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Guide to ThunderCats (New for Patrons!)
New Guide, HO! I’m back with another special mid-week licensed property guide exclusively for Pledgeonaut Patrons of Crushing Krisis. This guide is for a property I love dearly, which rocketed from the obscurity of nostalgia to be the most pre-ordered comic book of the decade, due out a week from today! That’s right, it’s a Guide to ThunderCats – HO!
Guide to ThunderCats comic books
I was surprised when I heard that the new ThunderCats comics by Declan Shalvey & Drew Moss from Dynamite Entertainment had the highest pre-orders of any comic so far in the 2020s. Did people still love this property that much? And, hadn’t there already been plenty of ThunderCats comics?
That led me down a rabbit hole that got surprisingly deep, thanks to one particular long-running ThunderCats series most readers have likely never seen or heard of.
New Comics & Collected Editions: Marvel Comics – January 31, 2024
It’s the fifth new comic book day of the new year! This post covers Marvel Comics January 31 2024 releases. Missed last week’s releases? Check out last week’s post covering Marvel Comics January 24 2024 new releases.
This week in Marvel Comics: Danny Rand’s early Iron years, Sabretooth post-exile, late-breaking mutant resurrections, Secret Wars that should’ve stayed secret, and more!
This list includes every comic and digital comic out from Marvel this week, plus collected editions in omnibus, hardcover, paperback, and digest-sized formats. For each new release, I’ll point you to the right guide within my Crushing Comics Guide to Marvel Comics to find out how to collect each character in full – and, if a guide is linked from this post, that means it is updated through the present day!
Marvel Comics January 31 2024 Collected Editions
Betsy Braddock: Captain Britain
(2024 paperback, ISBN 978-1302950750 / digital)
See Guide to Captain Britain. By the start of 2023 Betsy had held the Captain Britain title for over three years of comics, but this was her first solo title. Unfortunately, it also marked the end of her exploits as a leading lady in the Age of Krakoa. I wasn’t always on Tini Howard’s side as an author of Betsy, but I think this was one of her tighter arcs with the character.
If you were waiting for more of the focus Howard showed on the Malice material from the end of Excalibur (2019), this feels closer to that. Plus, it has the historically bisexual Betsy actually dating a woman (who happens to be one of my favorites characters)!
Daredevil: Born Again Gallery Edition
(2024 “Gallery Edition” oversize hardcover, ISBN 978-1302953041)
See Guide to Daredevil. This oversize Gallery Edition hardcover collects all of Frank Millers return alongside David Mazzucchelli for the all-time classic “Born Again” story in issues #226-233.
Dark Avengers Modern Era Epic Collection: Osborn’s Reign
(2024 paperback, ISBN 978-1302952709 / digital)
See Guide to Thunderbolts & Dark Avengers. It’s funny to me that this is an “Epic Collection” when really it’s just a more complete “Complete Collection” since it doesn’t skip over the Dark Avengers / Uncanny X-Men crossover material like the previous Complete did.
The fact that a one-off run like this is getting an Epic Collection just goes to prove how “all-in” Marvel has gone on moving all of their classic paperback reprints into Epic format. This is my favorite Brian Bendis comic and you really don’t need to know these characters from Thunderbolts to appreciate how awful (in a good way) they are as Norman Osborn’s Avengers.
Iron Fist – Danny Rand: The Early Years
(2024 oversize hardcover, ISBN 978-1302954857 / digital)
See Guide to Iron Fist. This is a much-needed omnibus edition that combines the contents of the single Iron Fist Marvel Masterworks with all of his Deadly Hands of Kung-Fu magazine material. This marries up neatly with the run of Power Man & Iron Fist on the other side.
However, like all of his other collections, it still puzzlingly excludes Marvel Team-Up (1972) #31 – one of his major starring appearances in this period! I guess that’s an oversight that will never be corrected, at this point. Even without that issue, this is a terrific read – largely written by Chris Claremont. [Read more…] about New Comics & Collected Editions: Marvel Comics – January 31, 2024
Guide to Pre-Crisis Action Comics – Golden Age, Silver Age, & Bronze Age (New for Patrons!)
To celebrate seven years of my Guide to DC Comics, it’s time to tackle DC’s biggest hero in a new guide exclusively for Pledgeonaut Patrons of Crushing Krisis. When it comes to the superhero that started the Age of Superheroes, you have to start at the start, which is why today I’m debuting: Guide to Superman in Pre-Crisis Action Comics – The Golden, Silver, & Bronze Ages!
Guide to Superman in Action Comics (1938 – 1986)
I have Marvel’s complete publishing history dedicated to memory thanks to reading and re-reading Les Daniels’ Marvel: Five Fabulous Decades of the World’s Greatest Comics over and over again as a tween. My relationship to DC Comics was more approximate. I knew DC better through cartoons and films, and through the major events of the 90s like “Death of Superman” and “Knightfall,” but I didn’t know much about its beginnings and how it kept superhero comics alive in the post-war era until the dawn of the Silver Age.