Dancing with the Devil in the Pale Moonlight - Catch It Aug 11th, 2021

Welcome to Catch it at the Comic Shop, where the Panel Patter team looks at what's coming out at your favorite store or digital device this week. Each one of us that participates picks up to five items due out this week, with a little bit about why we like them. (NOTE: We use solicitation material for this, so if we miss creators, please talk to your publisher!) Sometimes we might only have a few items to share, other weeks, keeping it to five will make for hard choices. Here's what the team wanted to highlight this week...

Mike's Picks

Batman '89 #1 by Sam Hamm, Joe Quinones, Leonardo Ito, and Clayton Cowles, published by DC Comics

Wendy/Wendy’s Revenge by Walter Scott, published by Drawn and Quarterly

Wendy: Master of Art is one of the funniest and also most disturbingly accurate books I’ve read in quite some time, and I'm thrilled for these two releases in the Wendyverse. Walter Scott’s titular Wendy is an everywoman for our times, and Scott’s characterization is both poignant and pointed. This is satire, but it’s also reflective. Some satire bites for the sake of biting, but there is something more humane behind Scott’s jokes. He lampoons life as a young person with such accurate and relatable detail that it resonates even if your years of of early 20s reckless abandon are in the rear view. 

James' Picks:

Batman '89 #1 by Sam Hamm, Joe Quinones, Leonardo Ito, and Clayton Cowles, published by DC Comics

I feel like it's hard to really state what a big deal the Batman movie was when it came out in 1989. Decades before the MCU, here was something truly remarkable. It was only a few years after the last Superman movie (the less said abut that one, the better), but it was something completely different. It was dark and stylish and weird, and full of larger than life characters like Jack Nicholson's Joker. Batman was EVERYWHERE that summer. Books, TV, music, people getting the bat-symbol cut in their hair. It was quite a thing. Anyway, I'm having fun reminiscing about that summer. So I'm thrilled to read this comic that's set in that world.   

Defenders #1 (of 5) by Al Ewing and Javier Rodriguez, published by Marvel Comics

I can't say I particularly care about The Defenders as a superhero team. I guess that's the thing, they're kind of a non-team team. With many different iterations over the years. Here's what I can tell you. Al Ewing and Javier Rodriguez?? That's a creative team to get very, very excited about. Frankly, I would read literally any comic that creative team wanted to do. Ewing writes big, heady stories, whether in epic space settings, or in the midst of terrifying body horror and trips down to hang out with the one-below-all. And Rodriguez, every single thing he does is an absolute joy and delight. I adored his work on Spider-Woman, and recently I was blown away by his incredible scope and detail in the History of the Marvel Universe. His work just has so much life and personality. What I'm saying is, get this comic.