F For Fake

Posting about my reread of Phase 1 (over in the 1000 books in 2023 thread) reminded me that I don't think I ever mentioned that I finished assembling my IDW Transformers collection a while back. My goal was to get the entire IDW continuity in hardcover format, without paying above retail. At the time there were several OOP volumes, but over the course of a couple of years, I was able to put the whole thing together, making major headway via Target B2G1 sales, and also conveniently timed reprints of some books from IDW. My goal was to get the whole thing assembled before IDW lost the license this year, and I just made it! So, that's Phase 1 and 2 complete in HC, as well as the entire 2019 reboot series (which I've not read at all.) Unfortunately, IDW lost the license before being able to complete Phase 3 in hc, so I had to assemble several trade paperbacks (shown on the far right) in order to complete the stories. I also got several of the crossovers and spin-off volumes, though I'm still missing a handful (TF vs Star Trek, Back to the Future, etc). I started my revisit of the entire IDW line in January, and just finished up Phase 1 a day or so ago. My thoughts are in the 1000 in 2023 thread. I'm sure you can't wait to read them, as I'm a fascinating person! PS: Phase 2 V1 not pictured as that's the book I'm currently reading, and it's on the nightstand upstairs!

Continuing my revisit of the entire IDW Transformers universe, I finished up IDW Collection Phase One Volumes 2-8 as of last night, which is about 113 individual comics, bringing my 2023 total to 132. Not great, but I think pacing ahead of where I was last year. The Phase 1 reread was as spotty as I expected. Some pretty great stuff, but lots of mediocrity as well. Reading it all in a straight shot, with several years of books condensed into a reading period of a few weeks, it really laid bare just how schizophrenic the Phase 1 stories were, with writer and artist switch-ups, soft reboots, and tonal shifts. It really doesn't hang together as a single story, at all. I know a lot of people are loyal to Simon Furman, since he'd written TF for so long, but I found his stories the least appealing, especially when trying to shoehorn in human characters. It was pretty thin soup. The assorted spotlight books were entertaining as they tended to focus on the actual Transformers, which is what I'm there for. Apparently a lot of folks didn't care for All Hail Megatron, but I enjoyed it. It was a pretty wild shift from the previous storytelling style, and provided some cheap thrills. I'm also understanding that a lot of people apparently didn't care for Mike Costa's run that followed, but I have to say, aside from the fact that the final storyline seemed very rushed, I really enjoyed it. SO, yeah, a real mixed bag, but I enjoyed it more often than not. I just started up Phase 2 volume 1, and was instantly reminded why I loved those stories so much. What a joy, I'm so anxious to revisit all of these stories again, as well as catch the ones I missed previously. These are some great comics.

Yeah, he's had it for years, it always makes me laugh. I'm a member of his Facebook group, and he interacts with fans routinely over there. He does great stuff. But he's a bit of an odd duck, so to speak.

Same. I'm usually there the morning after the new listings start so I can throw $1 or whatever on each lot. It's fun, I get that same feeling I got as a kid when the new Sears Wish Book showed up in the mail, and I'd spend a day circling all the stuff that I hoped Santa might bring. Only now I'm Santa, down to the white beard and big belly!

Don cracks me up. To be clear, I have tons of respect for his work, and love his comics, but he is such a crank, it's hilarious. I'm sure that he was getting a lot of questions that he found annoying about Duck Tales, since he's such a fanatical stickler about the holy texts of Carl Barks. But still, the fact that he decided to make a sign telling people that "THIS IS NOT DUCK TALES" rather than just saying "Uh, yeah...it's Duck Tales...and prints are only $20" is really something. Take the money and run, Don!

Today was payday, so I placed a fairly large (for me) order, around 16 Transformers. Getting caught up on a lot of things I'd been slow to grab, like a few Shattered Glass bots (Ultra Magnus, Soundwave, Blaster), a bunch of SS Bumblebee bots (Ironhide, Ratchet, Wheeljack, Arcee, Soundwave), that Orion Pax/Alpha Trion convention pack from last year, and oddly enough, several recent Legacy releases (Needlenose, Scraphook, Crankcase, etc) that haven't even shown up on shelves around here . Why spend time driving to various Targets looking for the latest wave when I can grab them on Pulse for $16 a pop? Ended up spending around $330 for $500 worth of stuff, shipped directly to my door. I can live with that. I'm thinking about placing a second order to grab those exact o-ring sets you mentioned, plus the Transformers/GI Joe crossover HISS and AWE Strikers, as that may finally be a decent price for them. Haven't decided yet.

Indeed, and it was when Lobo was still cool!

Well, not reaaaaally, except that L.E.G.I.O.N. and Starman were cool, and Astro Boy is also cool! L.E.G.I.O.N. was a sort of sci-fi, military police force type deal, which was set in the then-present day DC Universe, and featured some characters which had ties to Legion of Super-Heroes. The Starman series this button was promoting was from the late 80's, one of several characters that bore that name. It was fairly generic DC superheroing, but I enjoyed it as a kid. Astro Boy is a classic manga and anime, that influenced pretty much every Japanese comic and cartoon that followed it. So, not really similar, other than all being cool things, and sometimes that's enough!

