What Are You Reading?

[Pharass]

Recently I've read:

100 Bullets vol 3
Scalped vol 2
The Goon vol 1
And The Ballad of the Salt Sea

There's not much I can say about either Bullets or Scalped, they continue to impress me deeply both when it comes to art and storytelling, so instead I'm going to talk a bit about the other two.

The Goon is a comic that I've been curious about for quite sometime and having finally read the first volume I can only say that it's one of the funniest comics I've read in a long time. It's not often that I actually laugh out loud when reading a comic, even if I find it funny, but I did when I read this one.

The Ballad of the Salt Sea is, of course, one of the all-time classics; introducing Hugo Pratt's most famous character, Corto Maltese. This is an excellent adventure-story filled with interesting, larger-than-life characters. It's available in English again in the first time since forever, so I definitely recommend you guys pick it up if you get the chance. My only complaint is that my copy seemed to have a few errors/typos in it. For example: "Stupid cannibal, if he'd bee a little more careful, we could've been friends." Yeah, pretty sure there's an "n" missing there. Still, it's nothing that affects the quality of Pratt's artistic and storytelling abilities, which are those of a master.

[gunswordfist]

100 Bullets is my all time favorite comic book series. I want to see it get animated.

Paraphasing:

Deadpool (to The Punisher): You want to pee on him, don't you?

Spider-Man: That is NOT going to happen.

I was laughing randomly just thinking about that. That was from Deadpool Suicide Kings which I read Friday night. Decent comic book with a few good laughs.

[Pharass]

100 Bullets is my all time favorite comic book series. I want to see it get animated.

An animated series would be great. Plus, I think Risso's art would take the step from comics to animation really well, without many changes to it.

[gunswordfist]

I wish we got more non-superhero animation adaptations of comic books.

[Pharass]

I wish we got more non-superhero animation adaptations of comic books.

You and me both.

[gunswordfist]

Friday:

Green Arrow Quiver- Pretty elaborate Green Arrow resurrection story and yes it had a lot of dialogue. My favorite out of the 3.

Saturday:

Green Arrow Archer's Quest- Oliver travels around with his son. It was already.

Green Arrow City Walls: OK, again with the demons? Why do they think Queen should be fighting so many demons? Mia's annoying as hell and they waste The Riddler's appearance in the book. Overall...it was a decent book.

And that's me continuing the recommended Green Arrow stories. I'm liking the character more and more.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

So, I met up with an old friend of mine and he loaned me the 6 issues of Iron Man: Extremis, since he used to collect a lot of comics being released as individual issues. Its nice that this story doesn't really expect you to have any real knowledge of the extended Universe of Marvel or even common Iron Man lore, as I was able to follow the story quite well. The art-work was a bit too realistic looking, for my liking, but I can tell that a lot of effort went into it and I suppose it does look really good, its just not my cup of tea, though. I felt that the story was rather interesting, but I found the last 2 issues to be incredibly rushed, and Iron Man's solution to his problem was underwhelmingly anticlimactic, IMO. Still, it was interesting enough for a quick read-through. I'll take recommendations for other Iron Man stories, though, and I'll see if my friend has any of them, as I remember him having quite a collection of comics (at least from my perspective), and he told me that he has still kept most of them, though not all of them are in great condition except for his favorites (they are all readable, though, of course).

[Avaitor]

This is perfect time to read Extremis, since that's going to be the basis for a big chunk of Iron Man 3.

Oh, one of my favorite Iron Man storylines is the Dragon Seed saga. It's a solid introduction to the Mandarin for you, and even has Fin Fang Foo. You already know Tony Stark/IM and Brody, so you should be good.

[gunswordfist]

This is perfect time to read Extremis, since that's going to be the basis for a big chunk of Iron Man 3.

Oh, one of my favorite Iron Man storylines is the Dragon Seed saga. It's a solid introduction to the Mandarin for you, and even has Fin Fang Foo. You already know Tony Stark/IM and Brody, so you should be good.

Ohhh, the dragon. And I'm surprised that they are actually going to have some Extremis influence in the next film just like some article wanted.

