And now for the second edition of PANEL DISCUSSION, BOOKGASM’s occasional round-up of comic books and graphic novels to which you should be paying attention. Did you miss the first one?

PLASTIC MAN: RUBBER BANDITS
Abe Lincoln! Dinosaurs! Vampires! Brain-Swapping Ray Guns! Books of Forbidden Evil Knowledge! Cute Mice That Live in a Round-Topped Hole in the Wall Who Refuse to Die! This is the stuff that mainstream comics has been missing, and now will continue to miss with the recent cancellation of DC’s award-winning PLASTIC MAN title. Luckily, we’ve got this collection, assembling issues 7-12 in their Chuck Jones-meets-MAD Magazine glory. Sole creator Kyle Baker improves upon the uneven first collection with a balls-to-the-wall approach that hits exponentially more than it misses, as well as sneaks in some not-so-subtle political commentary. Highly recommended for smart fans of smart/dumb humor.

SMAX
Despite the title, SMAX is not a new breakfast cereal from General Mills. However, it is indeed magically delicious. A sideways sequel to Alan Moore’s magnificent “HILL STREET BLUES with superheroes” book TOP 10, SMAX is a fantasy adventure for everyone who loves – and hates – fantasy adventure. Not unlike most of Moore’s oeuvre, SMAX is exciting, hilarious, frightening and ultimately brilliant, often within the same page. Zander Cannon (also a TOP 10 graduate) fills each panel with layers and layers of in-jokes without getting in the way of the narrative, and his character design does a nice job of balancing the light and dark aspects of the story. The only real negative of the experience is knowing that Moore has once again “retired” from comics and other creators are now in charge of these great characters. A damn shame. As strong as they may be, very few writers come close to the creative power of Alan Moore.

OCEAN
Warren Ellis is a great writer. Warren Ellis is a horribly overrated writer. I agree with both sentiments. When Ellis is on, his work is fun and exciting and fresh. When he’s off, it’s usually because he’s trying too hard to push his vision of hip nihilism through too-cool-for-school characters and obnoxious, sub-Cronenberg organic gore. He’s generally not boring, though, so I was surprised that OCEAN turned out to be the comic book equivalent of a Saturday night, made-for-Sci-Fi Channel flick, or a feature directed by the second unit AD of RESIDENT EVIL, shelved for two years and then released in mid-January.

The plot concerns a U.N. weapons inspector (the standard Ellis model: painfully clever and all-knowing, but this time he’s black!) investigating a space station orbiting the moon Europa. Standing in his way is a platform operated by the super-conglomerate DOORS. That’s right, “DOORS.” I mean, Jesus, calling them MacroHard would’ve at least made for some good jokes. It turns out that there are thousands of space coffins in the ocean of Europa – with convenient windows so we can see the faces of the space vampires lying within. Turns out, they’re ancestors to humans on Earth! And they’re about to wake up! And transport to the moon to invade after a million years or some bullshit like that. This entire premise gets sillier the more I think about it.

And did I mention the conveniently international, mostly female crew? The butchy white chick! The Asian hottie! The Middle-Eastern love-interest-but-not-really-because-all-they-do-is-touch-hands-and-act-coy! And featuring the slobbish white guy who’d have been played by Paul Giamatti during the lean pre-AMERICAN SPLENDOR years.

Boring, boring, boring. But it does feature great art from Chris Sprouse (TOM STRONG), whose pencil work is like what Dave Gibbons’ would look like if his characters had slightly more mobility than Kenner’s early Star Wars figures. So it’s a pretty, albeit pointless, read.

Wait for the movie, then don’t rent it. –Brian Winkeler