Tag: Halloween

Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: DC’s Halloween Sale; Venom; Miles Morales: Spider-Man; She-Hulk

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, DC launches its Halloween sale. Marvel drops a discount on Venom, Miles Morales and She-Hulk.

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):

DC’s Halloween Sale

The DC Horror and Mystery Sale runs through Monday, 10/30.

We’re not sure why this isn’t being called a Halloween sale. If looks like a duck and it quacks like a duck and it’s October, it’s probably a vampire duck.

That said, this a quality sale with lots of $2.99 collected editions to satisfy your thrifty needs. It’s worth a browse. Since there’s so much good stuff and it’s a two week sale, we’ll go over the highlights of A-Hellblazer this week and hit the back half of the alphabet next week.

Things that caught our eye as interesting:

What’s good here? All of the above.

A bit of recent news you might not have heard of yet. Regular readers will know the high esteem we hold the  Spurrier/Campbell Hellblazer run in. It seems DC has come to their senses (or the collected edition sales finally got high enough to get their attention) and Spurrier & Campbell will get another 8 issues of Hellblazer in ’24. (And the original run for $2.99/$3.99 per volume is a good deal, too.)

We’d highlight Batman: Haunted Knight, which are what really established the Loeb/Sale creative pairing before Long Halloween blew up and raised their collective profile.

If you’ve never tried DCeased, this is a good time of the year to try it. Leave it to Tom Taylor to take a potentially silly high concept like “superheroes vs. zombies,” tie it in with the Anti-Life Equation & Darkseid, then add in enough character work to make it a must-read.

John Constantine, Hellblazer   Batman - Haunted Knight   DCeased

Poison

The Marvel Venom Sale runs through Monday, 10/23.

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 from… 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.

Venom by Remender   Venom by Cates   Venom

Miles To Go Before I Sleep

The Marvel Miles Morales Sale runs through Monday, 10/23

Way too many editions of the same content for this one. Here’s our cheat sheet:

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 Miles Morales: Spider-Man, Vol. 2 collection for the ’16 Bendis/Pichelli/Nico Leaon run. (Do not ask us why the first omnibus isn’t on sale…)

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

  Miles Morales: Spider-Man   Miles Morales

You Have the Right to Remain Green

The Marvel She-Hulk Sale runs through Monday, 10/23.

Why yes, Jennifer Walters is a lawyer. Let’s first run down the series involved here.

  • The Savage She-Hulk (’80-’82) – mostly by David Anthony Kraft and Mike Vosburg
  • Sensational She-Hulk (’89-’94) – John Byrne, then the unlikely team of Steve Gerber & Bryan Hitch
  • She-Hulk (’04-’05) – Dan Slott / Juan Bobillo
  • She-Hulk (’05 – ’09) – Initially Dan Slott / Juan Bobillo, then Peter David takes over.
  • She-Hulk (’14-’15) – Charles Soule & Javier Pulido in one omnibus
  • She-Hulk (’16-’18) – Mariko Tamaki / Nico Leon
  • She-Hulk (’22-’23) – Rainbow Rowell / Roge Antonio / Luca Maresca

If you’re coming into She-Hulk through the TV show, the legal angle for the character really started getting emphasized with the Dan Slott era and then was followed up on by Charles Soule (who just might be a lawyer in his secret identity). Rainbow Rowell’s also picking up a pretty dedicated following with her current runs.

She-Hulk by Dan Slott   She-Hulk   She-Hulk

Zenescope’s Halloween Sale

Zenescope’s Tales of Terror Halloween Sale runs through Sunday, 11/5.

This is essentially the Zenescope version of Tales from the Crypt and it comes in three formats:

Grimm Tales of Terror   Grimm Tales of Terror   Grimm Tales of Terror Quarterly

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Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: It’s Villains Week – Thanos, Deathstroke, Superior Spider-Man, Suicide Squad

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, it’s villains week. DC’s discounts are on their “Villains” sale, while Marvel offers up Thanos and Super Spider-Man (Dr. Octavius, if you’re nasty).

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):

They’re Just Drawn That Way…

The DC Villains Sale runs through Monday, 10/16.

