ERIC'S "MAXI-SERIES MADNESS!" NEWSLETTER VOL. 8 #5 - May 2006

INTRODUCTION
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Superman Returns. Need I say more? The next big superhero movie to sweep in big box-office bucks. I'm so excited about a new Superman movie that I went and got the Superman Quadrology and started watching the Reevian legacy from the beginning and, man... those... movies... are... CHEESY. I know that I have to give them some cred because they're practically as old as I am, but, seriously, they have goofy acting (Reeves' mild-mannered Kent is nearly emabarrassingly over-done), they have horrible casting (On what planet is Margot Kidder's chain-smoking Lois Lane considered "hot" or even "mildly attractive" even in the 70s!), and the movie's put together poorly (the incredibly Looney-Tunes-like theme music for Lex Luthor and his ilk is just terrible and not very evil-inspiring). You've got to hand it to superhero movies now, no longer will Metropolis be a town where idiotic action sequences take place like the one at the beginning of Superman III where a beautiful woman causes chaotic distress in the city streets... superheroes are a serious business now. My only worry now is whether a scrawny, relative newbie can really do a Superman portrayal justice. I've got my fingers crossed...

IF YOU READ NOTHING ELSE
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With so many maxi-series event-tie-in comics coming out in May, I have become a little jaded. I know what you're saying: "Eric, you? Jaded? Never!" But, it's true. May has brought out my cynicism in the worst way, and what makes matters even harder for me to deal with is that I'm kind of looking forward to Marvel's Civil War tie-in series. I know. I'm pathetic. I'm giving in to the marketing mantra of Marvel madness. Bah. But, it sounds neat. So, my pick-of-the-month is Marvel's Civil War.

MAR062081 Civil War #1 of 7 $3.99 retail

*** 50%-OFF AT WWW.COMICSNOW.COM ***

HUGE DISCOUNTS AT WWW.COMICSNOW.COM
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Aside from always offering 35% off the cover price of monthly comics with no minimum to buy, each month Comics NOW offers incredible deals on some of the newest titles out there. Just point your browser to http://www.comicsnow.com to order any of these titles below at huge discounts or any other comic at least 35% off the cover price.

Here are this month's deals:
MAR060309 52 WEEK #1 50%-OFF $2.50
MAR060303 CRISIS THE SPECTRE #1 50%-OFF $2.99
MAR060334 SECRET SIX #1 50%-OFF $2.99
MAR060335 SHADOWPACT #1 50%-OFF $2.99
MAR060318 GREEN LANTERN CORPS TP 40%-OFF $12.99
MAR060324 JLA NEW MAPS OF HELL TP 40%-OFF $12.99
MAR060302 SUPERGIRL POWER TP 40%-OFF $14.99
MAR062081 CIVIL WAR #1 50%-OFF $3.99
MAR062088 FANTASTIC FOUR DEATH IN FAMILY 50%-OFF $3.99
MAR062066 LAST PLANET STANDING #1 50%-OFF $2.99
MAR062129 X-MEN FAIRY TALES #1 50%-OFF $2.99
MAR062155 HULK VISIONARIES VOL 3 TP 40%-OFF $19.99
MAR062156 SKRULL KILL BREW TP 40%-OFF $16.99
MAR062140 SPIDER-MAN EVIL MEN DO TP 40%-OFF $19.99

THE BIZ
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BLADE ON TV

Blade, everyone's favorite half-vampire, half-human vampire-killing dude dressed in black with nasty weapons, is coming to TV. This we knew. He's coming to Spike TV. Well, this we knew, too. He's coming soon. Natch. Are we excited? Dude, it's Spike TV. They get excited about CSI reruns. I'm pretty sure I smell another Witchblade-esque series here. Or perhaps a Sci-Fi Channel Painkiller Jane movie. *sigh*

TOMB RAIDER RETURNS TO GAMES

From video game to comic to movie and back to video game, Lara Croft is returning to the gaming industry... again. Tomb Raider: Legend, comes to pretty much every system April 11, 2006 and strives to return Lara Croft to her roots. We can only hope. After a middling existence in over 8 different video games up to this point (all but the first one being copy-of-a-copy action), I pray that the new developers know what we want and give it to us. Only time will truly tell.

BEN FOSTER IS ANGEL IN X3

Never heard of the dude? Me neither. Do an IMDB search on this little bugger and you'll see that it's with good reason. His biggest role to date is Spacker Dave in the merely-terrible Punisher movie from 2004. And now he's Angel? Man. I did some acting in a high school play or two, I want to be in X-Men 4... darn it!

TOP-10 and TOP-100
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Check out Comics NOW! Inc.'s Top-100 on IRX Productions. Download the April 2006 Top-100 PDF file (it's 8KB!).

It's Comics NOW!'s very own Top-10 and Top-100 lists. This list is based on the internal sales quantities of the titles with Premiere being the big guns who pay the extra bucks to be listed first in the ordering system: Dark Horse Comics, DC Comics, Image Comics, and Marvel Comics. The Independent list is everyone else, all those pea-shooters who no one really pays attention to... or do they?

