Category: Graphic Novels

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Original Sin


By Jason Aaron, Mike Deodato Jr., Frank Martin & many and various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-632-8

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Solid Superhero Blockbuster Entertainment… 8/10

Once upon a time massive crossover events starring an entire company’s pantheon of superstars were rare and eagerly anticipated occurrences. These days, however, it seems costumed champions and aggregated universe-savers stagger from one catastrophic crisis to the next with barely time to wipe their boots or iron their capes.

Still, it’s hard to complain when the results are as gripping and controversial as Original Sin…

Spanning April to August 2014, this chunky volume collects miniseries Original Sin #0-8 and the 5-issue follow-up anthology Original Sins, taking a good, hard look at the dark underbelly of the Marvel Universe, removing a number of major characters and laying the groundwork for more shocking revelations in the months to come…

The main event is written by Jason Aaron, with Mike Deodato Jr. illustrating and Frank Martin providing the colours, but before that all unfolds issue #0 cunningly provides invaluable background with artists Jim Cheung, Paco Medina, David Meikis, Mark Morales, Guillermo Ortego, Juan Vlasco and Justin Ponsor setting all the plates spinning in ‘Who is the Watcher?

Sam Alexander is still just a kid but he’s also the newest Nova of the alien peacekeeping force pledged to policing the universe. He’s inherited the role from his dad, a drunken deadbeat the boy had always believed to be a delusional fantasist.

Now the boy spends his days on the moon, trying to befriend the austere and aloof cosmic voyeur Uatu the Watcher, an impossibly powerful, immortal being who views all that occurs throughout the vast multiverse but never acts on any of it…

As a tenuous relationship develops Sam learns the tragic origin of the Watcher race’s sacred vow of non-interference and gleans another secret: his long-vanished father is not dead…

The shocks come thick and fast in this thriller which is more murder mystery than celestial Armageddon scenario so I’m attempting to reveal enough to tempt without giving anything away…

In ‘No One is Watching’, a quiet dinner for Wolverine, Captain America, Black Widow and super spy Nick Fury (the original WWII one, not the son who’s currently appearing in all those movies) is interrupted by an ominous phone call. Thor is on the Moon and has found The Watcher murdered…

Rapidly relocating to Luna the heroes see that the all-powerful celestial has not only been shot in the head but cruelly mutilated. His huge, all-seeing eyes are missing. Moreover his fantastic citadel has been demolished and the incredible storehouse of artefacts and weaponry from across the universe pillaged.

Grizzled veteran Fury points out that the limited number of people who even knew about the cosmic observer, let alone possessed the power to harm him, means the suspect pool must necessarily include not only villains but heroes too…

Meanwhile in the great Necropolis of Wakanda, the Black Panther is being updated by a shadowy figure calling itself The Unseen. The nebulous source also emphasises that in the days to come, with the kind of technologies the killer now possesses, nobody can be trusted, urging former King T’Challa to lead a distinctly offbeat team in a clandestine parallel investigation of the cosmic assassination…

Soon mystic master Dr. Strange, current Ant-Man – and former criminal – Scott Lang, Winter Soldier “Bucky” Barnes, telepathic X-Man Emma Frost, “deadliest woman in the galaxy” Gamora, former CIA spook and mercenary Moon Knight and wanted mass-murderer Frank – The Punisher – Castle are following up leads somehow not available to Fury and the Avengers, even as on Earth The Thing battles a monster which might be connected to the crime…

The creature is a Mindless One from Dormammu‘s Dark Dimension but this particular destructive horror now has a personality and even telepathic powers. It also wants to die and even with Spider-Man‘s aid Ben Grimm is unable to stop it committing suicide using the Ultimate Nullifier which used to belong to Uatu…

By the time Fury and the Avengers arrive all that’s left is a scene of devastation, and the retired super spy officially takes over the investigation of what is now clearly a much bigger and growing problem…

Splitting up, the secret searchers travel to vastly differing locations in ‘Bomb Full of Secrets’ with the Panther, Frost and Ant-Man heading to the under-Earth kingdoms and uncovering a vast graveyard of monsters, whilst Castle and Strange voyage to a mystic realm where a magical leviathan has been killed by a incredibly large bore gamma bullet…

On Earth Fury has captured another rampaging No-Longer-Mindless One and is on the trail of the unlikely culprits who have brought the eldritch berserkers to Earth. Dr. Midas, his daughter Exterminatrix and The Orb were never A-List villains – or even contenders – but with one of Uatu’s eyes in their possession not only do they have access to everything the Watcher ever saw but the actual organ also mutates and transforms anything in its proximity into immensely powerful things never meant to be…

When a full team of Avengers raid the bad guys’ New York lair, a cataclysmic struggle ensues which ends as the Orb unleashes all the stored knowledge within the eye. In an instant, heroes, villains and innocent bystanders alike are engulfed in a wave of uncomfortable answers as every hidden detail of trillions of lives seen by Uatu for millions of years is randomly released and psychically downloaded like a ‘Bomb Full of Secrets’ into the mindscape of the world…

In the aftermath ‘Trust No One, Not Even Yourself’ sees the city reeling with the shock of uncounted disclosures – from stolen snacks to secret affairs to murders all coming to light – whilst at the centre of the Earth Ant-Man has finished recovering hundreds of gamma-bullets from the unending field of monster corpses.

In deep space Gamora, Winter Soldier and Moon Knight have followed their trail to a dead world. It takes a subtle shift of perspective and a sneaking suspicion to confirm that they are standing on a colossal, once-living planet-sized organism riddled with gamma-bullets…

The frustrated spacefarers chafe at the lead which has resulted in a dead end, but everything changes as Winter Soldier suddenly teleports out, blowing their ship up as he leaves. The Unseen’s covert investigators now have their first solid suspect…

On Earth Fury is pondering upon who might have Uatu’s other eye when Winter Soldier beams in and kills him…

‘Secret Warriors’ then focuses on growing divisions as Punisher and Dr. Strange steal Fury’s body whilst Barnes, holding the eye taken from his most recent victim, heads to the Watcher’s shattered lunar home before beaming into a hidden satellite.

His infiltration of the stellar fortress coincides with the arrival of his understandably aggrieved former associates and another brawl breaks out. The carnage is only curtailed when The Unseen appears…

It is a trusted ally who has been playing them all from the start…

The betrayer then recounts ‘The Secret History of Colonel Nicholas J. Fury’, disclosing how half a century ago a man named Woody McCord died battling an alien invasion, one of hundreds the hidden hero had stopped without the world even suspecting.

With the covert assistance of millionaire industrialist Howard Stark and his shadowy cabal, the replacement had become a “Man in the Wall”, spending all his days killing monsters, repelling demons and despatching extraterrestrial threats to mankind.

But with his death another – still relatively clean and idealistic – soul had to step in and continue doing all the unavoidable dirty jobs proper superheroes would baulk at.

This was achieved with no one the wiser whilst keeping up appearances in the “day job” as a shiny, bright public champion…

With clearly nothing as it seems, ‘Open Your Eye’ reveals how Dr. Midas, the Orb and Exterminatrix attacked Uatu, taking his eye. In the now The Watcher-mutated Orb demands the traitor tell the rest of the truth.

The second Man in the Wall is now dying too and convened the Panther’s investigation team to ferret out a suitable replacement ready to defend Earth with absolute resolution, deadly gamma bullets and no remorse…

As the failing warrior explains the true circumstances of Uatu’s death in ‘Nick Fury Vs. the World’ the possessor of the Watcher’s other – until now missing – eye is shockingly exposed and the fighting resumes. With Midas making one final push for ultimate power, the mess gets even messier as the Avengers, having pursued their own lines of enquiry, bust in and a frantic free-for-all begins…

With all the secrets laid bare and an event of cosmic importance clearly occurring a group of other Watchers materialise – and does nothing – as the Man in the Wall clashes with Earth’s champions; citing morality and expediency until Midas’ final gambit interrupts everything and already-transformed Orb steals the other eye, triggering a devastating detonation. When the dust settles a transmogrified Orb is loose to roam the Earth, a third Man in the Wall takes up the gamma-gun and waits for the next invasion and a newly transformed figure haunts the Moon as ‘The One Who Watches’…

The miniseries generated 44 tie-in issues scattered through 14 other titles, but this compilation skips right to the end, to spotlighting a number of quirky vignettes from Original Sins #1-5, focusing on the fallout from the wave of secrets which were released to blanket the world after The Orb triggered Uatu’s eye.

