Month: February 2021

Comixology Sales: The Joker, Transformers, War of the Realms, Vintage Jim Starlin, Young Avengers and Image gets Romantic(ish)

This week’s Comixology Sales highlights start with a celebration of the Joker. Then Marvel highlights the Young Avengers and Ware of the Realms. Valentine’s Day is over, but we look at what’s notable in Image’s romance sale anyway. Plus, Transformers galore and that the glory that is Dreadstar.

(Disclosure: If you buy something we link to on our site, we may earn commission.)

The Joke’s on who?

DC’s The Joker’s Greatest Jokes Sale runs through Monday (3/1).

If you’re going to get one “Best of” Joker collection, you’re going to want The Joker: A Celebration of 75 Years. Being a thicker collection makes it more complete, but moreover, we don’t think you can have a “Best of” that doesn’t include the Englehart/Rogers “Laughing Fish” storyline.

For something that doesn’t necessarily come immediately to mind, there’s the Joker arc of Gotham Central, the classic GPD series by Ed Brubaker & Greg Rucka with Michael Lark as the artist for this arc.

There’s a lot more Bat-family material in this one, though we weren’t sure the Joker is integral to (or even appearing in) all the titles in this sale.

Joker: Celebration of 75 Years   Gotham Central

No love for the Old Avengers

The Marvel Young Avengers Sales runs through Sunday 2/28.

Young Avengers by Allen Heinberg and Jim Cheung: The Complete Collection is the original, formative run. And for as short as it actually was, this is a fairly influential comic with everything from the recent Empyre Event to WandaVision on streaming having echoes of it.  Oh, there’s more Young Avengers material on sale, but this is one of the times to start at the beginning.  And yes, Young Avengers: Children’s Crusade is conspicuous by its absence.

Young Avengers

Why can’t The Realms just get along?

Marvel’s  War of the Realms Sale runs through Thursday (3/4).

This was a Thor-centric Jason Aarons event. As a Marvel Event, there were a ton of spin-off mini-series that tied in. Explore those at your leisure, but this War of the Realms is the tentpole series around which the Event revolved.

War of the Realms 

More off-kilter romance

The Image Romance Sale runs through Monday (3/8).

No, Image really isn’t a bastion of traditional romance, but they do have a few things that fall vaguely into that territory.

Twisted Romance is an anthology of, well… twisted romantic tales built around a set of Alex de Campi stories with some prose and shorter comics filling in around them. Notably, there’s some intergalactic space pirate romance with Carla Speed McNeil on the art.

My Heroes Have Always Been Junkies might not be the most romantic title in the sale, but it’s good book. A entry in Ed Brubaker / Sean Phillips crime catalog (as consistent a catalog as you’ll find these days), this one concerns murder and mayhem at a high end rehab clinic.  As always, recommended if you have an itch for crime comics.

Sex Criminals is the recently completed Matt Fraction / Chip Zdarsky off-color comedy about a couple who can freeze time when they have sex and use their ability to rob banks.  OK, there’s a bit more to it, but that’s the tried and true tagline.  All but the still-new final volume are on sale.

Twisterd Romance   My Heroes Have Always Been Junkies   Sex Criminals

All Hail Megatron has transformed into an omnibus

The IDW Transformers Sale runs through Thursday (3/4).

IDW has effectively treated the Transformers line as a saga. The original run of that is The Transformers: The IDW Collection series of omnibuses and is probably a good place to start here.

Fans of a certain age might also be interested in Transformers: Classics, which is the original Marvel Comics run.

Transformers: The IDW Collection   Transformers: Classics

Thicker editions

The Dynamite Select Omnibus Sale runs through Sunday (2/28).

Dreadstar Omnibus is the first 12 issues (and story arc) of Jim Starlin’s Dreadstar. Dreadstar was Starlin’s major work between wrapping up the original Captain Marvel / Warlock / Thanos saga and returning to Marvel (proper) for Silver Surfer and Infinity Gauntlet. (Sure, he did some Batman before returning, but Dreadstar is just on another level.) It’s the tale of the last survivor of the Milky Way taking on the corrupt Church of the Instrumentality as a rebel insurgency of sorts. An absolute classic of the first wave of creator owned comics in the ’80s.

The Shadow: Year One – Omnibus is an origin tale for The Shadow and Margo Lane, written by Matt Wagner (who’s done a lot with ’30s era heroes over the years) with art by Wilfredo Torres.

There’s a lot of Red Sonja and Vampirella on sale, too, if that floats your boat.

Dreadstar   The Shadow: Year One

Still on Sale

Posted on by comics_p1pusl

Comixology Sales: Wolverine, Claremont’s X-Men, (Karen) Berger Books and DC’s First Volumes Sale

This week in Comixology Sales, Claremont’s X-Men gets the nod and “Weapon X” means Wolverine is underfoot. We root out some DC Vol. 1s that are more self-contained and find some highlights from Karen Berger’s imprint.

