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The Greg Kihn Band - Jeopardy
'Matthew Henson and Ice Temple of Harlem' Book Review By Ron Fortier
New Post has been published on https://esonetwork.com/matthew-henson-and-ice-temple-of-harlem-book-review-by-ron-fortier/
'Matthew Henson and Ice Temple of Harlem' Book Review By Ron Fortier
MATTHEW HENSON and the ICE TEMPLE OF HARLEM By Gary Phillips Agora Books 232 pgs
In contemplating this particular review, we were reminded of the old McDonald’s campaign ad in which people were encouraged to increase their initial order from a simple burger and fries to Super-Size. Not that that was good for anyone’s overall health, but the idea of exaggerating something seems an appropriate theme here. You see,
Matthew Alexander Henson (August 8, 1866 – March 9, 1955) was a real person. He was an explorer who joined Robert Peary on many Arctic voyages over a period of twenty-three years. Best known for his part in the 1908-1909 expedition wherein Henson claimed to have been the first human to reach the geographic North Pole on April 6, 1909.
All of which describes a truly heroic character in the flesh. Now, writer, Gary Phillips has turned Henson into a bonafide pulp action hero; in other words, he Super-Sized him. And he did it with his usual writing flair and panache. The historical setting is accurate throughout the book and it is obvious Phillips is having so much fun having Henson interact with such notable figures as crime boss Dutch Schultz and inventor Nikola Tesla. Focused on Harlem, characters like Langston Hughes and Bessie Coleman also appear, and Phillips enjoys sharing little-known facts about that part of the Big Apple during the post-World War One era. When reading historical pulp, and that’s what this is, we really appreciate these true facts.
The plot itself is a basic one. While on his last venture to the frozen North, Henson and a close Eskimo friend discovered a meteorite containing unbelievable energy. He is unclear as to what to do with the fragment he brought back with him. When he discovers certain unscrupulous men with money want to use it to power weapons of mass destruction, the world-weary explorer is determined to thwart their plans. Thus begins a deadly hide and seek contest that leaves several people dead and threatens a horrific attack on a large public gathering where a noted black leader is speaking. Henson must convince his friends of the danger and recruit them to his cause in the hope they have time to avert calamity and save the day.
“Matthew Henson and the Ice Temple of Harlem” is a pulp romp, with a wonderful storyline filled with amazing characters, both real and fictional. Phillips, like the best musicians, never misses a beat between the drama and bullets flying. It’s a page-turner from start to finish and we loved every bit of it.
Peepland #2 Review
Peepland #2 Review
Sex, Strangling, and Video Tape. Creative Staff: Story: Christa Faust & Gary Philips Art: Andrea Camerini Additional Inks: Cris Bolson Colors: Marco Lesko Letters: Comicraft’s Jimmy Betancourt What They Say: With the evidence in hand, Nick and Roxy begin piece together movements of the C...
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Peepland #3 Review
Peepland #3 Review
Everybody knows….
Creative Staff: Story: Christa Faust & Gary Phillips Art: Andrea Camerini Additional Inks: Jed Dougherty Colors: Marco Lesko Letters: Tom Williams
What They Say: With the Central Park killer still at large, Roxy and Nick try to let some steam off at an impromptu punk show at CBGBs. But across town, it looks like their only piece of evidence is about to fall into the wrong hands…
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers): Okay okay okay okay okay, I’m a little late on this one. I completely blame the holidays.
That actually segues well into this story, considering it takes place around Xmas. Whereas my holiday was nice and low key, Roxy, her friends, and New York in general are having a rather terrible one. The Central Park killer still roams the streets and the only piece of evidence was placed in the absolute wrong hands. To make matters worse, Aiesha—another performer at Peepland—discovers that the cops suspect her son of being the killer and now she needs to raise cash to hire a lawyer. Her girlfriend, A.J., takes it on herself to get the money, an act that leads to disaster.
And that’s just for starters.
The lesson is here is that in New York, in the 80s, no one in power can be trusted. The cops arrest the wrong people, not caring for the truth. Most of them are on the graft, and the most powerful man in town goes to any lengths to protect his son—a murdering slime who strangles women in the park. Trust is at an all-time low, and the only people making any sort of stand are pornographers and petty criminals.
Of course, neither New York nor the 80s hold the lock on corporate or police corruption. Although Peepland takes place thirty someodd years ago, the story is startlingly, sadly prescient. In his afterword, Gary Phillips links the present and past, talking about the election of Trump (who obviously served as the inspiration for Simon Went) and the death of Leonard Cohen as well as the story of the Central Park Five—a notorious case of racial profiling and false imprisonment. As much as we would like to believe that the past is a distant country we can never visit, Peepland reminds us that it’s here, ever present, in the soil and the rocks, in the air and the water, in the granite we use to build our monuments, and that every action we take affects others. As Phillips writes, “To paraphrase Cohen’s ‘Everybody Knows,’ the game is fixed and all we can do is duck and dodge, regroup and get our hustle on. And just maybe we can make it through to the other side.”
That seems like an odd sentiment for a hardboiled story, but only on the surface. Certainly the genre features many cases of awful people doing awful things and getting away with it, but more often than not the protagonists exist in a world where “the game is fixed” and instead of trying to play it, they decide the only option is to go outside the rules. Or, as Ryan Phillipe says in the great movie The Way of the Gun: “We do not accept your natural order.”
