Tag: Spider-Man

Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: DC Prices Improve; Spider-Man; Loki; Assassin’s Apprentice

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, DC’s deals improve with a little more $1.99 action and bigger books at $2.99. Marvel discounts Spider-Man and Loki. Dark Horse cuts prices on Assassin’s Apprentice, Assassin’s Creed and Critical Role.

Where did the New Releases and Sale pages go?

(Disclosure: If you buy something we link to on our site, we may earn a commission.)

In case you’re having troubles with the new UIX (a LOT of people have been):

So That’s Where the Black Friday Sale Went?

World's Finest  The Flash  Wonder Woman: Dead Earth

The DC World’s Greatest Super-Heroes Sale runs through Monday, 12/16.

If you were thinking that DC’s Black Friday sale didn’t contain the pricing you were expecting, this week might work a little better for you and there are definitely some things we’re going to be pointing out for price points here.

As usual, there’s more to the sale and it’s worth your time to browse, but here are a few things that caught out attention:

Recent Release / First Discount

This is a popular series at the site, so let’s point out up top that V.4 of Batman/Superman: World’s Finest has gotten it’s first discounted listing. Mark Waid and Dan Mora continue the Kingdom Come prequel from V.2 as this continues to be one of DC’s best reads. (The whole series is on sale and we recommend it.)

“Regular” Highlights

  • 52 – Geoff Johns/ Grant Morrison / Greg Rucka / Mark Waid / Keith Giffen / Eddy Barrows / Phil Jimenez / Dale Eaglesham; A 52 issue weekly series to tell the story of a “missing” year in the DCU. Also where Dan DiDio picked up his proclivity for the number 52. 2 volume set for $2.99 + $3.99
  • Alan Scott: The Green Lantern – Tim Sheridan / Cian Tormey; First time discounted
  • All-Star Superman – Grant Morrison / Frank Quitely; Essentially, this is a love letter to and distillation of everything good about the Silver Age Superman stories. Highly recommended. $2.99
  • Aquaman: Deadly Waters – Back half of the influential Steve Skeates / Jim Aparo run. This one is usually a little overpriced in digital because it’s a HC in print; $2.99 (as low as we’ve seen it)
  • Batman: The Black Mirror – Scott Snyder / Jock / Francesco Francavilla; Snyder’s earlier run on Detective; $1.99
  • Batman: The Court of Owls Saga – Scott Snyder / Greg Capullo; The first arc of the Snyder/Capullo Batman run. 11 issues / 350 pages – $2.99 (And yet, not the biggest page count for $2.99 you’ll see today…)
  • Batman: Year One – Frank Miller / David Mazzucchelli; Bruce Wayne figures out how to be Batman and Catwoman gets a new background story. You may have heard that David Mazzucchelli draws real purdy. It’s true. $1.99
  • Birds of Prey (’23) – Kelly Thompson / Leonardo Romero; Black Canary leads a raid on Paradise Island
  • Black Lightning – The original series through the Detective and World’s Finest solo appearances; $1.99@
  • The Flash: Savage Velocity – Mike Baron / William Messner-Loebs / Jackson Guice / Greg Larocque;  Wally West debuts as The Flash with the full Mike Baron run and beginning of Messner-Loebs. Kilg%re! Kapitalist Kourier! Chunk! Also, 475 pages for $2.99!
  • Green Arrow: War of the Clans – Jeff Lemire / Andrea Sorrentino; 450 pages for $2.99 (!)
  • Justice Society of America: The Demise of Justice – Len Strazewski / Grant Miehm / Mike Parobeck / Tom Artis / Rich Burchett + a couple Paul Levitz/Joe Staton tales; Warm up miniseries prior to the Strazewski/Parobeck run that STILL NEEDS TO BE COLLECTED; $2.99
  • Legion of Super-Heroes (’80-’85) – As low as the prices get for most of these. The Curse is a real value buy with 450 pages of Paul Levitz / Keith Giffen goodness for $2.99
  • Saga of the Swamp Thing – Alan Moore / Stephen Bissette / John Totleben; The legendary run w/ the first four volumes at $1.99@
  • Superman Smashes the Klan – Gene Yang / Gurihiru; An Eisner winner based on a Superman radio serial. YA;  $1.99
  • Superman: Up In the Sky – Tom King / Andy Kubert; Superman pursues kidnappers into space; $1.99
  • Swamp Thing: The Dead Don’t Sleep – Len Wein (Swampy’s creator) returns to the swamp in ’16 w/ Kelley Jones; $1.99
  • Wonder Woman (’23) Vol. 1: Outlaw – Tom King / Daniel Sampere; An Amazon is implicated in a death and a coverup / propaganda campaign begins as Wonder Woman becomes an enemy of the state. Darker than you’re expecting and V.2 is even *darker* as King explores the politics of domination and manipulation.
  • Wonder Woman: Dead Earth – Daniel Warren Johnson; Wonder Woman wakes up to an apocalyptic hellscape and tries to determine what happened. If you’re looking for the “metal” experience, look no further. $2.99
  • Wonder Woman Historia: The Amazons – Kelly Sue DeConnick / Phil Jimenez / Gene Ha / Nicola Scott; Multi-Eisner winner

Golden Age Omnibuses

Silver Age Omnibuses

300+ pages for $2.99

Spider-Teen

Mighty Marvel Masterworks: The Amazing Spider-Man  Untold Tales of Spider-Man  Ultimate Spider-Man

The Marvel Teen Spider-Man Sale runs through Monday, 12/16.

We’re not sure that’s the best name for this sale, despite it being literal, so let’s explain the thought behind it. When Spidey started under Stan Lee & Steve Ditko, Peter Parker was a high school student. When the original Ultimate Comics launch happened (and does that ever feel strange to type), Peter was once more in high school.

This isn’t so much “teen” Spidey as “Spidey the early years.” And really, you can break this into original / 616-Spidey and Ultimate Spidey.

616-Spidey

Mighty Marvel Masterworks: The Amazing Spider-Man collects the original Stan Lee / Steve Ditko run. Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 will take you through #19 and Annual #1.

Spider Man: Blue by the famed team of Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale is a story about Peter and Gwen Stacy falling in love.

Spidey is the ’15-’16 take on Peter’s high school years by Robbie Thompson and Nick Bradshaw.

Amazing Spider-Man Vol. 1.1: Learning To Crawl is essentially the Dan Slott / Ramon Perez take on “Spider-Man: Year One”

But we’d like to draw special attention to Untold Tales Of Spider-Man: The Complete Collection Vol. 1  by Kurt Busiek and Pat Olliffe. This ’95-’97 series often flies under the radar because it was part of an experimental line of $0.99 comics at Marvel. This was the only thing from this line that got any traction. For our money, this was the best Spidey comic from that period. It’s set in the same time as those early Lee/Ditko stories and it just feels right. And let’s face it… this is .cheap. OF COURSE we liked the quality $0.99 book when everything else was $1.50 cover price. Plus, no clones and stories that ended promptly.

Ultimate Spidey

Ultimate Spider-Man  – Brian Bendis / Mark Bagley (and Bill Jemas in the outline/treatment stages). This was the first “Ultimate” title. A back to day one “modern” restart on Spidey that introduced his friends and enemies in slightly tweaked incarnations and in different orders. And it was a very good comic. Worth your time if you’ve never tried it. The link is to the double volumes (listed by Amazon as Omnibuses), which are a little cheaper for the number of issues.

God of Mischief

Loki: Agent of Asgard   Journey Into Mystery   Mighty Marvel Masterworks: The Mighty Thor Vol. 1: The Vengeance Of Loki

The Marvel Loki Sale runs through Monday, 12/16.

