Comics Review: Captain America Epic Collection--The Bloodstone Hunt

I allowed myself to go to Zia Comics after finally finishing catching up on reviewing all my comics. I had told myself not to buy any more until I had. I had to go to work that day without a holiday for Independence Day. (It was on a Saturday, so we didn’t get Friday off.)

I was wearing my Captain America t-shirt (Issue #427) and I bought this Captain America trade paperback. This was about as fanboyish and patriotic as possible. I additionally bought a Godzilla comic and a Vampirella comic for other people. (I was in a generous mood.) The Vampi issue got me a look from the woman cashier. (Hey, you’re the one selling it and I’m even buying it for a girl, who likes the character.)

I’d enjoyed the previously Captain America trade I’d bought (6-23-26).  This volume is from the same era, but a couple of years before it. The reviews were generally good, so I couldn’t resist wanting to get it.

It starts with a bang. John Walker, the replacement Captain America, is assassinated when he gives back the shield to Steve Rogers at a press conference. The murderer is then killed himself by the villain-killer, Scrooge. This plotline is followed up on by Walker’s partner, Battle Star, in later issues, which is too bad, because this kind of intrigue that made Captain America: Winter Soldier, such an entertaining film.

As is, Cap has to track down his old pal, Nick Fury, who’s listed a rouge agent. He enlists a somewhat frumpy Peggy Carter to help him. (She’s not exactly the MCU Peggy.) She will be a background Avengers staff character in the series. They find Nick, who makes a couple of Donald Trump references. It’s easy to forget how famous this guy was before he was President. Fury took down his own SHIELD organization because it had become filled with corruption. Again, echoes of the MCU. This storyline is also not followed up on in this title.

The World Trade Center appears in the background a couple of times in this book.

Some Soviet superheroes show up on the Avengers’ island (don’t get too attached to this location) while Captain America is holding tryout’s for some other heroes, including Speedball. The Russians are looking for asylum. Instead, other Soviet super soldiers show up in disguise and kill them. This prompts the Captain into taking a trip to Moscow. Surprisingly, he speaks Russian and is quite diplomatic on his mission. The Captain doesn’t quite solve the mystery, but the defectors end up recovering after energy-draining their attackers. Again, this potentially interesting storyline is dismissed.

Issue #354 is an interesting visual experiment as the Captain America is tracking down a mystery on the top of the page, while Battle Star is still trying to find out what happened to John Walker on the bottom. Its two stories at the same time, which unfortunately don’t connect at the end. Battle Star hands off his findings to his government contact, Valerie Cooper. She is then introduced to the new US Agent, who is Walker in a new identity. His assassination was faked and the vigilante group, the Watchdogs, was framed, though his killer getting killed wasn’t fake.

Next, Cap receives a request from his old girlfriend to track down her missing sister. He discovers that there’s been a rash of abducted teenagers and he has himself magically turned into a teen to go undercover. Sigh. All this political intrigue and we’re doing this. Meanwhile, Battle Star meets Falcon in a story that goes nowhere. Whatever this was supposed to set up didn’t happen in this volume.

Interestingly, a member of the Watchdog group is sacrificed here. Nobody likes these guys.

From flipping through the book, I was sort of dreading this teenaged Cap episode. The drugged teens are sent to “Camp Rage,” run by the Red Skull’s daughter, Mother Night, to “Teach you to channel the power of Hate!” So, it’s basically a typical university class and its run by a bunch of feminist women.

This story doesn’t entirely resolve well with Cap unexpectedly getting his powers back and then giving a heavy-handed speech. There is the amusing scene with Cap having to pay back his magical debt to the Eternals’ witch, Sersi, with a date. I think they cut away a little too soon on that scene.

No explanation is given for this odd scene. Another missed opportunity.

This issue also marks the beginning of the Bloodstone Hunt. Baron Zemo’s son and a bunch of losers find the skeleton of Ulysses Bloodstone and plan on using part of his ribcage as a divining rod to find the Bloodstone, for reasons not explained. Diamondback stumbles upon their plans and is subdued and thrown down a pit. Cap rescues her after braving several deathtraps and gets the story. He fashions his own skull detector to follow after the villains. Cap reluctantly takes along Diamondback, who’s obviously crushing on him.

