Dave's Capsules for September 2026

 

Archive of older reviews

Items of Note (Strongly Recommended or otherwise worthy): The Inflictors Come Together, Kaiju No. 8 vol 16 (of 16)

In this installment: Supergirl (movie), The Inflictors Come Together, Nancy Drew Ep 5, Go! Go! Loser Ranger vol 18, I'm In Love With The Villainess vol 11, Magical Girl Dandelion vol 3, The Amazing Digital Circus vol 1, Spy x Family vol 16, Kaiju No. 8 vol 16 (of 16), The Last Human In A Crowded Galaxy vol 1, Fantastic Four #14-15, Moon Knight #6-7, Gatchaman #20, Red Impulse #4 (of 4), Thundarr the Barbarian #6 (of 6), Vampirella #4-5 (Legacy #691-2), Godzilla Monsterpiece Theater: Roar of the Worlds.

"Other Media" Capsules:

Things that are comics-related but not necessarily comics (i.e. comics-based movies like Iron Man or Hulk), or that aren't going to be available via comic shops (like comic pack-ins with DVDs) will go in this section when I have any to mention.  They may not be as timely as comic reviews, especially if I decide to review novels that take me a week or two (or ten) to get around to.

Jane Wick

Supergirl (movie): DC/WB - Supergirl has long had a problem with what I call "concept thrash," in which they can't seem to settle on a core premise for the character.  This is often a problem with female spinoffs of prominent male characters, because "girl version" stopped being enough of a hook decades ago.  Supergirl may even have it worse than Power Girl (who you'd think is worse because she started as Earth-2 Supergirl), if only because she gets used more often.  While Superman is no stranger to weird reinventions (lightning costume, anyone?), his niche is pretty stable, while Supergirl has been all over the map.  Still, one aspect that's sometimes touched upon is the idea that Supergirl is simply more alien than her cousin.  After all, Clark was raised from infancy on Earth.  If Kryptonians don't quite look like they're From Around Here, he at least grew up in Earth culture and the vibes are fine.  If Kryptonian phenotypes are a little different from anything on Earth (genetic compatibility doesn't mean he's gonna look identifiably like someone from England or Sweden or whatever), people probably just figured he was a bit mixed like a lot of Kansans.  Supergirl's formative years, at least for the versions that are Kara Zor-El and not Matrix or whatnot, were in Kryptonian culture.  She should always seem a little off, even years after arrival.  She should feel and look foreign, even slightly into the uncanny valley.  And while Milly Alcock might not look unusual in the antipodes, she does manage to convey a "not from around here" vibe, particularly in the makeup used for this movie (other publicity pictures of her in standard Hollywood Starlet makeup look rather different from how she looks in this movie).  And I really like that she looks a little off, even if that wasn't actually their intent.

The movie immediately jumps into Kara being alienated, not fitting in anywhere or knowing where she might fit in, and that's basically the main theme of the movie, even moreso than the overt plot of helping a girl get justice rather than revenge.  She's not just a party girl as implied by her brief appearance in Superman, she's just following the standard spiral of "party to drown out the screaming voice at the pit of her soul," and trying to do it on planets where her powers don't work so that she can feel something.  Of course, it also means she starts the movie without powers (or not MUCH power, a baseline Kryptonian probably couldn't take the abuse she does in the early scenes when she's partying and brawling).  Of course, it's not JUST alienation, it's survivor's guilt and and PTSD, she has Argo City in her background and it's one of the more unpleasant versions of the survivor enclave.

If I have a significant criticism of the movie, it's that Lobo is pretty much a deus ex machina in most of his scenes, showing up to help get Kara out of the corner the script painted her into.  He does serve the purpose of a contrast to the girl Kara's trying to save, having no use for revenge while being an even worse killer than the sort of person Kara is trying to stop her from becoming.  But that's really just a contrast for the audience, as none of the other characters seem to draw that conclusion, and Lobo himself doesn't care if he's being a role model, either positive or negative.  A secondary complaint I have is how everyone seems to know Kryptonian strengths and weaknesses even though Krypton died decades ago and the whole "survivor syndrome" thing hinges on them NOT having been active spacefarers.  While there's ways around that (several having been used in the comics over time), the movie just sort of lets the contradiction sit there.

