It's All About The Building Blocks

Batman 608-619
DC Comics
Jeph Loeb, writer
Jim Lee and Scott Williams, artists

**********SPOILER ALERT**********

If you don't recognize the issue numbers above, they are from the yearlong, 2002-03, epic story arc "Hush," the Batman story that features a huge cast of Batman's allies and rogues along with the mystery of who Hush really is. This type of story is a theme repeated by writer Jeph Loeb in other Batman stories including "The Long Halloween" and "Dark Victory," both of which also feature a central whodunit mystery and a tour of Batman's rouges' gallery.

The biggest criticism of the initial "Hush" story was that ultimately the villain responsible for everything was a character who didn't exist in the pages of Batman before issue No. 609. That's right, the character's very first appearance as Hush doesn't come until the second chapter of the story, and it isn't until almost the end of that issue that his real name is even mentioned. Then he makes his first unmasked appearance in a flashback. And finally on the next to last page, he makes his first unmasked contemporary appearance.

Loeb provides clues to the true identity of Hush throughout the story, but the character is purely his own creation that was brand new for this story arc. Despite that fact, the emotional impact of the villain's identity hinges on readers accepting that this brand new character is one Bruce Wayne is supposed to have known all of his life, a childhood friend now grown, and seemingly just as twisted as Batman is honest.

Despite the immediate cries of "foul" and "cheat" when Hush's real identity was revealed in the story, the character has returned in a number of story arcs by other creators to very good effect. That, I believe, is testament to the fact that Loeb really did craft a good story despite what many claimed at the time. And beyond just being a good story, it provided the building blocks that shaped a great deal of the Batman universe going forward as other creators stepped in after Loeb's epic.

For instance, Batman and Catwoman have long had a flirtatous relationship in the comics, but it is during the "Hush" story arc that Batman decides to reveal his true identity to Catwoman as a show of trust. Without that development in the modern versions of the characters, I don't think we would have gotten Catwoman's characterization in the latter part of the third series to bear her name, particularly the issues by Will Pfeifer.

I also like the interaction shown in this arc between Batman and his allies, Alfred, Nightwing, Robin, Oracle and Police Commissioner Jim Gordon. Nightwing in particular gets a lot of "screen" time in this story, a further plus in my book. It doesn't hurt that I like the way Loeb writes their interactions and depicts their relationship through their characterization.

If you've never read "Hush," pick it up in single issues or trade. I think you'll be glad you did. It is filled with solid writing and some mighty pretty art.

She's Quite An Intriguing Character

Modesty Blaise Volume 1: The Gabriel Set-Up
Titan Books
Peter O'Donnell, writer
Jim Holdaway, artist

Modesty Blaise is one of those many characters I've heard about but wasn't really very familiar with. She was kind of a female James Bond in a comic strip, I believed for a long time. I was curious to find out more about the character and sample her adventures, but she was pretty far down on my list.

I was right about the comic strip part, although that comic strip has proven popular enough to lead into a number of prose novel adventures and comic books and inspire three films.

Modesty is the creation of Peter O'Donnell, based on a child he saw while he was serving during World War II. The character O'Donnell created was a child refugee without a name or anyone but herself to depend on with war and fighting all around her. The young girl was able to survive by learning various fighting and defensive skills. The few remaining skills she couldn't acquire on her own, like reading and writing, came from an elderly gentleman she befriended. This man, another refugee, also gave Modesty her name.

Later, Modesty's various talents allowed her to enter a small-time gang of thieves in Tangier. When the leader of the group was killed, Modesty rallied the rest and became their leader. She quickly grew the gang into one of the largest, most successful criminal empires, The Network, that operated in almost every country of the world. All of this was accomplished by the ripe old age of 20.

While serving as the head of The Network, Modesty met Willie Garvin, a Thai-style fighter with more rage than sense. Modesty saw potential in the man and, on a whim, bought his way out of prison. From that moment on, Willie served as Modesty's right-hand man. He, too, proved to be very adept at a number of skills critical to the criminal lifestyle.

The Network was so successful that in less than 10 years both Modesty and Willie could retired from lives of crime quite wealthy. She bought a penthouse in London, and he bought a small country pub. But the life of leisure proved boring for these two people so used to adventure and action.

