S.H.I.E.L.D. Notes #1: "The Unholy Resurrection of Leonardo da Vinci"

I mulled over doing some of these but honestly had no clue if there would be any interest in them. All credit goes to David Uzumeri of Funnybook Babylon fame for the original idea and format with his Batmannotations and the dudes of the Something Awful Comics Board for saying they actually wanted to see this. Let's see what we can come up with:

Issue One

Page 1: Enter Leonid. Described by Hickman as "The Eternal Dynamo... the great engine of the human machine. He represents progress, the advance of society and all that other cool stuff." He is cosmic in origin but human in form which gets explored more in issue #2.

Page 2: Panel 1 is Agents Richards and Stark, Fathers of Iron Man/Tony Stark and Mr. Fantastic/Reed Richards.

Howard Stark: I don't believe his appearance here is considered a retcon given that most of the stories he appeared in were set in the World War 2 era. I'm also not certain how this time line is going to work here with Marvel's sliding time scale. Tony originally became Iron Man around the period of Vietnam, which has now been retconned to Afghanistan, given that S.H.I.E.L.D. begins in 1953, we may or may not see this touched on.

Nathaniel Richards: Already known in the 616 universe for being a time traveler, his appearance here working for Shield isn't surprising given the book and organization's population of ordinary men who have stepped outside of the world in order to better humanity.

Useless trivia: I'm about 60% certain their car is based on the 1955 Thunderbird, and would certainly make sense as the prototype for S.H.I.E.L.D. flying cars. Although suicide doors are making a comeback, they were last popularly used on the 1971 model.

Panel 4 is our first glimpse of the cosmic powers of young Leonid.

Page 3: "I was taken to Rome." This isn't the first Hickman comic involve the city of Rome, his comic Pax Romana featured a Catholic Church that utilized time travel to try and shape the future of the world.

Page 4: The Eternal Place probably refers to the longevity of Rome through time. The Immortal City may or may not relate to the book, "Rome, The Immortal City" as well as the film, "The Immortal City" which appropriately features the tagline: "Where The Destiny Of The World Was Decided!"

I wasn't able to track down an origin for the headpiece the various councilmen are wearing. They may be original design by Dustin Weaver, but they do look similar to the headpiece work by Noh-Varr in issue three of the Grant Morrison/JG Jones comic, Marvel Boy. They may simply be an evolution of the headpiece worn by Imhotep as we see later on.

Page 5:  Panel 1 "Rome is built atop an older Rome and even more ancient layer lies beneath.."  I don't know if there is a city that has been destroyed and rebuilt more times than Rome, from the fires started by Nero, to the sacking by the various barbarian tribes during the Dark Ages.

Panel 2 "The Immortals" or the High Council of The Shield clearly aren't immortal barring some sort of Secret Warriors/Fantastic Four reveal.

Panel 3 I'm not sure what the appropriate name for this machine is, it is either an early typewriter or something that is recording the conversation. This is Howard Stark speaking into the machine however, what the ultimate goal is remains uncertain. The quote "Everything begins with an idea." has probably been spoken a thousand times over across the history, but is officially attributed to motivational speaker Earl Nightingale.

Page 6: A flashback to 2620 B.C. What we're seeing is the arrival of The Brood, created by Chris Claremont and Dave Cockrum. Their first appearance was Uncanny X-Men #155 (March 1982). Brood implant eggs much like the Aliens we all know in love and when the egg hatches, it takes over the host's body.

Page 7: The introduction of the first of our Action Philosopher (copyright Fred van Lente and Ryan Dunlavey of course!) Imhotep. To his right is one of the early incarnations of the Moon Knight, avatar of the Egyptian God, Khonshu. To his left, a young En Sabah Nur.

