The Factual Opinion

No Pictures: Waiter, More Swedish Thrillers Please

The Man Who Smiled
by Henning Mankell
2005, English Translation, 1994, Swedish
Published by Vintage Crime/Black Lizard

As Kurt Wallandar books, Smiled sets the unsightly record of being the worst one ever.  Might be that Vintage Crime/Black Lizard agrees, as they waited to publish this, the fourth book of the series, until after all of Mankell's other Wallander books had been on the stands for awhile.  Makes sense--this is nothing much more than a protracted epilogue to the visceral gun-fest that ended White Lioness, which was actually a pretty great book.  Still, Mankell didn't want his character to go the John Mcclane route and start solving crimes the way he did at the close of White, so the first fifty or so pages of Smiled contain nothing but a descriptive passages of a man trying to drink and fuck away the memory of slaughter.  Luckily, he returns to the force to solve a real softball of a case, one that discloses it's motive and perp in the books prologue.  After that, it's just more observances of Kurt, the only detective who seems to operate best sleeping around 2 to 3 hours a night for months at a time.  By the end of Smiled, he's basically reverted to being the exact dude he was before Lioness.  That's a serial for you.

Resuscitation Of A Hanged Man
by Denis Johnson
1991, Published by Farrar, Straus & Giroux

Jesus' Son is amazing.  Hanged Man is good, just a little too long, and a little too in love with being crazy.  Not much in the way of plot here, mainly just a fun ride down into the world of that guy on the bus having a massively religious conversation with himself.  (Which the main character, at one point, actually does!  And he does it far enough into the book that you can't help but get really disgusted with all the people that are reacting the same way you do when somebody is talking to themselves on the subway!  They, meaning you, are a total dick!  Why are you a total dick?)  While Hanged is a decent journey in a lunatics brainstem, it's pretty much just a diverting time-filler.  The dialog is off the chain, though.

Groundwork Of The Metaphysics Of Morals
By Immanuel Kant
1785, Published by Some German People
Review Copy Published by Cambridge University Press

The best story ever told about Kant is the one that refers to the legend that the man took his morning walk at the same time every single day, to the point where the locals set their watches by his rounds.  Due to a late night reading some masterpiece of philosophy, he missed his walk and a whole lot of people spent the day running late.  It's got to be a lie, right?  But if you've spent anytime with Groundwork, a book that quite happily advertises itself as "difficult", "unwieldy" and "complicated" you'll probably find yourself believing it.  After all, it reads like a guy who's life was planned to tight corners.  It's about a lot of stuff, like the ground, and the work that needs to be done to it so that metaphysic morals can be built there.   No, that's really what it's about.  Fuck you, you didn't read it. 

The Laughing Policeman
by Maj Sjowall & Per Wahloo
1971, English Translation, 1968 Original Swedish
Published by Vintage Crime/Black Lizard

It takes a long time to get to the part of the book where the aforementioned "Laughing Policeman" is revealed, and by the time the cynical joke is revealed, the reader has probably already reached their fill of cynicism.  This is, after all, the David Simon version of 1970's crime fiction, meaning everybody is a little too real, their behavior a little too normal, and the crime a little too upsetting.  (Which means, of course, that it's a tremendously good fucking read, even in a genre that's swamped with quality work.  There's certainly got to be a huge backlog of terrible Swedish crime books, but America seems to only translate the cream of the crop.)  The mystery underlying the book plays out well, and it ends with the sort of relentless intensity that would surprise even the biggest Alien 3 fan.  It's surprisingly timeless stuff, and barring a few too many cops with seriously fucked up conversational skills, it's pretty unique to the field as well. 

Poor People
by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Translated by Hugh Alpin
2002, Alpin Translation, 1846, Original Russian
Published by Hesperus Press

In the world that is books constructed out of letters, this is not better than The Sorrows of Young Werther, but it is better than getting punched in the face, mostly because it's short.  But there's no one on Earth that's going to feel sorry for either of Dostoevsky's whining idiots by the time they near the end.  That's a sort of testament to his ability as a writer, as he effectively portrays the characters as people the reader will most certainly wish a massive amount of harm on, but it doesn't serve to make for a pleasant period of reading time.  If anything, it's a masochistic journey with some of the most selfish morons Fyodor ever put on the page. People who choose pride over bread deserve to die of starvation.  I don't give a shit how you paint it.

-Tucker Stone, 2007

The Virgin Read: When Is Her Face? (Where She Reads The Only Two Full-On Lesbian Sex Comics That Came OUT This Week)

52 Aftermath: Crime Bible Five Lessons of Blood: Lust
Written by Greg Rucka
Art by Jesus Saiz, Steve Lieber & ERic Trautmann
Published by DC Comics

This comic has a somewhat intriguing cover, because of the half-naked woman (with realistic proportions) reaching towards the faceless woman.  I wish the facelessness hadn't intrigued me, now that I finished reading it.  In picking this weeks comics, I tried to not pick something featuring superheroes, not realizing that I was staring into the facelessness of a superhero.  (I'm trying to stay away from superheroes because they still have residual corniness of the 1960's version of the Batman television show, which i've seen in reruns.  The only other super-hero exposure I have is Super-Friends on Saturday Morning Cartoons, and the occasional Superman/Spider-Man/X-Man movie.  The 60's Batman and Super-Friends are silly and unrealistic, and i feel like i can't, at this point, give their comic versions a fair try.  Yet.)

So, 52 Aftermath: Crime Bible Five Lessons of Blood: Lust. Maybe I should go to the Super-Friends anyway.  What was the point of this comic?  What is a "faceless defiler?"  What is her "power?"  She takes a pill, gets blue hair and loses her face?  And then she goes "Hey look, no face!" Punch.  Ahh, the old no-face fake out.  What?

I have more questions.  How have they seen into that room every time Renee was there, but didn't see the first time when she changed into the blue-haired faceless thing?  What, exactly, did she accomplish when she did change into the blue-haired faceless thing?  She flexed her "powers of snooping?"  Too bad she doesn't have Superman's hearing, because i was forced to read two pages of "unintelligible, unintelligible, do this" etc.  And hey, lesbian sex!

Why?  I don't know.  But I do know that the whole last page reminded me of that old Morgan Fairchild movie The Initiation of Sarah, because of the fire, the hoods and the people acting like a coven.  Are they Wiccan?  Is this a lesbian Wican comic?  Does anybody know where I can get a VHS of The Initiation of Sarah? I still think about that scalding shower scene with Morgan Fairchild in the tub sometime.  (Not because I'm a lesbian.  That's okay if you're a lesbian.  I guess this is your comic book.  You can have it back.)

I have nothing else to say about this comic.

Casanova # 11
Written by Matt Fraction
Art by Fabio Moon
Published by Image Comics

Yes, I read two comics this week.  I narrowed it down to these two but couldn't decide.  I asked if it was okay to read two, and he said yes, as long as I reviewed both of them.

Gee, thanks for the guidance.

Lookie here: another lesbian sex scene.  I guess this really is a male fantasy.  Cracks me up.  Anyhoo.  Casanova was all blue, black & white this month.  I guess this month, I don't know if it usually is.  I can see how this comic is in a class of it's own, interesting to many and unique.  That being said, I didn't really like it.  Although I read the recap (only once), I still don't know who or what I was reading about, either in the recap or the comic.  The first part was...interesting?  Realizing the twist, the game that the two were playing was cool, but seriously--did poisoning her champagne have to follow random lesbian sex?  Couldn't they have just talked?  I don't have problem with lesbians, and I don't have a problem with sex.  (I support one and enjoy the other.  Guess!)  This just seemed gratitious, or more like, "Hey, I'm good at Drawing Boobs! When can I Draw Some Boobs?" 

So now I'm gonna jump to talk about form.  On the two-page layout, focusing on the post-coital poisoning, I couldn't follow the sequence of the panels.  I re-read three times to figure out the order to read them in.  (Don't worry.  I "got it.")  It was just seemed like it was all about the two naked woman in the middle of the page, with the dialog treated as an after-thought.  It was clever to use the black & white to portray memories--but still, what were you doing?

