Pull quote link-blogging! I read some good things this past week, and I am here, sharing them, because I love you.

Here’s how it works. Sarting on the 16th, there will be a form field on this site where you can enter your name, address and age. Choose what general type of manga you want (shojo, shonen, seinen, yaoi, etc.), submit the form, and you’ll be entered for a random drawing. Each day, one person will receive 5 graphic novels. A winner is only allowed to win once… BUT! Post a photo of yourself with your manga, and send me the link at “jason@sonic.net”, and we will cross-post it on this blog and send you 5 more graphic novels.

Jason Thompson, author of Manga: The Complete Guide, is giving away a gang of manga. That’s all there is to it, really.

Gonzo’s “There’s not a word yet, for old friends who just met” is an absolutely gnostic maxim. You are old friends because the spark of god comes from the same ancient source, but you have not yet met in the fallen world.

Geoff Klock examines gnosticism and The Muppets? I was skeptical when I saw the title, but dang if he doesn’t convince me over the course of the essay. It’s a fun read, and a nice way to look at a classic.

Third, there is no such thing as a “universal” canon. This is what I call the “Gershwin” rule. From the perspective of an American historian, George Gershwin is a canonic composer, profoundly influencing the development of American music with his distinctive marriage of black vernacular styles to European art forms. But from a Russian or Italian perspective, Gershwin is a local anomaly, a decent American composer who enjoys a far greater reputation among his fellow countrymen than in the international community. (Translation: he ain’t no Stravinsky or Verdi.)

Kate Dacey takes on the question of what belongs in the manga canon, to great effect. She approaches it from an angle I never would’ve expected, in depth, and wow– it’s totally worth the read. Also, she’s in it for the long haul down in her comments. Good golly. One of my favorite reads from last week.

The women on vintage and even contemporary mystery covers are, more often than not, busty blondes that generally fall into one or another simple category: Victim or Vixen. You’d think you’d be able to tell the V-Blondes apart by how scanitly dressed they are, but another pattern is that both types are often pretty disheveled in the clothing department. (Who knew ghosts and murderers loved fabric so much!) The true way to tell if they are a Victim or a Vixen is by their gaze. If they are looking directly at the reader they are a Vixen and are not to be trusted.

Colleen AF Venable at First Second goes in on one of my favorite things: book design. She discusses a few tropes of old school book covers, approaching the design for a new book, and has generally written a piece that’s absolutely worth reading if you care about things like “how books look.”

I’m just glad to find out that I’m not the only person who will spend an hour or two poring over old book covers.

The simple answer is that it is often necessary to emphasize immediate sales in an industry with tight profit margins, and that’s understandable. But if you have the financial backing to shift your priorities slightly — which is the question Quesada was asked — why wouldn’t you? If you could afford to invest in the best creators up front and give them the creative freedom that original graphic novels offer, or allow yourself gauge the success of more monthly comics as longer-term investments, why wouldn’t you?

Laura Hudson, czar of AOL’s Comics Alliance blog, digs right into Joe Quesada’s position on why Marvel doesn’t do OGNs. Another great read, and when I say “digs right into” what I really mean is that she “obliterates his wishy-washy answer.” C’mon Marvel, you got to do better.

It just makes it another crappy Big Two super-hero comic. It will sit on the shelf for awhile, eventually go out of print, and someday exist as little more than a reminder that yes, this is what they thought we’d want. A repellent, juvenile product–lazy in design, ignorant in preparation, and blind to the response it would create.

Tucker Stone looks at the online reaction to a certain comic book, and the comic book itself, and comes to a few conclusions. Which comic? JLA: Cry for Justice #3. He puts a few things into perspective, and wraps it up very well. Some whiny jerk shows up in the comments, too, having clearly missed the point of the editorial, but hey kids! Comics writing!

A while back, there was that story about Gwen Stacy’s clone children. Originally, they were meant to be Peter’s, but it was overturned because Peter Parker having children of any kind would age him.

Joe Quesada decided that Peter Parker and Mary Jane should not be married anymore and that Peter should be single. One of his wafer-thin reasons was that Peter Parker being married would age him.

The whole idea about Mephisto retconning away their marriage was partially because Quesada definitely did not want the two of them to get a divorce. Why no divorce? You guessed it. It would age him.

My personal opinion is that no, none of these things would truly age the character. I mean, hell, Scarlet Witch has a father who survived the Holocaust, a brother with white hair and a full-grown daughter from another reality and she still seems plenty young. All that Spider-Man stuff mentioned above doesn’t totally age Peter. But you know what does?

