Hiatus

I'm just going to be on hiatus for a week.

This past week saw some good books: JLA Another Nail, Planetary, and Sleeper Season 2 were all to my liking.

Astonishing X-Men was excellent as well, finally, one of the new X-writers has acknowledged that the events in Grant Morrison's run actually happened!

Superman Birthright wraps up the 12 issue mini, it wasn't bad but there were some cheesy moments (he sews up his costume with heat vision?)

Superman furthers the mystery of the vanishing, I think it's finally starting to get good.

Avengers 500 puts the Avengers in a bind. Can Bendis wow me with this story or will it be another dud like his Ultimate X-Men run? It's too early to tell.

Fantastic Four - Waid's run started great but now I'm a little more down on it. I guess I'm just not a huge FF fan.

Ultimate Fantastic Four is proving the previous statement true. It's interesting but I just must not like the FF that much.

Amazing Spider-Man uses some cheap tricks out of the past to make me really wonder, sort of like Identity Crisis. Not sure if they're good or not yet.

While you're waiting...

While you're waiting for my amazing review of books from this past week, chew on this script idea I have. Normally I don't have many script ideas (and I hate fanfics) but this one will satisfy many fans:

X-Men #165 - First issue AA (After Austen)

[Shot of Genosha from afar]

[zoom in on Xavier sleeping]

[two page spread of Xavier waking up, sweating, gasping for air]

Xavier: HOLY CRAP! I just had the STRANGEST dream ever. First Juggernaut joined the X-Men and moved into the mansion, THEN we found out Angel's blood could heal people and he fell in love with Cannonball's teenage sister, AND a crazy nurse fell in love with Havok while he was in a coma WHILE Polaris went insane AND Iceman became a jackass, homophobe and bigot, THEN we found out Nightcrawler is one of many other demon-like creatures who have all been fathered by the devil. SUBSEQUENTLY we found out Cannonball's brother is ALSO an angel whose blood heals others and She-Hulk slept with the Juggernaut. Oh and Gambit got blinded while fighting a bunch of ethnic stereotypes.

Hmm. Why do I suddenly hate werewolves so much?

Wow! That was so cRaZY! I better not tell anyone or else they'll think I'm totally nUtS!

Delayed review

This week I bought:

X-Men
Daredevil #62
Ex-Machina #2
Wolverine #17

I will review one of these books more fully this week. As a quick summary, I enjoyed Ex-Machina, Wolverine and Daredevil. X-Men was not as bad as some of Austen's prior work but it features the Collective Man, a character I find mildly offensive.

Review: Ultimate X-Men #49

Ultimate X-Men #49
Marvel Comics
Writer: Brian K. Vaughan
Artist: Brandon Peterson

I was telling a friend of mine that I had lost enthusiasm for some of the comics that have been coming out recently. But we both buy stuff that would make this week a big week. Even so, my enthusiasm was low before reading my titles this week (Titans, Ultimate X-Men, Superman/Batman, Marvel Knights Spider-Man, Pulse, JSA and Identity Crisis). But as it turns out, none of the titles disappointed.

So how did I pick Ultimate X-Men to write about? My last few posts have highlighted a lot of Spider-Man stuff -- the movie, Amazing Spider-Man, Ultimate Spider-Man, so I figured I'd pick a book with a different theme. In addition, the X-Men are my favorite characters, yet to this point I haven't reviewed an X-Men title.

Brian K. Vaughan's first story, The Tempest is excellent. His signature surprises have popped up several times throughout the story. He has re-worked Mr. Sinister into a threatening villain. The many team members (made even larger by Mr. Bendis) are handled quite well, and their characterization is growing. This is how to write good team stories and expand the characters at the same time (are you listening, Mr. Austen?). Rogue comments on how Iceman's is "the only one who treated me halfway decent" in the middle of a dramatic moment and builds the relationships. Brandon Peterson's art is pretty good although something about it looks funny to me. I like how he manages a number of the panels, especially where Kitty phases Rogue.

This is great stuff. Having gone back and re-read the Millar run on the title, I've come to realize that Bendis didn't too good a job on Ultimate X-Men. His first story, Blockbuster, starts out as a Spider-Man/Wolverine team up and then becomes somethign completely different. The next story, New Mutants, ended up as just a vehicle to introduce 7 more mutants into the Ultimate X-Men universe. The part of his run where Beast dies is lame since Millar previously did a gag where Beast looked dead but wasn't. It just wasn't that great. I like most of Bendis's other stuff (although read too much of it and the characters start to sound the same), but in the case of the Ultimate X-Men, Brian K. Vaughan is a welcome change of pace. Let's hope that he can negate the arrival of "Ultimate Gambit."

Amazing Spider-Man #509 Cover

Look at his left arm... What muscles are those?

Review: Ultimate Spider-Man #62

Ultimate Spider-Man #62
Marvel Comics
Writer: Brian Michael Bendis
Artist: Mark Bagley

This book has always been a quality book and so I guess we don't really need another review saying how good it's been. Yes, the stories move slowly, but the output of issues per year is high and the concepts are pretty good. On top of all this, Peter, Mary Jane, Gwen, Aunt May and the whole cast really seem to work out pretty well.

Now this issue had some great character moments and I'm curious to see where this all heads. The issue ends with a cliffhanger, and my measure of any good book is that I want to know immediately what will happen in the next issue. This issue is that way. I have one complaint about the issue but I can't really discuss without it being a spoiler so perhaps I will just see next issue if that complaint is valid or not.