Comic-Con Roundup and Reactions

So my having a job that requires me to not be at a computer all day and then being busy to kick the weekend off left me a little late on some SDCC news that may have come out but I wanted to wait, as I did last year, until I had seen most everything I think I'm going to see about Marvel's Comic-Con this year. Still not sure I have and I'm certainly not sure that I actually heard everything that's been announced as is, which leads to my first point. I'm kind of underwhelmed? I don't know, maybe I missed some stuff, but here's what I think we've mostly learned from this year's biggest comic convention.

Gillen and Bennett heading ANGELA: ASGARD'S ASSASSIN
I'm not so enamored with Angela that I can find this the most entrancing news but readers know I do love Kieron Gillen, who will be joined by fellow writer Marguerite Bennett and artists Phil Jimenez and Stephanie Hans (who I quite like) for the new series. (fun fact, by the way, all my links will be from CBR because I'm too lazy to find multiple links, guys. Sorry)

Marvel debuts Ant-Man concept art, announce roles for Lilly and Stoll

With a new director (Peyton Reed) onboard and a 2015 release date still in place, Marvel has finally shown some concept art for the upcoming Ant-Man and announced that Lost's Evangeline Lilly will play Hope Van Dyne, daughter of Hank Pym, and House of Cards' Corey Stoll will play Darren Cross, a version of the villain Yellowjacket. The news comes even as they lose three attached actors. With Edgar Wright's departure from the long-rumored film, I find myself rather uninterested in all of this.

Marvel announces new SHIELD ongoing, written by Mark Waid
Though it seems like this may play a sort of bridge between the TV show (ugh) and the 616 Marvel Universe, writer Mark Waid advertises his new SHIELD ongoing as a sort of "stealth team-up," indicating that any superhero might end up working on SHIELD's behalf in the series. I like Mark Waid, I'm lukewarm AT BEST on SHIELD, and I really don't like that TV show, so we'll see what that all amounts to. Though I will say I'm irked that I indicate a comic title with all-caps and now I have a comic title referring to an organization that I write in all-caps. What is this business?

Guardians of the Galaxy sequel confirmed for 2017, Gunn returns to write and direct
July 28, 2017 is the projected date for the sequel to the still-upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy, which is garnering praise from fans as its release approaches. I can't really make any sort of judgment on this news until I've seen its predecessor but I will say this wasn't a franchise I was really clamoring for. Maybe my mind will be changed but it feels like this just puts off another new potential franchise.

Guardians of the Galaxy cartoon confirmed for Disney XD

The newly confirmed animated series will join Ultimate Spider-Man, Hulk and the Agents of SMASH, and Avengers Assemble on Marvel's animated block on Disney XD. I'd be more interested in this news if I didn't hate every one of those shows (with the exception, perhaps, of the Hulk show, as I've only seen maybe one episode, which, admittedly, I didn't not like). I'd be interested in this if it were teamed with, oh, I don't know, Spectacular Spider-Man and Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes, which were both GREAT cartoons (I totally did know when I said I didn't).

Marvel teases new Agents of SHIELD and Agent Carter information
Still don't care about Agents of SHIELD even with the hint that Mockingbird could show up at some point. She'll probably just be crappy, sadly. Agent Carter still excites me, though I'm a little put out by the quality of Agents of SHIELD so I'll have to hold off getting too excited about that.

Marvel announces new line of STAR WARS books, headed by Gillen, Aaron, Waid

As the rights to the STAR WARS comic universe transfer back to Marvel after decades out of their control, Marvel had a slew of SDCC announcements for next year's launch, including Kieron Gillen writing STAR WARS: DARTH VADER with artist Salvador Larroca, Jason Aaron writing STAR WARS with artist John Cassaday, and Mark Waid writing STAR WARS: PRINCESS LEIA with artist Terry Dodson. These are pretty big announcements and feels like a big business move for Marvel, putting three top writers and some big name artists on these properties instead of allowing them to carry their weight with name recognition alone. Gillen on a DARTH VADER book is particularly intriguing (though I don't love Larroca. Helped that the covers will be from Adi Granov). Still, the news isn't huge to me so who really cares?

