Weekly Crisis Comic Book Reviews for 02/18/09

Meant to update yesterday with the reviews, but was off watching the Montreal / Washington hockey game until late. It was an amazing game, for those wondering. One of the best I've watched this year.

In other news, I managed to get an early viewing of the Wonder Woman animated feature and can confirm everything you've heard about it is true. This movie could be the comic book movie of the year for me and, as hard as it is for me to say this, I think it blew the JLA: New Frontier movie out of the water and I absolutely loved that movie. I'll see about doing up a review for the weekend, but go out and preorder this one right now if you haven't yet. You won't regret it.

Hit the jump for the reviews.

DARK AVENGERS #2
Written by Brian Bendis
Art by Mike Deodato

Bendis continue along with his Ellis impersonation in the second issue of Dark Avengers and I'm still very much enjoying this title. I know that opening line might sound condescending in regards to Bendis' abilities, but that couldn't be further from the truth.

In fact, I think this is some of Bendis' best work since his Daredevil days and it's easily his best non-street level work to date. He's managed to blend the dark humour of Ellis' Thunderbolts with the more mainstream appeal of the regular Avengers titles while still maintaining the dark humour and style that made Ellis' run such a great read.

Take this issue as an example. We have Bullseye picking up the Spider-Man-like joker role for the team, making quips like how, if he hadn't killed his mother, she'd be proud of his being an Avenger. Or when the Sentry, well, I'll just come right out and say it - when the Sentry rips the freaking head off of Morgana to "end" the threat in an instant. The book is filled with great moments like this and Mike Deodato's artwork only furthers the dark humour or intensity of these scenes.

However, this issue isn't without faults. Bendis reverts to his over dependance on narrative at times and I think the best example of this is the opening pages where Norman Osborn gives a speech to his first wave of HAMMER recruits. It's a two page spread and, I swear, there are more speech bubbles visible than actual artwork in the top two panels of the spread. I'm also not a fan of his Ares interpretation, who is little more than a meat headed Neanderthal, which, in some cases, can be, admittedly, funny. Also, what was up with Victoria Hand having a red stripe of hair and wearing some kind of Swordsman-like combat suit? She used to be black hair and office lady attire.

Verdict - Must Read. Despite some flaws, I'm still going to give this issue a Must Read verdict as I enjoyed it immensely and more than a few pages had me going, "OH SH--!". This isn't the most cerebral comic on the market, but it's definitely entertaining.


GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY #10
Written by Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning
Art by Brad Walker

While I usually love Guardians of the Galaxy, I found this issue simply went through the motions as Abnett and Lanning wrapped up the Prison 42 arc, gave control to Blastaar and then had the GotG team save both Starlord and Jack Flag.

The story simply goes from point A to point B with no real deviation from what you could expect and I feel like this storyarc was wrapped up this way so we could move on to the War of Kings event. My brief two line description above is all you really need to know about what happened in this issue and having the dialogue and pictures to go along with the explanation wouldn't really add much to the experience.

Now, what I've written so far makes it sound like this comic is absolutely horrible. That's just not true. The issue is simply forgettable. I read it, put it down and nothing from the issue stands out in my mind or left me wanting more. I liked it and there wasn't anything inherently wrong with the issue, but, like I said, it was forgettable, which is probably not the best reaction a 22 page, $2.99 comic book should be and something typically unheard of for this title.

In fact, the only really noteworthy thing to happen is that Jack Flag looks to be joining the increasingly large cast, of which we didn't even see anything from Drax or Quasar this issue, and only those enamored by his recent Thunderbolts appearance will probably care for.

Verdict - Check It. I don't want to give the book an Avoid It because I do love this title and stuff does happen in this issue - it's just completely predictable and felt like the writers were finishing up their chores moreso than telling us some thrilling prison break adventure. Hopefully things pick up next month.

Related Posts