Graphic Novel Interlude

I have a pile of graphic novels that a friend lent me.  While I really want and need to read some of the books I own (I'm going to be moving in the nearish future), I decided it was a good idea to get through the books that people have lent me first (so I don't accidentally pack and/or lose them).

So I started with Godzilla vs The Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, which was a pretty ridiculous romp. Rita finds a magical stone that lets her travel to another world without the Power Rangers, but finds Godzilla instead!  Tommy was brought along with her, and tries to stop Godzilla from destroying the world, mistakenly thinking Godzilla is one of Rita's monsters. The other Rangers come to help, and after failing to take down Godzilla, they realize that he is their best bet in stopping Rita and an alien race called the Xiliens who keep summoning more and more monsters to destroy them!

Next up was Sonjaversal. I'm not familiar with Red Sonja at all, but I still enjoyed this graphic novel. The different Sonjas of the multiverse all pray to their god or goddess, and gain power but in exchange for keeping to a condition.  The gods or goddesses are all different, the conditions are all different, but that is the essence of their power.  Saint Sonja is the only one who can commune with the gods or goddesses directly.  It is her job to keep everyone true to their oath.  When they break their oath, she has been pitting the oathbreakers against each other, with the winner being forgiven.  But no matter how many Sonjas she sends after Red Sonja, they all die!

This was a very interesting graphic novel which seems to open up so many story possibilities for the many different Sonjas (and honestly just for coming up with all kinds of creative takes on Sonja).  I also really liked how the Sonjas were all so different.  While they were (almost - shout out to Lacrosse Sonja!) all great at killing, they killed in different ways. Some were futuristic Sonjas, others were more modern, and yet others were more fantasy-esque.  Even the devil was a Sonja!  

While I admit that I probably won't specifically go looking for more Red Sonja stories, I did enjoy reading this one.

Next up was Die!namite Volume 1, which was an insane story bringing various Dynamite characters together into a zombie apocalypse that threatens the entire universe! I didn't know who some of the characters were (like Project: Superpowers), but I did recognize Red Sonja, Vampirella, and John Carter (from Edgar Rice Burroughs' books). No one is safe as the zombie plague spreads from world to world and throughout time! 

While this one started out rather interesting, it really shone at the end.  Our heroes have retreated to the last safe place and are being assaulted by zombies.  They realize that the whole cause of the plague is that Hel is looking for her assassin who forsook her and is hiding there from her.  With the help of Hel's super-powered zombies (members of Project: Superpowers who succumbed to the zombie outbreak almost immediately), they manage to take down Red Sonja.  But rather than becoming a zombie, she ends up assuming the mantle of Hel's assassin.  And in an even crazier twist, she murders Hel and assumes command of the undead army herself!

While I was expecting at least one of the main characters to become a zombie by the end, what happened with Red Sonja took me by complete surprise!  

Prior to that moment, I was on the fence about reading more of this story.  But now that this happened, I would definitely like to read Volume 2!!!

Finally, my friend lent me Operation Dragon. Have you ever wondered what WWII would have been like with dinosaurs?  This graphic novel helps to answer that question!

A disgraced ex-cop named Rick and a mobster trying to escape his past named Tony cross paths in the Pacific Theater.  Despite hating each other from when they previously met, the two end up working together with an intelligence officer on a mysterious mission.  Her mission brings them to a hidden island where the Japanese have been raising and training dinosaurs as their super-weapons!  

Operation Dragon is a lot of fun.  It takes a little bit for the story to really get going (the book holds off on revealing the dinosaurs, even though thanks to the cover and the book's blurb, the audience is well aware of what is happening. But once the trio get to the island, and the US Rangers show up and attempt to rescue them, things really get going.  How will the US forces escape?  And how will they stop the Japanese from shipping dinosaur eggs out to the rest of the Pacific Theater?

I also really liked the interplay between the three main characters, especially Rick and Tony. How they went from absolutely hating each other to being able to work together made this story that much more interesting. 

So there we have it - the pile of graphic novels I got through over the last few days!  

I'd also like to note that previously on this blog I missed talking about was Crossover Volume 2.  My friend who lent me these four graphic novels lent me that as well.  I reread the first volume and then read the second one awhile ago. Unfortunately I forgot to post about it here at the time, and now I don't remember what I thought of it.

Halo: Blood Line

I don't have a whole lot to say about Halo: Blood Line.  I've had this graphic novel for several years now (I think I got it around the same time I got Helljumper and Uprising).  Blood Line is the story about Spartan Team Black, a team of Spartan-IIs I've never heard of before. They're sent on a covert operation to kill some Covenant when their ship crash lands on a moon.  At the same time, a Covenant ship also crash lands.  Both sides are attacked by an unknown enemy, which captures members of both teams.  So the survivors (both Covenant and Human) band together to rescue their comrades.

Blood Line is also the story of family.  Team Black has become its own family through its history of growing up together and working together.  On the other side, a pair of Elites are brothers.  The strongest one, Ship Master Thon, has always looked after and protected his much weaker brother, Reff.  Blood Line is about what both kinds of families will do for each other (and also what family means in both contexts).

Finally, Blood Line is the story of how Iona, the AI of UNSC ship Long Time Coming ended up part of Spartan Team Black.

It's a little hard to follow all of the action, but overall Halo: Blood Line is an excellent read.

Library Book: Cowboys and Aliens

I recently watched the movie Cowboys & Aliens starring Daniel Craig and Harrison Ford. I really enjoyed it and decided I wanted to read the graphic novel it was based off of as well. Luckily the Library had a copy, so I put it on hold and picked it up yesterday while at work.

I have to say: the graphic novel is nothing like the movie. Well, there are some similarities, like the cowboys, Native people and aliens are fighting. And the cowboys have to work with the Natives in order to defeat the aliens. But other than that, this is a very different story from the movie.

The main difference is the very narrative. The prologue opens by comparing tha aliens to the way the Europeans looked at the Native people of North America (and pretty much every non-European in the world): their ways are inferior and so they must move aside, join us (but as inferior savages) or be elliminated. The aliens do this to another planet. So when the aliens actually do show up to Earth, they look at all humans as savages. (And from their point of view, they have good reason to. They have the superior technology, having travelled through space. We have mastered only steam technology at this point, far inferior to them).

I also liked that the graphic novel characterizes the aliens in a way that the movie didn't. In the movie, the aliens are gross monster-like things, doing experiments for no explicable reason (other than to "learn our weakenesses"). Here the alien leader is a jerk who thinks he's superior and is damn well going to show it (ie. kill people) through all his technology. It was a lot easier to relate to him and his followers. Plus they were some sort of galactic slavers (a friend of mine compared them to pirates), which again made more sense than whatever they were doing in the movie (I know what they were doing, but I'm trying to avoid spoilers here. But it really did make less sense than the graphic novel's version).

Don't get me wrong, I really like the movie. It had a great cast and did a fantastic job of being a Western turned on its head. But I think the graphic novel was better.