Enter Sir Gerald Tarrant, head of a group of British secret operatives. He approached Modesty with a proposition that could alleviate her boredom and help his agency out with a problem they were having. Modesty agreed to take the assignment on the condition that Willie was included. Modesty and Willie don't actually work for the British government, so Tarrant has deniability and Modesty and Willie retain their autonomy.

In this collection, the pair help break up a murder-for-hire ring called "La Machine," track down a scientist being held against his will by thieves in "The Long Lever," and go up against Gabriel, an international crime boss they have run into before in "The Gabriel Set-Up." While Modesty Blaise is more down-to-earth than most James Bond movies, it is an adventure strip filled with action. Modesty and Willie each have an impressive array of natural talents they employ in the course of their adventures, but nothing -- in this collection at least -- enters the realm of supernatural, superhuman or beyond the ordinary gadgetry.

All in all, this collection of the first 354 strips in Modesty Blaise's nearly 40-year run is a very good read. To be honest, I doubt that I will buy any of the future volumes as they are pretty expensive for what would likely be one-time-only reads, but I will try to track down more of Modesty's adventures from my local library. They are that good.

The Best One Yet

The Ultimates: Tomorrow Men
Pocket Books (2006)
Michael Jan Friedman, writer

This is another Marvel prose novel, but from a later set than the previous ones I've discussed. This set of novels, released in the mid-2000s, has a slightly different cover style than the previous series of novels in the 1970s and 1990s. The 2000 books all have a solid color strip on the left side of the front cover that matches the spine and back cover color. The title of the book and author are printed sideways on this solid color strip.

The Ultimates is the first book from this series that I have read, and if it is any indication of the quality of the overall series, it is a step up from the 1990s prose novel series. Not that those books were bad, but this one just reads a little better, one of the better comic-book novelizations I've read to date.

The Ultimates as a concept is basically a modern retelling of the Avengers, but for Marvel Comics' Ultimate Universe. While the Avengers have often worked with Col. Nick Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D. in the regular Marvel Universe, in the Ultimate Universe, the team is assembled by Gen. Nick Fury specifically to be a super-powered S.H.I.E.L.D. strike team. In the first twelve issues of the comic-book series, the team is assembled with the newly revived Captain America, Iron Man, Wasp, Giant Man/Ant Man and scientist Bruce Banner. Their first mission is to bring in Banner after he accidentally turns himself into a monster called the Hulk. And then, the team -- joined by Thor, Hawkeye, Black Widow, Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch -- must repel an alien invasion.

This novel, according to notes in the book by Friedman, is meant to bridge the gap between that first 12-issue Ultimates comic series and the second. The novel begins when a group of intruders suddenly appears inside the Triskelion, the Ultimates' island base of operations. Iron Man is the first to arrive and manages to fight the intruders to a stand-off until the arrival of Captain America and the Wasp causes the invaders to suddenly surrender. Once the fighting stops, Gen. Fury and the rest of the Ultimates question the intruders who claim to be time travelers from the future on a mission to benefit mankind. The Tomorrow Men, as they call themselves, have come back in time to stop the growth of a vast criminal empire that will eventually seize control of the world and dominate humanity in the future. They are hoping to enlist the aid of the Ultimates in their mission.

Several references are made to the first 12-issue series of The Ultimates comics, but everything needed to follow this story is presented in these pages, making the novel reader friendly. The bulk of the action focuses on Iron Man, Captain America, the Wasp, Thor and the Black Widow, although the other characters are also present. And again, this was a very good read.

I do find it curious however that Captain America alone is so prominent on the cover of the book. Iron Man and another character -- possibly the Black Widow -- are suggested behind Cap, and I realize cover space is limited with that title strip taking up some of the room, but that still seems an odd choice for a team book. But oh well, can't have it all.

Sabotaged

The Adventures of Superman 627-647
DC Comics
Greg Rucka (mostly), writer
Matthew Clark, Renato Guedes, Paul Pelletier, Karl Kerschl, Carlos D'Anda and Rags Morales, artists

Greg Rucka is a phenomenal writer, and he "gets" Superman and his supporting cast. The bulk of these issues, representing almost two years' worth of stories, detail a single, massive epic that stands up to repeated readings. Unfortunately, Rucka's narrative is also riddled with crossover interruptions that drag his work down.

