Comics Briefly: American Vampire: Survival of the Fittest #2, Batgirl #23, Dollhouse: Epitaphs #1

Favorite Issue This Week: Batgirl, by a landslide!

All books new in stores on 7/12/11

American Vampire: Survival of the Fittest #2
Writer: Scott Snyder, Artist: Sean Murphy, Color: Dave Stewart

Solid second issue. More about Felicia and Cash's unease with their mutual history. Cash gets a pretty good scene to show off his smarts and bravado. Good cliffhanger. Entertaining, but not quite as good as Issue 1.


Batgirl #23
Writer: Bryan Q. Miller, Artist: Pere Perez, Colorist: Guy Major

This issue ROCKED! The super-jerks Steph has been fighting for the last year finally put their brains together enough to actually be dangerous. There is a lot of action, a dollop of pathos, a kicking cliffhanger and some truly excellent surprise guests. (Slight spoiler: Dear DC, for my birthday I would like an ongoing or a mini written by BQMiller about the Junior Birds. Teen Titanesses. Super-Chicks. Whatever. Pretty pretty please?)


Dollhouse: Epitaphs #1 (of 5)
Writer/Story: Andrew Chambliss, Jed Whedon, Maurissa Tancharoen, Pencils: Cliff Richards, Inks: Andy Owens, Colors: Michelle Madsen

Herein starts the miniseries promised by the one-shot from a few months back, and it picks up right where that left off. Alpha and the Ivys start training their one recruit, and we see more hints of Rossum's plan for their zombified hordes. It's pretty entertaining if you like the ideas from the series, but nothing amazing.


Also Considered:
Birds of Prey #14
Read through this issue in the store, and while it was really fun seeing Zinda interact with people from her own time, it wasn't good enough to buy. Fairly pretty, though.

X-Men: Schism #1
This was solidly written and fairly entertaining, but felt a little too much like more of the same X-stories they've been rewriting for years for me to plunk down five bucks.