« Reply #3 on: July 03, 2017, 09:22:57 AM »
I'll update with how some series are going.
KISSDynamite's KISS series has been very bumpy. It's the tale of 4 teens, and doesn't even feature KISS at all. Rather the band are some sort of old Gods or something. There's a world torn Earth, space cities or...I don't really know to be honest it's not the best story. It's an attempt to that KISS' Elder album and something with it, but it ends up sort of confused and lacking the fun a KISS book should hold.
The last issue, #9, did something interesting for once where the characters board a ship only to find a J-Rock trio. I figured it was a reference to MomoClo who KISS collabed with in 2015, but they where a fiction group. It was an odd feature but somehow fit in a KISS book, even if the group literally spoke in kanji that went untranslated. Which was...an odd choice. But it was an amusing issue.
The KISS series isn't great but the KISS Vampirella spin off had a good start with a fun issue. It's set in the 70's and features KISS as a band, which is best. In 1978 KISS did the cheesy made for TV movie Phantom of the Park where they played superheroes. This is how I feel KISS would go over best in a comic for some campy fun! and the Vampirella comic seems to want to do this so it should be fun. Vampy is often dull in comics, as classic as her design is I find her books to be bland mostly.
But the KISS/Vampy team-up seems to be effective and is certainly more interesting then the main series and the melodramatic Gene spin off. Star Wars (Main Series + Doctor Aphra) The Star Wars comic just finished the Screaming Citadel story which also went into the Doctor Aphra comic so you have to follow both to get it all. I do like the Aphra series actually, she is one of the Marvel series original characters, and with her evil droids she is a good addition to the crew, as well as Sana, a rebel with Han Solo in her history.
The story is basically Luke and Alphra going to some planet ruled by a Queen, there's like some mind control stuff and things happen. I don't know but I like the adventures the cast gets up to in the Star Wars comics. I feel Marvel does very well capturing the fun and adventure aspect of the franchise, so we get to see a lot of planets and new characters. I do like the series a lot and feel it's overall very worthwhile to keep up with the main series and spin-offs.
Archie The new Archie series is a perfect fresh version of the old series. The art is updated and it takes place in today's world, but it manages to keep all the themes and traits of the characters in tack. It is rather fun as well. The latest issues have this dramatic story where Archie has to race the sort of mean dude character and in the mist Betty ends up in the hospital. The latest issue makes it off like she's dying or something, I was like wtf, this is Archie. It says like next issue things change forever! I'm like...um, what are you doing? We'll see.
The Josie and the Pussycat series which I've talked about above is still doing great, I quite like that one.RE-READ All Hail MegatronThis series from 2008-2009 was something I loved at the time and kept up with it every month, but I never made it to the last issue. Recently I finally got issue 12 and re-read the whole series.
All Hail Megatron is an easy access story for those unfamiliar with the IDW cannon, basically the Decepticons have completely wrecked the Autobots and banished them to Cybertron, Optimus is on death's door and in general moral is low. Meanwhile Megatron and the gang go to earth to smash things up and set up a space bridge, basically to begin world conquest or something? I don't know whatever Decepticons do, get energon and be bad. The series focuses on earth with the Decepticons and humans trying to stop them. It's a real threat for humanity and the series starts with a hopeless feeling for everyone as they terrorize New York and then, the world.
The series uses the G1 characters, up to early season 2 with the triple changers. On Cybertron it's more all over with Kup, Springer, Blurr, Hot Rod and the new character Drift. There are the classic themes present, like the Decepticons being a giant mess where Starscream is always making plans to overthrow Megatron. At this point Devastator has recently been created, there is a lot of tension in the faction with the Insecticons and Seekers as well. The narrative is very straight forward and predicable.
There is a traitor in the series, who is telegraphed quite obviously, and it connects with the IDW story with the headmaster Sunstreaker stuff that, I don't understand. The series gets more into that as it goes on, and it also gets worse. It starts off just fine but I feel it gets a little dull at the end and the final confrontation is very lame and underwhelming. The human characters are never exciting and sure enough they are bland here. It is neat to see how the humans try to defeat an impossible threat though. But really, you read Transformers for Transformers, you want cool robots not boring military people.
The art is amazing in this series with great detail, the characters look much like the toys from the time, basically updated versions of their G1 selves. Some like Megatron never transform, so there is no classic cheesy, watch as the big tall leader becomes a tiny gun that someone else has to fire. Which is actually like one of the funniest things about G1. I like the use of Reflector in this series, a forgotten character, and even Thundercracker does something for once.
All Hail Megatron does some neat things with the fractured Autobots but you know how it will go, there are no real surprises. It's an alright series overall but I felt underwhelmed at the finale that's for sure.
« Last Edit: July 03, 2017, 09:25:06 AM by Manimal »
Logged