Maritimus

It feels I narrowly avoided that menace era, having grown up with Alan Grant's Batman and Claremont/Jim Lee X- Men.. Clone Sagas, Spawn and Knightfalls was what actually made me grow up. It felt bullshit even at 13 so I lost interest and stopped reading.

Check out the video interview in my previous post, if you haven't, Mignola addresses the very issue of work overload among other things. He basically says that he is 100% back in Hellboy and he doesn't want to do anything else. His name is on the cover of BPRD, but he only works as a consultant and John Arcudi is the real writer. Not sure about Lobster. Also - Joe Golem, a project put on hold years ago gets fleshed out as an illustrated novel, sounds very interesting. A really cool interview, i recommend.

Huh, I did not notice that.

I've never been one to really notice the quality of comic book production though. I'm only interested in story.

While I understand that this can be a consideration in cost, as in "Why am I paying the same price for this cheap version as I was for a better quality version?", I only notice a cut in the amount of story.

I'm used to reading comic books that were printed in the 1960s and 1970s, and have been sitting around on store's shelves for years and years. It's hard to gauge quality when talking about recent comics if you remember reading a newsprint quality '60s comic.

 

Anyway, I was probably just happy to finally get to read The Storm and the Fury. I've been waiting for over a year (I think it's been that long!) to finally see this story.

And, it delivered. I had noticed a drop in the quality of the Hellboy stories in recent years, actually.

Don't get me wrong. It was still one of the best books on the racks, no doubt. Yet, I consider the first 6 or 7 Trades of Hellboy to represent pure perfection. I rank it as one of the best pure comic stories ever, but after "The Troll Witch and others" TPB, I found the stories just weren't quite at that same level as the early stories.

That changed with the final (as of now) story-arc. It took me back to the feel of the original Hellboy stories.

"Epic" is really the only way you can describe The Fury.

I do agree that Hellboy dropped in quality after The Island trade. I was very disappointed with Darkness Calls, and I initially thought it's the change in art, but i have come to really appreciate Fegredo (who showed incredible growth since). I think the real factor might be that Mignola was doing to many things - the movies (he was on the set a lot), the BPRD gaining velocity, design work for Disney.. The Storm and The Fury have both been great and it really feels like Mike is putting all his powers to Hellboy once again.. check out the interview, something great is coming.. My link

I noticed the drop in paper quality a few months ago in BPRD Being Human trade - it was thinner than before, and the colors less saturated. I probably wouldn't bug me so much if not for the fact that Dave Stewart, who is a God of comic book coloring, is doing such a remarkable job, and this new print quality takes away from the vibrancy of his palettes.. I deal with drawing and colors all the time, so i tend to be a pain in the ass when it comes to it.. If you grab any of the trades from previous years, and feel the texture and thickness of the paper, and compare it to The Storm and The Fury, there is a drop. Perhaps there are different providers for different outlets. I know for a fact that Barnes and Noble has different printers than comic book stores, which is why their comics look much better. I checked out the same Hellblazer trade at B&N and Midtown Comics in NY, and the difference is just colossal. Than again, i tend to pay attention to it.

I love Hellboy. I love the quality of the paper Dark Horse prints their comics and trades at. Until now.. What the f%$k? I was about to pick up the latest Hellboy trade collecting The Fury and The Storm, both of which have been stellar, and what do i see? Cheap paper, bad color quality.. Why? WHY DARK HORSE?? I used to love the paper quality in their trades and now they are changing? This sucks.. At least the singles are still looking good..

These Biz tapes are great. Bisley himself seems like a cool guy, some enlightening thoughts on art and the process of creating it. I like it when he says you have to offer your spirit into a drawing to get something back. I will watch them a couple of times for sure.

At least 2000 AD riffs off of the good stuff. Marvel rips off itself mostly. "What if... what if.. what if Wolverine fought Iron Man.. in Las Vegas!" "That's ounds like it could work.. always did before.. let's do it!" Whatever the reason, I find more fresh creative energy in 2000 AD stories from a quarter of a century ago than pretty much all of the recent stuff I've read in the mainstream , with a few exceptions. I hope your evil plan didn't aim to bring misery Jason, because I'm sure much happier with those reprints . Judge Dredd next I think.

I was puzzled to find the 2000 AD thread 9 pages into the archive, with the last comment almost 4 years ago. Buried is the right word :) Funny, I thought I would see a huge neon sign "2000 AD is awesome" somewhere closer to the top.

Ended up picking up Robo-Hunter "Day of the Droids" trade. Only a few pages in, the impressions so far : 1) the character and the premise seem familiar. What if Raymond Chandler wrote "Do androids dream of electric sheep?" . Not sure if that's good or bad. 2) I try to like Ian Gibson's art but honestly i'm not too keen on it. He draws the main character well enough, but his backgrounds are sketchy and his use of perspective pretty limited. The android language ("Ungrab me, I say") and humor mixed with broader themes make me want to keep reading. Thanks for all the pro/cons from you guys. Is there a 2000 AD thread out there? This got quite far away from Hellblazer, perhaps it needs its own space?