Eschewing strict chronology for comprehension the exposures begin with all five chapters of Young Avengers serial ‘Hidden in Plain Sight’ (by Ryan North, Ramon Villalobos & Jordan Gibson) which sees Hulkling, Marvel Boy and Prodigy attempt a different way of dealing with demon-possessed felon The Hood.

The skeevy rat wants to extract all the knowledge forcibly inserted into the heads of an entire building full of recreational drug-takers who were all high when the “Secrets Bomb” went off… not for himself, of course, but because the data is basting the minds of the already brain-fried kids and killing them.

Happily complying with such a selfless request, the Young Avengers seem to have forgotten one basic fact: demon-possessed felons have secret agendas and often lie…

Following swiftly on, ‘Terminus’ (Nathan Edmondson, Mike Perkins & Andy Troy) finds S.H.I.EL.D. agent Seth Horn pressing commuter Henry Hayes on his other identity as cyborg assassin Deathlok.

The psychic fact-insertions might have pushed incontrovertible truths into people’s heads but it did nothing to augment common sense or self-preservation…

That is also apparent in ‘Black Legacy’ (Frank Tieri, Raffaele Ienco & Brad Anderson) as writer Rebecca Stevens stalks Dane Whitman and challenges him with the bleak history of the curse of the Ebony Blade – a fearsome plight the traumatised Black Knight is already agonisingly aware of…

‘Whispers of War’ (Charles Soule, Ryan Brown & Edgar Delgado) finds newly Terrigen-enhanced (see Inhumanity) Lineage suddenly party to the true story of King Black Bolt‘s greatest mistake and thus apprised of a fresh and now unavoidable conflict with the star-spanning Kree in the offing, whilst ‘Checkmate’ (James Robinson, Alex Maleev & Chris Peter) proves to ambitious businessman Gil Carmichael that insider information isn’t everything when the exposed secrets are Dr. Doom‘s…

Nick Fury then callously reveals to lifelong comrade Dum Dum Dugan ‘How the World Works’ (Al Ewing. Butch Guice, Scott Hanna & Matthew Wilson) after which the funnier side of secrets comes to the fore in ‘Lockjaw: Buried Memory’ (Stuart Moore, Rick Geary & Ive Svorcina), Howard the Duck learns his place in ‘Before Your Eyes’ (Ty Templeton & Paul Mounts) and a Daily Bugle archivist uncovers the wrong review of Spider-Man’s early showbiz career in ‘Bury the Lead’ (Dan Slott, Mark Bagley, Joe Rubinstein & Mounts).

The glimpses into minds’ eyes ends with ‘Catharsis’ (David Abadta, Pablo Dura & Erica Henderson) as an anonymous Inuit flashes back to a distant moment in the arctic with a star spangled ice-cube before the whole shebang concludes with an outrageous and hilarious sequence of false memories starring Marvel’s biggest stars in ‘The No-Sin Situation’ by Chip Zdarsky…

With 43 covers-&-variants by Cheung, Ponsor, Julian Totino Tedesco, Mark Brooks, Paulo Manuel Rivera, Skottie Young, Art Adams, Zdarsky, Steve McNiven, Agustin Alessio, Gabriele Dell’Otto, Stephanie Hans, Guice, Marco Checchetto, Paul Renaud, Mike McKone & Jeun-Siik Ahn, this is a stunning and sensational saga that will delight any Fights ‘n’ Tights fan with a passing knowledge of Marvel history and comes fully loaded with digital extras accessible via the AR icon sections (Marvel Augmented Reality App) which give access to story bonuses if you download the free code from marvel.com onto your smartphone or Android-enabled tablet.

™ & © 2014 Marvel & Subs. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. through Panini S.p.A. All rights reserved. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.

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Superman: ‘Til Death Do Us Part


By Jeph Loeb, Mark Schultz, Joe Kelly, J.M. DeMatteis, Stuart Immonen, Ed McGuinness, Doug Mahnke, Pablo Raimondi, Kano, Yanick Paquette, & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-56389-862-4

Superman has been altered and adjusted continually over his many decades of fictive life since Jerry Siegel & Joe Shuster’s iconic inspiration first appeared in Action Comics #1. Moreover, every refit and reboot has resulted in appalled fans and new devotees in pretty much equal proportion, so perhaps the Metropolis Marvel’s greatest ability is the power to survive change…

Although largely out of favour these days as the myriad strands of accrued mythology are being carefully reintegrated into an overarching, all-inclusive multi-media dominant, film-favoured continuity, the grittily stripped-down, post-Crisis on Infinite Earths Man of Steel (as re-imagined by John Byrne and superbly built upon by a succession of immensely talented comics craftsmen) resulted in some stunning high points.

Actually, no sooner had the Byrne restart demolished much of the accrued iconography which had grown up around the “Strange Visitor from Another World” over fifty glorious years than successive creators began expending a great deal of time and ingenuity putting much of it back, albeit in terms more accessible to a cynical and well-informed audience far more sophisticated than their grandparents ever were.

Even so, by the mid-1990’s Byrne’s baby was beginning to look a little tired and the sales kick generated by the Death of and Return of Superman was fading, so the decision was made to give the big guy a bit of a tweak for the fast-approaching new millennium: bringing in new writers and artists and gradually moving the stories into more bombastic, hyper-powered territory.

The fresh tone was augmented by a new sequence and style of trade paperback editions and this third collection gathers material from Superman #155-157, The Adventures of Superman #577-578, Superman: Man of Steel # 99-100 and Action Comics #764-765 covering April to June 2000 as the world slowly recovers from the terrifying attack of future fiend Brainiac-13, an assault which left Metropolis transformed into a literal “city of Tomorrow”…

The never-ending story resumes with ‘The Private Life of Clark Kent’ by Jeph Loeb, Ed McGuinness & Cam Smith from Superman #155 wherein the exhausted hero heads to Kansas for a quiet break with his parents and finds unwelcome interloper Superboy already in residence.

The Man of Steel has always been uncomfortable around his obnoxious, eternally juvenile clone but the gentle wisdom of Ma Kent soon smoothes the troubled waters. It’s a pity she’s not around when he gets back to the big city and increasingly irritable new wife Lois lays into bewildered Clark…

Retreating back to Smallville in ‘A Tales of Two Cities’ (Adventures of Superman #577 by Stuart Immonen, Jay Faeber, Yanick Paquette, Rich Faber& José Marzan Jr.), Clark debunks a case of eco-terrorism: clearing innocent kids and catching the real big business culprits even as in Metropolis Lex Luthor makes a play for economic supremacy.

The wily villain sacrificed his baby daughter to Brainiac in return for the patents to B-13, and his stranglehold on the future tech is being inexorably parlayed into a commercial – and soon political – monopoly…

Out of sorts and still avoiding Lois in ‘All That Dwell in Dark Waters’ (Mark Shultz, Pablo Raimondi & Sean Parsons from Superman: Man of Steel #99), Clark then rescues childhood sweetheart Lana Lang and her husband Pete Ross from an aquatic spirit and receives a much-needed pep talk on responsibility whilst in Metropolis semi-retired hero Steel and his niece Natasha tackle a cult of electronic packrats dubbed Cybermoths from plundering future tech ‘In the Belly of the Beast’ (Shultz, Doug Mahnke & Sean Parsons).

The resultant struggle happily leads to a brand new extra-dimensional opportunity for the astounded and late-arriving Caped Kryptonian…

Still avoiding his irrationally irascible wife in Action Comics #764, ‘Quiet after the Storm’ (Joe Kelly, Kano & Joe Rubinstein) finds Clark talking over his marriage problems with his dad whilst saving a lonely old lady from death by despondency in Smallville. However when visiting the Martian Manhunter the invulnerable hero finally acknowledges that not all his problems are emotional after collapsing in a choking fit…

Superman #156 opens ‘The Tender Trap’ (Loeb, McGuinness & Smith) as Lois and Clark’s relationship deteriorates even further, a situation exacerbated when Daily Planet Editor Perry White hires Lana…

Shaken, bewildered and increasingly wracked by coughing fits, Superman barely survives an ambush by energy – and now memory – leech The Parasite.

Thankfully Wonder Woman is on hand to drive the monster away, but the Amazon’s appearance only reignites Lois’ feelings of neglect, jealousy and overriding suspicion.

