What Comic Books Have You Read Today?

[Wandering Sensei: Moderator Man]

Report what comic books you have read today--and tell us a little something about it while you're here!

[Jeff of Earth-J]

Cockrum's Legion and Futurians and (one issue of) X-Men led me to read the two-issue Starjammers series for the first time ever. I must have been in one of my "cutback phases" in 1990 when X-Men Spotlight On... Starjammers was released, because I didn't buy it at the time. (I often mysteriously deduce that I am spending too much money on comic books. For  another thing, the Starjammers are to the X-Men as the Inhums are to the Fantastic Four, that is, they are more interesting as supporting characters.) Anyway, several years after the issues were released, I had the opportunity to buy one of them at a 25¢ sale, so I did. A couple of years after that, I bought the second at another 25¢ sale. A couple of decades after that, I finally got around to reading them. 

The series is written by a writer I don't particularly care for, and it is inked, lettered and colored by people I have never even heard of. I generally wouldn't mention the lettered or the the colorist, but their are so many typographical errors in the first issue it's distracting. Similarly, the coloring errors are minor, but the effect is cumulative. There was "only" one typo in the second issue, and no coloring errors, but the real damage is done by the inker. Cockrum is an artist whose work could save a lame plot (which this one is), but his inker is very "flat" and doesn't embellish Cockrum's pencils at all.

I will say the series is worth the 50¢ I paid for it... but just barely.

[Jeff of Earth-J]

Every year for Independence Day I read something patriotic. Usually it's one Captain America story or another, but this year, inspired in part by Alex Ross and Jim Krueger's Project Superpowers, I've decided to read IDW's Super Patriotic Heroes edited by Craig Yoe.

[Jeff of Earth-J]

I can't believe it's been only two years since the last time I read The Eternals, but inspired by Kirby Genesis and the Secret City Saga, I decided to read a somewhat truncated version (i.e., series one #1-12 and series three #1-7). The reason I started that thread in 2024 is because one publ;ished or another had solicited a pencils-only version for October of that year, and I wanted to have a discussion already in place. Unfortunately, for whatever reason (low pre-orders, I suspect), the project was cancelled prior to publication. I do have a few issues of series four, but I've never read them. Perhaps now is the time...?

[Rob Staeger (Grodd Mod)]

I've spent a lazy day reading comics on DCUI -- the latest available issue of Fury of Firestorm, three issues of the new Batwoman series (as always with Rucka, it reads better in chunks), and a Veitch/Alcala Swamp Thing issue that brings me a wee bit closer to being able to start the retro (and originally intended) finale that DC is finally publishing. 

[Jeff of Earth-J]

CONAN:

I'm well on the way to my goal of reading through #57. I just finished reading The Chronicles of Conan v6, which takes me through #42. I read the Thomas/Smith stuff a cople of times, but almost none of the Buscema era, and very few of the original REH stories. I knew the pulps were written wildly out of chronological order, but occurred along a generally agreed-upon loose timelime, but I had no idea that comics followed that timeline as closely as they do (which I know know thanks Roy Thomas's series of informative introductions). He wrote a few original stories to fill some gaps (or to get Conan from point A to point B), and he also adapted several non-Conan REH stories into Conan stories.