Crossovers are a staple of the comics business built out of fan wish-fulfillment. What reader hasn't dreamed of favorite characters meeting and teaming up? And, when done right, they can be a true joy to read. But other times, they just seem to run off the rails leaving poor stories in their wake.

Rucka is a novelist and comics writer who had done a number of projects before 2000, but that was about the time he came to the attention of DC Comics and started leaving his mark on their Big Three and laying the groundwork for some of the major points in the DC Universe crossover Infinite Crisis. Rucka wrote a handful of issues of Batman and the majority of the issues of Detective Comics (Nos. 739-753 and 755-775) between 1999 and 2002. Following that work, Rucka was the writer of Wonder Woman (Volume 2, Nos. 195-226) from 2003-2006. One of the hallmarks of Rucka's runs on both Detective Comics and Wonder Woman was his focus on and additions to each character's supporting cast. No mere superhero-supervillain mashups, Rucka's stories focused on characterization, depth and involved long-term storytelling. His arcs built on each other allowing an overall narrative to emerge from his runs on a title.

The same goes for his time writing Superman in The Adventures of Superman from 2004-2006. One of the best things Rucka did with his run on this Superman title was to not forget Clark Kent. That might seem pretty basic, but a lot of writers who can turn out a very nice Superman story have no idea what to do with Kent. Rucka made Kent a very important part of his run on the title, and it made for better stories.

Rucka also added, once again, to Superman's -- or rather Kent's -- supporting cast. Kent is newly assigned to cover the police beat in Metropolis, and we meet two other reporters from rival publications also covering the Metropolis cops -- Bernie Carver with the Daily Star and Geraldine "Gerry" Frank with the Weekly. It is clear from the comfortable way they talk to each other that Carver and Kent are familiar with each other. Gerry is much younger, just out of journalism school, and has a bit of a chip on her shoulder when she and Kent first meet, but that eases with time and familiarity.

Another new character Rucka introduced is Lt. Lupe Leocadio, the new head of the Metropolis Major Crimes Unit. Lt. Leocadio makes it clear from her first encounter with Kent that she does not much like him. By contrast, she seems quite interested in Superman and is not at all shy about letting him know that. On the job, she is no-nonsense and also makes it very clear that even though she is attracted to Superman, she expects him to follow her lead at all times out in the field.

Rucka's first issue, No. 627, introduces these characters along with establishing Kent's current status quo. The action centers around the return of a villain Superman has fought previously, Replikon, who can imitate the powers of the entire Justice League. But it becomes clear from this first issue that something about Replikon's attack is not quite right. Leocadio is quick to dismiss his concerns, but Superman suspects someone else is directing Replikon's actions.

In the very next issue, Superman's suspicions are confirmed, when the name Ruin comes to Superman's attention. This is the mastermind behind Replikon's attack, but who is Ruin, how does he (or she) know so much about Superman and what is the final goal? Along the way, Rucka creates a few other new villains, including two new Parasites. And there is also an ongoing subplot involving Mr. Mxyzptlk. Believe it or not, Rucka treats the character seriously, and weaves Mxy's visits into the overall Ruin story to wonderful effect.

Rucka doesn't forget Superman's better half, either. Remember, back in the 2000s, Clark Kent and Lois Lane are married. Lois gets an interesting subplot involving war brewing in a fictitious Middle Eastern country named Umec. She convinces Perry White to send her there to dig up what she can, and Lois winds up embedded with a group of soldiers in the thick of the shooting!

All in all, this run adds up to brilliant writing through several interesting story arcs which can all be viewed as one massive epic. And the art! I wish Matthew Clark, who started out penciling the issues, could have stayed on for Rucka's entire run. His art at the beginning gives us a dynamic Superman, a sexy Leocadio and a truly horrifying Ruin, but he also does a masterful job on making all of the characters look distinct and real. There are a variety of body types and faces in his characters -- something comics, especially superhero comics, are not always known for. I'm not sure why Clark didn't stay with the book, and the art was still good when the others filled in and eventually took over, but its always nice to have a consistent look throughout an arc, especially when the artist is so good at his craft.

