What Are You Reading?

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Morrison's Batman and Robin is a lot of fun so far (I'm only one volume in, granted). I found his solo run before Final Crisis to be a bit too hard to get into with how obtuse and referential to past continuity his material could be. At least so far, B&R seems to be less heavy-handed and feels like it has just enough of the modern grit of Batman stories while also somehow balancing it with the fun camp of previous decades. It's much more up my alley, personally.

Booster Gold by Dan Jurgens is a surprisingly well thought-put comic so far just from the first few issues (it's only a handful of issues long, anyways, and is more of a miniseries). I expected it to be just flat-out parody, but Booster shows a decent amount of nuance and pathos as a character that clearly carried into JLI later on, so it looks like that's where they got that characterization from in the first place.

I'm also reading the alien costume saga collection for Spider-Man, which at least initially plays put like typical Spider-Man stories, so it does seem like the whole symbiote angle wasn't initially planned and this was originally just meant to be a power-up for Peter to shake things up a little for readers.

On the manga side I'm reading through Mashle: Magic and Muscles which is a really entertaining parody of various things like battle shonen series and Harry Potter (among other things), that feels like a far more comedic version of Black Clover (and personally is more to my preference, so far). It's been a while since a manga could make me laugh out loud.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Been reading some more Fantastic Four again. I won't lie, I'm kind of slogging through the issues leading up to John Byrne's run, which is really what I want to get to, but kind of want to still stick to my commitment to reading the entire mainline publication. That said, I can safely say that the 70's was a pretty weird and directionless era for this series. It's passed from writer to writer back and forth and all over the place like a game of hot potato with nobody sticking with the series long enough to develop a clear vision for it. Even writers like Roy Thomas and Gerry Conway seem to struggle with coming up with fresh and interesting stories and seem to resort to rehashing Lee/Kirby era plots with Doctor Doom, Galactus, and so on without any real sense of gravity to the stories, even by that era's standards. It's no wonder that whenever the discussion topic of the best FF runs comes up, this entire period of publication is entirely forgotten about.

I also read the most recent chapter of One Piece (1,026), and it's moments like this that really remind me of why this series has justified it's length. Among other things, there is just such a strong emotional impact to seeing something achieved that was alluded to literally hundreds of chapters ago (nearly 600 in this case). That's not the only reason, of course, as there are a lot of strong story details that this series is able to utilize thanks to it's length and interconnected plot threads and characters, but the big moments also hit that much harder because they have built up in your subconcious as a reader for so long as well. This truly felt earned and made me excited to see this character that I've followed for over a thousand chapters reach this high of a level. One Piece isn't my favorite series ever, there are other shonen or fantasy that I would rank above it, but it's definitely up there, and I can definitively say that it has the best use of long-form story-telling that I have ever seen in fiction.

[Dr. Insomniac]

Something I've noticed about Tynion-era Batman is it's the first era in a long time that cares more about the Bat-family than Bruce, by vastly increasing the amount of supporting heroes and remembering Cassandra and Stephanie exist. Snyder did that too by introducing Harper and Duke, but not to this degree. One of the spinoff comics even gives Tim something after Morrison, Snyder, and King left him in the background to focus on Bruce's relationship with his other sidekicks. And it's an interesting feeling, since I haven't cared much for the last time the Batman comics valued the Bat-family more than Batman. They always went into that direction where the story portrayed Bruce as an asshole father figure who treated his children like pawns. Which, yeah, I get it. A vigilante recruiting lonely kids to become soldiers in his war on crime looks horrible these days, which is why adaptations either age Robin up to an adult or do away with him entirely. But that previous era didn't come up with anything else to say about that other than scolding and surface-level criticisms, never anything unique to say, or anything that helped Bruce change as a character because they were still keeping up the status quo despite criticizing that same status quo. You can only poke at the problem without fixing the problem so many times before it eventually became baggage, and hypocritical baggage in some cases like when one of Bruce's trusted friends lets one of his Robins die to make a point to him about using children as pawns (which got retconned when everyone pointed out how stupid that was). Not to say everything about that time was bad, I still have fond memories of Gotham Central and Birds of Prey, but it was absolutely a time when Batman was the least interesting part of Bat-comics. Of course, Tynion's run doesn't share those problems, he knows how to write Batman, but it's still worth noting.

[Foggle]

I'm definitely liking the direction the comics are going in right now! I've always loved the Bat-Family aspect and lamented its loss in the New 52, but yeah, it sucked how often Batman was portrayed as a deadbeat asshole and editorial kept trying to "deconstruct" it with godawful events like War Games. Literally everyone into this stuff just wants to see Batman as a nice guy dad with a portrayal similar to how he was in TAS or the Silver Age. I'm overjoyed that Cassandra Cain is finally back (with her original costume!) and even though the solicits make it sound like they've been mysteriously de-aged and it's being written for young teens, I'm so excited to see her team up with Stephanie again in the Batgirls book!

