REVIEW: Jupiter's Legacy, #1

[CBR News]

Mark Millar and Frank Quitely's "Jupiter's Legacy" #1 plumbs familiar territory with the family tree of a super-powered family, but there's a promise to this start that hasn't been present for a while in Millar's scripts


Full article here.

[Jack00]

Is this a mini-serie or a on-going ?

[Socrato]

I think this is on-going. I'm interested because of the hype, but overall it doesn't seem very good. I don't want to learn about "aging superheroes," I want to remember my heroes like Beta-ray bill and Thor in their prime.

[Batman9]

This is a bi-monthly miniseries. After the first 5 issues, it will take a longer break. It ends with issue 10.

[punisher97]

This is a bi-monthly miniseries. After the first 5 issues, it will take a longer break. It ends with issue 10.

Do you know how long the break is?

[Personamanx]

I dug the first issue, I'm a fan of Quitely, not so much of Millar but I felt that they brought their A-Games here and while I'm not sure if I'll continue reading it I am at the very least intrigued.

[Batman9]

Do you know how long the break is?

Nope. Nobody does.

[Greg McElhatton]

Do you know how long the break is?

I suspect they're going to play that by ear, to see how much time is needed to build up another backlog of pages.

[nosocialize100]

I'm really excited for this series. Millar clearly wants to juxtapose the idealist adventurer with the spoiled brat, and he does a good job of it too, particularly with the smug spoiled child syndrome amongst the youngsters. Instead of showing us their exploits he decides to have them speak and convey their ideals through dialogue. This forces the reader to parse out what is going on and while it’s usually better to show and not tell, it does an adequate job getting into the heroes heads.

It’s nice to see Millar branch out from his typical gore induced comics to a more sophisticated, dialogue heavy comic book. Clearly this is for a more adult reader who wants to see ideas at play. That said, it’s a little heavy in the delivery and may come off as conceited stuff. We aren’t shown why we should care for any of the characters, nor why any of it matters, so to hear them go on and on about how they view the world is a bit much. I’m sure Millar fans and Quitely fans will eat it up though, because we all know just how good they can be. It’s just unfortunate they may be resting on their laurels and skipping ahead a bit to get to the meat of the conversations they want to deliver.

I reviewed it with pictures myself here if anyone is interested.

[Icefanatic]

I liked the concept the moment I heard of the book, but didn't expect Millar to do the story justice. I was pleasantly surprised. While there was the expected sex, drugs and (only moderate, another surprise) violence, the focus on the more idealistic older characters and the divisions among them gave the story more depth and people to actually relate to and root for, instead of just watching the spectacle of the younger bunch train-wreck, self-destruct and spiral out(though there was that, too). I liked it and am moderately hopeful about future issues.

[cgh]

Serious question: is it mostly just Americans who dislike Millar? A poster up above referred to his "gore-induced" comics (probably meant "gore-infused", but whatever). Millar's stuff is actually pretty mild by Euro standards, and even compared to other Image titles and independents. I mean, look at Luther Strode, my god. That said, it's possible that most peoples' exposure to Millar was via The Authority which was indeed quite violent.

But let's look at his more recent output:

The Secret Service - kind of a James Bond sort of thing, not gory, some British swearing/slang
Supercrooks - a funny tale of a villainous supergroup of sorts, not gory
Superior - Superman homage, kid-friendly
Hit-Girl - yes, blood-and-swearing soaked

Seriously though, if you think any of Millar's stuff is particularly offensive, I recommend you stay far away from a lot of classic Euro stuff, anything by Chester Brown, anything by Garth Ennis, etc. Also Alan Moore - I'm not sure if that guy has ever written a comic without a rape in it. But you never really hear too much offense being taken.

Anyway, I'm kind of a Millar fan so perhaps I'm biased. Opinions?

[Drithien]

Serious question: is it mostly just Americans who dislike Millar? A poster up above referred to his "gore-induced" comics (probably meant "gore-infused", but whatever). Millar's stuff is actually pretty mild by Euro standards, and even compared to other Image titles and independents. I mean, look at Luther Strode, my god. That said, it's possible that most peoples' exposure to Millar was via The Authority which was indeed quite violent.

