Comics Worth Reading: FRAGGLE ROCK

A few days ago, I posted an old article I wrote back in 2004. I posted it in reaction to the news that DC Comics is canceling two of their all ages titles.

Those of you who know me, know I've spent much of my career working on all ages comics. (Shameless plug: coming soon -- The Oz/Wonderland Kids!!! Stay posted as I can give more details.)

So I was reminded yesterday while at the comic shop that there was a series on the shelf that I've been talking up with everyone I can talk it up to. (Did that sentence make sense? I need an editor . . .) And that series is Fraggle Rock, by Archaia Comics.

Fraggle Rock, Free Comic Book Day issue

Now, i had no idea that there was going to be a Fraggle Rock comic. Or maybe I did, but I heard about it so long ago that I completely forgot. But when I helped my local comic shop, BuyMeToys.com (also publisher of The Oz/Wonderland Chronicles and The Oz/Wonderland Kids), with their Free Comic Book Day event, The Archaia free comic caught my eye.

"Fraggles?" I said. "Really? Fraggles?" Guess what the first comic in my take home pile was. Guess what the only comic in my take home pile that I've actually read was.

Fraggle Rock #1

I've made no secret how much I admire Jim Henson. Dark Crystal and Muppets and Labyrinth and The Storyteller and Fraggle Rock. These things all helped shape me creatively. Not only that, puppets are a huge part of my life, between the work I do with children and some of the film work I'm looking at doing in the near future. When I was a child, my parents would travel to work at camps and Bible schools and stuff like that, and those puppets were passed down to me.

So, armed with the knowledge that Fraggle Rock is a comic book, but cautiously optimistic (it's EASY to write for a license, NOT easy to do it well) I flipped through the free comic. It looked AWESOME. I read it, and it read AWESOME. They got it.

And I got the next issue. Paid for that one. (And eventually, the other two issues as well.)

Fraggle Rock #2

The Fraggle Rock comic series is an anthology. I don't know how they selected the different artists and writers for the series (but I'm jealous of them), but each issue of the books has three or four different short stories, each one by a different team. There are a number of different styles, but amazingly each style is able to capture the character design without following a "house style".

These books are, simply put, gorgeous. I mentioned in some previous posts about how much I love to flip through concept art. These comic books are similar. I could stare at this artwork forever.

Essentially what you have here is an anthology on the level of Flight . . . except all the stories are about Fraggles.

Not one story looks "wrong", even though each story looks different.

Fraggle Rock #3

But on to the topic that made me post this in the first place: these books are TRULY "all ages". Like the TV series, these Fraggle stories are "for the young and young at heart" (to use an apropos cliche). They are fun. They are energetic. They are sweet. They are even a bit edgy. Just like the TV show.

A hardcover collection is coming out in September, I believe. You can order the Fraggle Rock Hardcover from Amazon for just $10. (That may just be a pre-order deal.) I believe that means that it would be in last month's Previews. I'm going to be ordering mine through my local comic shop (although that means paying more for it) (it also means I'm buying it twice, but I can live with supporting it like that). But for any fan of all ages fantasy and whimsy, this is a must have.

~ Ben

PS -- I understand Archaia is developing both Dark Crystal and Labyrinth comics. Very interested to see what they do with those . . .

Artwork (c) Archaia Comics

WAITING FOR THE TRADE: Some Cool One-Shots

Here's a review I've been wanting to write for a while now.

I'm not a big fan of big events, mainly because I don't have money to follow them. So, halfway through I find out that Blackest Night might be awesome . . . but I'm just going to have to hope my library gets the collected editions.

But I like the characters. I like Hulk . . . I'm just not going to buy the latest run of Hulk crossover event stuff. (Speaking of, I have the entire run of Planet Hulk and World War Hulk, including Amazing Fantasy #15 which debuted Amadeus Cho -- is that the kid's name? -- and the four issue storyarc that led to Hulk getting launched into space, I'm willing to part with it . . . cheap. Any takers?) I like Green Lantern and the Corps, I'm just not going to buy five titles a week to keep up with the storyline.

