The Manhattan Projects #18 – Review

By: Jonathan Hickman (writer), Nick Pitarra (art), Jordie Bellaire (colors) and Rus Wooton (letters)

The Story: Allegiances shift and new antagonists come to the fore….

Review (with SPOILERS): This issue of The Manhattan Projects was pretty interesting because it closed a chapter while opening a new set of possibilities.  I still think TMP is a little light on overall narrative, but the reshuffling in this issue will allow our oddball characters to be odd in new ways.

• End of Oppenheimer?: Evil Oppenheimer has been a central character since TMP began and the prime antagonist for the last 6-7 issues.  Is he really dead?  Or did he just just download his brain into the Omni-President’s AI?  I did seem like Oppenheimer was “cured” of his dual personalities before he was shot….
• Turncoat Einstein: As he says, he is “not a good man”.  All along, Einstein has never really been a team player.  He’s kinda done his own thing and it’s just so happened that his goals align with those of the team.  Now that the team is massively realigning, it’ll be interesting to see how Einstein fits into the new power structure.
• McNamara is charge: What a great character he has been!  It’s tempting to call him a Rambo-wanna-be, except that he can really dish it out.  He kills the funny blue alien all by himself, takes the alien’s ear and now wants to carpet bomb the galaxy.  He’s kinda like a young version of how left-wing folks see neo-conservatives like Rumsfeld and Cheney.
• Groves turncoat?: We’ve gotten used to the idea that Groves is somehow the ally of the scientists, but he’s really just been a man on a mission….and now we see that he’s still looking for dragons to slay.  Remember, he was pumped full of truth-serum when he joined McNamara.  He even got a promotion out of it!

The whole thing is a welcome shake-up for the series.  I’m not sure that TMP is ever supposed to really be about anything…..there is no massive storyline.  Or perhaps it would be more appropriate to say that TMP is a comic series where the plot exists to service the characters.  I enjoy TMP not so much to find out “What will happen next?” but just to see what these whackos are up to.  It’s the comic equivalent of people watching.  That makes it somewhat unique in my pull list and it’s why I try not to get too bothered when I can’t remember plot details like what is/was going on with the FDR A.I.  It doesn’t really matter….the cool thing is that there a FDR A.I. exists at all.

The Manhattan Projects #17 – Review

By: Jonathan Hickman (writer), Nick Pitarra (art), Jordie Bellaire (colors) and Rus Wooton (letters)

The Story: A strange alien comes to the aid of the captured scientists.

Review (with minor SPOILERS): This issue is great if you love the characters and events of The Manhattan Projects.  If you’re someone who demands that the PLOT be paramount, this probably isn’t the issue (or series) for you.

Over the last 4-5 issues, TMP has tried to implement a more structured plot where not-Oppenheimer became the antagonist.  I’m not exactly sure what his motives are/were, but he was working in cahoots with President Kennedy and Secretary of Defense Westmoreland and captured all of the other scientists of The Manhattan Projects.

The problem with this plot development is that it started to detract from what made the series so great.  TMP is at its best when it relies on strange circumstances, strange characters and visual gags.  The plot is really incidental to all the cool stuff like finding out that this slavering monster that Einstein and Feynman discover talks like a surfer dude or that when Oppenheimer injects truth serum into someone, he just leaves the needles sticking out of the side of their neck or seeing Westmoreland all loaded up like a cross between Chuck Norris and Sgt. Elias from Platoon.  THIS is the stuff we read TMP for.  I can’t say that I really care about the “plot” all that much.  In fact, the “plot” often gets in the way.

The Manhattan Projects #16 – Review

By: Jonathan Hickman (writer), Nick Pitarra (art), Jordie Bellaire (colors) and Rus Wooton (letters)

The Story: Having been imprisoned by one of their own, the scientists of The Manhattan Projects must come up with a plan.

Review (with SPOILERS): This doesn’t have to be a long review: It’s a very good issue (again), but nothing spell-binding or exceptionally weird happens that merits two paragraphs of discussion.  If you’ve enjoyed the series, you’ll enjoy this issue.  If you are new to the series, this is probably not the place to start.