[Dr. Insomniac]

Recently, it came to me that All-Star Batman and Robin was Miller thinking "Realistically, what kind of person would take a recently-orphaned kid and turn him into a vigilante who fights serial killers like the Joker?" and came to the logical conclusion. And Morrison's process for Damian was "In order to make Bruce look good in this mentor/ward relationship, the Robin in question would have to be the kind of psychopath who makes Bruce look normal by comparison".

I'm on the fence about the Bat-Family, personally. While I love the characters, I can't think of that many stories I like that revolve around them besides Birds of Prey. Most of the Nightwing ones I read were fine, most of the Tim Drake ones I read were fine, most of the Batgirl ones... you know what I mean. One of the recent Zdarsky stories in Urban Legends was the first time I liked a Jason Todd story. And it's telling even though Dick's been Nightwing for so long,  he only has a couple of popular villains in his rogues' gallery, and Slade's mostly gotten a lot of popularity because "morally conflicted vigilante who recruits teens and turns them into soldiers, and neglects his loved ones for the mission" makes him a dark mirror of Batman than anything. I think Morrison gave the Batman world much needed change by shifting Bat-stories away from detective procedurals to a character study of Bruce and what it means to be Batman, while taking all the old conceptions like "Batman's a grumpy asshole" or "Batman can beat anyone with prep time" and turning them all on their heads.

[Foggle]

I do think a lot of the blame for most Bat-Family stories being frustratingly lacking lies more with the old-guard executives at DC (who thankfully seem to have been ousted recently) rather than the actual creative teams. They desperately wanted to ensure that no one could ever have character development, that the status quo would never change outside of poorly thought out retcons, and enforced weird restrictions that made Batman look like a shithead, among other things. The early Cassandra stories were mostly good/great, at least, though I admit I don't have much familiarity with many other family-centric books outside of Gail Simone's work, which is almost always fantastic. Urban Legends is awesome so far and Chip Zdarsky has been one of my favorite comic book writers ever since I read his Howard the Duck run. I don't particularly care for Damian but Morrison is a mad genius and he definitely did right by Batman imo.

[Dr. Insomniac]

Yeah, you look at the major Batman stories of the mid 90s to mid 2000s, and they're mostly huge collabs with 5 or 6 writers working on one story, or a bunch of stories that never quite form a long epic run akin to Morrison/Snyder/King/Tynion. There was seldomly a Batman run by a single writer for very long. It was always rotating teams of Rucka/Brubaker/Dixon/Willingham/Robinson and an assortment of other writers that made sure the only consistent creative voice in that era was the editor instead of any one author. Even the ones before that like Knightfall were the result of a team of writers juggling plot points at each other instead of a focused vision.

[Dr. Insomniac]

Well, they did it. They somehow managed to to cast out OMD in such an unsatisfying way. I hadn't been keeping up with the current run of Amazing, mostly knowing what happened through word of mouth, but I did read the last few arcs and thought "What the hell is all this?" Harry clones. Mayday prophecies. The reason why Mephisto specifically wanted Peter's marriage. It's too focused on repairing bad stories than doing anything new, and its repairs make the bad stories even more ludicrous.

[Dr. Insomniac]

So, Morrison's final issue of their Superman run. Loved it. Great as a metaphor for passing the baton to the current roster of Superman writers and opening up new pathways, like Multiversity except other writers are willing to play ball this time. Wish this miniseries was far longer than 4 issues though.

But then I saw this and got annoyed. I think taking the metaphor out and literally making superheroes do real-world activism or fight the real issues never works because it becomes a dead end. You're left wondering why Superman doesn't just refreeze the ice caps with his freeze breath, or why he won't break into Amazon HQ and leak Bezos' secret files with Lois' help, but if a comic did that it would come off as tacky wish fulfillment that doesn't offer an applicable situation. You can't really do comics in the vein of O'Neil's Green Arrow/Green Lantern run anymore. That kind of story only works with small-scale, personal tales like Superman Smashes the Klan. Otherwise, you have to make an allegorical version of real-world troubles with an alien planet version of climate change or a fictional DC equivalent of Amazon to make it work, or something like Immortal Hulk that asks harder questions than the readers are willing to think about.

speaking of Ewing, I read his Ultimates run. He managed to make Carol and America Chavez into wonderful characters to read, gave some much needed second wind to characters I already loved like Monica and T'Challa, and escalated it into a huge cosmic war. If Marvel were smart, they'd dump a truckload of money at Ewing's place and let him write whatever he wanted. He, Hickman, and Zdarsky are the trio saving Marvel Comics right now.

