The All New Comics Thread 2017+ Edition

[Mister Six]

Started reading this comic called Ice Cream Man, it's a horror anthology sort of thing, with the only recurring character being the mysterious Ice Cream Man. I was enjoying it a lot. Then it started adding recurring motifs, no problem, it's an anthology - that happens. I can live with that.

Then they introduced another recurring character. Then the comic briefly became entirely about the history of the recurring mysterious characters. Then it started doing a different gimmick every issue, like a way to play with the format of the comic. This was maybe 8 issues in.

So... this comic I started reading as a horror anthology now seems to have like one issue in six that's a horror story that kinda stands alone. And all the rest of it is going "look what I can do" and talking about this space alien Ice Cream Man guy and his cowboy brother.

I mean... I'm sure it's very good. But... I liked it better when it was just a horror anthology that happened to have an Ice Cream Man on the fringes of the stories. You know...?

Heh, Ice Cream Man blew up in my other online circles a few years ago, but honestly I only got on with the stuff involving the cowboy older brother and the backstory about the parallel dimensions. I found the individual horror stories kind of weak sauce and lacking cohesion - each issue felt like it was just horrible things happening to random people without anything much else to it: no unexpected twists, no character development, no ironic punishments or sense of why I should care about this month's victim's gruesome fate.

The bits that interested me were the hints at a backstory and some kind of overarching storyline, but outside of those little moments there wasn't much sense of continuity or consequence; one issue, the town's on fire or a skyscraper has turned into an abattoir; the next everything is back to normal and none of the weird stuff from before seems to have left any lingering traces on the world. There might be a reason for that, and probably is (the Ice Cream Man obviously has reality-warping powers), but I didn't stick around to find out.

I much preferred another anthology comic that I discovered around that time - Sink, which does a much better job of offering up a self-contained horror/crime (or horror-crime) story each issue while also slowly establishing a wider world and context for all the weird shit, with characters popping up here and there across several issues.

It's set in the thankfully fictional Sinkhill estate of Glasgow, where an occult crime boss oversees vicious street gangs, a fox-headed vigilante deals out bloody violence, deranged clowns steal away the unwitting, something nasty lurks in the minds of the sleeping and you never, ever want to catch the last bus home.

Only two volumes out at the minute, and the series is on a hiatus while the creators work on other things, but I highly recommend them to all. First volume is called Welcome to Glasgow, and the second is called Blood & Rain.

[madhair60]

I've sort of got over myself with Ice Cream Man and am re-reading it with a more open mind and liking it. The spin-off of sorts, "Haha", is brilliant, though.

[bgmnts]

So it seems Uncanny X-Men Omnibus Volume 2 is a bit of a holy grail at the moment. Lowest I can find it is 105 quid and that's a hardcover. Some paperbacks clocking in at 500-600 quid.

That volume contains Dark Phoenix and Days of Future Past so it's pretty seminal and important. Bit gutted.

Depending how it goes, I think I'm going to go all the way up to Age of Apocalypse as I assume it gets a bit 90s Liefeld-y and shit. Then maybe start back with Bendis' run with House of M and going all the way up to All New X-Men and modern day. Or is there something vital reading in the interim?

On a different subject , the 20% off I got as a result of my omnibus purchase got me buying League of Extraordinary Gentleman: Century, so it'll be good to finish that off as I never got round to reading it.

[Magnum Valentino]

So it seems Uncanny X-Men Omnibus Volume 2 is a bit of a holy grail at the moment. Lowest I can find it is 105 quid and that's a hardcover. Some paperbacks clocking in at 500-600 quid.

That volume contains Dark Phoenix and Days of Future Past so it's pretty seminal and important. Bit gutted.

Depending how it goes, I think I'm going to go all the way up to Age of Apocalypse as I assume it gets a bit 90s Liefeld-y and shit. Then maybe start back with Bendis' run with House of M and going all the way up to All New X-Men and modern day. Or is there something vital reading in the interim?

On a different subject , the 20% off I got as a result of my omnibus purchase got me buying League of Extraordinary Gentleman: Century, so it'll be good to finish that off as I never got round to reading it.

