Fairest In All The Land

Written by Bill Willingham
Art by Chrissie Zullo, Karl Kerschl, Renae De Liz, Ray Dillon, Fiona Meng, Mark Buckingham, Phil Noto, Meghan Hetrick, Russ Braun, Tony Akins, Gene Ha, Tula Lotay, Marley Zarcone, Ming Doyle, Chris Sprouse, Karl Story, Nimit Malavia, Dean Ormston, Kurt Huggins, Adam Hughes, Al Davison, Shawn McManus, Inaki Miranda, and Kevin Maguire

I'd gotten pretty bored of Fables and its related properties, but with this hardcover, featuring work by a number of fantastic artists, but telling one complete story from beginning to end, my appreciation of Bill Willingham's work with these characters was restored.

Fairest: In All the Land is a terrific murder mystery that begins in the lost Business Office, and is narrated by the Magic Mirror.  Our narrator is also a participant in the story, as he realizes that a visitor has come into the office, a space that has been set dimensionally adrift, and has been cut off from the other Fables for a long time.  Shortly after this, beautiful Fables, starting with Rose Red, are being murdered.  A list of intended victims is found, and Cinderella is pressed into solving the murders.

Cindy's skills lean more towards espionage than detective work, and so it takes her a while to figure things out.  The Mirror has an idea of what's going on, but isn't able to communicate with anyone, trapped as he is.

This story ranges across the history of Fabletown, and involves a number of supporting characters showing up for a bit to play their part.  I'm not sure that someone new to Fables would get a lot out of this, but for a long-time, lapsed, reader, it was a treat.

Willingham was assisted by a remarkable list of artists.  I'm not sure what I found more exciting - to see up and comers like Tula Lotay, Ming Doyle, and Marley Zarcone represented, or to see actual interiors by Adam Hughes.  There are a few artists here who are unfamiliar to me, which is also pretty exciting, as the art is consistently great throughout this book.

Having finished this, the only Fables left for me to read is the last volume; I'm going to have to get around to that some time soon.

24 Seven Vol. 2

Edited by Ivan Brandon

This anthology is the second of two graphic novels that contain only short stories featuring robots.  The trick, or the conceit, is that the robots are the only inhabitants (except, in one story which also has gorillas) of the planet, and they tend to live what we regard as normal lives.  The book is somehow connected to the NYC Mech series that Image put out in the middle of the decade, but these books feature a rich variety of talented writers and artists.

When I read the first volume, I complained that the stories were pretty ordinary, and didn't do much with the robotic concept.  People whined about their jobs or had break-ups, and the fact that they were robots seemed to exist solely in the visual aspects of the comic.  That is not the same with this volume.

Instead, many of the stories deal head-on with the notion that the protagonists are mechanical in nature.  There is a story by Carla Speed MacNeil and Bruno D'Angelo that has the main character slowly trading in his parts so that the he can become a dancer, although it means giving up his family's legacy.  Similarly, Kelly Sue DeConnick and Andy MacDonald tell a story where the hero literally carries his emotional baggage around with him, attached to his body.

There are lots of great stories here by a very impressive list of creators, including Gene Ha (who plays around with a homage to Little Nemo in Slumberland), Fábio Moon, Michael Avon Oeming, Francesco Francavilla, Gabriel Bá, Juan Doe, Rafael Albuquerque, Ben Templesmith, Dave Johnson, Jason Aaron, Fiona Staples, Jason Latour, and Frazer Irving.

This is a very coherent and enjoyable anthology, which covers a number of different genres.  Recommended.

Top Ten Season Two #4

Written by Zander Cannon
Art by Gene Ha

Okay, so Season Two of this series ends, but without resolving about six or seven plot-lines. We have no idea what's going on with Peregrine's husband, the murder of the people in the fountain in the first issue is barely mentioned, and many other things are just left out completely.

Much of this issue centres on Pete, who is apparently having all sorts of problems, but we don't really get a sense of what those problems are, or where he's going from here. The commissioner from another parallel gets taken out of the picture mostly off-panel. Something's up with Slipstream, but we don't know what.

In short, as an issue of an on-going series, this is a very good one. As the end of a mini-series, this issue is very frustrating. I know there is a Special coming out in a couple of weeks, which according to the solicitation text, looks to resolve the Girl Two storyline, but I don't think it can possibly conclude the multitude of new plot-lines that Cannon has begun with this series. I feel like he should have been given six or eight issues to play with. But then, this is Wildstorm, and the one thing they are very good at is bungling the endings of their better comics (Stormwatch: Team Achilles, Wildcats 3.0, Winter Men, etc.). I hope this comic is going to continue as a series of specials or small mini-series.

Cannon has done a great job of playing in Alan Moore's backyard. He shows an affinity for these characters and the weirdness of the Top Ten universe (I love the department shrink in this issue), and clearly has a lot of story ideas in his head. Ha's artwork is beautiful as always, and this is over-all a great book. I just wish it would be allowed to finish properly.

Top 10 Season Two #3

Written by Zander Cannon
Art by Gene Ha

I was a little nervous at the thought of this book coming out again without input from Alan Moore, as the 'Beyond the Farthest Precincts' series was only okay, but when I read the first issue, all concerns were gone. This new series is written and drawn by Cannon and Ha, the team that worked with Moore on the original series, and they seem to have a good handle on his characters.

It's good to get books that are this filled with content. Most pages have a 9-panel grid, reminiscent of Giffen's Legion, and a lot happens in a single issue.

What I like best about Top 10 is the way that it manages to marry the better police procedural TV show (Homicide, The Wire) to super-hero comics in a way that mostly makes sense. Similar to these types of shows, new plotlines develop late into the series. Most 5-issue mini-series are well-entrenched by their third issue, but this one continues to develop new characters and situations. And of course, the art by Ha is fantastic.