22 Comics I Read in 2018

I don't have a good way to count individual, single-issue comics that I've read over the year, but I also read a bunch of graphic novels and collections. I mentioned in the overview the other day that Bill Watterson's The Complete Calvin and Hobbes was both the longest book I finished (it's three volumes) and the most liked by other Goodreads users. There's nothing to say about the strip that the world doesn't already know, but I was reminded that Watterson is a brilliant cartoonist who's equally excellent at both humor and warming hearts. Reading the series 23 years later, though, I was struck by his observations about culture and how little has actually changed. Social media has amplified some ugly aspects of human nature, but Calvin and Hobbes is a powerful reminder that our biggest problems have always been there.



I also started Charles Schulz' Peanuts archives with The Complete Peanuts, Vol. 1: 1950-1952. Early Peanuts is so awesome. Charlie Brown isn't yet the loser he'll become; he's just one of a group of kids who enjoy each other while occasionally giving each other a hard time. He's an equal member of the group and often an instigator in teasing and mischief.

Initially, the group is him, Shermie, Violet, and Patty (not Peppermint; the other one whom nobody remembers these days, but recognizes when they see her). And Snoopy is there of course, but he's not clearly identified as Charlie Brown's dog until later. He begins as just sort of a neighborhood dog whom everyone takes responsibility for.

Schroeder, Lucy, and Linus are all introduced in this volume (in that order). They each come into the strip as a precocious infant or toddler and then quickly grow into about the same age as the other characters until Schulz decides he needs another younger character and brings in the next one. It's fun to see baby Linus and Schroeder, but it's even more fun watching baby Lucy. She's a high-spirited handful from the start, but not the crabby fussbudget that she'll eventually grow into. The cartoons are often laugh out loud funny, but always sweet and of course well-drawn.



I read several Marvel Masterworks volumes last year, starting with Atlas Era Jungle Adventure. I got partway through the first volume, remembered that I'd read it before, and my memory was that it doesn't get any better than the first couple of stories. I love jungle adventure and I love female characters, but the Lorna stories are especially sexist. She falls for a horrible chauvinist who disrespects not only her, but explicitly all women at every opportunity. The text specifically calls him her "friend" and pretends that this is a normal, healthy relationship. It's gross. The art's pretty good, but not great enough to carry me through the rest of it.

After that, I dug into the early Marvel superheroes, starting with the first three volumes of The Fantastic Four. Stan Lee and Jack Kirby's work on it was as imaginative and exciting as everyone says. It was thrilling to finally read the introductions of Doctor Doom, the Skrull, Puppet Master (and with him Alicia Masters), Impossible Man, the Watcher, and of course the reintroduction of the Sub-Mariner. There's also the first meeting between the Thing and the Hulk, which was super cool.

The constant sidelining of Sue Storm got tiresome, so I still look forward to seeing that change in future volumes. There's a panel in Volume 2 where Reed defends Sue's value to the team by talking about how she keeps up the morale of the male members. Yuck. "Different times" and all that, but it's a huge distraction for me. Volume 2 wraps up with Fantastic Four Annual #1, which is a cool way to close. It's a huge, exciting story in which Sub-Mariner has finally found his lost people and leads them in an invasion of New York City. That battle has some truly exciting moments, even by today's standards.

Then Volume 3 stands out for including the FF's portion of arguably Marvel's first crossover event, though it wasn't heralded that way. It's a sprawling story around the Fantastic Four, the fledgling Avengers, and even the mysterious, new team known as the X-Men as they try to figure out what to do with each other as well as the random destructiveness of the Hulk and Sub-Mariner. And it's quite good.

Speaking of the Hulk, I read the first volume of his adventures, too. Jack Kirby's version is my favorite look for the character and all the art in this collection is a joy. There's one non-Kirby issue, but that was drawn by Steve Ditko, so it's great, too. What's interesting about these stories is seeing Kirby and Stan Lee figuring out how they want to handle the character. He's gray in the first issue, green in the rest, and Bruce Banner's transformations are triggered by everything EXCEPT his emotions. It starts as a nighttime change and by the end of the collection it's something that Banner and the Hulk control with a machine (although an unpredictable one that seems also to have a negative effect). There's also a weird issue or two where the Hulk is mind-controlled by Rick Jones. I'm looking forward to reading other volumes and seeing how long it takes to settle into a status quo for the series. It's all over the place in the beginning, but that's not a complaint.

