Berlin by Jason Lutes - This hardcover is over 500 pages and collects the entire 22 issue run which has taken since 1996 to complete.  I've been reading the series since it began, but purchased the hardcover as well.   It takes place in Berlin from 1928-1933 and utilizes a lot of characters who are not necessarily important historically - Marthe Muller, an art student who comes to the city at least in part to get away from her father - Kurt Severing, a journalist who writes for a paper read by poets and intellectuals - Silvia Braun, a young girl whose father is a National Socialist and whose mother is a Communist - The Cocoa Kids, an African-American jazz quintet in town playing at a jazz club - and others as well.  The unrest in the city is shown and the gradual buildup of power for the National Socialists (Nazis) plus the battles with the Reds (Communists) and the anti-Semitism as well.  This is a well researched and entertaining story that is well worth checking out.

Edited to add - One thing that I should note is that the font size used in the word balloons is kind of small which may make it difficult for some people to read.  It is still worth it, though.

Quote from: DeCarlo Rules on October 06, 2018, 01:16:31 AM

Quote from: rusty on October 05, 2018, 08:01:55 PM
I finished up My Hero Academia 13-15 and My Hero Academia Vigilantes 1-2 earlier this week.  It is a fun series where just about everybody has a superpower (called a quirk), though only some are licensed to use them.

How would you rate those on a scale of 1 to 10? I remember reading one of those FCBD preview books of MHA, back when it had just come out from Viz. My thoughts at the time were that it seemed like a definite reaction to the breakout popularity of One-Punch Man (which began as a webmanga in 2009, and was then remade as a print manga in 2012, a couple of years prior to MHA's debut).
Black Butler sounds interesting too, so I'll probably check out the first volume of that, if it's still easy to order a copy through Diamond.

I've enjoyed My Hero Academia quite a bit.  I had two friends recommend the series to me within the last couple of months.  I also helped out at a graphic novel booth part time at the Chicago Comic Con in August and the My Hero Academia volumes were very popular.  MHA does have a focus of the training academy plus there is a tournament or two mixed in, but they are done in a pretty interesting way and the tournament doesn't drag on as many tend to do.  There is also a mentoring aspect involved with the main character being mentored by the hero who gave him his powers.  Students at the academy also end up interning at superhero agencies.  All in all, I would give the series 8/10 and I think it is worth checking out.
There are actually two spinoff series.  Vigilantes is the first one and it focuses on several people who hunt down bad guys and do other good deeds while outside the law since they are not licensed heroes.  It crosses over with the main series tangentially, but can be read on its own.  I've enjoyed the first two volumes as much as the main series.  The second spinoff is due in the U.S. next spring.
I haven't read One Punch Man yet, though I do have a copy of the first volume and plan to give it a try.
If you do give Black Butler a try, let me know what you think.

I finished up My Hero Academia 13-15 and My Hero Academia Vigilantes 1-2 earlier this week.  It is a fun series where just about everybody has a superpower (called a quirk), though only some are licensed to use them.
I read Soul Eater Not 1-5 and while it was okay, I decided to pass on reading the regular Soul Eater series after looking through the first volume.
Over the last couple of days, I read Black Butler 1-25.  In Victorian times, a young boy whose parents are slaughtered is kidnapped and tortured.  He escapes by making a deal for his soul with a devil who will help him get revenge.  He also happens to be the heir to an Earldom where the Earl works directly for Queen Victoria.  The devil (Sebastian) becomes the boy's butler and helps him in any number of ways.  I enjoyed this series quite a bit.  I wasn't really sure in reading the description, but the art is decent and the stories have been pretty good for the most part.
I also read Telepathic Wanderers 1-3 today and am waiting on the fourth (and final) book to arrive at my library.  This is an older Tokyopop series, but it has been very good.

During the past week, I've read Xxxholic volumes 1-16.  I am missing #17 so I will finish the series after that volume shows up at the library.
I also read Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle volumes 1-28 which crosses over with Xxxholic.
I am currently working on getting caught up with My Hero Academia and have read volumes 1-12 so far.

I finished The Colony Season 3 and am 70% of the way through Cloak and Dagger.  It has been very good so far, much better than I was expecting.

I finished watching The Crown Season 1 and enjoyed it a lot.  Now I'm working on The Colony Season 3.

Quote from: DeCarlo Rules on July 09, 2018, 07:14:38 AM
I've also been reading a few manga:
   ONE-PUNCH MAN VOL 14: THE DEPTHS OF DESPAIR (tankobon) by ONE & Yusuke Murata
   BATTLE ANGEL ALITA: DELUXE EDITION HC VOL 04 (of 5) by Yukito Kishiro

One Punch Man is a series that I've heard mentioned a lot and will probably try out eventually.  What do you think of it?

I love Battle Angel Alita.  I first collected it in regular comics and continued as they switched to the volume format.  I wasn't going to get the deluxe editions, but when I saw how nice they were, I went ahead and bought them even though I have the earlier editions.  I'm behind on reading Mars Chronicle, but will get to those eventually.

My monthly shipments from DCBS and Mycomicshop should be arriving within the next few days.  Meanwhile I have been catching up on various manga, reading around 50 volumes over the past couple of weeks:

Abandoned Sacred Beasts
Anonymous Noise
Astra Lost in Space
Attack on Titan Lost Girls
Children of Whales
Dimension W
Food Wars
Golden Kamuy
Haikyu
Kuroko's Basketball
Oresama Teacher
Platinum End
Promised Neverland
Skip-Beat
Yowamushi Pedal

and others

I just finished watching the first season of Netflix's Lost In Space reboot.  I thought it was very good.

I'm listening to the Hamilton soundtrack. 


I helped chaperone a 3 day field trip to Chicago last week where we  took 15 of our best students to participate in a workshop with students from other schools and actors from Hamilton and then watch the matinee performance.  It was a lot of fun and a great experience for all involved.

I just finished watching the first season of Black Lightning and thought it was pretty good.  I'm working my way through the third season of The Magicians now.

Mycomicshop.com has several copies in stock.  There are also a few copies on ebay at the moment.


I checked with comics.org and that is not an issue that they have inventoried yet.

Sounds like a printing error.  I checked my copy of #286 and assume that you are talking about the Ski the World story.  In my digest, Page 10 is on the back of Page 9 and then the story ends on Page 11 with a little END box in the last panel.  The back of that page starts The Andrews Family Tree story.

I'll definitely be buying the series.  Then again, I supported Your Pal, Archie as well.

I picked up a number of issues of March of Comics, a promotional series that ran for nearly 500 issues back in the 1940s-1980s.