What Are You Reading At The Moment?/What Did You Last Read?

[hammard]

Suprisingly earlier than I thought I managed to get hold of a copy of:

Sandman Vol 3: Dream Country: 9.5/10: A brilliant short little diverison from the main arc with 4 unrelated stories. The only reason I don't give it full marks is that it's not quite as good as Doll's House and Seasons of Mists on either side.

[hammard]

I read Wolverine & The X-Men Vol 1 by Jason Aaron. After all I'd heard about it I was surprisingly unimpressed. That tends to be the case with most superhero comics which try to be funny.

I also read Superman and The Legion of Superheroes by Geoff Johns. 4/5. It's not amazing but is highly enjoyable nonetheless.

[hammard]

Quite a number of new TPBs in Bedford Library and I grabbed a few:

New Avengers: Breakout by Brian Michael Bendis: 3/10: A very dull by the numbers team creation story where nothing vaguely interesting or surprising happens. Competent but dull.

Batman: Black Mirror by Scott Snyder: 6/10: Great art and some good character moments but a pretty weak storyline. Mostly it just reminded me how much more I used to like Dick as Batman over Bruce.

Superman: Grounded vol. 2 by J. Michael Straczynski: 2/10: I'd stopped reading the story when it started and continues to be pretty poor throughout. The only highlight is the blasphemous flashback story where Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne meet before becoming superheroes and take down Vandal Savage, total fan service but I love it.

[Merc With A Mouth]

I started reading comics in single issue form rather than TPB this past November with the Marvel Now! relaunch. Currently I am reading;

• Deadpool
• Cable and X-Force
• Uncanny X-Force
• Fearless Defenders

I also have a few books on pre-order;

• X-Men
• Deadpool Kills Deadpool
• Thunderbolts (which I'm only reading once Daniel Way leaves the title)
• A+X #8 & #10 (Deadpool / Hawkeye and Domino / Scarlet Witch = yes please)

I'm loving the new Deadpool run, Cable and X-Force is a lot of fun, Uncanny X-Force is at risk of being dropped if it doesn't improve, Fearless Defenders is fantastic. I did read Deadpool Killustrated as well which was pretty decent.

[hammard]

Legion of Superheroes: #1-24 by Keith Giffen and Tom & Mary Bierbaum: 8/10: Probably the best run on the Legion I've read. Moving away from the government-sanctioned brightly coloured teens with flight rings in a utopia, it makes them much more on the edge and in more exciting situations. It also expands the panel numbers to 9 a page and adds long prose background section, making it heavily in depth. Unfortunately, this does have the side-effect of the entire comic seeming to take place in slow motion.

[hammard]

Picked up a load this week and only just got through them:

Uncanny X-Force: Final Execution: 2/10: Violent nonesense.
Green Lantern: Sector 2814: 4.5/10: Very standard silver-age stuff.
Wonder Woman: Blood: 3.5/10: What don't I like about Brian Azzarello? Everything logically points towards me liking this title but I just don't. This tends to be the case with Azzarello's work, one day I'll figure it out...
Teen Titans Presents: Rise of the Ravagers: The Culling: 2/10: Tom De Falco and Scott Lobdell together write over 10% of DC new 52 titles. I can only assume that is based on the fact that they refuse to quit rather being any good. I want to like the Super titles, I want to like the teen titans and legion lost, I want to like Red Hood and the Outlaws but they havve just been poor...
TMNT: Classics: Vol 1: 6/10: Not sure what I was expecting from this but it turns out to be reasonably enjoyable fluff. Nothing amazing, insightful or special, just moderately enjoyable.
Sandman: Season of Mists: 10/10: Of course it's genius! Makes all those recent dead return to life dramas seem really dull in comparison.
The Invisibles: The Invisible Kingdom: Erm, I'm not entirely sure what happened in it. I obviously need to pick up the other volumes as this just seemed to be incomprehensible bollocks.

[Merc With A Mouth]

I'm trying to get into Kelly Sue DeConnick's Captain Marvel and Matt Fraction's Hawkeye, but rather than buying in trade I wanted to get them in single as well. I managed to track down Captain Marvel #1 and #2 on Ebay but no such luck with Hawkeye yet!

[Veela Magnet]

Originally Posted by Merc With A Mouth

I'm trying to get into Kelly Sue DeConnick's Captain Marvel and Matt Fraction's Hawkeye, but rather than buying in trade I wanted to get them in single as well. I managed to track down Captain Marvel #1 and #2 on Ebay but no such luck with Hawkeye yet!

Ah, I've been reading Cap'n Marvel in singles since it came out (something I rarely did until a year or so ago), but I've just picked up the first trade of Hawkeye -- kinda wish I'd got in on the ground floor now!

[hammard]

This week's pick-ups:
Aquaman #20: 8.5/10: Ah, John Ostrander may be my favourite all-time writer, making interesting teams and characters I would never usually care about.
Arrow #7: 6/10: Not amazing but at least helps cope with some withdrawl symptons
Green Lantern #20: 7.5/10: I've followed Geoff Johns Green Lantern on and off for a long while but never really liked. However, this is a pretty satisfactory conclusion to the storyline. Unfortunately, that means I have no interest in reading any more stories as they would just spoil the ending.
Green Team #1: 6/10: Good but not great. Probably won't keep it up.
Injustice Gods Among Us #2: 7/10: Some great blockbuster stuff involved.
Justice League #20: 7/10: The fight with Despro and Batcave scenes were pretty standard but some interesting hints with the Martian Manhunter and The Atom.