So that’s weird. This is the first month since I’ve been writing this blog that I’ve purchased absolutely zero new comics in a calendar month. not any. I’ve switched to graphic novels for reading, and as the space in my apartment reaches capacity for new books, I’ve made a conscious effort to buy fewer and fewer books, but I’m still surprised to find zero new comics coming in this month. That defeats the purpose of this column, in which books that I think are exciting or interesting can be purchased rather than borrowed from the library, through which they appear under “Purchased,” “Borrowed,” or “Reviewed” position in the hierarchy to highlight, which I’ll probably do if it keeps up.
In the meantime, here are the books I read this month (fewer than usual!)… not counting Batgirl Vol. 1I gave my own post.
borrow:
Comey Can’t Communicate Vol. 25 (visual media) Comey, Tadano and Najimy are about to begin their junior and final year of high school, which means Comey’s goal of making 100 friends is now on the deadline. The three of them are in a new class and almost no one they know joins their class. Comey’s signature.
The book centers on a strange New Year’s ritual, an annual battle royale with a Nerf, well, “enough” gun. During the fight, Comey got into an argument with a classmate who was cynical and didn’t like doing things in groups or following others.
There are a lot of new characters, and a weird, standalone storyline that actually feels like a good jumping point in a long-term narrative, even though for the comic, there’s not really a need for a jumping point because that’s The first volume is. still, hurry up Still a very interesting regular read.
Ninja Turtles: Armageddon Game – Opening Action (IDW Publishing) I had originally planned to ignore IDW’s TMNT event story “Armageddon Game” entirely, as I had ignored most of the publisher’s TMNT expansion “Volume Five” (at least not written and/or drawn by EDILW favorite Sophie Campbell part) ). I didn’t have much choice, though, as these events invaded Campbell’s home TMNT The latest series is ongoing (game changerreviewed here), which includes written by Tom Waltz and illustrated by Campbell TMNT FCBD 2022: Doomsday Gamea masterfully remixed version of Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird’s 1984 original Ninja Turtles #1. This intrigued me enough that I was actually interested in this series of events, even though it looked big and clunky, and this That seems to be the beginning of it.
A Marvel-style trade collection, presumably written specifically for those interested in crossovers but not yet paying attention to IDW’s massive content TMNT I published the series from the beginning (I only lasted nine volumes of the series and then left until Campbell took over with the occasional crossover or miniseries in the renamed “Rebirth” series). This 160-page tome not only includes two issues of the “Armageddon Game” prequel series opening moves, as well as the 2020 and 2021 issues, all written by Tom Waltz, as well as issue 84 or the regular TMNT series written by Waltz, Eastman and Bobby Curnow, as well as something called “Prelude to the Mouse Kingdom” written by Curnow. Six different artists are responsible for the content: Pablo Tunica, Dave Wachter, Adam Gorham, Casey Maloney, Maria Keane and Fero Pe.
The main storyline is the Rat King, who in IDW’s iteration is the God of Mischief, part of a pantheon that includes versions of the old Archie Comics character Jagwar and other original creations. The Turtles have obviously dealt with all of these people before, with the Rat King being a particularly common adversary.
The story here develops the character through his interactions with the Turtles, Shredder, and members of his pantheon. There’s a battle with the Turtles, which takes place in both the physical and astral planes, an attempt to recruit a reformed Shredder, a visit to Kraang, who’s somehow stuck in Leatherhead’s belly and semi-controlled, Subsequently visiting many of his siblings in an attempt to get them interested in reviving the titular Doomsday Game, a game of the gods involving real people (and/or mutants and/or aliens) as pawns, whose The rules are not written with the same attention as the players and prospects.
He ends up recruiting members from the Turtles’ arsenal of villains: evil scientist-turned-mayor Baxter Stockman, interdimensional warlord Kraang, and alien businesswoman Noor. Meanwhile, Shredder, who is related to the Rat King’s sister Kitsune, is warned of the upcoming game, and he and Kitsune investigate new players in astral form, revealing a hodgepodge of the same existing characters from Astral. .
As a first read, it definitely served its purpose. As a relative newbie, I now understand the Rat King, his pantheon, and some of their interest (or lack thereof) in the Turtles and other players in the IDW Turtles universe. I know that this game exists, and I also know the identities and some of the history of new players, and their various enemies besides the turtles.
But I can’t say it’s very attractive. Waltz specifically writes the Rat King as an interesting character, but in a way the book feels a bit like homework, like studying comics in order to appreciate the comics to come, which I suppose it is. The Turtles are mostly absent from the proceedings, with their most significant involvement being in a single issue collected in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series and appearing early in the proceedings.
The visuals match the quality of the writing. The art was all serviceable, but nothing really blew me away, and what was most interesting was seeing how characters and concepts I was familiar with from various earlier iterations were reinterpreted by my new artists to fit into the new story world. This may betray my own bias towards Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles stories, but the most interesting moment in the book to me was Eastman’s variant cover of the proceedings. This is interesting – read Strange—sees Eastman’s style, so familiar from the earlier, grittier, alternative comics version of the Turtles, applied to characters like Cherub in later, kid-friendly iterations.
This extinguishes my excitement end of the world game Sort of, albeit an improvement over Campbell and Co.’s last volume TMNT, but at least now I feel fully prepared to read it. It’s a bit cumbersome, but, it’s actually designed to be just that, a semi-necessary cram school for trade paperbacks.
Reviewed:
Vann Club: Batman Squad (DC Comics) Prolific children’s book creator Jim BentonDear Dumb Diary, Franny Stein, cat group) has made a graphic novel that’s sort of about Batman, or at least looks at Batman through the eyes of Batman superfan Ernest Fann, the man closest to him (his closest friend). best friend, his nanny, his dog) starts a Batman fan club in order to bring justice to his world. It’s really fun; trust me. More here.
