Monthly (Comic) Book Club - April - Invincible14292
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| Fresh from his new animated series on Amazon Prime, Invincible! Wk1 (4/5-4/11): Invincible #1-4     Wk2 (4/12-4/18): Invincible #5-8 Wk3 (4/19-4/25): Invincible #9-11 Wk4 (4/26-5/2): Invincible #12-13 Discussion topic ideas: * Thoughts on the story or artwork * Details in the story, artwork, or presentation * References to outside events or other works of fiction * Making of/Behind the Scenes details * Adaptations into other media * Editions you will be reading from * Items in your collection pertaining to this week’s selection |
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 If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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| I'll be reading a run-of-the-mill TPB, no extra goodies. But I've also been watching the show on Amazon Prime. They've released four episodes so far, and the last one for season 1 (I believe there are only 8 episodes) will come out on Friday the 30th. Good timing for comparisons to this month's reading! | ||
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| I’m refusing to get any more streaming services aside from Netflix and Hulu so I’m missing out on Invincible (and The Boys) unless Amazon ever decides to release them on blu ray. I ended up picking up the slightly oversized Ultimate Collection hardcover that collects the three storylines we’re reading this month. I think it was like $15 shipped.  |
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| Alright, whipped through issue one today. It felt like a very quick read. The first issue really felt like it wanted to acknowledge classic super hero comics while doing something a little different. The first page after the opening splash hit you with its panel layout, each one outlined in bold lines and big booming sound effects gave it a very classic feel. However, once we’re past the cold open it becomes pretty clear this isn’t your standard origin comic. Maybe the fact that Mark is holding a comic the first time we see him out of costume is a signal that the writer is very much aware of the tropes in comic books because this book seems to sidestep a lot of them. We learn quickly that Mark’s father is a superhero. We don’t quite know everything about him. We know he can fly and has Superman-like invincibility. We also learn that giant dragons wrecking major cities don’t seem to be especially big news. Gone is the traumatic origin. Mark just one day realizes he has powers. Maybe we’ll see something later on that sheds some light on Mark’s upbringing but he seems to have expected it to happen at some point and doesn’t seem too surprised. The closest analog I could think of would be like a mutant in the marvel universe except there is no tragedy either leading to the powers or as a consequence of them. Gone is the powers-learning montage. Again, Mark seems to know what to expect and pretty much succeeds in using them right away. Gone, too, is any real call to heroism. Once Mark has his powers he just starts super-heroing. A couple of tropes that were kept though were the hero putting the school bully in his place once he’s gotten his powers, though Mark wasn’t the target of the harassment, as well as the shoddy homemade starter costume, though that was done away with fairly quickly. Clearly there is a bit of genre subversion going on. The writer expects that the reader is well familiar with comic book origins so it seems to avoid retreading ground that the reader is all too familiar with. Because of this approach it doesn’t so much feel like we’re watching someone become a superhero so much as we’re getting an introduction out of the way so we can get on with their adventures. It kind of made the events in this issue feel a bit insubstantial but maybe that’s why they had the cold open, so we get a glimpse of what’s to come and stick around long enough to get there. I am a little on the fence about the artwork. The art style is very clean and very bold but because it is so minimal it can easily go from looking good to looking bland. The opening splash page, for example, feels fairly dynamic and the compositions of the following frames keep the action interesting. But the cover is bland as all hell. I think the use of yellow in huis suit catches and directs your eye but there is very little interesting to see once they get there. His pose against a monochromatic background just feels lacking in energy and the use of only 5 or 6 colors makes it feel very flat. It was only after looking at the cover for a while that the impact cracks in the wall and the shadow looming across the cover came together to suggest that he was possibly fighting someone powerful and dangerous enough to hurl our hero into a wall. And I just thought to myself that the idea should be more interesting than what we’re seeing. So for a first issue, I thought it was okay. The genre awareness was refreshing but the fact that it does so at the expense of setting up any conflict makes it feel fast and disposable. Hopefully in the second issue we’ll begin to see some direction but I wonder what would be lost if we would’ve just started there. |
