This part of 2022 was one of the more difficult parts of my life. I spent a lot of it, when I wasn’t working or tending to my family, at my dad’s bedside with my mom. He never recovered from the stroke he’d had on the operating table, and was in no shape for the chemo or radiation treatments that might have prolonged his life, and in any case the quality of that life was not great and got worse and worse. He died on December 9.

In the meantime, I was reading comics and lots of stuff about William Blake, and also Alan Moore. The Blake and Moore reading was in service of two Watchmen Bestiary posts, one focused on Blake and one focused on Moore. As for the comics, I’d gotten through the Marvel Previews (though I jumped on each new one as I picked it up from the comic book store) and was moving on to some of the other M’s on the shelf, including various Marvels and some indie comics as well. They comforted, as always.

There are spoilers here and there. In particular I cite a major concept from Busiek and Cinar’s series The Marvels.

William Blake vs. The World

John Higgs
8.9/10 · July 28, 2022

Most of the reading associated with my Watchmen project feels like work, but this one was a pleasure. Higgs brings a fantastic humanity and an eclectic body of knowledge to his examination of Blake, and in the process renders Blake’s often bizarre expression understandable and fascinating. There are also a bunch of really relevant references, like to Moore’s Jerusalem and to the King Mob riots! Also, the writing itself is a pleasure to read. A delightful find for this part of the project.

The Cambridge Companion to William Blake

Morris Eaves, ed.
7.1/10 · September 20, 2022

In a strange twist of life, despite not having been in academia for 28 years I find myself reading an essay by David Simpson, for whom Laura and I used to house-sit. And I’ve ended up citing it in the draft of my Blake & Watchmen post! This is a collection of academic essays, most written in blessedly non-jargony and non-theory-heavy prose. They tend to vary in usefulness and enjoyability, generally staying in the 35% – 75% range, with a few stronger moments and a few sloggier passages. A good survey of scholarly viewpoints on various aspects of Blake and his work, with some occasionally interesting biographical and structural insights. Also, I felt really validated by the number of full-on Blake scholars admitting that Jerusalem is really, really hard to read.

Annotated Marvels sources

Marvel
9.2/10 · September 25, 2022

Annotated Marvels came up in my (incomplete) issue collection shortly after I’d already read it for the random Previews project — too soon to just reread. But as it happens, each of these annotated issues includes a list of sources, so I decided to read those sources in conjunction with rereading the issue, to see how Busiek & Ross wove together the history of the MU from Phil Sheldon’s viewpoint. Kind of a very pale shadow of the Watchmen project. As with the larger work, deeper knowledge of the well deepens the delight of reading. Even aside from how brilliant Busiek is at constructing a coherent history, it’s super cool to see Ross’s renderings juxtaposed with the original art. A long but pleasant journey.

Wolverine: Journey of Time

Jody Houser and Marco Itri
4.3/10 · September 25, 2022

This is like a 16 page version of those old Hostess Twinkies superhero ads, except instead of Twinkies it’s motorcycles. Silly and meaningless — what’s a little fun at one page is a total waste of time at 16.

Star Wars: The High Republic (2021)

Cavan Scott et al.
8.4/10 · October 2, 2022

An enjoyable little series, with reasonable characters + situations. Nothing that blew my socks off, but I don’t regret the time spent. It’s nice to see Jedi wrestling with moral dilemmas, and figuring out how to hold the line “for light and life.” That’s a refreshing change from the usual Jedi storyline of “struggling back from extinction.”

She-Hulk: Law and Disorder Infinity Comic

Charles Soule, Javier Pulido, and Ron Wimberly
6.7/10 · October 4, 2022

Read up to current episode (#12). So this was a pleasant, entertaining enough read up until issue #9, when somebody called Ron Wimberly takes over the art and it becomes just HIDEOUS. Everybody looks like a halfhearted attempt at cubism — neither good to look at nor thought-provoking. Wimberly completely ruins whatever goodwill the first 8 issues built up, and distracts fatally from the story. It might be worth (mildly) recommending again once he’s gone, but man, until then, AVOID.

The Marvels #11-12

Kurt Busiek & Yildiray Cinar
9.3/10 · October 5, 2022

A satisfying conclusion to the story. I really appreciated the way it addressed multiple levels of comics history at once, something Busiek is perfectly suited for. Lots of great comics metacommentary, like the Torch’s bafflement at inserting a fictional new country amongst a bunch of real countries — “How does that even WORK?” Even more, though, I loved the way it literalizes the metaphorical operation of superheroes — if Captain America is a simile by being like America, Siancong is a metaphor by BEING Siancong. That some fictional broken humans try to absorb that metaphorical power for real destruction is an apt metaphor for what some real broken humans do.

