Mighty Avengers #5
Woo, it’s finally out. And I’d say it was worth the wait. Frank Cho draws a tremendous beat down between femme-Ultron and the Sentry, while the rest of the team works on a plan to stop her, and she works to launch the United States nuclear weapons. Brian Michael Bendis does a great job with the characters in this issue. Ares in particular gets his issue to shine. I also think the Bendis reached a good amount of the thought bubbles, as I’ve found them too numerous to the point of distraction in previous issues, but he made good use of them here. I only hope that issue 6 doesn’t take as long to come out. But I’m not holding my breath. —4 out of 5

PULL LIST 10-17-07 Mighty Avengers #5 Fables #66 Marvel Comics Presents #2 Wasteland #12 Maintenance #5 Powers #26 Scalped Vol. 1: Indian Country

Fables #66
Woo, again, as the storyline makes some forward progress. Flycatcher begins to create his new kingdom in the heart, and proves that he can be a tough ruler as he banishes Bluebeard and Shere Khan, which is all part of his plan. This puts into motion a bigger plan to attract the attention of the Adversary, and what do you know, there should be a good showdown next issue. I’ve complained a bit recently that the story has taken it’s time to get to some action, and it looks like my request has been answered. This is another great issue in a continually great series. —5 out of 5

Marvel Comics Presents #2
It’ll be interesting to see what Marvel does with this title after the first batch of stories finishes. This series will only have legs if they can keep high quality talent producing stories for it, but if it degenerates into a bunch of no name talent producing boring stories, then this will die a quick death. As it stands, issue 2 finds another bunch of hit or miss tales. Vanguard by Marc Guggenhiem is pretty good, with a good concept, some nice painted art and decent dialog. The Immonen’s “Hellcat” story is still decent, and of course it looks great. M. Zachary Sherman writes a decent one-off Taskmaster story with art by Khoi Pham, who does a better job here than in his recent fill-in arc on X-factor, but the story is fairly pointless. Lastly, the Guardian story continues but looks like it may be fairly boring, as this one is just the new Guardian talking to his therapist, which at least in the anthology means it’s short. If they can keep the hit to miss ratio down, this is a book I could see buying for a while, as I really like anthologies. They have to keep it high though. —3 out of 5

Wasteland #12
This one came out a few weeks ago, but I finally caught up on it this weekend, so I wanted to plug it here. If you’re not reading this series, it’s the story of a post apocalyptic world where the main characters were forced to leave their town and move to a larger city where their religion is looked down on and has made them slaves. The action ramps up in this issue as the city gets attacked from the outside, and it looks like it will be attacked from the inside next issue. Artist Christopher Mitten has a scratchy style that looks a bit like Ben Templesmith, but has its own personality. The action has focused the series after a few issues spent meandering. This issue reminded me of the stuff I loved about the first six issues or so. I highly recommend it. —4 out of 5

Maintenance #5
Another older issue I finally caught up on. This is a humor series from Oni Press about two janitors, Manny and Doug, who work for a company that deals in super-science. In the last issue, the two main characters where blackmailed into shrinking down and fighting a bunch of creatures called Clogoids in the buildings sewer system. This finishes the story as the janitors meet their prey, but learn that they have a lot in common. This was the funniest issue of the series so far, as the creatures get a lot of good lines. Artist Robbi Rodriguez draws some great expressive faces that really work to get the humor across. A great fun issue. —4 out of 5

Powers #26
It’s great to see this series back on a mostly monthly schedule. We still get great art from Michael Avon Oeming and great writing from Bendis. You can tell that this is a series that the creators have a lot of care for and put a lot of effort into. Walker’s new partner turns out to have a few secrets of her own which should be interesting down the road. We also get a reunion of sorts between Walker and Pilgrim and some more info on the powers virus story. Another of my favorite series. —4 out of 5

Scalped Vol. 1: Indian Country
This trade came out a while ago, but I wanted to read it because it’s built up a bit of buzz and I’ve been hearing good things. I have to say that while the series is not that new, it’s basically Donnie Brasco on a reservation, but the setting is one that doesn’t get a lot of notice and it brings up a lot of good points about the modern life for Native Americans. Dashiell Bad Horse returns to his home after a long time away to find nothing has really changed. He doesn’t get along with his mother, crime is rampant, and unemployment is high. He takes a job working for the big man in charge, Lincoln Red Crow, who is opening a casino soon. Turns out though that Dash is an FBI agent who is working to bring down Red Crow. The book ends with another mystery being set up, so I’m looking forward to the second volume. Art comes from R.M. Guerra whose work is good at setting the mood, but I can’t say I really like the style. It’s a bit too sketchy for my tastes. The work is similar to Eduardo Risso’s art on 100 Bullets, in that it perfectly establishes the tone and setting of the book. Guerra also does a good job of making the Native American faces look realistic and not just like dark white people. It looks like this could be another decent crime noir series with some interesting characters and a good hook. I’ll look forward to the next volume when it comes out.