Losing Touch

We now have official verbal confirmation that DC Comics has lost touch with their industry.  From the good people over at Bleeding Cool I bring you a recent conversation between Dan DiDio (the head of DC Comics) and Paul Pope:

Paul Pope: “Batman did pretty well, so I sat down with the head of DC Comics. I really wanted to do ‘Kamandi [The Last Boy on Earth]‘, this Jack Kirby character. I had this great pitch… and he said ‘You think this is gonna be for kids? Stop, stop. We don’t publish comics for kids. We publish comics for 45-year olds. If you want to do comics for kids, you can do ‘Scooby-Doo.’ And I thought, ‘I guess we just broke up.’”

For the record, Paul Pope is this guy:

and how awesome would a Kamandi series be if Pope was to create it?  We'll never know now.  Apparently it would need gratuitous sex and violence to appeal to DC's forty-five year old demographic which is obviously not what Pope had in mind when he pitched it.

It actually makes me sick to think that this is an industry that I wanted to work in for so long.  An industry that has become so short-sighted and profit-driven that it can't get out of its own way.  To think that the comic industry (and DC Comics in particular, though I wouldn't be surprised if internally this was Marvel's mantra as well) is going to alienate the kids that will make up its future audience, causing them to turn their attention to television or video games or something else.  There should be a push to get children interested in comic books so that their love of these characters can start at an early age.  

Both Marvel and DC do a good job of bringing in children with their various animated cartoons, however you would think that that would be a vehicle to get children to want to pick up the comic.  If you create a fan and a collector at an early age, you have a cash cow for a long time.  Instead, a kid going to the comic shop looking for the newest Batman comic because they just saw the latest cartoon featuring the Dark Knight, will come across what?  Batman banging Catwoman on a rooftop (Catwoman #1) or Joker's removed face and subsequent torture of the Bat-Family (last year's "Death of the Family" storyline).  If I came across that on a spinner rack as a kid, my parents wouldn't have let me anywhere near comic books.  

Are we, therefore supposed to just pander to kids with comics involving Scooby Doo or Looney Tunes and hope that they like the medium enough to come back to it when they reach an age that is appropriate for the stories being told with the characters they really want to read?  That seems like wishful thinking, and with the average attention span of kids nowadays as short as it is, comics will run out of readers in the next twenty to thirty years as they die off from old age.  Or, they'll alienate the readers that they do have and have no one to replace them with as the children that should be reading comic books are off doing something else.

I don't think I've ever felt so ashamed to be a comic book fan as I do now (and I survived the 90s and early 2000s).  

Thanks DiDio.

Thanks DC. 

Comic Review: The Wake #2

                Sean Murphy, you are my kryptonite apparently.  Even though I am against anything and everything big two related (with a few nostalgic exceptions) it apparently doesn’t matter as long as Sean Murphy is the artist.  I gleefully trotted out to the comic shop last month to pick up issue one of The Wake (but had something else in mind to review at the time), and with this week’s second issue release I now present you with a review.

Cover:

                Sean Murphy can draw better than most if not all of the artists in comics today.  That being said, this cover is incredible as a standalone piece of art as well as part of the overall poster image that it will create once all of the covers are completed and placed together.  Movement and design have always been one of Murphy’s strong suits and that is not hindered by the fact that this is a piece of a bigger design.  In fact, Murphy has done a phenomenal job of making sure that each cover (at least for the first two issues) can stand on its own as an image and not be reliant on other subsequent covers to make sense of what is going on. 

                The cover itself doesn’t really have anything to do with this particular issue, but it does show more of the underwater creatures and scenes that Murphy has excelled at in the first two issues.  Everything is perfectly referenced and entirely believable in terms of the sea-creatures and even the dive suits on the humans.

8/10 – It’s a great looking cover.  Not as immediately iconic as the Punk Rock Jesus covers but well done nonetheless.

Story:

                Scott Snyder is following a pretty standard horror-story blueprint for the writing.  This is not bad, but it is fairly familiar, and he hasn’t done much to differentiate his story from its forebears yet.  Each individual in the underwater oil rig that is their home for the duration (which just replaces the space station, haunted house, asylum, etc.) has a different skill set.  If he follows the standard horror trope, they will get killed off one by one and their skills will not be able to be utilized.  Pay attention to the badass poaching lawbreaker as he will probably be either one of the first to go.  There always seems to be the “bad boy” that you think will be able to handle anything because that’s what he does for a living, then he gets killed just as easily as those less familiar with violence. 

