New Avengers #5 – Review

by Brian Michael Bendis (writer), Stuart Immonen (pencils), Wade von Grawbadger (inks), Laura Martin (colors), and Chris Eliopoulos (letters)

The Story: The Avengers learn who is behind the mystic attacks and devise a plan to challenge him/it.

What’s Good: By this point, it should go without saying that I’m loving this as a Marvel mystic storyline.  It makes New Avengers feel distinct, it helps bring in some real power players from an arena that is largely ignored.

Focusing on the mystic corner of the Marvel Universe has also brought the best out of Stuart Immonen and Laura Martin, who are able to make the kind of bright, vibrant, Saturday-morning artwork on steroids that they clearly excel at.  New Avengers, even moreso now with all the mystic lights, spells, and blasts, is just downright fun to look at.

This issue’s plot had enough twists and turns to keep me interested.  There’s a constant sense of things getting increasingly large, both the story and the villain.  Things keep getting exponentially bigger and by the end of this issue, from a mystic perspective, the conflict is positively massive in scale despite its really only involving one team of Avengers.  Certainly, putting an identity on the bad guy (and it’s a huge one) helps a great deal with this.  Not only is the revelation both interesting and surprising in its gravity, but it also helps to make the story feel more important, something that has been lacking lately what with all the faceless, formless goons the Avengers have been fighting lately.

Doctor Voodoo: Avenger of the Supernatural #4

By: Rick Remender (writer), Jefte Palo & Alessandro Vitti (artists), Jean-François Beaulieu (colorist)

The Story: Nightmare has taken over the world. The other heroes of the Marvel Universe, including Doctor Strange, are his captives. Only Doctor Doom has escaped the clutches of Nightmare, and his fortress is falling.

What’s Good: Remender’s take on Nightmare is brilliantly conflicted. He’s made Nightmare a creature of irrational appetites, but of cunning intellect. If that’s hard to understand, let me put it this way: Nightmare has been slowly materializing Jericho Drumm’s nightmares for decades, signs of hyper-intelligent cunning. However, pages later, when Nightmare is on the verge of conquering Doom, the last holdout of humanity, he doesn’t care that this will result in their mutual destruction. Even when Doom points it out to him, it’s like Nightmare doesn’t care, not because he doesn’t understand the consequences, but because they seem disconnected from what he wants. It’s an interesting and disturbing take on such an old and powerful Marvel villain.

Remender’s vision of Drumm was equally compelling. I liked the visible arc of Drum growing into the role of sorcerer supreme (arcs similar to those being followed by Bucky, Donna Troy, Dick Grayson and Wally West) over the last couple of issues, but the revelation that Drumm himself, in combination with Nightmare’s influence, was creating the curse he is suffering, was awesome. Suddenly, I saw why Drumm had been tapped as the sorcerer supreme. It made sense, as much as it had when Strange had taken on that mantle. Remender did some great work here.

And, although I’m running out of space to praise Remender, I have to point out the great world building he did here. Those of us following Dr. Strange thought we’d seen all that could be seen of Marvel and magic. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Remender’s magic, and the introduction of the Lao, and a different set of cosmic (who all seem to be minor, compared to the ones Strange had tapped) is really, really cool.

And the art was great. It was not realistic. The stylistic, gritty take on Drumm’s magic is great. Nightmare never looked better or creepier than on the cover of this book. The spookiness evoked by Palo and Vitti works, through the dangling, shrunken heads on the staff of Legba, the clawing hand at the entrance to Bondyè and the scary supernatural creatures now working for Nightmare (including the spirits of vengeance!). The action sequences were dynamic, the faces expressive, and the world and people textured and real. All in all, art and story matching really well.

Doctor Voodoo: Avenger of the Supernatural #2 – Review

by Rick Remender (writer), Jefte Palo & Gabriel Hardman (artists), Jean-Francois Beaulieu (colorist), Lauren Sankovitch (editor)

The Story: Doom has abandoned Jericho Drumm in a dimension where his magic does not work. Worse yet, half of his Staff of Legba is stolen. He barely makes it back to Earth, only to find out that whatever foe he has been fearing is already way ahead of him. Luckily, Daimon Hellstorm is there to help.