Alas, several other storylines involving crossovers big and small intrude on this excellent run, occassionally derailing Rucka's narrative. Rucka has almost the first entire year to himself, but then a Superman-centric crossover causes the first hiccup in Adventures No. 639. This is the second part of a three-part story called "Lightning Strikes Twice" featuring the evil Eclipso pitting Superman against Captain Marvel. The issue is written by Judd Winick, with Ian Churchill and Norm Rapmund on art chores. The entire issue has nothing whatsoever to do with Rucka's ongoing story; I don't think it even mentions a single subplot. Yet there it is, smack in the middle of Rucka's run.

By Adventures No. 641, stirrings of both OMAC Project -- another Rucka book -- and Infinite Crisis -- a DC linewide crossover -- begin to make their presence known. Rucka is still writing Adventures for No. 641, but the inclusion of the OMACs is so heavy in this issue, and it comes just two issue's after Winick's interruption, that the OMACs still feel out of place in the Ruin story. Then, Nos. 642 and 643 are part of the "Sacrifice" storyline that ran through all of the Superman titles that month and serves as a prologue to Infinite Crisis. Rucka wrote all of the "Sacrifice" issues, they do include subplot developments from the Ruin story, and "Sacrifice" is a good story on its own, but it still serves to once again interrupt and sideline the Ruin story progress.

And then finally, Adventures No. 648, Rucka's last, is a full-on Infinite Crisis tie-in which has little to do with the Ruin story that precedes it.

Despite the flaws and interruptions, I still highly recommend the full Ruin epic by Rucka and Co.; it is a truly inspiring Superman story. But it could have been so much better without the distractions created by the crossovers and interruptions from the main story.

Nicole's Life Better Go Smoother Than Helena's Does

Catwoman (2001 series) 53-82
DC Comics
Will Pfeifer, writer
David Lopez, Alvaro Lopez and Adan Hughes, artists

Despite some great writers, I never picked up the early issues of the 2001 relaunch of Catwoman's solo title. But I heard good things about the book when DC had its line-wide event, "One Year Later," and jumped all of their books' storylines ahead one year. The creative team that launched Catwoman: One Year Later -- Pfeifer, Lopez, Lopez and Hughes stayed with the book until the series' final issue, No. 82. And it was a truly great run.

Catwoman started out as a cat burglar influenced by the appearance of Batman to adopt her own costume and animal motif. Throughout the character's history, Catwoman has walked a fine line between good and evil, sometimes committing crimes and leading Batman on merry chases like the rest of the Gotham rogues and other times working with the Dark Knight as an ally on the side of justice. On the pre-Crisis On Infinite Earths version of Earth 2, Catwoman even reformed completely, and Selina Kyle, Catwoman's alter ego, went on to marry Bruce Wayne.

The main conceit of the 2001 Catwoman series was that Catwoman was still not above committing the occasional crime for profit but spent most of her time as a resident of Gotham City's East End and spent her nights in costume defending the downtrodden in that poor area of Gotham. Maybe she wasn't quite a hero, but she was at least an anti-hero, and the people of the East End grew to love and depend on her protection. Prior to "One Year Later," the crime boss Black Mask took an interest in the East End and was making life miserable for Catwoman and her supporting cast, including Holly and "Slam." Holly Robinson is a longtime supporting player in Catwoman's life. Her back story has changed a bit over time, but she was basically a young runaway Catwoman took in and saved from a life on the streets. She has long been a protege, though I don't think Holly had ever donned a costume before this point. Samuel "Slam" Bradley was an aging private eye working out of Gotham's East End. Bradley's publishing history dates all the way back to Detective Comics No. 1 in the mid 1930s. He is hired by the mayor of Gotham to find Catwoman in this modern series, but instead, befriends her and sometimes aides her in her adventuring.

With "One Year Later," readers find that Black Mask is dead, and it is uncertain who killed him although many suspect Catwoman. There is also a question about what became of "Slam" Bradley's adult son, Sam Bradley Jr., a recently disgraced Gotham cop with good intentions. And the biggest change is that Selina, having learned she was pregnant, decides to give up being Catwoman in favor of being a full-time mother. She hands the costume off to Holly, who decides to take up the role of Catwoman and protect the East End.

