Comics (Obama approves of this thread)

[Gregg Popabitch]

Grant Morrison and Darick Robertson's new creator-owned book from Image is called "Happy." apparently it's something about an ex-cop hitman, who drinks, is troubled by eczema and talks to a tiny blue horse with wings. and it's about christmas.

yup. should be brilliant.

"Happy! is a story I've wanted to write since hitman Nick Sax and his 'partner' Happy the Horse appeared fully formed in my head two years ago," Morrison told Newsarama.

"I wanted to do a classic Christmas story - like A Christmas Carol or It's A Wonderful Life - but with all the junkies, killers and paedophiles which make our modern world so colourful."

Meet Nick Sax — a corrupt, intoxicated ex-cop turned hitman, adrift in a stinking twilight world of casual murder, soulless sex, eczema and betrayal. With a hit gone wrong, a bullet in his side, the cops and the mob on his tail, and a monstrous child killer in a Santa suit on the loose, Nick and his world will be changed forever this Christmas. By a tiny blue horse called Happy…

This looks terrific.

[The ILLatino]

I just read the first TPB of REVIVAL by Tim Seely and it's is creepy as fuck. It's a twist on the whole zombie thing...with people coming back from death but still being the person you remember. So I guess they aren't technically "Zombies," but anyways... That's just the basic premise, as the mystery deepens much more past that. The art is solid and it's not like anything else out right now. Image keeps winning.

[Spartan]

Finished reading the final tpb instalment of Judge Dredd: Day of Chaos. Sov-Block revenge, 375 million dead, Statue of Judgement obliterated, a 'new' Chief Judge and Ol' Dredd executing kids.

Considering the hype over the return of The Dark Judges, their involvement in this storyline was surprisingly pathetic and a complete anticlimax in contrast to all the build-up and the pandemonium occurring in Mega-City One. Otherwise, John Wagner's "last" Dredd epic was pretty great, hardly a classic but still very enjoyable.

That Henry Flint kid is good, but not a patch on Carlos Ezquerra, Steve Dillon and the legendary Brian Bolland.

[Random Sample]

I started reading again. Went into a comic store to buy my nephew a Christmas gift and I got the bug again.

Just been picking up some trades and some single issues here and there.

Saga - I can't recommend Saga enough. Such a great book. bought the first two trades and then tracked down the rest of the issues. Definitely worth the read.

Batman - Really liking the reboot of the Batman book. Snyder and Capullo do a great job. Read the first trade and I am starting the second one tonight.

Wake - pretty cool sci fi written by Snyder. Only 5 issues so far, but pretty cool. I dig Snyder's style

East of West - just picked these up, but I have heard good things. Haven't had a chance to read them yet.

Avengers - I dig the new ones.

I have heard good things about Hawkeye, but haven't read them yet.

What is everyone else reading?

[The Afronaut]

I started reading again. Went into a comic store to buy my nephew a Christmas gift and I got the bug again.

Funny that you say that. Similar thing happened to me.

I've been returning to older stuff though. I was huge fan of Batman during the aughts. Hush, War Games, Bruce Wayne: Fugative all were excellent and Im reading again and realizing why I loved them so much.







Also, Daredevil had an excellent run in the aughts as well. I havent picked those back up yet but plan to.



Reading this right now:



Im also pretty excited to read this again (got it as a gift recently):



loved it when it was released.

For me its all about Brubaker and Bendis...there are other authors that are I enjoy, but with these two I can pretty much say I'm gonna like a book out the gate. They've made me invest in characters that I didnt give a shit about beforehand.

[Random Sample]

I really like Bendis too. Been looking for his new stuff too.

[Mercuthio]

it's hipster-nerd-cool to hate Bendis now, i guess. but i actually like his All-New X-Men and Uncanny X-Men. go figure.

