What I Bought 8/10/2018

Two books from last week, which is a decent haul around here these days. Not a lot else going on around here right now. Trying to do some writing these next two months, we'll see how that goes.

Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #35, by Ryan North (writer), Derek Charm (artist), Rico Renzi (color artist), Travis Lanham (letterer) - I guess squirrels and spiders both have poor depth perception.

By the time Doreen finds Kraven, he and Spidey are in battle. Doreen tries throwing the "power and responsibility" thing in Spidey's face, that Kraven is still learning the responsible side, but Spider-Man is unmoved. Before he can get Kraven, Brain Drain steps in with some load of hooey about if you don't think Kraven can change then you don't believe you can change, and as I said, that's a load of hooey. But Spidey goes to find other crimes, rather than punch the brain in a jar - and really, what's the point of superheroing if not to punch brains in jars - and Kraven goes off to try and work at being a better person.

Doreen's desire to see the best in people is a wonderful trait, and she has evidence of his willingness to do good, but it's hard for me to disagree with Spidey here. Kraven killed Spider-Man and put him in a grave for two weeks. Doreen knows this because she read it on Kraven's rap sheet last issue. Spidey doesn't owe Kraven a second chance for nuthin'. Brain Drain's supposition kind of neatly sidesteps the difference between "can change" and "will change". A penguin can flap its wings, but that doesn't mean it will fly. There's also the question of how many opportunities you're expected to give someone who, you know, hunts people for sport. Second chances are great and all, but Kraven's up to at least his 50th chance at this stage. How many chances is he supposed to get?

I suppose if, as a reader, I didn't already know so much of Kraven's history, all the fighting and hunting and trying kill people, I'd be more inclined to give him benefit of the doubt.

I continue to be like with how Derek Charm draws Spider-Man, and there was some solid beats in this issue. Those silent panels of anticipation, where it's uncertain how things are going to go. Ryan North may just really like that as a writing device, because it was common when Erica Henderson was penciler on the book as well. It is a handy technique. You can build tension, and then have it payoff any number of ways. They used it 4 times just in this issue. A couple of times, both when brain Drain was trying to talk Spidey down, went for jokes of a sort. The silent standoff between Spidey and Doreen ended when the fight continued. The fourth one looked as though it was going to escalate the situation, but then you turn the page and it goes differently. They make it work very well.

Domino #5, by Gail Simone (writer), David Baldeon (layouts), Michael Shelfer (artist), Jesus Arbutov (colorist), Clayton Cowles (letterer) - That's actually a solid cover by Land, setting aside he made Desmond look like Magneto. Overall though, I think Land's batting a solid 3 for 5 on these covers. Maybe even 4 out of 5.

As Domino tries to control her power while fending off a bunch of Shang-Chi's rogue's gallery, Outlaw and Diamondback continue their fight against Desmond and Topaz. With a lengthy break in their where Desmond gives us his tale of woe, how he was tortured by Topaz' dad to amplify Domino's powers, blah blah, hate her, whine whine, all mutants are bad, you know that tale of self-loathing and self-pity. At least adding in the notion that they've absorbed this "we mutants are monsters" vibe gives a little sense to the fact they've targeted Domino. Because otherwise, blaming another test subject in the awful experiment for things outside their control would be a really annoying trait.

I'm not sure what good having control over her power is going to do against Topaz, who can apparently mess with or take away others' powers. Are they saying Topaz' power only works on people who haven't learned to control their abilities yet? Like, she couldn't steal the Human Torch's fire, because Johnny knows how control it? That would make sense, in this coming down to a test of wills sort of way, but that doesn't seem to be how it's been treated up to this point.

I didn't realize Shang-Chi had that many enemies, and I don't recognize 75% of them. Was that Sunturion, isn't he more of an Iron Man bad guy? Works for Roxxon, something like that. The Cat was there, who I only know from Cable/Deadpool as a guy who takes jobs just for kicks, and therefore have trouble picturing him working for these obviously murderous psychos. If he did, why isn't he going after Shang-Chi, who I assume would be the challenge he'd seek?

Michael Shelfer handles some of the art chores (I'm not sure what doing "layouts" as Baldeon is credited, involves). The linework is lighter, definitely not as many thick black lines. So characters look less intense much of the time and much younger. There are some panels in there where Outlaw looks like she's in her early teens, maybe. It's actually kind of strange to see Topaz not looking like she dragged a hot poker over the skin around her eyes. The emotions are still easily readable, just dialed back a couple of notches. The fight scenes are good, nice sense of progression of the action from panel-to-panel. Not sure why Domino was so impressed by Shang kicking one dude in the face, though.