Here's an example of how to read the format:

1. (3) The Amazing Eric Comic

"1." - the place of the title in the list this month

"(3)" - where the title was LAST month ("-" if it wasn't)

the title - this one should be pretty obvious

TOP 10 PREMIERE COMICS

1. (1) Infinite Crisis
2. (-) Superman Batman
3. (-) Astonishing X-Men
4. (2) All-Star Batman and Robin the Boy Wonder
5. (10) Batman
6. (5) Amazing Spider-Man
7. (3) New Avengers
8. (4) Supergirl
9. (-) Justice
10. (6) Ultimates 2

TOP 10 INDEPENDENT COMICS

1. (1) Transformers Infiltration
2. (-) Transformers Beast Wars
3. (3) Soulfire
4. (-) Transformers Generations
5. (2) Fallen Angel
6. (-) GI Joe vs Transformers Cvr B
7. (7) GI Joe America's Elite
8. (-) GI Joe vs Transformers Cvr A
9. (-) Fathom
10. (5) Strangers in Paradise

THE GOOD STUFF
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DC COMICS

SUPERMAN RETURNS: THE MOVIE ADAPTATION #1 of 1

I'm not sure why I'm always so into movie adaptations but I am. I mean, seriously, the comic book industry wrings as much money-juice out of a movie as possible by simply "remaking" the movie into a comic book counterpart, but I still love 'em. This one is for the upcoming Superman Returns.
By Martin Pasko and Matt Haley.
72 pages. Oneshot. $6.99 retail.

CRISIS AFTERMATH: THE SPECTRE #1 of 3

The Spectre is always an acquired taste. When done well, the Spectre is a spooky character who fights evil in all sorts of creepy ways. When done poorly, the Spectre is some mystical Firestorm ripoff dressed in green and grey. The Spectre teams up with yet another human in this mini-series, a Gotham City cop, but the cop wants nothign to do with him. What's a Spectre to do? Try Match.com!
By Will Pfeifer and Cliff Chiang.
32 pages. 3-issue mini-series. $2.99 retail.

52: Weeks 1 - 4

Okay, so the superheroes of the DCU disappear for an entire year. In that year, normal people rise up to become heroes. DC is trying to squeeze as much as they possibly can from the Infinite Crisis and One Year Later maxi-series so it makes logical sense that they should try a new stunt -- a 52-issue weekly comic. And, to make matters even more profitable, EACH issue is $2.50. 52 seeks to cover all the stories of what normal people were up to when the superheroes were gone, and does so at great expense, to us.
By Various.
32 pages. 52-issue maxi-series. $2.50 retail each.

SECRET SIX #1 of 6

Here we go again... the Secret Six is a "mysterious team -- with a confidential roster -- that walks the line between good and evil..." Ick. Really? Are we really doing another one of these?! REALLY!? Holy crap...
By Gail Simone, Brad Walker, and Jimmy Palmiotti.
32 pages. 6-issue mini-series. $2.99 retail.

SHADOWPACT #1

You know a series is always destined for greatness when it combines a bunch of D-list superheroes into a team and starts off its first issue with a special guest appearance by a big-named superhero. Enter Shadowpact. We've got Nightmaster, Ragman, Nightshade, Blue Devil, Enchantress, and Detective Chimp (really) creating a "ragtag band" with guest appearance by Superman in its first issue. Yeah, I expect to see this comic last more than three issues.
By Bill Willingham.
32 pages. Ongoing series. $2.99 retail.

IMAGE COMICS

EMISSARY #1

Oh, boy. You knew it was coming. Whenever one of the big three releases a comic about a particular topic, each of the other two has to jump into the fray. Emissary is Image's toss-of-the-hat into the ol' religious-superfight ring. A superhuman shows up on the scene and everyone wonders what his deal is? Is he good? Bad? And, of course, the government does what it does best -- try to kill him.
By J.R. Rand and Juan E. Ferreyra.
32 pages. Ongoing series. $3.50 retail.

THE LAST CHRISTMAS #1 of 6

It's a post-apocalyptic world and... err... Santa... is having trouble in the North Pole. This ... dark comedy... attempts to investigate what the Last Christmas might be like after all hell has broken loose on Earth.
By Gerry Duggan, Brian Posehn, Rick Remender, and Hilary Barta.
32 pages. 6-issue mini-series. $2.99 retail.

MARVEL COMICS

LAST PLANET STANDING #1 of 2

Galactus is back and his new plan may involve the destruction of the entire Universe. Oh, golly, no! Marvel needs to take a chill pill; you've removed most of the mutants from the Universe, you brought Ultimate Extinction to the Ultimate Universe, and now you're messing around with Galactus, one of the most poorly designed destroyers of the universe. C'mon... purple?! Really?
By Tom Defalco and Pat Olliffe.
32 pages. 2-issue mini-series. $2.99 retail.

CIVIL WAR #1 of 7

*sigh* It's Marvel's next big maxi-series. Some big dispute has been brewing in the Marvel Universe over the past year (I think it's the butter-side-up, butter-side-down controversy) and now all of the superheroes are going to have to pick sides. For us, the loyal readers, there's no avoiding this massive storyline as it's going to permeate all of Marvel's biggest titles so you might as well buy the maxi-series, too (at least, that's Marvel's marketing logic as always).
By Mark Millar, Steve McNiven, and Michael Turner.
48 pages. 7-issue maxi-series. $3.99 retail.

FINAL NOTES
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As usual, when we enter into the summer months, we must all brace ourselves for the regular onslaught of summer events from all of the main comic producing companies. Contact your credit card companies. Lower your interest rates. Take out loans. The maxi-series are coming and they will not rest until you own them all!

And, remember, if you don't buy Civil War, Crisis Aftermath, Ultimate Extinction, Day of M Aftermath, 52 Weeks, One Year Later, or any of the other maxi-series, you may just, barely, have a chance at life in the real world... but probably not. And, as always, thank you for your business!

Eric Jacobson