Hunter x Hunter: Memory

I read Hunter x Hunter, Vol. 29

I posted a review at the ComicBookBin.

Albert Avilla Reviews: Red Lanterns #14

Red Lanterns #14
DC Comics

Reviewed by Albert Avilla

Writer: Peter Milligan writer
Artist: Miguel Sepulveda

“Home Is Where the Heart Is” (Spoilers!)

In the “Rise of the Third Army” event this is where the action is. The Red Lanterns are fighting the Third Army. The Red Lanterns have found their weakness and destroyed the creatures through their eyes. We are not talking about let’s subdue these creatures and take them in kind of action. This is fight to the death: tear off arms, body parts flying all over the place action. The Red Lanterns are able to defeat the creatures, but not without the lost of Skorch.

Atrocitus takes the remains of one of the creatures to Ysmault to find the origins of the creatures. Using his blood magic, Atrocitus learns that the creatures come from the DNA of the Guardians. These are some really gruesome scenes; if horror is your thing, then this is the book for you. Atrocitus’s animosity toward the Guardians is increasing. Atrocitus gives his Lanterns missions to seek out the blood of the guilty to feed the Red Power Battery; a leader delegating responsibility. Then, bam! The creature regenerates from a rat; you can’t get away from those little B’s anywhere in the Universe, and it attacks. Atrocitus, being the battle leader that he is, instantly comes up with a plan to destroy the creature. Artist Miguel Sepulveda gives us another blood-splattering, gore-fest page.

Atrocitus comes up with another plan to defeat the Third Army by using a synthetic army, the Manhunters. Rankorr is sent to Earth to get his vengeance and become a true Red Lantern. Atrocitus returns to Ayutt, his home planet, where he relives the destruction of Sector 666 by the Manhunters. If you like science fiction, superhero throw-down, and blood and guts action, then, look no farther.

Milligan keeps the action rolling, and when there is a pause in the action, it’s building up to some more action. Milligan keeps the intensity level high and the story is well done. The characters are exciting and vibrant; they are not just rage-filled maniacs running around the Universe, killing the guilty, but the rage does give these characters that certain spice to their personalities. Atrocitus is quite fascinating, with his intelligence and leadership shining through the rage. This book is a punch in the gut that sends shivers down the back.

The art is horrifically wonderful, and it accentuates the writing completely. After he has splattered this bloody rage throughout the book, Sepulveda surprises us with a landscape of a beautiful country town. What did his teachers say when they caught him drawing these scenes in elementary school?

I rate Red Lanterns 14 Buy Your Own Copy. (#2 on the Al-O-Meter Ranking)

Review: NUMBER 13 #2

NUMBER 13 #2
DARK HORSE COMICS – @DarkHorseComics

STORY: Robert Love and David Walker
PENCILS: Robert Love – @Robert33071
INKS: Dana Shukartsi
COLORS: Heather Breckel
LETTERS: David Walker with Robert Love
COVER: Robert Love with Christian Colbert
28pp, Color, $3.99 U.S.

Robert Love formed Gettosake Entertainment with his brothers, Jeremy and Maurice, in 1998. Since then, he has worked on a number of comic books, including Fierce (with his brother, Jeremy).

Number 13 is a new comic book series from Robert Love that he co-writes with David Walker. This science fiction tale is set in a world where a plague, Monstrum Morbus (the monster plague), turned people into mutated monsters (“the fected”) or killed them. Only a few humans remained (“the mune”), but they became like monsters as they slaughtered the fected and effectively ended the world. The story centers on a bionic amnesiac known as Number 13 (or Number Thirteen), who is trying to recover his past.

Number 13 #2 opens 60 years after the end of the world. Number 13’s creator, the Professor, recounts the beginning of the plague and the war that followed. He continues his search for 13, his “son.” Meanwhile, Mother Goose, the leader of a small “kingdom” of the fected, continues her manipulation of 13, because she hopes to use him as a defense against the mune who hunt her kind. Meanwhile, some of 13’s new fected friends strike out on their own, only to fall into a trap.

As did the first issue, Number 13 #2 shows the influence on creator/artist Robert Love of Jack Kirby and John Byrne (himself influenced by Kirby). Love has taken his influences and created something new, something that also recalls Vaughn Bodé’s post-apocalyptic-set comics.

Number 13 is like a Saturday morning cartoon, but reflecting Barack Obama-era diversity in terms of the characters and players. After reading the first issue, I was careful not to over-praise. Now, I know I’m right. Number 13 is simply fun to read. I can’t get enough, and I want to spread the Robert Love all over your reading list.

