The Comic Book Thread

[IrishNinja]

yeah, ive enjoyed some of Spencer's run on Cap (shame that Sam's book is done) but i don't know if he can carry an event. just looking forward to Marvel Legacy when things go back in august/sept or so

[noiseredux]

oh I realized I didn't comment on finishing Infinity Gauntlet. I think you all know I just post my thoughts on comics I finish on comicbooknoiseredux.wordpress.com ?

Anyway:

Whoo. What to say? So I’m still working my way (slowly) through a big giant list of 90’s books that I’m considering a bit of a crash-course syllabus. I originally started reading comics in the late 80’s and early 90’s so a lot of this stuff is either revisiting stuff I was a fan of back then, or finally getting to read the stuff I wanted to at the time. As a kid it was harder to keep up with series, so I’d just get to read random issues whenever I had the chance.

I remember The Infinity Gauntlet stuff from back then. It felt like it was this huge deal – Thanos getting all crazy powerful. My friends and I used to play that TSR Marvel role playing game back in the day and would fight over who could be Thanos. I’m pretty sure we just made up our own rules now that I think about it.

Anyway I think I maybe overhyped this book in my mind. I was so excited to read it but ultimately it felt like a slog to get through. And as much as I can appreciate the comics of this era, this one really feels like it falls into that “Too Much” category of comics from the time that I just can’t get past. Too many characters trying to do too much stuff and with too much dialogue… it all just gets so messy and hard to follow. Hard to read, even! There’s just so much stuff on each page that it feels beyond cluttered.

I also hate the writing style… I’m not quite sure how to describe it but it’s like you have a narrator that’s trying to oh so poetically describe everything that’s going on. I’m a much bigger fan of show, don’t tell. But more importantly I’m a bigger fan of Keep It Simple Stupid. I don’t feel like it does a story any service to write it as if it were a Shakespearean sonnet. I really prefer writing that feels natural and less verbose. ‘Say what you mean’ and whatever other cliches you think I should use here.

Having said all this – I want to disclaim that I didn’t hate Infinity Gauntlet. There were some great PARTS. I liked the whole thing about Thanos suffering because now matter his power; no matter what he did, he could just not gain the affections of Lady Death. The motivation there feels almost human. Unrequited love led to a gigantic war. But mostly I felt like I could have read the first and last issues and been totally fine reading this story in Cliff’s Notes mode.

I also think Adam Warlock is kind of lame, though. And I’m now in no rush to read The Infinity War.

[noiseredux]

any of you guys remember Free Comic Book Day today? My wife and I ended up picking up 36 new issues today.

[Michi]

Thirty-six? The store I go to has a limit of 4, so I end up having to drag someone with me in order to get more than that (and they usually keep at least one .)

But I got the ones I wanted and managed to pick up a couple back issues and some old game manuals to boot. So twas a good day.

[noiseredux]

no no, we got a few free ones and bought a bunch for a total of 36. haha.

[Michi]

Thanks for clarifying. I thought your comic guys were a lot nicer than mine and was a little jealous. The shop I used to go to before they closed had a limit of 6 freebies, but that was a much larger store...



I miss that store.


Anyway, I ended up with 11, including the free books. I'll have to go back some time later to go through their back issues. They just moved to a new, larger location, so they're just now getting all their stuff back out and organized. Looks like they also got a lot more books in. I look forward to browsing through them when the store's not so crowded.

[noiseredux]

I hadn't been to my shop in two weeks, so I had a lot to catch up on. I went to three different shops on Saturday. The actual FCBD issues I grabbed were Guardians Of The Galaxy, Buffy, Avatar and TMNT. My wife got the Riverdale and Betty & Veronica. Everything else was just stuff we were buying.

On that note - new Youngblood comic is awesome.

[Michi]

I've cut down my single issue buying to just 2-3 books. But I've picked up a lot of older stuff recently. I'm currently trying to pick the issues I'm missing from the original Generation X run. I actually found a lot of the later issues at the thrift store a couple months ago (which was awesome), but I'm still missing about 20ish issues.

I did pick up a couple of trades while I was away last week. One of the stores in the area was transitioning from comics to more of a tabletop gaming store (read: Magic), so all their old trades were 75% off. They were pretty picked clean, but I did get:

Batman Illustrated by Neal Adams
Lobo/Authority: Holiday Hell
Animal Man Vol. 1: The Hunt

Not really familiar with the last two (I'm trying to broaden my horizons), but for the price I figured I'd take the risk.

[noiseredux]

What current series are you following?

[noiseredux]

hey you guys, something occurred to me. I have A LOT of digital codes for comics that I never used. TBH, it's been very very rare for me to read a digital copy in the past year. MOST Marvel comics come w/ digital copies. I've been way too lazy to bother redeeming any of them. So, in an effort to get others actually talking in this thread, I'd be happy to pass some of these on to you guys. I don't have a full list, but for now let me know if there's certain series that you're interested in checking out. Or certain characters or whatever.

Also in a secondary effort to get folks reading and talking, I've got a small stack of doubles and extras that keeps growing. I'd be glad to swap my pile of un-needed comics for your pile of un-needed comics. Hit me up if interested.