I have to wonder if these all came from the same collection, or same collector.

If so, I hope they're doing alright. From 2010, AAFES 10th Edition [New Avengers: X Exchange] #10. The GCD notes, no credits, but at least three art teams.

This actually makes the fourth of these oddly-sized AAFES military exchange comics that I've gotten from my local comic shops dollar bins: previously we've seen Iron Man, Thor, and Captain America issues. But, as you might expect, all three appear this time around, although not until near the end. Captain America saves a kid from being held hostage by Whiplash, while Thor fights the Abomination in Indonesia. When Thor picks up the Abomination and starts flying up with him, Abommy thinks Thor's trying to freeze him out, but that won't work. Nah, he just wanted to get him in the air to lightning the crap out of him.

Iron Man battles a recently-awakened, confused and cranky Fin Fang Foom; who may have been the victim of somebody trying to weaponize the dragon. Were these three events related...? Yes, but who cares, the Avengers were on their way to the opening of a new exchange, to honor the troops. 

 This particular copy wasn't in as good of shape as the others I've picked up, but it wasn't as good of an issue either; it kind of just trails off. Maybe bit off more than they had the page count for! But, at a glance, it looks like AAFES did maybe 17 little Marvel books, between 2005 and 2013.

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Here's another one I had been looking for, and again, the quarter bins provide! (Almost literally this time, it was a fifty-cent buy!) From 1996, Guy Gardner: Warrior #41, "Guys & Babes in Toyland" Written by Beau Smith, pencils by Marc Campos and Mike Parobeck, inks by Dan Davis.

I'd mentioned this before, as featuring animation-style art by the great Mike Parobeck: he had done something similar for Superboy #4, and we do see a thought balloon in the animated version as G'nort wishes he had got that job with Superboy! Here, two versions of the same story run simultaneously: the 'real' events of Guy's visit to Toy Fair '96; and a cleaner, TV-friendly cartoon version. Guy's there to promote his uncle Buck Fargo's planned toy line and tie-in cartoon for him. This version of Guy was way more chill than his JLI days, as well as more respectful to women: one of his sidekicks was jungle-girl Veronna, who was willing to do anything for Guy, but the idea of taking advantage of her seems too much for even him. Toy sales rep Olivia does think Veronna's action figure was going to sell well, though!

This being a comic book, of course some bad guys show up; and hey, why not get a team-up in there? A really, really awkward one, with guest-star Fire! With Ice currently dead, they had both been in mourning, but may have been drifting closer together in spite of themselves. In the animated version, the bad guy is "the Debt" and gets shut down by Olivia; but in real life it was goons from Quorum, who don't appear to have accomplished anything...except their true purpose, getting cell samples from Guy!

Later, Guy manages to catch his show, and is dismayed to see how G-rated/"Captain Marvel" he was portrayed; but too late to change it now. And Fire plans, to maybe see Guy again. 

 I'm actually a little sad I wasn't reading this one when it was released: it's good-natured fun, with Guy far more sympathetic than he'd ever been. I would've still remembered him as a grade-A jerk, though; and he's probably back there now. Also, is it going back to the well to have Parobeck do another animated-show riff? Maybe, but there was still water there! I feel like Wonder Woman deserved an issue of that: Diana, frustrated with executives, "...what, exactly, is a 'Star Rider'?" Parobeck was of course the best, but Campos does a great job here too. Dig it up!

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