A Cacophony of Dirge

So, not done one of these for a while; a random blog. Kind of a "What's New with Sid" blog.

Don't expect too many updates this week, I actually have stuff to do at work for once (shock-horror). You see, I have not sorted our comic back-stock for about 4 years and it's got to the point that if I don't do it now I never will.

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Promethea

I have just started reading my Promethea Hardcovers, I am glad I didn't read the series when it first came out circa 1999, I so wouldn't have understood it on the level I do now. It is heavy going and certainly not for everyone.
I think Morrison and Ellis fans would get a kick out of it, obviously Alan Moore fans will, as he penned the series. The art is by the ever so talented J H Williams III who some of you may be familiar with through his work on the recent Desolation Jones series (another book I will get in trade as well as singles).
Promethea is an interesting use of fiction about fiction, Alan Moore has constructed a truly rich and thoroughly intriguing historical tapestry for the protagonist and the reader to navigate through, all the while examaning the core philosphy behind existence. Like I said, it can be heavy going, but it is certainly one of the best books I have read this year.
The story can be both lighthearted and deadly serious, following Sophie Bangs journey as she slowly unravels the mystery of magic and Promethea, with comic relief from her best friend (her name escapes me and I can't be assed to google it). We also have the misadventures of F4 parody "Five Swell Guys" (one of whom is a female named Roger) and social commentary in the form of a very Transmet-esque news service, constantly updating the reader of the mental state of the local mayor, and his 42 multiple personalities.
The artwork is dense with lots going on in the background, such as adverts and posters for pop-icon "Weeping Gorilla", and its never afraid to experiment while both form and style.
Promethea ran for 32 issues (even the issue numbering has relevance to the final story) and is currently available in all good comic stores as five Tpb volumes, the fifth of which is due for release very soon. Each retails for about £10 each, except in bookstores where they can run up to £13 each.
Seriously, the now deleted Hardcovers sold for £17 each in comic stores, or £25 each in Borders and Ottakers! It pays to support your local store.

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Batman Begins!

God I love this movie, between this and Sin City, comic fan's really had it good at the cinema this year. In fact the only person who had it better was cult legend Rutger Hauer - surprising everybody by appearing in both. If you've not seen Batman begins or Sin City yet - then what are you waiting for?

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Comic Shop Newsletter

Coming soon, honest. I am kind of waiting 'till closer to Christmas as that is what this newsletter will cover. Expect it Mid-November.

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DVDs

I have turned into a complete DVD whore lately. I finally relented and imported South Park series 5 and 6 as it looks like they are never going to be released in the UK, my god - these are two of the funniest series I have ever seen.
Simpsons Series 6 is another one I am working my way through, as well as the first two series of Ren and Stimpy.
The best DVD you can buy at the minute is undoubtably the abjective-less Firefly series by Joss Whedon, its avilable in HMV for about £18, if its sold out there, then go to:
http://www.play.com
Which segways nicely into my next thread.

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Serenity

SEE THIS MOVIE. It's fairly awesome, and by fairly I mean a lot. People have compared this to the original Star Wars, which is a nice gesture but one which I think ultimately does more harm than good. While Star Wars created an entire scene, Serenity reminds us what it was about good 'ol fashioned Sci-fi action adventures that we used to love: characters!
Lets face it, Episode 1 - 3 had no Han Solo, and that's what they were missing. Don't blame Lucas, don't blame CGI, don't blame Jar-Jar, it just didn't have Han, that was all.
And while Firefly / Serenity doesn't have Han Solo, it does have extremely well realised, realistic characters.

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Video Games

This week I have been mostly playing Bubble Bobble and Rainbow Islands. After 19 years I finally completed Bubble Bobble and Super Bubble Bobble, strangely enough it took the assist of my girlfriend whom has never played the game before and turned out to be remarkable good at it. Go figure.
Rainbow Islands is still a complete bastard. I finally got past the level seven boss but because I had all seven rainbow diamonds it unlocked levels 8 through 10 (stages 29-40), all of which are rock hard and you cannot use continues on them. christ, I am starting to sound like I am on Andi's blog.

