An Epic Attempt

     Now, like most people, I was so excited when Gail Simone was announced to be the new writer on Wonder Woman.  As the most prominent female comic book writer, Simone was destined to write Wonder Woman sooner or later.  And with all the delays and quality problems during the first year, everyone knew that things could only get better.  And when Rise of the Olympian was announced, it seemed like Wonder Woman would finally get back to the quality of the George Pėrez and Greg Rucka runs.

     Yet somehow, Gail Simone has yet to deliver that special something that Wonder Woman lacks.  Her first arc was quite interesting, and the Dodsons’ art made everything shine in the way Wonder Woman should.  Yet subsequent arcs have lacked a certain sparkle of plot.  Gail Simone’s arcs have explored Diana’s psyche in a way that few writers have, and she has the voices of Etta Candy and Nemesis down perfectly.  But they never seem to utilize Wonder Woman’s rogues gallery well, or truly explore her role in the DC Universe.  I’m not even sure if that alone would give the title what it needs.  All I and many other readers know is that it is missing something that we can’t quite describe but that is keeping Wonder Woman from being on the same tier as Superman, Batman, and Green Lantern.  The one thing I do know is that the whole Sarge Steel paranoia thing has gone on too long.  It’s pretty stale now.

     Aaron Lopresti’s art is nice to look at, but it isn’t quite the art Wonder Woman needs.  Wonder Woman has had some top-quality, industry-leading artists in its day, including George Pėrez, Phil Jimenez, and the Dodsons.  But Lopresti just doesn’t quite match that standard.  It’s not that he’s bad.  However, Wonder Woman has been blessed with such amazing artists that someone like Lopresti looks worse by comparison.  It is quite sad that Simone and Lopresti have not already made their mark on Wonder Woman history.  Genocide sounds interesting, but the result is less cool than the idea.  And it seems to being going all over the place with0ut a clear direction.  I hope that this arc will turn around soon, for the future of this title.

Plot: 8.2      Art: 8.9      Dialogue: 8.8      Overall: 8.6

Standing on its Own

     Since its relaunch a little over two years ago, Justice League of America has been plagued by constant editorial mandates and crossover storylines.  First, it was the Lightning Saga crossover with Justice Society.  Then, it was the Injustice League Unlimited arc leading up to Salvation Run.  Then it was the Salvation Run and Final Crisis tie-ins.  Then, with the subsequent arc, Dwayne McDuffie and Ed Benes were finally given the chance to write their own stories for the JLA.  The arc focused on Vixen and Red Tornado, bringing to a close their long-standing character arcs that began with the series.  McDuffie also tied together the origins of Vixen and Animal Man in an excellent way, creating a new character, Anansi, who acted almost as his own voice in the world of DC.

     Sure, no one would call McDuffie’s run on Justice League groundbreaking.  But, largely, due to his work on the spectacular Justice League Unlimited cartoon, he has a natural grasp for the characters of the team in a way that many writers today do not.  Another excellent continuing character arc is Black Canary’s conflicts with the Trinity, Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman.  This conflict shows McDuffie’s understanding of the Trinity’s importance as well as allows for a natural evolution of Canary’s character.

     The current story arc involves the introduction of McDuffie’s own Milestone Comics characters into the DC Universe proper.  For some reason, the Shadow Cabinet is after Dr. Light (Kimiyo Hoshi, not the villain).  Immediately, the Justice League and the Shadow Cabinet are thrust into confrontation.  McDuffie is equally proficient with the Milestone characters, largely due to the fact that he created most of them.  As such, this is a very obvious choice for McDuffie to make.  It allows him to tell his own stories with his own characters and finally not have to write whatever he is told to write.

     Although there are many complaints about Ed Benes’ work on JLA, I actually share almost none of them.  Admittedly, a few less butt shots would be nice, but I find his art very crisp and polished.  There aren’t many people who consistently draw such dynamic poses and excellent group shots.  So I hope that he stays on the title for a good long time, so long as women get a bit better of treatment.  At any rate, this is a rising title that will finally be able to satisfy people craving for good JLA action for the first time since the cancellation of the last volume.

Plot: 8.8      Art: 9.0      Dialogue: 9.0      Overall: 9.0

Titanically Mediocre

     So, as my first DC review, I’m doing Teen Titans, the first DC comic I started reading.  The Teen Titans cartoon show was really interesting, so I thought I’d try out the comic.  I started reading right at the One Year Later arc, as Ravager and Kid Devil became major characters and the roster shifted dramatically.  Actually, the roster hasn’t been set ever since then.  It’s in constant flux, though the next arc promises to finally bring some stability.

     After Geoff Johns’ surprisingly lackluster showing in the Titans East arc, Sean McKeever took over with Eddy Barrows on pencils, starting off with a sequel to Titans Tomorrow and continuing with the Terror Titans arc.  And what have these arcs spawned?  More confusion.  Supergirl comes and leaves.  Ravager, the most awesome Titan in a long time, quits the team.  Miss Martian, a character I fell in love with despite initial apprehensions, leaves.  Blue Beetle joins.  Cyborg, Jericho, and Raven quit.  Bombshell betrays the team, dies, comes back to life, and rejoins.  It’s all very confusing.  Now, Static, Kid Eternity, and one other character are set to join.  And Robin seems mysteriously absent from the cover depicting the new team.