The interesting thing about a Loki sale? These days you have “post-TV” Loki and traditional Loki.

If you’re looking for Loki as the lead, the closest you’re likely to get to the TV show (thus far) is probably looking for either Loki, Agent of Asgard by Al Ewing, Lee Garbett and Jorge Coelho or the Loki run in the revived Journey Into Mystery by Kieron Gillen, Doug Braithwaite, Richard Elson (and a few more artists).

If your jam is the traditional Loki as a villain, this isn’t the best sale for that, although it does have Loki’s original appearances in Mighty Marvel Masterworks: The Mighty Thor Vol. 1: The Vengeance Of Loki.

The Marvel “Maybe” Sales

Weapon X-Men

The trend continues. New releases at lower than expected price points and discounted pre-orders. Is this the new normal? We’re not sure, but let’s run them down.

Dropping This Week

Unannounced Sales

Assassin's Apprentice The Hunger and the Dusk The Metamorphosis

Dark Horse seems to have multiple sales going on in the background:

Also,

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Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: Black Friday Sales, Part 1 – The Annual Marvel Omnibus Sale

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, Black Friday sales are early this year. In Part 1, it’s the annual Marvel Omnibus Sale and we break out what’s new to the sale since last year.

Where did the New Releases and Sale pages go?

(Disclosure: If you buy something we link to on our site, we may earn a commission.)

In case you’re having troubles with the new UIX (a LOT of people have been):

Important Black Friday Administrative Notes:

This week the Black Friday sales are out a week before Black Friday. (Everyone’s doing it!) There were some problems with the ones that were posted the morning of Tuesday, 11/19. If you bought something off the deals page On Tuesday, double check and make sure the price isn’t a little lower right now. All the new sales were removed from the deals page Tuesday evening and reposted a few hours later. The new prices should be correct (although we need to take a closer look at the reposted DC sale).

Because of the size and all the hubbub around the (now) Annual Marvel Omnibus Sale, we’re looking at that right away and will come back at the usual time for the DC sale and anything else that pops up.

The Annual Marvel Omnibus Sale (Omni-Man is Elsewhere)

Avengers Omnibus  Daredevil Omnibus  Spider-Man Brand New Day Omnibus

The Marvel Omnibus Sale runs through Monday 12/2.

The Marvel omnibuses will run as long as ~1200 pages / 50 issues, although page and issue counts vary per issue. They’re mostly running in the $10-$15 range, instead of the $30-40-ish range, so the prices are slashed and 50 issues for $15 would be $0.30/issue.

There are a few things here that aren’t in other collections, but the reason we keep hearing that folks like the digital versions is that they’re easier to sort. That is to say, fewer items in your digital library.

So first, let’s run down the list of what we think are all the Omnibuses released since last year’s sale (or rather, getting discounted the first time since then). Did you think Marvel was releasing quite a few Omnibus editions in the last year? Yeah, you might be surprised. And this doesn’t include Rom or Micronauts, neither of which appear to be discounted. Annotations added when appropriate:

Is that enough Omnibus activity for one year? Only David Gabriel’s opinion of that matters! At any rate, the omnibuses have historically gone on sale once a year and that’s now, so it’s worth your time to have a browse through the actual sale at some point before 12/2. The official page is NOT well organized, so you can also use the above list to get quicker access to some of the series, just click on the series link on the book page.

A few “older” items we would make sure you’re aware of:

  • Captain Britain Omnibus – This has everything from the beginning of the 70s UK run through Captain Britain Magazine and the early X-Men appearances. What you’re really getting this for are the excellent and groundbreaking Alan Moore/Alan Davis and Jamie Delano/Alan Davis runs from the end of this period, which we’re not currently seeing available elsewhere. The rest is a bonus.
  • Incredible Hulk by Peter David Omnibus 1-5. That would be Hulk by David with that ridiculous sequence of artists he had, including Todd McFarlane, Gary Frank, Dale Keown, Angel Medina and Liam Sharp. 1-4 collect his original run and V. 5 collects some of the many times he’s revisited Hulk since the original run ended. Why the omnibus? Because this is a weird run to pick up in collected editions. It starts out in “Marvel Visionary” editions and eventually switches over to Epic Collections. This is just a drastically easier way to grab an exceptionally long run and probably cheaper than waiting to score the Visionary editions on sale. We also don’t mind tipping our hat to Peter David when he’s recovering from some health problems.
  • Knights of Pendragon Omnibus was out of the Marvel UK office. Knight of Pendragon was a Captain Britain-adjacent title. Dai Thomas, the supporting character from the main strip, is more of the central character with Captain Britain and Union Jack along for the ride. This was largely a Dan Abnett/John Tomlinson/Garry Erksine feature. You get some Brian Hitch art from Mys-Tech Wars and Carlos Pacheco art from Dark Guard. This is another where if you want the comics, it’s Omnibus or the back issue bins.
  • Miracleman Omnibus is the 80s revival of the British character Marvelman by Alan Moore, Gary Leach, Alan Davis, John Totleben and Rick Veitch. Another of Moore’s pre-Watchmen superhero deconstructions with a Captain Marvel (Shazam)-like character rediscovering his magic word after years of a normal life and very bad things following that. A landmark book that fell to the wayside after years and years of legal battles over who held which rights. This one isn’t on sale very often and it’s roughly as cheap as you’ll find it.

The Marvel “Maybe” Sales

Amazing Spider-Man  Deadpool X-Men '97

The trend continues. New releases at lower than expected price points and discounted pre-orders. Is this the new normal? We’re not sure, but let’s run them down.

Dropping This Week

Pre-Order for Next Week

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Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: Batman; Vertigo; Creature Commandos; Carnage; Dark Horse Manga

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, DC has a Halloween sale with Batman, Vertigo and even the Creature Commandos. Marvel adds Carnage to the season’s sale rotation and Dark Horse has discounts on manga.

Where did the New Releases and Sale pages go?

(Disclosure: If you buy something we link to on our site, we may earn a commission.)

In case you’re having troubles with the new UIX (a LOT of people have been):

A Batman + Vertigo Sale For Halloween?

Batman - Haunted Knight  Creature Commandos  Unwritten

The DC Horror and Mystery Sale runs through Monday, 10/28.

You did hear that the return of the Vertigo imprint was announced at New York Comic Con, right? Chris Conroy will be heading up that and Black Label for DC editorial and it sounds like the right things are happening with more announcements imminent.

This sale is a little bit of Vertigo, a little more Batman than necessarily fits Halloween and some superhero things that fall somewhere in-between. We’ll run down the Halloween-specific highlights, but there’s a good deal more in what’s a relatively deep sale.

  • Batman: The Long Halloween – Jeph Loeb / Tim Sale; you knew this was going to be here
    • Batman: Dark Victory – the Loeb / Sale sequel
    • Batman: Haunted Knight – This collects the Halloween specials Loeb & Sale did prior to The Long Halloween, so it’s probably the most Halloween volume of the trio.
  • Detective Comics: Gotham Nocturn: Overture – Ram V  / Rafael Albuquerque; As long as we’re on Batman, Ram V’s been doing a long form, slow burn, horror-tinged Batman run that we’re enjoying quite a bit. This is part 1.
  • American Vampire – Scott Snyder / Rafael Albuquerque; A new strain of vampire appears and we follow him through history
  • Basketful of Heads – Joe Hill / Dave Stewart; From Hill’s short-lived imprint
  • The Books of Magic – Neil Gaiman / John Bolton / Charles Vess / Scott Hampton; pre-dating Harry Potter, the ultimate destiny of a boy destined to be a power wizard is debated by Constantine, The Phantom Stranger, Mister E and Doctor Occult
  • Creature Commandos – J.M. DeMatteis / Robert Kanigher / Fred Carrillo; The original Weird War stories that inspired the new cartoon
  • Creature Commandos Present: Frankenstein, Agent of S.H.A.D.E. – Grant Morrison / Doug Mahnke & Jeff Lemire / Alberto Ponticelli
  • DCeased – Tom Taylor / Trevor Hairsine; The Anti-Life Equation gets loose and turns most of the population – including superheroes – into zombie-like creatures, while the survivors look for a way out. Shockingly good and there are more collections in the main link.
  • Deadman – Neal Adams / Paul Levitz / Len Wein / Jim Aparo / Jose Luis Garcia Lopez; The original run plus the 70s appearances (the very definition of a cult hero)
  • Death: The High Cost of Living – Neil Gaiman / Chris Bachalo / Mark Buckingham
  • The Demon ’72-’74 – Jack Kirby’s fantasy-action classic about a Demon bound to a mortal host throughout the ages
  • The Demon ’87 – Matt Wagner’s take on Kirby’s creation
  • Hellblazer – The legendary (and consistently good) Vertigo run for $3.99-$5.99/volume
    • John Constantine: Hellblazer – Si Spurrier / Aaron Campbell / Matias Bergara; This recent Black Label series is right up there with the best of the Vertigo run – which is saying a LOT
  • I… Vampire – J.M. DeMatteis / Tom Sutton; The original run from House of Mystery
  • Lucifer – Mike Carey / Peter Gross; Sandman spin-off where Lucifer leaves Hell for Los Angeles… a bit different from the TV version
  • Justice League Dark ’18 – James Tynion IV / Alvaro Martinez Bueno; That’s right, before The Nice House on the Lake; Tynion & Bueno were doing the Justice League horror title
  • The Nice House on the Lake – James Tynion IV / Alvaro Martinez Bueno; A group of friends find themselves trapped in a vacation home at the end of the world; This link is the whole series in one volume
  • Night Force – Marv Wolfman / Gene Colan; Marv’s favorite work; The Tomb of Dracula team regroups for a series about a mansion with a portal through time and space, it’s mysterious resident and the agents he sends out on occult missions
  • Preacher – Garth Ennis / Steve Dillon; As seen on TV, God has gone missing and Jesse Custer would like a word with him. Double volumes for $3.99
  • Saga of the Swamp Thing – The Alan Moore / Steve Bissette / John Totleben / Stan Woch classic run (the Mark Millar / Phil Hester run is also listed here)
  • The Sandman – Neil Gaiman and a rotating cast of artists
  • The Spectre – John Ostrander / Tom Mandrake; under the radar classic as a dead man struggles with his existence and the spirit of wrath that’s tethered to him
  • Swamp Thing – Len Wein / Bernie Wrightson; The legendary original run by Wein & Wrightson through the pre-Moore ’80s revival.
  • The Unwritten – Mike Carey / Peter Gross; Yes, that’s M.R. Carey from The Girl With All the Gifts; The son of a novelist tries to figure out if he’s really the boy-wizard from his father’s books
  • Y: The Last Man – Brian K. Vaughan / Pia Guerra; A mysterious event leaves one man alive on Earth (and his monkey). He’s looking for his missing girlfriend and the “Daughters of the Amazon” are looking for him.

More Hot Symbiote Action

Carnage  Carnage  Absolute Carnage

The Marvel Carnage Sale runs through Monday, 10/28.

If Venom has a sale (and movie), might as well have Carnage as a sequel sale, right?

This is an odd set compared with something like Fantastic Four, since Carnage has been a guest villain or mini-series dweller for part of the time, so here’s the highlights and short tour.

For early Carnage, your best best is probably Carnage Epic Collection: Born in Blood. That gets you the first Carnage tale from Amazing Spider-Man _and_ the Maximum Carnage arc. For more of those early villain and mini-series appearances, there are two more Epic Collections with their own series page.

Jump forward to 2015 and you’ll find what’s probably our favorite take on  Carnage: Gerry Conway & Mike Perkins have a run that’s got a real 70s Marvel horror flavor to it. Carnage is seeking the Book of Darkhold and is pursued by Flash Thompson in his Toxin era, Man-Wolf and the Order of the Midnight sun.

Absolute Carnage was a big 2019 Event spinning out of Venom by Donny Cates and Ryan Stegman.

Carnage then relaunched in ’22 by Ram V and Francesco Manna. This one weaves in and out of serial killer thriller / fantasy (with a trip to Asgard) / and capes.

The third volume of this series is listed separately as Carnage Reigns with Alex Paknadel tagging in as writer.

The next series of Carnage follows that up with the team of Torunn GrØnbekk & Pere Perez.

The Marvel “Maybe” Sales

Blood Hunt   Incredible Hulk  Miles Morales: Spider-Man

The trend continues. New releases at lower than expected price points and discounted pre-orders. Is this the new normal? We’re not sure, but let’s run them down.

Dropping This Week

  • Blood Hunt – Jed MacKay / Pepe Larraz – $9.99

Pre-Order for Next Week

Unannounced Sales

Astro Boy Elfen Lied Path of the Assassin

Dark Horse has a wide selection of their manga titles on sale this week. Some titles we noticed:

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Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: Miles Morales – Spider-Man; DC’s Top 100; House of M; Groo; The Crow; Nova

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, DC drops a Top 100 sale. Marvel offers discounts on Miles Morales, Nova and House of M. Dark Horse cuts prices on Groo, along with several unannounced offerings.

Where did the New Releases and Sale pages go?

(Disclosure: If you buy something we link to on our site, we may earn a commission.)

In case you’re having troubles with the new UIX (a LOT of people have been):

So Much For Top 10

Kingdom Come  Superman  Watchmen

The  DC Top 100 Sale runs through Monday, 9/9.

Top 100 what? We have no idea what the criterion would be, here. It’s a mix of recent and evergreen titles. Not a bad mix, either. A few things standing out:

Miles To Go Before I Sleep

  Miles Morales: Spider-Man  Miles Morales

The Marvel Miles Morales: Spider-Man Sale runs through Monday, 9/16.

Miles, of course, was the second Ultimate Spider-Man, but that world no longer exists and now there’s a new Ultimate Spider-Man and… we wouldn’t want to explain that to somebody walking in off the street.

For the first Brian Bendis/David Marquez/Sara Pichelli run, you’re probably best off with the Miles Morales: Ultimate Spider-Man Ultimate Collection set.

Then jump to the  Spider-Man for the ’16 Bendis/Pichelli/Nico Leaon run. (Yes, constant relaunching and it’s confusing to follow.)

Before we’re done with Bendis, there’s the very good Spider-Men series of mini-series where the “traditional” Peter Parker crosses paths with Miles. Get them both in one volume with Spider-Men: Worlds Collide by Bendis & Pichelli.

And after that wraps, it’s time for Miles Morales by Saladin Ahmed and Javier Garron.

And then, Miles Morales: Spider-Man by Cody Ziglar and Federico Vicentini. 

No More Mutants

House of M  X-Men: Reload  X-Men: The Day After

Marvel’s House of M and Decimation Sale runs through Monday, 9/9.

This would be the Event Miniseries where Wanda snaps and rewrites reality… forming the basis for the WandaVision TV series.  Brian Bendis and Olivier Coipel are your creators. This is the sort of Event where we recommend getting the main series and then dipping your toe into the supporting collections in the sale at your own discretion.  A good chunk of the Marvel line shifted their storylines to participate in the Event, buy how relevant they were to the main storyline varied widely and a lot of it would firmly be considered side stories. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it’s not always presented as such.

