How's Your Imagination?

By Mike Pellerito

How’s your imagination? Do you remember when you were a kid, and everything unreal, had to be real? Aliens, Bigfoot, Santa Claus, talking animals all had to be real, right? Remember the days when you just knew if
a meteorite landed in your backyard it would give you super powers?

Good times. It doesn’t seem too long ago that lots of us would look up at buildings and half expect to see superheroes battling giant attack gorillas. Never mind a little alien landing in the backyard and becoming your best friend. Of course a dinosaurs has to be alive and roaming around somewhere, if only someone could find that darn hidden island.

Recently had a chance to see a very good movie that embraced some of those wild imaginative thoughts of childhood, “Night at the Museum”. The story is straightforward; NYC’s Museum of Natural History just hired a new night watchman, Larry. Much to Larry’s surprise everything in the museum comes alive at night. Statues, dinosaur bones, everything comes alive. The movie is rated as PG, meaning the movie clearly needs to be examined by parents before they let their children attend. Nothing popped out as concerning, but a few scenes might scare the younger kids. After all, there are dinosaur bones running around. One note, don’t leave before the credits are over. The movie has some nice twists and turns, and presented the story nicely, with lots of imagination.

Not quite sure if this move stuck a cord because the museum is a personal favorite, or if it was because it was always easy to imagine all these wonderful things coming alive. Before the renovation a few years ago, it was a place that I could navigate almost blindfolded. Since the renovation it has been great to learn and see it all over again. It’s nice to think that a little magic still lives in the universe. Nowhere is that magic more powerful than the imagination. Especially a kid’s imagination.

In today’s world, most comics seem to focus on the realistic, and miss the wonder and imagination that having super powers would bring. Rarely do the heroes ever smile, and thinking about it, the villains are usually wearing the grins.

In the past few weeks a handful of comics have come out, and should still be available, that shows fun and imagination that comics need a lot more of.

THE BAKERS MEET JINGLE BELLE
PRICE: $2.99 us
FORMAT: Full color, 32 pages One Shot
DIAMOND ITEM CODE: OCT060022
AGE LEVEL: Grade School and Up
Writer: Paul Dini (added inspiration-Lillian, Isaac and Jackie Baker)
Artist: Kyle Baker
Designer: Darin Fabrick
Asst, Editor: Katie Moody
Editor: Dave Land
Publisher: Mike Richardson

Two great creators and their creator owned properties collide for some creative Christmas fun. Paul Dini made his name bringing Batman to the small screen, animated of course, and is now, among other things making a name for his fun character, Jingle Belle. Jingle is the devious daughter of the one and only Santa Claus.

Kyle Baker has been making some of the best comics around for years. His creations, based on his family, The Bakers, seem to get into more wild situations than any other family on the planet.

It is Christmas Eve and the Bakers need to finish their holiday shopping, Jingle is looking to ditch her dad. Of course Jingle is mistaken for the babysitter from the agency, the Bakers just happened to call for their 3 children. It of course all goes downhill from there. Santa and father Baker on the run from the police, to all sorts of shopping mall madness, this story delvers on the laughs. Of course, there is a nice ending with that Christmas magic feeling. You know those holiday movies you watch year after year and never get tired of? The Bakers Meet Jingle Belle is that, just in a comic book.

SPIDER-MAN AND POWERPACK #3 OF 4
PRICE: $2.99 us
FORMAT: Full color, 32 pages, Mini Series
DIAMOND ITEM CODE: NOV062280
AGE LEVEL: All Ages/Grade School and up
Writer: Marc Sumerak
Artist: Gurihiru
Letterer: Dave Sharpe
Production: James Taveras
Special Thanks: Aki Yanagi
Editor: Nathan Cosby
Consulting Editor: Mark Paniccia
Editor-In-Chief: Joe Quesada
Publisher: Dan Buckley

If you come across the name Marc Sumerak, and you want a good read for the All Ages crowd, just buy it. The art by Gurihiru is some of the sharpest looking comic art on the stands and excellent storytelling. Marvel has probably been the biggest surprise in the quality of its All Ages and younger readers comics. Just about everything is a blast to read.

Surprisingly one of the most enjoyable comics has been the various Power Pack team-ups. The current mini-series has the 4 Power siblings in NYC where trouble seems to find these kids with startling regularity. Already 2 issues in and several of the cleverer plot twists seen in a while the series keeps delivering. Venom, one of Spidey’s most popular (soon to be on the big screen in Spider-Man 3) and dangerous villains makes an appearance and the Pack and Spidey must save the day. Venom, in a nutshell, is an alien symbiotic life form, can merge with a person, and give them a nice power boost and do all sorts of evil things. This is one of the cleverest uses of that creepy crawly nature of Venom’s powers.

JUSTICE LEAGUE UNLIMITED #29
PRICE: $2.25 us
FORMAT: Full color, 32 pages, Ongoing Series
DIAMOND ITEM CODE: NOV060252
AGE LEVEL: All Ages/Grade School and up
Script: Adam Beechen
Pencils: Carlo Barberi
Inks: Tom Fowler
Letters: Mike Sellers
Colors: Heroic Age
Editor: Michael Wright

So giant super powered gorillas vs. the Justice League. What’s not to like? Oh, yeah a bunch of killer bees, tons of superhero infighting and one super crazy hero most kids might not know, but will probably soon love.

From page one the action starts and goes nonstop until the end of the story, featuring B’Wanna Beast- lord of the jungle. B’Wanna, is to put it delicately, difficult. Animal Man, who is constantly stuck with B’Wanna due to their animal background, narrates the story. The two in powers and personality are quite different. So with tons of action and quite a bit of characterization, Adam Beechen manages to write a story any kid and longtime comics reader would love. Some of the most lively and fun art you’ll see in a superhero book, Carlo Barberi’s rendition of the Justice League fit the fun and lively story perfectly. Oh, and it has gorillas, or was that already mentioned?

COMIC ZONE: DISNEY’S LILO & STITCH VOL. 1
PRICE: $4.99 us
FORMAT: 96 pages full color Graphic novel
ISBN-10: 0786847190
ISBN-13: 978-0786847198
AGE LEVEL: All Ages/Grade School and up
Written by: Michael Stewart, Paola Mulazzi and Bill Matheny
Artwork by: Academia Disney

If you have never seen the Lilo & Stitch movies, don’t worry you will after reading this Graphic Novel. Collected from stories in the Disney Adventures magazine usually found at the supermarket checkout aisle, you quietly see the stringing together of several short stories into one grand adventure. Lilo a young Hawaiian girl, who lives with her sister, is quite the character and often the cause of some sort of trouble due to her imagination and curious nature. Stitch is a wild looking alien critter, who is even more troublesome than his best friend Lilo. The first few stories feature the two characters secretly, until Stitch makes it to earth and his new friend Lilo. When these two free spirits get together, watch out world! Disney again has some of the most beautiful art and most imaginative stories you can hope for.


See you next Tuesday for more good to read comics and if all goes well a new feature!

Send your thoughts and projects you’d like to see reviewed to: MikeP@SilverBulletComicbooks.com

Check out some new All Ages reads on sale this week:

NOV063293 ARCHIE #572 $2.25
NOV063295 ARCHIE DOUBLE DIGEST #176 $3.69
NOV060257 SCOOBY DOO #116 $2.25
NOV063394 SIMPSONS COMICS #126 $2.99
NOV062305 MARVEL ADVENTURES AVENGERS #9 $2.99
NOV062304 MARVEL ADVENTURES FANTASTIC FOUR #20 $2.99
NOV062358 MARVEL ADVENTURES SPIDER-MAN VOL 5 DIGEST TP $6.99