                Where Snyder does differentiate from many of his influences is in his inclusion of both the distant past and the distant future in the story.  This isn’t something that a movie could really do with too much success anyway, but it’s nice to see Snyder utilize the comics medium instead of making a book solely for a movie deal (though with how well the comic is selling, don’t be surprised if Warner Brothers tries to adapt it in the near future). 

                The book moves along at a relatively slow pace, and while I generally do not like that kind of decompression, for this kind of story it is actually ideal.  The slow drag out of the plot points only helps to heighten the awareness of the gravity of the situation.  I will admit that the lack of dialogue on many of the pages can lead to a couple confusing instances, but it’s not anything that lingers.  While we are not becoming any more invested in these characters, and therefore won’t care too much if they die, with the decompression of the story, it does give that feeling of a long walk down a damp, dimly lit hallway that serves this story well.

                The fact that the “villain” is a monster and yet we aren’t really sure who the real villain is feeds into the horror-movie magic as well.  Is the creature really the villain or are we the villain because we invaded their turf?  This could turn out to be either very good (if not relatively predictable) or it can be another allegory for man overstepping his bounds in terms of exploration and cultivation of natural resources (the addition of oil as the main catalyst for their underwater drilling has not fallen on deaf ears either). 

6/10 – It’s a bit heavy handed and formulaic, but the hook is there and the use of different time periods to essentially tell three different stories that will all (conceivably) tie back together is a nice touch.

Art:

                Murphy is the man.  Everything that was incredible about Punk Rock Jesus works here too.  His artwork doesn’t appear as minutely detailed this time around, which could be due to the fact that he’s not really dealing in real-life environments like a house in Ireland, and instead in a fictitious underwater oil rig.  That being said, the art lacks a little of the comfort and hominess that Punk Rock Jesus did.  This may just be by design though as the scientists are all in an alien environment without their normal creature comforts. 

                I do have to mention the coloring by Matt Hollingsworth.  After seeing Murphy’s work in its uncolored form, the fact that he is being colored on this project feels like a step back.  As good as the coloring could be, hell he could have had Jose Villarubia using the same incredible techniques he uses on Jae Lee’s art, it would not compare to the look and the feel of those uncolored inks.  I realize it was a different book and a different feel in general, but the art feels under-represented here.  Many of the subtle nuances that were present in Punk Rock Jesus are nowhere to be found here (either by design on Murphy’s part, or unknowingly covered up by the color).  This is not a knock against Hollingsworth or the work he does, I just think it was a mistake to have it colored at all.

8/10 – The art in general is great and the characters are all varied and interesting in design (not just boring cookie-cutter humans).  I could have done without the coloring but it’s not a deal breaker by any means.

7/10 – It’s not the home-run for me that Punk Rock Jesus was, even with the enhanced pedigree of Scott Snyder as the writer.  It’s still good and it’s nice to have a story doing well that isn’t steeped in continuity, meaningless events, or as a setup for a movie script. 

Comic Review: Masters of the Universe The Origin of Hordak #1

                It was a light week this week, so I’ve decided to review the newest spinoff from the Masters of the Universe franchise at DC.  This latest attempt to cash in on the successful relaunch of the licensed property brought to you by Keith Giffen on story (with Brian Keene) and pencils.  This is a one shot issue that explores the origin of Hordak, the leader of the evil horde and the current agitator over in the Masters of the Universe regular series.  Now is this a legitimate comic or just a cash grab?  That’s the $2.99 question.

Cover:

                The cover by Keith Giffen actually has something to do with the story and is not just a stock image of Hordak, though it would have been well within the right of Giffen to do it on a number one issue.  For that I give him extra credit.  The artwork is akin to a very rough Jack Kirby, similar to Erik Larsen but not quite as good in my opinion.  The coloring by Hi-Fi is decent, but I would think that Hordak’s “powers” would cast a little more light onto everything around it.  The coloring does follow a bit more of an “old school” type pattern (very flat with little to no definition added) so it actually coincides with the line art nicely in that respect.

