Volume 43: Iron Man: Extremis (2005)

Iron Man: Extremis (2005)

Author: Warren Ellis  |  Illustrator: Adi Granov

"John Pillinger says the Iron Man suit is a military application. I told him he was wrong. I'm trying to decide if I was lying."

Extremis, perhaps more than any other individual Iron Man story, is responsible for the origin and aesthetic of the first Iron Man live action film. Warren Ellis is a good writer, he's not afraid to take bold chances with existing properties and it paid off this time, mostly.

It was a new start for the character, bringing him up to date while remaining faithful to the original team of Stan Lee, Larry Lieber, Don Heck and Jack Kirby. In approach, it's less superhero and more sci-fi thriller. Iron Man is a weapon, not a flying hero in metallic tights.

In an abandoned slaughterhouse a test subject is injected with a secret serum; it transforms him into something more than human. Iron Man is called in by an old friend to fix the situation but he's carrying around more baggage than just a heavy suit of armour.

It places Tony temporarily out of the convoluted continuity of the extended Marvel universe and focuses on the man; it humanises him, exposes his flaws and shows that being a high-profile millionaire isn't always just necking champagne and bedding bunny girls. When it works it's fantastic, and he still finds time to have the obligatory fight scene with people lifting cars over their heads, etc.

The real star, however, is Adi Granov's amazing art. He sketches in pencil and colours with watercolour, inks, gouache, etc. He takes that into Photoshop and renders there. It's a mix of the traditional and the new (like the story) and the result is emotionally-charged and dramatically staged panels that often tell a story without the need for words. It needs to be seen to be understood properly. It's a slow process, it took him a year and a half to complete the work, but the finished product is definitely worth the wait.

The book collects together Iron Man (Vol.4) #1-6.

Verdict:

Volume 42: New Avengers: Break Out

New Avengers: Break Out

Author: Brian Michael Bendis  |  Illustrator: David Finch

"No more politics. Just us. No U.N. No governments. Just us helping people that need help. The big problems."

The events in Break Out take place six months after Volume 34: Avengers: Disassembled. The team as they existed at the end of that book is no more, disbanded, the dead are still dead, Stark isn't as filthy rich as he used to be, etc. When the Ryker's Island maximum-maximum security installation (yes, double maximums) has an Arkham Asylum-esque security failure a huge number of crackpots and supervillains are let loose upon the world, necessitating a dedicated team of heroes to do what heroes do: yadda, yadda, assemble.

It makes a kind of sense that the arc be included in the Collection, in part because it continues the Disassembled story line, telling of the evolution and change that's inherent in such teams, and it's really not a bad story, per se, but I don't feel that it's an essential read unless you're a devoted Avengers fan. On the plus side, it spends an admirable amount of time setting up the new team, as opposed to throwing them together without rhyme or reason and asking that we accept it without question, like good sheeple.

Bendis engineers a scenario wherein the heroes see the benefits of teaming up, but he leaves a window open through which tragedy may later creep, bringing with it bags filled with vicissitude and hubris.

The addition of Spider-Man (the loner) and Wolverine (the loose cannon) allows for their more series-specific villains to possibly feature in future, if the need should arise. I get the feeling that it will because neither of the two men are what I'd call team-players, so it seems natural to assume that they'll feature heavily in the works to come, creating conflict on multiple levels. Otherwise, why add them?

The book collects together New Avengers # 1-6.

Verdict:

Volume 41: Son of M

Son of M

Author: David Hine  |  Illustrator: Roy Allen Martinez

"There's something dark inside you. It's spreading all over. Can't you feel it? Doesn't it hurt you?"

The aftermath of the momentous event that ended House of M (see Volume 40) is far-reaching, and therefore explored across a number of different Marvel titles. Son of M focuses on Pietro Maximoff, aka Quicksilver. I can't talk about Son without going into what happened in House, so there'll be spoilers ahead for the latter title. If you haven't yet read House and, like me, hate spoilers, then it'd be best not to read past this paragraph because I will be referring to it.

Pietro's conscience is troubled by his role in the 'Decimation' that ended House, but what's really eating him is the loss of his powers. A life lived at normal (human) speed is a kind of living hell for the speedster. He spends his days like an addict forced to live without his drug of choice. Haunted by memories, he's a shell of man. His self-interest drives him to the point where he'll do almost anything to get his fix, even if it means screwing over those who care for him most.

Son of M is a smaller, more personal story than the one that birthed it, but it's every bit as good. In fact, I liked it more than House. It explores the moral depths that a damaged individual will sink to in order to fill a void in their life. It understands that rock bottom isn't always the starting point to recovery that opportunistic people think it is. Sometimes a victim will choose to exist there for a long period of time, until escape becomes so all-consuming that their sense of reason is suppressed. Scars don't heal well when they're hidden under the covers. (To err is human... to super-err is superhuman?)

Pietro's sister, the Scarlet Witch, is an interesting character, but I'd personally never found Quicksilver to be that exciting, but Author David Hine changed that, at least for a time.

I loved Roy Martinez's art. Faces are occasionally a little off, but when he gets it right, which is most of the time, he gets it VERY right! His thin lines retain the human touch that I adore, and his ability to communicate the fragility of the human condition through them gives the book a special quality, one to which the carefully chosen colouring is fully respectful.

The book collects together Son of M #1-6.

Verdict:

Volume 40: House of M

House of M

Author: Brian Michael Bendis  |  Illustrator: Olivier Coipel

"What would you have me do?"

