Batman #247So 2006 has come and passed, and that means it’s time for retrospectives. In the world of comics, it’s been a busy year, and while everyone’s going to tell you what was the best and what was the worst, what I want to look at is what books surpassed their hype, and what books made you regret (or at least SHOULD make you regret) forking over your hard-earned cash. So here they are: Five books that made me look forward to the next issue and everything that the creative team will ever produce in the future … and five books that might make me wish I’d just set my money on fire instead, because at least my brain wouldn’t have those abominations permanently etched into its squiggly wrinkles.

FIVE FOR FAMAZING

Superman #654FIVE – Superman
written by Kurt Busiek, Fabian Nicieza, Geoff Johns, Richard Donner, Darwyn Cooke, and others – art by Carlos Pacheco, Adam Kubert, Tim Sale, and others

In Infinite Crisis, when Batman accuses Supes of failing to inspire anyone since his death, this hit a chord with me, as I actually haven’t bought a single Superman comic since the “Death of Superman” event. However, since Crisis, there’s been an unusual amount of buzz surrounding the Superman titles, and finally with a push over the edge by our own Josh, I gave ’em a shot. To my surprise, these books were full of tasty goodness! In hindsight, I shouldn’t have been surprised. Let’s face it – Busiek and Pacheco could be working on a Rocket Racer book, and it’d be worth its weight in gold. With the two of them on Superman? No question – this is a solid buy. On Superman Confidential, Darwyn Cooke and Tim Sale are like a dreamy teamy, and hey, I’ve even been eating up the Action Comics run by Johns, Donner, and Kubert. (To be fair, I never read the second issue – somehow my meager local shop ran out of this minor, little-known title.) Let’s face it, at least from where I’m standing, this is a good year to be reading Superman and all his periphery.

Criminal #1FOUR – Criminal
written by Ed Brubaker, art by Sean Phillips

Reuniting the team from the glorious Sleeper series (by Wildstorm), this book set the expectations staggeringly high (at least, it did for me, anyway), as Sleeper is, by far, one of the best stories I’ve ever had the pleasure of reading. To compare it with that book at this point is unfair, as Sleeper went 24 issues, and we’ve only just begun with Criminal, having just reached issue 3. Issue 1 was excellent, but it didn’t blow me out of the water. That honor was reserved for issue 2. Issue 1 was merely the “gathering the team” issue, but issue 2 contained the entirety of the heist, with betrayals, backstabbings, and all. It was great, because you knew the main characters were going to get screwed by the dirty cops, but the magnitude of the screwing… Well, suffice to say, issue 3 has barely begun to deal with the fallout. I hunger for each new issue with a gnawing in my stomach. Books like these don’t come along often – I suggest you find these issues and get on board while you can. (Hey, issue #1 is available online here!)

Incredible Hulk #95THREE – Planet Hulk
written by Greg Pak, art by Carlo Pagulayan and Aaron Lopresti

I have to admit, despite recent accolades, I was one of the skeptics. Hulk running around an alien planet, fighting as a gladiator? Sure, it’s not one of the standard done-to-death ideas, but it’s not exactly … logical. But once again, man-amongst-men Josh kept pimping the book, and I finally gave it a try. I’ve never been so happy to be wrong. This book has everything I could’ve wanted and more. Hulk pounding enemies senseless? Check. Hulk tearing a mountain apart to douse enemy armies in lava? Check. Hulk as a religious saviour figure? …Check? Hey, much like the general concept, it works out much better than the concept initially sounds on paper. See, the locals keep seeing the Hulk fufill prophecies regarding a certain religious figure who may be the saviour – or destroyer – of them all. It’s a very meaningful addition to what is already an exciting thrill-ride of a story.

Annihilation #5TWO – Annihilation
written by Keith Giffen, art by Andre Divitio

Now this is a comics event done right. You hear people bitching left and right that Civil War is screwing up all sorts of characters from their decades-old personalities. But you don’t hear it when people talk about Annihilation, despite Galactus being beaten down by two previously non-existant peers, the Silver Surfer returning to be Galactus’s herald, Drax being a savage badass warrior and hanging out with a little girl, Gamora not hanging out with Warlock, and … well, the list goes on and on. You know why? Because this book is a non-stop barrage of awesome. And what’s more, Giffen doesn’t fall victim to standard trappings of telling a comic book story in a 6 issue arc – by issue 3’s end, Nova and company had lost their war against the Annihilation wave, completely changing how things from there on out to guerilla warfare. And after recent shocking events with Thanos and Drax, there’s no telling where things will go from here. This is, hands down, the most exciting ‘event’ Marvel’s putting out right now. No lie.

