Conan #268. Thomas, Docherty and Villagran... A creative team blessed by Crom himself!

Death: the high cost of living #3. And people say that comics were bad in the '90s!!! This is not a must-read title, but for an "ordinary" comic, it's quite decent!

Hellblazer #65. Garth Ennis, Steve Dillon... they helmed one of the great eras for the title, of which there were admittedly several. I enjoyed all the references to life in the UK... it was quite exotic to a certain young Canadian!

Legion of Super-heroes #43. A little effort is made to make the title exciting again, and the Immonen art is excellent... but after so much angst and depression, it's something of a losing battle.

Legionnaires #2. The Chris Sprouse art does it for me. Wow! But I don't like the way the young Legionnaire clones are passed for the real thing.

Sandman #49. Brief Lives , the ninth chapter... and more brilliance from Neil Gaiman and Jill Thompson. I don't remember if that's the last issue of the arc (which it might well be, seeing as next issue is #50, a stand-alone). If so, it's the one in which we see the lost Endless again, the ginger-haired Destruction. I was disappointed by that choice. Destruction? Isn't he sort of redundant when you already have Death in the family? I would have chosen some other endless thing with a name starting with the letter D, like "Debate on the internet".

Savage Sword of Conan #209. Oh, won't this Spider God storyline ever end? There! That should have been the lost Endless in Sandman: «Dull storyline that won't end!»

Uncanny X-Men #300. Nice to see John Romita Jr. again!


March 1993... Hey, that's the month I moved to Germany! During the next two years, I wouldn't have access to American comics (at least not at prices I was ready to pay). I would switch my reading habits to the Prinz Eisenherz (Prince Valiant) series published by Carlsen comics. Classic Hal Foster strips are the best way to practive an unfamiliar language!

Lot to unpack here. Classic Star Wars was more Archie Goodwin/Al Williamson/Carlos Garzon goodness, reprinting the newspaper strip, which was way better than the books or films, at the time or later. Dark Horse Comics was the company's more mainstream offering, centering around their Comics' Greatest World, which debuts with issue #8 and X, their Batman wannabe (and wasn't). It also featured James Bond, who was getting a big push at Dark Horse; but, the Silent Armageddon mini is an anomaly in the whole James Bond franchise. Back a few years, there was a 6 month gap between issues one and two of James Bond: Permission to Die, from Eclipse and Acme Comics. It took two years before issue #3 was published. Mike Grell told me, in answer to direct questions about the delays, that Eclipse had the whol thing in house; but couldn't pay for the printing, for a while. Their ccash flow was so bad and they had burned too many printers that no one would take a check from them or would invoice them for later payment. They had to pay up front to print their comics, which meant that they had to earn money, then apply it to the next book to publish and so forth. That is part of the reason why Acme yanked the deal from them and took it to Dark Horse. Dark Horse scored a big hit and a major coup in getting Doug Moench and Paul Gulacy, who did the closest thing to Bond, with Master of Kung Fu, to do the same for the real thing, leading to Serpent's Tooth (which was pretty good, though not quite as epic as you built up in your head). This time, it was a British creative team, with writer Simon Jowett, who had done some work with Marvel UK, and John M Burns, a noted british comic artist, who had been around since the 60s, working on everything from TV Century 21 to 2000 AD, Modesty Blaise and more. JB: Silent Armageddon, was supposed to be 4 issues. Only two appeared. Apparently, Burns was slow to do the art and Acme and/or Dark Horse would not put out 3, until they had issue #4 and he never produced it. Burns had been fired off of Modesty Blaise, after 2 1/2 stories, supposedly over deadlines. he also never finished Sable & Fortune, at Marvel, though another artist did (similar to Kevin Maguire, on Captain America: Sentinel of Liberty). The story featured a new criminal group, Cerberus (Jowett could spell it right, unlike Dave Sim), led by Erik Klebb (who I assume had some connection to Rosa Klebb, of FRWL, though she was a lesbian). I had the two issues, but can't recall the plot, as I never re-read them, since it was left unfinished. Jowett did continue and write Shattered Helix, for Dark Horse and Quasimodo Gambit was also produced. Sadly, nothing after issue #2, from Burns.

Not quite to where i picked up the Flash, but I got this month's issue not long after I did pick up the series. Green Arrow continues, under Grell and wonder Years finishes up the revamped Year One.

