[REVIEW] End of Month Reviews #45 - September 2007 [spoilers]
Saxon Brenton
saxonbrenton at hotmail.com
Fri Oct 19 21:12:39 PDT 2007
[REVIEW] End of Month Reviews #45 - September 2007 [spoilers]
Reviewed This Issue:
Coherent Super Stories #7-8 [ASH]
Enforcers #1 [Misc]
Jolt City #11 [8Fold]
Lady Lawful And Doctor Developer #5 [ASH]
Thunderclap #7 [Pincity]
Time Capsules #11 [ASH]
Also posted:
58.5 #10 [LNH]
Incarnate #3 [8Fold]
Legion of Net.Heroes Vol.2 #22 [LNH]
LNH Comics Presents #235 (or #91) [LNH]
Mr. Transparent #3-4 [Misc]
Tales Of The Intermezzo: Plot Device [TF/LNH]
A lot of time earlier this month was taken up by having the kitchen
renovated. It took longer than Dad or myself expected, but the effort
was worth it. Not so much that I now have a spiffy new kitchen, but
that I have a spiffy new kitchen WITH CONSIDERABLY MORE STORAGE
AND WORK SPACE.
Oh yeah. And I failed to mention that 58.5 #9 was posted last
month along with issues 7 and 8 even though I included it in the plot
summary. So there you go.
Spoilers below.
-----
Coherent Super Stories #7-8
'The End Times Part II: Drifter' and
'The End Times Part III: Reunion'
An Academy of Super-Heroes [ASH] series
by Dave Van Domelen
You may remember that in last issue of the EoMR I predicted the
possibility that the End Times arc may boil down to people discovering
new and interesting ways to react in horror to the disappearance of a
large part of the world's population on 6 July 1998. While there's an
element of that the stories fortunately manage to stretch beyond it.
Weapons Master's story in issue 7, for example, works as a good
old fashioned adventure story. A group dedicated to Aengus, Celtic god
of love and poetry, settle down in an out of the way area and thereafter
people in the nearby community start going missing. The hero duly
investigates, and it turns out that because the people at the commune
are polytheists they have, not unnaturally, asked for some help from a
another Celtic god with the food gathering. Unfortunately Cerunnos
also likes to relax by running the Wild Hunt, and Weapons Master is
only saved when the gods are expelled from the world by the creation
of the Barrier.
Since Weapons Master and everyone else have very little idea
exactly what has happened, the story ends on a far more optimistic note
than Jiang's did last issue. My main problem with issue seven was
dissatisfaction with the deus ex machina (or perhaps anti-deus ex
machina) that rescued Weapons Master at just the right moment, since
this is exactly what saved Jiang from the Tiger Tong last issue as well.
I accept that it's a case of dramatic timing. However, I suspect that
had the story been written in a longer format then Dvandom could have
shown far more examples of Weapons Master being clever in evading the
Wild Hunt and demonstrating why Cerunnos thought he was a fun plaything.
The story format then changes completely for issue 8, with Amy
Baines (formerly Ladyhawke, who we saw a lot of during the first story
arc) going on with an almost perfectly mundane life, ameliorated only
by the presence of a superhero son and various paranormal influences
that have been adopted into her workplace. Unlike the stars of the
previous two stories, Amy has had enough screen time to act as not just
a viewpoint character but also as a source of emotional attachment.
Being maternal over her son's impending return to active duty helps with
the latter. However, whereas Jiang's story in issue 6 worked as a horror
story (ending without much hope), and Weapon Master's as an adventure
story (ending with an optimistic outlook that, even if Weapons Master
had a lot of work for himself in the future, he'll cheerfully throw
himself into fighting the good fight), Amy's story is basically there
for plot exposition: to finally explain to the audience exactly what
the Barrier that Tymythy Twysted created *is*.
