Category: Miscellaneous Superhero

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Battling Boy

(Uncorrected Proof Copy)

By Paul Pope (First Second)
ISBN: 978-1-59643-145-4

Paul Pope is undoubtedly one of the most creative and visually engaging creators working in comics these days. Since his debut in 1993 he has stunningly combined elements of European and Japanese styles with classical American themes to produce tales of science fiction, fantasy, crime, comedy, romance, adventure and even superheroics, generally for mature audiences.

If you’re not a fan yet, check out Sin Titulo, Batman: Year 100, Heavy Liquid, 100%, One Trick Ripoff and more…

This latest venture, however, is aimed a general readership – Hey, Kids, This Means You! – and introduces a world very similar to our own but with one big, big difference…

Arcopolis City would be the perfect place to bring up kids but for one thing. Ghastly devils roam at night, stealing children. Even the days are increasingly fraught as a seemingly endless procession of monstrous beasts incessantly carves a swathe of mindless destruction through the bright, breezy thoroughfares…

Of course the valiant sentinels of the Fighting 145th do their very best to contain the daily onslaughts, but it is to jet-packed, ray-gun-wielding science hero Haggard West that the harried citizens look to end the crisis. Those heartfelt hopes are cruelly dashed, however, when hooded horror Sadisto lays a crafty trap and blasts the magnificent rocket-man out of the sky…

His daughter and apprentice Aurora is shattered as she watches her dad vanish in a blast of blazing plasma…

Entire universes away, a shining citadel of warrior deities celebrates a very special event as the greatest pantheon of dutiful cosmic champions in the universe revels in the brief return of their mightiest hero. The stormy saviour of many worlds is back to see his son, who has reached a very special age…

The Boy is not ready for his Turning Day. Even if every child born here is invariably sent into the cosmos on their 13th birthday to save some lesser race from imminent peril on the venerable quest known as “a Ramble”, he knows he isn’t strong enough yet. After all, many of his childhood comrades have never returned…

As usual, though, his puissant father knows best and the anxious lad (armed with a very special cloak, battle grieves, the Encyclopedia Monstrosity, keys to an apartment, a map, a magic credit card and a dozen totem tee-shirts) is booted out of the veritable Valhalla of the Starry Lofts and dumped on a mountaintop overlooking a seemingly continent-sized city …just as a homogonous Humbaba rampages through Arcopolis eating cars and crushing tanks…

Before hurtling off to another appointment with destiny, the lad’s proud father casually reminds his spooked scion that if his “Battling Boy” cannot end the plague of monsters on this world, humanity is finished here…

Even as Aurora West begins to unlock the secrets of her father’s legacy and keenly embrace her own dreamed of destiny, the reluctant young demi-god makes his way to the epicentre of chaos and engages the ferocious furious Humbaba.

Things do not go according to plan…

Wry, spectacular and astonishingly engaging, this is a supremely entertaining, beautifully rendered yarn with plenty of fast-paced action, judicious suspense, likable heroes and a gloriously arch villain in the Machiavellian Sadisto, whose subtle scams and unlikely alliances stretch far beyond this blockbusting premiere epic.

This is an ideal comic book for older kids, and reads even better if you’re their adult keeper or guardian. Don’t miss out on the start of something very special…
© 2013 by Paul Pope. All rights reserved.

Battling Boy will be published on October 8th 2013.

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The Dragon: Blood and Guts


By Jason Pearson & Karl Story & various (Image Comics)
ISBN: 1-887279-10-5

In the fan-led, gimmick-fed early 1990s a group of young, ambitious comics-creators suddenly realised that they had a proven popular profile and all the power in the dwindling American marketplace. So they formed a co-operative company dubbed Image Comics and produced a welter of titles and characters their way…

For a while the co-operative’s stripped-down, post-modern, deconstructed output held collectors, if not always readers, in a frenzy of mass-consumption, but eventually the bubble burst and much of the material – ranging from derivative to frankly appalling – disappeared.

There was, naturally, a backlash, but when the dust settled old gits like me, who loved strong stories as well as pretty pictures, took another peek and realised that many of the surviving titles actually had something worth looking at.

One of the best and most consistently engaging titles was The Savage Dragon by Erik Larsen: a creator who never clearly forgot that although death-drenched, multi-layered epics and the continual angsty beating of meaty male chests was fine, bombastic action, strong traditional storytelling and wry humour never pall…

The Dragon is a bulky green bruiser with a giant fin on his head who woke up in a burning Chicago field one night: super-strong, exceedingly durable and with no memory of who or what he really was.

With no visible means of support but essentially a moral man, he enlisted in the police force just as a wave of super-criminals and manic monsters started appearing to menace the troubled citizens of the Windy City…

The series is Image Comics’ Great Survivor; continuously published since the first miniseries hit comic shops in 1992 and still the longest running full-colour American comicbook produced by a single artist/writer. In 1995 the series was adapted as a TV cartoon show running for two seasons.

I really must get around to reviewing the series some day, but here however I’m choosing to focus on a fabulous fun-filled diversion by Larsen’s associate Jason Pearson, who scripted and pencilled this deliciously over-the-top 3-issue miniseries with the deft assistance of  inker Karl Story (& chums) as well as colourists Reuben Rude & Antonia Kohl and letterer Chris Eliopoulos.

At this time the marvellously down-to-earth Dragon had just lost his girlfriend Debbie – murdered by her crazy ex-boyfriend – and the Pistachio Powerhouse was determined to drink himself into oblivion, something his partner, occasional lover and regular, human hard-assed cop Alex Wilde was determined to prevent…

She got some unexpected help from the ever-unwelcome FBI when utterly obnoxious Agent Sheridan breezed into town demanding Chicago’s super-cop act as bodyguard to a crucial witness in a Federal case.

Alicia Cordova married the wrong guy. Not just because he’s a wife-beating criminal scumbag but because he’s also the super-powered top-ranking assassin dubbed “Grip”. Her testimony will put him away and expose the powerful clients he worked for… if she can get to the court alive. Moreover this time it’s not just her own health she’s got to consider…

Dragon just doesn’t care anymore and quits the force rather than work with an arrogant, manipulative creep like Sheridan, who exhibits some unusual tendencies of his own after shrugging off an extremely physical rebuke from the furious fin-head.

Meanwhile in a church, Grip and his gang of psychos are having fun, killing time – and the congregation – until their spy gets back from police headquarters…

After Dragon storms out Alex is determined to help. Maybe it’s because she went to school with Alicia, or maybe there’s something more going on. Dragon’s former boss Chief Wisenberg certainly thinks so…

Chapter two (with additional inking from Jason Martin, Aurora Chen, Cully Hamner, Brian Stelfreeze, Rick Mays & Drew Garaci) opens with a tense armoured-car ride already underway, carrying Wilde, Sheridan and three SWAT guys as well as the terrified Cordova to her final destination. Things start to go crazy when The Dragon busts in and commandeers the vehicle, forcing it to change routes.

He was almost in time…

Unfortunately Grip and his motorbike riding cronies are already trailing the van and their attack is sudden and devastating…

Despite being nigh-invulnerable Dragon can’t fully resist Grip’s death-touch and even though the brutal battle leaves the contract-killer with his eye shot out, the attacking assassins successfully make off with Alicia. In the body-bestrewn aftermath Sheridan is just too quick to close the case, though, making Wilde and the mint-green monolith wonder if some of those potentially exposed clients might include certain Governments…

Convinced Alicia is still alive and now certain who their real enemy is, the outraged cops go on one last blistering mission to take down the bad-guys and save the day whatever the cost…

Superbly synthesising and utilising all those much abused, old clichés of gritty cop/ mindless action movies, Pearson and crew have produced here a wonderfully sharp, no-nonsense, guns-a-blazing thriller made all the more realistic by the fact that the leading man actually is a bad-tempered, bulletproof gung-ho hero.

This is sheer visceral, cathartic fun that never takes itself seriously but goes all-out to blast you out of your seat with frantic, frenzied fun and beautifully rendered mayhem.
The Dragon & Alex Wilde © and ™ 1995 Erik Larson. All other characters © their respective creators or owners. All rights reserved.

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The Umbrella Academy volume 2: Dallas


By Gerard Way & Gabriel Bá (Dark Horse)
ISBN: 978-1-59582-345-8

Superheroes have been around long enough now that they’ve been able to evolve into different sub-sets: straight Save-the-World continuity types as championed by DC and Marvel, obsessively “real” or realist iterations such as Marvelman, Crossfire or Kick-Ass, comedic spins like Justice League International or She-Hulk and some rare ducks that straddle a few barstools in between.

