Daredevil by Zdarsky and Checcetto: A complex run that mirrors a complex world

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By Toren Chenault — Violence is complicated. Audiences are fine with violence in movies like Transformers or Infinity War, and for readers of comics like Batman or Spider-Man, violence inflicted on villains feels necessary. Here comes a man called Bane, high on venom, or a man dressed as a goblin throwing exploding pumpkins from a glider. We see these villains, and we want heroes to pummel them. It quickly becomes good vs. evil, right vs. wrong, and then it’s on to the next issue, the next arc, the next story.

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Rereads: Mister Miracle by Tom King and Mitch Gerads

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By Keigen Rea — Welcome back to Rereads, a feature in which I’m rereading a comic once a month (at least) for various purposes, potential reasons including; not “getting it” with previous reads, not liking it at all the first time, experience and time providing a different perspective on the work, forgetting what happened, or any number of other reasons. The idea is to reread with purpose more than comfort, largely because a comfort read doesn’t interest me in the same way that a purposeful and critical read does, but I won’t be surprised if a comfort read sneaks in at some point in the future. Anyway, welcome!

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Gotham Central, Case by Case: SOFT TARGETS

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By Bruno Savill De Jong — While Half a Life is Gotham Central’s famous storyline that examines the weight of Gotham upon a single cop, Soft Targets is another popular plotline that examines a single case’s impact upon the whole city. Over Christmas, Gotham is gripped by a supervillain’s terrorist threat. Now, that might sound like a typical superhero set-up. Indeed, Tom King did exactly this in The War of Jokes and Riddle (Batman Vol. 3, #25-32) a few years ago. But while I like that storyline, Gotham Central, well, centralizes Gotham in a way mainstream Batman titles cannot

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CLASSIC COMIC OF THE WEEK: Promethee – Volume 1 Atlantis

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By d. emerson eddy — On 22 September 2019, all of the clocks stopped at 13:13 PM UTC. They restarted again exactly 3 hours later. This was the first time the world experienced these odd time problems collectively, but a number of other oddities occurred on the days surrounding the clocks stopping including the disappearance of the space shuttle, Atlantis, its reappearance two days later, along with the arrival of a number of other vessels that had been believed missing, sunk, or destroyed much earlier. Like the Titanic. This is the central setting for the science fiction thriller series that begins in Promethee – Volume 1: Atlantis by Christophe Bec, Sébastien Gérard, and Studio Charon, translated into English by Edward Gauvin.

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Truth Reborn: WONDER WOMAN REBIRTH

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By Taylor Pechter — “When a lie is confronted, there are three choices. Admission, and thus honesty. Perpetuation and thus feeble deceit. Or hostility, the child of fear.” Diana of Themyscira, postulating about her current situation. The examination of lies, and said confrontation of them, is brought forward during the first 25 (technically 26 with the Rebirth one-shot) issues of Wonder Woman’s 2016 ongoing series during DC Rebirth. Marking the return of legendary Wonder Woman scribe Greg Rucka — joined by the artistic talents of Liam Sharp, Nicola Scott, and Bilquis Evely, with colorists Laura Martin and Romulo Fajardo Jr., and letterer Jodi Wynne — this run is seen as one of the most unique, and most critically acclaimed of the early Rebirth era.

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Gotham Central, Case by Case: DAYDREAMS AND BELIEVERS

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By Bruno Savill De Jong — Following the long dramatic storyline of “Half a Life”, it seems the single-issue “Daydreams and Believers” will be a relaxing break. Brian Hurtt temporarily replaces Michael Lark with a softer and rounder art-style, and Lark himself gives an Alex Toth/John Romita Sr/Romance Comics tribute cover between Batman and Stacy, a fantasy which loosely frames the story. Stacy, the GCPD’s secretary, narrates “Daydreams and Believers” (a focused focalization rare to Gotham Central), which operates like a backdoor-introduction to the GCPD staff seen from her perspective.

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Black Hole and Beyond: Preparing for a Kickstarter

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By Toren Chenault — Since my last column about Black Hole Comics and Entertainment, we had a Lift Off segment come out and another short story as well. Both were great examples of how cool the people are that I get to work with. The world around us is still going through a plethora of changes, and we’re all just trying to adapt to them.

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CLASSIC COMIC OF THE WEEK: Fantastic Four #52

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By d. emerson eddy — This past Friday was the 103rd anniversary of Jack Kirby's birth. It should go without saying that he's one of the titans of the comics industry, responsible for creating or co-creating so many of our cherished comics characters and frameworks for the Big Two publishers like The Fantastic Four, The X-Men, The Avengers, Captain America, The Demon, The Fourth World, Kamandi, OMAC, and The Hulk. Even Kirby's less commercially successful efforts, like say The Sandman or The Eternals, show a seemingly limitless breadth and scope of imagination. He left a legacy that is practically unmatched and neither the Marvel nor the DC universes would be the same without him.

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The Sixth Gun #1 - CLASSIC COMIC OF THE WEEK

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By d. emerson eddy — As we travel further down that dusty western trail, we realize that it's becoming less and less a trail well-travelled, maybe not even a path now, and we're getting tangled up in a messy bramble growing out of what looks to be a swamp. The horses don't much like it, but you notice that one of them is now skeletal and the other appears to be speaking an indigenous language no one thought was extant. We've strained far from the westerns of old and are back in one of my favorite realms, the weird western. And to another modern masterpiece, The Sixth Gun from Cullen Bunn and Brian Hurtt.

