Sunday, December 14, 2008

Random Dive #1


Originally, this week was going to be about a bunch of Marvel books, but Marvel pissed me off recently. They don't deserve free advertising right now. Paying more than full price for less than 22 pages of Astonishing X-Men: Ghost Boxes is definitely not cool. Before I go off on a anger induced tangent not appropriate for this blog, I think I should take my mind off it and talk about something fun and as far from Marvel as possible. So, let's take a dive into the longboxes and see what I can find. I plan on making this a regular thing with just random pulls out of the boxes just to see what comes out.

Practically every person I know around my age has fond memories of a very particular block of television, the "Disney Afternoon." For two hours every weekday, Disney controlled my TV. I would run into the house after school just so I could watch Ducktales, Chip N' Dale Rescue Rangers, and the others. Now when I saw Uncle Scrooge #230 and #236 sitting in a quarter bin, a wave of nostalgia came over me and I added them to the pile of books I was purchasing. Tom Katers of Around Comics once said that adults are the only people that read Uncle Scrooge anymore. Sadly, I bet it is true. They have a lot of great stories of stinginess but they are only read by old people looking for that same nostalgic feeling I had. With so many people asking about what comics are appropriate for young readers, here is some advice. Go find a couple issues of Uncle Scrooge in the quarter bin and give them to the little ones. You won't be sorry.

Next on the docket is Ambush Bug #3 written by one of the greatest writers in comics, Keith Giffen. This issue has been sitting in my collection for some time now because I was worried that I wouldn't get any of the jokes. I bought it since I had heard of Ambush Bug a little and the title of this issue was "The Ambush Bug History of the DC Universe" which sounded like fun. I've explained before that as a kid, I never really read a lot of DC comic books. Now that I have immersed myself in DC history, I thought that I would be ready for some Ambush Bug. (Plus the fact that I have really been enjoying the current Ambush Bug: Year None series didn't hurt either.) Now that I have the background to get the jokes, this issue was really hilarious. I really don't want to spoil anything since I think real DC fans should go out and find this issue. I love it when a company can take a step back and make fun of themselves. Comics are always so serious lately and having a laugh about them once in a while is always a good idea. All I can say is that seeing what Ambush Bug would look like if drawn by Jack Kirby, Gil Kane, and Frank Miller made me crack up and made this book worth all the time I have spent learning all about DC continuity.

3 comments:

Rick Hansen said...

While I appreciate the Disney cartoons, my favorite Saturday periods were the "Godzilla Power Hour" and, then, the Spider-man and His Amazing Friends/The Incredible Hulk hour. As far as comics go, I remember horror comics being my favorites, particularly some really scary werewolf stories. I had a few Scrooge McDuck comics, but I have no idea what became of any of these treasures. Lost to the sands of time.

Michael Moskop said...

I still love Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends. Whenever I see it on the cable guide, I almost always stop and watch.

Rick Hansen said...

Yeah, it was kind of like the "Star Trek" of Saturday Morning Cartoons. As many people love it and watch it today, there just wasn't enough viewers at the time to justify more seasons. Really sad, but still good memories.