Wednesday, September 30, 2015

Comic Review: Wild's End: Enemy Within #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.
Last year, there was a miniseries called Wild's End, about a village that was caught in the middle of an alien invasion. Don't worry if you haven't read it, since I didn't read it either, and it's not really required reading for the new series, Wild's End: Enemy Within. Enemy Within manages to stand on its own, and works well as a story set in the aftermath of an alien invasion.

Tuesday, September 29, 2015

Interesting Comics This Week (9-30-15)

Archie Comic Publications:
I did not expect to enjoy this series as much as I have. Archie was something that I always knew about, but never paid any real attention to. This series has made them interesting to me for the first time, and is making me see why these characters have been around for so long.










Monday, September 28, 2015

Comic Review: Mythic #4

I started following this series after picking up the #1 issue randomly. I read just about every #1 from Image, but don't always pick up the issues after it. This comic just hits a very specific spot for what I want to see and feels like a recent theme: comics that decide they're going to throw as many ideas out there as possible and make them work. Somehow, Mythic has kept pulling it off for a number of issues and is showing no sign of stopping.

Sunday, September 27, 2015

TV Review: Gotham Season 2, Episode 1 "Damned If You Do"

Last season, I watched every episode of Gotham. I didn't quite watch it as it aired, especially after the first couple episodes, and I finished a few weeks after the season ended, but I mostly kept up with the show. It was okay, trying to do a lot of things and only sometimes succeeding, with a lot of elements that seemed ill-advised or problematic. Probably the worst thing I can say is that I don't remember a lot of the first season, which is never a good sign.

Still, I was cautiously optimistic and watched "Damned If You Do", the first episode of this season, and I still have no idea if my optimism was misplaced. I wouldn't call it good, but I wouldn't call it bad either. At the very least, they appear to be trying to go in a different direction.

Saturday, September 26, 2015

Comic Review: Over the Garden Wall #2

Despite never having watched the TV series it comes from, I loved the first issue of Over the Garden Wall. It felt like such a weird and inventive comic, and don't hold the All-Ages audience against it. Without knowing the TV series, it's a bit hard to follow the jumps in time that it takes, but it makes up for that with continuing how fun and off the wall it is throughout.

Friday, September 25, 2015

Comic Review: Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 10 #19

This is a particularly weird issue of Buffy. It has gotten a lot of positive reception, which I understand and don't completely disagree with, but it is also a weirdly flawed story that doesn't work for nearly the entire issue. Somehow, the ending pulls it together, even though the rest of the issue doesn't really work.

Thursday, September 24, 2015

Comic Review: Danger Girl: Renegade #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.
Before reading this issue, I didn't know that Danger Girl had an established history in comics. As it turns out, that is a very good thing. Danger Girl: Renegade #1 makes me want to read more, and its back catalogue means I don't have to wait for a new issue to get more.

Wednesday, September 23, 2015

Comic Review: Drive #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.

Drive started its life as a novel, then was adapted to a movie, and with Drive #1, IDW is now adapting the novel to comics. While the novel is considered a classic and the movie has a lot of critical acclaim, the comic is unfortunately not up to those standards.

Tuesday, September 22, 2015

Interesting Comics This Week (9-23-15)

Mentioning a comic here doesn't necessarily mean I will be reviewing it, and not being here doesn't necessarily mean I won't. Instead, this is meant as a simple look at what sticks out about what is coming out this week.
 
Action Lab:

Princeless Be Yourself #4
Despite having only read the Raven: The Pirate Princess spinoff, just about everything in the Princeless series jumps out at me as something to pay attention to right away. This one is the final issue in a miniseries, so while I can't speak to it out of experience, it's still worth looking at, or noting down to keep an eye out for the trade.
 

Monday, September 21, 2015

Comic Review: Over the Garden Wall #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications. 
I had trouble at first figuring out exactly what I thought about Over the Garden Wall #1, based off the Cartoon Network miniseries. A lot of that comes down to it looking like a kids' comic, which has a lot of negative connotations in the industry now. That term isn't meant as a negative here, since it doesn't have the unintelligent sense of humor that you might suspect out of a kids' comic, but instead is just in a style that appeals to kids, without sacrificing any wit or intelligence in the humor. 

Sunday, September 20, 2015

Comic Review: D4VE2 #1

Even after reading through it a couple times, I can't tell you what exactly D4VE2 is. It is about robots, and is quite out there, even by comic standards. Trying to summarize it is a losing battle. I will likely check out the next issue, though I find it difficult to explain exactly why.

Saturday, September 19, 2015

Comic Review: Tokyo Ghost #1

The only comics I've read by Rick Remender are this and Low, and both have given me the impression that I do not like what he writes. He's not the only creator, but there are similarities deeper than just the writing. A lot of people like him, but so far I have not, and Tokyo Ghost does nothing to make me want to come back for another issue.

Friday, September 18, 2015

Comic Review: Awake #1

Awake is only the second comic I've read from Action Lab (the other being the surprisingly good Princeless: Raven the Pirate Princess), but I'm getting a feel for one thing they do well: All-Ages comics. They're not perfect, but they're so much fun I'm more than willing to overlook the flaws.

Thursday, September 17, 2015

Comic Review: Boy 1 #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.
 Science fiction often exists for the sake of making fantasy stories feel more grounded. From the beginning, Boy-1 seems to be straddling that line, trying to bring fantastical things to life while actually starting in real science and moving forward. It focuses on genetic engineering, though exactly the role that it plays in the plot is not really clear quite yet.   

