Secret Invasion: Black Panther

Writer: Jason Aaron
Artist: Jefte Palo
Colorist: Lee Loughridge
Letterer: Virtual Calligraphy's Cory Petit
Publisher: Marvel Comics

What's it about?
In 2008 Marvel Comics did a big 'event' called:

 

How pulpy.

Secret Invasion's premise is that a group of shape shifting aliens - the skrulls - have been infiltrating Earth society and are now poised to launch a full scale (secret) invasion.  The skrulls can replicate powers so have replaced key superheroes on earth:

N.B: This is a teaser image and is not necessarily the actual heroes the skrulls replaced (no spoilers here, Jimmy).

The skrulls are undetectable and so it's very hard to know whom to fight.  Whilst the main mini series was a bit dull, a few of the tie-ins were great fun. The 3 Black Panther issues are some of the more enjoyable ones.

The Black Panther, also known as T'Challa, is the King of Wakanda.  Wakanda is a small African country that has never been defeated, not once in 1,500 years.

The Wakandans have always had far superior technology to the rest of the world.  They retain their African identity, culture and dress.  It is unusual to read about a culture with better tech than the Western capitalist world, who dress in both tribal and business clothing, and revere an animal god (in this case the Panther God who gives T'Challa his abilities).  The Wakandans are pretty darn intelligent but not greedy.  They are nationalistic but do not seek out conflict.  They do aggressively defend their borders should anyone seek to invade.

Now, the skrulls have infiltrated the Avengers and the Fantastic 4 and replaced many earth heroes and villains.  They decide to go for Wakanda.  What do you reckon the chances of them claiming control are?

House of M

Writer: Brian Michael Bendis
Penciller: Olivier Coipel
Inker: Tim Townsend
Colourist: Frank D'Armata
Letterer: Chris Eliopoulos
Publisher: Marvel Comics

What's it about?

Wanda Maximoff, aka the Scarlet Witch, is a mutant with magical, reality-altering powers.  After a traumatic event wherein she kills some of her fellow Avengers, the X-Men decide that she needs to be reined in.  Her brother Pietro, aka Quicksilver (he's a speedster), and her father Magneto (the X-Men's main enemy), want to save her and so spirit her away.  The Avengers and the X-Men go in search of the missing family but before they find anyone the world turns white and changes.  Suddenly, mutants are in charge.  They are running things and aren't victimised.  Magneto is a sort of benevolent leader and homo sapiens (us normal humans) are the oppressed.

Only Wolverine can remember how things used to be, so he sets out to put things right.

Seen the film?. Read the book: Captain America, Spider-Man, X-Men and Guardians of the Galaxy

Four films in one post, because I'm rather behind!

Captain America: The Winter Soldier
This film is based on a story arc by writer Ed Brubaker and penciller Steve Epting.  The film isn't really close to the books, but it's close enough if you want to experience it in comic form.  Brubaker's run is very highly thought of and is considered a great example of Captain America stories.  If you want to read more Cap'n, the relevant trades are as follows (in order):

Captain America: Man Out of Time - This isn't by Brubaker, but is very very good.
Captain America: Winter Soldier
Captain America: Red Menace
Civil War: Captain America (best read alongside the main Civil War series)
Captain America: The Death of Captain America
Captain America: The Man With No Face - this looks like it's out of print, but should be available digitally on www.comixology.co.uk/com
Captain America: Road To Reborn
Captain America: Two Americas
Captain America: No Escape
Captain America: The Trial of Captain America
Captain America: Prisoner of War

After the Winter Soldier story Bucky got his own series, also written by Ed Brubaker, which is traded as:
Winter Soldier: The Longest Winter - this looks like it's out of print and is going for ridiculous amounts of money, so also check comixology to see if you can get it digitally for a fraction of the price.
Winter Soldier: Broken Arrow
Winter Soldier: Black Widow Hunt
Winter Soldier - The Electric Ghost - this has a new creative team.

Amazing Spider-Man 2
I thought this film was a terrible mess.  However, they did get Gwen Stacy right.  Gwen hasn't been around in the comics for a long time because she was killed by the Green Goblin in 1973.  In the comics, the Green Goblin was Norman Osborn, not Harry Osborn.  You can read the story in the trade Spider-Man: Death of the Stacys.