What continues to strike me about this “Finite Oppenheimers” storyline is how TMP actually feels like it has a coherent plot for the first time.  The first ~12 issues did have a nominal plot, but the plot felt like it was there to service the zany things that Hickman and Pitarra were doing with the characters.  Now, it feels like we have a story with a true antagonist in Oppenheimer who has a real motivation: He is arrogant, ambitious, prideful and covetous of recognition; he wants to be recognized as the BEST scientist.  It also feels like we’re starting to see his opposite number arise in Einstein.  This issue made me feel as if the other TMP scientists are supporting actors to Einstein’s leading man.  I could be wrong about that, but we’ll see how it plays out.  Certainly, Einstein v. Oppenheimer sounds like fun.

There are weird little events in this issue too, but nothing that compares to things that have happened in the past.  I don’t think the series has shot its wad, it’s more like it just isn’t quite as funny this month.  Even then, there are still things that would be remarkable in another comic, but TMP readers have gotten immune to such things.

The Manhattan Projects #14 – Review

By: Jonathan Hickman (writer), Nick Pitarra (art), Jordie Bellaire (colors) and Rus Wooton (letters)

The Story: The Manhattan Projects face their biggest enemy yet.

Review (with SPOILERS): One of the funny things about The Manhattan Projects is that it hasn’t ever had a bigger narrative.  Instead of being a coherent story, it is more of a reality show where there are hidden cameras all over the TMP labs and we could watch the guys grappling with their various projects.  It never severely bothered me because the things we saw through those hidden cameras were so splendid: Cannibal Oppenheimer, Einstein drinking whisky in his underwear, aliens being sawed in two…..  Great and fun stuff.

But, since this is a comic book series and I tend towards reading story-based comics (like American Vampire or Saga), it has bugged me a little when I wondered, “What is the point of all this fun and shenanigans?  What is the bigger story?”

So, it’s ironic that in this issue where we start to get a bigger story, the issue wasn’t as fun.  Go figure.  This issue brings in Robert McNamara of Vietnam War infamy.  McNamara doesn’t like TMP and is going to shut them down.  We learn later in the issue that he’s probably working in cahoots with Oppenheimer who we saw go rogue last issue.  So, it looks like we finally have a Big Bad in the series.  Yay for a central conflict because now we know how the action will be focused moving forward.  I guess we’ve had mini-emergencies in TMP before, but they never felt as meaty as this plotline, so I’m going to assume this story will be around for another few issues.

The Manhattan Projects #13 – Review

By: Jonathan Hickman (writer), Nick Pitarra (art), Jordie Bellaire (colors) and Rus Wooton (letters)

The Story: After the death of a teammate, the other super-scientists move on with their own projects.

Review (with SPOILERS): This issue made me feel like those times I watch TV with my wife and I’m flipping channels and I get complaints that I’m flipping too fast.  “How can you even see what is happening when you flip through so quickly?  I might have wanted to watch more of that.”

Here we get little insights into what the various scientists of The Manhattan Projects are doing since the death of their colleague, Enrico Fermi.  As you’d expect from this group, there is no mourning.  They all just dive back into their own particular projects.  The problem is that we don’t get to spend quite enough time with any of the projects for this issue to develop any sort of momentum.  It’s just kinda, “Einstein is doing THIS” and “Von Braun is doing THAT.”  There also doesn’t seem to be any linkage between the projects.  In fact, this issue made me really think about how I can’t identify a central theme for this series.  It’s a cool series and I love how it is funny and irreverent, but I’d like a little more coherence to the overall story.  Right now it seems like the characters are just screwing around in a lab and people die sometimes.  But, then again, these are government jobs so maybe expecting purpose and coherence is inappropriate…

The Manhattan Projects #8 – Review

By: Jonathan Hickman (writer), Nick Pitarra (artist), Jordie Bellaire (colors) and Rus Wooton (letters)

The Story: The powers that be declare war on the scientists.

Review (with minor SPOILERS): This was the first issue of The Manhattan Projects that I haven’t loved.  Further, it made me feel left out.

The early issues of TMP were overflowing with good ideas, clever concepts and sick humor, but it really needed a central story to congeal around.  This issue made me feel like that central story started a few issues ago and I just didn’t pick up on it.  Stated another way, this issue felt like starting a novel in Chapter 3 where you kinda know what is going on, but feel like you’ve missed something too.

