So my friend and comic book mentor Wayne Wise recommended I try Next Men a couple months back. This 1990s John Byrne series from Dark Horse Comics is solid. I bought the first 12 issues at my LCD for a few dollars (seriously, something like $8.00).
The stories are great, but often the letters pages are better. In Next Men #8, I discovered this classic letter written by none other than comic book mega-writer Brian Michael Bendis:
All I have to say is: ZING! Damn, Bendis. John Byrne was ripping on your hair way back before you even lost it!
I wonder: have these two creators ever met? They must have by this point. I hope they talked about this letter. Seriously.
P.S. If you haven’t already noticed, I changed the way I’m naming this column. The whole “Week whatever 2008″ system was just ineffective. How is anyone ever going to know what the post is about like that?
Don’t get me wrong — I love Brian Michael Bendis’ concept here. There’s a Skrull infiltration of planet Earth and now we have no idea who is a genuine superhero and who isn’t (though it seems pretty obvious that Tony Stark is legit right now).
But I’ll be damned if I didn’t start cursing by the time I got to the end of Secret Invasion #2. I paid $3.99 for 22 pages of story that took place in two and a half settings over the course of what… maybe 10 minutes? I was just getting into the issue when all of a sudden BOOP! it was over.
REALLY? That’s all I get? It’s a well-made comic, please understand that. But it’s no better than the pre-Secret Invasion New Avengers stories and I’m paying a buck more to see Mark Morales and Laura Martin overwork Lenil Yu’s pencils. Martin and Morales are great artists — they just have a tough time blending in well with Yu’s more abstract line work.
If there is one extremely frustrating flaw that I can say I dislike unequivocally, it’s the recap page. The design going on in the background looks like an eight-year-old tried to make a magic eye poster in Photoshop and failed miserably. The design is full of so many saturated colors that I can barely read the text on the page. Marvel really needs to do something about this. I mean, what is wrong with white letters on a black background? Since when was readability uncool?
Overall, this is a good issue. But the value just isn’t here. I appreciate the work of Bendis, Yu, Morales, Martin, and letterer Chris Eliopoulos — I did buy the damn issue after all. But if this thing doesn’t turn itself around by Secret Invasion #3, I can guarantee you that #4 won’t be making it home with me.
Not too much to say this week on the ComicShocker. I’ve been busy reviewing new comic books and getting the podcast ready for tomorrow. However, I will take the time to pass along two comic book Reads You Need:
Young Avengers Presents #1: Patriot - This solid gold comic book from last week comes from Ed Brubaker and Paco Medina. We follow Patriot, grandson of the first Captain America, Isaiah Walker. Eli is a young superhero that wears the American flag, but sometimes he can’t reconcile the reality of the United States with his feelings about social justice. They often seem to stand in contrast to each other. A good talk with the Winter Solider (in his last appearance before becoming the new Captain America himself) helps Patriot find his own interpretation of patriotism.
New Avengers Annual #2 - This awesome read is set to hit racks this Wednesday. I got a sneak peak because I get paid to review comic books every week, and let me tell you: this issue changes everything for the New Avengers. The team loses an important member, they potentially gain an Initiative recruit, and the least likely ally runs to Tony Stark. Not to mention a huge fight scene where someone kicks the bucket (it is comic books after all, so the bucket is only kicked temporarily). With art by Carlo Pagulayan, Brian Michael Bendis writes another shocker that almost slips out under the radar.
It’s the first ever AudioShocker Comic Pick two-way tie. Last week had a fairly horrid turnout but this week had copious amounts of awesome issues. It was so tough to choose the best that I had to make a compromise.
Mighty Avengers #6 ended the delayed first arc of this series with stellar results. Brian Michael Bendis and Frank Cho produced a wonderful team effort that reads like a dream and looks like a comics masterpiece. Standout moments include Cho’s visualization of Ultron’s antivirus efforts, the Wasp’s heroic moment, and the Sentry’s emotional revelation.
Kyle Baker’s second issue of Special Forces came out one month after the first and delivered an equally rousing story in only 22 pages. Frankly, I didn’t expect to see this series follow up so quickly with a part-two. I’m glad it did because Baker’s interpretation of a modern day war story is thoughtful and intriguing while never slacking in action.
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