Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: DC’s Summer Sale and Dark Horse Goes Line Wide

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.

American Vampire   Batman - Prey   Challengers of the Unknown

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.”

Omega Men   New Teen Titans

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):

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 EntertainmentThe 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.

Air   Alice in Sunderland   Baltimore Omnibus 1

BlacksadJuan 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.

Blacksad   Concrete   Finder

🤞 Don’t miss these tips!

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

Still On Sale

Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: X-Men; New Teen Titans; Aztec Ace; Geiger; Air

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, Marvel contemplates Mister Sinister, DC celebrates teamwork, Image does science fiction and Dark Horse discounts fantasy.

Where did the New Releases and Sale pages go?

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

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

New sales did post this week, so that’s good… but make sure you eyeball the displayed prices to see if it looks like it’s really on sale. A number of things did not pass the eye test, although at least the DC sale got fixed. As we type this, not everything did. Speaking of DC:

Fight and Then Team Up

The DC Super Teams Sale runs through Monday, 1/30.

There’s a 2-Omnibus set of 52 that’s a good deal. 52 issues for $20 works out to $0.38/issue, better than you usually see. 52 was a weekly comic co-written by Mark Waid, Greg Rucka, Grant Morrison and Geoff Johns. Keith Giffen did the layouts and then a whole bunch of artists finished those. The story is a set of plot threads telling the aftermath of Infinite Crisis, with arcs for Booster Gold, Black Adam, Elongated Man, Adam Strange, Will Magnus (the Metal Men’s creator) and The Question, among others.

This World’s Finest is the 1990 Prestige/Dark Knight format version from Dave Gibbons and Steve Rude. Not something we’ve heard discussed in awhile, this is an attempt to recapture the Silver Age mojo as Lex Luthor and The Joker team-up to bedevil Superman and Batman. As pretty a comic as you’ll find.

The New Teen Titans by Marv Wolfman and George Perez essentially pulled DC back from the brink at a low point in the company’s sales history. It’s a classic and it’s $4.99 per volume.

52   World's Finest   New Teen Titans

It’s a Sin

The  Marvel X-Men: Sinister Stories Sale runs through Monday, 1/30.

A tie-in to the “Sins of Sinister” Event? Sure enough. And given that’s a Kieron Gillen outing, it seems like Uncanny X-Men by Kieron Gillen: The Complete Collection is probably good background reading, since it establishes Gillen’s take on Mister Sinister.

Also particularly relevant to the current incarnation of Sinster is the recent Hellions series by Zeb Wells and Stephen Segovia. We’re big fans of this one, which has Minster Sinister acting as Professor X for a unit of more… anti-social mutants. Is he using them as pawns in his greater schemes? Absolutely. One warning here, though. The middle volume of this doesn’t have much of a discount and we’re wondering if that’s an error? The omnibus edition is a tad more expensive and also a lot higher priced than you’d expect for a sale. Maybe it gets fixed and maybe it doesn’t. It’s still a highly entertaining run.

And while it’s not the first appearance of Sinister, we think one of the better values in the sale is X-Factor Epic Collection: All-New, All-Different X-Factor, which is the Peter David run. You’ve got a Mister Sinister arc, a Hulk crossover and art by Larry Stroman, Dale Keown… and some lad named Joe Quesada (whatever happened to him?)

Uncanny X-Men   Hellions by Zeb Wells   X-Factor Epic Collection

We Were Promised A Flying Purple People-Eater?!?

The Image Sci-Fi Sale runs through Tuesday, 1/31.

Fear Agent by Rick Remender, Tony Moore and Jerome Opeña is a pulp science fiction adventure of the hard-drinking final member of the Fear Agents, a force that handled alien threats. Spoiler: one of those alien threats is still active. It’s an old favorite around here.

Farmhand is a science fiction/horror/comedy series from Rob Guillory, who you might remember from Chew. This time out Rob’s doing full writer/artist duties and proving that Layman wasn’t the only pleasantly twisted person behind Chew. In Farmhand, Jedidiah Jenkins has an unusual cash crop – he grows replacement for human organs. Where did these crops come from? That would be telling, but strange things are happening around the farm at to some of the transplant recipients.

Geiger is a Geoff Johns / Gary Frank post-apocalyptical, traversing the wastelands adventure. We got some (darker) Kamandi/Ben Boxer vibes off it. Very much a post-modern take on the DC “Great Disaster” era science fiction tales of the 60s and 70s and in a good way.

Fear Agent   Farmhand   Geiger

No, Not That Kind of “Fantasy”

The Dark Horse Fantasy Sale runs through Monday, 1/30.

This is a VERY expansive sale and worth an extended browse it you have time. We’re going to point out three, somewhat under the radar books, two of which we don’t think have been on sale before.

