Bushido #5 by Rob Levin (Comics Review)

And finally this mini-series is at an end. Its a been a long road, all five weeks of October to be precise, but the story is done and dusted and there have been some important changes in the status quo of Feudal Japan, changes that have rocked the island nation and its foundations. And there have been heroes here, and villains aplenty as Rob Levin brought this screenplay to life as a comic.

When I first picked up this mini-series, I wasn’t expecting it to be as good as it turned out. Not really. I thought it’d be decent fun and that was that at the time. But then I began reading it, tuning in each week for the next installment, and finally we are here as Rob Levin closes out the story of Kichiro and Orochi, of a Vampire invasion of Nippon. This week’s final issue turned out to be fairly good, but it was still plagued by all the deficiencies of the previous issue unfortunately.

Bushido #3-4 by Rob Levin (Comics Review)

As we move into the final days of the month, Rob Levin’s comics adaptation of the “Rising Sun” screenplay by Shahin Chandrasoma also draws to a close. Today sees the release of the fourth issue, and then there is one more left till this mini-series completes up and we get the full story of Kichiro’s coming of age from a gaijin to a samurai.

By injecting vampires and their brutality into this story of feudal japan and a denied romance between Kichiro and the Shogun’s daughter, Mitsuko, Levin and Chandrasoma have done much to create their own (inspired) setting. Its certainly been a fun ride this far but the cracks are somewhat showing now. This remains a pretty fun mini-series, but I’m still waiting for it to really step up.

Comics Picks of The Week 16.10.2013

This was another week with me reading far more non-DC comics than DC comics, as was the case in September. Lots of great variety in the comics this week, especially a lot of exciting new series with their first issues. There are a few other series that I’m looking forward to reading in the next few days, particularly catching up with some favourites like Bill Willingham’s Fables, of which I’ve read the first two volumes, and some Top Cow books.

Which brings me to the my usual complaint with my comics reading: the lack of being able to read any graphic novels. I fully expected to be able to move through at least two this week but I got caught up reading a really big fantasy novel that proved to be a tough slog, not to mention a sudden fascination with the Candy Crush game on my iPad and my smartphone, so I’ve been whiling away a lot of time. No idea what’s gonna happen this week, but as always, I’m hopeful!

In the meantime, here’s another edition of this new feature. Full reading list, as always, is available here and all my comics reviews are available here.

Comics Picks of The Week 09.10.2013

Finally, this was a week where my non-DC reading far out-stripped my DC reading. Villain’s Month really seems to have taken a toll with my reading, what with reading like seven or eight titles a week. Things are finally becoming more normal, and that’s excellent in and of itself. Lots of Dark Horse and IDW reading as well this week, which was really nice, since I’m playing catch-up with a few of their titles and really need to be getting down to read these issues.

However, no luck with reading any graphic novels again this week. I had hoped to read at least one during my flight back to Dubai from Delhi but things didn’t work out like that since I slept on the entire flight, all three and a half hours of it. That’s something I suppose. But now I have the time I hope so will see what happens.

In the meantime, here’s another edition of this new feature. Full reading list, as always, is available here and all my comics reviews are available here.

Bushido #2 by Rob Levin (Comics Review)

Like I said last time, the fertility of vampires in fiction is at an all-time high these days. Novels or comics, movies or TV shows, they are everywhere, and the horror/urban fantasy genre is doing really well as a result. Frankly, there couldn’t be a better time really if you wanted to write vampires because now is the time to truly differentiate your work from the rest.

And this is what Rob Levin has done with Bushido. Vampires and samurai are a fairly interesting mix to throw together for a story, more so when it is in the medium of comics. Rob Levin presented a fairly interesting take in the first issue of his new mini-series for Top Cow and it proved to be a delightful read. Keeping up the momentum isn’t always easy for a mini-series but Levin looks to be set to do just that with his second issue.

Comics Picks of The Week 02.10.2013

This week was filled with reading a lot more than just the regular DC books. I read a fair amount of Marvel stuff this time, and also other titles from other publishers, particularly Vertigo, which is a DC imprint. A lot of these comics were really good, some not so much, and that’s pretty much normal really. Never a full week of solid comics. An impossibility I think.

I wasn’t able to get around to reading any graphic novels this time around, sadly, mostly because I was caught up reading a really big fat military space opera novel. It was written by a favourite author so that helped get over that a little bit but the book still took too much time. Not to mention that I was generally short on time so had to make do with reading single issues.

Perhaps this week I can get a couple graphic novels down!

In the meantime, here’s another edition of this new feature. Full reading list, as always, is available here and all my comics reviews are available here.

Bushido #1 by Rob Levin (Comics Review)

Given the success enjoyed by certain franchises of late (like in the last five years or so), Vampires are everywhere these days. Whether it is in movies or books or TV shows or whatever, there’s at least something going on with them at any given time. Of course, comics have long been a fertile ground for this horror subgenre, particularly if you look at the Vampirella pulp comic that is still alive and kicking today or the various current ongoing comics such as Scott Snyder’s American Vampire.

Joining all these titles is Rob Levin’s latest, an adaptation of a screenplay as it turns out. Levin, who has worked on various Top Cow/Image properties before, is back with a story involving vampires and samurai in feudal Japan, a setting that I really enjoy in any medium, and with the type of characters that I love reading about.