"This is not how the world ends!" is truly the mantra or motto of this comic and may or may not be a play on the T.S. Eliot quote, "This is the way the world ends" from his poem The Hollow Men. The poem dwells on the troubles of holding onto hope and was written after World War 1 which at that time had been the worst conflict the world had ever seen. Given that S.H.I.E.L.D. is a sort of sermon on the power and the ability of the mortal man to overcome adversity in a world of creatures and Gods, the two phrases juxtapose well.

Pages 8-9: This is just awesome.

Pages 10-12: Transition from Imhotep's shield to 1953 Rome. The shield is placed at the center of a diorama of our solar system, no doubt reflecting the believed importance of the agency. The quoted subjects by the councilmen are probably considered important components of the human intellect, but admittedly I don't know what to make of this quite yet.

Page 13: Flashback to 114 A.D. Zhang Heng, while having a palace is a statesman, not the Emperor. The Shield and Spear refer to Imhotep's weapons when he defeated the Brood, and the division of East and West is not uncommon throughout history, and began with the splitting of the Roman Empire by Diocletian, if not even earlier. What is he facing is one of the Celestials, created by Jack Kirby in his comic, The Eternals. This particular Celestial might be, Ashema the Listener, created by Peter David and Salvador LaRocca. Note the bird symbol on his chest piece.

Pages 15-17: Florence, 1495. The readied device is a early telescope for looking at the sun. What Leonardo da Vinci and his assistants are seeing is the impending arrival of Galactus, Devourer of Worlds, created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. In the workshop on the wall is Imhotep's shield again, and a  clockwork dog. The skull on the desk makes me wonder if da Vinci's desk is supposed to be the scene of this promo image:

Pages 18-20: Forward 8 years, da Vinci and his team have finally perfected what I could only describe as a one man flying spacesuit or maybe even a chronosuit for time travel. A better look at the workshop shows us several things: Imhotep's helmet, the headpiece being worn by the councilmen, a prototype airplane, and plenty more. I had originally predicted that the golden orb was early vibranium but that is probably not the case. Again, "This is not how the world ends."

Pages 21-23: 79 years in the future and it falls now to Galileo to stop Galactus.What they've constructed is an early version of the Ultimate Nulifier, the only weapon capable of intimidating Galactus. The weapon was first utilized by the Fantastic Four during the "Galactus Trilogy." The herald in this spread could possibly be Gabriel, the Air Walker.

Page 26: 1956 in Rome. The first appearance of The Night Machine, Leonid's father. We previously saw doves on page 15 at da Vinci's workshop. Given the last page reveal, The Night Machine and da Vinci are working together, the dove has a greater significance. I read a theory somewhere, it might have been David Uzumeri's Twitter, that predicted The Night Machine is actually Nikola Tesla and looking at their mustaches, I might have to agree.

Page 30: Richards and Stark utilizing some self-assembling Stark/Shield Tech and gravity boots. This is the first time in the story they're identified by name. If The Night Machine is Tesla, the "Aren't you supposed to be dead?" would refer to Tesla's death in 1943.

Page 32: Panel 3, the E that is top middle of the page is the constellation Cassiopeia, to the right of it is the Big Dipper, and on the bottom left is Andromeda. I doubt there is a deeper meaning here, just a portion of the sanctuary.

Extra Material: I'm not certain what I can say about this stuff. Section Four: The Source, I believe is a reference to Leonid, the Human Engine. If his purpose is to "stand in the gap" as Page 12 tells us, then he is what will allow humanity to bridge "the gap" towards Section Seven, "The Death of Chaos / Tomorrow" or simply, the future.

The Vitruvian Man is supposed to encompass the perfect symmetry of man, and thus the universe. Leonid would be the connection between sections three and five. What that means, I have no clue.