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If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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| I had some intensive code running today, so I knocked out a few issues. The situation reminds me (as many things do) of an XKCD cartoon https://xkcd.com/303/ . #1: I didn't find the art flat, per se (Phil Noto does a fair amount of X-Men work, and he is what I think of when I think flat), but it isn't my favorite. It feels like people's faces have extra lines, and then sometimes they're missing lines, like Omni-Man doesn't have a nose when he zooms in to dinner. The Amazon cartoon is pretty faithful to the book so some of the differences stand out (I don't think there are any spoilers here since we're reading the book). The cartoon has much more of Mark practicing amongst his early trips out in a costume. And his parents are much more interested when he says that he gets his powers than they are in the book. There is a bigger difference with Derek, the bully at school. I'll have to see how that plays out in future issues. For the book overall, I wouldn't say I was blown away. But I've come around to the idea that you have to read a few issues, maybe an arc, to decide if a book is any good or not (and the same for TV; hard to know if something will be good just from the pilot). So on to #2. |
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If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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| #2 introduces more teen superheroes (literally The Teen Team). They, and the Mauler, both show up in the cartoon but are introduced differently. It's kind of funny that Mark is worried about people finding out his secret identity at school (maybe jokingly?), but he was just flying around in his pajamas the night before. Maybe it's a sign of his immaturity and/or overconfidence, like when he asks "is it always this easy?" after they defeat Mauler again. Maybe it's because the cartoon is doing hour-long-ish episodes, but it feels like the book is on a slow burn. On the other hand, they have introduced Mark, Mark's family, another super-team, and a couple of villains. They even explained that Mark and his dad have powers because Mark's dad is an alien. So maybe it's the cartoon. From a conceptual standpoint, the Viltrumites' decision to actively move along other planets is interesting. I always think of Star Trek and the Prime Directive: don't interfere with the development of a planet/culture/species. The Viltrumites explicitly go the other way, picking out promising planets and helping them develop. |
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If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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#3 gives us a little more detail on secret identities, as Mark's dad is a novelist. He still makes Mark work so that he builds character. In the cartoon I think Mark said he was working so that he can buy his comic books, but maybe that's part of character building  Mark is kind of playing it cool (or trying to) with Eve but it's pretty obvious he's interested in her. But, she's dating her teammate Rex Splode. Classic teen dating stuff. Classic any romance stuff, really. Invincible seems to be doing basically a fight per book, and here it's a very brief alien invasion, but along the way Mark and his dad make time for a little bonding time. Omni Man is a much more powerful and experienced hero than Invincible, which he shows off pretty casually. We do get a flash of his temper, though, when he tells the aliens to 'get off MY planet' and looks enraged even when they do. Mark's mom certainly acts like she's seen it all. The aliens come back and pull Mark's dad through a portal, and she's just happy to get more pork chops. |
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If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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| I found #4 more compelling that the previous issues, maybe because it was a bit more serious. There were still jokes, obviously, but with Mark's mom being more open and the whole human-bomber thing, it at least struck me as more serious than the previous issues. Although on the last page we see Mark's mom going back to putting on the brave face after hearing about her superhero family's day. I did find Mr. Hiles' background pretty confusing though. The first four issues covers a few months of time, and we saw his son Derek earlier (unless I'm confused). So in four months or less his son died, he lost his job, he got divorced, and he got a new job as a high school teacher? And was so put off by it all that he figured out how to make human bombs and start kidnapping kids? That's a tight timeline! I also don't know why he was talking about Mayan mythology if he's the physics teacher. Maybe he was subbing? Seems like a lack of attention to detail though. That said, Hiles' confession coming about 45 seconds too early is a fun twist on the monologuing villain trope. Apparently he isn't as smart as Ozymandias. I do find it a little funny how everyone just assumes that Mark and Eve are dating. I guess that's what happens when high schoolers start spending a lot of time with each other. The book is still well behind the cartoon in terms of plot (I get to watch episode 5 tonight!), but maybe I'm getting into it. |
