JonesyLovesBlogs

NerdcastCOMICS is a great new spin-off Podcast of NerdcastONLINE, and it’s got me thinking about seriously getting into comics again.  As I ponder that decision (read: already made, getting back in) I’ve also decided to do a retrospective on one of my favorite past times:  Reading comics on the can.  Hence the new segment ‘____: It’s in the can.’

This first post will be about the book that has gotten EASILY the most commute time between shelf and throne: The Ultimates: Superhuman.  Read the review after the obligatory cover art:

Presentation: Superhuman is one of the RARE comic book experiences that exists as not only a reboot, refresh, or jumping off point but an amalgam of each that when you read cover to cover, over and over again, you still get the same amount of enjoyment.

Millar’s first arc for the Ultimates is incredible.  If sets up great characters that are both heroic and tragically flawed and plays the story more like a Hollywood summer Blockbuster than just a comic book.

Characters: Some great twists from the main stream are presented here for our heroes, while some are enhanced in ways that play out more realistically. 

For instance, in Superhuman we are presented with a Captain America that is not just a transplant from WWII but a man out of time who is conflicted between a love of a country that he remembers like it was before he was locked in time, and a country that he is now profoundly offended by.  Millar plays him as the hard as nails WWII vet that just might have been molded after one of our grandfathers and then exposes all of those emotions under Cap’s armor and it’s this character development that I feel steals the show away from the rest of the book.

Secondly, even though I had different thoughts on Thor, Millar’s take on a character that might be a thunder god, or a mentally damaged male nurse is a great spin on one of the most powerful characters in the Ultimate universe that manages to give Thor a real personality.  I kind of wish they never resolved this issue and left it up to the reader to decide.

Experience: As a reader you really feel like you are part of this universe where superhuman people are starting to appear.  The resulting public change and political climates that occur because of these events just feel so real and fleshed out.  In a book where basically the Avengers just fight the Hulk, the atmosphere and popular culture tie-ins really make this story stand out.  And each time I re-read it I find myself catching something different in the dialogue or art that changes my view of it enough where I’ll want to go through it again.