Category: Comics

Cover Reveal! Pinnacle City: A Superhero Noir

5/16/2018

Time to ooh and ahh over the unbelievably gorgeous cover of Matt's and my upcoming adult sci-fi title, Pinnacle City: A Superhero Noir!

This one's coming in August from Talos Press (pre-orderable now!), and you might or might not have heard Matt or me talking excitedly about it approximately a billion times by now.

It's chock-full of our signature dark humor, some affectionate riffing on comics tropes and history, plenty of social satire, and tons of gritty noir flavor. We're champing at the bit to share it.

And just look at this cover!

About Pinnacle City: A Superhero Noir

To some people, Pinnacle City is a glittering metropolis, a symbol of prosperity watched over by the all-star superhero team, the Pinnacle City Guardians. But beneath the glitz and glamour is a gritty underbelly, one still feeling the physical and economic damage of the superhero-villain battles of generations past, where the lower class―immigrants, criminals, aliens, sorcerers, and non-humans alike―jostle and elbow for scraps to scrape by on.

Private investigator Eddie Enriquez is an ex-con and veteran with powers of his own who still bears the scars of his time as a minion for a low-level supervillain. Good work’s been hard to come by until a mysterious woman shows up at his office with a case the police and superheroes are ignoring: the suspicious death of a prominent non-human rights activist.

Meanwhile, superhero Kimberly Kline, a.k.a. Solar Flare, has just hit it big, graduating to the Pinnacle City Guardians. With good looks, incredible superpowers, and a family name that opens doors, the sky is the limit. But in trying to make the world a better place . . . she’ll discover Pinnacle City isn’t as black and white as it once seemed.

From the minds of Matt Carter and Fiona J. R. Titchenell, Pinnacle City is a pulpy, throwback noir of yesteryear, where two people from opposite sides of the track must team up to do good in a world full of bad.

Coming August 7th 2018, from Talos Press.

Oh, hey, look! Pre-order links!

Amazon

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Book Review: Piper

2/1/2018

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Book Review:

Piper

Jay Asher, Jessica Freeburg, Jeff Stokely

Razorbill, 2017

A-

The Basics:

The town of Hameln is overrun with rats. A mysterious wandering piper offers to get rid of them, for a price. This part of the story we know, but a young woman named Magdalena, immune to the piper’s strange powers due to her deafness, is curious to capture the rest of his tale, and once she does, she has a tendency to embellish.

The Downside:

Although told from a different perspective, Piper adheres very closely to the beats of the Pied Piper story and is stark and simple as a result. The added story, mainly the romance between Magdalena and the piper, could have benefited from a bit more lingering in places. In particular, there’s a moment where Magdalena has to reassess her level of trust in the piper based on a rapid succession of new information. Blink and you’ll miss the interchange of her train of thought, and end up spending some of the most crucial emotional moments trying to catch up.

The Upside:

The original Pied Piper can be interpreted as the instrument of a cautionary tale about the importance of honoring agreements, but as a character, he’s a scary, dangerous guy. For such a minimalist expansion on the story, Piper does a surprisingly smart and nuanced job with him as an ambiguous romantic hero, neither undoing nor excusing his elements of villainy, while adding enough pathos to make his connection with Magdalena credible and sympathetic.

This version of the piper is the perfect self-perpetuating cycle of an outcast. People distrust him for having control over other life forms, including people, through his music, a skill his family passes down as a way of getting by in a world that distrusts them. He also lives with the constant temptation to abuse his power by responding with magical force to the many injustices he faces and witnesses, but as pitiable as his frustrations may be, they don’t erase his responsibility or the seriousness of his slips.

Magdalena, meanwhile, is a ray of defiant optimism in the face of the cynicism and cruelty around her. Her tall-tale-telling coping method, and her supportive home life with her adoptive mother, are particular highlights that make the sadness of the story resonate that much more deeply.