Another comment on form:  what was with the ending?  It jumped from a paneled story to...I don't know, what were all the panels of words?  Were they using their minds to speak?  Was it a group dialog, like therapy?  And why did that one guy have such a big head?  I get that the "space-time continuum is all a-tither" but I can't deal with the "When is Casanova?" 

It's where.  Where is Casanova.  Because he's not HERE.  Where is he?  When someone's across the world, in a different time zone, I don't say "When is John?"  I say "Where is John!" 

I don't mean to be nasty.  Like I said, I appreciate the cleverness and the oddness of this comic.  I started reading the commentary at the end to get some insight about the comic, and I did find it to be interesting, heady stuff for the first couple of pages.  I'm currently reading the Bhagavad Gita.  The version I'm reading has an introduction to each chapter, explaining and explicating the meaning of what comes next.  I continue reading that commentary because I'm really interested in understanding the Gita as much as possible.  As I'm reading the commentary about Casanova, I realize I'm not as interested in it as I am in the Bhagavad Gita, and I'd rather be reading that right now.  So I put the comic down.

I feel bad, like I'm totally panning Casanova, and that's not what I mean to do.  It makes me feel ignorant, like I'm trying to put something down because I don't understand it.  Matt Fraction!  You have all my respect!  Just not my readership.  I'm sorry.  Maybe if I read Casanova #1 I'd feel differently.

Kisses!

-Nina Miller, 2007

The Virgin Read: Chicks Like Brian Michael Bendis Too!

Powers # 27
Written by Brian Michael Bendis
Art by Michael Avon Oeming
Published by Icon/Marvel Comics

What's a Virgin Read? Well, it's a dame who writes about comics, that's what.  No penis, and no comics experience. (Except for Watchmen, because hey, doesn't everybody like Watchmen? Haven't all Malaysian people read that by now? If not, why not?) Anyways, she'll handle one of the regular comics of the weak, for the foreseeable future, as Tucker has been called away to an offshore rape factory. Have fun and get wet.

So, the CEO of The Factual Opinion comes to me with a stack of the current week in comics for me to choose from. As is this is my first foray into comics journalism, I, without shame, must say that I, quite literally, judged the books by their covers. So I chose Powers.

The cover picture is simply strong. I don't know that I initially noticed that it was a drawing of a man assaulting me with his pained intense stare, his pistol taking aim and his larger than life badge casting a shadow over his face. It was the sleekness and strength that grabbed me in stark contrast to the other options. 

Anyhow, I'm glad there's a recap section to give me an idea of what's going on, that was a plus. I was surprised to realize, having never read Powers prior to this, that I found myself caring about what was going to happen next before I was halfway through. It should be made understood that, being mostly new to comics, that it's a little hard to swallow super-heroes and super-powers right off the bat. That's why I think I enjoyed this so much, as the crime story was the focus and the "powers" area was vague. Nevertheless, I was captivated by our hooded-friend, and wondered who she was. And what she was doing with her hand. Although the end reveal is clear to any Powers reader, I still didn't get exactly who she was supposed to be. (I realize that it's some kind of pretty big deal.) 

It was hard to see the Triphammer person on the roof in his getup. The comic nearly lost me there. Having him "lose the armor" helped. So what am I saying? I really enjoyed this comic. Comics I've previously read usually take a lot more effort to stay interested and committed too--this wasn't the case with Powers.  Again, that's probably because this felt more like a realistic crime story than a fantasy I don't have. I particularly enjoyed Michael Avon Oeming's art. He has a talent for drawing large groups. For example: the detectives on page 2 & 3, the bar on 4 & 5, the rows of police on 14, the Jane Does on 19, the school kids on 22 & 23 and the the Simons on 26 & 27.

It makes me think of a recent conversation with the florist from my upcoming wedding. I want a sleek, classic look and I have flowers and colors in mind. She, the florist, likes my idea but said that she'll have each arrangement on each table a little different because she "gets bored" doing the same thing over and over. Ah. To me, this separates the self-involved artist from an artist/craftsmen. The ability to do the same thing, again and again, like a group shots of characters to serve the overall narrative and be comprehensible to the reader is what a comics artist, it seems to me, needs to be able to do without "getting bored." It's not that artist can't, or shouldn't experiment, it's that they have to be able to replicate form on a consistent basis if they desire any commercial success. Otherwise, it's just the comics equivalent of an artsy-fartsy florist who thinks my wedding is all about her flowers and not about me. ME! ME! MY DAY!  =And I want ivory and periwinkle on every table, goddammit. And they better all be the same! If not, I'll call Oeming and he can do my tables. With those funny little bald men.

-Nina Miller, 2007 also wanted to call this column "Meow Mix","Pussy Power", "I Don't Like Spandex" and "Reh, reh, reh, reh ahhhh."

The remainder of the weeks comics live underneath this review. Clicking on that link is the definition of lazy.

Comics Of The Weak: When A Lot Of Talented People Should At Least Pretend To Challenge Themselves

Checkmate # 20
Written by Greg Rucka
Art by Joe Bennett & Jack Jadson
Published by DC Comics

Greg Rucka has, for what it's worth, put all his chips down.  Checkmate is a comic that's written for people who want to buy it on a regular basis, in pamphlet or trade--DC will probably keep throwing that "New Storyline!" tag on the book every time it rolls up on a "Part One," but make no mistake--Checkmate is officially a comic book with no interest in new readers.  If you haven't been hanging out for a while, than the random twists and turns (that are only random if you haven't been keeping score) will seem off-putting and out of place, if you aren't paying attention to the opening intro boxes that showcase the cosmetic differences of it's non-costumed characters, than it's somewhat far-fetched to think you're going to enjoy this book.  Tolerate it, read it--maybe so.  Enjoy it?  Not so much.  It's too bad that it operates that way, but it's unlikely that Rucka's espionage exploration of the DC governments take on spandex could work with a smaller cast.  (If the United Nations, like, the real one, is going to be a character, that already necessitates a pretty large group of people to read about.)  Art wise, Bennett and Jadson are a pretty good fit--they don't up the goofball factor of superheroes the way the Checkmate/Outsiders cross-over did, but that also means that Checkmate is never going to be a book anybody buys for the art.  It's economic stuff, designed, seemingly, to mute the overblown explosiveness that ruins so many books. 

And yes, it's still really, really good.  Not as good as Queen & Country, but on par with Gotham Central.

And yes, it's still probably headed for cancellation.

Dark Sector Zero
Written by David Wohl
Art by Bill Sienkiewicz
Published by Top Cow

Probably one of the most attractive advertisements to have been published since that John Romita dental care Spiderman issue from the...70's?  Early 80's?  Designed to stoke the enjoyment in the fifteen or so comics readers who don't already play video games, this is pretty much exactly what the product was described as when it was first brought to the table.  Get somebody to write a short prelude to a video game with some requisite heavy-handed video game dialog, give it to some artist, put it in stores, and watch the video game money roll in.  Doesn't really make any sense, from an business standpoint.  If there's one industry that isn't suffering from any economic downturn, besides the military complex, it's video games.  Why throw this bone to comics shops?  There's nowhere near enough comics buyers who are willing to experiment with anything non-Marvel and non-DC for this thing to have any notable increase in video game sales.  Either way, what's been produced and sold is even weirder--Sienkiewicz style of art is one of those that pretty much demands the use of the term "unique," whereas the actual game this comic promotes looks pretty much the same as any of those Bloodrayne/Devil Crying shit.  For the majority of the book, it features full page drawings of intricate pieces of propaganda style artwork, often featuring scientists with Freudian faces or full on military regalia.  It's indescribably interesting to look at, a complete bore to read, and doesn't stoke any excitement for the upcoming game at all.  One of the oddest mainstream comics of the year, and only for one good (Sienkiewicz) reason.

