The New 52 - Animal Man

First of all, I have to admit that I wasn't going to pick up Animal Man when it was first announced as one of the New 52.

I should also warn you that there are likely to be an awful lot of "I remember whens..." in these 'New 52' posts.

Have I mentioned that I've been collecting comics for over thirty years? If there was any justice then that would elicit applause in the same was "I'm 75 years old" does from a TV studio audience. Oh put your hands down all those of you that have been reading for longer, its not a competition. I'm just warning you that some of these reviews will elicit distant and/or recent memories of mine such as..

Of course, I was around for the first Animal Man series in the late 80s. Grant Morrison, Chas Truog. Good times. Morrison built on what we already knew about Buddy Baker and gave us a much more domestic super-hero albeit with a surreal, post-modern twist. Morrison left the book, but I stuck around to read the successive runs by Peter Milligan and Tom Veitch before dropping the title.

Subsequent appearances in 52, Countdown to Adventure and the Animal Man mini-series from a couple of years ago, all followed Morrison's lead of keeping Buddy's family (wife Ellen and kids Cliff and Maxine) at the heart of his story.

Given how much a love the Bakers as characters this really should have been a must-buy, but I was trying not to get carried away with the DC52 books so I didn't add it to my standing order.

Then the reviews came in...and I held off. Then the reviews came in for #2. And I panicked, rang my local comic shop and asked them to put the first two issues away for me.

And I'm so glad I did.

Writer Jeff Lemire does an amazing job:. After using a magazine article to bring us up to scratch with where Animal Man is at the moment he then perfectly captures Buddy's self-obsessed insecurity as a potentially has-been hero. Ellen is a wife and mother trying to keep the family organised with little help from her partner who is more concerned with his media image at the moment. Meanwhile, Maxine wants a pet dog.

It could be so easy to let this characterisation fall into cliche, but we're not talking a couple on the edge of breaking up, this is a family that gets a little snarky from time to time like most of our families do. And Lemire portrays is beautifully.

Events proceed and Buddy finds himself undergoing an unexpected physical change and Maxine has filled the pet-shaped gap in her life be reanimating dead pets from around the neighbourhood. Buddy & Maxine go on a quest to find out whats happening to them both, travelling to the Parliament of Limbs, while Ellen & Cliff have to stay at home, wait for news and dead-pet sit. Maxine has unlocked powers even greater than her father's and is the Avatar of the Red, the force that connects all animal life. The Red is under threat from the Rot, a force of decay which is targeting Maxine and has assigned its agents, the Hunters Three, to capture her.


These fleshy creatures (a bit Brundelfly meets Yuzna's Society for you film fans) are amongst the most repulsive things I've ever seen in a comic book, and that only adds to the dread as they close in on their prey. This is where artist Travel Foreman's contribution to the book makes its most impact. This volume of Animal Man is more of a horror book than a super-hero one, and Foreman's work here provides a horrifying visual to Lemire's concepts. The Hunters (in all their forms), Buddy's journey into the Red and the Parliament of Limbs themselves are all stunningly rendered.

However, its not just in the horrific that Foreman excels. His does great work with the Bakers: the tender moments between Buddy and Ellen, Maxine trying to get her father's attention and a Cliff full of energy. Even the scenes featuring the Maxine's dead pets are quite sweet.

Or maybe its just me.

Anyway, the creative team have done a great job of keeping up the pace and moving things along. I'm certainly hooked and will be sticking around for the foreseeable future. This book really reminds me of the pre-Vertigo horror books DC used to create, and I'm definitely reminded of Alan Moore's Swamp Thing. All in all this is one of my favourites amongst the DC 52, and I can't recommend it highly enough!

Next Time on Bouillabaise Yum Yum: Demon Knights.

Fairytale of New 52

It's New Year's Eve babe,

In the kitchen,

Got a stack of comic books, to wade my way through.

They're DC52,

Four months worth actually,

And as I read them all

I'm gonna blog for you.

So it's four months since DC Comics essentially rebooted their universe amid much hoo ha from the comic book community and a bit of attention from the wider media.

DC, with a legacy of over 70 years making comic books, declared that it was going to cancel all its mainstream titles and relaunch with 52 new #1 issues. They announced a relatively diverse range of books: super-hero, horror, western, military, sword & sorcery. This variety hark ens back to when I first got into comics and you could find issues like Sgt Rock, Arak: Son of Thunder, Jonah Hex, Weird War Tales, GI Combat, etc. Still no funny animal book in the New 52, but you never know.

