The Best Sequential Art I Read Last Week: December 24 – December 30, 2014

I am a comic book collector and happy to be one. I might say “proud” if I hadn’t, over a year ago, switched to reading digital as opposed to print comics. I feel a bit robbed of the tactile sensations of the hobby – of the turn of the page, the sneaking look to the panel a page over, the bagging and shorting and stacking and filing. Though I read my comics in a different medium than I used to, I still treat each Wednesday (comic book delivery day to specialty shops around the country) as different from the other days of the week. I subscribe and now, rather than go to the comic store to be handed the books pulled for my “Hold Slot,” I click a button on my iPad and watch them download.

Then I read them.

Rare is the week that I don’t read them all between Wednesdays and some weeks I have, well… let’s just say more comic books in my digital downloads than a grown man should. Comic book legend Will Eisner (creator of The Spirit) is one of the most influential men even to put pencil to drawing board in the pursuit of making comics. So influential was he that the industry awards (think the Oscars or the Emmys or the Grammys) are named The Eisner Awards. He called comic books “sequential art,” perhaps because he became embarrassed by his profession when he had to admit what he did for a living. This is my weekly reaction to the comics I read.

I read 10 comics last week: Batman Eternal #38, Arkham Manor #3, Avengers and X-Men: Axis #9,  All New X-Men Annual #1, Batman Annual #3, Daredevil #11, New Avengers #28, Superman #37, Superman/Wonder Woman #14 and Uncanny X-Men #29.

The best comic I read last week was Daredevil #11.

Daredevil scribe Mark Waid is, for my money, one of the top five best writers in comics. Daredevil artist Chris Samnee is, for my money, one of the five best artists in comics. Put them together and Daredevil should be one of the top five best comics in comics.

It is. Consistently, month-after-month, Daredevil is a wonderful read. Waid has made the character fun. He’s revitalized “the Man without Fear” and his supporting cast and has done so by creating exciting plots that feature not only some of the best adversaries from the hero’s rogues gallery (Bullseye and the Purple Man leap to mind) but also some of the best treatments of so-called “real world” issues that one can find in comic books (Waid’s takes on cancer and depression are shockingly moving). He knows Matt Murdock. He knows Marvel Comics’ history. He knows how to write great stories. Everything Waid puts out is worth reading.

And the writer has found a perfect partner in Chris Samnee whose Daredevil in costume somehow looks just like his Matt Murdock out of costume. It’s a pretty cool feat. I cannot think of another artist who manages to capture his lead so perfectly in and out of costume. Daredevil is a great looking book and Samnee’s cartooning style is an excellent compliment the stories Waid is telling.

The writer and artist will leave Daredevil this spring, and that’s a shame. Their departure coincides with the premiere of Netflix’s Daredevil series, a show which promises to be closer in tone to the darker Daredevil stories of the past and, while dark Daredevil stories are all well and good, I will miss this take on the character.

And I will miss Waid and Samnee. Hopefully, they will find another character to take on together.

DC’s Flash, anyone? Waid has a tremendous history with that other red-costumed superhero and Samnee’s style would be an ideal counterpart.

 

The Best Sequential Art I Read This Week (7.31 – 8.6)

I am a comic book collector and happy to be sure. I might say “proud” if I hadn’t, over a year ago, switched to reading digital as opposed to print comics. I feel a bit robbed of the tactile sensations of the hobby – of the turn of the page, the sneaking look to the panel a page over, the bagging and shorting and stacking and filing.

Though I read my comics in a different medium than I used to, I still treat each Wednesday (comic book delivery day to specialty shops around the country) as different from the other days of the week.

I subscribe and now, rather than go to the comic store to be handed the books pulled for my “Hold Slot,” I click a button on my iPad and watch them (painfully slowly on my first generation device) download.

Then I read them.

Rare is the week that I don’t read them all between Wednesdays and some weeks I have, well… let’s just say more comic books in my digital downloads than a grown man should.

Comic book legend Will Eisner (creator of The Spirit) is one of the most influential men even to put pencil to drawing board in the pursuit of making comics. So influential was he that the industry awards (think the Oscars or the Emmys or the Grammys) are named The Eisner Awards. He called comic books “sequential art,” perhaps because he became embarrassed by his profession when he had to admit what he did for a living.

This is my weekly reaction to the comics I read. I consumed 10 comics last week: Batman Annual #2, Batman Incorporated # 13, Detective Comics Annual #2, Flash Annual #2, Superman Annual #2, Daredevil #29, FF #10, Indestructible Hulk # 11, Uncanny X-Men #9 and The Wake #3.

The comic that most arrested my attention, that I thought was the best read of the week and that I most enjoyed was Batman Incorporated #13.

I admit that this comic, written by Grant Morrison – a mad genius of sorts about whose work I go back-and-forth between loving it and being completely baffled by it – had a leg up. It is reported to be the “final” Batman story by Morrison who has been weaving a pretty amazing (and pre-New 52 spanning) mythology around the Dark Knight for over seven years. This issue was a fitting culmination of his work. More direct than most Morrison, more final than most narratives (with one gigantic backdoor left open for another writer), Batman Incorporated #13 wrapped up an almost impossible number of dangling plot threads elegantly.

I wish Lindelof and Cuse had been so neat in their stepping off the stage with the final episode of Lost.

This is a carefully chosen comparison because Morrison’s narratives have much more in common with Lost than they do with other comic books. That I didn’t become too confused (or too bored) with Morrison’s methods speaks of a cohesive whole that, for me, had a significant pay off.

He introduced Bruce Wayne’s son only to kill him. He spent a year with Dick Grayson as Batman. He introduced a flying batmobile. He undergirded his entire narrative with a psychotic love story. He put the Joker undercover as a trusted confidant of the Bat-Family. He incorporated Batman as a brand and had Wayne Enterprises fund Batmen world-wide. He suggested a time traveling Batman was responsible for his own creation!

Sound trippy? It was, and entertainingly so.

I guess Batman Incorporated #13 was long destined to be the Best Sequential Art I Read This Week. It was quite a payoff.

And I didn’t even mention Bat-Cow. (You read that right).