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Post by The Captain on Mar 21, 2024 8:42:00 GMT -5
Recently picked up the first three collections of Strange Academy at Half-Price Books for…well, half of cover price each, although I had traded in some TPBs that I was never going to read again for store credit, so total bill for the three of them was roughly $10.
What a fun little series, one that I will be encouraging both of my daughters to read.
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Post by The Captain on Mar 17, 2024 14:41:59 GMT -5
Bah!!! I want to be a Grit paperboy! You get cool prizes, too! My wife actually was a Grit papergirl, and I have been to the old Grit headquarters in Williamsport, PA.
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Post by The Captain on Mar 9, 2024 11:04:11 GMT -5
I read the entire Secret Society of Super-Villains in the past week or so. The idea of Gorilla Grodd, Captain Boomerang, Captain Cold, Sinestro, Mirror Master, Star Sapphire and other baddies being the focal point of the book is what encouraged me to pick up the series in the first place, but my interest was short-lived once the book introduced the painfully dull Captain Comet as the heroic foil to the bad guys' (and girls') exploits. Making it worse further was the introduction of Funky Flashman to the book (gee, I wonder who he was supposed to be modeled after), and then ultimately the focus turning to Wizard, a villain from Earth-2, which is a concept that I have no background with or affinity for. It's something that I got through, and something I will never read again. Probably move it to the "get rid of" box shortly. I love the old SSOSV series. It was the first DC series that I read regularly for more than three issues. I mostly didn’t like DC as a kid, but I sure loved the villains! Also, it was the first time I encountered characters from the Fourth World. I can’t remember if they ever explained the secret of the Star Sapphire who wasn’t Carol Ferris. The book got cancelled before they ever got into the mystery of the "new" Star Sapphire. There were apparently two issues, #17 and 18, that were either completed or nearly completed before the DC Implosion, and those got reprinted in the hardcover collections of SSOSV, but as I only have the floppies, I don't know if they ever got around to that reveal.
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Post by The Captain on Mar 9, 2024 10:23:42 GMT -5
I read the entire Secret Society of Super-Villains in the past week or so. The idea of Gorilla Grodd, Captain Boomerang, Captain Cold, Sinestro, Mirror Master, Star Sapphire and other baddies being the focal point of the book is what encouraged me to pick up the series in the first place, but my interest was short-lived once the book introduced the painfully dull Captain Comet as the heroic foil to the bad guys' (and girls') exploits.
Making it worse further was the introduction of Funky Flashman to the book (gee, I wonder who he was supposed to be modeled after), and then ultimately the focus turning to Wizard, a villain from Earth-2, which is a concept that I have no background with or affinity for.
It's something that I got through, and something I will never read again. Probably move it to the "get rid of" box shortly.
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Post by The Captain on Mar 9, 2024 10:12:16 GMT -5
Imagine if WCW had ran a restaurant: they’d have put gravy on your fries (who wants that?!),... Depends on your definition of "gravy", but you may have just insulted a large portion of the population of Pittsburgh, PA, as thick, rich, brown beef gravy on crispy French fries is a local favorite.
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Post by The Captain on Feb 24, 2024 9:20:40 GMT -5
Out of those books, the Flash one appeals to me the most, primarily for the first appearances of the Rogues. The other ones mostly seem to have a lot more modern content, which I’ve either read or have little interest in, except for the Superman book, of whom I’m not much of a fan.
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Post by The Captain on Feb 9, 2024 15:29:12 GMT -5
Doctor Strange was a bit of a letdown, as I expected an issue that was Bats the Ghost Dog heavy would be more interesting. The reveal of the mysterious presence that Bats was sensing in the Sanctum was "oh, him again" for me.
Captain America wrapped up the first story arc of the new series in OK fashion. The overall story didn't really blow my socks off, although the flashback portion of it was the more interesting of the two, so I'm hoping the next one starting in issue #7 builds some momentum. I really hate it when Cap's books are bad, or even worse, just "meh".
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Post by The Captain on Feb 9, 2024 15:25:56 GMT -5
She-Hulk continues to be a fun read, there's not much going on plot wise but the day in the life adventures of Jen and her friends is still making for great reading. I enjoyed the last She-Hulk series before this inexplicable reboot, but I didn't get this one because it was a little too light on substance. Slice of life stories are fun as a diversion from the main plot, but if nothing ever happens, they become kind of "samey".
