PopSugar Reading Challenge Book 30 or Seven Wondering WTF Is Going On?

For a book with a number in the title, I chose Seven Wonders by Adam Christopher. I saw it sitting on my friend’s shelf and thought it looked like fun. Everybody’s gotta be wrong sometimes.

From the cover and general description, the premise is great. The last troupe of superheroes, the final supervillain, and one ordinary citizen who just became super himself. I expect Tony to be the main POV character but we don’t really spend that much time with him overall, and that was a huge problem.

Christopher was trying to tell too many stories: Tony, Blackbird, the Cowl, Sam & Joe, the Seven Wonders, and a few others. Because there were so many different narratives going on, none of them were very deep. We weren’t able to go deep enough into Aurora, Dragon Star, or Cowl’s mind to get a good picture of them as characters or find out what they know. It also disrupted the narrative flow to jump from character to character. We’re following the cops and now we’re switching to Tony and now we’re switching to the police chief.

What was almost as distracting as the ricocheting narrative? Never know anything! I was able to make some educated guesses in the beginning but toward the end it got more and more convoluted. I’m dealing with issues from a dozen characters and nobody can know what the hell is going on at any point in time? I wonder if this is how amnesiac characters on soap operas are supposed to feel.

By the final 100 pages, I was only still reading because I wanted to see what would happen with the plot. I wanted to see if, by some dues ex machine of epic proportions, this could be tied together. If 90% of the remaining characters died, I was fine with that since I had no investment in any of them.

Austin Grossman did a much better job of telling a superhero story with Soon I Will Be Invincible. There were 2 POV characters and it worked pretty well. Christopher was trying to do all the subplots of Game of Thrones with none of the depth and it didn’t work. Mildly entertaining but not worth the amount of time I wound up putting into this book.

A Graphic Year Ends Early

I am admitting defeat. I will not be able to complete A Graphic Year challenge. It got away from me sometime in July. I was scraping by toward the very end of the month but with my new gig and move in August, it all collapsed.

I'm still going to keep reading graphic novels because it's an excellent genre. Currently sitting on my shelf is the final installments of Fables, My Friend Dahmer, Rat Queens 1 & 2, The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl, Legenderry, Smut Peddler 2014, Lumberjanes 1, Paige by Paige, The Wicked + the Divine 1, Leaves on the Wind, The Underwater Welder, Quantum and Woody 1, The Adventures of Apocalypse Al, Black Canary & Zatanna, TNG & Who, Archie Meets KISS, Saga 1, and several different Deadpool stories. 

Plus, with the new Archie and the classic Deadpools all coming out, there's a lot more out there for me to find and enjoy. Below I have the final reviews I was able to generate before everything got away from me.

Week 24 

This week I took on an old Baltimore Comic Con purchase, Peril at Summerland Park.

I love choose your own ending novels and this was no different. A mix of comics and full page text, Peril lets you and 2 of your friends navigate the turn of events when you check out an abandoned amusement park.

I was impressed with the amount of adventure and twists and turns that were packed into such a small book. Charging jungle animals, disappearing roller coaster tracks, paralyzingly arrows, friends, foes, and mystical critters I haven't even heard of.

There was an excellent balance of endings where everyone lives, you meet your doom, or only a few of you make it out alive. I look forward to tackling more of the series.

Week 25-30 

A friend lent me Deadpool and Cable 1-6 which I've been very curious about. While entertaining, it reminded me why I stayed away from superheroes for a long time.

The scope of each story arc was so large, its impact so great, that it felt like it should have been extended. Cable grow in his power and influence so rapidly in the first two trades that I wondered how much else there could be to tell. The further into the series, the more it became what I don't like about superhero stories. 

It became convoluted and harder to follow. Once they started bouncing through worlds following Cable's soul, it started to lose me. I feel like these stories could have been stretched longer, the characters becoming more developed rather than throw one epic storyline into each trade.

Deadpool gets to remember his past and we barely touch on what that means. I've only read a little bit of Posehn but he definitely tries to explore the importance of that. It stopped being character driven and became driven by these extreme plots which meant little because of the shallow characters. The beginning was great, the middle was OK, and the end just felt tedious.