Other comics kind of announced?
This is a little trickier to talk about since they're not really big announcements. They include an ORIGINAL SIN ANNUAL (why?) from Jason Latour, an ALL-NEW CAPTAIN AMERICA infinite comic from Dennis Hopeless, a few more tie-in books to DEATH OF WOLVERINE, tie-ins to SPIDER-VERSE, and others in that vein. Not huge books by any stretch. In fact, almost undoubtedly books I will roll my eyes at when I go to review them.


So that's the news I encountered. Did you guys see more? Did you, maybe, see more that made you excited instead of, you know, anywhere from mildly interested to completely uncaring? I don't know. Not so into it? The biggest news to me was...

Jordie Bellaire wins Eisner for Best Colorist
Totally well-deserved. She does phenomenal work where ever she is and where ever she is happens to be MOST BOOKS.

Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky win Eisner for Best New Series with SEX CRIMINALS
I really like SEX CRIMINALS and think it's a really fun and interesting book with some real and often surprising pathos. I was surprised to see it on the Best Series list but Best New Series seems apropos, though I haven't read many of the other contenders (I will note, perhaps controversially, that I don't think SAGA deserves as much credit as it gets. Do NOT get me wrong, I think it's a very good book, I just don't think it's the comics-changing epic it's often lauded as).

HAWKEYE 11 wins Eisner for Best Single Issue or One-Shot
Yup, no problems with that.

David Aja wins Eisner for Best Cover Artist
I have no problems with this, though I was personally pulling for Mike Del Mundo on X-MEN LEGACY. My girlfriend and I also talked about the likelihood of seeing Jamie McKelvie's name in this category next year (and winning this category next year). Every cover he draws (and right now particularly, he's got covers on MS. MARVEL, NIGHTCRAWLER, and THE WICKED AND THE DIVINE) is outstanding. Anyway, congratulations to Aja and all the other winners!

Eisner Award nominations announced!

The prestigious Eisner Award nominations have been announced for 2014 and Marvel finds its name strewn all about the list. As this is a Marvel based blog, I'm only going to really talk about the Marvel nominations, though I may use very loose pretenses to talk about other people too (fair warning). The full list of the nominations can be seen here.

Marvel saw nominations in a number of categories particularly for Fraction and Aja's HAWKEYE. I'm going to list off the categories and say who is competing in them with a particularly highlight on the Marvel nominee and likely some running commentary on my thoughts on the nomination.

Best Single Issue (or One-Shot)
-DEMETER, by Becky Cloonan (self-published) (Cloonan could be seen at Marvel last year as one of the guest artists on the two-part finale of YOUNG AVENGERS. Check her work out, it's continually strong stuff)
-HAWKEYE 11: "Pizza Is My Business," by Matt Fraction and David Aja (Marvel) (the infamous dog issue is highlighted here because it's GREAT)
-LOVE AND ROCKETS: NEW STORIES 6, by Gilbert Hernandez and Jaime Hernandez (Fantagraphics)
-VIEWOTRON 2, by Sam Sharpe (self-published)
-WATSON AND HOLMES 6, by Brandon Easton, and N. Steven Harris (New Paradigm Studios)

Very excited to see HAWKEYE 11 on the list of nominees. HAWKEYE is a great book with a number of incredible single issues and it seems hard to pick just one but it's hard to go against this choice. Also cool to see Marvel on here at all alongside a number of indie titles; Marvel typically doesn't write for single issues so the idea that one issue from a meaningful run would be chosen is pretty neat.

