Gail Simone's Wonder Woman run has been really hit or miss. She's had some pretty good arcs, and she's also had some pretty bad ones.
While not necessarily a main character, Soranik Natu in the Green Lantern Corps series is a pretty strong female character. You might enjoy reading GLC. Pretty much the entire book has been good, from the time of its relaunch until present.
In GLC there have been two major writers: Dave Gibbons and Peter Tomasi. Both have told some really good stories, and both have handled Natu very well. She's one of my favorite characters in the series. But like I said, she is not a main character. She is merely a part of a fairly large cast.
Lucascraft on
0
AriviaI Like A ChallengeEarth-1Registered Userregular
Gail Simone's Wonder Woman run has been really hit or miss. She's had some pretty good arcs, and she's also had some pretty bad ones.
While not necessarily a main character, Soranik Natu in the Green Lantern Corps series is a pretty strong female character. You might enjoy reading GLC. Pretty much the entire book has been good, from the time of its relaunch until present.
In GLC there have been two major writers: Dave Gibbons and Peter Tomasi. Both have told some really good stories, and both have handled Natu very well. She's one of my favorite characters in the series. But like I said, she is not a main character. She is merely a part of a fairly large cast.
I'm fine with that, but I've never read GL (been more of a Marvel girl than a DC fan). Would I be fine starting with the recommended reading list in the GLC thread?
Arivia on
0
TexiKenDammit!That fish really got me!Registered Userregular
edited August 2009
Yes.
Just start with Green Lantern Corps: Recharge, and then the following Green Lantern Corps trades.
Recharge was the mini series that launched the ongoing GLC corps series.
GLC: Recharge is where Soranik Natu was first introduced. She's really only about 5 years old as a character.
Lucascraft on
0
AriviaI Like A ChallengeEarth-1Registered Userregular
edited August 2009
Right, I just wanted to be sure I wasn't going to miss out on anything by not knowing what's up when that character from the 1960s/1980s/Jack Kirby's left nostril appears.
Nothing in Recharge is super obscure. It is a good blend of new characters introduced into the series, as well as the return of some older characters.
The basic scenario going in is that Hal Jordan was bad for a long time, and he single-handedly destroyed the Corps with the power of Parallax, who is the avatar of fear.
Hal Jordan was redeemed and Recharge is the story of the rebuilding of the Corps. Many old members come back out of hiding, but many new members must be recruited to fill the ranks of the people that Jordan killed.
Soranik Natu, as I suggested, is one of the new recruits. She's a strong female character and she's a lot of fun to read about. But like I said also, she's part of a large cast, and her character is built up slowly over many issues.
Forgive me if this is too off topic but I just got to LA yesterday and I need to know the location of one of those incredible Comic shops I have been hearing about. I don't have a good internet connection other than this cafe I am posting this from so I can't go looking through all the G4 archives to find out where that one blair is always talking from.
Forgive me if this is too off topic but I just got to LA yesterday and I need to know the location of one of those incredible Comic shops I have been hearing about. I don't have a good internet connection other than this cafe I am posting this from so I can't go looking through all the G4 archives to find out where that one blair is always talking from.
Forgive me if this is too off topic but I just got to LA yesterday and I need to know the location of one of those incredible Comic shops I have been hearing about. I don't have a good internet connection other than this cafe I am posting this from so I can't go looking through all the G4 archives to find out where that one blair is always talking from.
The one comic book character that I wanted to read about, and he isn't an actual character.
I'm going to pass on The Spirit. Thanks though.
you really shouldn't. the spirit is fucking fantastic, both the original will eisner stuff (there's a REASON the comic book version of the Oscars are called the Eisners) as well as the newer darwyn cooke stuff, and if you're interested in that '50s-style crimefighter motif, you can't really go wrong.
Quick question - I'm wondering which series to start, and I have several to choose from.