Seven Soldiers #1ONE – Seven Soldiers of Victory
written by Grant Morrison, art by more people than have ever been born ever

If you only had a chance to read one 30-issue maxi-series in 2006, I hope it was this one. While it was coming out, I had mixed feelings and a LOT of confusion regarding what was going on, but once it was finished, I couldn’t believe it. I’ve read through the entire thing twice since then, and each read-through becomes more rewarding than the last. Over the course of seven intertwined (yet somehow separate) minis, Grant Morrison tells a number of exciting stories, develops countless rich and interesting characters (even the minor ones – Sally Sonic, anyone?), and weaves thematic elements throughout regarding myths and superheroes, growing up vs. maturity, and guilt and transformation. The buy-in at this point may be high (four big meaty trades – not counting the JLA Classified #1-3 lead-in), but the wealth of meaning behind everything makes this one I look forward to returning to again and again. It’s not perfect, mind you, but Morrison’s storytelling, mixed with his willingness to experiment with the format, makes this a landmark event in the world of comics.

Agents of Atlas #1Honorable Mention – Agents of Atlas
written by Jeff Parker, art by Leonard Kirk

Have you ever wanted to read a spy book where a mysterious robot, a talking gorilla, a Roman Goddess (OR IS SHE???), Atlantean Royalty, a de-aged Chinese spy from the 50’s, a human half-turned into a Plutonian alien, and a SHIELD agent team up to fight a weird enemy of the Chinese spy from the 50’s? Then I have the mini-series for you! (Seriously, it’s a great story, with wonderful characterizations.)

And now, since I’m sure you’ve been waiting for it…

FIVE FOR FAILURE

The EternalsFIVE – The Eternals
written by Neil Gaiman, art by John Romita Jr.

It’s hard for me to level the guns at this one, as it has so much going for it in concept alone. Gaiman? Great! J.R. Jr.? Fantastic! The Eternals? GOLD. So why am I so bored? Well, the ads for this book repeatedly shoved in our faces that gorgeous two-page spread of Ikaris darting by (with Mercury in hand, I believe), with giant Celestials in the background. But other than that one brief glimpse in the first issue, where else have we seen that? I don’t want to read about Sersi, Party Planner – I want to read about Sersi, THE ETERNAL. To be fair, Gaiman seems to be working a slow burn, seeding clues and interesting moments throughout, but a seven issue mini is no place to pad out a story. You need to hit hard and fast. Instead, we’re getting one of Marvel’s best action artists giving us page after page of talking heads. It’s not that the book is awful, because it’s not. It’s just that it’s not the wonder that it really needs and deserves to be.

The Boys #1FOUR – The Boys
written by Garth Ennis, art by Darick Robertson

Yes, I realize I hyped the book. And on the upside, the book isn’t a total waste – there are some enjoyable ideas going on in there, like the idea of hunting superheroes, and that there’s also the possibility that the main character (Hughie, right?) is encountering evidence that The Boys are no better than those they’re hunting (like when Butcher actually gave Hughie super powers without his consent). Also, I heard that Hughie ran into the girl who joined – oh hell, you know, I just don’t care. Now, don’t get me wrong – I’m not fazed by swearing, sex, violence, or whatever other R-rated material is in this book. But the sheer volume of it, being used to seemingly shock people into thinking this is edgy – storyarcs aside, ultimately it ends up reading like something by a jerk kid trying to emulate The Sopranos. This wouldn’t be such an irritant if it wasn’t for the fact that Ennis really is an excellent writer. I guess I’m just going to have to chalk this up to it being his rendition of junk food – undeniably delicious to some, but with minimal redeeming value to me.

Justice League of America #1THREE – Justice League of America
written by Brad Meltzer, art by Ed Benes

To start off, I do have to point out that there’s a lot I enjoy about this book. Meltzer excels at writing character moments, and man alive, does he enjoy a surprise reveal. Benes has clearly been throwing himself into the art chores, and his enjoyment with the task definitely shows through. That said … Why are the Big Three STILL sitting around a table, choosing the team? Clearly, the team is already being chosen on its own, by nature of the fact that they’re obviously the people already out there doing things and being useful. Hell, even Vixen is running around, doing … well, I don’t know what, really, but it’s definitely gotta be more productive than parking in the Batcave all day, passing judgement over everyone else in the DCU. Meltzer should take a page from Geoff Johns, who got his JSA relaunch off to a bang-up start and hit the ground running. While JSA #1 was in many ways a “gather the team” issue, we also got some clear story, and most importantly, we FINISHED GATHERING THE TEAM. Well done, Johns. Melzter, this is a flagship title. Let’s get out of first and shift into drive already.
(Disclaimer – My shop hasn’t received JLA #5 yet. Maybe it’s an action-packed orgy!)

