#IReadsYou Review: CAPTAIN AMERICA #1

CAPTAIN AMERICA No. 1 (Legacy #705)
MARVEL COMICS – @Marvel

[This review ws originally posted on Patreon.]

STORY: Ta-Nehisi Coates
PENCILS: Leinil Francis Yu
INKS: Gerry Alanguilan
COLORS: Sunny Gho
LETTERS: VC's Joe Caramagna
COVER: Alex Ross
VARIANT COVERS: Adam Hughes; Joe Jusko; David Mack; Jim Sternako; Frank Miller with Edgar Delgado; Leinil Francis Yu; Paul Renaud; Joe Simon and Jack Kirby; Marko Djurdjevic; Ron Garney with Matt Milla; Mike Zeck with Richard Isanove; John Cassaday with Laura Martin
40pp, Color, $4.99 U.S. (September 2018)

Rated “T+”

Captain America created by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby

“Winter in America” Part 1

Captain America is a Marvel Comics superhero created by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby.  Captain America was Steve Rogers, a frail young man who reached the peak of human perfection via the experimental “super soldier” serum.

He first appeared in Captain America Comics #1 (cover dated:  March 1941), which was published by Timely Comics, a predecessor of Marvel Comics.  After Captain America Comics was canceled in 1949, there was a revival of the series from 1953 to 1954.  Captain America fully returned to modern comic books in The Avengers #4 (cover dated: March 1964).

Steve Rogers/Captain America embarks on a new beginning again with a relaunch of his title series.  The new Captain America comic book series is written by Ta-Nehisi Coates; drawn by Leinil Francis Yu (pencils) and Gerry Alanguilan (inks); colored by Sunny Gho; and lettered by Joe Caramagna.  In the new series, Captain America faces an existential crises as he wrestles with how people view and perceive him in the wake of the Hydra Captain America impostor that briefly took over the world as an authoritarian dictator.

Captain America #1 opens in the Sayan Mountains of Russia months earlier.  There, something new is emerging from the ashes of Hydra.  In the present day, Captain America and the Winter Soldier battle a small army of men who resemble Cap's old adversary, Nuke.  They are killing civilians in a mass shooting event in and around the National Mall in Washington D.C.  As Captain America battles to save lives and stop these killers, he will also have to face another harsh reality.  No one really trusts him anymore... even the people who should know him best.

I would not call Captain America #1 2018 a great comic book, but it is the best written Captain America comic book that I have read in ages.  Ta-Nehisi Coates cleverly uses the battle at the National Mall's aftermath to depict not so much Captain America in crisis, but the Sentinel of Liberty as man at odds with the people, places, and nation he has sworn to protect and to defend.  It makes for great reading, because we known this is the true Captain America, but the dramatic tension brought by the distrust of Cap from the other characters makes for some good reading.

Leinil Francis Yu has been a skilled graphical storyteller for over two decades, but his drawing style has taken an ugly turn the last several years – as far as I am concerned.  He is better here, and Sunny Gho's evocative colors strengthen how the narrative conveys its ideas and heightens the drama.  Letterer Joe Caramagna creates a steady sense of rhythm that paces the narrative flow for both the action scenes and for the character scenes that confront Captain America.

I think Ta-Nehisi Coates will make me a regular Captain America reader for the first time in ages.  I think this is the beginning of a good age for Captain America.

8 out of 10

Reviewed by Leroy Douresseaux a.k.a. "I Reads You"


The text is copyright © 2018 Leroy Douresseaux. All Rights Reserved. Contact this blog or site for reprint and syndication rights and fees.

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#IReadsYou Review: XERXES: The Fall of the House of Darius #1

XERXES: THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF DARIUS AND THE RISE OF ALEXANDER #1 (OF 5)
DARK HORSE COMICS – @DarkHorseComics

[This review was originally posted on Patreon.]

