Fallen Angel #19

Written by Peter David

Art by J.K. Woodward

Cover by Billy Tucci

IDW Publishing $3.99 

Well, I’m glad that’s over.  These last three issues that have comprised the Shi crossover have been the worst three issues of Fallen Angel and I have read every single issue, both DC and IDW, ever published.  Overall, this issue has been the best out of the three issue arc and this arc has meant the return of Woodward to handling the art, so that’s good as well.  Up until this issue I haven’t really been able to say anything good, but now I can say this:

In this issue Peter David gets back to fucking around with mythology and religion(which is really just mythology, after all) in modern society, which was a relief.  He toys with the issue of multiple gods and who is really in charge, the answer is generally no one.  I liked the concept that, as people move on from the old gods and worship the new, exciting and more relevant ones, the old gods are forgotten and their power fades.  Thus, the power of gods lies only in the belief of their followers, which is true in our society; the insanity of the Christians rules society because they believe, they accept their mythology as truth, live it, and it becomes the truth to them.  An interesting and pretty relevant concept because we live at a time where Christians, Muslims and Jews are all scrambling to stop social progress from happening because the further along we come along, the more irrelevant the old mythology becomes.

As Bill Hicks said, it’s time we evolve our ideas.

Star Trek: Klingons Blood Will Tell #4

Written by Scott Tipton & David Tipton

Art by David Messina and Elena Casagrande

IDW $3.99

The miniseries winds down with the apparent conflict or resolution between the Klingons and the Federation quickly approaching. Morglar, an old comrade of Kahnrah’s recounts a tale, for no apparent reason, about his interaction and experience actually murdering human beings, which impresses K’ahlynn to no end. His story is about an encounter with the Enterprise, Kirk and company and a brutal sword fight among dozens of members of both the Federation and the Klingon soldiers who are trying to take it over in retaliation for being attacked by the Enterprise. Of course, the Klingon’s see this as Kirk’s fault and he utterly refuses to back down until a truce is called by both sides.

Again, in the end everyone ends up having drinks and telling jokes. This issue is a retelling of the Original Series episode, day of the dove, but it tries to be more multifaceted in it’s portrayal of the Klingons, showing them as a race trying to secure a military advantage instead of the fascist way that they have often been portrayed in the television series. In the end, Morglar tells them to take up arms with the humans, that they should work together, because his battle on that day showed him that the humans can be trusted, but they are also incredibly strong and deserve the right to be respected.

Without a doubt, this series has been 200% better than the TNG series. I hope Tiptons get another Trek series, because they definitely know what they’re doing.

Fallen Angel #18

Written by Peter David

Art by J.K. Woodward

IDW $3.99

Okay. Last month I became really worried. A lame crossover, more bad art, the single worst issue of the 37 issue series, a story that seemed so bad it must be a joke. But this issue starts off with the most appreciated return of J.K. Woodward and the story turns around. Last months flipbook was a horrible idea and made for a ridiculously bad, short and disorderly introduction to a story and to be honest, I thought using Shi in the book was just a gimmick. This issue didn’t justify the horrible quality of issue 17, but it did restore my faith in the series by introducing a plot that actually makes sense in the long-running continuity of Fallen Angel.

The return of Yurei, Woodward, the concept of tricking Lee into eating some kind of cursed food so that she can never leave Yellow Springs and return to Bette Noir makes perfect sense in the context of Yurei being an evil, power hungry bastard. I have yet to decide where Shi comes into play, why David agreed to write her into the series and why she’s necessary in the story. If Yurei set them up to come to Yellow Springs, Shi fits into the equation somewhere, whether she double crosses Lee or is in league with Yurei himself, something more complex than two incredibly powerful, religiously affected women who have killed lots of people wander into a strange cursed place at the same time has to be happening.

David’s return to form is most evident in his projections of the simplicity of Christianity and how flimsy it’s grounds are. As Shi hears Lee’s experience with God, hearing the revelation that God doesn’t care about humanity, in fact, he is disgusted and bored with us, Shi, the faithful Christian is immediately upset and scared that Lee might be right. Lee asks her, “if he had no mercy for his only son, what chance do we have?”, clearly scaring the shit out of Shi.

Next month will be fun to see where this all goes, if Shi will stick around, what she’s there for, what happens with Yurei and what exactly comes next. And a fight with hundreds of samurai is almost guaranteed, which definitely helps.