As a side bit of nerdery, they continue to use Esperanto for Kryptonian (I think the Superman movie did this, and I know My Adventures with Superman does), with Kryptonite being Kryptonaĉ, the suffix meaning "bad." 

While not without flaws (I mean, it's based on a Tom King story, so it's gonna have his usual issues), even beyond those noted, it was an enjoyable movie and does seem to be willing to create a role for Supergirl other than "Superman's Cousin," we'll see if this one sticks.  Recommended despite Tom King's involvement.  Price varies by store and format, also available on a streaming service I don't get.  I got the BluRay, lots of extras.

"Was it supposed to be
secret?"  "Apparently not."

The Inflictors Come Together: Spare Oom Press - It's January 1, 1977 in a world that has had superheroes for a few years, but unlike in the comics they didn't seem to really focus on the Big Apple.  Oh, the city has a couple of supers here and there, but they're all solo acts...until now.  This is WAY more 70s than most actual comics in 1977, with a notable exception that this seems to draw some inspiration from.  Basically, this is "What if Iron Fist went looking for other heroes but didn't stop with Power Man?"  (I do hope that Pigeon is not a deliberate Colleen Wing pun sort of reference, though.)  The book is broken into sections titled after various members of the slowly-coalescing team, and while the inciting problem that gets Dragon Warrior (who has no powers and sees a problem that needs powers to stop) going isn't really addressed until the last section, the stories weave together quite well.  Despite some personality conflicts and occasional friction, they find reasons to help each other and work together, helped by a somewhat hands-off "If they wanna pretend they have a secret identity, I guess I'll let 'em for now" running gag.  Yeah, lots of running gags and catchphrases, the sort of thing that definitely happened in 1970s superhero comics. It helps that author Keith R.A. DeCandido has written a decent number of comics and plenty of comics-related prose, although not as far back as the 1970s (he's only a year older than I am).  It's also far from his first foray into gritty cops-n-criminals stories in the Big City (such as the urban fantasy Precinct books).  DeCandido does sometimes need to tread a narrow line between Scott Evil style, "Let me get my gun, I'll just shoot him" practicality and the need to have the antagonists leave the heroes alive, but I think he managed it well.  Also, I am amused that this is a SF/F story set in New York City with a talking cat and it wasn't written by Diane Duane.  Strongly Recommended.  I got it on Kindle, where it was $6.99, the paperback (NOT mass-market) is $25.  Also listed as "Come Together (The Inflictors Book 1)".

  

Expected next month: Dunno.  I passed on the animated Knightfall, and from what I've seen online I'm glad I did.  Looking at releases for next month on BluRay, I don't see any comics-related stuff I want to watch, nor anything on the streaming services I subscribe to.

Digital Comics:

I will not be reviewing ongoing webcomics in this column, sticking with collections that I'll get in hardcopy form.  eBook novels and streaming TV/movies will go above in Other Media.  This is for full comics read in digital form, either because that's how they come out, or because I tried it out on the LibraryPass app but either didn't care for it or wasn't able to get a hardcopy before the end of the month.  The heyday of ComiXology Originals is long gone, though, so there's not a lot of regular books I get digitally.

