Mike Sterling's Progressive RuinWhere legends live since 1969

Accidentally demolishing a $250 Spider-Man statue is no way to start off your workday.

§ May 22nd, 2013 § Filed under retailing, this week's comics § 8 Comments

So basically, if someone out there is trying to complete your set of all 5,000 copies of the Marvel Milestones Spider-Man statue from Art Asylum, you’d better cross production number 1213 off the list, because alas, it’s shuffled off this mortal coil. And it didn’t jump…it was pushed. By me. With a bulky ol’ Diamond shipping box I was hauling into the store and, not seeing where I was going, I accidentally knocked the poor statue off the counter upon which it sat and sent it to its doom.

The only somewhat good part of this is the fact that we acquired the statue as part of a collection, and we actually didn’t have that much money into it. But let me tell you, I’d much rather have sold that statue than swept it up.

The worst part: I can’t yell at an employee about it. The only person to yell at is me, and I can’t yell at me, I’m too wonderful.

Anyway, here are a couple of comics that came out this week:

Now I certainly would have preferred it if this issue, wrapping up the “First Lantern” storyline, had actually come out a couple of weeks ago, when the Green Lantern Corps issue containing the first epilogue to said storyline did ship, since that would have saved a whole lot of explaining that, no, I didn’t forget to order Green Lantern #20, it’s late, it’s not my fault, it’s DC’s. Alternatively, I would have been okay with DC simply delaying GLC #20 ’til GL #20 finally was released, since DC obviously wasn’t shy about putting out Red Lanterns #20 and Green Lantern: New Guardians #20, also containing epilogues, this week as well, so what difference would one more GL book have made?

As for the comic itself…it’s a nice send-off to the Geoff Johns era of the franchise, so if you didn’t like any of the GL comics that came before, you’re certainly not going to like this one. I’ve generally enjoyed the GL run over the last few years, myself, and I thought the different colored Lantern Corps was a fun concept. It would be nice to have just a plain ‘ol “Hal versus Goldface” story now, but I don’t know if we can go home again after years of GL Cosmicness.

One interesting bit of business in this comic is an interspersing of full pages of pull-quotes from various comic creators, filmmakers, pals and family members, all congratulating Johns on his GL run. Don’t know if I’ve seen that ever done in a comic before, particularly for someone who’s still alive, but, well, there it is. Looking forward to DC doing the same thing for Grant Morrison when he leaves Batman.

They certainly crammed a whole lot of stuff into this issue, along with a couple of nice surprises, so if you are a fan of the GL books, this actually is a satisfying ending to the last few years’ worth of storylines. But here’s hoping things are a little more…accessible in the GL books that follow.

I don’t read the Dark Horse Presents anthology on a regular basis…I picked up the issues with the new Concrete stories, which were eventually collected into a standalone comic that I could have waited for instead if I’d known that was coming. (I figured they would end up in one of the eventual Concrete trade paperbacks, if anything.) Of late, I’ve been picking it up because of the new Nexus stories, which I suppose may also be collected into their own comics or trades at some point, but I’m not taking the chance, because it’s Nexus and there are few comics I love more than Nexus.

I do read the rest of the comic, too, though like most anthologies, not everything is going to be to everyone’s taste. The other ongoing adventure serials don’t really do anything for me, but the more oddball stuff, like Shannon Wheeler’s “Villain House” and “Hunter Quaid: Armageddon Out of Here,” are a lot of fun. I do wish there was more Geof Darrow in these books aside from the spot drawings, however.

Ah, I see my paperwork requesting a Swamp Thing Versus Frankenstein cover has gone through. Excellent, excellent.

This is kind of what I wanted when I clamored all these years for Swamp Thing’s release from Vertigo’s mighty grip…more “Swampy Versus The DC Universe.” I suppose I should have specified which DC Universe (“not one hastily rebooted with an indeterminate history, please!”) but beggars can’t be choosers. Justice League Dark has, to the surprise of most everyone, turned out to be the best of the new comics with the words “Justice League” in the title, even though most people hate that title while realizing this is probably the only reason it hasn’t been cancelled yet. Well, that, and the fact the series itself is very enjoyable, nicely utilizing DC’s supernatural characters in a more superheroic context.

Believe it or not, I haven’t read this yet, because I’m spending my free time writing this post about it instead. There’s something somewhat self-defeating about that.

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If you give a bull a comic, he’s going to post about it on his site, and that’s just what Bully T.L.S. Bull, Esq. did, discussing the comic in question and very kindly thanking me in this blog entry right here. You’re very welcome, Bully!