Random Back Issues #78 - Copperhead #16

Kid, if we didn't let people who only an idiot would give a badge become cops, we wouldn't have any cops. Hmm. . .

Sheriff Clara Bronson is a bit tied up, as she's been taken prisoner by escaped criminal Clay and his lady friend Annabeth. Clay heads out to get the money from an armored car heist Clara has. Or so Annabeth thinks. Clara explains he's actually here for his son. Who is Clara's son, or rather, Clara's sister's son.

The flashback plays out over this and the next issue, but for now we see that Fiona was very excited to pull a robbery with her beau that would set them and their son up for life. Clara has, entirely reasonable doubts about this, and Fiona basically questions her right to judge anyone else's decisions. Clara can't hold a job, can't even hold her nephew. Always with the excuses. Ah, the bond between siblings.

Back in the present day, Bronson's old boss Lieutenant Ford is trying to find her and Clay ASAP. Unfortunately, Bronson's only deputy recently became Mayor, so now Ford's deputized the local schoolteacher, who is also an artificial human (or "artie"). Ford doesn't know any informants here, but Luken does, the father of one of his students. The man, who looks a bit like a past-his-prime Hellboy declares he's not a snitch, but agrees to make some calls in exchange for a guarantee his son will pass all his tests the rest of the year. I wish my dad could have functioned as a snitch during my high school years, instead of being one of my teachers. Might have done a lot better in Pre-Calculus that way.

Zeke, meanwhile is hiding out at an old scrapyard with Missus Sewell, a local woman who acts as Zeke's nanny or babysitter. Zeke doesn't know what's going on, so he's just excited to camp out. He's significantly less excited when someone shoots Missus Sewell, even if that someone turns out to be his father. Zeke has more than one protector tonight, though, as the artie named Ishmael, who lives alone out in the wilderness arrives. He really should have just shot Clay, rather than announcing himself.

Clay's not impressed, pointing out he was locked up for killing 17 men (probably not something to admit in front of your son), but they never bothered counting how many artificial humans he killed. Ishmael had been a pretty solid badass up to that point in the story, but he gets his butt kicked emphatically in the next issue. His face ends up looking like a pug's, or a manatee's.

[3rd longbox, 6th comic. Copperhead #16, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer)]

Sunday Splash Page #113

"{Awkward Silence}", in Copperhead #4, by Jay Faerber (writer), Scott Godlewski (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Maurer (letterer)

A space Western, which seemed to be a really popular genre in comics a few years ago. Still might be for all I know. This is the only one I really got into, though.

Clara Bronson shows up on the mining planet Jasper with her son Zeke, looking for a fresh start as the new sheriff of Copperhead. Which is a town with a lot of the typical problems of mining towns in Westerns. The guy who owns the mining company thinks the town is his to do with as he sees fit. Bronson's deputy is a member of an alien species that lost a war to Earthlings, and he's not real happy he didn't get the job. Clara doesn't particularly like the androids Earthlings used to help win that war, and there are several of them that live and work at the mine, as well as one who lives in the wild by himself. Plus the usual spate of murders, robberies and family squabbles.

Faerber's good about hinting at mysteries and then gradually revealing them. Here, it's the question of why Clara, who seems to be a very good cop, ended up in a craphole like Copperhead. There's also hints about the androids. It's mostly in terms of what they're made for, what they don't believe in, but eventually it turns to what they do believe in.

Unfortunately, while we do eventually learn why the sheriff's there, we may never learn what the androids are after if the book doesn't come off hiatus. The final story arc started in mid-2018, the first issue shipped, and then. . . nothing. Maybe it'll come back, maybe not.

Scott Godlewski was the artist for the first 10 issues, established the look of the series. The mixture of dingy, ramshackle structures with nicer, more futuristic interiors. The different alien species and the hints of the cultures and styles in their homes. (Deputy Budroxificus' place looks very different from Clara and Zeke's, or the android schoolteacher's). The way androids skin changes to color to match their surroundings (which took me forever to catch on to. I thought it was just supposed to be weird shadow effect). Drew Moss drew the next two storyarcs, covering 8 issues. Seemed to struggle with maintaining consistent human proportions. Sheriff Bronson had some tiny hands in certain panels. Godlewski came back for the last arc, but he'd been doing work for DC recently, and so I wonder if that was taking up his time, or if Faerber just lost interest or what.

What I Bought 6/23/2018 - Part 1

There wasn't a single comic I wanted that came out last week. I did, however, find all the comics I was still looking for from the week before on a weekend jaunt. So let's look at those instead.

Copperhead #19, by Scott Godlewski (writer/artist), Jay Faerber (writer), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - The cover and the final page of the issue mirror each other effectively.

The thing unearthed in the last issue looks like a glowing blue rock. It glows the same color as some antennae on the back of the native species heads. Except the antennae are actually parasites, and the native species are suddenly being very aggressive in approaching the town. Hickory's bosses are excited and pushy, but the artificial humans have a plan of their own, involving some group they belong to, indicated by a tattoo. The sheriff and the Mayor are trying to figure out what Hickory is up to, and Clara is trying to reconnect with Zeke, who is struggling to process that Clara isn't his birth mother, that she killed his mother.

A lot of plates spinning, which, since this is supposedly the last arc, makes a certain amount of sense. If there's going to be any resolution or payoff, it has to happen now. Be interesting to see if Faerber and Godlewski can pull it off, or if they're even planning to do that.

