The State of Comics... - Page 2 - OG Myth-Weavers

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The State of Comics...

   
https://m.ranker.com/crowdranked-lis...ected-editions

I only buy trade paperbacks now. They are usually self contained stories. One of my all time favorites is Fables. Geoff Johns and Mard Waids run on the Flash are amazing. And I really like the Long Halloween and Dark Victory for Batman.

I started to stay away from DC after the new 52. I dropped marvel back in the 90s when DC and Marvel kept doing their massive story line crossovers. Financially I decided to do one or the other but not both anymore. I did get in on the Ultimate Spiderman which was great.

I'm in the burned-out crowd. The burnout happened near the end of World War Hulk. I never even finished that mega crossover.

Too many massive world-changing crossovers. Too many world changes. Too many appearances by whoever was in that movie last year, and not enough of the interesting C list characters. A simple 3 issue run about one character doing one thing became a rarity. A one issue story started to feel non-existent.

The price is 160% what I used to pay as a teenager. That is the cost of buying a new digital issue, and it accounts for inflation. The burnout hit my wallet as much as my brain.

I will still buy an occasional trade paperback. Most of those are on deep sales at Comixology. All of those are somewhere between a year and thirty five years old. I was very happy with the Slapstick trade paperback "That's Not Funny." To me, they reconciled a character who had been interpreted in sometimes extremely different ways. That was something to really enjoy.

I ultimately enjoy comics a lot more by not even trying to keep up with the constant crises and crossovers. The thrill of keeping up is gone, while the fun of sitting down to read a full story has come back. That's not so bad. Plus, a $3.99 trade paperback with six issues even works out to be less expensive.

Trade paperbacks are definitely a nice route to go now. I enjoy the Essentials collection for Marvel, where I can drop $20 on a heap of issues from years back. The 'problem' of crossovers and interdependence does seem to be a growing one and I'm not sure how I feel about it, other than it's currently a turn-off for both print and cinema.

I read a couple issues of the Terrifics, which is a DC team, the other day under recommendation. Apparently it's pretty self-contained, which was the big selling point. I'm not settled on it. I'm also investigating non-Marvel/DC titles pretty aggressively and trying to see what else is out there. Super appreciate this thread, btw. <3

Before I signed up for Unlimited and Universe, I was already on trade paperbacks rather than floppies, and Essentials and DC Showcase had been my largest area of purchase.

Hoopla allows you to check comics out digitally for free, if you are in the US and your local library has Hoopla. (Mine has Libby. )

Hoopla is great. We get all our comics from the library/Hoopla now that we don't have DC Universe anymore. My middle kid and I just started reading Alan Moore's Swamp Thing.

@Suzuki Stumpy: It’s worse if you live in the US and still don’t have access to Hoopla. So close, but not close enough. I mean, it’s not like I get Star Trek: Discovery on Netflix in return.

@Zod: DC Universe used to be “curated” (limited and rotating), but this year they made a radical change and converted it into a genuine competitor to Marvel Unlimited as a comics archive. I believe it has over 20,000 titles.

There were rumors a couple of days ago that they were thinking of making changes to DC Universe (unclear what) as part of the AT&T/Time Warner merger, but those have now been denied. Still, it’s very thinkable that at some point at least the streaming TV may get put under some larger umbrella with the rest of the megaconglomerate’s media properties, and at that point, who knows if they will even care about the comics side at all? But for the moment, it’s excellent value if you’re a DC fan (and, well, your pseudonym...)

That might be worth subscribing to their service. Too bad I'm too busy at the moment to do a lot of reading. Maybe once summer is over.




 

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