Posts tagged marvel

Why I love comics - March 2012

Prophet

Yesterday I picked up Prophet 21 and 22 from Image comics and they’re great.

Back in the 90’s Rob Liefeld had an imprint at Image Comics called Extreme. One of the books he created was called Prophet. In a lot of ways, it was kind of the essence of what Rob was doing at Extreme, distilled down into one character. Big mysterious guy with swords, guns, shoulder pads and head gear in a lot of highly cross-hatched action poses. I don’t say that to be dismissive - it was pretty sparse as far as concepts go, but kids loved it, and it probably got a lot of kids into comics, so good lookin’ out.

Twenty odd years later, Image has revived the character with a completely new team and largely new concept (but kept the old issue numbering). Prophet is written by Brandon Graham with art by Simon Roy. It’s a slowly unfolding story about a man who wakes up from a technologically induced hibernation with a mission to fulfill on an earth filled with strange new alien life forms. Simple, yet involving. It’s one of those books like Orc Stain where the creators are engaging in some serious world building - where new ideas are tossed out on every page. It’s great. I read two issues last night and immediately wanted a third. Well done to everyone involved.

To recap, this:

Became this:

And it’s great.
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Rick Remender

Rick Remender is one of those names I’ve always kind of been aware of, but never figure heavily into my monthy reading for whatever reason. When the feeling hit, I would pick up the random book like Doll and Creature, Fear Agent, or Last Days of American Crime, but that was the extent of it.

He grabbed a tighter hold on my attention when he and Tony Moore turned The Punisher into a Frankenstein monster. It was fun and goofy but still played straight enough to enjoy. No easy feat, I’m sure.

From there I started reading his work on Uncanny X-Force. It was his collaboration there with the phenomenal Jerome Opena that initially hooked me. Opena is now in a rotating position as artist on the book, but Rememder’s writing has kept me coming back (along with some other great artist - Rafael Albuquerque, Esad Ribic, Greg Tocchini). Something about Remender and his run on this book reminds me of Chris Claremont on Uncanny X-Men back in the late eighties. Claremont was writing great, involved, emotional stories with a talented regular artist (John Romitat Jr) and incredible fill-in artists (Arthur Adams, Barry Windsor Smith, and Rick Leonardi).

I’ve also started picking up Secret Avengers since he came on board as the series writer. Two issues in and I’m hooked. What I loved about the Avengers when I was a kid was the discordant personalities and the tension they created - and so far it looks like that will be a big part of Remender’s run, so I’m in.

To recap: Rick Remender has my full attention
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Casanova

To recap: New issue of Casanova soon.