Marvel has gotten much better with trying to keep those books in print and it won't be long before it'll be back in stock. I'm almost confident enough to guarantee it.

The problem is, X-Men Omnis are always more expensive than the others. Sort of an unseen tax applies to them, this has been the case as long as I've been collecting.

But it'll be back in stock soon enough, keep an eye open.

[Dayraven]

That volume contains Dark Phoenix and Days of Future Past so it's pretty seminal and important. Bit gutted.

Consider looking for a different reprint, maybe? Some other edition might be cheaper and give you the issues you want. (For one thing, there's the old Essential X-Men line, if you can stand black-and-white versions of colour comics, and I'm sure there are others)

Depending how it goes, I think I'm going to go all the way up to Age of Apocalypse as I assume it gets a bit 90s Liefeld-y and shit.

I'd say the Liefeld-y approach starts to come in during Claremont's run, when Jim Lee and other artists of the Image generation start working on the X-Books, then steps up after Claremont leaves.

Or is there something vital reading in the interim?

I'd strongly recommend the Morrison run — very good, lets you jump in easily, and for some characters (Cyclops and Emma Frost in particular) sets up how they're characterised for a long time after.

[letsgobrian]

So it seems Uncanny X-Men Omnibus Volume 2 is a bit of a holy grail at the moment. Lowest I can find it is 105 quid and that's a hardcover. Some paperbacks clocking in at 500-600 quid.

That volume contains Dark Phoenix and Days of Future Past so it's pretty seminal and important. Bit gutted.

Depending how it goes, I think I'm going to go all the way up to Age of Apocalypse as I assume it gets a bit 90s Liefeld-y and shit. Then maybe start back with Bendis' run with House of M and going all the way up to All New X-Men and modern day. Or is there something vital reading in the interim?

You will be already past the "90s Liefeld-y and shit" era by the Age of Apocalypse. You're into the era of Joe Kubert's kids, manga influenced art, and the Crisis on Infinite Mike Deodatos at that point. Though iirc, I don't think the X-Books were too affected by the Deodato Studios credit confusion.

[bgmnts]

You will be already past the "90s Liefeld-y and shit" era by the Age of Apocalypse.

Oh shit well I better get prepared for that then. I've seen some of his artwork and it's painful to look at in some cases. For some reason I had in my head that AoA was the last big story before the 90s era or at the very beginning of it. Didn't realise it was so far into it.

Not a huge fan of manga style art either so that puts me in a pickle.

[Dayraven]

Liefeld is the pretty much the worst of the Image generation, but only does one issue of the main X-Men series. It's mostly Marc Silvestri and some Jim Lee on Uncanny in the last few Claremont years.

[Small Man Big Horse]

Marvel has gotten much better with trying to keep those books in print and it won't be long before it'll be back in stock. I'm almost confident enough to guarantee it.

Out of interest, do you (or anyone else) know what DC and/or Marvel's policy for reprints is? I get if something sells poorly then it won't be reprinted, or in some cases even get collected together in the first place (why yes, I am incredibly annoyed I can't Shade The Changing Man in full), but what about semi-popular series? I ask as I've read the first of Runaways The Complete Collection (a bargain at £6 from a local charity shop), the second is around £25 on ebay (which isn't a problem as you get 18 issues) but the third and fourth are about £100 each, which of course is madness and something I'll never buy. But is it likely there'll be reprinted any time soon?

[Magnum Valentino]

Out of interest, do you (or anyone else) know what DC and/or Marvel's policy for reprints is? I get if something sells poorly then it won't be reprinted, or in some cases even get collected together in the first place (why yes, I am incredibly annoyed I can't Shade The Changing Man in full), but what about semi-popular series? I ask as I've read the first of Runaways The Complete Collection (a bargain at £6 from a local charity shop), the second is around £25 on ebay (which isn't a problem as you get 18 issues) but the third and fourth are about £100 each, which of course is madness and something I'll never buy. But is it likely there'll be reprinted any time soon?

In this case, no, I don't think it is.