They are:
DMZ
Scalped
The Boys
Criminal
Sleeper
Pride of Baghdad (not a series but still unsure)
Unknown Soldier
It's really just a monetary issue for the moment so I'll eventually get round to picking them all up, but I'm not sure which to go for at the moment. Narrowing it down to two would be a big help, and from there I'll go on to a mass series consumption spree until they're finished or I'm caught up. With regards to what I've read recently and enjoyed, here's a few:
Fables, Ultimate Spider-man, Invincible, The Walking Dead, Umbrella Academy, 100 Bullets (will/did she shoot him?), Preacher, Y: The Last Man, LoEG and All-Star Superman. I tend to prefer stories with big arcs and lots of questions/mystery throughout. Also, any that aren't on my list that you would recommend feel free to list. Merci beaucoup à l'avance
markini6 on
0
TexiKenDammit!That fish really got me!Registered Userregular
edited August 2009
Pick up Jack of Fables if you haven't. It's a good compliment to Fables, and it would help in understanding the Great Fables Crossover that will be out in trade soon. Also worth getting is the stand alone graphic novel Fables: 1001 Nights of Snowfall, which tells some stories of the main characters before they were invaded by the Empire.
Of those books you list, Scalped, Sleeper, and Criminal would be the top choices, probably in that order.
Pride of Baghdad is good as well, but that's just a one off story.
Unknown Soldier is recent and I haven't checked it out yet, The Boys is too much in love with making superheroes look bad and just being perverse for no other reason, and DMZ is just full of itself.
I was unsure about Jack of Fables, mainly because I didn't really care for him that much when he was in the main book. Is the series itself as good as Fables is?
markini6 on
0
TexiKenDammit!That fish really got me!Registered Userregular
edited August 2009
It is good. Jack is an asshole but it works with the stories, because the supporting cast is strong. The first trade should give you an indication of what the series is like.
Cheers for the advice. After reading All-star Superman I'm wondering what the best Superman stories are, any suggestions?
markini6 on
0
TexiKenDammit!That fish really got me!Registered Userregular
edited August 2009
Superman for All Seasons
Superman: Birthright
There are 6 trades of Superman stories from the early 2000's that is really good. They're in 1-6 order, #4 is called Condition Critical, #5 is President Lex.
Superman: Up, Up & Away!
Superman: Camelot Falls
Superman: The Legion of Super-Heroes (written by Geoff Johns drawn by Gary Frank)
Superman: Brainiac (same creative team as above)
Superman: New Krypton
Superman: The Coming of Atlas
TexiKen on
0
AriviaI Like A ChallengeEarth-1Registered Userregular
edited August 2009
I thought Superman: Secret Identity was great as someone who doesn't usually go for Krypton. It's basically the non-canonical alternative of a man named Clark Kent gaining powers from a meteorite in an America where Superman exists already as a cultural icon. It's very basic, very open, less superhero comic and more Great American Novel.
Arivia on
0
TexiKenDammit!That fish really got me!Registered Userregular
edited August 2009
Oh yes, that was excellent. One of the best stories I've ever read in any format. It really shows how someone in the real world would have to do all these extra things to keep his identity safe. Busiek's best Superman work to date.
It's just that that story is a what if?/elseworlds story, not part of the real Superman mythos.
Superman: Red Son is also decent, and the ending is really the best part of it. It's a what if Superman landed in the Soviet Union instead of Kansas.
TexiKen on
0
AriviaI Like A ChallengeEarth-1Registered Userregular
edited August 2009
I basically marathoned it all as a lend from a friend, and I stopped after the first issue and went "Do I want to keep reading this? There's no way the rest of this is going to be as good." And I went "Well, even if the rest is half as good it'll still be very awesome." And then I read the last issue and went "...wait. Did they seriously just do that in a superhero book? Did they seriously just do that in a Superman book? ...that couldn't have ended any other way. Even better than the first issue."
I have to agree, it stands up really well not just as a "comic" but as a text.
edit: shit, just reread the fourth issue and now I'm crying.
