Review- THE CURSE OF DRACULA

THE CURSE OF DRACULA (Dark Horse, 2013; Hardcover)

Collects The Curse of Dracula Nos. 1-3 (cover dates July- September, 1998)

Writer: Marv Wolfman

Artist: Gene Colan

Colorist: Dave Stewart

Marv Wolfman and Gene Colan are best known as the creative team behind Marvel's long running Tomb of Dracula, a macabre soap opera with a backdrop of revenge and retribution. Dark Horse's The Curse of Dracula revisits this formula but uses it as a springboard for something slightly different. There is a team of vampire hunters all with their own reason for joining this crew, and this vampire has a different motive. The only thing about this book that is disappointing is that it ends rather suddenly and with a cliffhanger ending.

Some artists' work looks better in color while others, like Colan, provide so much shading with their pencils that color strips the atmosphere away. Colan is a true master of the artform. Marv Wolfman is among the top Bronze Age comic book writers. I love his splash page writing, where he sets the tone of the scene with words as much as the picture does. So many modern writers avoid this, claiming that it is “outdated”. My gut feeling is that they don't have Wolfman's ability for foreshadowing.

Colan passed away a few years ago, so now there is no way that we'll see more of this series. Those looking for more of the Wolfman/Colan collaboration are in luck, though. Marvel has issued Wolfman/ Colan's Tomb of Dracula in 3 Omnibus hardcovers, 4 Essential black and white phonebooks (long out of print), and there are also three full color trade paperbacks out there. They did not collect the full series in that format, though. DC issued a skinny quasi-trade of the first four issues of their early '80s series Night Force, with plans for a hardcover and trade paperback of the entire series scuttled due to low pre-orders. I'm still pissed off about that.

Junk Food For Thought rating: 4.25 out of 5.

The OCD zone- This book is a tremendous value at $14.99 MSRP.

Paper rating: 5 out of 5. Superb thick coated stock with the sweet toxic smell that all books printed in China seem to have.

Binding rating: 5 out of 5. Sewn binding, lays flat, I'm happy.

Hardback cover coating rating: 4 out of 5. The black portion of the cover has that dull matte finish coating which can be scuffed. The image and logo have that screen printed coating.

Buy THE CURSE OF DRACULA HC at InStockTrades!

Also available in softcover here.

Review- TOMB OF DRACULA OMNIBUS VOL. 3

TOMB OF DRACULA OMNIBUS VOL. 3 (Marvel, 2010; Hardcover)

Collects Dracula Lives! Nos. 1-13, Frankenstein Monster Nos. 7-9, Tomb of Dracula (magazine) Nos. 1-6, and selections from Legion of Monsters No. 1 and Savage Sword of Conan No. 26 (cover dates 1973- August, 1980)

Writers: Marv Wolfman, Roy Thomas, Steve Gerber, Tony Isabella, Doug Moench, Gary Friedrich, Gerry Conway, Gardner Fox, Len Wein, Chris Claremont, and many others

Artists: Gene Colan, Dick Giordano, John Buscema, Steve Ditko, Neal Adams, Bill Sienkiewicz, Rich Buckler, Jim Starlin, Mike Ploog, Dick Ayers, Alfredo Alcala, Sonny Trinidad, George Tuska, Russ Heath, Pablo Marcos, Val Mayerik, Win Mortimer, Bob McLeod, John Romita, Sr., Tom Palmer, Klaus Janson, and many others

Artwork by the master, Gene Colan, with Pablo Marcos.

This book is a beast, weighing in at 5.8 lbs. (2.63 kilograms for my metric system using friends out there in the world outside of the United States) and clocking in at a staggering 944 pages. All of the issues are in black and white as originally published, with the exception of each issue's covers and the three Frankenstein Monster issues . I was glad to get the Roy Thomas/ Dick Giordano adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula here in its original black and white, since I have the recently completed and recolored hardcover. Girodano's artwork is gorgeous on that one. 

