June 11, 2023

There are still a couple of books from last week that I have yet to read, but a chunk more have gone down since. The biggest one that I have yet to touch is the giant hardcover book Criminals by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips. It collected that series and I am looking forward to getting that one started. However, it is a big book and is a tad intimidating.

So with some of the others from last week still up, I will push that book off for awhile.

Killadelphia Vol. 1. “Sins of the Father.” Written by Rodney Barnes and drawn by Jason Shawn Alexander. This is a collection of Killadelphia issues #1-6 from Image. This series was Eisner nominated and, although I typically do not like the collected books, Killadelphia has been around for awhile and would be expensive to get the actual comic book issues. And who knows if I would have even liked it. So I grabbed the first volume at Comic World last week. This was great. It made President John Adams and his wife Abigail Adams vampires. This was so cool and told a great father/son story as well. May have to look into the next volume of books.

Damn Them All #2. Written by Simon Spurrier and illustrated by Charlie Adlard. More magic as Dora and Ellie move on with their attempts to find help with the 73 demons. We are introduced to Carlin and Pruflas in this issue.

X-Men #23. “When Cometh… the Stark Sentinels” The X-Men come to confront the brand new Iron Man Sentinel from Orchis and they discover that one of these new Sentinels is going to be very difficult to handle.

New Mutants: Lethal Legion #3. “Old Wounds, Old Weapons“. These New Mutants are strange for me. I have found them interesting to read, but I have struggled to know who was whom. Outside the familiar New Mutants such as Rahne, Dani and Karma, the rest of these characters are new or unfamiliar to me and tough to connect with. I have been enjoying the book so far though.

Fury #1 “Who is S.C.O.R.P.I.O.?” Written by Tom King. Art is handled by several people including Scot Eaton & Cam Smith, Tom Reilly, Adam Kubert, and Ramon Rosanas. Adam Kubert and Dean White did the cover art. This was an interesting book using both the new Nick Fury and the original Nick Fury, showing where they are and moments of their backstory on how they got where they were. It was neat how they told the story with different styles from the different time periods. I could definitely get into more Nick Fury, especially with Secret Invasion coming this month on Disney +.

Thor #34. “Blood of the Fathers Part Four” More goodness from Thanos, Dr. Doom and Thor. We also have Hela making a return, Loki showing up, Thor’s sister taking a step forward. Things are feeling as if they are beginning to prepare for a finale for this storyline.

Deadpool: Badder Blood #1. Story by Rob Liefeld, script by Chad Bowers and pencils by Rob Liefeld. Team up with Cable and Wolverine. I have to say there were some amazing moments of art in this book, including a couple of pages that were tilted in the other direction that made this an intriguing read. I’ve been digging Deadpool recently.

Star Signs #2. Written by Saladin Ahmed and featuring art by Megan Levens. A group of young heroes, who’ve been dubbed names of the Zodiac, are begin brought together after the stars disappeared from the sky. It looks as if there are two sides collecting powered individuals and things are getting more fascinating.

Invincible Iron Man #7. “Fight the Future” Written by Gerry Duggan and drawn by Juan Frigeri. Kael Ngu did the art on the cover. Tony and Rhodey try an assault on the Stark Unlimited facility producing the Iron Man Sentinels. Things seem to be going well until Rhodey gets captured and set up for murder. (BTW… I thought the cover art was a little weird. It looks like Tony Stark has big rollie-pollie, cartoonish eyes that are looking up and to the right. I know that is not what it was supposed to be, but now I can’t unsee it.

Peacemaker: Tries Hard #2. Written by Kyle Starks and drawn by Steve Pugh. Cover art was by Kris Anka. Peacemaker and Mallah go to assault the secret base of General Immortus to get the DNA of the Terminator. And things do not turn out well for Peacemaker.

Daredevil & Echo #1. Written by Taboo & B. Earl with art by Phil Noto. This story takes place during two distinct timelines, current day with Daredevil and Echo and in 1835 with Tommy Murdock. This was a good read, better than I anticipated it was going to be.

X-Men: Before the Fall-Mutant First Strike #1. “Here to Help” The anti-mutant organization Orchis is spreading misinformation and propaganda against mutants and the X-Men are doing what they can by helping victims of a deadly strike against a small town of Milford. The strike was intended to look like it was done by mutants, though it seemed that Orchis orchestrated it. It was cool to see some of these X-Men again (in their fun red X, white jackets). It was weird though cause I saw Angel here and then, for a few panels, I saw Archangel, and I did not know why there was no example of Warren changing. Maybe I missed something over the years of skipping X-books.

Love Everlasting #8. “Too Hip for Love.” Written by Tom King and drawn by Elsa Charretier. Joan is back from the mental ward and is struggling to maintain her grasp on sanity. Doesn’t help when she is seeing the Cowboy constantly. Plus, it never seems to change from 1963. Joan is reaching the end of her rope as she had a gun to her head this issue. She did not kill herself, but the idea is there.

Ambassadors #6. Written by Mark Millar and illustrated by Matteo Scalera. I picked up the second variant cover, which was in black and white. This is the final issue of the first arc of Millar’s newest book. This final issue was filled with some excellent action as the super heroes all come together for the first time. A brutal ending too.