Sunday, May 8, 2011

Free Comic Book Day 2011

As always, we oberve the holiday known as Free Comic Book Day with some mini-reviews - if you picked up some different freebies, let us know what you thought.

This issue is like an extra issue of Thor The Mighty Avenger by writer Roger Langridge and artist Chris Samnee.

It features Captain America and the god of thunder meeting in a fun, time-tossed story that takes the duo back in time to meet a few famous faces.

As always, great art and a fun story. I love Cap's final line.

Grade: A-

Green Lantern is the third star of a big summer movie in our first two free comics, but here he appears in a reprint of a key part of the Secret Origin series from a few years back.

But it's good work by Geoff Johns and Ivan Reis.

The comic also features a preview of the next big event for DC, Flashpoint (starring The Flash, natch), also by Johns with artist Andy Kubert. It's short but enticing.

Grade: B

Elric: The Balance Lost is (of course) a preview of a new series starring Michael Moorcock's mystic hero.

It's a good (if a bit gory) overview of The Eternal Champion, with story by Chris Roberson and art by Francesco Biagini - both of which are promising, though they have some big shoes to fill, as the backup feature shows.

It's especially difficult to follow the likes of Barry Windsor-Smith, P. Craig Russell and Walt Simonson, to name a few.

Grade: B+

Bongo Comics celebrates Free Comic Book Day with a terrific homage to Uncle Scrooge McDuck on the cover.

(Of course, it's silly - what fan would allow his comics to be piled 90 feet deep? Imagine the curling!)

It's fun issue with several short features, including one by Sergio Aragones as Bart and Lisa visit the circus.

Good stuff!

Grade: A-

Richie Rich was always a favorite back when Harvey Comics was in its prime, but this is a different version of that classic character.

The character names are the same, as Richie and the spoiled Reggie, butler Cadbury, robot maid Irona, pet dog Dollar and Richie's pal Gloria have their island vacation interrupted briefly by an erupting volcano.

They're drawn in a slightly more realistic style - which takes some getting used to.

This is a flip comic, with the other side dedicated to Kung Fu Panda, which is pretty much exactly what you would expect.

Grade: B

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2 comments:

Kyle said...

Hey Chuck, another great FCBD. I picked up a load of freebies. As always I end up spending a ton as well. I hit about three different shops in order to pick up as many of the freebies as I can... I feel obligated to drop some cash to support the shops that are doing this so ended up with two Fables TPB's, Fables 1001 Nights of Snowfall HB, Showcase Presents Aquaman Vol 2, and a back issue on a whim (Weird War Tales featuring The Creature Commandos and the G.I.Robot! I sure hope some day they release a Showcase of these). As far as different titles from your reviews:

Baltimore was my favorite. Although Mignola did not do the interior art, he always manages to pick someone who fits the story very well. Didn't care for the flip side Criminal Macabre too much.

Young Justice Batman Brave and Bold was another mixed bag. I liked the Batman half. It was another "panel of someone saying something disparaging about Bruce Wayne followed by Batman heroicly being the exact opposite" type story... but I'm a sucker for that so it worked for me :). Didn't care for the Young Justice, , would have preferred a Tiny Titans, but can see why they are pushing the cartoon (which I have never seen).

Civil War Adventures was certainly interesting. I got the feeling they were trying to be an educational comic with a few text pieces around the two illustrated stories. The stories were good weird western/ weird war style stories. The text pieces were interesting, but wow, don't think I needed to know that much about battlefield amputations!

Darkwing Duck / Rescue Rangers had some really good art and good stories. The DD half was a Dark Knight Returns homage/parody and was better than the RR half.

Atomic Robo was pretty crazy. A dinosaur with guns tries to steal a students project from the science fair at which Atomic Robo was a judge. The Foster Broussard feature had some promise, but the Moon Girl was not good, I couldn't follow what was happening other than two people were fighting for some resaon, possible during the day, or possibly at night, and it may or may not have been indoors...

Betty & Veronica was basically a typical Archie comic (which I do in small doses, say once a year :)...). Although it was weird seeing cell phones and YouTube videos in an Archie comic... kinda clashes with how I imagine Riverdale but it works.

Chuck said...

Kyle, appreciate the recaps - in fact, I'm going to post this out on the main page to make sure all our visitors see it!

I have seen the Young Justice cartoon, and it's entertaining - good characterizations with some sharp stories. I really like their treatment of Robin as a laughing but incredibly capable fighter.