Trades I Read Recently: Aztek & The Question vol. 2

This guy's dead, right? He's not coming back or anything in Final Crisis is he? So why bring out a collection of his cancelled series now? Oh yeah, Grant Morrison and Mark Millar...before they were considered super-hot in the biz. Aztek: The Ultimate Man came out around about the time I was getting sick of the whole comic collecting hobby. So I missed out on a gem here. Aztek is this guy conditioned to be a superhero by a super secret group who are all into South American mystical stuff and whatnot. They are waiting for the return of a big bad guy and they predict Mr. Baddie will make an appearance in Vanity City. That's where our hero is based.

The pencil style of N. Steven Harris isn't really to my liking but it quickly grew on me. It's not bad. It just reminded of an early Giffen, who I think is much better at plotting than pencilling. But overall it's okay.

Aztek only lasted 10 issues which is a shame 'cause Morrison and Millar clearly had plans for this guy. Lots of threads remain loose but what we do get here are some entertaining adventures of a guy who believes he's way over his head but tries to do the right thing anyway. I guess not all superhero comics that came out during the '90s were crap. Oh, and Batman makes a cameo. Like he always does with a new comic in order to boost sales. Didn't work here, unfortunately.

Volume two of the man with no face. The Question: Poisoned Ground sees Vic Sage go up against a drug dealer who wants to quit (and looks a bit like Wolverine), a Mikado quoting vigilante, saves his kidnapped friend, have a quickie with his ex-girlfriend for old times' sake, gets kicked a lot, gets punched a lot, gets drugged a lot, gets stabbed a few times, defeats a guard dog by breaking its neck, kicks someone in the balls and fights a gun toting rabbit and a cat (he got drugged a lot, did I mention?). Lots of noirish stuff in here. No wonder the fanboys didn't like it. Not enough of the spandex brigade. But if you loved the '80s Green Arrow by Mike Grell, you'll love the Question.