Archive
DC Comics Presents: Son of Superman #1
June 3, 2011
Title: Son of Superman
Writers: Howard Chaykin & David Tischman
Art: J.H. Williams III
Inks: Mick Gray
Colors: Lee Loughridge
Letters: Kurt Hathaway
Cover: J.H. Williams III & Mick Gray
Editor: Andrew Helfer
Publisher: DC Comics
Another original graphic novel (this one from the Elseworlds imprint) is brought back in the nifty DC Comics Presents format. This 1999 volume by Howard Chaykin and David Tischman projects a future where Superman has long since vanished and the Justice League has become a government arm, locked in a perpetual battle against a terrorist group, the “Supermen of America,” led by Pete Ross and Lana Lang. Jon Kent, the son of Lois Lane, is shocked when he suddenly develops incredible power and learns the truth about himself – he is the son of the missing Superman. The question now is, will he side with the League, with the Supermen, or will he find his lost father and forge his own legend?
The story’s pretty good, if not spectacular. There have been hypothetical stories about Clark Kent’s son for decades, after all, and putting him in a sort of dystopian future isn’t that big a stretch. While this is, of course, an Elseworlds, I wasn’t really happy with the characterization of some of the Justice League (Wonder Woman and the Martian Manhunter in particular). If the idea was to present this as a “potential future,” I can’t imagine either of those heroes ever reaching the state they were in throughout this book. Jon isn’t really a likable character either, although that’s more forgivable, as part of the story is watching his growing and maturation into a hero worthy of calling himself Superman’s son.
J.H. Williams and Mick Gray are really the stars of the book. Their artwork was fabulous then and hasn’t lost a step in the years since. If you’re in comics more for the artwork and you’re a fan of these guys, the book is well worth picking up. If you like alternate versions of Superman, you could do worse than getting this story. But ultimately, it’s not really anything memorable.
Rating: 7/10
Recent Reviews: June 15 Releases
Hey, look, I remembered! Here’s my roundup of the June 15 comics I reviewed over at CX Pulp!
Walt Disney Treasures: Disney Comics-75 Years of Innovation
July 31, 2006
Quick Rating: Very Good
A collection of rare Disney comics from across 75 years and around the world!
Writers: Floyd Gottfredson, Ted Osborne, Walt Kelly, Carl Buettner, Hubie Karp, Bill Walsh, Carl Barks, Don Christensen, Romano Scarpa, Dwight Decker, Dick Kinney, Vic Lockman, Eirik Ildahl, Freddy Milton, Daan Jippes, Geoffrey Blum, Renato Canini, Marck Meul, Jim Kenner, Byron Erickson, Bruno Sarda, Gary Leach, Don Rosa, Janet Gilbert, Evert Geradts
Art: Floyd Gottfredson, Earl Duvall, Ted Thwaites, Wilfred Haughton, Al Taliaferro, Walt Kelly, Carl Buettner, Paul Murray, Dick Moores, Paul Murry, Bill Wright, Carl Barks, Gil Turner, Frank McSavage, Romano Scarpa, Giorgio Cavazzano, Al Hubbard, Tony Strobl, Freddy Milton, Daan Jippes, Roberto O. Fukue, Daniel Branca, Andrea Ferraris, William Van Horn, Don Rosa, Vicar, Mau Heymans, Cesar Ferioli
Restoration: Daan Jippes & David Gerstein (“Race to the South Seas”), Rick Keene (“Sauce For the Duck”)
Colors: Rick Keene, Kneon Transitt, Marie Javins, Scott Rockwell, Barry Grossman, Susan Daigle-Leach, Michael Kraiger
Letters: Susie Lee, Jon Babcock, Bill Spicer, Willie Schubert, John Clark, Rick Keene
Archival Editor: David Gerstein
Cover Art: Don Rosa
Publisher: Gemstone Comics
Borrowing a page from Disney’s DVD department, which has been putting out a line of Walt Disney Treasures collector’s editions for a few years now, Gemstone Comics has graced us with this new volume, collecting rare comics and imports, some never before reprinted, from the vast history of Disney Comics. Billed as containing “75 years of innovation” (which is technically true, as it collects stories from 1930 through 2004, a total of 75 years), this is a very nice sampler of some of the various comics Disney has graced us with over the decades.
The collection has too many stories (presented, more or less, in chronological order of publication) to give a full review of each one, so let’s just take an overview of what we get here. First, there are several short stories from the various Disney newspaper strips, including a really nice Sunday storyline about Mickey and the gang trying to conquer a mountain. (To give you an idea of how old this story is, Goofy is still referred to here by his original name, “Dippy Dog”.) We get a smattering of various characters from throughout the Disney library, including a Brer Rabbit story, a Lil’ Bad Wolf story, stories with Grandma Duck, Fethry Duck, José Carioca, Arizona Dipp, Bucky Bug and a great Gremlins strip by the immortal Walt Kelly. Goofy stars in two stories, one co-starring with the little-seen Ellsworth and the other featuring his alter-ego, Super Goof. Pluto faces off with Chip and Dale, the Beagle Boys co-star with Magica DeSpell, we have a Ducktales story with Launchpad McQuack and, of course, a healthy sprinkling of stories featuring the Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck families of characters. It’s a testament to how rare these stories are that I’ve only read one of these (the Beagle Boys/Magica story) before I got this volume.
