Comic Picks By The Glick

Hrm…  When it was teased that Batman killed for the custom-human-trafficker known as “Mother” because he wanted a Robin more suited for the job than Dick Grayson, I knew it was all a fake-out.  As should anyone else who has been reading “Batman,” and superhero comics in general, for a reasonable amount of time.  My expectation was that the explanation behind what really happened was going to be the real surprise here.  That didn’t happen.  What Scott Snyder, James Tynion, and their co-writers came up with basically amounts to, “Of course he didn’t.  Now let’s move on.”  That’s pretty disappointing and part my problem with this concluding volume.

For all of its sprawl and excess, “Batman Eternal” still had a semblance of unpredictability to it.  Putting aside the fact that we knew everything would work out for the title character and his comrades in the end, there was still a feeling of “Where the hell are they going with this?” that lasted through the entirety of the series.  Even at its most filler-y parts I was still involved and my patience was rewarded in the end.  Theoretically, the fact that “Batman & Robin Eternal” was set to run for half of that series’ length should’ve given its writers the ability to deliver a more focused and entertaining story.  It is focused, and things did start off well.  However, the story being told here has a more conventional and predictable arc to it where the only surprises involve the characters that show up towards the end.

Not that the presences of Damien Wayne and the Midnighter aren’t welcome.  In fact, the spotlight this series casts on the supporting members of the Bat-family is quite welcome.  We get to see the various Robins -- current and former -- demonstrate the strengths that took them from sidekicks to star material (in their own ongoing titles).  Harper Row also comes more into her own as Bluebird and Cassandra Cain is brought back into the DCU in dramatic and worthy fashion.  There’s some good work mixed in amongst the formulaic here, which makes it a decent read over all but not an essential one by any means.

Akiko Higashimura’s epic of female otaku, fashion, and jellyfish takes two conventional, but not unsatisfying, turns in its second volume.  The first is that the standard shojo manga love triangle starts to become a bit more codified here.  Dowdy jellyfish-lover Tsukimi really does have the hots for crossdresser Kurano’s handsome, responsible, and utterly inept in social skills older brother Shu, but she needs to get over her self-esteem issues first.  Meanwhile, the stylish and fun-loving Kurano is slowly finding himself entranced by Tsukmi’s random bouts of passion and inspiration when it comes to awakening her fashion sense.  Shu is also attracted to Tsukimi’s “awakened mode,” though the transformation is so dramatic that he doesn’t know it’s actually her.  The man also has to deal with the gold-digging real estate developer who has latched onto him in the hopes of making use of his family’s connections as she spearheads the plan to bulldoze the apartment complex that houses Tsukimi and the rest of her “Amars” gang.  Though the wackiness and outright slapstick threaten to overwhelm the characters, Higashimura keeps the drama on a slow burn so that things keep unfolding at a rate and in a way that managed to hold my interest in spite of the familiarity of this setup.

The other thing is that the mangaka appears to be taking small steps towards making her collective of female otaku somewhat self-sufficient.  I mentioned in my previous review that I didn’t think this series would work if it were focused on male otaku because it’d be impossible to feel sympathy in seeing guys living a life so pampered and indulgent.  That said, Higashimura apparently realizes that the members of Amars can’t live off of their parents indefinitely and starts steering the narrative towards giving them some manner of self-sufficiency.  Tsukimi is mainly the agent of this with her jellyfish-sewing and newfound dressmaking skills, but her fellow otaku pitch in as needed while Kurano works to handle the business end of things.  Seeing these characters work towards some kind of agency for themselves is the more involving of the two turns in this volume.  There may not be a whole lot that is new on display in this series, but it’s done well enough (and delivered in two-volume chunks) to make it worth reading for now.

Wonder twins Gabriel Ba and Fabio Moon are back and this time they’re adapting a short story from Neil Gaiman.  Dark Horse has made a small cottage industry of getting top-flight creators -- John Bolton, P. Craig Russell, and Michael Zulli -- to adapt shorts from Gaiman over the years, and “How to Talk” is a funny, quirky, and a little scary addition to them.  It’s about two friends, Enn and Vic, who are on their way to a party in the suburbs.  Vic exudes confidence and has no problems talking to the opposite sex.  Enn is just the opposite, but is encouraged by his friend to get to know some of the girls who have decided to attend this party.  What the sociably reluctant teen finds out is that the members of the opposite sex may very well be from another planet.  At least, maybe just the ones who are attending this party.

“How to Talk” operates from that classic assumption that the female mind and unknowable to men.  Gaiman just runs with it in a slightly more literal direction for his story.  As for the adaptation work by Ba and Moon, it’s a huge step up from what I experienced with their efforts on “Two Brothers” last year.  The art is lively with a dreamlike quality that helps with the suspension of disbelief for the story’s more fantastical elements.  Those only break through in a piercing moment of nightmare towards the end.  Enn is something of a blank slate as a character, but his concerns help make him relatable and that blankness works well as a contrast when he’s put up against the respective histories of the girls he meets at the parties.  It’s great work from all of the parties involved and warrants an easy recommendation to their respective fans.  As well as anyone who is wondering if these adaptations of Gaiman’s short stories are worth checking out.

jason@glickscomicpicks.com

Yeah, there were lots of interesting comics titles announced in the run-up to Comic-Con from Marvel.  I liked the fact that Al Ewing’s “Avengers” titles will be continuing on in “U.S.Avengers” and “Ultimates [Squared].”  The idea of the new “Champions” series being made up of teen superheroes opposed to the events of “Civil War II” sounds nice, even if Mark Waid strikes me as being just a little too old to write about characters so young (give it to Noelle Stevenson, is what I’d like to shout though my rational mind says that Waid will still deliver a solid read regardless) and I’m sad to see Humberto Ramos off “Extraordinary X-Men” to write this title.  No America Chavez title either, but I’ll let everyone else be annoyed about that for me.