All Marvel’s Voices issues (as of 10/18/2022)

Marvel
8.5/10 · October 18, 2022

Like any anthology, let alone anthology of anthologies, this is kind of a mixed bag. But I love the basic concept of highlighting marginalized creators and marginalized characters (or at least characters from marginalized backgrounds, but there’s an awful lot of overlap.) There’s a fair amount of meh, much of it driven by the enforced shortness of the stories, but there are some gems, including a Dani/Rahne story in “Indigenous Voices” that I am going to have to track down on paper. Also, D-Man and his trans superhero support group is great, and the Iceman stories in the infinity comics do a fine job of defining Bobby Drake as a great gay superhero.

The Massive: Ninth Wave #1

Brian Wood and Garry Brown
6.3/10 · October 19, 2022

This is apparently the first issue of a prequel series to a bigger post-apocalyptic saga, none of which seems to be available online through any legit channel. I would have been interested in reading more, but I’m not going to order big books of such an unknown quantity. In any case, while I liked the art and the storytelling in this issue, I have a problem with how I’m supposed to root for the characters who poison the water supply in a major city. Like, yeah, they stick it to the man I guess, but what about the babies whose formula has to use that water?

Master of Kung Fu – Battleworld

Haden Blackman and Dalibor Talajić
8.4/10 · October 19, 2022

This was one of the many “Battleworld” series that Marvel spun up briefly as part of the big Secret Wars event in 2015. I’m on record as not caring about alternate universes, but this one had Wolfsbane in it, so of course I’m gonna buy it. Overall, the book does a creditable job of mashing together Shang-Chi and X-Men, and I did really dig Rahne’s alternate Asian self, bit player though she was. Enjoyable and, like most alternate universe stories, forgettable.

Miles Morales: Spider-Man #29

Saladin Ahmed and Chris Allen
8.8/10 · October 19, 2022

I keep hitting overlaps with Miles, but that’s fine, because this is good stuff. I had this issue on my shelf for whatever reason, so I reread it. What jumped out at me this time was the subplot about the essay Miles has to write for his scholarship application. Having it center on how he still continues to put in the work and take care of business despite all the insanity of his life feels like a great surrogate for the BIPOC experience writ large — accepting great responsibility in order to maintain any power at all.

Minor Threats #1

Patton Oswalt, Jordan Blum, and Scott Hepburn
7.3/10 · October 19, 2022

Maybe it’s just me, but after watching several seasons of The Boys and having read many deconstructions of superhero mythology (including the one I’m spending years on end writing about), this debut issue felt like it was traveling very well-trodden ground and not finding any new frontiers in it. Very good art, and some fun ideas, but overall kinda uninspired.

Miracleman #1-3

Alan Moore, Garry Leach, Mick Anglo, et al
7.9/10 · October 21, 2022

These were the Marvel reprints, which I bought a few of when they came out. Again it’s an overlap with reading I did earlier this year, but these had quite a bit of back matter, including several original Anglo stories per issue. Being very familiar by now with the Moore stuff, more of my focus went to these 1950s stories, and I ended up enjoying them more than I’d expect. I’ve already rated the Moore work on its own, so I’ll rate these here. They are silly, of course, but their silliness really helps to enrich Moore’s vision. In a way I suppose it’s a similar pleasure to what I get from Watchmen background reading.

Free Comic Book Day – Molly Danger & PrinceLess

Jamal Ingle (Molly Danger), Jeremy Whitley + Emily C. Martin (PrinceLess)
6.3/10 · October 21, 2022

Both these features are well drawn and competently told, but they feel like generic girl-power tropes to me. Like, a superhero but she’s a tween kid! And her name is Molly! But not Molly from the Runaways, this is a whole OTHER Molly, who is very similar but less specific. Or like, a medieval fairy-tale thing but the damsels kick butt instead of being in distress! They don’t need princes! They’re… PrinceLess! Neither one made me want to seek out more, so good thing it was free.

Ms. Marvel volume 1 (Issues #1-19)

G. Willow Wilson, Adrian Alphona, et al
9.7/10 · October 23, 2022

This was a reread, going through my paper issues that had been sitting on a shelf, and it was just as delightful as ever. Kamala is a fantastic character, and I love the way these stories are told — a charming mixture of humor, heart, wonder, and growth. Wilson leans into Pakistani and Muslim specificity, which works great for me as an outsider and (judging from the letters column) seems to work great for insiders as well. Alphona brings a little bit of a MAD Magazine quality to his art, which makes the pictures both fun to look at and undercuts the superhero angst of it all. But the core of these stories is Kamala and her relationships, much more than superpowers and punching. The support and the stress she gets from family, friends, super-friends, and a bad boyfriend let us see the grounded, caring kid she is, even as she’s learning to navigate it all. Very satisfying.

