Top Five Fridays 4/18/08
Some of you may have noticed on the sidebar, we have our “Top Five of the Moment” listed. These are the five books that are most clicking with each Pants writer. It may or may not represent the best books we’ve read all month, year, or just what we’re digging that week. We generally try to update it with books from that week, but there are no hard and fast rules. Inspired by an email from one of our readers, we’re going to post every Friday with the most recent Top Five from each member of the Panteon, and hope for your comments on our lists, or maybe even your own “Top Five of the Moment.”
Also, just as the Wednesday Number Ones feature is generally our spot for folks to talk about the comics of the week, we hope that Top Five Fridays is where you’ll come to talk about what’s going on in comics in general. News in the comics world, thoughts on comics you’ve recently read, talk about comic-related movies that release this weekend and more are welcome in the comments thread for Top Five Fridays.
This week, the Top Five Books of the Moment are:
Nick Budd’s Top Five Books of the Moment
- Pigeons From Hell
- Annihilation Conquest
- Incredible Hercules
- Amazing Spider-Man
- Jim Butcher’s Dresden Files
Dave Farabee’s Top Five Books of the Moment
- Annihilation Conquest
- Robin
- Batman & the Outsiders
- Warhammer: Forge of War TP
- Incredible Hercules
Dan Grendell’s Top Five Books of the Moment
- PS238 V.5: Extraterrestrial Credit
- Noble Causes Archives V.1
- Wonderlost
- Monster V.14
- Annihilation: Conquest
Randy Lander’s Top Five Books of the Moment
- Hellboy Library Ed Vol 1 Seed Of Destruction HC
- Pigeons From Hell
- DMZ
- Incredible Hercules
- Annihilation Conquest
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It was a really good week for me. So good, in fact, that I’m going to make an alternate top five from a dimension where my first five picks didn’t come out.
1. Hellboy Library Ed Vol 1 Seed Of Destruction HC - Damn, this thing is gorgeous. Same format as the Art of Hellboy books, and Mignola’s artwork is *stunning* at this size.
2. Pigeons From Hell - Great art by Nathan (DMZ) Fox, nice creepy haunted house story from Robert E. Howard and Joe Lansdale. Some elements of the story are very familiar to all haunted house tales, but it’s executed really well.
3. DMZ - Second issue in the election story, and I love that even as Matty adapts to the DMZ, he’s still so naive in so many ways that he winds up pissing off everyone around him. Great art by Burchielli too… check out that second panel on the opening page.
4. Incredible Hercules - I liked the Eternals vs. Hercules, but what I’m really loving is the Pak/Van Lente version of Athena, who’s smart enough to hold her own with Amadeus Cho and tough enough to hold her own with Hercules. Give this character her own mini from one or both of these writers and I’d be all over it.
5. Annihilation Conquest - Fantastic finale. I don’t want to say anything to spoil it, but this was a great closer to a great epic space adventure series.
Alternate World Top Five:
1. Damned Prodigal Sons - I loved the first Damned, but the ending seemed kinda abrupt. Now I know it’s because it wasn’t an ending, it was more of a pause before the next issue. Wish this was an ongoing instead of a series of limited series, but otherwise it’s great.
2. Noble Causes - Good new jumping-on point for this book, making it more of a true companion book to Dynamo 5.
3. Robin - Spoiler returns! Maybe. Dixon is doing fantastic work on this book, building up a supporting cast, using an interesting villain in an interesting way and providing a nice balance of plot and character. He may not hit the heights of a Vaughan or a Brubaker, but Dixon is a consistently good, occasionally great, writer of superhero comics, especially at DC. Shame DC seems to view him as a fill-in guy, and they haven’t got his runs on Robin or Birds of Prey reprinted in trade.
4. Batman And The Outsiders - Another well-executed Dixon team book. Beautiful artwork, and I love the members of this team. The Metamorpho stuff this issue was gold.