Brain Stew: SDCC Aftermath

So the San Diego ComicCon was this weekend and there were plenty of huge announcements that are going to shake some things up and may or may not make some people happy. Here are three big ones that caught my eye:

Batman Inc.: Definitely the biggest announcement and the one I had been waiting for was the reveal of this title, the next chapter in Grant Morrison's Batman epic. From what Grant and Dan Didio have said, the key idea of this book is about "franchising Batman" and will feature multiple Dark Knights. Admittedly, I can't help but feel pleased as back in April I mentioned this:

"Another outcome is to revisit something Tony Daniel touched on during his Battle for the Cowl mini: Multiple Batmen. The potential for artistic confusion seems infinite, but Bruce and Dick in differing costumes, prowling the city, if executed well could be a lot of fun."

Grant also mentioned that this will primarily be a Bat-Family team-up book like The Brave and the Bold which will no doubt be a ton of fun. Definitely one of the best things to come out of the con.

Amazing Spider-Man goes from a Brand New Day to the Big Time: Awhile back, Bleeding Cool News posted a story that the BND era of Amazing Spider-Man was coming to a close and this weekend Marvel confirmed it. After two years of thrice-a-month shipping with a brilliant rotating team of talent, ASM will switch to a bi-weekly schedule, written by Dan Slott with art by Marcos Martin, Paulo Siqueira and Humberto Ramos. Some of the teased bits included Spidey in a Fantastic Four outfit, plenty of costumes, the return of impact webbing and Mac Gargan's devolution into the Scorpion.

My first thought on this was to abandon ship but I think I may give it a shot. Dan Slott isn't Zeb Wells, Joe Kelly, FvL or Waid, but he has still done some fun things with the book and admittedly New Ways to Die is what got me buying ASM again. It looks like his primary goal is to make the book fun and take it somewhere fresh, especially with all the people asking why Peter is broke if he is on the Avengers and stuff. I'm down for a Peter that is more Batman than Booster Gold and the artistic talent is still top notch.

Power Man and Iron Fist On-going: I may have lied when I said that Batman Inc. was the biggest announcement, as I definitely went nuts when I read this. An Iron Fist title has been absent for over a year now since Duane Swierczynski's run ended and while I knew there was going to be a Power Man and Iron Fist mini tying into Shadowlands, the news that it would be a pre-cursor to a new on-going is fabulous news. What's even better is that it is going to be written by Fred Van Lente who is one of my favorite writers in the industry right now. I have no clue what direction this is going to take or even how much I'm going to like the new Power Man but I'm still very, very excited.

Brain Stew: Red Mass for Mars

After two years of waiting, the last issue of this series finally came out this week and much like the Christian Bale screaming at the dude on the set of Terminator: Salvation, I have no clue what could have caused such a delay. The final issue was a quick read so unless Ryan Bodenheim had some kind of artistic troubles, I imagine this issue just sat on someone's desk for a long time.

Given that the entire thing was written probably back in late 2007 - early 2008, it is very hard to align the current incarnation of Hickman with the underwhelming script of Mars. It is certainly an interesting concept: a Superman raised by "vikings" versus two good hearted farmers but was done much better by Mark Millar with his Red Son story. But while the plot is weak, plenty of Hickman's strengths still shine through, particularly his talent for world building which is some of the best in the industry. Also present are Hickman's potent monologues and dialogue and ability to write bad asses in general. Jonathan has single handedly revitalized Nick Fury for Marvel and although everyone associates him with science fiction properties, I would love to see him take a real shot at Captain America, be it Bucky Barnes or Steve Rogers.

Bodenheim's work is gorgeous, detailed and packed on the page, although the storytelling is quite basic but will certainly develop with practice. I can't help but wonder how this book would look without the signature Hickman colors however. After months of looking at full colored Marvel work, I had forgotten that Hickman's independent works are often colored solely in blacks, whites and earth tones to denote the present while reds and blues are used to accentuate or for flashbacks.

As a rookie project, Red Mass for Mars is a good early work and there are plenty of devices within that have clearly been harvested and refined for other works. It certainly isn't a must read and I doubt I could see myself pushing it on other people who weren't already interested in his work, but I didn't feel I was wasting my time either.

