Mark Waid, Paolo Rivera & Marcos Martin: Here Comes… Daredevil, Vol 1

I always liked Mark Waid. He's a solid comics writer well grounded in characters' history, and prepared to take a refreshing look at them from new angles, and to introduce some surprises in his stories. He's not quite in the Moore - Gaiman - Morrison league, but always enjoyable, so perhaps a notch below that top tier, pretty much like Peter David (IMO).

So I had high hopes for his Daredevil. And I wasn't really disappointed. This book starts off with Daredevil crashing a Mob wedding to stop a kidnapping by the dimension-jumping Spot. Paolo Rivera's art for this chapter is especially nice – and reminds me a bit of David Mazzucchelli, possibly because of how he depicts DD's body in motion (and possibly also from how he spots the shadows on it) dramatically but not overly flashy, making it look positively naturalistic by Marvel standards.

Waid then proceeds to give a solution how to move on from DD's secret identity having been outed previously – in this internet/paparazzi age, memes like that tend to lose power over time, so the notion that Matt Murdock is really Daredevil is now in the "some people are sure of it, others don't really know" category. Clever, if not earth-shattering, and opening up a nice venue of subplots and clever story details.

Since everybody now knows – or "knows" – that Matt Murdock is Daredevil, his legal career goes down the drain, because, well, somehow the prosecutor working the word "Daredevil" into every other sentence makes it impossible for Matt to win cases. I'm not really with Waid on how this works, actually, but I'll go along with it for the sake of the story. It's because Waid is a good writer that I'll, as a reader, choose to go along, but it's also a mark of how he's not top-notch (to me, at least) that I'll still have reservations. I've followed – for example – Grant Morrison along on far less logical story developments, but that's because with Grant Morrison, I'm usually just swept along with the inexorable flow of brilliant storytelling.

Anyway, Matt Murdock comes up with a new way of helping people, now that he can't be their lawyer: he'll teach them how to represent themselves, and coach them towards victory. This is, again, clever, and actually reminded me of the feeling I got when reading my very first DD story many, many years ago, with Stan Lee depicting a Matt Murdock able to come up with a clever way of helping his client, regardless of what conventional wisdom said.

So far, so good. What about the actual action? Well, DD faces two menaces in this collection. The first is a new take on a classic Marvel villain (again, in keeping with Waid tradition), the second a somewhat more prosaic criminal/superterrorist organization(s) threat against a – get this – blind kid. Of course Daredevil has to get involved. And they bring in the Bruiser, who's out to show he can take on all sorts of lower-lever superbeings in the Marvel Universe, crossing them of his (smartphone – another nice touch) list as he beats them, one after one. (DD is just above Spider-Woman on that list, something Bruiser regrets after handily beating DD in their first encounter.)

On the art: Paolo Rivera is the artist for the first half of the book, and as noted does an excellent job. Marcos Martin does the second half, and his figure and action drawing is excellent as well, but he needs to work on his faces – they're too cartoony, and not in an elegant cartoony style either, unfortunately. It's not terrible, but there's plenty of room for improvement.

Anyway, I'll give away a bit of the ending because it speaks to a larger point I've been making: the showdown with the conglomerate of criminal organizations is resolved with some clever lawyeristic wrangling by Daredevil – but I don't really buy it, because I can see the counter-argument to the point DD is (successfully) making to the crooks. Had it been Moore, Miller etc writing the story, I can well see how I'd be carried along by the strength of the narrative and/or the cleverness of how the argument is formulated, but that doesn't happen with Waid. He's merely in the "damned good" category of writers for me, not quite in the "superstars" one.

But you know what? "Damned good" is still damned good, and this book has plenty of clever and just plain good things going for it. This is excellent superhero fare. Heartily recommended.


(Second opinion: Comics Alliance has a good review of the book here, which among other things points to how Daredevil gives a little smile when he's about to throw himself into a fight against tough odds, giving emphasis to his "daredevil" moniker. Good catch, that.)

Vicki Scott & Paige Braddock: It's Tokyo, Charlie Brown

You know those old Peanuts movies and specials? Those that basically took a bunch of gags from the strip and strung them together to form part of the movie, and then had the plot sort of develop from there?

Well, that is pretty much what this is, albeit in comics format. Writer-penciller Vicki Scott starts off the book with some baseball gags from the strip, emphasizing Charlie Brown's lack of skill and his team's lack of success, and then throws in the kicker: the kids become selected as goodwill ambassadors in the president's "Young Ambassadors Program", and will travel to Japan to play baseball against another kids team.