(Disclosure: If you buy something we link to on our site, we may earn commission.)

Let’s say it’s Chris Claremont-centric

The X-Men Legends Sale runs through Sunday (2/21). It might be a little reductionist to call it a Chris Claremont sale when they’re launching the X-Men Legends comic as a monthly, but… we know what we’re looking at here.

X-Men Forever  is Claremont returning to X-Men and picking up where he left off when he exited the title.  And you know what? It moves with a faster and more deliberate pace than the original Tom Grummett is the primary artist on the run, though Vol. 2 is notable for having some Paul Smith work.

X-Men: Legion – Shadow King Rising is a set of stories featuring Legion and the the Shadow King.  Again, this is largely a Claremont collection and notably includes the excellent Legion sequence from New Mutants with Bill Sienkiewicz.

X-Men: Mutant Genesis is where Claremont got off the airplane, the first time around. It’s the launch of the “adjective-less” X-Men with Jim Lee.

X-Men Forever   X-Men: Legion  X-Men: Mutant Genesis

Wolverine by any other name

Marvel’s Weapon X Sale runs through Sunday (2/21).  Let’s just call it a Wolverine sale, shall we? A couple things stand out here.

Wolverine: Weapon X is the Barry Windsor-Smith serial from Marvel Comics Presents that tales the brutal tale of how the adamantium got into Logan.  You want Weapon X? This is Weapon X. An influential comic.

Wolverine: Weapon X Unbound is the tail end of the Larry Hama/Marc Silvestri run.  Hama had a pretty long run on Wolverine and Silvestri was destined for Image.

Wolverine: Weapon X   Wolverine: Weapon X Unbound

DC’s V.1  sale

DC’s Start Here Sale comes in 2 flavors: Graphic Novels and Single Issues.  DC would probably like you to buy Volume 1 at a discount and keep buying the rest at regular prices. We’re cheap, so let’s talk about some volumes that aren’t the first part of sagas you’ll need another five collections of.

DC’s 1st Issue Specials is an oddball book. In the 70s, it was a sort of tryout book, although the only thing it really launched was Warlord. That said, there are some gems in here. Martin Pasko and Walt Simonson have a stellar Doctor Fate strip.  Jack Kirby has three concepts here that are worth a look. Manhunter actually sorta/presages Englehart’s use of the concept in Justice League, even if Englehart takes the ball and runs in a very different direction.  Atlas would have been an epic fantasy. The Dingbats of Danger Street — your mileage may vary on this one, but it’s an extra goofy updating of ’40s kid gang comics with a little more bite.  This one comes at a good discount, too. It’s not for everyone, but if you’re interested in Bronze Age ephemera or Kirby, jump on it.

Swamp Thing: The Bronze Age Vol. 1 is the original Len Wein/Bernie Wrightson run. It is legendary for a reason.

Green Lantern: Sector 2814 Vol. 1 is another Lein Wein project. This is his Green Lantern run with a pre-Watchmen Dave Gibbons and a pleasant run it is.

DC's First Issue Specials   Swamp Thing: The Bronze Age   Green Lantern

Don’t call it Vertigo (while anybody’s looking)

The Dark Horse Berger Books Sale runs through Monday (3/1).

We’re not saying Berger Books is Vertigo, so much as we’re saying Karen Berger is Vertigo and she happened to switch publishers.  There is a certain throughline to Berger’s editorial work.

Incognegro by Mat Johnson and Warren Pleece is a wonderful mystery/crime comic about an African-American reporter from New York sent to Mississippi in the 1920s to investigate a murder his brother’s been accused of… and he does so by “passing” as a white man.  Excellent book that moved over from DC with Berger. There’s also a second volume if you like the original.

Invisible Kingdom by G. Willow Wilson and Christian Ward is conspiracy tale about a religious sect and an intergalactic religion having some backdoor relations when they’re supposed to be at each other’s throats.  It also won 2 Eisner Awards in 2020.

The Seeds hasn’t been out much more than 6 weeks as a collected edition, but the buzz has been building on it.  Ann Nocenti and David Aja construct a strange and eerie tale of a collapsing ecosystem, an anti-tech movement, click bait journalism and aliens who harvest the seeds of dying races. We’re going to have to invoke those pretentious film students you went to college with and say the real star here is the comic’s mise-en-scène.  The non-pretentious phrasing would be atmosphere, but Seeds has so much texture to the atmosphere, it needs the fancy term to really do it justice.

Incognegro  Invisible Kingdom  The Seeds

Still on Sale

Posted on by comics_p1pusl

Comixology Sales: DC’s Odd Valentine’s Day Selections, Hellboy, Nova, Jeff Lemire and Kieron Gillen

This week’s Comixology Sales are highlighted by DC’s… unusual sense of romance, the many incarnations of Nova over at Marvel, Image’s 2020 highlights and delicate embrace of Hellboy.