Brian K. Vaughan is a goddamn master of this here comic medium.

is everyone reading Saga? well, you should be reading The Private Eye too.

it's a web-digital only-thing by BKV and Marcos Martin. you can DL the issues (5 of them out now) for free, or you could not be an asshole and pay em 2-3 bucks.

it is brilliant. i shan't give too much away; but it's about le future. in 2070ish the internet is no more because of something called The Flood, in which everyone's personal shit became public. not just personal pictures and texts and facebook-stuff, but everyone's entire search-histories too. everyone ended up knowing everything about everyone.

so now, people wear disguises and shit. yeah.

anyway, read it! there's an old hipster dude with tattooes, who's got alzheimers and can't remember why he can't play games online. it is the shit.

http://panelsyndicate.com/

[Reggie]

Lotta good comics these days.

Best in superheroes is Mark Waid and Chris Samnee's Daredevil. You can get about half of the current run in trades right now. It reboots in March or April as part of the Marvel New Now! thing...same team, except Murdock is in San Francisco. Oh, and they're going to charge another buck.

Second-favorite "superhero" comic is Swamp Thing by Charles Soule and Jesus Saiz. Charles Soule is currently writing about six thousand books, all of them pretty good. Check out his indy comic Letter 44 from Oni Press, the reprint of issue #1 is a buck.

Highest recommendation at the moment is Afterlife With Archie, drawn by Francesco Francavilla and written by some guy with a complicated name I've never heard of before this. The art is just great and the story is genuinely interesting. There's lots of riffs on the Archie universe, which you can take or leave and still enjoy the book.

Honorable Mentions: Superior Foes of Spider-Man, Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky's Sex Criminals, Greg Pak and Aaron Kuder's Action Comics (only about three issues in the run, it's already really good.)

[Positive A]

Damn...forgot this thread was around. I posted this in the "it's a matter of class" forum, but it belongs here:

So I randomly got Hawkeye Vol. 1 and 2 TPB's (written by Matt Fraction, pencils by David Aja) this week and the shit is glorious. So hooked now. Trying to get my hands on more of Fraction's stuff.

Anyone know where to go next? Been doing a little searching online and the consensus seems to be "The Immortal Iron Fist" or some Iron Man stuff...

Highly recommend the Hawkeye shit though. It's great.

I'm hooked hard now.

I'm reading Bendis/Maleev Vol. 1 TPB of Daredevil for the 2000s and it's so great. Never really paid much attention to Daredevil when I was younger, but this book is really, really great.

Also reading the Green Lantern relaunch, which is decent. I'll probably stick with it for bit.

I got the Detective Comics relaunch TPB (Vol. 1) which was pretty great.

I have the Batman Night of the Owls HC story arc, but I haven't opened it yet.

Picked up that Immortal Iron Fist (which I mentioned above) which looks really great.

But this Daredevil...fuck. And I guess when Waid took over, his books was superb as well. So I need to cop those too.

Fuck. And that Frank Miller DD Omnibus that's out too? I'm fucked.

[Positive A]

Also, is anyone reading Valiant? I've been reading positive reviews about most of their titles. Rai, Quantum & Woody, Harbinger and Bloodshot to name a few...

[BigCat8]

to all of this, but I've been reading a bunch of (mostly older) stuff lately. Comics I've been enjoying this year:

-People have told me repeatedly to read The Sandman, and I finally have. And I'm hooked. It ended where it needed to, but I need more. I'm trying to read all the related stories. I've knocked out Death, Endless Nights, and At Death's Door. I'm currently working on The Dreaming and The Sandman Presents, and I'll probably wait for Overtures to be released as a trade before I work on that.

-Brian K. Vaughan was mentioned a little bit ago, and I couldn't help but be reminded of how much fun I had reading Runaways. Just a relatively simple story that relies on a variety of interesting characters.

-To touch upon a discussion I missed in the last few pages, New 52 Batman is rad. For someone who hasn't read a current storyline... pretty much ever, I think I decided to get back into it at a good time. Snyder is 3 for 3 as far as I'm concerned.

-Speaking of Snyder, the stuff him and Lemire did on the Animal Man/Swamp Thing Rotworld arc was pretty dope.

