November 4, 2023

Welcome. This past Wednesday was not only NEW COMIC BOOK DAY, but it was also my official anniversary for collecting comics. I have been collecting comics for 43 years now. Sure there were stretches where I did not have much money and so I did not buy comics (I’m looking at you 1990s), but I never considered myself not a collector.

I remember staying over at a friends house over Halloween, reading a bunch of his own comics and deciding the next morning that I was going to collect comics too. He had a folder at Comic World in Dubuque and since my dad worked at John Deere and would commute daily, I would have him stop off monthly at Comic World and pick up my folder from Al Picker, the owner at the time.

Dad always gave me crap about how much money I was spending in my collection, but he never refused to pick them up for me. 43 years later, I am still picking up comics at Comic World, though Al Picker is gone from the store and it is no longer down on Central Ave.

Being the fifth week of a month, there were not as many comics this week as usual.

This week’s books:

Planetary #6. “It’s a Strange World” Written by Warren Ellis and drawn by John Cassaday. I have been pushing this book off lately while doing Omega and Howard the Duck. I have enjoyed this book so far, so it will be nice to get back into it.

Spider-Boy #1. Written by Dan Slott and art by Paco Medina. The cover art was from Humberto Ramos and Edgar Delgado. The fun new book featuring the mysterious Spider-Boy, who claims to be Spider-Man’s sidekick though no one else remembers anything about him. At this point, I find Spider-Boy interesting enough to be curious.

Ultimate Universe #1. Written by Jonathan Hickman and art by Stefano Caselli. Bryan Hitch and Alec Sinclair did the art for the cover. The Ultimate universe is being reborn with a group of characters that are somewhat like the ones we know. This has an Ultimate Thor, Ultimate Iron Man, Ultimate Doom, Ultimate Sif, along with some others. I am giving this a try, but I have never been a big fan of those books outside of general continuity in Marvel.

Unnatural Order #1. Written by Christopher Yost and featuring art by Val Rodrigues. This was on sale at Comic World for $0.25. That was why I picked it up. I read part of it. It was not for me. It felt like a D & D campaign.

Blood Commandment #1. Part 1: “Flesh.” Written and drawn by Szymon Kudranski. I picked this up because of Kudranski. He was the creator behind Something Epic which has been one of my favorite books. Blood Commandment started off very strong too with a very intriguing character named Ezra, whose relationship with his son Wil was front and center even though there was a secret in Ezra’s life. Art is absolutely gorgeous.

Avengers #7. “Twilight Dreaming” Part One. Written by Jed MacKay and drawn by C.F. Villa. Stuart Immonen did the cover art. A new arc begins for the Avengers and this started really dark. I was not sure what was happening as characters were being killed. Then, it revealed the truth. Nightmare. Looking good.

White Widow #1. Written by Sarah Gaily and art by Alessandro Miracolo. Cover art was by David Marquez & Rachelle Rosenberg. Yelena BeLova is featured in this new series. This was okay. I may not have loved it, but I did think it was fine. May check out number two just to see how it progresses.

X-Men #28. “Jail Break.” Written by Gerry Duggan and penciled by Joshua Cassara. Firestar and her undercover work is having some success as she helped Juggernaut escape and passed some vital info to the X-Men. Her time inside Orchis may be coming to an end soo though. Not sure what is happening with Sunfire, but… was that Apocalypse?

Doctor Strange #9. “Nebraska Pt. 1” Written by Jed MacKay and with art by Pasqual Ferry. Alex Ross did the cover art. The battle between Stephen Strange and General Strange intensifies and there is a little baby girl?

Scarlet Witch #10. Written by Steve Orlando and art by Sara Pichelli. This is the last issue of this series which I have been enjoying. I am sad to see it go, although apparently there is a new series coming next year called Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver. Here Wanda takes on Hexfinder, the killer of witches.

Ghostlore #6. Written by Cullen Bunn and illustrated by Leomacs. Cover art by Reiko Murakami and Jakub Rebelka. Jakub Rebelka illustrated a few pages in the center of the story when one of the ghosts was telling his story to Lucas as he is in search for his daughter.

It’s Jeff: The Jeff-Verse #1. Written by Kelly Thompson and drawn by Gurihiru. The short stories with the shark Jeff are back. That’s about all I have to say.