[00:00:10] Speaker A: Welcome back to the Capes and Tights podcast right here on capesandtice.com. i'm Justin.
[00:00:14] Speaker B: I'm Paul.
[00:00:15] Speaker A: We're here at a live studio audience. I would say live studio audience, but, like, I'm gonna blow this out of proportion, but we're in Maine, snowing out, and people don't.
[00:00:23] Speaker B: It's true.
[00:00:24] Speaker A: For some reason, people don't want to travel in the snow. I don't like. I mean, we got Jason here, though.
[00:00:28] Speaker B: We got Jason.
[00:00:28] Speaker A: Jason's here. We got Danny.
[00:00:30] Speaker B: We got Graham.
[00:00:31] Speaker A: Graham, Yep. We got Drunk Mike.
Iron Man's here. Stan Lee's here. I see Stanley.
[00:00:38] Speaker B: Stanley's in the background.
[00:00:39] Speaker A: That's true. But this episode is once again brought to you by Galactic Comics and Collectibles. We're actually here.
[00:00:44] Speaker B: We are.
[00:00:45] Speaker A: We're live Galactic Comics. And, yeah, we're here for you to.
[00:00:50] Speaker B: Find a website that I need to update.
[00:00:54] Speaker A: Oh, where's your web person?
[00:00:56] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:01:00] Speaker A: Truth Comics of the Year. Paul.
[00:01:04] Speaker B: Comics of the year. The top 10 comics of the year. Can you imagine? How did the year go by? Do you remember what last year's top 10 was?
[00:01:10] Speaker A: No, but I do remember when we started doing this, you being like, oh, crap, I gotta read current comics.
[00:01:15] Speaker B: I'd like to think I was better about it this year. I got some stuff done. I read. I. I really started early and kept an ongoing list all year. So I'm proud of myself. I really stepped up.
[00:01:24] Speaker A: I know I won't say it now, but I know what your number one is, so there's that.
[00:01:27] Speaker B: I think everyone knows my number one.
[00:01:28] Speaker A: Is you come into the comic book shop. You know.
[00:01:30] Speaker B: Yeah. If you come in here, it's to.
[00:01:32] Speaker A: Remind people the classification of a comic book that came out in 2024 is at least two issues had to be released in 2024. I think we passed. We've done three issues, things like that. But this is weird. Like, if comics come out in November and it's November and December, those qualify. If a comic comes out in October and the last issue hits in January, that's a tough one because, like, if.
[00:01:55] Speaker B: I cheated two years, I think two different years I've cheated. Yeah.
[00:01:58] Speaker A: One issue came out, I'm like, you better. First of all, it better be on your list next year because that doesn't qualify for this year. So he's gonna come back and be like, oh, that sucked. It wasn't a horrible. It was a horrible issue. A horrible comic book. But this is.
[00:02:09] Speaker B: I believe this year I am legit. All books have come out in this year with all of the qualifications. So first, I think maybe the first time we've done this said, I didn't cheat at all.
[00:02:19] Speaker A: Paul also wants to let everybody know that they're all available in trade here.
Every comic book you pick this year is available here. You don't. You have to be able to buy it here? No.
Let's get into it then.
[00:02:28] Speaker B: Just not on the website.
[00:02:30] Speaker A: I'll read off my honorable mentions. We'll just fly through the honorable mentions to start off this thing.
[00:02:33] Speaker B: So I hear where my 10 is.
[00:02:35] Speaker A: I have like five honorable mentions, which is a weird because it ended up becoming a top 15. But I don't know. Midnight Shadows graphic novel from Dark Horse Comics. Zach Kaplan and the Midnight Band.
Techno pop band. I don't know, synth band. Great comic book, great artwork on the inside. The Deviant from Image Comics. The Road graphic novel, which is the adaptation of Corman McCarthy's book.
[00:03:02] Speaker B: I still need to read that.
[00:03:03] Speaker A: The Displaced from Boom Studios and the Blood Hunt miniseries of the story arc for Blood Hunt from Marvel. Yep, those are my honorable mentions. What do you got going on?
[00:03:12] Speaker B: All right, honorable mentions. I have Canary, and that just barely fell off my list. That was a Scott Snyder Dark Horse. Let's go horror western. I thought it was a great matchup. I also had Deviant. It was excellent read. Blood Hunt. Same. Didn't. Didn't make my top 10. But on the list this year, technically it did come out. Was a Haunted Girl that just fell off my top 10. I absolutely love Haunted Girls, so shout out to that. It was in my top 10 last year. And then I had one these Rick Remender sacrificers series I need to catch up on, but I thought was worth mentioning. So there's my honorable mentions of the year.
[00:03:50] Speaker A: It's funny too, because I thought about after as you were reading those that the.
It's easier to pick a top 10 when you only read 20 comics and like 20 different series a year.
[00:03:59] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:04:00] Speaker A: But when you're like going into it being like, I gotta read a lot more this year because I got to get into this top 10 mode.
[00:04:04] Speaker B: Right.
[00:04:05] Speaker A: Like, well, then you end up reading a hundred comic books and then you have to try to whittle down which ones you like.
[00:04:08] Speaker B: Yeah. Which ones you really liked. And I mean, I do research for this stuff too. I go in and I see other people's opinions of things and go, okay, well, now I need to read that. That is not how I made those rung for like, what, three hours? Four Hours.
So I went in and I'll say okay. And then maybe I missed that. Maybe I need to read that. Let's give this and give it around. So yeah, you know, I think it's good. It's a good thing.
[00:04:28] Speaker A: So from here on out what we do is I'll read 10. 10, 9. 9. Well no, you read 10, then I'll return so that I get never last pick.
[00:04:36] Speaker B: Oh, that's how it is now we see.
[00:04:39] Speaker A: So Paul do his number 10. You're by the way, first of all, before we get into this, your voice. Did you record that when you were in high school?
[00:04:45] Speaker B: So many persons say that. So my buddy Joe was in one day and that thing went off. And Joe goes, who the hell is that anyways? I said it's me. He goes, no, that's not you. He goes, you need to do that again.
[00:04:57] Speaker A: Yeah, it sounds like you're sex. It's like the. Your three year old Paul Eaton recording. One of these days I'm gonna come.
[00:05:04] Speaker B: Well, the answering machine is old enough to be when I was six, so you know, I do comics, which is.
[00:05:13] Speaker A: Actually kind of funny. I don't even think my work has an answer machine. If the phone rings, they just.
[00:05:16] Speaker B: Right, don't pick. I get back to people. I make sure.
[00:05:19] Speaker A: So I'll tell you right now, if you call here, he does look at caller id so if he doesn't want to talk to you, he won't talk to you.
[00:05:24] Speaker B: That's not true. Kinda. All right.
Number 10 is a marvel. I go with Al Ewing's immortal Thor. That was one that made the list. Later I said, okay, I gotta try this. I haven't read it. And you know what? I gave me all of my love of the God of thunder back. This brought me back to like the olden days and his epic battles with monsters and he's back to controlling and being the king. And man, I just loved it. I was like, I didn't realize how much I missed Thor until reading Immortal Thor.
[00:05:53] Speaker A: I just have a problem with the fact that they're using this immortal thing. Like okay, Immortal Hulk was a hit, so let's do with Thor.
[00:05:58] Speaker B: Is it that or do they just like evaluating right to mortal. Yeah, like it doesn't matter whether we're.
[00:06:01] Speaker A: Gonna have a mortal daredevil name now. The immortal Al Ewing.
[00:06:04] Speaker B: It should be. I'd sign off on that.
[00:06:06] Speaker A: That's the only reason.
[00:06:07] Speaker B: There you go. There's my. My top 10 goes to Immortal Thor.
[00:06:09] Speaker A: Or 10. 10 is the writer from Dark Horse Comics and the Berkowitz brothers, along with Josh Gad. Yes, Olaf himself, which is kind of funny. So this book is like. Relies a lot on Jewish history, like old school comic book telling, storytelling. The main character, protagonist looks like Josh Gad, which is also kind of funny. It's like the. What was it? Berserker.
[00:06:32] Speaker B: Yeah, Berserker.
[00:06:33] Speaker A: Keanu Reeves looks like the main character. It's like, oh, are they setting it up for that? If they end up making a movie of. This is the other option.
[00:06:38] Speaker B: But what if he doesn't get cast as that?
[00:06:41] Speaker A: It's like, obviously, Ken, a deep berserker. Like, is Josh Gag going to play the protagonist? And this, this becomes a movie or a TV show. But it's also, it's. It's proof that again, I think there's this crossover between comics and movies and comics and TV and comics and things that. That there's people that are writing or acting in comic or TV shows and movies that can write comics, and they're not all writing them all. So let's be honest. Like, Josh Guy probably did applauding character creation, things like that. And the Berkowitz brother actually did the script and all that stuff. So there is that side of it. But like, that was a fun book. And again, if the Jewish culture, it's for. I mean, it's for them for sure. But I think it's a fun book. And I think that again, Dark Horse killed it this year for me. And I think that number 10 is the writer.
[00:07:23] Speaker B: Very nice, Very nice. This is gonna be annoying. I unlock my phone every single time.
All right, number nine, I go Kill All Immortals. Also comics. Yes.
So, I mean, I have a little bit of love anyways for anything that's like Viking culture. That's some of my heritage. But I think this does a great job of showing you some of the, like, old Viking lore mixed with the action adventure and stuff in modern time.
Absolutely. Love Kill All Immortals and is made in my top 10 of the year.
[00:07:55] Speaker A: That's a fun one, I'll tell you that much.
[00:07:57] Speaker B: That's really, really great read for anybody looking for a good action adventure.
[00:08:00] Speaker A: I mean, I don't know you guys like that. The name Kill All Immortals just sounds like you want to read that. We want to know more. Whether I want to read all five issues or you want to read anything. Just like you want to know, like, what the hell is this all about?
[00:08:10] Speaker B: The cover's been great too.
[00:08:11] Speaker A: Just so you Immortal things. Your list, the Immortal Paul list. This Year.
[00:08:15] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:08:17] Speaker A: Dark Horse is number nine for me.
Into the Unbeing from another Zach. Oh, I got a Thompson. And Hayden. Hayden Sherman. I was gonna say Sheridan, but just. No, Sherman. A book that is a post apocalyptic style book but deals with like climate crisis, like the end of the world basically due to climate crisis. And you can tell through the whole book that it like both these characters, both these writers and these artists writing from a point of passion, a point of like caring about the earth they live on and so on and so forth. And Zach is a Canadian, so obviously he's nice.
[00:08:52] Speaker B: He has to be. That's a requirement. Unless you're playing hockey.
[00:08:55] Speaker A: It's a beautifully illustrated book too. And it's being. It's. Dark Horse is committed to it because it's the first issue. The first four issues were each of the on being Part one.
[00:09:04] Speaker B: Right. Part two.
[00:09:05] Speaker A: Part two comes out in January. So there's like this. We're going to commit to this part of it. It's. It's all good. J. Jason. It's all good.
Yeah. No, so yeah, into the On Being Part one.
[00:09:17] Speaker B: Just don't start calling Galactic over and over again. So that keeps going off.
[00:09:21] Speaker A: It's be Brock. That's not my name, but yeah, into the. I'm being at number nine. I think we're. We're going to fly through numbers 10 through six and then we'll maybe dive in a little bit more at issue five. That's where the wheel.
[00:09:36] Speaker B: Yeah. The meat of it all is. All right, well this one's a bit of a cop out, I'm gonna tell you right now.
[00:09:41] Speaker A: So I did TMNT number one because you have a store variant of it. Is it really?
[00:09:47] Speaker B: No, no, no.
So this is. I did Energon Universe. Okay. Because I didn't want to have like, like Duke and Cobra Commander and like. So I just did Energon Universe cuz I really felt like it wrote me in with everything. And I obviously I'm a GI Joe guy. So this was, you know, really easy. I was gonna read Duke, I was gonna read Cobra Commander, but I got. I was so like into the universe. I said, you know what, I gotta read Void Rivals now. Even though originally it wasn't really on my radar and I ended up loving that too. I think Void Rivals was a fun read. It gave us like, I don't know, I. Compared to Saga without all of the extra stuff.
[00:10:23] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:10:23] Speaker B: You know, but you're still getting some of that Energon tie in universe stuff. So rather than saying I got Duke here. I just. Energon Universe. There you go.
[00:10:31] Speaker A: I see it. I mean, talking to people about comment or books, I'm always like, it's Clown on the Cornfields, one of my favorite books of all time. But I'm always like, I like two and I like three.
[00:10:42] Speaker B: Right.
[00:10:42] Speaker A: Like the whole series of it you should read, not just one book.
[00:10:44] Speaker B: I actually started volume one of them, so.
[00:10:46] Speaker A: Yeah, I can see that. Same thing with. I mean, Graham would know about, like, Stephen King's Holly Gibney. It's like Holly Gibney as a character is in like seven different Dark Tower series. Yeah. Yes. Yeah, exactly.
It's my second year in a row with picking a graphic novel, like a straight ahead graphic novel. Because that does qualify as obviously Houses of the Unholy from Image Comics. Brubaker and Phillips. Can't go wrong with those names. They're killer general. So I could just leave it at that and just drop the mic and say, we're fine. However, it's a crime thriller, horror. And so like, that to me was just a phenomenal one. And it was cool because I, as a. As a person who runs like capes and tights in the website and all that stuff, I do a lot of reviews. I have access to a netgalley account too, as a media member. And so I get to get to read some things ahead of times. And because a graphic novel is a bookstore thing, I get to read that ahead time. So I was able to read that like, not like a week ahead of time. Like, I get the comic books. I was able to read that like six months ahead of time, and I absolutely loved it. So Houses of the Unholy and the Hard Cover and the words that are in red and they're foil killers. It's just beautiful. That's number eight for me.
[00:11:53] Speaker B: Fun part for that too is like, most of their stuff tends to be very like. Like ground level. So it's interesting to go into a horror side.
[00:11:59] Speaker A: This has been very well now at this point. Like, do they. Can they do anything on their own?
Every do this thing, but Sean Phillips is not gonna be there. Like, well, I don't want to worry to them. That's not my thing.
[00:12:08] Speaker B: Right. All right. So then I go back to the Marvel Universe for Ultimate Spider Man.
[00:12:13] Speaker A: Dude.
No, you're great. It's just great. It's just crazy because I think in the past I wanted to do these. These lists of being like, let's do independent comics or something like that because it was so hard to Pick.