Batman: Confidential # 11
Written by Michael Green
Art by Denys Cowan & John Floyd
Published by DC Comics

As if last months "Batman hired assassins to murder the man-who-will-be-Joker" weren't still irritating the Bat-fan contingency, rumor has it that, for the 9,000th time, Bruce Wayne may end up dead before this time next year.  On top of that, Michael Green's latest issue of Batman: Confidential hits the stands and it's revealed that, following the creation of the Joker, ole Bats took a little break watching his coma girlfriend drool while ole Paleface was running around Gotham killing, literally, hundreds of innocent people.  Again, it's a bit of an industry surprise-fest, as it's now been announced that DC is canceling this title  (basically because nobody wanted to read this specific kind of piss-on-your-Superfriends stories) yet DC is still pushing this nasty bastard out.  Besides the whining angsty-mess that is this comics version of Batman, the Joker's behavior is the model of the sort of shitty, half-assed Hannibal Lecter the character has become.  Neither compelling, sexy, or even scary, the current Joker is just gross and boring--and it doesn't help that Denys Cowan's art seems to have veered totally away into the realm of Make Everything And Everybody As Ugly As Fucking Possible.

Grendel: Behold the Devil #1
By Matt Wagner
Published by Dark Horse Comics

It's not really that cool to treat comics like rap music, and call people sell-outs.  After all, whereas musicians can pull a Fugazi or Godspeed and control their own destiny, there's no money to be made in comic books unless you're jacking at the top of the pile.  Sometimes you can go the sort-of-classy route, like Darwyn Cooke's Criterion Collection art, or Adrian Tomine's New Yorker covers.  Other times, you have to pull a Wagner, and go back to the version of a character that you pretty much have spent your entire career trying to put to bed.  Nobody's ever been as sold on the futuristic Pope Grendel, or the dreadlocked lesbian Grendel as they were on this, the Hunter Rose pretty-much-Batman-as-assassin Grendel.  So here we are, 2007, and Wagner is earning some boat money.  Looking at this as anything else, believing that it's "a story that must now be told" isn't just bullshit, it's fanbody fakery trying to disguise another nostalgic wankfest.  It looks good, and Wagner's a better writer than he was twenty years ago, but it's a soft-cock fuck in a warm pond.  Bling fucking blong to that.

Detective Comics # 838
Written by Paul Dini
Art by Ryan Benjamin & Saleem Crawford
Published by DC Comics

Ryan Benjamin is a hellacious go for broke talent when it comes to drawing mountains and snow, but he draws human beings like He-man action figures.  Again, for the 4th time, this is another chapter in the Ra's Al Ghul Batman cross-over, and for what it is, it's tolerable.  Some of the imaginative work that's been going on in the main Batman title bleeds into this, but it does seem that even Grant Morrison is going to end up suffering the blanket blandness that dismantles any excitement that these things have.  Paul Dini must've believed people were reeling from the non-stop excitement of fighting in the last two parts, as he tones it down a notch for some talking and some squawking.  (Not that those issues were that exciting, but it's likely that Dini, currently shepherding the thing they call Countdown, has lost all ability to gauge what people might want to read.  One imagines a beard-stroking Paul saying "A super-hero fighting ninjas?  I'm sure it's never been done.  Give it to Don Kramer, he's got the dynamic talent required.")  The last page, where Ra's Al Ghul exhorts Batman to choose between Damian and Robin, is actually somewhat of a relief--it's the type of embrace-the-70's Batman story that Grant Morrison has been so ennamoured with, and it's glaringly contrasted with a book that's been mired in trivialities for a while now.  It's not the least bit believable for a cliffhanger, but neither were all those Neal Adams covers that said "Tonight a Batman DIES!" 

Hellblazer # 238
Written by Andy Diggle
Art by Danijel Zezelj
Published by Vertigo/DC Comics

Ignore the cover--excepting Constantine's complaint about London's smoking ban, this issue doesn't pay much attention to John's delightfully antagonistic habit.  That's probably for the best--it's asking a little too much of longtime Hellblazer readers to believe that, of all people, John wouldn't know which bars happen to ignore England's attack on tobacco.  This is another quality Diggle story, and the second comic this month that's shown why Danijel Zezelj is the best new artist that Vertigo's had in a while.  After cutting his teeth on Loveless, hanging at the DMZ, Zezelj takes his time drawing the best looking Constantine this side of the always exceptional covers.  Whether he's staying or not is a question for comics sites that do research, but if he is, than Hellblazer readers should be two shades of excited.  On top of that, somebody fools the main character for the second time in as many months, and, just like last time, it only serves to make the comic better to have it's protagonist keep losing.  No, it doesn't have any spandex, and yes, it's the best thing DC put out this week.  Go figure.

The Spirit # 11
Written by Darwyn Cooke
Art by Darwyn Cooke & J. Bone
Published by DC Comics

This is the first time the Spirit has attempted a multi-part storyline, and it's been somewhat of a disappointment.  After the exciting debut of this series, it's become something of a bore--yes, all the pieces are there that make for a good read, Darwyn Cooke is, no matter what he does, an intelligent storyteller with a clear mastery over his esteemable talent.  Maybe it's the character, maybe it's the cheeseball zombie apocalpyse, but besides the fact that it looks good, this is a comic that's running out of reasons to exist: it still looks better than Eisner's Spirit, but it certainly isn't as entertaining or original.  It's just really good looking fan fiction from a guy who's already got one foot out the door.  Why is that worth anyone's time?  If guys like Brubaker and Morrison can work out some original and new ideas for what to do with characters as archaic as Superman as Captain America, Cooke can certainly do something with a character that has a far less vocal fanbase.  He clearly doesn't lack the balls, if his recent Comics Journal interview is any indication.  Surprisingly, this reader is glad he's leaving the book--maybe things will be different under the hands of Sergio Aragones.

Captain America # 32
Written by Ed Brubaker
Art by Steve Epting & Butch Guice
Published by Marvel Comics

Another chapter in Ed Brubaker's longform shaggy dog story that is "Who's taking over for Captain America?"  Everybody knows that, whether it's next wednesday or 09, the answer is going to be "Captain America, eventually,"  but that doesn't seem to be lessening Brubaker's desire to play the feint out.  Happily, Epting's linework wasn't ruined by Butch Guice, an artist best known for confusing this reader as to why anyone likes him, and so, once again, there's another decent issue of Captain America on the stands.  After spending some hours with the monster-sized Brubaker Omnibus, it's brutally clear how much better these stories read in the collected format, but it's going to be another two years before they have enough material for volume two, so pamphlet's will have to do.  The main thing learned in this issue was all reinforcement for stuff that everybody already knew:  all of the Dead Captain's friends operate at a Jack Bauer level of bad-assery, and the Falcon is way cooler than Luke Cage or Black Lightning will ever be.  Also, someone should write some kind of essay about the extensive comic tradition of people never suffering any lasting damage when they fall off buildings or out of airplanes.  If it hasn't been mentioned before, it happens a lot.

Incredible Hulk # 111
Written by Greg Pak & Jeff Parker
Art by Leonard Kirk
Published by Marvel Comics

Well, that was a real piece of shit.  Case in point, for disappointed World War Hulk readers--pick up the latest issue of Hulk's main title, and you'll realize that as dumb as WWH was, it was nowhere near as bad as it could be.  An obnoxious teenager teams up with a flying Mermaid-type-woman-sea thing, Hercules and, for no discernible reason, an X-men on vacation, and they fight a giant robot.  This is the kind of worthless trash that makes the entire thing that is reading comics seem like a hobby that's not worth having.  Who is something like this written for?  What's wrong with that person, that they want to read this?  Are they just stupid, the way people who think Kirk Cameron was a good actor are stupid?  Are they freaks, like the 2 Women 1 Cup women are?  Or are they just tired, old men holding out with the crazy, sad idea that someday these things are going to make them feel the way they did the first time they saw something drawn by Kirby, or Ditko, or Romita?  What's the deal?

