What is DARK CRISIS? DC Comics is having another one, just this time dark
DC Comics has announced its big summer event for 2022, and we’ve got a preview plus also jokes statements…
Read MoreREVIEW: Sex Criminals #69...after the climax
The (excellently) renumbered Sex Criminals #69 provides an epilogue for 32-issues of singular and very personal comics storytelling…our review of the series finale.
Read MoreREVIEW: Lonely Receiver #3...better and darker
Lonely Receiver #3 is another dark and excellent turning point for the creator-owned artificial intelligence break-up book, one of the best original comics of the year.
Read MoreREVIEW: Ice Cream Man #16, this series somehow continues to get better
By Zack Quaintance — Look, I know I’ve heaped just a ton of praise on Ice Cream Man in the past two years or so that the book has been coming out. As such, I know some of you may be tired of hearing it or are simply tuning me out. Still. If just one new reader comes to this book because of something I write about it, I think continuing to praise this comic is worthwhile. It’s just that good, and, somehow, it also continues to get better.
Read MoreREVIEW: Rai #1 evokes the peak Valiant Universe of a few years back
By Zack Quaintance — Plain and simple, Rai #1 reminds me of a better time for Valiant. It reminds me of the 4001 AD event of a few years back, which came before the leadership change that resulted in the ouster of long-time Valiant creative leader Dinesh Shamdasani, which is a personnel change that in my opinion the publisher has never quite recovered from. But I digress. For the unfamiliar, 4001 AD ran during the summer of 2016, and it told the story of future Earth in which the mostly-privileged lived in the island nation of Japan, which is ruled by a benevolent AI called Father.
Read MoreREVIEW: Olympia #1 is a stunning debut comic for readers who love comics
By Zack Quaintance — Olympia #1 is a comic for people who loves comics, who love the medium, love the history, and love the grandeur of the characters, concepts, and ideas it has kept alive for so many years. The first of five, this introductory chapter follows a protagonist named Elon, who is a latchkey kid that finds company and escape in comics. His adventure starts when, to borrow a turn of phrase from the preview text, “his favorite superhero, Olympian, comes crashing off the page and into reality.”
Read MoreREVIEW: Heart Attack #1, a powerful debut that announces the arrival of a major new series
By Zack Quaintance — Phew, Heart Attack #1 was so good. So good, in fact, that I’m struggling a bit as to where to start heaping praise upon this book. I’ll start with where I was at with it before I read the comic. I knew this one was a must-read the moment I read that Eric Zawadzki was the artist.
Read MoreREVIEW: Black Stars Above #1, Canadian cosmic horror has never looked so good
By Nick Couture — Black Stars Above #1 sees writer Lonnie Nadler striking out on his own after frequent collaborations with Zac Thompson. Nadler — who is joined here by a team of Jenna Cha, Brad Simpson, and Hassan Ostmane-Elhaou — has created something that feels wholly “Nadler.” It’s a small personal story with striking art. Canadian cosmic horror has never looked so good.
Read MoreREVIEW: Fallen Angels #1 is the first misfire from the new Dawn of X
By Zack Quaintance — No. Oh no. No no no no no no no. Noooooooooo...is what I was thinking while reading Fallen Angels #1, the sixth and final title in this Dawn of X relaunch wave for the X-Men franchise. Admittedly, I’m being harsh here, but Fallen Angels suffers from proximity to five other excellent new X-Men comics, and the comparison exacerbates this comic’s flaws.
Read MoreREVIEW: Family Tree #1 speaks to many of Jeff Lemire’s long-time storytelling interests
By Zack Quaintance — Family Tree is the best type of genre-bending comic, in that it doesn’t feel like it’s setting out to be a genre-bending comic. And look, I know that sounds goofy, but I really couldn’t get to a better way of phrasing it. This is a comic that has family drama, body horror, and a foreshadowed apocalypse. There’s a lot going on within the 20-some pages of this debut issue, and yet it doesn’t feel at all like the creators felt obligated to include any of the places this story goes for marketability or shock value or standing out, or whatever other reason contrived narrative bits find end up in comics.
Read MoreREVIEW: Folklords #1 is a polished and fresh take on the fantasy genre
By Zack Quaintance — We try to review most notable new #1 comics, with a heavy heavy emphasis on creator-owned books. As such, this year it has felt like every other week, I’m sitting down at my computer and typing, OMG this is crazy but we have yet another stellar first issue for a truly scary new horror book! Wow wow wow...what are the odds! I’m hyperbolizing a bit, but it really has been a strong year for horror comics. Off the top of my head, I’m in love various degrees of love with The Plot, Resonant, Cult Classic: Creature Feature, Pandemic, Basketful of Heads, The Mall, Bad Reception, Something is Killing the Children, You Are Obsolete, Gideon Falls, Ice Cream Man and the list goes on.
