Spider-Island: Deadly Hands of Kung-Fu #1 – Review

By: Antony Johnston (writer), Sebastian Fiumara (pencils), John Lucas (inks), Dan Brown (colors), Joe Sabino (letters) & Alejandro Arbona (editor)

The Story: Shang Chi, the Master of Kung Fu, runs into some of the Immortal Weapons for the Iron Fist stories during Spider-Island.

What’s Good: Two reasons to buy this… One, if you’re a Shang Chi fan you’ll want to see what he’s up to.  He’s one of those guys who is a cult favorite, but just cannot carry his own ongoing title.  So, if you want to see him, you have to look out for him in miniseries like this one or when he pops up in the pages of other comics.  This is a pretty good Shang Chi story as he has gotten spider powers (along with the rest of NYC), but is trying to figure out why he has these powers when a few others have been exempted AND why he is having disturbing dreams featuring the Immortal Weapons (who were created during Brubaker and Fraction’s great run on Iron Fist).  It’s fun and quick and features a lot of action.

This is also a comic to get if you like comic art.  I had seen the name Fiumara associated with this title and assumed that meant Max Fiumara.  Then I opened the issue and noticed how completely different this looks than Max’s art and was investigating whether the inker could possibly be having that HUGE of an effect.  Then I noted that this comic was penciled by Sebastian Fiumara.  Different artist (duh!), but really nice nonetheless.  One of the great things about these tie-in miniseries at Marvel is that the editors don’t just farm out art chores to Marvel regulars who aren’t on ongoing books.  Often they give the art chores to up and comers, giving you a chance to see something new and different.  Sebastian is one to keep an eye on because this art kicks ass.  You have wildly energetic characters (important with Shang Chi) that are drawn as if the artist has actually seen someone doing martial arts before (rather than just finding photo reference online).  He has that mix of proper anatomy and rough sketchiness that I so enjoy about artists like Riley Rossmo.  Great panel and page layouts too for those of us who find a bunch of rectangles really boring.  Really nice coloring from Dan Brown too where he matches his coloring to the roughness of the line art.

The Mighty Crusaders #6 – Review

By: Eric S. Trautmann & Brandon Jerwa (writers), Julian Lopez (breakdowns), Carlos Rodriguez (penciller), John Lucas (inker), John Kalisz (colorist)

The Story: The Mighty Crusaders enter the forbidden safe into a volatile dimension, all in an effort to track down the Shield’s father and retrieve a fatal piece of alien technology.  With the warring factions of aliens closing in, it may be impossible for all the Crusaders to escape alive.

The Review: There were some doubts over the decision to bring the Mighty Crusaders (formerly the properties of Red Circle Comics) into DC’s fold.  Reviving relatively unknown characters into the midst of a whole universe of icons was by itself a difficult challenge.  Even harder was trying to convince readers these characters deserved ongoing titles while more popular characters had none.  Ultimately, those titles never gained the audience they needed to survive, and folded.

DC’s latest attempt to sell the Red Circle heroes teams them up into the government-backed Mighty Crusaders.  You can say this miniseries acts as a test run to check if these characters fare any better as a group than individually.  And if their futures will be determined by this venture, then it’s likely you won’t see them again soon.  From the first issue to this last one, the whole series has been generic, at best.

It’s not hard to see why.  Government superhero teams abound in the DCU, whether in the uber-patriotic Freedom Fighters or the questionable Suicide Squad—and these are just the more famous ones.  The Crusaders need some kind of identity or at least a mission statement to separate them from the other guys, and they don’t achieve even that.  This mini focuses on their attempts to retrieve an artifact essential to the plans of those who threaten the US government—which is nearly the exact same premise of the story over in Freedom Fighters.

Eric S. Trautmann and Brandon Jerwa also have the problem of trying to give every member of the Crusaders a distinctive personality and background, but except for the Shield, the Web, the Hangman, and Inferno (who all had their own, albeit short-lived, titles), you never get a sense of who they are or what they’re fighting for.  In fact, if you haven’t read those titles, you probably won’t get a strong sense of even those guys.  You could take put any hero in their places, and the issue will read about the same.  Ten Crusaders (plus their supporting cast) and a conflict involving several factions of enemies—I mean, you do the math.  It’d be very tough to make heads or tails of any of these in only six issues.

Batman: Streets of Gotham #16 – Review

By: Paul Dini (writer), Dustin Nguyen (pencils), Derek Fridolfs (inks), John Kalisz (colors) & Steve Wands (letters)

Two-Face Back-up Story: Ivan Brandon (writer), Ramon Bachs (pencils), John Lucas (inks), Nick Filardi (colors) & Travis Lanham (letters)

The Story: With Bruce Wayne “coming back” someone is going to have to do something about Hush who has been posing as Bruce for the last year or so…

What’s Good: For as all-inclusive as Morrison’s epic Bat-story has been, I find it very odd that he has left this piece almost completely alone.  Namely, since Bruce’s “death”, Paul Dini has had Hush assuming Bruce’s identity.  I thought it was a clever bit of storytelling because it has certainly avoided the public question of “What happened to Bruce Wayne?” and Dini did some neat things with the story when he had Hush attempt to spend the Wayne family into oblivion by donating ALL of their money to charity.

