Tag: Comixology Sales

Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: Batman; Vertigo; Creature Commandos; Carnage; Dark Horse Manga

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, DC has a Halloween sale with Batman, Vertigo and even the Creature Commandos. Marvel adds Carnage to the season’s sale rotation and Dark Horse has discounts on manga.

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):

A Batman + Vertigo Sale For Halloween?

Batman - Haunted Knight  Creature Commandos  Unwritten

The DC Horror and Mystery Sale runs through Monday, 10/28.

You did hear that the return of the Vertigo imprint was announced at New York Comic Con, right? Chris Conroy will be heading up that and Black Label for DC editorial and it sounds like the right things are happening with more announcements imminent.

This sale is a little bit of Vertigo, a little more Batman than necessarily fits Halloween and some superhero things that fall somewhere in-between. We’ll run down the Halloween-specific highlights, but there’s a good deal more in what’s a relatively deep sale.

  • Batman: The Long Halloween – Jeph Loeb / Tim Sale; you knew this was going to be here
    • Batman: Dark Victory – the Loeb / Sale sequel
    • Batman: Haunted Knight – This collects the Halloween specials Loeb & Sale did prior to The Long Halloween, so it’s probably the most Halloween volume of the trio.
  • Detective Comics: Gotham Nocturn: Overture – Ram V  / Rafael Albuquerque; As long as we’re on Batman, Ram V’s been doing a long form, slow burn, horror-tinged Batman run that we’re enjoying quite a bit. This is part 1.
  • American Vampire – Scott Snyder / Rafael Albuquerque; A new strain of vampire appears and we follow him through history
  • Basketful of Heads – Joe Hill / Dave Stewart; From Hill’s short-lived imprint
  • The Books of Magic – Neil Gaiman / John Bolton / Charles Vess / Scott Hampton; pre-dating Harry Potter, the ultimate destiny of a boy destined to be a power wizard is debated by Constantine, The Phantom Stranger, Mister E and Doctor Occult
  • Creature Commandos – J.M. DeMatteis / Robert Kanigher / Fred Carrillo; The original Weird War stories that inspired the new cartoon
  • Creature Commandos Present: Frankenstein, Agent of S.H.A.D.E. – Grant Morrison / Doug Mahnke & Jeff Lemire / Alberto Ponticelli
  • DCeased – Tom Taylor / Trevor Hairsine; The Anti-Life Equation gets loose and turns most of the population – including superheroes – into zombie-like creatures, while the survivors look for a way out. Shockingly good and there are more collections in the main link.
  • Deadman – Neal Adams / Paul Levitz / Len Wein / Jim Aparo / Jose Luis Garcia Lopez; The original run plus the 70s appearances (the very definition of a cult hero)
  • Death: The High Cost of Living – Neil Gaiman / Chris Bachalo / Mark Buckingham
  • The Demon ’72-’74 – Jack Kirby’s fantasy-action classic about a Demon bound to a mortal host throughout the ages
  • The Demon ’87 – Matt Wagner’s take on Kirby’s creation
  • Hellblazer – The legendary (and consistently good) Vertigo run for $3.99-$5.99/volume
    • John Constantine: Hellblazer – Si Spurrier / Aaron Campbell / Matias Bergara; This recent Black Label series is right up there with the best of the Vertigo run – which is saying a LOT
  • I… Vampire – J.M. DeMatteis / Tom Sutton; The original run from House of Mystery
  • Lucifer – Mike Carey / Peter Gross; Sandman spin-off where Lucifer leaves Hell for Los Angeles… a bit different from the TV version
  • Justice League Dark ’18 – James Tynion IV / Alvaro Martinez Bueno; That’s right, before The Nice House on the Lake; Tynion & Bueno were doing the Justice League horror title
  • The Nice House on the Lake – James Tynion IV / Alvaro Martinez Bueno; A group of friends find themselves trapped in a vacation home at the end of the world; This link is the whole series in one volume
  • Night Force – Marv Wolfman / Gene Colan; Marv’s favorite work; The Tomb of Dracula team regroups for a series about a mansion with a portal through time and space, it’s mysterious resident and the agents he sends out on occult missions
  • Preacher – Garth Ennis / Steve Dillon; As seen on TV, God has gone missing and Jesse Custer would like a word with him. Double volumes for $3.99
  • Saga of the Swamp Thing – The Alan Moore / Steve Bissette / John Totleben / Stan Woch classic run (the Mark Millar / Phil Hester run is also listed here)
  • The Sandman – Neil Gaiman and a rotating cast of artists
  • The Spectre – John Ostrander / Tom Mandrake; under the radar classic as a dead man struggles with his existence and the spirit of wrath that’s tethered to him
  • Swamp Thing – Len Wein / Bernie Wrightson; The legendary original run by Wein & Wrightson through the pre-Moore ’80s revival.
  • The Unwritten – Mike Carey / Peter Gross; Yes, that’s M.R. Carey from The Girl With All the Gifts; The son of a novelist tries to figure out if he’s really the boy-wizard from his father’s books
  • Y: The Last Man – Brian K. Vaughan / Pia Guerra; A mysterious event leaves one man alive on Earth (and his monkey). He’s looking for his missing girlfriend and the “Daughters of the Amazon” are looking for him.

More Hot Symbiote Action

Carnage  Carnage  Absolute Carnage

The Marvel Carnage Sale runs through Monday, 10/28.

If Venom has a sale (and movie), might as well have Carnage as a sequel sale, right?

This is an odd set compared with something like Fantastic Four, since Carnage has been a guest villain or mini-series dweller for part of the time, so here’s the highlights and short tour.

For early Carnage, your best best is probably Carnage Epic Collection: Born in Blood. That gets you the first Carnage tale from Amazing Spider-Man _and_ the Maximum Carnage arc. For more of those early villain and mini-series appearances, there are two more Epic Collections with their own series page.

Jump forward to 2015 and you’ll find what’s probably our favorite take on  Carnage: Gerry Conway & Mike Perkins have a run that’s got a real 70s Marvel horror flavor to it. Carnage is seeking the Book of Darkhold and is pursued by Flash Thompson in his Toxin era, Man-Wolf and the Order of the Midnight sun.

Absolute Carnage was a big 2019 Event spinning out of Venom by Donny Cates and Ryan Stegman.

Carnage then relaunched in ’22 by Ram V and Francesco Manna. This one weaves in and out of serial killer thriller / fantasy (with a trip to Asgard) / and capes.

The third volume of this series is listed separately as Carnage Reigns with Alex Paknadel tagging in as writer.

The next series of Carnage follows that up with the team of Torunn GrØnbekk & Pere Perez.

The Marvel “Maybe” Sales

Blood Hunt   Incredible Hulk  Miles Morales: Spider-Man

The trend continues. New releases at lower than expected price points and discounted pre-orders. Is this the new normal? We’re not sure, but let’s run them down.

Dropping This Week

  • Blood Hunt – Jed MacKay / Pepe Larraz – $9.99

Pre-Order for Next Week

Unannounced Sales

Astro Boy Elfen Lied Path of the Assassin

Dark Horse has a wide selection of their manga titles on sale this week. Some titles we noticed:

🤞 Don’t miss these tips!

We don’t spam! Read more in our privacy policy

Still on Sale

Posted on by comics_p1pusl

Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: Doctor Strange, Marvel Monsters, The Flash, Wonder Woman, Cyberpunk 2077

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, more Marvel Halloween mayhem with Doctor Strange and the Marvel Monsters. DC has a few more recent collected edition releases, plus Cyberpunk 2077.

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):

The Doctor Will See You Now

Doctor Strange in Strange Tales  Doctor Strange by Englehart  Doctor Strange - The Oath

The  Marvel Doctor Strange Sale runs through Monday, 11/4.

And it’s most of the Doctor Strange material that’s been collected in book form. Alas, the Masterworks are not in this sale and they’re a little further along the 70s/80s series than the Epics are.

It seems the Jed MacKay run is still being kept separate from the “regular” Doctor Strange sale. No, it makes no sense to us, either. Parts of it have been discounted elsewhere.

