Quote from: chrisophical on July 25, 2017, 05:50:26 PM

Quote from: DeCarlo Rules on July 23, 2017, 03:27:41 PM
Well, he's the best male character. Hands down. Not even close. I think I'd rate the Boldman/Lindsey version as #1, with a tie for 2nd place between Samm Schwartz and Fernando Ruiz. All three versions are slightly different characters. Dan Parent's version would rate higher probably, if he'd done more Jughead solo stories, but I haven't seen all that many crop up. I don't know what I'm going to do now that JUGHEAD & ARCHIE digest is cancelled. Probably have to start buying more back issues, if I can find them.

What kind of monster tosses a box of Archie Comics on the side of the road?

It's crazy, I know! There were like 20-30 digests in the box, and they decided to just throw them all away!

I'm trying to visualize some sort of situation where they were bungee'd to some roof or trunk rack on a car (or maybe a motorcycle or scooter?), but even that seems pretty unlikely...

Your Pal Archie #1 was good. It contains 3 stories, the first of which (12 pages) is complete in this issue. The second story (8 pages) is Part 1 of a longer story, so it ends on a "To Be Continued!" teaser (not going to give away any spoilers here). The third story is a classic B&V reprint (5 pages), although the story selected is a relatively recent one, also by Dan Parent, so it doesn't look so obvious that it's a reprint (although it does actually say it's a classic reprint, so they're not trying to fool anyone here). It seemed vaguely familar to me, without checking, so I'm going to say it probably appeared in one of the two B&V digest titles within the past couple of years. It felt like a good selection to add some extra pages.

The cosmetic makeover of the characters was a little off-putting to me when first previewed, but in actual practice it doesn't make the stories that different. It felt like Ty and Dan were working from a presumption of readers having no real prior familiarity with the classic stories, so it's a bit of a clean break and a fresh start from that aspect. Notably absent from either of the new stories were any of those secondary supporting characters (virtually all of whom were created in the past decade) that Dan frequently likes working into his digest stories, since most new readers would not be familiar with them. All things considered, I find this to be a more-than-acceptable replacement floppy title for the 1st series ARCHIE, which ceased publication with issue #666 just about 2 years ago now, in a way that the New Riverdale ARCHIE will never be a replacement for me personally. I can accept it as an "alternate Archieverse" title for a different audience than me, but that's all. To me it will never be the "main" Archie.

I've mentioned this before, but all I really want is more new pages of classic Archie stories. I don't care what format they're in. It doesn't have to be the floppy comic format. I can accept the cosmetic facelift because that's what they think they need to do in order to sell this comic in the direct market. I'd probably have been happier to see them making a real effort to attract new readers to the digest titles by adding more pages of new stories (10-20 pages in every title), because that's where the real market for Archie seems to exist to me, outside the comic shops. If it were up to me I'd be making real efforts to reconnect the Archie characters with their main demographic, school-age kids, by pursuing formats that would get NEW stories into schools and libraries, where there already exists a "captive audience" of readers, and revitalizing the digests to make them more attractive to more readers. I do question what they think has changed in 2 years of absence of classic Archie stories in the floppy format that is suddenly going to result in a new influx of readers from the direct market (because outside of digital, that's really the only sales outlet here, comic book stores). If I had to hazard a guess I'd say they think the mere existence of Riverdale as a television show has raised awareness of the characters across the board to the point where a new classic floppy might be viable -- but I don't know... maybe I'm wrong, but it seems the mainstream comic shop consumers have always marginalized ACP's comic books and their characters, and never really embraced them like Marvel and DC's (or even Image or Dark Horse's) characters. Maybe relaunching with a new #1 will help, maybe not. I'd rather be wrong on this one.

Quote from: Tuxedo Mark on July 24, 2017, 09:14:44 AM
Seriously, though, how many actual Toni Topaz stories have there been?

Why, is there some kind of magic number of published stories before you're allowed to screw up a character with a distorted TV adaptation?

The way I see it, there's a pretty limited selection of pre-existing characters to pick from to cast as "the bisexual one" while still containing the backlash to a minimum. Might have even been some meeting between the TV people and ACP where they said "Oh all right, I guess you can have... Toni Topaz."

The point here is that the TV writers wanted to add a bisexual character to the show, and that's what ACP hopes people find buzzworthy -- the juxtapositioning of "bisexual character" with "Archie Comics" are the key words here. After that, "Vanessa Morgan", if her name can draw any of her fans to the show.

"Toni Topaz" is practically an afterthought. The thinking there was probably something like "let's pick a character who hasn't appeared in so many stories that has a fan-following that we might alienate, and that nobody can prove isn't bisexual", because if the character they pick to make bisexual is Moose Mason or Melody Valentine, then it's probably going to irk some people.

Quote from: PTF on July 24, 2017, 02:15:17 AM
"Toni Topaz is a character who was added on a little more recently in the comic books and she's always been very, very vivacious, exciting and a bit of a disrupter."

Yeah in all of two stories and the gazillion covers she was on that didn't include her in a single panel.

At least tell me they have casted a Midge.

If they really wanted to make things interesting they would have cast Midge as the bisexual one.

Well, he's the best male character. Hands down. Not even close. I think I'd rate the Boldman/Lindsey version as #1, with a tie for 2nd place between Samm Schwartz and Fernando Ruiz. All three versions are slightly different characters. Dan Parent's version would rate higher probably, if he'd done more Jughead solo stories, but I haven't seen all that many crop up. I don't know what I'm going to do now that JUGHEAD & ARCHIE digest is cancelled. Probably have to start buying more back issues, if I can find them.

What kind of monster tosses a box of Archie Comics on the side of the road?