And finally, for Marvel Masterworks, I finished the first volume of The Avengers. It was a great idea for a series and super fun for the first several issues. The status quo changed constantly with the Hulk's leaving and coming back and leaving again and being chased by the other members and then Captain America shows up... But the series settles into a rut for the last few issues collected here. Once Baron Zemo and the Masters of Evil show up, they keep coming back with various other villains as allies. Captain America's angst and declarations of vengeance against Zemo are especially wearisome.

Over on the DC side (though they weren't DC comics at the time), I read a couple of collections featuring the Captain Marvel family of characters: The Shazam Archives and The Shazam Family Archives. Fawcett's Captain Marvel has been a favorite character of mine since watching the Saturday morning live action TV show in the '70s. He's got an awesome costume and I love the concept of a younger person (a teenager in the TV show; a young boy in the comics) turning into a Superman analog by saying a magic word. This was my first time reading his original adventures.

CC Beck's art is lovably simple, but exciting. That's the highlight here. And just the joy of seeing the same villain, Dr Sivana, reappear over and over again in spite of being constantly defeated. He becomes an awesome archenemy just from sheer, relentless repetition.

Unfortunately, that repetition backfires when it comes to the tone of the collection. The villains' schemes are mostly fun and inventive, but all the stories are the same kind: secret villain has scheme, Billy Batson investigates, uncovers villain, and defeats them as Captain Marvel. They'd be fun read a month at a time, but they were hurt by reading together in a collection like this. I'm curious to get to stories featuring Tawky Tawny and some of the other crazy supporting cast, but hesitant to pick up the next volume. I decided to try some Captain Marvel Jr and Mary Marvel instead, which led me to Shazam Family.

I was initially disappointed to see how heavily skewed Shazam Family, Volume 1 is towards Captain Marvel Jr. I like Mary Marvel much more, but she's only got the one story in the collection. And sadly, there is no Shazam Family Archives, Vol. 2.

But even though it was a much deeper dive into CMJ's early adventures than I wanted, I had a ball with those stories. I even liked them more than the early adventures of Captain Marvel himself. Mac Raboy's realistic art style was way ahead of its time, making CMJ's comics look more like they were created in the '70s than the '40s. And even though the stories rely heavily on two particular, recurring villains (Captain Nazi and Mister Macabre), the plots and settings of those stories vary enough that I never grew bored the way I did with the Captain Marvel volume.

The final collected volume I finished was Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan: The Jesse Marsh Years Omnibus Volume 1. Sadly though,  I couldn't finish it. I expect to struggle through a certain amount of racism in old Tarzan stories, but it is so prevalent in these tales and often coming directly out of Tarzan's mouth, which is not something I'm used to. Marsh's linework is quite good though, so there's some enjoyment to be had just flipping through the drawings.



Finally getting to graphic novels, I started the year with the first two books in Mike Maihack's fun Cleopatra in Space series: Target Practice and The Thief and the Sword. I enjoyed Maihack's webcomic with the same character and premise, but that was a very light adventure and I wasn't confident that the printed version would have the emotional weight I wanted from a graphic novel. It does though. Target Practice is not a collection of the web strips and Maihack knows the difference between the two formats and makes the right changes.

The web comic made sure that there was an action beat or gag on every new installment/page, where the graphic novel is an immersive experience. It gave me the time I wanted to get to know Cleo, her environment, and her friends, and to relate to her predicament. It's still action-packed, super cute, and very funny, but now all of those things are surrounding solid characters.

The Thief and the Sword is a strong follow up. It has all the same charm, plus it expands the universe. I wasn't crazy about the new, thief character, but he's potentially redeemable. My only complaint is that it ends on a cliffhanger. That's not exactly a dislike though, because I'd wanna read the next one anyway.



Koma: The Voice of Chimneys is a short volume about a young chimney sweep who meets a monster. It's building to something bigger, so it was impossible to tell what I'm going to think of the plot, but I like the main character and the art is fantastic. The design of the creature is both spooky and affecting. I'm looking forward to seeing where it goes.



You know I'm all about the pirates, but while Barracuda, Tome 1: Esclaves is beautifully drawn, I don't like any of the characters and the tone is oppressively dark. I'm not reading any more of this one.



