I Want A Phrase Tattoo

Review 206: VF MAGAZINE February 2011

Spider-Man 133:

- 621-622-623 Spider-Man: Mission Recovery - That's life - The stages of grief .

After the very good bow on the back of Mysterio belonging to the saga of Gant, renews the series with episodes less tied up and executed by various creative teams.

The # 621 is well written by Dan Slott and drawn by Michael Lark , and alone is worth buying the magazine. With the help of Black Cat, Spidey infiltrates the hideout of Mr Negative to retrieve the blood sample he had extorted him and could be used to concoct a deadly poison against him. The mission is a success, even though Weaver has yet to face this formidable boss and make do with the methods (and lust) of the Black Cat ...

Very bright and served with sharp dialogue, the script is a delight and shows that Slott, when he does not treat his case with nonchalance, is a writer capable of very good things for Spidey.

But it is especially the drawings of the pair Michael Lark, Stefano Gaudiano (too rare since Daredevil), supported by impeccable colorization Matt Hollingsworth, who hoisted this chapter at a level above average. Lark dreamed of illustrating the adventures of the weaver and it actually "owns" the character with his usual skill. Its boundaries are fluid and tonic is a real treat and we will eagerly watch his back (from # 634).

The # 622 is a mini-episode of 12 pages written by Fred Van Lente and designed by Joe Quinones , which extends the # 621 since the CAT has sold the blood sample for Spidey money. Weaver must infiltrate the fans vampires and found this opportunity Morbius struggling, too, with a lover rather twisted.

The tone is comedy and it's really funny. However, the credit goes to Van Lente less than that gratifies us Quinones boards where tasty bursts expressive genius - what we do regret that this artist does not sign more often inside pages ...

The # 623 focuses on Flash Thompson, income maimed in Iraq and full rehabilitation. Proactive temperament of Comrade Peter Parker is strained and it passes through different states before accepting his new condition. The scenario

Greg Weisman is not bad but not transcendent, it suffers mostly go after the copies of Slott and Van Lente, more verve. But the drawings (not inked and placed directly in colors by Rob Schwager ) by Luke Ross are very beautiful, much better than those he had committed on the arc of Two Americas Captain America.

*

- Spider-Man & Wolverine: An error of plus (1).

The first episode of this mini-series written by Jason Aaron and drawn by Adam Kubert (a son of the legendary Joe ) is the event number. Or, more reasonably, his curiosity.

argument is strange because Spidey and Wolvie are catapulted, without knowing how, in the Cretaceous period: the end of the world of dinosaurs is close, but it just happens that they are again thrown into time, with a new threat to face ...

All this puzzled me: it reads without displeasure, but not exciting. And did we need yet another series with two characters already ubiquitous ? It feels more mercantile operation, mounted on the names of two celebrities (be they heroes or authors) that the production memorable.

That is not, in any event, that will reconcile myself with Adam Kubert overestimated nor with the famous Jason Aaron (Scalped whose series earned him much praise).

*

- J. Jonah Jameson: Taking the Pulse + Spider-Man: Movement mood.

Both fillers can be skipped: the second does a board, issue of the anthology Age of Heroes , and the first is really unworthy of Kurt Busiek and Marko Djurdjevic .

*

Review: a very good number, especially with a fine cast of designers. Next month, the saga of the glove reasserts itself.

X-MEN 169:

- X-Men Legacy: The Tell-Tale Heart.

After crossover Necrosha , Mike Carey offered a break with his favorite character, Rogue. So it is a transitional episode, quiet, but very well done.

Rogue goes live full day of lessons, she wants to Cyclops who entrust the education of young mutants. She tries to help Paras, an Indian pacifist who refuses to use its powers and suffers; it absorbs the faculties of psi Cuckoos trying to locate the force of the phoenix is approaching Gambit, his lover who does not share all her secrets with her, she faces her attraction for Magneto (mutual attraction) ...