Ms. Marvel volume 2 (Issues #1-38)

G. Willow Wilson, Nico Leon, et al
9.5/10 · November 2, 2022

These 38 issues conclude Wilson’s run on the book, and it’s a great read. Several things stand out as impressive. First, Wilson’s ability to make participation in crossovers result in deeply significant story developments — Kamala’s part in Civil War II causes a rift with Bruno that she spends the next two years trying to heal. Speaking of which, the second impressive thing is the very well-realized supporting cast, who sometimes completely take center stage, such as at the beginning of the Teenage Wasteland storyline, and Bruno’s solo Wakanda issue. Finally, and most impressively, it’s the community that gathered around this hero, who felt seen and validated by her as girls, as kids, as brown people, as Muslims, as Pakistanis, and as brown kid Pakistani Muslim girls. That, more than anything else, made this book feel like it matters.

Mud Man

Paul Grist
8.4/10 · November 5, 2022

I picked #1 off the racks as an experiment, and enjoyed it enough that I sought out the (digital) collection of the first five issues. Unfortunately, it only lasted 8. It’s a nice start though — a classically told superhero story, with deepening intrigue and a likeable protagonist, with a pretty creative power set. I wasn’t familiar with Grist, but reading up on him it’s clear he has a fan base. Though not a big enough one to keep this book alive I guess. I thought the art was pretty enjoyable — a good 1960s Marvel vibe. I would have been happy to read more of this, but oh well.

Multiple Man (2018)

Matt Rosenberg and Andy MacDonald
8.9/10 · November 7, 2022

Jamie Madrox is such a ridiculous concept that he turns out to be unexpectedly rich in metaphor. Peter David did an A+ job exploring this in the various incarnations of X-Factor and Madrox, but Rosenberg’s take is okay too. It’s got some amount of alternate universe nonsense, but I appreciate the notion that somebody could have in them both a megalomaniac and a subverter — palace intrigue all inside the skull, except everything in Jamie’s skull gets externally manifested. Also, it did get across some of the horror of just endless copies of someone. Plus Wolfsbane is in it, so that wins some automatic points from the judges.

Peter David Grey Hulk era

Peter David et al
9.0/10 · December 2, 2023

Per recommendation from Reddit: Hulk 314-377, plus some crossovers and a Joe Fixit epilogue in Hulk 395 + 396. This was inspired by wanting to dig into the history on Joe Fixit, and taking the recommendation to read broadly for context on either side, since I enjoy Peter David’s writing so much. The Hulk was very status quo for quite a long time, and this story arc really shook a lot of things up, returning to the earliest roots of day/night transformations, gray skin, and the Rick & Rosses supporting cast. It starts with John Byrne, moves into Al Milgrom, and then gets wild once Peter David shows up. We get some early work from big 90s-era artists like Larsen and McFarlane, and explore the possibilities of finding more parts in Banner, and more incarnations to go with them. I don’t know that he’ll ever be my favorite character, but these comics were certainly worth reading, and brought a psychological depth to the stories that they’d been crying out for.

Magic Words: The Extraordinary Life of Alan Moore

Lance Parkin
9.5/10 · December 4, 2023

A biographer of Moore has a bit of a tightrope to walk, since one would want to remain on his good side, but that’s not always so easy to do. Lance Parkin does quite a respectable job of treating his subject lovingly but fairly, including the more controversial bits, and he does so by rooting his analysis in Moore’s Northampton roots, over and over again. As a result, this book pairs quite well with Jerusalem — just revisiting a page of it after reading ~600 pages of the novel lit up lots of connections between Moore’s life as he’s described it and this enormous magnum opus I’m traversing. Excellent research material, and a pleasure to read as well.

The Multiversity: The Deluxe Edition

Grant Morrison et al
7.8/10 · December 12, 2023

So this is Grant Morrison being insistently, relentlessly, sometimes tiresomely and sometimes awesomely bonkers. Just bonkers at an earsplitting volume. Tons of meta, tons of “wha…?”, tons of parody and commentary, some of it clever, some of it stupid, some of it so on-the-nose that it smashes the nose right into the face. I picked it up because it has a Watchmen-esque chapter which is basically all of the above, in a mean-spirited way more often than I wanted it to be. Partly it didn’t connect with me because I lack the deep roots in DC continuity, but partly it didn’t connect with me because it’s a little too navel-gazing to really connect with a reader. Parts of it were really fun, and that made the other parts worth wading through.

New Avengers #1-14 + Infinity event

Jonathan Hickman, et al
5.6/10 · December 28, 2023

I’m not sure I read the original Illuminati story arc(s), but my understanding is that it’s about hubris. A bunch of guys who think they’re the smartest ones in the world decide that they should start making decisions unilaterally — like shooting the Hulk into space — and they end up paying dearly for that. Hickman’s premise, I guess, is that these guys have learned nothing from that experience, nor from Civil War, so what we get is yet another retread of arrogant “geniuses” behaving like a conspiracy that thinks it’s a meritocracy, in the face of a seemingly world-ending threat, like this is the first time that’s ever happened. Did I mention these are alleged superheroes we’re talking about? I covered some of this ground earlier in a read of Hickman Avengers v4, and my opinion hasn’t changed. Everybody’s acting way out of character, and the whole thing seems quite overrated to me.