CSBG Archive
A Year of Cool Comics – Day 148
Here is the latest in our year-long look at one cool comic (whether it be a self-contained work, an ongoing comic or a run on a long-running title that featured multiple creative teams on it over the years) a day (in no particular order whatsoever)! Here‘s the archive of the moments posted so far!
Today we take a look at one of the best issues from one of the best anthologies of the past decade – Darwyn Cooke’s Solo!
Enjoy!
Solo is a weird comic book. It’s like something we never should have been privileged to have in the first place. It just sounds THAT good – take some of the greatest artists of the modern generation, then give them almost 50 pages to use HOWEVER THEY WANTED, then release them to an awe-inspired public.
Editor and series creator Mark Chiarello is far, far too good to us.
In any event, while I don’t know if Darwyn Cooke’s Solo was the best of the bunch, it is certainly up there.
The book uses a framing sequence of Slam Bradley at a bar that works sort of like a nexus of all realities…
Next we have what you have to presume is an auto-biographical story of how Cooke got into art, back in the late 60s/early 70s…
then a striking King Faraday story set in the days before Castro took over Cuba…
then a delightful two-page “Funny Pages” spread…classic stuff (the best stuff is on the other page that you can’t see so you have to go buy the comic and enjoy how awesome it is!)…
then a hilarious “murder mystery” of some poor bastard who killed the love of his life – his vacuum cleaner!
then a cool post-9/11 Question story…
and finally, a re-make of a classic 1970s’ Batman tale…
Now, come on, that looks amazing, doesn’t it?
And it IS – seek this issue out, people!
10 Comments
Bill Reed
May 29, 2010 at 10:23 am
I’d say this is the best issue of Solo, yeah, with the McCarthy issue close behind. I haven’t read them all, however. Gotta track down that Paul Pope issue…!
Keith
May 29, 2010 at 8:47 pm
I want more Solo!!! This is a great issue, and probably my favorite of the series. i haven’t read them all, but this one really stands strong with solid quality throughout.
DanLarkin
May 30, 2010 at 6:13 am
I could never find this one or the Paul Pope issue. Darn.
Said
May 30, 2010 at 10:00 am
a very solid read. i know it defeats the original purpose, but it would be nice if DC reprints the whole series some day. they don’t have to call the reprints “solo”. maybe “them” or “they”
fanboy d
May 30, 2010 at 11:40 am
I really, really love Darwyn Cooke. I hope he manages to squeeze out a few projects other than Parker in the coming years – this book alone shows the man’s range! We’d be robbed if he limited himself for too long.
Rusty Priske
May 31, 2010 at 6:18 am
Wow.
I am certainly going to try and find this comic…
Matthew Johnson
May 31, 2010 at 7:12 am
The Mike Allred issue was very good as well.
JKC
May 31, 2010 at 9:55 pm
Every time this series is brought up, I swell with pride for owning all the issues.
These are great, great comics.
DanCJ
June 1, 2010 at 2:05 am
I’d definitely be there if they collect this series in TPBs.
PeterCSM
June 3, 2010 at 9:59 am
Good thing I brought some sandals because my socks just got rocked and ain’t gonna be recovering anytime soon!