What I Bought 11/27/2019

The final tally for fiction writing in November was 53,429 words, not counting Blogsgiving last week. Because that wasn't fiction, obviously. Like I figured, none of the stories are anywhere near completion - they're mostly just getting to the part where things really kick off - but it was real progress, so I'm pretty happy with that. Now it's just a matter of keeping going.

Infinity 8 #16, by Emmanuel Gilbert and Lewis Trondheim (writers), Franck Biancarelli (artist) -  That creature in the background looks like something from a more recent Scooby-Doo series.

OK, sixth try at a timeline. This time, it's Leila Sherad, from the Antiquities section of the Customs department. Sherad is a real "shoot first, ask no questions" type. Seems a little careless for someone dealing with antiquities. At least they know to investigate closer to the center, and that the people they want to talk to will emerge in four hours. Of course, that leaves four hours for Sherad to fuck things up somehow. She requests to bring along a historian she hassled at the beginning of the issue, and while he gets a chance to investigate the hyper-sarcophagus of an alleged living god, they find a floating orb that might contain a message, or it might be something else. At the least, there's something else interested in that sarcophagus in the area.

I'm curious how Sherad and this historian are going to mess this up, seeing as there are still two more turns available to use. I guess these two could always get it right and solve the mystery, but I feel like they wouldn't tell you they could use the timeline trick up to 8 times, and call the series Infinity 8, then only use 6. The most likely is Sherad shooting someone or something she shouldn't and prompting a hostile response from the ones responsible for this place. Or a hostile response from just about anyone, really. You would think someone with expertise in other cultures to be a little more diplomatic.

Biancarelli's style makes the space necropolis look more like the deep sea at times, opting for a lot of blues in the sky, and weird bits floating through that could look like air bubbles or something. Little different than most of the other artists. Biancarelli also doesn't play up the T&A factor with Sherad as much as most of the artists have with their officer. That might just be because he doesn't put her in the standard uniform, that skintight blue number with the exposed midriff. She's in what looks like a pair of jeans a white tank top. Which I'm guessing represents her general disdain for regulations or protocols. It's certainly not any sort of normal uniform, since she has to keep telling people she's a cop.

I like the choice of visual for the blaster she carries. The whole panel is colored golden yellow, except for the white lines expanding outward from the barrel of the weapon. It's such a change in color scheme from the rest of the panels it really stands out.

Power Pack: Grow Up! by Louise Simonson (writer), June Brigman (artist), Gurihiru (artist), Roy Richardson (inker), Tamra Bonvillain (color artist), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - Kitty shouldn't need to phase through that, should she? It's just light.

Power Pack feels like something I should have been into back in the day, but kind of missed for one reason or another (except the issue of Uncanny X-Men where that one Morlock abducts the kids and makes their parents forget about them). I don't even know how old most of them are now in continuity. In this case, though, the story revolves around Alex' 13th birthday, with the main part drawn by June Brigman. Alex is really excited to spend time with a girl he likes, but worried his siblings will embarrass him at the Lila Cheney concert. But the kids are too busy trying to protect their talking horse alien friend from the Brood to do that.

There's a recurring thread of Katie being angry that everyone keeps calling her a baby and treating her like one. Being an only child, I don't know if that's accurate, other than it certainly seems like siblings would pick at each other that way. I did like how there's almost a sense of constantly shifting alliances between the kids. Jack, Julie, and Katie might all be angry at Alex for how he's acting towards them, and therefore defend Katie against Alex. But when he's not around, they (especially Jack) will give Katie grief instead.

I did get a good laugh out of Katie insisting that next time they try to use the "bathroom" excuse to slip away from their parents, it has to be someone other than her that has to go. That seems fair, although I imagine it'll be harder to explain Katie accompanying her older sister to the bathroom than vice versa. But I see her point.

The other story, the one drawn by the Gurihiru team, takes place later that night, and focuses on Katie, who feels bad because she spent all the money that was supposed to be for Alex' present from her on the Lila Cheney action figure she got. Which she did because he was being a jerk, but now that he's acting nicer, she feels bad. Which feels accurate from what I remember being that age. Doing something that seemed perfectly reasonable at the time, then figuring out I was being a selfish jerk later on. Ugh, I hated that feeling. Stupid guilt. The resolution is set up by something from the tail end of the first story, and not hard to see coming, but it's nice.

Both Brigman and Gurihiru do a good job being expressive with the kids' faces. Especially Alex, who has some expressions where you'd understand his siblings wanting to pop him in the jaw. Brigman gets to draw some fight scenes, which work pretty well. Nothing majorly creative, just a good ebb-and-flow where the kids have the element of surprise, and then things start to turn against them, as they're pretty disorganized. I feel like Gurihiru draws the kids as taller, but still kids. It might just be because they're really only around each other in that story, rather than giant aliens and adults. There aren't a bunch of bigger characters to make them look smaller by comparison.