Tagged: DC

Review: New ‘Fables’ & ‘Jack of Fables’ Volumes

[[[Fables]]] is one of the big successes of the current version of the Vertigo line, where every book has a Hollywood-style high concept: all males on Earth are killed – except one!; New York’s mayor can talk to machines!; Refugee fairytales live in the modern world! And, in another Hollywood-esque twist, Fables even has a spin-off of its own, like Diff’rent Strokes begat The Facts of Life.

Last month, both the parent and spin-off series had new collections, with titles that implied a connection. So let’s look at the two of those books together:

Fables, Vol. 10: The Good Prince
By Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham, and others
DC Comics, June 2008, $17.99

Fables, as you might know, is a series in which all of the folkloric and fairy-tale characters that you’ve ever heard of are real, and originally lived in an array of alternate worlds. But “the Adversary” – whose identity was revealed a few volumes ago – led huge goblin armies to conquer nearly all of those worlds, sending a few (but mostly very well-known) Fables to our world, to live in secrecy in an enclave in New York City.

More recently, the cold war with the Adversary is beginning to heat up, with Fabletown’s leadership striking alliances with the “Cloud Kingdoms” (you know, where the beanstalk led?) and with the as-yet-unconquered world of the [[[Arabian Knights]]]. (There’s also an unsubtle parallel between Fabletown and Israel that Willingham is a bit too fond of.) As we hit this tenth volume, we know that the Adversary is building for a major attack three years from now, and the characters of Fables learn that quickly as well.

The last storyline, [[[Sons of Empire]]], served to ratchet up tension, but [[[The Good Prince]]] goes the other way; Flycatcher – Prince Ambrose, the Frog Prince – has finally regained his memory, and is grieving over the loss of his family centuries before. But Red Riding Hood goads him out of his misery, and he rushes off to get fighting lessons from Boy Blue.

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The Weekly Haul: Comics Reviews for July 17, 2008

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  • July 17, 2008

A couple disappointments and a near no-show from DC aside, this was a pretty good week in comics, especially outside of the mainstream superheroes.

Still, this week more than anything is just a little whisper, as all eyes are on San Diego for next week’s Comic-Con. All the same, books came out, so on to the reviews…

Book of the Week: Mice Templar #5 — This series started out as a fairly typical fantasy story, albeit told with mice and featuring a violent edge.

Last issue, it started becoming clear that writer Bryan J.L. Glass was veering away from the expected route of the young protagonist realizing his great destiny and triumphing over evil.

This issue, any and all signs of the archetypal fantasy narrative have been thrown clear out the door. Paradigms change in a big way for Karic, and to write anything about it would be to spoil the fun.

Mike Oeming is once again top-notch on art, and really the only question left is how many times the creative team can keep raising the bar.

Runners Up:

Captain America #40 and Ghost Rider #25 — Marvel had two superhero winners this week, with very different very good issues. Ghost Rider starts out slow, continuing the retrospective storyline of Johnny Blaze in jail. Zadkiel’s manipulations continue, and things build to a hellacious conclusion, highlighted by Blaze literally using the Bible as a weapon. Only Jason Aaron could make that work.

Cap sees the big fight between Bucky and the new impostor (the old Nomad), but the real bout to watch is that between Sharon and the Red Skull’s daughter. Ed Brubaker uses his skil with pacing to tell both stories at once, using each to heighten the drama of the other. And the ending? An out-and-out punch in the stomach moment.

Omega the Unknown #10 — The weirdest Marvel series in a good, long while finally ends, with Jonathan Lethem and Farel Dalrymple taking a bow with a nearless wordless denouement that comes straight out of David Lynch’s oddball mind. It’s a fitting conclusion to the series, which was enigmatic for the whole trip.

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ComicMix Six: Greatest Joker Victories

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  • July 16, 2008

Sometimes the villain wins.

Sure, you might stick them in jail — or an asylum — for what they’ve done. You could even throw them off a rooftop, leaving them paralyzed for life. But that won’t change the fact that they already did it. They scored a victory, even if it was short-lived.

The Joker is definitely a villain with a better track record than most. Lex Luthor may have become President and nearly destroyed Superman a few times. But he never killed Lois Lane or tortured Ma and Pa Kent. The Clown Prince of Killers, however, has had quite a few shining moments.

What drives this evil mass murderer? Some have claimed the chemicals which altered his pigmentation also damaged his brain. Some have claimed he suffered such psychological trauma and simply snapped. Some believe his brain actually acts on a higher level of perception, forcing him to operate with a logic we simply aren’t equipped to understand. Half of his crimes seem to be a way of trying to bring Batman to his own way of thinking, that there is no hope in the world, only chaos.

