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Dave's Capsules for April 2016 [message #317188] Fri, 29 April 2016 23:01
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Dave's Comicbook Capsules Et Cetera
Intermittent Picks and Pans of Comics and Related Media

Standard Disclaimers: Please set appropriate followups. Recommendation does
not factor in price. Not all books will have arrived in your area this week.
An archive can be found on my homepage, http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/Rants
And starting to move to the new place, fixing stuff, etc. Adulting!

Items of Note (strongly recommended or otherwise worthy): The Imitation
Game: Alan Turing Decoded (not strongly recommended, but otherwise worthy)

In this installment: Daredevil S2 Eps 5-13, The Justice League vs. Teen
Titans, The Imitation Game, Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur #6, Totally Awesome
Hulk #5, Ms. Marvel #6, Gold Digger #231, Astro City #34, Saber Rider and the
Star Sheriffs #2, My Little Pony Friends Forever #27, My Little Pony
Friendship is Magic #41, Transformers Sins of the Wreckers #4 (of 5),
The Transformers #52, Transformers More than Meets the Eye #52.

Current Wait List (books either Diamond didn't ship or my store failed
to order): Toil and Trouble #5, Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur #3 AND #4


"Other Media" Capsules:

Things that are comics-related but not necessarily comics (i.e.
comics-based movies like Iron Man or Hulk), or that aren't going to be
available via comic shops (like comic pack-ins with DVDs) will go in this
section when I have any to mention. They may not be as timely as comic
reviews, especially if I decide to review novels that take me a week or two
(or ten) to get around to.

Daredevil Season 2, Episodes 5-13: Marvel/Netflix - In many ways, the
first four episodes were like a pre-credits teaser (albeit a 4 hour long
one), setting up the theme for the rest of the story. And that theme is,
"Daredevil versus Doing It Wrong." The Punisher, Elektra, Stick, Kingpin
(who returns), the Hand...each is trying to make the world a better place in
a way that can be considered similar to Daredevil's way in some fashion, but
is ultimately at best misguided and at worst evil. But doing it the right
way carries a cost, paid not just by Daredevil, but also by several of his
allies. Could it have been told a little more tightly? Yeah, there were
certainly bits where it rambled on, especially Karen Page's stuff. But it's
still a pretty solid thematic arc. (And I am amused at how Foggy seems to be
getting shuffled off into Jessica Jones S2.) Recommended.

The Justice League vs. Teen Titans: DC - Actually didn't come out until
about mid-month, I was misled about the release date last month. Anyway,
these pseudo-nuDC direct to video movies have really felt lately like they
should be done like Daredevil if they can't get 'em on TV. Sure, there's one
overall story, but very clear episode/issue breaks, whether they're adapting
comics (Bad Blood) or going their own way (I'm told that at least one
significant spoilery plot element in JLvsTT is new to the cartoons, not
something in nuDC comics).
The basic premise is that Batman has decided he can't make Damien stop
being Damien, and ships him off to join the Teen Titans in the hopes that
being around kids with something closer to normal socialization might help.
And them being super-powered would let them survive Damien's personality.
Maybe. And then Trigon happens, because you really can't introduce the Teen
Titans anymore without Raven's dad becoming a problem. A new bit of business
about Ra's al Ghul helps tie Damien to the Titans more solidly, and while
it's a major retcon in the grand sense, this is a new (if nuDC-inspired)
continuity, so okay. Recommended. $12-20 depending on store (more if you
want the BluRay with the Robin figure).

Digital Content:

Unless I find a really compelling reason to do so, I won't be turning
this into a webcomic review column. Rather, stuff in this section will be
full books available for reading online or for download, usually for pay. I
will often be reading these things on my iPhone if it's at all possible.

Nothing this month.


Trades:

Trade paperbacks, collections, graphic novels, pocket manga, whatever.
If it's bigger than a "floppy" it goes here.

The Imitation Game: Alan Turing Decoded: Abrams ComicArts - The latest
science bio-comic from Jim Ottaviani, this time with art by Leland Purvis.
This is partially fictional, with Ottaviani having to fill in some of the
gaps in the historical record in order to tell a compelling tale. The
narration weaves about, a series of ghostly houseguests in the framing set-up
telling their tales of Turing's life, with Turing's own narration woven in
among these stories. Other than the occasional "of course, I didn't know
then" sort of digression, it's pretty much told in order, childhood through
death. Purvis does a good job of varying the layouts to emphasize when
things are normal-everyday and when they're, well, NOT. Recommended.
$24.95/$29.95Cn/#15.99UK


Floppies:

No, I don't have any particular disdain for the monthlies, but they
*are* floppy, yes?

Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur #6: Marvel - End of the first arc.
Fortunately, the "enforced normality" grounding is only a minimal hassle this
issue, and by the end Moon Girl has made it clear to her parents what is
important to her. Things aren't exactly resolved (in part because the arc
ends on a cliffhanger...yes, it's still the end of an arc, but while the
immediate plot resolves, the uberplot does not), but it's firmly established
that we're not going to have to worry about the "Luna's parents won't let her
do her thing" plot device intruding to an unreasonable degree. Recommended.
$3.99

Totally Awesome Hulk #5: Marvel - The theme continues to be "evil but
hot women try to corrupt Amadeus" apparently. I suppose I wouldn't mind the
"Amadeus versus his own Id" plot if it weren't being strung out like this,
and I wouldn't mind a slow burn for a plot I liked more, but meh. Neutral.
$3.99

Ms. Marvel v2 #6: Marvel - Like Moon Girl, this marks the end of an arc,
although it was a bit fitful in getting underway. The main theme is Kamala
being a victim of her own success and her own desire to say yes. The "Army
of Me" issues were not just literally Kamala versus (clones of) herself, but
also Kamala versus her own personal self...once she defeats her own flaws,
the actual giant monster stuff is dealt with almost casually. Because the
first step in nuking it from orbit is admitting to yourself that it needs to
be nuked from orbit. Recommended. $3.99

Gold Digger #231: Antarctic Press - And now for something low-stakes,
with Dreadwing seemingly out of the way at the moment. The giantesses from a
while back are brought to main Earth to keep them from environmentally
devastating their own pocket dimension out of boredom. Lots of pro wrestling
gags and large butt gags to be had. Mildly recommended. $3.99

Astro City #34: DC/Vertigo - And the Steeljack arc concludes, with the
Fan.dom of the Alt.ra getting his comeuppance and Steeljack ending up kinda
hosed as seen in the opening scene of the arc (like this season of Arrow,
it's all been flashback since then). It does depart a bit from the noir feel
at the end, tonally speaking, but that's part of the point of the arc: you
don't need to stay defined by the same sort of story you've been living, you
can switch genres. Recommended. $3.99

Saber Rider and the Star Sheriffs #2: Lion Force Comics - Well, the
unnamed studio artists this time are a bit better at layout-based
storytelling, although they develop a new problem: blank eyes. Are they a
cue to someone being mind-controlled? Or just a stylistic choice being
applied inconsistently when someone is angry, sometimes? The story is more
"gather the team, build towards Big Evil Plot Device," nothing too special.
Mildly recommended. $2.99

My Little Pony Friends Forever #27: IDW - Pinkie Pie and Granny Smith.
Granny gets injured, Pinkie wants to help, and Granny spends most of the
issue being cranky and only grudgingly accepting it. Rice avoids taking the
easy way out of having Pinkie's cheerfulness break, while giving Granny an
appropriate point to Learn An Important Lesson. (I say easy way out, because
not only is the "cranky old person hurts the young'un's feelings and feels
bad about it" cliche kinda weak, but "let's make a canon character behave in
a way that's supposed to be unusual for them" is also a cheap trick to make
weak plots stronger.) Recommended. $3.99

My Little Pony Friendship is Magic #41: IDW - The cover is an homage to
the style of the Little Golden Books, but Cook and Price bounce around among
various kiddiebook styles fairly manically as Zecora narrates the take of
Rainbow Dash's dreary day. And since disharmony has been established to have
a creature that feeds upon it (Windigoes), why not crabbiness? This is
definitely more of an experimental issue, much like the recent holiday
special, a bit more concerned with storytelling form than the story being
told (which is pretty pedestrian). Still, it's amusingly told, and gives
Cook and Price an excuse to bring back a lot of their comic-creation
characters ahead of Cook departing the title to work on other things (like
Gronk). Recommended. $3.99

Transformers: Sins of the Wreckers #4: IDW - Never underestimate the
ability of a determined idiot to do the impossible. And with loads of
determined non-idiots in the mix too, at least one reality is likely to be
destroyed. This issue is interesting and amusing, although the mood tends to
whipsaw around between horror and farce. And it has a definite plot-tease at
the end, a false climax that gets turned around for what feels like just
padding. Granted, at this point getting a satisfying resolution into 4
issues would have been hard, but there was a certain amount of padding in
previous issues as well: this is a four issue story stretched to five.
Mildly recommended. $3.99

The Transformers #52: IDW - Looks like Arcee's origin is being retconned
some more. On the one hand, her original background (made female by Jhiaxus
as part of a sick experiment, just to see if he could "invent" gender, and
she's hunted him down ever since) did the canon few favors, equating as it
did femaleness with insanity and abomination. But I don't think Barber's
solution implied in this issue is all that great either. As for the rest of
the issue...kinda forgettable. Optimus tries to get the Council of Worlds
involved, tries to get guidance from various people, and it largely feels
like it goes nowhere. A little revelatory soliloquy from Starscrean, at
least. Mildly recommended. $3.99

Transformers More than Meets the Eye #52: IDW - Ravage is Keyboard Cat.
Well, control-panel cat. Same pose. Like Sins of the Wreckers, this issue
feels somewhat padded out, but Roberts manages to make it work better in my
opinion. The extra time is used for character development that feels more
solid AND more tonally consistent, as various characters come to painful
realizations about themselves without the realizations being coerced by some
Evil Invention plot device. High-density angst, as opposed to SotW's
low-density angst, if you will. Oh, and meanwhile any illusions people may
have had that the DJD were sympathetic? Boom. Still totally horrible, for
all that they have internal codes annat. Sure, Tarn won't kill his own
people to curry favor with a potential ally, but he'll kill his own people in
a nanoklik if they violate his own rules. Recommended. $3.99


Dave Van Domelen, "So...embarrassing..." - Carnivac, TF: Sins of the
Wreckers #4 (of 5)
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