What comics are you collecting/reading?

[Kai Lord]

A friend gave me a Wizard magazine which inspired me to pick up a few comics for the first time in almost a decade.

I bought:

Transformers/GI Joe #'s 2-5 by Dreamwave.

I never imagined I'd be seeing such a classic team-up of such amazingly high quality. Possibly the most artistic and engrossing takes I've seen for both franchises.

The Autobots/Joes duke it out against the Decepticons/Cobra in WWII with absolutely stunning art by Jae Lee. A very grim and gritty tale, with lots of alternate origins and deaths(and possibly the most gruesome take on the disfiguring of Snake Eyes.)

I love it. Highlights include a Grimlock who transforms into a tank and Snake-eyes fighting Ravage to the death in hand to hand combat.

Conan #0 by Dark Horse Comics.

Wow. One of my favorite comics as a kid was King Conan and but this new Conan blows it away! Fantastic art with stories promising to follow the original Howard novels. Can't wait to see this get underway.

Ultimate Fantastic Four #1 by Marvel.

My favorite super hero story ever was John Byrne's run on the FF back in the early 80's. Looks like this will be an interesting take, but still a "wait and see." I'm on board for the time being.

I was also loaned a copy of the most recent Ultimate X-Men. A very compelling story about a boy who develops a shocking mutant power.

I browsed many comics at the local shop, I'm amazed at how many high quality titles there appear to be! So what are you reading? What are your recommendations?

 

[Mog Elffoe]

I recently cut back on my monthlies, but I still pick up a ton.

Ultimate FF is good stuff. So is Ultimate X-Men. Ultimate Spidey is THE BEST, though. It's in seven trade paperbacks so far so hopefully that isn't too daunting. I dig pretty much everything that Bendis writes actually.

Other recommendations:

The Goon Fun, fun, F-U-N! I only have the current Dark Horse run so I'm going to have to track down the earlier issues. Zombies, sea monsters, gangsters, and spontaneously combusting orangutans--The Goon's got it all!

Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang Neat take on James Bond, where the main character is a mean, petty, misogynistic, and so extremely competent spy that everybody is pretty much forced to put up with him. Only one issue has come out so far but I really dug it.

Punisher I was about to drop Punisher from my monthly list, and then it went 'adult' with Marvel's MAX line. Suddenly the stupidity that's plagued the title for a while now just seemed to go away. Aside from one completely gratuitous remark from a minor character in the first couple pages it's a really solid read. I'm excited about the title again.

JSA & Hawkman These are two of my favorites each month, and the current storyline running through both them kicks all form of booty. They've really made the character of Hawkman into the 'Conan with wings' that they promised. He's just plain scary in the last issue.

 

[Teflon Billy]

• The Ultimates
• Ultimate X-Men
• Astro City

 

[Silver Moon]

• Astro City

Oh yeah, IMO the best series last year! (JLA/Avengers 2nd best)

Other books currently collected:
Knights of the Dinner Table,
Teen Titans,
Exiles,
Ironman.

 

[nHammer]

Rex Mundi - Check out the website. http://www.shrunkenheadstudios.com/rexmundi/index2.html

The tpb collecting the first 6 issues of Rex Mundi will be availible soon. I highly recommend it.

DigitalWebbing Presents An anthology book of mostly amatuer creators. This book has some good stories and art. DWP is watched by the big comic companies for prospective talent. http://www.digitalwebbing.net/comics/

The Goon Somebody else mentioned this, and I think it's a good choice. This book is just plain fun to read. http://www.thegoon.com




Go to the websites and check out these books. You won't be dissapointed.

 

[Mog Elffoe]

Oh yeah, IMO the best series last year! (JLA/Avengers 2nd best)

Other books currently collected:
Knights of the Dinner Table,
Teen Titans,
Exiles,
Ironman.

I LOVE Astro City. I thought the issue commenting on the whole Lois Lane trying to prove Clark Kent is Superman bit was classic. One of Busiek's best.