STORY: Frank Miller
ART: Frank Miller
COLORS: Alex Sinclair
EDITOR: Freddye Miller
MISC. ART: Paula Andrade
COVER: Frank Miller
36pp, Color, $4.99 (April 2018)

Xerxes: The Fall of the House of Darius and the Rise of Alexander is a five-issue miniseries written and drawn by Frank Miller with colors by Alex Sinclair.  Xerxes: The Fall of the House of Darius and the Rise of Alexander is a companion series to Miller's 1998, five-issue miniseries, 300.

Historically inspired, 300 is Frank Miller’s fictional retelling of the Battle of Thermopylae and the events leading up to it.  Miller tells the story from the perspective of a fictional version of the king, Leonidas of Sparta.  Xerxes: The Fall of the House of Darius and the Rise of Alexander (Xerxes, for short) focuses on Persian King Xerxes, who sets out to conquer the world to avenge his father, Darius's defeat.  Xerxes, a “god king,” wants to create an empire unlike anything the world has ever seen, but soon faces his adversaries, The Greeks' own “god king,” Alexander the Great.

Xerxes: The Fall of the House of Darius and the Rise of Alexander #1 opens in 499 B.C. with the sacking of a city which turns into a grudge on the part of emperor of the Persian Empire, Darius.  490 B.C., the Persians return with a vengeance, but this time they will face Themistokles and the forces of Athens.  Later, General Miltiades leads the Greeks in an epic battle at Marathon.  Will Greek “democracy” survive Persian “tyranny?”

I find Xerxes to be far less racist than 300, with its historically simplistic and strident “war of civilizations.”  Frank Miller has been one of the most influential creators of American comic books over the last four decades.  Publishers fawn over him and throw money at him, yet you would not know it by Miller's publicly displayed persecution complex.  Comic book stores generally stock his publications in copious amounts.  Miller writes and draws practically anything he wants, yet he complains about the censorship of his work, which has happened... when?

300 was the creative culmination of a prince of the realm so blessed with privilege that such an embarrassment of riches made him think that he was THE persecuted comic book creator of the late twentieth century.  Yet 300, with its beautiful color renderings by Miller's then-wife, Lynn Varley, was a huge success in a decade, the 1990s, that saw Frank Miller reach his high-point as a comic book artist, illustrator, and graphics artist.

Xerxes #1 recalls the graphical design and graphics tour de force of both 300 and Miller's Sin City (also published by Dark Horse).  That is on display in the costumes (especially the uniforms of the Persian archers), in the weapons and tools (Greek blades and shields), and in the staging of action sequences (when the Persians climb Hephaistos).  Xerxes #1 is a graphics, design, and illustrative, visual feast for the comic book reading eyes and imagination.

The more you can set aside and ignore the Greek democracy vs. Persian tyranny tripe, the more you can enjoy Xerxes #1.  Xerxes' soliloquies about Greek democracy ring as hollow as Obi-Wan Kenobi telling Anakin Skywalker that his (Kenobi's) allegiance is to democracy and to the Republic before their epic duel to the death or grievous bodily injury (in Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith).

Alex Sinclair, known for coloring Jim Lee and Scott Williams' comic book art at DC Comics and for coloring Andy Kubert and Klaus Janson's art on Dark Knight III: The Master Race, is Xerxes' colorist.  Sinclair is one of the best colorist of this still young twenty-first century, but he does not hold a proverbial candle to Lynn Varley.

I would not call Xerxes publication late, not by two decades or by ten years.  Still, without Varley's colors, Xerxes does come across as something, if not late, then, too long in coming to be relevant to anything.  Maybe not having Lynn Varley could discourage comparing Xerxes to 300, which is a good thing.  300 came at the end of Frank Miller's peak period, and it is best not to think about what was anymore.  Xerxes is good enough and helps us accept what is, now.

7 out of 10

Reviewed by Leroy Douresseaux a.k.a. "I Reads You"


The text is copyright © 2018 Leroy Douresseaux. All Rights Reserved. Contact this blog or site for reprint and syndication rights and fees.

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#IReads You Review: THE KAMANDI CHALLENGE #12

THE KAMANDI CHALLENGE No. 12 (OF 12)
DC COMICS – @DCComics

[This review was originally posted on Patreon.]

