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Skye Runner issue 1, by Allen Warner, Ale Garza, and Richard Friend, 2006, Wildstorm Ladies and gentlemen, we officially have a trend. Every company is putting out fantasy comics these days, and this book is the latest. On the whole, I consider it to be average. The book is about Skye, a warrior lady who lives in a small village and has to endure the taunts of the other ladies in the village because she dresses like a tart. A comment is made that she is dressed like a "warrior woman," but a real warrior woman probably wouldn't wear short shorts and a shirt that is cut open all the way down the front, with just a few pieces of string keeping her ample assets from breaking free. Yeah, let the teenage hormonal fantasies commence. Outside of the main character's ridiculous clothing, the story is OK. A god (giant, magical beast) shows up after Skye's niece and nephew (I think) find a baby unicorn and bring it home. Much mayhem and slaughter ensues, with a rather unpredictable ending. The ending was actually the best part of the comic, as it really gave a good, if brief, view into the larger world outside of Skye's village. On the art front, the art is generally OK. The children look very strange, with odd-shaped heads and mouths. The adults look fine, though. Coloring is very good. Incidentally, the dude on the cover doesn't even appear in the book. Overall, not a bad book, and perhaps worth picking up some issues if you like fantasy stories. |
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Skye Runner issues 2-4, by Allen Warner, Alex Garza, and Peter Guzman, 2006, Wildstorm Productions I enjoyed the first book in this series, but I had trouble finding any more. A few weeks ago I was able to track down what I was missing, and I must say that each issue makes less and less sense. I think that the authors have fleshed out a full fantasy world, but they way that they are showing it to us readers is somewhat disjointed and I find myself wondering what is going on, even though I'm pretty sure I should know by the time we have reached issue 4. After getting rescued by the crazy wizard in the end of issue 1, Skye helps said wizard regain her power, and then she meets up with a knight and some elf hunter dude and they go to this city for supplies and hints on where to find Skye's niece and nephew who were kidnapped by a god. There is much fighting along the way, and lots of wierd monsters. And outside of fighting wierd monsters and Skye's ridiculous warrior outfit (hot pants and a haltertop that barely contains your heaving breasts really doesn't qualify as "combat gear" in my book), there isn't much here, at least for me. I will henceforth be dropping this series, as it is just too wierd for me. |
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Steampunk: Manimatron, by Chris Bachalo and Joe Kelly, 2000, Cliffhanger/DC Comics I got this book after discovering the art of Chris Bachalo, which I really like. I found out that he had helped create this series, so I picked up this book, the first of two graphic novels collecting the individual issues of the series. Going in, I knew that this series had originally been planned to be much longer than the dozen or so issues it ended up being, so I wasn't expecting grand plot development or long monologues on the nature of the universe. I was expecting lots of fast action and pretty pictures. The fast action is definitely here, and some of the pictures are pretty, but overall this book is just weird. The basic plot is that a scientific madman, back in the mid-Eighteenth century, found a patsy to go forward in time and steal lots of technological inventions, which allowed him to take over Europe and other parts of the world, and also take technology in a "steampunk" direction, where steam, rather than internal combustion engines, powers the world. That could be an interesting setting, but it ends up not being interesting because there are many things that don't make sense. Take the ubiquitous robot bugs, for example. If our hero really did go into the 1900s to steal technology, that wouldn't allow for making robotic bugs. Then the villain also makes weird human/animal hybrid creations, and in fact his entire harem is genetically modified in rather crazy ways. Twentieth century technology doesn't all for that. On top of the rather unworkable back story, the pacing of the story, and more importantly, the framing of the drawings, is really out of the ordinary. I read lots of comics, and I am familiar with how to read comic frames, but I really had a hard time following this book. Some pages had upwards of 20 frames on them, and it wasn't clear what order to view them in, or even what was going on in them half the time because they were so dang small. In the end, I have to say that I was unimpressed by the book. The story didn't flow well, the art didn't flow well, and after thinking about it for a while, I still don't really know what happened in that final battle. A very odd book, indeed. |
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Supermarket TPB, by Brian Wood and Kristian Donaldson, 2006, IDW Publishing I first learned about this series when I found issue four in my local comic shop. The story and the art were interesting, but it is the coloring that sells this story. The colors are very bright and vibrant, and somewhat different from the norm. Backgrounds will change in color depending on the mood and environment in the scene, which should be jarring but instead works out super well. The coloring makes this book really unique. On to the story! Our heroine is Pella Suzuki, a typical teenager full of angst about the corporate world she lives in. As it quickly turns out, however, her family is anything but typical, as she is the heir to a criminal fortune. So off she runs, chased by the yakuza and the Porno Swedes, a group of Swedish porn stars that are essentially the local mafia. Pella is not all on her own, however, as she finds a couple friends who try to help her out. OK, so the plot isn't anything super great, but the writing is quite good, overall. Pella's internal dialogue is appropriately snarky, and things move along at a good pace. The only thing I didn't care for was the ending, because it seemed quite Deus ex Machina to me. Ah, well. Also, there really wasn't enough time for character development. I felt like if this story was longer, it would have made more sense. It was still a good book, if not as good as it maybe could have been. |
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Someday's Dreamers volume 1, by Norie Yamada and Kumichi Yoshizuki, 2006, Tokyopop I have waited for years to read Someday's Dreamers. Back in 2003, I came across some of the cover paintings on the internet, and I was immediately captivated by the artist's use of color and light, and how soft everything looked. Those landscapes are just so enticing I want to jump right into them and fall asleep. Anyway, I actually purchased a copy of the Japanese original manga so I could look at the pictures, but since I don't read Japanese I didn't know what was going on. Now, after being able to read what is going on, I can honestly say that this isn't really my thing. The problem is that this is a girls' manga, and it shows. Everyone sits around and talks about their feelings. Our heroine, Yume Kikuchi, performs magic by using the feelings in her heart. Basically, everything is super touchy-feely, and the emotions of the characters are the primary focus of the story. This is not something I am used to, and I'm really not sure what to do with it. Yume is completely adorable, though, so I will just enjoy the great art (sooooooo great...) and the pretty pictures. |