Graphic Novel A Day: Extreme Cheater Edition

I've been a little busy, but I have been reading graphic novels on a mostly daily basis. I just haven't had time to do write-ups. So rather than go through and back-date a bunch of posts, find images, etc., which I'll probably just keep procrastinating on, here's a list of what I've read and quick thoughts:

Star Wars Visionaries TP (Dark Horse) - Stories and art from concept artists who worked on Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith. Most of the stories are pretty weak, save a decent offering about a soldier on Hoth by Alex Jaeger and M. Zachary Sherman and an interesting and beautifully painted story about the origin of General Grievous by Warren Fu. But the art throughout is really nice, and the concept art showcased really cool. I would have preferred this to be a gallery piece, mostly showing off unused concept art, but it's an interesting idea for a Star Wars book at any rate.

Mutation Vol. 1 TP (Markosia) - Really nice Bruce Timm-esque art, some solid superhero slugfests, but the stories just don't make any sense. It's clear what writer George Singley is aiming for, a basic no-calorie superhero action book, but he needs a little bit more of a hook to make it anything but pretty fights by Ethan Beavers.

Captain Gravity and the Power of the Vril TP (Penny-Farthing) - A somewhat overwrought and melodramatic take on the pulps, Dysart's script should have dialed back a little on the angst and aimed for a more fun, pulp spirit, but despite that, it's a pretty solidly entertaining yarn that is more or less true to the nature of pulp superheroes. Also, terrific art by Sal Velluto (with some inks by his Black Panther compadre Bob Almond), nice colors by Mike Garcia and solid production values from Penny-Farthing. Never rises to great, but a solid B offering.

B.P.R.D. Vol. 6: Universal Machine TP (Dark Horse Comics) - Another fantastic offering from the regular BPRD creative team, revealing some of the secret history of zombie captain Ben Daimio and really allowing non-powered agent Kate Corrigan time to shine as she bargains with a sadistic demon for the return of Roger the Homunculus. Plus, as always, Guy Davis and Dave Stewart just bring the house down with the art.

Ex Machina Vol. 5: Smoke Smoke TP (DC/Wildstorm) - The best Ex Machina trade since the first one, including flashbacks to Hundred's days as a hero, intrigue within his cabinet, great supporting cast (love the two gay firefighters more than most of Mitchell's actual support staff) and a fantastic single issues shedding light on the past of his bodyguard Bradbury. Terrific art by Harris, Feister and Mettler as well. This might be my favorite Brian Vaughan book at the moment.

Para TP (Penny Farthing) - Stuart Moore's tale of a supercollider accident, a grieving daughter and an investigation into what happened starts off intriguing and creepy and then quickly goes off into bizarre, borderline superhero/sci-fi territory where it doesn't belong. Too much over-the-top technology like killer robots and other-dimensional ghosts, and the spooky, X-Files-ish vibe of the early issues is lost. Good mystery setup, extremely dissatisfying resolution.

One Page Filler Man (Image) - Jim Mahfood just cuts loose and makes it up as he goes along. The results are mixed, but the art is strong and there are great, fun bits throughout.

The Norm In Color (The Norm.com) - This is a gorgeously produced book. Michael Jantze is an extremely talented cartoonist, and his work in color is jaw-dropping, comparable to some of the greats like Berke Breathed or Bill Watterson. Seriously, there's a visual imagination at work here that takes aspects of pop culture and cartoon culture, breaks them down and incorporates them, and it's stunning. Unfortunately, the subject matter of too many of the strips and the gags resulting are often overly familiar riffs on guys and girls and relationships, without much new to offer. That's not to say there aren't laughs to be found, or genuinely touching moments, or that The Norm is bad. Indeed, it's very entertaining most of the time, in the same way that a good, solid sitcom can be entertaining. It's just that visually, the book is breaking boundaries, but its story and characters are of a more standard variety, and art this great deserves stories just as great.

