Unctous Sodomites And Vain, Pampered Whores: The Shade #7 Review

EDITOR’S NOTE: And one last brief review of one of last week’s comics before the comic stores open…

Looking back over this past week’s reviews, it seems like there wasn’t very much I actually liked. Which is a bummer, but just the way things go sometimes; some weeks you get journeymen turning in inspired craftsmanship, others you get dillitanates who are fucking around in the medium for the sheer, lunatic thrill of it.

Thankfully, The Shade is no dillitante… and neither is writer James Robinson, who is continuing via The Shade miniseries to channel the closest to a Jack Knight Starman story that we are every likely to see again.

Robinson is just over halfway through this 12-issue miniseries with this issue, and yet amazingly, it is not a bad place to jump on if you haven’t been reading from the beginning. Yes, it is mid story – even mid ministory within the series, which recalls adventures from the title character’s past – but Robinson gives the reader a three page recap at the start of the book, in the middle of a fight, to bring us up to speed. Which is valuable, and the kind of thing that I like to see in comics – I prefer a book that I can pick up and follow without having to hunt up back issues or old trades – although I’ll admit that the sequence is dialogue-heavy exposition.

The Unchanging Man: The Shade #2 Review

For all the excitement that DC Comics has been trying to generate with the New 52, and their loud and public protestations that everything is all-new and all-different, this appears to be the week that they’re playing to old readers’ nostalgia… if not every reader’s nostalgia, then mine in particular. Going through this week’s DC take is like being 25 years old again, except I no longer have to choose between comics and food that isn’t ramen noodles, my joints crack whenever I do anything more strenuous than turning a page, and those cracking joints are the only ones I currently have hidden in the house.

James Robinson’s Starman was one of the bright spots of comics in the 1990s, a decade that brought us chromium variant covers, Spider-Clones and the ability for Rob Liefeld to make a living that didn’t involve grocery bagging or glory holes. Starman was a book that was as much about world-building as it was the title character, making its Opal City art deco setting and its residents as much a key character as Jack Knight himself. Robinson retired Jack Knight as Starman – permanently, so far – in 2001, and supposedly has a deal with DC where they can’t use the character without his permission, making Robinson the first comic creator I’ve been tempted to torture for the good of comics who didn’t draw Captain America with tits.

So, no Starman for you. However, Robinson’s giving us The Shade miniseries, which is still pretty Goddamned good.