Quick Reviews

Promethea; SpyBoy: Final Exam; Strangers in Paradise

Promethea #31
by Alan Moore & J. H. Williams III
"In This Issue: The World Ends!" And that's just halfway through--the remainder of this issues shows us what happens after and brings to story to a close. It's quite fitting, then, that there's still one issue left. Alan Moore has used Promethea as a vehicle to explore various ideas about the nature of reality, and here he explores eschatology. He also manages to invoke the Strong Anthropic Principle--I'm not a strong believer (I'm more of a Weak Anthropic man myself) but I've got to admire any story that brings it into a comic book. Williams really gets to show off his artistic chops in this issue, and I do hope that he manages to land a prime gig once Promethea comes to a close.
Rating: 4 (of 5)


SpyBoy: Final Exam #4
by Peter David, Pop Mhan & Norman Lee
Really, you can't end a series on a cliffhanger like this. Okay, Angel was able to pull it off, but they get a one-time dispensation. I suppose we can look at this as a cliffhanger at the end of a season, as we are promised "See ya next time!", but after four issues and twelve dollars, I would have liked to have seen the main plot resolved. I may be harping on a small point here, but it makes an otherwise fun mini series slightly annoying.
Rating: 2.5 (of 5)


Strangers in Paradise #68
by Terry Moore
The plot starts to kick into high gear again, as the pasts of both Katchoo & Marie Peters come back to haunt them. The phone call between the two of them was especially effective. I found the choice to reproduce the middle section directly from pencils to be a bit odd, as I can't see anything special about the bits of story therein that would require such a drastic shift in artistic technique. It's not like Moore was cutting corners or anything, as these are very detailed pencils made to intentionally look rough. It's just an odd thing to do for no apparent reason.
Rating: 3.5 (of 5)