                The main problem with the coloring is that everything starts to blend together, especially since they decided to color the sky an orange-yellow color and that just happens to be right behind a bunch of warm colors.  Nothing really pops.  Even Hordak’s “powers” tend to blend a little because everything has a very washed-out feeling to it.

5/10 – A serviceable cover, but not great.  It does the job, and shows a bit of narrative but could be better.  It looks rushed.

Story:

                The story is touted as the origin of Hordak, but when we see him, he is already Hordak.  Has he always looked like this?  Part of me thinks not because the big reveal in the story is that Hordak and Zodac are brothers.  Zodac looks human, at least as far as Masters of the Universe standards are concerned and yet Hordak is some kind of bat/vampire creature.  Something must have happened at some point and yet what we get in terms of an origin is that Hordak is Zodac’s brother.  How did Hordak come to join the horde?  Is Horde Prime still around?  What caused the transformation and how does he consume souls?  That’s the kind of stuff you would assume that an origin story would answer, not prattle on for twenty pages about nothing.  The biggest kick in the crotch comes from  the end, where Hordak looks like he’s all powerful and ready to take over the universe and it says to check out the regular comic for more involving Hordak.  I just spent $2.99 on an ad for the regular comic book.  Awesome.  There isn’t much more to say, this was a blatant cash-grab.

0/10 – You can’t expect me to give you a high mark when there was no real origin story within the pages, just a build up to try and get me to buy the regular series.  I’d say “for shame DC Comics” but you obviously don’t care about comic fans, so I won’t waste my breath.

Art:

                Giffen’s art is not terrible.  I do kind of enjoy how Kirby-esque it is, especially for a story that is supposedly an origin (and even tells you it takes place one million years before the birth of He-Man).  Having the art feel old-school just makes it feel almost like the comic should have come out in the 70’s. 

                That being said, the art is very inconsistent.  The characters looked markedly different from one panel to the next and it can get jarring at times, pulling you completely out of what little story there is to be pulled into. 

2/10 – I wasn’t impressed.  The little Batman silhouette on the second to last page may have been an inside joke by Giffen, but it just illuminates the point that this is a corporate comic released for no other reason than to make more money.

Overall:  1/10 - This may be the shortest review I’ve ever written but I can’t think of a more appropriate comic to throw the towel in on.

Comic Review - He-Man and the Masters of the Universe #2

                First of all, do not confuse this with the earlier review I did for He-Man comics from DC.  That was a limited series that apparently sold so well (it’s hard to imagine why) that it was turned into a regular series, now on its second issue.  Let’s see if this one is any better than the previous one (with pretty much the same creative team).

Cover:

                While I’m not a huge fan of the character redesigns, I like the cover itself.  This whole grim and gritty thing just doesn’t work for me on this particular title, and the character designs are a big part of that.  The cover by Howard Porter works very well as the villains definitely look imposing as they are crushing the titular hero.  However, the characters that are crushing the hero are Skeletor’s minions…that are nowhere to be found in the issue at all, so that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense in terms of relating to the interiors. They are partnered with Adora, who is part of the Horde (Hordak’s gang) so that makes even less sense as to why this pairing would happen.  I kind of understand that the rest of the Horde has yet to be revealed and you may not want to do that on a cover, but stranger things have happened.   That being said, with what Porter is given , he does a great job of making it dynamic as well as highlighting Adora, who is the villain but will probably become the star of the book when she switches to She-Ra.  How does he do this you ask?  Look at the strategic placement of the swords held by He-Man, Adora and Tri-Clops.  I didn’t catch it at first but it is absolutely there.  The coloring is a little too muted, and doesn’t do much to pop, but it’s definitely better than many I have seen. 

6/10 – Good, not great but faaaaar better than the cover for the previous issue two.  I would like to see this as a print as I have a feeling that once the logos and corporate bullshit is removed and we can see all of the characters it will be even more impressive.

Story:

                 I have not been a fan of Keith Giffen’s treatment of these characters from the get-go.  The story in the limited series was creative and interesting enough to at least cause me to consider (along with my loyalty to the character) picking up this series.  However he seems to be repeating that story here, just with a different villain and showing us more of the setup.  Heroes are outmanned and outmuscled by their opponents and after getting beaten down, they must fight back.  That’s it.  The only difference between the two is that he had to give the characters amnesia in the limited series so that he could find a reason to reintroduce them all.  He doesn’t have to do that here so instead we get to see the conflict from the beginning.  Let me guess the next story arc, villains attack and overtake the heroes who in turn have to band together to mount a resistance.  Nailed it.