I've always admired Rick Geary's linework, but this is the first book by him that I've read. Most of his stuff falls into the category of True Crime, which isn't a genre I enjoy, but this is full-blown fiction featuring one of my favorite actors as the detective. It's an engaging riddle and though I was a little disappointed with the solution itself, I was thrilled with the way it was revealed. I would love to see Geary create more Louise Brooks Mysteries.



Lovely art. Fun characters. It's a bit densely packed for my taste (and eyesight; small panels) and I don't feel like Delilah is as much a character as an idea for a character, but I quite like Mr Selim (the Turkish lieutenant) and I'll be reading the next volume.



Lovely art depicting deep characters in a romantic setting. But while the characters are varied and complicated, I'm not actually all that interested in most of them. Or maybe it's the absence of a central plot that I'm reacting negatively to. I wonder if subsequent volumes begin to develop a stronger story with character arcs. I'm just not decided on whether I want to find out enough to continue the series.



I've been a fan of Kickliy's work for over a decade and it's been fun and rewarding to watch him grow as a cartoonist and storyteller. Perdy is a very naughty Western with great characters, intriguing mysteries, a bawdy sense of humor, and - most of all - a gorgeous visual style. As "Volume 1" suggests, it's not a complete story, but it's a satisfying read and I can't wait for the next installment.



I read the first volume in single issues and was captivated enough that I just bought the rest of the series in collected volumes when I had a chance at a sale. Terry Moore's drawing is always exceptional and he set up a great mystery in Volume 1 around why a dead woman's body was left half-buried in the woods and why she came back to life. Volume 2 answers most of the mystery in order to reveal a conflict that I imagine the rest of the series will work to resolve. Sadly for me, the conflict isn't as intriguing as the mystery was, so I'm not going to rush into Volume 3.

But Moore's skills in creating rich characters and mood are great enough that I enjoy being in the moment with his stories even when I'm not pulled forward by the plot. I will eventually come back and read more.



Butch Guice's art is always great. He has a grounded, realistic style that's just as convincing when he's depicting mythical creatures as when he's drawing everyday people and objects. He's the perfect artist for this kind of Harryhausen-influenced story. And the events of the story are pretty great. There's a mystical island filled with awesome creatures to run away from.

The characters are fine, but they're fairly standard archetypes and no one stands out as a favorite so far (though the villain shows signs of being more than he seems). It's only the first volume, so I'm hopeful that the characters grow on me as they continue to be challenged by the island and their mission on it. It's a good start and I'll keep reading.



Finally, I'm a big fan of Bryan Talbot's steampunk, talking animal mysteries and the way the characters develop and the situations build on each other. I'm an even bigger fan when he's clearly drawing inspiration from James Bond as he is in this volume. Can't get enough of this series.

31 Days of Gothic Romance | Gothic Tales of Love

Marvel also tried their hand at a gothic romance series, but in a different format. Instead of a comics anthology series, they published a black-and-white text magazine through their Curtis Magazines imprint. Since magazines weren't bound by the Comics Code Authority, Marvel had formed Curtis as a way to publish Mature Readers stories that wouldn't fly in the regular comics. In addition to classics like Crazy, Deadly Hands of Kung Fu, and of course Savage Sword of Conan, there were less-successful attempts like Gothic Tales of Love.

Unlike some of Curtis' other black-and-white magazines that included comics in them, Gothic Tales of Love was all about text stories with some illustrations. Some of the stories were original, but others were reprints of what the editors thought were under-read, contemporary gothic romance stories. The True Love Comics Tales blog has some great posts about the magazine, including the table-of-contents of each issue and a full story (in two parts) from the first issue. (As long as you're perusing True Love Comics Tales, be sure to check out this post that serves as a gateway to complete stories from Dark Mansion of Forbidden Love and Sinister House of Secret Love.) You can also find the full, second issue of Gothic Tales of Love at Archive.org.

Even though Marvel went a different route with its gothic romance title, it had a similar result to DC's efforts. Gothic Tales of Love only lasted three issues before it was cancelled.

Interestingly, comics publisher Dell had tried something similar a few years earlier with a black-and-white magazine called simply Gothic Romances. It had also contained a mixture of reprints and original stories and had also lasted only three issues. It got a second chance by being renamed Gothic Stories, but that only carried it three more issues before its final cancellation.