[00:12:22] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:12:23] Speaker A: Marvel Comics. I do think you've done this well with doing Ultimate.
[00:12:26] Speaker B: And I don't like last year I had very few Marvel books, I think. So Ultimate Spiderman got me. I got. As far as the shop goes, that's got to be one of our highest selling single comics of the year. It went to. What the hell, they go to like, like 8th printing for number one or something like that. Like, it just kept back out. But every time I turned around, I had to order more because we're out of them.
[00:12:45] Speaker A: Well, you don't have any on the shelf right now, but that's just because diamond didn't deliver.
[00:12:48] Speaker B: Yeah, that's a whole different problem. Yeah. Thank you, Diamond Comics.
But Ultimate Spider man, the hype was huge in here. Every time I turned around, we had more people joining the store, joining the polis and really joining the comic community because of what they heard about Ultimate Spider Man. So I said, well, obviously I've got to read this thing too. But I couldn't get my hands on any realistically until the trade came out. And it made my list. It got me.
The modern Spider man stuff has not been really great in my own modern Marvel stuff.
[00:13:16] Speaker A: So, like, it's just, well, if you were to pick a new modern Marvel thing, Spiderman, and having me that Spider man is the one that it does well. Does it well?
[00:13:24] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:13:25] Speaker A: Is awesome. I love that thing. And I think it was proof that they honestly made a mistake killing off the ultimate universe.
[00:13:30] Speaker B: Yeah, Well, I mean, hey, here it is. It's coming back around with a new take on it. And I thought it was great to return to a Spider man story. And it's. But it's different. It's not your same old Spider man story. And I enjoyed it. I thought it was well written. It's. It's got a slow burn. But I enjoyed the slow burn. I'm in for the ride.
[00:13:47] Speaker A: So I think it's one of those things that you grow as a human being. And so like when I first started coming to the shop, I was a Marvel zombie through and through.
[00:13:57] Speaker B: The first book club, I think you had what, everything from Marvel phone casing to Marvel socks to Marvel underwear.
[00:14:03] Speaker A: But it was just like it was just Marvel, Marvel, Marvel.
[00:14:05] Speaker B: Now I'm wearing a Marvel hat and Marvel shoes.
[00:14:07] Speaker A: So I don't know.
It's not just the independent comic books have been on rise. It's also that Marvel had been on a decline.
And I hate. I sound like I'm 38, but I sound like an old cross man, like.
But, like, it's true. And for a while, and I think a lot of people understand that there wasn't. Has been a crossover. And that's why on my honorable mentions was the Blood Hunt.
[00:14:29] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:14:29] Speaker A: But I honestly think that, like, if you just. You just did the Energon.
[00:14:32] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:14:32] Speaker A: If I said the new Ultimate Marvel universe as a whole, just do all of it, that could be in assistance. You said Spider man. But, like, let's be honest, Ultimate Black Panther has been very good. The Ultimates have been really good.
[00:14:42] Speaker B: Ultimate X Men as a huge invasion.
[00:14:43] Speaker A: Was that that one shot that came out good. So I think it's a. It's a. It's a future that's bright for Marvel in that sense. But number seven for me. Magma Comics makes their way under our list first time. That's obviously. I mean, they're not. They've been around for a little while, but, like, they haven't been so prominent as they are in 2024. And that is with the pedestrian from our boy Joy, Joya Esposito, who lives here in Maine, where we're from, and Sean Von Gorman. This book, I think the biggest was the wow factor of just, like, what the. What am I looking at? What am I seeing? What am I reading? When we. When we brought the initial preview of this, both of us, we kind of, like, send each other a message being like, what is this gonna be? And then we read the first issue. I'm like, still, what is this gonna be? What's going on? And I think that was cool because I think one of the biggest things I talked to other creators in the podcast here is I want something unique, something that draws me out of the normal. And I think that there's a lot of. One of the reasons why maybe I got stagnant on Marvel, it was just repetitive. Same thing over and over again. Because with independent comics, they're just going everywhere. And this pedestrian was just like, where do some of these creators get this stuff? And so the pedestrian having this, like, visitor that visits this small community that's just helping out. But then it goes. There's not even a way to. That's how to explain, like, issue one.
[00:15:59] Speaker B: Well, it's so funny because, like, I had the. My sales pitch pedestrian people were, this is the top book you've got to read. But I don't know why. I can't tell you why you need to read it. I tell you I read it, but you need to read this book. But I don't know why it's It's. It's not even so much. At least in the. In the first round. It's not even about the pedestrian. It's about the community around him. But you roped in. You're interested.
[00:16:22] Speaker A: So number seven, pedestrian. Magma Comics.
[00:16:25] Speaker B: Great pick. And I feel bad for the. For it didn't make my list, but I thoroughly enjoyed that book.
[00:16:29] Speaker A: Well, as I say, it's one of those. It's also. I think it could be a polarizing comic book. I think it's one of those things someone could say, oh, it's top 10 book of the year. And someone can come at you and be like, well, it's top 10 worst book of the year because of how it's such an off the wall.
[00:16:40] Speaker B: It's so different style book that I.
[00:16:42] Speaker A: Can understand why someone wouldn't want it. But the. Sean Montagorman does a great job with it. And then again, gotta give love to Mainer Joey Esposito.
[00:16:51] Speaker B: Number six.
[00:16:51] Speaker A: Yeah, here.
[00:16:52] Speaker B: Number six. I go with Farrell.
[00:16:56] Speaker A: I love that book. Sucks.
[00:16:58] Speaker B: Yeah. Right.
[00:16:59] Speaker A: I was trying to get a reaction out Jason over there.
[00:17:01] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:17:01] Speaker C: I was like, what the hell?
[00:17:05] Speaker B: I love it. Tony Fleeks brings it back around stray dogs. Like, absolutely loves the stray dogs run. And we met Tony years ago, and he goes, well, now I'm working on something with cats, and I. My first thought was like, how many times are we gonna. Can we. Can we do that? How many times can we do this?
I'm like, how many times can we do this and keep it. And keep it interesting, keep it fun, keep it different? And yet Pharrell comes out and bam, right off. I love. I think I like feral more than I like stray dogs.
[00:17:33] Speaker A: There is.
[00:17:33] Speaker B: I loved it.
[00:17:34] Speaker A: Yeah, there is that side of the thing, and I think that there's the. By saying it's just cats. It's not Sons of Lambs meets all those go to Heaven with cats. It's. It's a. Literally a completely different story.
[00:17:43] Speaker B: It's almost. It's almost got the zombie vibe going, you know, and the characters are different. It's not the same as stray Dogs was. I feel like there's actually more like character development in Feral than there was in Stray dogs versus Stray dogs. Hit really quick would be like, this is from the perspective of dogs. It hasn't been done before. And Farrell is more like a deep dive, I feel like, in the characters. So Farrell is.
[00:18:09] Speaker A: It's also an ongoing series. So that's the other part about it is like, yeah, you got a finite five issues, whereas we're now into volume two.
[00:18:18] Speaker C: Genius.
[00:18:19] Speaker A: Incredible.
[00:18:20] Speaker B: There we go.
[00:18:20] Speaker A: Jason loves it too. I mean, I think it's a big. That's a big. That to me is. I mean, now that's just. That that's perfect. Jason loves it too. So.
[00:18:27] Speaker B: Yeah, see, we got a sealed deal, right? It has to be. If it's got. If it's got both of our team.
[00:18:32] Speaker A: I mean, number six for me is Pyongyang. No, just kidding.
I guess that's a kind of an inside joke. That might be an inside joke that doesn't actually fit. Yeah, exactly.
Another graphic novel for me. Two graphic novels make this.
[00:18:47] Speaker B: Holy smokes.
[00:18:47] Speaker A: And Pauline is gonna collapse here on the floor. We gotta get the hospital, the ambulance here ready.
[00:18:53] Speaker B: Just call 911 already.
[00:18:55] Speaker A: It's a DC comic.
[00:18:57] Speaker B: What? What? How do I have Marvel on my list and yet You've got the D.C. number.
[00:19:03] Speaker A: Six. Not even on my list.
[00:19:05] Speaker B: Yeah, it wasn't like you just mentioned it.
[00:19:06] Speaker A: This land is our land. A Blue Beetle story from Julio Anta and Jacoby Salcedo.
[00:19:12] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:19:12] Speaker A: This book is a coming of age origin story for Hame yet. Right. Hame Reyes as Blue Beetle. So I'm not a big D.C. fan, as most people know. I don't know a lot of DC horror or DC lore. I mean.
[00:19:24] Speaker B: No, you were a big DC fan. That was like your jam.
[00:19:27] Speaker A: And so to me, it was like getting back into something. Some. Something like Blue Beetle is a not obscure character, but not a Superman. Batman.
[00:19:34] Speaker B: It's not the trinity of dc.
[00:19:36] Speaker A: And so having this origin story and having this ability to read this story based in true events, to real events, racism, you know, following the news too much, both left and right. Just. Just listening to the Internet too much. All that in this one encapsulating graphic novel.
[00:19:52] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:19:53] Speaker A: Was phenomenal. I'm a big fan of Jacoby Salcedo from its only teenage wasteland. So that's the reason why I even read it in the first place.
[00:19:59] Speaker B: Right.
[00:19:59] Speaker A: So we'll get that caveat.
Yeah, that's why. See, DC Comics is where I always go to the DC first and then say, okay, what do I want to read after dc? No. Because of Jacoby Salcedo doing the art on this book, I thought, I need to do this. And they won an Eisner Award for Frontera.
[00:20:14] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:20:14] Speaker A: Which is a young adult graphic novel they did together, the two of them, Anta and Salcedo. So that's what drew me into it. But then when I got into it, I'm like, dude, this is phenomenal. I just couldn't put it down.
[00:20:22] Speaker B: I think it's great. That a ya major top 10, like, that's awesome.
[00:20:25] Speaker A: You know what, listen. See, I am 38, but I'm 17 at heart.
[00:20:30] Speaker B: I think 17's a stretch, but all right, sure.
I always tell people, best thing about.
[00:20:35] Speaker A: Young adult novels, graphic novels is I get older, they stay the same age. No, no, it's not the next.
[00:20:43] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:20:45] Speaker A: Not that it's the appropriate quote that ever should have been told. Ever in that movie. Ever.
[00:20:49] Speaker B: No.
[00:20:51] Speaker A: All right, number.
[00:20:52] Speaker B: Number five. Number five. All right, well, I'm gonna go for a little visual effects on this one here for anybody.
[00:20:57] Speaker A: Don't take your pants off, please.
[00:20:58] Speaker B: Again.
[00:20:59] Speaker A: Do you remember that? Do you ever see the episode of the Office or they're recording the meeting because Michael's on vacation. And it's not a video recording, it's just audio recording. And they're saying, dwight, why are you taking your shirt off? Dwight, you have a Muppets baby. Yes. You have animal. The Muppets on your ass.
No, we have video here. We can prove that Paul has his clothes on right now.
[00:21:18] Speaker B: Yes, yes. The clothes stayed on this time. All right, number five.
[00:21:22] Speaker A: So you did do it.
[00:21:23] Speaker B: I did do it. Yes, I did. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. All right, well, let's cover some. Yes, fine. We have our Galactic Comics exclusive team of T number one with our buddy Bob Tacky. Hold it up.
[00:21:34] Speaker A: On sale now.
Sales pitch over here.
[00:21:39] Speaker B: That's actually on the website, too.
[00:21:42] Speaker A: Free for all of our list. No.
[00:21:44] Speaker B: Yeah, well, yeah, maybe not.
[00:21:49] Speaker A: It's just. It's got a little guy with a shovel and it says under construction in progress.
[00:21:54] Speaker B: We're working on it. Yeah. Still waiting for the AOL to finish up. Downloading it.
[00:21:58] Speaker A: I think you can buy the Superman trade paperback on there. I think you can buy.
I think all the trades that balls way too many of are on.
[00:22:08] Speaker B: Yeah, those are all there.
All right, so tmnt. All right, first of all, I mean, obviously, right, I'm a Ninja Turtle guy. I love turtles. I grew up with turtles. The fact that we restart, I think was a good push. I think it's hard to deep dive into a comic series. It's been out for a really long time, right? Like, if you're new and you're coming in and you see TMNT number 147 on the shelf, you go, I can't start here. Where do I even begin? So Here you go.
[00:22:35] Speaker A: 150, right?
The longest, the run before this was the Longest run of TMNT in history.
[00:22:40] Speaker B: Yeah, Ever.
[00:22:41] Speaker A: And they. And they decided to go with number one again.
[00:22:43] Speaker B: So. So we start off and issue one kicks you right off with wrath. And in each issue going forward, you get another, like, completely honed in issue on a turtle. And I love that. I think it's a great setup, fantastic.
[00:22:57] Speaker A: Storyline, great variant covers.
[00:22:59] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:23:02] Speaker A: Schmucke has a good variant cover for it.
[00:23:04] Speaker B: Actually, Schmokey has some awesome variant covers for it. Yes, I can see that.
[00:23:06] Speaker A: So it's one of those also discussions we've had every year. Like, I think last year you had something still in the children on your list. Yeah. Which is one of those ones. I. The problem is I don't think about it until we start talking.
[00:23:15] Speaker B: Right.
[00:23:16] Speaker A: And you start saying something where I'm like, oh, shit. I guess a continuation, a continuous series can actually be like a comic book that's on 37. Could actually become a book of the year because. Or it's not series. It didn't say new series, didn't say miniseries, didn't say anything. It's so one of those things that, like, we just talked about, like if. If, you know Poison ivy's on issue 26, it could be your comic book of the year. The other side of it is I completely forgot about the reboot of it.
[00:23:40] Speaker B: Right.
[00:23:40] Speaker A: And I guess one of those things. And like, now I can like, let's sit there. Let's just re record this whole thing because I'll get my.
Not on my list.
[00:23:47] Speaker B: Right.
[00:23:47] Speaker A: And that's not. Because. Not good.
[00:23:49] Speaker B: I mean, started this year and it's.
[00:23:52] Speaker A: Like Greg Katzmann from IDW is gonna be very pissed that it's not on your. Email me now and tell me that it's not on my list. But. But no, I can see that. Top five makes sense.
[00:24:04] Speaker B: You think Kevin Eastman's gonna send you an email about this?
[00:24:06] Speaker A: Kevin Eastman? No. He'll try to see.