[Dr. Insomniac]

Since Superman and the Authority ended, I thought I'd read Morrison's Action Comics run that I started ages ago but never finished. It's not as good as All-Star Superman, but "not as good as All-Star Superman" is still a great Superman comic. I think the reason it doesn't receive anywhere near the critical recognition All-Star gets is it's a lot messier, more open-ended than the pure concentrated energy in that book. Because for one thing, it pretends to be an origin story for Superman, when it reveals itself to be a time-travel story. Morrison even invents knockoffs of the Daleks for Clark to fight. And it's definitely more confusing since the plot revolves heavily around the Fifth Dimension and Mxyzptlk's people. That said, while he goes on a ton of weird adventures in only 18 issues, the Clark Kent in this comic's very much grounded in human roots. He's a working-class Superman who goes after corrupt businessmen and tries his hardest to put justice back in the hands of the people.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

I really did like Morrison's mini-series on Superman and the Authority. It felt like a good response and criticism of the modern sensibilities of modern comic book stories (even in the movies these days, really) of trying to be edgier and treating past stuff like a relic. Manchester Black essentially represents the modern ideal superhero to a lot of modern fans, whereas Superman in this story is remnant from an older era that Manchester sees as outdated. What's interesting is that Superman in this story (and let's be honest, he's really an extension of Morrison himself in terms of his viewpoints and use of dialogue to get the author's voice across) isn't outright against Manchester. On the contrary, he only wants to see the newer generation succeed, and does note how the more progressive nature and ability to tackle modern social issues is a positive of modern heroes (and in effect modern comic book stories). However, the more needlessly cynical side of theser characters is where he finds fault and what needs to be improved on.

That's just a very rough, watered-down interpretation of this story, but regardless, it was an interesting read for sure.

I've started reading Something is Killing the Children by James Tynion. I'm only a couple of issues in, but it definitely has my interest as an action/horror comic. I found Tynion's Batman material to be inoffensive and roughly average (some of it was enjoyable, but most of it was forgettable to me), but this story seems to have a lot more of a personal touch to it, and you can tell this is more of a passion project for him than Batman was, or at the very least that's what it feels like to me.

I also recently read the Beta Ray Bill miniseries by David Warren Johnson, and it was a surprisingly fun and engaging read that felt like it accomplished a lot for the character in just a few issues. Much like Bryan Hill's Killmonger miniseries, it manages to really do a great job of putting the spotlight on what many see as a secondary Marvel character, and making it feel like you have learned something new about them that adds a layer of nuance to their persona.

I've also been reading The Saga of the Swamp Thing by Alan Moore. It's one of those classic runs that I was bound to get around to eventually, and I have to say that this one has been utterly excellent so far (I'm only one volume in out of the six-volume box set). Say what you will about how obtuse much of Morrison's later work has been, and the guy hasn't exactly been portrayed in the most positive light in regard to how negative he has constantly been about the comic book industry at large (granted, at least some of that is how comic book journalists go out of their way to portray and over-emphasize that side of him), but much like with Frank Miller that hardly matters when strictly considering how good his stories were at his peak as a writer. With this series you can clearly see just how firm of a grasp Moore had on telling an interesting story that was not only unique in it's medium, but also felt ahead of it's time with a more cohesive narrative than most of it's contemporaries which felt more episodic and disjointed in nature.

[Dr. Insomniac]

What was both cool and miserable about Superman and the Authority was its genesis. Originally, Morrison was going to leave DC after Green Lantern to focus on TV work, but then they heard DiDio's plan to make a fascist authoritarian Superman so they went back one last time to go "No. That's not how we do things here."

I've caught up Zdarsky's Daredevil lately, and I love it. Minus a Karen Page, it feels like the Season 4 we never got. I especially love what the comic's done with Elektra, forcing her to play by Matt's rules this time and having to prove to him that she can be just as much a protector of the weak as he is, while still making it clear she's not just filling in his shoes.

[Avaitor]

Today is the last day of Barnes & Noble's half-off hardcovers sale, and while right now is supposed to be a financially tight period for me, I do want to check it out. I ideally want to get the next couple of Carl Barks volumes I need, but I doubt they'll have them, and this sale is in-store only. So I may get the first volume or two of FOTNS instead.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Went from curiously checking out to outright binging Something is Killing the Children. It's a really engaging read. It's nothing original as the concept has been done many times before, and it's not what I'd call an instant classic by any means, but it knows what kind of story it is and how to keep it's material interesting from issue to issue. Again, my only other exposure to James Tynion was his Detective Comics run, which I was mostly indifferent to (I didn't particularly get much out of it, but also found very little to actually dislike about it), but this title feels like it has real passion and energy put behind it.

I've also just started Kieron Gillen's ongoing title, Once & Future, but have only read the first issue so far and don't have much to go on to formulate an opinion on it yet.

[Dr. Insomniac]

Yeah, Tynion's fine on Batman, but he's got so much more energy in his creator-owned work. I wish his Batman comics had the same ferocity Department of Truth did.