REVIEW: Ice Cream Man #10, one step back and two steps toward that other dimension

View fullsize

Ice Cream Man #10 is out 2/27/2019.

By Zack Quaintance — There was bound to be a bit of a slowing down after the revelations of Ice Cream Man #9, a comic that (cliche alert!) took everything you thought you knew about this series and flipped it on its head. Ice Cream Man #10 had the difficult task ahead of it of returning the audience back ever so slightly to the core concept of this series, while still building on the mind-bending preceding chapter.

For those who may have missed it, Ice Cream Man #9 put the titular white-clad ice cream man in the foreground along with the black clad hero figure who’s been chasing him (and who he murdered in Ice Cream Man #8, but that’s a whole other thing…), and it put them front and center in what is presumably a different planet...or a different dimension...or our same planet during a mythological time of gods when fate was still undecided...or all three? As you can see, the whole thing was very Stephen King’s Dark Tower.

The effect it had on the audience was all very impressive, reorienting our understanding of the connective tissue between the preceding eight issues. Ice Cream Man #10 doles out, hmm, let’s say a half scoop of more context around that, while instead returning to the horror-tinged vignettes that have run throughout this series. This was a great choice, reminding us that while, yes there is some sort of potentially cosmic epic of gods and spirits raging behind the mundane everyday facade of the world, possibly spilling over at times to inflict great pain and suffering upon the normals (normals like us), the real important stuff here has been that everyday facade all along.

Now, I won’t front like I have any idea whatsoever what may or may not happen in the final three issues of this series. C’mon—I know my limits, but I think making it just as much about the individuals we’ve seen brutalized, tormented, and in rare instances left to grow old and happy as it is about whoever these elemental forces are? Well, I think that’s a very good flavor, indeed (jesus, sorry about that, it’s late and I clearly should have written this earlier…).

In more practical matters, it should perhaps be noted that the vast majority of this issue was written in Spanish. I can read Spanish myself at maybe a third grade level, somewhere in that vicinity, and I didn’t struggle with comprehension at any point, not even for a moment. If you have even a cursory handle on the language, you’ll glide seamlessly through it. Even if you don’t, though, you’ll be just fine. If you really need to know every last word, Google Translate has gotten amazingly proficient lately (seriously, it’s one of the best inventions of our modern era and like nobody talks about it...we can instantly translate like anything!). This entire issue is set on the border, and writer W. Maxwell Prince approaches it with the attention to immersive detail that has powered this entire series.

The venue shift really works well for this story and this comic, given that to date everything took place in an idyllic (on the surface, anyway) suburb. Essentially, it fits with the expanded scope of the story as established by last issue. If this is going to be a tale of deep and massive forces, it needs to effect all of space and time, and that’s what we start to get in Ice Cream Man #10. Meanwhile, Martin Morazzo’s artwork continues to impress with colors by Chris O’Halloran, and as usual, the letterer, in this case Good Old Neon (yes, you read that right), is the unsung hero of the creative team.

Overall: One step back and two steps in some potentially cosmic direction nobody saw coming, Ice Cream Man #10 nudges the series back toward its core concept—horror vignettes—while still pushing forward the overarching narrative. This is one of the best comics today, and we should all be grateful for it. 9.4/10

Ice Cream Man #10
Writer: W. Maxwell Prince
Artist: Martin Morazzo
Colorist: Chris O’Halloran
Letterer: Good Old Neon
Publisher: Image Comics
Price: $3.99

For more comic book reviews, check out our review archives.

Zack Quaintance is a tech reporter by day and freelance writer by night/weekend. He Tweets compulsively about storytelling and comics as BatmansBookcase.

REVIEW: Ice Cream Man #9 changes everything you knew about this book

View fullsize

Ice Cream Man #9 is out 1/30/2019.

By Zack Quaintance — Whoa. This issue was nuts, in the best way, and I’m going to do my best to not tip into spoiler territory here. However, I make no promises. So, if you really want to avoid any and all chance of spoilers, I encourage you to skip to the Overall section of this review down at the bottom for a spoiler-free word about whether you should buy this comic. If you have read Ice Cream Man #9, well friend, strap in, because this is about to get wild.

