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Aaron Robinson

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From Wiki:

Magog's character design was based on superhero design trends of the time, principally the Marvel Comics anti-hero character Cable. Alex Ross stated, "As I remember, Mark originally told me, 'Make him look like everything we hate in modern superhero design.'"
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Finished Preacher Vol. 2: Until the End of the World

This volume was better than the first. I especially liked the All in the Family arc, the first half of the book. It was an incredibly well done flashbacks mixed with current happenings further establishing our characters and their personalities. Gran'ma and her physical manifestations of evil in Jody and T.C. were excellent villains (especially Jody). Although it doesn't further the main plot and main search, it really helps provide more depth to our main character. Except in the deadly serious rivalry between Jody and Jesse, the over-the-top-ness of the book is still done in good fun and humor.

The second half of the book, think the arc was called party crashers or something, wasn't nearly as strong of an arc but was still better than most of the first volume. I think the main reason the quality goes down is that Ennis again gives lots of heavy handed exposition through the Starr character. It's a lot to take in, and heavy to remember when spoon-fed in big chunks. Also there's just way too many new people introduced here from the sexual investigators, the grail members, and Jesus De Sade that it takes away. There's one scene where Custer and Cass enter the sexual investigators office and interrogate some guy named Calico (who I'm not sure has even been in this book before). So yeah...too many coincidences to keep straight, and too much heavy plot exposition by Starr. When it finally comes together, I'm not sure I even felt the tension that Ennis was building up but it sure seemed to get back on track real quick after the big meet at the party and it got me really excited for the next volume. But I think I'm going to have to give this arc a re-read first.

Still this is probably some of the funnest shit ever. Parodying all kinds of American cinema, mixing it in with Ennis commentary on a variety of topics (this volume had family, bullying, child abuse, oversexualization, and of course, religion) and making the whole book completely over-the top gory, funny, and somewhat masking the seriousness of the topics.

9/10 for volume 2

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Preacher volume 3: Proud Americans

I reread the second half of Preacher volume 2, and I just finished volume 3 this morning. On the reread of the volume 2, all the little plot details came across better and overall it didn't seem as messy as I thought it was. Sure there are a lot of coincidences in that story but it really reads like Garth Ennis' take on that style of storytelling ("Crash" style, I guess, although this book came out way before that movie it's the most obvious movie that represents the storytelling). It also has more character moments than I originally thought, the absolute beating of Jesus De Sade being one of my favorites.

Volume 3 shifts to the plot over characterization style a little more. With most of the characters being so established by this point, volume 3 focuses on moving the plot forward a lot more. It's very entertaining but it's missing some of the emotion and fire (well not literally) that volume 2 had, focusing more on action and subdued stories, such as the political infighting/cat and mouse of the Grail. Volume 3 is bordered by two great flashback stories that really flesh out the history, personality, and motivations of both Cass and Jesse. These flashbacks also make for some touching moments surrounded by downright brutality or hilarity (like Cass' real name).

8/10

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Preacher Vol. 4: Ancient History

Another volume of Preacher done. This one not telling the main story but looking at some of the supporting characters in the book. It's a step down from previous volume and I think part of the reason is that Dillon isn't doing the art.

The stories, while still riddled with violence and religious iconic imagery, are subpar to the main story. The best of the bunch involves the back story of the Saint of Killers as it comes closes to the feel of the main story's Saint of Killers and because there is the most mystique surrounding the character. Plus it provided depth that the other two stories didn't really.

The other two stories were bland. I especially disliked the Arseface story (partly because I can't stand the character), it just seemed awkward as I wasn't sure what Ennis was doing (sometimes it felt like he was trying to build sympathy and other times it seemed like he was just blasting the kid). The "Good Old Boys" story was ok, but again, Jody and TC are better when they play off of Jesse as villains instead of heroes of their own story or anti-heroes or whatever the fuck they were supposed to be. I don't know it wasn't nearly as fun for me as it was supposed to be.

The weakest volume thus far: 6.5.

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Volume 4 is a collection of annual style one-shots, elnino, which is why Dillon wasn't the artist. Those stories are all right, but they're not essential to the rest of the series (with the possible exception of the Saint of Killers arc). When I'm re-reading Preacher, which I've done maybe a dozen times now, it's not unlike me to skip that TPB altogether. Rest assured, it picks up a huge head of steam almost immediately. Once you reach the desert, the hits just don't stop coming.