The “Decimation” part of the sale refers to the aftermath in the X-Men line after Wanda proclaims “no more mutants” and decimates the population. X-Men: Reload By Chris Claremont Vol. 2: House Of M by Claremont/ Chris Bachalo / Billy Tan covers House of M and Decimation in Uncanny X-Men. X-Men: Decimation – The Day After by Peter Milligan / Salvador Larocca / Roger Cruz covers Decimation in X-Men.

Corpsman
Nova Classic  Nova by Abnett & Lanning

The Marvel Nova Sale runs through Monday, 9/9.

Let’s run down the contents here:

  • Nova (1976-78) – The original Marv Wolfman/John Buscema/Sal Buscema/Carmine Infantino run
  • Nova (2007-10) – The Dan Abnett/Andy Lanning/Paul Pelletier/Kev Walker/Andrea di Vito era – the Complete Collection is the better deal.
  • Nova (2013-15) – Gerry Duggan / Paco Medina was probably the longest tenured creative team of this volume.
  • Nova: Resurrection (2015) – Jeff Loveness / Ramon Perez
  • Nova: The Human Rocket (2015-16) – Sean Ryan / Cory Smith / John Timms

What’s good here?  We’d go with the original run or the DnA run (complete with a space station carved out of a Celestial’s head – yes, the concept predates Avengers Mountain).

Theft

Criminal  Gideon Falls  Stray Bullets

The Image Summer Crime Sale runs through Sunday, 9/15.

Crime? Maybe crime, horror and science fiction? The sale’s title might be a bit reductive.

What we’d put at the top of it:

  • Criminal – Ed Brubaker & Sean Phillips; While this was their second series (after the lesser known Sleeper), their mid-00s revival of crime comics locked in Brubaker & Phillips as a long term team… and Image would soon lure them away from Marvel
  • Fell – Warren Ellis / Ben Templesmith; A creepy, surrealist detective feature and we seem to recall the plots often resembling actual “News of the Weird” newspaper columns.
  • Gideon Falls – Jeff Lemire / Andrea Sorrentino; A wild SF/horror/time travel tale of a mysterious barn that appears and disappears, always leaving a trail of bodies
  • Stray Bullets – David Lapham; This was Criminal, long before Criminal came to be. Along with AKA Goldfish and Jinx by Bendis, this was the main crime comic of the late ’90s.

The Marvel “Maybe” Sales

X-Men Ultimate Spider-Man

The trend continues. New releases at lower than expected price points and discounted pre-orders. Is this the new normal? We’re not sure, but let’s run them down.

Dropping This Week

Pre-Order for Next Week

Robbin’

Robyn Hood  Robyn Hood  Robyn Hood

The Zenescope Character Spotlight Sale – Robyn Hood Sale  runs through Sunday, 9/22.

This sale is in three flavors with three links:

Looks like the Omnibus is cheaper than the collected editions and the collected editions are cheaper than the single issues, but you can double check that on individual collections. 99-cent single issues make that easy.

And yes, those really are Chuck Dixon and Howard Mackie on runs towards the bottom of the listings.

Possible Oni Sales

OK… you might remember this drill from the distant past. Oni’s had two sales listed for a couple of days. They don’t look like sale prices to us. Maybe that gets fixed at some point, but that’s what we’re seeing at the moment.

Unannounced Sales

The Crow  Groo  Barbaric

Over at Dark Horse, everyone’s favorite stupid barbarian is on sale. Yes, that’s right… it’s Groo by Sergio Aragones and Mark Evanier!

And taking a wider view:

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Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: X-Factor; Star Wars: The High Republic; Scarlet Spider; Aliens; Predator; Avatar: The Last Airbender

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, Marvel discounts Aliens, Predator, X-Factor, Scarlet Spider and Star Wars: The High Republic. Dark Horse cuts the price on Avatar the Last Airbender. Batman’s still on sale, plus some more unannounced discounted items.

Where did the New Releases and Sale pages go?

(Disclosure: If you buy something we link to on our site, we may earn a commission.)

In case you’re having troubles with the new UIX (a LOT of people have been):

The Mutant Variable

X-Factor by Peter David   X-Factor by Peter David   X-Factor

The Marvel X-Factor Sale runs through Monday, 8/12.

This one’s a little different from most of the Legacy sales in that it’s mainly a Peter David X-Factor sale. Let’s walk through that.

Of the original X-Factor run, you’re really looking at the Epic Collections, here. While the book started out with Bob Layton/Butch Guice, Louise & Walt Simonson tagged in and had one of the defining runs on the book. A bit later, Peter David started his first run, which had Joe Quesada and Larry Stroman as part of the artist rotation, while it was definitely funnier, this was still basically the original X-Factor setup, just tweaked a little.

When people think of Peter David and X-Factor, the run they’re most likely thinking of is the 2005-13 run that starts out with Madrox (The Multiple Man) opening a detective agency. Yes, this is the run where Layla Miller knows stuff. (If you know, you know.)

Technically, this all started in the Madrox mini-series, originally under the Marvel Knights banner.

There are also two X-Factor by Peter David: The Complete Collection  volumes. Vol. 1 is the original Madrox mini-series and X-Factor 1-12. Vol. 2 collects #13-24, 28-32 and two specials. You can save a couple bucks there.

There was also a ’14-’15 X-Factor relaunch by David and Giuseppe Camuncoli. This sale is all about the Peter David runs!

Out from under the shadow of Mr. David, there are two other notable titles in the sale.

Back in 2010, X-Factor Forever saw Louise Simonson returning to the situation as she left it on the book (prior to Peter David taking over) along with Dan Panosian.

And then, in the aftermath of House of X / Powers of X, Leah Williams and David Baldeon relaunched X-Factor as the mutants who investigate the circumstances of death and missing persons for Krakoa.

Not of this Earth

The Marvel Aliens & Predators Sale runs through Monday, 8/12.

Predator versus Wolverine  Alien  Aliens

It’s probably best to divide this into the Marvel section and the Dark Horse section.

On the Marvel side of the fence, there are two big winners, we’ll happily point you to.

Predator Vs. Wolverine by Ben Percy / Ken Lashley / Andrea Di Vito / Greg Land is exactly what it sounds like… except that it’s actually very enjoyable. You’d think this would be a trite cash-in, but that’s not the case. Predator Vs. Wolverine in a vendetta-ish scenario across the years. $2.99 even qualifies as Cheap!

The Philip Kennedy Johnson Alien sequence (V.1 & 2 here; then V. 3 here — yeah, we know… comics publishers need to work on the meta data) with Salvador Larroca, followed by Julius Ohta; is essentially one winding tale of Weyland-Yutani Corporation conspiracies that starts out with hiding a few of those eggs that couldn’t possibly get out of control, moves on to interstellar pioneers and religion, then comes back to the living conditions of rogue androids. Effective slow burn storytelling.

Also on the Marvel side:

  • Declan Shalvey’s Alien run
    • V.1 w/ Andrea Broccardo
    • V.2 w/Danny Earls
  • Ed Brisson’s Predator run
    • V.1 w/ Kev Walker
    • V.2 w/ Netho Diaz

From the original Dark Horse material:

Spiders

Spider-Man: The Complete Clone Saga Epic Spider-Man: The Complete Ben Reilly Epic Spider-Geddon

The Marvel Ben Reilly and Kaine – Scarlet Spiders Sale runs through 8/12.

Yes, it’s a clone sale! Let’s take this roughly in order.

