Welcome back to PCS’ weekly rundown of the best and worst new releases, courtesy of our friends AHR & Albert (Geekanerd), Ernie Estrella, and (Jason Michelitch).

PAN: Brawl #2

I was really thrown by the pairing of indie vet, Dean Haspiel (The Quitter) and Michel Fiffe, who I was reading for the first time. Each artist takes half the book to tell their tale of “Creature Romance”. Both stories are abstract and it would be a disservice to take these stories so literally, but this book is not recommended for fans of a straight story. Haspiel’s “Immortal” features two over-exaggerated pulp versions of Tarzan and Jane as they find time in between their love-making to save the city from what appears to be a giant macaroni noodle. Each scene seems as if two or three panels are missing in between, which in turn makes for a jarring, yet strangely compelling experience.

Fiffe’s “Panorama” introduces us to Agustus, who in the midst of adolescence is having a terrible time controlling his body’s spastic mutations. The execution of this second story struggles to be coherent. We get no explanation or reason as to why the characters act the way they do, nor are we given anything to draw us in any deeper to really find some poetic meaning to it all.

I really tried to give Brawl a chance after two issues. Haspiel’s “Immortal” intrigues me as the heroic couple gathers sacrifices from the townspeople to offer the creature. Despite the eccentric narrative, there is this moxie–born out of the silliness of 60’s serial television and male bravado of that same era–that brings a chuckle or two. However, I’m not sure I’d read it again. Fiffe’s second installment of “Panorama” was not a story. All it did was show just how grotesque Augustus’ face can get. If there is a story at all, someone please explain it to me. It was almost devoid of any romance and it is a chore just to finish the book. “Panorama” does not pull its weight and makes you wonder how you could have spent another $3 to find closure. At best, Haspiel’s art almost saves Brawl; I said almost.

Shock Value: D+ - Ernie

PICK: Infinite Horizon #1

Gerry Duggan and Phil Noto bring us the exploits of a Captain’s dangerous assignment while his family awaits the end of his tour of duty in this modern and provocative re-imagining of The Odyssey. The thought of reuniting with his family is his driving force for survival and his main motivation for his actions. Noto’s signature wide open panels and stylistic paintings attracted me to pick up the book. His palette of warm tones transferred me to the Middle East at a page’s turn, then New York at the next. Still there is room for Noto to grow as a sequential storyteller as his action scenes remain a little stiff, but his manufactured landscapes and moody set design make for haunting compositions of a subject deep in our hearts and minds. Shock Value: B - Ernie

PAN: Justice Society of America #11

Wow, these team books can get convoluted and bogged down with such a large cast of characters and so many stories going on. After the last issue, which concentrated on the return of Kingdom Come Superman, there’s just too much going on in this issue. The JLA comes in to validate that KC Superman is who he claims to be, while the Blood Soldiers kick their way into the book, the Flashes explore the Speed Force, and Power Girl is still mourning. This issue reads like it’s laying the foundation for what’s coming next but I’d rather Geoff Johns keep it simple and keep the focus on KC Superman. Shock Value: C - Ernie

Omega The Unknown #3

The first two issues of this book showed great surreal potential, but the story hadn’t really taken off yet so it was hard to wholeheartedly recommend. But with this issue things are starting to fall into a good rhythm. The hyper-intelligent boy Alex is having a hard time fitting in at school, due to the fact that he was raised by robots and is clueless about the subtleties of human behavior. His innocently know-it-all personality makes him a target for ridicule, and his inability to sense sarcasm make things hard for the one person to try to befriend him. Meanwhile, the titular hero is working as a fry cook by day and breaking into Pharmacies to get ingredients for some mysterious concoction by night. But really this is Alex’s story, which is good because the mute Omega doesn’t give us much to work with. If you’ve read any of the story so far are wary because you’re afraid it isn’t going anywhere, you can buy this issue with confidence. And if you haven’t yet cracked a page of this shockingly original book, you owe it to yourself. There’s gold in these pages. Shock Value: A - Albert

DOUBLE PAN! Ultimates 3 #1

The first Ultimates volume was my favorite Avengers story of all time. It was new, it was fresh, I was in love. This book is such a pale mockery of that I shuddered when I had to open it again to write this review. It’s too dark and sexy for its own good. The characters are all one-note stereotypes (Tony the drunk! Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch the creepy siblings! Hawkeye the asshole! Cap the prude!) The art has little sense of continuity and when there are backgrounds they seem incongruous with what came before—Venom breaks through the wall of the Avenger’s mansion on the second page, the next page (without Venom running away or anything) they are on a city street, there are a couple of pages with no backgrounds but also no chasing of any sort and then we’re all of a sudden in the middle of a park. I’m not sure what the problem is here. I like Jeph Loeb, I like Joe Madureira… I can point a finger at Christian Lichtner’s colors for making the book’s tone so oppressively un-fun, but even that seems too easy. It’s just a case of talented people coming together and striking out. It happens. Shock Value: D - Albert

(And excerpted from Jason’s full-review, which you can read here…)

Jeph Loeb’s writing hasn’t worked for me since Batman: The Long Halloween, and I never really “got” Joe Madureira, and I’d stopped reading The Ultimates back around issue 5 when I got tired of reading about the Avengers recast as shallow and vicious Blackwater operatives. So I didn’t have any great hopes for ULTIMATES 3. Rather than ignore the book, though, I looked on it as an opportunity – an opportunity to give Loeb, Madureira, and The Ultimates each a second chance. It’s December, after all, and I’m told that forgiveness and second chances are part of some holiday you all have coming up.

Turns out I really shouldn’t have bothered. The book isn’t completely terrible or anything, but it’s almost aggressively bland. As much as I despise Mark Millar, he has a surface veneer of cleverness, and at least Bryan Hitch brought the widescreen-action of The Authority to the party and made the original Ultimates somewhat new and exciting (though the elements of that style have now made their way outwards and are now commonplace, the way contemporary pop songs started showing up ironically in mainstream films a few years after Kenneth Anger’s Scorpio Rising cut scenes from a movie about Jesus together with The Shangri-Las’ “Leader of the Pack”).

Madureira’s art just looks like the ’90s, his manga-influenced style not looking nearly as odd or different in this manga-infused decade. The coloring by Christian Lichtner casts a muddy-brownish red over everything, turning all the visuals into a non-dynamic mush, making the whole book just look like one of the lesser Virgin Comics titles. Jeph Loeb’s writing also reeks of the ’90s, only with the new Ought-friendly elements of secret porn tapes, incest, slobbery drug overdoses and gory holes through people’s hands. Anybody remember when the Ultimate line was supposed to be appropriate for eight-year olds?

Shock Value: an aggressive C- - Jason

PICK: Zombies Vs Robots Vs Amazons #1

Often you can judge books by their covers. In this book’s case, the cover has zombies, robots and Amazons. If those three things appeal to you, this comic will not jerk you around. The zombies are brain-eating, the robots are steampunked out with big guns, the Amazons are both ass-kicking and lady-loving. You are getting your three dollars worth. Despite the almost cynically ridiculous plot setup, everything about the book feels rough and smart; the art balances the beautiful with the chaotic, and artist Ashley Wood is skillful enough to make his Amazon protagonists strikingly sexy without seeming exploitative. The script brims with funny offhand comments that makes the dialogue feel spontaneous and alive. Plus a final page that deserves a reader’s verbal exclamation of approval; I went with “awesome”. Shock Value: A - AHR