I didn’t buy that many books this week — only four, in fact. I anticipate next week will be even fewer. These summer crossovers/end-of-all-titles deals are really taking a toll on my reading habits, not to mention the impending cancellation of several books. This frequent diminishment is part of being a comic fan in the modern age. I have runs of Batman and Detective Comics that stretch for hundreds of issues, and my X-Men hoard is even larger. And yet now if I maintain 30 consecutive issues of a title, it feels like a big deal. I’m sure the fairly commonplace turnover of creative teams is part of my problem, but lately it feels more like the problem is the re-start/re-jigger/re-number thing companies want to do every couple years. Fatigue sets in much quicker when you’re constantly jumping back to the starting point.
And that leads right in to the final issue — of this incarnation of the book, anyway — of Legion of Super-Heroes. Number 16 is the big finale to the Saturn Queen vs. LSH battle that’s been building for the last four or five issues. Paul Levitz knows what he’s doing, he knows the Legion as well as anyone, and yet this felt like a let-down. I look back at the early issues of this run — a whole year ago, if you can believe that — and the book had momentum and pacing that implied the sort of slowly-developing, interlocking plots that come when a writer is committed to a lengthy stay on a book. I don’t know this for sure, but it feels like about six months ago Levitz was told to wrap it all up by August, and so he had to drop lots of plots and bang this out to meet the deadline. The result is a book that sputtered to the finish line instead of being a modern epic. We don’t get an inventive, super-sciencey and optimistic solution to the conflict or a soaring good-bye, just a weak left cross to end the threat and a bunch of table setting for the various Green Lantern titles. And it ends with the reminder that “Coming in September: A New Beginning.” What was wrong with the last “new beginning?”
I haven’t bought an issue of Hellblazer since John Constantine looked like Sting, but the Simon Bisley cover of 282 caught my eye. He also does the interior art in a much less-exaggerated style than the classic Biz look. I liked it. Peter Milligan’s plot is kinda so-so, a standalone story about Constantine going undercover in a creepy prison to root out a demon as a favor to his father-in-law. Honestly, it was perfunctory at best. I’m not a regular reader of the series, so maybe this is a bracing examination of Constantine’s character and how marriage has changed him. All credit to Milligan, though — he introduced every character efficiently so that even I knew who everybody was and how they relate to one another. Not enough writers do that anymore.
Conan: Road of Kings 7 continues my favorite Cimmerian’s long walk to the west. Mike Hawthorne is still on pencils, and to my great surprise, his lay-outs are much more dynamic and his weapons are more proportional. He’s still way too cartoony for my liking though; that splendid cover by Aleksi Briclot is much more what I want in a Conan comic. Roy Thomas’ plot revolves around Conan being blackmailed into joining a rebellious Aquilonian lord’s personal bodyguard, and then being stuck in the middle — with a kid, no less — when the King’s men uncover their plot. I’m all right with everything up to the kid. J.M. DeMatteis created a pair of juvenile sidekicks for Conan back in the early 80s, and the whole thing was terrible. Thomas has a much better grasp of what works and what doesn’t in Hyboria, however, so this may not end up being completely ridiculous. But then I look at that adorable stuffed bunny the kid carts around and I shudder to think of all the tender scenes that could come. Conan soothing her fears around the campfire; Conan solemnly swearing to return her to her home safely; Conan cradling her while she sleeps; Conan brushing her hair, and her reciprocating by putting his in hot rollers. Ugh, Conanny is the worst idea ever. Roy Thomas, please have this kid slaughtered by the midpoint of issue 8, and then let Conan wreak his bloody vengeance on the guilty parties.
And lest you think I’m anti-child, Tiny Titans 43 was how I wrapped up my reading, and I loved it. Superboy decides he wants a cape, which sets all the other Titans off in search of their own capes. I’m no fan of Superboy, but his confrontation with General Zod, Ursa and Non made me laugh. Robin struggles with Bat-Cow over the latter’s cape, Aqualad dabbles reluctantly in cross-dressing and the group orders new outfits from Sidekick City Costumes. It’s simultaneously ridiculous and eminently satisfying. Tiny Titans, not for the first time and certainly not for the last, is the best thing I read this week.
-Paul
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