Deadman #1-3
My local comic shop had a midnight sale on Thanksgiving discounting all the #1 and #2 issues of The New 52. DC has done an outstanding job with all the books that I've read so far so I took this opportunity to try out some titles that I skipped the first time around. Seeing that my favorite books from the New 52 have mainly come from the darker side of DC (Animal Man, Swamp Thing, Justice League Dark) I thought Deadman would be another home run. Wrong. What should have been a dark and haunting tale of possession, the dead and the undead turned out to be just another superhero story.
Bernard Chang's talents would be much better used on a traditional title like Superman or Green Lantern. When compared to the strange and exotic illustrations in Animal Man or the gruesome, photorealistic art found in JL Dark and Swamp Thing Chang's work simply doesn't fit.
I feel like this book is my dirty little secret. If Gint was with me at the comic shop he would probably slap this book out of my hands. And what's worse is it's not really even that good. Sami Barsi is an amazing artist. Each month I fall in love with the clean lines and great character design. I'm going to start a petition to get Barsi on a quality book.
The story.....kind of shitty. Standard "aliens walk among us" type stuff. But the story wasn't the biggest problem I had with this issue. Green Lantern is featured in this book but I was unsure if this Green Lantern was Kyle Rayner or Hal Jordan. It looked like Kyle, but since I only read Green Lantern and not any of the hundreds of other GL centric books I'm not even certain if Kyle still rocks a ring. This could have been cleared up with one caption saying "Kyle Rayner. Green Lantern". I'd imagine this would really confuse a brand new reader who is unfamiliar with Earth's multiple Lanterns. Shame on you DC editorial staff.
The question is still left unanswered. Do I like Chris Bachalo's art? This month was pretty shaky. Jumbled panels and bad coloring are the major culprits here. Bachalo also has a habit of not drawing backgrounds for many of his panels. It gets hard to gauge where the characters are. I end up spending more time figuring out where the action is taking place than what is going on in the story. It's a shame because the story is interesting. The evolution of Wolverine, Kitty Pryde and Iceman is enjoyable. Jason Aaron is taking these characters to places that haven't been explored. I just wish the art could clean itself up to match the storytelling.
Justice League Dark #3The cover art promises a story involving Deadman, John Constantine and Zatanna. Instead we get Shade the Changing Man and a villain named Mind Warp. What a dirty trick. Despite these two dumb characters hogging all the panels this month I'm still totally invested in this story arc. I'm having a lot of fun with this book and it's strange cast of characters.
Mikel Janin's art is mind blowing (or mind warping, zing!). I especially like the way Deadman is presented. He isn't just a pale bald dude. You can see the bones underneath his wrinkled, shagging skin. He looks like a corpse and isn't that the whole point?-$
Panel of the Week: Oh Kyle, you are so creative.
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