The graphic novels loved by children and adults alike
Aug 22nd, 2012, 5:48 pm
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Title: Lobster Johnson – The Prayer of Neferu (Click to go to the release post)
Writer(s): Mike Mignola and John Arcudi (Click to see other books from this writer released on this site)
Review source: jbennett (Don't click it, read the review here... ;) )

" This is the sort of story my grandfather would have seen and enjoyed as a young man and it is still a fine tale today."

Review:
    The work opens with a classic film noir atmosphere, full of murders and mummies in New York City. This work will be a fun, if all too brief, favorite of both devotees of original pulp comics and the uses of Egyptian mythology in modern popular culture. Intrigue amongst Egyptologists is hardly a new story trope, but the directness of the hero, Lobster Johnson, is refreshing. One distinct difference between this work and its pulp era predecessors, to which it owes an obvious artistic debt, is Johnson’s willingness to use his gun to actually shoot people, particularly the man he accuses of contracting the theft and murder. For those unfamiliar with the Lobster Johnson series, the sudden appearance of a giant with a bullet-proof blacksmith’s apron and giant hammer may be a bit of a surprise even if his limited mental abilities aren’t, but the story doesn’t take itself seriously and neither should the reader. However, without the smith, there would be no ready explanation for the availability of a steel sword shaped like the bronze ones of the Hyksos in the Second Intermediate Period of Egyptian history. As is usual in such stories, the hero escapes the villain’s clutches through sheer prowess, but only after hearing Neferu’s nefarious plan. Also customary, the villains fall victim to a combination of their own poor planning and the hero’s tendency to be very, very lucky. This is the sort of story my grandfather would have seen and enjoyed as a young man and it is still a fine tale today.

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More info:
    Writer: Mike Mignola, John Arcudi
    Artist: Wilfredo Torres
    Colorist: Dave Stewart
    Cover Artist: Tonci Zonjic
    Genre: Action/Adventure, Horror

Publisher:
    Image

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Aug 22nd, 2012, 5:48 pm
Aug 23rd, 2012, 10:42 am
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Title: Daytripper (Click to go to the release post)
Writer(s): Fabio Moon and Gabriel Ba (Click to see other books from this writer released on this site)
Review source: Chris Murphy (Don't click it, read the review here... ;) )

" Daytripper is one of those books we should set aside specific adjectives for, to be used only when a book this incredible is created."

Review:
    Daytripper was the best comic book mini-series I read last year, one of the finest comics I've ever read, and one of the most emotionally powerful experiences I've ever had with visual storytelling. I could praise this book forever, but writer Kieron Gillen summed up the quintessential experience with the story within Twitter's 140 character limit:

    I can't say if Gillen's reaction is universal, but I certainly shared it. In my case the only difference was that I wasn't on public transportation when the force of the work hit me full on and didn't have to hold anything back.

    Published by DC's Vertigo imprint, the book was created, written and drawn collaboratively by brothers Gabriel Bá (The Umbrella Academy) and Fabio Moon (Casanova), and they have produced a masterpiece. Their story of Bràs de Oliva Domingos, a son, a father, a friend, a lover and a writer, told through glimpses of pivotal moments in Bràs' life, is beautiful on every level.

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    If you missed Daytripper in single issues, you're actually in luck. Vertigo released a trade paperback collection of all ten issues this month and the series has a significantly greater impact as a complete volume than it did in a serial format.

    Each of Daytripper's issues is a window into a moment in Bràs' life and ends as if he were to die in that moment. With these events presented out of any linear forward or backward chronological order, the reader is left to slowly piece together information about Bràs and what matters most to him: his failed romances leading to his relationship with his girlfriend and eventual wife Ana; his decades-long friendship with Jorge; his desire to become a published novelist, and, central to the book, his relationship with his father, accomplished author Benedito de Oliva Domingos.

    New revelations of past or future events ask the reader to continually reevaluate moments they've previously read, while the story itself builds on its examinations of family, friendship, love and life. And from the moment the first issue opens with Bràs' work writing obituaries, it's an examination of the inevitability of death, of preparing for death, and of how no amount of preparation is enough for those left behind.

    Throughout it is gorgeously illustrated by Bá, Moon, and colorist Dave Stewart. There are beautiful rural, urban and coastal landscapes of the brothers' native Brazil, mixed with surreal touches when appropriate. I could go on, but your experience with this book should come from reading it and seeing it for yourself. And if you've already read it in single issues, go set aside a few hours to experience it all at once and read it again.

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    In comics journalism there's a tendency to hail every enjoyable work that comes along as the most awesome thing ever, to the point where that kind of hyperbolic speech is the norm. While it's not awful that we're so excited by our medium, its fans, and its creators, this approach does often mean that in those rare moments when something truly special appears, we can't adequately describe it. The words we would ordinarily use have been devalued.

    Daytripper is one of those books we should set aside specific adjectives for, to be used only when a book this incredible is created. It is an intense work that draws readers into their own moving and deeply personal journey as they follow Bràs on his.

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More info:
    Writer: Fabio Moon & Gabriel Ba
    Artist: Fabio Moon & Gabriel Ba

Publisher:
    Image

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Aug 23rd, 2012, 10:42 am
Aug 23rd, 2012, 7:00 pm
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Title: B.P.R.D.: The Warning (Click to go to the release post)
Writer(s): Mike Mignola and John Arcudi (Click to see other books from this writer released on this site)
Review source: Andrew Wheeler (Don't click it, read the review here... ;) )

" The Warning is a great installment of a top-rank adventure series..."

Review:
    Dark Horse Comics, May 2009, $17.95

    The Warning is the tenth volume collecting the adventures of the Hellboy-less Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense, and the first in what the creators are calling the “Scorched Earth Trilogy.” The afterword by co-writer John Arcudi claims that events will getbigger and more dangerous from here – though he does note that this volume includes, among other thing, “[name withheld] gets kidnapped, … entire fleet of helicopters gets wiped out, and gigantic robots trample [name withheld] into rubble.” And previous volumes of this series (and, of course, of the related Hellboy) have been no slouch in the near-Armageddon sweepstakes – particularly The Black Flame. That’s a lot of promise, but Mignola’s fictional world does always teeter o the verge of utter supernatural chaos, in his very Lovecraftian way. It would be wise to take Arcudi at his word.