Addressing the same Edgy, Catastrophic Absurdism as Grant Morrison’s Doom Patrol, the archly anti-didactic antics of The Umbrella Academy offered readers a subtly subversive take on the idiom which impressed the heck out of everybody and lured many disillusioned fans back to the pitifully tired and over-used genre when first released…

This second collected volume gathers the frenzied fantastical follow-up 6-issue miniseries as well as an offering a chance to see the 8-page online yarn from MySpace Dark Horse Presents #12.

Once upon a time a strange event occurred. All across Earth, 43 babies were unexpectedly born as the result of apparent immaculate conceptions – or perhaps some kind of inexplicable parthenogenesis.

The births even surprised the mothers, most of whom discarded, abandoned, sold or had adopted their unexpected, terrifying newborns.

Notorious scientist entrepreneur and closet extraterrestrial Sir Reginald Hargreeves, inventor of the Levitator, mobile umbrella communicator, Clever Crisp cereal, Televator and a process which enabled chimps to speak had a secret plan, and he knew the kids would all be special. He thus acquired seven of these miracle babies for an undisclosed purpose, subsequently rearing and training the children to become his private superhero team to enact it.

He was in no way a “good” parent…

The callously experimental family, after a spectacular early career eventually proved to be unmanageable and the Umbrella Academy – created and trained “to save the World” – sundered in grief and acrimony, but not before poor Ben, Number 6 AKA “The Horror”, pointlessly lost his brave young life and Number 5 “The Boy” took a short trip into the future and never came back…

The surviving members of the utterly dysfunctional superhero team parted but were reunited twenty years later when the news broke that Hargreeves – whose nom de guerre was The Monocle – had died…

In the interim, Number 1 son Luther became an off-earth defender and pioneer, so hideously damaged by a doomed journey to Mars that to save him, Hargeeves had grafted The Spaceboy‘s head onto the body of a colossal Martian Gorilla.

Poor, neglected Vanya, whose musical gifts Hargreeves deemed utterly useless, became a drop-out and wrote a scandalous tell-all book before becoming a voluntary exile amidst Earth’s lowest dregs. When Number 7 returned she was again rejected by her “family” and summarily seduced by a manic musician who unleashed her true potential and almost destroyed the world with her untapped power…

The Boy returned after sixty years of ranging through the time-stream and materialised in the body of the ten-year old he had been, However, his physical form was frozen and he stopped aging at that moment…

Favourite friend, technologist, housekeeper, actual lifelong care-giver and talking chimp Dr. Pogo had died in Vanya’s – or rather The White Violin‘s – apocalyptic attack which had left Allison (Number 3, The Rumor) with her throat severed, apparently forever deprived of her talent for warping reality with a word…

Diego (Number 2, The Kraken) remained the obsessive scary vigilante psychopath he’d always been but Klaus (Number 4, The Séance) was even weirder than before: a floating, shoeless space-case who talked to the dead and pulled the wings off the laws of physics…

Once upon a time, long ago and whilst still children, the UmbrellaAcademy saved WashingtonDC from an animated and extremely angry Lincoln Memorial. They’ve had an odd relationship with American Presidents ever since…

Now having saved the entire world from prophesied destruction, the dysfunctional quintet are at a loss and killing time in the rubble of their old home: Luther zones out watching TV, Klaus pampers himself, Diego keeps busy assaulting various underworld ne’er-do-wells, and maimed Allison offers rather radical treatment to amnesiac Vanya.

Only The Boy is really busy as he deals mercilessly with yet another attempt by chronal cops of the Temps Aeternalis to make him fulfil the mission they recruited and rebuilt him for.

In ‘The Jungle’ of the modern world nobody is a more apex predator than the time-locked tyke, but his former masters are adamant he should fulfil his purpose and send in their most dreaded expediters Hazel and Cha-Cha…

‘Boy Scouts’ sees The Kraken and Police Inspector Lupo closing in on the mystery assailant leaving dismembered bodies all over the city – and slowly becoming aware how little they really know about the fortuitously returned Number 5 – whilst billionaire John Perseus arrives back in town with a most mysterious crate which definitely bodes badly for all humanity….

It’s The Rumour who actually tracks down The Boy and gets to the truth even as the unstoppable Hazel and Cha-Cha make their first gory move…

‘Television or Are You There, God? It’s Me, Klaus’ sees The Séance desperately seeking assistance before succumbing to the time-tossed, sugar-crazed killer couple as the horrific story of The Boy comes out.

Temps Aeternalis spent a lot of time and effort upgrading the kid into the perfect assassin for difficult, history-altering missions and even after a relative eternity of brutal successes they still need him for the Big One.

Dallas 1963…

Klaus, meanwhile, has moved on and is chatting with the Big Guy in Heaven when Luther becomes Hazel and Cha-Cha’s next target in the campaign to get the rebellious Number 5 to do what he was re-made for. If the world is to survive Kennedy must die – but Number 5 just won’t play ball and reality is beginning to suffer…

A countdown to nuclear Armageddon starts ticking as ‘A Perfect Life’ finds the separated Hargreeves clan all zeroing in on yet another end of the world and taking extraordinary steps to stop it.

Rumour and the Boy for example, ally themselves with the Temps Aeternalis and agree to personally stop The Boy (the other one but it’s really him too, see) whereas Luther, Diego and the freshly resurrected Klaus opt for a straight time-jaunt to the kill-zone to lay in ambush.

Sadly they miss by years and have to wait a bit for their plan to come to fruition in ‘All the Animals in the Zoo’ before all the alternate Earth craziness is superbly made sensible and satisfactorily wrapped up in the deviously bravura climax of ‘The World is Big Enough Without You’…

Also included are an Introduction from Neil Gaiman, a brace of Afterwords by Way and Bá (‘Texas is the Reason’ and ‘Rock ‘n’ Roll’ respectively) and a short revelatory glimpse at the rebellious teen years of Vanya and Diego and their punk band The Prime 8s in the deeply moving ‘Anywhere but Here’ from MySpace Dark Horse Presents #12 (July 2007).

This volume concludes with more fascinating behind-the-scenes secrets of ‘Designing the Umbrella Academy’.

Whilst happily swiping, homaging, sampling and remixing the coolest elements from many and varied comics sources, The Umbrella Academy created a unique synthesis and achieved its own distinctive originality within the tired confines of the superhero genre. It’s a reading experience no jaded comics fan should miss.
Text and illustrations of the Umbrella Academy ™ © 2008, 2009 Gerard Way. All rights reserved.

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The UmbrellaAcademy volume 1: Apocalypse Suite


By Gerard Way & Gabriel Bá (Dark Horse)
ISBN: 978-1-59307-978-9

Superheroes have been around long enough now that they’ve been able to evolve into different sub-sets: straight Save-the-World continuity types as championed by DC and Marvel, obsessively “real” or realist iterations such as Marvelman, Masked Man, Crossfire or Kick-Ass, comedy versions like Justice League International, Ambush Bug, Deadpool or She-Hulk and some rare ducks that straddle a few barstools in between.

Cut from the same cloth of Edgy, Catastrophic Absurdism as Scott McCloud’s Zot!, Brendan McCarthy’s Paradax or Grant Morrison’s Doom Patrol and Flex Mentallo, the archly anti-didactic antics of The Umbrella Academy offered readers a subtly subversive take on the idiom which impressed the heck out of everybody and lured many disillusioned fans back to the pitifully tired and over-used genre when first released…

This debut collected volume gathers the initial 6-issue miniseries as well as a 2-page online tease from MySpace Dark Horse Presents and an introductory short story from the company’s Free Comic Book Day issue in 2007.

Once upon a time a strange event occurred. All across Earth 43 babies were unexpectedly born as the result of apparent immaculate conceptions – or perhaps some kind of inexplicable parthenogenesis. The births even surprised the mothers, most of whom abandoned or put up for immediate adoption their terrifying newborns.

Seven of these miracle babies were acquired by esteemed inventor and entrepreneur Sir Reginald Hargreeves. The inventor of the Levitator, mobile umbrella communicator, Clever Crisp cereal, Televator and a process which enabled chimps to speak was in actuality an over-achieving alien with a secret plan, and he raised the children to become superheroes to enact it.

He was not a good or caring parent…

The callously experimental family, after a number of early spectacular successes such as ‘The Day the Eiffel Tower Went Berserk’, soon proved to be unmanageable and the Umbrella Academy – created and trained “to save the World” – sundered in grief and acrimony, but not before poor Ben, Number 6 or “The Horror”, pointlessly lost his brave young life and Number 5 “The Boy” took a short trip into the future and never came back…

An utterly dysfunctional superhero team, the children parted, but now, twenty years later, the surviving members of the squad gather again at the news that Hargreeves – whose nom de crime was The Monocle – has died…

In the interim, Number 1 son Luther became an off-earth defender and pioneer, but was hideously damaged on a doomed journey to Mars. To save him, The Monocle grafted his head onto the body of a colossal Martian Gorilla but the “Spaceboy” found it far easier to live alone on the Moon than stay with his saviour.

