American Comic Books

[lord_breetai]

You know it comes up enough in other threads... I thought it would be interesting to have a place to discuss what's going on with American comic books... wether we're talking about Superheroes, GI Joe or heck even Betty and Veronica digests .

Right now I'm reading,

Deadpool (Marvel)

Supergirl (DC)

Trinity (DC)

and I will be reading

GI Joe (IDW)

GI Joe Origins (IDW)

and GI Joe Cobra (IDW)

when they start next year.

So here are my thoughts on things at current

DC/Supergirl New Krypton

So how long do you think this "New Krypton" stuff will last, they can't maintain having thousands of Kyrptonians on Earth for very long... it makes Supergirl, and Superman not all that special. I dunno if this is going to be a permant thing or not.

I do however like that they took the oppertunity to explain Supergirl's Identity issues, (even if it makes her seem a little too much like her Earth-2 counterpart, Powergirl) and give her one fixed origin. What is annoying is the way they havn't been able to settle on her private life still... She's on her second secret identity and is now trying to decide if she should keep it or not after just one issue.

Trinity

I can't decide if I like this series or not, it's half way through it's one year run of weekly comics... and I went from loving it (before the spell was completed), to thinking it was a cheap House of M knock-off to thinking it cold get really interesting when we found out the villain's spell backfired. I'm in this one for the long hall... just not sure if it's going to be epic failure or not.

Deadpool

So how come he's got three warring voices now, two in his head and one in his mouth? I remember he thought in little yellow boxes but the multiple personalities is new to me... otherwise Deadpool is just as awesome as always.

[Golden Arms]

I've been reading Final Crisis and several of its tie ins. Also Green Lantern, JSA, JL and Green Lantern Corps.

I gave up on Marvels Skrull invasion after book 5.

[VFTF1]

I'm getting old, cranky and nostalgic, and have been reading the trade paperback reissues of Marvel's Transformers: Generation 2...

I also like Mauss - that's an American comic book.

Hmm...what else? Oh - Darkhorse's Alien: Labirynth. I LOVED that and am deeply ashamed of loosing it. I have Alien: Rogue but it's no where near as good...

DC comics - I have a trade paperback collecting the issues in which Robin is killed by the Joker - a good piece of work, although I am not a huge Batman fan.

And last but not least - the only comic books to have survived in my collection...surprise surprise...

The majority of all of the original issues of...The Nam.

That was the best comic book that Marvel ever made - particularly the first 24-30 issues and the later issues.

I am also kicking myself for not buying those lovely lovely collectors hardbacks and paperbacks of the classic Marvel Spiderman, Hulk, X-man etc etc last time I was in New York - but I did read them And dagg...were the awesome.

Will have to pick them up.

Pete

[kanedaestes]

I am currently reading deadpool. I love the writing and it is just a fun read overall

[promethuem5]

I am an Iron Man whore, and have been since around '98... I am glad Secret Invasion is over, and while it was fun, it was unspectacular in the end and didn't do much for me... altho I'm interested to see where Stark goes from here in Invincible Iron Man, as that book has been A-mazing so far, and a testament to the awesomeness IM's title book hasn't had for a long time now, even if the end of IM: Director of Shield did signal the deathknell of the contiguous run of IM books since the original series. I collect IM stuff, and hope to someday have every IM book... I'm missing most all of the first 100 from the original run in the 70's, but that's about it.

[Radd]

I've always loved Deadpool. I haven't been reading too many comics lately. Less so of the big title comics. I love comics like Maus, Transmetropolitan, Sandman, and League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Books where I know the characters are going somewhere. There doesn't seem to be a lot of that in popular american comics, where characters remain perpetually in their 20's-30's for 50+ years and manage to get worked over by a horde of different writers in that time.

I have been meaning to nab a copy of Amazing Screw-On Head ever since catching the Sci-Fi channel pilot for the cartoon. Real shame that didn't get picked up for a series.

I haven't been any more up to date on new stuff beyond what a co-worker of mine has been telling me after his weekly new comic feasts. He's mostly been reading Final Crisis Invasion, and that weird Batman story arch that's been going on.

[lord_breetai]

I've always loved Deadpool. I haven't been reading too many comics lately. Less so of the big title comics. I love comics like Maus, Transmetropolitan, Sandman, and League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Books where I know the characters are going somewhere. There doesn't seem to be a lot of that in popular american comics, where characters remain perpetually in their 20's-30's for 50+ years and manage to get worked over by a horde of different writers in that time.

