Category Spencer Irwin

Feb 9 2018

“High” and “Low” Art Collide in The Wicked + The Divine 1923AD

by Spencer Irwin

This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!

The difference between “high” and “low” art has always seemed rather arbitrary and elitist to me, but that hasn’t stopped debates about the two from raging in one way or another for centuries. That conflict is the heart of The Wicked + The Divine 1923AD, manifesting both in the actual plot and in the format in which Kieron Gillen chooses to tell his story, a tale and a format that can really only serve as celebrations of all kinds of art: “high,” “low,” or otherwise. Continue reading →

Feb 8 2018

Rapid Recovery in She-Hulk 162

by Spencer Irwin

This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!

Enjoying any form of fiction requires a little suspension of disbelief, but this especially goes for superhero comics. Yeah, comics have rich themes and characters and exciting stories to offer, if you can get past the superhuman abilities, if you can reconcile decades of tangled continuity and retcons, if you can learn the rhythms and tricks of the medium.

I adore that kind of nerd nonsense, and I’ve never had any problem accepting superhero comics for exactly what they are, but it took even me a second to accept what was happening in She-Hulk 162. It’s actually a rather delightful issue, as Mariko Tamaki and Jahnoy Lindsay take an insightful look into Jennifer Walters’ trauma and recovery, but both the methods and the speed with which they do so require quite a bit of suspension of disbelief. Continue reading →

Feb 7 2018

The Ol’ Weekly Series Wheel-Spinning in Avengers 678

by Spencer Irwin

This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!

A weekly title — especially one running more than a few issues — should feel big, as if its story simply cannot be told in any other format, on any other release schedule. Instead, though, I’ve found that weekly comics often tend to feel padded, as if a typical story is being stretched out to better fit the format. That’s certainly a problem I’m starting to notice with “No Surrender,” the current weekly Avengers event. Continue reading →

Feb 5 2018

Searching For the Truth of The Infinite Loop: Nothing But the Truth 4’s Finale

by Spencer Irwin

This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!

There’s a mystery surrounding Pierrick Colinet, Elsa Charretier, and Daniele di Nicuolo’s finale to The Infinite Loop: Nothing But The Truth. There’s several mysteries, actually. First of all, is this even the finale at all? Issue 4 brings this story to a close, but the series was solicited as being six issues, and this issue is still referred to as “Part 4 of 6” even on Comixology. More important, though, is the mystery revolving around the issue’s hopeful epilogue. Is this ending truly as happy as it seems? How true is it? What even is the truth anymore, anyway? Continue reading →

Feb 2 2018

Motherlands 1: Discussion

by Mark Mitchell and Spencer Irwin

This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!

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Mark: I grew up in a fairly regimented househould. That’s not a complaint, it instilled a lot of (to my mind) positive values in me, but it did definitely affect my worldview. My parents are deeply religious, and accordingly, their religion guides them to seek out things that have redeeming value. Growing up, this translated into strong feelings on what is and is not appropriate. To give you an example of where the line lay: The Simpsons? Not appropriate. When I reached a more rebellious age I began to watch, when I could, things I knew my parents didn’t approve of, but usually with one hand on the channel changer in case they happened to walk into the room. Of course, as I’ve grown older, I’ve determined for myself where the boundaries of good taste are tread, but from birth, a sense of good old fashioned Puritanical Shame has been instilled in me, and occasionally my palms still get a little sweaty when reading a smutty comic, like my parents are going to walk in on me at any moment.

Simon Spurrier and Rachael Stott’s Motherlands 1 is smut — it’s shrill and pornographic and grotesquely violent — but it’s principled smut. Continue reading →

Jan 30 2018

Tapping Into the Raven of Old in Raven: Daughter of Darkness 1

by Spencer Irwin

This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!

When talking about the three new characters he co-created at the outset of The New Teen Titans, writer Marv Wolfman has said that, while he’d probably eventually run out of ideas for Cyborg and Starfire, he felt like he could continue on writing Raven stories forever. I find it sweet and admirable to see how Wolfman has stuck to that nearly 40 years later, continuing to pen the occasional new Raven story even as the character has changed so much from the one he originally conceived.  Continue reading →

Jan 26 2018

Doomsday Clock 3: Discussion

by Spencer Irwin and Michael DeLaney 

This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!

Spencer: What’s the most controversial element of the original Watchmen? For my money, it’s the pirate comics. I understand and appreciate the in-universe reasons for choosing pirates, and I understand their function in reflecting the themes of the story in a sort of parallel narrative, but I’ll admit that, while many readers consider them sacred, I’ve skipped them in all my subsequent Watchmen rereads. To me, those segments have always felt tantamount to the supplemental material in the back of each issue, something extra and non-essential, important more as an intellectual exercise than as an interesting narrative, or an interesting part of the overall Watchmen narrative, in their own right. Issue three of Geoff Johns and Gary Frank’s Doomsday Clock introduces this semi-sequel’s own version of the pirate comics: the noir movie. I have similar issues with these segments as well. Continue reading →

Jan 26 2018

A New Perspective Benefits Avengers 677

by Spencer Irwin

This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!

The nice thing about team books is the wide and varied casts that allow the creative team to explore each story from multiple perspectives. The nice thing about weekly series is the sheer amount of space they have to work with, giving them all the time in the world to explore even the most wide and varied of casts. That seems to be the idea behind Avengers: No Surrender. Thus far Mark Waid, Al Ewing, and Jim Zub (with Pepe Larraz on art) have used each issue to explore the perspective of a different Avenger. While the first issue largely used Lightning as an outside POV and the second didn’t lean enough into Falcon’s unique perspective, Avengers 677 digs deep into its spotlight Avenger, Quicksilver. Continue reading →

Jan 26 2018

Mighty Thor 703: Discussion

by Taylor Anderson and Spencer Irwin

This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!

Taylor: One of the hardest lessons to learn growing up is that everything has a cost. This is a particularly difficult lesson to learn because when we’re young, things tend to not really cost all that much, if anything at all. It’s only once we become adults and begin to age that literally everything has some cost associated with it. Want to go out and drink all night? The cost is a hangover. Want to get a master’s degree? The cost is crippling student debt. Heck, even want to find love? The cost is putting in the time and effort to cultivate a meaningful relationship with someone. This isn’t to say that things aren’t worth their cost – love is a good example of something that more than pays for itself. However, the cost of things always has to be collected, as Jane and her friends learn in Mighty Thor 703.

Continue reading →

Jan 24 2018

“Adventures” in Aging in The Further Adventures of Nick Wilson 1

By Spencer Irwin

This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!

Where are we gonna go, now that our twenties are over?

The Menzingers, “Tellin’ Lies“

I turned 30 last year, and it was both as overwhelming and as underwhelming as I’d been led to expect. It was underwhelming in the sense that I didn’t (and still don’t) suddenly feel any different, but also overwhelming in the sense that it’s a major life milestone, a pretty decisive end to my youth. You’re “supposed” to have your life together by 30, to have some sort of direction, but so many of us (especially now in the Millennial generation) don’t. I often feel just as aimless as I did at 18, only with the added bonus of feeling like my opportunities to find that direction have all but vanished. I’m not necessarily full of regret, but I still can’t help but to sometimes look back at my youth with nostalgia for all the possibilities I once had, and I’m rather certain I’m not alone in that regard. Nick Wilson, the titular star of Eddie Gorodetsky, Marc Andreyko, and Stephen Sadowski’s The Further Adventures of Nick Wilson, certainly knows how I feel. Sure, he once had all the direction in the world, but now he’s as aimless as the rest of us. Continue reading →