There is quite an assembly of talent here, and I bolded Wolfman and Colan's names because they did the lion's share of the stories contained herein. The roll call above is like a who's who of legendary creators from that era, and to have them all slapped between two covers is divine. While not every story is great, there is an ample amount of goodness to outweigh any so-so stories. Some of these stories are great, though, like the aforementioned Dracula adaptation, Angela from Tomb of Dracula #4, and Bounty For A Vampire from Dracula Lives! #13. The latter is especially great, with an over the hill marshal turned bounty hunter in pursuit of the lord of the vampires. It's a spaghetti western meets Horror, and it pre-dates all of these recent takes on that (i.e. American Vampire from Vertigo/DC) by decades. 

There are so many good stories and creators involved that I cannot possibly list them all. Let me just add that it pleases me to no end that Dark Horse gave Marvel permission to reprint the two stories featuring Solomon Kane here for completion's sake, since Marvel no longer holds the license for the Robert E. Howard characters. Kudos to Dark Horse! I hope that there can be more cooperation between all of the companies when it comes to comprehensive reprint projects like this. When issues are omitted due to licensing rights, it's a like a smile that is missing a tooth.

Did Steve Ditko bring The Question to Marvel?? Nope, it appears that he just liked drawing faceless characters with that style of hat. Rorschach who?

The OCD zone- The restoration is generally excellent. The problem lies with the super high gloss paper, which is much, much glossier than any stock that Marvel has used in years. While it feels great, and I am admittedly partial to coated paper stock with a slight sheen, the black and white material contained in this book is difficult to read under both CFLs and incandescent light bulbs. The only comfortable, glare free reading that I had was in natural light with no other lights on. This book boasts wonderful sewn binding, and like all post-2007 Marvel Omnibus hardcovers, lays flat from the first page to the last. I just wish that the paper wasn't so damned shiny. 

Gene Colan- one of the absolute masters of the art form.

Drowning in my backlog

EX MACHINA VOL. 9: RING OUT THE OLD (Wildstorm/DC, 2010)

Collects Ex Machina Nos. 40-44 and Ex Machina Special No. 4 (cover dates February- October, 2009)

Ex Machina remains one of my favorite titles. Sadly, the series ended with Issue 50, so that gives us only one more trade of Brain K. Vaughn and Tony Harris goodness. This comic is a real page turner, and it will be interesting to see how it all plays out. (Although, given my backlog, I will have to wait for quite some time.) If you want a truly sophisticated "adult" comic that doesn't rely on adolescent pandering to be "mature", then pick this title up.

THE GOLDEN AGE SANDMAN ARCHIVES VOL. 1 (DC, 2004)

Collects material from Adventure Comics Nos. 40-59 and New York World’s Fair Comics 1939 (cover dates July, 1939- February, 1941)

After reading several satisfying volumes of Sandman Mystery Theatre, I decided to dig deeper into the Sandman catalog. For those of you who are not familiar with Sandman Mystery Theatre, it was a title published by Vertigo/DC in the '90s about the Golden Age Sandman. It was set in the '30s and '40s and is a terrific read. I did some digging around online to see if there were any collected editions of said character, and discovered that there was indeed a DC Archive published several years ago.

While not as satisfying a read as Sandman Mystery Theatre, this was still very entertaining and bled charm. Several of the villains from the Vertigo series got their start here. DC's restoration for this volume is mostly excellent, except for the word balloons. I don't know if they worked from scans or photostats when restoring this book, but several word balloons must have been touched up. Sandman is referred to as Bandman several times, B-s are replaced with F-s, and there are a few other minor mistakes. There are less then a dozen throughout the 220-odd pages of the book, but it is more than enough to make my OCD keep me awake at night, tossing and turning over the imperfect restoration of these issues. Oh, and DC only included the covers that had the Sandman on them...I can't stand that!!

So yes, before the relaunched Sandman by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby, before the guy actually made of sand created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko appeared in Amazing Spider-Man, and before Neil Gaiman made waves with his incarnation of the Sandman, there was THIS Sandman. I guess that we could call him OG Sandman...or not.

