Swamp Thing #34 – Review

By: Charles Soule (story), Javier Pina (art), Matthew Wilson (colors)

The Story: There ain’t no plan like a Weeds plan.

The Review: In the superhero genre, where it’s common practice for writers to constantly recycle established characters, it’s rare to encounter new characters who are as rich or intriguing as the old ones. Soule has been on a streak in that regard. True, it’s not as if Swamp Thing had a whole host of characters to draw from, so he had incentive to create new ones. But these creations have become a crucial part of his run’s enjoyment, which is no small achievement in this biz.

It’s possibly to classify Soule’s characters as either heroes or villains, but all of them are somewhat more complicated than that. Wolf and Weeds may be antagonists as a consequence of plotting against Alec, but their grievances against him are legitimate. Alec may disclaim any responsibility for their fates, arguing that it’s they who failed to roll with the punches, but this ignores his role in delivering the blows. After unleashing them from the Green, he never did give much thought to their fates afterward. If he had, maybe he could’ve kept them fixed on what they have instead of what they had.

Swamp Thing #33 – Review

By: Charles Soule (story), Javier Pina (art), Matthew Wilson (colors)

The Story: Jonah proves to Weeds and Wolf that sex is more rewarding than scheming.

The Review: I might have said this before—in fact, I’m almost certain of it—but one of the best things Soule did for this series was introduce us to specific members of the Parliament of Trees, then include them as part of Alec’s supporting cast. Alec has always been a decent, likable protagonist, but the additions of Jonah, Lady Weeds, and the Wolf have given Swamp Thing layers of human intrigue between its supernatural mysteries.

Almost all of that intrigue is generated between Weeds and Wolf alone, not least of all because they have such dramatically different personalities. Wolf prefers to play the long game, slowly breaking down Alec until the final stroke can be delivered. Weeds would rather eschew this Machiavellian approach for a more direct attack. It’s not hard to figure out whose plan will carry the day in the end; it’s just amazing that Weeds goes along with Wolf for as long as she does.

Swamp Thing #31 – Review

By: Charles Soule (story), Jesus Saiz (layouts), Javier Pina (finishes), Matthew Wilson (colors)

The Story: Alec should know better than to get deep into ‘shrooms before a big event.

The Review: I’m not a diehard Alec-Abby shipper by any means—I sort of felt they got together by virtue of narrative inevitability than genuine chemistry—but I was still excited by the prospect that they might reunite, even temporarily, through the human hosts provided by the Sureen. Alas, it’s not Abby residing in Miki’s inviting body. The fungi growing out of Miki’s orifices signal a different force of nature altogether, “the Mycos. Some called it the Grey.”

It’s not as dramatic a revelation as the Rot was, and Soule doesn’t play it as such. Instead, he finds surprises and twists from other avenues, mainly in Miki’s defiant rejection of her* role as avatar. Interestingly enough, this rejection goes back even to the early days of the Grey, or at least, its intersection with humanity. Alec’s brief travel through the Grey is unmarked by any parliament, suggesting that Miki is not only its current avatar, but its first as well.

Swamp Thing #30 – Review

By: Charles Soule (story), Jesus Saiz (art), Javier Pina (finishes), Matthew Wilson (colors)

The Story: Time is running out for Alec, which means it’s the perfect time for a date.

The Review: For a long time, Alec was really the solo driver of this book, his isolation broken only by a troubled romance with Abigail Arcane and a brief partnership with Buddy Baker. But ever since Soule took over the series, he’s slowly added more permanent fixtures in the characters of Capucine, Lady Weeds, the Wolf, and Brother Jonah, all fully realized with motivations entirely separate from Alec. This isn’t just Alec’s show anymore; what we have here is an ensemble.

It’s pretty easy to tell whether a group of characters is a true ensemble or whether they’re just filler orbiting the star. Just remove the biggest name from the picture and see how the rest get on. True, Alec is only incapacitated for a few pages, but that’s enough for you to see how functional and entertaining his supporting players are without him.

