Well, those Crazy Communists in China have done it again! Now apparently a hard working Chinese person can not make an honest wage playing games for other people on the internets! China Bans Gold Farming! And Real Gamers Rejoice! You see, gold farmers are universally hated by all Real Gamers. Why? Because they greatly contribute to massive inflation in the economies of MMORPG games like the most popular MMORPG, World of Warcraft.And besides that it’s like cheating and stuff.
When I first started playing World of Warcraft in the early days of November 2004, 5 gold was A LOT. Now 5 gold is like a nickle. A wooden nickle. Why? Because people in China and other … economically challenged … countries will actually play the game just to collect gold and then, through what are now huge businesses, sell the gold to other players too lazy to play the game for themselves. And it is BIG business. Since it’s sort of a “grey market” know one really knows the exact numbers but it is estimated to be potentially as high as a billion dollar a year industry. A BILLION dollars. For nothing more than currency in a GAME.
So now that gold farming is officially outlawed in China, assuming that they actually bother to enforce this law to any successful degree, it means that entire industry must either relocate its work force (probably not possible), hire more in other countries (possible in other SE Asia probably, or, you know, Detroit), or they stand to lose a lot of income. A LOT of income.
One thing is probably a sure bet: the price of gold in WoW is going to go up. And hopefully that also means that with less gold getting dumped into the economy of the game, there will be lower prices at the old Auction House in Orgrimmar. Or Iron Forge for you Alliance wussies.
Dark Horse Comics has a monthly Eisner Award winning web comic anthology that they have been hosting for the last two years on Myspace, called “ Myspace Dark Horse Presents”. The nice thing about this web comic is that it has real-comic production values, because Dark Horse puts top name talent on the project, like Joss Whedon, Mike Mignola, Gerard Way, Steve Niles, etc.
But according to CBR, Dark Horse’s next issue of “Dark Horse Presents” will be released on Dark Horse’s own web site this time. Apparently with Myspace having over 400 layoffs in recent weeks, they have gotten rid of everyone who knew anything about the web comic. In order to get the material out in a timely fashion, Dark Horse is resorting to taking the issue back to their home website.
Apparently, this may or may not be a temporary solution. If MySpace re-organizes and can get their people back on this project, Dark Horse would like to continue hosting the web comic at MySpace since they have a relationship and are coming up on their two year anniversary for the project.
I’m hoping they keep it at Dark Horse’s web site, personally, for reasons I won’t go into right now. It’s their content, they should be using it to promote their own web site, unless it’s a bandwith thing.
Also, in case your wondering, I do recommend this web comic, it is good-to-fantastic most of the time, and you can sample material related to other Dark Horse comic book products. So it’s kind of like a demo in some ways but better because each story on the web comic is self contained so unlike a demo you aren’t left completely hanging.
The nominations for the Harvey Awards for comics are in. What is the Harvey Awards?
The Harvey Awards are one of the comic book industry’s oldest and most respected awards. The Harveys recognize outstanding achievements in over 20 categories, ranging from Best Artist to the Jack Kirby Hall of Fame. They are the only industry awards both nominated by and selected by the full body of comic book professionals.
Beginning in 1988 at the Chicago Comic-Con, the Harveys enjoyed runs at the Dallas Fantasy Fair, Oakland’s Wondercon, the Pittsburgh Comicon, and the Museum of Comics and Cartoon Art. In 2005, the Harveys have joined the Baltimore Comic-Con, held each year at the Baltimore Convention Center. We look forward to a long and fruitful relationship with the Baltimore Comic-Con.
The Harvey Awards are presented annually to those creators and publications that receive the most votes from their peers in the comics industry. At the beginning of each year, nominating ballots are sent to comics professionals and publishers. Qualifying professionals are able to nominate up to five entries in each category. The top five nominees, plus ties, in each category are placed on the final ballot, which is mailed in the Spring. Final ballots are returned one month later and the votes are tabulated. Winners are announced each year at the Harvey Awards banquet.
Now on with the nominations. My own picks, limited to the nominees, are in BOLD.
