Comics (possible spoilers)

[joshnotgood]

Here's a few quick reviews of what I've read recently...

Big Bratty Book of Bart Simpson TPB (#9-12) – It's a Simpsons comic. I got exactly what was expected. Good, clean fun.

The Blackburne Covenant TPB – This was a pretty solid book. Written by Fabian Nicieza, art by Stefano Raffaele (never heard of either of those guys until now). It's about an author who writes a best selling fantasy novel. It turns out that the book was not a work of fiction, but instead a long forgotten/erased history. Shady characters start following him. He starts realizing some supernatural powers, etc, etc. Good story, decent art. My only complaint is that it feels like the story should continue. It feels more like the beginning/origin of an ongoing series rather than a finite mini-series.

Fantastic Four: The End TPB – This was written and drawn by Alan Davis, so you know that at least the artwork is going to be excellent. This book starts with a flashback of Doom killing Franklin and Valeria Richards in a battle with the FF. Then it goes back to the present where the FF have all gone their separate ways. Reed is wrapped up in his work trying to perfect wormhole transportation. Sue is an underwater archeologist. Johnny is a member of the Avengers. And Ben is living on Mars with his wife and children. A lot of shit happens that I'm not going to go into detail with, and the FF have to work together again to save the world. Basically every major villain and character from the last 50 years of FF comics makes an appearance in these six issues. I've never been a huge FF fan, but I've read enough of their comics and read about enough of the comics to know all the characters and villains. So I wasn't lost, but it felt a little forced trying to get all of these characters in the book. I think it detracted from the main plot. Still this ended up being a decent read. I think a bigger FF fan probably would like it more than I did, but overall it wasn't bad.

Moon Knight: The Bottom TPB (#1-6) – This is written by Charlie Huston, art by David Finch. Holy shit was this book awful. This book reminded me of one of those shitty Image or Top Cow books that didn't care how bad the story was and just tried to be edgy, dark and violent. The story line was very confusing. Characters showed up that had no real back story or explanation of who they were supposed to be. One of the characters close to Moon Knight reveals that he is gay, even though every writer who has written him since 1975 has written him as a straight character. The long established character coming out of the closet is a gimmick I wish would soon die in comics. There is excessive amounts of censored expletives in this book. It's very annoying when every few words is another four letter #### that you have to guess what it is. They need to realize that this is a main Marvel universe book, not a Max book, and write accordingly. Finch's art is okay, but that is the only redeeming quality this book has. Everything else is complete garbage.

Moon Knight: Midnight Sun TPB (#7-13, Annual #1) – Everything I said about the first Moon Knight volume continues to ring true in this book. The plot is even more confusing than the first. You get some pointless cameos by Captain America, Spider-Man, Punisher and Iron Man. David Finch drops off this stinker after issue #9. Two artists I never heard of take over the pencils and neither artist is very good. The characters barely even look the same between issues #12 and #13. The only redeeming quality this volume had was the story from Annual #1, by Duane Swierczynski, was decent.

New Avengers: Revolution HC (#26-31) – Can you say filler? Brian Michael Bendis stretches out two issues worth of ideas into 6 issues in this collection. This basically bridges the gap between Civil War and Secret Invasion. Nothing much happens, then Elektra is a Skrull. There wasn't much story, but Alex Maleev's art in issue #26 was very enjoyable. Leinil Yu was the artist for the rest of the issues. His art wasn't bad, but it seems like it might have been rushed. Not his finest work.

Spider-Man: Reign TPB – Written and drawn by Kaare Andrews. This is basically Spider-Man: The Dark Knight Returns. I bought and read this as it came out in '08. I liked it a lot then, and enjoyed it just as much the second time around. Nothing too original about the story, but it is very well executed. Recommended!

Top Ten: Book 1 TPB (#1-7) – Written by Alan Moore, art by Gene Ha. Top Ten is about a city where everyone is some kind of super-powered, costumed character. Top Ten is the police precinct in the city and the book follows their exploits. The book is basically a super-powered cop drama. I was a little overwhelmed at first with the number of characters, but you quickly get to know and care about all of them. This is just a good fun comic book. Nothing to deep or intense like some of Moore's more well known books.

Top Ten: Book 2 TPB (#8-12) – Just as good as Book 1.

