When talking to folks at the comic store I often get asked, 'What are your favorite comics right now?' I am in an uncomfortable position of listing them and in many cases, having people not even know the book exists. Which is a shame because each one of them is a gem. Today I'm going to talk about two of them. Hero Squared by Keith Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis is probably the funniest comic on the shelves today. It takes in all the goofiness of silver age and modern comics along with the mundane trivialities of modern life and in doing so, points out the strengths and weaknesses in both. The comedy is a little higher brow than fans would expect from the team behind Formerly the Justice League. There are times that the humor extends all the way to placement of bubbles to give it as close to a 'What if Robert Altman wrote Superhero comics?' feel to it as possible. They are free of the shackles of continuity established by others and take full advantage of it. Each issue exceeds its hype and just gets more and more hilarious. I loved their Justice League. Hero Squared is a comedic hot rod that even makes comics like Formerly the Justice League look like a busted up VW minibus. Fallen Angel by Peter David is a dark, brooding comic where there are no heroes and villains. Of course, that is tired and tread territory for comics these days. What sets Fallen Angel apart from most of these other books is that the characterizations are solid. The characters seem real in spite of the fantastic elements. They are unapologetic and uncompromising but also compassionate. Compassion does not serve to save them but only drags them further into darkness. No good deed ever goes unpunished in Bete Noire. It is cold, harsh, brutally honest noir fantasy. All fantasy is a love story. All noir is a story of heart break. Fallen Angel is the story of a love that went sour for all the right reasons.

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