Swamp Thing #28 – Review

By: Charles Soule (story), Javier Pina (art), Matthew Wilson (colors)

The Story: You’re not truly living until you’ve thrown up in the streets of New Orleans.

The Review: Previously, on Swamp Thing—thought I’d take a page out of the TV convention book there—we left Alec standing over the withered remnants of the Parliament of Trees.  More intriguingly, there were three very nude bodies also sprawled on the swampy ground.  I’m sure we all had our suspicions of who they were.  The tubby chump with no hair seemed like a shoo-in for Wolf, which made the raven-haired beauty a good candidate for Lady Weeds.

That left one comatose man outstanding, who reveals himself here as one Brother Jonah, the monk who instructed Alec on the Sanctuarium Folium Viride back in #21.  At least, that’s what the man claims.  It’s hard to see much resemblance between him and the monkish figure who appeared in Alec’s vision of 12th-century France—except maybe the beard.  Indeed, when Alec asks if he can trust him, Jonah replies noncommittally, “I am as trustworthy as any man.”

The Swamp Thing Annual #2 – Review

By: Charles Soule (story), Javier Pina & Kano (art) Matthew Wilson (colors)

The Story: Whoever knew the Green had an avatar apprenticeship program?

The Review: In light of a rather interesting article by Albert Ching of Comic Book Resources on the comeback of the annual, I must say that in comparison to most of the annuals I’ve read this year, this one is an excellent sample of the format and what it can do for an ongoing series’ storytelling.  Like Matt Fraction’s Hawkeye annual earlier this year, Soule’s crack at a Swamp Thing annual not only stands very well on its own, but advances the title’s cause as a whole.

Soule also does something with the annual that works very well and which I’m surprised other writers haven’t taken advantage of very often before.  He uses it as a fairly effective primer on the continuity behind both Swamp Thing and the Green, but more than that, he adds generously to the title’s mythos, allowing old and new readers to end the issue on fairly even footing.  Ever since this series was revived under the DC banner, we’ve been operating on a well-established understanding of how its world worked; Soule expands that understanding dramatically.

DC Universe Presents #19 – Review

By: Tony Bedard (story), Javier Pina (art), Jason Wright (colors)

The Story: Beowulf isn’t interested in doing anything too touristy for his one day in New York City.

The Review: It’s always a shame when a title with an interesting format or concept fails, no matter how deserved.  You can’t deny that DC Universe Presents has been mostly a failure, though a noble one.  In theory, having a title that can feature some of the underrepresented figures in the DCU, or perhaps allow a writer to deliver that one good idea for a story that’s not ongoing, sounds great.  In execution, we’ve far more misses than hits.

The series has always suffered from too much mediocrity in the writing, which it can ill afford.  An ongoing starring a popular character can easily scrape over a few forgettable issues without much suffering, but a title with a revolving door of features gets consistency in only one way: its quality of talent.  Having an entire arc of Dan Didio and Jerry Ordway on a Challengers of the Unknown story is not going to cut it, I’m afraid.*

Birds of Prey #8 – Review

By: Duane Swierczynski (story), Jesus Saiz (pencils), Javier Pina (inks), June Chung (colors)

The Story: Starling proves threatening a man’s privates is on par with threatening anyone else’s life.

The Review: Even though this series has been consistently enjoyable since it debuted, it still hasn’t really achieved that special quality which makes a title a must-read.  Last month, I pointed out the slightly lacking group chemistry among the Birds; while each has her unique attraction, they don’t have much in the way of common ground or a mutual agenda.  Another missing element, one which may prove even more important, is a clear direction for the series.

Swierczynski likes the in medias res style of opening, throwing us right into the boiling point of the action from the start, and letting us figure out the context as the issue goes on.  He’s managed to make it work before, but this time, the jump between where we left off last time and where we pick up now leaves us helplessly confused.

Birds of Prey #6 – Review

By: Duane Swierczynski (writer), Javier Pina (artist), June Chung (colorist)

The Story: Just when you think you know a guy, he turns out to be a secret killer agent.

