Post-Crisis Comic Book Previews for 06/27/12

It's hard to believe it, but we're already closing out the month of June here at the Post-Crisis Previews. Time flies when you're reading a bunch of comics. I'm excited to announce that it appears to be the Atomic Robo show this week! We have the newest volume of the main series in The Flying She-Devils #1 and the latest iteration of the Real Science Adventures spin-off. There's probably a bunch of other comics, but I'm having a hard time thinking of them. Hopefully I'll figure it out before you see what's after the cut...

AMERICAN VAMPIRE #28
Written by Scott Snyder
Art by Rafael Albuquerque

“The Blacklist” begins here!
The next AMERICAN VAMPIRE epic begins here with part one of “The Blacklist.” 1950’s Hollywood is in the grip of “The Red Scare,” but in this twisted tale it’s more than just the political scene that runs red. Our gal Pearl and Skinner Sweet return to the town where it all started for them, only to learn that things have gotten much worse since they left This massive story with major revelations is NOT to be missed!

Grant: Okay, I'm pretty pumped for this issue of American Vampire. Notwithstanding the three-issue lapse that was "Beast in the Cave", American Vampire has been astoundingly good every single issue. And I feel like things have only been getting better of late. Both "Death Race" and the two issue "The Nocturnes" were a ton of fun.

ATOMIC ROBO: FLYING SHE-DEVILS OF THE PACIFIC #1
Written by Brian Clevinger
Art by Scott Wegner

It's called The Flying She-Devils of the Pacific. If there's another combination of English words that could better sell you on a comic book than those, it probably involves 'give you' and 'a million dollars.'

Grant: This is what it's all about as far as I'm concerned. Brian Clevinger and Scott Wenger's Atomic Robo is my absolute favourite thing in comics. I say it every single time a new issue comes out, but it only becomes more accurate with each and every comic I read. I'm excited for the Flying She-Devils of the Pacific for a variety of reasons. There's the fact that it looks to be a ballin' story about air pirates. Or that all the She-Devils are apparently loosely based on talented female webcomic artists. Or that Clevinger has called this story arc "a synthesis of everything that is an Atomic Robo tale". It makes for some rather high expectations, but coming in on the seventh volume of the character, I'm pretty sure Clevinger and Wegner will be able to pull it off.

ATOMIC ROBO - REAL SCIENCE ADVENTURES #3
Written by Brian Clevinger
Art by John Broglia, Scott Wegner, and Various

The Sparrow and Virginia Hall thwart Nazis! The Chinese military has a Robo up its own sleeve? Department Zero, the U.S. Government's own secret Anti-Helsingard unit in action! And a Bruce Lee / Atomic Robo team-up! The untold tales of Atomic Robo become un-untold at long last!
Grant: Um, should I just copy / paste what I wrote above? It's more Atomic Robo. This is A Good Thing. This anthology of bite-sized Robo stories started a little rocky, but I felt that the second issue was a much better package. Seeing as we're coming up on the third, I'm confident that the book's quality will only continue to improve. The fact that this issue will feature " eight pages of sky schooner action starring Tesla’s 19th century science team first alluded to way back in Volume 3" (thanks to Clevinger for that bit of detail!) doesn't hurt things either.

BATMAN, INCORPORATED #2
Written by Grant Morrison
Art by Chris Burnham

• This is the story of a man and a woman fighting over the heart and soul of their child. Unfortunately for the world, the man is BATMAN, the woman is TALIA AL GHUL, and the child is DAMIAN.

Grant: While the solicitation is somewhat lacking, I'm thrilled to have more of Grant Morrison's wonderful Batman epic. Batman, Incorporated #1 seemed to make it clear that Morrison is playing pretty loosely with the changes brought onto the DC Universe with the New 52, using things that work for his story and ignoring everything that doesn't. It may not make for incredibly smooth continuity, but Morrison has been planning this story way too long for a company-wide reboot to get in the way of his vision, and I'm happy to turn a blind eye to any continuity "lapses" that might arise from this series, as I'm sure most other readers will be. Oh, and let's not forget how amazing Chris Burnham is, because he's one talented dude.

