If you're even remotely familiar with comic books, chances are you've either heard of or been exposed to contributions by a king named
Jack Kirby.
Kirby is to comic books as Dale Earnhardt is to Nascar as the American flag is to freedom. His talents can be found attached to pretty much every mainstream super-hero comic book from Fantastic Four to Superman to X-Men.
That's why writing this review on
Kirby: Genesis #1, Dynamite Entertainment's latest acquisation and comic book title, is bittersweet, as I feel a bit like I've insulted my grandmother by saying how unenjoyable and useless this book was for me.
First off, let me say I didn't buy
KIRBY: GENESIS #0. I didn't think it was necessary, and after reading #1, I still don't feel like there's anything more I can learn from it.
First off, the writing is just not Kurt Busiek's best in my opinion. The first 4 pages involve a conversation between a college-aged genuis named Kirby and a girl. I can't seem to remember her name because she calls Kirby "KIRBY" about 500 times throughout the book...as if readers aren't able to make the connection that, yes, this book features characters that are an important part of Jack Kirby's legacy. Thus, when the action started, I was already bored and turned off by the book...even though the last half of the book sped up in pace and challenged me as a long-time comic reader a little more.
Pop culture mainstays in our lives are referred to such as Twitter and Facebook, but feel very much like product placement...like it's an intentional stretch to make these Kirby characters more modern and up-to-date. But it feels forced.
What can you say about Alex Ross? Extraordinairy talent...but his contributions to the book, (including the loud "disco-like"-tribute cover) looks like a challenging 3D image gone horribly wrong. Not to mention it's used OVER and OVER on variant covers. Wraparaound, split covers...at this point it wouldn't surprise me if Dynamite offered an "Upside Down" image variant. For someone such as myself that knows little about Kirby's characters that have nothing to do with MARVEL and DC...this was not a smart book for Dynamite to publish. Judging by the number of copies still on my LCS's shelves after a week, I would say the book wasn't well received by the rest of the store's customers.
In short, let me do you a favor and tell you where to direct your money. Go buy something...anything...that Jack Kirby put his pencil to and avoid this title. It's a decent effort by Dynamite, but to me, too much flash and not enough sizzle. HOWEVER, if you absolutely MUST own a copy, there are at least 13 different variants as of this writing, giving you 50% of the alphabet worth of juicy variance to sink your teeth into.
Let your research into KIRBY: GENESIS begin on ComicCollectorLive.com. Simply type in "Kirby" in the library search and you're set.
But I'll see your KIRBY: GENESIS and raise you a PROJECT: SUPERPOWERS any day of the week.