Dean Ormston

There's a bit of a sucker punch at the end of Testament: Why spend so much time creating stories modeled after those of the Bible when in the end, there's the suggestion of a different path? Much of the content here seems as if it comes from someone with rabbinical training, which makes the conclusion so jarring. I'll keep the three stars -- an average rating -- only because that's what I gave to the rest of the issues. But in terms of "satisfaction," I'd probably rate this with two stars. show more (I'm also still not a fan of our main character Jake 's long hair, because I keep confusing him for a girl in many of the long-range shots.)

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LT Haiku:

Plot takes all the gods
and splits them into factions:
Which are the good ones? show less

I was showing some friends the art in Sandman and I got in the mood for some of that mythology. I didn't feel like lugging around my Absolute Sandman, so I decided to try out Lucifer.
I borrowed this copy from my usual book dealers (I have a couple of friends I trade books with, but I'm usually in the borrowing end of the trade), and I think I will borrow the rest. It's not Sandman, somehow it lacks a sense of something bigger that I always feel when I read Sandman (the fact that I'm reading show more the Absolute versions with its lustrous paper and recoloring might help that feeling).
But it still is a really nice story (2 actually). I liked the first arc better, in some ways it sounded more like Gaiman's Lucifer. In the second arc Lucifer was a bit more deceptive but also a bit more passive, bidding his time, waiting for Fate, while on the first arc he actually went on a quest. show less

I'm in the midst of a week-long project to catch up with the Black Hammer sequel and spin-offs. Up now is the conclusion of the story begun in the first issue.

So this series has repeatedly pretended to make real progress on the last page of one volume only to walk it all the way back for the next in order to drag things out and take more homage detours. This time our heroes reboot without their memories into a world without superheroes. Conveniently, one of them does remember and sets out to show more get the band back together in time to stop an impending apocalypse.

I was hoping that like Alan Moore's Watchmen, Lemire was going to take all his pastiche characters and use them to make a real statement about superheroes or comic books or something, but he seems content to simply wallow in DC Comics nostalgia and invite all his fellow fanboys to join him in the mud. And the mud felt squishy and warm between my toes for a while, but now its drying out and leaving grit in sensitive places.

It really doesn't help that Lemire pulled the bury your gays trope these last two volumes. Ugh. show less

Oh! My new library has all the newer Black Hammer books that my old one didn't. Time for a week-long project of catch-up.

When last I saw the mopey heroes of the Black Hammer universe, they were moping around a farm being mopey. Despite their best mopey efforts to remain mopey, the secret of the farm is at last revealed and the status quo gets status broke. However will they mope now?

Along the way we get a pastiche within the pastiche as one character takes a trip into DC's old Vertigo show more imprint to meet some slightly askew versions of John Constantine and the Endless and also, according to the end notes, The Ramones, though I did not recognize them as such in the story.

This was borderline 2-stars for me, but I'm relieved that some progress has finally been made and am actually curious about the next book. show less