BEST WRITER Kyle Baker, NAT TURNER, Abrams Books Ed Brubaker, CAPTAIN AMERICA, Marvel Comics John Gallagher, BUZZBOY, Sky Dog Comics Jeff Kinney, DIARY OF A WIMPY KID, Amulet Books Grant Morrison, ALL-STAR SUPERMAN, DC Comics
BEST ARTIST Gabriel Ba, UMBRELLA ACADEMY, Dark Horse Comics Kyle Baker, NAT TURNER, Abrams Books Jimmy Gownley, AMELIA RULES, Renaissance Press Jason Kruse, WORLD OF QUEST, Yen Press Frank Quitely, ALL-STAR SUPERMAN, DC Comics
BEST CARTOONIST Lar deSouza, LEAST I COULD DO, www.leasticoulddo.com John Gallagher, BUZZBOY, Sky Dog Comics Al Jaffee, TALL TALES, Abrams Books Jeff Kinney, DIARY OF A WIMPY KID, Amulet Books Thom Zahler, LOVE & CAPES, Maerkle Press (I abstain on this category as I haven’t read any of these)
BEST LETTERER Jimmy Gownley, AMELIA RULES, Renaissance Press Rob Leigh, THE SPIRIT, DC Comics Doug Sherwood, LOCAL, Oni Press John Workman, MARVEL 1985, Marvel Comics Thom Zahler, BUZZBOY, Sky Dog Comics
BEST INKER Rich Faber, BUZZBOY, Sky Dog Comics Jamie Grant, ALL-STAR SUPERMAN, DC Comics Jeff Kinney, DIARY OF A WIMPY KID, Amulet Books Mark Morales, THOR, Marvel Comics Ryan Winn, THE DARKNESS, Image Comics
BEST COLORIST Frank Cammuso, OTTO’S ORANGE DAY, Raw Junior, LLC Jamie Grant, ALL-STAR SUPERMAN, DC Comics Laura Martin, THOR, Marvel Comics Wil Quintana, THE MICE TEMPLAR, Image Comics Dave Stewart, UMBRELLA ACADEMY, Dark Horse Comics
BEST COVER ARTIST Frank Cho, BUZZBOY: SIDEKICKS RULE!#3, Sky Dog Press James Jean, FABLES, Vertigo Comics Jay Lynch, MINDSHAFT #23, Mindshaft Publishing Ken Rocafort, PILOT SEASON: CORE #1, Top Cow Alex Ross, JUSTICE SOCIETY OF AMERICA, DC Comics
BEST NEW SERIES THE DREAMER, IDW ECHO, Abstract Studios HIGH MOON, www.zudacomics.com NIGHT OWLS, www.zudacomics.com SUPERTRON, www.zudacomics.com (I abstain on this)
BEST CONTINUING OR LIMITED SERIES ALL-STAR SUPERMAN, DC Comics CAPTAIN AMERICA, Marvel Comics DIARY OF A WIMPY KID, Amulet Books MICE TEMPLAR, Image Comics UMBRELLA ACADEMY, Dark Horse Comics
BEST BIOGRAPHICAL, HISTORICAL OR JOURNALISTIC PRESENTATION DRAW!, edited by Mike Manley, Twomorrows Publishing HOW TO MAKE WEBCOMICS, Brad Guigar, Dave Kellett, Scott Kurtz, and Kris Straub, Image Comics KIRBY: KING OF COMICS, Mark Evanier, Abrams Books SCORCHY SMITH AND THE ART OF NOEL SICKLES, edited by Dean Mullaney, IDW WORDLESS BOOKS: THE ORIGINAL GRAPHIC NOVELS, edited by David A. Berona, Abrams Books (abstain)
BEST SYNDICATED STRIP OR PANEL BREWSTER ROCKIT: SPACE GUY!, Tim Rickard, Tribune Media Services GET FUZZY, Darby Conley, United Features Syndicate MUTTS, Patrick McDonnell, King Features Syndicate THE NORM, Michael Jantze, Uclick Gocomics PEARLS BEFORE SWINE, Stephan Pastis, United Features Syndicate
