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Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Comic book wrap up: A look back at summer comics The Daily’s Osi Aken’Ova reviews IRREDEEMABLE When I heard Mark Waid was doing another this summer’s most memorable comic that challenged the way people thought comic books. about super heroes, I just rolled my eyes and recFor some, the long summer holiday is an opportunity to relax and enjoy time away from school. But for us realists, it’s a time to enroll in summer classes so we can get out of college faster. After hours of summer school classes, there was nothing I enjoyed more every Wednesday than waiting for new comic books at the comic book shop, and for OSI the most part they didn’t disAKEN’OVA appoint. Although there were a few misses, most of the comics I read this summer were highly enjoyable. These are a few of my favorites and one of my least favorites.
ULTIMATUM: SPIDERMAN REQUIEM As New York recovers from the decimation of the Ultimatum wave, J. Jonah Jameson- having realized that Spiderman is a hero not a menace as his tabloid had labeled him-recalls Spiderman exploits. The great thing about this two-part series is that not only does it summarize the entire 133 “Ultimate Spiderman” run but the choice to have original series artist Mark Bagely draw the flashbacks is amazing. There’s nothing I hate more than different artists working on one issue because it looks unprofessional and the lack of continuity serves as a distraction from the story but in this case, it works perfectly. This book is worth every penny and is only in two parts so just in case you missed it, pick it up.
WEDNESDAY COMICS On July 9, DC launched “Wednesday Comics,” a collection of 15 weekly one-page DC comics written by a different creative team that comes out weekly. Nothing really special or new but it also is printed on the same paper that is used for newspapers to give the comic books a Sunday morning comics feel. This might just seem like a simple gimmick but surprisingly you completely forget about that because the mainstream superhero comic book art simply looks beautiful on 14 inch x 20 inch paper. It might be annoying to wait a full week just to read a page from your favorite comic, but all the pretty pictures make it worth it.
ommended it to his fans without reading it. After I read the first collection, I was blown away. In the first seven pages, the Plutonian (an invincible superhero with superman type powers) brutally murders an innocent family without blinking an eye. The book follows his old accomplices as they do what they can to find out what drove this compassionate superhero to become a global terrorist. This is one of the darkest books I read this year, and the fact that such grim subject matter is paired with the innocent Golden age inspired art by Peter Krause is very interesting and just adds many layers that keep the reader guessing what Waid and Krause might be up to.
INVINCIBLE I know, I know, I write about “Invincible” every chance I get and that bothers a lot of people who think I’m just jumping the Kirkman bandwagon. But the book is simply that good and Robert Kirkman is one of the best writers out there; he is not afraid to take his characters to very dark places and rough them up. In the “Conquest” storyline, everything Invincible cares about in the world is shattered by his seemingly unstoppable enemy who also challenges the young heroe’s ideals. Not only is the story beautifully told but Kirkman’s abilty to keep the reader on his toes makes this a very entertaining series that keeps getting better and better.
ULTIMATUM I recommended this series a lot last semester and I apologize, it was the most disappointing books I’ve read in a long time. The only thing it’s good for is pissing really busy people off by wasting their time. “Ultimatum” is the series that ended the Ultimate universe and tied all the Ultimate books together, which it does but it just ends up feeling like the creators were behind on their deadlines and rushed to make them. It had so much potential and great ideas, like making Magneto the big bad, but the writer, Jeph Loeb, relied too much on killing numerous beloved characters to entertain the readers, which can only get you so far. After awhile no one even cares about their favorite characters that dying, they just want it to be over. Osi is a film and video studies senior.
PHOTO PROVIDED
Five of the most notable summer comic book covers include: “Ultimatum: Spiderman Requiem,” “Wednesday Comics,” “Irredeemable,” “Invincible” and “Ultimatum.”
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