This is volume three of the new Batman series in the DC rebirth series. It picks up where volume two left off in which Batman was able to bring back the character named Psycho-Pirate to help restore Gotham Girl back to a regular mental state due to events that are explained in volume one.
This is another Green Hornet comic book volume that I enjoyed. I liked that this one is “old school” in that it is situated in the past rather than the present. Putting the Green Hornet in our contemporary era seems to take away something from the story and I was disappointed when other Green Hornet graphic novels did that. So I’m glad that one of the latest Green Hornet from Dynamite Entertainment retain the 1930s-40s era of the Green Hornet. Note: If you don’t want to read any spoiler skip the next paragraph and read what follows after that.
The character Kato is the sidekick of the Green Hornet and while the title of this graphic novel is Kato Origins: Way of the Ninja it really is not an origin story per se but don’t let that stop you from enjoying the story. While it did not cover Kato’s origin in the traditional sense of how most comics would approach it, this work though was definitely a story about the identity and identity crisis of Kato, among other things.
I haven’t posted a light leisure reading for the weekend for a few weeks now. Sometimes Pastors also need to take a mental break…
Andy Diggle. Green Arrow: Year One. New York, NY: DC Comics, April 22nd, 2008. 160 pp.
This was for a fun read. I did enjoyed it. This is another character that I don’t know anything about and it explains the origin of the DC hero Green Arrow and his beginnings. The story tells us of a rich and spoiled young man name Oliver Queen who suddenly found a purpose in life in fighting for justice. What began as a trip on a yacht with an ex-Royal Marine mentor on all things “manly” becomes horrific as he is conned and left for dead. But Oliver survives alone in an island where he soon found out that it is run by an evil enterprise where the natives are enslaved. This fight for justice for the native would launch him into a career of being a hero for justice. Overall I enjoyed this story and the character’s transition from a celebrity spoiled brat as seen in how he ruined a charity auction become a man with a deep sense of justice.
The following below are the graphic novels or comics I did finished but for one reason or another it wasn’t on my list of exceptional works, hence my delay in reviewing them earlier in 2015. Just for the record there’s many comics and graphic novels that I didn’t finished because it was either not that good of a story or because it was inappropriate. So for me to finish a graphic novel requires a lot, unlike my reading with non-fictions, which I typically can’t stand the idea of not finishing. Also with all my discussions of worldviews, there’s time where the reading was just for enjoyment. I’ve arranged the order of these reviews from what I most enjoyed to the least satisfied.
The Shadow Hero
Gene Yang. The Shadow Hero. New York, NY: First Second, July 15th, 2014. 169 pp.
5 out of 5
It’s hard to find a good graphic novel involving superheroes that has good story telling, original, nice artwork, meaningful and also appropriate and clean that you can really recommend to people of all ages. This is one of them. It is not so childish that it’s beyond adults or teenagers reading them either. I really enjoyed this book and I picked it up to read because of who authored it. This book certainly didn’t disappoint. I love this story about a hero and how it touches on the Chinese American experience: it has reference to Chinese immigrants coming to America, a son who is born in America and raised by traditional Chinese parents in an ethnic enclave of China town in an urban city. Readers of Asian American descent will have a kick and the story is told in such a way that all can follow and appreciate. I like how the author and illustrator also tells us the background to why they told this story and apparently there was a “Green Turtle” superhero during the 1940s that mysteriously died out as much as it mysteriously started. Very fun read and I highly recommend it.
I don’t really watch much movies let alone movies with superheroes but when I do, I do think about worldviews. Here I want to look at X Men: First Class and it’s theme of God, evolution and ethics.
We’ll start with the movie’s opening scene.
The movie’s opens with a rainy moment where the first thing viewers see are some feet walking in the mud and the rain. Whoever those feet belong to, they certainly were not walking in confidence or in a hurry to get out of the rain. One can’t tell whether it’s day or night; nor does it matter, since it is meant to invoke nihilistic and hopeless feeling to the viewers. Nothing captures the symptom of nihilism and hopelessness as the losing track of time and where one’s external environment no longer matter. A few seconds into it, you see the backside of a soldier manning a machine gun post with the unmistakeable Nazi shape helmet, and a caption that says “Poland 1944.” Here everything on the screen tells the viewer that the setting is in a holocaust concentration camp, with a line of people marching. As the movie continues, attention focuses on a young boy and his father and mother. The Nazis separated the child from his parents, with one party going one direction and the other another. With the mom crying and looking back, the young boy ran towards the direction of his parents, only to have one soldier, then two and eventually four soldiers pulling this young boy back. All the while, the young lad has his hand stretched out to the gate that blocks where his parents has headed towards. If that does not call the viewers attention to the incredible power this boy has, the scene with the Nazis soldiers looking at the twisted gate now makes the viewers realize that this child has super power (and for those familiar with the X-Men story, this would make fans immediately realize that the young child is Erik Lehnsherr who later becomes the villain Magneto).