So angry is the enraged reporter that she takes up Luthor on a long-standing offer…

Desperate to repair his relationship with Lois, Clark organises a substitute hero team to watch Metropolis whilst he takes her for a vacation to a paradise planet in ‘Getting Away from it All’ (Adventures of Superman #578 by J.M. DeMatteis, Pablo Raimondi & José Marzan Jr.). Once again fate and duty conspire to ruin everything…

In ‘Creation Story’ by Shultz, Doug Mahnke & Tom Nguyen (Superman: Man of Steel #100), the pocket dimension discovered by Steel is spectacularly filled and repurposed with the last Kryptonian remnants of the original Fortress of Solitude. Sadly the astounding architectural feat draws the rapacious Cybermoths and their anarchic queen Luna into action again, but neither Superman nor his engineering associate are aware that a horrifying old enemy is behind her repeated attempts to seize this new “Phantom Zone”…

A bizarre change of pace features in Action Comics #765 as ‘A Clown Comes to Metropolis’ (Kelly, Kano & Marlo Alquiza). Tragically the Joker‘s idea of good times include humiliating Luthor and wanton mass slaughter, whilst all Harley Quinn can think about is beating his lethally effective bodyguard Mercy to death…

With chaos and carnage running rampant it’s the worst possible time for Superman to be sick, but even after sending the homicidal humorists (barely) packing, worse is in store for the Man of Steel…

Concluding instalment Superman #157 opens with Clark reeling at the news that his wife is leaving him. Before that can sink in he then finds himself in super-powered combat with his spouse in ‘Superman’s Enemy Lois Lane’ (Loeb, McGuinness & Smith); a blockbuster battle that threatens to decimate the city.

Aware too late that his wife has been replaced by an impostor, the hero valiantly overcomes his illness and reluctance to hit the “woman” he loves, but his eventually victory is a purely pyrrhic one.

When the dust settles Superman is the only survivor and suddenly realises he has no idea where the real Lois is, or even if she still lives…

To Be Continued…

With a cover gallery by McGuinness & Smith, Immonen, Terry Dodson, Manke, John Dell and Yvel Guichet this captivating conundrum of a compilation pits the World’s Greatest Hero against insurmountable problems whilst examining the mere man beneath the steel hard skin.

Lovers of the Fights ‘n’ Tights genre cannot help but respond to the sheer scale, spectacle and compelling soap opera melodrama of these tales which remain a high point of the canon and a sheer delight for all fans of pure untrammelled Action fiction.

© 2000, 2001 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

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Inhumanity


By Matt Fraction, Kelly Sue Deconnick, Warren Ellis, Samuel Humphries, Matt Kindt, Christos N. Gage, Jonathan Hickman, Olivier Coipel, Nick Bradshaw, Todd Nauck, Matteo Buffagni, André Lima Araújo, Paul Davidson, Stephanie Hans, Simone Bianchi & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-614-4

During earlier mega-crossover blockbuster Infinity, mad Titan Thanos invaded Earth and clashed with the Inhumans’ ruler Black Bolt to a standstill. As a last resort the embattled Inhuman king crashed the flying city of Attilan onto New York and into the Hudson River, simultaneously releasing the Hidden People’s mutagenic Terrigen Mist into the atmosphere where it triggered mutation in millions, proving that Human and Inhuman were not necessarily different races…

Collecting assorted incidents of Terrigen exposure – specifically Inhumanity #1-2, Avengers Assemble #21.INH to 23.INH, #24-25, Avengers A.I. #7, Inhumanity: The Awakening #1-2, Inhumanity: Superior Spider-Man #1 and New Avengers #13.INH (spanning December 2013 to May 2014) – this epic chronicle of a game-changing publishing event takes a look at the fallout of that colossal catastrophe wherein a vast portion of the planet discovers everything they believed about themselves was wrong whilst coping with the shock of developing new and scary unnatural abilities…

The drama begins with Inhumanity #1, by Matt Fraction, Olivier Coipel, Mark Morales and Laura Martin (with flashback sequences illustrated by Leinil Francis Yu, Gerardo Alanguilan, Dustin Weaver & Israel Silva), as in the immediate aftermath of the cataclysm the Inhuman called Karnak is arrested by the Avengers.

His incomparable ability has been to infallibly detect the flaw and weakness of anything – object, person, even concept – but as he wearily describes the history of his people to his captors/hosts he reaches a startling fresh conclusion…

The Inhumans came into existence 25,000 years ago, after Imperial Kree explorers landed on Earth and tampered with the genetics of a tribe of primitives, just as they had on hundreds of other worlds.

Millennia later Randac, one of the rulers of the intellectual super-race that subsequently developed, took that meddling to its ultimate end by devising the Terrigen Mist process, enabling citizens to mutate into infinitely unique individuals of astounding power.

The measure originally met with much opposition and many citizens of Attilan quit the city forever, setting up their own diasporic enclaves and increasingly interbreeding with their unevolved cousins. As the Inhumans retreated further into myth, isolation and dogma, their alien-altered genetic heritage was slowly spreading and disseminating throughout baseline humankind.

Now the clash with Thanos has unleashed a Terrigen cloud that will slowly pass over the entire planet, activating all those dormant genes and metamorphosing possibly millions into new lives via body-altering cocoons…

The diminutive warrior also speaks of the last moments of the city, the final official use of Terrigen and how his people evacuated the doomed city: passing through the chimerical living teleport door Eldrac; scattered to the place the living portal deemed they “most needed to be”…

As Karnak continues his ruminations, his cousin Queen Medusa arrives. Believing herself widowed and facing the shattering burden of saving her people without the aid of her messianic man Black Bolt, she is further shaken when her logic-driven kinsman continues his evaluation and arrives at an inescapable conclusion he simply will not abide…

Inhumanity #2, with art by Nick Bradshaw & Todd Nauck (augmented by Scott Hanna, Tom Palmer, Antonio Fabela & Andres Motta), follows Medusa as she copes with a fresh tragedy, the aching responsibility of repairing New York and the horrific tidings that a variety of human villains and scientists are stealing and experimenting on the cocoons of the newest and most vulnerable Inhumans…

As the Avengers’ top brains try to assess the scale of transformations, evil men are murderously hijacking her freshly revealed fellows whilst some full-blooded Inhumans – such as exiled former king The Unspoken – have organised into militias to reclaim the transformative pods and slaughter the sub-Inhuman transgressors who took them.

Worst of all, most inhabitants of fallen Attilan remain missing, included cousin Triton and all of the city’s children…

With such pressures engulfing her it’s almost a relief to learn of an A.I.M. science citadel where the technological terrorists are vivisecting confiscated cocoons and furiously lead a vengeful squad or outraged Inhumans against it…

The story shifts to a more personal mode with Avengers Assemble #21.INH to 23.INH and #24-25, written by Kelly Sue Deconnick and Warren Ellis with art by Matteo Buffagni, Paco Diaz& Nolan Woodward. Here the focus is on novice super-hero Anya Corazón – the latest Spider-Girl – as she strives to rescue someone close to her…

With Terrigen pods now a highly valuable commodity, rogue genetic researcher Dr. June Covington – AKA The Toxic Doxie – takes delivery of one and barely escapes a lethal booby trap which kills her favourite assistant.

Covington’s MO includes assimilating genetic discoveries and improvement into her own body and taking vicious, excruciating vengeance on those who cross her, so the failed ploy by A.I.M. agents quickly takes up all the outraged mad scientist’s attention…

Meanwhile at Avengers Tower the big guns are being swamped by the Inhuman pandemic and haven’t time to listen to the junior arachnid as she demands some help to recover two stolen pods, one of which contains her Social Studies teacher Mr. Schlickeisen…

Finally, after plenty of sniping and her explosive tantrum, Captain America orders Spider-Woman Jessica Drew and Black Widow to assist and the trio quickly track down an errant A.I.M. cell run by wicked whacko Kashmir Vennema. Sadly the spider squad is promptly overwhelmed whilst learning that Schlickeisen is already dead, just as elsewhere Toxic Doxie takes over a rogue science lab to begin her mission of research and retribution…

Breaking free, the Arachnoid Avengers escape and return to base but Anya is unsatisfied and wants to go back, declaring that her teacher deserves a decent burial. This time grizzled warrior Wolverine and scary scientist Bruce Banner tag along and soon extract information out of a severely rattled Vennema.

