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April 30, 2015April 29, 2015

Essential Spider-Man volume 6

By Gerry Conway, Stan Lee, John Romita Sr., Ross Andru, Gil Kane & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-1365-2

The Amazing Spider-Man was always a comicbook that matured with – or perhaps just slightly ahead of – its fan-base and this sixth exceptionally economical monochrome volume of chronological web-spinning adventures sees the World’s Most Misunderstood Hero through one of the most traumatic periods of his career.

By the time of these tales Stan Lee had replaced himself with young science fiction author Gerry Conway and the scripts acquired a more contemporary tone (which of course often feels quite outdated from here in the 21^st century, Man!) which were purportedly more in tune with the times whilst the emphatic use of soap opera subplots kept older readers glued to the series even when the bombastic battle sequences didn’t.

Moreover, as a sign of the times a hint of cynical surrealism also began creeping inâ€¦

Thematically, there’s a decline in the use of old-fashioned gangsterism and a growing dependence on outlandish villains. The balance of costumed super-antagonists with thugs, hoods and mob-bosses, was gradually ending and soon the global resurgence of interest in supernatural stories would result in more monsters and uncanny happeningsâ€¦

Nevertheless the Wallcrawler was still indisputably mainstream comics’ voice of youth and he defined being a teenager for young readers of the 1970s, tackling incredible hardships, fantastic foes and the most pedestrian and debilitating of frustrations.

High School nerd Peter Parker had grown up and gone to college. Because of his guilt-fuelled double-life he struggled there too, developed a stress ulcer but found true love with policeman’s daughter Gwen Stacyâ€¦

This volume, collectively spanning October 1972-October 1974, reprints Amazing Spider-Man #114-137 and includes team-up tales from Giant-Size Super-Heroes #1 and Giant-Size Spider-Man #1 and 2, opening here with the next chapter in a long-running duel for control of New York’s underworld in ‘Gang War, Schmang War! What I Want to know is … Who the Heck is Hammerhead?’ by Conway, John Romita Sr., Tony Mortellaro & Jim Starlin, from #114.

Our angst-ridden arachnid is trapped between the battling mobs of 1930s movie gangster pastiche Hammerhead and archenemy Dr. Octopus; each seeking to dominate the Big Apple’s underworld.

In the melee Spidey is captured by the brutally ruthless newcomer and learns from the boastful braggart how an ordinary amnesiac gunsel was rebuilt into an unstoppable cyborg by a rogue scientist named Jonas Harrow.

Seconds from death, Spider-Man is driven to risk everything on a wild escape bid after he overhears that Ock is meeting up with an old lady and fears that his beloved, befuddled Aunt May is once more sheltering the many-armed menaceâ€¦

Dashing across town, he breaks in to Ock’s HQ only to be brained with a vase by the terrified May. Moments behind him are Hammerhead’s goons and all too soon ‘The Last Battle!’ (art by Romita Sr. & Mortellaro) is underway. As the mobsters decimate each other, Spider-Man barely escapes being shot by his own aunt and is more than happy to disappear when the police show up to arrest (almost) everybody.

In the aftermath, however, May astounds everybody by revealing that she will be staying in Octopus’ Westchester mansion until he is releasedâ€¦

Amazing Spider-Man #116 began an extended political thriller as charismatic reformer Richard Raleigh opens a savvy campaign to become Mayor, only to be opposed and hunted by a brutish monster in Suddenlyâ€¦ the Smasher!’

Older fans will recognise much of the story and art since Conway had recycled and augmented Stan Lee, Romita & Jim Mooney’s black & white story from 1968’s Spectacular Spider-Man Magazine (with additional art by Romita & Mortellaro): reconfigured to encompass new subplots regarding May’s absence and publisher J. Jonah Jameson‘s involvement and obsession with Raleighâ€¦

The drama deepens with ‘The Deadly Designs of the Disruptor!’ as the monster’s masked master intensifies his efforts to destroy the would-be Mayor – with only Spider-Man seemingly able to deter the maniac – before the affair finally culminates in a ‘Countdown to Chaos!’ wherein the true architect of the campaign of terror is exposed and destroyedâ€¦

Peter’s problems exponentially increased in #119 as a mysterious telegram to May calls him away to Canada to meet a man named Rimbaud. Before he leaves, however, his best friend’s father has a disturbing episode.

Norman Osborn had been the maniacal Green Goblin until cured by hallucinogen-induced amnesia. Now as Parker readies himself for a trip to Montreal, Osborn seems to be recovering his memoriesâ€¦

With no other option the harried hero heads north, arriving in time to be caught in a city-wide panic as another verdant former sparring partner hits town. ‘The Gentleman’s Name isâ€¦ Hulk’ (an all-Conway & Romita collaboration) saw the wall-crawler utterly overmatched but still striving to stop the rampaging green juggernaut, spectacularly culminating in ‘The Fight and the Fury!’ (drawn by Gil Kane with Paul Reinman and inked by Romita & Mortellaro).

With the immediate threat averted, Peter at last rendezvous with Rimbaud only to see the man murdered before he can share whatever secret he knew about May Parkerâ€¦

In these days of an infinitude of fan-sites, publicity cycles and gleeful spoiler-mongers, it takes a lot to keep a shock ending from the readers, but back in 1973 comics consumers had only word of mouth and the story itself. Thus Amazing Spider-Man #121 staggered everybody when it was releasedâ€¦

The Norman Osborn storyline kicked into high gear on ‘The Night Gwen Stacy Died’ (Conway, Kane, Romita & Mortellaro), the initial instalment of a two-part tale which stunned the readership as Peter’s greatest efforts are not enough to save his intended from the insane rage of the resurgent Green Goblin. The tragic episode then leads inexorably to ‘The Goblin’s Last Stand!’ and a grim and gritty new directionâ€¦

With Spider-Man accused of murdering Osborn and implicated in Gwen’s death, Jameson takes advantage of a new kind of metahuman champion in #123; engaging a Hero for Hire to bring the webspinner to justice in ‘â€¦Just a Man Called Cage!’

However the clash only proves that the antagonists’ lives are more tragically similar than different and Luke Cage resigns from the case in a most distinctive mannerâ€¦

As previously stated, at this time horror was on the rise and the trend permeated all aspects of Marvel continuity. In #124, Jameson’s astronaut son John was revealed to have picked up a strange gem during a moonwalk which transformed him into a lupine beast bearing ‘The Mark of the Man-Wolf’ (art by Kane, Romita & Mortellaro).

Deranged and deadly, the hairy horror stalked his own fiancÃ©e Kristine Saunders as well as his father, with a fighting-mad Spider-Man reacting in a far more brutal manner than ever beforeâ€¦

The conclusion marked the introduction of the next star penciller to the venerable strip as Ross Andru joined Conway and Romita to delineate the end of the ‘Wolfhunt!’ offering a particularly grisly cure for the altered astronautâ€¦

In #126 a new subplot bloomed as a marketing firm hired the astounded and unbelieving arachnid to build a â€œSpider-Mobileâ€ whilst an old and inept enemy returned in ‘The Kangaroo Bounces Back!’ (illustrated by Andru & Mooney).

Short of cash and desperate, Spidey ropes in best frenemy Johnny (Human Torch) Storm to help assemble the anticipated automobile, but is totally unprepared for his Australian attacker since the Kangaroo has had a power upgrade from a mad doctor named Harrowâ€¦

And in the apartment Peter shares with Harry Osborn, the son of the Green Goblin finally succumbs to the mental illness that has been sucking him down since the death of dear old dadâ€¦

Peter’s great friend and good time girl Mary Jane Watson comes under the spotlight in #127 as ‘The Dark Wings of Death!’ (Conway, Andru, Frank Giacoia & Dave Hunt) finds her targeted by a strangely familiar monster who believes she witnessed his last kill. The mystery concludes in ‘The Vulture Hangs High!’ wherein an incredible truth about the avian atrocity is revealed.

Moreover, portents of future trouble manifest as Parker’s biology tutor Professor Miles Warren warns that the student’s grades are slipping and his position is far from secureâ€¦

Conway, Andru, Giacoia & Hunt then crafted a true landmark in comics history in Amazing Spider-Man #129 with ‘The Punisher Strikes Twice!’ which introduced not only the renegade gunslinger but also nefarious manic mastermind The Jackal.

Although one of the industry’s biggest hits from the late 1980s onwards, the compulsive vengeance-taker was always an unlikely and uncomfortable star for comicbooks. His methods are always excessively violent and usually permanent. It’s intriguing to note that unlike most heroes who debuted as villains (Black Widow or Wolverine come to mind) the Punisher actually became more immoral, anti-social and murderous, not less: the buying public simply shifted its communal perspective; The Punisher never toned down or cleaned up his actâ€¦

He was created by Conway, Romita Sr. and Andru; an understandably toned down and muted response to popular prose anti-heroes like Don Pendleton’s Mack Bolan: the Executioner: the cutting edge of a bloody tide of fictive Viet Nam vets who all turned their training and talents to wiping out organised crime in the early 1970s.

