Gotta say that I liked Shrill's old look better. I wish the original version of her had been in more stories.

Quote from: Gisele on April 13, 2016, 02:28:14 AM
I just recently did a Captain Canuck cover (can't show it yet.) I'm starting to dabble in it! hehe

Cool; I remember the original Captain Canuck by George Freeman (is he still around?), and I got a copy of the first trade paperback collection of the rebooted Captain Canuck (haven't had a chance to get to it yet). Now I see where they're bringing the original Captain back in a separate series (due to numerous requests?)  Which series did you do a cover for?

You know, I'm not entirely sure how this works, but I've been googling images on the web, and finding things from the old site. Sometimes things that I myself posted on the old site. Not only that, but when I click on these images, the text that accompanies them from the old site is still there... SOMEHOW. So I'm reading snatches of things I posted (or remember others having posted). But if I click the button that says "Go to this page", it takes me NOT to the Wayback Machine or some saved mirror image of the old page, but right back to this site (where of course I can't see the image OR the text the google image search just told me it found). Weird.

Oldiesmann?  Anyone? Any ideas about where these ghosts in the machine are coming from?

Quote from: invisifan on April 13, 2016, 01:48:12 PM
0-day so I've read (so far):

   
• Spidey #4
• Spider-Gwen #7
• The Unbelievable Gwenpool #1

Saving Princeless book 5 #1 for last ...

"0-day"?

Wow, I read a few pages into SPIDEY #4 and then just gave up. What a difference the art of Nick Bradshaw made on the first 3 issues of that book (which are slated to be reprinted in a one-shot deluxe Marvel Treasury Edition). Unless Bradshaw's just skipping an issue or two before coming back, I guess I'm done with it.

Here's what I read today:
REGGIE'S WISE GUY JOKES #13 (June 1970)
HENCHGIRL #6 (Things take an interesting turn in this issue.)
AW YEAH COMICS ACTION CAT AND ADVENTURE BUG #2
WALT DISNEY'S COMICS AND STORIES #730
THANOS: THE INFINITY FINALE (OGN) - (This being the third OGN by Jim Starlin in a trilogy. It occurs to me I may have missed the second one, so I'll have to look into reordering that.)
SILVER SURFER #3 (I just love what Dan Slott and Mike Allred have been doing with this character. Great stuff.)
HERCULES #6 (A title I was only slowly warming up to, this issue totally sold me on the revised concept. Absolutely zero action in this issue, but the characterization and dialogue held me riveted for the entire issue. A teaser on the last page leads me to believe this is the final under this title, to be replace by a new #1 called THE GODS OF WAR.)
MOON KNIGHT #1 (I haven't been a huge fan of Jeff Lemire's writing, so I almost skipped this, but I'm glad I read it now. I'll read at least a couple more issues now, as he kind of hooked me with the general concept here.)
BATMAN/TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES #5 (of 6)
JUPITER'S CIRCLE - Book 2 #5 (of 6)
ROUGH RIDERS #1

I have more to get to from this week's haul, but that's probably it for today. Other stuff I got today:
THE PHANTOM COMPLETE SUNDAYS VOL 3 HC
DONALD DUCK: GHOST OF THE GROTTO TP
DONALD DUCK: THE GOLDEN HELMET TP
BLACK BAT DOUBLE NOVEL #3
THE SHADOW DOUBLE NOVEL #105
MONSTER BASH #26
CAPTAIN AMERICA 70TH ANNIVERSARY MAGAZINE (Free)
DC REBIRTH PREVIEWS MAGAZINE (Free again)
WONDER WOMAN '77 SPECIAL #3
DOC SAVAGE: THE SPIDER'S WEB #5 (of 5)
BRUCE LEE: THE DRAGON RISES #1
THE THREE STOOGES: THE BOYS ARE BACK #1

Quote from: 60sBettyandReggie on April 13, 2016, 01:16:41 PM
No, this isn't the first time I noticed this. I know they love to repeat stories over and over but it still makes me mad....I didn't know about HS Hijinks being cancelled. Is it the same one as Pep Rally, or is that another one?

