Sneak Peek Reviews: 01/13/09

Faces of Evil: Prometheus
Written by: Sterling Gates
Art by: Federico Dallocchio

Sterling Gates is certainly doing an admirable job of establishing himself as more than just "Geoff Johns protege". Between his work on Supergirl, a really great story in the most recent DCU Holiday Special, and his debut work Tales of the Sinestro Corps: Superman Prime he has amassed a pretty admirable body of work. And then he was given the reigns on re-establishing one of the most undervalued and overlooked villains of recent memory: Prometheus. When Grant Morrison and Arne Jorgensen created the character during Morrison's run on JLA (Actually for [coincedentally enough] a Supervillain themed series of one-shots from 1998 called New Year's Evil ... 11 years later he makes his serious return in another one-shot during January ... curious) and he quite nearly took out the entire Justice League. He was widely known as The Anti-Batman. His parents hippies who went on a Bonnie & Clyde style killing spree and when they were killed by a slew of police officers in a final brutal shootout. Now he seeks to take down Justice of any kind. Morrison really knew what he was doing with the character and in a whole lot of ways he epitomizes the kinds of villains that Morrison is known for and I think that anyone who missed out on that story definitely go back and read at least JLA Vol. 4 Strength in Numbers where he debuts and World War III where we see, what we come to know in this issue, is the last time we saw the real Prometheus. A character who can take out the entire Justice League certainly got his head handed to him by his own fair share of characters after Morrison was done with him and what Gates does with this one issue makes it all finally make sense and with it also manages to make Prometheus one of the most frightening villains in the DCU ... and these days that's saying something. This is really an automatic pick up for most everyone who likes DC these days and add to it the fact that Federico Dallocchio is really doing a fantastic job on the artwork for this single issue and I think you'll realize that for $2.99 (a one-shot for $2.99 you say?!?!? Must not be Marvel) it is worth the price of admission and then some.

Locke & Key: Head Games #1
Written by: Joe Hill
Art by Gabriel Rodriguez

You know those books that you just cannot wait to read? That nothing will keep you from pouncing upon when you see them? The books that really just make you salivate ... Locke & Key is one of those books for me. Seriously I never thought that a book written by anyone related to Stephen King would make me this excited (I'm not the biggest King fan ... he's good, just not GREAT). Gabriel Rodriguez had me when I saw his artwork on Clive Barker's Great and Secret Show that was also published by IDW and once I heard about this book Locke & Key I was interested ... but because of Gabriel Rodriguez. So I think that probably makes me a member of a very small portion of the readership. Then I read the first issue of the first mini-series and I flipped (not literally ... I fall off ladders ... the one time I ever tried to do a real flip I wound up falling on my head on the floor of my concrete garage when I was like 6 ... TMI? I thought so). Hill knows how to craft a page turner. He knows how to craft a comic and it is clear that while he may not have the most experience writing comics that he has certainly read his fair share because he really knows how to draw you in and keep you in a trance. The second mini-series of his Locke & Key series was certainly worth the wait. From the first page I couldn't wait to see what was going to happen as the story progressed and that it is not told from the perspective of any of the Locke family really makes it special. It's clear that Hill has crafted an entire world for his series and I think that anyone who likes horror of any kind should pick this book up ... and if you're feeling froggy jump in and buy the Hardcover for the first mini-series as well because it is really, really well put together and is well worth it's $24.99 price tag. Seriously, Joe Hill just might be one of my favorite writers of recent memory ... and this mini-series is going to show whether the proof is in the pudding.