     Anyway, this last arc has been about Bombshell’s rejoining of the Teen Titans as well as fluctuations in Wonder Girl’s power.  The prologue to this arc was the story of Wonder Dog, who was actually the hellhound of Lycus, son of Ares and nephew to Wonder Girl.  Wonder Dog killed Marvin and mauled Wendy, leaving her in a coma in the hospital.  Too bad, since these characters were finally developing personalities in the Terror Titans arc.  Then, in the arc proper, Bombshell comes back to life and flees Project Atom, which seems to be after her life, while Wonder Girl feels the effects of Lycus’ attempt to weaken and replace her as Ares’ champion. 

     While the Wonder Girl redesign was welcome, this arc is just like all of Sean McKeever’s previous arcs.  All over the place without anything that really stands out.  Sure, stuff has been interesting.  But nothing was great.  And an unstable roster doesn’t really help.  The fact that it is taking a year and half for McKeever to set up his new team without any truly amazing things happening beforehand (Terror Titans was too much like Titans East) makes everything go way too slow.  So there is nothing terribly wrong with Teen Titans aside from that it should be much better.  It isn’t bad, but it isn’t good.  It’s just meh.  Same with the art.  Teen Titans just doesn’t have that same spark from the Marv Wolfman/George Pérez and Geoff Johns/Mike McKone eras that made it great.

Plot: 7.3     Art: 8.8      Dialogue: 7.5      Overall: 7.8

The Best Kind of Reunion

     So, everyone was excited when the award-winning team of Mark Millar and Steve McNiven came back together for the epic Old Man Logan arc in Wolverine.  And for good reason.  Civil War was a smash hit, and it was possibly the only major Marvel event in the last few years that wasn’t bad and/or boring.  The whole idea of an alternate universe Wolverine wasn’t exactly new, but Mark Millar wrote Enemy of the State, one of the best Wolverine story arcs ever.  And Steve McNiven…  well, he’s Steve McNiven.

     Despite all the amazing hype, Millar and McNiven managed to deliver, in one of those rare cases where things actually are as cool as they look.  Wolverine acting as a pacifist is something totally new, and it’s an amazing idea that I’m a bit surprised no one else has ever really tried before.  Plus, blind Hawkeye is really cool, and the whole road trip thing allows Millar to give us a truly great view of this world where almost all the heroes are dead and villains rule the world.  The Red Skull is the president, just to give a bit of persective.  The Red Skull.  Yeah, things are that messed up.

     Anyway, this arc is absolutely awesome.  Sure, there have been and likely will be delays.  But McNiven’s art is worth it.  Far from being more of his Civil War work, McNiven has altered his style to be a little more “dirty” in the best way possible to fit the mood of the arc.  It’s some of the best-looking comic book art today.  And Millar has an excellent grasp of the Marvel Universe as a whole, so that this world seems as well-developed as the normal Marvel timeline.  It’s good that another issue is coming out this week, because I think that people just can’t get enough of this stuff.  Really.

Plot: 9.4      Art: 9.6      Dialogue: 9.5      Overall: 9.5

How the Mighty Have Fallen

 

       

     Now, I don’t normally review manga.  However, manga are comics too, and I am quite fond of many of them.  One of those used to be Naruto.  Sure, it had a ton of shonen manga stereotypes.  But few manga don’t have those stereotypes and nonetheless, the battles were interesting, and the characters were endearing.  Who wasn’t excited to see the fights in the Rescue Sasuke arc?  Who wasn’t excited to watch Sakura actually be useful and help kick the snot out of Sasori in the Rescue Gaara arc?  Who wasn’t shocked to see Sasuke’s return?  It was all good stuff.

     But then, after we saw Sasuke again in Part II, everything went downhill.  The Kakuzu and Hidan arc was good, but not great, especially since Naruto’s victory over Kakuzu was so ridiculous.  Then, everything pretty much sucked.  Sasuke randomly annihilated Orochimaru.  Sasuke gathers a team of losers, minus Juugo.  I think everyone can agree that Karin is a loser.  Then, Sasuke defeated Deidara and Itachi (the latter only due to his exhaustion) in a row.  Now, Pein just blew up Konohakagure.  That’s right.  He blew it up.  Did I mention that Kishimoto Masashi is systematically killing off all the mentor characters?  First, Sandaime.  Then, Asuma.  Then, Jiraiya.  Now, possibly Kakashi.

     So yes, this is a manga that has lost what made it great.  Instead of focusing on the trials and life-changing adventures of Naruto, it focuses on Sasuke.  An obnoxious, angry brat whose only character development is to change who he hates.  Yeah.  And the jutsu have gone from awesome to unrealistic.  Blowing up Konohakagure?  Seriously?  And don’t forget Sasuke’s ridiculous Kirin technique.  And Karin’s “bit me” technique.  That just made me cry.  Plus, the only major black character is a stereotype.  Seriously?  Killer Bee is a pretty terrible character.

     So, due to all of these things, I have offically stopped reading and watching Naruto.  This manga used to be about changing destiny, about hope in the face of hatred and unrealistic odds, and about changing lives.  Now what is it about?  The anger and bloody tears of Sasuke.  I’m sorry, but aside from masochism and self-loathing, Sasuke is emo.  Deal with it.  Kishimoto has fallen into cliché trap after cliché trap.  And there are no signs of him changing his ways.  After all, Sasuke is his favorite character.  So, I am done with this manga for good.  It makes me sad, since Naruto had so much promise.  Hence the title of this post.

Plot: 2.5      Art: 8.5      Dialogue: 8.0      Overall: 5.0