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Aliens vs. Predator 2 (August 1990)
The issue opens with some weak dream exposition. It doesn’t fit the narrator’s voice–Stradley never establishes why he’s using it (I think it’s a callback to the Aliens series where people have nightmares around the aliens)–and it’s a weak opening. But then Stradley recovers beautifully. Until the end of this issue, Aliens vs. Predator is… 📖
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Aliens vs. Predator 1 (June 1990)
Norwood’s very design-oriented–he’s a Hollywood storyboard guy–and the art suffers for it. The setting, the designs of the human settlement on an alien planet, is great. The panel composition is stunning. The figures are awkward and bad. Everyone’s proportions are off a little bit. They’re too stout for their height. Stradley’s writing here is really… 📖
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Aliens vs. Predator 0 (July 1990)
Stradley’s issue is two bored cargo spaceship having a conversation while Norwood’s art shows us all about the Predators getting ready for the Aliens vs. Predator series. First it’s showing the alien eggs, then it’s a bunch of fighting for dominance. The off panel dialogue back and forth constantly relates to the dialogue-less action going… 📖
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Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man (1976) #93
Milgrom sure does like some naked Peter Parker. He’s got Petey traipsing around his apartment in a too short robe, even answering the door for his landlady in it, then tossing it at the fourth wall to get into his costume. The art this issue is rather bad, which is always a surprise. Spider-Man was… 📖
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Air (2008) #5
Perker’s full page of Amelia Earhart alive and well in the pages of Air might be the ugliest piece of artwork in the issue. And the issue is full of ugly artwork. It’s also full of swearing. I don’t think the comic was PG before, but Wilson’s apparently gotten tired of writing dialogue so every… 📖
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Air (2008) #4
Two things this issue really rile me. First, the ending–there’s this hostage situation with the protagonist, Blythe. She gets taken up to the roof where the villain throws her off and she lands safely on some steampunk thing. Steampunk thing not the issue–we don’t get to see her taken up to the roof. There’s not… 📖
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Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man 93 (August 1984)
Milgrom sure does like some naked Peter Parker. He’s got Petey traipsing around his apartment in a too short robe, even answering the door for his landlady in it, then tossing it at the fourth wall to get into his costume. The art this issue is rather bad, which is always a surprise. Spider-Man was… 📖
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Air 5 (February 2009)
Perker’s full page of Amelia Earhart alive and well in the pages of Air might be the ugliest piece of artwork in the issue. And the issue is full of ugly artwork. It’s also full of swearing. I don’t think the comic was PG before, but Wilson’s apparently gotten tired of writing dialogue so every… 📖
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Air (2008) #3
Once again, Wilson has some really significant pacing problems. I imagine she thinks the reader immediately finds her details as interesting as she does, but the reader is just hearing about them or seeing something briefly related to them. They make very little impression. It’s like she doesn’t quite know how to add personality when… 📖
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Air 4 (January 2009)
Two things this issue really rile me. First, the ending–there’s this hostage situation with the protagonist, Blythe. She gets taken up to the roof where the villain throws her off and she lands safely on some steampunk thing. Steampunk thing not the issue–we don’t get to see her taken up to the roof. There’s not… 📖
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Air (2008) #2
The second issue of Air works a lot better than the first. There’s the terribly overwritten letter the protagonist’s boyfriend writes her and it had me mildly upset, but it only lasted about a page. Instead of forcing the reader to be interested by making things quirky, Wilson is letting the situations she writes engender… 📖
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Air 3 (December 2008)
Once again, Wilson has some really significant pacing problems. I imagine she thinks the reader immediately finds her details as interesting as she does, but the reader is just hearing about them or seeing something briefly related to them. They make very little impression. It’s like she doesn’t quite know how to add personality when… 📖
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Air (2008) #1
Air tries pretty hard to get its quirk on. The book’s a fine read, but hardly monumental. Vertigo has put out series just as wacky its entire history as an imprint–I’m thinking of Gerber’s Nevada. The problem is the Wilson is loading up the quirks at the beginning to generate interest. Maybe the Neil Gaiman… 📖
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Revolt of the Zombies (1936, Victor Halperin)
What an unmitigated disaster. It takes a lot for me to open with such a statement–well, maybe not, but certainly for a film I finished watching, even if it only does run sixty-two minutes. But Revolt of the Zombies might be one of the worst things ever and really shouldn’t be. Okay, worst things ever… 📖
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Air 2 (November 2008)