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More about Comics

The Other is turning into a surprisingly dull story. My interest in all things X has pretty much atrophied, Astonishing X-Men is the only glimmer of hope. the Ultimate Universe chugs along quite nicely, especially the Ultimates, can't wait for the animated movie of that. New Avengers is still quite a good book, but the three issue in four weeks really hurt our sales for it. Superman is surprisingly healthy at the minute, I think its because of all the infinite Crisis malarky, it is really raising the bar at DC, not long till All Star Supes. Lots of DC variants at the minute, but I suppose you don't have to buy them. The Batman books are tragically juxtaposed right now; stuff like Batman is great, but Detective sucks, and that thing about Leslie Thompkins killing Spoiler made no sense at all. Comics comics comics rragh! I read too many.

Transformers is late.

Bastards.

The Stuff I Buy Final Week

Small week.

This is the last one of these, I just thought it would be fun for people to see what an average month looks like for me, so that way you can all figure out what books i am reading.

JUL050277 ASTRO CITY THE DARK AGE #4 (OF 16) $2.99 - Waiting for the full series, thats how I read the first volume and it read a lot better.

AUG050262 AUTHORITY REVOLUTION #12 (OF 12) (MR) $2.99 - Uh, I think I cancelled this. I don't know. it wasn't what I hoped anyway and looking at the sales figures, I am not alone.

AUG050186 BATGIRL #69 $2.50 - I think thats seven issues behind.

AUG050183 BATMAN #646 $2.50 - Looking forward to this, as always.

AUG050182 BATMAN GOTHAM KNIGHTS #70 $2.50 - Not so much with this one.

AUG050208 BIRDS OF PREY #87 $2.50 - 10, 12 issues behind? Shit or get of the pot time methinks.

AUG050214 GREEN LANTERN CORPS RECHARGE #2 (OF 6) $2.99 - Enjoyed the first issue more than I thought I would. don't always agree with Gibbons as a writer, pleasant surprise.

AUG050285 HELLBLAZER #213 (MR) $2.75 - Bored. Looking forward to new writer.

AUG050194 ROBIN #143 $2.50 - great artwork, but I am falling behind.

AUG050195 SUPERMAN #222 $2.50 - Been great since Azzarello left.

AUG051885 MARVEL KNIGHTS SPIDER-MAN #19 $2.99 - Too many ad's, story is okay, hate Pat Lee.

AUG051926 RUNAWAYS #9 $2.99 - Waiting for a good chunk, then will blast through it.

AUG051888 SHE-HULK 2 #1 $2.99 - Still undecided on single issues or trade.

AUG051895 SPIDER-MAN FAMILY #1 $4.99 - Pointless, but I have bought it anyway.

AUG051955 SUPREME POWER HYPERION #2 (OF 5) (MR) $2.99 - Waiting for all five.

AUG051890 ULTIMATE FANTASTIC FOUR #24 $2.50 - Still enjoying.

AUG051893 ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #84 $2.50 - Really liking this at the moment.

AUG051951 X-MEN #176 $2.50 - About 15 issues behind.

APR052741 SHAOLIN COWBOY #4 $3.50 - Love it, one of my favourites.

AUG052972 TRANSFORMERS #0 $0.99 - I am there, will get all covers as I am a TF geek.

A House of M / Infinite Crisis dissection.

SPOILERS PEOPLE!

Ryan says:

House of M is perhaps one of the biggest let downs I've ever read (but this is only 3 years of comic reading speaking here), this thing is so slow, Bendis could have easily fitted it in 6 or even 4 issues, but then I guess they wouldn't be able to sell as many tie ins would they. The whole mutant thing they've been moving to wasn't much of a surprise either; it's something that's been recognisably wrong for a while. The whole Hawkeye thing managed to get sand in my vagina too, so the guy dies and then comes back, but he dies again essentially because he isn't any good at Tetris.