    The Warning begins with the team going in two directions at once, urgently following up recent events – Abe Sapien leads an assault squad out into the snowy mountains to try to find and retrieve the Wendigo-possessed former leader of their team, and the others have a séance to contact the mysterious ‘30s costumed hero Lobster Johnson, whom they think will have information about the robed man taunting and manipulating firestarter Liz Sherman in her mind. But neither one of those leads works out as the B.P.R.D. hopes, and, before long, they’re face-to-face with another high-powered menace and seeing another city being assaulted by giant robots.

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    And yet, remember that note from Arcudi. The plot of The Warning turns out to be just a warm-up; the antagonists here are not the true enemies of the B.P.R.D. Near the end, that mysterious man claims that he isn’t their real antagonist, either. The B.P.R.D. is fumbling in the dark in The Warning, unsure of what the real menace is, let alone how to stop it. But they go on, because that’s what they do.

    The Warning is a great installment of a top-rank adventure series, filled with wonder and terror, eyeball kicks and quiet character moments. It’s a magnificent brick in a more magnificent wall, but it’s no place to start. If you haven’t read B.P.R.D. before, go back to the beginning with Hollow Earth</em> – or, even better, go back to the beginning of Hellboy with Seed of Destruction. But, if you enjoy adventure stories with characters who don’t wear skin-tight outfits, you should have discovered Mignola’s world by now.

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More info:
    Writer: Mike Mignola, John Arcudi
    Artist: Guy Davis
    Colorist: Dave Stewart
    Cover Artist: Mike Mignola
    Genre: Horror, Action/Adventure

Publisher:
    Image

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Aug 23rd, 2012, 7:00 pm
Aug 24th, 2012, 2:09 pm
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Title: Northlanders Volume 1 (Click to go to the release post)
Writer(s): Brian Wood (Click to see other books from this writer released on this site)
Review source: Niall Alexander (Don't click it, read the review here... ;) )

" Northlanders is doing something that to the best of my knowledge no other comic book has done."

Review:
    Without some social contract in place - some agreement to say I will not harm you on the condition that you do not harm me, signed in spirit if not on legal letterhead - life, according to the 17th century political philosopher Thomas Hobbes, tends towards being nasty, brutish and short.

    Nothlanders, the long-running comic book series about Vikings and all the bad juju they do by DMZ co-creator Brian Wood and in the first arc artist David Gianfelice, is nasty and brutish all right - in fact from the outset it is so very nasty and so excruciatingly brutish as to sicken, on occasion - but short? Short it is not.

    Oh would that it had been! Would that Sven the Returned, the story this first trade collects, had been six issues of the ongoing long instead of eight; were that the case, Northlanders would have gotten off to an excellent start. But no. Instead, from the very beginning, writer Brian Wood seems content to spin his wheels, artificially inflating what should have been a solid introduction to the series to such an extent that it seems simply, sadly insubstantial.

    It's the year 980, or thereabouts, and Sven has come home. Home for him, which is to say the place where he was born, is Orkney, a small island to the North of Scotland where Sven's father ruled the roost. Least he did till he died... murdered by his brother, Gorm, who has since piled evil upon evil and stolen Sven's inheritance. But now, after years abroad, living a life of luxury in Constantinople, the wayward son returns with dark designs of his own: to take back his birthright, by force if necessary.

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    And in the end, blood will tell. Fucking buckets of the stuff.

    Northlanders has a pretty grim premise for a comic book - make no mistake: it is a far cry from teenagers nibbled by radioactive insects and blind men bearing sonar superpowers - and I'll admit I had my doubts as to whether such a story could sustain itself in the long term. That, in fairness, remains to be seen, but Sven the Returned seems an unconvincing opening statement in the case for sequential swords without sorcery, with as many high points as it has utterly loveless lows.

    First and foremost, there are at least two issues' worth of padding in the first collected volume of Northlanders. Never mind the meaningless digressions that make up the larger part of what is in essence a fairly straightforward story - a bloated chronicle of Sven's lone wolf war on an isolated Viking settlement - for more egregious than these is Wood's use of space. There are wasted pages in each issue... needless single and double-page spreads in every last part which leave the heavy lifting to the artist, who despite his self-evident skillset can't single-handedly make something interesting out of nothing.

    Here: look at Orkney. Rugged, isn't it? Now, look at it again. Had enough? No? Well, look at it ten more times! So it goes.

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    This is lazy storytelling, plain and simple, and there is evidence of Wood's lamentably simplistic approach elsewhere. With all its contemporary cussing, for instance, the dialogue and narration of Sven the Return is obviously attempting a Deadwood, but Brian Wood is no David Milch - certainly not judging from this - and it sticks out like a sore thumb

    That said, David Gianfelice's art is... if not attractive, exactly, then absolutely suited to the book. Alas, he's not the regular penciller; I'll be sad to see him take leave of the series as of the second volume of Northlanders, called The Cross + The Hammer. Which I will be reading.

    If that comes as a surprise given my various criticisms of the creative force behind this series, then consider this: Northlanders is doing something that to the best of my knowledge no other comic book has done. Sequential swords without the sorcery. Dungeons without the blasted dragons. It's blazing a trail, in a way, and if there are a few missteps along the road to Something New... then so be it. So be it, so long as it isn't all bad.

    And Sven the Returned is many things, but not that; not bad, not in any sense. Just too long, for what it is, and awfully self-serious where I'm sure a little silliness would have done this series the world of good.

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More info:
    Written by: Brian Wood
    Pencilled by: Dave Gibbons, Davide Gianfelice, Andrew Kubert
    Inked by: Dave Gibbons, Davide Gianfelice, Andrew Kubert

Publisher:
    Image

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Aug 24th, 2012, 2:09 pm
Aug 24th, 2012, 8:20 pm
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Title: Any Empire (Click to go to the release post)
Writer(s): Nate Powell (Click to see other books from this writer released on this site)
Review source: goodokbad (Don't click it, read the review here... ;) )

" Any Empire is a good book, a great book."

Review:
    In a pretty wild display of my country’s militarism, the US Marine Corps ran some close to full-scale training exercises in actual American cities. Dayton. Birmingham. Boise. In order to simulate for soldiers the difficulties involved in urban warfare, the marines were tasked to carry their training, complete with helicopter drops and in some cases live ammunition, through the civilian streets. At least in some cases, areas were cordoned off in an effort to protect citizens from, well, injury and death. In others, city-dwellers were given the opportunity to play a part in these exercises. Some saw these events in a dim light and really, for the already mistrustful public, what does it say when a nation’s military practices invading its own cities?

