Review: Sabretooth: Back to Nature

Writer: Jorge Gonzalez
Artist: Frank Teran
Published: Marvel, 1998; $5.99

As I’ve mentioned a few times before, I’m not the biggest fan of villains who are psychopathic killers, or ones who are just straight-up evil. I’m much more interested in the complexities of a character like Magneto, who sincerely believes that he’s doing the right thing even when people are dying as the result of his actions. Characters like these give us the opportunity to reassess the heroes – to ask what reasons the “good guys” have for fighting, and thus to either affirm their actions as truly “heroic” or to recognize them as being more flawed than perhaps we initially thought.

Not so for a character like Sabretooth. Here is an individual who relishes in murder and depravity, for no other reason than that some people seem to think that makes him a good foil for Wolverine. And while I suppose he does occasionally work on that level – that is, as an external manifestation of the “man vs. beast” conflict constantly being played out in Wolverine’s mind – as his own character, Sabretooth is one-note and, quite frankly, boring. (One exception is Frank Tieri’s depiction of Sabretooth in the short-lived ongoing Weapon X series, in which the character takes a supporting role and is depicted as being slightly dynamic. Not coincidentally, this is one of the few comics where I find Sabretooth tolerable for more than a few pages.)

I’m the kind of person who’s always open to reevaluating these kinds of things, though, and I thought an original graphic novel starring Sabretooth might be just the thing to change my mind. However, Sabretooth: Back to Nature is every bit as dull as I’ve made the character out to be in the preceding paragraph. In the end, the book is really just a vehicle for a plot point that will later play itself out in X-Factor (more on that later). It’s a story that should have been told in a normal comic book – like X-Factor itself, for example – rather than thrown between two cardstock covers and slapped with a higher price tag.

Anyhow, the book begins with Sabretooth attempting to escape from a restraining collar designed to control his homicidal impulses. The collar is the handiwork of X-Factor, which at this point was basically a government-sponsored branch of the X-Men. At this point in Marvel history, Sabretooth was essentially the team’s captive, and he was regularly brought on missions with them. Interestingly, this wasn’t the first time the X-Men had attempted such a plan to “reform” Sabretooth, and it wouldn’t be the last either. Needless to say, it has yet to work out.

Unable to break free of the collar, Sabretooth resigns himself to tagging along with X-Factor member Wild Child on the latter’s quest to find the serial killer who murdered his ex-girlfriend. This might have been a more engaging set-up if Wild Child had at any point ever been an even slightly compelling character, but alas. This leads to the first of many instances in which Sabretooth possesses far more knowledge than he possibly could given the immediate situation. The killer, we learn, likes to chop his victims up into little bits, and from just this one shred of information, Sabretooth intuits that the killer is none other than his old (previously unheard of) foe, the moronically named “Chop Chop.” I’m fairly certain that more than one serial killer in human history has used a similar modus operandi, so how Sabretooth is so confident is a mystery. So is the full psychological workup of Chop Chop that Sabretooth rattles off on the following page, sounding more like a psychologist than the homicidal nutjob he is.

The story from here on out is almost too predictable to even go into details: the characters go after the killer, they all fight, and (shockingly) Sabretooth kills Chop Chop and his brother Yuri. There’s a subplot involving Wild Child’s inner struggle over whether it’s acceptable to kill people, but it’s rendered fairly impotent by the fact that the bad guys in this story are hardly portrayed as human beings at all. As I said, though, the main point of the story is to plant a seed that will later play itself out in X-Factor, and that happens when Sabretooth figures out a way to overcome his restraining collar in order to kill the bad guys.

So how does he do it? He steals some painkillers from Chop Chop and Yuri, then downs a few fistfuls of them so he can’t feel the electric shocks administered by the collar. Now, let’s think about this for a moment. According to writer Jorge Gonzalez, X-Factor has equipped Sabretooth with a collar that inhibits both his mutant powers and his killing instinct…but not the effects of painkillers? Seriously? Somehow, I think he could have come up with a better explanation for returning Sabretooth to his mass-murdering status quo.