New comics for August 03, 2007

I’m a week and a half behind, so this week I ended up picking up quite the pile. I was glad to see so many great issues in my pile this go around. I was particularly excited about walking dead, which is already reviewed, batman, dark tower and JLA. I’ll be putting up several reviews per day and working my way through my pile over the next several days.

Action Comics #853 - Kurt Busiek(w), Brand Walker, Livesay, Lee Loughridge(a)
Batman #666 - Grant Morrison(w), Andy Kubert, Jesse Delperdang(a)
Black Panther #29 - Reginald Hudlin(w), Francias Portela and Val Staples(a) Arthur Suydam(c)
Black Summer #1 of 7 - Warren Ellis(w), Juan Jose Ryp(a)
Chronicles of Wormwood #6 of 6 - Garth Ennis(w), Jacen Burrows(a)
Countdown #39 & 40 - Paul Dini, McKeever(w), Jim Calafiore and Jay Leigten(a)
Dark Tower: The Gunslinger Born #7 of 7 - Peter David and Robin Furth(w), Jae Lee and Richard Isanove(a)
Deathblow #6 - Brian Azzarello(w), Carlos D’Anda, Henry Flint(a)
Fallen Angel #18 - Peter David(w) and J.K. Woodward(a)
Futurama # 32 - Ian Boothby(w), Mike Kazaleh and Andrew Pepoy(a)
Grimm Fairy Tales #16 - Ralph Tedesco and Joe Tyler(w), Andrew Magnum and Roland Salvidor(a)
Justice Society of America #8 - Geoff Johns(w), Fernando Pasarin and Rodney Ramos(a)
Metal Men #1 of 8 - Duncan Roleau(a & w)
Midnighter #10 - Keith Giffen(w), Chris Sprouse, Karl Story, Randy Mayor(a)
Raise the Dead #4 of 4 - Leah Moore and John Reppion(w), Hugo Petrus, Marc Rueda and Ivan Nunes(a)
Speak of the Devil #1 of 6 - Gilbert Hernandez(Spider-Man Fairy Tales #3 of 4 - C.B. Cebulski(w), Kei Kobayashi, Christina Strain(a)
Star Trek: Klingons Blood Will Tell #4 - Scott and David Tipton(w), David Messina and Elaina Casagrande(a)
Star Trek: Year Four #1 - David Tischman(w), Steve Conley, Leonard O’Grady(a)
Uncanny X-Men #489 - Ed Brubaker(w), Mike Perkins and Andrew Hennessey(a)
Unholy Union #1 - Ron Marz(w), Michael Broussard(a)
Walking Dead #39 - Robert Kirkman(w), Charlie Adlard, Cliff Rathburn(a)
Welcome to Tranquility #9 - Gail Simone(w), Neil Googe(a)
Wetworks #11 - J.M. Dematteis(w), Joel Gomez and Trevor Scott(a)
World War Hulk #3 - Greg Pak(w), John Romita Jr, Janson, Strain(a)
World War Hulk: Ironman #20 - Christos Gage(w), Butch Guice, Dean White and Gerald Parel(a)
World War Hulk: The Incredible Hulk #108 - Greg Pak(w), Leonard Kirk, Scott Hanna and Chris Sotomayor(a)
World War Hulk: The Irredeemable Ant-Man #10 - Robert Kirkman(w), Phil Hester, Ande Parks, Bill Crabtree and Val Staples(a)
X-Men #201 - Mike Cary(w), Humberto Ramos, Carlos Cuevas and Edgar Delgado(a)

30 Days of Night Eben and Stella #3 of 4

Written by Steve Niles and Kelly Sue DeConnick

Art by Justin Randall

IDW Publishing $3.99

Xen’s quest to find the missing vampire baby that will help him rise to the upper eschelons of the vampire society continues with conning Eben to help find Stella, who has the baby.  It works, vampires get shot, the baby doesn’t show up anywhere in the issue and things generally seem to be working out in Xen’s favor.

The issue is a lot of action with lots of guns blasting, pissed off vampires and some good narration that you’d expect from Steve Niles.  I liked the running theme of the issue being fear and how one just has to face it, swallow it and move beyond it, or get crushed by it.

Star Trek: Klingons: Blood Will Tell #3 of 5

Written by Scott Tipton & David Tipton

Art by David Messina

IDW Publishing $3.99 

When I started reading this series, I didn’t actually know much about Star Trek outside of the first season of Star Trek Enterprise, which I’ve been watching in order throughout the year and just recently finished. I liked it, I’m interested in the Star Trek universe, but I didn’t really know where to go from there. Then, about halfway through the first season, I noticed that IDW was doing a Next Generation mini-series, so I started reading it. I liked it, though I wasn’t at all familiar with the characters of the settings. Then the Klingon mini-series started and jumped on that, knowing that I wouldn’t know what was going on. I’ve really enjoyed not knowing what was going on and now I feel like I know a little bit about what’s happening. I’ll be sticking with the comics and the DVDs.

