Category: Graphic Novels

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Guardians of the Galaxy: Guardians Disassembled


By Brian Michael Bendis, Dan Slott, Kelly Sue DeConnick, Dan Abnett, Andy Lanning, Nick Bradshaw , Jason Masters, Todd Nauk, Cameron Stewart, David Marquez, Michael Oeming , Paolo Siqueira, Ronan Cliquet de Oliveira, Phil Jimenez, Dexter Soy, Gerardo Sandoval & others (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-636-6

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Fabulous Fun for Cosmic Connoisseurs… 7/10

A few years ago a plethora of cosmic crises forced the champions and remnants of many heroic races to band together and save the cosmos. Although said crises were largely averted, some of those Sentinels of the Spaceways eventually got their band back together, determined to keep the universe a safe place. After a lot of quibbling they finally agreed to call themselves the Guardians of the Galaxy.

The boisterous, officially unaligned rabble were led by a half-breed Terran who was revealed to be the unloved son of J’Son of Spartax – undisputed ruler of an aggressively militaristic interstellar empire – and no friend of Earth…

Peter Quill AKA Star-Lord was aided in pacifying an unruly and increasingly martial universe by Drax the Destroyer, Rocket Racoon, Groot, Gamora (“Deadliest Woman in the Galaxy”) and extra-dimensional new recruit Angela whilst staying one step ahead of the militaristic Spartoi and their allies…

The self-appointed Guardians’ ongoing troubles stem from a recent compact of major interstellar powers and principalities. This coterie of rulers had formed a Council of Galactic Empires and unilaterally declared Earth “off limits”; quarantined from all extraterrestrial contact, but that high-minded declaration hadn’t stopped some of the signatories from breaking their own embargo or being mightily ticked off whenever Quill’s crew kicked them off Terra and back into space.

Not long ago the situation worsened when Emperor Kallark of the Shi’ar (AKA alien superman Gladiator) informed his kingly colleagues that Jean Grey – former host to the overweening Phoenix Force – was back from the dead and he was going to try her for her crimes… even though, as a chronally displaced child, she hadn’t technically committed them yet…

With the Guardians’ timely assistance this venture led to another galling debacle and defeat for the Shi’ar by Earth’s X-Men. Individually every leader of the Council had reason to want the Guardians dead and thus they singly opened covert operations against them. Cold and distant J-Son, of course, had his own good – if undisclosed – reasons for wanting his son curbed and controlled, if not dead…

This treasury of space terrors and attendant sidebar tales collects Free Comic Book Day: Guardians of the Galaxy, Guardians of the Galaxy volume 3 #14-17 and Captain Marvel volume 7 #1 spanning June-September 2014, plus pertinent historic material from Amazing Spider-Man #654 (April 2011) augmenting and clarifying the big screen experience for new readers who might not know as much about the latest Earth-born addition to the squad whilst providing an immense amount of spectacularly bombastic fighting fun for all.

Following a most useful recap page, further enticing background is provided by ‘Welcome to the Guardians of the Galaxy’ by Brian Michael Bendis, Nick Bradshaw, Scott Hanna & Morrie Hollowell (from Free Comic Book Day: Guardians of the Galaxy #1, July 2014) as erstwhile Guardian Tony Stark runs down the history and capabilities of the stellar centurions before offering paraplegic war veteran Eugene “Flash” Thompson his vacated place on the team…

The story picks up in GotG #14 with the soldier – in his transmorphic guise of Agent Venom – beginning his tour of duty by visiting an armaments fair on crossroads world Knowhere with the intention of upgrading his weapons. The culture-shocked earthling is accompanied and watchdogged by resurrected (and cosmically reconstructed) fellow Earther Drax…

Whilst Flash is gone, however, the assembled forces of the Council strike, overwhelming the Guardian’s ship and capturing the skeleton crew aboard…

As Star-Lord awakens in custody on Spartax, elsewhere Gamora is ambushed by a bounty hunter she previously humiliated. Hauled off to Moord, homeworld of the Brotherhood of Badoon, she fully expects to die; but not soon and certainly not quietly.

On Knowhere, another sneak attack captures Drax despite Venom’s every effort to save his new comrade, and on a cell in Spartax, J-Son confronts his wayward heir with the (utterly erroneous) fact that nobody can save the Guardians now, before disclosing just what he needs from his son…

The second chapter (with additional art by Cameron Stewart) opens with Rocket under the scalpels of questing Kree vivisectionists, even as Gamora is being tortured to death by a legion of Badoon monsters on Moord. Drax awakens on a Shi’ar space station and finds himself on trial by Kallark for daring to aid the X-Men. The grizzled warrior’s only response is to challenge Gladiator to a duel…

Back on Knowhere Thompson is relieved to be rescued by a team of Avengers but soon smells a rat and discovers he has fallen into the shape-shifting hands of a band of Skrulls intent on separating him from the alien Symbiote which provides all his powers. In deep space the malevolent Brood, having tired of their examinations of Groot, jettisoned the tree being into space to fall blazing into the atmosphere of searing, arid hellworld Rigel 8.

Negotiations having stalled on Spartax, Peter Quill tells dad exactly what he thinks of him before leaping to his death out of a skyscraping citadel window…

Issue #16 (illustrated by Bradshaw, David Marquez & Jason Masters) furiously follows up as the tide finally turns in favour of the hard-pressed heroes. As the Skrulls fatefully learn the folly of messing with a symbiote and its chosen host, Gladiator at last gives Drax the death match he’s been demanding and on Moord inexplicably absent cosmic hunter Angela locates her missing partner-in-carnage Gamora. The resultant loss of (Badoon) life is incomprehensible…

Plunging to his death on Spartax, Quill is plucked from disaster by the just-in-time intergalactic Avenger Carol Danvers – a feat he smugly claims prior knowledge of – and discloses that his revelatory conversations with J-Son have been broadcast to the entire populace. With the whole empire aware of their ruler’s plans for – and opinions of – his subjects, rebellion begins to shake the homeworld…

In a far distant place the strategically savvy Kree Supreme Intelligence realises the tables have turned and orders his researchers to put Rocket back together, speculating that perhaps it’s time for the cagily conservative pragmatists to consider their options with the impossibly formidable Quill and Co…

With art by Bradshaw and Michael Avon Oeming, the Guardians portion of the collection concludes as Star-Lord and Danvers escape Spartax and begin rounding up their errant membership, assisted by freely offered intel from the Kree Supremor. However many – especially Groot and Rocket – are neither whole nor hearty…

Only one member remains missing and the reunited team wearily make their way to Knowere to begin their search for Agent Venom…

To Be Continued…

The remainder of this sterling chronicle offers a delightful plethora of additional insights and personal exploits beginning with the lowdown on Flash Thompson’s unique association with one of the most terrifying creatures in the universe…

‘Rebirth’ by Dan Slott, Paolo Siqueira, Ronan Cliquet de Oliveira & Greg Adams first appeared as a back-up in the monster-sized Amazing Spider-Man #654.

Once upon a time Spider-Man spawned an implacable enemy called Venom: a deranged and disgraced reporter named Eddie Brock who bonded with the alien entity Parker brought back from the Secret Wars.

The “high-tech smart-suit” was in fact a semi-sentient alien parasite called the Symbiote and almost ended up possessing and consuming the horrified hero until Parker escaped and destroyed it. Or so he thought…

Brock willing joined with the creature to become a savage, shape-changing, dark-side version of the Wallcrawler, but after numerous spectacular clashes, the arachnid adversaries eventually reached a brooding détente and Venom became a “Lethal Protector”, dispensing a highly individualistic brand of justice everywhere but New York City.

Since then many other hosts have bonded with the ebony parasite, including Brock’s wife Ann Weying, Mac Gargan AKA the Scorpion, and even Franklin Richards and other members of the Fantastic Four.

Eventually the Government took control of the Symbiote and in this terse tale we see how the military then offered it – with many strings attached – to Flash Thompson: Spider-Man’s greatest fan and a war-hero who came back from Afghanistan without his legs.

A recovering alcoholic, Eugene became the star of a military black-ops operation which uses the Symbiote to carry out under-the-radar missions vital to US security.

In return, Thompson gets to be a hero (of sorts), feel useful again, serve his country and get out of his wheelchair prison for 48 hours at a time. Agent Venom even became a Secret Avenger, serving directly under Steve Rogers.

Of course there were drawbacks: the parasite is a voracious deadly menace, constantly seeking to permanently bond to its wearer, and is classed as one of the most dangerous entities on the planet. If the new Venom should go berserk or if the human host stays bonded for more than 48 hours, his war-room controllers will simply detonate explosives attached to Thompson’s body and start the project over with another volunteer. It’s what they had to do with the previous wearer, after all…

This is followed by the untitled story of how Avenger Carol Danvers finally deems herself worthy of her universe-saving predecessor and accepts the mantle of Captain Marvel (Captain Marvel volume 7 #1 by Kelly Sue DeConnick & Dexter Soy).

The process involves a titanic struggle against the Absorbing Man, a pithy pep talk from Sentinel of Liberty Captain America, mild mockery from Spider-Man and the funeral of her greatest inspiration before the cosmic champion heads of to the stars and a rendezvous with Star-Lord…

A fascinating peek into the “childhood” of an iconic star comes next as Andy Lanning, Phil Jimenez, Livesay & Antonio Fabela take us to Planet X to tell ‘Groot’s Tale’ before the marvellous madness ends with a tantalising glimpse of Things to Come as Dan Abnett, Gerardo Sandoval & Rachelle Rosenberg visit Earth circa 3014 and reintroduce Arnold Drake, Gene Colan & Steve Gerber’s original Guardians of the Galaxy in ‘Fight for the Future’.

