Welcome to another edition of Last Call Comics. Here, as we continually bolster AIPT’s weekly comics coverage, we catch any titles that might’ve fallen through the cracks. Or, those books that we might not cover but still deserve a little spotlight. Either way, it’s a chance to explore more comics, generate some novel insights, and maybe add to everyone’s to-be-read pile.
Once more, happy New Comic Book Day to everyone.
City Boy #3
Courtesy of DC Comics.
I fear things that I shouldn’t. For instance, what might happen to a still-developing book that I admire when the creators make only their third issue about Superman. But as they’ve already done a couple times, the team behind City Boy turned Big Blue’s appearance into a truly compelling moment.
I don’t want to spoil too much of the actual story, but it does involve a giant dragon which serves as the lynchpin of this issue’s biggest attraction: compelling character development! Cameron and Supes spend the bulk of this issue trying to help our young hero sort through his powers and increased prevalence in the realm of DC. It’s not exactly a new idea — Superman helps person! — but writer Greg Pak positions their dynamic in some truly novel and thoughtful ways.
It’s mostly centered around cities, which are where people connect and society happens, and both men have different connections to these institutions (and thus roles to serve). Superman takes a kind of overarching, distinctly positive view, and that informs how he sees the world. Cameron, meanwhile, is both on the street level and profoundly aware of the harrows of day-to-day life, and that’s given him a slightly cynical approach. And so when these two engage to help Cameron understand and control his powers, what we’re really getting is a poignant exploration of modern heroism and how cities (the thing that connects a lot of us) define a lot of those ideas. It’s a subtle but hugely powerful moment that’s both thought-provoking while also being a great one-on-one moment — a chance to delve deeper into both men and compare and contrast to achieve novel understandings. In a way, it puts Cameron on Supes’ level, and feels like a true feat of character development.
And while there is a sick dragon in this issue — one made of a city streets and junk metal — the art here really does take a backseat, as it were. And artist Minkyu Jung and colorist Sunny Gho seemingly accept their fate with ample grace and nonetheless big ideas. They create and foster these big, compelling visuals — which also include sick portals that Cameron uses to travel and the standard superhuman feats from the Man of Steel — to support the issue in a really essential way. We get these tent-poles of action, but I think the real magic is in how they show off during those “quiet” moments between Cameron and Superman.
The overwhelming energy and intensity of Superman contrasted to Cameron’s quiet, uncertain vibe imbues their convo with raw power. The way the city exists here reaches new levels of life — it feels as if you can see it breathe at times, and that plays up some of the big themes and conceptual moments here quite nicely. Even the way the dragon’s depicted here is a way to visually track Cameron’s connection to Superman and the way he views his own place in the world by the issue’s end. Obviously art and story need to blend and lift one another as much as possible, which this issue certainly does. But it’s also nice to see how that relationship ebbs and flows here to give us a more textured story experience.
The end of the issue sees Cameron making some big moves. (Hint: it involves a different city beyond Metropolis.) And to an extent, that only could come after a really important, world-building interaction with Superman. Does it somehow give him the strength and support to be a proper hero? Not really — it’s something altogether more interesting. It’s the power to take another step forward, and to sort it all out in real-time.
That feels like the most organic and thoughtful way for a new hero to step into their own — by remaining as uncertain as ever but wanting to do more. In that way, we get a really inventive “origin” story here, and something that pushes Cameron toward his fate. Whatever it may be won’t just be interesting, but a powerful dissection of cities, heroes, and the true magic of these stories.
Final Thought: More like, “The Man of Feels,” amirite?!
Score: 8/10
Quest #1
Courtesy of Image Comics.
I wanted to truly and genuinely like Quest, but it made the process mostly a harrowing journey.
Because, in some really important ways, the book has everything going for it. For one, Jonathan Luna (The Sword) teams up with Crystal Wood (The Black Ballad) for a story inspired by Southeast Asian storytelling and cultural traditions. That is a win in and of itself.
