ET-ER #1

When an up-and-coming emergency medicine doctor witnesses an after hours car crash in the hospital parking lot, she scrambles to the scene. It's a decision that will change Dr. Chen's life forever. A team of orderlies quickly arrive and take the victim to the basement. But there's no emergency ward in the basement! Is there?

Underneath a major medical center somewhere in the United States, there's an emergency room for intergalactic patients. And they serve anyone, anytime. From a convalescent that is a literal planet killer to an invalid with a weaponized immune system to a medium-sized green man in desperate need of a universal translator, Dr. Chen will learn the true meaning of universal healthcare. That is if she decides to join the staff of the ET-ER.

I wasn't expecting this story to take place on Earth. I was thinking that the ET-ER was going to be like Grey's Anatomy on Deep Space Nine. Instead, this series is more like Men In Black meet Chicago Med. But I loved it. 

This late 2021 series was lauded as a one-shot from AWA as part of the publisher's Upshot imprint. Upon finishing this book, I was disappointed, thinking that my visit to the emergency room to the intergalactic stars was over. But I am happy to say that another issue is on the way sometime this year. There's a Frank Cho cover coming that I may have to pounce on!  I'm so ready to schedule a follow-up visit with this team of extraterrestrial physicians.

Oddball drama with sci-fi medical science. Featuring a slew of talent including Dan Panosian (Alice Ever After) and Mark Texeira (Moon Knight), it's the best care anywhere!

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.

Amazing World of Carmine Infantino (2022 Comic Book & Graphic Novel Challenge)

My Mount Rushmore of comics would be comprised of Stan Lee, Julius Schwartz, Will Eisner and Jack Kirby. After reading this book, I might have to change my line-up. 

I knew of Carmine Infantino's work on The Flash and ushering in the Silver Age of Comics. I was familiar with his work on Adam Strange and Star Wars. But I never really knew just how much of an influence on the DC Universe and comics itself that Infantino had until now.

If not for Infantino:

+ The look and feel of Batman would be very different including DC Comics' loss of rights to the character.

+ DC's 1960s beloved oddball characters such as Deadman, Detective Chimp, Bat Lash, and Strange Sports Stories would not exist. 

+ DC might have folded in the 1970s during a time when newly formed Warner Bros. was looking to unload the fledgling House of Superman that was being crushed by upstart Marvel Comics.

+ The policy of returning rights and artwork to artists might never occurred. Or possibly been seriously delayed well into the 80s or later.

And there is so much more. So much, it fills a volume!

Amazing World of Carmine Infantino is over 170 pages of comic book history. Filled with his artwork, sketches and words, this autobiography is also an oral history as many of Carmine's peers and influences offer insight. There's also a ton of praise from countless others who benefited from Infantino's talent and tutelage. 

Within the last year or so, I read the graphic novel biography of Jack Kirby. Having finished this autobiography, I see now how much Carimine Infantino was the Jack Kirby of DC Comics. He did everything. Infantino was a writer, plotter, artist, cover artist, editor, publisher and later DC Comics president. But unlike Kirby, Carmine didn't get as screwed by his publishers as The King did. As for when Kirby was with DC, the promised creator freedom didn't appear. Infantino doesn't seem to blame executives for the thriving failure of Krby's Fourth World as Jack always did. Infantino just blames poor sales and moves on.

Dosed Carmine paint a rosy picture of himself? To some degree. But he also seems not to bear grudges (though, boy, does he hate Bob Kane) and he is willing to point out his shortcomings and defeats. Don't expect to get too much a reveal in the artist's personal life once he gets going in the comics profession. 

An enjoyable book, Amazing World of Carmine Infantino highlights an exciting time in the comic book history- The Silver Age. If you are a Marvelite, you probably wont do flips for this book. But if you are also a comic book history, this is a fascinating account of how the 'enemy' operated in the early days of the war between DC and Marvel.

Now, who do I replace on my comic book Mount Rushmore???

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars.

Completing this review completes Task #28 (Prose non-fiction about Comic Book History) of the 2022 Comic Book and Graphic Novel Reading Challenge.

The Nearly Complete Essential Hembeck Archives Omnibus

Fred Hembeck- The Man who launched a thousand optometry appointments. 

