BuraddoRun

A few more HPB pickups, each for half off the cover price. The Ghost Rider annual was not polybagged, and the card was surprisingly tucked inside.

Page Punchers Wave 2 is out, and Wave 3 is coming soon! Both have brand new original comics included! These are the bigger action figures, not the tiny ones that came with reprinted comics. Wave 2 has an Injustice comic. Attached are pics of the Black Adam Line Variant from Wave 1 (comes with the Target Exclusive figure), and a few pics of the Injustice book from Wave 2.

So Page Punchers (the big ones, not sure about the little ones) is a continuing line, with more original comics incoming! The second wave of figures is out, and Wave 3 is announced for later this year. Attached is a pic of the Line Variant for that Black Adam comic from the Target Exclusive Batman from Wave 1. The interior is the same as the regular book. I also have the Injustice book from Wave 2, pics attached.

I got my book yesterday, and I've read it. here is my review: The physical quality of the book is very good. It is professionally done, and feels like a normal graphic novel you'd get from any of the big companies, though there is no bar code or even price printed on the books anywhere. But it is solid, has a thick, glossy exterior and nice stock for the interior pages. No complaints in this department. Regarding what the book represents and the various concerns about it being political or anti-political or whatever other social concerns, it's pretty straightforward. Eric July has a 1-page Forward at the beginning of the book where he thanks everyone and mentions his feelings that the legacy comic characters we all know and love have been mishandled in modern times. It's not a deep discussion, just a couple of sentences before segueing into why that inspired the creation of the Rippaverse. At the end of the book, there's the printed "Rippaverse Ethic," where he again mentions, in one sentence, "the unfortunate state of the industry." He then promises readers that he knows customers deserve respect and without customers the book won't exist. He also talks about how each book will matter and continuity and the timeline are important. There's a single page pinup that serves as a separator between the main story and an epilogue or intro to another story that shows Eric (I believe it's Eric, but I suppose it could be a character) wearing a hat that says "taxation is theft." Finally there's another 1-page pinup where Eric is holding up a sign that says, "Respect the source material." Besides those things that might be controversial to some, everything else in the book, including the story itself, is just a story. There are no political discussions, no mentions of anything that's a hot political or social topic these days. It's a straightforward story about a guy, a former hero apparently, who comes back from hiding to help an acquaintance. There are some discussions between characters about hard work, family, and community, just your standard everybody-can-agree stuff. One character has one line where he talks about seeing someone in service (church). A couple of cops talk "locker room talk" about what they'd let a certain female superhero do to them (not a graphic discussion) before the chief angrily kicks them out of the office. The point is, this story does what he promises. It isn't far-right propaganda and it isn't left-wing erasure. It's just a story about a flawed guy trying to do good in a world of super-powered folk that can be good or bad. On to the art. It's good! I honestly don't love it personally, but the artist is talented, certainly better than a lot of other books on the shelves. One thing I do really like a lot, though, are the action sequences. The choreography, so to speak, is great. I love the fight scenes! The lettering and coloring were both professionally done as well, though, to be fair, those are aspects I don't usually pay much attention to. The point is, everything looks and feels professional here aesthetically. Now on to the meat of it: the story. Honestly, I thought it was...OK. I won't lie. I wanted it to be great. Jumping on at the beginning of something new that has been a financial success and where the creator is excited to unveil his dream was exciting for me, too. But the book itself wasn't super exciting for me. The characters aren't all that interesting to me. There was nothing that really drew me in to them. I just don't know them enough to care right now. There's some mystery to Isom's past, and while I find myself wanting to know the answers, I also kind of feel that it isn't very important. The point is that he stopped being a hero, and now he's back. The person he's trying to save, or the bad guy he's trying to beat, isn't all that interesting either, nor are the supporting characters we meet. I mentioned it above, but when a fight scene occurred, I really enjoyed it. It was illustrated very well in those parts, but almost everything in-between, all the character and world-building parts were not very interesting in my opinion. Also, the dialogue felt uneven. Sometimes characters spoke very formally, and other times they switched to informal, without rhyme or reason. It felt inconsistent.The epilogue/preview at the end seemed interesting enough, but that felt more like a teaser than anything, which I suppose is fine. Overall, unfortunately, I have to say I'm not super-impressed with the actual story thus far. So overall, I think the book is just OK. I'm interested to see where it goes, and I'd love to see the Rippaverse make an impact in the market. Healthy competition is a good thing. I also think what Eric says he wants to do with this book is a good thing, and appeals to people that may be disgruntled with the Big 2. But I don't think this will ever be a Marvel or DC killer. Honestly, I don't know if it will be successful in the end. It's a start, but it has a long way to go, despite its initial resounding success. $47 (after shipping and tax) was a big asking price for a single, 96-or-so page book. I'm not giving up on Rippaverse yet, but the next book will need to really grab me to keep my attention. And that's my honest opinion. I've attached some pics.