It depends on a number of things, and the main factor is format. Chances are that those Complete Collections won't ever be reprinted, but there's more of a collectors market for the larger Omnibus collections. I can't think of many Complete Collections that didn't start to go for stupid money once they fell out of print, or any that came back into print (and stayed there).

The Runaways Omnibus (which collects the first two Complete Collections and most of the third, covering Bryan Vaughan's run) is out of print, too, but because it's written by a 'name' writer, if Marvel thought they could piggyback on the back of something like Saga (same writer, over at Image) getting adapted for TV they might reprint it.

Similarly, if the comic itself (or subject matter adjacent to it) is being adapated, collection or reprints of existing collections are likely. Runaways was actually collected in Omnibus after the TV series was made, but because that's already happened, it won't again (at least for that reason).

Lastly, Marvel's started to listen to its fanbase in the past few years. There's now an informal point of communication between the collector community and David Gabriel (who looks after collected editions for Marvel) in the form of the Youtube channel Near Mint Condition, which conducts a Most Wanted poll every year for both new collections and reprints, and feeds this back to Marvel. Marvel, in turn, when demand is clearly proven, will in some cases put books back in print.

DC are harder to predict. They're more likely to abandon reprint programs either after a few volumes (the Starman paperbacks) or in advance of printing if there's not enough pre-orders. They are, however, much much better at keeping books in print and are more reliable for 'evergreens'.

There's a seller in Netherlands who has the Runaways Omnibus for 85e with 15e postage to UK, which isn't a bad price for an OOP book of that nature, and you could probably recoup some of that flipping the first volume on Ebay.

Hope that helps!

[Small Man Big Horse]

In this case, no, I don't think it is.

It depends on a number of things, and the main factor is format. Chances are that those Complete Collections won't ever be reprinted, but there's more of a collectors market for the larger Omnibus collections. I can't think of many Complete Collections that didn't start to go for stupid money once they fell out of print, or any that came back into print (and stayed there).

The Runaways Omnibus (which collects the first two Complete Collections and most of the third, covering Bryan Vaughan's run) is out of print, too, but because it's written by a 'name' writer, if Marvel thought they could piggyback on the back of something like Saga (same writer, over at Image) getting adapted for TV they might reprint it.

Similarly, if the comic itself (or subject matter adjacent to it) is being adapated, collection or reprints of existing collections are likely. Runaways was actually collected in Omnibus after the TV series was made, but because that's already happened, it won't again (at least for that reason).

Lastly, Marvel's started to listen to its fanbase in the past few years. There's now an informal point of communication between the collector community and David Gabriel (who looks after collected editions for Marvel) in the form of the Youtube channel Near Mint Condition, which conducts a Most Wanted poll every year for both new collections and reprints, and feeds this back to Marvel. Marvel, in turn, when demand is clearly proven, will in some cases put books back in print.

DC are harder to predict. They're more likely to abandon reprint programs either after a few volumes (the Starman paperbacks) or in advance of printing if there's not enough pre-orders. They are, however, much much better at keeping books in print and are more reliable for 'evergreens'.

There's a seller in Netherlands who has the Runaways Omnibus for 85e with 15e postage to UK, which isn't a bad price for an OOP book of that nature, and you could probably recoup some of that flipping the first volume on Ebay.

Hope that helps!

Thanks so much for that, it really was helpful and I didn't know any of it either - when I first started reading comics it was back in the late eighties where I could afford to buy pretty much anything I wanted thanks to them being cheap and my having a part time job, but then when I headed off to university in the mid-nineties I stopped buying comics and only got back in to them around about 2006/7 when I found out about torrenting, and it's only been the past three years where I've started building up a physical collection again so I 've lost track of how the industry functions.

To be honest with Runaways while I've enjoyed it a fair amount I don't think I'll buy the omnibus version as it's just too expensive, there are some comics I'd shell out that much for (the aforementioned Shade The Changing Man if such a thing was possible, and I plan to get the Doom Patrol Morrison Omnibus as a birthday present to myself this year) but pretty much £100 is too much for a comic I don't really love.

Thanks again though, it really is intriguing as to how the market exists, and it's vaguely possible I'll find future collections in charity shops as my local ones have turned up the odd gem over the years.

