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Aug 13, 2020

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1994 - 1996: Kaboom #1 - 3, Sept. - Nov. 1997

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I decided to do these three comics together for two reasons. First, I'm falling terribly behind on my blogging, and this is an easy way to get back on track. Second, it's basically a single story told over three issues, so it's easier to talk about it all at once.

Kaboom is a part of the Awesome Universe, like Fighting American and The Coven, that isn't directly controlled by Alan Moore. I'd left it for a little while to read because I was worried that it wouldn't hold up to the standard set by Moore's work in this setting, and by some of the other writers/artists who contributed characters and stories to the shared universe. It was a pretty good series, but not a great one, I'd say. Jeff Matsuda's artwork is super-kinetic, very much like reading an anime adaptation or a manga. There's a few artists whose work really nicely demonstrates the influence of Japanese comics on North American production, and Mr. Matsuda is definitely one of them.

As for the story, it's a pretty standard origin piece. Teenager gets powers, turns out there's people who want to kill him as a result. But as I say, Mr. Matsuda's art gives it a bit of a boost, including some really great, and weird, designs for The Nine, agents of Scarlett, the villain who wants to remove "the mitts" from Geof Sunrise's hands. Shenanigans ensue.

More to follow.

Further Reading and Related Posts

Mr. Matsuda's work has  shown up a couple of other times in the project.

Mr. Loeb, however, has shown up quite a lot.

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