Good King Leonardo has decreed
that we review this week three comic
books that vary in subject matter,
but have the
common element of dark themes in
their storylines. So let's see how
these three issues stack-up against
each other:
Shadowland-Daredevil:
The Man Without Fear #510
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Andy Diggle & Antony Johnston:
Writers
Marco Checchetto: Art
Matt Hollingsworth: Colors
Marvel's "Shadowland" event series
continues in the new issue #510
of Daredevil: The Man Without Fear.
Several weeks ago, I reviewed issue
#1 of the five-part Shadowland mini-series,
which established the basic premise
of Shadowland, in which Daredevil/Matt
Murdock becomes the new head of
The Hand, the ninja assassin organization
which he has opposed since day one
of the Daredevil series. Having
established a Hand headquarters
in his New York City Hell's Kitchen
neighborhood, Daredevil encourages
the area to decline into brutal
superhuman and civilian violence
as a demon possesses Matt, slowly
expanding its power over him and
shaping him into an evil head of
the assassin group. A page one narrative
in issue #510 brings the reader
up-to-date on the storyline so far,
explaining how good and evil characters
are assembling for further Shadowland
conflict in the wake of Daredevil
killing in cold blood his archnemesis
Bullseye.
This latest installment in the multi-issue
story arc initially centers on Daredevil's
friends Foggy Nelson and Dakota
North. The issue begins with the
pair surviving a brutal attack by
assassins masquerading as Hand ninjas.
The battle is a spin-off of the
city is cascading into brutal violence,
with civilian wannabes costuming-up
in mimick of both the good and bad
heroes. While costumed hero Black
Tarantula convinces Foggy and Dakota
to leave Town, a parallel sub-plot
follows several other Daredevil
characters, including Luke Cage,
Iron Fist and villain The Kingpin
brainstorming how to team-up and
take-down Daredevil as his demonic
possession intensifies. The issue
concludes with two dramatic climaxes.
In the first, Foggy and Dakota are
blocked from escaping the city and
dragged into a full-scale mob riot,
while in the second climax, Daredevil's
footsoldier White Tiger kills Black
Tarantula and dramatically announces
the ascent of the demonic possession
of Daredevil.
I enjoyed very much my first taste
of the Shadowland event series many
weeks ago, and wasn't disappointed
by this latest issue read of the
ongoing series. There's an awful
lot of fast action, significant
decisions and sharp dialogue happening
here, as the many characters maneuver
about Hell's Kitchen like good and
bad chess pieces in a high stakes
game of save-or-destroy civilization.
The creative team is very adept
at making it all seamless and naturally-flowing,
providing both entertainment and
credibility for the major changes
resulting from all of the action
and violence that are unfolding
for both the Daredevil and general
Marvel universes. What fascinates
me most about this series are the
significant deaths that are scattered
throughout the series. From the
previous death of Bullseye to this
issue's killing by White Tiger of
Black Tarantula, alongside some
major decisions on the part of both
good and bad guys, this series appears
to be making some permanent and
major shake-ups in the world of
Daredevil. Whether they really are
permanent or just reversible gimmicks
of this event series will remain
to be seen. But either way, there's
some very engrossing action, adventure
and dialogue unfolding within the
Shadowland series, well-worth checking-out
in this issue as well as within
the other various titles and issues
of Marvel's Shadowland event, all
available on the new issues shelves
at That's Entertainment.
Madame
Xanadu #26
Publisher: D.C. Vertigo Comics
Matt Wagner: Writer
Chris Siezullo: Art
DC's Vertigo imprint is up to issue
#26 of the Madame Xanadu title.
I've written very positive reviews
of previous issues of this Eisner
Award-nominated series, which began
with a classic 20-plus issue story
arc scripted by veteran Matt Wagner
with art by Amy Reeder Hadley and
Mike Kaluta. This comic book title
took Kaluta's 1970's-created mystic
character of Madame Xanadu and portrayed
her journey through time, from her
origin days as a wood nymph in the
realm of King Arthur to modern times
as a mystic seer based in New York
City. Along the way, the good Madame
interacted in key historical events
such as the French Revolution, and
surprisingly interacted with several
iconic DC Golden Age heroes, influencing
their lives in some very surprising
and entertaining ways. DC recently
announced the conclusion of the
title in the near future, based
on low sales in spite of its critical
acclaim.
This current issue #26 presents
a one-issue tale entitled "Lingering
Scent." Presented with fairytale-style
narrative and art, the plot features
a small boy named Sammy, who gives
off a horrible, gagging odor. Sammy
has amnesia and has no idea who
he is or where he came from. He
wanders the streets of New York
City, grossing-out everybody whom
he encounters. When he beds-down
each night in a vacant building,
he has strange fairytale dreams
of rescuing a princess and trying
to avoid a magical witch. Toward
the end of this tale, Madame Xanadu
arrives on the scene, explaining
that she's the witch in the dream,
and she's been searching for the
boy. She reveals to him that he's
the lost spirit of a dead, abandoned
kid and lays him back to rest in
the skeleton of his original body,
back in his abandoned building.
