A-FORCE #1: Singularity, who was part of an all female team on Battleworld, finds the Alpha Flight Space Station where Carol Danvers, otherwise known as Captain Marvel, is running her team. While Singularity remembers her time on Battleworld, Carol does not and does not remember her friend. The Anti-Matter Well, that the Alpha Flight team had earlier neutralized, reforms and causes not only Captain Marvel but Singularity. The ship Singularity is in crashes into New Attilan, where she climbs out to find that Antimatter followed her down. They brawl in the streets until Singularity sees Jennifer Walters’ office and heads there. Unfortunately, She-Hulk doesn’t know her either but they team up to defeat Antimatter. Medusa shows up with an army, because Singularity destroyed an expensive communications tower in the process. Confused, because she saw Medusa die in Arcadia, Singularity goes to embrace her and is put in handcuffs.
I read the first issue of this series when it was part of the SECRET WARS and it was so bad that I couldn’t even think about spending my money on it. So, I come into this book without knowing what transpired there. What the Splash Page of this book by G. Willow Wilson and Jorge Molina tells me is that the team will be made of Medusa, She-Hulk, Singularity, Captain Marvel, Nico Minoru (from The Runaways) and Dazzler. While I like the characters individually, I’m not keen on the way this team has been introduced here. Of course, eight months have transpired and we have no idea how we got to here. I do have to admit that the Wilson’s writing is keen and much better than the first issue of that mini-series. But it’s still not my cup of tea.
AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D. #1: Someone wearing a fake Iron Man armor is attacking The Pentagon. Later, Tony Stark and Melinda May try to figure out where Phil Coulson is, not knowing he in being tortured in a A.I.M. base. Luckily, Coulson’s team, consisting of Quake, Mockingbord, Fitz, Jemma and Deathlok, are available to bust him out. Stark informs Coulson that the source of the lost technology is Lola Daniels: his ex-fiancée. Meanwhile, Fitz asks Melinda May out to dinner.
I watched the first season of the television show and it had its’ ups and downs. To be honest, I haven’t see it since except for the first episode of the second season. I have a problem with a book that is adapted from a television show. Marc Guggenheim and German Peralta do the best they can, but I see no point in this except to cash in on the show. Oh yeah: what Deathlok is this? Henry Hayes? Who?
CAPTAIN MARVEL #1: Captain Marvel is Carol Danvers and is also Commander Carol Danvers: head of the intergalactic Alpha Flight. In the process, she says goodbye to her boyfriend James “Rhodey” Rhodes and meets Lt. Commander Abigail Brand and teammates Sasquatch, Puck, and Aurora. In the issue, they come across an ancient war ship. When Carol investigates, she finds out that there is a marking on the ship-his making.
I read the first issue of the last series, as written by Kelly Sue DeConnick. Suffice it to say, I absolutely hated it! I didn’t like her characterization and liked DeConnick’s dialogue even worse. So Michele Fazekas and Tara Butters took over the writing on this version and it’s an improvement. Fazekas and Butters worked on AGENT CARTER, so they know how to right a great story. And again…it’s better than DeConnick’s run. But the clear winner in this book is Kris Anka’s artwork. Oh yeah…we also get Puck, Sasquatch and Aurora. Now, if you can give me the rest of the classic team…
DEADPOOL AND CABLE #1: Deadpool is ripping through Hydra guys to get to Dr. Carl Weathers and plans to kill him. But cable shows up and tells him killing him will lead to the destruction of the universe. So they set off to stop an assassin and may save him, but it costs the life of a bystander in the process.
I am a huge fan of Fabian Nicieza’s writing, but I can’t get behind this title. The joke count is higher than it is in the regular DEADPOOL title…what does that tell you? Reilly Brown handles the art and it looks great. In fact, that is the best part of the book. As a Nineties throwback, it just doesn’t work.
OLD MAN LOGAN #1: Following the end of the SECRET WARS, a naked Logan wakes up Times Square in his own past. In flashbacks, he thinks of his time in the future where he and his family had to deal with life after the villians’ uprising. Back in the present, he hunts down and executes the youth who would otherwise have become The Butcher.
