Monthly Archives: June 2010

Review: Velocity #1 – “Decoys”

The first issue of Ron Marz and Kenneth Rocafort’s Velocity miniseries delivers an effective blend of action and exposition. Appropriately for a book about a speedster, it hits the ground running, and while the main conflict doesn’t really begin until the end of the issue, there’s plenty going on in the opening chapter.

The setup for “Decoys” is simple: A mad scientist infects Velocity and her teammates with a virus that will kill them within an hour, and she’s the only one who might be able to stop it.

Wait, Who?

A bit of background for those not familiar with Top Cow’s resident speedster: Carin Taylor is a member of Cyberforce, a team made up of former (unwilling) test subjects of Cyberdata. Cybernetic implants give her super-speed, and a layer of Kevlar under her skin gives her some degree of invulnerability.

The comic is actually quite new-reader friendly. You get a good sense of Velocity’s personality (snarky, tends to get ahead of herself), powers (runs fast, jumps fast, dismantles killer cyborgs fast…but vibrating through walls and into other dimensions is right out), and the basics of her origin. The villain’s motives are established clearly. There’s even a page in the back with short profiles of Velocity and her teammates.

Continue reading

Speed Reading

Some weekend linkblogging…

Once Upon a Geek can’t wait for the upcoming DC Adventures RPG.

Multiversity Comics casts the Teen Titans

The Beat finds that Comic-Con brings money into San Diego after all. Who knew? Oh, right, we did: the ones spending it!

4thletter! looks at Flash and Batman in Final Crisis: “Everything about the Flash, any of them, in Final Crisis is dead on…”

Flash Week Concludes

Flash Week at Collected Editions concludes with a review of Flash: Rebirth!

Here’s a full list of the Flash trade paperback and hardcover reviews posted this week:

If you’ve been following along, you already know that I contributed the reviews of the Morrison/Millar books, Emergency Stop and The Human Race. I forgot to mention it earlier, but this is actually the second set of guest reviews I’ve done for the site: I reviewed Perhapanauts: First Blood for them last year.

When you visit Collected Editions, be sure to check out the huge collection of reviews (including more Flash trades) and the DC Trade Paperback Timeline.

Velocity #1 Preview

Newsarama has a 5-page preview of Velocity #1 by Ron Marz and Kenneth Rocafort.

Carin Taylor is the fastest woman in the world. At least, she’d better be if she wants to save her own life and the lives of her Cyberforce teammates. When a former Cyberdata scientist — and test subject — seeks revenge against the members of Cyberforce, only Velocity can save her friends before the clock literally runs out.

Bringing together writer Ron Marz (Witchblade, Angelus) and artist Kenneth Rocafort (Cyberforce/Hunter-Killer) for the first time. Featuring two covers by Rocafort and Chriscross (Captain Marvel).

I quite liked the Pilot Season one-shot by Joe Casey and Kevin Maguire, and I’ve been looking forward to seeing more solo adventures, even though this is a completely new team, and a 4-issue miniseries rather than an ongoing. (The downside: as well-executed as Rocafort’s art is, the covers are cheesecake-y enough that I feel like I need to hide the comic on the bottom of my stack — and avoid reading it in public!)

Velocity #1 ships next Wednesday, June 30.

Update: I’ve had the opportunity to read an advance copy. Here’s my review of the comic.

Flash #4 Delayed One Week

According to Diamond/Previews’ shipping updates, Flash #4 has been pushed back one week from July 28 to August 4. (Hat tip to Jay75 on Comic Bloc)

In the discussion on Comic Bloc, trmnlvlctyyy pointed out that Francis Manapul has been traveling a lot filming a TV show, which probably interferes with his time to work on the art.

On the other hand…how many comics is Geoff Johns writing these days? Add in the fact that Brightest Day is biweekly and has to be a priority, and he’s got that new job wrangling all of DC’s media adaptations, and you’ve got to wonder just where we should be pointing the finger.

Flash #3 is still scheduled to arrive in stores next Wednesday, as can be seen on Diamond’s upcoming releases list.