larroca. It had the good fortune to launch in the wake of the original “Iron Man” movie and the even better fortune to be able to pull itself out of a steep creative dive halfway through its run. While the title of this collection is correct in stating that it collects the entire “World’s Most Wanted” storyline, wherein Tony Stark finds himself on the run from Norman Osborne who is running S.H.I.E.L.D. replacement H.A.M.M.E.R. in the wake of “Secret Invasion,” it’s not the whole story. The arc that followed, “Stark: Disassembled” would properly wrap things up and put the character into a working position going forward for future stories from the creative team and the Marvel Universe at large. What’s here is good, no doubt about that, it’s just not everything (yet).