Sunday Splash Page #386

"Air Drop," in New Warriors (vol. 2) #6, by Jay Faerber (writer), Jason Armstrong (penciler), Walden Wong (inker), Kevin Somers (colorist), Richard Starkings and Jason Levine (letterer)

The first New Warriors series ran a little over six years, and then there was a 3+-year gap before this brief volume, written by Jay Faerber, started up. Faerber starts with Speedball trying to recruit old friends to restart the New Warriors. But Nova already turned him down once, Justice and Firestar are happy playing in the big leagues with the Avengers now, and Night Thrasher's moved to the Pacific Northwest. Elvin (Rage) is going to school. Darkhawk's got his own school issues. Dagger won't split from Cloak (and Cloak's not interested), and Alex Power won't risk pissing his siblings off again.

Faerber also includes one panel of Speedball getting laughed at by the Slingers (two of them, anyway) when he asks them. Considering none of them had ever been members, I don't know what Faerber was doing there, but it sets the tone for the series (we'll come back to that.)

Ultimately, Namorita and Nova are in the middle of (failing) to cheer up Speedball when they get a call from Genetech that Blastaar's busted through their Negative Zone portal. Turbo joins in on the way, along with a couple of new characters, Aegis (a young man who found an enchanted breastplate sent to Earth by Athena) and Bolt (a mutant with electricity powers, and the Legacy Virus.) Justice and Firestar show up to help, and inadvertently steal the credit for the Warriors' win, but that aside, it's a new team.

A new team that proceeds to not do real well. This feels like the beginning of the slide of the New Warriors' rep. Part of the reason Nova's reluctant to join is he feels the Warriors are "bush league" and he wants a higher profile. The press consistently downplay or misconstrue the Warriors' actions, though this is the Marvel Universe, so that's no huge surprise.

More than that, the team just isn't very competent. In the first series' second issue, the Warriors encountered a street gang with AIM weaponry. It's mostly an excuse for the rest of the team to do something while Night Thrasher hashes things out with Midnight's Fire (read: beat hell out of each other), and they handle it in a handful of pages, the biggest complication being when Nova takes a hit because he charged in on his own.

This version of the Warriors get their headquarters blown up by a street gang using just a regular old rocket launcher and guns. Like, the gang of regular guys was a plot that actually required more than one issue to resolve. Partially because Aegis knew one of them and let him escape, but still. They run into Generation X in the fifth issue, and even though Nova, Namorita and Speedball all have way more experience than any of the mutants, including Jubilee, the Warriors get treated as the over-aggressive rookies.

They get trounced - the entire team, handily - by a suit of Iron Man armor that's gained sentience (the media naturally frames them as being in the wrong for stopping Iron Man from killing the Blizzard.) This after Nova was losing to the Blizzard. They get humiliated by the kid that steals Iron Fist's chi in Faeber's run-up to Iron Fist/Wolverine, then chewed out by Night Thrasher for being so disorganized. Then maybe you should have taken an active hand in the team prior that, Thrash-man. Faerber had this whole thing where the team had no official leader, and I guess that's supposed to make them poorly coordinated, but two-thirds of this roster had been teammates for a long time. There ought to be some base level of muscle memory for how to work together between Nova, Nita, Speedball and Turbo, at least.

The book goes through a bunch of artists for only 10 issues. Steve Scott to start (with Chris Renaud drawing part of issues 3 and 5), Karl Kerschel on issues 4 and 5, Armstrong on issue 6, and finally Jamal Igle for the last 4 issues. Even with Walden Wong as inker for the entire run, the look of the book varies a lot. The Kerschel issues look the roughest, the most rushed, characters reduced to almost blocky outlines. Igle's art is probably the best; he's able to handle fight scenes with lots of characters and keep designs consistent, but I find his faces kind of squishy-looking. All the pre-existing characters get new costumes, though at least Nova ditches the look above later in that same issue. Namorita says she got tired of looking like a swimsuit model, but are the white crop-top and yoga pants really an improvement? I have no idea why Speedball thought he needed goggles, but I do like the change in Turbo's look. Switching from the big circular turbines at the wrists and ankles to something more like an intake or output blower for a jet engine.

As for subplots, Turbo falls for one of the loser super-villains they fight (in his civilian identity) and has to deal with that. The team, Nova particularly, have trust issues with Aegis after the problems with his buddy in the gang. Bolt hides his Legacy Virus issues from everyone except Nita, who lets him use her spare room. You may have noticed Namorita's back to being white instead of blue, well she also got some new powers because of all the stuff that Atlantean scientist put in her genetics to try and avoid issues with being a clone. (Though she seems to lose the ability to redirect electricity considering Iron Man's armor KO's her by zapping her with one of Bolt's attacks. Or, you know, it's the diminished competence thing.) Most of Nova's issues are going on in his own book, but he and Speedball are trying to get a movie made about the New Warriors. That crops up occasionally, mostly in terms of Nova being too concerned with his public image and wanting to hog credit.

The title ends with Bolt telling the rest of the team about his infection, Nova scrapping his dreams of movie stardom, and Night Thrasher deciding they're finally worth his time, though he also blames them for the fight with Iron Man. I'm guessing Tony Stark didn't admit his armor was sentient and beating his enemies to death. What a surprise, I say, in the flattest most sarcastic tone I can manage. Actually, the last page is a lead-in to Iron Fist/Wolverine, which, barely involved the New Warriors, but I guess Faeber's focus was already someplace else.

Next week, things get even worse. 

Random Back Issues #132 - Elsewhere #8

Bye everybody! We'll be back in 20 pages if it turns out our home planet sucks now!

I reviewed the first half of Elsewhere 2.5 years ago, but today we're looking at the last issue. Having found a doorway back to Earth, Amelia Earhart and DB Cooper step through and find themselves facing a bunch of soldiers and guns.

Kept under observation for a month, an officer with a lot of ribbons on his chest finally explains to Earhart it's the year 2018. While she and Cooper (which we learn from a partially redacted psych profile is not his real name) try to adjust, Earhart spots a native of Korvath talking with a scientist.

A little arm-twisting gets the guy to spill the beans. Some hikers stumbled across a part, the government built a facility around it, stabilized it, and sent troops in. They captured a native and eventually came to an arrangement: the U.S. keeps troops out, and receive an elixir that promotes cell regeneration. Find it hard to believe the government hadn't already gone back on their word and just conquered the place. Or at least given whichever side offered the sweetest deal weapons to help seize/maintain power.

But the scientists did want to study a Korvathian, so this elder sent Gwenore through, and told her beloved, Earhart's pal Cort, a bullcrap story that she'd been abducted. Earhart and Cooper make the scientist take them to Gwenore. Cooper knocks the nerd out, and they try to reach the portal, but encounter some soldiers.

Not much of a problem for Gwenore, and they send her back home. Given a choice between arrest or life free on an alien world, Earhart and Cooper run through the portal, using another grenade to destroy the Stargate-looking thing stabilizing the portal and saving Korvath from the perils of imperialism. Hooray!

Earhart and Cooper reunite with Cort and Gwenore's people. Meyrick, who made the deals with the U.S., chooses exile over what I assume was going to be a painful execution. Have to imagine if the book had continued he would have popped up allied with some new group of troublemakers. And the last we see of Earhart and Cooper is them flying the big gargoyle-looking creatures while Earhart promises maybe she'll tell us about more of their adventures some day. But as CCR once noted, someday never comes. At least it hasn't in the subsequent six years.

