Secret Invasion #1 ~ Who do you trust? Well, based on this issue, I trust Bendis - he kicks off Marvel's big event with a hell of a boom, providing plenty of spectacle along with ample material for internet message boards to argue themselves nuts over until next month. And the clever thing with this issue is that, while there are several stand-out moments where you turn the page and go "Whoa," they're each different kinds of surprises. Some are doubtless true Skrull reveals - we're starting to find out which of the characters we've been suspecting for months really are aliens in disguise. Some are almost certainly fake-outs - one in particular simply cannot be true, but it's impressive just in that Bendis had the balls to do it. Some are plain ol' whammies, where what happens on the page wows you. And some are like that, but then you stop and think about what you're seeing, and you start to wonder what it might all mean - there's certainly more going on here than just a simple 'take over the Earth' effort by an alien threat. One thing's for sure - and this is a good sign after the opening shot of a big event like this: I don't know how the hell the good guys are going to get out of this one.
Leinil Yu is an artist I've never really cottoned to - his sketchy, angular style is probably the main reason I don't read New Avengers, since although it works well in some regards, it's notoriously bad at attractive women, which is (you may have gathered) something I quite like to see in a comic book. So you can imagine I wasn't exactly thrilled to learn he'd be drawing Secret Invasion - well the good news is that he's got an inker (Mark Morales), and though his style is still there (and the women still don't look great), being inked rather than just colouring the raw pencils takes the edge off it, so far as me not liking it goes. Along with bold, confident colours, the art ends up being something that, while not as great in my eyes as other artists, I can enjoy just fine.
Anna Mercury #1 ~ A new book which I thought I'd try out - I'm not entirely convinced yet, but I'm interested enough to get the next issue to see where it goes. The setting is a kind of corporate crime noir with a dash of sci-fi, and the titular heroine is a slinky leather-clad gymnatic assassin type with big hair, who sneaks about and breaks people's faces and swings from the rooftops a la Spider-Man. This issue shows her off, and introduces the plotline about a big (and apparently evil) city waging a war on another big city, which gets Anna involved in a quest to stop the evil city using a new superweapon they've developed to annihilate their foes - plus she's also got other loyalties besides saving people, and on top of that she's not shy about beating the hell out of anyone in her way, or letting them die if it furthers her aims. It's an interesting setup, and Anna - despite her ginormous mane of hair, which I am having a bit of trouble taking seriously (it's like Byrne-era She-Hulk times ten) - has some qualities that set her apart from the crowd, but it's not yet at the stage where it's so cool you just have to have more. A lot of time is spent early on with her swinging this way and that, being all acrobatic and sexy, plus there's a big, text-less two-page spread to show off the city which I'm not entirely sure was necessary - at the end of the issue, you realise that a lot of page space has been spent on things other than character and story development. Don't get me wrong, I like cool visuals as much as the next Michael Bay fan, but at 22 pages for US$3.99, it's a bit of a shame there wasn't more of an effort to be visual and pack in a lot of storytelling.
The Blackbeard Legacy #2 ~ This pirate tale romps on, moving quickly through a tense negotiation with the all-female crew's newfound male captive, who promises to lead them to a hoard of loot in exchange for a share (and to save his own skin), on to the dead rising, and back to the ocean where a curse of some kind seems to have called an almighty storm down on our fair heroines' heads. At US$3.99 an issue you'd want value from this title, and so far it's delivering enough to keep me happy - the art is vivid and kinetic, with a playful sense of visual style and humour accompanying a fast-moving storyline, and Captain Hanna, with the lion's share of the 'screen time', proves to be an entertainingly ruthless and shrewd pirate lass. I'm not calling this a runaway success, but it's good enough that I feel I've gotten my money's worth in entertainment, and I'll be back for more next month.