Nancy Drew the Secret of the Old Clock Ep 5: Patreon.com - Flood cleanup has been handled and now it's Nancy's turn to get in the water as she encounters several vehicle problems on her way to the Toppams' lake house.  (This is one of the things that dates the story, regardless of how Espinosa might update the technology visually...motor vehicles really did break down a LOT more back then, and if you were a regular driver or motorboater you picked up repair skills or you made sure you had a mechanic traveling with you.)  She finally catches up with the thieves from earlier, even though she wasn't even looking for them, and Espinosa has some fun casting the Three Stooges in the roles.  It's a slight departure from the canon, but hey, he didn't change the character names and they apparently did bicker a lot.  As an added benefit, splicing Stooge-style dialogue in helps counter the generally leaden (to modern ears, at least) dialogue that Keene wrote in this first book.  Recommended.  $4.99 for the single issue, or included with higher level tiers on Patreon.  

 

Expected next month: Things seem back on track, so likely Nancy Drew Ep 6.

Manga Collections:

Most of these are "tankobon" or collections of work serialized in a weekly or monthly publication, although some were written directly for the collection.  All of them have been translated from Japanese (or maybe Korean, although I don't think I'm reading any manhwa) into English.  Things with a manga aesthetic but done in English originally will go in one of the sections below as appropriate.

Go!  Go!  Loser Ranger! vol 18: Kodansha - Almost the entire volume is flashback, as an aspect of the Yellow Keeper fills D in on the full story of how the Dragon Keepers went from a failed one season kids' show to a real life menace to the world.  By the end, the origins of the Dragon Keepers, the Bosses, and the Dusters are laid out clearly (although it's entirely possible some of this is a self-serving lie or delusion and there's plot twists yet to twist), confirming and explaining some of the previous revelations (like how Keepers can turn into Bosses, and Bosses can revert to a human-like state).  Mostly this is a deep dive into a character who up until now hadn't been all that prominent in the story despite his importance in the story's setting.  I suppose the only way D was going to listen to so much exposition was if he was trapped in it until the whole backstory had been laid out, so it'd have been harder to spread this out over more volumes.  At the end, we get back to the main plot that was kinda cliffhangered at the end of vol 17, but that only barely advances.  While the big backstory dump does feel like we're entering endgame, Wikipedia says that there's currently 22 volumes, and there'd be more if not for the creator's health problems...so either we're looking at a really long final battle (given how long the fight against Deathmecia was, not an implausible option), or solving the current problems will only generate more problems (very likely, given D's personality).  On the one hand, this is important backstory, but on the other D is barely in it as anything but an audience. Very definitely not a volume to start on!  Mildly recommended on "is it a fun read," but if you're invested in the series already you shouldn't skip this one.  $10.99/$14.99Cn, rated Older Teen 16+ for suicidal ideation, suicide, mass murder, and generally a rather dark turn for the series.

I'm In Love With The Villainess vol 11: Seven Seas Entertainment - The game's Big Damn Crisis has hit, shattering the monarchy and pushing things down the road to bloody revolution, and Rae doesn't know if she can actually save Claire from the inevitable fate of nobility in a pastiche of the French Revolution (which in real life was also partially kicked off by volcano-induced famine, but the real volcano wasn't right next to Paris).  Rae finally tells Claire (and the reader) why she specifically fell in love with that particular villainess, and is forced to come somewhat clean to Claire about what her deal is.  Somewhat.  She does recast things in terms more likely to be accepted (explaining computer games would be a bit of a lift) and indicates to the reader that she's still lying a little by omission, but it's a major  development in their relationship.  Also, while Rae isn't the absolute creep she was in the start, she's still not exactly a Good Person.  Saving Claire is her first and pretty much only motivation, and she's willing to let others die and society as a whole to collapse as long as it doesn't fall on Claire in the process.  Definitely a flawed protagonist even if she's stopped being a sex pest.  It's when things fall to pieces that some aspects of a person's character are revealed or tested, and the story is definitely moving into "Who is Rae Taylor, REALLY?" territory at last.  $13.99/$17.99Cn, rated Teen 13+ for psychological trauma and some unpleasantness vis a vis falling structures. 

