Adam Graham's Blog: Christians and Superheroes, page 6

Book Review: ="Frank Thomas Archives v1 - Centaur Years (Centaur)

Frank Thomas Archives v1 - Centaur Years by Frank Thomas

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This book is the first of several volumes collecting the work of Golden Age of Comics writer/illustrator Frank Thomas.

This volume collects his early for Centaur Comics in the late 1930s and early 1940s.

The largest section of the book is dedicated to Chuck Hardy, Land Beneath the Sea which finds two divers ending up in a mysterious world undersea and getting strange powers. A good way to describe this is as an Ocean-based Flash Gordon. It's a good bit of Science Fantasy that doesn't offer any closure, but is fun while it lasted.

Doctor Hypno is a superhero who develops the ability to transport his mind into the body of various animals. I didn't care much for the first strip, but he did find a clever way to use them and a kind of wish there had been more because there were definitely possibilities for him.

Beyond that, the book also includes a couple of features that didn't really go anywhere. One introduced a mystery man known as the Researcher and the tales wasn't all that interesting even though the art was fine. Solarman introduced a Saturnian hero to Earth. This one had potential, but I don't if it would have made it in the 1940s, plus the origin took up way much space for a first story in that era.

Other than that, we get some text stories by others that Thomas illustrated and he does some good work on these particularly the baseball story.

Overall, these are some really strong examples of public domain comic work. The main features are better than some of the stuff that's collected in Marvel Masterworks and if you're looking for some offbeat stuff, this makes for a good read.



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Book Review: Justice, Volume 1

Justice, Volume 1 by Jim Krueger

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Justice, Volume 1 is a slow build but a really good one. There's a lot of narration and build up as to what the villains' plans are and why they involve doing seemingly heroic things. There are multiple mysteries that are raised.

Jim Kruegger has a handle and manages to balance all these characters. Alex Ross' artwork is at its captivating best. The fourth issue a real treat. The entire book builds to it and the first four issues end on one heck of a cliffhanger that definitely leaves the reader wanting more. Overall, a just superb start to this series.



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Book Review: Marvel Masterworks: Golden Age Young Allies, Vol. 1

Marvel Masterworks: Golden Age Young Allies, Vol. 1 by Stan Lee

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


This World War II-era book features the first four adventures of the Young Allies led by Captain America's sidekick Bucky and the Human Torch's Sidekick Toro and then four other streotypical boys from the era.

The book has some strong points. First, the adventures are longer than most typical golden age stories. The first two issues have the Young Allies in full-length adventures (64 pages) and the last two issues in the book still have their adventures clocking in at more than 40 pages. That allows for fuller stories than most Golden Age tales outside of maybe the Justice Society of America.

In addition to this, you have additional guest appearances by Captain America and the Human Torch, and also appearances of villains from other books fighting the Young Allies including two visits by the Golden Age's Big Bad for Timely, the Red Skull. The relationship between Bucky and Toro is actually interesting as they have a great comic rivalry. M0st importantly, the book was written by young Stan Lee.

The stories themselves are okay but not remarkable. Rarely do they make great use of their length. I do think the regular summoning of adult heroes at the end can become a bit of a deus ex machina. The kids outside of Bucky and Toro are really stereotypical. This is particularly true of the Black character Whitewash Jones who has some cringeworthy lines, does stereotypical stuff around watermelon and even pretends to be a monkey. While I understand the past is another country, in a mediocre book like this, I think this makes the book for historical purposes rather than working for any entertainment value.

The short text stories included in each issue are fine, but unremarkable. The House Ads that were originally in the book add to the historical value of the book. The back up features added in Issues 3 and 4 are mostly unremarkable with some humor pieces, some dark fact or fiction pages, some magic and detective comic strips. The best back up strip in here is Issue 4's use of the Vagabond, a brilliant agent who dresses as a stereotypical hobo, fights crime, and then wanders off to the next city.



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Book Review: Rocketeer Adventures Volume 1

Rocketeer Adventures Volume 1 by Mike Allred

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


The Rocketeer Adventures is a grand anthology of pulp adventures featuring Dave Stephens' Rocketeer, written by a talented group of artists. There's not really a bad story in here, although these are pretty standard 7-10 page pulp stories. However, Kurt Busiek's Dear Betty actual does have an emotional journey and an interesting focus on Betty that makes for compelling reading.

There's so many interesting stories, nods, and pastiches to the Golden Age of Comics and Stevens original work that if you love comics and stories of this era or enjoyed the original Rocketeer book, this is worth checking out. There's no ongoing story but a really fun anthology.



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Book Review: Detective Comics #1000: The Deluxe Edition

Detective Comics #1000: The Deluxe Edition (Detective Comics by Alan Grant

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


The 1000th Episode of Detective Comics is a celebration of Batman even though Batman didn't show up in the pages of Detective Comics until issue 27, but that's okay. That just gave DC an excuse to do another one of these when issues #1027 rolled around.

Anyway, as a collection, this is a pretty good. You get an anthology release of 8-10 stories, all from top Batman writers. If I had one I didn't like, it was the Arkhamn Knight tale, but it wasn't bad, I've just read that story arc and the idea that "Batman" sounds like "Bad man" as the basis for declaring war on someone...is something else.

