Erstwhile: Untold Tales From the Brothers Grimm (2012) Gina Biggs, Louisa Roy, Elle Skinner As a huge fan of folk and fairy tales, I’ve had Erstwhile on my RSS feed for awhile now, and I was vaguely aware that they’d published a printed collection of their tales, but when it popped up on Amazon, I […]
Madame Mirage (2008) Paul Dini and Kenneth Rocafort Oh! That was lovely! Well, not lovely lovely. I mean, it was violent and lots of bad things happened. But it was a fabulous story of revenge and consequences. It also took a quick poke with a sharp stick and hero and gender stereotypes–yeah, I know. I […]
Fables Vol 18: Cubs in Toyland (2013) Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham, Steve Leialoha, Gene Ha I… oh. So. There’s death. We were forewarned, but that didn’t mean I was expecting it. Winter Wolf is off with Bigby, learning how to be the North Wind. Beauty and Beast are still with Flycatcher in Haven. The citizens […]
Northlanders Vol. 1: Sven The Returned (2008) Brian Wood, Davide Gianfelice Wow. Totally not for me. Not at all. Published by Vertigo
X-23 Vol. 3: Don’t Look Back (2012) Marjorie Liu, Sana Takeda, Phil Noto This is (apparently [at least for now]) the conclusion to Laura’s story arc. The first part of the story–pretty much ‘Adventures in Babysitting’ with X-23 I really could have one without. It felt like they needed to shoehorn some action adventure in, […]
X-23 Vol. 2: Chaos Theory (2012) Marjorie Liu, Sana Takeda, Phil Noto What could this be? Why, it’s a new volume of X-23! This wasn’t bad, but it’s still nowhere near as good as Craig Kyle’s take on X-23 in Innocence Lost and Target X. The first half of this volume is very good–X-23/Laura continues […]
So, yeah. I went to put away my new X-23 comics, and instead ended up rereading all the X-23 and NYX books. Oops! The stories written by Craig Kyle were still–far and away–my favorites. X-23: Innocence Lost (2006) Craig Kyle, Christopher Yost, Billy Tan, Jon Sibal X-23: Target X (2007) Craig Kyle, Christopher Yost, Mike […]
The Killing Dream (2011) Marjorie Liu, Will Conrad It’s possible I should have paused a bit, between reading X-23: Target X and The Killing Dream, because Target X is really really good. That’s not to say The Killing Dream is bad–it’s just not as good as Target X. Apparently, Things Happened between Target X and […]
Target X (2007) Craig Kyle, Christopher Yost, Mike Choi I really liked the X-23 comics, but for some reason had only read NYX and Innocence Lost. Target X is the same author and storyline as Innocence Lost. We see what has happened to Laura after her escape, and how she has continued to struggle with […]
Fairest Vol 1: Wide Awake (2012) Bill Willingham, Phil Jimenez, Andy Lanning, Matthew Sturges, Shawn McManus If you know me at all, you know that I love Fables. However, I have not loved the spin-off comics. I straight-up dislike Jack of Fables, nor did I like Cinderella (though Cinderella was not written by Bill Willingham.) […]
Fables: Werewolves of the Heartland (2012) Bill Willingham, Craig Hamilton, Jim Fern, Ray Snyder, Mark Farmer I love Fables. Werewolves of the Heartland is a Bigby Wolf stand-alone story. Bigby is out searching for a new home for Fables, now that New York (city and state) are no longer safe. They found records in Bluebeard’s […]
Sandman Vol 3: Dream Country (1990) Neil Gaiman, Kelley Jones, Colleen Doran, Charles Vess, Malcolm Jones III I’m particularly fond of this volume–I quite like the Shakespeare story, as well as the dream of a thousand cats. Rating: 8/10 Published by Vertigo
Sandman Vol 2: The Doll’s House (1990) Neil Gaiman, Malcolm Jones III, Mike Dringenberg, Michael Zulli Here we see glimpses of where the story is going–as well as the relationship between the Endless. (I sometimes forgot what a bastard Desire is.)
