Wednesday is new comic book day, and if you are lost when it comes to finding something interesting to read, let the Major Spoilers Staff be your guide to books they recommend this week.
ADVENTURE TIME #9
Writer: Ryan North
Artist: Braden Lamb, Shelli Paroline
Publisher: BOOM! Studios (kaboom! imprint)
Cover Price: $3.99
SOLICITATION: Join Jake the Dog and Finn the Human as they try to right the wrongs of a Jake-caused TIME PARADOX! If you haven’t checked out the comic book adaptation of the hit Cartoon Network show, there’s no better time to jump into the all-ages sensation!
JIMMY: I am a recent Adventure Time convert, and as I tend to do with most things I get interested in, I dove in head first. There is only one episode of the TV series that I have not yet seen, and as much as I love the show this comic series is even better. If you’re not reading this already, this probably isn’t the best issue to jump in on, but the first TPB is available for pre-order on Amazon (try clicking the handy dandy link on the top right of Major Spoilers!) and it comes out in just a few weeks!
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #696
Writer: Dan Slott
Artist: Giuseppe Camuncoli
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Cover Price: $3.99
SOLICITATION: GOBLINS GO TO WAR…and Peter Parker is caught dead-center!
GEORGE: Slott’s Spider-Man continues to be great fun. I was worried about the Alpha sidekick stuff, but Slott executed well on a concept that I thought was doomed to fail. I should know better than to doubt Slott and Spidey at this point. And I don’t have to, on this arc – I love his version of the Hobgoblin, and setting him at odds with old school Hobby promises to be all kinds of entertaining.
ROB: Is it Spider-Man? Is Dan Slott still writing? Yes to both? I’m in. Also, with twice the Hobgoblin and Peter’s secret being spoiled it sounds like were ramping everything into the last few issues of an amazing series (pun only partially intended).
STEPHEN: I’m really looking forward to the ongoing adventures of Spider-Man. Since Mr. Slott started on this series, I’ve enjoyed the series, and though it looks like someone else will be under the mask following issue #700, it’s not the end, but the journey getting there that has me pumped.
ZACH: Five issues left until the big 7-0-0, which can only mean that characters are going to start dropping right? Everyone is totally going to boycott these issues and yet inexplicably know what is going on, right? I mean Dan Slott is ruining the very foundation of comics when Superior Spider-man releases, right? I don’t know any of those answers but I’m buying all of them!
BATMAN: THE DARK KNIGHT #13
Writer: Gregg Hurwitz
Artist: David Finch
Publisher: DC Comics
Cover Price: $2.99
SOLICITATION: Batman is pushed to his limits as he faces a fear toxin unlike any he has ever encountered! What is Batman most afraid of? Find out here!
More on The Scarecrow’s origin.
JIMMY: There are so many good Batman titles right now it’s incredible. In my memory there has never been a time when there were so many consistently great Batman books on the shelves on a monthly basis; between Snyder’s Batman, Morrison’s Batman Incorporated and Hurwitz’ The Dark Knight it is truly the year of the Batman.
BATMAN INCORPORATED #4
Writer: Grant Morrison
Artist: Chris Burnham
Publisher: DC Comics
Cover Price: $2.99
SOLICITATION: BATMAN and TALIA AL GHUL continue their fight for control of their son DAMIAN – better known as ROBIN! WINGMAN and REDBIRD descent upon GOTHAM CITY! Who are these heroes, and what is their relationship to THE DARK KNIGHT?
JIMMY: This was my most anticipated Bat-book of The New 52, and while delays and the like have caused my excitement to cool a bit I still am eager to read each issue as it comes out. There are only 8 more issues of Grant’s Bat-epic remaining, and the promise of learning more about Wingman means this will probably be the first book I read on Wednesday.
