A Matter of Life and Death Part 2

PREDATOR: LIFE AND DEATH #1-4
Written by Dan Abnett
Art by Brian Albert Thies
Coloring by Rain Beredo

It's fine. Predator: Life and Death is fine. Perfectly fine. There's colonial marines. They fight and they bitch at each other as you would expect Colonial Marines to fight and bitch. Somebody screams “Get some” and unloads a magazine into the jungle. There's a corporate goon. There's a predator-- Predators, even. And it's all fine. It's a Predator story and it's fine.

Predator: Life and Death is another "multifranchise story cycle" from the minds at Dark Horse. Their previous attempt at weaving Predator, Aliens, Aliens Versus Predator, and Prometheus together into one big story involved different writers and different artists for every story. This time around, they just got the one writer.

Dan Abnett is a perfect choice. He's done space warfare with his Gaunt's Ghost series and he's done comic books (with Andy Lanning) in Guardians of the Galaxy (you might know them from the only Guardians of the Galaxy comic story than anyone has ever ready).

Unfortunately, like much of the line art and the coloring, Predator: Life and Death is a merely adequate experience. At best, it hits the beats that it needs to, at worst it just feels slightly off. It's a book that's better than it could have been, but still not as good as it should be.

At least it's not good enough to get me to forget about how the last time this went down, half of these stories were garbage.

There's one thing about these books, one thing that almost always bugs me, which is that the art doesn't feel right. It doesn't have the grit or the feel of the movies (or even my memory of the novel adaptations-- shout out to SD Perry). The work of Brian Albert Thies is no exception. His work feels unfocused, making it look less like an Impressionist's vision of Predator and more like sloppy art. I suppose there's an argument for both of those art styles. It isn't like adhering to the world's previous creators is going to do anyone any favors.

The colors from Rain Beredo don't help either. The page are colorful in a way that a limited edition bag of Skittles are colorful. It's a semi-pastel wash that doesn't seem to match either the art from Thies or the story from Abnett. In some cases the coloring from Beredo seems to be doing a lot of the heavy lifting (and not very well). The two sides of the art seem to be telling a different story, and neither of those seem to agree with what kind of story they're telling. It isn't bad. There aren't any mistakes that are irredeemable, but they're mistakes that keep the book from being better than a competent licensed comic. That's a bummer, considering the potential that even something as silly as Predator (see: Predator: Fire and Stone).

Then again, I suppose Thies deserves some credit as far as the design of the world goes. He's got some chops as a mechanical draftsman, which sounds like it isn't much, but, seriously, you go out there and try drawing machinery that looks like it actually works. It's really hard. He also manages to embed references to the original 1990 AvP comic which is a nice, if superfluous touch.

But, of course, the most important touch is this:

Thies put the Cracked Tusk Predator from the Kenner AvP action figure line into the comic. There's two reasons for this: 1) He's lazy and used the figure (or the Neca update) as a physical reference or 2) Either him or Abnett did such a deep lore dive that they figured it would be cool for the superfans to see a twenty year old toy in their silly little comic book.

Well, I noticed, and I love it.

It's little things like that that this book needed more of. More weird stuff. More easter eggs. More joie de vivre. As it stands, it's a very nice book, I just see myself having any real future with it.

. . . That was weird. Don't know where that came from. . .

Anyways, like I said, all in all Predator: Life and Death #1-4 is fine. And as fine as it is and as glad as I am that anyone can get comic books made, I can't help but feel that this isn't the best project for Abnett's talents as a military sci-fi writer and that Thies could use a few more years in the oven before he's allowed to handle something as kinetic as this book. And Beredo? He'll be fine. Jordie Bellaire and Dave Stewart can only color so many books, right?

MONSTER OF THE MONTH/MONTHS/WHATEVER: There is none. It's just the predator. Unless you consider Man to be the ultimate monster. Which I don't. Because that sucks. I suppose a straight Predator story, if well executed, doesn't need a gimmick monster to make it worth reading. Predator: Life and Death is not in need of a silly monster. It's fine as it is. It'd just be nice, you know? It would be nice if there was something more to this story than what there currently is.

I give Predator: Life and Death THREE CHESTBURSTERS OUT OF FIVE. It's a likable, well put together action story, if entirely by the numbers.

ONE QUICK NOTE-- This is not the only Dan Abnett story on the shelves right now. Over the past five years or so Dan Abnett and his artist partner INJ Culbard have been quietly making some of the coolest science fiction books out there (The New Deadwardians and Dark Ages) and Wild's End is a continuation of that run.

Wild's End is-- and I want you to stick with me on this until I'm done saying what I've got to say-- is a retelling of War of the Worlds in the world of The Wind and the Willows. It's an alien invasion with anthropomorphic animals.

It's a conceit that allows for Culbard to do some pitch perfect cartooning and for Abnett's handle on the English vernacular to be that much more charming. It's a well written, beautifully illustrated book that I simply adore. I would highly recommend it to anyone. I also feel like after the amount of shit I just talked, I should say something nice about something. Well, there it is. Buy Wild's End.

IN OTHER NEWS: This series doesn't stop here. I will be covering Dark Horse's "Life and Death" story cycle for as long as it's going. That also means that I have an excuse to talk about other Aliens, Predator, and AvP comics because, boy howdy, have I been making some dumb decisions on eBay lately.

If that sounds appealing to you at all, then stand by. If that doesn't sound appealing to you, please send help.

Aliens: Defiance #1 and #2 are out as we speak (and are not part of the "Life and Death" cycle as I had assumed they were) and, just last week Prometheus: Life and Death #1 has come out as well. I'm working on those reviews as we speak.

More on the way, in the meantime, you can check out my previous run of reviews by searching for “James Versus Fire and Stone."

As far as other parts of this series (which includes Archie Versus Predator and Aliens/Vampirella), you can go here.

See you soon.

“BEHOLD! GLORY!”

Predator #4 Review

Part Fifteen of James Versus Fire and Stone

I can't believe I've made it. I can't believe we made it. I can believe that I'm this late, though. That shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. In reality, this whole thing. . . Well, I guess I'll get a little more meditative when I review Prometheus: Omaga. . . Whenever it is that I get around to that one.

Back when iFanboy* had a website complete with writing one of the running gags, or complaints, really, was that it was hard to write things about good books week in and week out. There was Brubaker's run on Captain America. There's books like The Walking Dead (which they read in different formats, but still). Even now they still kind of go on about how it's hard to say new things about books that are continually good (Batman under the tutelage of Scott Snyder and Greg Capulo comes to mind)

I always saw that as a lack of creativity. Or will. Some kind of intellectual cowardice. Well, I'm here to say that I'm an asshole. It's hard to say more good things about Predator #4.It's just a solid book. It's fun. It's funny. It looks good. It feels good in a way that I cannot quite quantify. It's possible that it isn't the most intellectual stimulating book on the market, but I bet a lot of smarter books don't also have an alien big game hunter getting into a fist fight with a living god. If you like Predator, then go buy this book. Go read it at your local library. Just do something, will you?

