Thursday, May 31, 2007

Best. Comic. Book. Cover. Ever.


Without a doubt the best (or at least my favorite) long-term rivalry in comics is Hulk vs. Thing and this is the best of all their big battle covers. Can you get anymore iconic, any more "comic-book-y" than this? It's simple, it's to the point, it's two heavyweights getting ready to just beat the heck out of each other. Even the colors are perfect - the orange Thing, the green Hulk, the dramatic black background. Just great, great stuff. No distracting details, no silly marketing ploys, no "Part 13 of 32" to clutter it all up. Compare this to some of the goofy looking covers out there now days and try not to get too depressed. 'Nuff Said.

Wednesday, May 30, 2007

It's Not "All-Star Batman and Robin"...


As anyone who follows comics on the internet knows, there have been a thousand and one takes on All-Star Batman and Robin, from the outraged to the confused to the admired. I think most people are missing the point because this isn't really the comic book they think it is.

This isn't the companion book to "All-Star Superman", as the name implies. It's not an iconic look at Batman for the ages. No, it's something very different but no less admirable. It is quite simply, as each new issue continues to confirm, the prequel to "Dark Knight Returns". It is "Dark Knight: Year One" (as opposed to Miller's equally impressive "Batman: Year One", which dealt with early "mainstream" Batman.) I'll be the first to confess that I didn't get this when it first came out. I was expecting Miller and Lee's mirror version/companion piece to Morrison and Quitely's outstanding Superman book. But, to each team's credit, they are as different as night and day.

Whether this was the initial plan (I doubt it) or just how it happened to work out, isn't really important. And, although I have no way of knowing whether this is true or not, it seems like a premeditated return volley from Miller in response to the reception of his "Dark Knight Strikes Again", which I think suffered from many of the same things this series does - massive pre-misconceptions as to what it would and should be, confusion over what it actually was and what it was saying. From experience, I can say that both series benefit greatly from re-readings, without the pressure of personal expectations. Try reading the first 5 issues of "All-Star" again with the assumption that it is "Dark Knight: Year One" and tell me it doesn't make a whole lot more sense and that it isn't a whole lot more enjoyable. Go ahead, I dare you.