OMAC Archives - Comics.Cheap

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, Marvel’s big Daredevil sale and DC’s Labor Day Sale return… with actual sale prices! Plus, Masters of the Universe and Van Helsing.

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 Daredevil Sale Returns

Well, well, well… look who showed up Thursday morning:

The Marvel Daredevil Legacy Sale runs through Monday, 9/11.

Yes, they fixed last week’s sale. The usual discounts now apply. So first, let’s run through the various series. Believe it or not, Daredevil hasn’t been relaunched as many times as, say, Hulk has.

Daredevil ’64-’98 – The original run. Plenty o’ Epics and Masterworks on sale.
Daredevil ’98-11 – The Marvel Knights relaunch. Kevin Smith / Brian Bendis / Ed Brubaker
- For the Bendis and Brubaker runs, you want the Omnibus section and scroll down for their respective “Ultimate Collections”
Daredevil ’11-15 – This was really two volumes with an arbitrary relaunch in the middle, but the excellent run by Mark Waid / Chris Samnee / Paolo Rivera / Javier Javier Rodriguez is a better buy in this 5 volume set that collects both volumes and treats it like the single run it was.
Daredevil ’15-’18 – The Charles Soule era with Ron Garney as the main artist.
Daredevil ’19-’21 – Chip Zdarsky’s breakout title as a writer. Marco Checcetto is the primary artist.
- Omnibus formats (the final omnibus is not on sale)
Daredevil: Woman Without Fear ’22 – Zdarsky / Rafael de Latorre; Sort of a bridge title during the Devil’s Reign event, but part of the ongoing plot.
Daredevil ’22-’23 – Also known as Daredevil & Elektra. The final act to the Zdarsky/Checcetto era

Since it’s been a couple years since this sale was run, let’s have a look at the Epics and Masterworks that might not have been in the last one, shall we?

New(ish) Epic Collections:

Going Out West – #87-107; Gerry Conway era ends; Steve Gerber begins
Watch Out For Bullseye – #108-132; Gerber era ends; Then Tony Isabella, and enter Marv Wolfman and Bullseye debuts
It Comes With Claws – #234 – 252; Ann Nocenti’s run begins. John Romita, Jr. arrives to start that famous pairing towards the end of the volume.
Dead Man’s Hand – #301-11, plus some crossover/event issues; The D.G. Chichester / Scott McDaniel era

New(ish) Masterworks:

Oh, look… this is when they got to the Frank Miller run!

Daredevil Masterworks V. 15 – #159-172
Daredevil Masterworks V. 16 – #173-181
Daredevil Masterworks V. 17 – #182-191

What’s good? Honestly, Daredevil has been one of the best curated characters of the last 40 years. There haven’t been very many bad issues since Frank Miller showed up. (Some people complained about the Chichester/McDaniel/Weeks run and the new armor, but we like that run and “Last Rites” seems to be more popular now than at the time.)

The usual advice on Epics & Masterworks – you need to check the page counts, but the Epics are usually a little longer and more bang for your buck, but not all Epics are priced the same.

For $5.99 for ~300-ish pages/~12 issues, it’s hard to beat these collections of the Waid/Samnee(/Rivera/Rodriguez) run. A side thread to this run. It starts out with “Daredevil wasn’t originally such a dark book” and then it proceeds to go to dark places after a bit! Seriously, an excellent run.

Currently not in a larger collection, Daredevil: Born Again by Frank Miller and David Mazzucchelli is a very, very effective story and maybe Miller’s high point on the character. It doesn’t have the page count of some these other collections, but at $4.99, it’s still a truly classic 8-parter for the price of a new single issue.

The Last Rites Epic Collection is 500 pages for for $6.99. It’s the end of the Ann Nocenti run and the beginning of the D.G Chichester era. Lots of art by the always under-rated Lee Weeks. Bullseye, The Hand, Typhoid Mary and The Kingpin all show up. Plus some Punisher and Ghost Rider, so there’s something for pretty much everyone in this.

