A world of four color magic arrives every Wednesday.
Stories and adventures of heroes and villains, good versus evil.
Tales that entertain and excite by talented writers and artists.
Here are my thoughts Among The Panels.
Metaphysical Neuroma #0
Writer: Attila Adorjany
Artist: Attila Adorjany
Publisher: 600 Pound Gorilla
Price: $0.99 – Digital
Okay, so picture yourself falling down a hole. While you are falling the walls around you start to glow and show you your life. As they show you what you have seen and not remembered; your memories themselves divulge their own secrets that rip and tear at who you are inside.
Yeah, that’s Metaphysical Neuroma. If you go out and get this; get ready to be blown away.
This is one of the greatest comics, no, one of the greatest things I have ever read.
I don’t know why it elicited such high emotion in me but I was visibly elated while reading.
The story is based on a scrolling mechanic that works well in the PDF version I read. I don’t think this comic would work that well in print but that doesn’t stop me from wanting to put my hands all over it.
Okay, on to the story! Our unknown lead character is dying or so we are lead to believe. In his dying moments he is watching his life in the form of spliced together movie sequences and airline emergency documentation. His brain tells him that he can break up his life into three moments. We barely see what is going on as we are led down the rabbit hole of images that help forge the interesting brain we are now part of. As we get to the end of this book the pages lose their color and it just kind of fades away.
It was heartbreaking and awe inspiring at the same time. It takes balls to end a comic like that.
Only I hope he meant to end it that way. This story is so strong that even reading it again I came to the same conclusion. It’s near perfect.
Attila has a style all his own and he shines beautifully here.
There are just so many images that are captivating and relevant. His choice of paneling and colors will honestly grab your heart and squeeze. The images popped off my screen like nothing I have ever seen before. The way he chose to have images overlap their own panels and manipulate what you are looking it, while trying to figure out what the hell is going on. The information in this story feels real and I have to think that some of this comes from Attila’s life and it connected with me on a ton of levels.
This comic is what I have been waiting for, for a very long time. It’s fresh and unlike anything I have ever read before. This is what the comic book industry should try and emulate.
Go to Comixology right now and search for this comic. It is only a dollar. I can’t stress this enough, it is more than more your time and money to read this comic. Support the cause and I will be share this with everyone I meet.
Score: 6 out of 5.
Halo Escalation #10
Writer: Brian Reed
Artist: Ricardo Sánchez / Juan Castro
Publisher: Dark Horse
Price: 3.99
Having played all of the Halo series and really liking the story; I feel that it doesn’t do well, for me, in the comic form. I feel like the experiences that happen when you play a video game can only really stay on the screen.
Halo Escalation #10 is just another issue in a line of comics that feel like they are going nowhere fast. This story is only being held up, on one end, by every fan’s obsession with a game that no longer holds relevance in a market littered with sci-fi goodness.
This story is not that boring; it just feels flat and this issue doesn’t really add anything that will keep you coming back for more.
The Spartans battle and defeat their foe in a predictable and underwhelming way.
I just don’t know where this story is going and who Brian Reed is writing for. Is this just fan service to keep a dying franchise alive? Or is he really trying to tell stories that are meaningful in really cool world that is known to a ton of people? It’s really bad that I can’t tell.
The art in this book is so uneven I don’t really know where to start. I guess it’s easy to tell that two pencilers worked on this book; one being good, Douglas Franchin, also not credited, and the other being mediocre, Ricardo Sanchez.
The first few pages are rendered nicely with clean lines that show emotion and skill and then we get back to Halo and see the Spartans drawn in crude dimensions that are hard to read on the page. They are just blocky and strange. It must have been hard for the inker to do anything with these pencils and it shows on most of the pages. I know this book has been riddled with a bunch of different artists and I think it really hurts what could be a great book. I think people turn away because of the consistency issues more than anything. If a book stays solid people will want to keep reading.
Another thing on the art side is that when they splice in obvious digital rendered images on top of the crudely drawn art we get a bad contrast that brings you eyes away from the scene on the page and it just plain looks bad. I am surprised something so weird managed to get printed. I hope I’m not the only one that feels like this.
To reiterate this issue is nothing special and I think that there is a new story starting soon that might bring this story around. I still think that this franchise is on its way out and we should let it go without clubbing fans over the head with bad iterations of a universe they know and love. Dark Horse should think about shelving this title until it feels relevant again.
Score: 2 out of 5
Wicked + Divine #4
Writer: Kieron Gillen
Artist: Jamie McKelvie
Publisher: Image
Price: 3.50
If you haven’t been following this title I suggest you stop hurting yourself and go out right now and find it. This title just keeps on giving.
With issue number 3 being kind of hard to wrap your head around; this issue is much better for your brain.
Finally we meet the last of our pantheon of Gods and they do not disappoint.
I am still impressed with the research Kieron did on the history of the gods they chose to include in this book. I have taken a few history of religion and I feel really happy knowing that these Gods exist a lot of people’s lives.
I am sure that some people are kind of upset by the representations of these characters but damn it’s hard not to love this book.
Baal introduces himself with explaining that his ego is actually small for a God of his power. Then we enter the circle room where Gods apparently just hang out and ignore each other. I can’t for the life me understand why people do this. Never in the almost 29 years that I have been on this planet have I seen a group of powerful people sitting in a room where none of the chairs face each other or a table. It just doesn’t happen!