5. Grendel Behold The Devil - Fantastic art from Wagner, amazing action sequence this issue too.
6. Suicide Squad Raise The Flag - Nice finale, I’m still not wild about the Rick Flag retcon, but the rest of the series was vintage Squad. I’ll be picking up the trade. And wishing that this was an ongoing, because it’s clear Ostrander has more to say with these characters. Like Dixon, he’s a solid, consistent writer who doesn’t get the respect he’s due.
7. Naoki Urusawa’s Monster Vol. 14 - One of the weaker volumes, but still a great suspense manga.
8. Captain America - I’ve lost a little interest in this book of late, but the writing and art are still so damn good, and the twists and turns so interesting, that I just can’t stop reading it.
9. X-Factor - Arcade! Used well! That alone is enough to make this worth a read.
10. Amazing Spider-Man - Nice performance from Wells and Bachalo, a strange choice of foes for Spidey (Mayan Snow God?) but I like that kind of thing from time to time.
11. Warhammer Forge Of War TP - Great dark fantasy comic from Boom! Would rank higher, except it was a great week and I’ve already read all the stories within.
18 Apr 2008 at 11:36 am
QuoteI noticed the Noble Causes Archive in my LCS today - is it worth a tumble???
18 Apr 2008 at 12:39 pm
QuoteYou betcha. The artwork holds up great in black and white, and Faerber’s superhero soap opera about a normal woman who marries into a famous dysfunctional superhero family is at times touching, at times exciting, but always gripping. For twenty bucks, it’s a steal. If you really gotta have it in color, it’s out in normal trades, too.
18 Apr 2008 at 1:00 pm
Quote1)100 Bullets- The final arc is reaching far beyond my expectations.
2)Annihilation Conquest- Bring on the Guardians!
3)Hellblazer- Diggle is the Man. The best Constantine stuff in years.
4)DMZ- Up tp par as usual.
5)The Sword- Because everything else on my pull list was rubbish.
18 Apr 2008 at 1:15 pm
QuoteThis was a crazy good week for comics, and that made it hard as hell to pick a top five. On any normal week, anything from my list could have made it.
1. PS238 V.5: Extraterrestrial Credit- I’m a huge fan of Aaron Williams’s book about elementary school kids with superpowers going to a secret government school together, and the biggest reason is that it’s smart. I just wish Williams could keep the trades in print; they go out of print all the time and stay that way for way too long.
2. Noble Causes Archives V.1- See my post above.
3. Wonderlost- C.B. Cebulski’s anthology book of stories from his life is funny as hell and incredibly true to life. These are stories of the kinds of things that happened to all of us but that we are either too embarrassed or afraid to tell anyone. I just wish this came out more than once a year.
4. Monster V.14- More mysteries revealed means more to figure out. This is chugging right along to an upcoming end, though I am definitely going to have to re-read it from the beginning, because I know I’m missing stuff.
5. Annihilation Conquest- A spectacular ending to a great series, and one that leaves me wanting Guardians of the Galaxy right now.
6. Incredible Hercules- Prologue to the Sacred Invasion. Athena kicks ass, Eternals are awesome, and I love this book.
7. Jim Butcher’s Dresden Files- This is my first encounter with the Dresden Files. I’ve never read the books or seen the show, but I dug this. It has a cool feel. Less grim than Hellblazer or Gravel.
8. Robin- Dixon has got me back on this book. I loved his long run on it before, and fell off of it when he left; the hints that Spoiler (a favorite of mine) may be coming back, plus his characterization of Tim, have me loving it again.
9. Batman and the Outsiders- Dixon again, with more coolness. The additions of the ghost Dibnys to a book I was already kinda digging solidified it for me. Plus, it’s nice to see Batgirl acting like herself again.
10. Damned Prodigal Sons- I loved the first mini, and this one looks to be a winner too. The mix of demons, curses, and 30’s gangsters just does it for me.
