135 The Legion By Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning Vol 1

I have to say I'm rather surprised that DC has published this book.  At this time, I mean.  They just started collecting the Legionnaires and Legion Of Super-Heroes books earlier this year.  This book shouldn't be out already.  I thought it would all get collected chronologically.  But I'm wrong.  And I'm happy.  I particularly loved this run on the book.

According to the afterword in the book, both series were losing readers and Abnett & Lanning were brought in to spark new interest with a new direction.  Now, if you've read any of my mini-reviews, you know one thing I hate is when a new team is brought in to give a book a "bold new direction" and they start things off by discarding what's come before them.  Well, Dan and Andy did just the opposite.  They had a big idea, but they lead into it.  Quickly, but without throwing anything away.  Their first story introduces the Blight, their second story sets characters in place for the Blight storyline and then BAM, we're smack in the middle of the story.  And it's a good one.  And from there they start making the changes they want to make in the book.  All the changes are plot dictated and very organic.  And that, my friends, is how you change the direction of a book.

I remember being kind of upset when this book first came out.  Olivier Coipel's art was so ugly to me.  But as the story progressed, I realized he was the perfect artist to draw the whole Blight storyline.  It works incredibly well.  It holds up to this day.

I love the Legion.  I love this book.  I'm so glad DC is showing the Legion some love right now.

The Legion By Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning Vol 1

Writer: Dan Abnett, Andy Lanning

Artist: Olivier Coipel, Adam Dekraker, Jeffrey Moy, Angel Unzueta, Chuck Wojtkiewicz, Andy Lanning, W.C. Carani, Jaime Mendoza, Dexter Vines

DC Comics

083 Batman/Wildcat

I love this kind of compilation book.  Unlike a book that collects a specific story arc or run by a particular creator, it's a book that takes a couple of mini-series and pads it out with some spectacular bonus material.

This book collects the Batman/Wildcat mini-series, the Catwoman/Wildcat mini-series and all the Batman/Wildcat stories from The Brave & The Bold.  And it's glorious.

The two mini-series are nothing to write home about, but they're solid and an enjoyable read.  The first mini-series is yet another take on the Fight Club cliche.  The second is another Vegas/Mob story.  Neither are original concepts by any stretch, but like I said before, decent enough reads.

The real treasure here is the inclusion of the Brave & Bold stories.  I'm currently reading the giant Brave & Bold Omnibus at work and have come across some of these stories recently already.  For some reason, DC decided to team Batman and Wildcat up despite the fact that Wildcat was an Earth-2 character.  No mention was ever made of it, so clearly this is an Earth-1 version of the same character.  I don't think he ever appeared anywhere but these select issues, which is too bad.  Not that it matters anymore.  After Crisis, there was only one Earth, so only one Ted Grant.

I'd love to see more books along the lines of this one.  Such fun to read.

Batman/Wildcat

Writer: Chuck Dixon, Beau Smith, Bob Haney

Artist: Sergio Cariello, Art Thibert, Danny Miki, Jaime Mendoza, Tom Palmer, Irv Novick, Mike Esposito, Bob Brown, Nick Cardy, Jim Aparo

DC Comics