What Are You Reading Right Now?

[MR.COMICBOOK]

I am reading three bronze age classics at once, I rotate them.

DC Comics Classic Library: Roots of the Swamp Thing : Swampthing 1 to 10 by Bernie Wrightson and Len Wein. just an amazing series and I am enjoying it more than Alan Moore`s version(Blasphemous).

the Marshall Rogers Detective run, now this is the Batman I like not that Frank Miller Batman on steroids.

Warlock Masterworks Vol. 2 : Jim Starlin The Strange Tales-Warlock Magus Saga, I can`t see anything topping this. Starlin is a fantastic artist and the man can write.

I am having fun reading the above stuff and it is not dated.

 

I am reading the Warlock MM vol. 2 as well and totally agree... this to me was the pinnacle of Starlin's art and overall, his greatest saga. I enjoyed his Captain Marvel run, the Death of Captain Marvel and Infinity Gauntlet, but this run on Warlock was just incredible... full of angst and bitterness like nothing I've ever read in comics.

 

Also reading anything Green Lantern related, Geoff Johns once again is exceeding himself and proving to me that he is the best writer of the past decade.

I wonder if his Dreadstar stuff was this good? I have been totally blown away at how good this Warlock stuff is,it makes me want to go out and go buy more Jim Starlin stuff.

[Annihilus]

Just picked up the Tomb of Dracula Omnibus in a little shop in Montana for half price (it even came with a clear sleeve on the dust jacket!). I've read the series a couple of times already and have the run as well as the Essentials TPBs, but couldn't pass it up at that price.

 

Really itching to read 'Y The Last Man' if I can find the whole thing in tpb somewhere.

 

Just touching on some comments above, it really doesn't get much better than Preacher (ok, well, Sandman). If you can get past the vulgarity and religious conflict (absolutely no problem for me), it's really a great read. My mother who is a devout christian can't read Stephen King for the same reason...but funny enough she can read Lovecraft which contains arguably more blasphemous material than King (demons, black magic, etc., etc.).

[Wally's Comics]

The Classic BA Spectre run from Adventure Comics.

 

 

 

[Ken Aldred]

Parker - The Hunter HC

Local HC

Blackest Night / Green Lantern / Green Lantern Corps

Asterios Polyp - the new David Mazzuchelli book

Agents of Atlas

Starman Omnibus Volume 2

 

That's my current 'to read' list

 

[Foolkiller]

Also reading anything Green Lantern related, Geoff Johns once again is exceeding himself and proving to me that he is the best writer of the past decade.

 

For superhero books, you're probably right. He's got a great handle on the characters and their history. Loved how he ret-conned that Parallax (sp?) mess in Rebirth.

 

 

I don't want to be overly harsh on the Ron Marz stuff. To be honest, when it first happened, I thought that the idea of having Hal go a little nuts and making a new GL was actually a good one. While it was offensive to some of the older, more traditional fans, the truth is, I thought it was a novel concept that really ramped up interest in GL. In fact, for awhile, i think GL did really well. As time went on, making Hal the Spectre etc. and other ideas got further and further away from a basic concept.

 

In terms of superhero books v. other genres, I probably would defer to someone else on who is the best writer. I'd give it to Johns over almost any other writer. While I think there are some other cool non hero concepts out there, to be honest, I think making the super heroes interesting has the most pressure and is the most challenging. While things like Walked Dead etc., are great concepts, it's hard to continuously come up with a new idea and make it seem fresh and exciting. Johns has taken old characters and updated them with respect to their histories. It's sort of amazing when you think about it.

 

Marvel will eventually need someone like Johns after the mess Bendis and others have made of the marvel u.

[cd4ever]

I just finished a Power Girl TPB and am starting on volumes1-6 of the Walking Dead. I bought them from a board member (sorry, I forget who) probably well over a year ago and amd just getting around to them.

 

And to answer a question above....Dreadstar is not as good as Starlin's peak Marvel work.....but it's still pretty good.

 

 

[Ogami]

Marvel will eventually need someone like Johns after the mess Bendis and others have made of the marvel u.

 

No kidding. From a Marvel Zombie perspective, I could do with a little bit of good old fashioned traditional storytelling and/or retconning.

 

Can you retcon an entire editor-in-chief away?

[rob_react]

I just finished Lone Wolf and Cub. All 8300 (or so) pages of it. A stunning series.

 

Marry me.

 

 

Rob, it can't possibly be the first time you've read Lone Wold and Cub, can it?

 

I remember vividly the beautiful and impressionistic artwork in the whole series. It's funny to say impressionistic when the series can be so violent but the landscapes are out of this world in that series. I have great fondness for the whole story and would recommend it to all. It helps I found the whole set of trades at 1/2-price books and was able to sell them for a profit when I was done reading

 

It's the first time I've ever finished it. I read the First editions back in 1987, but those fell well short of completing the series. I started reading these maybe 3 years ago. I averaged one every 6-8 weeks for a while and then, over the past two months, have plowed through the last ten volumes.