Carey imagine situations in which the density is amazing, the character of Rogue wins a thickness which makes it perhaps the most interesting character of the mutant community is rare but exciting to see a writer portray with such thoroughness and intelligence his heroine. The dialogues are remarkable finesse. After

Clay Mann is Yanick Paquette which illustrates this chapter, the series is spoiled - especially as the Canadian designer, inked by Michel Lacombe remains sober while making a Rogue creature but very attractive never touted. It is superb.

*

- The New Mutants (vol. 4) 11: The Valkyrie Hel.

Again, this is an exceptional episode, less because it is connected to the saga Siege , because it is illustrated by a guest star, Niko Henrichon ( Pride of Baghdad).

Zeb Wells discusses the links between Dani Moonstar to Asgardian Hela, who made his Valkyrie to retrieve the souls of warriors fallen in battle. The team of New Mutants appears only fleetingly in this segment that the graphics amazing, published a month late.

is pretty good, but shifted.

*

- Dazzler: In blood & Phone call - Colossus: Testament - Jubilee: I miss you .

These four episodes are a very limited interest and we have the unpleasant feeling that Panini mouth holes before the renumbering at # 1 and the launch of new monthly X-Men Universe (replacing Astonishing X-Men ).

history into two parts with Dazzler is very low and the designs are ugly.

history with Colossus is misplaced since it takes place before the return of Kitty Pryde, but at least she is well illustrated by David and Alvaro Lopez .

As for the story with Jubilee, well ... Anyway ... Is dispensable.

*

Review: number that starts well but that is fading over a summary composed of stories published until the reboot of the journal.

MARVEL HEROES 1:

- The Avengers 1: Avengers Upcoming (1).

"Heroic Age" here really starts with the resurrection of the historic title Avengers which Brian Bendis charge, he who, 6 years ago, in Volume 3 with buckled bow Chaos (Disassembled in vo).

The writer told in interview that the original idea of New Avengers were to form the equivalent of the JLA . But this direction than he had suggested Mark Millar had never really materialized, and even had perished with Civil War. After this crossover, Bendis had attempted, with the series The Mighty Avengers , to revive an iconic team, without really convincing and then passing the baton to Dan Slott .

Today, for the third time, but in a new context, Bendis tries again to play as a group worthy of the pantheon of Marvel, with its most iconic heroes: Captain America / Bucky Iron Man, Thor, Spider-Man, Wolverine, Hawk-Eye, Spider-Woman.

For this first episode, we can say that the writer does not waste time: the recruitment team is fast and they are immediately facing a major threat. No doubt, the Avengers will be the title of "big guns"!

Program: Kang, one of the oldest enemies of the group, and the promise of a trip in the future, where children of the Avengers have become tyrannical masters of the world - unless they are of a trick ...

It is premature to say if Bendis will deliver this chapter with a very promising without giving sufficient guarantees as to whether this is the real comeback of adventure and action. The gamble is bold for the writer who is never better than the sidekick and intrigue where he can wander between scenes of Homeric baston. Here he has the most popular characters of his publisher and hopes to return to basics.

To help him he has the support of the artist "marvelien" par excellence, John Romita Jr. , with whom he has never worked, but dreamed of working on this title and has the style muscular required this kind of series. If the designer is inspired also shows that at the time with his run on X-Men in the 80s, all hopes are ...

But we must remain cautious because JR Jr draws together after Kick-Ass and suffers through an inking Klaus Janson and ugly colors of Dean White . Some boxes and boards are one level beneath the graphics team to such a title.

A monitor with vigilance.

*

- Avengers Academy 1: Close File.

Consolidation title The Avengers: The Initiative , this new series is the pleasant surprise of the journal and of the month.

6 young superhuman - Sailing, Foudre, Breastplate, Hazmat, Reptile & Finesse - spotted by Norman Osborn in the "Dark Reign" are supported by Hank Pym, Quicksilver, Tigra, Speedball (ex-Penance) and Justice to become the next generation. But they learn that they were chosen less for their merits as to avoid becoming criminals ...