In addition to a nice mix of characters, we get a nice mix of creators as well. There’s the aforementioned Walt Kelly (best known as the creator of Pogo), and we see the work of Floyd Gottfredson (creator of some of the best Disney newspaper strips), William Van Horn on the Ducktales story and popular creators from overseas such as Romano Scarpa, Daniel Branca and Vicar among others. American legends Carl Barks and Don Rosa each contribute a story to this volume as well. With any collection like this, the stories are expected to vary in quality, but with the exception of the Bucky Bug story (I’m just not a Bucky fan) I didn’t think there was a weak story in the bunch. The Goofy/Ellsworth story (reprinted here for the first time since its original Italian publication in 1965) is particularly funny. Barks’s story features Donald and Gladstone in a race to save their lost Uncle Scrooge, each hoping to secure their place as his favorite. Rosa’s story is unusual in that it has no villains other than Scrooge’s thirst for wealth – the ducks attempt to conquer a mountain he’s purchased looking for rare gems or metals, and it’s his zeal or Donald’s ineptitude that cause all of the mayhem. The artwork is beautiful and the writing is hysterical – just what you expect from Rosa. Mickey’s last story, by Byron Erickson and Cesar Ferioli, features his friends suspecting he’s ready to throw Minnie over for a new girl and plotting to confront him. With the possible exception of the Barks story, the volume doesn’t contain any of the high adventure stories that mark my favorite Disney comics, but fans looking to laugh will be highly satisfied.
Gemstone went to great lengths to imitate the DVD style with this book, from using the same cover design (including a wonderful Don Rosa cover) to commentary by Archival Editor David Gerstein, taking the role filled on the DVDs by Leonard Maltin. In addition to an introduction discussing the history of Disney comics, he also takes time to discuss how some of the cultural stereotypes shown in a few of the stories were viewed at the time. Maltin has done similar things on some of the DVDs and, like there, I found it a little frustrating – not so much that the discussion was held, but that if Gerstein hadn’t addressed the issue himself there would inevitably have been some people who complained about the stories without thinking about their context.
Judging from the number of titles this volume has – Walt Disney Treasures: Disney Comics – 75 Years of Innovation – it gives me the impression that future Walt Disney Treasures collections are in the works. I certainly hope that is the case. This was a good read, but aside from their scarcity the stories collected in this volume don’t really have any connective thread or reason to be presented together. It’s like reading a particularly long, particularly good issue of Walt Disney’s Comics and Stories. Here’s hoping Gemstone comes back with more volumes collecting great works by different creators, characters, stories with the same themes or other volumes that feel more complete in the stories collected therein. As far as this book goes, though, it’s a satisfying read for any real fan of Disney comics.
Rating: 8/10
Ultimate Spider-Man #64
August 20, 2004
Quick Rating: Good
Title: Carnage Part 5
Confronted with the creature that killed Gwen Stacy, Peter Parker must fight for his own life.
Writer: Brian Michael Bendis
Pencils: Mark Bagley
Inks: Scott Hanna
Colors: J.D. Smith
Letters: Chris Eliopoulos
Editor: Ralph Macchio
Cover Art: Mark Bagley & Richard Isanove
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Is this the end of this story arc? In five issues? It certainly seems like the end… and as far as endings go, at least for this series, it’s slightly disappointing.
Gwen Stacy is dead and the creature that killed her – a mixture of DNA from Spider-Man, Curt Conners and the experimental cancer dip that Richard Parker was developing – is confronting the wall-crawler at his home in Queens. An enraged Peter sends Conners to safety and faces the monster himself.
Bendis chooses an unusual sequence for this issue – the first half of the book is the first half of the fight, then he jumps ahead in time and we see the conclusion of the fight in flashback. Is this for dramatic effect? Is it to call Peter’s recollection of events into question? It’s not confusing from a storytelling standpoint but it is sort of confusing as to why it was structured this way.
The book does end logically, but it doesn’t tie up any loose ends. Far from it – nearly every page of this issue screams of dangling plot threads that are being left flapping in the breeze to allow a return to this storyline in the future – which would be fine if it wasn’t quite so obvious. The ending of this issue is, at this point, something of a cliché — the sort of thing that again makes logical sense, but has been done so many times (particularly in the Spider-Man titles) as to have lost all meaning. Kind of like killing off Jean Gray in an X-Men comic.
Mark Bagley’s artwork is a saving grace this issue. He does an excellent fight scene, with great poses and facial expressions and some really dynamic angles. None of this is made easier by the fact that our hero is not in costume for the battle and that the villain is really an amorphous blob that just chooses to take humanoid form when it’s convenient.
Based solely on his origin, I actually find this incarnation of Carnage far more interesting than his mainstream Marvel Universe counterpart, and I feel confident that much more will be done with him (it?) in the future. For his debut storyline, though, I feel like more could have been done. Most of this storyline, as pained as I was to read it, was really well done, so it’s a shame that this conclusion is kind of a letdown.
Rating: 7/10
The Back Issue Bin 