Fred Hembeck has been a part of my life for a very long time. From his hilariously deadly Fred Hembeck Destroys the Marvel Universe to his splash page spreads in Marvel Age to his similar postings in DC's Daily Planet, I cut my teeth on the cartoonist/comedian/comic book historian. While I am sorry for the bite marks, I am even more sorry to say that none of those amazing works I previously mentioned are in this book. 

The omissions are due to those works being owned by DC and Marvel and this massive work was published by Image. But packed within this 900 page behemoth are all of Fred (and your) favorite characters. Superman. Spider-Man. Jimmy Olsen, The Hulk, Nick Fury, Bizarro. Dennis the Menace. Wife Lynn and daughter Julie. And of course Fred!

The majority of work in this collection is from Hembeck's Dateline: @!!?#, a regular comic column that appeared in various incarnations of the Comic Buyers Guide. There's some rough drafts, experimental non-comic book related work. That tragic assault on a Native American family by US cavalrymen will haunt me till the day I die. Plus, there are dozens on comic book cover recreations; including some brilliant switches that take a DC icon and a Marvel regular and put them in the other's books. 

As I mentioned earlier, this book is just a fraction under 1000 pages. I should have finished this book in just a couple of months. But I took my time. For one reason, Hembeck is noted for using very, very tiny letters, as he's got lots to say on the subject of sequential art. So I would have to take breaks due to eye strain. Unfortunately, some of the Datelines didn't reprint very well either due to smudging or too dark inking. So I had to skip a couple of them as they were indecipherable. That being said, reading 2 or 3 of Fred's Dateline: @!!?# reports,which are normally only 1 page in length each, is tantamount to reading an entire magazine's worth of articles. 

If this type of writing/reviewing style sounds familiar, yeah it probably does. I do see a little bit of Fred Hembeck in my love of comics. Makes sense. I see a lot of my most beloved professors from my degrees in both culinary and history in my day-to-day professionalism. They say that if you spend 10,000 hours on something, you become an expert in it. At age 44, I probably qualify as such with comic books, though I still have much to learn. And Fred Hembeck was and is one of my comicdom professors. 

Oh, yeah... The other reason for taking so long to finish this work! I didn't want my time with Hembeck to end!  I've been honored to be a Fred Hembeck acquaintance for almost a decade now. I bought a Supergirl sketch card from him on eBay and wound up a friend on Facebook. Every year, my family look forward to his witty (and long) birthday wishes to me. Now we've evolved into rivals playing each other on a music trivia app. 

So when I closed the book on this for the last time I was sad. But then I realized that Fred has a website. And it is still accessible. So I've got lots more education to gain from Mr. Hembeck!

And sir- if you're reading this- Very sorry for those bite marks! Hope they've healed!

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars.

Marvel Comics Presents #71

The Wolverine and Ghost Rider story comes to an end. Finally! Too many ninjas. Too much backstory of a family that isn't interesting. Too many chapters. It all comes to a close!

More deaths fill the pages of the Shanna the She Devil segment. But at least no animals were harmed in the illustrating of this chapter. 

The Daredevil story takes a great turn in a apocalyptic story that is becoming a whodunit. Very good story that just has an implausible overtone to it.

The New Mutant Warlock stars in the one-shot story. This was a story that I wish Marvel had followed up on. In it, Warlock saves a FBI agent from a group of mutated scientists with the ability to change their shape. Kinda like Clayface- only with flesh instead of mud. And there is 3 of them!

Anyways, the story had a setup where the FBI agent offers Warlock a place in the agency and I really think Marvel should have done a miniseries on the pairing of the straight-laced fed and the wacky New Mutant. Another Scott Lobdell triumph that had a bunch of untapped potential. Too late to do something now...

A better issue. Maybe I am biased with the Wolverine/Ghost Rider story coming to a close. But I did enjoy reading this one.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars.

My Video Game Ate My Homework (Family Comic Friday)

Dewey Jenkins is a brilliant kid. He's great with electronics and gadgets. But because he is dyslexic, Dewey struggles in school. If he can't ace it in his science fair project, Dewey will spend his vacation in summer school. 

