Sunday, July 02, 2006

Blog Template Update for June
This is the latest monthly update to the left column of the blog, updating my favorite comics and TV for the previous month. The listings are alphabetical, not by rank of how much I liked them in comparison. My criteria for what makes the list is when I read them, not necessarily when they were published.

June started out as a bit of a rough month for me, comics- and TV-wise. There were a couple weeks there where I started to wonder if I was losing my enthusiasm for the comics medium entirely, and since most TV had gone to reruns, there were only a few shows I was watching. Of course, I still didn't have time to catch up on everything, so it's not like there was a dearth of entertainment in life... it's just that a lot of it was on DVD or Tivo. I did have to cheat a little bit to get to ten TV shows this month by including stuff I'm catching on DVD, like The 4400 and Newsradio.

There was also a nice boost for comics in the third week of June, when we had a really great week. Lots of good graphic novels and single issues, making up for a disappointing month in general. Looking at the patterns, there are nine publishers represented in my ten graphic novels, meaning there was a pretty good spread of quality amongst a variety of publishers. The indies are definitely suffering a bit on the single issue front, however, as only three books (one Oni, one IDW and one Maerkle) weren't from the "big four." Marvel did comparatively well with me this month, with 6 books, three of them pretty new. The DC Universe is almost completely dead to me, but Wonder Woman #1 was impressive, and All Star Superman continues to be one of my favorite books on the stands, period. Vertigo I continue to love, although Y The Last Man isn't on the list this month because it is coming out the first week of July. Still, Fables, American Virgin and DMZ are always on the top of my reading pile. Same goes for Dark Horse's entries Usagi Yojimbo and BPRD, and Star Wars Legacy had a strong showing with its quarter priced sourcebook style zero issue, although the first issue was a bit meh and didn't make the cut.

Notable first issues in June were Casanova, Eternals, Star Wars Legacy #0 and Wonder Woman. Entertaining one-shots were Love and Capes and Marvel Westerns Two Gun Kid.

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