    That’s probably neither here nor there so far as concerns Any Empire. Probably. But let it be known that until after I finished the book the first time and did some poking around, I had no idea that this sort of thing happened. And that ignorance cost me a perfectly enjoyable experience on my first read-through. I had gotten to this point in the last third of the book and I was just completely baffled, thinking that Powell had without enough warning taken readers into the same surreal territory as he had in Swallow Me Whole. (If you’ve forgotten Swallow Me Whole, the male protagonist talks to a wizard the size of his fist and the female lead becomes the Queen of Insects.)

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    Oh yes please, let’s!

    But see, he hadn’t. I didn’t know it at the time, but Powell’s finale is largely literal. Based-on-true-events kind of stuff. Certainly there’s a bit of subjective magical reality going on, but the stuff that happens there at the end? It happens.

    I wish I had known about these maneuvers before I had read the book. That’s why I led off with the stuff. It would have helped a lot and made my first reading more enjoyable. Which would have been great because Any Empire is an incredibly rich book. Heck, it’s an incredible book. And that my first experience of it should have been less than stellar just makes me sad. On the inside.

    Any Empire is an exploration of the essentially violent worlds that many of us have grown into. Powell’s male lead, Lee, grows up in the late ‘80s or early ‘90s reading Larry Hama’s G.I. Joe and imagining his town a war zone. Visually, Powell projects these imaginations and visions into real space, showing how strongly they exert their force upon Lee’s interpretation of the world around him.

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    Worst date ever.
    Tip for the kiddies: never ever text on a date.

    Similar forces play on the perspective of Lee’s neighbour, Purdy. An insecure child, both bully and bullied, Purdy is at odds with a world that he cannot understand, a world that doesn’t care to be understood by him. He’s not quite a bad guy, but he’s not good enough not to be. He too lives in a militaristic imagination and even during his childhood, the reader sees that he is a bit unhinged from any sort of plausible take on reality.

    It’s as Powell follows these two through their lives into young adulthood that we see how their affections for the implements of war have impacted their lives. Powell creates a couple worthwhile lessons here, but even if those are his main point, he doesn’t seem to feel any need to belabour them. Powell says his piece through several moments and leaves the story to unfold itself.

    He definitely has things to say both about our culture of violence and the human affection for war, but Powell spends time on the healing side of our nature as well. Any Empire's female lead, Sarah, cares deeply for animal life and goes to great lengths to secure the welfare of any injured creature she discovers. Just as Lee lives in a world propped up by G.I. Joe, the clockworks of Sarah’s world grinds under the direction of Nancy Drew mysteries. And these affections follow her into adulthood. While as a child, she investigated the abuse of the local turtle population by a gang of ruthless children, as an adult she makes investigative housecalls for child services. Both are thankless jobs, but she pursues them because it was in her nature to do so.

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    It’s Sarah and her mom who drive home the lesson that not all people are such as those described in 1939’s classic animated short, Peace on Earth—a powerful, anti-war piece that Powell uses to good effect in one of the book’s more poignant scenes. In Peace on Earth and its 1955 remake, Good Will to Men, some animated squirrel children (or mice in the remake) ask an older animal what men are, referencing the lyric “Peace on earth, good will to men.” The grandfather figure explains how men were terrible creatures, bent on destruction, and how even when there were only two left, those two still ended up killing each other. It’s a fearsome picture and I recall vividly the first time I saw Peace on Earth as a child. Powell uses this story to lead into a powerful moment between Lee and his father, but it’s seeing Sarah live out a life counter the film’s example that really sells the idea.

    Any Empire by Nate Powel
    Powell retells the film beautifully,
    even if they were squirrels in the original, not mice

    Powell continues to show himself a creator who is absolutely worth paying attention to and Any Empire may even be better than Swallow Me Whole, which was sublime. The great thing about these books (I mean, beyond the stellar art) is how well they stand up to multiple reads. Powell crafts a rich tapestry of both visual and narratory tricks that serve to inject subsequent investigations with a freshness and interpretive excitement. Any Empire is a good book, a great book.


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More info:
    Nate Powell writer, artist, cover

Publisher:
    Image

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Aug 24th, 2012, 8:20 pm
Aug 25th, 2012, 12:09 pm
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Title: The Hound of the Baskervilles (Click to go to the release post)
Writer(s): Ian Edginton (Click to see other books from this writer released on this site)
Review source: goodokbad (Don't click it, read the review here... ;) )

" I am always cheered to see an artist evolve through his work."

Review:
    After an unsuccessful permanent hiatus (and killing off his great detective), Arthur Conan Doyle returned to Sherlock Holmes and penned perhaps his most famous of the sleuth’s stories. The Hound of the Baskervilles was well-regarded and is still read by students and Holmes aficionados every year. I, however, have never read the book and approached this adaptation in near total ignorance. As mentioned recently, I have some familiarity with the characters and their inclinations via the cultural hivemind in the same way that I know about Bambi’s mother and the man behind the curtain without having ever seen either Bambi or The Wizard of Oz. And of course, I have now also read an adaptation of A Study in Scarlet.

    So while I’m starting to get a better handle on Holmes’ moods and methods, prior caveats remain in that I cannot judge the faithfulness of the adaptation but can only judge the story as it appears to me in the Edginton/Culbard work. Any issues I take with the story will be issues that may or may not be a reflection of the source itself.

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    While Edginton and Culbard’s A Study in Scarlet chronicles the first of Conan Doyle’s Holmes stories, the pair adapted Baskervilles first (probably to help generate interest in a series I hope will continue for some time). In the backmatter, Culbard shares some of his original sketches for how he planned to render Dear Elementary Watson.* It’s interesting to compare Edginton and Culbard’s two adaptations. While Baskervilles is a fine book, one can sense certain refinements between it and Scarlet. The story flows better in Scarlet, but as I mentioned, I’m not in any position to judge whether that responsibility belongs to Edginton or Conan Doyle himself.

