LATE REVIEWS FOR (06/02/10)

I’m feeling much better now and I’ve pretty much finished reading my small haul of 3 comics from last week. I’m sure you’ve seen my review for Brightest Day #3, so all I’ve got left to review are the crimson DC duo of RED ROBIN #13 and RED HOOD: THE LOST DAYS #1. Check out what I thought of them under the cut.

RED ROBIN #13
WRITTEN BY FABIAN NICIEZA
ART BY MARCUS TO

It looks like Franken-Castle isn’t the only character with a ‘Hit List’ last week in comics.

Red Robin’s second year of publication begins with the return of former Robin writer, Fabian Nicieza, and his ‘Hit List.’ While I haven’t read Nicieza’s take on Robin, from what I could gather from this book, it looks like he’s picking up where he left off with Tim Drake while incorporating former writer Christopher Yost’s ideas into the mix and that’s always a good thing.

This issue pretty much reads like a debut issue for a new title, showing us the current status quo, introducing the characters to newer readers and giving us an idea where the next few issues might be going. In that sense, this is pretty much a solid issue that accomplishes everything that it sets out to do. The highlight for me is how Nicieza handles the dynamics between the family of Batman characters in Gotham.

It’s no secret that Bruce has amassed a pretty large brood of characters in Gotham City and, save for Daniel’s Batman, they rarely ever interact with each other. Nicieza rectifies that by incorporating all these characters into this book. He even adds to that by reminding readers that Drake and Grayson have ties to other DC Universe books by bringing up the Justice League of America and Teen Titans in conversations between characters.

Oh, and speaking of conversation, his dialogue is pretty good. He even continues the trend of Damian being absolutely awesome in all of his guest appearances outside Batman and Robin [well, barring that horrible moment in Battle for the Cowl - but that didn't happen].

Like I said on the previews, Marcus To is a great artist and it’s amazing that he still hasn’t skipped an issue ever since he started a 8 or so issues ago. He makes everyone look like a million bucks and I’d be glad if he got more higher profile work after he finishes up his run in Red Robin.

This is how you reinvigorate interest in your run on a title after taking the baton from a [arguably] bigger name. Nicieza outlines everything he wants to do with that title in that final page, which you can check out here, and I honestly can’t wait to see where he goes with this title. It’s not going to be the biggest, most important Bat-book in the stands, but it’s going to be the one that has ties to all of them while still having solid writing and solid art. This is most definitely a book to watch.

RED HOOD: THE LOST DAYS #1 (of 6)
WRITTEN BY JUDD WINICK
ART BY PABLO RAIMONDI

Judd Winick is a controversial figure in comics. I’ve seen a lot of hate for him online thanks to his runs on The Outsiders, Titans and even his work on Green Arrow. However, I can’t really hate the man because I think he’s churned out the best Jason Todd stories since his resurrection by retcon punch in Infinite Crisis. I absolutely loved his ‘Under the Hood’ and I absolutely can’t wait to see it animated as the DC Animated Universe’s newest feature film.

With the feature film due in a few short months, it’s no surprise Winick’s penning another Red Hood story to ‘tie-in’ with it. Unsurprisingly, this is very good stuff from Winick. However, this story doesn’t really feature Jason Todd, in fact he doesn’t even have a speaking role in this issue, instead it fills in the gaps from Batman Annual #25, I think, and tells the story completely from Talia Al Ghul’s  point-of-view.

It’s easily the best I’ve seen her written in quite a long time and it really lays out her motivations for what she did and why she decided to use the Lazarus Pit to give Jason back his memories. However, I feel like I’ve seen most of this book before in various snippets from both volumes of Under the Hood. While it’s nice to see them cast in a new light, it is also disappointing to find out that we’re not getting a lot of ‘new’ material here.

Despite my minor problems with the script, Winick’s collaborator, Paolo Ramiondi, is a very, very good artist. If you saw the previews at the back of most of DC’s books this week, you’ll know that the art is very, very solid and he’s able to keep that quality up for the rest of the book. I’ve never heard of him before, but you can rest assured that after his performance here, I’ll be looking out for his name on the stands.

This reads much better as a companion piece to Under the Hood so I think I’d much rather wait for the collected edition for this series. Despite DC’s atrocious schedule for their collections [two years before I get a trade of the Sinestro Corps War, really?] I think that this story will read better as a cohesive whole side-by-side with Winick’s original Red Hood tale.

Tags: DC Comics, Fabian Nicieza, Judd Winick, Red Hood, Red Hood: The Lost Days, Red Robin, Reviews