Having an 8-year-old Danny Rand play with a Spider-Man action figure!

Let’s see… Danny is 8 in that sequence. The last year of his comic has made a big deal out of him being 33 now. Spider-Man started fighting crime at 15…

So there you have it. Spider-Man is at least 40-years-old! Looking pretty good for a guy that age. Soon he’ll be getting hair plugs and a shiny, new Spider-Mobile to deal with his spectacular middle age crisis. I wish him well.

Speaking of Iron Fist, that issue has a preview for Fat Cobra’s upcoming one-shot. It’s great already and I’m sure the final product will be brilliant. Fat Cobra is easily one of the best new characters from either of the big two in a long time.

The weekend of chunky guys dressed like Colossus and hot women dressed as Slave Leia has come to an end. I myself had a great time, spent with hermanos from this very site and a whole bunch of guys from Funnybook Babylon. Sadly, Thomas “Wanderer” Wilde deemed himself “too broke” to consider joining us and Hoatzin would have probably involved a gigantic plane ticket paid in rare diamonds, since he’s from Europe. I don’t know. I really have no grasp on how that type of thing works. Besides, Hoatzin seems to have vanished from our planet. What happened to that guy?

This one movie sent the other movie into space.

Day One

Last year I got to New York the day before the con started, which allowed me enough rest and whatnot. This year I had to come in the first day of the event and kill time until David Uzumeri came in from Canada, since he was in charge of dealing with the hotel. I walked straight from the Port Authority bus terminal to the Javits Center, which tired me the hell out.

After getting my swanktastical press pass, I met up with hermanos and Joseph of FBB. They were at a panel starting up that was a screening for a new Will Eisner documentary. Since I was tired from all that walking, I decided to stick around and watch it. I found it interesting in the sense that I honestly didn’t know all that much about Eisner, which is almost a sin if you’re a comic fan. The four of us (David U. showed up towards the end) mostly agreed that while it had some fantastic stuff in there, such as taped conversations between Eisner and guys like Kirby, the sum of it was incredibly dry.

Shortly after, we went to the panel on online journalism, with guys from Newsarama and CBR there. It wasn’t as good as the comic blogging panel from last year and mostly focused on arguing over criticism vs. getting press releases. Once that was done with, I was rested up enough to do some wandering.

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Check it, it’s like…
My man Jus used to keep an ox between his teeth
Said he could spit it with pinpoint accuracy if there was beef
We chuckled out loud… Still the thought of it intrigued me, (right)
So now I keep a jackal under my tongue to spit with related reasoning
–Aesop Rock, “Nickel Plated Pockets”

(an ox is a razor)

If he talkin’, he a target
–Royce da 5’9″, “Politics”

I missed my third year comics blogging anniversary by a just under couple months, looks like. I’ve been preoccupied, I figure.

Anyway– three years of blogging. Wow. I think I took a break of a few weeks at some point in 05, where I relaunched 4l after being a little less than enthused with both online and offline things, but it’s been more or less weekly ever since. Hopefully more than weekly. Maybe thrice weekly. Maybe a bit more, I don’t know.

I was mulling this over and thinking about what I’ve learned and seen. Interacting with people via blogs, message boards, and emails has been interesting. What have I learned? Let me boil it down to 13 things.

1: Don’t expect e-fame. Three years on and I’d consider myself small time. A few people who run popular blogs know my name, and that ended up in me running another comics site (and what a ride that is!). We’ve got a grip of readers, but 4l was never about hits anyway. It was about me listening to the sound of my own voice while I talk about comics with other people who may or may not agree with me. It was about learning, listening, and laughing.

If you’re blogging to get famous, you’re probably not doing it right. Do it because you like it.

2: Timeliness helps. If you want readers, you have to attract them. Part of that is being timely, whether that means meeting a daily deadline or talking about current comics events. Doing 29 days in a row for Black History Month was a beast, but I felt good when I finished and I felt like I’d learned something. Even better, I felt like maybe somebody else had their thoughts provoked a little bit.

4l has been not quite daily in varying degrees of “not quite” since forever. We’ve added a considerable amount to our visitors ever since we started doing “almost daily” rather than “not quite daily.” Timeliness helps.