What follows is a world-wide chase for the fragments of the Bloodstone. It is very much like an old-fashioned movie serial with hair-breadth escapes from danger. At one point, Cap is fighting a mummy. In the end, the gathered fragments bring Baron Zemo to life, but as a demon inhabiting his dead body. The Baron and his son end up getting tossed into a volcano with the Bloodstone.

These issues also came out on a bi-monthly basis, so they were a bit rushed. (I remember this with the X-Men, which I was collecting at the time. Two issues a month was a major financial strain on my teenage self and likely kept me from buying some Disney comics I wanted.) There are some real gaps in the story logic that detract from the story. It probably needed the extra pages that were taken up by a backup feature with US Agent. He’s trying to stop Scourge from killing the Power Broker, who has a business power-augmenting people, including himself. The Broker ends up taking himself out.

One loose end of the Hunt is that Diamondback is taken captive by Crossbones, who was also following along in the chase. He takes her to the pirates’ den of Madripoor and summons Captain America to capture him for his employer, the Red Skull. The Skull actually orders Crossbones to let him go for some reason. The backup features follows up on the Power Broker story with a client woman. I thought this was the same woman from the US Agent limited series in the next volume, but she’s not.

Next we go into a crossover event, Acts of Vengeance. Oh, boy. I don’t know anything about this series and I don’t care, since it doesn’t seem to amount to anything. The Red Skull is offered a deal with a mysterious man to join a cabal of supervillains. Cap returns to NYC and finds the Avengers’ island has been sunk. He unceremoniously dumps off Diamondback and ends up in a fight with a mind-controlled Submariner.

The obvious problem with gathering supervillains is that they don’t play well together, especially the Red Skull, former Nazi, and Magneto, concentration camp survivor. This leads to an inevitable confrontation. Heh, heh. Skull makes a good point here with Magneto.

The backup feature in these issues are about Cobra of the Serpent Society. He needs to prove his leadership skills by taking out his previous partner, Mr. Hyde. And there’s also an extremely creepy origin story of Machinesmith.

The Red Skull gets the worst of his meeting with Magneto and gets locked into a dark room underground. Crossbones and the Captain America both end up looking for him. This ends up in a fight in the sewers under the Hellfire Club with the vampire, Selene.

The backup story is more interesting. The Red Skull becomes delusional while essentially buried alive. It is the phantasm of Captain America that convinces him to hang on.

Ron Lim starts doing the artwork later in the volume. It’s a definite upgrade. Crossbones eventually rescues the Red Skull, who’s in pretty bad shape. Captain America is summoned to the Skull’s mansion for a meeting. The Red Skull announces that he has regained the will to live after seeing his eternal foe and dismisses him. Outside, Diamondback tries to figure out for the reader why Captain America is just walking away from this. I guess they didn’t have a story prepared yet for the Red Skull’s big comeback. It’s truly bizarre.

Finally, the one-sided romance between Diamondback and Captain America finally comes to a head. She’s had it with being brushed off. He doesn’t want another partner or a girlfriend, but agrees to be friends. With that opening, she talks him into a date.

Masked romances are a bit awkward.

The fun part of this story is a couple of Diamondback’s girlfriends from the Serpent Society are tagging along and defusing any situations that might disrupt their date. Apparently, there’s a supervillain around every street corner in New York City.

Awww. Yeah, this was my favorite story in the book, possibly the only one I really liked.

I have to compare this volume with the previous one I bought. As uneven as Arena of Death was, enjoying the highs were worth putting up with the lows. Bloodstone Hunt, which chronologically came first, strikes a bit of a monotone. It was mostly not that bad, but not that great either. Many of the issues had a second feature, which cut into the story development. This was even worse with the bi-monthly summer issues. The Hunt storyline should have been epic, but came off silly. Arena was so over-the-top in places and that’s how Hunt should have been.

Hunt does recommend itself in lots of non-stop action, like an old movie serial. The artwork, particularly Ron Lim’s, is pretty good. I kind of appreciate some of the scenes with Cap interacting with his duties that don’t involve superheroics and with the Avengers’ staff members. It makes the setting feel a little more real. Some of the second features are actually a bonus and are interesting studies of minor characters.

Spectacular Pinup in the back

The main problem is all of the missed opportunities for great stories that were simply passed over, especially at the beginning of the book. They didn’t want to commit to any complex stories and settled for pointless action. Future writers would see the potential better and produce some classic stories that would be translated into hit movies.

