I made a great achievement last night. I read the final issue in the Silver Age Flash Omnibus, which means I have now read an entire comic era of a character. It was wonderful. The entire era of Flash was nothing but pure joy. It might not have been as story driven as the Marvel comics I have read from that era, but it was still a blast to read through. Sure, not every issue was great, as there were a couple of stinkers sprinkled throughout, especially this one chunk of issues after John Broome took a break (or something) and the artwork got weird. The inks didn't look anything like Giella's inks and Flash's proportions got chunkier while his lightning logo went across his chest horizontally instead of vertically, so that was annoying.

I love the two parter issue when he fought the Samuroids though because it was so bad with how they had the Japanese characters speak. The story itself was interesting, but damn. Some of my other favorites include the first appearance of Captain Boomerang, the one where Captain Cold and Heatwave first teamed up and they caused their own defeat, the formation of the Rogues, this one horror tale where Flash helps a possessed woman, a lot of the Mirror Master stories were great, and of course, the first team up with Jay.

On the other hand, there were stories like these 3 bumbling idiots who accidentally turn their car into a bouncing ball and this one story where Barry thinks he failed to save Central City from being nuked only to have to help out this lady whose scientist is . Those ones did nothing for me. Another oddity is that a lot of the stories in the last quarter of the book have none of Flash's rogues involved. There's a Captain Cold story and an Abra Kadabra one, but other than that, the last like 20 issues are set against regular criminals or aliens. The formation of the Rogues story is the last one to feature the Top, Captain Boomerang, and Mirror Master. I'm not sure if it was due to them just having run out of ideas (hell, Captain Cold suddenly becomes obsessed with getting a girlfriend halfway through this era), but it took me by surprise.

Regardless, I highly enjoyed spending the last 2 and a half months reading this era of Flash and I hope DC doesn't take too much longer to bring out the first volume to the Bronze Age so I can continue my read through of Barry's run before Crisis.

Earlier tonight I was reading issues 7-10 of Swamp Thing from the still new Bronze Age Volume 1 trade paperback.

The issue with Batman was kind of cool but short

That's an interesting issue.

Well, I just finished reading the last few issues to Amazing Spider-Man Volume 4 and I highly enjoyed it. Sure, Conway's stories weren't the masterpieces that Lee's were, but I didn't think they were as bad as some people made them out to be. At least, for the most part as there are quite a bit of flaws.

The Doc Ock/Aunt May wedding stuff was atrocious and the whole thing about Aunt May inhereting some Shadow Moses made even less sense than the wedding itself. I guess this is what this Canadian secret agent guy was trying to get in touch with Peter over when he ran into Hulk, but even that was not exactly well written. That entire plot seemed halfassed and forced. Easily the first true bomb off the entire comic run. It goes right up there with One More Day.

I still do not agree with the killing of Gwen though. There was so much more they could have done with Peter and her together, but instead of actually committing to a relationship, they copped out and killed her.

Then there's Harry becoming Goblin. I don't know what to think of it. It feels weird that Harry somehow knew his dad was GG and then managed to swipe his clothes and became GG. There's no explanation for it at all. Also, he somehow manages to kidnap Flash, MJ, and May from a hospital, ties them up, straps a bomb to May, tells Peter he has 6 minutes to rescue one of them, and Peter has time to knock out Harry, go home to get his spare webshooters, and then go to May all in six minutes? o_O I guess they're working by DBZ time.

I am really intrigued by The Jackal. I really know nothing about him other than he is supposedly Peter's college professor (an interesting idea given the Vulture copycat story). I am very curious to see where this goes and it feels like they were trying to add in a new mystery element harkening back to the Green Goblin adventures in the early years. A shame Volume 5 is not going to be out probably for another few years.

Speaking of the Vulture copy cat story, that happens twice in this book. First we have one with another guy pretending to be Vulture, and then one of a guy pretending to be Mysterio. Though, I highly enjoyed the Mysterio story. I had no idea someone other than Quentin Beck donned Mysterio in the comics, so this means they could do that in the MCU. The best thing about this story though was trashing the Spider Buggy.

I also have to say that while I miss Romita's artwork, Ross Andru is doing a fine job of bringing his own style to the comics. In fact, I love the details he is putting into his backgrounds. The house from a story with this dude called the Mindworm was quite impressive. Then there are some top notch backgrounds like a huge advertisement for alcohol above a building as it looked very realistic. He most certainly makes for a better Spider-Man artist than he did for Flash. My only complaint is he keeps forgetting to draw Spidey's webwings.

It was great seeing Morbius return and getting to read the first appearance of Punisher was interesting. It's kind of strange to know such a flagship character got his start in Spider-Man, but then again, a lot of general characters have such as Kingpin.

Man, it's kind of weird because now that I'm actually typing up my thoughts on these issues, I'm starting to realize there were a lot of flaws with these stories even though I didn't feel that way when I read through them. Well either way, I was entertained and I really do hope it doesn't take two years for Volume 5 to come out as I speculated above.