[00:24:08] Speaker B: Watching.
[00:24:10] Speaker A: That's. We had to pay that we had to do this because I had Kevin Eastman on last year. Two years ago. So this is. We had to promote TMNT for the rest of our lives now because he was on for 15 minutes. No.
Galactic Comics and Collectibles. They. Galactic Comics and collectibles, collectibles.com.
[00:24:23] Speaker B: Are those your only ones?
[00:24:24] Speaker C: They don't have. They don't affect the list.
[00:24:26] Speaker B: No, no.
[00:24:27] Speaker A: I'll say that this episode is brought to you by Orner Brewing Company too, because they supplied the beverages for this thing. Beverages drawn by Leona kangas for episode 200.
[00:24:35] Speaker B: Love it, Liana.
[00:24:36] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:24:36] Speaker B: Crushing it, as always.
[00:24:38] Speaker A: Yes. Beautiful, beautiful. Art number five, Feral Forstner. I fell into that again. Here's my short statement on it. Rabies, zombie cats, period.
[00:24:53] Speaker B: Done.
[00:24:54] Speaker C: If only that covered it, though.
[00:24:56] Speaker A: It does. And it took Rabies, rabies, zombie cats from the creators of Stray Dogs. To me, like, that was like. If I ever had to explain it to someone who's red. Stray Dogs, I'm like, that's. You. Like, that's. Yeah, that's so. Tony is a phenomenal artist, but somehow has also weaved his way into making writing. Amazing career for him, too, because Stray Dogs, Feral, Local, and there's all these different characters, the things that he's written. It's the same thing, I think, with Scotty nowadays, too. Scotty's done some phenomenal things in the writing side of things. And I think that some of these people we've talked to have, like, they have a bunch of stories to tell, and they can't illustrate them all.
[00:25:33] Speaker B: No. There's enough time in the day.
[00:25:34] Speaker A: Writing a story is a lot. Not easier, but a little bit more time. That's kind time consuming than illustrating a story. And so having his ability to actually let Trish do all the right illustrations, him write the story and do the stuff. And Feral is amazing. And I think Feral is one of those ones that actually took over for Local man because Local man ended.
[00:25:51] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:25:52] Speaker A: Hiatus.
[00:25:53] Speaker B: No. Yeah. Well, yeah. We don't want to say it ended, but he chose.
[00:25:55] Speaker A: He chose between two, and it was Tim stealing him.
[00:25:57] Speaker B: I don't know how some of these creators. I don't know how they can possibly do as much as they.
[00:26:01] Speaker A: And they chose. He said, I need the new comic shelf.
[00:26:04] Speaker B: And it's just like the 3, 4, or 5 from the same creator.
[00:26:07] Speaker A: Like, I need to put on the time this series. And he decided Local man was that series and that Pharaoh wasn't the one. And that, to me, said. Spoke something.
[00:26:13] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:26:14] Speaker A: That he believes in it more. And I think there's more to tell in that story, and there's more to tell in that world. And Pharaoh made number five. And it's not because there's a polka in the back of it. It's for me.
[00:26:22] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, That's a good question. Does every single one of you guys have a Pokemon?
[00:26:25] Speaker A: That's a. No. Pedestrian. No. I don't know about pedestrian yet.
[00:26:28] Speaker B: We don't know about pedestrian yet. Yeah. Has it gone to print? No.
For all of you listening that are part of the Galactic Comic Book Club, Group. We're gonna be doing pedestrian next year. I'm excited. 2025, they would know that if they were here. That's true. That's true. Well, you know, they can start doing the book club.
[00:26:44] Speaker A: So I will say, like, you weren't here, Jason, is that. I got a text message from Emma, one of our book club members, at 12:37 in the morning.
That was. Is tonight the recording for the podcast.
[00:26:59] Speaker B: At least you're excited.
[00:27:01] Speaker A: She's like, first of all, there's a chance I was up because I have an 8 month old and a 3 year old. So there was a chance that I was up not because I didn't go to bed yet, because I woke up in the middle of night. My phone goes on do not disturb at like 9. So I'm not like ever gonna get these messages anyway.
[00:27:13] Speaker B: My phone's on do not disturb always.
[00:27:14] Speaker A: Yeah. And so I was like, that made a sound. I did it with a paper. 1237. I also. Then I also go again. I'm 38. Emma's not.
Do you like. I'm thinking to myself like 12:30.
[00:27:26] Speaker B: I don't remember. I don't remember last time in our world to Emma. It's like seven.
[00:27:30] Speaker A: Yeah. I'm thinking myself like, when was the last time I was up at 12:37 in the morning on purpose?
So.
But Mo is working. That's the reason it been this decade.
Yeah.
See this?
[00:27:44] Speaker B: You have a spot in the city that you sit over like Batman. You lean over, you know, a rooftop.
[00:27:48] Speaker C: I'm not gonna tell you where it.
[00:27:50] Speaker B: Okay, well, that's fair. You don't want a line to have to start. You don't wanna wait for somebody else to get done brooding. See, there we go. Danny is out coming to you live.
[00:27:58] Speaker A: Our only Superman fans now leaving. So.
[00:28:00] Speaker B: Oh, man. And I think Superman was my top bookies gonna be here to hear it.
[00:28:04] Speaker A: Superman still have comics out.
[00:28:05] Speaker B: I don't know who's Superman?
[00:28:07] Speaker C: You guys are shameful.
[00:28:10] Speaker B: Go Superman.
[00:28:11] Speaker A: Superman. Superman.
[00:28:13] Speaker B: All right.
[00:28:14] Speaker A: Are you on number four already?
[00:28:15] Speaker B: Number four already? Yeah, this is. We're. We're flying through these. Really? So number four was one of our book club books of the year.
[00:28:22] Speaker A: Was it books of the year or books that came out this year? Because we didn't do a book of the year yet.
[00:28:26] Speaker B: Okay. Yeah, we should. We should do what's great.
[00:28:31] Speaker A: Let's remember to do that at the holiday party. We'll throw a little. Everybody write their favorite on the thing. We'll do a little thousand.
[00:28:36] Speaker B: Can we Remember which books we read this year?
[00:28:38] Speaker A: And then we'll put it. We'll put it up on the. On the shelf over here.
[00:28:40] Speaker B: Yeah, that'd be great.
[00:28:41] Speaker A: A book club's favorite book of the year that we read. I think it's great.
[00:28:44] Speaker B: Yeah. All right. So my book is Beneath the Trees where Nobody Sees.
[00:28:48] Speaker A: See, there you go.
[00:28:49] Speaker B: Yep.
What else can you say about this book? So is it an original story? No, it's a murder mystery. Right. But the artwork is phenomenal. And the telling of the story coming from the, like, perspective, really, of, like, a children's story. It was just. It, man. It just grabs you and sucks you in. So Beneath the trees Where Nobody Sees. I just loved.
I don't know. It was such a unique telling of the story, and I was. I love to find out that it's going to continue.
[00:29:21] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:29:21] Speaker B: We're going to go on to another volume and continue with these characters, and I think that would be great, too, because I want to see. I want to see more of what's going on in this town and what these people are about. What. What has Sam been doing, the main character, to try to, like, cover up what she does in her spare time.
[00:29:36] Speaker A: So she, like, describe it to people.
[00:29:39] Speaker C: I'm like, I don't want to tell you too much about this. I just want you to read.
[00:29:42] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:29:43] Speaker A: I think that's fair.
I think the.
[00:29:45] Speaker B: The. The.
[00:29:46] Speaker A: The slogan for it was like, Dexter meets Richie Scary.
[00:29:49] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:29:49] Speaker A: Is like a good. I. My brother is a huge fan of those, like, comparison things.
[00:29:54] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:29:55] Speaker A: I'm usually like, how do you do that? There's only been a few. I think Stray dog saying it wasn't what was the one. Although I was going to have it. It was lady in the Train meets Something's Coming. Sons of the Lambs.
[00:30:08] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:30:09] Speaker A: Ladies trip meets. Really just take the nose.
That is spot on. And I think that Richard scary means Dexter is literally like, he said, I want to make a comic book that's Richard Scary means Dexter. I made a comic book.
[00:30:21] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:30:21] Speaker A: Like, it wasn't like, I made this pigment. This comic book. What's it like? It was literally like, I love Richard Scary as a kid, and I love Dexter. So I'm now gonna make a comic book.
[00:30:28] Speaker B: And I love the fact that IDW said, yeah, we'll go with.
[00:30:31] Speaker A: Well, I don't even think. Like, I said, Greg's gonna be pissed at me again. The marketing communications person from. From. From idw. But I don't even think they understood what we had.
[00:30:40] Speaker B: No.
[00:30:41] Speaker A: I don't think that anybody understood what this comic was, how hot it was gonna be.
[00:30:44] Speaker B: Yeah, it was. It's. I don't know, it's funny because like we said, original storyline. No. It's a murder mystery. But in the grand scheme of things, I've never seen anything else like this.
[00:30:52] Speaker A: No. And no one can because it ends up being copying. So you have stray dogs.
[00:30:55] Speaker B: We talked about Pharaoh.
[00:30:56] Speaker A: Stray dogs is it's own animal.
[00:30:59] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:30:59] Speaker A: No pun intended. And beneath the trees. Like I feel like anybody who comes after this and tries to do a similar thing now.
So I just watched the Ed Gein. I'm super into serial killer.
[00:31:10] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:31:11] Speaker A: And when the guy who made the Ed Gein movie.
[00:31:16] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:31:16] Speaker A: Like there's a movie came out in 2000 called Ed Gein.
He left out certain parts that are actually part of the story, but that were used in Silence of the Lambs. And Silence the Lambs was based loosely off of the Edge character. And he gets. Yeah. He solely left him out of the movie because people would assume that he was copying Silence the Lambs even though it's part of the original actual story. He was like, someone's gonna immediately say. I think it might have been when he puts this mask or the face on his face.
[00:31:44] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:31:44] Speaker A: Because I didn't silence the Lancer. That red dragon. Whatever. One of the movies is like he does this thing. I think he would basically made Eggy not wear the face mask in the movie of Skin because it had been in a different movie. He's like, I don't feel think I'm copying it.
[00:31:56] Speaker B: Right.
[00:31:57] Speaker A: Anybody comes out of an anamorphic serial killer style story done. It really assume that copying this book.
[00:32:04] Speaker B: And so any. Any anamorphic thing that comes out now. I think that is in that same vein is gonna be. If you're trying to do a hoarder.
[00:32:09] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:32:10] Speaker B: You're gonna go, oh, so beneath the trees when nobody sees me. Poltergeist.
[00:32:13] Speaker A: The animation being kids oriented in the story being adult oriented. That in general, I think is just.
[00:32:18] Speaker B: Now you're immediately gonna.
[00:32:19] Speaker A: Tony Trish and Patrick have now taken that whole thing.
[00:32:22] Speaker B: Yeah, agreed. And I mean cr. So good.
[00:32:26] Speaker A: Minor. I'm gonna say this for you, number four, from the world of minor threats, Bar Fly. So it's barfly. So I this little discussion before we started recording about how it should be called Bar Fly from the world of minor threats. Because I hate the. Every comic book now that's in the world of minor threats now says that from the world of minor threats.
[00:32:45] Speaker B: I never know. So I type up the like, yeah, the list of the week. Here's your comics coming out. I don't know what. What the hell do I put this as? I think it's just like, I got this giant name, but I don't want to just put Barfly because I'm afraid people are gonna be like, what the hell is that?
[00:32:58] Speaker A: So Butterfly is. By the God. I'm sorry. I'm gonna tell him now. The God. Kyle Starks, who again, is another one of those people who, as they started their really.
[00:33:08] Speaker B: Their.
[00:33:09] Speaker A: Their comic book world, their journey as an incredible illustrator in comics, and then they've moved on to. I want to tell a bunch of stories and do a bunch of things. I don't have time to illustrate it all. So I'm going to write some stuff and have come on to write Peacemaker Tries Hard, which was phenomenal.
[00:33:22] Speaker B: I can't wait to read that as I might read list.
[00:33:24] Speaker A: So, like, there's. I hate this place was phenomenal.
[00:33:28] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:33:28] Speaker A: And then you have this Barfly comic book that was created by Jordan Bloom and Pat Noswalt and then handed over the keys, basically the story to Barfly to Kyle Starks and artist Ryan Brown.
Phenomenal.
[00:33:43] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:33:44] Speaker A: And it's basically this character in the first Minor Threat series. They're just called Minor Threats. It's in the background of the bar when he's sitting at the bar, and his name is Shit Eater and he's a fly, and he doesn't speak. He's a fly.
[00:33:58] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:33:58] Speaker A: He just buzzes around. And his whole book is based around Bar, the barfly.
[00:34:03] Speaker B: Right.
[00:34:03] Speaker A: And they wanted to call it Shit Eater, but Dark Horse is like, yeah.
They did do a variant, I think, for New York Comic Con that Shit Eater has the title, but, yeah, he's just side character that everybody loves. We're reading the first series, like, let's write a whole series about.
[00:34:18] Speaker B: It's like that character in the background of the canteen at Star wars. And you're like, oh, we got to know about.
[00:34:21] Speaker A: You know, in Spider man, into the slider verse, there's the scene where they throw the bagel.
[00:34:29] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:34:29] Speaker A: The guy in the head and says bagel.
[00:34:30] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:34:31] Speaker A: There's multiple sides of those jokes in this. In this comic book where the illustration, the lettering, and the artists have gone through and done these things that were like, you. You have to read it. And you go, oh, my God, that's hilarious. There's posters in the background. There's things that are just. It's a funny comic book, and I do Think that funny. Comic books are polarizing. There's. There's this weird thing. Comedy is not horror in my opinion. There's levels of horror, yeah, like there's like, you know, terrifier and then there's like your basic horror movie, you know, like there's these difference. However, horror is horror in my opinion. Comedy is not just comedy in my opinion. There's come is there's different genres and avenues for comedy. I think that comic books. One of the reasons why you see mean, I don't think it's a fun. Is there.
[00:35:10] Speaker B: I mean, there really aren't very many comedy style comic books out there.
[00:35:15] Speaker A: So hard to find a giant group of people that will laugh at this one style of com.
[00:35:20] Speaker B: Right?
[00:35:21] Speaker A: I think com books, if you say horror comic books, most horror. Comic book fans are gonna read most horror comics.
