DAVID: Man, this is the smallest week ever.
CHRIS: Agreed, New Comics Day Ain’t Gonna Hurt Nobody‘s wallet, although there are a lot of interesting products coming from without the Big Two for people who have a big Labor Day bonus burning a hole in their pocket.
52 Aftermath: The Four Horsemen #1 (of 6)
Keith Giffen & Pat Olliffe
DAVID: This is a particularly interesting project because Giffen is such a luminary amongst the comics world — or at least, was — that it’s kind of surprising he’s rolling with an epilogue miniseries to the weekly event of the, well, decade. However, considering his role in the plot’s original production and his relationship with the four maestros who masterminded the event, it makes perfect sense as a method for following up on some loose ends and also allowing the talented Mr. Giffen some space to write an awesome DC Universe miniseries. Given last year’s Annihilation I don’t think he’s lost his edge.
CHRIS: Big fan of Giffen’s, and while I was initially skeptical about this project — why focus on some boring-ass AVATARS OF DOOM when you’ve got the far more interesting Oolong Island Crew lurking in the background? — Giffen’s Newsarama interview has convinced me that this might actually be an interesting book. Cautiously optimistic.
Batman Annual #26: Head of the Demon
Peter Milligan & David Lopez
CHRIS: This is apparently the “definitive” NEW EARF origin of Ra’s al Ghul, leading into this fall’s “Resurrection of Ra’s al Ghul” Bat-event. This has two strikes going against it from the outset: I don’t think anyone wants another big Bat-Event, and Peter Milligan’s got a pretty shaky history on big work-for-hire books (check out his runs on X-Men and Elektra if you don’t believe me; better yet, don’t). On the plus side, it’s a big Bat-Event masterminded by Grant Morrison, who managed to run a tight ship and make the behemoth DC One Million more coherently and enjoyably than it ever should have been, and it’s a Bat-Event written by Morrison, Milligan and Fabian Nicieza, who can all write a good superhero story. Plus, it’s written by Peter Milligan, who missteps aside, also wrote X-Statix, Human Target, Enigma, Shade the Changing Man, and even a series of pretty enjoyable Batman stories for DC back in the early 1990s. If there was any way to make this sort of thing work, DC has put together the proper scenario for this occurrence.
Teen Titans #50
A Whole Bunch Of Dudes Including Sean McKeever & Randy Green
DAVID: This is an interesting issue because although the main creative team is Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane alumnus Sean McKeever, the major plotline will deal with 2004’s Titans Tomorrow story by Johns & McKone and probably involve the standard DCU continuity fanwank. This issue is supposed to be a gravestone for Bart Allen, recently killed off in Flash: TFMA #13 and now Official Martyr of the DC Universe(TM). Given the guest teams — Johns & McKone, Wolfman & Perez (who are these dorks?) and Dezago/Nauck, it’ll hopefully be a celebration of his life and a solid launch into a good TT run.
Fantastic Four #549
Dwayne McDuffie & Paul Pelletier
DAVID: Dwayne and Paul still have a few more issues after that before those two guys with funny accents (Mark Millar & Bryan Hitch) take over. And honestly,given considering the inarguable creative synergy of the latter talent pool, I’ll be sad to see McDuffie go. I loved his work on the brilliant JLU cartoon, and he really seemd to be hitting his FF stride just as it’s revealed he’s a placeholder for two unintelligible white dudes. But shit, it’ll probably be good comics, so bring it on — and I’m still very excited for McDuffie bringing me a JLA book that has some goddamn fisticuffs in it.
Punks the Summer Comics Special
Joshua Hale Fialkov & Kody Chamberlain
CHRIS: I know almost nothing about this comic, but someone sent me an unsolicited message about this comic, correctly pegging my love of funnybooks, The Young Ones and Abraham Lincoln. There’s a preview up on their website, and it looks like a lot of fun.
Mean
Stephen “Ribs” Weissman
CHRIS: This is a compilation of the early “Yikes” work of one Stephen Weissman, who has been cartooning the adventures of Pull Apart Boy, Lil Bloody, Kid Firechief, Sweet Chubby Cheeks and other characters for quite some time now. The “Yikes” series chronicles the adventures of a bunch of kids who happen to also be firechiefs, vampires, zombies, big wheel racecar drivers, and other things that generally come off as a charming sci-fi/David Lynch reinvention of Peanuts/Our Gang/etc. There are some sample strips up on the Fantagraphics site if you’re not familiar with his work. It’s fucking adorable.
Incredible Change-Bots
Jeffrey Brown
CHRIS: Jeffrey Brown is probably best known for his series of “girlfriend” books, autobiographical recaps of his various relationships. But he’s also done projects like Be a Man and Bighead that reveal a propensity for MAD-style zany parodies/comedy (and I mean that in a positive, olden days MAD, not [insert bad era of MAD here] style. This is obviously the Transformers pastiche. The preview looks kind of funny, hopefully the rest of the book runs with it.
Small-ass week. Hit da jump. (more…)