Poor, neglected Vanya however, whose musical gifts Hargreeves deemed utterly useless, became a drop-out and wrote a scandalous tell-all book before becoming a voluntary exile amidst Earth’s lowest dregs…

In ‘We Only See Each Other at Weddings and Funerals’ the disparate clan gathers and Luther discovers The Boy has returned, looking not a day different. He isn’t – but his mind is sixty years old and has experienced horrors beyond all imagining…

Made welcome by technologist, housekeeper and talking chimp Dr. Pogo, Luther is startled by the return of Allison (Number 3, The Rumor). She’s changed a lot since her marriage – although she’s now single again – but Diego (Number 2, The Kraken) and Klaus (Number 4, The Séance) are just the same: physically mature but still completely, scarily demented…

The interment ceremony is a complete fiasco and descends into a brawl, but the savage bitterness the family exhibits towards each other is as nothing compared to the carnage caused by the arrival of merciless robotic Terminauts tasked with stopping the Umbrella Academy reforming at any cost…

Across town, poor forgotten Vanya has an audition with some very special musicians. The Orchestra Verdammten need only the best if their unconventional maestro, The Conductor is to perfectly premiere his latest opus – The Apocalypse Suite…

As the reluctantly reunited Academy fall into old habits and dash off to save innocents from slaughter, The Boy drops his last bombshell: in the future he’s returned from, Earth was destroyed three days after the Monocle died…

Built by a long-vanquished foe, the killer mechanoids are ‘Dr. Terminal’s Answer’ to the pesky kids who ruined his plans, although they don’t fare well against Spaceboy, Rumor Séance and The Kraken.

Dr. Pogo has stayed to examine The Boy and finds him exceedingly strange: a 60-year old mind wearing a 10-year old body that hasn’t aged a single second since it reappeared. There’s even stranger stuff going on which the monkey medic can’t detect, though…

Diego never stopped fighting monsters and has become a darkly driven vigilante, who even now has ignored the flamboyant threat of the robots to save imperilled kids. However when Vanya – fresh from fleeing the deranged Conductor – stumbles into the conflagration he disparages her; calling her useless, just like Hargreeves used to.

As her strange siblings wrap things up and return to the puzzle of exactly how the Earth will end in a matter of days, the dejected, rejected Number 7 returns to The Orchestra Verdammten…

Subjected to outrageous experiments in ‘Baby, I’ll be Your Frankenstein’, Vanya is quickly transformed into a finely-tuned instrument to shatter reality, even as Pogo and The Boy stop for coffee and meet time-travelling trouble.

…And at the Icarus Theatre, the once disregarded and discarded White Violin makes her deadly, devastating debut…

At a certain Diner, distressed waitress Agnes tells Police Inspector Lupo how a veritable army of futuristic thugs were reduced in seconds to scarlet shreds and tatters by a little boy who politely said ‘Thank You for the Coffee’ before leaving with his chimpanzee friend. Lupo has endured a long and difficult unofficial association with ruthless avenger Kraken which has kept the city’s worst criminals from running riot, but when the old cop casually remarks that a lot of violinists have suddenly vanished even he is quite unprepared for the vigilante’s reaction…

The family gathers at the Academy: Luther and The Rumor slowly rekindling a long suppressed relationship even as The Boy makes the huge mistake of looking through Hargreeves’ trademark Monocle just as prodigal sister Vanya knocks on the door – with shattering, killing force…

The shocked stunned survivors quickly marshal their forces for ‘Finale or, Brothers and Sisters, I Am an Atomic Bomb’, but even though they achieve some sort of victory and save reality, it’s at a terrible, World-shattering cost…

Following Editor Scott Allie’s Afterword on the trials, tribulations and triumph of working with a big-name rock-star (yes, that Gerard Way: the multi-talented musician/writer/artist/designer who fronts the band My Chemical Romance…) whilst trying to maintain a comicbook schedule, illustrator Gabriel Bá and the author then reveal a host of production secrets in ‘Designing the Umbrella Academy’.

But that’s not all: the introductory ‘Short Stories’ – with notes and commentary from Bá – follow, revealing a lighter side to the team in ‘“Mon Dieu!”’ and a surprisingly deft surreal murder mystery in‘…But the Past Ain’t Through with You’ (first seen in MySpace Dark Horse Presents and Dark Horse Free Comic Book Day 2007 respectively).

Whilst happily swiping, homaging, sampling and remixing the coolest elements from many and varied comics sources, The Umbrella Academy created a unique synthesis and achieved its own distinctive originality within the tired confines of the superhero genre. Maybe because it stylishly combines the tragic baroque tone of a La Belle Époque scenario with an ironic dystopian fin de siècle sensibility and re-presents it all as a witty post-modern heroic fable, or perhaps more likely simply because it’s all just really damned good, darkly sardonic fun, conceived with love and enthusiasm and crafted with supreme skill and bravura by extremely talented people who love what they do…?

Read The Umbrella Academy: Apocalypse Suite if you’re smart, read it if you’re bored, read it because I said so, but if you too love the medium and the genre, read it, read it, read it.
™ © 2008 Gerard Way. All rights reserved.

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New Crusaders: Rise of the Heroes


By Ian Flynn, Ben Bates, Alitha Martinez & Gary Martin (Archie Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-936975-31-0

In the dawning days of the comic book business, just after Superman and Batman had ushered in a new genre of storytelling, many publishers jumped onto the bandwagon and made their own bids for cash and glory. Many thrived and many more didn’t, relished only as trivia by sad old blokes like me. Some few made it to an amorphous middle-ground: not forgotten, but certainly not household names either…

MLJ were one of the quickest publishers to jump on the mystery-man bandwagon, following the spectacular successes of the Man of Tomorrow with their own small but inspirational pantheon of gaudily clad crusaders, beginning in November 1939 with Blue Ribbon Comics, soon followed by Top-Notch and Pep Comics. The content was the standard blend of two-fisted adventure strips, prose pieces and gag panels and, from #2 on, costumed heroes…

However, after only a few years Maurice Coyne, Louis Silberkleit and John Goldwater (hence MLJ) spotted a gap in the blossoming market and in December 1941 nudged aside their masked heroes and action strips to make room for a far less imposing hero; an “average teen” who would have ordinary adventures like the readers, but with triumphs, romance and slapstick emphasised.

Pep Comics #22 featured a gap-toothed, freckle-faced, red-headed goof who clearly took his lead from the popular Andy Hardy matinee movies starring Mickey Rooney. Goldwater developed the concept of a youthful everyman protagonist, tasking writer Vic Bloom and artist Bob Montana with the job of making it work. The 6-page tale introduced Archie Andrews and pretty girl-next-door Betty Cooper as well as his unconventional best friend and confidante Jughead Jones in their small-town utopia of Riverdale.

The feature was an instant hit and by the winter of 1942 had won its own title. Archie Comics #1 was the company’s first solo-star magazine and with it began the gradual transformation of the entire company. With the introduction of rich, raven-haired Veronica Lodge, all the pieces were in play for the comicbook industry’s second Genuine Phenomenon (Superman being the first)…

By 1946 the kids had taken over, so MLJ renamed itself Archie Comics; retiring its heroic characters years before the end of the Golden Age and becoming, to all intents and purposes, a publisher of family comedies. Its success, like Superman’s, changed the content of every other publisher’s titles, and led to a multi-media industry including TV shows, movies, and a chain of restaurants. In the swinging sixties the pop hit “Sugar, Sugar” (a tune from their animated show) became a global smash: their wholesome garage band The Archies has been a fixture of the comics ever since.

Nonetheless the company had by this stage blazed through a rather impressive pantheon of mystery-men who would form the backbone of numerous future superhero revivals, most notably in the High-Camp/Marvel Explosion/Batman TV show-frenzied mid-60’s…

The heroes impressively resurfaced in the 1980s under the company’s Red Circle imprint but again failed to catch the public’s attention and Archie let them lie fallow (except for occasional revivals and intermittent guest-shots in regular Archie titles) until 1991, when the company licensed its heroes to superhero specialists DC for a magically fun, all-ages iteration (and where’s that star-studded trade paperback collection, huh?!).

