The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1891: Awesome Preview, 1998

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This'll be one of three times that I'll be reading the story "Glory and the Gate of Tears," reprinted one more time from Awesome and then once from Avatar (plus a preview of it from Avatar). As I've noted in my posts on the various covers that this incarnation of Glory commands, it's a bittersweet tale to read because it's got so much promise. I know that much of that promise is fulfilled in Promethea, so that's nice, but I feel that Glory would have brought a very different aesthetic to the exploration of the World Tree and the Sephiroth. Where Promethea exists in a superheroic world, I'm not sure I'd class her as a superhero. But Glory definitely is - she's got the comics to prove it.

I'll talk more about this story tomorrow.

The Fighting American preview is quite cool - it's just Stephen Platt's pencils and I love seeing stuff like this. His work is super-detailed. I can't imagine being the inker for this work. That said, the Dogs of War mini was my least favourite of the Awesome Fighting American stuff. But his pencils are gorgeous.

The Re-Gex preview is Beowulf's story, but without dialogue. I think this story is reprinted in an issue of The Coven, in the Re-Gex zero issue, and potentially in one of the Re:Gex preview issues that I do not have. Maybe this one is reprinted almost as much as the Glory story. As I've said over the last couple of days, Re:Gex is interesting, but ultimately goes nowhere.

First day on a new job today.

More to follow.

And here's the flip cover:

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1888: Re:Gex #0, December 1998

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 The only other full issue of Re:Gex is, as far as I can tell, simply a repackaging of a number of short stories previously published elsewhere. I am torn over this.

I think the main story in today's issue comes from the Wizard World convention preview, while the story of Scarab's early years was a back up feature in The Coven. Similarly, Beowulf's 4-page tale is from both the Awesome Preview, though reproduced without dialogue there, and also from The Coven #5, with dialogue, as a back-up feature.

I'm totally fine with repackaging like this. If you publish stories as back-ups in comics that readers may not have picked up, it's nice to get all these little bits and pieces under a single cover, and under the title of the series one is collecting. However, I think that's a good thing to do if you're actually producing new content to go alongside this reprint issue. That was never the case with Re:Gex, unfortunately.

As I was going through the GCD, there was a note on one of the comics I was looking at for Awesome that made reference to something called the "Awesome Implosion." Likely a reference to a well-documented event in the 70s in which DC reduced their number of published titles for a time, Awesome underwent a financial crisis in late 1998 - early 1999 that shifted their publishing schedules and art teams, and eventually led to their collapse. Brigade, published in early 2000, was Awesome's last gasp. It could be that Re:Gex was simply a casualty of this implosion, though I also wonder when you're getting 4 or 6 page stories whether or not those responsible for the comic are simply incapable of producing enough work to fill a full comic. In yesterday's issue there's even a note that the comic was shot from pencils, rather than having the series inked, and though it's passed off as a choice made by the creators, I think it may have had something to do with hitting deadlines as well, which Mr. Liefeld is notoriously bad at.

Anyway, that was Re:Gex. I don't think I like where it was taking the Awesome Universe, and I wonder how it would have stood up against Alan Moore's stories if both had had a chance to flourish.

More to follow.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1887: Re:Gex #1, September 1998

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I bought this comic years ago, when it came out, actually. I'll admit that I was probably drawn in by the semi-nude Genie on the cover, but I also knew virtually nothing about Mr. Liefeld and his history in comics at the time.

 

I admit that when I read this comic this morning, there were parts that I had literally no memory of. It's got an interesting, if very X-Men, vibe to it, though 3 pages devoted to Genie showering is a bit much, Rob, you horny devil. It's set in the Awesome Universe, given Avengelyne's appearance at the end, and appears to be trying to add another hidden history to the setting. As I say, intriguing, but aside from 2 or 3 little 4-page stories in preview issues, and a cobbled together zero issue, this is all the Re:Gex we get. I'm very surprised the Liefeld hasn't tried to start this series up again. His thing these days really seems to be rebooting his own series over and over and over.

Though, were that to happen, I cannot imagine I'd be picking it up. Jeph Loeb's words are good, but Liefeld's art is Liefeld's art. Genie's boots are just the worst.

More to follow.