The Review: Some would argue that the real measure of a great superhero is a great supervillain, and that seems pretty true.  You can’t really think of any of the giants—Batman, Superman, Captain America, Spider-Man—without simultaneously thinking of their evil counterparts—Joker, Lex Luthor, Red Skull, John Jonah Jameson (and yes, that last one is, in fact, a joke).  So it stands to reason that often, the failing of any new hero can often lie with mediocre nemeses.

For these new Birds, their first antagonist is kind of a weird bird.  On the one hand, the scope of his abilities and his altogether faceless nature poses some worthy challenges for our heroines.  On the other hand, we haven’t really seen Choke actually do anything, nor do we know much about his motivations.  Without a clear goal, he’s just being manipulative for the sake of being manipulative—which in itself might be interesting, but this issue hints nothing like that.

The real antagonists the Birds have faced thus far have all been these Cleaners, sleeper agents activated by remote hypnotic triggers.  Swierczynski makes the rather pleasant decision to buck the trend of leaving nameless thugs to be nameless thugs and actually follow one of the Cleaners around.  And his name is Brendan, by the way.  Seeing his experience of living a fairly normal routine most the day, only to black out and find himself in pants-wetting situations later (by which I mean he’s been suddenly stripped naked in a warehouse, Katana poised over him with a syringe), definitely shows you how disorienting and frightening it must be to live his life.

Birds of Prey #5 – Review

By: Duane Swierczynski (writer), Jesus Saiz (penciller), Javier Pina (inker), June Chung (colorist)

The Story: I don’t suppose anyone thought to write down what we were doing on a Post-It?

The Review: The best part about a title that features a group of solely women is for once you get (when executed properly) the kind of variety among characters of a single gender that you’ve been getting with dude-focused titles for years now.  It’s remarkable how many comic book writers tend to approach scenes featuring more than two women as if their only experience of such interactions is from what their girlfriends made them watch of Sex and the City.

In sharp contrast to the sameness of females over on Justice League International, each Bird has an immediately recognizable and distinctive voice and bearing.  Poison Ivy is brusque and to the point; Starling is equal parts brash and sensitive; Katana, while cool and businesslike, reveals a sense of humor beneath a surprising shyness; and Black Canary, as the emotion center of the team, has a little bit of everything bubbling her cautious exterior.

You’ll notice I haven’t mentioned anything of Batgirl yet.  The reason is simple: she doesn’t really get much of an appearance in this issue.  And the reason for that?  Well, it’s complicated.  As Canary very efficiently sums up, “Last thing I remember, we were on Choke’s secret floor fighting a dozen of those creepy ‘Cleaners’—and all five of us were kicking ass.”  Cut to the first page, and the Birds (minus Batgirl) are under military fire in the midst of a rubble, with no clue what’s gone on in the last few hours.

It’s not just that they’re missing time out of their lives.  None of them seem to have consistent memories of what’s happened (some remember Batgirl being there, others don’t).  Starling’s broken hand has mysteriously healed up.  More significantly, each of them comes away from the experience troubled and out of sorts, which they each deal with in their own way, revealing interesting bits of backstory along the way.

Ev can’t settle herself at the range, so she goes to visit a lady-acquaintance with whom she seems to have a complicated past (“I know what you said…but I really, really needed to see you.”).  Also intriguing is Ivy’s dealings with an unidentified businessman, which may bode ill for her loyalty to the Birds—or it may not; his question of, “You’ll still honor our arrangement?” could mean treachery, or it could mean he’s asking if she’ll keep up an earlier, unrelated bargain with him while having a go at “the hero thing.”

Soldier Zero #4 – Review

By: Paul Cornell (writer), Javier Pina (art), Archie Van Buren (colors), Ed Dukeshire (letters) & Bryce Carlson (editor)

The Story: Big time throw down between the Soldier Zero/Stewart construct and the bad guy.  Or is he?

What’s Good: If you’re into sci-fi themed comics, there really aren’t too many outlets right now, so you might want to check this out.  This is an pretty solid issue that showcases a huge throw-down between our protagonist, Stewart, who is wearing a good suit of armor and the evil suit of armor that has taken as its host a decomposing policeman.  Ewwww!  Does that give him magical stink powers?