TOMB OF DRACULA OMNIBUS VOL. 2 (Marvel, 2009)

Collects Dr. Strange No. 14, Giant-Size Dracula Nos. 5 and Tomb of Dracula Nos. 32-70 (cover dates May, 1975- August, 1979)

After many months in the backlog and a couple of months of intermittent reading, I finished this nearly 800 page monster tome (pun intended). This is dense, text-heavy Bronze Age goodness. Tomb of Dracula was writer Marv Wolfman and artists Gene Colan and Tom Palmer's tour De force. The series was to be cancelled with issue 70, but work on issues 71 and 72 was already well underway. They delayed issue 70 by several months, made it double-sized, and it was re-tooled to be the series finale. Had Marvel not included the extra, unfinished, unused pages, I would have never known that the published ending was not the creators' original intention. The ending was executed flawlessly and was a satisfying end to this epic.

This series is being reissued again as a series of affordable trade paperbacks for the masses. I think that are one or two of them out already, and they clock in around 200 pages each. I'd recommend this to any fans of the Horror or vampire genres that haven't already checked them out.

POWER PACK CLASSIC VOL. 2 (Marvel, 2010)

Collects Power Pack Nos. 11-17, Marvel Graphic Novel- Power Pack & Cloak and Dagger: Shelter From The Storm and Uncanny X-Men No. 195 (cover dates June- December, 1985; MGN, 1989)

The first thing that I thought of when I heard that Disney bought Marvel is 'finally, we will get a Power Pack movie'. No, really. It makes perfect sense for this to be a Pixar CGI flick. While I would love to see them modeled after June Brigman's artwork, they would likely be modeled after the more recent, cartoon-y, cutesy, mang-ish GuriHiru artwork.Whatever it takes, I think that these characters would be excellent in a cartoon flick.

I bought all of these issues off of the stands, with the exception of the Marvel Graphic Novel with Cloak and Dagger. That was the weak link in the book. Everything else is wonderful. The writing and artwork all hold up very well a quarter century later.

MARVEL MASTERWORKS: GOLDEN AGE SUB-MARINER VOL. 3 (Marvel, 2009)

Collects Sub-Mariner Comics Nos. 9-12 (cover dates Spring, 1943- Winter, 1943-44)

Wow, this has a steep decline in quality from the earlier Bill Everett written and drawn issues. Everett was away serving Uncle Sam during the time that these issues were made. The stories starring the series back-up feature, The Angel (by Gustav Schrotter) are a better read than the Sub-Mariner during this era. In "The Battle of Kwangto" (Sub-Mariner #12), Namor deals with a Captain Stark at Naval Headquarters. Now, I'm going to go all Roy Thomas and retroactively insert him into continuity as a relative of Tony Stark (Iron Man). It doesn't fly in the face of Marvel continuity (1961-on) and therefore, by his definition, BECOMES a part of the continuity. Retroactively, of course.

Sub-Mariner's primary enemy during this time are the Japanese, and he refers to them in any number of unfavorable ways. This WAS wartime, and they WERE the enemy. I look forward to future volumes, as I know that Everett returns down the road. His '50s Sub-Mariner ranks among some of the finest comic books of that decade; go check out the Marvel Masterworks: Atlas Era Heroes volumes and see for yourself.

AGE OF BRONZE VOL. 1: A THOUSAND SHIPS (Image, Fourth Printing, 2008)

Collects Age of Bronze Nos. 1-9 (cover dates November, 1998- November, 2000)

Eric Shanower has crafted a compelling and engaging account of the Trojan War. His artwork is very detail-oriented, with each panel having nuances that require you to stop and look in order to fully appreciate it all. The story flows nicely, being as dense or as decompressed as the scene dictates. There are segments that you fly though, and others that make Chris Claremont look like Brian Michael Bendis. This comic book is both entertaining and educating, and I would recommend it to open-minded readers.  