Mr. Schlickeisen was gimmicked up and sold to Covington and now Spider-Girl has a fresh target to hunt…

Whilst Toxic Doxie completes her Terrigen-assisted biological improvements, Wolverine takes Anya aside for a little private tuition and technological upgrading before they hit the trail for the maniac’s last known whereabouts. They’re too late but the battle against her abandoned and crazed associates yields more useful intel, such as the fact that Schlickeisen is still alive…

Iron Man then assumes the role of on-the-job trainer, teaching Spider-Girl the value of research and preparation whilst deducing where the body-in-question is stashed. After rescuing the still comatose New Inhuman they have a solid idea of what new enhancements Covington has added to her body arsenal and that’s she’s readying an attack on the A.I.M. faction that set her up…

With the victim safe and a target location provided, Anya then gets the promotion of a lifetime, leading a team of veteran Avengers in a blistering raid to wrap up all the bad guys in her own web of justice…

This fast-paced and deliciously light-hearted action romp gives way to a far more emotive and evocative tale in Avengers A.I. #7.INH (Samuel Humphries, André Lima Araújo & Frank G. D’Armata) which examines the experiences of a recently transformed New Inhuman.

As Hank Pym‘s quirky cybernetic team encounter Daredevil and a lonely old lady mutated into a nauseating monster, the shock of her fate seems likely to drive poor Doris over the edge until a most unlikely robotic saviour talks her down…

Inhumanity: The Awakening #1and 2 by Matt Kindt & Paul Davidson then traces the efforts of a combined group of teen heroes from the X-Men’s Jean Grey School and Avengers Academy as they respond to the desperate social media cry for help of young Fiona who hatched out of a pod as a bird girl and was immediately targeted by online trolls and High School bullies.

The young thugs posted what they did to her on the web, but that proved to be very unwise as her angry little brother also mutated… and his power-set was far from benign or inconsequential…

Sharp, witty and painfully relevant, the solutions proffered and accommodations reached in this no-easy-answers yarn are remarkably astute and optimistically hopeful…

Inhumanity: Superior Spider-Man #1 by Christos N. Gage & Stephanie Hans offers more emotional insight as arch-villain Doctor Octopus – currently inhabiting the body of the Wondrous Wallcrawler (see Superior Spider-Man: My Own Worst Enemy) – battles a tragic human victim of circumstance determined to exploit a Terrigen transformee. The original motive might have been cruel and ultimately selfish but a misconceived battle soon teaches everyone something about true power and responsibility…

The portentous wrap-up provides a dark glimpse of horrors yet to come when The Illuminati clash over the Terrigen crisis in New Avengers #13.INH.

Scripted by Jonathan Hickman and illustrated by Simone Bianchi, the response of the world’s most powerful and important individuals (Black Bolt, Namor, Reed Richards, Tony Stark, Hank McCoy, Dr. Strange and Black Panther) is framed against a background of an even greater disaster – the ongoing collapse of the multiverse as alternate Earths randomly smash into each other.

On Earth-23099, a subtly different Illuminati conclave convenes to combat the threat of a Terrigen Bomb detonated by Maximus the Mad as another world hurtles towards them. From this malign Earth come unstoppable Black Priests who destroy everything and everybody. With their grim harvest completed the cosmic clerics then turn their gaze to our world…

To Be Continued…

With cover-&-variants by Coipel, Dean White, Bradshaw, Skottie Young, Mike Deodato Jr., David Marquez, Davidson, Hans, Bianchi and Jorge Molina, this comprehensive exploration of a strange new phase for troubled planet Earth offers suspense, drama, explosive action, wry humour and a potent metaphorical message as it describes the reunification of two deliberately distant branches of mankind, and comes fully equipped with the usual digital extras accessible via the AR icon sections (Marvel Augmented Reality App) which give access to story bonuses once you download the free code from marvel.com onto your smart-phone or Android-enabled tablet,

™ & © 2014 Marvel & Subs. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. through Panini S.p.A. All rights reserved. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.

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Wallace & Gromit – The Complete Newspaper Comics Strips Collection volume 2: 2011-2012


By various (Titan Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-87276-082-5

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: a Grand New Christmas Tradition… 10/10

Hard though it is to believe, Wallace & Gromit have been delighting us for nearly 25 years and this second extremely engaging newspaper strip compilation – originally published 2011-12 – again attests to just how much a cornerstone of British culture the potty putty pair have become.

The quintessentially English cheese-chasing chaps were originally conceived as an Art School graphic novel for the student Nick Park, before the Plasticene lure of movement and sound redirected the concept to the world of animation.

With the films a global multi-media phenomenon, the animator’s ingenious inventors went full circle bringing the dog and his old boy to cartoon album audiences. After years of perpetually pining for more Wallace & Gromit, the public were then given a big treat when Aardman and Titan Comics put their collective creative noggins together and produced a daily, full-colour comic strip to run in Red-Top tabloid The Sun.

Easily overcoming some early controversy about the suitability of the sometimes saucy venue, Wallace & Gromit debuted on Monday 17th May, 2010, establishing a regular weekly adventure format which comprised six complete, stand-alone gags in traditional format (three panels: Set-up, Delivery, Punchline!) that built to one full storyline.

The tone is always bright and breezy, inventive family fare with all the film-originated regulars in play and the emphasis squarely focused on weird science, appalling puns and the beloved traditions of British sitcoms and farce.

…And Cheese. Mountains and mountains of fermented milk-curd mirth…

Following a foreword of fond remembrance from animator and Aardman co-founder David Sproxton CBE, the witty workouts of nutty northern boffin Wallace and his incomparable best-of-breed working dog Gromit, in their preferred environs of scenic 62 West Wallaby Street, Wigan, start with ‘Library Mate 5000’ wherein a hastily constructed robotic shelf-filler soon proves too much for the staff and readers, after which ‘Pick of the Litter’ finds the likely lads inadvertently changing the nature and face of the Mayor’s clean-up campaign whilst the ‘Lazy Reader 3000’ proves no help at all when Wallace tries to bluff his way into wonderful Wendolene‘s new book club…

As ever there’s a host of howling in-jokes scattered throughout the strips such as scholarly Gromit’s quirky reading habits (Mansfield Bark, Bleak Doghouse, Larry Potter and the Half Blood Prince Charles Spaniel, etc…) as well as a glorious parade of pained and hangdog expressions on the haunted hound’s hard-pressed, long suffering snout, such as seen when a blow to the head inflicts Wallace with ‘Am-cheesy-a‘ or, after the inventor is happily restored to what passes for normal, he misconstrues a sewing moment at Wendolene’s shop for a frenzied scissors attack in ‘D is for Dummy’…

As always the strips are accompanied by a wealth of double-page photo-spreads taken from the original animated features and after the first of these the movie themes continue in ‘Not Matinee Idles’ when W & G take over a failing cinema and attempt to augment the viewing experience with a little technology…

‘The Umpire Strikes Back’ then finds the canny craftsman regretting building a tinker-toy tennis partner whilst a bit of a cellar clearout leads to a cash bonanza in ‘Car Boot’ prompting our heroes to open their own cleaning business utilising the formidable yet ultimately useless ‘Washinator 600′.

Following another photo-op poster the vacation season finds Wallace testing to destruction his cybernetic camping kit in ‘Climb Any Mountain’ and designing a most troublesome vegetable labyrinth in ‘Mazed and Confused’ before succumbing to the invention-proof vicissitudes of a British ‘Heatwave’. When that results in ‘Coughs and Sneezes’ good old Gromit proves more of a remedy than the robot nurse Wallace constructs…

A film set poster leads to a spate of camera creativity and the making of a remarkable ‘Home Movie’ before the lads head for ‘The Grand Tour of Cheese’. The first stop is naturally Wensleydale, after which week two finds them on the continent scouting out France and (mis)hap-pily stocking up on Camembert and Brie inevitably ending up in Holland for ‘The Grand Tour of Cheese #3’.

An intimate poster or Wallace in romantic mood segues neatly into the balding boffin’s brief flirtation with ‘Street Art’, physical fitness in ‘One Dog and his Man’, the perils of barbeque in ‘Garden Party’ and ballooning in ‘Pup Pup and Away’.

Wallace and Wendolene share an romantic poster moment before the comic capers resume with ‘Polly Wants a Cracker (with Cheese)’ as the boys try to capture an escaped Macaw, whilst a haircut for Gromit inspires a new grooming robot, but ends up in ‘Hairs and Disgraces’.

A scheme to build toys for kids in hospital goes strangely awry but ends well on Halloween in ‘Night of the Living Bears’, but there’s no such saving grace when Wallace devises a Magic-o-tron for children’s parties in ‘The Entertainer’. At least his chickens derive some benefit from the wildly inappropriate ‘Rooster Booster 800’…

An industrious photo-spread leads into a week of frantic fiddling with a mechanoid drinks dispenser in ‘Tea Party’, after which the lads turn their skills to trapping ‘The West Wallaby… Wallaby!’ and latterly solving traffic congestion with their mobile, multi-decker ‘Easy Parker’ garaging invention.

