What Are You Reading?

[LumRanmaYasha]

Recently I bought the twelfth omnibus edition of Vagabond for half-off the list price at the bookstore I frequent. I just found out today that wasn't supposed to even be out until late April.

This isn't the first time I've bought a new manga volume weeks before it's intended release date at that store, but a whole three months ahead? I honestly have no idea how they've even been getting a hold of those copies that far ahead, much less how they are able to sell them that far ahead of the release date at all. It's a good deal for me, but it really is quite bizarre.

[gunswordfist]

i bet those comic books "just fell off of a truck".

[Markness]

Recca is a decent manga. For me it never quite reached the heights of greatness, though.

In terms of manga, what kinds of stuff do you usually prefer?

Anyways, as for comics, I know next to nothing about Marvel or DC either, but Knightfall, which I'm reading right now, is from the 90's and in TPB,  and so far it's amazing.

It has just occurred to me that I have NEVER seen Bane done this well in any adaptation, not even in the animated series. I liked him well enough in other mediums, but this is the first time he's ever truly impressed me as a villain.

Partly why I haven't read Recca yet is because I prefer reading physical copies of manga. I'll do online reading but only for keeping up with new chapters for ongoing series like Nanatsu no Taizai and unlicensed series like Medaka Box. I'll probably purchase a chunk of Recca off eBay or some other place since it's hard finding the volumes in stores.

As far as manga goes, I tend to read 90s shounen and seinen the most. I can go from reading something like Houshin Engi one read through to Oh My Goddess! the next.

Knightfall sounds cool. I'll put it on my stuff to look for list.

[Avaitor]

I haven't had too much time to red comics or manga, but I should dig through the third Monster omnibus soon, and I've been meaning to pick up the OTGW prequel book as well.

[LumRanmaYasha]

After Weekly Manga Recap announced on Wednesday that their next review was going to be Mx0, I decided I might as well finally check it out. It didn't take me that long, so I also decided I should finally finish reading Psyren too, so now I've finally read both of the most commonly lauded 00's battle shonen cult hits. I enjoyed both series, though I didn't really find them necessarily fresh compared to most battle shonen. Neither endeared me to their story or characters on a particularly strong level, but for the most part I thought both were well written in what they presented and were fun reads. Between the two I'd say I liked Mx0 a bit more mainly because though there wasn't much story to it I liked how it focused more on low-key situations based in it's school setting without any real villains or the common battle-shonen "fighting lots of enemies of increasing difficultly" arc structure and had a good sense of humor, while I felt Psyren sort of dropped a lot of it's more intriguing elements after the person behind Nemesis Q was revealed and became a more straightforward battle shonen story with a few elements that, because it was forced to end prematurely, it wasn't able to execute as effectively as I'd have liked to see. I also didn't really care for Psyren's final arc, especially the whole plot twist with Mithra which seemed to come out of nowhere, but I do think that considering the circumstances the mangaka did a commendable job of tying things up the best he could to give readers a satisfying ending. Overall, I thought both were enjoyable series, but have to admit that, considering their reputations and strong cult followings, they didn't live up to expectations for me, and I didn't find them much more interesting and unique compared to other contemporary above average battle shonen. I will say that I do look more forward to seeing where Kagamigami goes after reading Psyren, though, because the mangaka really does have the talent to tell a very fun and well-written shonen series, and I hope he can find more success with his new work. 

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

It's been so long since I read Mx0, and I never got that far into Psyren, but eventually I'll circle back around to both of these manga. I have a massive backlog, though.

[LumRanmaYasha]

They don't strike me as series that you'd really care for based on your opinions on a few contemporary battle shonen manga, but I do think they are worth giving a try at some point. 

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

I liked Mx0 just fine when I first read it (and I did on fact complete it), but my tastes have changed a lot since then, so I'll have to see how it holds up. As for Psyren, I liked the little that I read of it. I wouldn't call it great, by any stretch, but certainly enjoyable.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Yep, the end of Psyren was forced. The last arc was unfortunately not allowed any room to breathe, but he did what he could to finish it right.

Mx0 was simply fun. It wasn't the most inventive thing ever, but it had a lot of fun with itself and its world, and for that I like it. It's a shame it ended when it did, because I think it could have really been great if given time to build up, but as it is it's a pretty fun story.

[Markness]

I initially ignored Psyren and Mx0 but with all this talk about them, I'll add them to my list of stuff to check out. It'll be a while before I get to them, though, as I need to finish reading Medaka Box and I am going to order a set of Flame of Recca volumes so my plate will be full until then.

I looked through the first volume of X-Men's Onslaught Saga and it looked so damn good that I purchased it in a heart beat. It's taking me back to the times I played the X-Men games on my Sega Genesis and watched the cartoon series. Unfortunately, I never knew about the comics since none of my friends read any nor did my family buy any for me.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

I went to the bookstore and they were out of KnightQuest copies. I could just buy the E-book version, but I really want to collect the TPBs for this story-line.

In the Meantime I'm reading the E-book version of The Long Halloween. I know that Jeph Loeb isn't well liked for butchering the Marvel TV shows these days, but I've heard that some of his DC work from earlier in his career is actually quite good. The premise for this story intrigued me well enough, so I've decided to give it a shot.

[gunswordfist]

it's probably his best work.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Didn't he do one of the Hush story-lines? I always thought that was your favorite Batman comic.

[Foggle]

Jeph Loeb's earlier DC work is pretty good, yeah.

[gunswordfist]

i like hush more than most but tlh and its sequel are better, from what i remember.

my favorite batman comics are the dark knight returns, heart of hush (paul dini wrote it and its easily hush's best comic) and lovers & madmen.