Chad’s Comments (group member since Mar 22, 2018)

Chad’s comments from the I Read Comic Books group.

Mike wrote: "I also read the last two volumes of Darth Vader: Star Wars: Darth Vader, Vol. 3: The Shu-Torun War & Star Wars: Darth Vader, Vol. 4: End of Games. Star Wars books can REALLY pull me in sometimes. "

I'm always surprised at how good the Marvel Star Wars comics are. The Star Wars books have felt very neutered since they started the new canon.

Phillip wrote: "The top books that I've read recently are The Infinity Gauntlet and Harbinger, Volume 5: Death of a Renegade. Both really good books. Infinity Gauntlet was pretty easy to get into considering I haven't actually read anything with Thanos or the Infinity Gems in it before. "

Infinity Gauntlet stands well on its own as long as you read Thano's Quest first, but i think that's typically included in most of the collections.

What did you think of Harbinger? It was always my favorite series of the 90's Valiant universe and the new one is good as well. Actually the whole Valiant line is pretty solid.

Phillip wrote: "I don't have a PS4...yet. Now that this game is out I might be more tempted to go and pick one up. How's the story so far? I liked the fighting system in the Batman games, so I'd probably enjoy thi..."

I haven't played a whole lot of the story so far. It starts off with a call from Yuri Watanabe that the police are taking down the Kingpin and need your help. So I went through all that and then went to my job which is a research scientist for Dr. Octavious. The game seems to pull a lot from the Brand New Day era of Spider-Man but is obviously its own thing since you're working for the guy who becomes Dr. Ock. The voice acting is top notch. Then you get sent on a mission to fix some police radio towers (You actually have a good relationship with the police in this, which is nice.) and I started exploring Manhattan. I got really wrapped in this because you start listening into the police band of the radio as you fix the towers and you can respond to crimes. I spent a few hours last night doing this and going on side missions. It was a lot of fun. I would say if you like the Batman games you'll definitely love this. It is however, a PS4 exclusive. Since Sony made it, I don't ever see it getting ported over to Xbox One.

Wing Kee wrote: "I do and I am tempted to buy a PS4 just for this game (I have an Xbox One). How is the combat. Does it allow you on the fly to choose how you fight? Are the fights vertical?"

The fighting changes as you move along and level up. You certainly can punch someone into the air and then jump up with them and beat the crap out of them. Fighting multiple people is similar to the Batman: Arkham games but with Spidey's acrobatics and webs mixed in. I haven't fought any flying villains yet. (The game just came out yesterday so the only villain I've fought so far is the Kingpin.)

FYI, there is a Spider-Man special edition PS4 out that is gorgeous. It comes with the deluxe edition of the game that has the DLC.

Anyone else here play video games? I just picked up Spider-Man for the PS4 today and it is awesome. A very good mix of fighting Spidey's rogues as part of the main story line and swinging around stopping street crime. Plus, New York really looks like New York.

I hope they never explain how the animals became sentient. Anything Bennett comes up with is going to sound hokey. There's no physical way most animals could ever talk, especially insects and the like. Just leave it a mystery for the reader as well as the characters in the books.

Wayland wrote: "The New Mutants book is pretty good, although this grouping was never really a team. Rhane was an original member, Magik came later, and Strong Guy was never on that team at all as far as I remember. I think Rictor came along in X-Force, not New Mutants, but I'm going off memory and might be wrong.
"

Strong Guy (Guido) was Lila Cheney's bouncer and may have appeared briefly in the issues where Sam dated her, but he's only been a member of X-Factor. Rictor was in the tail end of New Mutants. He showed up around the time Liefeld started drawing the book, issue #87 or so of the original run.

I loved this world. Sandor and Jesse's relationship is wonderful. Bennett really captures the love between a dog and their family.

The story is so visually striking, especially once Jesse and Sandor meet up with the Animilitary. Koala's walking around with huge pistols, turtles with rocket launchers on their backs. I found myself just staring in awe at the creativity of these panels.

Here are my actual reviews. I went and read all of Year One. I couldn't stop myself.
Animosity, Vol. 1: The Wake
Animosity Vol. 2
Animosity Year One

OK to Air

You should look into it if you read a lot of Marvel. For $5 a month you get access to thousands of comics. The new stuff lags about 6 months or so, but it's a fantastic deal for going back and reading older comics.

I forgot to mention that if you have Marvel Unlimited, all of these issues are there as well.

