As always, “Five & Three” brings you my favorite things in comics this week. Every week I pick my five favorite covers and three favorite panels to create “Five & Three”. I like to talk about why I picked the covers and panels and welcome hecklers and trend setters alike.
I can’t believe the week we had and the books I didn’t pick! Image delivered hits, BOOM! Studios delivered gold and everyone else gifted the comics world with greatness. I’m afraid next week we’ll only see three books and they’ll all be mediocre. That of course means that I had a hard time choosing my favorites this week. I also didn’t get much help from the outside but @Brandigirlio, as usual, helped me pick the covers.
I’m going to lead with one she knew I was going to pick. I’m a huge fan of samurai and more specifically Bushido. That’s my favorite part of Wolverine and I’ll be sad to see it go away for a time when he dies – for a time. Until that happens I can be glad Marvel encourages great covers like this week’s “Savage Wolverine #23” by Declan Shalvey. The cherry blossoms and the meditation are, to me, instantly calming.
I’m going to guess now that every cover to Neil Gaiman’s “The Sandman: Overture” will make the cut for “Five and Three”. I make that bold prediction because of the insanely talented artist on the book J.H. Williams III.
“Umbral” brings the heat to newsstands and spinner racks every week it releases. The cover work by Christopher Mitten is outstanding and always pleasing to the eye.
Greg Tocchini is creating an amazing sci-fi world with Rick Remender on their book “Low”. Issue 3 has to be one of the best covers I’ve seen in a long time. I knew it had to be included and it looks great next to J.H. Williams III’s “The Sandman: Overture” cover this week. Anyone would be lucky to have this cover as a print in their home. If it was just the art without the cover dress, your non-comic fan wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between it and fine art.
Gail Simone is creating some great stories over at Dynamite on “Red Sonja”. I know the book is controversial because of the scantily clad heroine but with covers like this one, how can anyone fault the beauty or fearsomeness of the character? This cover pulls me in and I’m not entirely sure why. It’s hard to put a finger on why it works but I’m glad it does so with the use of a close-up on Sonja’s face and sword arms.
“Chew” makes me laugh every time I read it. I usually read the book in floppies but picked this issue up for the crazy cover and the fact that it was halfway through the latest storyline. I didn’t spoil much but I had a great time… mostly at Robert Kirkman’s expense. If Kirkman is Conan does that mean Gail will show up in a future issue of Chew as Red Sonja?
I’ve been wondering what the hell has been the point of the absurdly good “The New 52: Futures End” since the weekly started earlier this summer. I finally get something of a decent answer from the book and all it’s done is create more unanswered questions. I wish I didn’t like this series so much, but it’s been wonderful so how can I resist?
My favorite book this week wasn’t “Sex”, it wasn’t “Saga”, and it wasn’t “Guardians of the Galaxy”. My favorite book was Charles Soule’s “Letter 44”. The book has been a wild ride on a roller coaster made of one part sci-fi and one part political intrigue. I’ve heard that this story has been optioned for a TV series and I insist it be done. If it is though, my hope is that it doesn’t end up on a foxy network that will cancel it or a completely witty network that will tween the story down. I hope it ends up on one of those Networks with quality Flix or one that happily breathes originality into their programming.
That’s all for this week. If you disagree with a pick, let me know in the comments or on Twitter @MarkAvo or on Instagram @TheMarkAvo. If you think I should’ve picked something else or if you have a pick in mind for next week, give me a shout out and let me know. If you’d like to check out more “Five and Three” comic book moments start with “Five and Three” from last week. Until next week, enjoy the sun while it lasts!