I Was Kidnapped By Lesbian Pirates From Outer Space!!! #6 ~ The opening miniseries wraps up, with Susie and the Lesbian Pirates staging a daring escape from Male Man's spaceship, and making a startling discovery about the identity of their missing princess along the way. Reviewing this is kind of redundant, since the whole six issues (as well as the seventh, and several pages of the in-progress eighth) are available free on the website. It's a mix of old school sci-fi schlock fun with goofy comedy (including Dr Wendy's finest moment so far) and a cute love story, illustrated in the same style as you see on the cover, which looks simplistic but is actually full of character. Platinum has been odd publishing this one, with the last four issues popping up in rapid succession recently, but even though you can read them for free online, the comic collector in me can't not buy them.
I Hate Gallant Girl #1 ~ Formerly 'I Hate Galaxy Girl' - it seems there already was a Galaxy Girl around somewhere, so there were lawyer issues. This was actually the runner-up in Shadowline's 'Create A Superheroine' contest back at the beginning of the year (the winner, Incredible Journey, is still a few months away), but I guess they liked it so much they picked it up anyway. This one's kind of Justice League meets American Idol, with our heroine Renée Tempête (aka 'Tempest') an entrant in a super-powered contest to win the spot of 'Gallant Girl' in the Fellowship of Freedom super-team. She's pretty powerful - flight and fire-based powers - but she's not a blonde bombshell, so she loses out to some other girl who's got minimal powers but killer looks. It's... not really what I was hoping for, to be honest - the original aim of the contest, according to Shadowline, was to find a counterpart to Bomb Queen (thematically, not in terms of pairing them up in stories), a female comic character on the good side to balance BQ's evil. Renée's a good kid, and when danger (in the form of a giant robot) strikes she fights the good fight, but... I dunno, maybe it's just me, but how 'heroic' can you find a teenage girl whose idea of success is to win Idol? By the end of the issue she's moving towards being a hero on her own terms - albeit only with the help of an established hero - but... hell with it, it's not a story I find interesting. The art doesn't help - it's quality work, but the style is heavily cartoony, almost children's-TV-animation-style, and it just serves to sap whatever seriousness is in the story, further pigeonholing it into the 'flawed teenage girl hero' genre that's cropped up in Buffy the Vampire Slayer's wake. If teenage heroines are your thing, give it a look, but if you prefer Wonder Woman to Supergirl, this isn't going to interest you. (Of course, I sent several entries to the Shadowline contest myself - Domino Effect, Paragon, Celestine, Raptor, and Golden Goddess 101, but they didn't get shortlisted so no-one's heard of them - so I risk this review looking like sour grapes... but, eh, what can you do?)
Manhunter #36 ~ News has come through that this title has been cancelled, which... well, it's a shame, but I can't say I'm surprised. The whole Vesetech storyline that's been going since Manhunter restarted has been long, plodding, and not very interesting, and it's only in this issue that we finally get Kate Spencer doing what she's done best since the beginning of her title: law. It's not courtroom stuff, but the press conference sequence, where Kate lays out all of Vesetech's illegal doings, and explains all the ramifications such a corporation's dirty dealings could have in practically every walk of life - with examples drawn from established DC lore - is exactly the kind of thing Manhunter was about to begin with, and should never have drifted away from, examining the DC world from a perspective other than capes and tights. The subplots are still there, sadly - as usual, with each one broken up into only a couple of pages per issue there's no sense of urgency, or even coherency, to them unless you read all the issues together. It's unlikely Manhunter will rise again, after having gone and returned already - I'll miss it, but it was languishing anyway.
Anna Mercury #4 ~ This title seems to be primarily a vehicle for an endless stream of variant covers, with the occasional new issue thrown in as an afterthought. After the opening trio of issues, featuring a lot of action scenes and - after a long wait - some exposition on what the hell is going on, this one settles down to more traditional storytelling, starting with Anna Britton (Mercury) in her everyday boring routine back on Earth before heading in to work - as with the action scenes in earlier issues, it's well presented, but you have to wonder if we really needed four pages of random scenes just to convey the message that Anna's an ordinary woman. The middle of the issue picks up, with a discussion between Anna, the Prime Minister, and Mr. Collier (Anna's boss) which goes into some detail on the situation with the world Anna visits, its history, and what's happened recently, but then it's back to business as usual with Anna jumping into action, and the last few pages conveying about half a paragraph's worth of story over several action-filled pages. The writing - heavily decompressed as it is - is stylish, and the art is flawless within its style, but I'll be honest, it's probably just as well the next issue will conclude the story, since I doubt I'd put up much longer with paying US$3.99 for a bit of a story padded out with action sequences every issue.