What’s good?  The original Lee/Ditko run is great and you can get that in the first Epic Collection. Things pick up again when Englehart and Brunner show up towards the end of the Marvel Premiere run and the whole ’74-’87 run is solid, though we have a particular soft spot for the Roger Stern / Marshall Rogers / Paul Smith material towards the end.  Yes, Doctor Strange had A list creators most of the time.  That’s your core.

Another personal favorite is Doctor Strange: The Oath by a pre-Saga Brian K. Vaughan and Marcos Martin. They’ve both moved on to bigger things, but a long run by those two would have been a real highlight.

Something under the radar?  The final Waid/Walker run is also a lot more under the radar than it should be.

Or We Could Just Call It a Halloween Sale

Man-Thing by Steve Gerber  Tomb of Dracula  Marvel Zombies

The  Marvel Monster Sale runs through Monday, 11/4.

One thing you’ll note when browsing the links is how the 70s “Complete Collections” are in the process of turning into “Masterworks” editions. We suspect that when the Masterworks are complete, the Complete Collections will be rebranded as Epic Collections.

So first, an overview of the highlights:

What’s good here? There are two titles you’ll usually hear mentioned as the top Marvel monster/horror book:

Man-Thing – three volumes get you the full run of one of Gerber’s longest running associations. He didn’t create the Man-Thing, but Gerber defined him. The final volume even catches you up on the Marvel Comics Presents serial and The Infernal Man-Thing miniseries that was published post-posthumously. There are a lot of artists tagging in and out, but prominent ones include Mike Ploog, Val Mayerick, John Buscema, Tom Sutton and Kevin Nowlan. Yes, both DC and Marvel had great swamp monster runs that kicked off at roughly the same time.

Tomb of Dracula – This one had some creative false starts, but once Marv Wolfman and Gene Colan have a couple issues to settle in and start building their supporting cast, this quickly becomes one of the most interesting books Marvel was publishing for it’s 70 issue issue run. Like Man-Thing, it’s one of the gems of the ’70s.

And for something a little more modern, there’s Marvel Zombies. The “Complete Collection” editions are extra interesting because the first one collects the Zombie dimension’s initial appearances away from the miniseries that followed. While the mini’s have occasion to float into the absurd, the initial appearances where a little more firmly in the horror world. And yes, the first two mini’s were Robert Kirkman writing zombies at Marvel.

Pride Cometh Before the Sale

The Flash  Shazam  Wonder Woman

The DC Fall Sale runs through Monday, 10/21.

A lot of the more relatively recent collections this week. Here are some things that jumped out at us, most of them at a cheap $2.99, a common price for this sale:

What’s good here?

Wonder Woman is actually something of a political thriller and King’s political inclinations flow a little better here than they have in other places as it makes a slow, deliberate march into “enemy of the state” territory.

Shazam! should be a top choice if you’re looking for something that leads with fun, as it course corrects the character back towards the classic format.

The Flash starts out with the Speed Force and then veers off in more of a cosmic horror direction. Maybe skip the very out of place Beast World tie-in in the middle of it, but stay for the strangeness and sense of wonder as the mystery slowly unspools.

The Marvel “Maybe” Sales

Blood Hunt  Edge of the Spider-Verse: Spider Society  Predator: The Last Hunt

The trend continues. New releases at lower than expected price points and discounted pre-orders. Is this the new normal? We’re not sure, but let’s run them down.

Dropping This Week

Pre-Order for Next Week

  • Blood Hunt – Jed MacKay / Pepe Larraz – $9.99

Unannounced Sales

Cyberpunk 2077   Cyberpunk 2077 Big City Dreams  The Nasty

Looks like there’s an unannounced sale on Dark Horse’s Cyberpunk 2077. A video game adaptation with an interesting award to its credit.

The first four collections can be found here.

After which, the property went to the album format Dark Horse sometimes uses for titles with a higher bookstore profile, which are listed with the single issues:

Big City Dreams was the 2023 Hugo Award winner for Best Graphic Story or Comic. And there you have it.

Also with discounts: remember  The Nasty by John Lees & Adam Cahoon? Come to find out, it’s on the New York Public Library’s list of the 50 Best New Comics for Adults in 2024.

🤞 Don’t miss these tips!

We don’t spam! Read more in our privacy policy

Still on Sale

Posted on by comics_p1pusl

Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: Moon Knight, Ghost Rider, Vampirella, Bendis @ Dark Horse

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, Marvel keeps things moving in a Halloween direction with discounts on Moon Knight and Ghost Rider. Dark Horse slashes prices on the independent work of Brian Bendis and Dynamite celebrates Halloween.

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):

The Light of the Silvery Moon

Moon Knight  Moon Knight Epic Collection   Moon Knight

The Marvel Moon Knight Sale runs through Monday, 10/14.

The original Moon Knight run is mostly in Epic Collections, but it’s in two separate links because… well, we shouldn’t be surprised by this, should we?  The first link has two volumes that are not closely related. Bad Moon Rising is the Werewolf by Night appearances through the backups in Hulk Magazine and the first issues of 1980 solo series. The other volume in that link… we’re not as big on. That was later volumes.

You can go here for the rest of the 1980 Moon Knight series, which was the most famous version for quite some time. If you came into the character through the TV series, know that the original Moon Knight was a lot closer to Batman and The Shadow. Oh, sure the werewolf showed up, but most of the mystical things around Konshu were kept in the background and a lot more mysterious. The multiple identities were originally more like the cover identities adopted by the Shadow (and the original series editor, Denny O’Neil, adapted The Shadow for DC). This is where Moon Knight got popular.

If you came in through the TV show, there really isn’t a comic that quite matches that version of the character, but the series did draw on the Jeff Lemire / Greg Smallwood Moon Knight series in which Moon Knight has a run-in with the Egyptian gods and his personalities run amok. It’s also a good run.

We also have been enjoying the current Jed MacKay/Alessandro Cappuccio Moon Knight series. This one takes up the unenviable task of rationalizing the various incarnations over the years (and there have been a lot of different takes on the character). Mr. Knight is in therapy for his multiple personality issues. He’s running the Midnight Mission and conduct himself as Konshu’s ambassador… after a fashion, although he’s not really happy with Konshu. And there are vampires. Lots of vampires.

Highlights of the rest:

  • Moon Knight ’89-’94 – Most of this is only collected in omnibus form  for the longest running volume. This is largely the Terry Kavanaugh years with Gary Kwapisz and James Fry on art. Possibly more interesting, it also includes a Bruce Jones/Denys Cowan special and a Doug Moench/Art Nichols team-up with Shang Chi. (A second volume with earlier issues just dropped, but isn’t discounted yet.)
  • Moon Knight ’10-12 – Brian Bendis / Alex Maleev; Controversial to say the least, this one really leans into Moon Knight’s multiple personality disorder and breaks the character if you prefer the original concept. On the other hand, it’s surprisingly witty and funny. One of the oddest takes on the character.
  • Moon Knight  ’14-’15- Most notable for the style-forward Warren Ellis/Declan Shalvey reworking (introducing the business suit)

The novelist corner, because Marvel has put a couple name novelists on the property:

Shouldn’t He Be “In the Sky?”

Ghost Rider  Ghost Rider  Ghost Rider

The Marvel Ghost Rider Sale runs through Monday, 10/14.

Halloween is coming, so here comes a demonic biker. Coincidence? We think not.

As a bonus, the absurdity of Cosmic Ghost Rider:

The Marvel “Maybe” Sales

The Spectacular Spider-Men  Edge of the Spider-Verse: Spider Society  Predator: The Last Hunt

The trend continues. New releases at lower than expected price points and discounted pre-orders. Is this the new normal? We’re not sure, but let’s run them down.

Dropping This Week

Pre-Order for Next Week

Putting the Bite on Halloween

Vampirella  Sacred Six  Eduardo Risso's Tales of Terror

The Dynamite Halloween Sale runs through Thursday 10/31. (Fancy that!)

The highlight here, particularly since Vampirella is one of the flagship characters at Dynamite, is the Christopher Priest / Ergün Gündüz Vampirella run. This is something we’ve been meaning to circle back to, since the collected editions slowed down during lockdown. We’ve read the first volume and it’s definitely a Priest take on the character (which we consider a good thing). A bit more continuity than you might expect and conspiracy unravelling as several longtime foes converge on Vampi.

