Justice League of America #5 – Review

By: Geoff Johns (story), Brett Booth (pencils), Norm Rapmund (inks), Andrew Dalhouse (colors)

The Story: The JLA reveals that breaking up evil robots as an early specialty.

The Review: A long time ago, when Identity Crisis was still a controversial novelty, I remember one of the better jokes in the series involved a bunch of villains sitting around their satellite HQ and discussing the death of Donna Troy.  I believe it was Merlyn who deadpanned, “She’ll be back.”  The line reveals that comic book writers know how meaningless death in the superhero genre is, and yet the cycles of lifelessness and resurrections continue.

I’ve given up hoping that publishers will take a hardline stance on this point.  All I ask is for writers, if they’re going to use death as a narrative gimmick, then to at least use it well.  I’ll be more specific and say that they probably shouldn’t end an issue on a death if they know that we know it won’t take for longer than a single issue.  Here, Catwoman’s “death” doesn’t even last even three pages after her shooting, and we all know, before Martian Manhunter reveals himself, how that managed to come to pass.

Aquaman #20 – Review

By: John Ostrander (story), Manuel Garcia (pencils), Sandra Hope, Rob Hunter, Ray McCarthy, Wayne Faucher (inks), Pete Pantazis (colors)

The Story: Oddly, a girl who sees dead people is not the strangest member of the Others.

The Review: One of the best concepts Geoff Johns introduced on his run here has been Aquaman’s first team effort, the Others.  Johns not only managed to give each member a well-defined personality and design, he also gave them a strong team dynamic, as if they really had worked together for years.  Their intimacy was so convincing that it was kind of bittersweet to see them part ways when it was so tempting to give them a title of their own.

In this issue, Ostrander sort of tests the viability of the Others as characters in their own right, without Aquaman as their center.  Indeed, here Arthur seems more like a featured player in his own title.  Despite being their de facto leader (though the Operative may disagree with that assertion), he comes to them as someone asking his friends to do him a big favor, one he’s not yet comfortable presenting to his current team.  He stands equal to the Others, which in turn boosts their own standing.

Vibe #4 – Review

By: Sterling Gates (story), Manuel Garcia (pencils), Fabiano Neves (art), Sandra Hope Archer (inks), Brad Anderson (colors)

The Story: It’s not every day you meet a cute girl while chasing after extraterrestrial travelers.

The Review: From the moment Vibe agreed to work with A.R.G.U.S., we always knew shis collaboration would end in bitterness and disappointment at some point.  No relationship can function without trust, and A.R.G.U.S. has never been upfront with Cisco about much of anything.  But once the truth comes out, as it inevitably must, what can he, the least experienced and most naïve member of the Justice League of America, do about it?

The title has done Cisco a favor by speeding up that inevitable conflict.  Given how obvious both Gunn and Waller have been in their deceptions, our hero would look pretty dumb if it took a couple arcs for him to catch on—especially with his brother, Kid Flash, and now a mysterious dimensional breacher (named Breacher, confusingly enough) all telling him A.R.G.U.S. isn’t to be trusted.

Justice League of America #3 – Review

By: Geoff Johns (story), David Finch (art), Richard Friend (inks), Sonia Oback (colors)

The Story: Catwoman is kind of like your coworker who likes to steal supplies from the office.

The Review: If there’s one thing the JLA definitely has going for it, something that puts them a step above their iconic peers, it’s a bubbling brew of personalities.  With the Justice League proper, you can tell there are differences between them, but very narrow ones, kept very tight to their characters.  The members of the JLA, on the other hand, wear their differences quite openly, allowing them to clash with a lot more abandon.

It all makes for a livelier read, even when not very much happens.  The JLA’s encounter with the robot-Trinity is only moderately exciting, as the fakes seem to have only the most basic abilities of the real thing.  You’re not inclined to see the JLA’s takedown of three mechanical imposters as the same as facing against all ten current members of the Justice League (soon to be eleven, with Zatanna slated to join—re-join?—the team).  That doesn’t stop Steve Trevor from remarking, perhaps naively, in wonder, “The Justice League versus the Justice League.”

Black Widow #6 – Review

By Duane Swierczynski (writer), Manuel Garcia (artist), Lorenzo Ruggiero (inker), Jim Charalmpidis (colorist)

You Know What I Like?: Digital comics. I do. I’m getting into them in a serious way and I’d like to put some thoughts together to share with you on the matter. You know why I like them though? About a month or two ago, Marvel offered the digital version of Black Widow #1 for free through their comic portal app. Having always been fond of the character, and still bitter over her lame appearance in Secret Avengers, I downloaded the comic and ended up loving it. I loved it so much, in fact, that I went to my local comic shop the next day and picked up the rest of the issues I was missing so that I could catch up with the story. The point I’m making here is that Marvel offered me a free issue of a comic and ended up not only earning a new customer on another of their comics, but they drove traffic into the direct market. This is smart. But I digress.

The Story: This issue marks the beginning of a new storyline and a new creative team. When journalist Nick Crane learns that the presence of a mysterious woman in black may have had something to do with his father’s suicide, he is determined to discover who she is and exact vengeance. The thing about that though is the Black Widow would also like to know more about this woman bearing her likeness because she’s been assassinating key political targets around the world and drawing some very unwarranted attention and retribution onto Natalia.

The Good: Simply put, this is one hell of a great book! Nevermind that, we need more comics like this featuring strong female characters. Black Widow is simply a great espionage story with enough action, intrigue, and occasional weirdness to keep me coming back for more. With the arrival of Swierczynski and Garcia this month, we have in place now a creative team that is well-suited to the gritty tone of this book (but if you’re reading this, Marjorie Liu, please know that I loved the shit out of your storyline and it’s the reason I’m still reading this comic!). I didn’t quite care for Swierczynski’s run on Immortal Iron Fist, but I appreciated his ambition enough to keep an eye on him as he moved around various Marvel comics. With his arrival on this comic, I feel pretty good that he’s more than capable of delivering to Widow the recognition she deserves. More than ever (and that’s saying something because, again, Liu did a damn fine job with the comic), Black Widow is portrayed as being a consummate professional and world-class operative. She’s a woman who has lived her whole life in the shadows and learned to move about easily in the darkness. Through narration captions she briefly lets us into her world to see slivers of her thoughts, plots, and machinations, but even then you can’t shake the feeling that there’s something she’s not telling you, even more secrets she feels compelled to keep. Normally, this kind of characterization would drive me insane but here it pulls me into the story and makes me want to know more about this woman whose made it her mission to not be known.