Distributor-delayed comics for January 4, First Looks Jan 11

[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.
Alliance botched the order again.  Lovely.  Rants, Capsules can be found on my 
             homepage, http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/Rants 

First Looks:
     Every so often, I'll have the time (either while waiting for comics to
be sorted on Wednesday, or over the weekend) to pull out my PDA and type up
reviews of the stuff I read out of the First Looks pile.  Books I end up
buying will be moved down to the Capsules section on Wednesdays.  If I don't
give it a recommendation, I'm probably not buying it.
     If I read the First Looks on Wednesday, I won't include them in the next
week's review.  But if I don't get around to them until the weekend, I'll
include them in the next regular post.

January 11, 2006:

     Captain Atom Armageddon #4 (of 9): DC/Wildstorm - The punching tour of
the world continues as the Authority makes popcorn or something.  Decent as
fightscene issues go, but not really advancing the story.  $2.99/$4.00Cn
     Daughters of the Dragon #1 (of 6): Marvel - Feh.  The story is so-so,
the scripting dips into "horrible" in several places, the title characters
have been replaced by horny pod people, and the artist seems to be trying to
fit in as many erect nipples as he can.  Stinkburger.  $2.99/$4.25Cn
     Ares #1 (of 5): Marvel - The Previews blurb for this didn't sound too
good, but Oeming does a really good job with it.  Foreman's art doesn't
really sing, but it's technically proficient.  Recommended.  $2.99/$4.25Cn
     eXiles #75: Marvel - Off to 2099 for the next leg.  The original, not
the newer version appearing over in MTU.  This one seems to insert about the
time of the pseudo-Asgardian plot, a sensible place for it.  It also allows
for a little irony.  :)  Recommended.  $2.99/$4.25Cn
     She-Hulk v2 #4: Marvel - A flashback issue, covering some of the eight
month gap between v1 and v2, with apropos guest art from Scott Kolins.
Really good character story from Slott.  Strongly recommended.  $2.99/$4.25Cn


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.

     Outsiders #32: DC - Van Meter juggles two plotlines, and does so not
very well.  It's like he wants to get involved in all the Countdown plotlines
at the same time, with inevitable loss of focus.  Mildly recommended.
$2.50/$3.50Cn 
     Teen Titans #31: DC - There's really no attempt to integrate the Captain
Carrot pages into the book this time, since the Titans side is a series of
running fight scenes.  The focus doesn't really suffer, although it would
have been better to make the CC stuff a backup rather than interlacing it.
Mildly recommended, but better than Outsiders. $2.50/$3.50Cn
     JSA #81: DC - Taking a break from all the crossover stuff, more or
less.  This is a focus issue on one of the JSAers, although the ongoing
crises are kept in mind.  A solid story by Johns with good art by Eaglesham.
Recommended.  $2.50/$3.50Cn
     Doc Samson #1 (of 5): Marvel - DeFillipo's story is...well, I think he's
trying too hard to be "camp with a straight face".  Delving into some deep
issues of psychological trauma, while also throwing around goofy characters
and one-liners.  It's a blend that can work, I'm just not so sure it IS
working here.  Mildly recommended.  $2.99/$4.25Cn 
     Iron Man vWhatever #5 (of 6, looks like): Marvel - Solicitations for #6
have already retconned this into a miniseries.  The retconning of Iron Man's
origin story continues as in the present Iron Man undergoes changes that will
probably be ignored.  I will say that I don't care for some of the details of
the new version of the origin story, replacing cleverness with firepower.
Mildly recommended.  $2.99/$4.25Cn
     Marvel Team-Up #16: Marvel - One of the temptations of time travel
stories is that since it's all going to be undone at the end, you can rack up
the body count.  Sure, undoing the body count is probably the heroes' goal,
but knocking off the survivors one by one until only one barely survives to
save the day...that's cliche, overdone, and a trap.  Unfortunately, it looks
like Kirkman's heading that way.  There's some good bits here and there, but
it's quickly becoming the sort of story that can't result in character
development.  As an aside, is it just me, or does Dagger look totally
swipefiled from Rick Leonardi on the last page?  Mildly recommended.
$2.99/$4.25Cn
     X-Men: the 198 Files: Marvel - Another "in story" field guide, with 120
or so of the remaining 198 mutants plus some of the government players
keeping track of them.  Short, fairly useful entries, with an overall threat
assessment for each mutant that deals not just with their powers, but also
their ability to be dangerous in general (i.e. Kitty Pryde is a Severe
threat, not because she could take on the Living Monolith on her own, but
because she could screw up the government's plans and is likely to try).
Unfortunately, they really botched on element of graphic design: the entries
are littered with faux hyperlinks in dark blue...on a black background.
Sheesh.  Decent overview reference, recommended.  $3.99/$5.75Cn


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 1/6:

     Transformers Way of the Warrior TPB (which shows as "backordered" on
Diamond's system, meaning they're out) Bone Sharps, Cowboys and Thunder
Lizards GN, Exalted #1, Transformers Fallen Star TPB, Keif Llama V2.1,
Captain America and the Falcon: Secret Empire TPB.

Awards:

Best Book: None.  Still working through the Green Lantern novel, though, and
     still loving it.

"Did We Really Need To Know That, Grace?" Award to Outsiders #32

"Recovering From Vertigo" Award to Teen Titans #31

"Still Looks Pretty Good In Spandex" Award to JSA #81

"I Dare You To Get That Backpack Through Airport Security" Award to Doc 
     Samson #1 (of 5)

"Just Waiting For Bobby Ewing To Wake Up In The Shower" Award to Iron Man #5

"The Other Future Meat" Award to Marvel Team-Up #16 

"Re-De-Un-Retconning" Award to X-Men: the 198 Files

   Dave Van Domelen, "I can't believe the afterlife has a sense of humor." - Beast Boy, Teen Titans #31

Comments

[megaspork.livejournal.com]

I don't think it's really going that way with Marvel Team Up so much that it looks like Kirkman agrees with my friend V about Arana. IOW, she was strictly miniseries material and from a writer's viewpoint the reasonings behind her creation and continued publication for a while HURT.
Not that I don't like Arana, I do. But considering it was Marvel trying to be PC in the writing itself and the staff behind the book... it's funny to look at. So it might have been an injoke in that way.