As “oldest Earthman alive” Vance Astro, Jovian militia-man Charlie-27, crystalline scientist Martinex, Centauri warrior shaman Yondu and all knowing space god Starhawk brutally demolish a Badoon concentration camp on conquered planet Terra, they are searching for one particular prisoner: young Geena Drake whom the portents show holds the fate of humanity in her scabby teenaged hands…

Thrilling, edgy and ferociously fast-paced, this spectacularly seductive tome also includes a gallery of covers and variants by Bradshaw, Ed McGuinness, Mark Farmer, Justin Ponsor, Joe Quesada, Dexter Vines, Javier Rodriguez, Adi Granov and Alvara plus a bunch of electronic extra attractions provided by AR icon sections (Marvel Augmented Reality App) offering access to story bonuses and background bumph once you download the free code from marvel.com onto your smart-phone or Android-enabled tablet.
™ & © 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 Marvel & Subs. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. through Panini S.p.A. All rights reserved. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.

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Silver Surfer: New Dawn


By Dan Slott, Michael and Laura Allred & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-617-5

Although pretty much a last minute addition to Fantastic Four #48-50’s ‘Galactus Trilogy’, Jack Kirby’s scintillating Silver Surfer quickly became a watchword for quality, depth and subtext in the Marvel Universe and thus a character Stan Lee kept as his own personal toy for many years.

Tasked with finding planets for space god Galactus to consume, and despite the best efforts of intergalactic voyeur Uatu the Watcher, one day the Silver Surfer arrived on Earth, where the latent nobility of humanity reawakened his own suppressed morality; causing the shining scout to rebel against his voracious master and help the FF save the world.

In retaliation, Galactus imprisoned his former herald on Earth, making him the ultimate outsider on a planet remarkably ungrateful for his supreme sacrifice.

In 1968, after increasingly frequent guest-shots, the exiled Norrin Radd finally got his own title and quickly became an icon of the counterculture: a questing, misunderstood seeker of truths and allegorical Christ-figure, exposing through his own suffering Man’s dual nature of noble sacrifice and ingrained inhumanity to and intolerance of just about everything…

The isolated alien’s travails and social observations elevated him to a metaphoric status for an audience which was maturing and rebelling against America’s creaking and unsavoury status quo, but years passed, times changed and eventually the Shining Skyrider escaped his terrestrial trap; returning to the stars and becoming a stellar crusader and restless explorer of infinity.

Now after numerous sidereal sea-changes he’s back in a gloriously light, bright and witty fantasy setting, courtesy of writer Dan Slott and artist Michael Allred (with colours as always by Laura Allred and letters from VC’s Clayton Cowles), which deliciously rekindles the sheer wonder of the multiverse…

Collecting issues #1-5 of Silver Surfer volume 7 (May to September 2014) and a teaser tale from All-New Marvel Now! Point One, the mind-expanding begins twelve years ago in ‘The Most Important Person in the Universe’ on a night when twin girls unknowingly wished upon the scintillant stratospheric Silver Surfer, thinking him a poor lonely shooting star burning out as it crashed to earth.

Outgoing and gregarious Eve certainly fulfilled her casual whim, becoming a globe-girdling nomad, spending her days as a living advert for her dad’s New England guest-house in timeless, unchanging idyllic Anchor Bay.

Introverted sister Dawn stayed behind, reluctant to ever leave her paradisiacal home…

Today, in the depths of space, Norrin is performing another act of benevolent mercy, eager as ever to atone for the uncountable lives he ended as Galactus’ food-finding scout. As he completes his task the repentant hero is approached by mysterious alien the Incredulous Zed who also desperately needs his aid.

The excitable executive runs a fantastic artificial world named The Impericon, but the wary skyrider has never heard of it. The reason why is simplicity itself: due to its unique power source – which casually warps the established laws of physics – the pan-species, planet-sized “Impossible Palace” holiday resort has been able to mask itself from the infallible senses of Galactus and his numerous heralds for centuries…

Now the entire structure faces certain doom and Zed wants the Surfer to be his latest champion in battle against the marauding Queen of Nevers. Norrin happily accepts but Zed is the cautious, distrusting type and uses his “Motivator” to ensure the hero’s very best efforts.

As it has done so many times before, the device scans all of infinity and takes hostage the most important being in the appointed champion’s life, but the Surfer is completely baffled when he finds an Earth girl he does not know deposited in a block of cells amongst the nearest and dearest of hundreds of fallen warriors…

Despite Zed’s double-dealing Norrin still wants to save the Impericon so ‘Everything and All at Once’ sees him flash into the void only to discover a floating field of his deceased predecessors. Moreover, his opponent is an extremely aggrieved Conceptual Entity…

Stay-at-home Dawn Greenwood adapts to her alien surroundings with admirable aplomb and within hours of captivity has orchestrated a prison break taking along with her all the other hostages, but in deep space the Surfer knows none of this. His anticipated confrontation with the personification of All Possible Alternative and Potential Futures is agonisingly one-sided.

However as Norrin Radd continues to strive valiantly he comes to a startling conclusion: he is fighting the victim and not the aggressor in a cosmic power struggle…

Concluding that The Impossible Palace only exists because it runs on the Never Queen’s stolen heart, he rapidly doubles back to infiltrate the Impericon and retrieve it, but finds that mysterious Earth girl who’s supposed to be important to him has already taken care of that…

Realising the jig is up, the real ruler of the artificial world despatches Zed with the uncanny extra-universal blade which first excised the all-powerful organ from the Queen of Never and Norrin is compelled to break off and stop the crazed thief.

Dawn, meanwhile, has taken the purloined power source and ‘Change of Heart’ reveals her inner strength as she leads the hostages to safety and, by returning the infinite pump, restores infinite choice, infinite hope and infinite potential to all of Reality…

Still unsure how the girl can possibly be personally significant to him, the Surfer escorts the unflappable teenager back to Earth, only to be intercepted by the Guardians of the Galaxy as they patrol Sol’s system.

Rocket Raccoon, Drax, Gamora, Groot, Agent Venom, Star-Lord and Carol “Captain Marvel” Danvers are pledged to stop alien menaces harming Earth and indigenous threats getting off-world to imperil – or just annoy – stellar civilisations, but eventually they give the roving voyagers a provisional clean bill of health.

Norrin is far more concerned about meeting his oddly engaging charge’s family. After he reluctantly agrees to stay at the Greenwood Inn and experience life as an Earthman he soon relaxes and learns to kick back a bit…

Sadly he’s picked the absolute worst moment to de-power, eat food and sleep. When old allies Doctor Strange and the Hulk suddenly turn up they reveal that a periodic cosmic conjunction of planets has allowed dream demon Nightmare to manifest and turn the world into a realm of escalating insanity.

With horror the heroes quickly realise that almost all of humanity is asleep – even the Surfer and themselves – with only his excitable new best bud awake to stop the dream lord…

Her methodology is uniquely her own, but the Greenwood girl rises to the occasion and in the aftermath her unlikely but crucial connection to the restless wanderer is revealed, leaving ‘New Dawn’ a much-changed child: one who is willing and even hungry to see all of everything, everywhere, beside the gleaming ever-soaring Silver Surfer…

Although published before the current series began, ‘Girl on Board’ from All-New Marvel Now! Point One (March 2014) very much epitomises the tone of the new adventures as Norrin and his platonic protégé visit a water world to experience a moment of rare cosmic beauty and spirituality but instead stumble into a bunch of star pirates causing trouble.

The unavoidable – if spectacular – punch-up is the very least part of this charming tale of interspatial tourism and youthful self-awareness building…

Funny, smart, warm and wonder-filled, this astoundingly addictive tome also includes a gallery of covers and variants by the Allreds, Jim Starlin, Al Milgrom, Salvador Larroca, Francesco Francavilla, Chris Samnee, Skottie Young, Adi Granov and Gerald Parel, plus extra treats provided by AR icon sections (Marvel Augmented Reality App) which give access to story bonuses once you download the code – for free – from marvel.com onto your smart-phone or Android-enabled tablet.
™ & © 2014 Marvel & Subs. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. through Panini S.p.A. All rights reserved. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.

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B.P.R.D.: Plague of Frogs volume 1


By Mike Mignola, Christopher Golden, Tom Sniegoski, Brian McDonald, Miles Gunther, Brian Augustyn, Geoff Johns, Joe Harris, Guy Davis, Ryan Sook, Matt Smith, Derek Thompson, Michael Avon Oeming, Scott Kolins, Adam Pollina, Cameron Stewart & various (Dark Horse Books)
ISBN: 978-1-5958-2675-6

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Epic Eldritch Entertainment… 9/10

Hellboy is a creature of vast depth and innate mystery; a demonic baby summoned to Earth by Nazi occultists at the end of Word War II but subsequently raised, educated and trained by parapsychologist Professor Trevor “Broom” Bruttenholm to destroy unnatural threats and supernatural monsters as the lead agent for the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense.

After decades of unfailing, faithful service he became mortally tired and resigned. Itinerantly roaming the world, he still managed to encounter weird happenstances but could never escape trouble or his sense of duty. This book is not about him.

The massive collection under review here instead features his trusty comrades and other assorted spin-off characters from Mike Mignola’s legendary franchise: valiant champions who also deal with those occult occasions which typically fall under the remit of the Enhanced Talents task force established in Fairfield, Connecticut as the baby imp grew to monster-mangling manhood.

If you’re having trouble with the concept think of a government-sanctioned and internationally co-sponsored Ghostbusters dealing with Buffy-style threats to humanity.