Infinite Crisis is to me the better of the two, the whole things happening in the real universe so any changes are going to be around afterwards, you'd think by now Marvel would push the boat out and do a big crossover that isn't in a 'different universe'. I love what DC has been doing, luckily the whole thing built as I've been reading comics so I haven't missed out on much, might have to go back and read the original crisis though. I only followed OMAC and Villains United, out of the four, for the past 6 months and it still hasn't interfered with my enjoyment of the story. The small beef I've got with DC is why they haven't released a list of all the issues that were involved in the story, I mean come on marvel did it on a door hang for gods sake.

But my major beef with DC is what they're doing to my characters, I came into comics reading Hush and I fell for those characters. Yet now the I'm-an-asshole-Batman I love is going to go through the crisis and change. I know that loads of other fans want him to be a little lighter but this is the Batman I've been following and I want him to be just as cynical when the crisis is over, I just hope it's handled well. But I'm all for the fixing of Superman, that line from Batman in Infinite Crisis sure put a smile on my face. The X-Men change is deserved though, the mutant thing needs to be put back into its box, just hope my favourites make the cut.

So I guess I hate the way House of M has been told, but I love what they've done to the X-Men situation. Yet I love the way the new crisis has been handled, I'm just pensive about what the characters will be like when they come out on the other side, but I guess that's just how they want me.

…and there's my two cents.
So what are your feels about them?

Sid Says:
Couldn't have said it much better than that myself.
House of M is unfortunately what we have come to expect from Marvel recently, a fairly decent idea horrifically executed. Reading an issue of House of M is akin to drinking Pepsi Max - it goes down quick enough but you are left wanting more with a bad taste in your mouth, and you wish it had a little more sugar in it.
Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the "twist" that the villain of the piece wasn't Magneto for once, but trying to paint Wanda as the victim is pissing me off, kill her. I don't care.

As for the Hawkeye situation, I've always liked the character, especially in the original Thunderbolts, but I really don't care if he lives or dies anymore. I quite liked his death, it wasn't hyped, it wasn't cheesy, it was very much a case of "this is how it is", even Hawkeye had that grim moment of recognition. The Internet backlash and the Bendis letter page in powers was hilarious, all these people talking trash at Bendis for killing him off, but at the same time saying they didn't think he was really dead - Marvel couldn't have bought that much publicity. I don't care if he lives of dies, but Marvel should. Pick one. Stick with it.

On to Infinite Crisis.

I love this book, I have read it like 3 times in the last week. The more you have put into this book by reading all the back story, the more you get out of it. By contrast though, even a complete DC novice can enjoy it.
I have read most of it: Villains United, OMAC, Rann / Than, Day of Vengeance, ID Crisis, Outsiders, Teen Titans, Supes / Bats etc... But I have never read the original Crisis, so there are bit's of it I don't get. But I still love it.

I have a friend who has followed the lot, he is a real DC fanboy (he has the Flash and Supes logos as tattoos for Christ's sake), he swears by the original Crisis. You only have to mention Psycho Pirate and he pop's like a girl at a Boyzone concert (who is it the kids like these days?). He loved Infinite Crisis.

By sharp contrast, another friend of mine only reads Green Lantern, missed ID Crisis and the original Crisis. He sat down and read Infinite Crisis. Loved it.
In fact, even the Internet reaction has been remarkable healthy. Yeah, a few people griping here and there but that is always going to happen, you can't please everyone (and if you could people would rip your idea off until people hated it).

There are however a few complaints / questions about Infinite Crisis, here are my solutions:

"I don't get it?" - Then read it again, the first issue is the equivalent of the first 15 minutes of a movie. Its introduced the characters and started to set the scenes. You might not get every reference and understand what is going to happen, and isn't that the point? To keep you interested and turning the page / watching the movie, finding out more and more as the story progresses.

"I still don't get it?" - Go to Newsarama, they have an excellent breakdown of what is going on page by page, what you should have noticed, what's important etc...

"Two Supermen? That's gay!" - It's all going somewhere, keep reading.

