Sunday, September 17, 2006

New comics 9/13

Ex Machina #23 (Brian K. Vaughan/Tony Harris, DC/Wildstorm)
Until now, the nature and origins of Mitchell's powers have been sort of an afterthought behind the political drama, but this issue Vaughan offers some tantalizing and creepy glances into the entities that gave Mitchell his powers, and a very effective and unexpected cliffhanger. Plus all the typical political drama stuff and another gruesome scene with the firefighter-impersonating serial killer. This continues to be the richest and most intriguing arc to date.

Fables #53 (Bill Willingham/Mark Buckingham, DC/Vertigo)
It's amazing to me how Willingham is consistently able to take these often-sanitized fairy-tale characters and make them genuinely menacing and scary. This storyline promises to be as epic and significant as "March of the Wooden Soldiers," which seemed like the definitive word on the conflict with the Adversary at the time. Willingham is able to go back to that well fairly soon without at all seeming like he's repeating himself. As always, Buckingham's art brings it all to life, especially his alluring and delightfully evil portrayal of the Snow Queen. This month's back-up, with art by Joshua Middleton, seems even more inconsequential than the last, a little sidebar to the main story based on a lame joke. But who knows, it may turn out to be important somewhere down the road.

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