A Fistful of Comics - May

When I was stooging  about Southampton last weekend I swung by Forbidden Planet and snagged a bagfull of comics, largely based on the cover art. Here's a quick rundown on each one.

 Jirni#1 (Aspen comics)

 What's it about?  A mysterious woman rescues a cat-girl from cannibals and since they happen to be going in the same direction, suggests they travel together. Nylesa wants to find her people's homeland in the east while her saviour, warrior-woman Jirni, is hunting the sorceror that stole her mother with intentions towards great violence.
What did I think?  Well I'm not entirely sure I'd be buying this on a regular basis. There's nothing wrong with it - the artwork is decent,  the character designs are unusual and I am sorta interested in what happens next and why Jirni seems to be some sort of shapeshifter - but I have at least one box filled with #1 issues for this sort of thing. I think I'd rather keep an eye out for the TPB. 

Jirni makes an entrance in grand style.

 

Uber # 1 (Avatar Comics)

 

What's it about? Berlin 1945. The Russians are closing in on the Fuhrer's bunker. He has the barrel of his pistol in his mouth...

 And the Soviets are suddenly smashed by a terrible Nazi secret weapon. The Panzermensch.

What did I think? To sum up in two words:  Nazi Supermen. A concept that has been done before but off the top of my head I can't remember an entire book being built around it. 

  Quite a dark book as it happens. "Grisly" might be a better description. The point being, this is not campy fun by any stretch of the imagination.

  I did think it a bit weird that you barely get to see the Panzermensch in action. The victory over the advancing Soviets happens offstage and the next third of the comic is people reacting to it. In fact a Panzermensch doesn't even show up until about Page 10. 

 Now might be a good time to mention that the Aryan Supergirl on the cover doesn't make an appearance at all.  

Still, I'd rather like to see how this proceeds, especially since there's a definite possibility the Allies have their own version of the Panzermensch. Promising. 

    Hitler has his own Superman. Trust me. What happens next is not pretty. 

Grimm Fairy Tales presents 

Robyn Hood vs Red Riding Hood One-shot. (Zenescope)

What's it about? Red Riding Hood hunts down rogues from the mystical realms. Lately she's been on the trail of one in particular - a woman who's left a trail of bodies behind her.

 Meanwhile Robyn Locksley is trying to lie low after leading a successful rebellion and gaining revenge on those who hurt her. 

 Do you really need me to tell you what happens next?

What did I think? A crossover featuring characters from two series I've never actually read?  Could have been awkward. Luckily the creative team managed to explain who these ladies are without the whole-page exposition speeches Marvel used to do.

  The story follows the traditional template for this sort of thing: Two characters meet and thanks to a misunderstanding and/or outside forces wind up trying to kill each other. In this case you do get a valid explanation beyond "I don't know who you are and you're wearing a funny outfit. Have at thee!"

 Art isn't bad, it's not as fanservice-y as you might expect, there's a couple of decent punchups and the whole thing is interesting enough that I plan to have a look and see if here's a TPB or two knocking about. 

 Any series where somebody uses cats as a weapon has got my attention.

Robyn pops in for a chat.

My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic #7 (IDW)

What's it about? The girls, plus Spike and Princess Luna, are on the moon trying to rescue their friend Rarity. Sadly Rarity isn't in the mood to be rescued, what with  being possessed by the powers of darkness and all.
What I thought: Spike gets a lot more focus this issue, not really surprising given his relationship with the lovely fashion artiste, and the moment when he finds himself face to face with her again is nicely done. Other than that, the issue moves thing along in decent fashion.
 Somebody thought it was a good idea to put the dialogue for the bad guys in red on black speech balloons so you might want to be somewhere well-lit when you read this.

 Spike tries to reason with the possessed Rarity

 And finally, on my way home I picked up a couple of "Commando" comics from WH Smiths.

Commando#4599: Operation Nachthexen

Commando#4601: Rogue Bomber

  I used to read these little pocket digests as a kid so it's nice to see them still around. The storytelling and artwork are firmly of the old-school British Boys Comic and the two issues above feature two standard Commando storylines: A traumatised officer tries to recover his nerve and a cocky pilot faces an jinxed aircraft that's killed every one of it's pilots so far.
 "Rogue Bomber" is actually a reprint from the 60s (Which might explain why Stirling heavy bombers are attacking at low-level at night) and the art is noticeably more sophisticated, even if the artist sometimes gets his Stirlings looking more like Wellingtons.  It's a good little story that takes a bit of time to build things up.

"Nachthexen" means "Night Witches" so as soon as I saw the cover I was thinking "This I need to check out."  Since this is a new story Commando step outside their comfort zone a bit by having one of the major characters be...a girl!

 Truth be told, other than that "Nachthexen" is OK but nothing special. The main story ideas - wounded pilot is posted to a Russian unit but needs to get his nerve back before he can go back into combat - I'd already seen quite recently in "Soviet Spitfires" and when our hero agrees to fly as observer in a Night Witch bomber...already seen that too. (Nina-Petrova - The Angel of Death)
   Still, if you have a nostalgic yearning for some traditional British derring-do it's worth £1.50.

 That's all f...

Actually, you know what? Let's have the bit with the killer cats, shall we?

 See you next time.