Comic Books - Do You Read Them?

[Areala]

Tell us about your favorites, or your least favorites. What books do you follow? What books did you follow in years past but no longer? What sorts of stories do you enjoy reading?

*huggles*

Areala

[Phillyman]

I read them as a kid, but that was due to a comic book store being 4 blocks away from my house. I made a pretty penny buying clearance comics for $0.50 a pop and then taking them into middle school and selling them at lunch for $2-$3 each. I actually ended up disturbing classes to the point where my parents had to have a meeting with the Principal, and I was banned from bringing comics to school.

But funny that you mention comics, as I saw Barnes and Noble had some where the magazines were. I was in there to buy the latest EGM and RetroGamer, and I wanted to buy a comic.....but I don't want to go into a story that is already in progress.

The other day I was watching IrateGamer's new video about the TMNT (will link the video below). It was a pretty decent review of how the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles comic got started. So of course I go to eBay and look up the prices for that first issue Guess I will have to settle for a reprint!

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #1 CGC 9.6 1st Print! WHITE! TMNT 181 B5 cm

http://www.ebay.com/itm/350573824026

[HowardBware]

Yes I do. My favorite of all time is Sergio Aragones' "Groo the Wanderer" hence my profile picture.

I also am a huge Ninja Turtles fan.

As superheros go I am Partial to DC over Marvel but do like book from both. Superman, Batman, Green Lantern, Swamp Thing, HellBlazer, Animal Man. Nightwing.

I also really enjoy the more obscure books like The Flaming Carrot, and other various funny books, and horror books.

[Areala]

Holy thread necromancy, Batman!!

It's cool though. Not a lot of talk about comics here, so I'll take what I can get.

*huggles*
Areala

[twiztor]

i, too, am a comic book fan.

my favorite character is Dick Grayson/Nighwing/the first Robin. i'm collected his entire run as Nightwing (up through the current-but-soon-to-be-ending 'Grayson' series), along with memorable appearances in Batman/Detective Comics and New Teen Titans.

just less than a year ago, i finished a readthrough of every Batman comic. i'm talking over 3,000 comics, starting with TEC #27 and continuing up until the New52 reboot. it took about 4 years and was quite a fun task.

i'm just getting started on a similar read for X-Men, starting with (Uncanny) X-Men #1 and going up until the X-Men movie came out in 2000ish. it's much slower going due to a change at work so i can't read them on breaks anymore.

some of my favorite series of all time:

MiracleMan by Alan Moore (currently being reprinted by Marvel!)

Astro City by Kurt Busiek (fantastic creator-owned series that continues to this day, although i'm like 6 months behind on it)

Infinity Gauntlet by Jim Starlin (which also means i'm SUPER excited for the next Avengers flick)

the Captain America run by Ed Brubaker (the one that resurrects Bucky/the Winter Soldier)

and, because i have weird taste, the "Just Imagine" series by Stan Lee that has him reinventing the major DC heroes, published in 2001 or so.

i could go on further, but let's see if this discussion grows....

[kitsunebi]

I like comics more than games.

THERE I SAID IT.

I have about 6TB of comics on my hard drives. That's in addition to probably around 20 long boxes of the real things in storage.

My problem is that I'll read just about anything. And since I had to stop buying comics cold turkey upon moving to Japan (since having them mailed over would be too expensive), I started downloading literally every comic released each week (usually between 4-8 GB per week). Reading them all isn't possible, so as my collection grows, I just get further and further behind.

Brian K. Vaughan's Y the Last Man is an all-time favorite of mine, and his current series, Saga, is also excellent.

I must admit, Areala, that I've never actually read any of the Warrior Nun comics (not yet, anyway - I do have a bunch of them on my hard drive). I'd always assumed they were no good. Am I wrong, or did you just figure it was a cool avatar? I have read Ninja High School, but honestly have never been a huge fan of Ben Dunn's art.

[HowardBware]

Yeah, I try not to be that guy that starts a thread that already exists. I skimmed through some of the older ones, there are more I will likely resurrect at one point or another.

[Areala]

I must admit, Areala, that I've never actually read any of the Warrior Nun comics (not yet, anyway - I do have a bunch of them on my hard drive). I'd always assumed they were no good. Am I wrong, or did you just figure it was a cool avatar? I have read Ninja High School, but honestly have never been a huge fan of Ben Dunn's art.

In order to answer this question, I'm going to give a brief history so you understand why I'm being long-winded.

There are two types of Warrior Nun Areala stories. The first is what appeared in Ben Dunn's original three-issue WNA miniseries in 1994, and continued in 1995 with the six-issue miniseries WNA: Rituals.

The second is typified with Barry Lyga's six-issue series which ran from June 1997 to May of 1998 which was not drawn by Dunn, and Steve Engelhart's Warrior Nun Areala / Scorpio Rose story which was.

If you don't like Ben Dunn's art (and aren't a big fan of his storytelling), then you probably aren't going to like the first type of WNA story. Dunn's original idea for Areala is very much akin to Ninja High School meets Catholicism. There's plenty of silly gags, nods and winks to other Antarctic Press properties, and while some awful things happen to people (Areala gets her arm blown off by a demonic fireball and satanists sacrifice people in the original mini-series, and an underground movement is looking to resurrect the Third Reich in 'Rituals'), it's all very much fun-and-games, tongue-in-cheek, comic book style storytelling. It's serious, but amusingly so and with a 90's sort of excessive sensibility. In short, they're comics first, and stories second.

If you aren't a fan of Dunn's art/storytelling, then I think you'll really dig what writers like Lyga and Engelhart do with the characters. Barry Lyga's run on WNA is some of my absolute favorite comic storytelling of all time, and Sam de la Rosa brings a less manga, more traditional style to the artwork. Unfortunately while I loved it, few other people did; sales numbers on Areala tanked as AP readers made it known with their wallets that they wanted light-and-fluffy stuff with 'serious' storylines given the back seat. Lyga was let go from the book, Dunn took over editorial duties, and re-launched Warrior Nun Areala a third time in 1999.

Other writers/artists were given stabs at the Areala property with AP's blessing over the years, and one series, called Warrior Nun: Black and White, was a Dark Horse Presents-style, all pen-and-ink anthology series, where the stories could pertain to other warrior nuns and their activities at various points in history. One of my favorites is a three-parter set in 1870's Arizona, where a six-gun toting nun named Sister Trinity is set out west to find out what's killing off a tribe of Native Americans. Other stories were set in Japan, or followed a Justice League-style group named "The Redeemers" who went around foiling the plots of Hell without explicit permission from the church.

In addition to this, there are other miniseries set in the same universe but starring different characters, most not written or drawn by Dunn, that can also be fun and worth reading, but are also kinda "out there". Crimson Nun (a pulp-era Warrior Nun), Warrior Nun Dei: Aftertime (a Warrior Nun from the far-flung future), and Warrior Nun: Frenzy (a Paris-based Warrior Nun hunting a dangerous arsonist) are all examples of this, with Frenzy being particularly neat since it was originally written, illustrated and published in French before being translated and re-printed for the US market. Antarctic Press going a little Cheval Noir, if you ever read that Dark Horse series.

Anyway, long story short, Areala is many things at many times depending on who's writing her adventures. She's teamed up with several other bad girls from 90's comics (Razor, Glory, and Avengelyne), crossed over with other Antarctic Press properties, has been rebooted at least three times...I pretty much threw up my hands and tried my best to make everything sensible when I wrote up her biography at the Comic Book Database (http://comicbookdb.com/character.php?ID=7778 if you want to have a read). I'm responsible for something like 70% of all the Warrior Nun-related content on the site, including cover scans and issue synopses though, so I'm biased in my nerd-votion to Sister Areala.

What I'm getting at is, like Baskin Robbins, Areala comes in many flavours so if you don't like the first one you taste, see if a different one strikes your fancy. I'm willing to bed you'll find one that you enjoy. Lyga's stories and the Scorpio Rose mini-series are my favorites by far, but as AP found out, they weren't anybody else's, so...

*huggles*

Areala

[kitsunebi]

Thanks for the history. I'm not a fan of the bad-girl genre that popped up in the 90s, which is why I've stayed away. But like I said, I download pretty much everything EVER, and I give it all a chance before deciding to delete, so I'm sure I'll get around to it one of these days. Although if I'm ever gonna read all of these comics in my lifetime, I need to find a way to stop time for a couple of decades...

[Areala]

Thanks for the history. I'm not a fan of the bad-girl genre that popped up in the 90s, which is why I've stayed away. But like I said, I download pretty much everything EVER, and I give it all a chance before deciding to delete, so I'm sure I'll get around to it one of these days. Although if I'm ever gonna read all of these comics in my lifetime, I need to find a way to stop time for a couple of decades...

You're welcome. I know I threw a wall of text up there, so my apologies to anybody else who runs across this thread and is like, "What is all this shit about a stupid 90's comic doing in this thread?!"

