Dec 18 2015

Limbo 2

Today, Ryan M. and Ryan D. are discussing Limbo 2, originally released December 9th, 2015.

Ryan M.: There are few things as irrationally irritating as watching someone else flip channels. Each person has an internal rhythm to their choices and since it is such a solitary activity, there is usually no time for discussion before another channel is passed by. No other person is going to press up at the same time that you would, knows which station to linger on or which weird movie moment deserves a press of the “Info” button. Channel surfing puts you into a sort of trance, a disconnection from the world outside of the screen. In Limbo 2, Clay is forced into experiencing the channel surfing of a mystical creature and it transcends mere irritation to become terrifying.

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Dec 14 2015

We Stand On Guard 6

Today, Taylor and Drew are discussing We Stand On Guard 6, originally released December 9th, 2015.

Taylor: We are a society that loves to understand why people are the way they are. Go to any bookstore or read a small amount of investigative journalism and you’re bound to find something dissecting the reasons why a particular person has done a particular thing. While there is a fair amount of literature dedicated to the study of why people do amazing things, there’s almost an equal amount examining those famous for more nefarious reasons. Murderers, terrorists, and dictators are fascinating to many for the reason that it’s interesting to examine what would drive someone to do something truly awful. We Stand On Guard 6 explores this issue but does so not by studying a villain. Rather, it does this by examining its hero. Continue reading →

Dec 9 2015

Paper Girls 3

Today, Ryan D. and Michael are discussing Paper Girls 3, originally released December 2nd, 2015.

“Don’t trust anybody over 30.”

-Jack Weinberg

Ryan D: The Free Speech Movement, originally born out of the turmoil roiling in the belly of an America committed to both the Vietnam War and the tumultuous Civil Rights Movement, gave youths protesting a mantra regarding who is trustworthy and who is not. The original quote, spoken first in 1964 when an interviewer accused Weinberg and the Movement of being backed by Communists or some other nefarious group, asserts that people over a certain age always have an agenda. Though Paper Girls takes place twenty years after the FSM, this most recent issue’s reveal proves that the saying holds true, even in the far future, or alternate universes, or wherever it is that is invading the Earth in this ripping read. Continue reading →

Dec 7 2015

Commentary Track – Dan Watters and Caspar Wijngaard Discuss Limbo 1

With so many varied series coming out of Image, it can sometimes be hard to know which new ones to check out. Limbo distinguished itself from the masses in its first issue with deft storytelling, a wry sense of humor, and plenty of intrigue. Just before issue 2 lands this week, Drew sat down with creators Dan Watters and Caspar Wijngaard to go through issue 1 page by page, so get your copy handy and join us on the Commentary Track. Continue reading →

Dec 7 2015

East of West 22

east of west 22

Today, Patrick and Taylor are discussing East of West 22, originally released December 2nd, 2015.

Patrick: The world of East of West exists in a state of ceaselessly progressing apocalypse. Jonathan Hickman and Nick Dragotta’s series is appropriately grim to match the tone of a world mired in sustained war, famine, disease and death. And while that’s all terrible, it has sort of become background noise against which millions of people still lead their lives. It takes a specific moment of invasive violence to snap readers out of their apocalypse-apathy, and issue 22 doubles down on both the specificity and the invasiveness of that violence. The result is a haunting, immediate issue that preys on our fears of being attacked when we are at our most vulnerable. Continue reading →

Dec 2 2015

The Fade Out 11

Today, Drew and Patrick are discussing The Fade Out 11, originally released November 25th, 2015.

Scientia potentia est (knowledge is power).

Francis Bacon

Drew: Anyone who’s ever seen a Schoolhouse Rock short will be familiar with the power of knowledge (or at least the sentiment), but another idiom reminds us that “the more you know, the more you know you don’t know.” In that case, knowledge isn’t power, is just the self-awareness of not having power. That’s exactly the kind of knowledge Charlie and Gil are grappling with in The Fade Out 11 — enough to know they’re out of their depth, but that realization may come a little too late for their own good. Continue reading →

Nov 30 2015

Saga 31

Today, Ryan D. and Drew are discussing Saga 31, originally released November 25 2015.

Ryan D: The hiatus is over! Superstar creative team Brian K. Vaughn and Fiona Staples have been keeping themselves rather busy since issue 30 released a million years ago in July, hitting Comic Cons and embarking upon new series. Though Vaughn’s mini-series We Stand on Guard outsold Saga in the month of it’s debut, the Eisner-winning space opera returns with a new chapter which promises to keep returning readers satiated with its signature bend of absurdly imaginative and developed characters in an ever-expanding universe. Continue reading →

Nov 24 2015

Tokyo Ghost 3

Today, Drew and Patrick are discussing Tokyo Ghost 3, originally released November 18th, 2015.

Drew: There’s something violating about an “averted happy ending” — endings that dangle a “happily ever after” in front of the audience before cruelly snatching it away. Vertigo is probably the most well-known example of this, but there are countless others. It’s an effective choice — we’re conditioned to expect happy endings, so denying us that happy ending at the last moment is always surprising — but it’s often brutal on the audience, who just wants resolution for the characters. It would be misguided to suggest that Tokyo Ghost 3 presents an averted happy ending — the central conflict has barely begun, let alone concluded — but I couldn’t help but feel just as violated by the loss of that “happily ever after.” Continue reading →

Nov 18 2015

The Wicked + The Divine 16

Today, Spencer and Patrick are discussing The Wicked + The Divine 16, originally released November 11th, 2015.

Spencer: Back in 2012 I was supposed to go to the midnight premiere of The Hunger Games with a group of friends, but I ended up getting tickets to a different theater by accident. Rather than go by myself, I roped a friend who wasn’t a fan of franchise into going with me by playing up the movie’s violence and making it sound like something it wasn’t. He wasn’t happy with the movie, and I knew up front he wouldn’t be, but at the time I didn’t care — I just wanted him to come with me. I couldn’t help but to remember that anecdote while reading The Wicked + The Divine 16; The Morrigan’s inviting Baphomet into the Pantheon is equally selfish, if much more destructive in the long run than my boneheaded move.

(For the record, I did apologize, and he’s made me watch much worse)
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Nov 13 2015

The Goddamned 1

goddamned 1

Today, Patrick and Michael are discussing The Goddamned 1 originally released November 11th, 2015.

And the disciples came and said to Him, “Why do You speak to them in parables?” Jesus answered them, “To you it has been granted to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been granted. For whoever has, to him more shall be given and he will have an abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has shall be taken away from him. There I speak to them in parables; because while seeing they do not see, and while hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand.”

Matthew 13: 10-13

Patrick: God makes Adam and Eve. They defy God’s will and are cast out of the Garden of Eden. They have two sons: Cain and Abel. The sons don’t get along, so Cain kills his brother. God is furious with Cain, marks him as a cursed man and sends him out to the land of Nod away from his family. My summary of the Cain and Abel story right there is about as long as the actual text from Genesis. That book is nuts – it can spend paragraph rattling on about lines of succession, but burn through two deep betrayals and the first murder ever in a scant few sentences. If there’s any meaning to be found in that story, it must be extrapolated out by the reader – that’s why people go to church every Sunday: so someone can try to explain the “meaning” of the stories to them. But even those explanations are hard to understand. Take Jesus’ answer to “why do You speak to them in parables?” above. The point of the stories isn’t to understand them necessarily, but to experience them. Jason Aaron and r.m. Guéra’s harrowing first issue of The Goddamned sets out very specifically to be experienced rather than understood.