(If A Touch of Typhoid was $5.99, it would go to the head of the line. That’s the meat of the Nocenti/JRjr run and earned its rep.)

Still, plenty of good reads in this sale and we’re glad it got fixed!

Speaking of Sales That Got Fixed…

The DC Labor Day Sale runs through Monday, 9/11.

We’re not sure those $4.65 price points are supposed to be there, but there’s plenty of graphic novels for $2.99 (and $4.65 is a considerably better price than we were seeing last week).

Some items of possible interest:

Gotham Central for $2.99 per (double) volume? Um, yes! GREAT comic. Ed Brubaker, Greg Rucka, Michael Lark, Stefano Gaudiano and Kano on tales of the Gotham PD trying to handle things when Batman is otherwise occupied.

OMAC: One Man Army Corps by Jack Kirby. You might have run into this concept in a movie recently. This is Kirby’s original dystopian satire. It’s… well, you kind of need to experience this one for yourself. Describing it doesn’t do it justice, just know that it’s REALLY over the top. $2.99

Final Crisis by Grant Morrison, J.G. Jones and Doug Mahnke. The Event itself, plus the Batman and Superman tie-ins (which are important to the plot). 391 pages for $2.99? From Morrison/Jones/Mahnke? That’s a good buy!

Deadman – The 60s/70s cult series in 5 volumes. The first two are the Neal Adams run, then a volume that’s largely Paul Levitz/Jim Aparo picking up the reigns and popping in and out of various titles. V.4 is largely the Len Wein/Jim Aparo/Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez Adventure run. V.5 is the Andy Helfer/Garcia-Lopez miniseries and the Challengers of the Unknown appearances. $2.99 a pop.

Creature Commandos – We’re not sure when the cartoon is coming out or if the strike affects it, but this is the original material from Weird War Tales. Lots of people worked on this, including J.M. DeMatties, Robert Khaniger, Fred Carillo, Jerry Ordway and even Dan Spiegel.

And for something under the radar: Lobo: Portrait of a Bastich. In the mid-90s, Lobo had a series of miniseries and specials that were the gold standard for rude humor. Keith Giffen, Alan Grant and Simon Bisley were the original team and this collects the first two mini’s. It is, as MTV used to say about Monty Python, an effective tool for the offending of the easily offendable.

This sale is worth a deep browse over the weekend. There are a lot of good runs with a single $4.65 volume in the middle of $2.99 ones.

Masters and Servants

The Dark Horse 2023 Masters of the Universe Digital Sale runs through Monday, 9/25.

Yes, that would be He-Man. Two sections to the sale:

Classic material

The original comics – that is to say, both the comic strip and the mini-comics that came with the action figures. (Call them dolls at your own peril.)
Art of He-Man and the Masters of the Universe

Current Comics

99-cent single issues – better buy
Collected edition

Grimm Vampire Tales

Zenescope’s Van Helsing Character Spotlight Sale runs through Sunday, 9/24.

This would be the daughter of Professor Van Helsing doing battle with the forces of darkness. You expect to see Zenescope regulars Pat Shand and Raven Gregory here, but Chuck Dixon also shows up for a few runs.

We’re looking at 99 cent single issues (with the odd higher price for things like #50) and $5.99 collected editions, which means the single issues will likely be a little cheaper or a wash.

Helsing
- Single Issues
- Collected Edition
Van Helsing
- Single Issues
- Collected Editions

Also in the sale 99-cent issues of the spin-off Hellchild.