DARK HORSE PRESENTS #17
Writer: John Layman, David Chelsea, Carla Speed McNeil, Tony Puryear, Phil Stanford, Jimmy Palmiotti, Justin Gray, Michael T. Gilbert, Michael Avon Oeming, Colin Lorimer
Artist: David Chelsea, Carla Speed McNeil, Tony Puryear, Michael T. Gilbert, Colin Lorimer, Sam Kieth, Richard Corben, Patric Reynolds, Tony Akins, Victor Santos
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Cover Price: $7.99
SOLICITATION: This issue features the return of Colin Lorimer’s UXB and Michael T. Gilbert’s Mr. Monster! Plus, another Edgar Allan Poe story adapted by Will Eisner Hall of Fame inductee Richard Corben and a new short written by Michael Avon Oeming and illustrated by Victor Santos!
* Crime noir, horror, fantasy, science fiction—this anthology has it all!
* The DHP conclusion to Tony Puryear’s Concrete Park and John Layman and Sam Kieth’s Aliens: Inhuman Condition!
* 80 pages! No ads!
* Dive into The Deep Sea—a new creator-owned series from Palmiotti and Gray!
RODRIGO: So I keep running into decent stuff from Dark Horse that comes from their Dark Horse Presents comic. Maybe I should just start going straight to the source.
FF #23
Writer: Jonathan Hickman
Artist: Nick Dragotta
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Cover Price: $2.99
SOLICITATION: Jonathan Hickman wraps up his tenure as Old Franklin teaches Young Franklin “How To Be A God!”
ZACH: I honestly just stopped reading FF a few months back without any real explanation, just stopped one week. Hickman’s runs on Fantastic Four and FF were part of my coming into the Marvel Universe so I will definitely pick up his last issue on this and go back later and fill in all the gaps.
GAMBIT #4
Writer:
Artist: Clay Mann
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Cover Price: $2.99
SOLICITATION:
The world-shaking conclusion of the first arc of Gambit’s new ongoing series!
Cursed by an ancient artifact, betrayed by his only ally, and staring down a Guatemalan god monster accidentally loosed on Earth, it’s going to take all of Gambit’s cunning to win the day this time!
ROB: Zach showed me the first issue of this on the way to GenCon (or the way back , but that doesn’t matter) and I was pleasantly surprised with the less heroic bent of the book. Now on the fourth issue I’m pretty much hooked and happy to be reading of a Cajun thief with some super powers. If you like to merely dabble in the world of super heroics, this is a book to pick up, it shouldn’t disappoint.
RODRIGO: Say what you want about Gambit, but there’s something about him that just moves books. Is it his cool haircut? his ability to turn things temporarily pink? His Robot knees? Apparently he doesn’t have those anymore, so I’m out of ideas.
GHOST #1
Writer: Kelly Sue DeConnick
Artist: Phil Noto
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Cover Price: $2.99
SOLICITATION: The enigmatic Ghost, along with paranormal investigators Tommy and Vaughn, takes to the streets of Chicago in search of the crystal-powered machine that first conjured her, hoping to find clues to her mysterious past life. But the machine’s original owners have a deadly agenda of their own. Picking up right where Ghost #0 left off, Ghost #1 continues Kelly Sue DeConnick (Captain Marvel) and Phil Noto’s (Angel & Faith) reimagining of Dark Horse’s greatest heroine!
STEPHEN: Comic’s Greatest World was an interesting experiment that came out of the ’90s. Ghost was part of that (as was Barb Wire), so I’m interested in seeing what Dark Horse Comics has in store for us this time around.
ICE AGE PAST PRESENT & FUTURE
Writer: Caleb Monroe
Artist: Shelli Paroline
Publisher: BOOM! Studios
Cover Price: $3.99
SOLICITATION: Recollecting what a huge ‘help’ he was last year, Sid decides to pay Santa and the North Pole a visit and once again offer his assistance for Christmas preparations! Before anyone can stop him, he’s opened a box filled with Santa’s magic…and he finds himself visiting Sids in the past, present, and future!
A sweet holiday story featuring popular characters from the summer smash ICE AGE: CONTINENTAL DRIFT.