X-Men: Days of Future Past
Like Winter Soldier, the film isn't the same as the comic that inspired it.  In the comic it was Kitty Pryde (Shadowcat) who time travelled (not Wolverine) and there are different X-men involved.  The comic story only takes 2 issues to tell, so plays out rather differently.  It's a good story and worth reading.

The trade collects issues 138-143 from The Uncanny X-Men other series and starts as an epilogue to the Dark Phoenix saga.  Then there is a Nightcrawler story, then Kitty is introduced to the series, we have the two issue Days of Future Past story and the final issue in the collection is Kitty coming into her own and proving her worth as and X-Man.

Guardians of the Galaxy
This film seemed to be the break out hit of the summer.  Everyone seems to love it.  There have been a lot of Guardians comics and it can be quite hard to work out what to read, or to find copies.

The Annihilation omnibus is considered a good companion piece to the movie, however at £95 for the hardcover volume that's probably out of a lot of peoples budgets.  A more reasonable place to start would be Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning's Guardians collection. It's currently priced at just under £18 on Amazon, but your local comic book shop might be able to get you it for cheaper.  We have a list of recommended shops here.  Alternatively, try comixology for digital copies.  A complete list of Marvel's cosmic stuff (with lots of Guardians characters) can be found here.

Many thanks to @feemcbee for helping me identify and locate these titles!  If you're on twitter go follow her, she knows her Marvel.

Best of 2013: Marvel

To finish off the Best of 2013 roundup I thought it would be worth mentioning DC's and Marvel's superhero offerings.  Today we shall look at two fine series from Marvel:

Fearless Defenders

 
















I absolutely cannot rate this series highly enough.  Fearless Defenders brings together a group of Marvel's female superheroes and has them defending the earth.  Front and centre in the group are Valkyrie (a character from Norse Mythology) and Misty Knight (black detective/martial arts expert with a bionic arm).  Valkyrie is tasked with reassembling the Valkyrior to defend the realm against mystic attacks.  Over the 12 issues that this series ran for they hang out with and recruit several other lady warriors, including some brand new lesbian characters.

The series is smart and funny.  It filled the gap that DC's Birds of Prey left and it's a crying shame that it was cancelled.  The covers were quite often satirical, often mocking the industry's predilection for tits and ass poses of women.  This was sometimes undermined by the art within the issues, which occasionally got a bit tits and assey, but the rest of it is so good it made up for that.  Written by Cullen Bunn, the plotting was tight and the characters were used effectively.  It is one of my most loved series.

All 12 published issues gave been released as two trades, you can buy them from Amazon or from your local comic shop:

Volume 1: Doom Maidens
ISBN: 0785168001
Price:£11.99

Volume 2: The Most Fabulous Fighting Team of All
ISBN: 0785168494
Price: £13.50

X-Men

In 2013 Marvel relaunched their X-Men series as an all female team.  I'm not sure if this was done as a gimmick or because it felt like natural evolution for the team.  Whatever the reason was, the readers got an excellent comic series full of action and great characters.  The team includes well known characters such as Storm, Kitty Pryde, and Rogue, as well as fan favourites like Jubilee and Psylocke who are probably less well known to non comic readers.

The series is written by Brian Wood and has been strong from the start.  Art is provided by Oliver Coipel (pencils and inks), Mark Morales (inks), Laura Martin (colours), Joe Caramagna (letters).  Issues 1 - 5 are collected in trade under the title 'Primer'.  They deal with an alien invasion and a new baby on the team.  It was one of the best superhero titles on sale in 2013.  Volume 2 should be out fairly soon.

Price: £10.99
ISBN: 0785168001

Seen the movie? Read the book – The Wolverine

The book has been released with a few different covers: these are two examples.

The latest Wolverine film is based on a trade, written by Chris Claremont, drawn by Frank Miller, and simply titled Wolverine.  I recently read and thought it would make a good update.  Here goes.

