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Absolute Power, a DC Comics Event Reading Order

Last summer, horror was invading the DC Universe in the Knight Terrors crossover event. This year, the world of DC Comics will once again be shaken by another summer blockbuster event: Absolute Power! From the creative team of Mark Waid and Dan Mora (Batman Superman World’s Finest), DC Comics Absolute Power pits the greatest DC Super Heroes against the “Trinity of Evil” in a major conflict that will determine the fate of all metahumans in the DC universe.

Set in the aftermath of Titans: Beast World and House of Brainiac,  DC’s Trinity of Evil—the Brainiac Queen, Failsafe, and Amanda Waller—has won. As DC explained, they “hold all the cards in their final gambit to eliminate all metahumans in the DC Universe! Batman, Wonder Woman, Superman, and the rest of the World’s Greatest DC Super Heroes make their last stand in Absolute Power.”

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Dragon Ball Reading Order, Akira Toriyama’s Classic Series

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When it comes to manga, Dragon Ball is a classic. Written and illustrated by Akira Toriyama (1955-2024), Dragon Ball was first serialized in Shōnen Jump from 1984 to 1995. A long run due to the fact that it quickly became one of the most successful manga series of all time. A status cemented by the multiple adaptations into various anime series, movies, video games, and other media.

At first, the story of Dragon Ball tells the adventures of Goku, a pure-hearted, naive, and incredibly strong monkey-tailed boy martial artist, as he embarks on a quest for the mystical seven Dragon Balls, powerful artifacts that can summon Shenlong, a wish-granting dragon, when gathered together. Everything begins with Goku’s encounter with Bulma, a brilliant inventor who is searching for the Dragon Balls to fulfill her wish of obtaining a boyfriend. Together, they embark on a journey filled with battles against powerful foes, including the likes of Emperor Pilaf, the Red Ribbon Army, and the evil King Piccolo. Along the way, Goku trains under various martial arts masters, forms lifelong friendships, and faces increasingly formidable adversaries.

As the series progresses, Goku’s quest expands to include participation in various martial arts tournaments where he faces off against other skilled fighters from around the world. He also learns about his Saiyan heritage, a warrior race to which he belongs, and confronts powerful enemies like Vegeta, Frieza, Cell, and Majin Buu, who threaten not only Earth but the entire universe.

Beyond the first long-running series, Dragon Ball continued with other series like Dragon Ball Z, Dragon Ball SD, Dragon Ball Super, and more! Hundreds and hundreds of chapters of the manga were collected in a fairly notable amount of volumes published in America by Viz Media.

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Gambit Comics Reading Order, Your Favourite Cajun (X-Men)

He’s a cajun, a professional thief, and one of the X-Men’s most charming members. A master of kinetic energy from New Orleans, he has been called Le Diable Blanc but he is known as Gambit alias Remy LeBeau!

Gambit was created in 1990 by Chris Claremont and Jim Lee. Initially, the writer had planned for him to be, at first, an adversary or traitor to the X-Men. Following Claremont’s departure from the X-Men, the writers altered the original plan to better fit the readers’ expectations of the character. Our charming thief had indeed quickly conquered the hearts of the readers and became one of the most popular X-Men characters of the 90s.

Gambit made his first appearance in Uncanny X-Men #266. In the story, he helped a de-aged Storm with amnesia and they formed a partnership as thieves. When Storm returned to her true self, she invited Remy to join the X-Men. The secretive Gambit accepted the proposition to redeem himself of past actions. While Gambit’s past will eventually catch up with him, he quickly integrated into the team and formed close relationships with several members, including Rogue – with the two starting a turbulent romance and becoming one of the most iconic X-Men relationships.

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Mister Mxyzptlk, Recommended Reading for The Annoying Imp From The 5th Dimension (DC Comics)

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Some characters from the DC Comics universe are old. In the case of the infamous Mister Mxyzptlk, we are talking 80 years old. It was in the Superman daily comic strip by writer Whitney Ellsworth and artist Wayne Boring that the mischievous imp made his first official apparition.