                Not only do we get a recycled plot, we are subjected to characters that are not themselves.  If Giffen was to write Superman and he didn’t sound like Superman, DC would throw a fit (especially with the movie coming out), but he can write Teela as a dumbass bitch and it’s okay?  She has always been written as a strong-willed take no prisoners kind of character, which is what always put her at odds with Adam who when he wasn’t He-Man was a slack-ass act before you think kind of guy.  When she goes on a tirade in this issue about how she wishes that anyone but Mekaneck would have escaped the city massacre because his powers aren’t “useful” it reeks of either Giffen not understanding the characters or he is using Teela as a mouthpiece to make fun of the property itself (something he also does when He-Man says that Hordak and people from another dimension are silly, to which King Randor states that a lot of things on Eternia are silly too).  I understand what he could be doing in both instances, Teela could be knocking Mekaneck down so that he can swoop in and save the day later in the arc, and Randor could be telling the audience that just because things seem silly doesn’t make them not real.  The problem is that the delivery is way off, particularly with the fact that the “old” Teela would be thinking of ways to utilize Mekaneck, not belittle him; plus Giffen has done so much to bastardize this property up to this point that it’s hard to take this as anything but a mocking tone. 

1/10 – The story would be fine if I didn’t just see the same damn thing in the last mini-series.  The voices of the characters are all wrong as well.  They deserve so much better than that.

Art:

                The art by Pop Mahn is actually pretty good (and is a huge step up from where it was at the beginning of the limited series.  I think the fact that the hair is not inked but is just colored with an outline that is the same color as the hair (it’s hard to describe, but take a look at it and you’ll see what I mean) is silly.  I’m not sure what it really brings to the table and if it is just a “style” thing, then it’s a style I find unimpressive.  The female characters look a little too skinny, unnaturally so and it doesn’t make sense how they can generate much power with such slight frames.  The sequence where Teela is grabbed and hurled off the roof is so unbelievable that I’m surprised it made it past the editor (ok, not really surprised) as it looks like Adora flicks her wrist and sends Teela hurtling off the rooftop.  

This sequence.  Also a great example of silly hair.

Was this poor storytelling on the part of the writer or the artist?  I have no idea, but it was probably the same guy that decided to have He-Man falling off a roof and then not show him landing, just already landed and picking himself up.  

Seriously, he goes from diving off a rooftop...to this.

An opportunity was missed to create an impact panel that could really show off He-Man’s power as he hurtled into the villains below, but what do I know, people actually pay you guys to create this stuff.

Oh hey, there's Battle Cat, not that He-Man notices.

It sounds like Randor may have thought his crown was a helmet, and upon testing that theory became a little brain damaged.  I can't say enough about how poorly these characters are written.

7/10 – More good but not great work.  Every piece of art I see pertaining to He-Man now just makes me miss Emiliano Santalucia’s work even more.

Overall:  4/10 – It could be good if they treated the title with the reverence that it deserved instead of as another cash grab.  Hey DC, leave licensed comics to the people that care about them.  

Comic Review: Masters of the Universe Origin of He-Man #1

            This comic week was actually quite small, which is nice considering the fact that next week will be substantial with the new Think Tank as well as a cavalcade of Transformers titles (so look for that promised Transformers: More Than Meets The Eye review next week).  It was therefore a good week to catch up with everyone’s favorite Eternian, He-Man, as he had two titles come out from DC Comics this month.  The mini-series concluded with a thud after it failed to really get off the ground at all in the first six issues.  The ending did set up the upcoming regular series (debuting in April if I remember correctly) pretty nicely, but if it wasn’t for my allegiance to the property itself, I wouldn’t even bat an eye at the comic, and wouldn’t expect it to last another 12-18 issues if the quality stays the same. 