Anyway…Besides my pet peeves with the locale of this meeting I have to say that seeing the rest of the Gods was a real treat. We get brief views of Sakhmet, Minerva, Ananke, and Amaterasu. They all play into their roles described in vicious snark by Lucifer. The back and forth here with Lucifer is one of the greatest ways of explaining character traits I have ever seen.
Kieron just nails it again and again when it comes to the writing on this book. We get a lot of information packed into this book and when it comes down to the end you are going to be upset that it ends where it does. You turn the page and feel your stomach drop because you know you have to wait another month to get the next taste.
I can’t end this review without talking about the art. If you have read any of my other reviews of this title you know that I am in love with this art style. Not only is paired perfectly with this type of story but it just blows traditional comic book art out of the water.
Don’t get me wrong I love Jim Lee and what has done and will continue to do for traditional comic book art but for me I need something new. This books art just kills it on every level there is. I will read anything Jamie McKelvie is attached to and that is a promise. This title is a must read. Catch up quickly!
Score: 5 out of 5
Oddly Normal #1
Writer: Otis Frampton
Artist: Otis Frampton
Publisher: Image
Price: 2.99
I hadn’t heard or seen anything about Oddly Normal so I was going into this book completely blind and what I found was nice.
I use the word nice because this book is not abrasive or anything that going to bring the house down. It’s a story about family, magic, and how hard it is to be a kid.
Otis Frampton crafts a really pretty looking story about a 10 year old girl named Oddly Normal.
I wasn’t a hundred percent sure if her name was just Oddly without the Normal or if it was just one weird name. I think it’s just one name but I wish Otis had made it clearer.
We never get her parents names but Oddly refers to her father as being the essence of normal so I feel like it would be weird if his last name happened to be Normal.
This book is a really quick read because most of the narration is in square boxes and there is very little dialogue. Otis crafts a character in Oddly that speaks to weird kid in all of us. She is bullied at school mostly because she has green hair, pointy ears, and her name of course. Most of us have felt the sting of insults and there are catalogued for us in the opening pages of this book. Otis makes fall for Oddly almost instantly.
Throughout her inner monologue she reveals that her mother is a witch from a world that is different from our own. She was sent to our world to gather information on what regular humans do. While investigating she fell in love with the most normal human she could find. So that makes Oddly half a witch and half human. She is not happy about this because she is not allowed to travel to the world where her mother is from but she doesn’t fit into the world she is forced to be part of.
The main bulk of the story is just her telling us the story of her parents and how Wizard of Oz has a base of reality to it.
One thing I felt was missing is that it never explains if her father knows about the witch world or that Oddly is a half breed or if people can see her green hair and pointy ears. I was just glossed over without any kind of explanation. I hope he fills it out later.
Otis also does the art on this book and it’s really nice to look it.
It is soft and childlike but doesn’t feel like an amateur did it. You can tell that he has a real love for this story and he tried really hard to project the world in his mind onto the page. This book appeals to pretty much everyone with a heart and who had a hard time being a kid.
Score 3.5 out 5
Edge of Spider-Verse #2
Writer: Jason Latour
Artist: Robbie Rodriguez
Publisher: Marvel
Price: $3.99
If you are not caught up on what is happening in the Spider-Man Universe here is a quick update. Some masked foe is traveling through time and the multiverse to eradicate all incarnations of Spider-Man .
One Spider-Man of the future is hot on his trails and collecting his Spider-friends as well to help defeat this mystery man.
In Edge of Spider-Verse #1 we were given a Spider-Man from the 1930’s who was given his powers by a Spider-God.
In this issue we are taken to a world where Gwen Stacy was bitten by our magic spider and was turned into Spider-Woman.
In this world Peter Parker took on the role of The Lizard and was killed accidentally when Gwen had to stop him. The death of Peter Parker was placed in the hands of Spider-woman and Gwen’s father being the chief of police was out to get her. There are a few familiar faces but the most surprising was Matt Murdock. He plays a minor role in this book but it was still shocking to see his red tinted sunglasses.
Jason Latour did a really good job turning Gwen into Spider-Woman but he missed the mark one giant front. His dialogue for the teenagers is really hard to read; I just don’t think teenagers talk in that much shorthand. It felt like you were hearing an old person try and mimic something they heard on a bad TV sitcom from the nineties. The weird thing is that this only happens when the teenagers are talking to each other. When Gwen is smart-mouthing the police she just sounds like a Spider hero should but Jason just couldn’t have teenagers be smart enough to not use slang in everything that came out of their mouths.
This book was really fun to read, despite the cliché teenager speak. The art by Robbie Rodriguez was the best part. His line work and character designs really fit the story. He has a sort of sketchy style that makes his Spider-Woman look really graffiti like. I think the purple, white, and black color scheme for Spider-Woman was also a really great choice.
I also think that having her wear a hood really helps bring her into her own and I think a sweatshirt in that style would fly off the shelves.
This story is shaping up to be really great and I hope that all the writers and artists are having as much fun as it seems they are. I feel that you can tell when someone loves what they are doing because the book tends to be more fun and not as formulaic. We are three books in and have 7 more to go! I hope you’re as ready as I am to see where this is going.
Score: 4 out 5
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