3: Timeliness doesn’t matter at all. Honestly, if your content is good, people are gonna tune in. One of my favorite blogs is Not Blog X, a review blog for X-Men comics that were coming out in the 1990s. Each post is a trip down memory lane for me, but the most recent comic reviewed on the blog is basically 14 years old. Fourteen years old. Regardless– it’s awesome. Each post reminds me of something from when I was a kid, and G. Kendall is a pretty dope writer. He’s got a format, a good hook, and a site that I immediately added to my RSS feeds.

4: Blogger is terrible. Seriously, I switched to using WordPress and bought my own domain a few years back. It’s been pretty much smooth sailing ever since. My site only breaks when I break it, rather than when Blogger goes down and freaks out. I have total control, and that is a wonderful thing. 100 bucks a year isn’t a lot at all. RSS feeds, RSS comment feeds (I can’t describe how much I love those), plugins, all of that. It’s golden. Livejournal and blogger are dinosaurs. Make your own site.

5: Don’t name your site after yourself if it’s a group blog. For some reason, the exclamation point in my site’s name always ends up left out and a space gets added in between 4th and letter. However, 4thletter! means one thing– D. As in David. As in me.

Oops.

It’s catchy, though, and 4l/fourel is kind of a cool abbreviation.

Sorry Gavok and Hoatz! It’s all about me-me-me-me-me. We’ll have another 7thletter! and an inaugural 8thletter! day sometime in 2009 when I finally stop talking about black people in comics.

6: Don’t be afraid to use your real name. When I asked Gavok if he wanted to do some work at PCS for me, I also asked him if he wanted to be credited as Gavok or Gavin. He said Gavin, ’cause PCS was a different kind of site than 4l. Here, a nickname is gravy. It’s a fansite, it’s a place to make stupid posts about Jubilee or What Ifs.

I can see where he’s coming from, but I took it a step further. There’s only one place online where I still use a pseudonym, and that’s more due to laziness than anything. Plus, “hermanos” is a really, really crappy secret identity.

Using my real name is just taking away that (thin) veil of anonymity that the internet gives us. It’s saying, “Yeah, you can’t see me, but I’m here and my words matter.” No one can use that “Oh, you’re hiding behind a fake name” excuse when you call them out.

7: If you’re talking, you’re a target. This is step one is basic discourse: don’t open your mouth if you aren’t ready to back up what you say. This is the internet– someone is gonna argue with you on whether or not the sky is blue today. What makes you think they won’t call you out when you’re wrong?

I think about every blog post I write. I’ve had posts checked out by other people when I’m really worried. This is because I’m not the type of person to pop off at the mouth with something half-cocked. You have to think if you’re going to blog, and you have to be prepared to be disagreed with. Expecting everyone to fall in line behind you like you’re Pollyanna is dumb.

I once wrote a love letter to Joe Quesada. Joe Q is a guy that half of the fans out there want dunked in acid for “ruining Spider-Man forever.” I did it and got away with it because I backed up what I said. I thought it through and argued my points. Looking back, I could’ve done better, but that’s any post I’ve ever made. Some may not agree, but they can’t say I didn’t try and didn’t make sense.

8: Controversy sells. The flipside of the above is that the squeakiest wheel gets the grease. The loudest blogger gets the hits. Going off half-cocked and shouting at people is going to get you attention. Being a jerkbag is going to you even more attention, as people who should know better will come to try and set you straight or debunk your points. Don’t be afraid to troll a little bit. Call that blogger worthless. Call that creator as a pedophile. Put out that hit piece on a popular comic and how overrated it is and all its fans are racist ageist sexist misogynist misandrist flat-footed pot-bellied balding imbeciles who probably eat babies for lunch and senior citizens for dinner.

However, all of this will make you look like a jerk to everyone ever. At least, I hope so. Anyway, don’t do this one. Controversy doesn’t sell, it just makes you look dumb.

9: Everything has a funny side. Learn to laugh at yourself. Taking yourself too seriously is for, I dunno, action figure bloggers (do those exist?), not comics bloggers. We’re talking about funnybooks here, and while there are Issues to be solved, you cannot take this too seriously. It’ll kill you.

Seriously. Your blood pressure’ll get up and then you’re screwed. Semi-famous comics blogger dead at 27 of a fatal heart explosion due to reading the internet, news at 11.

Don’t be jealous, either. Sure, there’s an idiot of a blogger with crap opinions who has higher hits than you, but screw that. Do your thing. They’ll self-destruct eventually, right? If they don’t, uh, pretend like I never said that.