STORY: Gail Simone
ART: Jill Thompson; Ryan Sook
COLORS: Trish Mulvihill; Laura Martin; Andrew Crossley
LETTERS: Clem Robins
MISC ART: Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez and Joe Prado with Mark Chiarello; Adam Kubert
COVER: Frank Miller with Alex Sinclair
VARIANT COVERS: Ryan Sook; Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez and Joe Prado with Trish Mulvihill
40pp, Color, $4.99 U.S. (February 2018)

Rated “T” for Teen

Kamandi created by Jack Kirby

[Afterword by Paul Levitz]

“The Boundless Realm”

Created by Jack Kirby, Kamandi, The Last Boy on Earth was a comic book series published by DC Comics in the 1970s.  Running from 1972 to 1978, the series starred Kamandi, a teenaged boy in a post-apocalyptic future.  In this time, humans have been reduced back to savagery in a world ruled by intelligent, highly evolved animals.

Kamandi, The Last Boy on Earth #1 (cover dated: October 1972) opens some time after a huge event called “The Great Disaster,” which wiped out human civilization.  In “Earth A.D.” (After Disaster), many animals have become humanoid, bipedal, and sentient, and also possess the power of speech. These newly intelligent animal species have equipped themselves with weapons and technology salvaged from the ruins of human civilization and are constantly at war in a struggle for territory.

The world of Kamandi returned in the DC Comics miniseries, The Kamandi Challenge.  Ostensibly a tribute to the 100th anniversary of Jack Kirby's birth (1917), The Kamandi Challenge brought together 14 teams of writers and artists.  Each team produced a single issue (or worked on a single issue) of The Kamandi Challenge, which ended in an cliffhanger.  The following issue's creative team would resolve that cliffhanger left behind by the previous creative team however it wanted.  That team would craft its own story, which also ended in a cliffhanger, which the next creative team would have to resolve... and so on.

The Kamandi Challenge came to an end with the recently published twelfth issue, featuring two creative teams.  The first team is writer Gail Simone; artists Jill Thompson and Ryan Sook; colorists Trish Mulvihill; Laura Martin; and Andrew Crossley; and letterer Clem Robins.  The second creative team is comprised of writer Paul Levitz; artist José Luis García-López (pencils) and Joe Prado (inks); colorist Trish Mulvihill; and letterer Clem Robins.

The Kamandi Challenge #12 opens with the story “The Boundless Realm” (by the Simone-Thompson/Sook team), which introduces “Kamanda: The Last Girl on Earth.”  Who is she and what does she have to tell Kamandi: The Last Boy on Earth as he enters his final battle with “The Misfit?”

The second story is “Epilogue the First: The Answers” by Levitz- García-López.  Kamandi meets his creator Jack Kirby and gets some answers.  But what kind of answers are they?

Let us make no mistake, Jack Kirby is a great artist, worthy of being a comic book icon (or the comic book icon) and being in the hallowed halls of museums and academia.  The problem with tributes to great artist is that those tributes are sometimes offered by people who, while they are influenced by great artists, are not themselves great artists.  In fact, sometimes the people who offer tributes are hacks, in spite of the greatness they admire.

And The Kamandi Challenge is the creation of some who are middling talents, some who are hacks, some exceptional talents that produced middling work in this series.  In this final issue, from the ugly Frank Miller front cover to the “it was all a dream” type ending, The Kamandi Challenge #12, like the earlier issues, is a tribute in name only to Jack Kirby.  Yes, there are some good moments and good issues in this twelve issue maxi-series, but The Kamandi Challenge is a cynical attempt to make money using Jack Kirby's name and legacy.

The best thing about The Kamandi Challenge #12 is Paul Levitz's afterword, which is a true and loving tribute to someone who was obviously a friend, the truly talented and late Len Wein.

5 out of 10

Reviewed by Leroy Douresseaux a.k.a. "I Reads You"


The text is copyright © 2018 Leroy Douresseaux. All Rights Reserved. Contact this blog for reprint and syndication rights and fees.

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