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http://www.darkhorse.com/Books/15-566/MPD-Psycho-Volume-10-trade-paperback-collection

The Walking Dead #100

I didn't think I would ever be affected by a comic book this way, but FUCK YOU Kirkman! I am pissed. I don't blame the character that did it, I blame you. So, you know... way to break the fourth wall while you're at it. There is no way the TV show could follow the book properly with all the horrible shit this guy does to his characters.

Glad to see I am not the only member here who keeps up with TWD.

What do you mean by Kirkman breaking the fourth wall? Negan explaining his reasoning for who he is going to kill? Didn't really feel like a genuine wall break to me.

The Walking Dead #101

Still waiting for things to pick up or for some big game changer to happen in order to keep things interesting. The story has been meandering for a while. We were promised something really big in issue #100, and it really wasn't that big.

*SPOILERS* Someone died, and all those extra pages they'd been advertising issue #100 would have were used in order to show that character die in as much unnecessary brutal detail as possible. *SPOILERS*

It really isn't worth reading on a monthly basis, because each issue just isn't interesting enough on its own anymore. After issue #102 ends the current arc, I am just going to forget about the series for a while and maybe come back six months or so later to enjoy several issues in a row.

What I'd kind of like to see happen to mix things up and carry the story forward would be something along the lines of Rick and most of the other survivors we are close to dying, then skipping ahead a few years and showing us a teenage to young adult Carl in the leadership role. Carl has been molded to be this totally badass character, but he is still this little kid. I'd really like to see what he is like when he is older, and I don't want to have to wait 20 real life years for the story to progress that far, which is what we are looking at at this rate.

Oh, and as of a couple of months ago, I now have a Rick Grimes (comic version, of course) action figure on my desk near my Bouncer (Bioshock) figure.

The Dark Empire trilogy

I still like the art, and the characterization of Palpatine (at least in DEI, anyway), but the story is a little on the weak side, especially with the final two entries in the trilogy. In DEI, too much vital information on Luke's initiation into the dark side is glossed over, briefly mentioned in passing rather than being shown to the viewer, and DEII & III feel like rough drafts that could have been good sequels with a little more development and polishing, but as they are feel rather pointless and unnecessary.

Overall, I don't hate the Dark Empire trilogy like some SW fans do, but it could have been far better.

CP3S said:

What do you mean by Kirkman breaking the fourth wall? Negan explaining his reasoning for who he is going to kill? Didn't really feel like a genuine wall break to me.

Nah, not technically. I could just feel Kirkman's hand all over it. To me Negan was Kirkman, lining the characters up... "Right, 100th issue fuckers, who's it gonna be?"

Carl has been molded to be this totally badass character, but he is still this little kid. I'd really like to see what he is like when he is older, and I don't want to have to wait 20 real life years for the story to progress that far, which is what we are looking at at this rate.

Agreed. I foresee some problems with depth perception ;)

^^I've been hearing good things about the new Aquaman comic. It's not one that I collect but there is a cross-over with Justice League so I will be getting it for that.

The Walking Dead issue 105 was my favorite issue in a very, very long time. Three issues have come out since my previous post in this thread, in which I was kind of hard on the comic, the pace is definitely picking up. Totally failed at the waiting a few months to let them pile up thing, been reading month-to-month.

Stargate: Underworld

I'm not much of a fan of the SG-1 series anymore, but even I can tell that it's better than this mediocre fanfic, faithfulness to the original film be damned.

Green Lantern/Green Arrow

Collected volume of Dennis O'Neil and Neal Adams run on the comic from the 70's.

For a long while now, I've wanted to own a complete set of Epic Comic's colorization of AKIRA. The last issue I needed arrived in the mail yesterday. This will be my 3rd read-through, first time in color. The Epic run of AKIRA was one of the first manga to be translated into English, and maybe the very first comic to ever be computer colorized. This definitely shows, it's like the colorist, Steve Oliff, didn't have his levels properly set in Photoshop because you can see where his darker blacks end and the lighter blacks of the original art begin. I flipped through some later issues, and it seems like this got fixed at some point, but at least in the first dozen issues, it's pretty noticeable. Also, according to fans, the translation is inferior to the Dark Horse 6-volume set.

Still, AKIRA is the only manga I've read front-to-back, one of my absolute favorite comics in general. I love being able to re-read it in color. I feel like one of my lesser holy grails has now been found! :)

Found this great explanation from Oliff about how Akira was colorized, at least in the beginning:

Two days after Christmas 1987, Federal Express delivered two boxes to my office in downtown Point Arena. It was an IBM 286 12mhz box, loaded with an AT&T Targa graphics board, DOS, their “Kaliedoscope” software, and a monitor. It also had a handmade heat diffuser to cool off the math co-processor.

Taped to the case was a one page sheet of instructions about how to run the system. It was very simple. I set it up and loaded in some of the disks of Akira art, then spent the next three months coloring Akira #1. The system chugged like an old farm truck. The software was buggy and the machine was erratic. It really needed that heat diffuser, because when it overheated (every day, some days many times a day), it froze, and I'd lose everything up to the last save. It got so bad that I'd save the page after every polygon (each traced off and enclosed area of color). I colored all but 3 or 4 pages, which Abel Mouton helped me with. Eventually.

In the early days, Kenny scanned the pages, then shipped me the disks. I colored them on the system, and sent the disks back to him. From there he made proofs and output the film. I didn't see a single proof until the issue came out in print for the first 10 issues. With issue #11 I got a printer and a scanner, so I could actually check things. All the issues before were kind of seat-of-your-pants, hope for the best.

Yes, it is as stupid as it looks.

What use would God or Superman have for a machine gun?

asterisk8 said:

What use would God or Superman have for a machine gun?

It's worse than that Jim.

Why did DC comics decide that all heroes need to have lots of new lines on their costumes. It's like they had a "redesign" party where they took existing pictures of the heroes and just drew lots of lines on them. It looks stupid.

^^ I have been reading the Batgirl issues of this story arc. The last page of Batgirl #17 was pretty gruesome. The story concludes in this weeks Batman #17. I think I may know what you mean. If so....yeah..what ?

The new Marvel title 'The Fearless Defenders'#1 has started pretty good. Valkyrie and Misty Knight join forces to fight an undead army of Vikings.This is going to be an all female team with Dani Moonstar and Hippolyta joining in the next few issues.

One thing that's bothering me at the moment regarding The Avengers. In Uncanny Avengers #3, Thor has a strong resemblance to Chris Helmsworth on one page, and the new Secret Avengers#1 cover has Black Widow looking like Scarlett johansson and the new Nick Fury a spitting image of Samuel L.Jackson.

Marvel's 'Journey In To Mystery' is going along at a cracking pace at the moment with a story involving Lady Sif. Filled with the Beserker Rage, Sif is moody and kick ass, just how we want her to be. Recommended !