Arena is better and I’d recommend it, with some reservations, to any comic book fan. Hunt I’d recommend to Captain America fans, but it might not be as entertaining to other comic book fans. It’s fun, but shallow material.

Comics Review: A Review 6-Pack—X-Men Outback, Turtles, Youngblood

Continued from Part 1

X-Men Outback #1

This was hard to resist on the rack with this appealing Psylocke cover. This is her armored warrior phase, before the proper English girl got turned into an ethnic Asian ninja. In retrospect, that was a questionable editorial decision. I guess Jim Lee wanted to draw a hot Asian girl. I’m not really complaining, I think. This did lead to Olivia Munn playing her in an X-Men movie, the part she was born to play.

What does it say about the current state of the X-Men that Marvel is publishing three different “retro” X-Men titles this month and another to come next month? The X-Men 97 cartoon has been enough of a success to merit a second season and convince Marvel to publish a comic book that readers actually want. If they went “backward” with their entire line, they might sell more comics than DC and their Absolute “Hulk/Batman” creature.

This series is meant to supplement the X-Men’s time in the Australian Outback. It was an odd moment where the X-Men were thought dead and were hiding out. An Aboriginal teleporting mutant, Gateway, provided them the ability to easily the travel the world, even from such a remote location. This era didn’t last long and was mostly known for Marc Silvestri’s excellent artwork.

The story is Sabretooth finding the X-Men and attacking them. Psylocke has to adjust his memory afterward, so that he forgets the encounter. I suspect this sort of thing will be happening a lot in this series to explain why nobody knows about these new adventures. The comic is not exactly a throwback. The artwork is half-anime/half-splatter horror film. It’s cute and bloody.

In the dialogue, there’s also a definite undercurrent of current day writing, which is functionally Chris Claremont’s 80’s writing. The subplot is Wolverine telling Storm to take command. I guess it’s trying to explain why Logan isn’t in charge, which didn’t need to be explained. She’s been in charge before; Wolverine hasn’t. It just gives Logan the opportunity to tell Storm how amazing she is several times.

It’s the right idea and reasonably well done. The creative team knew the source material well. (I think this even starts with an off-panel Mojo cameo.) It’s a little too close to Claremont’s 80’s stories and maybe that’s the problem. You would put up with certain things from Claremont, because he’d bring originality with it. If I were planning on going to the comic book store next month, I’d probably pick up the next issue and give it another shot, but I wouldn’t be going just to get it. I doubt you’re going to see anything really fresh or novel in the rest of the series. They have to work within established canon and it’s not like anyone at Marvel has had a good new idea in years.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #20, 300-th Issue Special

I think I’ve only ever had one TMNT comic (11-22-19) and the Palladium RPG book, which included a Turtles story done just for the book. I never had any of the toys, but I enjoyed the original cartoon and some of the movies well enough. In spite of the $7 price tag, I was a sucker for the retro cover and an anniversary issue to boot. I did pass up a couple of “blind bag” issues for the same price with possibly valuable variant covers. It won’t be the first time I’ve made a poor investment decision with a comic.

I was glad I got this. It was most definitely goofy, silly Turtles, but there was a tremendous amount of character motivation, backstory, and a good plot. There are real stakes, emotions, foreshadowing, betrayal, and loyalty. You’re getting the gambit of storytelling. I was impressed. Unfortunately, the main story was continued and I don’t plan on going back next month. The artwork is also very well done and finely detailed.

The other story in this was a nostalgic retrospective on the different styles of Turtles stories that have occurred over the past 299 issues. Mostly, it was meant to show that however much the Turtles change, some things never change with them. If I’d been following along with the comics all this time, I’m sure I’d have more to say. And there’s a gallery of all 300 covers (as thumbnails).

This is another IDW production. It feels like they really take care of their properties. Nickelodeon is listed in the credits. I don’t know if that means that they own the Turtles, but the corporate oversight is paying off in quality material. Now that I’ve read this, I could see getting a TMNT trade if I see one that looks this good.

Giant-Size Youngblood #1

In honor of Rob Liefield’s artwork, I’m writing this review with my mouth open and screaming. I’ve been listening to Rob’s podcast for a while and mostly enjoying it. I appreciate his enthusiasm for the art form and criticisms of the comic book industry, while I’m skeptical of his fanboying of Hollywood.

