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Back to Brooklyn #1

Written by Garth Ennis and Jimmy Palmiotti
Art by Mihailo Vukelic
28 pages, color
Published by Image Comics

With Garth Ennis’s run on The Punisher now over, I was starting to wonder where I could get another sharp, well-written crime drama on that same level. And, as if on cue, Back to Brooklyn showed up, a new mini-series co-plotted and written by Garth Ennis. No super-powers, no fantastical elements, just a gritty real life drama involving the mob and someone trying to get out with his family. But would it be able to measure up Ennis’s earlier highs?

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Incredible Hercules #121

Written by Greg Pak and Fred Van Lente
Art by Clayton Henry
32 pages, color
Published by Marvel Comics

I do like it when what sounds like a daft idea turns out to be utter brilliance. That’s the only way I think I can describe Marvel’s decision to take The Incredible Hulk and rename it The Incredible Hercules, starring the titular demi-god and his traveling companion, the boy ultra-genius Amadeus Cho. By all reports this should have been nothing short of a disaster, taking B- and C-grade characters and putting them in starring roles in a comic that used to be all about one of the company’s most recognizable faces. Instead, though, we’re getting what’s probably the funniest book at Marvel right now.

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Northlanders #9-10

Written by Brian Wood
Art by Dean Ormston
32 pages, color
Published by Vertigo/DC Comics

I don’t think there’s any way about it—Brian Wood’s ongoing series Northlanders is a bit of a gamble. At a glance, it doesn’t seem like too much of a reach; a series about Vikings told as realistically as possible seems like a sure-fire hook for readers, right? What makes seem a little less so, though, is that each new story arc stars a completely different set of characters, and often in a different setting entirely. In many ways, it’s really a series of mini-series about different Vikings, all under a single umbrella header. With the first Northlanders story having come to a close, it seemed like a good a time as any to check out the comic and see how the switch would be handled—especially after jumping from an 8-issue story to a much shorter 2-parter. And the end result? Well, I’m still not sure how the market in general will treat Northlanders, but my mind is certainly made up.

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Uncanny X-Men #502

Written by Matt Fraction and Ed Brubaker
Penciled by Greg Land
Inked by Jay Leisten
32 pages, color
Published by Marvel Comics

One of the very first superhero comics I ever read was Uncanny X-Men, so I’ve always had a bit of a soft spot for the comic. That’s not to say that I’m willing to give it a free pass, of course; I’ve had quite a few years in which I’ve given the book a shot, decided it wasn’t for me, and left it aside. Happily, right now makes me feel for the first time since Grant Morrison stopped writing the X-Men that there is a book that is aimed squarely at me, and for that I have Matt Fraction and Ed Brubaker to thank. Now if only Terry Dodson would come on board sooner rather than later, I think I’d be set.

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Love and Rockets: New Stories #1

Written by Gilbert Hernandez, Jaime Hernandez, and Mario Hernandez
Art by Gilbert Hernandez and Jaime Hernandez
104 pages, black and white
Published by Fantagraphics

In late 1991, a good friend of mine handed me a stack of Love and Rockets comics with the comment, "You have to read these." I’ve been a fan of the Hernandez Brothers’s comics ever since then, with the only real constant being that I never would know what to expect next. Now they’ve finally left the single-issue comic format behind, releasing Love and Rockets: New Stories as a thick annual format, giving each of the brothers more room in a single release. And the end result? Well, let’s just say that once again, they’ve shown that I really had no idea what to expect.

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Buck Godot, Zap Gun for Hire Vol. 2: PSmIth

Written and penciled by Phil Foglio
Inked by Julie Sczesny
80 pages, color
Published by Airship Entertainment

Now don’t get me wrong, I love Phil and Kaja Foglio’s Girl Genius; there’s no other way to describe how I feel about a comic where I not only read the online updates three times a week, but then buy the special hardcover collections as well. But there are times when what really makes me the happiest about Girl Genius is not so much that it exists, but rather that that it seems to be financing the reprinting of Phil Foglio’s earlier comics. And having somehow missed out on the second Buck Godot, Zap Gun for Hire book in the past, trust me when I say that I was particularly excited about finally getting to read it. As it turns out, it really was worth the wait.

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Flight Vol. 5

Edited by Kazu Kibuishi
368 pages, color
Published by Villard Books

With each new volume of the Flight anthology, it’s a reason to celebrate. If I had to try and sum up the basic thrust of each book, it’s stories that instill a sense of wonder and excitement in the reader. Almost every single story does that in any volume of Flight, which is why I think it’s one of those books that I simply cannot get enough of.

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B.P.R.D. Vol. 8: Killing Ground

Written by Mike Mignola and John Arcudi
Art by Guy Davis
144 pages, color
Published by Dark Horse

We’re all familiar with the hyperbole. "In this issue, everything changes!" It’s a promise that decades upon decades of comics have promised, with some huge status quo shattering event teased on the cover. More often than not, though, it’s a company-owned comic that for the purposes of trademark (or just a general unwillingness), things are back to normal within a year or two. All of that ran through my head when reading B.P.R.D.: Killing Ground, because despite the lack of a promise on the cover, this is a book where I’m willing to believe that everything does, indeed, change.

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Mo and Jo: Fighting Together Forever

Written by Jay Lynch
Art by Dean Haspiel
40 pages, color
Published by Toon Books

If there’s one thing that kids are good at, it’s fighting with siblings. No matter how much or little they may like each other, I’m willing to wager that at some point they’ve ended up bickering with each other—it’s probably some sort of genetic imperative. Jay Lynch and Dean Haspiel certainly had that very much in mind when they created Mo and Jo: Fighting Together Forever for the Toon Books line; what better conflict can you have with superheroes when it’s a duo that are also brother and sister?

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X-Men: Manifest Destiny #1

Written by James Asmus, Mike Carey, C.B. Cebulski
Penciled by Chris Burham, Michael Ryan, David Yardin
Inked by Chris Burham, Victor Olazaba, David Yardin
40 pages, color
Published by Marvel Comics

Is it just me or the X-Men trapped in a never-ending cycle of subtitled stories and eras? Since October of last year, we’ve had Messiah Complex, Divided We Stand, and now Manifest Destiny. And, not content to just slap the logo on all of the mutant books, there’s also X-Men: Manifest Destiny, a four-issue anthology about some of the mutant characters and how they travel or deal with the move to San Francisco. So far, that’s proved to be just about as variable in quality as you can imagine it would be.

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