nikasaur

Comics Extravaganza - Pow Bang Smash!

Recommended Posts

I tracked down a copy of Beautiful Darkness. It's gorgeously illustrated, and tells you the bare minimum you need to know about the little people in a disjointed-feeling but very compelling way. It's not even made clear what they are, only that they have the naivety of children and are capable of profound casual acts of cruelty. Ending the book with the protagonist realizing that the people she had formerly treated with the same kindness and respect she afforded everyone were uncaring monsters and ultimately killing them when she realizes that they'll only contribute to her suffering is about as dark as you can get. The whole thing is kind of one part The Smurfs and ten parts Lord of the Flies. I enjoyed it a lot.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I just finished Southern Bastards #8 which ended the second small arc and man this book is just so good. I just finished it on a Monday which is the longest I've ever waited after an issue has come out (which is on Wednesday.) Scalped was my favorite book when it was coming out, I'm almost certain it's my favorite series in the 2000's, and I thought there wouldn't be another series like it but so far Jason Aaron is doing it again (not to discount how much Jason Latour is doing as well). It's not for everyone, but it's basically everything I like in comics. It takes the intimate/personal stuff I like in books like Essex County and Optic Nerve and combines them with the character-driven crime stuff I like in books like Stray Bullets and Criminal.

I completely agree.  It's been a real pleasure to read.  I was worried during the whole first arc that the books was just going to be Jason Aaron does Walking Tall.  I was so glad about how wrong I was.  Now, with Boss's story arc I'm starting to see the parallels with Scalped.  It's beginning to tell a deep intergenerational story of a place.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I completely agree.  It's been a real pleasure to read.  I was worried during the whole first arc that the books was just going to be Jason Aaron does Walking Tall.  I was so glad about how wrong I was.  Now, with Boss's story arc I'm starting to see the parallels with Scalped.  It's beginning to tell a deep intergenerational story of a place.

I agree that with this second arc the parallels start to show, even how Scalped started focusing on Dash with Red Crow being just a full on villain, but then as it progressed it wasn't just about Dash, and Red Crow became really fleshed out. I think this last arc really filled in a lot of the character of Coach Boss, though I think the last issue pretty much confirms that we aren't going to come around to being sympathetic towards him like with Red Crow.

I also agree that for a book that started out as a very specific story about one person it has grown to be about the place more than any one person. I hope we see some side stories like with Scalped, I really liked that that one-shot in Scalped about the old couple living alone far from town that wasn't connected to the plot at all.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Comixology currently has a bunch of Daredevil stuff on sale, likely to coincide with the Netflix show. Born Again for $5 is a pretty sweet deal.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Comixology currently has a bunch of Daredevil stuff on sale, likely to coincide with the Netflix show. Born Again for $5 is a pretty sweet deal.

 

A very good book.

 

If we ignore Shadowland, Daredevil probably has the longest continuous run of brilliance in superhero comics.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

http://lineworknw.com/

That's a comics/illustration festival in Portland next weekend, it's free!

I wish I lived in Portland so I could go fanboy to Michael Fiffe.  I love Copra.  This article by one of my friends does a pretty good job explaining some of the ways it is brilliant.

 

http://infinitecomix.com/12th-level-intellect-copra-1-legacy-of-the-suicide-squad/

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

It's Free Comic Book Day, right?I was expecting places like Comixology to have their issues digitally, but I forgot the whole deal is about getting people into comic stores... I hope we can get them digitally later, because I don't have access to any comic book shops.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

You can probably find a collection of FCBD stuff scanned online at some point int he next few days and since it's free I don't think there would be anything morally dubious about downloading it.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Well, the FCBD comics are free to customers. Comic shops count on buying them and giving them away in the hope that those customers will buy something else in the shop. Take that however way you will.

 

In other news, Secret Wars started today. Marvel events have largely been extremely lacklustre, but Jonathan Hickman has been playing into this event for the past 5 years or so and the payoff is amazing. Esad Ribic on the art is also fantastic, I've been a big fan of his ever since I read his Thor series.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Is it me or does this Secret Wars thing intend to kill off Kamala Khan? I don't know what to think of these events, they seem to kill off characters only to make them come back and do things that will be undone....

 

I'm still going to be upset if they kill any character I like. XP

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Is it me or does this Secret Wars thing intend to kill off Kamala Khan? I don't know what to think of these events, they seem to kill off characters only to make them come back and do things that will be undone....

 

I'm still going to be upset if they kill any character I like. XP

 

One of the FCBD comics was set after Secret Wars, and Kamala is in it, so no I don't think she's being killed off. I'm actually not at all sure how Secret Wars will play out since the outcome seems to be "just like 616, but with Miles in it".