{4th longbox, 75th comic. Elsewhere #8, by Jay Faerber (writer), Sumeyye Kesgin (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer)}

Sunday Splash Page #265

 

"Out of the Mouths of Smelly Canadians," in Iron Fist/Wolverine #3, by Jay Faerber and Jamal Igle (storytellers), Rich Perrotta (inker), Liquid (colorist), Starky and Comicraft's Troy (letterer)

Like an unexpected rain that brings on a sharp freeze, killing all your flowers, Iron Spring is here to upend your day with a very early-2000s mini-series meant to tie up some loose ends from both Ostrander's Heroes for Hire and Faerber's New Warriors, with Wolverine along in the attempt to goose sales.

The chi of Shou-Lao was stolen from Danny (see what I mean about that being a recurring theme?) by the snot-nosed punk doing the DragonBall Z homage on the far right. Then Junzo and his sorcerer mentor were able to bring K'un-Lun onto Earth, so it began to overlap and override Tokyo.

Iron Fist and Luke Cage show up to try and fix things, though Danny mostly succeeds in getting his ass repeatedly kicked by the kid. Captain America shows up with SHIELD, because an ancient-looking city with dragons appearing from thin air is a big deal. Stark's company was Stark-Fujikawa at this time, so he gets involved. Wolverine shows up because the Hand are working for the kid, and we know how Wolverine likes stabbing ninjas. Logan brings Psylocke because she hates the Hand for stuff they did to her previously.

Everyone has a reasonably viable excuse to show up, but it still feels overstuffed when you throw in the ninjas, dragons, the kid and his sorcerer buddy, Danny's uncle Yu-Ti. Jamal Igle manages to keep the many, many fight scenes broken up so that the reader can have a general idea of who is doing what in relation to everyone else.

This being set in Japan, Sunfire is contractually obligated to show up. He agrees to work with everyone, for about five minutes. Once he learns this is somewhat Danny's fault, he reverts to, "Begone outsiders! Sunfire will protect his homeland without your help!" As he does. Captain America smacks him in the puss with his shield. As he does.

The fusion of K'un-Lun with Tokyo can be undone if Danny or Junzo die. Danny appears to make the sacrifice, but there's some deus ex machina that brings him back. K'un-Lun also doesn't entirely disappear, and the kid still has the chi of Shou-Lao. Neither of those two points will ever be mentioned again, to my knowledge. You'd think Junzo might be a loose end for Danny to pursue, or someone who could show up trying to claim Danny's legacy, but everybody always reverts to Davos for that.

Danny, Misty and Luke decide to stick around in Tokyo to look after the dragons and handle any other residual problems. Again, never referenced. There's a six-issue mini-series in 2004 and Danny's roaming on his own with the Iron Fist back in his possession.

The next thing after that was Immortal Iron Fist, which really should have rendered all the, "Danny loses the Iron Fist" nonsense moot. If he and Orson Randall could use it simultaneously, because just a small bit of the chi flows into each of them, rather than residing solely in one, then you can't very well steal it away, can you?

Random Back Issues #88 - Dynamo 5 #23

That's what you said when you wouldn't stop at McDonald's last week.

Last time we looked at an issue of Dynamo 5, most of the team had packed up and gone home, leaving a hodgepodge of Faeber's other characters to fill the gap. The whole team is back now, but things aren't going much better.

Maddie was investigating the disappearance of a friend's husband, only to find he and five other scientists put their brains on an android body and started calling themselves Brain Trust. The ensuing fight wasn't going well, so team shapeshifter Myriad injected himself with an extra dose of a drug he'd been taking to boost his speed, strength and reflexes. Unfortunately, this version of super-soldier serum turned him into a version of Whiptail, a Lizard-type foe the team fought before.

Even worse, people all over town who were using the drug are also turning into Whiptails. Lizard-man epidemic! Also, no help from the authorities. In fact, Maddie orders half the team, Visionary and Slingshot, to go help the authorities. 

While Scrap and Scatterbrain try to contain their teammate, Maddie makes a pitch to Brain Trust. They use their knowhow to devise an antidote and it'll help protect the loved ones some of them probably have in Tower City. Considering last issue's attempt to get these guys to surrender by threatening their original bodies didn't work, this seems like a faulty plan. So Maddie also agrees to let them just go, as long as they get out of Tower City. Scrap and Scatterbrain object, and Maddie does what she usually does when someone disagrees - tells them to shut up and does what she pleases. She's Asshole Batman, basically, if he was a middle-aged secret agent/reporter.

Fortunately, Brain Trust are not smart enough to recognize they could just leave now, and Maddie and the team are too occupied to stop them. Antidote created, antidote applied, everyone's back to normal. Brain Trust leaves, the husband Maddie was looking for asking her to tell his wife he loved her. Maddie tells him to just leave. Curious how she's going to explain all this to her friend. They try going up the ladder to the source of the drug, but he was working with the head of the covert agency Maddie used to work for, and got tipped off. Bad guys getting away all over the place.

Leaving time for an uncomfortable conversation between Myriad and the others about why he took the drugs. Basically, he felt he had the lame powers and needed a way to keep up. Slingshot points out the last time they found out Myriad was keeping a secret, he said it was because he wasn't used to having people to confide in. Well, yeah, that sort of ingrained behavior doesn't just vanish overnight. Especially since, as I recall, the team didn't take finding out Myriad's momma was also an alien all that well.

In "subplots which are about to become plot," Captain Dynamo's other daughter (via one of his arch-foes), Synergy, has brought a special gun she stole from that covert agency to a guy she's staying with. The guy turns out to be Maddie's estranged son.

Everyone in this comic is a lousy parent. It's like reading X-Men!

{4th longbox, 42nd comic. Dynamo 5 #23, by Jay Faerber (writer), Matteo Scalera and Mahmud A. Asrar (artists), Ron Riley (colorist), Charles Pritchett (letterer)}

Any Elsewhere But There

Elsewhere volume 1 (collecting the first 4 issues) starts with Cort and Tavel escaping from prison, only to stumble across a woman dangling from a parachute in a tree. A woman who calls herself Amelia Earhart. A name that means nothing to them, because this is Korvath, not Earth. Amelia just wants to find her navigator, Fred Noonan, but everyone's a little busy trying to rebel against Lord Kragen at the moment.

The basic set-up reminds me a lot of Lost Planet, a 6-issue mini-series Bo Hampton published through Eclipse back in the late '80s. Both stories even include DB Cooper, who doesn't look like Adam West at all. Newsradio lied to me! Jay Faerber makes Earhart the central character here, while Hampton created a treasure hunter character to be the protagonist.

The plot really zips along for just four issues. Earhart meets Cort and Tavel, gets herself captured to try and rescue Fred, but finds Cooper instead. They escape, join the resistance Cort and Tavel are part of, escape flesh-eating insects that don't seem native and find evidence other people from Earth have visited. They attack Kragen's fortress, seemingly defeat him, and Amelia learns what happened to Fred. The pace works against the big reveal in issue 4, because Faerber hasn't had enough time to establish the emotional connection to make us care. He does succeed in making Kragen's motivations make sense. They aren't deep, but suitably petty for a tyrant. (I'm being vague to try and avoid spoilers.)

Most of the cast don't get much more than bare bones characterization. Cort is more noble and heroic. The one who interrupts his escape from prison to investigate calls for help. Tavel is the friend who goes along with it, but grumbles the whole time. Man after my own heart. There's a guard who helps Amelia and DB escape that tries to pass herself off as just doing it for money, but it seems like there might be something deeper there with her. Hopefully we see her again.

