AdmiralWhiskers's Profile
Joined: May 29, 2019
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The notion of Joker's biggest nightmare being that he's stuck in a call center is brilliant.
If only they had stuck with that, it could have been fantastic. But alas, the character reverted to form.
Art was fine.
Knight Terrors: The Joker #1
The Joker's worst nightmare becomes a reality: he's got a day job! How will he handle meetings that could have been emails?! Why did management cancel "bring your child to work" day?! Who will want to make small talk at the coffee machine?! What is Alexis going to pick for lunch?! And who is the masked madman terrorizing Gotham at night?!
I don't give 10s lightly, for a perfect score means nothing can be better.
Barry Windsor-Smith, with his words and artwork, has made such a book. It is brilliantly crafted. I don't want to say much more than to urge you to get your hands on the book and aavor every page.
Monsters #1
Created over a period of 35 years, Barry Windsor-Smith' Monsters is a
tour de force of visual storytelling. Part family drama, part espionage thriller, part metaphysical journey, it is an intimate portrait of individuals struggling to reclaim their lives and an epic political odyssey across two generations of American history. Monsters is rende...
NOW we're cooking! Miriam's strange powers explained. Mole agents exposed, and the FBI agents orginally on the case are sidelined. Even a nice little action sequence.
The art isn't my favorite, but it's good enough to tell the story.
At this point, I'd suggest trade waiting on this "kinda sorta rooted in reality" spy thriller if such things interest you.
Red Atlantis #3
Last week, Miriam Roberts was a normal college student. Now, she's wanted by the FBI in
connection with a series of terrorist attacks involving psychically powered Russian sleeper agents. Just when Miriam believes things couldn't get worse, secrets about her long-lost
parents resurface, and she realizes that she might have powers of her o...
Wow. WOW. So much to process. Okay, basic premise is what if, in the American world of Mad Max, a society of "Ranger Scouts" organized as a quasi-religious cult based around the 7 Laws of their founder? As insane as this sounds, it works really well. (But all is not what it seems...)
Art and coloring are excellent complements to the script, too.
That said, and I apprec
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Scout's Honor #1
Years after a nuclear apocalypse, a new society has risen from the ashes...and their bible is an old Ranger Scout manual.
A young Ranger Scout named Kit has endured the harsh survivalist upbringing needed to con-quer the irradiated Colorado Badlands. But after discovering a terrible secret once lost to histo-ry, Kit must risk everything o...
Extinction Day....the kids rush to the train that will take them to the evacuation ship, but (of course) there's interference. Chaos ensues. The train scene has the same overtones as the beginning of Snowpiercer. Well told, very well drawn. And I enjoy the coloring...very bright and almost cheerful, which is odd for an end of the world book.
One thing I did not indulge on past issue
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We Live #4
Humbo's plan for escaping the Acceptists might not be enough for the group to make the train headed to Megalopolis Mother 9. This might be the end of the trip.
The fragile fantasy world created by Tala for her little brother Hototo finally crumbles under the cruel weight of reality. Tears are the only language left between them....
The creature is in the house and spends the issue getting acclimated. He reads some robot comic and figures that to be the template, so he cannibalizes the electronics and machinery in the house. Fun reveal at the end!
Cute piece, but we're halfway through this miniseries without much happening.
Art has a cartoony flair.
Byte Sized #2
When two young siblings excitedly unwrap their final Christmas presents, they discover toy robots unlike anything they have ever seen. And with good reason. What the kids and their parents don't know is that their quaint suburban home just became the beachhead for these self-aware 'bots that have begun to explore the outside world. And when one of ...
The "10 minutes of powers per day" leaves a lot of tine to fill. It's a lot of young high school stuff, and that's not appealing to this reader. Think an old school Peter Parker book with only sporadic Spider-Man.
Art is manga-inspired.