BEST ANTHOLOGY COMIC BOOK TATTOO, edited by Rantz Hoseley, Image Comics FLIGHT VOLUME 5, edited by Kazu Kibuishi, Villard MOME VOLUME 10, edited by Eric Reynolds, Fantagraphics Books PIXU #1, edited by Gabriel Ba and Fabio Moon, Self-Published POPGUN VOLUME 2, edited by Joe Keatinge and Mark Andrew Smith, Image Comics (abstain)
BEST GRAPHIC ALBUM – ORIGINAL BOTTOMLESS BELLY BUTTON, Fantagraphics Books DIARY OF A WIMPY KID: RODRICK RULES, Amulet Books ESSEX COUNTY: THE COUNTRY NURSE, Top Shelf SKIM, Groundwood Books TOO COOL TO BE FORGOTTEN, Top Shelf WORLD OF QUEST: VOL. 2, Yen Press (abstain)
BEST GRAPHIC ALBUM – PREVIOUSLY PUBLISHED AMELIA RULES!: FUNNY STORIES, Renaissance Press M, Abrams Books NAT TURNER, Abrams Books THE MICE TEMPLAR: VOL. 1, Image Comics Queen and country: VOLUME, Oni Press SKYSCRAPERS OF THE MIDWEST (HARDCOVER), Adhouse Books
BEST SINGLE ISSUE OR STORY ACME NOVELTY LIBRARY #19, Self-Published FIRST BORN: AFTERMATH #1, Top Cow LOVE AND ROCKETS, VOL. 3 #1, Fantagraphics Books M, Abrams Books NASCAR HEROES #5, NASCAR Comics NAT TURNER, Abrams Books THE AMAZiNG REMARKABLE MONSIEUR LEOTARD, First Second Y: THE LAST MAN #60, Vertigo Comics
BEST DOMESTIC REPRINT PROJECT ASTOUNDING SPACE THRILLS, IDW COMPLETE PEANUTS, Fantagraphics Books COMPLETE TERRY AND THE PIRATES, IDW SCORCHY SMITH AND THE ART OF NOEL SICKLES, IDW WACKY PACKAGES, Abrams Books (abstain)
BEST AMERICAN EDITION OF FOREIGN MATERIAL GUS AND HIS GANG, First Second POCKET FULL OF RAIN, Fantagraphics Books RED COLORED ELEGY, Drawn and Quarterly SOLANIN, Viz WITCHBLADE TAKERU MANGA #’s 11 & 12, Top Cow
BEST ON-LINE COMICS WORK BLACK CHERRY BOMBSHELLS, Tony Trovarello and John Zito, www.zudacomics.com HIGH MOON, Scott O. Brown, www.zudacomics.com LEAST I COULD DO, Lar deSouza and Ryan Sohmer, www.leasticoulddo.com NIGHT OWLS, Bobby & Peter Timony, www.zudacomics.com PVP, Scott Kurtz, www.pvponline.com
SPECIAL AWARD FOR HUMOR IN COMICS Lar deSouza, LEAST I COULD DO, www.leasticoulddo.com John Gallagher, BUZZBOY, Sky Dog Comics Al Jaffee, TALL TALES, Abrams Books Jeff Kinney, DIARY OF A WIMPY KID, Amulet Books David Malki, WONDERMARK, www.wondermark.com
SPECIAL AWARD FOR EXCELLENCE IN PRESENTATION COMPLETE LOCAL: HARDCOVER EDITION, Ryan Kelly and Brian Wood, Oni Press KIRBY: KING OF COMICS, Mark Evanier, Abrams Books QUEEN AND COUNTRY: VOLUME 3, Greg Rucka, Mike Norton, Steve Rolston, and Chris Samnee, Oni Press TALL TALES, Al Jaffee, Abrams Books WONDERMARK, VOL. 1: BEARDS OF OUR FOREFATHERS, David Malki, Dark Horse Comics
BEST NEW TALENT Matt Cassan, NASCAR: HEROES, Nascar Comics Bryan J.L. Glass, THE MICE TEMPLAR, Image Books Laura Innes, THE DREAMER, IDW Tim Sievert, THAT SALTY AIR, Top Shelf Bobby Timony, NIGHT OWLS, www.zudacomics.com
Here is the list of comics coming out this week July 1, 2009 that I will be buying.