Top Ten: The Forty-Niners TPB – This is a prequel to the regular Top Ten books. It's about the earlier days of the city. Completely different characters, and rather than following the Top 10 police precinct, it follows two newcomers to the city (one of which joins Top Ten). Not as good as the regular Top Ten series, but still worth while reading if you liked the first two books.

X-Men: Deadly Genesis TPB – I had heard that Ed Brubakers run on X-Men was underwhelming, so I wasn't sure what to think going into this book, but I ended up really liking it! This takes place after House of M. Professor X is missing and the X-Men are trying to find him. While looking for the Professor the X-Men encounter a new threat from a forgotten past. I can see how some diehard X-Men fans might not like this because Brubaker does a substantial amount of revisionist X-Men history to tell his story. That did not bother me at all though. This was a great read! It makes me want to check out the rest of Brubaker's X-Men run.

Sweet reviews. I too really liked Spider-Man: Reign. I thought the art was interesting and it was done well. It's interesting to hear how bad the Moon Knight series is, I guess I've never been interested in his character enough to learn much about him.

I just finished Star Wars: Dark Empire. Thought the story was interesting enough, it's set six years after Return of the Jedi. I like the idea of Lea becoming a powerful Jedi, but I thought the art was distractingly terrible, Cam Kennedy I think. I'm debating reading Deark Empire II, same artist.

This last weekend I spent some time listing my collection on comic book database dot com. I'd recommend it. It was easy to use.

My collection

http://comicbookdb.com/collection.php?ID=28391

[kurtz]

Looks like comicbookdb is down right now.

I use Comic Collector Live to keep track of my collection. It costs $30 a year, but I think it's worth it. It doesn't host your collection online though, so you are not able to share it like a tradelist.

[antoine]

How many comics do you guys have?

I use bdgest to catalog my comics (www.bdgest.com). They have a HUGE database of comics, and you download them in the software. It's really great, tough there's is not many us comics as of right now. MOstly Franco-Belge Stuff. But every time someone add a comic to his collection, he can upload it on the online database (www.bedetheque.com for the database.)

I have 2763 in my software , plus a few hundres comics in long boxes not cataloged yet.

Here's a small picture of the software

[kurtz]

According to CCL, I have 4766 comics.

That is only counting individual issues. I don't have my TPBs and HCs cataloged.

[robotnerd]

i've got somewhere around 2000 singles, and probably around 500 trades and hardcovers.

[joshnotgood]

Comicbookdb says I have 495 comics.

[kurtz]

I've started a comicbookdb list now. It seems like a cool site and I wouldn't mind having a backup copy of my list.

Still working on it, but here's the list so far.

http://comicbookdb.com/collection.php?ID=28412

[joshnotgood]

Today I picked up:

Superman: Last Stand of New Krypton #3 of 3

Fraggle Rock #1 of 3 (Covers A and

Fraggle Rock was pretty good, the art was nice and it's on a thicker, glossy paper (odd sized comic too). It also has two short stories in the back, one of which was written and drawn by Katie Cook. I've been a fan of hers since she did some cheap sketches for my friend and me at the Fall Con here in MN a few years back. Her art is really, cutesy? for a lack of a better word. But really cool. http://katiecandraw.typepad.com/

Some comics I've been eying and thinking about getting are, The Muppets: Peter Pan, Robin Hood, King Arthur books and the Wall-E comics. Wall-E looks really good and I think I'm going to jump in on that one next.

[antoine]

Anyone went to FCBD today? I think it's a great day for kids! At my store in Ottawa, there was around 12 store clerks in disguise (supergirl, emma frost, wonder woman, 3 star wars dudes, green arrow, etc...) and kids really seems to appreciate it! The staff was outside the store inviting people in and telling them about free comics. I think it's a fantastic idea to promote comics! I got around 25-30 free comics, witch is also great!

[Guest markovianprocess]

Anyone went to FCBD today? I think it's a great day for kids! At my store in Ottawa, there was around 12 store clerks in disguise (supergirl, emma frost, wonder woman, 3 star wars dudes, green arrow, etc...) and kids really seems to appreciate it! The staff was outside the store inviting people in and telling them about free comics. I think it's a fantastic idea to promote comics! I got around 25-30 free comics, witch is also great!

I went today, but it was a much smaller event in Glasgow. I picked up the War of the Supermen and the 'Iron Man and Thor' issues. I was just pleased to grab that WOTS issue, as it looked pretty cool online.