Magical Girl Dandelion vol 3: Viz - In the end notes the creator says she was working on her university senior project while working on this volume and I immediately aged into dust and blew away.  (I have since recovered.)  The new fiend (Ice) from the cliffhanger of volume 2 is Shade's old friend from ten years ago, possibly the first person he befriended after becoming a fiend.  Thanks to a fiendish plot device, we do get to see more of what Shade was like back then, and it wasn't a whole lot different than his present personality aside from his attitude towards Ice, who has set up this whole thing in an attempt to get Shade to come back to him.  Obviously, the truth of why they split up will be revealed at some point, just not yet...there's still trauma to dump and magical girls to stab.  Kaeru Mizuko's art continues to be a bit on the busy side, although the action is generally still easy to follow despite all the frills and lace and energy effects (something she has a leg up on compared to Bukimi Miki over in Shy). I suppose you don't go into the magical girl manga biz these days if you're averse to over the top outfits (any animated adaptation would probably need to simplify some of the outfits, though, even if mostly CG animated).  Despite their grit, determination, and (in Peony's case) bitchiness, the magical girls are a bit outnumbered at the end of the volume, so of course there's a Final Page Shocker.  Heh.  Recommended.  $11.99/$15.99Cn/#8.99UK, rated Teen for fantasy violence, actual violence, and implied childhood trauma.

The Amazing Digital Circus vol 1: Viz - I have not watched the show, although I can't exist in the online spaces I do without knowing some of the spoilers from the finale.  When I saw this solicited, I was thinking it'd be a cel book or otherwise a color work trying to capture the appearance of the show, but it's straight up black and white manga, right to left reading order and all.  This adapts the first episode, and from skimming the TADC Wiki (of course one exists) entry on the episode after reading this, it looks like this is a pretty faithful adaptation.  It's apparently a Tron-style "enter the computer" isekai, but at this point neither the reader nor the characters (other than Caine, the ringmaster, who isn't about to provide reliable information) know if the human bodies still exist out in meatspace, if they've died, or if this is a full Tron-style transubstantiation (the headsets everyone remembers putting on argue against the full Tron, but this may be a dodge).  Anyway, the game the protagonist has fallen into is bright and colorful and happy and truly horrible.  The downsides of being a living toon are suggested pretty early on, and around the midpoint of the volume we get the obligatory "cast member has something horrible happen to them so that the protagonist knows there's worse fates than just being trapped forever" bit featuring a character based on Koko the Clown.  The protagonist, randomly renamed Pomni, is a sort of jester doll archetype, but there's not a strong unifying theme to the forms of the other characters beyond "something you might see in a show for kids."  Jax, the designated asshole, is a rabbity thing who's like the worst side of Bugs Bunny, Ragatha is basically just a Raggedy Ann riff, Zooble is a 90s-ish abstract construction toy, Kinger is a chess king in a robe, and gangle is a tragedy or comedy mask with ribbons for limbs (probably fits the loose theme the worse).  The ringleader Caine has giant wind up teeth for a head, with big googly eyes on the tongue.  I would said it might be reading too much into things to infer that Caine is somehow connected to the Biblical Cain and the Amazing Digital Circus is a sort of purgatory he runs in the Land of Nod, but having seen some Discourse on the show I think it's safe to say there's no such thing as reading too much into this series.  I mean, I'm probably wrong, but I'm not out of line to think so.  (It helps that I also recently binged the webcomic Misfits in Toyland, which has similar themes and had Zooble as a background cameo, and I'm pretty sure THAT place is Purgatory in the pre-Vatican-II sense.)  No, I don't plan to watch the show, but I like the story enough I'll keep reading the manga.  Recommended.  $11.99/$15.99Cn/#8.99UK, rated Teen for existential horror.

