While Christmas continues to speed towards us (or are we speeding towards it?), the most important week of this addict's life has just come to an end.
It's been a busy old week as, over the weekend just gone, I hit another Birthday. It wasn't a landmark one or anything, but it was a good old time with my wife and kids which saw me gifted a whole heap of comic goodness. This goodness included volume one trades of White Ash and the Good Asian, a Superman Bust, a Man of Steel (Film connected) watch, some Eaglemoss trades in the form of JLA: Tower of Babel, JLA: Act of God and Superman/Batman: Public Enemies, a bunch of funky t-shirts and, to top it off, a hardcover volume one collected edition of Gideon Falls.
So, all in all, a good haul.
However, while the week started off with some big additions to my comic library, none of these were the main focus of my reading week.
You see, this week's main read was the Modern Frankenstein #1-5, which I've been sitting on the single issues of for a couple of months since its release. Created by Paul Cornell, Emma Vieceli, Pippa Bowland and Simon Bowland and published by Heavy Metal/Magma Comix, this series follows the story of Dr Elizabeth Cleeve, a promising young doctor studying under the tutelage of the brilliant but mysterious Dr James Frankenstein. However, when Frankenstein seemingly cures Elizabeth's mother from a seemingly incurable condition, the student finds herself drawn deeper under her teacher's thrall (in more ways than one) when he invites her to see his true work: Experimenting on people in order to find cures for all conditions of the mind in order to make people 'better.'
Leading into this series, I had high hopes for it to really work for me given it's creative team. With the story being written by the legend that is Paul Cornell (Captain Britain & MI13 and I Walk with Monsters) and drawn by the fantastic Emma Vieceli (Breaks), two of my favourite creators going, the Modern Frankenstein seemed like a sure fire win. However, while it was a good read, I'm not sure if it was the absolute hit I was expecting.
When I originally read the first issue some months ago for review purposes, I thought that the issue had something of a slow burn as it started a truly cerebral thriller. This continued to be the case here as, reading the story in it's entirety, I realised that the Modern Frankenstein continue to move at a slow pace throughout the first three issues at minimum, even feeling like it had slowed down more so after the opening instalment. Of course, I'm making it sound like a bad comic read and nothing is further from the truth as, despite its slowness, I found myself truly sucked in and eager to know how this story was going to end, for all of the players if nothing else. I found the characters to be ... well, not very likable but then, given their actions through the series, maybe that's the point. Nonetheless, both Frankenstein and Elizabeth were very intriguing characters as will was intrigued by their actions and how both dealt with the emotional repercussions of them. This helped keep me invested as the story reached the final act and their views and objectives seemingly diverged. As such, the twist toward the end was a little unsettling, despite it being a nice payoff from an earlier set up, and helped ramp up the horror aspect while also improving my concern for the fate of one of the leads while disliking the other in equal measure.
As for the art, I really liked Vieceli's art style that is used here, with it having a clean look which, when coupled with Pippa Bowland's colours, has this look which makes me think of how classical it comes across as, sort of like Curia Regis in that it is attempting to reflect the original Frankenstein's era but in a more modern setting. I also thought that the art really had an unsettling look to it in some way, which certainly helped later when the story seemed to push towards the more horror side. In fact, my only complaint had to be that while the colours really suited the pencils, I do wonder if they were too light for the more horror tinged final act of the story.
By the end, I have found myself struggling to find a theme for this series (or maybe it had too many). Is it about the dangers of needing total Control? How obsession can be dangerous? How Love can make you blind until it is too late? Should you disregard the rules for the greater good? Maybe it's a little of all of them. Still the Modern Frankenstein was a good and engrossing read and, having finished, I'm glad that I gave it the time to check it out.
So, with Modern Frankenstein done, I moved onto White Ash Season 2 #1, which I read for the purpose of reviewing for Pipedream Comics. This issue, which picked up a couple of months after the first volume and resulted in its characters hunting down another villainous Brood, felt like a continuation of that first season both in terms of story telling and its overall presentation and quality. The art still looked terrific here, and continued to make me think of work done by Darwyn Cooke and my buddy Robert Ahmad.
Meanwhile, I really thought that the characters had begun to get more interesting, with a couple more who had previously been in the background looking like they were being pushed up to a more 'main cast' type of role (or would be if this was a TV show). Suffice to say, this series continues to get it monstrous hooks into me good and proper and I really do look forward to what more is to come during the rest of this second season (and hopefully beyond).
I then moved onto Fantastic Four #38, which I picked up early this week after being unable to get it from my LCS on New Comic Book Day last Wednesday. This issue started a (presumably) two part story where the Wizard arrives at the newly rebuilt Baxter Building in order to retrieve his 'son', Bentley-23. However, rather than do battle with the First Family, Bentley Whitman produces a weapon that the FF were not expecting; a legal summons. Now, with the help of the MU's super lawyer She-Hulk, the Richards clan must do battle with their enemy in a battlefield they are not used to; the courtroom.
For me, FF has been having a good run of late of consistently good issues but I did feel that this one was where the ball was dropped a bit. I can't lie that I really liked the concept on display here, but the execution left something to be desired in my eyes. Almost the entire issue felt like a slog and I really struggled to feel all that invested in its progression. It wasn't helped by the fact that the main three family members (minimal Johnny this week) seemed to act really out of sorts for much of the issue (don't get me started on Sue pushing for a fight). I also wasn't overly impressed with the depiction of the Judge, who really felt like she was a caricature of the type of cliched judge you seen in a TV show.
On the other hand though, I really loved the art. This issue's art is, as usual, phenomenal thanks to Francesco Manna. This does make me ponder 'Where do Marvel keep getting these artists?' as, after Isaakze, Medina, Silva and now Manna, they have placed a terrific selection of creators whose styles not only mesh together in terms of consistency but also look absolutely fantastic (pun very much intended). To cap it off (or get the ball rolling I guess) was a truly beautiful cover by the Dodson's which will always make things better in my opinion. However, despite the great art, this issue was only an ok for me. I'm hoping that it's let down is solely due to a lack of an ending and I really want to believe that the next issue will bring its stock up and make it all one of those 'whole is greater than the sum of its parts' deal, but I guess we'll have to wait until next month to see.
And that's been the books I've read this week. In truth, I did start one other, but given that I didn't finish it while I wrote this, that comic will fold over I next week.
Not that it'll take me long to finish the Good Asian.
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