But let's look at his more recent output:

The Secret Service - kind of a James Bond sort of thing, not gory, some British swearing/slang
Supercrooks - a funny tale of a villainous supergroup of sorts, not gory
Superior - Superman homage, kid-friendly
Hit-Girl - yes, blood-and-swearing soaked

Seriously though, if you think any of Millar's stuff is particularly offensive, I recommend you stay far away from a lot of classic Euro stuff, anything by Chester Brown, anything by Garth Ennis, etc. Also Alan Moore - I'm not sure if that guy has ever written a comic without a rape in it. But you never really hear too much offense being taken.

Anyway, I'm kind of a Millar fan so perhaps I'm biased. Opinions?

Hahaha, I have exactly the same question. I am european as well. And it seems to me that a lot of readers, while asking for mature content, when given it, get too tangled up in violence or nudity if they are present. And just don't have the clarity to see what a story may be about, because they are still thinking about that "violent image some pages ago".

Millar has done nothing even close to torture porn, yet some readers have associated him with it because "there is violence in his books". Completely ignoring that if that was the case then most british writers would be writing torture porn. And of course a lifetime of writing quite tame stories for the Big Two is washed away because of Kick-Ass of all things, which is an amazingly interesting piece of work, if the reader is mature enough not to bet busy trying to get offended, and realises what a nice story he has made about a super hero, with no powers, stranded in our dull and unmerciful world, yet still determine to do the right thing, in spite of all the obstacles in his way, even himself.

The only thing that he has ever done were he took things close to the extreme is Nemesis. And in that case it was done on purpose.

But I don't know if it's an american thing, or just about Millar. Ennis and Moore have also been critisised similarly. And it's always about the same things: asking for mature content, but not liking it actually. Moore I remember got critisised for including an orgy and a rape in a Cthulu piece he did some time ago. So much outrage! And for what? For giving a Cthulu story its proper treatment... Like what did they expect out of such a story? For Ghostbusters to show up?

It's like some people like the idea of something, like frenetic war action, but don't realise that war doesn't look that nice actually, so get shocked and "offended" when they find out.


As for the title itself: I loved it. And I couldn't agree more with the review of it. The art was amazing. I don't even like what Quitely does with faces much and that should get in the way logically, but the overall style, attention to detail, dynamism, subtlety, everything, is just amazing. Millar meanwhile plays mostly in all the right notes, with characterisation, pace, information, and setting up his story.

Two things I don't like about it. The first is that it's bimonthly apparently. That's just brutal. The second is that either Quitely's ability to keep up, or some other factors, seem to have created a sense of urgency in wrapping it up. Just ten issues to build a world, and then tear it apart only to rebuilt it again, with so many characters and such a scale, seems like too small an amount of space. And I worry about what it may do to the quality of the series. Already I can see how there have been a few forced information dumps in the first issue, that if Millar had more space, he wouldn't have done most probably. I hope I am wrong about this though and the series amazes me to no end :)

[Groundh0g]

Interesting decision to not have this available digitally for 3 months until it's in print. I would have definitely bought #1 digitally, but given it will be up to issue #4 by the time I get a chance (I only read digital) he may lose some sales if it's not getting consistent critical acclaim for the next 3 issues...

[ishikabe]

I live in America and I can tell you about 50% of us are offended by gore/nudity.(not me as I want freedom of the press) That's why there is this debate over Saga having "gay" images. That doubly offends some Americans.

[InformationGeek]

The only thing that he has ever done were he took things close to the extreme is Nemesis. And in that case it was done on purpose.

What about The Unfunnies? How's that for taking it to the extreme?

I live in America and I can tell you about 50% of us are offended by gore/nudity.(not me as I want freedom of the press) That's why there is this debate over Saga having "gay" images. That doubly offends some Americans.

I'm more offended by how stupid that was than the fact it involved "gay" images.