This week was really busy, so I never got to the new comics I picked up, but I did read the rest of last week’s…
Best Comic of the Week:

FML #3 – Kelly Sue DeConnick and David López are killing it on this book. They’ve created a really interesting cast of characters and are using them to share a unique outlook on life, aging, family, and friends. The teenage characters get the chance to perform their music in front of a big audience for the first time, while the mother character makes a breakthrough in the death of a friend from decades ago. The two threads collide at the end of the issue, leaving a lot of questions. This is a really fun series that is also pretty serious. I’ve missed DeConnick’s writing, and love the designs and look López is giving this book. Great stuff.
Quick Takes:
Avengers Assemble #5 – I’m sad to see this miniseries come to its end. Steve Orlando crafted this as a throwback to the days when Roger Stern and Mark Grunwald steered the Avengers and Captain America, and filled their comics with cool lineups and serpent-themed villains. I see that this is going to continue as a digital comic, but I don’t read those. Maybe it’ll get collected on paper some day. This was enjoyable, and it was great to see the Serpent Society back in an expanded version. Also, I loved the jackets!

Batman and Robin: Year One #4 – Chris Samnee is one of the best in the business when it comes to drawing exciting and fluid action sequences, and he keeps it up here as Batman goes after this new crime lord, General Grimaldi, while still trying to navigate becoming a parent to Dick. I’m enjoying this series and the work that Mark Waid and Samnee are putting into it, but I’m also a little surprised that they are going up against such a generic villain.
Exceptional X-Men #5 – After a shaky start, this title is starting to grow on me. The focus shifts to one of the new mutants Kitty has started training, Thao, who is the most to learn what Kitty did during the Fall of the House of X era. She learns that things are rarely black and white though, when her efforts to help her cousin, who just turned into a bit of a dinosaur (she’s also a mutant) goes badly. Eve L. Ewing has gotten all the work of establishing the book out of the way, and can now focus on further developing her characters and their relationship to one another. It’s working now.
Jenny Sparks #6 – We’re getting closer to the end of this slow-moving series. In flashbacks, we see how Jenny managed the Covid pandemic, and in the main story, we see her finally confront Captain Atom and call him out on his madness. I like this series, especially Jeff Spokes’s fantastic art, but also find it a little boring at times. I don’t feel like Tom King is deconstructing Jenny with the same level of insight we’ve seen in similar titles from him.

Miles Morales: Spider-Man #29 – I’ve not liked any part of the ‘Miles is a vampire’ story, so I’m glad to see that we’re turning a page away from it with this issue. Cody Ziglar adds another supernatural element to Miles’s life, though, as he becomes the focus of Anansi, the spider-god’s attention, and it remains to be seen how that will affect things. My favourite Miles stories always involve him being in Brooklyn and being a kid/young hero, but now we’re moving into a four-part story with Deadpool that I have no interest in.
Minor Arcana #5 – This issue, which is last before the series goes on a brief hiatus, is a flashback issue, showing the main character’s grandfather long before she was born. I’ve noticed that this series has something to do with a few older men whose names keep turning up (they’re mostly dead in the modern-day part of the story), and we see that they all knew each other in this issue, which isn’t a surprise given that it’s set in a small town. Jeff Lemire is still building this story, and it’s kind of interesting to see it move away from Theresa and her problems. I’m enjoying it a lot.

The Question: All Along the Watchtower #3 – I’m enjoying this series, which has Renee working with a bit of a random group of heroes to figure out what’s going on at the Justice League Watchtower. This issue reveals who the bad guy really is, and reveals why some characters have been acting so out of character. Alex Segura is doing decent work writing this book, and finding ways to fit a street level character like The Question into a superhero filled space station in a way that makes sense.
Star Wars: The Battle of Jakku – Last Stand #3 – Eleven issues into this mess, and with only one left to go, and the pivotal scenes of this issue all revolve around characters I barely know or completely don’t recognize (like the woman who turns up at the very end). Worse than that, I still don’t know why the Empire and the New Republic are fighting over Jakku, other than it seems that the remaining Imperial forces decided to make a stand there. I don’t know why the Republic seems so interested in stopping them, or why the Imperials would have ground forces. Are they just fighting over a desert? This title, by Alex Segura, has consistently failed to do what it was supposed to do. I’d liken it to the newer trilogy, in that I don’t care about the characters, but it doesn’t even have the sense of adventure of that book. Instead, Segura has spent all this time rearranging chess pieces that we’ve never seen before on a board, without really telling us how they move. I fear for the future of Star Wars at Marvel now that they’ve gotten to this point.

Titans #19 – I’m liking John Layman’s Titans. He’s got the team starting to chafe in its position as part of the Justice League, but not as an important part of the League. He’s got Deathstroke working in the shadows to emotionally manipulate villains and would-be colleagues, putting together his own team. He’s got some friction in the team, as Roy has issues with Raven’s apparent instability. It’s good stuff, if a little unspectacular. My issue with this issue is that I did not recognize Killer Frost at all. When I first saw this cover to this issue, I thought she was Flatline; I miss the original look and characterization of her (which reminds me how much I want to do a full Firestorm re-read).
The Week in Music:

Michael Kiwanuka – Small Changes – Michael Kiwanuka made a beautiful album that was released towards the end of 2024. His music sounds like it’s from an older era, reminding me of the psych-inflected soul music of the late 60s and 70s, but it also feels very modern. This whole album was a collaboration between Kiwanuka and legendary producers Danger Mouse and Inflo (of Sault fame). It’s really very good, evoking a different time.
Adrian Younge and Ali Shaheed Mohammad – Jazz is Dead 21 – The third ‘season’ of Jazz Is Dead is underway, which means it’s time for another sampler, previewing the artists that Adrian Younge and Ali Shaheed Muhammad have worked with. This time around, the focus is moving onto more tropical sounds, mostly Brazilian, and I’ll admit that I’m not all that familiar with these artists, who will all be getting their own album. Ebo Taylor, from Ghana, is someone I’m familiar with (and looking forward to seeing in April), but the rest are new to me. The last track here features The Midnight Hour, which is the Younge & Muhammad led band that I’ve missed while they’ve focused on this project. I hope that means a new album from them is in the works. These sampler volumes are always nice, if not conceptually meaningful on their own.