Blog Archives
Hot Diggity Dog, Ryan North is Writing Fantastic Four!
It’s a good day in comic book news, friends! Ryan North, the extremely funny and talented writer of The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl, will be taking over the main Fantastic Four comic in November. This is super cool! I am a huge fan of North’s writing, and I’m super excited to see him take on a headline superhero team. Art will be by Iban Coello.
Skipping out on the bulk of Dan Slott’s Fantastic Four series has been a real regret. I loved it at the beginning and had no real reason to drop it, but I did, because I’m a fool.
You best believe I’ll be jumping in full steam ahead when Ryan North takes over with a new Fantastic Four #1 in a couple of months. According to this interview with Marvel.com, North is planning to tell some down-to-Earth stories of the team after Slott went big. That also sounds great!
Here’s what the man himself said:
“I want to do these smaller, self-contained stories in the vein of ’60s Star Trek, where they go down to a planet, find a weird thing, fix the weird thing, and move on. Having these four weirdos roll into town where there’s a mystery or a problem or some sci-fi thing, solve the problem, and then move on struck me as a very interesting way to position the Fantastic Four and tell stories that would feel fresh and not like a retread of what we’ve seen before.”
That sounds phenomenal! Everything about this series has me excited, nothing more so than getting to read another Ryan North comic at Marvel. Let’s go!
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My 10 Favorite Comics of the 2010s
Another decade has come and gone and we are all, therefore, another decade older. I know I’m feeling it! Let us distract ourselves from such mortal concerns by reflecting on my favorite comic books from the past 10 years!
It was a nice decade in comics
My memory isn’t all that great, but I’ve looked back over my various comic reviews and favorites lists and I think I’ve narrowed down a good list of 10 comics that I very much enjoyed. This blog started in 2011, so I’ve definitely been talking about a lot of comics over the past 10 years. It was a pretty monumental decade! We had the New 52 from DC Comics and the influence of the Marvel Cinematic Universe at Marvel Comics.
This was also the decade where I finally started writing my own comics! Gamer Girl & Vixen has been doing pretty well, and volume 2 is in production!
Join me after the jump as I take a look back at my favorite comics from the past decade! They are not in any particular order.
Hench-Sized Comic Book Reviews – 11/16/19
Have you listened to my movie podcast yet? I can’t necessarily say if it’s any good, but it exists and I want it to be successful so…*shrug*. Don’t worry, I’m not about to start cramming it down your throats.
We had a lot of nice comics this week. Dawn of X gave us the final new series, Fallen Angels, which I both liked and couldn’t care less about. We also have the final issue of Unbeatable Squirrel Girl! It’s great and wins Comic Book of the Week for being so momentous!
I don’t have the heart to tell her
Just don’t tell Far Sector #1, which is a truly standout comic starter and was the best comic I read this week.
Meanwhile, I owe a big apology to Black Cat writer Jed MacKay. I’ve missed the past two issues because Black Cat came out during busy weeks and it was at the bottom of my read pile. But in last week’s issue, MacKay sent Felicia on a date with Batroc the Leaper and delivered a truly phenomenal issue.!This is exactly what I want from comics. They go on a normal date, talk about work, then go out and do some burglary for the fun of it. Felicia is written so well, Batroc is written so well, their world is explored like we rarely see. MacKay delivered!
Though I still wish they got some better art on Black Cat.
Comic Reviews: Fallen Angels #1, Far Sector #1, Go Go Power Rangers #25, Runaways #27, Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #50 and X-Men #2.
All the Things Wrong With Unbeatable Squirrel Girl’s Courtroom Scene
We all have jobs. Does it ever bother you when a piece of entertainment gets everything so completely wrong about your job? I’m a reporter for a small daily newspaper in Upstate New York, and I usually don’t have a problem with how reporters are portrayed on TV, in movies or in comics. But I cover cops and courts, everything from arrests to court appearances to trials, and as a result, I can’t stand watching courtroom scenes in any media. Nobody ever gets them right. It’s like nails on a chalkboard how writers warp the reality of the criminal justice system to fit their narrative.
This week’s new issue of Unbeatable Squirrel Girl is about as massive a miscarriage of justice in regards to a courtroom scene as I have ever witnessed.
Pun always intended.
She’s beginning to look a little squirrelly
In Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #34, Squirrel Girl and her friends are placed on trial for trying to stop the cops from arresting super-villain Kraven the Hunter. And writer Ryan North gets pretty much everything wrong about how a courtroom actually works. This breaks the immersion of the story, hence the nails on the chalkboard feeling.
Now, you might say, “But Sean, it’s just a silly comedy comic, what does it even matter?” To that I would say a couple of things. 1.) Unbeatable Squirrel Girl might be a comedy, but it’s not some whacky, Looney Tunes-style romp where nothing matters. Unbeatable Squirrel Girl has always operated on a foundation of realism. Just look at how stringent North is about the reality of computer coding and programming. This comic could serve as a college text book on the subject. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to then hold him to the realities of the criminal justice system, a system that operates on rules, much like computer programming.
2.) This is just my rinky dink blog, which has no oversight other than myself, and which North probably won’t see, so I can write whatever I want. The entire point of this place is to get stuff off my chest. And 3.) It’s not like I’m disparaging this comic or its creative team. It’s still a fun issue and one of the best comics on the stands. It’s just this courtroom stuff that really, really, really bugs the hell out of me.
So join me after the jump for how badly Ryan North messes up the criminal justice system! It’s me at my most nitpickiest!
My 6 Favorite Unbeatable Squirrel Girl Moments (So Far)
Unbeatable Squirrel Girl is one of my all-time favorite comic books. It is, hands down, the funniest comic I have ever read. I’m working to buy all of the trade paperbacks so that I have the whole collection on my graphic novel shelf for future reading! Writer Ryan North and artist Erica Henderson, along with their colorist, letterer and the rest, are a crack creative team! And to honor Henderson bowing out of the series, I wanted to get together my favorite moments and jokes so far!
Funny story. I met Erica Henderson once at Boston Comic-Con about two years ago. She was at her booth and I was on the prowl for a guest cover artist for the Gamer Girl & Vixen graphic novel. In my foolish bravery, I asked her if she did that sort of thing on commission. She looked at me like I was trying to sell her on a pyramid scheme and politely suggested I use the convention to find some local talent. I felt quite silly. She was so right.
Here’s hoping she has even more great success on her next projects! Join me after the jump for my favorite bits from Unbeatable Squirrel Girl!
And yes, I realize that my taking the time to explain the jokes kind of ruins them…so perhaps just read the comic pages I post and that will suffice!
Henchman-4-Hire 