Monkey Prince (2022) #3

Mp3 Monkey Face—sorry, Monkey Prince—sort of transcends this issue. The comic’s set over forty-five minutes to an hour, but isn’t a waste of decompression. Instead, Marcus the Monkey Prince has a very full after-school calendar. He gets some more training from the custodian, Mr. Zhu, who’s actually a mystical being (Shifu Pigsy), but most of his story has to do with dream girl Kaya.

Meanwhile, Shifu Pigsy will go on a demon hunt and determine the threat is even more imminent than he’d been thinking, and Marcus’s parents will have some workplace troubles. Marcus’s parents work for the Penguin, who has been possessed by the mystical villain, the Golden Horn. The Golden Horn is going to be Monkey Prince’s big bad—presumably, as Shifu Pigsy seems really worried about him.

Marcus isn’t interested in gold-plated Cobblepots, not when Kaya starts flirting with him. She’s got some questions about Monkey Prince and Marcus—like, why isn’t Marcus ever around when Monkey Prince is on the scene—and there’s also the matter of Kaya’s brother. Turns out it’s Marcus’s nemesis, The Riz, and he’s missing. Monkey Prince promises to find the missing dipshit.

At this point in the issue, writer Gene Luen Yang has completed a full enough comic book narrative gesture. He’s done character development, he’s done twists with Kaya, and there are the subplots with Pigsy and the parents. But then Monkey Prince delivers on the promise instead of kicking the can down the road for two more issues. Monkey Prince goes off to find the Riz, who’s being questioned by Boy Wonder Robin (the cover promises a Batman appearance, which thankfully doesn’t happen).

Monkey Prince and Robin have a fun, funny, and (gently) gross fight scene. Artist Bernard Chang does a good job throughout the issue, but something about the Robin fight just brings it all together. Visually, Monkey Prince is a strange combination. There’s the obvious “real-life” meets comic book, but there are also Chinese mystical beings in modernity as well as them interacting with men and boys in tights.

Good resolution, good cliffhanger. Yang’s doing a fantastic high school superhero comic here.

Oh, and the parents. I’ve been bearish on the parents, but this issue turns it around when they start Nick and Nora’ing as they contend with an even more dangerous Oswald Cobblepot.

Great stuff.

Monkey Prince (2022) #2

Monkey Prince 2 Wait, is Batman just supposed to be a bad dad? Did DC really not think giving him a kid through? Or does Monkey Prince writer Gene Luen Yang just get to flash his bonafides and characterize Batman as a complete dipshit?

In addition to Batman attempting to gaslight and emotionally manipulate Robin (who’s now his son), which Robin calls out, we also find out Batman doesn’t tell Commissioner Gordon things like “I went into a high school and beheaded someone.” Is the natural conclusion of fascist, abusive Bat-dad is he’s a punchline?

Maybe, but seeing how little Batman cares about anything is still bizarre. Civilians, murder victims, whatever. Basically, he’s a tool, just like the school bully in Monkey Prince. Luckily for lead Marcus, his new school’s got plenty of non-tools around, including—sort of—Robin’s alter ego, Damian Wayne. Damian’s an annoying kid on the school newspaper who interrupts his interviews to take WayneTech Watch calls from his dad and mock him.

Marcus also gets to hang out with his crush, Kaya, and it’s adorable when he gets elated at the thought he’s on her radar (only to discover she’s part of the school’s mental health club, something Bruce Wayne probably ought to be paying for city-wide). He and de facto mentor Mr. Zhu have some long talks about Monkey Princing, and then there’s some more with Marcus’s parents.

I’m guessing Prince established Marcus was adopted last issue, but I’d forgotten. It doesn’t really change anything (yet?), but Yang’s setting him up for a big moment when he discovers his adorkable parents are actually supervillain support scientists.

Yang’s still in the setup phase of the series, though I did entirely miss the Penguin has been turned into “Golden Horn Penguin.” I blame artist Bernard Chang, who does an excellent job throughout—especially with the humor—but his one introduction shot to a mutated Penguin isn’t enough. I thought the mutant was eating Penguin, not Penguin mutated and eating other people.

Anyway.

Really strong issue, can’t wait for more, exactly what a teenage superhero comic should be.

Monkey Prince (2022) #1

Mp1 I’m not up on modern Batman takes, but… has everyone just agreed he’s a dick? Monkey Prince starts with a Batman cameo, then brings him (and Robin) into it for the cliffhanger. In addition to him being a dick, does every new book have a Batman cameo for the sales? Though Batman’s only on one of the variant covers. Maybe you assume Batman will be in all DC #1s?

