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Review Date: 06/06/2010
Good King Leonardo has declared this
to be an All-DC Comics Week,
so let's see how the latest issues of three current DC titles
are faring:
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The
Brave And The Bold #34
Publisher: D.C. Comics
J. Michael Straczynski: Writer
Jesus Saiz: Art
Tom Chu: Colors
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DC's current incarnation of its esteemed "The Brave
And The Bold" title is up to issue #34. For
the past several months, the series has been one of
the most popular and talked-about DC new issue titles,
due to the extremely high quality writing that A-list
scribe J. Michael Straczynski has been bringing to
each and every monthly issue of the series.
I gave a very positive and enthusiastic review
several months ago to the issue that teamed-up Batman
with the popular 1960's counter-culture hero Brother
Power The Geek, and my fellow reviewer Dave LeBlanc
gave a very well-deserved thumbs-up to last month's
issue #33, which starred Wonder Woman, Zatanna and
Batgirl. So let's see what the creative team brings
to this month's issue #34, which teams-up The Doom
Patrol and Legion Of Super-Heroes.
Issue #34 is entitled "Out Of Time," and is part one
of a two-issue story arc, written by Straczynski with
art by Jesus Saiz and Tom Chu. This is a time
travel tale, which begins with 31st Century Legionnaire
members Saturn Girl, Lightning Lad and Cosmic
Boy barely escaping the destruction of Earth
by an unexpected black hole. The trio use their
time bubble vehicle to travel back to our present
day and enlist the help of The Doom Patrol to carry-out
a high-energy scientific procedure that will hopefully
destroy the black hole and re-establish the timestream
without the anomoly of the unexpected black hole colliding
with the Earth. There's a secondary sub-plot
throughout the issue that indicates that someone else
is mysteriously interacting with the action taking
place, as indicated by an unexpected artifact discovered
by the group within the time bubble vehicle.
The issue concludes with a bridge that indicates that
next month's installment will give the reader some
explanation of the mystery of who else is influencing
the activities within this time travel adventure.
J. Michael Straczynski hits it out of the ballpark
for about the fifth month in a row with this latest
B&B issue, for three reasons. First
is his skill in providing a script that breathes fresh
personality traits into these decades-old DC
superhero characters. While the Doom Patrol
have always had a fun sarcasm about them, the Legionnaires
have traditionally had the more cardboard personalities
of 31st century boy and girl scouts. Straczynski
doesn't alter these personality traits, but instead
wisely adds personality layers to these characters
that make them less wooden and both more real-world
human and fun. The result is to present these
decades-old DC superheros with more believable dialogue
and behavior, resulting in a very fresh and entertaining
modern comic book tale.
The second fun story element here is Straczynski expanding
the Doom Patrol's well-known sarcasm to include the
Legionnaires. Our three Legion members finally
let their hair down in this story, shedding the Eagle
Scout images and zinging each other with one-liners
and entertaining put-down's on par with The Doom Patrol.
And the third strong point of this story segment are
the two interweaving mysteries of this tale, namely,
the questions of why the anomolous dark hole destroyed
Earth, contrary to the known timestream, and who or
what is the mysterious unseen character obviously
on the scene with our team of action-adventurers.
After reading the entertaining and unexpected end-of-story
twists that Straczynski has delivered in each of his
previous B&B stories, I'm certain that next month's
issue won't disappoint and will provide a
surprising and extremely entertaining twist conclusion
to this two-part time travel story.
I know that with this thumbs-up review I'm just
preaching to the choir regarding those many folks
who are already fans of this current B&B title
run, so I'll conclude by reaching-out to those of
you who haven't read this title, lately: I'm
100% certain that you won't be disappointed by adding
this comic book to your monthly reading
list, so don't hesitate to start with this current
issue and stay on-board for the rest of J. Michael
Straczynski's iconic and hopefully long run of scripting
this series on a monthly basis.
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Batman:
Streets Of Gotham #12
Publisher: D.C. Comics
Paul Dini, Dustin Nguyen & Derek Fridolfs: Script
Dustin Nguyen: Pencils
Derek Fridolfs: Inks
John Kalisz: Colors
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One of the many new Batman titles
available these days, Batman: Streets Of Gotham, is
up to issue #12 this month. I've never read
this particular Caped Crusader title before, so let's
see how it holds-up in comparison to the many other
Batman titles currently out there. Issue #12
is scripted by Paul Dini, Dustin Nguyen and Derek
Fridolfs, with art by Nguyen, Fridolfs and John Kalisz.
Issue #12 is entitled "The Carpenter's Tale" and is
part one of a two-issue story arc. The plot
stars Jenna Duffy, a.k.a. "The Carpenter," a young housing
contractor who specializes in discretely constructing
and/or remodeling secret hide-outs per the design
specs of super-villains. Picture "This Old House"
for super evildoers and you get an idea of Jenna's
profession. I first came across Jenna in
an issue of "Gotham Sirens" a few months ago, where
she wowed the Gotham Sirens with an amazing Extreme
Home Edition make-over of an old house into a super
secret lair for that crew.
