New Comic Cavalcade: Siege #2 and More

Hey kids, welcome back to the latest episode of New Comic Cavalcade. You may recall that last month, we reviewed Siege #1, Warlord #10 and the Blackest Night tie-in Weird Western tales #71. So how far have things progressed in the course of a month? We're about to find out, because it's time for reviews (with spoilers) of Siege #2, Warlord #11 and the Blackest night tie-in Starman #81. Yes, I have been buying other comics, but I also value continuity. So, let's go to the comics, why don't we?



Siege #2
By Brian Michael Bendis and Olivier Copiel

Last month, I complained about the lack of footnotes or any other kind of context, which proved confusing considering the comics that were supposed to set up Siege were in many cases yet to be released. Now, a month later, I can safely say that... well, some of them have come out. I'm still not sure how Thor or the Asgardians ended up back in Oklahoma, but I guess we'll just chalk it up to magic (the magic of editorial screwups) and move on.

So how does the actual issue measure up? Well, it's by Bendis. That's not necessarily meant as a dig, but this issue even more than last seems very Bendis, meaning that like many of his bigger stories there's a lot of surface flash and dazzle that may distract readers from the shaky foundations. Basically, half of the story focuses on Sentry going into full Miracle Kid mode and tearing Ares in half with his bare hands in a giant two page spread that consists almost entirely of a huge splash of blood and flying internal organs. Subtlety is apparently not high on Copiel's to-do list and as a long time fan I could only imagine the kind of infarct this sequence would have caused Jim Shooter.

As usual, though, that's the big problem with Bendis: the comic is cool enough assuming you've never actually read any Marvel comics before. If you have, you might start asking pesky questions like, how can Taskmaster easily take on Asgardian warriors? That sort of thing, of course, is increasingly irrelvent in light of the fact that Bendis places massive plot importance on characters such as Sentry, Daken and Phobos -- in other words, on newer characters whose sudden primacy in the MU is sure to drain much of the drama of the story for older readers, who are probably stuck somewhere between "who are these people?" and "why do I care about any of them?" I will give Bendis some props for turning Sentry into pretty much a grade-A supervillain, which I hope sticks after the end of Siege as it's basically the only justification for his pimping over the last several years that would seem reasonable to me. But as a whole, while there's plenty of pretty action to look at, this comic is still way to much flash (and gore) and not enough substance.

My Grades: It's entertaining enough. But so are cat themed youtube clips, and those aren't actually good either. C.



Starman #81
by James Robinson and Fernando Dagnino

And here, after more than a decade, is a new issue of Starman. Before we get into the issue itself, let me say again that I think this is maybe the greatest event tie-in idea ever, resurrecting entire titles as zombies to go along with the zombie storyline. It's genius. Of course, as we saw last month with Weird Western Tales, it's kind of hard to write a story that's actually relevant in one of these one shots, but heading into Starman #81 I was curious to see if Robinson could pull it off, especially considering the widespread negative reviews he's been receiving lately for stuff like Cry for Justice.

I'm happy to report that no negative review is needed for Starman #81. With this story, Robinson manages to stay true to himself and the series (to the point where, as promised, Jack Knight still remains retired in the happily ever after and doesn't appear in this issue) while still providing both a solid tie-in to Blackest Night as well as a coda to Starman that's actually relevant to the characters. In this case (since Jack remains off limits) those characters as The Shade and his erstwhile love interest Hope O'Dare, who are confronted by the reanimated corpse of Jack's brother Will, who was killed in Starman #0 way back when the series launched.

The fact that this attack take splace right as Shade and Hope are in the middle of having one of those awkward relationship-defining conversations that couples sometimes have means that unlike Weird Western, this comic is elevated beyond a simple zombie shoot out with in-jokes for fans of the defunct property. Actual advancement and development takes place, meaning that instead of being an empty (if cool) exercise, this comic can safely takes it's place right after Starman #80 as a worthy addendum to the series as a whole. Not a half bad trick to pull off.