Spy x Family vol 16: Viz - Donovan Desmond's wife opens up to "Doctor Forger," and her claims seem totally insane...but that's only because Loid doesn't know his daughter is a telepath and the family dog is precognitive.  To the reader, her claims are almost plausible, although keeping the genre tropes in spy territory would require she be mistaken...it's probably something entirely different but equally implausible and fantastic.  As important as this thread is to the overall Operation Strix plot, though, this is one of those volumes that doesn't linger too much on any one storyline.  We also get Anya starting the new semester and dealing with classroom shuffles, and Yor going on a business trip for the Garden.  A bit more of her employer's motivation and professional ethics are laid out, and we finally meet more of her non-cover-job coworkers, some of whom are...not well.  Even by the standards of the existing cast of this book.  Assassination may not attract the most emotionally healthy people, who knew?  Recommended.  $11.99/$15.99Cn/#8.99UK, rated Older Teen for violence, mostly Yor and her coworkers this time around. 

Kafka sure has...
changed.

Kaiju No. 8 vol 16: Viz - The grand finale, an oversized volume to get it all in here rather than having a puny vol 17 (the creator admits to some worries about botching the pacing in terms of planning out the cover art).  Still regular price, though, which is both nice and also unexpected from a lifelong U.S. comics reader accustomed to special oversized installments costing more.  It's all on the line here, Kafka has given up his chance for a normal life (or a continued life, if things go badly) to help the spirits of long-dead warriors redeem themselves and finally defeat the mega-kaiju they failed to stop long ago.  Meanwhile, bratty little sister character Shinomiya also has one last chance to do or die (or do and die) and surpass both of her parents in order to help avenge her father and save Japan.  It doesn't help that her father isn't entirely dead, just subsumed into the mega-kaiju, so that there's some mega-angst to overcome.  Of course, Captain Mina needs to be part of the final assault, since everything Kafka has done in his life has been aimed at being her equal and partner in protecting Japan.  Her contribution isn't as emotional (frankly, Shinomiya has a LOT more issues that needed working through, even with extra page count Mina has to just cope), but she does get to fire the biggest gun she's ever fired, which has to have made her day.  In the end, Japan is saved, a surprisingly large number of named characters survived, and Naoya Matsumoto did not seal off Oz, as it were.  Like, the biggest threat ever known has been dealt with, but it's not like Kaiju were "solved" by this.  The surviving characters still have work to do, if hopefully an easier job of it for a while.  This may be the end of the "why Kaiju No 8 exists" story, but even leaving aside the side stories (which I haven't read, since they were by other authors), there's room for more stories with Kafka Hibino once Matsumoto feels like picking up the threads.  Strongly recommended.  $11.99/$15.99Cn/#8.99UK, rated Teen for fantasy monster on monster ultraviolence and some bloodied humans. 

Expected next month: Man, a bunch of stuff originally set for September has been pushed back, in one case after I'd already pre-ordered it.  Wolf's Daughter vol 4 won't reach me until October, although I think that was a stocking issue rather than resolicitation.  Journey To The West is pushed back to late October, probably won't be in my hands until November.  Another book I was planning to check on the shelf is pushed all the way back to mid-November.  So, assuming none of the following books are similarly or further delayed, I should review Wolf's Daughter vol 4, Ichi the Witch vol 5, Monster Cats vol 4, Chainsaw Man vol 22, Infini-T Force vol 10 (of 10), Magilumiere Magical Girls Inc. vol 15 next month.

Other Trades:

Trade paperbacks, collections, graphic novels, whatever. If it's bigger than a "floppy" but not Manga, it goes here.  