The Zero Year trade is out, and I'm waiting for that to show up at the library... but I think I need to add something else to my plate. New, old, whatever... any recommendations?

[Positive A]

to all of this, but I've been reading a bunch of (mostly older) stuff lately. Comics I've been enjoying this year:

-People have told me repeatedly to read The Sandman, and I finally have. And I'm hooked. It ended where it needed to, but I need more. I'm trying to read all the related stories. I've knocked out Death, Endless Nights, and At Death's Door. I'm currently working on The Dreaming and The Sandman Presents, and I'll probably wait for Overtures to be released as a trade before I work on that.

-Brian K. Vaughan was mentioned a little bit ago, and I couldn't help but be reminded of how much fun I had reading Runaways. Just a relatively simple story that relies on a variety of interesting characters.

-To touch upon a discussion I missed in the last few pages, New 52 Batman is rad. For someone who hasn't read a current storyline... pretty much ever, I think I decided to get back into it at a good time. Snyder is 3 for 3 as far as I'm concerned.

-Speaking of Snyder, the stuff him and Lemire did on the Animal Man/Swamp Thing Rotworld arc was pretty dope.

The Zero Year trade is out, and I'm waiting for that to show up at the library... but I think I need to add something else to my plate. New, old, whatever... any recommendations?

Fairly new back into this shit, but man...Hawkeye is pretty damn good. Fraction/Aja kill it in seemingly every issue.

[Positive A]

Also, just realized I said "great" so frequently in my post above like I was Toby from Seinfeld. My bad.

[Mercuthio]

Anyone know where to go next? Been doing a little searching online and the consensus seems to be "The Immortal Iron Fist" or some Iron Man stuff...

Yeah, Fraction is a beast. Big fan of his Iron Man run. You should give vol. 1, "The Five Nightmares", a try; excellent stuff.

But I think I might be digging his current Image stuff more than his Marvel stories, actually. "Sex Criminals" with Chip Zdarsky is just a really great story that is hilarious and ingenious and awesome.

NSFW - I guess...





Also, Fraction and (the always awesome) Howard Chaykin have a thing out called Satellite Sam, which is great too.

[Hayzoos]

Been out of the comic loop for about 4 years now. What are some of the best recent TPBs to pick up? My favorite series ever was Y: The Last Man, don't mind a good superhero story but would prefer something along those lines.

[alpha]

Planetary is not new but I loved that. Been meaning to through saga and "Locke and key."

Read the first issue of sex criminals and it was awesome.

[Positive A]

Yeah I've read good things about Sex Criminals.

I have that Y: The Last Man in five volume HC. Can't wait to get into that.

I finished Vol. 2 TPB of Hawkeye last night. It ends with No. 11, the issue from the dog's point of view. Such great stuff.

[Sucka Ducka]

Just went fucking apeshit and ordered or downloaded a bunch of stuff from this thread and that I found on Image's and other sites

[Hayzoos]

I had bought Saga vol. 1 when it first came out but never really gave it a chance. Read it today and couldn't put it down, went out to get 2 and 3 right after.

[alpha]

have you read planetary?

[907]

Has anyone read any of the Batman; Death of the Family tpb's yet? The only new 52 I've read so far is the Court of Owls stuff, which I really enjoyed, so I'm thinking that this might need to be next.

[Hayzoos]

Saga is so fucking good, BKV is the modern God of comics. Everything he does is incredible.

I want to check out Sex Criminal, but I can't find any stores that carry it.

[Positive A]

Saga is so fucking good, BKV is the modern God of comics. Everything he does is incredible.

I want to check out Sex Criminal, but I can't find any stores that carry it.

Can't wait to start reading his stuff.

If you want to order online, TFAW has everything you'll need.

http://www.tfaw.com/Search?_results_use ... pe_search=

[None]

have you read planetary?

Planetary is the best

[Sucka Ducka]

do you guys go to comic stores or buy online? Best place to buy comics online?

