Sunday, August 29, 2010
Monday, August 23, 2010
SEAN PHILLIPS - ED BRUBAKER WORKS
Career
Phillips began his career in British comics working with John Smith on New Statesmen andStraitgate, as well as Pat Mills on Third World War both at Crisis. He was part of the British Invasion, getting work on Hellblazer before returning to the UK. There he most notably Devlin Waugh for the Judge Dredd Megazine but also provided the art on a number of series for 2000 AD including Judge Dredd.
He returned to the American comic book industry in 2000 when he inked Scene of the Crimewritten by Ed Brubaker, a writer he would collaborate with a number of times over the following years. He moved on to Wildstorm for a long run on WildC.A.T.s with Joe Casey before teaming up Brubaker on Sleeper.
Phillips went over to Marvel Comics in 2005 where he joined Brubaker on Criminal at the Marvel imprint Icon and he also became the main artist on the first two installments of the Marvel Zombies series with Robert Kirkman.
Recent work includes Incognito, another series with Brubaker at Icon and a US reprint of 7 Psychopaths at Boom! Studios.
Phillips has also provided the art for the Criterion Collection release of the 1961 noir film Blast of Silence.
Saturday, August 21, 2010
MARKO DJURDJEVIC
Some fantastic comic art from Serbian-born and Germany-based illustrator Marko Djurdjevic(who is, thankfully, doing covers for Marvel these days.) You’d never guess that he’s only 31. Most of these are copyrighted by Marvel. If you like his work, you can also find more of it onmarvel.com and in the Marvel Wikia.
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
WHY SOCCER SUCKS
As an antidote to the current World Cup soccer idiocy, we suggest taking 1 full dose of The eXile’s classic soccer takedown, published during the 1998 World Cup.
Here’s a little something to consider for all you folks who’ve been trying to watch the World’s Greatest Sporting Event–otherwise known as the World Cup–over the course of the last week. The following is a short list of some of the official mascots of the World Cup in the latter half of this century. 1990: Ciao, an abstract object (Italy). 1986: Pique, a chili pepper (Mexico). 1982: Naranjito, an orange (Spain). 1978: Gauchito, a boy (Argentina). 1974: Tip and Tap, two boys (West Germany). 1970: Juanito, a boy (Mexico). 1966: World Cup Willie, a lion (England).
An abstract object, a chili pepper, an orange, a boy, two boys, a boy, and a lion named “World Cup Willie”…Is this sports or a NAMBLA convention?
Tough question, and one thing’s for sure: you’d never be able to figure it out by watching the game in question, called either soccer or football depending on whether you have a life or not. In fact, we at the eXile feel that this week, during the very heart of World Cup 1998 in France, is the right time to finally come out and say it: soccer isn’t a sport. It’s an exercise in mass denial, a desperate attempt by the runner-up nations of the world to protect themselves from the spread of American consumer culture by clinging to a pastime no rational person would consume.
Tip and Tap: would you let your child play with Germany’s mascot-duo?
Soccer didn’t always suck. About a thousand years ago, natives on the American continent played a sport that was prophetically named pasuckuakohowog–we’re not making this up–which featured teams of up to 500 people apiece playing on fields one mile long. Players kicked balls toward a goal just as they do in modern soccer. Unlike modern soccer, however, they wore warpaint and committed atrocities upon their opponents, using weapons and breaking bones as a matter of routine. Whatever your feelings were about atrocities, there was one thing you had to admit about pasuckuakohowog: it was interesting to watch. Something happened during the games. Unlike…Even the British played interesting football at one point. In the 11th and 12th century, football games were so lawless and violent that the game became the subject of repeated royal bans. But now…
Now? Now the European game of football has become so effete that the days when it was physically taxing are recalled with horror by its proponents. The following is an excerpt from the official Web Page of the 1994 World Cup, in a section outlining the history of the game’s equipment:
“The Original Soccer Ball”
The “ball” was made of animal skin on the outside and filled with hair on the inside. People kicked the ball across a “goal,” but the game was much rougher than it is now. It was common to kick someone’s shins, and players often suffered broken bones!