Impact Comics was a vibrant, engaging and fun all-ages rethink that really should have been a huge hit but was again cruelly unsuccessful…

When the line folded in 1993 the characters returned to limbo until DC had one more crack at them in 2008, trying to incorporate the Mighty Crusaders & Co into their own maturely angst-ridden and stridently dark continuity – with the usual overwhelming lack of success.

Now at last the wanderers have returned home to Archie for a superbly simplistic and winningly straightforward revival aimed squarely at old nostalgics and young kids reared on highly charged action/adventure cartoon shows: brimming with all the exuberant verve and wide-eyed honest ingenuity you’d expect from an outfit which has been pleasing kids for nearly seventy years.

Released initially online in May 2012 – and followed by a traditional monthly print version that September – the first story-arc even made it to full legitimacy in this thrill-packed collection, equally welcoming to inveterate fanboys and eager newcomers alike.

The first 6 issues collected here offer grand old-fashioned Costumed Drama and modern teen-targeted Fights ‘n’ Tights action that begins with the 2-part introduction ‘From the Ashes’ by Ian Flynn, Ben Bates & Gary Martin.

Red Circle is an idyllic, storybook American town – now. That wasn’t always the case however, and as Mayor Jack Sterling hosts a party for some very old friends and their kids in ‘Reunions’, that dark past horrifically resurfaces as the festivities are cancelled due to a murderous attack by a manic super-villain.

One minute Ralph Hardy, John Dickering and wife Thelma, John and Rose Raymond, Ted Tyler and Kim Brand are watching their respective teenagers mooching about and not getting along and the next they’re all dead at the hands of alien overlord the Brain Emperor…

Only late arriving Joe Higgins is left to shepherd the kids from the burning Mayoral mansion, operating under a long-practised escape plan devised by the heroic Mighty Crusaders…

Debuting way back when in Pep Comics #1, January 1940, Higgins was an FBI scientist who devised a suit which gave him enhanced strength, speed and durability, battling the USA’s enemies as The Shield in the days before America entered WW II. He also devised a serum which enhanced those powers, smashing spies, saboteurs, subversives and every threat to Democracy and well-being. A minor sensation, he is credited as comics’ first Patriotic Hero, predating Captain America and Quality’s Uncle Sam in “wearing the Flag”.

In the sixties he and many of his lost cohorts returned to battle crime and craziness once more…

After accomplishing the impossible and wiping out super-crime he, Steel Sterling, Jaguar, Comet, The Web, Pow-Girl, Fireball and Fly Girl happily retired from action. Unable to settle or relax, Higgins became a virtual recluse and, as Evil Never Dies, laid contingency plans with his old comrades.

Now with all his nightmares come true, he sequesters the traumatised kids in his high-tech bunker and relates the truth about the seemingly dull-and-boring dearly departed in ‘Birthrights’.

The Red Circle tragedy is covered up by Federal spooks from the Military Logistics & Jurisdiction Bureau and dubbed a freak storm on the Impact City news, but orphans Johnny Sterling, Alex Tyler, Greg Dickering, Kelly Brand, Wyatt Raymond and Hardy’s young apprentice Ivette Velez know the truth. They just can’t come to grips with it.

Once Old Man Higgins had saved them from the monster-maniac, he locked them up in his subterranean wonderland – with the full approval of the MLJ – and started talking nonsense.

He claimed their folks were the world’s greatest superheroes and expects them to take up their identities and mission. It’s crazy and totally impossible to believe, but he has all kinds of evidence and gadgets in his bunker. There’s even a mutant talking monkey named Dusty, and somehow he makes more sense than his snarky, impatient boss…

It’s too much and the kids rebel, so Higgins lets them go. All they have to do is get out of the bunker alive…

The terrifying gauntlet proves to the shell-shocked teens that they are far from average and they elect to stay. ‘Legacies part 1: Growing Pains’ then describes the mandatory training process wherein the neophytes, through determination, pre-prepared inheritances, sheer dumb luck and rash stupidity become a second generation of heroes, privy to all the secrets and responsibilities of a world hidden from most of humanity.

Kelly is dispatched by Dusty (or Dr. Uruk Ak’ahk to give him his proper title) to a trans-dimensional space station operated by veteran Crusader Bob Phantom to pick up the alien gimmicks which will make her the new Fly Girl, whilst timid low-esteem-plagued Ivette is given the magical Jaguar Helmet of Ai Apaec, discovered by her boss Ralph Hardy and intended for her alone. However no-one realised it would put her into deadly contact with and at the mercy of a terrifying, possessive, savage lost god…

Puny Wyatt is as smart as his parents The Web and Pow-Girl ever were but has none of their physical gifts. A high-tech combat suit handles the muscle, speed and agility deficit, and the psionic power he’s hidden since infancy more than makes up for his lack of combat experience.

The real problems come with the three alpha-males. Impetuous and rebellious, Alex and Greg hastily misuse the serums intended to duplicate the pyrokinetic and lethal light-wielding power of Fireball and the Comet – nearly dying in the process – whilst Johnny just can’t bring himself to submit his perfect Jock’s body to the nasty nano-surgical procedure that will make him a second Steel  Sterling…

As ‘Legacies part 2: Inheritance’ (illustrated by new regular penciller Alitha Martinez) opens only Fly Girl is willing – or indeed able – to embrace her destiny, but fate takes charge as the implacable Brain Emperor strikes again, just as a poignant message from his departed dad inspires Johnny Sterling to take up the metallic mantle of a champion.

The Brain Emperor strikes in ‘Trial by Fire part 1’ raiding the penitentiary holding the original Crusaders’ greatest foes and causing a deadly ‘Jailbreak’ forcing the junior heroes and their aged tutor into action far too soon. Nevertheless, the kids do alright and the Cerebral Conqueror has made a crucial error: the prison held not only an army of vicious super-freaks but also three rogue heroes in special isolation.

The Black Hood, Hangman and Deadly Force are a remorseless Riot Squad just itching to get their merciless hands on more criminal scum ‘Caught in the Flames’…

As the alien Emperor gathers selected villains for his next enterprise, the New Crusaders’ blistering trial by fire proves to be an education for all, but not every hero survives…

To Be Continued…

Full of vim and vigour, this no-nonsense superhero saga is a slick and smart return to tried-and-true comicbook bombast and action which manages to feel brand-new whilst somehow still remaining faithful to all of the many iterations and re-imaginings of the assorted superheroes – even the two produced in conjunction with DC Comics.

This delightful exercise in recapturing the straightforward excitement of a genre also includes such special features as a variant cover gallery by Bates, Mike Norton, Ryan Jampole & Matt Helms, ChrisCross & Thomas Mason, Sanford Greene, Rich Buckler, Francesco Francavilla and Fiona Staples plus bonus featurette ‘Dusty’s Files’ on ‘The Pitch’, ‘The Cast’, ‘The Braintrust’ (creators Ian Flynn & Ben Bates), ‘The Legacy’, ‘The Villains’ and ‘The Future’.

Fast, fulfilling and fun, New Crusaders might just be Archie’s long-awaited superhero “one that didn’t get away”…
© 2013 Archie Comics Publications. All rights reserved. NEW CRUSADERS and RED CIRCLE COMICS ® ACP, Inc.

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Secret Identities


By Jeff Yang, Parry Shen, Keith Chow, Jerry Ma & various (The New Press)
ISBN: 978-1-59558-824-1

A little while ago I reviewed Shattered: a splendid anthology of superhero-related stories by and about Asian Americans which, although self-contained, stemmed out of a previous and equally innovative Fights ‘n’ Tights assemblage. Secret Identities was designed to craft an alternative American history and milieu for heroes and villains more in tune with the needs and interests of a vast, neglected sector of the Republic’s readership, and having acquired a copy of that previous tome – still available and worth every penny – I thought I’d share a few further details with you…

Devised and supervised by life-long fans and mature creative types Jeff Yang, Parry Shen, Keith Chow & Jerry Ma, Secret Identities blends enchantingly intimate thoughts and reminiscences about the comics we all grew up knowing with a decidedly fresh approach to old plots, characters and treatments. Featuring the talents of exclusively Asian American creators from comics, the arts, design and computer gaming who smartly re-examine the USA’s signature sequential narrative genre from the social, cultural perspective of a non-WASP, non-Jewish experience, this compilation is a sharply different yet familiar take on the marvellous world of Men in Tights and Women in Control…

Following a close-knit over-arching timeline the book opens with a wonderful Marvel Comics Spoof – The Y-Men #1 – as the editors recall their childhood love affair with costumed characters and reveal how the project really got started. ‘Preface: In the Beginning’ by Jeff Yang & Jef Castro leads seamlessly into the Brave New World as ‘Prologue’ and ‘Driving Steel’ by Yang & Benton Jew take us to the 19th century American West, where immigrant workers struggle to build the trans-continental railroad and Irish Navvies ruthlessly compete with their Chinese counterparts. Sabotage, skulduggery and ill-will run rampant, and only little Negro lad John Henry is party to the fiery true nature of indomitable – and undying – labourer Master Jimson Fo…

‘S.A.M. meets Larry Hama’ by Tak Toyoshima is a breezy interview with the venerable veteran creator on the sense of cartoon affirmative action, after which the saga proper continues with ‘Section One: War and Remembrance’ as Parry Shen & Alexander Tarampi begin to examine the fictional history of Asian American mystery men and metahumans during WWII.