Skull the Slayer: Polemic or Pulp? [Guest Post]

By GW Thomas

1975 saw two things happen almost simultaneously. Marv Wolfman came to Marvel comics and he created Skull the Slayer. Who? Yes, Skull was not the runaway success that Tomb of Dracula was. But it was a project that Marv had thought about for four years before getting to write it. What he wanted to do was take an entire skyscraper full of people and put them in the dinosaur-haunted past. The series would focus on a different character each issue. That idea is at least as old as Murray Leinster's "The Runaway Skyscraper" (Argosy, February 22, 1919), but Wolfman's version was a little closer to Edgar Rice Burroughs. Leinster's early pulp tale has the skyscraper arrive in Manhattan before Columbus.

A couple of things changed Wolfman's original idea. First was the popularity of von Daniken's The Chariot of the Gods (1969) and Charles Berlitz's The Bermuda Triangle (1974). The second was Gold Key's Tragg and the Sky Gods, beginning April 1972, which featured cavemen and dinosaurs with aliens. Thirdly, Stan Lee liked the idea, but insisted on dropping the anthology part for a central character. Wolfman accepted the challenge and created Jim Scully or "Skull," an ex-Viet Nam hero who has been branded a murderer. Encountering the left overs of a UFO, Scully finds an alien belt that gives him super strength.

When the comic finally appeared August 1975 it was named Skull the Slayer. (There had been some trepidation around the name because Marvel also had Robert E Howard's Kull. That title folded, removing any difficulties.) Set in the Bermuda Triangle, Skull the Slayer features dinosaurs and cavemen and all things Edgar Rice Burroughs. It also has a cast of four, with Skull being the lead. The other three are Dr. Raymond Corey (a black professor of physics and Skull's ideological antagonist), Ann Reynolds (spokeswoman for the female side), and Jeff Turner (the son of Senator "Stoneface" Turner). Between these four viewpoints, Marv found his anthology of characters, making the comic not only a pulp for fourteen year olds, but also a venue for political discussion, a polemic for issues of the mid-1970s.

That's up to Issue 4 (March 1976) when suddenly Marv's no longer writing this strip, but acting as editor. Steve Engelhart takes over and changes everything. First he kills off the supporting cast in a scene that cuts counter to everything that has gone before. Jim Scully, who has dived in feet first in every other fight, suddenly abandons his friends to death. From hero to zero in one page! Also, Engelhart turns the storyline from ancient Egypt to the days of King Arthur, bringing in Marvel's former character the Black Knight.

And if you don't like it... don't worry, because by the next issue (May 1976) Bill Mantlo is driving the bus and he brings back the three friends (Hey, this is science fiction. We can do anything!) and after an aerial battle in which Jeff, Ann, and Dr. Corey fight against Skull's side in the robot battle, they all make up and the team is back together. Mantlo confesses that when he was approached to take over the comic, he insisted on going back to Marv's original ideas. This meant as quickly as possible bringing back the dinosaurs and blowing up Slitherogue and his time tower, erasing them from the storyline.

For the last two issues (September and November 1976), the revolving door took Marv from the editing post and replaced him with Archie Goodwin. Mantlo's writing improves things with the team back together and finding an Incan city of gold run by another person from outside. The back-biting polemic is gone, with Skull and Dr. Corey co-existing under a truce. Mantlo heats things up by having Senator Turner send Scully's arch enemy from Nam, a Southern boy named Lancer, into the Bermuda Triangle after them. Despite the improvements, the flip-flopping took its toll. Issue #8 was the last. Skull and his friends remained in the power of a new villain, The Children of the Night, introduced via pterodactyl riders.

In the art department, the lead on Skull the Slayer had been Steve Gan; sometimes inking his own work, sometimes with Pablo Marcos. The look was good, feeling a little like Joe Kubert and a little like Alfred Alcala. With Issue #4 Sal Buscema took over, having his work inked by Mike Esposito, Steve Gan or Sonny Trinidad. The inconsistency on the inking made some issues better than others and hurt the over-all feel the book.