A comic book plot doesn't have to
be all light and happy in order
to be entertaining. However, the
darkness of the tale and the extremely
bleak ending aside, the quality
of this story stinks, pun intended,
of course, for three basic reasons.
First, its extremely creepy and
weird to present such a dark and
disturbing tale in little kid-oriented
art style and narrative. Secondly,
since the conclusion of the epic,
original multi-issue Madame Xanadu
story arc, all of these recent stand-alone
one-issue Madame Xanadu tales are
extremely weak on basic story dialogue
and logic. Its as if Matt Wagner
is just tossing unfinished story
concepts into the title, to keep
it going for a few issues before
the cancellation date. And third,
fans of Madame Xanadu would be disappointed
to see her character take such a
secondary, limited role in the storylines
of this issue and the previous few
issues.
Any one of these flaws alone would
have still given this issue a chance
at mixed success. But all three
combined result in a thumbs-down
review recommendation. Its sad to
see such a high quality title go
out on such a low quality note,
but on the bright side, those first
20 or so great Madame Xanadu issues
are all still available at That's
Entertainment, both in the back
issues bins and in reprinted softcover
compilation, so my positive advice
is for you to really enjoy the high
point of this wonderful title by
reading those issues.
X-23
#1
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Marjorie Liu: Writer
Will Conrad: Art
John Rauch: Colors
Marvel Comics is in the midst of
publishing several Wolverine-themed
ongoing comic book titles. A new
title in this inventory is X-23,
which is the name of a female teenaged
Wolverine clone. A very lengthy
narrative in the back of issue #1
brings the non-Wolverine reader,
such as myself, up-to-date on the
place of this young woman within
the Marvel comic book universe,
from her upbringing as a trained
child-assassin through many apparent
character twists and turns that
have led to this month's publication
of issue #1 of her own comic book
title.
Issue #1 is entitled "The Killing
Dream," and is part one of a multi-issue
story arc. The plot has two alternating
storythreads. In one sub-plot, X-23
a.k.a. Laura is having vivid and
disturbing dreams in which she visits
the original Wolverine in hell,
where his soul is apparently residing
in other title's of the Wolverine
comic book franchise. The bulk of
issue #1 focuses more on x-23's
personal struggles in trying to
fit-in with living in the society
of X-Men in the San Francisco area,
dealing with rejection from the
other teen X-Men and coping with
her resentment of being used as
an assassin by the adult X-Men.
By issue's end she's thrown into
another bloodthirsty situation,
which I won't detail here as a spoiler.
I haven't read any of the past year's
Wolverine/X-Men universe comics,
so I'm coming to this character
stone-cold with this issue #1. Reading
this comic was a positive experience,
though, in that the creative team
does a credible job giving us a
strong plot, interesting dialogue
and entertaining subject matter.
I was a bit confused by many of
the references to prior developments
in the X-Men universe among these
characters, and as an older fanboy,
I wasn't that much interested in
the heavy element of teen angst
and self-absorption that just radiates
off of X-23 and the other teen X-Men
in this title. But there's obviously
a demographic of the readership
base that can relate more to this
style of story, and for those readers,
this is a very entertaining and
interesting new title and story
universe. So a worthy thumbs-up
for this addition to the Wolverine/X-Men
franchise which highlights a female
teenaged member of the growing Wolverine
family.
Contest Winner Announcement!!!
Our latest contest challenge was for you to tell us what two current major league baseball teams evolved from the former Saint Louis Browns and Washington Senators. And our winner is (drumroll, please)...Kevin Browne, who correctly identified that the St. Louis Browns (no relation to Kevin!) relocated to Baltimore and became the Baltimore Orioles, while the Washington Senators actually had two reincarnations. The original Senators relocated in the 1960's and became the Minnesota Twins; major league baseball later established a second Senators team in D.C. which eventually also migrated, becoming the Texas Rangers. We would have accepted either Washington Senators submittal as sufficient, but hats-off to Kevin for correctly identifying both Senators teams.
New Contest Announcement!!!
Let's go back to our comic book-thinking roots for this week's contest. As you know, each May we all celebrate National Comic Book Day with the various comic book publishers issuing on the first Saturday in May special Free Comic Book Day editions of either established or new-and-upcoming comic book titles. Your contest challenge is to e-mail us at Gordon_A@msn.com and pitch to us what comic book title or titles you think should be included in next May's Free Comic Book Day group of publications. Our selected contest winner will receive a $10.00 gift certificate to That's Entertainment. The Bongo Congo Panel Of Contest Judges will also consider forwarding credible entries to the respective publishers for their consideration for next May's celebration.
That's all for now, so have a great comic book reading week and see you again next week Here In Bongo Congo!