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| I found issue #2 far more interesting right off the bat and an improvement in every way over issue #1. I am still agreeing with my past self and think this issue is a better starting point for the story. Of course we’ll have to see how the rest plays out but this one gets us right into the action must faster and you can start to see threads where things can develop. The cold open being immediately related to the character we are getting to know worked a lot better for me than the random guy exploding we got at the beginning of issue 1 which we only call back to at the end of this issue. I’m tempted to swap the openings of the two issues to see how that affects the flow of everything. Maybe because I found the issue more interesting, I felt the art had a better variety. Actually...taking a quick peek back at the first issue, no. The first issue was definitely a lot more monochromatic with the school, the house, and the exterior all having this very similar orange-to-tan color scheme that lost my interest pretty quick. In this issue, we start off with Mark’s father in that same drab color scheme I mentioned above for a single image before we are getting scenes in space, Utopic alien civilizations, developing alien planets. Even though it is just the opening, I feel the issue as a whole has a much more interesting range of color choices and more depth to some of the art, like some of the shadow work and silhouettes. Quote: Originally Posted by xkonk I’m not too familiar with Noto’s interiors but I love his covers. But even something like this from Cable, I could understand being called flat still has more subtlety and dimension than we’ve seen so far.  I actually remember when Invincible first came out and they were giving away promo CD roms at SDCC. I honestly did not know it was a comic at first. I thought it was like a flash animation or something. |
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If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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| Noto's interiors are essentially the same style as his covers. He's pretty distinctive. Maybe 'flat' isn't the right term, and I've grown to like it a bit, but there's something about his style that makes me think of it that way. Maybe it's thin lines, or the color palette? Perhaps desaturated is what I'm looking for. | ||
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Wk2 (4/12-4/18): Invincible #5-8    |
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| I’m trying to wrap my head around this book’s style as it very much seems that it is being intentionally unconventional as it throws a lot of comic book tropes at the reader but doesn’t really resolve them the way you would expect a comic book to, most often minimizing them to the point of triviality. In this issue we get Mark in conflict with his boss. The down on his luck hero struggling to balance super-heroism with paying bills is classic comic book conflict but here Mark just quits. He worries briefly about explaining it to his dad who ends up just suggesting he quit anyways since they don’t need the money. Then there is the alien invasion, a staple in science fiction. Normally you would expect a massive alien invasion to be a story spanning several issues but here it is introduced and mostly resolves itself in a few pages. It is very possible that there may be callbacks to all these seemingly minor speed bumps we’re seeing. Time will tell. The actual story slowly unveiling seems to be the missing students waling up in shopping malls with bombs strapped to their chests. It is mentioned that there have been two bombing so far. We saw one in the previous issue, another in this one, and a flash forward of another in issue one but no idea who or why is doing it. |
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| So, coincidentally, Comixology is having a sale on Invincible comics at the moment So issue wraps up what I guess you could call the first storyline but it’s kind of strange in that what little overarching story there was was pretty much resolved without Invincible. His major contribution was flying Mr Hiles to a remote location to safely explode but finding the actual bomber just kind of happened in the background by other people. The book so far has been entertaining but it is still difficult to figure out what I should be caring about since again so much is thrown around and dismissed even quicker. Robot just figures out the bomber using his second OS while engaging in an unrelated fight we know nothing about and isn’t acknowledged by any of the characters. There was no effort to save Omni-Man, just a quick rundown during dinner. Even the “worried loved ones at home” is mostly side-stepped as Mark’s mom is pretty nonchalant about everything, except for getting lost in other dimensions. We’ll have to see if that is actually characterization or if it is just a funny quirk they just threw in. The relationship between Mark and Sam is actually what seems to be the most serious, as far as ongoing storytelling is concerned, in that it at least seems to carry over from issue to issue and escalates, though in unexpected ways. I found it kind of funny that their changing spot was used as a make-out spot by another couple and seeing them there could surely fuel rumors later on. Quote: Originally Posted by xkonk I think you are confused. We do see Derek briefly in issue 1 speaking with Mr Hiles but Derek is not Mr Hiles’ son. Derek is a fourth bully he kidnaps to turn into a bomb like other students like the ones that drove his son to suicide. I don’t believe we ever see Mr. Hiles’ son so the Invincible #1 starts AFTER his son’s suicide, losing his job, and getting a job as a teacher. We’re not even sure how long he has been a teacher before we see him for the first time. As far as Mr