The Boys # 12
Written by Garth Ennis
Art by Darick Robertson
Published by Dynamite Entertainment

Sometimes you have to go looking to find out why people don't enjoy this comic--up until about 20 minutes ago, the only complaint that had registered with this reader about why The Boys is so "awful" was because it's "disrespectful."  Those type of reviews were always good for a laugh, as there seems to be no tolerance in comics for writers who refuse to take spandex seriously.  It's a sad place, that place where satire lands with a thud.  However, it's been brought to the Factual's attention that another part of the comic is part and parcel of what people find offensive:  the N-word.  You know, because a comic that doesn't have respect for common decency, contains graphic violence, sex and language, satirizes every aspect of mainstream comics including dead creators, ridicules American shame regarding hetero-,homo-, and ear canal sex, should somehow know better than to use a racial epithet.  Cut a guys face off, put it on a pizza, but God forbid you drop an n-bomb.  That's Across The Line.

Countdown Presents: The Search For Ray Palmer Gotham By Gaslight # 1
Written by Brian Augustyn
Art by Greg Tocchini, Jesse Delperdang, Derek Fridoffs & Paul Neary
Published by DC Comics

The first of this series that this reader has had the distinct displeasure to read, this is one of those comics that dances on the edge of outright cruelty to the buyer.  Safely put, it's not a story that Brian Augstyn, or any comics writer, could've wanted to tell, nor could any of the artists been excited to work on.  A completely mercenary attempt by DC to capitalize on the crazed fanboy market that's proven itself more than willing to throw money after the Countdown series, the actual story is non-existent--it's as simple as it's advertised.  Some super-heroes are following another super-hero through alternate realities, and this was the issue where they ended up in an old Mike Mignola Batman story.  That's all.  There's a fight, and then they move on.  Nothing that has to do with any larger story occurs, nothing happens that's at all interesting, and it ends only with the promise that these same characters will continue the journey somewhere else.  If any DC comic book, short of Countdown, has been this devoid of anything beyond the economic exchange that purchasers went through to obtain it, then it hasn't crossed this desk before.  Pedestrian, insulting, stupid work.

-Tucker Stone, 2007

Nina Miller's initial foray into comics handles this weeks issue of Powers, right above this review.  Using this link to get there makes you the laziest person on the interweb.

Comics Of The Weak: Where Everything Was About Punching Each Other, But We Were Too Grown-Up To Care

Salvation Run # 1
Written by Bill Willingham
Art by Sean Chen & Walden Wong
Published by DC Comics

Sean Chen's art isn't going to be the draw for this comic, that's for sure.  As our resident female reporter here at the Factual put it: "That looks like some shitty cartoon from the 70's."  Still, crappy art hasn't hurt Willingham's sales that much before, and there's clearly some kind of market that DC keeps grabbing with these interminable examinations of the Flash's "Rogues Gallery."   At this rate, it's not going to be that surprising before they start doing mini-series about the Weather Wizard.  The plot is basically the same as that Ray Liotta movie from a few years back, which should tell you hard DC's working to keep up with trendy new readers.  (Actually, considering the average age of most DC readers, referencing a shitty action movie from the early 90's is pretty prescient.)   For those less well versed in Liotta, Willingham has thrown every useless and unknown villain on to some faraway planet and left them to fight, or form a commune, or starve.  It's sort of like Lord of the Flies, if all the kids were wearing form-fitting spandex and didn't end up blowing each other.  (7 issues to go for those who are looking for some hot action.)  Willingham also was able to pull off getting permission from the Bat-editors to use the Joker, so he's sure to eventually kill some of these twerp characters.  None of these things bode well for a good read, but that probably won't stop this thing from being successful enough to do it again.  Long-time DC readers are nothing if not predictable, and this is the exact sort of averagely done crap that flies right into their long-boxes.

BPRD: The Killing Ground # 4
Written by Mike Mignola & John Arcudi
Art by Guy Davis
Published by Dark Horse Comics

The first of what became multiple books this week that were pretty much non-stop fights from cover to cover.  This being the Mignola's B.P.R.D. universe version of fight week, it was the only one with the real ability to surprise, as Mignola seems to be the only writer currently working who's not only willing to let his characters lose, he occasionally lets them die as well.  It's not that he's bloodthirsty, it's that Mignola is committed to telling pulpy monster stories, and unlike DC and Marvel, he likes their to be actual stakes to the scares--which means that somebody is gonna die.  Mignola's commitment to putting out more books lately has meant spreading himself a little thin--the recent Hellboy series was a bit of a letdown, and Lobster Johnson has been a little heavy on the silliness.  All that being said, Killing Ground has been a pleasure so far--a straight up locked house monster story, with a wry mix of quippy dialog and completely insane action.  On top of that, Guy Davis has finally made the book completely his own--at this point, it would be Mignola's Abe Sapian that would look out of place here. 

100 Bullets # 86
Written by Brian Azzarello
Art by Eduardo Risso
Published by Vertigo/DC Comics

Azzarello has been heading down a pretty frightening road as of late--in the last issue an entire family was executed, children and all, and in this one, the Minutemen wreak out a particularly horrific violence against others guilty of the similar crime.  On the surface, the story has only the mildest connection to the larger tale that 100 Bullets is far into the midst of, it as after all, Azzarello you're dealing with--and as always, it won't be until the book finishes that all the pieces will fully make sense.  (Possibly, not even then.)  Risso's work is as solid as ever, and while it's clear from some critics that his work is an acquired taste, even his haters can't argue that his consistency in every issue is a skill that very few artists can claim.  There's very little on the stands that's as dark as the Bullets, and while that's not a good reason to love it, it's certainly going to be a gaping hole when the book finally finishes.

DMZ # 25
Written by Brian Wood
Art by Daniel Zezelj
Published by Vertigo/DC Comics

Brian Wood is either working his way towards another one of those big six-part storylines that he likes to try with this title, or he's finally grasped what anybody who loves this book has been saying: DMZ works at it's best when it's a done-in-one chapter that focuses on the people on the sidelines.  Even though last month's excursion with the failed suicide bomber wasn't, honestly, very good, Wood's best work has been when he ignores his journalist main character and goes deeper into the little world he's created.  Like the proud graffiti artist tale in issue 23, this is another strong chapter focusing on a tough Chinese gangster who used the battle for Manhattan to cement a Don Corleone type relationship over a few city blocks.  While a future relationship with Wood's reporter is foreshadowed in the final pages, the majority of this issue is just a backseat look at interesting characters doing interesting things--and considering that comics only have 22 pages in which to operate, that's no mean feat.  The presence of such an outrageously talented artist like Zezelj only increases the pleasure. 

Ghost Rider # 17
Written by Daniel Way
Art by Javier Saltares & Tom Palmer
Published by Marvel Comics

Not funny, just random and stupid this time.  Ghost Rider is just a dumb ass fun book, and it dangerously treads the line every month between what it does best, which is watching a flaming skeleton kill demons, and what will eventually kill the title (as it always has before), which is try and tell some type of story that neccessitates either character development or believability.  There's nobody who could pull off making Ghost Rider into something like Queen & Country, Preacher or even Punisher Max, and it's completely bizarre why writers always think they should try.  It has been said before, and it never gets old: you are writing a comic book about a skeleton that is on fire and rides a flaming motorcycle.  Stick to point A-point B type stories.  Point C?  Beyond your reach.

New Avengers # 36
Written by Brian Michael Bendis
Art by Lenil Yu
Published by Marvel Comics

Pretty much just more of the same which most people don't mind eh whatever.  We liked the last issue, even though we were supposed to be really upset and perturbed by what happened in it.  This issue was just a lot of dipshit fakery and nonsense.  Boring with a knuckle sandwich.  If you like Lenil Yu, then this is still a worthwhile book to read, but this comic surely reads far better in a collected format--it's gotten so "decompressed" that half of the book takes place over the five minute periods that 24 usually use as commercial breaks. Oh, and there's also a long conversation that takes place between a naked Spider-Woman and a clothed and threatening Wolverine in the shower, and there probably isn't anything that's quite as pleasurable as being a man, reading that passage, and not finding it arousing in the slightest.  It's so clearly designed to titillate and sexualize that when it fails, it feels almost like earning a merit badge. 