In the short, sharp shocker the man with the skull logo was duped by his manipulative partner into hunting Spider-Man. Still a suspect in the death of Norman Osborn, the hero was easy to set up for the murder of the Punisher’s personal gunmakerâ€¦

The long-running mystery over May’s connection to Doc Ock was at last addressed in #130 as ‘Betrayed!’ finds Hammerhead prodded and provoked by the Jackal just as Octavius breaks out of jail.

Distracted by the now completed Spider-Mobile, the Wallcrawler is slow to react until he finally discovers why his aunt is so important to the villain, but by then she’s in the process of becoming Mrs. Otto Octaviusâ€¦

Spiderman is just about to bust up the wedding in ‘My Uncleâ€¦ My Enemy?’ when Hammerhead beats him to it. As the three-way battle escalates the truth comes out. May has inherited a desolate Canadian island which just happens to be teeming with uranium deposits which both Ock and Hammerhead want to secure as the means to becoming an independent nuclear powerâ€¦

Ock has already built an experimental atomic plant on the rocky crag and when his rival invades it all Peter can do is get May out before the entire place becomes an atomic infernoâ€¦

Romita, Reinman & Mortellaro return to limn #132 as the weary Spider-Man arrives back in New York only to stumble into ‘The Master Plan of the Molten Man!’ When old school flame Liz Allen resurfaces, Peter has no idea she is secretly trying to help her criminal stepbrother.

As a super-strong metal-skinned bandit Mark Raxton was only a minor inconvenience to Spider-Man but now his chemically induced condition has worsened and he is swiftly turning into an incandescent human fireball. By the time ‘The Molten Man Breaks Out!’ in #133, however, there is nothing the hero can do except fight until one of them is deadâ€¦

With the monster boom in full swing Giant-Size Super-Heroes #1 (June 1974) then teamed two of the Arachnid’s eeriest enemies in a double-length epic as ‘Man-Wolf at Midnight!’ (Conway, Kane & Esposito) finds John Jameson again gripped by murderous moon madness and enthralled by Living Vampire Morbius ‘When Strikes the Vampire!’

That dynamic dust-up led directly into Giant-Size Spider-Man #1 (July 1974) wherein the web-spinner went in search of an experimental flu vaccine improbably carried on a ocean liner in ‘Ship of Fiends!’ and clashed with Dracula and a scheming Maggia Don at ‘The Masque of the Black Death!’ (Conway, Andru & Don Heck)â€¦

The much-misunderstood hero again crossed paths with The Punisher in Amazing Spider-Man #134-135 when a South American bandit – trained to be his oppressive regime’s Captain America before going freelance – attempted to pillage a Manhattan tour boat in ‘Danger is a Man Namedâ€¦ Tarantula!’ (Conway, Andru, Giacoia & Hunt).

Once again unwilling allies, the ethically-estranged duo dutifully dismantled the villain’s schemes after a ‘Shoot-Out in Central Park!’ but the real danger was building elsewhere as poor Harry accepted at last the infamous inheritance of his devilish, recently departed dadâ€¦

Before then, however, Giant-Size Spider-Man #2 saw the Webslinger drawn into battle with Shang-Chi, Master of Kung Fu as sinister immortal Fu Manchu framed Spider-Man in ‘Masterstroke!’ Eventually the duped heroes cleared the air in ‘Crossâ€¦ and Double-Cross!’ before uniting to foil the cunning Celestial’s scheme to mindwipe America from the ‘Pinnacle of Doom!’

This compelling compendium concludes in a two-part thriller as Conway, Andru, Giacoia & Hunt’s long-brewing clash of former friends kicks off with completely crazy Harry attempting to blow up Peter and Mary Jane. Privy to his best friend’s secret, the maniac then targets all Parker’s loved ones in ‘The Green Goblin Lives Again!’

The desperate, deadly duel ends when ‘The Green Goblin Strikes!’ resulting in doom, destruction, shocking revelations and another tragedy for Peter to feel forever responsible forâ€¦

Despite major qualification this is still a fantastic book about an increasingly relevant teen icon and symbol. Spider-Man at this time became a crucial part of many youngsters’ lives and did so by living a life as close to theirs as social mores and the Comics Code would allow.

Blending cultural veracity with glorious art, and making a dramatic virtue of the awkwardness, confusion and sense of powerlessness most of the readership experienced daily, resulted in an irresistibly intoxicating read, delivered in addictive soap-opera instalments, but none of that would be relevant if the stories weren’t so compellingly entertaining.

The tales in this transitional tome at last proved Spider-Man was bigger than any creator and was well on the way to becoming as real as Romeo and Juliet, Sherlock Holmes or Tarzan.
Â© 1972, 1973, 1974, 2011 Marvel Entertainment Group, Inc. All rights reserved.

April 29, 2015April 28, 2015

IR$ volume 1: Taxing Trails

By Vranken & Desberg, coloured by Coquelicot and translated by Luke Spear (Cinebook)
ISBN: 978-1-905460-51-9

The most appetising thing about European comics (and manga too, although we only ever see the tip of that vast iceberg in English) is the sheer breadth of genres, styles and age ranges of material available.

The same used to be true of British and US comics but creeping colonisation by calcified fan-bases has slowly but surely eradicated many types of tale that might pique interest beyond the generalised ghettoes of superheroes, space opera, sexy horror and merchandised adaptations. Even crime and war comics are a rare exception these days.

Thus this quirky but exceedingly readable thriller with a tantalising twist is a welcome treat even if the Franco-Belgian original first saw print in 1999.

The unlikely champion of these sagas is a civil servant with a US government, who once upon a time started employing super-cool and infallibly effective agents to go after the type of tax dodger far beyond the reach of the law. These days, perhaps every country should have oneâ€¦

Belgian writer Stephen Desberg is one of the bestselling comics author in France. He was born in Brussels in 1954, son of an American lawyer (who was the distribution agent for Metro-Goldwyn Mayer) and a French mother. Stephen began studying law at UniversitÃ© Libre de Bruxelles but dropped out to follow a winding path into the comics biz.

He began with plots and eventually scripts for Will (AKA Willy Maltaite) on Tif et Tondu in Spirou, growing into a reliable jobbing creator on established strips for younger readers before launching his own in the StÃ©phane Colman illustrated Billy the Cat (a funny animal strip, not the DC Thomson superhero series).

Thereafter came 421 with Eric Maltaite, Arkel (Marc Hardy), Jimmy Tousseul (with Daniel Desorgher) and many others. During the 1980s he gradually redirected his efforts to material for older readerships (see for example The Garden of Desire). In 1999 he created popular modern thriller IR$, and a year later added historical drama Le Scorpion to his catalogue of major hits.

Bernard Vranken was an award winning artist by the time he was fifteen and was working on Tintin a year later. Whilst studying architecture at Saint-Luc he took some comics courses by legendary illustrator Eddy Paape at St. Gilles and his true career-path was set. Vranken was crafting short stories for A Suivre when he met Desberg and in 1996 they collaborated for the first time on epic romance Le Sang Noir. Three years later they traded love for money and launched IR$…

The premise is simple and delicious, and Cinebook’s premiere English edition in 2008 doubled your money by combining the first two albums – La voie fiscale and La stratÃ©gie Hagen – into one compelling compilation.

Taxing Trails opens with stylish American mystery man Larry B. Max calling his new favourite chat-line girl Gloria Paradise (Larry hates complications in his life) to kill some time before heading out.

A few days previously a Swiss banker had been rather ostentatiously splurging cash on a visit to California when he’d ended up as a freeway statistic. However his spending spree and sudden demise had raised a few red flagsâ€¦

A right place, wrong time kind of guy, Larry was decisively ending a convenience store hold-up he’d stumbled into when he got a call and soon was working his way up a deadly chain of wealthy reprobates trying to track down who had issued the contract on the bankerâ€¦

Before long Max has identified the former Luc Cretier as a minor banker but major blackmailer who pushed someone too hard and paid the price. That said, the person he was putting the squeeze to is of far more interest to the tax detective. Jewish-American Abraham Loewenstein is a rags-to-riches holocaust survivor who turned tragedy into a life of success and good works.

Larry however has seen something the rest of the world has not and his interview with the aged activist (as an author investigating the scandal of Jewish gold illegally held in Swiss Banks) puts him on another profitable trackâ€¦

Those esteemed institutions had always found some legal chicanery to deny the claims of survivors and family-members who tried to attempted to retrieve their property but in recent years – due the efforts of people like Loewenstein – have seen frustrated victims beginning to win justice through court cases exposing bank practises.

