No one else really came close to the lower cutoff. For the second year in a row, Ms. Marvel bounced between artists so much it didn't get a single pencil artist to do more than five issues, despite shipping 12 times. There just aren't many series I bought enough issues of for their artist to reach that page total, even if the book kept the same artist.
Justice League of America #1: Batman decided they needed a somehow more down-to-Earth JLA, which sounds like another Outsiders, but let him call it what he likes I guess. Steve Orlando, Ivan Reis, with Joe Prado and Oclair Albert on inks, Marcelo Maiolo as colorist, and Clayton Cowles lettering. This is the recruitment drive issue. At least Orlando got it over with in one issues. AS long as you don't count those one-shots they did about most of the characters. And was there a #0 issue? Whatever. This issue still boils down to Batman strutting around barking orders, which certainly seems like a good way to build a team that hates your guts. To be fair, he has taken a lot of hits to the head. Pass.
Justice League of America - The Ray: Hey, here's one of those one-shots! Stever Orlando wrote this, too, with Stephen Byrne handling the art, and Clayton Cowles on lettering duties again. Changed the origin a little, with Ray living with his mom, running away from home, figuring out his powers on his own. It's not bad as a one-shot, tracing this arc of Ray being forced to hide himself in one form or another, and finally deciding not to do that any longer. Sort of. Have to make allowances for the secret identity thing.
Master of Kung-Fu #126: Another of the Marvel Legacy things. Shang-Chi tracks down a crazy ex-Hand scientist who was trying to teach animals martial arts, and was then just going to transplant Shang's brain into an octopus. That doesn't go well for him. CM Punk wrote it, with Dalibor Talijac and Erick Arciniega on art duties, and Travis Lanham lettering. Of the three of these I tried, I think this one did the best at just writing a done-in-one story. Kept it accessible without too much backstory, brought in a fun, disposable villain. I feel Arciniega's colors muddied the artwork, but maybe Talijac needs someone else to ink him, because the linework wasn't as strong as in other work of his I have. Still, I'd be interested to see more of this.
Ms. Marvel #14-25: Another busy year for Kamala. G. Willow Wilson wrote the book all year, and Ian Herring's coloring kept it having a consistent feel despite the 5 different pencilers the book used this year. Joe Caramagna lettered it all year. Takeshi Miyazawa drew the battle between Kamala and a computer virus learning sentience from humans on the Internet. Francesco Gaston drew a one-off issue checking in with Bruno in Wakanda. Marco Failla drew the return of HYDRA to Jersey City. Diego Olortegui drew the story about Kamala and her acquaintance from Karachi the Red Dagger trying to slow down a runaway train. And finally, Nico Leon drew the most recent issue, where Kamala's friends are trying to protect the city in Ms. Marvel's absence.High Point: I know the book gets artists who are mostly within the same general range of styles, but I think a lot of credit has to go to Ian Herring for keeping the feel of the book consistent with his color work. I know I said that in the previous paragraph, but it was worth repeating. Of the artists, I like Miyazawa and Olortegui the best. Miyazawa adds such interesting background details, and Olortegui is pretty great at body language and expressions. Mike and Zoe trying to be Ms. Marvel has been funny so far. That HYDRA twerp Lockdown being arrested was gratifying.
Low Point: The fact they just let Josh walk away after his involvement with HYDRA's attempt to subvert democracy in Jersey City. It isn't as though he snuck out the back. The last we see of him he's standing in the middle of the street watching Kamala walk away. He's right there, friggin' arrest him!
Nova #2-4: Well, Jeff Loveness and Ramon Perez, with clutch superstar Ian Herring on colors and Albert Deschesne handling lettering, brought Richard Rider back. So that was something. He and Sam shared the book, fought Death's Head at one point, went on separate dates.High Point: Perez' artwork was excellent, and Herring got to go different places with the colors than he normally does on Ms. Marvel. A lot of neon purples and reds. Cosmo was involved in the fight with Death's Head in issue 3. Cosmo's always good.
Low Point: I just don't really care about Sam. That part where Sam's teammates kind of blew off Rich being a New Warrior hurt. They're calling themselves the friggin' Champions, they don't get to look down their noses at anybody else's team affiliation! And Rich was an Avenger, for like five minutes! Ask Ed Brubaker, he did it!
Patsy Walker, aka Hellcat #14-17: Geez, feels like eons since this book ended. The Black Cat got her hands on a magic claw that put people under her control and rather than grab, I dunno, Thor or a Hulk, she grabbed some of Patsy's friends. That didn't end well for her, but Ian had the chance to get some closure with his abusive ex-girlfriend. Patsy had a strange magic cold where he sneezes made random things happen. And then she got a big advance check for a book and took her friends shopping. So Kate Leth, Brittney L. Williams, Rachelle Rosenberg, and Clayton Cowles at least got to give Patsy a happy send off.High Point: I remain surprised by how well the addition of vampire, ex-mutant, infant son-having Jubilee to the cast went. She rolls with Patsy's craziness so well (it's better than dealing with Logan and his moods), and Williams drawing her mist form as a little pink cloud with pink sunglasses is adorable. The back and forth between Ian and Patsy is entertaining. Hellstrom banishing Hedy to Hell, but then chastising himself for losing control again. So dramatic.
Low Point: The Black Cat arc was a low point. The story didn't make a heck of a lot of sense, even if I'm willing to roll with the Black Cat being flat out evil. Which I'm not.
Power Pack #63: The last of these Legacy I bought. Devin Grayson opted to have Katie relate an old adventure to her teacher like she was telling a story. It mostly focuses on Katie's relationship with Alex, who is off with Reed Richards, wherever they are, and basically ignores half the team. Not necessarily bad for a one-off story, but if you're trying to sell folks on wanting to see more, kind of a curious approach. But that's as much to do with the overall idea of these things as anything else. Marika Cresta and Chris O'Halloran handled the art duties, and Joe Caramagna lettered it.
Ragman #1: Ray Fawkes, Inaki Miranda, Eve de la Cruz, and Josh Reed were the creative team for this updating of Ragman's origin, where he looks a bit more like a mummy, or like he's made out of vines, than the patchwork costume he typically has. And Rory is a soldier dealing with PTSD after things went bad in some attempt at tomb-robbing. I didn't care for the redesign on the outfit. I guess it fits with a more horror vibe, but it's kind of dull. And the first issue didn't really do enough for me to develop any interest in what was happening.
Real Science Adventures #1-3: Even though I hadn't found the anthology format of these Real Science Adventures stores to work for me, I figured I would try again. There were two stories running. One was about the Flying She-Devils trying to swipe a flying boat from a rival crew to enable them to keep their base. The other was about Agent Sparrow infiltrating some Nazi super-weapon to destroy it. Brian Clevinger, Anthony Clark, and Jeff Powell worked on both stories, with Lo Baker as artist on the She-Devils story, and Wook Jin Clark on the Sparrow story. I couldn't really get into either story, so I bailed halfway through.
2 comments:
I do still miss Hellcat. It was silly, but dadgummit, it was fun! A lot more fun than seeing Batman bully people.
And seriously, an octopus with martial arts is simply delightful as a concept.
Just so long as black belt octopi stay a concept, and not a real thing. Beaches are dangerous enough as it is.
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