DARK HORSE COMICS Buffy The Vampire Slayer #26 – Chen Cover-$2.99 Star Wars: Invasion #1 (Of 5) -$2.99 Witchfinder: In The Service Of Angels #1 (Of 5)-$2.99
DC COMICS Batman And Robin #2-$2.99 Batman Confidential #31-$2.99 Brave And The Bold: Without Sin TP-$17.99 El Diablo: The Haunted Horseman TP-$17.99 (will zon) Green Lantern Corps #38 – $2.99 Green Lantern: Rage Of The Red Lanterns HC-$24.99 Jonah Hex #45-$2.99
IMAGE COMICS Savage Dragon #150 -$5.99 Spawn #193-$2.95 Witchblade #128 – Ross Cover-$2.99
Well today I played in my first AD&D 1st edition game since the 1980’s. I had to look up everything again, naturally. Being so accustomed to 3rd edition is somewhat of a hindrance to this since the rules are vastly different. We ended up with a pretty even party, with a Fighter, A Ranger (me!), a halfling Thief, an Elven Fighter/Magic User, and a Cleric of St. Cuthbert. We’re all mostly “good-ish” characters.
We’re playing in Greyhawk. We’re doing the Village of Hommlet adventure (prelude to Temple of Elemental Evil). It’s been so long since I played ToEE and Hommlet I don’t remember enough about it to spoil myself, I hope, even though some of the others have apparently played the recent video game version of it extensively.
Our first session went 8 hours and that included character generation for everyone and a pizza dinner, and we didn’t even have a single combat yet. We did discover something about a thief who was delaying the building of a keep near town. We haven’t caught the bugger yet, though. We are now off to rid the woods of some giant spiders next.
Figured I’d update on my World of Warcraft playing recently. I have I guess about 4 main toons, spread across three servers. The first toon is Aymi (click link to see gear) on Khadgar, formerly Ami of Argent Dawn server. She is a level 55, night elf Hunter (Alliance). I worked her faction a lot too and trade skills besides just the leveling. I may move her to another server, possibly Whisperwind.
Once I got her to 55 I started playing Malevolenz on Whisperwind because a friend wanted me to join his guild there. Malevolenz is a draeni Death Knight level 60 (Alliance). I wanted to get into the Lich King expansion material with him, which was pretty cool.
But before I got those characters up I was over on Thunderhorn playing Horde, where I have a lot of toons, the main ones being Rez, a troll Priest level 46 (Horde).
And the last one I want to mention is a new Death Knight I started on Thunderhorn, just 56 so far (in the DK newbie zone) and she’s a blood elf named Maladi.
I have a lot of other toons, especially on Thunderhorn and Argent Dawn, mostly in the 30’s and 20’s. But I won’t go over all of those losers.
So, anyway, apparently Blizzard has a new Battle.Netweb site where you can register all of your Blizzard games and link your World of Warcraft account to your Battle.Net account, having one single web site to manage your Blizzard games and one single log in. The nice thing about this is that if you misplace your media you can re-download the client right here from the Battle.Net accounts page. I went ahead and registered all of my Blizzard games that it supported:
So, as you can see, Diablo 1 and the older Warcraft games aren’t supported (yet?). But everything else pretty much is. Not that Blizzard has this huge library, it’s just that all their games rock.
I assume Battle.Net will become a lot more relevant with the release of Starcraft 2 and Diablo 3. One other thing you can do on the Battle.Net accounts page is set up your Beta Profile, where you can download a dilly that will inspect your PC’s specs and then upload them to Battle.Net allowing you to opt in to any Blizzard beta tests. So sign up and you could get picked to do the Starcraft 2 beta later this year.
That’s about all I got for WoW this time. If you want to game shoot me a comment!
J. Michael Straczynski, known to comic fans as “JMS” has been very successful as a comic writer for a long while. Gaining fame through his science fiction television show Babylon 5, for which he won two Emmy awards, Straczynski has also written episodes for other TV series such as He-Man, The Real Ghostbusters, Captain Power, The New Twilight Zone, Jake and the Fatman, and others. In 1999 he broke into comics in a big way with his critically acclaimed Rising Stars series for Image Comics. He did an amazing 8 year run on Amazing Spider-Man for Marvel. He did Supreme Power, the reboot of Squadron Supreme. Some Fantastic Four, Bullet Points, Silver Surfer: Requiem, and others.