There’s a trade of Liefield’s run of New Mutants at Zia Comics that I’ve passed over several times. Since I already have the first appearance of Deadpool from that run 11-21-22 and didn’t think much of it, I haven’t been willing to buy it. (It’s also not well-reviewed and it’s full price, unlike the other trades I’ve bought there lately.) There have been a few issues of the new Youngblood on the rack. I’d recently seen a video on Liefield. There was a description of the Youngblood premise in it that made it sound more interesting than I thought it was. Today was the day I decided to try an issue.

In contrast to the standard “Liefield” style, this super-group has a decided lack of small pouches on their uniforms and is totally lacking large firearms. This is a 64-page square-bound book with no ads. This is the nice portion of the review.

Is this the worst comic I’ve purchased on a price-per-page basis? I think it might be. I can’t remember a comic with a more relentless lack of characterization and plot. It’s a context-less fight scene and it even wasn’t much of a fight. Rob’s rants about writers being nearly unnecessary compared to the artist’s contributions are actually how he does comic books. And he seems stunningly unaware that all of his favorite comics that he spotlights are well-written. (He even sued Marvel over not getting credited as a writer in a reprint.)

Oh, and the art, it’s not that great either. In the 90’s, this was a fresh new style and it would be sort of iconic. That’s not to say it’s good; it’s just distinctive. Rob reminds me of my own art. Occasionally, I might make a nice drawing, almost by accident. The difference is that I’m not a professional artist and Rob’s been at this a long time. He should be much better than this in art and storytelling.

Just to rub it in, this large issue is half, if not more than half, just reprinted pinups. You could probably argue that the whole book is nothing but pinups. Four of the pinups featured Obama to let you know how old they are and who Rob voted for.

If I were a long-time fan of Youngblood, I’d be infuriated with this, since I doubt the original series was this bad. As is, I’m wondering if I should ever buy another comic I’m not familiar with . . . if I should buy another comic at all. This sounds like hyperbole, but I’ve declared a moratorium on buying comics until I get this taste out of my mouth. I’m not going to ask Rob for my money back (it won’t help with the emotional damage anyway), but I’m putting everything he says from now on in context with this comic.

Whew! What a roller coaster ride from this trip to the comic book store. Regardless of the highs and lows, I do think I’ve been a little too indulgent buying comics for the last couple of months and need a break. I’d finally cleared out some shelf space and I just filled it right back up. I’ve been done with comic books several times, but I wonder when they’ll be done with me.

Comics Review: A Review 6-Pack—Moonstar, Grimm, Zatanna

It was a successful trip to Zia Comics and a disaster. I’d gone for one comic (Moonstar) and ended up with six comics and a Barbie magnet and $40 lighter. I’d even put back a couple of issues before going to the register. A couple of these were gifts, but I did not mean to go nuts buying comics today. It’s a pretty rare trip that I find this many comics I’m interested in sitting on the rack.

The Barbie magnet was a gift for my co-worker, Toni. I couldn’t find comic for her, though I did on last month’s trip. That time I’d bought another Captain America trade from the 90’s, since I’d enjoyed the other one I’d gotten (6-23-26). (I haven’t finished it yet to review it.)

(Consider these a couple of bonus reviews.) Toni’s fiancé is a Godzilla fan. She’d bought him a couple Godzilla comics from Zia Comic for his birthday. One of them was a series with Godzilla versus America, where he stomps various cities. (This is a lot like the 70’s Marvel series, actually.) A new issue came out with Godzilla vs Portland. It was double-sized and $7. I looked over it (she was on vacation when I’d bought it) and was profoundly disappointed. It mostly was kids with crayons-level artwork and a bunch references that only Portland natives would get. Godzilla’s appearance was an afterthought and a joke. I apologized when I gave this to her.

Over the weekend, I was over at Barnes & Noble and noticed this trade, Godzilla: Rulers of the Earth. This looked a lot more like what I was intending to get. Like the IDW Rocketeer trade I’d gotten (6-22-26), this was very reasonably priced, so I picked it up. It was about 300 pages, so I didn’t have time to read it over the weekend before I gave it away, but it looked great. It had the whole toy box of Toho monsters fighting in it. (The old Marvel series did not have the rights to anything beyond Godzilla.) I’d recommend this for a Godzilla fan, even without reading it. No apologies necessary here.

Boy, did I get a look from the woman cashier buying this while buying the Captain America trade and the Godzilla comic. This one was for another girl, Zee. She’d seen me with some comics and mentioned she loved the old Vampirella magazines from the 70’s. That’s a little surprising. She liked that Vampi kicked ass and looked good.

