What I Bought 8/19/2015 - Part 3

I'm getting pretty close to finish up a couple of series I've been picking up in back issues, and so I was scouting for other possibilities. I was going to try the stretch of Mike Carey's X-Men Legacy where he made Rogue the main character, but geez. Every five seconds it's another tie-in. Necrosha, or Avengers vs. X-Men, or Schism, or some other crap. Really off-putting. Oh well, plenty of other options out there.

Ms. Marvel #17, by G. Willow Wilson (writer), Adrian Alphona (artist), Ian Herring (color artist), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - Carol could at least try to look like she's enjoying the team-up a little bit.

Carol doesn't do a terribly good job convincing Kamala the world isn't ending, but does agree to help find Aamir. While searching for him, they came across the same idiots that got run off from the school by Loki's spells, and Kamala urges them to 'You have skills! Go use them for good instead of stupid!' The body language Alphona gives her there is great, with the one hand on hip, but the other hand with the thumb jerked in the direction of the school. It's a very good example of being fed up, but in a way that works for Kamala. She's not going to be snarling through gritted teeth, she's just exasperated. She can't believe these guys decided this was the right thing to be doing.

She and Carol make their way to the docks, find some kittens that someone did their best to provide for, fight off Kaboom (the Inhuman girl with the electricity powers), and find Aamir, floating and glowing in the Terrigen Mists.

While I appreciated Carol's attempt to assure Kamala that everyone feels like they're screwing up all the time, she should have used a different example than Iron Man. If Stark actually spent any time wondering if he was screwing everything up, he might not have done half the stupid shit he's done in the past decade. That aside, I did enjoy the interplay between them. Kamala has a tendency to babble, and Carol's believable as the calm veteran for her to bounce off. Also, it's neat how Carol largely lets Kamala lead. She agrees to help, even though she has other stuff to be doing. When Kamala decides to stop and deal with the out-of-control electricians, Carol helps, but lets Kamala do the talking. And she lets Kamala work through where Aamir is hidden. It's a mentoring approach, giving support when needed, getting Kamala back on course when the enormity of things starts to get to her, being willing to poke fun at her even. I forget sometimes Carol has experience in the mentor role from working with Arana among other things.

I like how easily Kamala uses her powers now. It's something she does naturally, and Alphona conveys that well. When she makes her legs longer so she can check out rooftops, but the rest of her remains normal size. Or how she makes one foot larger when she's standing on the crazy electrician. It's very casual, very controlled use of powers. Overall, it's pretty much been what I was hoping for, though we'll see how it concludes when the next issue comes out in two months.

Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #8, by Ryan North (writer), Erica Henderson (artist), Rico Renzi (color artist), Clayton Cowles (letterer) - Maybe it's the angle, but Thor's head looks much too large.

The Thors and Nancy are in Asgard, trying to figure out how Ratatoskr got free, and how to get him back in. The answer to the first, as it so often is when it comes to things going wrong in Asgard, is "Loki", but at least he cops to it, and is quite taken with Nancy's forthrightness and love of Cat Thor. I'm not so taken with Cat Thor, but that's because Nancy made frost giants dogs. DOGS ARE NOT BAD GUYS! This may seem odd given the numbers of complaints I've made about my father's dogs (especially Charlie) over the years, but they aren't bad, just rambunctious (and some of them are stupid). Completely different. I give the fanfic a 2-star review, and one star is only because of Odin's "Aye, thee proclaims that every time," in response to Thor's "I gave them. . . Claws for concern?"

Back on Earth, the heroes are having some trouble with Ratatoskr, since it keeps turning Doreen's allies against her. Even the aid of Spider-Man's (stolen) web-shooters can't overcome the odds, but she's able to hold her own until the Asgardians arrive. With ear plugs. Squirrel Girl's big friendship speech mostly doesn't work, because saying not to be insecure and jealous is one thing, actually doing it is something else, but it helps just enough. Probably all the yelling was just really distracting, but the evil squirrel is defeated and imprisoned. Loki even provides a final twist of the knife with a note and a gift for it. I have to admit I enjoy this version of Loki. He's a good guy, but he's still a mischievous dick. So he keeps the Cat Thor head look just to annoy his brother a bit, but doesn't let it distract him from helping.

I have to say, even as much as I like Spider-Man, given the opportunity, I'd have stolen Captain America's shield instead. How could you pass up the chance to hurl that thing at least once? Plus, she could have altered the lyrics to that song to fit with her. "When Squirrel Girl lobs a shield that's been swiped, all the bad guys will, um have plenty of gripes." Something like that.

Henderson's work has a rushed look to it. The lines aren't as strong, faces are less detailed than they have been. There are certain panels where I think Renzi's colors are serving as the lines. It seems to happen a lot with Ratotskr, which makes sense given it's almost all black so lines would struggle to show up, but also Tippy-Toe, which looks more unfinished. Some panels are stronger than others, although given how much talking Loki does, she doesn't have much room to operate at times. But up to this point Henderson's drawn 8 issues, and they've all been on time (and I don't know if she's doing other books or commissions on the side), so maybe this is the limit to what she can manage without a skip month? If so, she's still well ahead of 95% of the artists working for Marvel and DC these days.