Mystery Hunt

Mystery Society #3

While Nick and Anastasia Mystery escape with the super-psychic girls Sally and Nina to a new hideout in the tropics, the Skull and Jules Verne (in his awesomely cool robot body) travel to Baltimore to look for the stolen skull of Edgar Allan Poe. After evading the police by pretending to be going to a sci-fi convention, they meet up with a possible culprit in the theft — namely, the suspiciously-named Charles Y. Culprit, who runs the Edgar Allan Poe Historical Society. Meanwhile, Sally and Nina reveal that they can read minds and teleport when they take Nick and Anastasia to see Zeke Jones, a tech expert who analyzes the security tapes that purport to show that Nick killed a general. Hoping to find more answers, Nick and Ana return to Area 51, but run into the general’s son, who attacks them with giant robots.

Verdict: Thumbs up. All in all, it’s pretty rollicking good fun. The art by Fiona Staples is just grandly charismatic, and Steve Niles’ story is zipping along wonderfully. I just wish we could see more of the Skull, who is frequently hilarious.

Birds of Prey #5

The newly re-reformed Savant and Creote take Babs to her new Gotham headquarters, while Black Canary handcuffs the White Canary and accompanies her back to Thailand. Hawk and Lady Blackhawk are taken to the hospital to recover, and Huntress almost decides to shoot several arrows into Penguin’s face. After Zinda recovers, she and Huntress make a trip to Bangkok to find Dinah, but they’re attacked by a bunch of martial arts thugs with a surprising leader.

Verdict: Thumbs down. It’s boring, and this is not a comic that should be boring.

The Unwritten #17

We get a little stuff about Lizzie Hexam’s past, and then Tom Taylor and Savoy help her escape from the hospital. I actually had some trouble getting this story to make sense, because it’s all told in the style of a “Choose Your Own Adventure” book. You know, “If you want to take the corridor on the right, go to page 43. If you want to take the corridor on the left, go to page 12.”

Verdict: Thumbs down. I loved the “Choose Your Own Adventure” books when I was younger, but it turns out, they don’t seem to adapt well to comic books. Bad enough you end up reading nearly the entire comic turned over on its side, but there’s just too much bouncing back and forth in a comic that’s not all that easy to read in that format. I think the story was fine, but it wasn’t worth all the hassle of actually reading the durn thing.

Today’s Cool Links:

• If you’re ever traveling through time and need a convenience store, you now know where to go.
• Chad Vader, brother of Darth, gives some humorous shout-outs to the cosplayers at Dragon Con.
• I’m a big fan of gypsy-punk band Gogol Bordello, so I really enjoyed this video and interview.