Well, you got me with that one. I hadn't even heard of any Spectacular called "Pep Rally", so I had to google that one for more information. Most of those turned out to be dead ends (like the Walmart.com listings) that didn't provide any information or even show a cover image.

No, I had to go all the way to a bookstore in Malaysia to find a listing for that with a little more info and a cover image, which indeed -- does turn out to be the same cover as "High School Hijinks". Unlike a lot of the other listings, this one actually identified the book correctly as being cancelled.

https://malaysia.kinokuniya.com/bw/9781627388665

Quote from: 60sBettyandReggie on April 13, 2016, 12:53:43 PM

Quote from: 60sBettyandReggie on April 12, 2016, 01:11:36 PM
This morning I finished reading Archie Comics Spectacular Block Party.
I'm gonna start reading Archie 1000 Page Comics Gala.

I hate that they repeat the same stories in different books. I started reading 1000 page comics Gala and there are 8 stories in a row that I had already read on Block Party. 

I can't believe you're just noticing this for the first time. You know that the 1000 Page digests just contain straight chunks of pages (several stories in the exact same order) as the regular digest titles from 3 or 4 months earlier, right?  And the Spectaculars just reprint the stories from recent digest titles on better paper, grouped by some kind of theme (very loosely themed, I should say). At any rate, they cancelled the last Spectacular (High School Hijinks) that they solicited, so it looks like there will be no more of those.

Today I found a copy of ARCHIE'S CAR by Al Hartley, and it was in pretty good condition. This was one of the later printings, from 1986, under the Barbour imprint (they took over after Spire Christian Comics and just reprinted the comics exactly except for the company imprint and cover price -- this one was priced at 69 cents). I think there were 17 different Archie comics done by Hartley under Spire, and I'm keeping an eye out for these. I got a kick out of it, anyway.

Ten years from now people will be watching the Riverdale TV pilot on YouTube and laughing about what a ridiculous distortion of the characters it is.

Quote from: JonInIowaCity on April 12, 2016, 09:49:12 PM

Quote from: DeCarlo Rules on April 12, 2016, 09:28:23 PM

Quote from: BettyReggie on April 12, 2016, 09:11:32 PM
Why is Shrill involved in the comic, I didn't think she even knew Kevin. What Kevin's friends Wendy & William. And what about his relationship with boy he dated in school. Was it Devon?

Kevin and Devon broke up. That's not Shrill.

According to the interview, that is indeed Shrill.

As to why she's there? They've become friends since high school? They go to the same college? I'm sure we'll find out in a couple of months.

Yeah, I suppose. Well, she doesn't look like Shrill, but I guess people change, and don't wear the same kind of clothes they did in high school. Apparently she also stopped wearing contacts and decided to wear regular glasses. She went from being "Riverdale goth" to "artnerd".

Quote from: The Bee on April 12, 2016, 09:34:33 PM
Yeah I knew they did this but I wasn't aware they would throw in a digest from the 90's if they had it available. I thought it was mostly recent stuff in the bundles.

Here's the way those bundles break down. You'll only find digests from the last couple of years in the Super Sample Pack, because that contains 10 random Jumbo Comics and Annual digests, and those have only been around a couple of years. I think there used to be a category that just had the older traditional (96-128) page 'single' digests, which were discontinued in 2010. You still might find a couple of those older ones in the Digest Sample Pack. The Double Digest Pack contains just Double Digests, none of the older 96-128 page ones, or any of the newer Jumbo or Annual ones -- but it could still contain some of the older Double Digests from 1990s.

Quote from: The Bee on April 12, 2016, 09:30:46 PM
So will this be a continuation of what Dan has done in with Kevin in the past or is this going to be like the other two rebooted series starting new?

I think they're giving you a hint with the title. LIFE WITH KEVIN is to KEVIN KELLER as LIFE WITH ARCHIE (magazine) was to ARCHIE (classic). A possible future for the teenage Kevin.

Quote from: The Bee on April 12, 2016, 04:48:44 PM
I also always wondered what they do with the surplus digests. Do they put them in a warehouse and save them for a later date and then put them as part of there bundle of digests in what they attempt t sell on the site or do they shred them after a certain amount of time?

