Comments on: What I bought – 16 September 2009

By: Greg Burgas

Greg Burgas — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 21:29:03 +0000

Ah, I see. That’s a good way to do it!

No Moon Knight hate, Tim? You’re slipping!

By: TimCallahan

TimCallahan — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 21:24:54 +0000

You can tell them apart in this simple way: Kerschl draws the hell out of anything. Fletcher doesn’t draw.

By: Greg Burgas

Greg Burgas — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 18:21:50 +0000

Whoops, my bad. I could have sworn Fletcher was drawing it. Sorry, Misters Kerschl and Fletcher!

By: Ian A.

Ian A. — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 15:47:33 +0000

I will say that Fletcher’s page design on the Flash strip is just amazing

…Fletcher – dang, some good art this week!

Brenden Fletcher is the co-writer of the Flash strip, Greg. Karl Kerschl, who also co-writes, is the artist, so credit for the page layout should probably go to him.

By: TimCallahan

TimCallahan — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 13:06:32 +0000

Luckily, the “Batman and Robin” #4 Philip Tan is not the Philip Tan of the mid-to-late “Final Crisis: Revelations,” but, well, the art’s still not all that good. My CBR review: http://tinyurl.com/l5kqx7

By: Dan Bailey

Dan Bailey — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 11:59:31 +0000

Y’know, I own a Right Said Fred single with something like 7 mixes of “I’m Too Sexy.” Also their (only?) CD. Bought ‘em both used for pennies on the dollar, of course, but still … still, my taste in music is infinitely awesomer than yours & just about anyone else’s here. Amazing, isn’t it?

By: Duff McWhalen

Duff McWhalen — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 03:23:15 +0000

While nothing makes me happier than thinking “Opena on Moon Knight” I really wonder what the hell is going on. It’s like they plucked Punisher #1 for ideas on how to make MK sell sometime during the Benson run.

By: Greg Burgas

Greg Burgas — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 21:31:09 +0000

Very cool, sir. Thanks!

By: jccalhoun

jccalhoun — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 21:26:44 +0000

Darkhorse.com is back up. Here’s a link to the ecomic of the older Beasts of Burden stories http://www.darkhorse.com/Features/eComics/1090/Beasts-of-Burden

By: Chad Nevett

Chad Nevett — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 21:15:12 +0000

Like I said, I think this issue relied on subtle nuane between characters at times… which is a flaw in Morrison’s writing as I’m not sure he knows exactly what he wants either. How are we to take Grayson’s body language in the party scene? I couldn’t tell what Morrison and Tan were going for really — in the art or writing, honestly. I liked Morrison’s dialogue in the Red Hood/Scarlet scene, but Tan’s art (his choice of angles a lot of the time) brought it down.

By: Greg Burgas

Greg Burgas — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 21:11:03 +0000

Good stuff, sir! I disagree with your comment about the first page, ignored the bird (no, it doesn’t say good things about Tan’s art, but it doesn’t detract either), and thought Lightning Bug was ugly because he was, you know, getting shot through the neck. It does seem that a lot of people ignore problems in the script because it’s what’s-his-name, and that when he’s paired with a good artist (like Quitely), the problems in his scripts get covered up somewhat. Everyone is focusing on the art in this issue while ignoring the kind-of paint-by-numbers script. That’s not Tan’s fault. Sure, he could have jazzed it up, but it’s still not his fault!

By: Chad Nevett

Chad Nevett — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 21:00:03 +0000

Well, another issue or tighter pacing up to this point could have helped. Even just devoting a little bit of time to Alan and Steven talking more… I don’t know.

Also, I answered your challenge regarding Tan’s art (in my way): http://graphicontent.blogspot.com/2009/09/i-bought-comics-september-16-2009.html

By: Greg Burgas

Greg Burgas — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 20:37:03 +0000

Thanks, Tekende! That’s all I ask for!

Chad: Yeah, that’s part of why the book feels rushed. I just don’t know what Sable could have done differently.

By: Chad Nevett

Chad Nevett — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 19:08:20 +0000

Unthinkable was pretty damn good. I loved the art especially. I still think the final issue suffered by not giving more sympathy/credence to Steven’s reasons for his actions. That’s kind of glossed over in the final push to the end. A little weak. Otherwise, a really good read.

By: Blackjak

Blackjak — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 17:40:31 +0000

“Why are you such a wanker, Chet?”
“Because I get off on it!”

By: Derick

Derick — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 17:00:27 +0000

Agents of Atlas, Cable, Guardians of the Galaxy… a lot of Marvel books are having rotating art teams. That´s really annoying.

By: Bill Reed

Bill Reed — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 16:21:32 +0000

Gotta remember to pick up the Veil trade.

By: Tekende

Tekende — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 15:12:05 +0000

I disagree about Tan’s art. His page layouts are awful. There were quite a few pages I found really confusing because the panel layouts made no sense, or because there was just enough overlap that two pages looked like a spread but weren’t. There were a number of places where he chose to use very odd perspective, and while there’s nothing wrong with odd perspective per se, there is a problem when it makes the art hard to read, which it was in this case. In addition, he used too much black in too many places, obscuring a lot of details and making the art even harder to read (and I’m a guy who loves heavy use of black ink in comics!).

Tan’s only got two more issues, right? I can put up with that, but if he’s on for much longer than that I’m giving him one more issue to improve, and if he doesn’t I’m dropping it. I don’t need to spend as much time as I did trying to figure out which panel comes next when I’m reading.

There you go, a thoughtful critique of why I didn’t like Tan’s art, and up until this sentence, not one mention of Quitely.

By: jccalhoun

jccalhoun — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 14:49:58 +0000

I had never heard of Beasts of Burden before so I looked on Dark Horse comics for something about them and good news: they have 3 of their 4 earlier appearances online! Unfortunately it looks like darkhorse.com is down right now so I can’t link to it directly.

By: Greg Burgas

Greg Burgas — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 14:21:57 +0000

Joe: Yeah, I knew that would be a controversial statement. I thought the pages 2-3 spread was nicely done; no problem following it at all. I agree that the exploding car was a bit confusing, but only because of the cause, not because of the way the art flowed. It gets back to how much is Morrison – did he give vague instructions about things blowing up or did he just let Tan go nuts? I don’t know. I didn’t say it was GREAT art, just a lot better than I thought it would be.

I forgot you were sick, Tim. And working hard. It’s like you care about kids’ education or something!!!!!

Of course, I already like Neil Patrick Harris. Ross’s cover designs are already working!!!!!!

“She’s the One” is my favorite Springsteen song. I know that makes me weird.

I haven’t seen any Comic Book Comics listed in Previews recently. Dunlavey reads the blog occasionally, so maybe he can come by and give us an update. I would imagine he likes working for actual money, so it might just be on the back burner for a while.