I need suggestions for comic books that are...
1) Set in a "real" Earthy type setting and actually shows the cities reaction. So while Fables is set in the "real" world, the series really bypasses their reaction.
2) Really grounded in the relationship between the hero, villain, and the city. Something more than "I'm a bad guy lol I do evil things".
3) Ideally is dealing with a small cast of characters.
Improvolone on
Voice actor for hire. My time is free if your project is!
I need suggestions for comic books that are...
1) Set in a "real" Earthy type setting and actually shows the cities reaction. So while Fables is set in the "real" world, the series really bypasses their reaction.
2) Really grounded in the relationship between the hero, villain, and the city. Something more than "I'm a bad guy lol I do evil things".
3) Ideally is dealing with a small cast of characters.
Astro City is pretty mindful of how the city as a whole and the average man on the street reacts to heroes, and even features a few stories that use the man on the street rather than the hero as the narrator. There's a large-ish cast of characters, but that's just because each story focuses on a different character. After that story is done, the character might appear again, but having read the story they first appeared in is not particularly important.
Cheers for the advice. After reading All-star Superman I'm wondering what the best Superman stories are, any suggestions?
I'll pretty much double TexiKen's list, but I wanted to point out that Superman: Up, Up, and Away! is pretty much Geoff Johns doing a Rebirth-style story with the Man of Steel, clearing up some loose ends and taking a lot of the continuity burden off of him. From that point on in TexiKen's list, it leads up to Brainiac and then the current New Krypton stuff going on in the books right now.
I actually came in here to suggest that the recommendations section in the OP be cleaned up a little bit, and that the Johns Superman stuff be added.
Cheers for the advice. After reading All-star Superman I'm wondering what the best Superman stories are, any suggestions?
I'll pretty much double TexiKen's list, but I wanted to point out that Superman: Up, Up, and Away! is pretty much Geoff Johns doing a Rebirth-style story with the Man of Steel, clearing up some loose ends and taking a lot of the continuity burden off of him. From that point on in TexiKen's list, it leads up to Brainiac and then the current New Krypton stuff going on in the books right now.
I actually came in here to suggest that the recommendations section in the OP be cleaned up a little bit, and that the Johns Superman stuff be added.
i would also recommend the amazing transformations of jimmy olsen trade and the daily planet trade. they're both collections of random issues. the jimmy olsen one is all silver age crazy-sauce, but features a lot of superman exasperatedly saving jimmy from disasters of his own making (frequent culprit- jimmy hates the dentist, but apparently loves candy as he has constant toothaches and often forces superman to act as a super-dentist). it's good fun.
the daily planet one is a good retrospective of superman's supporting cast, which i think is at least as good as batman's (in fact, i'd say that batman has the best rogue's gallery, but superman has the best friendly supporting cast). it's an especially good spotlight of perry white, an sadly underrated character in these j. jonah jameson-happy days. it also reveals how very, very, very little a woman like lois lane actually needed to do in order to become a star reporter.
it also features the one amazing transformation of jimmy olsen which somehow didn't make it into the other trade- the time jimmy became a transvestite and dated a mob boss. the mob boss is such a jealous freak that he actually has a man murdered when he won't stop bothering lady-jimmy. jimmy, typically, doesn't really give a shit.
Any suggestions for caped crusaders that the townsfolk just don't know anything about, going so far as to claim he doesn't even exist?
Batman: Year 100 is kind of like this. The government is actively pursuing him, and most of the people don't believe he exists or that he is some kind of beast monster. There's supplemental material in the trade that really adds to this.
I've started Grant Morrisson's run on New X-Men. So far so great!
I've also finished All-Star Batman & Robin, Vol. 1. That... was... not that great. I'm sure there's a good book hidden behind all this. Behind all the poor writing and the horrible character development for Batman. I don't mind having a Darker Knight, but this Miller's Batman (this pre-Dark Knight Returns Batman) is just annoying. He acts like an arrogant son of a ...
