Wayne Markley

by Wayne Markley

With every blog I ask for suggestions of books you are reading that I am not and you think I am missing out on.  This time out I am going to review three books that were all suggested to me by readers of this blog. So first off let me say, thank you.  I always welcome your suggestions and while I read more comics than anyone should, there are a number of them I miss out on due to my own prejudices towards the subject matter, access to the material, time or any number of reasons.  Since the point of this blog is to point out books the reader might have missed out on and are worthy of your time to read (and that is why I rarely have a negative review as I am not trying to tell you what not to read. I do not feel that serves me or you any good), but I want to help expand the readership of books I have enjoyed and think other people would also enjoy.  Thus it is such a pleasure to read these books I had overlooked. Thanks to you, that has now been corrected. Thanks to you, the readers of this blog.

Star Wars: Darth Vader Vol. 1 – Vader

I want to give a big thank you to Brett A. for telling me how good Star Wars: Darth Vader by Kieron Gillen and Salvador Larroca is.  Brett has spent more time than I could count telling me how great this book was and how I was missing out on a great read.  Well, he was right.  First off, this book had two strikes against it before I ever considered reading it. First off it was written by Kieron Gillen who, and I know I am in the minority here, is not my favorite writer.  As a general rule I find his work to be convoluted and so muddled I just do not enjoy it, even though many people have told me I am wrong on this.  Secondly it was Star Wars, which is not my favorite genre. Again I know this is sacrilege, but it has never been my favorite film series or comic books.  Now here is where I eat humble pie, as I have been reading the Marvel Epic Collections of Star Wars reprinting the old Dark Horse Star Wars comics I find I have thoroughly enjoyed them. There are currently four different series of Epic Collections focusing on different time periods of the Star Wars universe, and each and every one of these collections has blown me away with how good they are and how tight the continuity is.  A plus, to me at least, is Marvel is reprinting all of the Dark Horse Star Wars comics in chronological order, not willy nilly as they were when they first came out.  (Dark Horse did a ton of Star Wars comics over 20 years, and the stories were set at the time of the first movie, then 10,000 years in the future, then 10,000 years prior to the first movie, etc. So reading these stories in order to me is sooo much more enjoyable.) Because of this Epic collections and the respect I have for Brett’s opinion, I gave Vader a try, in spite of my reservations.

Brett told me that Darth Vader was a perfect story of science fiction, politics, personal intrigue and Star Wars mythology. Based on this I read the first two Star Wars: Darth Vader trades; Vader (collecting issues 1-6) and Shadows and Secrets which collects issues seven through twelve. Both of these books lived up to Brett’s descriptions and exceeded them.  Kieron’s storytelling was straight forward and clean with a story that builds towards an ultimate goal that fits nicely with in what was already established in the prior Star Wars stories (Are the original Dark Horse Star Wars comics still cannon? I have been told both they are and aren’t). The characters all act as you would expect, with Darth being motivated by his own desires and goals, which are not necessarily obvious, and at times run in opposition to the Emperor.  This is the best work I have read by Kieron Gillen and makes me think I need to go back and re-read his Loki and other work as maybe I misjudged it.  As for the art by Salvador Larroca, it is beautiful.  It is clean and fits the story perfectly as it mixes a dark spy tone with science fiction elements (space and spaceships) flawlessly. On top of that his landscapes and droids are almost too beautiful to describe (and these are droids unlike I have seen anywhere else in Star Wars). Unfortunately for me I came across this book too late as it ending with issue 25.  According to Gillen this book is ending because it came to a natural conclusion and not due to the usual culprit, sales.  I for one am going to be sad to see it go and but I have at least three more trades to look forward to reading. Great stuff in spite of my original prejudices.

