Comics Review, March 16 2014

I have an ulterior motive in writing this post: the first five of you to read it will push my views over 5000, which makes me rather happy. That's kind of a milestone for me, and I appreciate your readership. Cheers, to you.

(I also need something to do while I sit around waiting for Saga vol.3)

Now, to comics. Personal budget cuts have been hard on my pull list, and I've basically cut DC and Marvel out of my life altogether at this point. Which sucks, really, because Jeff Lemire is still doing a wonderful job with Green Arrow; I got pretty pumped when Tockman made an appearance in the comics and the show (Arrow), in the same issue that Diggle first appears in the comic. It was, I think, a sign that DC is beginning to do with Green Arrow what Marvel has done with S.H.I.E.L.D., create a storyline and characters with a foot in each world, print and screen.

At this point there are four print titles that get me all hot under the collar when they show up each month: FBP and Hinterkind, both from Vertigo; and Velvet and Pretty Deadly, both Image titles. I've reviewed most of these already, but it's been a while and I want to quickly touch on what I'm liking about each series. I think I'll start with Velvet.

Velvet #4 cover by Steve Epting

I've gushed a bit about the artwork in this title, and Brubaker's treatment of such a beloved but under-used spy trope, the "Girl Friday". That was after the first issue; #4 came out this month, and it's only been getting better. Our heroine, Velvet Templeton, has shown herself to be resourceful, elegant, determined, scared, angry, and most recently dumbfounded by the intriguing mess she has become embroiled in. Brubaker's writing is, as ever, superb, and Steve Epting's art is tantalizing blend of flair and grit. The punches fly thick and fast, and the shadows are deepening. I'm not sure that it's Noir, at least not to the level that Criminal or Fatale were. You don't develop such a deep loathing and pity for Velvet as you might for the Lawless boys, but she's got flaws nonetheless. Brubaker is still keeping his characters grounded in a sort of wounded reality, something I think his readers have really connected with over the years, maybe even the thing that his readership has become founded on. Feel free to prove me wrong on that count. Either way, Ed's sticking to the dark and secretive stories we've come to love him for, and this book is a treat to get my hands on every month.

Pretty Deadly #4 cover by Emma Rios

Pretty Deadly's been getting some wicked great reviews, and who can disagree? It's a phenomenal series. It got off to a rough start with that whole debacle about the issue that was torn up somewhere down south, but the number of issues #1s sold was astonishing. I don't really know that I can say anything about this series better than John Parker already has.

Pretty Deadly is an Eastern myth incubated in a Western Womb; a story within a story within a story; a dark fairytale about bad men, worse women, and Deadface Ginny, the reaper of vengeance, the daughter of Death. Commence head-banging now.

Everything about the series just clicks for me. Emma Rios's style of illustration is visceral, energetic, the kind of non-polished immediateness I've been trying to achieve in some of my own work. The colours are spectacular; if you've ever been to the Painted Desert in Arizona, you know what I'm talking about. The story...well, reading it as someone who cut his teeth on Louis L'Amour paperbacks and has developed an abiding interest in all things mythology, not to mention Eastern (Islamic, specifically Persian) forms of narrative, has been an absolute joy. The mythic landscape DeConnick and Rios are creating gets more layered and complex with each issue. The frame-narrative form solidifies. New characters are introduced, and new spiritual elements are made apparent, which adds a deeper consequence to the actions of the story. You become invested in their world, and that is a sign of a well-crafted tale.

Hinterkind #6 cover by Greg Tocchini

On the topic of mythology, Ian Edgington's Hinterkind has been an interesting ride. I don't often put it in the list of favourite comics that I rattle off when people ask me what I'm reading, and then I remember how pumped I am to find it in my box once a month. I must be enjoying it or something. For a couple issues near the beginning I wasn't quite sure where it was going. The premise seemed a little hodgepodge, a bunch of scraps of ideas that we were allowed to glimpse out of context one at a time, with no notion of how they might fit together. This last issue, though, #6, solidified in a big way. Some pretty massive hints were dropped about what's in store for us, in a way only attempted assassinations and airships can do. I will say no more. If you're looking for a unique blend of post-apocalypse survival and Hellboy-esque re-imagined faerie civilization, then this may be the book for you. The art's a little rough, and the start's a little slow, but I have a hunch that there's some big story in the next couple issues. I for one am looking forward to it.

FBP #5 cover by Nathan Fox

And finally, FBP, formerly Collider for those of you out of the loop (there's a physics joke in there somewhere...). This title is hands-down my monthly favourite, a colourful, sharp, unpredictable romp through the ins and outs of life in the Federal Bureau of Physics. It's so good that I keep thinking it's an Image title (I'm so unimpressed with DC these days that, when something good comes out, I assume they weren't responsible for it. I have to start cutting Vertigo some slack). I couldn't pick my favourite bit of this title if I wanted to. Oliver's writing is dry, smart, and funny; Rodriguez's art is the perfect pairing. Not to mention that I get a new Nathan Fox cover to drool over every month (a good reason to keep your comics in plastic, folks), though he did change up his style a bit on this last one. I'm still trying to figure out what I think of it. New story arc, though, starting in issue #8, so maybe it's just a matter of him creating a way of visually identifying a chapter. I'd be okay with that.

