Brightest Day: Justice League: Generation Lost #4
I had been wondering why I was still buying this title. Sure, I like the characters (though admittedly I haven't quite gotten all the JLI trades yet) and I'm inclined to buy anything that Jaime Reyes is in except Teen Titans because that shit is awful.
But I wasn't really getting anything out of it.
I was pleasantly surprised by this issue. Let's talk about it for a minute.
The art is okay. Joe Bennett knows how to get expressive. A little over the top, but in superhero comics you kind of want that - you can't describe somebody feeling fear, so you want to get that across in a single panel. Jo Bennett is good at that, in my opinion. He's also good at having action flowing, putting energy into the page and having it be understandable.
I don't quite like his art because 1) there's a skritchy sort of feeling to it that I'm fully aware is a problem I have with his style and not necessarily makes it bad art. 2) Totally biased here, but I think he's having a really hard time drawing Blue Beetle. Unfortunately for Jaime, some artists get his suit, and some artists drop the ball. Bennett is okay with the suit, but how he draws Jaime's face leaves much to be desired. 3) JESUS CHRIST, MAN - SHOW US BOOSTER'S EYES. Yes his goggles are yellow, but you can still see through them. I will give him props to how the shadows in the goggles do show a bit of his eyes, which would be very neat on another character, but doesn't suit Booster. Not to mention it's really distracting. Use it some of the time, not all of the time. 4) Not so sure Ice's shirt should be giving quite that much definition.
Look at this! Look at this!
On a completely different note, Tony Harris & JD Mettler knocked this cover out of the park. Very nice. It feels like Russian Constructivist propaganda with the Rocket Reds and that really works with what goes on in the issue. But mostly it's just really striking. You can't really go wrong with black white and red, honestly. Well, you'd have to work real hard to be bad at it anyway. I like the softer brush-looking style of the drawings with the hark lines of the background. This is a nice cover, dudes. It is making me jealous.
What actually happened this issue!
So it starts out with a research lab that Max Lord arrives at. I'm going to be completely neutral with the whole evil Max Lord thing and not really say anything about it. Anyway, so Max talks to doctor dude, and the scientist is all: "Are you even allowed here, guy?" and Max is all: "LOL, no. I'm just making time until I can do the whole mind-control thing" and the scientist is all: D:
That... doesn't turn out that well for Max. And that's pretty cool. After the smug first page, it's nice to see him off-balance. The reveal that his powers are freaking out on him raises questions about the whole Making-The-World-Forget-About-Him thing, but it is a neat twist, and does tie it into the whole Blackest Night/Brightest Day thing.
Then it goes to the heroes and the Rocket Red team, and it turns out there's this communist rogue Rocket Red who totally fanboys over them going "OMG, it's the JLI" and the heroes are like "Wat. The JLI is totally over, dude." ANYWAY.
The neat thing here is that the older heroes are all "We shouldn't get involved in the Rocket Red fight" and then civilians get involved and then they're like "...Right, we're getting involved." Hey! Superheroes caring about people! That's nice. That's classic superheroism right there. That's what you should be taking from older comics. Yeah, I don't like Grim 'N Gritty (most of the time).
Moving along. Rogue Rocket Red gets Booster Gold thinking about how everybody Just Happened to get together, and he guesses that this is more of Max Lord's manipulation. Quite literally, "Let's get the team back together". Everybody is like "LOL, wat", but Max actually responds. This is pretty great actually. It's nice to see Smart Booster. Booster's one of those characters that all the other characters and sometimes the audience thinks of as stupid and selfish. He's not, really. It's stuff like this that makes Booster a great character, and it is a great character moment. Kudos.
I figured out why I'm still reading this comic. Because I honestly want to see what happens next in the Booster Gold - Max Lord relationship. I might not like this title all the time (this was one of its better issues), but I actually want to see what happens next. So good for it.
Moving on.
Batman: Streets of Gotham
Paul Dini and Dustin Nguyen have been putting out a pretty solid comic. It's not Batwoman: Detective Comics OMG MUST HAVE NEXT ISSUE NOW, but I always smile when I pick it up.
Art first. I like Nguyen's art, but I feel like he's better when he works with his watercolours like when he does the covers. But mostly because his watercolour stuff is frikkin amazing. I mean seriously, this guy gets colour. Once, just once, I'd like to see him do an entire issue like that.
This particular cover isn't the best he's done. Compared to some of his others, it's rather bland.
I will also give him a high-five for not sexualizing the Carpenter. The comic never takes time from the story to give us needless fanservice, and I appreciate that.
Dini is a writer that writes a satisfying comic. The arc ends well, with a good conclusion. It's almost a little boring in that I can't really say anything about it! If I had started these reviews earlier I would have plenty to say about the new character Abuse (mostly good things), but for this it's just... Yeah. I do really like Carpenter. Dini seems to be developing how the villains work behind the scenes. First with the guy who buys the hideouts, and now the girl who builds the deathtraps and things. THat's pretty fantastic.
I'm not really going to say anything about the Manhunter backup, but I'll probably commit internet suicide in that I bought her first two trades and they didn't really suit me at all. I didn't like them. Her backups have been Meh for me.
Joe the Barbarian
Oh Grant Morrison. I'm pretty sure that there isn't anything I could say about you that anybody else hasn't already talked about. I am enjoying Joe the Barbarian, though.
I really, really like Sean Murphy's art. It is skritchy, but in a good way. Joe is absolutely adorable, as well as the other characters. His sense of style, the little details, the way he draws clothes, faces, backgrounds. There is nothing about this guy's art I don't like.
I'm also going to shout out to the colourist, Dave Steward 'cause that's some nice colour. The rendering is subtle and doesn't distract from the art, the way cool colours play with warm colours is very effective. It's colourful but subdued, and really helps with the mood.
People, be nice to the colourists. Especially the good ones.
Plot now. This issue was interesting. It moved forward the uh, not-real plot forward. There's a couple of brief moments that touch on Joe's reality, including one moment where it almost seems like characters from the not-real world entered Joe's Reality for a split second. This title is confusing, but Grant Morrison is good at doing that in a way that works. Other than that, I don't really have much to comment on.
Parody sketch of the week!
I've been, uh, playing a lot of Team Fortress 2.
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