[Hayzoos]

Comic Stores >>>

I only buy trades at this point though, no real reason to buy single issues anymore. It's been so long since I bought/read single issues, I can't imagine having to go back to that.

[BigCat8]

Has anyone read any of the Batman; Death of the Family tpb's yet?

Yes. Read it.

The main Batman arc is awesome, and the Joker: Death of the Family trade ties up everything going on with "The Family".

Also, when it comes to reading damn near anything I want to get my hands on, the library >>>>>

[Reggie]

to all of this, but I've been reading a bunch of (mostly older) stuff lately. Comics I've been enjoying this year:

-People have told me repeatedly to read The Sandman, and I finally have. And I'm hooked. It ended where it needed to, but I need more. I'm trying to read all the related stories. I've knocked out Death, Endless Nights, and At Death's Door. I'm currently working on The Dreaming and The Sandman Presents, and I'll probably wait for Overtures to be released as a trade before I work on that.

-Brian K. Vaughan was mentioned a little bit ago, and I couldn't help but be reminded of how much fun I had reading Runaways. Just a relatively simple story that relies on a variety of interesting characters.

-To touch upon a discussion I missed in the last few pages, New 52 Batman is rad. For someone who hasn't read a current storyline... pretty much ever, I think I decided to get back into it at a good time. Snyder is 3 for 3 as far as I'm concerned.

-Speaking of Snyder, the stuff him and Lemire did on the Animal Man/Swamp Thing Rotworld arc was pretty dope.

The Zero Year trade is out, and I'm waiting for that to show up at the library... but I think I need to add something else to my plate. New, old, whatever... any recommendations?

If you dig Scott Snyder, check out American Vampire drawn by Rafael Albuquerque. Really good story. He's also doing another title for Vertigo called The Wake, the first half has a trade but you can probably just wait for the full trade (I assume this will be out in the Fall.) Drawn by Sean Murphy.

Hawkeye is good if you're reading trades. A little frustrating in singles because the schedule is wacky. I'd say you should get this from the library, though, because individual mileage may vary.

Jeff Lemire and Andrea Sorrentino's run on Green Arrow just started getting collected in trade, beginning with vol. 4. It's worth checking out for sure, I think it's pretty compelling and the layouts are fantastic. DO NOT READ VOLUMES 1-3. They are absolutely awful.

I really enjoyed the Superior Spider-Man run, most of which is out in trade. Really fun, interesting book with lots of twists. I think Dan Slott is one of the better writers in comics, his books are always paced well and he doesn't always try to blow your mind like some other writers.

But the greatest things to be released lately are pre-code horror comics from fly-by-night publishers--Dark Horse has been collecting Crime Does Not Pay, Adventures Into the Unknown! and Forbidden Worlds (and probably others) while a UK publisher has been collecting absolutely everything: the titles mentioned that Dark Horse is doing (except Crime Does Not Pay, I think), plus a dozen or more others. http://www.acgcomics.com/
Would that I were Jay-Z, I'd have them all (but then I wouldn't be Hova.) As it is, I pick these up remaindered at the used bookstore or when my LCS is having an unbeatable sale. I love these comics so much, for their crudity and experimentation. And if you were ever wondering what Frederic Wertham was going on about in Seduction of the Innocent, these are the books to read.

Yoe Books is also distributing a bi-monthly edition of horror comics called Haunted Horror. A lower-risk peek into the stuff I've mentioned, though the print quality is awful (looks like a hi-speed color printer to me.) The print quality was awful on the originals, however, so it's not a big problem.

[Mercuthio]

pre-code horror comics .

speaking of, the EC Archives published by Gemstone ( i think they are actually also published by Dark Horse now too) are brilliant. They are expensive, but brilliant.

[Positive A]

Just read the FIRST book of Vaughn's Y: The Last Man. Glorious. First thing I've read of his and I can tell that this is going to be some next level shit.

Day off tomorrow, so I'm heading to the shop and grabbing that "Saga" based on recommendations in this thread.