Special: All-New Hawkeye/Hero Cats: Midnight Over Stellar City/Howard The Duck Mini-Reviews

All-New Hawkeye #1
Publisher: Marvel Comics

Synopsis: Hawkeye and Hawkeye take aim at another season. But it's not all straight as an arrow for Clint and Kate. A deep-seated rift that stretches across time, brings old man Clint and a wiser Kate back together as they chase down mistakes from their past. The star-studded team of Jeff Lemire and Ramon Perez return, bringing you another inspired look at the world of Hawkeye.

My thoughts? This iteration of All-New Hawkeye didn't start off quite as well as the last one did, however, the first one was so universally loved, myself included it would be hard to replicate let alone surpass. This book picks up a while after the last series concluded and the rift between Clint and Kate is still very large after they came to blows deciding what to do with the mutated children eventually turning them over to S.H.I.E.L.D. This series, much like the last, also covers two timelines although this time we're going 27 years in the future rather than back into Clint's past. Turns out the kids are being used by Mandarin as a W.M.D. and levelled half of China. Grown up Hawkeyes have to put the tights back on and fix their mistake but can they beat the Mandarin let alone get to the kids?

Hero Cats: Midnight Over Stellar City #1
Publisher: Action Lab

Synopsis: Midnight is on the hunt, tracking down the mysterious Crow King.  Can the claws of justice outwit this fowl villain and uncover his grand scheme?

My thoughts? Midnight is a member of the Hero Cats of Stellar City, a group of cats that got together to protect their humans and their city... Turns out their newest threat will involve saving the entire world. If you haven't been following along in the pages of Hero Cats you may be lost, however they do give you a recap section, though strangely enough it's at the back of the book. In any event Midnight is a fearless defender that is a bit of a loner but he's always trying to dole out justice. The art style of this book is beautiful, it's more inks than art but for a Midnight book it fits perfect and is stunning to examine. Not a lot happens here as Midnight simply inches towards catching The Crow King and getting Bandit back from another dimension. Step one: Learn to defeat his minions... Check.

Howard The Duck #1
Publisher: Marvel Comics

Synopsis: First spectacular issue! A great jumping on point! Sure to go up in value! Don't miss out on the series everyone is calling "Howard the Duck"! The last page will shock you! Nothing will EVER be the same again! Hey! Where are you going? Come back! Waugh!

My thoughts? Like Hawkeye above, Howard The Duck was another relatively new book that got a new #1 despite having the same creative team post Secret Wars, which due to delays is actually still ongoing but anyways... See on the cover that "Plus: Gwenpool" part? Yeah. It was surprisingly really good! I might have to work the ongoing into my titles but we'll see, Howard decides he wants to go back to his own planet and Dr. Strange tells him how but he's stopped right before fully entering the portal somehow and at the end of the book we meet some bizarro versions of some favourite characters from the previous volume. I'm just going to grab some popcorn and enjoy seeing where this goes... :)

Special: Halloween ComicFest!

Well kids it's officially here. We're on the eve Halloween ComicFest, which means tomorrow you can head down to your local comic book shop and pick up free comics! But which should you pick up? I got you covered. Check out my rankings below and remember to use the Comic Shop Locator to find your local participating store.

15. Rachel Rising: This book is in black and white and the pencils aren't good, plus the story is boring. Avoid this book.

14. Vamplets: I was really excited for this mini comic. Even bought some to hand out on Halloween, but little did I know that this would be a poor jumping on point with little happening and no back story to go on.

13. The Adventures Of Ernie: The cover is misleading, this is very cartoony. Also very kid-like, the pages are meant to be coloured in and numerous puzzles like maze's and alike disrupt what little narrative there is.

12. Plants Vs. Zombies: I get this is based of a video game with no narrative but this is pretty hard to follow even split up in different stories. Maybe if I played the game I would understand more, but at face value it's nothing more than a couple physical gags.

11. Scooby-Doo Team-Up: Another one for the kiddies here, although this book isn't really bad, the Scooby gang aren't allowed to do what they do best with Batman hanging around, it's also the '66 Batman so I'll just leave that at Zoinks!

10. My Little Pony: This actually had it's share of laughs until the end when we learned moral lessons... This will be a great book for kids but it's a little too silly for me,

9. Extinction Parade: They did a good job setting up this series for new readers but it was extremely wordy, though I suppose that's at least a little expected since they have to carve out vampire and zombie histories while talking about the humans to a certain extent.

8. Boom! Halloween Fright Fest: Really without the god awful Adventure Time holding this book back this could've easily been a top 5, maybe even top 3... But where Adventure Time failed, Peanuts and Fraggle Rock shined.

7. Resident Evil: A Fun read for fans of the series, difficult for new readers since it reads like traditional Japanese manga from right to left. It's also all in black and white but it gives that certain aura about it being a Resident Evil book.

6. Angry Birds: The birds interacting with the pigs made for some funny moments in this all ages book that reads just as well to adults.

5. Grimm Fairy Tales: This was a very good read and although in true Zenoscope fashion there are ridiculous amounts of oversized cleavage espescially since we are to believe that this half naked witch woman is hanging out with a bunch of kids. We get a retelling of the classic monkey paw story and it is definitely the book you get the most bang for your free buck since it's a full book,

4. Betty and Veronica: The creme de la creme of mini comics this year, normally Archie ends up near the bottom of my list but this was a very good read as was the other Archie title.

3. Hero Cats Of Stellar City: If you follow my Big B blogs I wrote about how much I enjoy this series and the Halloween story is no different, we also get a back-up Princeless story that I didn't think was as good as the critics say it is but hey it still made the top 3.

2. Afterlife With Archie: This is just a reprinting of the first part of the first issue of Afterlife and although it avoids the gore to make it more kid friendly, and black and white to keep the cost down, you also get the first few pages of the newly launched Chilling Adventures Of Sabrina.

1. Legends Of The Dark Knight: Before their was The Long Halloween, Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale did a series of Halloween Batman one-shots, this reprints perhaps the finest from the series as a can't put down book that should be at the top of everyone's list to grab tomorrow.

Other titles I haven't read:

Marvel Comics #1
Secret Wars #1
Little Battlers Experience Mini-Comic
Mermin Mini-Comic