It's the big guns this week with a new comic pull list! I'm back to old habits and am discussing 24 different comics! Seven of the are either first issues or Specials, and at least three are final issues, so it isn't as crazy as it sounds.
Many of the week's pulls are limited series' in some way, as well, making them technically temporary pulls. If you're more into knowing about publishers, nine are Marvel, three are DC, and the rest are spread across independent publishers. These 24 pulls this week are also why some of my ensuing blurbs are a little shorter than normal. Continuing in doing my representation spotlights, I picked out Bitter Root and it's creative team as the spotlight on creators of color. Non-binary artist Jen Hickman is talked about for queer representation, and Spy Island, with it's Man-Eaters team of women, for female representation in the comics industry. Continue Reading to see what kind of amazing comics are coming out this week!
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Just announced today, Vietnamese-American actress Kelly Marie Tran will be starring as the lead role in the upcoming Disney animated movie, Raya and the Last Dragon! Vietnamese herself, Raya will be the first South East Asian Disney Princess, and this will be Tran's second major role under the entertainment empire. Continue Reading to learn about the complicated relationship between women and Star Wars, and why I'm so fired up about this casting news!
TOP Comic PICKS for Week #288/26/2020
Welcome to week 28, post-reading! This week was super relaxing for me in terms of reading because I had a much smaller pull list than usual, so the week's reads were easy to get through. Though it may be starting to sound predictable, three of my top five comics from this week were Dawn of X books. I can't help it that Johnathon Hickman, Leah Williams, and Zeb Wells (from this week's books) are all such fantastic writers with satisfying takes on their teams.
Additionally, I picked Bliss #2 from Image Comics, and Batgirl #48 from DC. Batgirl is in it's last issues, the final four of which I'm doing an ongoing review of, which you can find linked in the Batgirl section beyond the cut. Bliss is an eight-issue limited creator owned series with intriguing differences from our own world. At just issue two, this series has brought up a lot of darkness seen in our world, and how it effects those who live through it. This article contains in-text links and definitely some spoilers, so Continue Reading for the week's best in comics!
This week, we have a rare thing in comics: a short pull list! Admittedly, four of the ten issues are Dawn of X books, one Marvel Annual, two are DC and three are from Image. A little skewed, as far as publishers go, but all quality comics nonetheless. And, I have to admit, it is a lot less pressure having fewer comics to write about every week.
This week I'm particularly proud of the representation spotlights. I talk about writer/artists Johnnie Christmas and Mirka Andolfo in the sections on creators of color and women in comics, respectively. Both creators have strong styles of and sectors of the comics world they thrive in, with impressive work under their belts already. Then, in the spotlight on LGBTQ+ topics in comics, I talk about Northstar and Daken--two queer male comics characters as two very different examples of queer male portrayal. Continue Reading for all this and more!
Welcome to another big week in comics! I feel like I've been going pretty hard on these pull lists each week, and I hope the new formatting helps with the added features. Feedback is always appreciated!
One thing that stood out to me about this week's pull list is that a solid third of them are #4's. I'm not sure why this struck me as odd, but I wanted to share. You might have also noticed I read a good deal of limited series'. This week alone, there is the Death Metal event tie-in, the fourth of five for Star and Ludocrats, and the final issues of Dead Earth, the X-Men tie-in to Empyre, and Ant-Man. I'm also picking up the final book of the once-ongoing Harley Quinn series, where the notoriously self-contained book is going canon for it's bonus-sized final issue. A lot of independent publishers often prefer short story contracts, to keep their releases fresh and new, offering more all the time. Since I'm actively trying to expand the ratio of indie comics I read, it makes sense that I'm reading more limited series', as well. I'm also still doing the spotlights on representation in comics, which I plan to continue for the foreseeable future. This week, I'm discussing comic writer Ta Nehisi Coates, pop culture's response to Harley Quinn's multi-faceted sexuality, and a spotlight on the women of comics showcasing writer Karla Pacheco and her new Spider-Woman series. You may also notice a number of these "blurbs" are smaller than my usual pull list writing. This is due to a larger number of commitments over the weekend, pressing myself for time, and the fact that for some of these, I've either talked them to death already, or the story isn't capturing me as well as it used to. If the shortness of those blurbs is off putting, apologies, I'm a little overdue for a pull list cleanup. Continue Reading for all this and more!