10: Comments count. I’ve had some of my best conversations in comments. That’s part of why I love WordPress’s Comment Feeds feature. It’s brilliant.

There are three kinds of blogs out there. Ones with comments, ones without comments, and ones with moderated comments.

Ones with comments are wonderful. You get to dig in, debate, question, answer, troll, reply, and figure things out with others. If things get out of line, the blog owner can step in and shut things down. In my mind, this is the perfect blog. It’s like a mini message board or classroom. It also turns the blog into a two-way street– if you’re going to make a stupid post, someone out there is gonna call you an idiot for it.

Ones without comments are less wonderful, but still good. Nine times out of ten in this case, you can toss an email at the blogger and get into private conversations with them. In a way, this is a better thing for the blogger, ’cause you’ve got to the space to make your point clear and you don’t have to worry about commenters getting things twisted up. It’s all about you. No distractions.

Ones with moderated comments are worthless, nine times out of ten. I feel like moderated (as in approval first) comments just lead to commenters toadying up to the blog owner, neutering your point so you don’t offend, and a culture of yes-men playing greek chorus in each post. It’s lame. The temptation is too strong to just leave out the negative posts. After all, who wants to be told that they’re wrong? Who wants to be questioned?

I want to be called out when I’m wrong or lazy or intellectually dishonest with my points. I’m in this to learn, not to have my feet rubbed. Yes, Virginia, that’s why this blog has comments– so that I can be called an idiot when I need to be.

11: Any idiot can be a blogger. And sometimes, that idiot is you. Or me. Or a friend. Make an effort to not be that idiot.

12: Make some friends. I hesitate to call them allies, mostly because that sounds corny and terrible, but go out and find semi-like-minded people and chat. Discuss things over email. Keep in contact. I’m hitting New York Comic-con again this year and I’m easily supposed to meet over a dozen people who I only know via the internet. All of these are online friends that I’ve been talking to.

This includes the iFanboy (though I met them at Wondercon), Funnybook Babylon, and PCS gangs. Not to drop names or anything.

I wonder if I can convince Pedro that the FBB/4l! alliance should be called F-Unit. Funnybook Babylon, Four(4)thletter!…

Anyway, knowing people is great. It’s a huge plus to blogging, and gives you even more people to talk shop with. If someone writes a post you like, drop them an email. It’s more personal than a comment, but less personal than visiting their house. Give it some thought. All of my e-buddies are e-cool.

Also, you can use your friends to bounce ideas off of, or check to see if you’re out of line.

13: It’s just comics. If blogging isn’t fun, you aren’t doing it right.

(Note: This was originally meant to be a few paragraphs, only it stretched into a full rant about a series of things. I’m not a Spider-Man expert and haven’t read every single thing he’s been in for the past few years. Forgive me if my information is off. But I feel that I know enough for my ire to be justified.)

Back when Marvel was in the latter days of the Spider-Man Clone Saga, the writers all got together to brainstorm a good way to end this massive story arc. They needed something big. A lot of the ideas weren’t so good, like revealing a big chunk of it to be a virtual reality program or have Peter Parker go public with being a clone or just kill off Ben during Onslaught. Some were a bit better, like revealing that Judas Traveler was Seward Trainer from the future and that Seward betrayed Peter into thinking he was a clone all this time. The most interesting and best way to keep both Peter and Ben fans happy turned out to be a time loop.

See, Ben would start remembering events that happened to Peter. Being buried alive by Kraven or fighting Venom. Then, during a big villain gathering climactic finale, Carnage would mortally wound the Judas Traveler and Scryer would reveal his true self. He is Mephisto, orchestrating this whole mess.

As part of this craziness, Peter is sent back in time five years with a distorted memory. Hence, neither is the clone. Peter Parker and Ben Reilly are both Spider-Man, just aged a bit differently. Not the best story ever, but it wasn’t too bad.

There were a handful of reasons why this idea was turned down. Ben should be more aged if this was true, but considering the healing part of his powers and the relatively less stressful life he’s had in those five years, I could buy that they’d still look the same. Then there are a couple continuity issues, like how Mephisto is supposed to be dead around that time. But the main reason why it was tossed out?

Mephisto doesn’t really belong in a Spider-Man story!