Sandman Vol 1: Preludes and Nocturnes Neil Gaiman, Sam Kieth, Mike Dringenberg, Malcolm Jones III “I’m not going to reread Sandman right now. Sandman makes me cry.” Yeah. So, just finished rereading volume 1. Death is before me today: like the recovery of a sick man, like going forth into a garden after sickness. Death […]
Hellboy Vol 12: The Storm and the Fury (2012) Mike Mignola, Duncan Fegredo Oh. Wow. I wasn’t expecting that at all. The Hellboy series has typically alternated volumes of short stories with volumes of the ongoing series. I generally tend to prefer the short story collections, but have read the ongoing stories with interest. Well, […]
Hellboy Vol 11: The Bride of Hell and Others (2011) Mike Mignola, Richard Corben, Kevin Nowlan, Scott Hampton By all rights, I shouldn’t like the Hellboy comics at all. Except, how can I not love a story containing dialog like this? HEY EMILE! Cut it out. You’re making the dead people nervous. That bit was […]
Girl Genius Book 11: Agatha Heterodyne and the Hammerless Bell (2012) Phil & Kaja Foglio Clanks! Fighting! Even smooching! It’s the latest Agatha Heterodyne book! Rating: 8/10 Published by Airship Entertainment
Fables 17: Inherit the Wind (2012) Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham, Steve Leialoha, Shawn McManus The North Wind is dead! Long live the North Wind! That’s right, someone has to become the new North Wind, and the best candidates are the cubs. Meanwhile, in the Land of Oz, Bufkin and several others are on the run […]
Locke & Key: Vol 1 Welcome to Lovecraft (2008) Joe Hill and Gabriel Rodriguez Good, but really not my thing. Published by IDW
Fables Vol 16: Super Team (2011) Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham, Steve Leialoha, Eric Shanower, Terry Moore That was… unexpected. Rating: 7/10 Published by Vertigo
Dark Entries (2009) Ian Rankin, Werther Dell’Edera I have a conflicted relationship with John Constantine stories. I love the idea of who Constantine is, but for some reason the stories always fall short of my expectations in some manner. But when I saw that Ian Rankin–whose John Rebus mysteries I love–had written a Constantine graphic […]
Madame Xanadu Vol 4: Extra-Sensory (2011) Matt Wagner, Marley Zarcone, Laurenn McCubbin, Chrissie Zullo, Celia Calle, Marian Churchland I really like the layout for this volume. We see slices from several years in the 1960s in which Madame Xanadu took part. The first several stories only have Madame Xanadu in the periphery–she steps in to […]
The Adventures of Rabbi Harvey: A Graphic Novel of Jewish Wisdom And Wit in the Wild West (2006) Steve Sheinkin I completely and totally got this one a whim, because I love folklore, which is what much of this is based upon. Imagine the Wild West. Now imagine a Rabbi there, keeping the peace and […]
Edie Ernst – USO Singer: Allied Spy (2011) Brooke McElowney I’m not even sure anymore how I stumbled across 9 Chickweed Lane, but I did, and it amused me, so I’d read it most days. Then the Edie Ernst thread started and I was hooked. Some background: 9 Chickweed Lane is about three women: a […]
House of Mystery Vol 6: Safe as Houses (2011) Matthew Sturges, Luca Rossi, Werther Dell Edera, Jose Marzain Jr I was intrigued by the first volume of House of Mystery, and the subsequent volumes were also interesting, but this volume fell flat for me. I think the primary reason was that–for me–the best parts of […]
Fables Vol 15: Rose Red (2011) Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham, Steve Leialoha, Inaki Miranda, Andrew Pepoy, Dan Green Last we saw Rose Red she was slowly destroying herself after losing Boy Blue. Her lack of presence on The Farm means that things with Geppetto are spiraling out of control, while the Fables from Fabletown fight […]
Chew Vol 1: Taster’s Choice (2009) John Layman and Rob Guillory Tony Chu is a Cibopath. When he eats something, he gets impressions of the past (and even present) of whatever he eats. Which makes meat really unappealing, since he can see the last moments of the animal before it was slaughtered or even as […]
The Rabbi’s Cat (2005) Joann Sfar One way to summarize this story would be that when the Rabbi’s cat eats the Rabbi’s parrot and gains the power of speech, his relationship with the Rabbi and the Rabbi’s daughter, Zlabya, changes. But it is so much more than that. The cat is both an observer and […]
Madame Xanadu Vol 3: Broken House of Cards (2011) Matt Wagner, Amy Reeder, Richard Friend, Joelle Jones I am really enjoying this series. I know there is a ton I am missing because I am not familiar with classic DC comic characters, but it doesn’t matter because they appear in the story as unknowns to […]
House of Mystery Vol 5: Under New Management (2011) Matthew Sturges, Luca Rossi, Jose Marzan Jr I think what I like best about the House of Mystery are the stories between the story. Like the House at World’s End, it’s full of tales and stories told by the visitors to the house, tales from other […]
Girl Genius Vol 9: Agatha Heterodyne and The Heirs of the Storm (2010) Phil Foglio & Kaja Foglio Rating: 7/10 Published by Studio Foglio
Fables Vol 14: Witches (2010) Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham, Steve Leialoha, David Lapham, Jim Fern, Andrew Pepoy, Craig Hamilton Fabletown is a wreck, and as it is now inhabited by Mister Dark, it is completely inaccessible to the Fables, who have retreated to the Farm. The main characters of the first half of the volume […]
