No coffee today. We swung into Tim Horton's and I don't love their coffee so I got tea, which I do like. XL, 4 sugars.
Let's talk comic books.
DC Comics
So in the last issue I said I was planning to re-read the Superman Truth arc from the New 52. As I was looking for the right place to start I decided to just do a whole reread of New 52 Superman. This era of Superman has a pretty notorious rep and I hadn't read it since it dropped the first time and I really couldn't remember. I started with Grant Morrison's Action Comics Omnibus. This comprises the first 18 issues plus an annual and a #0. The art is primarily by Rags Morales. Right away were are off to a weird start. As I recall the lead up to the New 52 was a streamlined, back to basics kind of take on DC Comics. If that's really the goal, who in the world thought Grant Morrison was the one? I do have to admit the first 5 or so issues where we have t-shirt Superman doing some street level stuff, I was a pretty in. But then that vanishes and we go on the typical trippy, Quaalude-fueled ride that is a Grant Morrison story. And there's no transition. It's just suddenly aliens and demons and time travel and Mxyzptlk. I don't get it.
Then there's the art. I guess that's a place where I would have gone with a classic, shiny, spit-curled kind of vibe. Instead it feels very loose and inconsistent. Superman is unrecognizable from panel to panel. It's weird and I found it to be very unpleasant. What's more, nothing from this run made any lasting impact on the character.
Over on the mainline title we have two volumes, Superman: What Price Tomorrow? and Secrets and Lies. While the art feels better and the clear shake up in status quo with Lois, Clark and Jimmy is there, nothing feels fresh about it. Again, if you are going for a shiny, modern take why dust off old guard writers like George Perez and Dan Jurgens. I don't say that to throw shade, it's just an odd choice, one that doesn't pay off. Neither lasts long and I think that's for the best. My estimation of these volumes hasn't changed with this reread. They are utterly skippable and ultimately inconsequential, but the art in Secrets and Lies is pretty great.
Next comes the big H'El on Earth storyline which features crossover issues from the Superboy (just awful) and Supergirl (my favorite of the New 52) series.
Marvel Comics
Over in Marvel, I finally sat down and read the two issues that make up X-Men: Days of Future Past. I feel like this is one of those rare situations where the later adaptations really make the story. I found these two issues to be relatively brief and not particularly exciting. I am, of course, familiar with the animated adaption from the 90s and the later Fox film (Rogue Cut, all the way), but for whatever reason I had never read this. I'm a sucker for time travel and those adaptations were some of my favorites from their respective series.
Next, I read Daredevil: Noir by Alex Irvine in preparation for my upcoming interview. My first experience with the Noir line came a few years ago when I was prepping to interview author Fred van Lente. He had written X-Men: Noir and while I thoroughly enjoyed chatting with Fred, I can't say the same for X-Men Noir. More recently I read Luke Cage: Noir and that was a real standout. I think Cage just works in that setting and the same is true for Daredevil.
It makes sense that this would be a good spotlight for the character. Saying Daredevil: Noir is practically redundant. I haven't read a ton of Daredevil comics, but I recognized the changes from the source and found it worked really well in this standalone story.
This is cheating because it isn't a comic, but I read the prose novel Generation X. What a weird one this was. I loved the old X-Men prose novels and typically enjoy the writing of Elliot S! Maggin and Scott Lobdell. This was a little wacky though. They did a good job of establishing this team as connected, but separate from the X-Men proper. It didn't have that feel of X-Men without the X-Men as these types of things so often do. It also made me want to read the Generation X comics, so that's a win all around.
(Fun fact: I interviewed author Elliot S! Maggin over on the All the Books Show.)
Everything Else
Finally, I read The Comic Book Story of Baseball, also by Alex Irvine. I likely wouldn't have picked this up had it not been for my upcoming interview with the author, but I'm glad I did. It was an incredibly thorough history, but still managed to be fun and engaging. I learned a lot and it made me want to pick up some more Baseball books. We'll see.
For next time, I'm planning to pick up Alex Irvine's Iron Man run, continue my New 52 Superman re-read and maybe pick up an X-Men book. I'm in the mood.
P.S. Another feature of the video version of Comic Book Coffee Break was the Quarter Bin segment. Each week I would drag a random issue out of my childhood longbox and revisit. Look for that dropping on Wednesday.
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You can find back issues of the video version of Comic Book Coffee Break here.
The audio version of Comic Book Coffee Break is over there.
You can find me as the co-host of 9021 Here We G0: A 90210 Rewatch Podcast for the Radio Meanwhile Network.
I also host Howe's Things, the podcast and radio show of the David A. Howe Public Library.
