Green Hornet #4
writer: Amy Chu
artist: German Erramouspe
covers: Mike McKone (A), Mike Choi (B)
Mike McKone (RI-B/W), Mike Choi (RI-Virgin)
FC | 32 pages | $3.99 | Teen+
Kato orders the Hornet team to Hong Kong where they’ll need to break into the ultra secure National Bank of China in order to find the answers they need. But will they be able to pull off this daring heist without attracting the attention of the public’s new favorite hero, the Oko?
Green Hornet #3
writer: Amy Chu
artist: German Erramouspe
covers: Mike McKone (A), Stephane Roux (B)
Mike McKone (RI-B/W), Stephane Roux (RI-Virgin)
FC | 32 pages | $3.99 | Teen +
In Istanbul, Mulan and Daily Sentinel reporter Tai reunite with Britt Jr. But he refuses to take the mantle of the Green Hornet back! Meanwhile, things get complicated when the mysterious hero The Oko reappears and blames the Green Hornet in Sebastian’s death.
Green Hornet #2
writer: Amy Chu
artist: German Erramouspe
covers: Mike McKone (A), Sean Chen (B), Mike McKone (RI-B/W), Sean Chen (RI-B/W)
FC | 32 pages | $3.99 | Teen +
The new Green Hornet embarks on her journey to become a hero and faces a threat unlike any she’s ever faced before!
It was new comic book day yesterday! What’d everyone get? What’d you enjoy? What’d you dislike? Sound off in the comments below! While you decide on that, here’s some comic news and reviews from around the web.
The Beat – Eddie Campbell Has Some Comics on His New Website – Go check it out!
The Comichron – Black Panther continues reorder chart domination; Spidey rules advance reorders – This should be no surprise.
Reviews
Comic Attack – Assassin’s Creed Origins #1
Newsarama – Green Hornet #1
Comics Bulletin – Oblivion Song #1
It’s new comic book day! What’s everyone getting? What are you looking forward to? What are you reading first? Sound off in the comments below! While you wait for shops to open, here’s a bunch of news and reviews from around the web.
Metal Injection – Norway’s Bloody Black Metal History Is Being Turned Into A Comic Series – Nice! We’re sure there’ll be lots of forests for them to get lost in.
ICv2 – Pepe the Frog Creator Sues InfoWars – Good!
Reviews
The Beat – Compulsive Comics
Newsarama – Crowded #1
Newsarama – Doctor Star and the Kingdom of Lost Tomorrows #1
Newsarama – Dodge City #1
Nothing But Comics – Firebug
Newsarama – Gideon Falls #1
Newsarama – Green Hornet #1
Newsarama – Oblivion Song #1
Talking Comics – Relic Dragon #1
Comic Attack – The Terrifics #1
Talking Comics – The Wilds #1
Green Hornet #1
writer: Amy Chu
artist: German Erramouspe
covers: Mike Choi (A), Carli Ihde (B), Mike McKone (C), CP Wilson III (D)
Mike Choi (RI-Virgin), Carli Ihde (RI-B/W), Mike McKone (RI-B/W)
FC | 32 pages | $3.99 | Teen +
Britt Reid Jr., the scion of the Daily Sentinel publishing empire, vanishes during a wild party on his friend’s yacht. Meanwhile, crime spikes in the streets of Century City with the mysterious criminal/secret vigilante the Green Hornet absent. It’s only a matter of time before SOMEONE puts two and two together, and it’s up to Kato, former partner of Britt’s father, and his daughter Mulan to protect the city AND the Green Hornet legacy, while finding out what happened to Britt. Amy Chu (Red Sonja, Poison Ivy, KISS) picks up where Kevin Smith left off with an action packed mystery.
Dynamite Entertainment has announced they will be adding a new entry into the Green Hornet universe, as the prolific and talented Amy Chu, best known for her work on Red Sonja, KISS, and Poison Ivy, has been tapped to serve as writer for the upcoming series. Chu will be joined by artist German Erramouspe for the upcoming March 2018 release.
Britt Reid Jr., the scion of the Daily Sentinel publishing empire, vanishes during a wild party on his friend’s yacht. Meanwhile, crime spikes in the streets of Century City with the mysterious criminal/secret vigilante the Green Hornet absent. It’s only a matter of time before SOMEONE puts two and two together, and it’s up to Kato, former partner of Britt’s father, and his daughter Mulan to protect the city AND the Green Hornet legacy, while finding out what happened to Britt. Writer Amy Chu picks up where Kevin Smith left off with an action-packed mystery!