However, like with Bizarro, the planning of publication pushed the real first issue a bit later as Mister Mxyzptlk was created by writer Jerry Siegel and artist Ira Yarborough in a story published in Superman #30 (fall 1944).

Mister Mxyzptlk is a magical being from the fifth dimension (like Bat-Mite) who enjoys causing mischief and playing pranks on Superman and other characters within the DC universe. In fact, where he comes from, he works as a jester, a powerful magical one. He possesses the ability to warp reality and manipulate the laws of physics, often leading to bizarre and surreal situations.

He loves challenging Superman to some sort of game or contest, and Superman can only defeat him by tricking him into saying or spelling his own name backward (“Kltpzyxm”)–a fine trick that was modified in the 1986 Crisis on Infinite Earths reboot. After that point in time, Mr. Mxyzptlk changes his condition to leave with each new apparition (even if saying his name backward eventually came back).

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Adam Strange Reading Order (DC Comics)

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As the Space Race was just starting to become a reality, National Comics (aka DC Comics) went back to produce a bit more science-fiction stories. It was 1958 and Space Ranger was created, and rapidly forgotten. That was not the case of another space hero created almost at the same time, Adam Strange.

The idea for the character came from editor Julius Schwartz and the costume design was by Murphy Anderson. Strange first apparition was on the cover of Showcase #17 drawn by Gil Kane, but it was Mike Sekowsky who penciled the story written by Gardner Fox following Schwartz’s direction.

Adam Strange’s origin story is highly inspired by Edgar Rice Burroughs’s John Carter of Mars. The character was an archaeologist working in South America who was suddenly transported to the distant planet of Rann by a beam of energy from the Zeta Beam, a device created by a scientist named Sardath. On Rann, Strange discovered that he had gained superhuman abilities due to the different gravitational pull and the planet’s radiation. He also learned that the Zeta Beam technology only allowed him to stay on Rann for a limited amount of time before transporting him back to Earth.

Adam Strange became a hero on Rann, saving the world from tyrants, monsters, and extraterrestrial invaders among other threats. In addition, he developed feelings for Alanna, a Rannian woman, with whom he finally got married.

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Nick Fury Reading Order

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Created by writer/artist Jack Kirby and writer Stan Lee, Colonel Nicholas Joseph “Nick” Fury Sr. has a long career in the Marvel Universe! Born around 1920, he enrolled in the American Army at the age of 20 and became leader of an elite U.S. Army Ranger unit during WWII in Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos #1 (1963).

After the war, he trained and became a Colonel in the Central Intelligence Agency O.S.S., the predecessor of the CIA. He worked for them until Tony Stark recruited him to lead the counterespionage agency known as S.H.I.E.L.D. Nick Fury has never been the type of man sitting behind a desk and he transformed himself into a sort of James Bond-like spy, going on the field for important missions. The agency grew under his command and built important alliances with the Avengers and other teams of superheroes.

But all is not what it seems in the spy world, and soon, Nick Fury finds himself in some complex spying game, leading him to disband and rebuild the S.H.I.E.L.D. Like many Marvel Characters, be assured that Nick died at some point and came back, quit, or retired from his position. And more improbable things completely change his place in the Comic book world.

So today, we dive into the long history of Nick Fury (and his many SHIELD missions!) with this Nick Fury Reading Order!

This reading order was suggested by Jal Hicham, one of our readers! Don’t hesitate to leave a comment or write to us with some other suggestions!

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Power Girl Reading Order (Kara Zor-L)

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Family Tree are quite complicated in the world of Comic Books, and Power Girl will not tell you the contrary! Created by Gerry Conway and Ric Estrada, our superheroine made her first appearance in All-Star Comics #58 (1976)  as Superman’s Kryptonian cousin. 

