HAPPY NEW YEAR!

And that's another (calendar) year in the books, folks! It's hard for me to believe, but I'm still going after ten years of this thing! Yes, it's true -- I stopped making blog anniversary posts some time back, but if I hadn't, I would've celebrated a full decade of NOT A HOAX! back in August. I started this site in 2013 as a way to "discuss" comics I was reading, even if it meant hollaring into a void (but thankfully I've had many readers and commenters in all this time, so that hasn't been the case). First it was Marvel's CAPTAIN BRITAIN and EXCALIBUR, then it was IRON MAN by Michelinie, Layton, and Romita Jr., then Spider-Man by Roger Stern, and then on and on and on, running a gamut of creators, publishers, and content.

Now, I hesitate to say at this point that I'm still "going strong" after ten-plus years. There have been points, particularly when my son was a newborn and toddler, where I was barely able to hang on by a thread! And I've long since moved away from more than a single post a week; even when I think I'll be able to manage more, something always happens to prevent it. But I'm okay with that! I'd rather be going one post a week after ten years than not at all.

So as usual for these year-end posts, let's have a quick rundown of what we covered in the past year, as well as the now-annual tradition (down from once a month many years ago) of The Unboxing.

The first part of that is pretty straightforward, of course. It was the Avengers. That's pretty much it. I started reading the Bob Harras/Steve Epting/Tom Palmer run late last year and it carried us through November of this year as well. Then we wrapped things up with James Bond in December, closing a hole which has bothered me for several years, as the Bond newspaper strips were my only cancelled/unfinished series in all this time.

And now The Unboxing. This year actually featured more books than I've become used to in recent years, and next year looks to have more still. It seems perhaps Marvel and the rest have finally gotten back to reprinting material that interests me after a bit of a dry spell! Throughout 2023, I picked up all of the following:

• CAPTAIN MARVEL: GENIS-VELL OMNIBUS: I'm extensively on record regarding my love of late nineties Marvel, and the CAPTAIN MARVEL series by Peter David and ChrisCross is a great artifact of that era. I'm quite pleased to have this book, but I have three issues with it: one, they used the wrong logo, from the series' relaunch a few years in, rather than the original and far more "comic booky" Comicraft logo from 1999. Two, I could have done without having that relaunch series in this tome. For me, the David/ChrisCross CAP run ends after the first series. The relaunch, wherein Genis-Vell went insane, was garbage. And three, my Late Nineties/"Heroes Return Avengers" shelf on the bookcase is too crowded to hold this book in addition to everything else there! But in spite of all these shortcomings, I'm nonetheless quite happy to have this one.
• JEPH LOEB & TIM SALE: SPIDER-MAN GALLERY EDITION: I already raved a bit about this volume in last year's Unboxing around this time, when it was en route. Well, now it's here and I've (re)read it, and I still love it. This is, hands-down, one of my all-time favorite Spider-Man stories. I bought the original issues. I bought the hardcover edition. I bought it digitally. And now I've bought it in the super-oversized Gallery Edition format. And I'll probably buy it again in whatever double-super-deluxe version Marvel dreams up next. I love it that much! (For those who care to know why I'm so enamored of this tale, I wrote about it here nine years ago)
• JEPH LOEB & TIM SALE: DAREDEVIL GALLERY EDITION: Most of this list is in alphabetical order, but the prior entry and this one are reversed, because I simply had to rave about Loeb and Sale's Spider-Man as early as possible. But DAREDEVIL: YELLOW (which I also wrote about back in 2015) is easily my second-favorite Marvel outing from the duo, and I'm nearly as excited to have it in the Gallery Edition format as I am for Spider-Man. I've no plans to pick up Gallery Editions of any of Loeb & Sale's remaining Marvel "color" series, as I'm not as enamored with HULK: GRAY and CAPTAIN AMERICA: WHITE as I am with their Spidey and Daredevil outings -- but I would totally grab a Gallery Edition of WOLVERINE/GAMBIT: VICTIMS, if anyone at Marvel is listening!
• NEW WARRIORS CLASSIC OMNIBUS vol. 2: The original NEW WARRIORS is one of those Marvel series where I've only read bits and pieces, but I've always wanted to check out the whole thing. Marvel published the first volume in this series ten years ago (weird how that number keeps popping up), and then waited the better part of a decade to release volume 2 this past year (after reissuing volume 1 in 2022). But fortunately, volume 3 won't have nearly as long of a delay; it's scheduled for relese this June!
• SPIDER-MAN 2099 OMNIBUS: Wow, two Peter David Omnibuses this year! And much as I was a fan of Genis-Vell, I absolutely loved SPIDER-MAN 2099 as a teen. I didn't read all of Marvel's 2099 series, but I regularly followed DOOM 2099, X-MEN 2099, and SPIDER-MAN 2099 -- so I'm pleased as punch to have this Peter David/Rick Leonardi/Al Williamson epic collected in full hardcover format. Marvel has a second volume coming in just a few months, but it's all latter-day material, so it doesn't count.
• THUNDERBOLTS OMNIBUS vol. 3: Words cannot express how gratified I am to have this one on the shelf, finishing off the entire late nineties/early 00s THUNDERBOLTS run, and including the mid-00s NEW THUNDERBOLTS era as well! Again, I adore late nineties Marvel, and THUNDERBOLTS was one of the crown jewels of that era. And hey, very nearly bringing the list full circle (if not for the one remaining item below), the NEW THUNDERBOLTS issues feature Genis-Vell, post-insanity, picking up his story where his Omnibus ended!
• UNCANNY X-MEN OMNIBUS vol. 5: Another one I'm pleased to have on the shelf, though with a bit of a caveat. But first, the good news -- as of this volume, Chris Claremont's entire original 1975 - 1991 run on X-MEN is collected in full, in hardcover format. That's exciting. The rub, however, comes in the fact that the ink on this book had barely dried when Marvel announced (but has not yet solicited) an X-MEN: MUTANT MASSACRE PRELUDE OMNIBUS, which collects nearly all the same material, with more to boot! So pick your poison, if you haven't already.

