Sunday, October 04, 2009

Obsession: The New Fragrance from Vertigo Comics

The last time I wrote about comics in any extended manner was back in April when I noticed that the list of what I was reading was becoming dominated by graphic novel collections.

It's happened again.

Then I was reading Queen & Country, Girl Genius, and Fables. The whole comics scene was entirely new to me. Oh, I had read some Star Wars and Buffy books and had a brief foray into Joss Whedon's X-Men work, but the scene was really new to me.

I've barely scratched the surface of the goodness that is out there, but I'm pretty much caught up with the three above-mentioned series (in terms of what has been collected and published in trade paper). I've been working on a few other series.

Not surprisingly I've expanded my Fables reading into the spin-off Jack of Fables. What has surprised me is that I've enjoyed those books. Yeah, it's still Fables and it is written by Bill Willingham, but I never liked the Jack character in those first Fables volumes. I still don't, but the storytelling is well done and Willingham has created an excellent villain in Revise and the Jack series works.

I'm also working on Y: The Last Man, Transmetropolitan, Ex Machina, DMZ, Preacher, and Bone. I've just started 100 Bullets and Echo. The first volume of Scalped is on hold at the library.

Seriously, I'm becoming obsessed. Some of those series have been completed, so I'll work my way through, finish, and move on (while enjoying some damn fine storytelling), and others I'll have to wait for the next volume to be published (Fables and DMZ, I'm looking at you).

And should I somehow run out of things to read, which is not at all likely, and I forget that there are probably another dozen Vertigo titles out there worth reading - not to mention other publishers - I have this list from Paul Cornell. That's actually where I discovered Ex Machina, DMZ, and Echo. Of those three, I am most excited about DMZ, for what it is worth. The other two are just interesting enough so far, but not enough to fully hook me.

What this means is that I intend to write up a couple of the newer volumes I've been reading. Right now that'll be DMZ, Y: The Last Man, Transmetropolitan, and Preacher. We'll see if I want to do more after that.

7 comments:

Carmen Papaleo said...

Thanks to your frequent mentioning of Fables I was intrigued enough to check them out. Ive read up to Wolves so far and was starting to feel guilty about graphic novels dominating my reading. I think the series is great, and I'm intrigued about the Jack of Fables series. You articulated exactly my anxiety about it: I never liked Jack's character all that much. I'll have to read it now based on your response.

Joe said...

The first Jack volume is especially good. I've got 4 & 5 at home right now. Volume 6 ties in with Fables 13. Otherwise they're fairly independent.

It's good stuff, and I'm glad you're enjoying it.

V said...

I kept trying to tell you Vertigo is quality ;)

Kendall said...

There're definitely worse things to be obsessed with than the comics you list here! :-D

Unknown said...

I'm going to suggest a couple of things that perhaps don't always get the attention they deserve outside of the comics community as it were.

Proof, Fear Agent and Wasteland. All quite different and from different publishers but more importantly all really good. Definitely worth checking out. Would love to read your thoughts on them if you ever do get round to checking them ouut.

You've sort of followed a similar path to the one I've had in my comics reading. I've yet to try DMZ though but that's only because of money issues. That will probably be rectified shortly I hope.

Joe said...

sg4: Those three have been peripherally on my radar. Is Wasteland the Antony Johnston from Oni Press? I'm aware of it because Johnston did some work on Queen & Country.

La Vie has been trying to poison my mind against Oni for a few months now. I tell her that Q&C is outstanding, but she says that outside of Q&C the press doesn't have that good of reputation.

La Vie: Mmm hmm. I've never argued the Vertigo point. :)

Unknown said...

@Joe: Yeah. That's the one. Well Q&C is brilliant and all but I think Wasteland itself does get well received by critics so that's at at least another title in their lineup. Unfortunately besides those two titles I haven't looked into much of the rest of their lineup.