Comic Reviews

The Flash #5 Review

The Flash has so far been a surprising joy for me. I did not expect this series to be so great. It tells a great story for Flash and his supporting characters and always leaves us with a great ending for us to want to pick up the next issue. 

In this issue The Flash is still trying to learn how to control his new powers. Manuel is trying to figure out a way to save his clones, but it may end up killing himself in the process. When something goes wrong with Manuel and his clones the Flash is going to have to save the day and pay the price.

Astonishing X-Men #46 – Review

This issue has Scott and alternate versions of Wolverine, Emma Frost, Nightcrawler, Shadow Cat find out the reason behind Savior’s actions. Unfortunately it’s the cliche of the ends justifying the means that so many grey hat villains use. There was a huge catastrophe and of course only the energy that could be found in heroes was powerful enough to contain it! And that had me yawning. It also reminded me a lot of Final Fantasy 6.

Unsurprisingly, the mutants in this issue didn’t hear this and decide they should just got back into captivity and become living Duracells. So the team decides to fight their way towards a special jet that can travel between dimentions. I don’t want to give away the ending in this review, but the pacing also seems way off – this story arc will probably end up being about two issues longer than it needs to be to tell this story. And that decompression is what gives off the feeling of Marvel directing the write to leave the story in a holding pattern until Liu’s turn at the helm comes.

Deathstroke #5 – Review

This issue of Deathstroke, overall, leaves much to be desired but has enough action combined with depth to keep readers coming back for more despite the flaws. There is little progress with character development and the artwork is full of disproportioned bodies and environments that are almost hard to look at.

We step back in time to see a much younger Slade (much younger being 60) and his son Grant training with Peabody. After an ‘acceptable’ session, we return to the present to see Slade’s degrading condition and his fight with the new Legacy… who proves to be more of a challenge than any of the previous wearers of the Legacy suit.

Sweet Tooth #29 – Review

For our recent feature that wrapped up the best comics had to offer, I named Jeff Lemire the best writer of 2011. I admitted this was based primarily on his exceptional work with the Animal Man series, but I also noted that what little I had read of his original work, Sweet Tooth, certainly did not hurt his notoriety. Now that I have a few more books of the series under my belt, I’d say it’s about time a bit greater tribute was given to where it’s due. Sweet Tooth is a pretty great book.

Moriarty: The Lazarus Tree #8 – Review

Moriarty leaves me feeling like an incompetent oaf yet again. Our suave and arrogant detective draws confusing conclusions from thin air, the story only slightly progresses, several characters that I did not even know existed say their farewells, and we end this mostly boring but sophisticated issue with a fantastically nightmarish hallucination which almost makes the rest of the issue worth it. Unfortunately, almost is all writer Daniel Corey gets.

With the help of Blair, Moriarty attempts to stop the riots from getting even more out of hand while looking for his old friend Morley, and the Lazarus Tree, in an attempt to prevent his death. He also receives an impromptu nightmare featuring his old adversary Sherlock Holmes.

Uncanny X-Men #5 – Review

Uncanny X-Men is heavy on continuity but actually manages to be so in a good way as it picks up on threads started by Uncanny X-Force. Looking to make up for her role in Archangel’s crimes, Psylocke uses false pretenses to bring the Extinction Team to the world he created, and only Magneto knows the truth of it. This is an issue that focuses more on character interactions than plots, and that proves to really play to Kieron Gillen’s strengths with these characters in particular.

Even though it is handled well, those who haven’t been following Uncanny X-Force could easily get a little lost with this issue. The story of Warren Worthington III going all Apocalypse and accelerating the evolution of this one isolated patch of Earth can be a lot to try to take in all at once like this. Thankfully, Gillen doesn’t dwell much on the details and really only focuses on two beats that are easy to understand. The first is that this is an area that has been mutated by someone manipulating time. The second is that Psylocke feels guilty because she feels she could have prevented it. As long as you grasp those two ideas, the story is pretty easy to follow.

Uncanny X-Force #20 – Review

In Uncanny X-Force #20, Rick Remender doesn’t take a breather.  In fact, he expands the questions to those of identity and family.  The X-Men books have always been about two things: prejudice and family.  Most of the original team and many, if not most, of the later members were either abandoned by their biological families or orphaned.  And so they came to be a family at Xavier’s.  For some it was metaphorical like the father-daughter relationship Wolverine has had with plenty of girls at the school.  For others it was literal such as Scott and Jean and their children from various timelines.  And yet others came with their siblings and then either expanded their families or grew apart from their siblings.  Through it all their internal squabbles rarely went beyond the boundaries of family.  

Justice League International #5 – Review

Justice League International continues to be boring in their latest installment. The storyline has progressively moved forward, but after suffering through the paper-thin plot the storyline has long overstayed it’s welcome, if it was ever welcome at all. The characters on the JLI continue to be interesting, and the artwork goes from stiff to good, but none of these elements become as great as they should be.

Peraxxus’s goal to decimate the Earth is finally coming to a close. His Signal Men are ready to destroy everything unless the JLI can stop them. Unfortunately, they are under a pile of magma with no confidence coming from their creators. All hope may be lost if the team does not come together and think of a plan to save the world – and themselves!

Batman #5 Review

For the first four issues, Batman has found himself up against The Court of Owls.  This is an organization that goes way back in Gotham – so far back that most people believe it to just be a scary story told to kids.  Now, you may be thinking, “Batman is the greatest detective in the world, so how could he have gone so long without checking this out?”  We actually found out last issue that he DID check it out and he concluded they were not real.  However, as he checked on how an ancestor died, he was plunged into a maze. 

And that’s where this issue picks up.

Morning Glories #15 Review

To start this review I would just like to say that Morning Glories is one of my favorite series right now and I love how the series always surprises me. Something that makes me want to pick up every issue and get excited to read every issue is the mystery and never knowing what is going to happen next. Every issue gives you questions to ask yourself about the series and with each issue you feel like you are getting closer and closer to a solution.

In this issue three students of Morning Glories Academy Zoe, Hunter, and Jun are in search to find a red flag as part of their woodrun, which the school makes mandatory. As these three characters search for the flag we learn more about one character in particular and that is Zoe. We learn more about her past before Morning Glories and about a murder she committed, which we first learned about in issue seven. We find out about the aftermath of the murder and how this will affect her in Morning Glories Academy.