Battle of the Planets: Trial by Fire

Rating:
Summary: terrific artwork, clunky story--buy the DVDs instead
Review: I remember Battle of the Planets from when I was a kid, and boy, was I disappointed by this story. The artwork was terrific, right in the spirit of the original show (which is now available on DVD). But the story made me wonder if the writer had ever seen an episode. The characters aren't themselves--they aren't really even characters. There's no real sense to what they do and why they do it. The plot has no real twists. It's just kind of there. I kept getting bored. There's a scene in the middle where Keyop goes nuts and stabs a scientist a dozen times in the chest. There's a mutillated cat. Jason is a foul-mouthed, trite womanizer who insults his teammates--and has no sense of teamwork. Remember how teamwork was at the heart of the tv show? It's not in evidence at all in this story. Princess is just a girly-girl who likes brushing her hair and wears perfume. Eh. And the writer felt it necessary to create an irritating general named Tomak who stomps all over the team and belittles them and is generally unappealing. He's not in the TV show at all, but he dominates the comic.

Save your time and money (and Tums) and buy the DVDs of the original cartoon. This may have tried to update the story, but it only succeded in diminishing it. Not once while reading did I think to myself, "THIS is why I used to love this show!" It's sad because I had such high hopes for it, too. I really wanted to like it a lot.

Rating:
Summary: Well done
Review: I'm really surprised to see people panning this. I think the Battle of the Planets comics have been exceptionally well done, not just in the art but in the story as well. We finally learn why the Spectrans look just like humans (I've always disliked the cliche of "humanoid" aliens, and I was pleased to get a reasonable explanation for once), we learn what the "spirit" is that Zoltar receives his orders from, we see the Earth public's reaction to the growing realization that there are aliens among us laying the groundwork for an invasion--including a fair number of human collaborators. Even General Tomak, a new character that one reviewer criticized, turns out to have a good reason for being there. Again, I think the monthly series has been quite well done, and I consider myself a tough critic of comics, especially Image (I have a long-standing grudge against Image for their style-over-substance approach and love of gore and violence displayed in so many of their comics--but NOT in this one, thankfully.)

Unfortunately, we don't get much of the overall story arc in this first volume. I'd hoped that now that Image has completed the first run of the monthly series and switched to a black & white manga-style format, that the color stories would all be reprinted in a single graphic novel, but instead they've spread it over three. G-Force's first mission doesn't go very well for them, but their first mission is all we get in this volume. Most of the backstory and explanations I spoke of don't occur until later, either.

I should point out that there is one scene in this volume that seemed jarring to me (Spoiler warning)--Keyop (the little sidekick) kills a bad guy in a pretty bloody fashion. It makes sense in the context of the story, and it's handled tactfully, but to someone who grew up watching the sanitized Sandy Frank Engish language version of the show (as opposed to the original Gatchaman, which is supposedly much more violent), it was a bit of a shock, and I couldn't help but mutter something about Image Comics when I saw it.

Anyway, I'd say this is definitely worth your while. If not the graphic novel, then go to your local comic shop and just check out the monthly comic. I really admire the effort that's been put into it, and I'm concerned it will go under if not enough readers support it.

Rating:
Summary: Well done
Review: I'm really surprised to see people panning this. I think the Battle of the Planets comics have been exceptionally well done, not just in the art but in the story as well. We finally learn why the Spectrans look just like humans (I've always disliked the cliche of "humanoid" aliens, and I was pleased to get a reasonable explanation for once), we learn what the "spirit" is that Zoltar receives his orders from, we see the Earth public's reaction to the growing realization that there are aliens among us laying the groundwork for an invasion--including a fair number of human collaborators. Even General Tomak, a new character that one reviewer criticized, turns out to have a good reason for being there. Again, I think the monthly series has been quite well done, and I consider myself a tough critic of comics, especially Image (I have a long-standing grudge against Image for their style-over-substance approach and love of gore and violence displayed in so many of their comics--but NOT in this one, thankfully.)

Unfortunately, we don't get much of the overall story arc in this first volume. I'd hoped that now that Image has completed the first run of the monthly series and switched to a black & white manga-style format, that the color stories would all be reprinted in a single graphic novel, but instead they've spread it over three. G-Force's first mission doesn't go very well for them, but their first mission is all we get in this volume. Most of the backstory and explanations I spoke of don't occur until later, either.

I should point out that there is one scene in this volume that seemed jarring to me (Spoiler warning)--Keyop (the little sidekick) kills a bad guy in a pretty bloody fashion. It makes sense in the context of the story, and it's handled tactfully, but to someone who grew up watching the sanitized Sandy Frank Engish language version of the show (as opposed to the original Gatchaman, which is supposedly much more violent), it was a bit of a shock, and I couldn't help but mutter something about Image Comics when I saw it.

Anyway, I'd say this is definitely worth your while. If not the graphic novel, then go to your local comic shop and just check out the monthly comic. I really admire the effort that's been put into it, and I'm concerned it will go under if not enough readers support it.

Rating:
Summary: Only the art is worthy of five stars.
Review: Would someone please tell the comic book industry that the only way to sell comics is to combine intelligent and thought-provoking writing with excellent art? The art is here- Wilson Tortosa's pencils, UDON Studio's coloration, and Alex Ross' incredible covers are sensational and capture the original animation style created for the series by the house of Tatsunoko. Unfortunately, the writing is a mixed bag, ranging from merely adequate in a Wendy and Marvin Superheroes kind of way, to the degree of suckiness that could strip the chrome off every trailer hitch in the lower forty-eight states. And that 's a shame since the ad campaign this comic got practically promised a blockbuster hit. Guys and gals, we have here the comic equivalent of the 1998 Godzilla movie: tons of advertising, killer effects, lame delivery. Honestly, the only thoughts the the comic provoked is questioning why the heck Alex Ross didn't do a better editorial job. For crying out loud, he of all people should know that combining a great story with great art creates a great comic- look at the incredible sucess Kingdom Come was and still is. So, are you looking to read this comic for new and exciting adventures featuring G-Force? Don't even bother. They're barely a force (no pun intended) in this comic and when they are, they're nothing but sterotypical parodies of themselves, and not even in a good satirical sense- paper dolls have more personality than this. The comic is taken over by an overbearing blow-hard of an army general who wasn't even in the series to begin with. About the only good thing that can be said for the story is that there's no 7-Zark-7 Lucasfilm ripoff. Save your money and get the DVDs instead. You can fast-forward over Zark, or better yet, discover the original Gatchaman series episodes that Battle of the Planets was derived from, included in the DVDs.