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Post by The Captain on Feb 9, 2024 15:22:57 GMT -5
I will pick up any late 1970s and 1980s-era Batman or Detective issues if I can get them for $2 or less, which usually isn't too difficult. A lot of these books focus on the classic villains, which I enjoy. I've read a good bit of Silver Age and early Bronze Age Batman and it's decent but not necessarily my cup of tea, especially the Detective Comics in the early 1970s that had a supernatural bent to it.
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Post by The Captain on Feb 4, 2024 10:31:40 GMT -5
Hoosier X, I agree with pretty much all of what you wrote above. When I read Thor from start to finish a few years back, there was definitely a period of “who knows what the hell we’re doing” that transitioned into something more grand, more interconnected, more visionary. It stopped being an extension of the mish-mashed nonsensical Silver Age stories from the 1950s and turned into a sweeping epic that built upon itself issue by issue.
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Post by The Captain on Feb 3, 2024 8:29:30 GMT -5
I broke 100 reads in January, which was a big goal of mine. Wanted to start off the year strong and build some momentum.
The past few years, I've really struggled with being motivated to read, so while I have literally thousands of issues sitting around me at all times, I just haven't wanted to pick any of them up. The big thing for me in January was that there we no repeat reads; it was 105 brand-new, never looked at before books.
Plan for February is to wrap up the "mod" Wonder Woman era, then move on to either Jonah Hex or Scalphunter, as I'm trying to balance superhero books with other genres so that it doesn't feel too "samey". Also avoiding doing any "epic run" reads, like when I read Thor or Iron Man from start to finish with no breaks for anything else other than the weekly comics; I always felt burned out at the end of one of those and don't want to look at another comic book for a while after that.
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Post by The Captain on Jan 29, 2024 18:53:33 GMT -5
I want that SO BADLY!!! I have about 75% of that set already (although no Gretzky rookie yet) and would love to complete it as well as upgrade a good number of cards I have that aren't in great condition.
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Post by The Captain on Jan 27, 2024 16:13:35 GMT -5
There are only two that I'm actively trying to complete.
I have the first Captain Marvel Omnibus (picked it up cheap because someone apparently dropped it and the bottom of the back cover has a nice dent in it), so starting with floppies after that book wraps up at issue #33, I only need six issues, all between 34 and 43. They're not hard to find, so I'm waiting until our best LCS has its anniversary sale in March/April and going to get what I can for 30% off, then will pick up the remainder here and there.
I also would like to pick up issue #2 of Nick Fury vs S.H.I.E.L.D., but it has proven elusive in the $1 and discount bins, which is where I grabbed the other five issues in the series from.
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Post by The Captain on Jan 27, 2024 11:47:29 GMT -5
Bunch of oddball Marvel C-List books have some value, usually related to late-series low-print run issues. This includes:
Darkhawk - last five issues go for $15 or more, while the last two can hit $30 or more on eBay.
Silver Sable #23 has a Deadpool appearance and can fetch $15, while #35 (last issue) can go for $20 or higher.
Last two issues of Sleepwalker (#32-33) can sell for $10-$15.
The first Blade solo series (after Nightstalkers ended) has #1 routinely selling for $30 or more, while #10 (last issue) can go for $15-$20.
Nothing that will put your kids through college, but these are things that can be found in $1 bins or at stores that don't go through their inventory regularly to find stuff like this.
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Post by The Captain on Jan 26, 2024 14:42:52 GMT -5
To the point about Loki appearing 3 times in 9 issues and it hurting the book, the same was true in the Captain America Tales of Suspense stories with the Red Skull. So many appearances in that run that it got to be boring. At least later on they introduced AIM, but that was when they were aligning Cap with Nick Fury to see how that dynamic would work as a pairing.
And those aren’t Valkyries, warrior maidens of Asgard. Those are more like handmaidens of Asgard looking all pretty and soft in their flowing robes, as it seems as though Stan and Larry weren’t quite up to speed on Norse mythology yet to know the difference.
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