It ends in a stronger way that any of the other books have. A solid portion of my good feelings towards the ending is down to this being an otherwise excellent book. So, if the ending is open-ended or incomplete in some way, oh well. The rest of it was fun as hell. In the end we get the journey and the destination. Good for Predator.

Also, shouldn't it be enough that something doesn't make people feel bad about things? That's an art, right?

If you want to imagine what this book is in my brain, it's Christopher Mooneyham and Joshua Williamson doing donuts in the school parking lot while everyone else from Fire and Stone looks on in frustration, trying to finish their assignments (not sure if Sebela and Olivietti can see it from the special education building down the way, but they can definitely hear those sweet, sweet donuts getting pulled). That's what it is. Imagine two bros pulling donuts in a parking lot forever. That's Predator: Fire and Stone.

Fuck it: I give Predator #4 FIVE OUT OF FIVE CHESTBURSTERS. I love it. It excites me. There's something about taking a thing as silly as a Predator/Prometheus/Alien crossover and taking it just serious enough to crank out a fun book. Go read it. Contrary to my whining about the BOOK WHICH SHALL NOT BE NAMED, this is the type of thing you should support. It's not high art, but it doesn't need to be. It's a genre piece that works and, since we're all friends here, I'm not afraid to say this: Sometimes that is as good as you need to be.

You can read the previous installments of "James Versus Fire and Stone" below:
Alien Versus Predator #4
Predator #3
Aliens #4
Prometheus #4
Alien Versus Predator #3
Aliens #3
Predator #2
Prometheus #3
Alien Versus Predator #2
Aliens #2
Predator #1

Prometheus #2

Alien Versus Predator #1

Alien #1 and Prometheus #1

*Gee, I sure mention iFanboy a lot. Probably because it's one of the few sources of comic opinions that I've listened to over the past eight years. And it's not like I'm going to link my friend Joe's opinion or a back issue of Wizard or something, appealing as that might be to everyone. . .

James Kislingbury is a writer, a podcaster, and a survivor. You can follow his show here. You can donate to his endeavors here. Or you can just hire the poor bastard. Have you seen how skinny he is? He can't be eating well.

In Which I Finally Crack

Or “Well, that got out of hand quick”

A Review AvP #4

Part Fourteen of "James Versus Fire and Stone"

The nightmare is over. We have reached the end of the tunnel and there is light. Alien Versus Predator did not bury us, but sometimes I wish it had.

In many ways AvP #4 is worse than I could have imagined. The one-liners seem to have been written by a child. The art is lazy and muddy in new and stupid ways. The story. . . well, it actually makes sense, so there's that. Yet, despite all of this it's also the funniest released so far. AvP #4 is the issue in which is has passed through the vortex and emerged on the other side as “So Bad It's Good,” as opposed to “So Bad It Should Be Sealed Away in a Vault Forever and Ever.” Congrats, Sebela and Olivetti. You did it.

All that said, don't buy this run of Aliens Versus Predator. Don't read it. Don't even think about it. Speak not its name. Know not its horrors. With all of that said, I have this horrible feeling in the back of my head that tells me that my life is going to be ironically saved by this final issue somehow, and, honestly,, I don't know if death is better.

“Consumer” is an ugly word, isn't it? I'm no communist, but it is certainly revealing of what the people in charge of production think of us, doesn't it? What do you do? Do you enjoy? Do you ruminate? Do you meditate? Do you absorb? No. You consume. It's a reduction of a human being to a medium that moves money.

It's part of a trend, or at least a change in our perception of what art is. It's a devaluing of what it is. You see it all over and, unlike being a consumer, you actually see

I guess it's probably always been this way. I mean, how old is that "Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" essay? Gotta be pushing a hundred, right? The modern twist is that we seem to have accepted just how crappy things can be. This is a crappiness not thrust upon us, but a crappiness we have taken into our hearts.

You see this with how we watch TV. We don't watch it any more, we "binge watch." It's depressing. Besides it taking its terminology from one of the more decadent mental dysfunctions we've drummed up as human beings-- is that it has helped eliminate the idea that we should pause and take any time to think about anything. Want to think about what this means for Walt and Skyler's relationship? Maybe? Fuck it, put the next one on. There's no breathing room. There is no time for (Japanese word for “breathing room”). There's just non-stop noise. A wall to wall assault on the senses

What'd you do with Breaking Bad? I consumed it. Great. I'm sure that's what Vince Gilligan and everybody wanted you to do with their art. Then again, maybe they did. I'm sure the paycheck doesn't look any different.

It is as though, at some point, we all watched They Live, smiled, nodded, and then put on another episode of Friends (now on Instant Watch!). Sometimes, some of us need a Trashcan of Reason to the head. I paw through AvP, desperately trying to make sense of it, and I think that Trashcan has finally arrived at my head.And if you're not a consumer, it's not like you get upgraded. Instead, what are you? You're a fan. Great!

“Fan” is an equally ugly little word. It comes from fanatic. I supposed being a fanatic of Transformers is a vertical move away from the type of cave dweller that flies planes into buildings, but the connotation is there. I mean, nobody likes fanatics, do they?

I look at Aliens Versus Predator, and the trend our media is stuck in in general and I think “God. Can't we do better than this?” We're science fiction nerds. We supported Star Trek and Richard Matheson and Harlan Ellison and Kurt Vonnegut. We watched Twilight Zone when it was more than just a marathon on Thanksgiving Day. We believe in ideas. We like weird shit. Now what do we foam at the mouth at? A Jurassic Park sequel? Another Disney movie based on a ride (based on a retro-future)? Is this the future we were building for ourselves? Do we somehow deserve this?

The depressing capper on all of this is a realization I had about Steven Spielberg. Twenty-some years ago he made Jurassic Park. If he was an up and coming film maker today, he would be relegated to a Jurassic Park reboot. Or a fucking monkey movie reboot sequel and you fucks think you're going to break me? And, yeah, most of those movies are fine, some better than fine, but, really, what would you rather have? Jurassic Park or another Jurassic Park sequel?

So Dark Horse pumps out bullshit like Aliens Versus Predator and it sells. And it has for decades. To quote a film executive in the early 90's, “I could piss on a wall for two hours and call it Alien 3 and it would make sixty million dollars.” Names sell. Divorced of even its source, we still lap it up and, why? Because we're consumers. We're fans. It's what they expect of us because it's the easy thing to do. And, fuck that. It's a marketing strategy that takes us for saps.

But there's hope. There are people doing right by us, people that aren't looking for another inch of flesh to fuck us in. In comics we have Jonathan Hickman, for one. Between East of West and Manhattan Projects, he's making some of the craziest, most interesting sci-fi out there (and that isn't to mention his work for Marvel, of which I have only read Agents of SHIELD, which was, well, a book of questionable quality and purpose). He's a man who is swings for the fences and connects most of the time. He's a writer who is worth spending some time with.