Spotlighting villains? Sure. It’s not like giving villains their own comics is common or anything.

We’d put the best villain comic in recent memory as the Priest/Carlo Pagulayan run on Deathstroke. Oh, there’s talk of reforming… but there’s a lot more scheming and a bit of philosophy as Deathstroke runs slightly wild through the DCU.

Note: Deathstroke crosses over with Teen Titans a couple time for key plot points (and Priest writes a better Damien Wayne than most), so you absolutely need The Lazarus Contract  and The Terminus Agenda to get the complete series.

One of the bigger villains in DC’s world is Darkseid, so naturally, The New Gods by Jack Kirby is included in the sale. The original run is definitely an impressive feat.

You really couldn’t have this sale without The Joker. While there’s plenty of that, we’ll point out one of the more offbeat offerings: Emperor Joker. That’s a Joe Kelly / Jeph Loeb / Doug Mahnke / Ed McGuinness tale that has Superman running up against a Joker who’s somehow gained the power to reshape reality in his image.

Deathstroke   New Gods by Jack Kirby   Superman: Emperor Joker

Now, if we go back to that concept of villains taking more of a heroic turn there a couple other things that come to mind.

Gail Simone, Nicola Scott and Jim Calafiore had a memorable run on Secret Six –featuring Deadshot (moving over from Suicide Squad) Catman, Ragdoll and even Bane towards the end.  (The preceding Secret Six miniseries is here.)

Did we just say Suicide Squad? Good, because the original villains pressed into service series by John Ostrander, Luke McDonnell and Geoff Isherwood is also on sale. Amanda Waller assembles a team of imprisoned super villains and offers them a deal… if they go on what’s effectively a suicide mission. This is where the format was set.

For a more recent take on this, there’s Suicide Squad: Bad Blood by the team of Tom Taylor and Bruno Redondo, not too long before they landed on Nightwing.

Secret Six   Suicide Squad   Suicide Squad Bad Blood

The OG Marvel Cosmic Sale

The Marvel Thanos and the Infinity Gauntlet Sale runs through Monday, 10/16.

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).  The Rebirth of Thanos arc was the “oh, snap” moment (pun intended) where Thanos resurfaced and the wheels were set in motion for The Infinity Gauntlet (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.

Avengers Vs. Thanos   Rebirth of Thanos   Infinity Gauntlet

Superiority Complex

The Marvel Superior Spider-Man Sale runs through Monday, 10/16.

Yes, that would be the run when Doctor Octopus took over Peter Parker’s body. One of the great 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.

Superior Spider-Man   Superior Spider-Man Companion   Superior Spider-Man

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Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: The Halloween Sales are Here: DC, Marvel, Archie, BOOM! and some Star Wars on the side.

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, the Halloween sales have begun and we’ll start out look at DC, Marvel, Archie, BOOM! and a bit of Star Wars on the side.

Where did the New Releases and Sale pages go?

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

Marvel Says Boo!

The Marvel Monthly Sale – Halloween runs through Monday, 10/31.

When it comes to Marvel horror, ’70s Marvel horror is where it’s at. Two of the best things Marvel did in the ’70s were horror.

Man-Thing by Steve Gerber: The Complete Collection follows the Man-Thing across Adventure Into Fear, through Man-Thing and Giant-Size Man-Thing, and eventually even collects 2012’s posthumous Infernal Man-Thing. Gerber writes almost all of it and the selection of artists includes Mike Ploog, Tom Sutton, John Buscema, Sal Buscema and Kevin Nowlan. Some say this was Gerber’s crowning achievement, others say Howard the Duck. Either way, it’s a classic.

Tomb of Dracula: The Complete Collection is a 5 volume set that collects the Marv Wolfman/Gene Colan horror classic, with the magazine version of Dracula thrown in. The comics the bigger draw here. You need to give a few issues for Wolfman to arrive and get his feet under him, but one Wolfman & Colan gel, it’s quite a ride. A celebrated run.

Plenty more ’70s horror here and all kinds of Ghost Rider, too.

Man-Thing by Steve Gerber   Tomb of Dracula

DC Says Boo!

The DC Frights & Fights Sale runs through Monday, 10/31.