He acted a bit like one in The Dark Knight Returns but it was done so much better.
The fact that he says "the Goddamned Batman" and "Shut up" every five seconds makes him look like an arrogant teenager.
It's so sad, because beneath all this poor writing job, there's a good Dark Knight Returns hidden. Somewhere deep, but it's there. It can be found in some great lines and moments, but they are so few and so burried under all this mess. But it's there.
Then again, the question is: why did we need a prequel to TDKR in the first place?
ASBAR is supposed to be over the top and ridiculous
None of it is supposed to be taken seriously
For Christ's sake when Green Lantern shows up he has Robin paint the entire room yellow and then offers GL lemonade while insulting every member of the JLA
Posts
While not necessarily a main character, Soranik Natu in the Green Lantern Corps series is a pretty strong female character. You might enjoy reading GLC. Pretty much the entire book has been good, from the time of its relaunch until present.
In GLC there have been two major writers: Dave Gibbons and Peter Tomasi. Both have told some really good stories, and both have handled Natu very well. She's one of my favorite characters in the series. But like I said, she is not a main character. She is merely a part of a fairly large cast.
I'm fine with that, but I've never read GL (been more of a Marvel girl than a DC fan). Would I be fine starting with the recommended reading list in the GLC thread?
Just start with Green Lantern Corps: Recharge, and then the following Green Lantern Corps trades.
Recharge was the mini series that launched the ongoing GLC corps series.
The basic scenario going in is that Hal Jordan was bad for a long time, and he single-handedly destroyed the Corps with the power of Parallax, who is the avatar of fear.
Hal Jordan was redeemed and Recharge is the story of the rebuilding of the Corps. Many old members come back out of hiding, but many new members must be recruited to fill the ranks of the people that Jordan killed.
Soranik Natu, as I suggested, is one of the new recruits. She's a strong female character and she's a lot of fun to read about. But like I said also, she's part of a large cast, and her character is built up slowly over many issues.
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
This it?
https://twitter.com/Hooraydiation
I've seen Golden Apple on the show too.
There's gotta be some trades of this guy somewhere. Can someone point me in the right direction?
I'm going to pass on The Spirit. Thanks though.
you really shouldn't. the spirit is fucking fantastic, both the original will eisner stuff (there's a REASON the comic book version of the Oscars are called the Eisners) as well as the newer darwyn cooke stuff, and if you're interested in that '50s-style crimefighter motif, you can't really go wrong.
They are:
DMZ
Scalped
The Boys
Criminal
Sleeper
Pride of Baghdad (not a series but still unsure)
Unknown Soldier
It's really just a monetary issue for the moment so I'll eventually get round to picking them all up, but I'm not sure which to go for at the moment. Narrowing it down to two would be a big help, and from there I'll go on to a mass series consumption spree until they're finished or I'm caught up. With regards to what I've read recently and enjoyed, here's a few:
Fables, Ultimate Spider-man, Invincible, The Walking Dead, Umbrella Academy, 100 Bullets (will/did she shoot him?), Preacher, Y: The Last Man, LoEG and All-Star Superman. I tend to prefer stories with big arcs and lots of questions/mystery throughout. Also, any that aren't on my list that you would recommend feel free to list. Merci beaucoup à l'avance
Of those books you list, Scalped, Sleeper, and Criminal would be the top choices, probably in that order.
Pride of Baghdad is good as well, but that's just a one off story.
Unknown Soldier is recent and I haven't checked it out yet, The Boys is too much in love with making superheroes look bad and just being perverse for no other reason, and DMZ is just full of itself.
Superman: Birthright
There are 6 trades of Superman stories from the early 2000's that is really good. They're in 1-6 order, #4 is called Condition Critical, #5 is President Lex.
Superman: Up, Up & Away!
