taffer

I haven't read any Marvel since 1994. I am getting the itch to get back into it. Is Marvel Now accessible for someone who hasn't read any Marvel in 20 years? I know it's not an actual reboot like the New 52 is. Are there any books that aren't new-reader friendly (such as Geoff Johns' Green Lantern and Grant Morrison's Batman continuing into the New 52)? Is X-Men still a convoluted mess?

stingermck

haha not at all. Unless you get one of the random .1 issues or a monthly #1

Trevor

Go to Comixology and read a bunch of the free recent Marvel stuff, including the Now launch sampler.

Even more free books are on the Marvel specific app if you have an iOS or android device.

madcougar

Hmm... how accessible is it... I dunno.

I read X-Men books for about 12 years from 1986 to 1998. And by that I mean I read them ALL. It got to the point where comics were getting more and more expensive and eventually dropped them.

When All New X-Men came out last year, I was intrigued and started reading it. I had to go read 15 years of X-Men history on Wikipedia and Comic Vine to find out what the hell was going on, but once I did that, it was fine.

Mike Long

I hadn't been near a comic since 1995, but I was intrigued by the death of Peter Parker in 2012, and I've read the Marvel Now Spider-Man titles released over the past 15 months. I clearly missed a lot in those years (most of which sounds very far-fetched, even by Marvel standards), but enough of the basics were the same that I was able to assimilate. (Being a huge fan of Venom, I did pick up the back issues which featured Anti-Venom.)

Josh-da-man

I was a Marvel reader up until the mid-90s or so... I think I finally bailed not long after "Age of Apocalypse." No... actually, the last Marvel comics I got were the Onslaught saga... and I finally cut the cord after that.

I see all of these Uncanny Avengers, Uncanny X-Force, A+X, Dark Avengers, six Wolverine titles, and it just looks like a big incomprehensible mess.

Xiroteus

Basically. Along with relaunching every other second even though the last story line ties right into the relaunch.

taffer

Same here. I liked Marvel up until 1994, and then I just dropped them cold and haven't read any since. I still read DC, but I have generally always preferred DC. I really love the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and that's what has piqued my interest in getting back into Marvel comics.

I agree that the multitude of Avengers and X-Men titles looks like a gigantic mess. It's especially bad when considering that many Marvel titles double-ship. People say DC puts out too many Batman titles, but the multitude of Avengers and X-Men titles looks even worse.

Patman

Plus there are a plethora of #1's coming out from Marvel all the time now, just jump right on, long-term readers be damned. Glad I jumped off once it was clear almost all their 20-22 page titles would be going to $3.99/issue. No thanks.

Xiroteus

Avengers is quite bad, a dozen series a month that continue to be rebooted with the same titles over the years.

For some of them it should be, jump right on to a new story line and first issue that directly ties into last months issue 14!

Even if one is not against relaunches they could at least make sense.

majorjoe23

For the few Now series I've read, it feels like a fairly ground floor entry for me. I've checked out Indestructible Hulk, Superior Spider-Man and Deadpool and had no issues, and read the first issue of Captain America (I might read more).

X-Factor feels pretty different from the previous run. I don't think a new reader would have needed anything from Peter David's old series to enjoy it. I think the fact that I read the old series might actually hurt my enjoyment of the new series a bit.

Josh-da-man

You know, superhero comics were a lot more fun when I could buy Batman, Detective Comics, Justice League America, Justice League Europe, Daredevil, The Punisher, Punisher War Journal, The Incredible Hulk, Uncanny X-Men, New Mutants, X-Factor, Excalibur, and Wolverine (which included all of the Batman titles, and all of the X-Men titles) for under $15 a month.

Xiroteus

Even based on inflation comics are likely have increase twice as much as that would allow for. I understand why yet it's really hard to justify handing someone a twenty dollar bill and getting four comics.

taffer

http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc....990&year2=2014

Comics were $1 in 1990. Adjusted for inflation that would be $1.80 today.

fujishig

taffer, do you just really want to collect stuff monthly now? Otherwise you can pretty much just cherry pick from the various hardcovers and collections. I've been going through Waid's recent Daredevil run, for instance, and it's excellent.

taffer

I became a trade waiter with the New 52. I discovered instocktrades.com sells New 52 trades for less than $10. I just can't justify paying $4 for a floppy after discovering that.

fujishig

Ah, in that case, especially if you haven't read any Marvel since 1994, you shouldn't restrict yourself to Marvel Now. Trust me, as a fellow trade-waiter, I've learned that the Marvel Universe changes so much that by the time you read something in trade format, the next event has already begun shaking up the "status quo," so it's best to just find stuff that you'll enjoy.