Honorable mentions go to the Hellboy Library Edition, which is just gorgeous but which I haven’t gotten my hands on yet, and the latest issue of Noble Causes, which I haven’t read yet. I know it’s five years in the future and good for new readers, but I’m a few issues behind and I want to get caught up to avoid spoilers before I read it.
18 Apr 2008 at 1:26 pm
QuoteThis is likely the last week I’ll be buying monthlies and I just got two.
Jason Aaron’s Ghost Rider is way more fun than people expect, with kind of a nice Grindhouse feel.
The Brave and the Bold reminds me why I almost never buy DC. I get involved in a story, and then a few issues later it has some convoluted conclusion that ties in with a crossover I don’t give a shit about. This happened to me with Adam Strange and here it is again. No mas!
18 Apr 2008 at 2:08 pm
QuoteNo love for Avengers Classic #11..? I can’t find anything on any sites. What a bummer.
18 Apr 2008 at 3:05 pm
QuoteAaron’s Ghost Rider has been a blast so far. Anybody who has liked his writing on Scalped or Other Side should really give this a try. Plus artist Roland Boschi is kicking all sorts of ass in the art department.
My top 5:
1. Annihilation Conquest
2. Grendel: Behold the Devil
3. DMZ
4. Ghost Rider
5. Noble Causes
With honorable mentions for 100 Bullets and Captain America. Pretty good week overall.
18 Apr 2008 at 4:17 pm
QuoteOn Dixon’s first issue back (think it was #170), you guys rated it as solid and mentioned a title “doesn’t really have much of a reason to exist.” But now, it’s fantastic? You guys are killing me! But seriously, I hope Chuck stays on the title for long while and same for Tomasi for Nightwing. It’s been a while since I have enjoyed those two titles.
Anyway, no love for the latest Brave and the Bold?
Also, just wondering what are your thoughts on Fraction and Brubaker leaving Immortal Iron Fist and that Duane Swierczynski will be taking over? I haven’t read anything he wrote but depending on how it goes, I’ll buy the trade of his Cable run. Are you guys optimistic that Swierczynski will write stories just as good as Fraction and Brubaker on Iron Fist?
18 Apr 2008 at 4:55 pm
QuoteThat was actually Randy, and I don’t really agree- I think Tim’s adventures (at least as Dixon wrote them) were plenty different enough from Batman’s to provide a raison d’etre. Dixon actually treated him like a teen hero, with the things that go along with it- dealing with family, school, friends, and a girlfriend. Of course, post-Dixon that was pretty much all trashed, so it’s nice to see some of it being reconstructed. I agree about Nightwing, though- Tomasi has made that book fun in a way that’s been missing since…well, since Dixon.
The latest story has had a bunch of cool moments, but the whole Megistus thing as an over-arcing plot just failed hard for me. I think I’d prefer to see shorter arcs that weren’t so convoluted. There was certainly some coolness there, though.
No. Honestly, no, I’m not, but that’s more a testament to how awesome Fraction and Bru have been than anything against Swierczynski. I’m certainly going to give him a shot, and I’ll go into it with an open mind, but I think the magic may be gone from that book. I really hope it isn’t, though.
18 Apr 2008 at 9:28 pm
QuoteAGHHHH! I just found out that Guardians of the Galaxy is starting with a Secret Invasion tie-in. I am so frickin tired of all these tie ins to events I could care less about. I really need to try more indie books. Every crossover promises big changes and things go right back to normal after six months except for sales numbers. Please do it right, DnA.
19 Apr 2008 at 12:37 am
Quote1. X-Factor: Madrox - Multiple Choice HC
2. Amazing Spider-Man
3. X-Factor
4. Incredible Hercules
5. Captain America
19 Apr 2008 at 11:43 am
Quote1. X-Factor- Arcade! Good to see him used again. I love the idea that he still plays the “custom theme park assassination” scam. He is the most ridiculous of all villains and I loves him.
