There are honestly not a lot of good reasons why I live where I do--I'd tell you why, but I don't like remembering what a lout I was--except comics. Seriously. When I was a kid, probably from about seven years old until I graduated from high school; there was always at least three places in my tiny Montana hometown that had comic books. The last time I was there was at least fifteen years ago, and the only comic I saw was a clearance copy of WATCHMEN. (Which I bought!)
Where I live now, my main comic book shop, where my pull list lives, has three locations; two of which often have cheap books. (The third is a bit more of a casual, gamer store) There's two other comic shops, a used bookstore that sells a bunch; and then two more places the next town over! Throw the local comicon on top of that, and more recently, a used toy store with two locations? That kind of explains why I remain. (Well, that and inertia...those boxes are heavy!)
I think of this, not just because said comicon is tomorrow; or because I just bought a stack of books when I was trying to get a ticket for it; but because my dad turns 80 this month. And he's doing OK for an 80-year-old guy; although he's not driving anymore: he recently told his doctor that was kind of hard on my mom, since it cut into her drinking time...I don't think Mom's had a glass of wine in years, and I unfortunately see where my sense of humor comes from...Anyway, I was thinking, what if I had to go back to Montana and take care of my folks? (Odds are I won't have to; my sister lives much closer!) I might not have a comic shop within a hundred miles or more; so stocking up on cheap books now while I can makes more sense! Get those issues of Damage while you can! Doesn't matter if I have time to immediately read them.
Anyway, here's a book from a mini-series that I bet you a quarter I don't find the rest of at that show: from 1989, Strikeforce: Morituri Electric Undertow #1, "Street Moves" Written by James D. Hudnall, pencils by Mark Bagley, inks by Carlos Garzón.
We checked out the last issue some time back, which had the same creative crew; but like a ton of other comics had the time this was an attempt to pivot to 'prestige format,' and maybe keep going as mini-series on their own schedule instead a month-in/month-out grind. Or maybe to charge $3.95 a pop instead of $1.50...Actually, before I bash that, let's math it out. This one's 52 adless pages for $3.95; while Strikeforce: Morituri #31 was $1.50 for 25 story pages, with ads. I'm basing the page counts on the GCD rather than counting myself, and I think the $1.50 book was a slightly higher-end than regular newsstand, newsprint comics, but it seems like a better deal. For readers, anyway; maybe the creative team got a bigger payout with the prestige format stuff. Also, I'm glad I looked this up, since this was a five issue mini and I wouldn't have guessed that. (A brief pause, as I just ordered a collection, with the tailend of the regular series and all of Electric Undertow!)
You may be wondering if I ordered it just to save myself some hassle, or I saw it cheap and snatched it, or some vague completionist urge, or was it actually good? Three out of four of those; but mainly, it is pretty good! Set ten years after the end of the regular series, after the alien Horde had been defeated, earth has settled back into being largely corporate-run states, with the citizens affluent and kind of dumb; addicted to VR and computer learning and/or consumerism. There also seems to be a lot of people spontaneously combusting, although no one knows why. Dan Baker is a private investigator, and one of the few surviving Morituri recipients (the one-year lifespan having been cured in the series) and has a fairly good life: he married one of his teammates, and they have two kids. Except he was currently living in his office, since he was afraid he was losing his mind; as he kept seeing one of his dead teammates, Will Deguchi. (I'm not positive, but I think Will was designed after early series artist Whilce Portacio!)
This was maybe less than a year out from New Warriors #1, so Bagley hadn't quite broken big yet; but this is nice work. Now, if I could just find that note I scribbled somewhere; I think I'm missing one, maybe two issues in the whole series; let's see if I can avoid buying the whole run twice!
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