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I’ve been putting out vinyl since ’93 and never looked back once
And y’all trying to chase me
You don’t innovate because you can’t innovate
It’s not a choice despite what you might tell your boys
Keep your identity crisis under the table
I always knew who I was and I’ll always be more famous
-El-P, “We’re Famous”

“What the fuck is DC anyway?” Mr. Quesada said, stoking the fires. “They’d be better off calling it AOL Comics. At least people know what AOL is. I mean, they have Batman and Superman, and they don’t know what to do with them. That’s like being a porn star with the biggest dick and you can’t get it up. What the fuck?” (Paul Levitz, DC’s president and publisher, declined to comment for this story through a spokesperson.)
—The Observer, 04/28/02

Joe Quesada, EiC of Marvel Comics, gets a lot of crap.

To be honest, a lot of it is deserved. Marvel has done some bone-headed stuff under his rule. Losing Grant Morrison, the Heroes for Hire thing, giving Greg Land work, almost firing Mark Waid, and so on. I’m sure you have a laundry list of reasons to dislike the dude. He’s got a big mouth, too, and doesn’t hesitate to open it.

But, and here is the rub– it’s his fault that comics are so good right now. Let me explain.

There is a philosophy that a president, I think it was President Rickard, used to have. Okay, it was Truman and I was reaching way too hard for the Prez Rickard joke. Anyway, it’s “The buck stops here.” In other words, if you’re the boss, all the bad crap that happens is your fault, whether you had a direct hand in it or not. It’s a way of taking responsibility for things that your organization does. It’s also a way of blaming the head guy in charge for everything and anything.

Turn that around, though. Doesn’t the head guy in charge deserve some credit for the good things, too? I think so.

Joey da Q is not the best guy around, I won’t deny that. Marvel is hardly perfect. But, he’s trying, and I can respect that. Obviously, the credit for these decisions should be shared with his editors, the creators, Bill Jemas, and Dan Buckley, but Joe Q should get a slice of that, as well.

This is pretty long, and I cover a lot of stuff, from comics to sex to race to dissing the competition, so click through.
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As inspired by a post on Higher Voltage, I present to you: World War Hulk, the Vastly Abridged Version Where Things Actually Do Change Somehow.

(Honestly, at this point, the best thing for the Marvel Universe would probably be the Hulk killing off half of their established cast to thin the herd, but there’s a goddamn Iron Man movie coming out, so that can’t happen…)

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NEWSARAMA.COM: NEW JOE FRIDAYS WEEK 26

I’m a Joe Quesada fan. There, I said it. I love reading his interviews because he combines straight shooting with marvelous hype. He said something in the latest NJF that, to me, highlights the difference between Marvel and DC.

Superman was the first, no one is arguing that. He was the very first to put on his underwear outside of his pants. He is the Elvis of comics. Sure, was his creation influenced by other sci-fi and classic stories that came before, of course it was, Elvis was influenced by early rhythm and blues. Much like Elvis, Superman and his compatriots shook up the comics world, in essence created it. He flew over tall buildings, he was the model on which every thing else would be built. Elvis shook his leg, greased back his pomp, and created the blueprint for what was to become Rock n’ Roll.

While Elvis had some incredible hits, as did Superman, the music was simple, quaint in many ways. Almost every Elvis song can be boiled down to three chords. We call it a 1-4-5 progression. They would just change the key, tempo, feel or melody in order to decorate it differently. Still, it was the music of its time and it was beautiful. Then in the 60s came this little group called the Beatles, they were funny, articulate, socially conscious and they spoke to us on a whole different level. The core of the relationship between the music and the listener was much deeper, more relatable.

More importantly however, they brought something else into the music. While they themselves worshipped Elvis and had their share of very early singles with the simple 1-4-5 progressions, they learned from their predecessor and built upon it. Suddenly, we were getting songs with minor chords, diminished sevenths, before you could even get accustomed to all of that, they layered harmonies and added orchestras to their compositions, it was a whole new world that was much more sophisticated than what Elvis had first presented. That’s no slight on Elvis, it’s what happens when art moves on.

To me, the creation of the Marvel hero is very much like this. It took what Superman and other DC greats made famous, in many cases lifted whole parts, and added layers never before seen. Heroes with problems, heroes with Achilles heels, heroes who didn’t always make the right decisions, heck, sometimes they didn’t even beat the bad guy. This was a huge variation in the theme, the defining moment for everything.

