Cinderella: From Fabletown with Love #1 (of 6)

Chris Roberson & Shawn McManus
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Seemingly ditsy fashion aficionado by day, secret spy for Fabletown by night - that's the idea behind Cinderella in Fables, the Vertigo book that this six-issue mini-series spins out from. Cindy has been one of my favorite Fables characters because of this dynamic, and this new series doesn't disappoint, as we see Cinderella perform some James Bond-ish moves as she works to track down some magical Fable weapons that are being smuggled into the "mundy" world, that could expose the immortal Fables to the humans. This is really a fun book to read because Cinderella is such a cheeky character. Throw in the undercover action and it's easily better than that other Fables spin-off (Jack of Fables). Chris Roberson comes up with a nice story for Cinderella to show off her talents, one that incorporates many favorite Fables characters, and big enough to really show readers what Cindy is made of. McManus does a fine job of illustrating the adventure, executing some nice fight scenes and drawing in a style similar to what we're familiar with in the main Fables book. But I think the real stand-out artist here is that cover artist, Chrissie Zullo. Zullo is new to the comics scene, but definitely worth keeping an eye on because that cover is just beautiful. Anyways, nice first issue, great premise - I whole-heartedly recommend this to readers of Fables proper, and the book gives enough information to fluidly welcome new readers into the fold as well.

The Week In Awesome! V and More

Here are five things that excited me over the past week!
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1. Suckin' It For the Holidays by Kathy Griffin - Her latest television special on Bravo, Balls of Steel, may not have been up to her usual standards, but her new "Christmas" CD, recorded live in New Jersey, is a lot of fun. Within, she trashes the Housewives, tells dick jokes, talks about her mom...pretty much what you'd expect from the lovely Ms. Griffin.
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2. 1,001 Children's Books You Must Read Before You Grow Up - Like the title implies, Julia Eccleshare gives synopses of 1,001 children's books, from board books to teen novels, that are the cream of the crop. Lots of fun with plenty of history of the medium.
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3. V - The television series remake of V debuted to stellar ratings with a pretty decent episode, with plenty of familiar faces from past science fiction shows.
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4. Battlestar Galactica: The Plan - The final offering from the Battlestar Galactica television show is this direct-to-video movie of the series told through the eyes of the Cylons.
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5. The Fourth Kind in theaters - Another sci-fi offering... This is an abduction movie with a really creepy trailer that debuts in theaters today. If you haven't seen it yet, watch the trailer here.

Black Widow: Deadly Origin #1 (of 4)

Paul Cornell & Tom Raney

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The acclaimed writer behind fan-favorite series Captain Britain and MI-13 sets his eyes on the Russian spy Black Widow to tell her origin in time for the new Iron Man film coming out next summer. The opening scene is pretty neat, that of Black Widow aboard a space shuttle with the man who stole it, and revealing herself as having replaced his partner. The two then have a little shit-talk where they try to up the other one about what they're going to do to each other, leading into a scuffle that ends with the two of them parachuting over a casino. Very fun. Then the book regresses in time to show Natasha as she's slowly drawn in to The Red Room, beginning with having been raised by a soldier she treated as her father, then training under the tutelage of a man who wishes to train her as a weapon. When Natasha is chosen for the "icepick protocol," which threatens to destroy everyone close in her life, she vows revenge. The art by Raney is competent all the way through, but nothing to really brag about, although when John Paul Leon takes up art chores in the flashback scenes between pages 13 and 19, things get much prettier, making me wish that he'd taken up penciling the entire series. But then we're back to Raney by the end, which is fine because he is a fine artist - I just preferred the more interesting-looking art by Leon. Cornell does a fine job of building an origin for the character so far, but it's mostly set-up at this point. The real test will be the subsequent issue. He's already proven that he can bring out the bad-ass in Black Widow with that opening scene, so I'm ready to see Natasha cut loose and become the woman she is today.