Broken bones! God help us!
Of course, even this newspaper isn’t crude enough to suggest that any sport without violence isn’t a real sport at all. On the contrary, there are dozens of competitive sports, ranging from basketball to tennis to volleyball, even to team handball or chess or even checkers, for God’s sake, where artistry is an ample visual substitute for force. But all of those sports have one thing in common: something happens during the games.
Nothing happens during a soccer game. Nothing, that is, except the audience’s infinitesimal drift in the direction of still greater loneliness, despair and irrelevance. Tune in to the World Cup this week on Russian TV or Eurosport, and you’ll realize that that’s what European football is really all about. It’s Europeans getting together en masse in big parks to whine about not mattering anymore.
As a culture, this is all that Europe has left-gathering around to watch a shockingly boring and precious little spectacle performed by fruity little guys with nauseating haircuts, sticking up its collective nose, and proclaiming a great love for the “best game in the world.” All its other great ideas this century–social democracy, titles, interlocking alliances, military independence from the United States, existentialist literature–they lost their resonance ages ago.
So “football” is all they’ve got. It’s their only way into the headlines. And it still sucks. Here are nine reasons why:
1. Soccer Haircuts
Ever wonder why Western Europe’s population is in decline? Well, let’s ask this another way… Would YOU fuck a guy with a soccer hairdo? Do you know ANYBODY who would?
Like radiation sickness, the most visible, ubiquitous cultural effect of soccer is the distinctly ugly upside-down L-shaped soccer hairdo. “L”: as in, “Loser.” As in, “Kick me, I’m a Loser.” Unlike radiation sickness, however, it not the bearer of the deformed hairdo who suffers nausea, but rather, everyone else around him. To make matters worse, the upside-down L-head often accentuates his loser-hairdo by getting a cheap wave or perm, so that he looks like a divorced mother of three. As if realizing that he’s pricing himself out of even the most forgiving homosexual market, he inevitably grows a mustache and does curls, wears hooded sweat shirts, and black imitation all-turf cleats.
This may explain the overall declining birthrate of the White European. Women cannot ovulate if they live among men who have “Loser” tattooed on their scalps.
2. Guys who writhe around on the ground in pain for two minutes, then get up and run off like nothing ever happened.
Anyone here watch the Italy-Chile game last week? Late in the game, Italy star Roberto Baggio, a guy who in his pro career makes millions of dollars a year, gets kicked in the shins and falls down. Clutching his leg, he rolls around wailing on the pitch for a while until the referee comes over, then plays it up a little more, appearing-to the untrained eye, anyway-to be literally CRYING with pain. Impressed, the referee pulls a yellow card out of his pocket: penalty, Chile! Satisfied, Baggio gets up and trots off happily down the field, obviously unhurt. He went on later to score the game-tying goal on a cheap penalty shot.
We here at the eXile don’t know about you, but most of us were raised by our American parents to never cry, even when we’re hurt. As for crying when you’re not really hurt, that was a punishable offense for most of us around here. I myself was grounded for it, forced to spend two days at home with slant-eyed old Granny Goldberg.
Europe, on the other hand, is a culture that actually encourages its best athletes to whine and cry like babies. Not promoting machismo is one thing. But raising a whole generation of turds is another. If it were our kid, Europe would be grounded. And beaten with belts and brushes.
3. Ties.
Even the leaders of organized chess, a game whose appeal is limited exclusively to a type of intellect so patient and sensitive that it can appreciate a single move of the finger for a half hour at a time, have recognized in recent years that unless it finds a way to reduce the number of drawn games, it will soon lose all of its followers. To this end the game’s leaders have devised knockout systems in tournaments, used new forms of speed chess as tiebreakers, and sped up games, all in the hopes of making this effete bourgeois mind sport more visually stimulating to everyday spectators.
