May 23, 2007

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.
Dropped $200 at the optician today.  Rants, Capsules can be found on my 
             homepage, http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/Rants 

First Look Comments:

     Books I read over the weekend as First Looks, but didn't buy, so can't
really say much in detail about.  DC has stopped having First Looks, so it's
just Marvel and Image...and there's word that Diamond doesn't want to bother
with the program at all anymore.

     Books for next week - 

     None interested me.


Capsules:
     Short, relatively spoiler-free reviews of books I actually bring home
(as opposed to reading in preview form in the shop or online).  If I get a
book late due to distributor foulups or whatever, I'll put it in the Missing
section.

     Books of Note (Strongly Recommended or otherwise worthy): Friendly
Neighborhood Spider-Man Annual #1, Gold Digger: Peebo Tales #1
     
     Countdown #49 (of 0): DC - Sigh.  Most of this is the Monitors plotline
that already bores me, but the Mary Marvel one seems dead set on undoing
"long term" changes that happened all of a month ago.  The more Countdown I
read, the more pointless 52 becomes.  Also, either there's more crossover
events needing explanation, or the artist for this issue got the wrong
reference materials.  Neutral.  $2.99/$3.65Cn
     Supergirl and the Legion of Super-Heroes #30: DC - Fairly elegant
solution to the whole mess, albeit not as permanent as could be hoped for.
Perhaps a tad anticlimactic, but a reasonably good "farewell" from Waid and
Kitson.  And a cute bit of parallelism at the end.  Recommended.  $2.99/
$3.65Cn
     Shadowpact #13: DC - A prologue issue, setting up a bunch of new threats
while barely showing the heroes themselves.  Hampton's guest art has some
merit to it, but really doesn't suit superheroics, even mystically-bent
ones.  And while portentious prose comes naturally to the Phantom Stranger,
it's still a tad purple.  Mildly recommended.  2.99/$3.65Cn
     The Irredeemable Ant-Man #8: Marvel - Heh.  Ant-Man finds his soulmate,
which means he's highly doomed, but at least he'll have some fun on the flume
ride to destruction.  Recommended.  $2.99/$3.75Cn
     Fantastic Four #546: Marvel - A fun read and a clever solution to the
dilemma.  McDuffie definitely gets Priest's T'Challa.  Recommended.  $2.99/
$3.75Cn
     newuniversal #6: Marvel - Stepping back, taking stock, and then spending
way too many pages showing Justice kill people.  About twice as long as it
needs to be, but by modern standards that's not too bad.  Recommended.
$2.99/$3.75Cn
     She-Hulk v2 #18: Marvel - Here's one of the places where things start
blowing up in Tony Stark's face.  Too bad it was telegraphed in Hulk books a
couple of weeks ago.  Still, it's satisfying to have someone in-story say
some of the things to Tony that most readers have been thinking.
Recommended.  $2.99/$3.75Cn
     Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man Annual #1: Marvel - The main story is
Sandman: Year One, the all new fully retconned and reconciled origin of the
Sandman.  And it's good enough that I hope this one sticks.  :) There's also
a short backup drawn by Colleen Doran, a touching tale of how you can save
someone while also failing to save them.  All written by Peter David.
Strongly recommended.  $3.99/$4.75Cn
     Iron Man Hypervelocity #5 (of 6): Marvel - A tad "by the numbers" in the
sense that while the villain is doing her bit, we know that there's more
going on that what we see.  Still, a fun trip and some good visuals from
Warren and Denham.  Recommended.  $2.99/$3.75Cn
     Dynamo5 #3: Image - A fairly straightforward mission combined with
everyone getting a page or two of downtime in their civilian IDs.
Interesting, but unremarkable.  Recommended.  $3.50/$4.15Cn
     Gold Digger v3 #85: Antarctic Press - Setting up the next Big
Adventure(s) and digging up some creaky old things from the past.  And, in
addition to the 80s cartoon references, there's some archaeology.  ;) Oh, and
the term "dongle" is used.  Correctly, even.  Recommended.  $2.95/$3.40Cn
     Gold Digger: Peebo Tales #1: Antarctic Press - Solicited as the Summer
Fun Special.  More short-form fun with everyone's favorite AI bit-bombs!  No
dongles, but plenty of fun for those with an AI interest, on top of the
general mayhem and shenanigans.  Strongly recommended.  $3.50/$4.05Cn  (Side
note: I SOOOOO would buy a set of PVC Peebos.)  (Later note: so does AP, but
sadly the economics don't allow it these days.  Or plush Peebos.)


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 5/23:

     Still missing Gold Digger Tangent #2, Fred Perry's S-Guild #1,
Dr. Debunko: the Short Stories, Devil's Panties #7 and #8, Dino Wars #3 and
#4, Fallen Angel #15, "You Can Draw Transformers".  Add Fall of Cthulhu #3.

Awards:

"Flauting The Law" Award to Countdown #49 (of 0)

"I Hope For Sun Boy's Sake She Can Turn Those Off" Award to Supergirl and
     the Legion of Super-Heroes #30

"Sadly, That IS His Best Behavior" Award to Shadowpact #13

"My ORGANS!" Award to The Irredeemable Ant-Man #8

"Froggy Style" Award to Fantastic Four #546

"And He's Buy-uy-ing A Sta-airway..." Award to newuniversal #6

"How Many Lawyers Does It Take To Screw Over An Iron Man?" Award to She-Hulk
     v2 #18

"The Stories We Tell Ourselves To Get Through The Day" Award to Friendly
     Neighborhood Spider-Man Annual #1

"Yes, The 'A' DOES Stand For France" Award to Iron Man: Hypervelocity #5 
     (of 6)

"Shaky Grasp On Reality" Award to Dynamo5 #3

"What Are The First Three Protocols?" Award to Gold Digger v3 #85

"These Systems Come With A GUII!" Award to Gold Digger: Peebo Tales #1

     Dave Van Domelen, "Oh, GRIFE."  "What?"  "A thousand votes just came in
for BRAINY."  "Oh, GRIFE."  "Wait...whew.  TWO thousand just came in voting
'anyone BUT Brainy.'  Do we COUNT those?"  "GOD, yes." - Theena and Sun Boy,
SG&LSH #30
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