Best Continuing Series
-EAST OF WEST, by Jonathan Hickman and Nick Dragotta (Image) (Hickman, obviously, is a big part of Marvel over the last several years and EAST OF WEST is one of those books I keep telling myself I'll get around to reading at some point. His other non-Marvel work is often just as heady, if not more so, than his Marvel titles, like the incredibly interesting THE MANHATTAN PROJECTS)
-HAWKEYE, by Matt Fraction and David Aja (Marvel) (I believe this is the second nomination for HAWKEYE as best continuing series in two years but I'm certainly not about to do any research)
-NOWHERE MEN, by Eric Stephenson and Nate Bellegarde (Image)
-SAGA (by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples) (I believe SAGA won this category last year but, again, saying so definitively would require more research than I'm willing to do right now. Marvel fans will know Vaughan from legendary runs on books like ULTIMATE X-MEN and, most notably, RUNAWAYS)
-SEX CRIMINALS, by Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky (Image) (Fraction makes a second appearance on the list here for the Mature Readers Only title SEX CRIMINALS, probably one of the most fun books out there right now)

I'm disappointed in myself for only really reading two of the series on this list. SAGA is another one I keep telling myself I'll read and I really should read NOWHERE MEN as it's one of the big staples of Image comics. Nice again to see a superhero series cracking through the incredible lineup of entire genre-encompassing work that Image is putting out. It's a testament to how good and how inventive HAWKEYE is that it's considered here.

Best Writer
-Kelly Sue DeConnick, PRETTY DEADLY (Image); CAPTAIN MARVEL (Marvel) (Kelly Sue DeConnick gets the nomination everyone agrees she deserves for her incredible series with Emma Rios, also nominated, PRETTY DEADLY as well as the fantastic CAPTAIN MARVEL)
-Matt Fraction, SEX CRIMINALS (Image); HAWKEYE, FANTASTIC FOUR, FF (Marvel) (Fraction is at the absolute top of his game just a couple years removed from his own fear that he was on his way out of comics. Hard to vote against this guy. Also a little surprised that his work with Howard Chaykin on SATELLITE SAM isn't recognized here)
-Jonathan Hickman, EAST OF WEST, THE MANHATTAN PROJECTS (Image); AVENGERS, INFINITY (Marvel) (Similarly surprised that NEW AVENGERS isn't mentioned here. Hickman too is seeing a lot of payoff for his story-driven epics that all deserve a lot of credit)
-Scott Snyder, BATMAN (DC); AMERICAN VAMPIRE, THE WAKE (DC/Vertigo) (I kind of fell off of BATMAN as it started to feel like it was requiring too much universe reading to truly keep up but there's no doubt that Snyder can write a great story. I've been interested in AMERICAN VAMPIRE and THE WAKE but, if this post proves nothing else, it should prove that I have a whole bunch of comics I'd like to read. Did I tell you guys I'm all caught up on INVINCIBLE? Pretty cool, huh?)
-Eric Stepenson, NOWHERE MEN (Image)
-Brian K. Vaughan, SAGA (Image)

Geez, hard to pick a winner out of this bunch. Like I said above, Fraction's on the absolute top of his game and his great work on HAWKEYE rocketed him to great books like SEX CRIMINALS and SATELLITE SAM. Hard to go against that, though he has worthy adversaries here including Hickman and DeConnick. I would be a little sad to see a non-Marvel writer win this but it's hard to argue that the nomination committee (or whoever it is that does this) pretty much nailed this category.

Best Painter/Multimedia Artist (Interior art)
-Andrew C. Robinson, THE FIFTH BEATLE (Dark Horse)
-Sonia Sanchez, HERE I AM (Capstone)
-Fiona Staples, SAGA (Image)
-Ive Svorcina, THOR (Marvel) (Svorcina gets a well-deserved look here for his run of art in the THOR books, though I guess I didn't realize Svorcina was the one responsible for the painting-like feel of Ribic's work. This is why colorists deserve more attention)
-Marguerite Van Cook, 7 MILES A SECOND (Fantagraphics)
-Judith Vanistendael, WHEN DAVID LOST HIS VOICE (SelfMadeHero)

