word mining central
Deadpool (Pro edition), 2018, Stern
We’re back in this century and it’s a branded backglass so you know it’s going to be, well, marketing. Deadpool, center, is punching Colossus (I think it’s Colossus, been a while since I picked up a comic book) while a bunch of other characters including Wolverine and Mystique lurk in the red background. There’s a taco truck in the top left corner. The Hell House and mini-Deadpool also make appearances. Everything is very red.
The comic is better.
I’m an anne-with-an-e and so it was a requirement of the universe that I’d be reading Anne of Green Gables before I escaped junior high.
Trying to read the original series has multiple hurdles that have only gotten stronger since I was a child. The series was set in rural Prince Edward Island, Canada, in a time before telephones, cars, and refrigerators. (The internet wasn’t even dreamed of.) The books were written in the early 1910s, so more than 100 years of word loss and language migration has taken place. And the story of a young white girl with red hair adopted by two older people who wanted a boy that could take over the farm isn’t exactly as easy to relate to these days as it was even when I was a teen in the 1990s.
But the story’s arc as a coming-of-age tale is certainly still relevant. People (of all ages) still need to know what a good apology looks like, why it can be hard to fit in when you’re different, that parents (and other adults) get things wrong too, and that the kid you think is a jerk might actually be more sincere than he lets on.
I’m thrilled that Anne of West Philly retells the first Anne of Green Gables story, overcoming the language barriers of the original and turning it into a graphic novel for all ages.
Some of the changes to be aware of:
In other words, it’s the kind of story that a kid today could understand without having to know anything about rural living, Canadian geography, or English as spoken 120 years ago. A timeless story that’s reset to a time that makes it easier to enjoy.
Definitely worth reading, and I just gifted it to a teen I know.
You’re probably familiar with the green and blue foxes that star in Foxes in Love, because Toivo Kaartinen posts them on twitter, Instagram, and tumblr. If you’re not, you’ll want to be. These are some of the most loving and caring comics available on the internet, with just enough of a humor twist to make you grin.
— Foxes in Love (@foxes_in_love) October 2, 2021
When you’re done volume 1, go preorder Foxes in Love volume 2.
Atomic Robo and the Knights of the Golden Circle is written by Brian Clevinger and drawn by Scott Wegener.
Semi-spoiler alert: That thing the dinosaur did in the previous book sort of but didn’t quite work, resulting in Atomic Robo traveling back in time.
Most of the “back in time” books of Atomic Robo are actually just stories we haven’t heard yet, about a younger Robo during a younger time, a time post-Edison and Tesla, perhaps of World War II or the Cold War, punching Nazis or threatening Soviets.
This book, however, takes place in the Old West, before Edison and Tesla. Before electricity. Before robots, certainly. And Robo, who certainly didn’t plan ahead for his predicament, has only a limited amount of power, a strong desire to not change the past, and of course, an overdeveloped sense of justice.
Thus he finds himself with two famous westerners in 1884, fighting cyborg cowboys and saving the world. As you do.
There’s quite a bit of tension in this volume, some dry humor, and enough cyborgs to choke a steam engine. Definitely worth picking up.
Atomic Robo and the Temple of Od is written by Brian Clevinger and Scott Wegener.
Atomic Robo is in pre-World War II China, where the Imperial Japanese Army is forcing a Chinese scientist to work on a super weapon. Fortunately, the good guys have volunteered Robo to save the scientist.
There’s a bit of a Casablanca feel to this tale, since Robo’s working with an old flame, Helen McAllister and her new love, Chen Zhen, both of whom are fighting for the Chinese Resistance.
“Was that a real explosion?”
“It was! Robo’s alive!”
Add in a hidden fortress and a constantly-switching-sides band of mercenaries called the Ghost Bandits, and it’s a winner of a tale.