comic books – PopCult Reviews

Comic Book Review – American Cult

American Cult: A Graphic History of Religious Cults in America from the Colonial Era to Today (2021)
Edited by Robyn Chapman
Written and illustrated by Steve Teare, Emi Gennis, Ellen Lindner, Rose Colon Guerra, Janet Harvey, Jim Rugg, Andrew Greenstone, Lara Antal, Josh Kramer, Mike Dawson, Ryan Carey, Mike Freiheit, Lisa Rosalie Eisenberg, Ben Passmore, Jesse Lambert, Vreni Stollberger, J.T. Yost, Robyn Chapman, Robert Sergel, Lonnie Mahn, and Brian “Box” Brown

The United States has been a place where the religiously fanatical have flocked since its founding. Most people who studied what passes for U.S. history in schools will know about the Puritans and the Salem Witch Hunts. You’ve probably heard of Jonestown and The Heaven’s Gate cult. The Westboro Baptist Church made sure they became infamous to convince themselves they were “beloved” by their demonic image of god. American Cult touches on several of these well-known cults and still delivered surprises to me. It also presents several cults you may not have heard about, with some continuing to have a place in your life through the goods they manufacture to stay afloat. What can’t be argued is that the particular nature of America and Americans makes them susceptible to cults in a way few other societies ever have been.

Comic Book Review – Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The IDW Collection Volume One

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The IDW Collection Volume One (2015)
Reprints Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2011) #1-12, Raphael, Michelangelo, Donatello, Leonardo, and Splinter Micro-Series one-shots
Written by Kevin Eastman & Tom Waltz (with Bobby Curnow, Brian Lynch, Erik Burnham
Art by Kevin Eastman, Dan Duncan, Mateus Santoluco, Franco Urru, Andy Kuhn, Valerio Schiti, Sophie Campbell, Charles Paul Wilson III

Since their debut in 1985, there haven’t been many instances where there wasn’t a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles being published. Since 2011, the Turtles’ adventures have been published by IDW. They are the 5th largest comics publisher in the States, having made their way with many licensed books, and currently publish a handful of Star Wars comics outside the Marvel banner. The Turtles have been one of their biggest successes, with a major reboot happening over the last year that has expanded them into a whole line of ongoing books. We’re returning to where it all started with this volume of the first year’s worth of issues.

Comic Book Review – Top 10 Compendium

Top 10 Compendium (2022)
Reprints Top 10 #1-12, Smax #1-5, Top 10: The Forty-Niners, Top 10: Beyond the Farthest Precinct #1-5, Top 10: Season Two #1-4, Top Ten: Season Two Special #1
Written by Alan Moore, Phillip De Fillippo, Xander Cannon, and Kevin Cannon
Art by Gene Ha, Xander Cannon, and Jerry Ordway

In 1999, Wildstorm Comics announced a new imprint, America’s Best Comics (ABC). This initiative would be centered around the work of Alan Moore, best known for comics like Watchmen, From Hell, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, and more. Titles published under this banner included Promethea (a personal treatise from Moore on his magic beliefs), Tom Strong (an homage to pulp heroes), and the book Top 10 (a police procedural). Moore worked with artist Gene Ha on the first Top 10 mini-series and the follow-up graphic novel The Forty-Niners, with other creatives handling later series. The idea behind Top 10 is an intriguing hook: what would the police be like in a city full of superheroes and other fantastical beings?

Comic Book Review – Cat-Eyed Boy

Cat-Eyed Boy: The Perfect Edition Volume One and Volume Two (2023)
Written & Illustrated by Kazuo Umezz

Kazuo Umezz is one of the most famous Japanese horror manga authors and started his career in the 1950s. Bucking the trends of the time, Umezz incorporated gory & grotesque imagery often associated with Japanese folklore, especially the Yokai – the umbrella term for ghosts, demons, and other nefarious spirits. One of his most well-known series was Cat-Eyed Boy, initially serialized in the pages of Shōnen Gaho, an anthology magazine. Like most manga that prove to be a success, there was an anime series (though it was more like voiceovers and little paper cutouts) as well as a live-action series in the mid-2000s. While the title character does prove to be an important part of each story arc, the stories were more like serialized horror anthology tales, a la American Horror story.