Some insight into the Klingon’s history and political strifes has been incredibly fun. I had assumed this mini-series would be like the next generation book in that it would be four to six individual stories that didn’t really hold itself within any particular continuity. Those stories are interesting in their own right and must certainly be easier for a writer to work around without having to worry about throwing off any balances for a later story, but when everything is going to be wrapped up in 22 pages, the storyteller lacks the ability to truly stretch out and lay out the details.

The Tipton’s stories mostly focus on a small group of Klingons trying to expand their reach without being caught by the starfleet, who they seem to truly loathe, during the time line of the original Star Trek series. James Kirk even showed up last issue. The mission statement of the comic is to show the Klingon side of an already told story. I find this to be an interesting way to tell the story, but if one hopes to find sympathy or understanding in the warrior race, they will certainly be let down. This alternate look at the Klingons only furthers the look of rugged, ruthless hateful people looking for personal gains through bloodshed.

That being said, I really like the comic. The writing does a pretty good job at showing the Klingons in a more in depth style without too much interference from the good guys and it has a bit of room to explore the Klingon history and culture. This is easily the most interesting and valuable thing the comic offers, for it’s not really a different perspective that’s so unique, but it’s the actual insight into characters and culture that is vast and, to this reader anyways, unknown territory.

Fallen Angel #16

IDW Publishing - $3.99

Peter David - Writer

J.K. Woodward is still gone, the art is still way below par, Peter David is still one of the best writers in modern comic books.

The current arc is interesting, but not really incredibly important, it felt like one of the first Fallen Angel filler arcs. The month to month story isn’t always completely related to the current development of the characters and the plot, but it often goes back in time and adds some interesting insight into either Fallen or the other characters, since most people in the book are so incredibly old.

This past arc has focused on the woman who did Lilandra’s kind of vigilante job before she showed up. This issue shows how she went overboard and the The Hierarchy pushes her out of town, almost killing her, and she ends up wandering the earth, trying to relocate Bette Noire, the only thing she remembers about her life after her torrential ass beating via sea monster. I wouldn’t say it was bad, it was just…unimportant, seemingly. But I would imagine that some time a year or two from now, David will bring this back and it will be some incredibly important, obviously relevant connection.

The issue wraps up with both of the angels walking out of Bette Noire, I’ll be interested to see if this old angel pops back up again when someone is in trouble. Next month starts the Fallen/Shi crossover, which should be interesting. I think Woodward is back after that and I’ll feel secure in my Fallen Angel consumption again.

30 Days of Night: Eben and Stella # 2

IDW Publishing $3.99

Written by Steve Niles and Kelly Sue DeConnick

Art by Justin Randall

Eben and Stella has been a great return, almost to the very first mini-series, in the sense that it picks up on old characters from the early stories , but it’s also a Steve Niles story, which improves everything drastically.   In addition, the art is much improved, in fact, the art for this book is down right fantastic.  It reminds me of J.K. Woodward’s work in the second Fallen Angel series, utilizing photoshop to manipulate brush strokes and more traditional art to make the work look incredibly realistic.  I wouldn’t call it computer art at all, because it has a distinctive life-like quality, not the well-known downfalls of CGI art - rounded, blatantly fake plastic skin tones and awkward light reflections.  It’s great art.

The story goes back to show what happened to Eben and Stella Olemaun, the former of which was bitten by a vampire and committed suicide to stop himself from hurting Stella, his wife.  She managed a way to bring him back, he infected her.

This mini picks up, expanding on Stella’s feelings of betrayal and she soon finds herself in a poor position, stealing a car that just happens to have a baby in the back seat.   And that baby just happens to be part of a vampire prophecy that the vampires believe will destroy them.  Because she has the child, the vampires believe Stella is part of the prophecy, wishing to fulfill it and end her suffering, as she had never wanted to actually become a vampire.

The story is good and interesting, backpedaling to old characters I’ve been wondering about since the first 30 Days series, and it looks like it will continue well throughout the year, with one more miniseries planned before the movie is released in October.   2007 should be a good year for vampire nerds of the non-Joss Whedon order.