            On a nicer note, Deathmatch #2 came out this week and it adds another layer to the mystery surrounding why the heroes and villains are captured and why they are being forced to kill one another.  It is by far one of the best and most complete comics on the shelves right now and is some of the best work that I have read from writer Paul Jenkins in recent memory (and that’s saying a lot considering his pedigree).  So while I am not reviewing #2 this week, I am declaring Deathmatch the winner, and I wouldn’t be surprised if this turns out to be one of the best comics of the year (so far, it has the crown).

            Anyway, back to the reason we are here.  With the release of Masters of the Universe Origin of He-Man #1, we are set to take a peek into what transformed Prince Adam into He-Man.  While DC has basically raped the franchise with their printed comics (I haven’t read the digital ones so I can’t really comment on those), they do have a chance to redeem themselves with a quality origin tale.  Let’s see how they do.

Cover:

            I like this cover by Ben Oliver.  I like the simplicity of it and the fact that it really highlights the nature of He-Man himself.  As much as Prince Adam doesn’t want to be defined by his sword, that’s exactly what He-Man is all about.  Adam doesn’t become He-Man until he takes out the sword and says the incantation.  The sword is the conduit and it is what transforms the man into the myth.  That’s one thing that I always loved about He-Man growing up, the mythological quality of it all.  The larger than life characters are a huge part of the story, but everything is basically centered around a guy and his sword.  This cover illustrates that perfectly, and having the cover be completely white aside from that image ensures that the focus is on that imagery and nothing else.    I am not even bothered too much by the fact that the sword is straight up and down because the image reflected in the sword is slightly tilted.  Oliver did a great job of making everything on this cover work together to create the best possible image.

9/10 – Good stuff.  The He-Man redemption project at DC is starting out well.

Story:

            I spoke too soon.  What this story by Joshua Hale Fialkov basically boils down to is that Prince Adam became He-Man because the Sorceress told him to.  That’s it.  This could have literally been done in one page.  Sure, we see a battle between Adam and Skeletor, a very one sided battle as Adam is quite the pussy at this point, but it’s not very compelling or interesting.  It’s just Skeletor looking for the power sword.  Adam gets crushed by rocks (apparently, as we never actually see this happening but when he wakes up from his Sorceress dreamtime he is covered in rubble), which I find it hard to believe he could survive through without being He-Man, but whatever.  The Sorceress then appears to him and tells him that he is He-Man and that he needs to grab the power sword (which conveniently lands next to him as he is crushed by rocks).  The sword then awakens the power of Greyskull in him and he emerges from the rubble to fight Skeletor.

            Okay.  Here’s the issue with that.  I realize that in the He-Man universe, there is a certain suspension of belief in terms of the Adam/He-Man transformation.  They look exactly the same, I get it.  How Skeletor and his henchmen, not to mention the people that are around both He-Man and Adam all the time don’t get it I will never understand.  At least Clark Kent wears glasses!  Skeletor (apparently) actually buries Adam under the rubble.  There is no one else in the room.  No one at all.  Then all of a sudden He-Man emerges from where Adam fell and Skeletor doesn’t seem the least bit skeptical.  I get it, it’s hard to say “how did you get there, where’s Adam” when you are fighting for your life against a sword-wielding Barbarian, but come on.  Eventually Skeletor loses (like he always does) and he would have time to digest what happened.  At that point, don’t you think logic would prevail?  Or is that the He-Man mythology now, that everyone knows from the beginning?  I realize that in the mini-series they know, but I thought that was because Adam was basically outed as He-Man when Skeletor took over. 

I don’t know, I am still trying to wrap my head around the whole Skeletor is He-Man’s uncle thing.  It just adds an unnecessary wrinkle to the whole mythology.  What purpose does it serve?  Skeletor thinking he got slighted as ruler of Eternia?  Guess what, Skeletor is an asshole, he doesn’t need a concrete reason to want to take over Eternia, and even if he did, you could come up with a better one that doesn’t require rewriting the mythology. 

1/10 – At least it was only $2.99, considering the fact that the bulk of the story was one or two pages in length with the rest being filler.  It’s official, the He-Man redemption project failed.  Thanks DC, first you take away Superman’s underpants and now you rewrote Masters of the Universe.  Thank you for ass-raping my childhood with a salad fork.

