Matt buys back some time - 6/11 books

I think it's getting to be about time for me to trim my buying list -- I find myself reading an awful lot of these books and thinking, "Hey, that was meh ... just like last issue." Which is both financially irresponsible AND a waste of my time, especially as I have a new baby that's more intriguing to me than mediocre comic books. Also, I don't want to feel like Negative Review Guy, which is what happens when I read a bunch of books that don't thrill me. Here, then is my public declaration of what I'm not reading

۞ Booster Gold #10 is my last issue of this book. It's perfectly adequate, but it's not dazzling me enough. I feel like the ideas are intriguing at their core, and I like the issues when they're described to me ... it's just that actually reading them consistently leaves me cold.

۞ I'm buying Green Lantern Corps as I eagerly await the forthcoming crossover, but issue #25 ends that. I confused Peter Tomasi and Stuart Moore last month, which makes me feel dumb, but they both write perfectly good space opera that fails to engage me. I'll stick with the core book for now. (I maintain that this book would be much awesomer if it were called Green Lantern Crops and were about interstellar farming, but what do I know?)

۞ Somewhat surprisingly, the current run on Batman Confidential remains on my purchase list. I just adore Kevin Maguire's art, and Fabian Nicieza is, er, playing to his artist's strengths here. (ie, Issue #18 features an extended sequence in which the original Batgirl fights Catwoman naked in a hedonist club. If that's not playing to Maguire's strengths, I don't know what is. Also, probably not a comic to read at work, or around children, or in public, or anywhere else where you might be embarrassed.)

۞ Trinity #2 makes me think I'll stick with this as well. I've got a lot of time for Kurt Busiek, who is competent even at his worst, and this nice, slick, mainstream superhero story is far from his worst. Feels more "comic book-y" than the semi-novelistic sweep of 52, and more "good" than the horrifying disaster of Countdown.

۞ I like newuniversal shockfront also -- it builds nicely on the basic NU concept, but is another strong mainstream showing from Warren Ellis. Every so often it seems like he recharges his batteries and starts churning out really solid work again; he's in one of those phases now. I'll keep buying this...

۞ ... and Doktor Sleepless as well, for most of the same reasons. I wish the art in Doktor Sleepless were a little less generic Avatar house style, but it's perfectly readable, and this book makes a great venue for Ellis's obsession with the intersection of science fiction and our contemporary reality. Good stuff.

۞ I really enjoyed Captain Britain and MI13 a LOT -- it's an improvement on the first issue, and one of the best things to come out of Secret Invasion so far. I'll definitely keep picking this up ... BUT it also points out one of the main problems with modern superhero comics, althoug I'll have to bury discussion of it behind whited-out spoilertext. Highlight between the brackets to figure out what I'm on about. [Apparently, we were meant to believe last issue that Captain Britain (or at least his human host) really died. Like, tragically sacrificed himself. This issue is all about starting to play up the ramifications of that, and it does that well ... except that I never, ever, ever, ever even considered that at the end of last issue. I saw the explosion, thought "well, I wonder how he escapes from that," and moved on. It was a bit jarring to find that everyone here is taking it so seriously -- don't you all know you're in a comic book?] Aside from that minor complaint, though, a fun book.

۞ Secret Invasion: Who Do You Trust is pretty good for one of these one-shots. I really like Mike Carey's work at Marvel, and Christos Gage is becoming a reliable mainstream writer. And there's some gorgeous Timothy Green III work, which is nice to see. Worth picking up if you're following Secret Invasion, actually. I don't regret buying this at all. (I absolutely abhor the title pages for the SI books, though -- it's like generic Photoshop Backgrounds for Spastic Beginners 101 stuff. Just hideous.)

۞ I love Action Comics #866 -- when Geoff Johns is on, he is ON. And this is the strongest thing to appear in a Superman book in some time. Genuinely creepy, ominous, and fun to read. I'll be buying this, moving forward.

۞ And Locke & Key continues to be the best thing being published this year, by ANY comic book company. Not only will I continue buying this (for the one remaining issue), I'll buy the collected edition, and anything else Joe Hill writes. Fantastic horror comic. Really.

So after that dramatic intro, I cut a whopping two books. Great.

And the posts keep trickling in

I worked really hard to read four whole comics just for y'all:

Thunderbolts #120: I would read Warren Ellis' "Norman Osborn: Director of Thunderbolts." Also, apparently OMD in Amazing Spider-Man erased everything Straczynski did on the title, and brought Harry Osborn back to life, but it could not undo the Stacy twins? Seriously? I still liked this a heck of a lot (even when they showed people who were not Norman Osborn), and especially compared to

newuniversal: shockfront #1: I was actually excited to read this. In the year since the last series ended, I had developed fond memories of the original series (though not fond enough to re-read it). After reading this, though, I remembered my problem with the previous series: it was boring. And this, despite explosions, mass destruction, and killing, is slower. Three pages of complaining about manga? Really? Explaining Spitfire and then not featuring her, like, AT ALL? Justice killing people off-panel? At least without an A-list artist there's a chance it'll come out on time.

Amazing Spider-Man #559: If you've been reading Brand New Day, this is more of the same: New villain, Peter has no money, quick read, awesome art, overall very good (and much better than last issue).

Wolverine: Amazing Immortal Man and Other Bloody Tales: I'll read anything with Wolverine. Or Cable. It's my guilty pleasure, shut up. Actually, except Origins, which I dropped after about issue 12 because, well, nothing happened in 12 issues, so... But this? I've never read Stray Bullets, so maybe I'm not "getting" something here, but these three short stories by David Lapham are just bad. Terrible. Terror, Inc. looks subtle and complex by comparison. So, the book is three short stories illustrated by different artists that show Wolverine at various times in the past (all during his "kill'em all and let God sort 'em out" phase) being an Emo charicature of Wolverine: delivering babies, being a sypathetic shoulder to cry on, letting toddler killers go so they can grow up and become real killers before he then kills them, and so forth. I feel dirty owning this (and I have Lost Girls). Dreadful.