I Dropped a Lot of Comics Part Three: Other Publishers.

I already talked about the Marvel Comics I kept or ditched, along with DC and Image's output, but what about the other, smaller publishers? Let's discuss....

Other Publishers

Among Dark Horse's offerings, I no longer want to read that "Killjoys" comic because the damn thing makes no sense to me. It is sad as I truly adore Gerard Way's "Umbrella Academy" comics and hopes he returns to them soon. I am keeping "Dark Horse Presents" because even though it is an anthology book, and lots of anthologies are hit-or-miss, "Dark Horse Presents" has enough titles that "hit" I feel it is a good value for the money. One other Dark Horse title I want to keep up with actually had a segment in the anthology, "Resident Alien" which has a new mini, "Resident Alien: The Suicide Blonde" coming up. Lastly, "Fatale" by Ed Brubaker and Sean Philips is shaping up into quite the big story and I want to keep on following it for now.

Publishers that I am reading only one book from currently are Dynamite with their title "Uncanny" and the newly-formed Amigo Comics with its superb, "The Westwood Witches". I am also reading a good number of Boom Studios books considering they don't have a ton, with "Six Gun Gorilla", "Deathmatch", and "Suicide Risk" all being excellent reads by great writers (Si Spurrier, Paul Jenkins, and Mike Carey, respectively). There is a small publisher known as Comixtribe who puts out some good stuff too, such as "The Red Ten" and "The Standard". Also, anytime IDW releases something by Ashely Wood I snatch it up, but there aren't any current works solicited by him that I know of.

If there were one company who "won" all of this cutting among the smaller publishers it would probably be Avatar Comics. I am reading a lot of their output besides "Crossed" (which I got tired of some time ago) and "Feral" (which I haven't gotten around to trying). I'm reading the new Christos Gage title. "Absolution: Rubicon" which is a sequel to the original great mini-series "Absolution". I'm also reading "Uber", "Skin Trade", "Extinction Parade" and am eager to read the upcoming, "God is Dead" by Jonathan Hickman. I guess I just really like a lot of Avatar's stuff.

That's all the smaller stuff I can think of that I'm still interested in. Stay tuned for Part 4 where I discuss all of these posts and what they reflect of my tastes and the comic-book industry.

Examining The Recent Past of the Character "Legion" AKA David Haller and Why You Should Read His New Series

A person with a ton of amazing powers often bores me. For example, I make no secret of the fact that Superman usually is dull in my eyes. He can do almost anything and is well-adjusted and happy...eh. Give me a character who is so powerful that their own abilities work against them, or they are powerful but have trouble using powers appropriately, and I'm intrigued. This is why, "Legion," or David Haller as the character prefers to go by, is a fascinating individual to me--besides my having a soft spot for characters with the name David, of course.

The son of one of the most famous mutants around, Charles Xavier, David Haller has incredible powers, the kind that can alter all of reality and possible destroy the world or make it a better place. He also has crippling mental-health issues in that each of his powers manifests itself in his mind as an individual character with its own motives. He bounced around various comics for some time, sort of disappeared, was found again by the New Mutants, and then we reach the point in David's recent history I'll discuss, from the "Age of X" event  to now.

Anyways, David had gone to live on the X-Men's island-nation of Utopia, and he was not doing well psychologically. Then suddenly the world shifted into a comic event called "Age of X". Things were odd though, the characters felt a strange sense of repetition, memories didn't quite make sense, and before too long it was revealed that one of David's personalities/powers had altered all of reality into this little world where David was a big hero and everything was perfect for him. It of course had to end.

Normal reality was restored, but some of David's personalities got away, with the comic "X-Men Legacy" following he and a handful of X-Men working to get them back. Mike Carey wrote the "Age of X" stuff and David's  "Legacy" adventures quite well and then David just sort of disappeared.

After the "Avengers Versus X-Men" event there was a newly re-numbered "X-Men Legacy" starring none other than David Haller. Oh, and it has been one of the best comics coming out from any publisher. It is revealed that at some point after his shenanigans in the old "X-Men Legacy" David's dad put him in a remote camp high in the mountains to work on gaining better control of his powers. Well, those who read AVX know that things didn't work out well for the professor and that is reflected in this comic by David basically having a meltdown when he senses Xavier's death.

The thing is, he gets better though, and realizes he needs to do something the so-called "super-heroes" never do, be proactive instead of reactive. This new comic written by Si Spurrier is just incredible. It drips with contempt for modern super-heroes in such a blatant way I can't believe Marvel publishes this series. It points out that if someone were to go and fix the threats faced by Mutants instead of just letting them percolate and build, something positive could actually get done.

The comic also is full of introspection, with David reflecting on good, evil, and if he is in fact a hero or a villain. Plus, the comic often is just hilarious. The 12 issues I have read (I haven't had time to get to the 13th that came out recently) are just sheer genius. Between David's mind being shown as a prison for his multiple personalities, to the way some of the most recent issues seemed like little one-off tales that actually all linked into a killer climax at the end of the 12th issue, this is just an amazing series people really need to be reading.

David's personality and sarcastic attitude really shows in the comic under the skillful writing of Spurrier, and Tan Eng Huat's artwork is just stellar with its quirky appearance, perfectly matching the comic's tone. Plus, the covers by Michael Del Mundo are just pure awesomeness. Seriously, go get the first trade and the newest issues or the second trade when it comes out shortly. You will be in for some awesome comics courtesy of Spurrier's stellar writing, Huat's amazing art, and Del Mundo's fantastic covers.
5 out of 5 stars (for issues 1 through 12 overall).

