Broken Frontier

Hello, everyone! This is William Gatevackes, back for another edition of Guiding Lines. Here is what’s hitting the shelves tomorrow, April 19, 2006.

Wolverine: Origins #1 arrives in stores tomorrow and marks the character’s second ongoing solo series. The title will supposedly give us Wolvie’s true back story, which has been shrouded in mystery since his first appearance over thirty years ago.

Wolverine is one of Marvel’s most popular characters, and the company uses this fact to their best advantage. Not only does he appear in two solo series, he makes appearances in all the X-Men books, in The New Avengers, and often crosses over into other titles, such as Marvel Team-Up.

The argument has been made that the character has become overexposed, a viewpoint backed up by that list of books in the previous paragraph. Some months he might appear in as many as seven titles or more. But the reason he appears so often is because readers can’t seem to get enough of him. As long as Wolverine remains this popular, his numerous appearances will be supported by his fans. However, this latest series might affect his popularity a bit.

In my opinion, what made Wolverine such an interesting character was the mystery that surrounded him. The fact that neither he nor we knew exactly what his past was added depth to the character. Revealing Wolverine’s history might give us a lot of interesting stories, but it will definitely make the character less unique.

And what if fan reaction to the telling of his history is tepid at best? Or what if future creators wish to add to the character’s history, but are pigeonholed by the events in this title? This is supposed to sort out the various versions of Wolverine’s back story and give the definitive chronicling of the character’s past. If the stories aren’t up to snuff, Wolvie’s popularity might be damaged.

Iron Man #7 is the first issue of the new creative team of writers Daniel and Charlie Knauf and artist Patrick Zircher. Daniel Knauf helped create the cult HBO series Carnivale, and Zircher has been slowly making a name for himself with his artwork. Still, these three have the big shoes of Warren Ellis and Adi Granov to fill. However, if the new creators can return the title to a monthly schedule, they will have succeeded in one area the previous creators couldn’t.

The six-issue arc that Ellis and Granov worked on took over a year to complete. This would be normal if the series was solicited as a bimonthly, but it was supposed to be a monthly. The lateness most likely was caused by Granov’s digital painting style, which is much more time-consuming than normal pen and ink artwork.

Late issues have long been the bane of the comic industry. Having a long wait between issues removes the title from the forefront of the customer’s memory. While its lateness hadn’t really affected Iron Man’s sales much—the fifth issue ranked at #32 in January’s Diamond top 100—one has to wonder if it might have ranked higher if it came out on time.

Carnivale is no longer on the air, so Knauf might not be plagued with the delays that writers from other mediums suffer from in the comic field. But if his scripts are late, at least there has been a precedent set in the title.

DC gives us Man-Bat #1 tomorrow. This is the first of a five issue mini-series focusing on one of the most interesting members of Batman’s rogue gallery. Man-Bat is Kirk Langstrom, a scientist whose experiments turned him into a half-man, half-bat creature. Inspired, as many characters are, by the book Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde, the concept lends itself to the horror genre. So DC’s choice of writer for this series, Bruce Jones, looks like it will be a perfect fit.

Bruce Jones made his name in the horror genre, starting with his work in the 1970s on the Warren Publications Eerie and Creepy and continuing in the 1980s with his work on Pacific’s Twisted Tales and Alien Worlds. His style harkened back to some of the best stories of EC’s horror line. His recent work, most notably on the Hulk series, left the scares behind for a more mainstream style. But Man-Bat, if the solicitations are to be believed, will mark Jones’ return to the story type that made him famous. So if you are looking for a frightening read, you may want to check out Man-Bat.

Speaking of horror, Vertigo brings us Bite Club: Vampire Crime Unit #1. This sequel to 2004’s Bite Club seems to match up vampire driven horror with a downright police procedural. A sort of Dark Shadows meets CSI, if you will.

Combining genres is one way of creating a fresh approach in many mediums. TV’s Firefly was a Sci-Fi Western. The movie Shaun of the Dead was half horror, half romantic comedy. The results in both of these examples were good stories which brought something fresh and original to the styles they combined.

It is no surprise that this trend would find a home in the comics, where they are constantly looking for new ways to generate more readers. Maybe fans of crime and horror comics will join together and purchase Bite Club: Vampire Crime Unit. After all, enough of them bought the first series to make this one possible.

Annihilation: Nova #1 is not only another entry in the Annihilation event but also another Marvel character from the 1970s getting a new series. The first Nova series ran from 1976 to 1979, and he has appeared in at least two other solo series since then.