"One Moment in Time Part One" -- A Review and Discussion

I'm going to abandon my no-spoilers policy because I want to talk about this book in a little more depth, so if you haven't read the issue yet, move on please. Otherwise, join us down a bit.






























Amazing Spider-Man #638: So here it is, after the conclusion of "The Grim Hunt" last week, Joe Quesada, Marvel's Editor-in-Chief steps in to walk us through the fallout of the "One More Day" storyline, and reveal what happened to save Aunt May's life and establish the Brand New Day status quo. Picking up the threads from a two year old story, "One Moment in Time" is going to be a lot of things to a lot of different people. For the haters who have been hating on ASM since 2008, in their eyes, this is probably going to justify their hate. For those who joined the book recently, there is going to be a lot of confusion and for those who are willing to see it through to the end, hopefully there will be satisfying answers.

Personally, I think I fall into the latter category even though I am a total Mary-Jane fanboy. I caught the Spidey bug with Maximum Carnage, at age 7, so it took me years to truly understand who Gwen Stacy was, and why it was so important that she showed up during the Clone Saga. Because of that, I've never been a fan and Mary-Jane has always been my gal, so while I, like so many other people, were super critical of dissolving the marriage, I can't deny that the ends have certainly justified the means. Let's break the issue down a bit:

While we knew that the secret of Mary Jane's whisper was going to be a reveal, I, like I think a lot of people, were caught off guard by how minor it turned out to be. A number of theories I've read believed that Mary Jane was the architect of everything and so far that doesn't appear to be the case. There is still more to be revealed so the potential is there, but we'll have to wait and see.

I was also very surprised to see a lot of Quesada art haters come out of the woodwork for his framing pieces. I'm not a huge fan of the first Mary-Jane page, but everything else was at least decent, although the people who've written pages about Joe Q being obsessed with Peter to the point of drawing him to look like himself are just off the rails.

If there is one group of people I want to hear from when this is over, it will be those who suggested that this should have been released as a remixed version of the Wedding Annual issue, which is essentially what they've done here. I wasn't shocked that they cannibalized it but was actually anticipating Rivera simply re-drawing a lot of the issue, rather than them actually replicating pages of the comic.

That said, Rivera's art really is gorgeous here isn't it? It is like the perfect blend of modern and classic and does a fantastic job of supplementing the annual pages, capturing the Silver Age feel while bringing quality storytelling to the additional parts. He colors his own work and his mastery shows, this is probably the biggest project he has had to date and I hope it lands him something huge in the future.

So through one issue, the whisper is revealed and the wedding failed to happen because Mephesto as a bird managed enact some Butterfly Effect, releasing a criminal and allowing the resulting actions to lead to Peter being knocked unconscious and missing the wedding. It is definitely going to be interesting to see where things go from here, as this first issue ends in unison with the annual. Everything after this is off the map so to speak, which means full time Rivera but everything written is from Quesada.

Overall, a solid issue. I do think that this is going to be a story that relies more on the whole than the sum of the parts however. If I had to rate this issue on its own, I would probably give it a B-, but I'll give it to the conclusion.

"I saw it on the "youtube."" Reviews for 07/21/2010

No Bendis or X-Men this week! Taste it Second Coming!

Dark Wolverine #88: One of the best things to come out of Marvel's Dark Reign event was putting Daniel Way's character, Daken, in the Bendis-written Dark Avengers, and letting Way push a Dark Wolverine book. As the son of Wolverine, the character continues the Snikkiting and invincibility of his Old Man, but has a much more devious and self-centered attitude, as well as pheromone powers. During Dark Reign's "The List" mini-event, Osborn used Daken to kill the Punisher, kicking off the Frankencastle storyline and now it is time for Round 2. In terms of plot, the comic is straightforward. Way and Liu set up a great bit that ties into their current long-form story and giving current DW fans some scenes to enjoy that do an excellent job of introducing Daken in a more personal way for Remender readers. After that, Frank hits the pages and it is pure action. Nothing visually crazy, but a very enjoyable beat-em up with some decent dialogue as the two banter back and forth now that the field is a little more even. I wish there was a bit more plot here, but I honestly wasn't expecting much more than 4 issues of violence from this story. At this point, the potential to surprise is there but I'll continue to enjoy this story the way I enjoy Michael Bay flicks, from a purely popcorn and entertainment perspective. B-

