REVIEW: End of Month Reviews #73 - January 2010 [spoilers]
Saxon Brenton
saxonbrenton at hotmail.com
Sat Feb 27 17:12:21 PST 2010
[REVIEW] End of Month Reviews #73 - January 2010 [spoilers]
Reviewed This Issue:
Academy of Super-Heroes #103 [ASH]
Godling #15 [Misc]
Journey Into... #9 [8Fold/Contest] {high concept 6}
The Stars Are Just [Misc]
Thunderclap #16 [Pincity]
Also posted:
Just Imagine Saxon Brenton vs. Andrew Perron in the Return of the
RACCies! #6 [LNH/RACCies]
Digital JUMP! #1-3 [LNH][Repost: newsreader's digest]
Spoilers below...
====
Academy of Super-Heroes #103
'Field Trip' [Rival Schools Part 3]
An Academy of Super-Heroes [ASH] series
by Dave Van Domelen
Okay, full points to The Ginch for both lateral thinking and
seeing the hidden-in-plain-sight. But you just know that now the other
Understudies are going to be targeting him to trim back any net lead
he's achieved in Conflicto's marking system.
However, let's have a look at the big picture first. In this
episode the 'trainee superhuman' theme continues and focuses for the most
part on the Understudies of Crime. Justice gets no screen time at all.
Both Red Widow and Ahmed get cursory scenes that don't present anything
unexpected in the way their plots are developing, but do at least allow
for some character development. Meanwhile Netwalker does get new
direction to his plot development as the Artificial Consciousness named
Ectype reveals the reason why he contacted Netwalker in the first place:
to rescue the construct ADA built by Charles Babbage. And in most of
these there is worldbuilding.
In the main plot Conflicto brings the Understudies to Venus on a
field trip with a simple instruction: place a business card with the
trainee's name on it in a secure place somewhere among the various
political factions established on that planet. The story of the
Understudies then separates in several scenes following individual UoC
members as they go about their task, as well as the lives of people they
disrupt and tick off. (My favourite incidental scene of this type was
the revelation that Bronzewing takes exception to being tracked by
satellite, and can launch individual pinions into orbit on interception
paths to take down the specific piece of hardware.)
However after all the daring-do comes a rather clever twist, which
is consistent both with Conflicto's character and with the broader theme
of the _ASH_ series of the use of power and superpowers. Which is:
there's nothing in the rules of the test that compels the individual
Understudies to use stereotypically villainous methods involving breaking
security, causing property damage or otherwise acting outside the law.
The Ginch realises this and simply travels around the various groups
openly, introducing himself and handing over his business card as part
of the introduction. As Conflicto explains, villainy is a means to an
end, rather than the end itself, and if it's not going to produce results
then use another method.
Godling #15
'Dealing with the Devil'
A Miscellaneous [Misc] series
by Jochem Vandersteen
Hmm. Looks like the start of a new story arc, or perhaps a change
in direction which acts as a pseudo-story arc. Following the death of
Safari last issue, Godling sets out to clean up the working class suburbs
of New Troy that Safari formerly protected. He starts by tracking down
information on where all the superhuman beings appearing in New Troy are
coming from, and as a result makes a deal with the minor crime boss Tony
Gold for help in taking down Master Destiny. Of course, Master Destiny
learns of this effectively immediately thanks to his almost omniscient
monitor screens.
Predictably but amusingly all three men involved - Godling, Tony
Gold and Master Destiny - believe that they can use this to their
advantage and come out on top. Going by past form Master Destiny will
probably try a more sophisticated variation on what he's done in the
past and keep throwing an unlimited number of superhuman pawns at Godling.
We'll have to wait and see what resources Tony Gold has available to
carry out his plans, or whether he's simply having himself on because
he's misjudged the power levels involved between street level criminality
and superhuman conflict.
Journey Into... #9
'Bitter Beans'
An Eightfold [8Fold] series {high concept 6 contest}
by Tom Russell
This is an entry for the 6th High Concept Challenge: "When the
Earth becomes infested with hardwired aliens, one Earthling and his/her
chocolate respond by swimming."