My only complaint is that the original issue covers are not included. They would have made for nice chapter markers, as there are none in the entire book. It is impossible to tell where one issue ended and the other began, as it read like one seamless story. 

AGE OF BRONZE VOL. 2: SACRIFICE (Image, Second Printing, 2005)

Collects Age of Bronze Nos. 10-19 (cover dates February, 2001- March, 2004)

The artwork and story remain exquisitely well done, crammed with details. I find this sort of 'historical fiction', or infotainment, to be lots of fun. I enjoy this series because it shows what comic books can be capable of being with enough thought and effort. I am primarily a Marvel guy can appreciate a well done title like this.

SHOWCASE PRESENTS THE PHANTOM STRANGER VOL. 1 (DC, 2006)

Collects Showcase No. 80 and The Phantom Stranger Nos. 1-21 (cover dates February, 1969- October, 1972)

OK, who do I petition to get this series done in color and in hardcover? I bought this on a whim because I have been intrigued by the character's appearance in the other DC titles that I have read (like the Superman- Man of Steel trades), so I skimmed my toe in the waters of this phone book and...wow! These are superb comic books, written largely by Len Wein (some guy who created a little known character called Wolverine a few years later) with artwork by Jim Aparo, a Neal Adams clone of the highest order, and Neal Adams himself. Adams in an absolute master of the art form, often imitated but seldom duplicated...although Aparo is pretty darn close. Adams mostly sticks to cover art, but what covers they are!

The Phantom Stranger's 'adversary', or counterpoint, is a skeptic named Dr. Thirteen, the Ghost Breaker, whose primary goal is to prove that the Stranger is a fraud. Mystery heaped upon mystery, they still don't really tell you the character's true origin or nature of his powers some 540 pages later. I have Volume 2 in my queue, and can't wait to tear into it.

THE FLASH CHRONICLES VOL. 1 (DC, 2009)

Collects Showcase Nos. 4, 8, 13, 14 and The Flash Nos. 105, 106 (cover dates October, 1956- May, 1959)

Like most little boys who grew up in the late '70s, I loved the SuperFriends cartoon on Saturday morning. The Flash was one of the characters on that show, but for whatever reason I decided that DC sucked when I was around 8 or 9 and never read a Flash comic book until now. This trade paperback was in the 1/2 off section at the Motor City Comic Con last May, and since I've enjoyed the other Chronicles trades so much I figured that I'd give this a try. Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman all rocked in the Golden Age of Comics. The Green Lantern Chronicles trades skipped the Golden Age version of the character and skipped right ahead to the Silver Age version. The Flash Chronicles did the same thing. Whereas Green Lantern has a zany, fun vibe going on, Flash kinda sucks.

One of the first things that you have to adopt as a comic book fan is a healthy suspension of disbelief. Many fans erroneously state that they like Marvel because their comics are more realistic. I prefer to say that they are more believable, in that the pseudo-science used to define a character's powers has a set of parameters, and the character and their power operate within them. DC seems to have a whatever suits the story type vibe to their powers. I have an extremely hard time swallowing the concept of Flash. Barry Allen is a scientist who is struck by lightning, and that along with some chemicals gives him the power to run fast. So fast that he can break the time barrier or move at 1/1,000,000th of a second. For one thing, I doubt that his lungs could enable him to breathe running at those speeds, so he'd essentially 'drown'. For another, his costume doesn't seem to be made of some fricition resistant "unstable molecules" (as Marvel calls them), so it would be scorched right off of him. His skin would likely also be peeled off him and he'd die. So yeah, while I can buy an alien crashing on Earth and giving Hal Jordan a power ring to become Green Lantern, or a baby crash-landing on an alien planet and raised by farmers, or a boy witnessing his parents murdered in front of him and vowing to rid the world of evil...heck, I can even buy Paradise Island and the whole Greek God Wonder Woman crap, but I can't swallow this. Gorilla Grodd completely rocks, though, so not all is lost. Also, the Flash's costume is among the more dynamic ones in all of comic books. So yeah, The Flash sucks...sort of.

