written by Ta Nehisi Coates
drawn by Chris Sprouse and Karl Story (issues #8 and 10) and Brian Stelfreeze (issue #9)
colored by Laura Martin
It's been a while since I've read this title, but while I was happy to see Brian Stelfreeze on art duties again, if only for one issue, I confess I was a little disappointed to read three issues that were, for the most part, basically just a lot of talking heads. Still, the issues were a rewarding read just the same as Nehisi's dialogue, even when it isn't punctuated by fighting scenes is still grossly engaging.
Basically, after the action-packed issue #7 in which the Black Panther recruits a number of Marvel Universe friends to deal with Tetu's insurgents, things settle down a bit as Ayo and Aneka, the rogue Dora Milaje reevaluate their alliance with Tetu and Zenzi and their purported army of "the People" and T'Challa engages in a bit of a heart-to-heart with Changamire, the aged revolutionary whose ideas have inspired this uprising. More importantly, however, working together with Australian teleporter Eden Fesi a.k.a. Manifold, T'Challa succeeds in bringing his sister Shuri back from the dead. This could go a long way towards turning the tide of the uprising in T'Challa's favor.
I have wondered for some time as to why this book seems particularly intent on portraying Shuri as some kind of savior figure and playing up T'Challa's own personal inadequacies. There are a lot of strong women in this title, ranging from Ayo and Aneka to the empath Zenzi and even T'Challa's own mother, and I get the impression that part of Ta Nehisi's advocacy, at least for this title, is to really call people's attention to the gross disparity between the way men and women are treated in African societies. I often wondered why the title seemed so fixated on people's rage with T'Challa, not merely as a king but as a man, but when recalling the experiences of my aunt during her stay in Malawi some years, I finally came to understand where Coates' characters' rage is coming from. In many African countries, apparently, women do all the work while men do next to nothing. In families, women do the (literal) heavy lifting. It's not unlike the way lion prides operate; the lionesses do all the work. I'd like to believe there's more to this particular sociological phenomenon than just flat-out sexism, but whatever it is, Coates puts it right smack in the middle of the conversation, and it's definitely a conversation worth having.
This is really one of the more intelligent books I've read in a long time, and I find myself deeply interested in how it discusses topics like government, revolution and the relationship between men and women in a way that neither condescends nor reeks of intellectual pretense. It may get a little too esoteric at times for my taste, but even then I can still enjoy them. Still, even for a quality title like this, three issues of talking heads in a row is a bit much.
I also wished Brian Stelfreeze had drawn more of these issues.
7.5/10 (all three)
Monday, February 20, 2017
Sunday, February 19, 2017
Attempted Suicide-by-Bullseye: A Review of Daredevil #16
written by Charles Soule
drawn by Goran Sudzuka
colored by Matt Milla
Charles Soule and fill-in artist Goran Sudzuka conclude yet another of their fill-in "mini" arcs between story arcs as Matt, who has put a bounty on Daredevil's head to lure his arch-nemesis Bullseye (who is apparently alive and well, despite what happened to him during Mark Waid's and Chris Samnee's run), to take a shot at him, comes to realizations about the will to live. He had thought he had put out the bounty to raise money to help his friend Blindspot, but then realizes that he was actually looking for an easy way out of despair, something he realizes when he has a conversation with the benevolent but burly Father Jordan who, it is revealed, is much more than what he first appears to be.
Soule whets the reader's appetite for what has to be one of the most important story arcs of this new series: the one that explains how this status quo came to be.
It's not much of an arc, and I honestly felt myself a little disappointed after the high I got from reading most of "Dark Art" but it does tie up rather neatly. I found it silly, though, that an arch nemesis like Bullseye gets only a throwaway two-issue arc with next to no dialogue, especially considering that Waid and Samnee invested so much more storytelling in his ongoing blood feud with Matt. I also found the revelation regarding Father Jordan to be a little bit contrived, though if it portends for more stories involving this character I'm willing to keep an open mind.
Sudzuka's art is serviceable at best, though the two-page splash in which depicts Matt as being attacked from all directions by various peeople in his life is a striking visual that serves the story well.
The good news is that the story ends exactly where it should: setting up the next chapter, which promises to be a doozy.
