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Friday, September 3, 2010
From Project Superior to Nicholas the Bloody
A fistful of reviews
Project Superior by Various (AdHouse Books) Compact and crammed with dozens of stories, this follow up to Project Telstar out thrills and out funs its predecessor. In Project Superior, Chris Pitzer gathers a ragtag band of indie and small press comic creators and lets them loose in a more mainstream playground – super heroes. The result? Superior is a diverse mix of unrestrained mayhem, moody stories and flat out ridiculous moments. The first thing you notice about this almost 300-page book is the construction. It's a solid 6"x 9" package with a thick, intentionally weathered looking, wrap-around cover by Paul Hornschemeier. When you open up the book, you'll note the interesting use of color. It starts subtly with shades of blue mixed in with black and white. Then the blue shifts to red for several stories. Suddenly, with Jim Rugg and Brian Maruca's "Shock-A-Con!" on page 98, the stories are in glorious full color. About a hundred pages later, the color shifts back to shades of red with black and white and then finally the book ends the way it began, shades of blue. I didn't like every story in here, as every anthology has its low points, but I flat out loved many of the short pieces in Superior, more than enough to make this a bargain at $19.95 if I met it on the shelf of my local shop. Most of the names are familiar to those of us who find our thrills past the front racks. There are fabulous strips by Jim Rugg and Brian Maruca, Paul Pope, Bryan Lee O'Malley, Zack Soto, Brian Wood, Rob Ullman, Jaime Tanner and Jeffrey Brown, as well as some unexpected entries like Tim Biskup and Vertigo cover artist James Jean. There are also a few surprises in this issue. On page 258, Megan Whitmarsh (Snowmonkeys) turned in one of my favorite stories of the book. In it two would be super heroes, Dottie and Oslo, get the call to disarm some dangerous monsters. Oslo is ready in a flash, while Dottie agonizes over the proper outfit. Oslo falls asleep waiting for Dottie and then finally takes off on his own to do battle. This is an irresistible strip with appealing characters. Another strip by Paul Rivoche takes the semi-serious approach and manages to entertain and touch the reader. In "The Last Stand of Bomb Boy Benton," Rivoche uses the sidekick Sparrow to tell the story of the alien Bomb Boy's dramatic last standoff. This reads like a late Silver Age story, but it packs the punch of 22 pages of story into only eight. Jay Ryan and Joe Meno turn in a tale of a different kind of super hero. In "Plush Boy: Discarded Gift Relocator," a stuffed bunny, I think it's a bunny, secretly exchanges gifts that disappointed people discard. For instance, a snow globe is mysteriously replaced by an iPod. There are too many wonderful stories here to mention, but Tara McPherson's "Dream a Little Dream," Graham Annable's "Captain Insomniac" and the "Bird Man" strips by Jaime Tanner were also standouts. Project Superior hits the stands tomorrow, so make sure you get your copy. Cusp by Tom Herpich (Alternative Comics) Cusp is an over-sized, like the last issue of Eightball, comic with over a dozen Herpich strips. Some are only one-page, while others stretch to several pages. Herpich, who also did the excellent Gongwanadon that I raved about months ago, is a surprising cartoonist; meaning his work takes unexpected, sometimes disturbing, turns. His work is visually simple, although unadorned would be a better description. Herpich's art sneaks up on you as you read the story and the emotional weight of the strip is only apparent as you digest the last panel. Herpich is one of those cartoonists that I can't wait to see more from. Both Cusp and Gongwanadon are available from Alternative Comics. Captain America Issues 1-3 by Ed Brubaker, Steve Epting and Michael Lark (Marvel Comics) Flush from reading Reginald Hudlin's excellent Black Panther, I picked up these three issues of yet another relaunch. I've enjoyed Brubaker's work on Sleeper; though somehow fallen behind on that title. How far behind? I'm still reading the first season... Anyway, I'm only remotely familiar with the character of Captain America. He's the big patriotic guy that the Avengers found in the ice during issue four of Avengers Volume One. I figured with Brubaker on board, the book wouldn't be a big patriotic love-in and I was right. Judging from these first three issues, this new book will be a meaty thriller with terrorists and shadowy organizations. It's a solid tale with gorgeous art. Epting's pages are nice to look at, and very realistic. The artwork is a bit too realistic for me at times, but not enough to seriously detract from the story. The Red Skull is very creepy in the first issue. He's a spooky villain and just when you get used to that ugly visage, he's shot in the back by a sniper. It looks like he's probably dead, but this is comics after all. In each issue, flashbacks are handled by Michael Lark in a beautiful shadowy black and white palette. These are somewhat reminiscent of the flashback scenes in the "Talking with David" stories from Starman. I don't think I would have enjoyed this had I simply read one issue at a time. Reading three issues made it a nice chunk of story, but it would be much better in trade format. Enough with the single issues Marvel; if a story is suited for a trade, publish it that way. Plastic Farm #8 by Rafer Roberts It took some time for me to warm up to this title. I thought the art was a bit rough, but Rafer is really creating his own crazy world in this title and I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. The first issue grabbed