    Regardless, even in keeping our focus on Culbard’s work, we can note one singular improvement: less reliance upon technical gimmickry. In Baskervilles, Culbard experiments with Photoshop techniques to show skewed character reflections and these always look out of place. Later in the book, when rendering the moorish landscapes, he relies upon what I have to imagine are shopped photographs of the moors themselves. Each time, these additions look strikingly out of place, at odds with the wonderfully consistent style that Culbard brings to the rest of his work. Scarlet betrays none of these weaknesses so far as I remember and even though Culbard had the opportunity to experiment similarly in depictions of the American frontier, he thankfully restrained himself. I am always cheered to see an artist evolve through his work. (I am looking forward to seeing what Culbard does with The Sign of the Four, their next Holmes adaptation.)

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    As a detective story, I’m not sure exactly why it became such a popular event in Holmes’ life. Perhaps readers of the era were unduly enamoured with the Scooby-Doo-style crossover of science vs. the supernatural. After all, if it worked for X-Files... Honestly, despite the presence of several cheats in the former tale, I really did prefer A Study in Scarlet. The present tale is built upon an overwhelming implausibility, namely that the villain would pursue the inheritor of the Baskerville fortune from his first step in London rather than simply wait for the man to walk, unsuspecting, into his trap. As the story wraps up, I found myself baffled as to why any would-be murderer smart enough to outstrip Homes in the early game would forfeit himself in such amateur ways.

    On the other hand, I am kind of a sucker for glowing dogs.

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    Apart from my negative feeling toward the story’s plotting and my (mostly) positive outlook on Culbard’s art, there are two other points worth noting. For the one, the creative team again (for the first time!) does a marvelous job with Holmes’ character. He is exactly as distant and arrogant and wry as I imagine he is meant to be. He is conveyed perfectly. For the other, Edginton and Culbard take an early opportunity to present Holmes as a genius whose inductive process is incredible though far from foolproof. In the earliest episode from the book, Holmes and Watson take on the task of identifying the owner of a walking stick based on nothing save the stick itself. Holmes is patronizingly charitable toward Watson’s own attempt before revealing the whole truth of the matter. Which is then proven to be only partially correct by facts far more brute than his meager inductions. It is a humbling moment and Edginton and Culbard capture it flawlessly.

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    If The Hound of the Baskervilles was the creative team’s first attempt and A Study in Scarlet their second, I am well onboard to see what they do with their third and can only hope their improvements carry on in a similar vector.

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More info:
    Sir Arthur Conan Doyle author/creator
    Ian Edginton adapted writer
    I.N.J. Culbard artist

Publisher:
    Image

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Aug 25th, 2012, 12:09 pm
Aug 28th, 2012, 10:02 am
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Title: B.P.R.D. Vol. 9: 1946 (Click to go to the release post)
Writer(s): Mike Mignola and Joshua Dysart (Click to see other books from this writer released on this site)
Review source: Thick Online (Don't click it, read the review here... ;) )

" If you really are a hardcore BPRD fan, you won’t be able to stay away!"

Review:
    Within the chronicles of BPRD stories, 1946 pretty much stands alone. Much the same way Preacher: Volume 4 fills in more backstory for the world of Preacher, so too does 1946 give us a look into the past of the Bureau and its founder Trevor Bruttenholm (Hellboy’s foster father). The title refers to the year that the story takes place as a young Prof. Broom puts together the first incarnation of the BPRD and sends them on a debut mission. He has already discovered Hellboy by this time; although juvenile Hellboy is thankfully absent from this book. Instead he must make due with a crew of military failures. Of course they’re thrown into the deep end of the occult and supernatural as they try to track down one of Hitler’s super secret projects, Vampire Sturm (roughly translated as Vampire Storm).

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    The artwork could either be perceived as rough and messy with a sketchy quality to it or as a quaint, wood-carving styled artwork that is perfect for such a period piece. As with much of Mignola’s writing, the concepts are well presented at the sacrifice of smaller moments for characters. This is part of the style of the books of course, where character growth is something read between the panels or hinted at. This is because these stories are about giant, cybernetically enhanced gorillas and secret Nazi labs filled with robotic spiders! Another new addition to the series is Varvara, a demon that inhabits the body of a small child. She is the one stand out new character in the book, providing the hero-monster like Abe or Hellboy. She isn’t all that heroic as you soon find out. Seeing as she's immortal, we could see more of her character in future BPRD stories.

    This volume also includes Darkhorse's 'Free Comic Book Day' comic from this last year which is also a "year one" BPRD story, no doubt conceived to help promote the new miniseries. Some diehard fans will recognize Von Klempt as the talking Nazi head in a jar from previous short stories in the Hellboy universe, which is wicked fun and a nice thread to tie the book in with Hellboy continuity.

    If you’re only interested in Abe or Liz or Hellboy, then you can totally skip this volume without missing anything going on in current continuity. That being said, if you really are a hardcore BPRD fan, you won’t be able to stay away! Hordes of Nazi vampires, big robotic gorillas and all the staples of what makes Mignola’s world so seductive.

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More info:
    Writer: Mike Mignola, Joshua Dysart, Josh
    Artist: Mike Mignola, Paul Azaceta, more
    Colorist: Nick Filardi
    Genre: Horror, Action/Adventure

Publisher:
    Image

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Aug 28th, 2012, 10:02 am
Aug 28th, 2012, 12:23 pm
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Title: Witchfinder: In the Service of Angels (Click to go to the release post)
Writer(s): Mike Mignola (Click to see other books from this writer released on this site)
Review source: JR Gumby (Don't click it, read the review here... ;) )

" It is definetely a good thing to pick up if you're engrossed in hellboy, or possibly if you're into Victorian occult detectives."

Review:
    I've looked forward to this book for some time now, as I am very fond of the brief appearance Grey made in The Drowning and his even briefer appearances in Hellboy.

    To start with, the book is essentially identical to other Dark Horse TPBs in size and print quality. The pages run on the slightly light side, the print quality is good, and the binding is glued. In the past I have experienced hallboy TPBs losing their covers without a great deal of abuse, but the print itself is very good.

    The next thing I noticed when I opened the book was the art. It has echoes of Mignola's sharp lines and heavy shadows, but there are times when I feel like the illustrations are clean as a result of a lack of character than style. Overall, I would rate him slightly below the other artists that have done a lot of work on Hellboy (Davis, Jason Shawn Alexander, Mignola, and Fegredo) but the "slightly" in there is more of a complement: those guys are amazing. Where Fegredo tends to deviate more towards detail in his style, Stenbeck tends to leave things very clean. I think it works fairly well, and overall the illustration adds a lot to the book as any decent graphic novel should.