The fact that we can argue about the Joker’s sanity (or lack thereof) is part of what makes him so interesting. And so, with the release of The Dark Knight — and the Joker — looming near, we’ve sifted through the long and bloody history of the Harlequin of Hate to find those victories which stand out above the rest. Steel your nerves and enjoy ComicMix Six: The Six Greatest Joker Victories.

And if you’re interested, you may want to check out our related article, 11 Batman Stories to read before The Dark Knight.

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E3 2008: Mortal Kombat Vs DC Universe Gameplay

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  • July 15, 2008

The 2008 Electronic Entertainment Expo is underway. Just to start us off right, Midway released the first gameplay footage from the upcoming Mortal Kombat Vs DC Universe videogame. Since we’ve seen the Mortal Kombatants before, the video wisely focused on the DC Comics characters. Superman, Batman, Catwoman, and Flash were shown in some exciting footage using their unique abilities. For instance, the Flash smashed his enemy through several walls while going through rooms in a few seconds.

But the Mortal Kombat characters got the last laugh as the final moment shown was Scorpion unmasking to perform his famous fire fatality on the Scarlet Speedster. Mercifully, the camera cut away before that happened. Flashes always seem to die in these multiverse crossovers, don’t they?

See the video for yourself below:

 



Video: E3 2008: Mortal Kombat VS DC Universe

The Dark Knight: 11 Must-Read Batman Stories

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  • July 15, 2008

A few months back, we posted a reading list for anyone who wants to catch up on the Batman mythos before checking out The Dark Knight. With the release of the blockbuster Batman Begins sequel looming, we wanted to call out that reading list one more time, just in case you missed it the first time around.

Our "11 Batman Stories to Read Before Watching The Dark Knight" feature rounds up some of the most important Batman stories to occur in the period leading up the events of The Dark Knight, according to our comic book historian Alan Kistler’s perceived timeline of the Batman mythos. We explain why each story is important, provide a general synopisis of what occurs and call out any special notes for fans of the character who want to learn more about DC’s famous hero.

Here’s an excerpt:

batman-yearone-7796244Batman: Year One – It all starts here in this story by Frank Miller (Sin City) and David Mazuchelli (DAREDEVIL: Born Again). After years of learning how to be a detective and training in the martial arts and ninjitsu in the Far East, Bruce Wayne returns to Gotham City to begin his war on crime. Learn how he first met a young Lt. James Gordon (who would later become the famous commissioner of the GCPD) and hot-shot District Attorney Harvey Dent, as they all try to free their city from a corrupt police department and fight against the mobster known as Carmine “The Roman” Falcone.

This comic also features the reason Bruce Wayne chose a bat as his symbol and his first encounter with Catwoman. The end of this story leads directly into another item on our reading list, BATMAN: The Man Who Laughs.

Batman and the Monster Men – In Year One, you might notice a large gap of time that passes between November and December. This story, written and drawn by Grendel’s Matt Wagner, takes place during that gap and reimagines one of Batman’s earliest stories from the Golden Age of Comics. Meet Bruce Wayne’s early girlfriend, Julie Madison, and watch his first encounter with the sociopathic Professor Hugo Strange. This story also introduces the proto-version of the Batmobile.

So be sure to check out our list of The Dark Knight Must-Read Stories if you haven’t done so already and keep an eye here on ComicMix throughout the week for more on The Dark Knight, which hits theaters July 18.

 

New ‘Superman’ Movie Coming?

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  • July 15, 2008

Craigslist in Omaha, Neb., has a fairly mundane looking call for extras for a movie, at least unless you’re interested in the Superman film franchise.

OMEL Courtesy Casting is looking for stand ins and extras, the ad says. But here’s where it gets interesting:

Plot Summary: A sequel to the summer 2006 action-adventure. Bryan Singer returns to direct with Brandon Routh again playing Clark Kent/Superman.

Maybe that Warner Bros./DC meeting from last week really did speed things up. I grew up in Nebraska and have quite a few friends in Omaha, so with any luck one of them will check in on this and see if it’s legit.

(via CBR)

‘X-Files’ Comic Preview at EW

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  • July 14, 2008

9999_400x600-6040641The new X-Files movie comes out July 25, and that week also sees the debut of a tie-in comic book series from WildStorm.

Entertainment Weekly has a preview of X-Files #0, from series co-producer and co-writer Frank Spotnitz. Check that out right here.