I also pick up Teen Titans and Iron Man. Teen Titans is great. Reminds me a lot of the Wolfman/Perez issues. I almost dropped Iron Man but thought that I'd try out this new writer/artist team first, and boy, am I glad I did. The current storyline is the strangest, and yet most natural feeling Iron Man story I've read in ages. Exiles, though, I have dropped. I have found that I do not care for Chuck Austen's writing in the slightest. The book was great when Winick was on it, but mean-spiritedness that Austen brings to it, and the total lack of humor (especially when he is trying to be funny) have totally turned me off. I dropped Avengers for the same reason. I'm depending on JLA/Avengers for my fix on both teams now (I dropped Joe Kelly's JLA quite a while back.)

 

[Welverin]

I can not recommend Bone enough. It's started out as a humor book (to hook people), but morphed into a fantasy story (what Jeff really wanted to do). The series is almost over now, and everything gets collected into trades which will make it easy to collect. If you'd like to try it out before buying anything you can try it ou here, vol1 page 5 is the beginning of the series (pages 1-4 aren't story pages). If you don't like it I'll be dumbfounded.
I'd also suggest reading Stupid, Stupid Rat Tales and Rose.

Powers, by Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Avon Oeming is second on my list of favorite comics. It's about two cops who investigate crimes involving superpowered individuals.

Ultimate Spider-man would be third and it too is by BMB, as Mog Elffoe said anything by Bendis is good.

Other stuff I read: Marvel's whole Ultimate line (except Ultaimate Adventures, which is likely dead anyway), Supreme Power, 1602, anything by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale (currently Hulk Gray), Amazing Spider-man (by J. Michael Straczynski), Astro City.

TPB's of completed series' to look into: Midnight Nation by JMS; Batman the Long Halloween, Spider-man Blue, Daredevil Yellow all by Loeb and Sale; Marvels by Busiek.

 

[Villano]

Well, I'm in a bit of an unusual situation. There are no shops where I live, so I have to rely on a good friend who lives in NYC to pick up my comics for me. He only goes every 3 or 4 months, so I usually get entire story arcs in one package. This also means that, if I want to add a new series, I can't just read one issue and decide if I want to keep collecting. At the prices comics are today, that may mean spending $9 or $10 for a series I may hate.

This, coupled with the fact that I don't live near any shop and can't see what new titles are out (I only learned that Hawkman even had a series last month), means I only get a few series that I know I like.

Anyway, currently, I'm collecting Catwoman (my favorite), JSA, and Green Arrow. I've been on the fence with GA since the beginning, but it's much improved since Kevin Smith left. I've also dropped JLA because I hate Joe Kelly's writing.

As to mini-series, one-shots and the like, I've got JLA/Avengers, but haven't gotten a chance to read them, yet. I also have The Many Worlds Of Tesla Strong, a one-shot spin-off of Tom Strong. I really liked it and may have to start collecting Tom Strong again. I'll probably pick up one of his TPBs sometime.

And I've got several of the Barnes & Nobles softcover Marvel Masterworks books. So far, I have Silver Surfer, Hulk, Avengers, and Spider-Man 1 & 2. I'm keeping an eye out for the Thor, Dr. Strange, and possibly Sub-Mariner when they come out.

Oh, and I also have The Essiential Tomb Of Dracula on my "pull list" at the comic store, but won't get it until my friend's next comic trip. I'd prefer to see ToD in color and a softcover TPB, but you take what you can get.

 

[Villano]

Other stuff I read: Marvel's whole Ultimate line (except Ultaimate Adventures, which is likely dead anyway), Supreme Power, 1602, anything by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale (currently Hulk Gray), Amazing Spider-man (by J. Michael Straczynski), Astro City.

Okay, bearing in mind my previous post, what's Supreme Power? The only "Supreme" comic I know about is the one Rob Liefeld did.

And, is the Hulk gray again?

 

[Mog Elffoe]

Okay, bearing in mind my previous post, what's Supreme Power? The only "Supreme" comic I know about is the one Rob Liefeld did.

And, is the Hulk gray again?

I pick up Supreme Power as well, and it is definitely worth takin a look at. It's J. M. Straczynski's take on Marvel's Squadron Supreme characters, which means it's really his take on the JLA characters, just with names like Hyperion and Nighthawk instead of Superman and Batman. It is good stuff and I'm always excited when a new issue hits the stands.

Hulk: Gray is a limited series by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale that is a sort of 'Hulk: Year One' story, so the Hulk is gray in it. To my knowledge he is still green in the current ongoing issues (but I dropped that one too, so I wouldn't know for certain.)