That sets the stage for the gags and character interactions to follow. Marcie reads the guidebook to Japan, learning more about the country and teaching her friends a little about it in the process, Charlie Brown gets caught up in the moment and makes nice speeches to his friends about their responsibilities as goodwill ambassadors and nobody listens to him, and Woodstock gets mugged by the food in the Japanese restaurants they visit. Finally, the play baseball against a Japanese kids' team, and play at their usual level of competence (especially Charlie Brown), and Scott throws in a plot twist to keep it all from becoming an unhappy ending.

All in all, this really is an excellent Peanuts TV special. I won't compare it to Schulz' strip – really, how could you? – but it's a good, entertaining story with some nice touches and that is faithful to Schulz's characters. It's 100 pages, and I thought it was well worth my time reading them. Recommended.

Back from the comics store, November 2012 edition

Mutts – I've always liked Mutts (well, I loved it for the first coupla years), the Hägar and Wizard of Id collections are classic daily strips, Mort Drucker is only like the best MAD artist ever, and Gray Morrow is also a classic artist.

I love Peanuts, and while the comic book isn't really Schulz quality (how could it be, honestly?), this was a good issue with some well done stories,  Buz Sawyer is a classic, and in 1945-46 not yet the somewhat dull Cold War strip it would become later, Neal Adams is the superhero artist even if he doesn't today have/use the smooth, elegant line of the 70s Neal Adams and I fully expect the writing to be... not the best possible, the Avengers book is written by Kurt Busiek whose work I've always liked (it was nice when the rest of the world caught up so he could get more work), and the Essentials and Showcase volumes are a good way of getting old comics that are in no way worth what it would cost to buy the original comic books.

Aaaand finally it's more Peanuts, Joe Kubert's lovely art in Sgt. Rock, I've always liked the Justice League – and the art of Alan Davis, and it's very nice to see classic EC work by legends Wallace Wood and Harvey Kurtzman in affordable format. I will enjoy reading this lot.

Back from the comics store, October 2012 edition

I also got my monthly comics package down at my comics shop, Prisfyndet, a couple of weeks ago. With my editors throwing work at me, it'll be a while before I get to read this stuff (worst part is, I suspect they're giving me work not because they think I do a good job, but because they want to stop me from having time to read and enjoy myself).

I get all the Showcases; it's comics history in cheap packages – if not always all that great comics history – much like the Marvel Essentials. James Robinson's Starman is excellent and the omnibuses are a cheap-and-easy way of getting them. I love Peanuts, so I'm getting the new (kids) stuff even though it's nowhere near Shultz's truly magnificent strip. Barbara is by manga legend Osamu Tezuka, and thus pretty much mandatory. Mark Waid (Daredevil) is a good, solid superhero writer – not quite as outré as superstars like Grant Morrison, but delivering solid stories with good twists. Girl Genius is by almost-always-funny Phil Foglio, who holds the distinction of having created practically the only pornographic comics worth reading (Xxxenophile Tales). Neil Gaiman's Death stories are among the best stuff he's done, it's pleasantly free from the slight hint of pretentiousness that sometimes creeps into his Sandman stories, and the art by Chris Bachalo is excellent. Get it if you haven't already.

This lot is a quartet of classic newspaper strips. For the archives-I-hope-to-read-soon shelf.

Finally, in IDW's great-but-damn-it's-expensive Artist's Edition series, one of the truly great: Joe Kubert. It's gorgeous, but maybe you should settle for a somewhat cheaper collection instead of this oversized one. This one hurt...

Back from the comics store, September edition

So anyway, I got some stuff at the Gothenburg book fair, now that I have a house to put it in.

Li Österberg's stuff is always good. I prefer when she writes her own stories, but Patrik Rochling's scripts are very good, and make the people depicted in the stories people, instead of just characters in a story. Norwegian Jason is likewise always good, but I tend to only buy his stuff when it's on sale, as the hardcover editions are quite a bit on the pricey. Kvarnby serier contains comics by people who're studying a two-year course in the art/trade of making comics. And Den mystiska ön is and excellent adventure story for kids, reviewed here.

I bought some regular books as well; the Italian Renaissance is almost always enjoyable stuff, and I've always like the classical Dutch paintings. You can't go wrong with a huge book on evolution (unless, perhaps, if you're a teacher in some southern U.S. states), and I don't know much about horses, so why not get a book about them? Döda rummet is a pun on August Strindberg's classic novel Röda rummet, and an enjoyable fantasy by Per Demervall and Ola Skogäng about an alternative present where a cult has grown around the dead Strindberg... Or is he really dead? And Corto Maltese is of course a classic (although in my honest opinion, a somewhat overrated one).