Sumeyye Kesgin goes with the Star Trek approach to alien species. Same basic body type as Earthlings, but some head ornamentation. Cort's people are furry and have facial markings, Kragen's are green and have bull horns on the sides of their heads. Kragen's forces aren't the same as Cort and Tavel, though they seem to be native to the planet. Likewise, the buildings are a bit different in style, but still generally recognizable. It's more they're built into the natural terrain, than on it. There are these odd rocky spires, seemingly too narrow to be as tall as they are, and Kragen's fortress looks as though it was carved directly from one. The resistance live on natural ledges on trees in a forest. It's enough, combined with Ron Riley's colors, to give the landscape somewhat of an alien feel, but not so much you expect Amelia would spend all her time just gawking at stuff.

Kesgin goes weirder with the "steeds", large, vaguely gargoyle-looking animals. They're also empathic, and Amelia forms an almost immediate bond with one, surprising Cort and Tavel. Maybe it's the little tuft of fur at the tip of an otherwise smooth tail, but they seem like something you might see in a Dr. Seuss story, albeit with big, pointy teeth.

I should have the other four issues by the end of this week. I'm curious to see whether Amelia gets home, or how many other people, from Earth or wherever she happens across. Whether Cort learns what happened to the friend he's seeking.

Random Back Issues #78 - Copperhead #16

Kid, if we didn't let people who only an idiot would give a badge become cops, we wouldn't have any cops. Hmm. . .

Sheriff Clara Bronson is a bit tied up, as she's been taken prisoner by escaped criminal Clay and his lady friend Annabeth. Clay heads out to get the money from an armored car heist Clara has. Or so Annabeth thinks. Clara explains he's actually here for his son. Who is Clara's son, or rather, Clara's sister's son.

The flashback plays out over this and the next issue, but for now we see that Fiona was very excited to pull a robbery with her beau that would set them and their son up for life. Clara has, entirely reasonable doubts about this, and Fiona basically questions her right to judge anyone else's decisions. Clara can't hold a job, can't even hold her nephew. Always with the excuses. Ah, the bond between siblings.

Back in the present day, Bronson's old boss Lieutenant Ford is trying to find her and Clay ASAP. Unfortunately, Bronson's only deputy recently became Mayor, so now Ford's deputized the local schoolteacher, who is also an artificial human (or "artie"). Ford doesn't know any informants here, but Luken does, the father of one of his students. The man, who looks a bit like a past-his-prime Hellboy declares he's not a snitch, but agrees to make some calls in exchange for a guarantee his son will pass all his tests the rest of the year. I wish my dad could have functioned as a snitch during my high school years, instead of being one of my teachers. Might have done a lot better in Pre-Calculus that way.

Zeke, meanwhile is hiding out at an old scrapyard with Missus Sewell, a local woman who acts as Zeke's nanny or babysitter. Zeke doesn't know what's going on, so he's just excited to camp out. He's significantly less excited when someone shoots Missus Sewell, even if that someone turns out to be his father. Zeke has more than one protector tonight, though, as the artie named Ishmael, who lives alone out in the wilderness arrives. He really should have just shot Clay, rather than announcing himself.

Clay's not impressed, pointing out he was locked up for killing 17 men (probably not something to admit in front of your son), but they never bothered counting how many artificial humans he killed. Ishmael had been a pretty solid badass up to that point in the story, but he gets his butt kicked emphatically in the next issue. His face ends up looking like a pug's, or a manatee's.

[3rd longbox, 6th comic. Copperhead #16, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer)]

Sunday Splash Page #174

 

"Lizard Men Improve Any Occasion," in Dynamo 5 #22, by Jay Faerber (writer), Mahmud Asrar and Yildiray Cinar (artists), Ron Riley (colorist), Charles Pritchett (letterer)

The conceit behind is Dynamo 5 was that the Superman of that world was kind of a horndog, and after his death, his widow (a top-notch reporter) tracks down his various illegitimate kids and forms them into a super-team. Each kid ends up with one of dead old dad's powersets - telepathy, flight, super-strength, shape-shifting, or vision powers - and away they go.

Each of them comes from a different situation, and they're spread out in age a bit. Gage and Hector are both still in high school, Livvie's attending Georgetown, Spencer's an adult living in a series of hotel rooms. Livvie's mother is deceased, but her father (the one who raised her) isn't. Gage's parents are together, but he's got two younger brothers. Bridget lives alone, but her parents seem to having periodic falling outs. Faerber has a couple of the parents find out in different ways, with different reactions. The teens have their own trouble adjusting, both to the truth about their father, to having siblings, and to having super-powers and the strain it puts on their everyday lives. Sometimes to the good, like Gage being determined to help Hector talk to girls. Sometimes bad, when the team learns the other side of Spencer's family tree is a lot different from theirs and reacts badly.

Asrar's the artist for almost the entire series, minus this and one other issue Cinar draws at least part of, and one drawn by Matteo Scalera. Since it's a team book, Asrar goes for the team uniform approach, which a little variation. Scatterbrain gets a hood, puts the emphasis on his mental powers. Visionary's got a helmet with a visor that amplifies his powers. Slingshot gets some of the old armpit wings for maneuvering, stuff like that. Keeps them from being too interchangeable. 

Most of the different hero costumes are pretty straightforward, but I think Asrar has a little more fun with some of the villains. Like Brainstorm, the guy in the background of the picture above, who is a big android body with the brains of five human scientists on it (that's what the yellow bubbles are. You'd think they'd hide their brains inside the body, but I guess it's more impressive-looking this way.)

Asrar doesn't do anything too flashy on page layouts most of the time, but each character has a distinct look in and out of costume, which helps them feel like individuals. The fight scenes are well-drawn, and even the characters who take a physical approach do it differently. Myriad is maybe the most acrobatic, using a lot of flips and jumps kicks, whereas Scrap tends to just charge in a throw haymakers. She's stronger and tougher, but she also doesn't have as much experience fighting. When Gage fights physically, he tends to do so like a football player. A lot of tackles and using his size, which is what would come naturally to him by now.

Faerber and Asrar plays with expectations a bit. Maggie, the widow, turns out to have actually been a secret agent who uses being a reporter as a cover, or maybe an additional way to get information. She ends up keeping secrets a lot, and has her own skeletons in the closet. Which is where Maggie's tendency to act like a Nick Fury/college football coach-style hardass backfires a few times. But the series touches on the fact it's not easy for her to work with the living embodiment of her husband's fidelity. Gage, the big jock linebacker ends up with the telepathy, which predictably frustrates him, while Bridget, the extremely pale (but hot) goth girl gets the super-strength.

Faerber shifts things up a lot with some surprises and twists. Takes Maggie out of commission for a few issues, forcing the team to work without her guidance. The surprise reveal of Spencer's mother that throws the team for another loop. The roster changes once, Maggie's past comes back to haunt the team. There were a few things I don't think ever actually came to fruition, like the reporter Bridget briefly starts dating, or her and Spencer being roomies. On the one hand, it keeps the book from getting stale, because things can change at any minute, but on the other hand, it feels like some things get tossed aside without ever exploring if they could be interesting. Maybe Faerber reconsidered after he started and that's why he moved on from those ideas.