Scott Godlewski, who was artist for the first 10 issues, is back. There's a marked increase in the consistency of characters' sizes and proportions. Budroxificus looks suitably large, even when he isn't drawn to be intimidating. Sheriff Bronson is working with him, and Mister Hickory thinks he's got Boo wrapped around his finger, so neither is intimidated by him, and he isn't drawn in a way that suggests they are. No towering over them imposingly. But he still fills panels, because he's a big Cypabaran (which I just now realize is rearranging "capybara" and that's what he's based on).

Stellar #1, by Joseph Keatinge (writer), Bret Blevins (artist), Rus Wooten (letterer) - That's one way to kill a giant space monster. If only the pilot had buckled his safety belt first. . .

The series, so far, is taking place on a single world devastated in some major war that spread across the galaxy. Civilization hasn't collapsed entirely, but things are in flux, and a lot of people are struggling. The main character, named Stellar, was a super-soldier designed to win the war, and opted to go a different way at some point. Which put her in conflict with others like her. Or she's still in conflict with them. Time may also be unraveling, things are jumping around, so that I'm not always sure how we got from Point A to Point B. Or Stellar is hallucinating on that last page.

Blevins brings an interesting visual approach. It's the ruins of all those 1950s sci-fi pulp covers. The spaceship spaceships, the remains of giant robots and big statues like I remember from the covers of some version of Asimov's Foundation books. It takes something that the reader has some past visual reference for, and shows it as dead, maybe to give a scope of the destruction, or the level of fall from the heights they once were. Blevins is doing the color work as well, and in the flashback sequences, everything is dominated by yellows and oranges, vivid colors. In almost every one of those panels and pages, people are being vaporized, incinerated, or are being presented with the threat of those fates.

The rest of the book is done in cool, blunted shades. Even when it's showing some alien arthropods devouring the remains of some dead giant, the viscera is dull reddish-purple. Stellar wears a monk's robe and hood, concealing the old outfit she still wears underneath. Her face is more lined around the eyes - almost like Blevins made certain some of his initial sketch lines would show through as strain or sleeplessness - and she's paler. On the last page, when it looks as though the battle is starting up again, the oranges and yellows haven't returned, which is why I suspect it's a hallucination, or echo of the actual battle, long finished.

I don't entirely know what is going on, or where Keatinge and Blevins plan to go with it, but I'm intrigued.

What I Bought 2/14/2018 - Part 2

When I was reviewing the most recent issue of Copperhead, I mentioned Ishmael, the artificial human being colored deathly white during the scene in the hospital bed. I wasn't sure how that worked at the time, but reading back through earlier issues, it dawned on me that he's designed to unconsciously change color to match his surroundings. When he was fighting Clay, Clay had mentioned something about artificial humans being designed to be good at camouflage, but I thought he meant they had a skill for building clothing or face paint. Not that their bodies can actually change color. Whoops. I figured it out over the weekend and decided I'd use it as the intro before going into talking about the last book from last week.

Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #29, by Ryan North (writer), Erica Henderson (artist), Rico Renzi (color artist), Travis Lanham (letterer) - Credit to the guy for remembering to paint the soles of his feet. He just didn't give it enough time to dry first.

Squirrel Girl unsuccessfully fights the Silver Surfer for several pages, even with Loki teleporting in a bunch of other heroes (to protect Nancy). Explanations are eventually offered, and the Surfer is about to deal with the dopes pretending to be him, when an armada shows up. It's comprised of people from planets the "hunks" bankrupted, out to destroy the Surfer, and with the weapons to pull it off. The Surfer decides to selflessly sacrifice himself and spare us all any of his soliloquies about how alone he is in the universe. Unfortunately, Doreen, Tippy, and Nancy tag along, which puts them on the bullseye as well. So next issue, everybody dies.

I call bullshit on the Surfer being able to so casually swat Beta Ray Bill aside. He's Cyborg Horse Thor, he's not getting punked that easily by that whiny flying hood ornament. Is Ryan North taking writing lessons from Jim Starlin? That said, North writes a very good Drax (this version of him, anyway). Drax taking everything people say literally fits North's writing style well. People pointing out obvious stuff or plot holes, but not realizing that's what they're doing. That's kind of North's go-to move.

Henderson draws a very, I'd say "stripped-down" version of the Surfer, but he's always naked, isn't he? *ba-dump tisssh* Thank you, thank you! Seriously though, her version of Surfer doesn't have cheekbones, ears, much in the way of defined musculature. Normally he's drawn like a fit guy who got silver sprayed-painted all over, but here it's more as though Galactus redesigned him and a lot of extraneous parts were left out. Makes him sleek, also a little unearthly. I was thinking it was the pupiless eyes doing that, but he usually has those. But Henderson draws him from a bit of distance frequently, and a lot of the time he's looking at something we can't see, even when he's talking to someone in the panel. Like he's only half paying attention because his "cosmic senses" are looking at something else. He rarely shows much emotion in his reactions, a big change from his usual melodramatic shtick. I really like it.

What I Bought 2/7/2018 - Part 2

I bag on commercials a lot, because most of them are garbage. But I did like those insurance commercials about "Mayhem" when he resolved to be useful and helpful right after New Year's. And then he dropped his resolution after a couple of weeks, just like the rest of us.

Copperhead #18, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - Godlewski remembered Clara's armor still has the bullet impact from the previous sheriff's tenure on it.