Hiles talking about Mayan Fables, I actually don’t think that’s meant to be him and instead it’s the story and the art not making it clear that a scene change has occurred. Immediately before the Mayan fables scene, Mark tells Sam that they’ll see each other in Mr Hiles class later but that Mark will keep his eyes open for anything suspicious in the meantime. The Mayan fables page is supposed to be a that meantime, a different class, the joke being that Mark is bored to death and clearly not paying attention to anything. Aftter that we’re in Mr Hiles’ class with Sam and Mark explaining that he didn’t notice anything while the audience knows he was too bored to actually look. So, for a first arc I would say the book was entertaining but nothing really has gained traction as an emotional hook because everything so far has been resolved quickly and effortlessly, often without the involvement of our protagonist. While the style is unique and this opening “arc” was entertaining and helped introduce the characters and the world, I’m not sure an ongoing story would keep my interest if it doesn’t build up the stakes and our hero’s involvement a bit more. |
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Monthly (Comic) Book Club - May - Sandman: Preludes & Nocturnes Sandman #1-8 Wk1 (5/3-5/9): Sandman #1-2 Wk2 (5/10-5/16): Sandman #3-4 Wk3 (5/17-5/23): Sandman #5-6 Wk4 (5/24-5/30): Sandman #7-8 |
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If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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| Slow day today so I'm hoping to work through the week's reading. I liked #5. It's a (completely?) self-contained story that really could happen in any character's life. Mark gets a call that someone in space is coming and he has to go stop the bad guy. They punch around for a bit until Mark asks what the deal is, and it turns out it's a misunderstanding. On the one hand, the story is kind of weightless, like the fight (ha!). On the other hand, you can read a lot into it if you want to. Mark (the new, young hero) is willing to talk and learn and problem solve, especially since he can't quite punch his way right through the problem. His dad (the old, set-in-his-ways hero) never picked up on that despite having fought the guy four or five times. It reminds me of the Unbeatable Squirrel Girl TPB I have, where she spends as much time, or more, figuring out why the 'bad guy' is doing a bad thing and trying to fix it as she does punching someone. It also makes a little more of an explicit contrast between Mark and his dad, which is front and center in the cartoon but hasn't been as prominent in the book so far. |
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If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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| Issue #6: I really enjoy the Magnum Pi shirt. That was about my favorite part of the issue, I guess. The thing about William and his name was weird; I'm not sure if it was supposed to be funny. I do like the body language that Walker uses in the book. Like every time that Nolan zooms over to grab his wife, his body is at an angle even when he's paused to pick her up. Otherwise it feels like a set-up issue. We meet a mysterious person missing his powers (Black Samson) who maybe steals a super-suit, and there's some kind of cyborg who seems to have blown himself up on purpose. And William finds out that Mark is Invincible. The copies I'm reading have a letter page, and back in number 4 they said that the series had done well enough that they would be releasing a TPB with those issues. I wonder if they didn't plan a whole bunch past #4, because 5 was pretty standalone (although I liked it) and #6 feels like a lot of set-up, almost like a second first issue. Established series seem to work those things in along with an ongoing plot a bit better. |
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If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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| I don't want to spoiler anyone for issue 7, so I'll wait until @dielinfinite gets there. But I will say that I much preferred the cartoon version of this issue. | ||
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| I really liked issue 5 and I agree that it definitely reminds me of the Unbeatable Squirrel Girl series. I think the story has about as much weight as anything else in the series so far, which isn’t much but it was well written and amusing. One thing I do appreciate is that each issue goes by very quickly. The stories move at a brisk pace so even though I have this ongoing criticism about the lack of significance to what we’re reading, at the very least they do not overstay their welcome. I wonder how much of the stuff we’re seeing in passing will be called back to later on in the series when the stories have more gravitas to them. |