As discussed in Scott Allie’s Introduction, the B.P.R.D. soon established itself as a viable premise in its own right and, through a succession of interlinked miniseries, went on to battle an ancient and arcane amphibian menace to the world in an immense epic which spanned eight years of publication.

Periodically released as a series of trade paperbacks during that time, the entire supernatural saga dubbed Plague of Frogs has been remastered and will be now be collected as a quartet of monumental volumes, of which this is the fearsome first. Gathering material from Hellboy: Box full of Evil, one-shots Abe Sapien: Drums of the Dead, B.P.R.D.: Hollow Earth, B.P.R.D.: The Soul of Venice, B.P.R.D.: Dark Waters, B.P.R.D.: Night Train, B.P.R.D.: There’s Something Under My Bed, 5-issue miniseries B.P.R.D.: Plague of Frogs and choice snippets from the publisher’s trade flyer Dark Horse Extra, this macabre triumvirate of terror opens with ‘Hollow Earth’ written by Mignola, Christopher Golden & Tom Sniegoski and illustrated by Ryan Sook with additional inking from Curtis Arnold, letters from Clem Robins and magical colours from the himself-legendary Dave Stewart.

After the events of Hellboy: Conqueror Worm, the horned hero quit the B.P.R.D. which had been his only home since he was rescued from those Fascist sorcerers on December 23rd 1944, and our tale begins with the remaining investigators questioning their own validity in and responsibilities to an organisation which clearly does not fully trust or appreciate them.

Such ponderings are sidelined however when on-sabbatical pyrokinetic Liz Sherman sends a spectacular distress call to amphibious Abe Sapien. Since she has been missing for two years nobody downplays it and a scratch team is promptly dispatched to her last known location, a temple in the Ural Mountains, on the Arctic Circle.

The squad comprises conflicted, lonely Abe, disgruntled artificial warrior Roger the Homunculus (still peeved by the discovery that his bosses planted a bomb inside him to ensure he remained controllable) and new recruit Johann Krauss, a recently disembodied psychic, led by reluctantly promoted psychologist/ field commander Kate Corrigan …

When they arrive they find all the priests of Agartha slaughtered and Liz’s body cold and empty… but not dead. Also scattered about are the bodies of dead monsters and a great big hole leading down through the mountain into untrammelled subterranean depths…

Realising that Liz’s animating energy has been stolen, Abe and the team plunge into the darkness, determined to rescue their comrade and solve the mystery…

And so begins a ponderously oppressive, doom-laden classic adventure of sub-Terrene lost civilisations, ancient races, infernal entities and imminent threat of world conquest, all dealt with in blockbusting fashion by moodily charismatic heroes in the supremely entertaining action-packed, tension-filled nick-of-time.

Crafted by the same creative team and lettered by Dan Jackson, the under-Earth escapade is followed by ‘Hollow Earth, Dark Horse Extra’ which offers the tragic origin of bodiless spiritualist Johann Kraus, after which ‘The Killer in My Skull’ (written by Mignola, drawn by Matt Smith, inked by Sook and coloured by Stewart, introduces 1930’s masked ghost-breaker Lobster Johnson in a splendid weird-science shocker, whilst ‘Abe Sapien versus Science’ chills through an intimate glimpse at the fabulous manphibian’s early days as a guinea pig of the B.P.R.D.’s research division, with Mignola replacing Smith as inker. Pat Brosseau is the under-appreciated letterer in both cases, which both originally appeared as back-up strips from the miniseries Hellboy: Box Full of Evil.

Next up is a full-length Abe Sapien solo thriller, courtesy of writer Brian McDonald, illustrator Derek Thompson, colourist James Sinclair and Brosseau. ‘Drums of the Dead’ is a splendidly spooky sea-faring thriller involving voodoo, sharks and the unhappy unburied as Abe and apprentice Bureau psychic Garrett investigate uncanny and lethal transatlantic phenomena in the seas where once slave traders sailed…

The second book in this mammoth compilation is ‘The Soul of Venice and Other Stories’ commencing with that eponymous yarn by Miles Gunther & Michael Avon Oeming with a little help from Mignola, colours by Stewart and letters by Ken Bruzenak.

It all kicks off as amphibian Abe, bodiless Johann, lonely Roger and newly reinstated firestarter Liz are dispatched to Venice (that other one in Italy) to solve a literally nauseating crisis.

To fix the problem they have to invade a haunted palazzo, battle a debauched ghost-vampire and liberate an ancient Roman Goddess, incurring along the way the extremely polite disinterest of archdevil Lord Shax of Hell. However, in the triumphant aftermath Roger and the liberated deity Cloacina strike up an unlikely relationship…

Brian Augustyn, Guy Davis, Stewart and Michelle Madsen then pit Sapien and Roger against religious zealotry and misunderstood arcane forces in ‘Dark Waters’.

When the corpses of three women branded as witches centuries earlier are pulled, inert, unchanged and smelling of roses, from a 300-year interment at the bottom of a duck pond in Shiloh (near Salem), Massachusetts the duo reluctantly investigate, but things go nastily awry when fire-and-brimstone preacher Pastor Blackwood steals the bodies.

Happily the agents and a more piously forgiving man of god are able to thwart the witch-hunting loon before he unleashes forces nothing could stop…

‘Night Train’ (Geoff Johns, Scott Kolins, Stewart & Brosseau) give the old “ghost locomotive” plot an effective tweak when Liz and Roger meet the unquiet spirit of Lobster Johnson. The bombastic mystery man has returned to help stop the aged Nazi maniac who killed him and slaughtered a convoy of Manhattan Project scientists in 1939…

The entire team are on hand to solve the mystery of disappearing babies in ‘There’s Something Under My Bed’ by Joe Harris, Adam Pollina, Guillermo Zubiaga, Lee Loughridge & Brosseau, leaving the “Enhanced Talents” (at least) wondering if they should revise their definition of the term “monster”, after which ‘Another Day at the Office’ (Mignola, Cameron Stewart, Madsen & Michael Heisler) raucously recounts the fate of a resurrected Balkan necromancer who thought his zombie legions a match for Abe, Johann and a squad of well-armed, well-trained B.P.R.D. regulars…

The third and final Book reprints the monstrously chilling opening sally in the epic ‘Plague of Frogs’ (by Mignola, Davis, Stewart & Robins) storyline as the supernatural riot squad faces off against some of their oldest enemies, allowing the author to tie up a number of loose ends and plot threads which encompass the entire publishing history of Hellboy…

The challengers of the extremely unknown are called in when a spore monster escapes from a B.P.R.D. storage facility and Abe, Liz, Johann, Roger and Kate Corrigan have their work cut out trying to stop the granddaddy of all elder gods from turning Earth into a charnel pit and breeding ground for giant frog demons.

Amongst all that mood, mystery, carnage and catastrophe Mignola and the unbelievably underrated and unique Guy Davis even manage to give us an origin of sorts for Abe Sapien in such a way as to tell everything and still leave us all none the wiser…

To Be Continued…

Rounding out this astoundingly absorbing tome is a portentous Afterword by Mignola, who also contribute extensively to the trio of Sketchbook Sections for Hollow Earth (mostly Sook), Soul of Venice by Avon Oeming, Davis, Kolins, Pollina and Cameron Stewart and finally Plague of Frogs by Davis. Also included are a gallery of covers, character recaps and other eerie art treats.

With the tides of TV fashion once again shifting towards the fantastic, this bunch must be the first choice option for every production company out there. Until then why not get ahead of the rush by reading these truly magical tales?
© 2003, 2004, 2005, 2014 Mike Mignola. All rights reserved. B.P.R.D., all key and prominently featured characters ™ Mike Mignola.

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Gotham Central book 2: Jokers and Madmen


By Ed Brubaker, Greg Rucka, Michael Lark, Stephen Gaudiano, Greg Scott, Brian Hurtt & various(DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-2521-6

There are two names synonymous with Gotham City, USA.

If you’re a cop you keep your own opinions about the Batman, and it’s pretty much unanimous that The Joker is not someone you ever want to deal with. A madman with a homicidal flair for the theatrical, the clown loves a special occasion. It’s Christmas and it’s started to snow…

One of the greatest rewards of long-lasting, legendary comicbook characters is their infinite potential for innovation and reinterpretation. There always seems to be another facet or aspect to develop. Such is the case in regard to the much-missed sidebar series Gotham Central, wherein cop show sensibilities cannily combine with the deadly drudgery of the long-suffering boys in blue patrolling the world’s most famous four-colour city.

Owing as much to shows like Hill Street Blues, Law & Order or Blue Bloods as it did to the baroque continuity of The Dark Knight, the mesmerising tales of the series combined gritty, authentic police action with furtive, soft-underbelly glimpses at what merely mortal peacekeepers have to put up with in a world of psychotic vaudevillians, flying aliens and scumbag hairballs who just won’t stay dead.

This second huge hardback volume, collecting more procedural exploits of the hard-pressed guardians of the most dangerous city in America – specifically Gotham Central #11-22 spanning November 2003 to October 2004 – begins with moodily effulgent introduction ‘Noir Town’ by crime author Duane Swiercznski and a handy double-page feature re-introducing the hardworking stiffs of First Shift, Second Shift and the Police Support team of the ‘Gotham City Police Department, Major Crimes Unit’ before the dramas start to unfold.

First up is uncharacteristic tearjerker ‘Daydreams and Believers’ by Ed Brubaker, Brian Hurtt and colourist Lee Loughridge which explores the GCPD’s strange relationship with the masked manhunter.

