Comics for June 3

[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.
Summer classes start on Monday.  Rants, Capsules can be found on my 
             homepage, http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/Rants 

     Go check out http://www.whiterose.org/HowlingCurmudgeons/ when you're
done here. 

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.

     eXiles #48: Marvel - Full of sound and fury and signifying...well, not a
lot.  Mildly recommended.  $2.99/$4.25Cn
     Avengers/Thunderbolts #4 (of 6): Marvel - The Hawkeye narration was
pretty good, but "Heroes fighting heroes because Captain America is being a
jerk" doesn't really work for me.  Mildly recommended.  $2.99/$4.25Cn
     Alpha Flight v3 #4: Marvel - A kinda drifty issue.  It has some good
bits, and fills in a lot of character backstory, but at the same time it
feels too much like padding to stretch the arc out to 6-issue-TPB size.
Mildly recommended.  $2.99/$4.25Cn
     Justice League Adventures #32: DC - Keith Giffen writes an okay one-shot
tale that makes me wonder if he wanted to use Kilg%re or Brainiac and was
told not to.  Raspiel's art is decent.  Mildly recommended.  $2.25/$3.50Cn 
     Quagmire USA #3: Antarctic Press - A week late, but good.  The story
makes a couple of jumps that are tricky to follow, but it's worth the
effort.  Recommended.  $2.99/$4.05Cn 
     Girl Genius #11: Airship Entertainment - Well, the licensing thing has
cleared up (as explained in a text piece) and we finally get #11, which
probably has the most cliffhangery ending so far.  Many laugh-out-loud
moments, both in foreground and background (which, BTW, uses a lot of scanned
in forest scenery).  Strongly recommended.  $3.95  (Side note: this issue is
slightly oversized, and will not fit in standard comicbook bags.)
     The Chronicles of Conan Volume 1: Dark Horse - Dark Horse has gotten the
reprint rights for the old Marvel Conan series ("old" as compared to the
Busiek one...it's almost exactly as old as I am).  It's really weird for me,
having read Cerebus years ago and Busiek's series recently, but never these
issues until now.  Sim's parodies are pretty clear, and even Busiek seems to
have put a nod to this series in his own version.  The stories are short,
only about 20 pages each (the lengths vary slightly, probably making room for
shifting ad count), but Roy Thomas and Barry (no Windsor yet) Smith do a good
job making them complete stories each issue.  If I had one quibble about this
TPB, it's that the covers of the eight issues aren't included (especially
since the Roy Thomas interview specifically mentions the importance of covers
at one point).  Recommended.  $15.95
     Billy Clikk, Creatch Battler: Delacorte Press - The newest novel from
Mark Crilley, of Akiko fame, a new series.  For a full review, go to
http://www.livejournal.com/users/dvandom/5869.html (yes, I have a blog now).
Recommended.  $10.95/$16.95Cn (246 pages)

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!)

     I apparently forgot to order Misery A-Go-Go #1, and the store didn't get
any for the shelf.

Awards:

Best Book: Girl Genius #11

"I Didn't Know The Timebroker Was Edward Nygma" Award to eXiles #48

"Mission Kreep" Award to Avengers/Thunderbolts #4 (of 6)

"Dance Dance Revulsion" Award to Alpha Flight v3 #4

"Someone Forgot Some Of His Powers, Eh?" Award to Justice League Adventures
     #32

"El Goonish Feeple" Award to Quagmire USA #3

"Can't See The Forest For The Grass" Award to Girl Genius #11

"I'd Make A Crom Joke Here, But Don't Want To Be Smoten" Award to The
     Chronicles of Conan volume 1

"Creatch And Kong" Award to Billy Clikk, Creatch Battler

     Dave Van Domelen, "I know *that's* a Duchy of Blenshaf Gyro Wheel.  Your
Wobble Plate is loose -- it sounds like you've neglected to replace the
sponge dampers -- AND you don't have the correct formula for Tread Gunk."
- Agatha, Girl Genius #11