Aka Wednesday 25th
March - Sunday 29th March 2020
The rest of this
week was pretty similar to yesterday, Wednesday to Friday I spent home-working,
this is my “workstation” for working from home:
…but I did read
‘Steeple’ #1 - #5:
…in which Billie
Baker is the new curate in the Cornish village of Tredregyn, where the local vicar
battles Mer-People and the local Church of Satan is as integrated in the local
community as the C of E. Before Billie arrives in Tredregyn her car blows up on
the motorway, but she is recused by Maggie Warren, part-time barmaid and full-time
member of Tredregyn’s Church of Satan. The series follows Billie as she helps
Reverend Penrose and does community outreach and has many (mis-)adventures,
involving reaching out to the local youth, local activism vis-a-vie wind farms,
preventing a mini-rapture, helping out with Witch Fest and accidentally see too
much of the Church of Satan’s activities/rituals. The key to these (mis-)adventures
is Billies growing friendship with Maggie, who acts as a gateway for Billie to
see and experience new things and prompt her into think about her beliefs afresh.
‘Steeple’ is written
by John Allison, coloured by Sarah Stern, and lettered by Jim Campbell, and is
typical of John Allison’s work, as it is chock full of humour, emotions,
pathos, the supernatural and action. When you strip away the more outrageous elements
you’re left with the core of the book, which is the growing friendship between Billie
and Maggie and what it’s like when you’re new to somewhere and are in your first
job/post, taking your first steps out into the world. Plus, with hopefully
not giving anything away, I like how the cover to issue one foreshadows how the
series ends (although it is continued online here, with, I think, a new
series from Dark Horse to come). 11/10.
And these are the
variant covers (by Max Sarin, Lissa Treiman, Nick Roche with Josh Burcham,
Warwick Johnson-Cadwell, Robert Ball):
…on Saturday the
postman delivered ‘Wicked Things’ #1 and ‘Undiscovered Country’ #5:
…and I did my first
proper big food shop of the lockdown, this is a picture of the queue, but
because we all got there shortly before the store opened, we didn’t have to
wait too long before getting in:
…and on Sunday I
read:
‘Strange Adventures’
#1 (written by Tom King, art by Mitch Gerads and Evan ‘Doc’ Shaner, and lettered
by Clayton Clowes) – a nice first issue introducing to Adam Strange, his family,
friends and backstory, but leaving enough room so that we can’t dismiss or
completely believe it when he is accused of war crimes on Rann. It’s cool how
the art is set up so that Gerads does the art for the Earth bound, present-day
story and Shaner does the art for the story set on Rann, which is done in a
more traditional comics/sci-fi style, while Gerads art is more realistic/grounded.
Given that there are eleven more issues, it’ll be interesting to see way the story
goes, is it all going to be focused on whether Adam is a war criminal or is
that just the starting point for a bigger/wider story? 7/10.
‘Undiscovered Country’ #4 (written by Scott Snyder and Charles Soule, art by Giuseppe
Camuncoli and Daniele Orlandini, finishes by Daniele Orlandini and Leonardo
Marcello Grassi, colours by Matt Wilson, and letters by Crank!) – we learn more
about Valentina Sandoval, investigative journalist, which sheds more light on
the teams mission, while also deepening (or maybe adding to is a better way to
put it?) the mystery, more about the Destiny Man and more about Daniel and Charlotte.
The boo is keeping up its momentum, with things happening fast, with little
time to think them through before the next titbit is dropped. The only sour
note for me was the art in the second half of the book, which has Charlotte and
her brother free from the Destiny Man, driving away from him, but when we go
back to the Crawling Palace there is Charlotte, tied up with the rest of the team.
Which left me wondering if it was an art mistake or if the second Charlotte was going to be someone in
disguise or if the plot of the book changed at the last moment and there wasn’t
time to change the art to reflect the new direction/plot. 6/10.
‘Firefly’ #14 and
#15 (written by Greg Pak, illustrated by Lalit Kumar Sharma, coloured by Francesco
Segala and lettered by Jim Campbell) – Mal is well and truly drawn into being
Sheriff, it is no longer a ruse or something he has to do to avoid a worse
fate. He cares for the people he is protecting, or at least feels a sense of
duty to them, which puts him at slightly crossed purposes with his former
shipmates, who are variously stealing enough loot so that they can retire (kinda
with help from Mal) or just trying to find a home. The writing and art are top-notch,
and both perfectly capture the tone and feel of the show. There’s plenty of one-liners
and humorous moments, character growth and human/emotional moments. 10/10.
…I also did do this
week’s G2 Crosswords:
…Wednesday’s crossword went better than yesterday’s, as we
only had to cheat on a tenth of the clues (two out of 21). And it was all down
to intersecting letters – when I got the intersecting ‘v’ for ‘relative’ it
meant that it had to be part of ‘…ive’, which meant it was likely to be
‘…tive’, which made ‘relative’ a pretty safe bet to go for. And we learnt that
‘Manitoba’ is not only an electronica act, but also a ‘Canadian prairie province’
and that ‘mastic’ is a ‘putty-like cement used as adhesive or filler’…
…and Thursday’s crossword went a tad downhill, we had to
cheat on like a sixth of the clues (four out of 23), but aside from those four
the clues tumbled like bowling pins. And we learnt that a ‘versatile employee’
is a ‘factotum’, that ‘propitious’ means ‘favourable’, that ibid’ is the
abbreviation for the Latin word that means “in the same place”, and that
Zimbabwe’ is a ‘South-east African country’…
…while Friday’s crossword hits the upswing, with only having
to cheat on a tenth of the clues (two out of 21). We went for ‘immense’ for the
clue ‘huge (8), without realising that it’s only 7 letters long! And that
‘colossal’ was the right answer. And we should have gotten ‘owing’ from ‘due’…
…and Saturday’s crossword ends the week on a slightly sour
note as we had to cheat on a quarter of the clues (six out of 23). I guess that
those six clues were just too chewy for the little grey cells and me. But it
does mean that we learnt that ‘rigour’ can mean ‘excessive severity’, that a
‘lively drinking party’ can be called a ‘carousal’ that a ‘kepi’ is a ‘French
military cap’, that ‘Spode’ is a ‘brand of fine English porcelain’, that
‘crema’ is the ‘foam on top of an espresso’ and that ‘Orvieto’ is a ‘white wine
from Umbria’. So, all in all this crossword was a real learning experience 😊…
No comments:
Post a Comment