YEAR ONE: BATMAN / RAS AL GHUL # 1 (of 2) -- art by PAUL GULACY!!!
BATMAN: DARK DETECTIVE # 3 & 4 (of 6) -- Steve Englehart, Marshall Rogers & Terry Austin!!!
DC SPECIAL: THE RETURN OF DONNA TROY #1 (of 4) -- art by Jose Luis Garcia Lopez & George Perez (gee, the 2 guys who did the longest runs on NEW TEEN TITANS in the 80's!)
GIFFEN'S WHAT WERE THEY THINKING (one-shot) -- that lunatic Keith Giffen takes old WALLY WOOD war comics and replaces the dialogue to turn them into comedies... I'M NOT making this up!!!
SECRET IN THE SHADOWS: THE ART & LIFE OF GENE COLAN (available as either HC or SC)
WALLY WOOD'S LUNAR TUNES -- the last work Woody did before he passed away, most of it never published before (Wonder what took so long?)
Registered: Aug 2003
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ESSENTIAL KILLRAVEN --contains the entire run of KILLRAVEN / WAR OF THE WORLDS from AMAZING ADVENTURES, plus the MARVEL TEAM-UP issue, the KILLRAVEN graphic novel, and, inexplicably, the 1st issue of the Marvel Knights KILLRAVEN series. (Say what???) The bulk of the collection, of course, are stories written by Don McGregor and illustrated by Craig Russell!
DOCTOR WHO / THE TIDES OF TIME -- 3rd collection of DWM comic-strips, this one gets into the Peter Davison era, beginning with "The Tides Of Time", art by Dave Gibbons, considered by many possibly the single BEST DW comic-story EVER.
WALLY WOOD'S WAYOUT -- collection of Wood's sci-fi paintings!
X-MEN MASTERWORKS Vol.5 -- contains X-MEN #43-53, essentially Arnold Drake's run on the book, with art by Werner Roth, Jim Steranko, Don Heck & Barry Smith (his very 1st Marvel appearance!)
Registered: Aug 2003
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The New Legends of the Dark Knight storyline called "Snow" with seth Fisher (a personal fav) on art! The way he draws Alfred's hairdo is worth the price of the book alone
From: Alameda, CA | Registered: Dec 2003
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Well, this is what I am geting these days. Not too much. Marriage, a house, dogs, a kid, and of course beer cut into the old budgetmore than you would think.
LOSH (of course)- pretty good, need more interaction with the characters though
Teen Titans- like it, keeps my interest
JSA - starting to slow for me but will get JSA Classified
JLA - the arc about the fall out from Identity Crisis, we'll see from there
Supergirl - I'll try it
Return of Donna Troy- How can you pass it up if you're a Titans fan?
Green Lantern - The mini was okay, art good, but this is a trial
Young Avengers - Has my attention and I am enjoying
Red Sonja - Only have #0 so far but I likey!
Rann/Thanager War - Legion tie in, I'm in
Dropped Fables recently, it wasn't bad but just wasn't grabbing me much, I dunno...
Any new must haves out there?
-------------------- I just can't BLOK it out!
From: The land of toys and stinky diapers!!! | Registered: Sep 2003
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Anyone else around here read The Goon? Downloaded it on bittorrent just to see what the fuss was about, and I'm now going to get the trades to have it onhand for re-reading. Someone referred to it as a cross between The Spirit and Hellboy, and that comes pretty close. Hilarious and violent, but also has some touching human moments here and there.
Other offbeat stuff I've enjoyed lately is Walking Dead and Death, Jr. (both from Image).
-------------------- I used to get high on life, but I built up a tolerance.
From: Kansas City | Registered: Oct 2004
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I finally got started on reading (in some cases re-reading Titan Books' reprinting of the JAMES BOND 007 newspaper strips.
Titan Books began a reprinting project back in 1987... but inexplicably, stopped in 1990 after only 4 books, 3 of them later strips and the final one being CASINO ROYALE, which should have been the first!
At the beginning of 2004, they suddenly picked up again, and have done 6 books so far. What's maddenning is, 3 of these have been reprints of what they already reprinted in the late 80's. But at least they've FINALLY filled in the gaping holes of the early stories, even if they published them completely out-of-sequence. Now that I have ALL the early stories, I can finally read (or re-read) them IN sequence.
The "1st" book (new edition Feb'05) is CASINO ROYALE, which also includes (as in the Jul'90 edition) Live And Let Die, but also includes the NEVER-before reprinted Moonraker. (This is exactly the kind of "rip-off" that bugs me-- I had to get this for the 3rd story, even though I had the earlier version.) I plowed through the 2nd story last night, and the 3rd one this morning.
These were done originally by The Daily Express in England, and syndicated to a number of other papers in different countries... but NEVER seen in any US papers. They're very faithful adaptations of Ian Fleming's novels, with the exception of having most of the sex and violence trimmed down to an absolute minimum. As a result, while I only read the novels once apiece, and around 30 years ago (except for LIVE AND LET DIE which I read twice) I have very clear images in my mind of certain scenes in the books which are just not in the comics, because they couldn't do stuff like that at the time in English newspapers. Even toned down severely, the strips were STILL too nasty for American papers. Damn shame.
The strip started in Jul'58, 4 years before the 1st Connery film DR. NO (and even a year before the aborted Kevin McClory project THUNDERBALL). Presumably the artist John McLusky based his renditions of the characters on descriptions in the books. Even so, I'm picturing in my mind a few actors from back then who might have been perfect had they made movies actually based on the books...
