Sluggo Saturday #81.
AND THE SLUGGO
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I’m a difficult person to work with.
Mike: “I understand this new Dungeons & Dragons comic is actually supposed to be pretty good.”
Employee Aaron: “Yeah, it really was.”
M: “So are there any gelatinous cubes?”
EA: “Sorry, Mike, but no.”
M: “How ’bout displacer beasts? At least one?”
EA: “Not one.”
M: “Okay, fine…mind flayers?”
EA: “No.”
M: “Beholders. There has to be a Beholder in this comic.”
EA: “There sure isn’t.”
M: “This is a Dungeons & Dragons comic, right?”
EA: “Right.”
M: “Just checking. Is there any point where a character has to save vs. petrification?”
EA: “What? No, of course not.”
M: “Are there any instances of a gnome using his infravision?”
EA: “None noted.”
M: “Are there any bards?”
EA: “Are there ever any bards?”
M: “Point taken. …Does anyone detect traps?”
EA: “Nope.”
M: “Does a magic user gather material components in order to cast Magic Mouth?”
EA: “Not that I noticed.”
M: “Does a thief manage to do quadruple damage on anyone using a sneak backstab attack?”
EA: “Not once, no.”
M: “Does anyone, at any time, use a ten foot pole?”
EA: “No.”
M: “Are there any morale checks made to see if a character’s followers desert or not?”
EA: “…What?”
M: “Are any limbs severed as the result of rolling a natural 20 during a sword attack?”
EA: “How would that even work in a comic?”
M: “So does a character tell another character ‘I do not want to be in an adventuring party with you, as I am Lawful Good, and you are Neutral Evil?'”
EA: “That’s not something that happens, no.”
M: “Does anyone put on a cursed ring and suddenly exclaim ‘oh no, I have suffered an irreversible loss of three points of Constitution?'”
EA: “I can safely say this didn’t happen.”
M: “Is there any kind of kobold attack?”
EA: “No….”
M: “Does anyone shout to his comrades ‘this creature can only use his ranged attack once every five rounds — let’s go!’ at any time during a battle?”
EA: “No.”
M: “Does any character have his or her soul cast into The Void as a result of drawing from a Deck of Many Things?”
EA: “Uh-uh.”
M: “This is going nowhere. Let’s go back to the basics. …Is there a dungeon in this comic?”
EA: “Yes!”
M: “Now we’re onto something. Is there a dragon?”
EA: “Well, not exactly.”
M: “Oh, so there’s, like, a wyvern.”
EA: “No, no…there’s a dragonkin in the story. Well, maybe, he kind of looks like one…sorta dragony.”
M: “A dragonkin. What’s that?”
EA: “A half-human/half-dragon. You can play as one in D&D.”
M: “No, I’m sorry, no player-character monsters in my campaign.”
EA: “Now, Mike, a couple of these things you’re asking about were in the #0 issue.”
M: “I’m going to need all of these things in every issue.”
A swirling whirlpool of nerdiness, slowly dragging us in.
Here’s some follow-up to this entry about sorting my Superman comics, about which Tom Spurgeon said “isn’t for anyone,” and man, ain’t that the truth. That was a weird, obsessive thing for me to do, wasn’t it? Ah, well. ‘Course, that’s not going to stop me from doing it again, because some of you had questions:
- Chris McAree asks
“I was wondering what you, or any of the other readers of this blog do when a box early in the alphabet becomes overfull? When your Avengers box can finally hold no more do you start a brand new box after finally getting those ten missing issues from the Roger Stern run, or carefully and meticulously move the last ten issues from box ‘A’ into box ‘B’, box ‘B’ into box ‘B2,’ (cause god knows there are a lot of Batman issues out there!) and so on until you have wasted a couple of hours a finally reached box ‘Z is for Zatanna?’”
Well, my collection is sorted out, more or less, like this: several long boxes divided up by company, so I have a bunch of DC long boxes, about half as many Marvel boxes, a Gladstone/Gemstone box for all those EC reprints, a bunch of Misc. Indie boxes with the books ordered by company and then by title within, and so on. And then I have a bunch of short boxes sorted out by individual titles and/or franchises, like a couple of boxes for Justice League stuff, a Groo box, Swamp Thing boxes, etc. If one of those boxes starts overflowing, like the Justice League box, I start filing them into an overflow box shared by two or three titles that are also overflowing, until I get around to making a new box for that title.