Your Clone Saga choices are:

After the Clone Saga, Ben Reilly takes over as the Scarlet Spider (for about a year). That’s collected in:

Then in ’12 (spinning out of Spider Island, which isn’t in the sale), Kaine takes over for:

Then we pop back to Amazing Spidey in ’16 for a storyline

Then back to a solo book:

Then an Event:

Then a solo mini:

And finally, Ben Reilly is mixed up in another Event:

See? Nothing complicated about all those clones! <If you have a cheat sheet, that is.>

How High?

Star Wars: The High Republic   Star Wars: The High Republic - Season 2   Star Wars: The High Republic - The Blade

The Marvel Star Wars: High Republic Sale runs through Monday, 8/12.

For the uninitiated, this is a time period set “a long time ago” relative the first two film trilogies.

What are we looking at here?

The Marvel “Maybe” Sales

Beware the Planet of the Apes  Resurrection of Magneto

The trend returns after a short break. New releases at lower than expected price points and discounted pre-orders. Is this the new normal? We’re not sure, but let’s run them down.

Pre-Order for Next Week

Unannounced Sales

Avatar: The Last Airbender  The Blue Flame  Verse

BATMAN

Last week’s big and cheap Batman sale is still going on through Monday evening.

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Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: Punisher; Batman; Superior Spider-Man; Detective Chimp; Dark Horse Fantasy

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, Marvel discounts the MAX version of The Punisher and Superior Spider-Man. DC has a Memorial Day Sale on recent items. Dark Horse cuts prices on fantasy titles.

Where did the New Releases and Sale pages go?

(Disclosure: If you buy something we link to on our site, we may earn a commission.)

In case you’re having troubles with the new UIX (a LOT of people have been):

Momento Mori

Justice Society of America  Detective Comics  The Detective Chimp Casebook

The DC Memorial Day Sale runs through Monday, 5/27.

This is an extra eclectic mix of books and there seem to be a fair amount that are new to being discounted or recently started being discounted. A few things we found notable:

Warner Must Find Punisher MAX Confusing…
Punisher PunisherMax

The Marvel Punisher MAX Sale runs through Monday, 5/27.

Yes, Marvel’s been using the MAX label for mature reader comics longer than Warner’s been using it for streaming. One of those quirks of branding, we suppose.

This sale really breaks down into two titles:

Punisher Max: The Complete Collection is the ’04-’09 run that’s most associated with Garth Ennis returning to the character (with art by Darick Robertson, Leandro Fernendez, Doug Braithwaite and Goran Parlov, among others). This is Ennis doing the serious Punisher, as opposed to the hilarity of Welcome Back, Frank. Mike Benson, Victor Gischler and Jason Aaron pop up at the end of the run.

Then you’ve got PunisherMax, the ’09-’12 relaunch by Jason Aaron/Steve Dillon, where Frank mixes it up with The Kingpin and Bullseye.

Superiority Complex

Superior Spider-Man Superior Spider-Man Companion Superior Spider-Man

The Marvel Superior Spider-Man Sale runs through Monday, 10/16.

Yes, that would be the run when Doctor Octopus took over Peter Parker’s body. One of the greatest moments of “wait… this is actually good” in recent history. (Everyone we knew winced at the high concept, but the execution was on the money!)

The primary Superior Spider-Man series by Dan Slott and Ryan Stegman is best packaged in the 2-volume Complete collection, that also includes the “Dying Wish” arc that sets up the run.

Superior Spider-Man Companion gets you the first 12 issues of Superior Spider-Man Team-Up and some tie-in issues.

Superior Spider-Man (’18-’19) is the Christos Gage / Mike Hawthorne revival that returns Otto Octavious to his Spidey persona.

And for something a little different? The absolutely hilarious Superior Foes of Spider-Man by Nick Spencer & Steve Lieber. Boomerang tries to organize a gang of Spidey’s b-list foes and make a big score. Things… do not go as intended. Think an even more absurd Dortmunder novel with super villains and you won’t be far off.

Unlisted Sale

Air  Beasts of Burden  Elfquest

Dark Horse has a number of fantasy series on sale this week, including:

We’re going to stump a little for Air. This series was way under the radar at Vertigo and prior to G. Willow Wilson being a name author. It’s out there (in a good way) enough to be a little hard to describe, but it’s a strong book and it looks like the reissue is now complete.

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Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: Amazing Spider-Man (all of it); Blade; Dracula; Lazarus Planet; Dark Horse’s Cullen Bunn catalog

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, Marvel puts pretty much the full run of Amazing Spider-Man on sale and follows that up with Tomb of Dracula and Blade’s various titles. DC… has issues this week. Dark Horse celebrates the work of Cullen Bunn.

Where did the New Releases and Sale pages go?

(Disclosure: If you buy something we link to on our site, we may earn a commission.)

In case you’re having troubles with the new UIX (a LOT of people have been):

So Many Spiders…

Amazing Spider-Man  Amazing Spider-Man  Amazing Spider-Man - Kraven's Last Hunt

Marvel’s Spider-Man Legacy Sale runs through Monday, 4/29.

There’s a lot of ground to cover here, so let’s break it down by series.

  • Amazing Spider-Man (1963-98) – The original run before Marvel became quite so obsessed with rebooting titles.
  • Amazing Spider-Man (1998 – 2013) – This run starts out with the controversial J. Michael Straczynski/John Romita, Jr./Mike Deodato, Jr. run, then goes into the Brand New Day era with rotating creative teams and segues into the beginning of the Dan Slott era. (Slott’s written a LOT of Spidey.)  Now… this Amazon’s listings, so you knew something had to be messed
  • Superior Spider-Man – Possibly the high point of the Dan Slott era – Doc Ock takes over Peter’s body and life. The Complete Collections are the way to go here.
  • Amazing Spider-Man (2014 – 15) – Peter’s back in control and the Slott era continues.
  • Amazing Spider-Man(2015-2018) – It’s a relaunch. (Hey, Spidey’s been relaunched a lot less than Captain Marvel!) This is the end run of the Slott era, culminating in the Red Goblin affair. The “Worldwide Collection” omnibuses are the better buy.
  • Amazing Spider-Man (2018 – 22) – The Nick Spenser era is here, PLUS the 4 volumes of Spider-Man Beyond with Ben Reilly stepping in that take place prior to:
  • Amazing Spider-Man (2022-Present) – The current Zeb Wells / John Romita, Jr. / Ed McGuinness run.

And there are a few more Slott era omnibus editions floating around.  That’s probably not getting cleaned up anytime soon.<sigh>

Recommendations?  Well, first off Amazing Spider-Man doesn’t really have very many BAD periods. Oh, some runs are definitely better than others, but there aren’t huge swaths of duds.

You can definitely pick your poison between the $5.99 Masterworks and $6.99 Epic Collections for the original run (although a few Epic’s run a little higher). The Epics are typically much larger collections for only a buck more, but it depends on which format you started buying and which era you’re interested in. Some stretches are only in Masterworks, some are only in Epic.

Of possible interest, since there’s a sequel mini-series out, but NOT included in the link for the V.1 of Amazing is the Kraven’s Last Hunt Epic Collection, so we’ll call that one out directly. You get the J.M. DeMatteis/Mike Zeck classic, plus the issues of Amazing around it, plus Spider-Man Vs. Wolverine for about the price of just getting the regular Kraven collection.

We’d also recommend a look at the Brand New Day collections. It’s not a run that’s immediately talked about, but we found it entertaining and a much better set of creators was assembled than Marvel was necessarily given credit for: Mark Waid, Bob Gale (we wish he did more comics), Marc Guggenheim, Joe Kelly, Dan Slott, John Romita, Jr., Steve McNiven, Salvador Larroca, Phil Jimenez, Barry Kitson, Marcos Martin, Paolo Rivera, Lee Week and… others. I’m not sure there are “hidden” gems with Spidey, just runs that get discussed less.

