Weekly Crisis Quick Shot Comic Book Reviews for 04/23/08

Considering how few books came out this week, I probably should have had this with yesterday's reviews, but I've just been so run ragged lately, it's been difficult just making time to write the reviews. I'll try to make a more concerted effort, as the two reviews from yesterday was a pretty weak showing anyway you cut it, so I apologize for that.

I've had some comments concerning the whole "Quick Shot" name of the Thursday reviews and the non-quick aspect of said reviews. I've even joked about their length at times, but I've never bothered to change the name. I actually put out a call for names at one point way back when I started these when they were actually 200-300 word reviews. Now, it's more a mixed format of some short and some long, depending on how I feel about a book. I'm in no way attached to the name of these Thursday reviews, so, by all means, if you have any suggestions, feel free to throw them out there in the comments. I could even set up a poll or something if there's a few decent suggestions to choose from. I'd probably finally get around to making a banner for this article as well, since the major reason I never did was I didn't particularly like the name and was waiting to see if I'd change it.

Oh ya, I mentioned about setting up an archive a few weeks back that would have the individual reviews of all the books I've reviewed under easy listings by title. Just wanted to give a little update on how that's going. I've managed to get from the first set of reviews I did back at the end of July all the way up to November done. I had a different format for the earlier parts of the site, so I've added verdicts to each of the post and put them in the image/title/writer/artist format that starts all the reviews currently. I figure it should go much quicker from now on as I'm just catching up to where I switched to the more uniform format. I hope to have it done in early May, so look forward to that.

Heh, apparently, not even my intro can be "quick". Seeing as I've gabbed long enough, hit the jump for the rest of this week's reviews.

Quick edit: forgot to paste in the Ultimate Spider-Man review.

COUNTDOWN TO FINAL CRISIS #1
Story by Paul Dini
Story consulting by Keith Giffen
Script by Paul Dini
Art by Scott Kolins

I don't know if I should just be happy that this is finally over or if I should be livid over the fact it was a complete disaster and "ended", if you can call that an ending, with absolutely no resolution and a bunch of vague, I assume, Final Crisis dangling plotlines. Combined with all the tie-ins, which all proved completely pointless, I'm really soured on the whole weekly thing and am seriously considering not picking up Trinity, despite my love of Bagley's work.

This issue, picking up after the underwhelming and out of nowhere Orion "killing" Darkseid story from last week comes this epilogue of sorts that, while actually not a terrible issue, still has so many inconsistencies and plot holes that I can't even bring myself to like an otherwise decent issue, by Countdown standards.

Simply put, Kyle, Donna, Jimmy, Forager and Ray form a new team that will perform "border patrol" for the Multiverse in answer to Donna's groan inducing question of "who monitors the Monitors?". Yes, they managed to do a rip on Watchmen, which is an insult just by it now being referenced in a Countdown issue. On top of this, this new team consists of a useless human, a wannabe Wonder Woman, a guy who shrinks, a bug and a replacement Green Lantern (don't kill me Kyle fans) and they throw down an ultimatum to the all powerful Monitors, who just recently went toe-to-toe with Monarch's Multiversal army without even using a fraction of their powers, that they either toe the line and do what they say or they'll make them do it. How are these losers going to enforce anything on the Monitors and why didn't they just laugh their asses out of the building?

Only other noteworthy mess up was Black Adam being back to full power with no mention of how exactly that happened. Last I recall, he gave Mary all of his power, which reverted him to human form, and sailed off into the sunset. Then, Mary goes nuts, loses powers, regains them and turns evil again. Now she's picking a fight with him in the desert, where he laughs off her pathetic attempt at harming him and gives her a verbal beat down before leaving. I don't even care how he got the powers back, as it just means one good thing actually came out of this mess, but it doesn't make sense either.

Verdict - Complete Failure


MS. MARVEL #26
Written by Brian Reed
Art by Adriana Melo

Brian Reed needs a writing partner or tougher editorial handholding, as he's a great writer, but clearly lacks direction for his talents.

Take this issue, he does a great job with the sorting out of the "who's a Skrull" mess, gives us a nice bit of backstory for Agent Sum and has a funny, but skirting the line of in good taste, moment with Machine Man.