So, on the opposite end of the spectrum, we get One Shots. I like One Shots. A lot. They are single, self-contained stories (or a group of self-contained stories . . . or a group of stories that add up to a self-contained story . . . or, in some cases, a trick because they're really a prologue to a big event . . .).

Last month, Dark Horse put out a bunch of one shots -- two Star Wars ones, a Buffy one, a Conan one, Hellboy, Good, etc. -- and used the tagline "Suffering from crossover fatigue?" Nice! "One-shot wonders", they called them. I like it. A lot. I only bought one (although I plan to buy the second Star Wars one-shot), but I love the sentiment. And I'd love to see more stuff like this.

So here's some quickie reviews of some recent one shots and why you might like to buy them too:

Marvel Comics, Black Knight One Shot -- This was a fun superhero fantasy that feels like they might be rebooting the character a bit to start some sort of new series. It's an origin story, and really it's one of those stories that when you get to the end you realize it's really "the beginning", but from end to finish it's a fun romp with some fun twists and turns, that takes place in a medieval fantasy period. I like the character Black Knight, although I don't understand much of his backstory (because I don't know much of his backstory) so this was, as I said, a fun read. I have no idea how much was added to the backstory for this presentation, but reading it felt like much had been added to the mythos that may not have been there before, or at least much that had not been organized like this before. There's some interesting struggles with the concept of good and evil and how that battle works in our own life . . . and a cool sword! Written by Tom DeFalco, so you know it's going to be good (although, with limited space, you can see where he wished he were writing a four issue limited or something).

Marvel Comics, Hulk: Winter Guard -- This is exactly the kind of one-shot I like, although I think it should be retitled "Winter Guard: Hulk". It's really more about Winter Guard dealing with Hulk than Hulk dealing with Winder Guard . . . but who cares? It's a good story, it cleverly weaves a classic Hulk story into it, reprints said classic Hulk story as a flashback, and delivers a couple nice twists that let you look at the classic story slightly different and also make for a fun ride. David Gallaher always delivers exactly the kinds of stories I like to read and write, and consistently does so much better than I could ever do.

Dark Horse, Star Wars: Purge "Seconds to Die" -- This is a quick little story taking place between trilogies, as Darth Vader is tracking down some of the Jedi who may have fallen through the cracks when the Jedi were mass-murdered in Revenge of the Sith. The story follows her and her desperate plan in the aftermath. It's an interesting little story with a concise beginning, middle, and end, although it may resound more with fans of the original trilogy.

Like I said, I'd love to see more of these kinds of one shots. I can't buy all of them, but the ones that interest me are far more likely to make it into my "buy pile" than the big, grand crossover event type things. At $4 a pop, it's a good read, and a little longer than your usual comic book.

But don't wait for the collection!

~ Ben

WAITING FOR THE TRADE: Doomquest & Legacy of Doom

DOOMQUEST & IRON MAN: LEGACY OF DOOM

WRITERS: David Michilini, Bob Layton
ARTISTS: Bob Layton, John Romite, Jr. (Doomquest), Ron Lim (Iron Man: Legacy of Doom)
PUBLISHER: Marvel

I’d heard of the Doomquest issues of the Iron Man series a while ago, and I was interested in reading them, but never really looked for them. They were issues 149 and 150 and 249 and 250 of the Iron Man comic series.

What got my interest was seeing a paperback copy of the collected edition of “Iron Man: Legacy of Doom” mini-series on the new comics shelf at my local shop. I peeked at the back and saw that it was a sequel, of sorts, to those two Doomquest mini-story arcs. And that those two Doomquet story arcs were about King Arthur and time travel and . . . well, I was hooked.

A quick glance at the old comics shelf revealed a collected edition of Doomquest and the hardcover edition of Legacy of Doom. Cool. I just hoped it was worth it.

