What Classic Comic Have You Read Lately? Pt. 2

[thwhtGuardian]

It is fine-- and refreshing-- comic book isn't it? You've, rightly, extolled Kubert, but let me wax wonderfully on the first class job the legendary Sam Glanzman puts in his U.S.S. Stevens chapter. Boy, does he ever still have it. Its another gut wrencher, drawn in the raw, organic, naturalistic, yet highly accurate, manner that is the hallmark of a Glanzman effort. This Joe Kubert Presents series comes as a rather elegiac project, but one that couldn't be more welcome.

The U.S.S. Stevens story was great too, made even better by the fact that it's told by someone who was actually there; that just made it feel special to me it was as if I were having a personal conversation with the guy.

On a similar note Joe Kubert also had a story, his very last, published in the Vertigo anthology Ghosts that was amazing and they presented it just how they found it so it's just his pencil work. With a lot of artists the pencil work can be kind of ho-hum but Joe's were so close to the finished project that it was amazing.

[benday-dot]

HA! I'm actually one of the last 12 people on the planet NOT on FB.


They were in Previews, so I got them through DBCS. Actually, vol. 1 was like 50% off too! That company is putting out a few collections that are interesting, but I'm just going with the Planet Comics ones.

Thanks. That's a sweet deal too, since those books are kind of pricey. Alas, I don't buy Previews so I think I'll have to figure out another way too track it down.

[pmpknface]

The order code for it was: JUL121189 or the standard edition and you can likely google it. I bet you can find and on-line store that has it. It retailed for $48 but DCBS had it for $28. The order code for volume 2 is: OCT121172. GOOD LUCK!

[Libaax]

Im reading Watchmen for the first time because it has taken me few years to get past all the damaging hype from the superhero fans crowd. Now i can enjoy,analyze the story,comic in peace. So far early on im mostly impressed Roarscach inner thoughts, the surprisingly cool art by Gibbson that have aged well than his work in V for Vendetta for example.

[pmpknface]

Im reading Watchmen for the first time because it has taken me few years to get past all the damaging hype from the superhero fans crowd. Now i can enjoy,analyze the story,comic in peace. So far early on im mostly impressed Roarscach inner thoughts, the surprisingly cool art by Gibbson that have aged well than his work in V for Vendetta for example.

FYI:

Watchman = Dave Gibbons
V for Vandetta = David Lloyd

[dan bailey]

V for Vandetta = David Lloyd

Was this before or after he drew V for Vendetta?

(If I had a dime for every time I've made at least one typo while correcting someone else's mistake ... I'd probably have enough dimes to buy one of today's overpriced comics. Maybe even two.)

[Scott Harris]

What would be really ironic is if V for Vendetta had been drawn by David Lloyd George.

[dan bailey]

True. As if the fact that Watchmen was drawn by gibbons isn't fascinating enough.

They should've applied themselves to revivals of Squeeks or Detective Chimp instead, though.

[Aaron King]

I somewhat randomly picked up Essential X-Men volume 8 the other day. I just needed some continuity-heavy empty calories in my reading diet, I think.

This volume 8 reprints the "X-Men in Australia" stuff and the entirety of the Inferno crossover with X-Factor. Most of the art is by Marc Silvestri, who I don't have much experience with. There are some fill-ins by Rick Leonardi, who I think is under-appreciated. "My" era of X-Men was Claremont with Paul Smith and John Romita, Jr. I've also read a bunch of the Cockrum stuff and a bit of the Byrne. I always assumed the quality fell off sharply after the book became saddled with the artists who would go on to become some of the Image founders.

ANYWAY, I was pleasantly surprised by the book as a whole. It wasn't great, but I liked the Silvestri art more than I like his contemporaries (Liefield, Jim Lee, Whilce Portacio). The dialogue and narration weren't quite as bloated as some of Claremont's later stuff. (Maybe being bi-monthly encouraged him to rush it along a little quicker.) Inferno seemed convoluted, and not in a fun, drawn-out Claremont way, but in a rushed, forced-crossover way, but it was helped by the Simonson art. His Beast looked great.

Final verdict: worth the 7 bucks I spent on it, and it makes me consider getting the Essentials 1-7.

[Libaax]

FYI:

Watchman = Dave Gibbons
V for Vandetta = David Lloyd

Heh what a noob mistake. Although they have very similar works that i have read. Both have drawn Hellblazer and did artwork for War Stories with Garth Ennis i have read. I have read more works drawn by Lloyd really, dont see how i mixed him with Gibbons.

Its nice that Gibbons worked on Martha Washington with Frank Miller, easy to see that series on GNs in every comics shop because of Frank Miller name. I can enjoy his art after Watchman with that series.

[pinkfloydsound17]

Watchmen, as a movie, really wowed me. I watched it at a time when my comic knowledge was juvenile and I was basically entertained by just Spider-Man. I know that movie is not a masterpiece by any means, but Rorschach appealed to me, as did the whole tragic hero thing. Naturally, I had to read the story and I was even more impressed. Everythign from the art to the story to the characters just felt new and I guess that is really what it was for its time. It made a me a new fan even years after it came out.