European football, on the other hand–which professes to be a heavily proletarian pastime and a great spectator sport–is a game that still only produces a victor in about 55% of matches. Even at the World Cup, a tournament so rare and important it occurs just once in four years, with nations facing each other as rarely as once in a century, the game’s organizers have done nothing to ensure a victor in the early rounds. As a result, the game is plagued by ties–which, as the saying goes, are about as satisfying as kissing your sister.
None of us here at the eXile can figure out why the World Cup can’t be played without ties. Soccer people generally talk about the game being too physically stressful to play sudden-death overtimes, which would force players to stay on the field for an indefinite amount of time after regulation. If that’s true, how do professional hockey players manage during the NHL playoffs? It’s just as tough to score in hockey, and physically about ten thousand times tougher to play. The abovementioned Roberto Baggio would probably have to be hospitalized if he were forced to so much as watch one major-league hockey check, much less actually experience one. And yet: there are no ties in playoff hockey.
Even tennis players, for God’s sake, don’t play to ties. In a reverse of World Cup logic, tennis players in the big tournaments–the Grand Slams–must in some cases play to infinity in the fifth set to resolve even play. Basketball players play overtimes. Even in professional American Football, a sport so physically demanding that the average pro career lasts fewer than three years due to injuries, players play sudden death overtimes and may not conclude games in ties in playoff competition.
But not soccer players. They can’t handle it. It’s just too tiring, running around on that big field.
4. Pompous pseudo-intellectual Europeans who become soccer fans in order to convince the public of their link to the common man.
A British reporter interviewed for this article summed it up best: “Every member of parliament in Britain has to be a soccer fan, or else he can’t hold office. Not one of them has ever had the balls to admit that it’s the most boring fucking game ever invented.”
From Newcastle fan Tony Blair to Man United fans like wussbunny Cure lead singer Robert Smith, every hyperambitious Euro-egghead in sight attaches himself to a football team sooner or later, once his agent decides the time is right. It’s a phenomenon Americans can appreciate in the similarly disgusting habit their own effete intellectuals have of latching on to baseball–another conspicuous non-sport–to show that they’re people, too. Loathsome Newsweek columnist George Will is the classic example. Will staggers his most obnoxiously reactionary columns with columns about the Orioles or about Pete Rose or whichever player whose name he happens to know at the time, just to show he’s one of the guys.
He isn’t. And neither is Tony Blair. And the worst thing is, in the age of the EU, it’s now doubly important for public figures to be soccer fans in particular-it’s the only way they have of being pro-Europe and human at the same time.
5. Total fucking boredom.
For scientific purposes, I tried to watch the Austria-Cameroon match last weekend. At halftime, the two teams were locked in a fierce 0-0 tie. I shut it off and spent the rest of the night staring out my window.
The following day, Bulgaria and Paraguay played to a thrilling 0-0 tie. Belgium and the Netherlands followed up the next night by renewing their heated rivalry in exhilarating goalless fashion.
As I write this, I can still hear the Eurosport commentator during the Austria match. “We’ve been lucky so far in this World Cup to see goals,” he said. “We hope that there will continue to be goals.”
Let’s even excuse soccer for the moment for being invented in the age before men realized that athletes could score in a smaller goal with far greater precision and flair by using their hands, in a sport like basketball. Innovations take time, even obvious ones. We understand. But it takes more patience than a rational man should have to tolerate the means by which soccer players usually achieve their hideous goal-poor results.
Soccer just isn’t fun to watch. Attacks, when they happen, can be disrupted instantly by virtually any defender who comes near the ball. Luck plays a major role in a very high percentage of the few goals that actually are scored. The general offensive strategy is to get the ball as close to the goal as possible, then lift the ball over the penalty area with a so-called “crossing pass,” which the offensive team then hopes a passing player will either head or kick in the net. Once in a blue moon, a truly beautiful and acrobatic move is executed by a striker, resulting in a goal-a bicycle kick, say, or a long-range header. But that happens very rarely. The usual result is a botched pass or a near miss, a shot far wide of the posts, or a ball scooped up by a jogging or even walking keeper.
