April 7, 2010

     Dave's Unspoilt Capsules and Awards
     The Week's Picks and Pans, plus Awards of Dubious Merit

Standard Disclaimers: Please set appropriate followups.  Recommendation does
not factor in price.  Not all books will have arrived in your area this week.
An archive can be found on my homepage, http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/Rants 
  This may be the first time I got too few comics to use my credit card.
       (Well, since getting a credit card in the first place.)

     Items of Note (strongly recommended or otherwise worthy): None.

"Other Media" Capsules:

     Things that are comics-related but not necessarily comics (i.e.
comics-based movies like Iron Man or Hulk), or that aren't going to be
available via comic shops (like comic pack-ins with DVDs) will go in this
section when I have any to mention.  They may not be as timely as comic
reviews, especially if I decide to review novels that take me a week or two
(or ten) to get around to.

     MySpace Dark Horse Presents #34: Dark Horse - The Brody's Ghost preview
wraps up this month at http://www.myspace.com/darkhorsepresents.  Three of
the four installments interested me enough to read, including Brody, of
course. 
     Brody's Ghost Part 4: After giving the impression that Brody may be
living purely on the street in the first three parts, ghosts his only
companions, Mark Crilley shows here that he does have connections among the
living and places he can crash, if not live regularly.  A lighter story than
the rest, it focuses on the ways a ghost can get you do go along with what
they want, when all YOU want is to enjoy a beer and watch the game on a new
big-screen TV.  So now we've seen the street fighter, the detective, the
mystic apprentice and finally some of the guy underneath the job labels.
Recommended reading.  
     Las Primas Controla: Superheroics from Los Bros Hernandez.  This isn't
their first time writing superheroes, although what little superheroic stuff
of theirs I've read came across as lucha libre meets the Jetsons.  This story
is more like Space Ghost meets Shazam Family, but the tone is just as goofy
and bizarre as the previous stuff I've read.  As the title states, the main
characters are superpowered cousins ("primas").  They gain powers by speaking
magic words ("Orbita Taramanus Ridiculum," which makes no sense unless the
family name is "Taramanus" in which case it might mean "let a series of
ridiculous events surround the Taramanus!") and apparently face an invasion
by shapeshifting aliens called Molestors.  No, this isn't hentai, I think
they mean the word more in the sense of "those who bother in an objectionable
way".  Anyway, it's got that strong odor of an indie comic creator who
decides to make superhero comics based on decades-old faded memories of the
books they read at the dentist's office, not something I plan to follow.
     Englouorioues Mask-tards: Evan Dorkin and Hilary Barta seek bold new
directions in intnentional misspeling for the title of this Mask story.  Yes,
the green-faced one Jim Carrey made famous.  The high concept (high as in
"what are you smoking?" high) is that Tarantino and his buddies got copies of
the Mask's mask, and go on a rampage against movie critics, the press, other
directors and actors, etc.  At three pages, I think it could have stood to be
shorter.  Or maybe longer.  But it plays out its premise pretty much on page
one, then falls back on the usual Tarantino parody stuff (including stuff
Tarantino has parodied about himself).  Eh.


Time-Shifting:
     Sometimes I get a comic a week or two late because of Diamond's
combination of neglect and incompetence.  If it's more than a week late,
though, I won't review it unless it's very notable.  Additionally, I will
often get tradepaperbacks long after publication or even sometimes before
Diamond ships them, and those will go here.  If I'm reasonably sure I'm
reviewing something that didn't ship this week, this is the section for it.

     Nothing this week.  

New Comics:
     Comics and comic collections that I got this week and were actually
supposed to be out this week, as far as I can tell.  These reviews will
generally be spoiler-free, but the occasional bit will slip in.

     Invincible Returns #1: Image - This is like Invincible #0, a "catch new
readers up on what's going on" book.  Unlike #0, it's not a loss-leader, but
also unlike #0 it's new writing and art rather than a clip show.  It's very
heavy on exposition and "explain the plot to someone who already knows"
scenes, but it does still move the overall story forward rather than just
looking back.  And if it's got a lot of recap, Kirkman manages to generally
make it flow well enough.  The "returns" part of the title, by the way, is
metaphorical rather than literal.  The past couple of years have seen
Invincible go down a somewhat darker path, and the main conflict of this
issue is his attempts to claw his way back into the light...for all the good
it'll do him when the Viltrumite War kicks into gear.  Recommended.  $3.99

Gone Missing:

     Stuff that came out some places this week and that I wanted to buy, but
couldn't find for whatever reason, so people don't have to email me asking
"Why didn't you review X?"  (If it's neither here nor in the section above,
though, feel free to ask, I might have forgotten about it!) 

     Current list as of 4/7/10: Official Handbook of the Gold Digger
Universe #22, Gold Digger v3 #105 and #116, Gold Digger Sacred Library #3,
Marvel Boy: the Uranian #3.  

Awards:

"You'd Think They'd Have Smudge-Proof Glass In THe Future" Award to Brody's
     Ghost Part 4

"If Only Three Characters Get Speaking Roles, It'd Be Nice If We Got The 
     Name Of More Than One Of Them" Award to Las Primas Controla

"Not Enough Footnotes" Award to Englouorioues Mask-tards

"Hopefully They Tipped Well" Award to Invincible Returns #1

     Dave Van Domelen, "Feh.  Villains." - Invincible

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