Comic Journal

Beware spoilers right now. If I would've known that the overarching story of this comic is about evil aliens from another dimension taking over the world I would never have read it. Instead I was lured in with a promise of a politically charged graphic novel, something that wasn't delivered after say the first two volumes.

What the fuck is going on in this comic? I thought the superhero crap was out of place from the first issue and now they're placing all the focus on that and poor Lost-like mysteries and remote controlled mice and assassinating the pope and aaaaaaa

A bizarre, but utterly hilarious sequel to The Three Musketeers, in which the only remaining of the trio is transported to Mars to destroy a laser-cannon hellbent on destroying earth. He befriends a robot, the evil emperor's daughter, and duels with Rochefort for the last time. The fact that someone made this sequel makes it all the more enjoyable.

Jason goes all out in this Hitchcockian murder mystery. The intensity is almost unbearable despite the story not being terribly original. There however is an unseen thematical strength within it as this simple allegory deals not only with questions of our self-worth, but with how we aim to please others more than ourselves even with acts most bold.

A comic that occasionally reaches lows no comic should reach with simple narrative devices, The Boys is an occasionally uninteresting, but sometimes brilliant piece revolving around regular humans spying on bad superheroes. Too bad that the concept isn't fully realized and the storylines often feel almost patterned after the one that came before.

A nice collection of shorts. Some are better than others. The over-long chess western is probably the highlight of the book.

Jason's masterpiece about life. A Bergmanesque minimalistic and ultimately incredibly depressing study on the amazing ability of humans to ignore our own wishes and needs in order to not feel any different than we did the day before.

There is nothing one can say about this comic that hasn't already been said - it's a masterpiece, one of the medium's most intriguing and exciting works. As daring as it is exciting, there's very little to complain about here aside from the ending not quite reaching the tenacity of the ending of the Crusader-story arc.

Ennis's Punisher MAX is overall some of the most solid comic work I've ever read, and this finale doesn't shy away from that. The final ten-twenty pages are worthy of an Eisner-reward without a doubt.