I was going to describe how bad the art is in Back to Nature as well, but I think at this point I’ve already made my case against the book (rest assured, though, the art is pretty awful). Instead, I’ll just say that even though I was able to get this book for a mere fraction of its already low cover price, it wasn’t even slightly worth it. You may appreciate it a bit more if, unlike me, you actually enjoy reading about Sabretooth as a solo character – but, to be perfectly honest, I really doubt it.

Rating: 1 out of 5

Happy Anniversary, True Believers!

I can hardly believe that it’s already been a year since I started this blog! If the timestamps are to be believed, though, it was indeed one year ago today that I posted my first review, in which I spotlighted one of my favorite collected editions, The Amazing Spider-Man Omnibus, Vol. 1. Since then I’ve written and posted an additional 40 reviews, begun an annotated timeline of Marvel’s collected editions (more on that in a minute!), and made some great friends in the online comic book community. I’d like to thank everyone who has contributed to this blog in some way over the last year, whether you’ve read a review, left a comment, or browsed the timeline. I never imagined that I would accomplish so much at With Great Power in only a year, and I owe it to you guys.

But enough with the sappy stuff. It wouldn’t be an anniversary if we didn’t celebrate somehow, right? So in honor of the occasion, I’ve made the biggest update to the Marvel TPB Timeline ever. The timeline now begins with the first issue of Marvel Comics in 1939 and goes all the way up to the start of the Secret Invasion crossover in 2008. I’ve done my best to make the information provided on big storylines like House of M and Civil War as understandable as possible, so I hope you enjoy those sections. (On the other hand, if you think I could do better, feel free to let me know – I’m always looking for new ways to improve the timeline!)

I didn’t ignore the period of time (1970-2005) that had already been covered, though. It’s been overhauled with new and more accurate annotations for many books, information on a variety of out-of-print collected editions (including the original Onslaught and Kurt Busiek Avengers trades), and books from Marvel’s most recent batch of solicitations. In other words, pretty much everything published in Marvel’s first 70 years is on the timeline! Of course, that doesn’t mean my work is even close to being done – the next step is to get the timeline totally caught up to the present day, and beyond that, I have a few other cool ideas. They’re a little too far off to talk about in much detail yet, but I’m pretty sure you’ll like ’em!

So that’s what you can expect in the immediate future in regards to the timeline, and it’s exciting stuff, to be sure. What about reviews, though? As you’ve probably noticed, those have been a bit less frequent in recent months than they used to be. The simple reason for that is that I’ve been so busy lately that it’s been hard to find the time to read, much less review, very many comics. For the next month, at least, the reviews will probably continue at a rate of about one every other week, although I may occasionally be able to post a review on off-weeks. In May, though, I hope to really get back into the reviewing groove and to make up for lost time with extra reviews on top of the planned weekly ones. Also, as I’ve mentioned before, I’ll be doing a creator-focused month during the summer, which I think will be a lot of fun. Who will the creator (or creators) be, you ask? That’s still a secret… although I can tell you that the books have already been picked out!

That’s about it for now. Thanks again for stopping by, and as always, if you have comments, questions, or feedback of any kind, you can either leave a comment here, email me at marveltimeline@gmail.com, or follow me on Twitter (@Dief88)!

Some Thoughts on Collecting Venom

While I haven’t been an avid buyer of individual comic issues for a few years now (other than Amazing Spider-Man, which I still follow religiously), today I decided to pick up the first issue of Marvel’s new Venom series, written by Rick Remender and penciled by Tony Moore. It’s a pretty decent comic, as it turns out, although I don’t know that I’ll continue to buy it in single issue form. But this post won’t be too concerned with the actual content of that comic – instead, I’d like to talk about something interesting I noticed on the letters page, which for this first issue is simply a column written by the book’s editor, Stephen Wacker.

He begins by discussing a bit of Venom’s publishing history, emphasizing that Venom #1 is the 90th issue to star everyone’s favorite brain-munching alien symbiote. (In other words, you can expect the book to change its numbering for a “100th issue extravaganza” in just under a year!) Then – and this is what I find most interesting – he recommends several collected editions for readers who would like to learn more about the character:


What’s so interesting about this, you might ask? Well, of the seven trades Wacker recommends, four of them are actually out of print – and I don’t mean recently out of print, but for more than ten years in some cases! Let’s take a look at each of the trades in Wacker’s list, starting with the first one; throughout, I’ll discuss some of the list’s problems and end with a few suggestions on how Marvel might address them.