Art:

            The art by Ben Oliver is good.  The problem is what makes the art good probably has more to do with the colorists Jose Villarrubia and Kathryn Layno than it does Oliver.  Let me get this out of the way, Villaurrubia is a master, one of the best colorists working in the business today.  His partnership with Jae Lee has produced some of the best work of both of their careers and I was not surprised that a beautifully “painted” comic like this was his handiwork. 

            Because of the masterful job by Villarrubia and Layno, it is hard to judge the artwork by Oliver.  Where does his contributions end and that of the colorist begin? How much did they improve what he put down?  Therefore the best judge of Oliver’s work is the pages themselves in terms of their layout, composition and storytelling.  This is where Oliver loses me.  Each page looks like he sat down with a checklist of panel types and just tried to fit them in. Closeup – Check.  Extreme Closeup – Check.  Longshot – Check.  Mediumshot – Check.  Silhouette – Check.  And the silhouettes, good lord.  He does a decent job with them, but when there are eleven pages with silhouettes in a twenty page comic, that is either someone that is using the technique as a crutch, or just doesn’t want to draw an actual picture. 

            I don’t even want to get into the layout that DC comics made them adhere to that made sure there was an ad for one of their crappy capes comics pretty much every other page.  Talk about breaking up the flow of the story.  Damn.  This is one area that Image and independent comics have always and will always blow the big two away in.

This is the first page of the comic, and from the get-go you are asking "what the hell?"  Both He-Man (as Adam) and Skeletor are reaching for the sword at the same time, He-Man comes up with it, and yet Skeletor (who put Adam under that rubble in the first place) asks "who are you?" on the next page.  Give me a break. 

This page makes no sense because there is no context.  When does this happen?  What does this lead to?  Most of the book is a flashback except for maybe four pages (this being one of them) but while the present-day pages bookend the comic, this one gets thrown in the middle.  Poor story and editing.  The colors are pretty though.

Even though this page lacks any and all backgrounds, I still like it.  However if Skeletor can just toss Adam around like a ragdoll, you would think that the stone pillar falling on him would have done more damage.  

This is basically the only page this comic needs (minus the unnecessary silhouette).  Adam: "Why me?" Sorceress: "Because I said so."  There you have it, the entire origin of He-Man according to this comic.

5/10 – That’s five points for the coloring.  It’s hard to take the comic or Oliver too seriously when each page almost looks like an art school assignment to try and fit in the various kinds of panels.  I expected more, especially after that great cover.

Overall: 3/10 – A good cover is spoiled by terrible interiors.  Great coloring on the artwork cannot save a bad, boring story that is best suited for a two to three page backup and not a headliner.  I love silhouettes and when there are enough for me to stand up and take notice, then there are too many.  In short, don’t bother with DCs treatment of this property unless you are a die-hard He-Man fan and don’t mind having your childhood squashed on a monthly basis.  

Comic Review - Master's of the Universe #2

I have yet to review two issues of the same book, much less two consecutive issues, however, because the first issue came out July 1, and here we are on September 13, enough time has passed to warrant a fresh look (in my mind anyway, if you don’t agree then so be it). 

Cover:

            Ok, the fact that the cover actually pertains to the story is a bonus.  I like the traditional purple/orange color palette as well, and He-Man is drawn pretty well.  The problem here (and throughout the comic itself in general) is Trap Jaw.  If you grew up with the cartoon, and especially the action figures, in the ‘80s, there is a good chance that Trap Jaw was one of your favorites, as he was mine.  Here, he is presented as the leader of a nomadic tribe that captures He-Man/Adam.  Just the fact that on the cover Trap Jaw is depicted wearing a robe of some kind takes away from the general bad-assery of the character.  Trap Jaw is a tough guy that lost his jaw and had it replaced by a mechanical one.  He also has a right arm that can transform into various weapons/implements such as a gun or pincers.  Bad character designs aside, the strange way that the color from Trap Jaw dissipates over He-Man’s charging form could probably have been handled better.

5/10 – It’s an ok cover composition with decent coloring, but the actual drawing on everything but He-Man is not my cup of tea.

Story:

            The premise is great, and it provides a way for us to get introduced to the characters, especially for the audience that has yet to be exposed.  However it is written by someone that admitted (in an interview with CBR I believe, Google it if it interests you) that he wrote the character treatments before ever seeing an episode of the classic cartoon.  While it did not really show through too much in the first issue, this issue is a harsh reminder of that fact.  There is only one instance in this whole issue that comes across as an improvement on the existing characters.