[00:35:27] Speaker B: Most horror fans, if you say if they come in, they go, oh, I want to try comic books. And I go, oh, I'm into horror. Okay, terrific. Well, here's a whole genre of horror comics. They're gonna find something, no problem.
[00:35:35] Speaker A: So this being a comedy in a world that's not really a comedy, Minor Threats has this comedy aspect. It's super hero world all messed up. I don't know. There's something about this comic book and I think that again, the artwork is Ryan Brown's. Phenomenal. I love Ryan Brown's artwork and him throwing these jokes in there. And there's times where he basically said, I think we threw too many jokes in there. I'm like, no, you didn't throw more in. Perfect. In my opinion. So Minor Threats is just.
Yeah, it's perfect in my. It's number four. I don't know why it's not number one for me, honestly, but.
[00:36:03] Speaker B: Wow, that's impressive. All right, so Shameless plugin Kyle starks is God. Galacticon 2025 is coming. Kyle, just. Justin's throwing out the word God for you. Like, come on, man. Make the drive, make the flight, make the something. Come on up here.
[00:36:18] Speaker A: They're not a sponsor. Not a paid sponsor.
[00:36:20] Speaker B: No, no.
[00:36:21] Speaker A: Galactic on Zona, Blur that out.
[00:36:23] Speaker B: Yeah. No, no. Well, I mean, you know, we own it, so.
Wait, we don't have Lance's approval for this? Lance is the third person.
[00:36:31] Speaker A: Okay, hold on. Okay, this is the. This is the Galacticon donation bin. I'll take the $6 now. That was the sponsorship for that.
[00:36:39] Speaker B: Wait, that's. That's all the money we had for the show.
[00:36:44] Speaker A: May 31. If you live in the New England.
[00:36:46] Speaker B: Area, hell if you don't make the trip, it's gonna be awesome.
[00:36:49] Speaker A: It's a Minor threats number four.
[00:36:50] Speaker B: Minor threats number four. Number three. And it's funny because you did a comedy, and I do a comedy. I hate Fairyland.
Wait, why? Oh, my God.
[00:36:59] Speaker A: It's on my list again, that.
[00:37:01] Speaker B: I'm sorry. I love it.
[00:37:02] Speaker A: Okay, Bullshit.
[00:37:05] Speaker B: Hey, it's ongoing.
It's as good as it was.
[00:37:09] Speaker A: Mmm.
[00:37:10] Speaker B: Really? Wow. Okay. So I've still enjoyed it. Every time I Hate Fairyland comes out, I grab my copies. I'm still loving it. It's fun.
[00:37:19] Speaker A: I'm not saying is. I don't think.
I think it's great.
[00:37:25] Speaker B: Wow. All right. I think the jokes are still there. I still enjoy it. I still love it.
[00:37:30] Speaker A: Nothing as good as. I mean, Gertrude's Bush.
[00:37:33] Speaker B: God, the Gertrude Bush.
[00:37:36] Speaker C: Look at this from an objective.
[00:37:40] Speaker B: No, I swear I am.
[00:37:41] Speaker A: I mean, I have Gert as a tattoo, right?
[00:37:43] Speaker B: I don't even have Girt as a tattoo currently.
[00:37:45] Speaker A: I have. I love a Safer. I do agree with and. But this is another one of those examples of a comic book that's an ongoing comic book that I forget can still.
[00:37:55] Speaker B: You just keep up with it. So to me youe need a refresher sometimes, right? And I have gotten. I have gotten deep into the world of comic horror stuff. Like this is now. I almost feel bad because sometimes. So perfect example, right? I own a comic book store for a living. I got to talk about comic books. What?
[00:38:14] Speaker A: Wait, Jason, he owns a comic book store.
[00:38:17] Speaker B: So I should be. I should be. Oh, God, that's terrible. I should be. I should be well versed, right?
[00:38:25] Speaker A: Can I. Can I get sponsorships in both of them?
[00:38:28] Speaker B: I think. Well, we're gonna renege ours right now.
[00:38:31] Speaker A: The best part about this is the fact that this is like a worldwide podcast that people are like, who the top shop.
[00:38:35] Speaker B: What the hell are these guys talking about?
[00:38:37] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, you want to come book shop, right?
[00:38:39] Speaker B: So I don't. So I should be well versed. I should be well read, right? There is stuff going on in. Especially in the big two. I have no idea.
[00:38:46] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:38:46] Speaker B: Somebody asked me like, oh, how's Venom War? And I'm like, I'm sorry. I really don't know. Like, I have no idea. I couldn't keep up with.
[00:38:52] Speaker A: So hard to keep track of. Keep up with it.
[00:38:53] Speaker B: Oh, my God, there's so much stuff. So I am. I've been deep diving in all the horror and reading all this horror stuff, and I've been big in the indie scene and Sometimes you need that, like, refresher. You need that something different. And I hate Fairyland. Still, to this day, gets me laughs. I love it. I enjoy it. So I hate Fairy Land.
[00:39:10] Speaker A: Well, I think part of it is, is that Scotty doesn't do the art anymore. Not nothing against Brett, like, the artist that currently does the I hate Fairland. But it's like, one of the reasons I picked up I Hate fairly in the first place was because it was Scotty doing everything.
[00:39:21] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:39:21] Speaker A: And so having him not only write and not illustrate does take a small amount away from it. You know, I also do. Like, the very first story I Hate Fairlane was a very. The story was unique, the idea behind it, and now it's like one of those things, like, how. How is Patrick Horvath gonna do Beneath the Trees, Volume two?
[00:39:39] Speaker B: Volume two, Right?
[00:39:39] Speaker A: Like, how is it? So he's done it well. And I think Scotty did answer the question, like, okay, well. Well, at the end of the volumes of I Hate the first volumes of I Hate Fairlands, she gets out of. She gets out of Fairland.
[00:39:49] Speaker B: Right.
[00:39:49] Speaker A: So how.
[00:39:50] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:39:50] Speaker A: How's she gonna end it back in Fairland? How is. How is that gonna translate back.
[00:39:54] Speaker B: Back into it?
[00:39:56] Speaker A: A great job, you know, Comics of the year, really.
[00:40:00] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:40:00] Speaker A: But it's three. But it's also like, so 100 comics plus 100, 200 series plus. I read this year.
[00:40:07] Speaker B: Right.
[00:40:08] Speaker A: There's that, too.
[00:40:09] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't know. For me, I guess it just. It holds that spot, I still think, because I had the fear when it. When it restart, I go, why are we restarting? I like the way it ended. Do we really need to do this? So we need to restart.
[00:40:19] Speaker A: We started last year, and it didn't make your list last year, but eventually.
[00:40:22] Speaker B: This year, apparently, I've just enjoyed that that much more.
[00:40:26] Speaker A: I just. Okay.
[00:40:27] Speaker B: I don't know. Maybe it. And we should have said there isn't a lot of comedy in the world of comics anymore. So to me, that's that horror comedy.
[00:40:34] Speaker A: In that sense, too.
[00:40:35] Speaker B: It is too. Yeah, it is.
[00:40:36] Speaker A: It's not young adults.
[00:40:38] Speaker B: For anybody who doesn't know what I hate Fairyland is, I always say it's Calvin and Hobbes for adults. This is. This is not. Like, I'm not gonna hand this to my kids and go, here, guys, have fun.
[00:40:49] Speaker A: You know, we talked about, literally, a cover where the. The. Oh, that's the first thing is I hate Fairyland. But the actual. The comic book was originally supposed to call Fuck Fairyland and there's an actual variant cover, cover B every, every month that has Fuck Fairyland as the title. And. And there was a cover A, which was in the comic book. There was Gertrude with two Gertrude. Now she's an adult nude.
[00:41:13] Speaker B: And she's nude.
[00:41:14] Speaker A: And she has a green bush.
[00:41:16] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:41:17] Speaker A: And in the Fairyland variant, it's showing it. And the. I hate. Fairly huge. It's got the pixelated thing, right?
Yo, so here's the deal. No, here's the problem. So I. So this is funny. So we just renounced. This is episode whatever's past 200 now.
[00:41:34] Speaker B: Yeah, there were 200 plus.
[00:41:36] Speaker A: I can actually tell you it's 203.
[00:41:38] Speaker B: Oh, 203.
[00:41:39] Speaker A: But episode 101 was with Scotty was the most popular episode last year. And I talked to him, but I'm like, why did you take my innocent? I say innocent.
[00:41:49] Speaker B: Gertrude is not innocent. She murdered everything.
[00:41:52] Speaker A: She. Now I'm like looking at, I got this little girl here and also now she's an adult that has pubic hair. And I'm like, mother fucker, why did you do this to me? But no, it's true. And it's funny. It's like. That's the funniest thing. It's not raunchy, right? No, it's.
[00:42:07] Speaker B: It's got funny how she ends up, you know, it's not this cigar.
[00:42:13] Speaker A: Like this whole thing.
[00:42:14] Speaker B: He's always drunk. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, she would have to be to follow her around constantly.
[00:42:18] Speaker A: Such a fascinating thing. Because they're going to the fair. Then you're like, oh, it's fair. Then she gets. She's there. Stuck there forever.
[00:42:22] Speaker B: Yeah. And stuck there for 30 plus years. And she keeps aging mentally but physically. So, yeah.
[00:42:27] Speaker A: Worth trekking. I do agree. It's a good comic book. I'm just.
[00:42:30] Speaker B: Well, yeah, it's all right, Wilson. For me, I. I hate Fraley.
[00:42:33] Speaker A: I mean, at this point I've had Scotty on, so I'm not afraid of not getting him on anymore. So like, I can't like Scotty.
[00:42:37] Speaker B: I still love you, even though Justin doesn't.
[00:42:40] Speaker A: Number three for me is Kill All Immortals.
[00:42:43] Speaker B: Oh.
[00:42:43] Speaker A: So we had. This is the. Is this the second one now we've had on both of our lists that I got higher than than yours this time. Secession meets John Wick. I don't know if anybody's fans of those two series.
Family story. So a fantastic family story. Vikings Immortal. Vikings.
[00:43:03] Speaker B: That almost had me at that.
[00:43:04] Speaker A: Anyway, all this stuff. And so I had the. Honestly at issue One. But then as the issues continued and so on and so forth, there might be more coming. According to Zach Kaplan's email list, there might be a future to Kill All Immortals. But I think it's one of those things. And honestly, it's one of those things that would translate perfectly to tv.
[00:43:21] Speaker B: Yeah. No, I could totally see that being a TV series. Yeah.
[00:43:24] Speaker A: And so like, that's why this, this comic book, it's another Dark Horse comic for me this year. Dark Horse, to me, I don't know something about. And I don't know if it's because there's like IDW is like, I love idw, but like they're struggling in some. Some facets. They're succeeding with TMNT in some.
[00:43:41] Speaker B: Right.
[00:43:41] Speaker A: There's some they did a couple years ago that's amazing. Independent and creator own stuff. And seem to Dark Horse.
[00:43:47] Speaker B: I think Dark Horse proved their creator owned stuff a lot.
[00:43:51] Speaker A: And I think that, that, that something like Kill All Immortals and Zach Kaplan to me has been one of the. I mean, if we went through and did creators of the year and stuff like that, I think so Zach was an honorable mention. Zach was on an honorable mention with Midnight Shadows. And then this is absolutely phenomenal. And that said, he did Beyond Real.
[00:44:07] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:44:08] Speaker A: So there's a bunch of stuff that this guy's done that I've absolutely fallen in love with. And I think that the partnership with great artists on these things and so on and so forth, and I think there's some twists and some. Some action. The. The Secession meets John Wick is again, is another one of those ones where I'm like, I don't like those comparison things, but like, it makes complete sense about power and money.
[00:44:29] Speaker B: Oh, all of it. Yeah. How it corrupts.
[00:44:32] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:44:32] Speaker B: Deep down. Yeah.
[00:44:33] Speaker A: And so that's a short series. I think it's only four issues. Maybe.
[00:44:36] Speaker B: Was it. I thought it was five issues.
[00:44:38] Speaker A: But again, one of those mini series that you can get done and hopefully this. There's a future for it.
[00:44:42] Speaker B: Oh, absolutely.
[00:44:43] Speaker A: Number three.
[00:44:43] Speaker B: No, that. I mean, it's a great read. And I think to say something to Dark Horse.
So five years ago, when I say.
[00:44:51] Speaker A: Jokingly that they're listening, but Caitlyn might be listening.
[00:44:54] Speaker B: So five years ago, when I started, to me, Dark Horse was always Hellboy.
[00:44:58] Speaker A: Keep talking.
[00:44:59] Speaker B: It was Hellboy, you know, okay. I go, I open my order sheet. I'm not ordering Hellboy. I'm done. And I move on to my next publisher because we just don't have that much of a Hellboy following. And when I started, I felt like that's what Dark Horse was. And now I feel like they have got some of the best creator owned property coming out.
I think they're.
[00:45:19] Speaker A: The funny thing is I'm more of a fan of their creator own stuff than I am even Hellboy or anything is. It's like, oh, look at this new title coming out. I'm like, oh. And then I look at it, I find out it's Mike Mignola and it's just part of the Hellboy.
[00:45:31] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:45:32] Speaker A: Or that kind of stuff. And it's like the funny thing is Berserk is their number. That's how they make their money.
[00:45:39] Speaker B: It's crazy.
[00:45:40] Speaker A: It's the licensing they have with Berserk.
[00:45:42] Speaker B: Is still volumes of Berserk. Yeah.
[00:45:45] Speaker A: But all their other stuff, it's great. I think that they've had. They don't really do much. I mean, they do. They used to do the Star wars or they do the Star Wars.
[00:45:51] Speaker B: Star Wars.
[00:45:52] Speaker A: There's not very much intellectual property. It's mostly creator own stuff. And I think that. I think a lot of people like working with them. I think.
[00:45:57] Speaker B: I think they did the right thing. They took the step that needed to be done at the time to say, okay, it's time that we grow and change. Maybe what we do and what the perception of.
[00:46:05] Speaker A: I think they're up there. I think, I think honestly and again in the past I've done publishers of the year and like things like that list on the website. I think it's one of those things that Dark Horse is now considered to be that portion they've overtaken. Boom. In my opinion, Boom has something. Skill in the children.
[00:46:18] Speaker B: Right.
[00:46:19] Speaker A: Like they have that.
[00:46:19] Speaker B: Wait, did you say, did you say something? The children. Number two of the year. Something's killing the children.