Soccer is probably the only sport in the world in which highlights of things that ALMOST happen are shown on late-night sport shows. Even with baseball, a game where an offensive player earns millions if he’s successful even a third of the time, no highlights have ever been shown of a sharp foul ball, or a ball that was just a hair away from being a called third strike. But soccer fans flock to their television sets every night to watch highlights of shots wide right and missed passes, even cleanly fielded shot attempts. This is clearly not a culture much interested in the results of things.
I watched Brazil beat Scotland on the first night of the Cup. At one point, the much-heralded Ronaldo–who, to use one of the most tired cliches in 1990s sportswriting, is something like the Michael Jordan of soccer–took the ball on the wing and attempted to get a shot off. He dribbled past one defender, then a second, then got tripped up by a third before getting his shot off. Scotland reassumed possession.
Well, that was lame, I thought.
Eurosport didn’t agree. They showed that little moment about six times, raving over Ronaldo’s footwork.
The crowd in France cheered as well. They must be ancestors, I thought, of people who cheered their French army for almost stopping the Nazis. Hey, they had good footwork, too.
6. Brazilian players with one name.
Ronaldo, Romario, Pele-what the fuck is this? Are these guys athletes, or designer jean labels? It’s a minor point, but an important one.
7. The excellence of Western Europe.
No one is denying that, as Americans, it galls us to lose to countries like Germany in any sport, even ones we care about as little as soccer. But even putting aside our own hangups, no sport in which countries like Italy, France, Germany and England can be major powers can really be taken seriously.
Let’s take the recent summer Olympics. England didn’t win a single gold medal. It was revealed to be a nation of skin cancer candidates who in most sports were slow enough to be overtaken by portly Sports Illustrated photographers on the sidelines. Sports bookies in England recently placed the chances of Christ’s reappearance on Earth at lower odds than a victory by a Brit at Wimbledon–and this despite the fact that the British invented the damn game.
In life as in sports, Western Europe simply hasn’t been relevant since World War I. While other nations were busy developing huge masses of violent underclass degenerates–a talent pool for athletics–Western Europe was busy tinkering with its social democracies and searching for new income tax plateaus to ascend to. While Croatians were committing genocide and at the same time forging the first serious threat to the United States’s world basketball hegemony, Brits were going on the dole and the French were striking for a 35-hour work week. Germans, meanwhile, were putting on coke-bottle glasses and cranking out container-shipfuls of atrocious synthesizer music.
Nations like these have no business maintaining any kind of standing in world athletics. Let people from these countries perform their natural roles: as obsequious airline stewards, nature-show hosts, bank clerks, rude waiters, makers of quirky low-grossing films, founders of discos in third-world countries, tireless reformers of inherently flawed social democratic systems, keynote speakers at meaningless business seminars. But not athletes. Let’s be serious.
8. Lesbians
Northern Europe is full of lesbians with names like Petra and Ute. Northern Europeans love soccer. You complete the syllogism. There’s a connection, trust us.
9. Those annoying Andean musicians.
You know those guys who are out there on the Arbat, and in public squares in every other tourist-filled city in the world? You know, the ones that score with every chick in sight, even though they can’t see over the bar? Those guys wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for soccer. The world would never have heard of the Andes without it. Stop soccer and those guys will start looking like hairy little weirdos again, instead of rock stars. Soccer players and these guys, they’re all riding the same vibe. The only mitigating factor here is that Paul Simon ripped off a couple of his older tunes from Andean musicians, making him partly responsible for them as well.
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Monday, August 2, 2010
ZOMBIE TALES 4
Zombie Tales: This Bites is the fourth TPB volume of BOOM!’s ongoing series of zombie vignettes. If you’ve ever found yourself wondering if your house is zombie-proof while eating a hamburger at your kitchen table, this collection should probably be in your collection of books. This is 110 pages of putrified flesh and head shots in 12 vignettes and a cover gallery. Each story (with the exception of two) is written and illustrated by a different group of people.
This collection was hit and mostly miss for me. I found a few completely uninteresting, one I had no idea what the hell was going on, and another, while it brought up an interesting idea of using zombies as cannon fodder in war, I’m still lost on how you get them to hold weapons and go after a certain group of people. However, the hits were really big hits for me.