Avengers/JLA (Marvel/DC) - Finally broke down and bought this deluxe hardcover, and I still really like the story. It's a kind of old school team-up we'll not see again, given that the fans seem to want a much different kind of darker, more "realistic" superhero universe from both Marvel and DC. Makes for a last great hurrah for these types of stories, though, with amazing art by George Perez and a real love-letter to the characters by Kurt Busiek that still manages to be an exciting, classic style superhero story at the same time. The companion volume, with all the background on the Marvel/DC crossovers in general (and JLA/Avengers specifically), is also a nice treat.

Degrassi The Next Generation Vol. 1: Extra Credit (Pocket Books) - Planning to write a review of this J. Torres-penned graphic novel at Comic Pants at some point. In short, it's a lot like Breaking Up (with art by Christine Norrie) - good craftsmanship, and though I'm not really the target audience, I can tell that it does what it sets out to do very well.

King City Vol. 1 (Tokyopop) - This one I did review at Comic Pants. Loved it. My favorite graphic novel read of the month thus far.

Giant Robot Warriors (AIT/Planet Lar) - Reviewed this one at Comic Pants as well.

Essex County Vol 1 Tales From The Farm TP (Top Shelf) - An emotionally charged look at a sad little boy and the uncle who tries desperately to connect with him, and a has-been hockey player who finds a friend in the boy. Lovely art, and a poignant, effective portrayal of complicated relationships.

Graphic Novel A Day: Grendel Red, White & Black

Writer: Matt Wagner
Artists: Various
Company: Dark Horse Comics
Price: $19.95

It's been a while since I read this miniseries, and I'd forgotten just how good it is. True, some of the stories are a little hard to follow if you're not already familiar with the Grendel cycle, but some of them stand alone just fine. Looking back at the Hunter Rose and Argent era of Grendel, which has relatively few comics about it, results in a lot of great stories, generally with a crime noir or psychological horror edge. Wagner experiments a little in his writing, with poetry, illustrated text pieces and even illustrated haiku, but the book is at its best when it's Wagner writing a gritty crime story and one of the immensely talented artists illustrating. My favorites are Jill Thompson's "Nasty Lil Devil," Cliff Chiang's illustration of two detectives analyzing a Grendel crime scene, Tom Fowler's tale of a corrupt senator's assassination, Farel Dalrymple's work on "Devil's Retribution," Mike Huddleston's "The Devil's Tide", Zander Cannon's "Devil on the Roof" and John K. Snyder III's "Devil's Sentence," but really there are no bad stories here, and a ton of beautiful art.

Graphic Novel A Day: Who Fighter With Heart of Darkness

Writer/Artist: Seiho Takizawa
Company: Dark Horse Comics
Price: $11.95

Promising weird war tales, I was looking forward to reading Who Fighter, especially when I saw that it also included an adaptation of "Heart of Darkness," the novel on which Apocalypse Now was based. Not that I have any huge fondness for the novel or the movie (I haven't read the former nor seen much of the latter, although it's on my list to watch someday), but it was an interesting idea. As it turns out, while Who Fighter is plenty readable, it never fully engaged me. Takizawa has a love for historical detail, but at the same time he assumes his reader already knows the history, and as someone who doesn't follow military history, I didn't really know any of it. The first story is the best, about a Japanese pilot who runs afoul of alien technology, but it never really got into truly creepy or mind-blowing territory like I was hoping, playing out more or less along expected lines. "Heart of Darkness" is interesting, but lacks the edge of madness that I always picked up from Apocalypse Now, making it a bit bland. And the last story, a 8-pager about tank warfare, doesn't really have an impact either. All of these have nice artwork, particularly the impressively detailed tanks, planes and other technology of war, but the stories never connect.

Graphic Novel A Day: Grendel Tales: The Devil May Care

Writer: Terry Laban
Artist: Peter Doherty
Company: Dark Horse Comics
Price: $19.95

I've read most of the Grendel Tales series, the ones that came when Matt Wagner opened up the post-apocalyptic world of Grendel for other readers. In general, they were great reads, and this one, a rare story that I hadn't already read, was no exception. This time in, writer Terry Laban and artist Peter Doherty focus in on a nurse trying to run a hospital in Indianapolis, where the corrupt Grendel warlord system has turned the Indianapolis 500 into a barbaric ritual that is pretty much the only reason the city still exists. Like all of the Grendel stories, it has a nihilistic tone to it, and it's definitely a tragedy, but the characters are fascinating, the plot and its many twists gripping and Doherty's art really beautiful, reminiscent of Wagner's stuff but clearly his own style. Doherty, a Judge Dredd artist, clearly knows his way around futuristic violence. It occurred to me in reading this book that Grendel has a real Shakespearean feel to it in many ways, with doomed or forbidden love and a corrupt, often brutal feudal system at its heart.