But Marvel, having many comics to play with, did not have to leave Skull and his friends in limbo. The big finale appeared in Marvel Two-in-One #35 (January 1978) and #36 (February 1978). Ben Grimm and even Mr. Fantastic, Reed Richards, show up to finish this saga off. Written and edited by Marv Wolfman and drawn by Ernie Chan, the two parter follows Ben and the Skull crew as they encounter dinosaurs while looking for the old crash site so they can fix Grimm's plane. They eventually get out of the Bermuda Triangle but bring Baldy, the priest of the Children of the Night, and his pet pterodons with them. After one last fight, the crew is finally home and Jim Scully decides to turn himself in and face trial for his brother's death. (You can almost feel Marv Wolfman sigh in relief. The saga is over and he can get on with other things.) Despite being mostly retread, Wolfman does have fun by referring to currently popular people and events such as the changing of the name of Cape Kennedy and the election of Jimmy Carter to point out that the characters have been lost in a time warp for two years.

And so the saga of Jim "Skull" Scully ends on a landing strip in Miami. Marvel could have resurrected him, given him a new comic set in the regular Marvel world but this never happened. And it isn't surprising. Skull the Slayer still had his magic alien belt that gave him super strength but so what? Marvel had plenty of strong men on their backlist: Luke Cage (Power Man) and the orange gorilla himself, Ben Grimm, for example. One more muscle man with no dinosaurs to fight just didn't scream out as a bestseller. A slayer with nothing left to slay. He quietly went into comics oblivion, facing a self defence trial, with his girl Ann Reynolds declaring she'd wait for him and his two friends Dr. Corey and Jeff Turner ready to stand up and testify in court to his character. The polemic was long gone. No arguments were left.

GW Thomas has appeared in over 400 different books, magazines and ezines including The Writer, Writer's Digest, Black October Magazine and Contact. His website is gwthomas.org. He is editor of Dark Worlds magazine.

31 Werewolves | Werewolf by Night

In the '70s, Universal's unholy trinity came to Marvel comics. Marvel was introducing all sorts of new genres to their superhero universe and horror was a major one from spooky superheroes like Ghost Rider to classic monsters like Frankenstein and Dracula. Of course they had to have a werewolf too.

Werewolf by Night was the product of a few different creators. Roy and Jean Thomas came up with the basic idea, Stan Lee named it, and the first story (in 1972's Marvel Spotlight #2) was created by Gerry Conway and Mike Ploog. After a couple of more appearances in Marvel Spotlight (which immediately introduced Ghost Rider next), the werewolf got his own series that ran for five years and 43 issues. The Werewolf by Night series was the first appearance of Moon Knight (in #32) and Tigra was also introduced in a Werewolf by Night story in Giant Size Creatures #1. These stories were all reprinted in Essential Werewolf by Night, Volumes 1 and 2.

Typically called simply Werewolf by other characters, the protagonist of Werewolf by Night is a man named Jack Russell (I know), which is an Americanization of his actual, Transylvanian name: Jacob Russoff. Jack inherited his lycanthropy through a family curse that goes back to the late 18th century and connects to other Marvel characters like Dracula and even the High Evolutionary. As was typical of Marvel's horror characters in the '70s, Russell continued mixing with traditional superheroes and villains, and went on to meet everyone from Captain America and Iron Man to Doctor Strange and Sabretooth.

Tarzan 101 | Tarzan of the Comic Books

Celebrating Tarzan's 101st anniversary by walking through Scott Tracy Griffin's Tarzan: The Centennial Celebration.

Griffin covers the history of Tarzan in comic books from the character's first appearance in Tip Top Comics #1 (above) to his current status at Dark Horse. True to the roots of comic books in general, the earliest Tarzan comics were simply reprints of his newspaper strips. United Features started running the Sunday strips in 1936 in Tip Top, while the dailies began getting colored and reprinted two years later in Comics on Parade.

In 1939, Dell got into the game with new adaptations of Burroughs stories starting in Popular Comics #38. It would also be Dell who published the first original Tarzan comic book story in 1947's Four Color #134 with art by Jesse Marsh. Four Color was an ongoing anthology series in which each issue was devoted to a single character, but Tarzan got another issue that same year with #161 (the series wasn't a strict monthly and often had multiple issues each month). Those issues sold so well that Dell gave Tarzan his own series, with Marsh still drawing it, the following year.

