Below are posts associated with the “comics” tag.
lines from the existential horror comic Ice Cream Man that I could work into sermons
For reasons I don’t have to get into here, summer is one of the hardest times of year in mental health terms, and over the course of the past few months, I’ve had my fair share of existential dread and feeling adrift. As I wrote last week, that meant that I was hesitant to start reading the comics series Ice Cream Man, because I was afraid that it would further fuel that dread.
📚 bookblog: Invincible, Compendium One (❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤)
I have some mixed feelings about Invincible, though they obviously are positive enough for me to start a full series reread. In college, I used to own a hardcover collection regrouping the first several TPBs, but I gave it away when moving to grad school. I was bothered by the violence and gore then, and now I can add to that the casual homophobia and ableism of the early 2000s and the low-level objectification and misogyny that are in most superhero comics. There’s some not to like in this series.
📚 bookblog: The Hunger and the Dusk, Volume 1 (❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤)
I picked this up (along with Arca, some titles I’ll be reading and reviewing in the future, and a few that I’m going to skip because they are Not My Thing) in a Humble Bundle for recent IDW titles. I’ve read Wilson’s run on Ms. Marvel (or at least most of it), but I’ve bounced off some of her other stuff, so I wasn’t sure what I’d think of this.
📚 bookblog: Star Trek: Deviations (❤️❤️🖤🖤🖤)
I kind of thought this was dumb. There’s an interesting idea in there, and maybe I would have liked it as something shorter in an anthology, but I didn’t enjoy it in the form it took.
📚 bookblog: Star Trek: Waypoint, Special #1 (❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️)
Once again, anthologies are fun. I almost didn’t read this, because it felt weird to read and review a single issue of a comic, but I’m glad I did! Q meets Decker who’s wrestling with what it means (along with Ilia and V’Ger) to be an all-powerful being! There’s a funny and great story about Data’s cat! Ezri Dax consults with past symbiont hosts in a way that makes it seem more interesting than DS9 ever did! These are fun.
📚 bookblog: Star Trek: Waypoint, issues 1-6 (❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️)
Anthology collections are fun, and this is no exception! Some stories are better than others, but short stories spanning Trek time and characters make for a good read.
📚 bookblog: Star Trek 2011-2016, Volume 13 (❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️)
I have more Star Trek IDW comics to read, but I’ve completed this whole series! It ended on a good note, with a tribute to Leonard Nimoy and then some semi-fourth-wall breaking explorations of what it means for there to be two timelines in “main” Star Trek canon.
📚 bookblog: Star Trek 2011-2016, Volume 12 (❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤)
I have a lot of complaints about this volume, not least making Khan look like Benedict Cumberbatch. It also has some of the stronger stories of this series, so I’m trying to give it some benefit of the doubt.
📚 bookblog: Star Trek 2011-2016, Volume 11 (❤️❤️❤️🖤🖤)
Another day, another TPB’s worth of Star Trek comics. Not terrible, but not keeping my attention either.
📚 bookblog: Star Trek 2011-2016, Volume 3 (❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤)
There’s something inherently fanservice-y about spinoff comics, especially comics that are interested in reimagining beloved stories for a reboot. Not all fanservice is bad, though. I think the art is getting better, I appreciate those riffs, and if it’s not the best Star Trek, it’s fun to spend time with Star Trek.
📚 bookblog: Star Trek 2011-2016, Volume 2 (❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤)
This continues to be better than I expected. I’m just not likely to watch TOS anytime soon, so it’s interesting to see these takes on old stories, even if the off-model Chris Pine and company art bugs me. There’s also finally some branching into original stories, which is interesting.
📚 bookblog: Warp Your Own Way (❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️)
I can’t claim to have read all of the “choose your own adventure” comics in the world, but I’ve read a few in my time, and this is a good one! (Though I really need to figure out how to finish Jason Shiga’s latest…)
The art and the dialogue capture Lower Decks perfectly—I could hear the characters’ voices in my head as I read. I loved the puzzle-y bits, too, where you have to explore multiple paths (and also “cheat” at certain times) to get to a true ending. It also does what Lower Decks does best, which is to pay homage (and make fun of) what makes Star Trek fun. So glad I read this.
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for Joseph Smith and the Mormons, by Noah Van Scriver
This is an excellent graphic novel adaptation of the earliest of Mormon history. The art is good, the story is compelling, and I enjoyed reading it. I came close to buying this twice in the past year after finding it in comics shops, and I was delighted to find that my local library had a couple of copies.
I do wish that I either knew a lot more history or a lot less history going into this. The details of Joseph Smith’s life and early Mormon history are sometimes sparse or ambiguous; more importantly, they’re hotly contested. I don’t mind at all a critical take on Smith, but even though the author is clearly respectful of the historical figure even with his warts and all approach, there’s a deeply ingrained Mormon skepticism in me that wonders if any of the choices verged on the salacious. That’s not a critique of the book so much as a personal observation and a wish that I could have enjoyed the story while setting aside the instinct to be skeptical of non-LDS tellings of the history (which is all the more ridiculous given that I’m going on 5 years of not practicing in that faith).
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️🖤🖤 pour XIII Tome 9 : Pour Maria, par Vance et Van Hamme
C’est méchant de dire que cet album m’a été utile pour combattre l’insomnie hier soir ? Bon, c’est exaggérer un peu (n’importe quel livre aurait suffi), mais mes sentiments complexes envers cette série continuent.
C’est assez intéressant de revisiter l’Amérique latine, et il aurait servi comme occasion de critiquer le militarisme américain, mais pourquoi donc éléver un Irlando-Américain comme « sauveur blanc » pour ces rebelles ?
Je continue à lire, mais je continue à me demander si j’aurais du me mettre à collectionner une autre série de bd.