Graphic Novel A Day: Museum of Terror Vol. 3

Writer/Artist: Junji Ito
Company: Dark Horse Comics
Price: $13.95

For me, Junji Ito is the best horror writer (and one of the best horror artists) in comics. I first discovered his work on the Lovecraft meets Japanese horror flavored series Uzumaki, and have been seeking out more ever since. The first two volumes of Museum of Terror, Dark Horse's reprinting of Ito's work, have focused on his undying girl who inspires murder in others Tomie, and while it was good, it wasn't as great as Uzumaki. This volume begins collecting other short stories, and while the quality is hit and miss, there are several stories in here that are as creepy and effective as the ones Ito told in Uzumaki. My particular favorites in this one are the blood-spattered Bio-House, about a secretary who gets more than she bargained for when she dines with her boss, the cover-featured "Long Hair in the Attic" about a girl whose hair gets the better of her, the EC-esque "Love As Scripted" and the story of a haunted town in "The Village of Sirens."

Graphic Novel A Day: Hellboy Animated Vol. 1: Black Wedding

Writers: Jim Pascoe & Tad Stones
Artists: Rick Lacy & Fabio Laguna
Company: Dark Horse Comics
Price: $6.95 ($6.95 at Amazon)

Wow. I haven't watched the animated Hellboy stored on my Tivo yet, but I'm going to get to it soon, if the strength of this new digest from Dark Horse is an indication of what to expect. And given that Tad Stones, writer of the second story in the volume, is heavily involved in the animated movies, it probably is. At any rate, there are two really good stories in here. The main feature, "Black Wedding," is a beautifully illustrated story that features all the BPRD and Hellboy and is clever, funny and true to the spirit of the BPRD/Hellboy series but with a style that marks it as different for the "animated" style and the closing story, a shorter one about young Hellboy messing up BPRD research with his emulation of his screen idol, is a lot of fun as well. Great for fans of Hellboy and the BPRD, new and old alike.

Graphic Novel A Day: Grendel The Devil Inside

Writer: Matt Wagner
Artist: Bernie Mireault
Company: Dark Horse Comics
Price: $12.95 ($11.01 at Amazon)

I'm a big fan of Matt Wagner, I like Mireault's artwork and I enjoy Grendel, but I have to say, this was one of my least favorite Grendel stories. One of the things I enjoy about Grendel is that Wagner feels free to change up tone and style in each arc, not to mention mixing up his protagonists and antagonists, but this third generation following the original Hunter Rose feels like it's kind of losing the path. The story, in a nutshell, is that the lover of Christine Spar has been hit hard by her loss, and combining that with a growing disdain for the city, he slowly goes mad and starts killing people, eventually putting him in conflict with the cop who brought Christine Spar down. However, the story is told through several viewpoints, including the lead character's thoughts, his notebooks and the voice of Grendel, a presence which has begun to infect him. It's all very experimental storytelling, and it's an interesting experiment, but I guess I prefer Wagner a bit more straightforward in general. Solid work, but not the best chapter in the Grendel saga.

Graphic Novel A Day: The Irregulars

Writers: Steven-Elliot Altman & Michael Reaves
Artist: Bong Dazo
Company: Dark Horse Comics
Price: $12.95 ($11.01 at Amazon)

It seems like a good mix, the kid sidekicks of Sherlocke Holmes with contemporary villain Jack the Ripper and a touch of Lovecraft. With one of the original writers on Batman: The Original Series and Gargoyles as co-writer, even! Unfortunately, The Irregulars is sort of bland. The whole side jaunt into a fantasy realm feels more like a weak L. Frank Baum riff than Lovecraft, the writers and artist never really distinguish the characters enough to get me to care about any of them and as a result there wasn't much dramatic tension. Maybe bigger Sherlock Holmes fans than I would dig this, but I wanted to like it in theory and had trouble finishing it.