Now Larry’s forensic investigation lead straight to those so-secretive Swiss Banks and a generations-long scandal regarding the illegal retention and redistribution of Jewish funds deposited whilst Hitler was rising to power.

Although the Nazis are long gone, their heritage of plunder remains in those Helvetic vaults and somehow enigmatic, untouchable multi-billionaire survivor of the Death Camps Moshe Geldhof is involvedâ€¦

Larry knows he’s on to something when his car is sabotaged and less likely accidents – such as a girl on a motorcycle blasting him with a machinegun – start to complicate his investigation. Undaunted, he confronts Geldhof in a fancy New York restaurant and finds that hot lead is the first course on the menuâ€¦

After Abraham is murdered for knowing too much, a spectacular, breakneck car chase results in Max arresting Geldhof, but for once the infallible tax man has grossly underestimated the sheer power of moneyâ€¦

The story concludes in The Hagen Strategy as the scene shifts back to 1943 for the incredible truth about Moshe Geldhof as the indefatigable Max delves deeper into the history of the man who has the ear of governments, and especially of Israel.

In America the man himself seems to be â€œtoo big to failâ€ but his sudden liberation only pushes Larry to even greater efforts. That means heading to Bern and cultivating the attentions of Geldof’s ferociously Amazonian daughter Lenni whilst her dad is tangled in red tapeâ€¦

No sooner has he broached the palatial fortress-like mansion, however, than the sinister patron turns up and the hunt is on, with a cadre of heavily armed killers at Max’s well-shod heelsâ€¦

Larry has finally gleaned the true appalling secret of the contemporary Croesus and the truth is something his government can’t cover for him. Now he has only one possible ally in his all-or nothing-war against the money-man and places a call to Mossadâ€¦

Sleek, lean, almost Spartan in its lithe, muscular tribute to James Bond movies, IR$ is a splendidly effective, stylishly gritty thriller series that will delight fans of modern mayhem in all its literary and artistic forms.

Only death and taxes are inescapable, and Larry B. Max offers either or both in one suavely, economical packageâ€¦
Original edition Â© 1977 Editions du Lombard (Le Lombard/Dargaud SA) 1999-2000 by Desberg &Vrancken + Job. English translation 2008 Â© Cinebook Ltd.

April 28, 2015April 27, 2015

New Avengers: Secret Invasion Book 2

By Brian Michael Bendis, Billy Tan, Jim Cheung, Michael Gaydos & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-2949-3

The Skrulls are shape-shifting aliens who’ve bedevilled Earth since Fantastic Four #2, and they have long been a pernicious cornerstone of the Marvel Universe. After decades of use, abuse and misuse the insidious invaders were made the sinister stars of a colossal braided mega-crossover event beginning in April 2008 and running through all titles until Christmas.

The premise of Secret Invasion is simple: the would-be alien conquerors have only just survived a devastating catastrophe which destroyed much of their empire; subsequently leading to a mass religious conversion. They are now utterly resolved and dedicated to make Earth their new holy homeworld.

To this end they have gradually replaced a number of key Earth denizens – most notably superheroes and other metahumans. When their plot is discovered no defender of the Earth truly knows who is on their sideâ€¦

Moreover the cosmic charlatans have also unravelled the secrets of Earth magic and genetic superpowers, creating amped-up counterparts to Earth’s mightiest. They are now primed and able to destroy the world’s heroic champions in face to face confrontations.

Rather than give too much away, let me just say that if you like this sort of thing you’ll love it, and a detailed familiarity is not crucial to your understanding. However, for a complete experience, you will want to see the other 22 â€œSecret Invasionâ€ volumes that accompany this one, although at a pinch you could get by with only the key collection Secret Invasion – which contains the 8-issue core miniseries, one-shot spin-off â€œWho Do You Trust?â€ and illustrated textbook â€œSkrullsâ€ which claims to provide a listing and biography for every shape-shifter yet encountered in the Marvel Universe (but if they left any out, who could tell?).

The New Avengers segment of the saga concludes in the book, collecting issues #43-47 (September 2008 to January 2009) and offering more supplementary and sidebar insights to the main event as the Invasion progresses, focussing again on individual character pieces to propel the narrative rather than vast battles.

Scripted throughout by Brian Michael Bendis, the first tale (illustrated by Billy Tan & Danny Miki) returns to the moment which turned a cold war of suspicion and attrition into a hot shooting match after a spaceship full of what appeared to be Earth heroes crashed into the dinosaur preserve known as the Savage Land.

These returnees all claimed to be the originals, taken at various times and upon landing accused those who had been on Earth prior to their crash of being alien impostors. The most shocking example was Captain America, whom everybody saw assassinated weeks previously on prime time TVâ€¦

Whilst the Star Spangled Avenger is exposed as a Skrull a flashback reveals how potent the new Skrull strategy is, not only copying the body and powers but programming the infiltrator with false memories so that it actually believes itself to be the human hero it mimicsâ€¦

These unwitting Trojan Horses have been mixed in with genuine shanghaied Terrans and eventually allowed to escape back to Earthâ€¦

With art by Tan & Matt Banning, the next sneak peek harks back to the time when Earth’s â€œIlluminatiâ€ – Reed Richards, Tony (Iron Man) Stark, Black Bolt, Stephen Strange, Charles Xavier and Namor, the Sub-Mariner – confronted and were consequently captured by the Skrulls.

Although the heroes eventually escaped they left behind far too many genetic secrets, and this shocking history lesson proceeds to reveal how neophyte scientist Dro’ge Fenu Edu used the mind and personality of Richards to forge the final link in the aliens’ infallible invasion planâ€¦

Jim Cheung, Matt Dell & Jay Leisten illustrated the next chapter which intersected with publishing event House of M as deep-cover agent and invasion commander Queen Veranke found herself caught up in the reality-warping spell of the Scarlet Witch.

As that deeply troubled woman remade the world in a crazed attempt to create a mutant paradise, Veranke was forced to see things that would sharpen her resolve to eradicate humanity once the previous reality was (mostly) restoredâ€¦

Tan & Banning were back for #46 as mystic gangster The Hood and his syndicate of super-criminals rescue murderous menace Madame Masque from SHIELD agents, only to discover that the high-tech lawmen are shapeshifting aliensâ€¦

As the villains struggle to decide what their role will be in the coming struggle, The Hood at last learns where his own incredible abilities come fromâ€¦

The catalogue of changeling tales concludes with a Tan, Michael Gaydos & Banning art collaboration as new parents Luke Cage and Jessica Jones review how they first met when the former â€œHero for Hireâ€ commissioned actual private detective Jones to track down his estranged father.

Some heartbreaks lead to new loves but as the woman known as â€œAliasâ€ gradually moved into Cage’s life, neither knew that one day it would all lead to a Skrull impersonating the Avengers’ butler, stealing their babyâ€¦

Quirky, moving, and winningly low-key, the stories gathered here are supplemented with a cover gallery from by Aleksi Briclot and a selection of landmark original covers his homages are based on, including Avengers Annual #2 by John Buscema, New Avengers: Illuminati #1 by Cheung, House of M #1 by Esad Ribic, Bring on the Bad Guys by John Romita Sr. and West Coast Avengers #1 by Bob Hall.

Although impressive and entertaining, this great Fights ‘n’ Tights tome doesn’t really stand alone, but you will also certainly benefit from checking out the collections Secret Invasion: the Infiltration, Avengers Disassembled, and Annihilation volumes 1-3, as well as the rather pivotal New Avengers: Illuminati graphic novel.

Despite the copious homework list I’ve provided, this book is still a solid action-adventure read, with plenty of human drama to balance the paranoia and power-plays: a pure guilty pleasure.
Â© 2008, 2009, 2011 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

April 27, 2015April 24, 2015

Yakari and the White Buffalo

By Derib & Job, translated by Erica Jeffrey (Cinebook)
ISBN: 978-1-90546-004-5

Western yarns have always captivated consumers in Europe, and none more so than the assorted French-speaking regions who also adore comics. Historically we Brits have also been big fans of sagebrush sagas and the plight of the â€œnoble savageâ€â€¦

In 1964, French-Swiss journalist AndrÃ© Jobin founded the children’s magazine Le Crapaud Ã lunettes and began writing stories for it under the pseudonym Job. In 1967 he hired fellow French-Swiss artist Claude de Ribaupierre, who had started out as an assistant at Studio Peyo, (home of Les Schtroumpfs) where the lad had worked on a number of Smurfs strips for venerable weekly Spirou.

As â€œDeribâ€, Claude co-created with Job The Adventures of the Owl Pythagore for Le Crapaud Ã lunettes and two years later they struck pure gold with their next collaboration.

Launching in 1969, Yakari whimsically and enchantingly related the life of a young Sioux boy on the Great Plains; sometime after the introduction of horses by the Conquistadores but long before the pillaging advent of the White Man to North America.