If you haven’t guessed, Peepland operates on multiple levels. On the surface, it’s a damn entertaining hardboiled story, but underneath that surface, it contains a clear and powerful purpose that structures everything we read and see on the page. Good stories are like good watches: every cog, gear, wheel, spring works together for a singular purpose, and Peepland certainly proves it. While most comics are Casios, Peepland is a Rolex.
That precision extends to the plot. There’s no waste here. Every moment, every line of dialogue, every pencil line does exactly what it needs to do, and the comic fully immerses you in the time, the place, and the situation thanks to the excellent art by Camerini, Dougherty, and Lesko.
In Summary: Hard Case Crime definitely comes out of the gates, swinging with this title. Peepland is a damn near perfect comic, hardboiled in all the right ways, sympathetic to its flawed and lost characters, and oddly—sadly—prescient for our time. Dr. Josh gives this an….
Grade: A+
Age Rating: N/A Released By: Titan Comics Release Date: January 11th, 2017 MSRP: $3.99
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Peepland #2 Review
Peepland #2 Review
Sex, Strangling, and Video Tape.
Creative Staff: Story: Christa Faust & Gary Philips Art: Andrea Camerini Additional Inks: Cris Bolson Colors: Marco Lesko Letters: Comicraft’s Jimmy Betancourt
What They Say: With the evidence in hand, Nick and Roxy begin piece together movements of the Central Park slayer, but the NYC police department have another suspect in mind. Meanwhile, the real killer steps up the search for the missing videotape.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers): After taking the videotape Dirty Dick Durbin left in her peep booth, Roxy reconnected with her old boyfriend, Nick, to see why the tape was worth killing for. Durbin ran a public access porn show where he would go around the city asking women to take their tops off and whatnot. Unfortunately, he captured more than he bargained for when he accidentally videotaped the Central Park Slayer in the act.
It turns out that the Slayer’s father is the real estate tycoon Simon Went. Daddy sent a couple of goons to retrieve the tape. They ended up killing Durbin in the process, but otherwise coming up with squat. The goons eventually get on Roxy’s trail and no good will come out of them finding her.
Meanwhile, Nick’s VCR ate the videotape, so he and Roxy go to a video friend of theirs to fix it, saying that it’s just a bit of “Slash and Flash” for a music video. He repairs the tape and immediately understands what he’s seeing, but instead of doing the right thing and turning it over to the police, he decides to blackmail Simon Went, because that always works out.
To make matters worse, Lorenzo Nichols, the son of one of Roxy’s coworkers, is arrested by the cops. He was spotted near the scene of the last murder and the police waste no time trying to pin it on him and his friends. His mother, Aiesha, knows her boy didn’t do it, but her public attorney wants them to make a deal. In order to fight the charge, Aiesha needs a real lawyer. But that takes money, and it might drive her girlfriend to do something incredibly stupid.
There’s quite a few moving pieces in this issue, but the creative team makes them work together, creating a dense, layered narrative that’s as much about New York in the 1980s as it is about murder of Dirty Dick and the identity of the Central Park Slayer. While it may seem like an odd subject to pen a love letter to, Faust does so with honesty and fidelity, having actually lived in the city and worked in a peep show just like Roxy. That honesty and that clarity of space and time work wonders in making the world the story takes place in feel alive, and when you’re dealing with crime fiction, a sense of place and the particular atmosphere it creates is vital.
The art, of course, goes a long way in creating this sense of place. Andrea Camerini, Cris Bolson, and Marco Lesko bring 1980s New York to life in all its piss-stained, dirty glory right down to the hairstyles and clothing. They also populate it with an appropriately diverse cast. To digress for a just a moment, I watched Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them last week, and even though I loved it, I also noticed that New York was about as white as box of soap flakes. It took me out of the movie a bit and definitely felt like a missed opportunity. Thankfully that’s not the case with this comic. New York is full of people from some of the most myriad backgrounds around, and this series represents that well.
In Summary: Peepland 2 continues to impress with its layered plot, excellent characters, and fantastic setting. Like the New York in the story, it’s dirty and dangerous, yet powerful and alluring. It’s the beauty of starlight glinting off a switchblade, or the swirls blood makes on its journey to the gutter. Dr. Josh gives this an….
Grade: A
Age Rating: 17+ Released By: Titan Comics Release Date: November 30th, 2016 MSRP: $3.99
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Peepland #1 Review
Peepland #1 Review
Hits you like a bullet from a .45. Creative Staff: Story: Christa Faust and Gary Philips Art: Andrea Camerini Colors: Marco Lesko Letters: Comicraft’s Jimmy Betancourt What They Say: Times Square, 1986: the home of New York’s red light district where strip clubs, porno theatres and petty crime pr...
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DC Entertainment Announces The Vigilante: Southland!
DC Entertainment Announces The Vigilante: Southland!
A NEW TAKE ON A CLASSIC DC CRIME-FIGHTER—THE VIGILANTE: SOUTHLAND
Crime Novelist Gary Phillips Reimagines the Vigilante on the Mean Streets of Los Angeles in a New Six-Issue Monthly Miniseries Scheduled for October
The spirits of Greg Saunders and Adrian Chase are alive and well at DC, but instead of the open prairie or the skyscrapers of Manhattan, the next Vigilante will be battling crime on…
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You'll blow right through The Cocaine Chronicles.
Let Lee Child, Gary Philips, Jerry Stahl, Jervey Tervalon, and Laura Lippman tell you why.