The father of Catwoman's baby, a little girl she names Helena, is kept a mystery for several issues. Remember that pre-Crisis Earth 2 Batman and Catwoman who tied the knot I mentioned earlier? Well, they went on to have a little girl they named Helena. Helena was trained by her father to be a crimefighter while still just a child after her mother died. Then later, after he also passed away, she adopted the costumed identity of the Huntress, carrying on her father's mission to protect Gotham City. Would this little girl turn out to be the daughter of Batman?

A great deal of the action of this series for these final 30 issues centers around Selina trying to remain retired and safeguard her child from the dangers of being the child of Catwoman. Several old enemies and a few new ones crop up to threaten the pair's safety. Adding to Selina's worries, Holly isn't quite the efficient Catwoman that Selina was, and when some of those old enemies come calling, they mistake the new Catwoman for the previous one. That leads to a number of opportunities for Selena to once again don the ears and goggles. Along the way, other DC Universe events leave an impact on Catwoman's world, events like Amazons Attack! and Salvation Run. There are also a number of guest stars, including Batman and Zatanna, and several references to the events which led to the popular Identity Crisis storyline and the fallout of same.

All of that may sound like a lot to take in, but these issues were great reads when they were first released between 2006 and 2008. Pfeifer does an excellent job of giving readers enough information to follow Catwoman's involvement in the various crossovers without confusion, but reading the various other series can also enhance a reader's enjoyment of this series, if desired. And rereading these stories now, they take on an entirely different sense of enjoyment and connection. I'm not running around on rooftops or fighting for my life at my job, but I have a new-found respect for trying to get my work done while also taking care of our new daughter!

I Want To Like It So Much

Flash Gordon: Zeitgeist tpb
Eric Trautmann, writer
Daniel Indro and Ron Adrian, artists
Alex Ross, plotter and art director

Beautiful, photo-realistic covers and story concepts executed by others seems to be Alex Ross' stock-in-trade these days. The artist admits he works too slowly to handle the demands of being the sole artist on a monthly series. But when he does provide the art for the odd book from time to time, it is well worth the wait.

Adding to my appreciation for Ross' work is the fact that we are of the same mind on a number of areas of interest. Almost 15 years ago now, he collaborated on a series of picture-book style projects with Paul Dini focusing on Superman, Batman, Captain Marvel, Wonder Woman and the entire Justice League. More recently, he worked on a two-year maxi-series featuring the Justice League titled simply Justice. All of these books revealed an underlying appreciation Ross and I have in common for the old "SuperFriends" television cartoon series.

We also share a fondness for the source material for this Flash Gordon collection -- the original Alex Raymond newspaper strips, the 1979 Filmation cartoon series and the 1980 feature film starring Sam Jones, Melody Anderson and Max von Sydow. Ross cites his goal to tell the definitive Flash Gordon story, combining elements from all the previous incarnations of the character. I can appreciate that goal, and I can see the influences of each of those sources in this collected 10-issue series from Dynamite.

I also like how Ross incorporates real-world events into the story. The Flash Gordon comic strip debuted in the 1930s, so this story is also set in those times. The evil emperor Ming's advance invasion force from Mongo comes to Earth, and the aliens ally themselves with a charismatic figure who seems to be rising in power in Europe -- Adolph Hitler. While Flash, Dale Arden and Prof. Hans Zarkov are battling Ming's forces on Mongo, there are also battles going on here on Earth, between Mongo forces teamed with Nazis fighting against a resistance at least in part made up of rebels from Mongo and Ming's rule.

There is much to like about this series, and I really do appreciate a great deal of it. I think the problem comes in with this project being a little too ambitious. Some key parts of the story seem glossed over in favor of the overarching story. For instance, when Flash and his companions first travel to Mongo, they are quickly captured. Ming takes a liking to Dale and decides to keep her for himself, tries to make use of Zarkov's scientific genius for his attack on Earth, and opts to dispose of Flash by sending him to a gladiator-style tournament. Nothing new here, that is all established lore for the characters. Flash not only defeats a few opponents in the tournaments, but over time, he gains their trust and loyalty and uses them to begin forming an army to challenge Ming's tyranny.

It is an often-repeated concept simply because it is so great. And it is great to watch. But it is missing here. In just a couple pages, we see the beginning of Flash's first experience in the arena. Then some beautiful panels of random battle scenes. And then the unity has already been achieved.