Nova bore some comparison to both Spider-Man (he was a teenager who had “great power” placed upon him) and Green Lantern (he was a member of the Nova Corps, a group of centurions that protected the galaxy). While he might not have been the most original character, he has developed quite a following with fans and even professionals. Erik Larsen was a fan of the character, and came back to him several times during his professional career.

Nova could be similar to Bite Club, two separate, pre-existing concepts combined to make something different. The character might just be the answer to the question “What if Spider-Man became Green Lantern?” but this still didn’t keep Nova from finding an audience.

Marvel makes another play for the youth market with Avengers & Power Pack Assemble #1, the third series to feature Power Pack in the past two years.

Power Pack first appeared in their own title, which ran for 62 issues from 1984-1991. The characters were children ages 12 to 5 years old, granted powers by a mysterious alien to save the planet Earth from other, evil aliens called the Snarks.

Despite the ages of the main characters, the first Power Pack series was aimed, not at kids, but at a more mature audience. The themes and storylines contained within would not be understood by younger readers.

Recently, Marvel realized what a benefit these characters could be in their efforts to reach the youth market. After all, wouldn’t a five-year-old want to read a comic book about a five-year-old superhero? So Marvel re-launched the team with several miniseries, containing stories aimed at the ages 5-12 demographic. The first series dealt with Power Pack by themselves, the second with the team meeting the X-Men, and now the latest is a team-up with the Avengers.

Obviously, the concept has had a certain amount of success; not only did Power Pack receive two more series, but Marvel also used those series to introduce children to some of their other properties.

I support any effort any company makes to reach out to kids. If comics are going to continue far into the future, it will be through the patronage of readers who are 5 and 6 today.  These customers will hopefully be buying them for years to come if you hook them now.

Ex Machina Special #1 from Wildstorm isn’t your typical “Special.” Specials, as they pertain to comic books, are usually oversized, stand-alone issues which feature stories that don’t fit in with the regular book at the time. While the Ex Machina Special does meet the last criteria by telling a story from the main character’s past, it is actually the first issue of a two part miniseries.

I am puzzled as to why Wildstorm marketed the title as a special instead of a miniseries. Were they trying to pull the wool over the eyes of Ex Machina fans? It does say in the solicitation for this issue that it was supposed to be a “two-part” adventure. But it is conceivable that both parts could appear in the same issue. I know when I ordered this book, I did not expect it to be a two issue series.

Odds are, this was just the solicitation copy being unintentionally vague and not a bait-and-switch tactic by Wildstorm. But the company should take efforts to make sure the customer is better informed in the future.

Newspaper comic strips and comic books have always been connected. The first comic book was a reprinting of popular strips of the day. So if it wasn’t for comic strips, the hobby we love wouldn’t exist, and I wouldn’t be writing this column now. The strip/comic book connection continues in tomorrow’s Phantom #10.

The Phantom comic strip has been appearing in newspapers since February 17, 1936, and has also been featured in comic books, off and on, since 1948. The costume and action adventure theme lends itself well to the comic book format, so publishers have returned to the character again and again.

Other comic strips have enjoyed success in the medium as well. Flash Gordon, Peanuts, Dennis the Menace, Heathcliff, Prince Valiant and many more have crossed over into comic books. And comic book characters such as Spider-Man, Howard the Duck, and Superman have become comic strips. Moonstone’s current Phantom series shows that the intertwined nature of both media will continue to exist.

Finally, Dan Slott enters the world of creator-owned comics with Mr. Comics’ Big Max #1, which is scheduled to arrive tomorrow.  Drawn by James Fry, the book tells the tale of a superhero ape named Big Max, his sidekick Shakes the Monkey, and his love interest, Anne Fries (Get it? Big Max, Shakes, Anne Fries?), as they all fight evil.

I spoke with Slott at the New York Comic Con, and that’s how I found out about the series. He spoke with such enthusiasm and love for the project that it made an impression on me. If you are a fan of his work for Marvel and DC or appreciate his sense of humor, then you might want to consider picking this issue up.

Diamond’s shipping list has it arriving tomorrow, but elsewhere around the web it states that it should already be out. Regardless, if you don’t see it on the stands and you are interested, ask your local comic shop owner to see if they can get it.

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William Gatevackes is a writer living in Mamaroneck, NY, with his wife, Jennifer. He writes the periodic comic review at PopMatters. His origin, like Wolverine’s, is shrouded in mystery. But that’s only because it was too boring for anyone to bother finding out.