Course Correct Into Fall

I originally intended for this to be a post about my trip to a Double-A baseball game over the weekend, but it turns out a lot of people wanted those Adam Wainwright or Yadier Molina jerseys, so no dice. Pivot to the November solicitations then.

What's ending? Blink is, as I suspected a 5-issue mini-series, and issue 5 will be out in November. Likewise, the fourth and final issue of Locust: Ballad of Men will be out as well.

What's new I might buy? Marvel has 3 things I am sort of considering. Ryan North is taking over Fantastic Four with Iban Coello. I have never bought FF as a monthly thing, always came back around to various runs well after the fact. Will this be the trend-breaker? Alyssa Wong and Martin Coccolo are working on Deadpool, though I'm unclear if it's the first issue of an ongoing, or a one-shot. Wong's Iron Fist mini-series didn't exactly knock my socks off, but if I buy this in November, Deadpool can show up for Blogsgiving! Hmm, decisions, decisions. Thirdly, Emily Kim and Creees Lee (Marvel's solicit uses 3 e's twice, so I assume that's the correct spelling) are doing a five issue mini-series on Tiger Division, that Korean super-team that showed up in one of Jed MacKay's Black Cat Annuals. I mean, the characters looked kind of cool, and I don't want to be one of those stuffy fans who won't give the new characters a chance. I can still be cool!

(This is a lie.)

Among other publishers, Mad Cave Studios has the first issue of Nature's Labyrinth, a 6-issue mini by Zac Thompson and Bayleigh Underwood about an island where criminals are offered fantastic wealth to fight to the death. Over at Scout Comics, Karl Kesel and David Hahn have an Impossible Jones holiday-themed one-shot. TKO Studios has collected editions of Sara, Garth Ennis and Steve Epting's story about a bunch of Russian lady snipers killin' Nazis. I don't usually fall for Ennis' war comic stuff, but maybe this time. . . Ize Press has volume 1 of The Boxer, which I don't think is a comic about the Simon & Garfunkel song, but about a boxing prodigy who seems largely disinterested in life. Image has Two Graves, by Genevieve Valentine, with Annie Wu and Ming Doyle drawing the story from different viewpoints. I don't think I'll end up trying this, but I might, and it seemed interesting enough to be worth mentioning, at any rate.

A few new things I definitely won't be buying, but felt like mentioning. Geoff Johns is back writing stuff at DC, with JSA books and Stargirl books and whatnot. You can either celebrate or dive for cover, as is your preference. Or yawn. Yawning is acceptable. The other thing is Bash, a sci-fi basketball GN from Titan Comics, which is apparently written by new Minnesota Timberwolves' center Rudy Gobert. Mostly, I just laughed at its description of Gobert as a, "basketball superstar." Just because the T'wolves traded 9 first-round picks for a guy, does not make him a superstar. It means the Timberwolves have poor impulse control. 

I kid, I wish Gobert the best. Hopefully his teammates in Minnesota are better on defense than his teammates in Utah were. Wasn't his fault Donovan Mitchell and Jordan Clarkson treated defense as the time to practice their matador impressions.

What's out I will (probably) still be buying? West of Sundown is back with a new arc which might be bringing in Dr. Moreau? I never read that book or watched the movie, so this could be a problem, but I still need to see if the fifth issue is going to make any sense to me. The fifth issue of Ice Canyon Monster got solicited, but I'll still be taking the book one issue per month if I stick with it, so I'll be a couple behind. DC has the third issue of Sgt. Rock vs the Army of the Undead. Marvel has She-Hulk 8 (if I'm still buying it), Moon Knight 17, the re-solicited X-Men Legends 4, and the fourth issue of Damage Control. Viz Media has the 8th volume of Zom 100, about the people trying to do their bucket lists during the apocalypse. I've bought the first volume so far, and it might be a while before I get volume 2. Lot of other manga on the list to try first.