HERCULES: FULL CIRCLE (Marvel, 2009)

Collects Marvel Graphic Novel No. 37 and material from Marvel Age Nos. 4, 65, Marvel Comics Presents Nos. 39-41 and Marvel Tales No. 197 (cover dates July, 1983- January, 1990)

Top notch stuff by Bob Layton. I read the old Hercules- Prince of Power trade years ago and loved it, and this hardcover picks up where that left off. This has a light-hearted tone to it, and even though Hercules is an arrogant buffoon, you can't help but root for him.

Originally posted on my myspace blog on 1/10 & 1/25/2009

Why trades, you ask? Well, I read comic books, yes, but I prefer to read them collected in trade paperbacks and/or hardcovers. Modern comics have their stories structured in such a way that it is almost necessary to read them in this format. Up until the last decade or so, comic book stories were structured to be read in intervals, with brief recaps at the beginning of each issue via a flashback to bring the new reader up to speed. They now have a previously page, but that often doesn't work well enough to bring a brand new reader up to snuff. Another reason in the timeliness of publication. When I was a kid (insert old man voice here) comic books came out on the day promised, period. I never ever went to 7-11 on the day the new Spider-Man came out only to find that it had been delayed for 3 weeks. It is common for titles to be bumped a week or more, sometimes months (or in the case of a few creator owned comics, YEARS). This is unacceptable, and is part of the reason that I follow new comic books via their collected edition counterparts. Another huge reason is variant covers. Trades feature all of these as "DVD" style extras. If I were to buy single issues, I would have to buy sometimes 3 or 4 copies to get all of the artwork, which is BS. When I was a kid, buying the book once was enough.

X-MEN- KITTY PRYDE & WOLVERINE (Marvel, 2008; Hardcover)

Collects Kitty Pryde & Wolverine Nos. 1-6 (cover dates November, 1984- April, 1985)

It’s nice to see this series collected for the first time ever, and to have it done in hardcover with sewn binding to boot. This is the type of material that the Marvel Premiere Classics line should focus on: never before collected or long out of print mini-series or arcs. None of this re-re-releasing Marvels or Origin garbage! I have never much cared for the ninja Wolverine angle, instead preferring the brainwashed berserker killer from the ‘70s. Claremont delivers a solid story with a little too much room to breathe and add dialogue. Perhaps mini-series are where the pacing, made-for-the-trade style writing originally came from. Al Milgrom delivered solid artwork that seems dated by today’s standards. It should be noted, however, that all of his comic books shipped on time.

MARVEL MASTERWORKS ATLAS ERA JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY VOL. 1 (Marvel, 2008; Hardcover)

Collects Journey Into Mystery Nos. 1-10 (cover dates June, 1952- July, 1953)

Atlas (that's what Marvel was called before they were Marvel), like most comic book companies of the era, was a derivative company, jumping on whatever fad of the day was shipping units. EC struck gold with their “new trend” line in the early ‘50s, and the claim jumpers came a-runnin’ with their own line of Horror comics. These were all, of course, inferior to EC’s output, but there are some solid, entertaining stories in many of these imitators. Many greats worked on this title: Russ Heath, Dick Ayers, Stan Lee, Mike Sekowsky, Carmine Infantino, John Romita, Sr., Joe Maneely, along with some forgotten talents like Carl Hubbell, Jimmy Infantino, Carl Wessler, Dick Briefer, Al Luster and Charles A. Winter. I wonder how many of these stories Stan Lee actually wrote. Credits were scant back in this era, and comic historians have pieced together many of the credits in the table of contents via signatures on the splash page or stylistic cues. There are such cues in many of these stories that lead me to believe that Stan Lee wrote many more than he was credited for. I suppose we’ll never really know, because Stan has a bad memory and nobody kept track of the “funny books” they were working on back then. Issue 8’s The Strange Case of Mr. Whimple was good, and seemed familiar. A bit too familiar. Digging through my books, I deduced that it was a blatant rip-off of The Basket from EC’s Haunt of Fear No. 7 (May-June, 1951) from two years prior. Plagiarism was rampant during this era, and Al Feldstein and Bill Gaines were known to liberally borrow from Ray Bradbury. Go online and do some research for that amusing tale of how he went to work for them. Volume 2 is due out this year, and I can't wait! Marvel needs to release more Pre-Code Horror in hardcover. More more more!