But wait, I hear you say, isn’t Supergirl Superman’s cousin? Yes, that is the case! Power Girl, real name Kara Zor-L (also known as Karen Starr), is the Earth-Two counterpart of Supergirl and the first cousin of Kal-L, Superman of the pre-Crisis Earth-Two. Her origins story have been revisited several times since her creation, from her introduction to Supergirl’s Earth-2 doppelganger to being reimagined as an Atlantean after Crisis on Infinite Earths, then becoming a Kryptonian again after Infinite Crisis.

Outside of the world of comics, Power Girl is maybe more famous for her costume (and cleavage), though don’t let that distract you too much. She is genuinely an interesting character, maybe one of the most flawed Kryptonians out there, doted with a rash personality, her own fighting skills and good leadership capabilities. She fought alongside many heroes of DC Comics, has been the first chairwoman of the Justice Society of America, part of Justice League Europe, the Sovereign Seven, and many more teams.

Unfortunately for Power Girl’s readers, DC Comics hasn’t well collected her past stories, and it can be quite difficult to track her appearances. She had a few solo adventures, but is more a guest star/team member character! So here’s our Power Girl Reading Guide!

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Ka-Zar Reading Order, Adventures in Marvel’s Savage Land

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Created by writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby in The X-Men #10 (1965), Kevin Plunder is Ka-Zar. The New Ka-Zar to be precise as he used the same hero name as David Rand, a character from a pulp magazine created by Bob Byrd in 1936–published by one of the many companies owned by Martin Goodman. When Goodman began publishing comics with Marvel Comics #1 in 1939, writer-artist Ben Thompson adapted one of Byrd’s stories.

Since then, this Ka-Zar appeared in multiple Marvel comics like Marvel Mystery Comics or Human Torch. Then, during the Silver Age, Marvel reintroduced some of his Golden Age characters. Most of them have updated origins. However, Ka-Zar became a new character. He is now clearly a Tarzan-like hero but he is stuck in a Jules Verne setting–David Rand was lost in the jungles of the Congo, not in the dinosaur-populated Savage Land. But he quickly found his place in the Marvel continuity.

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Attack on Titan Manga Order (with Before the Fall, No Regrets and more!)

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Not far behind Demon Slayer in terms of sales, Attack on Titan (Shingeki no Kyojin) is also one the best-selling manga series of all time. Launched in 2009, the manga had a modest beginning before being boosted by the popularity of the anime adaptation. Since then, it inspired five spin-off manga series, three light novel series, several visual novels and video games, and a two part live-action film.

Written and illustrated by Hajime Isayama, Attack on Titan is a Shōnen manga set in a post-apocalyptic world where the last remnants of humanity live in a kingdom surrounded by walls designed to protect them from a powerful race of man-eating giants known as Titans. Living in this dark world is Eren Yeager, a teenager who has vowed to exterminate the Titans after his hometown’s destruction and his mother’s death.

Exploring human persistence in the face of failure, trauma, loss, and death, Attack on Titan lasted 139 chapters, compiled into 34 volumes. The main manga series came to an end in 2021.

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Crossed Reading Order, Garth Ennis’ Post Apocalyptic Universe

Writer Garth Ennis is known for creating stories depicting hyper-violence, and Crossed is no exception to the rules. A Post-Apocalyptic Comic book published by Avatar Press, Crossed follows survivors dealing with a pandemic that causes its victims to carry out their most evil thoughts, spreading evil and hunting down the last dying members of our species. Carriers of the virus are generally known as the “Crossed” due to a large, cross-like rash that appears on their faces.

While Garth Ennis and artist Jacen Burrows created the fictional world of Crossed, other writers penned stories set in this universe, from David Lapham (Stray Bullets) to Alan Moore. What it means for the readers is mostly many story arcs that can be read as self-contained and can be read in any order. With that said, there are a few crossovers, where characters introduced in a story appeared on another arc later that would justify following a certain order. So today, we are exploring the dangerous post-apocalyptic world of Crossed!

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