By Joe C.
This week is pulpier than your morning glass of orange juice, comics fans. (Sorry, everyone…I couldn’t resist!) Today’s must-buy book is Black Beetle: Night Shift No. 0 from Dark Horse. Written, drawn and colored by the phenomenal Francesco Francavilla, Black Beetle is a send-up to all things pulp, noir, detectives and superheroes. This issue collects the individual chapters that ran in Dark Horse Presents and is a primer for the upcoming Black Beetle miniseries starting in January. Pulp heroes, noir and fantastic art; this might just be the best $3 you spend all week!
If you missed out a few weeks ago, today Dynamite drops the second printing of Masks No. 1,
along with issue No. 2. The first issue was everything pulp fans could have hoped for, bringing together The Shadow, The Green Hornet, and The Spider, as well as hinting at some upcoming characters. One of those characters, the awesome Miss Fury, has been revealed for the second issue, and I could not be more excited. Miss Fury was the first female superhero written and drawn by a female artist. You should Google search “Tarpe Mills” for a quick history lesson before reading this one. The story Chris Roberson is laying out seems solid thus far, so my hopes are still high for this series to live up to its promise. Either way, seeing all these iconic characters together on the same page is exciting enough to forgive some potential plot holes. Catch up and jump on board for the rest!
Don’t worry, fans of the Big Two—you aren’t being left out this week. There may not be any new Marvel Now! books rolling out, but several of the new series are well underway. All-New X-Men, Thor: God of Thunder, Cable and X-Force, Captain America, FF, Thunderbolts, Indestructible Hulk and Journey into Mystery all have issues dropping today. Over at DC, the Joker continues his assault against the Bat-Family in Nightwing, Red Hood and the Outlaws and second printings of Batgirl and Suicide Squad. Longtime Vertigo fans will also want to pick up Hellblazer No. 298, which kicks off the final arc of the series that culminates with issue No. 300. As a child of the ‘90s, it feels very strange to type that sentence. It is truly the end of an era!