Superman: Camelot Falls
Superman: The Legion of Super-Heroes (written by Geoff Johns drawn by Gary Frank)
Superman: Brainiac (same creative team as above)
Superman: New Krypton
Superman: The Coming of Atlas
It's just that that story is a what if?/elseworlds story, not part of the real Superman mythos.
Superman: Red Son is also decent, and the ending is really the best part of it. It's a what if Superman landed in the Soviet Union instead of Kansas.
I have to agree, it stands up really well not just as a "comic" but as a text.
edit: shit, just reread the fourth issue and now I'm crying.
1) Set in a "real" Earthy type setting and actually shows the cities reaction. So while Fables is set in the "real" world, the series really bypasses their reaction.
2) Really grounded in the relationship between the hero, villain, and the city. Something more than "I'm a bad guy lol I do evil things".
3) Ideally is dealing with a small cast of characters.
Astro City is pretty mindful of how the city as a whole and the average man on the street reacts to heroes, and even features a few stories that use the man on the street rather than the hero as the narrator. There's a large-ish cast of characters, but that's just because each story focuses on a different character. After that story is done, the character might appear again, but having read the story they first appeared in is not particularly important.
https://twitter.com/Hooraydiation
I'll pretty much double TexiKen's list, but I wanted to point out that Superman: Up, Up, and Away! is pretty much Geoff Johns doing a Rebirth-style story with the Man of Steel, clearing up some loose ends and taking a lot of the continuity burden off of him. From that point on in TexiKen's list, it leads up to Brainiac and then the current New Krypton stuff going on in the books right now.
I actually came in here to suggest that the recommendations section in the OP be cleaned up a little bit, and that the Johns Superman stuff be added.
i would also recommend the amazing transformations of jimmy olsen trade and the daily planet trade. they're both collections of random issues. the jimmy olsen one is all silver age crazy-sauce, but features a lot of superman exasperatedly saving jimmy from disasters of his own making (frequent culprit- jimmy hates the dentist, but apparently loves candy as he has constant toothaches and often forces superman to act as a super-dentist). it's good fun.
the daily planet one is a good retrospective of superman's supporting cast, which i think is at least as good as batman's (in fact, i'd say that batman has the best rogue's gallery, but superman has the best friendly supporting cast). it's an especially good spotlight of perry white, an sadly underrated character in these j. jonah jameson-happy days. it also reveals how very, very, very little a woman like lois lane actually needed to do in order to become a star reporter.
it also features the one amazing transformation of jimmy olsen which somehow didn't make it into the other trade- the time jimmy became a transvestite and dated a mob boss. the mob boss is such a jealous freak that he actually has a man murdered when he won't stop bothering lady-jimmy. jimmy, typically, doesn't really give a shit.
Batman: Year 100 is kind of like this. The government is actively pursuing him, and most of the people don't believe he exists or that he is some kind of beast monster. There's supplemental material in the trade that really adds to this.
I've also finished All-Star Batman & Robin, Vol. 1. That... was... not that great. I'm sure there's a good book hidden behind all this. Behind all the poor writing and the horrible character development for Batman. I don't mind having a Darker Knight, but this Miller's Batman (this pre-Dark Knight Returns Batman) is just annoying. He acts like an arrogant son of a ...
He acted a bit like one in The Dark Knight Returns but it was done so much better.
The fact that he says "the Goddamned Batman" and "Shut up" every five seconds makes him look like an arrogant teenager.
It's so sad, because beneath all this poor writing job, there's a good Dark Knight Returns hidden. Somewhere deep, but it's there. It can be found in some great lines and moments, but they are so few and so burried under all this mess. But it's there.
Then again, the question is: why did we need a prequel to TDKR in the first place?
Oh Frank Miller, what have you become?
The writing is teeth-cringing.
If it's the best Bat-Book on the sheleves right now, how bad are the other Batman publications going on right now?
None of it is supposed to be taken seriously
For Christ's sake when Green Lantern shows up he has Robin paint the entire room yellow and then offers GL lemonade while insulting every member of the JLA