Comic reviews for the week of 11/8

This is kicking off a recurring feature on this blog: weekly short reviews of the week's comics. I'll try to keep things spoiler free - if I can't avoid it, spoiler warnings will be posted.

(star ratings are out of 4, by the way)

Amazing Spider-Girl 02: This comic seems very retro to me - not surprising considering it's written by Tom DeFalco, but still. Lots of internal monologue, very little decompression, things like that. It's not a bad comic by any means, but it just fails to keep me interested. **1/2

Annihilation 04: I was sort of bored with the series before this, but this issue really focused my attention. Some rather large bombshells get dropped, including a change I was really sort of sad to see (also, the Gaiman reference sort of irritated me). Giffen's definitely aiming for big things, and I'm excited (and slightly apprehensive) to see where this is going. ***1/2

Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes 01: WAY too much exposition. I suppose most people haven't read this era of Avengers history, but this issue wavered back and forth between a)spending too much time explaining Avengers history from 25-75, and b) offhandedly referring to events that I've never heard of. I just wonder why they feel a huge need to take a "between the issues" look at this point in Avengers history - I don't think anyone was clamoring to see how Vision first demonstrated his powers to Jarvis. *1/2

Bullet Points: JMS uses an interesting idea - what if Dr. Erskine (the scientist who gave Captain America his powers) was shot along with Ben Parker a day earlier? It's basically a What If? story, and it commits one of my hated crimes of alternate reality stories - history will realign so heroes get shuffled into different roles. That just pisses me off - instead of actually looking how Marvel history would change if Captain America didn't exist, JMS just stuffs him into an Iron Man suit and proceeds to go off in a totally different direction. Decent story, but the main idea just gets under my skin. **

Civil War - Young Avengers and Runaways 04. Uh, yeah. Interesting character interplay, confusing art (what exactly happened between Vision, Marvel Boy, and Chase?) and an ending that puts the pieces exactly where they were in the beginning with one important exception. I still question why they felt the need to put Marvel Boy in 616 continuity, although I am sort of interested to see where he goes from here. Overall, this mini just felt like a random cash-in to Civil War. **

52 Week 27 - The timing on this one is weird. It took Ralph 5 days to do what he did? More Skeets stuff, which is always nice, and finally the Question bombshell we ALL saw coming gets dropped, although in a really wimpy way. I'll give it ***, mostly for the creepiness of Ralph's idea (although frankly it's really damn cruel - he's effectively punishing the person who wasn't responsible for what happened) and the Skeets interlude.

DMZ 13 - I wonder if Brian Wood is happy or sad about the election. He turns his reference sights on Hallibuton this time, as Matty goes undercover as day labor for a corrupt rebuilding contractor. The only major problem I had was it looked like all his fellow workers were Middle Eastern - was this intentional? If so, that's rather racist (based on what happens in this issue, at least). **

Doctor Strange: the Oath 02 - Even though not much happens this issue, I'm still giving it ***1/2. Brian K. Vaughn is a master at the offhand dialogue, and he just keeps throwing lines out there that just make me smile. There's also a nice look at Dr. Strange when he was an asshole here, which just makes me want Vaughn to turn this into an ongoing.

Firestorm 31 - ugh. Lots of continuity heavy events, relating to a minor event that happened over 20 years ago. The art looks really washed out too. *1/2

Franklin Richards: Happy thanksgiving 01 - While I liked the earlier Franklin Richards stuff, this issue isn't that impressive. It's 4 stories that all have the same structure: Franklin is bored, gets a crazy idea, it messes up, HERBIE has to save him. Rinse and repeat. Art is fun, although I really don't know why Chris Eiliopolis hasn't heard from Bill Watterson's lawyers yet. *1/2

Green Lantern 14: This just reinforces my opinion that Hal is a dick, and should have remained Parallax. Art's good, though. **

Jonah Hex 14: Bernet's art is really the wrong choice for this - it's much more cartoony than I expect Jonah Hex to be. Gray and Palmiotti decide to tell Hex's origin in 3 parts, and the book really suffers now that they've left the "done-in-one" format. *1/2

Martian Manhunter 04: It's official: AJ Leiberman is the new Chuck Austin (although thankfully not as powerful). Besides the fact that the setup is enormously stupid, this just isn't the sort of story you want Martian Manhunter in. *, and that's only because the art is decent.

New Avengers 24: Brian Bendis doesn't get the Inhumans, does he? Sentry broods to himself for an entire issue, and then he seduces Crystal and Iron Man shows up to be an ass again. Meh. *1/2

New X-Men 32: I suspect I'm supposed to know who the villain is here. Confusing storytelling (how DID all those people die?), but some nice moments with the memorial and special guest star X-Factor. Nice to know they're not ignoring everything the previous creative team did. **1/2

Superman 657: Arion is a dick. If he's time traveling for this, then why couldn't he have traveled a bit earlier?! Ah well - it gives an excuse for an awesome alternate future story by Busiek, which he's great at (What happened to wonder woman? Who's the Green Lantern?). My one quibble is it seems like we should know the villain, but I have NO idea who he is. ***

Uncanny X-men 480: Clayton Henry is REALLY channeling Chris Sprouse here. Basically 22 pages of Vulcan being a badass. While the X-Men in space parts are fun, the issues centering on Vulcan are pretty boring. *1/2

Wisdom 01: Heh. When you combine government ops with magic, fun stuff results. This is what Nick Fury's Howling Commandos SHOULD have been. My one quibble is I have no idea what the final 3 pages mean - is that his son? ***

Wolverine Origins 08: More flashbacks, more wolvie being badass, more OH GOD I DON'T CARE ABOUT THIS WHY CAN'T STEVE DILLON DO SOMETHING THAT MATTERS INSTEAD OF THIS CRAPPY - *cough* sorry there, had another one of my spells. *

Wormwood Gentleman corpse 04: Hee! Man I love Ben Templesmith. This ends on a really weird note considering the buildup, but I like it. He's been learning from Ellis, but putting a much more fun-loving surface on things. ***1/2, and I'm looking forward to the drunken leprechauns.

Y The Last Man 51: OK, so we finally get the "answer" to the plague, and I call bullshit. If this is what Vaughn expects us to believe, then it really sours things for me. Besides the fact that how the hell could anyone measure that sort of thing (it should take about .05 ms if what he says is true) it ranks in terms of relating to real life about as much as saying "a wizard did it." Grrr. *1/2