They then turn into detectorists to unearth a fabulous lost horde (of cheese) in ‘Treasure Hunters’ and, after another poster break, construct something to take the drudgery out of present shopping in ‘That’s a Wrap’ before foiling a bold robbery attempt by evil penguin Feathers McGraw in ‘T’was the Night Before Christmas…’

A cold snap offers an opportunity to make some dirty money with a chimney cleaning gimmick in ‘Soots You!’ and leads to a bout of hang-gliding in ‘Blown Off Course’, before – after another photographic interlude – ‘Driving Ambition’ details the inventor’s attempts to start his own mass transportation system.

‘Foreign Exchange’ introduces the lads’ oddly similar French cousins Waltier et Bagget whilst in ‘Encounters of the Furred Kind’ Gromit has a brush with a dog from outer space and saves his boss from a big mistake babysitting a python as part of his ‘Pet Hotel’ venture…

Following another poster ‘Bark Life’ depicts the duo’s dealings with a rowdy canine bully before those animated teddy bears pop up again as ‘Wallace’s Grizzly Valentines’, leading to much-needed break on the canals in ‘Straight and Narrow’, despite the boffin’s balmy barge improvements…

Wallace gets completely the wrong idea after attentive Miss Anita Goodman starts pursuing him in ‘Leaping to Conclusions’ and, following another poster-show, returns to sow more chaos through her unruly pet mutt Cuddles in ‘Gromit the Underdog’…

Wallace’s plans to improve Gromit’s favourite chair go predictably haywire in ‘Sofa So Good’ before the tinkerer takes up a new post teaching ‘Evening Classes’, and that short-lived endeavour necessitates a cycling tour only ruined by the inventor’s habit of “fixing” things which aren’t broken in ‘On Yer Bike’…

Easter brings an increased demand for baked goods which the bonkers brainbox tries to meet with his robotic ‘Hot Crossed Bunny’, after which he renovates an old bomber plane and takes the skies in ‘Wallace’s Wings’.

A stint in the Security business leads to skulduggery ‘Behind the Screams at the Museum’, jazzing up old horror films results in more neighbourhood terror in ‘Movie Night’ whilst Gromit eschews exercise for cunning and sheer luck to defeat a canine thug in ‘Dog Fight’ before a national holiday parade leads to out of control dragons and knightly nonsense to catch an fraudulent saint in ‘By George!’

Rounding out this annual of machine-based mirth are the tribulations of wasp nest removal in ‘Sting in the Tail’ and the greatest advancement in the noble game of Cricket ever misconceived with the invention of bombastic bowling machine the ‘Dibbly Dobbly 2000’…

This classy collection closes with informational feature ‘Tomb of the Unknown Artist’ which tells all but reveals nothing of the Creation-by-Committee process which realised (for this edition at least) the mirthful material name-checking scripters Richy Chandler, Robert Etherington, Ned Hartley, Rik Hoskin, David Leach, J.P. Rutter and Rona Simpson, illustrators Jimmy Hansen & Mychailo Kazybrid, inker Bambos and colourist John Burns, all empirically overseen by Aardman’s enigmatic Keeper of the Flame, Cheese and Biscuits: Tristan.

Britain has a grand tradition of converting popular entertainment stars into sterling and memorable comic strip fare which gloriously continues in these superbly inviting, hilariously pun-chy, picture-perfect mini-sagas.

Moreover, all those parents who deliberately avoided the strip because of the paper which carried it no longer have any excuse and should now make this collection a “must have” for the family bookshelf…

WALLACE & GROMIT, AARDMAN, the logos and all related characters and elements are © and ™ Aardman/Wallace & Gromit Ltd. 2014. All rights reserved.

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Modesty Blaise: The Grim Joker


By Peter O’Donnell & Enric Badia Romero (Titan Books)
ISBN: 978-1-78116-711-3

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: unmissable comics for fans of classic blockbusting adventure… 9/10

Modesty Blaise and her lethally adept, compulsively platonic partner Willie Garvin gained their fearsome reputations as top-flight super-criminals before retiring young, rich and healthy. With their honour intact and their hands relatively clean, they cut themselves off completely from a career where they made all the money they would ever need and far too many enemies.

When devious British Spymaster Sir Gerald Tarrant sought them out they were slowly dying of boredom in England. The wily old bird offered them a chance to have fun, get back into harness and do a bit of good in the world. They jumped at his offer and have been cleaning up the world in their own unique way ever since …

From that tenuous beginning in ‘La Machine’ (see Modesty Blaise: the Gabriel Set-Up) the dynamic duo went on to crush the world’s vilest villains and most macabre monsters in a perpetual storm of tense suspense and inspirational action for nearly forty years…

The inseparable associates first appeared in The Evening Standard on May 13th 1963 and over the decades went on to star in some of the world’s most memorable crime fiction, all in three panels a day.

Creators Peter O’Donnell & Jim Holdaway (who had previously collaborated on Romeo Brown) produced a timeless treasure trove of brilliant graphic escapades until the illustrator’s tragic early death in 1970, whereupon Spanish artist Enric Badia Romero (and, occasionally, others) assumed the art reins, taking the partners in peril to even greater heights.

The series has been syndicated world-wide and Modesty Blaise has also starred in 13 prose novels and short-story collections, several films, a TV pilot, a radio play, an American graphic novel and nearly one hundred comic strip adventures until the strip’s conclusion in 2002.

The tales are a broad blend of hip and cool capers combining espionage, crime, straight adventure and even – now and again – plausibly intriguing sci fi and supernaturally tinged horror genre fare, with ever-competent Modesty and Willie canny, deadly, yet all-too-fallible human defenders of the helpless and avengers of the wronged…

Reproduced in stark and stunning black & white – and quite right too – Titan Books’ superb and scrupulous serial re-presentations of the ultimate newspaper troubleshooters continue here with O’Donnell and Romero offering a chilling trio of tales spanning November 1992 to February 1994, each prefaced with informative prose introductions from devotee and historian Simon Ward.

The rollercoaster ride begins with eerie thriller ‘A Present for the Princess’ (originally seen in The Evening Standard from November 3rd 1992 to April 8th 1993) with Garvin deep in the emerald mining region of Montelero, near Colombia.

He is in search of raw materials to create another of his outrageously over-the-top gifts for Modesty and is prepared for trouble from the thugs and bandits who inhabit the region, but not his own partner and guide Ramon who is, after all, a former pal from their long-defunct crime combine The Network…

In England Modesty takes it easy whilst entertaining psychic researchers Steve and Dinah Collier – truly gifted individuals Tarrant wants to employ – who are happily on hand when Blaise has a nightmare premonition that Willie is in trouble.

As usual Garvin has told no one of his plans or destination and when Ramon attacked him had no hope of ever being found. However, the indomitable survivor escaped the ambush – barely – only to be washed up more dead than alive miles downriver. He was then nursed back to health by poor peon Rima: a young woman who looks astonishingly like Modesty.

Willie doesn’t recognise the fact though. The brutalised, battered Englishman has lost his memory…

Although his history is denied him Garvin’s deadly skills are intact and he jumps to the obvious conclusion that he is some kind of criminal. His actions disprove this notion, efficiently saving Rima from an abusive landowner and his thugs.

Although she has fallen for him the native girl knows his clouded mind is obsessed with another woman and she treks with him to the capital city Toccopina to obtain papers and possibly passage back to Britain…

At home, with Willie long overdue, Modesty has employed the Colliers and another psychic to search for him. Their endeavours have narrowed the search to the selfsame South American city. They have also resulted in an enigmatic prophecy…

Willie’s gift for card-playing has meanwhile won the wanderers a nice nest-egg but dropped him clueless amongst the city’s criminal element, most of whom have good reason to despise him.

After an old enemy recognises him, Willie is befriended by the wily conman and unknowingly “sold” to local mob boss Senor Strobel, who cunningly convinces the lethally talented amnesiac that he is an evil man wanted for murder who would only be safe if he rejoins the gang as a hit-man…

By the time Modesty arrives, Willie is safely tucked away in a fortress-like nest of bandits, where his inner self rebels from the acts he’s expected to perform. Naturally she has a plan to save her brother-in-arms and make all the guilty parties very sorry indeed…

Following that spectacular and explosive resolution, the tables are turned somewhat for ‘Black Queen’s Pawn’, a riotous African adventure yarn (April 13th – September 10th) which begins in 1834 when Ranavalona, autocratic and utterly insane queen of Madagascar, obtains a treasure guaranteed to make her immortal. She then hides it away from the eyes of mankind and, just to be sure, has every person who knew of it slaughtered…

Now one hundred and sixty years later hard times have befallen the island, as is clearly observed by veterinary surgeon Greg Lawton who has been commissioned by government officials to find a giant fossil egg.

