Uber #9 – Review

By: Kieron Gillen (writer), Caanan White (pencils), Joseph Silver (inks), Michael Dipascale (colors) and Kurt Hathaway (letters)

The Story: The Soviets turn the tide on the Eastern front.

The Review (with SPOILERS): This was another very solid issue for the series.  As with the whole series (and I’ve said this before), it remains much more of a war-comic rather than an alt-superhero comic.  I feel like I need to keep pointing that out because we’ve gotten so many World War II comics featuring superheroes (like Captain America or the Invaders or Hellboy or whoever) and then there are the “clever” comics/characters (like Red Son, Red Skull, etc.) that attempt to show us how the bad guys also wanted superheroes and how the post-War could have been very different.  Uber is decidedly not THAT.  It is not focused on characters, but on the narrative of the War itself.  We do get to know a little about the humans who are turned into super-soldiers, but it’s pretty shallow.  These guys aren’t Captain America where Cap’s origin as a humble, skinny kid are vital to understanding his entire world-view.  These are just disposable human soldiers who are deployed impersonally because war sucks.

Another thing that I loved about this issue is that it shows the series is (probably) going to be pretty faithful to the factual outcome of World War II.  I doubt it’ll be a series where we’ll examine, “What if the Nazis won?”  This issue focuses on the Eastern front of the European Theatre.  Aside from little snippets about the Battle of Stalingrad, the Eastern front doesn’t really enter our Anglo-centric consciousness.  That’s probably because the Allies had their hands full on the Western front, but also because the Soviets were the bad guys and we didn’t really care about what happened to them.  If the Soviets wanted to feed hundreds of thousands of citizens into the Nazi wood-chipper, that was great because it meant that many fewer American and British boys would die.

The Legend of Korra S02E10 – Review

By: Tim Hedrick (story)

The Story: The fact the world is facing Armageddon doesn’t excuse missing tea time.

The Review: The last three episodes have marked a noticeable turnaround for the season, driving the show towards heights of fantasy that we haven’t seen since the end of the first Avatar series.  Although the political storylines have been sincere attempts to give this cartoon some sophistication, they’ve more often than not lost steam shortly after they’ve begun.  Case in point: the Water Tribe’s civil war bore little interest when it started and by now is best ignored.

In hindsight, the war seems to have been an unintended consequence of Unalaq’s plan to…I don’t know, take over the world, or something?  Had things gone his way, Korra would have acquiesced to his initial subterfuges and he might have gotten away with a semi-legitimate claim to total leadership.  But once that plan fell through, it was not only Unalaq left with an awkward military conflict on his hands, but the show as well, and neither have seemed very interested in developing that particular plotline.

God is Dead #2 – Review

By: Jonathan Hickman and Mike Costa (writers), Di Amorim (art), Juanmar (colors) and Kurt Hathaway (letters)

The Story: The Gods have returned to Earth.  Some people aren’t happy about that.

Review (with SPOILERS): There are a few decent moments in this issue, but it doesn’t seem to be interested in tackling the really big questions that would put it over the top.  There is more slam-bang than anything deep.

If you missed the first issue, the basic premise is that in modern times, several pantheons of Gods return to Earth: Zeus, Odin, Quetzacoatl, etc.  They are not benevolent Gods and demand to be worshipped and honored.  Some humans fall right into line as governments crumble.  Some humans hang on and resist…

The issue largely misses the mark because it takes the easy and noisy path.  Most of the action takes place with humans fighting Gods and infighting amongst the Gods themselves.  There’s just nothing novel about seeing a US military being threatened by Gods or aliens or whatever and taking the drastic step of using nuclear weapons in a US city.  We’ve seen that.  We’ve heard the dialog about the “innocent civilians” and we’ve heard the commander dismiss that concern as a necessary sacrifice.  We’ve seen these types of threats stand impervious to “our” biggest weapons before.  I guess it beats home the message that it will take a non-traditional approach to defeat these Gods, but I would have hoped that writers as talented as Hickman and Costa could have come up with a better way for us to get to this point.

Uber #6 – Review

By: Kieron Gillen (writer), Caanan White (pencils), Keith Williams (inks) and Michael Dipascale (colors)

The Story: The story of superbeings in World War II shifts to the Pacific Theatre.

The Review (with SPOILERS): Uber continues to do thing differently enough to be interesting and unique.  The first five issues had followed World War II in the European theatre as the Germans were just about beaten…..before unleashing their superpowered beings on the Allies.  The Allies responded and we ended that story with the Battle of Paris in the last issue.