X-MEN- MAGIK: STORM & ILLYANA (Marvel, 2008; Hardcover)

Collects Magik: Storm & Illyana Nos. 1-4 (cover dates December, 1983- March, 1984)

Another nice surprise to see collected in hardcover. This falls under the category of “probably cheaper to buy the singles than the hardcover”, but where’s the fun in that? Solid stuff by Chris Claremont, Sal Buscema and Ron Frenz that is much better than most comic books published today.

ESSENTIAL MARVEL HORROR VOL. 2 (Marvel, 2008)

Collects Dead of Night No. 11, Marvel Chillers Nos. 1, 2, Marvel Spotlight No. 26, Marvel Team-Up (Vol. 1) No. 24, Marvel Two-In-One Nos. 11, 18, 33, Strange Tales (Vol. 1) Nos. 169-174, 176, 177, Supernatural Thrillers Nos. 5, 7-15, and selections from Haunt of Horror Nos. 2-5, Monsters Unleashed No. 11 and Tales Of The Zombie Nos. 2, 6, 10 (cover dates range from August, 1973- November, 1977)

Essentials have come a long way, baby. Six years ago, they looked mostly like black and white photocopied comics. Spider-Man would have washed out weblines, linework would be obliterated, missing word balloons, etc. Nowadays, the linework is fine, the paper is a little brighter and the ink is darker. Now, if we could only get numbered pages like DC's Showcase phonebooks... On to the review: The Living Mummy was really good. With Steve Gerber and Tony Isabella writing and the vastly underrated Val Mayerik's artwork, how could it not be? Brother Voodoo has the righteous team of Len Wein and Gene Colan on guard. Can we please get this stuff in color and in hardcover, Marvel? At least the Scarecrow stuff has been collected in hardcover and in color in the Legion of Monsters from a couple of years ago. The B&W magazine stuff is my favorite, especially Gabriel, the Devil-Hunter by Doug Moench and the amazing Sonny Trinidad. Golem, Modred the Mystic, and the Scarecrow all suffer from the same problem: Half-baked ideas with no more than an initial appearance's thought as to how future stories would play out. They try, but like many Marvel Horror/Hero characters of the Bronze Age, there are many changes along the way. They try to make all of them seem way too important. Unfortunately, the premise of these characters don't make enough sense to back up the initial idea. Worse still is the way that Marvel would pull the plug on a character without warning, cancelling titles without a heads up, whathaveyou. Imagine kids trying to find the next issue of these title, going from spinner rack to spinner rack in vain. There were no comic shops or Internet back then, people! This is an excellent companion to Essential Werewolf By Night Vols. 1 and 2, Essential Monster of Frankenstein Vol. 1, and Essential Tales of the Zombie Vol. 1.

SHERLOCK HOLMES MYSTERIES VOL. 2 (Moonstone, 2004)

Collects Sherlock Holmes: Return of the Devil Nos. 1, 2, Sherlock Holmes: The Loch Ness Horror Nos. 1-3 (cover dates September, 1992- 2000)

This is another fantastic collection of Black and White stories of the latter days of Sherlock Holmes, originally published by Adventure and Malibu Comics.