2. Annihilation Finale- way to go out big and loud. I couldn’t be more stoked for Guardians of the Galaxy until I read it had a Secret Invasion tie-in. Booo. That said, DnA handled the Civil War stuff very well in the early run of Nova (I mean, putting Iron Man’s wee little conflict in perspective with near-total universal annihilation…perfect…pasting the Thunderbolts…priceless). I hope he hits the notes that keep the Marvel Overlords happy and moves on. More talking dog, please.
3. Suicide Squad finale- Why this isn’t an ongoing series again is beyond me. Ostrander wrote this puppy like he did the original run. It was almost like there wasn’t a nearly 20 year break in between. Great finale and good to see them back in action, if only for 8 issues.
4. Iron Fist Essentials- Still working my way through this. Great stuff, still. I had to go back once I read the above comment about Bru and Fraction leaving Iron Fist in the near future. That’s pretty sad. I hope that the new team can keep it up. Are these guys any good at pulp?
5. Dresden- Oh wait, no I didn’t read it. My store sold out. Who knew? Hopefully they can get it on re-order.
19 Apr 2008 at 1:30 pm
QuoteI’m not surprised, actually. It would be a little weird for the cosmic defense book NOT to deal with a Skrull invasion of Earth. I suspect it will give us a look at how the effects are playing out in space, which is something I’m kinda curious about.
19 Apr 2008 at 1:57 pm
QuoteI hear what your saying Dan but I have just found the whole Skrull invasion so trivial in terms to what had happened to their race after the first annihilation. It would be hard to conquer a planet after being all but obliterated (even if it were through covert shape-shifting). If there were a tie-in, a cosmic one would indeed make the most sense but I just hope there’s enough going on that it doesn’t get bogged down with all the convolution because I am not following Secret Invasion.
19 Apr 2008 at 5:03 pm
Quote1.Batman/Outsiders
2.Noble Causes
3.Captain America
4.100 Bullets
5.The Lone Ranger
Busiek’s last Superman issue turned out to be the best of his run on the book so hopefully that will roll over onto Trinity.
20 Apr 2008 at 11:00 am
QuoteI’m actually intrigued by the new team on Iron Fist. I was sad to see the Fraction/Bru/Aja trifecta, but I really dig what I’ve seen of the new artist. And while Swierczynski hasn’t wowed me on Cable, I’ll give him a shot.
Oh, and the Damned is off to an incredible start. I really enjoyed the breakneck pacing at the end of the issue.
21 Apr 2008 at 11:44 am
QuoteI did a phone interview with Matt Fraction for my paper this afternoon … he’s coming to Utah in a couple of weeks for an in-store signing. And he said everyone who’s loved “Immortal Iron Fist” should keep reading the book. That even HE was amazed at how cool Swierczynski’s pitch for the title was. And given how honest Fraction was about other stuff in the industry, I tend to believe him. So I’m going to give the first, post-Brubaker-and-Fraction arc a try.
Also, unfortunately, he says he, Brubaker and Aja are gone for good. Aja supposedly has something else big coming up, and Bru’s contributions have been diminishing because of his huge writing work load.
21 Apr 2008 at 8:34 pm
QuoteWhere did you read that? I was under the impression that the tie-in will be a couple of issues into the run.
21 Apr 2008 at 8:35 pm
QuoteI also hear good thing about Aaron’s “Wolverine.” I just read the first two trades of “Scalped” and thought they were very good. So maybe I’ll give his superhero stuff a try.
21 Apr 2008 at 8:38 pm
QuoteA little unrelated topic, so I apologize. When you guys did the Golden Pants award, I made a list of things to pick up and have been slowly working my way through. I picked up two Mangas off the list this week — the corpse delivery service and Monster. Good stuff. I usually have to force myself to pick up a manga, but I’m rarely disappointed. Thanks to that podcast, I’ve read Thunderbolts, Dynamo 5, Mouseguard, X-Men: First Class and Warhammer: Damnation Crusade (not sure about that one). I’ve enjoyed all of them, so thanks! I’ve still got Grendel: Behold the Devil, Green Arrow Year One, a Hellboy series and a BPRD series on my list.