And yes, we are enjoying the current Zeb Wells / (mostly) John Romita, Jr. series. It’s a little more somber than we were expecting from Wells, but it’s been a good ride so far. And this is a series that plays the long game resolving subplots.

Could There Possibly Be an Event Approaching?
Blade: Black and White Tomb of Dracula Greenberg the Vampire

The  Marvel Blade and Marvel Vampires Sale runs through Monday, 4/29.

That would be the Daywalker and vampire slayer who’s better known through the films than the comic.

We feel pretty strongly that Blade is best experienced in his original context – a supporting character in Tomb of Dracula. It’s not clear you can call Tomb of Dracula an under-the-radar 70s classic anymore, since it’s gotten a fair amount of exposure since the Essentials line (finally) collected it ~20 years ago, but now it’s in color reprints. One note, though – you need to give the series six or seven issues to get moving. There were some false starts until Marv Wolfman and Gene Colan were paired up… but after they’ve got a couple issues under their belt, this one really takes off.

Blade: Black & White is a collection of… that’s right, the black & white adventures over the years and is built around some magazine appearances in Vampire Tales and Marvel Preview. Wolfman and Chris Claremont are the primary writers for that period. Colan and Tony DeZuniga are the primary artists.

If you’re looking for something has resembles the film franchise a bit more, there’s Blade: The Complete Collection by Marc Guggenheim (with Howard Chaykin as artist).

For something completely out of left field, J.M. DeMatteis, Steve Leialoha and Mark Badger present Greenberg the Vampire. He tries to avoid drinking blood, loves his Mama and occasionally has writer’s block.

DC’s Almost-Sale

Legion of Super Heroes The Great Darkness Saga  Batman Beyond: The Final Joke  Lazarus Planet

The DC Multiverse Sale runs through Monday, 4/29.

*Sigh* It appears to have happened again. Most of these books are are at higher price points than we’ve seen in months or set to a really strange price point. Precedent would suggest that someone at DC did not enter the sale data correctly. This was a BIG problem at various point last year. (Especially August.)  As we type this up, no prices have been corrected… maybe they will be by the weekend?

If not, here’s the much shorter list of things we think are at “normal” price points & discounts. Hopefully this doesn’t linger for a month like it did in August.

Not on the sale page, but good prices:

An Unannounced Bunn in the Oven

Harrow County Omnibus 1  Tales From Harrow County  Shock Shop

It appears Dark Horse is having an unannounced sale on Cullen Bunn titles.

His flagship work for Dark Horse is most likely Harrow County with Tyler Crook. The two omnibus editions in that link are the best value here by a LOT.  Go to the bottom of the “regular” collection links for the Tales From Harrow County continuation.

Also on the list:

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Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: Batman; Spider-Man; Resident Alien

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, DC slashes prices on some newer titles, Marvel discounts Axis and a variety of clone adventures; Dark Horse cuts Resident Alien and Avatar the Last Airbender prices, too.

Where did the New Releases and Sale pages go?

(Disclosure: If you buy something we link to on our site, we may earn a commission.)

In case you’re having troubles with the new UIX (a LOT of people have been):

But… Epic is a Marvel Brand?

Batman & The Joker: The Deadly Duo Danger Street World's Finest

The DC Epic eBooks Sale runs through Monday, 3/4.

Hard to see a theme here, though there are a few newer titles on sale, some for the first time at a deep discount.

Some annotations:

  • Batman & The Joker: Deadly Duo – Marc Silvestri’s high profile Batman project (we think this is the first discounting)
  • Batman: The Dark Detective – if you’re getting the ’90s Detective collections, there are three more for $3.99:
  • Batman: Earth One: Complete Collection – The Geoff Johns / Gary Frank trilogy in one volume for $5.99. You already know whether you want it.
  • Batman: Gotham by Gaslight – Brian Augustyn / Mike Mignola; The Victorian Batman Elseworlds, which just had an Andy Diggle-helmed sequel announced.
  • Danger Street – Tom King/Jorge Fornés using all the First Issue Special characters in one series, as the high concept. Again, we think this is the first discounting.
  • Far Sector – N.K. Jemisin / Jamal Campbell; Hugo winner! (Without voting shenanigans, either!)
  • Gotham City: Year One – Tom King / Phil Hestor; This is a noir detective story w/ Slam Bradley. And a good noir, too.
  • The Human Target – Tom King / Greg Smallwood. Great title… but is this an Elseworlds, now that the imprint is back?
  • Kamandi by Jack Kirby – The whole Kirby run is now available on the cheap. Think Kirby riffing on Planet of the Apes… but with the entire animal kingdom. Extremely fun title and Kirby’s longest running at DC.
  • Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow – Tom King / Bilquis Evely; James Gunn sure seems to like it!
  • World’s Finest – Mark Waid/Dan Mora show what the old school DC feel is like.

There’s a whole lot more to browse here. Lots of Batman/Superman/Nightwing, too.

Clone Wars… Nothing But Clone Wars

All-New Wolverine  Spider-Man: The Original Clone Saga  Spider-Man: The Complete Clone Saga Epic

The Marvel Clones Sale runs through Monday, 2/26.

Yes, yes… you’re initially thinking Spidey, but our favorite clone series might be the Tom Taylor / David Lopez / Juan Cabal run on All-New Wolverine. You know, the one where Logan’s clone daughter takes up the Wolverine mantel while he’s dead. It’s a very good comic. Astonishingly good when you consider it was almost there as a placeholder after the Death of Wolverine stunt. But what do we always say about Tom Taylor making lemonade? Drink up.

As for Spidey, before there was the “Clone Saga,” there was the original Clone Saga and there’s a couple ways you can get this. The Epic Collection with The Jackal’s initial clone plot by Gerry Conway & Ross Andru and several non-clone related tales as the Len Wein era begins. You can also opt for Spider-Man: The Original Clone Saga which includes that Jackal tale, plus the Bill Mantlo / Jim Mooney arc from Peter Parker that introduces Carrion (and includes Frank Miller’s first Daredevil work), plus some later Gerry Conway/Sal Buscema Carrion appearances.  We’d probably go Clone Saga for Carrion and a few more pages at the same price, but there’s not really a wrong answer there.

As for the 90s Clone Saga.  Again, you have options:

  • The Complete Clone Saga – and that’s a lot of clones
  • The Complete Ben Reilly Epic – because Ben Reilly was Spidey in the aftermath of the Clone Saga
  • Spider-Man: The Real Clone Saga – Years later, Tom DeFalco, Howard Mackie and Todd Nauck get back together to tell the story of Clone Saga with the original ending, before Marvel’s marketing department decided the storyline needed to be extended.

There’s a bit more to it, but we’d call those the highlights.

OK Axis, Here We Come

Uncanny Avengers Access Prelude  Avengers & X-Men: Axis

The Marvel Axis Sale runs through Monday, 2/26.

What’s Axis? It was an Avengers / X-Men team-up event spinning out of Uncanny Avengers and dealing with the (then) ongoing situation of the Red Skull stealing Xavier’s powers and becoming Onslaught.

The run-up to the Event, Uncanny Avengers: Axis Prelude is probably a little more appropriate here than the usual “Road to” offering.  This is by Rick Remender / Salvador Larroca / Daniel Acuna / Sanford Greene .

The main event is Avengers & X-Men: Axis by Remender /Lienil Francis Yu / Terry Dodson / Jim Cheung.

