COMIC BOOK HISTORY OF ANIMATION #1 IDW COMICS
Well, Fred Van Lente and Ryan Dunlavey are at it again! And I, for one, am ecstatic! Part history lesson, part science experiment, learning was never more entertaining. The amazing backround, prior Disney, of the world of animation is really amazing and Van Lente really knows how to tell the tale. And he digs deep, so even if you know a lot about the early days of animation (Felix the Cat, Gerdie the Dinosaur, etc,) I willing to bet you’ll still find something new here. Simply jaw dropping. I give it a 10 out of 10 Grahams.
VAMPIRELLA THE DARK POWERS #1 DYNAMITE PUBLISHING
WHY? Ever since her first appearance in 1969, there have been dozens of incarnations and none of them have really captured the feel of the Warren black and white series. So changing up her costume again and have her uneasily joining up with a group of Golden Age heroes while in theory sounds good, it really doesn’t work well. Now the general plot here does work. Heroes from different dimensions teaming up to protect each others universes has deep roots in the classic big 2 teamsups from the 60’s and 70’s. The Golden Age heroes are recognisable (although I think maybe throwing in one or two more obscure heroes would have been nice) and work well together. And Dan Abnett’s story acknowledges not only Vampirella’s awkwardness working with others but the change of uniform. And while Paul Davidson’s art works with the interior story, it seems a bit unfair to create the inevitable comparisions with cover art by Joseph Michael Lineser, Jim Lee, and Junggeun Yoon. So we return to my original question, why? This is a good concept on it’s own. By making it a Vampirella title only confuses it. Why couldn’t this have been a Project Superpowers spin off guest starring Vampirella? By thinking about it like that I can bump it up the scale to a 7 out of 10 Grahams. 