[00:46:26] Speaker A: See, that's another one. Again, it's the continuation series that I just don't put on my list.
[00:46:30] Speaker B: Yeah, okay. I mean, hey, you don't have to. I can tell you every time something's killing. Something is killing the children comes out, my life stops. That's it. It's time to read something. Skill on the children don't bother me.
[00:46:40] Speaker A: Your life doesn't stop. You have three girls.
[00:46:42] Speaker B: No, no, I love my wife. She takes a little gremlins and says, all right, guys, we're gonna go do something.
[00:46:46] Speaker A: Dad's killing the children Day.
Guess what? If dad can't read Something's killing the children, someone will kill these children.
[00:46:56] Speaker B: No, she knows. She said, okay, you know this is like, this is my jam. This is my thing. So I sit down and I gotta say we talked about how the arc, the major overall arc for this year was more of like a prequel.
[00:47:08] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:47:10] Speaker B: But I think they still nailed it. They crushed it. And as always, I'm waiting for more. I can't.
[00:47:16] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:47:17] Speaker B: Everybody says, you know, I get so many people that come in, they'll say, oh, what are you reading? Or what's your favorite series right now? It's always something the children.
[00:47:24] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:47:25] Speaker B: So I can't help is number two.
[00:47:27] Speaker A: But so yeah. And then that's the title. That's. Nothing's keeping them afloat because they have a bunch of good titles, but that's the one they keep. That's got to be there because you got the source books coming out and the artwork books coming.
[00:47:38] Speaker B: Oh yeah. The arts. And they still have the side stuff of like the House of Slaughter and all these other things. But yeah. Something's killing the children to me is the. I don't know, the must read.
[00:47:47] Speaker A: I will say right now I recommend still good.
[00:47:49] Speaker B: So much we have sold, I think. I think we're closing on 70 copies of something skilling the children's trade, volume one.
[00:47:55] Speaker A: I think you're for a small market. Like you are right about it being still good. Nothing compares to volume one and two. It never will be.
[00:48:05] Speaker B: I think. Yeah. I think the first three to me.
[00:48:07] Speaker A: Hold on. A question from the audience.
[00:48:09] Speaker C: Oh, well, Justin, you had. You've said several times now that you forget these long.
[00:48:15] Speaker A: Yes. Long.
[00:48:17] Speaker C: You don't forget.
[00:48:18] Speaker B: Apparently not. I'm like an elephant.
[00:48:20] Speaker C: Do you think that it's easy to overlook them? Because, I mean you take something like Spider man that's been going on since the 60s.
I think some people might consider it just a machine.
[00:48:31] Speaker B: Yeah, right.
[00:48:32] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:48:33] Speaker B: It's almost like a given.
[00:48:34] Speaker A: The given Spider man is going to be good or going to be there going to be at least passable because Marvel's not going to let someone some schmuck write Spider man or illustrate Spider.
[00:48:45] Speaker B: Are we sure about that? Based on the last. Oh, sorry. Never mind.
[00:48:48] Speaker A: But I'm saying. But still, it's still not a random ass person writing a story. So it's like.
[00:48:54] Speaker C: But just. Just to ask, has anybody either of you read Spider man this year?
[00:48:58] Speaker A: No, this year?
[00:48:59] Speaker B: No, I have.
[00:49:00] Speaker A: We read basically, if anybody can't hear, have we read any of the Batman, Spider man, any of the main characters, main storyline stuff.
[00:49:07] Speaker B: So. All right. So I have. I have tried Spider Man. I tried.
[00:49:11] Speaker A: You read Ultimate Spider Man. But not.
[00:49:12] Speaker B: Well. Right. But I tried the ASM line and I'm sorry, just not my jam. I'm excited. It's resetting.
[00:49:17] Speaker A: Who was it this year?
[00:49:18] Speaker B: Zeb Wells? Yeah, still Zeb Wells. Still. And that's ended now. We're done. The Zeb Wells Era of Spider Man. And I think that's. It's great to refresh. I was shocked that ASM didn't go back to number one and we didn't start a new series because so many fans of Spider man were not particularly happy with this run. So I was sort of surprised to see Zeb Wells ended at 60, and I was surprised that 61 came out rather than saying, okay, we're going to reset this whole thing.
[00:49:44] Speaker A: I. Yeah.
[00:49:46] Speaker B: Modern. Modern Batman. I'm sorry, I'm lost on Modern Batman. I. I went back and I said, I gotta catch up. And I went back, and then I went back, and then I went back and I went. I'm so far back now, I don't even want to start again.
[00:49:56] Speaker C: One of the things that Batman's been doing is, like, whatever storyline they've got going and this has been going on for a while is you got to dig back years.
[00:50:03] Speaker B: You do?
[00:50:04] Speaker A: Yeah. You have to be a big Batman fan to read the current Batman.
[00:50:07] Speaker B: Yeah. You got to know what is going on in Batman. There's all these references. And that was my problem because I went in and I said, well, all right, I'm going to. I'm gonna pick this back up. Because I hated the Rebirth era, and that's where my Batman stopped. So I said, well, I'll pick back up. And then when I tried, I said, holy shit, I can't read this volume. I can't read that volume. I'm going further and further back. And by the time I got done, I had. I have a stack of Batman trades in my to read pile. And I went, I don't even feel like doing this anymore.
And I just decided I was going.
[00:50:31] Speaker C: To read City of Fame.
[00:50:33] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Well.
[00:50:38] Speaker B: And we talk about this in book club sometimes that it's hard with the big two because you try to pick something that doesn't require a lot of knowledge in one of these characters and not have a pile of background references.
[00:50:51] Speaker A: It's one of those things that, like, in book club, for book club sense, like picking a book. I was like, okay, it's not my responsibility that Jason doesn't know the history of. It's like, okay, we can't always pick something unless you Only ever pick independent that starts with issue one.
[00:51:04] Speaker B: Right.
[00:51:04] Speaker A: Like, that's the only.
[00:51:05] Speaker C: Like, I just did a little bit.
So I did a little bit of homework. I'm like, all right, I got it. And then I picked it up and I want to read the rest of it.
[00:51:14] Speaker A: But.
[00:51:15] Speaker C: But I. I read enough to know what.
[00:51:17] Speaker A: What's happening.
[00:51:17] Speaker B: Yeah. You know, no, it's. It's. It's definitely hard. And the big two are hard. And I. And I did that. I kept backing up and I said, geez, this is getting. I'm getting more and more trades in my pile to try to catch up on Batman. And by the time I got done, it was. It was almost overwhelming.
[00:51:31] Speaker C: Oh, sure.
[00:51:31] Speaker B: And I.
[00:51:32] Speaker C: But I would include encourage, you know, you know, people that are interested in breaking into an old series like that. It's like, just do it. It's going to be okay. You just got to read a little bit of background.
[00:51:41] Speaker B: Right. Pick us. Pick a spot and you're going to enjoy. Sure. Pick a spot. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:51:45] Speaker C: Not to digress. I was just curious.
[00:51:47] Speaker B: Yeah. No, yeah. And it is funny. And I think in our top 10 list, it's easy to say, well, I'm only gonna pick stuff that came out with number one this year. It's easy to say, all right. That way, you know, you've got a more full encompassing story that's all there.
But. And I. And I get. Justin, here we are, right? I hate Fairyland. Something's Killing the children. These ones that, to me, and it's not just that they're my favorite arcs or my favorite stories anyways, to me, they still hold up to being on the top books of the year. And I think I would say, sorry, to me, this is dropped off. Go read something else. And they haven't. I still think that I Hate Fairyland is as enjoyable now as it was. Somebody's killing the children is just as good now as it was. So for me, these ongoing stories still hold.
[00:52:34] Speaker A: And you're exactly what some of these publishers want to want. Like, you're the customer that they want.
[00:52:38] Speaker B: Right.
[00:52:38] Speaker A: Because if the world we've moved into is miniseries, like the miniseries.
[00:52:42] Speaker B: Oh, huge. Yeah.
[00:52:44] Speaker A: And I think this. I think part of my dilemma or part of my problem is I like new things, but like new stories, innovative, something fresh. And I want to find that next Something's going to children.
[00:52:56] Speaker B: Right.
[00:52:56] Speaker A: I want to find that next thing where they're like, oh, my God, this is the most amazing.
[00:52:59] Speaker B: You need that fix of that new.
[00:53:01] Speaker A: So I know for sure but you're right, though. Erica. Erica Slaughter is still just as good.
[00:53:05] Speaker B: Right.
[00:53:06] Speaker A: She's just.
[00:53:06] Speaker B: She's still as badass as she was the first time we talked about her shoot.
[00:53:09] Speaker A: Is still just as badass as she always. So I do understand that. I think that I'm more apt to. And Jason's point here with. With. With ongoing like Spider man stories or Batman stories or so on is I'm more apt to read continuously I hate Fairyland or something's killing the children.
[00:53:23] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:53:24] Speaker A: Department of Truth, things like that. Than I am to read Spider man right now. And I think that's just because I feel like I've been burned over the years, recent years with Marvel and buying it.
[00:53:34] Speaker B: Because you feel like you have to.
[00:53:35] Speaker A: Reading, you have to problem. If Marvel was like to take some of these innovative storylines that are independent comics are creating and put Spider man. Put. Put that as the background of Spider man. Why can't. Obviously I can make something show. This is a far off thing. Why can't there be a story in Spider man that's like something on the children.
[00:53:57] Speaker B: Right.
[00:53:58] Speaker A: Again, bad. Bad connection on what's two stories? I'm just thinking with two things you just talked about.
[00:54:02] Speaker B: Right.
[00:54:02] Speaker A: It's just like, why can't some of these innovative storylines still be in Marvel comics? Like, why do we have to have the same. Same thing over and over again? Yeah, sure.
[00:54:10] Speaker C: Because when you take, you know, there's. There's a big difference between like the writing that James Tynan does when he writes for DC and the writing that he does when he's on his own. He's more reeled in.
[00:54:21] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, for sure.
[00:54:23] Speaker C: You know, and that's their brand, I.
[00:54:26] Speaker A: Think, letting people have more freedom and tell stories. And you had a customer in here before we started recording about how he didn't like the ultimate stuff. Like, he basically was like, don't erase all my stuff.
[00:54:37] Speaker B: Right.
[00:54:38] Speaker A: Known.
[00:54:38] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, no, he was saying, like, you'd rather have it at least be that way than to be like, oh, by the way, everything that you have committed to for all this time is gone. So if we're going to kick off a new universe, let it be in a new universe. Rather than. And I feel like this is a hard part of the big two is that you have like, holy hell.
Hundred years.
[00:54:58] Speaker A: But I think it's material that's faulted them. And in the 80s, the 70s, 80s, the 90s, where they just continue doing it, if they would have started right back then, every couple of years rebooting the series Right.
[00:55:12] Speaker B: Instead the longest.
[00:55:14] Speaker A: Whoever can go 607. Who can. How far can we go right. Series. If they would have started by doing 30 issue series. And what would have happened if Peter.
[00:55:24] Speaker B: Stop being Spider Man?
[00:55:27] Speaker A: A different position. I think the big twos are always gonna have it. But what someone like DC is doing somewhat better than Marvel right now is also doing things like Nice house in the lake and Nice house in the Sea and doing some of the Peacemaker tries hard series. Like they're doing these series that are like kind of like independent comics in the world of D.C. or in the Was still the umbrella of Vertigo coming back.
[00:55:51] Speaker B: Right.
[00:55:52] Speaker A: Those kind of things I think is one of those things that Marvel has never. The only thing they have to play with is Marvel proper.
[00:55:59] Speaker B: Look at the Star wars.
[00:56:02] Speaker A: All their cool auxiliary characters they get to play with because of Disney. They're at Dynamite.
[00:56:08] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:56:09] Speaker A: And so it was just weird.
[00:56:10] Speaker B: Weird choice not to keep that stuff black labels in.
Great.
[00:56:14] Speaker A: But Vertigo, bringing Vertigo back.
Well, they gave all their Disney properties over to Dynamite. Oh Marvel said Darkwing Duck and your Ducktail. All those things are all over a Dynamite.
[00:56:25] Speaker B: Now I've started seeing a little bit of it coming back out into reprint. But originally they said they weren't going to reprint any of the Marvel Knights era stuff because it was too, too dark, too violent.
[00:56:34] Speaker A: Well, that's what I wish they would have done with Blood Hunt. With Blood Hunt, which is one of my honorable mentions.
And like I don't know about the red band. Is it. Do you think it was a shock factor. They thought people were gonna buy and you did have multiple customers buying both copies.
[00:56:46] Speaker B: Right.
[00:56:46] Speaker A: So maybe it's a sales thing but like Marvel, Max was phenomenal. I loved Max with the introduction of Jessica Jones and all those characters is. Let's go a little darker, go a little bit independent. But also have a. You can separate it by being a different line. And I think that's one of the reasons why I haven't kept with the longer series of Marvel. I've read the miniseries. I've read, you know, Bloodhound, the story arc serious parts. But I haven't. I haven't. I'll tell you. To be honest with you. One of the reasons why Spider Man's not on my comics of the year because I didn't read a single Spider man comic book this year.
[00:57:16] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:57:16] Speaker A: You know I, you know, I even bought all the Ultimate Spider Man.
[00:57:19] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:57:19] Speaker A: And didn't even get into it yet because again, I've been burned too many Times, I think.
[00:57:22] Speaker B: Look at that. I actually read.
I always read something you haven't read. Look at that.
[00:57:28] Speaker C: And I think the guy's perspective on, you know, with the Ultimates erasing what he's.
[00:57:32] Speaker A: Yes, yes, yes.
[00:57:33] Speaker C: Ultimately, that's really unfortunate because it does erase. It doesn't erase the. The storyline that's been going on because.
[00:57:40] Speaker A: You also, if you read it, it's still there. Right. So you can go back to I. It's still part of your history is.
[00:57:46] Speaker C: It'S a fantastic avenue comic book reader.
[00:57:49] Speaker A: To come in, you know, but yeah, I think it's. I think it's. There is this. And maybe that's my goal for 20 my.
What's it called? New Year's resolution for comic books in 2025 is to pick a series or two and say, okay, catch up on something that's killing the children. Stay with something that's killing the children and see if I like these things, dive into. I mean, Spider Man's gonna have to at some point be a number one. In 2025, they'll be a number one Spider Man. Like, they're gonna have to end the series and do the next series. They just always will have to do that. And maybe it is jumping back into a Spider man series or something like that. But like, I jumped onto Blood Hunt because I think it sounded fun. I think it's sounding like different. I was a big. I honestly was one of the few fans of King. A few fellow King in Black. I did like that series.