I'm a mostly scattershot collector, though I do search for specific characters, artists, and books I like. The problem is...I like a lot of stuff. But there is a theme I like collecting that is a partial focus, which is completed, yet unpublished pages. I just find the stories behind them fascinating, and love hunting for the answers. I don't have a lot of personal examples, but the ones I do were fun to find.

I may not be saying anything you don't already know, but Takeshi Miyazawa uses standard Japanese manga-sized paper for his comic art, which is smaller than the standard for American comics. He still puts in plenty of detail despite the smaller size, though. I like his work a lot.

Directly from the artist purchases are best, in my opinion. Not only does it cut out the middle men and allow for all the funds to go directly to them, it's personally more rewarding to contact the artists you like and chat with them. But I also buy from fellow collectors, reps, online stores, and auction sites. For me the auctions have been exclusively eBay and Mandarake. I haven't participated in the big boy auctions like Heritage yet.

WOW Voord! Last time I regularly visited the forum and peeked in this thread you were making Outer Limits sculptures for personal fun, having just picked up the hobby recently, I believe. Now you're making movie monster sculpts that are being turned into resin kits for everybody to purchase. That's nothing short of awesome!

Thank you! As it turns out, I think you're right, though it doesn't appear to be Elfquest. I didn't think the character in the page looked like an elf, though her hair is covering the tops of her ears. But I looked through covers of Warp comics and none seemed to have the look, and lots of their titles were, of course, Elfquest. But when I looked up Barry Blair, I found a book he did for Sirius called Warlock 5. And lo and behold, the character on the cover of the first issue appears to be the character on my art page! Regarding the Warp board, since Blair did some work for them around that time, maybe that's simply the boards he had when he did work for Sirius. Mycomicshop credits Blair as the writer, and Colin Chan as the artist, though. Anyhow, there are only 4 issues, so I bought all 4 for only $15 off eBay. Once those arrive I think I'll find my exact page. And yes, according to the synopsis, that character is human. Thanks again! I'll post an update once the comics arrive.

Hey All, I hadn't been buying OA lately, nor posting here, but I just picked up a cheapie on eBay that I thought looked nice. It's from WaRP Graphics, but that's all I know. There are no other identifiers that I can see besides the number 4 or 44 in the bottom right corner outside the art border. I've never read Warp's stuff, but I know Elfquest was one of their main books. I'd appreciate any help anyone here can provide. Thanks!

I got my shipping notification! After I read it, I'll come post my opinion.

Not my video, not me.

Just a straggler I picked up recently at HPB.

So besides these 6, there are 2 more. I searched a few stores and snagged 1 of each pack, and an extra Captain America 0. I got a couple of 1:10 variants inside a couple of packs, so that was cool. The Death of Dr. Strange Bloodstone was somewhat hot when it released, but it's cooled now I think. Still a nice get. Some of the books, like Shang-Chi and Spider-Punk, were printed with that super flimsy paper Marvel had for a few weeks, so finding high grades of those packs may be tough. The Moon Knight Vol. 1, No. 1 Facsimile variant is probably the coolest exclusive in this bunch. The cover is a wraparound rather than having the standard grey back cover. I always thought variants of Facsimile Editions were weird in principal, but I can't deny it's a cool cover!

Black Adam came in today from Amazon! I opened it and read the comic book, and now I'm here to share some pictures and thoughts. The figure is cool and it includes 2 lightning bolts as accessories, a base for the figure to stand on, a trading card, and of course the comic. I posted pics of everything in the Target Page Punchers topic (again, linked a few posts back by @ADAMANTIUM), but I'm just posting comic pictures here (with a bonus pic not posted in the other thread!). I have to say, it's THIS type of product that I think is really nice to find. The fact that the comic included is truly exclusive (correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think it's been printed elsewhere), has a story by established creators (Tyler Kirkham and Cavan Scott; admittedly, I wasn't familiar with Scott but Wikipedia says he's been working on SW: The High Republic), and is a high quality printing (nice and glossy book) just shows that care was put into the entire product overall. The story is a one-shot, which is nice, focuses on Black Adam obviously, but has a healthy roster of other characters including the 3 companion figures in the line and on the cover, some other Justice League members, another guest star I won't spoil who. has a decent fight against Adam, and a brand-new villain (again, I'm pretty sure anyway). The villain likely won't ever return in a mainstream book, and the story won't win any awards or become a classic in DC history or anything, but still, it's fun, has nice art, and just feels like what a comic book that comes with a toy and may attract new readers should be. It feels like a classic comic book story. Anyhow, the product gets an A+ from me. There are ads for various graphic novels inside which of course are aimed to new readers, which hopefully this type of product will attract. . *Edit: Wait, a Doug Mahnke variant cover...I wonder where we can find that one. The Line Art variant is the same cover in the Target pictures, but just black and white. Hmm...

