New Comic Book Day Megathread

[Hawkmumbler]

Small haul this week, only the weeklies.

WSJ features the conclusion to Jaco, which I will miss something terrible. Adventurer mentioned he wasnt sure if hee njoyed the Dragon Ball links, just to clarify, ALL Toriyamas manga is set in the DB universe and I can highly reccomend DB over DBZ as its a classic adventure manga much more in the vein of Jaco than its sequel. Elsewhere Toriko pisses me off with its quite tasteless depiction of female life (which seemingly involves cooking and looking prity while reading. Fuck that.) and Nisokoi continues the downwards spiral. On the other hand, I actualy enjoyed this weeks Naruto for once, though I cant think why, Bleach featured some damn good action scenes, OnePunch-Man has another good crack at an old super hero comic book trope (the ungrateful rescuee), World Trigger is a nice addition to the rauster even if it doesnt contribute anything original per say. Oh, and an ad for a new series starting next week. Judging by the outline, itll be either Buso Renkin or Psyren. Both series are long concluded though so I cant see why it would be any of them and would rather have Cross Menage back.

[The Adventurer]

Elsewhere Toriko pisses me off with its quite tasteless depiction of female life (which seemingly involves cooking and looking prity while reading. Fuck that.)

This doesn't seem to be exclusive to Toriko. I've been reading some early One Piece (and even current One Piece) and there are some uncomfortable female stereotypes present. I hear similar about Naruto (in the current story most of the female characters appear to be support/healer types). Unfortunately it seems to be a cultural thing. Its definitely an unfortunate state of affairs.

I don't think I've seen a single female character in One-Punch Man!

At any rate... I love Dragonball not Z. I hadn't realized that tying things into Dragonball was typical of Toriyama. Though I do recall a Dr. Slump crossover in Dragonball. So that explains a lot.

As for the new series, Crunchyroll thinks its a series called Owari no Seraph (Seraph of the End) from Jump Squared. Its described as..

One day, a mysterious virus appeared on Earth which killed every infected human over the age of 13. At the same time, vampires emerged from the world's dark recesses and enslaved mankind. Enter Hyakuya Yuuichirou, a young boy, who along with the rest of the children from his orphanage, are treated as livestock by the vampires. Even in captivity, Yuuichirou dreams big. He dreams of killing vampires. He dreams of killing them all.

Which could be okay. Could be a big pile of cliches. Jump Squared is also an older readers anthology (I think Blue Exorcist is from there), which could be a plus.

[Hawkmumbler]

I dunno what it was about this weeks Toriko that struck a nerve with me more than usual in regards to females in shonen, but at least One Piece and (to some degree) Naruto, has stronger female characters...sometimes. Bleach as far I'm concerned is the better of the four in this regard, perhaps because Kubos the only one of the four thats married....

As for Seraph of the End, it literally sounds like Attack on Titan with vampires, so considering how popular that manga has got, its no wonder the digital WSJ wants to use it. Could be interesting, considering its Jump Squared position along with Blue Exorcist. Would have preferred Claymore or Letter Bee but i'll give anything new a try.

[Mardroid]

A collection rather than an individual comic but, in my attempt to collect back issues of the Marvel Ultimate Graphic Novel Collection I ordered Astonishing X-Men: Gifted a few day back.

I came in this evening, and there was a book shaped package containing....

.... Dark Phoenix. A book I already own.

I thought that maybe I had made a mistake and ordered the wrong one so I checked my Amazon order. Nope. Faults there's.  (Not Amazon's, I bought it from a seller.)

Anyway, hoping they'll change it for me.

In spirit of the thread, my individual comic pulls are:

2000 AD
Judge Dredd Megazine.
Animal Man
Swamp Thing
All Star Western.

All okay so far.

[sheldipez]

All Star Western.

Has Booster Gold turned back after the 3 part he was in? Big Booste fan; criminal that he doesn't have his solo ongoing.

[Mardroid]

All Star Western.

Has Booster Gold turned back after the 3 part he was in? Big Booste fan; criminal that he doesn't have his solo ongoing.

Do you mean, has he returned to his present? Last I saw, [spoiler]he hasn't.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]Jonah has gone into his future though, and is in Batman's Gotham. I think this might smeg some readers off, all this superhero crossovers, and I can understand why. I'm finding it rather fun though.[/spoiler]

[Colin YNWA]

Yeah I was nervous about the current Jonah Hex storyline and all the more so after the first couple of parts when Booster appeared where pretty weak, in fact probably the weakest since the current run (and I'm talking back when Jimmy and Justin started). I've been won over as its gone on though, as its been handled in such delightful (well never the right word where Jonah is concerned!) fashion. Its back to being one of my favourite titles every month.