(Disclosure: If you buy something we link to on our site, we may earn commission.)

Not the Nova from Planet of the Apes

Marvel’s Nova Sale runs through Sunday (2/14).

Starting at the beginning, Nova  Classic is the original Marv Wolfman series that’s probably most associated artistically with Sal Buscema and Carmine Infantino.  And yes, volume 3 does include the wrap up in Fantastic Four.

Nova by Abnett & Lanning is the series that the Annihilation event series spun out of. That would be Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning with a rotating roster of artists. This one had some pretty wild concepts, like a city made out of the corpse of a Celestial, long before Avengers Mountain was a thing.

New Warriors was team book that had a definite moment in the sun in the 90s. Nova was a member, as were Namorita, Vance Astro/Marvel Boy, Speedball and their leader, Night Thrasher.  This is a fun title most people associate with Fabian Nicieza and Mark Bagley.

Nova Classic   Nova by Abnett & Lanning  New Warriors

Image celebrates 2020 so you don’t have to

The Image Best of 2020 Sale runs through Thursday (2/25).

Descender / Ascender  are two titles by Jeff Lemire and Dustin Nguyen.  Descender is the tale of a robot cast in the form a little boy and a robot rebellion.  It is a wonderful series that earns it hype.  Ascender is the sequel series that takes things in a fantasy direction.

Die by Kieron Gillen and Stephanie Hans is the extra dark tale of a group of gamers who thought they’d seen the last of a fantasy realm they’d entered and escaped from. They were wrong.  If you wanted to look at this as a nightmare mirror of the old 1980s Saturday morning Dungeons & Dragons cartoon, that’s not a bad point of reference.  Good series.

Gideon Falls is also by that Lemire guy, with time with Andrea Sorrentino for an excellent time hopping, body possessing horror tale of which we’d rather not say more for fear of spoilers.

Descender   Ascender   Die   Gideon Falls

DC has a strange take on Valentine’s Day

The DC’s Heroes in Love Sale runs through Monday (2/15). We have to say, Birth of the Demon and Longbow Hunters miiiiiiiight not be what we’d push for a romantic theme, but your mileage may vary… we’ll forge ahead with that in mind.

Aquaman: The Search for Mera  is the beginning  of the Steve Skeates/ Jim Aparo run on Aquaman that’s gotten a lot of love over the years. In this arc (and DC didn’t have so many arcs like this in ’68) Mera has been abducted and Aquaman goes on a quest to find her that involves some fantasy tropes, the mob, Black Manta and an insurrection. It covers a lot of ground.  Since this is currently matching the print hardcover price, the sale has it at a heftier discount than most.

Mad Love is Paul Dini and Bruce Timm telling the origin story of Harley Quinn in the Batman: The Animated Series continuity. A very, very influential tale by the two best people to tell it.  Worth a look and yes, Harley’s in love.  Not in a healthy relationship, but in love.

Mister Miracle #18 is the wedding issue for Scott Free and Big Barda. After the Batman non-wedding, we thought maybe it was worth highlighting an actual wedding for Valentine’s Day? It’s Jack Kirby, after all!

Aquaman   Mad Love   Mister Miracle

Go straight to Hellboy

The Hellboy Sale runs through Monday (2/21).

Hellboy (proper) is the regular series you’re most familiar. Do we really have to say anything about something that’s widely considered a classic and has spawned a couple films, among other things?  Didn’t think so.  The Omnibus editions of this are by far your best value.  We also love when Richard Corben popped in.

Hellboy and the BPRD is a companion of series of miniseries filling in the backstory. You’ll find most of these are titled by the year and they’re working their way through the 1950s.  Tip – if the digital collected edition only has 5 issues in it, as is usually the case here, you can save a buck by getting the $0.99 single issues.

Hellboy   Hellboy and the BPRD

Still on Sale

Posted on by comics_p1pusl

Comixology Sales: Black Panther, Miles Morales, N.K. Jemisin, George Takei, Alan Moore and quite a bit more

In this week’s Comixology Sales, we start to look at the Black History Month sales, which includes some *choice* Black Panther material, Miles Morales, N.K Jemison and John Ridley at DC, plus George Takei, Alan More, Elektra, the Fantastic Four and the Black Hammer.

(Disclosure: If you buy something we link to on our site, we may earn commission.)

Wakanda Forever

The Marvel Black Panther Sale runs through Sunday (2/28).

T’Challa has been gifted with some excellent runs and superior creators over the years.  The earlier material was not as visible as the more recent adventures, so we’re going to highlight those.

The Black Panther Epic Collection: Panther’s Rage is the original Don McGregor run with art by Billy Graham, Rich Buckler and Gil Kane (among others) that really fleshes out the Black Panther cast.  This is where Killmonger first turns up, along with the original rogues gallery.  A classic.

