Posts tagged reviews

[This was originally posted on my ComicVine blog in response to a growing number of comments I’ve received saying that I should be grading books higher based on… nothing really at all. I thought I would write a response.]

Every week, I write four to five comic book reviews for ComicVine as a freelancer. I’ve been working with them since May of 2010, and have enjoyed my time here immensely so far; the quests are fun and it gives me a platform to write about a medium I love.

Since CV requires me to quantify my reviews in a star rating, there seems to be an increasing number of people who take issue with them. While I’d like to say that every review gets at least one comment questioning a score, that wouldn’t be true: four to five-star reviews remain relative feedback ghost towns.

So instead of responding to each comment as they come, I’ve decided to head them off at the pass and post a blog on how I come to my score decisions.

I’d like to preface this by saying that I try to be as honest as possible, and that a book with a large amount of hype is not immune from bad scores. As always, reviews are supposed to be subjective, and the fact that I didn’t like a book doesn’t mean you will, as well.

In short, there’s really no reason to post angry comments saying “this score should be higher” because, really, it shouldn’t. I’m confident in what I gave the book, and stand by it.

Read more …

This week was nice in that I got to review two books I actually enjoyed a whole bunch: Wolverine #18 and Fear Itself #7.2.

However, the former takes the cake for how much it makes me feel like I’m watching Big Trouble in Little China. It therefore automatically becomes my pick of this week’s comics.

Some tidbits:

• Fat Cobra makes an appearance, which can only make the issue better. If you want good kung fu in Marvel, you have to go with one of Matt Fraction’s Immortal Iron Fist creations.
• The Jade Claw is a sexy, threatening villain. The “my cheapest bra cost more than what it would take to feed your family for a year” line illustrated her power in one sentence.
  However, it’s weird to think about international drug queenpins still dealing with mundane things like bras.
• I really like it when Wolverine takes a break from brooding and almost becomes a straight man to the Gorilla Man/Fat Cobra hi-jinks. It’s good to see the character portrayed in a lighter tone every once and awhile.
• My only real complaint is that it doesn’t really fit into the Regenesis event, and that it seems really mislabeled as such. It seems to be a “tying up loose ends” type of story, but I didn’t need the false advertising.

Other than that last point, it’s a really good issue. I blogged about next month’s Wolverine cover last week, so you should pick that up as well to round out the story.

Till next week, cheers! Reblog, like and retweet if you like this!

Also: would this maybe be better in a vlog format?

Haven’t done this in awhile, but here’s my comic reviews for this week!

Secret Avengers #18

David Aja’s art is gorgeous, and thankfully he got to play to his strength here: kung fu. Having Shang-Chi as a “guest star” definitely makes me smile, and Aja’s art style fromImmortal Iron Fist contributes wonderfully to the fight sequences. Aja’s faces have also become less gritty - this isn’t a complaint, but I think it fits better with the mood of the book. It’s very light-hearted - almost like Chris Samnee drew Thor: The Mighty Avenger - but still allows for some dark-ish moments.

The Mighty Thor #7

The art in this issue is lovely, and it does a good job of showing what pre-Asgard architecture and aesthetic looked like. I’ve always enjoyed the quasi-futuristic tone that comes with the Norse gods, and this issue capitalizes on it.

Seeing an older Odin holding an infant Thor just made my heart melt.

Avengers Academy #20

One of the first comics I ever read was a West Coast Avengers issue, and I couldn’t help but think about how hokey it sounded; it took a good concept like the Avengers and just said “Yeah, we’re in a new setting! That’s cool, right?”

That’s what this issue felt like: a bunch of “shocking” events that ultimately didn’t mean jack in the long run. Will we ever see Vance Astro and Speedball’s road trip? Unlikely. Will we really care about the new recruits to the Avengers Academy (apart from Butterball, of course)? Not really. Do we want to see characters written like they were in the past, with actual emotions and feelings? I’d like to think so.

Annihilators: Earthfall #2 (of 3)

There’s often a problem with guest stars, as some writers don’t know how to handle them. The Avengers in this issue seemed a little bit off in dialog, but I guess that can be forgiven. The rest of the issue, dialog aside, seemed was definitely on the food side, but not amazing by any means.

It will be interesting to see how the team manages the new threat of what look like brainwashed/alien children, as they certainly can handle them, but the PR disaster they’re currently facing could make it interesting.