Afternoon Rant-Reviews--Some DC, Boom, Image, and Other Indie Comics

As I spent the morning discussing Marvel comics, I thought it would make sense to now discuss some of the other varied stuff I've enjoyed/had to endure lately.

3 New Stories
Dash Shaw is a fabulous artist, and even if these three new stories are mostly just funny weird yarns it still is a pleasure to read them. As these are short tales you get nothing as expansive or insanely complex as his other works, but sometimes bite-sized chunks of an otherwise gigantic meal can be satisfying in their own way too.
4 out of 5 stars.

Storm Dogs #5
David Hine is a great writer and this mixture of sci-fi and police procedural is fascinating stuff which proves his skill. In the span of these five issues I care so much about these characters and really hope this sells well enough to get more "seasons" as it is stated by Hine he is eager to do. Plus, the book does a spectacular job asking questions that make you think, be it about sexuality and gender, or what it means to try and "save" a culture by basically destroying it (in this case that culture being all the native aliens our team encounters). Superb stuff even if all the plots being juggled can result in one needing to slow down and think about everything that is going on--but is it ever a bad thing if a comic actually makes you think?
4.5 out of 5 stars.

Green Arrow #20
I honestly did not read this series at all until I heard about it getting what was basically an entirely fresh start under Jeff Lemire and Andrea Sorrentino, with them providing quality writing and beautiful art, respectively. Once I learned of this soft-reboot (that basically followed the Nu52 hard-reboot of the character, but whatever) I checked the comic out and was extremely impressed by the aforementioned writing and gorgeous drawing. I've been enjoying this series since and this issue was no exception. We get some conclusion to Oliver Queen's conflict with "Komodo" but clearly a lot of the story is still just beginning. Pick up that first Lemire & Sorrentino issue and give this a chance, you'll be glad you did--even if just for the amazing art.
4.5 out of 5 stars.

Rogues #1
Ah, the debut issue of new publisher "Amigo Comics" pirates-tale (that actually features a cast from past comics, apparently). This is basically pure fan service with its violence and sex, but the comic's writer El Torres says in the back of the comic book that is kind of the whole point of what he is going for with this series--bringing back that feeling of 1990's excess. It helps that he has the spectacular Juan Jose Ryp on art as there has never been an attractive woman or spurt of blood Ryp would hesitate to draw the heck out of. That said, it is unfortunate that the art is the biggest selling-point of this book because Ryp is no longer doing it after this first issue. Still, it might be worth a glance along with the other upcoming releases from this new comic imprint.
3 out of 5 stars.

Parker VS Aliens #2
I picked both this and the first issue up at once because I have enjoyed watching writer Paul Scheer in his normal work as a comedian ("Human Giant" is one of the best comedy shows ever, for real). That said, while this comic does finally pick up some steam in the second issue I still found myself a bit bored by the plot, characters, and--worst of all considering Scheer wrote this--the jokes. We have the various cliches making up the crew of space deliverymen and the requisite mystery on a strange planet they set off to explore where things unsurprisingly go horribly wrong. It's just all so dull, which is quite unfortunate as I really was hoping for this book to be good. Oh well.
1.5 out of 5 stars.

Suicide Risk #1
Mike Carey returns to hero-styled comics! I enjoyed his work on (the older) "X-Men Legacy" and his contributions to the "Endangered Species" back-up/mini that a lot of folk hated but I loved was some of his best stuff too--not that "The Unwritten" is bad, I just kind of quit reading it when I moved almost two years ago and didn't bother to start picking it up again. Anyways, we've now got Carey writing this whole new world where it seems by having a special genetic marker you can pay to have something done to you that grants you superpowers. The problem is that most of the people with these superpowers seem to be villains, so being a hero is a...Suicide Risk (and now you see where that title came from). Carey faces the classic 1st-issue problem of trying to build up a new world and introduce us to our main character, a police officer named Leo. The thing is, Carey takes that problem head-on and does a pretty good job making us care about Leo and also be intrigued by this depressing universe where there are more bad-guys than good. I still am not quite sure what possesses Leo to try and gain powers at the end of the comic (I'm not spoiling anything, the solicit for this series said as much happens) as opposed to just shutting the dealers down, but perhaps as the issues continue things will become clear. A good return to super-heroes for Carey and I am eager to see what happens next.
3.5 out of 5 stars.

Justice League of America #3
This is interesting enough, with its mystery of just what a secret society of super-villains could be up to. However, as it has already been basically revealed that all of that ties-in to the upcoming "Trinity War" cross-over I suppose I'm not too excited as what seemed like an interesting story-line is in fact just a lead-up to a big event (kind of like how that Bendis-penned "Moon Knight" series was a big 12-issue promo for "Age of Ultron"). Still, the book looks pretty snazzy, is written decently, and otherwise is an example of how a comic can be good enough to be better than average, without achieving anything resembling greatness.
3 out of 5 stars.

Between my morning-post full of Marvel comics and this afternoon one of a variety of stuff I would hope there is a comic I've discussed that you now know to go and pick-up, or one you are now aware you should avoid like the plague. Whatever the case, have a great rest of your day.