Air Archives - Comics.Cheap

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, DC says school’s out for summer and Dark Horse discounts the whole line.

Where did the New Releases and Sale pages go?

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

In case you’re having troubles with the new UIX (a LOT of people have been):

Note: Since most of the sales are ending Monday, we _think_ things will be a little more normal, come Tuesday. We’ve been raising our eyebrow at how they’ve been timing the last few weeks of sales, too.

<Insert Alice Cooper Lyrics Here>

The DC Summer Vacation Sale runs through Monday, 7/10.

This is a standard DC misc. sale, so let’s look for the sweet spot of a lower price and better material on a few things.

American Vampire is where Scott Snyder first came to prominence over at DC (back when they still had Vertigo). Along with Rafael Albuquerque (and an opening with Stephen King), this is the story of a new breed of… that’s right American vampire, as something goes horribly wrong out West and sticks around. $4.99/volume for

Batman: Prey collects a pair of Hugo Strange arcs from Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight by longtime Batman writer Doug Moench and his old Master of Kung Fu partner, Paul Gulacy.

The Challengers of The Unknown by Jack Kirby is something of an oddity. This was a hit for DC in that brief period before Kirby left for Atlas/Marvel. The really interesting thing about this book is how much it feels like early Fantastic Four… except this was 1957 (instead of ’61) and isn’t quite superheroes. This was out of print long enough that most people don’t realize how similar the titles were.

The Omega Men by Tom King and Barnaby Bagenda was King’s DC debut. It’s a particularly dark tale where Kyle Rainer (operating as the White Lantern at this point in continuity) is kidnapped by the Omega Men, a group that might be terrorists, might be freedom fighters or perhaps both? In some ways, it’s closer to his Sheriff of Baghdad than his Batman.

New Teen Titans by Marv Wolfman and George Perez was one of DC’s shining lights of the early to mid-80s and is generally regarded as a classic. $4.99/volume through V.7, which happens to be “The Judas Contract.”

Anything Goes

The Dark Horse Everything Digital Sale runs through Monday, 7/31.

We should probably talk about this before diving in. This appears to be a line-wide sale. HOWEVER, only titles beginning with A-F are displayed on the sale page.

We know what you’re about to ask – is this another programmer error or are they going to change the page and display G-L next week? We don’t have an answer to that.

A few browsing options for the rest of the alphabet (Amazon doesn’t have an alphabetical sort available for normal listings, so we’re going to have to improvise):

Amazon’s “explore Dark Horse” page isn’t perfect, but you get some sorting options in the left hand column.
If you want to jump to the main Hellboy series.
Neil Gaiman titles
Umbrella Academy
Jeff Lemire titles

For the moment, we’re going to operate under the assumption that this was mislabeled and G-L (or a similar range) will appear next week for easier browsing.

So what’s good that’s on display in this chunk of titles?

Air – G. Willow Wilson and M.K. Perker collaborated on this criminally under-rated adventure into the unknown featuring an air hostess, terrorists, dimension hopping and celebrities who were supposed to be deceased.

Alice in Sunderland: An Entertainment – The very unusual masterpiece by Bryan Talbot that explores the origins of Alice in Wonderland and the English town of Sunderland. It’s a bit hard to describe, but it works very well.

Baltimore – Mike Mignola, Christopher Golden, Ben Stenbeck and Peter Bergting collaborate on an epic tale of how a plague is released at the end of WWI and the solider who’s hellbent on vengeance against the vampires behind it.

Blacksad – Juan Diaz Canales and Juanjo Guarnido bring you this jaw-dropping anthropomorphic hardboiled detective series about detective John Blacksad. These are tales from the Hammett/Chandler school with some of best art you’ll see. Click on the sample pages, don’t just take our word for it.

Concrete – Paul Chadwick’s old school, multi-award winning series about a man who becomes encased in a shell of alien rock (which he can’t escape) and the accidental celebrity that follows it.

Finder – Carla Speed O’Neil’s aboriginal science fiction series is all about world building. Much of it following Jaeger, a “Finder” who can most anything and navigate his way almost anywhere… as well as being a sin-eater. Another criminally underappreciated series. Note: Finder: Chase the Lady is mislabeled as a single issue and not listed with the graphic novels.