Long story short, they were. The first Doomquest story (issues 149 and 150, from 1981) has Iron Man and Dr. Doom thrust back in time, to the time of King Arthur and all his knights. Iron Man allies himself with Arthur, Doom with Morganna, and conflict ensues. It’s exciting seeing Iron Man and Dr. Doom’s technological armor amidst the knights of the round table and the crazy creatures of evil, and the story resolves itself nicely.

The second Doomquest story (issues 249 and 250, from 1988) pushes Iron Man and Doom into the future, where they must once more team up with Merlin to save the Camelot of the future, and the future king of Camelot -- Arthur. There’s some funny twists with Arthur and his legacy and upbringing. Now, Iron Man and Doom are outclassed when it comes to technology, and ultimately this is a fun comic book trip to the future and a nice counterpoint to the first Doomquest story.

Iron Man: Legacy of Doom, a four issue mini-series from 2008, reunites the creative team from those two Doomquest stories and takes up the themes (technology vs. magic) and tropes (time travel, although not as far flung into the future; along with the whole Arthurian thing) and wraps the story up neatly. (And like all good time travel stories, it wraps the story around as an element from the past that shows up in the future is preserved because of decisions in the present. Just read it, you’ll appreciate it.)

I liked these two volumes because it’s a good Iron Man story and a good Dr. Doom story, using these character archetypes in a way that you don’t need to know the convoluted backstories of the characters. If you’ve heard of the characters, you’ll get into the story. I also like the time travel themes that get used, and the technology vs. magic argument is explored in ways that aren’t just conflict, but philosophical concepts.

When the Iron Man movie came out, one problem I had was that there were no comic stories that were as good as the movie. These come close.

Check it out at your local comic shop (they should be able to order for you, and if you're not sure where your closest comic shop is, you can find out here: The Comic Shop Locator), OR you can buy Iron Man Doomquest here and Legacy of Doom here!

Visit the Waiting for the Trade bookstore here, where you can buy many of the comics I'm reviewing!

~ Ben

WAITING FOR THE TRADE: Star Trek Countdown

"Waiting for the Trade" is a term that was coined to describe people who, instead of buying monthly comics, waited for them to be put into collections. On my Myth Understanding blog, I have used the term to be the umbrella for my comic book reviews. My reviews aren't ALL about bound collections of comics -- some will be about comics I wish were collected, and some will be about comics I may not have waited for. For the most part, my reviews will be positive: the point here is to point people to works I enjoy, not point out things I disliked (unless I change my mind).

My first review:


STAR TREK: COUNTDOWN

Writers: Mike Johnson, Tim Jones (script); Roberto Orci & Alex Kurtzman (story)
Artist: David Messina
Publisher: IDW

This comic book series basically bridges the gap between the FAR future world of Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and Star Trek: Voyager and the NEAR (or nearer, anyway) future world of Star Trek, the new movie.

Spoilers abound in the following review . . . so if you haven’t seen the movie, you may want to skip reading this review. Maybe. So here’s the END of my review: I recommend this book if you are a fan of Trek or liked the movie and want to know more. Fans of Trek should read this before seeing the movie. People who aren’t fans should watch the movie first, and if they want more Star Trek this would be the first place to start.

Let the spoilers (for the movie, not the comic so much) begin.

First of all, the story of this comic was told in Spock’s mindmeld with Kirk on the ice planet. This comic fleshes that part out, though.

I knew the comic was coming out, but my local comic shop sold out of the first issue before I could get a copy because I didn’t know WHEN it was coming out. So I patiently decided to wait for the trade. A four issue mini-series, it tells the backstory of Nero, the villain from the film, and really gives more weight to his anger against Spock. Also, the scientific plot hole from the film is explained with some classic Trek-ish technobabble.

The story takes place after all the Next Generation movies have occurred. We get to see where some favorite Next Generation characters have ended up, and the whole story really serves two purposes: set up Spock and Nero’s backstory, while giving the Next Generation era a proper send off. Fans who believe the Star Trek timeline has been changed to much so that all the original stories never happened, you can be reassured when you see that last page.

