More to keep you busy/COMICS

CLOSE TO THE END
By Alex Ness, AlexanderNess63@gmail.com
May 9, 2023 

I've decided that I better take a hiatus.  Being so sick makes me either weepy and nostalgic or pissed off and unreasonable.  So when I finish the big review in 10 days or so, the edition following will be the last one for perhaps a long time.  Still working on the big book review, in the meantime, please give this a read and wait for the 17th or 18th for the big review. But I've added Covid to my list of health issues. For me, I thought if I ever get covid I'd surely die. Somebody suggested that I'm a magnet to shit health. Maybe that is true. This isn't meant to be meaningless jumbles of words, loads of filler, but to suggest some wonderful works that you might have overlooked it. The names are familiar, but the works themselves are  perhaps not.

Particular thanks for recent inspiration and outlook go to Barbara Schulz, Rich Chapell, David Hine, and of course, and always Mike Grell.

MIKE GRELL DC Comics Batman Elseworlds MASQUE

There is something to really celebrate about the amount of thought Mike Grell puts into his stories. He is a fine artist, I like his work, but when he is writing for his own hand, there is something far deeper at play.  Here he looks at Batman from the angle of 1890 Gotham City, with an opera house, that is fortunate to have the work of Harvey Dent as main actor in many performances. But during a fire, Dent's costume catches fire, and he is disfigured for life.  The story itself seems familiar, but it is made perfect by Grell's work on it. It deserved way more attention to it, and I get something new from it with each read.  I think the Elseworld's are special, because most are truly good, and offer an opportunity to see the character in a different setting.

GREY the Perfect collection VIZ Yoshihisa Tagami

I was never a fan of the Anime of GREY, but the story in the Manga is more than good, it is intriguing, with a level of thought that most comics of the day never bothered with. The story of GREY is familiar in Manga, a post apocalyptic world, trying to restore itself, and beset by rebellion and war lords. The art is consistent, nice to look at, and went beyond most other Manga, in terms of detail, cinematographic scenery, and displaying action as needed, rather than as being the sole source of interest. I really liked this.  The Manga has aged well, especially in terms of the depth of thought regarding how earth would try to recover from war, and in general disaster.

The Original ASTRO BOY Now Comics, previously from Japan

When I bought my first buttload of Astro Boy it was due to the fact that it was 10 comics for 2 dollars.  When I bought the second buttload of Astro Boy, it was due to loving the character.  NOW Comics gets a lot of notoriety for having gone bankrupt, once the fault of the owner, the other the fault of being part of a major buy out and his debt to a printer being used as a reason to delete his ongoing company.  I know the owner Tony Caputo, and while some folks disliked him due to his going out of business and owing money, he was not anything what I was told he would be. I think of him still as a friend or more correctly, a business friend. He's talented, charismatic, and has the flaw of being emotional in a world where that is perceived as weakness. But by the Gods of Valhalla I have to say, he had an eye for quality, new talent, and understood the business. Taking the license to do Astro Boy when Manga was first being discovered by American readers, seemed to some to be opportunistic, but what he did was place an artist who was in love with the character and a writer who completely understood the concept, and turned out 20 issues of f'king brilliant new adventures of an old and beloved character.  I know from other pros in the field that they wouldn't touch a comic by NOW, but if you want good reading, ignore those who have a grudge, and just read what you want. Astro boy is lovable, more human than humans in his kindness, and smart and powerful as a robot should be.

I love it.

GETTING REVIEWS?

For now, reviews won't be quickly happening, but when I return I will try to be as good as I've been over the last two years, which was but for one review item, pretty damn good.

I accept hard copies, so when you inquire at any of these places, I'll follow through by telling you my street address.If you send hard copies for review I will try to always review them, but if you prefer to send pdf or ebooks to my email, I will review these at my discretion. I don't share my pdf/ebooks.

My Creative Blogs:


My 5000 poem Blog AlexNessPoetry.Blogspot.Com
 
Cthulhu Alien Horrors CthulhuDarkness.Blogspot.Com

Atlantis & Lost Worlds AlexNessLostWorlds.Blogspot.Com
Published Work  AlexNessPoetry.Blogspot.Com/2007/01/My-Work.html

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