X-Men: Deadly Genesis #1TWO – X-Men: Deadly Genesis
written by Ed Brubaker, art by Trevor Hairsine

This one is heartbreaking for me. I wanted to like it so badly, as I love everything else of Brubaker’s that I’ve read. Instead, it’s a black mark on an otherwise spotless record. The highlight (lowlight?) of the book for me is one of my least favorite ‘techniques’ – killing off B-level characters for no real reason other than to show you that the situation is serious. Gasp! Banshee’s dead? This situation IS serious! And there’s also the sour taste of this being yet another massive retcon to the X-Men’s history. I swear, these characters were running around so much inbetween panels that they must have had 70-hour days to get all their crap taken care of. Normally, a good story can make you ignore such annoyances and frustrations, but this story really failed to make me care about anyone or anything in it. At least, not in a good way.

Civil War #1 - Turner VariantONE – Civil War
written by Mark Millar, art by Steve McNiven

Ah, the big one. You had to know it was coming, right? Personally, I had high hopes for this book. And at first, I was content with it. Issue 1-3 were passable, even if they weren’t golden. You can make plenty of arguments about characterization at that point, but with over half the series to go, there was plenty of time for Stark, Richards, and Pym to pull their collective heads out of their collective shiny butts. But then came issue 4, where it not only jumped the shark, it leapt over a veritable ARMY of robot sharks and continued into space, where it continued to leap over an entire planet of sharks – one built solely out of the bodies of other sharks – before hurtling into the sun and burning to a crispy shark. See, ‘clone Thor’ – whose mere existence is superbly questionable – wait for it … that’s right, he killed the B-level character to show us that the situation was serious. My favorite! And then Stark called on a pack of murderers to hunt down his protegé, Spider-Man. Amusingly, it takes only the Jester and Jack-O-Lantern to savage the guy – a man who routinely picks fights with a group of his six most sinister villains. But, in the end, these are just the details.

Looking at the big picture, let’s be honest – this series has been getting a ton of press, and this was Marvel’s moment to shine. Instead, what a newcomer gets is Spider-Man in an unrecognizeable suit, a Thor who happens to be a clone of the real thing (who actually happens to be deceased, sort of), and Tony Stark, Reed Richards, and Hank Pym acting like horrible, horrible people, supporting a cause that is being systematically undermined by the writing, rather than by rational story and characterization. It’s an inaccessible, heavy-handed mess that fails to fairly address the pro-registration side to even the remotest degree, because otherwise registration becomes a clearly preferable choice rather than simply the choice of madmen and lunatics. All storytelling failures aside, it’s worth noting that the delay of issues 4 through 7 caused, counting all crossover books, a delay of over thirty books. The laundry list of problems with this series go beyond what a simple one-paragraph gloss-over can begin to measure, but at this point, you begin to get the idea.

Infinite Crisis - Hardcover BDishonorable Mention – Infinite Crisis
written by Geoff Johns, art by Phil Jimenez, George Perez, and an army of others

I’d actually like to rank this one in the five, but as I understand it, my DC-humping buddies really did enjoy this one. As for me, I’m more familiar with the Marvel U (in case the lists didn’t tip you off), so I ran into the problem that many of the emotional scenes only mattered if you already cared about the characters. For example – the death of Superboy really gripped me, as I’ve been reading Teen Titans since it relaunched. The character was layered and very well written – but looking at it objectively, if I didn’t come into the book with that pre-existing love for the character, his death would have meant very little, as prior to his big fight, he did nothing in the actual Infinite Crisis book save for sit around and whine. This is actually why I cared so little about so much of what happened in the book, I suppose; the book didn’t make me care about most of the characters on its own. I felt it relied too heavily on the reader liking it for merely existing, rather than providing something brilliant by itself.

In its defense however, I think you were supposed to be pretty well steeped in DC knowledge to even dip into a book where four of the major characters were held over from Crisis On Infinite Earths. As a result, while there are vast parts of the story that make little to no sense to me (Why were all those guys in space? Did they actually accomplish anything out there, other than annoy Alex Luthor? And why was Power Girl so important? She didn’t seem to matter too much in the end, did she?), the prospect of going back and re-reading for clarity is like the prospect of eating a bushel of brussel sprouts. Maybe it might be good for me, but it’s probably just going to be an unpleasant experience. And ultimately, it probably won’t even be good for me.

So, there you have it. A completely perfect opinion on what you should like and dislike. Nothing to do now but eagerly await the reaming I’m sure to receive for either A) beating on someone’s favorite book, or B) not including someone’s favorite book. (I probably even forgot one of my own favorites, mook that I am.) But you know what? Speak up! I didn’t make this list because I thought I had some glorious knowledge that everyone else lacks – I did it because COMICS ARE AWESOME. So join in and say your piece; there’s a comments link right below the article; and the comics forum, like your mother, is always open business. (Oh snap!)

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