They all know he’s out there, but the official line is that he’s an urban myth and the Administration refuses to acknowledge his existence. Thus, civilian receptionist Stacy is the only person allowed to operate the rooftop bat-signal whenever crises occur, whilst the public are told that the eerie light is simply used to keep the cowardly, stupid, superstitious underworld cowed…

Here however we get a glimpse into the shy lamplighter’s inner thoughts as she observes the fractious byplay of the MCU regulars: all getting by thinking they’re fooling everyone else with their jealous bitching, petty sniping and tawdry clandestine affairs.

It’s all okay, though. Stacy has her own world to retreat into: one where the mighty Batman is her enigmatic but passionate lover…

The main event opens with a Yuletide shopping panic that looks to be the most memorable ever as ‘Soft Targets’ by Brubaker, Greg Rucka, Michael Lark & Stephen Gaudiano finds the entire Major Crimes Unit frantically hunting a sniper randomly assassinating citizens. Things get even nastier and more fraught when Mayor Dickerson is killed as he consults with new Police Commissioner Michael Akins.

The ruthless shooter guns down a school teacher and the medical examiner collecting her body and soon the pre-Christmas streets are deserted. The assassin then identifies himself by launching a website promoting “Batman for Mayor” and the appalled police realise just who they’re dealing with…

As Stacy turns on the roof signal her greatest wish comes true at last as the Gotham Guardian sweeps her off her feet… microseconds before a fusillade of shots would have made her the latest statistic…

As the Dark Knight vanishes into the snowy darkness after the maniac, the cops get back to their meticulous police work, tracking ballistics and hunting for the website’s point of origin. Mounting media frenzy and their own frustration lead to crippling tension and soon they are all at each other’s throats, but a potentially nasty situation is immediately curtailed by a new posting…

A live web-cam feed starts, counting down to a fresh victim somewhere in the huge terrified powder-keg metroplis…

As the cops pull out all stops to identify the building on-screen and resort to old reliables, such as violently rousting the Harlequin of Hate’s old flunkies, the scene suddenly changes. Now it shows prime media pain-in-the-neck Angie Molina as a captive of the killer clown: stashed somewhere anonymous and slowly ticking down to a bloody and show-stopping demise…

And just when things can’t get any crazier, The Joker turns himself in…

Even the insufferably cocky kook’s capture doesn’t halt the slaughter, since the proudly Machiavellian perpetrator can carry on killing by pre-programmed remote control even as he languishes in a cell…

When Lt. Ron Probson elects to go all “old school” in his interview with the loon, it only results in his own death and the clown’s escape. Stacy only avoids death a second time because Captain Maggie Sawyer shoots first – and often – and saves her questions for later…

Working a lead, Detectives Nate Patton and Romy Chandler have meanwhile found the captive reporter and realised the Joker’s convoluted, mass-murderous endgame, but even with Batman on scene they don’t all make it out…

‘Life is Full of Disappointments’ (by Brubaker and Rucka with art from Greg Scott) then focuses on disgruntled Second Shift veteran Jackson “Sarge” Davies who is still chafing at once again being passed over for promotion – especially as prissy new Day Shift commander David Cornwell has been parachuted in from outside the unit to run things…

As the squad come back from burying their dead, Sarge and partner Nelson Crowe catch a nasty case: a dead girl in a dumpster. However Stephanie Becker was no lost indigent or fun-loving party girl killed for the contents of her purse.

She worked in accounting at prestigious Washburn Pharmaceuticals and was killed with an exotic toxin. As the grizzled old-timers methodically work the case they find a succession of odd occurrences which lead them to First Shift colleagues Tommy Burke and Dagmar Procjnow, currently investigating the suspicious death of middle aged widow Maryellen Connolly, a still-warm stiff previously employed in the same office and slain the same way…

All the evidence seems to point to an unsanctioned million dollar deficit and deep Mafia involvement at the Pharma factory, but the diligent detectives keep pushing and discover a far older potential motive for the murders…

The gritty grimoire of Gotham atrocity ends with the bleakly chilling ‘Unresolved’ (by Brubaker, Lark & Gaudiano from issues #19-22) which features the reappearance of conflicted fan-favourite and all-around slob Harvey Bullock after the GCPD reopen a landmark cold case.

Marcus Driver and new partner Josie Mac are called to a hostage situation where a deranged perp continually screams about voices in his head before eating his own shotgun…

The troubled stiff was Kenny Booker – only survivor of an infamous High School bombing which shocked the city eight years previously – and the fresh tragedy compels Driver to take another look at the still unsolved mystery…

The “Gotham Hawks” were a championship school baseball team eradicated in a locker room explosion but every effort of Bullock and his squad could not pin down a single lead. However, when Marcus and Josie re-examine the accumulated evidence they find a potential link to one of Batman’s weirdest and creepiest foes.

It’s not enough and they are forced to call in the disgraced ex-cop for a consult. The move is a huge mistake as they are utterly unprepared for the fallout when Bullock talks to them.

The legendary maverick was fired after arranging the death of a killer the law couldn’t touch, and he has taken to drowning his days in booze. However this case has haunted Harvey for years and now that he sees a possible solution he goes completely off the rails in his hunger to finish things.

The trouble is that even now the facts tumbling in are increasingly pointing to a completely different culprit from the one Bullock always suspected but the fixated former lawman just won’t listen…

Going on a rampage he courts death by brutalising malevolent mobster The Penguin whilst miles away another suspect, galvanised after years of apparent anonymity, breaks out of Arkham Asylum and goes hunting…

Even after all this the true story is far more twisted than the bewildered detectives could have possibly imagined and the eventual conclusion destroys further lives and sanity and honour before the dust finally settles…

From an era when comicbook noir was enjoying a superb renaissance, these classic thrillers are masterpieces of edgy, fast-paced tension packed with layers of human drama, tension, stress and suspense.

Solid gritty police drama seamlessly blended with the grisly fantasy of the modern superhero seems like a strange brew, but it delivers knockout punches time after time in this captivating series which was the notional inspiration for the current TV sensation outlining just how Batman’s city got that way.

© 2003, 2004, 2009 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

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X-Factor volume 11: Happenings in Vegas


By Peter David, Sebastian Fiumara, Valentine De Landro, Emanuela Lupacchino, Pat Davidson & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-4655-1

Since its debut in the 1980s, X-Factor has been a splendidly effective umbrella title for many uniquely off-kilter iterations of Marvel’s mutant phenomena. Undoubtedly the most impressive and enduring assemblage was created by writer Peter David in 2006; mixing starkly violent suspense with cool detective mystery, laugh-out-loud comedy and fantastic Fights ‘n’ Tights action – and even slyly addressing social issues in a regular riot of superbly adult Costumed Drama.

The premise saw Jamie Madrox, the Multiple Man – veteran of a formerly government-sponsored (and controlled) team – appropriating the name for his own, to create the specialist metahuman private detective agency X-Factor Investigations.

Setting up shop in the wake of “The Decimation”, which had reduced the world’s mutant population to a couple of hundred empowered individuals and millions of distressingly humanised (ex) Homo Superior, he and a perpetually fluctuating team set out to discover why and how it had happened and, once that was settled, just kept going…

This splendid sampling of strange happenings – written as ever by Peter David – collects X-Factor #207-212 (September 2010 – February 2011), exploring some less well scrutinised elements of the immortal themes of Love and Death in a most unique manner…

Recently returned to New York from the wilds of Detroit (by way of the furious future), Madrox and literal mystery woman Layla Miller have no trouble settling in as ‘Lost Souls’ – illustrated by Sebastian Fuimara – opens with a stunning and statuesque client decked out in skimpy green sheen hiring X-Factor to track down a missing man and stolen pendant.

Her effect on the usually ambivalent-to-ladies, luck-manipulating alien Longshot is a study in weapons-grade pulchritude and should really have tipped off the detectives that all was not right…

Elsewhere Guido “Strong Guy” Carosella, Armando “Darwin” Muñoz and psionic super-woman Monet St. Croix are back from South America, having rescued the latter’s abducted dad from drug-lords and mystic menace Baron Mordo. To facilitate their escape Monet had to promise to let the dying sorcerer steal her life energies, but once on safe ground again the wizard finds that he has bitten off more than he can chew…

At a shooting range, young lovers Rictor and Shatterstar are working out a few emotional problems like men do, whilst a multitude of Madroxes and his unforgiving ex Theresa Rourke Cassidy (AKA Siryn) have located the fugitive thief Gofern. However, when they challenge the roistering rogue, things take a distinct left turn into pure wyrd…

Back home, Rictor’s former girlfriend Rahne “Wolfsbane” Sinclair accidentally interrupts him and Shatterstar making up and her shock is transparent and devastating. It’s pretty mutual however as the furiously feral transmorph seems to be extremely pregnant with what Rictor assumes is his child…

The untitled second part opens with Rahne taking out her not-just hormonal anger on her boyfriend’s boyfriend whilst in a dingy dive across town Gofern – now revealed as objectionable alien oik Pip the Troll – fights desperately to regain the amulet Madrox has confiscated. He claims the piece was the only thing protecting him…

Whilst the rest of the team strive to stop Wolfsbane killing Shatterstar, back at the bar things get very cold as outraged Asgardian Death Goddess Hela manifests to reclaim the obnoxious jester who dared to run from her…

The action switches to Las Vegas in ‘Strip Search’ (Lupacchino & Davidson) as a hand-picked squad track the Queen of the Nordic Damned. Madrox is determined to cancel the contract and rescue poor shmuck Pip from the underworld, but the trail seems to lead to nothing but frustration.

