Super Dinosaur #1 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Jason Howard (art & colors), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: A boy genius and his Super Dinosaur friend fight an evil scientist.

What’s Good: Comics for kids…  Some folks think we need a lot more comics for kids since most of the people reading comics are 30-45 year old dudes and people wring their hands about the “death of comics” and the “need to bring in new readers”.  But, how do we do that when even “safe” titles like Amazing Spider-Man has a bedroom scene every 40 issues and is “burdened” by decades of back-story.

This is a great kid’s comic.  It has the look and feel of a Ben 10-esque cartoon.  The basic story is simple: Derek Dynamo lives with his super-scientist father, Doctor Dynamo and his partner/friend Super Dinosaur.  They come into conflict with Dr. Dynamo’s former lab assistant, Max Maximus and his squad of evil, uplifted dinosaurs over access to some scarce raw material.  The dinosaurs come from some Inner Earth (think Journey to the Center of the Earth) and have been modified by the good/evil doctors.  That’s pretty much the plot and Kirkman explains it all in the first 3-4 pages with the rest of the issue being devoted to dinosaur fights and an interesting plot wrinkle tossed in at the end.

The best thing I can say about this is that it is fun and I think that any adult comic fan with a 7-10 year old boy could try handing this to them.  There is nothing even remotely risqué in this comic and it somehow gives you the confidence that it won’t ever get into bad language and wanton violence or sexuality in the future.  I think you’d be perfectly safe buying this at the comic shop and just handing it to your kid without previewing it first.

Weekly Comic Book Review’s Top Picks

Dean’s Top Picks

Best From The Past Week: Uncanny X-Men #535 – I should go back through my notes to see if I’ve ever let Uncanny X-Men wear the Big Sombrero and get to strut around as Best of the Week, but I don’t think I have before.  This comic made me so happy.  As a child of the 1980’s, Uncanny X-Men was the comic book for me and when I got back into comics as an adult, it really pained me that it often wasn’t a very good title.  Sure, there were often other X-books that were pretty good, but I wanted Uncanny to be good dammit!  So, I was extremely tickled to see Kieron Gillen knock his first issue out of the park with a fun and fast paced story that takes a small group (thank you) of X-Men off on a cool mission to mop-up some Break World leftovers from Whedon’s Astonishing X-Men run.  Great art by the Dodson’s too!  Runner-up: The Unwritten #24

Most Anticipated: Dark Horse Presents #1 – I LOVE me some anthologies and not many anthologies have a stronger pedigree than Dark Horse Presents.  Dark Horse properties such as Concrete, NextMen and Sin City are just a few of the properties that were first printed in earlier iterations of DHP.  This issue promises the first Concrete story in awhile, a Star Wars story and a sneak-peak at Xerxes (Frank Miller’s follow-up to 300).  Chances are there will be at least one awesome story in this issue.

Other picks: 68 #1, Hack Slash #3, Super Dinosaur #1, 28 Days Later #22, Thunderbolts #156, Hulk #32

Alex’s Top Picks

Best From The Past Week: Journey into Mystery #622 – Despite it being a big week, this was an easy pick.  Journey into Mystery was possibly the best first issue of 2011.  If you are at all interested in Thor, or fantasy in general, you need to be reading this comic.  If future issues are as good as this one, this may end up being Marvel’s best book, or at the very least in the running for that title.

Most Anticipated: Uncanny X-Force #8 – Whoa, two weeks in a row of Rick Remender’s Uncanny X-Force?  That’s awesome.  More awesome still is the fact that this issue sees the return of Jerome Opena on art.  I like Esad Ribic fine enough, but Opena’s work on this series has been outstanding.  Couple that with a plot that sounds like some over-the-top, 80s/90s, goodness and I am very excited.  Even if you can’t stand X-books, I highly recommend you give this book a shot.  It’s one of the very best team-books on the market.

Other Picks: Green Lantern Corps #59, Green Lantern #65, DMZ #64, Avengers #12, Invincible Iron Man #503, Iron Man 2.0 #4, Wolverine #8, Scarlet #5