Team Seven #4 – Review

By: Justin Jordan (story), Jesús Merino (art), Nathan Eyring (colors)

The Story: The difference between Slade and Eclipso is like night and later that night.

The Review: For any of you interested in the reviewing experience, let me just say the obvious that you never want to be in the awkward position of recognizing a writer’s talents, but concluding that his story is kind of lame anyway.  While you can definitely appreciate the rhythm and flow of Jordan’s writing, the plot itself has been less than inspired, with definite shades of editorial mandate.

It’s very, very hard for me to believe, given the mission statement and tone Jordan set up for this series at the start, that he ever intended to feature the Black Diamond and Eclipso as the primary plot device and antagonist for his first arc.  After all, Team Seven is a gang of highly skilled fighters and shooters; what do they really know about fighting demonic possession or demons themselves?  How can they use their mercenary know-how to defeat things that bullets can’t touch or simply bounce off of?

All-Star Western #15 – Review

By: Justin Gray & Jimmy Palmiotti (story), Moritat (art), Mike Atiyeh (colors)

The Story: For once, Arkham tops Hex in the senseless violence department.

The Review: I don’t know how to say this without sounding a bit mean, but I always felt this title had an inevitable expiration date.  In the last year, All-Star Western hasn’t exactly made any breakthroughs with Gray-Palmiotti’s in-your-face style of writing.  Instead, it’s gotten by on sheer novelty alone for most of its run.  At some point, however, their plot would lose that veneer of originality, exposing the inherent flaws of the series.

I think we’ve reached that point in this issue.  The introduction of Hyde and the use of the Black Diamond initially promised interesting things for this arc, but here we realize that, as written, Hyde is just a well-spoken bruiser, and while the Black Diamond may be a necessary in the context of the story, it adds nothing special or new to the plot Gray-Palmiotti have chosen.

Catwoman #15 – Review

By: Ann Nocenti (story), Rafael Sandoval (art), Jordi Tarragona (inks), Sonia Oback (colors)

The Story: The only time you’ll ever see a security guard put in his place by a map maker.

The Review: Have you ever gone on a date with someone—scratch that; I’ve used the romantic entanglement metaphor way too often on these reviews.  So instead, have you ever met anyone and quickly realized that any relationship—friendly, romantic, or otherwise—with them will be a fairly rocky one?  It’s amazing how often we look back on the beginnings of such acquaintances and realize how obvious the red flags were, and how persistently we ignored them.

All the flags are waving that any investment with Nocenti’s Catwoman will be filled with highs and lows.  Each time I read an issue, I see the elements that have made Nocenti respected in the business, but I also see how those same elements have a tendency to lead to erratic, bewildering storytelling.  One moment, things are going great and you think it’ll all work out fine; then, all of a sudden, you have a moment that throws the entire relationship in doubt.

All-Star Western #14 – Review

By: Jimmy Palmiotti & Justin Gray (story), Moritat (art), Mike Atiyeh (colors)

The Story: Not even Asian exceptionalism stands a chance in Gotham.

The Review: One of the more unfortunate side-effects of growing up is having all your favorite historical myths stripped away.  I would’ve been happy to spend the rest of my life believing that the proto-Americans and Indians spent at least the early parts of their relationship in some kind of harmony.  The truth, of course, involved a great deal more violence and a whole lot less comfort food.

Although the Indians proved to be hospitable at the beginning, one of them made the covetous mistake of stealing a small silver cup from Richard Grenville’s first group of British settlers.  Grenville, perhaps feeling he ought to set boundaries straight from the beginning, responded by sacking and burning the whole Indian village.  And as any history book will tell you, life between the red and white people plunged sharply downhill from there.

All-Star Western #13 – Review

By: Justin Gray & Jimmy Palmiotti (story), Moritat (art), Mike Atiyeh (colors)

The Story: Can we all just agree that it’s all clowns that creep you out, not just the one?

The Review: Pre-relaunch, Gray-Palmiotti wrote Jonah Hex solo for a long—surprisingly long—time, and they seemed to find plenty of success that way.  For Hex in the Wild West, cooperation wouldn’t seem natural or necessary anyway.  But in his urban environment, Hex could use the help.  Without Arkham’s intercession, he’d probably just get arrested and executed in a few months; without Tallulah’s randiness, he’d probably go crazy from the city life.

All this is to say I’m glad Arkham and Tallulah are officially part of Hex’s trio for the foreseeable future.  Although none of them would probably call it as such, they’ve developed a very functional teamwork.  Probably no one can cover Hex in a scrap as well as Talulah, and when it comes to tending to the innocent harmed, or offering some intellectual insight into the happenings, or fending off law enforcement (“I’ll explain to the authorities as best I can,” he sighs resignedly over a bloody mess at a circus), Arkham’s the man.

Demon Knights #13 – Review

By: Paul Cornell (story), Bernard Chang (art), Marcelo Maiolo (colors)

The Story: Hey, it may be Hell, but at least it’s custom-tailored to your tastes.

The Review: You may have heard by now that Cornell will leave this title in only a few more issues, which is heartbreaking, but apparently par for the course for him, given his records on Captain Britain and MI: 13 and Action Comics.  (I must say, this gives me chills about the future of Saucer Country already).  And even though successor Robert Venditti has gotten approval from Cornell himself, I still worry if he can bring what Cornell brought to this series.

Certainly a Cornell title doesn’t read like any other title out there.  He may not be as audaciously ambitious like Grant Morrison, but he really brings his own flavor of ideas to whatever he writes.  He never tells a story in a straightforward way, but always from an oddball angle completely unique to him.  Consider Demon Knights; the more you read it, the more you perceive the sullen tone it has that prevents it from being a pure sword-and-sorcery fantasy.