Recent Omnibus Adds


     Five that arrived in a little over the past two weeks. Sunday finally finds me starting to notice them, and begin sorting them into the collection in between loads of laundry and getting some cooking done.

     Really only one, the Avengers vol 5, adding the rest of the Englehart run to the Avengers Silver/early Bronze run, is a primary add. This is to say, something strictly in line with what I'd set for myself when I first started selectively building this comics library. This is meant to be a selective, physical rebuild of key-to-me comics runs (having sold off my original comics years ago), with an eye towards a next stage of life, following nominal "retirement," when I'll have the overall time and self-determination of schedule to let me as a late-stage adult potentially have the time for comics that I had back in the '60s and early '70s. The intent will be to evaluate them both with respect to nostalgia and (one would hope) evolved tastes.
     The Maestro volume is largely in-line with the original intent, especially in a library that already put such an emphasis on collecting the Peter David additions to the character's story via five hefty volumes. Much as with the Adam Warlock volume I picked up months ago (last year?), and the Black Panther: The Early Years one, this tome has chunks of it that are redundancies in my library, but I like the idea of having a concentrated, linear run of a character's appearances, especially one who either didn't have a series of their own, or had a long run of appearances in other titles before they landed one. With Maestro - a version of the Hulk from a distant, post-apoclyptic future, all of this self-titled series were specials and deluxe limited series.

     The other three books were a mix of momentary weaknesses, sharp discounts (one of them was 70% off), and the opportunity of getting free shipping on an order that crossed a specific price point.    
     The second volume of What If? has the back half of the original run of the series. Granted, the series seldom lived up to its potential. As the series rolled out from '77 on, more often than note it came to feel very amateur hour, including becoming gradually more focused on showing alternate versions of much more recent comics, rather than Silver Age ones. (This was the one that was 70% off, btw.) I'm curious to gradually come back to these with fresh eyes.
     Secret Wars was largely a veiled commercial for a poorly rolled-out toy line, bringing with it some changes, but generally sold to the fans as being a bigger deal - in terms of characters and stories - than it turned out to be. I was still in the first half of my twenties in '84/'85 when this was rolling out, and just old enough that I was nearly oblivious to, and otherwise unconcerned with, any toys. I wasn't aware there was some question here as to which was the dog and which the wagging tail. Simpler times, or maybe just simpler me? As with most things, a bit of both, and I can live with that.
     Still, it was folded into Marvel's continuity in an interesting way, having nearly all of the participants disappear into it one month, then return a month (our time) later, changed by the experience, which we saw unfold in detail over the course of a year of issues, so the writers in each of the affected series had to wait until revelations were made in given Secret Wars issues before they could be transparent about them in the character's monthly title.
     Anyway, this was a discounted volume that was already from the far, low end of pricing for Marvel omnibuses, and helped take the total over the free shipping line.

    Finally, there's the lone DC/Vertigo volume in the mix, collecting the Rachel Pollack run of Doom Patrol, after she took over from Grant Morrison. I already have the Morrison volume in the collection.
    Now, should they ever get around to re-issuing the Silver Age run of original team stories - I started buying omnibuses, and expanding to non-Marvel ones just a little too late, and missed picking that material up - I'll have all of the DP that I wanted.

     Currently all plans for digging into any of it, and getting my impressions down, is awaiting Better Days.
     Yes, more presumption and hubris on my part.


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