That core framework both matters and genuinely works in terms of the story, even as we get a pretty direct storyline with a slight twist (a princess sets off to rescue her newly-betrothed prince, or “The Reverse Zelda”). Those cultural references and touchpoints do a lot to make this world feel utterly different, stepping massively away from some other, Euro-centric fantasy tales for something that feels more robust and alive in its ways — as if a new cultural base infuses an “old” story with fresh and vital energy. And that’s even as the creative team spins in different references — like a dash or two of Lord of the Rings-esque regality and charm — to further differentiate this world.
It’s not just the framework itself that works. The people in — specifically Princess Anya and Prince Dyvan as well as Anya’s loyal bodyguard — feel like proper characters that don’t fall prey to the blander tendencies among fantasy tales. They’re brash and imperfect; romantic but thoughtful and strong; and brave but not always so commanding — in short, there’s some context and texture here that makes these folks feel like intriguing enough leads rather early on. A lot of the power of these characters is derived from the visual aspect. That Southeast Asian focus is super prominent, and it gives the world at-large a lot of new themes, colors, and general motifs that expand upon your average fantasy realm. I’ve always admired Luna’s style for his emphasis on humanity and romanticism, and how it makes everything feel deeply vivid. That remains true of Quest — it blends ideas and “genres” of fantasy to make this feel novel but also truly familiar.
While I’ve been fairly kind, almost adoring, to this point, it’s here that I need to talk about what makes all this potent magic feel sort of blah and bordering on the offensive. I think that as much as the book has some true strengths, they can often feel isolated — little strands and tidbits that are disconnected from one other. So while I can appreciate some design choice, or a bit of character development, it’s the cohesive story that feels mostly lacking. It’s often a two-sided problem. The first is the pacing of the narrative feels super slow, and it takes a whole extended issue to build what shouldn’t take more than a page or two. (That shouldn’t be an issue, and yet I can’t help but feel like any strengths could actually escape the sludge that was this needlessly methodical speed.)
And, secondly, as an extension of how this book moved, I couldn’t shake the slightly jarring, almost uneven sense that we were dropped into the book head first. Sure, I normally applaud such moves, but here it just took the legs right out from under us. The dialogue tried to build the history and scope of this world, but it often felt a little awkward (a feature of even Luna’s best stories), and that just made catching up less of a thrill and more of a chore. It’s these elements working in symphony that diminished a lot of the internal charm, and had me stumbling through slightly annoyed when I should have had more time to celebrate the early moments this book did foster with grace and intent.
The thing about “harrowing adventures” is that they should be worth traversing. The Fellowship didn’t just banish a big bad, but learned and grew from their long journey and battles. That’s mostly why I want to stick with this book: I think it’s honestly worth it. Do I expect some sweet companionship (i.e., more compelling adventure)? Sure. Do I also see little two-faced gremlin jerks (read: weird structural issues that vex and annoy?) Totes. I don’t know if the former can outweigh the latter just yet, but I’m willing enough to take a second step on this romantic crusade.
Final Thought: You wish this quest’s worst feature were just giant monsters and gnarly volcanoes.
Score: 5.5/10
The Oddly Pedestrian Life of Christopher Chaos #2
Courtesy of Dark Horse Comics.
To an extent, I get what dazzled my colleague Alex Schlesinger about The Oddly Pedestrian Life of Christopher Chaos. Because whatever magic was in issue #1, it’s certainly in #2 — for better and worse.
For one, I mostly agree that Tate Brombal’s writing is “heart-wrenching and heart-pounding”. He’s approached the horror canon (more on that later) with ample heart and commitment, and that’s resulted in a book where these devices are used to scare and exhilarate in equal measure. As if love and horror are perhaps two ends of the same spectrum, and this book expertly explores life as a teen (with all its endless uncertainty) through this novel structural lens. And that proves doubly true for #2, as the introduction of “Dracula Boy” not only builds Christopher’s world (and its corresponding challenges) but spins in even more things that prove horrifying, heartfelt, and even humorous. (Cause if you can’t laugh at the insanity of teenage-dom, what can you?)
As an extension of that core idea, Alex also noted how the book acts as a “stunning metaphor for the experience of growing up both neurodivergent and queer.” A lot of that, as I’d hinted at earlier, is how the book plays with the confines of horror, and more specifically that most novel idea of “The Other.” This notion that often what’s most scary is what we can’t understand or even seemingly connect to. Only this time, as Alex also noted, the series “successfully subverts and enhances the common tropes of these monster mythos, with a beloved high school hero as the wolf and Mr. Cross as the “Frankenstein-like mad scientist [as] sympathetic protagonist.”
In issue #2, that whole concept really comes alive — we grow the world of “monsters” here in such a way that we see not only how perfectly apt this “device” truly is but to extend the range of emotions. Like any school-age drama, there’s high stakes and over-sized drama, and as things develop around Dracula Boy, we get a more robust but nonetheless organic slate of sentiments and relationships to explore. Having that grander “palette” makes things more compelling and only further empowers the book’s commitment to exploring and infusing genres in the name of people-centric storytelling. Another vital part of that is, as Alex addressed with #1, how the book never “[makes] queer readers just guess” and instead embraces that queerness head on. That’s not just great for representation’s sake but it places a greater value on the lives of these teens and lifts up the whole narrative with depth and clarity.
And speaking of depth and clarity, I’m once more in agreement with Alex about the work of not only artist Isaac Goodhart but colorist Miquel Muerto. Together, the pair have extended the efforts of building a people-centric horror story in #1 into something all the more profound across #2. More specifically, little things — like the design of Dracula Boy, or even a monster-starring video blog, for instance — went a long way in shaping the story’s structure and sense of accomplishment while even filling in the holes when the story wasn’t quite direct enough. More than anything, though, issue #2 built on the visual identity kick-started in #1 with grander ambitions. The balancing act between cutesy, manga-adjacent teen story, queer romance, and horror story is no easy feat, and yet the visuals gave us big, bold designs and lots of subtle moments and interplay to nail the concept in ways both spectacularly over-sized and firmly understated. Christopher, especially, has a solid look that blends the many influences here and gives us a shorthand into this book’s main focus.
But that’s pretty much all that Christopher really does, and he’s the actual point where I’ve begun to veer away from my colleague’s glowing take. Because across #1, but even more so across #2, I couldn’t shake the sense that Christopher feels a little lost — to the point he’s so uncertain that he comes off as mostly flat and irksome. And it’s an issue made even worse when you consider some of his classmates, and how they feel deeply alive and dynamic across the board. (Heck, even Peg the undead pigeon sometimes comes across more charming than our lead.) Having this big, lively supporting cast lifting up someone who comes off lost and unsure just seems needlessly wasteful and a little infuriating for readers.
If the book features a character’s name, they need to be huge and mega-compelling — Christopher seems like he doesn’t know he’s the star of his own show and often feels like a set piece or an extra in and of himself. I get that maybe this is an instance of a character having to work out their specific role and thoughts and all that jazz, but it doesn’t feel that way in the book proper. Rather, it feels instead like Christopher’s an afterthought for a well-developed world, and that lack of a focus truly impedes what this book is trying to do while tarnishing some of its more notable achievements. Christopher’s meant to be a giant lovable nerd in a situation far over his own head, with all the skills and potential to make it all work for him. I have doubts that he ever truly will, and it feels like a betrayal of sorts for the grander vision of this book.
Does that mean I’ll stop here and never see what happens to Christopher and company? No way. Because this book is good (critics do agree) — because it does things that feel novel and nonetheless familiar. Should a still-uncertain lead ruin it all? No, but it definitely does make for an area of concern so early on and as the rest of the book marches ever-onward toward more layered, extra thrilling escapades. If our hero can flourish in a bigger way, this book will soar. And if he doesn’t, then the other critics are on their own.
Final Thought: A hero found lacking is not the kind of chaos we need here.
Score: 7/10
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