Derib, equally adept in both the enticing, comically dynamic â€œMarcinelleâ€ big-foot cartoon style and devastatingly compelling meta-realistic action-rendering, went on to become one of the Continent’s most prolific, celebrated and beloved creators with such groundbreaking strips as Celui-qui-est-nÃ©-deux-fois, Jo (the first comic on AIDS ever published), Pour toi, Sandra and La Grande Saga Indienne).

A large proportion of his stunning works over the decades reverberate with western themes and magnificent geographical backdrops and landscapes – and Yakari is considered by many to be the feature that catapulted him to mega-stardom.

Yakari et le bison blanc was the second collected European album, published in 1976 as the strip continued rapidly rising to huge prominence and critical acclaim. In 1978 the feature began running in Tintin, subsequently spawning two animated TV series (1983 and 2005), all the usual merchandising spin-offs and achieving monumental global sales of the 38 albums (in 17 languages) to date.

The most recent, Yakari et la tueuse des mers was released in 2014.

In 2005 the first translated volume – Yakari and Great Eagle – was part of Cinebook’s opening salvo in converting British audiences to the joys and magic of Euro-comics – and is still readily available for you and your family to enjoy.

Yakari and the White Buffalo begins one cold day on the plains with the winter snows still heavy on the ground. With Spring delayed, animals and humans are all going hungry and when the boy and his pinto mount Little Thunder return to camp they find his father Bold Gaze has decreed they will move south in search of better prospects.

As the tribe progress across the prairie the buffalo that should form the major part of their diet are nowhere to be foundâ€¦

Then one day scout Grey Wolf furiously rides in. He has seen the herd. Soon they will all be enjoying the nourishment of Great Spirit Wakonda‘s gift and that night the braves dance in honour of the moving mountains they will soon hunt.

Not permitted to join the men, Yakari wanders off with his pony and meets his totem spirit Great Eagle in a lush clearing. The noble bird warns him that the hunt will not go the way it should and the glum boy heads home with Little Thunder buckling under the weight of firewood the worried yet diligent lad has gatheredâ€¦

Far away the braves are baffled and still without meat. The night sky is riven with terrifying lightning and a furious storm. Back at the main camp Yakari is scared and worried but soon soothed by elderly Quiet Rock. Eventually the boy sleeps and is once more visited by prophetic dreams. After tracking the buffalo over boiling sandy wastes and through a strange horn-like rock formation, the vision ends with Yakari leading the herd and a great white bull back to the peopleâ€¦

As his mother wakes him in the morning, elsewhere the braves have reached a great desert and, with no sign of the great herd, are forced to split into small scouting parties. With little to do Yakari and Little Thunder indulge in a race with boisterous older boy Buffalo Seed and gentle Rainbow. The chase takes them to the top of a hill where he sees the rocky prominence of his dreamâ€¦

His friends cannot deter Yakari from riding right out into the vast empty plain in his quest and before long both boy and pony are suffering the harsh trials of scorching heat and burning thirst. Determined to go on, they are both near death when Great Eagle arrives and teaches them the secret of getting water out of the tall cacti around them.

Fortified and reinvigorated they push on into the sandy wastes and the next day are confronted by a towering wall of rock. Unable to climb the forbidding massif, Yakari discusses the problem with his pony and the wise steed suggests that every fence has an opening somewhereâ€¦

At last their patient search reveals a deliciously refreshing waterfall and a tunnel into a lush hidden oasis where the missing buffalo herd is grazing in total secrecyâ€¦

As they innocently approach the massive ruminants a young bull furiously attacks but his charge is intercepted by an immense white buffalo who then takes the intruders aside for a quiet discussion.

The wise beast explains the nature of the hidden pasture and listens with great care to the tale of woe that has left the Sioux starving. The white buffalo understands the role of all creatures in the grand scheme of life and was already preparing to lead the migration back to the plains when the boy arrivedâ€¦

By the time horse and rider have led the herd to the spring plains the adult hunters have returned home, but the snowy bovine mountain sagely advises Yakari and Little Thunder to ride away before the braves can arrive to fulfil their role in the eternal cycle of life and death on the plainsâ€¦

The saga of the valiant little brave who can speak with animals and enjoys a unique place in an exotic world is a decades-long celebration of joyously gentle, moving and inexpressibly entertaining adventures honouring and eulogising an iconic culture with grace, wit, wonder and especially humour. These tales are a masterpiece of kids’ comics literature and Yakari is a series no fan of graphic literature should be without.

April 26, 2015April 24, 2015

Ultimate Comics Spider-Man by Brian Bendis volume 4

By Brian Michael Bendis, Sara Pichelli, David Marquez, Justin Ponsor & various (Marvel) ISBN: 978-0-7851-6503-3

When the Ultimate Spider-Man died, writer Brian Michael Bendis and Marvel promised that a new hero would arise from the ashesâ€¦

Marvel’s Ultimates imprint began in 2000 with a post-modern take on major characters and concepts to bring them into line with the tastes of 21^st century readers – apparently a wholly different demographic from us baby-boomers and our descendents content to stick with the precepts sprung from founding talents Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko and Stan Leeâ€¦ or perhaps just those unable or unwilling to deal with five decades (seven if you include Golden Age Timely tales retroactively co-opted into the mix) of continuity baggage which saturated the originals.

Of course the darkly nihilistic new universe soon became as continuity-constricted as its ancestor and in 2008 cleansing exercise â€œUltimatumâ€ culminated in a reign of terror which killed dozens of super-humans and millions of mere mortals in a devastating tsunami that inundated Manhattan courtesy of mutant menace Magneto.

In the months that followed, plucky Peter Parker and his fellow meta-human survivors struggled to restore order to a dangerous new world, but just as Spider-Man finally gained a measure of acceptance and was hailed a hero by the masses, he took a bullet for Captain America and very publicly met his end during a catastrophic super-villain showdown â€¦

In the aftermath, child prodigy Miles Morales gained suspiciously similar powers (super-strong and fast and able to walk up walls, plus invisibility and a crippling â€œvenom-chargeâ€) and started out on the same deadly learning curve: coping with astounding new physical abilities, painfully discovering the daily costs of living a life of lies and realising how a crippling sense of responsibility is the most seductive method of self-harm and worst of all of possible gifts.

He was helped and hindered in equal amounts by his uncle Aaron: a career super-criminal dubbed The Prowler. Things started to go spiral out of control the night Aaron Davis died in battle with the new arachnid hero in town, but now – months later – the repercussions of the televised event have finally caught up with the boy who would be Spider-Manâ€¦

Written throughout by Bendis, this luxurious hardcover collection (re-presenting Ultimate Comics Spider-Man #16.1 and #19-25, from December 2012 to June 2013) finds the juvenile wall-crawler recovering in the aftermath of a second War Between the States.

That internecine conflict almost destroyed the Republic but has left the traumatised public in no mood to tolerate mysteries or put up with unexplained and potentially dangerous characters and vigilantes.

The action opens with jump-on tale ‘Point One’ (illustrated by David Marquez

from Ultimate Comics Spider-Man #16.1) wherein unscrupulous reporter Betty Brant uses her considerable investigative skills to establish a link between The Prowler, the second Spider-Man, the genetic experiments of Norman Osborn and a guy named Morales.

As she digs deeper and follows the brief career of the new hero, Betty not only uncovers the remains of the genegineered spider which transformed Miles, but also learns far more than she should have from disgraced Oscorp biochemist Dr. Conrad Marcus, as well as engendering the unwelcome interest of scientific monolith Roxxon Industries and a brutal, relentless monstrosityâ€¦

The main event is 4-part epic ‘Venom War’ (art by Sara Pichelli) which opens in the days following the civil war. Child prodigy Miles and best-bud/superhero trainer Ganke are back at Brooklyn Visions Academy Boarding School. Miles spends only weekends at home, and now he and his confidante are eagerly attempting to master Peter Parker‘s web-fluid formula and wrist-shooters which the inexperienced hero has recently inherited.

As a mysterious monster raids and wrecks Roxxon’s HQ, in Manhattan homicide cop and ex-SHIELD agent Mariah Hill is investigating the bloody murder of a journalist. Her interviews at the Daily Bugle all lead her to the Davis/Morales home in Brooklyn.