Zombie, Come Home made me laugh so hard at the end, I seriously choked. Neptune’s trident, that last page, I want it as a poster! Out of the 12, this one was the best and the only funny one out of the entire lot. There’s very little dialogue, but it had me interested start to finish. The story it tells just tickled my warped little mind.
The two-part story by Kim Krizan was also an interesting read. With the tables turned and the zombies on the top of the food chain, we kind of have to think about how we treat everything around us (not to mention each other). With the exception of the ending (it’s BCE not BC - I’m a budding art historian, sue me) with the zombies being nuclear blasted into the past, it was a solid commentary on humanity. Which is what a successful zombie story does, in my opinion. You know, besides the gross out factor.
The ending story was perfectly placed. You go through 12 stories of dehumanizing zombies, then blam! There’s a cure and those who were once zombies are now human again. Maybe. That whole craving brains thing still seems to be there. So, it’s more like Louis in Anne Rice’s vampire books; they eat animal brains when they’re feeling frisky. How can you go back after that experience?
If you’re a big time zombie fan, and you don’t already have the individual issues, this is a TPB worth picking up. For everyone else, go into this one like any other anthology - you’re going to like some and you’re not going to like others.
ZOMBIE TALES 5
Review: Zombie Tales #5
Zombie Tales is an anthology comic series published by Boom! Studios that gives us brief looks into the lives and unlives of people living and dying in the time of the zombie apocalypse. The newest issue, Zombie Tales #5, is in stores this week, and here’s a look at the three tales it offers.
He Ain’t Heaven, He’s My Brother
The first story in this issue is written by William Messner-Loebs, with art by Matt Cossin. It’s a short glimpse into the life of Ginny Horton, a mentally slow girl who is making her way through the zombie wasteland with her brother Joe, who took care of her before he became infected and turned into a zombie himself. In her time since the fall of humanity, Ginny has found religion through a televangelist. This story has her seeking out the pastor in the hopes that he can cure her brother of the zombie plague.
Sanctuary
Sanctuary, the second tale this month, is written by Brian Augustyn and drawn by Leno Carvalho. It focuses on a group of “young jaded Americans” taking a trip off the beaten path in Britain to see the standing stones and other pagan relics without being hampered by a tour group. Things quickly turn ugly when the Eaters of the Dead arise and consume all of the group but one girl, who manages to flee to an abandoned cathedral. As she tries to survive the zombies there, she also confronts her own faithlessness.
Bait
The final story in this issue is from writer Ian Brill and artist Jason Ho. This one follows two people–one dead and rotting in the passenger seat and the other very much alive and driving–on a journey across the desert in a truck carrying some mysterious cargo. The driver narrates and has a plan for dealing with the zombies, inspired by poor, dead Lisa before she became zombie chow.
Of the three, “He Ain’t Heaven” is my favorite. Ginny is such a clueless and winsome character that I couldn’t help but root for her, despite her obviously dead end quest. The story has some nice turns to it, and in the end it’s a surprisingly unique zombie story. The other two tales in this issue are enjoyable as well, but “Sanctuary” is my least favorite of the bunch. The conceit in the story feels a bit strained and comes across as a little trite. Each presents a unique and brief glimpse into a world where humans are in peril and zombies are on the prowl. All three stories deal with faith in one way or another. Ginny has her belief in the TV pastor, the girl in “Sanctuary” has no faith in God, and the driver in the final story places faith in Lisa and her ideas. I hadn’t read any of Zombie Tales prior to this issue, but I’m now intrigued enough to check out some back issues.
