Heralds: Baby's on fiyah, betta throw her in the watahh

[greenmask]

Marvel's Ladies Year, as previously discussed, is turning out seriously hit and miss. We've had a couple of posts for Heralds (and we know that stubbleupdate wasn't keen), but I don't think it's had enough love yet!

The book was a five-issue mini (written by Kathryn Immonen, this part pencilled by Tonji Zonjic) featuring Monica Rambeau, Valkyrie, Emma Frost, Agent Brand, She-Hulk, Hellcat, Sue Storm kind of, and a new character (who I'll be introducing later) teenaged waitress (redheaded! Hey Marvel!) Frances. It also brings back Frankie Raye: Nova, Herald of Galactus. Frankie's been dead, and she's a bit messed up and only partially present - a tiny fragment of her has been hidden in Frances since she was fourteen, and now the fragment has gotten out and found its way to ex-boyfriend Johnny Storm. Dreamscape possession time! In my opinion, this whole seven-page sequence from issue three is rad, but only three pages are included here.






"No air.
How can we keep on like this when there's no air?
I've missed the smell of rain. Like the thought of missing you."



Auhhh it's so AWESOME AND WEIRD AND SPOOKY! I really think this is great. It's so desolate in that fifties-sixties oppressive open plan futurism by-the-rules way. Johnny's burning nothing, Frankie's ironing nothing.. and burning it. The SYMBOLISM, man! Or rather, the symbolism, woman. This is such archetypal western "every-female" dismantled-dreams stuff that it's almost, but not quite, ridiculous. It's unabashed! I dig it!

Oh and, glass house = glass ceiling? y/n?




I love how Hank Venture Johnny looks here. I also love how plain and impossible the argument is. How many times have you been called "crazy" when you're actually just "angry"? We've seen this argument play out on s_d and ns_d more than once. Powerless mental/emotional anguish leads to lashing out; people who don't get it say what the hell.. things escalate. Zonjic's art is just grand for the scene too, they both look so perfectly pinched and worn behind/in front of the polished and put together. And the colouring! The colouring is great! I think this is Nathan Fairbairn (what a neat surname, by the way).

They argue some more, and fire fills the pool and air.

Frankie lists the men who have disappointed and betrayed her - "I never meant to let you down", says Johnny..




Great, right? I don't know if or when Heralds will be coming out in trade, but, cross your fingers or look out backissues, huh?

Comments

[selke]

Ooh, I love the art. It's very fitting.

[greenmask]

Isn't it just? I wasn't sold on it for some of the more superheroic scenes, but it suits this to the ground.

[icon_uk]

So she's assuming that this dream is really what Johnny wants?

Half the dreams I have feature stuff I don't want in them, and I certainly wouldn't want to be judged on them.

[greenmask]

I don't think either of them are really in control or fully cognizant of the fact that it's not Real Life.. Kathryn Immonen is often kind of confusing, but as far as I can call it it's a dream sequence in the truest sense - it seems real and straightforward and important at the time, but doesn't actually hold any precise sense in or relevance to waking hours.

It's emotional expression rather than a real exchange, I think.

[greenmask]

Also, I think that Johnny's only the guy in the situation because he's the only one on her grudge list who's really available right now. Her stepfather is dead, the Surfer's in space, Galactus also, etc etc. Johnny's on earth, was the boyfriend she was with when her powers manifested, and can take her firepower. It's just luck of the draw that he gets the brunt of her venting.

Bummer!

[kingrockwell]

This series wasn't perfect, it was a little hard to follow and the art was spotty at times, but generally I liked it!
This sequence was pretty amazing. Chills!

[greenmask]

Yeah, a couple of times the scene jumps were a bit disorienting and such. I was willing to forgive most of the problems (like you mention) as indicative of the.. potential instability of a lady-centric mini. I certainly wouldn't be at my most comfortable, artistically, if I were working under perceived strictures, y'know?

[arilou_skiff]

I'm willing to forgive it all for "No! Literally Einstein!" and "I MISSED PUNCHING HITLER!?"

[greenmask]

Yes THOSE TOO!

[kingrockwell]

"I have an Oppenheimer."

[stubbleupdate]

My problem with it was that I often felt like I'd turned two pages over at once, because it didn't make sense.

I excused that with Hellcat: Agent of the Initiative because it was cute and fun, but when the characters were introduced without telling me their essential backstory, the scene transitions made no sense and the fill in art was bad, I lost a lot of goodwill to it.

#1 was really good though.

[greenmask]

Yeah, I found that once or twice but I was enjoying the ride enough to shrug and puzzle it out.

I liked the fill-in art, a lot, but that's always gonna be a super-subjective thing!

Issue one was good, yeah. It's amazing how much my opinion of Summers changes when Emma's there to wrangle him.

*points up*

[jazzypom]

What he said. But then, I've found most of the Marvel: Year of the Woman issues to be a miss.

Re: *points up*

[greenmask]

No disagreements from me about the second part.

But I do think that the apparently overall lacklustre handling of the whole "year of women" thing probably had a hand in the underwhelming showing from said issues. :/

[dorksidefiker]

I had the same problem with Immonen's Pixie mini-series, too.

[sevarem]

Same here. Thought the first issue was really fun, but it went entirely downhill from there. It makes me wary of reading any other Immonen titles.

[cleome45]

I am SO glad that I'm not the only one who had this problem. I wanted to like it, but I was so lost most of the time-- which I'd originally attributed to my just having not been in fandom and kept up with everything.

[bluefall]

when the characters were introduced without telling me their essential backstory, the scene transitions made no sense and the fill in art was bad

For me that was the biggest thing - I think I could have rolled with everything else, the wtfery and the characters I don't know and all of it, but that on top of the unbelievably jarring shifts in the art style and quality from one page to the next, it was too much.

Which is such a shame, because I agree with greenmask entirely on the quality of scenes like this one.

[greenmask]

O hey! You agree with me upon long-awaited return. Huzzah!

[autohobbs]

I'm glad to know I wasn't the only one who read this and just got completely lost at times. I didn't even buy the final issue, although I really should I guess.

[meatwhichdreams]

Late to the post, but I am compelled to make these two most insightful points:

1) This is really gorgeous and strange and I really enjoyed reading it,

and

2) That is definitely Hank Venture.

[greenmask]

1) Hurray!

2) It's so easy to picture him getting into a situation like this too, isn't it?