Uncanny X-Men: Dark Phoenix saga

Writer: Chris Claremont and John Byrne
Penciller: John Byrne
Inker: Terry Austin
Letterer: Tom Orzechowski
Colorist: Bob Sharen and Glynis Wein
Publisher: Marvel Comics

What's it about?
The X-Men are a team of mutants.  That is, their genetics give them superpowers - anything from a healing factor, to telekinesis, to angel wings, to the ability to phase through solid objects.  Professor Charles Xavier, a phenomenal telepath, is the head of the X-Men.  As a team they fight terrible threats from this earth and beyond, and struggle to gain acceptance from regular humans who sadly are taught to hate and fear them.

Jean Grey is also a telepath. She's incredibly powerful but too young to fully handle this power, so has blocks placed on her abilities (by Xavier) to ensure she doesn't harm herself or others.  The Dark Phoenix saga is the story of how these blocks are lifted, how she gains power beyond measure and threatens the entire universe, and how the X-Men (and others) save the world.

Disabled superhero comics characters - wheelchair users

Note:  I thought this had posted back in November.  Apparently not!  Well, better late than never.

Continuing our series on comic heroes with disabilities, let's look at wheelchair users.
Here we have Charles Xavier, Barbara Gordon, Wendy Harris and Niles Caulder and more.  Read on.

X-23: Innocence Lost

Writer: Christopher Yost
Pencils: Billy Tan
Inks: Jonathan Sibal
Publisher: Marvel

What's it about?
X-23 was going to be a clone of Wolverine, but when the scientists tried to copy the only DNA sample they had, they discovered the Y part of his XY chromosome was damaged beyond repair.  One scientist, Sarah Kinney, decided to strip out the Y chromosome and copy the X.  So X-23 was created, more of a twin than a clone.

She has Wolverine's healing factor, she has his claws, his sense of smell and sad to say, his experience of horror and abuse.  For X-23 is created in a lab to be the perfect weapon.  Trained to fight and injure and kill from a young age, from the age of 12 she is sent out on assassination missions as a killer for hire.  Innocence Lost is the story of her creation, her upbringing and her fight to break free of the system.

Characters of Colour in superhero comics: the women (part 3) and a Spider-man

And so we come to the final entry in the our characters of colour in comics series, looping back to focus on women again..  We hope that we've showcased characters that interests you and we hope that you've been intrigued enough to search out some books.  There seem to be a lot more superhero men than women around, part of this is, I think, because there are more male superheroes than female ones, which is a pity.  Another thing I think we've learnt is that ongoing superhero series tend to feature white people, not characters of colour.  The only way this will change is if people buy more comics with characters of colour in them, showing the publishers that there is a demand.  So please, if you like the sound of any of these characters, buy a copy of the book!

To recap, the previous entries in our series can be found here:

Women (part one), women (part two), the X (wo)men, men (part one), men (part two), men (part three), men (part four), men (part five) and non-superhero comics.

And now, on with the women.

Marvels

Writer: Kurt Busiek
Art: Alex Ross
Letterer: Richard Starkings
Publisher: Marvel

What's it about?
Marvels is the story of the Marvel universe, from 1939 to 1974, told through the eyes of journalist Phil Sheldon.  From the elegant black cover, to the back page, it's an astonishing story of the rise of the superhero and what it means for ordinary people.  As the name suggests, it's a book to inspire awe and wonder, it is truly a marvel.

Characters of Colour in superhero comics - the X (wo)men

Yet more posts in our series, here is the fourth entry on the men, where we focus on the X-Men and their assorted hangers on.  You can read previous entries on women (part one), women (part two), men (part one),  men (part two), men (part three), non superhero comics, men (part four), men part five and finally women (part three) and a Spider-man.

The X-Men have always been a symbol of diversity and discrimination.  Their whole schtick is that they are different to everyday 'regular', so ordinary humans fear and attack them.   They can be read as a metaphor for characters of colour, gay, bisexual and transgender people, disabled people, anyone who is different and stands out from the rest really.  As such, it is entirely appropriate for the X-Men to have a cast of varying ethnicities.  Let's start.  There's a lot of them.

Characters of Colour in superhero Comics - the women (part two)

Continuing our series on characters of colour in comics, we bring you the women in superhero comics, part two.

You can read our other posts in the series as follows:
women (part one), men (part one),  men (part two), men (part three), the X (wo)men, non superhero comics, men (part four), men (part five) and finally women (part three) and a Spider-man.