Then there's Matt Fraction, Fionna Staples, Grant Morrison, Ales Kot, Kelly Sue DeConnick, and Brian K. Vaughn. John Arcudi, Guy Davis, and Mike Mignola are still doing their crazy apocalytic stuff with Hellboy and the BPRD with the same publisher that shoveled AvP out into the street. There's also Brandon Graham and his legion of artist and writer collaborators, who are playing DM with the Prophet license (proving that you can take a terrible license and make it into something wonderful). Hell, if we want to let Brian Wood back out of the cold, he's doing some solid work with The Massive. Then there's the legion of small publishers and indie artists doing their thing under the radar. It's not all gloom.

Now that I think about it, if you're into that sort of thing, even licensed comics seem to be pretty good nowadays. So, I don't know. There's hope. We just have to accept it. As consumers, as fans, as binge watchers, it's up to us to us to determine what the marketplace looks like. Or, god forbid, a gallery space. What's the Against Me lyric? "Be the bands you want to hear."

Overall, I look at the way we look at art and the way it's presented to us is done so in the most crass, disposable fashion. We aren't aficionados. We're consumers. Or we're fans. We don't appreciate thing. We binge on it. And we are expected to move on to the next thing. I don't think that's the way to look at good art and I don't think that it's the way we should be looking at art. Like I said, we're better than that.

Life is short and miserable enough without going out of your way to fill it with bad stuff. It's an exhausting way to live. That's the only lesson I think I can impart to you: Seek out the things you love and go love them. Try to make sure that the things you fill your life with and spend your money on aren't crass and disposable. You're better than that. Unless you just want to live in garbage, because the universe will always find a place for simple people with too much money in their hands.

What does AvP #4 get? ONE OUT OF FIVE CHESTBURSTERS. It's barely a book. It's barely a story. It's terrible. Read anything else, because the odds are good that even if it sucks, it'll be better than this piece of shit. The only pleasure I got from the book was when it was done. And even that was tinged with annoyance.

Ack. I need a musical break.




You can read the previous installments of "James Versus Fire and Stone" below:
Predator #3
Aliens #4
Prometheus #4
Alien Versus Predator #3
Aliens #3
Predator #2
Prometheus #3
Alien Versus Predator #2
Aliens #2
Predator #1

Prometheus #2

Alien Versus Predator #1

Alien #1 and Prometheus #1

James Kislingbury is a writer and a podcaster and a big game hunter. If you like what you read, you can support his podcasting endeavors by going to his Patreon. Or don't. Whatever. Be that way.

NEVER GET CAUGHT

Not Quite Like Pulling Teeth
Thoughts on Secret (2014).

Secret is one of those books I skipped reading in issues because I figured I was just going to get it in the trades. Manhattan Projects is one of the best books I've read in a long while (as far as super-science books go, I think Nowhere Men just barely edges it out). Considering the book's subject mattr, in addition to its pedigree, it seemed like a slam dunk. Having now finished it, having done some measure of meditation on the book, I kind of wish I had only bought the first issue instead.

And I am not entirely disappointed. Secret is a fine book. Perfectly fine, even. While I still really like Jonathan Hickman as a writer, this book feels sparse. In that way, it's less Manhattan Projects than it is Red Wing. It's an odd thing to accuse a Hickman book of being insubstantial. Overall it feels like a story that was sitting in Hickman's drawer for a couple of years until he became Mr. Crossover at Marvel. Good for him if he's got that kind of heat behind him. There's certainly less deserving creators out there and it's a hard enough trade, the comic's game, even within the halls of the Big Two.

On that same note Secret is fairly vapid. It isn't that it's dumb. I've read dumber books than Secret that don't move as quickly and as viciously as it does. The Programme is a book that is both dumb and slow. As a dressed-up genre book, it's doing something right. It's violent. It's mean. It's got twists. And that's about it.

When I approach some of the book's deeper meaning, I don't come away looking for more answers. I come away slightly more confused, as if the answer isn't even worth knowing. The artistic style leaps to mind.

The concept behind Michael Garland's color palette is my main stumbling block. In the book, it leaps from black and white to monochrome to sepia, with the odd splash of blood here and there. Think a collision of Sin City, Casanova, and, for flavor, the opening of The Big Red One.

Is it symbolic? Is it tonal? Is it just quirky? Am I an idiot? If so, why? Or is it just there as chaff to distract us all from the fact that there's basically nothing beneath the surface of this book? At least when Hickman did it (and I'm sure it was his idea, it almost has to be his idea) in Manhattan Projects there is a clear connection to either a character or a timeline. It works in conjunction with Nick Pitarra's art (also Jordie Bellaire, the fairy queen of coloring works on the book, which doesn't hurt). Here. . . I don't know it's just weird.

Other than that, the art is excellent.  Ryan Bodenheim does a fine job of differentiating characters and generally making Secret's world of office blocks and cubicles into something visually arresting. Or at least as visually arresting as those things can be. I'd be interested to see what Bodenheim does in the future and what he's done in the past. Even if this isn't the perfect project, his art carries the story along nicely. Then again, it'd have been nice to see some color thrown in there somewhere.

It's frustrating to not know how dumb or how smart it is. It's like Lost. Or The Leftovers. Is it me? Is it this dumb book? Both, maybe? Are you leaving us a mystery to solve or did you just plain forget to fill out the details? With Manhattan Projects there is no such doubt. And, hell, it isn't Hickman's experiment on SHIELD, whatever the hell that was supposed to be.

But it's Jonathan Hickman making an industrial espionage book with a fairly talented artist and I am perfectly okay with that.  It's also only $9.99, so who the hell am I to complain? Image drives a hard bargain. Just read Manhatattan Projects or Nowhere Men and let's call this whole thing a wash, okay? Or maybe Zero if you want some crazed ultraviolence. Or East of West.  

Hey, the world is your fucking oyster, okay? Go out there and read something.



James Kislingbury is a writer, podcaster, and an enemy of mankind. You can follow him on twitter.

Nippon by Numbers

"I'm the Most Acceptable at What I Do"
Thoughts on The Wolverine (2013)

The Wolverine is pretty good. It's competent in all the right ways and even has the odd moment of brilliance sprinkled through out the narrative. There isn't anything that is terribly objectionable. Overall, it's as challenging as a cup of cocoa. And not even, like, Mexican hot chocolate, I mean plain ass, straight up hot cocoa. Maybe some whipped cream on top.

It's the definition of a movie you watch on cable because there's nothing else on.

My main problem with the movie is also kind of the charm of it. Japan is as much of a character in The Wolverine as anyone else and, like everyone else, that character is a cartoon. The world that James Mangold has carved into celluloid (or, from the looks of it, binary code), is less an NHK documentary as it is a series of knobs and cranks doling out exactly what kind of Japanese we're going to see and how much.

