I read a lot while I was visiting my sister. We spent a lot of time drinking tea and sitting on the back verandah doing not-a-lot else and, well, I couldn’t help myself. Most of what I read was pretty old, but then I’m usually several steps behind the main trends anyway. I’ve split this into three posts to try and keep them short.
Stormwatch
Ellis is still my favourite author. I love Transmetropolitan. I love The Authority. I love his various grumpy-old-drunken-men series. More on that later, but suffice to say, I find his style of cynical humor with some crudity thrown in wonderful. But yes, The Authority is the entire reason I bought and read the first four GN’s of his run and probably the reason I will keep them. Don’t get me wrong, Ellis’ Stormwatch run is excellent comics and good writing… I didn’t think anything could make me love Jenny Sparks any more, but this series has managed it. Saying all that though, it feels like something’s missing. The stories never really feel like they’re building up to anything, and it feels kinda scattered. The books feel irritate,d I guess, like the author is annoyed and couldn’t stand many of the characters… and I guess he did kill most of them off and start again, so I can’t be that far off.
Still, it gave some context to The Authority, I definitely laughed and enjoyed it enough for my money’s worth.
Wildstorm's seriously wicked old skool wonder StormWatch.
Fell (Vol. 1): Feral City
The cover looks amazing IRL, shit online.
Ellis doing what he does best: a story about a grumpy man being angry at people and saving the world. The art is appropriately horrific, yet works to convey surprisingly beautiful imagery of one hell of a fucked-up city. Definitely worth it for the snark and artwork alone, but on top of that I’m such a sucker for stories that use cityscapes themselves as a character in the story. The combination of all this makes this amazing.
Can’t wait to find more from this series, I NEED to keep reading this. Totally hooked.
The All New Atom Vol 2: Future/Past
I don’t really know how I feel about this series. Something doesn’t quite work for me. Maybe because the US college system freaks me out? Maybe because I’ve never given a shit about Ray Palmer or Ryan Choi before? Maybe because the Atoms’ power has just always seemed really freaking stupid? Not Simone’s best, in my opinion, it feels more like something where she is playing with concepts and styles. I did like the little dialogue boxes with various quotes of varying degrees of seriousness throughout the piece, but I suspect they broke the reading flow a little too much and, for me at least, took a lot away from the larger story.
Interesting, but didn’t really work for me. Probably won’t worry about getting much more.
Nightwing: Year One
The Disco-wing edition
I love Nightwing. I really like Dixon’s Nightwing most of the time. I even like the way his relationship with Bruce is now often portrayed as strained. I get why the story of their breakup needed retelling, even. Just… this smelt an awful lot like a bunch of WAHWAHWAHWAH MY PARENTS ARE DEAD AND MY FOSTER DADDY DOESN’T LOVE ME ANYMORE, and not a lot else. I don’t know. I’m probably just at the point in life where hot 20-something boys doing their whole coming-of-age and finding themselves isn’t interesting anymore. Call me when he’s secure in himself and having actual fun adventures or personal growth or something entertaining.
So basically, I enjoyed Nightwing #2 from the recent reset a HELL of a lot more. Check that out instead, or the earlier Dixon trades, if you have Nightwing urges.
