Diary of an up and coming sociopath

Yet another bumper week as I catch up from Tenerife and try to plough through a really huge amount of stuff. I’m starting to feel like I’m buying a lot of shite at the moment. I might reassess my habits in favour of TPBs and graphic novels for a little while, since I’ve got loads of those I want but no spare budget for them. Things could get violent in the oncoming bloodbath.

House of M #6 - Standard review coming. Some people hate HoM but I can’t find too huge a fault with it. It’s the entire Marvel Universe interacting in a truly old-school way, yet with a slightly new spin. Writing is great, art is great, but will anyone actually care that much about the plot unless they’re a huge marvel zombie like I am? I can’t wait to give this a whole read through, but the spin-off titles have been of less than encouraging quality, so I’m concerned about the eventual ramifications of the story. But no huge problems with the book itself. A.

Rising Stars: Voices of the Dead #4 - Why do i punish myself so? This issue takes a step into LSD enhanced water and makes me wonder what the fuck brought all this plot on. It occurs to me that for all Fiona Avery’s being pimped out as JMS’ protege, she doesn’t actually seem to have delivered much of a story that I’ve found worth reading. I’m a stupid completist but she might have actually broken that cycle. If this doesn’t pick up I may have to avoid any further rising stars material written by her. C-, because the art is passable given what the artists are working with.

Daredevil: Father - I’m finding this hard to follow polt-wise, because I can’t even remember the first issue and I only glanced over the second, but Quesada’s art is stronger than I’ve seen from many people in years. It’s criminal he doesn’t draw more really, because in the midst of all the executive work he does you forget he built his career being an artist, and then something like this comes along to show what you’re missing. Admittedly, his writing isn’t always the best, but I expect this will read much better when there isn’t an 18 month gap between issues 1 and 2 to contend with, and even more so when the rest of the story follows immediately. B+.

X-Men #175 - Milligan’s turn on the book is working pretty well. There’s a hilarious bunch of scenes in this issue which highlight how Havok isn’t really working well as a leader, in that people like Storm and Wolverine are all too aware of how badly they outrank him, even if he is technically in charge. Part of X-Men’s appeal has always been the so-called soap opera dynamic established by Claremont, so it’s good to se someone play that up a bit. The problem if any is that Milligan plays it up almost too much. The plot takes a back seat to inter-character dynamics. It’s unfortunte to say as well, but I have to admit I’m officiall sick of Larroca’s art. He’s not been working for me since day one, it’s more the fault of the colouring and inking than the actual art, but I’d just like to have a change to the whole art team at this point. He can be great, but I don’t think he’s truly at his best here. B-

Black Panther #8 - Oh, how I wanted to skip this. An inter-book, interleaved crossover, just like the 90s used to make, and to further hammer that point home it’s following directly from an X-Men book, and into an X-Men book. Paul O’Brien points out, in the latest X-Axis, that the continuity in this entire series is beyond fucked up. Luckily, I didn’t read the first Black Panther arc. All I know is what I’ve read in X-Men and this comic, so it all works fine for me. In fact, I’m enjoying this a lot more than Milligan’s side of the story. Reggie Hudlin seems to be quite at ease writing the X-Men. Unfortunately there’s a line pointing to deeper problems where he has a character say something like “don’t let the child get away, I need her virgin blood to cure my AIDs” which is si horrible a thing to have written on just about every level that I’m surprised it got in. It might’ve been supposed to make the character look stupid, but it just makes the writer look that way. B

New Avengers #10 - What a great comic, seriously. The Avengers hasn’t been this good in decades. Which is odd because this issue mostly consists of Emma Frost, who isn’t an Avenger. The Sentry is dealt with in such a way that the continuity and gimmick of the character remain intact and it’s looking like one of Marvel’s most original (who was amusingly intentionally derivative) is going to be around for some time. Easily the most enjoyable thing I’m reading right now. A+ for the issue, A+ for the arc.

The Pulse #11 - Gaydos is back and all is well with the Pulse. Bendis and Gaydos reunited makes me bleed with happiness, since their run on Alias was one of the greatest comics I’ve read in some time. Jessica’s baby looks like it’s finally ready to be born and I haven’t ever cared about fictional children so much. Or non-fictional children. Humour, drama, it’s all in here. I’m starting to feel like Marvel should just rename themselves the Bendisverse, because once again I’m forced to deal out an A+ for something he’s written.

Truncated reviews:

Marvel Knights Spider-Man #18: Plot falls apart at final hurdle. Ridiculously trite “twist” ending. A promising arc left to decay somewhere around the second issue. That’ll teach me to try new material. This has only earned a repreieve from being dropped because I want to see what this Spider-Man “The Other” Crossover is like next month. C-.

Thunderbolts #12 - Didn’t care much for the purple man plot dynamics and the “maybe we haven’t been doing anything under our own will” uncertainty but it does seem to be over for now. The last page means that I’m keeping the faith, though, and I’m sure I’m coming back for something far better next month. C+.