Best Cover Artist
-David Aja, HAWKEYE (Marvel)
-Mike Del Mundo, X-MEN LEGACY (Marvel)
-Sean Murphy/Jordie Bellaire, THE WAKE (DC/Vertigo) (Jordie Bellaire, colorist extraordinaire, makes her first but not last appearance on the nomination list)
-Emma Rios, PRETTY DEADLY (Image) (She's an incredible artist; everyone should check out PRETTY DEADLY. DeConnick herself said on a recent Nerdist Writer's Panel that she feels she took maybe a little too long to start clearing up some confusions in the plot but that Emma Rios' art kept people onboard long enough to keep them interested and to get them to some of the reveals - I'd say DeConnick isn't wrong, it's very easy just to look at the book)
-Chris Samnee, DAREDEVIL (Marvel)
-Fiona Staples, SAGA (Image)

Really packed house with Marvel artists here, so it's hard to make a pick, not to mention Rios on PRETTY DEADLY. Okay, it's not too hard. I've adored all of Mike Del Mundo's covers on my much beloved X-MEN LEGACY so obviously that's what I'm picking. Very excited that he's getting attention for said covers. A little sad not to see Jamie McKelvie on here for the stunning YOUNG AVENGERS covers but I guess you can't fit everyone.

Best Coloring
-Jordie Bellaire, THE MANHATTAN PROJECTS, NOWHERE MEN, PRETTY DEADLY, ZERO (Image); THE MASSIVE (Dark Horse); TOM STRONG (DC); X-FILES SEASON 10 (IDW); CAPTAIN MARVEL, JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY (Marvel); NUMBERCRUNCHER (Titan); QUANTUM AND WOODY (Valiant) (Geez, Bellaire is just ALL OVER THE PLACE on a slew of amazing books. Again, colorists deserve tons of respect and it's nice to see Bellaire getting a good deal of it here. She, along with fellow nominee Matt Hollingsworth, does a great job keeping the tone and feel of a book the same even as the artist switches from issue to issue while still letting the art shine through in its own unique way)
-Steve Hamaker, MYLO XYLOTO (Bongo); STRANGERS IN PARADISE 20TH ANNIVERSARY ISSUE 1 (Abstract Studio); RASL (Cartoon Books)
-Matt Hollingsworth, HAWKEYE, DAREDEVIL: END OF DAYS (Marvel); THE WAKE (DC/VERTIGO)
-Frank Martin, EAST OF WEST (Image) (Martin is also a great Marvel colorist, though his work isn't referenced here)
-Dave Stewart, ABE SAPIEN, BALTIMORE: THE INFERNAL TRAIN, BPRD: HELL ON EARTH, CONAN THE BARBARIAN, HELLBOY: HELL ON EARTH, THE MASSIVE, THE SHAOLIN COWBOY, SLEDGEHAMMER 44 (Dark Horse)



Lot of really good nominees on this list and just another reminder that I have to read more comics. Also nominated for various categories include names people familiar with Marvel will recognize like Francisco Francavilla (Best Limited Series for THE BLACK BEETLE: NO WAY OUT), Christopher Sebela (nominated for Best New Series for HIGH CRIMES), Greg Rucka (also nominated for Best New Series for the fantastic LAZARUS), Ben Acker and Ben Blacker (Best Anthology for the amazing and much recommended THRILLING ADVENTURE HOUR graphic novel from Archaia), and, of course, Jack Kirby (Best Archival Collection/Project - Comic Books for IN THE DAYS OF THE MOB at DC - good luck voting against Jack Kirby).

Eisner Awards

I was out of state last week (as I said pretty often) which meant that I had to push reviews through Mondays, which is usually my free day. As a result, I didn't have a chance to really talk about Eisner Award nominees in Marvel. I don't have a ton to add, but let's go over it as it pertains to Marvel, which is what pertains to this blog.

