What I’m Getting Wednesday August 4

This is the first time in a year that I’m only writing one column regarding what is coming out later in the week. As some of you know I had a column at my friend’s store picking the best and sometimes most hyped new releases of the week. I would pick books that I personally wasn’t buying because of the high degree of interest, worse I often ended up buying a few extra books because I would get myself more interested in what might be coming out. I hate talking myself into stuff.

This week brings a new action figure, which my wife calls dolls, and it is the new Batgirl. I restrict myself to just DC characters and skip plenty of those as I have a lot of figures already, but the new Batgirl is pretty cool and I’m happy to add her to my collection.

The new books this week:

Batman Odyssey #2 (of 6): The beautiful art but confusing Batman story by the great Neal Adams. I wish DC had hired a writer to work with Neal because I had to see Neal get tarnished in any way with this project. My hope is the book will make more sense plot wise as we go along. The art is still phenomenal; I love Neal’s art and keep wishing DC will do an Absolute version of some of his stuff. I’m also waiting for the other volumes of Neal’s other DC stuff, especially the Spectre work.

Fogtown OGN is another Vertigo crime novel. I hope this program is successful because while these books are not all great, everyone so far has been very entertaining and worth the bang for the buck. $20 for a complete story that is well over a hundred pages with no ads is a heck of a lot better than a mini-series that you read over months filled with ads and is often less pages per dollar then these books.

Superman The Last Family of Krypton #1 (of 3) is an Elseworlds type book and who knows maybe DC is using the name again. Three oversized issues with the concept the Kal-El showed up on earth with his parents by Cary Bates. It has been a long time since I have read Cary’s work and I’m curious to see if his work still makes the grade. Many older writers have come back and have been unable to update their writing style and failed, but others have succeeded.

Daredevil Black and White #1 is out. I like the character Daredevil and I’m a sucker for a one shot with a good gimmick and the black and white idea is a good one for DD. I hope they have crafted some good short stories.

Batman Confidential #47 continuing the Kevin Van Hook and Tom Mandrake story of Batman and Superman versus werewolves, vampires and other things that go bump in the night. I think I’m ready to drop this book and I believe DC is canceling the title soon anyway. Overall it has been a good series but I have reached a point where I want more stories in continuity.

Brightest Day #7 is on the stands and this is a DCU series that I’m finding to be very enjoyable. I like the characters it is about, I enjoy as the mysteries unfold and I’m curious to see where we end up at the end of the day.

Kill Shakespeare #4 hits the stands. My lack of Shakespearian knowledge keeps me from embracing this story more, but I believe Gwen has been enjoying this series a lot.

Shadowland #2 (of 5) is one of those books I’m letting myself be sucked into just because I want to see how badly Marvel is going to screw this up. It reminds me of the Rise of Arsenal and Fall of Green Arrow stuff, advertised as something and then is something else. What is the point of having DD go to the dark side if it is some sort of demon possession that has made him that way?

Doom Patrol #13 is the next issue in a series I dropped for a month and then picked up the issue I missed. Giffen is taking this group down a strange road and utilizing some of Grant’s stuff with the group from many moons ago. This group was always meant to be something other than a straight super hero book and I’m enjoying the weirdness.

Magnus Robot Fighter #1 from Dark Horse and Jim Shooter should be good. Shooter did a nice job reintroducing Dr. Solar and I have faith that Magnus should be a good start also. I wonder if Dark Horse can generate a buzz on these books and be willing to support them long enough to generate an audience.

Irredeemable #16 hits the stands and Peter Krause is back as the artist, which is a very good thing in my mind. I’m still not sold on this being an unlimited series. I believe this type of story needs a definitive ending because if the Plutonian continues to destroy the Earth the book ends, if the good guys take out the Plutonian the series ends. The other choice is a never ending battle between the Plutonian and the Paradigm which leads to the same type of stagnation we have in Marvel and DC books.

Hawkeye and Mockingbird #3 is out. It is funny that this series seems to come out really fast, but I’m sure it is just monthly. This series fits into the category of a good book and a fun read, but not one I’m anticipating, so when it comes out it feels like it is coming out fast.

Captain America #608 will show up and will Bucky show up. This series is showing Bucky as an inept Captain America as Steve and Natasha had to pull Bucky’s a** out of the fire last issue. We are working up to Bucky going on trial for what he was caused to do when under the influence of the bad guy and it just seems to me that Bucky is a highly flawed Captain America.

Two monkey books from Marvel with Hit Monkey #2 (of 3) and Gorilla Man #2 (of 3) hitting the stands. Both books are goofy fun just in vastly different ways. Did Marvel do this on purpose or is it coincidence that Marvel is building up their simian characters at the same time. It looks like monkey see, monkey do all over again, each book aping the other.

The rest of the list is IZombie #4 (fun series), Jonah Hex #58 (love the one and done format), JSA All Stars #9 (still not 100% sold on this series), Rebels #19 (great under the radar book), Red Hood Lost Days #3 (of 6) (good so far), Red Robin #15 (solid and enjoyable), Secret Six #24 (I hope Gail is back), Sweet Tooth #12 (moving up the charts), Baltimore Plague Ships #1 (new Mignola series), Hellboy The Storm #2 (of 3) and Crossed Family Values #3 (of 6) (which is fun in a over the top end of the world way, but an unlimited series in the future, I don’t know about that).

It should be a good week to start out August as we head into the countdown to my daughter Jamie’s wedding. Feel free to send money and or gifts and maybe one day we will get her writing on the blog as we had advertised a while ago.