Posts Tagged ‘Supergirl Annual’

August 1st, 2011  Posted at   The Stack

July was an exceptional month for reading. For the first time since January, I am completely caught up on new material and the Reading Project. (It also tied January as the most productive month of the year, for what it’s worth.) I am hesitant to say that it won’t be a problem keeping up from here on out, but with my books getting cut drastically come September, obstacles are seemingly fewer.

Here’s July:

Action Comics #901-902
Adventure Comics #527
All New Batman: Brave and the Bold #8
Brightest Day Aftermath: The Search For Swamp Thing #1
Green Lantern (Vol. 4) #66
Green Lantern Corps (Vol. 2) #60
Green Lantern: Emerald Warriors #10-11
Hulk-Sized Mini-Hulks #1
Steel #38-44
Superboy (Vol. 3) #39-45
Superboy and the Ravers #9-15
Superboy Annual (Vol. 2) #4
Superboy Plus #2
Supergirl (Vol. 4) #9-15
Supergirl (Vol. 5) #64-65
Supergirl Annual #2
Superman #712
Superman/Batman #84-85
Tiny Titans #40-41
Young Justice (Vol. 2) #4-5
Showcase Presents: Superman Family Vol. 3

Total: 50 comics, 1 trade (Year total: 248 comics, 8 trades)

I started the Showcase volume back in May, but just finished it up. It was an excellent volume, though. It is, maybe, my favorite Showcase Presents volume so far. It is certainly my favorite of the non-pure Superman volumes. There are many classic and iconic stories in it.

The Reading Project is coming along nicely. I’m more than one-third of the way through now. STEEL and SUPERBOY AND THE RAVERS will be dropping off soon, and YOUNG JUSTICE will be added. None of those are likely to happen in August, but we will see. While we are on the subject, SUPERBOY AND THE RAVERS is a fun title. It’s unfortunate people pass on it because the dated (and kind of silly) title. Coincidentally, this era of Kon-El also gets passed on because of a dated costume and haircut. If you haven’t read it, you’re missing some fun stuff, folks.

HULK-SIZE MINI HULKS was… interesting. I don’t normally read Marvel titles outside of trades, but this looked cute. And it was, but also rather repetetive. It was also odd that the creators names were on every page.

My award for Best Book of the Month (which isn’t a real award, but I’m deeming it such for this post) goes to SUPERMAN #712, written by Kurt Busiek. It has taken its place as my favorite story of Kurt Busike’s run, topping out “The Best Day” from SUPERMAN ANNUAL #13. Not only was it an excellent done-in-one, it was extremely touching story. If you are a dog owner and don’t feel at least a twinge of emotion reading this, I might be lead to question your humanity. I might be sharing my thoughts on it more in an upcoming episode of “The Thrilling Adventures of Superman,” so keep an ear there.

And speaking of done-in-ones, GREEN LANTERN: EMERALD WARRIORS #11 was a nice one, with Guy Gardner in the lead role. Though I like him more these days than ever before, I never cared just a whole lot for Guy. That’s not to say he’s a bad character… just not my flavor. However, I enjoyed this story… even more because it was a self-contained, one-issue story. Comics need more of those these days.

May 1st, 2011  Posted at   The Stack

This was simply not a good month for reading comics. Just when you start to make a little progress

Here’s April:

Adventure Comics #524
All New Batman: Brave and the Bold #5
Brightest Day #20-21
Giant-Size Atom #1
Green Lantern (Vol. 4) #63
Justice League of America/The 99 #5
R.E.B.E.L.S. #26
Superboy (Vol. 3) #26-29
Superman #709
Steel #26-28
Supergirl Annual #1
Tiny Titans #37
Young Justice (Vol. 2) #2
Diana Prince: Wonder Woman Vol. 3-4 trade paperbacks

Total: 19 comics, 2 trades (Year total: 125 comics, 6 trades)

On the bright side, I finished out the DIANA PRINCE: WONDER WOMAN volumes. That was kind of an anti-climactic ending to a “new” Wonder Woman, wasn’t it? I did enjoy the four volumes, though, even though each successive volume got worse.

Now that those volumes are out of the way, I’ve moved on to the next book in the stack, which is BATMAN CHRONICLES volume four. After I get through with it, I’ll probably pull all the BATMAN CHRONICLES volumes out of the reading stack. Since Michael Kaiser and I are now doing the Batman podcast, we’ll be getting to the stories reprinted in the Chronicles series really soon, so I’d rather look at them from a fresher perspective.

On the reading project front, you’ll notice I read the SUPERGIRL ANNUAL from 1996! So even though I didn’t quite get to the SUPERGIRL series proper… or SUPERBOY AND THE RAVERS… or the ERADICATOR… they’re inching towards the top. And, even though I’ve said this three times in a row now, I should start on them this coming month. Hopefully. Heh.

I’ve also decided I’m dropping ADVENTURE COMICS at the next jumping-off point. The Legion of Super-Heroes, while I like the concept, doesn’t seem to hold my attention unless Superboy (or another character from The Family) is involved. And this “training squad” of the Legion holds it even less. I’ve only stuck with it this long because it was said the title would tie into “Flashpoint.” That doesn’t seem to be the case now and since I’m not reading “Flashpoint” anyway, why stick around?

Dropping that (along with BRIGHTEST DAY ending and the cancellation of R.E.B.E.L.S.) will bring my list down to 10 titles. I’m waiting to see where what direction the Green Lantern titles take after “War of the Green Lanterns.” If those books don’t pick up, that will mean three more titles trimmed.