"I haven't got a checklist" - That's because if DC did one, people would piss and moan at the sheer depth of the story. It's been building for over two years, there are far too many comics to mention. Be glad you have read what you have. Absolutely essential reads are: ID Crisis, OMAC, Superman: Sacrifice and DC Countdown. But there are loads more. A full checklist would turn more people away. DC has fairly healthy trade support and we have a good back issue section.

"Mark Waid said Batman won't be a dick anymore" - That's bollocks. Mark Waid always makes Batman a dick. Check out Kingdom Come and JLA: Tower of Babel. Mark Waid is more guilty of dickifying Batman than anyone. He means, he won't be as much of a dick. Or its a cunning play on words, and Batman will be a Dick, Dick Grayson. Much rumour-mongering suggests the idea of Bruce becoming the new human host of Spectre. Which I hate the idea of and can't see them doing 7 months after Batman Begins comes out, because regardless of how good or bad it is, it won't be forever.

"Who the fuck is the Psycho Pirate?" - Dunno. I know he was in the original Crisis and remembered what happened, went a bit nuts and was in early Animal man by Grant Morrison. It seems he is in the same situation as Donna Troy - knowing all that came before, but as a villain.

"Superman hasn't really been much cop lately has he?" - No, and its awesome. The best thing to happen to his character was them giving him one. If Supes is too perfect, then he is damn difficult to write and even harder to read. His biggest flaw isn't magic or Kryptonite, its naïveté. A flaw which is all too...human (cue Star Trek end credits, fade).

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In short, both house of M and Infinite Crisis seem to be a way of hitting reset buttons for the respective companies. Some characters need to be "reset" or "fixed", (most of the X line at Marvel for instance, and you can only have WW, Supes and Bats hating each other for so long before something gives. It's just DC's approach is interesting and they will do it with reverence to what has come before. Whereas Marvel will just write the line "No More Mutants" (you can't blame Bendis for everything, he has a boss you know) and let everyone deal with the fallout with no real direction for the next 5 years.

I have always been a Marvel fanboy, I have collected Spider-man for 10 years, 80% of my immense comic collection is Marvel. But right now...


Make Mine DC

Dear Comic Readers,

Fed up with too many advert's in comic-books these days? You're not alone.

Lot's of my customers have mentioned the over-abundance of adverts in the pages of Marvel books these days, so I decided to look into it a little more.
I must admit, adverts in comics have never really bothered me that much, I have always looked at them at worst as a necessary evil. At best, they are a fun way of grafting individual comic's to the time period they were released in. How cool is it reading an X-Men comic from '78 and seeing a Star Wars related advert? Or the bad hair on the kids in the 1980's Lego adverts? Zeitgeist baby.

So I was reading Marvel Knights Spider-man #19, and I was thinking to myself, "damn, this issue feel's thick?", so I did a page count. Now, in the old days, your average comic page count was 32 pages, with 22 pages of that being story, somewhere around the mid '90's the page count jumped to 36 pages, keeping the steady 22 page story count. Now bear in mind thiose 32 / 36 pages also included at least 1 page of letters, and 1 page of in-house group adverts (for instance, a look at everything coming from the X-Universe for a month).

Marvel Knights Spider-man #19 ran at 52 pages!!! That's 22 for story, 1 page for cover, and 1 page for














sorry, you weren't reading that were you? - "previously in" and credits (like in the Ultimate books), and 1 final page for in-house group adverts (in this particular issue, advertising for the rest of The Other crossover). The other 27 pages were all adverts.
Crazy shit, huh? Thats more adverts than comic.

Now you can see why so many people wait for the Tpb's. I don't know about you but I don't want half of my comic boxes to be filled with adverts, but after 12 years of comic collecting I don't want to break by Amazing Spider-man collection.

Marvel claim that monthly comics cost so much to print these days, that adverts are the only way of subsidising / off-setting the cost. But printing the comic with twice the adverts doubles the size of the book, which surely doubles printing costs you'd think?
Now, unless the adverts cover more than half the printing cost, they are not worth running at all as Marvel would lose money. So we have to presume that Marvel are making money on these adverts, otherwise, why print them?