The relationship between the piper and Magdalena is intense and sincere, but it explores the question so often ignored in both paranormal romances and superhero stories, of whether healthy love can ever truly coexist with a staggering imbalance of power, even with the best intentions of both sides.

Finally, the art is done in a beautifully atmospheric style, reminiscent of a fairytale storybook, with great attention to the characters’ visual expressiveness, leaving behind a memorable moodiness long after the story is over.

Agree? Disagree? Comments are always welcome (just keep it civil, folks)! Or keep up with my fictional musings by joining me on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, or by signing up for email updates in the panel on the right!

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Book Review: Zatanna

8/17/2017

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Book Review:

Zatanna

Paul Dini

DC Comics, 2017

B+

The Basics:

By day, Zatanna is a legendary Vegas stage magician. By night, she uses her vast and very real magical abilities to keep the world safe from all manner of demonic and dark mystical harm. Wait… I’m pretty sure the stage magic happens at night too.

The Downside:

Most of the time, Zatanna’s that character other heroes call upon for a special occasion magic-based issue or episode. She shows up, dazzles with her extraordinary power and charming sense of whimsy, and leaves the audience wanting more, as a legendary stage magician is wont to do.

Sadly, this volume makes it easy to understand why we generally can’t have more of Zatanna, however much we might think we want to. As fleetingly annoying as it may be when characters who’ve called on her before must conveniently forget about her or explain why she can’t be called in to fix other potentially world-ending problems with a few magic words, the rationalizing of continued stakes is even more difficult when that magical quick fix is the ever-present main character.

As a result, most of the major arcs of this omnibus revolve around creating or revealing different ill-defined and inconsistent weaknesses in Zatanna’s power, which apart from being problematic from a continuity standpoint, make it very difficult to feel that we really know Zatanna, no matter how much time we spend with her.

The Upside:

Thankfully, a good portion of the issues take the form in which Zatanna shines best -- episodic.

Easily the most enjoyable parts are the run-ins with magical monsters of the month, the weirder the better, from possessed ventriloquy dummies to time-manipulators who make her speak in palindromes. And naturally, one issue’s worth of vicious Zatanna/Constantine banter is worth the whole read, an extra concentrated dose of too-special-for-every-issue, within a comic about a character who’s already too-special-for-every-issue.

In all these self-encapsulated portions, Zatanna’s just as much fun on her own as she is backing up a more grounded lead, and when things drift further into the mythos, her cool, bubbly, slightly mischievous presence usually remains incentive enough to unplug from pondering the many questions begged by her brand of magic, to better enjoy the show.

Agree? Disagree? Comments are always welcome (just keep it civil, folks)! Or keep up with my fictional musings by joining me on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, or by signing up for email updates in the panel on the right!

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Book Review: Jessica Jones, Vol. 1: Uncaged!

7/10/2017

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Book Review:

Jessica Jones, Vol. 1: Uncaged!

Brian Michael Bendis, Michael Gaydos

Marvel, 2017

A-

The Basics:

Superpowered private detective, Jessica Jones, is fresh out of prison and, as the volume title suggests, on the outs with her husband, Luke Cage. Both the Avengers and an anti-superhero underground organization want her help, each to bring down the other, while Jessica herself craves a slice of peace and normality and, as ever, to do the elusive right thing.

The Downside:

This new return to Jessica’s story abandons the more optimistic tone of The Pulse without fully recapturing the bite of the original Alias series, leaving it with a slightly more generic feel. The two plotlines of this volume never intersect quite satisfyingly, both of them seemingly constructed to connect with the wider Marvel universe more than to complement each other. As in Alias, the frequent two-page spreads of panels aren’t always visually obvious, making it easy to read the dialogue inadvertently out of order (one of my only complaints about the original series).

The obliteration of Jessica’s previous happy ending, and the dubious reasoning behind it, have some of the contrived feeling typical of an unplanned resurrection installment, and yet…

The Upside:

If there were ever a character who could snatch life-shattering angst from the jaws of happy ever after without too much suspension of disbelief, it would be Jessica Jones.