PROJECT SUPERPOWERS VOL. 1 (Dynamite, 2008; Hardcover)

Collects Project Superpowers Nos. 0-7 (cover dates January- October, 2008)

This is a really good read by Alex Ross and company where they resurrect long-defunct (now) public domain characters from the Golden Age of Comics. Marvel also did something similar in The Twelve, and it smokes this series. I wish that Alex Ross did the interior art too, but that would probably take him years to paint 8 issues’ worth of story. This title is definitely made for the trade, and when read in one sitting like I did, it makes for a satisfying read. In monthly intervals, who knows? I have issues with this book as a book. First off, it really is a pretty book to look at. I have been spoiled by Marvel, as they have a nice thick waxy coating on their hardbacks and dustjackets alike. Dynamite has "fancier" production values, with only certain sections of the dustjacket offering a silk-screened image of sorts. DC also does this, and I hate it, as the remaining surface (and the image itself) are very easily scratched and damaged. Once the dustjacket is removed, you are treated to a beautiful wraparound Alex Ross painting, easily the most beautiful cover art for a book on the book itself that I have ever seen. Unfortunately, it is also not coated, and very easily scratched and damaged. I am not rough on my books, but am unhappy about this because one of the allures of trades (and more importantly expensive hardcovers) is the durability vs. the floppies (or single comics). The binding is glued, something that boils my blood on hardcovers. Binding on hardcovers should be sewn so that the book lays flat comfortably in one hand, the way God intended. This book, like most glued hardcovers that seem to litter this field, does lay flat in one hand a little bit in. Marvel has slowly moved into sewn binding for it's Masterworks, Omnibus, and now select Premiere hardcovers, and I wish that it were company policy to do so, but I digress. I wish that Dyamnite and every other company would do away with the devil that is glued binding on hardcovers. Also, hardcovers should be shrink wrapped! Most companies seal their hardcovers and so should Dynamite. Not to end this review on a negative note, the extras are amazing. I generally don't care for extras per se', but the character sketches and character galleries are very very cool. They show some characters who are not even in the series yet, and I would love to see them at some point in time (and I am sure that we will, with all of the related series spin-offs out there). The most interesting thing to me is the color guide by Alex Ross shown for comparison to a finished page. It is done in old fashioned flat four-color style, and I would pay to see this entire book re-colored like that. It's amazing and looks vintage, and I feel that this style might better serve the flavor of this series.

EX MACHINA VOL. 3: FACT VS. FICTION (DC, 2006)

Collects Ex Machina Nos. 11-16 (cover dates July, 2005- January, 2006)

EX MACHINA VOL. 4: MARCH TO WAR (DC, 2006)

Collects Ex Machina Nos. 17-20 and Ex Machina Special Nos. 1, 2 (cover dates March, 2006- July, 2006)

EX MACHINA VOL. 5: SMOKE SMOKE (DC, 2007)

Collects Ex Machina Nos. 21-25 (cover dates August, 2006- February, 2007)

EX MACHINA VOL. 6: POWER DOWN (DC, 2008)

Collects Ex Machina Nos. 26-29 and Ex Machina: Inside The Machine (cover dates March- August, 2007)

EX MACHINA VOL. 7: CATHEDRA (DC, 2008)

Collects Ex Machina Nos. 30-34 (cover dates November, 2007- April, 2008)

Brian K. Vaughn’s Midas touch continues on this title. This series hasn't lost any steam and remains a spectacular read. I am really enjoying the way that this title combines political topics with super-heroics.

ASTONISHING X-MEN VOL. 4: UNSTOPPABLE (Marvel, 2008)

Collects Astonishing X-Men (Vol. 3) Nos. 19-24 and Giant-Size Astonishing X-Men No. 1 (cover dates January, 2007- July, 2008)

A solid ending to the Joss Whedon/ John Cassady run on the title. This title may not have shipped on time, but it is a good read in trade form that will rank right up there with any of the great runs of the X-Men.