Now Warren Ellis / Image can afford to print a 24 page comic with 16 pages of story, and they need to sell 20,000 to make profit and make sure everyone working on it get's paid. One in-house advert. That's it, and they can make money on that at $2. So presumably, at $3 a pop, Marvel are making good money on a comic that sells somewhere in the region of 70- 75,000 issues each with 27 pages of ad's. Very good money.
If Marvel can ship an 88 page Tpb for £7.50 (still cheaper than the price of four individual comics) with no adverts, then you have to ask why are the single issues costing so much with adverts.

Is this just a blip? A freak one-off occurance? Ult. X-Men #64 which shipped the same week ran 27 adverts, Ghost Rider #2 shipped with 23 pages of adverts and last months MK Spider-man # 18 shipped with 23 pages of adverts with another four devoted to that Nick Fury's Howling Commandos series that won't sell.
By contrast, DC's infinite Crisis #1 only had 10 pages of adverts, and 32 pages of story. Now thats more like it!
I really can't see what difference adverts make to the price of comics anymore. Is it done purely because that's the way it's always been done? Has it become a case of the tail wagging the dog?

So what can we do?

In truth, very little. But if Shawshank Redemption taught us only one thing, its that writing letters can make a difference. Write Marvel, write Wizard, bug the shit out of them and maybe, just maybe, they will listen.

-Sid Beckett.
Writer of whatever's on his mind. He would like to add that Shawshank also taught us not to cry in prison and introduced us to the word; fuck-stick

The Stuff I Buy Week 4

AUG050028 GOON 25 CENT COMIC $0.25 - It's 25 cents for Christs sake, and has got so many good write-ups. Worth checking out for sure.

AUG050196 ACTION COMICS #832 $2.50 - More of the same from Supes.

JUL050284 EX MACHINA #15 (MR) $2.99 - Awesome series, I find the art a little flat and soulless sometimes, no doubt because of all the photo ref-ing, but its still a killer series.

AUG050284 FABLES #42 (MR) $2.75 - Awesome book, love it to pieces, I think when this book wraps-up, it will really start garnishing attention.

AUG050205 INFINITE CRISIS #1 (OF 7) $3.99 - OOOOOHHHH! Cannot wait, it has been hyped to death but its still gonna be a whole lot of fun. DC havn't dissapointed with this 2 year and building crossover yet.

AUG050217 JLA #120 $2.50 - Could go either way, JLA has been up and down faster than Gwen riding Norman Osborn the last few years.

AUG050193 NIGHTWING #113 $2.50 - For the most part good, waiting to see where this current arc goes. Can't belive we are 113 issues in already.

AUG050236 VILLAINS UNITED #6 (OF 6) $2.50 - Surely this should have shipped before Infinite Crisis? If DC drop the ball with a 6 issue how are they going to cope with a 52 issue weekly? Either way though, I will be there.

AUG050291 Y THE LAST MAN #38 (MR) $2.99 - Awesome series, and one which is ultimately destined to end with a bang rather than fade away.

JUL051936 ESSENTIAL SPIDER-MAN VOL 7 TP $16.99 - Its Oldskool Spider-man, what's not to like.

AUG051944 EXILES #71 $2.99 - Thats 22 consecutive issues unread.

AUG051884 FRIENDLY NEIGHBORHOOD SPIDER-MAN #1 $2.99 - Not a bad way for a series to start, the 'Ringo artwork helps. Not to keen on Tracer as a villain though, seems a bit '90's. I hope the Other will be as good as JMS' Spidey.

AUG051900 GHOST RIDER #2 (OF 6) $2.99 - Eh, it's okay.
AUG051901 GHOST RIDER DIRECTORS CUT #1 $3.99 - Eh.

JUL051844 HOUSE OF M #7 (OF 8) $2.99 - C'mon, wrap it up. I want to know where this is going.
JAN058166 HOUSE OF M LARROCA VARIANT COVER #7 (OF 8) (PP #684) $2.99

AUG051937 MEGA MORPHS #4 (OF 4) $2.99 - Waiting for the digest 'cause it will be so much cheaper.