Yes, more horror for the holiday. Some Vertigo, some old school DC, some new. This is another fairly deep one with 562 items.

We think it’s safe to call Nice House on the Lake by James Tynion IV and Alvaro Martinez Bueno DC’s premiere horror title right now. And it’s an extremely well-crafted comic, too.  $4.99 for that?  A very good deal.

We can’t very well mention Man-Thing without giving Swamp Thing equal time, can we? Yes, both DC and Marvel had a world class swamp monster horror comic in the ’70s. Go figure. The first volume is the famous Lein Wein / Bernie Wrightson run. (No hype, just quality.)

Preacher by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon is Vertigo-era horror with a twisted sense of humor (ah, the vampires of New Orleans…).  You’ve probably seen the TV adaption. $4.99 for ~12-issue volumes qualifies as a good deal.

Nice House on the Lake   Swamp Thing   Preacher

Now, since the DC sale has a moderate amount of superhero material in it, let’s go there.

Batman: Haunted Knight is a collection of the Halloween Bat-tales that Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale did prior to landing The Long Halloween. They’re striking and were a borderline shock to see when they appeared on the shelf. It’s certainly the season for it.

DCeased is sort of the DC version of Marvel Zombies. Darkseid unleashes the Anti-Life Equation. Come to find out it’s transmitted by technology (and bites) and it creates a sort of techno-zombie. The survivors gather in groups and try to ward off the “Anti-Living” who are coming after them – including a lot of super powered non-living interlopers – while they try to figure away out of this mess.  Tom Taylor and Trevor Hairsine helm this first installment and subsequent installments are also on sale. A highly enjoyable ride.

Batman - Haunted Knight   DCeased

There are also a bunch of $0.99 single issues towards the bottom of the page if you keep clicking through, much of it ’70s horror.  Here are some direct links to save you time and sanity, though not EVERY series.

And for $1.99 an issue

Archie Says Boo!

The  Archie Horror Sale runs through Monday, 10/31.

Yes, Archie does horror. And two things stand above the rest (we hope they do some more of them, too).

Afterlife With Archie by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa and Francesco Francavilla is a shocking thing, especially the first time you behold it. You might think the elevator pitch “Night of the Living Dead in Riverdale” sounds silly… except this really is a horror comic. Archie and the survivors flee for their lives as part of the cast stalk after them. It’s serious, hits a poignant note or two and, above all, is extremely well done!  The second arc is only in single issues (#6-10).

The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa and Robert Hack is what was adapted for the Netflix show. It’s a very 70s horror movie take on Sabrina, for whom her sixteen birthday presents a choice between the world of mortals and her witch heritage and an ominous destiny that seems to come with it.  The cheapest way for this comic is to get the collected edition of the #1-6 and then hit the single issues.

Afterlife with Archie    Chilling Adventures of Sabrina

BOOM! Says Boo!

The BOOM! Spooky Season Sale runs through Monday, 10/31.

Something is Killing the Children by James Tynion and Werther Dell’Edera is probably BOOM!’s flagship horror book right now. We’d probably call it a horror-adventure romp. Sure enough, something IS killing the children. A monster hunter shows up to stop it and her… organization then shows up to complicate matters. This one is fun horror.

But let’s get a bit further off the beaten path here:

Bone Parish by Cullen Bunn and Jonas Scharf is an odd little genre bender we enjoyed. “Ash” is the new drug that’s hit New Orleans. Consuming it you experience the life of another person… the person who’s ashes where used to make the drug. One part horror for the production of the magical drug, one part crime/gang story. A pulp page-turner.

And going back a few more years, we also enjoyed Dracula: The Company of Monsters by Kurt Busiek, Daryl Gregory and Scott Godlewski. What happens when a corporation gets their hands on Dracula? Why, resurrect him and exploit him like the asset he is, naturally. Of course, Dracula’s probably used to being the one doing the exploiting. It’s a different kind of corporate warfare.

Something is Killing the Children   Bone Parish   Dracula The Company of Monsters

Star Wars… is more like Trick or Treat

The Marvel Star Wars High Republic Sale runs through Monday, 10/10.