Over the course of the movie Wolverine battles his way from a POW camp to fighting the Yakuza in modern day Tokyo to fighting ninja and then, finally, a giant robot. It's literally every home grown bad guy Japan has to offer.

There was a time when all I knew about Japan and Japanese pop culture I gleaned from the pages of PSM. It's fun to revisit these things. It's fun to not have to think about politics or thousands of years of wood carving or tea ceremonies or whatever. It's a cartoon. It's simple, it's fun, and it doesn't need to be anything more than that.

Basically, Japan is The Wolverine.

But a few other things come to mind, such as how it treats Imperial Japanese soldiers and the dropping of the second A-bomb. Even in a movie that is as pop corn munchingly throw away as this one, it gives you something to think about. Or it at least tries, and that has always been the hallmark of the X-Men film franchise, which started with the Holocaust, for God's sake.

The Japanese Army's track treatment of their fellow man is well established. Anybody who knows anything about world history or World War II knows about how they treated civilians and natives and enemy combatants. If you don't, I'll be brief and tell you that they did not treat them especially well.

The Wolverine doesn't deal with those things. I doesn't need to. It doesn't even pay lip service to these things. At the risk of white washing history, I think it's a smart move on the part of the film makers. There's a couple of reasons for this.

The first one is practical. We have to spend two hours with this country (and almost exclusively this country, all but two of the leads, are Asian), so bringing up Unit 731 or bringing up "comfort women" or mass executions isn't going to make this narrative very palatable. Plus, it's a PG-13 movie. We don't need to see murder contests in a movie about a super hero vigilante trying to get his groove back.

When X-Men began with the Holocaust, it was a smart move. Maybe not in the best taste, but it was smart. It set up the plight of the mutant species (by showing both the specific plight of Magneto and by stating that the Final Solution is, in some way, analogous to the persecution of mutants). It also makes us sympathise with the villain of the piece, which, again, is one of the ongoing themes of the X-Men franchise.

Secondly, it goes against the spirit of the movie. In the opening minutes of The Wolverine, we see Wolverine in a hot box reminiscent of Bridge Over the River Kwai, but before that we see a Japanese officer freeing Allied (presumable ANZACs or Canadians) and waving off a guard from shooting them.

By doing this, it elevate the Japanese as more than brutal fanatics and it makes one particular Japanese man (who later turns out to be the villain) into a good guy. When the A-Bomb does detonate, it becomes  less an instrument of punishment as it is a force of nature.

In these ways it also injects a kind of basic human decency that is in keeping with the best of the series (or at least just Days of Future Past). It's a smarter, kinder move than a movie like this needs and if only for that it makes The Wolverine a better movie than it has to be.

It isn't changing history, it's choosing to deal with it in a different way. I like that.

And I can always watch Nanking if I want to be reminded of the actual facts. But sometimes I don't want to. Sometimes I just want to see a movie where a guy does what he does best and what he does ain't pretty.

I'd Hate to See The Union Busters

I'll be brief: You should read COWL #1.

As though engineered to anger my father, COWL tells the story of the world's first unionized superhero team.

Rather than using that idea as a set-up for some kind of reflexive, high-concept nonsense that floods the pages of Previews every month ("Hey, what if Batman was actually a vampire!?" and "Hey, what if Superman retired and got into cock fighting!?" they all said, choking on their own sick), COWL actually uses its concept to tell a story which, again, looking at the pages of Previews, actually is a kind of high concept in and of itself. . .

In short order, we're thrown into a familiar (but not too familiar) 1960's Chicago where we see a team of heroes closing out a case against a supervillain. It's a high concept deployed correctly and it's a story that feels new and different instead of playing off of a story we've seen a hundred times before (but with, I don't know, more drugs and uses of the c-word). If it's playing off anything, it's Mad Men and even that's only in the comic's set dressing.

It's the comic book that I didn't know I wanted. It's also mature in the proper sense of the word. Yeah, it has the murder and death, but so does Law and Order. By sprinkling in some sexism or brutality, writers Kyle Higgins and Alex Siegel are informing the world and the narrative, not just thumbing their nose at the Big Two's editorial policies. They aren't pushing buttons, they're creating a world.

Besides the sex and violence (and one delightful bit of public urination), it's also a book with a sense of humor. It also deals with complex relationships between people and it does so all in a very short amount of time. It's a fun book that smartly plays between the kind of "realism" we're used to seeing in superhero comic books post-1985 and the kind of fun that made us pick up comics in the first place.

And the art. . . Oh man, the art. You ever have that moment where you see an indie book that looks interesting and you pick it up to see what it's like inside and it looks like somebody who couldn't get work at DC? This isn't that.

As strong as the cover is, the interior is even better. Rod Reis' work looks like a comfortable mix between Bill Sienkiewctz and Phil Noto. It's a look that almost any book would be lucky to have and in this case, with this story, it feels a bit magical. Something special is going on in this first issue and I'm really excited for what the future might bring.

Go support good comics. Go support weird and new ones. Go read COWL.

Oh, and here's a free blurb: "COWL is Watchmen and The Wire meets FIST."

There. That blurby enough for ya?

FURTHERMORE:

There's a character called Arclight. And he flies. And I should have thought of it. But I didn't. And I hate it.

James Kislingbury writes comics and records podcasts. You can follow him on Twitter @kislingtwits.

WILD CYBERPUNKS RUNNING THE STREETS

WILD CYBERPUNKS RUNNING THE STREETS
Or "How I Got My Shit Together and Finally Started Reading Akira"

I started reading Akira.

More specifically, I finally started reading Akira. I might have been inspired by iFanboy's series on the show or I maybe Spex mentioned it to me one time to many. Or maybe my collective ignorance finally made me feel guilty enough to finally check the damn thing out. Maybe I just broke. You happy now?

I think the first time I ever saw this book on display was at the Virgin Records in Burbank. If you're looking to help date this: Virgin Records no longer exists. I'm fairly certain Burbank has been taken by the mole people, as well.

It wouldn't have been too long after seeing that I began my short foray into the world of anime. It's not a time I'm super proud of, but it wasn't nearly as dark as it could be. One of the reasons for this is that Akira was being re-released in theaters with a new voice acting (I didn't let the fact that Tetsou sounded exactly like one of the Digimon kids distract me. . . Mostly because I really like Digimon).

I might have seen Princess Mononoke at that point (on a VHS tape at my friend's house along with The Big Lebowski and Rushmore and, for whatever reason, Heavy Metal 2000), I was certainly aware of the medium-- but seeing Akira play out was like hearing Led Zeppelin* for the first time. It was the kind of seminal moments that you get when a work of art completely expands your horizons. It was what the medium was supposed to be. Looking at the comic book, even with it being nearly thirty years old, I realize that it still is everything the medium should be.

Akira is the first comic in a long time where I've though "Can you even do that?"