He’s brought old chum Modesty with him, but when they reach the poverty-stricken village of Mandofo they find the place has been taken over by ruthless thugs on a treasure hunt.

The leader Koch has crossed swords with her before and convinces his murderous underlings not to kill the westerners out of hand. If she dies, nothing could stop the absent Willie Garvin hunting them down. Far better to keep her alive and on her best behaviour by holding innocent villagers hostage…

Forced into unwilling neutrality, Modesty and Greg befriend local missionary Father Brienne and discover the savage invaders are seeking Ranavalona’s legendary lost hoard for mysterious millionaire paymaster Salim. As the cleric is also Koch’s unwilling translator of ancient documents, he provides clues which enable Modesty to deduce where the treasure actually is…

The suspenseful standoff continues until Willie – acting on his own uncanny instincts – surprisingly joins the party, but with Garvin now here in front of them instead of lurking unsuspected at their heels, Koch and Salim decide to arrange a little accident.

However with the deadly détente effectively negated their targets know full well all bets are off and, after brilliantly locating the treasure for the gangsters, go on to prove just a bit smarter and more efficient in settling scores…

The addictive action concludes in a classic murder mystery which sees Modesty take a rare personal interest in a news sensation as Britain is gripped by a series of bizarre, baroque and flamboyant murders by a macabre psychopath signing himself ‘The Grim Joker’ (September 13th 1993 – February 9th 1994)…

The killer apparently devises convoluted, extremely public executions for sheer amusement but such callous slaughter for pleasure disgusts reluctant professionals such as Blaise and Garvin.

Soon they have made themselves prime targets for the maniac, unaware that the Grim Joker is not what he seems. The insanely Machiavellian exploits are in fact a cunning blind concocted by a trio of greedy brats eager to expedite an eventual inheritance.

Brothers Matthew and Mark Goodchild, along with their shared girlfriend Prudence, originally set up the crimes to divert suspicion after they decided to bump off their rich uncle, but as they carried out the string of publicity seeking murders, the thrill of achievement affected them.

Prudence especially has become intoxicated with the undertaking, and begs for more before topping their true target and retiring. Her wish is granted after Willie publicly ridicules the Grim Joker on television and arouses the righteous indignation of the brothers.

It’s all a cunning plan by the ex-Network leaders. After consulting old friend Police Inspector Brook, Modesty and Willie have correctly deduced that the crimes are the work of a team not a lone maniac, and Garvin has offered himself as a too-tempting follow-up target.

Relocating to an isolated Scottish island “for a holiday”, Willie makes himself available for his unknown foes, with Modesty concealed waiting to spring their trap.

Unfortunately they’re keeping watch for a couple of strong men, not the frail helpless girl who first washes up on the desolate death trap…

What follows is smart, chaotic and shatteringly thrill-a-minute excitement, before the dust finally settles and the final tally is taken…

These are incomparable capers crafted by brilliant creators at the peak of their powers; revelling in the sheer perfection of an iconic creation. Unforgettable romps packed with sleek sex appeal, dry wit, terrific tension and explosive action and, these stories grow more appealing with every rereading and never fail to deliver maximum impact and total enjoyment.

Modesty Blaise © 2014 Associated Newspapers/Solo Syndication.

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Wolverine and the X-Men: Tomorrow Never Learns


By Jason Latour, Mahmud Asrar, Mateo Lolli, Pepe Larraz, David Messina, Massimiliano Veltri, Marc Deering & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-610-6

Wolverine is all things to most people and in his long life has worn many hats; Avenger, Teacher, Protector, Punisher.

As leader of covert black ops (and frequently wetworks) unit X-Force he was responsible for executing many maverick mutants but experiences misplaced guilt and shared responsibility for sparing reborn mutant nemesis Apocalypse when he should by all rights have put down his kind’s ultimate foe…

Now that confused child of terrifying potential resides at the Jean Grey School for Higher Learning where even his fellow students find it hard to believe that love and a good education can overcome the legacy of death latent within the boy now called Evan…

Collecting issues #1-6 of Wolverine and the X-Men volume 2 (May – September 2014), this fast and furious saga finds the diminished mutant everyman abandoning his preferred role as trainer of the next generation in ‘Tomorrow Never Learns’ to drag old X-Force comrade Fantomex back from a self-imposed exile of torture and unending combat…

While he’s gone many of the latest class of students are undergoing a wave of communal angst prompted not just by Evan’s proximity and existence. Also adding to the tension is the chilling realisation that former fellow student Quentin “Kid Omega” Quire has been revealed (by a batch of X-Men from the future) to be the destined host of supernal cosmic ravager the Phoenix and by the simple, sobering fact that being an X-Man is tantamount to receiving a death sentence…

As Logan returns with Fantomex the next crisis commences in ‘Storm Chasers’ as a global ad campaign co-opting the image of the Phoenix lures Quentin into a devious trap. The mind behind the Phoenix Corporation has employed time-displaced warrior Faithful John to psychically destabilise the already troubled Omega mutant and even the late arriving Storm and Wolverine are unable to overcome the Tomorrow Soldier’s mental assaults and sheer physical prowess…

In ‘True Believers’, as John escapes the adult heroes and turns to attacking their school, Quentin is hotly debating his possible future with disciple of destruction Edan Younge who worships the Phoenix and only wants to help the true host live up to his cataclysmic, universe-rending potential…

Happily Quentin’s feisty not-girlfriend Oya is made of sterner stuff. With Wolverine out of action and whilst Quire brutally rebuffs Younge, she leads a squad of classmates against rampaging zealot John despite a wave psychic strikes which decimate the youthful defenders.

Kid Omega uses the opportunity to run for unlikely help ‘In the Land of the Blind…’, recruiting ideological opponents Cyclops and his Extinction Team to the battle, but even as Younge gloatingly discloses his ancient connections to the Phoenix to a dying Wolverine and hints of a hand guiding his own, Evan and the still traumatised Fantomex make their own off-kilter move on Faithful John in ‘Chekhov’s Gun’ before the shocking revelation of mastermind behind everything exposes the actual motivation behind the attacks in ‘A Fate Far Worse’…

Non-stop visceral action, smart characterisation, hilarious interplay and shocking suspense propel this explosive yarn from high-octane start to explosive finish and the frantic Fights ‘n’ Tights School Daze delights is complimented by a beautiful gallery of covers and variants by Asrar, Marte Gracia, Mark Brooks, Jenny Parks, Art Adams, Jorge Molina and Michael Del Mundo.

Also upping the entertainment ante are added extras provided by of AR icon sections (Marvel Augmented Reality App) which give access to story bonuses once you download the code – for free – from marvel.com onto your smart-phone or Android-enabled tablet.

™ & © 2014 Marvel & Subs. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. through Panini S.p.A. All rights reserved. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.

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Magneto: Infamous


By Cullen Bunn, Gabriel Hernandez Walta, Javier Fernandez & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-618-2

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Solid, Mature Superhero Storytelling… 8/10

Cover-dated September 1963, X-Men #1 introduced gloomy, serious Scott “Slim” Summers (Cyclops), ebullient Bobby Drake AKA Iceman, wealthy golden boy Warren Worthington III – codenamed Angel – and erudite, brutish genius Henry McCoy as The Beast.

These teens were very special students of Professor Charles Xavier, a wheelchair-bound telepath dedicated to brokering peace and achieving integration between the sprawling masses of humanity and Homo Superior: an emergent off-shoot race of mutants with incredible extra abilities.

That first issue also introduced their murderous and utterly evil arch nemesis Magneto: a terrifying and supremely powerful radical menace determined to seize the world for mutantkind and enslave or destroy humanity. The master of magnetism quickly became one of the early Marvel Universe’s A-List villains.

Over the years, however, a wealth of transformations, introspective investigations and personal re-evaluations turned the monster into a too-often misunderstood freedom fighter for his own kind and increasingly an ally of the ever-evolving X-Men.

Then, during the cataclysmic events of Avengers versus X-Men, staunch and steadfast Cyclops – transformed and possessed by the overwhelming Phoenix Force – killed his beloved father-figure Xavier and in the devastating aftermath united with former comrade Magik and occasional enemies Emma Frost and Magneto in a hard-line alliance devoted to preserving mutant lives at all costs: even, if necessary, by sacrificing human ones.

