Variant Covers: Comic Books and the Infinite Adolescence!

Yo! Welcome to Variant Covers. This is the weekly column where I kick you my pull list for the week, and you spit back at me with yours. There’s too many titles to keep up with and buy on a weekly basis, so don’t nerdfroth if your favorite comic isn’t here. It’s part of the fun, send the recommendation my way.

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Breakneck #1.
Comic books are a crapshoot. The market is flooded, and as I’ve often intimated, there’s too much good shit out there. Sometimes things fall by the wayside, and I’m not a perfect dude! Take for example Breakneck #1. I came across the title when searching for a sweet header image. I thought the artwork was fantastic, and pressed I carried on my way. Snagged it, cropped it, didn’t think of even promoting it until a reader pointed out the douchery behind that in the comments section. Douchery, indeed. My bad.

Dropping this week, Breakneck a superhero title daring to exist outside of the gauntlet of Marvel and DC titles. The indie offering by writer Mark Bertolini and artist James Boulton is an inversion of the superhero motif, deciding to fixate on the workings of a bottom feeding supervillain. What’s the world look like to someone peering through the opposite side of the looking glass? Superheroes as menacing bastards, the supervillain as enterprising down on his luck protagonist. Don’t be like me, deciding to feed the machine while simultaneously bemoaning it. Check this out.

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Infinite Vacation #2.
I really dug the first issue of this series by Nick Spencer and Christian Ward. It strums up the zeitgeist of the modern dude or dudettes: we’re never happy, we’re always searching, we are missing life in search of something better, newer, faster. Vacation seems to posit that we can be perfectly happy if we just sit down and appreciate the moment. All done through the conceit of multiple dimensions, and modern technology, riding a couple of our other obsessions.

I don’t know if that’s something that rings of the Man Stuffing Us Back In Place, or as I imagine Spencer hoping, as a life-affirming notion.

This issue continues the main character’s search for the killer who is wiping out him out across dimensions. Gulp!

Around The Horn:
Casanova: Gula #4 is coming out, and it concludes the collections of Fraction’s first two stories in the Casa-verse. This summer the title will kick off new content. Then there’s Northlanders #39. I’m not really feeling this Northlanders storyline, but that’s the beauty of the title. With smallish storylines, you need just wait a couple of issues for something new to be introduced. Also, let’s face it: Wood’s lesser storylines carry more heat than most people’s fastballs. I just mixed all sorts of metaphors.

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Superboy #6.
For the love of god, just let Jeff Lemire write. Author of Sweet Tooth, and Essex Country, it is only Lemire that can have me caring about a confused Kryptonian boy who tucks his t-shirt into jeans. Goodness me. However!, the Gods of Editorial Mandate won’t allow that.

This month’s issue of Superboy sees the title tying into the current Reign of Doomsday storyline. What is this storyline? I don’t have any idea, but the title does carry some annoying, enormous graphic that I am sure will be plastered across senseless amounts of titles.

Also From DC:
Superman #710 sees Clark Kent still walking around and shit. That’s so tremendous! The story “Grounded” continues, and I marvel at who is reading this shit. Are you? Think it’s good? Sell me on it. I’m skeptical like a mofuckah.

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Battle Chasers Anthology.
God damn, thinking about this franchise makes me feel old as fuck. Joe Madureira’s never completed series is getting collected in an anthology, and its making me hit the wayback machine. I remember eagerly awaiting this title every month. It didn’t come out every month, and that just exacerbated my stiffy for the litany of fanboy tropes it trotted out. Oh goodness, a magical gauntlet! Huge tits! A mechanical golem! So good!, so good!

If I didn’t have all these issues, I may have had to snag this son of a bitch. But they’re locked up in the vault, no doubt crusted over from adolescent fluids and excitement.

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S.H.I.E.L.D. Infinity.
Hickman and Weaver’s Marxist interpretation of the Marvel universe sees itself getting a one-shot this week. I’m not going to stunt, I don’t know what the fuck this issue is about. All I know is that its by Hickman, and the dude spits positively hot fire in my eyes these days. Hickman and a variety of artists go in-depth with the machines of Da Vinci and some other bananas shit.

I’d love a couple of centerfolds of the aliens that Newton slammed in his quest to obtain the Five Magiks or whatever. I’m certain there’s some babes in there, if you take away what is to us humans malformed heads, and scales.

Also From Marvel:
We’re getting the finale to  Uncanny X-Force’s current storyline with issue #7 this week. As well, Thor gets rebranded as  Journey Into Mystery with #622, and with three weeks to go, goddammit we can’t have enough Thor titles. Right?

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What did you/are you planning to buy this week? Hit me.