Archie-syndrome is deffinitly a problem with American comics... but that wasn't always the case. the Golden Age Batman (what would be called Earth II Batman from the silver age onwards) had the following happen to him

-He got married to Selena Kyle

-Retired as the batman and became police commisioner of Gotham City

-Had a Daughter named Helena

-Had his wife die on him

-had his daughter grow up and become a Superhero herself

-died of old age

likewise the other Earth II characters did grow older... it's not until the Silverage onwards that we had characters who were frozen in time.

I agree it's a real problem. development is slow in a lot of places, sometimes it gets reset (*cough* Spider-man and Mary Jane I'm looking at you), and so on...

In that sense I really do like Supergirl, cause even though she was messed up for a long time... things still happened with her and you really feel like she's maturing.

LXG is just an awesome comic, (though that might be the fact that I love love LOVE Steampunk!), shame the movie was nowhere near as good.

Edited December 14, 2008 by lord_breetai

[Radd]

I should maybe take a look at the Golden Age Batman. I wonder if any of that was compiled into a trade paperback or if I'll have to go the digital route?

And, ja, it's not just that the League movie was not as good, it was downright terrible. And shamelessly transparent in the way business decisions overrode anything resembling a good story. I'm still holding out hope that Moore wants to write a third League of Extraordinary Gentlemen volume someday. I know there's a book, as in text with a few illustrations here and there, but I haven't gotten my hands on that, yet.

[lord_breetai]

And, ja, it's not just that the League movie was not as good, it was downright terrible. And shamelessly transparent in the way business decisions overrode anything resembling a good story. I'm still holding out hope that Moore wants to write a third League of Extraordinary Gentlemen volume someday. I know there's a book, as in text with a few illustrations here and there, but I haven't gotten my hands on that, yet.

Well a straight up adaptation of the graphic novel would have been very very R rated. The main problem is the movie was not only an awful adaptation of the comic, it treated the actual victorian characters with very little respect for their own source stories. Again Steampunk is something I almost always love... but when I saw the LXG movie in theatres I actually lost interest about half way though, and spent the rest of the time just making out with my girlfriend at the time, cause both of us were totally disgusted with the film. (She was huge both on Dracula and Sherlock Holmes and she hated it this did to those stories).

I still havn't even read the second graphic novel, should pick it up sometime.

[electric indigo]

What I'm collecting at the moment:

I kill giants

A somewhat twisted child's story published by Image, I love the art and storytelling. The final issue lies ahead, can't wait to see where it will go in the end.

http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=16178

DMZ

Civil war in the US. Manhattan is the DMZ, where journalist Matty Roth tries to survive the struggles of the powers that rule this world. I read the TPBs, and each one of them is like a really great movie.

http://www.dccomics.com/vertigo/graphic_novels/?gn=5272

The Nightly News

Very twisted story and very wicked art by Jonathan Hickman. Gives graphic storytelling a well-deserved kick in the butt.

http://www.pronea.com/tnn.html

[Radd]

Well a straight up adaptation of the graphic novel would have been very very R rated. The main problem is the movie was not only an awful adaptation of the comic, it treated the actual victorian characters with very little respect for their own source stories. Again Steampunk is something I almost always love... but when I saw the LXG movie in theatres I actually lost interest about half way though, and spent the rest of the time just making out with my girlfriend at the time, cause both of us were totally disgusted with the film. (She was huge both on Dracula and Sherlock Holmes and she hated it this did to those stories).

I still havn't even read the second graphic novel, should pick it up sometime.

Concessions would have been made to make a good adaptation of the book, with a marketable rating. Or they could have done a completely original story and still done it well.

I highly recommend the second graphic novel.

[Excillon]

I only read two books now. Moon Knight and Nova. I HIGHLY recommend Nova, I think it's one of the most well drawn, and definately the most well written comic series I have ever read.

[Gubaba]

And, ja, it's not just that the League movie was not as good, it was downright terrible. And shamelessly transparent in the way business decisions overrode anything resembling a good story. I'm still holding out hope that Moore wants to write a third League of Extraordinary Gentlemen volume someday. I know there's a book, as in text with a few illustrations here and there, but I haven't gotten my hands on that, yet.

Never saw the movie...the advance word was terrible, the ads were terrible (as Mina (I think...it could be Allan) says in The Black Dossier, "Only Americans would be stupid enough to think that "X" stands for "Extra"), and once it came out, the reviews were terrible...so it was easy for me to miss.

And Radd, I highly recommend the Black Dossier...it's more than just a "text with a few illustrations." It's HEAVILY illustrated throughout, in an impressive amount of different styles. The big difference is that, unlike the previous volumes, where in the comic was the main story and the little typey stuff at the end was a supplement, here the little typey stuff (which is neither "little" nor "typey," really) is the real story, and the comic is just a framing device. But, as always, it's astonishing stuff, and apparently sets the stage the for Volume III.

