Grumpy Old Comic Guy turns out to be Quite Reasonable, Actually.

Hey, all.  So, how did your 52 go?  Waded my way through Justice League, Justice League International, Green Arrow, Batgirl, Detective Comics, Swamp Thing, Sgt Rock and the Men of War, Green Lantern, Omac, and Action Comics.  Yes, I read that many.  It needs to be said, here and now, that I didn't actually pay for any of these, but instead worked my way through my mate's son's copies.

I know I'm probably being unreasonable, judging a comic by it's first issue alone, but, for the most part, I was neither impressed, nor unimpressed.  Modern comics tend to have that effect on me.  Take away all the big splash pages and the pin-ups and you're left with very little else of any substance.  Both Sgt Rock and Omac, the only two titles I had any real interest in, were shrug-inducing, at best, and I can't get behind the relaunched Green Arrow or Batgirl, at all.  Justice League was everything I expected a Jim Lee League comic to be, so no great suprise there, and Justice League International felt like it was spending too much effort trying to emulate the Giffen/DeMatteis League to find it's own voice.  Detective Comics was a bog standard modern Batman chases the Joker around for a bit comic.  And, I shit you not, both Green Lantern and Swamp Thing had exactly the same plot!  

Action Comics # 1, however, I liked.  A lot.  I'm still not too sure about the whole returning Superman to his "roots" thing, we've already got Batman to take out the pimps and the slumlords, but the art by Rags Morales and a terrific runaway train sequence won me over, in the end ( took me three readings to warm up to it, though ). And I trust Grant Morrison.  Ok, he's shown over the last few years that he has absolutely no understanding what-so-ever as to what makes a great Batman comic ( yeah, I know his Batman comics have been hugely popular, but just because something's popular that doesn't neccessarily mean it's good ), but All-Star Superman was, without any doubt, the best Superman series by anyone in decades, and proved that if anyone was ever going to make Superman the world's greatest super-hero again, then Grant Morrison's your man.

Still won't be buying the new titular Superman title, but I'm thinking I might give Action Comics the benefit of the doubt, and pick up the next couple of issues.

& while I'm here, there's this. . .

I borrowed this off me mate's son.  It's called Mystery Men, and, apparently, it came out earlier this year, but it completely passed me by.  Written by David Liss and drawn by Patrick Zircher, it's a 5-issue series, set in the 'early 'thirties, telling the tale of the first outing of a group of pulp-style heroes who join together to cut a bloody path of justice across Manhattan in their search to find the murderer of a young starlet.

Zircher's art is better than I ever remember it being before, and Liss' script is solid, nut-crunching pulpy goodness all over.  It's a great little series, a great little reminder that Marvel still has it in them to produce exactly the kind of comics that I want to read, and I'm recommending it.

So.  That's that, then.  Here's some Caza.

Here's some Frank Brunner.

And here's some Paul Gulacy.

You have a great day now.