If you read the books in numerical order (as printed on the spine, not the sticker on the front of each issue) then you'll be aware of what happened in Volume 34: Avengers: Disassembled and of what was left unresolved. House of M addresses that particular situation.

The opening four pages are top class stuff, setting the stage for what follows. The location is far from grand; the state of the buildings echo feelings felt not just by the heroes but also the antagonists of the piece, a post-traumatic landscape of loss and decay. The remainder of the story isn't perfect, but it has more highs than lows, and often with Marvel crossovers that's the best you can hope for.

The pre-battle gathering of heroes is the kind of thing that usually makes me cringe, but the weight that assails each one on a personal level gives it an edge that's often lacking. They aren't debating how best to take down a megalomaniacal supervillain in need of reeducation. They're seeking comfort, assurances, wondering if what they need to do can even be done, and if not by them, then by who?

That 'edge' is the product of a feeling that extends beyond the page. Without going into spoiler territory, the situation, as wildly fantastical as it is, has at its core a fragility that every person who reads it will be able to relate to. Everyone wants to be happy in their own way, but dig beneath the surface and you'll discover a wealth of clauses and provisos that must also be met lest the happiness be in name only.

The end might leave you with more questions than when you started, and Marvel retconned some stuff at a later date, but as a book in its own right House of M goes to some remarkably fragile places.

The book collects together House of M #1-8.

Verdict:

Volume 39: Ghost Rider: Road to Damnation

Ghost Rider: Road to Damnation

Author: Garth Ennis  |  Illustrator: Clayton Crain

"Let us be done with this."

When the numbering of an ongoing series is reset to issue one it's generally considered a good time for new readers to jump in. Road to Damnation, however, is a terrible issue one in that respect, and in many others. It introduces Ghost Rider in a dramatic enough fashion but quickly shifts focus to someone else, and overall GR isn't even in the arc very much. When he is featured he's something of a weak link.

A guy with a flaming skull for a head should be lighting up the pages at least half of the time, but GR is bland and there wasn't a single moment in which I felt that putting the book down unfinished would be something that I'd ever regret doing.

Typically for Ennis there's some very black humour that hits without warning - and I do mean VERY black; for some folks it'll be a step over their line. That's all I have to say about the story.

The artwork is something else that left me unmoved. Crain is a great artist, there's absolutely no denying that—I couldn't match his ability even if I practiced every day for a decade— but the digital techniques are simply not something that pleases my eye. (Subjectivity, yo!)

The backgrounds are too busy, resulting in nothing in the foreground grabbing the attention like it should. It's as if the addition of extra detail at the edges has flattened the overall composition.

It's also too dark to discern what the hell (or what in hell) is going on. I don't know if it's a problem unique to the TUGNC edition or if it's meant to look like it does. I know that it would be less of an issue on Crain's screen, but paper pages aren't backlit. The contrasts between light and dark are there, but when it's dark it's too damn dark.

There's a significant use of background blurring. It adds a touch or realism but, strangely, also artificiality, as if we're viewing events through a fixed camera lens. I dislike the technique. Cinematic/photographic processes can be used well in comics, I've commented favourably on just such a thing in previous posts, but I don't want my comics to be in direct competition with movies. I want comics to celebrate what they are and play to the unique strengths of their own medium, not strive to mimic the forms of another.

The book collects together Ghost Rider (Vol. 4) #1-6.

Verdict:

Volume 38: Black Panther: Who is the Black Panther?

Black Panther: Who is the Black Panther?

Author: Reginald Hudlin  |   Illustrator: John Romita Jr

"Emotional? I'm happy. All my enemies in one place."

The Panther's superpower seems to be that he serves as the religious, political and military head of a warrior clan but is unable to see the inherent conflict of interests that's present in his situation. Reg Hudlin, filmmaker turned comic book writer, fills the story with ridiculous schoolyard ideals and real world prejudices cranked to maximum level. What should've been a poignant subtext is instead a sledgehammer that forces the reader to either agree or disagree with what appears to be a skewed and discriminatory point of view.

The one-dimensional stereotypes are taken to ill-conceived extremes, so will be offensive to people sensitive to that kind of thing. I'm generally not, but I dislike bigots. We're constantly reminded that everyone who isn't black or Wakandan (the Panther's place of origin) is a selfish villain. Hudlin's selective misanthropy gets directed at his fellow Americans (for wanting to exploit natural resources), the British (for their slave trade), the Russians (for simply being Russian), and the French (for not dying needlessly in WWII). Some of those are justifiable. Some DEFINITELY aren't.

I'm aware that I maybe misunderstood Hudlin's intention, but if that's the case then there's the flip side of the argument: he wasn't being an ass, but by making almost everyone racist he was being unclear and damaging his cause, so either way the end result is the same.

I got the impression that he thought he was creating some kind of laudable political statement that was also high art designed to facilitate a colonial and/or post-colonial reading, but his primary concern swamped the narrative needlessly, creating something unbalanced and unreliable. I had to ask myself repeatedly, 'Is this just political commentary, or is there a large dollop of misdirected satire included?' I believe it was intended as both, but in my experience satire ceases to be just that when the speaker succumbs to the same thing that they're supposed to be satirising.

The Wakandans consider themselves morally superior to other nations, but will happily indulge in some murderous revenge when the opportunity arises. Oh, and they have a cure for cancer but withhold it from the rest of the world for judgemental reasons; it's okay if the children die, because they aren't our children. Someone ought to introduce them to the 'teach by example' method.

Art is by John Romita Jr, so I don't even need to go into any depth there. We should all know by now how good he is at his job.

The book collects together Black Panther (Vol IV) #1-6.

Verdict: