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...
James' Picks:
Asadora vol. 5 TPB by Naoki Urasawa, published by Viz Media
Asadora is a current manga from Naoki Urasawa, which is really all you need to know. But let me give you a little more detail. Urasawa is the legendary creator behind Pluto, 20th Century Boys, and other amazing stories. Urasawa's art is wonderfully engaging and he's an incredible storyteller. His stories have big, epic scope, but never at the expense of chracter growth and development. Asadora tells the story of a remarkable girl (now teen) who survived a deadly storm that might have been a Kaiju attack, and grows up to become an ace pilot. And is just generally awesome. It's an incredibly engaging story, and I guarantee you'll love it.
It's been ages since I read Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, but a number of the ideas have really still stuck with me (the class distinctions and the way every class was convinced not to want to be in a higher class, "we hate old things, we only want new things", etc.). Anyway, I'm excited to check out the graphic novel version of the book. I'm not familiar with writer/artist Fred Fordham, but from the samples of pages I've seen online, the book looks amazing.
We Only Kill Each Other TP by Stephanie Phillip, Peter Krause, Ellie Wright, and Troy Peteri, published by Dark Horse
A crime story involving Jewish gangsters set to take on Nazis? I'm in. I've read the first issue of this comic and I can tell you it's a fun, pulpy read. You've got rival Jewish Gangsters in New York in the 1930's, forced to work together to fight against American Nazi sympathizers (now there's a thing I didn't think would come back into fashion, but anyway). In addition to a compelling story, the art here from Peter Krause is just terrific. A very clean, classic style, perfect for the period setting.
While this is geared for kids, it got my attention as well. It's set in the 1950's and concerns a girl who dealt with polio and her struggles, and the Communist red scare, and some sort of supernatural elements as well? I know you're not supposed to judge a book by its cover but I was in fact immediately drawn in by the amazing cover, with the two kids who look like TinTin and the scary briefcase guy. It's a great cover, and it holds the promise of a fun story.