This, I think, makes it a little easier to add boxes when you need to expand, since you’re not shifting comics through the entire collection, but just through the section of the collection you need to open up some space in. …I have no idea if any of that made sense.
- Longtime site reader “O” the Humanatee! has a couple of questions:
“…When sorting alphabetically, does one use the common-sense title (say, Spider-Man rather than Amazing Spider-Man), the full title as it reads on the cover, or the title shown in the indicia? Should you group all titles starring a character together? Surely, it is an abomination against God to put Detective before Defenders just so you can group it with other Batman titles! Are you going to put Action in among your Lex Luthor comics?
And what should I do when the title changes mid-numbering? What do I do with ‘Tales of the Legion of Super-Heroes’ and ‘The New Teen Titans’? What, I beg of you? WHAT?”
Usually I go by the title on the front cover, because I’m going to remember that more easily than the official title on the indicia. And, as I said in the response to the first question, I have some franchises lumped together in their own separate boxes…so all my Batman books are separated out, filed together alphabetically. (And before you ask, Superman/Batman is filed with my Superman comics.) (In the Superman “specials/annuals/minis” boxes, which come after the post-Crisis series boxes, because I don’t have enough Superman/Batman to justify a box just for it, oh God, I’m doing it again.)
When a series undergoes a minor title change while keeping the numbering, I generally just keep filing later issues as if nothing happened, which is exactly what I did with your Tales of the New Teen Titans/Legion of Super-Heroes examples (and which also answers Thwacko’s later question about Peter Parker/The Spectacular Spider-Man). Plus, in both cases, I have Titans and Legion in their own boxes.
- Anonymous took advantage of my triangle numbers category and commented
“I looked at the Nov 2008 post about Superman triangle numbering, and the post included a comment about the Legion of Super-Heroes’ triangle numbering, saying something along the lines of ‘Remember when the Legion could support two monthly books?’ Without commenting on how successful the current Legion venture is, funny how the market actually IS currently supporting two Legion books.”
That’s true, it is, but every time they relaunch the Legion franchise, it seems like there’s a brief surge of interest at first…and then it goes back down to what it was selling before, or a little less. The current titles are selling for us at what is about the lower edge of “mid-range” — not a best-seller, like Morrison’s Batman stuff, but not at the “why did they bother” range, like the dozen or so minis companies tying into forthcoming movies. Anyway, when I wrote that old post, that was more or less true, but the push given the Legion by the Final Crisis crossover, and the additional anticipated sales goose of the return of 1) the original continuity Legion, more or less, I think, and 2) old Legion scribe Paul Levitz returning as writer probably encouraged DC to take a chance with a second Legion book. But, given that one of the books is named Adventure, if the Legion thing there doesn’t work out, they can always replace it with a new lead without having to cancel it.
- Michael G. notes
“I empathize. Have you ever tried shelving Acme Novelty Library? The first 15 issues are all out of order and most of them won’t fit in the same box!”
Ah, yes, those things. I have a pretty good-sized bookcase with a shelf large enough to hold even the tallest Acme volume, so I just have all of them together on that one shelf. It’ll do, it’ll do.
Woo boy. Here, after all that, let’s look, courtesy ProgRuin fan Todd, at some footage of the Sega Genesis Swamp Thing game prototype being demonstrated.
And, in other Swamp Thing news, Gail Simone describes her awesome, but ultimately not used, series pitch for the big green guy.
Someone ask Geoff Johns to bring back that Qwardian in the derby hat.
How evil is Green Lantern’s arch nemesis Sinestro? Why, he’s so evil, he’s coming in a very solid second, just behind Gypo-Bax, in the Most Evil Citizen of Qward popularity contest:
I do have to admit that the very idea of Sinestro desperately trying to win a popularity contest tickles me. I can just picture Sinestro handpainting a bunch of “VOTE SIN” construction paper signs and hanging them around the school. But then again, the very idea of Sinestro fretting about a contest like this, while appearing a bit silly to adults, would probably resonate with the school-age children this comic was aimed at.
But seriously, This Guy:
…he’s like the Qward Dimension Evil Anti-Matter Duplicate of Doiby Dickles.
And that he’s Sinestro’s “campaign manager” is a hoot, too. You know Sinestro didn’t hire the guy, that he just kinda declared himself Sinestro’s campaign manager, and Sinestro simply can’t shake him off.
…
Oh, speaking of Green Lantern, I guess there’s a trailer out for the movie.
images from Green Lantern #15 (Sept 1962) by John Broome, Gil Kane and Joe Giella
In which I tell you more about how I sort out my Superman comics than you ever wanted to know.
So thanks to pal Nat for dropping by yesterday’s post, being a good sport, and laying down some Peanuts knowledge re: the production of those Charlie Brown ‘Cyclopedias. If you missed that comment, go back and check it out. Thanks, Nat!
Another comment, from reader “Masonic Youth” (good nickname!) mentioned a book I hadn’t heard of before, called Will Eisner’s Gleeful Guide to Living with Astrology, a picture of which you can find on this Amazon listing. I didn’t find a whole lot of information about it via the Googling, though Gary Groth describes the book as “satirical” in this appreciation of Eisner’s work. Would kind of like to see a copy of this…or maybe Mr. (or “Ms.” or “Mrs.” — I shouldn’t presume) M. Youth, who has a copy, would be nice enough to give us a brief description of the book. (You can see images and descriptions of some of the other books in this series…but not the astrology one…on this page under “Humor.”)
Boy, that was a whole lot of links squeezed into a small space. Let me try to talk about something that doesn’t involve linking anything. Well, maybe one thing.
So, on Monday, I was recovering from some follow-up root canal business, and I decided to sort through and put away some comics that’d been piling up in the “Hey, Mike, log these and sort them into your Vast Comic Archives someday” boxes that occupy a corner of the bedroom. I’ve actually been doing this on and off as I’ve been finding the time over the last few weeks, putting away some Hulks here, some Justice Leagues there…and finally, I decided to tackle the Superman books.
Now, here’s the thing about the Superman books, particularly the (for the nerdy) post-Crisis (or for the non-nerdy) mid-1980s and forward run of the series: as some of you may know, the three, sometimes four, and very briefly five ongoing Superman series had “triangle numbers” on the covers, a separate numbering system (presented within a little triangle shape also bearing the year, hence the name) indicating what order the comics should be read in. This ran for little over a decade, starting in the early ’90s and running ’til the early 2000s (and popping up again briefly in the last couple of years). So, those comics I have sorted in triangle-number order, making for ease of rereading in all this copious free time I have to reread long runs of my old comic books.
In addition, at some point during the ’90s, back when I was still young and full of hope, I decided to “chronologically” sort the post-Crisis, pre-triangle number issues as well, even though at that time the books weren’t quite as intertwined as they would be later. And if that weren’t enough, even after the triangle numbers ended, I continued sorting the Superman books into the boxes in chronological order. Because I’m crazy.
Anyway, I realized I was, ahem, a couple of years behind in getting the books sorted into the proper boxes, so without doing a little research I wouldn’t be able to sort out the Superman books in exact order. Oh, sure, I could do them by month, putting all the May ’09 books together and so on, but I wouldn’t know for sure if the May ’09 Action Comics came before the May ’09 Superman comic or not, without having to pop ’em all out of the bags to check the “coming soon/next week/next issue” box, and who’s got that kind of time?
As you may be able to tell, this is stupid. Sure, it made sense when the multiple Superman series were effectively a weekly serial, and you had to read them in a certain order, but nowadays, with one Superman book actually featuring Lex Luthor with a Jimmy Olsen back-up and is totally awesome, and the other Superman book featuring Superman walking across the country and being a smug asshole to the locals, and never the twain shall meet, the need for maintaining the exact release/reading order of the various series as they related to each other is hardly necessary.
Just so you know, I am aware of how obsessive-compulsive this all sounds. Thought I should mention that, the further along into this I get.
But I decided just to make the cut-off issue for this chronological sorting Action Comics #800 (April 2003). There are a few inter-series storylines past that, but I figured that was far enough beyond the constant intertwining of the series to allow for splitting the titles back up into their individual runs without causing too much inconvenience when I’m in my 90s and I decide I want to reread all my Superman comics. Plus, given how often I seem to be able to put comics away at home, I no longer need the additional time-sink of sorting the damned things chronologically. “Title” and “issue number” are enough, thank you.
I pulled myself back from the brink. There’s a happy ending after all! I’m no longer obsessed about comics, he said in his nearly seven-year-old daily-updated comics blog.
In case you didn’t get enough Superman triangle-number talk, and boy, I’m sure you didn’t, I actually made a category for it so you can see what I said about these things the last time DC tried to implement them.
And here’s where I find out how many astrologers I have as readers.
So pal Dorian gave me this book over the weekend:
It’s volume 8 of Charlie Brown’s ‘Cyclopedia (1980), covering stars, planets, and plants, too, for some reason. It’s a collection of science facts accompanied by appropriate Peanuts strips and various illustrations with the Peanuts gang doing things of varying scientific value. You can read more about this series at pal Nat’s site in this entry specifically about the set this book is from, and this series, which was the actual source material from which the ‘Cyclopedia series drew.
Nat notes that some of the strips had their dialogue changed to more closely fit the material at hand, though it looks like some of the spot illustrations of the Peanuts gang were either cobbled together from various sources, sometimes over backgrounds obviously done specifically for the book (like a two page spread of various characters standing along a pier stretching out over a polluted lake…it almost looks like the characters were pasted into the image), or maybe even drawn specifically for the books, perhaps by Schulz, or more likely by studio artists. I have no idea, and I hereby invoke the name of pal Nat to shed some light on this if he’d be kind enough to do so, should he happen to drop by the comments.
In this illustration from the book, Linus reveals his secret hippie leanings:
This next image is kind of awesome, not just because of Snoopy tripping shrooms, but because of Woodstock face to face with a terrifying and comparatively photorealistic chipmunk:
Being this was 1980, and woo and magical thinking were running rampant through society (unlike now, where we’re all completely rational and sensible and there isn’t a half-dozen TV shows on the air devoted to people wandering through dark houses and pretending there are ghosts) , a page was included devoted to astrology. This was the amusing illo that ran on that page:
Linus and Sally’s word balloon order is a little wonky, and Charlie Brown’s balloon was cut off in my scan (too close to the spine…it reads “That’s all!? That’s it???”) but it’s a nicely skeptical take on the matter, compared to the actual text piece on the page which describes in a mostly neutral tone what people who follow astrology believe. I say “mostly” because the last line of the piece is
Man, those close-minded scientists, not buying into things that have no scientific basis whatsoever. Isn’t that just like them?
Anyway, it’s a neat and colorful little book, and now I kinda want to track down the rest of the volumes on the eBay. …Great, something else to collect! According to the back of the book, one of the other volumes is entitled “The Body,” and I’m picturing it as being page after page of images like this (except, of course, for Frieda’s cat, who, by all appearances, has no bones).
And now, a chain of logical connections Bruce (Batman) Wayne hasn’t had to make of late.
from Batman #33 (Feb-Mar 1946)
Sluggo Saturday #80.
HIS TERRIBLE SECRET
from Comics on Parade #103 (Jan 1955)
“Jin-Jay blow water out of her sea bicycle and show you how works”
Oh, hey, comics…they still publish those?
So apparently what the people want is creepy hobo Charlie Brown, judging by the linkage and traffic I’ve been receiving lately. Thanks for encouraging my behavior, Other Internet Sites, though sadly I don’t have much else in the vagrant Peanuts character vein. However, it does remind me that I haven’t mentioned pal Nat‘s new book The Peanuts Collection, a neat compilation of photos and replica tchotchkes (like trading cards, rare booklets, cels, and such. He brought a copy by for me to poke through, and it’s certainly a neat and beautifully-done package. No Hobo Charlie Brown that I noticed, but you should probably buy a copy anyway, courtesy this little box here:
In other non-Peanuts news, people have been sending me the link to Our Valued Customers, a collection of one-panel cartoons presenting things said by customers and Overheard at The Comic Shop. Reminded me a bit of that mini-comic I did back in ’96, and posted here on my site, though my examples are more general “everyone’s heard ’em” quotes, and Our Valued Customers’ examples are more of the frothing-at-the-mouth type. As has been noted by a pal of mine, I’m not sure I’d draw actual caricatures of my customers and post them online, but hell, I can enjoy ’em and not have to worry about taking the heat if any of them find out. (Though, as I admit in that old post, one person in my mini, aside from the self-portrait, was an intended caricature…she hasn’t come back and killed me in the 14 years since, so I think I’m safe. …So far.)
In other news, some new comics came out this week:
- The new Smurfs volume The Smurf King is out…still the same complaint about the lettering I had last time, but that still remains really my only complaint. Some fine, funny, witty cartooning that holds up all these decades later. Don’t dismiss it just because of the ’80s cartoon show…this is genuinely classic stuff.
- Batman: The Return of Bruce Wayne #6 – I think maybe if the only superhero comics I’d read from now on were ones written by Grant Morrison, I’d probably be okay with that. I get all the wonderfully strange and inventive and near-celebratory superheroic storytelling that I want from his comics, compared to some other titles where it just feels like pages are getting filled. In this particular case, it’s a shame about the series’ timing, but still remains a satisfyingly odd exploration of the history of Batman and a solid chapter in Morrison’s ongoing Bat-saga.
- Glamourpuss #16 – I’m the only person still reading this at our shop. I’m still enjoying it. Not even quite sure how or why I’m enjoying it, but Sim’s goofy combo of fashion industry parody and in-depth examinations of classic comic artists still keeps my attention.
- Green Lantern Emerald Warriors #4 – I’m a sucker for still getting this. I just really like the Green Lantern concept, so I’m an easy mark.
- Comic Book Guy The Comic Book #5 – End of the series, kind of wish there was more actual Comic Book Guy action throughout the story, but still a funny parade of knocks on the comics industry and the folks who enable it. In-jokey, but not overly so.
- Muppet Sherlock Holmes #3 – The parody Muppet minis aren’t as strong as the ongoing Muppet Show series, which means they’re only excellent instead of perfect. Plus, I’m a big fan of Sherlock Holmes pastiches and parodies, so this is right up my alley.
- Hellblazer: City of Demons #3 – Really have no idea why this didn’t just run in the regular series. It’s not a bad comic by any means, but the market doesn’t really need two Hellblazer comics on the stands at the same time. Nor does it need three Wolverine titles, but I think I’ve mentioned that enough.
- The Incredible Hulks #616 – I was kinda hard on this title last time, since the proliferation of Hulk characters (hence the title change) was wearing on me a bit, but I find myself enjoying Bruce Banner/the Hulk’s responses to the situations they’re finding themselves in. But I’m pretty much ready to be done with the whole Sons of the Hulk thing.
- T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents #1 – Okay, first, it’s a pain in the butt to type all those periods in that name. Second, I may have mocked this comic a little in the past, but the fact that Nick Spencer, the man currently writing the fantastic Jimmy Olsen back-up in Action Comics, is also writing this is very positive sign. It’s still an uphill battle, trying to get people invested in yet another new revival superhero series, but maybe it’ll actually have a chance if the writing is strong.
- Dungeons & Dragons #1 – By all accounts, a good comic, I’m hearing. Yes, everyone is completely surprised by this fact. The retailer incentive variant had a cover that resembled the old D&D adventure modules from TSR, and even included an actual playable adventure that wasn’t in the regular version. IDW has this habit of making the incentive editions the cool thing that might actually sell well, instead of making the regularly-available issue awesome. Don’t put that photo cover of handsome bastard 1960s William Shatner on your variant, put him on your regular Star Trek cover…and don’t make just the variant D&D book look like a module, make ’em all look like that. That variant grabbed the eye of everyone who looked at it, far more than the generic fantasy covers of the regular editions that simply blend in on the rack.
- Avengers: Children’s Crusade #3, Avengers Prime #4, New Avengers #6, I Am An Avenger #4, Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes #1 – sigh.
- Superman Vs. Muhammad Ali hardcovers – one version is at the original “treasury edition” size, the other at the standard comic book size (but containing additional unpublished art), and I’m unclear, since they arrived shrinkwrapped…are they both recolored by Neal Adams’ studio? If so, that’s a shame, but the fact remains that this really is one of the greatest Superman stories of all time, and if you can’t get your mitts on the original, I’d recommend the treasury-sized hardcover over the smaller one, regardless of the extra material. This comic needs to be read BIG.