Grimm Negaband Sale

Grimm Spotlight

The Zenoscope Grimm Spotlight Sale runs through Wednesday,  3/6… but there’s a catch…

Amazon has placed this sale on the same URL as the Media Do Valentine’s Day Fair BL Sale.  (And we’re not sure those sales appeal to the same demographic, either.)  So, whichever one you’re looking for, if you see the other, reload a few times and the sale you seek should eventually appear as you appreciate the attention to detail paid by whoever assigned the URLs!

Incidentally, this is a small sale on – you guessed it – Grimm Spotlight.

Unlisted Dark Horse Sales

Resident Alien  Avatar: The Last Airbender

The know the drill on this – we’re not 100% sure how long these sales are going to last, but the discounts are there.  This time out… TV tie-in sales!

Resident Alien 

This Peter Hogan / Steve Parkhouse comic was around before the TV show. The Omnibus editions are the better buy for V. 1-6; V. 7 needs to be bought as a “regular” volume.

Funny this should go on sale when the first two seasons hit Netflix and the third season hits SyFy.  Must be a coincidence…

Avatar the Last Airbender

The Omnibus editions are the better buy here. And yes, many of them are by the team of Gene Yang and Gurihiru.

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Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: Spider-Man, Batman’s Valentines, Nova, New Warriors and Hellboy

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, Marvel chops prices on Amazing Spider-Man, Nova and New Warriors. DC and Dark Horse celebrate Valentine’s Day.

Where did the New Releases and Sale pages go?

(Disclosure: If you buy something we link to on our site, we may earn commission.)

In case you’re having troubles with the new UIX (a LOT of people have been):

So Many Spiders…

Marvel’s Spider-Man Legacy Sale runs through Monday, 2/20.

There’s a lot of ground to cover here, so let’s break it down by series.

  • Amazing Spider-Man (1963-98) – The original run before Marvel became quite so obsessed with rebooting titles.
  • Amazing Spider-Man (1998 – 2013) – This run starts out with the controversial J. Michael Straczynski/John Romita, Jr./Mike Deodato, Jr. run, then goes into the Brand New Day era with rotating creative teams and segues into the beginning of the Dan Slott era. (Slott’s written a LOT of Spidey.)  Now… this Amazon’s listings, so you knew something had to be messed
  • Superior Spider-Man – Possibly the high point of the Dan Slott era – Doc Ock takes over Peter’s body and life. The Complete Collections are the way to go here.
  • Amazing Spider-Man (2014 – 15) – Peter’s back in control and the Slott era continues.
  • Amazing Spider-Man (2015-208) – It’s a relaunch. (Hey, Spidey’s been relaunched a lot less than Captain Marvel!) This is the end run of the Slott era, culminating in the Red Goblin affair.
  • Amazing Spider-Man (2018 – 22) – The Nick Spenser era is here, PLUS the 4 volumes of Spider-Man Beyond with Ben Reilly stepping in that take place prior to:
  • Amazing Spider-Man (2022-Present) – The current Zeb Wells / John Romita, Jr. run. Also some 99-cent single issues if you prefer that format.

And there are a few more Slott era omnibus editions floating around.  That’s probably not getting cleaned up anytime soon.<sigh>

Recommendations?  Well, first off Amazing Spider-Man doesn’t really have very many BAD periods. Oh, some runs are definitely better than others, but there aren’t huge swaths of duds, here.

You can definitely pick your poison between the $5.99 Masterworks and $6.99 Epic Collections for the original run (although a few Epic’s run a little higher). The Epics are typically much larger collections for only a buck more, but it depends on which format you started buying and which era you’re interested in. Some stretches are only in Masterworks, some are only in Epic.

Of possible interest, since there’s a sequel mini-series out, but NOT included in the link for the V.1 of Amazing is the Kraven’s Last Hunt Epic Collection, so we’ll call that one out directly. You get the J.M. DeMatteis/Mike Zeck classic, plus the issues of Amazing around it, plus Spider-Man Vs. Wolverine for about the price of just getting the regular Kraven collection.

We’d also recommend a look at the Brand New Day collections. It’s not a run that’s immediately talked about, but we found it entertaining and a much better set of creators was assembled than Marvel was necessarily given credit for: Mark Waid, Bob Gale (we wish he did more comics), Marc Guggenheim, Joe Kelly, Dan Slott, John Romita, Jr., Steve McNiven, Salvador Larroca, Phil Jimenez, Barry Kitson, Marcos Martin, Paolo Rivera, Lee Week and… others. I’m not sure there are “hidden” gems with Spidey, just runs that get discussed less.

And yes, we are enjoying the current Zeb Wells / (mostly) John Romita, Jr. series. It’s a little more somber than we were expecting from Wells, but it’s been a good ride so far. Peter’s trying to get back on his feet after doing something to get everyone mad at him. Who should show up with a redemptive peace offering, but… Norman Osborn? And that’s before the Hobgoblin turns up.

Amazing Spider-Man - Kraven's Last Hunt   Spider-Man Brand New Day   Amazing Spider-Man

Nooooova, Come Out and Plaaaaaay…

The Marvel Nova and the New Warriors Sale runs through Monday, 2/20.

Let’s run down the contents here:

  • Nova (1976-78) – The original Marv Wolfman/John Buscema/Sal Buscema/Carmine Infantino run
  • Nova (2007-10) – The Dan Abnett/Andy Lanning/Paul Pelletier/Kev Walker/Andrea di Vito era – the Complete Collection is the better deal.
  • Nova (2013-15) – Gerry Duggan / Paco Medina was probably the longest tenured creative team of this volume.
  • Nova: Resurrection (2015) – Jeff Loveness / Ramon Perez
  • Nova: The Human Rocket (2015-16) – Sean Ryan / Cory Smith / John Timms

What’s good here?  We’d go with the original run or the DnA run (complete with a space station carved out of a Celestial’s head – yes, the concept predates Avengers Mountain).

For the New Warriors:

  • New Warriors Classic – The original Fabian Nicieza / Mark Bagley / Darick Robertson series
  • New Warriors ’07-’09 – The Kevin Grevioux / Paco Medina / Reilly Brown series
  •  New Warriors ’14 – The Christopher Yost / Marcus To series

And here we’d absolutely go with the original run.

Nova Classic   Nova by Abnett & Lanning   New Warriors

Not the Safest Valentine…

The DC Valentine’s Day Sale runs through Monday, 2/20.

We’re not saying the DC universe is the safest place to celebrate a relationship… but there are a few things on sale.

The Batman Adventures: Mad Love is a classic of unhealthy relationships. This is the animated series origin story of Harley Quinn and Mister J. by Paul Dini and Bruce Timm. It is a romance, after all! Also falls under the category of “classic.” If you don’t need all the optional extras, you can get the original story in its original format for a lousy $0.99.

Speaking of Batman and unhealthy relationships, there’s always Batman: Birth of the Demon. This collects Batman: Son of the Demon by Mike W. Barr and Jerry Bingham, Batman: Bride of the Demon by Mike W. Barr and Tom Grindberg and Batman: Birth of the Demon by Denny O’Neil and Norm Breyfogle. Three original graphic novels about R’as al Ghul and Bruce’s relationship with Talia al Guhl. Indeed, Son of the Demon could be considered the origin of Damien, or at least a chunk of it. Originally, that tale wasn’t even supposed to be in continuity, except it was quite popular and things changed.

And for something a little more recent, there’s Mister Miracle by Tom King and Mitch Gerards. While the storyline is about Mister Miracle attempting to escape death, his relationship with his wife, Big Barda, is certainly at the core of the story. A series that did quite well for itself on the awards circuit.