I, on the other hand, looooooove the 'bad girl' 90's comic genre. Not because it's good, oh no, but because so much of it's just so ridiculously over-the-top it would make Tarantino go, "Wait a minute, can we be real here for just a second?" I like it for the same reason some weirdos out there just adore really awful B-movies, or think Ed Wood is the greatest film director of all time. They're the primo example, probably along with the old EC 'Vault of Horror' and similar titles, of comic books being as comic-book-y as possible and not giving a single rat's ass about what anybody else thought.

That said, I don't think WNA is a bad girl book even if it contains a strong female lead who often resorts to violence to dispatch her enemies. Areala has morals, does what she does for the good of humanity, frequently reflects on her mistakes, and takes her faith seriously. I wouldn't hold her up as the best role-model for women in comic-dom, but in the right hands, she's a well-rounded character. Even if Ben draws her boobs a few sizes too big.

Contrast that with London Night's "Razor", who was messed up from a young age by watching her father get murdered, spent time in an asylum where she was molested, and basically does what she does because it makes her feel good to go out and kill criminals. Sure, there's that primal need we all possess to see the bad guys punished, but Razor's just a female Batman without a conscience. She's a 'bad girl' because she's a bitch, something you could never accuse Areala of being.

*huggles*

Areala

[miketheratguy]

I didn't like mainstream comics as a kid. Like, at all. I had an X-Men comic when I was a little boy and I remember absolutely nothing about it. I couldn't care less about superheroes, and still can't. I haven't watched a single Marvel movie and likely won't ever watch the vast majority of them. In fact, every time a new one comes out (Deadpool is an exception) I get irritated because it means weeks and weeks of hearing about the same tired babble. There's such a thing as oversaturation, and how we haven't gotten there YEARS ago with that shit I'll never understand. There are literally something like 17 superhero movies scheduled to come out between now and 2020. I mean, really?

Anyway rant over. I have always liked Batman, probably because I don't consider him to be a superhero. Never read the comics though. For me it was always fringe or underground stuff. I introduced Howard to Groo the Wanderer, that character in his avatar, so we've both loved him since childhood. I loved TMNT. The only other comic I can say that I devotedly looked forward to was the extremely indie, extremely limited run of something called The Eye of Mongombo, which tells the tale of a cynical Indiana Jones-type character who gets turned into a duck by a vengeful voodoo mystic and has to seek out the legendary titular gem if he's ever going to get back to normal. It's snarky and it's full of swear words, so I loved it.

[kitsunebi]

I'm sure you realize the problem inherent in ranting about comics that you've never read and movies you've never seen. That said, there's nothing wrong with being disinclined to have an interest in something. Bollywood makes a bajillion films each year, but I have no interest in seeing any of them, even if I'm sure some of them are bound to be decent.

[miketheratguy]

I'm sure you realize the problem inherent in ranting about comics that you've never read and movies you've never seen.

I don't think that there is an inherent problem. I don't need to see something that I'm not interested in to know whether or not it annoys me. If I stood outside your window every day for the next three weeks and kept on shouting about how great The Walking Dead is, I'm guessing that it wouldn't take very long for you to be sick of hearing about Walking Dead.

It's not a point about whether the films are actually good (and I'm guessing that most of them are), it's just a matter of how frequently I have to be assaulted with hype about them. It gets old fast and makes me wish that they'd just go away for a while.

[kitsunebi]

Ah, so it's not so much the promotional hype but people's actual enjoyment that bugs you. I can see that. I know a guy who to this day refuses to watch Titanic because it was popular.

To be fair to actual comics (not comic book movies), they're all relatively unpopular these days and only sell a fraction of what they did in the 80s and 90s. Which is ironic, since they're far and away better written and drawn these days. Your average comic book movie fan doesn't read comics, much to the chagrin of comic companies, I'm sure.

[Sean697]

As a teenager for like a one year time frame I got into seriously reading and buying comments. I was big into Silver Surfer, nearly every X-Men title, Spiderman, Superman, and some image stuff like Turok. Really the Death of Superman storyline got me into it. After that year I stopped and never got back into comics again.

Until right before the Walking Dead TV show. A friend told me it was a good comic. So I started buying those on Comixology. That is the only comic I read now.

Superhero comics really dont hold my interest much anymore. I have copied some scans my friend downloaded from the internet of some Marvel story lines like Planet Hulk and CIvil War to read at work a few years ago. But I wouldnt buy superhero comics regularly. I do enjoy comic movies and TV shows though.