One of the most recent things he has done is an amazing reboot of the Marvel take on Norse deity THOR in 2008 and 2009. Most comic fans and critics agree that JMS’ run on THOR has been an excellent start for the series, and the sales have been high as well. But now with the upcoming “THOR: Defining Moments Giant-Size #1″ special issue due in September 2009, JMS will be leaving the THOR franchise to pursue other interests.
According to an interview with Comic Book Review, JMS is leaving THOR due to creative differences with Marvel editorial about whether or not THOR should be involved with an as yet unnamed upcoming Marvel Special Event series. It’s sad that the powers-that-be at Marvel couldn’t just have let him do his own thing with the book, he was really doing great on it. Hopefully whoever takes it over will do a compelling job while making the editors happy, a trick not so easy to do sometimes.
I am not really one of those kinds of people who always gets new “stuff” and consumes it just as soon as it comes out. In fact by the time I get around to reading Book X, playing Game Y, or even watching Film Z, it could be months, even years later. Should I even bother expressing my opinion about stuff “that old”? Does anyone even care at that point? I mainly write “reviews” to share with people in the hope of having a conversation about it. But maybe I AM just wasting time.
The following is my ranked pull list. What is a pull list? Well, it’s a list of all the comics I get (in actual comic form) from month to month (or however often they are released). Ranked? That means that the stuff on this list that comes first I give higher priority to than the stuff at the bottom of this list. The creme rises to the top, so to speak.
The format for this list is:
Rank. Title (Imprint) – Notes [Rating/5]
Rank I already explained. Title is the title of the comic book. Imprint is the publishing line. MU = Marvel Universe, DCU = DC Universe.Notes are just some random comments by me about that title. Rating is a x out of 5 rating, with 5 being super fantastic awesome, and 1 being crap. If a title is rated “na/5″ that means it either hasn’t come out yet or I haven’t read it yet to give it a rating.
01. Amazing Spider-Man (MU) – One of my favorite Marvel titles month after month, coming up on 600! [5/5]
02. Captain America (MU) – Still one of the top 5 books at Marvel, just amazing stuff! [5/5]
03. Boys, The (Dynamite) – Garth Ennis rocks this book that turns superheroes on its ugly head! [5/5]
04. Detective Comics (DCU) – Willing to give Batwoman a chance, also The Question! [5/5]
05. Buffy The Vampire Slayer (Dark Horse) – Season 8 keeps rockin’ and I keep giving it my cash! [5/5]
06. Star Wars Legacy (Dark Horse) – Best Star Wars comic on the market! And one of the best scifi comics evar! [5/5]
07. Savage Dragon (Image) – The big 150 is coming soon! [5/5]
08. Daredevil (MU) – With Brubaker off the book soon, can Diggle keep this rockin? Hope so! [5/5]
09. Fables (Vertigo) – Still one of my favorites month to month, everyone should get this! [5/5]
10. Incognito (ICON) – So far I like it even more than Criminal. [5/5]
11. Kick Ass (ICON) – If only this came out on time… so so good! [5/5]
12. Batman (DCU) – So far I like this new direction. [4.5/5]
13. Invincible Iron Man (MU) – In my Top 5 books at Marvel, this is Tony written right! [4.5/5]
14. Thor (MU) – Still a great Marvel title, needs to come out more often. [4.5/5]
15. Deadpool (MU) – Funniest book going right now! [4.5/5]
16. New Avengers (MU) – This was getting lame during SI but is back on track now, I think. [4.5/5]
17. Uncanny X-Men (MU) – Has been really good lately, and now xover with Dark Avengers! [4.5/5]
18. X-Force (MU) – One of my guilty pleasures [4.5/5]
19. Witchblade (Top Cow) – Still one of the best female-lead comics in print! [4.5/5]
20. Wolverine Weapon X (MU) – Not a bad reboot, don’t like the name of the title though. [4.5/5]
21. Darkness, The (Top Cow) – Great little anti-hero title, if only it came out on time all the time! [4.5/5]
