comic books

Crushing Comics includes definitive comic book guides, essays about characters and titles, collecting strategies, comic reviews, and more!

Collecting X-Men limited series & one-shots as Graphic Novels

The definitive, chronological, and up-to-date guide on collecting X-Men limited series and one-shot comic books via omnibuses, hardcovers, and trade paperback graphic novels. A part of Crushing Krisis’s Collecting X-Men: A Definitive Guide. Last updated July 2016 with titles scheduled for release through April 2017.

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In the early 1980’s Marvel found renewed success with comic fans, in no small part due to a surging X-Men title helmed by Chris Claremont.

With the trend 60s and 70s anthology titles out of vogue, Marvel tried a new approach to promote their most popular characters to a growing audience – releasing limited series telling finite stories.

Some of the earliest characters to receive the limited series treatment were Scarlet Witch and Wolverine, but soon the trend expanded to include seemingly any and every character. Some of the series were collected in trade paperbacks at the time, and are now being revitalized in Marvel Premiere Classics hardcover editions.

In the 90s the comics speculating trend helped limited series and one-shots balloon out of control – each first issue bore a “Collector’s Item!” burst! These editions are under-collected, just as their stories are frequently ignored by the canon of current X-Men authors.

Marvel’s tactic changed in the 2000s, using limited series to showcase hot creators and to test the waters for possible ongoing series. It seems that the more targeted approach is yielding more collections! [Read more…] about Collecting X-Men limited series & one-shots as Graphic Novels

Namor The Sub-Mariner, Definitive Collecting Guide & Reading Order

The definitive issue-by-issue comic book collecting guide and reading order for Marvel’s Namor, The Sub-Marinar in omnibus, hardcover, trade paperback, and digital. Part of Crushing Krisis’s Crushing Comics. Last updated November 2024 with titles scheduled for release through June 2025.

Namor. The Sub-Mariner. The King of Atlantis. He was Marvel’s first superhero, their first anti-hero, and their first mutant.

Namor has been around longer than the majority of people who will read this guide, and those seventy-odd years of life have seen him inhabit as many ongoing series as Wolverine!

If you enjoy Namor’s regal bearing and obstinate attitude, there are hundreds of comics to delve into – many of which have been collected into graphic novels. Namor has been a villain, an Avenger, an Invader, a Defender, and an X-Man.

This guide covers every one of those appearances, from the Golden Age to the present day! [Read more…] about Namor The Sub-Mariner, Definitive Collecting Guide & Reading Order

Young Avengers & Avengers in Training – Collecting Guide & Reading Order

The definitive, chronological, and up-to-date guide on collecting Young Avengers, Avengers Academy, and other youthful and in-training Avengers comic books via omnibuses and trade paperback graphic novels. A part of Crushing Krisis’s Collecting Avengers Graphic Novels: A Definitive Guide. Last updated December 2024 with titles scheduled for release through February 2024.

The Avengers has not historically included division for younger heroes, unlike the X-Men, whose entire premise was based upon a school. That made sense, since being an Avenger was a serious duty and frequently a job. A random team couldn’t declare themselves Avengers, though they could could be mutants by birth. And from a publishing standpoint, Avengers never had the cache to support more than a handful of titles.

That all changed in 2005 in a series created by budding superstar artist Jim Cheung and TV and film writer Allan Heinberg. In the wake of Avengers Disassembled fundamentally altering the team, a group of teen heroes arose to take on the mantles of their heroes – some of whom had fallen in battle. Inspired by Avengers members like Captain America, Thor, Hulk, Hawkeye, Vision, Iron Man, and Giant-Man, this new group declared themselves Young Avengers.

With the proverbial seal broken and the Avengers brand hotter than ever thanks to the stewardship of Brian Bendis, Marvel seized the opportunity for a decade-long run of titles focused on a next generation of Avengers. While the Young Avengers continued in a string of mini-series, an official training-squad was coined in Avengers: The Initiative, followed by an actual Avengers school in Avengers Academy.

The line-wide Marvel Now relaunch in 2012 brought with it not one but three Avengers titles focused on training squads – a redux of Young Avengers from the hip team of Kieron Gillen and Jamie McKelvie, the Hunger Games inspired Avengers Arena (which became Avengers Undercover), and finally a team of android and robot characters in Avengers A.I. [Read more…] about Young Avengers & Avengers in Training – Collecting Guide & Reading Order

X-Men Titles (2010 – 2019) – The Definitive Collecting Guide & Reading Order

The definitive, chronological, and up-to-date guide on collecting X-Men flagship title comic books from 2010 to 2019, including Uncanny X-Men, X-Men, Extraordinary X-Men, X-Men Gold, and X-Men Red via omnibuses, hardcovers, and trade paperback graphic novels. A part of Crushing Comics – Guide to Marvel Comics. Last updated December 2024 with titles scheduled for release through February 2025.

This guide follows the main, “flagship” titles in the X-Men line from after “Second Coming” in the Heroic Age in 2010 through Marvel Fresh Start in 2019, just prior to Jonathan Hickman’s takeover of the entire line.

X-Men titles had been distinctly separate from the rest of the Marvel Universe for years even before they headed into two years of tightly coordinated stories and crossovers from 2008 to 2010.

It had been since Onslaught in 1996 that the X-Men interacted significantly with other Marvel heroes – or even wider Marvel Universe storylines! – in their own books. They also didn’t get out much. Aside from House of M’s ramifications in Decimation, you’d be hard-pressed to find a non-mutant Marvel hero in any X-Title other than Wolverine!