My Grades: The art by Dagnino is solid, even though it doesn't quite match up to Tony Harris, and the story likewise fits right in. The only real downside is that you will wish Starman was still being published. A-.



Warlord #11
by Mike Grell

And, of course, the Warlord doomsday clock hits eleven this month. The good news is that Grell is back doing the art again, and any time you get a dose of Grell art it's a good day. Even better, the storyline, which revolves around yet another rebirth for arch-enemy Deimos (I believe this is his 6th go-round, though I would have to double check to be sure), looks like it may also provide a resolution to the long-running subplot about Warlord's son Tinder, who Warlord mistakenly believes he killed long ago (way back in the original Warlord #21 from 1979). Personally, I would say that 31 years is more than enough time to work out a plotline, so I for one will be really happy if this finally gets resolved (for those not familiar with the comic, the person Warlord killed was actually a clone of his son, while the real son has been hanging around as a supporting character in an ongoing subplot ever since, both parties unaware of their familiar connection).

So that's good. And this issue is okay, though it still suffers a bit from data dump syndrome, as we get several more pages devoted to going over Warlord's backstory, this time in the form of explaining the whole Deimos-Tinder-clone thingy. But there's some nice action drawn by Grell and the prospect of a resolution has me excited.

Unfortunately, I have a strange feeling that this also is a swan song for the title. There's nothing in the book specifically stating this, but the fact that Grell is back on art and finally tackling the Tinder plot suggests that DC may be giving him a chance to wrap up his dangling threads before they pull the plug. I hope I'm wrong, as I would like to see this comic finally take on some new material instead of just recapping the last 40 years of publications for new readers, but this could be the end.

My Grades: Looks great, but even with all the action in this issue it still plods along. Travis Morgan is actually starting to seem as old as his 84 years. B-.

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New Comic Cavalcade: Siege #1 and More

Welcome back to another edition of New Comic Cavalcade, where we bring to you the most timely reviews around so that you can best decide what to spend -- or not spend -- your hard earned comics dollar on. Up for consideration this week: Siege #1, Weird Western Tales #71 and, as promised, Warlord #10. Let's get right down to it.


Siege #1
Brian Michael Bendis and Olivier Copiel

Siege is an interesting case study in the drawbacks of writing within a shared universe. Of course, you might say the same about everything Bendis has written, but in the case the problems, such as they are, with Siege stem mostly from what is not in the story rather than what is in the story. So let's start first with what Siege does do: surprisingly enough (for me, anyway), it present a fairly entertaining preface to what promises to be an important story, as Marvel has promised this will be the endgame for everything that has been going on at the company for the past seven years. We get to see Norman Osborn marshal forces, with Loki's help, and we go behind the scenes with the supervillains to see what they are thinking as they prepare to attack Asgard. Typically for this current Marvel era, significantly less time is spent with any of the heroes, meaning that even when the battle is finally joined, we don't actually get to see much of the fight between Thor and Osborn's minions.

This is a drawback, as such a battle should be the meat of an action story but instead is depicted in long distance, grainy shots of tiny figures with an accompanying voiceover telling us Thor is down, rather than actually showing it happen. Which makes sense because, as I mentioned, what doesn't happen in the story is the main issue. We don't get any sense of what the motivation is for Osborn or what he stands to gain from this attack. More importantly, we don't get any explanation of a) why Asgard is back in Oklahoma (as opposed to Latveria, where it is still parked in the pages of Thor) or b) how Tony Stark ended up under Don Blake's care in Oklahoma, and with Maria Hill along to boot (again, nothing remotely suggesting this is happening in the pages of Blake's own title, Thor). I assume that this information is given somewhere, perhaps in Iron Man, perhaps in the Siege prologue one-shot. Unfortunately, the writers and editors also assume that you know this stuff as well, even though there's every possibility that you either don't read those titles or, in fact, that it simply hasn't yet been published (which not only applies to the end of the current Thor story, but also to the Steve Rogers appearance at the end of the issue, which... doesn't seem to make any sense based on when we last saw him). There has been a lot of talk recently about how scheduling delays have impacted the Marvel Universe, but allowing these problems to undermine what should be the culmination of a decade's work seems egregious.

