Top Five Fridays 02/08/08
Some of you may have noticed on the sidebar, we have our “Top Five of the Moment” listed. These are the five books that are most clicking with each Pants writer. It may or may not represent the best books we’ve read all month, year, or just what we’re digging that week. We generally try to update it with books from that week, but there are no hard and fast rules. Inspired by an email from one of our readers, we’re going to post every Friday with the most recent Top Five from each member of the Panteon, and hope for your comments on our lists, or maybe even your own “Top Five of the Moment.”
Also, just as the Wednesday Number Ones feature is generally our spot for folks to talk about the comics of the week, we hope that Top Five Fridays is where you’ll come to talk about what’s going on in comics in general. News in the comics world, thoughts on comics you’ve recently read, talk about comic-related movies that release this weekend and more are welcome in the comments thread for Top Five Fridays.
This week, the Top Five Books of the Moment are:
Nick Budd
- Uncanny X-Men
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer
- Batman: The Man Who Laughs HC
- Nightwing
- Abe Sapien: The Drowning
Dave Farabee
- Buffy The Vampire Slayer
- Uncanny X-Men
- Fables
- Abe Sapien: The Drowning
- Annihilation: Conquest
Dan Grendell
- Abe Sapien: The Drowning
- Fables
- Pantheon High V.2
- Annihilation: Conquest
- Super-Villain Team-Up: MODOK’s 11 TP
Randy Lander
- Fables
- Amulet Vol 1 Stonekeeper
- Abe Sapien: The Drowning
- Annihilation: Conquest
- Buffy The Vampire Slayer
David Martindale (D3)
- Uncanny X-Men
- Fables
- Annihilation: Conquest
- Amazing Spider-man
- Transformers: Devastation
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(sorry for jumpin’ the gun on “Buffy” talk on Wednesday, but I was excited!)
Buffy #11.. The interaction between the two slayers.. I just feel like if it was on TV, it would have been harder to execute without it looking like pandering. Not that I think they couldn’t have done it on the show.. but just one of those things that I read in the comic and think, great stuff.. going places the show couldn’t. I may be way off.. I dunno.
And don’t forget to read Joss’ words in the letter col on issue #5. His note on how much he respects comics reminded me of a [Bad Signal] a while back where Ellis was saying that Whedon could be writing big screenplays, novels, musicals, but he’s currently choosing to write comics.
Yay for comicses!
08 Feb 2008 at 1:47 pm
QuoteI can’t even get to 5 this week…
1) Wasteland - great little tale from Michael’s past, a well-timed break in the ongoing epic. This book deserves more love.
2) Uncanny X-Men - Bru should write an “Adventures of Scott & Emma” book, because it would be awesome, and would give him more room for Kurt, Logan and Piotr here.
3) Buffy - I am a nerd for all things Slayer, but this book has been up & down for me. This issue and it’s spot on characterization & dialogue was on the up side, but I’m still leery of more Buffy angst and season 3-ish dissention in the ranks of the Scoobs.
4) Amazing Spider-man - stopped reading JMS’ run with Sins Past, won’t ever read OMD, miss MJ Watson-Parker…but, but…this is fun!
08 Feb 2008 at 3:27 pm
QuoteSince I was outta town so long I’m having trouble remembering what was this weeks and what wasn’t.
But I will say I really enjoyed the latest “The Twelve” JMS mostly has left me cold in recent years, but I’m really enjoying this book.
08 Feb 2008 at 8:13 pm
QuoteI actually thought that this week was a strong week for comics, much better than the few previous weeks.
1. Uncanny X-Men
2. Buffy the Vampire Slayer
3. Batman: The Man Who Laughs HC
4. Nightwing
5. Abe Sapien: The Drowning
6. Transformers: Devastation
7. Annihilation Conquest
8. Halloween Nightdance
08 Feb 2008 at 8:52 pm
QuoteThe Twelve was actually my #6 pick and came very close to making my list this week.
08 Feb 2008 at 9:41 pm
QuoteFor me, this was a great week of comics.