Amid all of this, we get "voiceover" dialog boxes of Flash explaining the significance of the title of this collection, "Zeitgeist," which is very well written, but it's not the rallying speeches I expected to read. And this is just one example where familiar scenes are omitted simply because they are well-known. It's understood that they happened, but they are omitted here. I wish they were still there simply because they are the moments when the hero shines.

This series includes some great scenes, some incredible action, but it is missing some key things I expect from a Flash Gordon story leaving what almost feels like the Cliff's Notes version of what should be a rousing tale. Your mileage may vary, of course.

This Is A Spin-Off That Should Happen

Aquaman 20
DC Comics
John Ostrander, writer
Manuel Garcia, artist

This issue of Aquaman is a fill in -- it interrupts the main storyline and subplots, and another writer and/or art team step in to give the regulars a break or allow them to catch up if they're behind. Fans tend not to like fill in issues simply because they are an interruption. This fill in is no exception in that it interrupts the flow of the story being told in Aquaman in the issues before and after this one. But Ostrander is a skilled enough writer that he takes pains to ease the interruption a little bit.

Aquaman appears on two pages of this issue that instead features the surviving members of the Others, the team Aquaman belonged to before the formation of the Justice League. In the recent fight with Black Manta, two of the team's members, Kahina and Vostok, were killed. The remaining Others -- the other Others, if you will -- are the Operative, Ya'Wara and Prisoner of War. Aquaman gathers these three to help track down one of the missing Atlantean artifacts -- a power glove -- lost in the Arizona desert, not a place easily accessible for Atlanteans. The search for the other missing artifacts is part of the main story being interrupted.

This issue also introduces Sky Alchesay, a young Native American woman of undetermined age, possibly Apache, although that also is not specifically mentioned in the story. Sky is a medicine woman with the ability to converse with the dead and some other unspecified abilities, as well as apparently being the inheritor of Kahina's former talisman, an Atlantean seal. It turns out that when the Others join forces with Sky and track down the missing power glove, it is in the possession of an evil skinwalker using it to try to break down the barriers between the Living World and the Ghost World.

Along with Sky, we are also introduced to her brother, Victorio, a local law enforcement officer on the Fort Apache Reservation in Arizona. There is also Sky and Victorio's grandmother, also a shaman, and the person who taught Sky most of what she knows about being a medicine woman. We also get to meet Sky and Victorio's mother, although she died when Sky was small. Sky's abilities allow her to regularly converse with her mother, and we as readers could see the woman's ghostly image, although her words were not visible to us. Victorio doubts Sky's abilities are real and does not approve of their grandmother teaching the younger woman. We also hear a little about Sky and Victorio's grandfather and an uncle, both of whom prefer to follow Anglo ways to prosper in a white man's world.

Much of this issue is devoted to Sky and the people around her as she is the newest element and likely a new member for the Others, but Ostrander also fleshes out the individual personalities of the Others, especially Ya'Wara and the Operative, a bit more. When the Others first appeared, in the second story arc in Aquaman, there was some Internet chatter about a possible spin-off series featuring them if they proved popular enough. Here they are again, featured prominently in this fill in issue, and again in October's Aquaman annual No. 1, the story is supposed to center around the possible return of Vostok and feature the Others yet again. Rumor has it that sales on that upcoming annual will help determine if an Others ongoing series is in the cards.

I hope the team makes the cut. I know it is hard to make a new team of characters stick and find an audience sometimes, but these characters have proven themselves popular in the pages of Aquaman. Rather than the usual America-centric cast, this team offers a potential international flavor. Ya'Wara is from South America. While they are dead now, Vostok was Russian and Kahina was of Middle Eastern descent. Hopefully, they can be replaced by new members from other countries and cultures, as seems to be the case with the likely addition of Sky. That makes them unique enough to deserve a spot on DC's publishing schedule. There is still much to be explored with these characters.

You Win Some; You Lose Some

Headache/Endangered
Kickstart Comics
Lisa Joy/Josh Williamson, writers
Jim Fern/Juan Santacruz, artists

Kickstart has given me two really good reads so far. These two sounded like they might continue that trend, but as it turns out, not so much.