Graphic Novel A Day: Sergio Aragones' Groo Odyssey

Writer: Mark Evanier
Artist: Sergio Aragones
Company: Dark Horse Comics
Price: $12.95 ($10.36 at Amazon)

Groo is one of those weird holes in my comics history. I know Evanier's work to some degree, and of course I'm familiar with Aragones' cartooning, but I've never sampled their comedy about a hapless barbarian, which has run through several companies, killed several companies and currently rests at Dark Horse. This was my first exposure and I have to say, given it's reputation, I wasn't that impressed. Aragones is a masterful cartoonist, but the whole thing really is one joke (look how stupid Groo is) run over and over again in multiple variations, and it's just not that funny of a joke. Maybe it's just aimed at a younger crowd, but these tales of Groo as a pirate, Groo being mistaken for a god, Groo's rampaging sister and Groo as a lawman were mildly amusing at best.

Graphic Novel A Day: Star Wars General Grievous

Writer: Chuck Dixon
Artist: Rick Leonardi
Company: Dark Horse
Price: $12.95 ($10.75 at Amazon)

I'm cheating a bit, because I actually read this a couple weeks back, but I haven't read any graphic novels over the last day or so, and so I'm finally giving this one a write-up. At any rate, this is a mostly forgettable although decently done miniseries tying into Episode III. My hope was that Dixon and Leonardi, both known for doing solid if rarely spectacular work, would be giving us the never-revealed origin of Grievous. That doesn't happen here. Instead, it's a story of Grievous killing Jedi and kidnapping Jedi children, and of Jedi children standing up to him. It's about some Jedi seeking revenge because the council is too wussy to stand up to him. Basically, it highlights a lot of what I didn't like about the character, as opposed to what I did, which was the stuff in the Tartakovsky cartoons. That said, there's some solid action, an interesting backstory tying in Empire Strikes Back's Ugnaughts to the Republic era and he's still a more interesting character here than he was in the movie. Seriously, George, a cough? That's the tic you gave your big bad guy? Why not have him limp and have trouble going to the bathroom too?

Graphic Novel A Day: Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic Vol. 1: Commencement

Writer: John Jackson Miller
Artists: Brian Ching & Travel Foreman
Company: Dark Horse Comics
Price: $18.95 ($13.45 at Amazon)

I haven't played the Knights of the Old Republic videogame, but I've been meaning to, and reading this graphic novel just reinforces that. Miller writes a swashbuckling, adventure-laden story set in the earlier days of the Star Wars Universe that is fun (with touches of darkness in the plot) and has all the feel of a good Star Wars role-playing session. The artwork by Brian Ching and Travel Foreman is nice, the cast of characters interesting and the general plot, about an obsessive group of Jedi who commit an atrocity in hopes of preventing a larger one, pretty solid. I look forward to seeing where future adventures take us.

Graphic Novel A Day: Star Wars Tag & Bink Were Here

Writer: Kevin Rubio
Artist: Lucas Marangon
Company: Dark Horse Comics
Price: $14.95 ($10.17 at Amazon)

I read the original Tag & Bink miniseries, and remember finding it very funny. I read the latest one-shots, and didn't really get much of a chuckle out of them. Reading all the Tag & Bink stories together, my opinion meets in the middle. It wasn't really laugh out loud funny to me, but I had to respect Rubio's clever script, inserting the hapless Tag & Bink into every important event of the various movies, and I really enjoyed the cartoony artwork of Lucas Marangon quite a bit. Dark Horse's Star Wars line is an impressive array of different approaches to the characters, and this parody of them, combined with a loving devotion to continuity that only a true fan could have, is yet another interesting and fun flavor. It's not the first Star Wars book I'd recommend to someone about to dive into the comics, but it's hardly the last one either.

