My X-Men Reading Project

John Dunbar October 22, 2012 at 8:49pm

What held up? What didn't? Did anything surprise you, as in "I think I liked this better the first time" or "I don't remember this being this good before"?

Tell us more!

Jeff of Earth-J October 23, 2012 at 9:35am

Now that is a reading project!

Chris Fluit October 23, 2012 at 9:45am

Did you just read issues of Uncanny X-Men, or did you also read the spin-offs (from New Mutants on)? And the guest shots and miniseries?

I read the guest shots and mini-series but not the ongoing spinoff titles except for the issues that were explicitly part of a crossover. Those might be next. But I'll probably take a bit of a break first and read some Star Wars or Thor instead.

Chris Fluit October 23, 2012 at 4:37pm

Imagine someone going to work for Marvel now and trying to read 51 years of comics. It would be impossible. Even if you could do it without losing your sanity (or going blind), the project would take many, many years.

That's a good thing to remember when we complain about continuity errors. Even Stan Lee messed up on occasion and that was concerning books he had written himself.

Kirk G October 23, 2012 at 4:46pm

I have a better suggestion.

Why not just read the Omnibus, cover to cover...that would give you a good grounding in the FF, at 30 books per volume.

By the time you get to #60, you've got a pretty good feel for the characters, plus, there's only about seven more seriously GOOD stories until you get past the Kree and Him, so you could pick up one of the Marvel Masterworks to be brought up to speed. In fact, if you scored the first two ominibus volumes, you could probably pick up the next two Masterworks that follow (assuming there isn't a third Omnibus in the works) and get everything through the end of the Skrull slave world saga, and so, you'd have all the prime Jack Kirby multi-part stories.

You could read the Spider-man omibus to get through most all the critical Ditko period.

For the X-men, you could read one of the omnibus as well.

But to be brought up to current speed, you might only have to read a couple of most recent trades collecting some story arcs before writing your own current stories. Agreed?

George Poague said:

I remember Steve Englehart saying that when he began writing for Marvel, in 1971, he prepped by reading every comic book published by Marvel since FF No. 1. That included the western, romance and humor comics. (They apparently impressed him enough to revive Millie the Model, Patsy Walker and the cowboy heroes.) But that was only 10 years of comics to read.

Imagine someone going to work for Marvel now and trying to read 51 years of comics. It would be impossible. Even if you could do it without losing your sanity (or going blind), the project would take many, many years.

Kirk G October 23, 2012 at 4:47pm

I can't imaging how taxing that might be. I should think t hat you'd be able to knock off after the first five.

I can't imagine how much different the impact would be, strictly in black and white, you know?

It may be fine for cerebus, but for the FF?

George Poague said:

I recently read all 8 volumes of Essential Fantastic Four. That was reprints of every FF issue, and every annual and Giant-Size issue, from 1961 to 1977. But that only took about 3 weeks.

Jeff of Earth-J October 24, 2012 at 7:24am

Chris, I know you said you didn't read any of the spin-off series, but I'm wondering if you made an exception for X-Men: The Hidden Years...? The title knocked Avengers out of my personal "#1 favorite Marvel" spot at the time, but I've never gone back and re-read the entire series. I have a feeling that it might not hold up in a marathon reading session and that it might not fit very well following directly on the heels of [having read] X-Men #66.

Jeff of Earth-J October 24, 2012 at 2:51pm

It has not been collected in its entirety, but there has been at least one tpb collection, possibly two.

Kirk G October 24, 2012 at 4:43pm

I hear you, brother...

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My X-Men Reading Project

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