22. X-Men Forever (MU) – Really digging this so far [4.5/5]
23. Punisher (MU) – Liking this a lot so far, good reboot. [4.5/5]
24. Jonah Hex (DCU) – Stopped trade-waiting this with the six-gun war, loving it so far! [4.5/5]
25. Air (Vertigo) – Fantastic series! Even got my non-comic-reading wife reading this! [4.5/5]
26. Unwritten (Vertigo) – Seems good so far [4.5/5]
27. Exiles (MU) – This new reboot is great stuff, loving it so far! [4/5]
28. Spawn (Image) – Been getting this since 164, plus lots of back issues. Still love this book! [4/5]
29. Punisher Frank Castle Max (MAX) – I miss Ennis but this is still good Punisher stories. [4/5]
30. Red Sonja (Dynamite) – I still like this. And not just for the… assets. [4/5]
31. Batman And Robin (DCU) – Not bad. [4/5]
32. Star Wars Knights Old Republic (Dark Horse) – Second best Star Wars comic on the market! [4/5]
33. Batman Confidential (DCU) – “In-between continuity” stories with Bruce? Yes please. [4/5]
34. Red Robin (DCU) – Love me some Tim Drake comics! [4/5]
35. Dark Avengers (MU) – Bendis does another great team book, big surprise! [4/5]
36. Dark Wolverine (MU) – Hoping this “Dark” Daken crap is a phase on this title… [4/5]
37. Dark X-Men Beginning (MU) – Another Dark Reign tie-in! [na/5]
38. Dark Reign Sinister Spider-Man (Mini-4) (MU) – I just like Venom too much not to get this. [na/5]
39. Cable (MU) – Might be dropping again after the X-Force crossover if it doesn’t stay good. [3.5/5]
40. Deadpool Merc With A Mouth (MU) – Can we get enough Deadpool? I think not! [3.5/5]
41. Deadpool Suicide Kings (Mini-5) (MU) – Seriously, more Deadpool? Why not?! [3.5/5]
42. Batman Streets Of Gotham (DCU) – Dini can do no wrong. [na/5]
43. Mighty Avengers (MU) – Naysayers begone! Slott rocks this “classic” Avengers title! [3.5/5]
44. New Mutants (MU) – So far I’m liking this reboot… [3.5/5]
45. Thunderbolts (MU) – Seems like this is back on track of being good again [3.5/5]
46. Wolverine Origins (MU) – Get this out of habbit mostly [3/5]
47. X-Men Legacy (MU) – Another Dark Reign tie-in! [3/5]
48. Booster Gold (DCU) – Just started picking this up again after a haitus, so far it’s good. [3/5]
49. Ultimatum (Mini-5) (MarvelUltimate) – Will this ever end? [3/5]
50. Ultimatum Fantastic Four Requiem (MarvelUltimate) – Will this ever end? [na/5]
51. Ultimatum Spider-Man Requiem (MarvelUltimate) – Will this ever end? [na/5]
52. Ultimatum X-Men Requiem (MarvelUltimate) – Will this ever end? [na/5]
53. Brave And The Bold (DCU) – Picked this up for a few but the latest solicits look kind of stupid. [3/5]
54. Gotham City Sirens (DCU) – More Dini, more fun, gotta love it! [na/5]
55. Green Lantern (DCU) – Picking this up again with Blackest Night [na/5]
56. Green Lantern Corps (DCU) – Ditto [na/5]
57. Teen Titans (DCU) – Just restarted on this title after a long break, hope it will be fun [na/5]
58. Titans (DCU) – Getting it for the Blackest Night tie-in [na/5]
59. Boys Herogasm (Mini-6) (Dynamite) – More Boys-verse? Yes Please. [na/5]
60. Incredible Hulk (MU) – Going to try again with this with #600 up, Greg Pak is capable of greatness! [na/5]
61. Impaler (Top Cow) – So late, not sure I care anymore. [3/5]
62. Hellblazer (Vertigo) – Recently became a fan of this, so far I like it! [na/5]
63. Jack Of Fables (Vertigo) – More Fables goodness! [3/5]
64. Starcraft (Wildstorm) – Pretty good so far, anticipation of Starcraft 2! [na/5]
65. 28 Days Later (Boom!) – Giving this new series a shot. [na/5]
66. Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep (Maxi-24) (Boom!) – Comic adaptation of one of my favorite stories / movies of all time? Sure! [na/5]
67. Irredeemable (Boom!) – With the TPB #1 and issue 5 hitting at the same time I’m going to jump on. [na/5]
68. Aliens (Mini-4) (Dark Horse) – So far this is pretty good, not super good but worth a look. [3/5]
69. BPRD 1947 (Mini-5) (Dark Horse) – The BPRD in 1946 series was great, no reason not to think this won’t be. [na/5]
