Comic Quickies or Superior Double Shot

Superior #3: Okay, so Simon Pooni, the quadriplegic kid whose body has been changed into that of Superior, the mightiest hero of them all, has figured out his powers, figured out how to fly, and now all he's got to do is start saving the world.  Enter one of Mark Millar's customary "big ideas" and before you know it, Superior is saving an entire flipping space station from crashing into a busy New York City street.

In this issue we also get to meet Lois Lane Madeline Knox, a news anchor who apparently likes to hide two giant kick balls underneath her shirt.  Oh, wait, upon further inspection, those appear to be her ridiculously ginormous breasts. I was totally blown away by how crappy this character is.  Yes, there are a couple panels with Ms. Knox that don't  highlight her um, divine assets, but those are few and far between.  Doesn't Millar know that there is a little thing called the internet? If the teenage boys that read Superior wanna see some boobs, they sure as hell aren't gonna have Superior as their fix.  To make this issue even more fanTAstic, (emphasis on the T&A) , there's a beach scene, where all the chicks are either bending over provocatively... in thongs, or on the flip side, morbidly obese and wearing water wings.  To add "hilarity" to this scene there's also lots of fat dudes and an old man putting sun screen on his wrinkly, saggy wife.  Wow.  So fucking lame.

Despite all this lame shit going on, this issue doesn't manage to totally suck.  Simon/Superior manages to perform his most amazing feat of all and rescue this issue from the depths of despair.  The one thing that Millar seems to get is that no matter how amazing and super Superior is, there is still a twelve year old kid trapped in that muscle bound body, and Simon's humanity, innocence and uncorrupted desire to just be a good guy is what makes me able to root for Superior the character.  The guy can bench press a nuclear submarine, but he's gotta be quiet when he secretly crashes at his friend's house so that the parent's don't find out.  There's just enough of that wholesome stuff to keep me going, because I really like Simon and I wanna know what happens to him. 

Superior #4: This issue is all about Madeline Knox getting the first exclusive interview with Superior.  I gotta say, the way she goes about it is pretty ingenious, and ballsy. Compared to the last issue, this one is actually quite a bit better.  There's only one blatant shot of Madeline's boobage, and the interview scene is somewhat interesting.

The latter half of the issue, (ok, I lied, so the issue isn't all about an interview), delivers some more solid character development on the part of Simon and his friend Chris, who is pretty much a real-deal super hero for sticking by his buddy through all the tough times.  Chris gets hassled by some dick head ginger-kid and his cronies on the way to basketball practice and returns home to find Simon/Superior on his couch, chowing down on junk food, watching his own interview on TV.  When Superior gets wind of what happened, he and Chris deliver some satisfying pay back to the bullies.  We also get some insight into what exactly Simon wants to achieve with his new powers, and we get a glimpse of his potential nemesis.  It is nice to see this comic finally take a direction.  This could possibly get better.

Dracula the Company of Monsters #5: Yep, they're still cranking out the cheesy vampire magic covers.  This is another fairly solid installment in this ongoing series.  The main protagonist, Evan Barrington-Cabot is still a bit of an ineffectual character, but I think that is by virtue of him being stuck firmly in the middle of the whole Dracula resurrection scheme.  The poor guy is in way over his head now, and I think he is starting to realize that he has reached the point of no return.  He just needs to decide which side of the conflict he wants to support.

This issue was a bit of a set-up issue, as most of the pieces on the board did some recuperating or consolidating.  It seems like things are poised to blow up and get really interesting, but the pacing in this comic isn't the fastest, so there might be a bit of a wait before this title gets really interesting.  Though I shudder to say it, I think this comic would actually benefit from a bit more vampire mayhem.

Neonomicon #4: This issue was extremely tough to read, and probably the most disturbing thing I've ever read.  I understand that this is meant to be an extremely complex comic, and is meant to do lots of meta-textual things that will boggle your mind and play with the very fabric of the medium, but does it need to be so god damned off-putting?  I can appreciate the artisan-ship that has gone into creating such a complex and unique thing, but I can't tolerate the subject matter at all, to the point that I dropped this one from my pull-box.  I have a lot of respect for Alan Moore and the high quality comics he creates, but this one is not for me.

If you want a detailed,  in-depth analysis of what went down in this issue and what it all likely means, check out Bleeding Cool's review. But this is just one comic I can't support any longer.