Alpha Girl #1 – Review

By: Jeff Roenning (writer, co-creator), Jean-Paul Bonjour (co-creator), Robert Love (pencils), Dana Shukartsi (inks), Diego Simone (colors), Drew Gill (letters) & Branwyn Bigglestone (editor)

The Story: A rebellious teenage girl makes her way in a zombie apocalypse.

Review: This isn’t a bad comic and it has some promise.  Let’s start with the positives.  The art is definitely good enough to carry a comic book in this really crowded market where there is simply NO reason to read mediocre comic books.  Love’s basic look is very cartoony and with that come all sorts of advantages when it comes to showcasing action because it’s possible to wring so much more expression out of a cartoon character than a character based in realism.  I also really like how the comic is colored: mostly flat and lots of bright primary colors that POP out at you.  This is a very attractive comic.

This comic also fits into a niche of tongue-in-cheek humor comics.  The basic premise is that these “zombies” stem from an accident at a cosmetics factory.  See, that’s kind of a funny concept, right?  I expect that this comic will appeal to fans of Reed Gunther and Xenoholics (two other recent Image comics with cartoony art and a sense of humor).   You know, the kind of comics that fans say, “If you don’t like this, you’re allergic to fun.” Honestly, I must be allergic to fun, because none of those comics are my bag, but I know a LOT of people love them and if you are one of those, this is probably worth checking out.

Dark Horse Presents #2 – Review

By: Paul Chadwick, Robert Love, David Walker, Michelle Davies, Diego Simone, Thomas Mauer, Neal Adams, Moose, Carla Speed McNeil, Jenn Manley Lee, Bill Mudron, Howard Chaykin, Jesus Aburto, Ken Bruzenak, Michael T. Gilbert, Patrick Alexander, Sanford Greene, Chuck Brown, Tyson Hesse, Steve Dutro, Richard Corben, Clem Robins, David Chelsea

The Story: Another round of Dark Horse’s reborn anthology series.

Review: Honestly, this issue was a real slog to get through.  Part of the problem is that there was no singular story that was just electric in this short format.  Some of them might mature into great stories, but anthologies are hard. You have to grab the reader right away!  If the issue starts with 3 stories that fail to capture the attention, the remaining part of the issue might be doomed.

Another problem with this issue was editorial.  By having most of the first half of the issue filled with stories that began in last month’s issue, we got a lot of second chapters.  All told, we got a second chapter of Concrete (Paul Chadwick), Blood (Neal Adams), Finder (Carla Speed McNeil), Marked Man (Howard Chaykin), Mr. Monster (Michael T. Gilbert), Murky World (Richard Corben) & Snow Angel (David Chelsea).  That is just waaaayyyy too many second chapters.  Second chapters don’t have as much novelty, but they also don’t finish stories, so they can be pretty boring.  And this issue was pretty drab.

The few new stories in this issue were the high points.  Robert Love and David Walker give us “Number 13” which is about a post-apocalyptic wasteland, Patrick Alexander gives us The Wraith which is a silly kinda spoof of an evil Batman and Sanford Greene and Chuck Brown trot out Rotten Apple which had an interesting twist on a zombie overrun world.  I really enjoyed all three of these new stories because they were fresh.

Editorial could have helped this issue out a bit by putting the new stories at the front to build some more excitement for the rest of the issue.  It also might be good to stagger the ongoing stories so that we don’t get a whole pile of Chapter 2’s again.