Read MoreREVIEW: Going to the Chapel #3 is madcap, unpredictable, and very funny
By Zack Quaintance — There’s a reason that famous comedian/actor Patton Oswalt keeps Tweeting about Going to the Chapel. As I’ve written in past reviews, this is a well-done book that delves fearlessly into the absurd, exploring madcap relationship drama and doling out one-liners left and right. It’s also very very funny through out. And so it makes sense that Oswalt (who knows from funny) would be as into the book as I am.
Read MoreREVIEW: New Mutants #1 is a space romp brimming with cosmic adventure and one-liners
By Zack Quaintance — In some ways, New Mutants #1 might be the most surprising debut issue within the Dawn of X, which is the six-comic line-wide X-Men relaunch that’s now one book away from complete. Sure, some of the other comics have bigger plot twists (see X-Force) or wilder concepts (see Excalibur), but New Mutants is a rarer thing — it’s a comic that’s being co-written by Jonathan Hickman, that deals more in individual moments than it does high-concept sci-fi ideas.
Read MoreREVIEW: Wasted Space #11 is the funniest issue of an already-hilarious series
By Zack Quaintance — Maybe this compromises me as a reviewer of the arts, but I just love Wasted Space so much. I think I can say that, given this is the 11th issue of a longer story, which means we’re talking not just about this chapter but all that has come before as well. Anyway, as I’ve written in the past, Wasted Space is one of the best series in comics because of its tone. It’s established itself as a story with a great deal of range. It can have its characters lay down long monologues about philosophy, politics, and the nature of societal structures...right before segueing into a hilarious multi-panel joke about blue penises. It’s just an incredibly versatile space opera, built with much fun and excitement by writer Michael Moreci, artist Hayden Sherman, and the rest of the Wasted Space team.
Read MoreREVIEW: X-Force #1 is the dark heart of the Dawn of X
By Zack Quaintance — I knew when they got Benjamin Percy to write X-Force that this comic would be the dark heart of the new X-Books. Now that X-Force #1 has arrived, I’ve seen just how dark things in this series are about to get. See, Percy’s time in comics is maybe not an accurate reflection of his writerly interest, with the bulk of his work in the medium coming on the DC title, Green Arrow.
Read MoreREVIEW: Coffin Bound #4 is a visually-poetic abstraction of a finale
By Zack Quaintance — Since reading the first issue of Coffin Bound over the summer, one of the scenes in the book has really lingered in my mind. It depicts what is, essentially, a literal strip club, in which a dancer removes clothes...and then begins to remove skin. Eventually, the dancer in the scene is stripped down to the insides, raising a powerful visual metaphor about the nature of objectification.
Read MoreREVIEW: Heist or How to Steal a Planet #1 is an ambitious, high-wire act of a debut
By Zack Quaintance — As a reader — of novels, short stories, comics, anything — I apparently do not have an over-saturation point for well-told stories about the dangers of corporate greed. There is certainly no shortage of these stories in comics, be they near-future dystopian extensions of things we see in the real world every day, or giant science fiction projects that take familiar themes and extrapolate them deep into realms of fantasy. Heist or How to Steal a Planet #1 definitely falls into the latter category.
Read MoreREVIEW: No One Left to Fight #5, ‘bigger and bombastic-ier’
By Jarred A. Luján — No One Left to Fight #5 is out THIS WEEK! For those of you who have been following this book and were hoping for a big, bombastic ending to a comic that has had some of the biggest, bombastic issues year round, I have news! It is bigger and bombastic-ier than I imagined. I don’t think I’m allowed to curse in these (Ed. note: he is), so suffice to say: Holy cow. What an insane issue.
Read MoreREVIEW: The Plot #2 is more of the same high-quality storytelling from the debut
By Zack Quaintance — If you haven’t read my review of The Plot #1, allow me for a moment to summarize in brief: I thought it was one of the best creator-owned debut issues of the year (in a top-tier that now also includes Undiscovered Country). Basically, that first dropped readers into a full-formed world, which is impressive enough but the creator-owned ecosystem of late has gotten really good at that. What set The Plot #1 aside, was that it also seamlessly doled out the necessary bits of a complex family backstory/dynamic while establishing itself as a character-driven drama about two young, orphaned siblings.
Read MoreREVIEW: Wolvenheart #1, a polished adventure comic that sends monster hunters travelling through time
By Zack Quaintance — Wolvenheart #1 is a slick-looking comic that operates with the exact right amount of absurdity appropriate for a story about a time-travelling werewolf hunter. It’s an entertaining read, one that bounces through the ideas it needs to establish in order to pull off its world-building, doing so relatively efficiently. It’s also one of those comics that finds new narrative ground by combining past ideas, a bit like fusion cuisine at a restaurant or a mix by a DJ that specializes in mash-ups.
Read More