Comic Picks By The Glick

Even if Slott doesn’t reinvent the wheel with these two volumes, there’s still fun to be had.  Vol. 1, “Fourever,” does the dirty work of getting the family back together after years of corporate-mandated separation.  Reed, Sue, Valeria, Franklin, and the Future Foundation’s efforts to rebuild the multiverse come to an abrupt, and needlessly harsh, stop when they encounter the Griever of All things.  She’s entropy personified and finds their efforts at creation personally offensive. It’s going to take a lot more than who they’ve got to stop her, so it’s time to bring the Fantastic Four -- ALL of them -- back together.  It’s a fun, if simple, story with great art from Sara Pichelli, that draws on Slott’s “big idea” brain from “Silver Surfer” with a resolution that’s appropriately clever. The same goes for the Stefano Caselli/Nico Leon story about a Fantastic Faux-team that has sprung up in the original’s place which rounds out the volume.

Vol. 2, “Mr. and Mrs. Grimm,” kind of departs from the superhero paradigm entirely as it’s basically an anthology about the wedding of Ben Grimm and Alicia Masters.  Gail Simone and Laura Braga team up for a fun take on Alicia’s bachelorette with the all-time great title of “(Invisible) Girls Gone Wild.” Meanwhile, Fred Hembeck gives us a tounge-in-cheek history of Alicia’s dad, the Puppet Master, while Slott and Mark Buckingham give us the best story in the volume in “Father Figure” as Ben goes to ask Alicia’s father for his blessing.  Buckingham delivers some great chunky Kirby-esque art while Slott imparts the story with some fun and sinister twists. Slott and Mike Allred deliver a good-looking if unnecessary story of Ben and Sue in the early days with “Change Partners,” while the writer and Adam Hughes show off some rambunctious Marvel fun as Johnny tries to give Ben a bachelor party to remember in “Guy’s Night Out” and kind of fails spectacularly.

As for the main event, Slott and Aaron Kuder handle that.  If you were expecting something to go wrong there then give yourself a No-Prize.  Said interruption is a nice setup for the next volume -- it’s called “Herald of Doom” *hint, hint* -- but the best part is how Reed uses his big brain to have the ceremony proceed regardless of this.  Is it a selfish use of superpowers? Arguably. But if you can’t do something like this for family, then who can you do it for? It’s another clever moment in two volumes that are full of them, and these two volumes are a good read if you’re looking for some straightforwardly satisfying superhero action.

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It was the worst kind of surprise for me.  Was it a good ending, though?

That’s right, we’re now living in a world where “All-Rounder Meguru” comes out at such a pace (quarterly) that I can wait to review two volumes at once.  Of course, that approach presents its own problems as we progress deeper into the current tournament arc.  Meguru has a shot at making it to the finals, but first he has to get past Mitsuya. This former wrestler almost made it to the olympics and now he’s turned to MMA for a fresh start.  He’s built like a tank and prepared to steamroll all over the title character. Even if Meguru can take him out, his opponent in the finals is Muroi the aging (He’s 36!) amateur who’s looking to turn pro before it’s too late.  In the fights leading up to the finals, Muroi shows that he still has it even with his bum knee. In order to win, Meguru is going to have to show he can get past the narrative surrounding the man. Oh, and beat him up in front of his family as well.

The problem I created for myself by deciding to review both of these volumes at once is the realization that they’re both pretty much the same in terms of structure.  Meguru has a fight near the start of the volume, Muroi gets one in the middle, and then the volume ends with Meguru in the middle of a big fight. While I guess you could chalk this up to the fact that the character is in the middle of a tournament, I don’t think it would hurt the series any if mangaka Hiroki Endo decided to end the next volume right after or even before a big fight.  That aside, the series is entertaining as ever with its strategic focus on how MMA fighting works. There’s always plenty of good give-and-take in the action and even if it sometimes feels like Meguru is destined to win, Endo knows how to make him struggle enough so that his victories always feel earned. With vol. 10 ending on the Meguru/Muroi matchup in the finals, however, I wouldn’t say his victory is assured just yet.  So the cliffhanger to that volume leaves me more than a little eager for the arrival of vol. 11.

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Two volumes in and there are certainly things I like about Scott Snyder (and James Tynion IV’s) run on “Justice League” so far.  Chief among them is the fact that each volume is a smaller part of a much larger story that’s being told. We can see that in the opening issue which follows Luthor’s ongoing efforts to unlock the secret powers of the universe and the hints given to him by the Batman Who Laughs.  While I want to see where that goes, it’s also nice when we get to see what downtime with the League is like in the issue which follows. Snyder pulls off a nice balancing act as the team catches their breath while Superman rebuilds the Moon while shrugging off an alien threat. All of this looks great too as some of DC’s best artists -- Francis Manapul, Howard Porter, Jorge Jimenez, and Mikel Janin -- contribute art to this volume.  I can’t complain too much about a lack of stylistic consistency when the individual issues look this good.