70. Conan The Cimmerian (Dark Horse) – Mostly just getting this out of habbit now I think. [2.5/5]
71. Predator (Mini-4) (Dark Horse) – The FCBD preview was cool, hope this mini will be too. [na/5]
72. Star Wars Invasion (Mini-5) (Dark Horse) – This should be great, prequel to Legacy of sorts [na/5]
73. Adventure Comics (DCU) – Won’t stay on long if it ties in with other superman titles too strongly. [na/5]
74. Blackest Night (Mini-8) (DCU) – The Crossover Event of 2009! [na/5]
75. Blackest Night Batman (Mini-3) (DCU) – The Crossover Event of 2009! [na/5]
76. Blackest Night Superman (Mini-3) (DCU) – The Crossover Event of 2009! [na/5]
77. Blackest Night Tales Of The Corps (Mini-3) (DCU) – The Crossover Event of 2009! [na/5]
78. Blackest Night Titans (Mini-3) (DCU) – The Crossover Event of 2009! [na/5]
79. Wednesday Comics (Maxi-12) (DCU) – Not sold on the format, but too many great creators to ignore this! [na/5]
80. The Good The Bad & The Ugly (Dynamite) – Giving it a chance… [na/5]
81. Fallen Angel Reborn (IDW) – The Fallen Angel is back! Must read! [na/5]
82. Youngblood (Image) – If this starts up again? [na/5]
83. Astonishing Tales (MU) – Even tho this is reprinted Marvel Digital Comics Unlimited stuff, it’s not bad. [2.5/5]
84. Fantastic Four (MU) – Going to give this a shot with the new creative team [na/5]
85. Reborn (Mini-5) (MU) – Looks like this is going to be “Captain America Reborn” now, cool cool. [na/5]
86. Stuff Of Legend (Th3rd World) – Will give this a try [na/5]
87. Superman Batman (DCU) – May be dropping this, it’s good usually but… eh. [2/5]
88. Black Panther 2 (MU) – Dropped after #6. I need to stop falling for these re-launches. [2/5]
When I first heard about this one-shot, I was pretty skeptical and almost didn’t order it. The solicits were for “three ALL-NEW, ALL-ACTION Wolverine tales, all in fantastic BLACK AND WHITE!” I mean, seriously, black and white?! This is WOLVERINE we’re talking about here and they can’t be bothered to color the damn book? Hoo boy, was I wrong about this title, and I’m so glad I didn’t ignore it as I was originally tempted to do.
This is an anthology issue with 4 stories including one lightly illustrated prose piece. The first story is “Sense Memory” by Joshua Fialkov and Paco Diaz Luque. The story here is actually fairly typical Wolerine except for the ending which felt a bit out of character for Logan perhaps. Luque’s art on this piece is really the flagship for the entire one-shot, with amazing pencil work that defies the need for any colorization whatsoever.
Story two is called “Unconfirmed Kill” by Chris Yost and Mateus Santolouco. and at first you’re not sure who the protagonist is, and in fact turns out NOT to be the one you probably were expecting, this being a Wolverine title and all. It is a well done piece with some very competent artwork by Santolouco, a not-too-surpise ending but still very satisfying especially with a level of voilence that fans of Wolverine typically enjoy.
The prose piece “Kiss, Kiss” by Robin Furth with illustrations by “Nelson” who did the cover which btw was pretty cool, is pretty obvious and not too terribly interesting but it does tie in somewhat with “Unconfirmed Kill” so I guess it continues the story a little bit and from that standpoint is probably worth reading. I didn’t hate it, but it just didn’t really add much for me.
“Modern Primitive” is the final story written by Ted McKeever with some crazy outlandish art by Troy Peteri. Aside from the art being quite unusual I wasn’t particulary taken away by the artwork, and the story is really a two panel piece stretched out for three or four pages, but the ending was kind of cool and made me chuckle so it gets some points for that.
Overall 48 pages with no ads, I feel like I got my bang for buck with this title, but probably anyone who isn’t a hardcore Wolverine nut like myself won’t really get much out of this. A solid 3.5 out of 5 stars from me, mainly for the fantastic Paco Diaz Luque artwork.
