Welcome to Take It Or Leave It, where each week I pick out new comics and tell you if they’re worth the price and you should take them, or if you should just leave them on the shelf.
I had a late lunch meeting today, so my time at my Local Comic Shop was limited, and I only picked up a few issues this week. So I’ll only be reviewing Superman #31, Star Trek #33, and Fantastic Four #5 today. Not one of my better weeks.
Superman #31
I started out with high hopes for this whole Doomed story. But with each issue it just gets worse and worse. This is part 4, and I’ve read every part, but it seems like there is a ton of material missing. Maybe it’s because I haven’t read much New 52, but I don’t think so. I think the writing just isn’t very good. I mean, it’s not Infinity levels of incoherent, but the story doesn’t seem to be progressing very fast or in a really interesting way. And Superman is barely in the last few issues of the story, or at the very least he’s not the focal point of his own story. Sure, he narrates this a bit, but he doesn’t really behave like Superman. He’s acting like a mopey teenager and making one liners like he’s Spider-Man. At this point, I think it’s safe to jump off the bandwagon. You want a Doomsday story, go read Death of Superman, this doesn’t even come close.
Verdict: Leave It
Star Trek #33
This week is the beginning of a new storyline, entitled “Lost Apollo”. Based on the title, I assumed this would be the JJverse retelling of “Who Mourns for Adonais”, but I was sorely mistaken. The Apollo here is not the Greek god, but is actually the Apollo space missions from the 1970’s. Being the first of a two part story, it’s not entirely clear, but it looks like this is going to go the way of mixing Apollo 18 and “One Small Step”, with a secret NASA mission that goes wrong and ends up halfway across the quadrant. But we don’t see any of that yet in this issue. Kirk lands on a lush planet (the type that works well in comics but not on screen), loses his tricorder (because that’s original), then finds a crashed capsule. And then of course gets attacked by a giant monster. Becasue of course they do on the final splash page. Overall, the writing isn’t at it’s best, and while the planet looked good, a lot of the other art was wonky. I’m not sure if it’s solely Joe Corroney’s pencils or John Rauchs’ colors or the two together, but alot of the faces look all distorted and wierd. All in all, if you can get past the funky art and subpar writing, you may like it, but it’s safe to skip this story.
Verdict: Probably Leave It
Fantastic Four #5
I’m not entirely sure why, but this issue was a double sized issue. There’s absolutely no reason for this. It’s not any special anniversary that I’m aware of. If I wasn’t a regular reader of the series anyway, I’d be kinda pissed if I picked this up randomly. The majority of the whole issue is framed as a court hearing and acts like a clip show of all the Fantastic Four’s biggest hits. If you’ve never read a FF book, it might be an interesting jumping on point, but as a long time reader and fan, it’s kinda superfluous. Once the back end of the issue pulled around and set the groundwork for next issue there were some positives, as the setup looks interesting. However, there’s too much fluff and recap this week and not enough new story to recommend picking this up if you aren’t already interesting in the FF to begin with.
Verdict: Probably Leave It
JohnScott is the proud owner of a life size replica Captain Kirk Chair. He is a hoarder of Comic Books, Transformers, and Star Trek action figures. He attended Space Camp as an adult. He has taken vacations to the closing of the Star Trek Experience and the final night Shuttle launch. He has been known to yell at his television when the kids can't put together the damn statue in the Shrine of the Silver Monkey. When not writing for InsufficientScotty, he is a Software Engineer for a major healthcare communications company.
