Library reads - Blue Beetle trade paperbacks

Wednesday night, my son went back to Faith Formation classes for another year at the church. That means it was time for library night again for me (I park the car at the church lot, walk the half mile to the library, browse, then walk back - getting some exercise for my body as well as my mind). This week, I picked up a couple of trade paperback graphic novels to read.

The first was Blue Beetle: Shellshocked, which collected issues 1 to 6 of the comic series from 2006. The new Blue Beetle, the third to have that name, debuted back in Infinite Crisis and I have read about him some since in team-ups and over in Teen Titans. This was my first exposure to his solo stories though.

I found the beginning of the series an okay read. It builds nicely his supporting cast of family of friends as well as some reluctant allies and an arch nemesis. This is what you'd expect the beginning of a series to do. There is also the mystery of just where the scarab is from and why it gave Jaime Reyes, high school student, these amazing abilities.


The story then continues in Blue Beetle: Road Trip, which collected issues 7 to 12. These issues continue to expand on the opening concepts as well as include some guest appearances of other DCU characters. I didn't find this volume keeping my attention as much as the first one. However, it was enjoyable enough in that if I see other volumes in the library in the future that I will check them out. They both were good enough for reading - especially when the price was right (free).

If you like comics in the similar vein of early Spider-Man or Firestorm or Nova - ie. the high schooler adjusting to getting awesome powers and trying to cope with them - then you might want to give this series a look. This Blue Beetle shares a lot of elements with his predecessors in the genre while still adding its own twist to things.