MOMENTS OF THE WEEK
 Friday means it's time for the Moments of the Week. We've got cowboys, bladder spasms, Punishers everywhere and more in this week's edition. Hit the jump and enjoy! Action Comics #891  Lex expected this. I couldn't dream of something like this and he expected it. Moments like this are why I love comics. Amazing Spider-Man Presents: Black Cat #2  Really cool silhouette scene. Great use of colour and sense of motion here. Batman: The Widening Gyre #6  Remember that awesome moment from Batman: Year One? You know, the one where he tells the mobsters they're done feasting on the innocents of Gotham? One of the greatest Batman moments ever? Well, Kevin Smith didn't think Year One humanized Batman enough, so he he had him relate to his new sidekick/pet character how he actually had a bladder spasm and pissed himself during that scene. Good times.  Not content with making a joke of one of Batman's greatest moments, we get another excellent scene where Batman's fiancee relates to Alfred the story behind why she's nicknamed Batman 'Deedee'. That's right, the first time they had sex, they did it 11 times (she mentions the number specifically on another page) in one go. Alfred's response? To tell us the hilarious story of how a 15 year old Bruce Wayne was statutorily raped by a pre-med college student. Nothing says Kevin Smith comics like rape! Even with only spotlighting two horrible moments from this comic, it's pretty safe to say that this is one of the worst comics ever written. Frankencastle #19    Green Arrow #2  Green Arrow gets arrow'd in the head, just like he did to Prometheus in Cry for Justice. As he's living in the forest of life or some such, I imagine that tree with the White Lantern logo on it will bring him back. Green Lantern #56   Is Sayd actually dead? Larfleeze has only used constructs of those he's killed so far, yet there she as a construct below Larfleeze. He tells Hal that she's "on an errand" and trails off. Was he just covering up the fact he killed her? Or is she really on an errand? Lex Luthor was able to make his own constructs in Blackest Night, though, so who knows? We'll have to take Larfleeze's word on it. PunisherMAX #9  Bullseye is seriously $%^'d up in the MAX Universe.  I'd put Frank as a green man, myself.  All I could think of at the end of this incredibly messed up chat was Van Wilder with Bullseye's 'good talk' line at the end. Thor #612  There is something eating giblets with chopsticks that makes Mephisto so much more evil looking to me.  Ever wonder how Thor would react to a One More Day-like offer from Mephisto? Think he'd sell his soul or trade his love of Sif/Jane Foster for a rebuilt Asgard or something similar? Yeah, me neither, but I bet it would play out exactly like it did in this moment.  I loved this little speech. It's such a fitting line that takes into account these are gods that know they live in an endless cycle of deaths and rebirths. Adds a lot of weight to the journey to Hell they are about to undertake when we know the stakes are that much greater. Wonder Woman #601  A quick shot of the new origin for Wonder Woman as her mother kills herself to prevent the shadowy figure from using the Lasso of Truth on her to learn where Wonder Woman, still a child at this point, had been spirited off to for safe keeping.  |
Posted: 30 Jul 2010 02:04 PM PDT  The end of Siege and the beginning of the Heroic Age brought with it new titles and relaunches of current or older titles. In addition to relaunching their Avengers line, Marvel also launched a number of books starring B- and C-list characters. While this may seem like a good thing since Marvel is giving some properties that aren't A-list level a chance, two recent and similar titles, S.W.O.R.D. and Doctor Voodoo, were both canceled after only running for five issues. Will these new titles and relaunches face a similar fate? Hit the jump to find out as I take a look at the sales for the early issues of five series to see how long they might last. Before I continue, I would like to point that this is not a judgment of the quality on any of these series but simply a look how well they are selling and how long they might run before being canceled. I have not read any of these new launches and, as such, can't say whether they are good or bad. As for the sales numbers, all numbers are taken from ICv2.com and are only estimates, not the actual amount a book sold. The numbers also represent the number of comics sold to retailers, not the number of comics bought by readers. REPEATING HISTORY?  