Most of the movie and TV news coming out of the con was to my liking as well.  Casting Kurt Russell as Ego the Living Planet in “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2” sounds downright crazy, until you hear director James Gunn explain his reasoning.  Joss Whedon said that he’d come back into the Marvel fold to direct a “Black Widow” solo movie, which I’d love to see.  I just watched the new “Doctor Strange” trailer and saw Chiwetel Ejiofor become my hero for the “wi-fi password” business at the end of it.  Oh, and the “Legion” trailer for the series on FX next year looks pretty slick.  If it hews closest to Si Spurrier’s take on the character, then it might wind up becoming a must-see in my book.

Here is where we take a break from any long-term story threads this title has been nurturing.  Anyone expecting to learn more about Chise and Elias’ pasts, the mage school that approached Elias in the previous volume, or what that evil alchemist from the first couple of volumes is up to will have to wait and see if mangaka Kore Yamazaki decides to touch upon any of them in vol. 6.  What we get here is one subplot being capped off in emotional fashion as Chise lends a helping hand to the succubus who fell in love with the old man who tends his flower garden.  The old man is dying and the succubus is beside herself with fear and guilt at this thought, as her presence is still draining his life force even though she doesn’t intend for it to happen.  With time running out, Chise feels that the best way for this situation to be resolved is to cook up some fairy ointment that will allow the old man to finally see the spirit that has been at his side for many years.  There’s relatively little drama in the making of this ointment, but Yamazaki does a great job of selling the feelings of the primary characters in this story.  When they finally meet, the emotions of the scene ring true in bittersweet fashion.

The end of that story segues quite smoothly into the next one as the effort Chise expended in making the ointment has a devastating effect on her body.  Unsure of how to properly heal a human, Elias accepts Oberon’s offer of medical assistance and crosses the threshold with Chise into Tir Na Nog, The Land of the Fae.  While Chise gets some decidedly unconventional medical assistance from a changeling doctor, Elias hears out Titania’s request for him and his charge to come live in Tir Na Nog.  What’s most interesting in this section, and the rest of the volume in general, is the worldbuilding that Yamazaki engages in.  Fairy medicine doesn’t work the same way as the human stuff does, but there are clear and logical rules set out for how it does.  We also get to learn about Silky’s tragic-then-hopeful background, and find out about the traditions and terrors lurking in Yuletide.  Vol. 5 ends with a hint that we may be getting back to one of the threads that was put on hold here.  Yet it shows that even when Yamazaki decides to step back and flesh out the world she has created within this series, the results are still pretty fantastic.

It's a newly-minted Eisner-winning series and a return to form for Brubaker and Phillips.

Yup, fine.  Between driving down on Friday and hanging out with Steve afterwards and on Saturday, I probably spent less time at the con than I have in past years.  There was still plenty of rummaging through the half-off bins as well as the four panels I attended, and fun was had in these activities.  Particularly in seeing creators I like in person (as well as one industry person that I could’ve done without) and to hear them talk about their craft.  Tsutomu Nihei’s appearance on Saturday was my main reason for attending; though, I may scale things back to just attending one day next year.  Yeah, I’m complaining about a first world problem and deserve to be mocked for it accordingly.  That’s probably not the best lead-in to my thoughts on the four panels I did check out, but they can be found after the break.

There has been some consternation over the fact that America Chavez has not been given a solo series over at Marvel yet.  Well, her creators have decided to take matters into their own hands over at Image.  Joe Casey and Nick Dragotta -- Wait, you didn’t think I meant Kieron Gillen and Jamie McKelvie after they gave the character her star turn in their “Young Avengers” series?  Chavez was created by Casey and Dragotta in the pages of their semi-forgotten “Vengeance” series almost a decade ago.  Now they’ve giving us “All-America Comix” spotlighting the adventures of one America Vasquez, a Latina superheroine with unspecified (as of yet) powers.

For me the most worrisome thing about this series is Dragotta’s involvement as this implies “East of West” will be on hiatus while he’s illustrating this.  Other people will likely have issues with the fact that Casey created Chavez as a straight woman who didn’t wear panties for reasons that were very important to the plot.  Because reasons.  If this is the version of Chavez that he’s trying to reclaim, then the reaction to the first issue of “All-America Comics” will be VERY interesting to see.  This is even before you take into account Casey’s predilection for doing things differently for the sake of being different while he’s clearly trying to tap into a very specific set of fanboy/girl expectations here.  Unless Casey adjusts his usual approach to superhero comics, I’m expecting this to be a trainwreck of epic proportions.