Splitting up, Layla, Shatterstar, Siryn and Guido manage to wreck most of the town before Longshot’s luck powers draw them to vacationing Jane Foster (former love of Thor and expert on many things Asgardian) who advises them that the last thing they should do is attract the mercurial goddess’ attention…

Never ready to accept good advice, Madrox sets Longshot loose on the casinos and almost bankrupts the city before Hela takes the blatant bait…

Valentine De Landro illustrates the untitled next chapter as, back in the Big Apple, Monet agrees to psi-probe a woman plagued by dreams of atrocity and is frankly astounded by a rare, easily achieved success. Rictor and Rahne meanwhile go for an ultrasound scan and discover something most unsettling and inexplicably lupine and mystical about their impending sprog…

The action returns to a secret necropolis of Nevada for ‘Staying in Vegas’ (Lupacchino & Davidson) with the wayward away team under attack by an unending horde of undying warrior zombies. Whilst Hela idly tortures Pip in Niffleheim, his would-be saviours battle effectively but not tirelessly in the lands above.

They’re almost glad when the formidably daunting thunder god Thor – having received a phone call from an old friend – explosively storms in and takes command…

The saga astoundingly concludes as the unlikely and constantly sniping assemblage invades the nether regions to save the troll, much to Hela’s amusement. When challenged, she hands over the malodorous little troglodyte with a shrug and a smile.

She’s already bored with Pip and instead wants Longshot for her new toy, but when spurned the Queen of Hell is still in a good mood and grants them leave to depart.

Of course the exit is on the other side of her realm, but surely crossing the hostile, frozen perdition whilst every corpse and monster in her power tries to kill them won’t be any problem…?

As the heroes doggedly battle their way across the tundra of terror, Shatterstar is specifically targeted by recently deceased wolf-god Hrimhari, who claims the gleeful alien adventurer smells of his one true love. With horror Siryn remembers how the lupine lord once had a fling with the absent Wolfsbane…

With inevitable doom at hand, coldly calculating Madrox challenges Hela directly, gambling Darwin’s ability to hyper-evolve and counter every threat to his existence will provide a means to beat the death goddess…

Against all odds it does and they all – even Pip – escape, but the horrifying effects and shattering power of gentle Armando’s latest adaptation don’t fade even after they are all safely back on Earth…

To Be Continued…

With covers by David Yardin, this volume continues a superb run of challenging, compelling, compulsive and supremely scary funny tales, making this iteration of X-Factor the ideal example of mature Costume Dramas: utterly indispensable for everyone who needs wit to underpin their superhero soap opera shenanigans.

© 2010, 2011 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Uncanny X-Men: Sisterhood


By Matt Fraction, Greg Land, Yanick Paquette, Terry Dodson, Jay Leisten, Karl Story & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-4105-1

Since its revival in 1975 Marvel’s Mutant franchise has always strongly featured powerful and often controversial female characters and the balance has never rested solely on the side of light.

For every valiant woman – or indeed super-powered, conflicted teenage girl – fighting the good fight there has been a shady lady playing for the dark side.

This particular collection – gathering Uncanny X-Men #508-512, cover-dated June to August 2009 – primarily features a stupendous clash between the maligned mutant mavericks and a dastardly coterie of extremely wicked women warriors but also offers a fascinating insight into the occluded history of one of the endangered species’ most enigmatic survivors…

At this point in time, the evolutionary offshoot dubbed Homo Sapiens Superior is at its lowest ebb. As seen in both House of M and Decimation storylines, Scarlet Witch Wanda Maximoff – ravaged by madness and her own reality-warping power – reduced the world’s multi-million plus mutant population to a couple of hundred individuals with three simple words…

Most of the remaining genetic outsiders accepted a generous and earnest offer to relocate to San Francisco but, of course, trouble is always happy to make house calls…

Scripted throughout by Matt Fraction, the 4-part saga ‘Sisterhood’ – illustrated by Greg Land, Jay Leisten and colourist Justin Ponsor – opens following the shocking news of a massacre in Cooperstown, Alaska.

Terrorists had razed the isolated town to burning rubble because of reports that the first mutant baby since The Decimation had been born there…

Anti-mutant activist and passionate bigot Simon Trask was quick to stir the flames of panic and prejudice with his Humanity Now Coalition pushing the government to end the threat of mutants forever. With hysteria growing, even previously neutral outcasts began making their way to the mutant enclave of the Greymalkin Industries Facility on the Marin Headlands. However, even with an ever-growing host of feared and despised genetic pariahs housed in her city and the entire population potentially at risk from fanatics and mutant-hunters, Mayor Sadie Sinclair still stands firm on her offer of sanctuary.

The dark drama commences in a secluded private cemetery in Tokyo as the Sisterhood of Evil Mutants disinter a certain body. They are interrupted by probability-bending sometime X-ally Domino whose main talent seems to be landing in the wrong place at the right time.

Sadly, even her odds-altering powers and superspy training are not enough to stop the grave-robbing, and Regan and Martinique Wyngarde (daughters of the malevolent Mastermind), psychic assassin Chimera, cyborg killer Lady Deathstrike, extra-dimensional witch Spiral and the infernal spirit of Red Queen Madelyne Pryor get away with the corpse of ninja legend Kwannon…

In San Francisco Henry McCoy convenes his newly convened X-Club; a unique think tank comprising human geneticist Kavita Rao, mutant tech-savant Madison Jeffries, atomic mutation expert Dr. Yuriko Takiguchi and former Nazi-hunting mutant mystery man James Bradley AKA Doctor Nemesis.

The Beast carefully outlines their intended goal: finding a way to reactivate the millions of mutants “cured” by the Scarlet Witch. Their first session soon concludes that she has somehow switched off the power-creating “X-Gene” in most of the mutant population, but they need to know more about the origin of their own species before they can turn them all on again…

Elsewhere in the city the Sisterhood have completely resurrected the purloined corpse and filled the body with a former host… or at least one of them…

Long ago (Uncanny X-Men #256-258, in fact) priests of ninja cult The Hand mystically transposed the mind of telepath Betsy Braddock – AKA Psylocke – into the physical shell of a lethally effective adherent named Kwannon. The brainwashing and mystic body-swapping turned the English Rose into a sultry, sexy Chinese bodyguard/concubine/siren and perfect gift for the undisputed overlord of the Orient, The Mandarin.

After much ado, myriad battles and many years, both mind-switched incarnations died in combat, but now the Red Queen has succeeded in reuniting the long-separated soul and form of the elite killer…

As the X-Men reach out and enlist former Canadian mutant hero – and media-savvy global Gay celebrity – Jean-Paul Beaubier (one-time Alpha Flight member Northstar), the sinister Sisterhood moves on to the next stage of Pryor’s convoluted game-plan…

With the enclave happily acclimatising and being welcomed by the mellow Californians, the demagogue Trask springs his latest nasty surprise from Washington DC. Proposition X demands legislation to ensure the mandatory sterilisation of mutants and all humans carrying the X-Gene…

The news drives the younger mutants at Greymalkin into a fury, whilst in the science labs cooler heads have devised a potential plan to study the origins of their kind: all they have to do is travel back in time and get blood samples from the first humans to conceive a mutant child…

Outmanoeuvred, the usually reticent and inspirationally obnoxious Bradley is forced to admit having been born in 1906, and that his own parents might well be the best possible candidates…

Before they can act, though, the Sisterhood invade the Facility using a prisoner in the detention centre to deactivate all the psychic security provisions. The assault is devastating and catches the X-Men completely off guard, but Pryor’s big mistake is underestimating the determination and sheer bloody-mindedness of student heroes X-23, Armor, Pixie and the telepathic gestalt called the Stepford Cuckoos…

Following the kids’ counterstrike, the swift recovery and retaliation of the adult X-folk quickly drives the Sisterhood out, but Wolverine is forced to admit that the invaders got what they came for: a lock of hair from Jean Grey he’s been treasuring since her death.

The sample could provide the ghostly Pryor with the genetic material needed to grow herself a new body – one with all the power of the nigh-omnipotent Phoenix…

The conclusion (with additional art by Terry & Rachel Dodson) sees the desperate X-Men rush to foil the plot and spectacularly triumph, not only ending the threat of cosmic resurrection but incidentally reclaiming one of their own fallen from the grave…

Following that all-out cosmic-tinged clash ‘The Origin of the Species’ (illustrated by Yanick Paquette & Karl Story) offers a taste of steam-punk and tragedy as the postponed jaunt to the dawn of the Mutant Age finally gets underway.

Accompanied by the restored Psylocke and Archangel, Beast’s “X-Club” of super science geeks pop back to San Francisco in 1906 on an extremely tight deadline to get blood samples from Dr. Nemesis’ parents but stumble into the birth of their worst nightmare…

Inventor Nicola Bradley and his wife Catherine have been striving to complete a generator that will provide free, unlimited broadcast power for humanity but are increasingly being threatened by thugs and brigands determined to steal it.

Cornelius Shaw and his mentor Lord Molyneux are using the sybaritic Hellfire Club to fund Bradley’s experiments but they want his incredible engine for purposes far darker than lighting the world.

Molyneux has visions of mankind crushed under the monstrous heel of a new superior race – “Overmen” – and needs the battery to power his colossal mechanical Sentinel. Against that even the aberrations-to-come will be helpless…

He’s also behind the attempted raids; hedging his bets in case Bradley cannot complete the job, so when the freakish X-Club turns up he knows the time to act is now…

Thankfully – and perhaps instinctively inspired by his wife’s pregnancy – Bradley solves the final problem, but soon regrets his actions as the Hellfire lords take his device and unleash a marauding mechanical myrmidon upon the populace.