The meat of this would be the collected editions of the Star Wars: The High Republic series by Cavan Scott, Ario Anindito and Georges Jeanty.  And $2.99 for recent release tpbs does indeed qualify as cheap!

If you’re into $0.99 single issues:

Star Wars: The High Republic

There’s a lot more Halloween material on sale, so we’ll probably be back with another batch of that on Monday or Tuesday.

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Comixology Sales: Eternals, Jim Butcher’s Dresden Files and all the Halloween Sales

In this week’s Comixology Sales Highlights, King Kirby hits with the original Eternals and The Demon, Jim Butcher’s comics adventures of Harry Dresden are discounted and more Halloween sales than you can shake a bag of candy corn at.

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

Eternals… It’s Like There Was a Film or Something…

The Marvels Eternals Sale runs through Sunday, 11/14.

This is one where we have a very strong preference for the original run. You just can’t duplicate Jack Kirby. Over the years, Marvel’s not done the best job keeping this in print over the years and some (including us) might say it’s been overpriced at times.  But guess what? There’s a good price on The Eternals by Jack Kirby: The Complete Collection, which has the whole run in one volume.  This one has been overlooked a lot, so don’t feel bad if you’re not familiar with it.

Eternals by Jack Kirby

It Sucks (Blood)

The Marvel Halloween Sale runs through… you guessed it, Halloween!

What’s the best horror comic Marvel did in their best horror period?  Tomb of Dracula by Marv Wolfman and Gene Colan. (With a few other creators at the beginning before the format was set.)  Hard to beat it.

And for something completely off the beaten path, there’s Greenberg the Vampire. The what? From Bizarre Adventures magazine and the eponymous Marvel Graphic Novel by J.M. DeMatteis, Steve Leialoha and Mark Badger.  The story of a lovelorn vampire who’d really rather his mother didn’t know his condition. It’s a little different tone that you usually see at The House of Ideas.

Tomb of Dracula   Greenberg the Vampire

When Vertigo Was a Thing

The DC Halloween Sale runs through Monday, 11/1

Yes, DC has a lot more horror and spooky stuff on sale than Marvel.  Partially because they used to have the Vertigo imprint.  Speaking of which, there’s a whole bunch of stuff by what’s one of the last remaining traces of Vertigo – American Vampire by Scott Snyder and (mostly) Rafael Albuquerque on the art… with a bit of Stephen King at the beginning, but he might be too obscure for Halloween.  It’s the sprawling tale of a new strain of vampire developing and spreading through the decades.  We’d put it at or near the top of the Snyder cannon.

Deadman is one of the original cult heroes of the Silver and Bronze Ages. Originally in Strange Adventures by Neal Adams, Boston Brand is an acrobat whose spirit is seeking his killer. He can possess people’s bodies to interact with the world of the living.  The first two volumes collect the Adams run and then Deadman floats around the DC Universe (pun intended). He pops up in Challengers of the Unknown and Phantom Stranger, has a run in the Dollar Era of Adventure Comics and then the collections end with the ’80s mini-series.  A character the creative community loved to bring back and a Halloween superhero if ever there was one.

We started out talking about Kirby, so let’s talk about his most sorcerous run – The Demon. As Camelot falls, Merlin binds a hell-spawn to a human host. That host survives across the centuries and in modern times, Jason Blood will summon the demon Etrigan to do battle with all manner of unnatural scourges.  It’s the high adventure version of horror.

American Vampire   Deadman   The Demon by Jack Kirby

Wizard Dresden

The Dynamite Horror Sale runs through Monday, 11/1

Since it’s the season, let’s talk about something a little different from Dynamite: The Dresden Files. Jim Butcher’s collaborated with Dynamite for some original, in-continuity comic stories.  Mark Powers is the co-writer and for art, you’ve got Carlos Gomez, Chase Conley, Joseph Cooper and Adrian Syaf.  The Omnibus editions are slightly better deals and the second one is all original material.  Now, if someone would send over a bottle of Mac’s beer…..

Dresden Files

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The Rest of the Halloween Sales

We’ve highlighted most of this in previous weeks, but if you want to do trick or treating for discounts, here’s a ton of stuff for your browsing:

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