[bgmnts]

Consider looking for a different reprint, maybe? Some other edition might be cheaper and give you the issues you want. (For one thing, there's the old Essential X-Men line, if you can stand black-and-white versions of colour comics, and I'm sure there are others)

I'd say the Liefeld-y approach starts to come in during Claremont's run, when Jim Lee and other artists of the Image generation start working on the X-Books, then steps up after Claremont leaves.
I'd strongly recommend the Morrison run — very good, lets you jump in easily, and for some characters (Cyclops and Emma Frost in particular) sets up how they're characterised for a long time after.

Missed this first time round but ta much! I've heard the Morrison run is groundbreaking and quite a different direction and I've also heard this Hickman bloke is similar and also quite good. There's so fucking much to read though, the enormity of this task set in when I received 800 pages of Giant Size to issue 130 or whatever, half of which i've read before!

And yeah I suppose the Masterworks would have issues and storylines included in that expensive volume 2 but I really dont want to fuck about mixing and matching and want to make everything as streamlined as possible.

[bgmnts]

Also, has anyone read Alan Moore's Lost Girls? I've been reticent in the past because usually sex bores me in fiction but Moore's depiction and usage of sex I find refreshingly realistic so I'm quite intrigued. Is it genuinely a bit mucky and sordid and 'titillating' or is it not really important?

[13 schoolyards]

I haven't gone back to it since the collected edition was released, but it seemed a worthy but not all that successful attempt to make "worthy" porn, in that there were loads of highbrow ideas about the way our fantasies shape our personalities and how the tornado in The Wizard of Oz was really an orgasm metaphor in between scenes of some cavalry officer jizzing over a pair of shoes.

It's about sex much more than it is sexy, if that makes sense. Usually that'd be fair enough, but in this case it's clear Moore also wants it to be sexy and that side of things doesn't really work.

[Artie Fufkin]

Also, has anyone read Alan Moore's Lost Girls? I've been reticent in the past because usually sex bores me in fiction but Moore's depiction and usage of sex I find refreshingly realistic so I'm quite intrigued. Is it genuinely a bit mucky and sordid and 'titillating' or is it not really important?

I read it and thoroughly enjoyed it. Though did fear a knock on the door at 2am. Lolz. Yes, some of it is a little pervy. But not pervy for pervysakes, I didn't think.

[Artie Fufkin]

I much preferred another anthology comic that I discovered around that time - Sink, which does a much better job of offering up a self-contained horror/crime (or horror-crime) story each issue while also slowly establishing a wider world and context for all the weird shit, with characters popping up here and there across several issues.

It's set in the thankfully fictional Sinkhill estate of Glasgow, where an occult crime boss oversees vicious street gangs, a fox-headed vigilante deals out bloody violence, deranged clowns steal away the unwitting, something nasty lurks in the minds of the sleeping and you never, ever want to catch the last bus home.

Only two volumes out at the minute, and the series is on a hiatus while the creators work on other things, but I highly recommend them to all. First volume is called Welcome to Glasgow, and the second is called Blood & Rain.

Very much looking forward to reading this once I finish Sandman. I'm 2 issues into vol 9 now. It's been so good, barring a couple of weak issues.

[Mister Six]

Hope you enjoy it as much as I did!

I haven't gone back to it since the collected edition was released, but it seemed a worthy but not all that successful attempt to make "worthy" porn, in that there were loads of highbrow ideas about the way our fantasies shape our personalities and how the tornado in The Wizard of Oz was really an orgasm metaphor in between scenes of some cavalry officer jizzing over a pair of shoes.

It's about sex much more than it is sexy, if that makes sense. Usually that'd be fair enough, but in this case it's clear Moore also wants it to be sexy and that side of things doesn't really work.

Yeah, Melinda Gebbe's a good artist, but her work isn't what you'd call sexy or erotic, and that side of things is underwhelming.

I hate to be a basic bitch, but they needed someone with a smoother, more cheesecakey style, I reckon.

GIVE ME FRANK CHO'S LOST GIRLS!

