New Comic Book Day Megathread

[Colin YNWA]

Well if I see them on sale I think I'll pick them up.

[Colin YNWA]

Its been a while since I picked up my comics pile
I got um now so you don't have wait anymore

So yeah busy, busy, busy so its been best part of a month since I got to my nerd shop. Made it at last and got quite a pile, which an exhausted weekend of relaxation at home, with kids back, or starting at school has given me the glorious chance to get through them all already. So sit back, get comfie cos here I go.

Firstly there's a bunch of new of nearly new comics. I'll start with Lake of Fire 1 cos it probably should be last as comic of the haul, so instead I'll put it at the other end. Quite superb start to his series the opening episode of which wouldn't have been out of place as a Cinebook album. A load packed in 44 action packed, gloriously rendered pages of character, scene setting and crusaders fighting aliens. I mean really this is what comics excell at. You know how good this comic is as Resident Alien: The Man with No Name 1 isn't the best new comic I got and this is a bloody fantastic, quiet gem of a comic. Hellblazer 1 isn't in that class. A forced Swampie appearance leds to nice character introductions but little main plot development, yet. I trust this team to turn it around and make this good comics into a great series.

Both Kill or be killed 2 and Kong of Skull Island 3 are new series that I'm already really happy with and these respective issues don't change that at all, great stuff.

Then we get to Hanna Barbera comics, don't ask me how the fuck I ended up getting 3 of these on my pull list. I blame it on Future Quest... but we'll come to that. Anyway thank fuck I tried The Flintstones (3) (based on comments here abouts) its quite gloriously leftfield, but wonderfully fresh and different because of that. Loving this in a way I can't quite explain. Wacky Raceland 3 is losing me a little and is beginning to feel like it should be drawn my Belardinelli, its so chaotic which at first was enchanting and now is getting a little disengaging. Still I think this one only has 6 issue run now so I'll stick with it. Now back to the one comics I was most looking forward to in this series Future Quest 4 Parker and Shaner are a fantastic team, but this comic's early up and downs seem to have made it lose its way and its lost me with it. I'm going to dig out the first 4 issues (the first was so good) and see if it holds up and is worth the effort.

Two other comics are going to benefit with a series re-read Judge Dredd 9 and Doctor Who 11th 2nd 12 are both good comics that I think will be better comics when the series they are part of are read as one to bring all the elements together in sharper focus. Island 10 has similar problems this issue is a bit of a dip in form from the up lift of late. Mainly due to the fact that Pop Gun War which I really like has suffered form the gap and the fact I struggled a little to remember what had happened before. Still this anthology has justified my faith and I hope it mops up the hanging series soon and gets its out put a little better organised, as it will be exactly the series I'm after if it does.

The rest of my haul is great series having great issues. Pretty straightforward stuff really, just good comics. Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur 10 is fantastically frothy; Cinema Purgatorio 5 terrifically horrific (nice to see Uncle Aln back doing Time Twisters!); Unfollow 11 brutally brilliant (really nice to have Dowling back in art), Sex 31 characteristically character filled; Paper Girls 9 Tremendously tantilising (which of your otherselves would you trust?); Nowhere Men 11 Back to its brilliant best; James Bond 9 perfectly pitched; Lazarus 24 gloriously grounded meladrama.

Seriously if you are not reading any of the comics in that last paragraph you are missing out...

[Theblazeuk]

I was glancing through Lake of Fire while the Missus searched Orbital comics the other day. Looked reet good. I thoroughly enjoyed Dark Ages by Dan Abnett which was somewhat similiar in concept, but ended on a bit of a weird non-climax. Hopefully Lake of Fire will keep up the pace of what I saw in that first issue - will be adding it to my pull list I think.

[Hawkmumbler]

I presume you've not got to Maxx #35 just yet, Colin old son? Be prepared, it's certainly...something.

[Jim_Campbell]

Just to second recommendations for Lake of Fire and Kill or be Killed, both of which are great.

As an aside, I have to swim against the critical tide and say I thought the new Doom Patrol #1 was shit, redolent far more of Pollack than Morrison... you're never going to win if you're going to compete with the sublime GM run -- find something new to do with the book.

[Fungus]

I presume you've not got to Maxx #35 just yet, Colin old son? Be prepared, it's certainly...something.

Eek! Make mental note to avoid thread for a bit... 

[Hawkmumbler]

As an aside, I have to swim against the critical tide and say I thought the new Doom Patrol #1 was shit, redolent far more of Pollack than Morrison... you're never going to win if you're going to compete with the sublime GM run -- find something new to do with the book.