Justice Society of America Kingdom Come Special: Superman ~ I'm a tough sell for this, since while I've been enjoying the 'Thy Kingdom Come' arc in Justice Society of America, I've never read Kingdom Come itself, and I'm not much of a fan of Superman either - I don't dislike him, I just don't find him that interesting. And this issue - written by 'Thy Kingdom Come' co-plotter Alex Ross, rather than JSA regular Geoff Johns - is pretty much 23 pages of Kingdom Come Superman. Luckily Ross writes a tight story, one that introduces itself quickly and efficiently, so that little prior knowledge is necessary to grasp the basics, and then moves swiftly to develop an interesting concept. This isn't so much a story, in the sense of a dramatic journey, for KC-Superman - it's an illustration of where he is at the moment, and I found it a very easy to read, easy to enjoy one that I think will enrich my Justice Society of America reading experience. The art is Ross's usual photo-referenced material, and while it can be a bit irksome to see several panels of a character obviously rendered over the same source photo during dialogue scenes, there's no denying that Ross has a strong grasp of dynamic action, and subtleties of facial expression when he puts his mind to it; Alex Sinclair's colours are full of depth and vibrancy too. The adorable Cyclone turns up as Superman's sometime-confidante among the JSA, further endearing this issue to me - better still, Ross gets through the whole issue without falling victim to the Cyclone Costume Curse and mucking her outfit up somehow. To pad out the issue there are twelve pages of Ross's art under construction, showing various pages from the story as pencils, inks, plus the reference photos, and text from Ross explaining his process - interesting if you're into the art side of comics, especially given how influential Ross is as an artist. I wasn't sure about this trio of specials (with Magog and The Kingdom coming up) when I first heard of them, but this one has proved a good buy.
Fire and Brimstone #3 ~ Moving on from last issue's embarrassing failure to catch their target, long-suffering angel Brimstone and her cheery/annoying companion demon Fire are now on the trail of a bat-demon, while in the underworld a notorious freelance assassin demon, The Forge, is hired to eliminate the pair, thus freeing their list of escaped demons and renegade angels from a life of looking over their shoulders. The issue switches between the angelic/demonic duo doing their thing (bickering, mostly) and the seedy denizens of the Dark Corner - their favourite low-life bar - who're thrown into a tizz by the brooding arrival of The Forge to wait for their return. In both arenas, not a lot of actual plot happens - Fire and Brimstone do locate their target, but the fight is far from over by the end of the issue, and back at the bar nothing's going to happen until they return anyway - but in both the comedy is perfectly pitched, with smart-ass, characterful dialogue and lots of well-illustrated visual comedy. All in all, another excellent issues from one of the best snarky comedy comics I've found.
Hulk #7 ~ This is the issue that preludes, in a way, She-Hulk #34 (reviewed a couple of weeks ago), in which She-Hulk, having recently reassembled the 'Lady Liberators' for a shot at the red Hulk, calls the girls back together for a humanitarian mission. This, of course, is the shot at red Hulk ('Rulk' - sounds goofy). Half of the issue follows the ongoing storyline of the title, with Bruce Banner in Las Vegas turning into 'Mr. Fixit' (a smart version of the Hulk) and fighting some Wendigos among the slot machines. The other half is what I'm here for: She-Hulk, having taken a beating from Rulk and not liking that one bit, calls her friends list, and despite various rejections, enlists the aid of Valkyrie and Thundra for round two; Maria Hill briefs them, they go on a shopping spree through S.H.I.E.L.D.'s armoury, and go pick a fight with the red guy. More to the point, it's all drawn by Frank Cho, who has himself a field day illustrating three six-foot-plus tall Amazonian warrior women (his Maria Hill is damned good looking as well). It may be only eleven pages (plus one recap page, also sporting Cho art), but if you like superheroines big and bold and looking gorgeous and tough, it doesn't get much better than this.