Still On Sale

The Marvel Secret Invasion Sale runs through Monday, 7/10
The Incredible Hulk Legacy Sale runs through Monday, 7/10
The Marvel Nick Fury and Agents of SHIELD sale runs through Monday, 7/10
The Zenescope $5 Graphic Novel Sale runs through Sunday, 7/23
Kodansha Manga Summer School – S.T.E.M. Sale runs through Monday, 7/10
The Media Do Romance and Fantasy Sale runs through Sunday, 7/23

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, Marvel has discounts on a LOT of Thor titles, and Cable, too. Dark Horse favors dropping the price on the Berger Books line.

Where did the New Releases and Sale pages go?

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

In case you’re having troubles with the new UIX (a LOT of people have been):

Hammer Time

Marvel’s Thor Legacy Sale runs through Tuesday, 3/21.

As per our custom, here’s the breakdown by series/volume:

Journey Into Mystery ’52-’66 – The earliest Thor stories from Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
The Mighty Thor ’66-’96 – From Lee & Kirby until the relaunches started
The Mighty Thor ’96-’04 – The Heroes return Dan Jurgens era, initially with John Romita, Jr.
Thor ’07-’11 – Starts with J. Michael Straczynski & Olivier Coipel, ends with Matt Fraction & Pasqual Ferry. Gillen in the middle.
The Mighty Thor ’11-’12 – Fraction gets a relaunch with Coipel, Ferry and early Pepe Larraz
The Jason Aaron era ’12-’19 – It’s a LOT easer to look at the omnibuses across all the relaunches here
Thor ’20 to present – The current Donny Cates run with Nic Klein as the primary artist

Of your point of reference for Thor is the most recent film, you want the Jason Aaron era. The God Butcher is the first arc. If you go with that set of omnibuses, Jane Foster picks up the hammer in V.2. We don’t think that starting with the first Jane Foster issues (and slimmer volumes) is a great jumping on point. It’s a saga and you’ll get a lot more out of it if you start at the beginning of Aaron’s run.

Past that, we’re all about the Walt Simonson Thor. It’s probably the most influential run since early days and it’s great. You’ll want the Thor Visionaries: Walter Simonson set that starts here. (The Thor by Walter Simonson version of the reprints seems to be missing the final volume, or at least the last few issues. *sigh* These things happen.)

We also like to go back to the original Lee/Kirby. Not too early. We’d say stay closer to where it changed from Journey Into Mystery to Thor. The first year of JIM was a little rough. The Wrath of Odin Epic Collection is a good chunk of prime Lee/Kirby Thor and also features the first time Jane Foster was elevated to godhood, since Jane is a big topic right now. It’s also a $6.99 Epic Collection note: the Epic Collection prices vary a bit and the newer ones a little more expensive, so keep an eye on that and compare with the Masterworks editions.

No, This is Not a Spectrum Sale

The Marvel Cable Sale runs through Tuesday, 3/21

There really have been a lot of Cable titles over the years.

The original Cable series was the longest-lived. It starts out as Cable Classic with the original mini’s, but we might lean a little further down the page – Ladronn art and early stories by Joe Casey and James Robinson.

The other long-running title was Cable & Deadpool. Fabian Nicieza was the writer, with Patrick Zircher and Reilly Brown as the primary artists.

The most recent Cable was the HoX/PoX era series by Gerry Duggan and Phil Noto which finds Cable much younger, but still up to his neck in time paradoxes.

Karen Sale

The Dark Horse Berger Books Sale runs through Monday, 3/20.

As you may recall Berger Books is Karen Berger’s imprint. Karen basically was Vertigo at DC. Berger Books is a combination of new material and pulling in a few of the old DC titles. For example:

Air is a pre-Ms. Marvel series by G. Willow Wilson and M.K. Perker that ran at Vertigo awhile back. It’s an odd book about a flight attendant, terrorists, dimension hopping, missing celebrities and all manner of conspiracies. It’s a fun one that didn’t get the run it should have at Vertigo and we sure hope there’s a continuation.

Along those lines, Incognegro by Mat Johnson and Warren Pleece is the excellent tale of a New York-based reporter passing for white, in order to investigate accusations that his brother murdered a white woman in Mississippi… as the lynch mob assembles. In this case, there was a continuation. Technically a prequel. Incognegro: Renaissance has cub reporter Zane Pinchback investigating a murder in 1920s Harlem.

Something totally new from the line? Seeds by Ann Nocenti and David Aja is a striking book. This one blends a lot of disparate elements: an extra-terrestrial occupation, ecological terraforming, terrorism, forbidden love and… well, you get the picture.