Priest (this time w/Jae Lee & Stephanie Roux) also has a spin-off series Sacred Six (yes, we’re taking that as a pun on Secret Six), which teams up Vampi secondary characters Draculina, Pantha, Nyx and Chastity while Vampi’s mom is scheming.

Something a bit off the beaten path? Eduardo Risso’s Tales of Terror. The 100 Bullets artist does a series of horror tales, scripted by his Borderline collaborator, Carlos Trillo.

Unannounced Sales

Plants vs. Zombies  Powers Fortune and Glory

We have two more unannounced Dark Horse sales: Plants Vs. Zombies and the work of Brian Bendis.

Plants Vs. Zombies

Yes, this would be the comics adaptation of the Plants vs. Zombies video games by Paul Tobin and several artists (Ron Chan being the most frequent). And these sell better in the bookstore market than you might realize.

The omnibus editions are the best deal, but single volumes are also on sale.

Bendis

Dark Horse has a big block of Brian Bendis titles on sale. Let’s hit the numbers first:

We’d like to talk a little about the early Bendis, which doesn’t seem to be widely remembered after all his time at Marvel and DC. Bendis started out doing the full cartoonist and working on crime comics like Goldfish and Jinx.

He started getting a little more notice when he jumped over to Image for Powers w/ Oeming. Powers starts out as a police procedural in a world where super powers have to be registered (this is LONG before Marvel’s Civil War) and follows a police unit that handles “powers”-related crimes. There’s a lot of worldbuilding involved and things get quite a bit more complicated as the backstories of the main characters unfold.

Powers left Image for Marvel’s Icon imprint when Bendis blew up there and as he got deeper into Marvel, the shipping schedule got erratic. It’s relaunched a few times and seemingly lost a lot of audience momentum. Shipping schedules, have very little to do with the quality of the comic, however. It’s a good one and an influential one that’s worth dipping into the collected editions of. (And trust us, its so much easier with omnibuses where you don’t have to remember which relaunch a given issue is from!)

Also very worthwhile:  Fortune & Glory is Bendis recounting tales of interacting with Hollywood when Goldfish got optioned. It’s hilarious and multiple folks who work in TV/Film have assured us it’s frighteningly accurate.

We’d also point you to Scarlet as a more recent example of Bendis returning to that early crime vibe. It’s a strong comic.

Also with discounts:

🤞 Don’t miss these tips!

We don’t spam! Read more in our privacy policy

Still on Sale

Posted on by comics_p1pusl

Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: The Joker and Harley Quinn; Venom; X-23 (Wolverine); Marvel 2099; Dark Horse Horror

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, things move into the Halloween season. DC discounts The Joker and Harley Quinn. Marvel slashes prices on Venom, X-23 (Wolverine) and the 2099 line. Dark Horse even has a horror sale.

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):

52 Pick-Up

The Joker: 80 Years of the Clown Prince of Crime  Joker War Saga  Harley Quinn

The DC Joker and Harley Quinn Sale runs through Monday, 10/14.

Villains running wild! You’d think there was a movie coming out or something?

Let’s break this down by character, since Harley has her own life these days.

Joker

Harley Quinn

  • Harleen – Stjepan Sejic; Black Label reimagining of Harley’s origin
  • Harley Quinn ’00-’04 – Karl Kesel / Rachael & Terry Dodson
  • Harley Quinn ’13-’16 – Jimmy Palmiotti / Amanda Connor / Chad Hardin / John Timms
  • Harley Quinn ’16-’20 – Jimmy Palmiotti / Amanda Connor / Chad Hardin / John Timms (Is there a difference between this and the ’13 series? Nope. It’s all one run with a company wide relaunch in the middle.)
  • Harley Quinn ’21 – present – Stephanie Phillips / Riley Rossmo

What’s good here? We’d say get The Joker: 80 Years of the Clown Prince of Crime for O’Neil/Adams, Englehart/Rogers, The Killing Joke and Mad Love (still the best Harley Quinn tale). There are some classics in that book.

If your ideal Joker is the Heath Ledger version, Joker by Azzarello & Bermejo is your huckleberry.

For Harley, see Mad Love above and we’ve always had a soft spot for the absurdist, almost Looney Tunes take of Connor/Palmiotti/Hardin/Timms.

Spider-Juice

Venom by Remender   Venom by Cates   Venom

The Marvel Venom Sale runs through Monday, 11/4.

This is a fairly scattered sale, with multiple formats and a lot of random early miniseries floating around. Browse for a better accounting of the listings.

For the early stuff, the better values are the somewhat scattered Epic Collections.

The early (mostly) Spider-Man appearances can be found in Venom Epic Collection: Symbiosis. That’s largely the David Michelinie / Todd McFarlane / Erik Larsen material.  That’s followed by Venom Epic Collection: Lethal Protector which has a few more villainous appearances and the original Lethal Protector mini. And then Venom Epic Collection: Carnage Unleashed continues the 90s appearances.

Eventually Venom gets his own series:

  • Venom  (2003-4) – The Daniel Way era
  • Venom  (2011-3) – Rick Remender/Tony Moore, then Cullen Bunn/Declan Shalvey
  • Venom (2016-8) – Mike Costa / Tradd Moore / Mark Bagley
  • Venom (2018-21) – Donny Cates / Ryan Stegman
  • Venom (2021-present) – Al Ewing / Ram V / Bryan Hitch

Let’s talk about the last 12 years or so. The ’11-’13 series is more interesting than you might think. That’s when Flash Thompson has the symbiote and uses it (among other things) to replace the legs his lost in the war. There are some interesting pathos floating around, particularly in the Remender/Moore run.

The Cates/Stegman run is probably the most famous right now. That’s where Venom gets Cosmic and leads into the King In Black Event.

The current Ewing / V / Hitch run, Ewing is wrapping up and Ram V has moved on,  but it’s something else. Al Ewing drives the Cosmic elements, which are the most interesting part. Eddie Brock is dead. But he isn’t. He’s separated from his body and he’s bouncing around in time as his son becomes Venom in the present. It’s a much, much stranger take on Venom than most others and really dives into the King in Black mythos and timeline.

So yes, between Cates and Ewing, Venom has been a Cosmic book for some time.

The _Other_ Clone Saga

All-New Wolverine    X-23

The Marvel X-23 Sale runs through Monday, 10/7.

Laura Kinney is X-23. She’s also the clone daughter of Wolverine. Eventually, she’ll take up the mantle of Wolverine, but this sequence starts earlier than that. This can all be grouped into three titles to simplify your browsing.

  • NYX: The Complete Collection – Joe Quesada / Josh Middleton. Marjorie Liu / Kalman Andrasofszky; X-23 debuted here
  • X-23: The Complete Collection – These two volumes contain everything through the 2010 series.
  • New X-Men – The “Childhood’s End” Complete collection gets you issues #16-32; then skip ahead to V.4 & 5 to actually complete the run.
  • X-Force ’08-’12 – Craig Kyle / Christopher Yost / Clayton Crain
  • All-New Wolverine – Tom Taylor / David Lopez; Juann Cabal; Laura picks up the Wolverine mantle while Logan is “dead.”
  • X-23 (2018-19) – Mariko Tamaki / Juann Cabal / Diego Olortegui

We absolutely love All-New Wolverine. Tom Taylor runs the gamut of story types from goofy to action to borderline horror/thriller and does a ton of character development. Recommended.

76 Years Away

Spider-Man 2099   Doom 2099   X-Men 2099

The Marvel 2099 Sale runs through Monday, 10/7.

Yes, 2099 was a line for Marvel in ’90s. Spider-Man  2099 was the flagship and longest lasting of the bunch. Peter David wrote it and Rick Leonardi is the artist most associated with it. Mind you, Spidey 2099 has had scrolling revivals over the years including (and currently discounted):

What else was in the line (that’s been collected and is on sale?)