The storyline is great, the art is cartoony while retaining enough detail to make the characters recognizable, and not just as caricatures. There were moments in the script that felt just a bit too . . . cute? A clever line, slightly out of place, inserted just for the sake of being clever -- that sort of thing.

But overall, as a Star Trek fan I found this to be a fun comic.

It was also interesting, because it gave insight into the backstory material that the writers of the movie intended for their characters. I like seeing the artistic intentions of creators, and reading this comic book you can see that Orci and Kurtzman, when wrtiting the script for Star Trek, truly did not want to invalidate what people loved about Star Trek. Instead, they embraced it -- all the legacy, all the history, all of what had gone before.

Check it out at your local comic shop (they should be able to order for you, and if you're not sure where your closest comic shop is, you can find out here: The Comic Shop Locator), OR you can buy Star Trek Countdown here!

Visit the Waiting for the Trade bookstore here!

~ Ben

COMING UP: More time travel, superheroes, and teeny, tiny barbarians.

Nano Film Review #24: Star Trek

Can't believe I took this long to post a review of Star Trek, considering I've seen the thing twice already . . . in IMAX. And the second time around it was better.

The bottom line: this is a fun, fun movie. Fun in a way that Star Trek has not been in a long, long time.

The soundtrack is simply amazing. Michael Giacchino is fast becoming one of my favorite film composers. I've always liked his Lost and Fringe music, and I enjoy his Speed Racer soundtrack. But his Star Trek score is awesome. Check it out here:



It's sweeping and bold and epic and personal. Like the movie itself.

The writers and director did a better job than they had any right doing with their two-pronged goal: create a Star Trek story that will satisfy old Star Trek fans and create a story that will satisfy people who never watched Star Trek before in their life.

Judging by the box office, they succeeded.

My new rating system is simple: Yeah or Meh. Star Trek = YEAH!!!

~ Ben

SPIDER-MAN'S MARRIED AGAIN!!! (Sorta . . .)

So Spider-Man's Satanic divorce, which I blogged about here before, has officially been retracted . . . in the Spider-Man newspaper comic strip.

Mary Jane just walks out, Bobby Ewing style, after taking a shower. The whole unmarried thing, in the newspaper comic, was all a dream!

Wow. Even more impressive: there's still a Spider-Man newspaper strip?

Apparently.

Okay, so all the moral implications of my earlier postings still apply, but it's an interesting footnote . . . in one arm of the Spider-Man publishing universe, he's happily married.

~ Ben

Comics Worth Reading -- Metal Men

DC's Metal Men mini-series just wrapped up. And I really enjoyed it.

For those not familiar with the Metal Men, here you can find the "secret origin" of the group. 

The biggest reasons I picked it up in the first place were: 1. It was a limited series, 2. I like the Metal Men characters from some really old back issues I accidentally accumulated, and 3. It looked interesting.

This "re-invention" of the team was written by Duncan Rouleau (who I've never heard of), based on ideas by Grant Morrison (who I have heard of . . . and am leery of), it's a wonderful eight issue mess of time travel paradoxes and existential pop quantum physics (or something -- but what do you expect when it's based on ideas by Grant Morrison). And it's good.

This is real science fiction, here. It takes ideas from science and weaves them into a speculative story that's both sprawling an epic (spanning eons) and personal (following Dr. Magnus' personal trials as he creates the Metal Men and then must deal with the consequences).

The story itself jumps from the current action to flashback and back again constantly, and can be a bit confusing. But I'll say it again: I really enjoyed it. I enjoyed the characters, I enjoyed the bad chemical puns, I enjoyed the over the top bad guy, I enjoyed the audacious and old school tag ending, I enjoyed the clever ways the metal men used the powers of their elements.

I enjoyed it.

Now, if I could just find issue one so I could re-read the series. 

~ Ben

Comics Worth Reading -- glamourpuss

Wow.

Not much else to say.

Last night, before bed, I read Dave Sim's new comic book, glamourpuss.