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| Issue 6 definitely felt like things were stepping up in terms of seriousness. The scene with Samson was lit for a very dramatic effect, Robot is moving on to bigger and better things (though I don’t care enough about him as a character at this point for the news to invoke any kind of feeling), and of course the issue ends with sam returning to the Teen Team base and immediately becoming distraught. There were also a few callbacks which gets me thinking that maybe the story is finally starting to build up and develop the world instead of just quickly running through a situation and forget about just as fast. We hear from Mark’s dad a few more details about his abduction back in issue 3. Not fully developed yet but more detail than we had at the time. I was a little confused about the bag of trash landing in England and then I remembered that Mark discovered his powers when he threw a bag of trash from his job into the sky. It is a little weird in that it apparently took the bag weeks, if not months to come back down. If he threw it THAT hard then I’d imagine it just would’ve been thrown into space. Anyways, the scene with the robot was a little confusing, mostly because of the art, I think. I wasn’t quite sure what happened. Like @xkonk, I thought he blew up but what he did was impale himself on the compass sculpture. You see its feet hanging and blood oozing down the sculpture and a very small image of the cyborg impaled in silhouette below that frame. What makes it confusing is that you only see the full sculpture three pages before the event happens. Once the cyborg appears the frames are very tightly focused on it so you don’t get a good idea of the physical space around it. Once we get to the page where it kills itself the sculpture is pushed far to the edge of the frame to the point that it is mostly ignored. In the frame where he leaps onto the spike, the spike seems more of a foreground element with the cyborg in the mid-ground. Once he impales itself the combined silhouettes of the robot, sculpture, and the sculpture makes it a bit difficult to decipher what actually happened. The Charlie Brown cameo was kind of funny, though. I also thought the whole thing with William’s name was a bit strange. The story spent what seemed a lot of its text on it, especially for a character we’ve really only seen in passing up to this point. |
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| @xkonk I’m finally there lol So most of this issue is introducing us to the often mentioned but never seen Guardians of the Globe, which turn out to basically be the Justice League complete with a funny dig at Aquaman. Although, given all these superheroes it makes it a little weird that (according to Mark in issue 5) people on Earth don’t really believe in aliens After seeing introductions for each member where they are called to a high-priority meeting, comprising almost the entirety of the issue, all members are suddenly and brutally murdered...by Omni-Man!  Omni-Man being one of the few characters we’ve actually spent some time with, this FINALLY feels significant as we wonder why. We just spent the whole issue watching these characters doing good only for Omni-Man to brutally wipe them out, immediately painting him as the bad guy. Has he always been secretly evil? Does it have anything to do with his abduction? Does his wife know? I know I described it as “brutal” twice in as many paragraphs but I think it bears mentioning that this is the first time we’ve seen violence like this in the series. Even in a series with exploding teenagers and impaled robots, the comic has never shown any explicit violence and with its bright color pallet the book started off with an “all-ages” feeling so seeing the good guys getting run through, skulls crushed, necks twisted, guts exploding, and at the end of it Omni-Man covered in blood it is a surprising change in tone. The comment about the book possibly not having been planned to last very long seems like a reasonable assumption. This issue certainly wouldn’t have been nearly as effective if the tone had established earlier in the series. At the same time, it makes the first arc feel all the more throw-away and unimportant. I’m not sure I’d say the art style changed for each Guardian’s introduction but I definitely felt the atmosphere in the “Batman” intro and got more than a little hint of Jack Kirby’s art style in the Wonder Woman/Big Barda-looking character. I’m interested in hearing about the animated series’ take on this issue. @xkonk makes it sound like it is significantly different. |
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| I think with issue 8 the book is finally feeling like it’s going somewhere. I still think the first arc was pretty weak and while this arc is referring to it and building on it, I still think that first arc could have introduced those needed elements in a way that felt more significant. Anyways, the cover makes it clear that this is involving a funeral for the Guardians. We get a few cameos like Shadowhawk and Savage Dragon...those were the two I recognized because I’m not too well versed in Image’s characters but I figured there were more cameos but I had to look them up. Back in the issue, Omni-Man is being interviewed by a Rorschach-looking character, complete with gravely speech balloon and “hurm.” Omni-Man recaps the stealing of Tailor’s power suit for Samson before things move into Mark’s bedroom. Atom Eve is waiting for him, crying, and we learn that what brought her to tears a couple issues ago was catching her boyfriend cheating on her. A bit of a misunderstanding with Mark’s mom brings them downstairs for “the talk” only to be interrupted by Mark’s dad telling them the Guardians are dead. Back in school (which I only now realized is called Reginald Vel Johnson High School. Was that ever shown before?) ANYWAYS, back at school a lot of plot threads start dropping. Mark is handed a note by a girl we haven’t seen before and Derek, Me Hiles only surviving victim, returns to school, much