Quick Hits Reviews – Week of April 6, 2011

 

Is there ever going to be a “light week” of comics again?  Seriously, have these companies see the sales numbers?  Try as we might, sometimes we cannot get to everything for a full review, thus….the Quick Hits Reviews….

Avengers: The Children’s Crusade #5 – This was my “pick of the week” and it really came out of the blue because you usually don’t expect a middle issue (i.e. 5 out of 9) to be anything too special.  But, this issue had great action as the Young Avengers (and a few “old” Avengers) tangle with Dr. Doom, some neat time-hopping courtesy of Iron Lad and the return of an iconic character to the Marvel Universe.  So, it get’s “full credit” for story.  And Jim Cheung’s art is just incredible.  Sure, this comic only ships every other month, but it looks like Cheung is doing twice as much work and I’ve had zero trouble keeping the story straight in my head during the wait between issues.  This is really worth jumping on, folks!  Just go get the back issues and ride along from here.  Grade: A

Who is Jake Ellis #3 – This is a good example of how to maintain momentum in a story as the creators hit issue 3 out of 5.  Because they sprinkled their mysteries with a lot of Jason Borne-action in issues #1 and #2, the reader isn’t bored by now with the titular mystery.  I’m still legitimately curious about who Jake is…..and who Jon is for that matter.  I also really like that there seem to be only two plausible explanations for Jake (that he is a figment of Jon’s imagination OR he is some other ghostly agent somehow grafted to Jon), but that both seem equally plausible.  This is just a really tight series and I love the art.  Nice job guys!  Also very happy to see that this has sold well enough that it’ll we’ll be getting more than just the five originally planned issues!  Grade: B+

Sweet Tooth #20 – Here’s a tip (and a minor SPOILER)….. if you are a character in a post-Apocalyptic story and you stumble across some kind of underground sanctuary that offers copious food and shelter AND it is only being occupied by a singular caretaker, you should probably run away, right?  Do you think you’re the first people that he has brought into his trap….ooopppps…..I mean “HOME”.  Again with this issue, Lemire is setting up another story that is probably going to have a kinda grim ending because….well…..it’s Sweet Tooth.  But, you just know it’ll be told with style and will tug at your emotions in a way that very few comics will.  I’m also loving seeing Sweet Tooth himself begin to asset himself a little more in his dealings with Jepperd.  He’s come a long way from his days in the woods.  Great art!  Grade: B+

The Intrepids #1 – Review

By: Kurtis J. Wiebe (writer), Scott Kowalchuk (illustrator), Justin Scott (colors) & Frank Zigarelli (letters)

The Story: A mechanical engineer genius takes in woebegone kids, uses his scientific acumen to give them powers and turns them into a super team to take down his mad scientists.

What’s Good: This is a promising new series from Image by Wiebe & Kowalchuk.  I’m not familiar with either creator and didn’t really know what to expect from this comic, but this first issue is light and fun with pretty good art.

One good thing is that the central characters are all teenage kids who seem pretty new at this super-power game.  Kids are great in comics because they can actually show personal growth on the timeframe of a story arc versus the decades it takes an established adult hero like Batman or Cyclops to change much.  The comic opens with a bang, showing the kids infiltrating some secret, evil scientist lair.  As a team, they have all the boxes checked: flying girl providing aerial support, big strong brawling guy, computer whiz & expert marksman/leader.  Later in the comic we learn that their mentor, Dante (who has a Professor X vibe to him), has been nurturing them to take out his former lab partner and nemesis who has taken to performing augmentations on animals.

The art is a definite highpoint.  The overall look and feel of the comic is very much like something we would have seen in The Bulletproof Coffin or Jack Staff both in terms of character design and the use of bright, mostly flat colors.  I also really enjoyed the layouts, especially a really cool scene where the leader has to gun down a charging robo-bear.  Its just really nice stuff and this looser cartoony style is so effective for these sorts of stories because the reader doesn’t spend time fixating on how someone’s nose looks funny or perhaps their mouth looks different than it did in the previous panel.