The Web Haunt of Ryan K Lindsay

Picked up four comics this week and all of them were pretty darn good, but there was certainly an order of enjoyment out of them. Here goes a bit of a scoop into what I liked.

Spider-Woman #3 - Brian Michael Bendis & Alex Maleev

This issue was better than the first two in that it seemed to have more content. There was more to slow me down and let me chew on, and that’s including a four page helicopter-flying car chase through the city skies of Madripour. Most of it is Jessica Drew and Madame Hydra chatting in the plane and then on a rooftop. It’s one big conversation between two chicks who very much look alike, but there’s some good lines and info in there. I just wish a little more would happen. You’ll see my better reviewed issues are ones where a lot of things happen. I don’t mean going back to the olde Marvel days when everything happened too fast, I just mean having a few changes of scene, a bit of progression. But I guess since we are only following Jessica Drew and we need to be as isolated and unsure as she is, we have to be kept in the dark a little bit. I’ll stick this arc out, and truth be told the next one as well, but eventually my budget will put this series under the white hot light and ask it what its business here is. I hope it has a good answer. Stating that it’s here to bring those kick ass Maleev HYDRA agents is probably a good lead off.

Viking #4 - Ivan Brandon & Nic Klein

This issue was pretty good. We get a sense of all of the characters from the start of the series really coming together to play off against each other. The next issue is the conclusion of this arc so I wonder what it will set up for the next one. In this one we get changed game plans as people get stabbed wantonly, as seems to be the viking way, and a change of scene and pace for everyone involved. I don’t want to say more, lest spoilers sully your day, but it’s a neat little arc and I hope they end it well next month. Also, the cover must be drooled over. Easily my cover of the week, it just jumped out at me and begged to be slapped on a wall.

Cowboy Ninja Viking #2 - A.J. Lieberman & Riley Rossmo

This was still pretty good as we got a feel for the Pirate Gladiator Oceanographer (have a look at his speech bubbles, a cutlass, a trident, and a scuba snorkel!). Duncan is having some good back and forth with his female partner, Nix, and Rossmo’s art comes across pretty good, though slightly too sketchy and rushed in some parts. I like the colour palette and the thing that is keeping me hooked is the interaction of the cowboy, the ninja and the viking. They are hilarious together and there is one mammoth laugh-out-loud moment when they all get sat next to a pretty enormous lady on a plane.

My pick of the week, and this only just got ahead of the previous two entires, was:

Weapon X #7 - Jason Aaron & Yanick Paquette

The panel above could easily sum it up. It’s brutally strange and violent. It is like being shunted into someone’s nightmare and having to watch it slowly unfold around you in muted sounds and emotions. Wolverine still doesn’t know how or why he has ended up in such a mess, but Dr Rot is prepared to beat it out of him. But it comes back to the background for me. The guy above, Charlie Chainsaws, gets chased with his hands already cut off, Dr Rot follows, with face as always hidden, and it just seems like another day at Dunwich. Charlie turns up later, with these panels really paying off for some more gore and gruesomeness, but there’s also some other sap who previously had his arm broken by Charlie, then the orderlies break his other arm. He is later seen swinging from a pipe with a bedsheet around his neck. How he got up there to kill himself we may never know, and that’s the point. With this story, we just don’t know. Logan gets provoked a lot, and we see hints of his claws. Dr Rot wants to see them out, but why he’d want an enraged berserker in his house of horrors is beyond me, but I trust that it was also be hellishly enjoyable for me too. This arc is some of my favourite comics since I don’t know when. I get that feeling like I can’t wait to read it, much like I was with Brubaker/Phillips’ Incognito. It’s just damn enjoyable. I also think Paquette’s art is perfect for the story, he does creepy and discombobulated so well, and his Logan has a thousand expressions.

It’s a good lazy morning’s worth of reading, and that’s all you can ever ask for. Sadly, none of my words to be found amongst the group, but next week, oh, next week for sure. Hope you come back for my essay, Australian Noir, in Criminal come November 25. Enjoy.

Posted on November 22nd, 2009 by ryan
Filed under: comics