Marsh worked with writer Gaylor Dubois to create a new continuity for Dell's Tarzan that combined elements of the Burroughs novels with those of the Johnny Weissmuller films. The series lasted 131 issues until the summer of 1962 when it switched over to Dell's publishing partner Western and its Gold Key imprint. Gold Key kept Dell's numbering and its Tarzan series ran another 75 issues until 1972. A major change in the Gold Key era was that Marsh retired in 1965 and his assistant Russ Manning began drawing the series.

In '72, the Tarzan license went to DC. They changed the name to Tarzan of the Apes and identified the switch with a big, yellow bullet that said "First DC Issue." But like Gold Key, they kept the numbering from the old series. Issue #207 featured a new adaptation of Burroughs' first book with art by Joe Kubert. And though DC got a lot of mileage out of their five years with the Burroughsverse, they ultimately lost it to Marvel in 1977.

Marvel's Tarzan, Lord of the Jungle - with art by John Buscema - ran 29 issues until 1979, at which point Tarzan comics ceased to be published in North America for more than a decade. Malibu published American editions of some European Tarzan comics in 1992, but it wasn't until 1995 that Dark Horse got the license and began doing brand new stories again. In addition to a 20-issue ongoing series, they published numerous mini-series and crossovers in which Tarzan met up not only with other Burroughs characters like John Carter and Carson of Venus, but also Predators, Superman, and Batman.

Though Dark Horse still has the Tarzan license, it's not currently publishing original Tarzan stories. Instead, it's focusing on archival reprints of classic comics by guys like Marsh, Manning, and Kubert. I'm happy for those, but that leaves new Tarzan comics to Dynamite, who's adapting Burroughs' public domain Tarzan stories in its Lord of the Jungle series. I understand that those are very good (and have the first volume creeping its way up my reading pile), but I'm also eager for new, original tales. Hoping Dark Horse gets back to those soon.

31 Days of Dracula | The Tomb of Dracula (1972)

Leave it to Marvel, man. They're the company that took superheroes out of the silliness of DC's Silver Age and made them real and relatable, so it makes sense that at a time when the classic monsters were mostly seen as silly camp, Marvel would come along and make them cool and scary again.

The flagship of Marvel's horror line was Tomb of Dracula by Marv Wolfman and Gene Colan. Wolfman kept Dracula menacing by making him the villain who menaced a group of vampire hunters. And though Colan kept the vampire's famous cape, he gave him a unique look by basing him on Jack Palance instead of Lugosi or any other actor who'd played him on screen. Although...

Palance didn't make the cut for my 31, but the year after Tomb of Dracula was published he actually played the character in a made-for-TV movie that also starred Sarah Douglas (Superman II, Conan the Destroyer) as one of Dracula's wives. Need to see that.

Hellcat hates cephalopods

Quote of Day | "The system suffers from exhaustion and burnout"

My suspicion is that both [DC and Marvel] have a hard time selling comics that aren't event comics because there aren't enough readers to maintain high numbers on standard comic books. When readers are told what to buy, you have a hit. When they are joined by people that haven't been buying many comics at all, or at least that kind of comic, you have a potential mega-hit. But for the most part the system suffers from exhaustion and burnout.

--Tom Spurgeon

I don't have a lot of commentary on this. I just want to record it somewhere so I can find it again later and since it relates to my recent post on event-fatigue and DC, this seems like a good place.

I guess I will comment long enough to observe that Tom's basically saying that the kind of comics I still like from Marvel and DC are the kind that don't sell. That's always been the case though (starting with the very first series I ever collected, Alpha Flight). What's frightening is his question about "whether or not there's a system there to be salvaged long-term, and if so, if the major players are able to make the necessary investments to make that system as vital as it can be." I hope there is, but agree with Tom that the outlook doesn't look good from here.

Dumping DC

The title of this post isn't technically correct. I don't plan to boycott DC anymore than I've boycotted Marvel. But the Marvel Universe as a whole hasn't held my interest for a few years now and DC (as a collective line of comics) is about to follow it off my radar.

DC and Marvel get their bread and butter from enormous, line-wide events. They survive by telling their dedicated fans over and over again that "this is the story that you need to read; this changes everything; this is important." And for fans of those universes, they're not lying. I want to make it really clear that I'm not down on anyone who's a fan of those universes and still buys those events. I'm kind of down on you if you're doing it without getting any enjoyment out of it, but if you like big DC and Marvel events, that's excellent. Not that you need my permission to enjoy what you enjoy.