Ice Cream Man #9 up-ended my perception about the scope of this comic. It also sent me back through all eight of previous issues looking for clues. And you know what I found? Tons of them, along with a new sense of what this book is accomplishing. As I wrote in my review of Ice Cream Man #8, I thought this series was a commentary on instant gratification of the soul, on giving into easy feelings of fear and anxiety versus doing the difficult self work it takes to be optimistic, contented, happy. And it is that, to extent, but it’s also quite a bit more.

Ice Cream Man is a book telling an overarching story despite on its surface largely appearing to be an anthology series, albeit one with light connective tissue. The spider from the first issue here, a cop we vaguely know there, plus the titular Ice Cream Man and his weird enemy cowboy guy. A closer look, however, reveals that all along there has been a battle raging between two ancient polemic forces, one of malicious chaos and another that just wants folks to know we’re all friends, all connected, all just trying to live our peaceful lives.

To tell that story, writer W. Maxwell Prince, artist Martin Morazzo, colorist Chris O’Halloran, and letterer Good Old Neon have tapped almost every unique quality inherent to the monthly comics medium, ranging from the slow nature of the release schedule (used to draw the focus to the vignettes, rather than the forces in the background) to juke readers on the format of the narrative to the lettering, which is shaded white in boxes for the evil monologues and black fro the good. This comic has been a true work of patient serialized art, and now in Ice Cream Man #9, the creators are pulling what this book is really about from the background to center stage. And, to be crass, this sh** is f***ing epic.

I read this issue twice. The first time intrigued but bewildered. Then I went back and browsed previous issues for every appearance of the Ice Cream man, and I read it again. That time, I was absolutely blown away at what the creative team is doing. With that in mind, it is perhaps fitting and intentional that in Ice Cream Man #9 the old man character in this story tells the black-clad cowboy Caleb, End, beginning. It’s all the same, because Ice Cream Man is a comic built with no distinct start or end point. It’s a fluid story that demands repeat readings to really grasp its nature. At least the first eight issues play that way.

This issue pushed me to look back and also forward, seeding questions with every new reveal as if it were the work of David Lynch, who is a pretty clear influence on this whole deal, what with the idea that below the idyllic surface of life is bugs, as well as the counterpoint—we’re all the same and connected—which is rooted in Lynch’s beloved transcendental meditation and its universal field. But I digress and I’m getting long-winded here anyway, so let’s wrap things up...

Overall: The end of the beginning of the beginning of the end. An absolutely mind-wrecking read that suggests a more grandiose story than initially promised. Get past issues of Ice Cream Man nearby, because the creators have built something complex and subtle that will re-wire your perception of this series. 9.8/10

Ice Cream Man #9
Writer: W. Maxwell Prince
Artist: Martin Morazzo
Colorist: Chris O’Halloran
Letterer: Good Old Neon
Publisher: Image Comics
Price: $3.99

For more comic book reviews, check out our review archives.

Zack Quaintance is a tech reporter by day and freelance writer by night/weekend. He Tweets compulsively about storytelling and comics as BatmansBookcase.

Top Comics of 2018, #6 - #15

By Zack Quaintance —  The most difficult thing about a strong year for comics (like this one) is doing a year-end Best Of list. Now, to be sure, no one mandates websites do rankings. That would be a clear violation of civil liberties. There is, however, a part of the pop culture blogger brain that goes wild for it, whispering all year long...where does this one rank...and if you don’t satisfy that beast—well, bad things happen.

So, here we our with ours, freshly formulated for 2018 by our committee of one. Before we dive into part 2, which features in descending order selections #15 to #6 (Top Comics of 2018, #16 - #25 is up now, with the Top 5 due later today), let’s rehash our ground rules:

• No trades or OGNs: Building out our OGN coverage is a priority for 2019. We’re just not there yet. So, while I absolutely loved work like Tillie Walden’s On a Sunbeam, Box Brown’s Is This Guy For Real? The Unbelievable Andy Kaufman, and Ryan Lindsay and Eric Zawadzki’s Eternal, you won’t find them here. Ideally, next year’s we’ll have an entire post dedicated to OGNs.

• No webcomics, manga, or newspaper strips: Again, our site is a bit deficient covering these (if you are into these things, we’d love to chat about you writing for us!). I should, of course, mention that in 2018 someone under the pen name Olivia James took over the long-running Nancy strip and did amazing things with it (Sluggo is lit), but, again, you won’t find it on our list.

