The Weekly Round-Up #596 With Dead Dog’s Bite #3, Beasts Of Burden: Occupied Territory #2, Star Wars: War Of The Bounty Hunters Alpha #1 & More Plus The Week In Music & Word On The Passing Of John Paul Leon!

Columns, Top Story

Best Comic of the Week:

Dead Dog’s Bite #3 – Tyler Boss is doing incredible work on this book.  Joe is continuing to investigate her friend’s disappearance, and is getting close to figuring out a series of mysteries that have plagued her very strange town.  I love the awkward character interactions in this book, and the ways in which Boss lays out his pages.  There’s a cool sequence in the library that reminds me a lot of Chris Ware’s work.  This is a series that should be getting a lot of buzz.

Quick Takes:

Beasts of Burden: Occupied Territory #2 – The latest Beasts of Burden arc is centred on the Wise Dog Emrys and his adventures after the Second World War.  Emrys and a local street dog are investigating strange goings on in occupied Japanese territory.  There are ravenous severed heads and other threats in the forest, and Evan Dorkin does a great job of balancing the plot with some strong character work.  I love Beasts of Burden, and am enjoying the way that Dorkin has been expanding the scope of the series.

Die #16 – We’re back in the world of Die, and things are bleak.  The party has been travelling across an empty sea, looking for the way into the centre of the world, hoping to save the Earth.  When they find an island, it’s an incredibly creepy place.  At this point, it seems that all of the former friends pretty much hate one another, and a few of them hate themselves too.  I really love this series, despite the fact that I’m not an RPG gamer, but I also acknowledge that a lot of things are probably going over my head.  This book is so much richer and more complex that Once & Future, Kieron Gillen’s other current series.

ENIAC #3 – The first Bad Idea series is a really good read.  Matt Kindt continues the fight against a sentient computer program that controls the Earth’s technology.  The two agents tasked with destroying it before its countdown ends continue their quest.  One of them learns she has a very personal stake in all of this, and things get increasingly psychological.  Doug Braithwaite is very good at this type of story, which deals with a lot of black ops stuff.  The Hero Trade backup, by Kindt and David Lapham, is good twisted fun.  

Fear Case #4 – Matt Kindt and Tyler Jenkins (with colour by Hilary Jenkins) have tapped into a potent mix of paranoia and fear in this horror series that ends perfectly this week.  Two Secret Service agents have spent the last year investigating a mystical case that has been getting passed around the world, leaving a trail of destruction and misery.  In the last issue, one of the agents received the case himself; now he has to either pass it on to the person he hates the most, or it goes on its own to the person he most loves.  Kindt paced this book very well, and I found a few things I didn’t expect in this finale.  It’s a very well-written series, with terrific art by the Jenkinses.  I love when these people collaborate, and hope they have more to come together.

Fire Power #11 – It’s all action this issue, as the Scorched Earth Clan attack the Temple of the Flaming Fist, and Owen, Ma Guang, and the others find themselves up against their former friends and allies.  Chris Samnee is doing incredible work in this book, creating issues that flow so well.  Next issue promises to be a big one, and given what I know of Robert Kirkman’s writing, I’m expecting a big twist or two.  I’m just wondering if I’ll be able to predict it before it comes.

Hellions #11 – I didn’t enjoy this issue quite as much as I did the one before, as we learn just what is going on between Sinister and Arcade, as Psylocke takes on Mastermind.  Some months, this book is pretty funny, and in others, it gets kind of dark.  When it first launched, I thought it was going to be dumb, but I’ve mostly enjoyed it.  I’m curious to see how these misfits make out at the Hellfire Gala.

Hollow Heart #3 – Paul Allor and Paul Tucker are giving us a pretty compelling story in this series.  El is a constructed being in a large armored body, but with a human mind and other parts.  Mateo has agreed to help free him from the lab where he was built, but El is not exactly cooperating with him or content to stick to his carefully planned escape.  Allor is exploring the way people construct their own narratives about the people they try to help in life, and it’s pretty interesting.  Another strong series from Vault.

Immortal Hulk #46 – The Hulk, inhabited by a restored Joe Fixit, finishes off the U-Foes and just wants a quiet drink, but Gyrich won’t leave him alone, and calls in Marvel’s premier superhero team to come deal with him.  As much as I like all of that, what makes me happiest is seeing Puck and Shaman work together again, even if Michael turns down the offer of a role in Gamma Force (which is getting its own miniseries soon).  At this point, Al Ewing doesn’t seem to be writing this book in trade-friendly arcs anymore, and is just slowly progressing his main storyline.  This run continues to surprise, and I think that Joe Bennett’s art has never looked so good.

