Tuesday, April 3, 2012

Done: "Kurt Busiek's Astro City: Family Album" by Kurt Busiek

Done: Kurt Busiek's Astro City: Family Album by Kurt Busiek, 1998, 1563895528.

I found this in the Fitchburg library. More personal drama among the superheroes of Astro City. I read that Busiek will be at Murder and Mayhem in Muskego this fall. Maybe I'll try to go for the evening event. By the time the pancake breakfast is over I'm not sure it is worth the drive over there. Although Gischler and Abbott, Jr. are also scheduled to attend.

Five characters in this compilation.
1- First story has a newly divorced dad moving to Astro City. Their first night there is a massive battle with all the heroes against a Zeus-like weather guy.
2- Astra is a 10 year old kid of superheroes with powers of her own. She fights evil with her family but has no friends, is home-schooled by a computer, and has a lonely life. She decides to have an adventure of her own and learn to play hopscotch. She leaves home without telling her family and enrolls in school. Her family interrogates the universe's bad guys thinking she was kidnapped.
3. Junkman is a technological bad guy whose recent bank robbery left no clues. He is proud of his accomplishment. So proud he cannot stand no one knowing what he did and how. He heads back to Astro City to get caught and get credit.
4. Jack-in-the-Box has to come to grips with his impending fatherhood. Jack-in-the-Box is attacked alternate-future versions of his son. Two if the versions are super evil. Jack-in-the-Box worries more about the future.
5. Leo is a cartoon figure who was brought to life in '47. He has a highs and lows and tells his story to an adman.

Comments:
1. I like the artwork. Crappy artwork kills any story, no matter how good the writing.
2. The Leo and Astra stories were the best. Busiek took the space to tell their stories in depth. Astra is a lonely kid wanting to be a normal kid. Leo was brought to life by chance and left to navigate a new, real-life world.

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