…And that’s when the strangers with wings and blue fur and other incredible abilities reveal themselves…

Concluding in calamity, catastrophe and cruel, heartbreaking irony, this smart slice of time-tampering neatly wraps up a superb sample of Mutant Mayhem: at once exciting, enthralling and exceptionally entertaining.

This slim, stirring, supremely sensuous Fights ‘n’ Tights tome also includes a selection of cover reproductions and variants by Land, Ponsor, Paquette, Edgar Delgado, Laura Martin, J. Scott Campbell & Stéphane Roux, resulting in a treasure trove of treats for all fans of sexy superheroes and combat connoisseurs alike

© 2009 Marvel Characters In. All rights reserved.

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Uncanny X-Force volume 1: The Apocalypse Solution


By Rick Remender, Jerome Opeña, Leonardo Manco, Dean White, Chris Sotomayor & various (Marvel) ISBN: 978-0-7851-4655-1

There’s no such thing as simple background when dealing with Marvel’s mutant mythology. Uncanny X-Force debuted as a monthly title in October 2010, replacing its previous convoluted incarnation X-Force volume 3 (itself the inheritor of nearly twenty years of chopping, changing and hyper-charged complexity).

The premise of the prior title was to describe the actions of a covert team of X-Men convened to perform covert black-ops – and even wetwork – missions at a time when mutants numbered no more than a couple of hundred endangered souls. The group acted with the blessing of Cyclops – titular head of the sorely diminished X-nation – during the Messiah Complex and Second Coming publishing events but were summarily disbanded when exposed to the shocked scrutiny of their understandably appalled fellow mutants…

Written by Rick Remender, the new iteration – and this collection (comprising material from Wolverine: The Road to Hell – November 2010 – and issues #1-4 of Uncanny X-Force published with December 2010 to March 2011cover-dates) – opens with ‘The First Day of the Rest of Your Life’ from the aforementioned Wolverine one-shot wherein the feral fury realises that there’s still a need for a squad ready to do whatever it takes to keep the species of Homo Sapiens Superior safe…

Illustrated by Leonardo Manco and colourist Chris Sotomayor the introductory vignette finds the man called Logan joining Archangel, Psylocke and Fantomex in secret base Cavern-X deep in the Arizona desert, all in agreement that they must continue their necessary work without Cyclops’ knowledge, if only to give him plausible deniability and a clean conscience…

All are troubled souls with blood on their hands. Archangel will fund the project and has in fact already begun their first mission, despatching insane assassin Deadpool to track down the most dangerous mutant monster in history…

Eponymous epic ‘The Apocalypse Solution’, with art by Jerome Opeña and colours from Dean White, then opens in Egypt as the mirthful maniac uncovers an underground Temple and finds devoted acolytes of Clan Akkaba led by the insidious Ozymandias resurrecting the recently slain Apocalypse with their own willingly spilled blood.

The monster had spent millennia testing mutantkind and frequently gathered prime examples to be his agents. Now as Deadpool searches the base he encounters a monstrous Minotaur. The resurrectionists have freed the Final Horsemen: Apocalypse’s last line of defence and the most wicked killers in history…

With contact lost the rest of the team rush to the site in Fantomex’s extraordinary sentient vehicle EVA (in actuality a biomechanical exterior nervous system for the stylish, bio-engineered mutant thief/adventurer) all resigned that the Scourge of Earth must die again at all costs.

Archangel is riven by doubt and apprehension. When he was merely the X-Man Angel Apocalypse ripped out his wings, remade his body and rewired Warren Worthington‘s brain to make him one of his Horsemen. Thanks to the telepathic power of his lover Psylocke, Warren has regained autonomy now but lives in dread of that deep programming, constantly struggling to stop the murderous malice resurfacing. What will happen if and when he confronts his returned former master?

The rescue mission is only partially successful. Although they save Deadpool they are too late to prevent the Clan and revived Horsemen teleporting away with their newly restored yet strangely different master…

The second chapter finds the team apparently carving their way through a mass of minions at the Akkaba Temple until Archangel intrudes and discovers that the entire exercise is a simulation designed to accustom Psylocke to killing the winged wonder if Apocalypse should take him over or – worse yet – should his own dark nature win out over the personality of Warren Worthington…

With the chilling realisation that Wolverine has been preparing her to do the same for all of them, Warren is shocked from his dark thoughts by news that the fugitives have been tracked to the Blue Area of the Moon and expedites their pursuit in EVA…

However the raid immediately falters as the team is picked off by the arisen Horsemen even as, far below them in a colossal sentient Celestial ship, fanatical factotum Ozymandias experiences a few difficulties with his adored master.

The reborn En Sabah Nur is an innocent child who simply won’t accept the merciless philosophies of his former incarnation. Whilst his determined would-be killers rally and overcome their foes, edging ever closer, the return of the true Apocalypse seems destined to fail…

The blistering examination of relative moralities kicks into overdrive when Psylocke bursts into the child’s chamber just ahead of her red-handed comrades. Despite his warring personalities Archangel is ready to save the world; to Deadpool it’s just another hit and Wolverine knows that sometimes dark deeds are inevitable, but their readiness and resignation to execute the crying boy is nevertheless stalled.

Merciless, resolute Psylocke won’t let them harm the boy…

Tense, taut, bloodily action-packed and ethically challenging, The Apocalypse Solution offers a far darker side of the mutant question for fans – if not, perhaps, casual readers – to enjoy, leavening the grim tone with razor-sharp gallows humour and even moments of moving sentiment – which do nothing to dilute the shocking surprise ending…

This slim tome is further augmented by a covers-&-variants gallery by Mico Suayan, Jason Keith, Esad Ribic, Marko Djurdjevic, J. Scott Campbell, Edgar Delgado, Rob Liefeld, Thomas Mason and Clayton Crain, Behind-the-Scenes feature ‘Evolution of a Page: from Script to Colors’ plus a prose-&-picture history of recent ‘X-Force’ history narrated by Wolverine himself (as transcribed by Jeph York)…

Complex, compelling, compulsive and chilling, X-Force is a splendid example of mature Costume Dramas for everyone looking for a dash of darkness in their superhero soap opera shenanigans.
© 2010, 2011 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Shazam! Archives volume 4


By William Woolfolk, C.C. Beck, Mac Raboy & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-0160-1

One of the most venerated and beloved characters of America’s Golden Age of comics, Captain Marvel was created in 1940 as part of a wave of opportunistic creativity which followed the stunning success of Superman in 1938.

Although there were many similarities in the early years, the Fawcett champion quickly moved squarely into the area of light entertainment and even straight comedy, whilst as the years passed the Man of Steel increasingly left whimsy behind in favour of action, drama and suspense.

Homeless orphan and good kid Billy Batson was selected by an ancient wizard to be given the powers of six gods and heroes to battle injustice. He transforms from scrawny precocious kid to brawny (adult) hero Captain Marvel by speaking aloud the wizard’s acronymic name – invoking the powers of legendary patrons Solomon, Hercules, Atlas, Zeus, Achilles and Mercury.

Publishing house Fawcett had first gained prominence through an immensely well-received light entertainment magazine for WWI veterans named Captain Billy’s Whiz-Bang, before branching out into books and general interest magazines. Their most successful publication – at least until the Good Captain hit his stride – was the ubiquitous boy’s building bible Mechanix Illustrated and, as the decade unfolded, the scientific and engineering discipline and can-do demeanour underpinning MI suffused and informed both the art and plots of the Marvel Family titles.

Captain Marvel was the brainchild of writer/editor Bill Parker and brilliant young illustrator Charles Clarence Beck who, with his assistant Pete Costanza, handled most of the art on the series throughout its stellar run. Before eventually evolving his own affable personality the full-grown hero was a serious, bluff and rather characterless powerhouse whilst junior alter ego Billy was the true star: a Horatio Alger archetype of impoverished, bold, self-reliant and resourceful youth overcoming impossible odds through gumption, grit and sheer determination…

After homeless orphan newsboy Billy was granted access to the power of legendary gods and heroes he won a job as a roaming radio reporter for Amalgamated Broadcasting and first defeated the demonic Doctor Thaddeus Bodog Sivana, setting a pattern that would captivate readers for the next 14 years…

At the height of his popularity Captain Marvel was published twice-monthly and outsold Superman, but as the Furious Forties closed tastes changed, sales slowed and Fawcett saw the way the wind was blowing. They finally settled an infamous, long-running copyright infringement suit begun by National Comics in 1940 and the Big Red Cheese vanished – as did so many superheroes – becoming little more than a fond memory for older fans…

Fawcett in full bloom, however, was a true publishing innovator and marketing powerhouse – and regarded as the inventor of many established comicbook sales tactics we all take for granted today. In this fourth magnificent deluxe full-colour hardback compendium we can see one of their best manoeuvres at play as the company responsible for creating crossover-events invented a truly unforgettable villain, set him simultaneously loose on a range of costumed champions and used his (temporary) defeat to introduce a new hero to their colourful pantheon.

Spanning the fraught yet productive period October 31st 1941 to May 13th 1942 and collecting in their entirety Captain Marvel Adventures #4-5, exploits from Master Comics #21-22, an adventure from fortnightly Whiz Comics #25 and another from anthology America’s Greatest Comics #2 – plus all the stunning covers by Beck and Raboy – this splendid compendium kicks off with an erudite and incisive Foreword by P.C. Hammerlinck (artist, editor, historian and former student of C.C. Beck) who reveals many secrets of the original comics’ production before the cartoon classic commences.

