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The Forecast for October 6th 2004
Welcome to The Forecast. Every Monday, Ninth Art's core team of comment writers, the Ninth Eight, will be your guides to the best, worst, weirdest and most noteworthy books on the shelves of your local comic shop. BOOK OF THE WEEK: STARMAN Being a latecomer to the STARMAN mythos, I only started reading around the time the newly collected GRAND GUIGNOL arc began. I knew little of the characters beyond a vague idea of who the lead, Jack Knight, was. That didn't matter. What did matter was the elaborate plotting, the grand scale, and one of the best endings to a series ever committed to four colour glory. Spinning out of DC's otherwise horrendous ZERO HOUR crossover, James Robinson and Tony Harris took a long forgotten Golden Age hero, the titular Starman, and reinvented him for the Modern Age. Previously a two-fisted scientist in cape and tights, Ted Knight, he was now Ted's grungy, couldn't-care-less son, Jack, a hero who eschewed cape and tights for leather jackets and pants. Over the series, we saw Jack evolve into a son who his father could respect and admire. By this point in the series, artist Tony Harris had left and been replaced by Peter Snejbjerg After a few art hiccups, Snejbjerg settled into the role quite admirably. There are some truly evocative shots of Jack Knight's home, Opal City, although sometimes it's drowned in the colouring I like to call 'Vertigo vomit'. The covers by Andrew Robinson are almost worth the price alone, painted images so glorious that I'm disappointed to see so little more of his work. Read in one trade, STARMAN: GRAND GUIGNOL flows far better, with its flashback-present-flashback-present staccato rhythm. It's a trick that could have gone horribly wrong, but with so many players and so many plans in action, it's a clever way to get round the normally boring exposition. If you haven't read STARMAN before, then don't worry. There's lots to admire in this trade. [John Fellows] TWILIGHT BECOMES HER Imagine you were a kid who was born into a family of magicians, warlocks, faerie-fanciers and other such practitioners of the uncanny. Imagine if you'd been able to do magic at school. How cool would that have been? Chances are, you'd have followed the lead of Courtney Crumrin. Crumrin is a great character - completely convincing as a kid, as she's just as likely to be bored, petty, selfish and spiteful as she is to be angelic - and it just so happens she's got knowledge of magic to boot. She's also a great way for writer and artist Ted Naifeh to explore bizarre faerie realms and introduce strange mythical creatures and personalities to the reader. Courtney's curiously featureless face points to the fact that she is a sort of cypher, that the reader is perhaps meant to project themselves into her place. The COURTNEY CRUMRIN books from Oni Press are great fun, and actually manage to make faeries and their ilk more than just risible pixies - they're genuinely sinister and alien. Courtney's adventures in the latest book, COURTNEY CRUMRIN IN THE TWILIGHT KINGDOM, sees her accompanied by a group of kids in a LABYRINTH-esque mission to find a cure for a transformed classmate. It's well worth checking out, even if you normally prefer poker to pookas or homiez to gnomes - try something a bit more fantastic. [Lindsay Duff] THE BIG RED BOOK HELLBOY: ODDER JOBS (Dark Horse) isn't a comic, it's a collection of prose short stories, but that's OK; there's no discrimination here at Ninth Art HQ. Besides, HELLBOY is no a stranger to prose, as author Christopher Golden has written two Hellboy novels in the past, THE LOST ARMY and THE BONES OF GIANTS, and this is the second short story collection. The prose works help expand the world of Hellboy, and although he's a character who works better in a visual medium, they still provide plenty of entertainment. When HELLBOY the comic moved in the direction of short, self-contained stories, short stories in prose were the obvious way to continue this trend. The move also allows some excellent writers to play about with the big red guy. The first anthology, ODD JOBS, had stories from Nancy A Collins, Steve Bissette and Greg Rucka. ODDER JOBS features stories by HELLBOY movie director Guillermo del Toro, 'urban' fantasist Charles de Lint (SOMEPLACE TO BE FLYING), noted horror writer Graham Joyce, and SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION director Frank Darabont, plus there are interior illustrations from HELLBOY creator Mike Mignola. [Ben Wooller] THE SHIPPING LIST FOR OCTOBER 6th 2004: Shipping details come courtesy of Diamond. Visit the Diamond website for the latest information, as the list is subject to change. DARK HORSE JUN040013 ALIENS VS PREDATOR THRILL OF THE HUNT TP $6.95
DC COMICS DEC030235D ARKHAM ASYLUM LIVING HELL TP $12.95
IMAGE AUG041631D BATTLE OF THE PLANETS PRINCESS #1 (Of 6) $2.99
MARVEL AUG041845D ALPHA FLIGHT #8 $2.99
OTHER PUBLISHERS JUL042624E ADVENTURES OF LITTLE ARCHIE VOL 1 TP $10.95
The Ninth Eight are Matthew Craig, John Fellows, Kieron Gillen, Alistair Kennedy, Zack Smith, Andrew Wheeler, Ben Wooller and Bulent Yusuf. Ninth Art endorses the principle of Ideological Freeware. The author permits distribution of this article by private individuals, on condition that the author and source of the article are clearly shown, no charge is made, and the whole article is reproduced intact, including this notice. Back. |