• Longevity matters: New this year, you will find what I consider a key stat—how many issues were published this year. Late debut series like Die, Electric Warriors, and Bitter Root have tons of promise. They just haven’t been around enough to be a definitive comic of 2018. Ditto for comics that ended in April or earlier.

There you have it: guiding principles of our Top Comics of 2018. Now, without further adieu, let’s keep this bad hombre going!

View fullsize

15. Seeds
Writer: Ann Nocenti
Artist, Letterer: David Aja
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Issues in 2018: 2

The second issue of this series absolutely blew my mind. So much so it was enough to land this comic in our list, and at no. 15 too! I’m going to struggle to articulate why this is not only one of the best comics out today, but also the comic with the most potential to be an all-time great series. But here goes…

Writer Ann Nocenti and artist David Aja have clearly thought hard about the state of the world, dwelling on current trends, struggles, challenges, \and even a few victories to extrapolate a future the likes of which we’ve never seen. There are (as noted in yesterday’s list) many near-future disaster stories running through comics. Many of them do admirable jobs extending a fear or concern to logical places. Seeds encompasses much more with its predictions, in a way that feels impossibly novel yet so obvious you wonder why its ideas hadn’t previously occurred to you. If you start listing story elements—failing planet, media corruption, alien love story/menace—they sound a little rote, but the way these talented creators bring them together is nothing short of remarkable. Now, if only they could get a handle on the delays...  

View fullsize

14. Doomsday Clock
Writer: Geoff Johns
Artist: Gary Frank
Colorist: Brad Anderson
Letterer: Rob Leigh
Publisher: DC Comics
Issues in 2018: 6

Speaking of delays (hey! would you look at that transition), next we have Doomsday Clock. Writer Geoff Johns and artist Gary Frank were as good as their word this year, mostly sticking to the every-other-month schedule they promised following Doomsday Clock #3. We got six new issues in 2018, and the last three were straight up killer comics. This series has, to be blunt, massive ambitions.

Indeed, the intentions of this comic are starting to crystalize, and if Johns and Frank can pull this off, they could end up with a story that speaks to the current rise of authoritarian governments across the globe, the reactions of the media and the populous, and what it means to be a public hero today, to take a strong position. It’s heady stuff, with potential to shape DC’s line and maybe even the stories the aging company does for the next decade.

View fullsize

13. Ice Cream Man
Writer: W. Maxwell Prince
Artist: Martin Morazzo
Colorist: Chris O’Halloran
Letterer: Good Old Neon
Publisher: Image Comics
Issues in 2018: 8

As I’ve noted throughout, ranking the many many many excellent comics this year has been no easy feat. There were a ton of tough choices, but as my friend Rob from Panel Patter noted, at a certain point you have to choose, otherwise there’s no purpose to the endeavor. For me, placing Ice Cream Man was the most difficult decision. An anthology horror comic linked only by the titular (and hella creepy) ice cream man, this book has been a tour de force.

The reason it lands at #13 is twofold. No. 1, 13 is creepy and it seemed fitting, because aside from one other selection (we’ll get into that later), this is the highest-ranking horror comic on our list. No. 2, I’m trying to rank series for holistic reading experience. Ice Cream Man being made of vignettes makes that trickier. This book is easily one of the best comics of 2018, and we’ll heap more praise on it in future posts, specifically the Best Single Issues of 2018, coming later this week. For now, I’ll just note everyone should read this comic, just pick up random issues (they’re all self-contained) and go. The rate of success is high enough I’m confident you’ll all find flavors (sorry) you like.

View fullsize

12. The Wild Storm
Writer: Warren Ellis
Artist: Jon Davis-Hunt
Colorist: Steve Buccellato
Letterer: Simon Bowland
Publisher: DC Comics
Issues in 2018: 8

It’s pretty amazing this far into a celebrated career, Warren Elllis is doing his best work, writing a slow-burning epic that strips down characters he’s handled for years before building them back into something searingly-relevant for 2018. This new The Wild Storm has a few familiar names, while remaining entirely accessible for first-time readers of this universe. And what Ellis is doing here is exploring the vast influence wielded by long-standing (and hard to comprehend) power structures.