Graphic Novel A Day: Curse of Dracula

Writer: Marv Wolfman
Artist: Gene Colan
Company: Dark Horse
Price: $9.95 ($9.95 at Amazon)

An attempt to basically "relaunch" Tomb of Dracula with all-new characters but in the same vein and with the same creators, Curse of Dracula is, like most of Claremont's post-1990 work, a good example of how you can't go home again. Curse of Dracula does read a lot like Tomb of Dracula in some ways, with a cast of unusual hunters trying to take down the lord of the undead, but in the harsh light of modern comics, the approach looks a bit dated. Wolfman's self-aggrandizing intro, wherein he makes claims of writing horror and scary and that crime fiction and superhero fiction, no matter how good, can never reach such heights, doesn't help. The lead characters are interesting but a bit over-the-top, often featuring characterization that boils down to weird accents, and they don't have the likability or the depth of a Blade or Hannibal King. This Dracula is a sketch compared to the richly developed supervillain of Tomb of Dracula, where the book was as much about him as it was his hunters. And you'd think getting one of my favorite artists (Gene Colan) with one of my favorite colorists (Dave Stewart) would be fantastic, but instead it's merely adequate, and the "digital inking" style just really doesn't suit Colan's work. I'm sounding harsher than I feel, because I did actually read the whole thing, but my general feeling is that you're better off going back and reading the Essential Tomb of Dracula, when these concepts and their creators were fresher.

Graphic Novel A Day: Lone

Writer: Stuart Moore
Artists: Jerome Opena & Alberto Ponticelli
Company: Dark Horse
Price: $14.95 ($10.17 at Amazon)

The Rocket Comics line was pretty short-lived and, for my money, didn't really provide a lot of comics for me. But... Lone, the post-apocalyptic/western action comic by Moore and Opena, is a decent read. Opena has a really cool, Euro-influenced art style and as someone with a soft spot for both westerns and the post-apocalypse, I enjoyed the premise. Moore's story isn't quite all I'd like it to be, a little too straight to be over-the-top and a little too goofy in places to be serious and gritty, but there are a lot of neat ideas and some beautiful art that make it a good read. It reminds me pleasantly of the world of beloved computer game Fallout (although there are as many differences as similarities) and provides a solid read if you're in the mood for something in the post-apocalyptic vein.

Graphic Novel A Day: Banya The Explosive Delivery Man Vol. 1

Writer/Artist: Kim Young-Oh
Translators: Taesoon Kang & Derek Kirk Kim
Company: Dark Horse
Price: $12.95 ($10.36 at Amazon)

This is one of the new offerings in Dark Horse's manwha (Korean comics) line, translated by fan-favorite creator Derek Kirk Kim and his mother, Taesoon Kang. I should state right up front that Banya, despite the title, does not deliver explosives. Instead, that's more of an adjective describing him. How to describe Banya? Well, it's sort of Kevin Costner's The Postman meets Berserk with a little bit of manga-style slapstick humor for good measure. In what is either post-apocalypse or fantasy, there's a big war between men and monstrous Torren (think mutants), and delivering in these dangerous times and desert landscapes are Banya and his ilk, of the Gaya Desert Post Office. This is played for laughs, but it's also played in such a way to make Banya and the other two members of his Post Office look pretty badass. Really nice art, some great action sequences, an interesting premise, neat monsters and good characters, Banya is fun, stylish and action-packed.

Graphic Novel A Day: Pathfinder

Writers: Laeta Kalogridis & Marcus Nispel
Artist: Christopher Shy
Company: Dark Horse
Price: $19.95 ($15.56 on Amazon)

The first in my graphic novel a day series that I couldn't finish reading. This is a weird graphic novel, an adaptation of sorts of a movie (which either has already come out or is coming out) about a Native American tribe that battles Vikings. The artwork by Christopher Shy is in the Ashley Wood-Ben Templesmith style, which is to say it is occasionally evocative but almost completely unsuited for sequential storytelling (in my opinion), and it also doesn't really get the readers emotionally engaged. The story is built up from concept art and storyboards done for the movie, with dialogue that comes either from the director, the writer or the "producer" credited in the graphic novel. I realized it was time to stop reading when I got to the part where the vikings slaughtered the lead character's family in front of him and I just didn't care at all what happened next.