2018.020 Two-Face: A Celebration Of 75 Years

What should have probably been a volume of Batman Arkham turned into a deluxe hardcover collection of Two-Face stories.  And what a collection it is.  Harvey Dent has had a long career battling Batman.  We get a little bit of every variation of Two-Face in this book.  The monster he was in the 40s, the cliche he was in the 60s, the darker psychological mess in modern times.  What I absolutely love about reading through this book is how consistent the character has been overall.  His back story barely changed at all.  However, after the last story in this book is a reinvention of Harvey's entire backstory over in Scott Snyder's new Bat book.  I'm still not sure how I feel about that, but this.... This book I love.

Two-Face: A Celebration Of 75 Years

Written by: Bill Finger, Don Cameron, David Vern Reed, Dennis O'Neil, Bob Haney, Max Allan Collins, Mark Verheiden, Andrew Helfer, Bruce Timm, Greg Rucka, David Hine, Peter J Tomasi

Illustrated by: Bob Kane, Jerry Robinson, George Roussas, Dick Sprang, Charles Paris, Neal Adams, Dick Giordano, Jim Aparo, Irv Novick, Dave Cockram, Mark DeCarlo, Don Heck, Pat Broderick, Chris Sprouse, Steve Mitchell, Bruce Timm, Damion Scott, John Floyd, Michael Lark, Andy Clarke, Guillem March

158 The Silver Age Teen Titans Omnibus

This book is pure, unadulterated joy.  Plain and simple.  The original Teen Titans stories.  Nick Cardy artwork.  Everything good in the world all wrapped up in a beautiful package.

The book collects about 900 pages of Teen Titans comics.  The Brave & The Bold appearances, the Showcase books, the first 24 issues, a Brave & Bold Batman team up and the whole run of the first Hawk & Dove book.

It so much fun revisiting these cheesy as hell stories.  The first half (or more) are just so god awful, they're good.  The book was clearly a victim of it's era, but it was also written to appeal to 8 year olds, who I'm sure looked down on these scripts as being too juvenile.  LOL.  About half way through the book, the stories start taking a more serious vibe, written less for 8 year old and more for a general comics audience.  These are the stories I loved the best.  The Bronze Age Omnibus will have more of this type of story in it, which I'm so looking forward to revisiting.  

Teen Titans has been my favorite series ever since the first issue I bought.  It was #44, the revival issue.  I was living in Bethel, CT at the time and that is my strongest memory of the entire time I lived there.  Discovering this book.  I was probably 8 or 9 at the time (wait, I just googled it.  I was 10.)  It left a lasting impression in my head, 41 years later.

The Silver Age Teen Titans Omnibus

Writer: Bob Haney, Steve Skeates, Neal Adams, Steve Ditko, Mike Friedrich, Gil Kane, Len Wein, Marv Wolfman

Artist: Nick Cardy, Gil Kane, Irv Novick, Neal Adams, Steve Ditko, Bruno Premiani, Bill Molno, Lee Elias, Bill Draut, Sal Trapani, Jack Abel, John Celardo, Wally Wood

DC Comics

121 Wonder Girl: Adventures Of A Teen Titan

Fun.  If I could use one word to describe this book, it would be fun.  It's a collection of a lot of Wonder Girl "firsts."  We get the first appearance of Wonder Girl, who was actually Wonder Woman as a girl.  We get the first appearance of the Teen Titan Wonder Girl in Brave & The Bold.  We get the first origin story of that Wonder Girl as well as the first peek at her new costume.  We get the first real Wonder Girl / Wonder Woman team up from an old issue of Adventure Comics.  We get the first appearance of the Cassie Sandsmark and the first appearance of the Cassie Wonder Girl.  We get the first Donna Troy solo comic from DC's Girlfrenzy fifth week even.  And we get the first solo comic of the Cassie Wonder Girl.  It's really a fun, fun, fun collection of stories.  My one complaint about this entire book is that Cassie is featured so prominently on the cover rather than Donna Troy.  I'd much rather it be Donna or at least give Donna equal billing.

It really was a fun read.  If you like WG, you'll love this collection.

Wonder Girl: Adventures Of A Teen Titan

Writer: Robert Kanigher, Bob Haney, Marv Wolfman, Jack C Harris, J.T. Krul, John Byrne

Artist: John Byrne, Phil Jimenez, Ross Andru, Bruno Premiani, Gil Kane, Jack Abel, Adriana Melo, Mike Esposito, Nick Cardy, John Stokes, Mariah Benes

DC Comics

108 Batman: The Brave And The Bold - The Bronze Age Omnibus Vol. 1

Every day at work, I read comics.  I always have a trade or a hardcover in my desk.  The book I just finished was a labor of love.  It's this glorious book.  Bronze Age Brave & Bold stories.  This book absolutely brings me back to my childhood.  Many of these books were published before I started reading comics, but comics were so cheap back then that I'd picked up a lot of back issues at garage sales and flea markets.  As I got older, they got a little more expensive or were reprinted here and there. I've read all these stories before, but they're just as joyful and silly and fun a second, third, fourth or fifth time around.  Even moreso today.  They're all done in one stories, stripped of the darkness a modern day Batman book has.  The guest stars run a wide gamut from Wonder Woman and Flash to Sgt. Rock and the Demon and many more.

This book clocks in at just under 900 pages, so it took me quite a while to read it at work.  My lunch break is 30 minutes, so I was good to take in an issue or two at a time.  In a way I didn't want it to end.  It was so much fun to read.  They label this as volume 1, so I hope DC plans a follow up volume.  This ends at issue 109.  Brave and the Bold ran through issue 200.

And with this, I'm officially caught up on my mini-blog posts on my backlogged reading!!  

Batman: The Brave And The Bold - The Bronze Age Omnibus Vol. 1

Writer: Bob Haney, Mike Sekowsky, Dennis O'Neil, Marv Wolfman

Artist: Ross Andru, Mike Sekowsky, Bob Brown, Neil Adams, Irv Novick, Nick Cardy, Jim Aparo, Mike Esposito, Jack Abel, Dick Giordano, Joe Kubert, Frank McLaughlin

DC Comics

083 Batman/Wildcat

I love this kind of compilation book.  Unlike a book that collects a specific story arc or run by a particular creator, it's a book that takes a couple of mini-series and pads it out with some spectacular bonus material.

This book collects the Batman/Wildcat mini-series, the Catwoman/Wildcat mini-series and all the Batman/Wildcat stories from The Brave & The Bold.  And it's glorious.

The two mini-series are nothing to write home about, but they're solid and an enjoyable read.  The first mini-series is yet another take on the Fight Club cliche.  The second is another Vegas/Mob story.  Neither are original concepts by any stretch, but like I said before, decent enough reads.

The real treasure here is the inclusion of the Brave & Bold stories.  I'm currently reading the giant Brave & Bold Omnibus at work and have come across some of these stories recently already.  For some reason, DC decided to team Batman and Wildcat up despite the fact that Wildcat was an Earth-2 character.  No mention was ever made of it, so clearly this is an Earth-1 version of the same character.  I don't think he ever appeared anywhere but these select issues, which is too bad.  Not that it matters anymore.  After Crisis, there was only one Earth, so only one Ted Grant.

I'd love to see more books along the lines of this one.  Such fun to read.

Batman/Wildcat

Writer: Chuck Dixon, Beau Smith, Bob Haney

Artist: Sergio Cariello, Art Thibert, Danny Miki, Jaime Mendoza, Tom Palmer, Irv Novick, Mike Esposito, Bob Brown, Nick Cardy, Jim Aparo

DC Comics