Alrighty! Another month has passed us by and another installment of both the New Avengers and Secret Invasion have been plopped into my lap. Since the two story lines are so closely knit, I’m going to be reviewing them together from now on. So sit back, relax, and enjoy my review of both Secret Invasion #7 and New Avengers #46 after the break.

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Green Lantern Corps #29 Cover

Having previously read a bit of Green Lantern (specifically Green Lantern: Rebirth, a bit of Sinestro Corps War and most recently Final Crisis: Rage of the Red Lanterns) I decided to catch up with the Corps by starting with issue #29, part one of Sins of the Star Sapphire.

Peter Tomasi’s series serves as a perfect compliment to the Green Lantern proper, and is arguably better than the latter.  Combined with Patrick Gleason’s expressive artwork, Green Lantern Corps is a must read for any Green Lantern reader, and #29 is a perfect place to start.

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In Case You’re Just Joining Us:

Vixen went back to her home country as soon as she found out that the man who killed her parents is free. She confronts him, only to discover he has super powers of his own. She suffers a nasty stomach wound and has a gun pointed to her head.

But the real review is after the break.

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a tonfa will mess you right up

These days, a review about Nightwing is really a review about writer Peter Tomasi. Tomasi’s name is one I hadn’t remembered reading before I pounced on his Great Leap arc in Nightwing 147-150, but then I looked the guy up. His work on last year’s Black Adam mini was richly entertaining, but his Nightwing work has really been top notch. With issue 150, Tomasi concludes his Great Leap arc.

Great Leap, loosely part of the Batman RIP event, pits Nightwing against the villain many consider to be his true arch foe, Two-Face.

The twist?  Nightwing starts out the arc with a little help from Harvey Dent.

You heard me.

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52 Week 23 Cover

Last week in 52: Lex thinks that Supernova’s true identity is Superman; he makes clear that he wants to become a superhero to rival him.  However, after given a blood test he realizes that he is incompatible for the metagene therapy.

Meanwhile, Jon Standing Bear visits Metropolis to attend his father’s funeral.  Afterwards, his grandfather tells Jon of his obligation to follow family tradition and become the new Super-Chief.

On the fifth day of Week 22, Lex Luthor celebrates the grand opening of his Business School. Steel makes an appearance at the opening ceremony, intending to speak with Luthor about his niece and his own newfound powers, but another man who took part in the metagene therapy beats him to it.  After the man is taken away, Steel sympathizes with him.

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Amazing Spider-Man #575 cover

This week wasn’t too huge for me, but I had one comic I was really looking forward to: Amazing Spider-Man #576. Now, I meant to write a review for #575 but… well, it just didn’t happen. Nevertheless, these last two issues were utterly fantastic and I’ll go and sum things up in a moment.

Writer Joe Kelly entered the Spider-Man brain trust last week beginning his two-part series, “Family Ties.” Focusing around Hammerhead and the aftermath of him being saved by Mr. Negative this mini-arc is building more and more of the sub-plot that is Mr. Negative (yea, I know all ASM is doing lately is building, but bear with me).

But let’s get into things after the jump and I’ll give you the run down.

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Madame Xanadu #5 Cover

Previously in Madame Xanadu:

After saving Kublai Khan’s favored consort from assassins, Marco Polo and Nimue are awarded for their bravery. Marco Polo accepts an emerald lantern from the Khan’s grand chest, a descendent of the Green Lantern lamps. Upon receiving the artifact, Phantom Stranger escapes the prison. He reunites with Nimue and they share an emotional moment together, until Khan’s guards find him. Aware that she is now as much a criminal, Nimue and Phantom Stranger flee to the outskirts of town. However, as an agent of fate, Phantom Stranger abandons Nimue in the desert to fend for herself.

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The Sandman: The Dream Hunters #1 Cover

It’s a surprise that the original The Sandman: The Dream Hunters (by Neil Gaiman and Yoshitaka Amano) has been around for ten years now – time passes and this prose begins to build up dust as each year seems to float by, although you’d never know it. The Dream Hunters is another example of Gaiman’s fine work in storytelling. One of which never ages, but instead stares back at the reader with a wistful smile, looking to be broken into and enjoyed again and again. As though the writing itself is lost in time and the reader’s imagination is all that can ignite thoughts and feelings.

Ten years later, those thoughts and feeling have been ignited once more, this time in the form of a comic drawn by P. Craig Russell. Anyone unfamiliar with Russell ought to know that he loves adapting prose into comics. As Gaiman puts it, “His opera comics and his [Joseph Rudyard] Kipling and [Oscar] Wilde adaptations are remarkable and fine”. Russell’s sense of design and flow, are key. The way that he keeps his opposing lines dynamic, not forming symmetries, while keeping his lines fine and nuanced allows him to suggest the volume of the figure with shape alone (note the wave-like curves in his lines). The cartoony elements give his characters warmth and life, and his backgrounds are ornate without being over-rendered. This balance of halves remains the pinnacle of Russell’s art, establishing him to be one of the most admired and original artists today.

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I’ve always been at least a casual fan of Neil Gaiman’s original Sandman series, but then, who hasn’t? Dream’s intrigues with his family, the crazy art, the way it leaves you often thinking at the end of an arc, the little stories nestled away, just stellar stuff.

Sadly, the original coloring doesn’t live up to the discerning eye of today’s comic reader (at least, not mine); plus, it can be difficult to pickup an old issue for the sake of one-shot enjoyment without having to be intimately familiar with every ounce of backstory that has happened before.

This is part of what makes this comic adaptation of Gaiman’s novel “Sandman: the Dream Hunters” so wonderful. Starting as a simple Japanese fairy tale about a monk, a bold badger, and a wily fox, the tale time-releases mood and energy with fantastic lines, color, and page design by P. Craig Russell.

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Some of you may have noticed that I’m a little late on my reviews and for this, I blame Marvel. You see, the day after I posted my severely negative review of Civil War: House of M #2, I crashed and wrecked my car, effectively cutting off my supply of comic books. Clearly, they had cursed me.

So a few weeks later, I continue with the X-Men spin offs and pick up X-Men: Magneto Testament #2. Will I suffer the wrath of Marvel’s curses again or redeem myself? Find out, after the break!

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