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The Wicked + The Divine #16: Wic + Div Re-Read

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By Alex Batts — We’re back with another installment in The Wicked + The Divine Re-read Project! This week we reach Wicked + Divine #16, another entry focused on The Morrigan (yes!) and another issue I absolutely love. This issue also features another guest artist, Leila Del Duca, and guest colorist, Mat Lopes. With that, let’s get into the issue…

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Gotham Central, Case by Case: HALF A LIFE

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By Bruno Savill De Jong — During her morning jog, Renee Montoya is approached by a stranger. Moving from her familiar neighborhood where she lives into an isolated park, Renee is asked to identify herself. Identity and recognition are core concepts of Gotham Central, a series about what it means to ‘be a cop’ in Gotham, especially when your efforts are overshadowed by symbolically masked vigilantes. Detective Driver, our de facto protagonist for the preceding issues, is so desperate for the efforts of the GCPD to simply be ‘seen’. Now whether she likes it or not, Montoya is dragged into the spotlight, as Gotham Central strays from procedural casework into an interpersonal storyline, where Renee herself is at the centre of the investigation.

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Rereads: Phonogram - Rue Britannia

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Keigen Rea — Welcome to Rereads, where I’ll be rereading a comic and discussing my feelings about it, with an eye toward if those feelings have changed or stayed the same. Generally speaking, I’ll be choosing comics that I’ve disliked or didn’t understand well on the first read, unpacking why, and hopefully coming away with a different opinion. At worst, I’m hoping to better understand my feelings about the book, ideally discovering a new love for the story.

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Jonah Hex #33 - CLASSIC COMIC OF THE WEEK

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By d. emerson eddy — One of the best, if not the best, pure western comics this side of the classics was DC's second volume of Jonah Hex that ran from 2006 until 2011. It ran for 70 issues, as well as an original graphic novel, No Way Back. Penned by Justin Gray and Jimmy Palmiotti, with regular artists like Luke Ross, Jordi Bernet, and Phil Noto, and guest artists like JH Williams III, Fiona Staples, Eduardo Risso, and legends like Dick Giordano, Paul Gulacy, and Jonah Hex's co-creator Tony DeZuniga, the series was a pretty heavy-hitter for quality content right out of the box.

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SMALL PRESS PREVIEW: Holy West

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By Zack Quaintance — When you’re running your own Kickstarter (as I currently am!), you become acutely aware of how many excellent comics are being made through this indie-enabling crowdfunding platform. When I came across Holy West, I was so impressed that I immediately thought to myself — now this is what a Kickstarter comic should be. It really is that good and well put together.

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Comics Anatomy: THE FIX, when artwork does the heaviest lifting

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By Harry Kassen — Welcome back to another Comics Anatomy Charity Commission. I’ll be doing these through the Summer and then returning to the previous setup in the Fall. I want to thank Sean for his request for From Hell for last month’s article and I want to thank everyone who read and shared the article itself. I had a great time writing it and I’m proud of the work I did preparing for it.

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DC DIGRESSION: A publishing tradition in crisis

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By Zack Quaintance — I wasn’t going to write this column. Originally, I was going to write about how DC’s summer event — Dark Nights: Death Metal — was just fine, coming close to transcending self-seriousness to become a winking, grandiose celebration of big and goofy superhero books via this week’s Dark Night: Death Metal #3. But that was before news broke that DC Comics’ corporate owners were essentially laying off the entire leadership of the comics publishing division, save for Marie Javins and Jim Lee.

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Fatale #13 - CLASSIC COMIC OF THE WEEK

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By d. emerson eddy — I'm continuing my trip through some of my favorite westerns and western-tinged tales across the years in honor of the release of Pulp, this week spotlighting another book from Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips (with colors by Elizabeth Breitweiser), Fatale. This series is one of the ones that felt like Brubaker and Phillips were specifically writing it for me, delving into a world of Lovecraftian horror and crime noir that seemed note perfect, resulting in a tone that seemed right out of a Dennis Wheatley novel. Fatale #13 came smack dab in the middle of a loosely connected arc where we were witnessing the lives of a number of “femme fatales” across history, including our protagonist, Josephine's, early history.

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SMALL PRESS PREVIEW: Thompson Heller - Detective Interstellar

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By Zack Quaintance — Here at Comics Bookcase, we are unabashed super fans of artist Dave Chisholm. We really enjoyed his monthly series from Scout Comics, Canopus, and we were blown away by his forthcoming graphic novel, Chasin’ The Bird: Charlie Parker in California. Now, Chisholm has another monthly book due out this fall.

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SMALL PRESS PREVIEW: Skrawl - Comix Magazine

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By Zack Quaintance — As readers of the site are well-aware at this point (sorry!), this month I’ve been running my first Kickstarter campaign for a comic that I wrote, Next Door. As a result, I’ve been spending exponentially more time on Kickstarter, checking out other comics to back as well. And you know what? On that platform I’ve found some of the most exciting comics projects I’ve been made aware of all year, and chief among them is Skrawl: Comix Magazine.

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