It's quite OK to have a contrarian opinion. Even if you are wrong.

But then I think the GM run is over rated though so....

[Greg M.]

As an aside, I have to swim against the critical tide and say I thought the new Doom Patrol #1 was shit, redolent far more of Pollack than Morrison.

For what it's worth, I can't say I was particularly impressed by it on first reading either - rather than feeling like I was being drawn into a chaotic world of weirdness and catastrophe a la GM's DP, I found it slightly annoying and self-satisfied. I will read it again though to make sure. I've never read any of Way's other writing - I really don't like his band, and rightly or wrongly, that's always put me off - but I may still give the Cave Carson title a go.

[Colin YNWA]

I presume you've not got to Maxx #35 just yet, Colin old son? Be prepared, it's certainly...something.

Could it be anything but? Can't wait to read it, then at some point tackle the series as a whole. What an astonishing comic.

[TordelBack]

My biggest new-comics haul in many years!

In addition to the Prog and Meg, Black Hammer 3, Knights of the Dinner Table 235 and Britannia 1 from Milligan, which looks to be more Lovecraftian Porno Romans, and thus right up my cardo maximus.

That said, all I've had time to read is the Prog.  And how that rather ugly Jerusalem slipcase tugged at me, but €30 was a bit much in a busy comics-buying week.  Next week, Alan, I promise... I've waited so many years to read this, another week won't kill me.

[Colin YNWA]

Strangely I'm passing on Britannia would be right up my street I'd have thought. I think its the Lovecraftian stuff that's out me off. Let Romans be Romans I say!

Very interested to hear what people think about it though.

[I, Cosh]

Strangely I'm passing on Britannia would be right up my street I'd have thought. I think its the Lovecraftian stuff that's out me off. Let Romans be Romans I say!

Very interested to hear what people think about it though.

Conversely, I once again let my historic affection for Milligan overrule recent experience and bought this knowing nothing of it's Cthulhuish backdrop and I really enjoyed it.

As an aside, I have to swim against the critical tide and say I thought the new Doom Patrol #1 was shit, redolent far more of Pollack than Morrison... you're never going to win if you're going to compete with the sublime GM run -- find something new to do with the book.

I wasn't aware of the critical opinion but picked this up on a whim as I'd seen Rob Williams singing its praises and that one volume of Umbrella Academy I read that one time was way better than I would ever have believed anything written by that one guy from out of My Chemical Romance could ever be.

I loved it. It's very obviously cribbing from Morrison's Doom Patrol in both tone and - even more blatantly - structure. Crucially, however, there are significantly worse things to copy and it was just a tonne of funne. It may well get wearing over the long haul but I'm in for the first few at least.

[TordelBack]

Strangely I'm passing on Britannia would be right up my street I'd have thought. I think its the Lovecraftian stuff that's out me off. Let Romans be Romans I say!

Very interested to hear what people think about it though.

Having actually read it now, the dark-goddy stuff isn't specifically Lovecraftian, just yer basic formless horrors of the underworld. 

As to the rest: the protagonist is Marcus Didius Falco by way of Lucius Vorenus and, errr, Aquila; the otherwise very lovely art has that BD-album steroidal-males thing going on, and the style of dialogue Milligan plumps for is neither cod-ancient nor snappy-modern but a sort of casual mix of the two that sets my teeth on edge. 

But I did like the whole thing rather a lot, and will be getting it again. 

One day Nero is going to be re-appraised by writers of popular fiction as the great cultural visionary and peacemaker he was.  But this is not that day. 

[Link Prime]

And how that rather ugly Jerusalem slipcase tugged at me, but €30 was a bit much in a busy comics-buying week.  Next week, Alan, I promise... I've waited so many years to read this, another week won't kill me.

The single edition has been sitting untouched on my coffee table since Monday.
It's an intimidating monolith.

[TordelBack]

And how that rather ugly Jerusalem slipcase tugged at me, but €30 was a bit much in a busy comics-buying week.  Next week, Alan, I promise... I've waited so many years to read this, another week won't kill me.

The single edition has been sitting untouched on my coffee table since Monday.
It's an intimidating monolith.

Hmm, I hadn't thought about that. I had been thinking of going for the single volume edition to nestle in beside my hardback Voice of the Fire, because the three-book version looks, well, very print-on-demand.  But dragging the big boy on the Luas every day (for potentially two years) seems even less appealing...