But still to this day, Secret Wars. So War. Those are still my like, OG OG and they're not that OG but they're OG to me.
[00:58:45] Speaker C: Right.
[00:58:46] Speaker A: Serious that. I'm like, still. I just told Paul before my beloved.
[00:58:49] Speaker C: Beloved series is like, what do I like the best? Dark Phoenix Saga Mutants, you know, but.
[00:58:54] Speaker A: They keep also rehashing that and they keep trying to bring back Phoenix and they keep trying to do these things in days of future past. Like. Like.
[00:59:03] Speaker C: Well, they do it. They do it with all of them.
[00:59:05] Speaker A: Yeah. Yes.
[00:59:06] Speaker C: You know, Spider Man's. You know, Spider man, for example, has been going on for what, 60 years now. They have been telling the same story.
[00:59:13] Speaker A: But I like, like, so Secret Invasion is one of my favorite, if not my favorite story arc in Marvel history. Okay. I think there's a little bit of that mysterious part of it being like, who is. Who's good?
And here's the deal. They did that series, what, last year, two years ago?
[00:59:29] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:59:30] Speaker A: But other than that, they have not touched the secret invasion Style story done. No, they did Civil War 2 almost immediately, which sucks because I love bragging. It's like it's a stain on his career.
[00:59:43] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:59:43] Speaker A: But some of these other series they just keep going back to and see. It's like, you know, one of the things, if you look at the topic, top 20 movies of all time. Gross.
I would say out of the top 20, 18 of them are sequels, continuations, or same universes.
Right. Because that's the world we live in now.
[01:00:02] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:00:03] Speaker A: The. The beneath the trees that nobody sees isn't out there. Outside of independent comics. There isn't. Marvel's never going to take a chance on making a series that's so drastically different from what they do because they're afraid they're. People aren't gonna buy it.
[01:00:18] Speaker B: They think it won't work. Yeah.
[01:00:19] Speaker C: They can afford to.
[01:00:21] Speaker A: The ultimate universe could have been that. And I have no issue with the ultimate universe now. I love the idea of having an ultimate universe. I think they could have done the ultimate universe, which is like, we're gonna do crazy ass shit.
[01:00:31] Speaker B: Right?
[01:00:32] Speaker A: You're talking like. Like Black Panther is an actual panther. Like, you know, like just something along those lines where it's like we're just gonna go fuck wild and do this crazy completely. Ever, Ever. They're never. They're always going to be in this box. And that's nothing. There is people out there that solely read Big two.
[01:00:47] Speaker B: Yep.
[01:00:47] Speaker A: And I have no issue with them. I've just been over the past three or four years and you've seen my poll list and things like that that I've gravitated towards.
People who have no constraints.
[01:00:58] Speaker B: Yep.
[01:00:58] Speaker A: There's nothing that tells them outside of a publisher going, we're not gonna publish your book. What you can do in your book. James Tiny. I don't think boom is going to James and being like, hey, you can't do that.
[01:01:07] Speaker B: I don't see that.
[01:01:08] Speaker A: I don't see that happening. And it's their cash cow. It's this, you know. You know, same with. Even with tmnt. Nickelodeon owns tmnt, right?
[01:01:15] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:01:16] Speaker A: They're not going to Marvel or to idw. You can't tell that story.
[01:01:20] Speaker B: Right.
[01:01:20] Speaker A: And so like, there's these big properties that are out there that no one. I don't think Hasbro is really controlling too much what Transformers is doing.
[01:01:27] Speaker B: No, I don't.
[01:01:27] Speaker A: Boy Rivals or whatever, they gave the rights to Skybound to have anything.
[01:01:31] Speaker B: So you can put us in the. Put us in the big.
[01:01:33] Speaker A: It's a Big thing. So I don't know where we were at.
[01:01:35] Speaker B: I mean, number one.
[01:01:36] Speaker A: Well, I have a number two. We have number two.
[01:01:38] Speaker B: I had number two.
[01:01:39] Speaker A: Would you do number two?
[01:01:40] Speaker B: Number two. Someone's going to.
[01:01:41] Speaker A: Children, there's number two.
[01:01:42] Speaker B: Okay. Do your number two.
[01:01:44] Speaker A: Transformers. What?
[01:01:46] Speaker B: Whoa.
[01:01:47] Speaker A: So is your Transformers separate?
[01:01:49] Speaker B: We'll get to that in a minute.
[01:01:51] Speaker A: Okay. So Transformers, to me, I have never really been a massive Transformers fan.
[01:01:57] Speaker B: Right.
[01:01:57] Speaker A: Okay. I love.
Don't punch me. The spectacle that the movies are not the actual stories. I don't. The stories aren't great. The idea that. So here's the deal. You go. What do you go?
[01:02:11] Speaker B: I gotta go lie down.
[01:02:12] Speaker A: What do you go to the movie theater for?
[01:02:14] Speaker B: The fun of it, I guess. The entertainment. Yeah, sure.
[01:02:17] Speaker A: So you can't tell me that from. From. From Shia LaBeouf's transformers that the first couple of months that it wasn't at least entertaining.
[01:02:26] Speaker B: Okay. The first. The first movie is entertaining.
The first one or two or three, boy, it's starts. Okay.
[01:02:32] Speaker A: So seeing that and getting to see that. And here's a Transformers fan getting to see that live action, getting to see that whole thing is an exciting.
[01:02:39] Speaker B: Somewhere deep in my soul, Michael Bay literally is hurt.
[01:02:42] Speaker A: I don't. I don't know what Michael Bay does.
[01:02:44] Speaker B: I think he has hurt me.
[01:02:45] Speaker A: But I do think there's something to be said about. That's what my life to me really was, was that Transformers.
[01:02:50] Speaker B: Right?
[01:02:51] Speaker A: That's all so, like, getting to read this book. I'm like, I don't know much about Transformers. And Danny Warren Johnson killed the illustrations of it. He killed the storyline of it. He told stories that will resonate with old school fans, with new school fans. He really did the Transformers justice. And I think we talked about it off recording was the fact that he told Hasbro in Skybound, I am going to do the Transformers.
[01:03:14] Speaker B: Right.
[01:03:15] Speaker A: Then we'll talk about new creations.
[01:03:16] Speaker B: Right?
[01:03:16] Speaker A: Because they basically, I think, wanted him originally to be like, from the beginning.
[01:03:19] Speaker B: Let'S kick this style.
[01:03:21] Speaker A: We're going to start with new Transformers. And I don't think he wanted that. He's like, I want to be able to do the Transformers. People realize in the Transformers of old, and we'll go to the new ones some point. And I think that he did a great job with creating this. This. This story. I mean, the Energon universe, yes, is great, right? Duke's great. Scarlet's great. Void. Rivals is great. I think that GI Joe's is going to be great.
Transformers is the elite of all of those right now. And I think that's one of those things that Transformers just stands above the rest of them, I think. And I think Daniel Warren Johnson, tackling all of it. He's an insane illustrator and insane storyteller, has been Transformers top two comic of the year for me.
[01:03:57] Speaker B: Well, you're wrong, because it's number one for you.
[01:04:00] Speaker A: Yeah, I told you. I knew that was gonna be the answer.
[01:04:03] Speaker B: Number one.
[01:04:04] Speaker A: So you cheated again.
The Energon universe as one. That's the Energon universe.
[01:04:10] Speaker B: I'm not gonna say. Okay, I could have. I will say when my top 10 started, yes. I had. Duke is number two, and I think Cobra Commander was number five. And then I was going. I'm like, all right, let's suppose you.
[01:04:21] Speaker A: Go, okay, my top ten cost of the year is the Energon universe.
[01:04:24] Speaker B: Number seven is Void Rivals. I was like, all right, I can't do this. Like, we gotta get some more.
[01:04:29] Speaker A: My list outside of Transformers was your right.
[01:04:34] Speaker B: My number seven or whatever it was. But top of the year is Transformers, and that's the one. Anybody coming in, I'm gonna say read Transformers.
[01:04:44] Speaker A: Yes.
[01:04:44] Speaker B: Then after that, if you're hooked like I am, then go read some of these other things. And we have a diverse group here of fans coming in, and some of them are like the Transformer diehards. And they're going in, and then those people. We chat, and I say, you really need to go give Duke a shot because you're loving Transformers, or you gotta go give Cobra Commander a try.
But Darren Warren Johnson has absolutely made this a book for all readers. And I don't want to say all readers because it's graphic. You know, we have kids come in here sometimes. They're like, oh, Transformers. I'm like, this might not be your have any. I've got. I've got some trades that just came back in. Yeah. Because we have sold. We have sold 40 copies of Transformers Volume 1.
[01:05:25] Speaker C: I'm gonna have to check this out.
[01:05:26] Speaker B: You've not read Jason.
[01:05:28] Speaker C: I haven't. Transformers was the first book I ever collected.
[01:05:31] Speaker A: Yes.
There's something about this Transformer series. I mean, you're not wrong.
[01:05:37] Speaker B: So. And here you go. So I grew up with Transformers. Far as I watched it periodically in cartoon. I had some of the action figures. I wasn't deep into the Transformer war or anything.
[01:05:47] Speaker A: You're a big GI Joe fan?
[01:05:48] Speaker B: I was a big GI Joe.
[01:05:49] Speaker A: So having them Bill.
[01:05:50] Speaker B: Yeah. They crossed over.
[01:05:51] Speaker A: Right. Nowadays.
[01:05:52] Speaker B: Nowadays, yeah. You almost have one in the other, but with the new Transformers movies coming out back in the day with Michael Bay's stuff there. I went and saw it and, like, you know, great, terrific. Nice to see Transformers are back again on the general world to see it.
[01:06:09] Speaker A: Because of me and Foxes.
[01:06:11] Speaker B: No, no, no.
But I went out.
[01:06:14] Speaker A: It wasn't wrong. You weren't pissed that it was.
[01:06:17] Speaker B: Well, no, wait a second here.
But I was really.
[01:06:22] Speaker A: I was really into those Transformers.
[01:06:26] Speaker B: But, you know, I went out and I started reading the old. The now old IDW Transformer run, and some of that stuff is fantastic. And I said, it's hard because some of the original IDW Transformer run is really well done, and some of it gets really chaotic and it's quick. Yeah, you go right from like, I am on board to, what the hell is happening? What is going on? Why am I reading this?
So I think it's. It's. That part of it's hard. And Darren Warren Johnson has brought Transformers back to everyone to say, here's how it starts. It doesn't matter if you know who Optimus prime is in the first issue or not. And then coming to, like, my age group, it's everything you ever want Transformers to be. Like, it's an action adventure. It is more graphic, it is more violent than your traditional style of Transformers. Like, they're killing humans. The Decepticons are bad. They're evil. That's what they are. And you get deep into everything that I want to see in Transformers and the fact that, to me, because I'm wearing my GWO shirt here, I didn't know I needed to see Optimus Prime German Suplex, Starscream until I saw Optimus Prime German Suplex Star Stream. And I was like, holy hell, this is incredible.
[01:07:37] Speaker A: You know where that's coming from, though?
[01:07:38] Speaker B: Yeah, There you go.
[01:07:42] Speaker A: You know where this is coming from?
[01:07:45] Speaker B: Power bomb. Yeah.
[01:07:47] Speaker A: Yeah. And so, like, there's that. That crossover in there, and I think that there shows that the person who's, like, talented to write it. So, like, say, for an example, they were like, James Tinian. We're gonna get you to write Transformers.
[01:07:59] Speaker B: Cool.
[01:07:59] Speaker A: Excellent writer, killer job. And then you're gonna have so and so come in and do artwork. We'll probably do a killer job. Would probably be a great comic book. Right. I think I'll be number one for you.
[01:08:08] Speaker B: You love Ryan Brown. Ryan Brown in here. I love Ryan Brown. Him doing Transformers.
[01:08:12] Speaker A: Coming in and doing it and doing both. He's a classic fan of.
[01:08:18] Speaker B: Yes, he is a fan of Transformers.
[01:08:20] Speaker A: He's Gonna pour his heart into it. He did say it was one of the most difficult things he's done in his comic book history because like do a powerbomb, for example, was one of award winning book before this was characters. So you're. It's fluid. They're the. You know, your arm moves in a way that he can draw around edges and yeah, drawing Transformers a lot of straight lines.
Transformers are boxy. They're boxy by traits.
[01:08:44] Speaker B: You have to, you have to take in consideration Transformers a little bit that you can't just go, I'm gonna make him look this way. Because you still have to remember that they have to transform into whatever the hell they're supposed to transform into.
[01:08:53] Speaker A: Look like a specific character. This is not like someone he's creating. This is something.
[01:08:56] Speaker B: No, these are pre existing charact face.
[01:08:59] Speaker A: Looks kind of funny, but. Well, we haven't had him yet. So that's what it looks like.
[01:09:02] Speaker B: Right? It doesn't matter.
[01:09:02] Speaker A: You know, Optimus prime looks like Optimus. You have to have Optimus prime look human. When someone draws Star Wars, Lou Skywalker is transitioned or always been basically looking like Mark Hamill.
[01:09:14] Speaker B: Right?
[01:09:14] Speaker A: Early Mark Hamill.
[01:09:15] Speaker B: Yeah. If you come in and change Luke Skywalker.
[01:09:17] Speaker A: But you still have a freedom though. You still have a 10%, 20%, 30% on either side of it.
[01:09:23] Speaker B: You can age him, you can change him this and that, but you could.
[01:09:25] Speaker A: Also like be like, okay, his nose looks a little bit different. No one's really gonna question that as much as they're going to question why does Optimus prime leg longer than normal? Or why is Optimus Prime's color blue instead of red in that area? Like, it's like there's like you're talking 1980s now. Yeah. But you have this thing you have to stick to. But like again, start straight lines. Where was his big thing was the fact that there's like you can. There's so many straight lines. And he realized that when he did the Skybound and Hasbro had him do these like flashcards almost like to show his characters and he had to draw them on. He's like, oh, how did I sign on to.
Because he's like, I have to draw all these characters with straight lines. And it's like when they move in certain areas, you have to draw them specific ways. And it was just a little bit more difficult.
That being said, nail it.