One of Dewey's best friends, Ferg, is the principal's son. While in his dad's office, Dewey's buddy accidentally breaks the science fair grand prize, an experimental new video game system. Since Dewey is such a tech wizard, he'll probably be able to fix it. But when the video game eats Dewey's science fair project, he'll need all the help he can get.

Along with his twin sister, her best friend and Ferg the butterfingers, Dewey must enter the video game to save his project. Or it's summer school for sure!

This is an interesting entry in the DC kids graphic novels. Works like The Secret Spiral of the Swamp Kid and We Found A Monster star characters that aren't DC Universe regulars but there are some official guest stars floating around. Not in this work. I don't even think super heroes exist in Dewey's world. Instead, the kids wear tees with Wonder Woman on them and discuss their favorite characters on Teen Titans Go! 

This graphic novel was written and illustrated by Dustin Hansen, a real video game expert. Hansen also has dyslexia. You know how they say writers should write what they know? Well, Dustin Hansen really does know his stuff! And he does an amazing job showing this Madman what dyslexia looks like from a suffer's eyes.

My Video Game Ate My Homework was extremely clever and creative. I didn't really understand the whole thing about the number of lives that a character has in the video game. But that's always been one of my weaknesses when playing video games. Dusten Hansen does what video game developers do very well; he creates a whole world. 

Now for my criticism that isn't really a criticism. I liked Hansen's artwork. The monsters in the game and the settings are awesome. The one thing that is a bit unusual for a DC Comic is that everybody look like the human Muppets from Sesame Street. The round noses that are different colors from the rest of the body. The round eyes the size of billiard balls. The lanky arms and legs. I'm wondering if Hansen graduated from the Jim Henson school of art!

A really great graphic novel for 8-12 year old readers with a message. Perfect for those with learning disorders, fans of video games and of course, those who love comics and graphic novels. 

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.

Marvel Comics Presents #70

 Oh my God- this awful Wolverine/Ghost Rider story just will not end. I'm getting so tired of it.

The one-and-done story stars Black Widow as she battles with an old Soviet era friend over the soul of another Russian colleague. I thought maybe that one of these extra characters might be from Natasha's family in the Black Widow movie, but they're not. Would've been cool if it was!

The Daredevil story continues to be really good. Except that the 1991-92 idea of what an NYC lock down would look like is nowhere near what the real thing in 2019-21 was. 

I am also torn as to the Shanna the She-Devil story. It's really good with amazing artwork by Marvel Adventures' Paul Gulacy and I love the character of Dubose Wilson. But they keep maiming these magnificent looking beasts. At least it was not a cute little puppy or pussy cat. But I hate it when they hurt animals. Yes- even when they are just drawings and not the real thing.

An okay issue. But not one of my top favs.

Rating: 6 out of 10 stars.

Marvel Comics Presents #69

I might be sick and tired of the Wolverine/Ghost Rider team-up story. But I am in love with this cover! It's by Sandy Plunkett and Alan Weiss and it just may be in my top-10 favorite covers of all time.

The Shanna the She-Devil story is building. No gratuitous animal murders in this chapter. But we do get introduced to a diamond smuggler named Dubose Wilson in this issue. He's been stiffed by the guy who killed the zoo animals in the last issue and he's on route to Africa as well. I see this character as being played by Richard Pryor back in the 90s. Today, he'd probably be portrayed by Kevin Hart. Needless to say that Dubose is smarmy. But he's also likable.

A new multi-parter starring Daredevil begins in this issue as well. There's a heatwave going on and the Big Apple is on lock-down thanks to some rabid wild dogs. The story is quite good. But based on what I know having just experienced a lock-down, I find it hard to believe that the entire city would be shutdown thanks to a bunch of ravenous dogs. It was barely shut down because of COVID. Clearly, there aren't any packs of dogs in Jersey. Couldn't the National Guard come in a terminate these pooches? There's just a big chunk of plausibility that's missing from this story.

Lastly, in a single issue tale, the Silver Surfer encounters a sentient space ship that has been so terribly lonely for way too long. A heartbreaking story that will leave you in tears over a flying saucer. 

Not a bad offering this time around. The cover is just a thing of beauty. It alone is worth the asking price.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars.