Scoville Units Unite » comics http://agraham.org/blog reviews, rants and random chilli ratings Tue, 13 Dec 2011 19:39:21 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v= Buffy Season 8: Arc 1 of 8 http://agraham.org/blog/2011/04/04/buffy-season-8-arc-1-of-8/ http://agraham.org/blog/2011/04/04/buffy-season-8-arc-1-of-8/#comments Mon, 04 Apr 2011 20:36:10 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=820 Buffy Season 8 was the first proper monthly comic I started reading. I had loved the show, and Angel and figured: “It’s canon, I should read it”. I also started reading Angel, Spike and the various other Buffy-verse spin-offs.

It started off quite strong but towards the end I started to get really pissed off at it. Having read it over the course of 4 years with big gaps at some points I am re-reading it again.

Arc 1 – The Long Way Home

As an introduction this was excellent. Amazingly drawn covers and written by Joss Whedon. Four issues of one story and a one-shot about a Buffy decoy slayer.

The story picks up a few months after the last television series. Buffy and a gang of slayers have relocated to a castle in the Highlands. Dawn is inexplicitly a giant. Willow is awol. The first battle is beating up big demons who had just killed people with a weird scar on their chest. Later it is revealed Giles was on the side of the demons.

Amy returns and Warren animated with no skin. It’s all very weird. You don’t know if these choices have been made because of how much more freedom for the strange and bizarre when your special effects budget is just more pencils.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2011/04/04/buffy-season-8-arc-1-of-8/feed/ 0 Random Reads http://agraham.org/blog/2008/12/18/random-reads/ http://agraham.org/blog/2008/12/18/random-reads/#comments Thu, 18 Dec 2008 21:08:20 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=110 Last week I finally managed to pick up the much delayed issue of Buffy the comic, it was quite good. The cover art was amazing. I also grabbed Solomon Kane and the Underworld 2 parter, both of which were quite enjoyable although I think the Underworld story was covered in the second movie.

I also managed to read through a short Buffy novel Doomsday Deck. I picked it up for about a quid and it was quite enjoyable. I am always a bit weary of TV tie-in books but they are easy to pick up and carry on from, so perfect for reading on the bus early in the morning. Unlike the TV show though you already know that character A is not going to die and character B manages to escape without injury, especially ones set before the current time line in the universe. Ho-hum, it wasted some time and was a change.

I don’t know what my reading list is next year but Tayside Recyclers 10p specials have yielded me quite a varied bunch, I think for comedy’s sake I have to start the new year with Kilroy Silks autobiography from the 80s. It’s going to be baaaaaad.

]]> http://agraham.org/blog/2008/12/18/random-reads/feed/ 0 New magazine day! http://agraham.org/blog/2008/11/27/new-magazine-day/ http://agraham.org/blog/2008/11/27/new-magazine-day/#comments Thu, 27 Nov 2008 21:21:38 +0000 Alan G http://agraham.org/blog/?p=75 It’s that time of the month again: SciFi Now Thursday!

I started getting this about issue 6 (now 22) and it’s really good. The movie reviews are focused on SciFi/Fantasy/Horror/World Cinema type stuff so really covers most of my main movie interests. So far I haven’t noticed any signs of the reviews being biased by ads, they’ve been quite accurate for the most part. Quite the opposite of bought by adverts actually, they did a huge exclusive preview spread drooling over 30 Days of Night and then slated it in the review the next issue.

Today’s other new release is Viz. After really going down hill for about 8 months the last 4 or 5 issues have been superb. Last issues Profanisaurus was excellent.

The other release of this week which I won’t actually get for another fortnight is Buffy Season 8: Issue 19. The concluding part of the Fray arc of the Buffy comics looks to be good and after being hit by the curse of Fray and delayed so long it better bloody be.

I had never been a big comic fan (He-Man when I was young excluded) but Buffy Season 8 really sparked my interest. I have been getting Buffy, Angel, Spike, Serenity and a few other random TV related comics randomly. I obviously picked up the Watchmen and from one of the Angel staff got Everybody’s Dead which is a really silly/cool Zombie short series. I got Conan for a while then dropped but am enjoying Solomon Kane. Other random pick-ups have been X-Files and Lost Boys, I noticed there is an Underworld series coming out so I may pick that up to see what it’s like.

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