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Another Week, Another Few Books

343. Britten & Brulightly by Hannah Berry. Odd & slightly off-beat mystery story. (Checked out of the library.)
     
344. Popeye, vol. 1 by E.C. Segar. This really is the golden age of comic strip reprints. Beautiful book design & some wonderfully silly comic strips.
     
345. DC Universe: Helltown by Dennis O'Neil. O'Neil updates & adapts several storylines from the late 80s Question comic book into a novel.
     
346. Fullmetal Alchemist, vol. 18 by Hiromu Arakawa. Still pretty good, but it feels like it's dragging on too long. (Possibly because the anime series had wrapped up long before this point in the story.) (Library.)
     
347. Justice League of America: Second Coming by Dwayne McDuffie & Ed Benes. (Library.)
     
348. Supermen!: The First Wave of Comic Book Heroes, 1936-1941 edited by Greg Sadowski. In the early days of comic books there was more enthusiasm than talent, but the work here shows some promise (when it's not batshit crazy).
     
349. Krazy & Ignatz 1941-1942: A Ragout of Raspberries by George Herriman. Strange, arty, wonderful comics.

And some movies:

• Mad Men, Season Two. We've been watching this with some friends, and we finished just in time for the beginning of the third season. Amazingly written, and absolutely gorgeous.
  
• RiffTrax Live: Plan Nine from Outer Space. Many of the same jokes as on the DVD, but lots of fun, nonetheless.
  
• Mystery Science Theater 3000: Zombie Nightmare. Awful mid-eighties horror film featuring Adam West.
  
• The Castle of Cagliostro. Early Miyazaki. Very different from later works, but here & there you can see touches of what was to come.

Catching Up

321. Templar, AZ, Book 3: And a Stick to Beat the Devil With by Spike. As I think I mentioned when I read Book 1, I discovered Templar, AZ at this years Stumptown Comics Fest. I liked it, and was pleased to discover that the shop where I get my comics stocks the collections of this web-comic. However, it looks like Book 2 costs $18, and I wasn't quite willing to pay that much for it. So I read that one online. Book 3, on the other hand, was only $12, so I shelled out for it, and now I'm definitely hooked. I'm staying up to date online, and the next time I'm feeling rich, I'll be picking up Book 2.
     
322. Moomin: The Complete Tove Jansson Comic Strip, vol. 4 by Tove & Lars Jansson. The latest (final?) volume of Jansson's sweet, gently humorous strip about the characters from her children's books.
     
323. The Boys, vol. 1: The Name of the Game by Garth Ennis & Darick Robertson. Over the top and exceedingly violent. But I quite liked it anyway. (Checked out of the library.)
     
324. Usagi Yojimbo, vol. 23: Bridge of Tears by Stan Sakai. As excellent as always.
     
325. Scorpion: Poison Tomorrow by Fred van Lente & Leonard Kirk.
     
326. Captain Britain and MI13, vol. 2: Hell Comes to Britain by Paul Cornell & Leonard Kirk. The praise I've been reading online for this comic is well deserved. (Library.)
     
327. The Brave and the Bold, vol. 3: Demons & Dragons by Mark Waid, Scott Kolins, et al. Super-hero team-ups. (Library.)
     
328. Batman: Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader? by Neil Gaiman, Andy Kubert, et al. Gaiman's Batman-related stories.
     
329. The Weasel Patrol by Ken Macklin & Lela Dowling. Silly stuff.
     
330. Hulk: WWH - Damage Control by Dwayne McDuffie, Salva Espin et al. (Library.)
     
331. Mouse Guard, vol. 2: Winter 1152 by David Peterson. I liked the first volume well enough, but it didn't really grab me. This volume did. Looking forward to the next book.
     
332. Beanworld, book 2: A Gift Comes! by Larry Marder. Collecting the rest of the previously published Beanworld stories. I can't wait for book 3 and new material.
     
333. Ignorance, Thy Name is Bucky by Darby Conley. The latest "Get Fuzzy" collection.
     
334. Star Wars Vector, vol. 2 by John Ostrander, Jan Duursema, et al. Star Wars cross-over comics. But I really do like Ostrander's writing.
     
335. Spider-Man: Family Ties by various. (Library.)
     
336. Pluto, vol. 4 by Naoki Urasawa. I continue to be blown away by the emotional depth in this manga series. Wonderful stuff. And it's a retelling of an "Astro Boy" story.
     
337. Dan Dare Omnibus by Garth Ennis & Gary Erskine. Revamp of the old British comics character. (Library.)
     
338. Madame Xanadu, vol. 1: Disenchanted by Matt Wagner & Amy Reeder. Very good. I don't know what else to say.
     
339. Frankenstein's Womb by Warren Ellis & Marek Oleksicki. Comic about Mary Shelley, her creation, and the birth of modernity.
     
340. Elk's Run by Joshua Hale Fialkov & Noel Tuazon. Coming-of-age story set in what may be the worst-thought-out (by the characters, not the writer) Utopia I've ever encountered.
     
341. Tales of the Batman by Tim Sale, et al. I know DC put this out because Sale does (did? I've stopped watching) the comic artwork in Heroes, but I'll take it because there is some gorgeous artwork here. And the stories aren't bad, either. (Library.)
     
342. The Boys, vol. 2: Get Some by Garth Ennis & Darick Robertson. More deconstruction of super-heroes. (Library.)

Only a couple of movies in the past two weeks:

• RiffTrax: Carnival of Souls. There's about 10 minutes worth of story in this 82 minute movie. The rest is padding. OMG, this movie moves slowly. The jokes make endurable, just.
  
• Ponyo. Very sweet. Not as much substance as Spirited Away or Howl's Moving Castle, but still gorgeous and touching. I wouldn't expect anything less from Miyazaki.

House Guest

No post this week.

Some More Books

313. Incognegro: A Graphic Mystery by Mat Johnson & Warren Pleece. Set during the Harlem Renaissance, this graphic novel tells the story of a black reporter who can pass as white & who does so to report on lynchings in the South. Very well done. (Library.)
     
314. The Goon, vol. 7: A Place of Heartache & Grief by Eric Powell. Still very silly in places, but becoming more serious. (Library.)
     
315. HeroQuest: Core Rules by Robin D. Laws. My gaming group has started role-playing in Glorantha again, and so I wanted to pick up the latest version of the rules to support what I view as the best fantasy setting I've ever seen for an RPG.
     
316. What If? Civil War by various. Nothing terribly good in this, but one of the stories is simply awful. The art was unsuited to "serious" superheroics, and the writing was just amateurish. (Library.)
     
317. Nexus: As It Happened, vol. 1 by Mike Baron & Steve Rude. I already have the stories collected here, but I would like to see the rest of Nexus collected in an affordable format. There's no way I'm paying $50 a pop for the Archive editions.
     
318. Uncanny X-Men: Lovelorn by Matt Fraction & Terry Dodson. (Library.)
     
319. The Huntress: Darknight Daughter by Paul Levitz & Joe Staton. Comics about Batman's & Catwoman's daughter. (Library.)
     
320. Sam & Twitch: The Brian Michael Bendis Collection, vol. 1 by Brian Michael Bendis & Angel Medina. (Library.)

No new movies this week, but I did forget something last week. (Which is ironic, because I forgot to blog about it when Teena & I first watched it.)

• Penn & Teller: Bullshit!, The Complete Fourth Season. More debunking & offensive commentary from Penn & Teller.