Jessica’s still the “hot mess dumpster fire” (as one of her in-universe critics puts it) with a heart of gold we’ve come to know and love, and she’s back in her gorgeously hideous home sliver of the Marvel universe, which is reason in itself for celebration.

Her sweet but always difficult friendship with Carol Danvers is back in force, as is her stony-yet-receptive professional façade over her unshakeable drive to use her talents for good, and the end of this volume holds a gut-punch that takes any tentative curiosity for volume two and twists it into an edge-of-your-seat wait.

Agree? Disagree? Comments are always welcome (just keep it civil, folks)! Or keep up with my fictional musings by joining me on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, or by signing up for email updates in the panel on the right!

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Book Review: Mockingbird, Vol. 1: I Can Explain

5/22/2017

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Book Review:

Mockingbird Vol. 1: I Can Explain

Chelsea Cain, Kate Niemczyk, Ibrahim Moustafa

Marvel, 2016

Grade: A+

The Basics:

Bobbi Morse, A.K.A Mockingbird, is a superhero. Not that her bosses at S.H.I.E.L.D or her former idols on the camera-facing core lineup of the Avengers tend to notice much, but she is a scientist and martial artist who helps people for a living. She particularly excels at talking down mutant twelve-year-old girls who can’t get anyone else to explain what’s happening to their bodies, and bailing out Hawkeye, who’s totally not her boyfriend.

The Downside:

While I find it works well enough, the non-linear presentation of these five issues may frustrate many readers and doesn’t add exceptionally much.

The Upside:

Bobbi exemplifies the best possible version of the terms “attitude” and “snark,” in potently concentrated doses. She’s the angry, undervalued female superhero who knows exactly what she has to be angry about and how to point it out in a few sharply chosen words at exactly the right moments, before continuing to get the job done.

The sarcastic sense of humor here is constant without ever feeling forced, and toys with Marvel conventions, not only about gender, but about such tropes as hordes of faceless non-human enemies (allowing heroes to show off their fighting skills without looking like jerks) and the dubious morality of S.H.I.E.L.D’s shadowy government status.

The dysfunctional relationship between Bobbi and Hawkeye is the real treat of this volume, and detracts nothing from her character. Quite the opposite. This is where things gets complicated, and we get to see, as cool as she is, why Bobbi Morse is not someone you want to be. Or be anywhere near.

Bobbi is a bad significant other. Really bad. Almost as bad as the average male superhero, but unlike those guys, her story doesn’t pretend otherwise. She’s that aloof, dishonest, emotionally abusive partner who will nevertheless show up to save you whenever you need it, the one you can’t help liking in those rare moments when things are going well.

In other words, she’s an action hero with a love interest.

Depending on how much patience you have for the abundance of bad male partners in fiction, Bobbi can be viewed either as a welcome reversal, giving the woman a chance to be the layered jerk for a change, or as a commentary on why this archetype is so readily accepted the other way around in the first place.

Altogether, this is a series I’ll definitely be following for as long as it- What? It’s already been cancelled?

Typical. Right, Bobbi?

Agree? Disagree? Comments are always welcome (just keep it civil, folks)! Or keep up with my fictional musings by joining me on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, or by signing up for email updates in the panel on the right!

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Book Review: Lumberjanes, Vol. 1: Beware the Kitten Holy

5/8/2017

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Book Review:

Lumberjanes Vol. 1: Beware The Kitten Holy

By Noelle Stevenson, Grace Ellis, Shannon Watters, Brooke A. Allen

BOOM! Box, 2015

Grade: C+

The Basics:

The Lumberjanes are a scouting organization for, in the words of the back cover, “Badass Lady-Types.” Beyond earning survival badges and forging friendships (“to the max!”), the girls have to contend with a whole forest full of paranormal weirdness.

The Upside:

It’s harmless and intermittently cute, with a few educational interludes and the occasional laugh, appropriate for pre-teens getting into comics and looking for positive representations of female friendship.

The Downside:

The modern comic book renaissance has many better examples to offer of all the above positive elements.