Still on Sale

The Image Comics Discovery Sale Part 2 runs through Friday, 9/15
The Dark Horse 2023 Star Wars Digital Sale runs through Monday, 9/18
Dark Horse 2023 Mob Psycho Digital Sale runs through Monday, 9/25
Media Do Printemps Publishing Manga Sale runs through Friday, 9/22
The Dark Horse 2023 YouNeek Digital Sale runs through Monday, 9/18

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, we’ve got discounts on Kieron Gillen’s Marvel work – Eternals / Uncanny X-Men / Journey Into Mystery / etc.; Marvel’s Original Sin Event; another big block of DC collections, including Sandman; IDW cuts the prices on some classic newspaper strip collections; and we couldn’t really have a new season of Umbrella Academy without a sale on the original material, could we?

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):

Journey into Gillen

The Marvel Kieron Gillen Sale runs through Monday, 6/27.

We find it really sad that a “Marvel” Gillen sale does not include our two favorite works of the bunch: Darth Vader and Doctor Aphra. Yes, there will other Star Wars sales, but if you’re talking Gillen, that’s what we’d put at the top of the heap.

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

The Eternals with Eric Ribić. $0.99 single issues only and the collected edition is NOT on sale for reasons known only to Amazon and/or Marvel.
War Hammer 40,000: Marneus Calgar with Jacen Burrows
Journey Into Mystery (i.e. Loki) with Doug Braithwaite and Richard Elson (among others) – omnibus editions
Uncanny X-Men – omnibus editions
Young Avengers with Jamie McKelvie – omnibus edition
Thor with Billy Tan / Richard Elson / Doug Braithwaite – omnibus edition
Iron Man with Greg Land / Dale Eaglesham / Joe Bennett / Luke Ross

What’s good? This one’s going to be more personal preference than with many sales and to that end, we’d point out that we did read the War Hammer volume and it felt like that’s a book you’ll get a LOT more out of it if you’re a gamer. (But if you’re already into War Hammer, you’ll probably love it.) 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.

Casting the First Stone

The Marvel Original Sin Sale runs through Monday, 6/27.

We’d probably call this a one book sale – Original Sin is a big Event by Jason Aaron and Mike Deodato. Someone’s killed the Watcher, dirty secrets are bubbling up from everyone’s past and… more would get into spoilers. There are a few tie-in volumes also listed, but our recollection is that the tie-in volumes are not really necessary. While this is often the case with Events, it might be even more so here. Proceed with tie-ins only if they’re scratching an itch for you.

When they say “Multiverse,” they mean “Infinity”

The DC Multiverse and Beyond eBooks Sale runs through Monday, 7/4.

This is another entry in the new DC trend of dropping ~2000 collections without much noticeable curation, so you can pick through it at your leisure. Lowest prices are $4.99, but most non-YA doesn’t get below $5.99.

With the Netflix adaptation looming a little over a month away, they’re leading this sale off with Sandman. And it’s certainly a classic series. The question is whether it will dip below $5.99 when the show drops and we don’t have an answer for that. DC’s been holding the line at $5.99 for most of their sales in the last couple months.

Of possible interest from the more recently published volumes (DC does wait awhile before applying discounts):

Jack Kirby’s OMAC: One Man Fighting Corps is listed at $5.99. If you’re not familiar with it, OMAC is a surprisingly subversive dystopian take on a future where billionaires/corporations are running amok. There are superhero trappings, but it’s really a science fiction adventure/satire.

And for something else out of left field in a good way, $5.99 will get Manhunter: The Deluxe Edition. This collects the Detective Comics serial by Archie Goodwin and Walt Simonson. An absolute classic run, it’s not as mainstream well-known because the Paul Kirk character wasn’t continued in his own title (for obvious reasons). It’s just an excellent stand-alone tale by two legends of the art form.

Where’s My Umbrella?

The Umbrella Academy Sale runs through Tuesday, 6/28.

Why yes, there’s a new season on Netflix and we might even start on that tonight. Funny how sales line up with such things…

This one’s a lot easier to define: it’s a series by Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba about an extremely dysfunctional family of superhumans who are more than a little scarred by their adoptive upbringing. One series link for the collected editions and no fuss. Good comic, too. We enjoyed it.