Katsuhiro Otomo does things in the comic that should be impossible to do in the medium. You see a lot of this in bad comics. You see people trying to fit too many words onto a page. You see people used to working in one medium (almost always film or prose and almost always as failed movie pitches) failing to work in the other. You see all kinds of mistakes based on a basic misunderstanding of how comic book grammar works.

As an amateur, I've caught myself doing this when I write. Most of my mistakes involve a character doing too much in a panel (like, you know, moving) or it involves a sound effect (Note: You cannot cut on a sound in a comic). It's a terrible habit and it's something easy to do if you aren't completely versed in what a comic book can and cannot do.

With Otomo what you see is a man who knows the rules and who breaks these rules whenever he feels like it, and who then gets away with it.He inverts panels, he turns them on their head, he stacks them up and cuts up their borders. He chops things up, he shifts back and forth. He hides things from the reader. This comic has dissolves-- dissolves, for God's sake! That's not a thing you can do in comics! But he is and he's getting away with it!

What's impressive, beyond the strength of the actual artwork, is how seamless it all looks when you're reading it. It doesn't read as a man showing off what he can do, it just reads as good comics. It's the kind of good that seems so simple and so obvious that I wonder why more people don't straight rip it off. At least I know why I haven't ripped this book off.

In all those decades I can't think of anybody that has done what Otomo has done. I can only think of imitators and I can only think of imitators that fall short. And, really, that's all there is. There is Akira and then there's everything else that came after Akira. It isn't only that Otomo is a master draftsman, there is something magical going on inside this book that I can't quite put my finger on.

Again, it makes me feel like an idiot for having waited this long. Don't be like me, go out and read it right now. You won't be sorry for long.

I'm two volumes into the book. I only stopped because, for whatever reason, I'm missing volume three (which means I need to drive over to Long Beach and steal that copy from my friend Alex or just break down and actually buy the damn thing). I can't wait to blaze through the rest of this book. And to finally pick up Domu, which has sat in the back of my mind for nearly two decades with the rest of my hazy memories of Dark Horse's ads. That is if I can find a copy of Domu. After that I'm going to watch the movie again. And then I'll check out Steamboy one more time. And then. . .

James Kislingbury writes comics and podcasts. You can follow him on twitter.



SIDE NOTE:
Actually, you should all go and see Memories. I think I wrote about it once. . . Anyways, one of the shorts in the film is directed by Otomo and you should check that out, because nobody directs rusty industrial design quite like Otomo.

FOOT NOTES:
*I now realize that Zeppelin is one of the most profoundly over-rated and over-played bands in all of time and space, but we were all fourteen at one point and, thankfully, we were only fourteen once.

I Done Gone to the Library: A Follow-Up

Like I said: I went to the library.

My reading stack is getting ridiculous. I've got a Hellblazer omnibus, two volumes of Akira, Judenhass (still), and the first Satellite Sam trade. That's just the comics. I'm working my way through the first book of Shadow Claw and after that is Live and Let Die and then God knows how many WWII books after that. I'm just glad that, while at the store today, I realized that I needed another book like I needed a hole in the head (so I only bought the new League of Extraordinary Gentlemen).

And then Jan's Atomic Heart. And maybe a Parker novel and a George V. Higgins novel, but that's it.

I swear.

Here are the books from the library that I actually managed to read (and finish)--

Lost Dogs-- Jeff Lemire.

I was right. So very right. And I don't want to feel this pain any more.

It hurts so bad and I want to go home, but I'm already there.

On the plus side-- and there is a real plus side-- is that a book like Lost Dogs is proof that whatever project it is that you want to complete, there are people that will meet you half way. Lost Dogs is a rough looking book. Actually, I take that back, Sweet Tooth is a rough looking book. Lost Dogs is primitive. The color scheme is almost non-existent, the character models are. . . "fluid," let's say, and the brush work is downright sloppy. But it works and it's good because it does all come together to tell a story. It doesn't work as a collection of drawings. It does work, though, as a comic book. I really like it.

I like it not only because it's a simple story, well told (in the afterword Lemire goes on about how he failed to write and draw a massive sci-fi epic, which is funny, because I remember reading an Alan Moore interview where that same exact thing happened to him). I also like it because it encourages me to work on my own stories. They don't need to be showy or clever or stand out. They just need to be good. They need to be good in whatever capacity that means.

No matter how rough it is or how much of a bummer it may or may not be or how little of a name you are, there is an audience for your work. People will read it if it's good.

The Infinite Horizon-- Duggan and Noto.

The Infinite Horizon is not very good. Unlike a lot of times when I take a contrarian position, this time, I am legitimately baffled. Befuddled, even. Boggled.

That isn't to say that it isn't useful. The pages are overcrowded with text that seems to fill out what should be in the art. As much as I have liked using that in the past, it isn't until now that I realize just how annoying this is when you aren't the one writing it. When it comes to voice overs not everyone can make Apocalypse Now and when it comes to comics not everyone can be Neil Gaiman.

Having read this and having made my own half-assed diagnosis, I've come to the conclusion that I need to write less and let my artist do his thing. I have this blog if I want to babble on forever.

It's an odd comic overall. It doesn't quite feel like it's in the real world and it doesn't ever commit to being a fable. It's not gritty enough to be a war book and it pulls too much out of real world events to hit on the kind of legendary narrative that Star Wars or, hell, even Kings managed to nail.

I don't know what this is.Worse yet, I don't care enough about the story to ignore this flaw in the storytelling. The Infinite Horizon has received fairly positive reviews and I can't account for that other than these people are clearly sick and need help.

Pray for them, dear reader.

Maybe go read the current run of Black Widow. That's got some real good Phil Noto in it.

THE AD ZONE

A Quality Interruption is officially here. . . Sort of. It's just a place holder, really, to remind you that it exists. And now I'm reminding you that the reminder exists.

You can see my overwritten comics in the anthologies Old College Comics Presents and The Freshman Fifteen. You can buy a meatspace copy of it or a digital version! They're a good value, they're independent, and every issue you buy is one step closer to me getting a check for this thing that's more than fifteen dollars. Isn't that a dream worth helping along?

You can follow me on twitter, too. I guess.

Also, one last thing: Thank you, everyone who reads this. I really appreciate it. I don't get money for this. I don't get kudos. All I get is some odd numbers on the back end of this website. And that's all. And that's quite enough.

I Done Gone to the Library

The Pasadena Public Library is a wonder house.

Besides the fact that it's full of wonderful books that you can just go ahead and take, it has a wonderful comic book collection. I first read Watchmen because of that library. And League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and Sandman and Preacher and quite a few other wonderful books that I never would have picked up if they hadn't been there just waiting for me.

Libraries are pretty good places, as it turns out, especially for young, vulnerable nerds.

This past week I renewed the tradition and picked up the following books:

Infinite Kung Fu-- Kagan McLeod.