Lumberjanes attempts to imitate the optimistic, lighthearted style of female-led peers like Squirrel Girl, Ms. Marvel, and even Harley Quinn, but seems to have confused “lighthearted” with “insubstantial.” In an apparent effort to demonstrate the independence and competence of the Lumberjanes, every obstacle they face falls before the might of their teamwork and smarts, effortlessly and within seconds, eliminating the possibility of any tension or stakes.

The girls are fairly interchangeable, particularly in their bulletproof self-confidence which, while admirable in role models for girls, leaves little room for conflict or even self-discovery when the entire main cast shares this same immunity to all doubt.

What plot exists is instead pushed along by bizarre paranormal phenomena that come and go not only without explanation (which can work), but without resolution or any identifiable point, at least not within this first volume.

The bright colors and mood of wacky hijinks are probably sufficient to entertain younger readers while introducing concepts like anagrams and the Fibonacci sequence, but there’s nothing here to earn the firm stamp of crossover appeal that Lumberjanes seems to aspire to.

Agree? Disagree? Comments are always welcome (just keep it civil, folks)! Or keep up with my fictional musings by joining me on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, or by signing up for email updates in the panel on the right!

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Book Review: Saga, Vol. 4

4/11/2017

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Book Review:

Saga, Vol. 4

Brian K. Vaughan, Fiona Staples

Image Comics, 2014

A+

The Basics:

With Hazel now a toddler, Alana and Marko are doing their best to get by on Alana’s salary from performing on the Open Circuit, but the high-pressure, drug-fueled work environment is starting to get to her, while the loneliness of taking care of things at home is doing much the same to him. Meanwhile, the Brand has taken up the chase for the fugitive family, and Prince Robot the IV’s son being born in his absence is only the beginning of his newest nightmare.

The Downside:

There’s a fantastic moment in which Alana tries to defend her addiction, citing the horrors she’s been through as a soldier and claiming that no one could possibly understand, prompting Izabel to remind her that she understands the costs of war possibly better than anyone.

Izabel is the ghost of half a teenage girl, bound forever to the physical realm after stepping on a landmine. And for reasons unfathomable, Izabel’s hanging, severed entrails, which by now are such a normal part of her appearance that it’s easy to forget they’re there, are out of frame in this panel which would otherwise be a beautifully horrible moment to re-notice them.

This tiny choice in the composition of the artwork for a moment that remains powerful anyway is all the negative commentary I can offer.

The Upside:

The kidnapping of Prince Robot’s son, by a crazed victim of the Robot Empire’s horrific class struggle, may be the best example yet of Saga’s ability to blur the line between heroes and villains, making opposing sides conflictingly relatable.

As for Alana and Marko, this is that standard chapter of an extended romance where the relationship itself, the one good thing that has thus far stood against all adverse circumstances, is called into question.

Only it’s not that standard chapter, because those chapters are awful, and this is Saga, the farthest possible thing from awful.

Those are the chapters when characters hitherto known for their steadfastness suddenly receive total personality transplants and begin lying to each other for no reason and making life-ending extrapolations from the tiniest of irritations, while the audience throws things at the pages or screen, checks their email, and waits for the happy couple to get over it.

Alana and Marko’s issues come from the reality of struggling to raise a child together in the poverty, pressure, and isolation of their fugitive status. They’re living the romantic happy ending of running away from it all together, and discovering that it’s not all that perfectly happy.

The drift between them, the breakdown of their trust, is so natural and yet so weighty and devastating, that it’s almost possible to believe that the core of the series -- their marriage -- might actually be over. The worst parts of both of them, not abrupt changes to their characters but elements that have been hinted at from the start, surface catastrophically. They both cross real lines, but because it’s both of them, and because of the solid foundation they once built between them, it’s easy to root for that reconciliation with a fervor so many breakup chapters can only dream of inspiring.

Agree? Disagree? Comments are always welcome (just keep it civil, folks)! Or keep up with my fictional musings by joining me on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, or by signing up for email updates in the panel on the right!