Punisher War Journal # 13
Written by Matt Fraction
Art by Cory Walker
Published by Marvel Comics

This was pretty hilarious.  People seem to complain about this comic a lot, but Matt Fraction is probably the most individual voice Marvel or DC have had around in a while.  When is the last time Spider-man's irritating banter was actually funny? The last time somebody thumped the Punisher on the head and called him a "Tiny Monkey?"  When is the last time anybody got called a "Tiny Monkey?"  Although the basic bones of the story has been done before--a bad guy is keeping other bad guys locked up in cages in a warehouse--this comic has some of the out and out silliest dialog of anything Marvel has published.  It also has one of the best little killed-that-guy moments ever, when a silly conversation gets punctuated by a sniper's bullet delivered by the main character.  As it goes, War Journal has become a totally hit or miss title--sometimes it's really fun, and sometimes it's a painful blow-job, wrapped up in teeth.   This issue?  Sugar cane rum.

World War Hulk # 5
Written by Greg Pak
Art by Klaus Janson, Christina Strain & John Romita, Jr.
Published by Marvel Comics

Aww, was World War Hulk a letdown?  If you were reading it for resolution or change, and not just for John Romita's excellent artwork, than yes, it probably was.  As was made clear from the first issue, the character that nobody, anywhere, ever, likes showed up and acted like a fucking dick, and so did the Hulk, and so did everybody, and then it was almost over with nothing changing, and then there was a dumb plot twist that answered the question of why a spaceship explosion destroyed an entire planet, and then, some characters died that nobody except nostalgia freaks care about, and then there was a deus ex machina that made you wonder why people are ever scared of the Hulk, and then it ended by saying the Hulk was kind of, sort of, but not really, dead, and then there was an ad for two new Hulk comics that will come out later, one of which will be written by Jeph Loeb, who's a total fucking tool, and drawn by Ed McGuiness, who draws comics that should probably feature Voltron and talking rabbits. 

Random Observations:

*Was there anyone in World War Hulk that didn't act like a total penis?

*If all Iron Man had to do to stop the Hulk was shoot him with lasers, than why didn't he do that a long ass time ago?  Why was "send him into space with a really difficult to set-up-lie" the first choice, when the laser idea obviously didn't even require Iron Man to dress up in his Iron Man outfit?

*If there's anybody out there who's upset by the death of Miek or Rick Jones, those people should really reexamine their life choices up until this point.  And they should reexamine those choices will sleeping on the fucking highway.

*It would be really fascinating (in a painful, horrifying way) to have had this comic drawn by Michael Turner, or Rob Liefeld, or Todd McFarlane, or Don Kramer, or any of those artists that the Factual Opinion hates so much.

All-Star Superman # 9
Written by Grant Morrison
Art by Frank Quitely & Jamie Grant
Published by DC Comics

The problem with writing what is arguably the best version of a straight-ahead spandex superhero comic book, like, ever, is that it has nowhere to really go but down.  It's not like Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely working seamlessly together is going to be a non-starter, but it's also not like a comic about a superhero that plays totally by the classic rules can last for very long before it becomes, you know, a comic book about a superhero.  If comics were treated as a disposable commodity, than maybe that wouldn't be true--but the compulsion to keep them, the non-stop reprinting that occurs doesn't serve them very well.  When you're always a second away from reading a better version of the exact same story you just read, than how is any of it going to be that great?  Of course, the whole behavior towards comics seems to be that it's never about whether something is "great," it's always whether it's "good enough" or "not that bad" or "not as much of a piece of shit as Anita Blake, which is a comic for people who find Anne Rice and Dean Koontz too fucking deep."  So, yeah, this was kind of not that great of an issue of All-Star Superman, except for the part where Clark lit the bully's hairpiece on fire.  That was the stuff.  Everything else kind of made you wonder why it took so long for something this much like the first 6 issues to come out.  Does Frank Quitely weave his own paper?  What's the deal?

Batman & The Outsiders # 1
Written by Chuck Dixon
Art by Julian Lopez & Bit
Published by DC Comics

What's up with these one-name creators?  Bit?  What kind of asshole calls himself "Bit?"  This is the first of what's going to end up being about seven hundred or so comics written by Chuck Dixon, a creator who has never met a book he couldn't make totally mediocre work out of.  He's got his fans, and, unlike people who like modern Chris Claremont, that's totally understandable.  Dixon is a reliable writer, who never attempts to operate outside his comfort zone, who writes comics that come out on time, and he maintains long runs.  For the most part, if somebody has been reading DC's output on any extensive basis, they have read a lot of Dixon.  The only way to dislike the guy's work is to have read quite a bit of it.  That's when you start noticing that, although Dixon hangs out on titles for fifty issues or more, no one ever experiences anything approaching character development, that the dialog is nearly exactly the same for any and all characters, and that he never, ever, takes anything like what a 8 year old might refer to as a "chance."

All that reliable blandness shows up here in Batman & The Outsiders, yet another attempt by DC to make an edgy, real world, proactive strike force out of it's third tier spandex kids.  Didn't we already do this?  Like in Justice League Elite, Justice League Task Force, Extreme Justice (that was their real name!), and the original Outsiders?  Yeah, pretty much.  None of those lasted very long, and unless something pretty drastic happens here, neither will this one.

Green Arrow/Black Canary # 2
Written by Judd Winick
Art by Cliff Chiang
Published by DC Comics

That should make people complaining about Black Canary no longer under the control of Gail Simone shut the fuck up.  They'll still be able to complain about Judd Winick's treatment of the Amazons, but the regular whipping boy for everybody with too much time on their hands certainly did a fine job of painting Black Canary as a lady who-don't-take-no-shit.  She's still a pointless character with no real personality, but at least she's not getting exploited in this issue.  (That service is performed by antagonistic HIV positive ex-prostitute Speedy.)  The thing that's going to be a curiosity about this title is what sort of stories it wants to tell when the main crew gets back to whatever city it is they live in.  Do they plan to fight purse-snatching with a four-person squad?  There must be an actual death on the way.  And shouldn't Speedy start bloating up from her HIV medication?  People who buy into the theory that Judd is somehow committing some great public service by writing a character into having the virus don't seem to recognize that he needs to move the concept forward a bit for it to have any actual meaning.  At this point, her HIV-positive status has about as much importance and believability as buying into the concept that Canary is some model of feminist idealization.

Nightwing # 138
Written by Fabien Nicieza
Art by Don Kramer & Wayne Faucher
Published by DC Comics

Don Kramer is such a terrible artist for super-hero comics.  Receding hairlines, bizarre facial structure, incapable of even the most basic fight scenes and a total absence of continuity within a panel.  Really hideous work, in a field where hideous gets plenty of face-time.  This was another non-stop fight issue, and even though it had terrible artwork and gave way too much credit to faceless hordes of ninjas, it still ends up being the best issue of Nightwing in almost three years.  (And only three years because three years is all this reader could remember of this terrible comic book.)  After all, shit actually happened, even though it was a stupid ninja fight.  "Shit actually happening" isn't something that's been used to describe this particular title in a long time.  While this old school Batman cross-over will probably end up sucking some of the life out of the big-tier Batman and Detective issues it shows up in, it's certainly going to add some life back into Nightwing.  It would still be idiocy to think any of that will stick around when the thing ends, and Nightwing gets back to the only thing it seems to do well: being a total vacuum of awful to anyone involved in it.