A

Reviewed by Leroy Douresseaux

Review: NUMBER 13 #1

NUMBER 13 #1
DARK HORSE COMICS – @DarkHorseComics

STORY: Robert Love and David Walker
PENCILS: Robert Love – @Robert33071
INKS: Dana Shukartsi
COLORS: Brennan Wagner
LETTERS: David Walker with Robert Love
COVER: Robert Love with Christian Colbert
PIN-UPS: Ibrahim Moustafa, Jeffrey Kimbler
28pp, Color, $3.99 U.S.

Robert Love of Gettosake Entertainment has a new comic book. It is entitled Number 13, and Love co-writes the series with David Walker. The series is a dystopian science fiction tale set in a future world of mutants and those who hate and fear mutants. Into this world, a young bionic man, with no memory of his past, searches for answers and for his creator.

As Number 13 #1 opens, we learn that a plague, Monstrum Morbus (the monster plague), turned people into mutants, or into monsters, as their human brethren saw it. The human race became divided basically into the two groups: the mune (immune to the plague) and the fected (those infected with it). The violence between the two groups caused the end of the world, as we know it.

Sixty years after the end of the world, the fected are a race of mutants looking for safe haven. A small band of them find a young man who turns out to be a bionic amnesiac known as Number 13 (or Number Thirteen). Neither Number 13 nor his new friends know that they are about to become pawns in a great struggle.

In terms of style and graphics, Number 13 #1 bears a strong resemblance to the comic books Jack Kirby produced for DC Comics in the 1970s. In fact, Dana Shukartsi’s strong inks over Robert Love’s pencils create an art style that is something akin to John Byrne’s Kirby-influenced work, such as the excellent Byrne series, Jack Kirby’s Fourth World.

Of course, that means comic book art that pops off the page and a comic book that is a fun read. The first issue is raw in terms of storytelling, but this will get better. I think many readers will feel the way I do; by the time, I reached the last page, I immediately want to see the first page of the next issue.

B+

Reviewed by Leroy Douresseaux

Fantagraphics Books Collects "Delphine"

Delphine by Richard Sala

128-page two-color (with some full color) 7.25" x 10" hardcover • $24.99
ISBN: 978-1-60699-590-7

A mysterious traveler gets off the train in a small village surrounded by a thick sinister forest. He is searching for Delphine, who vanished with only a scrawled-out address on a scrap of paper as a trace.

Richard Sala takes the tale of Snow White and stands it on its head, retelling it from Prince Charming's perspective (the unnamed traveler) in a contemporary setting. This twisted tale includes all the elements of terror from the original fairy tale, with none of the insipid saccharine coating of the Disney animated adaptation: Yes, there will be blood.

Originally serialized as a multiple Ignatz Award-nominated deluxe comic book series, Delphine is executed in a rich and ominous duotone that shows off Sala's virtuosity — punctuated with stunning full-color chapter breaks.

"Richard Sala is an artist, a superb craftsman and a very funny man." – Gahan Wilson

"I adore Richard Sala's Delphine." – Junot Diaz

"Richard Sala’s take on Snow White is as beautiful as it is macabre." – Comic Book Resources

ABOUT THE CARTOONIST: Richard Sala lives in Berkeley, California. His artwork been exhibited internationally and his animated serial "Invisible Hands" appeared on MTV's Liquid Television. He has done illustrations for many magazines and newspapers, including Esquire, Newsweek, Playboy, The Washington Post and The New York Times, and for work by writers including Lemony Snicket and Jack Kerouac. Delphine is his eighth book for Fantagraphics.

Review: DELPHINE #1

DELPHINE #1

FANTAGRAPHICS BOOKS/COCONINO PRESS
CARTOONIST: Richard Sala
ISBN-13: 978-1-56097-822-0; paperback
32pp, B&W, 8½ x 11, $7.95 U.S.

Delphine was a four-issue miniseries written and drawn by Richard Sala, the author of the comic book series, Evil Eye (Fantagraphics Books). The series was published from 2006 to 2009 in a joint venture between Fantagraphics Books and Italy’s Coconino Press.

Delphine #1 was the 13th book in the Ignatz series, a line of comic books published by Fantagraphics Coconino Press. Each individual Ignatz comic book was printed on heavy paper with cardstock covers in an oversized two-color format. Ignatz titles were part book, part magazine, part comic book (pamphlet), and part serialized graphic novel, and like a book, each edition in the line has a dust jacket. The oversized publishing format makes this look like a magazine, but the contents are all comic book.