The Manhattan Projects #7 – Review

By: Jonathan Hickman (writer), Nick Pitarra (art), Jordie Bellaire (colors) and Rus Wooton (letters)

The Story: It’s a Superpower team-up.

A few things (with minor SPOILERS): 1). Story shows up. – This really hit the spot.  I’d said in my “Top Picks” column for the week that I’ve enjoyed TMP, but was looking forward to getting an actual story instead of a series of done-in-one vignettes about particular characters.  That clever Hickman–he knew just want we wanted.  It’s so timely to get a legit story at this point.  Even though this has been a nifty series, there is a limit to how far you can spin this concept of slightly-changed/demented WWII-era scientists.  Eventually, you have to give those characters something to do.  Knowing Hickman, it will be something wacky, raw and inventive.

The Manhattan Projects #2 – Review

By: Jonathan Hickman (writer), Nick Pitarra (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (colors) & Rus Wooton (letters)

The Story: The Manhattan Projects goes looking for some Nazi scientists.

Recap/Review: Folks who enjoyed Hickman’s Pax Romana are going to enjoy this series a LOT.  This issue perhaps doesn’t have quite the novelty of issue #1, but it still keeps that hard edge and tinge of pseudo-science that makes Hickman so enjoyable.

In some ways, one has to wonder if we’re meeting a kind of science version of League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.  We’ve certainly got a few of the big names in the fold already: alt-Oppenheimer, Einstein, Feynman, Fermi.  So, it makes sense to drag in some Nazis scientists and that is the focus of this issue.    It makes for a compelling “getting the team together” type of story and one wonders how much Hickman will play on urban myths about Nazi space technologies (just Google “Nazi moon base”) because there are few things more fun than speculating about what types of technology have already been invented but were somehow lost or concealed from the public at large.  And….the Nazis are a FONT of those myths….

The Manhattan Projects #1 – Review

By: Jonathan Hickman (writer), Nick Pitarra (artist), Cris Peter (colors) and Rus Wooton (letters)

The Story: What if there was more going on during the Manhattan Project than we were told?

Review: This was really good.  Anyone who has been a fan of Hickman’s creator owned works knows that he can whip up some crazy ideas and he likes to dwell in an area of secret conspiracies that is right up my alley.  Seriously, if you haven’t read Nightly News and Pax Romana you should correct that post haste!  Transhuman is pretty good too.

 I’m going to SPOIL one aspect of this first issue right now, it isn’t a huge spoiler, and nevertheless you’ve been warned.  You know that the series is going to be supercool when we see a military officer welcoming Robert Oppenheimer to “The Manhattan Projects”.  Did you catch that?  Yes, he used the plural form of “project” as in “the atomic bomb is only ONE thing we’re working on.”  So, one of the central themes of this story seems to be: What if there was a LOT more going on during the big World War II science projects than we were told?  We know a little bit about crazy projects that the Nazis and Soviets were working on during that era because they either (i) lost the war OR (ii) had their governments fall apart…. and it was some really trippy stuff.  We’re talking science that was seemingly decades before its time that took place due to the total war environment of WWII.  But, our secret projects are still nothing but the subject of conspiracy theories because we won the war and our government never fell apart.  The concept of a series written by Hickman that explores THOSE secrets is really tantalizing!  Sign me up!

Red Wing #2 – Review

By: Jonathan Hickman (writer), Nick Pitarra (artist) & Rachelle Rosenberg (colors)

The Story: A temporal war in which both father and son are key players is fought at multiple points in time.

What’s Good: We get a lot of Hickman’s big concept stuff as this story takes place in several decidedly different times:  We see the son (“Dom”), in what seems like the era in which the story is anchored, then we see the father marooned in the pre-European Central America hanging out with a bunch of Native Americans and finally we have a jump into a third (and unexpected timeline).

It is this third timeline where the magic in this issue happens.  There is a startling reveal on the final page in this timeline, but that isn’t really the cool thing.  What makes me interested for the next issue is that by playing a little bait-n-switch with the reader’s sense of the timeline, Hickman has really jiggled our expectations.  In a lot of ways, it reminds me of the final reveal in Pax Romana where you think you know what year the final scene takes place in, but couldn’t be more wrong.