A Graphic Year Week 23

I knew this was the direction they were taking the movies but I have a hard time seeing how one will have anything to do with the other. One of the biggest players in the comics was Reed from Fantastic Four and I think the movies are trying to keep those universes separate, as evidenced by the half-ass film to maintain rights to the franchise.

This story is very powerful. Doctor Strange said it best when he said that there was no right or wrong side, just the one with the least amount of collateral damage. After hundreds of innocent people die, mostly children, people turn on superheros. They are tired of masked vigilantes and people they can't hope to control. Tony Stark becomes the new front man for a movement to make all superheros paid government employees (SHIELD specifically). It will make them easier to regulate and control. Civilians will feel safer.

Captain America is the first to oppose this decision and many others soon follow. They have no interest in sacrificing their freedom for what people fear will become a fascist system. Will they still be able to determine the villains or become criminals when they no longer agree with who the government thinks are the bad guys?

Rather than fighting to protect the people, the heroes begin fighting each other.

One of the things I wonder is if the movies will be able to add enough heroes to make this fight seem screen worthy. There's a few extras from the most recent films but if they want enough for Civil War, they need Joss Whedon to stop killing off characters.

It's a very powerful story and one many people will relate to. It makes me think of the quote, "Those who would sacrifice freedom for security deserve neither." But superheroes often work above or beyond the law. Are they losing freedom when we ask them to live by similar laws as our own police or military force? I hope they do a good job of showing the fine balance they must strike here.

One character dies in this story to show a point of no return. There's no going back and people start to change sides after it happens. Will there be enough heroes to join the fight? Who will lose their life to give this story meaning?

A Graphic Year Week 12

Lately, I’ve been gravitating toward superheroes everyone picks on. First, Aquaman and now Hawkeye. I picked up Hawkeye Vol 1.: My Life as a Living Weapon during my comic shop’s black Friday bonanza. I definitely enjoyed hearing the stories of a hero with no powers who doesn’t get a lot of love.

I didn’t realize Maria Hill’s character went deeper into the world of Marvel but I’d like to get to know her better. I suspect the stories I’m reading tie into the Marvel movies they’re currently airing and filming. They dealt with SHEILD being rebuilt from the ground up with Samuel Jackson’s Nick Fury and finding moles. They’re also talking about Captain America in the past tense. I don’t know exactly what happens but I get the feeling this all ties together.

Hawkeye doesn’t strike me as a complicated hero. He knows who he cares about and what matters to him. The job goes from there. I’d be curious to see more of his adventures, especially since I hear one of them is told from his dog’s point of view.

At the end of this trade there was an issue from Kate Bishop’s series of young heroes. This is another one of those moments where my lack of context bothers me. I made total sense of it and enjoyed the story but I only knew 2 of the characters. I barely understood the premise of this world and how it connected to the other stories in the trade. It’s why I tend to shy away from superheroes in general. There’s so much frakking stories that it’s nigh impossible to get every story line to make sense on its own.

A Graphic Year Week 10 & 11

Once again I took care of 2 weeks in the same weekend and neither of them were Deadpool or Archie. I read the first trade of the New 52’s Aquaman. I wanted to find out why everyone constantly rags on Aquaman. It seems like he’s got a pretty cool power IMHO so I never got the hate. One of the guys at my comic shop was so enthusiastic about this one because Aquaman proves he’s a good hero, not just to the world, but to himself.

I didn’t know he was half-human and half-Atlantian. When he ruled Atlantis or walked on land, he was always of both and neither place. This series starts with unknown creatures rising from the depths that even Atlantians didn’t know existed. Aquaman manages to save many people but at a great cost. While pondering the cost, it is discovered that the artifacts found during the battle reveal a great deal more happening beneath the waves than Aquaman ever realized. I’m very curious to see where they take this series and the Atlantian mystery.

For this week, I read Great Zombies in History which is an anthology of what history would be like with zombies inserted into the annals of history. I picked it up at a Baltimore Comic Con a couple of years ago and it’s been collecting dust on my shelf for far too long.

The first one about the great battle of Troy is good but really sticks the landing at the end. Both Roanoke and Sacajawea’s stories are poignant while Teddy Roosevelt’s works well within historical continuity. The Jack the Ripper tale actually has some Deadpool like humor. If you’re into zombies and/or history, you’ll get a kick out of this one.