  • Doom 2099 – This collection is the Warren Ellis run with Pat Broderick and Steve Pugh as the main illustrators
  • X-Men 2099 – The beginning arc with John Francis Moore and Ron Lim
  • Deadpool 2099 – What? You don’t remember this? Ha ha! Marvel is slipping in a collection of a few Gerry Duggan / Scott Koblish issues from the ’15 run of Deadpool!
  • Marvel Knights 2099 – Robert Kirkman / Steve Epting
  • Timestorm 2009 – 2099 – Brian Reed / Eric Battle; 2009 crossover between “regular” Spidey, Wolverine and the 2009 universe
  • Secret Wars 2099 – Peter David / Will Sliney; Yes, Secret Wars had a tie-in for just about everything!

No Ravage 2099 / Punisher 2099 / Ghost Rider 2099 collections to be seen, if you were wondering.

The Marvel “Maybe” Sales

Deadpool & Wolverine: World War III  Ultimate Black Panther The Spectacular Spider-Men

The trend continues. New releases at lower than expected price points and discounted pre-orders. Is this the new normal? We’re not sure, but let’s run them down.

Dropping This Week

Pre-Order for Next Week

Something in Parabellum?
Deadworld   The Realm    Jazz Age Chronicles

The Caliber Comics Library 50% off Fall Sale runs through Thursday, 10/31.

There are a few titles here that were notable in the ’80s indie boom.

And plenty of Don Lomax war comics.

But if you want something a little more recent, Ageless might be of interest. It’s written by Torunn GrØnbekk, who’s been recently been writing Thor, with art by San Espina.

Ageless

Unannounced Sales

Grendel Omnibus  Hellboy  These Savage Shores

We have an unannounced Dark Horse on horror, or possibly Halloween. Here are a few things we noticed:

Also with discounts:

🤞 Don’t miss these tips!

We don’t spam! Read more in our privacy policy

Still on Sale

Posted on by comics_p1pusl

Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: Fantastic Four (a full run); Secret Six; Gwenpool; Golden Age Jack Kirby

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, nearly the entire Fantastic Four catalog gets a discount, plus Gwenpool. DC has an exceptionally deep bench and we go diving for hidden gems. Plus, the Dark Horse work of Tyler Crook.

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):

Four Play

Fantastic Four - The Coming of Galactus    Fantastic Four by Waid   Fantastic Four by Hickman

Marvel’s Fantastic Four Legacy Sale runs through Monday, 10/7.

So, first let’s break down the various FF titles/volumes on sale

Yes, Fantastic Four has been relaunched less than other Marvel titles.  As to what’s good, the gold standard has always been the Stan Lee/Jack Kirby run. (And yes, we do think you can draw a straight line from Kirby’s Challengers of the Unknown at DC to Fantastic Four.) We’d say they start to hit their stride a few issues before Galactus shows up – V.3 of the Epic Collections (“The Coming of Galactus“) or V.4/5 of the Masterworks editions and you can ride a very fun train from there to the end of Lee/Kirby.

And at this point, we should talk about the “pick your poison” of Epic vs. Masterworks.  The Masterworks are built out straight into the Byrne era. We think the $6.99 Epic Collections are the best value here, though some of the newer ones are priced higher. The discounted Epics are now a little past the Lee/Kirby era, but stop with #191 and then pick up again after Byrne’s run. Pick the format that works for you and has the issues you’re looking for.

Speaking of Byrne’s run, that’s the next highpoint that everyone agrees on.  How to read Byrne? Well, there are 6 volumes of Masterworks on sale (V. 21-26) or you can hop on to Fantastic Four Visionaires: John Byrne. You’d need to cut over to the Visionaries run in the middle of  V. 7 to pick up where the discounted Masterworks leave off.  These comics really ought to be in an Epic Collections, but Marvel doesn’t seem in any hurry to roll the Visionaires up into a more economical package. (Or should we say, economical when it’s on sale?) We figure the run will at least need to finish up in Masterwork format first and V. 27 is scheduled for June ’25, so there you go.

Move ahead a bit and Walt Simonson had a stint that may be a little more notable for being an early appearance of the Time Variance Authority (which actually debuted in his Thor run). This is most easily grabbed across Epic Collections V.20 and V.21.

Fast forward a bit to the Heroes Reborn era and there is a LOT to love about the Mark Waid / Mike Wieringo run. They brought back the “explorer” vibe from Lee/Kirby era that isn’t always there and upped the sense of wonder. You’d want the four Ultimate Collection volumes that start here. The “regular” collections don’t go all the way to the end.

Dwayne McDuffie and Paul Pelletier jumped in for an arc with Black Panther and Storm briefly joining the team.

And then, of course, there’s the the Hickman era. A long storyline that laid the groundwork for his Avengers run and you can certainly argue that his Secret Wars endcap to that is a Fantastic Four / Doctor Doom story. The omnibus editions we highlighted above include his FF spin-off comic that frequently crossed over with Fantastic Four, much like the Avengers titles flowed together. That packaging will be a better experience.

Universal Exports

Cosmic Odyssey  Marshal Law  Secret Six

The DC Universe Sale runs through Monday, 9/30.

This is one wide sale! Nearly 1,000 books on sale, including some deeper cuts that aren’t frequently on sale outside the holidays. This one is well worth your time for an extended browse over the weekend. In the meantime, we’re going to go through some of those deep cuts that are on our happy list that you might otherwise miss. (We figure you can find Batman without aid.)

  • Anarky: The Complete Collection – Alan Grant / Norm Breyfoggle; The Grant/Breyfoggle villain is briefly given the Joker treatment and spun off into his own series
  • America Vs. The Justice Society – Roy Thomas / Jerry Ordway; Batman’s lost diary fingers the JSA as Nazi collaborators
  • Aquaman: The Atlantis Chronicles – Peter David / Esteban Marato; OK, Aquaman is scarcely in this. This is a high fantasy about the history of Atlantis with exquisite art. Totally off most radars, but great stuff
  • Batwoman by Greg Rucka and J.H. Williams – Rucka / J.H. Williams III; Their superlative Detective Comics run introducing the current Batwoman
  • Camelot 3000 – Mike W. Barr / Brian Bolland; King Arthur returns to defend the planet against alien invaders
  • Cosmic Odyssey – Jim Starlin / Mike Mignola; Darkseid comes to the Justice League for help with something he can’t face alone
  • The DC Universe by Len Wein – One of the more important Bronze Age writers, but one who never really had long runs on a single title. Included here, a run from his fantastic Phantom Stranger w/ Jim Aparo and the DC Comics Presents sequence that introduces Mongul w/ Jim Starlin.
  • Doctor Fate – Paul Levitz / Sonny Liew; One of the better “re-imaginings” of recent times and Egyptian-mythology centric
  • Frank Miller’s Ronin – Frank Miller; Miller’s experimental tale mixing cyborgs and demons
  • Gotham Central – Ed Brubaker / Greg Rucka / Michael Lark / Stefano Gaudiano / Jason Shawn Alexander / Kano; The Gotham PD attempts to handle things without Batman; One of these days the TV version will actually go through
  • Hard Time: The Complete Series – Steve Gerber / Mary Skrenes / Brian Hurtt; When a bullying “prank” goes wrong, something metaphysical emerges from a 15 year old boy and lands him in jail with a 50 year sentence
  • Legends of the Dark Knight: Norm Breyfogle – Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 – Great big chunks of the superior Alan Grant / Norm Breyfogle years
  • Marshal Law – Pat Mills / Kevin O’Neill; Think Judge Dredd with superheroes, only much darker
  • Night Force – Marv Wolfman / Gene Colan; After moving to DC, the Tomb of Dracula team reunited for a horror series about a mansion with a portal through time and space… and its mysterious owner; Would’ve fit in at Vertigo
  • Secret Six: The original miniseries and the ongoing series – Gail Simone / Nicola Scott; Arguably Simone’s best work at DC as a group of villains go mercenary; It sort of zigs crime where Suicide Squad zags espionage
  • Seven Soldiers of Victory – Grant Morrison / J.H. Williams III / Simone Bianchi / Ryan Sook / Doug Mahnke; One of Morrison’s most creatively successful Events, told in a series of interlocking miniseries
  • Sleeper – Ed Brubaker / Sean Phillips; set in the old Wildstorm universe; an undercover operative is left out in the cold as espionage and superpowers overlap.