The fun for the rest of the series will be to how the puzzle pieces fit together.  How did the father and son come to end up in their “current” positions?  Can we ever truly nail down the whole story when a temporal war is keeping everything in flux?  Surely that Central American diversion for the father will be important, especially with the Native American chief saying that they have no word for “war”.  Hickman is a strong enough storyteller that he should bring this story home strongly.

The Red Wing #1 – Review

By: Jonathan Hickman (writer), Nick Pitarra (artist) and Rachelle Rosenberg (colorist)

The Story: Imagine a war with weapons and soldiers that can travel in time.

Review: I’m a huge fan of Hickman’s creator-owned work.  You won’t find a series that is more of a raw, punch-in-the-face than Nightly News or as mind-bending as Pax Romana or as creepy and layered as Transhuman.  I didn’t love Red Mass for Mars, but it was more that I didn’t love it in comparison to the other series.  Red Mass is still probably a 7/10 story.  I even re-read all four series over the 4th of July holiday to get my mind “warmed up” for the release of Red Wing.

Re-reading was probably a mistake because although Red Wing is a perfectly fine comic, it does pale slightly in comparison to a re-read of those four finished works.  It isn’t as brave as Nightly News and it isn’t as high-concept as Pax Romana, so it is hard to not be a little disappointed.  It is probably a little unfair to judge a new #1 issue versus completed stories where the issue-to-issue story beats fade away.  But, having put myself in that mindset before reading, it was hard escape.  Folks coming at this fresh may view the comic very differently.

But, Hickman does have a very interesting concept: What if time-travel was discovered and it became routine to fight wars by using time travel technology?  How would such a war be waged?  What happens to pilots flying temporal fighter planes that get shot down in the past?  Even though this first issue spent a lot of time laying out the technical ground rules, I remain very confident that Hickman will ace this story in the long run.  I just can’t imagine the brain that has given us Nightly News and Pax Romana and Transhuman failing to make a tasty dinner with these ingredients.  Hickman also gets bonus points for not getting bogged down in the “rules” of time travel: “Be careful what you change in the past or you could wipe us all out of existence.”

S.H.I.E.L.D. Infinity – Review

By: Jonathan Hickman (writer).  Too many artists to list—check the review.

The Story: Nothing like a ton of meta-babble to get the juice squeezed out of your mind-grapes.

The Review: The first volume of S.H.I.E.L.D. came with a lot of hype and critical acclaim, which was mostly deserved, but somehow lost steam along the way.  You just can’t help feeling that despite the quantity of fascinating ideas Hickman has brought to the table, he hasn’t really fashioned them into a clear direction just yet.  This special issue of S.H.I.E.L.D., four shorts vaguely connected together, doesn’t do much to address that point.

“Colossus” has da Vinci telling yet another tale of a S.H.I.E.L.D. brother who saves the world.  It’s a cool idea, but an old one, and executed in an increasingly familiar formula: Archimedes, ancient Greek mathematician, uses his ingenuity to turn the Colossus of Rhodes into a mecha which can face the seemingly overwhelming cosmic force called the Sentry—“This is not how the world ends.”—end scene.  Nick Pitarra’s cartoony art sort of undersells the high stakes of the battle and plays up the corniness of the wide-eyed kids listening to the story.  Overall, it’s a predictable effort.

Hickman seems just as fond of highbrow innuendo as Grant Morrison, and the dialogue in “The Hidden Message” encapsulates that perfectly.  Check out what these mysterious hooded figures have to say: “The way in, the purpose, the way out…the time…the destination…do we dare go?”  The way in and out where?  What is the purpose/time/destination, etc.?  You don’t know.  The story exists merely to build the intrigue and show the almost martyred devotion of these people, whoever they are and whomever they serve.  Zachary Baldus has a painted style that makes for some pretty stiff action, but rather pretty, especially with the slightly monochrome colors.

The one short with some bearing on the running story in S.H.I.E.L.D. is “Life, the End of the World, and the Key,” which follows up the Night Machine after he gets brought back to life the first time around.  Michelangelo, his savior, informs him that he and his son Leonid are key to saving the Earth, and sends him to the end of the world, where he finds…three Mongolian-esque warriors in stasis tubes—which no doubt will be explained in mind-blowing fashion later.  Kevin Mellon’s sketchy style has traces of Francis Manapul, but less defined and messier.  Dan Brown’s colors looks a bit rushed and sloppy in such uneven lines.