3.29.06 Reviews

Queen & Country #29 (Oni Press): Well, that certainly took a long time! Ok, last time I'll take a cheap shot at the ridiculous publishing schedule of this title. For me, this was good. Enjoyed seeing Tara withdraw deeper inside herself. Enjoyed the Dr. evaluating her. Enjoyed Paul Crocker's understanding of what drives Tara and his gamble of a play with his superiors. Enjoyed the fact that we're getting some material that connects the dots between the novels. Like I said, for me, this was good. Because I've read both novels. But, this is risky, risky, risky business, Greg Rucka! What about people that read the comic but not the novels? What about people who stumbled across the novels but don't read the comic? There are major story gaps for these people! Now perhaps this isn't a very large group of people I'm talking about, but this seems like a dangerous marketing approach. Granted, the payoff could be enormous if we successfully cross the audiences over, but what if we don't? No guts, no glory I suppose. Then there's the timing to consider. Wouldn't this have ideally been published after the first novel, but before the second novel? Not that I'm a continuity hound, but dude, we already have mini-series spin offs that go back in time vis-a-vis the main title. And now we have arcs of the main title that go back in time vis-a-vis the novels. Samnee's art was good, but not great. His use of negative space, shadowing, and the illusion of detail that worked so well in Capote in Kansas seemed painfully lacking here. Was it the larger size format? Did those qualities fade away when we moved from digest size to regular comic size? Grade B.

New Avengers: Illuminati Special #1 (Marvel): I still really dig the high concept here. The idea of the Avengers, X-Men, FF, Inhumans, Dr. Strange, Namor, and Black Panther forming a secret cabal to determine the fate of the world is not only believable, but raises some interesting philosophical debates. They even worked the forming of the group into previously established continuity nicely. However, we didn't get much time to explore these ideas, did we? Feels like we barely scratched the surface and more of this interesting debate was sacrificed for an obligatory fight scene between Namor and Iron Man. Will there be more of these, Marvel? Is that why it's listed as a #1 and not a one-shot? Feels like Tony is really the primary instigator of all of this and the information he injects, along with his proposed solution is ultimately why it falls apart, loved his "let me tell you the future" monologue. Wonder what the personal backlash to him will be? See, what I'm saying? Feels like we just got rolling on this 0 to 60 dash and never left second gear. Too bad I don't care enough to buy a jillion crossover books to find out. Competent and moody pencils, with one confusing sequence involving Blackbolt. Grade B-.