The Ultimates 2, Vol. 2: Grand Theft America
Mark Millar, Bryan Hitch
Marvel, 2007
Rating: 4.0

The Boys, Vol. 1: Name of the Game
Garth Ennis, Darick Robertson
Dynamite, 2007
Rating: 3.5

Since superhero stories are at heart power fantasies, themes of unchecked power and corruption come pretty easily – especially in this day and age, in which America’s involvement in Iraq is painted as either selfless heroism or megalomania, depending on which divisive political commentator’s beliefs you subscribe to. That theme reared its potentially unwieldy head in a big way in the previous installment of The Ultimates, and it rests at the very core of The Boys, Garth Ennis’ and Darick Robertson’s gleefully aggressive tale of a covert group tasked with reining in the excesses of the super-powered set.

But in the end, both the first collection of The Boys and the final collection of Mark Millar and Bryan Hitch’s Ultimates run suggest that for both titles, questions of absolute power and responsibility are just so much window-dressing, serving as either justification or garnish for tableaus of violent action calculated to warm the heart of any red-blooded adolescent male.  (more…)

Interesting news this week regarding casting for 300 director Zack Snyder’s upcoming adaptation of Watchmen. If you haven’t heard: recent Academy Award nominee Jackie Earle Haley (Little Children) is slated to portray the enigmatic vigilante Rorschach; Billy Crudup (Almost Famous) has been tagged for the role of the godlike Dr. Manhattan; relative unknown Matthew Goode (Match Point) takes on the pivotal role of Adrian Veidt/Ozymandias; Patrick Wilson (who also appeared in Little Children) will play the Nite Owl; Dean Morgan (Grey’s Anatomy) stars as the cigar-chomping Comedian; and statuesque actress Malin Akerman (Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle, Entourage, the upcoming Invasion) steps into the stilettos of the comparatively plain Silk Spectre.  (more…)

 If you’re into comic-book movies (and who isn’t these days?), you’ve probably already seen the clever “Hi, I’m a Marvel …” videos (parodying those increasingly annoying Mac/PC commercials) circulating around the Internet. They started a couple of months ago, but have been getting more and more attention lately, what with the release of Spider-Man 3. Anyway, it’s funny stuff.  

But the best humor always carries with it the cold bite of hard truth. To wit: Why is Marvel kicking DC’s butt so thoroughly in the superhero-movie sweepstakes?

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Civil War
Mark Millar, Steve McNiven
Marvel, 2007
Rating: 3.0

Civil War: Amazing Spider-Man
J. Michael Straczynski, Ron Garney
Marvel, 2007
Rating: 4.3

As its individual issues hit the stands in pamphlet form last year (and earlier this year), the episodic nature of Marvel’s massive Civil War event helped add to the excitement.  By now you’ve heard the set-up: The New Warriors, a team of C-list superheroes with their own reality TV show, engage some super-powered fugitives in a battle that goes horribly wrong when the villain Nitro detonates, killing hundreds and destroying a large part of Stamford, Connecticut.

The first two chapters, especially, are a doozy. The tragedy sparks community outrage leading to the passage of a super-powered registration act, which splits the hero community down the middle and sends Captain America on the lam to head up a resistance movement. In order to persuade other heroes to sign up, Iron Man convinces Spider-Man to unmask on live television. Sounds like a rip-roaring yarn, doesn’t it?

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From Wired magazine, an incredible story about how the CIA rescued a handful of escaped American staffers during the 1979 Iran hostage crisis by posing as a Hollywood production company.

It gets better: “Studio Six” was location scouting in Iran for a science-fiction film based on a book by Roger Zelazny, with early sketches done by comics legend Jack “King” Kirby.

 Johnny Hart, the cartoonist behind the incredibly long-running strip B.C., died Saturday. Shaking Through has long adhered to an unofficial policy of not speaking ill of the departed, so I won’t bash Hart here for the religious proselytizing that drove me from the strip years ago. (The steady decline in quality certainly helped — to be sure, the strip seemed funnier, and not coincidentally less offensive, decades ago.)  (more…)

No doubt about it, 2006 was a good year for comics, as this look back at the year that was proves. Whether you’re into hard-hitting superhero action, thought-provoking political commentary, imaginative science fiction or compelling looks at unlikeable but intriguing real-life folks, there’s something here that’s bound to resonate. If something here strikes your fancy, do yourself a favor: Go buy it — and read it.

1. Pride of Baghdad (Vertigo/DC) 
Brian K. Vaughan uses the notion of wild animals loose in the streets of a bomb-ravaged city to explore concepts of freedom, perception and the cruelty of war without falling into sermonizing.  (more…)

The big news in superhero comicdom this week is the death of Captain America, which received national media attention (including The New York Times, CNN, the Associated Press and The Colbert Report) following the release of Captain America #25 on Wednesday. I haven’t read the issue yet, and it may be awhile before I do, since I was unable to get to my local comics store on Wednesday and it may be sold out for the foreseeable future. But whatever Cap’s death says about the post-Civil War Marvel Universe, it’s interesting to watch current Captain America writer Ed Brubaker tiptoe around the issue of whether, in this case, “dead” truly means “dead.”  (more…)

Astonishing X-Men: Torn
Joss Whedon, John Cassaday
Marvel, 2007
Rating: 3.8

After starting off strong with Gifted and then running off the rails with Dangerous, Buffy the Vampire Slayer creator Joss Whedon and comics artist extraordinaire John Cassaday rebound — mostly — with this third volume to collect their Astonishing X-Men series. But though Torn features a compelling conflict, some funny character moments and at least one example of Whedon’s gift for dialogue (or, in this case, internal dialogue), it’s also a prime example of the pitfalls of what comics folk call “writing for the trades,” and also of the phenomenon of TV and movie writers flooding the superhero arena. While it does keep the pages turning at a fair clip, parts of this book feel so padded that you expect foam insulation to spill from its pages. (more…)