Clara has a standoff with Clay, which ends with Clay shot in the leg and Clara reunited with Zeke. Zeke has another panel where his lower body seems much too small for his upper body. Maybe his shirt is just covering a lot of his pants and that's what's throwing me off. Clay mentions that Clara killed Zeke's mother (her sister). That's a conversation she'll have to deal with it at some point. Ford's going back home, but Luken, the schoolteacher, has apparently decided he likes law enforcement and wants to stay on as Clara' deputy. I don't think that's going to end well for him. Miss Sewell survived Clay shooting her multiple times, but Ishmael isn't doing so well. Given that's he's normally purple or a deep blue, I'm assuming Riley colored him off-white in the hospital scene deliberately. Like most of the life has drained out of him.

This Miss Sewell thing annoys me. Not that I'm unhappy she's alive. She's not a bad character, and I wouldn't mind seeing her attitudes towards Zeke explored (if it's connected to the loss of her children). The reason she survived is not a bad dodge. Still, I kept thinking of the end of the Robert Downey Jr. movie Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. 'Yeah, I know, boo hiss. Why not just bring everyone back?' Faerber uses her apparent death for emotional punch, then pulls the rug out later. Feels cheap, something I'd expect from a Marvel or DC big event comic.

There's also some development in the thread of what Mr. Hickory is up to. It involves something deep in his mine, something they want to make contact with. Something that a few of his workers may have encountered at the end of the issue, and it probably didn't go well for them. Although maybe those dual 'AAAIIIEEEE!'s were happy screams. That could be interesting. I've been curious to see the Sheriff have to deal with something truly bizarre, just beyond the normal stuff a cop in her world would encounter. Even the assassin using worms that tunnel into the victim to kill them didn't seem to faze her much. Maybe that's just Clara, though. Having experienced what she has, maybe most things just bounce off her psyche.

I'm curious about Moss' decision, during the conversation between Boo and Clara, to have Boo backlit in the penultimate panel, when he asks if she wants to help him investigate Hickory. It makes him seem vaguely sinister, or like he's trying for mysterious. The conversation runs over two pages, and other than that one panel, whoever is in each panel is perfectly visible and well-lit. So making that choice right there, feels like s deliberate warning of some sort. And Boo did have to hustle away after Hickory realized someone was eavesdropping. Did they capture and replace Boo? Or is he running a plan on his own track, separate from Clara's or Hickory's?

What I Bought 1/3/2018 - Part 2

Alex and I watched a couple of different stand-up specials on Netflix recently, and I never want to see another comedian complaining about how people get too easily offended these days. Not that I expected better from Joe Rogan, but I did think Dave Chappelle wouldn't go that route, especially after he spent all that time on a bit about how good he is at coming up with jokes. Then it shouldn't be that hard to come up with some that don't punch down, should it?

Giant Days #33, by John Allison (writer), Max Sarin (penciler), Liz Fleming (inker), Whitney Cogar (colorist), Jim Campbell (letterer) - Hear no Embarrassing Disaster, see no embarrassing disaster, speak no, aw forget it.

With Daisy and Susan moving in with their significant others, with reservations, Esther is scrambling to find new roommates. But hey, there's Ed, also trying to find a place. He recognizes that Extreme Bros would be a terrible experience, but turns down Esther's offer. Then he ends up accepting Dean's offer to live with a bunch of coders who mine cryptocurrency, but not before helping Esther move in as well. And Ed makes sure she gets the nice room, while he takes the glorified closet.

Things are in a death spiral for several characters. Esther is running out of people to rely on, Ed's going to wreck himself hoping for Esther to confess feelings for him rather than just getting it over with and telling her how he feels. Daisy's doing the same thing with Ingrid (see her open admission to Susan they were hiding in her makeshift room, and her uncertain face when she says, 'If you can't beat them, join them!'). Susan seems to be doing the best, as she and McGraw seem to have found a good equilibrium. But she's worried she's committing to being an adult too soon. It doesn't seem as though any of them have figured out balance. What am I saying, of course they haven't. They're college kids. The fuck they know about balance? I'm considerably older than them and I still can't seem to find a good balance between time spent alone and time spent with friends.

Requisite paragraph gushing about the art: Sarin having Esther keep collapsing into the face on the floor position at each setback was pretty good. Daisy got a slight variation of it on the last page as she collapsed on the couch, which seems to indicate a similar level of unhappiness and isolation in the two of them. Also, Sarin draws the backgrounds with the same wobbly lines he draws the frazzled Daisy with. And in the panel where Esther first reaches out to her, the squiggly lines start just on the other side of Daisy, as if we're entering a zone of altered reality caused by her mental state. Actually, that may just be part of someone's coat hanging up in the background, but screw you, I'm saying it's a deliberate move.

And the panel of Ed's nightmare vision of Dean was beautifully colored, the pink glow of the computer monitors, contrasting with the maw of Dean's mouth. Sarin and Fleming even drew in the taste buds on the tongue of the giant, sharp-toothed Dean. It's just a nice, horrifying image.

Anyway, there will undoubtedly be many tears in the near future, though I can't predict at all who they're going to come from.

Copperhead #17, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - Human Resources is going to need to have a talk with Interim Mayor Budroxificus.

Ishmael's attempt to protect Zeke doesn't go well, as he gets beaten to a pulp by Clay. The Sheriff is explaining how she wound up with Zeke and Clay's money, and the sequence of events is not what I expected. Wasn't what her captor expected either, but that lady is dead now, so her expectations don't count for much any longer. Mayor Boo is tracking Mr. Hickory to some clandestine meeting. And by the end, the Sheriff has caught up to Clay, who she probably should have just shot when she had the chance.