Now we shift the focus to the Pacific Theater.  The Japanese are on the ropes (this is around the time of the Battle of Okinawa) and surprise……the Japanese seem to have a few superbeings too.  What I really liked about this revelation is that it isn’t made precisely clear HOW the Japanese ended up with these beings.  Did the Germans tell them how to do it?  Given how completely beaten the Germans were in the first story-arc, it seems a little implausible that they would have time to share.  It also seems unrealistic that they would WANT the Japanese to have the same technology.  So, perhaps it is a case of independent creation?  In reality, all of the major WWII powers had their own nuclear programs, so it would appear that in the Uber universe, they all had superman programs (and all of the spying on enemies and allies that comes with such programs).  Neat!  I look forward to seeing if the Japanese supermen have the same limitations/powers as the German/British/American supermen and superwomen.

God is Dead #1 – Review

By: Jonathan Hickman and Mike Costa (writers), Di Amorim (art), Juanmar (colors) and Kurt Hathaway (letters)

The Story: Gods return to the Earth.  Some people dig it, some people don’t.

Review (with minor SPOILERS): This is an interesting issue.  I’m not sure it is a great issue, but it was entertaining and raised a few philosophical questions that could be intriguing if the creators choose to pursue them.

Honestly, the main impetus to buy this comic was the Hickman name on the cover.  I just think that Hickman is a font of nifty ideas.  He’s also gifted from a graphical design and presentation standpoint and coming along as a pure writer.  He’s one to watch and he’s rarely guilty of being boring, so I’ll sample just about anything with his name on the cover.  Until I read the issue, I wasn’t aware that this was a collaboration with Mike Costa, but his name shouldn’t keep anyone away.  Mike Costa’s GI Joe: Cobra title has consistently been the best GI Joe book the last few years by featuring tight plotting and aspiring to be something other than a fanboy ode.

The basic premise of God is Dead is that the gods of old return to the Earth.  We’re talking about Odin and Zeus as well as the old Aztec and Hindu pantheons.  When the gods get here, they inspire some parts of the population to descend into religious fervor and we get things like groups in Mexico doing human sacrifices on top of the old Aztec pyramids.  Some other parts of the population want to continue with the modern world, so we’ve got a nifty little source of conflict for the series.  We also learn that the gods are working together with a plan for world-domination in a scene that is very much like seeing a supervillain team-up in a Marvel or DC comic book.

Fashion Beast #8 – Review

By: Alan Moore (script), Moore & Malcolm McLaren (story), Antony Johnston (sequential adaptation), Facundo Percio (art), Hernan Cabrera (colors) & Jaymes Reed (letters)

The Story: Doll returns to her crappy old neighborhood for a visit.

Review (with SPOILERS): This wasn’t quite the massive success that last issue was, but it is still a pretty complex story that keeps revealing more about itself the more you think about it.

Last issue featured both Doll and Celestine finding refuge in the same dark attic design studio.  Celestine was there because his spiteful – and deceased mother – told him he was horribly ugly, when he was actually a very lovely man.  So, he became a recluse and designed fabulous clothes that captivated a country going through an awful nuclear winter.  In contrast, Doll fled to Celestine’s attic because she was too popular.  This poor, cross-dressing and shallow boy was taken in by Celestine’s fashion house and turned into the top model in the city, until it became too much for Doll and she/he had to get away.  It was a wonderful bit of contrast: Beautiful man with spectacular talent who thinks he is ugly because his mother only allowed him a warped mirror Vs. shallow boy with no talent who is only popular because he/she has been dressed by someone else and viewed through the public’s warped mirror.  Clever, clever, clever….

Uber #0 – Review

By: Kieron Gillen (writer), Caanan White (pencils), Keith Williams (inks), Digikore Studios (colors) and Kurt Hathaway (letters)

The Story: Nazi Germany develops super-soldiers in the final days of World War II.

A few things: 1). More alt-WWII than alt-superhero – The best thing about Uber was something very subtle.  Comics already has a LOT of alternate versions of superheroes: “What if the Nazis developed Captain America?” or “What if Superman landed in the Soviet Union?” and that’s before you get to all the stories like, “What if Wolverine turned evil?” or “What if Lex Luthor became a hero?”  It isn’t that those sorts of stories are terrible, but we’ve seen lots and lots and lots of them.  Uber treats the superhuman as more of a weapons system than a human.  The superhumans in Uber almost aren’t even characters.  They’re more like tanks or airplanes.    So, this issue FEELS a lot more like one of those alt-WWII stories where we ask, “What if the Nazis had developed nuclear weapons?”  Once you put that spin on things, the comic becomes more interesting.  We don’t have a lot of war comics anymore and I appreciate this addition just for the sake of variety.

