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Review Date: 05/22/2009
It's "Back To The Fifties Week" here in Bongo Congo!
King Leonardo has apparently been watching The History Channel
of late, and has
proclaimed that this week we review the following two comic
books with stories set back in the decade of the 1950's:
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Booster
Gold #20
Publisher: DC Comics
Keith Giffen: Writer
Pat Olliffe: Penciller
Norm Rapmund: Inker
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DC's Booster Gold comic line
is currently up to issue #20 of the title. Added
to DC's superhero line-up back in the 1980's, Booster
is John Michael Carter, a time traveler who journeyed
back to our time with his robot assistant Skeeter
to gain fame and superhero celebrity glory.
I was always annoyed by the original portrayal of
this character as a vainglorious egomaniac, and was
curious to see how DC is characterizing him these
days in his own comic title.
These days, Booster Gold travels through the time
continuum with Rip Hunter, Time Master to address
anomolies that are occuring in the aftermath of the
52 comic series. Issue #20 is Chapter One of
a new story arc entitled "1952 Pick-Up." While
Hunter makes repairs to their time vehicle out in
the timestream, Booster makes a side timetrip to the
year 1952, hoping to enjoy a little "Happy Days,"
R&R, a la Fonzie-style. Instead of arriving
at the nearest diner, Booster lands smack in the middle
of a Nevada desert military facility, where he spends
most of this issue embroiled in a Cold War thriller
involving Soviet double agent military scientists, a
CIA-type spy group and DC's Suicide Squad.
I was very happy to see that DC has evolved Booster
Gold in 2009 by toning-down his overinflated ego and
giving him a less annoying, more standard superhero
personality. Veteran writer Keith Giffen guest scripts
this issue, and has crafted a very enjoyable spy thriller
in which Booster deals with multiple factions maneuvering
around 1950's Cold War secret missile research and
testing in the Nevada desert. I particularly
enjoyed a three-page sequence toward the end of the
story in which Booster returns to Rip Hunter in the
timestream, who interprets for him the consequences
of his visit to 1952 on the various people that he
interacted with.
I want Booster Gold fans to know that I'm not criticizing
the happy-go-lucky features of this character's personality;
instead, I always wished that he was balanced by
having a more responsible superhero side to
his personality. As such, kudos to the
creative team here with not only evolving this character
but still embodying him with a less gagging level
of wackiness. Writer Giffen blends a comfortable
level of wackiness into the story with an excellent
final two pages to the issue, in which Booster and
Rip Hunter make a quick return visit to 1952 so Booster
can briefly indulge in his "Happy Days/Fonzie" fantasy.
So all-in-all, an enthusiastic thumbs-up for a very
enjoyable comic book as well as an equally enjoyable
updating of this 1980's DC superhero character.
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Ignition
City #1
Publisher: Avatar Press
Warren Ellis: Writer
Gianluca Pagliarani: Artist
Digikore Studios: Colors
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Well-known comic writer Warren
Ellis's latest comic title is issue #1 of a five-issue
mini-series entitled Ignition City. The veteran
Ellis is well-known for a wide-range of comic titles
and subjects, including the very popular Planetary
and Transmetropolitan comic lines that originated
in the late-1990's.
Ignition
City is set in an alternate-reality world where adventurers
fly around in banged-up looking small rocket ships. The
setting in issue #1 is February of 1956, where
explorer Mary Raven receives notice in Berlin
that her estranged pilot father has died in Ignition
City, an artificial island spaceport described as
"Earth's last remaining spaceport". Mary flies
her small personal rocketship to the port and
begins the task of finding her father's remains at
the spaceport and speaking with folks who knew
him in order to learn the details of his life and
the manner in which he died. In the second half
of the issue we are also introduced to several burnt-out
characters who hang-out in and around a seedy bar
at the port.
This is a decent enough comic book concept gone very
bad for two reasons. First, the "seedy spaceport
full of rough characters" theme is a science fiction
and comic book concept that's been so overdone
and beaten to death over the last fifty years that
a writer needs a very special and fresh take on it
in order to be even remotely relevant and entertaining
in the year 2009. Warren offers nothing of the
sort in issue #1. The beat-up support characters
here just have a tired feel to them and are basically
disgusting.
The
second and much more significant flaw here is
the very jumbled and confusing alternate world that
Ellis attempts to create in this comic. The
only thing that's clear is that the society differs
from our world in that folks tootle-around in the sky
and into space in tiny one-person rocket ships.
There are intriguing snippits of partial explanation
regarding how this version of post-World War II 1950's
society came to be, but they are all contradictory
to each other to the point that nothing makes sense,
here. Is this world the result of an alien invasion,
the Earth adaptation of alien technology, implementation
of World War II-era military rocket designs, etc.?
I couldn't tell, and given how the story world seemed
glued together from so many contradictory bits and
pieces of ideas, I was left with a feeling of just
not caring about any of what Ellis was trying to pull-off
with this comic.
So while I'm a big fan of Warren Ellis's body of work,
I recommend that the good comic reader take a pass
on this jumbled mess and check the That's Entertainment
back issue bins or graphic compilation section for
one of his more respectable comic efforts.
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Ongoing Contest Reminder!!!
Only one more week remaining for
submissions to our current contest, in which we ask you
to tell us where That's Entertainment was located in Worcester
before its current Park Avenue location, as well as you
telling us a fond memory of visiting the original store.
My fellow reviewer Dave LeBlanc of course remembers the
first location well, and offers the memory that the store
was "small but had friendly people and all the comics
you'd want to buy. I also rememebr the floor was
not level-don't know why I remember that!" Come
to think of it, Dave, you're right, the floor wasn't level
in some places! So e-mail us no later than Wednesday,
May 27 at Gordon_A@msn with
your entry-first prize is a $10.00 gift certificate to
That's Entertainment!!!
Have a great Memorial
Day Weekend and comic book reading week, and see you here
again next week (Same Bat Time, Same Bat Channel!) Here
In Bongo Congo!
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