Surprising revelation in this issue comes from Interim Sheriff Ford telling a possible informant he can do anything he wants because he is human, white, and a cop. I knew humans in this universe tended to hold themselves at the top, certainly compared to the "arties" or Budroxificus' species. And cops are seemingly all conditioned to believe they can do whatever they please. I'm surprised, though, that being white still matters in this particular fictional universe. I guess crackers didn't see any reason to knock that shit off once they had other sentient species to discriminate against.

There's a few panels in here, when Moss draws people in profile, where his artwork reminds me a bit of Greg Capullo's. In the faces mostly. The panel in the lower left there, for one. He uses a little lighter linework than he normally does, but it might also be Riley's coloring. The skin tones remind me of Capullo's time drawing Batman in the last few years. It doesn't carry over from one panel to another, so it's a brief, abrupt surprise.

The fight between Clay and Ishmael is handled differently from Clara's fight with the assassin in the conclusion of the last arc. A lot fewer speed lines, and Moss doesn't focus on the impacts as much. In that earlier fight, there were a lot of panels of the moment a hit landed. Here, he seems to draw the moment before the hit lands, or simply doesn't show the impact. Because for Clay, Ishmael is ultimately irrelevant. Not because he's an artificial human (or not only that), but because, as Clay describes during the beating, he's naturally tough and mean. He likes hurting people, doesn't really matter who. He killed Missus Sewell without a second thought, simply because she was near his son. It's all in service of his goal, and that's all that matters to him.

Well, I certainly hope Clara choosing not to simply shoot Clay in the back doesn't come back to bite everyone in the butt next issue.

What I Bought 12/6/2017 - Part 1

When the trailer for Infinity War popped up, I kind of shrugged. Figured I was over the whole thing of movies with superheroes teaming up. Been there, seen that, not letting some massive company jerk me around. But then I watched the trailer and caught myself humming the Avengers' theme four hours afterward, so there goes my jaded comics fan cred. Comics I missed from November have arrived! Let's start with the books that are regulars here.

Copperhead #16, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - By issue's end, that is not nearly as comforting a cover image as I'd hoped.

Sheriff Bronson is captured after what looks like a hell of a struggle. Clay leaves his current lady to guard the sheriff while he tries to track down his son. While Interim Sheriff Ford tries to find Clara, difficult when he doesn't have informants, and won't trust Boo. Clara sets to telling Annabeth the story of how she wound up with custody of Zeke, mostly to try turning Annabeth against Clay. Hard telling if that's gonna work. And now the "artie" is the only one standing between Zeke and his dad.

I have not been a huge fan of Drew Moss' art, but I enjoyed the facial expressions this month. He exaggerated the faces a bit, but it works. It makes the characters a little more lively, sells the story. That Clara's a prisoner, but still working the situation to her advantage. He still struggles a little with proportions, but he seemed to find a mostly strong balance between the panels where he can really focus on more details, and the ones where he's better off going simpler.

I'm curious to see how what happened to Clara's sister played a role in Clara being like she is. It isn't too hard to see her being protective of Zeke as a desire to protect the last piece of her sister, but it doesn't explain her being so dogged as a sheriff. Especially in light of what we hear in the flashback, about how she's drifting, always looking for the excuse not to commit to any path. Even if the necessity of raising a child forced her to stick to a job, she could still halfass it easily enough, but that isn't her style. She's the type of cop who never lets go of a case. A 180 from where she was before.

Atomic Robo and the Spectre of Tomorrow #2, by Brian Clevinger (writer), Scott Wegener (artist), Anthony Clark (colorist), Jeff Powell (letterer, designer) - The more I get to see of Lang, the more I enjoy her direct, loud response to problems.

Robo has been doing a shitty job getting Tesladyne running. Given all these cybernetic people suddenly very publicly collapsing, which will likely cause a panic, I'd call it a suspiciously shitty job. He hadn't informed anyone that he was ignoring complaints from Richard Branson which have halted their work. Which has just about pushed Lang (and to a lesser extent Vik) to the brink. And Fischer's grasp on sanity is slipping fast.

I'm pretty sure all these cyborgs are failing because someone wants everyone pointing fingers and witchhunting. What they stand to gain, I'm not sure. Robo is tossing around ideas as to who's behind it, but I don't think he's on the right track. But he seems so distracted all the time. Maybe he just has no idea how to run any sort of company, despite having owned one for 50+ years. I could see that. Or his "death" and subsequent 110+ years spent as a deactivated head sitting in a forgotten box has altered his perspective on things.

Foley continues to serve effectively as the POV character, watching everything going to hell around her, Lang reaching a boiling point, and being confused at what is wrong with Robo.

I like the color choices Clark is making. He keeps using this kind of neon or glow-in-the-dark colors for each of the cyborgs as they break down around the world, while all the other people in the panels are colored in grey, maybe a bit of highlighting coming from the cyborg. But it conveys an otherworldly feel to them. When Foley ventures into the depths to find Robo, there's a faint pink tinting to her, a light source with no apparent source, which feeds into the uneasy sense that something's not right at Tesladyne. All the pipes and tunnels remind me of Robo's speech about "evil computers" from The Shadow from Beyond Time.

What I Bought 10/31/2017

The two books left over from last month. The return of Copperhead, and me giving that Ragman mini-series a whirl. Not the best possible pairing, but better than nuthin'.

Ragman #1, by Ray Fawkes (writer), Inaki Miranda (artist), Eva De La Cruz (colorist), Josh Reed (letterer) - I don't know if I'd call it a great cover - little too grey - but March drawing the moment right before the grenade explodes is pretty cool.