me, because the cowboy (The Kamikaze Kid) was riding a dinosaur (hey, I'm easy), but the following issues were kind of hit and miss. Issue #4 was a quiet tale of a powerful but doomed love, and then the next issue was back to the bizarre. There is a lot going on in this title. There's a haunted asylum, a creepy little mouse character that talks to The Kamikaze Kid and other plot lines floating around. At SPX, I ran into Rafer and he showed me some pages from issue #8. They featured these cute little potato sack monsters with big pointy teeth. The art had improved and he had made the stylistic choice of skipping traditional panels. Now, that I've seen the issue, I have to say I like the art, but the narration didn’t quite connect with me. I mentioned earlier that Rafer was building his own crazy world here, and he is. Everything seems to connect to everything else, but I would have to go back and read earlier issues again to figure everything out. This issue obviously makes sense to the creator, but as the reader, I feel like I'm probably missing out on something. I think this is another one of those comics that would read better as a collection or at least several issues in one sitting. In the meantime, I'll have to go back and do my homework on this title. Rafer's website is here. Check out this page to see what you think of the art in the issue eight. John #1 by Mark Todd This mini-comic is devoted to a childhood friend named John and his family. Todd has taken little vignettes from John's life and loosely created a couple illustrations to accompany the story. There's nothing earth shattering here, but it makes you think about the weird kids you grew up with and their families. For instance I knew a guy named Roger who had this scary violent dad. Sometimes when I stayed over at Roger's, his dad, who had been kicked out by his mother, would show up drunk and we would have to hide under the bed while he stormed through the house looking for someone to beat up. Its random things like that that make up this mini-comic. Mark Todd has several mini-comics available, but I like this one the best. There's another that I picked up called Bad Ass#1 that's a series of drawings of historical bad guys, no story or narrative, just drawings of different characters like Gene Simmons, Darth Vader, and Skeletor; you get the picture. John #1 is only $2 and might still be available with Todd's other comics at USS Catastrophe. Perhaps my favorite comic of the last two weeks came from an unexpected source – one of Kate's students. During the unit on Russia, Kate has her 7th grade history class do biographies of famous Russians. The biography can be in many forms, including a comic book. As Kate spends her evenings grading these assignments on the couch beside me, I can't help but notice some of the more interesting ones lying next to me. Last week, knowing my passion for the history of the Russian Revolution, she handed me a comic book diary of Nicholas Romanov called Nicholas the Bloody. Nicholas' life has a complicated and miserable timeline; capturing it in a short comic would be difficult for anyone. However, this student nailed the important events and delivered a well thought out narrative that went beyond the standard song and dance from the textbook. The colored pictures were used sparingly, but they gave the reader a deeper understanding of Nicholas' tragic life. I've included part of a page to show how the student uses three men with raised fists to illustrate the anger of the peasants on "Bloody Sunday." 
While the people were willing to give Nicholas the benefit of the doubt on many occasions, this day in 1905 would do great harm to the traditional role of the tsar as the father of the country. The shout of "No longer do we have a tsar!" coming simultaneously from three men in the crowd is a simple and powerful way to express the thoughts of the people on such a chaotic day. In this way, the picture perfectly compliments the text. The comic culminates in the killing of the tsar and his family in the basement of a house in Yekaterinburg. The last page shows one of the tsar's captors facing the reader with an outstretched arm. The final image of the comic is the extended arm and the barrel of a gun menacing the reader at point blank range. In this way, you face the last vision of the cringing royal family. Maybe this student is a future cartoonist, who knows? ************************************************* There's still plenty of time to grab a free copy of The Comics Journal #266 featuring the best of 2004 picks, reprints of Garrett Price's vintage White Boy strips and an entertaining and insightful (I'm not kidding) 40-page interview with Brian Michael Bendis. Email me in 500 words or less why you haven't read The Comics Journal and a free copy could be yours. Thanks to Eric Reynolds of Fantagraphics, I have two extra issues to give away and I'll be keeping my own. So email me at shawnhoke@gmail.com for a chance to win one of two copies of TCJ #266. Right now, you could email the word "money" and be a frontrunner. Rules and Regulations: -Those affiliated with Comic World News are not eligible. -Deadline for entry is March 23rd. Give me time to read the issue first. -I'll post some entries in the Past the Front Racks forum, so entering the drawing gives me permission to do so. -You must be 18 or older. -Please don't enter if you're an avid Journal reader just wanting to score a free copy from a struggling columnist. This is all about getting this book in someone's hands who has never read the magazine. -Keep it to 500 words or less.
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April 22, 2008:
February 4, 2008:
November 20, 2006:
A Comic-Con without the Captain