Dave Sim, to the uninitiated, is the creator/writer/artist of a 300 issue/26 year long run on a comic book series called Cerebus, a critically acclaimed series of monumental proportions.

glamourpuss is his follow up.

And, after reading it, I can't figure out if glamourpuss is a monumental mess or a work of genius. It is either the most absurd or the most ingenious comic ever made.

Essentially, the comic is Dave Sim musing about what this comic will be. Graphically, he starts out drawing photo-realistic black and white drawings of fashion models and ruminating on how he could do a comic about those images, since in a fashion magazine he really only gets a small amount of reference images for the same person. He shifts gears into talking about Alex Raymond and Al Williamson and their art styles, and he begins copying panels from their non-science fiction work (mostly, panels that seem to look like fashion models) and uses the speech balloons to continue his ruminating. It shifts gears once more, this time to present a story about glamourpuss, using a half dozen fashion magazine photo references to draw teh character, and then shifts back into musing and ruminating and ruminating and musing about art, the glamourpuss series, and life.

Think of it like this: if David Lynch and the editors of seventeen magazine got in a room to create a comic book, this is what it would be.

And it works. The traces and wisps of the story of glamourpuss and her twin sister, SKANKO (yes, i thought twice before typing it), are wound together with Dave Sim's own ideas about art and copying the masters, which is bookended by satire about fashion magazines.

I do not recommend this for everyone. I'm not sure if I recommend it to myself. But I will be buying issue #2.

For those wondering how Dave Sim's "seeming" "misogyny" play out in a comic book about women, I didn't see it. I did see some very biting satire of the fashion industry, which is mostly women. And there was the whole through line of, when asked what he was going to do after Cerebus his answer always was, "cute teenage girls in my besst Al Williamson photo-realism style", which he is essentially doing here. This book has a LOT images of beautiful women. But honestly, this book seems to be more commentary about his art and his reference material.

~ Ben

Nano Review #3 -- Meet the Robinsons

Two words:

Awe. Some.

Seventeen more words:

What a great time travel story! This is what good time travel is about: choices and consequences!

And thirty-nine (two of which are contractions) more words:

Doesn't hurt that it has believable and likable characters and a tight plot. I've heard this compared to Pixar's movies and I would jump on that bandwagon. This story had heart, and followed through in all the right ways.

Finally, twenty-one more words:

I was relieved, however, to find that they did not steal TimeFlyz's thunder with the "time travel twist ending" they used.

~ Ben

Nano Film Review #2 -- Renaissance

Finally, an animate feature in which the animation serves the story. A noir mystery set in the Paris of the future, the animation is a stark black and white with very little grey. The color scheme is used to great effect and heavily influences the mood and when the film was done, I couldn't help feeling that this story was a story that could have been live action . . . but shouldn't be. Rife with film-noir elements -- double crosses, revelations, counter-revelations, woman in peril, good cop with a past in a bad system -- the animation and future setting elevates above being a good genre film and makes it a good film in general.

~ Ben

Spider-Man's Deal with the Devil

Okay. So.

The Editor-in-Chief of Marvel Comics has been publicly saying for a while now that Spider-Man's marriage held the character back. "There are no stories that can be told with a married Spidey that can't be told with an un-married Spidey, but there ARE stories you can't tell with a married Spidey that you can tell with an un-married Spidey." He's gone on to say how married life is so much less exciting than unmarried life and a bunch of other stuff.

I don't read Spidey. I read The Incredible Hulk. (Click on those three links for one of the best comic storylines I've read in recent history from a major comic book company, excluding, of course this one and this one -- but I'm biased.)

I haven't read Spidey in a long time. I always did find his marriage to go against type. I mean, Peter Parker, the Spider-Man, is supposed to be a down on his luck guy and he's married to a supermodel who loves him very much and is fun and intelligent.

The guy has it good.

HAD it good.

So Marvel's EiC and the Spider-Man editorial staff decide a married Spider-Man is not a character kids can relate to. And they figure out a way to make it so he was never married, he lives in his aunt's house, and he's still thirty-something.

