154 John Constantine, Hellblazer Vol 9: Critical Mass

You know how excited you get when you find out one of your favorite writers is about to take over writing one of your favorite characters?  All that giddiness, all the expectations?  I was so excited for this volume because Paul Jenkins meets John Constantine.  What could be bad about that?

Well..... this is probably my least favorite volume of this series so far.  For some reason, this just didn't click with me.  It didn't ring true. The volume starts off with an Eddie Campbell tale.  That just didn't do it for me at all.  I know of Eddie Campbell, but I can't say that I've read much by him.  So I don't know if this is typical of him or not.  The story didn't feel right.  John didn't feel right.  The circumstances didn't seem right.  But I was willing to overlook it.  I can't like everything, right?  Paul Jenkins arrives and starts his story right where Eddie left off.  I appreciate things like that.  More than I can express.  But at the same time, this just didn't feel like John Constantine to me.  I really can't put my finger on it.  Maybe say that this character was Jack Cunningham or something like that and I might like it more, but as a Constantine story, it just didn't work for me.

On the plus side, Sean Phillips' art is amazingly beautiful.  I could just stare at the pages all day long.  I just would rather not read them again.  LOL.  

I'm very much backlogged on this series.  Volume 17 or 18 just came out, so I need to catch up on Constantine's adventures.

John Constantine, Hellblazer Vol 9: Critical Mass

Writer: Paul Jenkins, Eddie Campbell, Jamie Delano

Artist: SEan Phillips, Pat McEown

Vertigo

153 Batman By Ed Brubaker Vol 2

I did not read these stories the first time around.  I was on a Bat-hiatus at the time.  Reading them now makes me regret that.  I don't know why I wasn't reading any of the Batman titles.  I think I was probably tired of Batman.  I don't know.  But I missed out.

The stories in this volume take place during the Bruce Wayne: Murderer or Bruce Wayne: Fugitive storylines.  Bruce was framed for killing his girlfriend Vesper Fairchild.  He was taken into custody, but soon escaped.  He became Batman full-time.  These are the stories written by Ed Brubaker, rather than this collection being all the stories published at the time in all the Bat-books dealing with this story.  It's a damn fine read, too.  Ed Brubaker tends to know what he's doing and he does it well.  Scott McDaniel's art really shined in this book, too.  What's also nice about this collection is that although the various members of the BatFam appear, they don't over crowd the stories.  They show up when they're needed and go away when they're not.

I'm not sure when Brubaker's run ended on this, but there may be enough material for one more collection.  I'm looking forward to that.  I think the Hush storyline started not long after these stories.

Batman By Ed Brubaker Vol 2

Writer: Ed Brubaker, Geoff Johns

Artist: Scott McDaniel, Andy Owens, Sean Phillips, James Tucker, Stefano Gaudiano, Eric Shanower

DC Comics