A good batch of comics this week. Here’s what I’m looking at.
- 50 GIRLS 50 #1 (OF 4) - Only for Frank Cho. Only for Frank Cho…
- ACTION COMICS #901
- ASTONISHING SPIDER-MAN WOLVERINE #6 (OF 6) - I’m missing one issue from being able to dive into this. I imagine Jason Aaron’s Spider-Man is awesome, because his Wolverine is.
BATMAN BEYOND #6 - I’m caught up through BB #4 and enjoying this as much as I did the mini. Starting off the ongoing with a Justice League appearance was a good call in establishing Terry’s place in the DCU.- DETECTIVE COMICS #877
- FEAR ITSELF #3 (OF 7)
- FF #4
- FLASHPOINT #2
- GODZILLA KINGDOM OF MONSTERS #3- This title is everything I could possible want from a Godzilla book. The monsters are emerging and they’re not going to let humans stand between them and…well, doing whatever they want. The highlight of issue #2 was Anguirus turning into a spiky ball and rolling through the countryside. In this issue the monsters get named for dubious reasons, but at least we’re getting them named. The political commentary is boring me, but the story is still progressing nicely.
- GREEN LANTERN #66
- GREEN LANTERN CORPS #60
- GREEN LANTERN EMERALD WARRIORS #10
- HERC #4
- HEROES FOR HIRE #8
- HULK #34
- KIRBY GENESIS #0 - “Even better than seeing Kurt Busiek and Alex Ross team up again is seeing them doing it with Jack Kirby’s characters. I’m really looking forward to this.” I wrote that last week, then I read the book. The creators are top-notch, but these are a hodge-podge of Kirby characters you’ve never heard of and don’t care about. I’m also tiring of the Kirby homages. To really honor the man, create a new universe from scratch, don’t recycle his. And yes, Ross and Busiek have both done this, so it’s a somewhat inconsequential exercise.
- SECRET AVENGERS #13
- SUPER DINOSAUR #2 - This is the only book on the list I’m not picking up. Issue #1 and the FCBD Orign Special were fine and all, but seemed to be a bit more dumbed down that necessary, even for an “all-ages” book. In fact, it reads more like a pilot for Cartoon Network’s Saturday programming than anything else.
- THUNDERBOLTS #158
- UNCANNY X-FORCE #11
- VENOM #3
- WOLVERINE #9
Unlike Super Dinosaur, Gladstone’s School for World Conquerors is an all-ages book done right. I picked it up on a whim, but I’m glad I did. The story is fun and uncomplicated, but not in a way that makes it a burden for a grown-ass man to read. Mark A. Smith’s story is not overly-complicated, but also not dumbed down. That is, just right. Armand Villavert’s art is stylized a la Mike Oeming, and he creates more cool, unique throwoff characters in the background than we could hope for. This book is a treat, and the secret behind Gladstone and the school leaves enough mystery to leave me
eager to find out where it goes next.
That’s it for this week. What are YOU looking at?
They’re the other guys,
Somewhere around the time I bought an issue of Uncanny X-Men for the third time I realized it was time to create a more faithful list of my comics than the one in my head. I looked into simply using an Excel spread sheet, but that’s no good when you’re deal with the volume of data we’re talking about with a collection bordering on 8,000 books. I saw it as impractical to input all of that with the various fields I wanted (creators, plot notes, story arc/crossover info). Plus, I wanted cover images for shopping convenience. That’s when I started looking to see what was out there already. Surely some programmer has already created the databases I’d need to access and is willing to sell it to me along with a handy viewing/ report generating feature. Turns out there are several. They range from little more than spreadsheets to the ideal collecting compendium. Today I’m looking at two on the latter end of the spectrum.
(handles any size collection and has 5,000 cover images), Pro (28,000 images and syncs to various portable devices and smartphones), and Archive (20 gigs of images and a few other whistles and bells that the others don’t have. They range in price from fifty dollars to three hundred dollars. All versions support scanner wands for entering you collection by scanning the UPC, but the greatest thing that all of the versions share is the pdf report generating abilities. You can generate lists of what you have or want lists, they’re also customizable by the pre-programmed fields. So it’s pretty handy when you plan on doing some shopping at a convention. Finally, if you’re interested and keep up, the program calculates the value of your collection. It can also tell you the number of issues you own by publisher. There are only a few drawbacks to ComicBase.
version came out a couple of weeks ago, and I’m using some of my vacation to fiddle with it before getting home to do the major work on my collection. So far I’m liking it. To begin with, Collectorz has several other database products; they’ve tailored a basic program to fit different collecting needs. They’ve streamlined it and it isn’t a drain on the RAM. Like ComicBase, this one supports scanner wands. In Collectorz favor over ComicBase is that this program’s interface is much more visual and in some ways easier to navigate. Searches are easier, and the information per issue is not presented in the spare spreadsheet form. These are definitely major advantages over ComicBase’s drab look. Collectorz will also synch with more smartphones. The downside is a big one though. The reporting features are severely handicapped. Basically you can have a list of what’s in your collection or what you are looking for to fill your collection. Not bad by any means, just a big drop off from ComicBase. Collectorz is also significantly more net dependent. If you’re not online, you’re cut off from much of the information (including cover images for all individual issues). Price wise, this one is a bit more attractive. The standard edition is thirty dollars while the higher end pro edition is fifty. So far I’m liking the Collectorz. We’ll see how it goes when I start entering large amounts of books.