Jack Kirby Corner

  • Boy Commandos – Joe Simon / Jack Kirby; Extremely popular WWII era kids group
  • Challengers of the Unknown – What The King was doing at DC before heading to Marvel. Compare it to early Fantastic Four and be surprised.
  • The Newsboy Legion – Joe Simon / Jack Kirby; A crime fighting kids’ gang and their super hero “Guardian.” Kirby would revisit this in the ’70s as part of the Fourth World

The Other Side of the Pool

The Unbelievable Gwenpool  West Coast Avengers  Gwenpool Strikes Back

The Marvel Gwenpool Sale runs through Monday, 9/30.

Gwen Poole is a comics reader who woke up in the Marvel Universe… and then wackiness ensued.

The Marvel “Maybe” Sales

X-Force  Deadpool & Wolverine: World War III  Ultimate Black Panther

The trend continues. New releases at lower than expected price points and discounted pre-orders. Is this the new normal? We’re not sure, but let’s run them down.

Dropping This Week

Pre-Order for Next Week

As Seen on TV

Van Helsing

The Zenescope Character Spotlight Sale Van Helsing Sale runs through Tuesday, 10/15.

You may be familiar with the Syfy Channel version (adapted by Neil LaBute, who’s not the first name you’d think of), but in the comics version, Liesel Van Helsing is battling Dracula and his minions across the multiverse.

Two options here:

Unannounced Sales

The Crow Harrow County Omnibus 1 When Bad Things Happen To Stupid People

We have an unannounced Dark Horse sale on Tyler Crook comics, including:

Also with discounts:

🤞 Don’t miss these tips!

We don’t spam! Read more in our privacy policy

Still on Sale

Posted on by comics_p1pusl

Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: DC Teams; Thanos; The Spider-Verse; Captain Marvel; Usagi Yojimbo

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, DC discounts teams and team-ups. Marvel slashes prices on Thanos, Captain Marvel and the Spider-Verse. Plus, Usagi Yojimbo.

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):

Let’s Fight and Then Team Up

Batman and the Outsiders  Legion of Superheroes: The Curse  Suicide Squad

The DC United Sale runs through Monday, 9/16.

This is a deep, 600+ item sale that’s _mostly_ centered around team books and team-ups. Mostly. The sale page is almost completely unorganized, but it’s worth an extended browse. There’s a lot there.

Some things we found interesting and in a semblance of order? Sure, we can do that.

The OG Marvel Cosmic Sale
Avengers Vs. Thanos Silver Surfer: The Return of Thanos Infinity Gauntlet

The Marvel Thanos Sale runs through Monday, 9/16.

Thanos has become a saga, at least with the Starlin-driven material.

Avengers Vs. Thanos is a meaty ~470 page collection of the original ’70s appearances that were centered in Captain Marvel and Warlock.  You could make an argument that this is where “cosmic” Marvel was born. (It’s one of a handful of candidates.) Recommended.

And then Thanos was mostly on the shelf for ~13 years until Jim Starlin started writing Silver Surfer (with Ron Lim drawing… oh yes, those two would do some collaborating). Thanos got VERY involved in things, starting with The Return of Thanos and continuing with Thanos Quest and Silver Surfer: The Infinity Gauntlet. And yes, the first two volumes absolutely set up the famous The Infinity Gauntlet miniseries (with art by George Perez and Ron Lim).  And both of those are recommended, too.

There were two more Infinity sequels:

And a ton of supporting material.  “Infinity” and Adam Warlock were practically a sub-imprint for a couple years.

Starlin did more Thanos follow-ups over the years, culminating in a couple graphic novel trilogies:

and

And, for good measure, while not really part of the above – Avengers: The Legacy of Thanos by Roger Stern, John Buscema and John Byrne is a highly entertaining tale of Nebula (yes, the Granddaughter of Thanos who’d later be in Guardians of the Galaxy) attempting to conquer the Skrulls.

The most recent big blip on the radar was the Donny Cates / Geoff Shaw Thanos Wins and its spin-off, Cosmic Ghost Rider.

Not A Big Red Cheese?

Captain Marvel by Jim Starlin Captain Marvel Captain Marvel

The Captain Marvel Sale runs through Monday, 9/16.

Right. This one is a little goofy to define (and the beginning overlaps a bit with Thanos).

First off, the original Kree Captain Mar-Vell as Captain Marvel:

Is Starlin’s Mar-Vell, the best Mar-Vell? We’d say so. We’d also say the Englehart/Milgrom follow-up is well worth your time, but it’s not included here.

Carol Danvers as Ms./Captain Marvel:

OK… brace yourselves… this one has a ton of relaunches:

We think that’s the overly complicated chronology, anyway. For recommendations, we’re not really experts on this set of books, but we’re inclined to say go with the current Thompson run. Kelly Sue DeConnick has a very dedicated fanbase, so maybe browse the sample pages there and see if that catches your fancy, too?

Then there’s Mar-Vell’s son Genis:

This one is a Peter David joint, through and through. We did read the ’22 version last year and enjoyed it. It has a little more going on than you might think at first.

Invasion of the Spider-Riffs

Spider-Verse  Superior Spider-Man  Spider-Gwen

The Marvel Spider-Verse Sale runs through Monday, 9/23.

So, the Spider-Verse is basically a celebration of the Spider-Man cast expanding with a lot of Spidey-related characters and then throwing in some Spidey-equivalents from different dimensions. Miles Morales being the most important one, important enough to be ported into the main “616” universe when the Ultimate line was shuttered.

Spider-Verse was the original Spider-Man family event in the comics that formalized much of this. You’re best off getting the omnibus edition that has the entire thing and all the crossovers, else it gets complicated figuring out reading order between the various series-specific collections.  There are a ton of creators working on this, as you might expect, but this is effectively a Dan Slott as show-runner affair. (Which means, yes, Christos Gage is not far behind.) You can also grab the lead-in series,

If you’re a film fan, the first thing you’re probably thinking of when you hear Spider-Verse is Miles. We broke it down last week, but the  Marvel Miles Morales: Spider-Man Sale is still running through Monday.

There’s also a bunch of Spider-Gwen / Ghost-Spider material.

The original Spider-Gwen run was Jason Latour writing with Robbie Rodriguez on art.

The first series is collected as Volume 0. Then the second series is collected as Vol. 1-6, but you can get Unmasked instead of V. 4&5 and save a little money. (We warned you this was messy!)

A bit later, famed fantasy novelist Seanan McGuire (sometimes known as Mira Grant) wrote some Spider-Gwen, as the feature was re-named Ghost-Spider. The first series is here.  The second series, with art by Takeshi Miyazawa and Ig Guara, is here.

And the most recent installment in the sale is Spider-Gwen: Gwenverse by Tim Seeley and Jodi Nishijima.

And then we have a Superior Spider-Man section.

Yes, that would be the run when Doctor Octopus took over Peter Parker’s body. One of the greatest moments of “wait… this is actually good” in recent history. (Everyone we knew winced at the high concept, but the execution was on the money!)

The primary Superior Spider-Man series by Dan Slott and Ryan Stegman is best packaged in the 2-volume Complete collection, that also includes the “Dying Wish” arc that sets up the run.

Superior Spider-Man Companion gets you the first 12 issues of Superior Spider-Man Team-Up and some tie-in issues.

Superior Spider-Man (’18-’19) is the Christos Gage / Mike Hawthorne revival that returns Otto Octavious to his Spidey persona.

Of course, we all know who the real star of the Spider-Verse is: Spider-Ham!

The Marvel “Maybe” Sales

Ultimate Spider-Man She-Hulk  Venom

The trend continues. New releases at lower than expected price points and discounted pre-orders. Is this the new normal? We’re not sure, but let’s run them down.

Dropping This Week

Pre-Order for Next Week

Unannounced Sales

Usagi Yojimbo  Seconds The Hunger and the Dusk

We have an unannounced Dark Horse sale on Usagi Yojimbo.

This is Stan Sakai’s revered and long running series about a samurai/ronin rabbit. “Beloved” is a good word for it. The strange thing is, only the later volumes are showing the good discounts? Usagi Yojimbo Saga is the omnibus version and the better buy. Single volumes are here.

Also with discounts:

🤞 Don’t miss these tips!