Spider-Man vs. Venom was an extremely popular trade in the nineties. Originally published in 1990 and collecting a handful of issues written by David Michelinie and penciled by Todd McFarlane, it went through at least six printings and was even named one of Wizard Magazine’s top 100 trade paperbacks in 2006. It was out of print by the early 2000s, though, and in 2007, Marvel collected the full contents of Spider-Man vs. Venom (along with the contents of the out-of-print trade Spider-Man: The Saga of the Alien Costume) in Spider-Man: Birth of Venom, a trade which is still in print today. Although Birth of Venom is a little expensive, I would still recommend it – although that’s mostly for the Saga of the Alien Costume issues, which come from one of my favorite eras in Spider-Man history. But since Spider-Man vs. Venom is included in full in Birth of Venom, Wacker is essentially repeating himself by listing both.

Spider-Man: Venom Returns collects the next two storylines to feature Venom, written again by Michelinie and penciled this time by Erik Larsen. Published in 1993, this trade is also out of print, but unlike Spider-Man vs. Venom, its contents have never been re-collected. Priced originally at $11.95, a new copy of this trade will run you over $30 today, if not even more; one Amazon seller is currently charging $115. That makes Venom Returns pretty much the opposite of “accessible” for people interested in reading up on Venom’s history.

Venom: Lethal Protector collects the 1994 miniseries of the same name, written by Michelinie with art by Mark Bagley and Ron Lim. This trade is out of print too, and even less affordable than Venom Returns. I had to do a double-take when I saw it mentioned, to be honest, because this trade is known for being notoriously difficult to find at a reasonable price, even used. Amazon has used copies ranging from $25 to over $150, and one new copy for sale at $85. Why such high prices? I imagine it’s because the trade had a fairly low print run (collected editions weren’t always as popular as they are today, remember), plus it collects what is undoubtedly the best Venom miniseries from the nineties. It’s worth reading if you can get your hands on it affordably, but it’s definitely not worth the exorbitant price that many sellers are currently charging.

The next two trades that Wacker mentions, Venom vs. Carnage and Venom: Dark Origin, are collections of fairly recent miniseries and are still in print. I wouldn’t expect Venom vs. Carnage to be easily available for much longer, though, being the older of the two and having been released at a fairly low price point. I could very easily see Marvel re-releasing it as a Marvel Premiere hardcover for twice the trade’s price in a year or two.

This brings us to the final trade on Wacker’s list, Venom: Carnage Unleashed (which Wacker mis-identifies as “Venom/Carnage: Unleashed”). Written by Larry Hama and penciled by Andrew Wildman and Art Nichols, this is one of the better Venom miniseries to come out of the nineties, but it’s still a bit on the mediocre side. It’s also the second-most difficult trade on the list to find, behind Lethal Protector. The lowest price currently listed on Amazon for a used copy is just under $20, with other used copies at closer to $100; the only new copy listed is priced at $60.

As we can see, then, Wacker’s list of Venom trade recommendations is pretty problematic, not because of the quality of the books themselves, but because most of them haven’t been available at a reasonable price for years. That isn’t Wacker’s fault, though, and I certainly don’t mean to seem like I’m attacking him. The fact that this is the best list he could come up with actually speaks more to a failure on the part of Marvel’s collected editions department than anything else. You would think, with a brand-new series coming out starring a character as popular as Venom, that Marvel might take a bit more initiative in making sure that more than two or three trades starring that character were readily available.

I do have to give the trade department some credit, though. Just this month, Marvel released Venom by Daniel Way Ultimate Collection, which collects the entirety of Way’s eighteen-issue ongoing Venom series from the early 2000s. It was also announced last month that Marvel would publish an Omnibus edition collecting the entire Michelinie/McFarlane run on Amazing Spider-Man (during which Venom made his first appearance, in the issue pictured at right). Strangely, though, neither of these books appears on Wacker’s list; nor does Spider-Man: Maximum Carnage, an important Venom-related story which, unlike many of his recommendations, is actually in print.