This pic turned out crappy and does no justice to the four first volumes of the collected Duck works of Don Rosa, the brilliant writer-artist who unfortunately isn't doing any more stories because he's fed up with the lousy renumeration from the Disney juggernaut (I should add that the Swedish publisher of his works treat him pretty decently, though, as far as I know). Seriously, if you haven't read his stuff, you should – he's more or less the modern (or post-modern) Barks. I got these ones signed, and a sketch in one of them too – ha! Valhalla is an excellent album series by Dane Peter Madsen and his collaborators – though to be honest, it's just good a couple of albums into the series, and only excellent from about album 5-6 or so. This is the fourth collection of three albums, so it's well into the "excellent" phase. You gonna start reading this series, and you should, collection 3 containing albums 7-9 is the place to start, and you can expand your collection from there. Kiki of Montparnasse has received quite a lot of accolades, but I haven't had the time to read it yet.

Uti vår hage is a brilliant mixture of inspired silliness and crazy slapstick, sort of the Marx Brothers on steroids and in comics format. Well recommended. Zits is a modern classic (and I got my copy for free for having translated it). Elvis is also a bit of a modern classic here in Sweden, looking askance and through the eyes of a somewhat obnoxious anthropomorphic tortoise at the daily drudgery of modern (family) life. It's done by real-life couple Tony and Maria Cronstam, and you have to wonder exactly how much of it is from their own life, and to what extent they're just inspired by and/or extrapolationg from their own life. The strip is mainly played for laughs, but does occasionally delve into social commentary as well – which on one occasion seemed to flummox some less-than-competent critics who actually believed that the Cronstams were laughing at wife abuse, when it was simply the critics who were too stuck in their own prejudices about the Elvis strip to understand that particular strip. (I mean, good grief – seriously, a critic owes the works and artists/writers he reviews the courtesy of actually trying to understand what they're trying to say.) And finally, Norwegian Arild Midthun is a talented artist whose duck art reminds me quite a bit of the old master Vicar.

Johanna Kristiansson and Joakim Gunnarsson: Katten Nils & Morris – Den mystiska ön ("Nils the Cat & Morris – The mysterious island")

Yes, there hasn't been much happening on this blog for quite a while now. The main reason for that is that I moved and was rather worn out after moving about 140 shelf meters of comics, 60 shelf meters of books, and assorted other stuff that tends to accumulate as the years pass, and then trying to fit them into my new home in some sort of working order. (Haven't really succeeded with that part yet, I must confess.)

But having done at least the most necessary parts of getting the new house functional for my needs (se enclosed pictures at bottom of page), it is time to get some blogging going again. We'll start with an excellent children's comic by Joakim Gunnarsson and Johanna Kristiansson: Katten Nils & Morris – Den mystiska ön. If I understand things correctly, Gunnarsson is mostly responsible for the script and Kristiansson for the art.

Katten Nils – or, Nils the Cat – is a very popular comic strip in the Swedish children's magazine Kamratposten. Nils himself is not very intelligent, to say the least, but the strip's exploring of themes important to kids (mainly friendship and love, judging from the sample strips I've seen from it) has mightily endeared both him and the strip to Kamratposten's readers. Now, Gunnarsson and Kristiansson have staked out new ground with a book-length story about Nils and his best friend Morris joining cat-girl Semlan (who is in love with Morris and quite a bit bothersome, in Morris' opinion) on a ship to Semlan's aunt's coffe bean-producing island. The island is home to a volcano that threatens to erupt, so it's important to save as many coffee beans as possible. Semlan doesn't really want Nils coming along to disrupt her plans for some quality time with Morris, whereas Morris wants Nils coming along to disrupt any plans Semlan may have for quality time with him. And the adventure moves briskly along from there...

I was just a little bit wary of the depiction of Semlan at first, what with her being more interested in boys (well, Morris, at least – Nils seems a bit too loutish for her) and relationships rather than adventures. Now, I do think it's perfectly OK for both girls and boys to have different preferences, whether it's for adventure or for relationship stuff (and that it's more than a little bit stupid to try and force them to change their preferences based on what's the current fashion in society for what they "should" prefer), but I was a bit worried that Semlan come off as merely the classical girly stereotype – of which I've seen enough in many, many comics and movie stories already. Fortunately, I was proven wrong.