[Areala]

Your average comic book movie fan doesn't read comics, much to the chagrin of comic companies, I'm sure.

Nope. They could care less whether you read them if you see the films. They want your money, one way or another, and they know the number of people who see movies is much, much larger than the number of people who read comics. If they convert you to a loyal subscriber, that's icing on the cake. But the point is, as long as they get your money somewhere, they're fine. Obviously getting you to double-dip is the ideal outcome, but realistically that's not bound to happen very often, and when it does, it often means people start spending money on the second-hand market to acquire back issues, so comic companies don't see a return on that anyway.

*huggles*

Areala

[twiztor]

I know a guy who to this day refuses to watch Titanic because it was popular.

i've never seen Titanic, and i never will. for many years, i refused to give Leo DiCaprio any sort of credit and wouldn't watch his movies because of his association with Titanic. i finally gave up on that a few years back after discovering that he's a FANTASTIC actor. but i still won't watch Titanic.

back on topic,

i forgot to mention my favorite crossover of all time. X-Men: the Age of Apocalypse. all the regular X-Titles were interrupted for four months, and instead, alternate universe stories were told about different versions of the characters. my god, this blew my teenage mind and i became a lifelong comics fan.

[miketheratguy]

Ah, so it's not so much the promotional hype but people's actual enjoyment that bugs you. I can see that.

Well.......sort of. It's the obnoxiousness of extreme that bugs me. I don't mind that there are superhero movies. And I don't mind that people enjoy them. It's a big world and there's something for everyone. But when SO many movies are about superheroes, and those movies SO dominate public interest, it just gets so irritating that one simply wants it to go away and give him a break. It's like the Kardashians. Sure, they pretty I guess, but is there a reason why someone's going on about them every time one of them sneezes? There are other pretty girls. There are other things to think about. They'd be less annoying if they weren't always on tv or being plastered all over the internet. Can the world maybe spend just a few minutes without them? Just a few? Please?

I remember that when the recent Star Wars movie was nearing release there was so much relentless hype that the people who'd grown sick of hearing about it took to the message boards and started venting their frustration. They'd say things like "GOD, who cares? How can a stupid movie about XYZ have so much fanboy worship? Go see your stupid Star Wars movie in your Star Wars pajamas with your Star Wars lazer sword and shut the %^$ up about it already. I can't wait until a few months from now when my senses aren't assaulted by this movie's existence everyday, everywhere I go. And then in another year I get to put up with it all over again".

That's basically how it became for me, but much more frequently. Because multiple superhero movies are released every year. And they won't even leave well enough alone. They're all about "building the universe" now. It's fine when The Avengers stuck a bunch of characters into a single movie. That's what that group is all about. But now it's like anytime I go to a website that even vaguely interests me there they are, a bunch of superhero articles and links all over the page. "Doomsday is going to be in Batman vs. Superman!" "Spider-Man's going to be in the next Captain America!" "Captain America is going to be in the next Iron Man and they're going to fight!" There's an increasingly convoluted Marvel universe. The DC universe is already getting off to a convoluted start with reports of Wonder Woman and even Aquaman, for some reason, being shoehorned into what started as a simple Superman sequel which then morphed into the battle between he and Batman which has now morphed into the introduction of the whole Justice League. There are something like 10 X-Men movies and I couldn't even begin to tell you which ones are reboots, which ones are spinoffs and which ones are origin stories. Every character is jumping into everyone else's movie. The Suicide Squad is introducing yet another new group of characters. The Spider-Man series is about to get its second reboot in less than ten years. And all the while, in every instance that I just listed off, merchandise! Commercials! Box office reports! Fast food tie-ins! Hype from your friends! Hype on the internet! Articles! Links! Rumors! Speculation! Casting news! Late night talk show appearances! On and on and on and on and on and on it goes, all year round without a ^%$(*%ng end in sight.

I mean seriously, HOW much of this stuff can a guy keep being subjected to before he starts to go insane? I'm sure that all this crap is great for the people who actually love it, but for those who don't, man do we miss those days when we had this rare lost artifact called "moderation".

i've never seen Titanic, and i never will. for many years, i refused to give Leo DiCaprio any sort of credit and wouldn't watch his movies because of his association with Titanic. i finally gave up on that a few years back after discovering that he's a FANTASTIC actor. but i still won't watch Titanic.

Leonardo Dicaprio is a great actor, and I guess Kate Winslet is too (I wouldn't know, I haven't seen a quarter of the things that people raved about). But if someone is watching Titanic for either of them then they're watching Titanic for the wrong reasons.

