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PIPELINE COMMENTARY AND REVIEW #41
15 March 1998
by Augie De Blieck Jr.
http://www.nic.com/~augie/pipeline
"Beware the Ides of March."
Sometimes I think too much. This can be very detrimental. Things that
just really don't matter or are completely inane begin to occupy my mind.
You, the readers of this fine column, are about to experience a little of
what happens to an idle mind. Inbetween, I'll throw in some short of
reviews of comic books I've read in the past couple of weeks or so.
But first, an update on last week's column: Joe Torcivia was kind enough to
slap me upside the face for forgetting to mention one other example of
sideways comics which points to a rather good reason why they shouldn't be
done. In the pages now of WALT DISNEY'S COMICS & STORIES Donald Duck
comic strips are being serialized, while being printed sideways. It wasn't
so big a problem when these strips were seen in the pages of the
regular-format DONALD DUCK comic, but in the prestige format, it's terribly
awkward to read. You have to hold onto both sides of the book to hold the
damned thing open as it is due to the cardboard covers and square binding.
The book doesn't want to remain open at all.
Now on with the show:
John Ostrander has a good grip on the character of Dead-Pool. He proves
this in HEROES FOR HIRE #10, which is drawn - as usual - by Pascual Ferry.
Dead-Pool is the gabby merc-with-a-mouth gun-for-hire
insert-favorite-catchphrase-here. Almost like Lobo, he's Bugs Bunny with a
gun and only a developing conscience. But, wait! That's not all! He's a
perfect fit for this book. Ostrander writes the series in a hyperactive
narrator mode, and that just works perfectly with Dead-Pool. They're
compadres. A lot of this issue is made up of character moments meant to
advance the plot while at the same time recapping it. It's very effective,
very interesting, and well done.
Jae Lee's HELLSHOCK: Is it merely PITT reincarnated at Image? Is it a
parallel example of a creator obsessed over his creation to the point
where he feels the need to take over all the creative processes while
letting the timeliness suffer? Well, not quite. Latest word has it that
the next issue is the last. Dale Keown at least still puts out a couple of
PITT issues per year. As beautiful as his art is, though, the story does
nothing for me, so I skip it. ::sigh::
KURT BUSIEK'S ASTRO CITY #13 came out this past week and it is easily the
most anticipated issue of this series to date for me. The cover shown in
PREVIEWS 3 months ago of a cartoon lion in the real world intrigued me.
And the story did, as well. It's a bit morose, and the ending felt a
little flat to me, but the point was well done, and the story well-told. I
enjoyed it. It's a wonderful and captivating tale. There are, again,
parallels here to other comics and stories, from Donald Duck and his
nephews to Joe Camel to Roger Rabbit. I recommend this one to any of my
cartoon-loving friends who don't normally buy this series.
Speaking of recommendations, what should I do about grading books? When I
review comic books in this column, I don't use any sort of scale for
comparison's sake. There is no alphanumeric grading, which tends to lead
to too much quantification. Dave Van Domelen has the best system, I think,
when he simply has levels of recommendation for the books he reviews. But
he's already done that, so I won't. Each book should be judged on its own
merits, for sure. But it shouldn't be too hard to institute some form of
generalization to better help my loyal readers (thanks to the both of you)
get a gauge on my reaction to a given book, past the usual spate of
adjectives I throw at you. Is there an inbetween somewhere? A "worth it
for the money" or a "valid part of my collection?" That way lies madness
and does nothing for a single system of recommendation..
I haven't read this week's IRON MAN #4 yet, but I did feel the need to
point out they printed a letter of mine therein. Whee!
Nor have I read TRANSMETROPOLITAN #9, but I liked the cover. I think
Darick Robertson should do all the covers. Not only do they look fine, but
they also give the book a more unified approach. The interior artist
should draw the exteriors, as well.
WIZARD is too flashy and THE COMICS JOURNAL is too dry. Somewhere in the
middle is the answer. Why won't Wizard do serious hard-hitting pieces? Why
doesn't it do serious investigative journalism? HERO came close once or
twice, but never came anywhere near the nuts and bolts type of stuff TCJ
does. Is this industry just too in-bred to allow for any amount of serious
inquiry on a grand scale? Or would that just turn off readers? Maybe we
don't want the hard questions. Maybe we like the entertainment values and
stick with those.
The web counter on the bottom of the web site also keeps track of domains
used to access the site. It's very interesting to see all the countries
and places which have visited this site. Here's a partial list: Singapore,
Australia, Spain, Denmark, Brazil, South Korea, and Sweden. This is in
addition to those with old-style ARPA addresses and US Military addresses.
And Netscape is used more than Internet Explorer by a margin of roughly 2
to 1. FWIW, I use MSIE.
This week is Spring Break for me, which hopefully means I'll get to catch
up on everything from comic books to Dawson's Creek to my homework. I
caught upon X-Files last night. And wow, is the arc story really picking
up fast! I love it.
And I'm now at the lowest position in my NCAA pool. I was second going
into today's games, and now I'm dead last. College basketball is rigged, I
tell ya!
Ugh
-Augie
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