Initial reaction was mixed, with many fans saying they thought a reboot would make previous decades-worth of stories obsolete and provide the perfect jumping-off point for long-term readers. I understood those concerns, but I've been reading comics for over 30 years and have seen more reboots and retcons than most people have had hot dinners. I've come to see it as an inevitable fact of comic life.

However, when it came to the DC52 I thought this was a daring, brilliant idea! Y'see, I'm a DC kid. The first comics I remember picking up were DC comics: New Teen Titans, Adventure Comics feat. Dial-H-For-Hero, the Legion of Super-Heroes, DC Comics Presents. I LOVE DC!

But more recently they've always seemed to play second fiddle to Marvel in the sales and publicity stakes. The thought of a total, universal revamp was a crazy idea...but it just might work.

And I think, on the whole, it has. DC titles appear to be doing well in the sales charts, there is a healthy buzz about the New 52, and fans old and new are enjoying the books.

 

So, four months down the line, it seems an appropriate time to take stock of how I've found the relaunch/reboot/revamp whatever you call it. Over the next few days I'm going to reread the titles that I've been picking up and blog my thoughts on them.

 

Next Time on Bouillabaise Yum Yum: Animal Man.

Now, where WAS I....?

Did I mention that I'm a VERY slow reader?

Its now over four months since I started this blog and this is only my second post.

A few things have contributed to this:

1) I've learned that i really AM a slow reader. It appears that years of reading comics have finally started to rot my brain!

2) I've misplaced my bleedin' copy of Managra (the book I promised to review all those years ago, as you've probably forgotten). Don't fret for me, it's somewhere in the house, but when your home is a cross between the Library of Alexandria and the Death Star's trash compactor it can be difficult finding things.

and finally,

3) I had my head turned by the chance to review Sky Pirates! for the Terrible Zodin!

Sky Pirates! is, of course, one of the Seventh Doctor Virgin adventures. Written by Dave Stone, it's something of a surreal romp.

The Terrible Zodin is the online Dr Who fanzine, a vertiable treasure trove of Who gooodness (they even have PAPER DOLLS in some issues!).

Anyway, you can read my review of Sky Pirates! in the twelfth issue of TZ, which can be downloaded for FREE at http://dl.dropbox.com/u/32189648/TTZ12%20fall%202011.pdf 

So I've at least managed to review A Dr Who novel, even if its not the one I originally promised.

Finally, I'm going to give the initial remit of Bouillabaisse Yum Yum a bit of a tweak.While I am going to continue wading my way through my backlog of Who novels, I've decided that I will also use this space to look at comics, tv and anything else that takes my fancy.

Hopefully that will mean that this blog will become a little more regular in future.

You have been warned.

A Blog Is Born...(I bet that's been used a million times)

From a very early age I've filled my life with stuff. Stuff that the vast majority of people see as useless, meaningless, sometimes childish, quite often beyond their understanding. When I say "stuff" I mean Dr Who, comics, sci-fi (not the hard stuff), kids TV, horror and general pop culture trivia. That sort of "stuff".

As a kid most of my peers were desperate for the new Liverpool away kit. I just wanted a very long scarf.

Eventually, I relented to peer pressure and got an away kit. I wore it to play footie on occasion (twice, I think), but most importantly (turned inside out) it formed the basis for my costume as Loki, God of Mischief in the Third Year Juniors' Christmas play.

But I digress.

Why am I writing a blog? That stems from a recent Twitter discussion. It was started by @TerribleZodin (splendid fanzine, all of them) who asked people to name their favourite stories for each incarnation of the Doctor. And rather than it being limited to just the TV episodes you could include the various books, comic strips, audio adventures, etc. that have been produced over the years. That got me to thinking about all those Dr Who novels I'd picked up over the years. The ones that I generally put to one side and never got around to reading.

I don't know about you, but I find that a geek's work is never done. You've just caught up on this month's comics, but you've still got those Big Finish Cd's to listen to, and that Joe Hill book you picked up in the charity shop, and those two series of Carnivale are still burning a hole in the shelf. And it doesn't help when you are the world's slowest reader and, I suspect, an undiagnosed narcoleptic.

Anyway, I've set myself the challenge of finally reading those Dr Who novels and writing a blog about it. And along the road I'm sure there'll be comic book commentary and other little diversions.

Next Time on Bouillabaisse Yum Yum!

Thanks to a recommendation from @the_Arn I'm starting with one of the Virgin Missing Adventures: Managra by Stephen Marley, starring the Fourth Doctor and Sarah Jane Smith.