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    The story is where I really felt torn. Many of the hellboy stories are a rush through strangeness without a lot of explanation, but this story felt like the paranormal occult bits were blasted through and skimmed over even more than most. A lot of time is spent developing Grey as a character, and I did enjoy that. What I think really bothered me is you get the sense of some great impending conflict with a secret society with hints of how massive and powerful it is... only to have the story end without resolution and a page epilogue that wraps up 10 years of conflict into a single textbox or two. It felt awkward and limiting, as though the story were over and done and unlikely to be revisited but still woefully incomplete. That's my main criticism of this particular book.

    Still, it's a very enjoyable read. It is definetely a good thing to pick up if you're engrossed in hellboy, or possibly if you're into Victorian occult detectives. If you're interested in Hellboy, I'd recommend starting with the first Hellboy TPB, and if you've been following Hellboy I'd highly recommend The Drowning if you haven't read it already. I'm glad I bought this, and I'm sure it will be reread many times, but I didn't get quite the thrill I did from Seed of Destruction, Conqueror Worm, The Drowning, or Darkness Calls.


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More info:
    Writer: Mike Mignola
    Artist: Ben Stenbeck
    Colorist: Dave Stewart
    Cover Artist: Mike Mignola
    Genre: Horror, Action/Adventure

Publisher:
    Image

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Aug 28th, 2012, 12:23 pm
Aug 28th, 2012, 1:29 pm
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Title: Resident Alien (Click to go to the release post)
Writer(s): Peter Hogan (Click to see other books from this writer released on this site)
Review source: comicbastards (Don't click it, read the review here... ;) )

" This second issue left me sitting on the edge of seat..."

Review: Resident Alien #2
    Alien stories tend to be a dime a dozen and the focus always ends up more about the tech, the travel and the design more than anything else. With Resident Alien, the creative team has managed to put a spin on the “crashed alien” storyline that not only is very interesting, but engaging at the same time. To break it down, an alien has crashed landed on our planet and disguised himself as a retired doctor. He’s ended up filling in as the doctor for the small town he lives in due to the murder of the old one.

    This issue gives us some back story as to how he got his start on the planet after crashing. He’s able to talk to our technology to disable it or at the very least have it help him. He starts off in a mall by gathering food, water and clothes; he seems to have a basic understanding of our culture already and what he needs to do to blend in. He grabs a laptop and hits the ATM giving himself 1,000 bucks to get started before he heads off into the world to wait for rescue.

    In the present there has been a third gruesome murder that he’s been called to the scene of. The killer apparently was naked while he stabbed the victim, an old man that owned the banks of the town. He was hated by most, but as our Alien will find out… some more than others. After a routine health examine with one of the deceased doctor’s patient’s, our resident Alien heads to the library to piece the puzzle pieces together and basically solves the case of the naked murderer.

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    This is the story at its best; as good as the shorts were in DHP and as good as the first issue was this issue shines above them. The little bit of back story was great, but the developing story of the murder mystery and the possible reveal of our Doctor is very intriguing. The way the murder was revealed was perfectly paced and kept you interested in everything the Doctor was doing. Then in the same regard it made me wonder why he was doing it, why did he care? Has he in fact gone “native” as the character says in the book; personally I think this is to show his compassionate side and that he’s not a being to be feared due to his origins.

    This second issue left me sitting on the edge of seat until next month so I can close out the story. I hope that people are checking it out so that it can possibly go on; the premise and the world built are massive. The alien craze of the 90’s may be over, but books like this can easily rejuvenate people’s interest. I can’t wait to see how it turns out and hopefully it leaves our character in a position to continue his story.


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More info:
    Writer: Peter Hogan
    Artist: Steve Parkhouse
    Cover Artist: Steve Parkhouse
    Genre: Science-Fiction, Crime

Publisher:
    Image

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Aug 28th, 2012, 1:29 pm
Aug 28th, 2012, 4:55 pm
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Title: B.P.R.D. Vol. 5: The Black Flame (Click to go to the release post)
Writer(s): Mike Mignola and John Arcudi (Click to see other books from this writer released on this site)
Review source: Ryan Agadoni (Don't click it, read the review here... ;) )

" I keep finding excuses to spend money on the next trade ASAP after finishing the last."

Review:
    Though these BPRD collections may seem to be stand-alone (they each collect a 6-issue mini-series of the same name), they really must be read in order starting with Volume 3 for the entire Plague of Frogs storyline. I started with Volume 4 because I found it cheap and wanted to give Guy Davis a chance, quickly fell in love, and have now just ordered Volume 6 (after having bought and read through Vol. 3 and 5).

    Guy Davis' art really adds a lot to this story. He designs these nightmarish creatures very well, and really nails the scale necessary for these terrors. The colorist, Dave Stewart, cannot be overlooked for his contribution, either; his palette serves Davis' style very comfortably.

    Story-wise, I'm hooked. This is an epic story in terms of scale and impact on our heroes, and it's a good sign when I keep finding excuses to spend money on the next trade ASAP after finishing the last. The Black Flame in particular adds some interesting stuff to the overall. First off, I was unaware of the deeper connection shared by Roger and Liz up to this point. Sure, I knew that they had both swapped "life-force" in the pages of Hellboy, but I didn't know that that meant they had some sort of constant psychic link. This link is revealed when Liz senses something is wrong with Roger when he's off hunting frogs.

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    Also of interest is Roger's sudden gung-ho (and surprisingly effective!) leadership, modeled after team leader Ben Daimio. Why does Roger suddenly adapt his attitude and demeanor, and how does it make him an actual leader? Liz notes that Roger took after Hellboy when he was still around, so now in Hellboy's absence Roger has adapted Daimio's character instead.

    Which, of course, again makes me wish Hellboy would make an appearance (or even stay a while!). I miss Hellboy's presence just as much as the actual BPRD team does; he is one of the strongest characters in that universe and he added a totally unique dynamic to the decision-making and outlook of the team. There are no rules that say Hellboy can't be in the BPRD book, so let's have him visit, yeah? If he can guest-star in all sorts of other books (Savage Dragon, Ghost, Goon, etc.) surely he can guest star with his own ex-team. You'd think with such an epic event going on, he'd be drawn to it anyhow, especially since it involves his history and destiny.