The debut issue of Green Hornet features a wide selection of cover variants, providing fans and retailers with the freedom of choice! Four art covers feature the talents of Mike Choi, Carli Ihde, Mike McKone , and CP Wilson III. Limited variant editions in “Black & White” and “Virgin Art” formats are also available as retailer incentives for comic shops that support the launch issue by achieving stocking thresholds.
Green Hornet: Reign Of The Demon TPB
writer: David Liss
artist: Kewber Baal
cover: Ken Lashley
FC • 136 pages • $15.99 • Teen+
COLLECTS ISSUES 1-4
Britt Reid, the masked crimefighter known as The Green Hornet, and his inseparable ally Kato return in an all-new tale by David Liss (Black Panther, The Spider) and Kewber Baal (Kiss)! If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, it could be the deadliest for Central City’s staunch defenders! Green Hornet’s personal vendetta against organized crime creates a void in Chicago, one filled by two more masked individuals: the vicious Demone and the cavalier Swashbuckler. While the former establishes himself as a most formidable foe, the latter claims to be a friend… but is he playing a far more subtle game?
Barbara Hall became a prominent cartoonist during World War II before becoming a “hippie commune co-founder.” Her family was Southern and had strict rules against befriending Northerners, but Hall eventually attended art school in California and moved to New York.
In New York, she would begin a career that contributed many notable female characters to comics. Hall was hired by Harvey Comics to draw the comic Black Cat, about stuntwoman-turned-lead-actress-turned-hero Linda Turner. After Black Cat, she worked on the strip Girl Commandos, about an all-women team that was based on Pat Parker, also known as War Nurse. The team, consisting of Pat Parker, Pat Parker’s friend Ellen, a Soviet photographer named Tanya, a Chinese woman named Mei-Ling, and radio reporter Penelope Kirk, fought Nazis as a team. None of them had superpowers. Hall worked on Girl Commandos until 1943.
Hall was also responsible for creating Blonde Bomber, also known as Honey Blake. Blake was a broadcast news camera woman and an expert chemist. She worked with cameraman Jimmy Slapso and appeared in several issues of Green Hornet. During this time, she signed most of her work “B. Hall,” because it wasn’t commonplace or widely accepted for women to be in comics. After Hall left Harvey Comics, artist Jill Elgin took over much of Hall’s drawing responsibility.
After her marriage to Irving Fiske in 1946, Hall and Fiske bought property in Vermont that would become the Quarry Hill Creative Center. Quarry Hill is the oldest alternative living community in the United States, and was created with the intent of becoming a creative retreat for writers and artists. Cartoonist Art Spiegelman and his wife Françoise Mouly maintained a friendship with many of the residents. Quarry Hill is still open as an alternative living community, run by Hall and Fiske’s daughter.
Hall continued with art and opened a gallery called The Gallery Gwen in East Village in the 1960s. She and Fiske eventually divorced. Hall remarried at the age of seventy, and would remain married to Dr. Donald Calhoun until his death. Hall died in 2014 at the age of ninety-four.
Dynamite has a tenuous property on its hands with the Green Hornet. As a superhero he has really had his day, which was in the 1960s when he competed with Batman on television for popularity. Most attempts to revive the character into a comic format have been short lived, even if their quality might have been decent enough. With the recent popularity of steampunk as a sub-genre within science fiction, Dynamite decided on its own League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, albeit with the mostly public domain characters that it was presently publishing or had recently. Even then the Green Hornet seemed like a strange choice. The character is after all one that depends on certain modern inventions, and for whom there is usually not as strong a case in steampunk (for instance with the automobile).
With Legenderry Green Hornet all of these limitations seem to of less importance as the setting is able to fill in the gaps which the characters are lacking. Instead of the signature car, Britt Reid is relegated to horse and buggy, even when such “autocarriages” are available to others that have brought them from the science wonder city. With the hero able to function as a facsimile of other heroes because of his lack of a connection to much else in popular culture, the remainder of the story is left to take up the slack, and it does so. Part of what makes this work is the introduction of four separate villains, each with different intentions, but all of them dangerous in their own way. Some might think that four villains might confuse a story, but here they are presented in a logical way, which allows the story to be told.
There are three miniseries attached to the Legenderry universe, and of this, Red Sonja and Vampirella, this one comes out looking the weakest, though still a readable story. It may not be extremely noteworth, but it still captures the essence of steampunk which so few series attempt and even fewer manage to do effectively. It succeeds by not focusing too much on the main heroes, and this results in a fun and entertaining story which fits well within the shared universe.
Story: Daryl Gregory Art: Brent Peeples
Story: 7.7 Art: 7.7 Overall: 7.7 Recommendation: Read
Dynamite provided Graphic Policy with a free copy for review.