6.5/10
drawn by Goran Sudzuka
colored by Matt Milla
Charles Soule and fill-in artist Goran Sudzuka conclude yet another of their fill-in "mini" arcs between story arcs as Matt, who has put a bounty on Daredevil's head to lure his arch-nemesis Bullseye (who is apparently alive and well, despite what happened to him during Mark Waid's and Chris Samnee's run), to take a shot at him, comes to realizations about the will to live. He had thought he had put out the bounty to raise money to help his friend Blindspot, but then realizes that he was actually looking for an easy way out of despair, something he realizes when he has a conversation with the benevolent but burly Father Jordan who, it is revealed, is much more than what he first appears to be.
Soule whets the reader's appetite for what has to be one of the most important story arcs of this new series: the one that explains how this status quo came to be.
It's not much of an arc, and I honestly felt myself a little disappointed after the high I got from reading most of "Dark Art" but it does tie up rather neatly. I found it silly, though, that an arch nemesis like Bullseye gets only a throwaway two-issue arc with next to no dialogue, especially considering that Waid and Samnee invested so much more storytelling in his ongoing blood feud with Matt. I also found the revelation regarding Father Jordan to be a little bit contrived, though if it portends for more stories involving this character I'm willing to keep an open mind.
Sudzuka's art is serviceable at best, though the two-page splash in which depicts Matt as being attacked from all directions by various peeople in his life is a striking visual that serves the story well.
The good news is that the story ends exactly where it should: setting up the next chapter, which promises to be a doozy.
6.5/10
Saturday, February 18, 2017
The Redemption of Gwen Stacy: A Review of The Clone Conspiracy #5
written by Dan Slott
art by Jim Cheung (p) John Dell, Jay Leisten and Cheung (i)
colors by Justin Ponsor
When I first picked up this miniseries, which I have enjoyed from start to finish, I thought it was about bringing key members of Peter's supporting cast back from the dead, and to an extent, I was right, but as it wraps up in fine fashion with this issue I see that writer Dan Slott had a much deeper agenda: he sought to right a wrong that Marvel editorial had done to one of the most important characters in Spider-Man's canon: Gwen Stacy.
The Jackal's plan gets kicked into high gear as Otto Octavius, whom he had resurrected as a clone, has lashed out in anger and set off a frequency that activates a carrion virus that will destroy anyone who was cloned, or who benefited from the Jackal's "New U" process, or was infected by the clones through touch. Peter, Anna Maria Marconi and the rest of them are in a race against time to stop the rapid deterioration of the clones or whoever received the New U treatment, but things may be challenging, even with Spider-Gwen, Kaine and Prowler fighting alongside them against the enraged villain clones. Gwen Stacy (not the alternate universe one) having been brought back from the dead and now dying along with the rest of the clones, takes a stand to help the man she once loved.
Unlike 2014's event Spider-Verse, which I found to be a bloated, laborious slog to read with a distinctly unsatisfying ending, I found that this series, with an economy of issues and some consistently stunning artwork, effectively sets up the big return of not just one but two major Spider-characters. It revisited the Clone Saga of the nineties with both deference to what happened and some decent storytelling, and also went a long way towards righting the wrong that Joe Quesada and then Spider-Man editor Axel Alonso inflicted on Gwen Stacy with 2004's "Sins Past" storyline, who was retroactively made to have sex with and bear children to Norman Osborn in a storyline that focused on those children, whom then-writer J. Michael Straczynski had originally conceptualized to be Peter's children. The story line and its ramifications have since been quietly abandoned (so far), but the stigma of the retcon remained among those who remember it.
Slott has worked hard to rehabilitate Gwen's image among fans, and his first major step in this direction was the creation of the alternate universe Spider-Woman, Gwen Stacy, who has proven to be a huge hit among fans. But even this wonderful "new" character wasn't quite enough to remove the bad taste that Straczynski's editorially-mangled story line left in fans' mouths, and so with this new story, and this issue in particular, he provides a somewhat satisfying coda to Gwen's story which, I sincerely hope, lingers as part of the character's canon long after the "Sins Past" debacle has long been retconned away.
Just as I cheered for Anna Maria Marconi when she showed herself to be a hero to "different" people everywhere last issue (and she in fact saves lives in this issue, too), I also cheered when, even without the Spider-powers of her hip young alternate universe counterpart, Gwen Stacy manages to go out as a hero as well.
