Manga and Comic Reviews
Above-the-Board Recommendation: Radiant Black vol. 2: Team-Up The first volume of this series was one of the best surprises I read all year. One of the many disappointments in growing older is that it becomes harder for the things I like to surprise me. This is as true of comics as it is for everything […]
Above-the-Board Recommendation: Batman: Beyond the White Knight #1 (of 8) “Batman: White Knight” was an interesting “Elseworlds”-style story that sought to interrogate some of the more questionable/problematic aspects of the Bat-mythos before backing off and delivering a conclusion that mostly returned to the status quo. Its follow-up, “Curse of the White Knight” then took a […]
Above-the-Board Recommendation: We Have Demons #1 (of 3) I don’t think that Dark Horse’s recent acquisition by the Embracer Group is going to change anything for the company in the short term. As for the long term, things will only change if Embracer decides that they don’t want to be in the business of producing […]
Above-the-Board Recommendation: Defenders: There Are No Rules Al Ewing was doing great work at Marvel long before he blew up with “The Immortal Hulk.” I’ll refer you to his “New Avengers” and “Loki” series if you need convincing. Both series had great writing and clever plotting in addition to a willingness to take odd, random […]
I was genuinely surprised by the first volume of this series. Most of James Tynion IV’s superhero work had come off as by-the-numbers to me and his (and Werther Dell’edera’s) monster hit series “Something is Killing the Children” didn’t feel like it offered me anything new. “The Department of Truth,” however, took a nightmarish look […]
This latest arc of “Jojo” got off to a slow yet solid start as new protagonist (and son of Dio) Giorno Giovanna took his first steps to achieving his lifelong dream of being a mafioso. He takes a few more steps here after settling things with Polpo and formally joining Bruno’s gang. Its members, Abbachio, […]
I was looking forward to this volume in a way that I haven’t for previous volumes in this series for a while now. Though “Arslan” continues to be quite readable, its storytelling has fallen into a predictable groove where it’s easy to see how the major conflicts and character arcs are going to play out. […]
If anyone was expecting something significant to follow on from Makie and Nakahara’s late-night encounter at the end of the previous volume, then you’re going to be disappointed. In fact, much of Makie’s storyline gets put on the back burner as Minare and Mizuho gear up for the former’s latest gig for her radio show. […]
Contrary to what its title implies, the third “Reckless” graphic novel does not involve a giant-size Ethan Reckless taking on Gozilla, Mothra, King Ghidora, and other monsters in a giant kaiju free-for-all. (I would still pay to read that, Ed and Sean, if you’re reading this.) “Destroy All Monsters” is a bit of a departure […]
The monster finally made another appearance at the end of the previous volume, and it capsizes a ship at the beginning of this one. It’s on its way to Tokyo and that means it’s time for Asa, Kasuga, Keiichi and their shady government friends to spring into action, right? Well, it would be if everyday […]