As always Marvel represents the bulk of my book-buying, but I did pick up a handful of other items throughout the year. First, Fantagraphics is still plugging along with their CARL BARKS DISNEY LIBRARY series (whcih predates this blog, if you can believe it), and I picked up both of the year's offerings: VOLUME 28: THE CAVE OF ALI BABA and VOLUME 4: MAHARAJAH DONALD (I'm quite happy Fantabgraphics has finally gone back to fill in the first four volumes, which they skipped in favor of jumping to Barks' "prime" material when the series started twelve years ago. Volume 3 is on the way in 2024 as well.)

From DC, I updgraded my very old copy of Jeph Loeb and Time Sale's sole Superman story, with the newly released ABSOLUTE SUPERMAN FOR ALL SEASONS. It's a huge and lovely book! I also picked up the BATMAN ADVENTURES OMNIBUS. I already owned this series in four trade paperbacks (not to mention the original single issues from the nineties), but I couldn't resist the upgrade. I hope the sequel series, BATMAN AND ROBIN ADVENTURES, gets a similar treatment (not to mention the following series, GOTHAM ADVENTURES, which does not even have a comprehensive trade collection yet).

And I scratched my newspaper aventure strip itch by deciding early in the year, out of nowhere, that I should finally read Milton Caniff's TERRY AND THE PIRATES. I knew that IDW had released it under the Library of American Comics imprint some time back, so I went to see if the volumes were still available. And apparently I chose the precise right moment to look into TERRY, because while the IDW books are mostly out of print, the Library of American Comics (now moved to a new publishing house, Clover Press), started in 2022 a new reprint series of huge hardcovers called the TERRY AND THE PIRATES MASTER COLLECTION, featuring the best reproduction the strip has ever received, from Caniff's personal proofs. So I've picked up Volume 1: ENTER THE DRAGON LADY, Volume 2: THE BURMA BLUES, Volume 3: THE RETURN OF NORMANDIE DRAKE, Volume 4: PIRATE QUEEN AND PATRIOT, Volume 5: THE HYPNOTIC APRIL KANE, and Volume 6: THE TIME OF CHOLERA, and I expect by this time next year I'll have the entire series, or very close to it (Volume 7 and Volume 8 are already pre-ordered). I can't wait to read it, though I haven't yet decided if I plan to write about it here.

Lastly, I have honorary mention for something I picked up during this past year, which I'd been chasing for some time: DC's slipcase hardcover edition of JLA/AVENGERS: THE COLLECTOR'S EDITION (it's frequently referred to as being an Absolute edition, but it actually is not branded as one). I bought this series as it was originally released, but at the time the slipcase came out a year or two later in 2004, I was unwilling to pay the exorbitant seventy-five dollar cover price for a reprint of something I already owned. How times have changed! When George Pérez passed away in 2022, I got it in my head that I would like to own the thing after all, to sit alongside the AVENGERS BY BUSIEK & PÉREZ Omnibuses, among many other things, on the above-mentioned "Heroes Return" shelf -- so I started looking. Finally, this past summer, I found a copy on eBay in excellent shape and paid more than cover price -- but not more than I was comfortable spending -- to acquire it. I've had zero buyer's remorse since, so I'm pretty sure I made the right move, especially considering that unlike nearly everything else out there, this series is highly unlikely to ever get a reprint again; at least not until the day Disney buys Warner Bros. The Hero Initiative had to move heaven and Earth just to release a simple trade paperback with a minecsule print run when Pérez went public with his rapidly declining health a few years back!

And that brings us to the end of this year's "Year in Review" -- except for one thing. Next week, I'll announce the next review series. It's another long one; it will take us all the way through the year, up into December -- and I have all the posts written (if not yet proofread), so the coming year looks to be in pretty good shape. This is a run I've wanted to read for some time, and I've said as much here in the past. I also "Unboxed" its three hardcover volumes some years back, when I first got them. We spent this past year in Marvel's nineties, and prior to that we spent about two years in their seventies. So I'm thinking it's time to check on something from the Distinguished Competition's eighties. And I won't suggest that you read next week's announcement on a dark night -- but if you do, it would be totally appropriate.