Faerber had a few other superhero books he was writing at the same time - Noble Causes, Firebirds, maybe one other I can't think of - and he set all of them in the same universe. Which gives him the advantage of having other books to introduce characters and concepts in, which could then be sprinkled into this book whenever. Which is a nice way to make a book feel like it's part of a universe that's already been going for a while.

The series ran 25 issues from 2007-2009, plus an Annual and Holiday Special. There was another 5-issue mini-series a year or two later, but it was a big alien invasion thing that used not only a bunch of Faerber's other characters but also some other Image characters like Invincible, and I'm not really here for that.

Random Back Issues #53 - Dynamo 5 #16

You think that's bad, faceless cannon fodder, you should try the DC Universe. Four Green Lanterns, two Flashes, a fluctuating number of Robins and Batmen. . .

First time talking about this series that I grabbed in back issues back in 2015 or so. Quick synopsis is that the Superman-type of this universe died, but it turns out he was kind of horndog, so his Lois Lane (a secret agent named Maddie, who played reporter as a cover) tracks down 5 of his illegitimate kids, each with one of his powers, and turns them into a super-team to protect Tower City.

Except Maddie's in a coma, and four of the teens said enough. The remaining holdout, Scrap, has cobbled together a makeshift team from a few other heroes she or the team met along the way to try and hold the line. Which includes the two Firebirds up there, a guy named Quake who's a fine hero (as long as he stays on his meds), and Vigil, who's your mysterious terror that flaps in the night type (but is actually a character a reader of the series would already know).

As for this issue, there's not much to it, really. The new roster fights a bunch of guys calling themselves "the Veil" who were trying to rob a bank. It's just dudes in green jumpsuits with guns, so it goes pretty easy, but the previous team already trounced these guys and handed all their stuff over the a covert security agency, so where did this bunch come from?

 

After a little "enhanced interrogation" by Vigil, it turns out the bank robbers are actually a bunch of those covert security guys who decided there was enough chaos in the city they could make easy money using the bad guys' identities for themselves. Jeez, just take payoffs like regular bent cops.

The issue ends with news Maddie's condition is getting worse, and the only one who might be able to pull her out of it is Gage, the high school football star who got pop's telepathy (which at the moment, he's mostly using to know what play the other team is about to run.)

[4th longbox, 35th comic. Dynamo 5 #16, by Jay Faerber (writer), Mahmud Asrar (artist), Ron Riley (color artist), Charles Pritchett (letterer)]

Sunday Splash Page #113

"{Awkward Silence}", in Copperhead #4, by Jay Faerber (writer), Scott Godlewski (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Maurer (letterer)

A space Western, which seemed to be a really popular genre in comics a few years ago. Still might be for all I know. This is the only one I really got into, though.

Clara Bronson shows up on the mining planet Jasper with her son Zeke, looking for a fresh start as the new sheriff of Copperhead. Which is a town with a lot of the typical problems of mining towns in Westerns. The guy who owns the mining company thinks the town is his to do with as he sees fit. Bronson's deputy is a member of an alien species that lost a war to Earthlings, and he's not real happy he didn't get the job. Clara doesn't particularly like the androids Earthlings used to help win that war, and there are several of them that live and work at the mine, as well as one who lives in the wild by himself. Plus the usual spate of murders, robberies and family squabbles.

Faerber's good about hinting at mysteries and then gradually revealing them. Here, it's the question of why Clara, who seems to be a very good cop, ended up in a craphole like Copperhead. There's also hints about the androids. It's mostly in terms of what they're made for, what they don't believe in, but eventually it turns to what they do believe in.

Unfortunately, while we do eventually learn why the sheriff's there, we may never learn what the androids are after if the book doesn't come off hiatus. The final story arc started in mid-2018, the first issue shipped, and then. . . nothing. Maybe it'll come back, maybe not.

Scott Godlewski was the artist for the first 10 issues, established the look of the series. The mixture of dingy, ramshackle structures with nicer, more futuristic interiors. The different alien species and the hints of the cultures and styles in their homes. (Deputy Budroxificus' place looks very different from Clara and Zeke's, or the android schoolteacher's). The way androids skin changes to color to match their surroundings (which took me forever to catch on to. I thought it was just supposed to be weird shadow effect). Drew Moss drew the next two storyarcs, covering 8 issues. Seemed to struggle with maintaining consistent human proportions. Sheriff Bronson had some tiny hands in certain panels. Godlewski came back for the last arc, but he'd been doing work for DC recently, and so I wonder if that was taking up his time, or if Faerber just lost interest or what.

What I Bought 6/23/2018 - Part 1

There wasn't a single comic I wanted that came out last week. I did, however, find all the comics I was still looking for from the week before on a weekend jaunt. So let's look at those instead.

Copperhead #19, by Scott Godlewski (writer/artist), Jay Faerber (writer), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - The cover and the final page of the issue mirror each other effectively.

The thing unearthed in the last issue looks like a glowing blue rock. It glows the same color as some antennae on the back of the native species heads. Except the antennae are actually parasites, and the native species are suddenly being very aggressive in approaching the town. Hickory's bosses are excited and pushy, but the artificial humans have a plan of their own, involving some group they belong to, indicated by a tattoo. The sheriff and the Mayor are trying to figure out what Hickory is up to, and Clara is trying to reconnect with Zeke, who is struggling to process that Clara isn't his birth mother, that she killed his mother.

A lot of plates spinning, which, since this is supposedly the last arc, makes a certain amount of sense. If there's going to be any resolution or payoff, it has to happen now. Be interesting to see if Faerber and Godlewski can pull it off, or if they're even planning to do that.

Scott Godlewski, who was artist for the first 10 issues, is back. There's a marked increase in the consistency of characters' sizes and proportions. Budroxificus looks suitably large, even when he isn't drawn to be intimidating. Sheriff Bronson is working with him, and Mister Hickory thinks he's got Boo wrapped around his finger, so neither is intimidated by him, and he isn't drawn in a way that suggests they are. No towering over them imposingly. But he still fills panels, because he's a big Cypabaran (which I just now realize is rearranging "capybara" and that's what he's based on).

Stellar #1, by Joseph Keatinge (writer), Bret Blevins (artist), Rus Wooten (letterer) - That's one way to kill a giant space monster. If only the pilot had buckled his safety belt first. . .

The series, so far, is taking place on a single world devastated in some major war that spread across the galaxy. Civilization hasn't collapsed entirely, but things are in flux, and a lot of people are struggling. The main character, named Stellar, was a super-soldier designed to win the war, and opted to go a different way at some point. Which put her in conflict with others like her. Or she's still in conflict with them. Time may also be unraveling, things are jumping around, so that I'm not always sure how we got from Point A to Point B. Or Stellar is hallucinating on that last page.

Blevins brings an interesting visual approach. It's the ruins of all those 1950s sci-fi pulp covers. The spaceship spaceships, the remains of giant robots and big statues like I remember from the covers of some version of Asimov's Foundation books. It takes something that the reader has some past visual reference for, and shows it as dead, maybe to give a scope of the destruction, or the level of fall from the heights they once were. Blevins is doing the color work as well, and in the flashback sequences, everything is dominated by yellows and oranges, vivid colors. In almost every one of those panels and pages, people are being vaporized, incinerated, or are being presented with the threat of those fates.

The rest of the book is done in cool, blunted shades. Even when it's showing some alien arthropods devouring the remains of some dead giant, the viscera is dull reddish-purple. Stellar wears a monk's robe and hood, concealing the old outfit she still wears underneath. Her face is more lined around the eyes - almost like Blevins made certain some of his initial sketch lines would show through as strain or sleeplessness - and she's paler. On the last page, when it looks as though the battle is starting up again, the oranges and yellows haven't returned, which is why I suspect it's a hallucination, or echo of the actual battle, long finished.