[bgmnts]

Excited reading some of this ^ but it just arrived and FUCKING HELL it's the biggest book i've ever seen to my memory. Fiction book anyway. Looks like a big fuckoff encyclopaedia.

[willbo]

so many graphic novels/trades that I've wanted have been rare and £100s. Even ones I had bought new like 10 years ago! I thought the whole point of them was that they were an easy to find, non-valuable alternative to finding the actual comics in a comic shop. But often now the comic issues are cheaper than the book!

[willbo]

So it seems Uncanny X-Men Omnibus Volume 2 is a bit of a holy grail at the moment. Lowest I can find it is 105 quid and that's a hardcover. Some paperbacks clocking in at 500-600 quid.

That volume contains Dark Phoenix and Days of Future Past so it's pretty seminal and important. Bit gutted.

Depending how it goes, I think I'm going to go all the way up to Age of Apocalypse as I assume it gets a bit 90s Liefeld-y and shit. Then maybe start back with Bendis' run with House of M and going all the way up to All New X-Men and modern day. Or is there something vital reading in the interim?

On a different subject , the 20% off I got as a result of my omnibus purchase got me buying League of Extraordinary Gentleman: Century, so it'll be good to finish that off as I never got round to reading it.

I've got the black and white "Essential" volume with the Dark Phoenix/Future Past era. It's amazing, to be honest, I actually was waiting for it's release back in the early 00s so I could buy it as soon as it came out. I paid about £10 for it new. I like B&W art and rough paper, anyway. Feels more like a real "comic" to me

I want to catch up with the X Men/Wolvie universe, I stopped reading at the Whedon run and to be honest, neither his or Morrison's run grabbed me that much. Or maybe it's just that I'm not into the modern/post-80s comic pacing style. I was reading the essential Claremont/Byrne era at the same time and that was blowing away both Whedon and Morrison for me. I def wanna catch up with the past 15 years tho. Got my eye on getting all the current TPBs like this Benjamin Percy Wolvie run and the other x books from the same era.

[bgmnts]

Really liking this so far, usually as I've said I hate sex or romance or anything like that in fiction as it usually feels gratuitous and as someone who has never really experienced or understood sexual chemistry or passion or anything like that, it feels alienating and frustrating, but Moore's portrayals of the sexual activity feel like something more.

The reality of the girls' stories is quite dark but at the same very much not so and I'm intrigued to see where this goes.

I actually quite like the art as well to be fair. The size of it and the art style(s) do make me feel like i'm reading some huge fairy tale book that starts with Once upon a time.

I will admit there is something so much more pleasing to two women engaging in any form of sexual activity. It just instinctively feels more sensual and meaningful and safe and not so vulgar.

[madhair60]

I recently re-read the first two volumes of The League of Extraordinary Gentleman, and am now working up the energy for Black Dossier, Century and Tempest, all of which border on the incomprehensible in places.

I love it so much, though.

[13 schoolyards]

I think a lot of the complaints about how the last few volumes of the LOEG became too referential miss the fact that they work perfectly well as just fairly straightforward (if fairly mental) stories.

All the references are obviously signposted as references, but if you don't want to follow them up the whole thing still holds together. And as a counter argument, being dropped into a crazy world packed with media references you probably don't get but still feel like they're important is a pretty good reflection of being alive in the last decade or so.

[bgmnts]

I picked up the first issue of Century - the first two volumes being extraordinary -but havent read it yet but have heard it isn't as good so its on bottom of pile.

[Magnum Valentino]

What's the Hickman run like in comparison to Fraction's, out of interest? I finished both of his runs of Fantastic Four and FF (including the final four issues of each that he only plotted) and thought it was a shame he buggered off when he did, FF was still largely great but Fantastic Four was notably weaker and the alternative universe parts didn't do it for me. It was a shame both ended with a big violent mad finale too, with FF I loved it most when it was just being plain daft, and the kids mucking about in the Future Foundation, so even though it was inevitable it was a shame the ending was Scott vs Doom and they barely featured in issue 16.