[kitsunebi]

Nope. They could care less whether you read them if you see the films. They want your money, one way or another, and they know the number of people who see movies is much, much larger than the number of people who read comics. If they convert you to a loyal subscriber, that's icing on the cake. But the point is, as long as they get your money somewhere, they're fine. Obviously getting you to double-dip is the ideal outcome, but realistically that's not bound to happen very often, and when it does, it often means people start spending money on the second-hand market to acquire back issues, so comic companies don't see a return on that anyway.

*huggles*

Areala

I think what you say is true for Disney and Warner Brothers (the corporate owners), but not for Marvel or DC. There isn't much crossover between the comics and film divisions of those companies. The comics are made by writers and artists doing something they love, and you'd be mistaken if you don't think they wish they had a higher number of readers appreciating their work. Comics have come a long way from the money-fueled heyday of "hot" artists, hologram covers and dying supermen gimmicks that caused the entire industry to nearly collapse when the speculators jumped ship in the mid to late 90s. Most of them are actually trying to be GOOD nowadays.

[Areala]

I think what you say is true for Disney and Warner Brothers (the corporate owners), but not for Marvel or DC. There isn't much crossover between the comics and film divisions of those companies. The comics are made by writers and artists doing something they love, and you'd be mistaken if you don't think they wish they had a higher number of readers appreciating their work. Comics have come a long way from the money-fueled heyday of "hot" artists, hologram covers and dying supermen gimmicks that caused the entire industry to nearly collapse when the speculators jumped ship in the mid to late 90s. Most of them are actually trying to be GOOD nowadays.

Yes, sorry, I meant the people who make the films could care less if you read the comics or not.

Obviously the artists, writers, and publishers would be quite happy if they could get anywhere near the halcyon 90's levels of comic shipments back, but that ship sailed (and sank violently) a long time ago. A return, however, to 80's levels of comic sales isn't out of the question as long as the speculators are kept firmly in check and nobody gets it back in their heads that they're going to put their kids through college by virtue of selling their collections for tens of thousands of dollars.

I think most readers today are at the point where they understand the right way to navigate the hobby: buy and read what you like, and if you happen to get in on the ground floor of something that gets huge at a certain point (Wolverine, Deadpool, The Walking Dead, etc...), then count yourself lucky and enjoy the ride.

And stay the hell away from CGC-slabbed crap.

*huggles*

Areala

[Kain]

I enjoyed the Spawn comics. I didn't read every issue but from 40 or so issues i got my hands on i liked it. They were really well done. Also the Animated series is one of my favorite shows as well. And i enjoyed the movie as well. I also liked the Tomb Raider comics.

[synth]

I grew up on dutch translation of many comics like; Disney Land, Donald Duck, Tom & Jerry, Heidi, Flintstones, MAD Magazine, Muppet Babies, X-Mannen (X-Men), (Spinne-Man Spider-Man), Batman, Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles [The Archie comics version with short translated UK stories in the back].

I also read several unique comic albums which contained full stories per issue. These were mostly my favorites: Suske & Wiske (Willy and Wanda), Asterix & Obelix, Kuifje (TinTin), Paling en Ko (Mort & Phil), Lucky Luke.

I still collect the floppies of some vintage/retro releases from old cartoons like the Marvel Star Comics series and some Mirage Comics to fill in the gaps that I have.

I have a complete collection of TMNT vol. 1-4 (Mirage, Mirage , Image, Mirage) so far. I'm missing a few separate releases like Times Pipeline etc.

I also have the complete first run of Tomb Raider.

For current running series I'm mostly collecting the TPB releases nowadays.

I'm currently collecting/reading: The Walking Dead, Strangers in Paradise, Usagi Yojimbo.

[90sRetroGamer]

I'm part of the generation where comics was becoming less a part of young people's lives, although I'm familiar with all main comic-book heroes from the cartoons (Batman: Animated Series and 90s Spiderman) and of course the comic-book movies from 1989-present (both Batman series, X-Men, Spider Man trilogy). Oh, and I can't forget, games based on comic-book properties like the excellent Punisher arcade game!

One comic book that I liked was the Archie Sonic comics, at least from the start (1993) to 2002. The series starts off based on the SatAM cartoon but eventually went into its own direction. I especially LOVE the period from 1994-1999, after S&K but before Sonic Adventure when there wasn't any big Sonic game, so they had original plots & characters.

[danowar]

I once read through 40 years worth of Spider-Man comics. That was quite an experience. Now I talk to myself when traversing the city.