I don't entirely know what is going on, or where Keatinge and Blevins plan to go with it, but I'm intrigued.

What I Bought 2/7/2018 - Part 2

I bag on commercials a lot, because most of them are garbage. But I did like those insurance commercials about "Mayhem" when he resolved to be useful and helpful right after New Year's. And then he dropped his resolution after a couple of weeks, just like the rest of us.

Copperhead #18, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - Godlewski remembered Clara's armor still has the bullet impact from the previous sheriff's tenure on it.

Clara has a standoff with Clay, which ends with Clay shot in the leg and Clara reunited with Zeke. Zeke has another panel where his lower body seems much too small for his upper body. Maybe his shirt is just covering a lot of his pants and that's what's throwing me off. Clay mentions that Clara killed Zeke's mother (her sister). That's a conversation she'll have to deal with it at some point. Ford's going back home, but Luken, the schoolteacher, has apparently decided he likes law enforcement and wants to stay on as Clara' deputy. I don't think that's going to end well for him. Miss Sewell survived Clay shooting her multiple times, but Ishmael isn't doing so well. Given that's he's normally purple or a deep blue, I'm assuming Riley colored him off-white in the hospital scene deliberately. Like most of the life has drained out of him.

This Miss Sewell thing annoys me. Not that I'm unhappy she's alive. She's not a bad character, and I wouldn't mind seeing her attitudes towards Zeke explored (if it's connected to the loss of her children). The reason she survived is not a bad dodge. Still, I kept thinking of the end of the Robert Downey Jr. movie Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. 'Yeah, I know, boo hiss. Why not just bring everyone back?' Faerber uses her apparent death for emotional punch, then pulls the rug out later. Feels cheap, something I'd expect from a Marvel or DC big event comic.

There's also some development in the thread of what Mr. Hickory is up to. It involves something deep in his mine, something they want to make contact with. Something that a few of his workers may have encountered at the end of the issue, and it probably didn't go well for them. Although maybe those dual 'AAAIIIEEEE!'s were happy screams. That could be interesting. I've been curious to see the Sheriff have to deal with something truly bizarre, just beyond the normal stuff a cop in her world would encounter. Even the assassin using worms that tunnel into the victim to kill them didn't seem to faze her much. Maybe that's just Clara, though. Having experienced what she has, maybe most things just bounce off her psyche.

I'm curious about Moss' decision, during the conversation between Boo and Clara, to have Boo backlit in the penultimate panel, when he asks if she wants to help him investigate Hickory. It makes him seem vaguely sinister, or like he's trying for mysterious. The conversation runs over two pages, and other than that one panel, whoever is in each panel is perfectly visible and well-lit. So making that choice right there, feels like s deliberate warning of some sort. And Boo did have to hustle away after Hickory realized someone was eavesdropping. Did they capture and replace Boo? Or is he running a plan on his own track, separate from Clara's or Hickory's?

What I Bought 1/3/2018 - Part 2

Alex and I watched a couple of different stand-up specials on Netflix recently, and I never want to see another comedian complaining about how people get too easily offended these days. Not that I expected better from Joe Rogan, but I did think Dave Chappelle wouldn't go that route, especially after he spent all that time on a bit about how good he is at coming up with jokes. Then it shouldn't be that hard to come up with some that don't punch down, should it?

Giant Days #33, by John Allison (writer), Max Sarin (penciler), Liz Fleming (inker), Whitney Cogar (colorist), Jim Campbell (letterer) - Hear no Embarrassing Disaster, see no embarrassing disaster, speak no, aw forget it.

With Daisy and Susan moving in with their significant others, with reservations, Esther is scrambling to find new roommates. But hey, there's Ed, also trying to find a place. He recognizes that Extreme Bros would be a terrible experience, but turns down Esther's offer. Then he ends up accepting Dean's offer to live with a bunch of coders who mine cryptocurrency, but not before helping Esther move in as well. And Ed makes sure she gets the nice room, while he takes the glorified closet.

Things are in a death spiral for several characters. Esther is running out of people to rely on, Ed's going to wreck himself hoping for Esther to confess feelings for him rather than just getting it over with and telling her how he feels. Daisy's doing the same thing with Ingrid (see her open admission to Susan they were hiding in her makeshift room, and her uncertain face when she says, 'If you can't beat them, join them!'). Susan seems to be doing the best, as she and McGraw seem to have found a good equilibrium. But she's worried she's committing to being an adult too soon. It doesn't seem as though any of them have figured out balance. What am I saying, of course they haven't. They're college kids. The fuck they know about balance? I'm considerably older than them and I still can't seem to find a good balance between time spent alone and time spent with friends.

Requisite paragraph gushing about the art: Sarin having Esther keep collapsing into the face on the floor position at each setback was pretty good. Daisy got a slight variation of it on the last page as she collapsed on the couch, which seems to indicate a similar level of unhappiness and isolation in the two of them. Also, Sarin draws the backgrounds with the same wobbly lines he draws the frazzled Daisy with. And in the panel where Esther first reaches out to her, the squiggly lines start just on the other side of Daisy, as if we're entering a zone of altered reality caused by her mental state. Actually, that may just be part of someone's coat hanging up in the background, but screw you, I'm saying it's a deliberate move.

And the panel of Ed's nightmare vision of Dean was beautifully colored, the pink glow of the computer monitors, contrasting with the maw of Dean's mouth. Sarin and Fleming even drew in the taste buds on the tongue of the giant, sharp-toothed Dean. It's just a nice, horrifying image.

Anyway, there will undoubtedly be many tears in the near future, though I can't predict at all who they're going to come from.

Copperhead #17, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - Human Resources is going to need to have a talk with Interim Mayor Budroxificus.

Ishmael's attempt to protect Zeke doesn't go well, as he gets beaten to a pulp by Clay. The Sheriff is explaining how she wound up with Zeke and Clay's money, and the sequence of events is not what I expected. Wasn't what her captor expected either, but that lady is dead now, so her expectations don't count for much any longer. Mayor Boo is tracking Mr. Hickory to some clandestine meeting. And by the end, the Sheriff has caught up to Clay, who she probably should have just shot when she had the chance.

Surprising revelation in this issue comes from Interim Sheriff Ford telling a possible informant he can do anything he wants because he is human, white, and a cop. I knew humans in this universe tended to hold themselves at the top, certainly compared to the "arties" or Budroxificus' species. And cops are seemingly all conditioned to believe they can do whatever they please. I'm surprised, though, that being white still matters in this particular fictional universe. I guess crackers didn't see any reason to knock that shit off once they had other sentient species to discriminate against.

There's a few panels in here, when Moss draws people in profile, where his artwork reminds me a bit of Greg Capullo's. In the faces mostly. The panel in the lower left there, for one. He uses a little lighter linework than he normally does, but it might also be Riley's coloring. The skin tones remind me of Capullo's time drawing Batman in the last few years. It doesn't carry over from one panel to another, so it's a brief, abrupt surprise.