Marcus’ dad Jefferson Davis has become an involuntary and extremely camera-shy celebrity because of his stand against the secessionist organisation Hydra. When a film crew bursts into the family home he understandably goes ballistic and kicks them to the kerb, but his fury is futile in the face of the towering, metamorphic horror known as Venom, which chooses that moment to attack the person it accuses of being Spider-Manâ€¦

The next chapter opens seconds later as the beast lunges, and in the family home Miles suits up and springs into battleâ€¦

The clash is savage and terrifying. As the TV parasites carry on filming, Jefferson joins the severely overmatched Spider-Man only to be smashed and broken like a bugâ€¦

The Arachnid kid goes crazy but his best efforts – and the fusillade of shots from the just- arrived cops – are useless. Only after the shattered lad employs his devastating venom blasts does he succeed in driving off the amorphous atrocityâ€¦

The shocking struggle has been broadcast all over the world. Elsewhere in Brooklyn two girls cherished by the original web-spinner immediately drop what they’re doing and rush to the scene of the battleâ€¦

Many months previously, as part of the crowd of grateful strangers attending Peter Parker’s memorial, Miles and Ganke had talked to another mourner, a girl who was intimate with the murdered hero. Gwen Stacy offered quiet insights to the boy child who had just acquired his powers and then altered the course of his life forever by sharing a simple mantra: â€œwith great power comes great responsibilityâ€â€¦

Now she and Mary Jane Watson arrive at the crime scene ready to share their experience in keeping secrets just as attending detective Mariah Hill reaches the conclusion that the shell-shocked boy crying on the stairs is Spider-Manâ€¦

His mother Rio Morales is in the ambulance taking Jefferson to hospital and Miles is in no state to fend off questions from an experienced SHIELD interrogator or even speak to his equally traumatised buddy Ganke, but Gwen and Mary Jane certainly are and quickly shut down the situation and terminate the interview.

As they explain all the ghastly secrets of the Venom monster and its connection to the Parker family, speculation leads the youngsters to the idea that maybe the genetic quirk which made Peter Spider-Man might be repeated in the Morales familyâ€¦

Deep below their feet the shapeshifting symbiote is reconstituting. Soon it breaks out of the sewers to again consume human hosts. The consciousness in charge of the marauding terror hasn’t given up its search for Spider-Man and is all too quickly bursting into the hospital where Rio is waiting for word on her husbandâ€¦

The shocking conclusion begins with news of the assault reaching Miles. Hill, convinced she is right, gives Miles crucial advice for the battle she knows his coming. By the time Spider-Man reaches the medical centre Venom is carving a bloody swathe through the patients and doctors and the consequent clash is terrifying to behold.

With bodies falling everywhere Miles eventually finds a grotesque and dreadful way to stop the beast and expose the villain within, but in the aftermath realises that the awful cost has been another person he lovesâ€¦

As the ruthless boss of Roxxon now makes Spider-Man his only priority, in Brooklyn Miles wakes from a deep sleep and realises his life has changed forever. At last he understands the horror and tragedy which underpins the legend of Spider-Man. This time though, the response to a death in the family is not guilty defiance and an urge to make things right, but a crushing, total surrenderâ€¦

To Be Continuedâ€¦

With covers by Sara Pichelli, this is a tense, breathtaking action-packed, thriller full of the humour and drama which blessed the original Lee/Ditko tales: a controversial but worthy way to continue and advance the legend that Fights ‘n’ Tights addicts will admire and adoreâ€¦ Â© 2012, 2013 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

April 25, 2015April 24, 2015

Avengers volume 1

By Brian Michael Bendis, John Romita Jr., Klaus Janson, Tom Palmer& various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-4501-1

Once upon a time Norman Osborn was America’s Security Czar, an untouchable â€œtop-copâ€ in sole charge of a beleaguered nation’s defence and freedom, especially in regard to the USA’s costumed and metahuman community.

When the deranged former Green Goblin overplayed his hand, a coalition of outlawed champions united to defeat him and his fall from grace was staggering and total, leading to a new Age of Heroes.

As part of that resurgence, original Captain America Steve Rogers was appointed Supreme Commander of US metahuman resources and promptly set about redefining the what, who and how of the World’s Mightiest Heroes. This meant a flotilla of new teams (and titles) with Avengers volume 4 being the official spine of the comicbook franchise.

This slim yet spectacular collection gathers issues #1-6 (written by Brian Michael Bendis with art by John Romita Jr, and inkers Klaus Janson & Tom Palmer; spanning July to December 2010) and opens with the triumphant, reunited army of heroes trying to decide just who goes where and does what.

Those deliberations are rudely interrupted in ‘Next Avengers Part One’ when time-tyrant Kang the Conqueror beams in with a frantic warning. He barely opens his mouth before he’s blasted across the city by the wary, twice-shy heroes, but as they gather to press their attack the conqueror stops all hostilities by brandishing an ultimate weapon.

Iron Man Tony Stark prevents his comrades from finishing off Kang because he recognises the Dark Matter Accelerator. It’s something he thought up and swore never to build. The only way the future man can have it is if Stark made it and then gave it to himâ€¦

In the cautious ceasefire that follows Kang explains that he’s come to beg the aid of the Avengers. In the future he is one of a team that includes the children of the Avengers, united to stop life-loathing Artificial Intelligence Ultron from exterminating humanity.

They at last succeeded in destroying the mechanoid marauder but the children have now become an even greater menace. Moreover, Kang’s attempts to stop them have resulted in time itself shredding and all of reality is now collapsingâ€¦

The arrogant time-terrorist expects the Avengers to stop their errant offspring, but as Steve Rogers heads off all debate and allocates teams, back in the future Kang and his hidden allies make preparations to carry out their real schemeâ€¦

Not every past Avenger was keen to answer the call to reassemble. Simon Williams had come to believe the team had done more harm than good and threatened to stop them if they started up again. ‘Wonder Man Attacks?!!’ sees him make good on his warning as a committee of heroes track down Kree outcast Noh-Varr The Protector to make use of his expertise in time travel.

As the alien and Stark’s efforts finally bear fruit Wonder Man brutally engages the entire team and in the blockbusting battle that follows, something goes terribly wrong and an alternate Apocalypse and his horrendous Horsemen materialise, intent on ending mankind.

As the heroes swiftly mobilise to tackle the new crisis, a ‘Menace From Beyond Time’ manifests as various time-streams and realities begin to coalesce and overlap in New York City.

With All of Everything endangered, a small squad of heroes heads into the unhappy future leaving their harried comrades to hold back a tidal wave of time-tossed menaces – and the occasional misplaced hero such as Killraven and Devil Dinosaurâ€¦

Far away from now, Iron Man, Wolverine, replacement Captain America James â€œBuckyâ€ Barnes and Noh-Varr witness first hand the cataclysmic war against Ultron before being ambushed by the next generation in ‘Only the Good Die Young’.

Back in their home era a multitude of past menaces – from cavemen to cowboys to cosmic devourer Galactus – are keeping the majority of Avengers busy, whilst in the foredoomed tomorrow the questing quartet are painfully discovering that they’ve been played by Kang yet againâ€¦

Full explanations are promised by an incredibly aged Tony Stark and the architect of the chronal rescue plan: Bruce Banner in his gamma-charged arch-villain persona of the Maestroâ€¦

With two Starks, an incredibly experienced Banner and new element Noh-Varr all intent on fixing the problem, the sorry story soon comes out. All of creation’s future is stuck in a temporal loop: a cosmic â€œGroundhog Dayâ€ with Kang interminably spent battling Ultron but now, with the odds altered by the historical Avengers, there’s a chance to make things right in one final ‘Battle for the Future’â€¦

Of course as Thor’s clash with Galactus escalates and the assembled Avengers resolutely resist Apocalypse and his minions in the now, there may not be a past to return toâ€¦

Layers of murderous duplicity are peeled back in ‘Next Avengers Part 6: Conclusion’ as a cunning solution to the Ultron-Kang impasse is conceived but, even as reality reasserts itself and four weary heroes return home, old man Stark takes the risky chance of giving his younger self a deadly device and a portentous warning from the futureâ€¦

Epic, vast in scale and overflowing with action, this a magnificently rendered tale that might bewilder new readers looking for a post-movie fix, but will delight dyed-in-the-wool Fights ‘n’ Tights fanatics. It comes with 16 covers-&-variants by Romita Jr., Janson & Dean White, John Romita Sr. & Frank D’Armata, Greg Land & Morry Hollowell, Jim Cheung & Justin Ponsor, Alan Aldridge, Phil Jimenez & D’Armata, plus a massive combined variant cover by Marko Djurdjevic.

April 24, 2015April 23, 2015

Twin Spica volume 7

New, expanded review

By Kou Yaginuma (Vertical)
ISBN: 978-1-935654-12-4

The yearning, imagination and anticipation of space travel is paramount to this inspirational manga series from Kou Yaginuma, who first captured the hearts and minds of the public with his poignant short story 2015 Nen no Uchiage Hanabi (2015: Fireworks, published in Gekkan Comics Flapper, June 2000).

Following its unprecedented success, he expanded and enhanced the subject, themes and characters into a major epic combining hard science and humanist fiction with lyrical mysticism and traditional tales of school-days and growing up.

