Tuesday, February 6, 2007

Atomic Comic Collection Connection



The Ultimates, Vol. 1



Oh sure it's a few years old, but it's still awesome. Marvel's Ultimate Universe re-imagines classic Marvel characters in a more modern setting. In The Ultimates, Mark Millar and artist Bryan Hitch took on the super hero team The Avengers, featuring Captain America, Iron Man, Nick Fury, and a host of others. The result is highly entertaining.

For comic fans familliar with the characters, Millar has twisted around origins and abilities in creative ways that keep you interested without betraying the core of the character. For newcomers, everyone gets introduced and you don't have to know anything else to figure out what's going on. His dialogue is pretty sparse, but that's mostly to make way for the action.

Hitch's artwork is big and cinematic. Lots of big full page drawings to capture the action, and there's plenty of it. In the most positive sense possible, the book feels like a big Hollywood summer blockbuster. Marvel animation did take a stab at adapting it into a movie, but the Ultimate Avengers Movie was a miss.

This version is a hardcover collection of the 13 issues of volume 1, with a foreword by Joss Whedon. It's priced less than the two trade paperbacks it collects (at least on Amazon), so I figured it was a steal and picked it up. It's a quick read, and as I said, a big ball o' fun.

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