We don’t spam! Read more in our privacy policy

Still on Sale

Posted on by comics_p1pusl

Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: Miles Morales – Spider-Man; DC’s Top 100; House of M; Groo; The Crow; Nova

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, DC drops a Top 100 sale. Marvel offers discounts on Miles Morales, Nova and House of M. Dark Horse cuts prices on Groo, along with several unannounced offerings.

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):

So Much For Top 10

Kingdom Come  Superman  Watchmen

The  DC Top 100 Sale runs through Monday, 9/9.

Top 100 what? We have no idea what the criterion would be, here. It’s a mix of recent and evergreen titles. Not a bad mix, either. A few things standing out:

Miles To Go Before I Sleep

  Miles Morales: Spider-Man  Miles Morales

The Marvel Miles Morales: Spider-Man Sale runs through Monday, 9/16.

Miles, of course, was the second Ultimate Spider-Man, but that world no longer exists and now there’s a new Ultimate Spider-Man and… we wouldn’t want to explain that to somebody walking in off the street.

For the first Brian Bendis/David Marquez/Sara Pichelli run, you’re probably best off with the Miles Morales: Ultimate Spider-Man Ultimate Collection set.

Then jump to the  Spider-Man for the ’16 Bendis/Pichelli/Nico Leaon run. (Yes, constant relaunching and it’s confusing to follow.)

Before we’re done with Bendis, there’s the very good Spider-Men series of mini-series where the “traditional” Peter Parker crosses paths with Miles. Get them both in one volume with Spider-Men: Worlds Collide by Bendis & Pichelli.

And after that wraps, it’s time for Miles Morales by Saladin Ahmed and Javier Garron.

And then, Miles Morales: Spider-Man by Cody Ziglar and Federico Vicentini. 

No More Mutants

House of M  X-Men: Reload  X-Men: The Day After

Marvel’s House of M and Decimation Sale runs through Monday, 9/9.

This would be the Event Miniseries where Wanda snaps and rewrites reality… forming the basis for the WandaVision TV series.  Brian Bendis and Olivier Coipel are your creators. This is the sort of Event where we recommend getting the main series and then dipping your toe into the supporting collections in the sale at your own discretion.  A good chunk of the Marvel line shifted their storylines to participate in the Event, buy how relevant they were to the main storyline varied widely and a lot of it would firmly be considered side stories. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it’s not always presented as such.

The “Decimation” part of the sale refers to the aftermath in the X-Men line after Wanda proclaims “no more mutants” and decimates the population. X-Men: Reload By Chris Claremont Vol. 2: House Of M by Claremont/ Chris Bachalo / Billy Tan covers House of M and Decimation in Uncanny X-Men. X-Men: Decimation – The Day After by Peter Milligan / Salvador Larocca / Roger Cruz covers Decimation in X-Men.

Corpsman
Nova Classic  Nova by Abnett & Lanning

The Marvel Nova Sale runs through Monday, 9/9.

Let’s run down the contents here:

  • Nova (1976-78) – The original Marv Wolfman/John Buscema/Sal Buscema/Carmine Infantino run
  • Nova (2007-10) – The Dan Abnett/Andy Lanning/Paul Pelletier/Kev Walker/Andrea di Vito era – the Complete Collection is the better deal.
  • Nova (2013-15) – Gerry Duggan / Paco Medina was probably the longest tenured creative team of this volume.
  • Nova: Resurrection (2015) – Jeff Loveness / Ramon Perez
  • Nova: The Human Rocket (2015-16) – Sean Ryan / Cory Smith / John Timms

What’s good here?  We’d go with the original run or the DnA run (complete with a space station carved out of a Celestial’s head – yes, the concept predates Avengers Mountain).

Theft

Criminal  Gideon Falls  Stray Bullets

The Image Summer Crime Sale runs through Sunday, 9/15.

Crime? Maybe crime, horror and science fiction? The sale’s title might be a bit reductive.

What we’d put at the top of it:

  • Criminal – Ed Brubaker & Sean Phillips; While this was their second series (after the lesser known Sleeper), their mid-00s revival of crime comics locked in Brubaker & Phillips as a long term team… and Image would soon lure them away from Marvel
  • Fell – Warren Ellis / Ben Templesmith; A creepy, surrealist detective feature and we seem to recall the plots often resembling actual “News of the Weird” newspaper columns.
  • Gideon Falls – Jeff Lemire / Andrea Sorrentino; A wild SF/horror/time travel tale of a mysterious barn that appears and disappears, always leaving a trail of bodies
  • Stray Bullets – David Lapham; This was Criminal, long before Criminal came to be. Along with AKA Goldfish and Jinx by Bendis, this was the main crime comic of the late ’90s.

The Marvel “Maybe” Sales

X-Men Ultimate Spider-Man

The trend continues. New releases at lower than expected price points and discounted pre-orders. Is this the new normal? We’re not sure, but let’s run them down.

Dropping This Week

Pre-Order for Next Week

Robbin’

Robyn Hood  Robyn Hood  Robyn Hood

The Zenescope Character Spotlight Sale – Robyn Hood Sale  runs through Sunday, 9/22.

This sale is in three flavors with three links:

Looks like the Omnibus is cheaper than the collected editions and the collected editions are cheaper than the single issues, but you can double check that on individual collections. 99-cent single issues make that easy.

And yes, those really are Chuck Dixon and Howard Mackie on runs towards the bottom of the listings.

Possible Oni Sales

OK… you might remember this drill from the distant past. Oni’s had two sales listed for a couple of days. They don’t look like sale prices to us. Maybe that gets fixed at some point, but that’s what we’re seeing at the moment.

Unannounced Sales

The Crow  Groo  Barbaric

Over at Dark Horse, everyone’s favorite stupid barbarian is on sale. Yes, that’s right… it’s Groo by Sergio Aragones and Mark Evanier!

And taking a wider view:

🤞 Don’t miss these tips!

We don’t spam! Read more in our privacy policy

Still on Sale

Posted on by comics_p1pusl

Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: X-Force; Winter Soldier; Gillen at Marvel; Kirby at DC

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, Marvel drops prices on X-Force, Winter Soldier and the work of Kieron Gillen. DC highlights some deeper cuts in the catalog (and Jack Kirby). Oni may or may not be having a sale.

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):

Paths Less Taken

Far Sector  Omega Men  Orion

The DC Summer Sizzle Sale runs through Monday, 8/26.

And this week, DC’s mix of titles has a LOT of what we’d call “under the radar” books, many of which are featured a little less frequently. Fortunately, this is firmly in our wheelhouse to navigate.

Some highlights:

  • Checkmate – Greg Rucka / Jesus Saiz; Rucka’s take on the intersection of spies and superheroes
  • DC: The New Frontier – Darwyn Cooke’s look at the dawn of the Silver Age isn’t really under the radar, but it’s a truly great comic.
  • Deathstroke – Christopher Priest / Carlo Pagulayan; Missing the Titans crossovers, but this is a smart comic about villain that makes few bones about it.
  • Far Sector – N.K. Jemisin / Jamal Campbell; Superior worldbuilding as a new Green Lantern with an experimental ring investigates the first murder in living memory on a world without feelings. You could count Jemisin’s SF/F awards, but you’d need some time on your hands.
  • Flex Mentallo: Man of Muscle Mystery – Grant Morrison / Frank Quitely; An even further-out-there delight & Doom Patrol spin-off that, for legal purposes, has NOTHING to do with Charles Atlas ads…
  • Freedom Fighters: Rise of a Nation – Robert Venditti / Eddy Barrows; Just a very well done reworking of the original Freedom Fighters concept. Very under the radar, but we really enjoyed it. (Would work as an Elseworlds or Black Label.)
  • Jonah Hex – Jimmy Palmiotti, Justin Gray and an absurd rotation of high end artists; Fun westerns, some arcs, some done in one
  • Omega Men – Tom King / Barnaby Bagenda; Before he blew up, King penned this meditation on line between terrorism and freedom fighters, which is arguably a Green Lantern tale (Kyle Rayner). Often overlooked.
  • Orion – Walt Simonson’s entry in the New Gods saga. We liked it as much as his Thor, which is to say, a lot! Totally under most radars.

Kirby Korner

A good chunk of the King’s DC work is on sale:

Forced Entry

X-Force X-Force X-Force

The Marvel X-Force Sale runs through Monday, 8/26.

