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PIPELINE COMMENTARY AND REVIEW #42
22 March 1998
by Augie De Blieck Jr.
http://www.nic.com/~augie/pipeline
When I first started reading comics in 1989, one of the first things I ever
picked up was a Batman title, with Etrigan as co-star. Those first few
issues became my vision of what Batman should look like, much in the same
way that my view of what Spider-Man should look like will always be the
Todd McFarlane image. Who drew those Batman issues? Norm Breyfogle. His
style just fit Batman perfectly. It's hard for me to really compare him to
anyone else, or cite his major influences. His artwork is rather unique.
Stylish, yet easy to read. When Malibu tried their UltraVerse, he moved
there to draw PRIME for the first year or two. It was good, but somehow it
wasn't as good as his Batman work.
Breyfogle's been out of my radar range for a long while now. Haven't
really seen anything by him in a long time, quite honestly, until he popped
up this week as the artist of LOBO #51. And what we have here is pure
Breyfogle. It's dark, shadowy, and works within the theme of the story
perfectly. It's good to see his stuff again. Alan Grant's script is as
maniacal as any other has been recently, but without the feelings of unease
that the fiftieth issue was prone to giving me. And I thought for sure he
was going to homage the Marx Brothers' state room scene, but he didn't.
Too bad. It was a funny issue, anyway. The last three panels had me
laughing out loud. For some reason, these Lobo road rage issues are the
ones I like best.
SAVAGE DRAGON #47 came out this week, as well, and is that title's best
issue in quite some time - since maybe the wedding issue a few months ago.
Issue #50 -- coming out in three months' time -- may be the one everyone is
pointing to as the "jumping-on point," but I think in some ways this one
might work as well. This is an example of excellent, if not superior,
storytelling by the part of the writer/artist. Erik Larsen throws in a
half dozen pages of 16 panels of talking heads. But that's not all. It's
not the same panel copied over and over again. The talking heads act and
react well. The characters act in-character. Both the plot and the reader
get updated in these carefully crafted sequences. And one even contains a
decent laugh. Things are going badly in the Dragon's universe. Badly,
indeed. And Dragon must go fix it. Start with this issue - Erik's
strongest both artistically and story-wise - and join in the
originality and merry madcap fun now!
Finally read BONE #31 yesterday. It's a hoot. BONE is once again in top
form and I can't recommend this book highly enough. It's fun for all ages!
Hate to say it, but X-MEN #75 didn't do much for me. In fact, my sum
reaction is a bug shrug. What just happened here? I thought we were going
to learn something.
EXCALIBUR #118 features little BAMF and has more fun and angst in it, even
for a first time reader like myself. Of course, on the other hand, I look
forward to this title getting cancelled so that these characters can return
to their "home" books. It'll be great to see Kitty Pryde and Nightcrawler
and Colossus with the X-Men again, as I hope happens. Besides, this title
should've been cancelled after Alan Davis and Chris Claremont both left.
At last, I also got to sit down and read through Jeff Mariotte and John
Cassaday's DESPERADOES series, issues 1 - 4. It's good stuff. Mariotte's
story is strong and well-paced. Now that the characters have been defined,
I think future stories will be a real fun read. Alas, John Cassaday's
amazing art has landed him higher-paying gigs over at Marvel, so
DESPERADOES' future is uncertain. This is a shame in so many ways. For
one, I don't know if I can picture Cassaday doing super-heroes nearly as
well as he draws regular folks and real people. I imagine we'll find out
soon enough, but this guy can draw! Wow, is he good.
Jeffrey Scott Campbell's DANGER GIRL #1 came out this week from Cliffhanger
Comics. If you read it as just a fun, light-weight adventurous tome, in
the spirit of the Bond films or the G.I. Joe cartoons, you can probably
enjoy it like I did. If you're in the mood to go on a holier-than-thou
crusade over the depiction of women in comics, you'll probably hate it, all
the while loving such heavy-weight feminist pieces as X-MEN and
TRANSMETROPOLITAN or something. Really, I hear the complaints about the
obvious objectification of women in comics, especially as it relates here.
And let's make no mistake -- there's nothing all that original in this
comic. For goodness sakes, Campbell can't even get past the "precocious
fat teenager as computer queen" shtick. But he's not being unoriginal
here so much as he's playing with the cliches. I'm not going to call this
series a high-minded parody or anything, but it does have its good points.
Nobody else is doing an action comic like this right now. So I'll be
content with it.
TRANSMETROPOLITAN #9 is also a great read, I should add. Darrick
Robertson's art, in particular is just getting better and better. And that
writer guy Warren Ellis ain't no slouch, either.
-Augie
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