    Back to The Black Flame. Another interesting aspect of the story is Daimio's reaction to Roger's situation at the end. I'm itching to hear more of his back-story, because you know there's some good stuff to tell. He's not quite the mystery that Lobster Johnson is (since we've seen more of his personality), but still: the scar, his "death," his military history. We don't know anything yet!

    I recommend this trade only if you're planning on picking up Vol. 3-7 to get the entire story. It's great stuff, and you gotta get the whole picture.


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More info:
    Writer: Mike Mignola & John Arcudi
    Artist: Guy Davis
    Colorist: Dave Stewart
    Editor: Scott Allie
    Cover Artist: Mike Mignola
    Genre: Horror, Action/Adventure

Publisher:
    Image

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Aug 28th, 2012, 4:55 pm
Aug 29th, 2012, 12:47 pm
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Title: The Underwater Welder (Click to go to the release post)
Writer(s): Jeff Lemire (Click to see other books from this writer released on this site)
Review source: Erik Norris (Don't click it, read the review here... ;) )

" Thus far, this is my favorite original graphic novel of the year."

Review:
    We still have a long way to go before the year is over, but I’m willing to bet Jeff Lemire’s The Underwater Welder remains at the top of my list for best graphic novel of the year. Yeah, it’s really that good.

    The story follows a man named Jack who is dealing with some serious psychological issues as he and his wife get ready to usher their first child into the world. Jack’s trauma stems from when he was a boy and his drunken father died before he ever really got a chance to say goodbye. It’s something that’s torn at the seams of Jack ever since, as he struggles to balance a fine line of resentment for his father leaving him and an unflinching desire to live up to his father’s legacy as a loving, albeit flawed, man.

    I hate to steal the words out of someone else’s mouth, but Damon Lindelof’s introduction to the book is a perfect summation of Jeff Lemire’s work here. Lindelof calls The Underwater Welder “the most spectacular episode of The Twilight Zone that was never produced.” After reading the book, Lindelof was right on the money. There is an eerie quality to The Underwater Welder that carries the entire story, helped by the bizarrely attractive black and white art by Lemire himself. You never quite know where the story is headed, but every twist and turn is played expertly by Lemire leading to one of the most satisfying endings I’ve read in a long time. You know that feeling of hope you felt by the end of watching The Shawshank Redemption? Well, you get that same effect here with The Underwater Welder. The power of this book’s conclusion cannot be understated.

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    At its core, The Underwater Welder is a story about one man taking responsibility for his actions and the life he’s lived. It’s a coming-of-age story, only the man is already well into his adult life. It’s a tale that anyone should be able to relate to, although Lemire takes that emotional and thematic through line and spins it with a pseudo sci-fi twist. It’s that Twilight Zone inspiration seeping through, and it’s what makes The Underwater Welder truly a spectacularly unpredictable reading experience.

    Lemire’s artistic style can be considered an acquired taste; it’s very surreal and raw. Yet, the art of Underwater Welder perfectly complements the story as if the two are peanut butter and jelly (or fluff for the wild cards among us). Furthermore, the decision to go black and white with occasional gray tones is a nice touch that helps play up the eerie quality of the work.

    The Underwater Welder is a roughly 220-page tour de force with enough emotional resonance that you might find yourself wiping away a single tear while closing the book’s final page. Thus far, this is my favorite original graphic novel of the year. Hands down. You should not let this one pass you by. So rush out to your local comic shop and snag this bad boy as quick as you can, even if it’s at the expense of some of your weekly pull. Stories like this don’t come around too often, so get while the gettin’ is good.

    As a final note, digital comics readers can pick up The Underwater Welder for half off at $9.99 through comiXology. That’s an absolute steal. Buy it now.


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More info:
    Story by Jeff Lemire
    Art by Jeff Lemire
    Cover by Jeff Lemire

Publisher:
    Image

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Aug 29th, 2012, 12:47 pm
Aug 29th, 2012, 11:03 pm
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Title: B.P.R.D. – The Universal Machine (Click to go to the release post)
Writer(s): Mike Mignola and John Arcudi (Click to see other books from this writer released on this site)
Review source: Al Kratina (Don't click it, read the review here... ;) )

" The issue, scripted by Mignola and John Arcudi, is well-written, and nicely paced."

Review:
    For the past ten years, Mike Mignola's Hellboy has been the coolest thing in comics. There is no point arguing with me, I have a nine-foot demon with a stone hand on my side. The problem has been, however, that Mignola puts out issues of Hellboy with roughly the same frequency as solar eclipses, so it can be a little frustrating for fans. Perhaps it's the long gaps between the various series that help make Hellboy seem a rare treat, the beluga caviar among the cracked, sulfurous eggs of various sub-par X titles, but nevertheless, the intermittent schedule is difficult to get used to.

    Thankfully, in the past two years, Mignola and Dark Horse have come up with a solution to the Hellboy drought, with the advent of the B.P.R.D. series. The comics focus on the secondary and tertiary characters that surround Hellboy, and while Hellboy himself floats around in the ocean of the coast of Africa or casts for his next movie, the pyrokinetic Liz Sherman, fish-man Abe Sabien, homunculous Roger, and ectoplasmic necromancer Johann are all we have to tide us over. Essentially, the series is like the Lone Gunman to Hellboy's The X-Files, only people seem to like this instead of rolling their eyes and watching 20/20 instead.

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    Like Hellboy, B.P.R.D is an ongoing succession of miniseries that work together to form a larger, over-arching narrative. Each miniseries is self-contained to a point, but a great deal is lost if they're not read together, or in order. The Universal Machine picks up where the last few story arcs left off, with the team having defeated several large and gooey monsters, and coping with the death of a teammate. In true Mignola form, the first issue is layered with mythology and fantasy so thickly it becomes impossible to tell what is fiction and what is an obscure reference to a Montague Summers book or a 13th century illuminated manuscript. The issue, scripted by Mignola and John Arcudi, is well-written, and nicely paced. The plotting gets stronger and pulpier with each series, and The Universal Machineis a real page-turner that ends with two nicely intertwined cliffhangers.

    How Mignola managed to increase his output is, of course, by turning the art duties over to Guy Davis. As an illustrator Mignola was perfectly suited to burying suggested horrors in dark shadows, but ever since the recent Sin City re-releases, Frank Miller's been using up all the black ink, so Davis had to step in. Where Mignola is all angles and corners, Davis is slime and rotting flesh dripping off of bone, and though his take on the characters makes everyone look ugly and mildly deformed, his conception of the monstrous stands distinct from Mignola's and is no less unnerving. So much so that The Universal Machine, and most of the recent B.P.R.D. in general, manages to elevate itself above a Hellboy stop-gap, and stand on its own two decomposing feet.