There's nothing I love reading right now more than this comic. They've done a great job of pacing the story, sprinkling each issue with hints of mysterious family tragedy and high-level corporate conspiracy. There's a lot that can go wrong when you privatize control over the fabric of reality. They dropped a Plato's Cave reference in this last issue, and I sort of shook my head and kept reading. The Cave was cool the first time I heard about it, but it gets a little worn out the more sci-fi you encounter. It looks like FBP might redeem itself in its use, primarily because at this point I have no idea where Oliver is taking us with it. This is the unpredictability I mentioned earlier; there are no rules in the world Oliver has created, or rather, what rules there were are fundamentally breaking down. Nothing is stable. Every issue is capable of pulling you in and showing you something you never saw coming, no matter how much you thought you had it figured out. It leaves you wanting more. It leaves me with the insatiable urge to go shoot pool...

A Little Sword & Sorcery

There's a peculiar joy in creating a fictional character from scratch, coming to terms with their personality, their quirks and foibles, the things in their past that define who and why they have evolved. More than that, there is a joy in becoming that character, discovering how this person you've crafted holds up within a plot. And that is the magic of Dungeons & Dragons. Organic storytelling, role-playing, an immersive and interactive narrative that brings with a camaraderie unique to gamers. And if you're lucky, the gamers bring with them beer and pizza.

I've never used this blog as a platform for creative writing before, but why not? I use it for everything else, and You People keep reading it. Allow me to introduce you to Damian Jakobi of The Aundairian Dragoons, a soldier, a scholar, and a lover of good, dark Stout (like myself).

(Unashamed references have been made to Indiana Jones, Daniel Jackson, and Captain Diego Alatriste y Tenorio.)

It was a long war.

Granted, Damian Jakobi only had to fight through the last few bloody years of it, but it was enough. They were the frontliners, scouts, paving the way to war for The Knights Arcane. Never had there been a more thrilling time to be young and dangerous, trained in secret arts of alchemy and steeped in a nationalism born of war. Light and fast, mounted on the best horses House Vadalis had to offer the war effort, a group of young men hand-picked from The Academy for wits as quick as their blades.

They were fearless, to a man. At the head of their column rode Hardan D’Tharashk, a stoic young noble schooled in scout-craft by the best of his House. Not all of them were noble-born. Jakobi’s father had been a tailor before Fairhaven was set ablaze. Diego the Miller’s Son was the fastest rapier Damian ever knew. They dubbed Damian “Jack”, on account of his name and his reputation as a Jack-of-all-Trades. If one could be taught to be canny, then Jack was a masterclass in it. He had quick fingers from a childhood perched on a stool in his father’s shop; hadn’t dropped a stitch since he was six. Jack’s mother was housekeep to a librarian at the University; she used to bring him back books discarded from the collections, tattered pamphlets full of obscure legal history, or maps with legends in languages none of them could recognize. Jack drank it all in. He loved secrets, knowing things that others would be envious of if they knew he knew, but they never would, and that made it all the sweeter.

But his love of secrets landed Jack on the frontlines of a war he wished he’d never known, and when it was over he did his best to leave it all behind him. He returned to Fairhaven where he dove back into his studies with a voracious thirst to understand the world he’d seen torn apart. The Last War had been cataclysmic, but it was not the End. History, he felt, would have the last word yet, and when it did it those who held The Past would hold The Future.

The post-war years drifted by. Jack found himself Head of Archaeological Endeavours at The Univerity of Wynarn, making frequent trips to study giant ruins in Xen’Drik or to the edges of the Mournland, riding the edges of the fog-bound plains in search of…answers. But the larger part of his life was teaching, standing in oak-paneled rooms to pontificate on the mysteries of the past. Hardan would show up at the end of the day with some newly formulated quip about how academic life was making Jack go soft, and then they’d go in search of beer. Hardan would bitch about the Fairhaven Watch salary, and Jack would explain some new development in Warforged psychology, each talking while the other had his mug to his face. To an outsider they made a strange pair, the Watchman and the Scholar, until the lamps started burning low and the seventh round was toasted with a quiet clink to the glory days, and they started telling stories. And then it all made sense.

And so, when Hardan came around one day with nothing to say about the rust building up on Jack’s rapier hilt, and when after two rounds Hardan pulled out a roll of parchment stamped with the seal of The Wayfinder Foundation and tossed it across the table, Jack didn’t really think twice. This was the Orb of Merrix, Merrix D’Cannith, and it was about time for a sabbatical…wasn’t it? “You could surely use the brains.”, Jack said. So it was settled.

Xen’Drik.