141 doesn't sound as much as I expected.. but considering how many 5 or 6 part stories Grant wrote during that run, which is close to NONE, we could assume that today 141 would be doubled to get the same amount of stories by a random writer on a high profile book. Thanks for the calculation Christian.

That Batman Abduction is some conspiracy theory spoof? That would explain the Bruce Lee encounter :) "You are not dead? It was the aliens? Kennedy too? Good god!"

Is Robo Hunter any good? I've been meaning to buy it, but can't find any reviews

Thanks for your link as well JasonT, i dig it big time. Very glad someone did such a thorough interview covering Grant's career, with insights into his life and way of thinking. What Alan Grant accomplished for the comics is simply unmeasurable, and opening the door to 2000 AD for Alan Moore and Grant Morrison is just a fraction of it.

I didn't follow Shadow Of The Bat closely enough to comment on the burnout, but out of the handful of issues i was able to get my hands on, there were some real haunting great little stories there. "The Tally Man" and "The Human Flea" were the crushing highlights for me, but also "The Nobody", "The Black Spider" - when he hit, it was a home run.. which after 13 years is quite astonishing. Most writers seem to be burnt-out after less than half that time on a single title. How many Batman issues did he write in total, does anyone know?

I read an interview with Alan Grant stating that he only participated in Knightfall and the following "events" because the editorial staff left him no choice. Alan went on to say some rough words about the editorial focus on making big, ridiculous crossovers and forcing them on the writers, rather than allowing the writers to decide on the stories. Grant was later fired from his Batman:Shadow of the Bat gig, without a real explanation. All of his pitches to DC were rejected since.

Here is the interview My link. Both Alan Grant and Norm Breyfogle talk about their time on Batman and and some interesting stuff. A really fun read.

Hello, are you sure your name is not Danzig? That's what i read.. Then again, i'm having my 3rd beer. Welcome!

I agree than Alan is being irrational about the issue, and maybe that is his purpose, he has been burned by DC and just shows them a middle finger. He must know Watchmen are fictional characters, and this kind of beast tends to come back again and again. It's not like DC is rewriting real history or compromising the meaning of the original Watchmen, which was based on a lot of older characters anyway. Moore said it himself that he wouldn't oppose sequels if DC handed him the rights when he asked for them. Now he just unleashes his terrible curse..

The Shadow looks like Timothy Dalton on this cover..

Hahahha. I actually can't wait to see him again and i really don't know why, since he is such an annoying character. I guess he is just a part of the Hellblazer family now..

Ahh, you know, just a joke.. i meant that the cover alone is worth the price for me, regardless of the content.. which i still enjoy, but even if it was shit, i would buy the issue anyway :) Sorry if i indicated something different.. my English grammar slips sometimes.

Yeahh.. this makes my eyes happy. Thanks!

Wow.. that is my impression after reading Secret Avengers #20. Ellis is back at his peak, after last couple of years slump and some of the less thrilling comic work in his career. The SA run so far qualifies as perfect comics in my book. The story here is Natasha R on a time travel adventure to save the team. Did Warren learn from Grant M or figure it out by himself, or just evolved as a writer, I don't know, but the 20 pages are so full of a dense story, humor, great character moments, ideas, emotion and great dialogue, that I am completly blown away. Such a great feeling from a comic. On top of that Mr Ellis has a way of bringing out the best in the artists and this time is no different. I usually can't stand Maleev's work, but here I reealy liked it. There is especially one sequence there that brings the artwork in this book from "great" to "special".

I wonder if Ellis is producing his very best work knowing he may not be doing comics in the near future, as he stated on his website he has none planned. Or perhaps he just became a better writer somewhere along the way. I guess we will find out soon.. Viva Waren Ellis!

Not sure how to post it, but check out the new Hellblazer cover on Biz's facebook.. # 290, i know i'm getting it even if it has Azarello's Bingo issue reprint inside.. could someone post it here? it's really nice

I haven't looked at most of the new books yet, but it's still early in the relaunch and it will be nice to read some of them after the opening arcs are wrapped up if the buzz is good. There was no way i could put the time and money into all of the first issues, but what i gather from the articles and comments i read, DC put out a huge variety of titles - pretty much any genre that was created over the last 70 years is represented. The New 52 is in a way "same old", with just surface level changes to most of the characters. One of the freshest comic books right now seems to be O.M.A.C, who was created by Jack Kirby in 1974. Now, Kirby was way ahead of his time, it's good that his creations are getting recognition.

How much of the New 52 is really new? Batwing? I'm not reading it, but adding a new member to the Bat-family doesn't really count for me. I'm probably missing a ton of new character, someone please help me out..

