My Week in Comics: August 12, 2011

It's superhero comic book events galore in My Week in Comics! With two of the biggest event books in  comicdom coming out this week, this is gonna be a doozy! But I digress. It's time for the most verbose comic book reviews around! So what did I get myself into this week? Read on to find out! 

It's unfortunate that Fear Itself is a victim of comic fans' cynicism. But can you blame us? Event after event, year after year, amounting only to so much supervillain posturing and superheroes standing around just to facilitate the change in status quo. And it's unfortunate that Fear Itself #5 is more of the same. The Serpent posturing, calling our heroes 'children', the heroes basically barging in fists-first without thinking...

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely hate thinking this way. Comics are supposed to be simple but fun entertainment! But I just can't say that I was entertained by this book. It's obvious that Matt Fraction is channeling something, the bombast and verve of superheroes of yesteryear. There are slivers of over-the-top superhero comics in here, and its a refreshing change from the dull and grim events before it. But it all falls flat, coming across instead as overcompensating to hide a paper-thin plot.

At least the action sequences are appropriately badass (it's been a while since I saw Thor whip out his God of Thunder card), and a curiously convenient but interesting plot point pops up that could be useful down the road, if only Fraction takes the time to write our heroes actually thinking first before trying to punch an Asgardian god in the face. It's like these people haven't read The Infinity Gauntlet before, much less take part in it! Stuart Immonen's fight scenes are epic, though. That puts the issue a bit ahead. Unfortunately, it's a little bit too late. I'm out. I'll have to look to spoilers to find out what happens next. Dropping this book while I still can, and giving this a 2 out of 5.

The last issue of Artifacts ended with Jackie Estacado mackin' on Sara Pezzini while the big bad Survivor succeeds in collecting the majority of the Artifacts! It might not look bad for our heroes yet in Artifacts #9, as the Thirteenth Artifact has been found, and Jackie and Sara...have sex?

Wow. That floored me. It's been a while since I saw a sex scene in comics (not that I'm looking hard for it, mind you) and Artifacts #9 just gave everyone a heaping double page spread (hee!) of it. I'm sure it's a useful plot point down the road, but it just seemed weird. But hey, who am I to question Ron Marz's plans?

If there's one thing going for it, it's that this ish finally sheds light on the Survivor's mysterious past. It gave the Big Bad of this event some much needed depth. Now I know why he does what he does, and I'm excited to know if our heroes will survive the experience. But judging from the state our bound and gagged heroes are in, especially now that the Survivor has gotten almost all the Artifacts, it's gonna be a tough road ahead. Pretty straightforward storytelling, which is cool.

Jeremy Haun's art is a refreshing change of pace from Whilce Portacio's frenetic pencils, but like the previous issues, poor sequential storytelling spoils everything. Aside from the PG-13 sex scene, everything else lacked the oomph of excitement or the clarity needed to sell the drama of Marz's words. It's all plain, and plain isn't what you pay $3.99 for.

At the very least, Artifacts is doing something exciting for the Image universe. Three more issues to go! This one is a 3 out of 5.

Not that good of a week, but man if that Thor-Hulk fight right there didn't give me goosebumps. So what do you think of events? Leave me a comment below and let's talk about it. Thanks for reading!