Skeletor is pretty badass here.  Now if only Trap Jaw didn't look like some kind of robotic simpleton this would be a decent page

The rest of the time, the characters that we grew up with are relative caricatures of their former selves.  I will admit that the MV Creations series from the early 2000’s was a bit too campy and felt like it was taken a little too much from the cartoon, but at least it had the heart and soul of Masters of the Universe.  This is just a pale imitation.  I think that the most egregious story twist, aside from the terrible dialogue, is that He-Man is now Skeletor’s nephew.  Did I miss something over the last thirty years?  Is this something that was mentioned?  I know that Teela is the Sorceress’s daughter, but this whole “everyone is related” thing is ridiculous. 

            He-Man does some pretty stupid thing himself, such as ask the mysterious guys with the creepy red eyes for a drink of water.  Really?  I know Adam in the cartoon played dumb to throw people off his trail, but I think this iteration really is dumb. 

            The whole redesign of Trap Jaw is terrible too.  The fact that his hand now changes into stuff based on some kind of glowing dragon bug thing makes absolutely no sense and it is never actually touched upon aside from a one-panel drawing of the bug crawling out of his arm?  Huh?  This is what took two and a half months to produce?

2/10 – The only reason it’s at two instead of one is that page that makes Skeletor look like a badass.  Other than that, it’s a pretty terrible book.

Art:

            This book took two and a half months to publish and the original creative team of Robinson and Tan had to be assisted by Keith Giffen (writing) and Howard Porter (pencils).  Unfortunately the extra time and the extra sets of hands do nothing to help this book in terms of the content.  Porter’s pencils are not good as his proportions tend to go out of whack very easily and his panel and page layouts are way more confusing than they need to be.  While Tan’s page layouts are clearer and his anatomy at least a little more consistent, his character designs and storytelling are suspect.

So apparently Skeletor likes fruit and using the Darth Vadar "force choke".  Do you hear that sound?  It's the sound of my childhood weeping.

What just happened here?  Did he turn some random woman to stone?  Can he do that?  Why are his proportions so out of whack?  Does that happen when he turns people to stone?

This is the extent of explanation you get for Trap Jaw's shape-shifting arm.  Yup, that is no explanation at all. 

And....Teela's derp-face.  If that doesn't sum up this abortion of a comic book I don't know what does.

2/10 – What was Santalucia doing that they couldn’t get him to help out?  Anyone that worked on the MV Creations titles would have been a huge upgrade.  I know that this is not one of the New 52, DC, but fuck, put some thought into who you hire for projects that are based on longstanding licensed properties.

2/10 – Here’s what I want you to do; take your hand, ball it up into a fist, and punch yourself right in the face.  That’s about as much fun as this comic was to read.  Seriously, the best part of this comic was the double page Joe Kubert Memorium.

The Curious Case of Rob Liefeld

-Matt Magill

            I was a child at one point (the farther I get from that point, the harder it is to believe).  At that time, comic books were the most important thing to me.  They were what I wanted to read (I remember being asked to put away a copy of Uncanny X-Men during a scholastic required reading period because it was not legitimate reading material) and they were what I wanted to do with my life.  This was in the much-maligned 1990s which, as many of us know, was the heyday of variant covers, chromium foil and trading card inserts.  This was the time of hundreds of comic books, most with marginally talented creators, all being pumped out as fast as they could.  One of the individuals that is most closely associated with this time period (and all of the negatives that come with it) is Rob Liefeld.

            Now, I have not always been kind to Rob in the past (as you can see by my review of Youngblood) but I will readily admit that I was caught up in the ‘90’s comic firestorm and found myself rooting for, and even actively participating in, his Heroes Reborn relaunch.  I had always been a Captain America fan, so when it started over at issue one under the Heroes Reborn tag, I scooped that up like it was going out of style.  Of course that only lasted thirteen issues (and Rob’s involvement only lasted six) and was hastily relaunched with a new number one under the Heroes Return banner, to which I promptly said “screw this, I’m not playing your game anymore Marvel.”  While the comics that Rob produced, and continues to produce to this day, are not technical blueprints of artistic prowess, you can tell his love and devotion to the craft with every page.