As mentioned above, both S.W.O.R.D. and Doctor Voodoo where low tier characters and concepts that Marvel decided to give an ongoing series to but where both canceled after having only five issues released. Both series launched with a little over 20,000 units sold for their first issues (~22,000 for S.W.O.R.D. and ~23,000 for Doctor Voodoo) and both ended with a little over 10,000 for their fifth and final issue (~11,000 for S.W.O.R.D. and ~12,000 for Doctor Voodoo). Both titles were also spin-offs of Top 10 selling books as well (Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men for S.W.O.R.D. and Brian Bendis's New Avengers for Dr Voodoo). So, if two books that spun out of Top 10 selling titles failed commercially, what chance would books that didn't have? While there is always the chance that something can unexpectedly become popular, I thought that it was unwise for Marvel to be launching more new titles right now given how S.W.O.R.D. and Doctor Voodoo fared. In addition to being relatively untested titles, all of the first issues carried a $4 price tag, which has been a hot button issue for a lot readers recently and could possibly turn off otherwise interested readers. There is also the fact that Marvel have been expanding their "family" titles like the Avengers or Batman by launching new ongoings and miniseries or creating new ones, like Marvel's Wolverine "family" of titles which launch in September, all of which are A-list or solid B-list titles that would more likely be bought given they are firmly established properties. So, how did these launches fair? Overall, not that good but there were one or two surprises. THE COMICS  ATLASThe Agents of Atlas are the pet team of Jeff Parker. The group, made up of characters from Marvel Comic's predecessor, Atlas Comics, made their modern debut in 2006 with a six issue miniseries by Jeff Parker and Leonard Kirk. The characters then got another ongoing series that launched as part of Dark Reign, with art by Carlo Pagulayan, and lasted 11 before being canceled. Next, two miniseries,X-Men vs. Agents of Atlas (2 issues) and then Avengers vs. Agents of Atlas (4 issues), ran before the Agents of Atlas was relaunched as Atlas with art by Gabriel Hardman, who also did the art on Avengers vs. Agents of Atlas. Current Series Given these sales numbers, it's unsurprising that Marvel has canceled Atlas with issue #5. Why? Although both Agents of Atlas and Atlas appear to have launched under similar circumstances, there are a couple of crucial differences. First, and I think foremost, the $4 price tag. While the $4 price tag on many comics was introduced with Dark Reign, it has only recently seemed to have become a big enough concern to effect sales and you can find plenty of people online mentioning the $4 price tag as a reason why they passed up on a series. Of course, only the first issue is $4 but everyone might not be aware of that and, even if they are, they still might not want to spend $4 on the comic. Another, and very important, difference is that the people already had multiple chances to check out the team with Agents of Atlas and decide whether or not they were interested in the series. Even a crossover-over title with Marvel's most popular franchise, the Avengers, didn't do much to build interest in the title either. Although Marvel has given the title plenty of chances fans are just not interested in the ongoing adventures of the team.  BLACK WIDOWAlthough Black Widow has been a perennial B or C listAvenger, this is the first self-tilted ongoing solo-series she has starred in. The character previously had a couple of miniseries from 1999 to 2004 and a recent origin retelling by Paul Cornell, John Paul Leon and Tom Raney. The current series was launched by Marjorie Liu and Daniel Acuna in April of this year, a month before the launch of the Heroic Age and was given a Heroic Age banner with issue #2. Current Series Given the fact that Black Widow has been a solid B-list character for a while now, I'm surprised that the sales are this low, especially since the character has been regularly appearing in Ed Brubaker's Captain America and Matt Fraction's Invincible Iron Man titles. Liu and Acuna are not big name writers though, so that could account for the lower sales. Of course, there is always the possibility that there just isn't that much interest in the character to support her own series on an ongoing basis despite her long history in theMarvel Universe, but she was also just in the Iron Man 2 movie, which adds another layer to the mystery of why this isn't catching on at all with people. However, with issue #6 the title is getting a new creative team, Duane Swierczynski andManuel Garcia, so it is probably safe to assume that the series will at last make it to issue #10, but unless the new creative team brings a substantial sales boost, which is unlikely (not a shot at the creators, just logistics and past history backing me up), it probably won't make it too long past that since there is a crossover with Hawkeye and Mockingbird starting up in December. The crossover could boost sales as Hawkeye and Mockingbird is selling more but, again, any long term gains are unlikely so I would expect the crossover to signal the end for the series.  