I havent looked at any of this newer stuff they were doing or going to do (were they not going to write some prequel stuff???) I am assuming it is nowhere near as good and plan to avoid it unless I hear otherwise from some of you guys

[spoon_jenkins]

Thanks to the Essential Warlock volume, I could read the pre-Starlin issues all in one go... and it worked much better than I remembered!

The Warlock-as-messiah theme works quite well in the context of the counter-establishment early 70s and a quasi-hippie culture. It's more blatant than my young self had realized back then, but it's also more to the point, with little decompression.

An aspect that had eluded me is that there are years of untold stories between the end of Warlock#8 and when the storyline was picked up in The Incredible Hulk; for starters it's clearly said that Warlock has been around for three years in the Hulk issues ( and mere months can have elapsed between Marvel Premiere #1 and Warlock #8), but we also see that Warlock has had time to get many, many followers in the meantime (and president Carpenter appears to be far along in his first term in Hulk #176, judging from the way he acts). We also have the Washington monument being decapitated in Warlock #8, and again in Hulk # 176. The years of Adam Warlock preaching and opposing the Man-Beast's rule would have made for interesting stories.

The High Evolutionary as God, Warlock as Jesus and Man-Beast as Satan might be an obvious concei, but it worked for me.I wish that series had lasted a bit longer (with Gil Kane art, hopefully, with all due apologies to Bob Brown).

Because of Sandy, I was without cable and internet for almost a week. I polished off the rest of Essential Warlock. The mythology of the pre-Starlin issues is interesting, but it gets really heavy-handed in the Hulk issues. In fact, one of the things that I like about the early Starlin issues is the critique of the blind fanaticism of Warlock's followers.

The Starlin issues are really phenomenal. But I'm guessing that some of what made it interesting also led to its cancellation. It's a nice place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there. A lot of the Starlin stuff is bleak, about going crazy, etc. It works very well for a short time, but a bit sad with longer exposure. On the other, Starlin gave Warlock an interesting supporting cast with Gamora and Pip. Too bad there wasn't more time to develop the cast. The cancellations and revivals led to some dangling plot threads. Drax shows up to go after Gamora at the end of the Warlock series, but then it's briefly glossed over without any further appearance by Drax.

I'm a few issues into Essential Spider-Woman vol. 2 now.

[NerdCutie]

I just discovered these classic comics; I like them! Green Gorilla!?!? Love it! Do they count as classic?

http://schleppynabuccos.blogspot.com...-sandy-13.html

[pmpknface]

I havent looked at any of this newer stuff they were doing or going to do (were they not going to write some prequel stuff???) I am assuming it is nowhere near as good and plan to avoid it unless I hear otherwise from some of you guys

Yes, they have and I don't know because I haven't read any of it, but it sells well.

I just discovered these classic comics; I like them! Green Gorilla!?!? Love it! Do they count as classic?

http://schleppynabuccos.blogspot.com...-sandy-13.html

GOOM? GOOGAM? GROOT? Of course they're classic! And all primates by definition are classic.

[Reptisaurus!]

Reading Marvel Masterworks: Tales of Suspense Volume 2.



This reprints issues 11-20. Marvel giant-monster-ish stories with a twist ending (The flying saucers are actually alive! THEY ARE THE ALIEN! The mountain the aliens live on was actually the alien space-ship) from the early '60s.

Hey! Introduction by Roger Langridge. His Fin Fang Four is my favorite Marvel comic of the past decade. Good pick.

But it's all downhill from here. This is... not anybody's best work. You can tell that Stan Lee and Larry Leiber were churning the stories out on autopilot. The Goom and (especially) Googam: Son of Goom stories were the only two I really, really liked.

The art is... better. Kirby's monster designs are the big draw and the best stories are the one's with the most inventive design. It's hard to care about the earth being menaced by generic robot 13x, but Spoor the giant Amobea or Googam, Son of Goom. The plot beats are more or less the same in every freaking story - And characterization is minimal to non-existent - so a cool looking monster is really the only possible draw. And when the stories don't have that, they're just kind of a slog.

Kirby's using bigger panels here than he would in his soon-to-follow superhero work. Oddly, 1960 Kirby looks more like 1967 Kirby than 1964 Kirby.

Surprisingly, of the three other artists who Stan regularly taps - Ditko, Don Heck and Paul Reinman - the latter is my favorite. Ditko's best when he's given more than 5 freaking pages (one of them, usually, a symbolic splash) to build mood, Don Heck's giant monster stuff is more-or-less equal quality to his superhero stuff, but Reinman is surprisingly effective at building an engrossing fictional world in just a couple 'o pages. He's splashier, less introverted and not quite as subtle as Ditko, and fits better in the teeny number of pages he's allotted.

And a minor complaint but here you go: I'm far from an expert on Atlas era Marvel, but I know I've read some of these two-page text stories before. One is even used twice in the span of these ten issues - Although the production staff did bother to change the name of the stories and fix some of the more egregious typos.

It's a damn shame Marvel couldn't hold onto their top artist from earlier in the decade - Some Bill Everett or Bernard Krigstien would have helped these volumes a lot.