I refuse to hide in shame when I admit that three of my top-five picks this week are technically Dawn of X books. What can I say? Johnathon Hickman knows how to put together a universe.
X-Force, Marauders, and Empyre: X-Men are mt three mutant-based picks, leaving the other slots to this week's Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel. It also doesn't escape me how four fifths of this list are Marvel properties, but that is also easy to explain. Marvel's theory of "the more, the merrier" that they've had in recent years has excellent payoff, as far as I can see. There's something for everyone, no doubt about that. But let's not get too caught up in which publisher may or may not be better than others. When it comes down to it, Marvel and DC are both massive conglomerates that care only about their bottom dollar and give very little effort in terms of creator benefits. Dark sides of the industry aside, this was a pretty good week for comics! I'll admit that many of the other issues faltered for me, and many felt unimportant or like filler. These five, however, were the obvious choices that stood out for me in story, art, and overall quality, Continue Reading to find out more about my top picks from the week! WARNING: SPOILERS!
Click here for the most (and final) recent update!
In my opinion, Empyre: X-Men has been far and beyond better than the main Empyre event, or any of the other tie-ins. This might be because the series is co-written by ALL of the Dawn of X writers at Marvel, who in turn were picked by Head of X Johnathon Hickman to help build his new world for the mutants. Since the series is still coming out, here are the release dates of each issue: #1 July 22nd, Jonathan Hickman and Tini Howard, art by Matteo Buffagni #2 August 5th, Gerry Duggan, Ben Percy, and Leah Williams, art by Lucas Werneck #3 August 12th, Ed Brisson, Vita Ayala, and Zeb Wells, art by Andrea Broccardo #4 August 19th, Jonathan Hickman, art by Jorge Molina And just for fun, here's a breakdown for the writers on this series, and what they normally write for Dawn of X: Johnathon Hickman: X-Men, New Mutants Tini Howard: Excalibur Gerry Duggan: Cable, Marauders Benjamin Percy: Wolverine, X-Force Leah Williams: X-Factor Ed Brisson: New Mutants Vita Ayala: Marauders Zeb Wells: Hellions Continue Reading for the full reviews on each of the four parts! SPOILERS AHEAD! As I've mentioned in a few posts now, my partner and I recently packed up our entire lives and moved across the country. This included our extensive comics collection. While most of our comics were stored in long boxes, we had a fair amount (oh, 150+) displayed on our apartment walls, in categories.
The categories could be artist covers, character covers, and retro comics, so I ended up having an hour long video with over 17 parts! Continue Reading for the full video, or follow it through to the YouTube page and click the description links for a specific part of the collection! PhoTOYgraphy Update!8/9/2020 As I've mentioned in a few posts now, I recently moved across the US into a much smaller, more compact space. We don't have as much room for displaying our collectibles and whatnot, but it makes us really happy so I've still been rotating who's out on display in the minimal spaces.
Here I have collected some of the better (okay, they're not all good) ones to share! Continue Reading to see what I've added to the collection, and what pieces I have out on display! A few months ago I moved from an Atlantic coast city to a Pacific coast city, straight across the United States. Since my partner and I have a pretty extensive collection of comic books and action figures, I decided to document everything before packing it up. Here's the video I made on the action figure collection! Covering MOSTLY Marvel Legends, but also some DC figures, Dragon Ball Super Bandai, and more! Where we are living as I write this is a much smaller and more compact place, so I don't really have the space to set up the toys all together. And the collection is still growing! I'll update the site with some more pictures soon of my collection and any new pieces!
It's another banger of a comics week, with books of all kinds! At Marvel, the EMPYRE event wages on, leaving both excellence and stupidity in it's wake; plus X-books, some spiders, and a few unjustly digital-first released books finally getting their print release. DC has two doomed books, Mariko Tamaki's second issue of WONDER WOMAN, and more METAL! The indie stack is fairly well represented, with a new #1, Matt Fraction and the Dodsons' ADVENTUREMAN, and more Image books from Christopher Priest!
You may note I didn't do a "pick list" for last week. Usually I try to do them on Thursday, after binging the weekly comics by that afternoon. This week, however, I went on a road-trip Thursday instead! We went to the Bay Area for toy and comic book hunting, and I am pleased to report we found some INCREDIBLE collection pieces! I'll be writing somewhat about those eventually, but for now, onto the coming week's pulls! Continue Reading to see all the comics goodies I have picked out this week! |
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