Christos Gage poses very quickly and effectively the basics of the series in giving life to 6 new characters and original, in a setting conducive to a plot whose potential is attractive. The characterization is very well regarded and unwrapping secrecy may seem premature to make you want to know how the writer will develop the situation.

Mike McKone illustrates this very nicely, even if, quibble, one could argue that its action scenes would benefit from being more airy to be more dynamic. Nevertheless, after its passage New Avengers where he suffered the colors too dark Dave McCaig , its association with Jeremy Cox is a real pleasure for the eyes.

Very promising.

*

- Thor 610: Siege - Ragnarok.

This episode is really trivial and can zap smoothly: there Thor faces his crazy clone, created during the Civil War and virulent in the ruins of Asgard. Balder laments his reign. Kelda mourns the death of Bill, now at Valhalla.

Kieron Gillen fails at all levels, whether to give strength to fight or emotion in the moods of his characters. The dialogue is insipid. The series has really lost with the departure of large JMS and the prospect of being taken over by Fraction does not optimistic.

Doug Braithwaite illustrates it quite bluntly: sometimes it's certainly beautiful, but also with problems of astonishing proportions for a senior artist. The division is soft and can not transcend a script already very poor.

Bof, bof.

*

- Hulk 19: Conspiracy Theory.

Jeph Loeb enters the final stretch of his run (ending in # 24), which will be marked by its nullity and greasy dirt with his humor and his famous distressing enigma (which is the red Hulk? In fact, General Ross the enemy of Bruce Banner).

This episode opens in a crossover called vo Fall of The Hulk, to be followed in conjunction with the Incredible Hulk series in the journal "Marvel Stars", where the meeting as the villains of the Intelligentsia aims to neutralize the geniuses Marvelverse for yet another world conquest. Rulk, who had conceived the plan but was betrayed by his accomplices, wants to take revenge while winning the confidence of the hero and buy a pipe. He tries to begin to help the Fantastic 4 ...

Heavily illustrated by Ed McGuiness but written effectively enough, it's still readable but not exciting.

Roll on # 25 and the arrival of the duo Jeff Parker Gabriel Hardman anyway!

*

Review: mixed a reboot, which emerges especially Avengers Academy.

MARVEL STARS 1:

is the replacement for the journal "Dark Reign", which in summary there are two series ( Thunderbolts and Secret Warriors).

- The Avengers Secret 1: Secret Histories (1).

The title of this first arc could be used to resume the work of its writer, Ed Brubaker , which then piles up again for a "team book" mixed after his run on X-Men .

Steve Rogers has decided not to endorse the identity of Captain America but has become the new super-cop of the United States form its own team of Avengers. A group of thugs operating in the shadows and made up of heroes who share a past of military or soldier, one finds the Beast (who left the X-Men because it is more agreement with the leadership of Cyclops), Valkyrie, the Black Widow, War Machine, Moon Knight, Ant-Man (Eric O'Grady Thunderbolts), Nova and Sharon Carter, who assumes the role of liaison officer. Each was recruited for his special talent: science, destruction, infiltration, surveillance space ...

Their first mission is to recover the crown of the Snake, but they discover they are several, with different properties. The company is involved via Roxxon mining on Mars and the mysterious Shadow Council covets the same relics, headed ... Nick Fury?

Brubaker does not waste time and enters the heart of the matter, only he spends some vignettes for the recruitment of Moon Knight and the Ant-Man and guess-t-on the composition of the team will not be permanent (Nova, in particular, should not remain).

The atmosphere of espionage and black series is masterfully rendered by an author who excels in these areas and this episode of almost 30 pages to read very quickly and never mislead us, although the story is full of information. It's dense, robust, efficient: high art, which proves that Brubaker has re-entered after the last episode disappointing Captain America.

In drawing

Mike Deodato book boards in this expressionistic style and muscular control that as a person and ideally suited to this kind of history, with manly heroes and heroines bombesques. The opening scene is probably the most invigorating of all series stamped "Heroic Age" of the month, and the rest is in tune.

A series already addictive!