21 Apr 2008 at 9:26 pm
QuoteTom, I think you can be very confident that it’s not you… it’s the rest of the book. I’m a diehard Avengers fan, but I’ve already read all those original stories, and most folks who haven’t aren’t fans enough to want to read the early stuff. I suspect that’s why we’re not seeing any coverage in the blogosphere.
Avengers Classic seems like a misreading of the market by Marvel. When X-Men Classic was coming out, it was: A) The Best that book has ever been and will ever be, Claremont’s run from the beginning and B) In an era where trades, hardcovers and digital downloads/DVD copies were not plentiful. It’s *so* easy to find the early Avengers stuff to read that a $2.99 book with short backup tales isn’t really going to find a huge audience.
Now if they collect all the vignette stories the way they eventually did with the backups in X-Men Classic? *That* I’d read.
Heh. I stand by my original opinion, actually. It seems insane to me that we’re within a couple years of Robin #200. But that doesn’t mean the book can’t occasionally be very readable and fun, and Dixon (after what I thought was a weak couple issues to start) clearly has a plan for this book, and I’m liking it more and more with each issue.
Actually, I even wound up liking the first couple issues more when I could see the payoff a little more clearly.
I love that the Megistus story is finally over. Does that count?
Seriously, though, I wanted to love Brave & The Bold. At the beginning, and for a few issues, I did. But then it starts dragging in Crises and alternate Earths and an over-arcing bad guy and the Challengers of the Unknown being boring instead of DC: New Frontier style awesome and it became a book I liked in sporadic moments.
My thoughts, upon first hearing the news?
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I’ll give the new guy a chance, but I honestly can’t imagine anyone doing that book as well or better than the creative team that launched it. I can’t decide if I’m more disappointed by Fraction leaving Iron Fist or Fraction leaving The Order, but I do know that it has had the effect of weakening my interest in his Iron Man, because now I see that book as having helped kill two books I loved.
I know it’s unfair. I just don’t care.
Basically, Fraction on weird, fringe books like Iron Fist and The Order is vastly more interesting than Fraction on established, big books like X-Men and Iron Man. There’s so much more room to be original and fun on characters that haven’t been around for 40+ years.
I expect that those crossover issues will be good, possibly even great. I also expect that they would have been better had they not been dragged into Secret Invasion at all. It’s clear there will be no escaping the story if you’re reading any Marvel books.
My hope at this point is that, like Civil War, the post-Secret Invasion stuff will be so good that I don’t care how bad Secret Invasion is. I don’t dare hope that Secret Invasion will actually be good. Again, I know it’s not fair, just don’t care.
Looks like it’s out at Diamond, and Dabel Brothers haven’t said anything about a reprint. I know we under-ordered too… it’s hard to gauge these things. But the Dabels really need to get a reprint announcement out *soon* if they’re going to affect orders on issues two and three. Right now, I know we’re low on number two, but if I can’t get first issues, that’s going to affect how much of a bump future issues get.
You’ve still got great reading ahead of you. Glad you dug the stuff we recommended!
22 Apr 2008 at 1:05 am
QuoteI hate to sound like Matt Fraction’s publicist, but I can’t believe some of you are down on his “Invincible Iron Man” title before the first issue has even been released. Having talked to him, I can tell you how genuinely enthusiastic he is about the book and how much he loves the character.
Also, he says that he will be following up on some themes and concepts from “The Order.” Remember, Tony Stark has been a featured character in that book.
And of course, he is great on supposed, C-list characters like Iron Fist. But he also wrote the best Spider-Man story I’ve read in years … last year’s “Sensational Spider-Man” Annual, which was rightly nominated for an Eisner Award.