E-Ratic #2
Take another step into the world created in The Resistance. You're fifteen years old. You're suddenly granted incredible powers. Cool, right? There's only one problem: you can only use your powers for ten minutes at a time. What do you do when you have to save the world but you only have ten minutes to do it? This is the problem faced by Oliver Lei...
In this sci-fi book, four buddies take an adventure vacation to a resort on a wild planet. They run afoul of the locals and lost control of their craft a few hundred miles away from home base. They're left to their own skills to get back but have to contend with po'd locals, wild creatures and unforgiving terrain/climate.
Story is ok, art is never better than "could be better" and o
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Mann's World #1
A weekend getaway on a resort planet goes south when four friends run afoul of the planet's working class. Stranded in the wilderness of a strange planet, surrounded by danger on all sides and relentlessly pursued by vengeful locals, they must test their bonds of friendship in order to survive.
What appears to be an oversized book (but still 3.99) with 5 vignettes featuring origin stories of characters who survived the pandemic that killed millions and left a very few with extraordinary powers.
Straczynski writes with a detached style, and that made the initial miniseries a bit of a slog. Promising concept, just muddled execution. Well this is different as JMS has maybe 8 p
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The Resistance: Reborns #1
Stemming from the pages of the hit series, The Resistance, The Resistance: Reborns explores the origins of the newly superpowered humans after a global disaster leaves hundreds of millions dead in its wake, causing a few thousand to suddenly manifest superhuman powers. This special collection explores the origins of five characters in this new univ...
The colors muted a bit with this issue, but the story blossomed.
The Big Reveal happened, and it was done with a calm that would make this issue a talker if it wasn't so interesting and, dare I say, fun. The stakes are laid out, and the last 3 issues look to be exciting. That said, there's a question of "Why push forward?" that this issue suggests. I'm interested in seeing if the c
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Origins #3
* Chloe and David have discovered a lost city, populated by the robot servants of long dead humanity.
* But now that they've encountered their first human being in over a century, will they help Chloe and David - or become their enemies?
The assault on the Secrets is in full swing, with plenty of action and craziness. Two of the Secrets' cases are opened, which is good to see as I was well on my way to thinking that Taylor was screwing with everyone ("There's nothing in the cases!"). The character moments were traditionally Taylor strong. The supernatural elements...well, we'll have to see how this plays out.
Art i
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Seven Secrets #6
* To save The Order and everyone he loves, Caspar must leave them all behind.
* But even with his sacrifice, will Amon get his hands on the Secrets once and for all?
Book One of the second story arc. Ewing's writing on a couple of levels, and I'm afraid that he's entirely lost me on the deeper one. The "gotta repair the ship and GTF outta there" theme is pretty easy, but the crew is trying to work out some backstory that suggests Georges, the ship's captain and protagonist, has a very cloudy history.
Then we cut to a different ship, different cr
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We Only Find Them When They're Dead #5
* Destiny has come for the endeavors of the Vihaan II.
* Malik and Richter face off for the last time and only one will survive.
* Their uncertain futures will be forever changed by a shattering discovery.
* Please Note: The Spoiler Variant will be bagged to protect the shocking ending of this issue!
Donny Cates opens with a discussion of the ending of Watchmen and how it was a catalyst for peace and cooperation. He then says when we had our real catalyst (9/11), all we did was "[build] bigger bombs." Damn, that's fine writing.
While I could sit and ponder the opening pages for an hour, I'll try to write the rest. Cates again proves an insightful and easy read. No obtuse Al Ewin
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Crossover #3
"KIDS LOVE CHAINS," Part Three-Monsters and robots falling from the sky! Mysterious (and familiar??) superheroes joining our intrepid gang on their journey to event ground zero! CROSSOVER continues with the series' most explosive and shocking issue to date! Don't miss this one, folks.
If you do, it just might drive you...mad.
Apparently the start of the third arc. Let no grass grow, eh?