Do wonder if this is the status quo we'll have until the end of the series. They've had the simply fantastic 70 issue run of short westerns, they've tried embedding it in Gotham folklore and this seems to be the last stab at getting the book an audience, start of Nu52 aside, its never found in decent numbers.

Can't have any complaints as whatever happens DC have given this book an incredible run. Its rarely sold more than 20,000, often less than 15,000 and most books don't last 10 - 20 issues with those kind of numbers these days. With any luck we'll reach the 100 mark (of both titles) before DC finally pull the plug and I for one will be very, very happy to have those 100 plus (fingers crossed) comics. Its just frustrating when people complain about not giving good books a chance, as a good book, with a steady team will find an audience. Evidence alas says nonsense. A title that's been as strong as this, written by the same team since the start, with an array of arts that has been astonishingly strong, when it was sorts and then the same artist month in month out once its had a more ongoing storyline and its never found a big readership.There are so many times we see this happen.

[The Adventurer]

My Digital Pulls for 10/09/13

2000 AD 1853 - Same line-up as last week. Things are generally strong. Pat Mill's Flesh being the only thing dragging things down right now. How can something with such a wild premises (time travelling cowboys wrangle Dinosaurs!) with great black and white artwork, come across as such a dull bore? Only Pat Mills!
ASTRO CITY 5 - Its Astro City. It does what Astro City does. Must read comic right here.
THE MANHATTAN PROJECTS 15 - The Projects are under siege again, they seem to be having a bit more trouble then they did the first time.
MARS ATTACKS JUDGE DREDD 2 - Lagging behind on this, will probably pick up issue 1 this week.
MULTIPLE WARHEADS: DOWN FALL One-Shot - Brandon Graham is a genius, I reread King City recently and its even better reading in one wahck. However, I did sort of feel his Multiple Warheads mini-series wasn't quite up to that level. Mostly because it was kind of short. A visual tour de force, but not quit as punchy writing wise. This one-shot reprints some earlier material and I think a new story.
RESIDENT ALIEN: SUICIDE BLONDE 2 - Behind on this series also, catching up with issue 1 this week I think.
STAR WARS 10 - Still loving this series, great space opera at work here. Leia is really being put through the emotional ringer, far more then she ever was in the movie.
THINK TANK 10 - As someone who regularly reads science fiction this series continues to be a treat to see some of tomorrow's most plausible technology applications at work today. And as Matt Hawkins often tells us in his wonderful back-matter notes, this stuff ain't fiction any more.
THE WALKING DEAD 115 - Really starting to feel more invested in this arc. Took the series long enough.
WEEKLY SHONEN JUMP 45 - New series starts here, Seraph of the End: Vampire Reign originally from Jump Squared, an older teen focused manga anthology in Japan. Its Sci-Fi/Fantasy series about a world ravaged by an adult killing super virus that paves the way for the surviving population to get enslaved by Vampires. First chapter paints a pretty brutal picture, and surprised me a bit. Unfortunately it can't quite shake off some of its more overt manga cliches (World Trigger often suffers from this as well). We'll see. At any rate I'm am glad to have something new to fill pages though. WSJ, still a great value!

[The Adventurer]

Oh yeah, and I'm thinking about checking out Rocket Girl #1 from Image. It seems like it could be a winner.

[Colin YNWA]

Oh yeah, and I'm thinking about checking out Rocket Girl #1 from Image. It seems like it could be a winner.

Yeah I'm trying this, Pretty Deadly and 3 from Image this month. Good month for potentially exciting new titles, what with these and Hinterkind starting.

[sheldipez]

Oh yeah, and I'm thinking about checking out Rocket Girl #1 from Image. It seems like it could be a winner.

Yeah I'm trying this, Pretty Deadly and 3 from Image this month. Good month for potentially exciting new titles, what with these and Hinterkind starting.

I wasn't blown away by the Hinterkind art, a lot of felt half-finished or rushed rather than "sketchy" feel which the artist was probably going for. I enjoyed the story though, foundation of a good ongoing there.

