Aquaman #25 by Geoff Johns (Comics Review)

After twenty-six months on the relaunched title, Geoff Johns’ run finally comes to an end with this issue. Responsible for reintroducing the character to comics fans everywhere and making him as big a character as he could, Geoff revamped Aquaman and made him into one of DC’s definite heavy-weights. The title has recorded some high sales and the collected editions have even made it to the New York Times Bestseller’s List. Now that is impressive for a character who was largely relegated to suffering fish-jokes, despite always being a mainstream DC hero.

As is appropriate, Geoff closes out his run on the title by closing out his current arc as well, Death of A King. He created some wonderful mythology for the character, giving his backstory an epic scope that I definitely did not expect. Even with this final issue, he goes some places that I didn’t expect and he wowed me. He goes out with a definitive bang and leaves a teaser for his next crossover arc that is coming next year, Rise of The Seven Seas, which will unfold in the pages of Aquaman (under Jeff Parker) and Geoff’s own Justice League. Exciting times!

Agents of SHIELD Season 1 Ep 9 (TV Show Review)

Last week I talked about how uneven Agents of SHIELD was in terms of story quality, and I mentioned that the show flip-flopped with good and bad storylines every other week with almost a regularity to it. Still, it is very early days yet for the show, we are barely two months into it in fact, and so I can sort of accept such unevenness since a lot of shows struggle at this point in their development. The creators have to work from scratch, have to spread themselves around and hit on the magical story that will truly resonate with viewers and keep bringing them back in droves every week.

I’ve said again and again that this show is a very promising one and that it needs to take chances and be truly bold. It has a solid premise, it just needs to work on its execution, which is where it is most lacking for now. This week’s episode does some really interesting things and best of all it finally gives a reason for why Agent Melinda May gave up field-work and took a desk-job. At the same time, we also get an indirect Thor: The Dark World tie-in, which is just in keeping with last week’s episode which was much more of a tie-in than this one. However, the show still continued its “villain of the week” pattern and that was most disappointing, more so since there was a distinct lack of any story elements related to the previous episodes.

NANP: Method To Madness

On Thanksgiving Day I bring to you Kenny Soward, the author of the GnomeSaga series and a regular short fiction writer, for the latest on Names: A New Perspective. I haven’t had a chance to read his work yet, the first GnomeSaga novel Rough Magic still awaits me on my iPad, but he’s certainly one of the more interesting authors I’ve been meaning to read for a while. Kenny is also a fellow contributor to the Manifesto: UF, which saw the publication of my short story Dharmayoddha and his story Gold Dust Woman was a stand-out story. Hopefully after reading this post you’ll be interested in his work as well. I certainly encourage you to check it out at least.

The Flash #25 by Brian Buccellato and Francis Manapul (Comics Review)

In the final week of the month, with the crossover tie-ins for Scott Snyder’s Zero Year wrapping up, we get a one-shot from Brian Buccellato and Francis Manapul, who’ve served as one of the most consistent teams in the New 52, with other artists coming and going throughout the entire run so far. I only started reading the title quite recently and I’ve been very impressed with the two of them. Their recent issues have been quite excellent and this one is the same, albeit taking a slight hit due to the whole crossover concept for Zero Year.

This is Brian and Francis’ last issue on the title as a team, with Francis moving on to Detective Comics while Brian sticks around for a few issues still. This is not the amazing story I expected them to end their run with, but its still pretty good. Like most of the other Zero Year titles, this issue shows a slice of events happening in Gotham just before the storm of the century hits the city, already suffering from lawlessness and loss of power. Its a fairly good look at Barry before he became Flash, and I quite enjoyed his portrayal, which is kind of how I imagine him being introduced in CW’s Arrow next week for his 2-parter cameo on the show.