Scroll down to the bottom of the sale for an eclectic selection of single issues. A lot of wedding issues, but… to be honest, we probably wouldn’t have suggested celebrating Valentine’s Day with the first issue of Longbow Hunters. That’s a bit much.

Mad Love   Batman: Birth of the Demon   Mister Miracle

Enough With the Romance

The Dark Horse Valentine’s Day Sale runs through Monday, 2/20.

OK, enough with mushy stuff, let’s talk about the usual suspects here.  It’s Dark Horse, so you know there’s going to be multiple Mike Mignola items on sale. The Hellboy Omnibus line continues to be a good value – excellent comics with high page counts (especially V.3). If you haven’t been keeping up, scroll through the sale and scan the newer releases. Hellboy is still coming out.

Blacksad by Juan Díaz Canales and Juanjo Guarnido is an amazing body of work. Chandler-esque hardboiled detective stories in a world of anthropomorphic animals… but there’s nothing cartoony about it. Absolutely jaw-dropping art by Guarnido, too. Thick with detail and atmosphere. Click through and look at a couple preview pages.

Invisible Kingdom by G. Willow Wilson and Christian Ward has several rewards to it’s name. It’s a science fiction tale of what happens when an intergalactic corporation gets in bed with a religion.  All’s far in love and profit, after all. Note: The Library Edition is cheaper than getting the single volumes, which is not always the case.

Hellboy   Blacksad   Invisible Kingdom

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Comixology (at Amazon) Sales: Marvel Omnibuses; Miles Morales: Spider-Man; Dark Reign; DC Celebrates Black History Month; Image’s Discounted Romance

In this week’s Comixology (at Amazon) sales, Marvel has a rare sale on their Omnibuses, plus Miles Morales and Dark Reign. DC celebrates Black History Month and Image puts a (discounted) price on romance.

Where did the New Releases and Sale pages go?

(Disclosure: If you buy something we link to on our site, we may earn commission.)

In case you’re having troubles with the new UIX (a LOT of people have been):

As we adjust to whatever’s going on behind the scenes at Amazon, the sales did post this week, but they trickled out in an unusual pattern. At least the pricing seemed to be correct when they sales appeared this week. There’s a reason we don’t always rush to post the sale.

Did Somebody Say Omnibus?

The Marvel Omnibus Sale runs through Monday, 2/13.

Well, here’s a sale you don’t see every day. These omnibuses contain _around_ 40 issues each, though it can vary a few hundred pages from volume to volume. Evaluate these as bundles of collected editions, but there are some volumes that caught our eye.

The Captain Britain Omnibus is a very interesting thing. It’s basically all the Captain Britain appearances through when he first starts turning up in the X-Men line, so just before Excalibur kicks off. You’ve got the original UK run, which does have a little bit of early Chris Claremont in it. The Marvel Team-Up appearances (Claremont/Byrne), the David Thorpe/Alan Davis reset and then the two crown jewels: the Alan Moore/Alan Davis run and the Alan Davis solo run in the magazine version of Captain Britain. These last two runs are fantastic and highly influential (although you might be surprised how many things Thorpe initiated). And then a couple X-verse annuals to cap it.  Some really good stuff in here and Marvel’s a little inconsistent about keeping all of this available.

The Incredible Hulk by Peter David Omnibus set is the entire run. Peter David was on that book a LONG time and had a pretty darn good set of artists to team with, including Todd McFarlane, Gary Frank, Dale Keown, Liam Sharp and several others. It’s a little more understandable with such a long run, but we’re under the impression this is the only collection of David’s entire run. The “Visionaries” series doesn’t go all the way and only sections of it are in Epic Collections. So, here’s the entirety of a landmark run in 1000-1100 page chunks.

Another meaty set of books is the Thunderbolts set. V.1 is 1100 pages of Kurt Busiek and Mark Bagley. V.2 is another 1100 pages as Fabian Nicieza tags in for Busiek and we don’t think the back half of V.2 is currently collected elsewhere, either.

We know you were thinking it, so we’re going to go ahead and say it out loud: omnibus editions are a lot more convenient to read in digital. Those hardcovers can top 6 pounds.

Captain Britain Omnibus   Incredible Hulk by Peter David   Thunderbolts

Spider-Verse

The Marvel Monthly Sale: Miles Morales: Spider-Man Sale runs through Monday, 2/27

This sale is… kind of a mess to navigate.

For the first Brian Bendis/David Marquez/Sara Pichelli run, you’re probably best off with the Miles Morales: Ultimate Spider-Man Ultimate Collection set.

Then jump to the Miles Morales: Spider-Man, Vol. 2 collection for the ’16 Bendis/Pichelli/Nico Leaon run. (Do not ask us why the first omnibus isn’t on sale…)

And after that wraps, it’s time for Miles Morales by Saladin Ahmed and Javier Garron.

  Miles Morales: Spider-Man   Miles Morales

Make It Reign

The Marvel Dark Reign Sale runs through Monday, 2/6.

Dark Reign is a sort of background story that spun through a bunch of the Marvel titles, post-Secret Invasion.  Norman Osborn manages to get himself installed as Director of SHIELD and makes a power play. A lot of it involved declaring the various heroes to be enemies of the state and hunting them down. There wasn’t a mini-series driving this in the usual sense, but there were a ton of mini-series out there. A lot of this ran through the numerous Bendis Avenger titles.

The best thing to come out of Dark Reign was the “World’s Most Wanted” arc in Invincible Iron Man (Book 1 and Book 2) by Matt Fraction and Salvador Larroca. Fraction and Larroca essentially paused their story for this arc where Norman Osborn is after the knowledge in Tony Stark’s brain – especially all the secret identities. Stark is a fugitive on the run and he’s trying to delete and overwrite his brain, like a hard drive, to keep all the sensitive information out of Osborn’s hands. A superior arc.

Iron Man   Iron Man

You can pop in on the other titles to see where Dark Reign takes them, but Iron Man was a class above.

February

The DC Black History Month Sale runs through Monday, 2/27.

Some picks? Sure. Justice League by Christopher Priest collects the Priest / Pete Woods wherein Batman has a lapse in judgement and a “fan” moves in for the kill.

A lesser known recent title is Michael Cray by Bryan Hill and N. Stephen Harris. This was part of the Wildstorm revival and the titular Cray is an assassin tasked with eliminating some funhouse mirror versions of the Justice League. Well done twisted fun.

And from clear out of left field, here’s something we don’t recall seeing on sale in a while: Steel single issues for $0.99. Yes, the Death of Superman spin-off about John Henry Irons that spawned a Shaq movie. Creators on this include Louise Simonson, David Michelinie, Christopher Priest, Chris Batista, Phil Gosier and Denys Cowan. Yes, that’s an early Priest/Cowan pairing at the end of the series.

Justice League by Priest   Michael Cray   Steel

Romance… Through The Mirror, Darkly…

The Image Romance Sale runs through Monday, 2/27.

Might modern “romance” comics be a little off-kilter? Could be!

A marque Image series popping up here is Sex Criminals by Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky (Mr. Romance, himself) has a high concept along the lines of “Make love. Stop time. Rob banks.” Why yes, it’s also a comedy. The “normal” collections are a better price than the “Big Hard” collections and that’s an instance of a fancier print edition translating to poor digital pricing, as is frequently the case.

My Heroes Have Always Been Junkies by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips does have a romance in the middle of a tale about nefarious goings-on at a rehab facility. That’s a fair cop.

And a new title that might be of interest here: $0.99 single issues of Love Everlasting by Tom King and Elsa Charretier, featuring a woman caught in a series of bizarre romances bouncing around different time periods.

Sex Criminals   My Heroes Have Always Been Junkies   Love Everlasting

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