Love it. Oddly, the LEGION and Starman are my favorites, if just because they're not exactly the titles that attracted much swag.

I've still got my first printings of the DD by Miller Omni, as well as the Companion and Elektra books. Those were books I wouldn't allow myself to part with, so I've never bought the newer versions. So, I can't personally attest to it, but here's Omar's review of the newest printing and comparison to the original. The cover you featured here is the "poster cover" variant, which was new for this printing. Also available with this printing was the Daredevil 181 version, which had been used previously. Same contents, two different covers. Edit: the direct comparison begins around the 20:20 mark, if you don't want to watch the whole thing.

I have a handful of these things, I think they're cute. What I like about them is that it's a uniform toy line, where every piece is done in a single style and scale. The other thing I like is the breadth of licenses. There has never been another toyline in history that crossed over so many different properties. Now, that being said, I'd never pay more than retail for one, which is usually about $10, and sometimes less. I have maybe a dozen or so. My wife has several more. She has all of the British royal family, and some others like the Hamilton musical, etc. I think with a lot of these, it's just the sheer surprise of "oh, they made a toy out of THIS?" So, yeah, I can see the appeal at $10. They're cute and don't take up much space. I open them up, I throw away the box, which I assume instantly destroys the value, and that's fine. For me it's just another knicknack, and definitely not an investment.

My clearance priced IST picks are starting to arrive. Most of these are still in stock, I believe, if anyone is interested. $30 for the OHMU89 Update, $40 for the X-Treme X-Men by Claremont, and $50 for the Cap by Remender. I think the X-Factor by David Vol 2 has sold out at the clearance price, but may still be available at full price. All of my cheap MMW's also arrived, not shown is the latest Cap volume, which arrived on its own yesterday. Lots of good deals lately, more than I can keep up with!

I was bummed to miss the show this year. I went to the first one and was happy to meet fastball, Azkaban, etc. Did lots of good buying. This year the show fell on the same weekend as the Arcade Expo, and that's a tradition going back many years with my friends. So, I really couldn't miss it. But I will try to get to the next show if I can!

Great series, I've read is several times. There was a near complete set of 9.8's on CLink a couple of months ago, and I wish I'd bid harder on them, because the covers are so gorgeous, they'd make a beautiful set. Oh well, I had my sights set on some other stuff, but someone got a nice deal.

I went ahead and ordered Snow Job and the female Cobra trooper pack, since they were exclusives. I'm sure I'll pick up the others at some point, but didn't bother pre-ordering since they should be pretty easy to find. Too much money tied up in Transformers sales and other nonsense right now!

Cool! Distribution is still so screwed up, most of these haven't hit shelves over here in any appreciable number. I've seen a few reports of folks finding Tarn, Hot Shot etc at random, but all of the stores around me still seem to be drowning in Coronation Starscreams and Blitzwings. I finally saw Ironhide a few weeks ago, and apparently he's common as dirt! I'm stoked about Tarn, I'll take all of the IDW characters they want to make. I'm really not familiar with the Unicron Trilogy stuff, so unless a design is just totally awesome, I'll probably skip most of those, which is fine. The wallet can use a rest!

There's no shame in being proven wrong by @Bookerywhen it comes to pulps. He wrote the book on them. Like...he literally wrote the book. https://www.budsartbooks.com/product/bookery-s-guide-to-pulps-related-magazines-second-edition/

But I want them NOW!

Man alive, don't know if any of you guys are feeling the crunch, but it is a brutal time for the toy budget this week! This weekend I got notice that my two Classified Serpentors were charged and shipping (set to arrive this Thursday), and BBTS must have had a ship come in, because I had FIVE "Arriving Soon" notifications for pre-ordered Transformers. Sky Lynx and Jetfire reissues, plus finally getting Wild Rider, Breakdown, and Dead End. Other folks are reporting getting notices for Metalhawk and Twincast as well. When it rains, it pours! Happy to have all of this stuff finally hitting, but man, all at once? Yikes! No hookers and blow for me this week, gotta tighten the belt!

Love it! There was a time when I was really into bootleg and KO toys, especially Marvel related. It's a fun and sometimes challenging road to go down, as the offerings are so random.

I was very surprised and excited about the Atlas announcement from Fanta. They do such lovely work, I'm sure they'll give this stuff the treatment it deserves. I'd also say that answers the question of whether nor not Marvel would ever reprint the Atlas era MMW volumes, as they weren't exactly brisk sellers the first time around.

Ok, yes! Those are good too. So, a new proposal for what is allowed on our New YouTube 1. instructional videos 2. Funny animal videos 3. bootleg concert footage and that’s that!

Ok, this is true. YouTube is very handy for instructional videos, which I use all of the time. So how about we keep those, but ban any videos where people have…opinions…about things?

I was especially surprised to see the Cap and Spider-Woman books at that price, as they’re only a few months old!

Or, and I can't stress this enough: people could just stop making these videos, and Youtube could just go away forever, and everything would be great?