Logan is a wild animal in the hands of Jeff Lemire and Andrea Sorrentino. If you read the mini-series, you know what that means. This book looks great, has a great STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND feel too it and is possibly the best new post SECRET WARS book to date. I need to say nothing else. This title rocks!
ROCKET RACCOON AND GROOT #1: After SECRET WARS, the world at large thinks that Rocket Raccoon and Groot are dead. But they’re not. And we also get the new duo of Pocket the talking squirrel and his partner Shrub.
Scottie Young writes it and Filipe Andrade draws like Young. And it’s a GUARDIANS related title. And don’t we need as many of those as we need DEADPOOL and HARLEY QUINN titles?
SILVER SURFER #1: The Hordax show up on Earth’s televisions and threaten to destroy the planet. Luckily the Silver Surfer and Dawn arrive. While the Surfer defeats the Hordax, Dawn says hello to Dad and sister watching at home. The pair come to Earth and spent time with Dawn’s family, including sitting back and watching THE WIZARD OF OZ. Soon, the planet is having it’s culture stripped away, so Surfer and Dawn head back into space again to confront the Hordax. In the end, The Thing crash lands on Planet Elanis and bows down to the Keeper of the Great Truth.
So…it goes like this: you either LIKE Mike Allred’s art and Laura Allred’s colors or you don’t. Me: I LOVE Allred’s work and always have. Hey-I was a GRAFIK MUSIK fan back when most of the world had no idea what to make of it. Of course,,,I LOVED FLAMING CARROT TOO! Now, we all know Dan Slott from his work on THE AMAZING SPIDER MAN and again, you either like his work or don’t. For me, this team is a tremendous winning combination. If you didn’t read the last series, you need to embrace this one!
SPIDER MAN/DEADPOOL #1: Our heroes are tied up, arguing, and facing the wrath of the dreaded Dormammu. This leads to a flashback where the pair are fighting Hydro Man. It turns out that this whole battle with Dormammu is actually Deadpool auditioning Spider man for a job as his partner. In the end, Wade gets a job offer with a 100 million-dollar payday. The job? Take out Peter Parker.
Back in the day, Joe Kelly had a great Deadpool run along with some really good AMAZING SPIDER-MAN tales. Kelly reunites with Ed McGuinness to deliver a fun, silly, pun-filled title that puts DEADPOOL AND CABLE to shame. The joke count is as high here, but so much more on target. With Wade threatening to “unsheath my katana” against Parker’s “spider eggs”, the sexual innuendo is blatant that it is brilliant. The only thing that ticked me off was the size of the book, which contained all of VISION #1 reprinted in its’ entirety. Now, they didn’t charge extra for it, but I just feel ripped off by having a HUGE book with a story I already bought in it!
UNCANNY X-MEN #1: Magneto and his team of X-Men, Sabretooth, Monet, Psylocke, and Archangel, are dedicated to rescuing some mutants who have willingly placed themselves in suspended animation as they try to avoid the effects of the Terrigen mist. Despite their good deed, the Dark Riders are here and seem to be hell bent on eliminating mutants.
The good news is that this book looks tremendous in the hands of Greg Land. There are several great looking splash pages and an incredible two page spread featuring the team that is so amazing that if Marvel doesn’t put this out as a poster they are just throwing money away. But Cullen Bunn’s story is less than spectacular. The problem is NOT Bunn’s story, it’s Bunn’s characters. This is an anti-hero team similar to the last X-FORCE team. There is a morality issue at stake here and it seems that Magneto’s crew is all about mutants and not about maintaining human lives. Because of that, I found it hard to LIKE these characters. There are a whole bunch of X-titles out there and this USED TO BE the flagship title. But now, that has fallen on EXTRAORDINARY X-MEN and this title is just an also ran. I will stick with it for a bit, mostly because of Land’s work and the hope that there will be some good coming out of them.
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