With the exception of the Daniel Way trade, all of the books I just mentioned collect Spider-Man comics in which Venom happened to appear. But what about the 89 comic books starring Venom that Wacker talks about in his column? Much like what’s happened with the Clone Saga over the last few years, I think a good deal of nostalgia for these comics has built up lately and that there’s a viable market for reprints of these issues. I, for one, would certainly be interested in buying a series of Venom Classic trades collecting the character’s various series from the mid-nineties. After all, if Gambit, War Machine, and the Danny Ketch version of Ghost Rider are worthy of Marvel’s “Classic” line, why not Venom?

So what do you think? Has Marvel really done a poor job of collecting Venom over the years, or am I giving them the short shrift? And while we’re at it, what are your favorite Venom storylines, and which ones would you like to see collected (or re-collected)? Feel free to leave a comment or send me an email at marveltimeline@gmail.com with your thoughts!

Review: Harry 20 on the High Rock

Writer: Gerry Finley-Day
Artist: Alan Davis
Collects: 2000 AD Progs 287-307 (1982-83)
Published: Simon & Schuster, 2010; $19.99

Harry 20 on the High Rock is the first full story arc I’ve ever read from 2000 AD, a black-and-white British anthology comic which has been published weekly since the 1970s. While not as popular in the United States as it is in the UK, the comic has nonetheless produced internationally recognizable characters (like Judge Dredd) and has served as a launchpad for a number of prominent comics creators, including Alan Moore, Peter Milligan, Garth Ennis, and Grant Morrison, to name just a few.

There’s no overarching plot in 2000 AD; rather, each issue is comprised of a few five- and six-page stories, each of which is usually a part of some longer narrative that unfolds over several weeks, months, or even years. And while I picked Harry 20 as my starting point, it’s possible to dive in virtually anywhere. Approaching the comic for the first time, though, I was skeptical of just how good such a heavily segmented story could be. Would half the comic be spent recapping earlier plot points? And what exactly can a writer accomplish in just five pages, anyway? These were the questions I had as I began to read Harry 20 on the High Rock.

Luckily, I had nothing to fear. In fact, the short length of each chapter is actually one of the book’s greatest assets. Aware of what limited space he has, writer Gerry Finley-Day doesn’t waste a single panel, propelling the story forward at incredible speed even as he develops the central characters with surprising finesse. But I’m getting ahead of myself – I haven’t even explained the premise of the story yet. (I’ll just chalk that up as a side effect of the book’s breakneck pace!)

Harry 20 on the High Rock takes place in a future where the worst criminals are jailed not on Earth, but on an orbiting satellite known as the High Rock. And, as we learn on the first page: “The High Rock is Hell!” Tormented by sadistic guards and stripped of their surnames (which are replaced by numbers, reflecting the number of years each man is to be imprisoned), the High Rock is not at all a happy place for its prisoners. It’s also where our protagonist, Harry Thompson, is sent at the beginning of the book to serve twenty years for a crime he didn’t commit. His one goal, from the moment he arrives? Escape!

It won’t be easy, however, and Harry wastes little time in gaining the trust and help of his cellmates: Genghis Eighteen, a Mongolian imprisoned for refusing to sell his family’s land to the military, and Ben Ninety, an apparently crazy old man who may very well have been on the High Rock since it was built. Incorporating the best elements of all the greatest prison films and TV shows – camaraderie between those wronged by the system, rivalries with other inmates, a cadre of inhumanly evil guards led by a maniacal warden, and a truly wild escape plan – Finley-Day crafts a suspenseful, unpredictable story that also happens to be paced perfectly.

Not really knowing what to expect of Finley-Day’s writing before I began reading, though, the main draw of this book for me at the outset was that it features the earliest professional comics artwork by one of my favorite artists, Alan Davis. Since it comes from such an early point in his career, I had expected the art to be a little rough. But remarkably enough, Davis is at top form in these pages. Most impressively, it’s obvious that he put a great deal of work into the design of the High Rock itself. In fact, schematics that appear throughout the story show that Davis actually mapped out the entire prison from top to bottom, inside and out. The effect is that when the prisoners despair that there’s no way to escape the High Rock, it’s not a mere plot contrivance; instead, it’s the visual nature of the place Davis has created that makes us believe in the hopelessness of Harry’s situation.