[01:10:13] Speaker B: Oh, it's like, it's like he's just.
[01:10:15] Speaker A: Like complaining about it. We're all like, screw you, man.
[01:10:18] Speaker B: Yeah. No 100. Yeah.
[01:10:19] Speaker A: Yeah. He kills it.
[01:10:21] Speaker B: And your. Your character development is fantastic. But the homage to these characters, them acting the way they should, speaking the way they should is spot on. You can tell he's a fan. Yeah, you can tell he loves it. And I grew up, you know, not as Transformers as my. My prominent interest, but I still enjoyed it. So when I see these things, I do have an expectation Star Stream's gonna way. Gonna act the way Star Stream's gonna act and such. And they killed it. It was phenomenal. Jason's gonna grab the doors. We have another guest joining us. It's Emma.
[01:10:49] Speaker A: So you're right on the whole thing. It's like it's a whole. It's a. Emma's here. This is amazing.
And so the, the having his person of having someone like Dana Warren Johnson would have always fought for someone like anybody who writes Star wars or draws Star wars or something. No one hires, no company hires a creator who doesn't passionate about.
[01:11:19] Speaker B: You're not going to hire me.
[01:11:20] Speaker A: So when someone goes, someone does Star wars, they're never going to be like, oh, I kind of like Star Wars, I'll write it. No, they're gonna be passionate about things. But they got the most amazing person to do this book. And he shows you Transformers over doing something creator own where he's gonna make more money, where he's gonna have more freedom. And Dana Warren Johnson, I think I would say your number two. Your number one. My number two creator of the year right there.
[01:11:43] Speaker B: Oh, God.
[01:11:43] Speaker A: Yeah. He's Daniel Warren Johnson.
And so Transformers, you're being number two or your number one. Am I number two?
[01:11:49] Speaker B: Because it shows. I think we did this last year too.
[01:11:53] Speaker A: Comes the number one comic of the year.
[01:11:54] Speaker B: Because I think we did that last.
[01:11:55] Speaker A: Year comic that was also your highest rated comic in that sense. And so there's that. But my number one.
[01:12:01] Speaker B: Okay.
[01:12:02] Speaker A: Is Beneath the Trees or nobody sees.
[01:12:03] Speaker B: Hey, I had that on my list.
[01:12:04] Speaker A: And so Beneath the Trees and nobody sees. Patrick Horvath. We've talked about how he was on your list. Dexter meets Richard Scarry off the Wall kind of comic. Not original in the sense that it's basically a detective serial killer with a detective story together. Yeah.
[01:12:19] Speaker B: Who the. Who done it? Sort of.
[01:12:20] Speaker A: Richard Scary is where it makes the difference. It makes this whole like using child animation, child drawing, child illustrations to tell a horror story, a serial killer story. I think it'd be great. I honestly would love now to see anything. I would love to see Ed Gein's story, John Wayne Gacy's story. I'd love to see all these horror story is told in the format of young children's stories.
[01:12:41] Speaker B: You want to see little Freddy and Jason, all the slime movies redone Calvin.
[01:12:44] Speaker A: And Hobbs and tell friggin BTK Strangler. I want to see. I want to see horror stories told in kids animation over and over and over again. Now I don't. Patrick Horbath can now take.
[01:12:56] Speaker B: It's great.
Yes.
[01:12:59] Speaker A: So I was just talking about earlier with Aaron who helps helps you out here. I was saying that Aaron top unofficial.
[01:13:06] Speaker B: Official employee.
[01:13:09] Speaker A: Illustrated, I'm sorry, illustrated a book called did you hear what Eddie Geen did?
[01:13:16] Speaker B: I was gonna ask you what you thought.
[01:13:18] Speaker A: That book is phenomenal and I love the title of it because it's called did you hear what Eddie Gein done? Because basically what it was is that in plain sville where Eddie Gein was found, people were all like, oh, that sweet little kid, the sweet little guy, the guy that was wearing people's faces on the weekends. And that book is phenomenal. But would I have loved it way more if that story was told in the rich and scary universe? 100% and I think that's part of it. I think that's a juxtaposition of having this story that I would tell my 3 year old with a horror story that I don't want him to know until he's 30 is huge in my opinion. I think that Patrick Corbett has done it. I'm so pumped that we're getting the future of it. We're getting Rite of spring coming in 2025. He has another book that he did on Zoop, which is a crowdfunding platform for comics coming out on owning Press in 2025 as well. So like this guy is. We sent variant covers and things like that too. But he's got this art style that is going to be so much fun to work with and do things. So again, Transformers becomes our Dax de facto number one comic book of the year. But runner up there becomes Beneath the trees. Because I think it was your highest rated comic that. It was also my highest rated comic book that came together. And those two books together is just. It's. It's been a great year. It's been a great year on Comic Books 100. I honestly think that it's a weird year in comics and in some senses that, I mean two or three years. I think we did our first one.
[01:14:38] Speaker B: Three years ago at least now.
[01:14:40] Speaker A: Yeah, that we did. We did it three years ago. And I think There was a lot more like King and Black, I think mar. So there's this weird.
[01:14:49] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, because you have your. Your Marvel arc. Right. You know, your big one and Blood Hunt both was honorable mentions for both of us. I read some of Blood Hunt and said, okay, I see where this is going. It's interesting. It's different for Marvel Universe. I like that fact. But I'm also not like, just in totally, like, engulfed. I have to read more of this. It was like, okay, cool. Different. I like it.
[01:15:17] Speaker A: Yeah. And so I think Overall, our top 10 lists are always going to be saturated with independent comments.
[01:15:24] Speaker B: 100%. I mean, I always tell, like, new people asking about our store. I always say we're a very heavy, independent supporting store. We do a lot of independent comics. And I don't understand in this day and age, almost the traditional comic shops, they're like, we carry Marvel and dc.
[01:15:40] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:15:41] Speaker B: I'm like, how? Why, like, how is that all you do? You're missing out on the best comics in the world.
[01:15:47] Speaker A: So you have. So Sky.
[01:15:50] Speaker B: I think it looks good. I think it sounds good. And if I appreciate the art we're.
[01:15:53] Speaker A: Carrying it, I'll say it tell you right now, with transformers being 1A, 1B, you know, for both of us is it's a intellectual property.
[01:16:01] Speaker B: Right.
[01:16:01] Speaker A: I will say that in the years that we've done this, in the years that, going forward, that will intellectual property title be a number one, number two comic book for us? Probably not.
[01:16:10] Speaker B: Probably not.
[01:16:11] Speaker A: And so Transformers being up there, meaning that beneath the trees this year was that 8 billion genies last year being those are both independent comics. And so having this be the intellectual property comic book is the number one comic book of the year. Having Transformers, I think it's a stellar pickup for skydiving. Oh, you know what?
[01:16:31] Speaker B: I think the other thing with this is? Yes, it's an intellectual property. Absolutely. But as far as the movie side of it going and everything, it's. It's been on a downhill.
[01:16:40] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:16:41] Speaker B: And people have gotten. Have had less interest. There isn't like a big comic, like, cartoon series going of it.
[01:16:47] Speaker A: Transformers 1 is crazy, right?
[01:16:49] Speaker B: Transformers 1 came out. It was crazy. But Transformers 1 came out. After the Transformers comics has started, you know, back up again, and Transformers had kind of stopped. Like, there wasn't a lot going on in the world of Transformers when Darren Warren Johnson picked it back up and brought us a fresh telling and a new story to the Transformer world. And I don't. I'm sure there's more of it. Right. But how much more of the intellectual property is there out there that is going to get refreshed? It's funny because do you think looking around at the comic scene right now, tons of this intellectual property of my childhood that had disappeared all of a sudden.
[01:17:25] Speaker A: Silver Hawks. Silver Hawks. Come back, man.
[01:17:27] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:17:28] Speaker A: Silver Hacks. Ed Brisson coming out in 2025 from.
[01:17:31] Speaker B: Dynamite, Biker Mice from Mars Sectors, Dick Tracy. Like all of this intellectual property that had kind of died, it kind of stopped or really wasn't that big in the first place. I'm waiting for Inhumanoids. Why has someone not brought the Inhumanoids back? We need. We need Lore.
[01:17:47] Speaker A: Captain Planet.
[01:17:49] Speaker B: Captain Planet.
[01:17:50] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:17:50] Speaker B: Yeah. You know, it's only a matter of time before these ones get picked up. But I. I'm with you in the fact that how much of this intellectual property can we really get out there that is an original story that's different, that's going to make a top 10 or especially a number one, satisfy old.
[01:18:05] Speaker A: Fans and new fans together.
[01:18:06] Speaker B: Right.
[01:18:07] Speaker A: Because there's that part of it, too, where.
[01:18:08] Speaker B: Thank you. Thank you to all of the Energon creators. Because it's not just Aaron War Johnson's doing it. You know, we've got Williams, Joshua Williamson in there doing the GI Joe side.
[01:18:17] Speaker A: Robert Kirkman.
[01:18:18] Speaker B: And Robert Kirkman.
[01:18:19] Speaker A: Tip your hat to Robert Kirkman, because Robert Kirkman is the. The Jonathan Hickman of the X Men thing.
[01:18:24] Speaker B: Yeah, the. The. Here's your. Here's your void rival star.
[01:18:27] Speaker A: And then send it universe. The. The person who's taking a hold of the whole thing. The architect of the whole thing.
[01:18:34] Speaker B: Yes.
[01:18:34] Speaker A: And finding the right creators to do these things. And I think that there's a future for the Energon universe. I think there's GI Joe, which is kind of confusing because it's GI Joe 1 now and 0.
[01:18:45] Speaker B: I think. I think it's hard. I think a lot of this goes in the publisher side of it. That IDW kind of left GI Joe on a giant cliffhanger.
[01:18:51] Speaker A: Woman didn't know they were losing the.
[01:18:53] Speaker B: Well, well, no, because it was issue 200 and that was it. They wrapped up with this, like, cliffhanger. And thank God for the fans that were following that run. The image said, okay, fine, take three.
[01:19:01] Speaker A: Issues, wrap it up, and then keep going.
[01:19:03] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm sort of surprised. So, yeah, it is hard. The amount of people I've had to take Real American Hero from and go, you don't want this. This is not part of the Energon universe. You're not gonna know what the hell is going on in here.
[01:19:12] Speaker A: It's GI Joe, which is GI Joe number one. That comes from Skybound Universe.
[01:19:15] Speaker B: Right?
[01:19:16] Speaker A: Skybound. It's the Energon universe. And there's GI Joe, real American hero number 3 12.
[01:19:22] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:19:22] Speaker A: Which is part of the old. The continuation from the IDW run.
[01:19:25] Speaker B: Right.
[01:19:25] Speaker A: And so that's which.
[01:19:26] Speaker B: Which technically ties into the original Marvel run from my childhood. So which is. I mean, you talk about the whole where do you jump in thing. GI Joe won 1980. Whatever. 84, 85, whatever it is. Good luck.
Start there.
[01:19:41] Speaker A: But I think it's a future. I don't know. I mean, do you have Jason over there? Do you have a comic book, Your favorite comic book that came out this year or do you.
[01:19:52] Speaker B: There you go. Yes. Top. Top ten of both ours.
[01:19:55] Speaker A: Emma, have any that came out this year? Pharaoh Feral.
[01:19:58] Speaker B: Wow. All right. So Farrell is it? And Graham. Graham disappeared. We don't know.
[01:20:01] Speaker A: So if you think about as the whole Transformers number one or Transformers is number one, I would say then that that pushes as a galactic comics world.
[01:20:10] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:20:10] Speaker A: Pharaoh goes in number two, Beneath the trees number three, and so on and so forth. He did like a poll kind of thing, which we actually talked about when you weren't here, Emma, was the idea that doing a picking of the 12 books, 11 books we read this year for book club, which one's our favorite? So we're a little. At the book call at the Christmas party. We'll do a little.
[01:20:27] Speaker B: I think we're gonna. It's gonna be a challenge to go back through and try to remember exactly which books are read.
[01:20:31] Speaker A: Just this year I do a. There's a post at least on the website.
[01:20:35] Speaker B: Oh, that's true too.
[01:20:35] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:20:35] Speaker B: You always do the poster like what we thought of it. So that's good. Yeah.
[01:20:43] Speaker A: Wouldn'T matter.
[01:20:44] Speaker C: So that way about the book I hated the most.
[01:20:46] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:20:48] Speaker C: Well, actually it wasn't written this year.
[01:20:50] Speaker A: So I guess Pyongyang Scott was here and Scott abandoned us, so he doesn't get a chance to defend.
[01:20:59] Speaker B: But yeah.
[01:21:04] Speaker A: Yeah. So comic book of the year is. I would say I said as a consensus is Transformers. And I think that that. That goes.
[01:21:10] Speaker B: And then Feral and Beneath the Trees goes for your top three.
[01:21:12] Speaker A: So if you haven't read the Kill All Immortals probably before and then. Yeah. So I think that it's been a fun year of comics. I think we have 20, 25. I wish the world of comics was able for us to go this one. Looking forward to next year. Year.
[01:21:27] Speaker B: Right.
[01:21:27] Speaker A: You know, I wish I could say to everybody, be like, oh, we can say I'm looking forward to Beneath the Trees volume two continuing. I'm looking forward to more feral. Honestly, one of the ones that wasn't on either one of our lists that really probably could have made it was Local man was probably one of those ones. I was looking forward maybe that, that came back. But obviously it's on hiatus right now.
So of any issues that came out and if. As long as there was two issues in 2025.
[01:21:51] Speaker B: Yeah. So you came in late because I had some of these. Killing the children is number two. And I hate Fairylands number three. And both of which Justin was like, oh, come on, man. But they're ongoing. They're continued.
[01:22:02] Speaker A: They're still third year in his row. Someone's killing.
[01:22:05] Speaker B: I can tell you right now, someone's killing.
[01:22:07] Speaker A: Sure. That was on my 2022 list. Yep, it was on your 23 and it's now under 24. So they are. You have three years, three straight years.
[01:22:14] Speaker B: Of how the sneaky suspicion will be on my 2025.
[01:22:17] Speaker A: Probably will be. Unless James says I'm done.
[01:22:19] Speaker B: Yeah. Unless he goes, that's it.
[01:22:20] Speaker A: In which case puzzle Robert Kirkman with issue 37 and just says, I'm done.
