2025-04-27

The Strange Tales of Oscar Zahn, Vol. 1: A Graphic Novel by Trí Vương

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is exactly as the title suggests: strange. Oscar is just animated clothing and a floating skull and his companion (for parts of the story ) is an old woman versed in the supernatural. That is what Oscar does now, helping spirits find rest as he himself is somewhere between life and death, filled with an entity he calls ectopus (a paranormal ectoplasmic octopus in appearance)

As Oscar solves cases and helps people (Oscar is a sweet guy) we slowly see the backstory of his relationships with others and how he ended up the way he is. The stories include a haunted house (heartbreaking), spirits from a world war, the spirits of the drowned and most interesting, a woman he had (in her eyes) wronged. She's also a very interesting character once we get into her backstory.

The art is appropriately eerie and I would definitely like to see more of this.

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Black Bolt, Vol. 1: Hard Time by Saladin Ahmed

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

First off, the art is very good. Secondly, it's been forever and a day since I've read anything about the Inhumans so I was a little taken aback by some of the details (like Black Bolt and Medusa) but that doesn't much matter. This is more about BB and various Marvel villains.

BB has been incarcerated in a space prison where he had planned to put his brother, Maximus but Max used his powers to switch places somehow (how exactly BB was incapacitated for all of this is never made clear) and BB wakes up in this prison where torture and killing the prisoners only to resurrect them to do it again and again is the main form of punishment. Also whatever it is the Jailer is (we learn much later on) he has something that inhibits powers so BB's deadly voice is nullified and villains like Crusher Creel can't use their abilities either.

Honestly, Crusher, Blinky (a young alien) and the other side characters are actually a bit more fleshed out than BB. Maybe it's because we know BB well, that he's this stoic king etc etc but I wanted more for him which is why I gave it three stars.

I mean, he's powerless. He's being routinely murdered and revived. His brother is on the throne doing god knows what. Is Medusa in danger as a result (it's made clear he still loves her in spite of being broken apart). And there is a flat line of emotional content for all of that. About the only emotion we get from him is with Blinky at the end and when he thinks about Lockjaw (but how could you not love Lockjaw?)

The story moves along predictable lines naturally. We need to see BB win and escape because that's more emotionally rewarding than say someone figuring out Max's plans and riding to the rescue. (Though I loved what Lockjaw did along those lines).

It was good but not particularly memorable.

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