They had the new issue of Superman, and 2 DC What's Next? issues (Batman and Robin #1, and Green Lantern #29) for $1 each, and the 4 issues of X-Men Noir only came to £5. So I had a pretty good day!

[joshnotgood]

We also went and had a great time. We saw The Flash, Batman, Superman, Silk Spectre, Green Lantern (JSA), The Riddler, and The Penguin. Let me just say Green Lantern, Batman, The Riddler, The Penguin, and Silk Spectre looked like they walked off movie sets. Their costumes were great. I also grabbed a bunch of the FCBD comics, but even better were the sales. 65% off back issues and run packs?!?! Not that I had a lot of money to spend, but I did grab a bunch of old Disney stuff. Picked up a bunch of Tale Spin and Rescue ranger comics. Seemed like it was going over great here in MN, the store was packed.

[kirbypuckett]

I started (well I'm almost finished now) reading the Scott Pilgrim comics. Pretty good stuff IMO. It's kept me entertained enough that I finished each book in one sitting.

[teganandsara]

Still one book left in the series.

[jurrobear]

Scott Pilgrim is awesome, cant wait for the next volume in July.

Here's my pull for the week, cutting down on a lot of titles. I'm gonna start going through Diamond directly soon so I won't visit my comic shop as much as I do nowadays.

[teganandsara]

Let me know how the return of Bruce Wayne is I am not sure about picking it up.

[jurrobear]

Let me know how the return of Bruce Wayne is I am not sure about picking it up.

I enjoyed it, I can't wait till Grant Morrison lays it all out. The man can do wrong.

I'm not gonna lie though, DC can suck a dick for bringing him back so soon. They shouldn't have even said he was alive at the end of Final Crisis, from what I've heard through the grapevine; Grant Morrrison didn't want it included but it was inserted last second by that asshat Dan DiDio. I know that he rushed his return as well due in part to his hatered of the Dick Grayson character. I really wish that with Jim Lee as Co-Publisher things can improve but I have a feeling that it will take a long time before it does.

[kurtz]

Just added this to my Frank Cho collection. I didn't even know it existed until now, never seen one before. It's some obscure independent zine from 2000. It's about 30 pages, all b&w (the yellow is an obi strip), has a long interview with Frank and lots of his sketches, illustration and comic strip art. No other features or articles in the zine, all Cho cover to cover. I'm pretty stoked about owning this! I love finding the lesser known things Frank has done.

[kurtz]

Barnes & Noble has some decent TPBs & HCs in the bargain section again.

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/u/Bargain-Graphic-Novels/379000104/?cds2Pid=16757&linkid=1586062

I just bought all of these for $57.94 total.

Silver Surfer: Requiem

Wolverine: Origins, Volume 2: Savior

New Avengers, Volume 5: Civil War

New Avengers, Volume 7: The Trust

New Avengers, Volume 8: Secret Invasion, Book 1

New Avengers, Volume 9: Secret Invasion, Book 2

Wolverine: Weapon X

Lone Wolf 2100, Volume 1: Shadows on Saplings

Newuniversal: Everything Went White

Wormwood: Gentleman Corpse, Volume 1 HC

Uncanny X-Men: Lovelorn

Marvel Zombies

[teganandsara]

I just put all my single issue comics in the comic book database. It says I have 402 not bad for a little over a year of collecting. They do not even all fit in the storage box I bought.

[Fartcat]

The only single issues I buy anymore are Spider-Man ones, I have a huge collection, even have the first appearance of the Rhino.

[silentgods]

if you're not reading deadpool: merc with a mouth.

then you're missing out one of the more insane comics of the month. its awesome.

[Fartcat]

Haven't been digging Deadpool lately. Really liked most of that Seige shit, and now the Heroic Age titles have been pretty good.

[robotnerd]

The only single issues I buy anymore are Spider-Man ones, I have a huge collection, even have the first appearance of the Rhino.

the current run of amazing spider-man has really been fantastic.

[jurrobear]

The only single issues I buy anymore are Spider-Man ones, I have a huge collection, even have the first appearance of the Rhino.

the current run of amazing spider-man has really been fantastic.

THIS!

[Fartcat]

Yeah, I have enjoyed the Guantlet alot, can't wait to see what they have in store. The latest arc with the Lizard was phenomenal.