Falling Behind Again

Just as it seems I've caught up and can get to the stack of graphic novels and full runs of mini-series, I fall behind again. Here's what I've managed to read since last time.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer 10
Nice Buffy/Willow scenes and the Dawn/Xander scenes were fun and emotional. This is the sort of thing the show did so well, so it's nice seeing it here. A nice, self-contained, relationships issue.

Justice League of America 17
Instead of epics, we're getting two stories per issue now. One, tying in with Salvation Run, by Alan Burnett, was pretty good, with Roy's concern over Cheshire ringing true and Lian acting like the little girl she is. And I was glad to see Benes back. I do like his art. The second story, featuring Vixen, was by McDuffie and I thought it was better than his previous issues here, maybe because it was a smaller story. The art by Meyers and LaPointe, was a bit odd, but nice enough. I liked Vixen better than the guys, though. And I disliked the cover. The whole layout seemed off to me, and relegating the title of the book to small letters across the top annoyed me. If not for this already on my pull list and waiting for me, I likely would have missed buying it because I never noticed it on the New Comics shelves.

Countdown to Final Crisis 15
Ray's involvement in the coming crisis is becoming known and it isn't disappointing, so far. Donna kicked ass and was as confident as I've seen her. And shockingly, Jason's starting to actually grow on me. His scenes with Earth 51's Batman were very moving.

Simon Dark 4
I love this book. I love its oddity and its quirky characters. There's such sadness as well as innocence and goodness in Simon. I really want to know more about him.

Sheena 4
This finally came out. I'd forgotten the earlier installments, but caught up quickly enough in reading it. Despite some strong woman in the jungle cliches, this has been surprisingly entertaining.

The Spirit 12
I never really read the original Spirit by Eisner, so I'm not all that familiar with how Eisner wrote these characters and therefore can only say what I think of this and not compare the two. Darwyn Cooke goes out on top with this story of Sand Serif, The Spirit's first love. My only complaint is that it was too short. I felt there were some time gaps begging to be filled in, but perhaps it's best this way. I hope the new team can keep this book on top.

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And if you want to know what I think of the Wonder Woman on Playboy flap, you can read this excellent post by Kalinara, because I really doubt I could say it better. I even thought it was one of Playboy's more tasteful covers. The magazine exists to promote sex and titillation