Skip to main content

Featured

Of Embassies and Origins - Justice League International Part 2 (Eaglemoss Collection v77)

  Review: Since we are doing a series of reviews focusing on Booster Gold over his nearly 40-year history, we include this one as a collection of some of his earliest appearances, dating to late 1987. That places the original publish date of these tales while his original solo series was still going strong.  This book is a beautiful, glossy hard-cover with smooth and heavy-stock paper inside, although the sometimes-low print reproduction quality leads to blurred and hard to read word balloons on occasion. It is also a rare book here in North America, as Eaglemoss Collections targeted UK fans with this series. At this point in the history of the 1987-rebooted Justice League, they have gained official United Nations recognition and sanction. To ensure their reach truly is global, they rebrand as Justice League International (as does the title of the series!) and they open new headquarters buildings around the world: New York, Paris and Moscow are included here. As this is a product of 19
Post a Comment
Read more
Labels

Deluxe Edition and Jaw-dropping Art: Review of Inhuman graphic novel

 

Cover of Inhuman hard cover collection



Review:

This hefty hardcover deluxe edition book, released in the runup to the short-lived Inhumans TV series, collects the entire run of 14 issues and one Annual of the 2014-15 Inhuman comic series, as well as a tie-in story from Original Sins #3.

It is a handsome, startlingly premium, superb treatment for a group of characters that has lived much of its life in the backgrounds and shadows of the larger Marvel universe. If you've focused your comics reading on the world of the Avengers or X-Men, the Inhumans would have only rarely come to your attention. Yet they have been hanging around for decades, since their debut in Fantastic Four #45 in late 1965, and have earned a cult following of their backup-story features and usually short-lived or limited series.

The Inhumans featured prominently in the 2013 mega-crossover event Infinity, a story that brought major changes to their people. The story captured in this volume follows directly on those Inhumanity-shaking developments, including the death of Black Bolt, destruction of Attilan, and release of the green mist of terrigen triggering deaths and transformations worldwide.

Charles Soule jumps off from that starting point to tell a terrific tale, packed with tension, twists, betrayals and a myriad of emotions, from grief to anger, fear to hatred and more. He deftly weaves together several threads. To the main story about Medusa struggling to gather and hold Inhumanity together, he connects sub-plots of the unclear motives and alliances of Lineage; or Reader scouring the world for the next great Inhuman and stumbling upon Iso; or Black Bolt's death being perhaps untrue; even the return of Karnak. A lot is going on in these pages, and the reader never feels lost in the sub-plots.

A character guide, however, might have helped at points. So many new NuHumans get introduced, often with overlapping back-stories and not always wearing distinctive super-hero threads. Yet kudos to Soule for pacing their growth from extreme rawness into their new powers and community.

For at heart this is a story about lost and lonely individuals finding a place of belonging. It results in a beautiful, accessible, self-contained story set between the major events of Infinity and Secret Wars.

The chapters switch artists several times, leading to some inconsistencies in style and presentation of some of the characters. Andre Araujo's work in particular in chapters 13 and 14 suffers in comparison to the rest of the volume.

Several artistic highlights do shine through. Most notably the occasional silhouette panels, that add a touch of beauty and poignancy at key moments, or Medusa's ever-present flowing, living, never-still hair, a challenge to show such dynamism in static comic panels but the art team pulls it off, especially Ryan Stegman.

But the gold medal for art goes to chapter 12's visually stunning climax of Medusa and Black Bolt battling over the throne of New Attilan. These pages are packed with emotion and a balance of both fluidity and stillness, capped by the silent silhouette of tears following Medusa's victory.

With a gripping story, powerful visuals and deluxe format, this collection stands out on the comic collector's book shelf. 4 capes out of 5.



Description:

Marvel's newest heroes are born! The Terrigen Mist spread worldwide, triggering latent genes and transforming normal people into Inhumans! But as the mysterious Lash takes an unwanted interest in the new Inhumans and the newly transformed Flint's world falls apart, Medusa finds herself ruling the Inhumans alone, her husband Black Bolt believed dead. When the Unspoken stages a coup, Flint and his fellow NuHumans must step up and embrace their destiny! Meanwhile, Black Bolt is alive and allied with his mad brother Maximus...but why? What is the Ennilux Corporation, and how does it affect the Inhumans' future?

Collects: Inhuman #1-14, Annual #1, Original Sins #3

Authors: Charles Soule
Artists: Joe Madureira, Ryan Stegman, Pepe Larraz, Andre Araujo
Published By: Marvel
Published When: March 15 2016
Parental Rating: Teen
ISBN-10: 0785195572
ISBN-13: 978-0785195573
Language: English
Pages: 352 pages


Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular Posts