In this new version of Ragman's origin, Rory Regan was a soldier, part of a squad that decided to try and ransack an old tomb. That was a mistake, and now Rory is back in the States, the only survivor, with scattered memories of what happened. When he opens a box with a few things left over from it, a bunch of rags cover him and carry him out over the city, where he finds some odd creature attacking a person. His suit absorbs the creature, and he learns all the members of his squad are within the suit as well, and they seem to know more about what he is than he does, and about the creatures that are after him.

The way Miranda draws the suit, it looks very similar to the symbionts like Venom or Carnage. The sending rags out like tendrils to help him move across the city is not unusual from what I've seen of some of the earlier series he had. But the cape and hood the costume's traditionally had are gone, so one of the more distinctive elements is missing. There is a glowing symbol in the center of the chest, a feature shared by the two enemies that appear at the end of the issue. I'm guessing each is some sort of letter of word in ancient Hebrew, maybe it's a mistake to assume they're maintaining Rory's Jewish heritage.

So I don't know where Fawkes plans to go with this. What the nature of the threat Rory's up against is, what it's going to tell us about him. Rory seems to have been the explosives expert on the squad, but also the one the others kind of protected. It was because one of his charges didn't work they couldn't escape (or so it appears), so I don't know if this is going to be part of some larger thing about survivor's guilt, or him trying to prove he can stand alone when he has a suit that would let him draw on the strength of others. Could be any of that, or none of it. Hard to tell at this point.

Copperhead #15, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - Well I hope those dragon things can eat metal, or they're circling that thing for no good reason.

Clara had a fight with Clay and his lady friend. It's not clear how it turned out, other than everybody did some bleeding. Interim Mayor Boo is left with a bunch of bigwigs yelling at him and no law enforcement. So Ford steps into that role, dragging the local schoolteacher along with him (who is colored blue on one page, and purple the next, the art is really inconsistent this issue). And Mr. Hickory and some of his associates have something brewing down in the mine.

The issue ends on a big reveal, which I suppose shouldn't have been much of a surprise. The book has been hinting about something not being totally kosher about Clare and Zeke being there. I had been thinking it would turn out Clara had been Clay's partner, and the best they could manage for witness protection was as a sheriff. Which is overly complicated, but I dunno, it seemed like the sort of surprise I thought Faerber would try.

The art is not Moss' best work. It varies quite a bit from panel-to-panel. On one page he goes much more basic than normal for one panel of Ishmael and Boo talking, then shifts back to a more detailed style right after. It's enough of a shift I thought someone else had taken over art duties for a moment. There's one panel of Zeke where his upper body is twice as tall as his legs, which looks really strange. There are a couple of panels of Mr. Hickory where body parts just look entirely out of proportion to each other. On the plus side, some of the aliens he draws look suitably weird. But I really feel like the art is starting to drag this book down.

What I Bought 7/7/2017 - Part 2

I didn't realize the Justice League movie was coming out this year. I figured that thing was still years away. But until a month ago, I didn't realize the new Spider-Man movie was coming out now, either. I thought it was still a ways off, too. My grade school self would be appalled.

Real Science Adventures #3, by Brian Clevinger (writer), Lo Baker (artist/letterer Flying She-Devils), Wook Jin Clark (artist, The Sparrow), Anthony Clark (colorist), Tessa Stone (letterer, Flying She-Devils), Jeff Powell (letterer, The Sparrow) - A bottle of hooch, a seaplane, and a sturdy tree to lean comfortably against. That covers everything you need.

The She-Devils discover that Mad Jack watering his booze with hooch hurts fuel efficiency, so it's a question of whether they can reach the rendezvous point before they hit "E". Also, Jack isn't out of tricks to try and recover his plane - and his brewmasters - mostly undamaged. As for Sparrow, the Nazis caught her, but she stashed all the munitions she took off soldiers in the base in various places you wouldn't want explosives, so stuff is blowing up, which is going to give her a chance to get loose and wreak more havoc.

Baker's certainly good at drawing characters that show the wear of their lives. Nobody looks too smooth, everybody has a worn look to them, and in the case of Jack and his men, a maniacal look to them. As for the flight combat, which I was curious how Baker would handle, there isn't a lot of it yet, since Mad Jack is still trying to be crafty. The little there was, was OK. Baker breaks up the panels of the action outside with shots of the She-Devils' and the Tongan ladies' efforts to fight them off. Keeps the reader's attention on the stakes. The Sunderland dominates most of the panels it's in, but doesn't convey much sense it's moving. But it's essentially a fortress (not be confused with the B-17 Flying Fortress) under siege. Like in Sahara (the Bogart movie, not the Matthew Mcconaughey one) or whatever story about a small group trying to hold a position against overwhelming odds you prefer. The plane is target, everything else revolves around it.

That said, I don't know if I'm going to stick with it. I can't say I'm incredibly invested in it, and despite Clevinger's efforts to keep things moving at a brisk pace, the same is true of the Sparrow story. Although there it's because it's broken into six page chunks. Just as you start to get into it, it's over for another month.

Copperhead #14, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - No jokes, I just like that cover. It's fairly simple, but it's straightforward and tells you what you need to know: there's gonna be a fight.

The Sheriff is trying to find this assassin, and has to ask Ishmael to lean on some possible sources, which nets them a picture of the killer, right as said killer takes a shot at the sheriff. A fight ensues, and the sheriff narrowly wins. And it's right then that Clay finally reaches Copperhead, and he finds the sheriff immediately. That's probably bad.

