Today may have been the best Wednesday of the year. So many great comics, so little time.
Saga #1
Wow...just wow. Now, I'm not overselling this....I won't say it's the best comic of the year, or anything so bold...yet. But in a market that is currently putting so much stock in "high concept" comics, it's really nice to see a premise that obviously will need more than a 6 issues to wrap up nicely. The "Romeo & Juliet Vs. Star Wars" generalizations that this has been getting are apt. There is so much to explore with these characters, and you can tell that Vaughan is giddy at the opportunity to do so. Fiona Staples might not have been the artist that would first come to mind for a massive space epic like this, but I really think that her dark, rough pencils suited this perfectly.
Rating: A-
Secret History Of DB Cooper #1
My personal favourite of today's haul. If Richard Ellson and Mike Mignola had an art baby, it's name would be Brian Churilla, and his near-surreal pencils perfect for this psychedelic action comic. The premise is thus: In 1971, A man going by the name of DB Cooper pulled off the greatest crime in American history...and got away with it. This is his "true" history as a psychic assassin for the CIA, and the open-ended nature of the premise allows Churilla to go absolutely ballistic when it comes to the art.
Rating: A+
Saucer Country #1
Rarely has such an interesting premise been let down so much by it's execution. There's nothing "wrong" with this comic per se, except that like most of Cornell's work the plot gets completely lost in the name of "writing". Rather than tell a solid, linear story, Cornell uses dreams and flashbacks to set up his plot, but not particularly well, and the story ends up being a lot more complicated than he probably meant it to be.
Rating:
C-
Conan #2
Now we're talking! After a bit of a muddled first issue, Wood and Cloonan are firing on all-cylinders, with a rollicking pirate fight on the high seas. I really enjoyed this, and felt that the characterization of Conan here was perfect. This is the bad-ass adventure-seeking Conan that we all know and love, and Cloonan's art fit the tone of the fight scenes perfectly.
B+
