Thursday 31 August 2017

serves you right for falling in love with a person

Jughead #1 (2015)
Chosen by Chantal. And picked up off the shelf from my shop. This is the first review for a book I hadn't read previously.

For a while I considered I may be asexual. 
It would have made a sense of some of the confusion in my life. Even now I can be uncomfortable with people touching, especially hugging, me. I've never had any proper relationships. 
But I found I liked sex. Even given how bad at it I am (and normally when I'm bad at something I cant be bothered trying to be better but at board games and sex I'll keep plugging away, so to speak, as they're fun). Still, even now, in the middle of being a beast with two backs I can find myself in a strange sort of existential fugue, sort of like when you say the same word over and over and it loses meaning. A heightened reality where all the sweaty, grunting just seems so silly and weird. 

I'm not asexual, but Jughead is a hero for our age.

Jughead's disinterest in canoodling is never exactly a punchline, it can be funny - but because he is funny not because asexuality inherently is. 
And the first issue of the Archie comics relaunched for a more canny all ages market Jughead book is very, very funny indeed.
Zdarsky and Henderson work brilliantly together (the second Henderson book I've reviewed for this blog - she's really one of the greats right now), the character work is impeccable and the jokes thick and fast. A Game of Thrones parody may be a little low bar (and odd considering the child readership aspect of Archie comics - though that speaks to Thrones domination of pop culture I guess) but the flights of fantasy that continue into the next issues with differing flavours (a time travel one, a James Bond one) are great bits of silliness and deepen Jughead's character without being too on the nose.
A whimsical delight.

Writer: Chip Zdarsky
Artist: Erica Henderson
Letterer: Jack Morelli

Wednesday 30 August 2017

It's not the bullet that has your name on it you have to worry about...

Queen & Country #1 (2001)
Chosen by me as it was from the period when I was really getting into comics and still seems like an exciting golden age to me as everything had the thrill of discovery.

Cover Art by Tim Sale
Just a beautiful 22 pages or so. Clean, smart, concise - it get's the job done (much like it's main character) with a minimum of fuss but is exudes of intelligence and confidence. 
Rucka throws in enough character details in in this first issue that stop it from being a boring exercise in sub-Tom Clancy spy-jargon but throws in enough verisimilitude that it distances itself from a lot of the James Bond knock-offs and walks it's own interesting path.
Rolston's art is bold and dynamic (and I can vaguely recall a bunch of criticisms over it's 'cartoony' nature at the time but now it seems just perfect, fresh and modern) selling the character acting as much as the action. 
Just really strong stuff and I miss this book being around (the last issue was about 10 years ago though a couple of novels came after that point I think).

Writer: Greg Rucka
Illustrator: Steve Rolston
Letterer: Sean Konot 

Tuesday 29 August 2017

Man, Kraven better not have messed up my courses too

The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #1 (2015)
Chosen by Chantal.


Welcome to my new review blog 'Is It Wednesday Yet?' where I will look at some comics in brief (if you've somehow stumbled onto this without having seen my filmaday reviews - they tend to be short, light on information snaps of how i felt about a movie rather than what it is about, and feature way too many parenthesis). I'm not sure if I will do this daily (very unlikely) but for those who don't know, American comics tend to come out on a wednesday, hence the title of this blog and not necessarily a release schedule. 
A friend had been asking me to do something like this for a while so the first comic reviewed is one she asked for.

Unbeatable Squirrel Girl is pure joy. And not that I would want every super-hero comic to be like this but by golly I wish more were.
It has a fun done in one (most modern American comics are multi part stories) plot with as much emphasis on character building as action. The gags fly fast (it squeezes more in by having little punchlines at the bottom of each page) and the art and colour just pop.
It is very much a part of the Marvel world with neat jokes about the Avengers and a fun villain, who gets defeated by both brawn and compassion, which is a smart trick and marks this take on Doreen green/Squirrel Girl as something special.

Writer: Ryan North
Artist: Erika Henderson
Colour Artist/Designer: Rico Renzi