Jim Cheung wraps up the series with art just as vibrant and kinetic as the art he presented in the first issue and for this I was grateful, considering that Olivier Coipel, who illustrated the first few issues of the Spider-Verse event two years ago, didn't go the distance. Notably, this series finished on time.
Interestingly, of all the books I want to follow after this, the one I am most interested in is collected editions of "Spider-Gwen," though Stuart Immonen's impending arrival onto the flagship Amazing Spider-Man book may persuade me to come back as well. Time will tell. After all, after the mess of One More Day, Dan Slott has spent nearly the last decade striving mightily to do right by this character.
For now, though, and without looking ahead to what future series may bring, I am content with what has been an engaging read.
8.5/10
art by Jim Cheung (p) John Dell, Jay Leisten and Cheung (i)
colors by Justin Ponsor
When I first picked up this miniseries, which I have enjoyed from start to finish, I thought it was about bringing key members of Peter's supporting cast back from the dead, and to an extent, I was right, but as it wraps up in fine fashion with this issue I see that writer Dan Slott had a much deeper agenda: he sought to right a wrong that Marvel editorial had done to one of the most important characters in Spider-Man's canon: Gwen Stacy.
The Jackal's plan gets kicked into high gear as Otto Octavius, whom he had resurrected as a clone, has lashed out in anger and set off a frequency that activates a carrion virus that will destroy anyone who was cloned, or who benefited from the Jackal's "New U" process, or was infected by the clones through touch. Peter, Anna Maria Marconi and the rest of them are in a race against time to stop the rapid deterioration of the clones or whoever received the New U treatment, but things may be challenging, even with Spider-Gwen, Kaine and Prowler fighting alongside them against the enraged villain clones. Gwen Stacy (not the alternate universe one) having been brought back from the dead and now dying along with the rest of the clones, takes a stand to help the man she once loved.
Unlike 2014's event Spider-Verse, which I found to be a bloated, laborious slog to read with a distinctly unsatisfying ending, I found that this series, with an economy of issues and some consistently stunning artwork, effectively sets up the big return of not just one but two major Spider-characters. It revisited the Clone Saga of the nineties with both deference to what happened and some decent storytelling, and also went a long way towards righting the wrong that Joe Quesada and then Spider-Man editor Axel Alonso inflicted on Gwen Stacy with 2004's "Sins Past" storyline, who was retroactively made to have sex with and bear children to Norman Osborn in a storyline that focused on those children, whom then-writer J. Michael Straczynski had originally conceptualized to be Peter's children. The story line and its ramifications have since been quietly abandoned (so far), but the stigma of the retcon remained among those who remember it.
Slott has worked hard to rehabilitate Gwen's image among fans, and his first major step in this direction was the creation of the alternate universe Spider-Woman, Gwen Stacy, who has proven to be a huge hit among fans. But even this wonderful "new" character wasn't quite enough to remove the bad taste that Straczynski's editorially-mangled story line left in fans' mouths, and so with this new story, and this issue in particular, he provides a somewhat satisfying coda to Gwen's story which, I sincerely hope, lingers as part of the character's canon long after the "Sins Past" debacle has long been retconned away.
Just as I cheered for Anna Maria Marconi when she showed herself to be a hero to "different" people everywhere last issue (and she in fact saves lives in this issue, too), I also cheered when, even without the Spider-powers of her hip young alternate universe counterpart, Gwen Stacy manages to go out as a hero as well.
Jim Cheung wraps up the series with art just as vibrant and kinetic as the art he presented in the first issue and for this I was grateful, considering that Olivier Coipel, who illustrated the first few issues of the Spider-Verse event two years ago, didn't go the distance. Notably, this series finished on time.
Interestingly, of all the books I want to follow after this, the one I am most interested in is collected editions of "Spider-Gwen," though Stuart Immonen's impending arrival onto the flagship Amazing Spider-Man book may persuade me to come back as well. Time will tell. After all, after the mess of One More Day, Dan Slott has spent nearly the last decade striving mightily to do right by this character.
For now, though, and without looking ahead to what future series may bring, I am content with what has been an engaging read.
8.5/10
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