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I'm pretty sure Miss Marvel has been doing well and it's been great PR, so I doubt Kamala will get killed. The general impression I've seen is that Secret Wars is meant to bring the comics more in line with the Marvel Cinematic Universe and since the Inhumans factor pretty heavily into that, I imagine Kamala will be sticking around.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Then I'm angry at them for using the "Last Days of Ms. Marvel" name on the comics....  :angry:

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Oh, I wasn't aware of that. Ignore me then.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I tracked down a copy of Beautiful Darkness. It's gorgeously illustrated, and tells you the bare minimum you need to know about the little people in a disjointed-feeling but very compelling way. It's not even made clear what they are, only that they have the naivety of children and are capable of profound casual acts of cruelty. Ending the book with the protagonist realizing that the people she had formerly treated with the same kindness and respect she afforded everyone were uncaring monsters and ultimately killing them when she realizes that they'll only contribute to her suffering is about as dark as you can get. The whole thing is kind of one part The Smurfs and ten parts Lord of the Flies. I enjoyed it a lot.

BD was my favorite comic of '14.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Is Archie still the best selling comic in America? I don't think Diamond tracks their sales, and I'm too distant from that whole comic sales tracking thing to know how to look that up anymore.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Probably? It's still on every magazine rack at every grocery store ever, which is more than I can say for pretty much any other comic.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I've never read an Archie. 

 

Is it... worth reading?

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Archie is very nostalgic for me. It's very campy and inoffensive with only the occasionally really great story, but there's so much of it that you're bound to enjoy some of it.

 

However, I unabashedly recommend the Afterlife With Archie spin-off. It may require a little familiarity with the characters to appreciate its full impact, but it's genuinely the best zombie story I've ever read/seen.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Is Archie still the best selling comic in America? I don't think Diamond tracks their sales, and I'm too distant from that whole comic sales tracking thing to know how to look that up anymore.

I don't think it has been sine the 70's-80's.  I'm searching around and the numbers I'm seeing are that single issues sell less than 10,000 units and things like double digests sell ~50,000-80,000.  For the big 2 their most popular books (Batman and Spiderman) generally break six figures and then for other books you're looking at 50-80,000 for main books with less popular books getting around 20,000 on the low end/ danger zone.  Afterlife sells pretty consistently around 25,000 an issue and the trade of the first arc sold a lot (it was the best selling tpb the month it came out).  Hopefully the new Archie books do well, this graph is pretty sad, though granted its for actual issues of Archie which I don't think anyone buys, just the digests.

 

ArchieChart.jpg

 

Also re: should you read Archie.  I really don't know if I can recommend the normal books/digests since while I still occasionally will read them so much of that is childhood nostalgia for me and if you don't have that I don't know if you would like them.  The Life With Archie series which ended with Archie dying is super soap opera-y so if that's your thing you might enjoy them and if it's not you definitely wont.  I read the short series it spun off from, The Married Life, which was a 6 issue or so series where in three issues Archie see his future life if he Marries Betty and then three where he marries Veronica.  After that I read the first couple issues of Life With Archie since as I stated there's nostalgia there for me, but I dropped it and didn't pick up any issues until the end when they had all the variants (I got the Ramon K. Perez and Cliff Chiang covers for the last two issues which are the only physical floppies I've bought in a really long time). 

Afterlife With Archie I can recommend with no reservations.  It comes out super infrequently (#8 just came out last week I think, maybe the week before, and the issue before that was from December), but I love it.  I agree with Tegan that having knowledge of the characters/relationships does add to it a lot, but even just as a zombie story its super good. 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I'm only vaguely familiar with Archie, but I'm definitely going to check out the Waid/Staples series, because a)both of those creators are fantastic and b)I have thoroughly enjoyed two Archie-adjacent titles of late: Afterlife with Archie, a strangely adult and creepy zombie tale set in the Archie universe (with gorgeous Francisco Francavilla art) that's as good as tegan says above, and Criminal: Last of the Innocent by Brubaker and Phillips, which is basically an Archie Noir, in which Jughead is addicted to heroin instead of hamburgers and Archie plots to murder Veronica to steal her fortune (it's not licensed, of course, so they don't have the Archie names, but it is obviously intended to be the Archie cast).

 

I'm tentatively backing the Archie kickstarter, because I think they're an interesting company and I'd be interested to see what that Chip Zdarsky Jughead comic would be like, but I intend to reevaluate my pledge in the last few days of the campaign because the price is not an especially good value (I could easily pre-order this comic from DCBS for at most $2-3, so why pay $15?)...I may pick a different tier or just cancel it altogether (especially if they end up comfortably achieving their goal, although that looks doubtful at this point), but I'm reserving judgment for now.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now