This issue from Dynamite is #3 (#690 in legacy numbering). What a cover! It was easy enough to buy this based just on that. Regrettably, that was the best of it. The artwork inside was okay, but I was lost on the story. The old magazine featured self-contained stories. This issue was part of an ongoing series and I had no idea what was going on with the characters and their actions. I didn’t understand enough of it to really give an opinion on it, other than I decided this was a mistake. A detailed recap page might have been helpful. I again pretty much apologized when I gave this away, but Zee was very happy with it.

Moonstar #5

This is the comic I went to the store for. It’s the final issue of the series, though it doesn’t say that it is or that it was a limited series. (If it sells well enough, maybe they’ll continue it later.) I won’t reiterate what I’ve said in the previous reviews about the series (7-3-26).

This issue is the big climatic battle with Kyron and his evil sword, Dainsleif. That’s basically the whole issue, except for a quick wrap up at the end. I’d be lying if I said I really understood what happened in the story. I thought I was comfortable with the plot, but I wasn’t really getting what Dani did to end the threat. Was it too complicated or was it BS?

In any case, super-villain defeated and we get a happy ending. This is the first time I’ve seen Dani get romantic. If she’s had any other relationships, I never saw them. This pleased me, but the moment was nearly ruined with Kian literally saying, “You were amazing,” like he was her gay friend at her workplace. I guess Dani was hard up enough for a man that she’d take what she could get.

Also, Kian’s partner, Yanisa, who I thought had been killed, got better. And Beta Ray Bill shows up at the end for some reason. (You’re a little late to the party, pal.) “You are a great warrior, Dani Moonstar. I’m excited to see what you do next.” I swear the writing was not this bad in the previous issues.

Okay, just to see a character that I like in her own series, I’m okay with buying these issues. Unless you feel the same way about Moonstar, you’re likely not getting anything out of these.

Grimm Fairy Tales Vol. 3 #4

This was another gift for Zee. I was determined to get her a good comic. None of the Vampirella comics on the display seemed to have a self-contained story or even a good cover like the other one. It occurred to me that maybe she might like a Zenescope comic.

I’d bought an issue of this title before (11-6-20). My review was so badly written that I didn’t even mention what fairy tale characters were used in it. I don’t remember and I no longer have the comic. I picked up an Oz-inspired trade that I liked better this year (1-13-26). I would have liked something with a better cover and maybe a first issue, but this is what they had available. (Actually, they were stocking the shelves while I was there. I feel like I should have waited around a bit.)

Is this Red Riding Hood fighting wolves? I guess from the cover that’s the motif, though the main character in this issue isn’t wearing one in the comic and isn’t called, “Red.” Another cast member is wearing a red hood, but she’s not in the main action. There’s plenty of action, though not much resolution. I wish I knew more about the setting in this. There is a recap up front, but it assumes you understand the basic premise. This issue doesn’t seem to have anything in common with the previous issue I’d read years ago. (That was from a different volume of the series.)

Honestly, I wish one of these other issues had been there to buy. These Zenescope guys really know how to do an eye-catching cover.

Zatanna #4

I bought a Zatanna trade paperback a couple of months ago, but lent it out (to Toni, who I got the Barbie magnet for) and haven’t gotten it back yet. This issue is probably not related to that series anyway.

Swell cover and Zatana looks really classy. In this issue, we are establishing that she is the Sorcerer Supreme and . . . What’s that? Oh, excuse me. She’s the Prime Magus and consulting with the previous holder of the title, Zehuti, about what this means. “It means you get a mansion in New York City, babe, the Sanctum Sanctorum, and an Asian man-servant.” Actually, she has a hidden city of magicians and a horse that “mews.”

Jokes aside, this issue is well-illustrated. Some pages remind me of artist Alphonse Mucha’s work. The story is a series of three vignettes showing Zantana in her role as the Prime Magus. It’s kind of weird and abstract in presentation, but in a good way. It reminded me of Sandman and Books of Magic. While she’s wearing a top hat and fishnets and speaking spells backward in these scenes, it does not feel silly.

This was likely the best of the bunch. It was even $4, which cost less than the other comics I got. I’d be willing to get more of this, but I’m not going to the comic book store every month. If I’m there and see more, I’ll get them. (I showed this one to Zee and she loved it immediately. I ended up giving it to her, as well.)

Part2