Malin’s #CBR5 Reviews #86-87: Saga vol 1 and 2 by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

Rating: 4.5 stars for both volumes (I still think there is even better to come)

Marko and Alana are star-crossed lovers from either side of a huge and long-running intergalactic war. Marko is a prisoner, and Alana is his prison guard, when they fall in love, go on the run, and have a baby (who narrates several of the issues). Now both their peoples want them hunted down and killed, but at least one side wants the child alive.

I love pretty much every single character in this, and the series has pretty much anything you could possibly want – sexy main characters, witty banter, action, violence, wise cracking ghost girls, bounty hunters, evil armless spider-bodied assassin ladies, robot people, a sidekick cat that can tell (and will ruthlessly reveal) if people are lying.

The rest of the review – on my blog.

Fofo’s #CBR5 Review #16: Saga, Volume 1 by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

Target: Brian K. Vaughan’s Saga.  Art by Fiona Staples. Collecting issues 1-6

Profile: Comics, Science Fiction, Space Opera

After Action Report:

Saga is probably the most praised comic currently running.  Brain K. Vaughan has a bit of a reputation for excellent comics with his Y: The Last Man and Ex Machina stories making lots of people’s must-read lists.  So it shouldn’t be surprising that readers and industry wonks alike were practically frothing over Vaughan’s new series.  I got to this party a little late, mostly because I don’t see the point of collecting individual issues and prefer to wait for the mass-market paperback collections.  So I write this review with the enormous pressure of thousands of positive reviews sitting on my back.  Not that I feel the need to contradict them.  Saga is an excellent book with only one serious fault.  And that fault is one that could easily be corrected with time/more issues.

Saga is the story of Hazel, the half-breed offspring of soldiers of two warring races.  Her parents, Marko and Alana who are the protagonists of these first few issues, are objectors to a galaxy-spanning war that has lasted as long as either side can remember and has no end in sight.  Their joint desertion, and subsequent fraternization, is problematic to the higher-ups of both sides so Hazel’s baby shower gifts are mercenaries and a platoon of trigger-happy goons.  The first six issues cover the new family’s attempts to escape their pursuers and get off-planet.

Read the rest of the review…

Robert’s #CBR5 Review #05: Runaways Vol. 1: Pride & Joy by Brian K. Vaughn and Adrian Alphona

Imagine having a perfectly normal life as a teenager. Your parents provide for your every need and desire because of their immense wealth, but they also lay out strong boundaries for what you can and can’t do. You’re not spoiled because of the discipline but you are unable to appreciate what you have because of the level of control.

In Runaways, a comic series created by writer Brian K. Vaughn and penciler Adrian Alphona, six could-be perfectly content teenagers living the American dream see everything they thought they knew destroyed in one night. It turns out their benevolent, kind, charitable parents are all high-powered supervillains in a team called The Pride. The parents meet once a year to renegotiate their pact and prepare for their children’s ascension into the ranks at 18. When the six teens, ranging from 12 to 17, witness the end of the yearly ritual, they vow to take their parents down and make them pay for their crimes.

That’s before the teens even realize they all have superpowers. From super intelligence to telepathy, magical weapon casting to instinctive mastery of high tech weapons, the Runaways quickly realize the challenge they face. They’re brand new to their powers. Their parents have spent a lifetime honing the skills their children just discovered. The only advantage they teens have is receiving the strongest traits of a pair of supervillains, allowing their powers to blossom very quickly.

Julia’s #CBRV Review #6: Y: The Last Man, Vol. 1: Unmanned by Brian K. Vaughan, Pia Guerra, and Jose Marzan, Jr.

I’ve heard positive things about Y: The Last Man for years. So when I decided to buy volume one, “for my Dad,” I had every intention of borrowing it when he was done. My fear with every book that I’ve heard good things about is that it’s going to be a disappointment. Happily, volume one was extremely satisfying, but honestly, I don’t think I could ever not love a book that features a monkey sidekick named Ampersand.

Yorick Brown is a young man/aspiring escape artist who owns the aforementioned monkey. A plague hits the world, killing everything with a Y-chromosome, except for Yorick and his monkey. As the last man alive, Yorick has the responsibility of saving the human race thrust upon him by the new President, Margaret Valentine, former Secretary of Agriculture. Agent 355 is assigned to Yorick’s protection. Together they travel to Massachusetts to find geneticist Dr. Allison Mann, who believes she is responsible for the plague. However, Yorick is more interested in getting to Australia to find his girlfriend, Beth. Meanwhile, Yorick’s mother, Congresswoman Jennifer Brown, fends off Republican Representatives’ wives who believe they now are entitled to their husbands positions in Congress. Yorick’s sister, Hero, joins a violent band of feminist extremists calling themselves the, “Daughters of the Amazon,” who believe the death of men was a blessing.