I like the idea of 2 stories in each issue, and the idea that one is complete, but the other is continued in the next issue. That allows for variety of stories (if you don't like one of them that much, you may like the other one better), plus stories of different lengths. And if it's done right, the "continued" story can be written in such a way that it's sort-of complete in itself, while still leading into a second part - basically complications or consequences arising from the events of the first part. That gives it a connection and encourages people to pick up the following issue to see what's going to happen next.

Wasn't Vanessa Morgan one of those Disney Channel kids?

Quote from: Vegan Jughead on July 23, 2017, 11:26:37 AM
Got issue one in the mail yesterday as part of my subscription.


Pretty fun!  Great art and I like that there's several shorter stories instead of one long one.  B&V are beautiful drawn by Dan of course!!!

I thought I read an interview with Dan that said each issue would have two stories -- one complete, and another which continues into the next issue.

Quote from: Vegan Jughead on July 23, 2017, 11:25:12 AM

Quote from: irishmoxie on July 23, 2017, 11:21:36 AM
Never read Sonic. But hopefully they will put this money towards the relaunch of Betty and Veronica which was the best selling Archie title last month. http://www.comichron.com/monthlycomicssales/2017/2017-06.html

Dan Parent hinted recently at another (almost) classic title in the vein of Your Pal Archie.  Maybe B&V will get the same treatment!

"(almost) classic" in the sense of what ACP is calling "All New Classic"? As in the same cosmetic makeover in character designs used in Your Pal Archie? Or would this be some other experiment stylistically in-between "classic" and "New Riverdale"?

07/21-07/23:

CRIMINAL: THE DELUXE EDITION HC VOL 01 (collects the stories Coward, Lawless, and The Dead and the Dying)
CRIMINAL: THE DELUXE EDITION HC VOL 02 (collects the stories Bad Night, The Sinners and The Last of the Innocent)
SAVAGE SWORD OF CRIMINAL (magazine-format one-shot, 2015)
DEADLY HANDS OF CRIMINAL (magazine-format one-shot, 2016)

THE FADE OUT: THE DELUXE EDITION HC (collects issues #1-12)

CRIMINAL is a "Mature Audiences" crime noir series by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips. Except for the 2 magazine-size one-shots, I had not previously read any of the stories in floppy comic format. The 2 magazine one-shots are homages/metacomics stories that juxtapose a hard-boiled crime story taking place in the 1970s with pages out of a black & white magazine comic imitative of the style of comics published by Marvel (Savage Sword of Conan, Deadly Hands of Kung-Fu) in that same time period, by showing someone in the story reading the comic, then cutting to multi-page homages to comics done in that style. The two Deluxe Edition hardcovers also contain metacomics (a comic within the comic story that somehow relates to events in the framing story). Bad Night has as its main character a comic strip artist who draws a strip called "Frank Kafka", which is drawn in the style of Dick Tracy, but events in the strip continuity reflect the writing style of Franz Kafka.

The story that took me totally by surprise was The Last of the Innocent. It's a 4-issue story arc (originally published in 2011) that seems to take its inspiration from the "Archie Marries..." stories in LIFE WITH ARCHIE magazine that had debuted the year before. It is indeed a grim and gritty, dark and twisted tale of one "Riley Richards", who returns from the big city to his small-town home of "Brookvale" because of his father's impending death of stomach cancer. Flashbacks in the story are one-page sequences drawn in the simplified cartoony style of a teen humor comic book, which take place years earlier when Riley was in high school. This really requires a much more lengthy review which I promise to get to soon on my review page.

So what do these characters have in common?

Charles (Professor X) Xavier
Dr. Niles (The Chief) Caulder
Barbara (Oracle) Gordon
Anita (once dated Jughead) Chavita
Harper Lodge
Betty Cooper

What about MEGA MAN? Will another comics company get that license from Capcom, or will Archie Action resurrect that title after a long hiatus, now that Sonic the Hedgehog comics are no longer an option for them? Or will we at least see that MEGA MAN MASTER EDITION reprint trade collection solicited last year (and then cancelled)?

On the plus side, now that the two companies are working together, the way is finally clear for that Scooby-Doo Meets Archie crossover.

Quote from: irishmoxie on June 15, 2017, 08:11:51 PM

Quote from: DeCarlo Rules on June 15, 2017, 06:49:27 AMI'd like to see IDW just do a straight adaptation of the original cartoon – not updated (taking place in the '80s), not 'realistic', just a fun adventure with some comedy to it. Nothing to do with the problems of being in a band, just the fantasy of it, the glitz, the glamor, and the adventure, and crazy oddball happenings.

I'd like to see this too. I enjoyed the Jem comic series more for the gorgeous art. They're relaunching the comic series as a mini-series and making it more superhero-y without Gisele of course.

I'll admit to complete ignorance of how the "hologramic" (or superhero) aspects of JEM integrate with the band concept. I never did see the orignal cartoon. Only Jerrica/JEM has a dual/secret identity, and the rest of the band members seem to get along fine without any "holo"powered alter-egos. I got as much as Jerrica is sort of "non-glamorous" (still a cute girl, though) in her real identity, and JEM has sort of a fantasy image rockstar look, but couldn't she just wear makeup, a wig, and a costume? (Hey, it worked for KISS!) Or does she have some sort of crippling stage-fright phobia about performing in front of people that she can only overcome by "hiding" behind the JEM facade I.D.? It was never really clear to me. The only other possibility that occurred to me (which doesn't really seem to make sense for a lead character) is that transforming into her holographic JEM identity gives her some kind of singing or musical abilities that she doesn't have "in real life". I never saw any evidence of her sneaking off to "battle crime" or otherwise fight the evil forces of rotten music or anything.

INCOGNITO: THE CLASSIFIED EDITION HC