This story arc is very clearly someone at DC reminding Dini that he needs to clean up his toys before Grant “Daddy” Morrison gets home from work and finds Hush living as Bruce Wayne.  How awkward would that be?  But, where Dini excels is in making this more than a “taking out the trash” level of story.  He manages to have Hush continuing to do dastardly things right up until the (apparent) end as he is using his influence as “Bruce” to get psychos released from Arkham.  At least Bruce/Dick/Tim/Damien/Steph will have a lot to do in the months ahead!

Also excellent is the Ivan Brandon-penned back-up featuring Two-Face.  I’ve never loved Two-Face, but this series of back-ups from Brandon has made him a lot more interesting for me.  I won’t spoil the pay off, but it starts to answer the question of whether Two-Face’s psychotic cup is really half-full or half-empty.

I didn’t think that Nguyen’s art was quite as vibrant as I’ve seen in the past.  He’s also the incoming artist on Batgirl, so it could well be that he had double-duty this month and had to rush a bit.  He remains a real master of using heavy blacks as negative space (much like Chris Samnee) which is a different look and one that I enjoy.  Also, who knew that Zatanna owned such a modest dress?  Or did she wear that get-up because she was revolted by wearing her normal attire around Hush?

Batman: Streets of Gotham #15 – Review

By: Paul Dini, Ivan Brandon (writer), Ramon Bachs (pencils), John Lucas (inks), Nick Filardi (colors) & Travis Lanham (letters)

The Story: Two-Face and gang evade the cops while torturing a rat within their organization.

What’s Good: Considering that I’m a general fan of Batman’s world, some might find it surprising that I’ve never really cared for Two-Face as a villain.  I get sick of all the coin flipping and the hokey two-tone clothing.  He just looks like an ugly pimp to me.  And, throughout it all, I never really feel like he’s any sort of legitimate threat because he’s just a crazy attorney.

So, when I found out that this month’s Streets of Gotham would be a continuation of Ivan Brandon’s back-up story from last issue, I had mixed emotions.  On one hand, I think Brandon is a talented young writer and I was eager to see him get an opportunity to do this issue.  On the other, I was wishing he could do another character.

However, Brandon really did a nice job with Two-Face.  He does a great job of showing just how completely nuts Two-Face is.  At times in this story, I almost thought he seemed more like the Joker than the Two-Face I’m used to.  But, that’s okay because Brandon’s Two-Face isn’t anyone that I would want to be in a room with.  I think part of the story-telling effectiveness comes from the relationship with Two-Face has with his two minions and it is very cool how they alternate between being scared shitless of him and being sick of his craziness which leads to a pretty shocking conclusion.  I’m eager to see the next part of this story.

Batman Streets of Gotham #14 – Review

By: Paul Dini (writer), Dustin Nguyen (pencils), Derek Fridolfs (inks), John Kalisz (colors) & Steve Wands (letters)

Two-Face back-up story: Ivan Brandon (writer), Ramon Bachs (pencils), John Lucas (inks), Nick Filardi (colors) & Travis Lanham (letters)

The Story: Hush starts plotting again and Two-Face tries to root out a mole in his organization.

What’s Good: I’ve really come to enjoy Dustin Nguyen’s art.  I don’t think this is his artistic masterpiece, but I’m looking for something kind to say about this issue and I do think that Nguyen’s art is the high point.  I enjoy how he mixes his digitally drawn characters (at least that’s how I assume he’s doing it) with photo-realism in the background so he gets some of the photo-realism on the page without having his character’s expressions be constrained by whatever face the model was making.

This issue also revisits the fun Paul Dini concept of having the Outsiders and the extended Bat-family babysit Hush (who is masquerading as Bruce Wayne).  This concept was first tossed out in the early issues of Streets when Hush was attempting to donate all of Bruce Wayne’s money and bankrupt him, so in this issue Hush has a disguised Katana in tow.

Batman: Streets of Gotham #11 – Review

By: Main Story: Paul Dini (writer), Dustin Nguyen (pencils), Derek Fridolfs (inks), John Kalisz (colors) & Steve Wands (letters).  Manhunter back-up: Marc Andreyko (writer), Jeremy Haun (pencils), John Lucas (inks), Nick Filardi (colors) & Sal Cipriano (letters)

The Story: Damien and Abuse face off against Zsasz while the Manhunter looks for her lost kid.