The fight between Clay and Ishmael is handled differently from Clara's fight with the assassin in the conclusion of the last arc. A lot fewer speed lines, and Moss doesn't focus on the impacts as much. In that earlier fight, there were a lot of panels of the moment a hit landed. Here, he seems to draw the moment before the hit lands, or simply doesn't show the impact. Because for Clay, Ishmael is ultimately irrelevant. Not because he's an artificial human (or not only that), but because, as Clay describes during the beating, he's naturally tough and mean. He likes hurting people, doesn't really matter who. He killed Missus Sewell without a second thought, simply because she was near his son. It's all in service of his goal, and that's all that matters to him.

Well, I certainly hope Clara choosing not to simply shoot Clay in the back doesn't come back to bite everyone in the butt next issue.

What I Bought 12/6/2017 - Part 1

When the trailer for Infinity War popped up, I kind of shrugged. Figured I was over the whole thing of movies with superheroes teaming up. Been there, seen that, not letting some massive company jerk me around. But then I watched the trailer and caught myself humming the Avengers' theme four hours afterward, so there goes my jaded comics fan cred. Comics I missed from November have arrived! Let's start with the books that are regulars here.

Copperhead #16, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - By issue's end, that is not nearly as comforting a cover image as I'd hoped.

Sheriff Bronson is captured after what looks like a hell of a struggle. Clay leaves his current lady to guard the sheriff while he tries to track down his son. While Interim Sheriff Ford tries to find Clara, difficult when he doesn't have informants, and won't trust Boo. Clara sets to telling Annabeth the story of how she wound up with custody of Zeke, mostly to try turning Annabeth against Clay. Hard telling if that's gonna work. And now the "artie" is the only one standing between Zeke and his dad.

I have not been a huge fan of Drew Moss' art, but I enjoyed the facial expressions this month. He exaggerated the faces a bit, but it works. It makes the characters a little more lively, sells the story. That Clara's a prisoner, but still working the situation to her advantage. He still struggles a little with proportions, but he seemed to find a mostly strong balance between the panels where he can really focus on more details, and the ones where he's better off going simpler.

I'm curious to see how what happened to Clara's sister played a role in Clara being like she is. It isn't too hard to see her being protective of Zeke as a desire to protect the last piece of her sister, but it doesn't explain her being so dogged as a sheriff. Especially in light of what we hear in the flashback, about how she's drifting, always looking for the excuse not to commit to any path. Even if the necessity of raising a child forced her to stick to a job, she could still halfass it easily enough, but that isn't her style. She's the type of cop who never lets go of a case. A 180 from where she was before.

Atomic Robo and the Spectre of Tomorrow #2, by Brian Clevinger (writer), Scott Wegener (artist), Anthony Clark (colorist), Jeff Powell (letterer, designer) - The more I get to see of Lang, the more I enjoy her direct, loud response to problems.

Robo has been doing a shitty job getting Tesladyne running. Given all these cybernetic people suddenly very publicly collapsing, which will likely cause a panic, I'd call it a suspiciously shitty job. He hadn't informed anyone that he was ignoring complaints from Richard Branson which have halted their work. Which has just about pushed Lang (and to a lesser extent Vik) to the brink. And Fischer's grasp on sanity is slipping fast.

I'm pretty sure all these cyborgs are failing because someone wants everyone pointing fingers and witchhunting. What they stand to gain, I'm not sure. Robo is tossing around ideas as to who's behind it, but I don't think he's on the right track. But he seems so distracted all the time. Maybe he just has no idea how to run any sort of company, despite having owned one for 50+ years. I could see that. Or his "death" and subsequent 110+ years spent as a deactivated head sitting in a forgotten box has altered his perspective on things.

Foley continues to serve effectively as the POV character, watching everything going to hell around her, Lang reaching a boiling point, and being confused at what is wrong with Robo.

I like the color choices Clark is making. He keeps using this kind of neon or glow-in-the-dark colors for each of the cyborgs as they break down around the world, while all the other people in the panels are colored in grey, maybe a bit of highlighting coming from the cyborg. But it conveys an otherworldly feel to them. When Foley ventures into the depths to find Robo, there's a faint pink tinting to her, a light source with no apparent source, which feeds into the uneasy sense that something's not right at Tesladyne. All the pipes and tunnels remind me of Robo's speech about "evil computers" from The Shadow from Beyond Time.

What I Bought 10/31/2017

The two books left over from last month. The return of Copperhead, and me giving that Ragman mini-series a whirl. Not the best possible pairing, but better than nuthin'.

Ragman #1, by Ray Fawkes (writer), Inaki Miranda (artist), Eva De La Cruz (colorist), Josh Reed (letterer) - I don't know if I'd call it a great cover - little too grey - but March drawing the moment right before the grenade explodes is pretty cool.

In this new version of Ragman's origin, Rory Regan was a soldier, part of a squad that decided to try and ransack an old tomb. That was a mistake, and now Rory is back in the States, the only survivor, with scattered memories of what happened. When he opens a box with a few things left over from it, a bunch of rags cover him and carry him out over the city, where he finds some odd creature attacking a person. His suit absorbs the creature, and he learns all the members of his squad are within the suit as well, and they seem to know more about what he is than he does, and about the creatures that are after him.

The way Miranda draws the suit, it looks very similar to the symbionts like Venom or Carnage. The sending rags out like tendrils to help him move across the city is not unusual from what I've seen of some of the earlier series he had. But the cape and hood the costume's traditionally had are gone, so one of the more distinctive elements is missing. There is a glowing symbol in the center of the chest, a feature shared by the two enemies that appear at the end of the issue. I'm guessing each is some sort of letter of word in ancient Hebrew, maybe it's a mistake to assume they're maintaining Rory's Jewish heritage.

So I don't know where Fawkes plans to go with this. What the nature of the threat Rory's up against is, what it's going to tell us about him. Rory seems to have been the explosives expert on the squad, but also the one the others kind of protected. It was because one of his charges didn't work they couldn't escape (or so it appears), so I don't know if this is going to be part of some larger thing about survivor's guilt, or him trying to prove he can stand alone when he has a suit that would let him draw on the strength of others. Could be any of that, or none of it. Hard to tell at this point.

Copperhead #15, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - Well I hope those dragon things can eat metal, or they're circling that thing for no good reason.

Clara had a fight with Clay and his lady friend. It's not clear how it turned out, other than everybody did some bleeding. Interim Mayor Boo is left with a bunch of bigwigs yelling at him and no law enforcement. So Ford steps into that role, dragging the local schoolteacher along with him (who is colored blue on one page, and purple the next, the art is really inconsistent this issue). And Mr. Hickory and some of his associates have something brewing down in the mine.

The issue ends on a big reveal, which I suppose shouldn't have been much of a surprise. The book has been hinting about something not being totally kosher about Clare and Zeke being there. I had been thinking it would turn out Clara had been Clay's partner, and the best they could manage for witness protection was as a sheriff. Which is overly complicated, but I dunno, it seemed like the sort of surprise I thought Faerber would try.

The art is not Moss' best work. It varies quite a bit from panel-to-panel. On one page he goes much more basic than normal for one panel of Ishmael and Boo talking, then shifts back to a more detailed style right after. It's enough of a shift I thought someone else had taken over art duties for a moment. There's one panel of Zeke where his upper body is twice as tall as his legs, which looks really strange. There are a couple of panels of Mr. Hickory where body parts just look entirely out of proportion to each other. On the plus side, some of the aliens he draws look suitably weird. But I really feel like the art is starting to drag this book down.

What I Bought 7/7/2017 - Part 2

I didn't realize the Justice League movie was coming out this year. I figured that thing was still years away. But until a month ago, I didn't realize the new Spider-Man movie was coming out now, either. I thought it was still a ways off, too. My grade school self would be appalled.

