mysteriousmre's Reviews (1.22k)

I'm fascinated by the disfunctional family that is the Umbrella Academy. Despite not knowing anything beyond just the general backstory of these characters, Way does a great job of showing us these characters' personalities and the quality of their relationships to each other through their interactions. This is a family that has been through some tough stuff because of how they were raised and it makes for good drama. The world is quirky and bizarre to say the least and the artwork reminds me a lot of Mike Mignola's with it's blocky and exaggerated character designs. Pleasantly surprised by this book. Worth a read if you're looking for a different kind of team book.

As an occasional horror comic fan there's a lot to like about the new Justice League Dark. It does a great job establishing the new status quo for the magic side of DC's universe, has a very unique cast of characters with some new additions I have already become a fan of (I didn't think I'd care for Detective Chimp and nerdy Langstrom is absolutely adorable). But I despise how this volume is collected. 3 issues into the book and all of a sudden the story takes a break to tell a story that ISN'T COLLECTED IN THIS VOLUME, and then comes back without explaining what happened or the repercussions. Those repercussions aren't super necessary for the story in this volume, but it was readily apparent I missed some big character moments by not having the other book. It's still good, you just have to buy another book alongside this one to enjoy the full story and I'm not a fan of that :/

I was looking for something with a more light hearted tone after reading so many noir stories in a row and MAN was this book a breath of fresh air. The banter between characters is snappy and the jokes are hilarious. The drama was surprisingly good too. I didn't expect that since a lot of character backstory is framed in a comedic light, but, without going into spoilers, later on in the book the characters take those moments seriously, and it makes for some great drama. I wasn't sure how I felt about the art at first with all the thin line-work, but it grew on me over time. One of my favorite books I've read this year. Pick it up when you get the chance!

The art is still fantastic, but I preferred the first volume over this one for one reason:

Time Travel

My least favorite sci-fi concept. It makes for some great gags and wonderful twists in this volume, but it also makes plot a LOT more complicated. That's not to say the plot is bad, I just would have preferred an arc that was more focused on the family relations than the plot (but that's me just criticizing the book based on what I wanted and not based on what it is). As is though it's still a wacky, bloody, crazy story about a dysfunctional superhero family and I'm looking forward to see what we get in the next volume.