Just incidentally, I find it interesting that of the four stories
posted using this concept, that half of them used 'swimming' literally
and the other half metaphorically. In any case, this story is one of
those that use it literally. Set in 1580 during the Spanish conquest
of the Americas, some alien cyborgs arrive on Earth and begin killing all
the humans, Mexican and European alike, for some never explained reason.
One of the Spaniards, Jimeno, finds that he has by chance survived the
initial attack and makes the sensible decision to run away. Then he
amends this plan to going back for long enough to take some of the cacao
beans, so that he and his family will not be destitute when he returns
to Europe.
Although Tom has frequently stated his love for the superhero genre,
he also likes to play with non-superhero (even non-superhuman fantasy)
stories. In this case we have a protagonist who isn't the standard
fearless hero, and that makes him interesting. In fact, Jimeno is self
aware enough to know that he is lazy and somewhat cowardly. This means
that after the initial killing spree by the aliens (which happens off
screen, just prior to the start of the story proper) that the dramatic
conflict of the story is invested in Jimeno's internal emotional state
of fear versus desire: his visceral need to run away as far and as fast
as he can and hope the aliens don't catch him, versus his greed to escape
with some bags of beans to make his fortune back home. The telling of
Jimeno's emotion struggle is very evocative, from the moment when he
wakes up in the mud and realises that he's still alive, through his
realisation that he wants to/has to go back for some booty, through the
terror inducing setbacks of almost being discovered.
Now, if this were an action-adventure story there would only be need
for a brief description of Jimeno's feelings; just enough to explain and
justify his motivations and actions. But it's not, and reading how
Jimeno deals with his fraught nerves is the main point of the exercise,
so there lots of descriptive passages of fear and self-loathing and
internally yelling at himself. It's very effective for getting to know
the character, and I found myself hoping that - despite the very long
odds against him getting home by himself - that the weasely little man
makes good.
The Stars Are Just
A Miscellaneous [Misc] post
by Andrew Perron
Intriguing. The opening setup of this short story - with mental
battles during space flight - reminded me strongly of Cordwainer Smith's
classic SF story 'The Game of Rat and Dragon'. Then as the story
progressed and the protagonist became stranded on Earth it began to look
as though this might turn into a shaggy dog/shaggy god story, with the
crashed pilot being slandered into being cast as Satan in the local
mythology. And it did in a way, but I had missed the significance of
the title as a variation on the Lovecraftian phrase 'When the stars are
right' as well as all the other little hints about multi-dimensional
geometry, and being dead but not dead and dreaming. So it came as a
complete surprise that the stranded individual was revealed as Cthulhu,
heroic pilot of the starship R'lyeh. A neat little self contained story.
Thunderclap #16
'Revolutions Part IV'
A Pinnacle City [Pincity] series
by Rick Hindle
Considering how much fight sceneing goes on in this issue there's
surprisingly little in the way of plot development. Down in Montecaivo
in Central America, - in what I'll refer to the A-plot because that's
where the lead character, Thunderclap, is - Thunderclap and his allies
continue to fight goons before Zorstorer regroups and tries to blast the
heroes from an aircraft, and in the confusion Thrust slips off with Suzie
as his prisoner. In Pinnacle City itself the gang warfare spreads out
of the low-rent districts, with the Protectors and their allies being
spread a bit thin. And finally in Magadan in Russia the Baron's invasion
continues.
Overall this feels more like the part of a film where there are
cross cuts between parallel scenes showing what's happening and raising
tension. One possible problem is that as I type this I can't for the life
of me recall ever being given an indication that these three uprising have
any connection beyond the *theme* of revolutions; I think I'll need to go
back and reread the back issues for any hints in that regard. In the mean-
time, from the immediately available information in the story it looks like
three instances of the good guys struggling through an ante-penultimate
fight before the climax. Going hand-in-hand with this sense of 'hard slog'
are references to the viciousness from the villains which help set the
appropriate mood.
That said, there are some interesting bits, they just aren't the
highlights of the story. Thunderclap has the crap kicked out of him, only
to discover to his astonishment that he comes through essentially unharmed.
The description of Solstice's shock was quite effective. However, these
are only incidental highlights at a point where the story feels like its
taking a brief breather while it gets all the players set up for the next
phase of the action.
----------
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
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