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More info:
    Writer: Mike Mignola & John Arcudi
    Artist: Guy Davis
    Colorist: Dave Stewart
    Cover Artist: Mike Mignola
    Genre: Horror, Action/Adventure

Publisher:
    Image

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Aug 29th, 2012, 11:03 pm
Aug 30th, 2012, 1:28 pm
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Title: Prophecy (Click to go to the release post)
Writer(s): Ron Marz (Click to see other books from this writer released on this site)
Review source: Henry Higgins (Don't click it, read the review here... ;) )

" An enjoyable first issue, and a great way to suck in new readers."

Review: PROPHECY #1
    Mark Your Calendars…

    It’s actually pretty surprising to find out that Dynamite has never done a major crossover. As a publisher, they have been producing some of the most iconic independent characters in comics (Red Sonja and Vampirella), along with some of the most well known characters in fiction (Sherlock Holmes and Dracula), among others. Personally, I’m amazed it hadn’t happened before. But it’s probably a blessing it hasn’t, because then we might not have gotten this story. PROPHECY is a fast paced, well structured first issue, clipping by at a solid pace. It’s definitely the kind of first issue you want from an event book.

    Writing: (4/5) I have never really followed too much of Dynamite’s stuff, popping in every once in a while if something strikes my fancy. Crossovers usually dictate a strong understanding of the past events and the characters to get what’s going on, but not here; rather, you can read this comic and still enjoy it immensely, without ever having read a Red Sonja book. It’s all a credit to the writing of Ron Marz, who makes each character sparkle with some new level of individuality.

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    The story jumps between three distinct time periods, and introduces three new players into each era. In Victorian England, Sherlock Holmes investigates a break in/murder. In the 600s, the villainous Kulan Gath is hunted down by Red Sonja. In the present day, the recently arrived Sonja finds herself positioned against Vampirella. Each beat is well done and succinct, going for a different mood. The Sherlock sequence is the weakest, if only for its slightly rushed feeling. I hope Marz returns to these two, as having a bit more room with the characters could improve the tone greatly. The Aztec scenes are the most memorable, breezing by and giving just enough information to glean what’s happening. Marz manages to compress the beats with ease, leaving the characters room to flesh out the scene. The present day scene falls into a tried and true comic book moment (heroic misunderstanding leads to fight), but the brawl is short and sweet.

    Art: (4/5) Giovani does a remarkable job differentiating between the various eras, as does Lucas. Sherlock Holmes is met with a drab building, dull colours, and cold expressions. In Yucatan, the settings are bright and expressive, with each character brightly showing off some new emotion. In the modern day, the entire scene is punctuated by the bright moonlight, which does a marvelous job of giving everything a sort of motion and life. The art rarely falters, each face and motion being deliberate and clear. The only scene that is really lacking is, again, the Sherlock Holmes scene. It feels slightly rushed, and the faces aren’t as defined and sleek as the rest of the book. Apart from that, however, the art manages to impress throughout.

    Best Moment: The splash page of Sonja and Gath falling through time.

    Worst Moment: Some of the faces in Sherlock Holmes.

    Overall: (4/5) An enjoyable first issue, and a great way to suck in new readers.

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More info:
    Writer: Ron Marz
    Art: Walter Giovani

Publisher:
    Image

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Aug 30th, 2012, 1:28 pm
Aug 30th, 2012, 4:31 pm
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Title: B.P.R.D. Hell on Earth – New World (Click to go to the release post)
Writer(s): Mike Mignola and John Arcudi (Click to see other books from this writer released on this site)
Review source: Corey Pung (Don't click it, read the review here... ;) )

" A strikingly mature look at the world of monster hunting."

Review:
    In case you’re new to this site, you should know that I’m basically the Gene Shallit of comic book reviews. Given the chance, I’ll always go for a cornball pun for a title. This time around, after spending far too long trying to do some punning with B.P.R.D., I decided to instead reference a children’s cartoon from the 90s most people barely remember: Aah! Real Monsters. B.P.R.D. though is about as far from Aah! Real Monsters as a monster horror story can get. The characters are hardly animated, and there’s little or no comic relief, especially this time around.

    Instead, B.P.R.D.: Hell on Earth: New World is a strikingly mature look at the world of monster hunting. If you’ve read the early issues of Hellboy or have seen the films, you’ll recognize Abe Sapien and Johann Kraus. Liz Sherman is nowhere to be seen in this story, but she’ll come back in a big way later. This story does however feature the return of Ben Daimio, a military expert who turned into a were-jaguar and nearly ruined the B.P.R.D. before disappearing into the night (thank you Mike Mignola for making me aware of the were-jaguar myth!).

    The story mostly revolves around Abe Sapien as he investigates recent unexplained deaths happening in small towns. While researching in the woods, he runs into Ben Daimio, who, contrary to past beliefs, is very much alive. Together they find a strange murky pond and Abe, putting his gills to good use, dives in and finds it’s full of corpses. As is the case with every B.P.R.D. investigation, it turns out there’s a horrible monster involved, but this time the monster’s power source isn’t what you’d expect.

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    B.P.R.D. is remarkable for the emotional depth it gives the characters. Most writers would create giant knockout fights between the heroes and the monsters, but Mike Mignola and John Arcudi (the co-writers) are more interested in showing how the characters deal with their private grief and how they come to grips with their failures.

    In a short bonus issue in this graphic novel, two B.P.R.D. agents are shown surveying the wreckage of what was once a busy portion of Seattle, destroyed in a giant monster battle shortly before. This was interesting for me to read especially, since I’ve spent some time in Seattle. In one panel, the famous Public Market Center sign is shown broken down in the ruins of the Pike Street Market, Seattle’s most recognizable place besides the Space Needle.

    The artwork is supplied by Guy Davis, who has done much of the penciling and inking for the series. Guy Davis work is in a similar minimalist vein to Mike Mignola’s, but the way he draws faces is more expressive and thus perfectly fits a comic so heavy with emotions. The colors here are done by Dave Stewart, my favorite colorist. His use of colors serves to heighten the ambiance and to emphasize the gloomy moods of the characters instead of making the action splashier.