Although there was increasing talk of inevitable war amongst the American public at the time, most of these tales were created before Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor, making the role of Adolf Hitler as a recurring villain and the creation of Captain Nazi in those by-no-means certain days acts of prophetic calculation…

However, as the thinly-veiled saboteur and spy sagas which previously permeated the genre until official Hostilities were finally established gave way to certainty, the Axis became the overarching threat of many comicbook heroes and this tome re-presents some of the very best clashes between exactingly defined polar opposites.

Of more interest perhaps is that at this period the stories – many of them still sadly uncredited – largely portray Marvel as a grimly heroic figure not averse to slaughtering the truly irredeemable villain and losing no sleep over it…

In those formative years, as the World’s Mightiest Mortal catapulted to the first rank of superhero superstars, there was actually a scramble to fill pages and, just as CMA #1 had been farmed out to up-and-coming whiz-kids Joe Simon & Jack Kirby, these first two solo issues were rapidly compiled by anonymous scripters under the guiding hand of veteran Jack Binder (whose brother Otto would soon become the assorted Marvels’ definitive scripter), another rising star who drew the issues in a hurry, working from Beck and Parker’s style guides.

The first of those uncredited issues is Captain Marvel Adventures #4 (October 31st 1941) with possible authors including Parker, Rod Reed, Joe Millard, Manly Wade Wellman, Otto Binder and William Woolfolk, whilst the Jack Binder Studio consisted of the man himself plus neophyte artists and recent graduates from Pratt Institute including young Bob Butts and Bill Ward.

‘Sivana’s Revenge’ kicks things off with a return engagement for the Three Lieutenant Marvels (a trio of other kids named Billy Batson who somehow shared the magic of Shazam’s gift). Fat Billy, Tall Billy and Hill Billy were visiting their namesake when the Devil Doctor repeatedly attempted to murder the radio reporter before seemingly losing his life in the detonation of a trap consisting of one million tons of dynamite…

The next tale introduced Hitler as the German-accented “warlord” of an aggressor nation which used slave labour from conquered European countries to dig ‘The Tunnel of Invasion’ right into the heart of Florida. Upon discovering the plot Marvel helped complete the project… but only so that he could trap the entire Nazi army at the bottom of the Atlantic.

‘The Secret Submarine Base’ found Billy investigating a murder and wrecking a scheme by sinister Mr. Fog to hide ambushing U-Boats in South America before calling in his adult alter ego to smash the site. Thereafter he teamed up with crusading DA Shaw to destroy the criminal empire of mobster Giggy Golton and his band of merciless assassins ‘The Lawless Legion’…

Captain Marvel Adventures #5 (December 12th) was communally illustrated by Beck’s “Fawcett Captain Marvel Art Staff” – which generally comprised Costanza, Marc Swayze, Pete Riss and Kurt Schaffenberger amongst others – opening with a stunning recap ‘Frontispiece’ before Sivana again rears his gleaming evil-stuffed head to perpetrate ‘Captain Marvel’s Double Trouble’ wherein a refugee princess is kidnapped by a boxer the wily genius has transformed through surgery. He’s still no match for the real deal though…

Nor is the volcano-making ‘King of the Crater’ who attempts to turn America into a bubbling ring of fire until Billy and the Captain spectacularly upset his engineering applecart, after which a reclamation project is saved from sabotage by a cunning mastermind and an aquatic monster when ‘Captain Marvel Solves the Swamp Mystery’…

The issue ends with another bout of weird science as ‘Sivana’s Strange Chemical Potion’ transforms people into completely different… people!

When Billy is replaced by a new kid with no memory of the power of Shazam, it takes fate in the form of a bunch of kids playing Captain Marvel to release the hero and unleash justice…

Bulletman – ably assisted by his companion Bulletgirl – was undoubtedly Fawcett’s second – if lesser – leading light, with his own solo comicbook and the star spot in monthly Master Comics. However, that all changed with issue #21 (December 1941) and ‘The Coming of Captain Nazi’ by William Woolfolk & Mac Raboy. In the rousing tale Hitler and his staff despatch their newest weapon – a literal Ãœbermensch – to spread terror and destruction in America and kill all its superheroes.

The murdering braggart gets right to work in New York City and soon Bulletman meets Captain Marvel as they both strive to stop the Fascist Fiend from wrecking the town and slaughtering innocents. The astounding battle – gracefully and immaculately rendered by Alex Raymond-inspired Raboy – only results in driving off the monster…

The saga picks up in Whiz Comics #25 (December 12th) with ‘The Origin of Captain Marvel Jr.’ (Woolfolk, Beck & Raboy) as the Nazi nemesis attempts to destroy a monumental hydroelectric dam before once again being foiled and fleeing…

When the monster tries to smash a new fighter plane prototype Captain Marvel stops him, but whilst pursuing the maniac is not quick enough to prevent him murdering an old man and brutally crushing a young boy.

Freddy Freeman seems destined to follow his grandfather into eternity, but remorseful Billy takes the dying lad to Shazam’s mystic citadel where the old wizard saves the boy’s life by giving him access to the power of the ancient gods and heroes. Now he will live – albeit with a permanently maimed leg – and whenever he pronounces the phrase “Captain Marvel” he will become a super-powered invulnerable version of himself…

With the stage set the lad then rockets over to Master Comics #22 (January 1942) to join Bulletman and Bulletgirl in stopping a string of Captain Nazi-sponsored assassinations in ‘Dr. Eternity’s Wax Death’ (by Woolfolk & Raboy), victoriously ending with a bold announcement that from the very next issue (not included here, curses!) the mighty boy will be starring in his own solo adventures…

The merits of the ongoing court-case notwithstanding, Fawcett undeniably took some of their publishing cues from the examples of Superman and Batman. Following on from a brace of Premium editions celebrating the New York World’s Fair, National Comics had released World’s Finest Comics; a huge, quarterly card-cover anthology featuring a host of their comicbook mainstays in new adventures, and early in 1941, Fawcett produced a 100-page bumper comic dedicated to their own dashing new hero and the other mystery-men in their stable: Spy Smasher, Bulletman, Minute Man and Mr. Scarlet & Pinky and more.

This startling slice of World War II Wonderment concludes with a Captain Marvel yarn from America’s Greatest Comics #2 (February 11th – May 13th 1942).

‘The Park Robberies’, anonymously scripted but illustrated by Beck, Berg and the Fawcett Captain Marvel Art Staff, features Billy’s battle to stop and redeem a gang of underage muggers headed for prison or worse, with Captain Marvel going undercover as an ordinary beat cop, but is most noteworthy today for introducing comedy sidekick – and by today’s standards, appalling minority stereotype – Steamboat Bill, who saved the day when real hardboiled thugs took over the scam…

After a rash of complaints, Steamboat was dropped and didn’t resurface when DC acquired the Fawcett properties and characters in 1973. The revived series brought the Captain and his genial crew to a new generation in a savvy experiment to see if his unique charm would work another sales miracle during one of comics’ periodic downturns.

Re-titled Shazam! – due to the incontestable power of lawyers and copyright convention – the revived heroic ideal enjoyed mixed success and a live action TV series in his own unique world before being subsumed into the company’s vast stable of characters…

Notwithstanding, Captain Marvel is a true milestone of American comic history and a brilliantly conceived superhero for all ages. These magical tales again show why “The Big Red Cheese” was such an icon of the industry and proves that such timeless, sublime comic masterpieces are an ideal introduction to the world of superhero fiction: tales that cannot help but appeal to readers of every age and temperament…

© 1941, 1942, 2003 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

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Valerian and Laureline book 7: On the False Earths


By Méziéres & Christin, with colours by E. Tranlé and translated by Jerome Saincantin (Cinebook)
ISBN: 978-1-84918-190-7

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Stellar Entertainment to last the year through… 9/10

Valérian and Laureline is the most influential science fiction comics series ever created; an innovation-packed, Big-Ideas bonanza stuffed with wry observation, knowing humour, intoxicating action and sardonic sideswipes at contemporary mores and prejudices.

As Val̩rian: Spatio-Temporal Agent the strip debuted in the weekly Pilote #420 (November 9th 1967) and was an instant hit. It rapidly evolved into its current designation as his feisty, fire-headed sidekick developed into the equal partner Рif not scene-stealing star Рof light-hearted, fantastically imaginative, visually stunning, time-travelling, space-warping fantasies which nevertheless always found room to propound a satirical, humanist ideology and let loose telling fusillades of political commentary.

At first tough, bluff Valerian was an affable, capable (if unimaginative), by-the-book space cop tasked with protecting official universal chronology (at least as per Terran Empire standards) by intercepting or counteracting paradoxes caused by incautious time-travellers.

When Valérian landed in 11th century France during debut tale ‘Les Mauvais Rêves (‘Bad Dreams’ and infuriatingly still not translated into English yet), he was rescued from doom by a capable young woman named Laureline. He brought her back to the 28th century super-citadel and administrative capital of the Terran Empire, Galaxity, where the indomitable female firebrand trained as a spatiotemporal operative and began accompanying him on all his missions.

On the False Earths originally appeared in the newly monthly Pilote (issues #M31 to M34 (30th November 1976 -1st March 1977) before being collected as seventh album Sur le terres truquées – spectacularly reinforcing the “spatiotemporal” aspect of our heroes through a beguiling cosmic conundrum…

The story starts in frantic full flow as a very familiar figure fights valiantly and dies ignominiously during a pitched battle in 19th century Colonial India. He doesn’t go easy, however, using his ray gun to disintegrate an attacking tiger before beaming back crucial data stolen from a sinister maharaja equipped with technology he simply shouldn’t have…

In deep space distraught Laureline sees her man die, but her protests are ignored by heartless, man-despising historian Jadna. The scholar cares little for the oafish warrior undertaking a top secret mission for her. After all, there’s plenty more where he came from…

That’s literally the case as, a little later, another Valerian infiltrates Victorian London Society, breaking into a swank Gentleman’s Club and crashing a meeting of the Empire’s greatest movers and shakers. Once again these potentates are communicating with a hidden high-tech master, and once again the star cop expires trying to determine the mastermind’s exact whereabouts.

