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This Week in Comics – 1/25/10

Some weeks are like this, Internet: you struggle to fill your largely ignored weekly comic book column with new, interesting releases that aren’t tie ins to crossovers or being made into movies, but some weeks you just clutter the week with Batman. And that’s okay, because Batman is awesome and superhero comics are good. The world just shouldn’t revolve around them. But this week they can, because two awesome Batman books are coming out in the same week. Batman, Batman, Batman.

Welcome to This Week in Comics, where every day is a comic book. And many days are Batman.

MONDAY

First Issues

Robocop #1

(Rob Williams/Faviano Neves)

Dynamite Entertainment

I like RoboCop. That’s all I’m sayin’.

TUESDAY

New Manga Day

Barefoot Gen Volume 9: Breaking Down Borders & Barefoot Gen Volume 10: Never Give Up

(Keiji Nakazawa)

Last Gasp

Do you know someone who writes off manga as a whole lot of pap about magical girls, bishonen, or gay vampires? Time to introduce Barefoot Gen into this person’s life. A semi-autobiographical account of the aftermath of Hiroshima, Barefoot Gen is heartbreaking stuff in the same way that Grave of the Fireflies was. I had no idea it ran ten volumes, but here we are, with Last Gasp releasing the final two volumes this week. Read them and see just how powerful comics can be.

WEDNESDAY

Mainstream Superhero Stuff

Detective Comics #861

(Greg Rucka/Jock/Cully Hamner)

DC Comics

Okay, so this week is going to be Batman-heavy. I’m fine with that. Just look at all the parenthetical talent up there! Plus, J.H. Williams III does the cover. Detective Comics is particularly of note because it stars Batwoman, whose solo adventures we’ve been waiting for since her first appearance in 52. As if to annoy me, someone at DC decided that Batman should be on the cover. While it’s not THAT uncommon for a superhero to not be on his or her own comic book cover, to show the guest star who happens to be the male version of the protagonist aggravates. Am I too sensitive to gender issues, Internet, or is comics generally a sexist boy’s club?

THURSDAY

Not Quite Friday, but Still Exciting

Captain America Reborn #6 (of 6)

(Ed Brubaker/Bryan Hitch)

Marvel Comics

Waaay too many superhero comics on this week’s list, but them’s the breaks. If it’s any consolation, I chose the handful of good superhero comics, most of which involve Batman for some reason. You’ve heard my spiel on Captain America Reborn before (Grant Morrison meets Slaughterhouse-5 with superheroes) with great art by Bryan Hitch. We all know Captain America’s coming back, so it was just a matter of how. In Ed Brubaker’s hands the how, it turns out is pretty insane.

FRIDAY

TGICameron Stewart

Batman and Robin #7

(Grant Morrison/Cameron Stewart)

DC Comics

I wasn’t incredibly keen on the last Batman arc mostly because of Philip Tan’s art, which isn’t totally his fault because Frank Quitely is a tough act to follow. But Cameron Stewart is drawing the third arc of Batman & Robin, so the series is going to resume its expected high levels of awesome. This is a good time to list all the great things Cameron Stewart has done, most of them with Grant Morrison: parts of The Invisibles Volume 3 (collected as The Invisible Kingdom), Seaguy, Seaguy: Slaves of Mickey Eye, Seven Soldiers: Manhattan Guardian, The Other Side (with Jason Aaron) and his own webcomic Sin Titulo http://www.sintitulo.txcomics.com . So, yes. Cameron Stewart. Amazing.

SATURDAY

The Kung Fu Voodoo Queen Who Always Makes the Scene*”

Afrodisiac hardcover

(Brian Maruca/Jim Rugg)

AdHouse Books

Jim Rugg drawing a blaxploitation comic book? Looks like someone got my Christmas wishlist. In a perfect world Marvel Comics would publish an ongoing where Luke Cage, Iron Fist, Shang-Chi, Colleen Wing, and Misty Knight punched and kicked pimps and gangsters and kung fu masters in 1970s New York. But that comic doesn’t exist (unless you count the actual ‘70s comics), so here’s Afrodisiac. Because we deserve it.

*Seriously, you need to read Casanova.

SUNDAY

This one should have ended loooooong ago

Kick-Ass #8

(Mark Millar/John Romita Jr.)

ICON/Marvel Comics

I don’t quite understand why the final issue of Kick-Ass is coming out so late, but it’s not going to matter in a few years so let’s just ignore that fact. Hardly anything resembling the gritty, realistic comic as it initially seemed to be, Kick-Ass is a classic Mark Millar comic: smug, snotty, and just a bit annoying while being ultraviolet and entertaining. But I’m not as excited for the comic as I am the movie. April 16 can’t come soon enough!

“NOTE: Diamond says this Kick-Ass #8 comes out this week while Marvel’s website says it comes out on February 17. I’m gonna trust Diamond for now. If not, I’m just going to copy and paste this when the book ACTUALLY comes out.”