Haunted City #2
Written by Chap Taylor and Peter Johnson
Art by Michael Ryan
Colors by Kelsey Shannon with Peter Steigerwald and Beth Sotelo
Letters by Josh Reed
Covers by Michael Ryan, Alex Konat, and Micah Gunnell
Aspen Comics
Release Date: February 1, 2012
Cover Price: $3.50

I wasn’t sure what to expect from Haunted City #2, but whatever it was, I didn’t find it. In fact, I didn’t find much of anything here. Writers Chap Taylor and Peter Johnson kind of fall short on this issue. Having never read the first issue I went in blind, and even though I read the recap page, I didn’t have any idea what the book I was reading was about. Fast forward to the end of the issue, I still don’t.

Haunted City #1
Written by Chap Taylor, Peter Johnson
Illustrated by Michael Ryan
Colored by Kelsey Shannon, Beth Sotelo
Letters by Josh Reed
Aspen Comics
Release Date: October 12, 2011
Cover Price: $3.50

Paranormal comics usually aren’t my bag, but this one seemed different. A crooked cop, a Celtic goddess and children dying. Haunted City #1 brings all that to the story and a bit more. Best of all, not only is it a comic series but it will apparently transition into a feature film, a television show, and a video game.

The story is just getting started, obviously, but Chap Taylor and Peter Johnson spin one hell of an interesting tale. Secret police, female rabbis, drug dealers. A very populated first comic. And that’s not even including all the ghosts…it seems New York is an undead haven! The comic actually describes it as “the biggest haunted house in the world.” Even the bold lines of Michael Ryan‘s art is perfect for this series.

X-Men: Manifest Destiny
Written by Jason Aaron, Mike Carey, Frank Tieri
Drawn by Michael Ryan, Stephen Segovia, Takeshi Miyazawa
Marvel Comics
Release date: May 13, 2009

Having been decimated, become an endangered species, and developed a Messiah Complex, it is safe to say that the X-Men have had a rough couple of years. The years have not been kind to the merry mutants as their population dwindled and the hatred toward them increase twice fold. In their latest storyline, Manifest Destiny, with their home in ruins and with no allies to be found, the X-Men have decided to abandon their home in Westchester and set up shop in mutant friendly San Francisco. It is there with Warren Worthington’s (aka Angel) money, they set up a new facility to house any mutant in need of shelter, sort of like a new age Xavier Academy.

The storyline is actually pretty entertaining but too bad it is not in this hardcover. X-Men: Manifest Destiny hardcover does not collect the main story but rather the back stories and various mini-series that spun off from the storyline itself. One of the mini-series that it collects are Wolverine: Manifest Destiny, where fists fly and kung fu chops are thrown as Wolvie must confront his past in the heart of San Francisco’s Chinatown. In Nightcrawler: Manifest Destiny, our favorite elf heads off to a museum dedicated to him and the monster that lurks the area. Other back up stories revolving around Iceman, Mystique, and Boom-Boom that were presented as back up stories are also published in this book.