As much as it may sound like an overstatement, I feel quite confident in saying that Harry 20 on the High Rock is one of the best self-contained comic book stories I’ve ever read. The story and the artwork are perfect individually, and put together, they make for something truly awe-inspiring. If this book is at all representative of the quality of the rest of 2000 AD, I can’t wait to read more. Consider me converted!

Rating: 5 out of 5

Review: Superman: Earth One

Writer: J. Michael Straczynski
Artist: Shane Davis
Published: DC, 2010; $19.99 (HC), $12.99 (TPB)

From the moment it was first announced, and nearly every time I’ve heard mention of Superman: Earth One since, one word has come to mind: “baggage.”

Because that’s what almost every person who talks about this book seems to bring to the table, right? Baggage. Most of the comments I read online about this book before its release had to do with whether or not J. Michael Straczynski should even be writing Earth One in the first place (rather than the main Superman series), whether or not the world really “needed” another version of Superman’s origin, and whether or not original graphic novels are a thing of the past or a bold new approach in our current “Golden Age of Reprints.” For whatever reason, a number of people believed they had some kind of stake in this book, and they shouted it from the proverbial rooftops.

Personally, I think most of the debates that have constellated around this title are downright silly. That anyone should feel entitled to having Straczynski write this or that Superman comic rather than the one he actually wants to write is ridiculous, as is the argument that stories taking place outside of standard continuity are “unnecessary.” If anything, between books like All-Star Superman and Superman: Red Son, Superman is actually the poster child for characters with relevant and worthwhile alternate-universe stories. But these are arguments that were settled, at least by rational comic book readers, long before this particular book was even conceived of. Call me crazy, but I read comics for personal enjoyment, rather than with a cynical eye for the latest way comics and their creators have supposedly screwed me over.

Of course, it’s quite possible that someone reading this may be only vaguely aware of the central conceit of Earth One, in which case I apologize for what must have seemed a puzzling start to this review. To give it a more proper introduction, the book is an original graphic novel (the first in a projected series) written by J. Michael Straczynski and penciled by Shane Davis. It presents us with an alternate version of Superman’s beginnings, while at the same time striving to match the “real” version of the character both tonally and thematically. In Earth One, Clark Kent is a confused young man who has just arrived in Metropolis, and just like the traditional version of the character, he possesses the ability to do nearly anything he sets his mind to. This is evidenced in a series of amusing scenes in which he “applies” and is “accepted” for a number of different jobs, ranging from professional football player to think-tank research scientist. Straczynski is careful not to play for too many laughs, though, emphasizing Clark’s sense that his powers keep him constantly isolated from the rest of the world.

The main question he faces is what to do with all the power he possesses. Unlike they do in the main DC Universe, Clark’s adoptive parents don’t actively encourage him to be a superhero – instead, they simply want him to find whatever it is in life that will make him the most happy. When hostile aliens attack the planet in search of the last survivor of Krypton, Clark is thus put in an incredibly difficult position. He doesn’t want the world to know how different from everyone else he truly is, but at the same time, exposing his true nature may be the only way to save the world from destruction.

It’s rare these days for alien invasions in comic books to really carry any weight or suspense, but Straczynski pulls it off tremendously here (even if the aliens’ leader does sort of look like a reject from The Cure). In a twist on Superman’s traditional origin story, Krypton didn’t just explode – it was assassinated, and its killers are more than willing to give Earth the same treatment if they don’t get what they want. Perhaps needless to say, Clark does ultimately end up donning the traditional blue and red, and once he does, Davis treats us to a truly breathtaking and action-packed climax.

Along the way, Straczynski does an excellent job of reminding us what Superman has always stood for, but in a way that breathes new life into old characters and concepts. Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen both play pivotal roles in the story, for instance, but not in the capacity you might expect. Straczynski clearly remembers that the reason we love Superman, as a culture, is that he represents the best in all of us, and the story reminds us of that in its unique take on these characters, especially Jimmy.

The ending of Superman: Earth One sets the stage for possible sequels, but it works perfectly well as a self-contained narrative as well. I have to admit that, despite not coming to the book with any preconceived notions, it still far exceeded my expectations. This is easily one of the better Superman stories I’ve read in recent memory, and certainly the best one to be published since the turn of the decade. My only complaint, as clichéd as it is to say this, is that I wish it had lasted longer – not because it was too short, but simply because it’s not often that I have the pleasure of reading comics this good.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5