For me, I stopped enjoying them in 2008 (Final Crisis and Secret Invasion were the last scoops of dirt on the grave) and stopped buying them. The rest of this post is going to reflect that, so if you're a fan of that kind of storytelling and think you might be offended by my picking at it, please don't read any further. It's not my goal to make you angry; I just want to record some thoughts as I'm having them.

I grew up with Marvel and DC characters, but never had the money to read as much about them as I wanted. I'd get to a part in the comic where Spider-Man references some fight he had with Electro three issues back and there'd be that infuriating little editor's note: "See issue # whatever." As a kid, I dreamed of a time when I'd actually be able to go "see issue # whatever;" when I'd be able to afford as many comics as I wanted and finally get The Complete Story. For many years as an adult, I enthusiastically bought series after series and event after event - whether or not I was enjoying them on a story level - because I was finally getting The Complete Story. I was following every major thing that was happening in these two universes.

That's the lie though, right? There's no Complete Story. There may be Universe-Changing Events, but the very nature of corporate-owned comics means that they're making this up as they go along. There's no master plan. When I was a kid, I imagined that Marvel and DC had a guy whose sole job it was to make sure that continuity was adhered to and that everything fit together with everything else.

Once I realized that no one's on top of that stuff, the more Marvel and DC tried to maintain that deception, the more frustrated I got. It's like I'd discovered the man behind the curtain, but instead of coming clean about it, he kept pulling the curtain closed and insisting that the Wizard is real.

After 2008, I threw up my hands and quit. No Dark Reign for me; no Blackest Night. I didn't quit reading everything by Marvel and DC though; just the big events.  I still had a few titles that were mostly managing to stay out of all that. For Marvel, that was X-Men Legacy, but not much else. Alpha Flight when they rebooted that. Agents of Atlas of course. There'd be a tie-in or reference to whatever event was currently going on, but I didn't let those hook me. I just stuck with what I liked. I was done following the Marvel Universe.

It was the same with DC for three years until they came up with the New 52. Honestly though, it may have been even worse for DC. I can't tell you which - if any - DC comics I was buying from 2009 to 2011. What I loved about the New 52 wasn't that everything was fresh and sparkling again. (Actually, everything wasn't fresh and sparkling again, because they wanted to eat their cake and still have it by declaring a fresh start while also haphazardly incorporating popular stories from the past into the new continuity.) What I loved about the New 52 was the absence of crossovers and line-wide events. Since everyone was focused entirely on setting up their series, I could pick up any DC book and not have to follow it to another one. The whole DCU was an open playground and I could try out anything I wanted. So I tried a lot and got interested in way more DC series than I had been in years. For the past year, DC's been getting a lot more of my money than Marvel, but they're gearing up to kill that now.

We've already seen it starting in the Batman-related books with the "Night of the Owls" storyline. And there was an odd issue of Frankenstein, Agent of SHADE that tied-into a major crossover between Animal Man and Swamp Thing. Earth 2 #1 led directly into World's Finest #1, Frankenstein's joining Justice League Dark, and now there's word that another line-wide crossover is being planned for late next year. The DCU is becoming more interconnected.

It's no coincidence that this is starting to happen just as sales on DC comics are leveling out to where they were before the New 52. With the new car smell fading away, DC has to do something to generate excitement, so they're going back to familiar methods.

Unfortunately for me, the more DC ties its comics together, the less interested I am. To the extent that they still have books I'm interested in that don't require me to buy books I'm not, I'll keep buying their product. It's just that I'm no longer part of their faithful target audience. And I don't say that with any anger or even sadness, but with relief. That's that many worthwhile creator-owned series I can support instead.

Pass the Comics: Tales of Atlantis

Diversions of the Groovy Kind has three out of five installments up so far depicting the founding of Marvel's version of Atlantis as told by Howard Chaykin, Steve Gerber, and Joe Sinnott. [Parts One and Two. Part Three.]

Quotes of the Week: Sentient Hotdog Motorcycles

A while back I noted that televised news in the Marvel Universe must be like having professional wrestling on the air all the time, but, you know, at least that’s safely predictable. I think I’d be more comfortable watching Marvel News and seeing “Sub-Mariner and Dr. Doom have teamed up to fight the Fantastic Four,” which is something I could deal with, versus never knowing what new horror awaited me whenever I’d turn on DC News: “Top story tonight: Superman’s giant ant head…the world’s leaders react!” “The Dow dropped 300 points after today’s appearance of the Zebra Batman.”
--Mike Sterling, describing the respective strengths of Marvel and DC in as clear a way as I've ever seen.