Best Continuing Series
Hawkeye, by Matt Fraction and David Aja

Since this blog is called "Marvels" and its URL is readmarvel, I can only really offer my input on Eisner nominees from Marvel. That leaves us pretty limited in terms of what I can talk about here, as there are only a handful of Marvel titles sprinkled through the awards. Hawkeye cleaned up nominations, as far as cleaning up goes with the big two right now (DC had nothing nominated). Hawkeye has been an absolutely phenomenal series and has changed the way that superhero comics can act. I read a blurb in the Nerdist newsletter saying that Hawkeye is one of the heroes who should get a movie in Marvel's Phase III. They cited Fraction and Aja's series as how to make the movie. I have a little trouble seeing that, at least in the tone that the Marvel movies are coming out now. It reads more like an indie movie than anything else. It would be hard to make it a major blockbuster. That doesn't matter for this though, I just found it interesting and it's an example of how different this series is as a whole.
(I feel it's important to note that both Ed Brubaker's Fatale series and Jonathan Hickman's The Manhattan Projects were nominated for this category. Though Brubaker doesn't have a spot in Marvel any more, it's hard for me to separate him out, and obviously Hickman is doing great stuff with Marvel right now)

Best New Series
Hawkeye, by Matt Fraction and David Aja

Not much more to add here. Great series. I wouldn't be surprised to see more Marvel titles pop up on this list next year with the strength of their books right now. Indies rule the Eisners though, so we'll have to see. I'm admittedly disappointed by how little mention of books like Captain Marvel there is right now. This was a weird year for Marvel, with Marvel NOW! starting in the middle/end of the year, so a transition year finds fewer nominees, I would say. However, Captain Marvel and Hawkeye have both been around about the same amount of time. Both are great (Fraction and Kelly Sue DeConnick are totally Marvel's power couple right now, I think they could do anything they wanted and the fans would love it).
(Brubaker's Fatale was also nominated for this category, as was Ryan North's Adventure Time series. I'm not a big Adventure Time fan as far as the cartoon goes. I haven't read the comic but I am all for Ryan North being nominated for stuff, largely because of his fantastic Dinosaur Comics webcomic. He's one of my favorite people)

Best Publication for Kids (age 8-12)
Road to Oz, by L. Frank Baum, adapted by Eric Shanower and Skottie Young

I pretty much only review main Marvel superhero stuff on this blog because that's where my heart's at. As a result, I've left out a few books like Road to Oz and Powers and things like that. I've only read a couple issues of Road to Oz but it seems really compelling. An adaptation of The Wizard of Oz series, obviously, it reads well and, most importantly, features Skottie Young's incredible art. One of the things that's saddest about only reviewing mainstream Marvel is that Skottie Young so infrequently comes up. His baby variants throughout Marvel NOW! have been phenomenal and he's just an incredibly talented guy.









Best Adaptation from Another Medium
Road to Oz, by L. Frank Baum, adapted by Eric Shanower and Skottie Young

Road to Oz appears again on the nominee list and again is deserving. Another thing I like about it, especially as it appears in best publication for kids, is that it doesn't ever seem to talk down to its audience. The best children's material seems to be the type that respects its audience enough to give them a chance to get behind it. I always loved Lemony Snicket's Series of Unfortunate Events books for exactly that reason. It defines words for kids (sometimes a little too specifically for the situation) but it never comes across as talking down to children. From what I've read of this series, it's much the same way.
(A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeleine L'Engle, adapted by Hope Larson is also on this list. I always liked that book when I was younger and I like Hope Larson and her husband Bryan Lee O'Malley a lot. Just a note there)





Best Writer
Matt Fraction, Hawkeye; Casanova: Avaritia

Fraction again comes up and he totally deserves to be on this list. Hawkeye is a great book and, as I've said before in reviews, is a character who almost never sustains a book. Everybody likes Hawkeye as a character (he graces many "favorite Avengers" lists) but nobody wants to read about what he's doing on his days off. Almost as if that was a challenge, Fraction has written a book that touts itself as what Clint is doing on his days off. Casanova's another fun title (published under Marvel's creator-owned wing Icon) that is...well, it's hard to define. I'm not willing to try. It's worth checking in on, but don't necessarily be surprised if it's not to your liking. I think, as with most creator-owned works, it's more a niche comic than a superhero book is. Still, Fraction is clearly a great writer and he understands the medium and what he can do with it like few others.
(Also on this list are Brubaker and Hickman, which continues to be worth noting for the purposes of this blog)

