Radiant Comics

I’m back from the comic shop this week and I got five new comics plus a hard cover collection:

Savage Dragon – 151

Buffy Season Eight – 27

Echo – 14

North 40 -1&2

Agents of Atlas “Dark Reign” (HC)

And now for a review of something I’ve read recently.

Invincible Ultimate Collection Volume 4 by Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley

It’s been a long time coming this fourth “Ultimate” volume of “Invincible”. I think it was originally supposed to be out in June of ’08 but finally came out in May of ’09. I’m glad it’s finally here because I haven’t been buying this book month to month or even trade to trade. I’ve been buying these oversized hardcover editions. I like ’em.

I obviously also like “Invincible” since this is the fourth volume I’ve purchased and this one is as good as the rest. It’s a fun super hero book. There are lots of fights, characters, and plot twists but much like Spider-man is really about Peter Parker “Invincible” is really about Mark Grayson.

Mark is your typical college age kid who is trying to balance being a super hero who is on call with some government agency with having a real life. In the middle of doing whatever he can be called on to stop a bank robbery or fly into space to stop an alien invasion. He never knows and neither do we.

This volume finds Mark contemplating his future at his college, wondering if his being a super hero is fair to his girlfriend, worrying about his mom and new little brother, and trying not to get killed by all sorts of menaces. The books reads pretty fast but is still filled with stuff. Kirkman love to give us a page or two of foreshadowing or some long range plot element each issue.

The art is top shelf also. Ryan Ottley can draw well, tell a good story, and design imaginative characters. A triple threat. Bill Crabtree also does an excellent job with the coloring. Rus Wooton does a nice job with the lettering so it’s an really good team all around.

I have one really minor gripe with the lettering. Whenever there is computer generated lettering that is integrated with the art, such as the lettering on the Dean’s office door or especially the sign outside the Pentagon, it doesn’t like right and stands out like a sore thumb. I’m not sure if it is the letterer or artist doing this but I suspect it’s not the letterer. It’s just a tiny annoying thing though.

So if you’re a super hero fan and are not picking up “Invincible” I have to ask you, “Why?”. It’s fun stuff.