He resurfaces in San Francisco’s Chinatown in 1895 where enquiries arouse the wrath of the local tongs. This Valerian perishes after noting an increasing number of anachronisms – such as an Easy Rider on a chopped Harley Davidson motorbike…

From their secure vantage point on a vast satellite Jadna and Laureline see their agent expire in another artificially constructed historical microcosm. The callous historian ruminates on their mystery opponent: a being capable of reshaping matter, crafting perfect little worlds and recreating human eras with the skill of a master artist whilst remaining utterly hidden from all their probing searches. If the enigma hadn’t been detected rifling through Terran time zones – presumably for research – no one would even know of its existence…

The creator’s simulacrums are progressively advancing through brutal but significant periods of Terran history, but each visit by Valerian brings the investigation team closer to the mysterious maker’s actual location. Soon our hero is cautiously exploring a slice of Belle Époque France, but his enigmatic quarry is cognizant of the constant intrusions and has taken a few liberties with verisimilitude.

Waiting in ambush for Valerian are American gangsters with Tommyguns…

Rubbed out before he can even begin, Valerian is swiftly replaced by another short-lived duplicate whilst the original and genuine lies comatose in a clone-command tank. This last rapid substitution, however, finally allows the watching women to zero in on their target’s true location and they instantly shift their ship through the universal continua to reach the incredible being’s astounding base… and none too soon, as Jadna posits that the creature’s next construction will most likely be World War I…

She is proved painfully correct. As they ready themselves for a confrontation with the maker Laureline and the scholar realise that the astral citadel is a perfect replica of a Great War battlefield. Seizing the initiative Jadna activates and musters all the remaining clones – as well as the original McCoy – programming them to play the marauding “boche” in an apocalyptic re-enactment simply as a diversion to allow her to get to the impossibly powerful being she so admires…

Caught up in the incomprehensible slaughter and its bizarre aftermath the two spatiotemporal agents can only watch in astonishment as Jadna and the seemingly all-powerful artisan discover just how much they have in common…

Trenchant, barbed, socially aware and ethically crusading, Valerian and Laureline stories never allow message to overshadow fun and wonder and On the False Earths is one of the sharpest, most intriguing sagas Méziéres & Christin ever concocted, complete with a superb twist in the tale to delight and confound even the most experienced starfarer.

© Dargaud Paris, 1977 Christin, Méziéres & Tran-Lệ. All rights reserved. English translation © 2014 Cinebook Ltd.

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Batman: Going Sane


By J.M. DeMatteis, Eddie Campbell, Darren White, Joe Staton, Bart Sears & Steve Mitchell (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-1821-8

An old adage says that you can judge a person by the calibre of their enemies, and that’s never been more ably demonstrated than in the case of the Batman. Moreover for most of his decades-long existence, and most especially since the 1970s, the position of paramount antagonist has been indisputably filled by the Harlequin of Hate known only as The Joker.

The epic battles between these so similar yet utterly antithetical icons have filled many pages and this slim, shocking tome (collecting stories from Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #66-68 and #200 from November 1994 to February 1995 and April 2006) again proves how that unending war of wills always results in top quality Fights ‘n’ Tights entertainment.

LoDK began in the frenzied atmosphere following the 1989 Batman movie. With the planet completely Bat-crazy for the second time in 25 years, DC wisely supplemented the Gotham Guardian’s regular stable of comicbooks with a new title specifically designed to focus on and redefine his early days and cases through succession of retuned, retold classic stories.

Three years earlier the publisher had boldly begun retconning their entire ponderous continuity via the landmark maxi-series Crisis on Infinite Earths; rejecting the concept of a vast multiverse and re-knitting time so that there had only ever been one Earth.

For new readers, this solitary DC world provided a perfect place to jump on at a notional starting point: a planet literally festooned with iconic heroes and villains draped in a clear and cogent backstory that was now fresh and newly unfolding.

Many of their greatest properties were graced with a reboot, all enjoying the tacit conceit that the characters had been around for years and the readership were simply tuning in on just another working day.

Batman’s popularity was at an intoxicating peak and, as DC was still in the throes of re-jigging narrative continuity, his latest title presented multi-part epics reconfiguring established villains and classic stories: infilling the new history of the re-imagined, post-Crisis hero and his entourage. The icing on the cake was a fluctuating cast of first-rank and up-and-coming creators each getting “their shot” at arguably the most paradigmatic figure of the industry.

Most of the early story-arcs were then quickly collected as trade paperbacks, helping to jump-start the graphic novel sector of the comics industry, whilst the careful re-imagining of the hero’s early days gave fans a wholly modern insight into the highly malleable core-concept.

With that in mind, 4-part psychological study ‘Going Sane’ by J.M. DeMatteis, Joe Staton & Steve Mitchell takes us back to a time when Batman was still fresh to the game and had only crossed swords with the Clown Prince of Crime twice before…

The tale starts with a murderously macabre circus-themed killing-spree in the idyllic neighbourhood of Park Ridge, exacerbated by the abduction of honest, crusading Gotham Councilwoman Elizabeth Kenner. The twin travesties weigh heavily on a far-too-emotionally involved Batman as he furiously plays catch-up, leading to a one-sided battle in front of GCPD’s Bat signal and a frantic pursuit into the dark woods beyond the city.

Driven to a pinnacle of outrage, the neophyte manhunter falls into the Joker’s devilishly prepared trap…

Caught in a horrific explosion, the Dark Knight’s shattered body is then dumped ‘Into the Rushing River’ by an unbelieving killer clown reeling in shock at his utterly unexpected ultimate triumph…

‘Swimming Lessons’ opens with Batman missing and Police Captain James Gordon taking flak from all sides for not finding The Joker or the savage mystery assailant who had murdered an infamous underworld plastic surgeon…

Under Wayne Manor faithful manservant Alfred fears the very worst whilst in a cheap part of town thoroughly decent nonentity Joseph Kerr suffers terrifying nightmares of murder and madness.

His solitary days end when he bumps into mousy spinster Rebecca Brown. Over passing days the two lonely loners find love in their mutual isolation and a shared affection for classic slapstick comedy. The only shadows blighting this unlikely romance are poor Joe’s continual nightmares and occasional outbursts of barely suppressed rage…

As days turn to weeks and then months, Alfred sorrowfully accepts the situation and prepares to close the Batcave forever. As he descends, however, he is astounded to see the Dark Knight has returned…

The mystery of Batman’s disappearance is revealed in ‘Breaking the Surface!’ as the Gotham Gangbuster slowly gets back into the swing of things, laboriously connecting the dots linking the plastic surgeon’s death and the Joker’s wherebouts.

When his broken body was carried out to the sleepy hamlet of Accord the shattered hero was ministered to by Doctor Lynn Eagles, an ex-Gothamite doubly brutalised during her time in the city. A strange relationship grew between her and the troubled man she called “Lazarus”, but his clear yearning for the loving serenity the town offered couldn’t match his inner fire and unshakable sense of duty…

The inevitable, tragic finale arrives with the ‘The Deluge!’ as Joe Kerr – fictive product of a deranged mind which simply couldn’t face life without Batman – pops like a soap bubble when confronted by his somehow-resurrected resolute nemesis.

The World’s Greatest Detective has relentlessly tracked his polar opposite to his new life, without ever knowing the Clown is no longer a threat and, with both unflinching enemies restored, their apocalyptic clash is terrible but never final…

This emotive examination of twinned lives equally deprived of peace and contentment by their own intransigent natures is followed by a more traditional but intensely gripping thriller written by Eddie Campbell and Daren White with art by Bart Sears.

‘Gotham Emergency’ opens with the Dark Knight carrying a dying Joker into the Wayne Foundation Public Hospital ER. The mass-murdering Maniac of Mirth has poisoned himself with his own laughing toxin – “Smilex” – but Batman is ferociously insistent that Doctor Natalie Koslowski desert all her other critical patients to treat the conscienceless killer.

The reason becomes apparent after a Joker-created virus attacks the hospital’s records database as well as all other civic computer systems. It’s part of a sustained assault on Gotham by the Harlequin of Hate and follows two catastrophic detonations already triggered by the dying lunatic.

The first catastrophically went off in a crowded and unsuspecting newspaper office but the second, at the Gotham Knights Stadium, quickly brought Batman and in the ensuing chaos of their combat Joker took a face-full of his own poison.

Now the already-stretched medics must struggle to save him – and his gang of suitably trounced thugs – because the caped crimebuster is convinced that somewhere in Gotham a third bomb is ticking down, hidden in another area packed with innocents: a transport hub, or school or even a hospital…

And no one is prepared for what happens after the dedicated doctors bring the homicidal Harlequin out of his near-death coma…

Perfectly portrayed at his most devious and devilish, this duel between two decidedly different shades of darkness conclusively captures the conniving essence of the Joker making this smart, rocket-paced and chillingly suspenseful extra-length epic another unmissable example the eternal struggle between two of comics’ most potent characters.

Wonderful stories, appealing art, immortal characters, satisfaction guaranteed…
© 1994, 1995, 2006, 2008 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.