Paul's Picks! - Feb. 29th, 2012

Well, it's that time again folks: Wednesday! And you know what Wednesday is?... Well, of course you do, you're reading a blog about comics, so you obviously know it's New Comics Day, a.k.a. Paul's favorite weekly holiday! And in celebration of this weekly, well, celebration, Paul is here to give you his favorite book of the week.

Justice League in Review


For those of you who may have already read the "epic" finale to Geoff Johns and Jim Lee's introductory arc on the best-seller from the DCnU, please don't roll your eyes when you see their title at the header for this week's pick. If I can be totally honest with you, this week's column is much less about my favorite stand-alone issue from Leap Day, 2012 and more so about the feelings that I was left with after reading the greatly anticipated conclusion to this first arc of Justice League. I'm going to try and make this as concise as humanly possible, but take into account that this article has been half-a-year in the making. So without any more build up, let's get down to the nitty-gritty, shall we?

Gotta admit, it's a cool cover.

My Expectations:


When I read the solicitations for the launch of the New 52, there is no hiding that this book was most likely sitting at the top of my most-anticipated list. I mean, get real people: a Geoff Johns/Jim Lee ongoing series? And not just any series, a Justice League book! Let's be honest DC fans, over the last few years, the JLA book had pretty much fallen off the deep end. It was stuck in Lamesville and couldn't get out. DC promised to return to us all the things that we could possible desire from a team-up book: an A-list writer, one of the most favored artists in the business, a line up of the best heroes that DC has to offer, and a villain of epic proportions. In theory, this was the perfect setup! And I couldn't have been more hyped.

Paul's Picks! - Feb. 2, 2012

Well, it's that time again folks: Wednesday! And you know what Wednesday is?... Well, of course you do, you're reading a blog about comics, so you obviously know it's New Comics Day, a.k.a. Paul's favorite weekly holiday! And in celebration of this weekly, well, celebration, Paul is here to give you his favorite book of the week.

Swamp Thing #6 by Scott Snyder and Marco Rudy

Oh, that's not ominous...

Hey guys! I hope you've had a great week so far, thanks for checking us out again here at Ancillary Characters. We're finally hitting the stride we've been striving for with our weekly articles, and our first Ancillary Characters podcast is live on iTunes! If you haven't gotten around to downloading it, I recommend you do so, and do us a huge favor: write a review on there! Anyhow, I just wanted to take a sec and thank all of you guys that keep coming back week after week to hear what we have to say.

Now on the the goods! Week one of the month is always an interesting one, with some of the heavy hitters coming out side by side. For this week, my pick could've gone one of two ways. Grant Morrison's Action Comics won the week last month with that fantastic issue about the destruction of Krypton, and he and Andy Kubert definitely came out swinging again this month with another exceptional issue. However, the winner of my Pick this week has to go to Scott Snyder and his supernatural Swamp Thing series.

Buy This! - January 25th, 2012

Every Monday Seth picks out three items that are due to ship on Wednesday and directs you toward your best bets for a quality purchase. Some times it's a single issue of a comic, other times a massive omnibus edition of a beloved series, and occasionally a figure or shiny bauble that caught his eye. Read on to find the three items you shouldn't leave your comic shop without this week.

Another week full of comic goodness is upon us. Picks this week were difficult but in the end I went with three titles that I can honestly vouch for without any hesitation. Before we get to those I just wanted to point out that the Resurrection Man tpb that I wrote about a few weeks ago is finally coming out this week. Be sure to check that out if you're interested or have been reading and enjoying the New 52 series.

Also, in case you missed it, I wrote an article on shopping for comics online which you can find right here. Hopefully it's a help.