And you get to see James Bond make out with Emma Peel.

As for other comics, I really, really liked Strangers in Paradise, Bone, Sandman (I'm currently collecting the Absolute Sandman - three down, one of to go), The Invisibles, pretty much anything by Alan Moore, and Cerebus (which I followed all the way to the bitter end...and man, was it bitter).

I don't have a lot of interest in (or patience for) superhero comics.

[VFTF1]

and Cerebus (which I followed all the way to the bitter end...and man, was it bitter).

I remember him - and I also remember trying to get into it when I was younger - but it was waaaaay over my head. I do think I should get into it - so much still to do in life....

I first "met" Cerebus in the TMNT crossover with him (Eastman and Laird TMNT of course) ...

I could never make out what Cerebus was about - and regret not checking it out more thoroughly.

Pete

[lord_breetai]

Never saw the movie...the advance word was terrible, the ads were terrible (as Mina (I think...it could be Allan) says in The Black Dossier, "Only Americans would be stupid enough to think that "X" stands for "Extra"), and once it came out, the reviews were terrible...so it was easy for me to miss.

And Radd, I highly recommend the Black Dossier...it's more than just a "text with a few illustrations." It's HEAVILY illustrated throughout, in an impressive amount of different styles. The big difference is that, unlike the previous volumes, where in the comic was the main story and the little typey stuff at the end was a supplement, here the little typey stuff (which is neither "little" nor "typey," really) is the real story, and the comic is just a framing device. But, as always, it's astonishing stuff, and apparently sets the stage the for Volume III.

And you get to see James Bond make out with Emma Peel.

Sounds very cool, if you want to read a book that has a similar set up to the Leauge comics, I'd recommend the Anno Dracula series by Kim Newman, it has the same kind of progression (Victorian England > World War I > cold war spies) mixing popular characters from other works together... but with a Vampire focus.

And yeah, I guess using X for Extra is a bit silly, however if you use E it become LEG whch just doesn't sound indimidating.

But I'll deffinitly check out the rest of the Leauge stuff.

[mikeszekely]

Well, I've read just about all of IDW's Transformers comic books. I've loved the main story (although it was a little rushed at the end) and most of the Spotlights. Some of the Spotlights have been pretty weak, though. Megatron Origin was so-so, and All Hail Megatron, while featuring some of the best art in an IDW Transformers book to date, has been all style and little substance.

Aside from that, I read the Avengers: Disassembled crossover (loved it), the House of M crossover (liked it), then I tried reading the Decimation stuff. Honestly, I loved the X books prior to Age of Apocalypse, but their current stuff is awful. I kinda skimmed over the Civil War stuff, and I've been reading all the Spider-Man books since, with mostly mixed feelings there (Back in Black was okay, One More Day was terrible, Brand New Day was about as good as it could be post-One More Day, but it's been kinda dull since).

I liked the Thunderbolts, but I lost interest after Civil War.

I was a fan of the Danny Ketch Ghost Rider, so I've been reading the new Ghost Rider series. It started off okay, quickly lost direction, but is starting to pick up again.

I've read every issue of Ultimate Spider-Man, but it started going downhill after Mark Bagley left the series. I also though that Ultimates I and Ultimates II were some of the best-written comic books to date, but I never got around to Ultimates III.

I've been reading a lot of the old 80's and 90's Iron Man... there's some good stuff going on with Stark's personal life outside of the usual cornball Iron Man vs. Villain of the Week battles. I've got a collection that goes up to most of the modern stuff, so I'm looking forward to getting to that.

No DC on my plate. I was more of a Marvel/Image guy. When Wildstorm went to DC, I became pretty much just a Marvel guy, although I kinda dig what IDW's doing. Haven't read any of their stuff, but the guys at Udon seem to have some talented artists.

Oh, yeah, I was also reading Star Wars: Legacy. It started off kinda dumb, but it was getting pretty good for awhile. I wonder why I stopped?

[promethuem5]

I've been reading a lot of the old 80's and 90's Iron Man... there's some good stuff going on with Stark's personal life outside of the usual cornball Iron Man vs. Villain of the Week battles. I've got a collection that goes up to most of the modern stuff, so I'm looking forward to getting to that.

This is some of the best IM writing in the franchise, enjoy. I feel that once Busiek and Chen leave after the Sentient Armor bit IM really tanked for a long time, and I don't like the faux-painted art once Granov shows up, but the vol 3 early issues are some of the best. I also love the Heroes Reborn run, even tho that gets alot of flak from the purists.