As a stand alone tale, then, Siege #1 isn't half bad. But read in the context of the Marvel Universe, the more you try to figure it out, the more confusing it gets. And since the story only matters within that context, the failure to provide a proper setting to the reader is a major failing.


My Grades: It should be a solid B or B+. But editorial confusion demotes it to a C+. I will probably buy the next issue, if only for the fact that by the time it comes out, all the comics that were supposed to set the stage for it may also have been issued. One can hope.




Weird Western Tales #71
Dan DiDio and Renato Arlem

In case you've missed the last couple years of DC comics, they have a big event right now called Blackest Night, which is basically their version of Marvel Zombies, only it's taking place in continuity. As part of the promotion for the event, someone at DC had the absolutely brilliant idea to resurrect not just characters, but canceled titles from DC's past, so along with new final issues of classic comics like Starman and Suicide Squad, we also are given the unlikely treat of a new issue of Weird Western Tales for the first time since 1980.

The down side to this otehrwise awesome promotion is that these comics are part of Blackest Night. Which means in this case that we get zombie versions of the western heroes who appeared in the anthology's long history, including Scalphunter, Firehair and, of course, Jonah Hex. The story isn't too bad; DC EIC Dan DiDio does a decent job of tying this one-shot into both Blackest Night and recent events within Jonah Hex (in this case by bringing in Hex arch-villain Quentin Turnbull and his descendants as major characters). Still, though the comic is a fun call-back for long-time fans like me, it is necessary reading for pretty much nobody. I can't see Green Lantern fans bothering to buy this (or enjoying it much if they did), while Jonah Hex fans can also safely skip it without missing much. There's nothing wrong with the comic, mind you, but when the logo is the biggest selling point, chances are it's a good thing this is just a one-shot.

My Grades: A++++++ for the idea, C+ for the actual comic.




Warlord #10
Mike Grell and Chad Hardin

And, of course, it's Warlord. You may recall that in an earlier edition of New Comic Cavalcade I vowed to review every issue of Warlord until sales improved. Well, as far as I know, Mike Grell and I are still the only people reading it, so as promised, I'm bringing you the straight scoop on Warlord #10.

Actually, this issue is a slight improvement, all things considered. On the down side, Grell, who had stepped in to pencil a couple issues, is back doing just the covers and writing. But Chad Hardin, who returns to the book as artist, turns in with this issue his best effort to date. I'm not sure what it is -- probably the fact he is inking himself in a sketchier style, but I'm too lazy to dig out the back issues to check -- but this issue looks really good. I like his style in this issue much more than his previous efforts.

Unfortunately, the story struggles with the same problems it has had all along, namely too much standing around talking about Warlord by the supporting cast and not enough actual Warlord actually doing things. This time it's in the form of some on-camera interviews about Travis Morgan, which for people like myself who are long times fans is a little too close to Grell's six issue mini-series in the mid-90's, which was entirely about people discussing Warlord's legacy while he was off panel.

This kind of deconstruction is great if you're a long time Warlord fanatic, but chances are, again, that Grell and I are the only two people who find this sort of study interesting, and even I am getting a little tired of it after almost a year. Let's just have some balls out fantasy action and let this stuff be the subtext instead of the main text, okay? Since half this issue revolved around the newest incarnation of Deimos, though -- a character only long, long time Warlord fans care at all about -- things don't really look promising.


My Grades: Considering Grell wasn't drawing it, the art was better than expected, but the story is still stuck in neutral. B-.

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