I've just re-read Hickman's for the first time in a good few years and it's absolutely brilliant. There's plenty of what you've mentioned above, lots of the FF kids messing about and having a daft laugh and that, but there's also plenty of really heavy science-fiction idea-based storytelling. There's one notably long smashy smashy story about two thirds of the way through but it's smashy smashy to the absolute maximum of scale.

It's also very funny and extremely touching.

If you're looking to buy, the two hardcovers are still in print but for the sounds of it won't be for long (and have only just been printed), or alternatively there's four Complete Collections, but the fourth and final isn't out til later this year.

Fraction's run is good but it really pales in comparison to Hickman's, and if you're at all sentimental (as I am), you WILL cry.

[Small Man Big Horse]

I've just re-read Hickman's for the first time in a good few years and it's absolutely brilliant. There's plenty of what you've mentioned above, lots of the FF kids messing about and having a daft laugh and that, but there's also plenty of really heavy science-fiction idea-based storytelling. There's one notably long smashy smashy story about two thirds of the way through but it's smashy smashy to the absolute maximum of scale.

It's also very funny and extremely touching.

If you're looking to buy, the two hardcovers are still in print but for the sounds of it won't be for long (and have only just been printed), or alternatively there's four Complete Collections, but the fourth and final isn't out til later this year.

Fraction's run is good but it really pales in comparison to Hickman's, and if you're at all sentimental (as I am), you WILL cry.

That sounds just my cup of tea and I'll definitely get it, thank you so much for the write up. I'll probably wait until I get paid in June though as I've already gone over my graphic novel budget this month having bought on ebay Rat Queens Vol. 2 - 4, Casanova Vol 3, Vol 4 parts 1 and 2, along with Zero Vol. 2 - 4, Judge Dredd Case Files 14, and Fear Agent Vol. 1, and that doesn't include charity shop finds!

On that note: Fire Power: Prelude by Robert Kirkman - I've mixed feelings when it comes to Kirkman as I liked The Walking Dead initially but then grew to hate it with a passion, but enjoyed the majority of Invincible a good deal. Unfortunately this is very poor, a tedious tale of some bland guy who is searching for a mysterious temple in the mountains, with the first eight or so pages dialogue free, and the art is very, very average and so this was a really bad introduction to the series. When he finally finds it he discovers some old monk who is training a long lost martial art to a bunch of really poorly characterised men and women. One bloke doesn't like him, some woman fancies him a bit, and though it subverts the odd cliche most of the time it's horribly predictable and the dialogue is terrible. I didn't actually finish it but flipped through the rest and though the action picks up it's still written badly, and this will go straight back to the charity shop I got it from. 1/5

[Magnum Valentino]

I guarantee you'll enjoy those FF books, absolutely brilliant stuff although you're really asked to keep up with a lot of spinning plates. At least it pays off beautifully.

Speaking of Kirkman, has anyone read Outcast? I never finished that series (I fell out of collecting, and thus reading entirely, right in the middle of its run) but really enjoyed the nasty sense of ever-present dread in the two or three books I got through.

[madhair60]

And - of course - the first FF Hickman Complete Collections are now out of print and hideously expensive.

[Magnum Valentino]

Right enough, so they are. They'll likely stay that way even with the final volume out later this year, as they keep releasing Complete Collection volumes for Tomb of Dracula while volume 1 trades for crazy prices on eBay. There's a big difference between what books are being sold for and what they're actually selling for, but that first Draclia paperback really brings out the obsessive collectors.

Another option for the Hickman books is the original 5/6-issue trades, but there would be twice as many of them, in theory, although they wouldn't have the same collector value and might be easier to get cheap.

[Small Man Big Horse]

Speaking of Kirkman, has anyone read Outcast? I never finished that series (I fell out of collecting, and thus reading entirely, right in the middle of its run) but really enjoyed the nasty sense of ever-present dread in the two or three books I got through.

I read the first thirty issues (ish) and remember liking elements of it, and the dread you mentioned was definitely an aspect of that, but I stopped reading it at some point and never finished it off. I see it's now ended so may return to it, but I doubt I'll buy it so may rely on my local library now that it's apparently finally reopened.