RODRIGO: So. Weird. This is super weird right? Christmas celebrated in the Pleistocene? By Megafauna? I guess this story does involve time travel.. so… Nope, still weird. (So weird, right?)
INVINCIBLE IRON MAN #527
Writer: Matt Fraction
Artist: Salvador Larroca
Publisher: Marvel
Cover Price: $2.99
SOLICITATION:
END OF AN ERA!
• Who lives? Who dies? Who wins? Who loses?
• More importantly: what’s next for Tony Stark and Iron Man? You won’t believe it until you read it!
MATTHEW: Matt Fraction has had a damn fine run on Iron Man, a character that I had thought forever tainted by the stupidity of Civil War and The Initiative. Taking the badly damaged stock of Tony Stark and turning it into comic book gold, Fraction has had a good run on this book, making Tony Stark into a likeable (and bankable) character again. I’m sad that it’s over, but I’m interested to see where it goes. I’m not entirely sure I’m going to stick around for the Greg Land era of Iron Man, so I’m hoping this is the swan song that Shellhead deserves.
MAD GREATEST ARTISTS MORT DRUCKER HC
Author: Mort Drucker
Publisher: DC Comics
Cover Price: If you have to ask, you can’t afford
SOLICITATION: A contributor to MAD since its earliest years of the fabled Humor magazine, Mort Drucker is recognized throughout the art world as one of the greatest caricaturists of the twentieth century.
He has won numerous awards and honors including the National Cartoonists Society’s prestigious Reuben Award, the Will Eisner Hall of Fame Award, and an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts degree from the Art Institute of Boston.
Drucker’s most famous features are his movie and television satires. From The Godfather to Star Wars, and from Hulk Hogan to Woody Allen, he has captured our culture’s most popular characters with one master stroke after another. George Lucas personally traveled to Drucker’s Long Island home to convince him to illustrate the poster for American Graffiti.
Drucker’s greatest MAD works are collected here for the first time ever, hand-picked by the artist himself. It is a celebration that has been more than 55 years in the making!
MATTHEW: As a child, I loved reading MAD Magazine, especially the paperback collections of the books’ earlier years. Mort Drucker was a fave-rave of mine, (right after Jack Davis) and was consistently funny even when the magazine itself couldn’t always make that promise. It used to be said that you hadn’t made it in Hollywood until Mort did your caricature, and this collection promises to give us the gathering of his best work. Now, where’s my Jack Davis collection?
MASKS & MONSTERS #3
Writer: Joshua Williamson
Artist: Mike Henderson
Publisher: MonkeyBrain Comics
Cover Price: $0.99
SOLICITATION: Where were you the night Doctor Daylight died? Every Mask and Mobster in Golden City remembers that night. A single bullet and one dead superhero changed the city forever, and now via some after hours pillow talk we hear one Mobster’s tale about that night and his crazy encounter with a Mask that proved to be deadly! The critically acclaimed series that CBR called “easily the best comic for quality/quantity/price available this week” continues!
ZACH: MonkeyBrain Comics has been taking the comic world by storm since the launch this summer. I have been reading a few of the titles, but Masks & Mobsters is by far my favorite. The mixture of superheroes with crime noir set against Mike Henderson’s black and white art makes for a truly wonderful reading experience.
MIND MGMT #6
Writer: Matt Kindt
Artist: Matt Kindt
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Cover Price: $3.99
SOLICITATION: Henry Lyme’s past is revealed, but investigator Meru wasn’t prepared for Lyme’s shocking confession about tragedies in her own life. Learning that her world-spanning journey has been just another part of the psychic spy’s game, Meru fights back, as MIND MGMT’s first arc reaches its twist-filled climax!
GEORGE: Last issue was excellent and all kinds of chilling. No reason to doubt this one won’t be good. Mind MGMT is spy stuff for and by crazy people, and Kindt is using the comics medium in a way that few others have. Kudos to Dark Horse for letting him play in the margins and letter pages and advertising – I wish there were more comics as ballsy as this one.