[Hawkmumbler]

I wish Comixology had some handy Astro City collections so I'm not spending loads on trying to get caught up on decades old material! Its really good though!
Nice little haul this week...
WSJ- i'll get to Seraph of the End in a bit, now i'll just run through the regulars as per. One Piece, Yay. Naruto, Nay. Bleach, yay. Nisokoi, nay. Toriko, meh. OnePunch Man, all the yay. World Trigger, yay. Blue Exorcist, yay. And DBZ, meh. Now, Seraph of the End....prity kuch whatThe Adventurer said but I saw the grittier attitude coming. Most Jump Squared titles have a grity opening chapter (Well, D.Gray-Man, Blue Exorcist and Tegami Bachi did anyway. Claymore just got GRITTIER) and fall into typical shonen mode there after. But I did enjoy This opening chapter and look forward to a month of catch ups. Should be another winner for me, the art is very nice actually with great atmosphere.
Mars Attacks Judge Dredd #1- OK, finally got it. And its a solid fair, miles ahead of the ongoing IDW series. Not as mad cap as other Ewing Dredd stories but it has his flare to it. Could be a winner.
Grindhouse: The Doors Open at Midnight #1- start of a new anthology series from Dark Horse. Each couple of issues will be almost self contained, and will change quarterly. Each story will hark back to the age of low budget cinema making hen the laughable was common. This story was entitled Bee Vixens from Mars and reads like a Robert Rodriguez script. It was funny and dumb as a bed post. I liked it.

[Link Prime]

It's been a weird couple of months for my comic collecting habit, as I've almost completely dropped the once beloved Marvel (apart from Superior Spider-Man, recommended by Greg M, and he was right- it's great fun) stuff in favor of newer stuff by creators I enjoy.

This week its;

Mars Attacks Judge Dredd 2 (really enjoying this mini).
Three 1 (was talking about this with Kieron Gillen recently- he totally sold me on it, and claimed it was the most '2000AD ish' thing he's done- so I have to give it a try).
Batman 24 (a huge issue this month, wrapping up the first Zero Year arc- with two more arcs to follow. A continually rock solid run from Snyder & Capullo).
Afterlife with Archie 1 (I've never read an Archie comic in my life- was really intrigued by this, and Francavilla on art duties was the nudge i needed).

[sheldipez]

Busy week it seems looking to what I've got on order

Coffin Hill #1 A new Vertigo book, sounded interesting but the preview was off putting, we'll see.
The Walking Dead #1 Anniversary edition - The Walking Dead #1 coloured, I was tempted to call this heresy but can see Moore's art suiting colour. Curiosity purchase.
Superior Spider-Man Team-Up #4 this is an[other] Infinity tie-in which I'm not following but I'm not skipping an issue so guess I'm reading some Infinity.
Cryptozoic Man #1 as seen on Season two of Kevin Smith's Comic Book Men - looks like daft nonsense
Star Wars #10 this still rocks
All New X-Men Special #1 this was actually out last week but DHC never got it in their shipment so lands this week for me; part one of "the arms of the octopus", essentially Superior Spidey vs. Silver Age Doc Ock. Should be good fun. Art looks great.

Got a few Panini collector's editions to pickup from newsagent too but no one cares about reprints.

There's a bunch of cracking looking debut comics out this week, Rocket Girl #1, Three #1, Death Sentence #1, Afterlife With Archie #1, but my pull list is long enough. Some of these will check out in trade for sure. Looks like IDW's Dredd makes it to #11 this week too.

[Colin YNWA]

And with Uber 6I'm out. Just not getting enough from the book on a regular basis to keep it up. Mind elsewhere Keiron Gillen gives me one of a host of good starts this months with Three 1. Doesn't get to the meat of the story, but its good world building and i can see myself enjoying this one a lot. Other good starts belong to Hinterkind 1, which for a book that has a lot of people leaving a community to explore the outside world did give me much info about the community they were leaving. Felt a little odd that and would have liked it to turn down the pace to let me see what they were setting out from. Still sure that will come and over all very good start. As was Rocket Girl 1 whose whole point seems to be exploring how we got from one place to another, in this instance distanced by time.

FF 12 this series will be ending soon, which might be a good thing as this being a self contained long form story seems enough, beginning to wonder, glorious art aside if it has legs to go on too long. Still enjoying it while its here. Resident Alien 2, 2 is just fantastic, Lazarus 4 is pretty good conclusion to the first arc, wondering about the legs on this one too, but we'll see. its all about the longevity at the moment and while I've really enjoy Snyder's Batman to date 24 has me questioning if Synder is a one trick pony. Its beginning to all feel a bit samey now. FBP 4 rattles the first arc to the rabid conclusion, some elements (Kelly's motivation was thin as was his reversal) but unlike the some others mentioned just now this one seems to have an incredible world to explore with a load of space to play. Great stuff.