In the first issue of Delphine, an unnamed young man disembarks from a train and finds himself in a rustic village that is surrounded by an ominous black forest. A university student, the young man is looking for a young co-ed with whom he's smitten. Her name is Delphine Penny, and the first time he asks for directions to her home (in a creepy wig shop), he gets a violent reaction. Soon, he's whisked out of town by a grumpy old man who offers to take him to Penny's address, but he eventually finds nothing but abandonment and a cast of way-too-sinister townsfolk.

Delphine is apparently Richard Sala's retelling of Snow White, but from the perspective of Prince Charming and in a darker context. A detail from the cover of issue one and an incident early in the narrative are the most obvious references to Snow White. The joy, however, will be less in the reworking of that particular fairy tale, and more about the experience of Sala's unique style and execution of storytelling.

He's been favorable compared to Edward Gorey and famed New Yorker cartoonist, Charles Addams, and I've even compared his visual style to filmmaker Tim Burton. Sala's writes mystery stories fully dressed in the trappings of dark fantasy and horror. Like the best horror stories, his characters often blithely saunter into mysterious small towns and villages or isolated peculiar locales, or even find mystery in their backyards. With a stiff upper lip, they doggedly pursue answers and often end up battling adversaries right out of fairy tales, myths, and B-movies.

Visually, it's easy to see why Sala draws comparisons to Gorey and Adams, and his art bears more than a passing resemblance to the films of Tim Burton, James Whale, and producer Val Lewton. The atmosphere of Sala's work is sometimes similar to the "Ichabod Crane" sequence of Walt Disney's animated package film, The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad.

Does this amount to anything? Yes, Sala's cartoons are engaging, darkly sweet confections with a hint of pop gothic. He's whimsical and macabre and puts a wry spin on terror. He's a natural born storyteller, but does with the pen and cartoons what the best oral storytellers do with the color, nuance, and tone of their voices - transport the listener to new worlds. Like the best comix and storytellers, Sala's work also sticks with you and leaves you wanting more.

A+

http://www.richardsala.com/
http://hereliesrichardsala.blogspot.com/

Reviewed by Leroy Douresseaux

DC Comics from Diamond Distributors for January 23 2013

DC COMICS

MAY120292 BATMAN DARK KNIGHT ARCHIVES HC VOL 08 $59.99

NOV120206 BATWOMAN #16 $2.99

NOV120156 BEFORE WATCHMEN MINUTEMEN #6 (MR) $3.99

NOV120158 BEFORE WATCHMEN MINUTEMEN #6 COMBO PACK (MR) $4.99

NOV120210 BIRDS OF PREY #16 $2.99

NOV120244 BLUE BEETLE #16 $2.99

SEP120257 BOOKS OF MAGIC DELUXE EDITION HC (MR) $24.99

NOV120208 CATWOMAN #16 $2.99

OCT120250 CULLING RISE OF THE RAVAGERS TP (N52) $16.99

NOV120171 DC UNIVERSE PRESENTS #16 $2.99

NOV120300 FABLES #125 (MR) $2.99

OCT120254 GREEN ARROW TP VOL 02 TRIPLE THREAT (N52) $14.99

NOV120213 GREEN LANTERN #16 (RISE) $2.99

NOV120215 GREEN LANTERN #16 COMBO PACK (RISE) $3.99

NOV120218 GREEN LANTERN CORPS #16 (RISE) $2.99

NOV120221 GREEN LANTERN NEW GUARDIANS #16 (RISE) $2.99

NOV120305 HELLBLAZER #299 (MR) $2.99

NOV120253 JSA LIBERTY FILES THE WHISTLING SKULL #2 $2.99

NOV120161 JUSTICE LEAGUE #16 $3.99

NOV120165 JUSTICE LEAGUE #16 COMBO PACK $4.99

NOV120249 LEGION OF SUPER HEROES #16 $2.99

NOV120211 NIGHTWING #16 (DOTF) $2.99

NOV120212 RED HOOD AND THE OUTLAWS #16 (DOTF) $2.99

NOV120303 SAUCER COUNTRY #11 (MR) $2.99

NOV120185 SUPERBOY ANNUAL #1 $4.99

NOV120186 SUPERGIRL #16 $2.99

NOV120226 SWORD OF SORCERY #4 $3.99

NOV120168 WONDER WOMAN #16 $2.99

NOV120287 YOUNG JUSTICE #24 $2.99