MULTIPLE WARHEADS ALPHABET TO INFINITY #1
Writer: Brandon Graham
Artist: Brandon Graham
Publisher: Image Comics
Cover Price: $3.99
SOLICITATION: Sexica and her Werewolf boyfriend Nikoli travel across a sci-fi, fantasy Russia smoking singing cigarettes.
Meanwhile the organ hunter Nura is sent out with a severed head and instructions to find its body.
GEORGE: Brandon Graham is crazy talented as both a writer and an artist. If you haven’t read King City or been following his work on Prophet, rectify that immediately. And then get this. Graham first introduced the world of Multiple Warheads in a single issue from Oni Press back in 2007 – and it’s a Russian world of magic and science and apocalypse. If you don’t want to read that, then what the hell do you want to read? This should be very, very good.
SHAOLIN COWBOY ADVENTURE MAGAZINE TP
Writer: Andrew Vachss
Artist: Geof Darrow
Publisher: Dark Horse
Cover Price: $15.99
SOLICITATION:
Best selling author Andrew Vachss teams with award-wining artist Geof Darrow to revive the spirit and format of the pulp novels of the 30s and 40s. The Shaolin Cowboy Adventure Magazine is the first new hero-pulp to be printed in decades and combines hard-hitting prose with illustrated mayhem. The Shaolin Cowboy: The Way of ‘No Way!’ is a kung fu gripping tale of high adventure and relentless bloodshed. The Shaolin Cowboy and his trusty mule battle overwhelming odds and inclement weather against enemies thirsting for revenge and retribution in the battle royal to end all battle royals.
* Best selling crime-fiction author Andrew Vachss!
* Geof Darrow co-creator of Doc Frankenstein, Hard Boiled, and The Big Guy and Rusty the Boy Robot
* Decorated police officer turned author Mike Black! Prince Valiant artist Gary Gianni!
* And an amazing cover by award winning Scott Gustafson!
ROB: I have no idea what this is about, nor do I care. I was sold by the title alone. Now we add in a guy riding a dinosaur on the cover, I don’t think I could want this book any more than I already do.
Just read the actual solicit, I stand corrected, I want this even more than I did before.
TALON #1
Writer: Scott Snyder and James Tynion IV
Artist: Guillem March
Publisher: DC Comics
Cover Price: $2.99
SOLICITATION:
• A new series spinning out of “Night of the Owls”!
• After many years on the run, Calvin Rose returns to Gotham City to investigate the fallout from “Night of the Owls”!
• Can the Court of Owls finally be defeated? Could Calvin have the one thing he’s been seeking his entire life: his freedom?
STEPHEN: Please don’t turn into AzBats. Please don’t turn into AzBats. Please don’t turn into AzBats.
THARGS CREEPY CHRONICLES GN
Writers: Mark Millar, Al Ewing, Gordon Rennie
Artists: Frazer Irving, Greg Staples, Chris Weston
Publisher: 2000 AD
Cover Price: $19.99
SOLICITATION: From the deepest, darkest recesses of the Nerve Centre vaults, the eerie alien editor of 2000 AD known as the Mighty Tharg presents some of the creepiest, kookiest tales to terrify this Halloween. Featuring stories from reknowned comic talent: writers – Mark Millar, Gordon Rennie, Chris Weston, Arthur Wyatt and artists – Dave D’Antiquis, Frazer Irving, Lee Garbett, Chris Weston, Edmund Bagwell, Greg Staples.
MATTHEW: One of my regrets about my schedule is that I don’t get to review nearly as many non-American comics and publications as I wish I could. I’ve always kind of liked 2000 AD (when I can get hold of a copy, which, frankly, isn’t that often) and I’ve found the previous collections entertaining. Now, they’re collecting some of the strange horror-type stories from the hidden recesses of the 2000 AD vaults, and I’m onboard for an awesome reading experience…