The truth? It’ll be out there in theaters when The X-Files: I Want to Believe opens July 25. But thanks to Frank Spotnitz, the franchise’s coproducer and cowriter, it’ll also be available in comic-book form two days earlier, when DC’s The X-Files #0 hits stores. While the film takes place after the TV series’ end, Spotnitz’s title (illustrated by Iron Man: Hypervelocity‘s Brian Denham) is fully ensconced in buzzy season 5, with Special Agent Dana Scully’s cancer in attack mode, and her FBI partner, Fox Mulder, initially on the lam, probing Scully’s illness as well as surreptitious alien types.

Issue #0 is a story Spotnitz always wanted to tell, but never had a chance to. And it will, in fact, springboard into a few original comics miniseries set throughout seasons 2 and 5 of the show. Also, these tales will feature a familiar evil force. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. To jump-start the X-Files’ long-awaited resurrection, DC and Spotnitz have given EW.com this exclusive first look at pages from The X-Files #0.

A funny little side note: DC posted a news item about this on its home page, right here. But if you click the link, you’re taken to this wholly unrelated site.

Looks like Grant Morrison’s insiduous usurpation of DC is much farther along than we’d thought.

Dean Haspiel and the ‘Street Code’ Preview

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  • July 14, 2008

Over at Whitney Matheson’s Pop Candy blog, there’s a preview of Dean Haspiel’s upcoming semi-autobiographical webcomic Street Code. I’ve always been a fan of Haspiel’s work, ever since I first encountered a Billy Dogma story published by the act-i-vate webcomics collective.

From Matheson’s post about the preview:

"I felt that it was the right time to take what I learned drawing other people’s lives the past few years and revisit drawing my own," he told me.

The story follows Jack, a New Yorker who relocates from Alphabet City to Brooklyn, "where most everything he stumbles upon is not as it seems."

What I find most interesting about this project is that Haspiel is publishing it on DC’s controversial Zuda Comics webcomic imprint. Haspiel’s sensibilities have always struck me as more indie-aligned despite his work with some of the larger publishers, so it will be interesting to see how he’ll fare in this heavily scrutinized publishing model.

Street Code kicks off July 18.

Marvel’s Tom Brevoort Disses DC

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  • July 14, 2008

Safe to say there isn’t a lot of love lost between Marvel and DC these days, with that writers’ spat over Secret Invasion and Final Crisis, then rumors that DC pulled out of an awards ceremony over a Marvel joke.

Now over at Marvel’s Cup o’ Joe column at MySpace, editor Tom Brevoort has gone straight middle school on the other New York comics giant. In addition to previewing some Secret Invasion pages, Brevoort writes:

I want to announce that I’m not at all interested in replacing Dan DiDio at DC after he is booted three weeks ago, and I haven’t taken many secret, high-powered meetings with key DC and Warner’s executives, who’ve long admired my great success with Civil War and Secret Invasion and New Avengers and so forth. Dan’s doing an excellent job over there, and I’m sure I couldn’t raise their market share by 10%, 15% or 20%. Despite the fact that many top-selling, exclusive Marvel creators have called me up in response to the rumblings to let me know that they’d love to work on a DC project for me if I was running things over there and begging me to consider it, I’m not remotely intrigued by the possibility. If called, I will not answer; if I answer, I will not parley; if I parley, I will not accept the job; and if I accept the job, I will not work very hard. So there’s no truth to the wildfire speculation that links me at the hip to that position, and makes me the obvious next choice to sit in that chair. Just to make that all perfectly clear.

Ouch. I’m sure it’s all in good fun for Brevoort or Marvel, but that has to sting for DC, which has had some serious struggles lately. And, as someone who was at Heroes Con watching DiDio as those rumors came to a head, let’s just say he didn’t look like a happy guy.

Are Marvel and DC still playing softball against each other? If so, this year I’d watch out for the cleats.

DC and Warner Talk Movies

Warner Bros. is apparently looking to emulate the success Marvel has had making its own movies, such as Iron Man and Incredible Hulk.

Variety is reporting some Warner honchos held meetings with people at DC Comics to try to develop a better pipeline from page to screen.

Warners has never had such a strategy, and there have long been complaints the studio has been slow to exploit a potential treasure trove of franchises. And while the studio is basking in critical love for “The Dark Knight,” it has watched studio rivals rake in big bucks from Marvel Comics characters, and Marvel itself get into the tentpole business.

While it’s assumed there will be another Batman pic, there’s been no formal announcement. And Warners has no movies based on the classic DC universe to preview at this year’s Comic-Con.

Few details are coming out, aside from this official statement: "We’re constantly looking at how best to exploit the DC Comics characters and properties." Exploit?

Now, if only someone from Warners would talk to DC about straightening out their comic book line.

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