This new attitude appalled many of their former associates and created a schism in the ranks of Xavier’s many protégés.

The quartet instituted their own training academy – The New Charles Xavier School – and began drilling a new generation of mutants in the tactics of survival in a covert college dedicated to training mutants to fight and survive rather than placidly wait for mankind to turn on them.

The tutors, whose powers had all been radically curtailed in the battle against the Phoenix, also began a public campaign to win a place in the world for mutants, operated under the guise of terrorist group The Extinction Team.

Throughout his time with the group the war-weary elder continued to pay a deep game and, as this volume (collecting issues #1-6 of Magneto volume 3, March-July 2014) commences, he has left them and returned to old ways and his primary purpose…

Written by Cullen Bunn and grittily illustrated by Gabriel Hernandez Walta and Javier Fernandez, the tripwire-taut suspense begins in Missouri as witnesses describe a baroque and grotesque execution carried out by a man who could manipulate metal and who accused his victim of “crimes against evolution and genetic genocide”…

Magneto has used many names since his powers first manifested in a Nazi concentration camp during WWII, but now, with his once planet-wrecking potentialities reduced to merely moving around objects no heavier than a man could lift with flesh, bone and muscle, his priorities have changed. Now he is a creature of terror again, dealing final judgement to those who would eradicate mutants like some stain or mistake of nature…

Subject of a global manhunt by S.H.IE.L.D. – and lesser law-enforcement agencies – Magneto is restlessly travelling from region to region acting as a Homo Superior Punisher, protecting and avenging his people when human authorities can’t or won’t.

Now his travels have brought him to Mountain Air, California where a guilt-stricken vagrant has turned himself in after murdering three mutants. The magnetic menace is not prepared to leave such a killer to indifferent human justice…

However when he blasts into the Courthouse to administer his sentence the helpless, terrified indigent suddenly morphs into an Omega Sentinel and attacks him.

Quickly dispatching the cyborg mutant-hunter, the magnetic avenger is horrified to realise that the scared and totally bewildered human had no idea of the mechanical monster lurking within…

Whilst S.H.I.E.L.D Special Agents Rodriguez and Haines dog his heels, the master of magnetism backtracks the vagrant’s trail to a huge shanty-town where hundreds of dispossessed families cluster together, economic victims eking out a communal existence until they can break back into the society that abandoned them.

Welcomed as just another victim/loser to the spartan community of Down Acres, the punisher discovers that the tent city provokes long-buried memories of the Nazi-controlled Warsaw ghetto little Max Eisenhardt grew up in. The aged undercover vigilante realises that the same type of unfeeling monsters are at work here; kidnapping unwitting humans for raw materials and rebuilding them as stealth sentinels to hunt down mutants.

When the pressgang turns up to take more human fodder, Magneto is waiting…

By the time Haines and Rodriguez arrive, he is gone, following the Sentinel makers’ trail to a factory facility he will not allow to exist for one moment longer. However with his might so severely curtailed, the death and destruction he envisages has to be carried out at close quarters and preferably face-to-face…

His gory task concluded, Magneto travels to the Adirondack Mountains to destroy a secret base where religious fundamentalist sect The Purifiers experiment on mutant children before turning his angry attention to the constantly re-cloned mutant team known as The Marauders…

Human Briar Raleigh had been stalking Magneto for years. A survivor of one of his earlier rampages, the enigmatic manipulator offers her services to him as a skilled information-gatherer, providing data on the latest incarnation of Marauders for her own unspecified reasons.

The Marauders are all mutants, servants of genetic zealot Mr. Sinister, tasked with eradicating the crazed biologist’s failed experiments and anybody he considers a threat or valueless. The number of their own people they have callously slaughtered is incalculable and Magneto dearly wants to find these too-long unchecked race-traitors.

Entering into a cautious alliance with Briar, Magneto meticulously and permanently deals with Scalphunter, Prism, Scrambler, Arclight, Harpoon, Riptide and Blockbuster but simply executing the oft-cloned killers is not his ultimate goal. By finding where the next generation are maturing and deftly reprogramming them, the mutant avenger expects to add to his own growing arsenal of resources…

To Be Continued…

Non-stop visceral action, shocking suspense and a roaring sense of social injustice underpin this excessively grim and noir-tinted saga, exploring a savage genetic realpolitik that will astound and engage readers from bleak start to explosive finish.

This compulsive read also includes a gallery of covers and variants by Paolo Rivera, Chris Samnee & Matthew Wilson, Declan Shalvey & Jordie Bellaire, John Cassaday, Michael Del Mundo, Gurihiru Studios, Skott Young, Jerome Opena, Mark Brooks and Stephanie Hans plus added extras provided by AR icon sections (Marvel Augmented Reality App) which give access to story bonuses once you download the code – for free – from marvel.com onto your smart-phone or Android-enabled tablet.
™ & © 2014 Marvel & Subs. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. through Panini S.p.A. All rights reserved. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.

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Superman Annual 2015


By Joshua Hale, Dan Abnett, Andy Lanning, Rob Williams, Todd Seavey, Joelle Jones, Wes Craig, Chris Weston, Chris Jones, Craig Yeung, Al Nickerson & various (Titan Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-78276-190-7

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: What Every Kid Deserves… 8/10

The first British Superman Annual was for 1951, a power packed mono-colour monolith that introduced a legion of kids to the decidedly different American style of comic strips. It opened the floodgates to a tidal wave of other DC characters ranging from Tommy Tomorrow to Detective Chimp.

By the end of the 1970s the Superman (and Batman) Christmas editions were a slim and slight shadow of their former bumper selves, even though during the mid-1980s a new crop of editors and designers found a way to invigorate and add value to the tired tomes.

The perennial favourites’ fortunes waxed and waned as different companies attempted to reinvent the tradition but sadly the “World’s Finest” superheroes disappeared completely from British stockings for most of the 21st century.

Thankfully the Cape & Cowl tradition was revived by Titan Books last year and the current crop are ready to liven up a few more Christmas mornings…

This book is the 37th annual for the Action Ace (not counting a series of five combination Superman and Batman tomes for 1975-1978) and the publishers have again wisely catered to the characters’ small and larger screen presence throughout.

The majority of tales collected here come from the continuity-neutral original webcomic Adventures of Superman (#2 and 4, August and October 2013) with material and features from Superman: Secret Files and Origins plus a cool bonus story starring the World’s Greatest Superheroes from the TV spin-off Justice League Adventures #5.

The “Never-ending Battles” begin with ‘Slow News Day’ by Joshua Hale & Joelle Jones wherein a friendly “scoop” contest between rival reporters Lois and Clark inexplicably draws the Man of Tomorrow into the most hectic and annoying day of his life, after which a fulsome fact feature by James Robinson, Sterling Gates & Pete Woods provides everything you need to know about the vast and fascinating city of ‘Metropolis’.

Next Dan Abnett, Andy Lanning, Wes Craig & Craig Yeung reveal ‘A Day in the Life’, offering a sneaky peek inside the disturbed mind of Lex Luthor as the bonkers billionaire daydreams ways to kill his greatest foe, before another tranche of fact-files (by Geoff Johns & Francis Manapul) delivers the lowdown on both Luthor and space scourge Brainiac.

‘Saviour’ (Rob Williams & Chris Weston from Adventures of Superman #4) contrasts the frantic infallible Man of Steel’s battle against a bevy of super freaks with the loving homeboy who likes to visit with his mum in Kansas, before ‘The Daily Planet’ staff come under the fact-file spotlight courtesy of Gates, Jamal Igle & Jon Sibal, and Johns & Manapul provide the same information overload for superdog ‘Krypto’.

Wrapping up the story portion of this thrilling tome is ‘The Star-Conqueror’ (Todd Seavey, Chris Jones & Al Nickerson from Justice League Adventures #5, May 2002) wherein Superman, Green Lantern John Stewart, Hawkgirl, Flash and Wonder Woman voyage to a distant planet to liberate the population from the mental domination of stellar horror Starro…

With a final fact file on ‘Supergirl’ by Gates & Igle and big, bold cover/pin-ups by John Delaney, Rob Leigh & Bruce Timm, this stunningly seductive and engaging oversized (292 x 227mm) hardback bonanza is a perfect treat for comicbook buffs that will delight and dazzle young and old alike.

