A Few Thoughts on Comics from this week

Yes I know it's later than normal. I didn't feel well for a chunk of this week. Dagnabbit.

Not as much happened in Captain America #50 as I expected. I thought there'd be some big twist in the long term storyline but, if there was one, it was subtle. Maybe they're saving it for next month when they reset the numbering of the book to #600. Please don't ask me to explain setting numbers back; it's this whole 'having your cake and eating it too' concept that doesn't make a lot of sense.

Hulk #12... why I am still reading this? Solicts for July explain that soon we'll have this Hulk book and Incredible Hulk is returning after having been renamed Incredible Hercules (again, numbering, don't ask). I might get Incredible Hulk for awhile if Loeb isn't writing it. What annoys me about this book is that the Red Hulk is as all powerful as Loeb wants him to be in that second without any real explanation of what's going on. It might make sense once the origin of the Red Hulk gets explained and that's the only reason I've been hanging on this long. Well, that and the art. Here, I know how to explain this; this Hulk book is like watching a Michael Bay film: it's got some silly bits, some explosions, some stuff that's meant to be character building but isn't, and is fun if you don't think about it at all. Once you think about it, the story collapses around you, no matter how pretty it, or the girls in it, look.

Doctor Who - The Time Machination was fun. I remember having discussions online about continuity and, if the show was to return, whether it should bother to acknowledge the old stories or just start over. When the show did return, it did both and neither, which was really very clever indeed. This comic shows why keeping continuity can create new stories, not inhibit them as two 'classic' stories are referenced while using current continuity to create a new story for the David Tennant Doctor. Fun book.

Uncanny X-Men #510 features more of Greg Land's pretty looking but soulless feeling art. It is affecting my interest in the story. It just feels very processed. It's like he draws each character in three or four posts, scans them into a computer, and then photoshops the pictures together. Meh.

Fantastic Four #566 has us beholding the Masters of Doom! Doctor Doom that is. The story builds nicely, giving us detail on what's up for the FF and lets us see Doom preparing for his masters. When they arrive and he cowtows to them, it's creepy. They feel like a Big Deal. That said, it feels like Mark Millar is introducing a slightly more sane Judge Death into the Marvel Universe. That's not necessarily a bad thing.

Punisher #5 provides a big 'What The!?!' moment. Also a 'how long has this been going on?!?' moment that fades into a 'well, that might explain a lot' moment. It's all the same moment. At the end of the day, the important thing is that Frank Castle will have people to kill.

Tales of the TMNT #58 has a tight, cartoony art style, is the end of a trilogy of stories, has time travel, has space travel, has a scene with alternate dimensions, has a giant space vampire, and the C.O.W.Boys of Moo Mesa in it. What's not to like? I thought it was much fun.

All Hail Megatron #11 sets Megatron up in grand fashion while delivering much big action and excitement as well. Watching the Transformers cartoon in the 80's, it was easy to think of Megatron as a bit of an idiot. He'd transform into the gun and leap into the hands of Starscream, who was always seeking to take his place. Why should he ever trust him? This issue explains Megatron's motivations and sets him as a master planner, explaining how this plan went so right for a change as well as why he treats Starscream as he does. Neither character is a caricature anymore but plotters that have use for the other at the time. I had earlier wondered about the pacing of this series but it's been very deliberate, or maybe not as two 'coda' issues have now been scheduled! Good stuff this.