[01:22:24] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm done. Yeah. And then that's it. I close Galactic Comics. I go back to the auto part world. I go screw comic books. I'm finished.
[01:22:29] Speaker A: Because that's how you make your money is on some skill and children. So you know what?
[01:22:33] Speaker B: That is not our top selling comics. Our top selling trade for sure. But it's not our top selling comic. Probably Transformers. Oh, Ninja Turtles is probably our top because we order over 30 copies of TNT every night.
[01:22:45] Speaker A: It dropped it down. Cops. You had to order. Get your variant.
[01:22:48] Speaker B: Yeah, that's all right. That's.
[01:22:50] Speaker A: But yeah, so it's a. It's a. It's a fun world. I think there's publishers like Magma, they're gonna show their face. I think this year I didn't have a single Mad cave on there. Man Cave's great.
[01:22:59] Speaker B: I love Mad Cave.
[01:22:59] Speaker A: I think Mad caves and I had a few. Tracy would be on that image is on our list this year. Idw. Dark Horse. Marvel dc.
[01:23:07] Speaker B: How is it that I didn't have a DC title and you did and you didn't have a Marvel Me? He had a D.C. book.
[01:23:12] Speaker A: Emma came in late by Blue Beetle. Yeah. There's a D.C. graphic novel. Graphic novel, yeah, that was on there. That was phenomenal. From Julio and Jacobi Salcedo. But yeah, I think it's. It's a fun year. And I think 2025, I really wish it was the book year. I can literally sit here and go, there's five books. I can't wait for 2025. There's. I can't do that in the Marvel Transformers.
[01:23:32] Speaker B: I hate Fairyland.
[01:23:35] Speaker A: Series. Any new series. Things like, you don't know what's coming.
[01:23:38] Speaker B: Out like this far.
[01:23:40] Speaker A: Exorcism at 1600 PEN. The second issue literally is what would.
[01:23:45] Speaker B: Have been out if diamond hadn't screwed up, came out this week.
[01:23:49] Speaker A: And then those. There's only two issues that have come out, so I haven' even read the second issue. So that doesn't qualify. But the next year that might be in that issue. So there's some of those ones that like came out first issue, second issue came out in November. December will qualify next year. So maybe some of the. But I just really wish the comic book industry, I. My goal would be for them to be like five issue miniseries. I'm gonna sign Jason on for five issue miniseries. We're gonna illustrate three of them now, get them all ready. Release issue one while you're doing issue four and not be this whole like, oh, well, we don't know. And promote it. Yeah, all five issues. All five issues. Illustrated, written, all that stuff done. Get the trade going.
[01:24:28] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:24:29] Speaker A: Set a release date saying January 1, February 1, so on and so forth. Trade coming out in July and release that to the public is.
[01:24:36] Speaker B: I have, I have.
[01:24:37] Speaker A: There's too many times where it's like we get solicitations for it come out in February now.
[01:24:43] Speaker B: Right. And.
[01:24:43] Speaker A: But we don't know what July is happening until later. Later.
[01:24:46] Speaker B: Later on. And I have comics too with the same. The same idea of that should have been out last week for issue two that now isn't showing until January for issue two to drop. And issue three, that should have been coming out in a couple weeks or whatever is now been pushed way into February because of whatever, whether it be.
[01:25:05] Speaker A: The printer, the writers done, the artist is not done, the arsenal register somewhere in there.
[01:25:10] Speaker B: And then you. And I think this is a hard part that the comic world needs to catch up on is you are going all around the fact that this fan base is gonna remember and stay with you. And when you start going six weeks, eight weeks, 10 weeks between issues, they don't remember. I just saw a title coming out that did one comic on a one of three. They did one. It was well received as far as my store goes, I don't know, apparently nationwide, maybe there's a problem. It has been almost a year since that issue one came out. And I just saw that number one is going back to second print because inevitably they're now going to do the two and three that were promised. How in the hell did someone let this happen? This is not. No, you don't go start making a movie. You don't put out the previews. You don't go in and spend all this money to say, here we go, here comes the movie, then go, hold on a minute. We were supposed to come out in June, but we're gonna see what December looks like.
[01:26:02] Speaker A: A better example is TV show shows. Can you imagine a TV show coming with a pilot? You're just sitting there like, issue next year issues, episodes 2, 3, 4, and 5 and 6, 7. I don't think.
And that's my point. I think the world we live in in order.
[01:26:19] Speaker B: We want instant gratification, right? You want to have all of it at once, to sit there and just go right through. You want to binge watch. You want to binge read to compare to.
[01:26:25] Speaker A: To combat people who trade weight is. Is having everything done. So you go. You go. Yeah, you go. Issues say January, five issue series. January, February, March, April, May, five issues.
[01:26:38] Speaker B: You should have. You should. By June, you should have that trade.
[01:26:40] Speaker A: Trade.
[01:26:41] Speaker B: Yeah. Sometimes you're sitting August. No, like, sometimes like November, December, before the trade comes out for what was just only five issues, as you know.
[01:26:49] Speaker A: Because it's not like, whatever, financially a lucrative industry. And so there's part of this. I know that this part is part of his finances. Part of it.
[01:26:56] Speaker B: Yeah, there's a lot.
[01:26:58] Speaker A: How does it do?
Here's the deal. I have not seen a comic book come out in years. It has not had a trade come out.
[01:27:05] Speaker B: No. I don't see why you question from people. They will say, do you think there'll be a trade? Yes, there's no. There's no reason we would publish it and not make a trade. Because as far as the business sense of it goes, it's another opportunity to sell that product that we made.
[01:27:21] Speaker A: May not be 5,000 copies of it made, but there's something, right?
[01:27:24] Speaker B: It's gonna come out. Yes, it will.
[01:27:25] Speaker A: So.
[01:27:26] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[01:27:26] Speaker A: So it's interesting.
It was interesting to see how this goes. And this whole diamond issue you're dealing with right now with switching warehouses. We'll see how that goes in the future. I know it's going here, but yeah, you know, having this parody of having the ability to have Lunar and all these different penguin distributors. Helps with your shop because you have the opportunity to buy from somewhere else.
[01:27:46] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:27:46] Speaker A: But, yeah, it's. It's been a fun year. So Transformers number one overall.
[01:27:50] Speaker B: Yep.
[01:27:51] Speaker A: I'll call Feral number two overall. And Beneath the Trees Where Nobody Sees, number three overall.
[01:27:58] Speaker B: All independent.
[01:27:59] Speaker A: All independent. Yep. Three different publishers.
[01:28:02] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:28:03] Speaker A: Well, Feral and Transformers are both image.
[01:28:08] Speaker B: But you have Sky Image, Skybound. Yeah. Yeah, I suppose that's true.
[01:28:13] Speaker A: This episode was brought to you by Galactic Comics and Collectibles.
[01:28:16] Speaker B: Whoo.
[01:28:17] Speaker A: At Collective Comics, intellectuals.com or 547 Hammond street, right here in Bangor, Maine. We're so pumped. This is the last episode of 2024 before we go in 2025.
[01:28:28] Speaker B: Wow.
[01:28:28] Speaker A: We're looking forward to 2025.
[01:28:30] Speaker B: Can't wait.
[01:28:30] Speaker A: So, 203.
[01:28:31] Speaker B: You're gonna make me watch Shaq soon.
[01:28:33] Speaker A: I'm gonna make you watch steel for Shaquille O'Neal Steel.
[01:28:37] Speaker B: I can tell you as a child, I thought, this doesn't look good. I'm not watching this. And now I gotta watch it at 42.
[01:28:43] Speaker A: Yes. Yes. We're fine. We're gonna be fine. You're gonna be fine. Who knows?
[01:28:47] Speaker B: Maybe this would be my favorite movie of the year.
[01:28:48] Speaker A: This worked. We're working on this idea of doing this in person. We'll see how it goes. We did some test things tonight. We'll see how this goes in the future. It'll be fun to do some more in person things when we do our episodes together. Movie reviews, whatever it may be. Maybe we'll do some more countdowns throughout the year to fair horror comedy.
[01:29:03] Speaker B: Yeah, these were fun, doing the old countdown stuff.
[01:29:06] Speaker A: Yes. There you go.
We'll get Jason to sit in with us instead of over there, over here. Yeah, we'll do that.
Graham, sit in with us. No, Graham, no. Yes. There, you see? Sure.
[01:29:20] Speaker B: Okay. He's always excited if this is a. Garrett. If it was a top five scene. Garrett, where are you? Garrett? Garrett, can you step up to the. Oh, that's right. He left.
[01:29:28] Speaker A: I will say that I am disappointed in Mainers. They probably stayed home because of the snow.
[01:29:33] Speaker B: So I think my wife asked me earlier. Here, let me see if I can see this text.
[01:29:37] Speaker A: Exactly.
[01:29:38] Speaker B: It's mainly, my wife asked, did no one come because of the snow, or did no one come because it was you guys?
[01:29:46] Speaker A: Well, that's a good question.
[01:29:49] Speaker B: That's a gray area.
[01:29:51] Speaker A: But, yeah, we drank. That's the.
[01:29:53] Speaker B: Garrett, was it.
[01:29:54] Speaker A: We did drink some amazing bicentennial. Yes, we Did From Liana Kangas.
[01:29:59] Speaker B: Thank you, obc. Thank you, Liana.
[01:30:02] Speaker A: Yeah. Leon is a wonderful artist. One of the best in the bizarre. And. Yeah. 2025, here we come. You ready to read comics?
[01:30:09] Speaker B: I am, yes. You know what I like this year? And I liked having the challenge of saying I've got to sit down and read some of the fresh stuff I can't be reading. Remember, I'm doing the Spider man from.
[01:30:19] Speaker A: Still doing it.
[01:30:19] Speaker B: Yes, I am. Yes, I am.
[01:30:22] Speaker A: I feel like when we did this list in 2022, Paul was still reading Spider man omnibus.
[01:30:25] Speaker B: Do you have any idea how many omnibus there are? Like two years ago.
[01:30:29] Speaker C: You're always going to be reading Spider.
[01:30:30] Speaker B: I will be reading the Spider man omnibus until I die. Here's the question.
[01:30:33] Speaker A: Impressive. If I mention reading ongoing stuff. Y. Yes, Paul is reading ongoing stuff. It's spider man from 1970. He's now on.
No.
[01:30:42] Speaker B: When we get to the game, we.
[01:30:43] Speaker A: Do this comic book, you know, comics of the year 2035. Paul would definitely be talking about the current Spider Man Ryan, because that's what we cut up.
[01:30:50] Speaker B: Probably not. Probably not.
[01:30:54] Speaker A: Yes, exactly. We actually didn't know. If you want to answer. Do you have a comic book of the year for you for. That came out in this year for Graham. No, I don't. I'm not sure because I don't read too much.
[01:31:07] Speaker B: Current.
[01:31:08] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Current stuff. Yeah. I just get what's cheap and seems interesting.
[01:31:11] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:31:12] Speaker A: But from the book club, Stray Dogs this year. No, but I'll tell. I'll take it. But no, you're good. I think that to me, I also feel like we used to do in the past, which is what. What book you read this year? That.
[01:31:24] Speaker B: Yeah. What was your favorite book? Because we had Revival that we both asked ourselves, how did we not read this before?
[01:31:29] Speaker A: So that would be considered.
[01:31:31] Speaker B: Yeah. What would be your. So Stray Dogs goes as the top.
[01:31:34] Speaker A: Will you read Farrell?
Will you read it, though? Because you like Stray Dogs. You should. You should.
[01:31:41] Speaker B: Pharaoh might very well make our book club book.
[01:31:44] Speaker A: You should.
[01:31:44] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:31:47] Speaker A: And it's different. And that's what's cool about it. It's not like a continuation. So that's what's cool about it.
[01:31:50] Speaker B: But Geiger's Geiger, the continuation series did. Yeah. Yep.
[01:31:56] Speaker A: Yeah, it counts. But yeah.
[01:31:58] Speaker B: Well, we kind of miss that not having any ghost machine stuff because that was a huge book here.
[01:32:02] Speaker A: I can't get into it really.
[01:32:03] Speaker B: So I have.
[01:32:04] Speaker A: Honestly, my pick would be Red Coat.
[01:32:07] Speaker B: A lot of people. Like, I have a couple of our Polis members that Redcoats, the only one from the Ghost Machine universe are doing.
[01:32:14] Speaker A: It's very. So crazy. It's just so stupid.
[01:32:17] Speaker B: I. I love the initial Geiger run, for sure. It's amazing, but I actually haven't even started the Ghost Mission Machines.
[01:32:23] Speaker A: Well, Jeff Johns is not a very good writer, so.
[01:32:25] Speaker B: Oh, come on. Here we go again. Jesus.
[01:32:29] Speaker A: Because he wrote dc, That's a.
[01:32:31] Speaker B: Some people's kids. And yet I have no D.C. on my list.
[01:32:33] Speaker A: And you do Blue Beetle Man.
[01:32:36] Speaker B: Something is wrong.
[01:32:37] Speaker A: It's because you're racist.
So here we go. Wow.
[01:32:43] Speaker B: Yeah, that took a turn.
[01:32:45] Speaker A: Hey, at least we finished this episode saying everybody's name's right? And. Yeah, yeah, don't go back and listen to episode 99.
[01:32:52] Speaker B: The top episode. How is that not the number one episode of the Kids?
[01:32:56] Speaker A: 203.
[01:32:57] Speaker B: Whoa.
[01:32:57] Speaker A: Right?
[01:32:58] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:32:58] Speaker A: This is 203. Episode 99 was the last time we drank on an episode together.
[01:33:02] Speaker B: Hey, we're back at it.
[01:33:04] Speaker A: Four episodes.
[01:33:05] Speaker B: We are way more sober this time than we were.
[01:33:07] Speaker A: Oh, my God, yes. Yeah, I'm actually gonna drive home tonight. Whereas that would.
[01:33:10] Speaker B: 99 was. We shouldn't have been walking. I don't think that's fine.
[01:33:14] Speaker A: Fun. So, yeah, it's Comics of the Year.
[01:33:17] Speaker B: Hell, yeah.
[01:33:18] Speaker A: Do you want to read a quick, quick rundown, or do you want to just.
[01:33:21] Speaker B: Nah, I think they got.
[01:33:24] Speaker A: Yeah. Visit
[email protected].
[01:33:26] Speaker B: Oh, yes.
[01:33:27] Speaker A: Comicsandcollectibles.com.