Age of Reptiles: The Journey #1 (of 4)

Ricardo Delgado
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The Journey is the third mini-series from Ricardo Delgado's Age of Reptiles series, following Tribal Warfare and The Hunt. Unlike those previous two mini-series however, this book isn't focused almost exclusively on carnivorous dinosaurs (although they certainly make an appearance, and create quite a shake-up when they do) and contains far less gore. Like those previous incarnations, The Journey is a silent comic. Delgado could certainly have gone the route of having the dinosaurs talk, or make noises at the very least, but he keeps things quite realistic, even if the dinosaurs do do cute things on occasion. Despite being silent, Delgado manages to assign personalities to the giant lizards, especially the tyrannosaurus rex who eventually comes into the mix before leaving reluctantly without any prize to show his/her young. The Journey is about a great migration that the dinosaurs are making. All different types of herbivores (and a few smaller carnivores) are trekking across the beautiful land, including triceratops and ankylosaurus, with great herds of their kind mingling with that of others and, for the most part, getting along. But we're reminded time and again that nature is cruel and that the weak are consumed, and that the strongest survive. This book is just a nice beautiful read. Delgado has some nice touches thrown in, like of how the dinosaur herds all sleep together, the brontosaurus sleeping standing up in a circle around their young, their heads and tails laying on one another like they were intricately laced. It's very lovely, and when the tyrannosaurus does make an attempt at one of the young triceratops, it's not the typical confrontation that we've seen between the two bitter enemies, but the rex simply realizes that he/she is not in a position to win. This book is thoughtful, fluid and quite pretty, and certainly worth the cover price.

In Stores 11/4

Here are the highlights of books available in comic stores tomorrow!

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Pick of the Week

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The Marvelous Land of Oz #1 (of 8) - I really enjoyed Eric Shanower and Skottie Young's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz adaptation of L. Frank Baum's classic children's book, so I'm really excited that the two are continuing on with the second book in the Oz series (and my personal favorite) with some crazy new characters who are going to be fun to see come to life in comic form.

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Other Noteworthy Releases

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Age of Reptiles: Journey #1 (of 4)

Beast Master (Volume 1)

Best of The Wizard of Id HC

Black Bird (Volume 2)

Black Widow: Deadly Origin #1 (of 4)

A Christmas Carol HC

Cinderella: From Fabletown with Love #1 (of 6)

Claymore (Volume 15)

Criminal Deluxe Edition HC

Deathlok #1 (of 7)

Exiles: Point of No Return TP

High School Debut (Volume 12)

Hikaru No Go (Volume 17)

Honey Hunt (Volume 3)

Like a Dog HC

Lobo: Highway To Hell #1 (of 2)

Marvel Zombies: Evil Evolution

Nana (Volume 19)

Otomen (Volume 4)

Psylocke #1 (of 4)

Secret History (Book 6)

Stumptown #1

Tales From the Crypt (Volume 8): Stinky Dead Kid GN

Titanium Rain Double-Sized #3/4

Tsubasa (Volume 24)

Usagi Yojimbo: Yokai HC

Vampire Knight (Volume 8)

We Were There (Volume 7)

Wonder Woman: Rise of the Olympian HC/TP

X-Men Origins: Iceman

Monga Monday: Sugarholic

Sugarholic (Volume 1)

