What I Bought 8/3/2013 - Part 5

Like I said, posting's going to be sporadic. Hopefully things will be back to normal by next week. I'm missing a couple of books the store was shorted on for July. So this is the end of the July stuff for now. I do have two books from last week to discuss tomorrow.

Avengers Arena #12, by Dennis Hopeless (writer), Kev Walker (artist), Jason Gorder (inker, pages 7-12, 17-20), Jean-Francois Beaulieu (colorist), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - Nico isn't dead after all! She's just amped up on magic and out for blood! And Katy - even with Deathlocked, Chasehawk, and what's left of Juston's Sentinel - is out-classed. Oh, it's a close run thing, but it confirms a suspicion I had for awhile. Namely, that Katy would have difficulty controlling multiple weapons simultaneously in a situation requiring coordination and quick adjustments. If all that's needed is for them to burn down a forest, fine. Reacting spontaneously to a seriously brassed off opponent hurling a variety of offensive magic was another matter.

The Sentinel's trashed, Deathlocket loses her disproportionately large cannon arm, and she and Katy wind up swallowed by the earth. Which puts them in Arcade's base, though he doesn't know it, and Deathlocket found that he's collecting all the dead kids. Plus an unconscious Chris Powell, which doesn't make sense and is disappointing. The former because locking him up takes him out of the game, the latter because I wanted to see what Chris - as the most experienced of the bunch - could manage minus powers.

Kev Walker's back on the art chores, and he inked half his pages. I prefer his inks to Gorder's, because Walker uses a stronger line, which gives the faces more definition. Makes things a little starker, the shadows much deeper, which seems appropriate for this pretty fierce battle. I also like how he lays out the bottom half of page 15. It's four panels, and the two on the end are of the major combatants: The first is Nico looking fierce confident, leaning forward just slightly with the suggested aggression. The fourth is Katy, slumped, bloodied, torn shirt, finally decisively beaten. And in between are the two smaller, more critical panels. First, the Staff of One flying away from Katy, then it reaching Nico's hand as commanded. It's important to show that Katy misjudged the situation, thought having the Staff meant she had the weapon, and the realization that she was wrong, that Nico has the power, and Katy has nothing left to defend herself with.

I've mentioned this before, but I really like the purple Beaulieu uses for Nico's powers. It's a pretty purple most of the time, meaning it's a shade I find aesthetically pleasing. But combined with Walker's shading, it can be extremely effective for that otherworldly, somewhat horror effect. See page 16, when the Earth opens up and reaches out for Katy.

Daredevil #29, by Mark Waid (writer), Javier Rodriguez (penciler & colorist), Alvaro Lopez (inker), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - It's nice to know even successful superheroes like Daredevil hate having to listen to noisy children as much as I do. That completely helps me identify with him in a way I didn't before. I'm half-joking.

OK, I don't have #28 yet, but as I understand, Matt's helping a childhood acquaintance defend himself in court. Except this acquaintance known something the racist Sons of the Serpent want kept quiet, and they are all over the place in the judicial infrastructure. Which means the judge can shoot the man and expect he'll get away with it, because everyone else in the courtroom except Matt is a fellow member. Which putts Matt in a situation of trying to protect his client, plus any other innocent people (including one poor paramedic tagged as the fall guy), while also trying to figure out how to stop these guys from escaping scot free, in a situation where he can't be sure who is what they appear to be.

I feel like coming in halfway blunted the impact of the story for me. I like watching Matt try to protect people when he can't figure out who to protect them from. Especially when some of the cops aren't bad guys, just guys who got bad information and are reacting to it. One of their fellow officers tells them that paramedic is the shooter, they trust him. I'm sure it's not a coincidence the paramedic was black, both because we're dealing with an openly racist organization in the comic, and given the recent look into the NYPD's highly questionable practices when it comes to who they decide to "randomly" stop and search. I'm also curious if Matt trying to ferret out this corruption in the legal system will be the backdrop conflict for Waid and Samnee's next big arc (like how Bullseye's repeated attacks were for the first 2 years). That could be interesting, since it's a different sort of challenge, one that's personal in a different way. So even when it isn't an issue I love, it's still an issue I strongly like.

And let's talk about that art. It doesn't happen throughout, but there are a lot of times where Rodriguez draws Matt in such a way that his eyes are covered. I don't know if that's a coincidence, or a deliberate choice because it's Daredevil, so why not cover his eyes. The panel where he's preparing to jump kick the cop from behind, his arm is across his face, for example. I don't know, just something I noticed. Also, Rodriguez' Daredevil seems a little taller and thinner than Samnee's, but they still look similar enough that it maintains the look of the book, though Rodriguez favors a brighter array of colors. The first page has that panel of Matt kicking the bailiff with an extremely bright blue background. It's quite the attention getter. There's also the page of DD leaping down the stairwell, with the three long vertical panel charting his progress. Especially the last one, him diving straight down, the bullets whizzing past on all side. I always like those kinds of images.