1. Fables - Fantastic ending to what is probably my favorite Fables story to date. I always expect Willingham to pull out the downer, tragic ending, so there’s a lot of suspense even when the issue is mostly about things going well for our heroes
2. Amulet Vol 1 Stonekeeper - Beautiful art and an engaging, all-ages story about a magical amulet, alternate dimension, long lost relative, kidnapped parents, etc. From Scholastic, the publishers of Bone, and Kazu Kibuishi, cartoonist of Daisy Kutter and one of the brains behind Flight, and you can definitely see the melding of all that is good about those projects.
3. Abe Sapien: The Drowning - Spectacularly good art by Jason Alexander, the best stuff I’ve ever seen from him (and I’m a fan in general) and an interesting story of Abe’s first solo adventure courtesy of Mignola. Best Hellboy spinoff since BPRD, at least so far.
4. Annihilation: Conquest - See my capsule review for more.
5. Buffy The Vampire Slayer - Ditto
6. Teen Titans Year One - Short Pants review
7. Bakers Babies & Kittens HC - Short Pants review
8. True Story Swear To God - OK, I technically haven’t had a chance to read this yet. But I know it’ll rank at least this high, probably higher.
9. Northlanders - Best issue so far, our hero is still an amoral bastard but he does get to be quite the badass in this issue too.
10. Nightwing - See Short Pants, but basically this is great setup for the run
11. Uncanny X-Men - Nice take on Cyclops and Emma, great use of the Savage Land, fun issue that felt like old school X-Men in all the right ways
12. Warhammer Forge Of War - Great ending, see Short Pants for more
09 Feb 2008 at 3:22 am
Quote1) Blue Beetle Trade #1: First of all, thanks to Nick and others who recommended Blue Beetle. As suggested, I just picked up the first trade and found it to be exactly what I was needing! After getting over the “it ain’t Ted Kord” bit (having Giffen at the helm helped) I found this to be the kind of fun loving, kid-gets-superpowers-comic that DC and Marvel were getting away from with all their death and killing and angst. It had a passing familiar tone to the also awesome Invincible and I don’t think that was an accident. Great supporting cast in a part of the country we usually don’t get stories, great superpowered action, fun quips and solid art. It was all there. Thanks. I found a new book to follow!
The others were pretty fun this week.
2) Fables- I agree with Randy. A great ending to a wonderful arc. I always loved Fly and this story just blew me away. Willingham continues to surprise with finding new ways to make Fables interesting.
3) Halloween- I dug it. Good use of character, mood and tension to tell a good yarn. Will be interesting to see where this goes.
4) Annihilation: Conquest- I am not feeling the love for this as much as the original run but it is still good. It might come from the fact that Ultron just doesn’t seem like a galaxy-wide baddie. He was better as a nearly throw-away villain in Runaways. Still, the heroes make the book and the small parts held it together.
5) Buffy- Whedon comes back with a winner of a book. His first issue after BKV’s awesome run wasn’t that strong but this one does it nicely. Good stuff.
09 Feb 2008 at 11:43 am
QuoteUnfortunately, after reading this week’s JSA wherein Wildcat Jr. smokes a cigarette, I became addicted to smoking. Since I spend all my extra money on cigarettes now, I don’t have anything left to buy comics with. Why can’t DC be as responsible as Marvel?
10 Feb 2008 at 1:05 am
QuoteNo one has Scalped on their top 5.
Seriously the second trade dropped this week so hopefully it will be on someones list next week. Also if your reading it in issues a issue hit this week as well.
10 Feb 2008 at 11:13 am
QuoteMine this week:
1. Annihilation: Conquest
2. The Twelve
3. Doktor Sleepless
4. Ubu Bubu
5. Amazing Spider-Man
I have to say, I was a bit underwhelmed by Uncanny - it felt like a filler issue to me.
11 Feb 2008 at 6:49 am
Quote1. Abe Sapien: The Drowning
2. Fables
3. Uncanny X-Men
4. Nightwing
5. Transformers: Devastation
6. Northlanders
7. Justice Society of America
8. Buffy the Vampire Slayer
9. Detective Comics
12 Feb 2008 at 3:01 pm
Quote