The Last Human in a Crowded Galaxy: Dark Horse Comics - There's no "volume 1" on the cover or in the indicia, but since it doesn't cover as much of the story as the webcomic, I expect a second volume to be in the works.  This is actually the third time I've read a version of this story, I started with the webcomic (and thought this would just be a collection of that), then the prose novel set in an alternate version of the universe where the main character Sarya managed to remain undetected until her late teens, and now this.  This print edition is a reworking of the webcomic (the art evolved significantly over the early episodes), with the story tightened up and rearranged somewhat.  Where the webcomic meandered a bit before letting things go to hell, pretty much day one back in civilization Sarya gets on the radar of the Auditor and things start to go badly.  Later parts of this book seem to use the same art as the webcomic with reformatting and adjusted backgrounds, but even then the pacing is adjusted and several scenes play out differently.  Sarya reaches about the point she is in at episode 35 of the webcomic, while the Widow/Auditor scene only gets to about where it was in episode 33.  Note, the webcomic stopped updating at episode 41, which was the second part of a three part finale, although it does look like the third part would have been mostly epilogue and cleanup, as the big emotional climax happened in ep 41.  Sooo, all that aside, the basic premise of all three versions is that a scary spider lady adopts a young human girl while out on an archaeology expedition, but humans are considered bogeymen by the rest of the civilized galaxy for reasons never really made clear to Sarya (who doesn't even start the story knowing she's a human).  Despite being raised in a culture of savagery and murder by her adoptive mother, she excels at making friends wherever she goes, especially among artificial life forms...which causes problems.  Is this tendency why the galaxy fears humans?  I dunno.  The prose novel answered that question, but I don't feel like this version will go in that much darker direction, if only because some of the key pieces aren't even on the board yet in the comics.  (Also, though, kiddie Sarya doesn't feel right for the darker tone of late-teen Sarya's alternate universe, even if the universe itself is the same outside of her immediate reach.)  A good read, enough I don't mind reading it multiple times, I just hope we get the rest of this story.  Recommended.  $14.99/$19.99Cn

Expected next month: The Moonlit Spiral (Mike Maihack original property).

Floppies:

No, I don't have any particular disdain for the monthlies, but they are floppy, yes? (And not all of them come out monthly, or on a regular schedule in general, so I can't just call this section "Monthlies" or even "Periodicals" as that implies a regular period.)

 

Fantastic Four #14: Marvel - A done in one story featuring the Four's adopted Kree and Skrull kids, as well as a cute bit of foreshadowing that I'm kinda ashamed I didn't pick up on.  This is very much a Ryan North FF story, in that it depends on a weird math or science thing and is ultimately solved in a non-punching way.  Recommended if you like that sort of thing.  $4.99, rated Teen for math.

Fantastic Four #15: Marvel - This is the 65th Anniversary issue, and is largely an excuse to revisit famous scenes and artists from the title's history.  The premise is that Nicholas Scratch apparently heard he'd been punked a few issues ago and has launched another outre attack on the Four (I swear, he's getting more exposure from Ryan North than from all other sources this century), sending them hurtling back in time. They can manage to live forwards for only a brief time every several years, but this lets them contact a brilliant if unappreciated young woman in the 1800s.  She dedicates her life to learning enough science to save them, and eventually does, reversing their trajectory in time and letting them revisit those famous scenes and artists before getting home and dealing with Scratch.  If this review reads as a summary of the issue, that's because most of the actual issue reads as a summary of the events of the issue.  I liked the too-short first chapter, it could easily have been reworked into a full issue on its own, but the homage splash pages weren't given enough room to really be comprehensive and ended up just feeling kinda indulgent and taking away pages that the first chapter could've used.  I mean, this is an oversized issue, but not oversized enough to really do justice to its premises.  Mildly recommended.  $5.99, rated Teen for no particular reason.

Moon Knight #6-7: Marvel - In #6, Marc assembles another lineup of the Midnight Sons to help him assault the possessed Midnight Mansion, and in #7 they fight their way through until the Shocking Twist.  Well, "Moon Knight is an asshole" isn't that shocking of a twist, but the devil can be in the details.  Structurally, it's your basic "I'm in, you bastard" sort of heist movie plot, and #7 gets up to where Things Go Wrong As They Always Do, but the effect is a bit marred by the fact that the Midnight Sons all have a fair amount of plot immunity so there's only so many ways this can go.  Mildly recommended mainly because it's two issues largely in service to however the twist pays off in #8, and while they're not bereft of interesting bits of business it's writing for the trade more heavily than MacKay usually does.  $4.99 each, rated Teen+ for a lot of violence.