    On a side note, this graphic novels has one of the longest titles out there. B.P.R.D.: Hell on Earth: New World–it’s even longer if you know that B.P.R.D. stands for the Bureau of Paranormal Research and Defense.

    Also, in the afterword to this book, Mike Mignola says that Bride of Frankenstein is his favorite monster movie! I love that film.

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More info:
    Writers: John Arcudi, Mike Mignola
    Artist: Guy Davis
    Colorist: Dave Stewart
    Genres: Action/Adventure, Horror

Publisher:
    Image

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Aug 30th, 2012, 4:31 pm
Aug 30th, 2012, 8:35 pm
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Title: The Straw Men (Click to go to the release post)
Writer(s): Joe Brusha (Click to see other books from this writer released on this site)
Review source: Jeff Marsick (Don't click it, read the review here... ;) )

" The series is off to a solid start and I cannot wait to see how it all unfolds."

Review: The Straw Men #1
    If you have never read Michael Marshall’s novel, The Straw Men, your life is surely poorer for it. One of the best horror thrillers ever written, it is comprised of two seemingly separate stories: one (told in third person) about a serial killer of children, The Upright Man, and the two people pursuing him; the other (told in first person) a man’s quest to discover a secret life that his recently deceased parents kept hidden from him. The plots are complex and are expertly woven by Mr. Marshall’s terrific prose to intersect at a point of commonality: the Straw Men. It is a novel capable of blending creepy with outright terror with white-knuckle-can’t-put-it-downedness that does not lose an iota of effect even upon re-reading. Side-by-side against some of Stephen King, I would argue that it would give Uncle Stevie a run for his money (well, except for The Stand). It can be appreciated, then, how adapting such a piece of work into the comic form is an admirable idea, and if anyone can do it, Zenescope surely is a top contender. The question is, how well did they pull it off?

    The answer is: not too shabby.

    The book starts off during a lunchtime crush in the Palmerston, Pennsylvania branch of McDonald’s. It’s all Happy Meals and hamburgers until a pair of men walk in, and without ever saying a word, pull out guns and unleash a firestorm into the eighty-nine patrons. When the last report has died off, the younger of the killers dutifully turns to his partner, closes his eyes, and the latter shoots him point-blank in the face. A few moments later the man simply turns and runs away, never to be apprehended.

    Ten years later (a passage of time not mentioned in the comic that I hope is corrected in the final copy as it prevents an awkward segue from the prelude to the first chapter) Ward Hopkins stands graveside at a matching pair of coffins: his parents have recently been killed in a car accident. Ward is soon met by the family attorney who drops a revelatory bomb: Ward’s father, instead of leaving the family business to his son, had decided instead to have the operation shut down and boxed up. Ward, crushed by the gravity of losing his parents as well as this final middle-finger flick from his father, eventually finds himself sitting in Dad’s easy chair, contemplating the wheres and whys of their strained relationship. The chair, however, has a secret of its own. Ward unearths from its bowels its bowels a novel with a piece of paper inside. “Ward,” it says. “We’re not dead.”

    Cut to the Santa Monica Promenade where fourteen-going-on-twenty-four-year-old Sarah Becker is on her familiar stroll with BFF, Sian. Sarah is clearly an adolescent of privilege, a teen whose future is bright with the prospect of being the central nucleus about which a clique of gossip girls is sure to rotate. Unfortunately for Sarah, evil keeps a watchful on her from the shadows, coiling to strike...

    They are all intertwined, the violence, the secrets, the Upright Man and when they all eventually converge, what is brought to light are the horrifying truths about the Straw Men. Horrifying because when the final page is turned you have to wonder if it could really occur in the world around us.

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    Zenescope’s President, Joe Brusha, has clearly made a faithful and careful attempt at adapting the novel, excising with surgical precision key points of dialogue. It is unfortunate that conversation is about all he can extract, forced to leave on the cutting-room floor the bulk of the novel, which is Michael Marshall’s expertly smithed descriptive prose. This is a comic, after all, and the pictures have to do the heavy lifting. One line of prose that I wish had made final copy is one of the best ever written in the whole history of literature, and takes place during the McDonald’s massacre: “In a room full of victims, murderers look like gods.”

    Mr. Brusha has also taken two decided liberties that I wish he had not (but then again, I’m a purist). One is a flashback between Ward and his father, when the younger takes pops to Lazy Ed’s, the local watering hole that is underage-friendly. Ward witnesses an exchange between Dad and Ed, where the former claims he was “giving him a lecture on the subject of underage drinking”. If you’ve not read the novel, this is no great shakes. Unfortunately, this does not happen in the novel and it serves to circumvent the mystery of the Straw Men as revealed later on. How detrimental it is to the plot remains to be seen in later issues of this series.

    The other departure occurs in Santa Monica. Again, this scene does not occur as such in the novel and in the comic it overly simplifies the villain, painting him as a stereotypical pedophilic lurker when he is actually much more complex, calculating, and manipulative. I hope that as the series progresses Mr. Brusha keeps a closer reign to the novel and that the qualities that make this character so terrifying and terrible are adequately fleshed out.

    I’m normally not a fan of Brett Weldele’s style of artwork, which is sparse and scratchy and at times hard to follow. I would have preferred a more noir-ish style for this series, Sean Phillips perhaps, or even the vastly under-appreciated (and under-utilized) Paul Azaceta. I have to admit, however, that it does work, and he does a fine job of telling a story. There is a lot of story to juggle from here on out, and we have not even been introduced to FBI agent Nina Baynum, former detective John Zandt, and Ward’s friend/comic relief/spook Bobby Nygard. The switching between points of view is going to be interesting, and portends for a comic book yielding a complexity to match the novel.

    Zenescope is a terrific company that I don’t believe gets enough regard for their work. While they are best known for their cheesecakey and highly enjoyable re-imaginings of fairy tales, The Straw Men is their best shot of gaining notoriety and visibility in the same section of the store where the hard-case crime books reside. The series is off to a solid start and I cannot wait to see how it all unfolds. This is a thinking-man’s horror comic, a thrill-ride for readers who simply demand more from their comics. If I could, I would add it to everyone’s pull list.


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More info:
    Writer: Joe Brusha
    Artist: Brett Weldele

Publisher:
    Image

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Aug 30th, 2012, 8:35 pm