The Pull List: 7 February 2018, Part 3

Another one-shot special for The Wicked + the Divine, showcasing the Pantheon of a former generation. In this case it's the immediately preceding group from 1923. I really love these WicDiv one-shots, partly because they offer other artists the chance to play in the series but partly because it allows Kieron Gillen to experiment with storytelling style and format.

He goes all-out here, with a lengthy issue that's half comic book half prose short story. It's a technique I've seen before - Grant Morrison did a sensational issue of Batman like this once - but in this case Gillen really knocks it out of the park. It's one big Agatha Christie pastiche, with comic images used only to showcase the climactic moments. Aud Koch's artwork is superb, and fits the tone and style of the book perfectly.

Gillen captures the 1920s perfectly. His prose is purple - it feels deliberate - and his cast of gods reflect numerous literary identities and works of fiction. It is tremendously clever stuff and, coming just as the main storyline seems primed to wrap up, it's perfectly timed too. (5/5)

The Wicked + the Divine: 1923. Image. Written by Kieron Gillen. Art by Aud Koch.

Under the cut: reviews of Armstrong, Green Arrow, Mech Cadet Yu, Scales & Scoundrels, and Walt Disney Showcase.

Lacuna Coil: Broken Crown Halo (2014)

In recent blog posts I have listened to kawaii metal via Babymetal and cello metal via Apocalyptica. I figured for a third go I would listen to some goth metal, which is basically a sort of dark, dramatic kind of rock music. It seems to use a lot of the standard techniques and sounds of metal, but in much softer ways. In my experience it sort of sits on the fringes of metal as a broad genre, incorporating little bits of electronica and classical music to round out its sound.

A band whose work I have really enjoyed in this sub-genre is the Italian group Lacuna Coil. They have been around since 1994. Two years ago they released Broken Crown Halo, their seventh studio album. It is not their best work in my opinion - that would probably be their 2006 album Karmacode - but it is still pretty representative of their sound and a pretty enjoyable example of goth metal.

The Borgias (2011)

Not the popular television series starring Jeremy Irons - the five-volume graphic novel series by writer Alejandro Jodorowsky and artist Milo Manara. This European bandes-dessinées, originally released between 2004 and 2011, has recently been translated into English and collected into a single hardcover book by American publisher Dark Horse.

It tells the notorious story of the Borgia family, a Spanish dynasty living in Rome whose patriarch Rodrigo was elected Pope. Stories of horrific acts and lewd debauchery surrounded the Borgias, including accusations of murder, adultery, simony, incest and overwhelming corruption. It's likely impossible to know which, if any, of the numerous accusations against the Borgias were true; Jodorowsky and Manara assume for their book that they all were, making this a very confronting descent into the worst excesses of human depravity. This is one graphic novel that is categorically unsuitable for children.

The Black Beetle: No Way Out (2013)

Francesco Francavilla is a stunning comic book artist, whose work I've been admiring for some time. He's completely in his element with Black Beetle, a deliberately old-fashioned pulp adventure about a 1940s masked American crime fighter. "No Way Out" is the first four-issue arc for this ongoing series of comic book miniseries, and it's been collected into a handsome hardcover edition by Dark Horse Comics.

The Black Beetle is a caped vigilante with a string of gadgets who fights crime in the north-eastern American metropolis Colt City. When an explosion takes out the key members of a local crime dynasty, the Beetle is hot on the case to find the culprit.

In terms of plot there is nothing particularly original going on here. It is, however, an extremely solid pastiche of pulp crime stories. It immediately brings to mind The Shadow, Batman and even other pastiches of this genre, notably Dave Stevens' The Rocketeer. Sometimes, if the script is tight and entertaining enough, you don't need too much in the way of original ideas. This is one of those comics: well-written, fast-paced and very entertaining.