Music: Geronimo by Sheppard

A Graphic Year Week 8

This week, I read Deadpool Corp: Prelude (0.5) by Victor Gischler. After discovering the Deadpool Corp was a thing in Deadpool vs. Deadpool, I pounced on the used copies on Amazon because it’s currently out of print. There was a bit of backstory that would have been helpful but I saw how much those were selling for and decided to call it a day. There was a little bit of backstory I was missing but nothing that really got in the way of my enjoyment of the story.  

The prelude is when Deadpool rounds up Lady Deadpool, Kidpool, Dogpool, and Zombie Headpool to save the multiverse. It was interesting to see all of the different universes. I hope I can visit them again when it’s not so insanely expensive. It culminated in a battle for the Deadpool Corp to prove they were worthy to save the universe against robots and what appeared to be homicidal Carebear knockoffs. The last piece of the story was fun but done in a very dated computer graphic design that reminded me of the 1990s instead of the 2010s when it was published. I would have enjoyed the story more if the art wasn’t so off. I’m hoping this will shape up to be a fun series.

A Graphic Year, Week 2: Deadpool Gets Graphic

I took my sweet time getting into any hero comics and the first hero that spoke to me was Deadpool. Most superheroes feel overdone so it took me a while to come around. When I did, I went straight for the Merc with the Mouth. Superman was such a boy scout, Batman seemed rather one note from a distance, and I didn’t like the new 52’s Wonder Woman. Deadpool was on whatever side was paying him and had enough one liners to keep it interesting.

                                                      

I got the Deadpool Minibus for Christmas and the first book in it is Deadpool Kills the Marvel Universe. When I said it was going to be a graphic year, I wasn’t kidding. Using the traditional Deadpool style of multiple voices in different voice box styles, we see the arguments in his head. The X-Men bring Deadpool in to a new doctor to be treated. This doctor turns out to be Psycho Man who is not trying to better criminals; he’s trying to wipe their minds to make them his puppets in an army.

As he starts killing off Deadpool’s voices one by one, one voice remains and fights back. The red voice box was what made Deadpool such an efficient killer and Psycho Man removed the noise that kept Deadpool from seeing what was really there. In purging the world of its superheroes and villains, Deadpool will finally stop the madness that plagues the entire Marvel world.

It was obviously violent but the manner red voice Deadpool kills off his enemies and debates with himself was incredibly interesting. The red voice is cold, calculating, and intelligent. Normally written as a loveable, murderous goof, it’s interesting to see the character as intelligent and ruthless. Some of the ways he comes up with to execute his opponents is ingenious. I think my favorite death was Professor X. I won’t spoil anything but I will say it was rather unexpected.

Home Sweet Own Challenge 20

I love this concept. A world full of heroes who now must cope with those powers being gone? Brilliant. I even met the writer last year and he was a rather nice fellow. He signed my copy with the line you hear throughout the book “Everyone comes back.” I was very excited to finally read it. I really enjoyed the mix of B&W panels with the text. I wanted to like this book so badly. I’m mostly out of nice things to say.

I loved some of these hero concepts. They sounded fascinating and I would have loved to have seen a bit more of them in their heyday. Most of the back story comes is too little for some characters, too much for others, and most is too late to resonate. It’s hard starting with former heroes losing what defined them and trying to figure out how to be vulnerable mortals. There was no glory before it got depressing so the whole thing had a dismal tone.

So much time is spent on long drawn out expositions. It’s exhausting and grating. If those had been cut down to size, I’d have made it through a lot faster. I would literally think “Are we done yet?” in several chapters. I’m not a slow reader but this writing style made this drag on for at least another week since I’ve got a life too.

Then there was the oft repeated phrase “We all come back.” [SPOILER ALERT] They lied. Nobody’s powers were restored. Why the hell is that the damn catchphrase of the book if it doesn’t happen!?!

Some of the plot twists were good. The terrorist attacks and the true villain and the true nature of the blue. I also enjoyed the shifting perspectives which added to the story, just not enough. Some of the characters were less than likeable. I wanted to like Pen but he was cowardly. Sicko was all sorts of annoying and Strength irked me with her recklessness. Shouldn’t your protagonist be someone you can root for and get a better ending out of? I finally finished it and I remember thinking “What was the point of that?”

