New Comics We’ll Love To Read

By Devin T. Quin

We pick our favorites for various reasons. Maybe we remember an enjoyable road trip as a kid with tons of Spider-Man comic books, thus a fascination with the wacky-wall walker ever since. Maybe a deranged baker trapped us in a house of pies one summer and the only way we escaped was by weaving shredded copies of Batman, which he intended us to use as bedding, into a rope ladder.

Whatever your reasoning, we do love our comic books.

AUTEUR

There are some creators that can make us fall in love with comic books all over again! One such creative genius was Mike Mignola, who’s red skinned, gun-toting monster slayer Hellboy pumped a good deal of new cash and interest into a flagging market and captures the flavor for the next ten years.

Mike is rich and powerful now, so the latest Hellboy collection, available this week and titled Hellboy Vol. 10 Crooked Man and Others is not drawn by the man himself. You’ll get some other fantastic artists, most notable Richard Corben and Duncan Fegredo, but does the collection loose points for not flowing exclusively from Mignola’s pen?

This week, also from Dark Horse Comics we have The Buzzard #1, the new adventures of a notable supporting character from Eric Powell’s The Goon. The Goon is the heir apparent to the Hellboy feel, funny monster smashing with a down-home twang.

I’m excited about the Buzzard series, but I do still have some estranged feelings after picking up Powell’s last new series, Billy the Kid’s Old Timey Oddities. In this series Powell blended weird west with circus and vaudeville to concoct a soup sure to satisfy fans of neither genre.

Can an Auteur maintain his vision through other artists? Must a visionary stay true to his original characters?

VISIONARIES

Speaking of Auteur level talent, Grant Morrison returns to Batman this week with Batman #700, featuring art by Andy Kubert and Frank Quitely! Morrison will tell tales of several Batmen throughout time as only he can! Also Mark Millar teams up with the incredible Leinil Franscis Yu on Ultimate Comics Avengers 2 #3, a fantastic storyteller and a sensation penciler throwing the fun at the wall and seeing what sticks.

But when you consider that Millar has had huge break-away hits in his own creative owned projects, and that Grant Morrison strongest fan base is from his original series such as The Invisibles, Sea-Guy and We3, are these talents being wasted on mainstream cape titles?

NO RIGHT ANSWER

The best thing for the comic book industry right now is a plethora of stirring titles and stellar art. As long as the Auteur keeps creating we can let the critics sort out the merits. For my two cents I want the actual comic book creators to be as enthusiastic about their work as we are about our beloved hobby!

Let the money makers worry about the numbers as long as the artists get to practice their art as often and vividly as they can!

Viva la Comic Book and Viva la Auteur!