I'm wondering what the big surprise is going to be in the next story. Faerber keeps hinting there's more going on with Clay's obsession with reaching the sheriff than her simply being the one who put him away. References to Clay wanting revenge on the partner who sold him out, which makes me wonder if Clara was originally a crook who went straight, or was undercover as Clay's partner, or what. Still wanting to see what Mr. Hickory's plans are. Seems bigger than simply not wanting a sheriff who isn't properly deferential to him. Although my track record on guessing where Faerber's going with a story is so abysmal, I'm not even going to bother.

It's Moss' first fight scene on the book, and it works. He doesn't do anything particularly dynamic with panels or layouts, focuses on the action, two people ultimately punching each other a lot. There's one panel where the sheriff avoids being impaled and he draws her nose as being really wide, but it works as a suggestion of how fast she had to move to dodge, that our view of her is warped by it. I do wonder what happened to all the people that were shown in the background watching the fight right after that, who all seem to have vanished by the end when Clay appears. Granting that a brawl in the streets of Copperhead is probably not unusual, this one involves the relatively new sheriff, which you think would draw interest, if only from people waiting to see if the law is gonna get it in the neck.

There's a page where Clara scopes out the train station, trying to decide who looks like an assassin, only to pan over a whole crowd of rough-looking types and conclude that's going to be a tough call. Moss uses one wide panel, but breaks it up into three with a couple of panel borders, which, I feel works at cross purposes. If you're going for Clara scanning the crowd carefully, one wide panel suggesting an uninterrupted moment would work better. But if you want to suggest she's glancing around, eyes darting from one face to the next, multiple panels are a good idea, but then it probably shouldn't be drawn where a figure that starts on the right side of one panel, continues on the left side of the next. The general impression is still conveyed, but it doesn't work quite as efficiently as it could.

Overall though, Moss is still getting the job done, even if there are some stylistic tics I don't love.

What I Bought 5/20/2017 - Part 1

I did end up in Columbia, but at least it didn't storm. And I found three of the books from this month. Better than none. Start with the two that are still mid-storyarc.

Cave Carson Has a Cybernetic Eye #8, by Jon Rivera (writer/story), Gerard Way (story), Michael Avon Oeming (artist), Nick Filardi (colorist), Clem Robins (letterer) - Those look like fingerprints on the rocks. Enormous fingerprints. I have no idea if that's what's intended, or what's signified by it.

The Whisperer and his followers are moving across universes, converting people to their cause (represented by the skin at eye level being torn away and glowing blue bone and eyes revealed below). Cave and the others are trying to keep up, but are outnumbered and hole up in a universe where they find Cave's old mentor alive (albeit giving lectures to dead students). After a lot of discussion about what the Whisperer is up to, they are attacked by it and its followers, though it doesn't seem interested in finishing them off, so Cave will have the chance to deal with it.

It seems likely, given that Cave's wife is not buried in this alternate universe where she was in Cave's, that she's still alive. That Cave so adamantly denies Chloe's suggestion that maybe she is alive here only cinches it in my mind. But the refusal to consider the possibility makes sense. Cave has seized on this adventure as a way of, at best, pulling himself out of the depression he'd sunk into by way of action. It's a distraction, and encountering a living reminder of what he's trying to ignore, would make that difficult. Especially since she wouldn't be his wife, similar looking and acting and thinking perhaps, maybe even married to the cave Carson that existed in that universe, but not the same woman. And Cave couldn't stay, so what would be the point?

Granting that I don't know much about Cave's original comic adventures, it almost feels as though Rivera and Way are moving him backwards for this battle. More assertive, butting heads with this Johnny fellow from his old crew, no cybernetic eye. Chloe and Wild Dog both seem to be receding into the background a bit (Wild Dog more than Chloe, but she was closer to being a part of all this than he was). Is this Cave's chance to conclude old business that he should have finished long ago? Dealing with the Borsteins and the damage they've caused? Was it all brought about by his original explorations, and then it's reached this point because he washed his hands of it and stopped paying attention? I'm just spitballing.

Page 19 is a pretty one. Cave almost seems to have lost it, trying to yell at the Whisperer and Borstein to come out and face him as the followers swarm towards them. The lower two-thirds are set with a couple of large blue panels mirroring the eye sockets of those followers. The bottom of the page, bathed it a reddish-orange that matches what's rising from a smoking crater in the upper left corner of the page show hordes of the zombified followers, and some of them are climbing up the space between the two blue panels, to the panel above, where Cave is trying to stave them off with a flamethrower while the disembodied voice of the Whisperer/Borstein taunts him, by telling him he wouldn't want to leave cave all alone. So as you read that, your eye follows the fire of the explosion down the page between the blue panels, to the army below. And the blue panels show Cave looking downward towards the army, refusing to leave, while Chloe tries to get him and a wounded Wild Dog the hell out of there.

The specific way 'We. Are. Leaving!' is written there makes me think it's a reference to 'Marines! We Are Leaving!' from Aliens, but maybe not. Not that uncommon of a thing to say. It would fit, in the sense Cave staying to try and get revenge or strike back somehow is futile and getting their wounded to safety and regrouping is the best option.

Still enjoying Filardi's colors and what they add to Oeming's art. The Whisperer being this mess of bright orange and maroon tentacles and shapes, the neon green of the Mole's cockpit. And in general, I think his use of color helps to guide the eye through some of the more unusual panel layouts. I'm sure that's a collaborative effort from all parties, but it wouldn't work if Filardi's colors didn't grab the eye and draw it where it needs to go.

Copperhead #13, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - I bet that guy got those horns stuck on a lot of stuff when he was a kid. Unless they don't develop until his species hits maturity.