Ex Machina: Vol 10 Term Limits (2010) Brian K Vaughan, Tony Harris, JD Mettler Last volume in the collection. I can’t decide if I’m extremely happy or ridiculously disappointed. Regardless, it’s over. Rating: Published by Wildstorm
Serenity: The Shepherd’s Tale (2010) Joss Whedon, Zack Whedon, Chris Samnee The long awaited story of Shepherd Book’s past. First. Too short. Way too short. Extremely too short. We are given brief glimpses of his past and how he became the man who boarded Serenity. I suppose Book is supposed to be remembering his past […]
The Amazing Screw-On Head (2010) Mike Mignola I think that even for Mike Mignola this is a strange collection of stories. Amusing and interesting, yes, but also strange. The first story is about Screw-On Head, who is a head that screws into different bodies. Which is a fascinating idea. He’s sent out by President Lincoln […]
Hellboy: Masks and Monsters (2010) Mike Mignola, James Robinson, Scott Benefiel, Jasen Rodriguez These are two tales outside of the Hellboy time line (ie this is not a sequel to The Wild Hunt) but are crossover with other characters including Batman and Starman. Batman doesn’t play a particularly large role (after all, he’s a busy […]
Fables: Cinderella: From Fabletown with Love (2010) Chris Roberson, Shawn McManus Well. That was disappointing. Anyone who has read Fables knows that Cinderella has been acting as spy and assassin for Fabletown for years. Not that anyone in Fabletown aside from the sheriffs know this fact, but that’s good, because otherwise she’d be a lousy […]
Hellboy Vol 10: The Crooked Man and Others (2010) Mike Mignola, Richard Corben Frustratingly, Helloboy Vol 10 does not continue the story arc of Vol 9, but instead is another collection of stories, all set in Hellboy’s past. Mind you, I tend to prefer the “short story” Hellboy collections, but the story line was really […]
Hellboy Vol 9: The Wild Hunt (2010) Mike Mignola, Duncan Fegredo All those Hellboy stories–the ones in the story collections where there wasn’t necessarily a theme for the entire volume? Suddenly, everything is starting to come together. Hellboy has spent quite awhile hiding from his supposed destiny. He doesn’t want to rule the world. He […]
Ex Machina: Ring Out the Old (2010) Brian K. Vaughan, Tony Harris, Jim Clark, John Paul Leon, JD Mettler Uhhh… What the hell was that? There were so many different things I didn’t like about this volume. First and foremost was the meta “artists in the story” bit. Sorry BKV, but that was just a […]
House of Mystery: The Beauty of Decay (2010) Matthew Sturges, Luca Rossi, Werther Dell’Edera, Jose Marzain Jr Fig and friends are now stuck in The City in the Space Between, and no one can come up with a way out. Stories are still told–stories told and histories remembered where we learn a little more about […]
The Unwritten: Tommy Taylor and the Bogus Identity (2010) Mike Carey, Peter Gross After the disappearance of his father, Tom Taylor has been surviving by going to convention and doing book signings for the series he father named after him. Because Walter Taylor disappeared–and there is no proof of his death–Tommy cannot touch any of […]
Madame Xanadu Vol 2: Exodus Noir (2010) Matt Wagner, Michael Wm. Kaluta Disenchanted gave us Madame Xanadu’s past–how her powers were curtailed by Merlin. Exodus Noir gives us a different look into her past through two time lines, one in 1493 during the Spanish Inquisition, the second in the 1940s, as she looks into the […]
Fables Vol 13: The Great Fables Crossover This was apparently my week to be disappointed in my reading choices. I love Fables. I really do. I’ve avidly awaited every volume, especially as the War with the Adversary came to a head. However, I never much cared for the Jack spin-off, and actually gave up on […]
The House of Mystery: The Space Between (2010) Matthew Sturges, Luca Rossi, Jose Marzan Jr I’d somehow managed to forget that Fig’s father had shown up at the end of the last episode. Needless to say, he’s causing trouble for Fig, at a time when the house is having enough troubles of its own. There […]
Ex Machina: Dirty Tricks (2009) Brian K. Vaughan, Tony Harris, Jim Clark, John Paul Leon, JD Mettier Mitchell Hundred has several problems, as usual. He’s being haunted by a ghost, the Republican convention is coming to town, a woman is pulling crazy stunts to protest President Bush, and the Klan wants to march in the […]
X-23: Innocence Lost (2006) Craig Kyle, Christopher Yost, Billy Tan, Jon Sibal I came across X-23 in NYX: Wannabe, and discovered that she had her own story arc. Since I liked the NYX stories so much, I decided to check out Innocence Lost. I have to say, this was surprisingly good. I’ve browsed different superhero […]
NYX: No Way Home (2009) Marjorie Liu, Kalman Andrasofszky, Sara Pichelli I came across No Way Home at a book store and snatched it up. When I realized there was a volume prior to this, I ordered Wannabe, wanting to read that first. I loved Wannabe. Only problem with that is it set up expectations […]
NYX: Wannabe (2006) Joe Quesada, Joshua Middleton, Robert Teranishi Kiden had a normal life once. But it all fell apart. Then, when things are at their absolute worst, she discovers she has powers. Unfortunately for her, it seems to cause as much harm as good. Over the course of the story she meets up with […]
The Umbrella Academy: Apocalypse Suite (2008) Gerard Way & Gabriel Ba Seven children–of the forty-seven spontaneously born–were adopted by Reginald Hargreeves to become the Umbrella Academy. He sought to help them develop their powers to save the world, but no one knew what the world needed saved from. I wanted to like this, I really […]