Yes, the mutant black ops team, as originally established by Cable (and morphing out of New Mutants). There absolutely have a been a few incarnations and relaunches over the years. Let’s start out with an overview of that:

  • X-Force ’91-’02 – Originally Rob Liefeld & Fabian Nicieza with Greg Capullo tagging in early on. The first edition, if you will.
    • Counter-X: X-Force – From the period when Warren Ellis was showrunning some of the X-titles, by Ian Edgington & Jorge Lucas
  • Uncanny-Force ’10-’12 – Rick Remender and rotating roster of Raphael Albuquerque, Esad Ribic, Jerome Opena, Billy Tan and Phil Noto
  • Uncanny X-Force ’13-’14 – Sam Humphries / Ron Garney / Dalibor Talajic
  • Deadpool vs. X-Force ’14 – Duane Swierczynski / Pepe Laraz
  • X-Force ’19-’24 – Ben Percy / Joshua Cassara / Robert Gill

What’s good? Our top pick is the Remender Uncanny-Force. Black ops and a wide ranging, but complete story unit when taken as a whole. We’re also fans of the Ben Percy / Krakoa era X-Force.  If you want something off-beat, start here for the Milligan/Allred run, which is a satire.

Journey into Gillen

Darth Vader  Journey Into Mystery  Sins of Sinister

The Marvel Kieron Gillen Sale runs through Monday, 8/26.

Yes, has has written quite a bit for Marvel over the years. Our favorites? An absolutely brilliant turn on Darth Vader with Salvador Larocca and his evil Star Wars analogue of Indiana Jones, Doctor Aphra w/Kev Walker. When the glass cracks in his Vader run… well, see for yourself. Great moment.

So let’s start out with a cleaner recap of the major items in this sale:

What’s good?  This one’s going to be more personal preference than with many sales and to that end, we’d definitely say Immortal X-Men and particularly Sins of Sinister, which was as good as X-Men Event as there’s been… but needs context from Immortal and the X-line of books. Past that, Journey Into Mystery is where Gillen really popped onto the Marvel radar, Young Avengers is the familiar team of Gillen/McKelvie and Gillen’s Mr. Sinister in Uncanny X-Men definitely has had influence.

The Sidekick in Winter

Captain America  Winter Soldier  The Winter Soldier: The Bitter March

The Marvel Winder Soldier Sale runs through Monday, 8/26.

This is a slightly odd sale, in that it encompasses most – but apparently not all – of Ed Brubaker’s Captain America run and then several miniseries and abortive attempts at an ongoing series… including a few creator names you’ll recognize.

The originating storyline runs in the 2004 series of Captain America by Ed Brubaker and a rotating squad of artists including Steve Epting, Michael Lark, Butch Guice and Mike Perkins. There are a couple omnibuses available, but this doesn’t really have a definitive larger collection like, say, the Hickman Avengers era.

Note: if you’re going to read the Winter Soldier saga, you’re going to need Captain America: Reborn, the Ed Brubaker /Bryan Hitch mini-series that wraps up the “Death of Captain America” sequence.

For solo series, the first choice is Winter Soldier by Ed Brubaker, which is Brubaker and Butch Guice in a spin-off.

Also of possible interest:

The Marvel “Maybe” Sales

Resurrection of Magneto  Cable: United We Fall  Avengers: Twilight

The trend returns after a short break. New releases at lower than expected price points and discounted pre-orders. Is this the new normal? We’re not sure, but let’s run them down.

Dropping This Week

Pre-Order for Next Week

Possible Oni Sales

OK… you might remember this drill from the distant past. Oni’s had two sales listed for a couple of days. They don’t look like sale prices to us. Maybe that gets fixed at some point, but that’s what we’re seeing at the moment.

Unannounced Sales

Apex Legends  Anthem

Dark Horse has a couple of their video game adaptations showing up discounted:

🤞 Don’t miss these tips!

We don’t spam! Read more in our privacy policy

Still on Sale

Posted on by comics_p1pusl

Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: Image Comics Returns; X-Men; Moon Knight; Green Arrow; Minor Threats

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, Image Comics returns to the discount listing for the first time in a year. DC offers sale prices on some more recent titles like Green Arrow. Marvel cuts prices on Moon Knight, X-Men, and Avengers vs. X-Men. Plus, Minor Threats.

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):

Holy Crap! Image Is Back?!?

Black Magick  Chew  Nailbiter

The Hooked on Image Comics Sale runs through Thursday, 8/29.

We get a lot of questions about why Image hasn’t had any sales lately. Interestingly, this is right about when Image resurfaced for a few weeks of sales in mid-August 2023. Um, ’tis the season?

This is a rather small and… almost alphabetical slice of Image?

Things we’ve read and can happily recommend:

  • Black Magick – Greg Rucka / Nicola Scott; a police detective who happens to be a witch has her worlds collide. What were Rucka and Scott doing before the Wonder Woman relaunch? This.
  • Cassanova – Matt Fraction / Gabriel Ba; Extra trippy adventures with a dimension-hopping thief caught up in a conspiracy with a very Jerry Cornelius vibe to it.
  • Chew – John Layman / Rob Guillory; Absurdist adventures in a world where eating chicken is outlawed with a federal agent who experiences the sense of what he eats. So if he ate your thumb, he’d know where it had been. Black humor abounds, as to vampires and a death-dealing rooster. It’s a favorite. Layman’s now working on Spawn and Titans. This is the book that really launched Layman.
  • Nailbiter – Josh Williamson / Mike Henderson; Why does a small town in Oregon produce so many serial killers? A federal agent descends upon the town with one of those prodigal serial killers in tow, looking to find out. One of the things Williamson was doing before Superman and GI Joe took over his hours.

And By Recent, We Mean Within 5 Years

Danger Street  Green Arrow  The Sandman Universe: Nightmare Country

The DC Recent Hits Sale runs through Monday, 8/19.

It does have some new releases in it, though. More importantly, there are plenty of $2.99 collected editions. Let’s work through some highlights.

X-Men: The Glory Years

X-Men Epic Collection: The Sentinels Live   X-Men: The Fate of the Phoenix  

The Marvel X-Men Masterworks/Epic Collections Sale runs through Monday, 8/26.

To paraphrase The Blues Brothers, “We’ve got both kinds, Epics and Masterworks.”

Which is to say this is all contained in the original X-Men series link.

Pick your preferred format. In general, the Epics have a more pages and end up being more bang for your buck… although the more recent Masterworks have been pretty thick volumes.

From a pragmatic standpoint, the Masterworks volumes have everything in order through issue #243 (Uncanny X-Men Masterworks Vol. 16 – which covers Inferno).

The Epic Collections exist in order through #198… and then they start jumping ahead to Jim Lee / Whilce Portacio era. If you’re looking for 90s X-Men, you want the Epics.

If you’ve never tried the original X-Men, we’d say go with The Sentinels Live Epic Collection. It’s at the very tail end of the original run that the original X-Men run is at its best: a bit of Jim Steranko and then a Roy Thomas / Neal Adams sequence that ended all too quickly.

For the “new” X-Men, we’re cool with the theory that Giant-Sized X-Men #1 / Uncanny X-Men #94 through #200 is one big arc. That’s where we’d start if we were new. The Epic Collections stop at #198 before jumping ahead and that’s super annoying. #200 is a landmark issue.

The Light of the Silvery Moon

Moon Knight  Moon Knight Epic Collection   Moon Knight

The Marvel Moon Knight Sale runs through Monday, 1/29.

The original Moon Knight run is mostly in Epic Collections, but it’s in two separate links because… well, we shouldn’t be surprised by this, should we?  The first link has two volumes that are not closely related. Bad Moon Rising is the Werewolf by Night appearances through the backups in Hulk Magazine and the first issues of 1980 solo series. The other volume in that link… we’re not as big on. That was later volumes.

You can go here for the rest of the 1980 Moon Knight series, which was the most famous version for quite some time. If you came into the character through the TV series, know that the original Moon Knight was a lot closer to Batman and The Shadow. Oh, sure the werewolf showed up, but most of the mystical things around Konshu were kept in the background and a lot more mysterious. The multiple identities were originally more like the cover identities adopted by the Shadow (and the original series editor, Denny O’Neil, adapted The Shadow for DC.) This is where Moon Knight got popular.