TOMB OF DRACULA OMNIBUS VOL. 1 (Marvel, 2008; Hardcover)

Collects Giant-Size Chillers No. 1, Giant-Size Dracula Nos. 2-4, Tomb of Dracula Nos. 1-31 and Werewolf By Night (Vol. 1) No. 15 (cover dates April, 1972- April, 1975)

I had never read a single issue of Tomb of Dracula before I bought this monster tome (pun intended), but I have always been a fan of Marv Wolfman’s writing and have enjoyed Gene Colan’s artwork in the past. Sure, not every single panel is “iconic”, and not every page features a “splash page” worthy t-shirt design, but there’s a lot of story going on here. Bronze Age titles are meant to be read in intervals, being far more text laden than their modern day counterparts. I really miss those third party narratives in today’s comic books. These lend to more characterization in less space, and thus, less “talking head” pages than we see today. This book ends on something of a cliffhanger.The production values on this book are astounding. The book lays perfectly flat, from the first page to the last. The paper and sewn binding is top notch in spite of the fact that this book was printed in China. Just don’t lick the pages, kids! I am very happy with the improvements that Marvel has been making in their hardcovers over the last couple of years. Maybe my crazy letters demanding no more glued bindings were actually read!






















THE COMPLEAT JOHN BYRNE'S NEXT MEN VOL. 2 (IDW, 2008)

Collects John Byrne’s Next Men Nos. 13-30 (cover dates March, 1993- December, 1994)

This is some outstanding stuff by John Byrne. I plowed through this 500-plus page phone book in under 48 hours. I literally could not put it down. It must have been agony to wait for the next issue, although the wait was always part of the fun back when I read monthlies. Mike Mignola's sub-par artwork mars about 9 pages, where Hellboy guest-stars. Cutter and Skywise from Elfquest also make a guest appearance, and I suspect that the creator-owned royalties on these characters were part of the reason for the $24.99 MSRP on this book. That's quite steep for a black and white "phone book" type trade. Still, lots of fun even in black and white. The Matrix movie swiped so much from the first few issues of this series.

HOUSE OF M: AVENGERS (Marvel, 2008)

Collects House of M: Avengers Nos. 1-5 (cover dates January-April, 2008)

This was a surprisingly good read by Christos Gage and Mike Perkins. I had kind of written off the whole alternate reality/ House of M thing, but this mini-series shows how there are many more good stories that can be told.

MIGHTY AVENGERS VOL. 2: VENOM BOMB (Marvel, 2008; Hardcover)

Collects Mighty Avengers Nos. 7-11 (cover dates March- May, 2008)

Brian Michael Bendis and Mark Bagley have crafted some fine stories early on in Ultimate Spider-Man, and their winning streak continues here. Bendis has some good ideas, but he seems to take so goddamn long to make a point! The first 6 pages of Issue 7 are talking head shots with Iron Man and Spider-Woman. This could have been done in 2 or 3. The next 8 pages are spent with a group meeting, with an additional 6 pages being spent with the set-up of the symbiote invasion. It then takes 3 more pages for the team to “assemble”, and the issue is done. This could have been done in like 9 or 10 pages! An entire issue of set-up is BS. Issue 8 at least has a lot of fighting. Issues 7 and 8 should have been 1 issue. Issue 9 boasts three two-page spreads of fighting without one word of narrative or dialogue. Bendis does seem to be trying to put more dialogue into his stories as of late, so this return-to-form was a disappointment. Six out of the 22 pages in this issue were taken up by that and didn’t move the story forward too much. They could have had 1 or 2 pages with multiple panels and conveyed as much information. I enjoyed the retro flavor of Issue 10, both in narrative and coloring. I am glad that Bendis has brought back thought balloons. Again, the story was good, but some pruning and less 2-page spreads and less splash pages would make a better read, in my opinon.

HORROR BOOK VOL. 1 (Image, 2008)

Collects ‘68, Creature From The Depths, Frankenstein and Full Moon (cover dates January-July, 2007) 

This reprints a bunch of creator owned one-shots that were published by Image, and it was a very good read. The artwork was solid and mostly appropriate for the material. My only gripe is the paper used by foreign printers on these trade paperbacks always feels weird. This trade was made in Korea, and the paper has a weird coating that feels unpleasant to the touch, almost as if it was gritty or dirty.