I don't know that I could come up with anything new to say about [Superman] -- I'd probably shrink him and have him race Mr. Mxyztplk across the world on sentient hotdog motorcycles, or have him go on a reality show run by Lex Luthor wearing a blonde wig...
--Tom Spurgeon, trying to explain why he'd be no better a Superman writer than J Michael Straczynski, while simultaneously demonstrating that he's SO the man for the job.


Part of why Hamlet delays the murder of his uncle is that (and we've often spoken of his puritanism) murder is a sin. Though he was quick to swear revenge, the whole of the play has Hamlet working out how he can commit such an act (and abase himself to the level of Claudius - smiling and being a villain) in spite of his conscience. Even if we do not subscribe to Hamlet actually being mad, there is a dramatic insanity at work where a character cannot reconcile who he is and what he must do.
--Siskoid, explaining Hamlet in a way so that I can finally understand and accept the main character's inaction. Seriously, this is a big deal for me.

Friday Night Art Show: Greetings from Dinosaur Island

Pirate Girl



By Sarah Mensinga.

Heretic in a Balloon



By Frank Kelly Freas. [Golden Age Comic Book Stories]

Love, Atomic Robo



By Scott Wegener.

Poison in Her Well



By Annie Wu. [Warren Ellis]

Black Canary and Huntress



By Steve Bryant.

Misney



The last Marvel/Disney mash-up we'll ever need. By T Campbell and John Waltrip. [Robot 6]

Zatanna



By Michael Dooney.

Thundarr



By Otis Frampton.

Science Fiction Adventures



By HR Van Dongen. [Golden Age Comic Book Stories]

Wonder Stories



By Frank R Paul [Golden Age Comic Book Stories]

And Now the News: Gooflactus Edition

The Minnesota State Fair got in the way of my posting a news summary on Saturday, so I'm gonna catch up today and tomorrow. You may have heard that there was some really big news in the comics world last week. I figure that gets a post on its own, then tomorrow I'll mention the rest of what went on in adventure news.

If you keep up with comics blogs, this is going to be old news to you, but if you don't and are curious about what Disney's buying Marvel really means, then I'll try to sum it up. The short answer is that no one really knows. There's been a lot of speculation, but little in the way of actual information.

My own initial reaction was that this is going to be very interesting to watch. On the one hand, Marvel's been very successful lately and I'm sure that's what attracted Disney to them. I don't know why Disney would want to mess with that success very much (though there are certainly some things I'd love to see changed).

On the other hand, every time a company buys another company there are always changes and shake-ups. How will this affect Marvel's movie plans? How will it affect Joe Quesada as EiC? How will it effect Marvel MAX? How will it affect Marvel's dark storytelling style in general? (They say it won't.) Will we see some fun, Mickey vs. the Punisher specials or one-shots? How - for that matter - will it affect Boom!'s line of Disney/Pixar/Muppets comics? So many questions!

Jess and I shot some emails back and forth on the day of the announcement, wondering how this could affect the theme parks, especially Marvel's Islands of Adventure at Universal Orlando. I don't know much about Disneyland, but I can't imagine Spider-Man's walking around Disney World's Magic Kingdom. I'm guessing that if the Marvel characters do end up at Disney World it'll be in the Hollywood Studios park with other acquisitions like the Muppets. The Disney Blog has another idea: a whole new theme park, perhaps with more thrill rides.

That was about as far as I thought about it. Tom Spurgeon of course had more thoughtful reactions. As the week went on, most of the speculation would surround the movie aspect.

Of course, the Disney/Marvel mash-up jokes started immediately. I'll spare you the first ones that came to my mind because they're nowhere near as funny as the ones that other people came up with, including Adam Koford's awesome drawing above.

As far as real analysis goes, the best of it was done by Ben Schwartz and Nikki Finke. Schwartz points out that Disney's track record as a creative company can only mean good things for Marvel's comics if Disney chooses to get more involved with them. Finke keeps up with what the deal means for existing Marvel movie deals and the Universal theme park.