[Gubaba]

I remember him - and I also remember trying to get into it when I was younger - but it was waaaaay over my head. I do think I should get into it - so much still to do in life....

I first "met" Cerebus in the TMNT crossover with him (Eastman and Laird TMNT of course) ...

I could never make out what Cerebus was about - and regret not checking it out more thoroughly.

Pete

I still it's worth reading, although you may not make it to the end. The first book in the series is just okay, but the next five to seven are stunningly brilliant. Then he (Dave Sim, the writer, artist, editor, AND publisher of Cerebus) dropped the big shoe that alienated almost everyone in Book Eight ("Reads"), and so a lot of people left before the other shoe dropped almost ten years later (in Book Fifteen, "Latter Days")...and alienated nearly everyone else. I think it's still well worth the ride, but Sim seems to have been slowly going insane over the final hundred or so issues of the comic, and I mean that quite literally.

Sounds very cool, if you want to read a book that has a similar set up to the Leauge comics, I'd recommend the Anno Dracula series by Kim Newman, it has the same kind of progression (Victorian England > World War I > cold war spies) mixing popular characters from other works together... but with a Vampire focus.

And yeah, I guess using X for Extra is a bit silly, however if you use E it become LEG whch just doesn't sound indimidating.

But I'll deffinitly check out the rest of the Leauge stuff.

Yeah, the Kim Newman series is pretty cool, as is Phillip Jose Farmer's Wold Newton saga, which is also pretty much the same idea.

Edited December 14, 2008 by Gubaba

[lord_breetai]

Aside from that, I read the Avengers: Disassembled crossover (loved it), the House of M crossover (liked it), then I tried reading the Decimation stuff. Honestly, I loved the X books prior to Age of Apocalypse, but their current stuff is awful. I kinda skimmed over the Civil War stuff, and I've been reading all the Spider-Man books since, with mostly mixed feelings there (Back in Black was okay, One More Day was terrible, Brand New Day was about as good as it could be post-One More Day, but it's been kinda dull since).

No DC on my plate. I was more of a Marvel/Image guy. When Wildstorm went to DC, I became pretty much just a Marvel guy, although I kinda dig what IDW's doing. Haven't read any of their stuff, but the guys at Udon seem to have some talented artists.

I really liked House of M a lot, I bought 2 of every tie-in to it... was really into it loved the idea... then it kinda got cheapened for me when I realized it was largely very similar to the novel trilogy "X-men/Doctor Doom The Chaos Engine Trilogy", which I got the year before for Christmas from my brother (the first book havn't found the other two which are apparantly even more House of M like). House did a good idea of translating the ideas from Chaos Engine and a lot of the side stories were truly interesting... however the "your fondest desire" didn't make much sense when we factored in how many characters later turned out to be Skrulls... and Marvel went really down hill for me after house.

I was largely a Marvel guy back in the day too... but Supergirl, I dunno I just like her.

Udon is great, I enjoyed their first Street Fighter series and met Omar Dogun at a comic convention, I've mentioned this before but I got a custom sketch of Sakura from Street Fighter in a UN Spacy bridge uniform from him, (he also did the art for Robotech Prelude to the Shadow Chronicles so it seemed like a fun idea).

Yeah, the Kim Newman series is pretty cool, as is Phillip Jose Farmer's Wold Newton saga, which is also pretty much the same idea.

Oh, you've already read it? If you liked Genevieve from the first book check out "The Vampire Genevieve" where the character originated; it's published under a pseudonym (Jack Yeovil) and set in the Warhammer world but it's basically the same character and it's the same author.

Edited December 15, 2008 by lord_breetai

[Gubaba]

Oh, you've already read it? If you liked Genevieve from the first book check out "The Vampire Genevieve" where the character originated it's published under a Pseudonym (Jack Yeovil) and set in the Warhammer world but it's basically the same character and it's the same author.

Hmmm...that one, I didn't know. Thanks!

[Radd]

Sounds very cool, if you want to read a book that has a similar set up to the Leauge comics, I'd recommend the Anno Dracula series by Kim Newman, it has the same kind of progression (Victorian England > World War I > cold war spies) mixing popular characters from other works together... but with a Vampire focus.

And yeah, I guess using X for Extra is a bit silly, however if you use E it become LEG whch just doesn't sound indimidating.

But I'll deffinitly check out the rest of the Leauge stuff.

LoEG? LExG? Personally, I write the whole thing out on principle. There's a horrible movie named 'LXG', not to be confused with the wonderful books titled 'League of Extraordinary Gentlemen'. Heh.