On my comicbookdb collection page it says my collection is 4057 books so far, since around November 2006 when I started collecting them in my adult-life (I’ve long since lost any comics I had as a kid). I believe that the number is closer to around 4500 or so, due to me not having the gumption to enter in everything like I should all the time so there’s quite a bit of books I have that aren’t in there. Additionally, the database counts a trade paperback or hardback collection the same as a single issue, and I have close to 400 trades/hardcovers, which have an average of 8 or so issues per book.
Ever since I switched to buying most of my comics from Discount Comic Book Service I have kept records of all of my purchases in Excel. It’s easy because they put out an Excel sheet every month that you can mark up and upload to do your order, so I just keep those, and have combined them into what has grown to be a rather sophisticated sheet where I can keep track of a number of things. I have ordered 1562 items from DCBS, for a total cost of $4922, having a total cover price of $8673, which is an average savings of 44% per item. Before I started buying DCBS my local shop was giving me a 10% discount, but I had to pay sales tax, too so it was sort of a wash. I am not including shipping cost in the DCBS figures but my gas expense to and from the shop was probably higher than what I’ve been paying in shipping.
Of those 1562 items, 1211 of them have shipped to me already (you order like 2+ months in advance and sometimes stuff gets canceled), out of which 209 of those items were more than 31 days late from their original scheduled due date (as determined by Diamond comic distributors’ Previews). Which is roughly 17% of the books were late. That’s pretty pathetic. It’s not DCBS’s fault, btw, it’s the fault of the publishers which have in the last few years had pretty bad track records as far as getting books out on the date they were originally solicited for. The fact that I tend to order a lot of books from smaller publishers (smaller as in not Marvel or DC) makes that figure worse, because the smaller publishers generally have a worse track record than the big 2 do about tardiness. Not that Marvel and DC don’t ship books late too, just a smaller percentage of their titles probably.
Of those 1211 books, I have only read approximately 315. I say approximately. That’s the number I’ve marked as “read” on my sheet, but there’s a few I have probably read that I haven’t yet marked. Also this doesn’t distinguish between trades or single issues either and reading a trade is a “bigger feat” than a single issue. Still, that’s only 30%, which is, yes, pretty pathetic.
It is probably even worse if you consider my entire collection instead of just the stuff that I’ve ordered from DCBS, since I have bought entire runs of comics from eBay or other online venues where I have not yet gotten around to reading them yet. For example, I’ve recently decided I really like Image Comics’ Savage Dragon, and so I bought issues 1-3 of the mini (and read those) and issues 1-22 of the ongoing, and read 1-5 or so, and then I got trade paperback #5-11, 15, which I haven’t read yet, and then most of the issues from 86 up to 137, which I haven’t read, etc. Since I like to read them in order, when possible. So that’s pretty close to 100 Savage Dragon comics of which I’ve read only about 10 so far maybe. I have similar situations with old Spider-Man issues, Daredevil, Marvel’s Ultimate universe comics, Conan, and a few others.
What is my big problem right now is space. I am running out of room to store this crap. I have given away a few hundred comics to my nephews, but they can’t read the “mature” ones of which I tend to collect because that’s the kind of guy I am, and so I do need a way to get rid of some of my non-kiddie comics. I did sell a few on eBay and I guess I will resort to that more in the future. But hey, everyone has their problems.
Comics coming out this week that I’ll be getting:
DC COMICS
Batman #687-$3.99
Batman Confidential #30-$2.99
Booster Gold #21-$3.99
Fables #85 -$2.99
Red Robin #1-$2.99
Unwritten #2 -$2.99
IMAGE COMICS
Savage Dragon #149-$3.50
Witchblade/Darkness/Angelus: Blood On Sands-$2.99
MARVEL COMICS
Amazing Spider-Man #597-$2.99
Deadpool #11-$2.99
Punisher: Frank Castle #71 -$3.99
Uncanny X-Men #511-$2.99
Uncanny X-Men: First Class Giant-Size Special #1-$3.99
Wolverine #74-$2.99
X-Men Forever #1-$3.99
Most looking forward to Amazing Spider-Man and X-Men Forever.
RAMPAGING WOLVERINE #1 (one-shot)