‘9066’ by Jonathan Tsuei & Jerry Ma then details the tragedy of a dedicated crusader who couldn’t get his country to look beyond the colour of his skin and shape of his eyes, whilst in ‘Heroes Without a Country’ (Daniel Jai Lee & Vince Sunico) the same anti-Jap furore almost deprived American super-unit the Sunset Squad of their most valuable asset when raiding a Nazi laboratory of horror…

‘Gaman’ by Jamie Ford & Tarampi reveals the generational fallout of those embattled days to a modern student who learns the hard way just what makes him so different from his school friends, whilst in ‘The Hibakusha’ Shen & Glenn Urieta reveal the secrets and latent dangers of the children born from the atomic devastation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. So amazing were they that America’s interned them in Area 52 for years…

Marvel, DC and others generously allowed their characters to appear in the autobiographical sections of this collection, and a big-name writer and movie-maker shared a few insights about creativity with Keith Chow & A. L. Baroza in ‘Re-Directing Comics: Greg Pak’ before debuting his spectacular tension-drenched anti-hero after President Obama pardoned a dishonoured hero and potential assassin in ‘The Citizen’ by Pak & Bernard Chang…

‘Sidekicks: Gene Yang & Michael Kang’ finds the editors debating the Asiatic ghetto of faithful retainerdom (Chow & Baroza) after which ‘The Blue Scorpion & Chung’ by Yang & Sonny Liew provides an outrageous and wryly hilarious alternative to the traditional set-up, whilst the tragic story of ‘James’ (Kang & Erwin Haya) shows that the solution is usually in the assistant’s hands all the time…

‘Section Two: When Worlds Collide’ opens with another take on the strange visitor from an alien world scenario, courtesy of Chow & Chi-Yun Lau, after which another long-established comics creator speaks out in ‘Now There’s Something: Greg LaRoque’ (Chow & Alexander Shen), which leads into a compelling genre-bending fantasy of good, evil and family peccadilloes with ‘Trinity’ written and drawn by LaRoque himself.

‘No Exit’ by Naeem Mohaiemen & Urieta is a beautifully sharp examination of dignity and morality set in a Guantanamo-style camp not so very different from the shamefully real one, whilst ‘S.O.S.’ blends outsourcing to India with the back-office requirements of the busy, cost-conscious American superhero crowd in a delightful yarn from Tanuj Chopra & Alex Joon Kim.

Many of the tales in this tome take place in the modern metropolis of Troy, although New York City is the eventual location of Clarence Koo & Jerry Ma’s ‘The Wallpasser’, which mixes people-trafficking and illegal immigration with dark, super-normal forces and broken families before ‘Section Three: Girl Power’ takes a look at the distaff side of culture and super-society, starting with a hilarious silent and salutary fable from Kripa Joshi, whilst ‘You Are What You Eat’ (Lynn Chen & Paul Wei) finds a cake-loving lass given the greatest possible gift by her aged grandmother… and she can fight crime with it too…

‘Sampler’ by Jimmy Aquino & Haya also confronts long-held assumptions and prejudice when a Troy laundry/dry cleaning store frequented by costumed heroes provides a shy retiring seamstress with the opportunity to use her own long-unsuspected super-power, whilst ‘Learn to Share’ by Keiko Agena & Ming Doyle offers a disturbing look at the ethnic adoption experience through the malfunctioning eyes of a little girl with a dark past and terrifying power…

‘A Day at CostumeCo’ by Yang & Baroza introduces a magical family of metas-in-waiting in a masterfully enticing riff on the theme of superhero dynasties. When Vernon and Vivie Chang finally get rebellious big sister Valerie to accept her true nature All Heck breaks loose, after which Hellen Jo discusses the nature of female furies in ‘Supergrrrls’ before Jason Sperber & Chi-Yun Lau open ‘Section Four: Many Masks’; examining the nature of assumed identities in advance of a brief colour section introducing a barrage of new characters and concepts in one-page pinups.

Meta-merc ‘Agent Orange’ by Dustin Tri Nguyen & Dustin Nguyen is followed by supernatural judge ‘Gaze’ (Sung Kang, Billy Tan, Walden Wong & Sean Ellery) and acupuncture-activated go-girl ‘Flight’ by Ian Kim & Jeff Yang. Adulation-powered ‘Shine’ (Leonardo Nam, Anthony Tan & Ruben de Vela) and immortal avenger ‘Jia’ (Kelly Hu, Mark Allen & Cliff Chiang) are followed by Yul Kwon & Deodato Pangandoyon’s escaped North Korean lab rat ‘Cataclysm’ and one-man alien invasion resister ‘Go’ by Kazu Kibuishi, after which Anthony Wu’s army-of-one ‘Parallel Penny’ closes the file on this tantalising taster of things – hopefully – to come…

Returning to moody monochrome, ‘Section Five: Ordinary Heroes’ begins with Raymond Sohn depicting real folks’ definition of heroes before ‘Just Ordinary’ by Nick Huang & Shen takes a trenchant look at society and the media’s unhelpful expectations of what constitutes a champion, whilst ‘Twilight’ (Ted Chung & Anuj Shrestha) takes a hard look at alienation and self-discovery amidst the aftermath of disaster, and only a little time-travelling intervention at last saves ‘David Kim’ from his annoying match-making parents in a light and lovely super-folks RomCom by John Kuramota & Christine Norrie…

‘Meet Joe’ by Koji Steven Sakai & John Franzese shows how a determined kid-hero can buck both public expectations and family pressure, little So-Geum at last develops a super-power ‘On the Third Day’ (Johann Choi) – although not in the way his pushy parents wanted – and ‘Long’ perfectly captures the sheer exuberant joy of extra abilities in a brash bold pantomime by Martin Hsu. The chapter then closes with ‘Justified’ by Ken Wong & Tiffanie Hwang as a young hopeful innocently upsets ingrained ignorance and complacency during an open audition for aspiring mystery men…

‘Section Six: From Headline to Hero’ commences with a discussion of real-world American Asian heroes by Parry Shen & Jeremy Arambulo, after which ’16 Miles’ by Shen & Sarah Sapang extrapolates a poignant story of love and sacrifice in the midst of total terror whilst ‘Taking Back Troy’ (Yang & Francis Tsai) shows the downside of living with superhumans as a school party night goes tragically bad, before the action ends on a promising introductory note as ‘Peril: By the Time I Get to Arizona’ (Chow & Castro) introduces a desperate young man dragged into a world of impossible danger when the father he never knew goes missing and is branded a traitor. Dr. Won Kin Lun was the world’s greatest authority on super-powers and nano-tech and everybody wants his discoveries – except the unwilling, angry, betrayed son he secretly, arbitrarily inflicted them upon…

In ‘Epilogue’ Yang & Castro pensively wrap things up and consider the future but there’s still much to enjoy here. After full contributor biographies the added attractions start with ‘The One that Got Away’ by Larry Hama and there’s also a selection of Behind the Scenes concept art as well as ‘Our Favourite “Dear John” Letter’ – a brilliant manga cartoon apology for not contributing from eventual and actual contributor Jeremy Arambulo. The immersive experience then ends with a complete time-line chart and annotated score-card, ranging from the portentous beginnings in the 1800s to the unleashed future of 2020 and beyond.

Combining the best aspects of many storytelling traditions and artistic styles, utilised by a volunteer army of talented creators whose origins stem from Asia, India and all points East but whose ethnicity is definitely All-American, Secret Identities began a bold experiment in cultural assimilation that will amaze comics fans in search of something a little different…
Compilation © 2009 Jeff Yang, Parry Shen, Keith Chow and Jerry Ma. Individual pieces © 2009 each author. All rights reserved.

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Shattered: the Asian American Comics Anthology – A Secret Identities Book


By Jeff Yang, Parry Shen, Keith Chow, Jerry Ma & various (The New Press)
ISBN: 978-1-59558-824-1

The very best thing about old comics periodicals, and a factor sadly deficient in most graphic novels these days, is the lack of variety. Those venerable weeklies and monthlies were generally stuffed with different strips and features offering a host of entertainment options that contemporary books just can’t match.

