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Underground > Comic Books >

Warren Ellis' ANGEL STOMP FUTURE

rabideyemovement

02:34 / 14.01.05

I'm loving the new Apparatus line so far, but Angel Stomp Future looks like it will be my favorite. It's got all the psychosexual obscenity, body-modding and outrageous social illness that Transmet started off with, only this one's seriously amped by Juan Jose Ryp's psychedlic eyegasming artwork... Too bad we can't see this one in color! Warning. Infectious Suicide Club meme contained within. Don't anybody go killing themselves in droves now... I loved it. Can't wait for the next issue. This Apparat line may turn out some gems. Check out Ironwine for some good pulp-style detective reading. On the other hand, I found Quit City to be rather boring...
What do you guys think?

02:51 / 14.01.05

ummm

I feel terrible for bursting your bubble mate, but I'm afraid these were one-offs for warren. some kind of experimental imaginary fifth week kind of thing. You're in the spirit of what he intended though, if it makes you feel better. a snapshot of what mainstream comics could be.

ah alas. I really loved simon spector too....

i heard these did well, so you can be sure warren will get the nod to rework the concepts for another go, or modify them for dc or marvel work...

that said, ASF was great. warren's snarly athiest trip is getting a bit old, and his grasp of memetics is pretty shaky, but hey who gives a damn yeah?

broken gentleman.

04:10 / 14.01.05

i LOVED ironwine, great little story, just fucked up enough to stick in your head for weeks. i haven't seen anything else from the line other than quit city, which wasn't really up my alley.

still waiting on angel stomp and simon spector, and not so patiently at that. i should grab them tomorrow.

it depresses me that the last time i can recall reading something like frank ironwine was when brubaker was doing crime fiction without a superhero gimmick, something i desperately wish he'd do full-time.

damn whims of the market.

07:11 / 14.01.05

I read Frank Ironwine and Quit City, both of which were enjoyable. However, I solved the "mystery" in Ironwine within a couple of pages. Basically, the murderer in Ironwine was so typically Ellis.

14:37 / 14.01.05

Ironwine was ok but the others seemed to have kinda shit art. I'll have to give them another look...

rabideyemovement

14:53 / 14.01.05

One-shots? ONE SHOTS?! Dammit!.... What the hell was the point then? I hope he feels the need to write a few more at some point, because these are the kind of stories I expect from him. Much more enjoyable than Iron Man or Ultimate FF... I want more Angel Stomp Future, damn it!

19:39 / 14.01.05

The point was that it was an imaginary fifth week event promoting an imaginary "new" line of comics, done with a "what if the pulps had continued into the present day" theme. Of course, they ended up not coming out at the same time.

The only one I was really interested in was Ironwine, but there's probably zero chance of me finding a copy of any of these...

22:09 / 14.01.05

The point of these comics is pretty explicitly outlined in the prose sections in the back of each comic. Check it out.

I really liked Quit City - the amazing weirdness happening on the extreme periphery of the story, and the centring on the small, sad personal story instead. The art in QC took a while for me to adjust to, but once I'd given it a chance it worked pretty well.

What I think worked about these two was the non-fantasticness of the stories. Judging from the previews of the other two, I'm not sure I'll like them as much - they look a lot more "fantastic" in their approach. But you gotta catch 'em all, right?

Would've been great if they all came out the same week.

m.

04:10 / 15.01.05

waiting eagerly on ASF and quite a bit on SPECTOR. what I've seen of ASF reminds me of the madness in CITY OF SILENCE, one of Ellis' best comics in my opinion.

IRONWINE was great and the first pages mede me crack up, and the mistery itself wasn't that obvious for me, but I don't like how in most of his stories in which investigation takes place it doesn't solve much and people always bump into the murderer.

QUIT CITY kind of bugged me... I love Laurenn's art - XXX LIVE NUDE GIRLS is sinply beautiful - but here it seemed a bit rushed. and when I read the afterword it was clear why it seemd out of place for me. conceptually, Ellis seemed to try showing how fiction "quit" on hero pilots [or vice-versa].

but then, why not try and show an interesting new take on the subject? space is the limit etc. don't know if I'm making sense here...

04:19 / 15.01.05

One-shots? ONE SHOTS?! Dammit!.... What the hell was the point then?

Why start a bunch of ongoing series that you'll soon lose interest in writing when all you want to do is float some ideas towards the TV execs?

XXII:X:II = XXX

05:06 / 15.01.05

The only one of these I was really interested in picking up was FRANK IRONWINE, if only because I'm one of the biggest FINDER fans you'd ever meet, and I think Carla Speed McNeill is AWESOME. Unfortunately, these seem to have sold out and I sure as hell wouldn't buy a compilation of all four of these books, if there's any to come.

Yeah, these do seem like they'd function just as well as TV pilot pitches, don't they? I wonder why the remainder of Ellis' fans don't yet get that he doesn't like them unless he can use them to his own advantage. I suspect it will ultimately lead to both parties' downfall, if it hasn't already.

/+,

21:31 / 16.01.05

RE: SOLD OUT

On his website, I think, Ellis makes note that Avatar has plenty of copies. The books have not come close to selling out yet. They are even available online, if yr dealer is too lazy to get them for you.

I loved Ironwine, liked Quit City very much, liked Spector quite a bit, and wante to like Angel Stomp more than I did. I did love ASF's attitude, but it felt like acid-Ellis lite overall. His Bad Signal screeds, when they come, have more teeth. Also, Ryp's Darrowesque art seems better suited to color, or at least a larger format. His Avatar work looks cluttered, but maybe my eyes are just pools of liquid crap.

I hope Ellis balances his mainstream work with more of his own stuff, a la Millar's Marvbl & Millarworld dynamic. Although they were a mixed bag, overall I loved Ministry of Space, Mek, Reload, Red & Tokyo Storm Warning.

Does anybody know anything about TWO-STEP, the series he recently wrote for Image? he never mentioned it on his site, so i wondered if the book was sort of a red-headed stepchild which he would prefer to remain locked up in the attic.

04:21 / 17.01.05

Alright, read them all now.

I thought Frank Ironwine was okay, the character could use less blathering about cities and ghosts and more actual detecting.

Quit City was interesting, one I would actually like to see more backstory to.

I adored the art in Simon Spector, the first time I like Jacen Barrow's art in a while. It was great visual storytelling, and goddamn I could use more of that. Some of the writing was good too, I liked the "supersane" remark. The villain's reasoning made no sense in light of Spector's recent actions however.

Angel Stomp Future bothered the hell out of me. The art was cluttered and muddled. Half the story seemed to be a Bad Signal post, and there were only shreds of a decent plot.

Two Step. Imagine a female Spider Jerusalem, and Pete Wisdom get together in the future. Very slight, kinda entertaining.