Monday Morning Grind 4-11-22

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Sorry this is a little late. The list looks short but the two titles in blue are actually nine issues combined, since they are in trade form.

Eve Volume 1
She Hulk #1 (2022)
Doctor Doom #8
Snow Angels Volume 1
Buffy The Last Vampire Slayer #1
Werewolf By Night #32 (reprint of 1975 issue)
Carriers #1

Snow Angels Volume 1 I picked this story because it had several appealing things for me. I usually read Jeff Lemire in graphic form because the stories generally are very psychology based and need to be read as a whole work.. Books like Underwater Welder and A.D. require a good deal of patience and dedication to get the real impact they are meant to bring to the reader. Right now however, life provides enough mental burden, so I wanted a little escapism rather than something I had to carve out time for.

The second thing is that this volume also brings about a deeper question for the industry. That question being what is this item’s literary classification? Originally published digitally on Comixology rather than in periodical issues, it has now been released in bound form. The confusion comes to me as this question ‘Is it an original graphic novel or a trade paperback?’. Digital publication is bringing in more modern options to what previously has been a print based concept. Should we as a culture be reviewing the definition of printed materials origin?

Either way, Snow Angels is a coming of age story combined with an adventure, rather than the usual mental exercise from this writer. Much like Chuck Dixon’s Winterworld, it takes place in a metaphor of an Arctic setting called “The Trench”. No one is allowed to leave or the remaining community is visited, and punished, by vengeance in the form of “The Snowman”. The main characters celebrate being a family, face death, and endure wrath. And are forced to venture forward. alone. I am so ready for volume 2!

Eve Volume 1 This five issue mini-series takes place when the icecaps have melted. Most of humanity has been lost to a hidden disease, once held by the extreme cold, but now released. Now, a mysterious girl named Eve has awoken in secret and must deal with a world that’s nothing like the virtual reality of her upbringing. Accompanied only by Wexler, her robotic caretaker and protector sheathed in her favorite teddy bear, Eve must embark on a deadly quest across the country to save her father.

This one is sort of a global warming story with an Isaac Asimov twist. I enjoyed issues 1 and 2 a great deal. The kids at the first barrier are interesting and the “turning” is well placed and adds to the threat. I would have preferred the sidekick not to have become the antagonist, It buried the global warming issue very quickly, and action took the place of the lesson. It still finished well, but the emotional attachment to the main character was gone at issue four, which is what I was reading it for.

Carriers #1 – I tried but this just could not keep me reading. The story of gangster pigeons was an idea but the dialog and constant character switching just made this one not enjoyable.

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