What’s that? Oh, in the cartoon? That appears to be Ant-Man Eric O’Grady and Wasp Hank Pym, the stars of writer/artist Tim Seeley’s Ant-Man & Wasp #2, which ships this week, shrunken down to insect sized. What are they saying? Well, at that size, their dialogue is just too darn tiny to read, but I’m sure it’s a very funny joke.
Aside from Marvel’s shrinky, bug-themed hero team-up book, what else is coming out this Thursday? (Remember, Thanksgiving delays shipments an extra day this week). Let’s take a look…together!
Achewood Vol. 3: A Home For Scared People: Dark Horse continues their collection of Chris Onstad’s brilliant web comic with this $17, 105-page, black and white hardcover. As with the previous collections, this one will include the alt text jokes, strip annotations by Onstad and various bonus features to help justify buying something you’ve probably already read for free. You can read a brief preview here or, of course, read as big a preview as you want at achewood.com; “Ray’s Start Up” is one of the story arcs collected in this volume.
Action Comics Annual #13: Action Comics writer Paul Cornell continues to pit Lex Luthor against DC villains int this $5, 50-some page annual, which flashes back to a young, hair-having Lex’s first encounter with Darkseid. Marco Rudy and Ed Benes provide the art.
Batman: Orphans #1: Are the twenty or so Batman and Batman family books DC is publishing this month just not giving you your fill of Batman? Don’t worry! There’s always this two-issue miniseries by Eddie Berganza, Carlo Barberi and Juan Vlasco. Set in the recent past, when Bruce Wayne was the only Batman and Tim Drake was still Robin, each issue of this story is over-sized and $4.
Black Harvest: I thought this six-issue, 2005 series blending UFOlogy and religious symbolism left a bit to be desired, but I love Josh Howard’s artwork so much I’ll read just about anything he writes, so long as he illustrates it as well. This version of the story features an expanded ending though, so it might actually read better than the original series. You can take a look here. It’s a $16, 145-page collection, and you can take a look here.
Burma Chronicles: Guy Delisle’s must-read, 2008 travelogue-by-way-of-autobio comic is now available as a $17, 270-page trade paperback.
Chip ‘n Dale Rescue Rangers #1: With “Duck Tales” branded stories appearing in Uncle Scrooge comics and a Darkwing Duck series already going, it sure looks like Boom Studios is well on its way to producing comics based on the whole Disney Afternoon block of cartoons from my youth. This one is written by Darkwing scribe Ian Brill, drawn by Leonel Castellani and will cost you four bucks. If you’re either too old or too young to remember the show, it was about the title chipmunks, a couple of their rodent friends and a bug going on adventures and solving mysteries. The comic should boast one advantage over the cartoon show—you can enjoy the diminutive heroes’ adventures without having to listen to Chip’s ear-piercingly shrill voice. Now, what’s the over-under on Boom announcing a Tale Spin adaptation in the first half of next year…?
Devil: This $15, 95-page trade paperback collects manga-ka Torajiro Kishi and Madhouse Studios’ Western-style sci-fi comic book series about vampires, cops, a virus and a government conspiracy. Preview here.
Heroes For Hire #1: The 2006 Heroes For Hire series spinning out of Civil War didn’t quite take, lasting only 15 issues (or, in other terms, until the next big Marvel crossover event story, World War Hulk). Will this volume, spinning out of the Daredevil-centric Shadow Land event do better? It will likely depend on how well writers Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning and artist Brad Walker do with the concept, and an off-kilter cast including the likes of Elektra, The Punisher, Moon Knight and Ghost Rider. It’s a $4, over-sized issue.
King City #12: It’s the last two words I ever wanted to see in a solicitation for an issue of Brandon Graham’s brilliant King City comic—“final issue.” You can read a short preview here; and you can find me crying softly in the corner over there.
Marineman #1: Quick! Think Ian Chruchill! Now what comes to mind…? Ugh, I know right? Well check out this five-page preview of his new Image Comics series, Marineman. The artist best known for his X-Men work and his collaborations on Supergirl and Hulk with Jeph Loeb is writing and drawing this book about an Aquaman-esque underwater hero, and he seems to be working in a whole new, lighter-hearted, cartoonier style. Looks promising! (Oh, by the way, this one’s $4 too)
What If? Iron Man: Demon In An Armor: The premise of this special What If? one-shot sounds as goofy as the phrasing of the title—Tony Stark’s mind gets transferred into Victor Von Doom’s body, Freaky Friday-style, I guess?—but the Bob Layton cover riffing on the classic “Demon In A Bottle” cover (i.e. the best Iron Man cover ever) looks pretty cool, and writers Bob Layton and David Michelinie are joined by pencil artist Graham Nolan for this one, an incredible artist who just doesn’t do enough comics art to satisfy me these days. It’s a $4 book, but will include a back-up by Rick Remender and Shawn Moll providing the third part of the answer to the question What If…The Venom Symbiote Possessed Deadpool?
Wolverine: The Best There Is #1: Marvel just cleaned up their Wolverine “Family” brand with some renumbering, re-titling and re-focusing of several titles, so naturally it’s the perfec ttime to…add another Wolverine title to the schedule? Huh. Charlie Huston writes this one, but the book will probably be most noteworthy for pencil artist Juan Jose Ryp applying his hyper-detailed, busy artwork to a Marvel mainstay. This first issue is part one of a six-part story introducing a new Wolverine villain, and will cost you $4 for 22-pages of comics.
December 1st, 2010 at 6:20 am
Not a single $3 book… and I thought the price was going back down?
December 1st, 2010 at 8:10 am
When I started doing this column, the $3.99/22-page price point was still something of a rarity, with only a handful of Marvel books doing it, so I thought it worth noting, along with the prices of trades.
Now it seems to be so common that the $2.99/22-page price point is the rarity in some columns.
Any thoughts from readers on whether or not you want the prices of single issue, serial comics mentioned any more, if they’re between $2.99 and $3.99…?
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