He’s joined by Jon Davis-Hunt, one of (if not the) most underrated artists in comics. Davis-Hunt comes fresh from career work of his own on Gail Simone’s Clean Room, and as good as he was there, he’s hitting a new level, crafting graphic sequential storytelling both kinetic and real, capable of disrupting any visual laws of reality yet photorealistic and engrossing. As intellectual and nuanced a comic as we’ve seen, this is a must-read story.

View fullsize

11. The Mighty Thor / Thor
Writer: Jason Aaron
Artists: Russell Dauterman, Mike del Mundo, Christian Ward, Jen Bartel, Various
Colorists: Matthew Wilson, Marco D’Alfonso
Letterer: VC’s Joe Sabino
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Issues in 2018: 4 / 12

Jason Aaron’s ongoing run on Thor is the best long-form story happening in superhero comics, and it’s really not even close. Aaron and Esad Ribic’s Thor: God of Thunder #1, which essentially marked the start of this current run, hit stands in November 2012, a vastly different time in the world and industry. Marvel has no other run close, with Hickman and Bendis gone from the company and Dan Slott off Amazing Spider-Man. Invincible has also ended, and DC’s main challengers—Batman and Deathstroke, for my money—date back to summer 2016, which is hardly a challenge at all.

Thor, however, keeps going strong, landing this year’s 16 issues (and a Jane Foster one-shot) at #11 overall on our list. Our committee of one suspects it will be higher next year, what with the War of the Realms coming. The Jane Foster finale was certainly a high point his year, but it felt like more of a pause than a proper finish, setting the table for what is sure to be some damn fine comics to come. In summation, 2018 was another great year for Aaron’s Thor run, but we all but guarantee 2019 will be even better, possibly the high water mark for this story.

View fullsize

10. X-Men Red
Writer: Tom Taylor
Artists: Mahmud Asrar, Carmen Carnero, Roge Antonio
Colorists: Ive Svorcina, Rain Beredo
Letterer: VC’s Cory Petit
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Issues in 2018: 11

What a surprise this comic was. I’d tapped out on X-Men: Blue and X-Men: Gold, deciding to wait for whatever next big X-thing. Then comes an announcement of a third color, part of the Marvel Legacy line, which, let’s face it, was dead on arrival. But here’s the thing: Tom Taylor and Mahmud Asrar’s X-Men: Red was good. Like, really really really good. Taylor’s scripting understood the franchise better than any writer I’ve read in I don’t know how long, casting the team as equal parts superhero high-flyers and common defenders of the oppressed, all with a geopolitical angle.

It made Jean Gray the face of Xavier’s continuing dream, a brilliant move given her legacy (ahem) and similar skill set, and it faced the X-Men against threats essentially derived from the messages of hate coursing through the modern media landscape, be it reportage or social posting. It was a brilliant stretch of 11 issues that ended way too soon, and, in my opinion, it was the first real hint how the X-Men can be made relevant for 2018, 2019, etc., taking them out of their long-standing continuity mire. It will be missed, and I hope this new generation of X-writers draw from its example.

View fullsize

9. Vault Comics: Fearscape / Friendo / These Savage Shores
Writers: Ryan O’Sullivan / Alex Paknadel / Ram V.
Artists: Andrea Mutti / Martin Simmonds / Sumit Kumar
Colorists: Vladimir Popov / Dee Cunnife / Vittorio Astone
Letterers: Andworld Design / Taylor Esposito / Aditya Bidikar
Publisher: Vault Comics
Issues in 2018: 3 / 3 / 2

Okay, so this one is cheating, but of the three new Vault Comics launched by British writers with clear literary roots in the fall, I couldn’t pick any one to elevate above the others. They’re all incredible, and so I built myself a loophole (it’s my website, afterall), and included all three on the list. I heard Vault editor Adrian Wassel on a podcast earlier this year, saying comics could swing to a literary place that incorporates both recent cinematic storytelling trends and their unique ability to synthesize words and pictures. All three of these titles reflect that viewpoint.