So don’t give up yet on his stuff yet …
22 Apr 2008 at 5:06 pm
QuoteOf course, there is some more bad news … Matt also said “Casanova” is going on a slight hiatus after the current story line wraps up. Fabio Moon and Gabriel Ba both have stuff lines up, and he said he needs a break from it for a while.
Bummer …
(He did promise it’s coming back eventually, though.)
22 Apr 2008 at 5:08 pm
QuoteI’m not giving up… but I can’t deny that I’m much more excited about his writing on the fringe or new characters. The Spidey annual was good, but it can’t touch his work on The Order and Iron Fist, in my opinion.
And with him also taking a hiatus from Casanova (which, in fairness, I actually haven’t been a huge fan of) puts Fraction on only big books, which is a disappointing trend. Much like Bendis, Brubaker, etc., I prefer when these guys keep their hand in on more personal stuff. Brubaker still has Criminal, at least, and Bendis theoretically has Powers (although that book seems quarterly at best)… shame if Fraction is “that guy writing X-Men and Iron Man” and not much else.
22 Apr 2008 at 6:46 pm
QuoteBut writing the big books does put food on the table for him, his wife and new baby, so I can’t blame Matt for that. I have confidence that his Iron Man title will be good. And he did say that his Marvel Exclusive deal does allow him a few outside projects … as long as they’re not for DC.
22 Apr 2008 at 11:03 pm
QuoteWell, sure. For Fraction as a person and a professional, especially short-term, it’s a no-brainer. I’m glad he’s found that level of success.
Can’t blame Marvel for wanting to make some changes on low-selling books either, in terms of promoting up-and-coming talent higher in the company onto their bread and butter books.
It’s just that as a fan, I have the luxury of not worrying about market realities, I can worry about whether I’m personally excited about the product or not.
Still looking forward to Invincible Iron Man… it’s just that I’d trade it in a heartbeat for more issues of The Order or Immortal Iron Fist.
22 Apr 2008 at 11:36 pm
Quote23 Apr 2008 at 4:39 am
Quote23 Apr 2008 at 1:31 pm
QuoteMake no mistake … I’d trade everything at Marvel for more Brubaker-Fraction “Immortal Iron Fist.” Including Ed’s “Captain America” …
23 Apr 2008 at 1:33 pm
QuoteYes, Scalped is still around but I was hoping he would pitch more stories for Vertigo then writing for Marvel. Since it’s The Other Side and Scalped that gained him the attention from everybody including Marvel even though he had written a short story of Wolverine for them before he wrote for Vertigo.
I’m actually excited for Fraction on Iron Man. I was hoping Fraction would leave Punisher War Journal instead of Immortal Iron Fist, since PWJ is the weakest title out of all he writes, imo.
I enjoy Brubaker’s Captain America, but it’s not as good as Sleeper. It’s really Criminal that I’m glad he moved to Marvel, which he could for just easily pitch to Vertigo if he didn’t become Marvel exclusive since it’s created-owned project.
23 Apr 2008 at 3:18 pm
QuoteI wouldn’t be surprised if Marvel either canceled “Punisher War Journal” or turned it over to Rick Remender, who’s also going to be doing some writing with Matt Fraction on the book.
And “Scalped” and “Criminal” are both so good I wouldn’t mind if they were Aaron and Brubaker’s only titles. I could be wrong, though, but I think Brubaker soured on DC a little and might not be willing to do anything for Vertigo if it’s a DC imprint. Plus, I got the feeling he didn’t like how they treated his “Deadenders” book there.
23 Apr 2008 at 6:33 pm
QuoteIs that Brubaker really felt about DC or is that what you want to hear? I heard it’s because Marvel gave an offer Brubaker couldn’t refuse to come over to Marvel and also, he wanted to write Captain America badly, even commented about how he wants to write the title for as long as possible.
Anyway, glad you enjoyed Scalped. Now if at least one Panteon can embrace the title as well. One can dream…
24 Apr 2008 at 8:33 am
Quote