That’s certainly not the case in this marvellous collection of new stories supervised by Jeff Yang, Parry Shen, Keith Chow and Jerry Ma, who first came to Funnybook fans’ attention in 2009 with the satirical shared-universe superhero book Secret Identities. That tome showcased the talents of exclusively Asian American creators in comics amalgamating the US industry’s signature genre with the social, cultural and entertainment influences of a non-WASP, non-Jewish (it’s easy to argue that the American comicbook was primarily invented by immigrants – and largely Jewish ones at that) talent pool to produce a whole new take on the sequential narrative experience.

Now this fresh collection expands on that initial offering with new adventures set in that New Universe, as well as many sidebar and only notionally linked cartoon yarns, from a host of gifted writers and artists whose origins and ethnicity stem from Asia, India and all points East.

An overarching storyline links the tales here as the Eastern archetypes which permeate Western fiction – the Brute, the Brain, the Temptress, the Alien and the Manipulator – are reclaimed and transformed into the motivating force which links the Secret Identities tale into one longer epic, with each chapter then supplemented by additional, less canonical strips.

Thus the prologue set up of ‘The Sacrifice’ written by Yang, Shen & Chow and illustrated by Ma introduces a quintet of otherworldly demons who want to break back into our helpless world. Bo-Kwun the Manipulator, Kum-Sau the Brute, Zhi-Lik the Brain, Yi-Heung the Alien and Ngau-Yun the Temptress – collectively known as Ng Duk, the Five Venoms – were long ago banished and barred by two ancient Djinn heroes. Their tenuous triumph is now sustained by a cult of ever vigilant warrior priests…

The saga further builds in ‘Burn’, by Jimmy & Jerry Ma, as a masked westerner in 19th century China brought poisonous flowers to destroy the people’s way of life, even contaminating the soul of their greatest champion The Commissioner…

The story proper begins in America during the Gold Rush with ‘The Brute – Driving Steel: the Breaking’ by Yang & Krishna M. Sadasivam, as wandering oriental outcast Ifrit and his negro partner John Henry are tricked into breaking the Mirror of Divine Immortals and release the Five Venoms…

Tangential follow-ups then offer a new perspective on an old story in ‘Master Tortoise & Master Hare’ by Howard Wong & Jamie Noguchi, Bernard Chang’s ‘Showtime’ begins a demonic basketball battle resolved on the artist’s own website, whilst ‘Solitary’ (Michael Kang, Edmund Lee & Glenn Urieta) examines the contemporary gang scene and family bonds before ‘Clean Getaway’ (Jamie Ford & A.L. Baroza) perfectly pastiches EC crime comics, complete with faux cover from Tales of the Orient #12…

‘The Temptress’ leads off the next chapter of the ongoing epic with ‘Bai, Bai, Bai Tsai’ by Yang, Martin Hsu & Sophia Lin as the creators reference manga styles to relate how second generation kid heroes Magical Girl, Super Deformed and Hell Kitty solve an ancient mystery and uncover sinister exploitation involving a cancelled cartoon show after which ‘Ching Shih, Queen of Pirates’, by Natalie Kim & Robin Ha, details the history of a 19th century demimonde who uniquely took control of her own destiny.

Another kind of seductress figures in the bittersweet romantic fable ‘The Regrets We Talk About’ by Fred Chao whilst ‘Heroes Without a Country: Tokyo Rose’ from Daniel Jae Lee & Dafu Yu provides a delightfully smart WWII superhero spy-thriller and Amy Chu, Larry Hama & Craig Yeung cleverly recall a bad time for Japanese-American Nisei in ‘The Date’…

A full-colour glossy ‘Gallery’ of concepts and characters follows featuring art and synopses for ‘Adam Warrock’ by Eugene Ahn & Ming Doyle, ‘Revolution Shuffle’ by Bao Phi & GB Tran, ‘Tempest’ from Kai Ma & Eric Kim, ‘The Walkman’ hilariously conceived by Aaron Takahashi & Mukesh Singh, ‘Angry Asian Man’ Phil Yu & Jerry Ma, the utterly enchanting ‘Mei the Alien’ by Koji Steven Sakai & Deodata Pangandoyon, ‘Camp Mech’ by Eric Nakamura & Sara Saedi, and Thenmozhi Soundararajan & Saumin Suresh Patel’s ‘The Death Stalker’…

‘The Brain’ then takes centre stage for the unfolding epic in ‘Hide and Sikh’ from Parry Shen & Jeremy Arambulo wherein the atomic children born of the nuclear devastation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki grow into their dormant power and uncover a huge secret of metahuman genesis…

The remainder of the chapter then focuses on the dreaming world described by ‘The Power of Petunia’ (Joy Osmanski & Yasmin Liang), Paul Wei & Chi-Yun Lau’s classy future shocker ‘Drones and Droids’, a parable of High School popularity contests resulting in ‘Camden’s Revenge’ by Keiko Agena & Louie Chin and a darkly traumatic decision made in ‘Metatron’ by Stuart Ng.

Possibly my very favourite tale in this masterful monochrome compilation is Greg Pak & Takeshi Miyazawa’s ‘Los Robos, Arizona’, joyously referencing the wide-eyed wonder of manga boys and their giant alien Mecha as a young cadet is selected by fate to befriend an incredible metal visitor, whilst Ford & Baroza again charm with new nostalgia in ‘A Cut Above’ parodying EC horror with a snippet from Weird Asian Science #46…

The over-epic resumes with ‘The Alien’ in ‘Peril: Welcome to the Terror’ from Keith Chow & Jerry Castro, returning to Goldfield, Arizona in 1900 and an outrage against the Chinese immigrant workers, before jumping to today and a manhunt for a misunderstood hero steeped in the horrors of then and the technology of tomorrow…

Kripa Joshi then takes a swingeing pot-shot at a culture of callous bullying in ‘Miss Moti, Shattered’, Johann Choi reveals the darkness of ‘The Stranger’ and Traci Honda deliciously, wordlessly plays childish games with ‘Personal Monsters’.

Tanji Chopra & Alice Meichi Li take a long dark look at the sordid future of negotiable affection in ‘Weightless’, whilst Angela Veronica Wong, Reinhardt Suarez, Christine Norrie & Craig Yeung explore the endless anticipation of kid superhumans and their insatiable aspirations in ‘A Dream of Flying’, before ‘Fashion Never Dyes’ again displays Ford & Baroza’s delight with EC thrillers by providing a shocker from the tragically non-existent Uncanny Tales of the Yellow Peril #27.

‘The Manipulator’ at last steps up in ‘Hibakusha: Secrets’ by Shen & Sean Chen as a determined team of atomic heroes uncover the clandestine nature of the Arizona scandal in a spectacular action adventure, whilst the ancillary aspects include ‘Push’ (Jennifer S. Fang, Ace Continuado & Julian San Juan) which reveals what happens when Yankee superhero brawn meets studious Asian serial killer planning, whilst ‘Persons of Mass Destruction’, by Gary Jackson & Cesar P. Castillo, offers a chilling dose of metahuman realpolitik in relation to the “threat” of North Korea.

Also on view are Ren Hsieh & Bryan Lee’s alien incursion ‘The Merciful’, stunning kung fu doomsday parable ‘Qi Lai!’ by Roger Ma, Dheeraj Verma & Tak Toyoshima, the indescribably odd ‘Occupy Ethnic Foods’ courtesy of a solo flying Toyoshima, and the gloriously hip strip featuring the maternal tribulations of a rather harried ‘Shadow Hero’ by Gene Luen Yang & Sonny Liew…

Yang, Shen, Chow & Urieta then bring it all to a triumphal finale in ‘The Sealing’ as the disparate heroes unite to battle the Five Venoms and restore the Mirror of Divine Immortals through an ultimate sacrifice or two, wrapping up this stirring and staggeringly impressive anthology celebration in grand manner.

Finally the publishing project further underscores its debt of thanks to the constantly-changing nature of the American Experiment in illustrated Epilogue. ‘The Vilcek Story’ (by Jeff Yang & Wendy Xu) précis the history of the family of Czechoslovakian Jews who fled to the USA during the years of Nazi atrocity and, after building successful lives, set up a foundation which celebrates and supports the ongoing immigrant experience – and funded this collection…

Combining the best aspects of a vast panoply of storytelling traditions and artistic styles, Shattered is a bold experiment in identity and assimilation that will amaze comics fans in search of something a little different…
Compilation © 2012 Jeff Yang, Parry Shen, Keith Chow and Jerry Ma. Individual pieces © 2012 each author. All rights reserved.