2024AD: teenaged Asumi Kamogawa has always dreamed of going into space. From her earliest moments the lonely child gazed up at the stars with her imaginary friend Mr. Lion, especially at the twinkling glow of Virgo and the alluring binary star Spica.

An isolated, serious child, she lived with her father, a common labourer who had once worked for the consortium which built the rockets for Japan’s Space Program.

When Asumi was a year old, the first Japanese launch ended in utter catastrophe after rocket-ship ShishigÅ (â€œThe Lionâ€), exploded on its maiden flight: crashing to earth on the city of Yuigahama. Hundreds were killed and many more injured, including Asumi’s mother.

Maimed and comatose, the matron took years to die. The shock crushed her grieving husband and utterly traumatised infant Asumi.

In response to the disaster Japan set up an astronautics and space sciences training facility. After years of determined struggle, Asumi was accepted by the Tokyo National Space School. Slowly making friends like Shinnosuke Fuchuya (who used to bully her as child in Yuigahama), boisterous Kei Oumi, chilly and distant Marika Ukita and spooky, ultra-cool Shu Suzuki, Asumi daily moved closer to her unshakable dream of going to the stars.

Against all odds – she is small, looks weak and is very poor – Asumi endures. She still talks with Mr. Lion, who is apparently the ghost of an astronaut who died on the ShishigÅâ€¦

Individual episodes are divided into â€œMissionsâ€ all slowly forming a vast tapestry explaining the undisclosed interconnectedness of all the characters and volume seven comprises numbers 30-38, as well as a brace of enchanting autobiographical vignettes from the author’s own teenage years.

‘Mission: 30’ begins with Asumi and her classmates enjoying their seaside vacation in the largely restored resort town of Yuigahama – even Ukita. Nevertheless the still-quite-formal living enigma is plagued by feelings that she has been here before. These phantom memories increasingly draw her to a secluded shrine dedicated to the disaster.

As previously seen in a sequence of flashbacks, she has an ancient and inexplicable connection to a boy who grew up to be Mr. Lionâ€¦

Long ago in Yuigahama, a lad obsessed with rockets met a frail, sickly rich girl stuck in isolation in a big house. Her name was Marika Ukita and they became friends despite her condition and the constant interventions of her furious father.

She was beguiled by the boy’s tales of space flight and the history of exploration. In return she shared the only joyous moment in her tragic life, when her over-protective dad took her to see a play called Beauty and the Beastâ€¦

During the big annual Fireworks Festival the boy made a lion-mask of the Beast to wear, but she never came. He had to break into the mansion to show her. She was very sick but wanted to dance with himâ€¦

Later the dying daughter had quietly rebelled when told she was being packed off to a Swiss sanatorium. She slipped out of the house when no-one was watching and vanished. The boy knew where she had gone and rushed off to save herâ€¦

‘Mission: 31’ finds Marika succumbing to her inner torment and wandering off to find the isolated commemoration monument. When she becomes dangerously lost and her mysterious medical malady overwhelms her, Asumi, moved by her own memory-ghosts, tracks her down just in timeâ€¦

As they wait together to be found in ‘Mission: 32’, deep bonds are forged and Marika at last reveals that she is not a real person but â€œjust a copyâ€ of a sick and lonely girl who died long agoâ€¦

We are afforded a glimpse into events prior to and following the crash of the ShishigÅ and it becomes clear that both girls are afflicted with the same unquenchable need to escape Earthâ€¦

Asumi’s father Tomoro Kamogawa is no fan of the space program, having lost his wife, his engineering job and his pride to the race for space. In the wake of the catastrophe, despite being a grieving widower himself, he was assigned by his heartless bosses at the corporation who built the ship to lead the reparations committee.

Guilt-wracked and bereaved, the devastated widower had to visit and apologize to each and every survivor and victim’s family. He raised his daughter alone, working two and often three menial jobs at a time for over a decadeâ€¦

Now with ‘Mission: 33’ the truth over those terrible events starts to unfold. His old engineering colleague Takahito Sano is now one of Asumi’s professors at the Space School and when they meet again, their men’s previous history and relationship is examined and reviewed for the first time in yearsâ€¦

As five young astronaut trainees further bond in an atmosphere of unravelling secrets and far too many persistent ghosts and memories, a potential cause of the crash is mooted. The years leading to the construction of the Lion are revealed to be littered with political in-fighting, unscrupulous double-dealing, thwarted ambitions and corporate cost-cutting.

Moreover both Sano and Kamogawa were extremely attached to the woman who became Asumi’s motherâ€¦

The second half of this book concentrates on the students’ return to school and their next semester of training. In ‘Mission: 34’ Asumi’s relationship with orphan student (and apparent anti-space program activist) Kiriu seems to be developing into more than mere friendship.

He volunteers at a hospice and is trying to learn the harmonica so that he can play to an old woman with dementia. He so very much reminds Asumi of her school friend Shimazu who died from cancer after the Yuigahama disasterâ€¦

Diffidently bonding, Kiriu tells her of a Sunday concert he’s playing a week hence and she promises to be thereâ€¦

Elsewhere, the clone Ukita recalls how she began severing ties to the controlling dad who spent a fortune and broke the law to make her, and realises that her true home is with Asumi and her star-bound fellowsâ€¦

‘Mission: 35’ focuses on school where the latest tests of strength, ingenuity and fortitude find the class divided into teams and transported to a decommissioned prison. Their task: to break free within seven days. Worried Asumi surprisingly convinces the teachers to drive them back to the city early if they all finish the task before Sundayâ€¦

The test continues in ‘Mission: 36’ as the jailed students face isolation and a seemingly insurmountable problem whilst back in the city a boy with a harmonica tries not to fixate on whether a certain girl will stand him up.

In his cell Fuchiya is also thinking about her: why he can never say what he wants to her and why he can’t see Mr. Lionâ€¦

In their shared dungeon Asumi, Kei and Marika are finally working together and have conceived an escape plan in ‘Mission: 37’. Not long after they are joined on the outside by Shi and Fucchy.

However in ‘Mission: 38’, even with things working her way there’s a snag in Asumi’s return to Tokyo and her date. Surprisingly, grouchy, unpredictable Fuchuya steps in to help the girl he spends so much time studiously annoying and ignoringâ€¦

Even with his brusque assistance she’s too late for the concert, but arriving despondent at the park she finds Kiriu waitingâ€¦

Even with her all her dreams coming true, however, Asumi is still sad. Despite appearances, the new boy is no Shimazu, whom she misses so very, very muchâ€¦

To Be Continuedâ€¦

The main event suspended, this moving tome then concludes with two more ‘Another Spica’ featurettes which find author Yaginuma in autobiographical mode again. Harking back to his ambition-free teens, the first reveals how a crappy job in refreshment retail afforded him time one Christmas to recall that special girl in school he tried to grow taller for, after which the summer drudgery of the job leads to memories of first dates, first drives and first lovesâ€¦

These powerfully evocative tales originally appeared in 2004 as Futatsu no Supika 7 & 8 in Seinen manga magazine Gekkan Comic Flapper, aimed at male readers aged 18-30, but this ongoing, unfolding saga is perfect for any older kid with stars in their eyesâ€¦

Twin Spica filled 16 Japanese volumes from September 2001 to August 2009, tracing the trajectories of Asumi and friends from callow students to accomplished astronauts and has spawned both anime and live action TV series.

This compulsively addictive serial has everything: plenty of hard science to back up the savvy extrapolation, an ever-more engaging cast, enduring mystery, tender moments, isolation, teen angst and true friendships; all wrapped up in a joyous coming-of-age drama with supernatural overtones and masses of sheer sentiment.

Utterly defining the siren call of the Starry Reaches for a new generation (and the older ones too) Twin Spica is quite simply too good to missâ€¦

These books are printed in the Japanese right to left, back to front format.
Â© 2011 by Kou Yaginuma. Translation Â© 2011 Vertical, Inc.

April 23, 2015April 22, 2015

In the Shadow of the Derricks: Lucky Luke volume 5

By Morris & Goscinny, translated by Luke Spear (Cinebook)
ISBN: 978-1-905460-17-5

Lucky Luke is a rangy, good-natured, lightning-fast quick-draw cowboy who roams the fabulously mythic Old West on his super-smart horse Jolly Jumper, having light-hearted adventures and interacting with a host of historical and legendary figures of the genre.

He’s probably the most popular Western star still active in the world today. His unbroken string of exploits over nearly seventy years has made him one of the best-selling comic characters in Europe (81 albums selling in excess of 300 million copies in 30 languages thus far), with spin-off toys, computer games, animated cartoons and even a plethora of TV shows and live-action movies.

He was created in 1946 by Belgian animator, illustrator and cartoonist Maurice de BÃ©vÃ¨re (â€œMorrisâ€) for the 1947 Annual (L’Almanach Spirou 1947) of Le Journal de Spirou, before launching into his first weekly adventure ‘Arizona 1880’ on December 7^th 1946.