If you do want to sample Marvel Now, there is an omnibus of a bunch of issue ones.

I highly recommend Waid's Daredevil. I think the first two bigger hardcovers are out, with a third one coming soon. They reference stuff about his past but I think it stands alone pretty well. You missed out on some great Daredevil stuff from Bendis and Brubaker that I would also consider great reads, but I don't think the omniboo are still in print.

Speaking of, especially with the movie out, don't miss Brubaker's run on Captain America.

I like Hickman's run on Fantastic Four, which I believe are in two omnibuses. Abnett and Lanning's Annihilation, which reinvigorated the Marvel cosmic scene for a while, is coming out soon in conjunction with Guardians. Fraction had a great run on Immortal Iron Fist collected in an omnibus. Peter David's X-Factor run recently came to an end but is similarly great. If you like old school X-men crossovers, I thought Second Coming was pretty good (but you have to just roll with all the stuff you wouldn't otherwise understand about the state of the various X-teams). Kyle and Yost reimagined X-Force, and led straight into Remender's run of Uncanny X-Force which was recently released as an omnibus.

And if you really want to catch up you can get the trades of all the major events: Civil War, World War Hulk, Secret Invasion, Dark Reign, Siege, Fear Itself, Avengers vs. X-men, Age of Ultron... not all of them are great reads, and reading them all back to back you start to see how ridiculous all these changes are and how little really lasts, but they at least usually put great creative teams on them.

Timber

Only thing that could get me back into monthly comics at this point is Chris Claremont on an X-Men team book set alone in it's own universe outside of the other X-titles. Oh and he needs a decent artist because he seems to work better when he's with a Bryne\Lee\Laroca type, somebody with storyline input.

taffer

Is Morrison's X-Men a good place to start? I know X-Men has the most convoluted history in comics, so I don't really know where to start there. The last thing I ever read in X-Men comics was the issue where Juggernaut got punched halfway around the country at the beginning of the Onslaught saga.

Is the new Amazing Spider-Man #1 a good starting point? I know it continues on from the Doc Ock "Superior Spider-Man" which I haven't read, but am vaguely aware of through internet chatter.

I'm also interested in Fantastic Four, Guardians of the Galaxy (which I never heard of until the new movie), Captain America, Iron Man, Avengers, and Daredevil. I always heard the Bendis/Brubaker Daredevil stuff was great. Are the trades out of print, or is it just the omnibus? I don't care about omnibus, so I would rather have trades. Omnibus are big and heavy, and I prefer something smaller that's easier to hold. [/That's not what she said.]

Trevor

I guess you have no interest in the freebies on Comixology? Lots of Marvel sales too.

fujishig

Give me 80's/early 90's/pre Sovereign Seven Chris Claremont (and while you're at it, same era Byrne). But otherwise, I was very disappointed in his numerous comebacks.

Timber

His comebacks were terrible save for early Extreme before Laroca got taken away.

PhantomStranger

I think it would be easier to read something from other than the Avengers/X-Men lines of comics. That continuity is a complete mess and changes with the wind.

I imagine following a single character like Daredevil or Spider-Man would be much easier today. I'm not really sure what Marvel's target market is, I guess they get spillover from the popular movies.

Josh-da-man

Pretty much everything written by Claremont in the past twenty years has been awful.

And I've found that his old X-Men run doesn't hold up particularly well, either. I don't know if it's because I'm older, or that kind of writing is just out of style, but that's some terrible dialog. It's overly formal and stiff and comes off as 'written' and not things anyone would actually say.

Nevermind the plotlines that are dragged out for years and never resolved, the storylines that are cut off in order to accommodate the big fall crossovers.

taffer

I don't particularly care for digital comics. I bought a Nook HD+ last year when they were on sale for $149. I didn't like it at all.