Gatchaman #20: Mad Cave - Meh.  Yeah, the obviously evil savior types reveal their obvious plan and chuckle about how it's too late to stop them, but then they get stopped by a single clever trick that they were too arrogant to see coming.  There's a lot of potential for good stories in this revival, but Humphries doesn't seem to be the one to tell them.  Very mildly recommended.  $4.99, rated Teen for fantasy violence.

Red Impulse #4 (of 4): Mad Cave - There isn't really any sort of arc to this series, just four disconnected one-shots.  If anything makes this "earn" the cleanup spot, it's that Kentaro (leader of Red Impulse) actually interacts with Gatchaman, who doesn't know Kentaro is his father.  While the overt conflict is against Galactor as usual (who lose because their mecha designers are stupid), the real conflict is between the parenting styles of Kentaro and Nambu, and frankly they're both very bad at it.  Like, wire father and barbed wire father.  Mildly recommended.  $4.99, rated Teen+ for more spy-action violence.

Thundarr the Barbarian #6 (of 6): Dynamite - Yep, another "redo the origin story and then wait to see if there's interest in more" licensed property comic.  The various time loops close, implying that the timeline of the cartoon is what results (although, to be honest, I don't recall the cartoon Ariel having contempt for her father), then it skips ahead to an epilogue that suggests they're rather less confident that there will be demand for more.  I'm honestly trying to not give up on floppies entirely, but I may stop bothering with any other nostalgia properties Dynamite licenses, because I'm getting a bit of Origin Revision Fatigue.  Mildly recommended...it's a decent story and has a resolution, I just wish they'd tried something else, like a continuing series.  $4.99, rated Teen for fantasy violence.

Vampirella #4-5 (Legacy #691-2): Dynamite - It's not just the out of order storytelling, I think there's actually some pieces missing from these issues, as if artist Goetten just skipped entire scenes in order to give more pages to the ones he liked, and the editor just sort of let it happen.  Like, the big clash at the end of #4 made no sense until an "as you know, this thing happened" line in #5, which itself might've been Priest trying to salvage the comprehensibility of the story.  I'll probably still stick with the title as long as Priest does, but I'm not exactly happy with Dynamite editorial and other top-level decision-making.  Mildly recommended for the bits that can be made sense of, I'd suggest waiting for trades on this series though.  $4.99 each, rated Teen+ for blood and near-nudity.

Godzilla's Monsterpiece Theater Presents: Roar of the Worlds #1: IDW - Rather than just putting Godzilla into the original story, the story is moved from late 1800s Europe to late 1800s Japan.  Since it was imitating Europe in a lot of ways as part of modernization, this doesn't change a whole lot, but it does let some of the archetypes from the original Godzilla movie slip into the story.  Kyle Baker did all the creative work on the main story (Scioli does another short Robin Hood backup which is...meh), and he's playing it straight the way the original Godzilla movie did.  Very grim and melodramatic with the protagonist struggling with conflicting duties.  I guess this continues the pattern for me of liking Baker's comedic works more than his serious ones, though.  Mildly recommended.  $7.99, no rating.

Expected next time: Skip month.

Dvandom, aka Dave Van Domelen, is an Associate Professor of Physical Science at Amarillo College, maintainer of one of the two longest-running Transformers fansites in existence (Ben Yee insists I was first, I'm not so sure), finally got rain here so of course there was flooding, is an occasional science advisor in fiction, and part of the development team for the upcoming City of Titans MMO.

 

"Aren't you the ditz from that dive bar?"  "Funny, that's what I've been calling you."  "Touché." - Lobo and Supergirl