*

Thunderbolts: Infiltrated + 144: The Boss.

The other attraction of the magazine is the consolidation of the T-Bolts , with a new training but the same writer at the controls, the excellent Jeff Parker (who must be the essential Agents of Atlas and soon Hulk).

The new leader of this team of criminals who are offered a means of reducing their sentences or time spent in a cell is Luke Cage, who has himself been an inmate and a guinea pig origin. The position is given by Steve Rogers is counting on him to care for a most unlikely group with Songbird, Moonstone, Crossbones, the Phantom, the Scourge and the Man-Thing! Mach V, which has improved the security of the prison's Raft, and fix his helpers.

But this does not count with Baron Zemo who wants to recover his former disciples ...

Parker chose a colorful cast to revive the series and I'm curious to see how it will use these characters. The scenario of this episode and a half ( Infiltrated is actually a segement of the anthology from introductory Enter the heroic age ) is classical (the recruitment of the team) but ends with a cliffhanger panting.

The design Kevin Walker is confusing: breaking with realism almost ubiquitous current production style is a mix "cartoony" aggressive, angular, favoring close-ups. It's interesting and original but still very dynamic, and an effort on the sets would be welcome.

*

Hulk 606: Father's Day.

The other series Hulk (Incredible Hulk in vo ) focuses on the original hero, or more accurately, Bruce Banner and his son, the giant alien Skaar, who waits for his father turns back to kill him ( because he holds responsible for the death of his mother - all this time of World War Hulk saga ).

Greg Pak connects his narrative the crossover Fall of The Hulk which started in the Hulk series of the journal "Marvel Heroes", where the intelligentsia began to get rid of the geniuses of Marvelverse. Banner and Skaar will face Dr. Doom to thwart the plans of former accomplices of red Hulk ...

The battle itself takes up most of the episode (27 pages) and designed by Paul Pelletier , keeps its promises without genius artist, among Alan Davis and Mark Bagley his outrageous style is well suited to this kind of production that shines with little finesse.

The most interesting is the relationship between Banner and his son who hates him but is determined not to let anyone kill him in his place and before him. Hopefully this continues to be exploited, or, alternatively, that the crossover is not too annoying (it's not win ...).

*

- Secret Warriors 17: The Last Ride of the Howling Commandos (1).

And now the black point of the review!

Horribly designed (and made even more ugly colors) by Alessandro Vitti (and Imaginary Studios), this series originally launched by Brian Bendis and Jonathan Hickman is now only written by him in this fearfully slow and chatty style with which he also wrote the FF.

We must do violence to reach the end of this episode and I think I zap the next issue - waiting patiently for the scheduled end of the series (at # 27, I think).

*

Review: a No. 1 very promising, with both teams grabbing-books, and a powerful Hulk.

MARVEL ICONS 1:

First, note the curiosity of the journal runémoroter at # 1 while the summary shows not the beginning of the series flagship, The New Avengers , but the last episode of his first volume. ..

- The New Avengers: The Grand Final.

The dark reign is ended with the defeat and the arrest of Norman Osborn and his accomplices and after the fall of Asgard to Broxton (Oklahoma). The capture of the Wrecking Crew did understand that The New Avengers and Ms. Hood Mask escaped.

Once the right-hand man of Parker Robbins, John King, in his hands, Team locates their enemies who have found refuge with the Count Nefaria, the father of Ms. Mask.

The ultimate battle won and having learned from Steve Rogers became the new super-cop of the government, they are no longer forced to live in hiding, the New Avengers are questioning their future - and Luke Cage makes Update on the last 6 years ...

For Final , Brian Bendis saw the big picture and wrote an episode format exclusive 60 pages, including the last third is really a succession of double-page previews of events and the arcs most memorable of the series.

Before that, he imagined the dramatic confrontation between the hero and his trio The Mask Hood-Mrs-Nefaria (long-time foe of the Avengers, appeared in the early episodes Lee and Kirby ). It must be hard not to gloat with this chapter where the writer offers to the group and their fans a long awaited revenge: the battle keeps its promises and proves that Bendis wrote remarkably of "fights" in the great tradition.