Here's the way ArchieComics.com sells its backstock of older digests now. Snapshot taken off their website today (4-12-16).

Quote from: BettyReggie on April 12, 2016, 09:11:32 PM
Why is Shrill involved in the comic, I didn't think she even knew Kevin. What Kevin's friends Wendy & William. And what about his relationship with boy he dated in school. Was it Devon?

Kevin and Devon broke up. That's not Shrill.

Quote from: The Bee on April 12, 2016, 07:20:17 PM
Regardless if there is no reason why it has to be that way they still have to proportion stuff out equally in digital or in print. I hope I am totally understanding your post fully, but imaging this scenario. If you had a print publication that hit the stores every month and let's say it was Lil Jinx stories every month with no variation don't you think people who don't particularly enjoy reading Lil Jinx stories all the time would get fed up?

You're ignoring what it costs to print and distribute these comics, in the vague hope that they will be on sale in a place that a customer who wants L'il Jinx is likely to show up with money to buy.

The way digital works is completely different. You're buying "factory direct" from the manufacturer. There are no trees to kill, paper and ink to buy, printing press time to contract for, no copies marked as "unsold" for credit. No waste whatsoever. Buying a copy of something digital is as easy as taking a picture with your camera phone and has the same amount of overhead cost involved.

The people who hate L'il Jinx (or Little Archie) can spend their time and money on some other product. If all you want is stories that feature ARCHIE, and nothing but, then there is plenty of that for those people. Why shouldn't they cater to the audiences that just want to read Little Archie, or L'il Jinx, or Josie, or Sabrina, or That Wilkin Boy, or Archie's Madhouse? It doesn't cost them anything to sort the stories out and make them available by any particular character. Add up all those little groups of people and the combined profit begins to look substantial. You know what DOES make the customer fed up? Having to buy something that is composed of 90% of what they don't particularly care about, to get the 10% they really DO care about. Don't get me wrong, it's absolutely true that many people LIKE having the variety, and when you don't know a thing about the company's characters, it's a great way to get exposed to new things. The problem here is that once you get the lay of the land, and decide there's something you really like better than a lot of the other stuff, you're stuck. Right now, you have little chance of being able to get more of what you want, unless it just happens to be Archie, Betty & Veronica, or Jughead. They need to start thinking outside the box for digital comics, because the old rules that constrained marketing to consumers in print don't apply here.

Quote from: The Bee on April 12, 2016, 06:50:26 PM

Quote from: DeCarlo Rules on April 12, 2016, 06:37:53 PM
My basic complaint about Archie Digital is that they are a store that just sells dozens and dozens of varieties of Trail Mix. And they won't give you the list of ingredients in that Trail Mix before you buy it. I can't buy just a bag of cashews, almonds, sunflower seeds or M&Ms, I have to buy the entire bag of whatever they decided to throw in there. Most of the stuff I REALLY want is just a minor ingredient in the bag of Trail Mix, and there's no way I can increase that percentage except to buy in bulk. I gotta agree to take 10 Little Archie stories just to get a few Sabrina, Josie, and That Wilkin Boy stories. There's this attitude on the part of the company that everything they're offering is of equal value, but it isn't.

Other comic book companies let you pick out just the stuff you like, and get just that in a big collection.

You have to remember they are putting this stuff out for a lot of people and those people don't particularly like the same thing you do. They have to represent everyone when putting out in bulk. So there has to be those Little Archie stories because there are also a lot of people who enjoy them a lot as well(I am not one  BTW). So each individual is looking as you say for there own ingredients in the trail mix and it is different for everyone. That is why they have to put stuff out in bulk and I  guess they try and proportion it equally.

What you're quoting is the economics of PRINT publication, not digital. There are reasons why that situation needs to be the way it is when it comes to publishing the digests. There is NO reason it has to be that way when it comes to digital. There's no overhead for paying printers and distributors. That means that niche-marketing to 10 different groups with a small audience can generate the same profit as one item with a larger audience. In other words, small profits add up when there's no overhead to subtract from them. And furthermore, you know what? They don't really KNOW the size of the digital audience for some of the stuff in their library, because they haven't TRIED making it available that way. They only know it doesn't work for a print audience, economically.