The sheriff didn't actually quit, because she's still investigating. The Mayor was sleeping in the guest room in his house, because he was carrying on an affair. By the time Clara tracks down the other woman, she's dead the same way as the former Mayor. Current Mayor Boo is trying to keep Mr. Hickory calmed down, as it's hard to tell which of them is successfully manipulating the other. The dangerous criminal guy is still trying to make it to Copperhead. I'm guessing he'll show up sometimes at the very end of next issue.

I kind of wish this felt like more of genuine mystery I could be trying to solve. Maybe it's supposed to be, but it seems more likely (and the cover for the next issue being on the back cover of this issue doesn't help) like Ishmael is going to show up with a name of a killer for the Sheriff, she's going to go find the killer, there'll be a fight, it'll end somehow, that's about it.

Also, having Clara do the big "I Quit!" at the end of last issue, then immediately opening this one with her still investigating and having very much not quit, feels cheap. I didn't expect she'd stop investigating, but why try for that as your cliffhanger, and then blow it to hell on page 2 of the next issue? It feels like Faerber wasn't even really trying to for any suspense himself, so what's the point?

That complaint aside, there are pieces moving here I find interesting. This interplay between Boo and Hickory (and how Clara's going to fit into it). The Sheriff now owing a favor to Madame Vega. It feels like this thread with the escaped con has been going on forever, but I am curious to see exactly what his backstory is with the Sheriff, since it doesn't feel as simple as her having arrested him, or him being her son's father. And this murder mystery could play out in a cool way, it just hasn't been great so far. No particular reason to care about the now former Mayor, since he hadn't appeared at all prior to his death.

The complaint I've had about Moss not giving Boo the proper size, well I'm still not sure about Boo, but he drew the head of the Mayor's security large enough. Properly conveying size, making Clara's complete indifference to his attempts at intimidation more effective. Sometimes Moss nails the body language; some of the panels of Clara glaring. The one where she mutters to herself about everyone making things difficult while she talks to Madame Vega. There was a certain tiredness to that one, maybe because vega and Clara's panels are drawn so the two are in opposition, and Vega is drawn standing ramrod straight, while Clara seems somewhat hunched over, actually probably leaning against the fish tank behind her). It's a less aggressive approach than with the security guard, but she was hoping things were going to go smoother here.

Moss does seem to struggle with lips. The Sheriff's lips sit really oddly on her face in a lot of panels, usually when Moss is going for some more quizzical or disgusted expression. He gives her fuller lips than Godlewski did, and the coloring of them is darker, makes them stand out more. There's just certain panels where it looks like some attached lips the way you do on a Mr. Potato Head which is not ideal.

What I Bought 5/3/2017 - Part 3

Last two books from the shipment from last week. Probably won't be able to get this week's books until Friday, at the earliest. Maybe not until next week. Problems of working on the road.

Real Science Adventures #1, by Brian Clevinger (writer), Lo Baker (artist, She-Devils story), Wook Jin Clark (artist, Sparrow story), Anthony Clark (colorist), Jeff Powell (letterer and design) - Every great pilot must master looking thoughtfully into the distance as twilight approaches.

Two stories. The She-Devils are grappling with a lack of supplies to raid within range of their aircraft. If they don't solve that issue, they'll have to close the base and pull up stakes. Rather than deal with the horros of moving, they're going to steal the flagship of a rival crew, which is a British Sunderland flying boat. Big, slow, good cargo capacity, excellent range. All they have to do is steal it, then stay airborne until until any pursuit runs out of gas. Maybe they'll get to that point next issue.The Agent Sparrow chapter, which is only six pages, is the start of a mission to wreck a Nazi super-weapon. The mission goes awry almost immediately, of course.

So a lot of set-up on both fronts. The She-Devils' mission certainly sounds like it'll be fun to read, but I'll have to wait and see. I'll also have to wait and see how Lo Baker's art does when it comes it action sequences. Baker shows a style here somewhat similar to Scott Wegener's, but with much heavier linework. The problem is that in panels where our viewpoint isn't pretty damn close, the character's faces are then overwhelmed by those big, dark lines, and Baker has to simplify things to convey anything. It's like looking at a blurry photo. But when there's space in the panel to concentrate on one character, the body language and expressions are pretty good. There's a tendency towards elongated necks that reminds of something, but it works. The sound effects' lettering has a loose feel that fits with the makeshift surroundings in the story. They look kind of rough, some look like they were written in with your basic #2 pencil. Using whatever is at hand. It worked for this.

Wook Jin Clark did get a chance to draw some fight scenes, and did a solid job. Nothing flashy, but everything is clear and easy to follow. The progression of action from panel to panel makes sense. On a couple of pages, Clark draws a large close-up of one character's face along the margin of the page, while other panels shows what's going on around them. Almost like an inset panel, but not exactly. So a view of Sparrow's face as she surveys the landscape after scaling the cliff, that stretches vertically across the left edge of two horizontal panels showing what she's seeing (that there's no farmhouse with supplies, but there are Nazis). I'll be curious to see if Clark continues to use that going forward.

I can't say this issue alleviated the concerns I had going in about whether I'd like Real Science Adventures any more this time around, but I'd like to at least see the main story get going before I make a final determination.

Copperhead #12, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - It was as the alien worm erupted from the cadaver that the doctor realized he picked the wrong week to quit smokin'.

The now-former mayor was killed with some sort of alien worm. Or by said alien worm, since it's unclear if it is sentient or not. The artificial human, Ishmael, may be able to get the Sheriff a name, in time. That's about the most help she's getting out of any guys right now. This Ford fellow is just shoving his way into her life and constantly trying to explain to her how she's feeling about everything. Her son's father is still - gradually - making his way towards them. And she can't quit butting heads with her former deputy, current boss, Mayor Budroxifinicus.