Wednesday, September 16, 2015

Comic Review: String Divers #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.
When I first read it, I had no idea where String Divers came from. I had my suspicions, but it wasn't until looking into it later that I discovered that it was based off of a toy line. I don't say this in judgement, since I'll defend the possibility of good out of any source material, but to illustrate how knowing the genesis of something can explain so much about it.

Tuesday, September 15, 2015

Comic Review: We Stand on Guard #2

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.
When I read the first issue of We Stand on Guard, I was not over the moon about it. I liked it enough that I wanted to keep reading, but I was curious how well it would work as a continuing series. I loved the fact that it was all about the US at war against Canada (something that the creators liked to encourage), but I was having trouble actually being pulled into the characters and storylines. After reading We Stand on Guard #2, I continue not really knowing what I think about the series, but I see enough promise that I don't want to quit yet.

Monday, September 14, 2015

Comic Review: Morning Glories #47

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.
Writing about Morning Glories at this point is a nearly impossible task. This series has been going for almost 5 years at this point, and is unfriendly to new readers to the point of being outright hostile. The storylines are labyrinthine even when they're playing nice, the mythology is still unclear, and it makes Lost look positively straightforward. Still, for all of that, this series is truly great when doing what it does best, and for those who have put their time in, even a slower issue, like Morning Glories #47, is still a good read.

Friday, September 11, 2015

Comic Review: Star Wars: Shattered Empire #1

In the new Star Wars universe, this is the first of the comics to cover ground after Return of the Jedi. In fact, it starts almost immediately after that, starting to move the story forward in the immediate aftermath of the battle of Endor, but despite finally moving things forward, there are a few issues with how it handles moving the story forward.


Thursday, September 10, 2015

Comic Review: The Shrinking Man #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.
Shrinking Man #1 is the first issue in IDW's adaptation of the Richard Matheson novel, which even if you haven't read it, you likely know from reputation. True to its name, it follows a man who is shrinking a little bit every single day, and despite their best efforts, scientists have no idea why it's happening or what they can do about it.

Wednesday, September 9, 2015

Comic Review: Transformers: Combiner Hunters One-Shot

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.
Transformers: Combiner Hunters One-Shot starts off with an idea that I can really get behind. There is the possibility of combining some Transformers together to create a much larger one, and while that is happening, there are other Transformers hunting them down. As a high concept premise goes, it's pretty good. Also, despite this being a one-shot, it's not surprising that this is part of the Transformers comic universe; IDW has built a strong universe with those comics, and one of the strengths of a shared universe is the opportunities to tell a small story within that universe.

Tuesday, September 8, 2015

Comic Review: Valhalla Mad #3

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.
This is an odd comic series that I'm really not sure what to think about. When I read and reviewed the first issue of the series on my own site, I was in the same spot, but three issues later, I'm still not sure what to think about it. When I first picked up Valhalla Mad, I recognized the writer and artist from Catalyst Comix, a series that I loved despite barely knowing what it was half the time. I'm still trying to work out what I think about this series, but for some reason, I'm compelled to keep reading.

Monday, September 7, 2015

Comic Review: Transformers: Robots in Disguise #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.
I've never been a Transformers fan, mostly because I was born about 10 years too late for it to be a large part of my early life. In fact, all I've seen are the Michael Bay movies, but those are another discussion for another time. I do know a lot of it by osmosis, and with the launch of a new ongoing series based on a cartoon series, this issue of Transformers: Robots in Disguise (not to be confused with the previous series of the same name) felt like a place I could jump in and just have some fun with the series.

Sunday, September 6, 2015

Comic Review: Poseidon IX #1

At risk of spoiling my opinion, I am just confused by this comic. I know that Poseidon IX is somehow connected to the Aphrodite IX series, which I am vaguely familiar with buy haven't really read myself. Without that knowledge, this book left me more confused than anything else, and does not make sense as a jumping on point for the rest of the series. From my perspective, little about it really makes sense. 

Saturday, September 5, 2015

Comic Review: Plutona #1

Plutona is being sold as a comic about superheroes, but it's really only about it using a wide definition of the term. There are superheroes in the world, and they interact with the story, but they're not the main thing that it's about. In the end, none of that really matters, as it's in the areas other than basic premise that this story sticks out.

Friday, September 4, 2015

Comic Review: Angel and Faith Season 10 #18

This season of Angel and Faith has been a little strange. It started with the title characters on different continents, and that came back for this arc focusing on how Faith fares in London without Angel. With his arc in the Buffy series coming to an end, this arc had to come to a close to bring him back. Unfortunately, it ends rather abruptly, causing an awkward end to an otherwise solid arc.

Thursday, September 3, 2015

Comic Review: Death Head #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.
Dark Horse has a long and proud history with horror comics, and Death Head #1 is just their latest entry in that genre. I've never been the biggest horror fan, but I'm always willing to try anything. Unfortunately, this first issue ends up being more than a bit of a let down.

Wednesday, September 2, 2015

Comic Review: Aliens vs. Zombies #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.
Sometimes, a story can sell me with the premise alone. Whether it can be summed up in a couple sentences, or just in the title, if it's a short premise that can get me excited, it will take me a long way. For that, Aliens vs. Zombies #1 hits it right on, with the premise fitting nicely in the title, and the longer premise hooks me further, past even a somewhat lackluster beginning.