This continues to be good, the bonus material keeps getting better, and even though I can’t be bothered to write thorough reviews for these volumes (still 6 to go!), I’m really glad I own them.

The lines between books continue to blur, and as much as I like Becky’s growing importance, I’m not always a huge fan of Amazi-Girl scenes. This continues to be a good comic, though, and I’m enjoying the reread.

Lots of plot developments that will go on to define the comic here, and I enjoyed revisiting them. The bonus material is also really starting to pick up here with the inclusion of Patreon strips, so that’s fun, too.

To be honest, the collections are starting to blur together some, so I don’t exactly remember where the dividing line is between this one and the last. The series continues to be good and fun, though, so it gets this rating nonetheless! I think one reason I like DoA so much is because it’s so different than my own college freshman experience. Some of that is clearly because it’s a work of fiction, but it’s also because BYU is a very different place than other universities, so it’s still interesting to consider different experiences.

DoA can get kind of melodramatic sometimes, and there’s plenty of that in this book. Sometimes it strains credulity, but it doesn’t get in the way of a fantastic webcomic.

Like the first volume, this was familiar (since I’d just read these comics a few months ago) but worth rereading—both because the comic is good and because the bonus materials are interesting.

It was just earlier this year that I archive binged this comic, but I recently bought PDFs of the collections through a Kickstarter and decided to reread it with the commentary and bonus material. I can see the rough spots that have been improved in over a decade of webcomic history (in art and choice of language, for example), but this still makes for an excellent introduction to the universe, and I feel such a connection with Joyce that it’s interesting to meet her again in her original characterization.

Manga is one comics tradition I’ve never really gotten into, but I was impressed by someone else’s description of this series on Micro.blog and decided to give it a try. There are some manga conventions I’m still getting used to, and I don’t know that I fully “get it” yet, but it’s fun! The “cozy apocalypse” vibe it gives off is nice, and I’m looking forward to reading the next volume.

I’m glad that so many French comics are now available in American libraries, and it’s a pleasure to read something that came from the influential Métal Hurlant. This is one of those reads, though, where I understand why the work is important, but it just didn’t land with me.

I’ve read this a couple of times in the past, but I wanted to give it another read specifically as anarchist fiction. I’ve enjoyed other books with anarchist themes, so I wondered how this would read through that lens. I can see why this book is considered a classic, but it just doesn’t really resonate with me. The art isn’t my favorite, and while some of the ideas are interesting, the execution sometimes feels clunky.

This time, kiddo checked this out on hoopla, and I decided to read it, too. As I’ve said before, gag-a-day comics aren’t really my thing, and as delightful as Nancy is, I still can’t say that it’s my favorite.

I recently came into some Amazon gift cards, so I bought this volume to complete my collection of Queen & Country. I think this is the first time I’ve owned an entire comics series? At least, one of this length. I’m glad I own the whole series, but like the show its based on, I feel like it gets less interesting the longer it goes on. It’s fun to get some peeks into the backstories of the characters who come up in the first two volumes, but it’s just not as interesting as the early stories.

I don’t really like gag-a-day strips (or many comic strips at all), but Jaimes’s run on Nancy speaks to me in a way I can’t explain. I checked this out from the library for kiddo but ended up reading it myself.

I had to refresh myself on the last few volumes before tackling this latest one, and there are still lots of details I can’t remember. This series is gory, crude, and profane in ways that ought to turn me away from it, but it’s just so compelling. Great art, powerful characters, and good story. Maybe I should actually subscribe to issues as they come out? I’ve never read comics in a monthly format before, but I don’t know if I want to wait as long as I had to for this next TPB.

I’ve complained a lot about superhero comics nonsense throughout this series, but it’s still depressing to finally show that a 16-year-old wouldn’t survive all of these fights. It’s an interesting wrap up for this character, and I ought to find and read the Miles Morales series, but after 26 TPBs in a couple of months, I think I need a break from Spider-Man. There are other books I ought to read, and on the comics landscape, I hear there’s a new Saga TPB to get caught up on.

I miss the earlier art, and there’s still plenty of comic book nonsense, but this series has found a good groove. I don’t know a whole ton about main Marvel continuity, but I do feel like Bendis has the freedom to do his own thing here, and I gather that was the point of the Ultimate universe. Kind of wild to have the next volume’s big event spoiled in this volume’s title, but I guess it’s been long enough for it not to matter.

I’ve been meaning to read (play?) this for months, ever since we bought it for kiddo after she recovered from being sick. Today, she’s sick again, so we went through it together. This continues to be a great series by Shiga! I might like the first one more, but only slightly. The Beyond is surprisingly thinky for a kid’s book, has interesting puzzles, and there’s a hidden ending that I know exists but need to figure out.

Fun arc! I like the whole range of characters at Bendis’s disposal, and even though it strains credulity sometimes, it is fun to have Peter and friends as teenagers. Lafuente’s art isn’t bad, but I’m not used to it, so I have trouble recognizing Peter as Peter sometimes (especially in this arc!). Nearing the end of this journey, though I ought to read the Miles Morales volumes after that.

