Back to the Future #19
Bob Gale, John Barber (w) • Marcelo Ferreira (a & c)
HARD TIME part 1! The secrets of Jailbird Joey threaten Marty and Doc—what did Uncle Joey do in the past that was so bad… and what does that mean for Marty in the present day of 1986? You can bet your bottom dollar that Doc Brown has a theory!
FC • 32 pages • $3.99
Back to the Future #11: Continuum Conundrum Part 6
Bob Gale, John Barber (w) • Marcelo Ferreira (a & c)
END OF THE ROAD! Continuum Conundrum crashes to a conclusion! Trapped in 2036 with a furious Griff Tannen—and Doc’s only way to reunite with Clara means abandoning Marty to this terrifying future!
FC • 32 pages • $3.99
Back to the Future #10: Continuum Conundrum Part 5
Bob Gale, John Barber (w) • Marcelo Ferreira (a & c)
DOC’S STORY! Is he a man out of time? A visitor from another reality? An alien? A robot? Eighteen hyper-intelligent hamsters in a rubber human suit? Well, definitely not the last one—but the mystery of memoryless Doc Brown is solved… just in time for things to really get exciting.
FC • 32 pages • $3.99
Back to the Future #9: Continuum Conundrum Part 4
Bob Gale, John Barber (w) • Marcelo Ferreira (a & c)
DIVE INTO THE FUTURE! The mystery of amnesiac Doc Brown’s appearance in 1986 deepens as Marty hatches a plan to go further into the future than he’s ever gone. But what did Clara’s warning mean—and what can Marty do to heed it?!
FC • 32 pages • $3.99
Back To The Future: Untold Tales and Alternate Timelines
Bob Gale, John Barber, Erik Burnham (w) • Brent Schoonover, Dan Schoening, Marcelo Ferreira, Chris Madden, Corin Howell, Alan Robinson (a) • Dan Schoening (c)
BTTF creator/screenwriter Bob Gale returns with all new tales from the twisting and turning timeline that made Back to the Future a, well…. TIMELESS pop-culture phenomenon! From the Old West forward to the 1980s, from the 21st Century back to the Jurassic Period… and every time in between… Doc, Marty, along with their friends and enemies, embark on time-space continuum adventures of epic proportions!
TPB • FC • $19.99 • 120 pages • ISBN: 978-1-63140-570-9
Back to the Future #8: Continuum Conundrum Part 3
Bob Gale, John Barber (w) • Marcelo Ferreira (a & c)
THE CONTINUM CONUNDRUM part 3! Doc and Marty are on the run—but Doc can’t remember what he’s doing and Marty’s just happy to be back in the time-traveling adventure… until things start to go very, very wrong!
FC • 32 pages • $3.99
Back to the Future #7: Continuum Conundrum Part 2
Bob Gale, John Barber (w) • Marcelo Ferreira (a & c)
WHO IS DOC BROWN? Marty McFly thought he knew, but now even Doc himself isn’t sure. The mystery of the “Continuum Conundrum” deepens — as Marty and Jennifer’s lives are thrown in upheaval again!
FC • 32 pages • $3.99
Back to the Future #6: Continuum Conundrum Part 1
Bob Gale, John Barber (w) • Marcelo Ferreira (a & c)
An all-new, multi-issue, multi-continuum story starts here, courtesy of Bob Gale, John Barber, and Marceo Ferreira! We’d tell you more but in the words of Doctor Emmett L. Brown, “No one should know too much about the future.”
FC • 32 pages • $3.99
Back to the Future #5
Bob Gale, John Barber, Erik Burnham (w) • Marcelo Ferreira (a & c)
BACK FROM THE PAST! Doc finishes rebuilding the flux capacitor in the Old West and it’s time to find Marty… but an unexpected encounter threatens to derail the time train before it can take Doc, Clara, Jules, and Vern back to 1985!
FC • 32 pages • $3.99
The hit game franchise comes to comics! A prequel to the highly anticipated game, the Call of Duty: Black Ops III comic book series follows an elite group of soldiers as they wage a secret war across a futuristic, war-torn world transformed by technology. In the bullet-ridden first issue, the team infiltrates Tashkent, Uzbekistan, to take down a double agent . . . but as they close in, they uncover something much more sinister at hand.
I’m a pretty big fan of the Call of Duty video game franchise, and also have fond memories of Larry Hama‘s work on G.I. Joe growing up, so you’d think the two together would be an awesome combination. Unfortunately, that’s not the case and this is one mission that should have been scrubbed.
Today, there’s some fantastic more realistic military comics on the market including recent G.I. Joe from IDW, The Activity from Image, and Splinter Cell comics from Dynamite. A more serious tone, those comics take a more grounded spin depicting special op missions, and the world they exist in. The Call of Duty video game series straddles that grounded reality with over the top visuals and actions. They have a lot in common with the more modern Bond films.
Call of Duty: Black Ops III #1 is interesting in that while it has a familiar vibe, the comic has more in common with the Expendables than the video game it’s based on. Instead of Black Ops that mix finesse, stealth, and brutal accuracy, this first issue is as blunt, loud, and not smooth as they come. It’s a lot like 80s action films, all bravado, shooting, and action… and little else. The video game series’ story and action is more grounded than the comic, and I think that’s my issue. The tone is weirdly different, by a lot.
Marcelo Ferreira‘s art doesn’t help. The cover, by Benjamin Carre, is a style that would fit much better with the style and tone of the video game the comic is based on. The interior has a much more cartoonish take with action sequences that are at times hard to follow what’s going on. It’s possible Hama’s writing wouldn’t have come off as cartoonish as well if a different style was chosen for the art.
I went in expecting a comic much closer to the style and tone of the video game series, and instead found a comic that felt connected in name only. It seems when it comes to getting my fix of a good Call of Duty story, I may have to go and pick up a controller.
Story: Larry Hama Art: Marcelo Ferreira
Story: 5 Art: 6 Overall: 5 Recommendation: Pass
Dark Horse provided Graphic Policy with a FREE copy for review