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Preacher Vol. 5: Dixie Fried

First off I have to agree on the position of the one-shots collection and Saint of Killers miniseries as vol. 4, that wasn't a good idea at all. But I can see why they put it there considering there is references to the Saint of Killers miniseries in vol. 5.

Volume 5 picks up where vol 3 left off and brings us back to our main characters. It's not as good as Vol 2 was, but it's about on par with vol 3. The villains are treated somewhat haphazardly and the main arc certainly takes a back-seat. Instead we get a sort-of character study of Cassidy and the consequences of his actions. It's greatly appreciated that the characters are taking a front seat but it's at the consequence of forwarding the plot and action set pieces (vol 3 was the inverse). Ennis has been a bit off from the near-perfect balance that he was able to accomplish in volume 2.

Was I the only one who felt that the Cassidy romance angle came from left field?

8/10.

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So I just went to my comic shop to get my books and I pick up Final Crisis, flick through it and add it to the others. Then I pick up Legion of 3 worlds (a more optional title in my book) and flick through it, and something just isn't right. Its clearly Final Crisis 4 inside of the Legion cover. I check the next Legion book, its the same deal. They are all misprints. I go over to the guy behind the orders desk , hold up the two books and the following takes place.

Me: Hi, sorry but this Legion of 3 worlds has Final crisis in it.

Clerk looks up from the book he's reading with his feet up

Clerk: (condescendingly) Thats because its a Final Crisis crossover.

I pause for a second to comprehend how stupid he think I am given that the Legion book has FINAL CRISIS written down the sides in giant letters

Me: No, theres been a printing error, this Legion cover has the actual issue of Final Crisis inside.

Clerk: Oh...

After looking at this he determines that this is a problem not because I and other customers might be buying two copies of Final Crisis and miss out on a book they want, but because this means that 30-odd issues of Final Crisis are being mislabelled and might not get bought. This staggered me just because they already had a massive pile of Final Crisis #4 and absolutly NO Legion books at all. People wanting for Final Crisis were not going short. He seemed equally amazed at my viewpoint, I felt like from the start the coversation in his head had been-

Me: You got Crisis in my Legion!

Him: You got Legion in my Crisis!

Damn I miss the other comic shop in this town. At least those guys got to know you enough to respect your intellegence.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Preacher Vol 6: War in the Sun

It's been a while but....DAMN!

Now that's what I'm talking about! Fucking awesome. All the major players converge in the desert, in a freaking battle royale of epic proportions. Everything is awesome as the whole romance angle comes a huge twist. I really liked everything about the major storyline here. Ennis loves to be give his major characters shit and it's totally seen here as all of them struggle with the outcomes from this arc.

Some minor complaints:

I still hate the Arseface character.

I don't get the build up of Starr in the flashback only to see him torn down piece by piece as the story progresses.

10/10 - The best arc since volume 2.

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I read through the first trade of Hellboy. I thought it was pretty fun, I’m interested to see what the later trades are like.

I’m also really surprised by the quality of the latest Captain America. The whole thing felt really rushed and all over the place. It’s like they wanted a new point for fans to jump into the series, but didn’t know how to go about it. I’m still kind of interested though, if only to see more of

The Leaper!

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Preacher vol. 7: Salvation

Whoever said that this book rules when I hit the desert and won't stop has been absolutely right thus far. Ever since the War in the Sun, this book has been steamrolling through. This edition presents more of a side-track from the overall plot (and the best side track yet of them all) as it focuses on Jesse Custer cleaning up a small town and regaining his sense of purpose. While Dixie Fried was an entertaining character study of Cassidy, this is an entertaining character study of our main character. Not really any gripes about this one as it really fired on all cylinders. The dialogue is really spot on in this one.

10/10

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Now that I've finished the whole series, I like it, but my first run through, it frustrated me how Jesse did absolutely nothing for months after seeing Tulip and Cassidy together.

Obviously you're surprised, it's one of my favorite arcs, maybe my favorite.

So retard zombie humping is a no-no, but you're all for poultry humping?

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