However, the art really carries it with all the great extra pictures and alternate covers. It's a really nice visual experience.

While I would have liked more stories focused on those who shared the book with Batman (Batgirl, Martian Manhunter, and Elongated Man among others), this is a nice celebration of Batman.



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Book Review: Showcase Presents: Legion of Super-Heroes, Vol. 2

Showcase Presents: Legion of Super-Heroes, Vol. 2 by Jerry Siegel

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


A really solid run for the Legion of Superheroes. It starts off pretty light-hearted with the Legion pranking each other and doing stupid stunt but gets into more serious territory as Legionaires lose their powers (and don't get them immediately back), lose an arm. Perhaps the far future setting made the writers more willing to take risks with the characters.

Of course, there's plenty of silliness and fun, and fantastic situation, but it's a bit more real and grounded than many of the twentieth century earth-set stories DC was putting out at the time. Overall, a decent collection of stories from the mid-1960s.



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Book Review: Donald Duck: The Diabolical Duck Avenger

Donald Duck: The Diabolical Duck Avenger by Rodolfo Cimino

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This book collects Disney Material that's reprinted from foreign disney publications.

The titular story, "The Duck Avenngers" finds a ticked-off Donald trying to steal a prize that lucky cousin Gladstone and gets a beaten down old manner with hints of ties to a vigilante thief and he decides to try launch his own career and a masked avenger. Of course, whether this makes him a true anti-hero or just someone ticked off due to perceived slights as a result of behavior that's his own fault is a question for debate. However, it's a fun story with a lot of clever plot twists even though Donald is unlikable. This is an Italian story and they were aiming for a kid-friendly pastiche of Diabolique and from what I know of the character, they succeeded.

"Birthday Bugaboo" finds the boys wanting to adopted a stray dog and Donald opposed until he learns some startling information. Donald is once again, a jerk, but it's also a fun story.

The other really long tale is "The Perfect Calm" where Donald is thrown into jail along with an Eastern mystic and joins a Zen-like quest for perfect serenity, but the boys have to follow along to make sure he doesn't get killed. Overall, this was probably the most enjoyable story , with a long page count and a few surprises on the way. There's some goofiness in how they treat personal serenity as like a communicable disease.

The shorts are all good. There's a few featuring Donald Duck and one featuring Ludwig Von Drake. My favorite one of the shorts was a 1937 British short featuring Mickey Mouse and Donald. It's such a cool throwback to that era.

Overall, this book isn't Carl Barks but it actually is quite a bit of fun. If you love Disney and Disney comics than this collection of a lot of foreign material translated into English should be worth your time.



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Book Review: Kingstone Bible Vol. 9: The Christ (The Kingstone Bible

Kingstone Bible Vol. 9: The Christ by Ben Avery

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Grapic Novel bibles are hard to evaluate.

The writing of the book was decent. It covered a lot of stories and did a good job harmonizing the different Gospel accounts into a coherent narrative. If I had any complaint, it felt like everything had to be squeezed in. There's very little space for big moments to set in. While this is true of the Bible, I think a graphic version would do well not to cram so much together.

The art is okay, but not remarkable. The angels and demons were unimaginative, and some of the choices of facial expressions for Christ were puzzling.

Overall, this is a faithful, decently written, decently drawn graphc novel about Jesus' life that would make a good kids comic Bible, but doesn't blow me away.



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Book Review: Superman: Action Comics Vol. 3: Leviathan Hunt

Superman: Action Comics Vol. 3: Leviathan Hunt by Brian Michael Bendis

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


A bit of a mixed review on this one.

Not a whole lot hapepns here to move the ongoing plots forward for Superman. We get some interesting character insights with Red Cloud and Marisol Leone continues to promises a lot of mystery and make some public moves. And Naomi shows up and is more interesting than in her own book.

The big problem is that Naomi kind of takes over this book and becomes a bit of a Mary Sue and has an outsized role in dealing with a threat Superman's had in the background for two volumes. That is just off.

Overall, a so-so volume.



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Book Review: Batman, Detective Comics, Volume 5: Joker War

Batman: Detective Comics (2016-) Vol. 5: The Joker War by Peter J. Tomasi

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This book collects a one-shot Pennyworth RIP which has some good stories in it, but has an unpleasant feel as at this wake for Alfred, everyone shows up pays tribute to Alfred, rips Bruce Wayne, and walks off. Batgirl comes off as increasingly catty in a way that really has harmed some of her more recent appearances.

The Detective Comics Annual #3 focusing on Pennyworth was actually good and did a good job balancing a decent story with sentiment as an agent from Alfred's past tries to deal with a traitor.

The main storyline involving Two Face is good as it explores that relationship and also leads right into the Joke War.

The Joker War issue featuring Batwoman is pretty good as well. The others from Detective Comics #1027 are a bit more forgettable.

Overall, this is decent. I think the Joker War material has generally been all over the place in terms of quality, but this is some of the best of it with Tomasi turning in another winning volume.



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