November Reading Log

 

Shortest reading log ever...it's been a busy season. Expect another short one next month, but then (hopefully) I'll be back in full swing in January!

Reading Through the Fantastic Four- #19-40 (v. 3)

I would love to tell you Chris Claremont followed up his legendary run on Uncanny X-Men with an equally excellent time at the helm of Fantastic Four. I would love to tell you that, really. Unfortunately, despite some interesting nuggets here and there, Claremont's run, which ran from issue #4 through #32 of this third volume of Marvel's First Family, sees an old dog unable to learn new tricks, leaving readers with a book that never quite feels right.

The good: Claremont introduces Valeria von Doom, the daughter of Susan Richards and Doctor Doom in an alternate universe. Valeria was immediately a hit with fans and proved so interesting that she warranted her own short-lived spinoff title. Also in the good camp was a storyline that saw Reed's mind trapped in Doctor Doom's body, the sort of Freaky Friday story that made you think, "I can't believe they haven't done this already!"

The bad: while in the latter half of his run Claremont listened to the criticisms he was receiving and toned down the crossovers with his old X-Men and Captain Britain characters, this never really feels like a Fantastic Four book, more like a Chris Claremont book. It's hard to explain, but he just doesn't have a handle on these characters; what was supposed to be something of a reboot of the title was almost immediately disposed of when his run came to an end, with all of his changes immediately retconned.

Ultimately, this is a case of miscasting: Chris Claremont is a good writer, but not the right fit for the FF. His successors, Jeph Loeb and artist Carlos Pacheco would get the book back on solid ground before yielding the floor to all-time great pairing Mark Waid and Mark Weiringo. More on Loeb-Pacheco next month!

LEADERSHIP IN TURBULENT TIMES by Doris Kearns Goodwin

One of the reasons I so enjoy reading presidential memoirs and biographies is the case studies they offer in leadership. By reading how these real-life leaders handled real-life crises, I'm able to draw lessons that resonate much more with me than any list of principles. In Leadership in Turbulent Times, historian Doris Kearns Goodwin gives both, offering explicit education in leadership from the lives of the presidents she's spent her career studying.

The first section of the book looks at the early life and formation of the four men her book deals with: Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Lyndon B. Johnson. For those who, like me, have already read her bestselling books on these subjects, this part of the book is review, a distillation of the early chapters in those works. But in the section section she gets to what the book's all about. Using a case study from each leader—Lincoln's drafting and release of the Emancipation Proclamation, TR's navigation of a mining strike, FDR's first hundred days, and LBJ's crafting and guidance of the Great Society legislation—Kearns Goodwin tells the step-by-step history of these events while also directly pointing out the leadership lessons they offer.

If, like me, you were partially reading her earlier biographies for lessons in leadership, some of this book may be a little on the nose, explicitly stating lessons you'd already picked up between the lines. Nevertheless, the author's prose is as sparkling as ever, her subjects still fascinating, and the lessons remain worth learning. Especially if you haven't read those biographies, this is a great place to place to pick up some pointers on leadership while learning some history along the way.

ESSENTIAL PUNISHER VOL. 3 by Mike Baron, Bill Reinhold, Mark Texeira, Lee Sullivan, et al.

The late 1980s and early 1990s are one of my least favorite periods in comics history. The Punisher is one of my least favorite protagonists. So this volume never had much hope for a sterling review.

With Mike Baron still at the writing helm, as he had been since Frank Castle first got his own ongoing series, the Punisher continues to be portrayed as a gruff, Rambo-esque avenger, a take-no-prisoners killer concerned less with friends or ethics than with his war on criminals. Sometimes that works—there are a few self-contained issues in this book where Punisher takes on a drug kingpin or serial killer in New York City, and there is a thrill in moving from the introduction of said baddie to their extermination at Castle's hands.

The problem is that Baron seems convinced that readers will get bored of that, so he's constantly putting Punisher in situations that seem outside the purview of his war on crime in the inner city. Whether it's a multi-issue arc that sees Punisher taking on insider trading or another that transports him to the jungles of Venezuela, Baron seems intent on putting the character in unfamiliar settings for the sake of variety. Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think variety is something the average Punisher fan was demanding. For my part, these diversions don't work at a character level or a story level.

The art throughout the book is pretty pedestrian, emblematic of its era—lots of sketchy linework à la Todd McFarlane and Rob Liefeld but without their dynamism. It doesn't help that the book never seems to have the same artist from issue to issue despite the consistency on the writing side from Mike Baron.

Like I said, this book never had much of a shot with this reviewer, and it didn't do anything compelling enough to win me over. We'll see how things go in the fourth and final volume, but I'll admit...my expectations are low.