earlier than anyone expected. Back at home we learn that Mark’s birthday is coming up, which I imagine will be significant in some way for the comic. At the funeral, the Rorschach-guy investigating the murder turns out to be a gorilla. Not sure if he’s an Image character but we see a whole lot of them at the funeral (I wonder if they all appear in the show!). Not sure if these are meant as fun cameos or if it is meant to suggest that Invincible is part of a shared universe. The funeral is also attended bu the blue villain we encountered in passing in the first arc. The funeral does not go smoothly and Omni-Man’s eulogy is interrupted by Samson’s butler, who was the one who had stolen the Tailor’s super suit, wanting revenge for the team ruining his master’s life. After the funeral we have brief scenes of Atom Eve angry with her team and her ex in particular, William asking Mark for a flight, and some concern from Omni-Man’a wife over his reaction to the deaths of the Guardians. Back in the cemetery, Derek shares his feelings at Mr Hiles’ grave (though who knows what was left to actually bury?) and some punks dig up the Immortal’s grave in pursuit of some urban legend but are interrupted by the blue guys from the funeral. Did they have the same idea? Like I said at the start, it feels like things are finally on the rails with each issue flowing into the other as opposed to standalone, vaguely connecting stories. We have a mystery (why did Omni-Man kill the Guardians) that gives the story something to move towards, and we’re seeing relationships with Mark that can’t easily be ignored one issue to the next. All that said, this seems like a strange place to end the second trade paperback. Had I bought it on its own I would’ve felt like I’d gotten an incomplete story. I’m sure the story will be continued and resolved but as a story break, this is not where I would put it. |
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If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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| I agree that it feels like the series is finally acting like a series now (I also read #8 but don't have anything to add to the summary). That said, and since I got to watch the new episode of the cartoon last night, I think I prefer the cartoon. There's a lot of overlap but some changes in both plot and the order of presentation, and I think the cartoon is generally making the right choices in those changes. Quote: Originally Posted by dielinfinite I'm curious about that as well. One of the things I think the cartoon is doing a good job of is reorganizing so that things feel more continuous/interleaved. I guess we might not find out though, since we only have so much more to read and the series ran for quite a while. Quote: Originally Posted by dielinfinite I have the same feeling here and about the Guardians, and that's another place where the cartoon wins. You spend more time with the characters before these changes (or their equivalents if there's a plot change), so the change has a bit more feeling behind it. Do we even know how long the Teen Team has been together? Quote: Originally Posted by dielinfinite With this being the most high-profile event in the comic and the cartoon so far, this is why I think the cartoon is coming out ahead. The cartoon starts with the Guardians defending the White House from the Mauler twins, and then the rest is (as far as I remember; they released three episodes at once so I might be mixing a bit) introducing Mark and his family and Mark working on his powers. The Guardians-Mauler fight is a bit violent but not ridiculous, and once Mark puts on a suit he's pretty much just punching a couple people. Pretty standard. You get through the whole episode and then, almost as an after-credits scene, you get something close to the Guardians' individual intros from the comic. They go to their base and have the Omni-Man fight. But it isn't a page or two and over like in the comic. It's a several minute, back and forth, brutal Kirkman fight. It's a complete surprise and a big change in tone, and I think much more effective. Quote: Originally Posted by dielinfinite There are different artist credits for each of the intros but I agree with you that none of them feel out of place or dramatically different. Don't know if you caught it but in #8 the main artist changed from Walker to Ottley, but I think Ottley's style is pretty similar. I didn't notice a big change. |
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If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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Quote:Originally Posted by dielinfinite Yeah, it came up in outdoor shots. I don't know if it will 'pay off' exactly but it is kind of funny. |
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Quote:Originally Posted by xkonk. I hadn’t noticed the change in artists but I do think the art or at least my perception of it has included somewhat since the first issues. I still think it only middling at best but it gets the job done. Did the tv series include the various Image cameos during the funeral? |
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Wk3 (4/19-4/25): Invincible #9-11   |
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If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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Quote:Originally Posted by dielinfinite No, it didn't. I read some Image in the 90s (as I'm sure everyone did) but not much, and still recognized a decent number of the characters in that issue. It was a fun touch. |