I don’t know how to deal with the renaming and renumbering going on in this series, and trying to read up on it on Wikipedia is just making me more confused. This is very clearly a “reset the status quo” effort, but it’s not entirely bad? Bendis continues to mistreat Mary Jane, and I feel like it’s actually getting worse, so that’s not great. I do like the dynamic of Aunt May taking in more and more superheroes, though, so we’ll see how that turns out.

I’d heard a lot about Ultimatum before, but this was my first time actually reading the arc. There are things I don’t like in these issues—including some of the low-level misogyny I pointed out in previous volumes—but for a major crossover event filled with comic book nonsense, it was actually pretty good.

I really shouldn’t like this volume. I don’t care that much about Venom or Carnage, and I think their Ultimate origin stories are dumb. Gwen Stacy got treated terribly earlier in the series, and this comic book resurrection is as silly as her death was stupid. Yet, I thought the framing story was interesting, Venom is compelling as an eldritch villain, and I… enjoyed myself? Dunno what to make of all that, but four hearts it is.

I think this might be my least favorite of the three volumes I now own (need to track down the fourth to complete the collection). The first arc was good enough (and felt straight out of The Sandbaggers—Rucka borrows HEAVILY from a couple of episodes), but the second seemed like supplementary material to Rucka’s novels. I like this series when it’s riffing off of The Sandbaggers, but when it feels like its own thing with lots of continuity, it’s harder to enjoy.

This volume also feels like a step in the right direction! It seems like Bendis is willing to stretch with and fill out the universe some: What he did with Liz Allan and recurring villain/joke The Shocker are especially interesting. I’m having fun with this series again!

I feel like this series found its groove again! I miss Bagley’s pencilling, but Immonen makes a fine replacement. A lot of the stuff that bothered me in recent volumes has been redeemed here: Kitty Pryde is interesting instead of just a drama device, Norman Osborn gets some depth, S.H.I.E.L.D. is engaged with as the creepy organization they are, and it turns out that comic book nonsense can actually be fun sometimes.

I’ve complained a lot about comic book nonsense in recent volumes, and there’s plenty of it here, too, but this pulled a lot together in a way that just plain works. Interesting crossover action, classic Spider-Man morality of superheroes, good art, interesting stakes. I guess this is why I keep reading this series.

I almost gave this four hearts because I kind of like how it turned out, and it did touch on some good Spider-Man themes. However, I then remembered all the comic book nonsense that happens here—and the way that so many of these issues demonstrate how terrible it would be to live in the (Ultimate) Marvel universe.

I picked up this comic about a post-pandemic-apocalypse from the library on a whim. I have mixed feelings about this genre—especially since it’s hard to believe that it was begun before COVID-19. The story is somewhat interesting but choppy, and the characters are compelling but flat. The translation is rouuuugh, and I wonder how much better it might be in the original German. What saves this for me, though, is how clearly Swiss it is.

There’s some interesting stuff here, including Bendis’s riffs on power and responsibility and how that relates to secret identities. However, there’s too much welding to the broader Ultimate universe, including introducing characters I just don’t care about. I also still feel like Peter’s attitude toward MJ is more low-level misogyny than anything justified.

Definitely not my favorite of the series. Lots of crossover nonsense with characters I don’t really care about. Way too much casual misogyny (Peter toward MJ and creators toward the women they put in impractical fanservice costumes). Starting to question my commitment to this series binge.

This volume was excellent. Much more of the Sandbaggers vibes and less saving the world spy fiction. I ordered the third volume today!

I’ve been wanting to read this since binging all three series of The Sandbaggers, since I’ve seen it repeatedly referred to as a spiritual sequel. They weren’t kidding—the first story arc feels like a remix of the show! The third story arc was the least interesting to me (and probably the reason this didn’t get full marks). The first two deal with the cynicism of espionage and the brokenness of spies in the way I expected the series would, whereas the third arc felt more like a traditional spy story with maybe some furniture moving for future arcs.

Peter and MJ’s relationship is one of my favorite things to follow in this series, and that makes this volume a real disappointment. It seems like so much of the story is built around forcing drama and idiot balls into these two characters for the sake of adding twists and turns to the plot. Plus, it really comes through in this volume how often MJ is treated as an extension of Peter instead of a character with her own depth and agency.

This is mostly crossover nonsense, but it’s actually kind of good? The Doctor Strange issues feel overly dramatic at points, but Peter’s nightmare is classic Spider-Man responsibility angst, so I’ll give it a pass.

Gwen Stacy is wasted in the Ultimate continuity, and I have even less interest in Carnage than I do Venom. What saves this volume for me, though, is the throughline of the classic Spider-Man theme of power and responsibility.

This is a shameless attempt to profit off of whatever Spider-Man movie was coming out at the time, but it’s still a pretty fun story. It continues to strain credulity that this kid could keep up superhero hijinks without Aunt May finding out, but it’s enough of the mythos that I can deal with it (mostly).

This story is interesting, but it suffers from too much of superhero continuity bloat. I also miss Mark Bagley’s illustration—this artist’s faces all look alike, whereas Bagley’s characters are distinct and familiar to me. It’s just meh.