So I got Black Adam in the mail today. Here are pictures of everything for those curious. It came with the figure, a base (not pictured because I found it after I took the pic of the figure, but it's just a round black plastic base that fits under 1 foot), 2 lightning bolt accessories, a trading card, and of course the comic. It was $24.99, which is $15 more than the smaller Page Punchers, but the figure is of course much larger and more detailed. And the comic book is better in my opinion, simply because it truly is (as far as I know) an exclusive book with a story that hasn't been printed elsewhere, rather than the reprints that come in the smaller packs. All-in-all though, I love this line, big and small alike, and I'm looking forward to future packs if we get them!

Check out the announcement video. I think a lot of people are excited to jump in on something new, and this is from someone who cares about comics and wants to make something fans will love.

More random Half Price Books finds:

I found 8 different DC 4-packs from the most recent round, and yeah, they're terrible. None of the cover books are exclusive variants, and all the other books aren't just overstock, they're overstock that was in previous packs! I mean, I've literally gotten most of the books I got this round in previous DC 4-packs, and not the good stuff like RWBY. DC seems so hit and miss. Marvel is consistent in that you at least get an exclusive cover. DC had some recent exclusives, those pulped books, and store-exclusive variants, but no consistency at all. Oh well, I guess that's the nature of these things. Oh, and regarding the McFarlane Target books mentioned a few posts back (with the link to a thread about them), there are some bigger figure packs that come with an exclusive comic coming out soon (and apparently out in some places). I haven't seen the comic in person yet but it's a Black Adam book that stars him and the 3 other figures in the line: Batman, Superman, and Constantine. MSRP is $24.99 but you get a full-size action figure and the exclusive book. I'm pretty sure each pack has the same book, so if you just want the comic, pick your favorite figure and don't worry about the other 3. However, Target is getting an exclusive Black and White Batman with a Line Art variant of the comic, so if you care, be on the lookout for that one. I've pre-ordered it from Target, but I picked up the Black Adam figure from Amazon that is due in tomorrow hopefully. I don't know what it is, but something about these variant comics that show up at retail as opposed to comic shops always gets me. When i was a kid I loved the pack-in comics with toys like He-Man and those comic packs they had at Toys R' Us. I guess it reignites that joy of comic discovery.

There are bigger Page Punchers coming, or possibly out already? I haven't seen them in my stores yet. 4 different figures available from multiple outlets with an apparently exclusive comic. I believe they all include the same comic book, but I'm not 100% sure. But there's a 5th figure that comes with a line variant and that one's Target exclusive.

Personally, I think it's...OK. I thought it was a fun idea but the current Hulk VS Thor crossover is...farfetched? I mean, I know, it's comic books. LOL. I've read every issue so far, so there's that.

Ha! Not part of a story. Just a funny cover where yeah, poor Dan almost drowned despite having a Blanka floaty!

Those things are always hit and miss, but I make educated guesses based on what I see. I never rip the packs or anything like that (I hate it when folks to that!). But you can, of course, always see at least the 2 cover books they display, and the spines of the others. I'll search the spines and sometimes see something that looks like it could be good. The thick spines, like annuals and such, of course you can see clearly on the sides when there's text there. The pack that had the above comic had a Cloak and Dagger on one side, and I wanted that for my personal collection (I like the early C&D stuff). There were some other Marvel books from the 80s and 90s I could see from the side. Not enough to tell what they were, but enough where I could date the books by the corner boxes. So I figured it was a pack worth gambling on for that, and that I'd at least get some stuff from an era I enjoy books from. I had no idea One-Punch Man was in there, but I was pumped when I opened the pack and found it in there! So call it a somewhat educated gamble, though the book above was completely unexpected.

I am in Texas, yes. There's good stuff. You just have to have the patience to look. You won't always find something good, but the new stock that comes in as people sell their books in bulk always gives a chance for you to find a treasure. I've gone months without finding anything good at times, but I've also had spurts where every time I go I find something. Besides, the hunt is fun!

I found this in a mystery pack of comics at HPB. There were 30 comics and the pack was $10, so that makes this around 33 cents.