While that made for thrilling in-continuity stories for big X-Fans, it didn’t help bring new readers into the fold – or to share the wealth of X-Readers with other Marvel titles.

Marvel’s solution began with X-Men (2010). As with Astonishing X-Men before it, this title occurred relatively free of the convoluted continuity of other X-Titles, even though it made reference to outside events. And, unlike the self-contained Astonishing, X-Men, this title frequently featured guests-stars from throughout the Marvel Universe.

In 2011, Marvel ended their longest-running and highest-numbered title when they cancelled Uncanny X-Men, Vol. 1 with #544 to make way for a split in the X-Men between Cyclops and Wolverine explored in Schism. The subsequent Uncanny X-Men (2011) was still written by author Kieron Gillen with a similar tone and cast – just less Wolverine and Kitty Pryde. It was by many accounts (including mine) one of the best runs of X-Men ever written.

This, too, was in the service of steering the X-Men toward more interaction with the wider Marvel Universe – this time in the form of the major event, Avengers vs. X-Men.

In the wake of Avengers vs. X-Men, Marvel relaunched their entire line with nearly every creator shuffled onto a new book. In the shake-up, Brian Bendis hopped from the Avengers franchise to the X-Men franchise, taking over Uncanny X-Men (2013) (as well as a team of time-displaced teen X-Men in All-New X-Men).

Meanwhile, the adjectiveless X-Men volume relaunched a few months later with a primary cast entirely composed of X-Woman! It didn’t feel like a gimmick at all thanks to the X-Men’s legendary roster of women – including Storm, Psylocke, Jubilee, Kitty Pryde, Rogue, and Omega Sentinel, and more. Unfortunately, the title was quickly sent askew by the “Battle of the Atom” crossover and launch writer Brian Wood never quite recovered. Two later arcs by Marc Guggenheim (of TV’s Arrow) and G. Willow Wilson (creator of Ms. Marvel) were well-steeped in X-history, but not terribly exciting.

Bendis promised a lengthy run on X-Men, but another creator shuffle after Secret Wars in 2015 saw him depart the franchise for Iron Man in the All-New, All-Different Marvel.

In his place, Cullen Bunn took over Uncanny X-Men (2016). After a long streak of wrapping up soon-to-be-cancelled series for other writers, Bunn improbably struck gold on a menacing take on Magneto (2014) in his first ongoing series. He brought that villainous tone to his ongoing.

Alongside that, a more-heroic new title – Extraordinary X-Men – launched under the pen of Jeff Lemire and tied in closely to the wider Marvel Universe plot of the Inhumans and their Terrigen Bomb being poisonous to mutants.

After the resolution of the Inhumans thread in Inhumans vs. X-Men, Marvel relaunched the entire X-Men line in “ResurrXion.” This marked the first time since 2013 that there was no ongoing “Uncanny” title serving as one of the flagship books of the line. However, X-Men Gold was effectively “Uncanny,” with a Claremont-esque classic team of Kitty, Storm, Nightcrawler, Colossus, and Rachel Grey, among others. Meanwhile, Cullen Bunn continued his Magneto thread into the All-New X-Men cast with X-Men Blue. Nearly a year later, Phoenix Resurrection returned Jean Grey to the cast of X-Men, and she launched a third flagship with X-Men Red. And, finally, the period wrapped up with five X-Men Black one-shots focusing on major X-Men villains.

Then, in November 2018, Uncanny X-Men returned with a bang – as a 10-part weekly story arc called “X-Men Disassembled.” That story branched out into “Age of X-Man” – an alternate reality event – while writer Matthew Rosenberg continued the storylines of his past year of X-Men mini-series into a disturbing final run on the title that killed off many beloved characters… only for them to return in Jonathan Hickman’s relaunched Age of Krakoa!

Crushing On: Penny Arcade

January 4, 2011 by krisis

Tycho & Gabe, hard at work.

I was a big webcomics fan in the late 90s, but all of the comics I followed have gone the way of the dodo.

Well, all except for one: Penny Arcade, launched in 1998 and going stronger than ever – now they have their own merchandise, semi-annual & bi-coastal gaming convention, web TV show (which is pretty riveting), and multi-million dollar children’s charity.

The slight irony inherent in my subscription to PA is that it’s primarily known as a gaming web comic, and I am not much of a gamer. It also makes jokes about gamer-adjacent media, the terror of being an adult, fruit fucking, and the current state of the world, as well as presenting some general inanity,

Despite not entirely getting all of the jokes, I have been a dedicated fan since the very start – since I was a teenager! That’s partially due to my adoration of Jerry Holkins AKA Tycho’s razor-sharp incredibly-verbose wit (and his long-form writing), and partially for how Mike Krahulik AKA Gabe”s art ranges from animated James Bond sexy to completely ridiculous (frequently in the same strip).

It’s also due to those times when they hit an existential issue out of the park, like this strip from last week:

Click the comic to view it at full-size on the PA website.

One of my first acts as a homeowner was to take what little discretionary income I had left and buy every collected edition in the PA store, both to have them on my shelf and as a monetary thank you to Tycho and Gabe for years of laughter.

I wrote a note to that effect with my order and with no prompting T&G signed my copy of The Splendid Magic of Penny Arcade: The 11 1/2 Anniversary Edition with the inscription, “Happy Housening!”.

I love them.