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| Post 26 • IP flag post | ||
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If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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| #9: I enjoyed the Star Trek parody at the beginning, and apparently something important is happening on Earth now that the testing guy knows which planet it is. Eve seems to be a bit more assertive now that she left Teen Team. Or maybe I'm reading into it? I feel like the series is leaning into the comedic parts more now. Monster Girl goes off on Rex with hardly any justification, giving him a pretty solid beating. I think we're supposed to take it as funny, that a little girl would turn into a giant monster and beat the crud out of the unlikeable guy. It makes her unlikeable in my eyes; the response seemed pretty disproportionate. Plotwise, I feel like Kirkman is working things out better now. We have the hanging issue of whatever the alien guy knows about Earth; we picked back up the thread of Robot trying out for the big leagues and now we have a few known characters on a new team; and we have the Mauler twins reviving (?) the Immortal, in unknown mental shape. I don't know if I would call it focused, per se, since one issue has three plot lines running through it, but it's at least organized and there's an obvious ongoing plan. |
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| Post 27 • IP flag post | ||
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If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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| #10: on the topic of effective jokes, I enjoyed the meta-joke about artists reusing their art across panels. Obvious, but a fun poke at the industry. That said, Mark not knowing about a signing at the store where he has his pull list seems a little weird. Who gets their comics religiously and doesn't know if their store is having a signing? ... and that gets answered a few pages later. That's what I get for writing my thoughts while reading the issue. Similarly, I was going to say that after me saying that the last issue was doing a better job of staying on-track, this one felt kind of scattered. But it sure made up for it at the end. Answering my question about what state the Immortal was in, he apparently remembers everything and wants some answers. Omni-Man smartly takes the battle to the skies where no one will hear any of the 'discussion', except Mark shows up right when Omni-Man brutally kills the Immortal... again. I feel like this is much more of the hook that the cartoon had, and now I'm invested. The stakes are actually a bit higher, since in the cartoon it's just the audience (so far, pretty much) who knows what Nolan did, but in the comic now it's Mark too. |
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| Post 28 • IP flag post | ||
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If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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| #11 is basically all plot, so I don't feel I have much to say about it. I think Mark's reaction is completely appropriate, and Nolan's lack of expecting that reaction is a poor show for him. I guess in his head he's been giving Mark that speech for so long that he just thought it would go over better, but he didn't think about Mark being raised as a human and not knowing that history, or hearing the speech right after seeing his dad rip a superhero in half. And I guess in #12 we'll find out if Mark is actually invincible or not. | ||
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If the viagra is working you should be well over a 9.8.
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| #12 delivers the beatdown that you would have to expect, but I do think it was done in an effective way. Nolan punching Mark through buildings, subways, and a mountain while causing a huge amount of collateral damage is basically every other weekday for the DC movies. But Nolan does it to make a point; he and Mark (and any random Viltrumite) are so powerful that at any moment they could destroy as much of the Earth as they care to. It's damage that makes a point. I don't want to get off-track too much, and certainly not invite another multi-page thread on the quality of Batman Vs Superman, but this was my main criticism of the movie. Batman is all up to get rid of Superman because, in Batman's words, if there's even a 1% chance that he goes bad, the Earth is doomed. And then Batman just decides there isn't because Superman has a mom? I mean, geez. When the guy is trying to do *good* he destroys half a city. But there's never any reckoning with that, and Batman does a complete 180 on the issue in the amount of time it takes to say "Martha". It's extremely stupid. Don't people who care for their families also have even a 1% chance of being bad people overall? To that point, Mark eventually stops his personal beating by playing the family card. Even if he's well beyond the Earth in terms of ability and lifespan, he'll still be living with his dad 500 years from now. That's enough to give Nolan pause. So is Nolan a good guy now? Or is he going to wipe his tears, come back to Earth, and keep killing people? I'm much more invested now. Looking forward to reading the next set of issues. |
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