Anyway, I recommend....hmmm, Invincible Iron Man Omnibus vol. 1. It's after Extremis based off of what I just read. What makes it more interesting is it's basically a sequel to the first movie. You know how they sometimes make comics influenced by what's happening in the movies (Thor The Mighty Avenger, The Man Who Laughs). Anyway, the first half is that and it's a good story and easy to jump into. I would know, I've never read an Iron Man comic before. The 2nd half, IGNORE. Long story short, Iron Man is chased by a Norman Osborn who is head of national security after killing aliens and has red, white and blue Iron Man armor called Iron Patriot. It's stupider tha it sounds.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

After reading it, I can see that the first 2 films took at least a little bit of influence from Extremis with some of their elements. The first movie used the origin story from Extremis and the 2nd movie sort of took the idea of something causing Tony to slowly die which forced him to come up with a solution that also ended up being a major upgrade for him. It looks like the 3rd movie is supposed to base a lot more of itself on the Extremis plot-line, but obviously its still going to have to be quite different since it also has the Mandarin in it. I don't know who he is, and after reading the Extremis arc I still don't, because he's not in it. That makes it interesting to see how this movie will incorporate that particular villain into this plot-line.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Unfortunately my friend didn't have the Iron Man story that Avaitor was talking about in his collection, but to my delight he DID have Infinity Gauntlet, which he gladly loaned to me. I can't wait to read it. The premise sounds pretty epic.

[Avaitor]

Now THAT's perfect reading for Avengers 2.

[gunswordfist]

After reading it, I can see that the first 2 films took at least a little bit of influence from Extremis with some of their elements. The first movie used the origin story from Extremis and the 2nd movie sort of took the idea of something causing Tony to slowly die which forced him to come up with a solution that also ended up being a major upgrade for him. It looks like the 3rd movie is supposed to base a lot more of itself on the Extremis plot-line, but obviously its still going to have to be quite different since it also has the Mandarin in it. I don't know who he is, and after reading the Extremis arc I still don't, because he's not in it. That makes it interesting to see how this movie will incorporate that particular villain into this plot-line.

Hmm, I wanted The Mandarin in the story instead of it being about Extremis...and funny enough, it's going to have both.

[Pharass]

The last comics I've read are both manga: Akira vol 1 and Banana Fish vol 5.
Considering what a classic of the medium Akira is, I'm actually a bit ashamed to admit that I haven't got around to read it sooner; especially considering that I loved the movie when I was twelve. The first volume completely lived up to my expectations: Gorgeous artwork that reminded me of Moebius and an exciting storyline, that already differs in many ways from it's adaption (no wonder seeing as how the movie came out before the manga was finished, akin to Nausica? of the Valley of the Wind) while still having a familiar feel to it.

Banana Fish keeps holding the same high quality as before with the fifth volume offering new characters and new plot-twists. I especially liked the dinner-scene between Ash and Dino, which is loaded with polite, controlled menace. Of course, I've always been a sucker for scenes in which the hero and villain chats amiably while planning to outwit/kill each other, so there's that.

Did I mention that the volume 5 has one of the best cliffhangers I've seen in a manga?

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

So, I'm exactly half-way through the Infinity Gauntlet story-arc, and all of the superheroes are about to go to War with Thanos and most of them will probably be obliterated in the process.

Adam Warlock is one deceptive bastard....

The last comics I've read are both manga: Akira vol 1 and Banana Fish vol 5.
Considering what a classic of the medium Akira is, I'm actually a bit ashamed to admit that I haven't got around to read it sooner; especially considering that I loved the movie when I was twelve. The first volume completely lived up to my expectations: Gorgeous artwork that reminded me of Moebius and an exciting storyline, that already differs in many ways from it's adaption (no wonder seeing as how the movie came out before the manga was finished, akin to Nausica? of the Valley of the Wind) while still having a familiar feel to it.

I've been meaning to read the manga, one of these days. Those volumes look enormous, though. I wonder how much the whole set would cost me.