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Northguard: Manifest Destiny


By Mark Shainblum & Gabriel Morrissette with Jacques Boivin and others (Caliber Press)
No ISBN, ASIN B00071Y8KK

The huge outpouring of fresh material which derived from the birth of American comicbooks’ Direct Sales revolution produced a plethora of innovative titles and creators – and let’s be honest – a host of appalling, derivative, knocked-off, banged-out trash too.

Happily I’m the boss of me and I choose to focus on the good and even great stuff…

The 1980s were an immensely fertile time for English-language comics-creators. In America an entire new industry had started with the birth of dedicated comics shops and, as innovation-starved specialist retail outlets sprung up all over the country, operated by fans for fans, a host of new publishers began to experiment with format, genre and content, whilst eager readers celebrated the happy coincidence that everybody seemed to have a bit of extra cash to play with.

Consequently those new publishers were soon aggressively competing for the attention and cash of punters who had grown resigned to getting their sequential art jollies from DC, Marvel, Archie and/or Harvey Comics. European and Japanese material began creeping in and by 1983 a host of young companies such as WaRP Graphics, Pacific, Eclipse, Capital, Now, Comico, Dark Horse, First and many others had established themselves and were making impressive inroads.

Most importantly, by avoiding the traditional family-focussed sales points such as newsstands, more mature material could be produced: not just increasingly violent and sexually explicit but also far more political and intellectually challenging too.

Subsequently, much of the “kid’s stuff” stigma finally dissipated andAmericabegan catching up to the rest of the world, partially acknowledging that comics might be a for-real art-form.

New talent, established stars and different takes on the old forms all found a thriving forum desperate for something a little different. Even smaller companies and foreign outfits had a fair shot at the big time and a lot of great material came – and, almost universally, as quickly went – without getting the attention or success they warranted.

One of the most critically acclaimed and enthralling features was a bleak yet fearfully authentic-seeming interpretation of real-world superheroics from Canadian independents Matrix Books who launched another superb and too-soon-lost costumed crusader on an uncaring world in 1984 with the advent of New Triumph featuring Northguard #1-5. The black and white series for mature readers was sadly lost in a growing storm of black and white self-published titles of varying quality and folded in 1985.

In 1989, Caliber Press licensed the property and launched a general readership, 3-issue miniseries Northguard: the ManDes Conclusion to wrap up the interrupted storyline, simultaneously packaging the original Matrix issues as Northguard: Manifest Destiny, one of the industry’s earliest trade paperback collections.

Written by Matrix founder Mark Shainblum and illustrated by Gabriel Morrissette the story is one that will delight dyed-in-the-wool comics fans as one of their own finally lives the dream…

The volume begins with a fascinating potted history of Canada’s comics industry and love-affair with patriotic superheroes in John Bell’s Foreword after which ‘…And Stand on Guard…’ (lettered by Ian Carr and with an early plotting and art assistance credit for Geof Isherwood) opens with a grisly assassination and a tragic air disaster, before introducing young Phillip Wise ofMontreal.

Left at home whilst his parents vacationed, the young fanboy is just settling in with a stack of comicbooks when a knock at the door leads to his abrupt abduction…

Regaining consciousness in a palatial apartment, Phillip is introduced to billionaire inventor  Ron Cape, a single-minded, altruistic industrialist who runs P.A.C.T. – Progressive Allied Canadian Technologies – a company run by benevolent capitalists with a new world vision…

Capehas his own spy team “Unit 7”, used to protect company secrets and keep his rivals honest, but in the course of their investigations the team has obtained proof that an American company is planning to overthrow the Canadian government. Their only clue to the scheme is the enigmatic code-term “ManDes”…

Used to direct action, P.A.C.T. intended to use a uniquely gifted, trained operative and their latest prototype – a miraculous energy weapon dubbed the Uniband – to covertly counter the imminent threat, but that guy was just murdered and his deputy died in an air crash. Now the device needs months of calibration to a specific set of brainwaves before it can be used…

Without a new controller the Uniband, which taps into a whole, new set of physics, is just a very expensive piece of ugly jewellery, but after hacking all the medical records in Quebec, the P.A.C.T. team luckily found a near-match for their dead agent’s thought patterns…

As the awestruck kid ponders the offer of a lifetime, in America’s Deep South a Fundamentalist Christian and racist manic named Tyler who runs Ultra, one of the world’s most powerful corporations, takes further steps to thwart Cape and his inner circle…

After a pensive night Phillip reaches a decision. He will become P.A.C.T.’s human gun, but only on his own terms. Rather than a secret agent Wise wants the technologists to turn him into a real-life superhero – complete with mask and costume…

Over a barrel and against the advice of his subordinates and directors, Capecomplies and Phillip rapidly undergoes cybernetic surgery and radical physical training to enable him to use the miraculous Uniband. No one is aware that the boy is already a target of Dugan, the assassin who killed his predecessor.

In a bloody confrontation however, the barely-competent kid turns the tables on his coldly pragmatic attacker by thinking like a comic book character and not a rational, trained professional…

Northguard, as Phillip now calls himself, even manages to very publicly save the Premier of the province on live TV and foil the ManDes scheme to instigate an Anglo-French race war inQuebec…

‘Awaken the Dreamers’ (with Bernie Mireault helping out Morrissette on the art) finds the Jewish Phillip tormented by nightmares of racial atrocity and P.A.C.T.’s core team riven by doubt and dissent at the turn events have taken. Nobody signed on to become clandestine policemen and the consequent death toll has everybody rattled…

Meanwhile in the basement of their HQ, Dugan has broken out of custody and gone on a murderous rampage through the building. This time though, he’s ready for the kid with the wonder-weapon and easily defeats him, but then makes the horrific mistake of trying to use Uniband himself…

Frustrated by his constant failures “The Reverend” prays for guidance and hears the Word of God. Ultra has two years to wipe out the blasphemy that isCanadaor the Almighty will cleanse the entire Earth…

Inked by Jacques Boivin, ‘Target Red, Target Blue: Making Hate’ finds Phillip called to P.A.C.T. to be stripped of the Uniband he failed to protect, but absconding before they can remove it. Wandering the streets of Montreal, he finds himself at a dojo and watches a stunning display of martial arts grace and power. With thoughts of learning taekwon-do he chats with the devastating Manon DesChamps and before he even knows what he’s doing the lad has transformed into Northguard before her unbelieving, admiring eyes…

Meanwhile in Boston, Massachusetts, Vietnamvet Ed Holman gets a package from P.A.C.T. that will make his new job even easier. The corporation’s latest technological marvel, acting with the metal plate in his head, now enables him to change his appearance at the press of a button. The Steel Chameleon is ready to become P.A.C.T.’s only super-agent…

As Manon attempts to teach Northguard to fight, they are attacked by a mercilessly efficient squad of operatives led by a psychotic American woman named Valerie White and only Phillip’s overwhelming firepower and Manon’s skill allow them to escape alive…

‘Target Red, Target Blue: Never Surrender’ (with additional inking from J. Harpes & friends) finds Steel Chameleon being briefed by Cape as Phillip awakens at Manon’s apartment. Almost immediately a Russian operative codenamed Redstorm warns the youngsters that Valerie has tracked them down and offers to buy the Uniband for an astronomical sum…

Whilst Holman reviews Intel and realises Valerie – a ruthless USagent known as Eagle – and Redstorm are about to renew their mutually assured and long-running dance of sex and death on Canadian soil, his phone rings. Once again Phillip has done the unexpected in a crisis and simply called for help.

But even as Steel Chameleon rushes to their location, Northguard and Manon have moved to direct action, blasting the Soviet team’s car as a distraction before fleeing on a motorcycle. With Eagle and her squad in hot pursuit the young fugitives are trapped in a shopping mall by the relentless Cold Warriors as keen to kill each other as take the Uniband…

With bullets flying and bodies dropping everywhere Holman arrives just in time to push the rival agents into a horrific miscalculation…

And at Ultra, the Reverend rages at another scheme spoiled by the infernal P.A.C.T. unbelievers and decides to declare all-out economic war onCape’s company…

This terrific tome sadly stops – but doesn’t end – on a compelling low note with ‘Games of the Heart’ as the assorted cast-members are shown in poignant and telling vignettes. Reverend Tyler lays his divinely-inspired plans and marshals his religious zealots whilst the troubleCape loses his most trusted and intimate confidante and Phillip reels with unaccustomed jealousy after meeting Manon’s boyfriend.