That's right, the kids will be able to relate to that version of Spidey better, right?

Now, they couldn't have Spidey get divorced, because that would be sitting a bad example for the kids who don't relate to him. So how can they get Spidey to be able to get single again so he can live with his aging aunt and be able to "have *** and download ****" (direct quote). (Hm, maybe I shouldn't include the actual words since I have no idea what the Google Ads will turn up if it focuses on those as keywords, but you can click the link, which will take you to a worksafe convention report where some upset fans confronted the Marvel EiC about the issue.) (And yes, I'm aware of the irony that "divorce" is considered a bad example for kids, but "pre-marital relations" and dirty pictures from the internet are used as and example of the good life that makes being single so exciting but I guess aren't so much of a bad example for the kids who aren't reading Spider-Man because they can't relate to him being married.)

Whew. Okay, so I'm being a little facetious and I'm sure that Mr. Q was as well. He made a stupid joke about things single Spidey can do that married Spidey can't do and he got called on it and now it's on the internet for everyone to see.

Here's the real problem I have. First, restrictions on characters enhance creativity in my experience. When you have restrictions that you have to deal with, you end up pushing yourself creatively. So a married Spidey SHOULD be pushing the creators to be creative, find a way to make the stories work. Make the stories relevant.

Second, the way Spidey gets separated from his wife is . . . he makes a deal with the devil.

A literal deal with the devil.

See, his aunt is about to die and the only option is the devil (not the ACTUAL devil, but a high level alternate from the Marvel Superhero Universe), who says he'll give Spidey his aunt back if Spidey gives up the one thing that gives him the most happiness: his marriage.

Now, let's keep in mind . . . Spidey is an educated man. A scientist able to create web shooters when he was in high school. He's fought some of the world's most evil people . . . some of the universe's most evil beings.
Okay, forgetting for a moment that Spidey is a genius -- literally. Don't you think he may have:

1. Noticed how some of his friends who have made deals with the devil and end up getting the bad end of things . . . ?

2. Seen some of the half-dozen Twilight Zone episodes where someone makes a deal with the devil and it backfires horribly . . . ?

3. Read some of the great literature, from Irving to Faust, showing how evil presents something that looks wonderful to us at first glance, but ends up hurting us more than it helped us . . . ?

4. At LEAST seen the Saturday Night Live Halloween episode where Jon Lovitz plays the devil going to People's Court, where he is being sued by a woman who signed a deal with him to make her to best hair stylist in the world, only to become SO good that they only need their hair done once and then never again, meaning NO RETURN CUSTOMERS!!! The devil's answer: "I'm the devil, it's what I do."

"It's what I do!!!"

C'mon, Spidey! Even Jon Lovitz knows this!!!

And that's the problem I have with this whole debacle.

Spidey, your Aunt's about to die and the DEVIL comes to you with a way to bring her back, and you're gonna trust him? I don't care HOW distraught you are . . . something's going to go wrong! Remember the hairdresser! She had NO RETURNING CUSTOMERS! And that was just a business deal. We're talking life or death here!

Wait, here's another example from your good buddy Ghost Rider. (Remember? You were in the Fantastic Four with him.) He makes a deal with the devil (same devil you just made your deal with) to save his father from an incurable disease. Only to have his father DIE the next day in a STUNT MOTORCYCLE ACCIDENT!

So remember kids, when it comes to marriage, DIVORCE isn't a very good thing to do . . . but making a deal with the supreme evil of the universe to nullify the marriage so it never happened is.

~ Ben

Nano Film Review #1 -- Beowolf

Here's my review for the recent screen adaptation of Beowulf:

Neil Gaiman and Roger Avary, you're two of the most creative writers in Hollywood and that's the best ending you guys could come up with? Really? Robert Zemeckis, why was it animated again? Animation works best when it's stylized to serve the film. Flesh and blood characters would have probably elevated this movie from interesting technological achievement to engaging retelling of an age old story.

Maybe I should have seen it in IMAX 3D.

~ Ben