Enough with the rhetorical questions; enough with Batman. Monkey Prince isn’t about Batman, though his initial cameo gives away some of the hook—little kid Marcus Sun wakes up one night and hears a commotion in the living room of his family’s Gotham City apartment. He stumbles out, wiping the sleep from his eyes, and sees Batman beating up on his dad. Batman leaves after making some bad parent judgments (really, how’s Jason Todd again?).

Marcus never figures it out, but it’s pretty obvious his parents are supervillains. They turn out to be science hench-people who leave town soon after, living in all the big DC cities before ending up back in Gotham when Marcus is a teenager. Unfortunately, he’s still got PTSD from interrupting that Bat-fight, which causes a panic attack at the swimming pool. He makes the mistake of bumping into one of the school bullies, who then pushes Marcus into the pool.

The school custodian takes an interest, trying to encourage Marcus to work past his trauma, something Marcus initially refuses. When he tries to do it himself, Marcus discovers he’s, well, a monkey prince.

The issue hints at a rich cultural history for the character—in addition to the teenage son of bad guys, writer Gene Luen Yang’s front and center about how Marcus’s Chinese heritage affects his daily experiences, including his bully further attacking Marcus for having a white mom. It gives Marcus some more ground situation personality, which helps since he’s mostly just having panic attacks this issue. He also meets his presumable love interest; so far, Monkey Prince feels like a new teen superhero number one. With some asterisks, sure, but Yang’s not deviating too far from the playbook.

Bernard Chang’s art ably toggles between action paces—the superhero action’s much different than the bullying—and the character drama. Chang and Yang pace it rather well.

The series is off to a fine start.

Batman/Catwoman Special (2022) #1

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I’m a sucker for Catwoman and Batman as marrieds stories. I blame that Earth-2 story in Greatest Batman Stories Ever Told. The feature in Batman/Catwoman Special is one of those stories. It’s got a gimmick—it follows Selina Kyle through life but only on Christmas Day. And it’s Elseworlds Selina Kyle. Or Black Label Selina Kyle.

The longest scene comes at the beginning, seven-year-old Selina in the Wayne orphanage making a Christmas present for her only friend, similarly aged Bruce Wayne, in the benefactors’ portrait. The scene’s a little forced—writer Tom King gives Selina a fifth-grade reading level so her monologue can be more verbose—but artist John Paul Leon finds the inherent cuteness to it.

He then toggles to the viciousness of an orphanage nun.

Leon passed away while working on the Special; he finished the first thirteen pages and got through breakdowns up to page twenty. Bernard Chang and Shawn Crystal do the art from the breakdowns (the issue includes the breakdowns, so you can see what they’re working from), then Mitch Gerards takes over for the story’s second half. There are no more multi-page Christmases after the first one. Instead, it’s every year or a few in Selina’s life as of Christmas Day.

There are some fun Batman adventures; some are just for the smile (Selina and Joker’s interactions over the years as she changes from Rogue to ally). Some are a little deeper, like one where Selina calls Batman out for exploiting her and the inherent inequity of their romance; for a page, it seems like Taylor’s going to take the book somewhere very interesting. He doesn’t. In fact, he gives Batman an accountability pass overall, even after Selina brings it up multiple times.

Kind of amazing Batman’s never got to learn a damn thing, even as we watch him age sixty years.

There’s a bunch the comic skips, like the Robins and Alfred’s inevitable death at some point. Because there doesn’t need to be character development if you’re just doing the one-page gimmick.

Still, it’s an affecting main story.

Then there are a bunch of pin-ups and a few written homages in Leon’s memory. Plus two reprint Leon Batman-related stories. There’s a Batman Black and White about the Riddler being a Lewis Carroll fanatic. Leon’s art is fine; Walt Simonson’s writing is not.

The second reprint is from something called DC’s Crimes of Passion. It’s a Question story, written by Ram V. There was some point Question didn’t read like PG-13 Rorschach, right? Art’s fine. Leon puts in the work.

If you’re a classic Catwoman and Batman shipper, the feature story is worth a look, even if it’s not entirely successful.

The Leon pages are the best, then the Chang and Crystal ones. The Gerards ones are fine but very much just “Batman house style.” Morbid or not—I mean, the comic invites it by its very existence: You can’t help but wonder how much better Leon would’ve realized the script than Gerards. Could he have taken it from “worth a look” to Greatest? I mean, the script’s got a lot of problems, but maybe. The way Leon can sell that kid’s monologue is exceptional, and his initial pages get the Special’s momentum going, which continues until about halfway through the Gerards pages.