Fashion Beast #7 – Review

By: Alan Moore (script), Moore & Malcolm Mclaren (story), Antony Johnston (sequential adaptation), Facundo Percio (art), Hernan Cabrera (colors) & James Reed (letters)

The Story: Now that Doll knows the true nature of Celestine, what will happen next?

Review (with some unavoidable SPOILERS from last issue): This has been an odd series.  I don’t “love it”, but it is a very high quality comic.  The story itself isn’t anything that would immediately sing to me, but it has some attraction just because it is different.  I love post-apocalypse, but that genre has been overdone.  Fashion Beast features a city suffering from a kinda nuclear winter (or at least that seems to be the problem even if they never specifically say), where the city is still functioning, but it is cold and gray all the time.  In this bleak environment, it seems the populace has turned to fashion as their obsession.  By fashion, I mean being obsessed with runway models and clothing designers, not wearing funky clothing themselves.  Enter Doll, a transvestite who has risen from being a coat-check “girl” to lead model for Celestine, the city’s most elite fashion designer.  Celestine is a recluse to lives in a tower and designs clothes.  The assumption is that he is a hideous beast, but as we learned last issue, he is actually beautiful, but nobody will tell him that because otherwise he wouldn’t stay in his tower designing clothes.

Fashion Beast #2 – Review

By: Alan Moore and Malcolm McLaren (story), Alan Moore (script), Antony Johnston (sequential adaptation), Facundo Percio (art) and Hernan Cabrera (colors)

The Story: A young lady (?) gets a choice modeling gig.

Review: This is a tough issue to review because it says “Alan Moore” on the cover.  Even though it is not a traditional Alan Moore comic (for reasons I described in the review of issue #1), it still has that golden halo of quality about it that makes me view the comic in a “glass half full” sort of way.  What I can’t tell you is whether I’d still view the comic in that way if it didn’t say “Moore” on the cover because, well, let’s just say that you can’t “unring the bell”.

Fashion Beast #1 – Review

By: Alan Moore (script), Moore & Malcolm McLaren (story), Antony Johnston (sequential adaptation), Facundo Percio (art) & Hernan Cabrera (colors)

The Story: An old script from the great Alan Moore comes to life.

Review: For starters, this comic has a non-traditional background.  Supposedly, this is a story that Alan Moore and Malcolm McLaren (manager of the Sex Pistols) wrote as a movie screen play back in the mid-1980s.  That’s the same era when Moore was writing Watchmen, Swamp Thing, V for Vendetta and a few others.  Then, I guess this screen play lay idle for ~25 years before someone (Avatar??) decided to dust it off and have Antony Johnston adapt it sequentially.

The Legend of Korra S01E11 & E12

By: Michael Dante DiMartino & Bryan Konietzko

The Story: It may come as a shock to you that Amon is not a family man.

The Review: I’m a regular reader of Wired, the ostensible boutique magazine for geeks, and I find it, just like whatever that’s “boutique” anything, is a little prone to making broad, definitive judgment calls with no support.  Take Scott Thrill’s take on The Legend of Korra, in his eyes the “Smartest Cartoon on TV.”  Now, I didn’t quite do a spit-take on reading that headline, but I must say, with no offense to Thrill, that I respectfully disagree.

The last couple episodes have been solid enough to make me eager for the season finale, but halfway through, right around the point where Tarrlok spills the beans on every revelation you ever needed, I found myself turned cold.  Be forewarned, this next chunk of review will contain quite a few spoilers, so shut your eyes and move on if you’re not into that kind of thing.

The Legend of Korra S01E09 – Review

By: Michael DiMartino & Bryan Konietzko (story)

The Story: Grown-up Aang = less cute, more beard.

The Review: In some ways, this show has been quite prudent in avoiding too many references to or guest spots from the original Team Avatar.  Obviously, DiMartino-Konietzko want the show to stand on its own to some extent, and give the new cast a chance to grow without distractions from already beloved characters.  Yet it would’ve been highly unusual if we didn’t get to see the old gang at some point; I’m certain there’d be some kind of protest if that happened.