Real Science Adventures #3, by Brian Clevinger (writer), Lo Baker (artist/letterer Flying She-Devils), Wook Jin Clark (artist, The Sparrow), Anthony Clark (colorist), Tessa Stone (letterer, Flying She-Devils), Jeff Powell (letterer, The Sparrow) - A bottle of hooch, a seaplane, and a sturdy tree to lean comfortably against. That covers everything you need.

The She-Devils discover that Mad Jack watering his booze with hooch hurts fuel efficiency, so it's a question of whether they can reach the rendezvous point before they hit "E". Also, Jack isn't out of tricks to try and recover his plane - and his brewmasters - mostly undamaged. As for Sparrow, the Nazis caught her, but she stashed all the munitions she took off soldiers in the base in various places you wouldn't want explosives, so stuff is blowing up, which is going to give her a chance to get loose and wreak more havoc.

Baker's certainly good at drawing characters that show the wear of their lives. Nobody looks too smooth, everybody has a worn look to them, and in the case of Jack and his men, a maniacal look to them. As for the flight combat, which I was curious how Baker would handle, there isn't a lot of it yet, since Mad Jack is still trying to be crafty. The little there was, was OK. Baker breaks up the panels of the action outside with shots of the She-Devils' and the Tongan ladies' efforts to fight them off. Keeps the reader's attention on the stakes. The Sunderland dominates most of the panels it's in, but doesn't convey much sense it's moving. But it's essentially a fortress (not be confused with the B-17 Flying Fortress) under siege. Like in Sahara (the Bogart movie, not the Matthew Mcconaughey one) or whatever story about a small group trying to hold a position against overwhelming odds you prefer. The plane is target, everything else revolves around it.

That said, I don't know if I'm going to stick with it. I can't say I'm incredibly invested in it, and despite Clevinger's efforts to keep things moving at a brisk pace, the same is true of the Sparrow story. Although there it's because it's broken into six page chunks. Just as you start to get into it, it's over for another month.

Copperhead #14, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - No jokes, I just like that cover. It's fairly simple, but it's straightforward and tells you what you need to know: there's gonna be a fight.

The Sheriff is trying to find this assassin, and has to ask Ishmael to lean on some possible sources, which nets them a picture of the killer, right as said killer takes a shot at the sheriff. A fight ensues, and the sheriff narrowly wins. And it's right then that Clay finally reaches Copperhead, and he finds the sheriff immediately. That's probably bad.

I'm wondering what the big surprise is going to be in the next story. Faerber keeps hinting there's more going on with Clay's obsession with reaching the sheriff than her simply being the one who put him away. References to Clay wanting revenge on the partner who sold him out, which makes me wonder if Clara was originally a crook who went straight, or was undercover as Clay's partner, or what. Still wanting to see what Mr. Hickory's plans are. Seems bigger than simply not wanting a sheriff who isn't properly deferential to him. Although my track record on guessing where Faerber's going with a story is so abysmal, I'm not even going to bother.

It's Moss' first fight scene on the book, and it works. He doesn't do anything particularly dynamic with panels or layouts, focuses on the action, two people ultimately punching each other a lot. There's one panel where the sheriff avoids being impaled and he draws her nose as being really wide, but it works as a suggestion of how fast she had to move to dodge, that our view of her is warped by it. I do wonder what happened to all the people that were shown in the background watching the fight right after that, who all seem to have vanished by the end when Clay appears. Granting that a brawl in the streets of Copperhead is probably not unusual, this one involves the relatively new sheriff, which you think would draw interest, if only from people waiting to see if the law is gonna get it in the neck.

There's a page where Clara scopes out the train station, trying to decide who looks like an assassin, only to pan over a whole crowd of rough-looking types and conclude that's going to be a tough call. Moss uses one wide panel, but breaks it up into three with a couple of panel borders, which, I feel works at cross purposes. If you're going for Clara scanning the crowd carefully, one wide panel suggesting an uninterrupted moment would work better. But if you want to suggest she's glancing around, eyes darting from one face to the next, multiple panels are a good idea, but then it probably shouldn't be drawn where a figure that starts on the right side of one panel, continues on the left side of the next. The general impression is still conveyed, but it doesn't work quite as efficiently as it could.

Overall though, Moss is still getting the job done, even if there are some stylistic tics I don't love.

What I Bought 5/20/2017 - Part 1

I did end up in Columbia, but at least it didn't storm. And I found three of the books from this month. Better than none. Start with the two that are still mid-storyarc.

Cave Carson Has a Cybernetic Eye #8, by Jon Rivera (writer/story), Gerard Way (story), Michael Avon Oeming (artist), Nick Filardi (colorist), Clem Robins (letterer) - Those look like fingerprints on the rocks. Enormous fingerprints. I have no idea if that's what's intended, or what's signified by it.

The Whisperer and his followers are moving across universes, converting people to their cause (represented by the skin at eye level being torn away and glowing blue bone and eyes revealed below). Cave and the others are trying to keep up, but are outnumbered and hole up in a universe where they find Cave's old mentor alive (albeit giving lectures to dead students). After a lot of discussion about what the Whisperer is up to, they are attacked by it and its followers, though it doesn't seem interested in finishing them off, so Cave will have the chance to deal with it.

It seems likely, given that Cave's wife is not buried in this alternate universe where she was in Cave's, that she's still alive. That Cave so adamantly denies Chloe's suggestion that maybe she is alive here only cinches it in my mind. But the refusal to consider the possibility makes sense. Cave has seized on this adventure as a way of, at best, pulling himself out of the depression he'd sunk into by way of action. It's a distraction, and encountering a living reminder of what he's trying to ignore, would make that difficult. Especially since she wouldn't be his wife, similar looking and acting and thinking perhaps, maybe even married to the cave Carson that existed in that universe, but not the same woman. And Cave couldn't stay, so what would be the point?

Granting that I don't know much about Cave's original comic adventures, it almost feels as though Rivera and Way are moving him backwards for this battle. More assertive, butting heads with this Johnny fellow from his old crew, no cybernetic eye. Chloe and Wild Dog both seem to be receding into the background a bit (Wild Dog more than Chloe, but she was closer to being a part of all this than he was). Is this Cave's chance to conclude old business that he should have finished long ago? Dealing with the Borsteins and the damage they've caused? Was it all brought about by his original explorations, and then it's reached this point because he washed his hands of it and stopped paying attention? I'm just spitballing.

Page 19 is a pretty one. Cave almost seems to have lost it, trying to yell at the Whisperer and Borstein to come out and face him as the followers swarm towards them. The lower two-thirds are set with a couple of large blue panels mirroring the eye sockets of those followers. The bottom of the page, bathed it a reddish-orange that matches what's rising from a smoking crater in the upper left corner of the page show hordes of the zombified followers, and some of them are climbing up the space between the two blue panels, to the panel above, where Cave is trying to stave them off with a flamethrower while the disembodied voice of the Whisperer/Borstein taunts him, by telling him he wouldn't want to leave cave all alone. So as you read that, your eye follows the fire of the explosion down the page between the blue panels, to the army below. And the blue panels show Cave looking downward towards the army, refusing to leave, while Chloe tries to get him and a wounded Wild Dog the hell out of there.

The specific way 'We. Are. Leaving!' is written there makes me think it's a reference to 'Marines! We Are Leaving!' from Aliens, but maybe not. Not that uncommon of a thing to say. It would fit, in the sense Cave staying to try and get revenge or strike back somehow is futile and getting their wounded to safety and regrouping is the best option.