Now, i don't necessarily mind that there aren't a ton of new heroes as long as the stories are good. And some of them are. And some of them are quite bad, although i find them almost as interesting as the good ones. I love an idea of a bad comic, with cheese dialogue and cliche characters, but it only really works when it's not intended. So far The Green Arrow is a very strong candidate in this category. Also, The Dark Knight. Why not hire some writer who has new fresh ideas, even from outside of comics and do some spectacular batman Book, like Marvel did with Astonishing X-Men? I like the way Finch draws Batman, so i bought the #1, and it was bad. The Arkham inmates are breaking out (again!) and they are all on Bane steroids. sigh

It is good to see that DC put their big guns (Lee,Johns) on their flagship title Justice League. I'm not reading it but it's a commitment Lee didn't have to make, it shows mobilization top to bottom.

Just some random thoughts..

Last time i was really into the superhero comics was when i was about 12 years old, it was the mid 90's. Then the clone saga happened at Spider-Man, some other bullshit at Batman and i gave up comics until i found a trade of Sandman some years later. Right now i only follow the creators that i came to respect over the years, Morrison, Mignola, Ellis, Ennis, recently Remender etc., and i really don't care about any "big" superhero events unless they are written by one of the people who proved to deliver good stories. Secret Avengers with Ellis on it is not a revelation, but a solid action-adventure with a bit of humor and big pulpy sci-fi concepts. I haven't read any SA stories prior to Ellis', but found myself feeling like i was 12 again after having done so.. Each on is a separate episode, so you can enjoy them without knowing anything about what came before.

I had about 10 jobs over the last 10 years so.. :) I feel like you just have to try and be persistent in doing what you enjoy and one day it will pay off..hopefully. Batman would be a perfect Goth, but he chose to kick some criminal ass instead of being sad..

Cheers, Merry Christmas!

Seems like Ellis doesn't take comics in general seriously unless they have steampunk goggles in them. That said, have you read his recent Secret Avengers, #16-#19? Two more are on the way. Very fine little run, i would say his most "serious" mainstream work in a long time. They are a lot of fun, the craft and respect for the characters are there, the art is great, in my eyes his best work since Desolation Jones.

The first half of Batman Inc comes to an end with Leviathan Strikes, and like the case of Oroboro, the end is also a beginning. Now, you didn't expect Morrison to wrap things up here, did you? It feels a bit like the ending of RIP, which was a segue to Batman and Robin, which in the end turned out to be a great ending to a huge story Morrison was weaving.

Leviathan is about 56 pages of story, divided into two parts, the first one is drawn by Cameron Stewart and it is similar in tone with previous Inc issues, it focuses on one of the recruits, in this case Stephanie Brown. The second part is hard to describe, the story is simple, but there are many symbols and ideas planted here that its just to early to understand, although I'm pretty sure they will be tightly incorporated (no pun intended) and explained in the second half of the run. Now I need to re-read the Inc and Batman the Return to see if I find any clues.. Good story, but pure Morrison, really hard to understand or even completely enjoy halfway through it.

EDIT: Leviathan Strikes is quite puzzling at the moment, but it sure sheds some light on Batman The Return. I didn't really think much about it when it came out, now i read it again and it is much more interesting.. I'm getting a funny idea about who The Heretic might be under that mask, after what he says to Damian in The Return and in the light of who the main baddie is.

Holy crap, Tony Moore did a Ghost Rider arc? Sounds great, need to find it. He has a crossover in his Venom book soon and it will include Ghost Rider as well, that should be something.

I liked these Secret Avengers stories for their kinetic energy, remind me of the kind of thing Jack Kirby did. Fast paced, imaginative and with wit and humor that used to be Ellis' trademarks. I can easily overlook any continuity or the big story as long as the characters are well written and i am having a blast reading it every single time. I couldn't get through a Warren Ellis comic book without falling asleep for the past few years, he seemed to have lost his interest in comics in general. It's good to have him back, even briefly like that.

Warren Ellis delivers some of his most solid work in quite a while with Secret Avengers. Each one of the issues is a fun sci-fi adventure, self contained but with some elements that paint a larger canvas. He takes on a format of a lot of his Planetary run, each story is a genre piece, sci-fi adventure, sci-fi kung-fu adventure or whatever he puts together. Ellis writes an awesome Steve Rogers and his Beast must be a dream character for him to write with all the comic book "science fact" monologues. It is a funny book, but Warren treats the stories and characters with heart and respect. Art it top notch in each of the 3 issues i read.

 

Thorgal is awesome, though like all of Dufaux outputs (including XIII) it suffers from his lack of wanting to end series. XIII reaches its high point around number 8 or so, but is still continuing (it's at number 20 or so?). the art is amazing though, by the late great William Vance. If you do keep at it though, the 18th album is drawn by Jean "Moebius" Giraud, who is never not good.

I think you mean Jean Van Hamme? I agree, Thorgal should have ended around album 17, The Keeper Of The Keys i guess would be the English translation, after that it lost its greatness. Albums 1-17 are pretty much all awesome though.