AUG051892 ULTIMATE X-MEN #64 $2.50 - This series feels like its going through the motions until the Steve Dillon relaunch. Still no Bryan Singer.

AUG051898 WOLVERINE #34 $2.50 - Crappola compared to the Millar run. Issue #32 was great.

AUG052580 TOYFARE TOP 100 GEEK MOMENTS CVR #100 $4.99 - 100 issues? Making me feel old!

AUG053241 STREET FIGHTER II #0 PI - I will check it out, wasn't too impressed with volume one by the end of it.

JUL058060 DISTURBED TEN THOUSAND FISTS SPECIAL ED CD PI - Yeah, I will get it, but not from a comic shop. Play.com most likely.

A Letter to Mr. Larsen.

Dear Mr. Larsen,

First off, let me say, I have never been a follower of your work. (It gets better from here on, honest).
I got into comics around 1995, about the time most people were getting out of them, I liked the Clone Saga, still do. Since then I have been somewhat of a Marvel / DC fanboy until about 3 years ago, when I started branching out to find anything new that could interest me.
I always kind of considered Image to be somewhat lacking. I have never liked Spawn, Shadowhawk or any of the Top Cow books (JMS excluded).
It shames me to say that I had written Erik larsen the comic creator off as, "one of those Image guys". -How wrong I was.
However, I recently started buying more Image, (Invincible, Walking Dead, Girls, Flight) and was very impressed by the diversity of the product. I noticed that it was yourself who was behind a lot of the drive and diversity in the "New" image.
So when I saw that you were doing a weekly column on CBR, one of my favourite websites, I made it a point of reading it every week. I got a lot of friends to read it as well, people who had also previously ignored both yourself and Images work.
What a great column. Every one has been good, until about two weeks ago.
Thats when we got the great column.
READ IT HERE

I agree with most of the things you said in the column. I hear that PAD took major offense, some people will. Things that are worth saying are often the things that people don't want to hear.
So with a lot of people up in arms about the truth, with everyone on tender hooks waiting to hear your reply to Peter Davids response, what do you do? You have captured the industrys attention, knowing that EVERYONE will be checking out your next column, what do you do?
You run a column about how important your Grandpa is to you..
...thats so cool.
READ IT HERE
Good work Erik.

I was wrong it seems, about both Image and Erik Larsen.
-Sid Beckett

Crazy Comic Covers #1

Sometimes, these articles write themselves.


The subject matter for this issue is a good old Christian boy, who after watching the Americans oust the Nazi's, decided he wanted a life of adventure and joined his army. After being crippled in battle, god cures him (!!!), so he dedicates the rest of his life smuggling bibles into Rumania, with an assist from God who hides the bibles from the eyes of the guards on the border of the Iron curtain (these arn't the books you're looking for, move along!).
And then he moves to Hong Kong, gets married and then I got bored of reading it as my brain started to crawl away from my body and I caught it half way down the stairs pleading for freedom.

The Stuff I Buy Week 3.

After the mammoth amount of comics that comprised last weeks order, I am pleased to say that this week looks a little more sensible.

JUL058295 ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN #643 SECOND PTG $2.50 - Think I will skip this, much as I love DC, the second print thing has kind of passed me by these days. I even skipped on the Spider-Man House of M 2nd Prints.

JUN050360 DC SPECIAL THE RETURN OF DONNA TROY #4 (OF 4) $2.99 - After a bum first issue, I am pleased to say this book has picked up steam heading to its conclusion.

AUG050181 DETECTIVE COMICS #812 $2.50 - I have stopped reading this City of Crime storyline, sorry. Dave Lapham might write a kick-ass Matrix story and Stray Bullets, but his Batman doesn't do it for me.

AUG050221 JSA #78 $2.50 - I started buying this for the Infinite Crisis cross-overs and god help me, I don't know how to stop.

AUG050224 OUTSIDERS #29 $2.50 - Thank god Winnick is back, that 2 issue fill-in did nothing for me whatsoever.