Superman and all other characters featured in this book and the distinctive likenesses thereof are ™ DC Comics, Inc. Superman created by Jerry Siegel & Joe Shuster. By special arrangement with the Jerry Siegel family. Used with permission all rights reserved. © 2002, 2009, 2013, 2014 DC Comics, a Warner Bros. Entertainment Company. All rights reserved.

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X-Men: Bloodline


By Brian Wood, Matteo Buffagni, Phil Briones, Clay Mann, Gerardo Sandoval,Seth Mann, Paco Diaz & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-622-9

Since its revival in 1975 Marvel’s Mutant franchise has always strongly featured powerful and often controversial female characters, so when the fourth volume of the adjectiveless X-Men launched it was no real surprise to see that the leading line-up comprised exclusively women warriors.

This third collected chronicle, scripted by Brian Wood, re-presents issues #13-17 (from April to July 2014) – a spectacular, all-action five-part thriller ‘Bloodlines’ lavishly illustrated by Matteo Buffagni, Clay & Seth Mann, Gerardo Sandoval and Paco Diaz.

In recent times vampire mutant Jubilation Lee turned up at the Jean Grey School for Higher Learning as a devoted new mother to mystery baby Shogo.

A littler later, in a clash with mutants from the future, Storm’s teenaged daughter appeared, apparently deeply involved with a grown-up Shogo and after the time-bending clash concluded, Kymera opted to stay in our time-period for unspecified reasons of her own.

Now a few of that wonder baby’s secrets are revealed when, in a distant land, the most dangerous man on Earth slaughters his way out of an inescapable jail and heads for America, determined at all costs to reclaim his baby boy…

At the Jean Grey School Jubilee is attending her baby’s latest check-up with resident mutant medical savant Henry McCoy. The Beast has good news about Shogo but is concerned over the foster mother’s state of mind…

The quiet times then end suddenly when one of the students playing in the school grounds is shot by a sniper…

As the facility goes into immediate lock-down and McCoy begins operating to save Primal‘s life, another student – Sprite – is suddenly struck down by a mystery toxin and Jubilee receives a text message threatening death for everyone unless she surrenders Shogo. It is signed “The Future”…

The first three issues also contained a supplementary back-up tale illustrated by Wood & Phil Briones.

Eager to help, a band of older boys head for the Danger Room to prove to combat tutor Psylocke that they are ready to graduate to the big leagues and front lines during this current crisis. However, the ‘Bromo-Superior’ squad of Hellion, Rockslide, Broo and Anole find they may have bitten off more than they can chew against an army of orcs and monsters after Psylocke turns off all the safeguards and makes the test “pass or die”…

Back at the main event wonder woman Monet St. Croix and Marvel Girl Rachel Grey (the alternate Earth daughter of Cyclops and Jean Grey) have tracked down and captured the shooter even as The Beast, out of safe options, opts to use denatured genetic material from ancient alien meteor-borne infection and über-predator Arkea (see X-Men: Primer) to repair the damage done to Sprite and Primal.

It is not a decision he makes lightly…

In a quiet alcove Storm presses the stranger who will be her daughter for information and learns that the threat of The Future is the reason she stayed in this fluid time before her birth. Knowing what the child-obsessed assassin will do, she has gambled everything on changing the past – even if it means committing murder and suicide.

As Kymera’s plan begins, however, the school shudders to a wave of cataclysmic explosions…

In the wake of the destruction the girl from tomorrow briefs Storm and her team on the exact nature of what she’s resolved to prevent and fateful plans are laid to end that fate, whatever the cost…

Unfortunately it all seems futile as, when the seemingly unbeatable assassin makes his move, he cuts through the defenders like a scythe through ripe wheat and casually makes off with Jubilee: a perfect hostage to trade for his boy…

With their testing over, the battered but unbowed Bromo-Superior squad break the fully recovered Primal and Sprite out of the infirmary and – with Psylocke surprisingly backing them – convince Storm to let them all join the pursuit team. The undisputed leader of this latest band of mutant warriors is determined that the future she has heard described will never occur, and if that means blooding the next generation under full combat conditions, then that’s what has to happen…

The trail leads deep into the Adirondack Mountains where The Future and his slavish cult of killers have initiated a deadly prototype techno-organic defence-system. “Bloodline” uses the maniac’s own ichor to animate and turn the environment into a savagely hostile geological attack-dog which psychically renders most of the mutants helpless, but when the fanatical father demands his “property” back in return for Jubilee, Kymera uses little Shogo to pull a supremely risky masterstroke…

With a gallery of covers by Terry & Rachel Dodson, Briones and Paul Renaud, this fast and furious adventure offers clever characterisation, wry laughs, taut tension and a colossal amount of comicbook carnage in a no-nonsense rollercoaster romp of Fights ‘n’ Tights fun mutant mavens and Costumed Drama addicts will adore.
™ & © 2014 Marvel & Subs. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. through Panini S.p.A. All rights reserved. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.

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Batman Annual 2015


By Ivan Cohen, Jim Zubkavich, Matthew Manning, Luciano Vecchio, Neil Googe, Dario Brizuela & various (Titan Comics)

ISBN: 978-1-78276-189-1

A staple of Christmas mornings since the early 1950s, Seasonal annuals featuring DC superstars (generally Superman and Batman plus a few other less enduring icons) slowly became a shadow of themselves as the 20th century concluded.

By the end of the 1970s the Superman and Batman Christmas books were a slim and slight shadow of their former bumper selves, even though during the mid-1980s a new crop of editors and designers found a way to invigorate and add value to the tired tomes.

The perennial favourites’ fortunes waxed and waned as different companies attempted to reinvent the tradition but sadly the “World’s Finest” superheroes disappeared completely from British stockings for most of the 21st century.

Thankfully they were revived by British sequential arts bastion Titan Books last year and the current crop are ready and waiting to liven up a few more Christmas mornings…

The first Batman annual was dated 1960, with two separate publishers releasing Holiday collections during the heydays of “Batmania”, and this current one is the thirty-fifth (not counting a series of five combination Superman and Batman tomes for 1975-1978) and the publishers have again wisely played up the characters’ small and larger screen presence throughout.

Most of the stories and features are taken from the US comicbook tie-in to the tragically controversial CGI television series Beware the Batman; specifically #2-5 from January to April 2014, with a particularly tasty “in-continuity” comics bonus from Legends of the Dark Knight 100-page Super Spectacular #1, (December 2013).

The power-packed peril kicks off with ‘Son of Man-Bat’ by Ivan Cohen & Luciano Vecchio wherein the still barely qualified Caped Crusader, two-fisted butler Alfred and junior assistant Katana become embroiled in a comedy of errors when monstrous mutate Man-Bat begins another midnight rampage of terror and destruction.

However, thanks to the timely assistance of Commissioner Gordon‘s daughter Barbara (who moonlights as clandestine information analyst Oracle), it soon becomes clear that the leathery-winged horror terrorising the city is not Kirk Langstrom but a little kid who was in the wrong place when the afflicted scientist was testing out the latest cure for his mutation…

Soon the Batman and his eerie counterpart are hunting together and the desperate Langstrom is forced to choose between using his one shot at redemption on himself or a stupid, innocent child…

Next up is quirky psychological thriller ‘Diagnosis’ (by Jim Zubkavich & Neil Googe, originally seen in Legends of the Dark Knight 100-page Super Spectacular #1) which sees the Gotham Gangbuster in a tense standoff with former psychologist Harleen Quinzel. As Harley Quinn the demented Joker-groupie has Batman in a bad situation that he can only escape by allowing her to psychoanalyse him, but the daffy death-dealer has completely underestimated the hero’s determination and ingenuity…

Being a British Christmas book there’s a sheaf of extra features and the DC Nation Secret File lowdown on Catwoman nicely clears the emotional palate for the final comics clash as ‘Rule of Three’ (by Matthew Manning & Dario Brizuela from Beware the Batman #2) offers the origins of Batman, Alfred and Katana as backdrop to the shocking tale of a family visiting Gotham who are incomprehensibly targeted by psychotic eco-maniac Professor Pyg.

The porcine plunderer has no idea of the storm he has provoked by trying to deprive a small boy of his parents…

The mayhem and magic then wraps up with a DC Nation Secret File on Gotham gang boss Black Mask…

This fabulously engaging oversized (292 x 227mm) hardback bonanza, stuffed with additional big, bold pin-ups and portraits, is an impressive tome that will be of much interest to aging chronic nostalgists like me, but will also delight and enthral the younger members of your clan – the ones you can’t quiet down with a shot of hooch and a Great Escape DVD…
© 2013, 2014 DC Comics, a Warner Bros. Entertainment Company. All rights reserved.