Comics for October 25, 2006

[dvandom]

                    Dave's Unspoilt Capsules and Awards
         The Week's Picks and Pans, plus Awards of Dubious Merit

Standard Disclaimers: Please set appropriate followups.  Recommendation does
not factor in price.  Not all books will have arrived in your area this week.
I get to start injecting insulin tonight.  Rants, Capsules can be found on my 
             homepage, http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/Rants 

Capsules:
     Short, relatively spoiler-free reviews of books I actually bring home
(as opposed to reading in preview form in the shop or online).  If I get a
book late due to distributor foulups or whatever, I'll put it in the Missing
section.

     Books of Note (Strongly Recommended or otherwise worthy): None.

     Transformers the Animated Movie #1 (of 4): IDW - Oooh, glossy logo on
matte cover.  Anyway, I've said many times that I think an adaptation of TV
or movie to comics really needs to use a full issue for every 8-10 minutes,
and almost no adaptation even comes close.  This one is better than the
Marvel adaptation in that it spends 4 issues instead of 3 (of which I only
own #2, so I can't do a direct comparison yet), but still way too compressed.
Budiansky manages to keep most of the dialogue (although he left out "Such
heroic nonsense!") and Figueroa gamely tries to evoke lengthy action
sequences in a couple of panels here and there, but if you'd never seen the
movie, this comic would seem disjointed and rushed.  Some of the dialogue
bits make less sense or carry less impact or even change their meaning
because we don't get to see the actions that go with them.  There's also one
misdirected word balloon, but it's really a line anyone in the room could
have said without it being confusing.  Well, anyone but Prime.  As a trivia
aside, Ralph "not the Karate Kid" Macchio wrote Marvel's adaptation, so this
is not Budiansky directly recycling his own work.  :)  Mildly recommended.
$3.99 
     eXiles #87: Marvel - Bedard brings things back to "normal" with a
mission into a sort of "backworld", at least where some characters are
concerned.  Interesting use of design elements to hint at personalities by
Pelletier.  Recommended.  $2.99/$3.75Cn
     All New Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe #10 (of 12): Marvel -
Shadowoman (I even own the comics where she first appeared and I don't
remember her) to Tara (the nude female Human Torch from the recent short-
lived Invaders book).  Wow, SHIELD gets five pages, I don't think anyone's
gotten that many in this series.  A note on the cover...the art for the
covers on this series has been mediocre at best, but this issue is
particularly weak.  The blocking his horrible, making it look like
Shatterstar is taller than the Sphinx and clearly having Skein as big as
Stegron.  The background is also incredibly empty given the number of
characters who could be in the shot (like, oh, a flotilla of jetpack-wearing
SHIELD agents, maybe?).  It just screams "lame fan art".  Recommended despite
the unappealing cover.  $3.99/$4.75Cn
     52 #25 (of 52): DC - How did Kite-Man even get into a position to be
important enough to be on page three of this issue?  Also, while there is a
certain creepiness to how Bruno Mannheim is being built up here, it also
feels kinda by-the-numbers, pick one weird element from column A and one
demonstration of psychosis from column B.  A big chunk of the issue is taken
up by a decent if fluffy fight scene, and then we get more of Ralph's Journey
Of Weirdness.  Mind you, the cover of Previews this month kinda takes the
wind out of these particular sails.  Some other plots get some advancing,
although nothing really grabbed me until the final page, wherein a villain
even AMBUSH BUG mocked as too silly is brought back as a bit more serious of
a threat.  Mildly recommended.  $2.50/$3.50Cn
     Secret Six #5 (of 6): DC - Naked fight scene!  Heh.  The issue uses
several pages of parallel structure, which usually works, but sometimes
doesn't.  An amusing revelation about the Mad Hatter, hopefully it won't all
come to naught.  Recommended.  $2.99/$4.00Cn
     Planetary #26: DC - Huh.  No credits or title page.  Doesn't even have
credits on the cover.  Or a logo...just the bare minimum info needed so
retailers can sell it.  Presumably one issue to go, although it may not come
out before the Mayan calender runs out in 2012.  So, it's the big resolution
to the fight against the Four...which is simultaneously Big Damn Stuff and
kinda anticlimactic.  Even factoring out the massive time lag's effect on
sapping excitement, there's just something too understated about the whole
thing.  Sure, you can defend it on the basis of Ellis trying to make a point
or somesuch, but it still dramatically weakens itself.  Mildly recommended.
$2.99/$4.00Cn 


Gone Missing:
     Stuff that came out some places this week and that I wanted to buy, but
couldn't find for whatever reason, so people don't have to email me asking
"Why didn't you review X?"  (If it's neither here nor in the section above,
though, feel free to ask, I might have forgotten about it!) 

     Current list as of 10/25:

     Still missing Keif Llama V2.1, Stinz Tribals (which Diamond's system
says "will come in" June 14, and nothing else), Gold Digger Perfect Memory
v5, Gold Digger Tangent #2, Devil's Panties #3 and 5, Elric #4, the
Transformers Beast Wars poster, Fred Perry's S-Guild #1, the Amelia Rules
TPBs, Ninja High School #142, Dr. Debunko: the Short Stories, Transformers
Spotlight: Nightbeat.  Add Supergirl and the LSH #23.  Store got shorted on a
lot of stuff today.


Awards:

     I'm retiring "Best Book".  I just don't seem to have one every week, and
then I'll get three in a single week, which kinda runs counter to the spirit
of the thing.  Instead, up above the Capsules I'll list any Strongly
Recommended (or better) books so interested parties can take a closer look at
those entries, in case they weren't previously inclined to.

"Arcee's Got Back" Award to Transformers the Animated Movie #1 (of 4)

"Radd Poisoning" Award to eXiles #87

"How About Some More Spaceknights On The Cover, Cha & Chu?" Award to 
     All-New OHOTMU A-Z #10 (of 12)

"Huggy-Bear, NOOOOO!" Award to 52 #25 (of 52)

"Tuna Sashimi, Tuna Sandwich, Whatever" Award to Secret Six #5 (of 6)

"Cold Turkey" Award to Planetary #26

   Dave Van Domelen, "Unorthodox behavior in private chambers equals delight for the lucky observer! Oh, for a gift card for such an occasion!" - the Mad Hatter, Secret Six #5 (of 6)

Comments

[jarodrussell.livejournal.com]

I kind of expect Planetary to kind of be anti-limatic, either in #26 or the concordant #27, but I think it'll be worth just seeing how it ends. To quote Marge Simpson, "It's an ending. Sometimes that's good enough."

[dvandom.livejournal.com]

No, Twisted Kaiju Theater (http://neomonsterisland.com/tktarkv/vol3/021/1041/1.html) is anti-limatic at the moment. :)

[veloxiraptor.livejournal.com]

There's more than one misdirected word bubble in that TF movie adaptation. The word bubble for Perceptor's "cursory evaluation of Decepticon capability" is pointing at Blurr.

I think Perceptor's quotes are the only ones messed up, heh.

[dvandom.livejournal.com]

He must've pissed off the letterer.