AUG050231 RANN THANAGAR WAR #6 (OF 6) $2.50 - The only Infinite Crisis miniseries I havn't enjoyed. Its not that there is anything wrong with it, I just don't care for any of the characters.

JUL058321 SUPERGIRL #1 THIRD PTG $2.99 - Another one I will probably skip, nice as they are and all.

AUG050198 SUPERMAN SHAZAM FIRST THUNDER #2 (OF 4) $3.50 - First issue started off promising, but not enough to judge the series on. Solid characters and creators though.

AUG050290 VERTIGO FIRST OFFENSES TP (MR) $4.99 - An awesome book to get and lend out to people who are a little dubious about reading comics, the last one of these Vertigo put out I used to get a load of people into comics.

JUL058296 WONDER WOMAN #220 SECOND PTG $2.50 - I think I'll have to skip on this.

JUL050258 WONDER WOMAN #221 $2.50 - But this one I will have to get. Loving Greg Ruckas Wonder Woman run.

AUG051673 FELL #2 $1.99 - It's Ellis, it's monthly, it's cheap. And it's good too.

FEB051648 RISING STARS HC $69.99 - Bastards! I bought the extremely expensive Dynamic Forces Leather Bound HC's (Remarked Editions too) Vol. 1 and 2 for $100 each, only for them to not do the third volume. I hate DF. Where's my American Flagg while I'm whinging.

JUL051703 RISING STARS VOICES OF THE DEAD #5 (OF 6) $2.99 - Its average, but being purchased out of some misguided concept of loyalty to JMS.

JUN058283 ASTONISHING X-MEN SECOND PTG VARIANT #12 $2.99 - Have to check this one out, if the cover is awesome I will grab it. I love the disparity of the reprints though, Issues 7, 8, 10 and 12 get reprints!

JUL058045 GHOST RIDER RETAILER VARIANT #1 (OF 6) PI - Didn't even hear about this? Whats going on, I presume its a variant in the same style as New Avengers and Sentry.

AUG051928 MARVEL TEAM-UP #13 $2.99 - Falling behind, not read this since #7, I do love the randomness (and obscurity) of the team ups. Issue 14 is a must read.

MAY051811 POWERS #13 (MR) $2.95 - Great series, shame #12 was so late though. Hopefully Bendis will be back on the letetrs page this month.

AUG051954 PUNISHER #26 (MR) $2.99 - Christ, I am bored. Does anyone else want to see Ennis do something refreshing and original?

AUG051896 SPIDER-GIRL #91 $2.99 - How the hell has this book made it to 91 issues? it's great and all, but Marvel have tried to cancel it so many times. Long live Spider-girl.

AUG051887 SPIDER-MAN THE OTHER SKETCHBOOK $2.99 - Nice, but ultimately pointless.

AUG051956 SUPREME POWER NIGHTHAWK #2 (OF 6) (MR) $2.99 - Waiting for all 6 issues before I read this.

AUG051941 UNCANNY X-MEN #465 $2.50 - I wish I was strong enough to cancel this.

AUG051976 X-MEN COMPLETE AGE OF APOCALYPSE EPIC BOOK 2 TP $29.99 - I really am tempted to get this and volume one, despite having first prints.

AUG051947 X-MEN UNLIMITED #11 $2.99 - I don't even know if I still get this.

AUG053020 BAREFOOT GEN VOL 3 TP NEW PTG (RES) $14.95
AUG053021 BAREFOOT GEN VOL 4 TP NEW PTG (RES) $14.95 - Diamond UK seems unable to provide us with Volume One of this, which is really annoying as our Volume 2's are just sat there gathering dust and I really want to read them.

APR053461 COMPLETE CALVIN & HOBBES HC $150.00 - Yes, look at it. Every Calvin and Hobbes, ever.

JUN050452 V FOR VENDETTA NEW EDITION HC (MR) $29.99 - Tempted, sorely tempted.

JUN050406 WATCHMEN THE ABSOLUTE EDITION HC $75.00 - Ditto. And a lot better value for money than the Absolute LOEG, which only contained six issues each.