[Ogami]

"The Grandson of My Heart."

 

It is simply, an epic story.

 

Revenge, fatherhood, redemption, sociopolitical drama, serial, morality play.

 

When you meet the Buddha, Kill the Buddha.

 

I can't speak too highly of it.

[Ogami]

I have to say this-

 

I read issues 9 and 10, also from First Comics, 1987, the ones that Rob is talking about. They changed me forever. For a rural American kid, seeing Japanese culture, language, religion, architecture, all in a story about a father literally hell bent on revenge for the murder of his wife with his toddler in tow, this was heady, exotic stuff. I went on to get that whole series, which was less than 1/3 of the complete story. First Comics was unable to finish the run, and even so, had sanitized some of the more mature elements as well. The one advantage was the large size and the covers by Miller, Sienkiwicsz, Ploog, Wagner.

 

Fast forward to 2002 with Dark Horse putting out the trades. The downside was that they were smaller, much smaller than the material deserved. The upside was the affordability in being able to finish a 28 volume set, giving someone the entire story.

 

I will never forget picking up the last volume from my LCS. At that time, I lived about an hour away from the store. There was no way I was going to make it back home before I read it, and even when I got home, I would have had to deal with kids, wife, housework, etc. I pulled over on the side of the road and finished a journey that I had started over fifteen years earlier. Talk about delayed gratification.

 

I won't be giving anything away to say that I was weeping as I finished it. I don't expect everyone to love Lone Wolf and Cub as much as I do, nor do I expect everyone who reads it to cry as they finish it, but I'm telling you, I've read thousands and thousands of novels, and tens of thousands of comic books, and I'm telling you, from my perspective, it's one of the best stories I've ever read, in any medium.

[Ken Aldred]

A guy in my local LCS claimed that 'all' Geoff Johns has done is rip off Alan Moore's earlier Green Lantern work. I explained that Johns had started with next to nothing, a few cast-off lines like the Blackest Night prophecy, the throwaway Mogo backup story, etc. and created what's now several years of great storylines. I don't really think that Alan Moore expanding on Len Wein's groundwork in Swamp Thing, for example, was really much different as a creative process- Johns has been extremely inventive himself- my favourite mainstream comic book writer by far.

[Monstro]

Y Last Man Vol. 9

 

 

[chrisco37]

Johns has taken old characters and updated them with respect to their histories. It's sort of amazing when you think about it.

 

Marvel will eventually need someone like Johns after the mess Bendis and others have made of the marvel u.

 

No doubt. Johns appears to be pretty much a DC guy (has he ever done any Marvel?). I think that if Marvel were going to try and get someone (other than Johns) to fix things, and get back to "normal roots", the two names that pop into my head (as guys with the knowledge and reverence to history) are Busiek and Waid.

[Ogami]

I think that if Marvel were going to try and get someone (other than Johns) to fix things, and get back to "normal roots", the two names that pop into my head (as guys with the knowledge and reverence to history) are Busiek and Waid.

 

I agree with that. I will say that newer guys like Slott and the gang known as the Spidey Brain trust, (Waid is one of the members), Gale, Guggenheim, and Kelly are all contenders. Apart from the idiocy of retconning MJ out of Spidey's life, the book has been solid, traditional storytelling for about two years. I really like Tom Brennan as an editor, and wish he could take over the top spot.

 

Hell, if they would just get rid of Bendis, Millar and Quesada, I'd be happy.

[rob_react]

"The Grandson of My Heart."

 

It is simply, an epic story.

 

Revenge, fatherhood, redemption, sociopolitical drama, serial, morality play.

 

When you meet the Buddha, Kill the Buddha.

 

I can't speak too highly of it.

 

Epic indeed. The last volume was impossibly dramatic and the build-up to it was grand storytelling. 2-3000 pages of endgame.

[Currin Comics]

Project Superpowers 1

Superman/Batman-Vengence

Batman and Son-finished

Northlanders-Sven the returned-finished

DC Comics Weekly

Essential Werewolf by Night Vol 2

[alecholland]

Just finished the 3rd TPB of Preacher. Plan to continue with that series and also start reading the first trade of 100 Bullets.

 

[Ogami]

Rick's Story by Dave Sim.

[Flaming_Telepath]

Got it from Amazon some time ago but never got around to reading it...then forgot I had it.

 

Rising Stars Compendium

 

This contains all issues of the regular run, the #1/2 and #0, plus all three mini-series. Straczynski may have ruined Spidey, but he sure can write...this, Midnight Nation, Supreme Power...when he's got a blank slate to start with.

 

Heavy as , but superb reading. (thumbs u

[Ken Aldred]

I read the first few issues, which I thought had a good story that needed a much, much better artist. The publishing schedule started to get a bit erratic and eventually the gaps between issues killed my interest in it.

 

Anyhow, Nick, I'm glad you enjoyed the collected version.