Let me reiterate my belief about comics I don't care for: That doesn't mean they are bad comics. Not every comic appeals to every reader, and just because I didn't care for one doesn't automatically make it a bad one, just not for me. For instance, the first of these two books, Headache, actually has a number of endorsement quotes on both the front and back covers. Someone likes it. Just not me.

Headache refers to Sarah Pallas, an 18-year-old resident at an asylum. She doesn't suffer from headaches, and she doesn't consider herself a headache. That's how her extended family, especially her father and his wife, think of Sarah. The young girl is in the asylum because she has memories of being someone else, the goddess Athena. Her stepmother, Hera, wants to destroy her because Sarah is a constant reminder of Zeus' infidelity. And Zeus just wants to destroy all of mankind.

Obviously, this book is filled with gods and goddesses living in secret among normal humans. Sounds interesting enough so far, but almost all of the characters in this book are extremely one-dimensional. They all come across as so bored by humanity and their existence among humans, why bother to expend the effort even to destroy the human race, as many of them want to do. And Sarah/Athena, being half-human, wants to halt their plans but is pretty ineffective about doing anything. When she succeeds, it is almost more a case of the other gods thwarting themselves. The artwork on this one is nice, but not enough to save the book in my eyes.

The second book, Endangered, seemed even more up my alley. Chris and Mikey are two teens a little embarrassed by their safety specialist father until they learn he is secretly a member of an intergalactic police force and somewhat of a hero at it to boot. Chris and Mike learn the truth about their father when he doesn't come home from a business trip. Instead, a young alien girl shows up at their home saying that their father sacrificed himself to free her from the clutches of a threat to all life in the cosmos.

This one isn't really a bad story, it just didn't grab my attention as much as I expected from the description. Again, the art here is nice and helps compliment the storytelling, it just isn't enough to save the book by itself.

The Gamble Pays Off A Second Time

Book Smart
Kickstart Comics
Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Gray, writers
Juan Santacruz, artist

My first exposure to Kickstart Comics was with The Book of Lilah. I enjoyed that stand-alone, digest-sized graphic novel so much, I wanted to try some of the company's other offerings. And that has paid off nicely with this book, another stand-alone, digest-sized tome.

I'm already familiar with the writers of Book Smart; the writing team of Palmiotti and Gray is not a sure-thing for my tastes, but when I like a tale they've created, I tend to REALLY like it. And their writing is usually solid, no matter how much interest I end up having in the finished product.

For as much as I enjoyed this book, though, I was unsure about it until about halfway through. It starts off with a young woman in the Himalayas with two native guides. They stumble across a hidden temple, and the two natives attack and rob the young woman, stealing her possessions and leaving her to die in the cold. She doesn't die, however, instead wandering until she is found by a mountain villager who takes her to a hospital in Kathmandu, Nepal. When she wakes up after three days, the young woman does not know who she is or how she came to be in Nepal. Her doctor offers some suggestions for trying to piece together who she is and sends her out into the foreign city where she is immediately attacked by more thugs. Only, this time, she sees the attack coming and single-handedly fights off all of the attackers.

At this point, the book was seeming a little clichéd to me. I already knew the basics of the plot from the description before I bought the book: She's likely a spy or other covert agent, and while she doesn't remember who she is, she can fight quite well. Adding to my dislike were the series' art miscues. The woman on the cover of the book is standing in a typical spy pose, complete with high-tech pistol and is very obviously a dark-haired woman. But the heroine of the story has no gun, doesn't even bother to pick up a gun from one of her dispatched assailants and has brownish, sometimes almost dark blonde hair. It would still be a bad continuity error to confuse the color of the heroine's hair between the cover and interior if there were different artists involved, but when the same artist and colorist work on both the cover and interior, such an error is just sloppy.

The young woman tracks down the hotel she was staying at and learns she checked in under the name Samantha Rayne. Along the way, she picks up a few allies and several more factions wishing her harm. And then, about two-thirds of the way through the book, Palmiotti and Gray throw a twist into the action that not only takes the story in a unique and unexpected direction, but one that makes all previous complaints I had fade away. With one small plot twist, they managed to catch me off-guard, explain the significance of the book's title, renew my faith in the ability of the artists and capture my interest completely. Kudos all around, gentlemen; well done!