Best Penciller/Inker
David Aja, Hawkeye

I've already talked at length about how great Hawkeye is, but I guess I'll say some more. Aja's art on this book make it what it is. There's no other way around it. The art is gorgeous but deceptively simplistic. It matches the tone of the book perfectly in that respect. It's hard not to look at this book and instantly fall in love with it. I think that Aja has revolutionized the way Clint Barton will be portrayed for years to come. He's also already clearly had an effect on the look of Kate Bishop, as she carries something more similar to her Hawkeye look into McKelvie's portrayal in Young Avengers. Their art styles are completely different but she looks exactly right in both. It's incredible to watch.








Chris Samnee, Daredevil

Samnee, who switched from Captain America and Bucky over to Daredevil, seemed a perfect fit. I remember when they were teasing a new artist for Daredevil (hard to try to figure out, as Paolo Rivera and company had done such a great job when Waid initially took the book over) and then revealed it would be Samnee. I had been reading Cap and Bucky and loving the art and understood what a good fit it could be. Samnee has been everything fans could have asked for Daredevil. Good choices here.











Best Cover Artist
David Aja, Hawkeye

Not a lot more to say (not that I won't still say it). The Hawkeye covers are phenomenal. Again, deceptively simplistic and they lay out a perfect feel for the book before you even dive in. Aja has such a feel for Fraction's writing and what this book should be and he seemed to have it from page one (cover one, even). It makes such a difference to have that understanding of what the book will be. Fantastic.













So that's all of the nominees directly linked to Marvel this year. It would seem, also, that that's all the blabbing I can do about Hawkeye right now, but I'm sure I'll find an excuse to talk about the series more (especially as Hawkeye 10 comes out this week). GOOD TALK, GUYS.

Daredevil 25, Daredevil: End of Days 7

Daredevil 25
Waid (w) and Samnee (a) and Rodriguez (c)

I want to start quickly by saying that I like the idea in some Marvel books to christen the writer and artist as, like in this book, "storytellers" instead of "writer" and "artist." This book does it and Hawkeye does it (they don't really say "storytellers," they just present Fraction and Aja's names together in the credits) in the Marvel books (there might be more but I can't think of them) and I would bet more indie comics do it. It just feels like a nice touch and a nice response to the question of who drives a book. They're both necessary. This book has a killer team-up too, with Eisner award winning Mark Waid teamed with this year's Eisner award nominee Chris Samnee (totally deserving). Anyway, onwards we go.
Last issue ended with someone who had been experimented on turning up at Matt's doorstep (well, Foggy's hospital room doorstep). Matt has this guy, Larry, lead him to the place where the experiments were done, though he reveals as they touch down that he knows it's a trap. Larry didn't seem to know, just like he didn't know that the people trying to trap Matt gave Larry a defective pacemaker. Larry dies on the spot and leaves Matt waiting for an attack. He falls into the building below him as the glass on the rooftop breaks. There he's soliloquy'd to by a new villain, who reveals that the experiments were just the test subjects, weak and enfeebled already. They figured out the correct concoction and used it on someone more capable. Enter this guy, dubbed Ikari (Japanese for "fury") who comes in wearing Matt's father's boxing robe and wielding two Kusurigama blades (they're like baby scythes). Matt gets overconfident, feeling that he's mastered his own powers and there's no way a guy who has only just gotten them could be as prepared as he is. He's wrong, though, as he finds himself pretty evenly matched against Ikari. They do pretty equal amounts of damage to one another before Matt realizes the need to wrap it up. He flees momentarily from Ikari, disappearing into a closed sporting goods store. The store is confusing to a radar sense, with many different objects and smells, and Matt lights a match near a smoke alarm to set off a sprinkler system. Matt hides out, waiting for Ikari to get close enough and revealing to the audience that his radar sense is maybe 5% of what it normally is in rain but he anticipates that Ikari, without long training and experience, won't even be up to that. As Ikari inches closer to Matt's hiding place, Matt starts to grab at a bat. Ikari, next to him now, suggests he grab the red one. In a moment of nearly unprecedented fear and horror, Matt realizes Ikari isn't blind and Ikari beats him to within an inch of his life, allowing him to leave but warning him that the person who sent him will kill Daredevil, somehow and when he least expects it, but sometime soon.
It's another great issue with fantastic art and a lot of really fascinating ideas. Whoever is behind this (there is certainly speculation to be had on that front) knows how to scare Matt and how to enrage him. He also knows how his powers work and how Matt is trained to use them. We also get to learn a bit more ourselves about how Matt's powers work and how he uses them. It's always a fun part in Daredevil books when we reach a point where Matt explains the best places for him to fight and we can kind of see how his environment shapes the way he fights. In this case, learning about the sprinkler system (and Matt's own worry that someone would use that against him) is pretty interesting and, another bonus, negates what Daredevil, the 2003 really bad superhero movie, said on the subject, which was that his radar sense was enhanced in rain. Any separation you can get from that movie the better. This series continues to be one of Marvel's best and this issue is no different. Wonderfully done.