Air by G. Willow Wilson and M.K. Perker was originally a Vertigo book that Karen Berger appears to have pulled over to Dark Horse and Berger Books.  We would very much like to see a continuation, but… first things first. This is a very unusual genre bender. A little science fiction, a little fantasy, a little thriller. It also takes a little while to start unfolding. What starts as a flight attendant getting pulled into a terrorist conspiracy takes a turn for the weird and lands in a much wider conspiracy involving teleportation, time lost celebrities and an Aztec god. This is not a comic that’s easily reduced to a tagline, but it’s a good one.

Alice in Sunderland by Bryan Talbot is your unabashedly intellectual comic of the week. An excellent work of art and truly unusual. The starting point is a history of Talbot’s hometown of Sunderland, which turns into a study of the influences on Lewis Carroll while writing Alice in Wonderland and then turns… where Talbot feels like going. A unique book!

Aztec Ace by Doug Moench, Dan Day, Michael Hernandez and Ron Harris is a time travel adventure. The most unusual thing about it might just be that Moench had never seen Doctor Who before writing it in the early 80s. This is a very Doctor Who-compatible series. Originally coming out from Eclipse and long out of print, Ace is a time traveler from the 23rd century who’s battling time paradoxes and the mysterious Nine-Crocodiles, who seems to be behind the paradoxes. He’s aided by Bridget Chronopolis, who wanders into his sphere very much like one of The Doctor’s companions would, and the floating head of Sigmund Freud. Not the lowest priced item, but it’s 15 issues + extras, so a better value than you might think at first glance. And a lot easier than trying to track down the single issues. (Just trust us on that, ’cause we did.)

Air   Alice in Sunderland   Aztec Ace

🤞 Don’t miss these tips!

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

Still on Sale:

Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: DC Classics w/ New Teen Titans, What If?, Cullen Bunn and Tyler Crook, Peanuts

This week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales include DC “Classics,” which includes the Marv Wolfman/George Perez New Teen Titans run, so we’ll have to agree with the sale’s title. Marvel offers up What If? Fantagraphics discounts Peanuts and Dark Horse celebrates Cullen Bunn & Tyler Crook.  We would also remind you that there’s a very cheap Star Wars sale and a Doctor Strange sale that aren’t quite finished yet.

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):

A “Classical” Education

The DC Classics Sale runs through Monday, 5/16

This one is a DEEP dive into the DC backlist. And since the sale prices seem to have normalized, we’re happy to be able to point you to a few title that now have each volume on sale, which wasn’t happening in the last couple months.

Point in case: New Teen Titans by Marv Wolfman and George Perez now has the first 10 volumes (coincidentally, the Perez years) for $4.99 each. Previously several volumes would be at those bizarre prices that appeared to be in error. Well, no more of that.  New Teen Titans was effectively DC’s answer to X-Men in the early 80s (along with the Levitz/Giffen-era LSH, whose reprinting is more convoluted). It’s supposed to be a “classics” sale and this one is more classic than most.

Fast forward a few years and you get the “Man of Steel” era of Superman. Some people call it the John Byrne era, but this time frame also brings Marv Wolfman and Jerry Ordway into the fold. $4.99 – $5.99 per volume is also good pricing.

New Teen Titans   Superman: The Man of Steel

In general, the “Silver Age” collections tend to be a slightly larger page count and good bang for your buck.  However, you also might find yourself thinking that DC’s collected editions can be a little spotty and, gosh darn it, sometimes you’d just like to get some $0.99 single issues to fill in those series.  You’re in luck, there are a LOT of $0.99 single issues here, although it’s a royal pain to browse in Amazon sub-par user interface.  Here’s a cheat sheet for some of the single issues on sale:

If Not, Why Not?

The Marvel What If Sale runs through Monday, 5/16.

The interesting thing about What If is how often the modern age of Marvel has gone back to pilfer from it.  What If is where Jane Foster first took up the hammer of Thor. The first place Conan stalked the streets of the present. The first time the Hulk became a barbarian. Apparently, “there’s gold in them there hills!”  The larger collections are slightly more bang for your buck, BTW.

What If

The Fantagraphics Peanuts Sale runs through Monday, 5/16.

Yes, the classic Charles Schultz comic strip with Charlie Brown and Snoopy. Fantagraphics is reprinting it from the beginning. Strangely, there’s no series link on Amazon for this.

The Complete Peanuts

Tag Team?

The Dark Horse Bunn & Crook Sale runs through Monday, 5/23.

That would be Cullen Bunn & Tyler Crook, who’ve done quite a bit at Dark Horse over the years.  Their best known collaboration is probably Harrow County  (the omnibus editions are BY FAR the best buy).

