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Black & White Fun

(A long and trying week, much of it not seriously interrupted even now. For the moment I'm sticking to something light.)

My latest shipment of comics arrived Saturday, and in the mix were two B&W volumes from DC. Wisely taking a page from Marvel's wonderful Essential series (I've been picking those up despite having all of the original comics), DC's begun to do their own, 500+ page thick, black and white reprint series of silver age comics via a Showcase Presents series.

At least to kick things off, they're going it one better than Marvel by pricing these at $9.99. Given that one of my usual criteria for deciding on whether or not to buy a collected volume is the "10 cents per page or less" rule, something that's coming in at less than 2 cents/page and is of any interest is a shoo-in.

The two that arrived feature Superman and Green Lantern.

The Superman volume covers Action Comics #241-257 & Superman#122-133, alternating them in order of publication. Basically, it's Superman stories from June 1958 through July of '59. Lots of silver age wackiness, from Superman projecting a tiny duplicate of himself to becoming a were-Lion, along with the first appearances of Braniac, the shrunken city of Kandor, Titano the Super Ape, and a look at what life might have had in store for Kal-el if Krypton hadn't exploded. (The image to the left is fairly close to what saw print, though they had the sense to remove all of the cover dialogue and story title text, along with the bottom stripe and the "Volume 1" by the time it went to press.)

The Lantern stories start with Showcase #22 (Hal Jordan's first appearance) through Green Lantern #17, covering from Sept-Oct 1959 through December '62. Crisp, smooth Gil Kane artwork from the time before his style "evolved" into showing us everyone's nostrils. All the groundwork's here, including the first appearances of the Guardians, Sinestro and Star Sapphire. (The image here, to the right, is the cover artwork for this volume, of course.)

As the Essentials volumes showed us, the black and white presentation of the artwork is actually appealing in most instances, allowing the linework to stand on its own. There's simply no beating these inexpensive, handy compilations.

There were other comics in the pack (final issues of The OMAC Project and Day of Vengeance, the latest two issues of New Avengers, and a compilation of Identity Crisis among others), but I'm not in the mood to react to those right now.

Comments

Chuang Shyue Chou said…
Speaking of black and white, I just picked up another collection of 'Modesty Blaise'. 'The Green-Eyed Monster'.

Gorgeous black and white art!
12:33 AM
Anonymous said…
Those B&W DC collections sound... well... essential, yes. I'll definitely be keeping my eyes open for them. I've just heard there's a full color KAMANDI Archive Edition coming out or out already, too, so the reprint market is definitely looking up.

Chuang, I'm a huge Modesty Blaise fan, and my girlfriend has tracked down several of the old Eclipse editions for me. These are smaller than the recent Titan books editions, but I'm still happy to have them, and as cash allows, the new Titan editions are definitely on my list. I also have nearly a complete collection of the MB novels; only A TASTE FOR DEATH continues to elude me. And I'll get one of those yet.
6:12 AM
Anonymous said…
I love living in the age of reprints. It's like the 70's all over again, only more expensive.
12:28 PM
Chuang Shyue Chou said…
Old Eclipse editions! You scare me Highlander! And all the novels to boot! I have only read two novels. 'Sabretooth' and something else I think. I can't recall the titles but the two I have read were excellent stuff. Great pulp fiction. A lot of the modern pulp can't seem to hold a candle to these.

The Titan collections are indeed nice. Prior to these, I have not seen a collection before. Even the Eclipse editions. I am really glad that Modesty Blaise is finally getting her due in these new glossy editions. (Peter O'Donnell that is).
10:33 PM
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