Lastly, one of my favorite scenes of the entire book was Jameson throwing his shoe at Spider-Man and it flies out the window and then he realizes what he did was stupid. :lol

This weekend it will be time to send in the clones.

a few things Im reading here and there for old back issues,current new stuff and trade paperbacks

-few old back issues of original Alpha Flight
-the first couple issues of old NOW Comics Ghostbusters
-old Amazing Spider-Man at issue 40 or 42
-old Incredible Hulk at issue 110
-reading some old John Byrne Superman comics before Death of Superman
-original Power Pack. reading issues 29 to 35 probably next week anyway

trade paperbacks of Rebirth Batman, Flash and Green Lanterns Volume 1 for each series

Stuff Im reading

Star Wars Choices of One paperback
old back issues of old Alpha Flight and Power Pack.
Re-reading Ultimate Spider-Man volume 1 trade paperback. been a long long time since I read it

I went back and read the "Ballad of Beta Ray Bill" TPB just recently, and really enjoyed it. I've never been a Thor reader before. This was my first, but I've always liked Beta Ray Bill. Cool idea, and executed, for the most part, really well.

Next I've got the TPB of Kraven's Last Hunt. Looking forward to that one.

Well it took me like 6 months, but I FINALLY finished Clone Saga Volume 2 and what a glorified mess it was. Plots that made no sense. Major inconsistencies. Villains that just disppear. The New Warriors issues were an utter borefest to read through. I've come to realize that the team is no where near as cool as I thought when I was a kid. I'm glad to have this arc done even though I now need to read the Ben Reily run as Spider-Man. I did like that Peter and MJ have left the stage to have a family, so in some ways, I wish it had ended right there. Let those two live happily in retirement. Of course, we all know that did not happen and I'm not sure why. I guess I'll find out soon enough.

I will say that The Lost Years three parter at the end of the book that dealt with Kaine and Ben in Salt Lake City was pretty interesting. I'm really curious about how Janine died now, which I'm sure is never brought up.

I think it's time to start reading the third Lee/Kirby Fantastic Four volume though.

Not reading anything at the moment but in February i a getting back into a good mood of reading the comics i have. Especially reading the old Dark Horse Omnibus trade of old Marvel Star Wars Volume 4.

that and reading old Incredible Hulk stuff along with old Alpha Flight and old Power Pack

Red X-Men red and blue graphic novels, forgot what the title was for both. But one was basically the return of Prof X which was interesting how they stuck him in Fantomex body. The other one was the return of Jean Grey. Checked them out at the library. Not a bad read though.

Currently reading Judge dredd and predator comics.

flipping through the pages of Warlord issue 79 that i bought recently from a garage sale this past Saturday

@Captain Nash - I laughed harder than I should've at Scarlet Witch and Brian Michael Bendis. I'll match that with Married Spider-Man and Joe Quesada.

How about sixties Stan Lee with Steve Ditko (complete with drawing of Green Goblin) or Jack Kirby?

You put anyone against Bendis and it would be accurate. So glad he's gone. Possibly the worst thing to happen to comics since Wertham and the CCA

I'm glad that got the laugh it was intended to get, and I hope it gets more. And yeah anyone in his hands except his pet characters got screwed over but (IMO) no one so much as her.

Anyways aside from the one humorous one, I really would like to see all of what I listed. I tried thinking of a significant if not arch Captain America and Thor foe and just couldn't come up with one quickly.

Well... the CCA did indirectly help revive the super-hero genre in the fifties and sixties, so I’ll give them a mulligan.

Godzilla vs bendis.....with the same result as godzilla vs bambi. ( yes that last one IS a real thing. A parody but real. )

While it did help usher in the Silver age "Seduction of the Innocent"(Who doesn't read textbooks for fun and entertainment) took some shots at the Super Hero genre too

Welp, time to leaf through my copy again. To be fair to these button-down asshats, early fifties crime and horror comics were pretty shocking. I bought a whole bunch of old E.C. reprints, expecting gruesome monster fun like “Creepshow.” Instead I got murder and infidelity.

It was long before my time, but I've heard stories about the old horror and crime comics, the censorship sucks. As for "Seduction of the Innocent" Wertham specifically went after Wonder Woman and Batman & Robin

Sweet Jesus, I hate the direction they’ve taken the X-Men.

Wanda was always a favorite of mine...I stopped reading with "No more Mutants!"
It ruined her character to me and broke this fanboys heart. I understand why they did it but I hate it!! Now she's the boogieman to all mutants. Sad

Yeah, there are individual books I'm enjoying but the overall storyline feels completely opposite of what the X-Men were supposed to represent

What's worse is that by making Wiccan and Speed her twins, and retconning away her original origin they completely invalidated every single reason for House M and what followed.

You aren't missing much. The overall story is what happens when a fanboy with an eff'd up head canon gets to make his fanfic a reality