Morning Ramble for March 3rd, 2017

Here’s another Morning Ramble in which I take a look at the upcoming TV series American Gods, look back at Fantastic Four #6, and start my reading of Queen of the Tearling…such a busy day.

American Gods

I am so looking forward to this television series.

Bryan Fuller from Hannibal and Dead Like Me works with Neil Gaiman from Sandman and Coraline to bring Gaiman’s novel to life and I am excited for it. The show will air on Starz starting on April 30th and will be must watch TV in my household. I read the book a few years ago and may give it a re-read sometime soon, but it was a really fun book. The story sets the Old Gods of mythology against the New Gods of money, media, and technology, and as you can imagine there are a bunch of interesting tales that can come from such a mashup. I’m definitely setting up my TiVo for this when I get home.

Fantastic Four Issue #6

In Fantastic Four #5, we met Doctor Doom for the first time and he was a pretty dastardly villain, but the team defeated his plans. He was able to escape, however, and now he’s back – and this time he’s looking to team up with Prince Namor, another bad guy we’ve met before in issue 4.

Issue 6 has the first teamup I’ve seen in the Marvel Silver Age and it doesn’t bode well for the Fantastic Four. Lee and Kirby do a pretty good job of laying the groundwork for this issue by hinting strongly at Sue and Namor’s affection for each other and Doom and Namor’s shared obsession for defeating the Fantastic Four. Doom’s “grabber” device, that harnesses magnetic power to move any object, is pretty cool but we quickly learn that Doom isn’t so keen on sharing the defeat of the Fantastic Four with anyone. He betrays Namor as soon as the Prince plants the “grabber” in the Baxter Building. Doom pulls them all, building, Fantastic Four, and Namor into space where he sets them on a course for the sun. After a short kerfuffle, Namor and the Fantastic Four join forces to escape Doom’s trap but they fail to capture the Doctor. Instead he grabs onto a meteor which flies him off into space…never to be seen again?

I really liked the art in the underwater scenes and the layout of the Baxter Building that hearkens back to issue 3. I think this issue shows that the creative team is really starting to mesh with them pulling in pieces from the 3 previous issues and making a strong story with nearly all the named characters they’ve introduced so far in the series. I’m looking forward to continued fleshing out not only of the Fantastic Four, but the villains that they face. I’m rating this a solid B, and a fun issue.

Queen of the Tearling

I just started this book by Erika Johansen and from what I’ve heard, it’s pretty good. Funny that it’s highly recommended by Emma Watson who seems to be everywhere these days. Apparently she’s an executive producer and potential leading lady for the movie adaptation that’s in the works.

In any case, I’ve just breached the surface of this one, one chapter in, and the intrigue is already apparent. A girl living with foster parents is taken by a squad of soldiers claiming she’s the queen and “escorted” back to the capital. I guess the girl knew she would be queen one day, but has kinda been avoiding the fact that the regent is a jerk and only out to secure his power. So far, the soldiers are helping her out on her way to the throne, but there are strong indications they might not all be loyal to her. I’m looking forward to seeing where this goes.