Now, confession time. For anyone who's had an interested in the
ASH setting for any significant length of time this story is the big
payoff of the End Times arc. On a visceral level the audience may have
been expecting Tym to have built some 'artefact of pure awesome', as
the name 'Barrier' implies. However I realised quite some time ago that
against antagonists as powerful as the gods Tym really didn't have much
chance of building any*thing* capable of withstanding them. I was
therefore fully prepared for some sort of hand wave as to the mechanics
of the Barrier, counterbalanced by some insight into how Tym was reacting
to the situation. I was therefore pleasantly surprised when the Barrier
was actually explained (albeit in loose terms) as a clever trick on the
part of Tym and Wanderer in having found a fulcrum point within the
mechanics of the way reality works and using the resulting mechanical
advantage to achieve their ends. Looked at from a practical viewpoint
it's an elegant plan that doesn't need to fall back on the Rule Of Cool
to hand wave away holes in its logic by substituting spectacle.
Enforcers #1
'Cruises & Bruises'
A Misc [Misc] series
by Frumpy
This series spins off from the events of Mr Transparent #3. The
story starts with a cruise liner being attacked by Graybeard the pirate
and his crew, but it's clear from the opening paragraphs that at least
one superhero (Electric Lady) is on board incognito and has been
expecting something like this even if she would prefer her vacation
to continue uninterrupted. The Enforcers arrive and put a stop to
Graybeard, even though he subsequently escapes. More pertinently the
fight offers several instances for the team members to demonstrate
their abilities and in some cases their limitations. In fact, on a
superficial reading of issue 1 that seems to be pretty much all the
Graybeard confrontation was for, although that doesn't discount the
possibility of him returning in the future. For me most of the meat
of the story was the interpersonal relationships (worrying about the
outcome of Super Knight's trial, Waterboy and Electric Lady's romance...)
The second fight scene, however, combines the two. Magic King's
foe Dr Zomibe has found and reanimated most of the superheroes murdered
by Super Knight's betrayal. The Enforcers are infiltrated by the zombie
of Winglord (posing as his own son) and there's a fight. I do think it
would have made for a stronger ending if Magic King's exposition had
been held over to issue 2, however.
Jolt City #11
'Mystery Of The Two Green Knights'
An Eightfold [8Fold] series
by Tom Russell
It occurs to me that after the several issues of exploring Martin
Rock's flaws and hang-ups (most notably including his inability to
deal with his own childhood sexual assault) that issues 10 and 11 had
presented the other side of the equation. Last issue in particular
- even though last issue had lots of action and plot advancement - still
felt mainly like an opportunity to show how badass Martin Rock is.
This issue we get how generally awesome he is, and topping off with
Derek Mason (the ex-drug dealer he saved from the Crooked Man way back
in issue 2, and who's been filling in as the Green Knight to cover his
secret ID) asking Martin to take him on as the Green Knight's sidekick.
Which is a nice touch of thematically tying in the Green Knight's
attempts to make the slum areas a better place, even if it's one fight
at a time, one small victory at a time. Which is not to say that Martin
is presented as perfect: in a moment of impulsiveness he manages to trip
and knock himself unconscious (shades of the Silver Age Green Lantern!),
and at the end there is an oblique confession to Dani about his past
activities as the Mask With No Name, which ties in with his wrestling
with the vexatious subject of when/if four colours should kill.
This issue starts in the aftermath of the cliffhanger from last
issue: Martin had just engineered a prison breakout with the aid
of Dr Fay Tarif and the Derek-Green Knight and been confronted by
Darkhorse. Martin manages to beat the speedster by outthinking him,
possibly aided by the chip in his neck. Or at least, that's what
Darkhorse says. Poor Darkhorse, he just don't get no breaks, do he?
Even the enemies of his predecessor think that the current incumbent
isn't as intelligent.
The trio head for the apartment of the reportedly deceased Detective
Dani Handler, where due to Martin's presence (actually, probably that
chip again) she is drawn back from the other-dimensional void that she
had been sent to. After capturing and interrogating an Apelantian, the
group gather enough evidence to go after the crooked Assistant District
Attorney Fisk (although he wriggles out of charges) and crime lord Simon
Snapp on the grounds of conspiring with the Apelantian Empire to take
control of the surface world. The story closes with several vignettes
as plot threads are tied up, which highlights the feeling of it being
the end of a major story arc. We'll have to see what direction the
series heads in.
