A good week for comics: Douglas Rushkoff and Liam Sharp's Testament 11, Matt Fraction and Gabriel Ba's Casanova 5, and a double bill of Grant Morrison's Wildstorm relaunch with Wildcats 1 (art by Jim Lee) and The Authority 1 (art by Gene Ha). I will hold of reviewing these until next week, though I may say something in the comments section.
Strong potential stuff this week, but gear up: a week from today Planetary, with the exception of an epilogue, ends (we will see the defeat of the Four, I imagine) and Grant Morrison's Seven Soldiers ends with an extra large issue drawn by superstar J.H. Williams III.
In comics news this week Marvel and DC's January solicits are up at Newsarama.com.
Plus -- and I know it is not exactly comics news, but Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodreguiz are making a movie -- the trailer is up and it looks absurd, amazing. It's called Grindhouse. I would link to youtube, but it keeps getting put up and taken down so you will have to hunt for it yourselves. You won't regret it.
I don't think I've ever read Morrison's stuff. I'll have to check out that trailer too.
ReplyDeletePeace
Pat,
ReplyDeleteMy advice?
1. Read Morrison
2. Shake your head, go 'what?'
3. Read Morrison again
4. Read Geoff's book
5. Read Morrison again
6. Repeat as necessary
You don't have to do it that way, of course. I am, after all, not the boss of you. But that's the order I did it in and I turned out okay(ish).
But definitely read Morrison.
OK, having read Wildcats and the Authority I now have an articulate first impression.
ReplyDeleteBoth books establish the status quo. The Wildcats status quo I have seen before; it looks a lot like the Wildcats status quo from 1992. But the "Worldstorm" is coming and could change things. The Authority status quo I have also seen before, in such films as Sphere and Alien and The Abyss -- normal people exploring the deep are about to discover something very weird. I have not seen a superhero book like this before (though it has tones of a darker Astro City); in the next issue we will see if the blending of genres leads anywhere. In any case the status quo of both books is about to get disrupted.
What surprised me was that both books were sure people would stick around for the next issue. Neither book went for a big BANG reinvention right off the bat, so it's hard to know if either book will be any good. Wildcats seemed pretty bog-standard, and the Authority was interesting, but by no means hypnotic (as All Star Superman is).
Other people's thoughts, on these and other comics?
I haven't read much Morrison because finding the time to keep up on comics has been a task I haven't been able to keep up with, but it sounds like maybe I should!
ReplyDeleteI thought that Morrisson really drove in the fact that the new earth the Authority found themselves in was our earth.. Made it believable you know? Though I do wish that the team actually made an appearance in the issue.. Heheh.
ReplyDeleteI admit to skipping the authority issue, though I skimmed it in the store. I gleaned from it the same impression as iqbal mentions, I got a bit of an x-files vibe, but obviously that's from a cursory examination. For that sort of pacing I'll just wait and see rather than purchase or anything. It seemed liked a opening credit scrawl.
ReplyDeleteI did pick up WildCats though, and it indeed was pretty standard. I have a slight bit more ...general interest in WildCats from previous runs and things. But a couple of meta-references, 90's visual stimuli, and a Wolverine joke later, I hopefully we can all move forward.
All very "Ultimate" in starts, I think. Still, coming into the Wildstorm universe late, it's interesting to see how much a stamp Warren Ellis work in it has laid on all of it.
i'm not an uber comics person like some of you on this blog... but geoff has schooled me well & i agree with dan- read morrison! my faves are the smaller non superhero runs like vinanarama, we3 and seaguy. get them! read them!
ReplyDeleteAnd I'll presume it to be intentional, but Morrison was channelling a bit of Miller in that Grifter dialogue...oh, that needs to stop. It hurts my head.
ReplyDeleteI got Wildcats from this week and Annihilation from last week. Still loving Annihilation... I've also just finished the "Top Ten 49ers" Trade, which was great and has probably convinced me to get Authority just for Gene Ha's art.
ReplyDeleteTwo interesting bits of comics news. Since there is so much talk of Morrison, I thought I'd post a link to this video: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3039306070586717772&q=Grant+MOrrison&hl=en
It's Morrison giving a 47 minute speech. I watched as much as I could... some interesting stuff, but you can really only here that "alien abduction" story so many times before it starts getting tedious. (Wow, there's something I NEVER thought I would actually say!)
Also it was announced that Warren Ellis and Stuart Immonen's NEXTWAVE: Agents of H.A.T.E. has been cancelled. This makes me sad, because it was a fun little book. But, the good news is: it'll be easier to get friends to read if there is only one trade!