The second issue of Air works a lot better than the first. There’s the terribly overwritten letter the protagonist’s boyfriend writes her and it had me mildly upset, but it only lasted about a page. Instead of forcing the reader to be interested by making things quirky, Wilson is letting the situations she writes engender… 📖
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Air 1 (October 2008)
Air tries pretty hard to get its quirk on. The book’s a fine read, but hardly monumental. Vertigo has put out series just as wacky its entire history as an imprint–I’m thinking of Gerber’s Nevada. The problem is the Wilson is loading up the quirks at the beginning to generate interest. Maybe the Neil Gaiman… 📖
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Marvel Team-Up Annual (1976) #7
Did Louise Simonson get paid by the word? Ten pages into this issue and I was already ready for a nap. It’s the most boring comic book I can remember reading–Spidey and Marrina (from Alpha Flight) get kidnapped by an alien collecting lifeforms, including some Superman might want in his zoo, and Alpha Flight shows… 📖
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Steve Rogers: Super-Soldier (2010) #4
Well, thanks for the heads up guys, I thought you were being artsy with the hologram shield, a little Googling reveals it’s an energy shield… which makes no sense, since if it’s implanted in Steve’s hand, unless it’s grafted to the bone, getting de-powered last issue would probably have effected his physiology. But whatever. The… 📖
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Steve Rogers: Super-Soldier (2010) #3
One issue? Brubaker has Steve Rogers be “puny” for one issue? He reveals even a “puny” Steve Rogers can still kick ass and he only lets him be in that condition for one issue? What a cop-out. Oh, and before I get to Eaglesham, what’s up with the holographic shield? Is it one of Steve… 📖
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Marvel Team-Up Annual 7 (1984)
Did Louise Simonson get paid by the word? Ten pages into this issue and I was already ready for a nap. It’s the most boring comic book I can remember reading–Spidey and Marrina (from Alpha Flight) get kidnapped by an alien collecting lifeforms, including some Superman might want in his zoo, and Alpha Flight shows… 📖
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Steve Rogers: Super-Soldier (2010) #2
Brubaker’s very good at making his Captain America familiar. It’s amazing how he manages to be writing an issue set after a huge media event (the death of Captain America), with a noir approach (Steve Rogers, private investigator–it works well, but Eaglesham is way too clean for it) and still make me think of seventies… 📖
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The Traveler (2010) #1
I’m a little confused to Waid’s approach with this series. He has a lengthy opening sequence introducing a completely unimportant character and then he brings in the titular character. The Courier’s Tragedy it ain’t. Maybe the character will be back because the Traveler did something mysterious to her before she left, but it’s too soon… 📖
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Steve Rogers: Super-Soldier 4 (December 2010)
Well, thanks for the heads up guys, I thought you were being artsy with the hologram shield, a little Googling reveals it’s an energy shield… which makes no sense, since if it’s implanted in Steve’s hand, unless it’s grafted to the bone, getting de-powered last issue would probably have effected his physiology. But whatever. The… 📖
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Steve Rogers: Super-Soldier (2010) #1
I’m creating a new word. A Brubaker is when a writer introduces something previously unknown from an established character’s history (the farther back the better) solely to generate a new story for the character. Almost all of Brubaker’s Marvel stories, using this term, have been Brubakers. I don’t think many of his DC comics were… 📖
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Steve Rogers: Super-Soldier 3 (November 2010)
One issue? Brubaker has Steve Rogers be “puny” for one issue? He reveals even a “puny” Steve Rogers can still kick ass and he only lets him be in that condition for one issue? What a cop-out. Oh, and before I get to Eaglesham, what’s up with the holographic shield? Is it one of Steve… 📖
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Steve Rogers: Super-Soldier 2 (October 2010)
Brubaker’s very good at making his Captain America familiar. It’s amazing how he manages to be writing an issue set after a huge media event (the death of Captain America), with a noir approach (Steve Rogers, private investigator–it works well, but Eaglesham is way too clean for it) and still make me think of seventies… 📖
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The Traveler 1 (November 2010)
I’m a little confused to Waid’s approach with this series. He has a lengthy opening sequence introducing a completely unimportant character and then he brings in the titular character. The Courier’s Tragedy it ain’t. Maybe the character will be back because the Traveler did something mysterious to her before she left, but it’s too soon… 📖
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Steve Rogers: Super-Soldier 1 (September 2010)
I’m creating a new word. A Brubaker is when a writer introduces something previously unknown from an established character’s history (the farther back the better) solely to generate a new story for the character. Almost all of Brubaker’s Marvel stories, using this term, have been Brubakers. I don’t think many of his DC comics were… 📖
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The Amazing Spider-Man (1963) #255