A quick point about the Apelantians. More glorious Silver Age-style
silliness, perhaps made more so by a typo. Now, typos can't be fully
avoided in an online amateur fiction forum so I deliberately try to not
comment on them unless there are so many of them that it's clear that the
author needs to be made aware that he or she should use either use a
spell-checker or a proof reader. That said, when the appearance and
immediate attack of a gorilla with a fish bowl on his head has the near
Freudian-slip:
> The simian's fish connects with Martin's already battered face
then I immediately had a mental image not of an aquatic gorilla with a
glass vessel over its simian head, but of a gorilla body with a glass
bowl where the head would be, in which is swimming a fish. And because
this was in the first two paragraphs of any Apelantians being mentioned,
this image stuck with me. There's no particular point to this; it's
just something I found inadvertently funny. I did like the way the
captured Apelatian admitted that he thought the invasion plan was stupid
and that he should have joined his friends in dodging the draft. That...
well, 'humanised' isn't the word he'd appreciate... personalised him as
a character.
Lady Lawful and Doctor Developer #5
'You Can Go Home'
An Academy of Super-Heroes [ASH] series
by Andrew Burton
I had a bit of a problem with this issue.
Not with the writing, since the relationship between the two lead
characters remains as endearing as ever. Same with Cameron's
relationship with Tinker Tom, come to think of it. However, in the
background was a minor point that nagged at me while reading. Simply
put: I have a disconnect between the notion of Doctor Developer having
once been the top dog super villain in Detroit who all the other villains
try to stay out of the way of, and Lady Lawful's comments back in Time
Capsules #9 that one day Doctor Developer's non-lethal death traps will
tick someone off who's going to take it out of DD's hide. Has Doctor
Developer mellowed since he left Detroit? Or were the other super
villains of Detroit such a 'cowardly and superstitious lot' that they
were so easily cowed by the *threat* of death traps, and no-one was too
stupid and machismo-driven to test the threat? Were Doctor Developer's
'know how and connections' enough to give him real control of Detroit,
or enough for him to rule through an elaborate setup of smoke and mirrors?
I'm sure I'm missing something here, and I'll be reading issue 6
with interest.
Thunderclap #7
'High Stakes'
A Pinnacle City [Pincity] series
by Rick Hindle
The subject line reads #6, but actually it's #7. And on an
administrivia note, Rick has arranged for his stories to be posted under
a new [Pincity] tag. Now then...
Ooo. Very evocative start after last issue's cliffhanger.
Thunderclap standing there, in pain, feeling angry and grungy, and
suffering from the very idiosyncratic performance anxiety that
superheroes get in life-and-death situations...
Anyway, Senator Simian of the Protectors identifies the American
Ranger that they had been in conflict with as the Facebook (a
professional impersonator, apparently) who then kidnaps Tommy as a way
of escaping. Thunderclap goes and recruits the help of the Fedora in
tracking down where he's been taken, which is just as well, since the
Blowfeldian villain of the Baron wanted to demonstrate what the serum
Para-X13 will do when injected into a superhuman. It doesn't sound
pretty. Cue last second rescue and the lovely line 'Can't I do this
without some spandex wacko interrupting'. Then, during the big rescue
Thunderclap discovers that Tommy is a speedster: but will Tommy carry
though with his promise to explain all and tell that he's an Ancient.
(Although for that matter, does he even know himself?)
Time Capsules #11
'The Abyss Looks Back'
An Academy of Super-Heroes [ASH] series
by Dave Van Domelen
This issue's excerpt from a historical document is from a small
press edition of a manual on how to kill superhumans written by a pair
of ex-cops who went seriously off the deep end with their ideology.
Now, I don't have any familiarity with the purported source material of
military and survivalist 'how to' handbooks that this is supposed to be
based on, but its contents look like a variant on the type of advice-
overview that some roleplaying games give to summarise the strengths
and weaknesses of different character archetypes. Of course, the style
of writing - from the viewpoint of professional assassins of super-
humans - makes all the difference. Eminently readable if somewhat icky.
----------
Saxon Brenton University of Technology, city library, Sydney Australia
saxon.brenton at uts.edu.au
The Eyrie Archives of Russ Allbery which collect the online superhero
fiction of the rec.arts.comics.creative newsgroup can be found at:
http://archives.eyrie.org/racc/
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