            It is amazing to see not only the speed that Rob works, considering how many irons he has in the fire, but this is compounded by the fact that he writes as well.  He is not just a one trick pony that companies like Marvel and, most recently DC, trot out to increase sales on books that he had a big hand in in the past (Cable/Deadpool for Marvel, Hawk & Dove for DC).  Regardless of how he is perceived around the industry, the fact that, at the recent conclusion of his time at DC Comics, he was writing three books and penciling one of them is a testament to not only his work ethic, but also his love for the profession. Keep in mind that while he was working on the DC comics and heavily involved in “corporate comics,” he was also overseeing the Extreme studios properties (maybe not as closely as he would want to, but I am sure he kept an eye on things at the very least) so his plate was overflowing with work (and these are only the things that I know about, there were most likely more).

            Anyone that follows Rob on Twitter (which I highly recommend) or reads the comic news sites knows that his recent split with DC, while amicable up to a point, was not without due cause.  The simple fact that Rob’s reasons for leaving echoed those of another legendary creator, George Perez (even though he is still on World’s Finest, he did leave the Superman title) would indicate to me that something is inherently wrong with DC itself.  If one guy, even someone as credible as Perez, says something, it may be dismissed by the bigwigs at DC as a misunderstanding, or sour grapes, or something along those lines.  When two or more creators echo the same sentiment (and it’s not just Liefeld and Perez, Gail Simone, Paul Cornell and John Rozum had similar issues as well), well, where there’s smoke, there’s fire as the old saying goes.  That is a story for another time though, but if you want a one-sided but fairly non-confrontational account of editorial prick-waving just follow Rob on Twitter.

            What this really speaks to is where Rob is as a creator.  He is a guy that was brought in at the onset of the “New 52” and has been a mainstay on one title or another for the entire run of the relaunch up to this point.  Regardless of how derided he is in the comics media and by people that want their art to be less stylized, the dude obviously still sells a shit-ton of books.  The fact that he was in charge of writing three books also proves that he is not just a monkey with a pencil but a guy that is really trying to make a positive mark on the industry.  Now I have not read his recent DC stuff (it’s not you, Rob, it’s me, I don’t read any “Big Two” if it makes you feel better) but maybe his future is more as a writer than it is as an artist.  We all know he loves to draw, and it is pretty evident by his work ethic that he is obviously not just in it for a paycheck. 

Maybe it would be best if he put on his writer’s hat though, and tried his hand at world-creating on his own terms.  This would be a return to what really allowed him to blow up in popularity during the germination of the Image years.  There is one distinct difference here though, Rob is now twenty years older, wiser and hopefully better at his job than he was during those days.  While the wow factor that he (and everyone at Image in those days, for that matter) produced may be less than it was back then, the overall quality of the books will undoubtedly be better.  He could easily hire a bunch of creators to work with him and start up a couple new titles under his Extreme Studios banner (hell, I would work for him in a heartbeat - you can take that as my official job application Rob).  With the success of his recently relaunched group of books (Prophet, Youngblood, Glory and Supreme), as well as his obviously relatively successful run at DC, he may have the fan support to just go nuts.  Anything that is not associated with the Big Two comic companies is gaining more and more traction in today’s markets and this may be a perfect time to jump back into the role of world creating on his own terms.  While having an editor for the line would obviously be beneficial, it would have to be a real editor and not someone like he had at DC that basically (if I am interpreting things correctly) came in and thought that he could command and demand at will.   While this may be okay for some people (and it obviously is, considering the fact that there are still people employed at DC and no one has burned the place to the ground yet), for someone that is obviously bursting with ideas and is as involved in as many books as Rob is, I can only imagine the frustration.  This is only compounded by the fact that his workload at DC before his departure was far more than probably anyone else, save maybe Geoff Johns.

             Regardless, Rob if I could speak to you mano-a-mano, it’s time to stop being everyone else’s publicity stunt.  You are obviously capable of doing your own thing and by juggling the multiple titles combined with the various demands of the recent year or so at DC, you have undoubtedly made yourself a better writer.  It’s time to put that to good use and beat the other companies at their own game.  While I am not necessarily the biggest fan of Rob Liefeld the artist, I am definitely a huge fan of Rob Liefeld the person and comic book icon and wish you nothing but the best