What I Bought 8/19/09

Another week, another two books.

Deadpool: Suicide Kings #5 - I can't figure out why it's called "Suicide Kings". No one was trying to commit suicide. FYI, the cover is a send up of Spectacular Spider-Man #206, though I like this one better.

Deadpool and Spider-Man get trounced by the Wrecking Crew, who are under the mistaken impression people are impressed they've "fought" (read: "gotten whupped by") Norse gods before. Then the Punisher shows up in the most ridiculous outfit he's ever worn. And the letterer Cory Petit, or writer Mike Benson, mispelled "Klaw". Klaw, as in "the Master of Sound". It's little, but it bugs me. Wrecking Crew defeated, Deadpool fights Tombstone, manages to turn losing a hand into a positive, returns the whiny rich kid that set him up to his rich father, gets paid, clears his name, and makes out with Outlaw, which is probably the best turn of luck Deadpool's had in a long time.

This mini-series is one of those things I'm wishing I hadn't bought, but by the time I figured that out, I'd already requested pretty much all the issues, and I didn't want to stick my comic store with an extra copy they ordered for me, so here we are. For a five issues of Deadpool, only having two scenes that made me laugh out loud is not good. And honestly, I probably shouldn't have laughed at the overweight guy running from Wade but only getting five feet before being winded, but I did. I'm not strong. So disappointment reigns, I'd say I learned a lesson, but we all know I didn't, so let's move on.

Power Girl #4 - As thanks for helping to save the city, Power Girl takes Terra to the movies. So we learn a little something about Power Girl, and that Terra is trying out an Australian accent. It serves for a cheesy (and fairly obvious) joke, but I chuckled. Then they have to stop the armies of Mordor from wrecking a bridge on the Lower East Side. They take care of that, and Power Girl even uses connections from her everday life to try and rehabilitate their foe. Let's hear it for rehabilitation! Then we check in on her company and some of their work, and maybe she has a place to stay, and then something crashes destructively in the park.

So we saw how Power Girl interacts with her friends, employees, random strangers, how she handles problems both superheroic and everday, there was a fight scene, there were some in-jokes attempted ("Allen Barry" as the movie protagonist who died, but got better), good times. The dialogue's a bit stilted at times. Not in the overly melodramatic "Great Guardians!" Silver Age way, more mechanical. Sometimes Power Girl speaks as though she's not totally familiar with the English language. Or maybe she doesn't like contractions, since that was what mad me notice it, and it reminded me of Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation. OK, need to say something about the art. Amanda Conner is very good at drawing things going on in the background, while the main story is proceeding in the foreground. It's a positive attention to detail, because it doesn't make the panels feel overcrowded, it does help make the characters in focus feel like part of a larger world. It's not just about whoever happens to be talking.

All right, I'm done for the day. Discuss amongst yourselves if you'd like.