I need to note the momentum doesn’t fall off because of Gerards; it falls off because of the script. Leon just was able to keep ahead of the writing better.

It also might’ve played better with the pin-up artists doing a page a year. The story lends itself to a Many Hands approach.

So, as is, okay and interesting. Not a failure and only a mild disappointment. But clearly could’ve been better.

DC Universe Presents 3 (January 2012)

Jenkins sure does have a lot of ideas. He changes his approach to more of a heist movie with this issue, as Deadman lays all the pieces in place to get free of his leash.

Except Jenkins also feels the need to spend three or four pages in flashback, explaining a really bad experience for Deadman. It breaks the flow of the narrative–and gives Deadman time to do things off page, so the reader can be surprised by his heist planning next issue.

But it does a little more, showing Jenkins’s unsureness. Three issues into his (four?) issue Deadman story, Jenkins still doesn’t know quite what he’s doing. Deadman has become assured and unstoppable, which makes him a boring protagonist.

It’d be difficult, of course, for Deadman to be interesting with Chang drawing him. It’s like Chang’s trying to stylize, but doesn’t know how. The art’s a constant problem.

CREDITS

Twenty Questions, Part Three; writer, Paul Jenkins; artist, Bernard Chang; colorist, Blond; letterer, Dave Sharpe; editor, Wil Moss; publisher, DC Comics.

DC Universe Presents 2 (December 2011)

There’s something sadly desperate about DC having werewolves and supernatural social clubs, which this issue of DC Universe Presents reveals. They’re now trying to attract the Twilight audience.

It’s so desperate it’s sad.

Also sad is most of Chang’s artwork this issue. About the only character he draws well is Deadman himself, who spends most of the issue jumping from body to body.

Worse, Jenkins’s plotting has gone to the dumps. He wastes a few pages with Deadman and the god Rama, where we and Deadman both know she’s lying to him, but not even giving him tasks lying, just wasting pages lying.

Then Jenkins has to wrap up the rest of last issue’s cliffhanger before Deadman goes on his adventure to the supernatural club. Now, if last issue’s cliffhanger wasn’t important, why put it in a comic? Jenkins’s writing is lazy, unfocused and uninspired.

Universe has plunged in quality.

CREDITS

Twenty Questions, Part Two; writer, Paul Jenkins; artist, Bernard Chang; colorist, Blond; letterer, Dave Sharpe; editor, Wil Moss; publisher, DC Comics.

DC Universe Presents 1 (November 2011)

And so aerialist Boston Brand finds himself leaping from life to life, striving to put wrong right, and hoping each time that his next leap… will be the last.

For the first DC Universe Presents arc—is it just me or would a Superman team-up book make a lot more sense in the DC relaunch, sort of an Ultimate Marvel Team-Up—anyway, it’s Deadman. Except Deadman is now “Quantum Leap” with a ghost. Maybe it’s because there’s a TV show in the works and DC wants to make Deadman really episodic.

Deadman now jumps from person to person, making their lives better. Or something. He’s not sure because he’s supposed to be getting guidance from the god Rama, only she’s too busy for him.

A decent script from Paul Jenkins makes it digestible. Bernard Chang designs some great pages, but his art’s a little broad.

Overall, it balances.

CREDITS

Twenty Questions, Part One; writer, Paul Jenkins; artist, Bernard Chang; colorist, Blond; letterer, Dave Sharpe; editor, Wil Moss; publisher, DC Comics.

Supergirl (2005) #57

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Thank goodness for the colorist because without him, you wouldn’t be able to tell who Chang was drawing as a Bizarro or as a non-Bizarro.

Chang actually manages to draw Supergirl okay (too lanky to be slutty even), but everything else is a bit of a disaster. His art lacks dimension, which messes up his proportions eventually.

Again, Gates uses the events on Bizarro world to make Supergirl feel okay about herself and the New Krypton thing, but here it works a little better. Maybe because he’s got an actual relatable event, maybe just because he really does make all the Bizarros sympathetic. Bizarro-Girl is such a good character by the end, she’s ready for a limited series of her own.

The issue has an epilogue back on Earth, teasing about the revenge of Cat Grant. It’s a necessary addition, but it still damages the momentum.

Otherwise, fantastic.