The main plot in this issue has Jenna hired by "The
Broker," real estate agent extraordinaire for Gotham's
villains, to reconstruct an old warehouse for "The
Director," a nutty movie director villain who plans
to film Batman's death as his latest cinematic masterpiece.
Jenna designs a lair full of traps to ensnare the
Batman, then by issue's end becomes the captive bait
by which The Director plans to lure Batman to the
building. A second plotline features a
young boy named Colin interacting with that crazy
little Robin kid who's the son of Bruce Wayne and
Ras Al Ghul's daughter. A second nine-page story
in this issue stars Colin, who is actually the runaway
(and apparently super-powered) son of Kate Spencer,
the costumed crimefighter from the Manhunter
comic book title.
This is a very entertaining addition to the wide universe
of current issue Batman titles. The three-man
writing team clearly went to great lengths to give
us a story blending equal portions of action, drama
and most importantly, a campiness reminiscent of the
best camp elements of the old 1960's Batman television
show. Hence the fun of the wacky characters
associated with the Gotham underworld with names like
The Carpenter, The Broker and The Director.
Yet its not too goofy, as the world of Gotham presented
in this comic book is still rooted in the well-known
Dark Knight noir elements. I also just love
the idea of a contractor who specializes in doing
home remodeling work for bad guys. Apparently
even Batman finds that interesting, as its clear
from an encounter early in this issue between
Batman and Jenna that the Bat Guy knows all about
her line of work.
So another thumbs-up recommendation to read and enjoy
this very creative comic book that adds some new and
entertaining elements to the wide and varied world
of the Batman universe.
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Jonah
Hex #55
Publisher: D.C. Comics
Justin Gray & Jimmy Palmiotti: Writers
Vicente Alcazar: Art
Rob Schwager: Colors
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DC's current Jonah Hex title
run is up to issue #55 this month. With the
very upcoming release of the Jonah Hex movie, it seemed
timely to return to the comic book for a review this
week. I had given a positive review to an issue
reviewed last year. The title has been scripted
for some time now by the team of Justin Gray and Jimmy
Palmiotti, who are joined in this issue by the art
team of Vicente Alcazar and Rob Schwager.
The current issue is entitled "The Brief Life Of Billy
Dynamite," and stars a ten-year-old boy named (you
guessed it) Billy Dynamite. Early in the plot,
the kid witnesses his saloonkeeper parents killed
by a gang of outlaws who invade the bar. Our
anti-hero Jonah Hex arrives too late to prevent the
murders, but not too late for the kid to grab Hex's
gun and slaughter the bandits. Flash-forward
a few years and the now ten-year-old is running the
bar and dynamiting anyone who gets in his way.
When a new gang of outlaws threatens the kid
he strikes back, resulting in the gang wiring the
boy with dynamite and blowing the him into
pieces. The story ends with Jonah Hex hunting
down the crew and killing them all to avenge the boy.
I'm not sure whether its time to cancel this title
outright or just sweep-out the creative team
for a new group of writers and artists, but one of
the two options is mandatory at this point.
My guess is that Gray and Palmiotti are just burned-out
on this title. In place of a true, fleshed-out
storyline, the writers give us a very thin story idea,
the concept of a bloodthirsty avenging kid, and cover
this premise with layer-upon-layer of just-plain-stupid
slaughter and gore. The whole mess sinks below
the genre of western into a puddle of blood
'n guts hack writing and art. Granted that Jonah
Hex is an anti-hero western with a heavy dose of violence,
but this waste of comic book paper is not only ridiculous
but also just plain not entertaining. So
my advice is to skip this dead-on-arrival failed excuse
for a western and instead get your fix of western
genre comics with one of the many quality western
comic issues available throughout the extensive back
issue bins at That's Entertainment.
On a final note, let's just hope that the anticipated
Jonah Hex movie is of better quality, although the
word in the shopping aisles last Saturday at That's
Entertainment was that the film is also rumored
to be a dud.
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New
Contest Announcement!!!
We haven't received any entries
to last week's contest, which challenged you to e-mail us
with a proposed futuristic item that you think should be
included in a comic book or fantastic story, so we'll keep
that contest open until our next column, in the hope of
getting one or more prize-worthy entries.
In the meantime, since trivia
contests are more popular amongst our readers, let's open-up
a parallel trivia contest. Your challenge is to e-mail
us at Gordon_A@msn.com with the correct answer to
the following trivia question: what three Massachusetts
towns are named after foreign countries? Here's a
hint: two of the three are in Central Massachusetts, really
not that far from Worcester. And no, the town of Florida,
Mass. is not one of them, Florida is a state, not a country!
As always, in the event of more than one correct entry,
our winner of the $10.00 prize gift certificate to That's
Entertainmnet will be chosen via a roll of the dice.
That's all for this week.
We're on vacation next week, so Here In Bongo Congo
will return with new reviews and contest challenges
in two weeks. So have two great comic book reading
weeks and see you then back Here In Bongo Congo!
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