Astonishing X-Men: Gifted

written by Joss Whedon
art by John Cassaday
colours by Laura Martin 

What's It About? 

Marvel created the Astonishing imprint as a showcase for big name creators. The idea was to give these high-profile creators free reign to work magic on their own favourite characters, to tell the stories they really wanted to tell. Astonishing X-Men was the first title in the imprint and paired Joss Whedon of Buffy and Firefly fame with the art team of Wildstorm's flagship title Planetary.

As a team of super-powered mutants the X-Men are ostracised from mainstream humanity. As such, they have always been a vehicle for allegorical stories about prejudice, be it racial, religious, sexual and so on. Whedon opens his series with the announcement that scientists have discovered a way to “cure” mutants, to safely remove their powers and render them “normal”. But where did this cure come from? What secrets are the Benetech corporation hiding? And what will this cure mean to the mutant community?

Characters of Colour in superhero Comics - the women (part one)

Someone on the facebook group recently asked where all the strong female characters of colour in superhero comics were.  This is a very good question and one that I feel needs answering.

I think there is a feeling that superhero comics tend to feature only white heroes (and male ones at that).  Whilst historically this was certainly the case, in recent years it has got better.  There are now several characters of colour in the superhero books (although not as many as there are white characters).  They are also in independent publications and manga.  I'm going to use this post to highlight a few particularly great female characters, and then do another post of the male characters.

Marvel Fairy Tales

Writer: C.B. Bebulski
Art: João Lemos (Peter Pan), Nuno Plati (Created Equal), Takeshi Miyazawa (Alice in Wonderland), Ricardo Tercio (The Wizard of Oz and Off the Beaten Path), Kyle Baker (The Friendship of the Tortoise and the Eagle)
Colours: Christina Strain (Peter Pan and Alice in Wonderland)
Letterer: Dave Lanphear (Peter Pan, Alice in Wonderland, The Wizard of Oz, off the Beaten Path), Artmonkeys (Pinocchio), Dave Sharpe (The Friendship of the Tortoise and the Eagle)
Publisher: Marvel

What's it about?
Much like Spider-Man Fairy Tales this book contains versions of Pinocchio, Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan and the Wizard of Oz using characters from the Marvel superteam, The Avengers.  Also included is Off the Beaten path, a version of Red Riding Hood from the Spider-Man Fairy Tales collection, and The Friendship of the Tortoise and the Eagle from X-Men Fairy Tales.

Wolverine: Origin

One book, released with 3 different covers.  I believe only the top right image is still in print.

Script: Paul Jenkins

Pencils: Andy Kubert

Digital Painting: Richard Isanove

Lettering: John Roshell, Comicraft, Wes Abbott, Oscar Gongorra, Saida Temofonte

Publisher: Marvel

What's it about?

It's Wolverine's origin story.  Wolverine is a mutant, that is, like many other people in the Marvel universe he has evolved from homo sapien to homo superior.  Individuals who evolve gain abilities or superpowers and can do things the rest of humanity can't.  In Wolverine's case, he has retractable bone claws on each hand, an enhanced sense of smell and a healing factor that makes him very, very difficult to kill, or hurt.  In the Marvel Universe he is part of the X-Men - a group of mutants put together by telepath Charles Xavier, who fight against evil, for humanity and for mutantkind.

X-Men: Magneto - Testament

Writer: Greg Pak
Artist: Carmine Di Giandomenico
Colours: Matt Hollingsworth
Letterers: Artmonkeys' Dave Lanphear and Natalie Lanphear
Publisher: Marvel

What's it about?
The life of a Jewish boy and his family, living in Germany from 1934 (or thereabouts) to 1948.  At the start of the story young Max Eisenhardt is at school experiencing discrimination from his teachers, and at the end he has survived Auschwitz.

It's about the lies that the Nazis put forward, the degradation of the Jews and the Roma and the ways in which the persecuted groups within Nazi Germany survived, or didn't.  It is very much focused on the experiences of the victims, not the authorities.  It's about the methods and ways in which the Jews were sidelined and pushed out of society, resulting in their murder by millions in the camps.