Brightest Day #6: Last week I threatened to drop the book after this week and clearly someone listened to me. Or maybe the quality of the book is just inverted to the amount of pages that the Hawkpeople get. It also helped that the issue primarily spotlighted my two favorite characters, Martian Manhunter and Firestorm. The evidence continues to build for my theory that the revived people are still Black Lanterns and that their quest will be to complete some task to purge them, and apparently we'll find out in two weeks. The book remains gorgeous, as it should with all the talent on it but I, like everyone else, am totally over the amount of pointless murder in this series. Johns and Tomasi need to find some ways of generating cliffhangers that don't rely on violence and maybe start interacting with the wider DC universe. This book has the potential to go great places, but I honestly don't know if it will. What I can definitively say is, I will be dropping this for sure after the next issue as that will be where the first trade ends, unless it absolutely blows me away. B

Heroic Age: Prince of Power #3: This continues to be one of the best books on the stands and with the team on it, how could it not? Man, that is almost verbatim from the quote on the cover, but it is so true. Pak and Van Lente continue to shine, producing a comic that crackles with wit, sparks with action and remains full of plot and forward progress to a story that is closing in on 50 issues. Cho and Thor continue their search for the Book of Thoth, battling their way through Mythology to a semi-predictable end, meanwhile Athena and Cho's Gorgon-girlfriend work to escape from the Olympus Group prison. These stories are so well researched and enjoyable that it almost makes me wonder if College Mythology courses are going to start teaching with them and what kind of progress could be made. My only qualm with this book is how often it taps into pop-culture and current trends, I saw a quote somewhere that said, "As soon as you refer to something real, you've dated your book." and I can't disagree. And yet, how can you not love a comic that refers to Indiana Jones, Terminator 3, and Lolcats in an original and hilarious fashion? The art team continues to kill it on this book as well, the characters look great, the action is crisp and the layouts and storytelling are top notch. This book is a classic case of one that I always find drifting to the middle of my stack, but as soon as I read it I realize it has made a very, very solid case for potential book of the week. A must-read series. A+

Deadpool #25: At long last, another Deadpool anniversary issue. While Way hasn't recaptured the magic of Deadpool vs Bullseye from last year, he continues to write enjoyable, zany adventures for DP to embark on. The stories aren't anything particularly special, but the biggest credit I can give them is that they're fun, fairly witty and do an excellent job of balancing Deadpool's insanity with his skills and plotting of a trained mercenary. This month resolves Wade's pitstop in Las Vegas on his journey to become a hero with the expected results. Carlo Barberi has really surprised me with his pencils, for the longest time I had considered Paco Medina to be my "definitive" Deadpool artist, but I may rescind that if Barberi continues on the book. The biggest surprise was the bonus story, by personal favorite Duane Swierczynski and features art from Phillip Bond. The 10 page quickie also features "3-D glasses" that help you simulate DP's vision in the tale, which just happens to be non-existent. A fun extra where a blind Wade faces off against some villains, the plot is barely present and really just let's these two creators have some fun. Swierczynski continues to be my favorite Deadpool writer, having produced a great story in Deadpool #900 last fall, a mini called Wade Wilson's War that is on-going at the moment, and a fabulous Origin story that came out last week. The way he handles Wilson's inner dialogue continues to improve with each issue and his imagination for crazy situations is a perfect fit. If Way ever gives up the book, I really hope they'll consider bringing him in. Until then, I'll take it where I can get it. As I told Mr. Bond earlier in the day, him and Duane plus + "3-D glasses" = A+