What’s Good: I confess that I’m a fan of Marvel’s “sorcerous” worlds, all the way back to the spooky Lee/Kirby Dr. Strange stories, so seeing a new monthly with the new sorcerer supreme is awesome. Jericho Drumm is a great character. He obviously doubts himself, but is also obviously compensating and this is a situation that goes way back. He’s been someone filling shoes all his life and the shoes don’t get much bigger than holder of the Eye of Agamotto. Drumm is what takes a cosmic sorcerer supreme invasion story and makes it personal. And it’s not just Remender’s handling of Drumm’s personality that makes this work. There is also the whole different angle on magic: the new stuff, the new spells, all of which fit into Haitian mysticism. I listened to Marvel’s podcast interview with Remender on this new series and I was heartened to find out he’s as much a sorcerer supreme fanboy as I am and it shows in his approach to Drumm.

Palo, Hardman and Beaulieu deliver on the art chores. This is not realistic draftsmanship. Between the three of them, they produce one of the grittiest magic stories I can remember in Marvel. The textured environment, the stylized shadows on cyclopean frogs, the falling stones – the story is told through pictures and a brevity of text that really makes the bookwork. The surreal settings come alive because of the imagination that Palo and Hardman bring to the table. And Beaulieu adds a lot to the mood with the use of earthy browns, grays and dirty greens to set moods that are only interrupted by the red of Drumm’s cloak, or in the case of the flashback to his childhood, blood. Overall, the artistic effect is excellent.

What’s Not So Good: Nothing to complain about, other than having to wait until next issue to see what happens next.

Conclusion: Whether you’re a sorcerer supreme fanboy or not, go out and buy this book. It is original, tense, spooky, surreal and moody.

Grade: A-

-DS Arsenault

 



Doctor Voodoo: Avenger of the Supernatural #1 – Review

By Rick Remender (writer), Jefte Palo (pencils & inks), Jean-Francois Beaulieu (colors)

The Story: Jericho Drumm, the Houngan Supreme, and now Sorcerer Supreme, has to establish his street cred and get the big job done before a prophesied evil swallows the universe. First stop: Dormammu, and that’s just the prologue! Stephen Strange is there too, finishing up handing over the reins of power before heading off. Then, alone, Doctor Voodoo heads into the world himself, but is surprised by an old enemy and a new challenger for the mantle of Sorcerer Supreme.

What’s Good: The new conception of the Sorcerer Supreme. Doctor Voodoo is not your dad’s Doctor Strange! He’s walking around with human skulls on his belt and shrunken heads dangling off the Staff of Legba. He’s in-your-face and daring, the Gunner of God and the Houngan Supreme. It is seriously cool. The Haitian angle brings a new feel and tone to the Marvel Universe’s top sorcerer. Remender hit all the right notes. At the same time, Voodoo’s got some cockiness issues. Strange lost the mantle of Sorcerer Supreme because he’d become complacent and stopped learning, but Voodoo is into some nasty magic that Strange wouldn’t touch. Anyone smell hubris?

Palo and Beaulieu deliver some beautiful art. I think that magic always gives an artist room to run with the ball and we get a new classical-Greek view of Dormammu’s domain, shrunken heads, the Scrying Stones of Chthon, gritty New Orleans and a defeated, shaken Strange. And the variant cover by Tan was awesome. I’ll give a no-prize to anyone who can tell me which classic cover and artist it’s based on!

What’s Not So Good: Having really learned the worlds of Doctor Strange in the surreal weirdness of Ditko, Brunner, Russell, and even Paul Smith, I found some of the dimensions and environments visited by Voodoo to be a little… restrained. Don’t get me wrong. The art was well done, but I’m not used to straight lines anywhere the Sorcerer Supreme walks. Palo’s extra dimensional designs have a regularity that seems like a lost opportunity compared to the psychological chaos that usually provides the backdrop to Marvel’s magical adventures. Even the brief view of Shuma-Gorath felt like Palo was holding back. I hope in the next couple of issues, Palo lets himself go nuts and to put whatever bizarre wackiness he can think of onto the page.

Conclusion: There are lots of challenges to writing and drawing the Sorcerer Supreme well. Marvel has hit on the right concept and launched a great new series. I expect a few growing pains, but this first issue caught the tone needed to make the Sorcerer Supreme work. Go out and get it.

Grade: B+

-DS Arsenault