This is a book I've been waiting a long while to read. Like, years. Even when it came out in a TPB (and at a reasonable price), I never got around to actually buying the damn thing. I just looked at it and moved on and eventually forgot about it, which is the way of these things. If I hadn't found it at the library I don't know that I would have ever gotten around to it.

It's about Kung Fu and while I feel that my best Kung Fu loving years are behind me, this should be a good ride. One can always use more Kung Fu treachery in their life. Plus, it's called "Infinite Kung Fu." Who doesn't want to read that? That sounds like exactly what I need right now.

Lost Dogs-- Jeff Lemire.

Any time somebody smiles in a Jeff Lemire comic it seems like it's a set-up for something terrible to happen. And since Lost Dogs is one of his earlier, independent works, I'm fully expecting this to have an emotional palette that ranges from "Being waterboarded" to "Waterboarding your cat."

Not to say that it's going to be bad. I just know that it's probably going to hurt.

I never got around to writing about Sweet Tooth, so I suppose I'll do so here: Sweet Tooth is one of the best books Vertigo has come out with in a long time (or at least since Scalped). While Lemire's art is, um, rough, there is an emotional underbelly to that book that is so delicate that makes me feel like I've been writing wrong this entire time. And that's always a good sign. . .

War's End-- Joe Sacco.

I don't know much about Joe Sacco other than the fact that he tends to do books about war that are non-fiction. Apparently. I'll find out if I'm wrong soon enough.

This particular book is about Bosnia in the 90's, which despite Rick Steves' best efforts, is still not place that makes me think of a good time. Basically what I'm saying is that it'll likely be less merciless than the Jeff Lemire book I picked up.

The Infinite Horizon*-- Gerry Dugan and Philip Noto.

The Infinite Horizon is another book that I've been meaning to read for a long while. Well. Here I am. The library, once again, decided for me.

For those who don't know The Infinite Horizon is the Odyssey told in the modern era with the War on Terror serving in place of the Trojan War. It's a bit high concept for me and I don't have much attachment with the Odyssey outside of that one Wishbone episode, but anything that reminds me of Kings, however tangentially, is always welcome.

Wait. . . Is this title a reference to The Lost Horizon? Oh boy, that doesn't bode well. . .

Before Watchmen: Ozymandias/Crimson Corsair-- Len Wein, Jae Lee, John Higgins, and Steve Rude.

When I heard about this thing, the sudden taste of copper and bad oranges hit the back of my throat. It didn't seem right. When the talent attached to the project was announced and it almost seemed that DC, despite the wishes of the creators, despite good taste, and despite all odds, was trying to do this thing right. It's an especially odd choice when you consider that most alcoholics have less accute cases of self-sabotage than DC Comics.

And, yet, it still seemed wrong. Deeply and bizarrely wrong. I seemed odd that I had to have an opinion about it, to the point at which I had about the same feelings for it as crazy people that I have never met nor care to. It was like somebody was doing fanfic of the Bible. Or slash fiction on the Constitution. And they hired Stephen King to work on it. There's something to be said about leaving some things alone.

Then it came out and nobody cared and went away. That almost seemed like a small mercy. It was one less thing to be outraged about. One less thing to be annoyed about. Plus, since Alan Moore isn't involved in the project (except maybe buying one of the comics to make some sort of a Druidic hex), at least I don't have to worry about there being an obligatory rape.

I'm still curious, though. And I'll be goddamned if I'm going to throw actual money at the actual After Watchmen project. I'm sick, not crazy.

THE AD CULT DEMANDS BLOOD

Speaking of comics: I have written some. You can buy them in digital form or in good old analogue. The name of the collections I am featured in are The Freshman Fifteen and Old College Comics Presents. I'm rather proud of them. Everyone at Old College Comics is proud of the work we've done. It might not be the finest or the most polished comic book you'll ever read, but it's independent, it's

I also do a podcast called White Guys, Square Glasses. In this podcast my friend Cruz Flores and I ramble on about a particular movie in each episode. The subject ranges from schlocky camp fests to Japanese action movies to the odd Cold War thriller. It's a good time, through and through. On the latest podcast we reviewed the ridculous voodoo movie The Serpent and the Rainbow.

We're going to be changing the name to A Quality Interruption soon, so don't forget to subscribe to switch over when that happens on the 7th.

FOOTNOTES

*I read The Infinite Horizon. It isn't very good, you guys. You should probably read other things from Duggan and Noto instead.

Sex: It's What People Do

Author's Note: It's been pointed out to me that this has a lot of, shall we say, unfinished sentences? While I appreciate the effort I am well aware of my lack of a copy-editor that isn't my cat. The following is a second go at this article.

As discussed in a previously post, I went on a bit of a comic book buying binge. I blame Christmas. And my poor impulse control. And a lot of things.

Speaking of which, one of the comics I bought is Sex.

I don't know that I've ever read a Joe Casey comic before. There was a time when I wanted to pick up Butcher Baker the Righteous Maker, but since that violently imploded, I think I'll take the long way around to checking out that book. From my understanding Mr. Casey is a man who takes superheroes and pits them against situations that are completely opposed to superheroics or situations that are the ultimate conclusion of the superheroing business. (Trade? Practice?)

That's a fine way to go about things. It's also as much a part of the comic landscape as the straight stories about people in capes. He seems far less pleased with his ideas than a guy like Mark Millar does and he also seems far more talented than the kind of "But what if Batman was in real life!?' type of nonsense that pours out of the Preview pages.

Sex's particular take on superheroes is "What if Batman quit being Batman? Also, what if everyone in Gotham City was a sexual maniac? Also, what if costumes were a poorly explored metaphor about sexual dysfunction?" And then it goes from there. Kind of. In its defense it doesn't feel cheap or exploitative. Maybe it's because I'm so jaded and cynical, but I never batted an eye at the sexual content of the book.

Then again maybe that's also a problem. If I'm not batting an eye at the contents of a book that was sold with the tagline "IMAGE WANTS YOU TO BUY SEX" then maybe something has gone wrong somewhere along the lines.

Though, the boners and the tits are there. My reaction is sort of tempered by the fact that they are there and they are sticking up at you. If that's the sort of book you were looking for-- and I thought I was-- then Sex will deliver.

The main problem with the book is that as good looking as it is, it is listless. Appropriately listless considering the theme. Or one of the themes. I'm not sure I care to parse them out. Our main character is primarily defined by the fact that he doesn't do anything. He has a thrilling past and one full of trauma and psychological conclusion, yet we're stuck in the present with this white goofus who seems to have the acting range of an opium addled Keanu Reeves.

Like scenes like this? Well, don't get used to them.

Ennui isn't an emotion that moves stories forward. That's a lesson we never quite learned from the French.

This lack of drive carries over to Sex's world building. In works like Watchmen or The Winter Men or any number of other books in this vein we have fully realized worlds that are as much a part of the story as the characters or the dialogue. Batman has had 70 years to throw a world together, but as readers we know what Gotham City is. It's a place that is alive and that has real weight. As a writer Joe Casey is making an analogue of Gotham City without any of the texture of that city. In Sex we're treated to a lot of men in suits and skyscrapers. Saturn City doesn't feel like a real place and that's important if your main characters aren't exactly leaping off of the page.