Hmmm, the Black Dossier setting up a third volume kinda makes me want to put it off a bit longer. I'd hate to read it only to have years before the next volume of the graphic novel comes out. I know, not entirely rational, and I'll probably get around to reading it sooner rather than later anyways. Unfortunately, the comic book store is no longer located in the plaza across the street from where I work.

I tried getting into the Dreamwave Transformers comics when they were coming out. Beautifully drawn and coloured, but very bland writing. I have a trade paperback volume of War Wtihin, mostly for the art. I really can't stand Simon Furman's take on Transformers. I know a lot of people seem to love his work but it just never sat well with me. He has the Tarantino/Kevin Smith problem, where every single character sounds like a mouthpiece for the same dialogue. ( Except, personally, I find that Tarantino and Smith manage to entertain despite this. )

I haven't checked out any of the more recent Transformers comics.

[promethuem5]

I tried getting into the Dreamwave Transformers comics when they were coming out. Beautifully drawn and coloured, but very bland writing. I have a trade paperback volume of War Wtihin, mostly for the art. I really can't stand Simon Furman's take on Transformers. I know a lot of people seem to love his work but it just never sat well with me. He has the Tarantino/Kevin Smith problem, where every single character sounds like a mouthpiece for the same dialogue. ( Except, personally, I find that Tarantino and Smith manage to entertain despite this. )

What you're forgetting here is that all Transformers comics are boring... I don't know what it is, but I just don't really enjoy any TF comics ever... WWI is fun but unspectacular, and Megatron Origins is ok, but on a whole TF comics do nothing for me.

[lord_breetai]

I tried getting into the Dreamwave Transformers comics when they were coming out. Beautifully drawn and coloured, but very bland writing. I have a trade paperback volume of War Wtihin, mostly for the art. I really can't stand Simon Furman's take on Transformers. I know a lot of people seem to love his work but it just never sat well with me. He has the Tarantino/Kevin Smith problem, where every single character sounds like a mouthpiece for the same dialogue. ( Except, personally, I find that Tarantino and Smith manage to entertain despite this. )

Simon Furman has his good and bad points, he gave us the core of the Unicron/Primus mythos, and many other things... And the last two episodes of Beast Wars (which he wrote) were pure gold. I think though Furman is one of those writers who has awesome ideas and the ability to create a very well fleshed out universe and mythos but sucks at actually getting the character to deliver (another example is George Lucas).

But yes, transformers fans are very aware of his repeated dialog hence the FURMANISMS http://transformers.wikia.com/wiki/Furmanism

[Impreszive]

I actually have most of the single issues for the DW Transformers series. I've been trying to get rid of them forever.

[F-ZeroOne]

While discussing the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, just a little trivia - in the 1980s, artist Kevin O' Neill was the only artist ever to have his entire style disapproved by the Comics Code Authority...!

[Scream Man]

I want to get the IDW Trnaformers trade.s Just havent seen them around.

i get mostly trades, but titles i enjoy:

Annihilation various series

Nova

Captain America

Thor

Ultimate Spiderman

New X-men

Gargoyles

Gargoyles: Bad Guys

Green Lantern

Green Lantern Corp

Robin

Teen Titans

Flash

JLA

Justice League of America

Green Arrow

Supergirl

Aquaman

Justice

I think that's it...theres a few I plan to try when i get some time....

[Radd]

While discussing the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, just a little trivia - in the 1980s, artist Kevin O' Neill was the only artist ever to have his entire style disapproved by the Comics Code Authority...!

Huh, wow. I tried to do a few minutes of Google research into this, found a few sources confirming that this happened, but nothing really explaining just what it was that the CCA found objectionable about his style. Maybe I'll have to see the specific comic they refused to approve, but if the art itself is anything like his work in League of Extraordinary Gentlemen then I can't fathom how they could justify the statement. Maybe it was "how O'Neill drew what he drew" for that particular book, and not actually a general complaint of his art style, but those at the CCA couldn't express themselves in a way that made any sense?

I suppose it will remain a mystery.

[F-ZeroOne]

I may well be wrong on this, but I seem to recall it was a Green Lantern title that caused the trouble. Or maybe they just saw some of the stuff he was doing/had done for 2000AD in the UK and tried to head him off at the pass...

[Radd]

Yup, it was a Green Lantern comic. Apparently it had some things like a crucifixion which might have set off alarms, but it looks like DC asked specifically what they would have to remove in order to get CCA approval, and it's then that the CCA stated that it wasn't what was depicted, but the artist's style. I'm really having trouble wrapping my head around that concept.

[transfan52]

Best comic book adaptation EVER!

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=zgAPFKDL6Sg

[kanedaestes]

Agreed!