Prior to that, Morris met future comics super-stars Franquin and Peyo while working at the CBA (Compagnie Belge d’ActualitiÃ©s) cartoon studio and contributing caricatures to weekly magazine Le Moustique.

Morris quickly became one of â€œla Bande des quatreâ€ (The Gang of Four) which comprised creators JijÃ©, Will and Franquin: the leading proponents of the loose and free-wheeling artistic style known as the â€œMarcinelle Schoolâ€ which dominated Spirou in aesthetic contention with the â€œLigne Claireâ€ style used by HergÃ©, EP Jacobs and other artists in Tintin Magazine.

In 1948 said Gang (all but Will) visited America, meeting US creators and sightseeing. Morris stayed for six years, meeting fellow traveller RenÃ© Goscinny, scoring some work from newly-formed EC sensation Mad and making copious notes and sketches of the swiftly vanishing Old West. That research resonates on every page of his life’s work.

Working solo until 1955, Morris produced another nine albums worth of affectionate sagebrush parody before teaming up with Goscinny, who became the regular wordsmith. Luke rapidly attained the dizzying heights of superstardom, commencing with ‘Des rails sur la Prairie’ (Rails on the Prairie), which began in Spirou on August 25^th 1955.

In 1967 the six-gun straight-shooter switched teams, transferring to Goscinny’s own magazine Pilote with ‘La Diligence’ (The Stagecoach). Goscinny produced 45 albums with Morris before his death in 1977, after which Morris continued both singly and with fresh collaborators.

Morris died in 2001 having drawn fully 70 adventures, plus the spin-off adventures of Rantanplan (â€œdumbest dog in the Westâ€ and a charming spoof of cinema canine Rin-Tin-Tin), after which AchdÃ©, Laurent Gerra, Benacquista & Pennac took over the franchise, producing another five tales to date.

Moreover, apart from the initial adventure, Lucky (to appropriate a quote applied to the thematically simpatico Alias Smith and Jones) â€œin all that timeâ€¦ never shot or killed anyoneâ€â€¦

Lucky Luke first appeared in Britain syndicated to weekly comic Film Fun and reappeared in 1967 in Giggle where he was renamed Buck Bingo. In all these venues – as well as the numerous attempts to follow the English-language successes of Tintin and Asterix albums from Brockhampton and Knight Books – Luke had a trademark cigarette hanging insouciantly from his lip, but in 1983 Morris, no doubt amidst both pained howls and muted mutterings of â€œpolitical correctness gone madâ€, substituted a piece of straw for the much-travelled dog-end, which garnered him an official tip of the hat from the World Health Organization.

The most successful attempt at bringing Lucky Luke to our shores and shelves is the most recent. Cinebook (who have rightly restored the foul weed to his lips on the interior pages if not the coversâ€¦) have translated 53 albums thus far. In the Shadow of the Derricks was the fifth, now available both on paper and as an e-book edition.

As Ã€ l’ombre des derricks, it was first published in 1962: the 18^th European release and Goscinny’s ninth collaboration with Morris. It’s also one of the team’s many tales blending historical personages with their wandering hero’s action-comedy exploits and as such it’s a wry condemnation of the oil business both in terms of unchecked commercial adventurism and ecological impact and one of the earliest negative opinions of the trade in comicsâ€¦

It all begins with a little history lesson on how a toxic contaminant farmers once hated and dreaded finding on their land rapidly became a treasured commodity able to turn rational souls into greed-crazed prospecting zombies, after pioneer Edwin Laurentine Drake (popularly known as Colonel Drake and notoriously renowned as the first man to drill for oil in America) set up shop in Titusville, Pennsylvania in 1857.

Two years later his invention of the â€œOil Derrickâ€ triggers the first oil rush in history and prospectors come from far and wide to cash in on the new bonanza mineral. Terrified of the inrush of ne’er-do-wells and chancers, the Titusville City Council quickly telegraph for the greatest cowboy lawman in the world to come protect themâ€¦

By the time Lucky Luke rides in, the little city is a fetid sinkhole of greed and corruption which looks and smells as bad as it acts. The dignitaries who summoned him are now as enamoured of â€œblack goldâ€ as any transient prospector and the Deputy Mayor’s last official duty is to give Luke his sheriff’s badge before joining the deranged digging fraternity.

The crowning indignity comes when a passing prospector stops him from lighting a cigarette. The oil fumes are so prevalent and pernicious that one match might eradicate the entire town!

Setting to work, Lucky heads for the saloon and is accosted by a gang of thugs. The brutish Bingle is intent on scaring the lawman off but has completely underestimated his opponentâ€¦

Hauling the defeated desperado to jail Luke meets the only man in town immune to oil-fever. Old Sam Jigs loathes what the evil muck has made of his town and is happy to watch Bingle while Lucky goes to inspect Colonel Drake’s installation, meeting also the celebrity’s ingenious engineer Billy Smith.

The Colonel takes the sheriff on a tour of various claims and working wells, imploring him to try and restore some order to the wild and wicked region. However all the current fighting, feuding and wildcatting is as nothing to the growing depredations of smooth, slick, oily Texan lawyer Barry Blunt whom Luke first encounters when he stops a lynching.

The legal weasel has a plan to own every well in America and knows enough lawful dodges to trick or force all the other prospectors out of business before they’ve even begun. This is a new kind of opponent for the straight-shooter, who normally holds the Law in great esteemâ€¦

Blunt is inexorably forcing the independents to leave or sell up to him; his legion of legal wrangles and small-print scams backed up by a gang of ruthless cutthroats. One such is Bingle, whom the shady shyster tries to spring from jail, only to find that his hulking heavy doesn’t want to leave. He’s already struck oil while digging an escape tunnelâ€¦

When prospectors who won’t sell or quit start experiencing devastating oil-fires and unemployed townsfolk sell themselves into virtual slavery in Barry’s growing enterprises it’s time for drastic action, and Luke resolves to start using the spirit rather the letter of the lawâ€¦

Soon Barry is in jail on trumped up charges and the villain shows his true colours. Busting out and setting the entire region ablaze, Blunt proves himself a suicidal madman: if he can’t own the oil, nobody willâ€¦

After the final showdown Lucky and Jolly Jumper resign, heading back home extremely relieved that goofy old Texas doesn’t have to put up with idiot oil huntersâ€¦

Cleverly barbed, wickedly ironic and spectacularly cynical, this witty romp is another grand old hoot in the tradition of Destry Rides Again and Support Your Local Sheriff (perhaps Paint Your Wagon, Evil Roy Slade or Cat Ballou are more your style?), superbly executed by master storytellers as a wonderful introduction to a unique genre for today’s kids who might well have missed the romantic allure of an all-pervasive Wild West that never wasâ€¦

And in case you’re worried, even though the interior art still has our hero chawin’ on that ol’ nicotine stick, trust me, there’s very little chance of anyone craving a quick snout, but quite a strong probability that they’ll be addicted to Lucky Luke Albumsâ€¦

April 22, 2015April 21, 2015

Robert Louis Stevenson’s Kidnapped – the graphic novel

Adapted by Alan Grant & Cam Kennedy (Waverley Books)
ISBN: 978-1-902407-38-8

Practically as soon as comicbooks were invented, high-minded enterprising souls were using the new medium to get readers interested in great literature: paring down deathless prose whilst adding the sheer power of pictures in narrative sequence.

In most cases over the intervening decades these adaptations have been less than stellar, but every so often a piece of work emerges that is not just a mere distillation, adjunct or accommodation but actually works as well in comics terms as the original literary ones.

One sterling example of such graphic magic came out of the 2004 selection of Edinburgh as the first UNESCO City of Literature, when Scottish funnybook veterans Alan Grant and Cam Kennedy were invited to convert a brace of classic tales by Robert Louis Stevenson to publishing’s hottest mediumâ€¦

With a bare minimum of abridgement or adulteration and astonishingly augmented by the stunning art and colours of the inimitable Kennedy, the timelessly classic tale unfolds beginning with seventeen year old David Balfour who in June 1751 strides away from rural Essendean and the only home he has even known into peril, terror and astounding adventureâ€¦

Upon his father’s death Davie receives a letter which reveals the existence of a relative he never knew he possessed, so he promptly walks all the way to Edinburgh and sees for the first time the dilapidated, broken-down but still imposing House of Shaws.

At a time when the oppressive English conquerors are still openly revelling in crushing the Jacobite Rebellion, his progress is slow and cautious. One day David reaches the manor but is not comforted nor relieved, having heard no good word from any he passed about Ebenezer Balfour and his â€œhouse built on bloodâ€â€¦

The Laird is an elderly, scared-seeming, guilt-wracked scoundrel who grudgingly takes David in after declaring himself his uncle. Soon, however, David comes to realise that not only has Ebenezer long ago swindled his deceased brother out of his inheritance but is prepared to kill his only kin to keep itâ€¦

Forewarned, outraged and wary, Davie nonetheless falls into a trap when he accompanies his uncle to the family lawyer Rankeillor – purportedly to make amends and square accounts – at Queen’s Ferry. The lad is tricked aboard the brig Covenant where he learns Ebenezer has paid villainous Captain Hoseason to transport him to the New World to be sold as a slaveâ€¦

Clubbed unconscious and inescapably trapped, David plunges into despair and illness. His unwanted journey is marked with brutality and horror, but marginally improves after he witnesses the murder of the cabin boy Ransome and is compelled to become that poor soul’s replacement.

A week later everything changes after the Covenant collides with a smaller vessel in the fog and a survivor is hauled aboard. The small, ferocious and exceedingly dangerous-looking straggler is Alan Breck Stewart: an earnest Jacobite who spends his days collecting debts for the defeated Highland chiefs-in-exile and smuggling the money to them in France.

More avaricious than political, the captain agrees to ferry Breck to a friendly destination for sixty golden guineas but when David overhears Hoseasons and First Mate Mr. Shuan planning to murder the Highlander, he makes a fateful life-changing decisionâ€¦

Allying himself with Breck, young Balfour gets his first taste of battle and bloodletting when the pair heroically confront the crew from a readymade fortress in the main cabin. With nine men dead or maimed, Hoseasons has no choice but to negotiate and sullenly agrees to put them both ashore at Linnhe Loch, but even before the Covenant can reach that outpost of relative safety, the ship founders on a reef with David and Breck lost over the sideâ€¦

Cast away and lost he is eventually reunited with Breck, only to endure hardship, horror, pursuit and personal degradation as he and his contentious, complicated comrade are hunted by Royalist forces for the murder of Colin Roy Campbell, known and dreaded as King George’s agent â€œthe Red Foxâ€ who punishes and persecutes Highlanders and honest men, even selling them into slaveryâ€¦

Their trials and tribulations as outlaws of the heather, their meetings with kindred spirits, strains on their newfound friendship and eventual bringing to justice of the conniving Ebenezer Balfour are all deliciously revealed in gripping form and glorious imagery (although purists might miss much of Breck’s more esoteric phraseology) as the novel comes to rousing life in an iteration certain to please both devotees and first time readers.

Moody, evocative, fast-paced and gripping, this graphic goldmine was also released in two local languages: translated and dialogued in Lowland Scots as Kidnappit by Matthew Fitt & James Robertson and as Fo Bhruid – a Gaelic iteration translated by Iain MacDhÃ²mhnaill.
Adapted text Â© 2006 Alan Grant. Illustrations Â© 2006 Cam Kennedy. All rights reserved.

April 21, 2015April 20, 2015

Vengeance of the Moon Knight volume 1: Shock and Awe

By Gregg Hurwitz & Jerome OpeÃ±a & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-4106-8

Moon Knight is probably one of the most complex and convoluted heroes in comics. There’s also a lot of evidence to support the contention that he’s a certifiable loonâ€¦

He first appeared during the 1970s horror boom: a mercenary Batman knockoff hired by corporate villains to capture lycanthropic Jack Russell (AKA Werewolf by Night). Catching the readers attention, he then spun off into two trial issues of Marvel Spotlight and an exceedingly mature (for the times) back-up slot in the TV-inspired Hulk Magazine before graduating to a number of solo series.

His convoluted origin eventually revealed how multiple-personality afflicted CIA spook-turned-mercenary Marc Spector was murdered by his best-pal and comrade Raoul Bushman but apparently restored to life by the Egyptian deity Khonshu: god of the Moon and Justice, or perhaps simply Vengeance…

Over many years the solitary avenger and a select band of hand-picked helpers battled the darker threats more flamboyant superheroes neglected or avoided, ever-vacillating between pristine white knight and bloodthirsty killer-with-a-good-excuseâ€¦

At the time of this rocket-paced riot of action and suspense, resurgent villain and American Security Czar Norman Osborn was de facto ruler of America, using Federal power to wage war on heroes who refused to sign The Superhuman Registration Act. Those he couldn’t coerce or crush, he smearedâ€¦

As Moon Knight became more obviously frenzied and manic, Osborn framed the outlaw hero for murder ands numerous ferocious atrocities and, in response to seemingly overwhelming opposition, the out-of-control hero faked his own death, moved to Mexico and went about cleansing his ravaged mind and troubled soul.

The first and hardest part of the remedy was to eradicate every vestige of Marc Spector from his wardrobe of personalitiesâ€¦

Collecting Vengeance of the Moon Knight #1-6 (November 2009-May 2010) this spectacular breakneck thriller opens with the return of ‘The White Knight’ to New York City; (mostly) clear-headed and determined to reclaim his name and sullied reputation. That begins with a most public foiling of an extremely violent bank robbery, where, despite the utmost provocation and the watching citizenry’s fervent expectations, the silent Avenger kills absolutely nobodyâ€¦

The astonished observers – including the hero’s former lover and confidante Marlene Alraune – would have been even more astonished to learn that throughout the shocking struggle a little godling had been whispering in Moon Knight’s earâ€¦

Khonshu is displeased. He wants his chosen agent to exact full and final vengeance and is growing increasingly impatient over this sacrilegious â€œno killingâ€ peccadilloâ€¦

Nights pass and Moon Knight, hunted by cops and Osborn’s agents alike, prowls the streets, quietly thinning out the predators who feed on the weakest members of society. His diligent pruning is interrupted however when the most powerful of Osborn’s super-operatives appearsâ€¦

‘The Sentry’s Curse’ is that he is nigh-omnipotent, truly crazy and utterly unpredictable. As an old comrade, the golden giant grants Moon Knight a measure of leeway and one last chance, but Osborn is less sanguine about being defied and orders his mystic minion The Hood and telepathic snoop Profile to find and decisively deal with the returned rebel.

Now favouring his Jake Lockley and Steven Grant personas, the repentant paladin is visiting old associates and comrades whilst using his vast financial resources to upgrade the Moon Knight’s armoury. Being an outlaw, he has no problem employing the best criminal scientists money can buyâ€¦

The first felonious monster to fall to his renewed crusade is grotesque sin-peddler The Slug, and once again the cataclysmic clash is punctuated by his divine passenger screaming in his ear for blood. That distraction might be why the hero doesn’t notice Profile taking a reading and extracting the one secret that might end his ceaseless war on crimeâ€¦

After tolerating years of appalling atrocities, Moon Knight eventually killed his greatest enemy and, in a fit of madness, cut off his fright-mask of a face. Now, thanks to the psychic’s reading and The Hood’s dark magic, the one foe Spector could never handle is dragged howling from his grave to pick up where he left off in ‘The Bushman Cometh’â€¦

The resurrected psychotic immediately hits the ground scheming and whilst Moon Knight wastes time trying to convince Spider-Man that’s he’s back – but he is also better – Raoul orchestrates a bloody raid on horrific sin-bin Ravencroft Asylum.

With fellow maniac Scarecrow, Bushman turns an institution full of criminal madmen into murderous slaves and even augments his army of the living damned with a cadre of autonomous and atrocious menaces such as Herman the German and The Great Wallâ€¦

Never reticent, Bushman then unleashes his foul forces on sleeping Manhattan in the sure and certain knowledge that unremitting carnage and slaughter is bound to bring Moon Knight runningâ€¦

With the city under siege even Spector’s oldest – and most betrayed – friend sees the need for action, and with â€œFrenchieâ€ Du Champ once again piloting the awe-inspiring Moon Copter, the resurgent Knight takes on the entire legion of loons with devastating if non-lethal force under an unforgiving ‘Full Moon’â€¦

The battle goes into overwhelming overdrive in ‘Past is Prologue’ as Bushman finally confronts his ultimate antithesis, but as the chaos escalates the screaming of Khonshu for his chosen one to cross back over the line and fulfil his blood-letting destiny is almost too much for any mortal to resist.

â€¦And even after resoundingly defeating his physical foes and restoring some semblance of sense to the city the gory god still calls and, at last, ‘Knight Falls’â€¦

With covers by Leinil Francis Yu and eight stunning variants by Alex Ross, David Finch, Yu and Francesco Mattina, this high-octane, explosively all-out psycho-thriller is compellingly scripted by Gregg Hurwitz and captivatingly illustrated by Jerome OpeÃ±a, Jay Leisten and Paul Mounts who combine to create one of the most memorable and enjoyable reboots of recent years.

Fast, dark and savagely entertaining, Shock and Awe is pure electric entertainment for testosterone junkies and Fights ‘n’ Tights fanatics.
Â© 2009, 2010 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

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