Protectors finishes the initial storyline and I am pretty much washing my hands of any expectations of something cool with the series. I had better ideas in my own head than Malibu did. Grendel: War Child is nearing its conclusion, which lives up to the history of the series, but ends up being a bit of a disappointment, as a fan, though you get why what happenns...happens, because that is the nature of Grendel, no matter what. Grendel Prime had become the coolest Grendel out there, thanks to Simon Bisley's visual, making it the most "superhero" Grendel since Hunter Rose, who was pure super villain. Grendel prime ended up used in merchandising and would come back and factor into the second Batman/Grendel crossover and some pretty sweet t-shirts, from Graffiti Designs.

Roy Thomas returns to Invaders, though it doesn't really look as 1940s as Frank Robbins had made it. Justice Society has one more issue of Len Strazewski and Mike Parobeck goodness, before DC pulled the plug. Strazewski has always claimed editorial sabotage in the series and there was a definite core of people at DC who seemed to want to bury the JSA.

Peter Cannon continues to entertain me, though I don't know about anyone else. DC didn't exactly push it to the moon, since they didn't own it, like the other Action Heroes.

Quantum Leap was nearly done on tv, which ended up affecting the comic, sadly. This is the penultimate issue. Donald bellisario always wanted to do a story where Sam leaped into a baby; but, the effects work was going to be too costly, for their budget, to do the story justice. There was talk of using that for a proposed movie, but that never came about. Innovation was going to do it, since it cost the same to draw Sam leaping into a college student as it did a baby and it was announced and solicited as a QL special; but, it never happened. I can't recall if Bellisario stopped it or if it was Innovation going belly up (I think the latter, as it was near their end).

Sting of the Green Hornet I stumbled into, having missed the previous 3 issues. The Green Hornet, in WW2, with a pseudo-Captain America was a pretty good idea and Ron Fortier did an excellent job with it. I immediately grabbed it and then flipped through the back issue boxes, at my local, and found the other 3 issues and purchased them. It's the original Green Hornet and Kato, from the 30s and 40s, as featured in the serials (with Keye Luke, as Kato). One of Fortier's strengths was using the legacy aspect of the original radio/serial hero, the Bruce Lee and Van Williams tv series, and a new Green Hornet, for the 90s. Too bad he didnt handle the movie we finally got (I wanted it when Stephen Chow was going to play Kato and direct).

I can't recall if I bought the first issue of Stormwatch or not. I sampled a few of the Image launches, but very few 2nd issues. I can't recall if I bought it or just flipped through it on the stand. I do know I didn't buy or read a second issue, nor any other, until buying the Warren Ellis trade collections, after discovering The Authority (in trade collections)). I did pick up the Maxx. I didn't think much of a lot of most of Image's early offerings; but, I loved Sam Kieth's work, especially with William Messner-Loebs and there was just something about this series, even though I couldn't make heads or tails out of it until the cartoon and the completion of it and understood what was supposed to be real and what was fantasy and why it existed.

X-Men issues 17-19 are the ones where the Russian government kills off Colossus' parents so they have to bring the deaged Magik back to the mansion again just so they can kill her off too right afterwards. Those deaths become important to the plot of the Fatal Attractions event which was about to start.

March 1993:

Hate #12 - I haven't read a whole lot of Peter bagge's work but the first 15 issues or so of this series was probably my favourite of anything of his I've seen.

April 1993:

Mike Grell hits Image, while also reminding us of that really painful scene in A Man Called Horse...plus he was still killing it on Green Arrow, which reaches issue #75. I still don't know what is going on in The Maxx and won't until the MTV animated series.

Gregory!

Propellerman!

Finally got on board with the Waid Flash and quickly got the back issues. Midnight Men continues pulpy Chaykin goodness (and sex) and Trouble With Girls continues the return of Lester Girls and sexy femme fatales. Peter Cannon is about done. I liked it well enough, at the time, but haven't read it since. Sandman was finally at a point where I could start a storyline, after issue 50. I had been trying to find an entry point, for a bit, but it was never in my local, in back issues and always seemed mid-storyline. Continued Sandman Mystery Theater. Ultraman was on a whim and I liked the first issue enough to continue, even though I hadn't seen the show since the early 80s, at my grandparent's house.

I was pretty much done with Valiant, at this point. BWS had left Archer & Armstrong and I had severed ties. I think I picked up X-O Manowar 0, but might have gotten that with the trade. I don't recall.