HAWKEYE & MOCKINGBIRDAs the title would suggest, Hawkeye and Mockingbird stars the perennial Avenger Hawkeye and his recently resurrected wife Mockingbird. Although Mockingbird has never had either a self-titled miniseries or ongoing, Hawkeye has had several. The character had a miniseries in both the 80's and 90's plus a canceled ongoing that was launched in 2003 and lasted only eight issues. Recently, the pair starred in the post-Secret Invasion miniseries New Avengers: The Reunion by the creative team of Jim McCann and David Lopez, who are also the team working on the current series. Current Series The drop in sales from the last New Avengers:The Reunion issue to Hawkeye & Mockingbird #1 looks like a standard drop from one issue to the next for an ongoing series, which isn't a good thing. There was no sales bump for the new title so the previous series or the character appearances in New Avengers didn't build up hype or interest in either of the characters during the down time between The Reunion and Hawkeye & Mockingbird. Of course, the market is also different now than it was post-Secret Invasion when The Reunion launched. People seem to be wary of new titles, which may be a factor. Another factor is the fact that the previous miniseries was branded as a New Avengers title, which could have generated some interest off of the name alone with either retailers or fans. I would suspect that Hawkeye & Mockingbird won't last the year given that the first issue started off with less that 30,000 units in sales, though there is always the possibility that sales could immediately level off and the title survives for longer, especially if it bolstered by tie-ins. That said, I wouldn't expect sales to hold steady given the drop between New Avengers: The Reunion and Hawkeye & Mockingbird is similar to the standard issue to issue drop off and the title would be near or below cancellation levels around issue #10 if those kind of drops continued. However, given that there wasn't that large of a drop, most of the readers left could be fans of the characters and there won't be that much further drop off and sales could stabilize.  YOUNG ALLIESYoung Allies is a team book that mostly features a variety of C-list teen heroes that have been showing up in the Marvel Universe over the past couple of years - the new Spider-Girl, Nomad and Gravity. It also features newcomer Toroand ex-New Warrior Firestar. The series is written by Sean McKeever, who has a reputation for writing good teen-centric titles despite his ill-received run on DC's Teen Titans, with art by David Baldeon. Current Series Shockingly, the title isn't going to be canceled at this timeaccording to Tom Brevoort. As for why it isn't going to be canceled, I couldn't even begin to think why since its first issue sales were all lower than S.W.O.R.D., Doctor Voodoo and Atlas. Maybe Marvel has a lot of faith in the series or wants to see it succeed but, other than that, I can't think of anything else. Why the series is doing so bad is obvious though. Title's biggest character is Firestar, an ex-New Warrior, a group who hasn't had a lot of success or positive buzz since before Civil War. Not to mentioned that there was no pre-launch push for the title either in the comics themselves or any PR hype from Marvel. The title was basically on its own and failed to attract readers since it had no high profile characters or creators.  S.H.I.E.L.D.Although Jonathan Hickman's and Dustin Weaver's S.H.I.E.L.D isn't a Heroic Age title, it launched around the same time as the banner event so I thought it would be worth taking a look at. The title details the previously unknown secret history of the Marvel Universe and theS.H.I.E.L.D organization by mixing Marvel continuity with real world history. The biggest character in the series, to date, is arguable Leonardo Di Vinci given that the central character, a man named Leonid, is an entirely new character. S.H.I.E.L.D. #1 - 44,543 (38,030 without reorders and re-printings) I'll be honest, these sales surprised me. I expect the first issue to sell around 30,000 units at best but, when taking reorders into account, it sold over 40,000. Honestly, I'm not particularly sure why S.H.I.E.L.D is doing so well. While it's true that Marvel and DC tend to lag a few years behind mainstream entertainment trends, Di Vinci mania has been dead for a good few years now so that's not really an explanation. Jonathan Hickman isn't an established creator at this point either and this title is currently selling better than both Fantastic Four and Secret Warriors, Hickman's other titles. My guess would be the continuity and secret history angels are what is driving interest in the title but, like I said, I have no real idea as to why this is doing so well. |
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