20 replies to this topic

[SydneySox]

Are you a hidden nerd? Do you yearn for your youth? Are as excited as I am to be living in what's starting to be called the Golden Age of comics but don't know where to jump into the hobby?

Do you want to know more?

I want to help out here but I've been a little stymied by my inability to offer anything that is shippable (like Australian wine) or to buy anything I can use (like tickets). But this morning as I was helping a friend get into Batman comics after being inspired by the new movies, I thought maybe I could do the same.

I have no idea if people will be interested in this auction item - but I know some of my friends are here, so I thought maybe it could be something I could do to fight AIDS and destroy Africa or whatever it is we're aiming for.

For this auction I will help you get into/back into comics - and the best bit is you can do it without needing to actually enter the pretty intimidating world of comic book stores, without needing to stand, overwhelmed, staring at the racks and racks and shelves sporting publisher's titles like Marvel (the really big shelf), DC (the other really big shelf on the other side of the room), Boom!, Vertigo, Dark Horse or other... which says nothing for the back part of the room full of weird imported anime books where the kids whose hats have animal ears are huddled together.

For this auction, you will recieve:

One Year's Worth of Comic Books!

More accurately - every month, you will be mailed a package. In the package will be a couple, maybe 2, maybe 4, trade paperbacks... these are volumes collecting 3-4 issues together. Each of these Trades (cool comic slang, you'll get to learn that too) packages will be themed. Might be Batman month. Might be Marvel Under Appreciated Heroes Month. It'll be a surprise.

Each of the Trade's will be a Volume 1 - a starting place. It'll be up to you to decide if you'd like to go on reading the series from there, but at least you'll know where to start.

Each package you'll also get a short, unbiased, summary of the theme, tying the month's package together. The summary will be written in unicorn blood which, surprisingly, makes an excellent blue ink.

I promise that I will try to give you - over the year - as close as a 'these are the books you should read' primer that you can get.

What is it Worth?

I will cover the cost of the Trades... they run from AU$18 to $30 each. And I'll cover shipping. So I reckon you're looking at an outlay of several hundred bucks on my end, money I'll consider well spent if it goes towards destroying Africa and all those within. And, before you make all those jokes about AU currency, remember our dollar's been treating your dollar like a bitch for most of recent memory.

Where will we start?

I'm not doing this for profit - but I'm not giving it away. Africa must be stopped.

Start it $100, maybe.

(Then go tell your wife you spent a hundred bucks so an Australian could send you comic books)

Edited by SydneySox, 31 July 2012 - 11:37 PM.

[Tokyo Sox]

USD 100

[AlNipper49]

150

[BigA27]

$175

[Yaz4Ever]

$200

[Tokyo Sox]

$225

This is pretty cool.

[SydneySox]

'Cool' being a remarkably relative term in this situation.

[Yaz4Ever]

$250

[SydneySox]

We'll close this off next week so we can start in August!

[Yaz4Ever]

or, and this is just a suggestion, we can close it immediately

[SydneySox]

I won't be near a computer until the next time it closes so I will keep open till then... I have picked up the first month's books Yaz, so you'll have some reading to do!

August is Batman month. It's timely.

[Tokyo Sox]

$275

[Reverend]

OK, a couple things, first off, I think it might be worthwhile to mention to people that they might actually want to get into comics. And this is someone who was not into comics when he was young*.

The second thing is more important, and it's that Spider-Man cannot "totally beat Batman", but I'm putting that aside for now.

Comics grew up in a big way in the last 10-15 years. It's a legitimate literature now, and I say that without jest or irony. Some of the best stuff I've read on civil society was in DC's "No Man's Land" Batman run from 1999, pulled together from the work of many authors, and held important insights that were utterly lost on those involved in, say, New Orleans and Iraq, just to mention some important examples.

Similarly, Marvel's Civil War that spanned many titles had social criticism much more poigniant than you could find in near any popular media outlet and perhaps even most niche outlets.

The writers are late generation comics readers who have brought in a new level of thinking in the comics. It allows them to develop themes using already known characters which provide resources for bringing the ideas involved into high relief. This is done in many other cultures (playing with the Wong Fey Hong character in kung fu movies is a good example) but we never had much of an equivalent until recently--now, different writers get to explore how, say, Capt. America would deal with a problem, or the Batman, or... someone else.

And then there are non-main line comics that have been amazing in exploring all kinds of issues, be the concept of authority, religion, political structures (wait, I'm repeating myself, aren't I?) or just the tensions of... being? Whatever.

The point is, comics have grown up. They are a kick ass literature in their own right now (I mean, some suck, but the form has grown up such that there are more and more examples of really fantastic stuff). Instead of being a lesser form, it's now a form that offers new opportunities and constraints to crank out messages in a different and often damn entertaining fashion.

And if anyone has any interest in getting into this, Syd is absolutely your guy; I endorse his discernment in this matter as highly as anyone I know. I mean, don't lend him any money or give him any personal information, but on the comics thing, he's top notch.

I'm very certain that there are people on this site for whom this item would be worth a great deal on account of what would be received and future gratifications, but simply don't know it.

Yet.



*My old roommate had the books and I started reading them and was frankly amazed at how good they were. I tried to read some of his old ones and, frankly, found them almost unreadable. Having read ones that had matured as literature, I couldn't go back.

[SydneySox]

Hah! Thanks Rev.

To just add to that - it's not going to be just mainstream. In fact mainstream'll just be a small part of it. The stuff that exists right now as social and literary criticism is outstanding.

Alan Moore wrote 'Watchmen' a few decades back (I won't send out Watchmen - you should read it on your own. Everyone should read Watchmen) to make a point about the genre, the form and the way you can tell stories about things in formats that don't exist.

I mean, it sounds simple - you have a single, static picutre in a box and you get some limited text bubbles that have less space than a tweet for people to get a point across. And in the olden golden and silver age comics you'd get a lot of 'Zounds! His phaser blasts are stronger than my Super-Kick!' sort of stuff... but not really so much anymore.

There are some amazing voices in mainstream and non-mainstream comics in the industry right now and they're writing social commentaries, meta genre criticism and literary introspectives!

Tokyo's got the lead and it closes in about 24 hours.

[Reverend]

[SydneySox]

Dude. Nextwave was going to be my secret finale. Stop wrecking it!

[Reverend]

What about The Authority?

[SydneySox]

There are many options.

And at this point they all point towards Tokyo.

Closes soon at $275 which is gonna be a bargain... for AIDS.

[SydneySox]

Closed - Congrats Tokyosox.

$275 for the charity.

[Tokyo Sox]

$275 PAID

[jose melendez]

confirmed