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Book Review: Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur, Vol. 1: BFF

3/7/2017

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Book Review:

Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur Vol. 1: BFF

Amy Reeder, Brandon Montclare, Natacha Bustos

Marvel, 2016

B-

The Basics:

Lunella Lafayette (A.K.A Moon Girl) is a nine-year-old girl carrying the Inhuman gene, terrified of the Terrigen mists that could activate the gene’s potential at a moment’s notice and alter her body in ways she can’t predict. Thankfully, she’s a scientific genius who’s figured out how to protect herself from the transformation, if the grown-ups will only stop getting in her way. When Devil Dinosaur gets blasted through time, pursued by the primitive “Killer Folk,” an improbable friendship forms between brains and Tyrannosaurus-sized smashing power.

The Downside:

There’s a lot of wasted potential here, or at least potential not used to full effect within this volume, and the story is a bit unfocused. Lunella’s main goal is to take and keep control of her own body, life, and identity, which is great, and there’s a sense that she’ll succeed in asserting herself as a scientist and rejecting expectations all around her for what a little girl should be, but when the Inhuman transformation starts to play as more of a puberty allegory, a change she can’t choose to avoid, the message becomes muddled. The Killer Folk don’t make for an especially compelling antagonist, and between them, the antics of Devil Dinosaur running amok, and the full-of-themselves adults dismissing her at every turn, Lunella’s adventure is less an adventure that a series of episodic irritations she endures with few satisfying victories.

The Upside:

On top of the obvious pros of representation and science being cool and not evil, the combo of Lunella and Devil Dinosaur has a definite cuteness factor (“Mroo” may be the most adorable sound a red, time-displaced T-Rex could possibly make). Lunella’s passion for her chosen life’s work and her longing to be understood make her relatable across age groups, and her relationship with her parents is nicely complicated, full of disappointment, frustration, confusion, and genuine love.

Altogether a good-hearted read for all ages, and hopefully one that will find a bit more direction as the series progresses.

Agree? Disagree? Comments are always welcome (just keep it civil, folks)! Or keep up with my fictional musings by joining me on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, or by signing up for email updates in the panel on the right!

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Book Review: Saga, Vol. 3

2/28/2017

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Book Review:

Saga, Vol. 3

Brian K. Vaughan, Fiona Staples

Image Comics 2014

A+

The Basics:

Alana, Marko & co. are hiding out with their favorite author, D. Oswald Heist, while the hunt for their illicit fledgling family continues. The Will & co. debate their continued pursuit of the family on hallucination planet, Prince Robot IV is malfunctioning, and a pair of reporters of uncertain allegiances enter the search.

The Downside:

It would not be a stretch to call this arc a lull in Saga’s action. That said, action needs an occasional lull, and a lull with these characters remains more riveting than most characters at their best.

The Upside:

Novel lovers and especially writers will get a lot of private laughs out of the interlude spent hiding out with Heist, which are hopefully not too boring for everyone else. There’s a lovely skewering of the old adage “kill your darlings.”

We’re introduced to several intriguing new characters, including the Will’s sister, the Brand, a fellow mercenary whose shadow he’s had to live in, and in spite of their estrangement, his closest family. Then there are Upsher and Doff, the journalist couple newly investigating the fugitive family, whose relationship is straining painfully under not only their planet’s anti-gay sentiment but their own conflicting interpretations of journalistic ethics.

The lull in action is clearly not an accident or a simple matter of rhythm but a deliberate reflection of the way life is sometimes most difficult between catastrophes, in the day to day activities of getting by. Having made their escape for now, Alana and Marko have to figure out what kind of life they’ve escaped to, how to provide for their daughter, and how to balance being parents with being people. After losing her husband, Marko’s mother is living the bittersweet progression of falling in love again, if not in exactly the same way, and after being liberated from Sextillion, Sophie faces the monumental task of reclaiming an identity she barely had the opportunity to develop in the first place before having it taken away.

