Empowered Volume 4 | 
 enlarge | Author: Adam Warren
Publisher: Dark Horse
Category: Book
List Price: $14.95
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Avg. Customer Rating:  5 reviews
Sales Rank: 33547
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 208
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.8
Dimensions (in): 8.9 x 6.5 x 0.6
ISBN: 159307994X
Dewey Decimal Number: 741
EAN: 9781593079949
ASIN: 159307994X
Publication Date: November 5, 2008
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Product Description
Costumed crimefighter Empowered is briefly overjoyed to find herself in the running for one of the superhero community's annual Caped Justice Awards (or "Capeys") - only to discover that her nomination was merely a cruel joke by her obnoxious superpeers. But when the masked masses face a cataclysmic reckoning for such previous heartless hoaxes, can our perpetually struggling heroine overcome her resentment and save the day? And can she cope with the further problems posed by crossdressing vigilantes, dying wishes from preteen wannabe supervillains, telepathic "booty calls," a deeply depressed ninja, bedroom "cosplay" conflicts with her boyfriend, and even . . . Hummer fu? Each volume comes shrinkwrapped with an 18+ advisory sticker.
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| Customer Reviews:
Empowered Volume 4 December 21, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Very interesting take on the superhero genre, but definitely not for children.
Adam Warren never ceases to amaze me. December 14, 2008
His first volume was great; a story about a bumbling superheroine. Which was awesome, considering aside from the norm, this superheroine is a grown adult! All comedy aside, the volumes leading up to this were SWEET. But volume 4 of Empowered just takes the cake. Long story short? MOST. EPIC. BOOK. EVAR. Yes, 'evar'.
 Funny, sexy, even touching, worth picking up November 30, 2008
Adam Warren's Empowered is not what you'd expect. The basic concept is the misadventures of capture-prone D-list superheroine 'Empowered', her boyfriend 'Thugboy' and her best friend Ninjette. And the cosmic demon imprisoned on their coffee table. In this issue Emp is nominated for an award, Ninjette has a crisis of confidence, and we see Thugboy in bed with 2 women and a monkey.
Some stories are funny satires of superhero comics, others are titulating (but never more than PG-13) stories of her misadventures, but some have real feeling behind them. Empowered has major issues with her self-esteem, she's always wanted to be a superhero and now she's one of the worst. Behind all the superhero satire and relationship comedy there's real themes here.
So why 4 stars and not 5? The series is already feeling a bit padded. Adam Warren continues to tease us with imminent threats, mysterious pasts and other strange going ons but even with 300 pages to play with doesn't really move any of them forward. There was a similar problem with Vol 3 where it took the entire book to even learn Emp's real name.
Still it's a great series and a great read. I picked it up and read it in one go. Give it a try.
The best volume yet November 22, 2008
5 out of 5 found this review helpful
Warren does not disappoint as Volume 4 of Empowered is the best one yet. The pieces of the story are pulling together, making the wait for Volume 5 almost too much to bear. His main characters are deep and complex, and it's always a delight when a particularly clever bit of foreshadowing in previous volumes pays off. His courage in mixing comedy and serious themes is admirable, and he handles this very difficult task well (the villain Willy Pete, a psychotic sociopath, is as utterly terrifying as the overwrought Caged Demonwolf is hilarious).
The incredibly clever names he gives the heroes and villains never stop, with double and even triple entendres. In fact, the sheer explosion of ideas in the book is matched only, in my opinion, by Masamune Shirow, creator of Ghost in the Shell. Make sure to examine the backgrounds at the Capeys...every little figure is wonderful and full of character.
Warren might not appreciate this, but I think Empowered is also a great soap opera...or at least an engaging love triangle.
I suppose one should mention the sex. Yes, despite what the major comic book companies have told you for 50 years, it is indeed possible for comics to have sex in them. (What would you expect when buffed and toned young folks are in close proximity to each other?) And very enjoyable sex at that--past titillating, but less than graphic. Warren's women...and men...are a delight to look at (well, my wife likes the men, anyway). The story "Elephants, Cups, and Canoes" show how a story can be funny, sexy, and and yet inexplicably tasteful at the same time.
Warren's freedom in going to a "straight to complete volume" format pays off in the storytelling, as well. Unconstrained by the requirement of fitting each chapter into 24 pages, he can take as much--or as little--space as he needs to tell the story he wants to tell. It also allows him to put in amusing little vignettes that either cast light on the characters or move the ongoing storyline forward even as he tells self-contained tales.