-Tucker Stone, 2007

No Pictures: The Way It All Gets Started

Here we are, with The Factual Opinion's attempt to fill the interweb with things that are not the remaining Top Five Albums of 1983: this time, the flavor oft referred to as literature, treated with the same level of contemptible idiocy that we normally utilize for treating the comics and the cartoons.  It's books, people, and No Pictures will be the source to find out what happened when a little bit of intelligence and a heaping mass of chutzpah get combined with things recommended by Harold Bloom.

The Book of Job
Translated with an Introduction by Stephen Mitchell
1987, Published by North Point Press, Harper Perennial

If there's one thing that you can plow through in one sitting and grasp very little of, it's the Bible.  Just ask any of those lunatics who claim to have done it, or even better, ask them what it "meant."  Make sure you've got a snack, and a firm grasp on your ability to hide fear.  Crazy people can sense that.  Mitchell's translation of the Book of Job is pretty much a standard text these days, utilized for college classes and the oddly involved Sunday School class, yet that shouldn't be a turn-off to the casual reader.  (Conversely, the fact that it's not a turn-off to the casual reader shouldn't serve as a turn-off to the critical reader.)  It's an involving work, utilizing contemporary language with a poetic structure that's well suited to Job, a book often referred to as the favorite of people with dead children.  That being said, you can still get quite a lot out of it, even if your life doesn't closely resemble that of an ER season finale.  Who hasn't asked themselves why a guy like Milton Friedman led such a charmed life while Gandhi couldn't even afford shoes?  Why Mother Theresa had to hang out with lepers while Princess Di enjoyed the bright lights of gay Paris?  It's just not right!  Luckily, God will show up near the end of this delightful fable and tell you why:  'cause he's the deity version of Glengary Glen Ross's Alec Baldwin character, and his balls are bigger and brasser than the rest.  Always Be Closing, ye dust-eating sons of Adam.

Proust and Three Dialogues with Georges Duthuit
Samuel Beckett
1931, 1949, Published by John Calder Press, Calder & Boyers

Malone Dies
Samuel Beckett
1951, Published by Les Editions de Minuit, Paris
English Translation by the Author

One thing never to do when going into some Beckett for the first time is to remember how esteemed literary critics always refer to him as "very, very funny."  If it's your first time at the can't-go-on, must-go-on dance, you'll be kicking yourself in the taint to find the humor.  But for those of us returning to the Great French Irishman, you'll find Beckett's brutally intellectual analysis of Proust to be gut-busting hilarity.  Nobody puts the screws to Swann like Beckett.  Malone Dies is another beast altogether--if you've ever wondered where A. Dice Clay ganked his routine from, you'll find something suspiciously familiar about the passage where Beckett describes how the pig butcher's wife knows better than to deny her autistic husband safe passage to her "cunt."  The laughs really get going though, when Beckett rips full tilt into the graphic description of the meager supply of lead his nubby pencil is capable of:  until he pulls aside the wizard's curtain and reveals that he's got another as-of-yet unused writing implement under his pillow!  That's a point scored for the unreliable narrator, and it's well-deserved at that.

Picnic, Lightning
Billy Collins
1998, Published by University of Pittsburgh Press

Ah, Billy Collins.  Only in America could we have a Poet Laureate of such unbearably adorable whimsy.  Whimsically taking the reader around his glorious little homestead, delighting the reader with the true tale of the three blind mice, Picnic, Lightning is a whimsical romp that delights down the road of doe-eyed does and doe-eyed children, along with gum-drop covered thunderstorms.  One imagines Billy Collins sitting down at a whimsically archaic typewriter, with a "World's Most Contented Garrison Keillor Fan" coffee mug, listening to Peter, Paul & Mary sing the songs of the Partridge Family whilst penning  his latest bestselling collection of poems about waking up in the morning.  If you're the reader for him, and you'll know by walls covered in kitten pictures, than prepare yourself to dive into a pool of whimsy, filled with the juice left over when a copy of Chicken Soup for the Soul gets pressed through a cheese grater.  Can't find his book?  Check Grandmother's casket.  You've got a few minutes before they bury her with it.

-Tucker Stone, 2007

Comics Of The Weak: When Iron Fist and Jars Of Brains Are The Only Thing That Make It Worth The Investment Of Time

Robin # 168
Written by Peter Milligan
Art by Freddie Williams II and Andy Kubert
Published by DC Comics

Is it time for a bit of cautious optimism, now that Peter Milligan is beginning his run on Robin?  Milligan's work often gets unfavorably compared to Morrison's, as both have operated on Vertigo series that can be pretty out there and he's also spent some time on some of mainstream super-hero titles.  It's not really a fair comparison, most of the time, but it wouldn't be surprising if it starts rearing it's head again.  Whether he's destined to stay with the title after the Ra's Al Ghul cross-over story that begins here is probably something that can be found by looking around DC Comics fansites--but then, of course, you'd have to look around fansites and remember who you're sharing your hobby with.  Either way, Milligan's here for now, and it looks like it might be the Milligan who did the immensely enjoyable Skreemer series, and not the one who's also churning out Infinity Inc.  As cross-over super-hero books go, this wasn't too bad.  (It's an issue of Robin, so admittedly, expectations are low.) It's clear that now is the time where Grant Morrison and company are going to begin the major push for Damian, Batman's biological son, to join the cast of Bat-characters, and the only thing up in the air is whether he'll end up on the lawful side of the equation by the end of this story.  Not a whole lot happens in the issue--a reminder of who the bad guy is, in case "The Resurrection of Ra's Al Ghul" didn't make clear, a rough skirmish between Robin and Damian and a closing page of ninjas, ninjas and ninjas.  For what it is, it's decent: the ability to get aroused by the prospect of a comic-book cross-over is always going to be the province of action figure collectors, fan-fic writers, and small children, and none of those are this readers bag--we'd much prefer a return to the tennis storyline, which seems to be totally gone now.  Freddie Williams II rejoins the book, and he does his regular "little cartoon version of Erik Larsen" thing--deal with that as you will.

The Exterminators # 23
Written by Simon Oliver
Art by Darick Robertson & John Lucas
Published by Vertigo/DC Comics

The conclusion to the biggest fight scene this comic has had is exactly like the conclusion to every big action movie where the protagonists are surrounded by insurmountable odds.  People who hate each other team up, people let their emotions get the best of them (and then die), and a deus ex machina saves everybody in the story who really matters.  Then on the last page, there's a horror movie "worst is yet to come" moment, and you're out.  It's Exterminators, so the insurmountable odds is defined as "lots and lots of insects, and some crazy people that worship insects," and the protagonists are made up of a Taoist/Buddhist/whatever Eastern-mythology-you-need cowboy, an ex-con named after a dead writer, a particularly vicious gangland drug dealer, and a random assortment of side characters.  As always with the Exterminators, it skirts on wheels of black comedy, veers close to parody, and yet keeps ending up on the side of angels.  We've resigned ourselves to consistently expecting the next issue to be the last as no one seems to care about this comic, so our enjoyment of each issue is tainted with a bit of anger.

Y: The Last Man # 59
Written by Brian K. Vaughan
Art by Pia Guerra & Jose Marzan, Jr.
Published by Vertigo/DC Comics

Regardless of what the cover implies, the monkey survives the issue.  Here we are, with one issue to go.  Hopefully, the next issue will take place far in the future, and be some kind of epilogue to the entire series.  Otherwise, it's going to be some kind of cry-heavy emoticon festival, where Pia Guerra draws all the remaining characters standing around in various states of shock and sadness.  We realize we stand among the few who are reading Y: The Last Man, who, having been with the title since the first issue experienced the following reaction:

"Why the fuck did I read this comic for the past five years?" 