Prez: The First Teen President

A long time reader, Jeff W. strongly suggested that I read the new Prez series from DC that was a victim of the DC Rebirth launch and was cancelled.  As the full series has not been collected at this point, and I believe the story has yet to be completed, I went and read the original Prez from the 1970s.  DC recently released a collection of all of Prez (the teenage male president) stories from his original series by Joe Simon and Jerry Grandenetti, including the never (almost) before published issue #5 from Cancelled Comic Cavalcade #2. (Cancelled Comic Cavalcade was a super limited run; 35 copies of two collections of stories DC had done but did not publish due to a contraction in the number of titles they were publishing. It included single issues of Kamandi, Supergirl, Black Lighting, Prez, and many others. Fortunately, DC has been slowly issuing collections of these discontinued 70s series and including these issues that were previously lost to the average reader. The Cancelled Comic Cavalcades were done as “ashcans” to for copyright reasons and not for the general public. Some of these stories have been printed in other books since then, but by no means all of them).  In addition to the original series, included in this collection are Sandman #54 which featured Prez, the Vertigo Visions Prez by Ed Brubaker and Eric Shanower (this story alone is worth the price of the trade) and Prez appearances from Dark Knight and Multiplicty. The premise behind the series (and it is VERY 1970s) is the youth as young as 18 are given the right to vote and they vote in great numbers young teens like themselves into congress and then lowering the age of president to 18. Because of this Constitutional change, Prez Rickard becomes president at 18, and it becomes a tale that very reflect the times of the 1970s. The villain throughout is a mobster called Boss Smiley, who’s head was a giant Smiley face, and evil politicians, and all sorts of silly ideas that unfortunately are true today.  Prez’s right hand man and head of the FBI is Eagle Free who lives in a hidden teepee where Prez visits him for secret meetings.  There is a story about an America’s right wing political group that eerily reflects today’s political scene.  I was hesitant to read this collection as I remember these stories as being pretty bad, but they are actually quite good.  These are by no means great art or stories by today’s standards, or even that of the 70s to be honest, but there is a charm to the stories and a scary aspect in how these stories from 40 years ago still ring true today. I was surprised how much how I enjoyed these stories.  The Sandman story and the Vertigo Visions are both great stories and more than make up for any deficits that the original five issues may have.  As odd as a concept Prez was, the original stories are very entertaining and the more modern stories are great re-imaginations of the character. Overall I enjoyed this book immensely, and I am surprised how well this book holds up compared to what I remembered.  I am now looking forward to reading the new Prez that Jeff was so hyped on.  I am glad he suggested Prez (old and new) to me as I rediscovered another lost treasure.

Private Beach

Private Beach by David Hahn was a book I loved when it first came out in the 1990s from Slave Labor Graphics.  Dover Press just released the complete book reprinting the first seven issues and 30 pages that have never seen print before. I want to thank an anonymous reader who e-mailed me and pointed this collection out as they knew I was a big fan of the original series. This series was originally a miniseries called Fun and Perils in the Trudyverse and was published by Antarctic Press. It then moved on to Slave Labor where it lasted seven issues only to vanish. David went on to work on all sorts of material ranging from Bite Club to Batman ’66 Meets the Man From U.N.C.L.E.  I have always been a fan of his clean art and storytelling style that is perfect for so many books, that I am always surprised he does not do more high profile books. I was bummed that Private Beach never reached it conclusion, but now I am thrilled as I can finally read the complete story. And it was worth the wait. As the original title suggests, Trudy Honeyvan’s life is anything but ordinary. As you first start reading the stories you might think this is just a slice of life book, until the UFOs, the man in black, and the ever curious magic eightball shows up.  It is hard to categorize these stories are they tend to go wherever the characters seeming to want to.  There is a certain stream of conscious to this stories but there is a point behind all of the strange goings on.  I cannot not say how pleased I am to finally see what the ultimate goal was, and I must say the pay off really does work.  At times when reading this story it is easy to think you are lost or Hahn has lost his way, but if you stick with it, the end is well worth the trip.  I want to commend Dover Publications from bringing back to prints so many great lost gems, most with new material, such as this, Private Beach, Sam Glanzman’s U.S.S. Stevens and Attu, Terri Woods’ wonderful Wandering Star and so much more.

Johnny The Homicidal Maniac

A quick side note on last week’s blog about books that women might enjoy. Long time retailer, Hank Lattrell of 20^th Century Books pointed out the popularity of Johnny the Homicidal Manic with his female customers. I was a bit surprised by this as Johnny was a best seller for ages over the last twenty years, but I did not realize that the book still had such a strong following among women. I wonder if the draw is the character of Johnny, the influence of Invader Zim (both have the same creator, Jhonen Vasquez), or something else? I do know Johnny has always sold more from word of mouth than anything Slave Labor has been able to do to promote it.  I also found it fascinating that Hank says the sales of Johnny are of the single issues, not the compilation. Thanks for the update and input Hank.

This wraps up this week’s blog.  Thanks you for reading this blog and for your comments and suggestions. As you can see, I do read everything that is recommended and I often land up kicking myself for missing it the first time out, such as with Vader. Or other times I just do not realize a creator whose work I enjoyed is back in print, as with Private Beach, and once in a while it is just nice to rediscover something that inspired a new piece of work, like with Prez. All three of these books are very different but all three are excellent.  I would love to know what you thought of these books or if there are other books I have overlooked.  Once again everything I have written here is my opinion and in no way reflects the thoughts or opinions of Westfield Comics or their employees.  I hope you take time to read one of these books as they are all classics.  As always,

Thank you.