Comic Book Reviews

Joe the Barbarian TP (2024 Edition) by Grant Morrison – A Riveting Journey Through Imagination and Survival Grant Morrison’s Joe the Barbarian is a breathtaking graphic novel that masterfully intertwines real-life struggles with an extraordinary fantasy adventure. This 2024 trade paperback edition revives the critically acclaimed story, giving new readers and collectors the perfect opportunity to delve into one of the most imaginative and emotionally resonant works in modern comics. At its heart, Joe the Barbarian tells the story of Joe Manson, a lonely and bullied teenager living with Type 1 diabetes. One fateful day, Joe’s blood sugar drops dangerously...

The Damned #2    Oni Press really knew how to draw my attention with this one. A menacing, well dressed demon smoking a cigar in the dark woods? I had to see what’s going on with this issue. Plus, the title. Simply called the Damned. I’m sold.     Like many good stories, this one features demons. They seem pretty common place, too. I’m not sure if the demon on the front is supposed to be Satan (they only refer to him as Big Al, but he looks like the Devil), but he’s an angry gangster. And he’s a bad man. This...

Redneck #1 Technically, this is second printing of the first issue. But, when it originally came out, I wanted to read it, and chose something else. So when I saw this on the wall, I took it as a sign that this was my second chance. And, as they say, you shouldn’t waste a second chance. When I saw the title and look of this book, I assumed it would simply be about some small southern town. Really, I kind of thought that it was going to be in the same vein as Southern Bastards (which I only read a...

Rocket #1 Following last week’s new Guardians of the Galaxy #1 comes the new Rocket series. Rocket is back, sans the Guardians, in a heist book. Rocket is with his own crew now of strange looking aliens, each with a different specialty. My favorite of which, by the way, is an angry and destructive version of Tweety Bird. Seriously, they got the speech thing down here. Like I said, this is a heist book. Rocket, a former criminal, has put that life behind him when an old flame shows up to ask him for help. So Rocket has to use...

Bane Conquest #1 It’s often said that Batman’s got the best villains in comics. They are the most interesting, varied, and in the end, fun. So, here we are with one of the greatest: Bane. Who doesn’t want to see more of the man who broke the bat? Bane is back in his own mini-series, written and drawn by two of his co-creators Chuck Dixon and Graham Nolan. It’s always interesting to read about Bane because, as bad of a guy as he seems to be around Batman, he’s usually presented as a not-so-bad guy fighting for his city. That...