The determined kid still holds it together enough to undergo his first explosive full training session under the supervision of Steel Chameleon, however…

Of course nobody expected Manon to show up in a costume of her own, so how could they expect the dazzling Fleur-de-Lys to be so exceptionally efficient and effective at the whole superhero thing…
© 1984, 1985, 1986 and 1989 Mark Shainbloom and Gabriel Morrisette. Northguard, Fleur-de-Lys and all prominent characters are ™ Mark Shainbloom and Gabriel Morrisette. All rights reserved. Steel Chameleon © 1989 and ™Richard Comely/Star Rider Productions. Used under license.

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Kick-Ass

Revised, expanded edition

By Mark Millar, John Romita Jr., Tom Palmer & (Titan Books)
ISBN: 978-0-85768-102-7

Now that the furore has died down over the first movie and is yet to begin in regard to the sequel, I thought I’d take a look at the marvellously fun, blackly comedic and ultra-violent comedy that is Kick-Ass purely in terms of a reading experience, courtesy of the 2010 British Titan Books edition, which includes – as well as all 8 issues of the creator-owned comicbook miniseries (originally published through Marvel’s Icon imprint) – 15 pages of unseen design sketches, pages in process and assorted unseen artworks featuring the scene-stealing tyke of terror Hit-Girl…

Set in the horribly drab and disappointing real world, it all begins with the trenchant recollections of High School no-hoper Dave Lizewski, a pitifully average and unhappy teenager who loves comicbooks. With no chance of being part of the in-crowd, Dave hangs out with the other geeks, talking TV, movies, funnybooks and girls – and, of course, is besotted with ultra-queen of cool Katie Deauxma – who naturally despises him…

One day he has his big inspiration – he’s going to be a masked superhero. All he needs is a costume and a gimmick. Oh, and a codename too…

Clad in a wetsuit bought online and filled with hope, Dave starts patrolling the streets and promptly gets beaten into a coma by three kids tagging a wall…

After months in hospital and with three metal plates in his skull, Dave eventually returns to school, but the compulsion hasn’t left him and he is soon prowling the city again. Chancing on a mugging the masked moron again piles in and – more by sheer bloody-mindedness than any particular skill or power – manages to drive off the assailants. Moreover, this time his battle was caught on witnesses’ camera-phones and uploaded to YouTube…

An overnight internet sensation and supremely overconfident, Dave, or Kick-Ass, is floating on a cloud. Even Katie seems to have finally noticed him… but only because he’s gay: a rumour that had started when he was found naked and severely battered months ago…

So desperate is Dave that he plays to the rumour and becomes the prom queen’s “gay best friend”, whilst spending solitary moment stalking the streets, alleyways and rooftops in his superhero persona. He even starts a Kick-Ass MySpace page where fans and people in trouble can contact him…

Dave’s life goes into deadly overdrive when he acts on one plea and marches into a grungy apartment determined to talk a lowlife thug out of harassing and stalking his ex-wife. Suddenly confronted with a posse of brutal criminals for whom violence is a way of life, Kick-Ass is being beaten to death when a diminutive 10-year old girl slaughters the entire gang with deadly ease and honking great samurai swords…

Dave can only watch in awe as Hit-Girl glides like a ghost over the rooftops and returns to her burly partner Big Daddy: cool, efficient ninjas of justice and everything he’s aspired to be but could never approach in a million years…

These urban vigilantes are utter ciphers, stalking and destroying the operations of brutal Mafia boss Johnny Genovese with remorseless efficiency and in complete attention-shunning anonymity.

Dave is simply not in their league and doesn’t care for their methods. After all, superheroes don’t kill… Chastened and a little scared, he grudgingly carries on his own small-scale endeavours, drawing some measure of comfort from the growing band of costumed imitators Kick-Ass has inspired and those regular intimate moments when the still blithely ingenuous Katie tells him all her secrets, dreams and desires…

Things start to look up when he meets Red Mist, a fellow adventurer and one with a flashy car and lots of expensive toys. When the pair very visibly become media darlings during a tenement fire, Kick-Ass is visited by Big Daddy and Hit-Girl, who think they’ve found the perfect back-ups to help them finally eradicate the Genovese mob…

After telling Katie the truth, Dave rendezvous with Red Mist for the big push only to find that his partner is Genovese’s geeky, psychotic son, and the whole act has been an elaborate trap to kill the far-too effective and expensively competent Big Daddy and Hit-Girl…

With both his allies apparently dead, Dave is being slowly tortured to death. Kick-Ass can only draw upon his one advantage – his sheer, stupid inability to give up – until the miraculously surviving Hit-Girl comes to rescue with her customary mercilessness…

Bloody, bruised, broken but unbowed, Kick-Ass finally sheds his last superhero scruple and tools up for a blistering bloody showdown in the mobster’s skyscraper fortress…

Appallingly, graphically hyper-violent and atrociously foul-mouthed, Kick-Ass is the ultimate extension of the trend for “realistic” superhero stories and simultaneously a brilliantly engaging and cynically hilarious examination of boyhood dreams and power fantasies, delivered with dazzling aplomb, studied self-deprecation and spellbinding style.

Mark Millar’s compelling script – unlike the movie adaptation – never steps beyond the bounds of possibility and credibility, whilst the stunning art collaboration of John Romita Jr., Tom Palmer and colourist Dean White delivers an all too familiar picture-perfect New York.

Sharp, shocking, superb and with the promise of yet more and even better to come, the graphic novel Kick-Ass is a story not just for comics fans but a genuine treasure for all followers of furious fun and fantasy in any medium.

Kick-Ass comic strip © 2010 Mark Millar and John S. Romita.

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Operative: Scorpio


By Jack Herman, Dan Tolentino & Danny Taver (Blackthorne Publishing)
ISBN: 0-932629-15-6

Sometimes I just get a devil in me…

Although I review a broad spectrum of illustrated narratives and comics related books, I generally stick to the rule of thumb that the selection has to have some intrinsic quality or merit. Occasionally however there comes an item that I just can’t rationally recommend but still just… sends me…

As the first contraction of the 1980s independent comics boom began to cut down the plethora of small publishers, Blackthorne moved from canny licensed properties such as California Raisins and Rocky and Bullwinkle, 3-D titles and classic reprints like Tarzan, Dick Tracy and Betty Boop into a line of all-new characters, which might well have hastened their demise.

They also brought out many early graphic novels and Operative: Scorpio might well rank amongst their oddest.

In blocky black and white the confused but compellingly enthusiastic caper details the story of ambitious young thug Carl Manara who takes sole proprietorship of PMD, a new super-addictive drug hitting the streets of a peculiarly Latino Los Angeles, consequently falling foul of the criminal overlord Monticello, whose cabal Blackleague runs the entire country’s illegal enterprises.

Monticello has other problems; specifically a crazy masked martial artist roaming the streets and hitting all his organisations rackets. Scorpio’s campaign is costing him money and the cops – bought or honest – can’t catch the mysterious vigilante…

‘Breaking and Entering’ introduces Police Detective Morgan Pierce, tasked with stopping Manara’s super-drug from causing a bloody turf war. He has no interest in catching Scorpio: in fact he thinks the guy’s a hoax or urban legend…

Pierce has some odd friends he seems embarrassed by: fly-by-night playboy nightclub owner Aristotle, whose clientele ranges from the social elite to the dregs of the city, and disgraced competition martial artist Jay-Daniel Cobra, who only seem to meet with him at the oddest times – whenever no body’s watching…

After some beat cops are killed and civilians come under fire Scorpio gets involved, but Manara has a secret weapon. The designer of the new drug is a highly respected college professor and the only one who knows the formula, protected by a lethal hand-to-hand fighter. When the masked man raids the chemist’s fortress home Scorpio barely survives the encounter.

With war brewing between Manara and Monticello, the upstart’s gang begins selling the new dope out of their car and soon civilians are caught in gang crossfires. The cops won’t touch the dealers – after all they are Homicide Detectives too…

And that’s when the enigmatic Scorpio decides on drastic action: all three of him…

Muddled, manic and utterly mad, this yarn is full of brutal, pell-mell action and short on characterisation but that really doesn’t matter as the drama barrels along, reaching a climax but no real conclusion.

Clearly the opening shot in a longer epic, this dark yarn, with echoes of 1970’s exploitation cinema and Grindhouse movies, was written by Jack Herman, with art by the clearly Latin American or Filipino team of Dan Tolentino & Danny Taver – possibly pseudonyms for three or four different artists in a shared studio.

Even in 1989 the book looked and felt a decade older and I have a sneaking suspicion that it might even be a Mexican digest-comics story surreptitiously picked up and translated: no proof to support the idea but it just has that unshakeable feel to it…

Inexplicably compelling and splendidly fun, this is another guilty pleasure retro-read, best absorbed whilst listening to “Sabotage” by the Beastie Boys… but only at maximum volume.
© 1988 Blackthorne Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved.