Let me save you the trouble: “no, Mike, it’s just you.”

§ July 12th, 2013 § Filed under retailing, superman § 5 Comments

So pulled off the shelf from our stack of Superman Unchained #1 was a copy that had a translucent blue strip of tape that stretched around from the front of the cover, across the spine, and across the back:


…but still cut off at the edges so the book could be opened and read normally. The tape is applied straight and evenly, so it’s not like it was just dropped on there by accident. My guess, knowing nothing about the actual details of comic printing and production, is that a pile of unstapled covers was taped together for storage/shipping and that the cover with the tape stuck to it at the top of the pile wasn’t removed prior to assembling the whole package.

Or someone at the distributor is exacting revenge upon me for some long-ago slight, randomly affixing pieces of tape neatly to comic covers prior to packing them into shipping boxes destined for our store. I WILL HAVE MY REVENGE, PHANTOM COVER-TAPER!

In somewhat related news…I had told myself I was going to drop all the Superman titles following the end of Grant Morrison’s entertaining run on Action, making that my first break from regularly reading those titles in over 30 years. But, well, you know how funnybook fans are, and I kept going despite myself…only to find that Superman has been improving, and Action managed to keep my interest after Morrison’s departure. Overall, I feel like the storytelling on the titles have been…loosening up, I guess? Less concerned with trying to establish the New 52 status quo for Superman, and more focused on having a little fun, I’d think. Yes, there’s the stuff with Superman’s relationship with Wonder Woman that nobody’s particularly happy about (and to be fair, they did provide some in-story evidence for this particular turn of events being a bad thing, forthcoming Superman/Wonder Woman ongoing series notwithstanding). And that new costume is still terrible.

In general, though…I’ve been liking the Superman books lately. The first issue of Batman/Superman wasn’t bad, and the first issue of Superman Unchained, taped cover or not, was definitely a Big, Fun and Loud Superman Adventure…your big-budget Superman movie on paper. I don’t really want a half-dozen ongoing Superman books…Scott Snyder and Jim Lee taking over Action Comics would have been just as good, but of course wouldn’t have received the attention and sales the Brand! New! First! Issue! did. But there are all those comics anyway, and at least they’ve been mostly readable, he damned with faint praise.

So anyway, have any of you folks noticed an upswing in the Superman titles lately? Not saying they’re perfect, or outstanding examples of the medium…they just seem…a bit improved. Is it just me?

5 Responses to “Let me save you the trouble: “no, Mike, it’s just you.””

  • Mike Zeidler says:

    I almost feel as if the DCnU52 Superman costume is getting *WORSE* as time goes on. In this week’s Justice League (I think) the way it’s drawn/colored, Supes looks like he’s wearing a blue Nehru jacket with a tacky plastic Superman symbol dangling off his chest while flying.

    Thank goodness for magical nanite armor so you don’t have to worry about hiding it under street clothes.

  • Ed says:

    Did you happen to notice this issue was like MaxiMortal at all? just mentioning

  • Snark Shark says:

    “Special Blue-Tape Edition! Rare!!”

  • Chance says:

    What I want to know is why it is called Unchained. At what point was Superman chained? And by whom?

  • Mikester says:

    Almost certainly because someone thought Django Unchained sounded cool.