Gong GooGoo

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Sugarholic is a manhwa starring Jae-Gyu Sin, a lazy tomboyish character who used to bully kids when she was younger, and hasn't lost that tendency, as she's still loud and pretty violent to those around her. When her ancestral home is destroyed in a landslide, she is sent by her grandmother from the country to the big city to live with her reluctant brother in a fancy apartment, in a fish-out-of-water sort of tale, as she really isn't suited to the city life, at least not initially. I think her grandmother realized this, and used the excuse of the landslide to send this undisciplined girl out into the real world, since she is the kind of woman to teach a girl a lesson the hard way, like with the value of money, as is demonstrated by the bare minimum she sends Jae-Gyu into the city with, which ends up getting the irresponsible girl into trouble. I think the word obnoxious suits Jae-Gyu best, and I can't figure out why her childhood "friend" whom she tormented, now a famous musician, would be infatuated by her, let alone another gorgeous stranger (on the run from his overbearing father, who wants him out of the country to avoid being with a girl he doesn't approve of) she bumps into a few times. Jae-Gyu is very rough around the edges. She may look pretty with a little make-up on and when she runs a brush through her hair (an event that takes place practically by force), but I find this situation of men falling for her like this pretty ridiculous, and can't imagine any readers feeling like they have anything in common with such a trouble-making, abrasive protagonist. The secondary characters are much more likable. Gong GooGoo seems like a talented artist, using beautiful soft lines to illustrate the scenes, and any forthcoming works by the creator may be worth checking out, but Sugarholic is far from the addicting read that the title implies.

Previews HYPE: January '10

Diligently wading through the phone book that is Previews Catalogue so you don't have to...here are ten choice books shipping to comic shops in January that I think may get overlooked or that I'm just plain excited about...

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1. Joe the Barbarian #1 - This new Vertigo series by Grant Morrison and Sean Murphy follows a diabetic kid who may or may not be in an insulin-deprived hallucination when he's transported to a land populated by his toys.

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2. Little Adventures In Oz (Book 1) TP - One of my favorite comic book fantasies is being rereleased by IDW in smaller sizes, perhaps to appeal to readers of all-ages books like Bone. These self-contained stories by Eric Shanower are going to be available for $9.99 each, a nice appealing price, so hopefully they will be successful in reaching a new audience.

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3. Donald Duck Classics (Volume 1): Quack Up HC - Boom! Studios is beginning to turn out these classic collections of Disney comics, featuring favorite characters from the entertainment giant. This Donald Duck collection is 112 pages of pure Carl Barks stories.

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4. King Aroo (Volume 1) HC - IDW is really digging out some quality comic strip projects for their Library of American Comics line. This collection contains all dailies and Sundays from the King Aroo strip published between 1950 and 1952. Also available from IDW this month (through the new Yoe Studio! imprint) is the classic Krazy Kat story by George Herriman, Krazy & Ignatz in Tiger Tea HC, featuring Krazy Kat under the influence of a psychedelic substance.

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5. Copper GN - Kazu Kibuishi's popular on-line comic finally sees print in a complete collection. Bits and pieces of the boy and dog adventures have been in Flight anthologies, but here's the definitive edition.

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6. The Newsboy Legion by Joe Simon & Jack Kirby (Volume 1) HC - Continuing their mission to publish classic Jack Kirby comics, DC is releasing this new book featuring comics from Star Spangled Comics.

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7. Excalibur Visionaries: Alan Davis (Volume 2) TP - This makes me happy. One of my favorite comics growing up, and one of my favorite runs on the title, is continuing to be collected featuring some of the very first comics I ever read that still hold up today. Behold the Sat-yr-9 betrayal come to a head!

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8. Blackest Night resurrected comics - During this month only, DC is resurrecting a few of its fan-favorite canceled comics for a single issue, including Suicide Squad, Catwoman, The Atom & Hawkman, The Phantom Stranger, The Power of Shazam, Starman, The Question, and Weird Western Tales, many with the original creative teams. Also available this month, Marvel is capitalizing on Geoff Johns' rise to prominence by publishing some of his old works for their company in the form of Avengers: World Trust HC.

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9. Siege #1 - As Dark Reign comes to its concluding chapter, Marvel's mightiest heroes lay siege to Norman Osborn and his various resources, a rebellion that crosses over into many of Marvel's high profile titles, but the brunt of which will be felt in this four-issue mini-series by Brian Michael Bendis and Olivier Coipel.

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10. Tumor HC - From the creators behind the excellent Elk's Run GN, comes a new noir story featuring a man with a mission, whose tumor is also quickly killing him. This was #1 on the Amazon Kindle graphic novel bestsellers list for over two months, and finally sees print thanks to Archaia Studios Press.