It’s a perfectly decent done-in-one. The issue opens with the Black Fox (I thought he was the Black Cat’s father, but maybe not) and he introduces the issue’s main story, the Red Ghost wanting to rob a bunch of stores so he can afford to build his death ray (or whatever it’s called). There’s some… 📖
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Detective Comics (1937) #526
It’s a gorgeous issue. Newton and Alcala doing Batman’s rogues gallery is possibly an unsurpassable event. Maybe eight pages in, they have this incomparable Joker close-up. DC ought to reprint the issue oversized just so one can really look at it. But it’s also a really good issue. Besides Jason Todd’s endless thought balloons–not bad,… 📖
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Batman (1940) #359
Well, Batman is having a freakout–over women he decides. Having to decide between Selina and Vicki (mind you, Selina hasn’t appeared since the last really good issue Conway wrote) has made Bruce lose it. It’s why he let Killer Croc go he decides. There’s a bunch of eye-rolling logic this issue and the Dan Jurgens… 📖
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The Amazing Spider-Man 255 (August 1984)
It’s a perfectly decent done-in-one. The issue opens with the Black Fox (I thought he was the Black Cat’s father, but maybe not) and he introduces the issue’s main story, the Red Ghost wanting to rob a bunch of stores so he can afford to build his death ray (or whatever it’s called). There’s some… 📖
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Detective Comics 526 (May 1983)
It’s a gorgeous issue. Newton and Alcala doing Batman’s rogues gallery is possibly an unsurpassable event. Maybe eight pages in, they have this incomparable Joker close-up. DC ought to reprint the issue oversized just so one can really look at it. But it’s also a really good issue. Besides Jason Todd’s endless thought balloons–not bad,… 📖
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Marvel Team-Up (1972) #143
Michelinie being a competent writer aside, I really loathe nonsensical inter dimensional stories. Spidey and Starfox have to go into another dimension to figure out why Captain Marvel is all messed up. So the two mismatched heroes (we know they’re mismatched because of Spidey’s constant thought balloons on the subject) meet these two warring tribes,… 📖
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Marvel Team-Up (1972) #142
Michelinie writes a good issue here. Ten pages in and he’s had two action sequences, one for Spidey, one for Captain Marvel; it feels like you’re spending the day with the characters. Not in some fun sense, rather as though Michelinie is approximating real time in summary. It’s impressive pacing and it makes up for… 📖
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Batman 359 (May 1983)
Well, Batman is having a freakout–over women he decides. Having to decide between Selina and Vicki (mind you, Selina hasn’t appeared since the last really good issue Conway wrote) has made Bruce lose it. It’s why he let Killer Croc go he decides. There’s a bunch of eye-rolling logic this issue and the Dan Jurgens… 📖
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The Trollenberg Terror (1958, Quentin Lawrence)
The importance of the director, in cinema, used to be a topic of discussion for me. It hasn’t been lately, because it’s hard to find good examples of well-scripted, well-acted, but terribly directed motion pictures. Thank goodness for The Trollenberg Terror and Quentin Lawrence. Lawrence might be the most boring bad director I’ve ever seen.… 📖
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Marvel Team-Up 143 (July 1984)
Michelinie being a competent writer aside, I really loathe nonsensical inter dimensional stories. Spidey and Starfox have to go into another dimension to figure out why Captain Marvel is all messed up. So the two mismatched heroes (we know they’re mismatched because of Spidey’s constant thought balloons on the subject) meet these two warring tribes,… 📖
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Marvel Team-Up 142 (June 1984)
Michelinie writes a good issue here. Ten pages in and he’s had two action sequences, one for Spidey, one for Captain Marvel; it feels like you’re spending the day with the characters. Not in some fun sense, rather as though Michelinie is approximating real time in summary. It’s impressive pacing and it makes up for… 📖
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Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man (1976) #92
Milgrom spends the majority of the issue on Spidey and the Black Cat fighting a new villain, the Answer, who’s one of Kingpin’s henchmen. It all ties into the Black Cat getting her powers from Kingpin and… and… and I’m bored already. The first half of the issue isn’t terrible. I mean, the art’s weak.… 📖
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The Amazing Spider-Man (1963) #254
Here’s my issue… yes, Spider-Man has lots of human problems–his aunt’s pissed at him, he’s got girlfriend trouble, he’s got job trouble. He’s apparently the only superhero in New York when there’s a superpowered terrorist blowing up toy stores. The list goes on and on. But let’s look at these problems. Aunt May’s pissed he… 📖
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Detective Comics (1937) #525
Hmm. Young Dan Jurgens. Guess it’s why Bruce looks like Clark Kent without glasses. I’m curious to see Conway’s original script–he includes expository scene after expository scene, all the fill in space–and there only good scene is incomplete. Bruce breaks it off with Vicki by acting like a thoughtless ass, but it’s never made clear… 📖