The battle itself is really nicely done and some of the events start to call into question whether Soldier Zero (which I think is the name of Stewart’s armor) is really a good guy.  Thus, it’s also open to interpretation whether the “bad guy” is really bad.  Nonetheless it is a good fight and there is just enough of this “shades of gray” drama that you know that things are not quite as simple as they seem.

I have no major complaints about the art.  I’m not measuring a spot on my wall for where a framed original page can go, but it is perfectly fine and tells the story nicely.  Many comic artists that are trying to do creative things on the page need to master good, basic storytelling first which is what we’re getting on Solider Zero right now.

Soldier Zero #2 – Review

By: Paul Cornell (writer), Javier Pina & Sergio Arino (art), Archie Van Buren (colors), Ed Dukeshire (letters) & Bryce Carlson (editor)

The Story: We learn a LOT more about “Soldier Zero”, why he is here, how he works, etc.

What’s Good: The first issue of Soldier Zero was not so hot.  It spent a lot of time mewling over the central character and establishing that he was a Marine officer in a wheelchair, but he didn’t need any kind of special help…dammit!  It was okay character work, but we didn’t really see Soldier Zero until the very end.  With that lead in, I was surprised to see that….

This issue really kinda kicks ass!  We learn that this Soldier Zero thing that has come to Earth and bonded with our main character is a combination of Iron Man’s Extremis armor suit and the Trills from the Star Trek universe (or Venom, I guess).  [SPOILERS]  The suit is an alien symbiote, whose original host died during the space battle that was shown, but not explained, in issue #1.  The suit needed to grab someone just to stay alive and it settled for our main character.  The Iron Man thing comes in with how the suit manifests as it just kinda appears and can cover only certain parts of the body if need be, but it is not something that you put on like a pair of pants.

Why is the alien here?  Well, the mission is very interesting as well: It seems to be a modernization of ROM Spaceknight, one of my favorite comics of the early 1980’s.  Somehow Earth has been infiltrated by evil aliens that can assume human shape.  The Soldier Zero construct has fought against them in the past and can see them, but it is probably going to look like he is murdering innocent humans when he zaps them (just like ROM) and he won’t be able to get help from the authorities because he doesn’t know how pervasive the evil aliens are (just like ROM).

While it does seem to be an amalgam of story elements that we’ve seen before, it works for two reasons: One, ROM is so screwed up from an intellectual property standpoint that Marvel will never be able to do that character or even reprint the original comics.  So I’m happy to see someone continuing a ROM-like adventure.  Two, the story is well written and illustrated.  Story concepts are pretty easy, but writing and drawing them in an engaging fashion is hard and the creative team pulled it off (which was an especially difficult challenge given that I really didn’t like issue #1 very much).

Soldier Zero #1 – Review

By: Paul Cornell (writer), Javier Pina (art), Alfred Rockefeller (colors) & Ed Dukeshire (letters)

The Story: A handicapped U.S. Army veteran gains the powers of alien being who has fallen to Earth after being wounded in a cosmic battle.

What’s Good: The story is pretty serviceable and has promise.  This issue is entirely set-up as we meet Stewart, who is a wheelchair bound U.S. Army veteran and start to learn about his life as a recently handicapped guy.  All the predictable stuff is there and Cornell handles it quite well: Stewart’s desire to be treated normally, flash backs to his injury, problems with dating, girl’s finding him cute but wondering if his man-parts work, etc.

This is interspersed with snippets showing Soldier Zero engaged in a big cosmic battle.  Nothing is revealed about who Soldier Zero is or who he is fighting, but that will clearly become a major focus of the series.

Pina’s art serves the story well.  Boom! seems to encourage their artists to stay within the story because you never see attempts (even failed attempts) to create grand splash pages and Boom!’s devotion to story seems to be their differentiating factor (compared to Marvel/DC).  You never have any wonder what is going on in a panel because Pina has chosen some weird perspective or lighting source.  It’s just clear and straight forward comic art.