However, the plot falls apart as it just turns into random fighting, another Skrull shows up, gets killed easily and the Skrull Ms. Marvel just blurts out all their plans like a blubbering mess of a plot device. It could all be a fakeout, but past experience tells me it'll be otherwise.

Verdict - Check It



ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #121
Written by Brian Michael Bendis
Art by Stuart Immonen

It's issues like this that make me love Ultimate Spider-Man and wish Bendis could just write this three times a month instead of a couple other books he does. It very much reminded me of the old school Spider-Man stories that were 70% Peter Parker, his friends, trials and tribulations in high school and 30% Spider-Man messing everything up for him.

This issue fits that description to a tee and is a fun done-in-one story that wraps up the dangling Kitty / Peter school baby project. I could go into detail about what happened, but all you need to know is it's Peter, so the baby got destroyed in his battle with Omega Red.

All that is barely worth mentioning in comparison to the numerous joy inducing moments littered throughout the book. Where to begin? One, off the top of my head, is the return of Flash Thompson to the book, who hasn't been featured for a while, and his "I'M NOT SPIDER-MAN" routine. In fact, the entire guidance couciller scene was great, especially the end with Kitty Pryde's reaction to being singled out to explain mutants. Another great moment was at the end when Jameson wants Spider-Man to pay for the damages of the Omega Red fight. Immonen does an amazing job on the facial expression here and Jameson's reaction is pure gold as Spidey points his hand in the "your about to get webbed in the face" pose, as the scene fades to black.

I can't imagine anyone not liking this issue. It wasn't perfect or the greatest USM issue ever, but it's a damn good comic and a lot of fun to read and that's all you can ask from a book.

Verdict - Must Read


X-FORCE #3
Written by Chris Yost & Craig Kyle
Art by Clayton Crain

X-Force is really growing on me. I think it mostly has to do with the fact it's become the refugee for a) random New X-Men plot threads and b) a "bastion" for every B-list non-mutant villain to ever grace the pages of the X-Men. Considering I grew up reading 80's and 90's X-Men titles, people like Bastion, Cameron Hodge, William Stryker, Bolivier Trask and so on are all right up my alley in terms of hitting my fanboy buttons.

What? All those guys are dead? Well, seems Bastion is putting to use the techno organic virus and a bunch of dead bodies to get the old mutant hating gang back together. Oh ya, that Creed grave was for Sabertooth's father and former Bastion choice for president, Mr Graydon Creed, another mutant hater. So no retcon of Loeb's Wolverine arc yet.

Considering this was titled X-Force, the actual X-Force team barely played a part here aside from the prerequisite fight scene. It was mostly the badguys building their B-list version of the Sinestro Corps in preparation of what could be a really fun, if heavily nostolgia based, romp.

Verdict - Must Read (Check It if you have no idea who half the people I listed are)



YOUNG AVENGERS PRESENTS: THE VISION #4
Written by Paul Cornell
Art by Mark Brooks

I honestly forgot all about the Vision / Iron Lad / Cassie love triangle post Vision acquiring Iron Lad's thought patterns. It's just been so freaking long since the Young Avengers have been anything but background or cannonfodder for events.

Also, I've never really ever bought into the whole human loving a machine deal in science fiction / comics. Love is very much a biological reaction with little rational process and I just don't see a human falling in love with a machine that has no pheromones or what have you. I guess bias should also apply to aliens, but chicks with three boobs are hot (yes, that's a joke from Total Recall).

Another problem I have with this issue deals with the convenient loss of powers for each Cassie and Vision from one "special" gun from the AIM guys. If you can ignore such contrived plot devices and don't have any qualms about suspension of disblief concerning manbot love, I think this issue actually does a decent job with how little it had to work with.

I liked Cassie's attempt at defending the pro-Reg heroes' stance to Vision, but, considering she's in the Initiative and what's gone on in that title, I find it hard to believe she can still side with them after all the MVP madness and other shady things going on at Camp Hammond. It was just nice to see the whole team divided on registration addressed here. All-in-all, it was a decent one-shot that most YA fans will enjoy.

Verdict - Check It

Related Posts