What’s Good: I keep trying to drop this title on the grounds that I don’t need to get so many Bat-books, but it keeps being good enough to buy one more month.  Honestly, its been a better title than Batman has been for the last year.

I loved how we got to see Damien and Abuse settle Zsasz’s hash in this issue.  Dini has been building Zsasz up as the villain for nearly 8 months now, by having him build an arena for homeless kids to knife-fight to the death in.   So, it was good to see him get stopped by a couple of kids.

I’m also enjoying the growth of Damien over the last year into a heroic character, which comes to the forefront here as Damien is willing to sacrifice himself to let the other kid (Abuse) get away.  One of the big quandaries for the Bat-books is that all the Robins have stepped up (Dick, Tim & Damien) and I’m curious to see where they all end up once Bruce Wayne is back.

Dustin Nguyen is an acquired taste, I’ll say.  He probably isn’t my favorite artist just due to stylistic issues, but he does execute very well within his style on this issue.

Deadpool #14 – Review

By Daniel Way (Writer), Shawn Crystal (Pencils), John Lucas (Inks), and Lee Loughridge (Colors)

Some Thoughts Before The Review: Piratepool brought the funny last issue. I’m assuming that he’ll do the same in Deadpool #14.

The Story: Deadpool, his parrot (Hydra Bob), and his “blind pirate wench” face off against the pirate known as Wackbeard.

What’s Good: In Deadpool #14, as he did in the first Piratepool issue of Deadpool, Daniel Way finds a way to strike a nice balance between the clever and the obvious as far as the whole pirate thing goes. On the one side, you have stuff like Wackbeard mentioning just how much of Deadpool’s pirate obsession is the result of watching too many movies. On the other side, you have jokes about using a plunger for a peg leg. The back and forth between the two types of humor makes the latest issue of Deadpool an enjoyable read that really takes advantage of the whole pirate theme. Another thing that Way scores points for is the way he manages to bring Deadpool’s ridiculousness full circle in a way that makes the conclusion of the pirate arc a bit more satisfying than you might imagine.

The artwork by Shawn Crystal, while a bit rough (which I’ll get to), gives Way’s story an indie look that’s rather fitting. I mean, let’s face it, Deadpool rarely feels like the fairly high profile book that it’s become anyways. From Hydra Bob the (impressively expressive) parrot to Wackbeard and his crew, Crystal’s work captures the spirit of what makes Deadpool so much fun.

What’s Not So Good: While Crystal’s work does justice to Way’s script, I’m still a bit hung up on how much I miss the slick, polished work of Paco Medina and his crew. Since Crystal started handling Deadpool, the series went from being one of the best looking to one that just looks somewhere between decent and good. That said, I won’t mind if Crystal sticks around because his style definitely has a certain charm that works.

Conclusion: Deadpool #14 delivers pretty much everything someone could ask for in a comic about the Merc with a Mouth. It’s funny, it’s a bit silly, it’s action scenes are pretty cool (and suitably violent), and it tells a story that could only really work with Deadpool as the lead character.

Grade: B

-Kyle Posluszny

Deadpool #13 – Review

By Daniel Way (Writer), Shawn Crystal (Pencils & Inks), John Lucas (Inks), and Lee Loughridge (Colors)

The Story: After sinking a nuclear sub that he didn’t know was a sub, Deadpool buys a new boat with all the money he got as a result of the last arc. A new boat means that Deadpool needs a crew. It also means that Wade finally gets to live out his dream of being a pirate…

What’s Good: As expected, Daniel Way’s dry sense of humor and “just go for it” mentality makes Deadpool #13 one hell of a funny read. From the humorous set up to the repeated use of Hydra Bob’s name (“Damn it, Bob” or “Never ask me a question like that again, Bob”), nearly every page of the latest issue of Deadpool goes for a laugh either through a goofy situation or a line of dialogue. Now not only does the new Deadpool bring the funny, it also sets up a pretty entertaining story about Wade defending a resort island against real pirates. Sure it’s not the deepest or most epic plot, but there’s a whole lot of potential for stuff that could only happen in a pirate-themed Deadpool book. I like that.

What’s Not So Good: While Shawn Crystal’s artwork certainly gets the job done (it’s got a lot of personality and the right type of goofy flavor), it’s hard not to compare it to the work that had been done by Paco Medina and his team. Simply put, Paco Medina and his team made Deadpool one of the best looking comics on the stands. Without Medina and his crew working on the book, the Deadpool series loses part of what has made it kick so much ass for the majority of its current run.

Conclusion: Do you like Deadpool? Do you like Pirates? If you answered yes to one or both of those questions, then be sure to pick up the latest issue of Deadpool. I doubt you’ll be disappointed.

Grade: B

-Kyle Posluszny