Black Panther: Panther’s Quest is Don McGregor returning to Black Panther for a serial in Marvel Comics Presents. Gene Colan provides the art for this serial, which is a much more grounded take on the character as T’Challa sneaks into South Africa looking for his mother.

Black Panther by Christopher Priest: The Complete Collection is the Priest run (with a rotating cast of artists, particularly early on). Probably the wittiest Black Panther run, this one really runs the gamut from broad farce to thriller. It also builds firmly on the foundation from the original Panther’s Rage sequence.

Panther's Rage x Panther's Quest x Black Panther by Priest

…or you could call it a Spider-Man sale

Marvel’s Miles Morales Sale will run through Sunday (2/28).

These comics can be a little hard to keep track of because of how often Marvel’s felt compelled to give the series a new first issue.  It’s best to start with Miles Morales: Ultimate Spider-Man Ultimate Collection. This omnibus sequence starts from the beginnings in the old Ultimate Universe, where introducing Miles seemed to re-energize Bendis and set him on the path for another long character run.

Miles Morales - Spider-Man

A couple BIG writing names from other fields

The DC Black History Month Sale runs through Monday (2/8).

We seem to recall enjoying American Way when it first came out as a collected edition several years ago.  It’s a well regarded superhero saga that came out from the Wildstorm long before author John Ridley won his Oscar for 12 Years a Slave.  Georges Jeanty and Karl Story provide the art. Interestingly, there’s no collected edition in digital, so you’ll need the single issues here.

Far Sector is a Green Lantern tale by multiple Hugo award winning author N.K. Jemisin and Jamal Campbell. A rookie Green Lantern on the far side of galaxy investigates a murder in a world where emotions have been suppressed.  This series hasn’t actually wrapped up yet, but you can get a chunk of it for $0.99 a pop.

Michael Cray  by Bryan Hill and N. Steven Harris might be an odd one to pick up solo, but it’s a good one. A companion piece to the Warren Ellis Wildstorm revival, Cray is an assassin for International Operations and is leaving the bodies of the Wildstorm universe’s funhouse mirror versions of the Justice League in his wake.

American Way   Far Sector   Michael Cray

Ninja Assassin

Marvel’s Elektra Sale runs though Sunday (2/7).  Elektra’s one of those characters that’s so strongly associated with her creator, we’re also going to recommend the early material as a starting point.

Elektra Assassin is probably the artistic high point. This Frank Miller/Bill Sienkiewicz series involves Elektra and a SHIELD agent named Garrett chasing and being chased by The Beast. It’s a very subversive take on Elektra and extremely influential.

You also can’t go wrong with Miller’s original run which is contained in 3 volumes of Daredevil by Frank Miller & Klaus Janson.

Elektra Assassin   Daredevil by Frank Miller

Hammered

Dark Horse has the Black Hammer Sale running through Monday (2/8).  No, we don’t think this is a Black History Month sale. This is the much celebrated superhero tale by Jeff Lemire and Dean Ormston. It starts out with a group of heroes trapped for years in rural community and eventually builds out an entire universe around it. It’s probably best to start with the main series before branching out into the supporting mini-series.  It’s a comic that’s earned it’s way over the years.  Head up: the “regular” collections are slightly less expensive that the “library” editions.

Black Hammer

All kinds of FF on sale

Marvel’s Fantastic Four: World’s Greatest Sale runs through Thursday (2/11).

This is a challenging one to provide links for.  There are tons of digital collections crammed into long running series and you’re probably better off going through the main sale link for individual items.  But what do we like?  The Epic Editions are nice and thick. You can get the whole Lee/Kirby run there, as well as later material.  The best volume is probably The Coming of Galactus or The Name is Doom… but we’ve nothing but good things to say about the Walt Simonson run.

Past that, Fantastic Four by Mark Waid & Mike Wieringo is awfully good.

The Coming of Galactus  Fantastic Four by Walt Simonson  FF by Waid and Ringo

The inverse of “well” comics

The (IDW) Top Shelf Sale runs through Monday (12/15).  Top Shelf being an imprint IDW pulled into its orbit a few years ago with a longer history of alternative and arts comics.

The Bojeffries Saga is one of the thinner volumes we’ll recommend, but it’s one we’ve always liked.  The easiest way to describe it is Alan Moore’s British Adams Family.  Yes, Alan Moore’s pretty darn funny when he has a mind to be. This is him and Steve Parkhouse telling tales of a monstrous family.

They Called Us Enemy is George Takei’s multiple award winning memoir of his childhood in a Japanese Internment Camp during World War II. It’s co-written with Steven Scott and Justin Eisinger with art by Harmony Becker.

The Bojeffries Saga   They Called Us Enemy

Posted on by comics_p1pusl