Between Marvel Omnibus, DC Omnibus, the Epic Collection, DC Finest, Compact editions, and everything else publishers put out, there’s always way there’s always more to discover! Launched this past March, What to Read This Month highlights each month’s notable releases. Here’s our selection for May, featuring some great stories from… And if you missed last month’s picks, you can find them here.
July’s Comic Picks
All title summaries are taken and/or summarized from the copy provided by the publisher.
Dr. Werthless: The Man Who Studied Murder (And Nearly Killed the Comics Industry)
By Harold Schechter and Eric Powell
After the award-winning “Did You Hear What Eddie Gein Done?”(go read it!), true crime author Harold Schechter and cartoonist Eric Powell take a look at another complex man who occupy a special place in pop culture. Dr. Fredric Wertham didn’t murder anyone, but he almost killed the comics industry.
Reviled by comic book fans as a witch-hunting zealot who stirred up a panic among the parents of America for his own self-promoting purposes, he was also a renowned psychiatrists who, among other accomplishments, opened a clinic in Harlem for disadvantaged African-American patients and played an important role in the desegregation of the nation’s schools. Believing that murder could be abolished through a proper understanding of the mental and social roots of criminal violence, he took a genuinely humane approach to some of the most notorious homicidal maniacs of his time, while simultaneously exploiting their stories for his own commercial ends.
Agent Venom Omnibus
By Cullen Bunn, Rick Remender, Robbie Thompson, and More
Venom is one of Spider-Man’s most iconic villains, originally bonding with Eddie Brock, who served as the Symbiote’s most well-known host for many years. However, Eddie isn’t the only one to have worn the Symbiote. One of the most celebrated eras in Venom’s comic book history is undoubtedly his time with Flash Thompson, now available in Omnibus!
Spider-Man’s biggest fan meets his deadliest foe! The wall-crawler’s heroism inspired Flash Thompson to join the Army, where he became an accomplished soldier. Though he lost his legs in combat, the government has offered Flash a chance to serve his country in a shocking new way: bonded with the Venom symbiote that used to be Spidey’s black costume — and then his bitter enemy! As Agent Venom, Flash is the government’s most lethal operative — but how long can he keep control of his volatile other?
Shade, The Changing Man by Peter Milligan and Chris Bachalo Omnibus Vol. 1
By Peter Milligan and Chris Bachalo
As DC Comics reprints the final part of Jamie Delano’s run in an omnibus edition, the publisher is also bringing back another iconic title from the Vertigo era. In the 1990s, Peter Milligan reinvented Shade, the Changing Man, crafting a surreal and poignant commentary on the darker aspects of American culture (ranging from racial tensions and gun violence to homelessness), all unfolding in the middle of a love story.
Shade, the Changing Man starts with Kathy George’s encounter with Shade’s arrival on Earth from his home dimension of Meta—in the body of her parents’ killer. From there, Shade and Kathy journey into America’s collective unconscious to find the evil known only as The American Scream. From there, it’s a mind-bending journey into the heartland of a nation, in the most celebrated work of Milligan’s prolific career!
Superman: The Last Days of Lex Luthor
By Mark Waid and Bryan Hitch
What would be a month without a Batman or Superman story?! Both of them are teaming up for a DC Compact book (see our list below!), although the Superman title of the month is coming from Mark Waid. A spiritual sequel to Birthright, The Last Days of Lex Luthor is an out-of-continuity story exploring a dying Lex Luthor, his relationship with Superman, and a quest to save the greatest criminal mastermind of our time.
Superman learns Lex Luthor is dying, and he wants the Man of Steel to help him find the cure for whatever is causing his rapid decline. While the world wants to say good riddance to Luthor, Superman will go to the ends of the universe, through different dimensions, and across time to save his foe. But just why does he want to save the person who’s spent his life trying to destroy him? And will he even be able to find the solution?
The Complete Carl Barks Disney Library Vol. 1 – Donald Duck: Donald Duck Finds Pirate Gold
By Carl Barks of course!
At last, Fantagraphics presents Carl Barks’s very first Donald Duck stories! While the publisher has released many volumes in this superb series of books collecting all the Donald Duck and Uncle Scrooge stories from Carl Barks since 2011, the first one was still missing… until now!
Volume 1 in The Complete Carl Barks Disney Library is, naturally, filled with firsts: Barks’s first comic book story (starring Pluto), the first Donald Duck story created for an American comic book (and also the first to see Donald and his nephews go on a treasure hunt), Barks’s first Donald 10-pager, Barks’s first truly solo Donald Duck story, and Barks’s first solo longer-form Donald Duck adventure (“The Mummy’s Ring”). With more than 200 pages of story and art, each meticulously restored and newly colored, and the insightful story notes by an international panel of Barks experts, this long-awaited collection of stories makes clear what generations of Disney fans have always known: Carl Barks’s work as The Good Duck Artist is some of the greatest American cartooning in the history of the medium.
The New Printing of The Month
Every month is also filled with new printing, offering the possibility to complete our collection, buy the book we missed because we were broke (and still are, to be honest) or simply because we weren’t familiar with the story or the edition at the time. Each month, we highlight one book that finds its way back to the shelves!
Flex Mentallo: Man of Muscle Mystery – The Deluxe Edition
By Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely
Flex Mentallo made his debut in Doom Patrol, but he was destined for greater things: to headline his own weird comic book. Celebrated writer Grant Morrison uses the character to explore and deconstruct Silver Age comic tropes, delivering a weird, funny, and emotional story in a way only Morrison can.
Once he was Hero of the Beach…and of the Doom Patrol. Now Flex Mentallo, Man of Muscle Mystery, returns to investigate the sinister dealings of his former comrade, The Fact, and a mysterious rock star whose connection to Flex may hold the key to saving them both.
The Manga of The Month
Planetes Deluxe Edition Book 1
Makoto Yukimura
Before embarking on a Viking journey with Vinland Saga, Makoto Yukimura made his debut with the hard science fiction manga Planetes, a poetic and philosophical tale that explores our place in the universe through themes of loss, dreams, isolation, and the desire for connection. It’s a story that fully deserves the Deluxe Edition treatment now being released by Dark Horse.
In 2075, working-class astronauts try to clear the junk humanity brought into space—whether it’s deadly orbital debris, or just the messiness of being human. Hachi, son of a famous pioneer of Mars voyages, dreams of breaking out from his father Goro’s shadow by joining the Jupiter mission, but a traumatic brush with death may have used up Hachi’s courage to journey further. Fee, no-nonsense pilot of the Toy Box and working mom, is lauded as a heroine for preventing a terrorist incident in space, but faces an even tougher challenge as an astronaut—finding a place where she can smoke! And Yuri, the ever calm and reliable crewmate on the team, deals with the loss of his wife in a tragic accident while grappling with the true meaning of humanity’s place among the stars.
Also Released in July
Wait… There’s more! From the Top Cow adventures of Lara Croft to a new Bone Edition, Tom Taylor and Bruno Redondo’s run on Nightwing, or the complete collection of the Terrifics, here’s a non-exhaustive list of other June releases that caught our attention:
- Tomb Raider Colossal Collection Vol. 1
- H.P. Lovecraft’s The Colour Out of Space
- John Constantine, Hellblazer by Jamie Delano Omnibus Vol. 2
- Superman / Batman Book One: DC Compact Comics Edition
- Bone Deluxe Edition Part 1: The Valley
- Nightwing by Tom Taylor and Bruno Redondo Omnibus Vol. 1
- The Terrifics: The Complete Collection