Buying comics can be an expensive hobby. A lot of fans simply can’t afford everything they’re interested in, due to rising prices and the over-saturation of the market with superhero titles.
That’s why we’re here. Every week, the Multiversity staff is asked “What would you buy this week if you couldn’t go over $20?” and shares their reasons why, in order to help others who might have similar tastes make their own decisions in buying comics on a budget. Be sure to leave your own picks in the comments!
Johnny’s Picks:
The X-Cellent #1 ($3.99) – Pete Milligan and Mike Allred’s run on “X-Force” and “X-Statix” provided some of the most fun mutant comics of the early aughts, and remains today a highwater mark for the X-line. At once both a whip-smart satire of superheroes and celebrity culture as well as an outrageously violent and gloriously weird soap opera, Milligen and Allred (with the occasional help of others) created an instant cult classic book. We will likely never see a Disney X-Statix movie, and for that we should all be very, very thankful. Go grab this book if you like your mutants very weird and uncomfortably sexy.
Echolands #6 ($4.99) – I’m gonna be honest, I’m not quite caught up with this book – but to be fair to myself, to truly enjoy the art of J.H. Williams you need to sit with it a while and really devote some time studying it. The loving detail that goes into the layouts to make each page visually arresting and thematically relevant is an example of ways in which exploding the panels of comics on a regular basis actually works. Too often, it’s chaotic and overused, but in Williams’ hands the arrangement and flow of the story is in expert hands. Delving into worlds that feel very similar to the likes of “Sandman,” “The Unwritten,” and even Williams’ own previous work “Promethea,” “Echolands” is a wonderful and intense journey into metafiction.
Total: $8.99 – If you’re feeling up for it, Image has a cool retrospective of their nearly 30 years in business out this week, helmed by Image archivist and co-founder, Jim Valentino. “The Official Image Timeline” is only $7.99, and still puts us under the cap!
Mark’s Picks:
Manor Black: Fire in the Blood #1 ($3.99) – We’ve had a bit of a wait for this one thanks to the pandemic, but it’s an issue worth waiting for. Cullen Bunn, Brian Hurtt, and Tyler Crook’s “Manor Black” is definitely my pick of the week. Unlike the previous miniseries, which was drawn by Crook, this time Hurtt is on art with Crook painting the colors. And it looks fantastic. This isn’t the first time Crook and Hurtt have collaborated and it shows―it feels so unified. If this ever comes out in a library edition, I guarantee I’ll be buying it again.
Pixels of You ($16.99) – Ever since 2015’s “Lucky Penny,” a comic with the names Ananth Hirsh and Yuko Ota on it are a must-buy for me. They are always worth picking up. This time J.R. Doyle is on art duties―I’m not familiar with their work, but I’m looking forward to discovering it. I only know what little the book’s blurb reveals: a cyborg and a human-presenting A.I. work together on a photography project for an art gallery, and how the working together changes their understanding of each other. Yeah, that totally sounds like my jam.
Total: $20.98. I was one dollar short last week. I had to carry it over to make this week work.
Kate’s Picks:
Stranger Things: Erica the Great ($12.99): After Robin, Erica Sinclair was another fan favorite from Stranger Things‘s third season, so it’s no surprise she gets her own age appropriate graphic novel.
Official Image Timeline #1 ($7.99): The definitive history of what started as an experiment in comics publishing and is now a publishing powerhouse. Happy 30th anniversary Image Comics!
Total: $20.98. I’ll check the car for the spare change that put me over this week.