I'd start with Brian Posehn and Gerry Duggan's run. It's really the only one you need to read. Before this Deadpool just kind of operated in his own little bubble where nothing of consequence happened and he was just the Bugs Bunny of the Marvel universe. Gerry Duggan is still writing the book now so you can just keep reading it until you're current. Their run has been collected in a couple of different formats depending on how many issues you want collected at one time.

https://www.goodreads.com/series/9717...
https://www.goodreads.com/series/171543

I'm excited to read this again myself. Just picked up Year One from the library yesterday. Here is my review from when I read Vol. 1 last year. I really like this series.

I've never been able to get into Manga due to the whole reading backwards thing. I still don't get why with today's technology they don't just flip the art around and present this as a normal graphic novel for Western audiences, but I digress.

The story is about one of a very few young people who are born without "quirks" or superpowers. All he desires is to help people. Along comes the most famous super hero in the city "All Might" who turns out can pass his power onto someone else. But their body must be trained to control the power or it could kill them. Eventually, our young hero gets into superhero school where the book instantly becomes derivative of the X-Men or Sky High.

The art is very good except I have a hard time getting past the over expressive faces Manga is known for. It drives me batty, especially when mixed in with an otherwise serious comic. Some of the hair styles are just ridiculous, "Yes, I'm talking to you All Might".

The book was good enough that I'd consider reading another volume just because of how obsessed other readers I know are with this. But I wouldn't say I've been converted over into a fan of Manga yet.

FYI www.riptapparel.com has two My Hero Academia shirts. Today only.

Kryštof wrote: "Also some Fourleaf's artists were recently fired because they were drawing secret penises into the comics without anyone noticing for years. Just a little fun fact you can tell your friends in a pu..."

That's hilarious! Can you point to some examples? I tried googling it but everything came back in Czech.

Francis wrote: "In pretty new to WEBTOON and really only knew about it because of the Star Wars strip from a few years ago. Any recommendations? "

I like what I've read of Gunnerkrigg Court. To Me it feels like Harry Potter if JJ Abrams had gotten a hold of it.

A lot of people liked Crossed but it's not for the faint of heart. It's some of the most depraved stuff I've even read. I only checked it out because Garth Ennis and Alan Moore have written it at various times.

Whitney wrote: "I’ve begun reading Birthright. It’s another good one but has a few flaws that bug me (like, why is Mikey a giant even though his parents are average? height?! And could he really destroy a car as a human!?) but don’t matter to the plot. Nonetheless, I’m having fun with this series.."

I just always assumed Mikey was bigger and stronger from growing up in a world full of magic and being the chosen one.

Dee wrote: "Anyway, being kind of a comic newbie...where should I start? I am reading Ms Marvel currently, but would love to get all the back story on this whole Avengers-Thanos thing. And I LOVE old, cheesy comics. My son loves XMen and Guardians of the Galaxy. Any tips or suggestions would be awesome! Thanks "

MU is a great deal for reading older stuff. Most of which is better than what Marvel is producing today. You should also check if your library partners with www.hoopladigital.com They've got a ton of DC, Image, Dark Horse, and small publisher graphic novels available. All you need is your library card number to check and see. With my library I can download 8 items per library card per month, but each one is different.

Thanos Quest and Infinity Gauntlet were the inspiration for Avengers: Infinity War. This page lists all of the Thanos/Infinity Saga stuff.

Here's the beginning of the current Guardians of the Galaxy characters. There was a series before this but it has nothing to do with the current incarnation and was set 1,000 years in the future.

I know MU can be hard to navigate because Marvel loves to restart their series all the time. These series pages on Goodreads help quite a bit. You can find links to them in the title of a book page and also listed in the fine print of the same page under Series.

I've been on a tear the last couple of days.
Wonder Woman / Conan
Batwoman, Vol. 2: Wonderland
Gotham City Garage (2017-) Vol. 1
The Shadow, Volume 1: The Fire of Creation
The Shadow Volume 2: Revolution
The Shadow Volume 3

The Shadow Volume 4: Bitter Fruit
Crimson, Volume One

Crimson, Volume Two

George Perez's Sirens: Fronte Compatto

Mystik U

The Flash by Mark Waid: Book Three

The Flash by Mark Waid: Book Four

Ragnarok, Vol. 1: Last God Standing

Francis wrote: "Friendly staff, It's really important that staff are approachable and there is nothing worse than gate keepers who turn away new readers."

Not only approachable but won't scoff at anything readers are into, no matter how crappy it may be. Knows their stock well enough to give informed recommendations. Also, nowadays a robust collection of trade paperbacks is a must.

A hangout area really helps too so readers have a place to gather and talk comics. I've heard of a few comic / coffee shops. I think that's a wonderful idea.