This character was created to fit the Eberron setting for D&D; if you're at all interested I encourage you dig further into the history and cultures of Eberron. It's a glorious Sword & Sorcery stew of wars, dragons, gods, and heroes ranging from Epic Romance to Fantasy Noir.

http://eberron.wikia.com/wiki/Eberron

Review: Velvet #1 - Girl Friday, and a Breath of Fresh Air

The last week has been pretty great. Just, you know, in general. But especially for comics. I picked up some real gems at the shop on Friday, both of which are worth writing about. Here's the first:

Velvet #1

I feel like saying "this has been a long time coming" is a little bit cliche. Or even a lot cliche. But I have been waiting for this issue to be released for a number of months now, and I was more than a tad excited when I walked home holding it for real. A little bit of background. This is a spy comic that was announced back in July of this year, to be produced by the fabled creative team of Ed Brubaker and Steve Epting. I met Brubaker once, briefly. Our 30-second conversation outside his and Greg Rucka's ECCC panel on crime comics consisted of a handshake and determining that he didn't have time to sign my Death of Captain America collection because he was late for lunch. With someone definitively cooler than my 19-year old fanboy self. Honestly I don't blame him, and that never should have come up in this blog post. Anyhow...the man is a legend. His run with Epting on Captain America post-Civil War was a thing of beauty. So when it was announced that the same team was taking on a creator-owned spy fiction project, I may have gotten a little excited.

Hype is a strange thing, usually best avoided. It twists our perception of creative works before they are actualized, and alter our experience of the work when we encounter it, often for the worse. Despite the hype I had built around this comic for myself, Velvet #1 did not disappoint. I suppose that's the thing about dealing with as skilled a writer as Brubaker. I had seen a short preview of some Velvet pages, and it looked great. I assumed I was seeing the opening scenes of this story, and therefore drew conclusions about what I was going to be reading. None of those pages appeared in Velvet #1. The story took a very different road than I'd expected, building slowly, introducing the Cold War setting from various angles and setting up character roles in a skilfully subtle manner. It was fun to read, in part because I know Brubaker's just playing. The espionage flavour was something he had introduced in small doses to the pages of Captain America, but he could only take the action-oriented superhero genre so far down that road. He jumped back past the Cold War to Noir and the 30s and indulged his love of crime fiction and Lovecraftian horror, and we've been able to revel in the glory of Fatale as a result. In this, we finally get to see him let loose all his pent-up espionage ideas, and I'm loving it. The characters are everything you want and never quite what you expect. More than that, they're real and believable people...a damn rare quality in comics which I've probably ranted about at length before. Brubaker makes us believe his world, which is easy, because it's our world. I guess it's something we'll have to get used to, seeing this guy write about the world without monsters and capes. It's the 1960s, when people were still allowed to have names that were names. Velvet Templeton and Jefferson Keller meet at a rooftop party in New York. They talk about wine, before getting into a muscle car where they light up a joint as they take off into city traffic. They end up in a casual relationship, he the secret agent, her the boss's secratary, before he gets bushwacked with a shotgun in Paris. It's clean, beautiful, believable. It feels vintage, in a way best associated with old wines and finely-tuned cars.

Ed Brubaker is half of what makes this issue a pleasure to read. Steve Epting and his art is the other half. Nowhere have I seen an artist capture The City this way in a comic before (Darick Robertson's art on Transmetropolitan is genius, but that City is a little different...). I had art history class this morning, looking at turn-of-the-century representations of New York and views of modernist painters dealing with new urban landscapes. Three key features are suggested for the painting of the modern city: light, angularity, and focal point. Epting embodies that, especially the first. I miss New York. It happens to me about twice a year, that I hit a couple of weeks or months where I pine for that city and find myself folding my pizza slices and listening to Billy Joel on repeat. Part of what I miss is the lights, a landscape of brilliance that makes you understand the phrase "city that never sleeps". Steve Epting gets that. He puts you in a tailored dinner jacket and leather shoes looking out over the golden glow of a city that is as alive at midnight as it's ever been at noon. You're looking through electric towers at a slate-grey sky, and then you're flying over pavement of that same colour, under the glow and past the embers of glaring traffic lights glaring, driving at a terminal velocity that makes all the marquee lights blur together and snatches of lettering jump out of the world outside your smokey windows..."CHERRY BABY". Epting puts you in the city unlike any artist I've had the pleasure of reading. It's a beautiful thing.

There is a cold side to Epting's city as well. It exists in the underground marble-tiled halls of agencies we don't know the names of...but all that is best left for you to discover yourself. We the readers have been granted privileged access to this world of intrigue, by a man I readily consider one of Comics' most gifted storytellers and one of his greatest collaborators. They have chosen to operate outside the guidelines of their chosen genre to give us a story we simply won't see coming. Spy aficionados will love the wild ride where nothing is what it seems. Feminist readers will appreciate the overturned gender roles. Artists like myself will look at and breathe a sigh of, "ooh...pretty". I won't say that it's the perfect comic, because that's ridiculous. I will say it's really damn good. In the words of agent Jefferson Keller, "Press that button that looks like the lighter...

...and hold on."