Solo Tabletop RPG Actual Play – Supersworn: The Victory Academy Part Eight

Read the previous chapter here

Plot Thread: Time Cops on Patrol
[Begin a Session: External factors create new danger, urgency, or importance for a quest]Oracle: Capture Greed

Tempus Wright got a ping on his wristband. He had returned from a meeting with the police commissioner and Aiden Bell a couple hours earlier. Posing as Thomas Wright, a former CIA operative, he’d convinced them to give him access to the Victory Academy and its files. All that mattered was finding exactly where Jude Olmeda/Kismet altered the timeline to become Epoch in the future. This ping seemed problematic, though.

Solo Tabletop RPG Actual Play – Supersworn: The Victory Academy Part Seven

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[Begin a Session: Flashback reveals an aspect of another character, place, or faction]
Plot Thread: Coup at the Academy
Oracle: Evade Superstition

One year ago.

Aiden Bell enjoys the quiet of the Academy around midnight. The new students are settled in at the dorms. Days earlier, they had attended a speech from one of the Victory Vanguard founders, Master Destiny. Bell had chatted briefly with the seemingly immortal man, elderly during World War II and looking unchanged in 2024. Master Destiny mentioned how the Book of Destiny became lost inside the Academy during The Whisper’s siege of the grounds in the late 1970s. Master D had also mentioned rumors of a secret arcane library that had grown organically but is said to only be visible to those it wishes to find it.

Solo Tabletop RPG Actual Play – Supersworn: The Victory Academy Part Six

I chose to do something a little strange with this one. I wrote up two d6 lists of memories for Jude and Cortex, then scrambled those memories up. In this chapter we’ll float with Jude’s consciousness as it is pinballed through time and see how his power is unraveling reality.

Read the previous chapter here

Kismet – Jude Olmeda – knows he has a body that exists on the physical plane. Right now, all that exists is the endless void. He has no form but feels psychic extensions of his arms, legs, head, eyes, and mouth. There is something else here with him. It is metallic and cold. It pierces through his chest, tendrils linking up with a nervous system that floats aimlessly in the darkness of total oblivion. He has to reconnect with himself – his body to his mind before this alien thing replaces one or both.

Solo Tabletop RPG Actual Play – Supersworn: The Victory Academy Part Five

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[Begin a Session: External factors create new danger, urgency, or importance for a quest]
Thread: Alien Tech Aftermath
Oracle: Find Target

Everything fell apart for Ryker Vane the day the Space Agents filled the sky above his home world, Essifum. Vane’s tribe consisted of pacifist farmers. It was the Space Agents’ war against Bale and his Deathvoid Inquisitors that ended this idyll. Crops were burnt and houses razed as both cosmic forces battled, taking little heed of the innocents caught in the middle. Ryker would learn that to many, the Space Agents were considered heroes. He found the truth to be far different.

Solo Tabletop RPG Actual Play – Supersworn: The Victory Academy Part Four

Read our previous chapter here.

[Begin a Session: Seemingly unrelated situations are shown to be connected]
Thread: Coup at the Academy & Time Cops on Patrol
Oracle: Initiate Bond

Aiden Bell attends a midnight meeting with Police Commissioner Jeremiah Maxwell at Forge City Central Police HQ. They will further develop their secret plans for the EOD (Enhanced Operations Division), the task force that the Victory Academy will funnel super-humans into. Maxwell greets Bell with a firm handshake, almost an attack, a check to see which man is stronger. Bell half smiles, half grimaces, and squeezes back until Maxwell relents.

Solo Tabletop RPG Actual Play – Supersworn: The Victory Academy Part Three

Read the previous chapter here.

[Begin a Session: Unexpected return of an enemy or threat]
Thread: The Machine Collective – Aiden Bell
Oracle: Defend Reputation

Aiden Bell is attended to by his personal physician, Dr. Carly Clayton, formerly known as the hero Aegis. Clayton tells Bell he appears to be okay but wants to know how he was able to change into Captain Quantum, given that he was supposed to have expunged the entity years ago. Bell spits at her with rage, throwing his food tray across the room.

“It was a filthy dirty trick by that bastard Silver Sentry!” spits Bell. “And I am going to destroy him!”