FLASH #10
Written by Francis Manapul & Brian Buccellato
Art by Francis Manapul

• THE FLASH vs. THE WEATHER WIZARD!
• The Flash may survive…but will BARRY ALLEN?

Grant: My, that was a fast turn from the Weather Wizard. I could have sworn that he was trying to help out Central and Keystone cities in the Flash's absence? Am I just blanking on the last issue or is there some plot development that has yet to occur for that solicitation to make sense? Either way, this series seems to have regained its direction in the last few issues, which is good news to me, as I'll take most any excuse to continue buying any comic that features Francis Manapul's delicious art. Knowing that it's actually worth reading on top of that is a nice bonus.

PETER PANZERFAUST #5
Written by Kurtis J. Wiebe
Art by Tyler Jenkins

"THE GREAT ESCAPE," Conclusion
Paris isn't safe. The plan failed. A journey that began with promise comes crumbling down when the Nazi's take the capital and France plunges into occupation. With nowhere to run, the Lost Boys make their final stand.

Grant: Peter Panzerfaust has been a rather intriguing experiment in mashing together Peter Pan and World War 2, and I'd say that Kurtis J. Wiebe has succeeded far more than he has failed. Last issue saw an awful lot of danger and emotional moments for our Lots Boys, and I'm curious as to how Wiebe will tie this all together. I must also give some kudos to Tyler Jenkins for his great work on this book. I was somewhat leery of his art at the onset, but it's really grown on me, and I feel like Jenkins' artists instincts have served Panzerfaust well.

SCALPED #59
Written by Jason Aaron
Art by R.M. Guera

It’s the penultimate issue of the award-winning, critically acclaimed series and it all comes down to this: a Mexican stand-off like you’ve never seen before.

Grant: !!! Jason Aaron and R.M. Guera's Scalped is almost done! This book has been running for nearly 60 issues, and it feels like things have been turned up to eleven for the entire run. I don't rightly know what the heck will happen or how things will conclude, but I can tell you that it's going to be good. It's a little late to be jumping on to this series, but if you haven't been reading it, know that you should be running out to grab yourself all the trade paperbacks. It's definitely worth it, and soon you'll be able to read through the whole thing in one long go.

THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN: CENTURY #3
Written by Alan Moore
Art by Kevin O'Neill

The narrative reaches its cataclysmic conclusion in London 2009. The magical child whose ominous coming has been foretold for the past century has now been born and has grown up to claim his dreadful heritage. His promised age of unending terror can commence, the world can now be ended, and there is no League, extraordinary or otherwise, to stand in his way. The bitter, intractable war in Q'umar crawls bloodily to its fifth year, away in Kashmir a Sikh terrorist wages a holy war against Islam that must push the world into a nuclear holocaust, and in a London asylum there's a patient who insists she has all the answers.

Grant: I'll be honest with you, I'm not entirely sure why I'm buying this comic. I absolutely loved Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill's first few League of Extraordinary Gentlemen books. Volumes 1 and 2 were a heck of a lot of fun. But the Black Dossier got a little too involved in the idea of packing as many elements of public domain (and some still copyrighted) characters as it could. Unfortunately, this was often done at the detriment of the actual story. While Century started off somewhat more coherent, #2 was kind of a mess. It was hard to follow, lacking in direction, and easily the most self indulgent book of the series. The fact that he couldn't actually articulate that he was paralleling the Rolling Stones or Harry Potter didn't really help things. Frankly, the fact that I find it near impossible to read these stories without annotations is not a good thing. But I've read every previous story, and at 10 bucks for this title, there are worse uses of money. I guess.

That mini-rant out of the way, the fact remains that this week is chock full of Atomic Robo, and that makes me a happy camper. Are you excited for more Robo? Is there somehow other books coming out this week that are more interesting to you? I have my doubts, but drop a line in the comments to let me know if I'm mistaken!