Daredevil: End of Days 7
Bendis and Mack (w) and Janson and Sienkiewicz (a) and Hollingsworth (c)

I am not against reading. In fact, I am very pro-reading. I also love reading comic books. I appreciate that comic books have moved away from the "block of text" style of narration because it breaks up flow. Comics are, by their nature, an incredibly visual medium. There has to be something of a balance between art and word or else you're pretty much just writing a book. Or a script. Maybe script is a more apt description for where I'm going with this. Where I'm going with this is that the first page of this issue has 22 different boxes of narration over four-ish panels of art. I say "ish" because there's one drawing on the background that goes across the entire page and focuses as one to two panels and there are three actual panels on top of it. Don't get me wrong, I like the art in this book. I like both Janson and Sienkiewicz and I continue to think that the series has done a good job spanning Daredevil art styles and even artists. The first half of the book or so, though, is like the first page, with dialogue and narration just cluttering the page like crazy. And not particularly worthwhile dialogue. This is the problem with Bendis' need for snappy back-and-forth writing. It might work in television or movies because those are inherently different. You can see the scene under the words. The words might only take a few seconds to throw out. In this, the same conversation covers up the drawings and distracts from the scene while taking pages to get through. Also, one character who talks through a bunch of the first half, a secretary at the Daily Bugle, is super obnoxious and unpleasant to read. That doesn't help anything. So the question, then, is "is all of this dialogue/narration necessary?" I'd say some of it is. Certainly not all of it. The bonus of having an inherently visual medium is that you can allow your artist to do some work for you. You want to see Urich struggling with the things he's found out and the questions that remain? Look at the pictures. And Janson and Sienkiewicz show him that way. Throw in a couple lines about how frustrated he is, sure. You don't need to cloud a page with it all. It gets to a point where you're forced to start wondering what the level of trust in the artist is. Most of these problems disappear midway through the issue or so, as Ben Urich is attacked by the Hand and the narration and dialogue gives way to action. Here we actually start to get to new information, as Urich enters the apartment Melvin Potter said he'd sent plenty of costumes to before. On the computer, he sees all sorts of files, including one labelled "Map" and one labelled "One." Don't think that this is going to bring us to the secret of "Mapone" because apparently we'd rather save that for the LAST issue, as Urich views the files and we get to see his horror. It's weird to follow a character as our main narrator and see what he sees through the series only to, at the biggest reveal, not get to see what he sees. ANYWAY, the Hand finds Urich there and attacks, but he's saved again by the new Daredevil and Punisher. The new Daredevil rushes Ben to safety before going back to try to help fight the Hand with Punisher, who is mowing the ninjas down. When Daredevil returns to Urich, the reporter has an arrow through his gut. Daredevil rips off the mask to reveal Urich's adopted son Timmy as the new Daredevil. I have some problems with this, but I'd like to see where the last issue goes before airing them. I think I've said enough already.