Honestly, though, while it’s exciting to see the grown-up Aang, Sokka, and Toph, the only real resemblance they have to the cute kids we knew and loved are echoes in their physical features (with Aang, you don’t even get that; you can’t see a trace of the round-faced kid in this Amish-bearded, strong-jawed man).  But that’s to be expected; they couldn’t possibly be impulsive or silly children forever.  And on the bright side, you at least get a “Twinkle-toes” out of Toph and Sokka’s borderline creepy affection for his “trusty boomerang,” so it’s not a complete loss.

The Legend of Korra S01E08 – Review

By: Michael DiMartino & Bryan Konietzko (story)

The Story: Take a lesson from the Abba Teens, guys—tribute bands aren’t actual bands.

The Review: A couple weeks ago, I mentioned how I felt DiMartino-Konietzko only had so much story to tell for this season and how they’ve attempted to disguise the fact with several plotlines that didn’t really offer any worthwhile material.  Big example: the entirety of the pro-bending arc, which basically had some flashy animation and did virtually nothing else for the show.  At times, it almost exasperatingly got in the way of the truly intriguing stuff.

I’m talking, of course, about the bender versus non-bender war we’ve currently got in full force.  With all the opposing parties are out in the open, it seems like only now DiMartino-Konietzko can stride confidently into the story they’ve wanted to tell all along.  Everything certainly clicks a lot better than it has in the first half of the season, from the character interaction and even to the battle sequences.  You can sense purpose behind every moment, which is a great feeling.

The Legend of Korra S01E06 – Review

By: Michael DiMartino & Bryan Konietzko (story)

The Story: Ringside seats grow less amazing once terrorists take over the ring.

The Review: I don’t mean to sound like a downer, but I’ve found another point of dissatisfaction with this series.  It just feels like we don’t have much going on in each episode, making you feel as if DiMartino-Konietzko are trying to scrape a fairly limited plot across a whole season, filling in the gaps with as much bending tricks as they can dream up.  And while that’s entertaining enough in itself, it doesn’t make for a very driven or memorable show.

The show has a consistent problem of predictability.  At first, you think it throws you a curve ball when Tarrlok, of all people, is in total agreement with Tenzin on protecting innocent lives rather than confront Amon.  You start thinking he might have some good in his body after all, which would make him a more multifaceted character than your run-of-the-mill obsequious schemer.  And then he ruins it by immediately stepping back once he’s sure that someone else will take the blame should things go south.

The Legend of Korra Episode 4 – Review

By: Michael Dante DiMartino & Bryan Konietzko (story)

The Story: Korra learns it’s not easy to defeat the bending world’s Che Guevara.

The Review: No doubt one of the major factors which played into the original Avatar’s popularity was the irresistible charm of its star character.  Aang had such a joyful, happy-go-lucky nature (with just the right amount of pathos thrown it to keep him from being saccharine) that it was hard not to like him.  Since you naturally feel invested in anybody you happen to like, that made any change to Aang a little more intriguing and any danger a little more threatening.

So far I can’t really say the same for Korra.  While not totally unlikable in any way, she just doesn’t capture your heart.  Part of the reason is aside from her love of bending and a superficial desire to be Avatar, she doesn’t project many qualities you can get attached to.  She’s stubborn, strident, temperamental, and cocky, which doesn’t exactly make her the most appealing protagonist.  If not for her honesty and affectionate heart, she’d practically be grating.

The Legend of Korra Episode 3 – Review

By: Michael Dante DiMartino & Bryan Konietzko

The Story: Someone turn on Twisted Sister because the non-benders aren’t gonna take it anymore!

The Review: It seems pretty clear that this Avatar series won’t have the classically epic qualities of its predecessor.  The last show had all sorts of prophecies and symbolic elements running throughout the story, and the very concept of the Avatar had shades of higher powers within it.  Supernatural creatures abounded, from dragons to demons and even to demi-gods, of sorts.  Taken together, The Last Airbender was very much a spiritual tale.

Its sequel doesn’t have much to do with these rather ethereal themes, but the story it wants to tell is no less important.  Whereas the Avatar’s powers were crucial to bring an end to a senseless war driven by too much momentum to stop itself, no amount of power can really quash a war of ideas and principles.  The Equalist movement (which Tenzin foresees as a “revolution”) exists not on the basis of gaining power, but as an effort to gain dignity.