Warren is also clearly very well read, and the book brims with clever inside jokes. His dialog is sharp and snappy, and his voicings for various characters are consistent and clever. If the Caged Demonwolf doesn't make you laugh, nothing will.
The art, in Warren's trademark ultra-tight pencils, is crisp and clear. He seems to be able to draw just about anything with equal levels of skill, a rare gift for a comic book artist. His panel-to-panel storytelling is smooth and confident.
All in all, it is money well spent and a book that rewards multiple re-readings to catch all the subtleties.
In a just world, Empowered would be outselling tired old characters like Batman and Superman as they trudge through their hundredth similar plotline. We can only hope more and more people catch on to Empowered.
Hilarious as ever, "Empowered" endears even as it titillates.... November 1, 2008
8 out of 8 found this review helpful
One of the first of the American manga-imitators, Warren's work stands out from the pack because of his writing, his own, personal knack for simultaneously celebrating, parodying and exploiting multiple elements of pop culture (superhero genre tropes, cyberpunk sci-fi techno-babble, good girl art, hong kong action films, etc.) often on the same page, and even in the same panel. (In this his work recalls' Harvey Kurthzman and Will Elder's gag-filled work for the early Mad Magazine and their "Little Annie Fanny" strip for Playboy Magazine). So long as you can tolerate (or better, enjoy) good-natured cheesecake and copious amounts of fan service without getting enraged, you're almost guaranteed a rollicking good time reading one of his books (Recommended titles include "Titans: Rock Paper Scissors," for DC Comics and "Grunge: the Movie" for Wildstorm Entertainment).
However skilled Adam Warren is as a comic writer, he rarely gets the accolades he deserves for his talent for creating endearing characters, and writing engaging adult-orientated romantic comedy. The first time I noticed these strengths was when I (belatedly) read his tragically truncated run scripting Wildstorm's "Gen13" (with Rick Mays providing pencils). Here Warren managed to make even the most uninteresting secondary characters, Burnout and Rainmaker interesting, and in the latter case, even compelling. It's true that the careful reader can find hints of these talents in his early work (even the utterly mindless delirium of his "Dirty Pair" adaptations) however the sheer amount of fan service, techno-babble and high-speed action he crams into his layouts usually obscures those strengths. Ultimately the problem was that comic book editors rarely gave him writing stints that were long enough for him to display this side of his talent as a writer....
... Until now, with the advent of Warren's presumably creator-owned "Empowered," published by Dark Horse Comics, home of mainstream writer/artists gone independent, like Mike "Hellboy" Mignola and Frank "Sin City" Miller. (May Warren reach similar levels of success: now that audiences are used to comic book movie adaptations, they might just be ready for a movie version of "Empowered," a faithful adaptation of which would go a long way to make up for the lackluster, "My Super Ex-Girlfriend," a well-meant dud if I ever saw one.) Though once again, the book is primarily a genre satire, and, as usual, Warren piles on the manga-esque fan service (primarily parodies of bondage art), the heart and soul of "Empowered," and the real reason (other than the assurance of irreverent comedy) I think readers come back for more, is his appealing characterization of his spectacularly inept, yet unreasonably enduring and good-natured heroine, Empowered (Emp to her close friends), and Warren's ability to convey a convincing of warmth and affection between the members of her primary supporting cast, which includes: the her ever-supportive boyfriend, Thugboy, a former professional Witless Minion-for Hire (by supervillains) who also hides a violent past as a killer of both superheroes and their adversaries, Ninjette, a usually upbeat runaway ninja princess (and borderline alcoholic) with a bounty on her head, and the dangerous, conquest-bent outer-space demon lord, who lies trapped inside a power-draining piece of space-alien bondage gear (a leftover from one of Emp's more embarrassing misadventures) that rests on the coffee table in front of the roommates TV set.
To sum, in "Empowered," Adam Warren's really at the top of his game, infusing the more recent volumes with a surprising and refreshing warmth (so long as you don't mind good girl art - something that declines in emphasis as the story goes on... sort of) as the relations between those near and dear to our plucky heroine take center stage in the third and fourth volumes. For those who can tolerate a lot of good girl-style imagery (which serves instead of stops the story) "Empowered"'s definitely worth a try. (For those doubting Thomas out there, who want to settle the issue quickly, I suggest starting with the third volume.)
Happy Reading Folks,....
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