Not only are Semlan's feelings for Morris depicted with a lot of respect and compassion, both for the character and for those feelings, but she gets to show herself to be brave and knowledgeable in a manner that not only surprises Morris but also heightens his respect for her as a person. It works very well, and offers a nice model for the book's young readers how to treat others. (It's a nice model for grown-ups as well, but they're usually already too set in their ways to change, so if they're inclined to go with their prejudices rather than keeping an open mind towards others, reading a children's comic is hardly going to change that one iota.)

Now, I know Joakim Gunnarsson, so I know that he's an old comics fan-turned-pro and also quite the Bamse and Carl Barks aficionado – and it shows in the story. Not only is it a classical Bamse or Uncle Scrooge (albeit a little bit "childified" compared to the Barks variety) plot, but there are several Barksian references in the script as well. It works very well if you catch those references, and doesn't detract from the story if you don't.

I don't really know Johanna Kristiansson, I just met her briefly at this year's annual book fair in Gothenburg, so I can only say that she seems to be just about the nicest, most utterly charming person you could imagine, and that she does an excellent job with the art for this story. Kristiansson makes the characters move and emote with flair and gusto – vitally important for depicting both the adventure and emotions/relations aspects of the story.

This is a great children's book, and sufficiently well done that it isn't a waste of time for adult readers, either – even though they'll probably have to rely quite a bit on the child within to appreciate it, as it is pretty clearly a story aimed at kids.

Recommended.


And finally, as promised, a couple of examples of the interior decoration of my new home:

Oh, and I did this

Expanded summer edition. In stores now, and a couple of days more.

Sven Oskarsson & Sten Widmalm (ed.): Myt eller verklighet? Om samband mellan demokrati och ekonomisk tillväxt ("Myth or reality? On connections between democracy and economic growth")

I've been rather remiss in my blogging lately, which is connected with my efforts to find and buy a house I can afford as well as preparing to move into it. Anyway, I'll try to get some quickie reviews done. First up, another book on the democracy.

This is a book by people used to teaching students, and it shows in its didactic structure. The first chapter gives a quick overview of various theories of modernity - development - democracy. Second chapter takes a closer look at a specific theory of modernization, pioneered by Seymour Martin Lipset: that economic growth leads to socioeconomic changes which will lead to increasingly democratic rule. Then follows a couple of chapters on the general empirical support for the theory, a half-dozen or so chapters looking at various countries from the perspective of the theory, and a final chapter summarizing the findings of the book.

First off, the theory argues, economic modernization will change the class structure of society, creating a growing and more affluent middle class. It'll also lead to improved education and a better educated population, which'll lead to democratic values rooting themselves more firmly among more citizens. Education furthers the growth of more tolerant norms and reduces the attraction of anti-democratic extremist parties. Third, economic development strengthens civilian society, leading to more non-government, voluntary organizations that keep a check on elected power (and also teaches democratic values).

The correlation has been shown in empirical research to be quite quite clear and statistically rather weak. So the theory has met with a lot of criticism, and efforts have been made to deal with that criticism. One research approach has involved looking at the degree of socio-economic modernization, not just looking at GNP per capita, which has often been used as a proxy variable for modernization/economic development. And modernization can't just involve increased per capita incomes, it also requires that the increased wealth is somewhat equitably shared among the citizens of the country.

Turns out that when you take that variable into account, the theory gets that much stronger. Not only do countries with a more equal distribution of income tend to be more democratic, when combined with more equality, increased wealth also tends to correlate with increased tolerance towards various minorities (like homosexuals and immigrants).

The third chapter looks closer at this aspect and concludes that democracy will be more common among nations where the market economy won't result in very large economic disparities, where the costs of repression are high and where the tax base is comparatively mobile (which'll lead governments to refrain from overtaxing it, thus reducing the incentive for it to embrace anti-democratic methods to protect its wealth.

There's more in this book that's worth reading (although the chapters devoted to case studies of countries like France, Russia etc didn't do much for me as they mostly merely illustrated the theory and gave short overvies of those countries' recent political history – not a bad thing, but not really giving me any deeper insights into the theory and its empirical support or lack thereof).

Definitely worth your time if you can read Swedish. Recommended.

I did this, too!

"What's this white spot on the map, Sarge?"

Knasen 13/2012. In stores now.

I did this!

"Where is Beetle?!
Check to see if he's hiding in one of the tanks!"