I’m a fan of comics and most of those have better, faster story telling. Anyone who says if you like comics, you’ll like this, is wrong. This book has so much potential but it was such a letdown.

1) Fiction – A Once Crowded Sky by Tom King

2) Nonfiction – The Man Who Loved Books Too Much by Allison Hoover Bartlett

3) Sci-Fi – Redshirts by John Scalzi

4) Fantasy 

5) Mystery – Book of Lies by Brad Meltzer

6) Horror 

7) Memoir/Biography – Data, A Love Story by Amy Webb

8) Chick Lit – Me and Mr. Darcy by Alexandra Potter

9) Feminist – Commencement by J. Courtney Sullivan

10) Teen – What Happened to Goodbye by Sarah Dessen

11) Holiday 

12) Essays – What Was I Thinking? ed. by Barbara Davilman & Liz Dubelman

13) Short Stories 

14) Library 

15) Animal 

16) Book about Books – Judging a Book By Its Lover by Lauren Leto

17) New – Pitch Perfect by Mickey Rapkin

18) Old – Dark and Stormy Knights edited by P. N. Elrod

19) Pop Science – Why Men Fake It by Abraham Morgentaler, MD

20) Near 

21) Far 

22) Graphic Novel – Love and Capes: Do You Want to Know a Secret? by Thomas F. Zahler

23) Reread – Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

24) Wild Card 

25) Otherworldly Creature 

26) Free – Point Your Face at This by Demetri Martin

27) Noteworthy 

28) Bestseller – How to Be a Woman by Caitlin Moran

29) Themed Anthology – Red edited by Kris Goldsmith

30) Steampunk 

31) Movie-Book 

32) Media – Doctor Who: Touched By an Angel by Jonathan Morris

33) Travel 

34) Food 

35) Classic 

36) Humor 

37) Poetry 

38) Past – Stasiland by Anna Funder

39) Future 

40) Dystopia/Post-Apocalyptic 

41) Zombie 

42) Sports

Current Music: Crazy on You by Heart

Home Sweet Own Challenge Book 3

The current nonfiction book I'm reading for a challenge category is taking longer than I thought but I found something lighter to enjoy in the meantime. My graphic novel is the first trade paperback of Love and Capes.

I discovered this one at the last Baltimore Comic Con. I loved the concept of a superhero who finally tells his girlfriend about his secret identity and the relationship moves on from there. This was an impulse purchase I was very happy with.

It was light and fun. A lot of comics now thrive on drama and darkness. This was a breath of fresh air. I grew up on Archie but love Fables so I can appreciate both. I like that his is somewhere in between. 

It’s oft describe as a superhero parody because of spoofs of iconic heroes but it’s less about the heroes and more about the people. The heroics are all off camera so he focus is on the relationships between the characters: Abby and her sister, Crusader and Darkblade, Abby and Amazonia. Abby and Mark are so couple-y that you want to hate them but you like them too much. I can’t wait to read the next trade.

1) Fiction 

2) Nonfiction 

3) Sci-Fi 

4) Fantasy 

5) Mystery 

6) Horror 

7) Memoir/Biography 

8) Chick Lit 

9) Feminist 

10) Teen 

11) Holiday 

12) Essays – What Was I Thinking? ed. by Barbara Davilman & Liz Dubelman

13) Short Stories 

14) Library 

15) Animal 

16) Book about Books 

17) New 

18) Old 

19) Pop Science 

20) Near 

21) Far 

22) Graphic Novel – Love and Capes: Do You Want to Know a Secret? by Thomas F. Zahler

23) Reread – Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

24) Wild Card 

25) Otherworldly Creature 

26) Free 

27) Noteworthy 

28) Bestseller 

29) Themed Anthology 

30) Steampunk 

31) Movie-Book 

32) Media  

33) Travel 

34) Food 

35) Classic 

36) Humor 

37) Poetry 

38) Past 

39) Future 

40) Dystopia/Post-Apocalyptic 

41) Zombie 

42) Sports 

Current Music: Good Girl by Carrie Underwood