This week’s Comixology Sales includes a bunch of Marvel titles as they break out the Marvel Max line for a rare appearance, plus Sabretooth, She-Hulk and the world of Dan Slott. Speaking of creator spotlights, DC shines one on Joshua Williamson, Dark Horse on Matt Kindt and Spawn has always been a Todd McFarlane spotlight.
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X-Villain
The Marvel Sabretooth sale runs through Sunday, 1/9. (Amazon link)
Victor Creed, the Wolverine villain who Marvel’s never quite turned into a leading man/anti-hero.
You can go back to the beginning in Iron Fist Masterworks V. 2. Yes, Sabretooth is a Chris Claremont/John Byrne creation and started out in Iron Fist’s sphere. (Later teaming with the Constrictor in Power Man and Iron Fist.)
If you think of Sabretooth as an X-Men villain, Mutant Massacre is likely a major touchpoint for you. That would be the Claremont/John Romita, Jr. era, plus crossovers.
If you think of him as a Wolverine villain… well, there’s plenty there, but we’ve also had a soft spot for the lower key Greg Rucka run. Sabretooth shows up at the end of that sequence when Darrick Robertson was on art duties.
Spiders and Surfboards and Avengers, oh my
The Marvel Dan Slott Sale runs through Sunday, 1/9.
And yes, Slott has spent a fair amount of time at Marvel, so this sale covers some territory.
His most famous work has probably been Superior Spider-Man with art by Humberto Ramos and Ryan Stegman. This is the saga of when Doc Ock inhabited Peter Parker’s body. The two omnibus editions are the best deal here.
Slott’s most critically acclaimed work might be his Silver Surfer run with Mike Allred. Ah, mid-aught Marvel, OF COURSE there was a relaunch and despite the numbering, the collections are listed with series 1 and series 2. (Oh, Marvel…)
For something a little more off the beaten path, we always enjoyed Slott’s Mighty Avengers run, now conveniently collected in one volume. Back when Bendis was doing his New Avengers run, this was the only thing that felt like a traditional Avengers title for some time.
Hulking Out
The Marvel She-Hulk Sale runs through Thursday, 1/13. (Amazon link)
You have a few different directions in the She-Hulk cannon. The ones that seem to get revisited the most are She-Hulk as broad farce, like the Sensational She-Hulk run of John Byrne and lawyer She-Hulk, such as the Charles Soule/Javier Pulido run.
Not For Kids
The Marvel Max sale runs through Thursday, 1/20. (Amazon link)
Yes, this the Marvel imprint for ages 17+ that’s a little darker, more violent and not on sale quite as often.
The flagship here is probably Punisher. Particularly the first 4 “Complete Collection” volumes that pair Garth Ennis with Leandro Fernandez, Goran Parlov and Doug Braithwaite. This isn’t the comedy of “Welcome Back, Frank.” This is a quite serious and brutal sequence. It’s also a very good one… just not for kids.
Speaking of Welcome Back, Frank, it’s been moved over to Marvel Max. For those who haven’t heard of it, this is an Ennis/Steve Dillon/Jimmy Palmiotti Punisher series that takes a very idiosyncratic direction – Frank is still a very angry, death dealing man… but he’s thrust into the middle of an absurdist farce as he tries to bring down the Gnucci crime family. It’s utterly hilarious and something multiple directors have unsuccessfully tried to translate the screen. Influential and impossible to replicate.
There’s a lot more to the sale, but our off-the-radar pick is Dominic Fortune, Howard Chaykin’s pulp homage that also includes the character’s original appearances.
The Flash and Beyond
The DC Spotlight: Joshua Williamson Sale runs through Monday, 1/10. (Amazon link)
This is one of the smallest DC sales we’ve seen – only 20 items. Williamson’s profile at DC has been raised in recent months and outside of $1.99 Robin single issues, that’s not really reflected in the sale. What is here is the first six volumes of his popular Flash run where Carmine Di Giandomenico is the headlining artist.
Now, if you want to fly under the radar, there are a couple Vertigo volumes here pairing Williamson with artists we tend to associate with Image… and if you’re a .cheap regular, you know we mention his Image work fairly often.
Frostbite with art by Jason Shawn Alexander concerns a post-apocalyptical wasteland of a future where a plague is freezing people from the inside out.
Deathbed with Riley Rossmo finds a reporter sent to investigate the deathbed confessions of a 90-year old man who was once a famous adventure and who resurfaced after a 20-year disappearance. Could something unnatural be behind all this? Surely not.
Capes and Chains
The Image Spawn Sale runs through Thursday 1/20. (Amazon link)
Did you know Spawn has more issues out than Cerebus? It’s true!
Your best buy here is Spawn Compendium Vol. 1. That’s the first 50 issues and that comes out to roughly $0.48/issue. That’s the original run with Todd McFarlane doing full art, guest writers Alan Moore, Dave Sim, Frank Miller, Neil Gaiman and Grant Morrison. Early Greg Capullo art and some Tony Daniels , too.
The off-beat book here is Sam and Twitch, where a young Brian Bendis teams with Angel Medina, Alberto Ponticelli, Clayton Crain and Alex Maleev for some quirky horror detective stories about Spawn’s police acquaintances. It’s not always remembered, but it certainly helped launch some careers.
Underwater Minds
The Dark Horse Matt Kindt sale runs through Monday, 1/10.
Kindt’s most celebrated work at Dark Horse is definitely Mind MGMT. It’s a bit of a genre mashup about conspiracies and psychic espionage. Kindt writes AND draws it. One man gang, as it were. The omnibus editions are the best deal here.
If you’re looking for something similar to Mind MGMT, we’d point you towards Dept. H, wherein an investigator is sent to an underwater base to investigate sabotage and there are much stranger things going on than meets the eye.
