A month and a half out from the Baltimore Comic-Con and I’ve still got piles of comics to read. It’s been fun deciding what to pick up next and having the freedom to discard whatever I want. So here’s some capsule reviews of the books that I’ve read … and am still working my way through.
Action Comics #598-598 (DC): These were late Byrne-era issues. In them, Superman teams up with Lois Lane and Lana Lang and then Checkmate. Both have better covers than stories, to be honest. The Lana/Lois story has some leftovers from Millennium and it seems like Lois is going to put together the Clark/Superman secret identity but the issue is “solved” by some contrived “The Kents raised me” type stuff? The Checkmate team-up was almost a back-door pilot to Checkmate, which had been building itself up during the last several issues of Vigilante. That’s a title I’ve been interested in, so I may check it out on the app. For now, these are a keep.
Alpha Flight: Fear Itself #1 (Marvel): A tie-in to one of the many Marvel events that I both missed and have no knowledge of. It seems like they happen twice a year these days as it is. Anyway, all I know is that the team is betrayed at the end of the issue by a possessed one of their own. Decent art, entertaining in the moment, but I’m not interested in the Fear Itself event or Alpha Flight enough to keep going. Toss.
CrossGen Chronicles #2-5 (CrossGen): My time reading CrossGen books is very sparse, maybe a couple of random comics. This was a four-pack of comics that I got for $2 and I picked it up because George Perez was the artist. I didn’t know the characters, but the stories were intriguing. Perez stopped drawing with issue #5, so I am going to try and track down the first issue and may make a note to look for some of the company’s titles when searching the cheap bins. Keep.
Did You Hear About Mimi Green? #1 (Dark Horse): An influencer sort of goes missing, or at least it seems like she’s in some sort of rehab/spa. She’s become a bit of a cautionary tale after old posts of hers were dug up. And now people are disappearing and there seem to be monsters around? It was interesting enough that I picked up a few more of the miniseries and just need one more issue to complete it. Keep.
Evangeline Special #1 (Eternity): A 1980s indie sci-fi action comic with Chuck Dixon and Judith Hunt on the creative team. I really liked it but was disappointed to read how apparently the quality went south after Hunt left the title. But I’ll keep this one.
Guardians of Knowledge #1 (Marvel): I had thought this was an Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. comic when I got it out of the mystery box because it had a variant cover for the series. But no, this is a Guardians of the Galaxy miniseries that came out during the Secret Wars event a while back. I’d read that series and it was … interesting? It seemed like it couls have been a cool Crisis-type story but I remember being underwhelmed. I guess this was one of the “alternate reality” miniseries and had a tough time following it, but it was cool to see Drax the Destroyer fight Angela (of Spawn fame). Toss.
Tales of High Adventure #4, 5 (Marvel): This was an Epic Comics anthology series from the mid-1980s. It felt like a throwback to Adventure Comics and other Golden Age books of the same type. The stories were entertaining tales of swashbuckling and daring exploration. I could tell that Marvel was trying to go for the Indiana Jones audience and the creators seemed to be having fun with it. Ultimately, it wasn’t my bag, although I’m going to hold onto them in case I find others. Keep.
King Spawn #50 and Scorched #50 (Image): In these mystery packs, I always seem to get a few Spawn-related books. I collected Spawn in the ’90s and stopped somewhere around issue #50 or 60, so I ahd an idea of who the characters were. Scorched was one I’d gotten in another box and she seems like a character who is a replacement in some way for Angela (who was notably sued out of the comic by Neil Gaiman). It is so much of the original-recipe Image from the early Ninteies. That’s not necessarily a bad thing so much as “It is what it is.” I can respect Todd McFarlane’s commitment to this character and his fan base. They weren’t bad reads, either. But it’s not something I’ll dive back into. Toss.
Roku #1 and Secret Weapons #0-4: Valiant’s resurrection in the 2010s resulted in some very good comics, some of which I bought either off the stands or in trade (I especially liked the Rai relaunch). These two series were two that I missed and they came out in the back part of the decade. The Roku book had a striking cover and is a superhero/secret agent story that I wanted more of. Secret Weapons is a 5-issue mini (if you count #0) about a group of superpowered individuals who were rejected by the program that gave them powers. They wind up scrambling for their lives as well as trying to get to the bottom of their origins. By the end, they’re a team and it seems that they’re part of a company-wide event that I might see if I can find digitally somewhere. But some of these Valiant 2.0 books might be worth seeking out again. Keep.
