Ultimate Comics New Ultimates #1

Ultimate Comics New Ultimates #1
Marvel Comics
Jeph Loeb
(a) Frank Cho
FC 32 pgs w/ ads $3.99 US / Higher in Canada

The last of the new post-Ultimatum ongoing Ultimate titles makes its debut. It’s essentially a continuation of Jeph Loeb’s run from Ultimates 3 and Ultimatum. While Millar has been playing around with Cap and a bunch of new Ultimates, Loeb’s team is still Iron Man, Hawkeye, Captain America, Black Panther, Valkyrie, and Supreme Power refugee Zarda.

The story has what’s left of the team recuperating after Ultimatum and Loki has decided to attack. It’s a neat trick since Thor killed him at the end of Ultimates 2 but this is a comic book. Loeb’s story is alright, he doesn’t take the characters too far off their usual characterizations like he did in Ultimates 3 but there’s nothing here to make you jump up and down either. Frank Cho’s art is amazing and is really the highlight of this issue. The series is also on a bi-monthly schedule to accommodate the slower moving Cho.

I don’t have high hopes for this series and while I was hoping that Mark Millar’s Ultimate Avengers would be be better than it has been I’m hoping it picks up with his second arc because the relaunch of the Ultimate titles in general has been blah. (Shane Hnetka)

Ultimate Comics X #1

Ultimate Comics X #1
Marvel Comics
Jeph Loeb
(a) Arthur Adams & Mark Roslan
FC 32 pgs w/ ads $3.99 US / Higher in Canada

After slaughtering all the X-men in Ultimatum, writer Jeph Loeb has started the X franchise over. With what’s left of the X-Men permanent members of Bendis’ Ultimate Spider-Man title, Loeb starts off this series by introducing Wolverine’s son.

This isn’t an ultimate Daken. Jimmy Hudson has been raised by his foster parents, James and Heather Hudson – who are no longer Canadians but American trailer trash living Florida. He’s a teenage hick who races cars and keeps a pet alligator in the trailer park that he lives in. Kitty Pryde shows up and tells Jimmy who he is. The story is just ok – I’m not sure where Loeb is going with this series – other than introducing Jimmy it doesn’t seem to have a direction yet. The main reason I picked this up was for Art Adams’ art which as always is amazing. This first issue didn’t make much of an impression and other than Art Adams, I can’t see any reason to really pick up any other issues. (Shane Hnetka)

Batman: The Complete Hush

Batman: The Complete Hush
DC Comics
Writer: Jeph Loeb
Pencils: Jim Lee
Inks: Scott Williams
FC, 320 pgs
$24.99 US / Higher in Canada

In 2003, comic book veterans Jeph Loeb and Jim Lee took Batman to the top of the sales charts with “Hush”, a 12-issue storyline pitting the Dark Knight against an unseen villain with a score to settle, amidst a backdrop of almost every major supporting character in the series’ continuity. Though the series was a financial success, fan reaction was polarized by the time the series ended. Now that the entire series has been collected in paperback trade format, the question remains – does “Hush” deliver?

First things first–- Jeph Loeb delivers a well-written Batman. He strips the character down to the essentials, writing him as a solemn, efficient and brutal vigilante. This is a Batman who glides through the shadows, an intimidating and unstoppable hero who has studied his enemy and will let nothing stand in his way. The story is told not through painfully forced word balloons, but through concise narratives detailing the detective’s intricate thought processes. He is a man of few words, one who shoots first and asks questions later, and under Loeb’s direction, Batman is a force to be reckoned with.