The first thing I did when I opened this comic was realize I didn't have the foggiest notion who Zeb Wells is; I have seen and appreciated Crain's work in Ghost Rider, so I am at last passingly familiar with him. So, naturally, I decided to look him up on Wikipedia. I know Wiki is not the most reliable source on the Internet, but they usually keep it fairly accurate because of the many anal-retentive nerds that can correct the little details, so it is a good jumping on point.
What surprised me--Wells has worked on some light-hearted projects like "Robot Chicken", Young Avengers/Runaways, and Heroes for Hire...but Crain has a more serious art style, which would be oddly paired with Spider-Man's stereotypical "comic book" tone. Before reading, I had the feeling that Wells would do well for the classic Peter Parker.
First impression of reading the comic: the front cover is beautiful, but is it just me, or are all the Carnage covers looking a little too similar from this series?? Obviously they are made by the same artist on the same subject for the same title...but I figured there would be a BIT more than the minimalist motif with the character Carnage in different poses when Crain's interior art work is usually so detail-oriented.
The Arthur Adams variant cover is great--it reminds me of the current DC cover themes, with the all white background, the title, and a single image in the middle. I have been liking that as a change of pace and easily recognizable DC titles, but I think it is going to get old before they stop doing it.
Back to Adams though--love this look for Spidey. I mean, really classic. My only complaint? That Parker is rocketing what appears to be a handful of jizz toward me at the speed of light. I know that web goo has to be hard to depict without the obvious semen connotations, and as a reader I do my best to overlook such little allusions, but what bothers me about this one is that the rest of the webs on the page are so clear and defined and look to be made of different material than that handful of icky sticky coming my way, ya know?
Recap page: I have not kept up with the series up until this point; what is with the totally badass six (six?) armed carnage?
Who IS wearing the Carnage symbiote? Is it even called Carnage if it is not bonded with Cletus Kassidy?
I am also pretty unfamiliar with Shriek, but I am guessing her powers have something to do with some kind of sonic screech....one of Venom's notable weaknesses (loses structural and molecular integrity when confronted with powerful sound waves, IE a gigantic church bell, thus losing the ability to maintain its hold on its host body).
Okay--little off topic, but the second page of the issue is of a satellite being destroyed in space...wouldn't Crain do great on an galactic story line? All right, back to "Carnage".
Wow, just a few pages in and I am thinking this is much more intense and serious than I had originally thought. I guess my assumption would have been that Wells and the character of Spider-Man, who have similar cheery styles, would have maintained the traditional feel of Spider-Man titles while the artist Crain would have had to adjust his style to more fit the tone of the book. Boy, was I wrong--it seems like Crain was to be a signal as to the tone of the book, and Wells would be the one that adapts the character. Unexpected.
I guess I have trouble separating Peter Parker from the widely used goofy comics with underlying depth. Best example I can think of: Ultimate Spider-Man team up of Bendis and Bagley. That FELT like the Parker we all knew and loved, you know?
It is silly for me to typecast him or to try and fit in him into a stereotypical role befitting the teenager with more responsibility than he can handle since he is now--and has been for a while--an adult that is coming into his own as a valued and respected member of the mainstream teams...but I guess the hardest part for me is that the matured Peter seems to have been retconned along with his marriage in the "One More Day" series.
Obviously, I am not going to start a tirade about that tired old fight since it would be way too little, years too late; but on many levels, it WOULD make sense that if Peter and Mary Jane had never been married and Peter had never had to deal with a lot of the challenges from his marriage (like the miscarriage), then there would be a definitive lack of that maturation that a Peter of the same age who had to be a husband.
Way off topic, I know. Sorry. Moving on.
Hey! COOL prosthetic arm!! All right.
And that is one of the greatest artistic interpretations of Tony Stark's lab that I have ever seen in a comic. I have always liked that Tony's work space isn't this sterile, boring lab-like environment. It looks clean, but lived in; mechanical, scientific, automotive...the very essence of Ironman.
The writer really captured a fantastic back and forth with Tony and Peter. It doesn't feel like so many writers have done that there is always the unspoken superiority Tony has over Peter, but it seems like they could actually be friends.
Dude!! The scene in the limo where Dr. Nieves sees the two other passengers as living corpses? CREEPY!! It reminds me of "Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark" and the artwork of Stephen Gammell, the first man that ever gave me nightmares.
That half-smirk on the lawyer woman's face as she tells Nieves that hallucinations because of the prosthetic are perfectly normal...could there be anything more suspect than that?
When Spider-Man and Tony are discussing incinerating the specimen Tony was studying...does anyone know what is on the back of his shirt there? I thought it was just a black t-shirt at first, but it kind of looks like the Punisher symbol and the Captain America shield combined. Probably just a band t-shirt, which I like the "casual Stark" look, but it caught my eye at any rate.
When Ironman is first shown suited up in this comic, he looks BEEFED up. Seriously--much bigger, more built than before. Other panels he looks more normal sized, it was just that one image that I noticed.
Totally called it--I knew from the moment I saw that "hallucination" that the prosthetic had a mind of its own. Of course, an evil corporation wouldn't just give away a state-of-the-art piece of technology to an employee without an ulterior motive, and Nieves was showing no sign of suing or anything.
Woah! Slow down with the heated exchanging of legalities, Royal Blue and Ironman! I think it's getting a little violent for comics, lol.
Okay, I know symbiotes are rarely good-natured, benevolent beings....but I thought that the host of Kassidy was what made Carnage a psychopath? He was the one that was a mass murderer as just a human, wasn't he?
Just got on the last page--it still lists Joe Quesada as the EIC...but I thought Axel Alonso was officially named the Editor in Chief. I feel like I have been seeing his name in other comics as well. Was this an older issue than I had originally assumed?
Okay, see--the preview for the next issue? That's the change I was hoping to see. Much more dynamic. Awesome.
So that concludes my first comic of the day. Overall, I liked it, but I wasn't blown away by it. May have had more impact if I was current on the series and had been around for the original Carnage stories. Wells was pretty good--I like it. Crain is as always a fantastic artist, but I think his ethereal style is better suited to the supernatural than to the scientific; for example, the angels and demons of "Ghost Rider". But I could see him doing well for mystical too--maybe a Doctor Strange; or as I said earlier, a galactic? The art was great in the issue, I just don't really feel it fit the overall tone the story was going for as well Crain has done on other titles.
~Andie~
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