Astonishing X-Men # 23
Written by Joss Whedon
Art by John Cassady
Published by Marvel Comics

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men comic, a title that exists solely because Joss Whedon and John Cassady have enough of a grip on the nerd festival that they could get Marvel to publish a comic where USAgent spent 22 pages making out with Fin Fang Foom, is pretty much the holy archetype comic of all time.  Every issue has clever dialog and big booming fights, and it's pretty comprehensible even though it only comes out every three months or so.  That means it's supposed to be really good, right?  Yet it still seems to lack a bit of the soul and imagination that shows up in lesser books.  It might have something to do with it being about the X-Men, a family of characters that's about as unwelcoming to an uninformed reader as a watching untranslated French soap operas would be to a confused Dallas Cowboys fan.  Or maybe it's just that Joss Whedon and John Cassady are both a little better than this kind of stale tripe, and their lack of ability to disguise their condescension comes across to aggressively.  Either way, Astonishing X-Men is probably the best regular team book being published by either company--but it's still a pretty good example of why team comics are pretty tiring to keep up with.

Criminal # 10
Written by Ed Brubaker
Art by Sean Phillips
Published by Icon/Marvel Comics

If all the major publishing companies were doing crime comics, would Brubaker's Criminal still seem like such a fresh and exciting read?  As it is, like the Factual always says during weeks when Hellblazer comes out, here is a comic that is unpredictable and reliable in tone and content, which, when put along the stacks of books that arrive each week, makes it painfully unique.  Even when something like Astonishing X-Men is clever, or Robin is surprisingly not terrible, they are still super-hero titles featuring mainstream super-heroes.  Nothing is ever going to occur in those books that can match up to the surprise of a sober Mcnulty or a dead Stringer Bell.  That's the landscape that comics have to operate in, outside of their main audience.  As anyone can plainly tell from any cursory survey of comics reviews and websites, the main audience relies on them for that--most comics buyers want Superman to always win, they want Batman to always struggle with not murdering the Joker, and they want Hal Jordan to be a Green Lantern.  If you're somebody who reads comics on a regular basis, but you also ingest Cormac McCarthy, The Wire, or any other random pop example of genre work that doesn't play by the genre-specific norm, then super-hero comics don't take that long to get boring.  Then, when something like Criminal comes along, or Grant Morrison's Seaguy, or any of the other 3rd tier books that operate without explicit editorial control, all the overblown horses of complimentary phrases come out. 

Why all this blathering?  Because this issue of Criminal was merely okay, and anybody with sense figured out the chick killed Tracy's brother when she was first introduced, yet on the back of the comic there's a quote claiming that "There was only one book that caused me to hold my breath for the final 11 pages...that book was Criminal." 

The fuck?

The Immortal Iron Fist # 10
Written by Matt Fraction & Ed Brubaker
Art by David Aja & Kano
Published by Marvel Comics

Isn't Kano a character from the Mortal Kombat video game?  That must be irritating, to have that name, and work in the one field where you can bet that everyone of your coworkers probably knows that game really well.  Immortal Iron Fist comes back to what makes it work the best: going balls-out and having ridiculous shit like somebody named Dog-Brother # 1 attack using the "RAZOR DERVISH ATTACK-ULTIMATE" while fighting a crazy chick named The Bride of Nine Spiders.  And yet he still loses, even after claiming that he's "a pack of nine thousand strong!"  Brubaker & Fraction are onto something with this title, and with this issue, we think we might have guessed what it is: a complete lack of angst.  None of the characters in this title ever complain or whine about their situation--unlike Batman, Superman & basically the entire Marvel universe excepting Iron Fist, this is a comic about people who really enjoy battling each other to the death while wearing donkey-ass spandex.  These are freaks in love with the fetish, and it's a pleasure to read something with this little shame, and this little ambition.  The Bride of Nine Spiders ain't looking to prove shit: she's a bad-ass bitch and she's totally in love with herself about it.  Seriously, like writing late-night diary entries about her new pants, and what she ate this morning.  Why doesn't everybody read this book?  Do people really care that much about Skrull invasions?

New Avengers: Illuminati # 5
Written by Brian Michael Bendis & Brian Reed
Art by Jim Cheung & Mark Morales
Published by Marvel Comics

It's kind of fascinating how Marvel keeps being so successful at selling these big-event books.  Here we are, the fifth issue of this mini-series (which you don't need to have read issues 1-4 to understand, as no one at the Factual did, and we got this one fine) and Marvel is gearing up for another big "this changes everything moment."  Meanwhile, DC's big events don't seem to catch fire, all the new books they put out are dwindling in sales, and the most successful thing they have going is a pretty niche-specific cross-over about Green Lanterns and the Justice League, which is (after all the screaming and boob-socks) pretty much exactly like every Justice League comic ever.  Marvel, on the other hand, is on their fifth or 70th 'big event' comic in a row, and while all of them have just been long definitions of catchphrases, each of them has worked out pretty well for the house that Stan Lee plastered his name all over.  We're moving away from "Who's side are you on?" and "No more mutants" to "Who can you trust?" and in the back of the book, you're graced with the question "Who would you sleep with?"  Hopefully, "Who's father would you peg with your tongue?" is right around the corner.

Oh, and Black Bolt is a Skrull, or was.  Maybe Thor and Colossus as well, but that's more than likely just a fake-out.  Try to make yourself care, you'll be blowing rent money on it next summer.  Illuminati # 5 wasn't a very good comic.  It was, however, a pretty well constructed advertisement for what will probably be Marvel's next best-selling title, which is apparently called "Secret Experiment."  Didn't they used to give these teaser things away for free?

Omega The Unknown # 2
Written by Jonathan Lethem & Karl Rusnak
Art by Farel Darymple & Paul Hornschemeier
Published by Marvel Comics

What the fuck, Lethem?  The Factual is firmly in support of Motherless Brooklyn, The Disappointment Artist, Men & Cartoons, This Shape We're In & even Fortress of Solitude, and yet we're sitting here, reading Omega The Unknown and still only digging the art.  This shit is double-B boring, and while it "makes sense" it "makes sense" in the totally abstract kind of dipshit spandex manner.  The only appealing thing about Omega the Unknown, besides the looks-like-this-comic-should-be-about-dating art, is that Lethem's name is on the cover, which gets the imagination rolling.  But when read, it's just...stupid.  Robots fighting?  A kind old black man who looks after the goofball hero?  An obnoxious protagonist, coupled with an even more obnoxious nurse?  Stilted dialog?  Maybe this thing will start working as the issues come in, and we'll be glad to eat our words, but gaging this on it's lonesome, this is just a pile of boring ass phoning-it-in.  We get enough of that on anything Geoff Johns does.

Fearless # 1
Written by Mark Sable & David Roth
Art by P.J. Holden
Published by Image Comics

Each week, The Factual sends it's intern to the local comic shop, and said intern is under orders to return with a random 1st issue of something.  The hope is that it might turn out to be a diamond, a diamond in the rough, or just merely pretty in the light.  Fearless is one of those experiments, a comic published by Image, from a group of creators who are all relatively new to the business.  Artistically, it's in that vein of comics that looks a lot like it's storyboards for an animated television series on the WB network, and it's various violence and language are all tame enough to mesh into that environment as well.  Plotwise, it is so standard as to seem like it comes from a book about how to write mainstream comic books: super-hero with dorky past fighting the corruption and drug dealers that haunt his nondescript urban metropolis.  The requisite "this is what makes this different from Batman" twist is that the hero suffers from a pretty severe case of whatever disease it is that makes someone incredibly terrified of absolutely everything.  (Which we're not sure is an actual disease.)  There's nothing here to recommend this book, unless you're sitting around wondering how to take your crappy role-playing game sketchpad into story format.  If that's the case, buy it, cut out the pictures of the good guy and replace him with Danger Globe, the Mightiest Mortal Man, or whatever it is you're calling that guy.

Lobster Johnson: The Iron Promethus # 3
Written by Mike Mignola
Art by Jason Armstrong
Published by Dark Horse Comics

This is the issue where Mignola amps the pulpiness, specifically by including a talking brain in a jar.  Talking brains in jars have a long history in comics, one that predates the version of a talking brainlike object in David Lynch's Dune, and there's a reason for that:  there is nothing ever wrong with a talking brain in a jar.  One of the finest moments in comics history is the famous "talking brain in a jar" brain-fight in Grant Morrison's Doom Patrol.  Here, Mignola and Armstrong's brain merely reveals that he believes the greater adversary in the current battle to be the devil himself, and then the brain gets shot multiple times.  While the brain is wrong, the adversary is clearly Fu Manchu, or someone who dresses like Fu Manchu, no one corrects the brain.  That's a pretty consistent caveat too, that agreeable attitude that listeners adopt during conversations with brains in jars.  They are, after all, only capable of speech, and it's a bit nasty to contradict them--how would they know any better?  They can't SEE.  They're just a BRAIN in a JAR.  Also, this comic incorporates a classic fight tactic of throwing a magic scorpion at ones foe.  These two things are why Mignola's comics consistently sell.  He may not do it every time he shows up, but eventually, Mignola will give you what you want.  As long as what you want are things that sit on dusty shelves, being tended by people who still wear snap-brims.

-Tucker Stone, 2007

Off The Shelf: The Threat of Death and The Threat of Hearing About You Masturbating

Powerhouse Pepper
By Basil Wolverton
Published by Fantagraphics Books, 1994
Originally Published by Humorama Inc. and Visual Varities Inc., 1949-1952 & 1975

A scattered collection of stories, some of which feature Powerhouse, a character similar in behavior to Popeye, with no accent and, possibly, a little more intelligence.  Others feature a little spaceman, and his exploration of Earth.  His behavior is similar to Popeye's as well, but more of a Hanna Barbara alien crossed with Popeye.  The real draw here is the Wolverton art, which is as brilliant as it always referred to as being.  Although this reader found the strongest and most entertaining stories to be the ones filled with alliterative puns and speedy, rhythmic dialog, this short collection doesn't have anything in it that's bad on the appearance tip.  It's a great looking book, and while time may have aged the humor, it's still a whimsical little pleasure.  Time with Basil Wolverton is time well spent.

We Are On Our Own
By Miriam Katin
Published by Drawn & Quarterly , 2006

Miriam's graphic novel We Are On Our Own falls into the same category as Anders Nilsen's Don't Go Where I Can't Follow; autobiographies about some of the dark personal tragedies that the majority of the world prefers to experience through sentimentalized mediums--a Holocaust narrative (Katin) and the story of the death of one's partner (Nilsen).  Rarely do these subjects get treated in fiction with the same gravity and honesty found in biography, and nowhere could that be more true than in Katin's work.  The story is as stark as possible--a Jewish mother and daughter escape the Nazis as the Holocaust nears the end, by whatever means necessary.  Whereas "whatever means necessary" in fiction always implies that the mother turned into the female Jewish version of a bloodthirsty survivalist with S.A.S. level combat training, what it means here is that she just walks away from her home at the last possible second, makes her way by train and foot as far as possible, and then attempts to create some kind of sensible, satisfactory life for her daughter.  Along the way, they find that random kind assistance that goes completely without portrayal in fiction as being "unrealistic" and she skirts immediate death on relatively few occasions.  There's no need for Katin to up the psychological ante here--the war does that just fine, and there's never a moment in the book where one feels that any of the fear needs to be turned up a notch.  Her frank admittance that she finds it increasingly difficult to express any kind of faith or theistic imaginings is another surprise--rarely does one read a tale of Holocaust survivors where the Jewishness of its protagonists goes so unremarked upon.  Here, Katin doesn't ignore it--but she sees no need to conflate its importance to her and her family.  For her, and her mother, religion didn't serve to help them make their way to safety, nor was it responsible for the return of her father.  This is a story about courage, and dumb luck--it's not one that closes with exhortations of prayer and renewal.  It's a straight up study of survival.  Katin's art, a scratched in rough sketchbook version of storytelling serves the story far better than any more exaggerated cartooning would.  In a way, it's got a rough ugliness to it that makes it far more interesting to look at--it's so naked and raw that it helps make the narrative itself that much more visceral to read.  It doesn't look like art that can hide anything, it looks like art that comes straight from the gut of its creator.  As is the standard for Drawn & Quarterly, the packaging and design of the book fits the tone, a somber square bound affair that belies the painful content it conceals.  Hopefully, it's found the audience it deserves.

(A note, for full disclosure of possible bias:  this writer happened to meet Miriam at the 2007 Mocca Arts Festival--the copy reviewed here was purchased from her.  Although enough time has hopefully passed that all fond memories of her, and the delightful email she sent a few days later, have faded enough for this review to be treated objectively, the truth is that that is very, very unlikely.  Katin was a joy to meet and speak with, and her remark, that this writer and his lovely fiance "seemed like very serious people" is something that brings a pleasure to no end, even as it happens to be completely inaccurate.)

The Playboy
By Chester Brown
Published by Drawn & Quarterly, 1992
Originally serialized in Yummy Fur, Published by Vortex Comics

The other side of the autobio coin is that of Playboy, which could actually be referred to as Blankets for Catholics.  Chester Brown's obsessive little tale about growing up in the shadow of masturbation isn't, by any stretch of the definition, an incredibly pleasant read, but it's certainly a truthful one.  Following the course of our author's lifelong obsession with the the moments in his life where he practiced the dark arts of onanism, this little tome is heavy on the emotion and light on much else.  That's part and parcel of many autobiographical comics, so it's not really something to criticize the book for--it is, after all, Chester Brown.  In recent years, his work has gone more towards the historical fiction variety, which of course means he's shed some of his readers along the way. This reader, however, is from the opposite camp--while we've found his Louis Riel to be top-notch, this little tome on masturbation was a bit, well, masturbatory.  The doom and gloom attitude overshadowing the entire thing gets a little tired--we understand the compulsion among men to live in some kind of ridiculous shame spiral about their "special" time, but it's one of those things that is so obnoxiously ridiculous when it's presented on the page. It's like when somebody gets really in depth to a meaningless question like, "How you feeling?" 

Christ buddy, I don't really want to know!  Just say "fine" and move the fuck on, I got some copies to make. I've got some elderly women to rob blind.   don't want to hear about that dream where your grandmother stole your yearbook, and I don't want to know you're ashamed for doing something that every single 15 year old boy does constantly, excepting creepy religious freaks.

The Technopriests Book # 1: Initiation
Written By Alexandro Jodorowsky
Art by Zoran Janjetov & Fred Beltran
Translated by Justin Kelly
Published by Humanoids/DC Comics

Out of all the foreign sci-fi comics brought to America by the Humanoids line, Technopriests is one of the best looking.  It's also relatively imaginative, even as it deals with all the basic sci-fi tropes: here be space pirates, in every color of the rainbow.  (Excepting blue, for some reason.) The story is told in flashback, as a wizened old man records the history of his existence into some type of computer, all the while helped along by some kind of talking pet rodent.  Helpfully, the creature, a sort of cross between a cartoon mouse and an actual mouse, has somehow been alive just as long, so the reader is treated to consistent reminders of how he "soiled himself that moment" and "had many bursts of flatuence."  Jodorowsky deserves the cultish acclaim he's received for his comics and films, but his Dali-esque imagination doesn't extend when it comes to comic relief. He's talented at creating a pretty diverse universe of characters, and he's a genius at giving them weird shit to do, but all his jokes have something to do with pooping.

The course of the narrator's story is one that belies the original serialization of the story--each chapter has some kind of bookend check-in with our albino story-teller and his rodent buddy, and each experiences at least some basic rise and fall of action. Read in succession, the story can come across less than the sum of its parts--most of the trials and tribulations of our albino's life end up being solved by him calling upon "Super-Albino," a sort of exaggerated version of what the narrator imagines himself to be.  As the book progresses, it carries the classic comic pretense of leading towards a conclusion, but by the final pages it's clear that our narrator has a ways to go before he becomes the "Head Technopriest of the Known Universe" that he's presented as becoming.  Which, of course, is why there is a book two.

-Tucker Stone, 2007