Life in the Big City (Astro City, Vol. 1) by Kurt Busiek

It was okay

Originally published in 1999 by Wildstorm.

Let me start with this: I am not a big comics fanatic. I read some of these bigger collections from time to time for entertainment, but I've never been to a comic book shop, I don't own a Green Lantern shirt and there's no Superman sticker on my car.

But, I do know what I like and, for me, Astro City was an "okay" collection of new superheroes. This collections includes 5 stories, 2 of which I found tedious. In the intro, Busiek claims to want to get back to basics and stop the "deconstruction" of the superhero. Get out of the superhero's head and back to the action. But, the first and last stories are all about getting into the superhero's head. They were interesting stories, but they went against the spirit Busiek claimed to have been wanting to avoid.

In short, kudos to Busiek for creating a whole new world of superheroes, but this still didn't grab me enough to make me look for further adventures of these new superheroes.

I rate this graphic novel 3 stars out of 5.

This graphic novel can be found on Amazon.com here: Life in the Big City (Astro City, Volume 1).

Reviewed on September 26, 2008.