If you’d like something a bit more recent, Parasomnia by Bunn and Andrea Mutti was a February release.  The Unbelievable Teens (part of the Black Hammer universe) by Jeff Lemire and Crook was released on 4/5… and this is as quickly as we’ve seen a collection go on sale!

Harrow County Omnibus 1   Parasomnia   Unbelievable Teens

🤞 Don’t miss these tips!

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

Still On Sale

Comixology Sales: DC’s Huge Discounts Continue, Plus Ka-Zar vs. Thanos and X-Men

This week in Comixology Sales, we look at the back half of DC’s 70+% off Labor Day sale, plus Ka-Zar and X-Men get the discount treatment at Marvel.

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

DC Has STRONG Discounts

No, you’re not hallucinating. DC broke out of their slump with some of the best discounts they’ve had in months. 73-77% off. It’s better than a BOGO sale.

The “DC Labor Day Sale” comes in two parts.  Part One contains 100 Bullets though John Constantine, Hellblazer. (We looked at that last time out.) Part Two contains John Constantine, Hellblazer through Zero Hour.  There’s a ton of material here, including some semi-recent offerings so be sure to have a good browse.  That said, here’s some things that caught our eye in Part Two, but might not be at the top of your mind.

Let’s start out with HellblazerThe adventures of anti-hero John Constantine were a pretty consistently good read from Vertigo for a very long time before internal politics killed the original series.  22 volumes are on sale, ranging from $2.99 – $4.99, depending on the volume.

Hellblazer

Not so long ago, we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves revisiting the Paul Levitz/Keith Giffen era of Legion of Superheroes (which starts out as Levitz/Pat Broderick).  The Great Darkness Saga and The Curse – read in that order – are two thick volumes of prime material for $3.99/$4.99.  Outstanding buys.

Legion of Super Heroes The Great Darkness Saga    Legion of Superheroes: The Curse

And if we’re talking Levitz/Giffen Legion, we should probably also be talking Marv Wolfman and George Perez on New Teen Titans, DC’s other defining book of the pre-crisis era.  Fortunately, the sale is accommodating us and there are 11 volumes on sale for $2.99 a pop. (Cheap.) That takes you into the early Baxter series era. A very influential series to this day.

New Teen Titans

Preacher by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon certainly raised its already large profile when it got a TV adaption. Definitely not a comic for the easily offended, it concerns a disillusioned preacher, his girlfriend and his vampire buddy looking for God, who’s gone missing.  That’s safe for work version anyway.  Watch out for the New Orleans vampire sequence, it’s… but that would be spoiling. At $2.99 a pop for the 350+ page collections, this is another off the chart value.

Preacher

Speaking of large page counts for $2.99, remember when Gail Simone was writing the Secret Six? This is one of those title that Comixology splits up a little strangely, Volume 1 contains Villains United and the first Secret Six’s 6 issues. That was all in the run-up to Infinite Crisis. Volume 2 is where the second series starts and this is where we think it hits its stride as dark exploration of DC’s ne’er-do-wells.

Secret Six: Villains United   Secret Six

This might not be the consensus opinion, but we lean towards Omega Men being Tom King’s best DC writing. It’s also probably his least known. He was way under the radar when it started. You want this for $3.99, ignore the other link that’s the more expensive digital version of a print hard cover. (We always chuckle at HC prices for digital.)

And we end with another spectacular buy.  You may recall that a pre-Saga Brian K. Vaughan teamed with Pia Guerra for Y: The Last Man about the sole male survivor of a mysterious plague. It’s got a TV adaptation that drops on 9/13.  The omnibus editions are $2.99, same price as the regular (thinner) collections.  We’re not sure how much more you could ask for.  Click here, scroll down to “Omnibuses” and have at it.

Y the Last Man

There’s a ton more on sale and these discounts are unusual for DC, so carve out some time to browse this sale on your own.

Lord of the Jungle… er, Savage Land

The Marvel Ka-Zar Sale runs through Thursday, 9/9.

The best known Ka-Zar might be the 80’s Bruce Jones/Brent Anderson run, the first off of which is collected in Ka-Zar: Savage Dawn.

If you’d like something a bit more unexpected, Mark Waid and Andy Kubert had Ka-Zar squaring off against Thanos.  Yes, that Thanos.

And if you’re particularly old school, you’ll remember that Ka-Zar goes back all the way to the original 40s run of Marvel Mystery Comics.

There’s a bit more here, including some random Epic Editions where Ka-Zar appeared, for you to browse.

Ka-Zar Savage Dawn   Ka-Zar vs. Thanos   Marvel Mystery Comics

X-Men Event Editions

The X-Men Milestones Sale runs through Thursday, 9/9.

It’s a set of collections of X-family crossover events and it pretty self-explanatory. Looking to catch up on the original Inferno before Jonathan Hickman does his version?  This is where you can do that.

Inferno

Still on Sale