You can read more thoughts about each on our Reviews Page, but let me run through them quickly. Fearscape is a look at pretense, literary culture, and how the nature of creative writing often sees authors bouncing violently between bouts of outsized ego and crippling insecurity. The voice is pretentious and incredible. Friendo is a meditation on the decline of late-model capitalist countries, specifically the United States, casting apathy, ceiling-less corporate greed, and the marginalization of government checks as truly terrifying villains. These Savage Shores is a gorgeous and deep commentary on imperialism, using misdirection to to create an engaging and tone-heavy narrative. Basically, all three of these are well worth your time, and I highly recommend them all.

View fullsize

8. Exit Stage Left: The Snagglepuss Chronicles
Writer: Mark Russell
Artist: Mike Feehan
Inker: Sean Parsons
Colorist: Paul Mounts
Letterer: Dave Sharpe
Publisher: DC Comics
Issues in 2018: 6

Speaking of literary comics, Mark Russell and Mike Feehan’s Exit Stage Left: The Snagglepuss Chronicles (improbably) falls in that bin as well. Last year we highlighted Russell’s work on Flintstones. Another year and another smart take on a Hanna-Barbera property, and here we are again. In Russell’s re-imagining of this mythos, Snagglepuss is a basically closeted playwright during McCarthy-ism, trying to stay true to his values without running afoul of the federal government and staid societal interests.

Russell uses this premise to tell a sophisticated story that dances with ideas about life, art, politics, group think, and conservatism. The emotional core to this thing is the Huckleberry Hound character, whose tragic story beats brought tears to my eyes a couple of times. If reading a comic about Snagglepuss doesn’t sound appealing, don’t worry—you’re not alone in that thinking. But Russell also uses the legacy of the character to do work toward the satirical points he’s making, to help drive them home.  

View fullsize

7. Wasted Space
Writer: Michael Moreci
Artist: Hayden Sherman
Colorist: Jason Wordie
Letterer: Jim Campbell
Publisher: Vault Comics
Issues in 2018: 6 (counting the holiday special)

Phew, now we’re getting into the comics that I can’t imagine my 2018 without, the first being Michael Moreci and Hayden Sherman’s Wasted Space. I have heaped my fair share of praise on this book over the past 12 months, and I’m not alone. In fact, Nerdist has called it “easily the best new series to hit comic shops so far this year.” For my money, it’s without question the best wholly new property of 2018, and I’m going to quote myself to elaborate on why...

Wasted Space to me feels like Star Wars by way of 2018, determined to honor the hi-jinx & high adventure of space opera while fearlessly exploring the central conflict of our times: where should one’s desire for comfort end and their obligation to combat oppression begin? I’ve compared Moreci’s absurdist, idea-heavy writing to the late David Foster Wallace and I stand by that, noting that Sherman’s chaotic high-energy art style brings the world to life in a special way. This is maybe the highest compliment I can give: in a day and age where i buy fewer paper comics than ever before, I still have a pull list and on it near the top is Wasted Space.

View fullsize

6. Thanos Wins
Writer: Donny Cates
Artist: Geoff Shaw
Colorist: Antonio Fabela
Letterer: VC’s Clayton Cowles
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Issues in 2018: 6

Toward the end of 2017, Brian Michael Bendis left Marvel, dealing the publisher as significant of a writing void as I’ve seen in the past two decades, dating back to before Bendis established himself as the company’s prime writing voice. The thing about voids like that is they force publishers to take bigger risks and bring in younger, newer talent. For Marvel in 2018, that meant Donny Cates (among others).

One of Cates’ first charges at Marvel was to takeover Thanos in the wake of another essentially departing writer, Jeff Lemire, who seemed from the outside to be off to focus on the superhero universe he owned and created, Black Hammer. What Cates and past collaborator Geoff Shaw did with the final six issues of this run was absolutely remarkable, telling what is not only the best Thanos story of all-time, but the best end of the Marvel Universe tail this side of Jonathan Hickman. It’s called Thanos Wins, and it’s exactly what it sounds like.

Thanos Wins is as bold a statement as a young writer doing his first work at Marvel could have made. Aided by the out-of-this-world Geoff Shaw artwork and Antonio Fabela colors, Cates seemed to put all of comics on notice here, not being content to just decimate the very futures of these decades-old beloved characters, but insisting on doing so with wild grin viscerally affixed to his face. You might wonder, how do I know he was laughing and smiling as he wrote all of this. I think the better question, is how could anyone who’s read Thanos Wins doubt it?  