That’s not to say that Vol. 3 is completely lacking in action. Marko and Gwendolyn finally have the confrontation he’s been dodging from the start, and The Will’s group’s encounter with mind-controlling hallucinogens spills characteristically way out of hand. It's a joy, as ever, that makes you want to turn the page even and especially when the pages run out.

Agree? Disagree? Comments are always welcome (just keep it civil, folks)! Or keep up with my fictional musings by joining me on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, or by signing up for email updates in the panel on the right!

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Book Review: Saga Vol. 2

2/7/2017

1 Comment

Book Review:

Saga, Vol. 2

Brian K. Vaughan, Fiona Staples

Image Comics, 2013

A+

The Basics:

The little fugitive family of Alana, Marko, baby Hazel, and Isabel the undead babysitter expands with some growing pains to include Marko’s parents, while the original courtship and escape of Alana and Marko from their opposite sides of the conflict is recounted in more detail. Meanwhile, reeling from the recent murder of his on-and-off true love, The Will (with a The), one of the mercenaries formerly pursuing the family, joins forces with Marko’s vengeful ex and agrees to carry on the hunt, in exchange for her help rescuing a six-year-old from indentured prostitution. Prince Robot IV also continues his search for the family, knowing his father won’t allow him to return home to his pregnant wife until his mission is complete, with only a copy of Alana’s favorite book as a clue to their course.

The Downside:

For the sake of finding one, the excerpts given of Alana’s book, the secretly subversive one she and Marko first bonded over and the inspiration for their ship’s current heading, seem to come from a bland melodrama. But even that may an intentional part of the point, reflecting the way recognizing and sharing the value in a book sometimes requires the willingness to sound like a crazy person to anyone who’s only seen said book’s ordinary or even silly-looking surface.

The Upside:

Alana and Marko continue to be the lovable couple you’re compelled to root for, both in flashback and in their more complicated present, where they’re faced with reconciling their sudden union with the in-laws. Marko’s parents are both loving and badass, but carry the prejudices of a generations-long war full of atrocities on both sides. The friction around the news of their son’s interspecies marriage isn’t shrugged off easily, and Alana acquits herself with all the self-respect and sardonic wit we’ve come to expect of her, but ultimately the desire to stay close wins out, forcing all the lifelike patience, trust, and annoyance that comes with family.

As usual, the backdrop of all manner of sci-fi crazy does absolutely nothing to detract from the down-to-earth relatability of the characters and their struggle. Sure, this is an illegal mixed marriage in wartime. Sure, for them, the family thing is “complicated.” But the implication is, isn’t it always?

It’s sure complicated for The Will, with his new partner of convenience, their sort of adopted new six-year-old, and their lie-detecting cat, who cuts to the heart of whatever the group tries to cover or embellish with more efficiency than paragraphs of internal monologue could manage.

It’s complicated for Prince Robot IV, who’s trying to swallow his crippling PTSD and do whatever’s necessary to satisfy his father and get home to his wife.

And as a result, it’s intensely, nail-bitingly complicated for the reader, figuring out what to feel for these characters who do terrible things for inescapably understandable reasons, chasing stakes we can’t root against, at the expense of characters we can root against even less.

This is the paradox that continues to make Saga truly un-put-downable.

Agree? Disagree? Comments are always welcome (just keep it civil, folks)! Or keep up with my fictional musings by joining me on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, or by signing up for email updates in the panel on the right!

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Cover Reveal! Pinnacle City: A Superhero Noir

About Pinnacle City: A Superhero Noir

Book Review: Piper

Book Review: Zatanna

Book Review: Jessica Jones, Vol. 1: Uncaged!

Book Review: Mockingbird, Vol. 1: I Can Explain

Book Review: Lumberjanes, Vol. 1: Beware the Kitten Holy

Book Review: Saga, Vol. 4

Book Review: Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur, Vol. 1: BFF

Book Review: Saga, Vol. 3

Book Review: Saga Vol. 2

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