Marauders #20 – This is a very nice issue.  It seems Storm is leaving the Marauders, so the team spends a night at sea toasting her and sharing stories about her.  Oddly, all those stories are recent instead of digging into Ororo’s rich history with the X-Men.  In a lot of ways, this felt like a final issue, but checking solicitations, I see that this book is set to continue past the end of the Hellfire Gala, which I guess is next month.  This title is enjoyable, but incredibly inconsistent in terms of its pacing and overarching arcs.  I’m hoping that Gerry Duggan’s upcoming X-Men book is more stable.

Star Wars: War of the Bounty Hunters Alpha #1 – Like many who grew up with Star Wars, I love Boba Fett, especially the icy and distant Fett of the original films.  So while I’ve felt like the Star Wars line has been a little lost lately, I’m all in for a Fett-centric event.  This prelude issue, by Charles Soule and Steve McNiven, has Fett realizing that he needs to do some maintenance work on Han Solo’s carbonite freezing before he takes him to Jabba the Hutt.  That leads to something that will, in turn, lead to the “war” among bounty hunters next month.  McNiven’s art is always nice, and he makes Fett look hella cool.  This has me interested.

Suicide Squad #3 – I’m still on the fence about Robbie Thompson’s Suicide Squad.  Aside from Peacemaker and Superboy, I don’t know the members of the team, and am not finding myself any more attached to them even after three issues.  I’m also wondering where Rick Flag got to, after the first issue.  Yet, there’s still enough intrigue that I want to know more, and I like the way this ties in to Teen Titans Academy, another book I’m not completely sold on yet.

Vampirella #19 – The Interstellar arc really swings into high gear.  Vampirella tries to figure out how to keep the Earth safe from the threat of Drakulon, and also maybe save her mother, who is on trial.  Lots happens in this issue, and some of it is a little confusing, as is every good Priest comic.  I want to see more of Drakulon, and am loving Ergün Gündüz’s art on this title.

Whalesville X Rocks and Minerals – Bad Idea put out this gorgeous squarebound comic collecting two Matt Kindt stories about anthropomorphism.  The first story, Whalesville, is about a community of talking animals who live inside a whale.  When a young boy gets swallowed, he proposes radical change to their community, and they have to decide if they are not happier maintaining the status quo.  In Rocks and Minerals, some talking rocks recognize that there are other forms of life on the planet, but aren’t sure if that diversity should be embraced or rejected.  Whalesville is drawn by the incredible Adam Pollina, and is beautiful, while Rocks and Minerals is drawn by Tony Millionaire, and also looks very nice (his style usually isn’t really for me).  This book is, I think, geared towards younger readers, but is also enjoyable.  It’s always a treat to see Pollina working on a new comic, and I like that Bad Idea is staking out a place as a publisher with range.

Comics I Would Have Bought if Comics Weren’t So Expensive:

Green Lantern #2

In Memoriam:

John Paul Leon – This week we learned that we lost artist John Paul Leon to cancer.  I often got Leon’s work confused with Tommy Lee Edwards.  They both excel at using thick lines to convey emotion in their work.  The first place that I think Leon stood out for me was on Alex Ross’s Earth X series.  I remember being more excited by the interiors than Ross’s covers, and being very happy that he picked an artist whose work was so different from his.  My favourite Leon book will always be The Winter Men, a stand-alone Wildstorm series that took years to finish being released, but was utterly incredible.  It was an alternate history about the heroes of the Soviet Union in the post-Soviet world, and it reminded me of books like Suicide Squad.  I really think you should go check it out, especially if you’re not all that familiar with Leon’s work.  He was immensely talented, and his work will be missed.

The Week in Music:

Moor Mother & Billy Woods – Brass – I’ve been a huge fan of Billy Woods’s rapping since I first heard him on The Reavers posse album back in 2005, and it’s been satisfying to see him start to get the recognition he deserves in the last few years.  For this album, he partnered with Moor Mother, who is a challenging and experimental artist.  This album takes the best of both of their work, having them trade rhymes or (in Moor Mother’s case) sometimes poetry or performance over some nice hard Backwoodz Studioz-style beats.  They are joined by rappers like Elucid, Navy Blue, and Mach-Hommy on some tracks, but really carry this show on their own.  I know this came out a while ago digitally, but I waited for the CD before really listening, and I couldn’t be happier to finally have this in my hands.  Woods has this laconic delivery that always sounds so good after an intense part of a song – he follows Moor Mother perfectly.  They are both strong lyricists, and I can tell that I’m going to be spending a lot of time piecing together everything that happens on this.  So good…

Get in touch and share your thoughts on what I've written: jfulton@insidepulse.com