For the occasion, the series welcomes Bryan Hitch drawing, one of the few stars of Marvel never shown the New Avengers (Apart from a double-page spread in episode 50, repeated here). With inking Butch Guice and Andrew Currie , it delivers superb boards, its best since a long time, giving a scale rare in this chapter (for Asgard devastated is striking).

double pages can remember having worked with various artists on the track and point out how the series has really become the mainstay of Marvel crossovers with three appendices ( House of M, Secret Invasion and Siege).

Finally, the episode ends with a magnificent double-page signed Stuart Immonen Which will draw the first arc of the second series which will begin publication next month in vf.

enjoyment!

*

- Iron Man 25: Stark Resistance (1).

Obviously, after the party comes the hangover and it's an episode of 38 (!) Pages of Iron Man by the pair-Fraction Larroca completes the summary of the review.

is again particularly distressing: Thor offers some of the treasures of Asgard to Stark to resume its business (while suggesting that both partners have not resolved their dispute - Stark had created a clone of Thor crazy during Civil War), Stark does not want to invent and sell arms, a competitor in this market approach the army ...

is endless, the dialogues are crowded with the techno-babble, which is told in 40 pages could take in 5 ... Fraction is ready to sack Thor as he did with Iron Man and X-Men . What do we do to deserve this?

The drawings of Larroca, they are still ugly.

*

Review: a fine "Final" for New Avengers, who comforts the dark void where Iron Man.

MARVEL SAGA 9:

- The War of Doom (1-6/6).

After crazy FrankenCastle , published in this magazine three months ago, here again a complete history and a rich program (152 pages!): DoomWar (in vo) is after the "Dark Reign" and directed the Black Panther, Dr. Doom, with guest-stars the X-Men and the Fantastic 4.

The summary in the summary will be useful to those who, like me, have not followed the series Black Panther vo: we learn that Doom took advantage of his release by the Cabal of Norman Osborn returned to Latveria, faced T'Challa, King of Wakanda, aka the Black Panther, to plunder its natural resources - the valuable vibranium. Their struggle has left the African ruler is in a coma and his sister Shuri, who endorsed the name and costume of the Black Panther. When

Doomwar starts, Wakanda has just undergone a coup. Impact: Ororo, aka Storm X-Men, T'Challa's wife, is captured and sentenced to death, and T'Challa and Shuri went underground to seek the assistance of the mutants on the island of Utopia. The Cyclops refuses him, but Wolverine, Nightcrawler and Colossus disobey and go to Africa to save their friend. Doom, it tries to access the vibranium but must convince the god Bast panther let him use metal magic - that, against all odds, he succeeds. T'Challa, Shuri and the X-Men overturn the coup plotters but Doom is now at the head of an army of robots enriched vibranium. T'Challa then appealed to the Fantastic 4 to counter their common enemy ... The scenario

Jonathan Maberry is dense and breaststroke dramatic situations, bursting, which reminds Alan Davis writes (in mini-series like JLA: The Nail - Another Nail ). And like Davis, he n'évitee not always the trap of overcrowded fresco, in which characters are being convened under-employed, a team chasing the other (three X-Men giving way to very abruptly FF). One can nevertheless welcome the ambition of the narrative and the ambiguity of the characters who behave like real belligerent, not hesitating to kill to win.

However, originally planned five-part, the history would probably have won respect and Maberry plan to cure his epilogue, which, paradoxically, is too fast ships.

Graphically, Scot Eaton book an excellent copy: it is very comfortable with this casting provided, provided these sequences, alternating brilliant moments and quieter. It has an ink signed Andy Lanning (on the first two parts), assisted by Robert Campanella (the other four episodes). It will not be as flattering with colorization Watercolor Jean-François Beaulieu , with fairly disastrous effects chestnuts.

Appraisal: a saga uneven, but illustrated by an artist to watch (Eaton replace Deodato on Secrets The Avengers from # 13).