Read our analysis of Thanos Wins here!

Check back later today for our Best Comics of 2018, #1 - #5! Check out Best Comics of 2018, #16 - #25! And check back later in the week for more year-end lists, including our Best Single Issues and our Top Creators of 2018!

For the history-minded readers, you can find our Top Comics of 2017, Part 1, 2 and 3 online now!

Zack Quaintance is a tech reporter by day and freelance writer by night/weekend. He Tweets compulsively about storytelling and comics as BatmansBookcase.

REVIEW: Ice Cream Man #8 Hints at the Point: Happy Lives Aren’t Easy

View fullsize

Ice Cream Man #8 is out 10/31.

By Zack Quaintance — I was a late-comer to Ice Cream Man. I had a few reasons for hesitating, among them: there are tons of comics these days, the word-of-mouth for the first issue was mixed, and I was unfamiliar with the creators. I, however, absolutely loved the first volume, and Ice Cream Man #6 is now one of my favorite single issues this year.

Even so, I wouldn’t say I’ve figured out what this comic is about. Not entirely. It’s essentially a horror anthology, one in which we haven’t seen the same character twice, other than the titular creepy ice cream man, whose role in stories varies, both in terms of why he’s there and how much we see him. Ice Cream Man #6, which I loved so well, strongly hinted this was a book about nihilism, but, even then, that felt a bit reductive to me. I don’t find nihilism interesting, at least not as the driving force of a story, and yet this book had captured and kept my interest. More than that, it had me recommending it regularly to friends, the highest endorsement.

In Ice Cream Man #8, we finally have some strong clues as to what this book aspires to be about. This is a comic that strives to convey the power of perspective, operating as it does from a starting point that presumes a bleak world before arguing that the central conflict of human life is to overcome bleakness to obtain joy and beauty, regardless of how difficult doing so may be. Just look at this issue.

Like the other installments in this series, the art is fantastic, drawn by Martin Morazzo in a style evocative of greats like Frank Quitely, Geof Darrow, other masters of wavy detail. Morazzo’s work on Ice Cream Man has real range and this issue is no exception. He expertly renders the story’s central characters—paramedics abusing medication and undergoing a hallucinatory crisis—as they careen through a sleepy suburban town erupting in barely-noticed chaos, with homes on fire, people covered in worms, and a clown with a gunshot to his temple. As this story progresses, so does the chaos, culminating in anthropomorphic insect designs in a well-lit diner. It’s stunning stuff.

W. Maxwell Prince, meanwhile, compliments these visuals well with dialogue and narration. Talk between the paramedics is conversational, funny and authentic, yet steeped in existential panic and questions about what it’s all about (both life and this comic), as well as about human nature. The narration, however, is the real star, well-written, powerful, concise, featuring prickly lines like: We’ll all connected—through death, through suffering. Through our fleeting, ephemeral moments of joy; as well as a guiding motif about dark voices (which I read as thoughts, be they fear, anger, or mundanity). The key bit of writing, the one I believe speaks to Prince and Morazzo’s goals for this book, comes at the end, when the gruesome facade relents for a moment and the narrator tells us: The real song’s hard to hear—because good things take work.

“Ice Cream Man #8
Writer: W. Maxwell Prince
Artist: Martin Morazzo
Colorist: Chris O’Halloran
Letterer: Good Old Neon
Publisher: Image Comics
Price: $3.99”

This would, perhaps, be an obvious point to make in a first issue, but after eight chapters of violence, body horror, despair, and dark Twilight Zone-esque concepts, it rings true and cathartic. This isn’t a book that believes we’re doomed. No. This comic is built on the idea that a well-lived life requires effort, hard work, and deliberate hope. I’m still learning like anyone, but these are ideas I find inspiring.

Overall: Another excellent chapter in this anthology horror story, one that goes deeper into the abstruse philosophies hinted at by prior issues. Simply put, few books on the stands today match the craftsmanship and dogma in a single issue of Ice Cream Man. 9.5/10

For more comic book reviews, check out our review archives.

Zack Quaintance is a tech reporter by day and freelance writer by night/weekend. He Tweets compulsively about storytelling and comics as BatmansBookcase. He also writes comics and is currently working hard to complete one.