If only all of this was supporting a core story that wasn’t so determined to pursue sheer volume over actual substance.  “Graveyard of Gods” is an Aquaman-centric story as it involves the unleashing of a triumvirate of sea gods, locked away by the Atlantean hero Arion, upon the Earth.  There’s much flooding, magic water which turns people into fish-monsters, and lots of Black Manta as he looks to get the Life Force and rule the oceans himself. All of this is delivered at maximum volume with crazy stuff happening to raise the stakes on each page.  This approach, combined with lots of breathlessly expository dialogue overwhelmed me more than it swept me along. I can appreciate Snyder and Tynion’s ambition in trying to deliver an event storyline with every major arc of this series. I’m still waiting for them to serve up one that actually delivers on style as well as substance.

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Sadly, this isn’t the volume where we get to see Hulk punch Mephisto in the face.  The “hell” that Hulk and the rest of the cast were pulled into at the end of the previous volume is a more desolate place which is filled with the talking shells of the dead people closest to them.  It’s also being lorded over by the ghost of Bruce Banner’s father who’s apparently acting as a host for the mysterious force that’s behind Gamma radiation and wants to come into the Marvel Universe itself.  So there’s lots of creepy, character-driven stuff going on as Hulk has to confront echoes of characters from his past, using his words and his fists, and that’s stuff’s pretty good as writer Al Ewing knows what makes his characters tick.  Not as interesting are the lengthy expository digressions and speeches where it feels like the writer is working hard to add some profundity to the story he’s telling. It doesn’t really add much to what this story had from the start, even as artist Joe Bennett never stops delivering incredible visuals on each page.

Things wind down quite a bit in the two issues that follow the title arc as Banner and the Hulk catch up with some old friends.  First up is his ex-wife Betty, who’s dealing with the death of her father General Thaddeus Ross. The issue has some great stylized art from Kyle Hotz who makes the conversation scenes just seem strange enough, while things get much crazier for the fights.  It’s arguably better than the story deserves since it’s more about making sense of Betty’s status quo in order to set her up for a bigger role in the story down the line. More to my liking is the Doc Samson-centric issue which follows as it’s always a good time seeing the doctor’s logical approach to addressing superheroes’ mental issues.  It’s especially welcome here as he’s not only able to hold his own against the Hulk’s claims, but his return ties into the greater issue of why the Gamma-enhanced just don’t die. Something which is tantalizingly dangled in front of the reader on the final story page to stoke anticipation for the next volume.

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While I have yet to read the actual issue where Peter Parker revealed that he was Spider-Man to longtime antagonist J. Jonah Jameson, I have to admit that this development has worked out really well in the “Spider-Man” series I do read.  Rather than broadcast this secret to the world, Jameson has since become the character’s most overbearing proponent. As a result, there’s still this antagonistic tension between the two of them so their familiar character dynamic is still there.  It’s just being expressed in a different way now.

Above-the-Board Recommendation:

Harleen #1

I was very tempted to pick something else for this spot, until I realized that I’d rather wait to read that in softcover.  Even though I’ll be waiting to read this new Black Label miniseries when it’s collected I’ll be buying it when it comes out.  Regardless of whether it’s in hardcover or softcover. That’s because this miniseries comes to us from “Sunstone’s” Stjepan Sejic who has shown with that series to have a really good understanding of how to make an unconventional romance work.

With “Harleen” he’s taking on the most unconventional, and arguably least healthy, of DC romances.  I’m speaking of the one that exists between Harley Quinn and the Joker. Or rather, Dr. Harleen Quinzel as this is another take on her origin story.  The basics are still here: She’s still a doctor who has just started working at Arkham and is looking to treat the Joker’s madness. Given how well Sejic managed to get into his characters’ heads in “Sunstone” I’m expecting to see the same quality character work here.  Only in service of a much darker and more disturbing objective. Done right this will be a read that proves to be as compelling as it is uncomfortable, with some absolutely stunning art to go along with it.

In news I didn’t think I’d read anytime soon, Dark Horse announced at the Anime Expo panel today that they’ll be publishing new volumes of “The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service.”  The series, about a group of mostly unemployable college students who make ends meet by taking jobs from dead people, has been on hiatus since vol. 14 was released in July 2015.  Now, saying that we’re getting new volumes of this series is a bit of a misnomer. That’s because “Kurosagi” will be continuing in the three-in-one omnibus format that the first twelve volumes were re-collected in.  This means that the upcoming fifth omnibus will collect the existing 13th & 14th volumes and give us vol. 15 in English for the first time.

Speaking as someone who has already bought volumes 13 & 14, I have no problem with this.  In fact, I told series editor/adapter Carl Horn as much at the Dark Horse Manga panel he hosted at Fanime a few years back.  Given that the series has struggled so hard in the past to find an audience I’m not surprised that they’re going with the format that has actually made it profitable for the company to publish it.  I can understand that some people who bought volumes 13 & 14 are going to gripe about having to re-buy them to get vol. 15. They just need to keep this in mind: Re-buying two volumes to get the newest one is still preferable to getting no new volumes at all.

It also bears mentioning that this new omnibus is set to arrive next March, with another omnibus collecting volumes 16-18 following later that year (I hope).  While this is AMAZING news, the fact remains that the title’s future is not assured just yet. Dark Horse’s representatives stated at the panel that they will only release further omnibi if these new ones sell.  So be sure to open your wallets when next March rolls around to get this new omnibus. Barring someone deciding to make some kind of anime or live-action adaptation of the series -- not impossible, but I’d say the current chances of that happening top out at “extremely unlikely” -- this is likely our last, best chance to ensure that the series receives a proper, excellently translated English release.

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