As far as Sex's supporting characters, we have the Alpha Brothers (the world's one and only Sebastian O cosplay gang), The Old Man, Keenan, and this world's Catwoman stand in, each weaving in and out of each others' lives, trying to make a living in a world without Batman the Armored Saint. Yet, by the end of the trade the only thing that's changed in any of their lives is that Not Catwoman had to get glasses. Which she thinks makes her look old. Considering that Lisa Ann is the world's most popular porn star and she's known for dressing up like another well known MILF, I can't help but feel that Not Catwoman can't see the forest for the trees. You know. Literally in this case.

Plus the main character has a goatee and what the fuck is that in 2014?

Overall, though, the book is rather humorless. I mean. It's called Sex. I'm not looking for Benny Hill here, but if you're going to have superheroes standing around not being superheroes, at least make me smile. I mean, Lord almighty nobody is having fun in this book. I'll go watch Shame if I wanted that. (I don't.)

All in all I'm excited that Hayao Miyazaki is making comics again. I want to read something nice.



WELCOME TO THE AD GAUNTLET--

I came out with a comic book myself. It's called  Old College Comics Presents and it's pretty fucking exciting. The cover looks great. The paper stock is solid. Some of the words and drawings together are pretty decent, too. If you're not interested in picking up the new comic, we also have an old one (It's called The Freshman Fifteen. Get it?). Either way, who are you to resist?

(It seems our website hasn't been updated. . . Huh. That'll have to be resolved rather soon. . .)

I do a podcast with my actor friend Cruz Flores. It's called White Guys, Square Glasses. It is a title that is 75% accurate. If you like the kind of nonsense I've written in the above article you might like the kind of nonsense that falls out of my mouth on our show. It's about media and pop culture and rambling on about whatever catches our fancy. In short: It's a podcast. But it's one from me.

How Ill are Comics?

The Answer: Comic book are most ill.

As many comics as I have been buying and as many as I have been reading, my To Do List is getting higher and higher. Most of the time, when I buy one of these books-- or any book, really-- it's with the mental concession that I will either learn something about the craft or churn out a non-fiction piece of some kind on this blog. In that way it can do some actual, positive good in my life and not just entertain me, which, hey, I guess that is something. There's a lot of things out there that can't even manage that.

These are the following books that I have bought, but haven't read yet:

 Ghosted.

I'm always up for a good crime story. Supernatural stuff, though? It's about as attractive to me as a gay bar called the "Knife Wound." Even though something like Hellblazer or Hellboy will occasionally drop, you more often than not end up with the same shity paranormal investigator story ever written between 1993 and today excluding The X-Files (but not even all of The X-Files). It is a genre that has created an environment where RIPD could thrive.

Ghosted, luckily, isn't garbage. It seems very much aware of how overpopulated the genre is, as well as how underwhelming it usually is. The first two issues introduce you to a violent and vulgar world where a professional thief is tasked to steal Vincent Price a ghost. And then it gets weird. From what I have read, I liked. I'm looking forward to how this thing plays out.


Sex.

I've been wanting to read a Joe Casey book for a long while and since Butcher Baker is never getting a proper release or conclusion, I figured this is going to have to do. I've heard good things about this book, which allows me to ignore how loathsome I find that "But what if Batman was like this" type of bullshit that I imagine plagues Image's submission department. Plus, when I opened it up there was a lot of boners and tits and I realized that I haven't read a book like that in a long while and I figured the time had come.

Slayground.

Slayground is Darwyn Cooke's next installment in his run of Parker adaptations. There isn't much else to say about it other than the only reason that I haven't touched it yet is that, like a fine wine or a bottle of whiskey, I'm saving this up for the right moment.


Nowhere Men.

I've already read up to where this trade ends, so, really this is all about me re-reading the first arc of the story. I think I've already discussed this book, but it deserves a second mention, because it might be one of the coolest books on the market. It's also the coolest book that I'm reading where I still have no idea what it is that I'm reading.


Nowhere Men has managed to somehow  tell an interesting, clever story that still seems like it's just on the edge of getting started. The seed of the book seems to be "What if The Beatles were super-scientists." Yet by the end of the first issue, that idea has exploded into a kaleidoscope of side plots and ephemera that have still yet to link up or coalesce into a central idea. It's exciting to read where it can be this coy and still be this good. As lost as I might be, this book that has a clear vision and a clear direction and I'm perfectly fine with going along with the ride.

Judenhass.

I think 2014 is the year of me getting up the energy to finally read the graphic novel of the history of anti-Semitism. Finally.

There's a unifying theme in this list, which is that Image Comics is turning out some great work. I don't know what got into the water at Image HQ (which I imagine to be a trailer hidden away the in the mountains and when you knock on the door Erik Larsen comes to it with a shotgun and smelling of battery acid), but it's working. Whatever it is, somebody needs to pump some of it into the Marvel and DC HQs (a glittering skyscraper and a second-hand Soviet satellite, respectively).

The breadth and the quality of works that have come out of that company in the past year is astounding. Manhattan Projects. East of West. Zero. Saga. Satellite Sam. Prophet. Lazarus. Jupiter's Legacy. And those are just the comics that I'm reading. Thinks about how great those books are. Think how weird they are! Think about what this means!

They've got a wide array of books driven by talented people with a vision and that's exciting. It gives me hope. And it makes me think that maybe what's wrong with the world is that I'm just not paying enough attention. At the very least at 9.99 a pop, the price is right.

Now is an exciting time to be a comic book read. I'm glad for it. I'm glad for all of it. Because it'll be a cold day in Hell when I give a good shepherd's fuck about a Guardians of the Galaxy cross-over.

Social D was Right

I was wrong about The New Frontier. I was wrong and I'm sorry about that. So very, very sorry.

My main problems were that the beginning of the story struck me as dirivative of Watchmen which I think is a fair assumption considering how much of the landscape of comics is dirivative of Moore and Gibbons' work. (Also Cooke wrote and drew a Before Watchmen story and wrote another so, in hindsight, I am not all that far off base. But let's not waste any more calories than we already have). Where it becomes a stupid opinion is that it's much, much more than that, which is something most Watchmen rip-offs do not manage.

There's also a few more nebulous problems like the lack of Batman (and the Trinity in general), the appropriateness of the Centre as a villain (and it's inexplicable and hateful British spelling), and the fact that it's both too sprawling and too small.

Yet, now I feel the flaws less acutely and those few niggling doubts are overcome by the quality of the art and the quality of the storytelling. They're just mars on the piece, they aren't the piece itself. Darwyn Cooke might not be the literary heavy weight that Alan Moore is (which I mention because, rightly or wrongly, he weighs heavily in my outlook on comic books. . . mostly wrongly the more time goes on) or as prolific as a Jason Aaron or as clever as Jonathan Hickman, but he delivers something that none of these men can, which is that he can draw the stories that he writes.