James Bond -- Guy Doleman (THE IPCRESS FILE) Gala Brand -- Honor Blackman (THE AVENGERS) Sir Hugo Drax -- Howard Marion Crawford (SHERLOCK HOLMES)
With his tight squint and crew-cut blonde hair, I can't quite picture an actor for Felix Leiter... but I find in funny that he bears a slight resemblance to Race Bannon on JONNY QUEST, who was an American security agent not unlike Leiter.
It's also interesting to be reminded of some of the details from the books which turned up in movies not based on them directly. Between DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER (1971) and MOONRAKER (1979) the film producers did 5 films in a row that were a travesty of "adaptations". The next 5, however, from FOR YOUR EYES ONLY (1981) to LICENCE TO KILL (1989) seemed bent on making up for ignoring Fleming throughout the 70's by including as MUCH of Fleming as possible-- even though they'd run out of novels. So little of so many novels had been used in some cases, a ton of material could still be utilized... but as I like to joke, you need a score card to know what came from where.
The climax of the book Moonraker was used as the climax of the film THE SPY WHO LOVED ME (1977). The film FOR YOUR EYES ONLY (1981) used the main plots of both For Your Eyes Only and Risico (a pair of short stories that began as possible tv episode plots) but it also includes an "identi-graph" scene from the book Goldfinger, and the famous keel-hauling scene that was the climax of the book Live And Let Die.
In OCTOPUSSY (1983) the line "Spend the money-- quickly!" (one of Louis Jordan's best lines) came from Moonraker, after Bond out-cheats Hugo Drax at cards.
I'm about to start in on the "2nd" book, DR. NO-- which begins with Diamonds Are Forever and From Russia With Love. This was only just reprinted in May'05, though an earlier edition was the only book in the series put out by The James Bond 007 Fan Club in the US (sometime in the late 70's, apparently).
Unfortunately, the quality of the reprints varies depending on available stats. But for any fans of the books, these are a great way to relive the original stories.
Registered: Aug 2003
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SOLO # 7 with MIKE ALLRED. This features a story I've been waiting to see for years, since Mike mentioned it some time ago: "BATMAN A-GO-GO", a tribute to the Adam West Bat-universe!
Registered: Aug 2003
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Comic book (& related) events reported in comic book form - what could make more sense? A panel discussion with Brunetti, Seth & Ware, Neil Gaiman, a Harry Potter book launch... available at:
1. Ultimate Spider-man This is probably my all-time favorite comic book. Bendis has a way of drawing me back to my past through this book. I'm not saying I'm Spider-man, It's just that when he's writing a lunch room scene, I feel like I'm sitting at the next table trying to trade my bologna sandwich for somebody else's pudding cup. I just feel connected to the characters. It's a special book.
2. Invincible Great book. A lot like Ultimate Spider-man in that the main character is High School age and put into awkward situations. It's filled with lots of little "grin" moments throughout the story, but I always feel connected to the main character. Filled with twists that are hard to see coming. Couldn't ask for more from a comic book.
-------------------- Something Filthy!
From: NOVA by way of NOIN | Registered: Jul 2003
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One of the few things I consider a positive effect of the current Crisis is that it's moved DC to reprint its earliest Crisis stories, originally from JLA during the 60s and 70s.
Volumes 1 and 2 are a bit too old-fashioned for my tastes, but I did buy Volume 3, and I love it more with every read. Most of these stories are written by Len Wein, they are all penciled by the late Dick Dillin, and many of them are beautifully inked by Dick Giordano. Wein, with the guidance of the late, great editor Julius Schwartz, brought into the DCU the original Seven Soldiers of Victory, as well as the (now much-missed) Freedom Fighters, and he inadvertently anticipated a JSA plot strand (by almost 30 years) with his story about the Golden Age Sandman's sidekick.
The best story here is probably Crisis on Earth X, with the Freedom Fighters, but they're all great fun, and they stand the test of time very well. Get this TPB while you still can.
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It seems that me and Cali have been the only LWers talking about J. Michael Straczynski and Mike McKone's run on Fantastic Four. It's been really good so far, with JMS showing signs of being the rare FF writer to not be straitjacketed by the FF legacy of Stan & Jack, and McKone once again proving his greatness. The current issue, # 535, is the second half of an excellent Thing vs. Hulk 2-parter which does not unfold the way you might expect.
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"Japan As Viewed By 17 Creators" is an anthology: French comic book creators visited 8 Japanese cities and did stories about their experiences - and stories about 8 cities by Japanese mangakas. The very wide range of styles, both in art and story-telling make this a really unusual book. The anthology also serves as a travel book, if you're interested in non-tourist Japan.
A list of artists involved available at Mars Import
SGT Rock: the Prophecy - great gritty war comic by Joe Kubert, doing what he does best.
Jonah Hex - anyone ever wanting something more from DC: well, here it is! And its EXCELLENT!
Aquaman - so good it was worth the entire Crisis and OYL for this alone!
Fallen Angel - definately the best work Peter David has done since when Hulk was peaking. Years from now, it might be noted that this *is* his best work.
Runaways - Along with Sentry, Young Avengers and She-Hulk, this proves that Marvel still has an extremely creative and fun side to them that fans just don't seem to realize.
Captain America - most likely my pick for the single best comic book being published right now.
Ultimate Fantastic Four (Mark Millar's run) - The 'pleasant surprise' book of the year! Mark Millar is peaking as a writer right now and this feels like Stan and Jack diong the FF in 2006.
There's more of course (I collect 81 titles with my Dad and brothers) but these are ones I think people might not notice but are excellent.
From: If you don't want my peaches, honey... | Registered: Sep 2003
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Fallen Angel - definately the best work Peter David has done since when Hulk was peaking. Years from now, it might be noted that this *is* his best work.
I'll second that recommendation. And I agree, this seems like the masterpiece that Peter David had been working towards for his entire career up to now.
Hyperpath: Email this page to someone!
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