Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
If righteousness and treachery can be seen as going hand in hand, then for the team that has usurped the positions and members of The Justice League, the havoc they are wrecking upon the East Coast cities of America is one that is out of control. They are on the verge of destroying all that is good in the alternative universe they have found, to some they may be death itself but to themselves the thought must be that they will be Forever Heroes.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
It somehow feels kind of dirty, somehow unclean that deep in the heart of the crime fiction world lays the name Stephen King, the undisputed master of 20th and early 21st Century Horror. Yet for all the dirt, for all the feelings that must be overcome as any rational book reader must do, his second novel in the life of Ex-Cop and now Private Detective, Kermit Hodges is one that takes the idea of obsession down a very different route that plagued the writer during the days when Misery was such an enormous literary hit.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
The legend behind the Fables of The Farm and those displaced from both their natural worlds and Bullfinch Street in New York might end up relying upon the actions of two of the great witches that reside on the side of the greater community. For in Frau Totenkinder and the young but powerful Ozma, all the fighting for survival so far has been one in which their true selves have managed to keep out of the limelight, all that now is over and the real war begins.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * *
Every tale of heroism has a beginning, every superhero a back story in which the reality of their true nature shines through and the grip on the reader’s imagination starts to take hold.
The one huge problem with graphic novels and comic books is how time outstrips the development of the character. One Fantastic Four reader wrote to Marvel in the 1970s and explained how one year in time in their Universe was worth three to four in the real world, by which logic the average reader has moved on and only leaving the dedicated to follow the story line on ad-infinitum.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
Life is but a tale in which we are the masters of our own sharpened pencil and in which higher powers will always have an eraser, a bottle of correction fluid and a redaction machine handily placed in which to make us disappear if need be, or at the very least make our lives seem worthless and out of control. It is in this action that words and deeds become heroic or they become creatures in which the under fire find a kindred spirit; either way words are power, in whichever hands they are handled.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Vengeance is a dish best served slightly less chilled than its more unnerving half sibling Revenge, for vengeance reeks of slaughter on a bigger scale, it doesn’t just require the two spades that revenge insists be carried, it asks for a dumper truck, a blind eye and a concrete mixer big enough to fill in a new section of motorway. For vengeance takes down all who get in the way and for Harley Quinn, getting in the way is a hobby that crosses boundaries between the good, the bad and the psychiatrist chair are all too strewn with Vengeance Unlimited.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * *
Whilst American graphic novel giants D.C. were working near miracles with their New 52 series, miracles that saw the complete re-grafting and overhaul of titles such as Aquaman and Wonder Woman into near titans of the class, the same unfortunately doesn’t seem to have happened in some of the more obscure, less handily placed titles, including the underwhelming and distinctly average Green Lantern Corps. Not everything can be perfect in life and certainly not for the comic book or Graphic Novel buyer but some titles just don’t readily make themselves an attractive proposition.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
The war is over, the enemy vanquished and a new optimism fills the hearts of the populace of Fabletown. Yet something dark lurks in the shadows, something let loose as the Great Adversary wrestles with his freedom within the confines of his new home in New York City. It is a power that sees Bill Willingham’s collection of tales of heroism and valour return with a bang, and the world of the Fables is once more thrown into jeopardy.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
It always seems like an entertaining idea when a crossover in the world of graphic novels presents itself before the reader. Even within the pages of a company such as D.C. where the appearance of Batman and Superman outside of a Justice League story can titillate and tantalise even the most rabid of fans, such a crossover can mean growth, further development and more intriguing aspects that may have gone undeveloped for years. It can in some cases allow the undisguised stink of a money making exercise, the chance to breathe life into a fading, unlikeable character by teaming them up with a big monster of a comic book gem, either way, the fan will have an opinion on it.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
The war is over, the battles, at great cost, have been won and the exiled fables have been saved in part to the heroics of Bibgy Wolf, Prince Charming and Boy Blue, yet deep down, even with Geppetto being captured and the puppet adversary finally succumbing to overwhelming odds, the reader and fan of Bill Willingham’s highly delightful fantasy graphic novels knows that the real test is still to come and that Fables: War and Pieces is only the end of the beginning.