Clara's not really helping on that one by assuming right from the start that he's got it in for her. I understand her concerns, but he's been a good deputy and so he deserved the benefit of the doubt. But with the threat Clay presents in the back of her mind, and Ford very much annoyingly present, she's a bit on edge/off her game.

I feel like Moss has de-aged Clara a bit though. Godlewski typically gave her some shadows under the eyes, drew the mouth a bit smaller (when she wasn't yelling) like her face was a bit drawn. Everything had tightened up, pulled in on itself. Her hair had this stringy, disheveled appearance. It gave a feeling of her experience, a lot of bad road behind her, a lady who has a son to look after and a town to protect, and not much time for anything else. Moss' version doesn't convey that so far. And Boo still lacks the same presence he had previously. That one I could at least possibly explain with the idea he's carrying himself differently as a Mayor than he he did as a cop, going for quiet dignity rather than looming authority. But mostly it just seems like he got downsized.

So there are some ongoing concerns about the change in art teams, but the story is still solid, so we'll see how this arc unfolds.

What I Bought 3/25/2017 and 4/4/2017

A couple of books from outside Marvel and DC. One is midway through a miniseries, and the other is an ongoing returning after a long hiatus.

Copperhead #11, by Jay Faerber (writer), Drew Moss (artist), Ron Riley (colorist), Thomas Mauer (letterer) - Some don't greet unwanted guests with pies to the face, they just shoot them.

At the end of the previous issue, Sheriff Clara Bronson had entered the Mayor's office and found him dead. So now comes the attempt to determine the killer. His last appointment was with a local bigwig, and he doesn't particularly like the sheriff, so she lets her deputy, whose name is Budroxifinicus (generally called "Boo") go first. And he quickly gets installed as the new Mayor. Whether he's trying to sucker the bigwig, or this is his way of getting one over on the sheriff remains to be seen. The sheriff also has an old ex show up, and there's a dangerous escaped convict who probably has an unhealthy fixation on her somewhere in space.

In retrospect, I should have reread the first two trades, because I can't recall who "Ford" is in his day job. I do recall the bigwig calling someone looking for dirt on Bronson, and that someone implying the sheriff kills people who try that shit, which I guess was Ford. Besides that, Faerber did a good job at least outlining all the basic connections. The coroner's also the doctor, and a drunk. The bigwig doesn't like the sheriff, she and this convict have history, the guy named Ishmael looking after the kid is an "Artie" (artificial human), but manages to work most of that in smoothly over the course of the issue. It's not exposition that grinds the book to a halt.

Moss is new to the book, as cover artist Scott Godlewski was the original series artist. Moss does well, nothing too flashy. I think Ron Riley's colors help the book maintain a largely similar feel to the earlier issues. A lot of very dark nights, and day scenes with a pale pink tint to the sky. At certain points the colors feel slightly washed out, like there's just a bit too much sun. I think Moss needs to draw Boo larger, though. Until the last page, he doesn't really dominate panels or pages the way I recall him doing. Could be that's the point, that as Mayor he has some power over Clara and that lets him assert dominance. He and Riley also like to portray Mr. Hickory (the bigwig) with the brim of his hat shadowing his eyes, so that they appear as empty white circles. At least, they like it enough to use it twice in two pages. There's a good contrast between those pages and how he's drawn on the final page, in his more solicitous public persona as he meets Clara. He's facing us more fully, no hat or anything shading his face, no devious grin, just more open in appearance, even if it's a false impression.

Empowered: Soldier of Love #2, by Adam Warren (writer), Karla Diaz (artist), Ryan Kinnaird (co-colorist), Nate Piekos (letterer) - Well, they may be tangled in the plots and hair of a resentful magical princess, but at least Ninjette still has her beer.

Emp has been pulling together a theory about what's with all the cape-types hooking up, and it involves a strange event where a bunch of teenage girls got magic powers, and one of them hates her job and is on the loose. Which is exactly correct, and the Soldato del Amor intends to mess around with some sort of Super Shield thing designed to protect the city from catastrophe, and instead use it to trap the inhabitants of the city and eradicate all love forever and ever. And most of the heroes are too busy making out or texting each other to do anything.

It's that middle chapter where all the pieces get moved into position for the big finish, and there's a lot more explanation of what's going on and why. Which is not the most fun to read, especially with the various Superhomeys incessantly texting each other constantly. If this is what life is like for the Soldato, no wonder she hates love so much. And I'm in complete agreement with Ninjette, that calling someone "Daddy" as sexy talk is nauseating. Like when guys call their wives "Mother". Colonel Potter always did that on MASH, and it just seemed weird. She's not your mom, don't call her that!

I did enjoy the sequence contrasting Soldato's original glee at learning she's a secret magical princess, with her utter disgust at the role she's trapped in 10 years later. The top half of the page, with bright pink background lighting and literal sparkles around her face as she cheers. Then bottom half, with a dull beige, off-white background of hotel walls, as she sits on the bed with her e-cig of Amor and sullenly stares into space. The constant scowl (except when she's sneering) she carries as she goes about her business is a nice touch too. And having her voice balloons change color when she's in costume and speaking the Language of Love rather than her typical Spanish, of which I can piece together maybe 40%.

Look, if she was speaking German I'd have a chance, but she's not. It's not my fault I'm not the right bilingual.

OK, it is my fault because I didn't take Spanish, but I didn't know in high school I'd someday need to translate a magical floating pangolin's speech bubbles.