Roberts-Sized Pull List, 3-21

I'm on spring break right now. If my behavior during winter break is any indication, under normal cirumstances I'd be too busy doing other things to update this blog (which I can do anywhere, including back at the university, after all). However, as it happens, I sprained my ankle yesterday, on the *very first day I returned*. So it looks like I'll be working the typing skills after all.

I only made one purchase at the comic shop last week.
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The Brave and the Bold 2
The Lords of Luck, Chapter Two: Ventura
-- I came to a realization when I finished reading this: This might just be my new favorite superhero comic. That might be a bit premature only two issues in, but I don't think so. Even though we're in the middle of a multi-issue arc, each issue has been of a fairly self-contained nature, so I think we have a pretty good grasp of what the typical issue will be like already. (Though Waid and Perez could decide to arrange any future arc in an entirely different way, I suppose. I don't know.)

And what is the typical issue like? It's 22 pages of everything one could ask for in a good superhero comic: Imagination brimming on every page (...the Hounds of Chaos!...), clever banter that almost sparkles, artwork so vivid and striking that it comes to life whether you want it to or not. Perez seems especially well-suited for this title because his style is one that can successfully pull off a wide range of settings, from the mundane and gritty to -- well, to something as fantastical as a busy, extraterrestrial Vegas-writ-large.

Okay, so the characterization might not be the deepest. Not all books need it to be, though. And given how plot-focused this series is, it's quite impressive that Waid managed to get in as much of it as he did.

Now, some random observations about this issue in particular:

-I like that the Venturans come in more than one color. Humans do, after all. In fiction, unless an alien race looks exactly like humanity (e.g. Kryptonians), all its members tend to be of only one skin color. When Supergirl's carrying Green Lantern between the spires of Ventura, there's one panel that depicts a *blue* Venturan in the foreground. Actually, this could very well simply be a coloring error. Regardless of the cause, though, what's there is there. It was a nice detail.

-When Green Lantern mentioned Ventura's policy against "chrononauts," did anyone else think the story was leading to the authorities trying to arrest Supergirl for her time with the 31st century-located Legion of Superheroes?

-Perez went to town on his design of Ventura. That's one amazing skyscape. You'd think a place that's Vegas-writ-large would look tacky and gaudy (much like the actual Vegas), and maybe in real life, this sort of scenery would be. On the comic page, though, at Perez's hands, it's amazing.

-The background of the cover seems to contain pictures of characters who'll be showing up in future issues. There's Lobo, Adam Strange, the Venturan who's wielding the haruspex, Blue Beetle, and Batman. In the lower right, cut off by the page edge, we also see Mister Miracle (ah, but which one?). Who are the remaining two images, though? One of them seems to have an antenna sticking up from the right side of his head. At first, I thought it might be the cyborg member of the Fatal Five, but I checked and he doesn't seem to have any such design feature. And the thick arm in the lower left of the cover? Looks familiar, but I can't place it with certainty...


-In the time between reading that the balding guy with frizzy hair was someone on a mission and not just some schmuck and reading that he was a Rannian, my mind went to, "Someone from the 5th dimension?" The hair, it was his hair.

-This is my first real exposure to the new Blue Beetle. Not that there's a lot to go on this issue, but he seems pretty interesting here. And that armor and those wings sure look pretty and striking. I'm getting a Peter Parker-esque vibe from him.

-Hey, are those two Tamaranians in the luxury suite? Would their inclusion constitute... continuity porn? *rimshot*

-The woman who briefly appears in the pages of the Book of Destiny before it gets re-written, should we know who she is? Why else would George Perez draw her looking human when no one else on Ventura does (save the Rannian)... unless she's a pre-existing character?

-I like how despite Green Lantern and Supergirl having power of the pretty much unlimited variety, the plot has them using their brains to try to solve their problems.