Anyway, the lesson I took from this issue is that nobody is dead for long in FP-verse. But there are lots of good moments - Owen and...his wife...getting right with each other, then with the kids. The grandparents are supportive and add levity. And it looks like the bad guys are revving up again once they realize that t
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Fire Power #7
NEW STORY ARC!
The Dragon's Claw has struck! Damage has been dealt! Owen and his family are reeling from the loss-and more danger lurks on the horizon!
As we venture far astray from the top tier of indie books, we have Post Americana. I bought in because I loved Steve Skroce's art from We Stand On Guard by Brian K Vaughan. Lesson learned? As a writer, Skroce is...a great artist for Brian K Vaughan.
The story this issue involves our protagonists escaping from a cannibal cult camp and the President and his bunkerized government get
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Post Americana #2
From MAESTROS creator and WE STAND ON GUARD co-creator! Carolyn and Mike's mission to stop the new president is interrupted when they're captured by a gang of CANNIBAL MANIACS. They're not just on the menu, they're dinner theatre too. And these maneaters love to play with their food.
Ash is back on the beat, but not quite as orthodox as before. She'll let a replicant slide here and there. And that gets her access that she wouldn't otherwise have. Now, she's tracking down a death at the under-construction seawall, and it doesn't look like the death is a replicant. This issue represents a ton of gumshoe sleuthing, and that means world building as we see even more of the Blad more
Blade Runner: 2029 #2
The first comic to tell original, in-canon stories set in the Blade Runner universe returns!
It is 2029 and Blade Runner Ash continues to hunt the streets of the rain-soaked dystopian world of Los Angeles for renegade Replicants, but this time she's trying to protect as many as she can find.
Written by Academy award-nominated screenwriter M...
One of the downsides of these awesome looking covers is that you then have to open the book and see that the interior art sometimes doesn't live up to the excitement. This is totally the case here, where a great looking Frank Cho cover obscures what is run-of-the-mill, cartoony character work inside.
The story is a down-on-his-luck writer who has to move back into his parents' house be
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Radiant Black #1
For fans of INVINCIBLE and Mighty Morphin Power Rangers comes a brand-new ONGOING SERIES from acclaimed writer KYLE HIGGINS (Ultraman, C.O.W.L.) and artist MARCELO COSTA that reinvents superheroes for a new generation!
Nathan Burnett has just turned thirty, and things aren't great: He's working (and failing) at two jobs, his credit card de...
The protagonists and their hunter have indeed found a live God. But the hunter doesn't care. How do Malik and the small crew of the Vihaan II get out of it? Gotta read the book!
Ewing's story is dense, which is interesting as it's anything but over-written. Every word has meaning, and it takes a study of the page to get where it's headed (and I'm not sure that I do).
But
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We Only Find Them When They're Dead #4
* The final showdown between Malik and Richter has begun on the surface of the God they've discovered.
* But will Malik survive long enough to find a living God - or has he doomed his crew to an unimaginable fate?
Another "after the fall" story, this time where a guy holed up in the safe bunker meets up with a girl from the insane wastelands that used to be America. With lots of cannibalism. Lots. There's lots of world-building, but it's largely Mad Max-style screwball stuff.
Art by Steve Skroce (who also writes) is reasonable if a touch fanzine-ish.
In all, this is perhaps the ch
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Post Americana #1
From MAESTROS creator, WE STAND ON GUARD co-creator, and The Matrix storyboard artist STEVE SKROCE with coloring by Eisner Award-winning DAVE STEWART.
The Cheyanne mountain installation, aka The BUBBLE, is the most sophisticated super bunker in the world. It was built to ensure the survival of America's executive branch of government and its mo...
This book lost me. Not regretting dropping it.
Sea of Stars #8
"THE PEOPLE OF THE BROKEN MOON," Part Three
Kadyn is on the run in the wild heavens, with shark-riding warriors, a giant, mysterious leviathan, and his own space-ravaged (and possibly crazed) father in hot pursuit. He now must decide if he can trust Dalla, his only companion...but what is the dark tragedy that left her banished from her people?