Today, we can listen to Elvis songs, and they sound great, but because of the simple quaintness of them, I don’t believe they hold up to today’s younger listeners in the same way that the songs of the Beatles and those that followed hold up. Yes, much like Superman, every once in a while, someone does a great cover of an Elvis tune, but, it’s more nostalgia than anything else. I think the Superman movie proved that as well. You watch that movie and put it up against either of the Spidey movies and it feels like the difference between introducing a kid to Pong vs. Wii.

There’s a reason Batman is the greatest DC hero, he’s the closest to the Marvel formula, but the rest of the DC universe I feel suffers from the same flaws as Superman. In his time, Superman spoke of the immigrant experience which was very important in America at the time, but he’s also a paternal figure where as Spider-Man is us. At his core, Superman is also actually a dishonest character in his make up. He has to create a persona in order to be accepted by the people around him, the same for Batman. That’s also an intrinsic difference between the Marvel and DC characters. Spider-Man is the façade, he’s the mask, Peter Parker is the real deal and if we could actually be superheroes, that’s exactly how it would happen and by virtue of that, makes Spider-Man truer.

By the way, if you disagree with this, that’s cool, but then you would have to argue as to why DC, since the inception of the Marvel Universe, has been trying to Marvelize their characters.

The Elvis/Beatles comparison is a good one, I think. Read the rest of the interview, it’s pretty good and has some nice teases.

NEWSARAMA.COM: NEW JOE FRIDAYS – WEEK 24, A WEEKLY Q&A WITH JOE QUESADA

Longtime readers to the blog, all one of you, know that I think very, very highly of Eduardo Risso. 100 Bullets is a true 50/50 collaboration that works out into a beautiful book. Brian Vaughan and Risso were announced to be on a book called “Logan” I think during con season 2005, but nothing was officially shown. This week’s Joe Fridays has pages and they are tops.

Really, Risso is an incredible talent. If his work on Logan is half as good as Batman: Broken City, I’m going to be sold. He does great emotions, great action, and great character bits. He also draws snarls like no other!

Anyway, scroll down past Mike Deodato’s art for Thunderbolts to see Risso’s three preview pages, uncolored. I like his take on Wolveroonie’s hair.

I’m still mixed on T-bolts. I like Ellis, yeah, but Deodato managed to make me stop reading Spider-Man after JRjr left. His art is muddy and his people ugly, and not ugly in that Quitely/Risso/Robertson style that looks good.

Check out the rest of Joe Fridays for this bit in the comics for kids section:

NRAMA: Most impactful storyline?
JQ: How about two, The New Girl in Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane #6-#10. The Gwen Thing, in Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane #9.

NRAMA: MVT – Most Valuable Title?
JQ: Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane.

NRAMA: MVC – Most Valuable Creator?
JQ: Sean McKeever.

Yeah, buddy. Spider-Man :love: MJ is the best Spidey book out right now, I guarantee. Don’t let anyone tell you different. And is that Firestar on the new cover there? Man! Things are looking up. I’m sad that Takeshi Miyazawa is pulling back to do only covers, but David Hahn is a good replacement. Bite Club was excellent!

Also, holy crap, Marvel Adventures Avengers (the best Avengers book out, btw) vs Ego the Living Planet, who appears to be in love with Earth? Yes! Sold!

Also, c’mon guys, read the below post 4l is for… David (and Cassandra) Cain! I need to know if I’m crazy or if it makes sense. Don’t make me beg.

A small one for today. I recently bought the out-of-print Spider-Man: The Assassin Nation Plot tpb. It collects Amazing Spidey 321-326 or so, I don’t have the trade handy right now to check. Words by David Michelinie, art by Todd Mcfarlane on five out of the six issues. Erik Larsen pitch-hit on the odd issue out.

My first Spidey books were Amazing 316 and 317, a two-parter that brought Venom back into Spidey’s life. My second Spidey books, though I got them all at around the same time, were parts two and three of the Assassin Nation Plot. I still have the (well-read) originals of all of them, but I love the fact that I have them in trade form now.

I also bought the X-Men: Fatal Attractions trade. That’s right. Art by Joe Quesada, Adam Kubert, Andy Kubert, a cover by Bill Sienkiewicz, and words by Scott Lobdell and Fabian Nicieza? It is just like reliving my childhood!

Guys, seriously. I think I may have bad taste in comics! I need an intervention!

Anyway, here’s a page by Toddy Mac from the Assassin Nation Plot. It tripped me out as a kid and it trips me out to this day. Spidey in a suit with a mask? He beat Deadpool to it, baby!

What comics do you love?