The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1824: Star Trek Year Four #3, September 2007

I will post a picture here when I've got my electronics all figured out - can't make them talk to each other for some reason.

https://www.comics.org/issue/381201/

I really enjoyed this comic, and I think I'm definitely going to have to track down the other three issues of the series. Today's comic gave us a great science fiction story, one where we think one thing is happening, but it's actually something entirely other. As I mentioned when I read the first issue, the format of the comic allows for the Enterprise to really encounter strange new life forms, not just the humans with funny foreheads that tend to dominate in the television series. The viral lifeform encountered by the crew in this story is an excellent idea, and the symbiotic relationship that they have with the crew of the Enterprise, even though the crew don't realize it at the time, is an interesting way of exploring the universe. While perhaps not a completely new idea, the execution of it was great.

Gordon Purcell's art is very good as well, quite different from what I remember from Gammarauders. And not that I want to come down on him again, but I think that the more animated style of art from Steve Conley over the last couple of issues suited the series more so than Purcell's. The series starts out in the aesthetic vein of the animated series, which did for a while continue the 5-year mission, so to have the art jump from the cartoonish to a slightly more realistic depiction throws things off, for me at least. Which I think is almost the same critique I had for his work on Gammarauders. What I really have to do is see if I can find a comic that starts out with Mr. Purcell - then I won't have anything to compare it to and can appreciate it on its own merits.

Well, as much as we can do that with anything, if Derrida is to be believed.

More to follow.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1823: Star Trek Year Four #2, August 2007

Damn, but this is a good series. At first I wasn't on board with the art, but parsing it in terms of the animated series, it's fantastic.

But, oh shit, Kirk is a goddamn sexist bastard. The first page has him referring to one of the female servants on a particular planet as part of the planet's "natural resources." I'm hoping that this is a conscious decision on the part of the writer, David Tischman, demonstrating an understanding of Kirk's character in the original series. I'm hoping it's not, from a 2007 comic, a declaration of sexism on a level that we really ought to have moved past. Again, call me an optimist (those who know me laugh now), but I'm hoping this is narrative sophistication rather than social crudeness on display.

I've got one more issue of this series, and it only ran 6 issues, but I really think I may have to track it down. Perhaps it's the length of time since I've actually seen/read Star Trek, but this comic, and, based on yesterday, this series, really are excellent. Tischman and Conley have managed a really good adaptation of a particular era of the series, one that doesn't simply attempt to be an episode of the television series, but that instead transfers the atmosphere and narrative-style of the series to the two-dimensional medium of comics.

Was supposed to get back to Hard Time tomorrow, but we'll see about maybe reading the next issue of this series. Gordon Purcell is the artist, and the last time I saw him on something, it was Gammarauders, and I wasn't a fan of his style on that series. Interestingly, he's coming in in the next issue to replace an artist whose style is much more stylized that Purcell's, much like he did with Martin King in Gammarauders, so we'll see if that shift affects my enjoyment of the series. I'm so fickle :D.

More to follow.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1822: Star Trek Year Four #1, July 2007

In order that I don't fall into my usual trap of getting jaded and annoyed by a longer run of comics, I'm breaking up Hard Time with some other stuff I stumbled upon as I was revamping my filing system last week. When my brother was downsizing and moving, he bequeathed to me all of his I.D.W.-published Star Trek comics, of which I have only read one. So when I flipped past these, I thought that I'd have a look.

This was a pretty good comic, very much in line with the style of storytelling the original series is known for. We even had a redshirt getting left behind and then killed, with Kirk and the crew showing just as little emotion over the fact as they did in their live action incarnations. And speaking of that incarnation, this comic isn't really going for that particular aesthetic of Star Trek. The art style is much more influenced by the cartoon that followed the last of the live action series, a fact I noticed almost right away from the very rigid construction of many of the characters. At first I wasn't sure if this was the fault of a less-talented artist, until I realized that Mr. Conley was actually going for the aesthetic of the cartoon, which is famously a very poorly-animated show. After that, the comic fell into place for me. I'm hoping that the series, such as it is at only six issues, maintains its "one and done" style - I was rather happy to get a complete story this morning that really did feel like it could have been a 30 - 45-minute episode of a television series. It was also lovely to see some of the non-human characters from the animated series being deployed. While I get that there were budgetary restrictions, I've always felt that the lack of non-humans on board the original Enterprise was one of the aspects of the series that kept from really immersing myself in it. A universe filled with only, or mostly, humanoid creatures just seems very boring to me.

A bit more Star Trek tomorrow, and then back to Ethan and his hard time.

More to follow.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 807: Greatest Hits #2, December 2008

This comic continues to be entertaining, and I think it's likely I'll be tracking down the remaining issues. My concerns over some of the more inflammatory bits yesterday were, I think, unfounded. Our narrator, Nick, is kind of an ass, so his use of derogatory language toward trans people is in keeping with the character. As, I think, is the behaviour of The Mates in Newark. Mr. Tischmann and Mr. Fabry are going for accuracy through a historical lens, rather than a contemporary one, which adds to the authenticity of the piece, and also has us question the often misplaced nostalgia for the bygone era of the Summer of Love.

But I'm feeling crappy again, so I don't have much more to say.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 806: Greatest Hits #1, November 2008

What if the Beatles had been superheroes?

That's the driving question behind today's comic, and it certainly is an intriguing one. And the fact that it's drawn by Glenn Fabry doesn't hurt either. Known, in large part, for his wonderful covers for the Preacher series, his interior work is quite different, but no less compelling.

I wanted to like this series. It really seemed to be meshing a couple of things I really loved, but there's some problems with the story. The opening splash of superteam "The Mates" (that's them up on the cover) quelling unrest in a predominantly black neighbourhood in Newark seems a bit...off. The heroes appear to be joining the police in beating down the rioters which, from a particular point of view, puts the squarely on the wrong side of history.

And then later in the comic there's some derogatory language used in reference to a transsexual prostitute. Now, I'm willing to go with the notion that it might all be for a reason, that the use of this kind of language is a way of establishing the prejudices of the narrator, or that the Mates' involvement in a race riot is being used to depict poor choices they've made, but there isn't much indication of that in the comic itself. I'll give the second issue a go tomorrow (which is all the issues I actually have), and then we'll see.

Sorry - a brief and not too insightful post. I'm tired.

To be continued.