If you came in through the TV show, there really isn’t a comic that quite matches that version of the character, but the series did draw on the Jeff Lemire / Greg Smallwood Moon Knight series in which Moon Knight has a run-in with the Egyptian gods and his personalities run amok. It’s also a good run.

We also have been enjoying the current Jed MacKay/Alessandro Cappuccio Moon Knight series. This one takes up the unenviable task of rationalizing the various incarnations over the years (and there have been a lot of different takes on the character). Mr. Knight is in therapy for his multiple personality issues. He’s running the Midnight Mission and conduct himself as Konshu’s ambassador… after a fashion, although he’s not really happy with Konshu. And there are vampires. Lots of vampires.

Highlights of the rest:

  • Moon Knight ’89-’94 – Most of this is only collected in omnibus form  for the longest running volume. This is largely the Terry Kavanaugh years with Gary Kwapisz and James Fry on art. Possibly more interesting, it also includes a Bruce Jones/Denys Cowan special and a Doug Moench/Art Nichols team-up with Shang Chi. (A second volume with earlier issues drops in October.)
  • Moon Knight ’10-12 – Brian Bendis / Alex Maleev; Controversial to say the least, this one really leans into Moon Knight’s multiple personality disorder and breaks the character if you prefer the original concept. On the other hand, it’s surprisingly witty and funny. One of the oddest takes on the character.
  • Moon Knight  ’14-’15- Most notable for the style-forward Warren Ellis/Declan Shalvey reworking (introducing the business suit)

The novelist corner, because Marvel has put a couple name novelists on the property:

Friday Night Fights

Avengers Vs. X-Men A.X.E. Judgement Day

The Marvel AvX & A.X.E. Sale runs through Monday, 8/19.

And by “AvX,” they mean Avengers vs. X-Men. “Go along to get along” doesn’t necessarily apply here.

The “primary” Avengers Vs. X-Men was an Event back in ’12 with all sorts of creators contributing to it. Were there tie-in books? It’s Marvel, so there were plenty. Avengers vs. X-Men: VS was essentially the “all-fights” series.

Also included is the more recent A.X.E.: Judgment Day, the Kieron Gillen/Valerio Schiti – driven Event that crossed over Avengers, X-Men and The Eternals.

The Marvel “Maybe” Sales

Beware the Planet of the Apes  Resurrection of Magneto  Cable: United We Fall

The trend returns after a short break. New releases at lower than expected price points and discounted pre-orders. Is this the new normal? We’re not sure, but let’s run them down.

Dropping This Week

Pre-Order for Next Week

Unannounced Sales

Minor Threats  Daisy

That Patton Oswalt guy has recently been seen in comic shops promoting his “Minor Threats” franchise. Guess what’s on sale?

Also from Dark Horse:

  • Daisy – Colin Lorimer
  • UXB – Colin Lorimer

🤞 Don’t miss these tips!

We don’t spam! Read more in our privacy policy

Still on Sale

Posted on by comics_p1pusl

Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: X-Factor; Star Wars: The High Republic; Scarlet Spider; Aliens; Predator; Avatar: The Last Airbender

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, Marvel discounts Aliens, Predator, X-Factor, Scarlet Spider and Star Wars: The High Republic. Dark Horse cuts the price on Avatar the Last Airbender. Batman’s still on sale, plus some more unannounced discounted items.

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):

The Mutant Variable

X-Factor by Peter David   X-Factor by Peter David   X-Factor

The Marvel X-Factor Sale runs through Monday, 8/12.

This one’s a little different from most of the Legacy sales in that it’s mainly a Peter David X-Factor sale. Let’s walk through that.

Of the original X-Factor run, you’re really looking at the Epic Collections, here. While the book started out with Bob Layton/Butch Guice, Louise & Walt Simonson tagged in and had one of the defining runs on the book. A bit later, Peter David started his first run, which had Joe Quesada and Larry Stroman as part of the artist rotation, while it was definitely funnier, this was still basically the original X-Factor setup, just tweaked a little.

When people think of Peter David and X-Factor, the run they’re most likely thinking of is the 2005-13 run that starts out with Madrox (The Multiple Man) opening a detective agency. Yes, this is the run where Layla Miller knows stuff. (If you know, you know.)

Technically, this all started in the Madrox mini-series, originally under the Marvel Knights banner.

There are also two X-Factor by Peter David: The Complete Collection  volumes. Vol. 1 is the original Madrox mini-series and X-Factor 1-12. Vol. 2 collects #13-24, 28-32 and two specials. You can save a couple bucks there.

There was also a ’14-’15 X-Factor relaunch by David and Giuseppe Camuncoli. This sale is all about the Peter David runs!

Out from under the shadow of Mr. David, there are two other notable titles in the sale.

Back in 2010, X-Factor Forever saw Louise Simonson returning to the situation as she left it on the book (prior to Peter David taking over) along with Dan Panosian.

And then, in the aftermath of House of X / Powers of X, Leah Williams and David Baldeon relaunched X-Factor as the mutants who investigate the circumstances of death and missing persons for Krakoa.

Not of this Earth

The Marvel Aliens & Predators Sale runs through Monday, 8/12.

Predator versus Wolverine  Alien  Aliens

It’s probably best to divide this into the Marvel section and the Dark Horse section.

On the Marvel side of the fence, there are two big winners, we’ll happily point you to.

Predator Vs. Wolverine by Ben Percy / Ken Lashley / Andrea Di Vito / Greg Land is exactly what it sounds like… except that it’s actually very enjoyable. You’d think this would be a trite cash-in, but that’s not the case. Predator Vs. Wolverine in a vendetta-ish scenario across the years. $2.99 even qualifies as Cheap!

The Philip Kennedy Johnson Alien sequence (V.1 & 2 here; then V. 3 here — yeah, we know… comics publishers need to work on the meta data) with Salvador Larroca, followed by Julius Ohta; is essentially one winding tale of Weyland-Yutani Corporation conspiracies that starts out with hiding a few of those eggs that couldn’t possibly get out of control, moves on to interstellar pioneers and religion, then comes back to the living conditions of rogue androids. Effective slow burn storytelling.

Also on the Marvel side:

  • Declan Shalvey’s Alien run
    • V.1 w/ Andrea Broccardo
    • V.2 w/Danny Earls
  • Ed Brisson’s Predator run
    • V.1 w/ Kev Walker
    • V.2 w/ Netho Diaz

From the original Dark Horse material:

Spiders

Spider-Man: The Complete Clone Saga Epic Spider-Man: The Complete Ben Reilly Epic Spider-Geddon

The Marvel Ben Reilly and Kaine – Scarlet Spiders Sale runs through 8/12.

Yes, it’s a clone sale! Let’s take this roughly in order.

Your Clone Saga choices are:

After the Clone Saga, Ben Reilly takes over as the Scarlet Spider (for about a year). That’s collected in:

Then in ’12 (spinning out of Spider Island, which isn’t in the sale), Kaine takes over for:

Then we pop back to Amazing Spidey in ’16 for a storyline

Then back to a solo book:

Then an Event:

Then a solo mini:

And finally, Ben Reilly is mixed up in another Event:

See? Nothing complicated about all those clones! <If you have a cheat sheet, that is.>

How High?

Star Wars: The High Republic   Star Wars: The High Republic - Season 2   Star Wars: The High Republic - The Blade

The Marvel Star Wars: High Republic Sale runs through Monday, 8/12.

For the uninitiated, this is a time period set “a long time ago” relative the first two film trilogies.

What are we looking at here?

The Marvel “Maybe” Sales

Beware the Planet of the Apes  Resurrection of Magneto

The trend returns after a short break. New releases at lower than expected price points and discounted pre-orders. Is this the new normal? We’re not sure, but let’s run them down.

Pre-Order for Next Week

Unannounced Sales

Avatar: The Last Airbender  The Blue Flame  Verse

BATMAN

Last week’s big and cheap Batman sale is still going on through Monday evening.

🤞 Don’t miss these tips!

We don’t spam! Read more in our privacy policy

Still on Sale

Posted on by comics_p1pusl