Still enjoying Filardi's colors and what they add to Oeming's art. The Whisperer being this mess of bright orange and maroon tentacles and shapes, the neon green of the Mole's cockpit. And in general, I think his use of color helps to guide the eye through some of the more unusual panel layouts. I'm sure that's a collaborative effort from all parties, but it wouldn't work if Filardi's colors didn't grab the eye and draw it where it needs to go.

Copperhead #13, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - I bet that guy got those horns stuck on a lot of stuff when he was a kid. Unless they don't develop until his species hits maturity.

The sheriff didn't actually quit, because she's still investigating. The Mayor was sleeping in the guest room in his house, because he was carrying on an affair. By the time Clara tracks down the other woman, she's dead the same way as the former Mayor. Current Mayor Boo is trying to keep Mr. Hickory calmed down, as it's hard to tell which of them is successfully manipulating the other. The dangerous criminal guy is still trying to make it to Copperhead. I'm guessing he'll show up sometimes at the very end of next issue.

I kind of wish this felt like more of genuine mystery I could be trying to solve. Maybe it's supposed to be, but it seems more likely (and the cover for the next issue being on the back cover of this issue doesn't help) like Ishmael is going to show up with a name of a killer for the Sheriff, she's going to go find the killer, there'll be a fight, it'll end somehow, that's about it.

Also, having Clara do the big "I Quit!" at the end of last issue, then immediately opening this one with her still investigating and having very much not quit, feels cheap. I didn't expect she'd stop investigating, but why try for that as your cliffhanger, and then blow it to hell on page 2 of the next issue? It feels like Faerber wasn't even really trying to for any suspense himself, so what's the point?

That complaint aside, there are pieces moving here I find interesting. This interplay between Boo and Hickory (and how Clara's going to fit into it). The Sheriff now owing a favor to Madame Vega. It feels like this thread with the escaped con has been going on forever, but I am curious to see exactly what his backstory is with the Sheriff, since it doesn't feel as simple as her having arrested him, or him being her son's father. And this murder mystery could play out in a cool way, it just hasn't been great so far. No particular reason to care about the now former Mayor, since he hadn't appeared at all prior to his death.

The complaint I've had about Moss not giving Boo the proper size, well I'm still not sure about Boo, but he drew the head of the Mayor's security large enough. Properly conveying size, making Clara's complete indifference to his attempts at intimidation more effective. Sometimes Moss nails the body language; some of the panels of Clara glaring. The one where she mutters to herself about everyone making things difficult while she talks to Madame Vega. There was a certain tiredness to that one, maybe because vega and Clara's panels are drawn so the two are in opposition, and Vega is drawn standing ramrod straight, while Clara seems somewhat hunched over, actually probably leaning against the fish tank behind her). It's a less aggressive approach than with the security guard, but she was hoping things were going to go smoother here.

Moss does seem to struggle with lips. The Sheriff's lips sit really oddly on her face in a lot of panels, usually when Moss is going for some more quizzical or disgusted expression. He gives her fuller lips than Godlewski did, and the coloring of them is darker, makes them stand out more. There's just certain panels where it looks like some attached lips the way you do on a Mr. Potato Head which is not ideal.

What I Bought 5/3/2017 - Part 3

Last two books from the shipment from last week. Probably won't be able to get this week's books until Friday, at the earliest. Maybe not until next week. Problems of working on the road.

Real Science Adventures #1, by Brian Clevinger (writer), Lo Baker (artist, She-Devils story), Wook Jin Clark (artist, Sparrow story), Anthony Clark (colorist), Jeff Powell (letterer and design) - Every great pilot must master looking thoughtfully into the distance as twilight approaches.

Two stories. The She-Devils are grappling with a lack of supplies to raid within range of their aircraft. If they don't solve that issue, they'll have to close the base and pull up stakes. Rather than deal with the horros of moving, they're going to steal the flagship of a rival crew, which is a British Sunderland flying boat. Big, slow, good cargo capacity, excellent range. All they have to do is steal it, then stay airborne until until any pursuit runs out of gas. Maybe they'll get to that point next issue.The Agent Sparrow chapter, which is only six pages, is the start of a mission to wreck a Nazi super-weapon. The mission goes awry almost immediately, of course.

So a lot of set-up on both fronts. The She-Devils' mission certainly sounds like it'll be fun to read, but I'll have to wait and see. I'll also have to wait and see how Lo Baker's art does when it comes it action sequences. Baker shows a style here somewhat similar to Scott Wegener's, but with much heavier linework. The problem is that in panels where our viewpoint isn't pretty damn close, the character's faces are then overwhelmed by those big, dark lines, and Baker has to simplify things to convey anything. It's like looking at a blurry photo. But when there's space in the panel to concentrate on one character, the body language and expressions are pretty good. There's a tendency towards elongated necks that reminds of something, but it works. The sound effects' lettering has a loose feel that fits with the makeshift surroundings in the story. They look kind of rough, some look like they were written in with your basic #2 pencil. Using whatever is at hand. It worked for this.

Wook Jin Clark did get a chance to draw some fight scenes, and did a solid job. Nothing flashy, but everything is clear and easy to follow. The progression of action from panel to panel makes sense. On a couple of pages, Clark draws a large close-up of one character's face along the margin of the page, while other panels shows what's going on around them. Almost like an inset panel, but not exactly. So a view of Sparrow's face as she surveys the landscape after scaling the cliff, that stretches vertically across the left edge of two horizontal panels showing what she's seeing (that there's no farmhouse with supplies, but there are Nazis). I'll be curious to see if Clark continues to use that going forward.

I can't say this issue alleviated the concerns I had going in about whether I'd like Real Science Adventures any more this time around, but I'd like to at least see the main story get going before I make a final determination.

Copperhead #12, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - It was as the alien worm erupted from the cadaver that the doctor realized he picked the wrong week to quit smokin'.

The now-former mayor was killed with some sort of alien worm. Or by said alien worm, since it's unclear if it is sentient or not. The artificial human, Ishmael, may be able to get the Sheriff a name, in time. That's about the most help she's getting out of any guys right now. This Ford fellow is just shoving his way into her life and constantly trying to explain to her how she's feeling about everything. Her son's father is still - gradually - making his way towards them. And she can't quit butting heads with her former deputy, current boss, Mayor Budroxifinicus.

Clara's not really helping on that one by assuming right from the start that he's got it in for her. I understand her concerns, but he's been a good deputy and so he deserved the benefit of the doubt. But with the threat Clay presents in the back of her mind, and Ford very much annoyingly present, she's a bit on edge/off her game.

I feel like Moss has de-aged Clara a bit though. Godlewski typically gave her some shadows under the eyes, drew the mouth a bit smaller (when she wasn't yelling) like her face was a bit drawn. Everything had tightened up, pulled in on itself. Her hair had this stringy, disheveled appearance. It gave a feeling of her experience, a lot of bad road behind her, a lady who has a son to look after and a town to protect, and not much time for anything else. Moss' version doesn't convey that so far. And Boo still lacks the same presence he had previously. That one I could at least possibly explain with the idea he's carrying himself differently as a Mayor than he he did as a cop, going for quiet dignity rather than looming authority. But mostly it just seems like he got downsized.

So there are some ongoing concerns about the change in art teams, but the story is still solid, so we'll see how this arc unfolds.