He delivers something that is inherently part of the whole. There is no invisioning, there's no collaboration or compromises, there's just the finished work. Not every comic written and drawn by the same guy have that cohesion, though. Darwyn Cooke is just the guy who can fuse those things together, through style, though design, and through story. As a guy who piddles about with pens and pencils sometimes and has a back catalog full of genre bullshit that is inspiring. It means that someone can do it and do it well.

I think a lot of my esteem for Cooke comes from the work he did after The New Frontier (ie: the work I read after I read The New Frontier). Books like The Spirit and his odd story in Jonah Hex (a Canadian western? Okay. I guess that's not too weird) and especially his work on the Parker graphic novels have opened my eyes to the talented writer and artist that he always was. It wasn't that he got better it was that I was just too full of shit to see what was in front of me. The guy who forged that epic run on The Spirit is the same guy who spun out this wonderful not-quite Elseworlds tale.

Cooke loves good old fashioned fun and The New Frontier is chock full of that feeling-- that feeling that some things were better back then and if they weren't, at least they were simpler, more pure, more black and white. It's nostalgia done well. It doesn't shy away from the ugliness of the past, either. That's just another layer that he uses.

Another thing I find myself saying a lot and writing a lot is that this feels like storytelling judo. Cooke isn't screwing with things or skewering them or anything, instead he's it's using the momentum of nostalgia and the weight of the past to move into something else, bigger, and more impactful. And, again: It's great to see that someone can actually manage that.

I'm know I'm not breaking any news, I just wanted to make a correction. At least to increase the power of my other opinions, I'll say it again: I was wrong about The New Frontier.

That cartoon is still unlistenable, though. You'll bury me with that opinion.

And here's a Social Distortion song--


SIDE NOTE: The New Frontier was also a Las Vegas hotel. Like most of Las Vegas, it is thankfully long gone. What remains, though, are a few precious shards of history. I was going through an auction catalouge on my road trip with my dad and I found, coincidentally, some New Frontier chips for sale. They were estimated to sell for at least a thousand dollars. We are all obviously in the wrong racket.

My Review of "Shield: Architects of Forever"

What is this shit?

DSGN MGMT

I don't want to review MIND MGMT, I waste enough time on that. I instead want to talk about the design of the first trade of Matt Kindt's current series. So if you want an actual review go to an actual website with actual writers (that make actual money). Beyond its questionable art, what MIND MGMT, is one of the best designed books on the market.

From the artwork, to the margins, to the covers, to even the introductory pages of the graphic novel, MIND MGMT is something to behold. It's something no one else is doing in comics. Well, maybe Hickman.

Hmmmm, yeah, probably Hickman.

What I mean is the contents and shape of the book besides the story. It's the actual form of the book. It also means things as basic as paper stock and font (by the way: This book has some excellent paper stock). Design, as I understand it, is that bit of a work of art between the practical, physical aspect and what you're taking in as a reader.

Does that make sense? No?

What I am most impressed by is how this book is clever enough to overcome the sloppiness of the linework. The shape of the book is as much a part of the book at Kindt's art or writing. It's embedded in there and it isn't done in the way that Hickman does it, which is far more bombastic and segmented. To mangle a joke from iFanboy, “Hickman loves his title pages, doesn't he?”

Hickman's little flourishes of design (ie: Being a thing that is neither quite art nor writing, yet is a part of the same whole) are bold statements. They are title cards. They are supertext. They're calling attention to what is going on and it's great when he does it. It's one of the little things that makes The Manhattan Projects such a wonder of a book and it's something that adds to his other books, even when they might be lacking.

I'm sure some graphic designer is shouting at me through his computer screen right now.Well, shout away. Go design a gig poster, jerk, I'm talking about comics.

You know that this book is something entirely different from the other comics. From the first moment you crack open the covers, you see a series of almost entirely blank pages with a single statement made out of what appears to a ripped-out newspaper headline.

 Where he could have shoved ads for other books, we instead have a torn newspaper headline reading “TURN BACK.” I won't go so far as to say that they're wasted, but they aren't far from it (Somewhere, I'm sure there's some Marvel or DC editor looking at this book doing the math on what those six pages would have cost them).

Besides being this distracting and spacious introduction it also serves a practical purpose that reflects on the story.The book is warning you not to read it. But, you paid for this fucker and you're going to turn it anyways.

“YOUR LAST CHANCE” is the next page. You can't tell me what to do! You're just a book! And not even a Bible or a Howard Zinn book! You don't own me!"

And so you turn into the story, ignoring all warnings, like the character, like the world. There you are, getting brainwashed by the secret files of a crypto-agency and it's all your fault.

How cool is that?

It can't recall something like that outside of the Bioshock Infinite ending where you're forced to make a decision and I thought “What if I just turn this off? Don't I win? Don't I prove all of you wrong?” Maybe you do, but in both cases you miss out on some impressive storytelling.

By the way, that's not a real spoiler, so fuck you if you're acting like a wuss about this

It also understands that a trade paper back is something more than a compilation of single issues. In a world where writers and artists are attempting to emphasize the importance of the single issue, where guys like Ed Brubaker are creating original content specifically for their monthly books, it is exciting to see Matt Kindt take an opposing approach and treat the TPB as a form on its own. It isn't until all of these issues are thrown together into a single book that it stops being a serial, semi-disconnected story, but something bigger and distinct (that is also a serial story).

The wider conceit is, of course, that you are reading a manual published by organization MIND MGMT. It's a sub-conscious trick Kindt plays on his readers. They don't need to know what a mise en abyme or metatext or subliminal messaging is to know that they're reading something with some, not all, of its layers showing. It's a book confident and compitent enough to never have to use five-dollar academic words to get you to understand what those actual concepts are. It's a lesson I could use to learn.

MIND MGMT also exists as proof that a medium as low as the comic book doesn't have to act like it. Nothing has to be changed or sexed up, everything that make a comic book worthwhile is already there, it just needs to be brought out by someone who knows what they're doing. Matt Kindt isn't the only comic book creator working who knows how to do this, he's just the one that really makes me think about this. Read it for the interesting story about hidden psychic spies and hold onto it for the impressive lessons in graphic design. This also reminds me that I'm a self-hating snob. Thanks for that, Matt Kindt. 

Thanks for everything.

And speaking of sub-conscious advertising--

SIDE NOTE: There should be a rule: If it's in hardback, you get the back matter. I understand the reasons why this is so. I understand the practical reasons that retailers espouse and I understand the importance of disnguishing forms that Ed Brubaker makes. I get it. I still want my damn extras, though.

SIDE SIDE NOTE: I am of the opinion that knowing what a roman a clef or a bildungsroman is the kind of thing that improves your life considerably.

SIDE SIDE SIDE NOTE: But don't just take my word for it.