KILL SHAKESPEARE #1

The new “it” company seems to be IDW. At least for me, anyway. Sure, they put out the basic crap like G.I. Joe and The A-Team and Angel but they also put out this book as well as Locke & Key and We Will Bury You. That's three very strange books that probably would have normally been at Vertigo or Dark Horse or Image or nowhere. So it is nice that there's a new company out there putting out some interesting books. This book got savaged on one website. I guess if you don't know anything about Shakespeare then you might find this bore. On the other hand, if you wrote a PhD thesis on Shakespeare then you might think that these authors have no idea what they're talking about. I thoroughly enjoyed this book, although the only action scene (it involves pirates) is a confusing, uninteresting mess. I'm not really even sure what the plot is. The book seems to make a plot out of Hamlet going to find and kill the playwright William Shakespeare because Richard III wants him dead. The back of the book says that it “pits the Bard's greatest heroes against his most menacing villains.” Well, which is it? The art is terrific, though, and great colors by Ian Herring. It's sort of like Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead written by Charlie Kauffman. ***

THE LIGHT #1

This book is strange but not very good. A mysterious light starts killing people (they burst into flames). A guy and his daughter escape their house and run around amidst the chaos, the father in his work goggles and the daughter blindfolded. The book achieves a unique, strange beauty thanks to the artist
Brett Weldele. The book is odd but not exciting nor entertaining. It's not even a very interesting story. An evil light that kills people? It has potential but so far it's just boring. 1/2*

CHEW #10

Perhaps this book has the best art out there these days. It's comical and zany but it tells the story perfectly and fleshes out this bizarre world to a T. This is the final part of the current storyline. What we learn is that there is no such things as vampires. That, and the head guy of the island blows his brains out. And Chu's girlfriend, the food critic, has a Gallsaberry growing in her window sill. This is another odd issue. It seems that every issue adds another layer of strange to the proceedings. Now we have another villain to add to the list that includes Chu's old mentor: the psuedo-vampire. This guy isn't a vampire but he does drink people's blood (not to mention bits of their flesh). Why? He gains that person's skill. Yeah, he's like an X-Men member that can drain people's powers. The cover has a bowl of blood and an eyeball on it. How this cover got into any comic book store without a black bag over it is beyond me. ***

POWERS #4

This is more like #30-something, but Oeming and Bendis took some time off and came back with a new #1. I don't think making money is the point, although Bendis writes so many books these days he has to be making a lot anyway. The reason this book is so great is mainly because of the letters page. It's five pages long. This month it features an interview with a blogger that reviews comics. It also has letters that are ripped apart by Bendis. And it has descriptions of things Bendis is writing and things Bendis is reading or listening to these days. The comic itself isn't half as good, but it's dark and interesting. The plot has a superhero cop investigating murders that deal with superheroes. Did I mention it's dark? The art is extremely sloppy, but I'm used to it by now. The story here has Walker remembering the past when he was in a psuedo-Rat Pack full of superheroes that won WW2. Why does he not remember everything, though? And the daughter of a superhero killed her stepfather because he was a rapist. Maybe the book should just be a letters page. **1/2 (out of ****)